South Africa: SAA poised for take-off in September South African Airways (SAA) has announced that it expects to resume operations on the Johannesburg-Cape Town route and other African destinations on September 23. The carrier has not taken to the skies since early last year partly due to the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent hard lockdown as well as the need to finalise its business rescue process. The national carrier came out of business rescue at the end of April this year. SAA Board chairman John Lamola said since the national carrier came out of business rescue, the Department of Public Enterprises together with the airlines board and management team have been planning for the relaunching of a restructured and fit for purpose airline. The airline is restarting with a formidable business case, Lamola said on Wednesday. Interim SAA Chief Executive Officer Thomas Kgokolo said they are determined to make the airline a leader in the aviation sector. After months of diligent work, we are delighted that SAA is resuming service and we look forward to welcoming on board our loyal passengers and flying the South African flag. We continue to be a safe carrier and adhering to COVID-19 protocols. There is a profound feeling of enthusiasm within Team SAA as we prepare for take-off, with one common purpose - to rebuild and sustain a profitable airline that once again takes a leadership role among local, continental, and international airlines, he said. Kgokolo noted that the airline is conscious that the sector is facing difficult times. The aviation sector is currently going through a testing period, and we are aware of the tough challenges that lie ahead in the coming weeks. We thank South Africa for the support we have received in getting us to where we are today. As we are now poised for take-off, we see this as a major milestone for SAA and the country, he said. Tickets go on sale on Thursday, 26 August 2021, with the airline initially operating flights from Johannesburg to Cape Town, Accra, Kinshasa, Harare, Lusaka and Maputo. The airline says destinations will be added to the route network as operations ramp up in response to market conditions. Voyager bookings and Travel Credit Voucher redemption will be available from 6 September 2021. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: ECD centres encouraged to participate in ECD census 2021 Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga has encouraged all creches and play groups to participate in the Early Childhood Development (ECD) Census 2021. She was speaking via a video recorded message during the launch of the census today. The census is aimed at collecting data on all ECD programmes which will allow the department to have a better understanding of the sectors landscape. We are going to be counting all the creches and play groups and all the places where our most important citizens under the age of six stay during the day. We do need help because the more creches that we count, the more we can plan and make sure that [children] continue learning through play, Motshekga said. The departments Director for Learning and Teaching Support Material (LTSM): Policy, Development and Innovation, Kulula Manona, assured unregistered ECD centres that the census is not aimed at punishing them. This is not intended to be a punitive process. This process will actually benefit [the centres], particularly those that are not yet registered because they will get to be known, the challenges and gaps that they have which mitigate against them being registered. These will come to the fore and together we will plan and resolve how to support them. There is no intention for us to punish anybody, Manona said. Deputy Director of Research Coordination, Monitoring and Evaluation at the department, Dr Janeli Kotze, said the intention was to build a data management information system for the sector. Once weve got this information...[t]hen we can do adequate human resource planning, we can see how we make sure that we provide support to these programmes. We can do better infrastructure planning by understanding what are the needs of the sector and how do we plan over the next five to 10 years for supporting them better. "We can plan for the expansion of education to all programmes especially in those areas that are underserved, we can think through new [and] better ways to include children with disabilities and we can also help with support of implementing our national curriculum framework so that we can have integrated services and so that we can have quality education for all children, she said. Dr Kotze added that the department is planning on visiting an estimated 48 000 centres over the next 12 weeks but this will depend on how many of these centres exist. Data collection has already begun and the census is expected to conclude in December this year. SAnews.gov.za. This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Hong Kong: Civil Service College logo selected The Civil Service Bureau today announced that the Civil Service College Logo Design Competition has chosen to adopt the gold award entry, Staircase as the logo of the Civil Service College. The bureau explained that the logo symbolises the commitment of the civil service to growing as a learning and professional team through continuous learning and ongoing enhancement, and striving for excellence in the delivery of public service. Civil Service Training Advisory Board Chairman Victor Fung, Secretary for the Civil Service Patrick Nip and Permanent Secretary for the Civil Service Ingrid Yeung presented awards to the winners during a ceremony at the Central Government Offices. Over 600 entries were received from participants of more than 60 bureaus and departments for the competition. Entries winning the gold, silver and bronze awards and three meritorious awards were selected after two rounds of adjudication by a panel chaired by Mr Fung. The Civil Service College is expected to be established by the end of this year. The Civil Service Bureau is upgrading the existing facilities of the Civil Service Training & Development Institute at the North Point Government Offices to enable the premises to be used as the college's interim accommodation upon its establishment. Concurrently, the Government is pressing ahead with the Kwun Tong Composite Development Project, which will provide long-term accommodation for the college. The Government also plans to seek funding approval from the Legislative Council Finance Committee for the projects capital works within the current legislative session. This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Hong Kong: Govt announces senior appointments The Government today announced three senior appointments. Director of Civil Engineering & Development Ricky Lau will take up the post of Permanent Secretary for Development (Works) on October 8, succeeding Lam Sai-hung who will start his pre-retirement leave. Government Property Administrator Leonia Tai will become Postmaster General on September 2. While Deputy Director of Broadcasting Eugene Fung takes up the Government Property Administrator post on September 13. Secretary for the Civil Service Patrick Nip said he is confident that the three appointees will serve the community with professionalism in their new capacities. Mr Lau is an experienced senior civil servant with profound knowledge and rich experience in the works field. He also possesses effective leadership and management skills. On the appointments of Miss Tai and Mr Fung, the civil service chief noted they are seasoned administrative officers with proven leadership and management skills. Mr Nip also praised Mr Lam on his contribution. Mr Lam has rendered 35 years of loyal and dedicated service to the community of Hong Kong and has made exemplary contributions in infrastructure development, increasing land supply initiatives and conservation. I wish him a fulfilling and happy retirement. Click here for their biographies. This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: 48-year jail term for SARS fraudster Khathutshelo Mashau, a convicted fraudster who swindled several taxpayers, has been sentenced to 48 years direct imprisonment after being found guilty on charges of theft, fraud and contravention of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act (POCA). In a statement, the South African Revenue Service (SARS) on Thursday said Mashau had been handed the hefty sentence by the Boksburg Magistrates Court. This came after the court heard how SARS had received a complaint from a taxpayer that his personal income tax refund was paid into an incorrect bank account. SARS conducted an investigation and found that the refund was paid into an FNB account in the name of Khathutshelo Mashau, the revenue collector said. It said it was also found that several refunds for other taxpayers were paid into the same account. The affected taxpayers denied having knowledge of the FNB account that received the refunds. They also stated that they did not request that their personal information and bank accounts be changed to Khathutshelo Mashau. SARS said Mashau also had another bank account with Capitec into which four fraudulent personal income tax refunds were paid. No recoveries were made as all monies were withdrawn when the investigation started. SARS Commissioner Edward Kieswetter in the statement warned taxpayers to use only registered tax practitioners to assist them with their tax affairs. Persons who have no tax qualifications and who promise taxpayers huge refunds, are likely to be engaged in fraudulent activities which will harm the taxpayer. Taxpayers must report such persons immediately so that other taxpayers can be protected from these criminals. SARS makes it clear to taxpayers and provides certainty on which channels to use to transact with SARS and these are the only channels to use. If these channels are not sufficient to deal with a taxpayers needs, they should use the services of a recognised tax practitioner, said the Commissioner. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: Call for human settlements business plans to be integrated Minister of Human Settlements, Mmamoloko Kubayi, has called on the provinces to ensure that sustainable integrated spatial planning becomes an integral part of all human settlements business plans. During her first public engagement as the Minister of Human Settlements at uMshwati, KwaZulu-Natal on Thursday, Kubayi emphasised that for any human settlements business plan to be approved it must demonstrate sustainability and integrated planning. Our mandate is to change the lives of South Africans and end apartheid spatial planning. Human settlements should have all the necessary infrastructure including roads, bulk, education facilities, clinics and recreational facilities. We cannot build where there are no economic activities, Kubayi said. The Minister implored officials to put themselves in the shoes of the people they serve. If these temporary shelters are not good for you why give them to someone else. Services we provide to our people must be of standard we can expect for ourselves, she said. In an effort to ensure that there is a good relationship between the department and its stakeholders, the Minister made an undertaking to ensure that there is transparency in everything the department does. There is a huge trust deficit between government and the public and it is because our work has lacked transparency and accountability, the Minister said. While acknowledging the great work that has been done over the years, the Minister made a call to all relevant stakeholders, including the private sector to accelerate housing delivery. The department, working with provinces, has delivered close to 15 000 housing units at a value of over R3 billion in the first quarter of the financial year 2021/2022. The Minister will be in KwaZulu-Natal over the next few days to receive briefings on their plans for the coming years. She will also engage community members, do project visits and handover houses. KwaZulu-Natal MEC for Human Settlements and Public Works Jomo Sibiya joined the Minister during her engagement. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: EPWP creates job opportunities for unemployed The Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) is a government strategic intervention intended to reduce poverty and provide income support through the creation of work opportunities for the poor and unemployed South Africans. In South Africa, black Africans, women, youth and the unskilled are the most affected by the high unemployment rate faced by the country. Women are also the most vulnerable to the forces of the labour market, especially women of colour who mainly hold low-skilled jobs. This is confirmed by the Quarterly Labour Force Survey Quarter 1: 2021, released by StatsSA, which found that the unemployment rate for females was 34.0% against 31.4% of males. The EPWP through its Infrastructure, Social, Environment & Culture, as well as Non-State sectors play a significant role in improving livelihoods among communities through the provision of work, training opportunities, income in exchange for work and assets and services delivered to poor and unemployed South Africans. The EPWP is therefore committed to its mandate of providing work opportunities to the most vulnerable and rigorously engaging and intervening in strategies aimed at drawing a significant number of people into productive work and strengthening women participation in the implementation of EPWP projects in order to promote social protection and improve livelihoods, says Acting Deputy Director-General of the EPWP, Carmen-Joy Abrahams. In the current financial year 2021/22 for the period 1 April 30 June 2021, EPWP implementing bodies, i.e. government and its social partners have implemented 4 674 projects across all the nine provinces creating 472 646 work opportunities. Of the work opportunities created by the programme, 73% were created for women. This achievement is a contribution towards the 5 million work opportunities to be created though the EPWP by 2024. The participation target for women in the EPWP as one of the vulnerable groups has increased from 55% in the previous phase (EPWP Phase 3) to 60% in the current phase (EPWP Phase 4) of implementation of the Programme. This increase in the target is significant in order to address some of the economic inequalities that exists between men and women. Participants Testimonials A participant in the EPWP, Zanele Cosa, commended government for utilising the EPWP to provide economic opportunities to poor and unemployed women in her community of Emalahleni, in Mpumalanga. Cosa is one of the women currently being trained by the Mpumalanga Regional Office of the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure (DPWI) and Emalahleni Local Municipality in road construction work. She encouraged women in the EPWP to use the Programme to acquire skills they can use to gain employment or set up small businesses after exiting the Programme. For Thembisile Msomi, being part of the EPWPs Vukuphile Learnership Programme has changed her life for better. It is wonderful to see government providing women with skills to work in the construction sector, she said. Msomi is one of the learner contractors who recently received their statement of results after having participated in the Vukuphile Learnership Programme under the Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma (NDZ) Local Municipality in KwaZulu-Natal. She encouraged women in the EPWP to use the Programme as a platform to learn and to economically empower themselves. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. RTHK: Kabul airport hit by two bombs: Pentagon Two explosions struck near the main gate of Kabul airport on Thursday, causing multiple casualties in what the US military labelled a "complex attack" that took place as countries raced to complete evacuations from Afghanistan. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said there were "a number" of US and civilian casualties in the bombings, which came just hours after western officials said they had intelligence that suicide bombings were planned against the airport. "We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US and civilian casualties," Kirby said in a tweeted statement. "We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate," he said. The Baron Hotel, about 200m from Abbey Gate, had been used by some western nations as a staging point for evacuations since the airlift began on August 14. The US State Department said there were also reports of gunfire. "US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates. Those at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," it said. Thousands of people have massed over the past 12 days near the Abbey Gate and other entrances to the Hamid Karzai International Airport, hoping to be evacuated after the Taliban took control of the country. US officials say the Taliban has cooperated with the evacuation efforts. But US and allied officials said in the past day that they had intelligence that suicide bombers tied to the Afghan arm of the Islamic State group the Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K) were threatening to attack the airport ahead of Washington's August 31 deadline to finalise the evacuation. The group is known to be at odds with the Taliban. (AFP) ______________________________ Last updated: 2021-08-26 HKT 23:30 This story has been published on: 2021-08-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site. 0108263 License for publishing multimedia online Registration Number: 130349 Registration Number: 130349 The Iraqi government has signed an initial agreement with the giant PowerChina for the construction of a power plant with a capacity of 2 thousand megawatts. The world's second-largest Opec producer, the country depends on imports from Iran, which is subject to U.S. sanctions. In 2020, it burned about 17.37 billion cubic meters of gas. Baghdad (AsiaNews/Agencies) - Iraq has signed an initial agreement with Chinese energy giant PowerChina, for the construction of solar energy plants with the capacity of about 2 thousand megawatts. This was announced yesterday by an official source of the government in Baghdad, according to which in the first phase of the project the plants will have a capacity of about 750 megawatts, which will then increase in the future. Supplies from Iraq's main energy network suffer throughout the year from blackouts, which last even several hours a day. However, the problem is exacerbated during the summer months when temperatures regularly reach 50 degrees - especially in the south - and households must rely on air conditioners, heaters and fans. Iraq is the world's second largest producer among Opec nations, but it wants to decrease its dependence on electricity imports from Iran. In addition, Baghdad is under increasing pressure from the United States to break free from its ties to Tehran subject to U.S. sanctions since 2018 reimposed by then-President Donald Trump. In all these years, the two U.S. administrations (Republican and Democratic) that have come to power have granted waivers to Iraq, to allow it to import energy from the Islamic Republic. The last limit is fixed for December, but from many parts are asking for a decisive intervention in order to put an end to the chronic deficiencies that affect both the daily life of families and the productive sector. According to the World Bank, Iraq was the second nation in the world for consumption in 2020 (a position it has held for five consecutive years) after Russia, burning about 17.37 billion cubic meters of gas. In addition, the political crisis (and corruption) that has hit the country has hindered several long-term projects aimed at the development of gas extraction. Added to this is the continuing influence of Iran's neighbor, which has also determined its energy policies, and repeated attacks on power lines and high voltage lines by the Islamic State and other fundamentalist groups, including pro-Tehran militias. This year, the Baghdad government has already signed renewable energy contracts with TotalEnergies and Masdar, the renewable energy arm of Abu Dhabi's sovereign wealth fund, Mubadala Investment Company. The agreement with Masdar includes the development of solar projects with a total scope of about 2 gigawatts and would help achieve the goal of generating up to 20/25% of its energy from renewable sources (equivalent to 12 gigawatts by 2030). Energy import negotiations are underway with Jordan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Cooperation Council nations. by Vladimir Rozanskij President Berdymukhamedov wants the harvest in by 27 September rather than late October. Production is run Soviet-style. Ordinary Turkmen are exploited during harvest, children included. Any opposition, including abroad, has been silenced. Turkey backs the Turkmen regime. Moscow (AsiaNews) In order to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Turkmenistans independence with great labour victories, the countrys President, Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, has ordered that cotton ripen early so that the precious fibre can be harvested one month ahead of schedule and be available for offering on the altar of the celebration of 27 September. The presidents decision was announced in early August at an extraordinary meeting with the heads of the regions and the various local administrations. The authorities were called to give an account to the president of the work done so far in growing cotton, potatoes and other farm products, but also of the effectiveness of the technologies used. To make independence, i.e., national autarchy effective, Berdymukhamedov instructed his officials to provide the population with the necessary supply of vegetables and all kinds of local produce all year round. Above all, the president stressed cottons strategic importance. Khronika Turmenistana reports that the cotton harvest usually starts at the beginning of September and the assessment of the government cotton plan is presented to the Arkadag (Protector), a title reserved for Berdymukhamedov, in late October or early November. But this is a special year in which farmers have had to face, among other things, drought, as well as poor equipment, a throwback to Soviet times, when Central Asian republics were exploited as "cotton granaries to meet the production levels set by the Gosplan, the Soviet Unions almighty State Planning Committee. Generally, the Gosplan developed unrealistic plans designed to show the world the superiority of its system. This led to phoney financial statements, double-entry bookkeeping, corruption, bribery and related criminal shenanigans. In the Arkadags Turkmenistan, cotton is king, despite accusations by many observers and human rights groups that the authorities practice cotton slavery. To boost production, public employees, their spouses and children, are forced to pick cotton. As a result, many Western companies have stopped buying Turkmen cotton to protect the reputation of their bran, while ordinary Turkmen are too afraid to protest, concerned about angering the president and his cohorts, made up largely of his relatives and faithful servants. According to international agencies, freedom of expression in Turkmenistan is barely higher than that in Syria or North Korea. What is more, the government used the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic to further restrict information about the real state of the country. Currently, the virus is spreading across the country with a frightfully high cost for the economy. Yet, President Berdymukhamedov describes Turkmenistan as homeland of prosperity with no traces of COVID-19. Some protests have been reported outside the country, but the Arkadag is not losing any sleep over them. In Istanbul, Turkish authorities have detained young people of Turkmen origin for protesting. More generally, anyone opposed to the regime living abroad can expect to see their family pay a price for their activism. PM Pham Minh Chinh: Vietnam treasures ties with US Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh has affirmed that Vietnam treasures ties with the US and wants to foster bilateral comprehensive partnership in a practical, effective and stable manner, for the sake of peace, cooperation and development in the region and the world. Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh (R) and US Vice President Kamala Harris (Photo: VNA) During a reception in Hanoi on August 25 for US Vice President Kamala Harris, Chinh wished the US would continue assisting Vietnam in the fight against COVID-19 pandemic, including creating favourable conditions for Pfizer to speed up the delivery of more vaccines to Vietnam this year. Emphasising that Vietnam considers economy-trade a pillar and driving force of Vietnam US ties, he suggested both sides enhance coordination in the framework of the Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA) while considering the possibility of establishing a new economic-trade cooperation framework. Vietnam always creates conditions for US firms to do business in Vietnam, Chinh said, wishing that the US would also offer support to Vietnamese enterprises in the country, thus creating a balance in bilateral trade and investment. The host spoke highly of the USs long-term commitments to overcoming post-war consequences in Vietnam, and proposed the US accelerate the implementation of detoxification project at Bien Hoa airport and increase budget to support Vietnams development. According to him, Vietnam has huge demand for joint work in education-training, human resources development, science-technology, health care, biotechnology and space for civil purpose. Harris, for her part, stressed that the US treasures comprehensive partnership with Vietnam on the basis of respecting for each others independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity and political institutions, and not interfering into internal affairs of each other. She reaffirmed that the US supports a strong, independent and prosperous Vietnam and pledged to continue fostering bilateral ties more extensively, stably and firmly in the near future. The guest affirmed that the US will continue offering practical support to Vietnam to effectively cope with the pandemic and the risks of other epidemics in the future. She informed that the US will deliver 1 million doses of Pfizer vaccine to Vietnam in the next 24 hours. The US Government will continue giving priority to reinforcing bilateral ties in economy-trade, climate change, civil space, health care and pharmaceuticals, she said, adding that the US will offer further assistance to Vietnam in dealing with post-war consequences, United Nations peacekeeping missions, improving maritime security and development cooperation. On regional and global issues, both sides underscored ASEANs central role in the East Sea, Mekong and Myanmar issues as well as the principle of respecting international law in dealing with regional issues, including the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, ensuring security, safety, and freedom of navigation and aviation. The host said Vietnam expects to welcome the US Vice President again when the pandemic is under control. Harris also wished to travel back to Vietnam when possible./. Vietnam seeks COVID-19 vaccine supply support from Belgium Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, during his phone talks with his Belgian counterpart Alexander De Croo on August 25 evening, requested that Belgium help Vietnam access COVID-19 vaccine supplies from the COVAX Facility. During his phone talks with with Belgian PM Alexander De Croo, PM Pham Minh Chinh requests that Belgium help Vietnam access more COVID-19 vaccine sources. Vietnam expects to receive Belgiums assistance and support in COVID-19 vaccine access from COVAX as Belgium makes a positive contribution to this vaccine mechanism to assist countries with COVID-19 fight, Chinh told De Croo. He also suggested that Belgium cooperate in transferring vaccine production technology and supplying treatment drugs and medical equipment to help Vietnam soon control the fresh COVID-19 outbreak, which is currently complicated in a number of provinces and cities. PM De Croo noted COVID-19 is a great challenge for all countries in the world, and agreed that vaccination is the key to overcoming the pandemic. He affirmed that he would direct relevant Belgian agencies to positively respond to the Vietnamese sides request. The two PMs shared the view that the traditional and friendly relationship between Vietnam and Belgium has developed positively and substantively over the past 50 years with a variety of cooperation frameworks that complement each other and promote the strengths of both sides, including the establishment of a strategic partnership on agriculture in 2018. Chinh highly appreciated the role of Belgium, an important member of the European Union (EU), emphasized the effective implementation of the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) and asked the Belgian Parliament for early ratification of the Vietnam-EU Investment Promotion Agreement (EVIPA). Alongside the EVFTA, the early enforcement of the EVIPA will give an important impetus to promoting economic relations between Vietnam and the EU as well as between Vietnam and Belgium, he stressed. PM Chinh affirmed that the Government of Vietnam always supports and creates favorable conditions for foreign businesses, including Belgian firms, to come and do business in the long term in Vietnam, especially in the areas of Belgiums strengths in shipping, seaports, logistics services, renewable energy, high-tech agriculture, pharmaceuticals, among others. He also asked the Government of Belgium to facilitate the export of Vietnamese farm products, especially rice, coffee, cocoa, and seasonal fruits such as lychee, longan, and dragon fruit into Belgian and EU markets. He suggested that Belgium lobby the European Commission (EC) to soon remove the yellow card mechanism for Vietnamese seafood, meeting the interests of Vietnamese businesses as well as Belgian and EU consumers. The two PMs agreed that Vietnam and Belgium hold great potential for stronger cooperation in education and training, human resource improvement, science and technology, and judicial security. The two countries will strive to increase investment and two-way trade towards a post-COVID sustainable recovery in order to lift their relations to new heights in a more substantive and effective direction. The leaders emphasized the need for the two countries to strengthen their cooperation and support at multilateral forums, especially at the United Nations, ASEM, Francophone, ASEAN-EU, in order to address regional and global issues in the coming time. With regard to the East Sea issue, the two leaders affirmed the importance of maintaining peace, stability, security, safety and freedom of navigation and overflight in the regional waters. They stressed the need to peacefully settle sea-related disputes based on international law, including the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, while fully and effectively implementing the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea (DOC) towards achieving a substantive and effective Code of Conduct in the waters (COC). PM Pham Minh Chinh invited PM Alexander De Croo to visit Vietnam at an appropriate time. De Croo happily accepted the invitation, and said he is looking forward to welcoming Chinh to Belgium soon. Xi stresses promoting Saihanba Spirit, striving for economic-social development goals Xinhua) 07:51, August 26, 2021 Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, talks with local residents while visiting Binhe community in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of Chengde City in Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. (Xinhua/Li Xueren) CHENGDE, Hebei, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping has stressed implementing the new development philosophy, promoting the Saihanba Spirit, and striving to achieve this year's major goals for the country's economic and social development. Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks during an inspection tour of Chengde City in north China's Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. Xi stressed implementing the CPC Central Committee's decisions and arrangements, staying committed to the general principle of pursuing progress while ensuring stability, and putting into practice the new development philosophy in an all-round, faithful manner. He also underlined the need to achieve a balance between COVID-19 prevention and control and economic and social development, and between development and security, to promote high-quality development, and to strive to fulfill major social and economic targets and tasks for this year to ensure a good start of the 14th Five-Year Plan. Xi began the tour with a visit to the Saihanba mechanized forest farm in the northernmost part of Hebei on Monday afternoon. China has the world's largest area of man-made forests, an extremely great achievement, as noted by Xi. Saihanba, he said, has set an example in the global history of ecological progress. Xi expressed his hope that the farm staff would continue to work hard and take bold steps to explore deepening the reform of state-owned forest farms, promoting green development and increasing their carbon-sink capacity. He visited the farm's first man-made forest, named after a late farm official Wang Shanghai. Talking with staff representatives of the farm, Xi said generations of workers there have forged through concrete actions the Saihanba Spirit, featuring staying true to the original aspiration, being hardworking and enterprising, and pursuing green development. The achievement, Xi said, is an example to the rest of the country in advancing ecological progress. He urged the promotion of the Saihanba Spirit to inspire people to make new contributions to the realization of China's second centenary goal. On Tuesday morning, Xi inspected the Chengde Mountain Resort, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, to learn about the protection of cultural relics. He stressed efforts to properly protect, develop and utilize fine traditional Chinese culture, in a bid to build stronger cultural confidence and foster the national spirit. Leaving the site, Xi went to the Puning Temple, which was first built in 1755. Xi stressed upholding the principle that religions in China must be Chinese in orientation, with active guidance provided to religions so that they can adapt themselves to the socialist society. He then visited the Chengde Museum. Noting that China is a united multi-ethnic country, Xi said the diverse Chinese nation has been formed over the course of a long history. Experience has shown that only the CPC can unite the Chinese nation, and only under Chinese socialism can all ethnic groups work together and achieve development and prosperity, Xi said. Continuous efforts should be made to consolidate and develop socialist ethnic relations of equality, unity, mutual assistance and harmony, he added. In the afternoon, Xi paid a visit to the village of Daguikou in Chengde, where he inspected progress on rural vitalization. Highlighting the crucial role of industries in advancing rural vitalization, Xi urged efforts to develop industries with local strengths and deliver more benefits to rural areas and rural residents. He also called for strengthening public health services in rural areas. Xi dropped by the home of villager Huo Jin and chatted with the family. He stressed that, even when China's urbanization has reached a high level, there will still be hundreds of millions of people working and living in rural areas. Prosperity must be achieved in both urban and rural areas, Xi said, calling for building a new socialist countryside that is more beautiful and has better living conditions. He also visited a community-based service center for elderly home-care in the city. Pointing out that ensuring a happy life for the elderly people in their later years is a vital responsibility of Party committees and governments at all levels, Xi called for efforts to develop all-inclusive elderly care services and improve the networks for community-based service centers for elderly home-care. He also called on communities to play an active role as the first line of defense in coordinated control mechanisms and remain vigilant against the COVID-19 epidemic. Talking with community residents in a public square, Xi said that China will definitely realize national rejuvenation as more than 1.4 billion people are bending their efforts in one direction and traveling with perseverance on the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Du Mingming) New extravehicular pump ensures stable operation of China's space station Xinhua) 08:14, August 26, 2021 Screen image taken at Beijing Aerospace Control Center on Aug. 20, 2021 shows Chinese astronauts Nie Haisheng and Liu Boming waving their hands after conducting extravehicular activities (EVAs) out of the space station core module Tianhe.(Xinhua/Tian Dingyu) BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Chinese astronauts Nie Haisheng and Liu Boming completed extravehicular activities (EVAs) for the second time during the construction of the space station on Aug. 20. They installed extravehicular extended pump sets and lifted the panoramic camera in their EVAs. The newly installed extravehicular extended pump sets will play a key role in ensuring the in-orbit operation of China's space station for no less than 15 years, according to the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST). Screen image captured at Beijing Aerospace Control Center in Beijing, capital of China, June 17, 2021 shows China's Shenzhou-12 manned spaceship having successfully docked with the space station core module Tianhe. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang) EXTRAVEHICULAR "HEART" Developed by the CAST, the extended pump sets are called the "heart" of the fluid loop, which is a core part of the space station's thermal control system. "Like a heart providing power for blood flow and sending blood to all parts of a body, the pump sets keep the special liquid circulating stably in the loop," said Han Haiying, a CAST designer of the thermal control system. Without the protection of the atmosphere, the surface temperature of the space station can reach more than 150 degrees Celsius under the sunlight. While in the dark, its surface temperature can drop to lower than minus 100 degrees Celsius. In this harsh space environment, the thermal control system is crucial in ensuring the normal operation of the space station's equipment and comfortable living conditions for the astronauts. The fluid loop evenly covers the key parts of the space station. By circulating the special liquid in the loop, it is capable of collecting heat generated by onboard equipment and astronauts for cooling and bring the heat to relevant devices and structures for heat supplementation, according to Zheng Hongyang, a CAST engineer in charge of the fluid loop of the thermal control system. It can also help precisely control the temperatures of various "rooms" in the space station, said Zheng. "Always operating at a high speed, the liquid loop pumps have a limited service life and must be repairable and replaceable," Han said. The thermal control team thus created multiple "hearts" for both inside and outside the cabin for the fluid loop, so as to empower the system with ultra-long operation capability. Screen image taken at Beijing Aerospace Control Center on Aug. 20, 2021 shows Chinese astronauts Nie Haisheng and Liu Boming conducting extravehicular activities (EVAs) out of the space station core module Tianhe. (Xinhua/Tian Dingyu) SIMPLE BUT IMPORTANT MOVE In the space environment, astronauts wearing spacesuits are restricted in their movements. A simple action, such as turning a screw, could cost them a lot of energy and time. The CAST team did their best to simplify the procedure of installing the extended pump sets, making it a four-step process. The astronauts need to hook and lock the pump sets to the outer wall of the space station core module Tianhe, and then connect the electric circuit as well as the liquid circuit. Screen image captured at Beijing Aerospace Control Center in Beijing, capital of China, June 17, 2021 shows three Chinese astronauts onboard the Shenzhou-12 spaceship saluting after entering the space station core module Tianhe. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang) The newly completed EVAs not only verified the technology of installing pump sets in orbit but also laid a good foundation for the following construction of the space station and stable operation of the station for up to 15 years, according to the CAST. The three Chinese astronauts were sent into space onboard the Shenzhou-12 spaceship and entered Tianhe on June 17. Astronauts Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo completed the first EVAs on July 4. The Shenzhou-12 spaceship crew will continue to carry out scientific and technological space experiments before their planned return in the middle of September. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Du Mingming) China to increase fiscal support for Yangtze River Economic Belt development Xinhua) 08:29, August 26, 2021 BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- China will increase fiscal and tax support to promote high-quality development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, a State Council executive meeting said on Wednesday. The meeting, chaired by Premier Li Keqiang, also reviewed and adopted an outline for women's development in China during the 2021-2030 period and an outline for children's development in China during the 2021-2030 period. Efforts should be made to support ecological conservation in provinces and cities along the Yangtze River and coordinate protection and restoration of the ecology of mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands, said the meeting. Fishing in pivotal waters of the Yangtze River should be banned, and efforts should go into helping fishermen who relinquished their nets as required by a 10-year fishing moratorium, the meeting said. Provinces and cities along the Yangtze River should be encouraged to build pilot free trade zones and comprehensive bonded zones, the meeting said. It underlined supporting small and medium-sized enterprises to explore the international market and promoting the transformation and upgrading of foreign trade. The meeting noted that remarkable achievements have been made in the development of women and children in China in recent years. The outlines set out objectives and measures in areas including health, education, social security and welfare, family, the environment and the law, and require implementing the fundamental national policy of gender equality. Women's equal rights to education, employment, starting businesses, and participating in decision-making and management must be protected, the outlines said. The social security system and the legal system should be improved to meet women's needs and protect their lawful rights and interests, the outlines noted. More attention should go to protecting children in families, schools, society, and on the internet. Compulsory education will remain the top priority of education investment, said the outlines. Support measures for the three-child policy should be improved and multiple measures will be introduced to reduce the burden of childbearing, parenting, and education on families, the outlines noted. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Du Mingming) Airmen load missiles onto launching truck China Military Online) 08:39, August 26, 2021 Airmen assigned to an air-defense brigade with the air force under the PLA Southern Theater Command practice loading missiles onto a missile launching vehicle during a field training on August 11, 2021. (eng.chinamil.com.cn/Photo by Pei Jun) (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Hongyu) China to strengthen ties with Ethiopia, further vitalize China-Africa cooperation: FM Xinhua) 08:58, August 26, 2021 BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- China stands ready to strengthen practical cooperation with Ethiopia in various fields and take the opportunity of the upcoming meeting of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) to inject new impetus into China-Africa cooperation, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Wednesday. In a phone conversation with Ethiopian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Demeke Mekonnen, Wang said China and Ethiopia are each other's comprehensive strategic cooperative partners, and bilateral relations have gone through tests and become stronger over time. In the face of the the COVID-19 pandemic, the two countries have helped each other and deepened their friendship, Wang said, adding that China is ready to continue close coordination and cooperation with Ethiopia in international affairs and safeguard the common interests of the two countries and other developing countries. Wang said that China firmly supports Ethiopia's efforts to safeguard national sovereignty and independence, believes that the Ethiopian government has the capacity and wisdom to properly handle its internal affairs, and will continue to support the Ethiopian people in realizing national peace, stability, development and prosperity. China will adhere to its consistent position and oppose external forces interfering in Ethiopia's internal affairs under the pretext of human rights, Wang said. China hopes that the international community will support the position of the Ethiopian federal government on realizing a comprehensive and lasting ceasefire, and effectively promoting its national reconciliation, he added. Wang said that the United States is now trying to discredit China in order to shift its responsibility for failure in fighting the epidemic at home. In particular, he noted, the U.S. intelligence community is speeding up the fabrication of a so-called origins tracing report in a bid to pin the blame on China. Wang expressed belief that the international community, including Ethiopia, will see through the nature of the U.S. move, continue to take an objective and just position, clearly oppose the malicious attempt to politicize COVID-19 origins tracing, and jointly maintain the sound momentum of international solidarity against the epidemic. Demeke appreciated China's strong support to his country in fighting against coronavirus, saying Ethiopia is committed to advancing the China-Ethiopia comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership to a new level. Ethiopia, like China, firmly opposes Western interference in other countries' internal affairs under the excuse of human rights, he said, adding that his country believes that origins tracing should not be politicized and must be carried out in accordance with science. Ethiopia is looking forward to the new session of the FOCAC, and will make full use of the platform to enrich bilateral relations, Demeke said. The two sides also exchanged views on other issues of common concerns. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Commentary: Take a clear-cut stand against politicizing COVID-19 origins tracing Xinhua) 09:18, August 26, 2021 BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- For some time, the United States has been manipulating the COVID-19 origins tracing by distorting facts and hyping up such baseless cliches as the so-called "Wuhan lab leak" theory. The ulterior political motive behind the malicious U.S. acts is to deflect responsibility for its incompetence in tackling the virus and at the same time smear and suppress other countries. In this regard, the world must take a clear-cut stand against such attempts. It is common sense that the origins tracing must and can only be a matter of science. In the face of the global health crisis, countries need to work together with a rational attitude that respects science and facts. Meanwhile, the tracing study must be undertaken by scientists -- the only ones who are qualified to find the source of the virus and its transmission path to humans -- so as to better prevent future risks. Since last year, scientists from many countries around the world have expressed their views that the scientific direction of origins tracing should not be changed, and opposed instrumentalizing the origins tracing work and politicizing a scientific issue. In fact, China has always supported and will continue to participate in the science-based tracing study. Since the early stage of the pandemic, China has been actively cooperating with the World Health Organization (WHO) on the origins tracing of the virus. It shared the genetic sequence of the virus at the earliest possible date and invited WHO experts to China twice for origins studies. The WHO-China joint study report released in March has been prepared in total compliance with the procedures of the WHO, and used a scientific approach. It has been proven to be a valuable and authoritative report that can stand the test of science and time. The report ought to act as the basis and guideline for global origins tracing efforts. Any attempt to repudiate and distort the conclusions of the joint study report is a political manipulation and disrespectful to global scientists and science. However, the United States has been trying to kidnap the WHO and clamouring for another so-called virus tracing against China, which is not only a trampling on the scientific spirit, but also an insult to China's national dignity. China's refusal to such kind of virus tracing is not to hide anything, but to defend its rights and dignity in accordance with the law. China welcomes tracing efforts in a scientific and serious manner, but firmly opposes the so-called tracing work with mischievous intentions that flout science. As a sovereign state, China will never allow certain political forces with ulterior motives to manipulate the issue as they want and scapegoat China as they wish. From the perspective of international laws, linking state responsibility to the source of the virus is groundless and will set a perilous precedent. Moreover, increasing fresh discoveries of early outbreaks of the virus in multiple countries, some of which were earlier than the first cases reported in China, have sparked new thinking in the academic community about the origin and spread of the coronavirus. On origins tracing, Washington's distortion of facts is both a disregard for related international laws and a violation of the principle of presumption of innocence. Behind America's manipulation of origins tracing lies its sinister intention to smear China for its own political gains. On one hand, some U.S. politicians attempt to assign blame to China and stir up anti-China sentiment in America, in hope of chasing votes and distracting the public from their own failure in epidemic response; On the other, by scapegoating and demonizing China, they figure for containing China's development and securing America's global hegemony. Kenneth Hammond, a professor at New Mexico State University specializing in Chinese history, said "American politicians, and their wealthy interests which essentially control them, are very worried about losing their role as the dominant power in global affairs as China re-emerges as a major factor in the development of the world economy and in geopolitical relations." "These elites are anxious to stall or thwart China's development in any way they can," including adopting the relentlessly propagated narrative, he noted. In fact, the international community has more than once said no to America's politicization of origins tracing. Earlier this year, more than 300 political parties, social societies and think tanks from over 100 countries and regions opposed politicizing the disease's origins in a joint statement sent to the WHO Secretariat. Origins tracing requires cooperation, truth and science, instead of smear, lies or political manipulation. It is time for America to wake up to that, and understand that its evil calculation on seeking a "presumption of guilt" against China is doomed to failure. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) China to push forward high-quality development of women and children's affairs Xinhua) 09:18, August 26, 2021 Children take part in a racing game at a kindergarten in Neiqiu County of Xingtai, north China's Hebei Province, June 10, 2021. (Photo by Liu Jidong/Xinhua) BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- The State Council's executive meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang on Wednesday adopted the Outline for Women's Development in China (2021-2030) and the Outline for Children's Development in China (2021-2030), and required improving support measures for the three-child policy. Gender equality and women's all-round development are important hallmarks of social progress, and children represent a country's future and a nation's hope. Recent years have seen notable achievements the country made in women and children's affairs. "We must put high premium on work related to women and children as it is an important part of our modernization drive and a symbol for social progress. The principle of gender equality and putting children first should be better manifested in social life," Li said. The two outlines set out objectives and measures in health, education, social security and welfare, family, environment, legislation and other areas, and made the following requirements. The basic state policy of gender equality must be delivered. Women's equal rights to education, employment, starting businesses, and participation in decision making and management must be protected. Equal remuneration for men and women for work of equal value will be fully implemented. Public services that support the comprehensive development of families and women will be expanded, and social security system improved to meet women's special needs. Basic support and services for women facing difficulties will be strengthened and the legal system protecting women's lawful rights and interests refined. "There must be institutional arrangements to protect women's rights and interests. Competent departments must provide support," Li said. The two outlines highlight the need to uphold the principle of putting children first. Greater emphasis must be given to the all-round protection of children at the family, school, society and the internet levels. Compulsory education will remain the top priority of education investment. Children's well-rounded development in terms of moral grounding, intellectual and physical ability, aesthetic sensibility, and work skills will be promoted. The health services system for children must be enhanced to ensure the safety of food and products for children. The rights to survival, development and safety, and the interests of orphans, unattended children, children with disabilities and homeless children must be protected. Greater care and protection will be extended to left-behind children of migrant workers, and school bullying must be prevented and effectively dealt with. "There are 250 million children in China. Their healthy development is of vital importance to families and the whole society," Li said. "We should focus our efforts on tackling the prominent issues that constrain the development of women and children's affairs." The two outlines urged updating the support measures in executing the three-child policy. Maternity leave and childbirth allowance will be implemented, and parental leave explored. Public-benefit childcare services will be developed with the support of communities. Expenses for infant and child care services for children under 3 years old will be eligible for itemized extra tax deductions for individual income tax. Housing and other support policies will be strengthened. Multi-pronged steps will be taken to lighten the burden of family in child bearing, child care and children's education. "Support measures for the three-child policy should be carefully studied, to steadily optimize the demographic mix and raise people's educational level," Li said. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) U.S. should invite WHO to probe coronavirus origins at Fort Detrick, UNC Xinhua) 09:19, August 26, 2021 BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson on Wednesday urged the United States to stop political manipulation on the issue of coronavirus origins tracing, saying the United States should invite WHO experts to launch a probe into Fort Detrick and the University of North Carolina (UNC) to find the source of the virus if it is bent on insisting the lab-leak theory. Spokesperson Wang Wenbin made the remarks at a daily press briefing after the Permanent Representative of China to the United Nations Office at Geneva and other International Organizations in Switzerland wrote to the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), and submitted two non-papers on Fort Detrick and UNC, as well as an open letter signed by netizens demanding an investigation into Fort Detrick. Wang said China's stand on global origins tracing is consistent and clear, adding the issue is a science-based one, and China always supports and will continue participating in science-based origins tracing. The conclusions and recommendations of the China-WHO joint study report have been recognized by the international community and the scientific community, and must be respected and implemented, Wang said, adding that future global origins study should and can only be carried out on this basis. The Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) has received WHO experts twice. It is extremely unlikely that the novel coronavirus was leaked from the WIV -- this is the clear conclusion of the China-WHO joint study report, the spokesperson said. Those who insist that the possibility of a lab-leak cannot be ruled out should investigate Fort Detrick and the UNC in the principle of fairness and justice. Wang said the international community, including the American public, has long held concerns over the illegal, non-transparent, and unsafe activities of Fort Detrick, citing bio-safety incidents in 2019 that led to the shutting down of the lab and the ensuing outbreaks of illnesses with similar symptoms of COVID-19. For the UNC, the spokesperson pointed out the Baric team leads the world in researches in this field and has already advanced capabilities to synthesize and modify coronavirus. "We hope the international community can work hand in hand to resist the backlash of politicization and bring the origins study back to the right track of scientific cooperation," Wang added. Also on Wednesday, Fu Cong, director-general of the Department of Arms Control of the Foreign Ministry, said the United States, while clamoring for an investigation into other countries' bio-medical labs, is the only country standing in the way of establishing a multilateral verification mechanism under the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). "I wonder if the U.S. obsession with Chinese biological labs signifies a change in its position on a verification protocol. Simply put, is the U.S. government ready to withdraw its opposition to the negotiations of a verification protocol under the BWC?" Fu said the litmus test would come as early as next week when the Meetings of the States Parties to the BWC takes place in Geneva. "China will once again call for the restart of negotiations on a verification protocol," Fu added. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Digital economy opens new opportunities for international cooperation Xinhua) 09:47, August 26, 2021 -- At two events held in China's Chongqing this week, the digital economy has taken center stage and opened up new possibilities for international cooperation as it is becoming ubiquitous in modern life. -- The scale of China's digital economy hit 39.2 trillion yuan in 2020, accounting for 38.6 percent of the country's GDP. -- While evolving into a new driver powering economic growth, the digital economy has helped many countries deepen international cooperation in more fields. CHONGQING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- From big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things to blockchain, 5G and artificial intelligence (AI), the digital economy is the talk of the town in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality. At the Smart China Expo 2021 and the China-Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Forum on the Digital Economy Industry, both held in Chongqing this week, the digital economy has taken center stage and opened up new possibilities for international cooperation as it is becoming ubiquitous in modern life. Guests from all SCO countries and relevant SCO bodies attended the forum online or offline, and more than 610 companies from 31 countries and regions, including Huawei, iFLYTEK, Alibaba and Intel, participated in the expo through online or offline exhibitions. A total of 92 projects worth a total of 250 billion yuan (about 38.62 billion U.S. dollars) were signed at the expo on Monday, demonstrating the vitality of the digital economy. A correspondent views a 3D display product at the Smart China Expo 2021 in Chongqing, southwest China, Aug. 22, 2021. (Xinhua/Wang Quanchao) LATEST SMART TECHNOLOGIES The three-day expo, which concluded on Wednesday, saw the display of a wide range of cutting-edge technologies and applications, including a cloud-computing processor the size of a business card, an AI machine that can grade homework and tests, and smart home technologies that allow users to voice-control heaters and floor-cleaning robots through WeChat. A capsule robot capable of performing gastrointestinal endoscopy procedures through automated navigation caught the attention of many visitors. With the help of AI, the capsule robot developed by Chongqing Jinshan Science &Technology (Group) Co., Ltd. can navigate its way around the stomach along pre-planned routes and perform medical examinations in a painless and non-intrusive way, according to expo staffer Liu Siyu. "We see great roles that smart technology plays in various sectors whether it is AI, education, health, climate change, and agriculture, etc., in the past two years when the world has been under COVID-19," British Trade Commissioner for China John Edwards said in a recent interview with Xinhua. Nearly 50 British companies exhibited in the expo's UK Pavilion, joining the "UK Now" Roadshow and the Digital Transformation in Manufacturing Forum to share expertise, exchange ideas and forge partnerships. Visitors try VR devices at the Smart China Expo 2021 in Chongqing, southwest China, Aug. 23, 2021. (Xinhua/Tang Yi) NEW FIELD FOR COOPERATION In the Russian exhibition hall, the kokoshnik, a traditional Russian headdress, wowed many visitors with its exquisite craftsmanship. Russian kokoshnik craftsman Juhann Nikadimus had long sought to revive the traditional handicraft, but was often thwarted by the difficulty of acquiring expensive brocades, pearls and other materials in Russia. His problems were solved after he sourced the materials on AliExpress, a global online retail marketplace. "Chinese brocades are very similar to the materials used historically in Russia in terms of texture and quality, and they cost only a fraction," Nikadimus said. Photo taken on Aug. 24, 2021 shows the main venue of Smart China Expo 2021 in Chongqing, southwest China. (Xinhua/Wang Quanchao) The scale of China's digital economy hit 39.2 trillion yuan in 2020, accounting for 38.6 percent of the country's GDP, according to a white paper recently released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology. While evolving into a new driver powering economic growth, the digital economy has helped many countries deepen international cooperation in more fields. "We stand firm in our commitment to opening-up and cooperation, and will continue to expand new space and share development opportunities of the digital economy," said Xiao Yaqing, China's minister of industry and information technology, when addressing the opening ceremony on Monday. "The possibilities offered by the digital revolution are cross-cutting and limited only by our imagination," said Singapore's Minister of Communications and Information and Second Minister for Home Affairs Josephine Teo via video link. "Only by working together can we fully unlock the potential of digital technologies." (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Commentary: Erroneous U.S. report on Wuhan virus lab unprofessional, irresponsible Xinhua) 09:52, August 26, 2021 BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- A recent U.S. report on the cost of the Wuhan Institute of Virology's ventilation system is unprofessional and irresponsible, and is ridden with ridiculous errors. The United States House Foreign Affairs Committee minority staff, led by Republican Representative Michael McCaul, in August published an 84-page addendum on the origins of COVID-19, drastically exaggerating the budget figures for the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) with a view to hyping irregularities there. For example, it turned out that the stated figure of 606 million U.S. dollars for the ventilation system should, in fact, have been just 600,000 U.S. dollars -- meaning the cost was exaggerated a thousandfold. The congressional report cited the exaggerated numbers to suggest that something "unusual" was happening at WIV, speculating that "safety concerns and unusual maintenance" constituted "evidence of a lab leak." Articles on the opinion pages of some U.S. news media dutifully quoted this erroneous information, though correcting it afterwards. It was sad to see some U.S. congressmen and major U.S. newspapers making such errors, and multiple gatekeepers failed to catch them. Were they to exercise more professionalism and scrutiny, and a greater sense of responsibility, those errors would not have spread so widely. The congressional report should have been taken with a grain of salt from the very beginning, as the errors in the report are not difficult to spot. Sadly, it has become increasingly common for this sort of inaccurate, if not outright false, information to take the spotlight, at times even dominating the public discourse, particularly on COVID-19 origins research. With global anti-virus efforts still ongoing, objectivity and unity are more than welcome; lies and division are not. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Du Mingming) Qinghai-Tibet Plateau getting warmer, wetter due to global warming Xinhua) 09:58, August 26, 2021 Aerial photo taken on June 5, 2021 shows a view of a scenic spot of Qinghai Lake in northwest China's Qinghai Province. Located in the northeastern part of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the Qinghai Lake is key to maintaining the ecological balance in western China. (Xinhua/Wu Gang) BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Affected by global warming, China's Qinghai-Tibet Plateau has grown warmer and wetter over recent decades, contributing to the occurrence of extreme weather and climate events, a study has shown. The plateau has been warming faster than any other region in the country over the past 60 years, according to the findings of the study released on the China Meteorological Administration website on Tuesday. From 1961 to 2020, temperatures in the region have climbed steadily at a rate of 0.35 degrees Celsius every 10 years, more than twice the global average, while annual precipitation has risen an average of 7.9 mm every 10 years. Experts have said that the influences of such changes on the region are complicated: While a warmer climate has made the region greener and expanded the habitats of wild animals, extreme weather is more likely to occur in the region. Due to rising temperatures, extreme climate events and disasters such as blizzards, thunderstorms, landslides and debris flows have increased significantly over the past four decades. A warmer and wetter plateau could also lead to biodiversity loss, shrinking glaciers and vegetation growth changes in the region, the study has shown. Climate change is a major factor affecting vegetation growth on the plateau, scientists said, stressing that the increased vegetation in the area over the past 30 years is basically in line with most regions around the world. Yet the current warming trend has shown no sign of stopping. Experts estimate temperatures will continue to rise, with the region facing greater risks of climate and environmental disasters. Despite plenty of studies conducted on the plateau, there are still many uncertainties about how a changing plateau will impact the global climate and how different climate systems will interact with each other, experts said. To restore the plateau's ecosystem and ensure its sustainable development, scientists advised the region to put in place a three-dimensional observation network for climate change, build up data collection and early warning capacities, and conduct deeper research into climate change patterns in the region. With the highest elevation in the world's mid-latitude region, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is highly sensitive to the impact of global warming. The region is known as "the water tower of Asia" as it houses abundant glaciers vital to the regional water cycle and water resources in downstream areas. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Myanmar Chinese Chamber of Commerce launches vaccination program Xinhua) 10:02, August 26, 2021 YANGON, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Myanmar Chinese Chamber of Commerce (MCCOC) launched its vaccination program in Myanmar on Tuesday, according to a release from the Chinese Embassy in Myanmar on Wednesday. Speaking at the vaccination program, Counsellor of the Chinese Embassy in Myanmar Yu Bianjiang said the new wave of COVID-19 in Myanmar has become intense and this program will bring benefit to the country and the people. According to the embassy's release, a total of 700,000 doses of Sinopharm vaccines will be delivered across the country under the program. Myanmar has reported 378,377 COVID-19 cases with 14,622 deaths as of late Tuesday, according to the latest figures by the Ministry of Health. Myanmar detected its first two COVID-19 cases on March 23 last year. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Risk prevention and stability top priorities now China Daily) 10:04, August 26, 2021 Lujiazui, the financial center in Shanghai, forms a perfect backdrop to the Bund area. (WANG GANG/FOR CHINA DAILY) China won't overemphasize short-term growth despite downward pressure Downward pressure on the economy may be rising due to the resurgence of local COVID-19 cases and recent heavy rains in some areas, but China remains staunchly committed to financial risk prevention as well as avoiding measures aimed just for short-term GDP growth, experts said on Wednesday. So, the country is unlikely to loosen regulations relating to debt financing of property developers and local governments, they said. Instead, China will likely ease macro policy moderately, with focus on bolstering emerging industries and smaller businesses to stabilize the economy, they said. Their comments took stock of the general discourse among economists centering on whether or not China will dilute its de-risk efforts in areas like the property sector to shore up growth. "China has begun to give more heft to stabilizing growth, but this by no means indicates that it will return to the old mode of stimulating growth through heavy debt financing by property developers and local governments," said Hu Zhihao, deputy director of the National Institution for Finance & Development, a Beijing-based national think tank. "The government will instead boost credit growth in sectors conducive to economic restructuring, such as small and medium-sized enterprises, emerging industries and technologies, and the new energy sector, while becoming more tolerant of the risks brought by this process," Hu said. Agreed Zhu Haibin, JPMorgan's chief China economist. "It's clear that China will not forgo mid- to long-term policy resolves like financial stability and economic transformation for short-term GDP growth," he said. The government is likely to adjust the macro policy to buffer downside economic pressure, with fiscal policy set to accelerate budgeted spending and tap into this year's local government special bond quota in the rest of the year. The monetary policy stance, meanwhile, has been shifted from tightening to neutral, Zhu said. But industry policies to resolve risks in critical areas like debt of State-owned enterprises, local governments and property developers, and the shadow banking sector will continue throughout the year, he said. China's determination to combat financial risks amid economic headwinds highlights the country's economic governance principle, including the need to maintain strategic resolve and be prepared always to deal with the worst-case scenariopart of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialist Economy with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. Experts said China's overall stable financial situation has contributed to global financial stability, but the nation must deal with rising domestic and external risks, especially any defaults by large property developers, fiscal sustainability of some local governments, and the anticipated US Federal Reserve's asset purchase tapering. Dong Dengxin, director of the Wuhan University of Science and Technology's Finance and Securities Institute, said China's prudent policy stance in face of COVID-19 has made it a key pillar of global financial stability. "The nation should continue to play this role by sticking to high-quality development that refrains from ultra-loose monetary condition to stoke GDP growth," Dong said. China's overall stability in economic development and financial institutions' operations will keep systemic financial risks at bay, Hu of the NIFD said. The economy will not sharply decelerate amid ramped-up macro policy supportand years of efforts have significantly de-risked financial institutions, he said. The country is expected to withstand the risks stemming from any Fed tapering, which could exert pressure on emerging-market economies to tighten their monetary policies, and conflict with the need to keep domestic economic stability, he said. "China's principle to deal with such challenges will be prioritizing stabilizing the domestic economy," Hu said. "Maintaining domestic economic vitality remains the fundamental way to attract global capital." Zhu said the possibility of defaults by somewhat systemically important institutions cannot be ruled out in the coming months. But the government will draw up response plans in advance to minimize spillovers of the possible defaults and engage in more effective market communication about the risks and plans, all of which should help forestall secondary risks. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Hongyu) China urges U.S. to stop political manipulation on coronavirus origins tracing Xinhua) 10:07, August 26, 2021 BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- China on Wednesday urged the United States to stop political manipulation on the issue of coronavirus origins tracing. If the U.S. insists on the "lab leak" theory, it should invite the World Health Organization to investigate the labs of Fort Detrick and the University of North Carolina in the first place, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said at a daily press briefing. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Uganda starts distribution of China-donated Sinovac vaccine Xinhua) 10:08, August 26, 2021 KAMPALA, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Uganda's National Medical Stores (NMS) on Wednesday said it has started the distribution of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccines across the country. Trucks have been dispatched to different parts of the country to distribute the 300,000 Sinovac doses donated by the Chinese government, NMS spokesperson Sheila Nduhukire said in a statement. According to the ministry of health, Uganda expects to receive at least 12.3 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines by early 2022. The country aims at vaccinating about 22 million people, or nearly half the population, as a measure to put the pandemic at bay. As of Tuesday, about 1.2 million people had been vaccinated since the exercise started in March this year. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Things involving ethnic minorities weigh on Xi's mind (People's Daily App) 10:57, August 26, 2021 Poverty alleviation for ethnic minorities has always weighed on President Xi Jinping's mind. Whenever he goes to an ethnic minority community, he visits the kitchens and bathrooms of local residents, and asks about their education, medical care and income. (Produced by Sun Tianren, Wang Xiangyu, Di Jingyuan, Zhu Yingqi and Bi Jiayi) (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Hongyu) Chinese envoy urges countries to continue to support Iraq's political process Xinhua) 14:11, August 26, 2021 UNITED NATIONS, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese envoy on Wednesday urged the international community to continue to support Iraq's political process and assist Iraq in combating terrorism and COVID-19. As the upcoming elections in October are a top priority on Iraq's current political agenda and a crucial step forward in its political transition, "the international community should continue to support Iraq in advancing its domestic political process," Geng Shuang, China's deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, told the Security Council briefing on the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI). China supports Iraqi people's independent choice of development path that caters to their national realities, Geng said. "We are happy to see positive progress in electoral preparations. We support the UN in providing electoral assistance to Iraq, and hope that the UNAMI will play a constructive role in ensuring the smooth and successful conduct of the elections underpinned by the Iraqi-led and Iraqi-owned principle," he added. The envoy said that the international community should continue to support Iraq in combating terrorism and maintaining national security and stability. "Since the beginning of this year, there has been a marked surge in terrorist attacks on Iraqi soil, causing extensive casualties and damage to its infrastructure. It is imperative to increase international support to help Iraq address the threat of terrorism, combat the remnants of terrorist groups and accelerate the repatriation of foreign terrorist fighters," said Geng. Speaking of the fight against COVID-19, Geng called for continued efforts in combating the disease and the drive towards a speedy recovery. "The international community should translate its assistance commitments into action, effectively help Iraq rebuild its infrastructure, accelerate socioeconomic development and reverse the plight of vulnerable groups including displaced persons. Such assistance must not come with political strings attached," he said. "China stands ready to continue working with the rest of the international community to support Iraq in fighting COVID-19, accelerating reconstruction, restoring economic and social development and achieving long-term peace and security," said the envoy, as the third batch of vaccines from the Chinese government arrived in Baghdad on Aug. 12. (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Primary school in Beijing ready to embrace approaching fall semester Xinhua) 15:08, August 26, 2021 A teacher writes down greetings to students at Taiping Road Primary School in Haidian District of Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 26, 2021. Taiping Road Primary School is ready to embrace the approaching fall semester. The school regularly disinfects key areas such as teaching building corridors, classrooms, canteens and kitchens to ensure the health of teachers and students. (Xinhua/Ren Chao) (Web editor: Xia Peiyao, Hongyu) Chinese ambassador calls Meng Wanzhou, blasts Canada's hostage diplomacy Global Times) 15:43, August 26, 2021 As August 26 marks the 1,000th day since Meng Wanzhou, senior executive of Huawei, has been detained in Canada, Chinese Ambassador to Canada Cong Peiwu called Meng on Wednesday to express his sympathy and denounce the misdeeds of the Canadian government. The ambassador urged Canada to take the collective public opinion of over 1.4 billion people seriously in demanding the immediate release of Meng. Cong condemned the Canadian government's wrongdoing, emphasizing that any attempt and conduct of bullying or suppressing the Chinese people would be met with a counter strike, and the Chinese government firmly protects the legitimate rights of Chinese citizens and companies. August 26 marks the 1,000th day since Meng has been arbitrarily detained by Canada. Cong also published an article in local media The Hill Times on Wednesday, reiterating that the incident of Meng is purely a political one, and Canada is acting as a cat's paw for the US and has been used by the US. But the inspiring news is that a growing number of people have realized that the incident is, in essence, a political move that is illegal and unfair. Over 10 million people have signed a petition within protesting US political persecution of Huawei's MengWanzhou and demanding Canada to release her immediately. Click here to cast your vote for the release of Meng Wanzhou. The Global Times launched an online petition to release Meng on August 18 which has gathered over 14 million signatures as of Thursday morning, reflecting a strong public opinion in urging the Trudeau administration to stop playing the role of a willing accomplice of the US government and setting up such a well-plotted trap for the Chinese citizen to curb China's high-tech growth. Some Canadian media and politicians continue to ignore the collective voice of the Chinese citizens. Nevertheless, they have been quick to connect the incident of Meng with the recent judgments of Canadian citizens Michael Spavor and Robert Schellenberg, who were charged for illegally gathering the state secrets and drug trafficking, respectively. Cong said the nature of Meng's case is completely different from that of the Canadian citizens'. "The US fabricated false allegations of 'fraud' and Canada acted as an accomplice in detaining Meng, who did not violate any Canadian law. This is truly hostage diplomacy and arbitrary detention," he said. Also on August 18, the Global Times released an open letter to Canadian Ambassador to China Dominic Barton, demanding Meng's immediate and unconditional release and protested against the ugly acts of the Canadian government. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Hongyu) Critically endangered orchid lost for over 25 years rediscovered in SW China's Yunnan People's Daily Online) 16:32, August 26, 2021 The Cypripedium elegans (Photo/Jiang Hong) The Cypripedium elegans, a rare species of orchid, has recently been discovered for the first time in 25 years in Shangri-La, southwest China's Yunnan Province. The most recent specimen record on the flower in China traces back to 1996. The plant species has an extremely small population and is listed as critically endangered in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species. Researchers from the Yunnan Academy of Forestry and Grassland found wild populations of the Cypripedium elegans during an investigative trip to the Haba Snow Mountain in Shangri-La. Specimens of the species were first collected in 1879 in southwest China's Tibet autonomous region, the only other place home to the plant nationwide. (Web editor: Hongyu, Bianji) A visit to the Oriental Switzerland in Tibet People's Daily Online) 16:47, August 26, 2021 Lulang Town, located at an elevation of 3,700 meters, is hailed as the "Oriental Switzerland" in Nyingchi city, southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region. Being endowed with a breathtaking landscape, diverse ethnic culture and advanced infrastructure, the town has become a well-known tourist attraction along the Sichuan-Tibet highway. The Lulang International Tourist Town entered into trial operations in 2016 after Guangdong and Tibet collaboratively dedicated themselves to the project for a period of nine years and with a total investment of over 4 billion yuan (about $618 million). In the first half of 2021, the tourist town received more than 530,000 visitors and reaped a total revenue of over 65 million yuan (about $10.04 million) from its local tourism industry. (Web editor: Xian Jiangnan, Hongyu) Not your Father's Store anymore The enormous growth of the watchmaking business has also transformed the distribution of watches. Traditionally, a watchmaker relied on an arrangement of distributors across the globe to distribute its watches to a local network of retailers. These retailers were agents for multiple brands of watches that they offered their clientele. But by the year 2000, many watch brands had been consolidated into large luxury groups such as Richemont, Swatch Group, Kering and LVMH. These large groups then pushed for the integration of the traditional distribution channels, to reduce cost and increase the quality of customer service. The next step was to open mono-brand watch boutiques in large metropolitan cities across the world. Through these flagship points-of-sale, a brand can offer their clients access to exclusive or limited-edition watches, which would once have been challenging to access. More significantly, the brand can now build a choreographed experience for their customers: to enter a flagship boutique is to immerse yourself in the world of the brand. Certified Pre-Owned space in Bucherer Geneva boutique Bucherer To meet these challenges from the larger brands, the traditional watch retailer has also evolved its offering and customer experience. Retailers such as Bucherer and Watches of Switzerland have emerged, with large spaces and the ability to offer not only a greater variety of brands but also a depth of product. They are able to deliver more choices to their customers, and thus can better compete with mono-brand boutiques and the internet. A few also offer vintage watches and pre-owned models, which are usually trade-ins. These watches are usually refurbished to the specifications of the Manufacture, and are ready to find a new owner. This new category has found much popularity in the last few years, because it gives a broader base of customers access to watches that might otherwise be difficult to find, or too expensive to purchase new. Today, many retailers offer this new category of pre-owned watches, and even a few Manufactures have launched in-house programs similar to retailers. The early adopters are mainly independent watchmakers such as the manufacture F.P.Journe, which named its program Service Patrimoine, and unconventional brands such as MB&F, Urwerk and De Bethune, which simply call this category Pre-owned watches. Through these brands websites, customers can purchase older, discontinued collectible watches, which have been completely refurbished in-house. Certified Pre-Owned space in Bucherer Geneva boutique Bucherer Watch retailers have also experienced their own massive consolidation in the last 20 years. A few groups have now emerged to dominate the industry: in Asia The Hour Glass has traditionally been a dominating force, while in Europe and the United Kingdom, Bucherer and Watches of Switzerland have been increasing their presence in their respective markets. However, in the last few years, both these large retailers have been competing against each other in the United States through acquisitions. Watches of Switzerland has fuelled its growth by opening new boutiques in New York City and California, and has also acquired the well-established Mayors in Florida. In early 2018, Bucherer purchased Tourneau, the largest watch retailer in the United States, establishing a new status as a retail leader for brands such as Rolex. Smaller, family-owned retailers such as Wempe have also expanded by opening brand boutiques across the globe. Exterior of Watches of Switzerland in SoHo, New York Watches Finally, a new generation of retailers has emerged in the last five years, led by Hodinkee and Chrono24, both trailblazers in their own category. Hodinkee was founded in 2008 as a blog, but has rapidly transformed the watch retail business with its stylish website and a vast quantity of quality content that helps educate shoppers and allows them to make informed purchase decisions. Chrono24 has been an online marketplace for luxury watch dealers since 2003; it offers about half a million new, used or vintage watches from retailers all over the world, with easy navigation and a streamlined purchase experience. These two innovative pioneers have led to other online watch re-seller outlets, such as Watchfinder, A Collected Man and The Watchbox. Certified pre-owned area at Bucherer, Geneva Bucherer The watch retail business has seen a remarkable evolution in the last 20 years which has transformed the way watches are sold. This has benefited customers, by offering more choice and better access to watches. New technologies and more sophisticated collectors have challenged this traditional business, yet watch retail has proven itself able to adapt with an inventiveness that bodes well for the future. Certified pre-owned area at Bucherer, Geneva Bucherer *On the occasion of GMT Magazine and WorldTempus' 20th anniversary, we have embarked on the ambitious project of summarising the last 20 years in watchmaking in The Millennium Watch Book, a big, beautifully laid out coffee table book. This article is an extract. The Millennium Watch Book is available on www.the-watch-book.com, in French and English, with a 10% discount if you use the following code: WT2021. *Written by William Massena BEIJING, Aug. 26 -- According to Senior Colonel Tan Kefei, spokesperson for Chinas Ministry of National Defense, the Chinese military will host the first multinational peacekeeping live exercise Shared Destiny-2021 at the combined-arms tactical training base of the PLA Army in Queshan County of central Chinas Henan Province from September 6 to 15. Militaries of China, Pakistan, Mongolia and Thailand will dispatch more than 1,000 troops to participate in the drills, involving units of infantry, fast response, security, helicopter, engineering, transportation, and medical services, said Tan at a regular press conference in Beijing on August 26. The scenario of the exercise is joint operations of multinational peacekeeping forces, and the exercise will be held in a close-to-real battlefield environment set in accordance with the international, professional and realistic combat standards. In the exercise, drills of battlefield reconnaissance, security guarding and patrol, armed escort, protection of civilians, response to violent and terrorist attacks, construction of temporary operation base, battlefield first aid, and pandemic control will be conducted, for the purpose of responding to the UNs Action for Peacekeeping initiative, promoting practical cooperation and making joint efforts to enhance the peacekeeping standby forces capability of carrying out tasks. Tan said that the Chinese military, as a proactive practitioner of the vision of building a community with a shared future for mankind, will continue to take a more active part in UN peacekeeping operations and always be a staunch defender of world peace. BEIJING, Aug. 26 -- According to Senior Colonel Tan Kefei, spokesperson for Chinese Ministry of National Defense, the 10th experts' working group meeting on humanitarian mine action under ASEAN Defense Ministers' Meeting (ADMM)-Plus will be held via video link at the PLA Army Engineering University on September 14. Co-chaired by China and Cambodia, the meeting will be attended by representatives from 18 members of ADMM-Plus, ASEAN Secretariat, ASEAN Regional Mine Action Center, and International Committee of the Red Cross. The meeting is designed to have in-depth communication and discussion on the opportunities and challenges regarding mine-clearing cooperation, so as to promote the building of a multilateral mine-clearing cooperation mechanism of greater depth and breadth in the Asia-Pacific region, stated Tan at a regular press conference in Beijing on August 26. Tan also said that since its establishment, the ADMM-Plus mechanism has been focusing on addressing regional security issues, playing an important role in intensifying defense cooperation, promoting common security, and safeguarding peace in the Asian-Pacific region. China stands ready to work with all parties involved in the ADMM-Plus mechanism to actively advance cooperation at all levels and in all areas, provide help and assistance to relevant militaries within its capacity and make new and bigger contributions to preserving peace and stability in the region. BEIJING, Aug. 26 -- Practicing unilateralism and instigating confrontation will only lead to tension, instead of bringing about so-called "freedom and openness", said Senior Colonel Tan Kefei, a spokesperson for China's Ministry of National Defense, when commenting the recent US-led multinational joint exercises in the Indo-Pacific region at the regular press conference on August 26, 2021. Recently, the US military held the Large Scale Exercise (LSE) 2021 with the UK, Australia and Japan with the aim to strengthen the rules-based regional order and maintain a "free and open Indo-Pacific". Besides, the maritime joint exercise Malabar 2021, involving troops from the US, Japan, India and Australia, is scheduled to be conducted in the Philippines Sea from August 26 to 29. Some analysts say that the exercises mainly target China with increasingly intensified maritime activities. Snr. Col. Tan remarked that the US, for some time, by perceiving some other countries as its imaginary enemies, organized large-scale military exercises, formed gangs in relevant waters and showed off its military strength. Such movements of the US have severely undermined regional peace and stability, and run counter to the common aspiration of countries in the region to pursue peace, cooperation and development, Tan said. He stressed that China always holds that international military exchanges and cooperation should be conducive to safeguarding regional peace and stability, and enhancing mutual understanding and trust, rather than targeting or undermining the interests of any third party. China will continue to adhere to the concept of common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security, and is willing to work with the countries in this region to deepen security cooperation, jointly cope with threats and challenges and make the Asia-Pacific region a stable plate in the global framework, Tan added. BEIJING, Aug. 26 -- The global situation of COVID-19 prevention and control remains complex and challenging. Since August, Chinese military has provided COVID-19 vaccine assistance to militaries of related countries, said Senior Colonel Tan Kefei, spokesperson for the Ministry of National Defense (MND) on Thursday. To implement President Xi Jinpings important declaration on making Chinas COVID-19 vaccine a global public good, while doing well in its own epidemic prevention and control, the Chinese military continues to provide COVID-19 vaccine assistance to relevant foreign militaries, Tan said. Since August, the Chinese military has successively provided COVID-19 vaccines to the militaries of Bolivia, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, he noted. Next, the Chinese military will continue to strengthen anti-pandemic cooperation with defense departments and militaries of other countries, cooperating in fighting the COVID-19, as a way to make constant contributions to building a global community of health for all, Tan stated. Photo taken on Aug 23, 2021, shows packages of China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccines arriving at Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi, Vietnam. [Photo courtesy of the Chinese Embassy in Vietnam] HANOI - A transport aircraft of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) of China carrying a batch of China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine landed Monday at Noi Bai International Airport in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi. At the handover event, the Chinese Ambassador to Vietnam Xiong Bo said China had been paying close attention to the epidemic situation in Vietnam, and that the cooperation in the fight against the pandemic is a significant part of the cooperation between the militaries. China is willing to further its cooperation with Vietnam in battling COVID-19 in multiple ways, so as to help Vietnam both control the disease and advance socio-economic development, as well as to ensure the bilateral trade and the stability of the industrial and supply chains between the two countries, Xiong said. The handover marked the first time the Vietnamese military received COVID-19 vaccines from foreign militaries, and was the most vivid image of the comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership between the two countries, Hoang Xuan Chien, Vietnam's deputy minister of national defense, said at the handover event. Extending gratitude towards China for the vaccine, he promised that Vietnam will make the most of the vaccine and administer the doses in time among the Vietnamese personnel on the frontline against the pandemic. According to Vietnam's Ministry of Health, as of 6:30 pm local time Monday, Vietnam had registered 354,355 locally transmitted COVID-19 cases since the start of the current wave in the country in late April. Illustration/People's Daily Online The highly anticipated report on COVID-19 origins is finally set to be dropped. Ordered three months ago by American president Joe Biden and compiled by America's intelligence community, the report will arrive with the perfect timingwhen the US military, guided by the thorough calculus of US intelligence, has completed a swift and successful withdrawal of its troops lingering in Afghanistan. Well, this all depends on how you define "successful" and how you view America's intelligence community, which frequently offers up one-of-a-kind intelligence reports from time to time. If you are expecting a meticulous, watertight report that is in accordance with science and facts, you will probably find yourself disappointed. But if you are looking for a specious, preposterous, and Iraq-Has-Weapons-Of-Mass-Destruction-kind of piece, it's definitely worth the wait. In churning out gibberish and farcical accounts, the US intelligence community is rarely seen as reliable, and its output has certainly been stable in its quality. A brief review of its history will demonstrate how "trustworthy" the intel body has been. From the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 to the 9/11 Attacks, from the Fall of Saigon to the disgraceful fleeing of Kabul (not to mention the W.M.D. saga during the Iraq War)the US intelligence community has carried the torch of amateurish intel gathering in its surefire attempt to further fan the flames of war and confrontation. Taking a break from spying on American allies, the US intelligence community has been allocated with the significant task of tracking down the origins of COVID-19, capturing the spotlight and taking over the tasks of scientists. Biden's move to let intelligence personnel masquerade as scientists is appalling but unsurprising. After all, America is plagued with not only SARSCoV2 but also a blend of anti-science viruses, reducing them into a melting pot where masks are abandoned, vaccines rejected, and scientists taunted, where misinformation spreads as fast as the virus, and the voices of conspiracists and quacks speak louder than scientists and doctors. What to expect? On August 23, Jen Psaki, White House Press Secretary, revealed that the findings of the 90-day intelligence probe into the origins of COVID-19 would be finished this Tuesday, but that it would take a few days before it is declassified and made public. What you may ask is the fresh report all about? A similar report concocted by the Republican Party may offer a few clues. Earlier this month, the GOP disseminated a so-called "detailed" report on the COVID-19 lab leak conspiracy, offering their version of the COVID-19 probe, weeks ahead of the deadline of the report ordered by Joe Biden. In the GOP report, farfetched concerns and farcical trifles were pieced together to form "circumstantial evidence" pointing to a "lab leak" in China, e.g., major renovations to air safety and waste treatment systems in research facilities, satellite imagery of Wuhan in September and October 2019 showing "a significant increase in hospital visits and internet searches for COVID-19 symptoms," and the like. Come on the world's self-proclaimed most powerful intelligence community is better than this. Apart from the aforementioned tricks, Biden's intelligence squad might have mobilized some other cheap shots in vain. CNN reported on August 6 that American intelligence agencies had gained access to a catalog of virus-related information that contained genetic data from virus samples studied at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Hard as they tried, experts like Professor Jin Dongyan of Hong Kong University, believed that "no concrete conclusion can be reached in the analysis of indirect and circumstantial data. " "The sequence cannot tell where SARS-CoV-2 comes from. It could even be counterproductive, just raising more questions," said Jin. During an interview with CNBC's "Squawk Box" on August 23, NIH director Dr. Francis Collins reiterated that he believed the SARSCoV2 more likely has a natural origin, standing firmly along the long line of scientists who hold their belief against conspiracies and unscientific noises. "The vast evidence from other perspectives says no, this was a naturally occurring virus," Collins said. The reason why the US has been constantly belittling WHO's February report on the origins of COVID-19 and later decided to create their own versions of the report is very easy to fathom: the report didn't provide the conviction they wanted it to provide. Unless there is a guilty verdict, the US wouldn't give up so easily. In scapegoating China for its calamitous mishandling of the coronavirus, the US is following the same pattern used in framing China on Xinjiang, Hong Kong, and a whole spectrum of other issues: it created piles of anti-China documents packed with lies and disinformation and pressed for further investigations, all from a stance of moral supremacy. Whatever its findings, the COVID-19 origin report ordered by Joe Biden will at least divert some of the public's attention away from the recent developments in Afghanistan, which has dragged the president's support levels to a new all-time low. But the report proceedings will undoubtedly do nothing to persuade American citizens to put on their masks or roll up their sleeves in the fight against the virus. More likely than not, the report will merely serve as a piece of wastepaper that bears no other value than inciting hatred. The Chinese military urged the United States on Thursday to respect China's core interests and concerns, correct its wrong remarks and behave in the best interest of relations between the two nations and the two militaries, a spokesman said. Senior Colonel Tan Kefei of China's Defense Ministry said on Thursday afternoon in Beijing maintaining and developing a healthy, stable military-to-military relation is in the interest of both China and the US and is a shared hope of the international community. "Recently, some people in the US military made wrong, irresponsible remarks pertaining to China. We strongly oppose such moves. The fundamental roots of the grim situations and serious difficulties in the bilateral relationship are that the US side is obsessed with hegemonism, Cold War mentality, zero-sum games; it denies China's rise, regards China a strategic rival and security threat and makes all-out efforts to contain China," Tan said, adding the US' acts have severely compromised China's sovereignty, security and interests. He noted the Chinese armed forces are determined to safeguard the nation's sovereignty, security and interests as well as peace and stability in the region and the world. The spokesman said China sticks to a peaceful development path and its defense policies are defensive in nature. The nation is always a builder of world peace, a contributor to global development and a guardian of international order, he said, citing the Chinese military's participation in the United Nations' peacekeeping missions and multinational escort and humanitarian aid operations. "It has been proved China's defense development is an engine in the growth of the world's peace and the Chinese military is a firm pillar to the peace, stability and shared prosperity in the world," Tan said. In response to US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's statement that China's "claim to the vast majority of the South China Seatreads on the sovereignty of the states in the region", Tan said China's sovereignty over certain islands and their surrounding waters in the South China Sea is undeniable. The officer said China is dedicated to directly negotiating with related countries to resolve disputes on the basis of the respect of history and international law, while the US, as a nation outside the region, disrespects international laws and norms, flexes its muscles and makes trouble in the South China Sea under the disguise of "freedom of navigation", and keeps meddling in efforts by relevant countries to safeguard regional peace and stability. Seeking "independence" by force is a dead end, Senior Colonel Tan Kefei, spokesman of the Ministry of National Defense, said on Thursday in response to Taiwan's plan to expand weapons development. Joseph Wu Jaushieh, the island's head of external affairs, has recently claimed Taiwan is facing the "threat of military expansion" from the Chinese mainland and therefore should strengthen cooperation with "countries with similar ideologies" to improve the island's self-defense capabilities. Some media reports also said Taiwan is pressing ahead with the development of weapons for the so-called homeland defense operations. Tan said the one-China principle is the universal consensus of the international community. The DPP authorities have overrated their abilities by openly making "Taiwan independence" remarks and arrogantly engaging in provocations. The People's Liberation Army is on standby and will maintain a high state of readiness at all times to resolutely crush any "Taiwan independence" secessionist attempts, he said. "Relying on foreign powers and seeking independence by force is surely a path to destruction. China must and will be reunified. No one should underestimate the resolute determination, firm will and strong ability of the Chinese people to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity," he added. The PLA Tibet Military Command recently holds a live-fire exercise code named Snowland Mission 2021 on the plateau at the elevation of 4,500 m. The picture shows a tank firing at the simulate target during the exercise. (Photo by Wu Guolong) By RenqingWangdui, JinZhaowei, Jiang Feibo LHASA, Aug.26 -- More than 10 brigades and regiments assigned to the PLA Tibet Military Command recently held a live-fire exercise code-named Snowland Mission 2021 on the plateau at the elevation of 4,500m. Nearly ten thousand troops took part in the exercise. The exercise, an all-time, all-domain, all-factor, round-the-clock live-fire exercise involving units of combined arms, is aimed at enhancing the troops overall combat capabilities at high-altitude areas, including joint operation, precise attack, efficient destruction, and comprehensive logistics support. It verified the overall operational effectiveness of the combat units and weapons and demonstrated the combined operational capability of troops stationed in Tibet. The PLA Tibet Military Command recently holds a live-fire exercise code named Snowland Mission 2021 on the plateau at the elevation of 4,500m. The picture shows a vehicle-mounted howitzer conducting night firing during the exercise. (Photo by Lu Jian) BEIJING, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese military spokesperson Thursday urged the United States to respect China's core interests and major concerns, correct its own erroneous words and deeds, and do more to improve the relations between the two countries and two militaries. Tan Kefei, a spokesperson for the Ministry of National Defense, said at a press conference that for some time, some U.S. military officers made irresponsible and erroneous remarks on issues about China. "We firmly oppose such remarks," he said. The root cause of the difficulties in the bilateral relations is the U.S. side's obsession with hegemony, a Cold War mentality, and a zero-sum game, Tan said. Tan added that the United States sees China as a strategic rival and a security threat and has been doing everything possible to contain and oppress China, severely undermining China's sovereignty, security, and development interests. Reiterating China's commitment to peaceful development, Tan accused the United States of being the major factor driving the tensions in the South China Sea. "The Chinese military will resolutely safeguard China's sovereignty, security, and development interests, and firmly uphold regional and global peace and stability," he said. BEIJING, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- A joint military exercise between China and Russia, code-named ZAPAD/INTERACTION-2021, has charted the course for a new high-point in bilateral relations, opened new horizons for military drills between major countries, and explored new models for planning exercises together, a Chinese military spokesperson told a press conference on Thursday. The joint military drill was held from Aug. 9 to 13 in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. It concluded with great success and achieved the targets of deepening China-Russia strategic mutual trust, strengthening exchanges and cooperation between the two countries, and unleashing their combat capabilities, said Tan Kefei, spokesperson for the Ministry of National Defense. In one of the highlights, Chinese State Councilor and Minister of National Defense Wei Fenghe and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu observed the exercise, held talks and observed the signing of cooperation documents, according to the spokesperson. For the first time, the Russian military was invited to China on a large scale to participate in a strategic campaign exercise organized by the Chinese side, Tan said. Li Zuocheng, a member of the Central Military Commission (CMC) and chief of staff of the CMC Joint Staff Department, served as the general director of the exercise. He attended the opening ceremony and gave the order for the exercise to begin. It marked a new beginning for the Chinese military to conduct high-level exercises in an open and joint manner, said the spokesperson. During the exercise, the Chinese and Russian troops were mixed into groups, made exercise plans together and carried out joint operations on the same battlefield. A command information system specially designed for the two militaries was applied during the drill and the participating troops were able to carry out effective coordination thanks to the information system, said the spokesperson. Tan said the military exercise demonstrates the determination and ability of both sides to jointly deal with security threats, and safeguard regional security and stability. In the future, Tan said the two militaries will enhance strategic communication and practical cooperation, and continue exploring new models of international military cooperation, so as to add new dimensions to the China-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination for a new era. The Taliban also said it will not allow any extension of the Aug. 31 deadline. Therefore, U.S. allies say they are left with no choice but to follow that timetable. Professor Andrew Bell of the Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies at Indiana University, who served with the U.S. military in Afghanistan, said U.S. firepower is vital for the evacuation operations. "They provide important security capabilities that certainly in small components can be provided by some of the NATO allies, but really, the backbone has been formed by the U.S. military and for the mission to continue, really would rely on the capabilities brought by the American military," Bell told VOA. However, in a televised address Tuesday after the G7 summit, the president made it clear that the U.S. is sticking to the timetable. "The sooner we can finish the better. Each day of operations brings added risk to our troops," Biden said. "The completion by August 31st depends upon the Taliban continuing to cooperate and allow access to the airport for those who were transferred, who were transported out and no disruption to our operations. In addition, I've asked the Pentagon and the State Department for contingency plans to adjust the timetable should that become necessary," Biden added. Britain, which holds the rotating presidency of the G7 group of advanced economies, called an emergency virtual summit of the group Tuesday to discuss the crisis. Many G7 leaders implored U.S. President Joe Biden to extend the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of American troops. U.S. allies say they have no choice but to follow the American timetable and withdraw their troops from Afghanistan by Aug. 31, despite fears that not everyone will get out in time. Several NATO allies are evacuating their citizens from Kabul airport, including eligible Afghans who worked alongside them and who are now desperate to flee. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said U.K. forces had already evacuated 9,000 people as of Tuesday. "We will go on right up until the last moment that we can. But you have heard what the president of the United States has had to say, you have heard what the Taliban have said. I think you have got to understand the context in which we're doing this," he told reporters after the summit. "We're confident we can get thousands more out. But the situation at the airport is not getting any better, there are public order issues, it's harrowing scenes for those who are trying to get out, and it's tough for our military as well." Johnson said G7 leaders had agreed a common future approach. "We've got together, the leading Western powers, and agreed not just a joint approach to dealing with the evacuation, but also a road map for the way in which we're going to engage with the Taliban, as it probably will be a Taliban government in Kabul." The G7 has set conditions with safe passage for those who want to leave as the number one priority, Johnson told reporters. "Now, some of them will say that they don't accept that and some of them, I hope, will see the sense of that because the G7 has very considerable leverage, economic, diplomatic and political." Several G7 nations pledged for an increase in humanitarian aid and financial assistance for Afghanistan and its neighbors. In a press conference Tuesday, the European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the bloc has conditionally set aside $1.2 billion for Afghanistan for the coming seven years for development aid. "I and many others stressed that the future development assistance has to be condition-based. It always is condition-based, linked to fundamental values, human rights, of course, women's rights," von der Leyen said. "This aid ($1.2 billion) is now frozen. And it is frozen until we have solid guarantees and credible actions on the ground that the conditions are being met." There are European concerns over the longer-term consequences of the Western withdrawal. Charles Michel, the European Council President, said the EU would not allow another migrant crisis. "We will work with the countries in the region, especially Iran, Pakistan and Central Asia, to address the different needs. International protection will be needed for those facing persecution and for other vulnerable Afghans. And EU member states will contribute to this international effort," Michel told reporters. "Let's be clear, let us not allow the creation of a new market for smugglers and human traffickers. And we are determined to keep the migratory flows under control and the EUs borders protected." The focus of the U.S. and its allies currently remains on the difficult and dangerous days ahead, as the evacuations continue amid the chaos at Kabul airport. But analysts say the abruptness of the U.S. withdrawal has also tested transatlantic alliances. "In the short term, certainly this will continue to add some of the friction. There are bridges that continually need to be rebuilt in the post-Trump era," Indiana University's Bell said. "But I think in the long term this won't do much to significantly damage our [U.S.] relationship with our with our allies." Old brands embrace new mooncake varieties By:Wu Qiong | From:english.eastday.com | 2021-08-25 09:20 A cheese cranberry mooncake, a coffee with rice wine sauce Shanghais time-honored brands are continuing their way of innovation. As the Mid-autumn Festival is approaching, people are queuing up in front of Sunya Cantonese Restaurant on Nanjing Road Pedestrian Street to buy the must-eat mooncakes. Apart from classic savory mooncakes with their rich pork filling and the yanduxian (pickled pork simmered with bamboo shoots) mooncakes, this year the time-honored store has also innovated new flavors, such as tangerine peel & red bean paste, and lard, osmanthus & red bean paste. Old brands have also blazed new paths of selling their products. Since last year Xing Hua Lou has opened live-streaming channels for online sales. This year, it has planned to increase the number of live streams to 80 during the mooncake season. It has also worked with big data companies for digital transformation. Xing Hua Lou mooncakes will join Wei Yas live-streaming room at the end of this month, said Lu Jun, a sales person from Xing Hua Lous Innovative Marketing Center. She has selected what to present: the Golden Moon gift box with Shanghai-style packaging, he added. To better target consumers, it has made preparations with the help of big data. After analyzing parameters including consumers ages, shopping habits and locations, it will combine the results into promotional campaigns like live-streaming and flash sale. It is found that Xing Hua Lou has an advantage among consumers aged 30 to 45, while the market share in consumers aged 25 to 30 is only 22%. These young people tend to buy mooncakes featuring cheese, lava, and low sugar. Another example is Shao Wan Sheng, an old Shanghai brand known for its pickled and liquor-laced foods. Not long before, it became a new hit among the younger generation after opening its first coffee store at Peoples Square, by cooperating with J9 Coffee. The four kinds of coffee are popular among many consumers. (Photos/Zhang Yuyun, Xinmin.cn) Texas flags wave in the wind as they sit on display in the Main Plaza for Texas Independence Day on Tuesday, March 2, 2021. MIKALA COMPTON | Herald-Zeitung The automated material handling system sorts through returned books at the New Braunfels Public Library on Wednesday, March 31, 2021. New Braunfels Public Library will host its first-ever Community Read program in September and October. MIKALA COMPTON | Herald-Zeitung New Braunfels, TX (78130) Today Some clouds. Low around 75F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Some clouds. Low around 75F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph. Thank you for reading! Please log in, or sign up for a new account and purchase a subscription to continue reading. Woburn, MA (01801) Today A steady rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Low 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight A steady rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Low 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Support Local Journalism Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by making a contribution. Parents by the dozens took turns at the lectern during the South Madison Community Schools board meeting Aug. 19, pleading with elected officials to lift the districts mask mandate, The Herald Bulletin of Anderson reports. Interestingly, those demands were made the same day the district middle and high schools went to all-virtual learning. Enough of the panic button, parent Kyle August Novich said during his time at the microphone. Enough of the masks. I question what were doing and who we are trying to protect. Its a scene thats coming to every school board in Howard County. So theres no excuse for local school officials not to have those answers at the ready. Action taken by South Madison Community Schools and closer to home, by Maconaquah schools, after 46% of its high school students tested positive for COVID-19 or had contact with a someone with the virus is due to a nationwide fourth spike in COVID cases. According to the state of Indianas COVID-19 Dashboard, which updates school-case data each Monday, every Howard County school building but one reported zero cases or fewer than five cases in total on Aug. 16. The outlier was Eastern Elementary, which reported eight students with COVID. Totals surely will be higher this week. Support Local Journalism Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by making a contribution. Contribute At an Aug. 16 press conference, Commissioner Paul Wyman said Howard Countys 10-day, new-case average was 40 COVID cases, up from 10 one month ago. Hospitalizations are up to 15-20 each day, up from three a month earlier. There are many more people that are sick in our community with COVID at this time, Wyman said last week. And with a full-vaccination rate of just 43% in Howard County, more residents will fall ill with the virus. We recognize that no one wants to be the bad guy. After a local mask mandate and brief lockdown due to COVID in 2020, no elected official particularly the president and the governor - wants to issue yet another COVID-related health directive. The next ones will be issued locally. Were surprised masks arent required in local schools already. At some point, and soon, they will be. So, to answer that Pendleton-area parent, who asked board members whom they were trying to protect from COVID-19: That would be your children, their teachers and the community at-large. - Kokomo Perspective Josh Lucas has joined the cast of 'Lilly'. The 50-year-old joins Thomas Sadoski and Patricia Clarkson in the political thriller based on the life of Lilly Ledbetter, a key campaigner in the fight for equal pay for women in the United States. Lilly was the Alabama woman who President Obama named his first piece of legislation The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act of 2009. The movie explores the cost of putting one's life on the line in a bid for justice. At the heart of the film is the romance between Lilly (Clarkson) and her husband Charles (Lucas), who stood by his wife despite life-threatening challenges and family strife. Thomas will play the role of Jon Goldfarb, the civil rights attorney who oversaw Ledbetter's legal battles. Rachel Feldman is directing the movie from a script written by Adam Prince. Support Local Journalism Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by making a contribution. Contribute The indie film will be produced by J. Todd Harris, Kelly Ashton, Simone Pero, Christine Schwarzman and Kerianne Flynn in association with Thomasville Pictures. Patricia previously explained how she felt a personal connection to the role as she hails from a political family. Her mother Jackie Clarkson was a political figure in New Orleans. She said: "When I told my mother that I'd be playing Lilly Ledbetter, she had to put the phone down to catch her breath. Playing Lilly is truly an honour, I'm thrilled to bring this extraordinary woman to life." Feldman added: "There have been many films made about an ordinary citizen who fights entrenched, monolithic systems, but as a filmmaker, what interests me is not the struggle per se, but the psychological cost of activism. "Though Lilly never received a dime in reparations, she became the face of an issue, and speaking up for others defined a life of purpose, fulfilling her destiny. I believe Lilly's story of radical resilience is a theme that will resonate around the world. The opportunity to collaborate with the astoundingly gifted Patricia Clarkson is thrilling." A decision regarding the neglect charges against the adoptive parents of Natalia Barnett was upheld today in The Indiana Court of Appeals. Kristine and Michael Barnett were charged with multiple counts of neglect of a dependent in 2019 for leaving their then-adopted daughter alone in an apartment in Lafayette. A Tippecanoe judge dismissed most of the charges in August 2020, deciding that they weren't applicable due to another judge's determination of Natalia's actual age, as well as the statue of limitations being exceeded before the charges were filed. Tippecanoe County Prosecutor Patrick Harrington took the case to the Court of Appeals, which upheld the decision Wednesday. The prosecutor's office plans to appeal the decision further to the Indiana Supreme Court, Harrington said Wednesday evening. Kristine and Michael Barnett adopted Natalia in 2010, believing she was legally 7 years old. In 2013, the Barnetts filed for for an "age-change order" to change her birth date from 2003 to 1989 in a probate court in Marion County, effectively making Natalia legally 22 at the time, according to previous Exponent reporting. The court didn't appoint a guardian to represent Natalia in the decision, and neither her nor the Barnetts were present when the decision was made which, the prosecutor argues, means the decision should not have been affirmed. The age change was based on estimates from a primary care physician and a social worker, according to court documents. Natalia has a form of dwarfism called diastrophic dysplasia, which results in muscle and bone issues. Along with lying about her age, the Barnetts claimed that Natalia attempted to poison them, stood over their bed with knives and tried to push Kristine into an electric fence accusations Natalia denied when she went on "The Dr. Phil Show" in 2019. Support Local Journalism Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by making a contribution. Contribute Because of this, the Barnetts moved Natalia into her own apartment in Lafayette and helped her obtain federal disability benefits to aid her transition into adult life, court documents say. The Barnetts moved to Canada soon after with their biological children, and while they paid her first year's rent, they didn't support Natalia financially in any other way. After multiple investigations starting in 2013, the Barnetts, who have since divorced, were each charged with six counts of neglect of a dependent and two counts of conspiracy to commit neglect of a dependent. The first six charges were dismissed in 2019, but the conspiracy counts remain. The appeals court dismissed the prosecutor's first argument of collateral attack, which is defined in court documents as a judicial proceeding used to evade or deny the validity of a previously valid judgment. The prosecutor claimed that the age-change order should be voided since the adoption court had already confirmed Natalia's birth year as 2003. The appeals court ruled that neither the adoption court nor the probate court were acting out of their authority to make their respective rulings. The prosecutor also argued that because the state was not present when the age-change order was decided, applying the decision in further rulings would be unfair. The appeals court cited in its documents multiple instances in which the state could have appealed the decision and failed to do so. Finally, Harrington's office argued that the statute of limitations had not been reached, as the Barnetts concealed their wrongdoings to keep the state from prosecuting. The appeals court ruled that nothing the Barnetts did truly prevented the state from bringing charges against them at the time the offenses occurred. The Exponent has reached out to Natalia on Facebook and hasn't received a response. Press Release August 26, 2021 'Return everything': Unused funds in PITC, PS-DBM should be returned to national coffers, Drilon says Senate Minority Leader Franklin M. Drilon on Thursday lauded the Philippine International Trading Corporation (PITC) for heeding his call to return billions in unused funds to the national treasury in support of the government's response to COVID-19 pandemic. However, the minority leader, who exposed billions of pesos parked in the PITC, said the trading firm should return "up to the last centavo" of the P11.02 billion unused and unexpended funds. "This is consistent with the findings of the COA, the Government Auditing Code of the Philippines and the provision in the Republic Act No. 11520 that extended the availability of the 2020 national budget," Drilon said. RA 11520 explicitly provides that "Any balances of fund transfers in the books of the PITC shall revert to the unappropriated surplus of the general fund" upon its effectivity" in December 2020. It was Drilon who inserted that provision in the said law to force government procurement agencies to turn over unused funds to the national coffers. According to the 2020 COA report, the balance of the fund transfers amounting to a little over P11 billion from various source agencies, specifically national government agencies, were not returned to the concerned source agencies or the Bureau of Treasury contrary to audit guidelines as well as the general provisions of the prior year's General Appropriations Act, Drilon noted. The PITC had earlier reported to have returned P5.2 billion of its funds to the Bureau of Treasury. "Is the P5.2 billion being reported as having been returned part of the P11.02 billion flagged by COA?" asked Drilon. If not, Drilon said then the entire fund must be returned immediately. "Ilang milyong bakuna ba ang mabibili sa P11 bilyon? Ilang pamilya ang makakatanggap ng P4,000 kung maibabalik nang buo ang P11 bilyon? Drilon said. Drilon said if the entire P11 billion is returned, it will enable the government to buy 22 million doses of vaccines at P500 per dose or provide ayuda to 2.7 million families. Drilon said the controversial Procurement service of the Department of Budget and Management (PS-DBM) should do the same. The COA also flagged PS-DBM for unused funds that remained dormant for years to the tune of P11.86 billion. "The PITC and PS-DBM have no right to keep this huge sum of taxpayers' money. Pursuant to Section 65 of Presidential Decree No. 1445 or the Government Auditing Code of the Philippines, all interest earning of the fund transfers must be remitted to the national treasury," Drilon stressed. "Consistent with the provision of RA 11520, any balances of fund transfers to procurement agencies should revert to the general fund," he added. He advised the Department of Finance (DOF) to look into the funds being held by PITC and PS-DBM "contrary to the laws." - END Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare Spokeswoman Sarah Farley said on Thursday the strain is ongoing at hospitals across the U.S. and at Medthodist. Iraq is ready for the pullout of the US troops, top diplomat Fuad Hussein stressing that his country had all the forces and means to fight terrorism, Middle East Monitor (MEMO) reports. Speaking from the Russian capital Moscow, Fuad told Sputnik that the Iraqi security services had sufficient information about terrorists and how to combat them. We are witnessing some movement at some hidden cells but this activity does not pose a threat to Iraqi society, he said. The Iraqi top diplomat also indicated that there was a clear agreement on the withdrawal of the US combat units, noting that some other units are still there helping the Iraqi government and security services in every way possible, including training and exchanging information, MEMO notes. The development in Afghanistan where Taliban regained control of the country following the gradual withdrawal of US forces, has stocked fear a complete pullout of the US boots could also lead to chaos. Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang in a correspondence with his Syrian counterpart Hussein Arnous indicated that Beijing to support Syria in combating the coronavirus pandemic, improving the livelihood of its people and accelerating reconstruction, Middle East Monitor (MEMO) reports. Keqiang said the Chinese government attaches great importance to developing relations with Syria, adding that the two countries have traditional friendly relations and have long exchanged understanding and mutual support on issues related to core interests and major concerns of the two countries. Arnous reportedly stressed that Keqiang has expressed his countrys readiness to make joint efforts with the Syrian government to consolidate the traditional friendship between the two countries and constantly push forward cooperative relations, wishing Syria and its people security and prosperity. Barely a week after partnering with rapper Khaligraph Jones to support talented rappers in the grassroots, Odibets has now teamed up with Bahati for a new campaign. Dubbed Pata Bahati ya biz na Odibets, the promo seeks to support small-scale businesses. It is a partnership between the local betting company and the musicians Bahati Tena Foundation. The one-of-a-kind promo is set to see several lucky betting fanatics win Sh 50,000 weekly to boost their business. Customers are required to place at least one jackpot bet on any Odibets Mega jackpot round using a stake of Sh95. They will then automatically enter into the draw to win. All Mega jackpot bets shall also be considered as entries in the promotion. Winners will receive their boost credited to their OdiBets accounts. This can be withdrawn via Mpesa. Bahatis foundation represents the ghetto people. I have decided to partner with Odibets on this promo to give back to my loyal fans who have been with me through thick and thin, boosting their businesses and helping them earn a living for themselves will see them through the rest of the year as the promo runs, Bahati said during the launch of the promo at Sankara Hotel. The Promo runs from August 23th 2021 to 1st of July 2022. Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) detectives have arrested a prison officer who was reportedly out for the blood of his girlfriend. Edwin Omuse, who is stationed Kangeta GK Prison in Meru, reportedly stormed out of the correctional facility on a mission to kill his girlfriend. He was armed with a gun loaded with 20 rounds of ammunition that was concealed in a sack. Omuse had been overheard saying that he would travel to Thika with a mission of eliminating his girlfriend, whom he alleged had defrauded him Sh900,000 that he had borrowed from a money lending institution, the DCI said. Efforts to trace the warder gone rogue in Meru became fruitless after he disappeared from the prison, where he had been assigned sentry duties. The last eyewitnesses who saw Omuse in Meru told detectives that they had spotted him on a fast-moving motorbike. Detectives attached to the Special Service Unit swung into action and through intelligence managed to trace the womans house which is located in Kisii Estate within Thika town. The sleuths moved her to safety and laid an ambush in wait for Omose. At around 5 pm Wednesday, Omose arrived, and using a spare key he gained entry into the house. He assembled the firearm and made a call to the girlfriend who is a fourth-year student at Mt. Kenya University, inquiring on her whereabouts. The detectives immediately moved in and without firing a single shot, arrested Omosa and recovered the firearm loaded with 20 rounds of 7.62 mm caliber, which had been hidden beneath a couch. The suspect is safely in our custody, as detectives process him for arraignment, DCI added. The officer will be arraigned in court today, Thursday, August 26. The DCI strongly warns and cautions the female youth particularly those in the Universities, Colleges and other tertiary institutions to be wary of predators whose bond of love is premised on monetary cords that are meant to temporarily win their affection. These cords suffer monetary volatility which lead to suicidal and animalistic psychological attacks. Take time to know him and do due diligence. An elderly man is facing charges of threatening to kill a woman who turned down his romantic advances after he had sent her money. Joel Mecha, 50, appeared at the Kibera law courts in Nairobi where he was accused of uttering the words: nitakutoa hio kichwa au mtoto wako apotee to the complainant. The words that loosely translate to, I will dismember your head or your child will get lost, were interpreted as death threats. The fallout between the pair started when Mecha reportedly called the woman to meet him in town and gave her a Sh10,000 cheque. The following day, Mecha sent her an additional Sh1000 and told her it was for accepting the cheque. The man would then proceed to make incessant calls to the woman which made her uncomfortable. The woman who works as a cashier at a church was forced to block his number, but Mecha used different numbers to call her. The two later met at the womans house after Mecha sent a churchmate to the complainant, During the meeting, he reportedly declared that he wanted her to be his lover. But the 32-year-old woman rejected his overtures citing their age difference. He would later issue the threats while demanding a refund. Mecha denied the charges saying their conflict is a result of a debt that the woman owes him. Senior resident magistrate Charles Mwaniki released him on a cash bail of Sh15,000. The case will be mentioned on September 6. The Kenyan boyband Sauti Sol has rubbished reports of going their separate ways. The Afropop group was reacting to an article by the Standard indicating that they had announced their breakup. In a shocking turn of events, long-time music group Sauti Sol have announced their imminent breakup. Group leader Peter Marangi explained that artistic differences were the main reason for the breakup, the article reads in part. The article also reported that rifts started appearing within the group in 2008 after their second album was released in 2006. It was also claimed that Sauti Sol was ejected from a concert in Nairobi in 2010 after a public disagreement. Taking to social media, the Midnight Train hitmakers dismissed the claims as witchcraft. What kind of witchcraft is this? they posed. Band leader Bien Baraza further rubbished the claims, saying: The same way it is unconstitutionally illegal to imagine the death of the President, it is also illegal to imagine the breakup of Sauti Sol. The wife of a policeman who went on a shooting rampage and killed his girlfriend has spoken out revealing more details about the ordeal. Police Constable Bernard Sivo, 28, had initially assaulted his girlfriend, 29-year-old Mary Nyambura, before following her to Njoro sub-county Hospital, where he shot her dead. The cops wife, Joyce Ndunge, was also caught up in the shocking midnight attack and escaped death by a whisker. Speaking to the media, Ndunge said there was something odd about Sivo that night. She recalled him playing with their children on Saturday night and later reported for sentry duty at 11 pm. Your browser does not support the video tag. A dozen Emory recent alumni and PhD students have been selected for the competitive Fulbright program to teach English, pursue graduate study and conduct research abroad for this academic year. Learn more about applying for Fulbright grants The Fulbright scholarship application process is open to Emory seniors, alumni and graduate students. Undergraduates, including those in nursing and business, and recent alumni can learn about the Fulbright process here; the internal application deadline is Sept. 9. Information about applying through the Laney Graduate School is listed here. Nine recent Emory University alumni and three PhD students have been selected as Fulbright finalists to teach English, pursue graduate study and conduct research abroad during the 2021-2022 academic year. The dozen were selected for the U.S. governments flagship international exchange program from a record 11,700 applicants. The finalists will study, conduct research and teach abroad through the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. They also work to support the Fulbright mission of building mutual understanding between the U.S. and more than 160 partner nations. Awardees are selected based on their academic merit, ambassadorial skills and leadership potential. We are proud of Emory undergraduates, alumni and graduate students for contributing their work to this important cross-cultural understanding, says Megan Friddle, director of Emory Colleges National Scholarships and Fellowships Program. Their accomplishments reflect our scholars commitment to servant leadership. Eight of the alumni selected for the latest Fulbright round are graduates of Emory College, including two Oxford College continuees. One graduated last year from Emorys Rollins School of Public Health. The PhD students, who all were selected for research grants, come from the anthropology, history and religion programs of Emory's Laney Graduate School. Emorys U.S. Fulbright research grantees for 2021-2022 are: Georgia Brunner, a PhD student in history, who will study and research gender, labor and identity between 1918-1985 in the building of Rwanda. Bridget Hansen, a PhD student in anthropology, selected for her research project in creating psychiatry and transforming doctors in the Sultanate of Oman. Brittany Landorf, a PhD student in religion, selected for her project, Training the Soul, Cultivating the Gendered Self, in Morocco. Karishma Mehrotra 16C, international studies and journalism, now a reporter at The Indian Express in New Delhi, selected for the Fulbright-Nehru Open Study/Research Award in Urban Studies in India, to research the pandemic lockdowns impact on the decision-making of migrants. Jesse Steinman 21C, history and German studies, selected for the Fulbright Community-Based Combined Award in History for a project developing an interreligious educational program about Graz, Austrias Jewish history. Julie Wechsler 21C, psychology and linguistics, selected for a linguistics research award to study the impact of a national registry of interpreters and translators of Indigenous languages in Peru. Awa Youm, a 2021 MPH graduate in global health, who received a public health research award to study reproductive coercion and gender-based violence in Mauritius. Those selected to serve as Fulbright English Teaching Assistants in countries around the world are: Megan Johnston 21C, applied mathematics and environmental sciences, Madagascar Louise Liu 19Ox 21C, English and psychology, Taiwan Demitra Papakostas 21C, mathematics and computer science, with a minor in East Asian studies, Taiwan Kaleb Roderick 21C, Spanish and linguistics, Brazil Rose Tehrani 19Ox 21C, biology and Spanish, Spain Four additional Emory alumni were named alternates for the both the Fulbright English Teaching Award and research grants. They are Anna Crossley 21C, English and creative writing, to teach in South Korea; Alana Giarrano 20C, political science, to teach in Laos; Madelyn Haden 19Ox 21C, human health and Middle Eastern and South Asians studies, for anthropology research in Morocco; and Piper Spooner 21C, Chinese studies, to teach in South Korea. Welcome Guest! You Are Here: Welcome Guest! You Are Here: Home Regional News East Cassation instance rejects nine appeals against bankruptcy of Promsvyazbank ex-owner RAPSI, Vladimir Burnov 11:13 26/08/2021 MOSCOW, August 26 (RAPSI) The Moscow District Commercial Court has rejected nine cassation appeals against lower courtsdecisions to declare ex-owner of PJSC Promsvyazbank (PSB) Dmitry Ananyev bankrupt, according to court records. The appeals instance dismissed the complaints filed by Promsvyazbank and several other legal entities and individuals against the decision of the Moscow Commercial Court of February 1, which introduced an assets disposition procedure with respect to the debtor, and of an appeals instance of April 21. The Ninth Commercial Court of Appeals declared Ananyev bankrupt on June 15, 2020 at the request of Nastyusha Grain Company, and a debt restructuring procedure was introduced with respect of that person The board of appeals canceled the determination of a first instance court of November 25, 2019, by which the proceedings on the banker's insolvency sought by the company were terminated. In also worth noting that in September 2019, the Russian Supreme Court dismissed Ananyevs move to cancel the decision on the initiation of the respective bankruptcy case. The banker appealed against the ruling of the Moscow Commercial Court of April 12, 2019, by which at the request of the bankruptcy commissioner of Nastyusha company a bankruptcy case was initiated against the businessman. Earlier, in June 2019, the Moscow Commercial Court dismissed a request to seize Ananyevs property worth 2.8 billion rubles ($38 million at the current exchange rate) when examining his bankruptcy case. At that time the court established that the applicant had not presented evidence proving that the failure to take interim measures could complicate or make impossible the execution of the respective judicial act. However, on May 29, 2019, the Moscow Commercial Court satisfied an application of Promsvyazbank seeking to seize the property of the former owners of the bank, Alexey and Dmitry Ananyevs, in the amount of 282.2 billion rubles ($3.8 billion) in the framework of a claim to recover losses in the amount of 282.2 billion rubles from twelve former top managers of the bank. On December 15, 2017, the Central Bank of Russia introduced a temporary administration for the management of Promsvyazbank. The functions of the provisional administration were entrusted to the Management Company of the Banking Sector Consolidation Fund. As a measure aimed at improving the financial stability of the bank and ensuring the continuity of its activities in the banking services market, it is planned that the Central Bank will participate as an investor using the funds of the Banking Sector Consolidation Fund. In October 2019 the Moscow City Court upheld the arrest of Alexey and Dmitry Ananyevs in absentia in a criminal case over embezzlement on an especially large scale, as the press service of the court informed RAPSI. On September 10, 2019, a first instance court ruled to detain the Ananyevs for two months. The term of detention is to be calculated from the date they are apprehended. Sentence of New Greatness extremism movement member in extremism case upheld RAPSI 12:56 26/08/2021 MOSCOW, August 26 (RAPSI) The Moscow City Court on Thursday upheld sentence against a member of the New Greatness movement Pavel Rebrovsky for organization of an extremist community, the courts press service told RAPSI. However, the court included his house arrest term served from March 2018 to March 2019 in the punishment term. In late October, Moscows Lyublinsky District Court convicted and sentenced Rebrovsky. Prosecutors asked to jail the defendant for 7 years. In October 2019, his case was sent back to a lower court for reconsideration. The Moscow City Court therefore overturned a 2.5-year jail sentence passed on him. The first trial of Rebrovsky was held without examination of evidence and witness interrogation as the defendant had pleaded guilty. However, he failed to fulfill the plea deal conditions that led to the sentence vacation and retrial. In August 2020, other New Greatness defendants Dmitry Poletayev, Maxim Roshchin, Maria Dubovik and Anna Pavlikova received 6, 6.5, 6 and 4 years of suspended sentence respectively. The movements leader Ruslan Kostylenkov was ordered to serve 7 years in penal colony; Vyacheslav Kryukov and Petr Karamzin were imprisoned for 6.5 and 6 years in jail respectively. The court found that had created the community for a violent upheaval. Prosecutors earlier asked the court to sentence alleged leader of the extremist movement Kostylenkov to 7.5 years in penal colony; Karamzin and Kryukov to 6.5 and 6 years behind bars respectively. Suspended terms were demanded for other defendants. The defendants were arrested in March 2018. Investigators stated that they followed far-right ideas and that their leader claimed that he planned to establish a new order in Russia. The New Greatness case became a subject of public controversy because the defense has information that the movement itself was organized by a law enforcement officer. Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin's Regular Press Conference on August 26, 2021 2021/08/26 CGTN: It is reported that international experts of the WHO-China joint mission on the origins study said recently that there is no evidence supporting the lab-leak theory and hyping up this hypothesis shows that the origins study is politicized. An international scientist familiar with the origins tracing work said the report of the US intelligence community on the origins of COVID-19 cannot provide any new evidence, which is no surprise for most scientists. Do you have any comment? Wang Wenbin: The origins study is a scientific issue that requires the cooperation of global scientists. This is the consensus of the overwhelming majority of countries and the science community. The US moves of relying on its intelligence apparatus instead of scientists to trace the origins of COVID-19 will only undermine science-based origins study and hinder the global effort of finding the source of the virus. Why is the US doing so although this is not the way the relevant work should be conducted? What is the US true intention of drawing on the intelligence community? These questions are worth pondering. SCMP: The US Justice Department has asked the US subsidiary of Sing Tao Daily, a newspaper headquartered in Hong Kong, to register as a foreign agent. Do you have any comment? Wang Wenbin: I'm not aware of the situation yet. China always opposes the wrong practice by the US side to carry out groundless political oppression on Chinese media. Xinhua News Agency: Rep. Michael McCaul, Lead Republican of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, released not long ago an investigation report on the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), which cited extraordinarily high budget figures to suggest that something "unusual" was happening at the WIV. But actually, the report exaggerated the expenses for a new ventilation system by 1,000 times. Besides, it also exaggerated tenfold or a hundredfold six other WIV budget figures. I wonder if you would like to comment on this? Wang Wenbin: I've noted relevant reports. This is further evidence that the so-called lab leak allegation by the US is not credible at all. It is based on nothing but false and erroneous information and data. This also shows again that origins study should not be politicized. It is a matter of science that should be studied by scientists, not manipulated by politicians or intelligence services. FSN: First, there are reports saying Michael Spavor has filed an appeal this week. Could the foreign ministry confirm whether or not that's the case and share any other details you may have? Second, today marks 1000 days since the arrest of Meng Wanzhou. Does the foreign ministry have any comment? Wang Wenbin: China has stated the position on the case of Canadian citizen Michael Spavor on multiple occasions. The relevant Canadian citizen is suspected of committing the crime of endangering China's national security. China is a country governed by law. China's judicial authorities handle all cases independently and fully protect the rights of the Canadian citizen. The case of Meng Wanzhou is purely a political incident. It is, in essence, a political persecution against a Chinese citizen plotted by the US and executed by Canada as an accomplice, and a deliberate oppression on China's local enterprise. The US and Canada repeatedly cited laws as the excuse to defend and whitewash their persecution against a Chinese citizen. However, the international community is fully aware that the laws the US and Canada referred to are merely a tool used by the US for predatory behavior, suppressing people holding different views and seeking personal gains, and are of no impartiality or legitimacy at all. The Canadian side, in total disregard of the US' political agenda and the fact that Ms. Meng Wanzhou had not violated any Canadian law, has groundlessly detained her for as long as 1000 days, making it an accomplice for the US' political persecution against a Chinese citizen. I wonder, does the Canadian side have a right perspective on what's right and what's wrong? Where is the human rights that the Canadian side claims to champion? What Canada has done as a cat's paw of the US brings no good to anyone. The gains by doing so cannot make up for the losses. The Chinese people uphold justice and are not intimidated by power or violence. The Chinese side will never accept any form of political coercion or abuse of justice, and will never allow its citizens falling prey to other countries' political persecution. The Global Times has recently launched an online petition asking the Canadian side to immediately release Ms. Meng unconditionally, which is signed by nearly 15 million people to date. We solemnly urge the US and Canada to heed the call for justice from the Chinese Government and people, correct its wrongdoings immediately, end the arbitrary detention of Ms. Meng Wanzhou, withdraw her arrest warrant and extradition request, and release her and ensure her safe return to China. Shenzhen TV: It is reported that the Japanese government and Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) decided on August 25 to construct an undersea tunnel for releasing the nuclear contaminated water from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant into the ocean. A South Korean official expressed strong regret over Japan's unilateral moves to push ahead the discharge plan without any prior consultations, adding that it is Japan's due responsibility to have full consultations and maintain communication with neighboring countries. Do you have any comment? Wang Wenbin: The Chinese side has noted the ROK's response and we share its concern. Following its wrong decision to release the nuclear contaminated water into the sea despite doubts and opposition at home and abroad, it is now going down the wrong path further by advancing relevant preparations both policy-wise and technology-wise. This only shows that Japan lacks the basic sincerity in understanding the concern of all parties. China urges Japan to earnestly respond to the call of the international community, neighboring countries and its own people, immediately revoke the wrong decision, fulfill due international obligations and avoid starting the discharge before reaching consensus with all stakeholders and the relevant international organizations through full consultation. Beijing Media Network: It is reported that Dr. Michael Ryan, Executive Director of the WHO Health Emergencies Programme, when asked about a relevant question the other day, said that all hypotheses regarding the origins of SARS-CoV-2 are still on the table, adding that China's call for an investigation into Fort Detrick is a "contradiction", as Beijing has fiercely pushed back against the lab-leak theory. Would you like to respond to this? Wang Wenbin: China's call is reasonable and justified. There is no "contradiction" whatsoever. On the issue of origins study, Chinese and WHO experts have reached the conclusion that a lab leak from Wuhan is extremely unlikely. Scientists across the world, including in the US, overwhelmingly believe that there is no evidence supporting a lab leak theory. It is the US that refuses to subscribe to this scientific conclusion and asserts that the virus was leaked from a Wuhan lab. Given that the Wuhan Institute of Virology has received two visits from WHO experts already and that the Fort Detrick base and the University of North Carolina (UNC) boast a long history of coronavirus research as well as poor safety records, if the US side insists on the lab leak hypothesis, then it's incumbent on the US to open up Fort Detrick for international investigation. In the same vein, if the WHO Secretariat insists that the possibility of a lab leak cannot be ruled out, then it's incumbent on the WHO to investigate Fort Detrick. Regrettably, we still haven't heard about any plan in this direction by the Secretariat. The Chinese side has submitted to the WHO Secretariat a joint letter signed by 25 million Chinese netizens calling for a probe into Fort Detrick, but has received no response yet. By calling for an investigation into Fort Detrick and the UNC, China hopes to show the world with facts whether the lab leak theory claimed by the US is tenable and credible. With this call, we also hope to rid global origins study of the disruption posed by US politicization so as to create enabling conditions for science-based research. Should the US refuse to cooperate, it would only further expose its true intention of politicizing origins study. Dusty snow dug up by NASAs Phoenix Mars Lander, a few centimeters below the surface. The blue box represents ice and the red box represents soil. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona/Texas A&M University Over the last two decades, scientists have found ice in many locations on Mars. Most Martian ice has been observed from orbital satellites like NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. But determining the grain size and dust content of the ice from that far above the surface is challenging. And those aspects of the ice are crucial in helping scientists determine how old the ice is and how it was deposited. So planetary scientists Aditya Khuller and Philip Christensen of Arizona State University, with Stephen Warren, an Earth ice and snow expert from the University of Washington, developed a new approach to determine how dusty Mars ice really is. By combining data from NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter with computer simulations used to predict snow and glacier ice brightness on Earth, they were able to successfully match the brightness of Martian ice and determine its dust content. Their results have been recently published in AGU's Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets. Mars is a dusty planet, so much of its ice is also dusty and much darker than fresh snow we might see on Earth. The dustier the ice is, the darker and thus warmer the ice gets, which can affect both its stability and evolution through time. Under certain conditions, this might also mean that the ice could melt on Mars. "There is a chance that this dusty and dark ice might melt a few centimeters down," Khuller said. "And any subsurface liquid water produced from melting will be protected from evaporating in Mars' wispy atmosphere by the overlying blanket of ice." Based on their simulations, they predict that the ice dug up by the Phoenix Mars Lander formed by dusty snowfall, sometime over the last million years, similar to other ice deposits found previously across the mid-latitudes of Mars. "It is widely believed that Mars has experienced multiple ice ages throughout its history, and it looks like the ice being exposed throughout the mid-latitudes of Mars is a remnant of this ancient dusty snowfall," Khuller said. For next steps, the team hopes to further analyze ice exposures on Mars, assess if the ice could actually melt, and learn more about Mars' climate history. "We are working on developing improved computer simulations of Martian ice to study how it evolves over time, and whether it might melt to form liquid water," Khuller said. "The results from this study will be integral to our work because knowing how dark the ice is directly influences how warm it gets." ASU press contact: Karin Valentine, 480-695-7340, Karin.valentine@asu.edu About Arizona State University Arizona State University has developed a new model for the American Research University, creating an institution that is committed to access, excellence and impact. ASU measures itself by those it includes, not by those it excludes. As the prototype for a New American University, ASU pursues research that contributes to the public good, and ASU assumes major responsibility for the economic, social and cultural vitality of the communities that surround it. Please follow SpaceRef on Twitter and Like us on Facebook. HP Mama B ($4.10) turned in a 1:55.1 course, stakes, and Canadian half-mile track record mile in her Ontario Sires Stakes Gold event for three-year-old trotting fillies on Wednesday (Aug. 25) at Grand River Raceway, but Imextraspecial ($2.70) one-upped her divisional foe by way of a 1:55 performance in the second split. Following Gold wins at Georgian and Woodbine Mohawk Park, Keith Coulter's Imextraspecial made her return to the half-mile Grand River track a triumphant one but she had her work cut out for her in the $99,800 second division (race eight). Trevor Henry sent the daughter of Muscle Mass forward from post six, and she used the entirety of a :27.4 first quarter to clear Midnight Miracle (Bob McClure). After catching a mid-race breather through splits of :57 and 1:26.2, Imextraspecial shifted gears on the far turn as Hawaii (Rick Zeron) launched a first-over attack. Under a strong drive from Henry, she found the line just in time, a neck better than both the surging Hawaii and inside challenger Midnight Miracle. Every trip is not going to be easy. Sometimes you get the good hole, good trip, but it was not the case tonight. She had to work her butt off to get to the front, and fortunately enough, Trevor got them shut down a bit and we could hang on, said Paul Walker, whose primary concern was whether the nine-time winner with over $440,000 in career earnings would be sharp enough coming off a three-week break. I was trying to look ahead a little bit. Shes got tough races the next four weeks, and I just thought, 'Well, Im going to take a chance and see if I can get her tight enough to do the job.' You hope you make the right decision, but you dont know at the time. A good horse will bail a trainer out most times. In the $100,600 first division (race five), HP Mama B floated forward from post five, but found herself parked for the first three-eighths of the mile before Sylvain Filion could work her clear of 35-1 roughie You Will Be Queen (Dustin Jones). But once the daughter of Royalty For Life gained control of the terms, there was no catching her. She coasted uncontested through splits of :56.2 and 1:25.3 before edging three lengths clear of You Will Be Queen. Dicentra (McClure) rallied off stalled cover to finish third. Like Imextraspecial, HP Mama B is also a three-time Gold winner this season, having banked over $295,000 in her career to date for trainer Benoit Baillargeon and the partnership of Guylaine Picard and Celine Paquin. She had to work for it tonight well, she comes to race all the time, but she worked pretty hard; she had enough at the wire tonight, said Baillargeon. The only thing that worried me was the weather. I hardly warmed her up tonight; I didnt want to do too much with her, but she raced good. She overcame it. Sign of a good mare. Bright Eyes M held the previous Grand River record of 1:55.4, having set that standard in an OSS Gold event of her own in July 2019. Filion and Baillargeon also teamed up to win the overnight feature, the $11,500 Preferred 2-3 Handicap Trot, with Refi ($3.70). The five-year-old Chapter Seven entire saved ground before slipping off the pegs with just under a quarter mile remaining, and then lifted three-wide off the home turn to eclipse Cheatalotpov and Bastiano by 1-3/4 lengths in 1:56.3. To view Wednesday's complete results, click the following link: Wednesday Results Grand River Raceway. (with quotes from Ontario Sires Stakes) ila Bank has won two top honours, Best Consumer Digital Bank and Best Mobile Banking App in Bahrain, in Round One of the Worlds Best Consumer Digital Bank Awards in the Middle East in 2021 by Global Finance. The awards stand testament to ilas customer driven, digital-first strategy which revolutionised the retail banking landscape in Bahrain and the region. Less than two years since its launch in November 2019, the digital, mobile-only bank has been recognised for the strength of its innovative banking model, attracting and servicing a substantial market share, the breadth of its product offering, user friendly app design and functionality, superior customer service and success of its digital initiatives such as its social media engagement and AI powered, digital assistant, Fatema. Now in its 22nd year, the Global Finance award platform has become a trusted standard of excellence for the global financial community. This years entries were assessed by a world-class panel of judges at Infosys, a global leader in consulting, technology and outsourcing. The final winners were selected by the editors of Global Finance. On this achievement, Sael Al Waary, Bank ABCs Deputy Group CEO and Chairman of ila Banks Advisory Board remarked: We are delighted to receive this remarkable recognition from one of the global financial communitys most trusted platforms. I attribute this honour to the sincere dedication and hard work of those who work tirelessly behind the scenes to make ila the innovative and dynamic brand that has strategically disrupted banking as we knew it. ilas digital mobile-only banking offering was very well-received right from its inception, and its uptake amongst the local community has been further fuelled by the demands of a new lifestyle the global pandemic has enforced. I would like to congratulate the entire ila team on winning these accolades, which reaffirm that we have transformed banking for the new world. I also thank the panel at Global Finance for recognising ila Bank as a leading digital banking player in the Middle East, added Al Waary. Mohamed Al Maraj, CEO, ila Bank said: ila has made a profound impact on the community, providing the optimal solution for Bahrains contactless banking needs. Not only does it offer consumers an array of financial tools at their fingertips, but it has spurred financial inclusion in Bahrain. Winning two awards on the Global Finance stage is a significant achievement which we are proud of. It stands testament to our teamwork and commitment to our purpose of elevating the banking experience in Bahrain. To accommodate its customers ever-evolving banking needs, ila has continuously released app upgrades inspired by customer feedback. Most recently, it introduced Transfer by mobile number, enabling seamless payment transfers by entering the recipients mobile number and connected to the national E-KYC platform, enabling a seamless account opening experience using only one ID and a selfie. ila has maintained strong app ratings of 4.5/5 in the Apple Store and 4.6/5 in Google Play over the past year, ranking 2nd amongst finance apps and 1st amongst purely banking apps in Bahrain. This reinforces its commitment to consistently design tailored solutions to meet customer needs, thereby creating a superior banking experience in a fast-paced, contactless environment.--TradeArabia News Service The Zulal Water Plant, a project of the Sharjah Electricity, Water and Gas Authority (Sewa), has revealed the operation of new production lines in various sizes with a new innovative design, according to a media report. Sewa aims to provide the best services to the whole population of the United Arab Emirates, where the plant provides 5 gallons, 1.5 litres, 500 ml, 330 ml, 200 ml, 150 ml, 100 ml bottles, in addition to paper tissues and sterilisers, Ali Ahmed Ali Al Kindi, Managing Director of the Zulal Water Plant, was quoted as saying in a Wam report. Sewa continues to work on developing the Zulal Water Plant; enhancing the plant competitiveness; and adhering to the social responsibility by adding new sizes to suit the requirements of customers and providing free of charge deliveries, he added. Al Kindi pointed that Zulal Water Plant works according to the best international standards to provide pure bottled water as basic and public service of the highest quality to maintain the health and safety of the public and meet their needs and requirements. Al Kindi explained that adding new packages, at competitive prices, aims to provide and deliver necessary products to households as a service provided by SEWGA within the framework of social responsibility. Al Kindi stated that thanks to the excellence of the products of the Zulal Water Plant and following the best procedures and systems, the plant obtained the ISO 9001/2000 certification, in addition to the Certificate of Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP). The factory also obtained the Emirates Quality Mark, which is issued by the Emirates Authority for Standardization and Metrology. The plant products were able to gain the trust of the population. ACME Group, one of the Indias fastest growing companies in solar energy sector, has signed a land agreement with Oman's Public Authority for Special Economic Zones and Free Zones (OPAZ), in a first step towards setting up one of the worlds largest green ammonia projects in the Port of Duqm. The plant would be developed in phases at an estimated cost of $3.5 billion over the next three years, said the company in a statement. It will be an integrated facility using 3 GWp of solar and 0.5 GWp of wind energy to produce 2,400 TPD of green ammonia with an annual production of 0.9 million tonnes. The land agreement was signed in the presence of ACME Group Founder and Chairman Manoj K Upadhyay and OPAZ Chairman Dr Ali Masoud Al Sunaidy and Vice Chairman Ahmed Hassan Al Dheeb Mahmoud Al Rawahi and other officials. On the strategic deal, Upadhyay said: "The signing of land reservation agreement will allow us to kick start pre-construction activities. We have hired environmental consultants and owners engineers Black & Veatch and we plan to start the construction at Oman as soon we commission our first green hydrogen and green ammonia plant at Bikaner in India." The project's Phase One is likely to be commissioned by end of 2022," he stated. In March, the Oman Company for Development of Special Economic Zone at Duqm (Tatweer) and ACME Group had signed a MoU to set up a large-scale facility to produce green hydrogen and green ammonia. This would be the first facility of this scale to be operational by 2022. The facility is being built to export green ammonia to demand centres like Europe and Asia. Upadhyay said ACME Group was in the process of commissioning the worlds first integrated green hydrogen and green ammonia plant in Bikaner, India. "Green hydrogen will be produced using 5 MWp, expandable to 10 MWp, from the solar plant, which is an integral part of the project," he stated. "ACME has built a solar portfolio of 6 GWp. Of this, our group currently holds a portfolio of 5.25 GWp that includes 2.2 GWp of operational capacity and another 3.05 GWp is under construction," he added.-TradeArabia News Service Majid Al Futtaim, the leading shopping malls, communities, retail and leisure pioneer across the Middle East, Africa and Asia, has signed its inaugural $1.5 billion (AED5.51 billion) Sustainability-Linked Loan (SLL). This is a financial instrument secured primarily on environmental, social and governance (ESG) related performance. In line with Majid Al Futtaim's ambitious sustainability strategy, the SLL aims to facilitate and support environmentally and socially sustainable economic activity and growth by incentivising ambitious, predetermined sustainability performance objectives. Majid Al Futtaim's five-year SLL is structured as a revolving credit facility (RCF) and is the largest corporate, non-government-linked SLL in the region and the largest in the Mena real estate sector, with over a dozen banks participating in the syndicate. The company's agreement also includes a gender diversity target for women to constitute 30% of board members and senior management roles, aligning with the global aims of the 30% Club, a first for the region. Ziad Chalhoub, Chief Financial Officer, Majid Al Futtaim Holding, said: "Majid Al Futtaim continually strives to become one of the most sustainably considerate companies in the world, and this extends to genuine accountability in how we finance our operational and capital expenditures across the group. The signing of our first Sustainability-Linked Loan comes as a result of, and in line with, our long-term strategic targets, including the production of more energy and water than we consume, reaching a Net Positive business model by 2040. While a companys profitability is important, how you contribute to sustainability is becoming more crucial and a filter for investors to decide how much and where they will invest. To ensure that you have access to funding and at attractive rates in a world where sustainability is becoming more important, it is imperative to embrace this reality now and not be left behind. One of Majid Al Futtaims core ambitions as part of this SLL is to have all its malls certified LEED Gold or better, which would be another first for the region. It is worth noting that Majid Al Futtaim Properties' hotels were the region's first to receive LEED Platinum certification across its 13-hotel property portfolio earlier this year. Majid Al Futtaim's SLL is the largest in the region since the updated principles of the Loan Market Association (LMA) were published in May 2021, requiring independent, external verification of annual KPI performance reporting to ensure clarity and compliance against specific sustainability performance targets (SPTs). Mohamed Salama, Regional Head of Client Coverage MENA, Standard Chartered Bank, said: We are delighted to support Majid Al Futtaim in their landmark debut sustainability linked loan by acting as sole sustainability coordinator. Having structured the first-ever loan in the Middle East to incorporate sustainability-linked pricing in 2018, we are proud to have brought another pioneering facility to the market. As a regional leader in sustainable finance and given our own commitment to be Net Zero across all our activities by 2050, we are committed to supporting our clients, like Majid Al Futtaim, to deliver on their sustainability objectives by structuring innovative solutions. There has been a remarkable increase in the volume of SLLs globally following the launch of the Sustainability-Linked Loan Principles (SLLP) in March 2019, published to promote the development of SLL products by providing a framework for application by lenders and borrowers. This SLL has clear SPTs across three KPIs for each year of the loan, in line with global best practice and is the region's first and only "penalty-only" facility, demonstrating Majid Al Futtaim's commitment to achieving real, tangible sustainability targets. Majid Al Futtaim has a long history of working towards the effective and efficient management of resources. In 2018, as a part of the company-wide sustainability strategy, Dare Today, Change Tomorrow, Majid Al Futtaim established three focus areas: Transforming Lives, Rethinking Resources, and Empowering Our People. In 2020, Majid Al Futtaim launched its company-wide Circular Economy Strategy to reduce environmental impact further, aiming by 2030 to have all Majid Al Futtaim businesses operating with circularity at the core.-- TradeArabia News Service Bahrain has highlighted the importance of taking a booster dose within a maximum of six months after receiving the second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine in line with a global report. Data from the National Medical Taskforce for Combating the Coronavirus (Covid-19) showed a decrease in the effectiveness of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in the month following the second dose from 88% to 74%, while the effectiveness of the Covishield-AstraZeneca vaccine decreased from 77% to 67% after four to five months after taking the second dose, reported Bahrain News Agency (BNA). The study was based on data from more than one million individuals who received these vaccines. The study by Britains ZOE Covid also showed that the protection provided by vaccines for the elderly and healthcare workers may drop to less than 50% by winter. The Taskforce noted that a booster dose can increase efficacy levels and enhance the bodys immunity against Covid-19 and its variants, as well as reducing severity of symptoms and mortality rates in case of infection. Those who meet the required criteria are encouraged to register for a booster dose by visiting the Ministry of Healths website, healthalert.gov.bh, or via the BeAware application, the report said. For people who are constantly struggling with sleep disorder and jetlag, there is happy news. A Russian company will, from next year, start producing eyeglasses that will help cure insomnia and jetlag. Depending on the material used, the glasses will be priced between 7 to 30,000 Russian rubles ($0.095 to $406.80). Wearing the glasses half an hour per day in indicated time intervals will help completely restore the sleep cycle, Emirates news agency WAM reported. Technodinamika Holding, under the Rostec State Corporation, has presented the prototype of "anti-insomnia Blue Sky pro glasses" at the Army 2021, an international military exhibition being held in Moscow. Rostec Executive Director Oleg Yevtushenko said: "The glasses enable one to control sleep disturbance and restore human biorhythms in a couple of days. Glasses will definitely be of interest to individuals suffering from insomnia or those regularly challenged by jet lag because of business trips. "At the same time, they can also benefit servicemen, including pilots, helping them to recover more rapidly (from sleep disorder and jetlag)." A press release issued by Rostec explained that the product helps get rid of drowsiness in the morning and to postpone sleep until approximately 23.00 hours in the evening. Glasses can also be used in case of changing time zones for more than three hours and for night shift. They will also help the user tackle depression, neuroendocrinal diseases and impaired concentration. The efficacy of the invention has been proved in the course of neurophysiological studies, the release said. The prototype of Blue Sky is made of eco-friendly high-strength composite material produced in Russia. The product contains a kit of changeable nose pads and the user can select the most convenient one. Furthermore, glasses are fitted with a type-c format universal connector for charging. Technodinamika Holding General Director Igor Nasenkov said: "We plan to start serial production of glasses from 2022. In terms of production volume, we are going to produce around 15,000 pieces." The innovative product is developed in partnership with the Samara State Medical University and serial production is scheduled to be launched at Samara Electromechanical Works. GE researchers are partnering with top chemists and engineers from UC Berkeley and the University of South Alabama in a $2 million project to develop a game-changing system for capturing carbon dioxide directly from the air. GE Research, with its University project partners, are developing a unique approach that involves pairing 3D-printed heat exchanger technology with innovative sorbent materials to create a system that effectively extracts carbon, in the form of carbon dioxide, from the air. This same team is employing a similar innovative approach to extract water from air as part an ongoing project with the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to provide potable clean water for troops in the field. Were combining GEs extensive knowledge in materials, thermal management and 3D printing technologies with UC Berkeleys world-class expertise in sorbent materials development and the University of South Alabamas and sorption modelling and testing to design a novel system for removing carbon dioxide from the air, said David Moore, the Principal Investigator and Technology Manager for Material Physics and Chemistry at GE Research. Through this project, were aiming to demonstrate the feasibility of a system that could become a future large-scale, economical solution for widespread decarbonization of the energy sector. Moore explained that the GE Research team brings decades of technical and domain experience in materials innovation, process engineering and commercialization, heat exchanger and other thermal technology design and development for its power turbine and jet engine platforms, and rich expertise in 3D printing, or additive manufacturing technologies. GE has an additive business and is a top manufacturer of 3D metal printers. In addition, GE Research has a dedicated team of additive researchers supporting the design and development of 3D-printed parts for a variety of industrial products across GEs business portfolio in energy, aviation, and healthcare. The team from UC Berkeley, led by renowned Professor of Chemistry, Omar Yaghi, is a world-recognized leader in development of sorbent materials that are capable of extracting targeted elements out of the air. Since the first crystallization and proof of porosity of metal-organic frameworks in 1995 and 1998, respectively, we have been continually developing their chemistry and design on the atomic/molecular scale, Yaghi said. While UC Berkeley will focus on the development and application of sorbent materials in the system, the team from the University of South Alabama, led by Prof Grant Glover, will help inform the selection of the right materials for the system. Metal Organic Frameworks (MOFs) provide an exciting opportunity to design materials to separate gases, Glover said. With the opportunity to pair these insights with the GE team that has expertise in manufacturing and product development, the possibilities of what we can bring to CO2 capture are quite exciting. TradeArabia News Service Boeing has rolled out advanced F-15 jets, the F-15QA for Qatar Emiri Air Force (QEAF), while announcing that the first set of jets will ferry to Qatar later this year following the completion of pre-delivery pilot training. The rollout of the F-15QA is momentous, not just in terms of capability but also in terms of the enhanced partnership it represents. The relationship the United States shares with Qatar is critical to the stability and security of the central command area of responsibility, and we are grateful for our coalition partners continued focus on building interoperability and combined readiness, said Lt. Gen. Greg Guillot, commander of 9th Air Force. The Qatar F-15QA program further enhanced next-generation technologies in the advanced F-15 such as the fly-by-wire flight controls, an all-glass digital cockpit and contemporary sensors, radar and electronic warfare capabilities, said Prat Kumar, vice president of the F-15 program. Driven by digital engineering and advanced manufacturing, these aircraft represent a transformational leap for the F-15. The F-15QA will enhance the superiority of the QEAF with more speed, range and payload than any fighter in the world. Boeing has been providing maintenance and logistics support for the QEAF during pre-delivery pilot training, which began earlier this year. In addition, Boeing will establish and operate an aircrew and maintenance training centre for the QEAF at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar through 2024 while also providing in-country spares and logistics support once aircraft are delivered. Boeing is proud to provide a holistic solution to our valued Qatari customer through tailored training and sustainment, said Torbjorn Turbo Sjogren, vice president of International Government & Defence for Boeing. We look forward to our continued partnership with Qatar and further supporting their mission readiness needs. TradeArabia News Service Masdar City Free Zone has introduced a new business package exclusively for all women entrepreneurs, to further support the growth of women-led companies in the UAE. The announcement comes ahead of Emirati Womens Day on August 28, which for 2021 is themed, Women: Ambitions & Inspiration for Next 50 Years, in line with the UAEs "Year of the 50th", reported Emirates News Agency WAM. Abdulla Balalaa, Executive Director, Masdar City, said: "From its inception, Masdar has valued the integral importance of women in progressing towards a more sustainable future. At Masdar City Free Zone, we mirror this view which is also in line with the UAE governments goal of driving greater gender equality and furthering successful sustainable development. For example, in 2017, the UAE government pledged $50m to the Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative fund and has introduced several initiatives to further encourage female entrepreneurship, including the Abu Dhabi Businesswomen Council. "In addition to the number of women in the workforce, in the UAE, women also constitute approximately 70 percent of university graduates. From next year, this will also include women graduating from Masdar City-based, Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI), the worlds first university dedicated to the study of artificial intelligence, and a highly significant area in progressing the global green transition. Masdar City therefore provides a unique ecosystem for women, who not only have the opportunity to study, but also the option to establish a business here and become part of an international network of innovators. With these kinds of opportunities, Masdar City Free Zone is an excellent location for women to set up their businesses, Balalaa added. Masara Alameiri, Acting Director, Masdar City Free Zone, said; "Masdar City Free Zone recognizes the essential role that women play in progressing the UAEs economic and development goals, which are critical to building a more sustainable and prosperous future for everyone. In Masdar City, which is the regional hub for the R&D of sustainability-focused technologies and solutions, women are key drivers of the ground-breaking progress being made here in the areas of artificial intelligence (AI), clean energy, healthtech, food security, mobility, water, and sustainable urban development. Masdar City recognizes their vital role and is offering a competitive business option that will allow even more women to establish their companies here. "The Masdar City Free Zone is run by a highly knowledgeable team of experts who are ready to assist women with all of their requirements, both in person, via email or phone, or via the Citys Free Zone portal," Alameiri added. In addition to the women-specific business package option, Masdar City Free Zone also offers competitive new business packages that offer flexibility for companies to adapt to their businesses specific requirements and are available now to both new and existing businesses. International Maritime Industries (IMI), the largest maritime yard in the Mena region, has signed a long-term agreement with JSA Loadmaster to enhance its efforts to localise its supply chain in Saudi Arabia. The agreement will enable JSA Loadmaster, a joint venture between Jackup Structures Alliance (JSA) and Loadmaster Industries, to localise its rig product manufacturing in Saudi Arabia and boost its lifecycle and maintenance support. Through the agreement with IMI, JSA Loadmaster is expected to contribute around SR750 million ($200 million) to the Saudi economy over the next eight years. The company will produce rig rack and chord, as well as derricks and other engineered structural products in the kingdom, in line with the highest standards of sustainability and environmental excellence. IMI, a joint venture between leading industry partners Aramco, Lamprell, Bahri and Hyundai Heavy Industries, will benefit from being able to source products for itself and its clients locally for rig manufacturing, reducing the cost of importing products from abroad. As part of the agreement, IMI will guarantee the ordering of rack and chord for four rigs, with an extension option of an additional two rigs. The signing marks the establishment of IMIs first long-term agreement with a supplier and a significant milestone in the companys efforts to localise its supply chain. The partnership will also provide IMI with the opportunity to learn and align with industry best practices and further improve its rig services, building on its competitive overall market position. The long-term agreement was signed by Fathi K Al-Saleem, President and Chief Executive Officer of IMI and Jay Fogal, Managing Director of JSA Loadmaster Arabia and President and CEO of Jackup Structures Alliance, during a ceremony at Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. It was also attended by executives from IMI, JSA Loadmaster, Saudi Aramco and ARO Drilling. Al-Saleem said: This agreement with JSA Loadmaster is an important milestone for IMI, marking our first big step towards supply chain localisation. We are proud to partner with a renowned global company like JSA Loadmaster, which is dedicated to supporting IMIs mandate to contribute to the development of the local maritime industry. As part of IMIs localisation strategy, the agreement lays the foundation for the establishment of a local, cost-competitive manufacturing operation where all manufacturing and delivery activities occur in the same place. It will also improve the efficiency, agility, and logistics of the manufacturing process overall; and create employment opportunities while adhering to the highest international standards of sustainability and environmental excellence. Jay Fogal, CEO for Jackup Structures Alliance, stated: Our team embarked upon this journey with IMI and ARO four years ago with the support of Loadmasters Chairman, David Russell. As we developed our understanding that we could add significant value to the IMI initiative, we formed JSA Loadmaster under the leadership of our Middle East VP Shaun Hanton, supporting Saudi Vision 2030. Our Joint Venture combines the strength, know-how, and technical expertise of both Jackup Structures Alliance and Loadmaster Industries. Jeff Myklebust, CEO for Loadmaster Industries, stated: JSA Loadmaster will deliver an industry-leading manufacturing and supply solution supporting and partnering with IMI. Our localisation plan includes a large percentage of technology and knowledge transfer through our technical and operations team led by Jeremy Guillotte. We will be developing and training Saudi employees to drive and grow the ecosystem required to support the initiatives of this Long Term Agreement, while respecting the culture, safety, and the environment in Saudi Arabia. IMIs localisation efforts are focused on the procurement of materials and services used in rig and vessel production, as well as maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) practices. The company intends to form more long-term partnerships with suppliers that are committed to localising the manufacturing of their products in Saudi Arabia.-- TradeArabia News Service At least 12 US service members were killed and 15 were injured in two explosions that took place outside the Kabul airport on Thursday as the US and other countries try to evacuate their citizens and Afghans at risk from the Taliban, reported CNN, citing the head of the US Central Command. More than 60 people are dead and at least 140 wounded, an official with Afghanistans Ministry of Public Health tells CNN. Twelve US service members and dozens of Afghans have been killed in two bombing attacks outside Kabul's airport, reported CNN citing the Pentagon and Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health. The deadly blasts came as the US and other Western countries raced to complete a massive evacuation of their citizens and Afghan allies following the Taliban takeover of the country. An official with Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health told CNN on Thursday that more than 60 people were dead and 140 wounded. Fifteen US service members were injured in addition to the 12 dead, said Gen. Frank McKenzie, Commander of US Central Command. US officials have been warning over the past week that a threat of a terror attack at the airport was becoming more acute. Earlier on Thursday local time, US diplomats in Kabul warned American citizens to "immediately" leave several gates into the airport, citing security threats. A US defence official had also told CNN that officials were concerned by a "very specific threat stream" involving the ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan. US officials believe the group, ISIS-K, was likely behind today's attack but are still working to confirm its involvement, according to a senior US official and another source briefed on initial assessments. The second source told CNN it may take a few hours before US officials are able to identify the specific individuals who carried out the apparent suicide bombing. Earlier in the evening, three US officials and a source familiar with the situation said that according to initial reports, there were some US personnel among the casualties. "We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby tweeted. The blast happened at one of the entry gates of the Hamid Karzai International Airport and appears to be a suicide attack, according to three US officials. Crowds of Afghans have been gathering at the gates trying to gain access to the airport, which has become the only way out of the country since the Taliban took over Kabul. About 5,400 US servicemembers are assisting with evacuation efforts in Kabul. The British have about 1,000 troops assisting with the evacuation efforts. The UK Ministry of Defense said there were no reported casualties among its government and military personnel in Kabul following the attack. A White House official told NBC News that President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris were briefed on the situation. "The president met with his national security team Thursday morning, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Army General Mark Milley as well as commanders on the ground in Kabul," the White House said in a statement. "He will continue to be briefed on updates on the evolving situation throughout the day," it added. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson too has been updated on the situation at the airport. A meeting slated for 11:30 p.m. ET between Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett at the White House has also been delayed. The US Embassy in Kabul described the explosion as large and said there were reports of gunfire, urging Americans to avoid travel to the airport and its gates. The embassy had previously issued a security alert urging Americans to avoid the airport: U.S. citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately, the alert said. In the last 24 hours, Western forces evacuated 13,400 people out of Kabul on 91 military cargo aircraft flights. Since the mass evacuations began on Aug. 14, approximately 95,700 people have been airlifted out of Afghanistan. About 101,300 people have been evacuated since the end of July, including about 4,500 U.S. citizens and their families. The top five countries with leading defence budgets are expected to spend $1.1 trillion through 2021 cumulatively with the US remaining the biggest spender at $740 billion, said Finbold, a global provider of latest finance data. China stands second at $178.2 billion, followed by India at $73.65 billion and Germany at $57.43 billion. Among the five defence budgets, the UK ranks fifth at $55 billion in spending. Interestingly, the total spend by the five countries has plunged 4.3% from last year's figure of $1.15 trillion. Last year, the US defence spending was $750 billion, representing a drop of 1.26% compared to this year's amount. Elsewhere, China's spending was at $237 billion in 2020, dropping 24.81%. Among the five countries, India and Germany had the highest growth rates of 20.73% and 14.86% between 2020 and 2021, respectively. The UK's defence spending slightly increased by 1.7%. The factors influencing defence spending The report identifies some of the factors behind the significant spending by the select countries. According to the research report: "Notably, the general instability in the Middle East region has previously compelled the US and European countries to spend more. However, the emerging Afghanistan crisis will potentially result in a refugee crisis that will call for more soldiers, possibly altering the spending among various countries globally. Therefore, countries from Europe and Asia might potentially see their defence spending increase." The defence spending is projected to change as more countries invest in various sectors like cutting-edge technology, the report said. TradeArabia News Service Abu Dhabi National Exhibitions Company (Adnec), the emirates premier event venue, is gearing up to host a variety of world-class exhibitions, conferences and events in the UAE capital and has announced its calendar for the rest of the year. From September 27 to October 3, the venue will host the Abu Dhabi International Hunting and Equestrian Exhibition (Adihex), which will see thousands of falconers, hunting and equestrian enthusiasts, end users, traders, and buyers from around the world as well as the UAE. Adihex is a key event on Adnecs calendar and is the largest event of its kind in the Middle East and Africa. Adnec Chief Commercial Officer Khalifa Al Qubaisi said: Our readiness to host visitors and exhibitors from the UAE and beyond is driven by our investment in the latest facilities and business offerings. "This decision has enabled us to keep up with the evolving needs of the industry, granting visitors, exhibitors and our stakeholders the ability to carry out business with confidence. As we collaborate with our partners from the public and private sectors, our events are crafted to the highest standards, befitting the regional and international reputation of the UAE. Adnec will also host and organise the third edition of the Abu Dhabi International Boat Show (Adibs) - the UAE capitals yacht, leisure marine and fishing show - from October 13-16. Al Qubaisi further said: By implementing preventative measures and protocols to protect the health and wellness of the visitors and participants, we are able to ensure that the infrastructure we have in place is appropriate for the needs of our clients business." The other events that Adnec will host are: - International Jewellery and Watch Show Abu Dhabi (JWS Abu Dhabi) from October 26-30 - Tawdheef Recruitment Show along with the Najah Education and Training event from October 27-29 - Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference (Adipec) organised by DMG events from November 15 to 18 - The ViV MEA Exhibition, the international trade show from feed to food for Middle East and Africa, from November 23-25 - Global Forum in Innovation in Agriculture (GIFA) from November 23-24 - The M&I Europe Winter 2021 Abu Dhabi from December 6-8 - The Middle Easts largest food, beverage, and hospitality events, SIAL Middle East 2021, will be hosted and organsied by Adnec from December 7-9 - The Abu Dhabi International Date Palm Exhibition will also be held alongside SIAL ME from December 7-9.-TradeArabia News Service Manchester City has teamed up with partner Etihad Airways in the international transportation of two player statues from across the world to Manchester. The large scale statues of club legends Vincent Kompany and David Silva have travelled 5,778 miles (approx. 9,300 kilometres) from the United States to Manchester ahead of their installation at the Etihad Stadium later this week, the club said in a statement. Glasgow-born sculptor Andy Scott was appointed by the club 15 months ago to bring the legends to life in sculpture form from his studio in Philadelphia. The entire process from commissioning to design and build has been conducted remotely due to travel restrictions relating to the global pandemic. Following completion of the statues, the work of logistics and transportation began with Etihad Cargo providing end-to-end service throughout the process. Separated into four parts and meticulously packaged, these sizeable statues were trucked from Andys studio in Philadelphia to Chicago, loaded onto a Boeing 777 Freighter and flown to Frankfurt and then transported by road to Manchester, ready to be installed on August 28. Hailing Etihads support in the delivery process, Manchester Citys Director of Infrastructure Ed Dalton said: These statues are bespoke and premium pieces of art that have been 15 months in the making. The precious nature of the pieces together with their sheer size and weight, meant that their transportation to Manchester was going to be a challenging and complex process. "Etihad Cargos dedicated team have worked with the club closely throughout this process and have been the perfect partner - highly organised, professional and collaborative and we are grateful for their assistance. Etihad Aviation Group Senior Vice President Sales and Cargo Martin Drew added: As partners to Manchester City for more than 12 years, we have watched what Vincent Kompany and David Silva have achieved for the club. Our team was, therefore, even more excited by this opportunity. "The complexity of this operation involved months of planning and technical expertise in close co-operation with the club. The successful delivery of this consignment demonstrated the teamwork capabilities within the Etihad network.-TradeArabia News Service According to the '2020-2021 White Paper on Business Travel Management Market' published by Ctrip Corporate Travel, China's share of the business travel market in the Asia-Pacific region is growing every year and reached 69 per cent in 2020. The latest data show that MICE and Buisness Travel are proving to be promising segments of the Chinese travel industry. Therefore, the co-operation with 14 leading MICE and Corporate Travel buyer partners will be strengthened to increase the purchasing power at ITB China, the marketplace for Chinas travel industry. The upcoming edition of ITB China will be held as a physical event in Shanghai from November 24-26, with a virtual extension from November 8 to December 31. The partners include BCD Travel China, BRAVOLINKS, CITS GBT, Ctrip Corporate Travel, CTG MICE, CWT China, GCM, HUACHENG MICE, Jin Jiang MICE, Meiya, JL Best Meeting, ON THE WAY (OTW), Smart MICE and UCC, according to a statement. CTG MICE General Manager Zhang Jian said: "We have years of experience in serving the government, state-owned central enterprises, and large and well-known companies. We look forward to a new round of co-operation with ITB China to connect with more high-quality domestic and international partners." As buyer partners,these 14 Chinese travel firmss will send top buyers from all over China to ITB China events and promote them among their resources and platforms, as well as organise activities, both physical and virtual at ITB China 2021, and share the latest market trends and their experiences in the domestic market. Sanya Tourism Promotion Board Marketing Director Ma Nan said: Its the first time that we are participating in ITB China. The development of MICE travel has always been one of the priorities for Sanya. Especially since the epidemic, the demand for domestic MICE travel has increased greatly. "We are looking forward to learning and exchanging experiences in destination marketing with overseas tourism bureaus and establishing contacts and business co-operation with more partners at ITB China 2021." Tourism Australia Regional Business Events Director LC Tan said: In the post-pandemic era, we will continue to provide extensive and practical products customised for our MICE partners to meet the various needs of different industries, and to set the stage for the full recovery of Business Events Australia."-TradeArabia News Service Saudi Tourism Authority (STA) has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Alibaba Cloud, the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group. The memorandum establishes the framework for a collaborative arrangement that will create a seamless visitor experience for Chinese tourists travelling to Saudi. The agreement is part of STAs strategy to employ the latest technology to deliver superior traveller experiences. Alibaba Cloud will also provide technical support to STA and help STA promote Saudi as a tourist destination to travelers in the Chinese market. As Saudi continues to develop its leisure tourism offering for local, regional and international audiences, STA is building a digital infrastructure which can provide the destination with a competitive edge and visitors with the best possible experience, said Fahd Hamidaddin, CEO of STA. The recovery of the global tourism sector demands fresh thinking to overcome challenges exacerbated by the pandemic. By collaborating with Alibaba Cloud, we will break new ground in the regional tourism sector and position Saudi at the forefront of efforts to modernise the wider global tourism eco-system. Through the collaboration, Alibaba Cloud will deploy advanced, secure and reliable cloud services and technologies to create an improved digital experience for Chinese tourists traveling to Saudi and allow for the automation of services in content delivery, digital storage, and digital processing. Selina Yuan, General Manager of International Business, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence and Vice President of Alibaba Group, said: This collaboration brings together two key actors in the tourism sector who can set a new standard for providing a travel experience like no other. With Alibaba Cloud leading the digital transformation of tourism, and Saudis unique destinations, this is a combination which will help to re-invigorate the tourism sector. - TradeArabia News Service Images Sorry, there are no recent results for popular images. by Nirmala Carvalho The Missionaries of Charity prayed today at the tomb of the foundress born 111 years ago. Several Indian politicians also wanted to remember her service to all humanity on her birthday today. Calcutta (AsiaNews) - Today is the birthday of Mother Teresa of Calcutta, who was born on August 26, 1910 in Kosovo. Like every year, the Missionaries of Charity, the order she founded, celebrated this date with a special moment of prayer in the mother house in Calcutta, where the saint is buried. In the presence of Superior Sister Prema, the sisters prayed for peace in the world and in the hearts of people, singing hymns in memory of Mother Teresa. A Mass was celebrated by Msgr. Alex Dias, bishop emeritus of Port Blair. On the initiative of AsiaNews, a special prayer intention was read for Fr. Bernardo Cervellera, former director of this newsagency who is about to reach Hong Kong on his new mission. The vicar general of the archdiocese of Calcutta, Fr. Dominic Gomes, placed a card with this prayer on Mother Teresa's tomb. Several Indian politicians also wanted to remember the saint of the slum people today. Delhi's local government chief, Arvind Kejriwal, recalled volunteering to serve alongside her. "I worked at the Kalighat ashram: it was a spiritual experience that taught me to put myself at the service of others in my life" Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot wrote in a tweet that "compassion is Mother Teresa's selfless service for the welfare of humanity remain a source of inspiration." Indian Union Minister Hardeep Puri also celebrated the woman today, who was awarded "the Bharat Ratna (India's highest honor ed.) and the Nobel Laureate for her life dedicated to the service of humanity." by Chiara Zappa Along with five nuns and Father Giovanni Scalese, the head of the missio sui iuris in Afghanistan, the kids landed yesterday in Rome. Italys airlift also brought out 15 associates of the Pro Bambini di Kabul charity and their families, whose lives were at risk. As for the others left behind, we do not know how to help them, said the associations president Father Matteo Sanavio. Rome (AsiaNews) Fourteen severely disabled children, abandoned by their families, are now safe. In Kabul, they were in the care of the Sisters of Mother Teresa who had been operating in the Afghan capital for several years. Yesterday afternoon they landed at Romes Fiumicino airport together with the four nuns who have "adopted" them, plus Barnabite Father Giovanni Scalese, in charge of the missio sui iuris in Afghanistan, and Pakistani Sister Shahnaz Bhatti, of the congregation of Saint Jeanne-Antide Thouret, who ran a facility for 50 children with mild disabilities in Kabul established by the inter-congregational association Pro Bambini of Kabul (PBK). Days of anxiety followed the Taliban takeover the city, with the few members of the Catholic Church waiting for the right time to get to the airport of the Afghan capital. In a country in the throes of chaos, they managed to board a plane, part of the Aquila 1 airlift operation organised by the Italian Air Force, which will end tomorrow. "For us it is a great relief, said PBK president Father Matteo Sanavio. The kids have arrived, all orphans aged 6 to 20 years, he told AsiaNews. For the rogationist clergyman, the latter are really the most vulnerable among the vulnerable, in wheelchairs, none of them are autonomous and alone they could not have survived", Indian Sister Teresia Crasta, of the Congregation of the Child Mary, also worked with PBK; AsiaNews featured her story a few days ago. The sudden arrival of the Taliban in Kabul turned all our projects upside down, said Fr Sanavio. Of course, given the climate that reigned in the country in recent months, we had already begun to organise the possible withdrawal of our religious and the handover of the school to a local group, pending a possible return in case there was a peaceful political transition. But the rapid advance of the fundamentalist group undermined out plans. In recent days, the prospect of leaving Kabul has been filled with dread and uncertainty. Italy moved quickly to organise the evacuation, but the presence of disabled children, who needed special care to reach the airport, complicated things, while security in the streets of the city was getting worse. If Sister Teresia, along with two Indian Jesuits who worked with refugees, managed to leave thanks to Indias airlift, Sister Shahnaz and the Missionaries of Mother Teresa went through more dreadful hours as the Taliban visited neighbourhoods, going house to house, looking for people who had cooperated with the West, including Afghans who worked at the PBK school in Kabul, about 15 people plus their families. While we kept in constant touch with Italian authorities, we worked with the Community of Sant'Egidio to include the names of these people in the list of those who could use humanitarian corridors. Today I can say that almost all of them have managed to reach Italy; now we are waiting for the last ones. What will happen to them? Father Sanavio explained that The various congregations that make up our association have already offered to welcome these families and support them in order to integrate them in their new environment. Of course, our thoughts today go to the many others who are asking for our support to flee Afghanistan and whom we do not know how to help. It is really painful to have to say no. How can one choose between who to save and who to abandon to one's destiny? But resources are limited and time is running out. In such a tragic situation, the priest is keen to "thank Italy, from the Defence and Foreign ministries to the diplomats and the military, who are doing the impossible to evacuate those at risk. The sight of Consul Tommaso Claudi among the children at the Kabul airport is only the tip of the iceberg. What will happen to the Church in Afghanistan now? It was always hidden, almost symbolic, yet it has done so much for the neediest. I still hope that we can return in the future. At present, well follow the developing situation and wont stop praying. For now, the Grace Wisher Way sign installed in July is the only visible sign of the growth of her story at the site since Lawrence learned of her during her initial 2018 visit. Feeling a sense of urgency to deepen the acknowledgment of Graces role in history, the griot ordered the sign in red and installed so when you drive down that one-way street, youre going to see the sign. Circuit Judge John Brown had little leeway to order jail time. Instead, he fined the states highest law enforcement official $500 for each of the two counts and ordered him to pay court costs of $3,742. Brown also ordered the Republican attorney general to do a significant public service event in each of the next five years near the date of Boevers death granting a request from the Boever family. But he put that on hold after Ravnsborgs attorney objected that it was not allowed by statute. Keep in mind: I do not have the benefit of seeing a police body camera recording of what happened. Access to it has been denied by both the Baltimore Police Department and Mosbys staff because it will presumably be used in Nguyens prosecution. Also, Nguyens attorney declined to comment on the case. But I have documents the criminal information Mosby filed Aug. 12 and Nguyens report of what happened on the day he allegedly neglected his duties to the point of criminality. Masks can be uncomfortable, hot in summer and make it more difficult to teach and receive non-verbal feedback. However, with the delta variant surging, schools need to use every available tool to enable them to resume in person classes. With that said, schools and the community should take incremental steps to make masks unnecessary. Steps should include requiring vaccinations for everyone eligible, increased ventilation, social distancing and testing. Each district should develop a plan. The meeting, the second in the groups history, was convened to begin a performance review of Cumming that officials had hoped to complete by September or October. Several members and Cumming herself, however, were preoccupied at times with the question of who should be conducting the review. Relentless violence against Afghanistans Shia Hazara community by the Sunni extremist Taliban and the Islamic State-Khorasan in recent years had prompted some of their youth to pick up arms to defend their community. Their fears have intensified with the Taliban coming to power. Recent attacks have heightened their sense of insecurity. Should violence against them persist, Hazara militias will proliferate. The Fatemiyoun Brigade, which is lying low, could be activated. Shia Iran could intervene to support the Hazaras. BACKGROUND: On August 18, the Taliban destroyed a statue of ethnic Hazara leader Abdul Ali Mazari in Bamiyan. Mazari was a prominent leader in the fight against the Taliban in the 1990s. He was captured by the Taliban in 1995, and tortured and killed before his body was flung out of a helicopter. The decapitation of Mazaris statue came shortly after the killing in early July of nine Hazara men in the village of Mundarakht in Ghazni province. Six of the men were shot dead and three were tortured to death, including one man who was strangled with his own scarf and had his arms sliced off. The Talibans capture of power in Kabul on August 15 has triggered a tidal wave of fear among Afghans of all ethnic groups. However, the Hazaras, who are Shia, are particularly terrified as they have been targeted repeatedly by Sunni extremist groups including the Taliban as well as the Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K). On May 8, a car bomb explosion in front of the Sayed al-Shuhada girls school in Kabuls Dasht-e-Barchi neighborhood left at least 85 people dead and around 150 injured, most of them teenage girls of the Hazara community. Three weeks later, bombs went off on two buses headed for Dasht-e-Barchi. Again, Hazaras figured prominently among the casualties. Dasht-e-Barchi is a predominantly Hazara neighborhood in Kabul. Hazaras have suffered oppression for centuries. In addition to systematic discrimination and socio-economic marginalization, they have suffered extreme violence, even massacres at the hands of both regime forces and insurgents in Afghanistan. In 1993, the Burhanuddin Rabbani regime massacred Hazaras in western Kabul as did the Taliban at Mazar-e-Sharif in 1998. Hazaras have been persecuted because of their faith; they are overwhelmingly Shia in a predominantly Sunni Afghanistan. As a result, the Taliban declared jihad against them in 1996, while the IS-K views them as heretics. Countless Hazaras have been abducted for ransom or shot dead by the Taliban and the IS-K. Insecurity in villages and small towns even in districts where Hazaras comprise a majority of the population forced thousands to flee to Kabul. However, they have been targeted there as well. Since 2015, the Taliban and IS-K have repeatedly targeted mosques, schools, education centers, hospitals and wrestling clubs in the Dasht-e-Barchi neighborhood, ensuring that most of the casualties in these attacks are Hazara. After taking control over Afghanistan on August 15, the Taliban has been attempting an image makeover. It has sought to assure Afghans and the international community that it has changed for the better. In an interview to NPR, Suhail Shaheen, the Talibans spokesman in Qatar said that the Taliban now has a policy of not having any kind of discrimination against the Shia people. They are Afghans. They can live in this country peacefully and they can contribute to the reconstruction, prosperity and development of the country. However, there is little reason for Hazaras to believe him. On the very day that Shaheens conciliatory interview was broadcasted, Mazaris statue was destroyed. IMPLICATIONS: Afghan Hazaras fear that they will continue to be targeted by the Taliban regime not only because of their Shia faith but because they have been strong supporters of the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan and closely associated with all post-2001 governments in the country. Afghanistans 2004 Constitution and political system paved the way for unprecedented inclusion of Hazaras. In addition to one of two vice-presidential slots being filled by a Hazara, members of the community have been appointed to high posts such as ministers, and governors. Hazaras backed the new order resolutely and joined the Afghan army, police and civil bureaucracy. They also availed opportunities that opened up in education. Indeed, of all Afghanistans ethnic groups, the Hazaras benefited the most from the opportunities emerging in the wake of the international communitys post-2001 engagement with Afghanistan. Should the Taliban target Hazaras in the coming weeks and months, the latter will join militias. At least one has been active for some years now. In 2014, Abdul Ghani Alipoor set up a Hazara militia, the Jabha-ye Moqawamat (Resistance Force) and in the years since, this militia has defended Hazaras in districts like Behsud. In November 2018, Alipoor was arrested on allegations of running an illegal militia. In March this year, his fighters shot down an Afghan military aircraft. In the likely event of attacks on Hazaras, Alipoors Jabha-ye Moqawamat can be expected to play a larger role in defending the community. There is also a regional dimension to the mounting Hazara insecurity. Given their shared Shia faith, Iran has often projected itself as the guardian of their interests and society. Indeed, thousands of Hazaras moved to Iran in recent decades to escape persecution in Afghanistan. More recently, large numbers of Hazara youth also went to Iran to join the Fatemiyoun Brigade, a militia of Shia Hazara fighters that Iran deployed in Iraq and Syria to further Iranian interests. Thousands of these battled-hardened fighters are now returning home to Afghanistan. They could pick up arms again, this time in Afghanistan to defend their own people. However, Iran is caught in a dilemma. The Talibans Sunni extremism is a matter of major concern for Teheran. The last time the Taliban was in power, it slaughtered 11 Iranian diplomats in the city of Mazar-e-Sharif, bringing Iran and Afghanistan to the brink of war. Iran supported an alliance of anti-Taliban forces that the U.S. led coalition backed to oust the Taliban regime in 2001. However, Teherans relationship with the Taliban has changed since. Iran has supported the Taliban with arms and sanctuary in recent years, and welcomed the Talibans victory and the exit of U.S. troops. While Iran is expected to recognize the Taliban regime if only to secure stability in the region and further its own economic and other interests in Afghanistan and Central Asia, the wellbeing of the Shia Hazaras is a matter of concern. Should the Taliban attack Hazaras, it would feel compelled to extend them its support. The possibility of Iran activating the Afghan Fatemiyoun or supporting Alipoor cannot be ruled out. CONCLUSIONS: Recent attacks on Hazaras in Afghanistan provide little reason for them to be convinced by Taliban assurances that they will be safe under Taliban rule. A small but growing number of Hazaras have been picking up arms to defend themselves in recent years. This movement will grow as Hazara insecurity deepens. Should Iran decide to intervene on behalf of the Hazaras, it could activate the Fatemiyouns battle-hardened fighters. AUTHOR'S BIO: Dr. Sudha Ramachandran is an independent researcher and journalist based in India. She writes on Asian political and security issues. Her articles have been published in The Diplomat, China Brief, etc. She can be contacted at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Image Source: U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Albert F. Hunt accessed 8.26.2021 Dakota graduated from Bret Harte in 2013 and went to Davidson College, NC where she earned a bachelor's degree in Arab studies. After spending time studying in the Middle East and Europe, she is happy to be home, writing about the community she loves. Comment Policy Calaveras Enterprise does not actively monitor comments. However, staff does read through to assess reader interest. When abusive or foul language is used or directed toward other commenters, those comments will be deleted. If a commenter continues to use such language, that person will be blocked from commenting. We wish to foster a community of communication and a sharing of ideas, and we truly value readers' input. Coming as the shaking did at a time of the year when malaria is supposed to stalk about, it was suggested that, perhaps the earth was having its little malarial attack due to the sudden drop in the thermometer yesterday, reported The Sun the next morning. Whatever caused the shock there was a very perceptible tremor of the earth about five minutes past ten oclock and continued about half a minute. We have been enormously pleased with our Westminster distribution and fulfillment center. So, when we decided to expand into a fourth facility to support our continued nationwide focus on growth and innovation, it was a natural decision to select a second Maryland location, Annette Danek, executive vice president, supply chain, of Penguin Random House, said in a statement. We are enthusiastic about the many terrific possibilities our Hampstead site can realize for our authors, booksellers, publishing partners and for the career opportunities for our Westminster colleagues, and new job opportunities for Marylanders. But at the groups Wednesday meeting, Atticks said the rules discussed by the work group would be some of the most restrictive in the state, if made law. While Wagner proposed requiring 25 acres of land to set up a farm brewery, Atticks said he thought that was higher than it should be, and anything more would be the highest threshold required in the state. According to the U.S. Attorneys Office, Ogunlana was a postal carrier with the U.S. Postal Service in Brooklyn, Maryland. He stole bank checks and credit and debit cards from the mail, sending photos of the mail and cards to Oguntuyi and others, who would use the personal identifying information from them to activate the cards and obtain new cards for their own use. Weve heard from many of our students about how the pandemic has negatively impacted them and that they are having some financial hardships and are struggling to meet some of their everyday basic needs, Chris Heston, associate vice president of finance, said in an interview. We just felt that paying off the debt for these students would have such a transformative meaning for the students that we decided as a college to proceed with doing this. Chonnathason Has, also known as Bora Has, must pay $2,478,069 in restitution to the unidentified company that makes personal products such as hair care, hair dye and lotions. Has and four other men created fake vendors the company hired in 2015 to dispose of various waste products stored at the companys two warehouses in Maryland. The men controlling the vendors then charged the company more than $2.4 million for their services and split the money among themselves, but never did any work. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of Americas longest war and the Talibans takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Kirby said the U.S. military will preserve as much airlift capacity at the airport as possible in the coming days, ahead of Tuesdays deadline. The military will continue to evacuate needed populations all the way to the end, he said. But he added that in the final days and hours there will have to be a balance in getting out U.S. troops and their equipment as well as evacuees. Schandelmeier, who is seeking to retain the council seat he was appointed to in September 2020, has extensive experience in Maryland Democratic circles, including serving as president of the District 30 Democratic Club. Those connections show up in his campaign report. Among his donors are at least seven Maryland delegates and state senators; two Anne Arundel County councilmembers; County Executive Steuart Pittman; former Annapolis Mayor Josh Cohen, and at least two other former city aldermen. A contract for the construction of the largest-ever infrastructure project funded by India in the Maldives will be signed on Thursday. The contract will be inked between the archipelagic nation's government and Maharashtra-based construction and engineering company Afcons infrastructure. The Greater Male Connectivity Project (GMCP) will be the largest-ever infrastructure project in the Maldives, funded under the Indian Grant and Line of Credit. Indian High Commissioner to the Maldives, Sunjay Sudhir, said that the GMCP is not only the biggest project India is doing in the Maldives but also the biggest infrastructure project in the Maldives overall. "The Greater Male Connectivity Project is concrete proof that India is a robust development partner of the Maldives in addition to being the First Responder in times of any emergency in the Maldives. This iconic project will give a major boost to the Maldivian economy," he said. India and Maldives signed the GMCP agreement in 2020. The project aims to revitalise the Maldivian economy through a $400 million Line of Credit (LOC) and $100 million grant linking its capital Male with Gulhifalhu Port and Thilafushi industrial zone along with a regular cargo ferry service between the two countries to boost trade and commerce. This project involves the construction of a series of bridges and causeways that amount to 6.7 kilometres long connecting Male to Vilingili, the industrial zone in Thilafushi, together with the newly proposed International Port at Gulhifalhu. This project will be an infrastructural complement to the Gulhifalhu commercial port project which is being done under an Indian LoC of USD 800 million. Since the current Male port has already reached its maximum physical capacity, the Maldives Government has decided to shift the Male port to Gulhifalhu island. This has given rise to the need to consider the development of link bridges to the three industrial islands for seamless connectivity, as per sources. (ANI) Also Read: Taliban directs Afghan women to work from home, says they are 'not trained' to respect them What can be trusted; what can be relied on; what stands firm no matter what? What isnt shaky and shifting below our feet? Psalm 93 gives a response to those questions about instability and Moreland Hills, OH (44022) Today Clear skies. Low around 55F. NNE winds at 10 to 20 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph.. Tonight Clear skies. Low around 55F. NNE winds at 10 to 20 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph. Some desks will also be removed to make space for more conference rooms and common areas where employees can meet and collaborate. Conference rooms, which previously all shared the same white and gray look, will have different furniture and designs to give employees options for which space best fits their needs, the company said. In 2014, Corn shifted from executive producer at ABCs World News Tonight to senior executive producer at Good Morning America, where Crawford began reporting directly to him. The suit alleges a noticeably intoxicated Corn groped and kissed Crawford in February 2015 while the two shared an Uber ride after attending company parties at the Academy Awards. At their hotel, she alleges he pulled her onto his bed after she walked him back to his room and kissed her before she was able to break free. Was the U.S. similarly lulled into dropping its guard? Its been announced that the head of the CIA is hurrying back to Afghanistan for a second round of talks with the head of the Taliban. The previous talks were kept secret. The Taliban has gone back and forth between refusing and granting an extension of the Aug. 31 due date for America being out of the country. On top of everything else, kids under 12 still cant get the vaccine. Their parents live in a swirl of fear and uncertainty while schools and businesses and the local, state and federal government officials dawdle about trying to decide whether to mandate vaccines or give in to the freedom squawkers who, I assume, think stop signs are a form of government overreach. (NOBODYS GONNA TELL ME WHEN TO COME TO A FULL AND COMPLETE STOP!) An Associated Press analysis shows the rate of new cases is slowing in Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas, some of the same states where first shots are on the rise. In Florida, pleas from hospitals and a furor over masks in schools may have nudged some to take more precautions. Later, shes called to the room of a woman who has a baby cooing on the bed; she asks Eve to watch the child while she takes a shower, which underscores the many ways service workers are expected to perform all kinds of tasks outside their job description. But at least the woman acknowledges Eves existence and asks about her life. Do you have children, she asks? Yes, a 4-year-old son, Eve replies. Throughout the film we see her make furtive phone calls during her shift, checking on that very child. Where do you leave your son when you come to work? the woman asks. Somebody takes care of him for me, Eve tells her. In interviews with more than a dozen attendants from major and regional carriers, crew members said they were getting squeezed on both sides from passengers and the airlines. They described regularly working shifts of more than 14 hours, being assigned up to four or five flights a day, not being given sufficient time to sleep and being deterred from taking leave if fatigued or unwell. Officers first were called to an alley in the 600 block of East 106th Street in Roseland about 4:10 p.m. Wednesday, where a 19-year-old man had been standing when someone fired at him, police said. He was shot in the chest and back and was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where he died. No trial date has been set, but Linn seems eager to hustle the case along, informing the attorneys at length about his process for selecting jurors even though the defense said that due to technical issues they have not even been able to access all the potential evidence in the case. When asked Wednesday by the media about the commitment to a non-police model, Lightfoot responded by saying: The answer is unequivocally yes, because we also know in certain circumstances, particularly when we are looking at people that are ODing, people that are having mental health crisis related to drug addiction, police are never the best answer. Will they be somewhere in the periphery to make sure everything is fine? The answer is yes. We want to see what are the right circumstances for a clinician-only response. The Civilian Office of Police Accountability, which also investigated the case, said in a statement the officer was choking the man who, prosecutors said, struggled to breathe for more than 10 seconds as Garcia hovered over him. Garcias partner came into the back seat and got Garcias hands off the mans neck and maneuvered him to a seated position so they could drive to the district police station, according to prosecutors. In response to a question on MSNBC about her mandate, Lightfoot ripped Catanzaras comments and said most police officers understand that the vaccine is absolutely safe, that its widely available, and its the only protection that they have against the virus. Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly paid a visit on Wednesday to the country's monument-rich city of Luxor and inspected the renovation work on some huge columns in the Karnak Temple Complex as part of a campaign launched by the government to rejuvenate the charm of the city ahead of its national day in early November. Accompanied by a number of officials including the tourism and antiquities minister and the governor of Luxor, the prime minister saw tens of specialized restorers standing on scaffolds while working on cleaning and restoring the original colors of 12 columns out of the 134 columns of the Great Hypostyle Hall inside the temple complex. "I am here for monitoring all the progress and the effort that are being undertaken by the governorate and the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities for the revival and renovation of different monuments and sites in Luxor," the Egyptian prime minister told reporters. He added that the ongoing renovations of sites in Luxor, including the Karnak Temple Complex, Luxor Temple and the Avenue of Sphinxes stretching between them, will be celebrated in "another international event" like that when Egypt celebrated in April relocating 22 mummies from a museum to another in Cairo in a remarkable event referred to as the Pharaohs' Golden Parade. Mostafa al-Saghir, director-general of Karnak temples, said that the Great Hypostyle Hall with its 134 columns in Karnak is admired and visited the most by local and foreign tourists. "We are currently doing the restoration work to show their original colors, which are so beautiful and amazing. All this comes within the preparation of Karnak temples and Luxor Temple for the planned opening of the Grand Avenue of Sphinxes," the official told Xinhua inside the massive hall. Saghir added that the Great Hypostyle Hall is "a construction miracle" in the New Kingdom of ancient Egypt, stressing that "while the Pyramids of Giza are the construction miracle of the Old Kingdom, the Great Hypostyle Hall is the construction miracle of the New Kingdom." Dressed in a white coat like her colleagues, Israa Hussein, a young woman, was standing on one of the scaffolds while using special tools and brushes to clean part of one of the columns and highlight its original colors. "We try to revive the spirit of the columns. It's an honor to work in this project in our city that contains a large amount of the world's antiquities, and we're happy that we highlight something valuable whose details and features used to be obscure," she told Xinhua. The restorers working on the temples in Luxor are mostly from the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) and they came from different Upper Egyptian provinces including Luxor and Sohag, according to SCA Secretary-General Mostafa Waziri. The Avenue of Sphinxes is 2,700 meters long, connecting between the temples of Karnak and Luxor Temple, told Waziri, noting that excavation work in the avenue, which started in 2017, led to finding new sphinxes in the place. The SCA chief said that excavation in the avenue will continue even after its opening for visitors in a few months, describing the monument-rich city of Luxor as "an open-air museum." The delegation of officials also took a quick look at Luxor Temple and the adjacent Avenue of Sphinxes before they concluded the inspection tour. From big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things to blockchain, 5G and artificial intelligence (AI), the digital economy is the talk of the town in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality. At the Smart China Expo 2021 and the China-Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Forum on the Digital Economy Industry, both held in Chongqing this week, the digital economy has taken center stage and opened up new possibilities for international cooperation as it is becoming ubiquitous in modern life. Guests from all SCO countries and relevant SCO bodies attended the forum online or offline, and more than 610 companies from 31 countries and regions, including Huawei, iFLYTEK, Alibaba and Intel, participated in the expo through online or offline exhibitions. A total of 92 projects worth a total of 250 billion yuan (about 38.62 billion U.S. dollars) were signed at the expo on Monday, demonstrating the vitality of the digital economy. Latest smart technologies The three-day expo, which concluded on Wednesday, saw the display of a wide range of cutting-edge technologies and applications, including a cloud-computing processor the size of a business card, an AI machine that can grade homework and tests, and smart home technologies that allow users to voice-control heaters and floor-cleaning robots through WeChat. A capsule robot capable of performing gastrointestinal endoscopy procedures through automated navigation caught the attention of many visitors. With the help of AI, the capsule robot developed by Chongqing Jinshan Science & Technology (Group) Co., Ltd. can navigate its way around the stomach along pre-planned routes and perform medical examinations in a painless and non-intrusive way, according to expo staffer Liu Siyu. "We see great roles that smart technology plays in various sectors whether it is AI, education, health, climate change, and agriculture, etc., in the past two years when the world has been under COVID-19," British Trade Commissioner for China John Edwards said in a recent interview with Xinhua. Nearly 50 British companies exhibited in the expo's UK Pavilion, joining the "UK Now" Roadshow and the Digital Transformation in Manufacturing Forum to share expertise, exchange ideas and forge partnerships. New field for cooperation In the Russian exhibition hall, the kokoshnik, a traditional Russian headdress, wowed many visitors with its exquisite craftsmanship. Russian kokoshnik craftsman Juhann Nikadimus had long sought to revive the traditional handicraft, but was often thwarted by the difficulty of acquiring expensive brocades, pearls and other materials in Russia. His problems were solved after he sourced the materials on AliExpress, a global online retail marketplace. "Chinese brocades are very similar to the materials used historically in Russia in terms of texture and quality, and they cost only a fraction," Nikadimus said. The scale of China's digital economy hit 39.2 trillion yuan in 2020, accounting for 38.6 percent of the country's GDP, according to a white paper recently released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology. While evolving into a new driver powering economic growth, the digital economy has helped many countries deepen international cooperation in more fields. "We stand firm in our commitment to opening-up and cooperation, and will continue to expand new space and share development opportunities of the digital economy," said Xiao Yaqing, China's minister of industry and information technology, when addressing the opening ceremony on Monday. "The possibilities offered by the digital revolution are cross-cutting and limited only by our imagination," said Singapore's Minister of Communications and Information and Second Minister for Home Affairs Josephine Teo via video link. "Only by working together can we fully unlock the potential of digital technologies." Chinese smartphone vendor Xiaomi Corp posted record revenue of 87.8 billion yuan ($13.57 billion) in the second quarter of this year, up 64 percent year-on-year and beating analyst expectations, as it benefits from rapid growth in overseas markets. The Beijing-based company said on Wednesday that its net income reached 6.32 billion yuan, up 87.4 percent year-on-year, which also beat analyst expectations. The strong performance came as Xiaomi earned its new tag of the world's No 2 smartphone maker by shipments in the second quarter of 2021. From April to June, Xiaomi shipped 52.8 million units of smartphones to the world, marking a year-on-year growth of 83 percent, according to data from market research company Canalys. In the second quarter of this year, Xiaomi's revenue from overseas markets was 43.6 billion yuan, marking a year-on-year surge of 81.6 percent. Xiaomi said earlier this month that it aims to outcompete South Korea's Samsung to emerge as the world's largest smartphone brand by shipments in three years. Economic and trade teams from China and the United States have maintained normal communication, according to the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) on Thursday. In the first seven months of the year, bilateral goods trade volume surged 40 percent year on year, said MOC spokesperson Gao Feng. During the period, China's imports from the United States jumped by 50.4 percent from a year ago, while exports expanded 36.9 percent year on year, Gao said. That fully shows the economies of the two countries are highly complementary, Gao said, adding that bilateral trade cooperation is in line with the interests of the two countries and two peoples. China has always maintained that the imposition of extra tariffs by the United States is not good for China, the United States as well as global economic recovery, Gao said. The Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee releases a document titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions" at a press conference in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 26, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua] The Communist Party of China (CPC), the world's largest governing party, on Thursday issued a key publication, expounding on the Party's mission and contributions. A press conference was held as senior Party officials offered more insight on the publication, cleared some misunderstandings about the Party, and rebutted unfounded overseas accusations. Titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions," the key publication released by the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee said achieving national rejuvenation is the historic mission of the CPC, adding that the Party has made an "unbreakable commitment" to bring the people a happy life. Wang Xiaohui, executive deputy director of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, said the publication -- which has a preamble, a conclusion and five chapters -- has shed light on the issue about where the CPC comes from and where it is heading. A strong party In 100 years, the CPC has grown from a small party with just over 50 members into the largest governing party in the world, with more than 95 million members. It is a party of major international standing and has governed the world's largest socialist country for more than seven decades. "Of the people, by the people, for the people -- this is what has guided the CPC from victory to victory over the past century," Wang Xiaohui said. The publication pointed out that the CPC is dedicated to the people and forever puts their interests first. The CPC pursues the lofty goal of working for the wellbeing of the Chinese people, and it does everything in the interests of the people. The document also said that Marxism is the single guiding ideology of the CPC. These hundred years have seen the CPC fight on, guided by Marxism, and buttressed by firm convictions, an enterprising spirit, and unyielding determination, it said. The CPC takes vigorous measures to maintain its members' purity and advanced nature, the publication said. With more than 95 million members, the CPC considers this matter a fundamental issue and an important task in its Party building work, said Qi Jiabin, an official with the CPC Central Committee's Organization Department. The CPC ensures the requirement of full and strict governance over the Party reaches every member and Party branch. Taking a zero-tolerance stance at its members' misconducts, the CPC enforces its discipline with resolute measures, said Wang Jianxin, an official with the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the CPC and the National Supervisory Commission. Notable progress has been achieved since the 18th CPC National Congress in 2012 as the Party has taken an even tougher fight against corruption and undesirable conduct. According to a survey of the National Bureau of Statistics, 95.8 percent of the Chinese people consider the CPC's Party governance efforts very effective in 2020, up 16.5 percentage points from 2012. Governing success The Party has saved the Chinese nation from the three mountains of imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat-capitalism, rebuilt it from scratch, and over a few decades developed it into the world's second largest economy and an upper-middle-income country. The publication attributed the success to the Party's robust leadership and its strong governance capability, and highlighted its strengths such as a strong Central Committee, sound guidelines and strategies, effective implementation of decisions and plans, pooling the efforts of all sectors, and fostering high-caliber Party officials. At Thursday's press conference, Wang Xiaohui emphasized the Party's leadership, saying that the CPC leadership system and its working mechanism are suited to China's national conditions and have won the people's support and demonstrated its high efficiency and strong advantage in practice. The Party has led China to success in eradicating absolute poverty and attaining moderate prosperity. The country is now on a new journey to fully build a modern socialist country, with common prosperity an important target. Han Wenxiu, an official with the Central Committee for Financial and Economic Affairs, said common prosperity means affluence shared by everyone, both in material and cultural terms, but not egalitarianism. Hard work is the fundamental pathway to common prosperity, Han said. "We allow some people to become well-off first, who then inspire and help the latecomers. We will not opt for a robbing-the-rich-for-the-poor approach." Not to export ideology The CPC is a political party that seeks happiness for the people and progress for humanity, and has always pursued the shared human values of peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy and freedom, said the publication. The Party has proposed building a global community of shared future, with the goal of creating an open, inclusive, clean and beautiful world that enjoys lasting peace, universal security, and common prosperity, it added. "China never seeks to export its ideology, values or development model," said Liu Jianchao, deputy director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee, rejecting the unfounded claim that China is playing a dominant role in the international community and international affairs. Liu said China gives due respect to people of other countries in pursuing development paths suited to their own national conditions based on their specific circumstances and sovereign rights. Xu Yousheng, vice minister of the United Front Work Department of the CPC Central Committee, made similar remarks when responding to the so-called "infiltration" claim. The CPC-led united front is committed to strengthening the unity and solidarity of all Chinese people at home and abroad to build a strong and prosperous country, he said. "The work is carried out in a transparent and open manner," he said. "China never interferes in other countries' internal affairs." Wang Xiaohui said the CPC is a political party that contributes to the peace and development of humanity. Looking ahead, the CPC will firmly walk down the path of peaceful development and stand on the right side of history and the progressive side of humanity, he said. Full Text: The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions You are here: China Students aged 15 to 17 received their second COVID-19 jab in Luohu on Aug. 21 and Aug. 22. The district set up five inoculation stations on school campuses including Shenzhen Middle School, Shenzhen No.2 Experimental School, Cuiyuan Middle School, Luohu Senior High School and Shenzhen Luohu Foreign Languages School. Meanwhile, any students who missed the opportunity can receive the vaccine at 10 other stations set in the neighborhood health centers. The Luohu Education Bureau is urging students within the age group to get vaccinated, given the continued challenges and risks posed by the pandemic. During the vaccination campaign, senior officials from the Luohu Education Bureau visited the five middle schools to supervise efforts and ensure that everything was running smoothly. Students in Luohu received their first jab on July 30 and July 31 following arrangements made by the Luohu Education Bureau. You are here: China Chinese public security organs have cracked 185,000 cases related to telecoms and online fraud and arrested 247,000 suspects from January to July, the Ministry of Public Security announced Wednesday. The number of telecoms and online fraud cases fell for two consecutive months in June and July compared with the same period last year, said the ministry. By the end of June, Chinese police had also arrested 36,000 suspects in 20,000 criminal cases related to food, drugs, the environment, and intellectual property rights, the ministry said. Over 3,000 missing or abducted children, including adults who had gone missing or were kidnapped as children, were rescued during a nationwide campaign launched in January, the ministry added. Flash A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson on Wednesday urged the United States to stop political manipulation on the issue of coronavirus origins tracing, saying the United States should invite WHO experts to launch a probe into Fort Detrick and the University of North Carolina (UNC) to find the source of the virus if it is bent on insisting the lab-leak theory. Spokesperson Wang Wenbin made the remarks at a daily press briefing after the Permanent Representative of China to the United Nations Office at Geneva and other International Organizations in Switzerland wrote to the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), and submitted two non-papers on Fort Detrick and UNC, as well as an open letter signed by netizens demanding an investigation into Fort Detrick. Wang said China's stand on global origins tracing is consistent and clear, adding the issue is a science-based one, and China always supports and will continue participating in science-based origins tracing. The conclusions and recommendations of the China-WHO joint study report have been recognized by the international community and the scientific community, and must be respected and implemented, Wang said, adding that future global origins study should and can only be carried out on this basis. The Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) has received WHO experts twice. It is extremely unlikely that the novel coronavirus was leaked from the WIV -- this is the clear conclusion of the China-WHO joint study report, the spokesperson said. Those who insist that the possibility of a lab-leak cannot be ruled out should investigate Fort Detrick and the UNC in the principle of fairness and justice. Wang said the international community, including the American public, has long held concerns over the illegal, non-transparent, and unsafe activities of Fort Detrick, citing bio-safety incidents in 2019 that led to the shutting down of the lab and the ensuing outbreaks of illnesses with similar symptoms of COVID-19. For the UNC, the spokesperson pointed out the Baric team leads the world in researches in this field and has already advanced capabilities to synthesize and modify coronavirus. "We hope the international community can work hand in hand to resist the backlash of politicization and bring the origins study back to the right track of scientific cooperation," Wang added. Also on Wednesday, Fu Cong, director-general of the Department of Arms Control of the Foreign Ministry, said the United States, while clamoring for an investigation into other countries' bio-medical labs, is the only country standing in the way of establishing a multilateral verification mechanism under the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). "I wonder if the U.S. obsession with Chinese biological labs signifies a change in its position on a verification protocol. Simply put, is the U.S. government ready to withdraw its opposition to the negotiations of a verification protocol under the BWC?" Fu said the litmus test would come as early as next week when the Meetings of the States Parties to the BWC takes place in Geneva. "China will once again call for the restart of negotiations on a verification protocol," Fu added. Flash At least 35 people were killed in a fresh gunmen attack in Nigeria's central state of Plateau on Tuesday night, a police source said on Wednesday. A police source told Xinhua on the phone at least 35 villagers were killed in the gunmen attack on the Yelwa Zangam village in Jos North local government area on Tuesday night, as he saw residents of the village took corpses of those killed in the attack to the state house of assembly in Jos, the state capital on wednesday. Simon Lalong, governor of the Plateau state, confirmed in a statement on Wednesday the gunmen attack on the Yelwa Zangam village on Tuesday night, leading to villagers killed and properties destroyed. Lalong described the attack as a "barbaric" act, adding security agencies had already arrested 10 suspects in connection with the attack and efforts were ongoing to track down the other assailants. The governor did not reveal the casualties in the attack, and said he was reinstating a 24-hour curfew from 4 p.m. on Wednesday in Jos North local government area to prevent further attacks. "It will also enable security agencies to deploy appropriately to maintain security as they search for the attackers of the villagers continues," he said. The state had only recently relaxed a curfew imposed in the same area after a convoy of five buses with Muslim followers were attacked by armed men along Rukuba road of the area on August 14, leading to 22 persons killed. There have been a series of gunmen attacks in Nigeria in recent months, leading to deaths and kidnappings. Airline Employees Placed at Risk from Shot Mandates NEWS PROVIDED BY Liberty Counsel Aug. 26, 2021 ORLANDO, Fla., Aug. 26, 2021 /Christian Newswire/ -- Liberty Counsel has been assisting thousands of airline employees with religious exemptions who have been told they must get the COVID injection in order to keep their jobs. These employees are facing illegal resistance from both the airlines, and lack of support from the unions. They are being placed under extreme stress. Based on direct conversations with airline workers, including many pilots and flight attendants, the pressure is resulting in an increased number of safety incidents. A captain of a major airline said that due to the extreme stress under which pilots are being subjected to regarding taking these unwanted shots or losing their jobs, this captain would not fly on the airline unless in the captain's seat. Another said that flight attendants are coming to the cockpit in tears due to the stress. Yet another said that due to distractions, there are also more safety incidents on the ground. Another said that a co-worker under fear of being terminated, succumbed to pressure and took the COVID shots, went into anaphylactic shock, and died. The number of airline workers in the airlines mandating the shots is in the thousands. The airlines are not only sacrificing their employees but putting passengers in danger. United Airlines became the first major U.S. carrier to mandate the shots for its approximately 67,000 employees, who must be fully vaccinated by October 25 or face termination. Staff who upload vaccination proof by Sept. 20 will receive a full day's pay. Frontier Airlines requires that employees must be vaccinated by October 1. Hawaiian Airlines has also told employees that they must be fully vaccinated by November 1. Delta just announced a shot mandate. However, neither the airlines nor the unions seem to be concerned with safety for their employees and passengers. For example, in the letter of agreement (LOA) between United Airlines and the pilots regarding COVID vaccinations, it admits that pilots could become disabled from the injections: "If a pilot suffers a medically-documented adverse reaction to COVID vaccination that prevents the pilot from exercising the privileges of a First Class Medical Certificate, the Company shall provide Company-paid drops (PDCP) until such time as the Pilot is able to exercise the privileges of a First Class Medical Certificate. Such period shall not exceed ninety (90) days." The LOA goes on to say that if the pilot's disability exceeds ninety (90) days, the pilot can file for long-term disability. The VAERS data shows 595,620 adverse events, including 13,608 deaths as of August 13, 2021 from the COVID injections. Ironically, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued guidance last February which identifies certain limitations for the holders of FAA airmen medical certificates or medical clearances who receive either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines. The Office of Aerospace Medicine (AAM) has stated that those individuals receiving either Pfizer or Moderna must be placed on a 48-hour "no fly/no safety-related duty" hold upon receiving each dose of a Pfizer or Moderna vaccine. The AAM will monitor patient responses to each dose and may adjust the FAA's policy as necessary to ensure aviation safety. When boarding an Alaska Air flight, passengers at the boarding gate see a pop-up sign that says: IT'S SAFE TO FLYAND EXPERTS AGREE. Travelers wearing a mask have a .003% or NEAR-ZERO CHANCE of being exposed to the virus, even on a full aircraft according to a recent Department of Defense study Air travel is the safest mode of Transportation thanks to. . . HOSPITAL-GRADE AIR FILTRATION CLEAN AIR EXCHANGE TOP-DOWN AIR FLOW The Department of Defense study was done in conjunction with United Airlines. It is hypocritical for United Airlines to now demand their employees to get the shots when the company was part of the study that concluded the risk of exposure was .003%, or NEAR-ZERO CHANCE. Regarding the Clean Air Exchange, the Alaska Air sign states this is "According to researchers at Harvard." United Airlines is illegally telling its employees that to obtain a religious exemption they have to be an adherent of a recognized religion with a history of opposition to vaccines. Employees are also being told they need to include a letter from a clergy to support their sincere religious beliefs. This is false. The only issue is whether the employee has a sincere religious belief, not whether a clergy or a "recognized religion" (whatever that is) agrees. Title VII defines the protected category of religion to include "all aspects of religious observance and practice, as well as belief." 42 U.S.C. 2000e(j). Moreover, as the EEOC has made clear, Title VII's protections also extend nonreligious beliefs if related to morality, ultimate ideas about life, purpose, and death. See EEOC, Questions and Answers: Religious Discrimination in the Workplace (June 7, 2008), ("Title VII's protections also extend to those who are discriminated against or need accommodation because they profess no religious beliefs...Religious beliefs include theistic beliefs, i.e. those that include a belief in God as well as non-theistic 'moral or ethical beliefs as to what is right and wrong which are sincerely held with the strength of traditional religious views.' Although courts generally resolve doubts about particular beliefs in favor of finding that they are religious, beliefs are not protected merely because they are strongly held. Rather, religion typically concerns 'ultimate ideas' about 'life, purpose, and death'"). The U.S. Supreme Court has been very clear on this point: "Intrafaith differences of that kind are not uncommon among followers of a particular creed, and the judicial process is singularly ill equipped to resolve such differences . . . and the guarantee of free exercise is not limited to beliefs which are shared by all of the members of a religious sect. Particularly in this sensitive area, it is not within the judicial function and judicial competence to inquire whether the petitioner or his fellow worker more correctly perceived the commands of their common faith. Courts are not arbiters of scriptural interpretation." (Thomas v. Rev. Bd. of Ind. Emp. Sec. Div., 450 U.S. 707, 715-716 (1981) (emphasis added). Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said, "The airlines are jeopardizing the health and safety of their employees and passengers by pressuring them to get the COVID shots or be terminated. This is a national emergency that places crew and passengers at risk. If the airlines claim, based on the Department of Defense study, that wearing a mask reduces the chance of exposure to the virus to .003%, or near zero, then why force these faithful employees to inject an experimental substance into their bodies? No one should not be forced to inject this or any substance in their bodies against their will. It is wrong to violate the fundamental right to free and informed consent and bully people into compliance." Liberty Counsel provides broadcast quality TV interviews via Hi-Def Skype and LTN at no cost. SOURCE Liberty Counsel CONTACT: Mat Staver, 407-875-1776, Liberty@LC.org Related Links lc.org/ Gerry Lamberti, center, an engineer and CEO of SuperSprings International, runs the business out of Carpinteria with Chief Commercial Officer Adam Weisner, left, and Chief Operations Officer Michael Stickney, right. Acetylacetone Market Key Research Findings Global acetylacetone market size in 2017 nearly US$ 130 Mn. The acetylacetone market is expected to grow at a CAGR of over 4% during 2018-2028. East Asia and Europe are expected to remain the largest regional markets in the global acetylacetone market East Asia and Europe are the leading regions in the acetylacetone market, owing to the increasing adoption of acetylacetone as a raw material for pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals. Distribution and marketing synergies between companies to exploit the growth prospects in the acetylacetone market. Many players in the established acetylacetone market are looking to build strong ties with suppliers and distributors. The heterocyclic compounds synthesis segment is expected to remain the most preferred application segment in the acetylacetone market. The growth of this segment can be primarily attributed to the global growth of the chemical market. Some of the factors such as cost-effectiveness and rising demand for pharmaceutical products are expected to propel the growth of the acetylacetone market. Click Here to Get Sample Premium Report @ https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/sample/13608 Top 5 Factors Shaping the Acetylacetone Market Acetylacetone: Growing Usage as an Intermediate in Pharmaceuticals and Agrochemicals Acetylacetone continues to gain high demand for heterocyclic compound synthesis and biomolecules. Acetylacetone finds wide use for its pharmaceutical and agrochemical intermediate formation. The global demand for acetylacetone is increasing as a result of the growing prevalence of end users such as agrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, coatings, and petrochemicals, to name a few, where acetylacetone is prominently used for production. Launch of New Products and Distribution Agreements are the Major Trends in the Acetylacetone Market Key market players such as Daicel Corporation and Wacker Chemie AG, among others, are focusing on the expansion of their acetylacetone product portfolios through distribution agreements and the launching of new products. Rising Demand for Pharmaceutical Products is Expected to Create Strong Demand for Acetylacetone According to the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs Data (2015), between 2015 and 2030, the number of people in the world aged 60 years or over is projected to grow by 56 percent, from 901 million to 1.4 billion, which is expected to result in the robust growth of the pharmaceutical market. This, in turn, is expected to drive the acetylacetone market to a great extent. Introduction of Agrochemicals Products Such as Fungicides and Pesticides Expected to Propel the Growth of the Acetylacetone Market Over the Forecast Period Manufacturers are constantly improving their agrochemical products so as to meet the increasing demand for quality food. The increasing demand for agrochemical products such as fungicides, pesticides, and others is expected to increase the demand for acetylacetone, as its used as a raw material for multiple agrochemical products. You can Buy This Report from Here @https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/checkout/13608/Single Emerging Countries Promise New Opportunities of Growth China is expected to contribute a high revenue share in the global acetylacetone market in 2018. However, substantial growth is expected in countries such as India, South Korea, and Japan, as governments and private players are focusing on improving the quality of healthcare in these countries. Among the emerging countries, China is likely to present sustained opportunities of growth for stakeholders in the acetylacetone market. Due to Chinas strong growth, East Asia is projected to emerge as a lucrative market during the forecast period. Request For Report Discounts @https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/discount/13608 Acetylacetone Market Structure Analysis Global Crane Market Key Research Findings Global crane market size estimated in 2019 nearly US$ 40,000 Mn. The global crane market is anticipated to grow at a CAGR of nearly 4% over 2019-2029. APEC and China are expected to remain large regional markets for cranes. APEC and China are prominent regions in the global crane market due to the growing demand for construction activities in these regions. Emerging companies are focusing on expanding their product portfolios by launching new products in the global crane market. Companies such as Tadano Ltd. and Terex Corporation, among others, are significantly investing in new product development and launches to sustain their market presence. The stiff boom segment is projected to be a prominent segment in the global crane market, in terms of design type, over the forecast period. Market Set to Grow 1.5X between 2019 and 2029 Click Here to Get Sample Premium Report @ https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/sample/13607 The global crane market is likely to witness robust growth over the projected period. The global crane market growth is expected to be mainly driven by the growing focus towards construction activities, and subsequent increase in the demand for commercial properties. Top 3 Factors Shaping the Global Crane Market Growth in construction and mining sector to drive the adoption of cranes The crane markets in emerging regions are expected to be driven by increasing investments in construction and mining. According to MEED (Middle East Economic Digest), the contribution of the construction sector to the GDP in UAE increased from 10.3% in 2011 to 11.1% in 2015. With the bourgeoning industrial sector, including mining, manufacturing, utilities, construction, and oil and gas, the demand for mobile cranes in these regions is expected to increase during the forecast period. As such, many companies are entering the market in Asia Pacific and the Middle East and Africa with the hope of capitalizing on this demand and expanding their geographical footprint. For this, companies are focusing on developing products that comply with the respective safety and emission standards of the local markets. Increasing investments in public and private sector construction projects Increasing investments made by governments as well as private sector companies in infrastructure development projects is the major factor driving the growth of the global crane market. Within these projects, the significant demand drivers going forward are urban infrastructure, road construction, irrigation, and mining operations. Investments in infrastructure can be classified into investments for airports, ports, railways, roads, pipelines, waterways, irrigation, and urban infrastructure. In September 2016, the Liebherr Group supplied three mobile cranes during the expansion of the airport to the suburban railway line in Barcelona. You can Buy This Report from Here @https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/checkout/13607/Single Increasing need for high capacity lifting for greater height application Mobile cranes are primarily used for high capacity lifting in greater height applications. However, the use of many other lifting equipment for these applications offer substantial limitations in lifting capacity, comfort, and difficulty in steering maneuverability. These limitations are overcome by mobile cranes due to the availability of large capacity cranes with enhanced driving comfort. Thus, the demand for these applications is mainly increasing the adoption of mobile cranes, thereby driving the global mobile crane market. In Oct 2016, Dornseiff, a crane rental company in Germany, employed mobile cranes for lifting HVAC (Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning) equipment weighing 2.4 tonnes to a height of 22.5 meters. According to the site technician, a tower crane is generally used for similar applications. Request For Report Discounts @https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/discount/13607 Global Crane Market Structure Analysis USA, 26 AUGUST 2021 At present, individuals have various sizes of beds in their homes, and they want the best quality bed sheets on their beds regularly. A bed sheet gives an attractive look to the bed and the whole room. There are many individuals who love white-colored bed sheets and some prefer colorful bed sheets, but when the thing comes to quality, everyone prefers top-quality bed sheets. In the industry, individuals have so many choices of bed sheets that come in different fabrics, for example, linen, cotton, silk, and much more. Many people give preference to silk bed sheets as compared to other kinds of sheets in the bedroom. The demand for silk bed sheets is hitting the roof because silk bed sheets provide several benefits to everyone. The primary benefit of silk bed sheets is that people get quality sleep on the silk bed sheets. 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Website : https://slipintosoft.com/collections/silk-bed-sheet Paraganglioma Market Highlights Paragangliomas, also called glomus tumors, is a rare and slow-growing tumor arising from non-chromaffin paraganglion cells, which are distributed throughout the body from the base of the skull to the urinary bladder. However, in over 50% cases it occurs in the temporal bone. The global paraganglioma market is expecting a healthy growth in the coming future. The global market is majorly driven by increasing paraganglioma patients across the globe. Additionally, increasing smoking population and rising consumption of alcohol have spurred the growth of the market. However, side effects of the treatment, long time for approval, and high cost may slow the growth of the market over the review period. The global paraganglioma market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6.1% during the forecast period 2017-2023. Request Sample Report at https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/sample_request/4838 Paraganglioma Market Key Players Some of key the players in the market are Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (U.S.), GlaxoSmithKline Plc. (U.K.), Bayer AG (Germany), Novartis AG (Switzerland), Spectrum Pharmaceuticals Inc. (U.S.), Amgen, Inc. (U.S.), Eli Lilly and Company (U.S.), AstraZeneca Plc. (U.K.), F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. (Switzerland), Janssen Biotech, Inc. (U.S.), AbbVie Inc. (U.S.), Takeda Pharmaceuticals (Japan), Pfizer, Inc. (U.S.), Sanofi (France), Merck & Co., Inc. (U.S.), Immunomedics (U.S.), and Oncomed Pharmaceuticals (U.S.). Paraganglioma Market Segmentation The global Paraganglioma Diagnosis Marketis segmented on the basis of types, treatment, and end users. On the basis of types, the market is segmented into caroid paraganglioma, cervical paraganglioma, jugular paraganglioma, secretory paraganglioma, temporal paraganglioma, vagal paraganglioma, and others. On the basis of the treatment, the market is categorized into therapeutic treatment and diagnostic treatment. The therapeutic treatment is further segmented into surgery, embolization, and radiotherapy. The embolization is further categorized into liquid embolic agents, sclerosing agents, particulate embolic agents, and others. The radiotherapy is sub-segmented into external beam radiation therapy, brachytherapy, and unsealed source radiotherapy. The diagnostic treatment is further segmented into CT scans, MRI, angiography, blood test, and others. On the basis of the end users, the market is segmented into hospital & clinics, ambulatory care centers, and others. Paraganglioma Market - Regional Analysis The Americas dominate the global market owing to a huge population suffering from paraganglioma, strong government support for research & development and high health care spending. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2014, over 14.1 million of new cancer cases were registered worldwide. Increasing prevalence of the disease has boosted the market growth in America. Additionally, changing lifestyle and smoking further fuel the growth of the market. Europe accounts for the second leading market in the global paraganglioma market, which is followed by Asia Pacific. Asia Pacific is the fastest growing paraganglioma market. It is majorly driven by India, China and Japan owing to a huge number of patients and rapidly growing economy. Governments in Asia Pacific region are supporting manufacturers for research & development, which can serve as a path for the development of the market. The Middle East and Africa contribute the least to the growth of the global market. The Middle East dominates the market of the Middle East and African region owing to the presence of the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait. Africa holds the least share of the global market due to limited availability of medical facilities and poor economic condition of the region. However, Global Paraganglioma Market Research Report, By Type (Caroid Paragangliomas, Cervical, Secretory, Temporal, And Vagal Paragangliomas), Treatment (Therapeutic, Diagnostic), End Users (Hospital, Ambulatory Centers, Oncology Centers) - Forecast Till 2023 Browse Complete 85 Pages Premium Research Report Enabled with 66 Respective Tables and Figures at https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/reports/paraganglioma-market-4838 About Market Research Future: At Market Research Future (MRFR), we enable our customers to unravel the complexity of various industries through our Cooked Research Report (CRR), Half-Cooked Research Reports (HCRR), Raw Research Reports (3R), Continuous-Feed Research (CFR) ), and Market Research & Consulting Services A new report titled Environmental Test Chambers Market Size, Growth Analysis & Forecast to 2027 by "Value Market Research" covers key players along side their market share and strategic development adopted by them which provides market scenarios and future situations along side an analysis of market trends, current and future, drivers, challenges, recent trends, opportunities, advancements, and competitive landscape. The entire environmental test chambers market has been sub-categorized into type and industry. The report provides an analysis of these subsets with respect to the geographical segmentation. This research study will keep marketer informed and helps to identify the target demographics for a product or service. Request a FREE Sample Copy of Global Environmental Test Chambers Market Report with Full TOC At: https://www.valuemarketresearch.com/contact/environmental-test-chambers-market/download-sample By Type Temperature and Humidity Chambers Customized Chambers Thermal Shock Chambers Other Chambers By Industry Aerospace and Defense Automotive Telecommunications and Electronics Medical and Pharmaceuticals Other Industries The research report also covers the comprehensive profiles of the key players in the market and an in-depth view of the competitive landscape worldwide. The major players in the environmental test chambers market include ESPEC Corp., Thermotron Industries, Inc., BINDER GmbH, Memmert GmbH + Co. KG, ACS, Actividades de Construccion y Servicios, SA, TPS, LLC, CTS Clima Temperatur Systeme GmbH, CM ENVIROSYSTEMS USA INC., Cincinnati Sub-Zero Products, Inc., Angelantoni Test Technologies S.R.L. This section includes a holistic view of the competitive landscape that includes various strategic developments such as key mergers & acquisitions, future capacities, partnerships, financial overviews, collaborations, new product developments, new product launches, and other developments. This section covers regional segmentation which accentuates on current and future demand for environmental test chambers market across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. Further, the report focuses on demand for individual application segment across all the prominent regions. 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Tel: +1-888-294-1147 Email: sales@valuemarketresearch.com Website: https://www.valuemarketresearch.com BERLIN, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --A Many renowned protagonists of the National Socialist art scene continued working in the Federal Republic as full-time visual artists after 1945.A They produced works to be displayed in public spaces, received lucrative commissions from government, industry and church organisations, taught at art academies, submitted proposals to art competitions and were represented in exhibitions.A Their designs for statues, reliefs and tapestries on public squares and faAades or in theatre and cinema foyers have left their mark to this day on the face of many city centres. They were able to profit from the anti-modernist climate in the early post-war decades. In an exhibition opening on 27 August 2021, the Deutsches Historisches Museum takes the "Divinely Gifted List" as the point of departure for a study of the largely neglected topic of the post-war careers of such "divinely gifted" artists as Arno Breker, Hermann Kaspar, Willy Meller, Paul Mathias Padua, Werner Peiner, Richard Scheibe and Adolf Wamper. The list was first compiled on behalf of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels in August 1944: 378 artists, among them 114 sculptors and painters, were considered "indispensable" and were exempted from military duty and work assignments. The exhibition "'Divinely Gifted'. National Socialism's favoured artists in the Federal Republic" shows for the first time the strong presence of these artists in public spaces, but also in the institutions of political, economic and cultural life in post-war Germany. It also examines their networks, the choice of their motifs, and the reception of their works as well as the related questions of continuity and adaptation to the new circumstances. Reinforced by the parallel exhibition "documenta. Politics and Art" (18.6.2021 a 9.1.2022), the idea of a supposedly radical, cultural-political new beginning in the young Federal Republic has thus had to be revised. The exhibition is supported by the Kulturstiftung des Bundes Long Version Press Release: https://www.dhm.de/en/press/press-release/how-national-socialist-artists-continued-their-careers-after-1945 Media Contact: Deutsches Historisches Museum Abteilungsdirektor Kommunikation Dr. Stephan Adam Unter den Linden 2 10117 Berlin Presse- und A-ffentlichkeitsarbeit Daniela Lange T +49-30-20304-410 presse@dhm.de www.dhm.de BEIJING, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Decades ago, no one would imagine that Saihanba - the once barren land located in north China's Hebei Province - would turn into the world's largest man-made forest.A China did it.A Saihanba now sees a forest coverage of 80 percent, which can conserve and purify 137 million cubic meters of water every year, an achievement hailed "great" by Chinese President Xi Jinping. "It is a model in the world's ecological civilization history," he said during his recent two-day tour in Hebei. During his trip, Xi learned about the management and protection of the forest farm, as well as Hebei's coordinated efforts in conserving its mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands, and desertification control.A The president stressed the importance of developing the green economy and furthering ecological progress, urging to carry on "Saihanba spirit"aa term attributed to generations of workers on the farm who have kept their mission in mind, worked hard and pursued green development.A Xi urged the workers at the Saihanba forest farm to gain a deeper understanding of ecological conservation and continue their hard work for new achievements. A Xi encourages elderlies to stay active in job market Facing a rapidly aging labor force in a continuously expanding economy, Xi encouraged more elderly folks to "stay active" in the job market when inspecting the Binhe community service center. Xi suggested those "younger seniors" to participate in duties like community volunteering jobs. According to China's National Bureau of Statistics, there are currently 264 million people aged 60 and over, accounting for 18.7 percent of the total population. The trend - many say - could potentially pose threats to the world's second-largest economy. The country has put it explicitly in its 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) that it will raise the statutory retirement age "in a gradual, flexible and differentiated manner" to adapt to that "new normal." During his visit, Xi also stressed the need to achieve this year's major goals for the country's economic and social development.A He underlined the need to achieve a balance between COVID-19 prevention and control and economic and social development, and between development and security, to promote high-quality development, and to strive to fulfill major social and economic targets and tasks for this year to ensure a good start of the 14th Five-Year Plan. A new development philosophy in an all-round, faithful manner is need to put into practice, Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, said. Xi calls for preservationA and development ofA culturalA heritage In the renowned Chengde Mountain Resort aA a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage siteaXi learned about its history as well as the preservation efforts there. The resort serves important historic meanings to communication between different ethnic minority groups, adaption of religion and the society, preservationA and development ofA culturalA heritage, as well as the peaceful coexistence between human and nature, Xi pointed out. He also highlighted cultural confidence and the unity between multi-ethnic groups. The Chinese president then visited Puning Temple, a famous Buddhist temple near the resort, and the Chengde Museum. Xi: From 'rural revitalization' to 'industry revitalization' China has always viewed rural vitalization as one of the keys to developing a modern economy, and President Xi took that a step further. He stressed the importance of "industry revitalization." Daguikou villageawhere Xi visitedanow grows strawberries, grapes and cherries. Yet fruit was not their first choice. The village had tried rice, corn and vegetables. But for all sorts of reasons like the lack of water, these products were underproduced. Therefore, villagers couldn't make money off them. So they turned to growing fruits instead. Now, growing strawberries has become the main business for the 1,700 residents, with each household making around $15,000 a year. Xi called on villages to implement tailored methods and find out their distinctive resource in singling out their advantages, while also calling to strengthen rural infrastructure and public service system. https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-08-25/Aging-in-China-Xi-encourages-seniors-to-stay-active-in-job-market-131aEaOXqU0/index.html Video -A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCnoBdWb7P8 A Litchfield, CT (06759) Today Cloudy with periods of rain, some heavy early. Potential for flooding rains. Low 56F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected.. Tonight Cloudy with periods of rain, some heavy early. Potential for flooding rains. Low 56F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Litchfield, CT (06759) Today Rain, heavy at times early. Potential for flooding rains. Low 57F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected.. Tonight Rain, heavy at times early. Potential for flooding rains. Low 57F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Several of the teens indicated to detectives that they knew something was going on with the Ridge Kids at the mall, and more than one of them overheard Sotelo make reference to being jumped by Ridge Kids earlier in the summer at the carnival outside the mall, records show. Detectives themselves knew Sotelo had been attacked and suffered minor injuries during the June 5 carnival but noted he was uncooperative at the time and told police not to investigate further, according to the affidavit. The first person arrested in connection the murder was Nahkyn Durazzo, 21, who police say was present and involved in the shooting incident that led to the death of Hardy. Durazzo was arrested on June 3 and charged with violation of probation and is held on a $75,000 bond. When I was in law school, along with another student, I represented an Afghan interpreter in the SIV process,' Blumenthal said. It took us four years to get him here. This guy was the ideal candidate. He worked with all different Army units. He was rejected essentially because there were a couple of buzzwords that the visa processors wanted, and none of them were all in the same letter. I shudder to imagine what happens to countless other Afghan interpreters who are equally deserving and do not have a lawyer and two Yale law students to help them through this process.' I believe that throughout my entire life, education and American history has been made for white people and to make white people feel comfortable, when in reality, if you really look at American history, I think its reasonable to say that nobody should really feel comfortable hearing the stories of actual American history, Ved Gautam, 17, a Middletown senior, said during a roundtable discussion with Sen. Chris Murphy Wednesday about how race is taught in schools. Lincoln, NE (68508) Today Mostly clear skies this evening will become overcast overnight. Low 67F. Winds SE at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Mostly clear skies this evening will become overcast overnight. Low 67F. Winds SE at 10 to 20 mph. The two carriers are linked; the Navy ordered them in an unusual two-ship contract. Thats produced important savings in material and components for both, but it also allowed the shipyard to set up something very much like an assembly line producing the giant building blocks that are assembled to make a modern ship, Fields said. The lawyers pointed out, for example, that no one even mentioned the pandemic at the initial April hearing at which prosecutors first sought closure. When the closure was challenged, the petition says, the Commonwealth all of a sudden pointed to the pandemic as a reason to close the courtroom. The joint filing said only that Grimm and the school board hereby stipulate and agree that Grimms request for payment of attorneys fees and costs is unopposed, and there being nothing left to consider, a final Order granting the Fee Petition should be entered by the Court. Lubbock, TX (79409) Today Some clouds. Low 72F. Winds SSE at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Some clouds. Low 72F. Winds SSE at 10 to 20 mph. Lubbock, TX (79409) Today Sun and clouds mixed. High 94F. Winds SSE at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight A few clouds. Low 72F. Winds SSE at 10 to 20 mph. The Moderna COVID-19 vaccine box holds 10 vials of the vaccine, while each vial holds 10 doses. After the seal is broken on one vial, the vaccine is only usable for six hours. Editor's Note: The following information is current as of Aug. 24, and will reflect the latest information on COVID-19 in regards to Texas Tec Indians have flocked to tourist spots across the country from the beaches of Goa on the west coast to the mountainous north on planes and in cars after the easing of restrictions. (Bloomberg) People across India are taking to the skies after months stuck in their homes during a deadly Covid-19 wave, driving a spike in demand for jet fuel, the oil product hit hardest by the ongoing pandemic. Indians have flocked to tourist spots across the country from the beaches of Goa on the west coast to the mountainous north on planes and in cars after the easing of restrictions. Air travel has climbed sharply, said Subhash Goyal, the chairman of STIC Travel -- one of Indias biggest travel agents -- estimating that domestic flights this month are around 75% of pre-virus levels. Thats translated into the biggest month-on-month increase in jet fuel sales in more than a year, according to preliminary data for the first half of August, although sales are still 45% below the same period in 2019. India is proving to be a bright spot for jet fuel demand after the fast-spreading delta variant of the virus interrupted a recovery in air travel from the U.S. to China. However, the revival might be fleeting with the government warning of a surge in infections as early as October if vaccination rates dont accelerate. I missed an office paid holiday to Mexico due to the international travel ban, said Surojit Dasgupta, 46, who has been on a whirlwind family tour since last month to places including Goa. That was frustrating and I decided to make up the loss by traveling to domestic locations wherever allowed before another wave puts us back in our homes. Airlines started to see an increase in demand last month. More than 5 million passengers took domestic flights in July, a 61% jump from June, according to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation. STIC Chairman Goyal is predicting August will be an even better month for air travel across India. Jet fuel sales during Aug. 1-15 rose 25% from a month earlier to about 165,600 tons, and was 48% higher from the same period in 2020, according to figures earlier this month from officials familiar with the data. At least one refiner is taking a cautious approach to the outlook for jet fuel, however. Jet fuel sales during Aug. 1-15 rose 25% from a month earlier to about 165,600 tons, and was 48% higher from the same period in 2020, according to figures earlier this month from officials familiar with the data. (Bloomberg) We need to watch how things pan out for a month or two before any estimate on demand, said Mukesh Kumar Surana, the chairman of state-run Hindustan Petroleum Corp. Unless there is a very severe third wave, there shouldnt be anything to worry. Mumbai: Insurance companies have welcomed the governments plan of introducing insurance bonds as an alternative to bank guarantees but said that the pricing should be market driven for insurers to offer such a product to cover unexpected liabilities in a project. Ashvin Parekh, managing director at Ashvin Parekh Advisory Service said, It is a progressive move. The pricing of the insurance bond should not be controlled but should be market driven. Karni Singh Arha, chief financial officer at Bharti Axa General Insurance said, It is a very good concept and an indication of maturing of the market with regards to accommodating a new product such as an insurance bond. However, the supply and demand will depend on the balance sheet strength of the issuing insurer and the interest of the buyer. Bank guarantees are usually asked for while extending a loan and typically require a collateral. An insurance bond is also a surety but it does not require any additional collateral, as the insurer guarantees payment. Finance secretary T. V. Somanathan on Tuesday made the announcement during a meeting between industry captains and finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who is on a two-day visit to the financial capital. "Government is exploring the possibility of instituting insurance bonds as alternatives to bank guarantees," an official statement said. As per reports last year, insurance regulator Irdai was also looking at the option of insurers offering surety bonds in the context of road projects. Meanwhile, Sitha-raman, who met the industry captains in the evening, said the government is committed to working towards ensuring policy certainty, adding that the regulators also have a key role in ensuring the same. She said the government is working with the regulators on this "important issue. Sitharaman met officials from income tax, Goods and Services Tax and customs departments in two separate meetings on Wednesday. Addressing reporters on Wednesday Sitharaman said public sector banks will adopt a nationwide district-wise credit outreach programme from October to boost credit growth. Mumbai: British lender Barclays Bank PLC India on Thursday said that it will infuse Rs 3,000 crore in India to boost its local expansion. The capital would purely be for growth of corporate and investment banking, and private clients businesses and not for back-office operation, it said. This is Barclays' single largest capital infusion in its Indian business in the last three decades. It comes after the lender pulled out of the retail business in India in 2011 and exited its equity investment business in 2016. The current infusion, Barclays the total invested capital in the country will increase to over Rs 8,300 crore, the bank said in a release. The expansion in tier-1 capital reinforces Barclays commitment to India, and will enable further growth of the banks corporate & investment banking and private clients businesses, the lender said. Jaideep Khanna, head of Barclays, Asia Pacific and country CEO, said The capital infusion in the bank reflects the success and strong track record of our India franchise built over the last three decades. We have ambitious growth aspirations, and the investment will help accelerate that as we look to leverage the attractive opportunities that the present situation offers. Prices of both rough and polished diamonds had remained stable in the pandemic-hit 2020 despite a fall in demand. (Photo: Representational/Pixabay) Chennai: Diamond prices have moved up by up to 20 per cent in 2021 with the demand for jewellery rising in key markets. Prices of both rough and polished diamonds had remained stable in the pandemic-hit 2020 despite a fall in demand. Restricted mining and production of polished goods had kept the pipeline stable throughout the year. However, with demand rising in 2021, the prices have started moving up. Prices are strong for both rough and polished diamonds. They have moved between 5 to 20 per cent depending upon the caratage. The bigger carat diamonds have heated up more, said Sachin Jain, managing director, De Beers India. The US and Chinese markets have been driving the demand as well as prices. As per Edahn Golan Diamond Research and Data, US jewellery sales advanced 41 per cent between January and May 2021 to $32 billion, up from $22.7 billion in the same period of 2019. In July, Chinese jewellery sales too have improved by 14.3 per cent. Exports growth is mainly attributed to the renewed consumer sentiments, especially in the US, with the announcement of Covid-19 stimulus package of $1.9 trillion. With the continued recovery in global markets, rise in disposable income of consumers, forthcoming festive season in domestic and international markets, we are expecting the demand to grow further in the coming months, said Colin Shah, chairman, GJEPC. Even in India we have seen demand rising in June-July, though the data has not yet been collated. Many weddings are being preponed and this is driving sales in the lean season of June-July, said Jain of De Beers. For the entire year, De Beers expects Indian sales to be 10 to 15 per cent higher than in 2019. The company is pinning hopes on the festive quarters in the second half. Even in 2020, the sales were down only by 15 to 20 per cent. We had a strong Q1 and a fantastic Q4, though the in-between quarters were affected by the lock-down, he said. While the demand remains strong, supply issues can possibly be a challenge. South Africa is currently seeing a surge in pandemic cases and the production may get affected if the situation escalates. The production was slower in 2020 as well due to the pandemic. In comparison to mild and moderate symptomatic individuals, asymptomatic primary individuals were much less likely to transmit COVID to close contacts. (Representational image: PTI) Beijing: People infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, are most contagious two days before, and three days after they develop symptoms, according to a study conducted in China. The research, published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine, also found that infected individuals were more likely to be asymptomatic if they contracted the virus from a primary case -- the first infected person in an outbreak -- who was also asymptomatic. "In previous studies, viral load has been used as an indirect measure of transmission," said Leonardo Martinez, an assistant professor at Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) in the US. "We wanted to see if results from these past studies, which show that that COVID cases are most transmissible a few days before and after symptom onset, could be confirmed by looking at secondary cases among close contacts," Martinez said. The researchers conducted contact tracing and studied COVID-19 transmission among approximately 9,000 close contacts of primary cases in the Zhejiang province of China from January 2020 to August 2020. "Close" contacts included household contacts -- defined as individuals who lived in the same household or who dined together -- co-workers, people in hospital settings, and riders in shared vehicles. The researchers, including study co-lead Yang Ge from the University of Georgia College of Public Health, US, monitored infected individuals for at least 90 days after their initial positive COVID test results to distinguish between asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic cases. Of the individuals identified as primary cases, 89 per cent developed mild or moderate symptoms, and only 11 per cent were asymptomatic -- and no one developed severe symptoms. Household members of primary cases, as well as people who were exposed to primary cases multiple times or for longer durations of time, had higher infection rates than other close contacts. However, regardless of these risk factors, close contacts were more likely to contract COVID-19 from the primary infected individual if they were exposed shortly before or after the individual developed noticeable symptoms. "Our results suggest that the timing of exposure relative to primary-case symptoms is important for transmission, and this understanding provides further evidence that rapid testing and quarantine after someone is feeling sick is a critical step to control the epidemic," Martinez said. In comparison to mild and moderate symptomatic individuals, asymptomatic primary individuals were much less likely to transmit COVID to close contacts -- but if they did, the contacts were also less likely to experience noticeable symptoms, the researchers said. "This study further emphasises the need for vaccination, which reduces clinical severity among people that develop COVID," Martinez added. Gene Weingarten, The Washington Post columnist, who also calls himself epistemologist, enthusiast of excreta-related humor [sic] on his Twitter profile has unleashed the wrath of none other than the otherwise soft-spoken gastronomy specialist and celebrity chef Padma Lakshmi. The matter began with a rather long and in-hindsight an unnecessary, apparently humour-ridden article Gene had written on 19 August for his column in TWP. In his article, titled You cant make me eat these foods, Gene had listed out foods he wouldnt eat, such as hazelnuts, anchovies and well Indian food. His article went on to say, If you like Indian curries, yay, you like Indian food! If you think Indian curries taste like something that could knock a vulture off a meat wagon, you do not like Indian food. I dont get it, as a culinary principle, he continued. It is as though the French passed a law requiring every dish to be slathered in smashed, pureed snails. (Id personally have no problem with that, but you might, and I would sympathize.) Among the many, including non-Indians who slammed Gene for his write-up, was The Top Chef hostess Padma Lakshmi. On her Insta page, she posted a caption saying, What in the white nonsenseTM is this? Then, as caption to her screenshot post, she wrote, There is truly no need for something like this to be published in 2021 (or ever). Its racist and lazy at best. My issue is not this persons performative contrarianism (although it is tedious) or that he didnt enjoy the Indian cuisines hes tasted. My problem is in this attempt at a comedic piece hes actually just regurgitating old colonizer tropes, gleefully reducing the culture and country of 1.3 billion people to a (frankly) weak punchline- and that the @washingtonpost published it [sic]. A by-now wiser Gene was quick to issue an apology even as the TWP issued a correction. From start to finish plus the illo, the column was about what a whining infantile ignorant d---head I am. I should have named a single Indian dish, not the whole cuisine, & I do see how that broad-brush was insulting. Apologies.(Also, yes, curries are spice blends, not spices.) [sic] Police added that the victim is a native of Uttar Pradesh. (DC File Photo) Mysuru: A 21-year-old MBA student was allegedly gang raped by four unidentified persons on Tuesday evening in Mysuru, police said. They added that the girl's friend was also attacked with stones by the gang. The incident took place at an unoccupied residential layout near Chamundi Hills in the city. Police added that the victim is a native of Uttar Pradesh. According to the police, the boy stated that the two friends were chatting when he was suddenly attacked by the gang, who, he said, were in an inerbriated condition. The gang then attacked the boy with stones and injured him. They then dragged the girl and allegedly raped her. After the attack, the gang fled the spot, after which the girl and the injured boy reached a private hospital, before his friends were alerted about the incident. The girl is said to be under shock and is being treated at a private hospital. A complaint has been lodged at the Alanahalli police station. Police inspected the scene of crime and have registered a case. Commissioner of Police Chandragupta said that teams have been formed to nab the culprits and a statement from the victim is awaited. District incharge and Minister for Cooperation Somashekar added that he directed the police officers to arrest the culprits. He also said that steps should to be initiated to prevent such incidents in future. Mumbai: Union Minister Narayan Rane on Wednesday asserted that he is not afraid of anyone, and thanked BJP leaders for standing behind him after his arrest for alleged "derogatory remarks" against Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray. Addressing media after getting bail from the local court in Mahad of Raigarh district, Rane said he will resume his Jan Ashirwad Yatra from Friday. "I am not afraid of you (Shiv Sena). My party leaders have stood behind me and I want to thank them all. The Jan Ashirwad Yatra will resume from the day after tomorrow," said Rane. The Union Minister added that he would not "allow" the West Bengal-like environment to be created in Maharashtra. Attacking Shiv Sena for its complaint against him, Rane reminded the party to "not forget" that he had a "big role in spreading Shiv Sena and making it big". "The verdict in all cases (by Shiv Sena) filed against me in Bombay High Court has come in my favour. This is an indication that the country is run by laws," said the Union Minister. Speaking about his "slap" remark against Maharashtra Chief Minister, Rane further asserted that he has "not said anything wrong". "But, if Devendra Fadvanis says it is wrong, then I will accept it, as he is our 'margdarshak' (guide)," Rane said. Rane also slammed Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray. "There were many incidents in the past where Maharashtra Chief Minister has given controversial statements against the BJP leaders like MLC Prasad Lad, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and even against Amit Shah. The language used by Chief Minister was not in right but nothing happens to him," Rane said. Rane, who was arrested on Tuesday evening was granted bail a few hours later by the local court in Mahad of Raigarh district earlier today. The Union Minister was arrested in Ratnagiri district after several FIRs were registered against him at many places including Nashik and Pune, based on the complaints filed by Shiv Sena leaders for his remarks against Thackeray. Rane on Monday accused Thackeray of ignorance about the year of India's independence at an event and said "I would have given (him) a tight slap." Rane was arrested while touring the state for the BJPs Jan Ashirwad Yatra from Mumbai to Sindhudurg. (Photo: PTI) Mumbai: A day after his arrest and release on bail, Union minister Narayan Rane has justified his slap Uddhav Thackeray remark, saying he made the comment because of pride in my country. He also made it clear that he would resume his Jan Ashirwad Yatra from Friday. On the other hand, Shiv Sena continued name-calling the Union minister. I made that statement as I could not tolerate the ignorance shown towards the nation and the national festival (Independence Day). I am proud of my nation and the nationality. I will not tolerate anything said against it, he said on Wednesday. I am not afraid of anyone and I am not backing out. My words were an expression of anger against the chief minister (Uddhav Thackeray) who forgot the year of Indias Independence, he added. Mr Rane, Union Minister for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, was arrested on Tuesday by Maharashtra Police for threatening to slap Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray. It is shameful that the chief minister does not know the year of independence. He leaned back to enquire about the count of years of independence during his speech. Had I been there, I would have given (him) a tight slap, he had said. He was released on bail in Mahad in Raigad, after spending nearly nine hours in police custody. Mr Rane also invoked Mr Thackerays earlier will hit with slippers comment about his Uttar Pradesh counterpart Yogi Adityanath on this occasion. Three years ago, the Shiv Sena chief had slammed the UP CM saying Is he a yogi or a dhongi (hypocrite)? He wore chappals (slippers) while garlanding Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. I felt like hitting him with the same chappal. Who are you to even stand before a statue of Maharaj? Mr Thackeray had said. Was that not a crime? Mr Rane asked while criticising Maharashtra CMs past comments attacking BJP leaders using foul language. The union minister was arrested while touring the state for the BJPs Jan Ashirwad Yatra from Mumbai to Sindhudurg. However, he claimed that he would resume the Yatra from Friday. The yatra will resume in Sindhudurg and it will not be discontinued, he said. Meanwhile, BJP MLA Ashish Shelar has demanded a CBI inquiry into the alleged involvement of Shiv Sena leader and state minister Anil Parab in the arrest of Mr Rane. In a video clip that has gone viral, Mr Parab is seen ordering police officers to arrest the union minister without delay. The Shiv Sena has continued to attack Mr Rane calling him a balloon with holes and croaking frog. In an editorial in its party mouthpiece Saamana, the Sena said there is no relation between Mr Rane and Sanskar. As a result, despite being Union Minister, he behaves like a chhapri gangster. The editorial also said that Mr Rane was never great or conscientious. He got all the name and fame when he was in Shiv Sena. Since he shifted his loyalty from the Sena to other political parties, he lost to the Sena four times including Assembly and Loksabha elections. In short, he can be described as a "balloon with holes". Who is Mr Rane? He himself announced that he is not a normal person. Is he abnormal, the editorial said. The Sena also defended the MVA governments action against Mr Rane saying he had crossed all limits. The editorial also alleged that the BJP has unleashed Rane only to trouble the Sena after losing power in Maharashtra. Efforts being made to douse leaked gas in the Pharma SEZ at Parawada in Vizag. (Representational Image: DC) Visakhapatnam: The residents of Tadi village in Parawada police station limits were in panic on Thursday following the reports of the gas leak from M/s. Admiron Life Sciences Private Limited in the Jawaharlal Nehru Pharma City in Visakhapatnam district. CITU Visakhapatnam district secretary Ganisetti Satyanarayana staged a protest at the plant, demanding that the government should take action against the companies which fail to adhere to proper safety norms in the SEZ. "The staff of the company also ran away from the unit for their safety and the police also rushed to the spot" Satyanarayana added. When contacted, Parawada circle inspector Umamaheswara Rao said "The incident of gas leak occurred at the Admiron's company here on Thursday morning. It was brought under control by noon. Nobody was affected." CITU Satyanarayana further said that the government relocated all villages from the pharma SEZ except Tadi village, which is surrounded by pharma companies. Nearly 1200 households in Tadi suffer from industrial pollution here since the SEZ was established here. Speaking to Deccan Chronicle, Parawada tehsildar B.V.Rani said that they already proposed the shifting of the Tadi villagers near the Pharma city to other places. "When the government asked, the Tadi villagers were reluctant to move from there, but now they voluntarily came forward to shift some other safe place. We will shortly shift the Tadi villagers to a safe place. The works are going on," Rani said. New Delhi: Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj S Bommai on Thursday held a meeting here with legal and technical experts to chalk out strategies for tackling water sharing disputes with neighbouring states. "Had a detailed discussion with the legal team on Supreme Court cases related to interstate river water disputes. Several issues were discussed," Bommai told reporters after the meeting. The meeting was held at the Karnataka Bhavan here. Emerging from the meeting, the CM said he had met senior advocates Mohan Khatri on Wednesday and Shyam Divan this morning and discussed ways to proceed in view of the existing water disputes. With regard to the Mekedatu project, Bommai said it has been decided to put forth the state government's stand when the case gets listed for hearing next time. Karnataka has proposed a balancing reservoir at Mekedatu in Ramanagara district, but the Tamil Nadu government has opposed it vehemently. Further, Bommai said the dispute over Kalasa-Banduri Nala project on Mahadayi river was also discussed. The hearing of this case is listed on September 2. The main issues in the special leave petition were discussed in the meeting, he added. Holding that water projects being implemented in Tamil Nadu are illegal in nature, Bommai said another petition will be filed in the Supreme Court against the neighbouring state and the matter will also be taken up with the Centre. "Many issues were discussed in the meeting. In a week or so, they will inform us of the progress. Our government is constantly trying to resolve long pending cases," he added. Karnataka Water Resources Minister Govind Karajola, Health Minister K Sudhakar, MP Shivakumar Udasi, Water Resources Department Deputy Chief Secretary Rakesh Singh, chief minister's general secretary Manjunath Prasad, Advocate General Prabhu Linga Navadagi and others were present in the meeting. The CM, on his second day of his visit, plans to call on Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya among others. New Delhi: Congress on Wednesday came out in support of Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh amidst the rebellion brewing in the Congress state unit. AICC in-charge of Punjab Harish Rawat on Wednesday said that Punjab Assembly elections in 2022 will be fought under Captain Amarinder Singhs leadership amid demands of his removal. The announcement came after four party ministers and three MLAs, who arrived in Dehradun, met Harish Rawat. The recent trouble began when the Chief Minister chastised the advisors of state unit chief Navjot Singh Sidhu who had spoken on sensitive national issues like Kashmir and Pakistan. Instead of controlling his advisors the state unit chief attacked the government over sugarcane prices. Immediately after this a rebellion started against the Chief Minister. The four ministers, known detractor of the CM, who met Harish Rawat are Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa, Sukhbinder Singh Sarkaria, Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa and Charanjit Singh Channi. Harish Rawat said they are concerned with the Congress prospect in next years election. They want to go with a roadmap for next year. It is important to fight jointly. They have some grievances and apprehensions related to the Punjab administration. But they have full faith in Congress leadership. I assured them to speak to the people concerned and, if required, they will take help from Congress senior leadership. Harish Rawat dismissed infighting in the Punjab Congress and said, There is no threat to the party, no threat to state government or the party prospect. Insiders claim that Rawat politely made clear to them that they were most welcome to meet him but the next election will be fought under the leadership of Captain Amarinder Singh. Meanwhile, another delegation comprising Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee general secretary in-charge Pargat Singh has already reached Delhi and is trying to meet AICC general secretary K.C. Venugopal. Sidhu was appointed the state unit chief against the wishes of the Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh. He had met Congress President Sonia Gandhi against open outbursts of Sidhu against his own government and asserted that this will further deteriorate the relations between the party and the government. The present imbroglio will only damage the position of the party in the upcoming polls. Minister Koppula Eshwar and Gangula Kamalakar distribute units to beneficiaries under the Dalit Bandhu scheme here at the collectorate premises in Karimnagar on Thursday. DC Karimnagar: Four beneficiaries received vehicles of their choice under Dalit Bandhu, marking the beginning of the implementation of the scheme on Thursday. Yendipoina Suguna and Mogili received a trolley, Dasarapu Swarupa and Rajaiah and Elukapally Komuramma and Kanakaiah received a tractor each and Rachapally Shankar and Maruthi a car at a function at the collectorate here on Thursday. Mogili, speaking to Deccan Chronicle, said that he wished to start a supermarket in Jammikunta town. After learning that there are around 200 gorcers in the town and that it would cost more than Rs 20 lakh to set up a supermarket, he withdrew his decision. Mogili said that the collector advised him to purchase a trolley which he could use to transport vegetables, cement and other commodities and can earn money daily. So I decided to take the trolley, he said. The Dalit Bandhu scheme introduced by Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao has brought light into the lives of all Dalit families. I felt very happy when my name was selected and my happiness doubled when I received a cheque from the hands of KCR, and my trolley from the hands of ministers. Mogili said. Rajaiah said that he had never expected that his life would change like this. I am a farm labourer and do not have any agricultural land. I am going to use the tractor for transporting grass, food grains and other agriculture products, as there is a demand for such vehicles in the surrounding villages, he said. He said that he had received the cheque from the Chief Minister 10 days ago, and received the tractor on Thursday. It is a very big day in my life and I will never forget KCR sir until my last breath. My family, friends and all my relatives are happy for me, Rajaiah said with a smile on his face. Welfare minister Koppula Eshwar and Backward Classes minister Gangula Kamalakar distributed the vehicles to the beneficiaries. Minister Eshwar said that government under the leadership of Chandrasekhar Rao was committed to the welfare of the Dalit people. The Dalit employed as a driver by someone else now owns a vehicle and that is the greatness of the Dalit Bandhu scheme, he said. In the first phase, the Chief Minister had handed over the Dalit Bandhu cheques to 15 beneficiaries. Kamalakar said that Chandrashekar Rao was fulfilling the dreams and aspirations of Dr B.R. Ambedkar by implementing a scheme like no other in any state. After Independence, no government had thought about the welfare of the Dalits like the TRS government, he said. We can see confidence and courage on the faces of the beneficiaries after getting their units under the Dalit Bandhu scheme, he said. Collector R.V. Karnan, Mayor Y. Sunil Rao, deputy commissioner, transport, M. Chandrasekhar, Suresh, executive director of SC Corporation, were among present. Southaven Mayor Darren Musselwhite is finalizing the list of road repairs that will be included in the city's FY'22 budget. The quiet scene at Derr-Okamoto Park during the morning after the Aug. 23 shooting there. FILE - In this June 26, 2018, file photo, Sen-elect Kelda Roys stands outside the Capitol in Madison, Wis. Roys a Democratic state senator who encouraged donations to defeat any challenger to a Republican lawmaker who was diagnosed with COVID-19 and is now on a ventilator tweeted Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021, that she was sorry he was sick but stopped short of apologizing for her call to beat him. We're always interested in hearing about news in our community. Let us know what's going on! Go to form Get 25% off of the regular $65 annual All Access rate. With this subscription you will get: Digital access to ElPasoInc.com and archives (value $45) Print subscription home or business delivered (value $65) Book of Lists (annual rate only, value $50) El Paso Inc. Magazine (value $20) El Paso Kids Inc. Special sections - OR - Get 15% off of the regular $45 annual Digital-only rate. 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Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies. Low near 75F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph. Data protection is a set of strategies you follow to keep all the data you handle safe. Businesses incur thousands of dollars of loss every year due to the negligence of data protection. Taking proper measures to maintain the data secure will save ample money, time, effort and ensure the concerned parties don't face any significant loss. Data protection is an essential aspect for every individual and business, and it is a must for everyone to follow specific steps connected with data safety. What does data protection really mean? Data protection means implementing a set of well-defined plans to keep personal and business data safe. Companies should protect vital data in a private area with limited access to essential workers. The office should have strict rules regarding who can get data, download restrictions, and file copying limitations to protect the data. Businesses should not compromise the integrity of information handled in any way by selling it to third parties. Indulging in such activities will make the customers lose trust in your business and damage the brand reputation. Individuals should protect their personal, medical, and financial data by keeping it secure using digital wallets, password managers, and the best antivirus and malware protection services. There is no single or defined solution to protect your data as technology keeps evolving. Stay updated and use the latest tools and emerging apps or devices. Data protection is a continuous process that individuals should not neglect at any cost to stay safe in this increasingly prying digital world. Significance of data protection Data protection is growing into a vital issue in the modern-day digital workspace. The tremendous rise of system dependency, cloud computing, and BYOD - bring your own device practices force organizations to worry about protecting their core data. Loss of data might result in loss of critical information, which stalls the operation or slows down the company's daily activities. On the other hand, well-protected data can be used for various analytics and create well-defined company plans. Data falling in the hands of competitors will affect businesses significantly and individuals badly by compromising their privacy. Data security and data protection are interchangeable terms used commonly and implementing them effectively is crucial for every individual as well as business. It will keep you away from third-party software vulnerabilities and data breaches. A data breach can turn into a disaster for anyone, and it can happen when individuals don't follow a proper strategy to protect the data. Taking proper methods prevents them from getting into trouble with the law and avoids non-compliance fees. Personal data often gets leaked through carelessness or lack of awareness resulting in serious identity theft and financial looting. Personal Data protection goals Individuals should set clear data protection goals which will help them safeguard their information, prevent accidental leakage and prevent theft attempts. The goals should aim to protect the individual's identity and all the private information leading to that identity. For that, people should never disclose their vital data to anybody or leave their devices unattended or unprotected. They should hide all sensitive personal information from social media and public profiles on various websites. Individuals should never share their important information like social security numbers with strangers. They should be cautious about whom they befriend online and check their identity thoroughly. One of the ways to do that is to use Nuwber - type the person's name or phone number in the search bar and analyze the details that come up. Leakage of personal data may lead to identity theft and various legal implications of the robbery. Misused personal information might enable criminals to use an innocent person's identity to commit multiple crimes and blame it on them. Always: Protect all digital documents with a password Keep all identity related digital documents in an encrypted format Mask credit card details while doing online shopping Use paid email services with extra safety to receive bank, medical and insurance emails Keep the system, laptop, and smartphone protected by using reputed security software Data safety for businesses No company wants to see their name occur on the data breach list. It severely compromises the brand's reputation among the customers and makes them choose another service provider. The frequent media coverage about enormous data breaches in huge companies like Equinox and Yahoo has created good customer awareness regarding data safety. Customers expect their banks, hospitals, and other service providers to take data protection seriously, showcase how their sensitive information is secured, and require full disclosure of data protection policies. Huge corporate companies have to yield to their customer and partner demands to invest in enterprise-grade data protection. It is a legal requirement to protect Personally Identifiable Information or PII every small business collects according to the CCPA and GDPR law requirements. It is unacceptable to hope that your business partners, employees, and other individuals are doing the right thing and taking the necessary steps to protect sensitive data. Over 50% of data breaches occur through employee carelessness or internal faults. Massive conglomerates are taking internal collaboration and training to upgrade their systems and learn about the latest strategies. They offer various training to their staff to create awareness about data protection practices. The employees work only on secured platforms and ensure each action is compliant with data security rules and regulations. Investing in data security and training is like creating a virtual shield to keep yourself safe from hackers. Conclusion Individuals should protect their data by taking such steps as using paid emails, password-protecting essential documents, and installing robust security software to safeguard the system and smartphone. Businesses should invest in the customized security solutions and train their employees to adhere to data security measures. Both small and huge corporate companies should give equal importance to safeguarding their data. Understanding data protection, the laws related to it, and taking steps to comply with them will help avoid data theft and non-compliance issues. Safe data gives you peace of mind and acts as a virtual protective net to keep all your secrets secured and invisible from hackers. Despite Joe Biden's confidence regarding the US evacuation effort, reports from Kabul show that the safety and security of US soldiers in the nation are quickly worsening. The US President has been accused of creating a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, and many people feel he is now attempting to deny it. Since the Taliban invaded the Afghan capital and seized control of the country, Joe Biden's approval ratings have plunged. The United States, the United Kingdom, and several other countries are hurrying to evacuate their citizens and at-risk Afghans. Despite the Taliban seizing power in a couple of days, the US president has maintained his decision to withdraw US troops from the country. Biden, speaking to the public this week, rejected requests to extend the August 31 deadline although many experts believe it is too short to rescue everyone. The public does not want Biden to run for president in 2024 According to a recent poll, 51% of Americans do not want Biden to run for president again in 2024 while only 34% favor him. In the aftermath of the Afghan fiasco, many people are turning to Vice President Kamala Harris to take up the responsibility, as per Express.co. Following a series of rhetorical and physical gaffes, the fall of Kabul has proven to be the sledgehammer, not the straw, that broke the camel's back. The president, having produced a humanitarian catastrophe due to his ineptitude, is now attempting to hide the fact that it is occurring. Per The Daily Telegraph, Biden didn't even mention Afghanistan in his 12-minute speech on Monday. He seemed to wish that everything would just go away. Following this terrible failure, Biden will stumble on, but the chance of a second term, which he desires, now appears unlikely. Many people want his presidency to end sooner rather than later, fearful of the other unknown disasters that may befall America and the rest of the globe in the following three years. The Republican campaign to invoke the 25th Amendment is already underway. Read Also: White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki Claims Americans Stuck Behind Taliban Lines in Afghanistan Are Not "Stranded" Biden refuses to extend Afghanistan withdrawal Senator Rick Scott of Florida, a Republican, said what many people were thinking. He questioned, "Is Joe Biden capable of discharging the duties of his office, or has the time come to exercise the provisions of the 25th Amendment?" Many Democrats are suffering from buyer's remorse. This is despite a daily US media output that mostly sticks to the now-proven-to-be-false narrative that Joe Biden is a steady hand guiding America away from the Trump era's instability. In the post-Trump era, there is still a sort of omerta in the US media regarding the Biden administration. This week, for example, the White House press secretary denied that any Americans were "stuck" in Kabul, which is just untrue. President Joe Biden claimed Tuesday that the US and its allies are on schedule to finish evacuations from Afghanistan by August 31, even if thousands of US residents, Afghans, and others are being flown out of the country every day. Since August 14, the US has assisted in the evacuation of 70,700 individuals, including roughly 12,000 in the previous 12 hours alone, according to the president. Biden met with G-7 leaders earlier in the day on Tuesday to discuss the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. US politicians and refugee activists are putting growing pressure on him to extend the deadline to allow vulnerable individuals to flee the Taliban-controlled nation. Biden has indicated that he will not budge, warning that staying any longer may be harmful, HuffPost reported. Every day that the US continues in the country raises the possibility of terrorist groups and the Taliban, who have stated that they would not tolerate an extension, attacking American soldiers. Related Article: Joe Biden Sticks With August 31 Deadline For US Withdrawal in Afghanistan; Actions May Lose Closest Allies @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. In their first discussion since Kabul fell to the Taliban last week, Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin pledged to work together to prevent security risks from spilling from Afghanistan. Their phone conversation occurred after the Group of Seven leaders met in an emergency meeting on Wednesday to discuss the situation in Afghanistan. During a phone call with Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping reaffirmed China's respect for Afghanistan's sovereignty, non-interference approach, and independence, adding that China is willing to improve coordination with Russia and the world to encourage all Afghan parties to form an inclusive political structure and cut ties with terrorism. Senior Chinese officials and diplomats emphasized the necessity for a political settlement on the problem, denounced the United States' indiscriminate sanctions against Afghanistan, and urged the international community to assist the country in achieving self-development, Global Times reported. China and Russia work together to rebuild peace in Afghanistan According to Chinese observers, Xi and Putin's talk, which focused on the Afghan problem, was a "strategic" interaction, indicating that China and Russia are working together to rebuild peace, stability, and prosperity in Afghanistan while respecting the Afghan people's will and choice. Although desperate crowds left behind by US troop withdrawal continue to fear for their safety, Chinese and Russian leaders discussed Afghanistan on Wednesday but did not echo the G7's call for the Taliban to allow people to flee the country after August 31. Xi and Putin spoke on the phone about Afghanistan, one day after the Group of Seven leaders met to discuss the matter. China and Russia are not members of the G7, a group of strong democracies led by the United States and the United Kingdom, as per Reuters. On Tuesday, President Joe Biden stated that the US intends to complete evacuations by August 31. According to the Taliban, all foreign evacuations from the country must be completed by then. The G7 leaders decided to push the Taliban to enable Afghans who wish to leave after August 31 to do so safely. Putin informed Xi that he shares China's viewpoints and interests in Afghanistan and that he is prepared to cooperate with China to prevent foreign forces from meddling and destroying Afghanistan. Read Also: North Korea TV Airs Cartoon Discussing Obesity, Overeating Amid Food Shortage China accuses the US of causing instability Per SCMP, both nations are afraid that instability in Afghanistan might spread to the region after the Taliban retook Kabul in record time on August 15, two decades after being expelled by US-led forces. Beijing, which is concerned that extremism in Afghanistan may spread to China's Xinjiang province, has urged Washington to continue trying to stabilize the nation, with Foreign Minister Wang Yi last week accusing the US of causing instability by withdrawing troops too soon. The abrupt fall of the US-backed Afghan government was "inevitable" and proof of American hegemony and military intervention's failure, Wang added. Last month, Beijing received a Taliban delegation and urged the international community to assess the rebel organization more fairly. The Taliban professes to be more moderate than it was in the 1990s, when it last controlled Afghanistan, and has promised to break links with terrorist groups, safeguard women's rights "within the limits of Islam," and provide amnesty to the government employees - but many remain skeptical. Related Article: Russia's Vladimir Putin Reportedly Rebuffs US President Joe Biden's Plan to Keep US Troops in Central Asia @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The American Meteorological Society marked 2020 as the hottest year on record for Europe and it also found that the year has been among the three hottest years worldwide. The report included information and feedback from the UK Met Office, which said that the record was broken "by a considerable amount." In the last year, experts recorded the average temperatures in Europe to be 1.9 degrees Celsius above the average from 1981 to 2010. The period was used as a benchmark to measure varying temperatures. Climate Change's Devastating Effects Experts said that the five hottest years experienced in Europe have all been since 2014, signaling the growing effects of climate change worldwide. The American Meteorological Society detailed its findings in its 31st State of the Climate report. Officials said that 17 European countries observed record-high annual temperatures. The regions include France, Spain, Switzerland, Belgium, Norway, and Sweden. The average temperature in the Arctic, on the other hand, was recorded to be the highest in 2020. Scientists observed temperatures that were 2.1 degrees Celsius above the average from 1981 to 2010, CNN reported. Similarly, Antarctica recorded extreme warmth, with 18.3 degrees Celsius being reported on February 6, 2020, in Esperanza Station. It was the highest temperature recorded on the continent and was significantly higher than its recorded peak of 17.2 degrees in 2015. Dr. Robert Dunn, a senior climate scientist at the UK Met Office, said that the level of difference from previous years was a concerning issue. He said it was an issue that the world should focus on since the effects are being felt worldwide. Read Also: 'Horrifying' Video Shows Wild Tortoise Attacking and Eating Baby Bird Despite Being Thought of as Vegetarian Several other experts agreed that the significance of the change in temperatures in Europe was of deep concern. Professor Gabi Hegerl, a professor of climate system science at the University of Edinburgh, said the amount of change should worry all of us, despite not being part of the study, BBC reported. Natural Disasters Climate change has been the center of discussions in recent years as extreme rainfall and flooding have left parts of destruction in several nations. The United States was not exempt from that scenario as Tennessee experienced 17 inches of rain falling within 24 hours this summer. The incident turned creeks into rivers and flooded hundreds of homes, killing at least 18 residents. Many people are now asking, is climate change the primary reason for the devastation in multiple parts of the world? While there has always been extreme weather, human-caused global warming could potentially increase the frequency and severity of the events. Research showed that human activities, including burning fossil fuels, have unequivocally warmed the planet. This means that the environment is holding much more moisture than it used to. A recent attribution study was released on Aug. 23, 2021, and observed the rainfall from the European storm that killed over 220 people. The incident flooded Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands in July 2021. The analysis found that human-induced climate change made a storm of that severity between 1.2 and nine times more likely to happen in current conditions, Yahoo News reported. Related Article: Uranium Cubes That Are Suspected Component of Hitler's 1945 Nuclear Bomb Now Under Study @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the United States is looking into two salmonella outbreaks in 17 states that may be connected to Italian-style meats. Health Agencies Start Investigation In a recently published article in FOX News, two salmonella outbreaks linked to Italian-style meats are being investigated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the United States Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service, and public health and regulatory authorities in multiple states. Before becoming ill, people in both outbreaks reported eating salami, prosciutto, and other meats found on antipasto or charcuterie platters. Investigators are trying to figure out which items are tainted and whether the two incidents are connected to the same food supply. According to an article published on the website of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as of Aug. 24, the two salmonella outbreaks spread to at least 17 states, resulting in 36 illnesses and 12 hospitalizations. However, it is suspected that there are more unreported cases related to the outbreak. Read Also: McCormick Recalls Seasoning Products Over Potential Salmonella Contamination; Here is the List of Items to Avoid Who Are at High Risk and What are the Symptoms? If you are 65 years old or older, have a health condition, or use medications that reduce your body's capacity to fight germs, you are at high risk for severe Salmonella infection, according to the CDC. Salmonella is also more likely to cause severe illness in children under the age of five, according to a report published in The Denver Channel. People who experienced the illness have the following symptoms: diarrhea and a fever higher than 102F diarrhea for more than three days that is not improving bloody diarrhea excessive vomiting that you cannot keep liquids down signs of dehydration, such as not peeing much, dry mouth and throat, and feeling dizzy when standing up They are advised to immediately contact their healthcare provider. Moreover, salmonella infection causes diarrhea, fever, and stomach cramps in the majority of individuals, with symptoms appearing six hours to six days after ingesting the bacterium. After four to seven days, the majority of individuals recover without therapy. Reported Salmonella Outbreaks Washington, California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Arizona, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Maryland, and Virginia are among the states affected by the initial outbreak. The sickness began on May 30, 2021, and ended on July 27, 2021. Sick individuals vary in age from 4 to 91 years old, with a median age of 44 and a male-to-female ratio of 67 percent. Nine individuals have been hospitalized out of the 21 people for whom information is available. Meanwhile, 13 individuals from seven states have been affected by the second outbreak, including Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, Texas, Minnesota, and New York. The sickness began to spread on May 9, 2021, and ended on June 24, 2021. Sick individuals vary in age from 1 to 74 years old, with a median age of 41 years old and a male-to-female ratio of 31 percent. Three of the ten individuals for whom information is available have been hospitalized. Furthermore, due to the fact that many individuals recover without medical treatment and are not tested for salmonella, the actual number of sick persons is likely greater than reported; and outbreaks may not be confined to states with documented infections. Determining if a sick individual is part of an outbreak may take three to four weeks, according to a report published in WTTW News. Related Article: FDA Announces Nationwide Recall of Frozen Shrimp Due to Salmonella Contamination @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The World Health Organization gathered a group of foreign experts on Wednesday and warned that the window for identifying the source of COVID-19 is narrowing. Progress of the Investigation Stalled In a recently published article in MSN News, the scientists convened by the WHO said that the window of opportunity for completing this critical investigation is rapidly closing, and any delay will make some of the investigations physiologically impossible to undertake. The team also added that understanding the causes of a catastrophic pandemic is a science-based worldwide goal. The investigation has come to a halt, and the Chinese team has been and continues to be hesitant to provide raw data, according to the report. The hunt for the origin of COVID-19 has reached a critical juncture. They did remark, however, that both the WHO international team and the Chinese team are ready to go ahead, according to a recently published news article in The Washington Post. Read Also: Coronavirus Origin: Controversial Theory That COVID-19 Came From Lab Not Impossible, Says Expert Concerns and Priorities of the Scientists Doctor Marion Koopmans and her WHO-recruited colleagues outlined a number of research priorities, including conducting larger antibody surveys to identify areas where COVID-19 was spreading undetected, both in China and elsewhere, testing wild bats and farm-raised animals as potential virus reservoirs, and following up on any credible new leads, according to an article published in ABC News. Other experts believe that the optimum time to gather samples was during the first few weeks after some of the first human cases were connected to a Wuhan seafood market. Hundreds of environmental samples were gathered by Chinese researchers shortly after the coronavirus was discovered although it is unknown how many humans or animals were examined. Professor Boni believes that by looking for similarly comparable viruses in raccoon dogs, mink, or ground squirrels, scientists may be able to identify COVID-19's animal origins. However, he estimated that doing the required comprehensive research would take approximately five years. China Suggests that the Study Should Be Pursued in Other Countries The search for COVID-19's origins has turned into a bitter point of contention between the United States and China, with an increasing number of American experts calling for an investigation into two Wuhan laboratories near the seafood market, which China has flatly rejected and branded "scapegoating." Officials in China stated on Wednesday that they should focus on other potential paths that may assist in tracing the origin of COVID-19 and that investigations in other countries should be undertaken, according to a published report in 4029 TV. Although it was a "shame" that the hunt for COVID-19's origins had stopped, Fu Cong, a director-general in China's Foreign Ministry, acknowledged that it wasn't China's responsibility. He said that China has always supported science-based origin tracing initiatives and would continue to do so in the future. He accused the United States of "hyping the lab leak hypothesis" in order to transfer responsibility to China, and he said the coronavirus might be connected to high-level American research laboratories, proposing the U.S. allow WHO to examine some of its facilities. Related Article: US Slams China for Not Cooperating in COVID-19 Origin Probe, Reminds Its Shortcomings in Early Days @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. A man who was angry about state-imposed COVID-19 restrictions was sentenced to over six years in prison on Wednesday for plotting to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a significant break that reflected his quick decision to cooperate and assist agents in building cases against others. After pleading guilty and collaborating with the police to build charges against his co-conspirators, one of the six men who plotted to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer last year was sentenced to a little over six years in prison. Ty Garbin, a 25-year-old airplane mechanic, admitted to his part in the alleged plot, providing investigators with a detailed description of how the six men planned to kidnap Whitmer over her COVID-19 restrictions enforced during the peak of the pandemic. The suspect apologized to the Michigan governor The airplane mechanic said the men practiced at his property in Luther, Michigan, where they built a shoot house to look like Whitmer's vacation home and assaulted it with weapons, according to his plea deal. Garbin also apologized to Whitmer and her family, who were not present in court. Things will never be the same for Whitmer, who filed a victim impact statement to the judge, claiming that threats against her had remained even after the failed kidnapping scheme. When the FBI heard about their scheme in October, Ty Garbin, Adam Dean Fox, Daniel Harris, Kaleb Franks, Brandon Caserta, and Barry Croft were arrested. They face a potential sentence of life in jail if convicted of conspiracy, as per Daily Mail. Prosecutors, on the other hand, proposed a nine-year sentence. But Jonker reduced Garbin's sentence to 6 years, claiming that he was certain that when he was freed from jail, he would have a "great potential" for staying out of trouble. Per POLITICO, even before detectives released all of the evidence following his detention, the government and Garbin's lawyers took turns applauding his readiness to accept guilt. Assistant US Attorney Nils Kessler said Garbin "didn't hold back." Garbin will be a star witness against the other defendant, according to defense attorney Gary Springstead. He stated a wish to continue "deradicalizing" himself to help others from getting radicalized and following in his footsteps. Jonker highlighted Garbin's "concrete" acts that indicated he was accepting responsibility for his conduct in explaining why he was awarded a lower sentence than federal standards required. Prosecutors claimed four members of the Wolverine Watchmen militia group met with two other men, Adam Fox and Barry Croft Jr., to discuss the kidnapping plans and participate in "field training exercises," which included shooting firearms and rehearsing how to infiltrate a structure. Read Also: NY Police Discover Dead Woman in Plastic Barrel After Luxury Wall Street Apartment Reports Foul Smell Group of men plot to abduct Whitmer According to court records, the guys performed day and night surveillance of Whitmer's summer home and discussed placing explosives beneath a bridge to delay the authorities. Fox allegedly advocated detaining Whitmer for "trial" or putting her in the middle of Lake Michigan in a boat without a motor as a "statement," according to investigators. When the kidnapping lawsuit was filed in October, Whitmer, a Democrat, blamed some of the responsibility on then-President Donald Trump's failure to condemn far-right groups for inspiring radicals around the country. It heightened the tensions in the latter weeks of a turbulent election season. The group of would-be kidnappers dubbed the "Wolverine Watchmen," were apprehended before attempting to abduct Whitmer from her vacation house to protest her COVID-19 pandemic regulations. According to officials, the organization was infiltrated by a team of FBI informants. Because of COVID-19, Whitmer imposed significant limitations on personal mobility and the economy last year; however, many of those restrictions have since been removed. Rallies, including ones with gun-toting protestors asking for the governor's removal, were held at the Michigan Capitol. Right-wing groups chastised Whitmer, a Democrat, for demanding severe social distance and economic limitations in the middle of the deadly global virus. In the aftermath of the unsuccessful kidnapping plan, she remained defiant, as per NY Post. Related Article: North Carolina Man Threatens to Detonate Bomb Outside US Capitol, Demands to Speak to President Joe Biden @YouTube @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. On Wednesday, a Taliban spokesman said that there is no evidence linking Usama bin Laden to the September 11 terrorist attacks. Taliban Spokesperson Said No Evidence Proved Bin Laden was Behind 9/11 Attacks In a recently published article in FOX News, During an interview with a news outlet, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed that despite a mountain of evidence linking the deceased al Qaeda leader to the airline hijackings that hit the World Trade Center and Pentagon, no proof exists that implicates Usama bin Laden in the Sept. 11 terror attacks. The Taliban spokesperson also said that Usama bin Laden was in Afghanistan when he became a problem for the Americans. Despite the lack of evidence that he was involved, we have now promised that Afghan soil would not be used against anybody. He said this while the Biden administration prepares for the departure of the U.S. forces, in answer to a query about whether the nation would once again become a base for terrorists. Mujahid doubled down when asked whether he thinks bin Laden was not engaged in the 2001 terrorist strikes. He said "There is no evidence. Even after 20 years of war, we have no proof he was involved. There was no justification for war. It was [an] excuse for war," according to a published article in India Today. Read Also: Osama Bin Laden's Niece Support Donald Trump's Re-election Bin Laden Admitted the 9/11 Attacks in a Taped Video Bin Laden acknowledged ordering the Sept. 11 attacks in a recorded message released in 2004, in which 19 hijackers seized control of four American commercial aircraft and smashed them into the World Trade Center buildings in New York City and the Pentagon. After a passenger rebellion, the fourth plane crashed into a field in Pennsylvania. Following a bombing campaign in reaction to the 2001 attack and the Taliban's reluctance to hand up al Qaeda officials who had been given shelter, including bin Laden, American forces invaded Afghanistan. The terrorist commander was assassinated by Navy SEALs in Pakistan on May 1, 2011, according to a published article in CNBC News. However, the "9/11 assault was driven by Usama Bin Laden," according to a 9/11 Commission report. It was stated that Mullah Omar, the Taliban's leader, was against invading the US. Despite the concerns of several of his top lieutenants, bin Laden successfully overruled them, and the assaults proceeded. Department of justice Pledged To Review the 9/11 Attacks Files After years of demand from victims' families to reveal evidence on the suspected involvement of Saudi government officials, the Department of Justice promised on Monday to undertake a new examination of data connected to Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks for potential public release. The decision comes only days after over 1,800 9/11 survivors, first responders, and victims' families informed President Joe Biden that unless he releases FBI papers revealing Saudi government officials' suspected involvement in the fatal attacks, they would boycott this year's commemoration ceremonies. It also comes a month before the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon, and Pennsylvania, which killed almost 3,000 people. Meanwhile, Biden praised the decision of the Justice Department. Related Article: Osama Bin Laden Foresees Joe Biden as US President, Stops Al-Qaeda from Assassinating Him @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. After being condemned to death for ordering a murder and attacks on people, a Japanese crime boss delivered a chilling warning to a judge. After denying being behind the brutal assaults on average citizens, Yakuza mafia leader Satoru Nomura, 74, warned the judge, "You will regret this for the rest of your life." Despite Japanese media reports to the contrary, Nomura, the leader of the 'Kudo-kai' crime syndicate in the country's southwest, was convicted guilty of the series of historic attacks. Although the Fukuoka District Court acknowledged that Nomura had been condemned to death, Japanese media reported that there was no concrete proof tying him to the crimes. Per Sky News, the Kudo-kai is the main yakuza group in Kitakyushu and is known for its military-style tactics, which include the use of machine guns and hand grenades. Yakuza - gangster in English - have long been accepted in Japan as a necessary evil for maintaining order on the streets, but a crackdown on gangs, along with decreasing societal tolerance and a poor economy, has resulted in a decline in the number of yakuza. Japan's first crime boss to face death sentence According to the BBC, this is the first time a top yakuza member has been sentenced to death. The court, however, stated that the gang functioned under such stringent regulations that it was unimaginable that assaults could have been carried out without the permission of its boss. Between 1998 and 2014, Kudo-kai members were accused of carrying out assaults, Daily Mail reported. During that period, a former leader of a fishing cooperative was shot and killed, and three others were injured by gunshot or stabbing, including a nurse and a former police officer. According to the Kyodo news agency, Nomura's defense attorneys want to appeal the judgment. Fumio Tanoue, Nomura's number two, was sentenced to life imprisonment on Tuesday. The yakuza mafia has long been tolerated in Japan as a necessary evil for maintaining order on the streets and completing tasks swiftly, regardless of the methods used. However, in recent decades, yakuza membership has progressively declined due to tighter anti-gang legislation, declining societal tolerance, and a failing economy. According to major media agencies, Nomura was found guilty of ordering the deadly shooting of an ex-boss of a fishing cooperative who had sway over port building projects in 1998. Read Also: China, Russia Agree to Strengthen Coordination to Prevent Security Risks; Xi Jinping Reiterates Respect for Afghanistan Sovereignty Crime boss involved with several attacks in Japan According to the court, he was also responsible for a 2014 attack on a relative of the murder victim, as well as a 2013 knife attack on a nurse at a clinic where Nomura was receiving treatment. The crime boss was also blamed for the 2012 shooting of a former police officer who was investigating the Kudo-kai. According to reports, the official survived with significant injuries to his waist and legs. Prosecutors allegedly said Nomura had complete authority over the syndicate. The mafia grew from a multi-billion-dollar criminal organization involved in everything from drugs and prostitution to protection rackets and white-collar crime during the turmoil of postwar Japan. Unlike the Italian Mafia or the Chinese triads, the yakuza have long existed in the shadows of Japanese society; they are not illegal, and each group maintains its headquarters in plain sight of the authorities. With over 100 people on death row, Japan is one of the few affluent countries that still use the death sentence. Despite worldwide condemnation, particularly from human rights organizations, public support for capital punishment remains strong, as per METRO. Related Article: Airplane Mechanic Plots to Kidnap Michigan Governor Over COVID-19 Restrictions; Suspect Sentenced to 6 Years in Prison @Youtube @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. A Chinese chef was poisoned by a severed snake head while preparing a special meal requiring it as an ingredient. The snake's head seemed to have an involuntary muscle reaction that caused the fatal biting incident in the jaw muscles. Peng Fan had done the recipe so many times, but the chopped head bit him this time. He never thought it would bite since he already cut the head off. A soup made from these poisonous snakes is sought after in Southern China, but it finally turned deadly for a chef like Fan. Severed snake head bites chef The Chinese chef came from Foshan, where it was on his restaurant's menu of unusual and dangerous dishes for connoisseurs, but this would be the last time Fan would prep it, reported the Daily Star. It was usual to lop the head of a deadly Indochinese Spitting Cobra. It took him 20 minutes to cook the soup and clean up. It was still alive when he was about to throw the head, and it sank its fangs into him, injecting the venom. The venom of a spitting cobra is very potent and fatal for its victims. Cobra venom has neurotoxins that will kill anyone or thing bitten in just 30 minutes. It will paralyze and affect the respiratory system that prevents breathing. A bite is usually non-fatal if the anti-venom is given asap, noted Livescience. Read Also: F-36 Kingsnake Can Replace F-16 Jet: 5th Minus-Generation Without the Stealth One of the guests in the restaurant is Lin Sun, 44, who was celebrating his wife's birthday when they noticed a commotion in the kitchen. The Chinese chef bit by a severed snake head was the source of the disturbance, noted the Daily Record. Sun said that he heard screaming coming from the kitchen that caught his attention. They heard that a man needed a doctor during the commotion, but the medical assistance arrived late, and the chef died. He did not finish their diner due to the incident. According to a police official, the last recorded death due to a snake bite was in 2014. It was not common what happened to Chef Fan since he had a complication from the bit that killed him. If medics gave the anti-venom earlier, he could have lived, but it was not the case. Horror of chef killed by snake bite 20 minutes after chopping its head offhttps://t.co/ZiZM1Peidd pic.twitter.com/4tlNJcEscV Daily Star (@dailystar) August 24, 2021 How can a dead snake still bite? Many experts say that snakes and reptiles can make involuntary movements, even after kill for an hour. One expert explained that the snake head was still alive when it bit the chef. It further explains that after getting its head chopped off, it ceases essential functions when still alive but can do reactive action. Despite being severed from the body, Peng never realized that a dead snakehead could bite and pump venom. Certain cultures believe that snake meat has magical properties that lead to killing them for food to near extinction. A spitting cobra does not usually bite its victim and will prefer to spit venom at a distance, not bite. They will attack from 9-feet away and target the eyes to incapacitate their prey. It will only spit at a moving face, not to any other movement, and its venom can blind too. Such snakes are sharpshooters, with black-necked spitting cobras having good aim hitting 8 out of 10 victims, but the Mozambique cobras are very accurate hitting the eye every time, noted Livescience. Most people know snakes are lethal, those with venom, but the Australian Inland Taipan kills in 30-minutes. The Chinese chef, bitten and poisoned by a severed snake head, did not realize his fatal mistake until it caused his life. Related Article: U.S.,Thai Troops Cutting off Snake Heads as Part of Their Survival Training @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Kathy Hochul, the newly sworn-in governor of New York, said she's cleaned house and fired those who allegedly contributed to a culture that tolerated sexual harassment under her predecessor. Andrew Cuomo Resigned From His Office In a recently published article in MSN News, Andrew Cuomo resigned this week after the New York Attorney General's Office published a report earlier this month alleging that he sexually assaulted 11 women. Cuomo has rejected sexual harassment allegations and said that he is leaving to avoid the distraction of an impeachment process. According to a report from MSNBC, this administration no longer employs the individuals named in the report. Hochul promised to remove anybody who contributed to the culture of sexual harassment the day after announcing his resignation. She said that the culture of sexual harassment is over and none of this is going to happen again. She also emphasized that she is surrounded by talented and young women. The newly sworn-in New York Governor stressed out as well that she wants them to become role models, according to a published article in VNExplorer. Read Also: Billboard Urges NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo to Resign 'Now' amid Sexual Harassment Allegations Some Aides and Staffers of Cuomo Resigned Several Cuomo advisers and employees included in the study have already departed state government, including former secretary Melissa DeRosa and former Financial Services Superintendent Linda Lacewell. DeRosa, a close ally of Cuomo's, resigned only days before the governor announced his retirement. Lacewell resigned on the same day as Cuomo, on Tuesday. Furthermore, as Albany moved ahead under new leadership, a number of state lawmakers requested that people linked to Cuomo and his scandals be removed from office as well, according to a recently published news article in Bloomberg. Additionally, Sen. Robert Ortt, a Republican from New York, has requested a "clean slate," saying in a statement earlier this month that state agency employees with clear connections to the soon-to-be-former Governor and the many scandals that have plagued state government should retire immediately. A New Era of Government in New York According to Basil Smikle, a political analyst and professor at Columbia University's School of International Public Affairs, her choice to fire those employees sends a message to voters that Andrew Cuomo's reign is gone. She said that all state workers would be required to attend in-person sexual harassment and ethics training. The political analyst also said that it was obvious that she had a certain goal in mind. She spoke a lot about openness and responsibility and the act itself is a continuation. However, he also admitted that changing Albany's culture as a whole may be more difficult. Moreover, he also explained it would be a mistake to believe that these early steps would eliminate all toxins. To really affect long-term change, she has to conduct a more comprehensive and broad examination of state agencies, state contracts, and even ties with lawmakers, as well as focus her administrative policies on diversity and women. Needless to say, Hochul also stated on Wednesday that she is investigating employees who were engaged in the tumultuous management of nursing facility data during the pandemic. Related Article: NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo's Top Aide Resigns Amid Sexual Harassment Allegations; Ex-Colleagues Slam Her as "Evil Human Being" @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. It was reported last night that Meghan Markle and Prince Harry considered naming the royal family member who made a racial remark before their son Archie's birth. According to an updated copy of the couple's biography, they debated whether or not to "reveal this detail" in their explosive TV interview with Oprah Winfrey. However, Meghan eventually informed Oprah that disclosing the person's name would be disastrous for them. The condition of their connection with the Royal Family and the consequences from the tell-all interview in March are all included in a leaked epilogue to the update of Finding Freedom. According to the report, Prince William was enraged by the broadcast, while Meghan Markle found it relieving and liberating. It also mentions a friend of the duchess as saying that the monarchy had taken little responsibility for her claims some months later. Prince Harry, Meghan Markle's updated biography may affect ties with the royal family The new version of the contentious book is expected to spark heated debate over Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's ties with senior royals. Although the Royal Family's emotions are still "raw" as a result of the Oprah interview, it says that it will push people to communicate for healing to begin. It quotes a source close to the pair as stating that it will force people to talk for healing to begin. The source informs the authors that it will take time to heal the scars, indicating that ties are still strained. Meghan Markle called one of the authors to check if they were okay after they allegedly experienced harassment on social media, according to the book, The Scottish Sun reported. Meanwhile, it is alleged that Prince William was enraged by Prince Harry's allegations of racism against the Royal Family. William is believed to have been shocked by his brother and Meghan Markle's stunning accusations about racist sentiments at the heart of the monarchy, as did millions across the world. According to a revised edition of Meghan Markle's friend Omid Scobie's book Finding Freedom, was thought to be upset that private family problems were being addressed so publicly. Prince William was "furious" after Meghan Markle and his brother Harry accused a member of the Royal Family of being racist. Prince William retaliated at the time, insisting that the Royal Family was "very much not racist." On a visit to an East London school with his wife Kate Middleton, the Duke of Cambridge defended The Firm. Per Express.co, royal commentator Jonathan Sacerdoti said Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's planned commercial projects might "start new attacks" on the Royal Family. More assaults might occur in Prince Harry's upcoming memoir, which is set to be released in 2022. According to the royal expert, assaults on the Royal Family have contributed to the Sussex brand being increasingly contentious. However, he also stated that this ensures their status as international celebrities. Read Also: Bob Ross Documentary: Revelations About the Vicious, Secret Battle of the Painter and the Cause of His Death The Sussexes' approval rating in the UK dropped Sacerdoti said Prince Harry's memoir might be a venue where the Duke of Sussex reveals information that could be seen as attacks on the Firm. He went on to add that since leaving their jobs as senior working royals, the couple has established their brands and their image in the United States, but that a significant aspect of their success is based on what they say. Since their royal exit, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have fallen farther in UK public polls than Prince Charles did when he divorced Princess Diana. According to Ipsos Mori data, Prince Charles' affair with Camilla Parker Bowles and the tumultuous breakup of his marriage to Princess Diana caused a 40-point drop in polls about whether he would make a suitable king. The data are similar to but less severe than, the recent drop in Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's popularity in the United Kingdom. The Duke of Sussex's popularity rating in the UK has dropped 50 points since his engagement to Meghan Markle was announced in November 2017, as per Newsweek via MSN. After Prince Harry and Meghan Markle left their royal duties, the decline appeared to begin in January 2020. It continued through their Oprah Winfrey appearance, with the Duke's approval rating plummeting to an all-time low of 31% in the second quarter of this year. Meghan's drop in British popularity has been less drastic since she started lower, but it has brought her to a comparable position, from 55% in October 2019 to 32% today. The data is based on representative interviews with 1,489 respondents and comes from rolling YouGov surveys that evaluate approval ratings for members of the royal family on a routine basis. The decline is so profound that it surpasses the depths to which Prince Charles fell following the breakup of his romance with Princess Diana. Like Prince Harry, the next-in-line to the throne had been scoring well, with Ipsos Mori data indicating that 82 percent of Britons thought he would make a good king in 1991, compared to 5% who did not. Related Article: Queen Elizabeth Has Had Enough of Prince Harry, Meghan Markle's Attacks, Orders Palace Aides to Plan Legal Fightback @YouTube @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced on Wednesday that the local government would require all city workers to be fully vaccinated by Oct. 15, a requirement that a leading police union in the region vehemently opposed. The president of the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police, John Catanzara, said that they were 100% opposed to mandating vaccines to their members. In an interview, the official said that the COVID-19 vaccines had no studies for long-term side effects or consequences. He said it was a "Hell, no" because of the lack of safety data to support the mandate. Chicago's Vaccine Mandate Additionally, Catanzara urged all police unions to join in solidarity to oppose the vaccine mandates. He said that it was not just members of his union that was opposed to the requirements, but also other sergeants, lieutenants, and captains. He said that all four unions were united in their stance, Yahoo News reported. Lightfoot's new policy will be effective for more than 30,000 employees in the region, including police officers, firefighters, park employees, and sanitation workers. However, staff can still file for medical or religious exemptions to keep them from being punished for not getting the vaccines. Read Also: COVID-19 Origin: WHO Warns that Investigation May Come to an End; China Still Refuse to Share Data In a statement, Lightfoot argued that the surging number of COVID-19 cases in the country has forced officials to take drastic steps necessary to curb the spread. The Chicago mayor said the vaccinations have proven to be the best way to protect residents from getting infected with the coronavirus or preventing severe symptoms and hospitalizations in breakthrough cases. The official said they have made the choice to join other municipalities in trying to recover from the devastating pandemic. The United States military has implemented similar requirements to its soldiers to keep their people safe, the New York Times reported. Similar Implementations in Other Areas Last week, the Los Angeles City Council passed a similar vaccine mandate that requires its nearly 60,000 municipal workers to get inoculated. Los Angeles County and Seattle are among the regions that have implemented vaccine mandates. Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York also announced that teachers and other school employees will be required to get the COVID-19 vaccines. He added that other city employees must either be vaccinated or submit themselves to weekly testing for the coronavirus. While negotiations about the details of the vaccine mandate were ongoing with several unions, Lightfoot has not announced when the requirement will take effect. The Chicago mayor expressed her support of a vaccine mandate during a Monday press conference, just hours after the Food and Drug Administration gave its full approval to Pfizer's coronavirus vaccine for people 16 years old and older. "City employees are absolutely going to be required to be vaccinated. We're working through those discussions which have been ongoing now for a couple of weeks with our colleagues in organized labor that represent city employees," Lightfoot said. The Chicago mayor emphasized the region's need for a vaccine mandate, arguing that the safety of all residents is the primary concern, specifically those members of the public who interact with city employees on a daily basis, Fox News reported. Related Article: Scientists Mark 2020 as Hottest Year in the UK; Climate Change Expected to Have Devastating Effects World wide @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. A Japanese nuclear power plant's officials said they planned to build an undersea tunnel where they could dump massive amounts of treated, but still radioactive, water into the ocean far from the area where it could interfere with local fishing. Authorities from the Fukushima nuclear power plant hoped to start releasing water into the ocean in spring 2023. Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (TEPCO) said that hundreds of storage tanks that contain the waste need to be removed to make room for the plant's decommissioning. Japanese Nuclear Power Plant Junichi Matsumoto is an official in charge of the water discharge project and an individual who said that TEPCO aims to construct the undersea tunnel by drilling through bedrock in the seabed near the No. 5 reactor of the plant. He said that the reactor had survived the meltdowns at the plant, and would minimize possible underground contamination or leakage of radioactive groundwater into the tunnel. Officials have stored more and more radioactive water at the plant, which has already filled about 1,000 tanks at the Fukushima Daiichi plant since 2011. At the time, a massive earthquake and tsunami ravaged the region and damaged three reactors and their cooling water became contaminated and later began leaking. Officials said that the tanks will reach their capacity late next year, NBC News reported. Read Also: COVID-19 Origin: WHO Warns that Investigation May Come to an End; China Still Refuse to Share Data In April, the Japanese government decided to start discharging the water into the Pacific Ocean after further treatment and dilution by spring 2023. They planned to follow safety standards set by regulators to keep the process safe. However, the idea was met with widespread criticism and disagreement from local fishermen, residents, and neighboring countries, including China and South Korea. The undersea tunnel attempts to minimize the "reputational damage" that would result if the contaminated water was released close to marine life on the Fukushima coast. Discharge of Treated, Radioactive Water Authorities plan to release water at a depth of about 12 meters below the surface of the ocean, Matsumoto said. Officials said that a pipeline enclosed in an undersea tunnel was much safer than simply laying a pipe under the seafloor in the off chance that an earthquake or a tsunami occurred, Yahoo News reported. Officials adopted this plan in hopes that local fishermen and other concerned groups feel safe enough to allow them to release the radioactive water into the ocean. Japanese authorities also planned to set up a fund to buy fisheries products and freeze them for temporary storage to cushion the impact from negative rumors about the planned water discharge. The region's government would also help promote Fukushima products to restaurants and other food industries in an attempt to appeal to residents and fishermen. The Japanese government added that it would start raising fish in the water treated to levels allowable for discharge to show to residents that it was safe, as part of an awareness campaign. However, officials have not yet detailed any other information regarding the projects. Authorities argued that the ocean release was the most realistic option they had to dispose of the radioactive water, the Associated Press reported. Related Article: 'Horrifying' Video Shows Wild Tortoise Attacking and Eating Baby Bird Despite Being Thought of as Vegetarian @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Japan and Taiwan hold talks on security, referring to China's aggressiveness in the South China Sea. Both countries are worried about what could happen if Beijing makes good on its threats to invade the Republic of China (ROC). Both countries are going to hold bilateral talks that are getting China's undivided attention. This comes as the perception of the US is laid low in Kabul. With Beijing blaring to US allies that they are on their own. It is a decidedly risky move for both nations. China is Not Pleased Professor David Roberts, a professor at King's College in London, whose specialty is security, foreign policy, and politics, calls it poking the bear, which is China. Talks will be on Friday with the top of the two countries, reported the Express UK in a first-ever bi-lateral talk. According to Masahisa Sato, a lawmaker for Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party that handles foreign affairs, further dialogue is needed because Taiwan's destiny significantly impacts Japan's security and economy, noted in the Financial Times. Sato added everything that happens next would hinge on Taiwan, making the talks very crucial. It will be done online too. Aspects of the meeting were discussed after the Singapore visit of the US vice-president Kamala Harris. She weighed in on the way that China has treated its neighbors, but she was rebuked. She said that China uses force and intimidation to secure the South China Sea as their, despite protests against them. Japan and Taiwan hold talks to discuss its impact on them further. Read Also: Chinese Submarines Using Underground Base in Hainan Island Captured in Satellite Photos Then explaining the unlawfulness of the PLA in its presents, vainly trying to project the US as still in control, but the Biden-Harris administration is not on solid ground. Sato made it clear the LDP will want higher talks to be held next time with Taiwan at a higher level in the future, cited Eminetra. Japan Steps In Bilateral talks between the Japanese and Taiwanese military officials come after Washington and Tokyo need to get ready if China attacks Taiwan. Based on a published white paper that cites that Taiwan security is connected to Tokyo's, that is much evident. With another Japanese lawmaker, Taku Osaka, Mr. Sato will represent Japan in the virtual talks with Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party. Mr. Sato has suggested cooperative training in a natural catastrophe and marine disaster search and rescue as a method to improve ties with Taiwan while maintaining Tokyo's long-standing policy of not forging a direct military relationship with Taipei. Taiwanese politicians have expressed their gratitude for Japan's added focus on the danger to their country. He explains that Taipei has long felt that increased communication between Japan is essential, especially on security issues. Adding it is like that all four are members of parliament and like a track one dialogue. China told Japan to stay out of its affairs. The Chinese spokeswoman Hua Chunying said that China forbids any interaction with other countries. Japan and Taiwan hold talks on China and its threat to both nations and the South China Sea. Related Article: Taiwan Holds Biggest War Games as Beijing Ramps Up Its Attempt to Isolate it From Allies @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Scientists have discovered that ancient human DNA from a 7,200-year-old woman shows she was part of a previously unknown group of humans in Southeast Asia. Experts know very little of the population history of Southeast Asia's modern humans due to ancient DNA being susceptible to degradation amid the tropical climate. But in 2015, scientists excavated a partially preserved human skeleton. Ancient 7,200-year-old Female DNA The piece of the ancient artifact was found inside a limestone cave in Leang Panninge on Sulawesi, an Indonesian Island. Experts called the discovery an "exceptionally rare" find in the area due to the humid climate that was known to be "exceptionally unforgiving," and prevented preservation of genetic material upon the death of the organism. Adam Brumm, a professor of archaeology at Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia, is one of the authors of the study. He said that analysis of the DNA revealed the subject was a young female hunter-gatherer. Scientists estimated the young woman to be about 17 or 18 years old and lived during the pre-Neolithic era. Brumm noted she shared half of her DNA with Aboriginal Australians and the other half was from people found in Papua New Guinea, ABC News reported. Excavators discovered the woman interred in a fetal-like position inside a shallow grave inside a Toalean burial complex around 7,200 years ago. The specimen was found with a few large rocks on top of some of her body as well as being surrounded by them. Brumm and his team also found sophisticated stone tools, including chipped arrowheads, inside the tomb. Read Also: Scientists Mark 2020 as Hottest Year in the UK; Climate Change Expected to Have Devastating Effects Worldwide Brumm's study called the specimen "Besse" and said that it was the first discovery of ancient human DNA in the island region between Asia and Australia. He said the discovery provided new insight into the genetic diversity and population history of modern humans in the area that is understood very little, CNN reported. Humans From Thousands of Years Ago Archaeologists believe that the specimen passed through the early migration gateway to Australia. They said that the previously unknown group of humans arrived at southern Sulawesi after the first group of people traveled to Papua New Guinea and Australia. Brumm said there seemed to be another wave of modern human colonization of the region. He added they only now discovered evidence for the incident because of the Toalean woman's ancient DNA sample. The earliest evidence for human settlement in Australia was previously 65,000 years old and left little evidence of when and how humans migrated over thousands of years. Many archaeologists believed that the first groups of humans passed through Southeast Asian islands known as Wallacea. At the time, islands such as Borneo, Sumatra, and Java were connected by land, and Australia and Papua New Guinea formed a massive landmass called Sahul. Experts believe humans traveled to Sahul in a variety of ways, including passing through Java to Timor and crossing the ocean. Another route went from Sumatra to what is now known as the southern ends of Borneo and Sulawesi, then later island-hopping to Sahul, ABC Net reported. Archaeologists also found signs of human settlements across the region, from specimens they believed migrated through Southeast Asia. Related Article: 'Horrifying' Video Shows Wild Tortoise Attacking and Eating Baby Bird Despite Being Thought of as Vegetarian @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Engineering is a subject that is very varied and extensive, with many different types of engineering available to study and pursue a career in. If you know that you want to pursue a career as an engineer, choosing the right specialism for you can help to give your career a boost. Some engineering specialisms are in higher demand than others, while others tend to have more generous rates of pay in comparison to some. Because of this, it's worth considering your requirements and preferences when it comes to your career, along with finding out more about each specialism to enable you to make an informed decision regarding the options that will be best for you based on a range of factors such as your previous experience, skills, and career goals. All types of engineering will generally involve a problem-solving aspect and a strong focus on coming up with solutions. However, there are several things to consider when choosing the right engineering discipline for you. Along with considering what you are most interested in when it comes to engineering, you may also want to consider more practical factors such as the career outlook, demand, average pay, and options for career progression and advancement. If you're considering applying to college to kick-start your career as an engineer, here are some of the main specialisms to consider. Computer Engineering: Computer engineers are enjoying increasing demand these days as technology becomes more and more important to our everyday lives. With the growth of tech as rapid as it is right now, computer engineers are professionals that are always needed to work with the design and prototyping of computer software and hardware. It's an IT-related career choice that has strong links to computer science along with electrical engineering. Many students who decide to opt for this choice of specialism in engineering will study it alongside a relevant IT subject. Computer engineering can lead into a wide range of different career options including software careers. If you are interested in becoming an expert in the smaller details of how computers operate and have good science, math and technology skills, this could be an ideal career choice for you. Chemical Engineering: Chemical engineering is a highly scientific choice of discipline. Professionals in this field work with scientific processes to produce various materials or substances. It is a multidisciplinary field, combining both natural, experimental and life sciences throughout the engineering process. Chemical engineers are required to be experienced in a range of scientific subjects including, but not limited to, biology, mathematics, biochemistry, microbiology and economics. If you are interested in the natural sciences or life sciences, this type of career might be an ideal choice for you. It is a specialism that is ideal for somebody with a very analytical mindset and a keen interest in the chemical processes behind the production of some of the everyday items that we all use. Chemical engineering covers various different specialist areas within this discipline, including process engineering, plant design, transport phenomena and more. Civil Engineering: Civil engineering is a field that involves the professional practice of designing and developing different infrastructure projects. This might occur on a smaller scale such as the development of roads and houses, or on bigger scales, for example, the design and development of a new nationwide travel system or major airport. This specialism in engineering might be the right choice for you if you are interested in the process of designing and building things. It often appeals to people who are interested and experienced in construction and want to take their skills even further. Studying civil engineering at the college level gives you an ideal opportunity to improve your design skills, particularly in computer-aided design. If you are interested in topics such as statistical analysis, hydraulics, materials science, mechanics and geotechnics, you may be interested in this field. There are various sub-specialisms that civil engineers can get into including structural engineering, architectural engineering, hydraulic engineering, geotechnical engineering and environmental engineering. Aeronautical Engineering: Engineers who work in the aeronautical specialism will research, design, and develop aircraft and space craft. They are also often involved in the construction, technology, science and testing of these crafts. Astronautical engineering is a sub-division of this specialism where engineers focus mainly on space conditions and space craft. If you are interested in aircraft, its history and methodology, this engineering career might be very appealing to you. It will give you the chance to learn as much as possible about aircraft and how they work right from the earliest concepts of human flight to how the modern aircraft that we all know today are designed, constructed and operated. If you want to learn more about the mechanics of flight travel, improve aircraft and flight conditions, and become an expert in how aircraft perform under extreme conditions, this could be a great career choice for you. Some of the various sub-divisions of this specialism in engineering include structures and materials, aerodynamics, aeroelasticity, propulsion, and avionics. Electrical Engineering: The main focus of electrical engineering is electrical power applications. Electrical and electronics engineering are two different specialisms that are quite similar to each other in various ways. Electrical engineers work with the production and supply of electrical power on a larger scale, while electronics engineers are usually more focused on smaller electronic circuits such as those that are found in our technological gadgets like laptops and smartphones. Either of these disciplines could be the right choice for you if you are interested in how electrical systems and devices work. If you want to be instrumental in working on the new and upcoming technological developments of the future, this could be an ideal career choice for you. If you are keen to work in a career where you can play a part in improving the devices that we all might be using in the future, electrical or electronics engineering will be a great way to do this. You can learn more about this field with an online electrical engineering degree from Kettering University. Mechanical Engineering: One of the broadest, and also the most long-standing engineering specialisms, mechanical engineering focuses on the design, manufacture and maintenance of mechanical systems. If you decide to pursue a career in this field, you will have the opportunity to learn about a large range of topics including mechanical design, technical drawing, stress analysis, thermodynamics, statics and more. This might be an ideal career choice for you if you are interested in working with any mechanical devices. If you're a creative person who likes to come up with new and innovative ideas for the future, this career path could be an ideal platform to bring those ideas to life. Mechanical engineering is one of the broadest engineering disciplines and as such covers a wide range of sub-divisions including manufacturing, robotics, nanotechnology and more. It is also closely related to several other engineering disciplines, particularly aeronautical and civil engineering. Choosing Your Ideal Engineering Specialism: With so many different specialist areas to choose from when it comes to pursuing a career in engineering, narrowing the options down and choosing the right one for you is always going to be the most important task. All forms of engineering are based on solving problems and there are skills that will be desired or required across all areas, such as critical thinking and technical design skills. Many people who decide on a career in engineering are interested in this subject due to the fact that it's a respected STEM subject but also gives you the chance to tap into your creative and innovative side in a way that many other STEM careers do not. Here are some strategies to consider when deciding on the best engineering specialism to boost your career as an engineer. Consider the Career Outlook: If you are interested in an engineering career that is highly lucrative with excellent salary opportunities, high demand and the chance to progress in your career from an early stage, it's important to be aware that the different engineering specialisms vary when it comes to the career outlook. It's a good idea to check out the database available from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to find out more about the average salaries for each specialism and which disciplines have the best career prospects, including the level of demand and the expected rate of growth in the next few years. Some of the most high-demand careers today include industrial, mechanical, civil and electrical engineering, with over 60% of engineers employed in these fields. On the future prospects side of things, biomedical engineering is expected to grow by a massive twenty percent over the next few years. Think About Your Interests: Career outlook isn't always everything, and for many people finding a career that they enjoy and are interested in is a huge part of making the decision. When it comes to choosing the right engineering specialism for you, it's a good idea to spend some time thinking about what you are interested in the most and what you could see yourself doing throughout your career. Consider your hobbies and interests now; you might be surprised at what you might be able to tie back to engineering, even if you didn't think you were that interested in the specific subjects like math or science. Computer engineering might be interesting for you if you are fascinated by technology, or civil engineering could be a good choice if you are a creative person who enjoys coming up with new ideas and building things. Consider Your Technical Skills: It's wise to carefully think about your technical skills and what you might thrive in the most before you decide on the right engineering specialism for you. Different roles in engineering will require various skills and personality traits, so it's a good idea to spend some time seeing how well you match up and if you have what it takes, or are willing to work to get what it takes, to work successfully as this type of engineer. For example, those who are not the most computer-savvy might not want to pursue a career in computer engineering, while chemical engineering might be a suitable option for you if science has always been your strong point. Get an Internship: Getting some relevant work experience if you can will help you get a clearer idea of what to expect from working in a certain engineering specialism, making it easier for you to determine if the career path is the right one for you. Internships and work placements are applied learning opportunities where you can get first-hand experience of the different specialisms and disciplines within engineering, along with getting a chance to meet with the professionals who are already working in these careers. You may want to try several different internship or work placement positions in different engineering fields so that you have experience that you can compare when deciding where you are going to be the best fit. You can find internships that are open to students and designed to help you make the best decisions for your future career. Speak to Engineering Professionals and Career Advisors: Last but not least, with so many different engineering specialisms to choose from, picking the right option for you might not be something that is easy to do on your own. Maybe you like a few different areas and are struggling to choose just one. In this case, it might be helpful to speak with careers advisors from your school or college who can help you see a different perspective and make it easier for you to make your final decision. Speaking with engineers who are currently working within your fields of interest can also be useful since they can provide helpful advice and insight into what the career is really like. If you've decided on a career in engineering, the specialism that you choose can give your career a boost. Within this field, there are several specialism and sub-divisions to choose from, with something to suit a wide range of goals, interests and skills. @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Reports of Pegasus spyware attacks on Bahraini activists' iPhones heightened fears of unscrupulous, wide-scale security breaches, particularly using such a personal communications device like a smartphone. Citizen Lab's revelation of Pegasus "zero-click" attacks on the activists is certainly shocking and disturbing. This means a government agency or any entity could pry on phones at will by simply purchasing and deploying commercial malware such as Pegasus. Such spyware even needs no interaction with hacking the victim, like clicking links or granting permissions, to proceed with the attack. Pegasus 'Zero-Click' Attack Proves Apple's Efforts Against iPhone Breaches Are Not Working But while this is a condemnable act, which the Bahraini government quickly denied, such "zero-click" breaches are prevalent and can be carried out on any platform. But with Citizen Lab's report of a string of hacks on iPhones, particularly in taking advantage of IMessage vulnerability, it seems Apple's efforts in preventing these attacks are not working. Read Also: Pegasus Spyware Breaks iPhone Security: Apple BlastDoor Protection Useless? Apple attempted to address such zero-click attacks on iMessage by adding a security tool called BlastDoor, which filters malicious code from reaching the messaging app, to iOS 14. It would weed out all those questionable components before they could affect the entire OS. However, despite BlastDoor's existence, zero-click attacks continue to persist, proving that Apple has not succeeded in preventing interaction-less hacks from happening. Apple Vows Stronger iMessage Security, Better Protection in iOS 15 Apple has yet to make a statement on the latest zero-click breach, but a spokesperson told Wired Magazine that the company will further strengthen iMessage security on top of BlastDoor, with new, better protection in iOS 15--which is set for release next month. No further details were given on these new security features amid the seemingly unpreventable zero-click hacks. Pegasus exploiting iMessage is quite expected, given how the app's features and interconnectivity with the iOS make it an enticing vehicle for zero-click breaches. These offer a window of opportunity for hackers to discover flaws they could exploit. Since the increase of zero-click attacks on iMessage a few years ago, it is quite obvious that Apple doesn't only needs to filter malicious code, but also has to do some overhaul in the app's architecture--which is definitely not forthcoming soon. Suggestions for Apple to Protect At-Risk Users from Zero-Click Attacks on iMessage Given this, Wired suggested that Apple could provide special settings so that at-risk users can opt to lock down the iMessages app on their iPhones. Doing this would include choosing to block untrusted content, such as images and links, and prompting the user before accepting messages from people not in their contact list. Apple could also allow users to disable iMessage entirely to keep the device safe. These may not be appealing for avid users, but if it would mean better defense against zero-click attacks, such options would definitely be worth it. Related Article: Is Your iPhone Infected With Pegasus Spyware? 1 Way to Scan Your Phone, Detect Scary Virus Will an Asteroid Ever Hit Earth? This question has certainly made people anxious and curious about the possibility. Knowing how an asteroid impact on Earth might have led to the extinction of the dinosaurs at the end of the Mesozoic Era 65 million years ago makes people more concerned about its destructive might. Watching such disaster movies as "Armageddon" does not ease the tension for sure. NASA Says Asteroid Threats Rare: In 'Scales of Hundreds to Millions of Years' To address these worries, NASA released a video featuring asteroid expert Kelly Fast, who finally gave a definitive answer to these concerns. Fast gave a direct answer: "Yes." She explained asteroids did hit the Earth in the past and will do so in the future. But she clarified that won't happen anytime soon since it doesn't occur that often. Fast said such strikes happen on "time scales of hundreds to thousands to millions of years." Read Also: Is Asteroid Bennu Hitting Earth? Scientist Prediction, Date, and NASA Asteroid Deflector It helps to note that NASA has strengthened its capability in spotting and monitoring such threats, Cnet posted. Currently, the U.S. space agency is tracking the most pressing threat, asteroid Bennu. Bennu is seen to make its nearest approach to Earth in 2135 and while it may not pose any serious threat of an impact, the Earth's gravity could change the asteroid's trajectory and increase the chances of a collision during the close encounter. Asteroid Bennu Has Low Impact Probability to Hit Earth However, findings from the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft show that such impact probability is quite miniscule--1 in 2,700 or 0.037 percent that Bennu will hit the Earth on its target pass on September 24, 2182. That's a near 100 percent chance it will spare our planet. As for the next centuries through 2300, the chance would be 1 in 1,750 or 0.057 percent, NASA added. Meanwhile, NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office tweeted that there are no expected asteroid impact threats in the next 100 years, Cnet further reported. Will an asteroid ever hit Earth? There are no known #asteroid impact threats to Earth for the next century, but small meteoroids disintegrate in Earths atmosphere all the time! Dr. Kelly Fast, one of our #PlanetaryDefense experts, tells us more: https://t.co/DdVoFv4n4w pic.twitter.com/W8ORMplFSd NASA Asteroid Watch (@AsteroidWatch) August 25, 2021 NASA Preparing DART, HAMMER Deflector Missions Even with the low probability of an asteroid strike, NASA and other space agencies are preparing for any eventuality that a space rock would pose a threat. NASA is set to launch a Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), a planetary defense mission that will smash a spacecraft into a moonlet to find out if such an impact could change its path. Should it work, the same method will be used to veer an incoming asteroid away from Earth. NASA is also lining up its HAMMER or Hypervelocity Asteroid Mitigation Mission for Emergency Response study aimed to use spacecraft as a kinetic or nuclear asteroid deflector. Around 34 to 53 HAMMER strikes are needed 10 years before an expected asteroid collision with Earth to put it off course. While asteroids are indeed on its way, although not in the next century at least, there should be enough warning about such a threat, and allow effective defensive action at the fullest. Related Article: China Space Agency to Use Rockets to Stop Armageddon-Like Asteroid; NASA Working on Asteroid Deflector? [Complete Details] Millions of families should have received their $300 child tax credit payment by now. Instead, many have reported their money missing. To help validate these payments, IRS released an online tool to help you check your eligibility status. The IRS already sent two waves of advance child tax credit payments on July 15 and August 13. Unfortunately, even with delivery delays, many families never received either of these payments. By now, it is recommended that you re-check your eligibility status on the child tax credit, so you could decide whether you should file a payment trace. Fortunately, the online tool "Advance Child Tax Credit Eligibility Assistant" is available. This is a highly intuitive tool that would automatically determine your eligibility after receiving the necessary information. How to Check Child Tax Credit Eligibility with IRS Online Tool To use the "Advance Child Tax Credit Eligibility Assistant," head to this website and click on "Check Your Eligibility." Afterward, you will be asked a few general questions about your tax returns and residency. The online tool will automatically notify and block the next steps if you do not qualify for the child tax credit. If you qualify, click "Next" to proceed. If you previously submitted your 2020 tax returns, then the online tool would automatically skip to "Step 3." If you have not submitted, then you would need to proceed to "Step 2" where you must provide your "Status & Income," as well as the number of "Qualifying Children" with their respective age. Do not skip any of the boxes to avoid receiving the error message. Click "Next." "Step 3" will showcase the full results of your eligibility status. This report will also explain how much payment you could receive depending on children's eligibility and your current AGI. Lastly, near the bottom, the online tool will offer to: Find out if you are enrolled in the ongoing payments: "Manage Your Advance Child Tax Credit Payments." Find out how advance payments could affect your 2021 tax return: "Get Details About the Changes." Note that the Child Tax Credit Eligibility Assistant works in different languages, including Spanish. This should help others who are struggling to translate the English language. Read Also: The True Story Behind the Instagram 'Nah He Tweakin' Meme: Who Started the Viral, Annoying Comment? How to Use Child Tax Credit Portal A second tool you can use to check on your ongoing payment is the Child Tax Credit Portal. This is helpful to people who want to: For eligible families who have already filed their tax returns, you do not need to take action for your child tax credit money. Your account would automatically be included in the IRS budget. Unfortunately, Cnet reported that the IRS is experiencing delays in its delivery. The tax agency recently encountered an issue that forced them to deliver the August 13 payments by snail mail, which would take until next month. Related Article: Fourth Stimulus Check Update: $2000 Petition Set for Massive Milestone! Wharton, TX (77488) Today A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Partly cloudy skies. Low near 75F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Partly cloudy skies. Low near 75F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph. Actors Shin Min-a, left, and Kim Seon-ho pose for pictures during an online media conference for the romantic comedy series "Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha." Courtesy of tvN By Lee Gyu-lee The new romantic comedy series "Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha," one of the most anticipated TV series this year, is finally set to take off this Saturday, with actors Shin Min-a and Kim Seon-ho as the leads. The actors expressed high hopes for the series during an online media conference Tuesday, giving a glimpse of their chemistry. "We have such great acting chemistry Kim Seon-ho has such a great personality and is a type of a person who makes others comfortable," Shin said. "I wanted to have flexibility in acting with this series and Kim was so considerate. I think we clicked very well." Adding that he enjoyed every moment of work on the show, Kim said: "Shin is very open to exchanging opinions and creating the scenes She would always come up with funny ideas and would show them to us, which were really amusing." "Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha," directed by Yoo Je-won, who led "Oh My Ghost" and "Tomorrow, with You," is set in a peaceful, close-knit seaside village, called Gongjin. Yoon Hye-jin (Shin), who is a successful dentist, moves from a big city to Gongjin to open up her own practice. As she tries to settle into her new neighborhood, she meets the town's handsome, jack-of-all-trades Hong Du-sik (Kim) who she finds to be her polar opposite. Scenes from the series / Courtesy of tvN "This is a story of a city woman Hye-jin settling into a town by a seaside, as she meets Du-sik. Because the two come from very different backgrounds, they bicker all the time, which brings them closer to each other," the director said of the series. "And as they do, she learns to mingle with the town's people and Du-sik also grows from being by her side." He added the scenery of the coastal city and the sea will also give something for the viewers to enjoy. "Our series doesn't revolve around some dynamic elements or story, but rather it will offer small, intimate 'healing' moments," he said. This is the first romantic comedy series in about five years for Shin, who has made several hits within the genre, including the series "My Girlfriend Is a Gumiho." She noted that she was looking to take part in a rom-com when she was offered the role. "When I read the script, it was well-composed and the story of people in it was really interesting. And the biggest reason I chose this is because I was drawn to the character Hye-jin," she said. "I've been doing works across genres to show different acting abilities. Now, I want to do a softhearted, feel-good series, so I've decided to join the series." Posters for the series / Courtesy of tvN Poster for the 24th Bucheon International Comics Festival / Courtesy of Bucheon International Comics Festival By Park Ji-won The 24th Bucheon International Comics Festival (BICOF) will be held in both online and offline platforms from Sept. 4 to 12 where a variety of free events promoting Korean web comics are planned amid the expansion of the web comics industry here. Themed "New normal, new connection," the festival, hosted by the Korea Manhwa Contents Agency, will hold various events, such as fan meeting events, the Gyeonggi International Cosplay Festival (GICOF), international seminars on various issues such as minority issues and the comic category "boy's love" (BL). Exhibitions will be held mainly on YouTube and at the Korea Manhwa Museum located in Bucheon, Gyeonggi Province. The opening ceremony will be presented in a virtual space by using digital technologies such as hologram, VR and AR. During the ceremony, the winner of the Bucheon Manhwa Award will be announced among "Yumi's Cells" by Lee Dong-gun, "Navillera" by HUN, "My End-of-pregnancy Story" (Korean title) by Aude Mermilliod and "Civilian Control Zone" by OSIK. The opening ceremony will be translated into English simultaenously, while some of the key videos such as fan meetings and exhibitions will have English subtitles later on, the organizer said. Kim Hyoung-bye, chairman of the festival's steering committee said "We aimed to show the joy of enjoying the dynamics of this content when we don't have much chance to meet offline. We hope audiences gain energy and comfort through the online-based festival." Yoo Soo-hun, director of the festival said during a press conference held to promote the festival that "Last year, we had some technical difficulties in holding online venues. So we tried to fix the errors so that audiences can communicate well with each other. For example, there are discussion sessions between Korean and French authors and with the Belgium comics festival." Lee Yong-cheol, head of the Culture Promotion Office of the festival, added that it aimed to introduce more web comics which didn't have enough chance to be promoted amid the fast expansion of the industry. One of the highlights of the show would be fan meetings with authors. Comics writers of eight works such as Lee Dong-gun of "Yumi's Cells," HUN and Jimin of "Navillera," Shin Il-sook of "Four Daughters of Armian" and OSIK of "Civilian Control Zone" will have fan meetings via ZOOM. About 10 fans would be able to have an online meeting with the authors, respectively. Also, a live concert of the OST from the megahit JTBC series "Itaewon Class" will be live streamed on Sept. 11. On the sidelines of the festival, the GICOF will hold "Cosplay@home," a costume play video festival, providing videos of costume players from 10 different countries while selecting winners among the Korean applicants who submitted costume play videos. By Lee Kyung-min Bithumb, a virtual asset exchange, has appointed Lee Yoo-jung as compliance monitoring officer, it said, Thursday. Lee has over 20 years of experience in compliance monitoring at global financial firms including Goldman Sachs and Nomura Financial Investment. Lee's previous work led to the establishment of corporate culture whereby internal controls were strengthened, Bithumb added. Lee has more than 10 years of experience in anti-money laundering and customer verification, a reason why the cryptocurrency operator considers her criteria would significantly help management in compliance monitoring. She graduated from Korea University with a specialization in business before beginning her professional career at the state-run Export-Import Bank of Korea in 1995. She was in charge of money laundering prevention and internal control at the Seoul branch of Nomura Holdings in 2006. She had a similar role at Goldman Sachs in 2010. Bithumb said it expects Lee to focus on strengthening the internal control system of the exchange including internal and external inspection and investigation activities. Prevention of money laundering will be another priority. "Bithumb will continue to bolster the transparency and reliability of the virtual asset industry by establishing an anti-money laundering system and strengthening internal control systems comparable to the financial industry," a Bithumb official said. Bithumb is the first cryptocurrency exchange in Korea to set up an anti-money laundering system. Bird Island on Saipan / Courtesy of Marianas Visitors Authority Korea By Jun Ji-hye The Marianas Visitors Authority (MVA) Board of Directors has decided to extend subsidies and benefits given to travel companies and tourists participating in the travel bubble program with Korea until the end of December, in a bid to attract more visitors from Korea. On June 30, the Korean government signed a travel bubble agreement with the Northern Marianas, which includes Saipan, Tinian and Rota, to allow group tours for fully vaccinated people. The term "travel bubble" refers to a partnership between two or more cities or countries with similar rates of COVID-19 infections to allow quarantine-free air travel in both directions. The Marianas' Travel Investment Resumption Plan (TRIP) program provides subsidies to airlines, hotels, travel agencies and other related businesses to help jumpstart tourism, which has been hit hard by the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic. The Mariana Islands had originally planned to apply the TRIP program for only eight weeks following July 24, when the travel bubble agreement was implemented. The program supports weekly flights from Incheon to Saipan by Asiana Airlines, Jeju Air and T'way Air. It also supports the full operation of a "quarantine resort," Pacific Islands Club Saipan, where all arriving travel bubble passengers must first quarantine, and two hotels where passengers can stay after their quarantine: Kensington Hotel Saipan and World Resort Saipan. In addition, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests for COVID-19 in Saipan will be free of charge for all Korean travelers who have booked the trips through travel agencies in Korea. "We are pleased to see more businesses reopening and people returning to work because of the travel bubble program," MVA Board Chair Viola Alepuyo said. "It's really a light at the end of the tunnel for our community members who have been able to return to work because more businesses have reopened their doors. We are extending the TRIP program so that we can continue slowly restoring tourism through the end of the year." The MVA added that it has been in constant communication with the Commonwealth Healthcare Corporation and the COVID-19 Task Force to ensure that all the necessary precautions are taken to cope with virus infections. Managaha Island on Saipan / Courtesy of the Marianas Visitors Authority Korea North Korean soldiers in Gaepung County, North Hwanghae Province are seen from the unification observatory in Paju, South Korea, near the border with North Korea, Aug. 20. Yonhap A North Korean propaganda outlet on Thursday slammed South Korea and the United States over their summertime joint military drill, calling it "a dangerous playing with fire" that heightens tensions on the Korean Peninsula. Uriminzokkiri made the criticism as the allies were set to conclude their nine-day combined military exercise Thursday, which has been held in a scaled-back manner due to the coronavirus situation and peace efforts involving North Korea. "The joint military drill is evidently aimed at intentionally worsening situations on the Korean Peninsula and a dangerous playing with fire underway as part of efforts to complete the preparations for invasion of the North," the website said. The website denounced South Korea, in particular, for making a "thinly-veiled excuse" to justify its "invasion act of crime" in collusion with the outside forces by saying the drill is defensive in nature. The ruling party and the government on Thursday agreed on a new youth assistance program, including a monthly rent subsidy for young people in lower income brackets, party officials said. The decision was reached during a consultative meeting between the Democratic Party and the government amid the country's soaring housing costs and the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic. Under the special youth assistance program, the government will pay a monthly rent subsidy of 200,000 won ($171.4) for up to a year to each young person whose income is 60 percent or less of the country's median income, starting next year. "(The program) aims to give temporary assistance to the young generations (in the lower income brackets) to ride out the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic," Lee Dong-hak, a member of the DP's supreme council, said in a briefing after the ruling party-government consultation. "Two hundred thousand won will be paid every month for the duration of up to 12 months." Lee added that an estimated 160,000 young people whose monthly income is about 1.2 million won or less are expected to benefit from the program. In addition to the monthly 200,000 won cash payment, government-assisted loans will also be available as part of the relief program, he noted. In line with the youth assistance program, the DP and the government also agreed to introduce a special bank account program dedicated to helping young people build assets, as well as a separate subsidy for small and midsize firms to encourage them to hire more young people. "The latest measures are focused on resolving (the widening) gaps within younger generations ... and recovering the employment rate for the youth to the pre-COVID-19 level," Education Minister Yoo Eun-hae said during the meeting. (Yonhap) South Korea reported yet another case of African swine fever from a local farm in Gangwon Province on Thursday amid lingering concerns over the fatal animal disease in the country. The latest ASF case was reported from Hongcheon, 102 kilometers east of Seoul, according to the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. The farm was raising 2,300 pigs, and there were no additional pig farms within a 10-kilometer radius. Health authorities have been carrying out preemptive examinations on all pig farms in Gangwon Province. Earlier this month, the country confirmed an ASF case for the first time in around three months in Goseong, which was followed by another case in Inje last week. Both regions are in Gangwon Province. ASF does not affect humans but is deadly to pigs. There is currently no vaccine or cure for the disease. The fatal animal disease earlier dealt a harsh blow to the local pig industry in 2019, when it infected 14 farms. More than 150,000 pigs were culled that year. Two more farms also reported ASF cases last year. South Korea has been warning of potential outbreaks of ASF at local farms, as wild boars born in the spring have expanded their activities to a wider area. "Considering wild boars normally live in a group of five or six, it is likely that the virus has already spread in Gyeonggi and Gangwon Provinces," the ministry said in a statement. Since June, the country identified 158 ASF cases among wild boars, up 70 percent from the same period in 2020. The ministry, meanwhile, said the latest ASF outbreaks are not likely to have an immediate impact on the local supply of pork products. The number of pigs supplied to the market in August is estimated at 1.41 million units, up 5 percent from a year earlier. (Yonhap) Family members of Afghans who helped the Korean government's activities in Afghanistan are aboard a Korea Air Force C-130 airlift plane as they wait to depart Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday. Courtesy of Air Force Gov't to revise immigration law to give long-term stay permits to evacuees By Nam Hyun-woo The Korean government still has a number of follow-up measures to handle, amid the arrival of 390 Afghans who have been evacuated from their Taliban-controlled homeland, as Korea's legal and social systems are still in an infant stage in terms of being able to deal with international evacuees and refugees fleeing from conflicts. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday, a military aircraft carrying 378 Afghan evacuees landed at Incheon International Airport. The evacuees were among 391 Afghans and their family members included on the list of people evacuated by the Korean government in recognition of their service to the Korean government's activities there. The remaining 13 are expected to arrive in Korea aboard other military aircraft soon. The evacuees entered Korea under the status of "people of special merit," rather than as refugees. A senior official at Cheong Wa Dae said that the designation is "a special way of granting a period of stay so as to provide immediate protection to the evacuees, given the time normally required to grant them refugee status." The Ministry of Justice said that it will revise an enforcement ordinance of the Immigration Act, in order to grant F-2 long-term residency visas to the Afghan evacuees as "people of special merit," because there are no legal grounds currently to give them long-term stay visas. The evacuees received C-3 short-term stay visas first and will get F-1 visas to permit their long-term stays, followed by F-2 visas, which will allow long-term stay and employment, after the revision which may take place as soon as Oct. 5. Until then, the ministry will collect public opinions on the issue. However, controversy is rising over the fairness of this measure, because the status of "people of special merit" offers greater benefits than refugee status. "The evacuees have contributed to the Korean government, so they will get greater care than refugees in terms of living costs, subsidies for settlement and education," Justice Minister Park Beom-kye told reporters upon welcoming the evacuees at the airport. Justice Minister Park Beom-kye, second from left, speaks during a press conference on Afghan evacuees' legal status at Incheon International Airport, Thursday. Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul Family members of Afghans who helped the Korean government's activities in their country arrive at Incheon International Airport, Thursday. A total of 378 Afghans arrived in South Korea on Thursday as part of Seoul's efforts to evacuate locals who worked at Korea's embassy and other government facilities in the war-torn nation, as well as their families. Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul A total of 378 Afghans arrived in South Korea on Thursday as part of Seoul's efforts to evacuate Afghans who worked at Korea's embassy there and other government facilities in the war-torn nation as well as their families, who feared for their safety after the Taliban's seizure of power. A KC-330 tanker transport aircraft carrying the evacuees landed at Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul, at 4:24 p.m., after departing from the Pakistani capital of Islamabad early in the morning, the foreign ministry said. Of a total of 391 people to be airlifted, 378 were on board. The 13 others left Islamabad at around 7 p.m. (Seoul time) aboard a separate military plane, expected to arrive in Korea early Friday afternoon, the ministry said. The 13 people, members of three families, had remained in Islamabad due to a lack of seats on the first plane and other circumstances. Family members of Afghans who helped the Korean government's activities in Afghanistan arrive at Incheon International Airport, Thursday. Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul About 180, or around half, of the total evacuees are under the age of 10, including 100 infants, a defense ministry official said, adding that the evacuees are comprised of 76 families. The evacuees are medical professionals, vocational trainers, IT experts and interpreters who worked for Korea's embassy, now-closed hospitals and a job training center that had been run by the country's overseas aid institution, KOICA. The evacuees had first been airlifted to Islamabad from Kabul on Monday and Wednesday. The Afghans will be coming in not as refugees but as "persons of special merit" and will be granted short-term visas which will be switched to longer-term ones, allowing them to find jobs. Upon arrival, they will be tested for COVID-19 and be placed under quarantine at a government-designated facility in the provincial county of Jincheon, 91 kilometers southeast of Seoul. They will also undergo screening again to confirm their identities. The evacuation got underway after Seoul closed its embassy in Afghanistan and evacuated its diplomatic staff to Qatar, as the security conditions worsened amid the ongoing pullout of U.S. troops and the Taliban's return to power. Family members of Afghans who helped the Korean government's activities in their country board a bus at Incheon International Airport, Thursday, upon their arrival in Korea. Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul In this Aug. 3 file photo, military vehicles are parked at U.S. military base Camp Casey in Dongducheon, Gyeonggi Provine. Yonhap South Korea and the United States on Thursday were set to conclude a major summertime combined exercise held in a scaled-back manner due to the coronavirus situation and peace efforts involving North Korea, officials said. The nine-day computer-simulated Combined Command Post Training began on Aug. 16, mobilizing the minimum level of troops without any outdoor drills, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). This year's summertime exercise kicked off amid strong protests from North Korea, with Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, blasting the drills as an "unwelcoming act of self-destruction for which a dear price should be paid." North Korea has been refusing to answer the South's regular phone calls via liaison and military hotlines since Aug. 10, when South Korea and the U.S. launched a preliminary exercise in the run-up to the main training. Colombian veterans of the 1950-53 Korean War pose with a Korean veteran after their interview with The Korea Times at a hotel in Seoul, Thursday. From left are Colombian Association of Veterans (ASCOVE) President Alvaro Lozano Charry, Korean War Veterans Association Vice Chairman Kim Ki-jae and Colombian Association of Veteran Officers of the Korean War (ASOVECOR) President Guillermo Rodriguez Guzman. Courtesy of the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs Colombian Korean War veterans visit Korea By Jung Da-min For Guillermo Rodriguez Guzman, 91, and Alvaro Lozano Charry, 86, participating in the 1950-53 Korean War was their own choice, as they both volunteered to come and fight to protect South Korean people. "I was then a platoon leader of the Colombian Army and when the United Nations asked the Colombian military to send our frigate unit, I volunteered for it," Rodriguez, president of the Colombian Association of Veteran Officers of the Korean War (ASOVECOR), said in an interview with The Korea Times at a hotel in Seoul, Thursday, during his visit to the country on the occasion of Colombian President Ivan Duque's state visit here. "As I was an Army officer, my colleagues and I often talked or read news about World War II. As I knew about the situation of the Korean Peninsula that it was divided due to the Cold War, I wanted to see the war with my own eyes and protect the South from the North's invasion." Lozano, president of the Colombian Association of Veterans (ASCOVE), said he was a young man full of spirit when he volunteered to participate in the Korean War, after one of his friends told him about Korea and asked if he would join him to go there. Lozano and his friend Rodriguez Nieto Armando both participated in the Korean War, but Nieto was killed during their first battle on the peninsula. Lozano suffered an injury to his left ankle due to a hand grenade explosion during a battle on June 13, 1953. But as he was looking outside the window lying in a bed after being hospitalized, he saw women and children crying, and he remembered why he'd signed up in the first place to protect the South Korean people and it was the right choice that he came to participate in the war. "Seeing that South Korea has now become an advanced country ranked among the top 10 countries across the world, I feel proud of the sacrifices of Colombian veterans and those who died during the war," Lozano said. Several years after he came to Colombia, he and his colleague veterans of the Korean War formed ASCOVE and continued to interact, not just among themselves but also with the South Korean government, to promote friendship between the countries. ASOVECOR, an association of veteran officers like Rodrigues, was formed on the occasion of the establishment of the South Korean Embassy in Colombia in 1971. "Thanks to the South Korean ambassadors who served in Colombia, veterans who were living in different regions of the country could gather again for many events organized to promote the friendship between Korea and Colombia," Rodriguez said. Rodriguez has visited South Korea eight times so far, including five visits organized by the South Korean government. Lozano has visited Korea two times including this time. Their five-day visit to Korea this time has been organized by the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs. During their stay, the two veterans also visited the DMZ, Seoul National Cemetery and the War Memorial of Korea to reminisce about the past and pay tribute to fallen comrades whom they shared joys and sorrows with during the war. They said both younger Colombians and South Koreans should remember the history of the Korean War, to better understand how the countries could achieve their developments. They said education for young people is especially important for the countries to maintain peace and security. The main opposition People Power Party (PPP) said Thursday it will mount a filibuster to block a controversial media bill, which it said would suppress press freedom and gag critical media. The ruling Democratic Party (DP) plans to pass the proposed revision to the press arbitration act during a parliamentary plenary session Monday despite resistance from opposition parties and media organizations. The bill, aimed at curbing fake news, would allow the court to order punitive damages of up to five times the actual damages caused by deliberately false reports. "We will apply for a filibuster to block the passage of the bill," Kim Gi-hyeon, floor leader of the PPP, said during a meeting of the party supreme council. "The bill violates the freedom of the press, controls and censors the media, and essentially infringes on the people's right to know." The party also plans to file a suit with the Constitutional Court against the DP's unilateral passage of the bill early Wednesday through the Legislation and Judiciary Committee. If the proposal is finally approved at the National Assembly, the party will support a petition expected to be filed against the legislation with the Constitutional Court, party officials said. The DP, with an absolute majority, had planned to pass the media act revision and other pending bills at the plenary session scheduled for Wednesday afternoon. But the floor leaders of the two parties agreed in the last minute to postpone the session to Monday. (Yonhap) Main opposition People Power Party floor leader Rep. Kim Gi-hyeon makes a speech in front of the National Assembly, Wednesday, during a protest against the ruling Democratic Party of Korea's unilateral move to pass a controversial bill aimed at curbing what it calls "fake news." Yonhap Controversial bill to be put to vote Aug. 30 By Jun Ji-hye The ruling liberal Democratic Party of Korea's (DPK) unilateral move to pass a controversial bill aimed at imposing punitive damages on what it calls "fake news" is facing criticism even from its own members, with concerns being raised that the bill could hamper the media's role in holding political or economic power in check. The DPK, which holds a majority of National Assembly seats, endorsed the bill to revise the Act on Press Arbitration at the Assembly's Legislation and Judiciary Committee, Wednesday, despite heated protests from opposition parties and journalists' associations. The party is planning to pass it at a plenary session scheduled for Aug. 30. Rep. Cho Eung-cheon of the ruling party said the revised regulation could lead to weakening the media's role in scrutinizing the powerful, and this will result in violating the people's right to know and disturbing the development of democracy. "The ruling party was criticized for its arrogance and self-righteousness as seen in the results of the April 7 by-elections. If the party continues to push ahead with the passage of the bill, this criticism will be invited again. And this will damage the value of democracy we have protected so far," Cho wrote on Facebook. Cho noted that reforming the media is necessary, but the procedures and direction are more important than the speed. "More discussion and review are needed, so that our original goal can be achieved through the revision of the law," he said. Rep. Park Yong-jin, one of the presidential contenders of the ruling party, also raised concerns over the party's move, saying that the revised law will reduce the courage of reporters and media companies in criticizing political or economic power. "The idea to revise the law had good intensions originally. The leadership of the party should have given more efforts to persuade opposition parties as well as people to resolve growing concerns," Park said during his radio appearance, Thursday. National Assembly Speaker Park Byeong-seug, center, holds discussions about scheduling a plenary session with floor leaders of the ruling and opposition parties at his office, Wednesday. They decided to delay the session supposed to be held on the day to Aug. 30. Yonhap President Moon Jae-in said Thursday the government will provide complete support for South Korea's high-tech startups and entrepreneurial ventures as the country aims to emerge as one of the world's four major venture powerhouses. He pledged to expand support for investments in venture firms via the creation of a special fund worth 1 trillion won (US$850 million), speaking during a Cheong Wa Dae event, titled "K+Venture (K Add Venture)." The government will make sure South Korea joins the top four of the world's venture powers through full support from business launch, growth, recovery to re-challenge, Moon said. "Support for venture investment will further increase," he added. "The government will also create a new fund worth 1 trillion won in order to expand the high-risk early stage of investment in startups." He stressed the need to foster technology startups and the inflow of talented manpower and capital, as well as invigorate the MA market. "The government will raise the number of technology startups (in South Korea), currently totaling around 230,000 a year, to 300,000 by 2024," he said. The president expressed optimism, saying South Korea is already riding on the second "venture boom" in the wake of the first one in the early 2000s. (Yonhap) Sea turtles are released with GPS trackers on their shells, Aug. 26. Yonhap By Hwang Dong-hee Six endangered sea turtles were set free into the ocean at Jungmun Saekdal Beach, Jeju Island on Thursday, in efforts to preserve the species in the wild, according to the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries. Among the six, two four-year-old green sea turtles were artificially hatched in an aquarium; one green sea turtle and three loggerhead sea turtles were rescued in the wild. All of them are in good health and ready to return to their natural habitat. Since 2017, the ministry has released a total of 128 sea turtles which were either rescued or artificially incubated at the same place every year, as marine turtles generally navigate back to their natal beaches to lay eggs. The release site, Jungmun Saekdal Beach, is where sea turtles had already laid their eggs several times in the past. Also, the island provides a favorable environment for the turtles with few fishing nets, a plentiful supply of food, and in particular, easy access to the Pacific Ocean. A green sea turtle, rescued on Aug. 22, 2019, swims in an aquarium in Busan. Courtesy of Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries Sea turtles are one of the most imperiled forms of sea life. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), six of the seven existing turtle species are on the verge of extinction listed as 'vulnerable,' 'endangered' or 'critically endangered.' Sandy beaches for their spawning grounds are disappearing due to coastal development and pollution, while marine waste mostly floating plastics threatens their lives, as they are in many cases mistaken for food. GPS trackers show the traveling routes of the previously released sea turtles. Courtesy of Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries By Lee Hyon-soo Relying on a peace agreement with the Taliban signed in February 2020, the United States is pulling its troops completely out of Afghanistan, leaving behind all their mighty weapons. In the belief that Afghan soldiers were well-trained by the U.S. forces and better armed than the Taliban, U.S. policymakers thought that Afghan would be well-protected after the departure of their troops. It did not take long to prove them wrong. Immediately after the U.S. troops departed, the Taliban reneged on the peace agreement and launched an all-out attack. Lacking the will to fight, Afghan soldiers threw away their weapons and fled. And nobody would or could stop them. They saw no reason for risking their own lives to defend the corrupt and inept government in Kabul. As a result, the Afghan government crumbled like a house of cards. And the Afghan president and political leaders ran away shamelessly to other countries, leaving innocent, defenseless citizens to the tyranny of the Taliban. Have we not seen something like this before? Yes, that is exactly what happened in South Vietnam in 1975. Now many people seem to wonder whether South Korea would follow in the footsteps of South Vietnam and Afghanistan. To dispel such doubts, the U.S. government publicly stated that South Korea is different from Afghanistan in many respects and that it has no intention of pulling its troops out of South Korea as long as the U.S.-ROK Mutual Defense Treaty remains in force. We have no reason to think that the U.S. government will betray us irresponsibly. The problem is that there are quite a few left-leaning, radical politicians and activists in South Korea who argue that a peace treaty should be signed between South and North Korea and that the U.S.-ROK Mutual Defense Treaty should be canceled. Although they are very vocal and make newspaper headlines, they are in the minority now. However, in the unlikely event that they have it their way, there would be no basis for U.S. troops to stay in South Korea and most likely the U.S. nuclear umbrella will also be withdrawn. Does anyone in his right mind believe that a peace treaty between South and North Korea will guarantee a permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula? What if North Korea reneges on the peace treaty for whatever reason and threatens to use nuclear weapons against South Korea? As South Korea is defenseless against nuclear attack on its own, some may argue that it is better to surrender and survive than to suffer nuclear holocaust. In this scenario, we would have to live just like our brethren north of the 38th parallel. Are we prepared to do so? History shows that a peace treaty is not worth the paper on which it was written in circumstances where the countries involved do not have the will or capability to defend themselves. Surely we cannot rely on the goodwill of our opponent and let our guard down. South Korea has come a long way over the past 70 years or so economically and politically, and we have to do everything possible to protect our achievements. We have so much to fight for. The writer (tomhslee43@gmail.com) is the author of "Tales of A Korean Globetrotter." By Stephen Costello Much of the discussion of how Seoul could be a greater asset to Washington has centered on growing its military capabilities along with Washington's sanctions-centered coercion toward Pyongyang, or helping form a clear anti-China or pro-democracy camp. However, each of those efforts which continue today more often serve to enable the worst instincts of unprepared U.S. leaders, and contribute to its decades of policy failures toward Korea. Instead, South Korea could finally pull more of its weight in the alliance by showing Washington how it can pursue its real interests and achieve lasting strategic wins in the region. Two items are key. The first new deal with North Korea must be reframed, so that it is pursued in the context of economic development and infrastructure expansion. This would show that denuclearization and political actions are necessary to enable realistic peninsular and regional progress. This is the most important, relevant and useful context in which to see the North Korea issues. The most successful deals that were ever pursued between Seoul and Pyongyang and between Washington and Pyongyang during the 1990s were based clearly on an economic development and security framework. Such framing makes denuclearization possible. Secondly, South Korea would take a much larger role as creator of structures for South-North cooperation and international investments, as well as creating a coalition of states and international institutions to support and guarantee implementation of agreements. The U.S. could also do this, but that cannot be expected. While this evolution goes against decades of Cheong Wa Dae's inability to assert its interests within the alliance, it also finally comes to grips with 20 years of bad analysis and expensive policy failure by U.S. administrations. Seoul can expand its role without confrontation with the Biden administration. The expected pushback could be managed through existing channels. Both strategic and optical advantages for the U.S. would be extensive and low-cost. Nevertheless, South Korea would have to step up and make its voice heard in both public and official ways. Seoul cannot "ask" Washington to play this role. Instead, the new role must be embraced, explained and clearly articulated. New responsibilities for Seoul would represent an overdue upgrading and modernization of the alliance. South Korean President Moon Jae-in has been unable to expand Seoul's role. Since his summit with Biden, his ministers and officials are trying harder, but we still do not see a real plan. The closest we've seen is Institute for National Security Strategy President Kim Ki-jung speaking frankly to a group at the U.S. Institute for Peace in Washington recently. That delegation strongly made the point that the U.S.'s goals in Northeast Asia hinge largely on its ability to advance North Korean denuclearization. Perhaps the next Korean president could do this, to the benefit of the U.S., South Korea, China, Japan, North Korea and Russia. However, we have little information about whether the next occupant of Cheong Wa Dae would or could do so. The election is still six months away. The main strategic point is the central trade: suspending the five extreme U.N. sanctions that President Obama (through the U.N.) imposed on North Korea in 2016 and 2017. North Korea would require this relief in any case, but the price for them should be our top requirements. A cap on fissile material production and long-range missile tests, and IAEA inspectors back in the country as part of a long-term verification regime, as well as an expanded role for Seoul in implementation and North-South cooperation would be necessary. We would get what we need, and President Biden would be able to credibly claim a security and diplomatic success. It should go without saying that Republicans and some Democrats in the U.S. will attack any agreement. It could not be a formal treaty. Like the Agreed Framework of 1994 or the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran of 2015 it would have to be a presidential deal. This simply recognizes that the U.S. political and diplomatic systems are deeply broken. This is one big reason why it is necessary to have South Korea play a larger role as soon as possible. It should also go without saying that South Korea's participation and support for any agreement is very much dependent upon a Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) candidate winning the Korean presidential election in March. This point is practical and realistic rather than partisan. As in the U.S., South Korea's opposition parties are no serious about North Korea and alliance policies. Key opposition and "conservative" figures are already talking about abolishing the Ministry of Unification, just as their predecessors did. How a non-DPK government in Seoul would handle North Korea issues is uncertain, but expectations should be extremely low. The presidential election in six months could go either way, but as a practical matter policy continuity with the Moon approach would have to be assumed in order for Seoul to move forward now. Finally, it has become less and less likely that the Biden team can settle its internal debates, assuming it has them, and come up with a realistic and bold initiative with North Korea. It has been instructive to watch as the new U.S. administration begins to tackle crucial foreign policy opportunities. A U.S. return to the JCPOA which could prevent a nuclear program, just like the Agreed Framework did with North Korea should have been low-hanging fruit, but after months of U.S. bungling, that agreement is hanging by a thread. Hopes among Washington policy professionals for diplomatic progress across the foreign policy spectrum have been disappointed. Regarding North Korea policy, there are simply no signs of movement. The whole catalogue of statements from the Biden diplomatic, security and East Asia teams for the past six months has been notable for its political insecurity, its strategic incoherence and its diplomatic insufficiency. Military exercises have gone forward without any effort to discover what could be gained from their alteration or suspension. Within the administration, we know that White House Asia czar Kurt Campbell and Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman have the knowledge and backgrounds to appreciate Seoul's points and the more strategic views toward North Korea. But we have no indication yet that either of them can or will play the role of internal catalyst among the Biden team. So we hope to be surprised, but doubt that we will be. It may be time for South Korea to respect its alliance responsibilities and help the U.S. to return to a positive, helpful posture in the region. Stephen Costello ( Costs55@gwu.edu ) is non-resident visiting scholar at the George Washington University Institute for Korean Studies. He is non-resident visiting researcher at the Gyeonggi Research Institute, and a columnist at The Korea Times. He directed the Korea in transition program at the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington, and was director of the Kim Dae-jung Peace Foundation-USA. By Carl Golden As the world watches, the United States effort to withdraw the military from Afghanistan and evacuate Americans has turned into a political, diplomatic, and public relations disaster. It threatens to define the Biden presidency, undermine its legislative agenda and become a dominant issue in the 2022 congressional midterm elections. In the run up to the withdrawal, the Biden strategy seemed to be: Order the military draw down by Aug. 31, fulfilling a campaign promise to leave the country after 20 years of warfare. If the effort collapses, blame former President Trump for negotiating a lousy deal with the Taliban in the first place. If the effort succeeds, take a victory lap, soak up the credit for ending a conflict and satisfying a war weary nation. When television screens filled with horrific images of desperate Afghanis storming the airport, climbing aboard airplanes and clinging to handholds only to fall to their deaths, the administration appeared befuddled and indecisive. The "blame Trump" narrative was quickly undercut when critics pointed out that in the early weeks of the administration, Biden had repealed dozens of his predecessors' executive orders and mandates and could easily have exercised the same authority to delay or negate the departure agreement. The Biden administration next turned to a "we always knew this would happen" rationale, a stunningly callous explanation that calls into question why they failed to anticipate, strategize and react decisively. No one, the administration argued, foresaw a collapse in little more than a week, despite evidence that the capability of the defense forces was highly suspect. Biden next chose to lay responsibility on the Afghani military forces, accusing it of throwing down their arms and fleeing in the face of Taliban forces, in effect blaming the victim. Spokespersons for both the Department of Defense and Department of State were embarrassingly inept as they bumbled their way through news conferences while attempting to convince millions of television-watching Americans the situation was under control. In one of the more bizarre performances, a Department of State spokesperson insisted the effort was not an evacuation, but a reduction of the U.S. footprint. While he doggedly forged ahead, he was flanked by the split screen coverage of the lowering of the American flag over the embassy in Kabul while diplomatic personnel scrambled for transportation to the airport and a flight to safety. The administration response to the rapidly changing events on the ground was a mishmash of conflicting reports, dubious explanations and confusing rationalizations which melted quickly upon harsh examination. Biden continued to insist the decision to withdraw the military from Afghanistan was his and his alone never has "the buck stops with me" been invoked by a chief executive more often than it has been in the past two weeks. The president was also struck with the out of touch brush when he claimed U. S. allies had not criticized his decision when, in fact, European leaders warned of disastrous consequences, including former Great Britain Prime Minister Tony Blair who publicly called the president's decision "imbecilic." Biden further claimed that American citizens' access to the airport was unhampered, only to be embarrassingly contradicted on the same day by the Secretary of Defense who related instances of Americans being harassed and beaten at Taliban-manned checkpoints. As the situation worsened, administration officials sought to distance themselves from any responsibility. Memos and cables were leaked to the media, an unmistakable first sign they'd begun to turn on one another to cover their actions and advice. Biden now faces extending a military presence in the country beyond the Aug. 31 deadline, a move the Taliban warned would result in deadly consequences, including, presumably, renewal of a shooting war. Afghanistan will cling to the Biden presidency, as Richard Nixon was defined by the Watergate scandal, Gerald Ford by his pardon of Nixon, Jimmy Carter by the Iran hostage stalemate, Ronald Reagan by the Iran-Contra affair, Bill Clinton by Monica Lewinsky, George W. Bush by the Iraq war, and Donald Trump by the siege of the U. S. Capitol. Coming so early in his administration, the breakdown in Afghanistan will haunt this president for at least the next three years. Carl Golden (cgolden1937@gmail) is a senior contributing analyst with the William J. Hughes Center for Public Policy at Stockton University in New Jersey. His commentary was distributed by Cagle Cartoons Inc. By Donald Kirk This nightmare scenario comes to mind: the Chinese have invaded South Korea in the name of the North Koreans, who are sort of an auxiliary force, and the wobbly, weak-kneed American president decides the South Koreans can fight on their own with no American troops, no U.S. air or naval power, just the arms the Americans have been selling them for billions.The Americans, those who are left in the South, have all fallen back to Camp Humphreys, the sprawling base south of Seoul, and nearby Osan Air Base. The South Koreans have fought valiantly, but the Chinese hordes have overwhelmed them and now are surrounding an enclave from Humphreys to Osan.The Americans have built up the walls surrounding Humphreys into what the U.S. commander assures journalists is an impenetrable fortress. Then the Chinese begin firing missiles into the base. The American president, having been elected on the populist slogan "War is Wrong," decides it's time to get out. His secretary of state negotiates a ceasefire with the Chinese for the 10 days he guesses it will take to airlift all U.S. troops and contractors and families and Korean staff out of Humphreys and Osan. The U.S. flag comes down, and the American era in South Korea, the Republic of Korea, is history.No, nothing like that is going to happen in the foreseeable future, but we have to consider beyond the horizon, an apparition that's vague, hazy, like a bad dream that's hardly remembered in the bright light of day. The American debacle in Afghanistan confronts us with a future that's uncharted and unknowable. Biden pulled out the cork arbitrarily, failing to consult with allies from Japan to Great Britain.The Brits in particular didn't think it was time to rush pell-mell out of Afghanistan. They had their own troops there. They knew the chaos that would ensue if the befuddled U.S. president, who talks from several sides of his mouth simultaneously, if not comprehendingly, had remembered to call his friend Prime Minister Boris Johnson and let him in on the plan.Now it's foolhardy to predict the future anything can happen. It's a little misleading to say North Korea is too weak to do anything while Kim Jong-un worries about his failing economy and the pandemic that he denies has sickened his people. Nor is it safe to assume the Chinese, luxuriating in their enormous trade surplus with the U.S., are smart enough not to kill the golden calf.Think how the Chinese will feel after the U.S challenges them in the South China Sea, the Indian Ocean and a dozen other pressure points. Some day they may decide it's time to recover Taiwan, the independent island state that Beijing claims as its own, and while they're at it reunite the Korean Peninsula in the name of their subservient vassal in Pyongyang.It's disingenuous to say, well, look, North Korea under Kim Jong-un's granddaddy Kim Il-sung didn't do a thing after the defeat in 1975 of the U.S.-backed government in Saigon. Would that not have been the perfect time to send the troops down again, just 25 years after they invaded the South at the outset of the Korean War? No, it obviously was not.China, immersed in inner turmoil, overrun by Red Guards during Mao Zedong's Great Cultural Revolution, was not about to go to war again for Korea. After Mao died in 1976, China slid under the rule of Deng Xiaoping, the reformer who opened up the country to modern capitalism while maintaining Communist rule not easy to do while fending off Mao's wife and the "gang of four."Times have changed remarkably since the Americans were living through the fall of Saigon, flying out Americans and Vietnamese who had worked for them, leaving hundreds of thousands to get out by sea on voyages in which many drowned. Since those terrible days, China has become a powerful nation and North Korea has gone nuclear. The North by now has fabricated a few dozen warheads and the missiles to send them to distant targets, not to mention mid- and short-range missiles within easy range of anywhere in South Korea and most of Japan.Neither China nor North Korea, which can't do a thing without China's say-so, has South Korea in its sights at the moment. The mess the Americans created in Afghanistan, however, exposes American weakness as harshly as did defeat in the Vietnam War. In Beijing and Pyongyang, leaders and strategists have to be plotting when might be the time to strike.They can afford to be patient while the nitwits in the White House and Pentagon scratch their heads and pray that they'll never have to fight for anyone, including their Korean ally.Donald Kirk ( www.donaldkirk.com ) writes from Seoul as well as Washington. President Moon Jae-in takes photos with startup business owners in Jung-gu, central Seoul, in this photo taken in 2019. Korea Times file Korea urged to capitalize better on 2nd startup boom By Yi Whan-woo Korea turns out to have only one new successful startup "unicorn" this year, raising the question of why the country has not done better to capitalize on the so-called "second startup boom" to help existing startup companies scale up their businesses. The term, "unicorn," refers to a private, tech startup with a valuation of over $1 billion, such as Market Kurly, an app-based overnight grocery delivery pioneer worth 2.5 trillion won ($2.14 billion). Market Kurly was the only Korean firm to join the list of 291 new unicorns worldwide in the January-July period, according to data from the U.S. private equity company, CB Insight, cited by the Federation of Korean Industries (FKI), Thursday. The total number of Korea's unicorns stood at 11, far behind top-ranked United States with 388, followed by China with 157, India with 36 and the United Kingdom with 31. The data also includes the newly-listed unicorns this year 169 for the U.S., 26 for China, 12 for India and seven for the U.K. This captured image shows a promotional campaign run by Market Kurly, the only Korean company to join the list of new unicorns this year, on its website. Korea Times file gettyimagesbank The United States has leapfrogged Australia as the leading exporter of frozen beef to China, with Chinese trade data further highlighting the fallout from ongoing tensions between Canberra and Beijing while helping further the progress of the phase-one trade deal. Australia has traditionally exported more frozen beef to China, but since April its exports have plunged, with the gap between the two widening quickly in favor of the US. In April, the US shipped $68 million worth of frozen beef to China compared to $80 million from Australia, according to Chinese customs. In May, trade patterns reversed and the US had shipped $90 million of frozen beef to China compared to Australia's $47 million. US exports kept rising and hit $107 million last month, with Australian shipments falling to $35 million, flipping the trade pattern seen a year ago. Australia still dominates exports of chilled beef another popular export to China but the gap is also closing, although experts have said chilled beef from the US remains more expensive than imports from Australia and New Zealand. US exports of goods to China that have traditionally been dominated by Australia, such as coal and now beef, have been growing over the past year since the political dispute between China and Australia and associated trade disruptions between the two countries has unfolded over the past 18 months. Since China informally banned a series of goods from Australia, including coal, log timber and wine last year, exports from the US have increased. In this May 13 file photo, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, right, and Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne hold a joint press conference at the State Department in Washington. Reuters-Yonhap U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris delivers remarks during the official launch of the CDC Southeast Asia Regional Office in Hanoi, Aug. 25. Reuters-Yonhap Vice President Kamala Harris said Wednesday the U.S. would find new ways to "raise the pressure on Beijing", accusing China of bullying in hotly disputed Asian waters for the second time in two days. Harris made the comments as she began a visit to Vietnam to stress U.S. commitment to Asia, a trip critics have slammed as tone-deaf given the parallels with the superpower's evacuations from Saigon and Kabul. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, left, talks with her Vietnamese counterpart Vo Thi Anh Xuan during a meeting at the Presidential Palace in Hanoi, Aug. 25. AP-Yonhap During a meeting with Vietnam President Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Harris said the U.S. would continue to challenge Beijing's "bullying and excessive maritime claims" in the South China Sea. "We need to find ways to pressure and raise the pressure, frankly, on Beijing to abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea," she added. During the Singapore leg of her regional trip Tuesday, Harris also accused China of intimidation in the resource-rich waterway. China hit back at the accusations through its state media on Wednesday, accusing the U.S. of hypocrisy in attempting to "coerce and intimidate" countries in the region in its "scheme to contain China." U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, right, attends the official launch of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Southeast Asia regional office in Hanoi, Aug. 25. AP-Yonhap Anomalous health incident Harris' arrival in Vietnam was delayed due to what U.S. officials called an "anomalous health incident" in Hanoi, an apparent reference to the so-called "Havana syndrome" which has afflicted U.S. diplomats in several countries including China and Russia. It is not clear what causes the syndrome, leading to unproven allegations that Russians or others used high-intensity electronic devices to physically harm U.S. diplomats. The Vietnam leg of the Asian tour has sparked criticism after the chaotic evacuation of Kabul prompted comparisons with the trauma of 1975 Saigon, when U.S. helicopters ferried final evacuees from the embassy roof in the last days of the Vietnam War. Harris is steering clear of both Saigon now Ho Chi Minh City and the historical parallels, instead emphasizing Washington's commitment to the region as she opened a branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Hanoi. The launch was a symbol of the U.S.'s "enduring relationship with Vietnam and Southeast Asia", she told President Phuc. On Wednesday, Harris said a donation of one million Pfizer vaccines would begin arriving in Vietnam in the next 24 hours from the U.S. which has already sent five million doses to the country. She later visited late U.S. senator John McCain's memorial during a downpour in the capital, laying flowers at the site where his plane was shot down by the North Vietnamese on the third anniversary of his death. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris speaks to troops as she visits the USS Tulsa in Singapore, Aug. 23. AP-Yonhap Description: The Attorney Generals Office, recently recognized by the Star Tribune as a 2021 Top Workplace, seeks an experienced trial attorney to join its Education Division which is housed in the Solicitor Generals Section of the Office. The lawyers primary caseload will involve representing the Minnesota Department of Education and Minnesota State Colleges and Universities in lawsuits and administrative proceedings. The lawyer will also advise and represent one or more of the three public pension funds in litigation. This work may include opportunities to defend claims that Minnesota statutes are unconstitutional or to work on cases of state-wide impact. Responsibilities: The successful applicant will litigate cases in state and federal district courts, at the Office of Administrative Hearings, and will advise agency clients during administrative appeals. In this position, the lawyer will act as lead counsel in all phases of assigned cases, including pleading, discovery, and trial with minimal oversight. In addition, the successful applicant will assist and support other attorneys in the division on cases requiring more than one attorney. Qualifications: Graduation from a law school accredited by the ABA and licensed to practice in the State of Minnesota; Three years of complex civil litigation experience; An interest in handling cases involving complex statutory schemes; Proven ability to litigate autonomously and make strategic legal decisions as lead counsel on a diverse caseload; Proven ability to counsel and advise clients throughout all stages of a case; Ability to travel to counties throughout the state; Experience using electronic files, case management tools, and e-discovery platforms; Proven ability to contribute positively to a team and interact successfully with clients and members of the public; Excellent research and writing skills; Proven ability to multitask by managing an active caseload and meeting tight deadlines; and Proven ability to work in an inclusive, creative and collaborative work environment. Preferred Qualifications: Five or more years of complex litigation experience, including the use of experts at trial; Knowledge of state and federal education laws, knowledge of state and federal laws governing public pensions, or a proven track record of handling cases that implicate complex statutory schemes; Knowledge of administrative law Appellate experience, including drafting briefs and arguing before appellate courts; and Current admission to the United States District Court for the District of Minnesota and the Eighth Circuit. Why Work For Us: The Office of Attorney General Keith Ellison one of Minnesotas largest public law offices and recently recognized as a Star Tribune 2021 Top Workplace has a clear mission: we help Minnesotans afford their lives and live with dignity, safety, and respect. Were a dynamic group of dedicated people who could all work elsewhere but choose public service as a calling, and were actively building an internal culture that supports that calling. We invite you to apply to be part of the team that helps recruit, support and train dedicated attorneys, legal assistants, investigators, and other staff, all focused on helping Minnesotans. We offer a great benefits package! The State of Minnesota offers a comprehensive benefits package including low cost medical and dental insurance, employer paid life insurance, short and long term disability, pre-tax flexible spending accounts, retirement plan, tax-deferred compensation, generous vacation and sick leave, and 11 paid holidays each year. Public service with this office may qualify applicants to have part of their student loans forgiven under a federal student loan forgiveness program for state government employees. (Visit www.studentaid.ed.gov/sa/repay-loans/forgiveness-cancellation/public-service for more information.) Application Information: Interested applicants must apply by sending a resume, cover letter and writing sample to ag.jobs@ag.state.mn.us. Applications preferred by September 7, 2021. Note: The Attorney Generals Office greatly encourages, celebrates and values diversity. It is an equal opportunity employer which does not discriminate on the basis of race, creed, color, national origin, religion, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, disability, or military status. If you need reasonable accommodation for a disability, please call June Walsh at (651) 757-1199 or (800) 627-3529 (Minnesota Relay). recblid 2p5j49vvpcmtubkzs9h8i6aq85wp81 Location: East Setauket - New York Job Description Who is Rockwell Do you want to make a difference in the world? At Rockwell Automation you can do just that and more. Rockwell is a global leader in industrial automation and digital transformation. We connect the imaginations of people with the potential technology to expand what is humanly possible, making the world more productive and sustainable. Rockwell is recognized as one of the World's Most Ethical Companies in 2020. We place a high value on integrity which fosters an environment where all employees can and want to do their best work. To learn more about how we are bringing The Connected Enterprise to life across industrial enterprises, please visit www.rockwellautomation.com. What Rockwell Brings to You Rockwell cares about our employees and our benefits package is just one way we support you. Outside the industry expected benefits, Rockwell provides paid parental leave, flexible work schedules, summer hours depending on business needs and eligibility for an annual bonus. To learn more about our Benefits Package, please visit https://raquickfind.com/. What Rockwell Needs from You We need a diverse workforce to do our best work. We need the makers, the forward thinkers, the problem solvers, and everything in between. That is where you come in. We are looking for an Assembler Level 3 to join our diverse production team and be responsible for the assembly of various independent cart servo motion control products, including motors, encoders, etc. This position starts at an hourly rate of $19.89 and is paid on a weekly basis. Experience will be the determining factor. Extra Incentives of joining our Organization: 3 weeks' vacation to start; prorated based on date of hire. Medical, Dental, and Vision Insurance: effective first day of employment if you choose to enroll. 14 Paid Holidays Paid Parental Leave policy Employer Paid Short Term Disability Employer Paid Life Insurance Flexible overtime options 401K: Rockwell matches 50% of the first 7% you contribute. Schedule: This is a 1st Shift Position, Monday-Friday 7:00 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Job Description Rockwell Automation is looking for a talented Electrical/Mechanical Assembler to join our production team. You will join a diverse production team and be responsible for the assembly of various independent cart servo motion control products, including motors, encoders, etc. Essential Functions and Responsibilities Desired employee will be performing a wide variety of electronic or electro-mechanical assembly operations on assemblies or sub-assemblies. Determines and/or follows methods and sequence of operations in performing wiring, component installation, hand soldering and cable harnessing on assembly units. Makes setups and adjustments holding tolerances to blueprint specifications. Works on assignments that are semi routine in nature but recognizes the need for occasional deviation from accepted practice. Normally follows established procedures on routine work, requires instructions only on new assignments. Applies acquired job skills and company policies and procedures to complete assigned tasks. Basic Qualifications: A minimum of High School Diploma/GED OR 2 years of verified related experience Legal authorization to work in the US is required. We will not sponsor individuals for employment visas, now or in the future, for this job opening Overtime is an essential function of this position which typically requires 5 to 10% of standard hours of overtime/week. Actual overtime hours may vary. Preferred Qualifications Mechanical Assembly Experience Ability to read and interpret schematics/blueprints Ability to work under pressure What Integrated Supply Chain Organization Does We are focused on the end-to-end supply chain for Rockwell. We are governed by our enterprise quality function and we plan, source, make and deliver Rockwell products and services to customers. We offer servo drives, servo motors and actuators to provide simplified machine design to provide more system flexibility and improve overall performance. We also provide a new approach to linear motors by using magnets instead of gear/chains and belts to allow for precise motion control with frictionless propulsion. The use of magnets results in reduced downtime and maintenance, decreased energy consumption and improved the ability to change machine profiles. We are an Equal Opportunity Employer including disability and veterans. If you are an individual with a disability and you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation during the application process, please contact our services team at +1 (see application details). Title: Energy Modeling Instructor - MiTEC $60,000- $65,000 Employee Name: TBD Supervisor: Tom Andrews, MiTEC Deputy Director Purpose: The Michigan Training and Education Center (MiTEC) is the Weatherization Training Center for Michigan. MiTEC is a dynamic technical instructional team that provides superior learning opportunities to professionals in the Department of Energy (DOE)s Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP), the home performance industry, residential energy efficiency industry, and construction industries. MiTECs instruction fosters engagement, innovation, quality work practices, enhances performance, teaches energy efficiency conservation measures, enhances energy savings, addresses health and safety techniques, and ensures student success through hands-on training opportunities by high quality certified instructors and classroom innovations. MiTEC provides students with in-person classroom training, field training, and online training opportunities. Duties and Responsibilities: Provide classroom and field training at partner facilities, meeting the requirements of the training contract outlined in the DOE State Plan and IREC certification requirements. Train others to perform energy audits, inspections, energy efficient measure installations and quality assurance assessments using diagnostic equipment, including, but not limited to, a blower door, pressure pan, CO analyzer, infrared camera, and the National Energy Audit Tool (NEAT) and Mobile Home Energy Audit (MHEA) energy modeling software. Become and maintain status as a Building Performance Institute (BPI) Exam Proctor for both written and field certification testing. Develop curriculum for assigned courses and areas of study. Maintain established curriculum according the IREC and DOE directives. Coordinate and manage logistics for delivery of on-site training courses. Create technical documents to support various weatherization and energy efficiency programs. Provide technical support to staff, students, the public, and industry stakeholders on topics including energy efficiency, home performance upgrades, and proper selection and installation of products. Perform Energy Auditor training, electronic energy modeling software training, and assist Weatherization providers guidance on proper usage of the NEAT/MHEA energy auditing software. Work with clients in the field during on-site training events and Training & Technical Assistance activity. Must be familiar with the Weatherization Assistance Program rules and regulations, the Standard Work Specifications (SWS), and the Michigan Weatherization Field Guide for training technical weatherization professionals. Represent the training center at national, state and local events, conferences, meetings, and committees as requested/required. Take on roles within MiTEC such as Safety Officer, Inventory Control Officer, Maintenance Officer, etc. as needed. Represent the best interests of MPHI and MDHHS at all times. Other duties as assigned. Qualifications/Requirements: Education: Possession of a bachelors degree or equivalent experience in building science, building construction, structural engineering, DOEs Weatherization Assistance Program, or a related field. Experience: A minimum of two years of related and progressively more responsible work experience in the Weatherization Assistance Program or related field. Important Skills and Characteristics: Strong knowledge, understanding, and application of NEAT/MHEA or other electronic energy modeling software desired. Familiarity with TREAT or other multifamily electronic energy modeling software helpful. Proven experience as a Technical Instructor and/or IREC Master Trainer is helpful. Industry certifications such as BPI Energy Auditor and QCI, Lead Renovator, Lead Risk Assessor/Inspector and OSHA is helpful. Strong written and verbal communication skills. Demonstrated customer service skills in a high pace, service-orientated environment. Collaborative, positive, team-oriented attitude coupled with ability to work independently and solve problems. Must be proficient with the Microsoft Office Suite, smartphones, tablets and web-based technology. The successful candidate for this position will be able to demonstrate hands-on knowledge and experience in the following Weatherization and building science skill set: Dense pack wall insulation Attic preparation, air sealing and insulation Foundation air sealing, moisture source control and insulation strategies Health & Safety issues related to performance of the Weatherization Assistance Program Mobile home weatherization including air-sealing, and insulation of the roof/attic, belly, or walls Understanding of application and proper installation of the ASHREA 62.2 ventilation standard Use of equipment essential to performance of weatherization measures including but not limited to blower doors, manometers, insulation equipment and infrared cameras The Technical Instructor will have significant work experience in residential single-family and low- and mid-rise multifamily construction with specific knowledge related to training, curriculum development, project management, and building science principles. The Technical Instructor will rely on strong interpersonal and leadership skills to maintain the trust of the MiTECs students. In addition, the Technical Instructor must be innovative to implement new ways to teach new skills to students. Building Shell Work Environment, Mobility, and Physical Requirements: Job may require moderate physical effort including lifting materials and equipment. This position involves performance of various diagnostic tests, including but not limited to, inspections and demonstrations requiring the ability to carry equipment weighing at least 35 pounds. Performance of training in the field may involve the use of ladders and extensive navigation in and around worksites including attics, crawlspaces, basements, knee walls, etc. Therefore, Technical Instructors must possess physical dexterity, endurance, and balance to accomplish this work safely and effectively. This position will involve viewing a CRT or VDT screen 25% to 75% of the time and the use of other standard office equipment. This position will require a Technical Instructor to use a mobile work environment, including the use of a home office, satellite locations, and other spaces as needed, to increase responsiveness and decision-making speed, resolve internal issues, and increase productivity. Travel: Travel throughout the state to MiTEC satellite locations and partner facilities will be required. In addition, travel to conferences and other state and out-of-state events may be required. Ongoing Work Performance: Training Plans: A Technical Instructor must implement the approved training curriculum and coursework to provide high quality instruction to ensure MiTEC is competitive and efficient. This includes staying within the approved operational budgets, maintaining training schedules and offerings, tracking student progress, and conducting innovative field trainings, conferences, and webinars. Training: A Technical Instructor must ensure each course they develop and/or teach meets the needs of the students and that the desired principles, techniques, and skills, based on the Job Task Analyses (JTA), where required, are being taught in the most effective way possible. This includes fostering a culture of learning within MiTEC. Evaluate Results of Training: After the students have taken the desired course, a Technical Instructor must identify areas for course improvement to ensure the students adequately learned the desired skills. This includes making sure the curriculum and coursework incorporates how to apply current regulations, standards, and field guide/SWS guidance. In addition, a Technical Instructor will evaluate the course materials to find better or less expensive ways to teach students in the future. Research Training Methods: A Technical Instructor will constantly be on the lookout for new training opportunities and innovative labs and training props to provide more effective ways to teach technical skills. This includes maintaining communication with the BCAEO staff to recognize new issues and plan for additional training. Impact on Projects, Services and Operations: A Technical Instructor has a direct impact on the success of MiTEC by ensuring high quality work standards are performed by certified Weatherization Professionals. RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE WORK OF OTHERS: Will lead projects and classes. Click "apply" above to submit resume electronically recblid cqz3pyan3o7xsrlctyjw0ahk68oox5 Job Description Under the supervision of the Fixed Site Coordinator/ Mobile Coordinator, performs donor suitability, histories and blood collection procedures. Ensures the safety of the donor and safety, purity, and potency of the blood collected. Assists in the set-up and break down of the mobile site equipment before and after the blood drive (if applicable). Performs various regulated functions related to the care of the blood after collections, including storage and transportation. Duties and Responsibilities The list of essential functions, as outlined herein, is intended to be representative of the duties and responsibilities performed within this classification. It is not necessarily descriptive of any one position in the class. The omission of an essential function does not preclude management from assigning duties not listed herein if such functions are a logical assignment to the position. All employees are required to perform all assigned duties in compliance with internal SOPs, external regulations, and internal policies, bring compliance issues to the attention of management and assure quality customer service to all customers. Performs donor registration process Performs mini-physical Performs medical questionnaire Performs blood collection procedures according to SOPs, including Quality Control. Attends to donors comfort and safety during and post donation, including those having reactions or complications to the procedure and notifying the Coordinator. Maintains confidentiality of all information regarding donors. Labels all blood collection materials according to SOP. Cares for blood after collection, providing temporary storage, and transportation to the center when necessary. Assists in unloading, assembling, maintain, dismantling and reloading of equipment and supplies (if applicable). Completes all required documentation Complies with LIFELINE safety policies and procedures. Demonstrates excellent customer service when dealing with donors, members of the community and co-workers. Qualifications EDUCATION: High School diploma. Phlebotomy certification preferred. Current CPR Certification EXPERIENCE: On the job training. SKILLS: Language skills must include the ability to read, write, speak English effectively and follow oral and written instructions consistent with policies and procedure, SOPs or other requirements. Documentation accuracy required. Effective planning and organizational skills Demonstrate the ability to multi-task. Ability to function as a key team member in a high-level production environment coupled with strong organization skills Ability to work independently and to meet deadlines. Demonstrated ability to work without direct supervision. Must be able to make simple decisions based on well-defined choices. Ability to communicate effectively with the staff and the public to enhance LIFELINEs relationship with the community. Basic computer skills Working Conditions Functions are regularly performed inside and/or outside with potential for exposure to adverse conditions, such as inclement weather, atmospheric elements and pathogenic substances. Performance of this job could expose the employee to blood-borne pathogens. The noise level in the work environment is usually low to moderate. Physical Requirements Employee is required to stand, walk, sit, and have the ability to lift a minimum of 50 pounds. recblid 40c8ookqgbzu1cp51eg85k7259e7gv United States District Court District of Delaware Vacancy Announcement 21-07 Position Title: Generalist Duty Station: Wilmington, Delaware Salary: CL 23 $37,986- $61,732 CL 24 $42,061- $68,378 Opening Date: August 26, 2021 Closing Date: September 9, 2021 Position Overview The duties of the Generalist include customer service, maintenance of automated and paper records, mail processing, inmate correspondence, case opening, general intake duties, support to the electronic filing help desk and other duties as assigned. Qualifications Applicants for this position must be able to deal effectively with the Judges of the District Court, co-workers, the public, and the Bar. The individual selected must also be able to understand the rules and regulations of the Court. General computer and word processing skills are required. A team attitude and a willingness to adapt to a changing work environment are essential to maintain the Courts quality standards. Professional or businesslike approach and attire are required. Education and Experience The completion of a degree in a field related to Criminal Justice or Legal Studies is preferred, along with experience in a related field. The minimum requirement is the possession of a High School degree or GED and two years of clerical experience. Education above the high school level may be substituted for general experience. CL-23 High School graduate or equivalent and possess two years of clerical experience or have a college degree CL-24 One year of specialized experience Benefits The United States District Court for the District of Delaware offers a generous benefits package which includes the following: Paid annual and sick leave Eleven paid federal holidays Participation in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHB) Federal Employees Dental and Vision Insurance Program (FEDVIP) Federal Employees Group Life Insurance (FEGLI) Flexible Benefits Program Employee Assistance Programs Long Term Care Insurance through the Federal Judiciary or OPM Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) Thrift Savings Plan (TSP)- up to 5% match Student Loan Forgiveness Program for Public Service Employees On-site fitness facility Transit Subsidy Program (contingent upon availability of funds) NOTE: Some benefits require a waiting period. Information for Applicants Consideration will only be given to those who apply online no later than September 9, 2021 and provide the required application documents in PDF format. The required application documents include the following: resume, cover letter, references and an AO-78 Federal Judicial Branch Application for Employment. To apply for the position, please visit the Courts website at: https://opportunities.ilnb.uscourts.gov/Employment/appform.cfm?ref=daye8adr&pos=21-07. Applicants will receive an email confirmation upon receipt. Incomplete applications, paper applications or faxed applications will not be considered. The U.S. District Court reserves the right to modify the conditions of this job announcement, to withdraw the job announcement, or to fill the position(s) sooner than the closing date, if a closing date is shown, any of which action may occur without prior written notice. This job announcement may involve filing more than one position described therein. This position is a mandatory EFT (Electronic Funds Transfer) participation for payment of net pay. The U.S. District Court requires employees to adhere to the Judicial Code of Conduct for Judicial Employees which is available on www.uscourts.gov. The U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Verification of employment eligibility according to the Immigration Control and Reform Act of 1986 will be required of all new employees of the U.S. District Court. The Generalist is a sensitive position. The selected candidate will be subject to an FBI fingerprint check as a condition of employment, and may be subject to periodic updates. If you have questions regarding this announcement, please contact Beth Mason at (302)573-6170. recblid ahqwocxamsybtb51lyu8dwux8u4em8 Duties Summary The United States Agency for International Development Office of Inspector General (USAID OIG) is seeking a highly qualified applicant to fill a Information Technology Specialist (Network) position located in the Office of Management (M), Information Management Division (IM), Washington, D.C. Learn more about this agency Responsibilities As an Information Technology Specialist (NETWORK), you will: Serve as an expert and technical authority on complex hybrid Microsoft Azure cloud and virtualized network environment with oversight responsibility to provide guidance for advanced system design, evaluation, implementation, and sustaining all network operations and systems. Provide expert guidance in the architecture of Local and Wide Area networks (LAN and WAN) and command datacenters across various locations, as well as network telecommunications to include IP subnetting and DMZ design, Cisco Router and Switches. Utilize a comprehensive knowledge of Microsoft Azure and )365 cloud technologies, VMware virtualization systems, ESX server provisioning, EMC storage Area Network (SAN), Exchange Online administration, Active Directory and network security services in order to provide expert guidance and advice to Director in the day-to-day management of network management and operations. Apply Azure cloud-based and on-premise network monitoring tools to control the performance, utilizations and status of network critical resources. Utilize Azure DevOps to support the progression of Information Technology projects and implementation efforts. Administer and Monitor OIG's network for unclassified information for optimum security. Oversee the activities involved in quality resolution of complex technical issues. Provide technical guidance for both government and contractor personnel providing analysis on existing, new and emerging automation technologies for both short and long term impact upon OIG customers and connecting automated systems. Provide annual network design changes for budgetary and staff hour requirements to senior IT management for planning purposes. Travel Required Occasional travel - International and overnight travel will be required. Supervisory status No Promotion Potential 14 Job family (Series) 2210 Information Technology Management Similar jobs Directors, Information Technology Systems Directors, Management Information Systems Information Technology Specialist (It Specialist) Information Technology Systems Directors Management Information Systems Directors Requirements Conditions of Employment U.S. Citizenship is required. Must be able to obtain and maintain a Secret security clearance. Relocation expenses WILL NOT be paid. Designated and/or random drug test required. Males born after 12/31/1959, must be registered with the Selective Service. Must be willing and able to travel domestically and internationally. Qualifications To qualify for the GS-14: Applicants must possess one year of specialized experience equivalent to the GS-13 or higher in the Federal service or equivalent. Specialized experience is defined as: (1) Expert skill in utilizing Microsoft Azure Cloud Technologies, specifically within a Hybrid Network Environment (2) Expert knowledge of the architecture of Local and Wide Area networks (LAN and WAN) and command datacenters across various locations, (3) and, experience administering and monitoring agency network for unclassified information for optimum security. There is no substitute of education for specialized experience for the GS-14 position. Time in Grade Requirement: Applicants who have held a General Schedule (GS) position within the last 52 weeks must have 52 weeks of Federal service at the next lower grade or equivalent. Applicants must meet basic eligibility requirements such as minimum qualifications, and other regulatory requirements by the closing date of the announcement. Education There is no substitution of education for specialized experience for this position. Additional information IMPORTANT : If you are found to have rated your self-assessment higher than the information in your on-line application, supporting documentation narratives, and/or other relevant part of your application package; including attachments, a score will be manually determined that reflects your documented experience. This may result in a lowered score and may also eliminate you from the best qualified list. The U.S. Agency for International Development is a participant of E-Verify. E-Verify provides an automated link to Federal databases to help employers determine employment eligibility of new hires and the validity of the social security numbers. Please note that travel and relocation expenses will not be paid. DIRECT DEPOSIT: All Federal employees are required to have Federal salary payments made by direct deposit to a financial institution of their choosing. TESTING DESIGNATED POSITIONS: These are Testing Designated Positions (TDPs) under the Agency's approved Drug-Free Work Place Program. All applicants selected for this position will be subject to random drug testing once they begin working for the Agency. SELECTIVE SERVICE: The Defense Authorization Act of 1986 requires that all male applicants born after 12/31/59 who are required to register under the Military Selective Service Act, be registered or they are not eligible for appointment to this position. For further information concerning Selective Service requirements, please visit (see application details) . Interagency Career Transition Program/Career Transition Program (ICTAP/CTAP) : This program applies to Federal workers whose positions have been deemed 'surplus' or no longer needed, or an employee has been involuntarily separated from a Federal service position within the competitive service. For information on how to apply and what documents to submit as an ICTAP or CTAP eligible, go to: http://(see application details) . ICTAP/CTAP candidates must be rated well-qualified for the position to receive consideration for special priority. Interchange Agreement with Other Merit Systems: An agency may noncompetitively appoint an employee covered by an interchange agreement to a career or career-conditional appointment subject to the conditions listed below. For more information to determine if you meet this criteria, please go to: (see application details) To be eligible for a VEOA appointment, your latest discharge must be issued under honorable conditions (this means an honorable or general discharge), AND you must be either: (1) a preference eligible (defined in title 5 U.S.C. 2108(3)), OR (2) a veteran who substantially completed 3 or more years of active service. Points are not adjudicated and preference is not applied under this type of appointment. EEO Policy Statement Reasonable Accommodation Telework People with Disabilities OIG prohibits discrimination in the workplace on the basis of race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy and gender identity), national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, genetic information, or any other non-merit-based factor. Read more How You Will Be Evaluated You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above. We use a multi-step process to evaluate and refer applicants: Qualified applicants receive a score of 70 to 100. You will be rated on your qualifications for this position as evidenced by the education, experience, and training you report on relative to this positions that show the degree to which you possess the competencies listed on this vacancy announcement. Paid or unpaid experience will be considered. USAID must be able to conduct reference checks as part of its assessment process. Applicants who do not permit reference checks from previous employers may be disqualified. Note: Your answers to the assessment questions, that attest to your work experience, must be supported in your resume. Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religious; spiritual; community, student, social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. For Competitive Merit Promotion and Veterans Employment Opportunities Act (VEOA) Applicants: The highest rated candidates will be referred to the hiring agency. For Noncompetitive Applicants: All qualified candidates will be referred to the hiring agency. The assessment questionnaire is designed to measure the following competencies that are required for the position: Attention to Detail Customer Service Oral Communication Network Management Technical Competence Problem Solving To preview questions please click here . Read more Background checks and security clearance Security clearance Secret Drug test required Yes Required Documents Resume showing relevant experience. Most recent copy of your SF-50 (Notification of Personnel Action); your document must reflect grade, step, tenure code "1", and type of position occupied. You can find this information in blocks 24 and 34 of your SF-50. Veterans' documentation, if requesting consideration under any veterans' hiring eligibilities such as VRA, preference point entitlement (e,g, DD214, SF-15, and Veteran's Administration Letter). For a detailed list of documents, click here . Supporting documentation if seeking eligibility based any other special hiring authority (e.g., disabled veteran, Schedule A) For a detailed list of documents, click here . Proof of government service documenting that you have met the time-in-grade requirements (SF-50) A copy of your most recent performance appraisal (if a current or recently separated Federal employee) Career Transition Assistance Plan (CTAP) and Interagency Career Transition Assistance Plan (ICTAP) documentation If you are relying on your education to meet qualification requirements: Education must be accredited by an accrediting institution recognized by the U.S. Department of Education in order for it to be credited towards qualifications. Therefore, provide only the attendance and/or degrees from schools accredited by accrediting institutions recognized by the U.S. Department of Education . Failure to provide all of the required information as stated in this vacancy announcement may result in an ineligible rating or may affect the overall rating. Benefits A career with the U.S. Government provides employees with a comprehensive benefits package. As a federal employee, you and your family will have access to a range of benefits that are designed to make your federal career very rewarding. Opens in a new window Learn more about federal benefits . Eligibility for benefits depends on the type of position you hold and whether your position is full-time, part-time, or intermittent. Contact the hiring agency for more information on the specific benefits offered. Fair & Transparent The Federal hiring process is setup to be fair and transparent. Please read the following guidance. Equal Employment Opportunity Policy The United States Government does not discriminate in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy and gender identity), national origin, political affiliation, sexual orientation, marital status, disability, genetic information, age, membership in an employee organization, retaliation, parental status, military service, or other non-merit factor. Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) for federal employees & job applicants Read more Reasonable Accommodation Policy Federal agencies must provide reasonable accommodation to applicants with disabilities where appropriate. Applicants requiring reasonable accommodation for any part of the application process should follow the instructions in the job opportunity announcement. For any part of the remaining hiring process, applicants should contact the hiring agency directly. Determinations on requests for reasonable accommodation will be made on a case-by-case basis. A reasonable accommodation is any change to a job, the work environment, or the way things are usually done that enables an individual with a disability to apply for a job, perform job duties or receive equal access to job benefits. Under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, federal agencies must provide reasonable accommodations when: An applicant with a disability needs an accommodation to have an equal opportunity to apply for a job. An employee with a disability needs an accommodation to perform the essential job duties or to gain access to the workplace. An employee with a disability needs an accommodation to receive equal access to benefits, such as details, training, and office-sponsored events. You can request a reasonable accommodation at any time during the application or hiring process or while on the job. Requests are considered on a case-by-case basis. Learn more about disability employment and reasonable accommodations or how to contact an agency. Read more Legal and regulatory guidance Financial suitability Social security number request Privacy Act Signature and false statements Selective Service New employee probationary period NEWARK CENTRAL SCHOOLS - COME JOIN US!..... Newark, a village in Western New York State, located on the beautiful Erie Canal, and home to approximately 9,000 residents. Its convenient location, only 15 minutes from the New York State Thruway, making it easy to offer a full complement of services more typically found in larger communities. Among its many amenities, Newark offers shopping, a state-of-the art hospital, businesses and excellent schools, contributing to a high quality of life and economic opportunity. Position Title Building Substitutes Required Application Type Teacher / Admin Salary/Pay Scale $42,546 Job Description 3.0 FTE Elementary 2.0 FTE Secondary Job Qualifications NYS Childhood Education for Elementary level Any content 7-12 for secondary level Application Procedure Please provide cover letter, resume, application, certification, transcripts, 3 written references, and 2 other references Job Category Teaching Job Location District Wide The Newark Central School District is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment in its programs and activities on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, disability, or age. Further, Newark Central School District does not discriminate on the basis of religion or creed, sexual orientation, military status, genetic status, marital status, domestic violence victim status, criminal arrest or conviction record, or any other bias prohibited by state or federal non-discrimination laws. recblid fdsw0bul9zdi3j6moh30l2t67hog2s Magnolia, AR (71754) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 73F. Winds light and variable.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 73F. Winds light and variable. Magnolia, AR (71754) Today A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Partly cloudy skies. Low 73F. Winds light and variable.. Tonight A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Partly cloudy skies. Low 73F. Winds light and variable. Left-winger Sharon Graham has won the race to become general secretary of one of Britains biggest unions, Unite, which has almost 1.3 million members. She did so by appealing to rank-and-file members with a promise to defend jobs and conditions. This early tremor is a sign of the earthquakes that will shake the trade unions from top to bottom. Sharon Graham, the left-wing underdog in the Unite general secretary contest, has secured a welcome victory, defeating the right-wing candidate, Gerard Coyne, to become the leader of Britains second-largest union. This win is a major blow to the establishment and the so-called moderates in the labour movement, who were hoping that their candidate right-winger Coyne could squeeze through the middle in this three-horse race. Grahams success was possible thanks to her campaigns strong support amongst grassroots Unite members particularly those in rank-and-file groups in sectors such as construction. Her victory will give confidence to workers moving into struggle, with her pledge to use Unites muscle to fight all the way to defend jobs, pay, and conditions. With Unison, the countrys biggest union, also moving to the left recently, it is clear that an upheaval is beginning to take place inside the trade unions. Along with other left-led trade unions such as PCS, CWU, FBU, and BFAWU the new left leaderships in Unite and Unison must prepare for the big battles ahead, on the basis of a united approach and a fighting programme. Left success Following early indicators of a Graham win, the final results were announced today, confirming her victory. Graham received 37.7% of the vote, with second place going to Steve Turner, who had been the bookies favourite until yesterday. Turner and Coyne gained 33.8% and 28.5% respectively, on a turnout of approximately 12%. These results must be seen, above all, as a huge victory for the left, with Graham and Turner gaining over two-thirds of the vote, and with Coyne trailing in third place. This reveals the radical mood amongst union activists, who are facing attacks across the board. UNITE GENERAL SECRETARY RESULT Sharon Graham: 46,696 (37.7%) Steve Turner: 41,833 (33.8%) Gerard Coyne: 35,334 (28.5%) Turnout: 123,863 (12%) Sharon Graham ELECTED. Stats for Lefties (@LeftieStats) August 25, 2021 Graham positioned herself as the grassroots choice. She previously headed up the unions organisation department, where she proved her credentials in supporting workers struggles, playing a key role in victories such as the Bromley library strike and the recent Manchester bus drivers fight against fire and rehire. It was this proven track record along with her support for rank-and-file union activists in battles such as the BESNA dispute, the sparks struggle against deskilling, and the anti-blacklist campaign that helped to differentiate her from the other candidates in the eyes of ordinary members. Striking a chord Grahams more radical campaign pushed Steve Turner into second place. Although on the left, Turner positioned himself as the pragmatist; someone who could negotiate with the bosses, the Tories, and the Labour right wing in order to secure a better deal for workers. He was very much seen as the continuity candidate, with the explicit backing of outgoing general secretary Len McCluskey. Turners compromising attitude did not fundamentally change throughout his campaign, even after Beckett who had run on a promise to fight militantly on both the industrial and political fronts stepped aside and encouraged members to vote for Turner. Grahams workplace not Westminster campaign, by contrast, clearly struck a chord with ordinary Unite members: firstly, with promises to fight over immediate issues such as jobs and wages; and secondly, by tapping into the disgust towards Keir Starmer and the Labour right wing, who have spent more time attacking the left than attacking the Tories. While we welcome Sharons victory, we should nevertheless avoid complacency in future elections. There was a real danger in this election that the left vote could have been split, allowing the right wing candidate to win. That was the case with the recent Unison general secretary election, which robbed the left of victory. In future, the left must ensure a single left candidate, committed to a fighting programme in defence of the working class. Political struggle Having secured the Unite general secretary position, Graham will be thrown in at the deep end when it comes to defending workers, given the sharp crisis of capitalism. Union members are already engaged in battles across industry, and in the public sector: from bus drivers to bin workers to British Airways; from the NHS to local government. And this is before the deluge of austerity and attacks hits. In the face of this coming tsunami, the union leaders will face a stark choice: fight or capitulate. Having run on a commitment to protect jobs, pay, and conditions, expectations will be raised amongst members, who will demand that Graham delivers on her promises. Workers are bracing for a new wave of austerity. Already, the bosses are attacking workers, who are being forced to defend themselves against 'fire and rehire' and other methods to undermine pay and conditions / Image: Socialist Appeal, Flickr The only way to fight back against the bosses is on the basis of mobilisation, organisation, and action around a bold militant programme. It is not enough, however, for the unions to limit themselves to the industrial struggle, as Graham suggests. The working class also needs a clear political alternative to the Tories and this means fighting to remove the rotten Labour right wing There is no Chinese wall separating the industrial and political struggles. We want a fighting trade union movement, but we also want a real socialist Labour Party. Both go hand in hand. The task still remains to clear out the Blairites from the Labour Party. And the affiliated trade unions should not forsake their responsibility in this regard. You can try to avoid engaging in political struggle, but politics will eventually come knocking at the door. Unite, for example, represents workers in the public sector, including various outsourced workers delivering services such as refuse collection for local councils. In many instances, it is right-wing Labour councillors who are engaging in fire-and-rehire practices; or who are handing out contracts to bullies such as Serco. In these cases, workers and the Unite officials who represent them will find themselves coming into conflict with Tories and Labour right-wingers, who must be actively replaced with class fighters. Similarly, Unite is the main union in most industrial sectors. And many workplaces in these industries from steel, to shipbuilding, to car manufacturing are under threat of closure, as British capitalism reels in the face of Brexit, economic slump, and long-term decline. The only solution for defending workers and their jobs in these industries is nationalisation and workers control, as part of a socialised economic plan. But clearly, neither a Tory government nor a Blairite Labour one will call for such a demand. The political struggle is therefore not a secondary issue, as Graham suggests, but an essential question for workers looking to fight back against the bosses and the Tories. And Unite, with its significant weight inside the labour movement, has an important role to play in this process. Earthquakes ahead Capitalism is plunging deeper into crisis. The class struggle is sharpening. The battle lines are being drawn. Faced with the bosses offensive, workers are beginning to move into action. And they are looking for a fighting leadership that can point the way forward. The victories for Sharon Graham in Unite and for left-wing NEC members in Unison are an indication of the real mood amongst the working class; a reflection of the volatility within society, and its impact on consciousness. The challenges are massive. Unite and Unison must therefore link up with the other left unions to forge a genuine united front to defend the working class. There has never been a more vital task. The crisis of capitalism is sharpening the class struggle, and workers are drawing radical conclusions. The victory of Graham, coupled with the left victory in Unison, are the tremors preceding an earthquake that will shake the unions from top to bottom / Image: Steve Eason, Flickr These recent changes at the top of Britains two largest unions are also only the beginning; a harbinger of far greater transformations to come; early tremors, signalling the earthquakes that will shake the trade unions and the labour movement from top to bottom. In the process, they will become key weapons in the struggle to change society. The urgent task at hand is to build the forces of Marxism inside the unions, on the streets, and amongst workers and youth to prepare for these titanic events that lie ahead. Otelo Nuno Romao Saraiva de Carvalho died last month. As a young army major, Otelo planned and coordinated the military coup of 25 April 1974 against the Estado Novo dictatorship in Portugal, despite the fact that the army had previously been one of its main pillars of support. What Otelo could not foresee was that the masses would surge onto the stage of history through the breach that the 25 April coup created at the very core of the bourgeois state. This date therefore also marked the beginning of the Portuguese Revolution. Since then, a myth has been concocted that the Portuguese Revolution was solely down to the actions of a handful of benevolent military officers. This falsehood conveniently sidelines the key role of the masses, whose actions were decisive in determining the course of the revolution. Otelo and the MFA Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho was born in Portuguese Mozambique in 1936 to a lower-middle-class Luso-Goan family. He enrolled in the Military Academy in Lisbon aged nineteen and moved up the ranks of the army in the course of the colonial wars in Angola and Guinea-Bissau. It was in the course of these campaigns that a profound anti-war sentiment developed among not only the ordinary soldiers, but also the middle layers of the officer caste. These sentiments clearly affected Otelo. Whilst the wars were increasingly becoming a lost cause for the Portuguese military, the decaying Estado Novo regime was clinging desperately to the colonies that it occupied as a bulwark of its rule, in both an economic and geopolitical sense. Something had to give. The final straw came when the regime announced that university graduates installed as officers in the army could be fast-tracked for promotion. This was one kick in the teeth too many for the career military men from the Academy. Not only were they fighting an unwinnable war with an utterly demoralised, and often mutinous army, they now found their career paths in the army blocked by the government. The only way they could look was down, at the discontent brewing in the ranks beneath them. From here rose the Movimento das Forcas Armadas (MFA), the Armed Forces Movement: a group of officers whose leadership developed around Vasco Lourenco, the communist-influenced Vasco Goncalves, and the master-strategist, Otelo. It began preparing a military insurrection against the 48-year-old dictatorship. The coup and the revolution The coup intended to overthrow the dictatorship, and to somehow resolve the colonial war in Angola, Guinea-Bissau, and Mozambique, which included plans to renew the subjugation of the colonies by less direct means. One of its main protagonists we might even call him a hero of that event was Major Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho, who, alongside the many others who joined him, risked his career and even his life on 25 April. But the Portuguese workers did not remain passive during these events. Despite the instructions of the MFA to stay at home, millions of men and women took to the streets to take their destinies into their own hands. After the MFA fearfully handed power to Antonio de Spinola and the other Generals of the Junta de Salvacao Nacional (National Salvation Junta, which assumed effective political leadership of Portugal after the coup), the masses did not wait for the latter to decide their fate. Instead, they attacked the PIDE (secret police); freed political prisoners, and in the following days and weeks began vying for control of the factories, workplaces, and barracks. Among the figures of 25 April mythologised by the ruling class, we find sworn enemies of the revolution. It ought to come as no real surprise that the current Antonio Costa government invited the Thermidorian General and former President Antonio Ramalho Eanes to chair the commission charged with commemorating the 50th anniversary of 25 April. This is the man who crushed the left-wing of the MFA during their attempt to seize power on 25 November 1975. The 25 April 1974 is celebrated as the day the Estado Novo regime was brought down. In reality there were two "25 Aprils" the coup led by junior officers, and the revolution which erupted that day on the streets / Image: Henrique Matos However, there were key actors in the MFA leadership who were genuinely drawn to the mass popular movement, precisely at the moment when the latter was seeking a way to realise its aspirations. Otelo was one such figure, whose sympathy for the revolution only grew as the pressure of the masses increased. The role these officers had played in ending the Estado Novo regime meant that the same MFA leaders found themselves holding the reins of power precisely when a movement of millions of exploited and impoverished people was out in the streets and in the fields. Although the coup leaders initially handed power over to their military superiors, wave after wave of the revolutionary movement pushed them to go far beyond their initial plans. They were pushed increasingly to the left. The absence of a revolutionary leadership among the main workers parties prepared to lead the workers, youth, and peasantry to the direct seizure of power only reinforced the sense of revolutionary authority thrust upon figures like Otelo. The fundamental factor driving events was the objective need for a social transformation to clear away the old order. This was above all expressed by the movement of the masses. For their part, the young military officers were ultimately balancing between the class forces in society. On the one hand, they filled the vacuum left by the old bourgeois regime, which had disintegrated after the slightest push. On the other hand, they were compelled to carry out measures that benefitted the struggling masses, not least to mitigate the economic crisis exacerbated by the counter-revolutionary measures of the big capitalists. But whilst the transitional governments were forced to cede repeatedly to the will of the masses during the revolutionary process, the lack of a clear, conscious revolutionary leadership meant this process could not be carried through to the end. In the course of a revolution that they simply did not understand, these young officers simply ended up giving the gold to the bandit, as they saw it. Otelo and COPCON Otelo and the soldiers around him played a contradictory role after 25 April. Following the coup, with the PSP [police] completely paralysed, and the GNR [national guard], hated and unable to intervene, the COPCON was created. This was a centralised military command encompassing all the special units of the armed forces. Its aim was to maintain order its commander was Otelo. COPCON was used on numerous occasions against the workers, in accordance with its stated aim. It is enough to remember the intervention against the strike of TAP workers in August 1974, in which troops commanded by Jaime Neves occupied the premises, with all the workers being placed under the jurisdiction of the Military Discipline Regulation (RDM). Under that RDM, 200 workers were dismissed, and seven were called on to testify before the military authorities. We could also recall the siege of Lisnave, when roads were blockaded in September 1974 to prevent Lisnave workers from marching to Lisbon. Or when COPCON was sent in to disperse the demonstration of construction workers that had surrounded the Constituent Assembly in November 1975. In general, however, the mass movement was too powerful for open repression to be conducted on a larger scale. Order as the officers conceived it could not be established and maintained in the course of the revolution. Despite ostensibly playing the role of armed bodies of men for the protection of the capitalist order, the soldiers, who were in daily contact with their fellow workers in struggle, felt an irresistible sympathy and attraction to the latter and often refused to intervene. More often than not they ended up fraternising with the same workers. This atmosphere of class solidarity also had an effect on Otelo and others who had taken up key positions in the state. Otelo often took some action with the intention of limiting the movement of the class struggle in some way, but ended up riding an even greater wave of struggle that ensued. There were even instances particularly in the land occupations of the Alentejo when COPCON would be used to defend workers and peasants against strikes of capital. This was necessary in a sense to prevent wider damage to the Portuguese economy, but it also exemplified the manner in which the bonapartist MFA would occasionally substitute itself for both the armed, independent working-class movement, as well as for the now collapsed bourgeois state in the course of the revolution. Otelo and the revolution Otelo concentrated enormous political and military power in his hands. In addition to commanding COPCON, he was also part of a short-lived triumvirate composed of Generals Costa Gomes (president of the republic), Vasco Goncalves (head of the government), and himself. This triumvirate was Portugals highest authority for a time. However, in the end he ended up using all the power that he had concentrated in his hands to lead COPCON in its actions against the workers, and to reinstate the Thermidorian Colonel Jaime Neves, who would later lead the crushing of left-wing regiments that attempted a rising on 25 November 1975. Otelo's legacy is contradictory. He was pushed to the left and his sympathies were with the masses, yet it was also he who was called upon initially to restore "Order". In the end, however, the ruling class in Portugal will never forgive him for precipitating a revolutionary movement through his actions / Image: EPHEMERA The tumult of the revolution pushed the officers who had led the coup into conflict with one another. The MFA was an amorphous body created for the specific purpose of conducting the 25 April coup. It had no single, organic social base within society, and under the pressure of the revolution, it began fracturing and splitting apart, roughly along class lines. Some shifted further to the right, even conspiring to conduct coups detat against the revolution. Others, such as Otelo, moved to the left, often demonstrating sympathy for the popular movement. For this reason, the right hates him. This is the same hypocritical right wing that, throughout the revolution, conspired to commit and actually committed terror attacks on the headquarters of leftist parties and trade unions; murdered leftist militants; organised armed militias of ex-PIDE [secret police] officers and far-right thugs, and that sought to convince the dying dictator of Spain, Franco, to intervene and drown the Portuguese Revolution in blood. However, in the absence of a revolutionary leadership and given the policies of the PS (Socialist Party) and PCP (Communist Party), even this mighty revolution was not enough to break the military hierarchy and the ties between officers, forged in Africa during the long commissions in the colonial war. On 25 November 1975 the Thermidor of the Portuguese revolution, in which the right wing of the MFA moved against the left Otelo abandoned his commanders, went home and surrendered in Belem to General Costa Gomes, president of the republic and former supreme head of the armed forces of the dictatorship, ending up in detention. Despite his sympathies with the mass movement, Otelo never stood fully and unambiguously on the side of the working class, and was ultimately defeated by the most reactionary wing of the MFA. However, many among the ruling class will never forgive Otelo for precipitating a revolutionary movement of millions that brought capitalism in Portugal to the brink of destruction. Correctly or incorrectly, this is what he continues to represent in the eyes of many on the left, and this is the part of his legacy we defend. So, at the time of his death, let us honor the brave officer who helped to bring down the dictatorship. But as we pay respects to the man, let us also bury the myth. Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. On Tuesday 24 August 2021 at about 18.25 hours, the MPA Port Control observed heavy smoke emanating from a vessel moored at the quarantine buoy which is located at the entrance of the port. Immediately, the Port Emergency Services Unit of the MPA was informed and it was confirmed that there was a fire onboard one fishing vessel at the Quarantine buoy. Tug Da Patten and Tug Dombeya quickly proceeded to the site of the incident. When Tug Dombeya reached the scene of the casualty, it was confirmed that vessel FV RUEY CHIEN TSAI 112 was on fire and that all the crew members had safely evacuated the burning vessel to gain shelter on other fishing boats moored next to FV RUEY CHIEN TSAI 112. No casualty was reported among the 18 crew members of the vessel. The fishing vessel was towed by Tug Dombeya to the outside harbour and was escorted by Tug Da Patten. The fire monitor of Tug Da Patten was used to control the fire during the towing operation. Given that no information was available on the cargo/fuel on board at that particular time, it was deemed appropriate to beach the vessel at Fort William on the rock revetment. It is to be highlighted that fire incidents on these types of vessels made of fibre glass and oil base paint, are difficult to extinguish. The casualty was being continuously monitored by the MPA team. The fire slowly consumed the vessel during the night and the MPA ensured that the casualty remained under constant observation for safety and security reasons. On 25 August 2021, early in the morning, the Mauritius Fire Rescue Services (MFRS) also assisted by using balls extinguishing medium to douse the fire along with the MPA Tug and NCG craft. A team from the MPA Port Emergency Services Unit has also been deployed on a small tug to contain the fire. The MPA wishes to point out that all necessary precautionary measures are being taken to contain this fire and as at now, interventions of the MPA Port Emergency Services Unit are still ongoing. The situation is being constantly monitored by the MPA Port Emergency Services. As at now, no oil spill has been observed, but as a safety measure, oil containment booms have been placed around the casualty. To bolster economic and social growth in Africa, the African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (AVCA) (www.AVCA-africa.org) has announced the establishment of the AVCA Training Academy (AVCA Academy) to provide private investment professional development across the continent. This is a first-of-its-kind in the industry and is aimed at supporting private investment professionals interested in Africa, by providing an agile and innovative learning platform tailored to Africas dynamic and diverse market. The AVCA Academy will play an instrumental role in catalysing investment into the asset class by deepening the capacity of African institutional investors to navigate investing in private equity, venture capital and private credit, and by supporting fund managers through their capital raising, deployment and exit journey. Programmes delivered through the AVCA Academy will have Continuing Professional Development (CPD) certification, demonstrating the credibility of the institution and its programmes. Given the lack of diversity of institutional investor capital in Africa-focused PE and VC funds to date, there is a critical need for the AVCA Academy. Participants will be able to discover the opportunities and challenges involved in investing in Africa through real-life, practical case studies. Through the synchronised learning platform, participants will also be provided with detailed resources to support independent learning. The AVCA Academy is an educational institution that will provide bespoke content through an immersive and blended learning approach for both remote and classroom-based participants involving subject matter and industry experts from across Africa. Abi Mustapha-Maduakor, Chief Executive Officer at AVCA said, The AVCA Academy is our solution to the increasing need for a platform to support first-time fund managers through the fundraising and investment lifecycle. We believe that education is the key to unlocking growth in this sector. Education should provide the inspiration and support needed to get African private equity on track to shape an economic global powerhouse of the future. She added, African institutional investors currently have less than 1% invested in private equity as an asset class so there is work to be done to unlock domestic capital. African pension funds have an additional US$29 billion to invest in PE which could double the size of the African PE industry. The AVCA Academy is currently sponsored by FSD Africa a specialist development agency supported by UK Aid, working to build and strengthen financial markets across sub-Saharan Africa. Evans Osano, Director Capital Markets at FSD Africa said, FSD Africa is pleased to partner with AVCA on this innovative e-learning platform. Leveraging an e-learning platform to deliver high-quality training and knowledge development is particularly relevant given the ability to transcend barriers such as travel restrictions due to COVID-19 and high costs associated with physical training sessions. We believe it will be essential in unlocking a growing institutional investor base in Africa to invest in transformative sectors through private capital markets. Through the Africa Private Equity and Debt Programme, FSD Africa is also supporting research, the development of policy and regulations aimed at improving access to private capital and supporting demonstration transactions. According to AVCAs 2020 Annual African PE Data Tracker, between 2015 and 2020, the total value of the 1,257 PE deals reported in Africa reached US$21.7bn. While deal volumes have maintained an upward trend, their value has gradually eased, suggesting growing investor interest despite smaller deal sizes. Yet, this is a small step on a long journey to increased growth of the asset class. Through this institution, fund managers will receive support around fundraising, value creation, and ESG, while institutional investors will receive support for fund manager evaluation, governance, and reporting. Professional services firms including law firms, fund administrators and industry regulators will also be provided with legal agreement training, GP/LP relationship management, and regulator training. Mauritius signed the Mutual Recognition Agreement between the APEI Competent Authorities of Professional Accountants and Auditors on 23rd August, 2021. Five like-minded countries Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles and Zambia embarked on a mission to accelerate the pace of economic integration termed as the Accelerated Program for Economic Integration within the ambit of COMESA and SADC. The APEI countries are pursuing a set of policy reforms that would strengthen economic linkages and facilitate exchange among themselves in priority areas relating to improvement of business regulatory environment, elimination of barriers to trade in goods, promotion of trade in services, improvement in trade facilitation and capacity building. APEI has adopted two major instruments which aim to strengthen the initiative: (i) Memorandum of Understanding for the Facilitation of Movement of Business Persons and Professionals between the APEI countries After in depth analytical research and intense negotiations, a Memorandum of Understanding for the Facilitation of Movement of Business Persons and Professionals (MOU) has been signed in September 2016 in Mauritius by Malawi, Mauritius, Seychelles and Zambia which is a major achievement and a precursor regarding movement of business persons and professionals within the SADC and COMESA region. Further to the signature of the MOU, a Roadmap for implementation of the MOU by the countries has been agreed to implement an APEI Business Travel Card to facilitate movement of business persons and professionals in the near future. (ii) Mutual Recognition Agreement between the APEI Competent Authorities of Professional Accountants and Auditors. The RMCE partnered with the Commonwealth Secretariat in the development of a Mutual Recognition Agreement between the APEI Competent Authorities of Professional Accountants and Auditors (MRA). The Commonwealth Secretariat provided technical and financial assistance for the development of the MRA including negotiating sessions and legal vetting. The MRA between the APEI Competent Authorities of Professional Accountants and Auditors has been signed in February 2019 in Lusaka, Zambia by Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia and in August 2021 by Mauritius. The adoption of the MRA marks another concrete step in the implementation of the Memorandum of Understanding for the Facilitation of Movement of Business Persons and Professionals between APEI countries in September 2018 as regards the movement of professional accountants and auditors in APEI. The signing of the MRA can pave the way for additional MRAs in other fields such as architecture and engineering. The Regional Multidisciplinary Centre of Excellence is driven by the Government of Mauritius (GoM) and was established in consultation with the European Union, the World Bank and Regional Economic Communities (RECs), namely, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the Indian Ocean Commission (IOC). RMCE is also providing coordination for the Accelerated Programme for Regional Integration (APEI) regrouping Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles and Zambia. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, it is envisaged to implement the APEI Business Travel Card before the end of this year or earlier to facilitate movement of professional accountants and auditors in APEI. The Travel Card has already been designed and adopted and national agencies should now coordinate efforts for its introduction and implementation The APEI Professional Accountants and Auditors Committee (APAAC) also needs to go beyond accounting and auditing functions to promote reforms for good economic governance. RMCE will continue to provide the coordinating mechanism for APEI and APAAC with a generous contribution from the Government of Mauritius and technical and financial assistance from development partners in particular the World Bank, the EC and the Commonwealth Secretariat. The Mutual Recognition Agreement between the APEI Competent Authorities of Professional Accountants and Auditors was jointly signed by the Mauritius Institute of Professional Accountants (MIPA) and the Financial Reporting Council (FRC). MIPA is the responsible body to supervise and regulate the accountancy profession and to promote the highest standards of professional and business conduct of, and enhance the quality of services, offered by Professional and Public Accountants in Mauritius. FRC is the body to promote the provision of high quality reporting of financial and non-financial information by public interest entities; promote the highest standards among licensed auditors; enhance the credibility of financial reporting; and improve the quality of accountancy and audit services. The virtual ceremony was organised by the Ministry of Financial Services and Good Governance in presence of the Chairman of the Financial Reporting Council and the Chairman of the RMCE. And, the most recent data shows the states Emergency Rental Assistance Program is reaching more people. As of May 31, only $67.6 million had been paid out across 17,288 households. Over the two months that followed, officials more than doubled the number of households they reached, and more than tripled the amount of money distributed. This wasnt the only time this young patient wasnt properly attended. On Feb. 23, the same day the inspection began, a staff member who was assigned to watch MR5, was spotted by coworkers sitting in the hall outside the patients room facing away from the patient. Nurses told inspectors that MR5s sitter was talking to a coworker who was also in the hallway. The coworker was also not watching the patient they were assigned, another minor, who was also under a one-to-one observation order. Her husband said she got an email from U.S. officials late Tuesday night, local time, instructing her to go to the Kabul airport the only exit point for U.S. citizens and others fleeing the country. When she got there, he said, she was able to pass through a Taliban-operated gate, but the next-in-sequence U.S.-operated gate was closed and not operational. We might try to give it another shot, because there is this one last location that we know of that might help us evacuate, Haisha said Thursday evening, Afghanistan time, of their prospects of escape. There is just so much news going on that we are just running everywhere that we can possibly grasp on to. One of the concerns is, how do you pay for this, right? Corman said during his recent conversation with Bell. And one of the concerns is, who is doing this work because you want credibility, right? And so I think what were trying to do is make sure that we have credibility, that we have people that will be looked at as neutral arbiters. Swaby, of Bethlehem, allegedly entered the apartment on the 400 block of McCartney Street armed with a knife. The apartment was occupied by two women, one of whom encountered the burglar in her bedroom. She told police he threatened her with the knife and told her he would rape her. The other woman in the house locked herself in her bedroom after hearing her roommates scream and a mans voice. Earlier this year, Sayed was accepted to Lehighs MBA program. As the semester was about to start, he still had not been granted a U.S. visa. The last communication from him said he had made a harrowing journey across the border to Uzbekistan with his wife and four small children. We are firm believers that local control is best, and part of local control is making decisions based on what parents and students of the district want and need not what the teachers union wants, the letter said. The parents we have heard from simply want a choice not a mandate. As a current print subscriber, you receive 24/7 access to our website and online e-edition at no additional charge. All you have to do is activate your access. To activate digital access, you will need your account number. You can find your account number on any recent subscription notice or bill. Sayre, PA (18840) Today Clearing skies after some evening rain. Low 53F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a half an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible.. Tonight Clearing skies after some evening rain. Low 53F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a half an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible. 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Ireland Uruguay, Eastern Republic of Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Viet Nam, Socialist Republic of Wallis and Futuna Islands Western Sahara Yemen Zambia, Republic of Zimbabwe National Pakistan objects to Kiru hydroelectric plant design NEW DELHI, AUG 25 | Publish Date: 8/25/2021 1:33:30 PM IST India says project fully compliant with Indus treaty Pakistan has raised objections to the design of Indias Kiru hydroelectric plant, a mega 624 MW project over the Chenab river in Jammu and Kashmir, but New Delhi asserts that the project is fully compliant with the Indus Water Treaty, according to officials. Confirming this development, Indias Indus Commissioner Pradeep Kumar Saxena told PTI that his Pakistani counterpart Syed Muhammad Meher Ali Shah raised the objections last week. Saxena, however, asserted that the design of the project is fully compliant with the provisions of the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT). It has been certified by the Central Water Commission, an apex organisation of the country in the field of water resources. This run-of-river project is being implemented by the Chenab Valley Power Projects Limited, a joint venture of the National Hydropower Company and Jammu and Kashmir State Power Development Corporation (JKSPDC). As a responsible upper riparian state, India is committed to full utilisation of its rights and believes in an amicable resolution the issues raised by Pakistan side in letter and spirit of the treaty. Pakistans objections on this project may come up for discussions in the next meeting of the Permanent Indus Commission scheduled this year in Pakistan. In the forthcoming meeting, the Indian side will explain its position and hope that Pakistan will appreciate the same and its apprehensions will be addressed through discussions, Saxena said on Tuesday. The treaty provides Pakistan the right to raise objection on Indian design within three month of the receipt of the information. India has supplied the information on this project in June to Pakistan. Under the IWT signed between India and Pakistan in 1960, all the waters of the eastern rivers -- Sutlej, Beas, and Ravi -- amounting to around 33 million acre feet (MAF) annually is allocated to India for unrestricted use. The waters of western rivers -- Indus, Jhelum, and Chenab -- amounting to around 135 MAF annually has been assigned largely to Pakistan. According to the treaty, India has been given the right to generate hydroelectricity through run-of-the-river projects on the western rivers subject to specific criteria for design and operation. The treaty also gives right to Pakistan to raise objections to designs of Indian hydroelectric projects on the western rivers. India is permitted to construct the run of the river plants on western rivers with limited storage as per criteria specified in the treaty, Saxena said. Earlier this year, during the meeting between Indus Commissioner of India and Pakistan, Shah also raised objections on the designs of Pakal Dul and Lower Kalnai hydropower projects in Jammu and Kashmir. To this, India said the designs are fully compliant with the treaty. Pakistan has also raised objections on hydropower projects in Chilling (24 MW), Rongdo (12 MW) and Ratan Nag (10.5 MW) are in Leh; while Mangdum Sangra (19 MW), Kargil Hunderman (25 MW) and Tamasha (12 MW) are in Kargil. India had said the designs of these projects are also fully compliant with the treaty. National SC gives Delhi HC two weeks to decide on Asthana being made DP chief NEW DELHI, AUG 25 (IANS) | Publish Date: 8/25/2021 1:34:05 PM IST The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the Delhi High Court to decide, within two weeks, the plea against the appointment of Rakesh Asthana as Delhi Police Commissioner. A bench, headed by Chief Justice N.V. Ramana, said: There are issues, one is about my participation in my matter as one ground. I have expressed my views about this gentleman in CBI selection. He said that the second issue is that somebody had filed a plea against his appointment, which is pending in the high court. The Chief Justice, while participating in the High-Powered Committee, had objected to the appointment of Asthana as the head of the CBI. The top court was hearing a petition filed by Centre for Public Interest Litigation challenging Asthanas appointment. Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing the petitioner, submitted: I dont think that disables your lordship at all. The bench, also comprising Justices D.Y. Chandrachud and Surya Kant, noted that a petition on the same issue has been filed in the Delhi High Court. We know time is of essence... we will give time of 2 weeks to the high court to dispose of (the petition), it noted, adjourning the plea for two weeks. It added it will have the benefit of the high court order in the matter. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta submitted that a similar petition is pending before the Delhi High Court and the petitioner before the apex court should also be asked to move the high court. Bhushan argued that the petition in the high court was a copy-paste from his clients petition. It was filed through somebody else after we filed the petition here, he said. Today we find ambush petitions being filed, filed in collusion with the government to get a dismissal of a genuine petition, he said, adding that the high court had adjourned the petition to the mid-September, after it was informed that a similar plea is pending in the apex court. Bhushan vehemently argued that egregious violations of rules has taken place in Asthanas appointment, which has resulted in violation of fundamental rights of all citizens. The bench gave liberty to Bhushan to intervene in the petition filed before the Delhi High Court. Mehta urged the top court to grant a period of at least four weeks to the high court to decide the matter, but the bench did not agree. News Eye WHY are numerous independent alternative media outlets and writers not questioning the Covid vaccine rollout? If anything, they are promoting it without even considering the serious concerns being voiced by top scientists. When there are experts like cardiologist and epidemiologist professor Peter McCullough, Dr Robert Malone (credited with inventing the mRNA vaccine technology), former vice-president of Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Dr Michael Yeadon, vaccine researcher and immunologist Dr Byram Bridle, world-renowned microbiologist Dr Sucharit Bhakti and hundreds of other respected scientists, immunologists and virologists expressing serious concerns or even calling for a halt to the rollout, surely their views must be given space. However, from the outset, these self-proclaimed anti-establishment platforms and journalists threw their hand in with the official Covid narrative. They are now supporting the vaccine rollouts and by implication the entities pushing the vaccines governments, mainstream media, the Gates and Rockefeller Foundations, big pharma and Silicon Valley and its bedfellow, the US military. In effect, the full weight of the establishment has been brought to bear on pushing the Covid narrative and the vaccines. The very establishment that these independent media outlets have previously challenged over the devastating humanitarian conflicts in Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan or Syria. To show such contempt for human life (civilian collateral damage) via geopolitical and resource-grabbing wars sold under the thin veneer of the war on terror or humanitarian intervention, but then feel a need to save humanity from the deadly virus must make some of those supporters of the official line on Covid just a little suspicious of the motives. As critical care physician Dr Pascal Sacre recently wrote: If people want trustworthy rulers, honest politicians, they should always judge rulers, financial elites and politicians by their actions rather than by their words. By not giving space to top scientists in the field of vaccine technology, immunology or virology who express deep concerns, these outlets are, in fact, engaging in censorship as much as the mainstream media, Facebook, Twitter, Google and YouTube. Science involves open debate and transparency, not censorship. Same old playbook THERE are strong similarities between the issue of genetically modified organisms in agriculture and the Covid pandemic in terms of the framing of debates in both fields: a type of the science is decided mentality and a smearing of critics in an attempt to demonise and close down debate. Some years ago, Robert T Fraley, Monsantos former vice-president and chief technology officer, asked on Twitter: Why do people doubt science? Accompanying his question was a link to an article that implied people who are suspicious of vaccines, genetically modified organisms, climate change or fluoridated water are confused, adhere to conspiracy theories, are motivated by ideology or are simply misinformed. But science is not the giver of absolute truth. That, in itself, should allow us to develop a healthy scepticism towards it. Scientific knowledge is built on shaky stilts that rest on shifting foundations. Science historian Thomas Kuhn wrote about the revolutionary paradigm shifts in scientific thought, whereby established theoretical perspectives can reinforce prevailing paradigms and serve as a barrier to the advancement of knowledge, until the weight of evidence and pressure from proponents of a new theoretical outlook is overwhelming. The old faith then gives way and the truth changes anew. The manufacture of scientific knowledge involves a process driven by various sociological, methodological and epistemological conflicts and compromises, both inside the laboratory and beyond. Why do people doubt science? Not because they are ill-informed or have read Kuhn or some sociology journal, but because they can see how science is used, corrupted and manipulated by powerful corporations and governments to serve their own ends. Take US agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack, for instance. He once called for sound science to underpin food trade that involves genetically modified organisms. Despite what Vilsack would have us believe that there are no concerns about genetically modified organisms many studies show that they present risks to human health and are having serious environmental, social and economic consequences. Sound science and the GMO agri-tech sector are too often perfect strangers. The industry carries out inadequate, short-term studies and conceals the data produced by its research under the guise of commercial confidentiality, while independent research highlights the dangers of its products. It has in the past also engaged in fakery in India, bribery in Indonesia and smears and intimidation against those who challenge its interests as well as the distortion and the censorship of scientific findings that undermine its agenda. In the United States, policymakers released genetically modified food onto the commercial market without proper long-term tests, citing the belief that it is substantially equivalent to ordinary food. But foreign genes are being inserted into organisms that studies show make them substantially non-equivalent. Substantial equivalence is a trade strategy on behalf of the GMO sector that neatly serves to bypass science by removing its genetically modified organisms from the type of scrutiny usually applied to potentially toxic or harmful substances. Ultimately, it is not science, itself, that people have doubts about but science that is pressed into the service of immensely powerful private corporations and regulatory bodies that are effectively co-opted and adopt a dont look, dont find approach to studies and products. There is a tendency to label anyone who opposes genetically modified organisms as anti-science, not least because they are arguing against a supposed scientific consensus in favour of genetically modified organisms. But this consensus is nothing but a fiction of the collective imagination of the pro-GMO lobby. The first rule of risk-taking is to not cross the street blindfolded, which is what the GMO and Covid vaccine lobbies would like us all to do, even though there are serious risks associated with these technologies. Furthermore, based on the work of US lawyer Steven Druker, we can see that the processes involved in getting GMO crop technology onto the commercial market were fraudulent and there has not been a single independent long-term epidemiological study on genetically modified organisms. With clinical trials still ongoing, similar concerns dog the emergency use authorisation of experimental Covid vaccines. The technological salvation argument being put forward in favour of the vaccines is also present with genetically modified organisms: the technology is needed to feed the hungry or save dying children. When an argument cannot be won using rational debate and science, we usually see the emotional blackmail fallback position and ad hominems against critics. Whether it is GMO crop technology or Covid vaccines, we are seeing a huge unscientific experiment using people as human guinea pigs to rake in massive profits. In the case of the vaccines, there is also a wider agenda involving a great reset of the economy and labours relationship to an increasingly authoritarian state whose role is to produce the conditions that will subordinate ordinary people to the new normal required by private capital: mass surveillance, joblessness and the eradication of civil and political rights in favour of technocratic rule. In fact, genetically engineered food and crops are an integral part of this reset. Part of the vaccine rollout involves accusing critics and the unvaccinated of being irresponsible and dangerous fearmongers. There is a huge government-media campaign to marginalise and demonise those who question the vaccines or refuse to take them due to valid concerns. Instead of indulging in smear campaigns and censorship, what society should be facilitating is open debate and taking very seriously what critics are saying. When people engage in the former and run from the latter, it indicates that their arguments will not and do not withstand scrutiny. Vaccine billionaires IN FINISHING, let us return to the world of Robert T Fraley and Monsanto and the type of science he pushes. Bayer, which took over Monsanto in 2018, has just lost another appeals court decision in the United States regarding its glyphosate-based herbicide, Roundup, often used with genetically modified roundup ready seeds and thus a key component of the GMO agenda. It faces tens of thousands of claims alleging that this herbicide causes cancer. In a recent decision by a court of appeal in California, it was stated: Monsantos conduct evidenced reckless disregard of the health and safety of the multitude of unsuspecting consumers it kept in the dark. This was not an isolated incident; Monsantos conduct involved repeated actions over a period of many years motivated by the desire for sales and profit. There is a clear lesson here with regard to the Covid vaccine rollout. Unlike Monsanto, however, Pfizer and the other vaccine manufacturers have received indemnities against the costs of compensation for adverse effects that might come from their Covid vaccines. A shrewd business move considering Pfizers corporate rap sheet which does nothing to inspire trust in that company. Its track record includes product safety, pricing, advertising and marketing, environment, human rights, labour, worker safety and tax and subsidy crimes and scandals. It is also claimed by the UK-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism that Pfizer bullied governments to put up federal bank reserves, embassy buildings or military bases as a guarantee against the cost of future legal cases stemming from the adverse effects of its Covid vaccine. This would mean that governments rather than the company would shoulder any legal costs. Vaccine manufacturers might well face bankruptcy sooner rather than later given the rising numbers of deaths and serious adverse effects being reported. But shielded from liability, the new vaccine billionaires, among them Modernas chief executive officer Stephane Bancel and Ugur Sahin, the chief executive officer of BioNTech, which has produced a vaccine with Pfizer, will be able to hold onto their loot. Although nothing will bring back those who succumbed to the deadly effects of glyphosate, at least Monsanto (via Bayer) is now in the dock and has already been forced to shell out hundreds of millions of dollars to its victims or their families. Through these legal cases involving glyphosate, it has been made clear just how powerful corporations can and do corrupt science for their own ends. Robert F Kennedy Jr, one of the attorneys fighting Bayer-Monsanto in the US courts, has explained that for four decades Monsanto manoeuvred to conceal Roundups carcinogenicity. He also says that Monsanto faces cascading scientific evidence linking glyphosate to a constellation of other injuries that have become prevalent since its introduction, including obesity, depression, Alzheimers, ADHD, autism, multiple sclerosis, Parkinsons, kidney disease, inflammatory bowel disease, brain, breast and prostate cancer, miscarriage, birth defects and declining sperm counts. This is what smearing and ignoring critics, malfeasance in public office, the capturing of regulatory agencies and scientific fraud leads to. It is interesting that governments and public officials sat on their hands and facilitated the rollout of glyphosate and other toxic agrochemicals and watched what is now a major public health crisis spiral out of control. They prioritised the needs of the agrochemical sector ahead of public health and side-lined science that challenged the adverse effects of its products. But governments are now suddenly expressing great concern for everyones well-being by locking them down, waging a fear campaign and cajoling and bribing people to take risky vaccines with dubious efficacy and which are arguably not needed. So, whose needs are they prioritising this time around? Although we are still in relatively early days of the Covid vaccine rollouts, disturbing evidence is mounting of the actual harm resulting from these poorly tested vaccines and the potential risks (infertility, cognitive, cancer, cardiovascular, etc) that lie in store. Dr J Patrick Whelan, a paediatric rheumatologist, warned the US Food and Drug Administration in late 2020 that mRNA vaccines could cause microvascular injury to the brain, heart, liver and kidneys in ways not assessed in safety trials. This is deeply concerning. But not for some. Not least the nine new vaccine billionaires worth a combined $19.3 billion courtesy of Covid vaccines that were largely funded with billions of dollars from the public purse. DissidentVoice.org, August 20. Colin Todhunter specialises in development, food and agriculture and is a research associate of the Centre for Research on Globalisation in Montreal, Canada. The CPC Its Mission and Contributions The Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee Contents Preamble I.Serving the People Wholeheartedly 1.Putting the People First 2.From Victory to Victory with the People 3.The People as Masters of the Country 4.A Good Life for the People II.Realizing the Ideals of the Party 1.Upholding Marxism 2.Firm Ideals and Convictions 3.Breaking New Ground 4.Defusing Risks and Overcoming Challenges III.Robust Leadership and Strong Governance 1.A Strong Central Committee 2.Sound Guidelines and Strategies 3.Effective Implementation of Decisions and Plans 4.Pooling the Efforts of All Sectors 5.Fostering High-Caliber Party Officials IV.Maintaining Vigor and Vitality 1.Upholding Intra-Party Democracy 2.Correcting Mistakes 3.Protecting the Party's Health 4.Promoting Study and Review V.Contributing to World Peace and Development 1.Safeguarding World Peace 2.Pursuing Common Development 3.Following the Path of Peaceful Development 4.Building a Global Community of Shared Future Conclusion Preamble The Communist Party of China (CPC), founded in 1921, has just celebrated its centenary. These hundred years have been a period of dramatic change enormous productive forces unleashed, social transformation unprecedented in scale, and huge advances in human civilization. On the other hand, humanity has been afflicted by devastating wars and suffering. These hundred years have also witnessed profound and transformative change in China. And it is the CPC that has made this change possible. The Chinese nation is a great nation. With a history dating back more than 5,000 years, China has made an indelible contribution to human civilization. After the Opium War of 1840, however, China found itself plunged into a semi-feudal and semi-colonial society. It endured intense humiliation, its people were pushed into darkness, and the ancient Chinese civilization lost its way. The Chinese people fought with indomitable spirit against repeated setbacks to save the nation from subjugation. The salvoes of Russia's October Revolution in 1917 sent Marxism-Leninism to China, and the CPC came into being. The Chinese people were awakened, and a torch was lit for the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. The founding of the CPC was an epoch-making event which profoundly changed the course of China's history, delivered a new future for the Chinese people and nation, and had an enormous impact on the rest of the world. During its endeavors over the past century, the CPC has developed a great spirit and carried it forward upholding truth and ideals, staying true to its founding mission, fighting without fear of danger, and meeting the people's expectations. This spirit has continuously inspired the CPC to forge ahead. As a Marxist party, the CPC, unlike previous political forces, has no special interests of its own to pursue. From the outset, the CPC has made happiness for the Chinese people and the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation its abiding goals. Like a beacon, it has illuminated the way forward for the Chinese people. Over the past hundred years, the CPC has grown from a small party with just over 50 members into the largest governing party in the world, with more than 95 million members in a country of more than 1.4 billion people. It is a party of major international standing. It has governed the world's largest socialist country for more than seven decades. It has led the Chinese people onto the path towards national rejuvenation and modernization, and it enjoys extensive support from the Chinese people. Over the past hundred years, all the struggles, sacrifices and efforts made by the CPC and by the Chinese people under its leadership have been directed to one goal the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. China's Communists, with Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping as their chief representatives, have adapted the basic tenets of Marxism to China's realities and its traditional culture, and they have gone from victory to victory on their journey towards national rejuvenation. To realize national rejuvenation, the CPC led the Chinese people in fighting with unyielding determination, achieving great success in the New Democratic Revolution (1919-1949). Fighting as armed revolutionaries through the Northern Expedition, the Agrarian Revolutionary War, the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, and the War of Liberation, they defeated the counterrevolutionaries, shattered the three mountains of imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat-capitalism, and founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949. They secured the independence of the nation, liberated the Chinese people, and put their future in their own hands. Victory in the New Democratic Revolution brought an end to China's semi-feudal and semi-colonial status and the disunity that plagued the country. All the unequal treaties imposed on China by imperialist powers and all the privileges they had accorded themselves were abolished. This created the fundamental conditions for realizing national rejuvenation. By engaging in this tenacious struggle, the CPC and the Chinese people sent a powerful message to the world: The Chinese people had stood upright. The time of oppression and humiliation was over, and it would never return. To realize national rejuvenation, the CPC led the Chinese people in a dedicated effort to build a strong China, and they achieved great success. By carrying out the socialist revolution in China, they brought to an end several thousand years of feudalism a system exploitative and repressive by its very nature and established socialism as China's fundamental political system. In the course of building socialism, they overcame subversion, sabotage, and armed provocation by imperialist and hegemonic powers, and brought about the most extensive and profound social changes in the history of the Chinese nation. This great transformation of a poor, backward and populous country in the East into a modern socialist China created the fundamental political conditions and laid down the institutional foundations necessary for realizing national rejuvenation. By succeeding in their tenacious struggle, the CPC and the Chinese people showed the world that they were equally capable of changing the old China and building a new one. They showed the world that only socialism could save China, and that socialism could deliver development to China. To realize national rejuvenation, the CPC led the Chinese people in freeing their minds and forging ahead, achieving great success in reform, opening up, and socialist modernization. The CPC led the people in making a great transition after the founding of the People's Republic by laying down its general guidelines for the primary stage of socialism. It advanced reform and opening up with resolve, overcame risks and challenges from every direction, and founded, upheld, and developed socialism with Chinese characteristics. This enabled China to transform itself from a highly centralized planned economy into a socialist market economy full of vitality, and from a largely closed country to one that is open to the world on all fronts. It also enabled China to achieve a historic leap from a country constrained by backward productive forces to the world's second largest economy and to make a historic transformation by raising the living standards of its people from bare subsistence to general prosperity. These achievements fueled the push towards national rejuvenation by providing robust institutional conditions and the material base for rapid development. By succeeding in their tenacious struggle, the CPC and the Chinese people showed the world that reform and opening up has been critical in making China what it is today. China has made great strides and caught up with the times. To realize national rejuvenation, the CPC has led the Chinese people in carrying out their great struggle, launching a great initiative, advancing their great cause, fulfilling their great dream, and achieving great success for socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. The 18th National Congress of the CPC in 2012 marked a new era for socialism with Chinese characteristics. In this new era, the Party has strengthened its overall leadership, coordinated the implementation of the Five-sphere Integrated Plan [ This is China's overall plan for building socialism with Chinese characteristics, that is, to promote coordinated progress in the economic, political, cultural, social and eco-environmental fields. ] and the Four-pronged Comprehensive Strategy [ This is China's strategic plan for building socialism with Chinese characteristics, that is, to make comprehensive moves to complete a moderately prosperous society in all respects, to further reform, to advance the rule of law, and to strengthen Party self-governance. After the Fifth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee, "finishing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects" was turned into "building a modern socialist country in an all-round way" in accordance with the actual conditions.], upheld and improved the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and modernized China's system and capacity for governance. It has adopted a full range of intra-Party regulations and exercised rule-based internal management. It has overcome significant risks and challenges, achieved the First Centenary Goal [ This is the goal set by the CPC at its 18th National Congress, to finish building a moderately prosperous society in all respects by the centenary of the CPC in 2021. Tr.], and adopted a strategic plan to fulfill the Second Centenary Goal [ This is the goal set by the CPC at its 18th National Congress to build China into a modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, and harmonious by the centenary of the PRC in 2049. This goal was further defined by the CPC at its 19th National Congress in October 2017 as to develop China into a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful by the middle of the 21st century. Tr.]. All these efforts have provided robust institutional conditions, strong material foundations, and a source of inspiration for advancing the cause of national rejuvenation. By succeeding in their tenacious struggle, the CPC and the Chinese people have shown the world that the Chinese nation has achieved the tremendous transformation from standing upright to becoming prosperous and growing in strength, and that China's rejuvenation is an unstoppable historical force. At the ceremony marking the centenary of the CPC held on July 1, 2021, General Secretary Xi Jinping declared that thanks to the continued efforts of the whole Party and the entire nation, China has realized the First Centenary Goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. This means that it has put an end to absolute poverty in China, and is now marching in confident strides towards the Second Centenary Goal of building China into a great modern socialist country. This is a glorious achievement for the Chinese nation, for the Chinese people, and for the Communist Party of China. Finishing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects means realizing a millennia-old dream and a century-old hope of the Chinese nation and fulfilling the solemn promise the CPC made to the people and history. In substantially reducing the world's poverty-stricken population, China has made an outstanding contribution to human progress. Over the past hundred years, the CPC has led the Chinese people in ending the humiliation and misery inflicted on them in the modern era. Without the CPC, there would be no new China and no national rejuvenation. This is a fact that is clear to the Chinese people based on China's achievements in revolution, reconstruction, and reform. The leadership of the CPC is the choice of history and the people. This leadership is vital for the future of the country, the nation, and the Party itself. Over the past hundred years, through its dauntless efforts to create a new China, the CPC has led the Chinese people in writing the most magnificent chapter in the millennia-long history of the Chinese nation. The great path they have embarked upon, the great cause they have undertaken, and the great achievements they have made over the past century will go down in the annals of the Chinese nation and humanity. I. Serving the People Wholeheartedly The Communist Party of China is the vanguard of China's working class, the Chinese people, and the Chinese nation. Serving the people wholeheartedly is its abiding mission. The country is the people and the people are the country. The Party's struggle to found a new China and develop it is for the people. Of the people, by the people, for the people this is what has guided the CPC from victory to victory over the past century. 1. Putting the People First The CPC is dedicated to the people and forever puts their interests first. It follows the underlying trends of social development and respects the people's principal role in making history. It pursues the lofty goal of working for the wellbeing of the Chinese people; and does everything in the interests of the people. The CPC is rooted in the people. It was born in 1921 in the great struggle against feudal rule and foreign aggression, at a time when Marxism-Leninism became integrated with China's workers movement. From the very day of its creation, the CPC has represented China's working class, the Chinese people, and the Chinese nation. It has no special interests of its own, nor does it represent any interest group, establishment group, or privileged social group. Its only goals are to deliver happiness for the people and achieve national rejuvenation. The CPC shares the same goals as the people, and it shares a common stake with the people. Drawing support and strength from the people, the Party has grown in strength in the fight to overcome every challenge. Members of the CPC are ordinary people. They love life and are hard working. They are sincere, open and compassionate. But they are also vanguards and role models in daily life, work, and public activities. They are the first to step forward in case of challenges and dangers, fearless and ready to give their all for the country and the people. They emerge from the people and lead them to go forward. They are Communists citizens of China both ordinary and extraordinary at the same time. From its very beginning, the CPC has striven to serve the people and won their support and endorsement. It represents the fundamental interests of all the Chinese, and everything it does is to realize, safeguard and advance their interests. Meeting the people's expectation for a better life is its goal. The people's interests are behind everything the Party does leading revolution, building the armed forces, developing political institutions, boosting the economy, carrying out reform and opening up, developing culture, and exploring better ways of running society. In China, the state founded by the people under CPC leadership is called the People's Republic of China; its government is called the people's government, the armed forces are called the People's Liberation Army; and Party officials are people's servants. The Party Central Committee's newspaper is the People's Daily, and China's central bank is called the People's Bank. The people are the lifeblood of the Party; indeed, they are the inexhaustible source of inspiration giving the Party all the strength it needs to fulfill its mission. The CPC makes decisions and adopts policies in the fundamental interests of the people. At different stages of China's revolution, reconstruction and reform, and at historical junctures critical to the future of the Party and the country, the Party has always acted to advance the people's interests and oppose any action that harms them. The Party has taken sound development as its top priority in governance. It has unleashed and developed the productive forces to meet the people's expectation for a better life. Since its 18th National Congress, the CPC has followed a people-centered philosophy; it has launched a full range of initiatives to achieve common prosperity and uphold fairness and justice. It has delivered initial prosperity for all. It has fought Covid-19 and saved lives no matter the cost. It has eradicated absolute poverty in the country, implemented the rural revitalization strategy, and promoted a new people-focused urbanization strategy. The vision that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets inspires the drive to protect the environment. Determined that housing is for living in, not for speculation, the CPC has taken clear steps to keep the housing market under control. It sees that the capital market is properly regulated. It also sees that justice is served in every judicial case. All of this has enabled the people to fully share the country's development gains. Over the past century, through all the changes in the domestic and international environment, whether in good times or bad, the CPC has always put the people first. It has never wavered in fulfilling this commitment. The CPC has made great sacrifices for the people. From the founding of the CPC in 1921 to the founding of the People's Republic in 1949, more than 3.7 million identified members of organizations under Party leadership gave their lives to liberate the country. Of the six family members of Mao Zedong who died for the revolution, five were Party members. In peaceful times, too, during disaster relief efforts after earthquakes, floods and other emergencies, Party members have rushed to the scene and risked their own lives to save the lives of others. Since the Covid-19 outbreak, close to 400 Party members and officials have lost their lives in the line of duty. More than 1,800 Party members and officials also gave their lives in the battle against absolute poverty. Among all those who have died were rank and file Party members, senior officials, and family members of top Party leaders. 2. From Victory to Victory with the People The CPC works in the service of the people. It trusts and relies on the people and mobilizes them to fight for their interests. It follows the mass line, a principle of "from the people, to the people". It has shared good times and hard times with the people, and it has led them in surmounting all obstacles and making great strides forward. By relying on the people, the CPC rose and grew strong. It gained the strength it needed to beat powerful enemies, both inside and outside China, and to win victory in the New Democratic Revolution. During this revolution, in the Agrarian Revolutionary War, the CPC galvanized extensive public support and defeated the first four Kuomintang (KMT) encirclement and suppression campaigns. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the Party mobilized the people and overwhelmed the enemy with a vast people's war. During the War of Liberation, with supplies transported in wheelbarrows and on people's shoulders, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) secured decisive victories against the KMT troops in the three major campaigns. [ This refers to the three major campaigns fought between PLA forces under CPC leadership and KMT forces in the Liaoxi-Shenyang, Huai-Hai and Beiping-Tianjin areas between September 1948 and January 1949. In this decisive period for securing overall victory, the CPC defeated the main forces of the KMT.] In these contests between progressives and reactionaries and between justice and injustice, the KMT forces shielded themselves in ironclad fortresses, and the Japanese invaders put their faith in their military superiority. However by relying on the people, the CPC defeated them all. By relying on the people, the CPC founded the People's Republic, carried out socialist revolution, and engaged in rebuilding the country from scratch. The founding of the People's Republic marked the ultimate moment of freedom for the Chinese people from the yoke of slavery and oppression. Now masters of their own country, the people threw themselves into reconstruction to create a bright future for the country and the nation. In just a few years, an independent and substantial industrial and economic system took shape in China. Groundbreaking successes were achieved in nuclear technology, satellites, carrier rockets and other cutting-edge technologies, and major advances were made in China's overall development. By relying on the people, the CPC carried out reform, opening up and socialist modernization, pioneering a path of socialism that is distinctively Chinese. The reform and opening-up initiative launched by the CPC in 1978 freed people's minds, inspiring them to boldly explore new frontiers. The household contract system was introduced in rural areas, and village and township businesses flourished. The setting up of special economic zones connected China to the world, enabling it to introduce foreign technology and capital and export Chinese products. Waves of reform swept across the country, powering China's development. With dedication and resolve, the Chinese people achieved great success in modernization, completing the greatest social and economic transformation the world has ever seen. By relying on the people, the CPC has ushered Chinese socialism into a new era. Since its 18th National Congress, the Party has galvanized the whole nation to realize the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation and boosted economic vitality with further reform. Its successful internal initiatives to improve Party conduct have boosted public morale. The Chinese people have given of their best and fully released their power of creation in pursuit of their shared dreams. They have carried out further reform and achieved all-round initial prosperity. They have eradicated absolute poverty. They have fought side by side in the battle against Covid-19. They have reined in environmental pollution. And they have succeeded in keeping systemic risks at bay. Their hard work has made it possible for China to turn its blueprint for development into reality. Together, the Chinese people are creating miracles that stun the world. Proud and confident, they are pressing ahead on the path of Chinese socialism. Over the past century, hundreds of millions of Chinese have dedicated themselves to realizing the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. Their contribution will go down in the annals of history; their epic deeds will be remembered by posterity. The people have created history, and they are the source of the Party's strength. The Chinese are a great, glorious, and heroic people this is a fact fully borne out by the 100-year history of the CPC. 3. The People as Masters of the Country The people should run their own country this is an abiding commitment of the CPC. Over the past hundred years, it has led the people in realizing people's democracy in China, a country with a feudal history dating back several thousand years that descended into a semi-feudal and semi-colonial society after the Opium War. Under the CPC's leadership, democracy has been practiced in the whole process of the country's revolution, reconstruction and reform, in all aspects of governance, and in every field of economic and social life. Democracy, a shared value, has taken root in China as a political institution and mechanism of governance, and the Chinese people now truly hold in their own hands the future of the country, society and themselves. The CPC has made unremitting efforts to explore new ways of realizing people's democracy. During the New Democratic Revolution, the Party committed to developing workers' and peasants' democracy and people's democracy, and set up Soviet congresses of workers, peasants and soldiers, assemblies of representatives, and representative conferences of people from all sectors. When the People's Republic of China was founded, the people's democratic dictatorship was adopted as the governing system, and the system of people's congresses was instituted as the governing structure, thus enabling the people to run their own country. Since the launch of reform and opening up, the CPC has worked to ensure the Party's leadership, the people's position as the masters of the country, and law-based governance, which have become fundamental principles of democratic socialism with distinctive Chinese features. Since its 18th National Congress, the CPC has set Eight Criteria [ At the meeting marking the 60th anniversary of the National People's Congress in 2014, President Xi Jinping said the following: The best way to judge whether a country's political system is democratic and works is to see whether the succession of its leaders is conducted in an orderly way in accordance with the law, whether government affairs and social, economic and cultural affairs are managed by all the people in accordance with the law, whether the public freely voice demands to advance their interests, whether all stakeholders in society are fully involved in the country's political process, whether government decisions are made in a sound and democratic way, whether outstanding individuals in all sectors can enter government leadership teams and the governance system through fair competition, whether the governing party exercises leadership over government affairs in accordance with the Constitution and the law, and whether the exercise of power is kept under effective checks and supervision. ] to ensure that China's political system is a democratic one that delivers, and these criteria underpin the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics. The Party takes the development of democracy as a matter of comprehensive and far-reaching significance. To ensure the people's principal position, improve the performance of the Party and the state, and arouse the people's enthusiasm, the Party has expanded socialist democracy, advanced electoral democracy, and developed consultative democracy. Instituted by the CPC, the system of people's congresses is China's fundamental political system. The Party fully solicits the views of the people and heeds their voices, and formulates its policies accordingly. In a framework under which the Party exercises leadership over the law-making process, and the National People's Congress (NPC) and its Standing Committee exercise the power of legislation, the Party's core beliefs have, through proper legal procedures, been written into the Constitution, the law, and codes of conduct for all the people, state institutions, the armed forces, political parties, social organizations, enterprises and public institutions. The system of people's congresses ensures the CPC's leadership, the people's position as masters of the country, and law-based governance, and it gives full expression to the guidelines of the CPC, the will of the state, and the expectations of the people. This system has been further consolidated and developed since the 18th National Congress of the CPC. The mechanism to ensure that deputies to people's congresses engage with the people has been strengthened, enabling them to better perform their duties, and enabling the people's congresses and their standing committees to better play their roles. In addition to practicing and improving the system of people's congresses, the CPC has led the people in establishing and developing a number of other political systems, including the system of multiparty cooperation and political consultation under the leadership of the CPC, the system of regional ethnic autonomy, and the system of community-level self-governance. These systems ensure that the people run their country. Consultative democracy is a distinctive feature of China's socialist democracy. It means consultation among political parties, people's congresses, government departments, committees of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), people's organizations, communities, and social organizations. It has enriched democracy by expanding its forms and channels. The system of regional ethnic autonomy provides an institutional base for all ethnic groups to run the country together. It fully protects the equal rights of all 56 ethnic groups and the power of self-governance in ethnic autonomous areas, underpins development in ethnic minority areas, and reinforces ethnic unity. Under the system of community-level self-governance, urban and rural residents directly exercise their democratic right to manage community affairs and programs for public benefit. Community-level governance in China is a dynamic, harmonious and orderly process. The system of democratic management by employees congresses in enterprises and public institutions plays an active role in protecting the lawful rights and interests of the employees. It ensures they run their own affairs, enhances vitality of these organizations, and helps them to flourish and prosper. The CPC conducts whole-process democracy. This practice is supported by public consultation, under which public issues are discussed by all those involved to reach extensive consensus. Under whole-process democracy, the people exercise their democratic rights through a variety of channels in regular elections, and through involvement in decision-making on major public affairs that are important to the economy and people's lives. This democracy is conducted not only by means of elections, but also through democratic consultation, decision-making, management, scrutiny, and other mechanisms of governance. It is not only a political activity; it also relates to economic, cultural, social and other fields. Indeed, it has become an integral part of daily life and work. The Chinese people enjoy extensive democratic rights. The days of isolation are gone in China, and democracy is the order of the day. The Chinese people now live in contentment, and Chinese society is full of vitality. Democracy is a shared value; it is not something to be claimed by any one country. There is no fixed model of democracy; it comes in many forms. In judging whether a particular form of democracy works, one needs to see whether it is adapted to a country's history and culture, whether it conforms to its conditions, whether it can deliver political stability and social progress, whether it can improve people's lives, whether it can win public support, and whether it can contribute to advancing the progressive cause of humanity. Democracy as practiced in China is rooted in China's history and culture. It fits the country's conditions and enjoys popular support. The CPC is committed to developing socialist democracy with distinctive Chinese features. It will continue to enrich China's model of democracy and ensure its sound development. 4. A Good Life for the People Everything the CPC has done in revolution, reconstruction and reform is designed to ensure a good life for the people. Over the past century, China has undergone tremendous changes turning itself from a poor and war-torn country into a dynamic and prosperous one. It is now the world's second largest economy, growing in composite strength and international standing. It has thriving cosmopolitan cities, beautiful and harmonious countryside, advanced infrastructure, a safe and convenient transport network, a dynamic market, and a stable and orderly society. Its people are leading a comfortable life to which they have aspired for several thousand years, and they are working towards common prosperity. The people's lives have greatly improved. They have shaken off absolute poverty and achieved moderate prosperity in all respects. Their rights to existence and development are well protected, and they feel happier, safer and more secure. With a per capita gross national income surpassing US$10,000, China has joined the ranks of upper-middle income economies, and is on its way to become a high-income country. The urban-rural income gap is steadily shrinking, and China has a middle-income group of 400 million people, the biggest in the world. The employment market in China is stable. At the end of 2020, almost 751 million people in China were in employment. China has built the world's largest social security network, with basic medical insurance covering 1.3 billion people by the end of June 2021. During the same period, one billion people were covered by basic old-age insurance, 222 million by unemployment insurance, and 274 million by work-related injury insurance. The people have better access to childcare, education, employment, medical services, elderly care, housing, and social assistance. The cultural sector is flourishing, and the Chinese people enjoy colorful and enriching cultural activities. China has done much to protect its environment; across the country there are more blue skies, lush mountains and lucid waters. China maintains long-term social harmony and stability, and its people live in peace and contentment in a country widely recognized as one of the safest in the world. The mindset of the Chinese people has changed profoundly. They have strong faith in the path, theory, system and culture of Chinese socialism. They now view themselves as the equals of any other in the world. They celebrate the CPC, socialism, reform and opening up, the motherland, and the unity of all ethnic groups in China. Patriotism, reform, innovation, and hard work have taken root in their minds. Core Socialist Values [ The Core Socialist Values: Prosperity, democracy, civility and harmony are values that underpin the Chinese nation; freedom, equality, justice and the rule of law are values that hold society together; patriotism, dedication, good faith and amity are values that underlie individual conduct.] are practiced, and traditional Chinese culture is full of vitality. All of this fills Chinese society with positive energy and confidence. The Chinese people value and uphold freedom. They enjoy true, comprehensive and extensive freedom. While pursuing their own individual freedoms, they also work to promote common prosperity, development, social harmony and stability. United as one, they face difficulties head-on, rise to challenges, and strive for success. They regard all the world's peoples as one big family, and wish peace and a better life for everyone. Energetic, passionate young Chinese are dedicating themselves to the cause of the CPC and the people, and they are at the forefront in working to rejuvenate the Chinese nation. While China has achieved remarkable successes as a result of a dedicated effort made over many years, it is still in the primary stage of socialism and will long remain so. China is still the largest developing country in the world. There is still a long way to go before China can resolve the principal challenge it faces the gap between unbalanced and inadequate development and the growing expectation of the people for a better life and deliver prosperity to all its 1.4 billion people. Over the past hundred years, the CPC has won the heartfelt support of the people, not with rhetoric, but with actions and outcomes and by meeting repeated challenges. This support has never wavered since the Chinese people first chose the CPC to lead them. The Party and the people work together and share weal and woe, and there is an inseparable bond between them. No attempt to sever that bond will ever succeed, and any attempt to shake the people's faith in the Party's leadership is doomed to fail. II. Realizing the Ideals of the Party Struggle is a distinctive attribute of the CPC. In a complex domestic and international environment, China has encountered unprecedented difficulties and challenges in its revolution, reconstruction, and reform. Since it was founded a hundred years ago, the Party has never given up on the struggle, whatever hardships, existential trials, or bitter sacrifices it faced. These hundred years have seen the Party fight on, guided by Marxism, and buttressed by firm convictions, an enterprising spirit, and unyielding determination. 1. Upholding Marxism Marxism is the single guiding ideology, the very soul of the CPC, and the banner under which it strives. Fundamentally, the strength of the Party and the strength of socialism with Chinese characteristics are attributable to the fact that Marxism works. The Party's history of struggle is a process of continuing to adapt Marxism to the Chinese context and to explore creative and innovative ideas. Inscribing Marxism on its own banner. Marxism reveals the universal laws of the natural world, human society, and the human mind, pointing the direction for humanity and human civilization to progress. The communist and socialist ideals expounded in Marxism tally with Chinese cultural values such as a people-centered orientation, harmony, and unity in diversity. They are consistent with the dream pursued by noble and idealistic Chinese for generations to build a strong and prosperous nation. And they accord with the aspiration of Chinese progressives, dating back to the Opium War, to rescue the nation from subjugation. A key feature of Marxism is that it not only defines the ideals of communism, but also specifies the ways and means by which they can be achieved. When Marxism was introduced to China, the founders of the CPC first reflected on it and conducted careful analysis, then gained hands-on experience, and finally chose to embrace it wholeheartedly. Since China's Communists chose Marxism, they have remained firm in upholding and developing it. Never have they wavered in their commitment, deviated from its goals, or abandoned it in favor of other options. Using Marxism as a powerful ideological weapon to seek the truth, understand the world and its laws, and transform it, rather than applying rigid dogma. Respecting reality and combining with the people are the characteristics and strengths of the CPC. Over the past hundred years, the CPC has continued to adapt Marxism to the Chinese context and the needs of the times. Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the Theory of Three Represents, the Scientific Outlook on Development, and Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era are the results. The Party has thus devised well-conceived theories for its own and the people's guidance, and made an enormous and original contribution to enriching Marxism. At the fundamental level, the CPC's successes can be attributed to its mastery of powerful theoretical weapons to correctly understand, scientifically analyze, and effectively solve problems by applying the Marxist stance, viewpoint and methodology. Experience has proved that the CPC's choice of Marxism is correct. On the journey ahead, considering China's realities in contemporary times the Party will continue to adapt the basic tenets of Marxism to the best of China's traditional culture, and use Marxism to observe, understand, and steer the trends of our times in the 21st century. 2. Firm Ideals and Convictions From the outset, the CPC has championed the cause of socialism and communism. Over the past hundred years, standing firm in its ideals and convictions, it has led the people to press forward towards these goals. It has established, upheld and developed socialism, upheld the principles of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and demonstrated the vitality and bright prospects of socialism. The Party has remained true to socialism, and socialism has proved its worth to China. Rising through adversity and failures. In the years of revolutionary war, the CPC was repeatedly confronted with difficulties and setbacks, to the extent that its very survival was threatened. After the failure of the Great Revolution (1924-1927), the membership of the Party fell from around 60,000 to just over 10,000. After defeat in the fifth encirclement and suppression campaign by the KMT in 1934, [ This refers to the Central Red Army's fight against the fifth encirclement and suppression campaign launched by the KMT troops in the Central Revolutionary Base Area from September 1933 to October 1934. From 1930 to 1934, the KMT troops launched five largescale onslaughts against the Central Revolutionary Base Area headquartered in Ruijin, Jiangxi Province. The Red Army overcame the KMT forces in the first four campaigns, but after defeat in the fifth campaign, it made a strategic withdrawal.] the Party and the Red Army were seriously weakened. The Battle of Xiangjiang soon after the beginning of the Long March [ This was the strategic retreat of the main Red Army forces under the leadership of the CPC, and the trek from the Soviet Area south of the Yangtze River to the Shaanxi-Gansu border area during the period from October 1934 to October 1936, marking a great transition from defeat to victory for the Party and the Chinese revolution.] cost the Central Red Army more than 50,000 of its 86,000 troops. But for all that the situation was bleak, the CPC remained unshaken in its convictions. It shook off its pursuers, rose above adversity, and emerged stronger from the setbacks. After the founding of the PRC, the country faced testing military and economic challenges and hostility from abroad. Led by the CPC, and fearless of hardship and death, the people overcame these challenges. A new socialist China soon stood firm in the East. From the late 1980s to early 1990s, when the tide of world socialism was on the ebb, the CPC led the people to press forward on the path of Chinese socialism, heedless of all obstacles. In the new era, faced with the formidable tasks of reform, development and stability, and confronted by an unpromising external environment, the Party has led the people to continue the great historic struggle and to champion the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Difficulties, failures and setbacks in the past hundred years have never prevented the CPC from forging ahead; they have only made it stronger and helped it mature. At critical historical junctures and in times of crisis, the Party has stood firm in ideals and convictions, rising undaunted to face challenges. This has demonstrated its strength, increased the people's trust and confidence, transformed its own prospects and those of the country, and advanced the cause of socialism. Fighting in both favorable and unfavorable circumstances. After securing victory in its military campaigns, the CPC maintained its fighting spirit and strove to avoid complacency. After becoming the governing party of China, it continued to remain modest and prudent, never arrogant or impetuous. In leading reconstruction in the cities in peace time, it preserved the style of plain living and hard struggle and never fell victim to the desire for creature comforts. In the process of reform and opening up, the CPC endeavors to guard against the erosive influence of feudalist and capitalist decadence. Entering the new era, the CPC has never allowed itself to be carried away by the successes the Party and the state have achieved. It has warned all its members that they must never surrender to complacency or sclerotic thinking, never falter, never waver; rather, they must remain alert to dangers in times of peace and keep fighting. Over the past hundred years the Party has never rested on its laurels, slackened its efforts, or allowed flattery and praise to dilute its spirit and will to fight. Being firmly grounded while aiming high for the future. Every generation of Party members has fulfilled its respective missions and kept pressing forward. The ideals of communism can only be realized by the Party based on fully developed and highly advanced socialism. Communists in China believe that if they keep fighting for this with sufficient effort over generations it can be achieved. In the battle to realize national rejuvenation, the Party and the people will pass on the torch from one generation to the next, with each generation fulfilling its duties for the benefit of the next. Forging a fighting spirit in hard work and working hard to keep that spirit. Carrying forward its founding spirit, the CPC has fought hard and persevered. It has developed a set of inspiring principles which are manifested in the ranks of its revolutionary martyrs defiant in the face of death, its hard-working heroes, and its selfless and devoted models. This invaluable spirit has been distilled into the lifeblood of the Chinese nation, boosting the Chinese people's morale, and creating longer, fuller and stronger support for the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. Over the past hundred years, led by the CPC, the Chinese people have changed the face of the country through their arduous efforts, and more importantly, reshaped China's national psyche. 3. Breaking New Ground China's revolution, reconstruction and reform are unprecedented undertakings, with no previous examples to serve as a guide. Facing new situations and new problems on the way forward, and employing indomitable courage and determination, the CPC has succeeded in blazing a new trail from the unknown to the realms of freedom. All its endeavors have advanced the cause of socialism in China. Recognizing the prevailing trends in the world, seizing and making the most of historic opportunities. There is an essential logic to the progress of human history. Over the past hundred years, the CPC has developed with this logic and kept pace with the trends of the times, constantly adjusting its strategies and policies in accordance with changing circumstances. The founding of the CPC, the founding of a socialist people's republic, and the launch of reform and opening up all followed underlying global trends. Based on its belief that peace and development were the themes of the times, the CPC pressed ahead with its plans for reform, opening up and modernization. It seized the opportunity of rapid advances in science and technology around the world, and applied the important proposition that "science and technology constitute a primary productive force". It mobilized the resources of the whole country in a series of key national science and technology research and development programs such as the 863 Program and the 973 Program [ The codename 863 refers to the National High-tech R&D Program implemented in accordance with a guideline issued by the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on November 18, 1986, while that of 973 is for the National Key Basic Research Program implemented in accordance with a decision by the National Science, Technology and Education Leading Group on June 4, 1997.]. All of this strengthened China's capacity for original innovation and resulted in significant progress in high-tech and key industries. The CPC followed the trend of economic globalization and initiated a set of major reform and opening-up measures, for example, creating special economic zones, opening up Shanghai Pudong New Area, implementing the strategies of "bringing in" and "going global", and acceding to the World Trade Organization, all of which helped the Chinese economy to integrate with the international economy. At the turn of the century, the CPC seized the first two decades as an important period of strategic opportunity to focus on development and promote more rapid growth. In the new era, the CPC has implemented the strategy of national rejuvenation within the context of global changes of a scale unseen in a century. It has judged that "China remains in an important period of strategic opportunity for development", and that "both opportunities and challenges are unprecedented in scale, with more opportunities than challenges in general". To tap into the trends of peace, cooperation, multi-polarity, economic globalization, and democracy in international relations, the Party places greater emphasis on the quality of growth. To this end, it has introduced and is implementing a new development philosophy and a new development dynamic as the country enters a new development stage. In external relations, the CPC pursues high-standard opening up and promotes win-win cooperation with more countries in more areas, on a larger scale, and in greater depth. The CPC is willing to contribute more to the world while promoting China's own development. Following an independent path. To carry out revolution, reconstruction and reform in a poor and backward country with a large population, it is fundamental to choose the right path. During the New Democratic Revolution, the CPC initially opted to follow the Soviet example of insurrection in key cities. But that proved unsuccessful. It then reviewed the lessons learned, summarized the experience gained, and embarked on the correct path of encircling the cities from the countryside and seizing state power with military force. After the founding of the People's Republic, the CPC applied itself to learning from the Soviet Union. Encountering problems with the Soviet model, it began to explore its own path for building socialism. Since the beginning of reform and opening up, it has led the people in identifying, upholding, broadening, and committing to the path best suited to China's actual conditions socialism with Chinese characteristics. In economic development, the Party has always adhered to the principle of self-reliance. To ensure that robust development continues amid mounting instability and uncertainties in the international environment, the Party has made the major strategic decision to accelerate the fostering of a double development dynamic, with the domestic economy and international engagement reinforcing each other, and the former as the mainstay. In the field of science and technology, the Party has led the people in independent and self-reliant development. With their own strength, the Chinese people have put in place a complete and independent system of academic disciplines and a comprehensive program of scientific research, paving the way for independent innovation with Chinese characteristics. All of this has carried forward the country's scientific and technological strength and capacity for innovation in leaps and bounds. In the early days of the People's Republic, even matches and iron nails had to be imported. China now leads the world in quantum communication, artificial intelligence and 5G technology. Its Shenzhou manned spacecraft and Tiangong space lab are orbiting the earth. The rover Zhurong has landed on Mars and is engaged in scientific exploration. Its manned submersible, Jiaolong, dived to the deep sea. All of these serve to demonstrate how China has significantly improved its independent scientific and technological capabilities. In the process of socialist modernization, the Party has led the people in realizing coordinated material, political, cultural, social and eco-environmental progress, pioneering a new and distinctively Chinese path to modernization, creating a new model for human progress, and refuting the myth that modernization can be achieved only by following the capitalist model. One of the basic reasons for the Party's success is its adherence to the principles of independence and self-reliance. It follows its own path in managing China's affairs in accordance with the country's own realities and characteristics. The Chinese people have the courage, confidence, and ability to manage their own affairs well. Emancipating the mind, seeking truth from facts and moving forward with unrelenting courage. In all of its endeavors in revolution, reconstruction and reform, the CPC has always proceeded from reality rather than placing its faith in books or established authority. It has constantly explored new paths, free from hidebound restrictions and proscriptive models. In its long-term leadership of economic development, the Party has adopted the basic principles of Marxist political economics and applied them in China's realities, shifting from a model of pure public ownership to a model where public ownership plays the dominant role alongside economic entities under diverse forms of ownership. It is committed to consolidating and developing the public sector of the economy, and to encouraging, supporting, and guiding the non-public sector of the economy. The economic system has been reformed from a traditional planned economy to a socialist market economy, so that the market can play a decisive rather than a supportive role in resource allocation, while the government can fulfill its role better. This has ensured that the lifelines of the Chinese economy remain firmly in the hands of the Party and the people, and that economic development serves the interests of the people and the country. Market entities can be more innovative, and the productive forces have been unleashed and allowed to develop. Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, China's reform has entered uncharted waters and encountered new problems. The Party has shown tremendous political courage, enacting more than 2,400 measures to remove deep-rooted obstacles, and promoting further comprehensive reform. This has achieved decisive results in key areas and boosted the driving forces of development. In pursuing reform, the Party encourages bold experiments and innovation while making sure that progress continues in the right direction. The basis of reform has always been upholding and improving socialism with Chinese characteristics and modernizing the country's system and capacity for governance. Pressing ahead with reform and development while maintaining the stability of the country, it has rejected both the old and rigid closed-door policy, and any attempt to abandon socialism in favor of some erroneous path. Understanding, grasping and following the laws of development. The ability to grasp and follow the objective laws of development is an important skill for a progressive Marxist party. The CPC has continued to expand its understanding of governance by a communist party, the development of socialism, and the evolution of human society, and to apply them in practice as a guide for action. In developing socialism, the Party has constantly asked and answered a series of key questions, such as: "What is socialism?" "How should we build socialism?" "What kind of a political party should the CPC be?" "How should we build the CPC?" "What kind of development should we pursue?" "How should we pursue this development?" "What is socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era?" "How should we uphold and develop this socialism?" It has given a series of new answers that have enriched and developed scientific socialism, and gained a much deeper understanding of the essence and nature of socialism, such as: "Poverty is not socialism. Development that is too slow is not socialism, either." "The nature of socialism is to release and develop the productive forces, eliminate exploitation and polarization, and achieve common prosperity." "Achieving common prosperity is the essential requirement of socialism." The CPC has also gained a much deeper understanding of the process of building a socialist system, from establishing the basic socialist system in the early days of the PRC, through creating socialism with Chinese characteristics after the introduction of the reform and opening-up policy, to upholding and improving socialism with Chinese characteristics since the 18th CPC National Congress. Socialism with Chinese characteristics has matured with the completion of an overall framework of systems for state governance. The CPC has also come to a deeper understanding of the laws of economic and social development, as reflected by its shift from "fast and sound growth" to "sound and fast growth", from "economic growth" to "economic development", from "high-speed growth" to "high-quality development", from "accelerating development" to "equal emphasis on development and security", from "the vision of comprehensive, coordinated and sustainable development" to "the vision of innovation-based, coordinated, green, open and shared development". Since its 18th National Congress, the CPC has initiated the Five-sphere Integrated Plan, the Four-pronged Comprehensive Strategy, the Eight Clarifications [ The Eight Clarifications: that the overarching task of upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics is to realize socialist modernization and national rejuvenation, and on the basis of completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, a two-step approach should be taken to build China into a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful by the middle of the 21st century. that the principal challenge facing Chinese society in the new era is the gap between unbalanced and inadequate development and the growing expectation of the people for a better life, which requires further commitment to the people-centered philosophy of development, well-rounded human development, and common prosperity for everyone. that the overall plan for building socialism with Chinese characteristics is the Five-sphere Integrated Plan, and the overall strategy is the Four-pronged Comprehensive Strategy, with an emphasis on stronger confidence in the path, theory, system and culture of socialism with Chinese characteristics. that the overall goal of in-depth reform in every field is to improve and develop the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics and modernize China's system and capacity for governance. that the overall goal of comprehensively advancing law-based governance is to establish a system of socialist rule of law with Chinese characteristics and build a country of socialist rule of law. that the Party's goal of building a strong military in the new era is to build the armed forces of the people into world-class forces that obey the Party's command, can fight and win, and maintain excellent conduct. that major-country diplomacy with Chinese characteristics aims to foster a new type of international relations and build a global community of shared future. that the defining feature of socialism with Chinese characteristics is the leadership of the CPC; the greatest strength of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics is the leadership of the CPC; the Party is the highest force for political leadership, setting forth the general requirements for strengthening the Party in the new era and underlining the importance of reinforcing the Party's political foundations.] and the Fourteen Imperatives" [ The Fourteen Imperatives are: ensuring Party leadership over all endeavors, people-centered development, comprehensive and in-depth reform, a new vision for development, the people running the country, law-based governance, core socialist values, improvement of the people's lives through development, harmony between humanity and nature, a holistic approach to national security, absolute Party leadership over the people's forces, the principle of One Country, Two Systems for national reunification, the building of a global community of shared future, the full and rigorous implementation of the Party's discipline. The Fourteen Imperatives form the fundamental guideline that underpins the endeavors to uphold and develop socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era.], which exemplify the Party's new understanding of the nature of governance by a communist party, the development of socialism, and the evolution of human society. Socialism can solve problems that other social systems cannot, and can achieve sustained, well-rounded human development and common prosperity. After several decades, socialism in China is still at the primary stage. The Party's understanding and practical experience of socialism with Chinese characteristics is still very limited, with many more questions to answer and many more problems to solve. The Party will continue to explore how best to advance socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era by building a deeper understanding of its nature and laws. 4. Defusing Risks and Overcoming Challenges China has carried out its revolution, reconstruction and reform against a backdrop of both conventional and exceptional risks and challenges, from both inside and outside the Party, from both within China and abroad, and from both human society and nature. The CPC has led the people in defusing these risks and meeting these challenges with courage, confidence and resilience, while promoting the cause of socialism. It has secured and consolidated its position as the governing party, guaranteed national security, and ensured continuous and consistent development. The Party is always ready to protect against potential dangers even in times of peace. Founded in years of trial and tribulation and maturing in adversity, the CPC always keeps in mind the ancient wisdom that "One should be mindful of potential danger in times of peace, the risk of downfall in times of rise, and potential chaos in times of stability." In the years of revolutionary war, the CPC maintained a high level of vigilance during a life-and-death struggle, and grew in size and strength despite being menaced by formidable enemies. During reform and opening up, faced with frequent social conflicts and disputes, and major setbacks to world socialism, the CPC made it a priority to increase its ability to fend off threats, and successfully dealt with various risks and challenges. After its 18th National Congress, the CPC was fully aware of the major changes in the domestic and international environment. One of its major principles of governance is to be always on guard against potential dangers in times of peace. It has made national security its top priority in upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics. Always alert to the worst possible scenarios, the Party adopts proactive strategies and strives for the best results. In every historical period, the CPC has remained vigilant and clearheaded about the situation, seizing the initiative on every occasion and ensuring success in defusing risks and overcoming challenges. The Party meets major risks and challenges head-on. It never hesitates in taking resolute action to address risks and challenges that threaten its position as the governing party, or endanger the stability of state power, the core interests of the country, the fundamental interests of the people, or the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. Shortly after the founding of the PRC, in the face of threats and provocation by American imperialism, the CPC had the courage to resist US aggression and aid Korea, in defense of the motherland and at the cost of its own economic development. Victory in this war foiled the aggressors' attempt to suffocate the new-born PRC, and established a firm foothold for the country. After the launch of reform and opening up, the Party led the people through the political turbulence in 1989, the Asian financial crisis in 1997, the global financial crisis in 2008, and a succession of unprecedented natural disasters. It emerged victorious from the fight against the SARS epidemic in 2002 and the Wenchuan earthquake in 2008. It adopted resolute and lawful measures to quell the riots, robbery, arson and vandalism in Lhasa and Urumqi. It also resisted attempts to isolate, suppress and contain China by external political forces. Since 2012, faced with a sensitive and volatile international situation, and challenging tasks related to domestic reform, development and stability, the Party has placed equal emphasis on development and security, pursued a holistic approach to national security, and led the people in an effective response to major risks, challenges, obstacles and conflicts by exploring new opportunities and breaking new ground. It has promoted supply-side reform to stave off economic risks. It has implemented effective countermeasures in the economic and trade friction provoked by the US. It has won a strategic victory in the battle against the Covid-19 pandemic. It has taken a series of resolute measures to restore order in Hong Kong and ensure a turn for the better in the region. All of these actions have contributed to social stability in China and sound and sustained economic development. The rejuvenation of the Chinese nation will not be easily achieved. It cannot be achieved merely by beating drums and clanging gongs. There will be all kinds of foreseeable and unforeseeable difficulties on the way forward. The CPC is a major political party that has accumulated rich experience in the long-term struggle over the last hundred years, which has enabled it to withstand risks and address complex issues. No matter the difficulties, the Party will lead the people to final victory. On its centennial journey, the CPC has tempered its character with the courage to vanquish formidable enemies, defuse risks, and overcome challenges. This has become the Party's defining quality. All of its achievements are the results of the hard work of generations of Party members, and the base on which the cause will continue to prosper. The success of the Party in the past equips it to face the future with full confidence. III. Robust Leadership and Strong Governance China is a huge country with a large population and complex national conditions. In order to achieve independence, development, and prosperity it must have robust and decisive leadership. It is the CPC's solidarity and unity, its firm leadership, and its strong governance capability that have rallied and united hundreds of millions of the Chinese people and overcome a multitude of difficulties and crises. 1. A Strong Central Committee The CPC is a mature Marxist political party organized in accordance with the principle of democratic centralism [ This is a principle that combines centralism built on the basis of democracy with democracy under centralized guidance. Democratic centralism is the Party's fundamental organizational principle and leadership system.]. Upholding the authority of the Central Committee and its centralized leadership has always been one of the Party's fundamental operational principles. Democratic centralism involves Party members deferring to Party organizations, the minority deferring to the majority, lower-level Party organizations deferring to higher-level organizations, and the whole Party deferring to the Central Committee. This and upholding the authority of the Central Committee and its centralized leadership are strengths the Party has built from valuable experience gained during revolution, reconstruction and reform. Upholding the Central Committee's authority and its centralized leadership has led to smooth and steady progress in China, and ensures the CPC's position as the governing party and the country's long-term stability. The first generation of the CPC central collective leadership with Mao Zedong at the core united the whole Party and the people and led them on the revolutionary path, using rural areas to encircle the cities and seizing state power with military force. It was under its centralized leadership that the Party and the people completed the New Democratic Revolution, founded the People's Republic of China, succeeded in socialist revolution, established socialism as the country's basic system, and advanced socialist development. All of this led to success in the broadest and most profound social transformation in the history of the Chinese nation. It also laid down the political and institutional groundwork for all future progress and provided invaluable experience, a theoretical base, and the material conditions for Chinese socialism in the new historical period. After the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee in 1978, the second generation of the Party's central collective leadership with Deng Xiaoping at the core led the Party and the people in a historic shift of focus to economic development and reform and opening up. Based on its keen understanding of the essence of socialism, the Party established its basic line for the primary stage of socialism, made it clear that China must define its own approach in building socialism, and provided answers to a series of basic questions. This marked the creation of socialism with Chinese characteristics. After the Fourth Plenary Session of the 13th CPC Central Committee in 1989, the third generation of the Party's central collective leadership with Jiang Zemin at the core led the Party and the people in defending socialism with Chinese characteristics in a complex domestic and international situation and in the face of serious setbacks experienced by socialism worldwide. It established the objectives and framework of reform for developing the socialist market economy, and put in place basic economic and distribution systems in the primary stage of socialism, advancing Chinese socialism into the 21st century. After the 16th CPC National Congress in 2002, the Central Committee with Hu Jintao as general secretary led the Party and the people in promoting innovation in theory, practice, and systems in the course of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, with a focus on people-centered, all-round, coordinated, and sustainable development, and upholding and building socialism with Chinese characteristics, at a new historical point. Since the 18th CPC National Congress in 2012, the Central Committee with Xi Jinping at the core has led the Party and the people in pursuing a great struggle, a great project, a great cause, and a great dream, upholding and improving the Party's overall leadership, and implementing the Five-sphere Integrated Plan and the Four-pronged Comprehensive Strategy. The Party has made greater efforts to improve Chinese socialism, modernize the system and capacity for governing the country, and uphold socialism with Chinese characteristics. All of this has prompted historic shifts and led to historic achievements in the cause of the Party and the country, ushering Chinese socialism into a new era. The prospects of national rejuvenation are ever brighter. Since 2012, the CPC Central Committee has taken a series of effective measures to strengthen the overall leadership by the Party and uphold the authority of the Central Committee and its centralized leadership. The central leadership has emphasized that: (1)The Party exercises leadership over all areas of endeavor across the country and is the highest force for political leadership; (2)Upholding overall Party leadership means first and foremost upholding the authority of the Central Committee and its centralized leadership, which is the highest principle of the Party's leadership and the fundamental political discipline and rule; (3)It is important to strengthen the consciousness of the need to maintain political commitment, think in terms of the broader picture, follow the core leadership of the CPC Central Committee, and act in accordance with its requirements; to enhance confidence in the path, theory, system and culture of Chinese socialism; and to resolutely uphold General Secretary Xi Jinping's core position in the CPC Central Committee and in the Party as a whole. The 19th CPC National Congress in 2017 emphasized: "Leadership by the CPC is the defining feature of Chinese socialism and the greatest strength of this system. The Party is the highest force for political leadership." The congress confirmed this principle as a significant element of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, and this major political principle has been enshrined in the CPC Constitution. In 2018 the 13th National People's Congress adopted at its first session an amendment to the Constitution of the People's Republic of China. In addition to providing for the CPC's leading position in its Preamble, the amended Constitution explicitly stipulates in its General Principles that leadership by the Party is the defining feature of socialism with Chinese characteristics. To uphold the CPC Central Committee's authority and its centralized leadership through concrete actions, the CPC has improved its leadership system and its working mechanism. The Central Committee has issued a series of regulations to this end: ensuring Party organizations and initiatives cover all areas; improving the system by which the Central Committee exercises leadership over major tasks; strengthening the roles and functions of relevant Central Committee offices in decision-making, deliberation and coordination, and improving the mechanism by which the Central Committee's major decisions are implemented; strictly enforcing the system by which all important issues are promptly reported; developing practical measures and making institutional arrangements to implement the principle of upholding the Central Committee's authority and its centralized leadership. In recent years, the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee has held dedicated meetings to hear annual work reports of CPC leadership groups of the NPC Standing Committee, the State Council, the CPPCC National Committee, the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, and the report of the CPC Central Committee Secretariat. Each member of the Political Bureau has submitted a written work report to the Central Committee and General Secretary Xi Jinping every year. This has been one of the institutional arrangements for strengthening and upholding the Central Committee's centralized leadership. To uphold the Central Committee's authority and its centralized leadership, a robust leadership core is the top priority. During the New Democratic Revolution, it was at the Zunyi Conference in 1935 that Mao Zedong was confirmed as the de facto leader of the Party Central Committee and the Red Army, and the Party's first central collective leadership with Mao Zedong at the core took shape. This move circumvented a serious threat to China's revolution and resulted in positive progress. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, with Xi Jinping at the core of the Central Committee, the Party, the country, the people, the military, and the whole Chinese nation have made unprecedented headway. Over the past hundred years since its founding in 1921, the CPC has been able to build consensus among its members on the way forward and take concerted actions; the fundamental reason for this is its robust leadership core, which has played a unique and irreplaceable role in leading the Party to grow stronger despite all the difficulties it has encountered. Both history and reality have shown to us that only with a firm and effective leadership core can the Central Committee exert authority and the Party remain strong. Upholding the leadership core of the CPC in no way involves the creation of any kind of personality cult something the CPC has resolutely opposed ever since it was first founded. The Party's Constitution explicitly stipulates that "The Party proscribes all forms of personality cult." The Party leadership core never wields unlimited power or engages in decision-making at will; instead, it takes on heavy responsibilities in steering the Party and the country. The CPC is organized on the basis of democratic centralism, so its leadership core functions by that principle, observes the system of collective leadership, and acts within the scope of the country's Constitution and the law. The Party leadership core does not emerge through entitlement; it is not self-proclaimed. It comes into being through long-term experience under sound leadership and as a common choice of the whole Party and the whole country. China's history, which dates back thousands of years, and its revolution, reconstruction and reform have fully demonstrated that only with a robust centralized authority to maintain unity of the whole country and rally the people can the nation achieve long-term peace, stability, and prosperity, and the people work and live in contentment. Centralized leadership by the Party serves the best interests of the Chinese people, suits China's national conditions, and conforms to traditional Chinese culture. This is an invaluable understanding that the Chinese people have gained through years of CPC leadership. There is a common purpose behind the conscious commitment of the Party and the Chinese people to uphold the authority of the Central Committee and its centralized leadership, and to protect and be loyal to the leadership core. 2. Sound Guidelines and Strategies Robust leadership comes from sound leadership; sound leadership comes from rational policymaking. For a party as large as the CPC, policymaking is its lifeline. Over the past hundred years, at every historic juncture, the CPC has been able to analyze the situation from an overall, objective and forward-looking perspective, and set forth practical goals, tasks, policies and roadmaps. It is the Party's sound guidelines that have enabled it to carry out its work in a well-organized and systematic manner. The CPC is adept at formulating sound guidelines, principles and policies. At different historical stages, the Party has succeeded in devising the right policies based on an accurate analysis of domestic and international developments. In the early years of the CPC, at its Second National Congress in 1922, the Party set forth its primary platform of achieving national independence and establishing a democratic republic, and its ultimate goal of realizing socialism and communism, pointing out the direction for a two-step Chinese revolution. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the Party identified the correct path towards ultimate success, adopting the strategy of total resistance and protracted war. During the Socialist Revolution, the Party devised the general guideline for the transition period [ In 1953, the CPC Central Committee adopted the Party's general guideline for the transition period from the founding of the PRC in 1949 to the completion of socialist transformation. The master plan was to realize socialist industrialization and transformation of agriculture, craft industries, and capitalist industry and commerce step by step over a considerable period of time.], mapping out the road towards socialism. After the adoption of reform and opening up, at its 13th National Congress in 1987, the Party formulated the basic guidelines for the primary stage of socialism One Central Task, Two Basic Points [ In 1987, at its 13th National Congress, the CPC specified its basic guidelines for building socialism with Chinese characteristics in the primary stage to unite with and lead the people of all ethnic groups, take economic development as the central task, uphold the Four Cardinal Principles (the socialist road, the people's democratic dictatorship, the CPC's leadership, and Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought), and uphold the policy of reform and opening up, be self-reliant, hard working and enterprising, to build China into a prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced and modern socialist country. ] to keep socialism with Chinese characteristics progressing on the right track. After its 18th National Congress, in accordance with its basic theories, guidelines and policies, the Party specified the measures for upholding and developing Chinese socialism in the new era, proposing the Five-sphere Integrated Plan for coordinating economic, political, cultural, social and eco-environmental progress, and the Four-pronged Comprehensive Strategy for achieving moderate prosperity, furthering reform, advancing the rule of law and strengthening Party self-governance. It is due to sound policymaking that the great cause of the CPC has remained on the right course, the CPC has rational guidelines to follow, the Chinese people have been able to enjoy tangible benefits, and the entire Chinese nation has forged a strong synergy to pursue shared dreams and aspirations. The CPC is adept at formulating time-phased development goals and strategies. To achieve its long-range goals, the Party has adopted progressive tactics defining time-phased objectives and roadmaps and achieving successes in steps. In the 1960s, after the Socialist Revolution had been completed and initial success in socialist development had been made, the Party set the goal of achieving the Four Modernizations of industry, agriculture, national defense, and science and technology by the end of the 20th century, and to this end devised a Two-stage Plan on Economic Development [ In the 1960s, the CPC Central Committee issued a Two-stage Plan on Economic Development, effective since 1966, the first year of the Third Five-year Plan (1966-1970) period: The first stage was to build an independent and relatively comprehensive industrial and economic system by 1980; and the second stage was to achieve modernization of agriculture, industry, national defense, and science and technology by the end of the 20th century, bringing China to the forefront of the global economy.]. In the early stages of reform and opening up, the Party set the goal of providing a relatively comfortable life for the people by the end of the 20th century. In the mid-1980s, the Party formulated a Three-step Strategy for Economic Development [ In 1987, at its 13th National Congress, the CPC put forward a Three-step Strategy for Economic Development: The first step was to double the 1980 GNP by the end of the 1980s, to ensure the people have adequate food and clothing; the second step was to quadruple the 1980 GNP by the end of the 20th century, to ensure the people live a relatively comfortable life; and the third step was to increase the per capita GNP to the level of moderately developed countries by the mid-21st century, to ensure the people live a well-off life and basically achieve modernization. ] to meet this goal. In the mid-1990s, the Party proposed a New Three-step Strategy for Economic Development [ In 1997, at its 15th National Congress, the CPC proposed a New Three-step Strategy for Economic Development: The first step was to double the 2000 GNP by 2010, to ensure the people live a better-off life and form a relatively complete system of socialist market economy; the second step was to achieve greater economic growth and establish more complete systems and institutions by 2020; and the third step was to realize basic modernization and build China into a prosperous, strong, democratic and culturally advanced socialist country by the mid-21st century, when the PRC would celebrate its centenary in 2049. ] to meet this goal. Entering the new century, the Party proposed to build a well-off society of a higher standard in an all-round way to the benefit of well over one billion people in the first two decades of the 21st century. In 2012, at its 18th National Congress, the Party set the goal of achieving moderate prosperity in all respects by 2021 when the CPC would celebrate its centenary. In 2017, at its 19th National Congress, the Party set the goals of building on moderate prosperity in all respects to realize basic socialist modernization by 2035, and turning China into a strong, prosperous and modern socialist country by the mid-21st century. The CPC has worked to see that the above goals and plans remain consistent, but are always adaptable to changing realities and new developments. Centralized leadership by the Party is one of China's political strengths. It enables the Party to formulate time-phased objectives based on long-range plans. It makes it possible to balance overall with particular interests, and long-term with immediate interests, to forge unity among all social forces to achieve common goals, and to ensure consistency in the implementation of state laws and policies. A step-by-step approach to policymaking has for many years brought China ever closer to the goals of socialist modernization. The CPC is adept at spearheading development and overcoming challenges through systematic planning. The mechanism of Five-year Plans on National Economic and Social Development has proven successful. Five years is an appropriate time span to ensure consistency in policymaking and to plan and accomplish major programs and projects. Since the implementation of the First Five-year Plan (1953-1957), the CPC has introduced a total of 14 such plans, with the 14th Five-year Plan (20212025) now under way. In the 1990s, the Party launched a mechanism of Ten-year Outline Programs to anticipate general trends of economic development in the next decade or the foreseeable future. The purpose is to set long-range goals, provide a framework for the Five-year Plans, and make the plans more future-oriented. In preparing Five-year Plans, the Party conducts in-depth research and many rounds of extensive consultations. To implement its time-phased plans and programs, a system of national planning guided by the country's overall development strategies has been established. This system divides overall goals into sub-goals in different categories and at various levels to ensure coordinated nationwide development. The system has expanded from social and economic fields to other areas of state governance. With proactive plans and feasible measures, the Party has succeeded in eliminating both "grand words and no concrete action" on long-range goals, and blinkered carthorses feverishly dragging their loads with no real idea of where they are heading. The CPC is adept at conducting pilot programs before launching nationwide reform measures. In addressing issues vital to the economy, development and people's wellbeing, the Party opposes both conservative thinking and impetuous actions, preferring to seek practical, balanced and steady progress while encouraging bold experiments and breakthroughs. Confirming long-term development goals and implementing related policies is always preceded by small-scale pilot programs. Within the policy framework of the central government, regional pilot programs are conducted to work out specific methods, through testing, modifying and then wider application, for the implementation of a particular national policy. These specific methods, if successful, will be gradually replicated by other localities. The Party's reform initiatives are implemented through national legislation so as to ensure their legal basis and assist their smooth and effective application. The Party attaches great importance to the rule of law and considers it a guarantee for consolidating the foundations of the Party's governance, meeting people's expectations, and maintaining long-term development. Successful reform measures are codified into state laws and policies in a timely manner. To mitigate the risks of any social instability or other problems that might arise from the ill-judged nationwide rollout of a pilot program, the Party conducts timely analysis of the results of the pilot and makes the appropriate policy adjustments. The Party has launched a series of major reform initiatives through pilot programs, including: special economic zones, China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, Xiong'an New Area, Shenzhen Pilot Demonstration Zone for Chinese Socialism, Pudong Leading Pilot Zone for Socialist Modernization Through High-level Reform and Opening Up, Zhejiang Demonstration Zone for Common Prosperity Through High-quality Development. The pilot approach has ensured that vigorous reform can make steady progress. It has made national policies more creative and adaptable, and facilitated positive interaction between the policymaking of central government and the innovative initiatives of local government. Through constant experiment and practice, China has created a positive cycle promoting reform through pilot programs, propelling development through reform, maintaining stability through development, and winning public support for reform by sharing the fruits of development achievements with the people. 3. Effective Implementation of Decisions and Plans If there were no strong organizational support and disciplinary restraints, the CPC would become fragmented and remain weak in spite of its massive size. Over the past hundred years, the Party has been consistent in building its organization, tightening its discipline and strengthening the rule of law. It has united tens of millions of Party members and organized hundreds of millions of Chinese people, thereby ensuring that its decisions and plans are implemented in a timely, resolute and forceful manner. The CPC has built an organizational system featuring unimpeded communication and effective policy implementation at all levels. Prior to and during the creation of the CPC, its founders aimed to establish a strong and tightly-knit organization. Over the years, the Party has established a sound and complete structure consisting of the central, local and grassroots units. The highest leading bodies of the Party are the National Congress, and the Central Committee which it elects. The Central Committee, the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, and the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau are like the brain and nerve center of a body. The Central Committee is responsible for formulating the Party's policies and guidelines. Therefore, it has the authority to make the final decisions. Local Party organizations are responsible for implementing the Central Committee's decisions and plans in their respective areas, and for reporting feedback and suggestions from grassroots Party organizations and Party members to the Central Committee. Hence they are important intermediate links helping realize the smooth transmission and implementation of policies. There are more than 4.86 million grassroots Party organizations, widely distributed in enterprises, villages, Party and government institutions, schools, research institutes, sub-districts, communities, social organizations, military units and other grassroots entities. They are like the nerve endings of the Party, responsible for implementing, at the relevant level, the decisions and plans of the Central Committee and the Party organizations at each successive level up. They also collect and report the concerns and suggestions of Party members and the people. More than 95 million Party members also play an exemplary role in grassroots organizations. With such an extensive, well-knit and strong organizational system, the Central Committee can command with flexibility and efficiency the subordinate Party organizations just as the brain employs the arms and the arms employ the fingers. This is why the Party's policies, guidelines, decisions and plans are implemented fully and rapidly at the grassroots. This is why the Party's organizations and members keep close ties with the people and constantly reinforce the foundations of the Party's governance. The CPC has strict discipline and rules. Discipline is the lifeline of the Party. Without strict discipline, there would be no unity and solidarity in the Party, policies would not be communicated and implemented smoothly, and the Party's cohesiveness and leadership would be seriously weakened. In the years of revolutionary war, convinced that "the army will win all battles in revolution as long as discipline is strengthened", the Party issued the Three Main Rules of Discipline and the Eight Points for Attention [ The Three Main Rules of Discipline and the Eight Points for Attention were formulated by Mao Zedong and other Party and military leaders for the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army during the Agrarian Revolutionary War (1927-1937). Later, they were applied to the Eighth Route Army, the New Fourth Army and the People's Liberation Army (PLA). The contents varied slightly in different military units and different periods of history. In October 1947, they were unified and reissued by the General Headquarters of the PLA. The Three Main Rules of Discipline are as follows: (1) Obey orders in all your actions; (2) Do not take a single needle or piece of thread from the people; (3) Turn in everything that is captured. The Eight Points for Attention are as follows: (1) Speak politely; (2) Pay fairly for what you buy; (3) Return everything you borrow; (4) Pay for anything you damage; (5) Do not hit or swear at people; (6) Do not damage crops; (7) Do not take liberties with women; (8) Do not ill-treat captives.]. It used these to reinforce its internal unity and win popular support. After the beginning of reform and opening up, in response to the adverse impact of bourgeois liberalization and the decadent Western lifestyle, the Party proposed that unity depends on ideals and discipline, and made great efforts to strengthen discipline. Since its 18th National Congress, the CPC has employed the enforcement of discipline as an essential tool in its full and rigorous self-governance. It has prioritized its efforts to enforce strict political discipline and rules, and is committed to running itself with rigor by forming a sound system of Party regulations. It has strengthened guidance and management of Party members, and strictly investigated and punished violations of discipline and rules. As a result, the principle of observing the Party's constitution, discipline and rules has become more firmly established. Strict discipline and rules and a sound organizational system ensure that the sophisticated machine of the Party runs efficiently, with all its parts well-coordinated, generating a powerful force. The CPC ensures that its leadership is followed in all aspects of state governance. As a governing party, the CPC exercises governance and realizes its goals by establishing and improving the state governance system. By exercising leadership over departments running state power, and embodying its leadership in the design, setup and functioning of state power systems and institutions, the Party has effectively integrated its views with the will of the state. The Party actively supports the work of the government in accordance with the Constitution and other laws. With the Party supervising officials and exercising leadership over staff, the CPC selects talented people of integrity and ability, and recommends candidates for leadership positions in government in accordance with statutory procedures. The Party exercises leadership over the state and society through the agencies of state power, and thus ensures that its decisions are implemented in the governance of the country. The Party establishes Party committees or Party leadership groups in government agencies, public institutions, people's organizations, social groups, enterprises and other entities, and places them under the unified leadership of the Party organizations at the next level up. The Party sets up and improves Party organizations in non-public economic entities and social organizations, to ensure that its leadership reaches all social undertakings. Since its 18th National Congress, the CPC has further reformed Party and government institutions, and conducted thorough and systematic restructuring of the organization and management of the Party and the government. As a result, the Party's leadership system and the government's administrative system have improved, and the leadership of the Party and the government's capacity to deliver have been strengthened. The integration of the Party leadership's political strengths and the government's institutional strengths unites the Party, the government and the people behind shared goals, interests and aspirations. This generates a huge cohesive force, keeps internal differences to a minimum, and significantly raises the efficiency of state governance. This is a clear manifestation of the institutional strengths of socialism with Chinese characteristics. The CPC ensures effective implementation of its policies through the rule of law. Respecting and practicing the rule of law are essential to good governance and the implementation of the Party's policies. The CPC is committed to law-based governance and always applies law-based thinking and approaches to consolidate its governing status, improve its approach to governance, and strengthen its governance capability. During the New Democratic Revolution, the Party supervised the formulation and implementation of laws on land, marriage, labor, finance and other matters in the Central Soviet Area, the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region and other areas under its rule. After founding the PRC, the Party applied its successful experience in introducing a new legal system in base areas during the New Democratic Revolution, and laid the foundations of socialist rule of law. After the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, the Party reviewed the experience and lessons it had learned in building democracy and the legal system. It used this review to accelerate the implementation of socialist rule of law and establish law-based governance as the basic means of governing the country, and law-based exercise of state power as the basic tool for governance. Since the 18th National Congress, to consolidate its position as the governing party and ensure lasting peace and stability, the CPC has emphasized the importance of the rule of law. Comprehensively advancing the rule of law is one prong of the Four-pronged Comprehensive Strategy. The Party provides guidance for legislation, guarantees law enforcement, supports judicial justice, and plays an exemplary role in abiding by the law. It holds that respecting the Constitution is essential to law-based governance. The Party is improving its working mechanisms for exercising law-based governance to ensure effective implementation of its policies through the law, and to modernize China's governance system and capacity. 4. Pooling the Efforts of All Sectors The CPC is strong because it has always placed the united front in an important position. It has ensured great unity and solidarity, and balanced commonality and diversity. It has strengthened theoretical and political guidance, built broad consensus, brought together the brightest minds, and expanded common ground and the convergence of interests. It has always consolidated and developed the broadest possible front, combining all the forces that can be united, mobilizing all positive factors, and pooling as much strength as possible for collective endeavors. The patriotic united front is an important means for the Party to unite all the sons and daughters of the Chinese nation, both at home and abroad, behind the goal of national rejuvenation. The CPC has united with and pooled the efforts of all sectors to defeat powerful enemies. During the Great Revolution (1924-1927), the Party actively called for cooperation with the KMT, which resulted in a nationalist revolutionary united front, striking a blow against foreign imperialist forces in China and ending the reactionary rule of the Northern Warlords. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the CPC campaigned for a national united front. Workers, peasants, urban petty bourgeoisie, national bourgeoisie, overseas Chinese, and some landlords and compradors answered the call in various ways, waging an all- Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 00:17:57|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson on Wednesday urged the United States to stop political manipulation on the issue of coronavirus origins tracing, saying the United States should invite WHO experts to launch a probe into Fort Detrick and the University of North Carolina (UNC) to find the source of the virus if it is bent on insisting the lab-leak theory. Spokesperson Wang Wenbin made the remarks at a daily press briefing after the Permanent Representative of China to the United Nations Office at Geneva and other International Organizations in Switzerland wrote to the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), and submitted two non-papers on Fort Detrick and UNC, as well as an open letter signed by netizens demanding an investigation into Fort Detrick. Wang said China's stand on global origins tracing is consistent and clear, adding the issue is a science-based one, and China always supports and will continue participating in science-based origins tracing. The conclusions and recommendations of the China-WHO joint study report have been recognized by the international community and the scientific community, and must be respected and implemented, Wang said, adding that future global origins study should and can only be carried out on this basis. The Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) has received WHO experts twice. It is extremely unlikely that the novel coronavirus was leaked from the WIV -- this is the clear conclusion of the China-WHO joint study report, the spokesperson said. Those who insist that the possibility of a lab-leak cannot be ruled out should investigate Fort Detrick and the UNC in the principle of fairness and justice. Wang said the international community, including the American public, has long held concerns over the illegal, non-transparent, and unsafe activities of Fort Detrick, citing bio-safety incidents in 2019 that led to the shutting down of the lab and the ensuing outbreaks of illnesses with similar symptoms of COVID-19. For the UNC, the spokesperson pointed out the Baric team leads the world in researches in this field and has already advanced capabilities to synthesize and modify coronavirus. "We hope the international community can work hand in hand to resist the backlash of politicization and bring the origins study back to the right track of scientific cooperation," Wang added. Also on Wednesday, Fu Cong, director-general of the Department of Arms Control of the Foreign Ministry, said the United States, while clamoring for an investigation into other countries' bio-medical labs, is the only country standing in the way of establishing a multilateral verification mechanism under the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). "I wonder if the U.S. obsession with Chinese biological labs signifies a change in its position on a verification protocol. Simply put, is the U.S. government ready to withdraw its opposition to the negotiations of a verification protocol under the BWC?" Fu said the litmus test would come as early as next week when the Meetings of the States Parties to the BWC takes place in Geneva. "China will once again call for the restart of negotiations on a verification protocol," Fu added. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 00:28:28|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- China will increase fiscal and tax support to promote high-quality development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, a State Council executive meeting said on Wednesday. The meeting, chaired by Premier Li Keqiang, also reviewed and adopted an outline for women's development in China during the 2021-2030 period and an outline for children's development in China during the 2021-2030 period. Efforts should be made to support ecological conservation in provinces and cities along the Yangtze River and coordinate protection and restoration of the ecology of mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands, said the meeting. Fishing in pivotal waters of the Yangtze River should be banned, and efforts should go into helping fishermen who relinquished their nets as required by a 10-year fishing moratorium, the meeting said. Provinces and cities along the Yangtze River should be encouraged to build pilot free trade zones and comprehensive bonded zones, the meeting said. It underlined supporting small and medium-sized enterprises to explore the international market and promoting the transformation and upgrading of foreign trade. The meeting noted that remarkable achievements have been made in the development of women and children in China in recent years. The outlines set out objectives and measures in areas including health, education, social security and welfare, family, the environment and the law, and require implementing the fundamental national policy of gender equality. Women's equal rights to education, employment, starting businesses, and participating in decision-making and management must be protected, the outlines said. The social security system and the legal system should be improved to meet women's needs and protect their lawful rights and interests, the outlines noted. More attention should go to protecting children in families, schools, society, and on the internet. Compulsory education will remain the top priority of education investment, said the outlines. Support measures for the three-child policy should be improved and multiple measures will be introduced to reduce the burden of childbearing, parenting, and education on families, the outlines noted. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 03:15:14|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close People queue up to board a military aircraft of the United States and leave Kabul at Kabul airport, Afghanistan, Aug. 22, 2021. (Xinhua) Spain's Minister of Defense Margarita Robles said there was "no doubt" the West had "failed the Afghan people." The minister also lamented the attitude of U.S. President Joe Biden, who continues to insist that American troops will leave Kabul on Aug. 31. MADRID, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Spain's Minister of Defense Margarita Robles said on Wednesday there was "no doubt" the West had "failed the Afghan people," as Spain and other western powers struggle to evacuate as many people from Kabul following the Taliban takeover. A steady stream of aircraft carrying refugees has been arriving at the Spanish Air Force base at Torrejon de Ardoz in recent days, but despite the efforts of Spanish troops who "are putting their lives at risk," Robles admitted "a lot of people are going to be left behind." The Defense Minister explained that the Spanish troops in Kabul were restricted by the fact they could not act beyond the airport. She also lamented the attitude of U.S. President Joe Biden, who continues to insist that American troops will leave Kabul on Aug. 31. "We won't be able to get any more people out, and we are aware of the human drama ... We will be there as long as necessary," said Robles. Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 04:30:19|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi (R) meets with Serbian Foreign Minister Nikola Selakovic in Amman, Jordan, on Aug. 25, 2021. Jordan and Serbia on Wednesday agreed to form a working group to enhance bilateral cooperation in various fields, Jordan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. (Photo by Mohammad Abu Ghosh/Xinhua) AMMAN, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Jordan and Serbia on Wednesday agreed to form a working group to enhance bilateral cooperation in various fields, Jordan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi discussed in Amman with visiting Serbian counterpart Nikola Selakovic the international efforts to return to serious and effective peace talks between the Palestinians and Israel based on the two-state solution. The two ministers also reviewed efforts to resolve the Syrian crisis and to ensure the continuation of international support for refugees and developments in Lebanon. The Serbian minister praised the Jordanian role and its efforts to achieve a just and comprehensive peace in the region. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 07:43:41|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A staff member installs a video monitoring system for the highest water level of the Miyun Reservoir in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 25, 2021. As of 8 a.m. Beijing time on Tuesday, the water storage volume of the Miyun Reservoir in Beijing reached 3.371 billion cubic meters, a record high. Built in 1960, the reservoir has a total storage capacity of 4.375 billion cubic meters. (Xinhua/Li Xin) Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 08:58:36|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Afghan refugees arrive at Mexico City International Airport in Mexico City, Mexico, Aug. 25, 2021. The Mexican government is participating in a humanitarian program to relocate Afghan refugees, said Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard on Wednesday. (Photo by Francisco Canedo/Xinhua) MEXICO CITY, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Mexican government is participating in a humanitarian program to relocate Afghan refugees, said Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard on Wednesday. "In keeping with Mexico's tradition in favor of refuge," the Latin American country "has decided to support requests of a humanitarian nature -- refuge, asylum, humanitarian visa -- for people in Afghanistan," said Ebrard. The official was on hand early Wednesday when some 130 Afghans, mainly media workers who applied for humanitarian visas and their families, arrived at the Mexico City International Airport, following a 20-hour flight aboard a Qatar Air Force plane. While all lives are important, this group "represents many values associated with freedom of the press and freedom of information," said Ebrard. A day earlier, Mexico received a small group of female students in a bid to support women and young girls from Afghanistan. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 10:46:53|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close The Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee releases a document titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions" at a press conference in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 26, 2021. (Xinhua/Jin Liangkuai) BEIJING, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee on Thursday released a key publication on the Party's mission and contributions. The document, titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions," stressed that over the past hundred years, all the struggles, sacrifices and efforts made by the CPC and by the Chinese people under its leadership have been directed to one goal -- the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. It added that "achieving national rejuvenation is the historic mission of the CPC," and the Party "has made an unbreakable commitment to bring the people a happy life." It also pointed out that the CPC is dedicated to the people and forever puts their interests first. It said the CPC follows the underlying trends of social development and respects the people's principal role in making history. The CPC pursues the lofty goal of working for the wellbeing of the Chinese people, and it does everything in the interests of the people, the document said. The document said that Marxism is the single guiding ideology, the very soul of the CPC, and the banner under which it strives. According to the document, in order to achieve independence, development, and prosperity, the CPC must have robust and decisive leadership. "It is the CPC's solidarity and unity, its firm leadership, and its strong governance capability that have rallied and united hundreds of millions of the Chinese people and overcome a multitude of difficulties and crises," it said. Also, the document said the CPC has always been able to maintain vigor and vitality and stand at the forefront of the times despite the many hardships it has endured in the past hundred years. This is because the Party has constantly engaged in significant self-reform while leading the people in a great social revolution. To maintain its health and vigor, the CPC exercises effective self-supervision, practices strict self-discipline in every respect, consistently pursues improvement, and advances with the times, the document said. Moreover, it stressed that the CPC is a political party that seeks happiness for the people and progress for humanity. The CPC has always pursued the shared human values of peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy and freedom. It has championed internationalism, stood on the right side of history and the progressive side of humanity, and contributed to world peace and development. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 11:09:31|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close by Matthew Rusling WASHINGTON, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Overlapping crises arising from a chaotic exit of U.S. troops from Afghanistan and an appalling surge in COVID-19 cases have engulfed the White House. The United States hopes to complete its Afghan evacuation by the end of this month, President Joe Biden said during a Group of Seven (G7) virtual meeting on Tuesday, while he has asked for the creation of contingency plans to adjust the timeline if necessary. The remarks came after Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns reportedly held a secret meeting with Taliban senior leader Abdul Ghani Baradar on Monday in Kabul. A Taliban spokesman has said the United States should pull out all troops and contractors from Afghanistan before the deadline. Biden is facing pressure to extend the evacuations beyond the deadline. U.S. House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff told reporters on Monday that "it's hard for me to imagine all of that can be accomplished between now and the end of the month." In April, Biden ordered all U.S. troops to leave Afghanistan before Sept. 11, the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks that drew Washington into its longest war, before bringing forward the deadline in July to Aug. 31. "The Biden administration seems to feel it important for reasons of domestic politics or international credibility, or perhaps obligation to the Taliban......to keep to this artificial deadline," Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow at U.S. think tank Brookings Institution. The United States has been scrambling to airlift Americans and its Afghan allies from the country since the Taliban entered the capital Kabul on Aug. 15. Around 21,600 individuals were evacuated during a 24 hour-period ending early Tuesday morning, according to the White House. In total, approximately 58,700 people had left the country since Aug. 14. As the Biden administration continues to be criticized over the Afghanistan fallout, it is also struggling to deal with a surge in COVID-19 cases in the United States. The current seven-day moving average of daily new cases in the United States stands at 133,056, an increase of 14 percent compared with the previous average, according to the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) weekly report. The combined proportion of cases attributed to Delta variant, which is coursing through regions of the United States where many residents refuse to be vaccinated or haven't received the vaccine shots, is estimated to have increased to 98.8 percent nationally, the report showed. If the overwhelming majority of Americans get vaccinated, the United States could get the pandemic under control by the spring of 2022, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN during an interview on Monday. As of Tuesday, 51.6 percent of the total U.S. population were fully vaccinated, CDC data showed. With the Delta variant, plus the Afghanistan fiasco on his plate, Biden must tread carefully if he wishes to pass his agenda, according to experts. "There clearly have been many problems in how things have gone, so Biden has to reassure Americans and the rest of the world that he can make adjustments, handle unexpected developments, and deal with the people who want to get out," said Darrell West, also a Brookings Institution senior fellow. "If he can recoup lost ground and move things forward, his agenda should move forward," West argued. "But it is important that he handles both Delta and Afghanistan in ways that are effective. He has a lot riding on the next few weeks." Congressional Democrats are trying to advance Biden's economic package on Capitol Hill. Biden's overall job-approval rating has dipped below 50 percent among adults for the first time in his early presidency, according to a new NBC News poll released on Sunday. The polls showed 49 percent of adults approve of Biden's overall job performance, while 48 percent disapprove. The poll also found fewer Americans support the Democrat's handling of COVID-19 than they did last spring, and just a quarter of respondents approve of his handling of Afghanistan. It's all produced a "summer of discontent" for Biden, said Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates, who conducted the survey with Republican pollster Bill McInturff of Public Opinion Strategies. "The promise of April has led to the peril of August," Horwitt said, pointing out that the pandemic -- more than Afghanistan -- has dented Biden's numbers. "It is the domestic storm, COVID's delta wave, that is causing more difficulties at this stage here at home and for President Biden." Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 13:18:27|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close File photo taken on Aug. 16, 2021 shows people gathering at the Kabul airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Xinhua) As the Biden administration continues to be criticized over the Afghanistan fallout, it is also struggling to deal with a surge in COVID-19 cases in the United States. by Matthew Rusling WASHINGTON, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Overlapping crises arising from a chaotic exit of U.S. troops from Afghanistan and an appalling surge in COVID-19 cases have engulfed the White House. The United States hopes to complete its Afghan evacuation by the end of this month, President Joe Biden said during a Group of Seven (G7) virtual meeting on Tuesday, while he has asked for the creation of contingency plans to adjust the timeline if necessary. The remarks came after Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns reportedly held a secret meeting with Taliban senior leader Abdul Ghani Baradar on Monday in Kabul. A Taliban spokesman has said the United States should pull out all troops and contractors from Afghanistan before the deadline. Biden is facing pressure to extend the evacuations beyond the deadline. U.S. House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff told reporters on Monday that "it's hard for me to imagine all of that can be accomplished between now and the end of the month." In April, Biden ordered all U.S. troops to leave Afghanistan before Sept. 11, the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks that drew Washington into its longest war, before bringing forward the deadline in July to Aug. 31. File photo taken on Aug. 22, 2021 shows foreign forces entering the Kabul airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Xinhua) "The Biden administration seems to feel it important for reasons of domestic politics or international credibility, or perhaps obligation to the Taliban......to keep to this artificial deadline," Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow at U.S. think tank Brookings Institution. The United States has been scrambling to airlift Americans and its Afghan allies from the country since the Taliban entered the capital Kabul on Aug. 15. Around 21,600 individuals were evacuated during a 24 hour-period ending early Tuesday morning, according to the White House. In total, approximately 58,700 people had left the country since Aug. 14. As the Biden administration continues to be criticized over the Afghanistan fallout, it is also struggling to deal with a surge in COVID-19 cases in the United States. People wait in line to receive the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine at a mobile vaccine clinic in the Brooklyn borough of New York, United States, Aug. 23, 2021. (Photo by Michael Nagle/Xinhua) The current seven-day moving average of daily new cases in the United States stands at 133,056, an increase of 14 percent compared with the previous average, according to the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) weekly report. The combined proportion of cases attributed to Delta variant, which is coursing through regions of the United States where many residents refuse to be vaccinated or haven't received the vaccine shots, is estimated to have increased to 98.8 percent nationally, the report showed. If the overwhelming majority of Americans get vaccinated, the United States could get the pandemic under control by the spring of 2022, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN during an interview on Monday. As of Tuesday, 51.6 percent of the total U.S. population were fully vaccinated, CDC data showed. With the Delta variant, plus the Afghanistan fiasco on his plate, Biden must tread carefully if he wishes to pass his agenda, according to experts. A woman looks at a memorial installation for those who died of COVID-19 outside Green-Wood Cemetery in New York, the United States, June 14, 2021. (Xinhua/Wang Ying) "There clearly have been many problems in how things have gone, so Biden has to reassure Americans and the rest of the world that he can make adjustments, handle unexpected developments, and deal with the people who want to get out," said Darrell West, also a Brookings Institution senior fellow. "If he can recoup lost ground and move things forward, his agenda should move forward," West argued. "But it is important that he handles both Delta and Afghanistan in ways that are effective. He has a lot riding on the next few weeks." Congressional Democrats are trying to advance Biden's economic package on Capitol Hill. Biden's overall job-approval rating has dipped below 50 percent among adults for the first time in his early presidency, according to a new NBC News poll released on Sunday. The polls showed 49 percent of adults approve of Biden's overall job performance, while 48 percent disapprove. The poll also found fewer Americans support the Democrat's handling of COVID-19 than they did last spring, and just a quarter of respondents approve of his handling of Afghanistan. It's all produced a "summer of discontent" for Biden, said Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates, who conducted the survey with Republican pollster Bill McInturff of Public Opinion Strategies. "The promise of April has led to the peril of August," Horwitt said, pointing out that the pandemic -- more than Afghanistan -- has dented Biden's numbers. "It is the domestic storm, COVID's delta wave, that is causing more difficulties at this stage here at home and for President Biden." Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 18:52:18|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Economic and trade teams from China and the United States have maintained normal communication, according to the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) on Thursday. In the first seven months of the year, bilateral goods trade volume surged 40 percent year on year, said MOC spokesperson Gao Feng. During the period, China's imports from the United States jumped by 50.4 percent from a year ago, while exports expanded 36.9 percent year on year, Gao said. That fully shows the economies of the two countries are highly complementary, Gao said, adding that bilateral trade cooperation is in line with the interests of the two countries and two peoples. China has always maintained that the imposition of extra tariffs by the United States is not good for China, the United States as well as global economic recovery, Gao said. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 22:24:39|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- By calling for an investigation into Fort Detrick and the University of North Carolina (UNC), China hope to rid global origins study of the disruption posed by US politicization so as to create enabling conditions for science-based research, said a Foreign Ministry spokesperson Thursday. "China's call is reasonable and justified," said Wang Wenbin. Wang made the remarks at a daily press briefing in response to a question on why China strongly opposes the lab-leak theory but is at the same time seeking an investigation into Fort Detrick. Chinese and World Health Organization (WHO) experts have reached the conclusion that a lab leak from Wuhan is extremely unlikely. Scientists across the world, including in the US, overwhelmingly believe that there is no evidence supporting a lab leak theory, he said. "It is the United States that refuses to subscribe to this scientific conclusion and asserts that the virus was leaked from a Wuhan lab," he said. Given that the Wuhan Institute of Virology has received two visits from WHO experts already and that the Fort Detrick base and the UNC boast a long history of coronavirus research as well as poor safety records, if the US side insists on the lab leak hypothesis, then it's incumbent on the US to open up Fort Detrick for international investigation, he said. In the same vein, if the WHO Secretariat insists that the possibility of a lab leak cannot be ruled out, then it's incumbent on the WHO to investigate Fort Detrick, he said. By calling for an investigation into Fort Detrick and the UNC, said Wang, China hopes to show the world with facts whether the lab leak theory claimed by the US is tenable and credible. With this call, we also hope to rid global origins study of the disruption posed by US politicization so as to create enabling conditions for science-based research, he said. "Should the US refuse to cooperate, it would only further expose its true intention of politicizing origins study," he said. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 23:57:36|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close -- The publication said achieving national rejuvenation is the historic mission of the CPC, adding that the Party has made an "unbreakable commitment" to bring the people a happy life. -- A press conference was held as senior Party officials offered more insight on the publication, cleared some misunderstandings about the Party, and rebutted unfounded overseas accusations. -- According to a survey of the National Bureau of Statistics, 95.8 percent of the Chinese people consider the CPC's Party governance efforts very effective in 2020. -- "We allow some people to become well-off first, who then inspire and help the latecomers. We will not opt for a robbing-the-rich-for-the-poor approach," a CPC official said. -- "China never seeks to export its ideology, values or development model," said another CPC official, rejecting the claim that China is playing a dominant role in the international community and international affairs. BEIJING, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Communist Party of China (CPC), the world's largest governing party, on Thursday issued a key publication, expounding on the Party's mission and contributions. A press conference was held as senior Party officials offered more insight on the publication, cleared some misunderstandings about the Party, and rebutted unfounded overseas accusations. Titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions," the key publication released by the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee said achieving national rejuvenation is the historic mission of the CPC, adding that the Party has made an "unbreakable commitment" to bring the people a happy life. Wang Xiaohui, executive deputy director of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, said the publication -- which has a preamble, a conclusion and five chapters -- has shed light on the issue about where the CPC comes from and where it is heading. The Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee releases a document titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions" at a press conference in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 26, 2021. (Xinhua/Jin Liangkuai) A STRONG PARTY In 100 years, the CPC has grown from a small party with just over 50 members into the largest governing party in the world, with more than 95 million members. It is a party of major international standing and has governed the world's largest socialist country for more than seven decades. "Of the people, by the people, for the people -- this is what has guided the CPC from victory to victory over the past century," Wang Xiaohui said. The publication pointed out that the CPC is dedicated to the people and forever puts their interests first. The CPC pursues the lofty goal of working for the wellbeing of the Chinese people, and it does everything in the interests of the people. The document also said that Marxism is the single guiding ideology of the CPC. These hundred years have seen the CPC fight on, guided by Marxism, and buttressed by firm convictions, an enterprising spirit, and unyielding determination, it said. The CPC takes vigorous measures to maintain its members' purity and advanced nature, the publication said. With more than 95 million members, the CPC considers this matter a fundamental issue and an important task in its Party building work, said Qi Jiabin, an official with the CPC Central Committee's Organization Department. The CPC ensures the requirement of full and strict governance over the Party reaches every member and Party branch. Taking a zero-tolerance stance at its members' misconducts, the CPC enforces its discipline with resolute measures, said Wang Jianxin, an official with the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the CPC and the National Supervisory Commission. Notable progress has been achieved since the 18th CPC National Congress in 2012 as the Party has taken an even tougher fight against corruption and undesirable conduct. According to a survey of the National Bureau of Statistics, 95.8 percent of the Chinese people consider the CPC's Party governance efforts very effective in 2020, up 16.5 percentage points from 2012. GOVERNING SUCCESS The Party has saved the Chinese nation from the three mountains of imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat-capitalism, rebuilt it from scratch, and over a few decades developed it into the world's second largest economy and an upper-middle-income country. The publication attributed the success to the Party's robust leadership and its strong governance capability, and highlighted its strengths such as a strong Central Committee, sound guidelines and strategies, effective implementation of decisions and plans, pooling the efforts of all sectors, and fostering high-caliber Party officials. At Thursday's press conference, Wang Xiaohui emphasized the Party's leadership, saying that the CPC leadership system and its working mechanism are suited to China's national conditions and have won the people's support and demonstrated its high efficiency and strong advantage in practice. The Party has led China to success in eradicating absolute poverty and attaining moderate prosperity. The country is now on a new journey to fully build a modern socialist country, with common prosperity an important target. Han Wenxiu, an official with the Central Committee for Financial and Economic Affairs, said common prosperity means affluence shared by everyone, both in material and cultural terms, but not egalitarianism. Hard work is the fundamental pathway to common prosperity, Han said. "We allow some people to become well-off first, who then inspire and help the latecomers. We will not opt for a robbing-the-rich-for-the-poor approach." The Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee releases a document titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions" at a press conference in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 26, 2021. (Xinhua/Jin Liangkuai) NOT TO EXPORT IDEOLOGY The CPC is a political party that seeks happiness for the people and progress for humanity, and has always pursued the shared human values of peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy and freedom, said the publication. The Party has proposed building a global community of shared future, with the goal of creating an open, inclusive, clean and beautiful world that enjoys lasting peace, universal security, and common prosperity, it added. "China never seeks to export its ideology, values or development model," said Liu Jianchao, deputy director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee, rejecting the unfounded claim that China is playing a dominant role in the international community and international affairs. Liu said China gives due respect to people of other countries in pursuing development paths suited to their own national conditions based on their specific circumstances and sovereign rights. Xu Yousheng, vice minister of the United Front Work Department of the CPC Central Committee, made similar remarks when responding to the so-called "infiltration" claim. The CPC-led united front is committed to strengthening the unity and solidarity of all Chinese people at home and abroad to build a strong and prosperous country, he said. "The work is carried out in a transparent and open manner," he said. "China never interferes in other countries' internal affairs." Wang Xiaohui said the CPC is a political party that contributes to the peace and development of humanity. Looking ahead, the CPC will firmly walk down the path of peaceful development and stand on the right side of history and the progressive side of humanity, he said. (Video reporter: Zhang Shuang; video editor: Yang Zhixiang) Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 18:05:12|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close WINDHOEK, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Namibian President Hage Geingob on Thursday called on his country folk to remain a resilient people in the midst of a challenging COVID-19 pandemic when they celebrate the country's Heroes' Day. "Not only is this day significant in the context of the struggle for Namibian independence but it also represents a pivotal moment in the struggle for the liberation of the entire southern African region," he said. Geingob said the country will honor fallen heroes during the liberation struggle and all modern day heroes, including those who have held the frontline in the war against COVID-19. "I speak of our courageous health care workers, law enforcement agencies, and public officials, who since the onset of the coronavirus, have risked their lives daily on the frontlines of this deadly pandemic. Namibia salutes your patriotism, commitment, and sacrifice," he said. Heroes' Day is a national public holiday in Namibia. It is recognized by the United Nations as Namibia Day. Celebrated annually on 26 August, the day commemorates the Namibian war of independence which began on Aug. 26, 1966. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 22:29:51|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ACCRA, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- The introduction of Chinese language learning is helping Ghanaian students better understand different cultures in the world, said a senior educator. Christina Armah, the deputy head of the University of Ghana Basic Schools in the capital, told Xinhua that the study of the language, coupled with the understanding of Chinese culture, is also building confidence among the students about their future, careers, and purpose in life. Since the introduction of the Chinese language in some Ghanaian primary schools in 2014, Armah said the participating students have shown progress in their proficiency in the language. "You would be surprised how they clamor to speak to the volunteer teachers in Chinese." "The University Basic School is the pioneer and pacesetter when it comes to learning Chinese in the basic schools in Ghana," she said. The University Basic School teaches the Chinese language from kindergarten to the junior high school level. "Teaching from the basics is important, and in fact, they are enjoying it. I am even enjoying the textbooks from which the teachers teach them, and the pupils from our school have fallen in love with the Chinese language," she added. In addition to learning the language, she added that the students "are in love with Chinese culture." "They can now set up and prepare Chinese tea, and it is a joy to watch them do it. They also learn Kung Fu, Tai Chi, and Chinese art and do paper cutting." Some Ghanaian students had traveled to China on exchange programs to learn first-hand how the Chinese people live, and received the annual Chinese Ambassador's Scholarship, which gives deserving students awards for excelling in their studies. "Visiting China, seeing all the wonderful places and development, as well as mingling with the Chinese people, helps to broaden their perspectives about life," Armah added. The Blessed Home Schools, a private primary school in Kwabenya, a suburb of the capital, has integrated Chinese language studies into its curriculum. Emmanuella Tanor, the administrator of the school, said through the interaction between the students and the teachers from the Confucius Institute, the Ghanaian students are beginning to understand the Chinese culture. Tanor is optimistic that the Chinese language study in Ghanaian schools will help gradually bridge the cultural gap between the Ghanaians and the Chinese. "This year, two of our students won the Chinese Ambassador Scholarship. And because the Confucius Institute used the overall academic performance of the children to determine the winners, it created a healthy competition among them, and made everyone study hard," she added. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 23:34:18|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ABUJA, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- At least seven people have been killed and over 74,000 others displaced this month by floods in Nigeria's northeastern state of Adamawa, said local authorities on Thursday. The floods have continued to wreak havoc in the northeastern state, affecting 79 communities across 16 local government areas, Mohammed Sulaiman, who heads the Adamawa State Emergency Management Agency, told reporters in Yola, the state capital. "From Aug. 11 to date, so far, about 74,713 people have been affected in 79 communities," Sulaiman said, adding seven persons have been killed by floods across the state during the same period. According to him, several houses and thousands of hectares of farmlands were submerged, while assets, including domestic animals, worth millions of naira were lost to the flood. The latest floods in Adamawa have been largely due to torrential downpours, he added. Nigerian authorities had in May issued an alert to 28 out of the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory in the country, warning of severe flooding this year. Enditem GOVERNMENT yesterday announced a staggered reopening of schools, with examination classes set to resume face-to-face lessons next Monday on August 30 and the rest of the learners joining them on September 6. Addressing a post-Cabinet meeting yesterday, Information minister Monica Mutsvangwa also said restaurants could now reopen for sit-in customers, but only for fully-vaccinated patrons and observing COVID-19 regulations. The reopening of schools was announced a day after government extended the level four lockdown by two weeks. Mutsvangwa said government had reached the decision after consulting the Health ministry as well as teachers, who have been threatening to withdraw their labour if the schools reopen before their salaries are increased. The Primary Education ministry met with teacher organisations and deliberated on the safe reopening of schools among many other issues, noting with satisfaction the preparation for the resumption of classes and schools, Mutsvangwa said. Cabinet is advising that schools will reopen on August 30, 2021 for examination classes, and on September 6, 2021 for non-examination classes. Level four lockdown is accompanied by inter-city travel ban and curfew which could affect the movement of schoolchildren who travel to and from their learning institutions. Government said it would allow inter- and intra-city travel during the schools opening period, to allow boarders smooth passage. As such, the inter-city and intra-city transportation for learners will be allowed during schools reopening periods, subject to close monitoring by law enforcement agencies, Mutsvangwa said. Government sought to assure parents that it was safe to reopen schools even though the nation is under level four lockdown for the next two weeks. The collaboration between the Primary and Secondary education and Health and Child Care ministries has buttressed the sectors COVID-19 prevention and management systems. The two ministries met with provincial teams to evaluate progress in the implementation of the joint operational plan, Mutsvangwa said. Government also eased lockdown measures on restaurants for sit-ins only for fully-vaccinated patrons, just two weeks after allowing churches to resume services. The nation is further informed that restaurants will be allowed to reopen for sit-in patrons who are fully vaccinated subject to the production of vaccination cards and strict adherence to COVID-19 protocols, Mutsvangwa said. Zimbabwe will be donating 20 000 vaccines to Namibia and is well on course to attain herd immunity by December this year, she added. The country has already acquired 13 million doses out of 20 million required in order to reach herd immunity. On the advice of scientists, the vaccination programme will be extended to the 1417-year age group, she said. Mutsvangwa also said government would take stern action, including cancelling operating licences for fuel companies accessing fuel on the foreign currency auction system, but selling it in foreign currency. Meanwhile, health experts have queried the governments justification in extending the level four lockdown when statistics were showing that there was decline in both new infections and deaths. The country has been under level four lockdown since the beginning of July this year. According to situational reports released by the Health ministry, in the past seven days, the highest number of deaths recorded was 44, way below the countrys highest record of 107 deaths last month. In yesterdays Cabinet minutes, the government noted that there was a 32% decrease in weekly cases from 3 761 during the week ending August 15, 2021, to 2 564 in the week ending August 23, 2021. The Zimbabwe Senior Hospital Doctors Association said there was a reduction in COVID-19 admissions at most hospitals, hence the justification for extending level four lockdown was questionable. Situational reports from @MoHCCZim (Health ministry) clearly show COVID-19 infections well below the resurgence threshold. Most COVID-19 units countrywide have significantly reduced admissions. Lockdown has achieved its aims, the doctors said. If we are basing decisions on statistics and science, what is the justification for the extension? Medical and Dental Private Practitioners of Zimbabwe Association president Johannes Marisa said since there was a decline in the number of COVID-19 infections and deaths, there was a need for government to consider easing the restrictions to allow economic activity. We have a decline in both new cases and deaths, according to statistics from government. We expect government to consider easing the lockdown in anticipation of the fourth wave, Marisa said. Since the fourth wave is highly probable towards the end of the year, during this period when new infections, deaths and admissions are receding, it is prudent for government to open schools and allow some social and economic activities to take place as it is vital for peoples livelihoods. Probably, government wants to be very careful, not to rush to lift the measures to avoid a situation where the wave hits us again. Newsday A Chivhu vendor, Enerty Chimedza was severely mauled by Police dogs on Sunday and then made to pay a fine of RTGS$1 000 for allegedly remaining at her stall after the 3:30pm business cut off time. Chimedza is appealing to members of the public to assist her with money to buy prescription given her by the doctor for the wounds. The drugs prescribed for her cost US$140. Mash East Police spokesperson Inspector Simon Chazovachiii said said he was yet to receive the report. I am yet to receive that report however what the police officers did is not acceptable and why could they hide the Memo pertaining to such a tragedy incident, he said. Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights Spokesperson Kumbirai Mafunda condemned the police brutality describing the incident as a true sign of human rights abuse by the law enforcement agencies. We condemn this kind of brutality by the police on this poor woman. We are concerned by increasing cases across the country where the police are not executing their duty professionally. They should not take the law in their hands and they should respect human rights,he said. Chimedza told The Mirror that vendors at the market stall close at 330pm but they leave one person to guard their wares until 6pm when a security guard comes for the night shift. On this day I was on duty to guard the wares until the guard came. Police details found me at the market and accused me of violating Covid19 regulations by doing business after 330pm. They assaulted me before unleashing their dogs on me, said Chimedza. After her arrest, Chimedza was taken to Chivhu Police Station. She was made to pay RTGS1 000 despite having been injured. She went to see Chivhu General Hospital nurses on Monday and got a prescription for injections which cost US$140. Police did not bother to get her treated for the wounds and the spokesperson Chazovachiii said he was going to make a follow up on the issue. Ward 9 Councilor Christopher Muchenje described Police action as barbaric and lamented the concerned cops for showing no remorse for their heavy handedness. This was just a defenseless woman. She is not a criminal, she is a mother, she is not armed, she is a poor vendor why use Police dogs on her? What touched us more is Police got her mauled by the dogs, arrested her and then fined her. Now she is faced with a medical bill, said Muchenje. Chimedza said she was only given a letter by the Police on Monday to get treatment at Chivhu General Hospital. Nurses at the hospital however, told her that there were no drugs. I am appealing to well-wishers to help me with money to buy drugs, said Chimedza. Vendors in Chivhu also accused cops of demanding sex from the women that they arrest and this is one of the conditions for getting ones freedom. They also accused Police in Chivhu of corruption and in particular they go around the small town taking bribes. Masvingo Mirror PRESIDENT Mnangagwa has challenged the private sector to take a leaf from Zimplats and implement projects that benefit communities. Speaking at the launch of the US$15 million cattle ranching project in Mhondoro-Ngezi today, the President said there was scope for synergies between the mining and agriculture sectors as demonstrated by Zimplats and Palmline Investments. Given the anticipated benefits that are going to accrue from this venture, I am calling upon other private sectors to emulate the initiative by Zimplats and Palmline Holdings by responding to my administrations call to come on board and invest not only in agriculture, but the other key sectors of the economy, the President said. The project is part of the countrys efforts to boost the national herd under the Livestock Growth Plan, which seeks to grow the sector to US$1,9 billion by 2025. The Livestock Growth Plan is part of the Agriculture and Food Systems Transformation Strategy, which seeks to achieve a US$8,2 billion agriculture economy by 2025, which also anchors and propels Zimbabwe towards Vision 2030 of an upper middle class economy. Increasing the cattle numbers from a 2019 baseline of 5,4 million to 6 million in 2025, with a beef production of 90 000 tons, and milk production from 79,9 million to 150 million, are some of the targets of the Livestock Growth Plan. The programme also aims at increasing the national dairy herd from 38 000 in 2019 to 60 000 by 2025. The Livestock Growth Plan, which was launched by President Mnangagwa last year, is expected to give solutions to challenges faced by farmers and ranchers. Herald Those who imposed Sanctions on us are disappointed that Zimbabwe is rising. We are rising, The Economy is recovering, Our institutions are strengthening, Our democracy is taking root.. President @edmnangagwa pic.twitter.com/KbKuRnRCHC Nick Mangwana (@nickmangwana) August 26, 2021 Earlier this month the state broke last years pre-vaccine record of coronavirus hospitalizations, making Florida the state with the highest per capita rate of both hospitalizations and infections. Children and young people are suffering the most in this latest bout, fueled by the highly transmissible delta variant. The infection is hitting the law enforcement sector hard, too. Its now the leading cause of death among cops. In an article published Wednesday in the scientific journal Nature, the team of 11 experts said their investigation is at a critical juncture in need of urgent collaboration, but has instead stalled almost entirely. Earlier this year, they were dispatched to the Chinese city of Wuhan, where coronavirus initially emerged in December 2019, on a mission to find the source of the global health crisis. Schools Chancellor Meisha Porter said older kids in quarantine will have access to remote learning, but did not specify who would be teaching those students, because negotiations are ongoing with unions. Some districts have said they plan to have educators livestream their classes to kids at home a practice that the city teachers union discouraged last year. In an effort to address the issues at MCC NY as quickly and efficiently as possible, the Department has decided to close the MCC, at least temporarily, until those issues have been resolved. Planning for the deactivation is under way, and we will have more updates as that process continues, a DOJ spokeswoman said in a statement. Three crooks one sporting a T-shirt from the HBO crime drama The Wire broke into a Bronx apartment with a a crowbar, tied up a 14-year-old girl with USB cords and got away with thousands of dollars in cash, jewelry and handbags, cops said Friday. The gunmen were trailed by two men on mopeds, one of whom was wearing a charcoal-gray sweatshirt with an American flag emblazoned across the chest, the new images show. The other moped operator was wearing a red sweatshirt and sported a black-and-white face mask. Parris most recent arrest was on June 9 when he was nabbed for possession of a loaded gun. He was released after paying $15,000 bail the next day and was due back in court in November. Were hopeful, Farrells sister-in-law Faith Farrell told the Daily News. (It was) just wrong place at wrong time. I cant think of anybody who would ever want to hurt Chris. The 17-year-old suspect, whose name has not been released because of his age, was charged Wednesday with murder and weapon possession for his role in the Nov. 22 bloodbath that left Daijyonna Long, 20, dead, and six others injured. One bullet grazed a 17-year-old girls head, another struck a 35-year-old woman in the buttocks, cops said. Its not clear if they were the shooters intended targets, police said. First of all, its illegal for them to mandate it. Its against the law, its against the Parents Bill of Rights, Bauman told CBS Miami before his arrest. Our belief is it doesnt stop the spread of the virus. It doesnt control it, it does more harm than good. Convicted killer Steven Avery filed a petition with the states Supreme Court this week asking the panel to review three key issues that, according to his lawyers, should warrant a new trial in the high-profile case. Avery and his nephew Brendan Dassey, who have long maintained their innocence, are serving life sentences for the 2005 murder of photographer Teresa Halbach. The outbreaks have been reported in 17 states, with California and Arizona recording the most cases seven and five, respectively. New York has had one confirmed case so far, according to the CDC. At least 12 people have been hospitalized, but no deaths have been reported, the agency said. Daybell and Vallow both face multiple counts of murder for the two children, while Daybell has been charged in his wifes murder and Vallow has been charged with conspiracy to commit murder in the death of her late husband, Charles Vallow, who was fatally shot by her brother, Alex Cox. UNL Chancellor Ronnie Green in a statement on Wednesday said the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity, widely known as FIJI on campus, would be suspended pending the outcome of an investigation into the claim. According to a University police report, the alleged assault took place at the frat house between 11:30 p.m. and midnight on Monday. The $100 million repair of a tilted San Francisco luxury high-rise, meant to stop it from sinking any further than it already has, is now on hold as engineers try to determine the cause of the building going down another inch. You know, for the life of me, I dont get it, Health Department Communications Director Liz Sharlot said of that states problem with locals sucking down horse pills. You have a vaccine thats safe and effective. And yet people, as opposed to getting the vaccine, want to go after these kinds of things. Patrick Baker, 43, was controversially freed by Republican Gov. Matt Bevin on his final day in charge before his Democratic successor, Andy Beshear, took office. Baker had been convicted in 2017 of reckless homicide in the death of Donald Mills in 2014 and sentenced to 19 years in prison. There was a guy sitting at the table with all of his family, and kids and everything. And the guy went there, and shot the guy, three times, a restaurant employee said. It is never too late to do the right thing. When I first met with the Willett family and listened to their stories, I knew we had to get this done, Suozzi said. Awarding the Harlem Hellfighters the Congressional Gold Medal ensures that generations of Americans will now fully comprehend the selfless service, sacrifices and heroism displayed by these men in spite of the pervasive racism and segregation of the times. All eight members of the panel appointed by legislative leaders voted in favor of the motions, while the five hand-picked by Cuomo abstained following a heated back-and-forth over whether the commission should go into a closed-door session. The lives we lost today were lives given in the service of liberty, the president said. To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. The Taliban took over Afghanistan earlier this month as the U.S. pulled its military out of the South Asian country. The U.S. has aimed to evacuate its forces and allies from the country by the end of the month. The lives we lost today were lives given in the service of liberty, Biden said in a somber address from the East Room of the White House. To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. Asked during an interview with ABC News about reports the evacuation could end on Friday, Ross Wilson, the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, declined to comment. He said there are safe ways to get to the airport for those Americans who still want to leave. He added that there undoubtedly will be some at-risk Afghans who will not get out before Bidens deadline. On behalf of the people of Israel, I share our deep sadness over the loss of American lives in Kabul, Bennett said in a statement posted on social media. Israel stands with the United States in these difficult times, just as America has always stood with us. Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of the United States. In May, 20 of the brothers relatives were held in the village of Komsomolskoye in the Urus-Martan district of Chechnya. They were interrogated for hours about the whereabouts of the mens parents, according to local media reports. Chalmers was already excited to be getting on the plane to Tokyo to do one of my dream jobs, he told BBC Radio 5 Live afterward. It was a special enough moment as it was, until the air stewardess pulled me to one side and said, Mr. Chalmers, am I right in saying that you served in Afghanistan? And I was like, Where is this going? What is going on here? Putting aside for now the problems with the law itself the fact that we give religious preference precedence over the right of the rest of us to move about safely, which we should not there are ways to effectively clamp down on exemptions, even if, legally, it might be more difficult to do away with them entirely. There is nothing, for one, that says that we have to make receiving an exemption convenient. It would be completely within the law to require those seeking exemptions to have to go through a mass of paperwork to do so. We could even require that they attend seminars (online) about vaccination effectiveness before receiving an exemption. Diversity problems extend to the powerful Appellate Division, the second-to-highest level courts in the state. As Presiding Justice Rolando Acosta of the First Department of the Appellate Division noted in a Bar Association article last year: it is not uncommon to have appeals decided by all-white panels of appellate judges (particularly in the Third and Fourth Departments, where there are still no Latino or Asian Justices) something we would never tolerate on state juries, especially in our more diverse parts of the state, like Albany, Buffalo and Rochester. But in truth, all of our current arguments about Afghanistan policy are somewhat beside the point. The bad news for the United States is that the story has already been written. The world has already seen the picture of desperate Americans including its military trying to flee in chaos and fear. The chaotic and bungled five days when the Taliban took over the country were encapsulated in that photo of a single desperate Afghan falling from the wheel well of a U.S. military plane as it took off. Those five days of retreat seared that image into the head of every policymaker from the U.K. Parliament and secretary general of NATO to the leaders of Iran and China and almost to a man they were appalled. Well, appalled or gleeful, depending on how much they believed in the America of 2001, to say nothing of 1945. When my mama got real bad with her [drug use], I didnt know where I was going to end up. Im proud of myself for how far Ive come, Thompson said in her interview. She added that the two are working on repairing their relationship so they can get back on track. Agricultural News Conterra Ag Capital Grows with New Relationship Manager for Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana A Frisco, Texas-based agricultural lender with more than eight years of experience has joined the Conterra Ag Capital team as the company continues to grow its ag financial services throughout the southern states. Matt Manuel has been hired as vice president relationship manager, serving customers around Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana. Matt Manuel brings a diverse agriculture finance background to Conterra with six years in the farm credit system before entering the private ag lending sector of the industry. I was extremely impressed with the Conterra team and the services they provide to clients, Manuel said. Conterra brings creative financing solutions to the agricultural industry with extremely competitive pricing and structure options. Its no surprise, Matt Manuel has a passion for agriculture after growing up in the Delta region of Louisiana and working within his familys poultry and row crop operations. Manuel attended Louisiana State University, graduating with a finance degree. His wife, and fellow LSU grad, and daughter love to visit family and take advantage of the beautiful outdoors near their home in Frisco. I was born and raised in an agriculture-focused family and have been in the ag lending space my entire career. I bring experience and knowledge to the table for clients to find products that best fit their needs, Manuel said. Matt Manuel prides himself on his relationship building and creativity to help clients achieve their financial goals. With my background, I feel I can understand financing needs through different perspectives than just the lenders eyes, Manuel said. I know American agriculture is the backbone of our country and our economic system. The addition of Manuel to the team of ag lending specialists will allow Conterra to expand its ag lending services to farmers, ranchers and members of the agribusiness community in the southern region. Conterra provides financial services and tools like long-term loans and debt restructuring, often working with local banks to meet agricultural customers evolving financial needs. We are glad to have Matt join the Conterra team, said Conterra President and CEO Paul Erickson. His experience and familiarity with agriculture throughout the south will help us further support producers in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma. Personally, I look forward to working with him as we build relationships in his region. WebReadyTM Powered by WireReady NSI Top Agricultural News The agreement applies to actors in shows like A Celebration of Festival of the Lion King at Animal Kingdom and Beauty & The Beast Live on Stage at Hollywood Studios. Also covered are those working at other attractions and performances across the resort, like the Dapper Dans at the Magic Kingdom, the Voices of Liberty at Epcot and Savis Workshop at Hollywood Studios, Levy said. Paulina Velasquez, 15, with her parents Orlando and Agnes Velazsquez in her room at Salah Foundation Children's Hospital in Ft. Lauderdale Florida on Wednesday August ,11 2021. Paulina was admitted to the hospital with COVI-19, and was placed on a ventilator and in critical condition in the pediatric intensive care unit. She is doing much better, and her condition has been downgraded to fair and she has been weaned off oxygen support. Broward Health physicians are optimistic about her recovery. (Mike Stocker / South Florida Sun Sentinel) Using any treatment for COVID-19 thats not approved or authorized by the FDA, unless part of a clinical trial, can cause serious harm, reads the release. There seems to be a growing interest in a drug called Ivermectin to treat humans with COVID-19. Ivermectin is often used in the U.S. to treat or prevent parasites in animals. The FDA has received multiple reports of patients who have required medical support and been hospitalized after self-medicating with ivermectin intended for horses. Perez clarified in an email to The Associated Press that four employees who either showed symptoms or tested positive stayed out of work but were unclear on the return-to-work policy and did not follow proper protocol to return. One employee from the agencys communications center returned to work 10 days after testing positive for COVID-19 but didnt notify the agencys health and safety office or get clearance from a medical doctor. interactive_content HOW TO SUBSCRIBE TO PODCAST, WATCH LIVE AND PARTICIPATE Listen to the podcast using the player above or subscribe to Orlando Sentinel Conversations to listen to all the daily updates using these providers: The indictment says the eight were part of a criminal organization that was engaged in extortion, fraud and money laundering, and managed to swindle more than $2 million from several victims by feeding them phony stories that their grandchildren were in terrible trouble and needed money fast, according to a press release from the U.S. Attorneys Office Southern District of California. Three groups of parents have already filed legal challenges to DeSantis July 30 executive order on face masks and a subsequent rule from the Florida Department of Health that required districts to allow parents to opt their kids out of any mask mandate. All of the lawsuits argue the state has endangered the health of children because not everyone on campus is masked even as COVID-19 cases surge in Florida. He claimed to not know a nest was in the area he was mowing, according to WESH. The withdrawal is depriving the United States of its on-the-ground strike capacity in Afghanistan, and threatens to weaken its ability to track the Islamic State and its attack planning as well. Biden officials say the Islamic State group is only one of many terror threats it is dealing with globally. They insist they can manage it with so-called over-the-horizon military and intelligence assets, based in Gulf states, on aircraft carriers, or other more distant sites. We are providing opportunity, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said of those Afghans, who include dual Afghan-American citizens. We are finding ways to get them to the airport and evacuate them, but it is also their personal decision on whether they want to depart.Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan, a figure that suggests the U.S. may accomplish its highest priority for the Kabul airlift rescuing U.S. citizens ahead of President Joe Bidens Tuesday deadline. What I can surmise is that the arguments going to be that [Fierle] went against what those standards of practice are and did something that would be deemed knowing and willful and an abuse not only of her professional responsibilities, but probably as an individual, Circuit Court Judge Melissa Polo said, denying a defense motion. Mr. Chairman, and to the Credentials Committee, my name is Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer, and I live at 626 East Lafayette Street, Ruleville, Mississippi, Sunflower County It was the 31st of August in 1962 that 18 of us traveled 26 miles to the county courthouse in Indianola to try to register to become first-class citizens. Her white landlord, she told them, evicted her that night because, he told her, we are not ready for that in Mississippi. I am the grandparent of five children in the Orange County system, and there appears to be no plan for how to educate those sent home because of contact with those who get COVID-19. The answer seems to be just to contact your teacher. That is no plan for healthy children who are forced to stay at home, including the more than 1,400 Orange County students forced to quarantine. We respectfully disagree with the district courts decision, and we regret that the Supreme Court has declined to issue this stay, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters in a briefing Wednesday. Our point of view continues to be that this program is was not implemented in a moral way. It was inefficient. It used resources by CBP resources. It led to a backlog in the system. And it is fundamentally a program we have opposed, but we are also abiding by a court order. What was important to the governor and I was to ensure that as quick as possible we could ensure that these organizations that were set up to provide for some of the most vulnerable victims in our state were reorganized that they were done so in a way that this cannot happen again, Moody said. That we can stop any misuse of taxpayer funds immediately and ensure there was no disruption in services to domestic violence victims across the state. There is no single policy priority that Governor DeSantis has devoted more time to this year than promoting COVID-19 vaccination, DeSantis press secretary Christina Pushaw said Thursday. He did over 50 public appearances in 27 counties focused on the vaccines. ... If someone is truly opposed to getting vaccinated after all this time, all the data we have, and all the reports that most people who are hospitalized are unvaccinated one more press conference from any politician (especially a politician who has always promoted vaccination) is not going to change their minds. The NASA technology attached includes the Navigation Doppler Lidar and Descent Landing Computer, which would work together to determine a spacecrafts location and speed as it approaches the surface of the moon, according to a press released from Blue Origin. The technologies could allow future missions both crewed and robotic to target landing sites that werent possible during the Apollo missions, such as regions with varied terrain near craters. The cruise line will beginning Sept. 3 be requiring all passengers 12 and older to be fully vaccinated to fall in line with an emergency order issued by the Bahamas that will not let cruise lines dock at any of its ports including private islands without fully vaccinated passengers. There are exceptions to those 11 and under who cannot be vaccinated yet, as well as those with a medical reason for not being able to be vaccinated. The Bahamas order lasts through October. Abuja, Nigeria (PANA) President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday welcomed the 2nd Quarter (Q2) 2021 report by the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics (NBS), showing a third consecutive quarter of positive growth of Nigerias economy, as well as the highest quarterly growth in GDP since 2014 Geneva, Switzerland (PANA) - The next three months will be a critical period for stepping up global collective action against future pandemics, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday, pointing to three major meetings on the international agenda Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - Two Libyan ministers arrived on Thursday in the Tunisian capital, Tunis, to discuss the reopening of land borders and resumption of flights between the two countries as well as bilateral relations Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - The United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) has welcomed the creation of a new joint force for the protection and security of the Great Man-Made River, the country's main source of drinking water "There are no current supply issues with our chicken bakes and our customers can continue to enjoy these as they usually would, a spokesperson for Greggs said They can take away our chicken but they can never take our sausage rolls! ( ), the nations favourite provider of sausage rolls, has joined the list of companies grumbling about supply chain issues affecting the availability of some products that contain chicken. For god sake, anything but Greggs https://t.co/1gqrPKDfui Rob Hudson (@rbthudson) August 26, 2021 Fortunately, Greggs does not commit the heresy of making sausage rolls with chicken but it does make chicken bakes, although the hot snacks company was at pains to stress that supplies of this artery-hardening treat will still be available, which suggests it is cutting out less popular chicken-based products from its range of snacks. "There are no current supply issues with our chicken bakes and our customers can continue to enjoy these as they usually would, a spokesperson for Greggs said. "Unfortunately, like others, we're seeing temporary interruptions in supply for some ingredients which occasionally results in shops not being able to maintain full availability on all lines, the spokesperson added. Nandos out of chicken, I'm off to the Greggs for a chicken bake. Steve #3.5%???? ???????????????????? #RejoinEU #FBPA (@poorscousertom) August 26, 2021 According to the web site PoliticsHome, the same shortage of lorry drivers that hit supplies of chicken to the Nandos restaurant chain last week is now disrupting supplies at Greggs. Fast food outlets such as KFC and McDonalds have also suffered stock shortages this month. Meanwhile, John Allen, the chair of the supermarket giant ( ), has joined the call for the government to eat humble pie possibly one of the few things likely to still be available in Greggs if the current crisis continues and lure back drivers from the European Union (EU) who have returned to work in their home countries after Britains exit from the EU. It was #McDonalds yesterday, its #greggs today. More food retailers get used to being out of stock of key ingredients. It was chicken here in Winsford. pic.twitter.com/to73UFEYMj Colletta Smith (@collettasmith) August 25, 2021 It's not all at the Co-op Echoing comments made earlier this week by Richard Walker, the managing director of frozen food specialist , Allen told BBCs Radio 4 that this is the time of year when the supermarkets would normally be building up stock ahead of the Christmas rush, but the industrys attempts to do so are being hampered by a shortage of heavy goods vehicle (HGV) drivers. 'I think certainly Brexit has been a contributor to that but also improving economies, higher wages in some of the countries that they've come from historically, have also led to that flow, Allen said. I think there may be some shortages at Christmas, Allen said, but added he wouldn't want to over-dramatise the extent to which that would be the case. I think it's very easy to make a drama out of a modest crisis, Allen said. Please stop scaremongering. This is what cause people to panic buy back in March 2020 "Co-op supermarkets facing worst food shortages ever seen, says chief executive Steve Murrells" https://t.co/vfjcUoi75b l u c y (@asdfghjkLUCY_) August 26, 2021 Steve Murrells, the chief executive of the Co-operative Group, went so far as to describe the current food shortages as the worst he has ever seen. The Co-op has had to reduce its range of food products because of the supply issues. A 5mln placing in July will provide funds for the programme ( , ) said it remains on track to start drilling in China later this year at the Jade prospect. A 5mln placing in July will provide funds for the programme, while in Indonesia negotiations are underway over a gas sales agreement as the Mako field moves towards a final investment decision. Drilling at Jade will require additional funding for final drilling preparation activities and the drilling (and testing) programmes and Empyrean added it was confident of meeting the full funding commitment after the July fundraise. In a statement alongside results for the year to March 2020, Tom Kelly, chief executive, said "Empyrean's focus during the year was largely to complete the critical de-risking work required ahead of the planned drill campaign in China, which is now on track to commence during 2021 with the drilling of the Jade prospect. In addition, following the exploration and appraisal success achieved in Indonesia in late 2019 the operator Conrad and the joint venture partners are working through all of the practical steps to put this exciting project into production. The group is still in its exploration phase so generated no revenues in the year to end-March, 2021, while losses for the year fell slightly to US$953,000. The technical report shows impressive surface sampling results over a substantially expanded tenement control footprint, which support the robust prospectivity of the extensive Halleck Creek project area. Allanite with metamict-isotropic core rimmed with epidote in quartz/feldspar. ( )s expanded Halleck Creek Project in the US has revealed consistently high-grade surface samples with total rare earth oxides (TREO) averaging more than 3,000 parts per million (ppm). The 2021 Technical Report of the Wyoming Halleck Creek Rare Earths Project report prepared by World Industrial Minerals (WIM) shows impressive surface sampling results over a substantially expanded tenement control footprint, which support the robust prospectivity of the extensive Halleck Creek project area. The report provides an overview of the Halleck Creek Project area, regional and local geology, recent claim-staking activities, general mineralogy of the host rocks and summarises assays of rock samples collected across the project area. ARR has filed for exploration drilling permits and JORC 2012 compliant exploration targets are being determined. Shares have been up more than 30% to an intra-day high of A$0.215. Report highlights The highest grade observed in the samples collected in 2021 are: The surface samples also host high-value neodymium (Nd) and praseodymium (Pr) with average values of 742 ppm for Overton Mountain and 661 ppm for Red Mountain study areas The magnet rare earth oxides, NdPr, comprises 22% of TREO at an ideal 4:1 ratio. A 62% increase of area under claim control, with 63 new lode claims staked, adding 1,193 acres (483 hectares). The total area under mineral claim control (tenement area) is about 3,109 acres (1,257 hectares) Accelerates timetable for exploration ARR managing director Keith Middleton said: The release of this report unveils the latest expansion and analysis of our Halleck Creek REE project. We are extremely excited about the results of the surface sampling. The TREO grades and the grades of key elements of Neodymium (Nd) and Praseodymium (Pr) in our surface samples accelerates the timetable to perform additional exploration of the project area. US domestic rare earths supply chain The continuous trend of high-grade mineralisation of the exposed and accessible Red Mountain pluton presents a high-value opportunity for drilling 100 metres or deeper over significant acreage. The report supports further development of the US domestic Rare Earths supply chain. Downstream US magnet manufacturers will benefit from using a domestic raw material source upon passing of the recently introduced H. R. 5033 ``Rare Earth Magnet Manufacturing Production Tax Credit Act of 2021''. Using a domestically sourced REE would increase the tax credit by 50% for each kilogramme of magnet manufactured. Halleck Creek acquisition The company completed the acquisition of the project from Zenith Minerals in June 2021 after the US-based leadership team successfully earned unanimous government approvals of the four associated exploration leases totalling 1,844 acres with the State of Wyoming. This success reinforces the companys strategy of basing key business and technical leadership near the US projects, activating their local relationships and knowledge of appropriate procedures. After careful data analysis and the additional surface sampling, ARR created shareholder value by adding lode claims (tenements). ARR staked additional areas, providing a more complete claim of the control area, especially in the geologic anomaly area known as the Red Mountain Pluton. The 63 new lode claims, staked in 2021, added 1193 acres (483 ha), representing an increase of 62% compared to the acquisition from Zenith Minerals. Easily accessible The Halleck Creek project is accessible by state highways and locally maintained roads from Wheatland, Wyoming. Major rail and interstate highways are within 50 kilometres of Halleck Creek. Electric power runs to the project area. Halleck Creek is in the Laramie anorthite complex of the Precambrian age. The Red Mountain Pluton is the predominant are earth oxide bearing formation at Halleck Creek. The Red Mountain pluton ranges in composition from fayalite monzonite, clinopyroxene quartz monzonite, and biotitehornblende quartz syenite to granite. The total mineral area controlled by ARR at Halleck Creek covers 3,109 acres (1257 hectares). ARR controls 68 unpatented lode claims at Halleck Creek covering 1265 acres (512 hectares and four state mineral leases covering 1,844 acres (745 hectares). Halleck Creek resides in the Laramie anorthite complex of the Precambrian age. The Red Mountain Pluton is the predominant Rare Earth Oxide bearing Formation at Halleck Creek. The Red Mountain pluton ranges in composition from fayalite monzonite, clinopyroxene quartz monzonite, and biotitehornblende quartz syenite to granite. Surface Sampling Since 2010, 259 valid samples have been collected across the Halleck Creek Project Area, with around 200 surface samples collected in 2021. The highest grade observed in samples collected in 2021 are: TREO: 5,756 HREO: 552 Magnet Minerals Oxide: 1,433 In about 197 surface samples in the Overton Mountain and Red Mountain study areas, the average TREO is about 3,349 ppm TREO and 3,002 ppm TREO, respectively. The surface samples also host high-value NdPr with average values of 742 ppm for Overton Mountain and 661 ppm for Red Mountain study areas, with an average of 702 ppm. Exploration drilling ARR is proposing to drill five core holes on BLM land and claims in the northern area of Overton Mountain. Notice of Intent documents have been filed with the regional BLM field office in Rawlins, Wyoming. ARR plans to drill additional exploration holes on state land and leases in the southern Red Mountain area. ( , ) (ASX:WKT, )s Andrew Cunningham joins Proactive London's Katie Pilbeam to discuss the latest update at their flagship Lindi Jumbo Graphite Project in Tanzania. As Cunningham explains the site has further progressed into the construction phase, with the commencement of site mobilisation and the appointment of an independent project manager (IPM). The CRDB-approved IPM has completed site visits and has been given the necessary approvals. The approval enables the company to move to a 24-hour trucking operation to transport iron ore from Riley Iron Ore mine to the port of Burnie although final approval is still pending Federal Government sign off. ( , ) has received Tasmanian Environment Protection Authority (EPA) approval to move to a 24-hour trucking operation for the transportation of iron ore from its Riley Iron Ore mine to the port of Burnie. The company, however, clarifies that final approval is still pending Federal Government (EPBC) sign off. Judicial review Venture has also received notice of a judicial review against the EPAs decision to vary the permit to 24-hour trucking. According to the company, this does not affect current operations or existing approvals, which allow it to continue to truck ore to the port during daylight hours. Shares today have been as much as 11.7% higher to 8.6 cents primarily due to improved iron ore prices while Ventures market cap at pre-open was approximately $102.7 million. READ: Venture Minerals will send off first iron ore shipment in early September Last week the company booked its first shipment of iron ore following the completion of plant commissioning and achievement of steady-state production. A 46,000-tonne capacity bulk carrier vessel has been chartered by a major international shipping operator. Ventures offtake partner and one of the worlds largest iron ore traders, Prosperity Steel United Singapore, will designate the discharge port in China. Major milestone Venture managing director Andrew Radonjic said: Venture already has a significant stockpile of iron ore ready to ship. The achievement of steady-state production and consequently continuous ore haulage has enabled us to immediately charter a bulk carrier vessel to load and deliver the first shipment, he said. This marks a major milestone for us as we transition from a highly successful explorer to producer. Improvement programs The company began commissioning its wet screening plant in May and this is now operational with 24-hour processing underway. Venture plans to work on continuous improvement programs for the following months as it ramps up production from one to two shipments per month. While insurers are prohibited from charging higher premiums to unvaccinated people, employers themselves can The unfortunately named ( ) is to slap a US$200 monthly surcharge on employees who have not been inoculated against the COVID-10 coronavirus. The US airline said it would only pay sick pay to employees who have gone down with the virus if they have been double-jabbed. The airline's boss, Ed Bastian, sent a memo to staff outlining the new rules for staff members who have enrolled in the companys healthcare plan. In the US, the average hospital stay for someone suffering from COVID-19 would cost the company US$50,000, which Bastian said was untenable. From 30 September, Delta intends to make all unvaccinated staff take weekly COVID-19 tests and wear masks on (indoor) Delta premises. Delta will charge unvaccinated employees on the company health plan $200 a month a policy executives say is needed because the average hospital stay for the virus costs the airline $40,000.https://t.co/l1xMMJdoVq NPR (@NPR) August 25, 2021 The exorbitant cost of healthcare in the US has prompted many US companies to go down a similar route to Delta, even ( ), the US investment bank where many employees aspire to be richer than Croesus. ( ) announced this week that all employees, clients and visitors to its offices would need to prove they had been double-jabbed before being allowed on the premises. The bank also plans to bring in mandatory coronavirus testing for staff on a once-a-week basis. The objective of the virtual clean tech mission, from September 20-23, is to attain a targeted six pre-screened, high-impact business-to-business meetings The selection was based on its CO2 Delivery Solutions application as a clean technology ( , ) said it has been selected to participate in a virtual trade mission to Mexico presented by the Ontario Ministry of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade (MEDJCT) in collaboration with the Toronto Regional Board of Trade. The selection was based on its CO2 Delivery Solutions application as a clean technology. The objective of the virtual clean tech mission, from September 20-23, is to attain a targeted six pre-screened, high-impact business-to-business meetings coordinated by Global BMT Consulting. Global BMT is a market intelligence company focused on international business, marketing, and trade consultancy that has been retained by the MEDJCT to introduce Ontario-based clean technology companies entering the Mexico market to targeted potential customers and distributors. Participation will augment our initial Mexico introductions screened by our Canadian Federal Trade Commissioners earlier in 2021 as well as our penetration of Mexico's protected Ag market by us and our Mexico marketing partner Rancho Nexo, CO2 vice president of sales and strategic alliances Aaron Archibald said in a statement. This is the fourth time our Canadian governments have selected CO2 GRO as a promising Canadian Ag tech (agriculture technology) company to help promote us in international markets. We are currently also in competition for other Canadian Trade Commissioner Ag Tech support programs for 2022 in the EU and the Middle East, he added. CO2 GRO's proprietary CO2 Delivery Solutions technology is revolutionizing the global 600 billion square foot protected agriculture industry. It creates a saturated CO2 solution that when misted onto plants provides growers that cannot gas with CO2 the opportunity to increase plant yields by up to 30% and profits by up to 100%. Applying saturated CO2 also suppresses the development of pathogens such as E.coli and powdery mildew, helping to reduce crop losses. Contact the author at stephen.gunnion@proactiveinvestors.com If you were looking for the Charlestown Democratic Town Committee website and ended up here, try this Got news tips, gossip, suggestions, complaints?E-mail us: progressivecharlestown@gmail.com We strive to avoid errors in our articles. Our correction policy can be found here With a band of lipstick warriors cornered and a swarm of Taliban soldiers preparing to launch a lethal offensive against them, one CIA operative, aided by his Kabul station chief and their crew of behind the scenes techies, go completely off the reservation in an effort to save them. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE / PRURGENT The fall of the Afghan government has brought Taliban barbarism to the forefront of media headlines worldwide once again. Summary executions, schools and infrastructure destroyed, women oppressed and the page turned back on human rights. But the resistance lives on. A recent piece in the Washington Post by Ezzatullah Mehrdad titled Anti-Taliban fighters claim victories as first stirring of armed resistance emerge, paints an inspiring picture of their defiance. The atrocities of this militant organization have long been catalogued, and now to this mix arrives the unique perspective of Gary Paul Corcorans recently released novel, 'Afghan's Lipstick Warriors: First Chronicle'. If the sudden and complete collapse of the Afghan Army has reinforced anything, it is the very premise of Mr. Corcorans novel. The women of Afghanistan have only one hope. Defend themselves. The men will not do it for them. 'Afghan's Lipstick Warriors' revolves around the life of Saarah Khalil, born in a secluded mountain village, in the shadows of the Hindu Kush, and having come of age mostly unaware of the endless wars and tribal strife going on beyond her sheltered world. Then one day, the Taliban came and everything changed. Faced with the prospect of a forced marriage to a Taliban warlord, Saarah flees to a womens shelter in Kabul, where she is confronted with a simple truth. Her hopes and dreams, and those of every woman in Afghanistan, will be meaningless if the Taliban are able to retake power. And so a decision must be made. Will she lie down like a dog before them? Or take up arms and fight? This sweeping tale of love and war and personal destiny is played out against the backdrop of an American government at war with itself, with the CIA doing everything in its clandestine powers to support this fledgling band of women warriors while the State Department, at the direction of a new president, appears determined to stamp out what the administration views as upending their neat and orderly withdrawal plans. The setting for the tale is several months before the stunning collapse of the Afghan government, when the thought of the Taliban imposing their strict interpretation of Sharia upon Afghanistan was yet unthinkable, when Afghans still held onto their frail hopes of a better world. 'Afghan's Lipstick Warriors: First Chronicle' not only champions those hopes, but presages its soon to be published sequel, 'Afghan's Lipstick Warriors: Darkness Falls, in which a determined movement of both men and women shake off the grim reality of their defeat and rejoin the fight for freedom. "In the course of human history, there is no greater miscarriage of justice than the one perpetrated by men upon women," Corcoran stated. "And so the hour is long overdue for every woman in this world to embrace and hold aloft this simple truth, for it haunts the mind of every tyrant, despot and dictator. A tiger is only tamed for so long as it accepts the whip." In keeping with the purpose of this novel, the author, along with his collaborator, Rob Williams, an Iraq and Afghanistan Wars vet, are dedicating 50% of all royalties to the aid organizations, No One Left Behind and Women For Afghan Women, in order to assist both the people fleeing Afghanistan and those who have been left behind. Gary Corcoran is available for media interviews and can be reached using the information below, or by email at gpcorcoran yahoo.com. 'Afghan's Lipstick Warriors' is available at Amazon and other book retailers. More information is available at his website at http://www.garypaulcorcoran.com. About Gary Paul Corcoran: The product of an Irish/Italian family, Mr. Corcoran was transplanted as a boy from the clapboard New England of his youth to the cookie cutter, stucco subdivisions that began to litter the disappearing ranches and orange groves south of Los Angeles in the 1960s. True to his rebellious nature and the folk music/coffee house idealism that helped shape his early worldview, Mr. Corcoran chose to resist the Vietnam War, was a man without a country for several years and can count incarceration in a Mexican prison as one of his many colorful experiences during that era. Having pursued a love of reading and writing in various forms all his life, Mr. Corcoran finally took this passion seriously around the turn of the millennium and has dedicated the remainder of his days to authorship. The author of eight previous novels, Mr. Corcorans rough and tumble early experiences animate all of his literary works, from his Michael Devlin crime series to his special forces adventures to his tales of romance. Mr. Corcoran is currently working on a sequel to Afghans Lipstick Warriors and expects to publish it by the end of 2021. In completing the karmic circle, the author recently returned to the New England of his youth and now resides along the coast of Rhode Island. A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind. Abiquiu reservoir is at a very low level, with water barely reaching the westernmost area of the dam. Department of Interior officials say the release of Colorado River allotments into Lake Powell will not affect water leases in New Mexico, Colorado and Utah, yet. The release of water was to support hydroelectric generation, irrigation and treated water for personal use in Arizona, Nevada and California. During the all-party meet held on Thursday, Congress leaders Mallikarjun Kharge, Anand Sharma and Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi should brief the opposition about the situation in Afghanistan and the government's stand with regard to the war-torn nation. The Congress leaders also asked about the reports of 'secret' talks being held in Doha, Qatar, with the Taliban to discuss the Afghanistan crisis, but sources said the government did not comment on the matter. The Congress leaders also demanded to know about the government's evacuation strategy and how many Indians are still stranded in Afghanistan. The Congress leaders asked the government to expresses solidarity with the people of Afghanistan and uphold the principles of fundamental right and freedom. What steps for humanitarian assistance are being taken by the government of India, they demanded to konw. The Congress delegation said that there is a perception that India appears to be isolated from its traditional allies in the region. "The Prime Minister recently spoke to the Russian President and the German Chancellor. We would like to know what transpired during these discussions? Further, what diplomatic or other strategic steps are being planned to strengthen our position, both in the short term and in the long run," the Congress delegation asked, as per sources. A man was allegedly shot in the head near Delhi's Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport, while he was going in his car along with his friends early on Wednesday. The victim, who was identified as Sandeep Bhati, was in his Hyundai Verna along with three friends when the incident took place around 5 a.m., according to the police. He is learnt to be critical and undergoing treatment in a private hospital in Noida. The police said the accused fired two bullets at Bhati's car. The first one hit the rear glass of the vehicle while the second hit Bhati on his head. "We received information through PCR call and when we reached the spot, we were informed by one of his (Bhati) friends that they were on their way back from a temple in Bhiwadi when an unknown person started following them from the airport," said Ingit Pratap Singh, DCP Southwest district. The accused has been identified as Nitin Singh Raghuvanshi and a case has been registered under IPC sections for rash driving, attempted murder and the Arms Act on the complaint of Bhati's friends, the DCP told IANS. He informed that during the investigation, police scanned CCTV footage from the Delhi-Gurugram border to Kalkaji and identified the Swift car that was driven by the accused. "After the firing incident, accused Nitin Raghuvanshi went to Kalkaji and sent his car to a repair shop in Okhla from where our team has seized it. His mother, Archana, is a Delhi Police officer. The family lives in a police colony in Kalkaji," Singh added. Three Punjabi men have been arrested from Brampton city in Canada for using an underage girl in sex trade. While Amritpal Singh, 23, Harkuwar Singh, 22, and Sukhmanpreet Singh, 23, have been arrested, the hunt is on for a fourth accused. The case came to light on August 21 when police got a call that a woman under 18-years-old was being held against her will, assaulted and was being trafficked in sex trade. The victim was rescued and taken to a hospital with serious injuries. The police then raided a house in Brampton and arrested the three men. While Amritpal Singh and Harkuwar Singh have been charged with sex trafficking, advertising sexual services, and benefiting from sexual services, Sukhmanpreet Singh has been charged with forcible confinement and aggravated assault Police say they are looking for the fourth suspect who is also a South Asian. The US Embassy in Kabul sent out an alert early Thursday, asking US citizens not to travel to the airport "because of security threats outside the gates", The New York Post reported. Senior US officials told the media that the warning was related to specific threats involving the IS and potential vehicle bombs. The State Department security alert also told Americans who where at three specific airport gates to "leave immediately", without further explanation. "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising US citizens to avoid travelling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a US government representative to do so," the statement read. "US citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," it added. President Joe Biden on Tuesday cited "the acute and growing risk of an attack" by the IS affiliate in Afghanistan, known as ISIS-K, as a reason not to extend the withdrawal timeline. "Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and Allied forces and innocent civilians," the President said. Edison, NJ -- (SBWIRE) -- 08/26/2021 -- HTF Market Intelligence released a new research Study of 75 pages on title 'Footwear Market in India (2021-2026) ' with in-depth analysis, forecast and business moves. The study covers key regions that includes North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, South America, Middle East and Africa and important players such as Khadim India Limited, Liberty Shoes Limited, Relaxo Footwear Limited, Sreeleather Limited, Bata India Limited and Adidas India Private Limited. Request a sample report @ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/sample-report/3249857-footwear-market-in-india-2 Summary Currently, India is the second largest footwear manufacturer in the world after China. The footwear market consists of companies engaged in manufacturing, selling and marketing of different kinds of footwear and accessories to the end users, namely men, women and kids. Footwear has evolved from being a necessity, as protection for feet, to an accessory which has become a style statement for customers. The Indian footwear market is dominated by unorganized players but as consumer preference and buying behavior is changing, organized retail players are making space for themselves in the market. Of the total footwear produced, ~90% are consumed within the country while the remaining ~10% are exported mainly to the European nations which include the United Kingdom (UK), Germany, Italy and France. With increasing internet penetration and rising popularity of the e-commerce market, footwear manufacturers, having a presence over the e-commerce ecosystem, are using the internet not only for driving sales but also to monitor consumer-buying behavior, and are accordingly offering a personalized experience to customers. Through e-commerce platforms companies also provide fast and convenient functional experience to customers like easy payment option, grievance management, after sales service and competitive pricing. Buy full copy of the report @ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/buy-now?format=1&report=3249857 Market segmentation The Indian footwear market is segmented by end user-wise sales, and type-wise market segmentation in which casual footwear contributes chiefly to the total revenue. Key growth factors o Increase in disposable income and per capita income has revolutionized the consumers' buying and spending pattern towards apparel and footwear. A greater proportion of the overall Indian population, which includes tier I and II cities as well as smaller towns, now have considerably higher spending power, as a result of which, expansion of the footwear market is gaining mass momentum. o The emergence of organized retail and e-tailing plays a major role in the development of the Indian footwear market. The modern retailing has resulted in increased accessibility, evaluation of a large number of alternatives, and special offers and discounts to attract customers. Threats and key players o In India, the unorganized footwear market accounts for 85% of total market and give stiff competition to organised sector players. Unorganised players have a lot of advantages over organised players like lower sales tax and lower labor cost. o Khadim India Limited, Liberty Shoes Limited, Relaxo Footwear Limited, Sreeleather Limited, Bata India Limited and Adidas India Private Limited are some of the major players operating in the Indian footwear market. What is covered in the report? 1. Overview of the Indian footwear market 2. Historical, current and forecasted market size data for the Indian footwear market (2017 to 2023) 3. Qualitative analysis of the Indian footwear market and its segments (end-user wise sales, organized vs unorganized split, material wise segmentation, type-wise market segmentation) 4. Trade analysis of the footwear market in India 5. Qualitative analysis of the major drivers and challenges affecting the market 6. Analysis of the competitive landscape and profiles of major players operating in the market 7. Key recent developments associated with the footwear market in India Why buy? 1. Get a broad understanding of the footwear market in India, the dynamics of the market and current state of the sector 2. Strategize marketing, market-entry, market expansion and other business plans by understanding the factors driving growth in the market 3. Be informed regarding the key developments in the footwear market in India 4. Understand major competitors' business strategies and market dynamics and respond accordingly to benefit from the market Customizations Available With the given market data, Netscribes offers customizations according to specific needs. Write to us at craig.francis@htfmarketreport.com. Enquire for Customization Available @ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/enquiry-before-buy/3249857-footwear-market-in-india-2 Chapter 1: Executive summary Chapter 2: Socio-economic indicators Chapter 3: Introduction 3.1. India retail industry definition and structure 3.2. Footwear market definition and structure Chapter 4: Indian footwear market - overview 4.1. Footwear market size and growth forecast- value-wise 4.2. Porter's five forces analysis Chapter 5: Indian footwear market - segmentation 5.1. End-user wise sales - percentage split 5.2. Organized vs unorganized - percentage split 5.3. Material wise - percentage split 5.4. Type-wise - percentage split Chapter 6: Trade analysis 6.1. Export of footwear o Value-wise o Country-wise 6.2. Import of footwear o Value-wise o Country-wise Chapter 7: Key growth drivers of the market Chapt View Detailed Table of Content @ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/reports/3249857-footwear-market-in-india-2 Contact Us: CRAIG FRANCIS (PR & Marketing Manager) sales@htfmarketreport.com Ph: +1 (206) 317 1218 Westerville, OH -- (SBWIRE) -- 08/26/2021 -- No More Phone Tag has improved equipment that offers complete backup of any current system and even replaces the current system entirely where applicable. No more Phone Tag is by HIPAA and emphasizes keeping HIPAA training and guidelines up to date. You can, then be sure that your sensitive data stays private and secure. All potential consumers are urged to carry out their research, and the company is happy to give their service and knowledge. They are also happy to note that their customer support scores are one of the best. No More Phone Tag's spokesperson further added, "We want to make it as flexible for our doctors, psychiatrists, surgeons, clinic and practitioners, and all healthcare professionals as possible. We have s strategy for someone to respond day and night to their phones, on holidays or not. They accept messages and prioritize them, filter received calls, and find out which doctors or nurses can be called to respond and which can take messages and call the healthcare provider late. Our team loves the freedom to perform what they do to save lives and fulfill their other obligations without unethical behavior for their patients." No More Phone Tag provides an excellent med answering service in Ohio. The company is equipped with experience in its field of work. Their med answering service providers are also bilingual, while others are trilingual. They also have HIPAA standards and offer high-quality services at an affordable price. 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Choosing an enterprise with sufficient experience in this regard reflects the customer service you get. It is crucial to know that the customer service specialist is fully trained in medical response. Remember that you cannot let a novice take care of your patients' medical demands." No More Phone Tag is among the best pediatrician answering services providers in Ohio. Their caregivers are highly trained to give top-notch services to children of any age. If your child needs medical attention, No More Phone Tag ensures that you get the best customer experience. About No More Phone Tag No More Phone Tag realizes the necessity for all patients to receive important medical attention and care. Every second is critical to them, and this is why their call respondents treat urgent calls and messages carefully. They take care of urgent calls by sending them to the right doctors as soon as they are made. If callers are not answered, they will be sent on a call to the next doctor so that any delays which may become harmful or fatal are kept to a minimum. This is why it is known as one of the top medical answering service companies in Ohio. Contact Details No More Phone Tag Address: 787 S. State Street, Suite B - Westerville, Ohio 43081 Phone: (614) 895-2820 Website: https://www.nomorephonetag.com/ A corrupt government becoming more and more distant to the people, many of whom were in poverty, and the US and allies seen as protecting the corrupt, provided ample ammunition to the Taliban to establish themselves throughout the country. by Raj Gonsalkorale The world needs an Emperor with full clothing to counter the increasing stridency of China. Unfortunately, the US has been progressively shedding its clothes beginning perhaps with the defeat in Vietnam. The many military incursions that followed, all basically abject failures in improving the lives of the people of the countries so invaded, has shown that US objectives have been flawed, and the execution of such objectives, even worse. One wonders however whether there is a dichotomy when it comes to these objectives. Were they meant to help the countries so invaded, were they purely to serve US interests, or were they to serve the interests of a powerful lobby within the US which has profited hugely on account of these futile military adventures. The latter wants conflict, war, instability, corruption at the highest levels in the countries invaded in order to beget even more conflict and war. If the invasions were for the benefit of the countries invaded, then during the time of occupation, the people of the countries would have had an improved economy, improved livelihoods for the people, a better health system, a more modernised education system, infrastructure, political and democratic freedoms. It is highly debateable whether any of the countries invaded passed muster on these key fronts. Afghanistan today is nearly 100% dependent on foreign aid to run the country, as it was 20 years ago. Reports say that Healthcare in Afghanistan is provided by over 3,000 health facilities found throughout the country. The decades of war and neglect by the world community has destroyed Afghanistan's already-poor healthcare system. In recent years, however, the country had somewhat improved its healthcare system. Life expectancy rates are among the lowest in the world and 25% of children die before their fifth birthday. In 2019, life expectancy at birth for women in Afghanistan was about 66.39 years, while life expectancy at birth for men was about 63.38 years on average. Lack of basic health care and malnutrition contribute to the high death rates. Afghanistan has the second highest maternal mortality rate in the world. UNESCO says that Currently, over 10 million youth and adults in Afghanistan are illiterate. However, it also says that since 2016, the country has made significant progress. While in 2016/17 the literacy rate was at 34.8 per cent, the UNESCO Institute for Statistics recently confirmed that is has now increased to 43 per cent. However, other reports say its around 28.1%. (https://www.infoplease.com/world/country-statistics/lowest-literacy-rates) As regards the economy of Afghanistan, Wikipedia says that while there have been improvements over the last few years, it is still described as follows Despite holding over $1 trillion in proven untapped mineral deposits, Afghanistan remains one of the least developed countries in the world. Its unemployment rate is over 23% and about half of its population lives below the poverty line. Many of the unemployed men join the foreign-funded militant groups or the world of crime, particularly as smugglers. The Afghan government has long sought foreign investment in order to improve Afghanistan's economy The statements made by the US and its allies that they invaded Afghanistan to prevent it from becoming a haven for the Al Qaeda terrorist movement and not for the benefit of the Afghan people seems clear when one looks at the above statistics. A question can be asked legitimately by the people of Afghanistan whether the price they paid for a decision they had no input or a say, was worth it, in getting the Taliban out of Afghanistan and for them to come back 20 years later, reportedly after spending some 2 trillion dollars over this period with not much to show as an improvement to the lives and livelihoods of ordinary Afghans. No doubt corruption and mismanagement has been one of the biggest contributors to the lack of trust and confidence the people of the country had with their politicians and government officials. So called war lords from provinces entered Parliament and some became ministers. A corrupt government becoming more and more distant to the people, many of whom were in poverty, and the US and allies seen as protecting the corrupt, provided ample ammunition to the Taliban to establish themselves throughout the country. Although there was increasing freedom for women during the past 20 years, in a country with high illiteracy, it is possible that many Afghan men may have been supportive of the Taliban as they too were not culturally supportive of freedom for women. The younger, more educated, urban based men may have been supportive, but they were a minority. The US, its allies and the Afghan government they propped, were not succeeding in winning the hearts and minds of people, and it was a matter of time before the Taliban took over. The issue before the US, NATO and Allies and what is called the free world, is not just Afghanistan. It is the situation where this group has shown its impotency in being able to halt the march of the not so free world of Islamic extremists, terrorist groups intent on achieving their objectives via violent means on the one hand, and the rising belligerence of China on the other hand. In Buddhist philosophy, the doctrine of dependent origination or Patticca Samuppada underpins ongoing human existence. It is about cyclical consequential thoughts and action that follows from present thoughts and action. This is a very simplified statement, but it is just that simplicity that has a bearing on some of the reasons for conflicts arising out of the battles between the free world and the not so free world. While the value of democracy, freedom and justice, and law and order existing or should exist in a society that has the fundamentals mentioned is not in question, it is perhaps pertinent to ask whether such societies have been as inclusive as they have been portrayed to the world. It is also equally pertinent to ask whether social and societal inequities and inequalities, exploitation of the less fortunate by the more fortunate does or does not occur in such countries, and what consequential actions follow as a result of it. Do the structures and systems in such countries have avenues for the less fortunate, affected people to overcome feelings of helplessness? People who are affected, and who do not feel the systems are able to address their situation, could react in many different ways. Some may just accept it, some may strive to find ways and means of overcoming such situations, and some may do so using methods that are not conventional and outside the norms of the societies they live in. Amongst these different groups, there would be fertile ground for extremist leaders, using tools such as extremist religious interpretations, to recruit such disgruntled people. These could be consequential actions arising from the mental state of some people facing helplessness and hopelessness in societies. Poverty is rife in many democratic countries and contributes significantly to the rise of extremism. GSDC Applied Knowledge Services in a working paper from Stanford Universitys Centre on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law suggests that the obstacles to the elimination of poverty are largely political. Poverty is generated and reproduced by power disparity and abuse. The enduring reduction of poverty requires a broad context of good governance, beyond the narrow arena of free and fair elections. The deepest root cause of development failure is bad governance the inability or unwillingness to apply public resources effectively to generate public goods. Good governance involves the capacity and commitment to act in pursuit of the public good, transparency, accountability, citizen participation and the rule of law. Bad governance prevents the accumulation of the financial, physical, social and political capital necessary for development. The paper goes on to say that Democracy should provide a corrective to bad governance by holding corrupt, unresponsive or ineffectual leaders to account and enabling citizens to participate in making policy. The evidence on the relationship between democracy and development is ambiguous, however. While authoritarian rule offers poor prospects for sustained poverty reduction, democracy does not offer any guarantee of good governance. The effectiveness of democracy in reducing poverty depends to a great extent on the type and degree of democracy. Democracy can be seen as having three dimensions: electoral competition, civil liberties and responsible and accountable government https://gsdrc.org/document-library/moving-on-up-out-of-poverty-what-does-democracy-have-to-do-with-it/. Two things are clear from this paper that firstly, democracy could be a very loose term and it doesnt necessarily serve all people with equal measure when it comes to inequity, inequality, opportunity and it provides safeguards to the less fortunate when through natural occurrences or deliberate acts, the less fortunate and the marginalised are left behind, and secondly, the democratisation experiment of Afghanistan did not work as it was not culturally attuned and facile at best. The lesson hopefully for the free world is to examine how these consequential situations occur, before they occur, and see how they can be avoided or mitigated. These need to be done within historical and cultural contexts in different societies as one rule does not fit all. This is probably the single biggest reason for the failure of US policy of successive regimes as cultural contexts have been rarely recognised by policy makers. The Emperor cannot wear more transparent clothes to cover its nakedness. The Emperor needs not just different clothes but more importantly, a different mindset to realise it cannot continue to walk around pretending there is no nakedness. This approach must be firstly and lastly, based on giving a helping hand to countries in need of assistance to overcome poverty, to improve their health services, improve education and helping them to stand on their own feet to improve their economies, but within their cultural contexts. Democratisation has to be a progressive exercise and based on conviction, and not introduced allowing corrupt individuals to further their personal nests. Placing military boots, guns and bombs in countries on the pretext of helping them has to stop, as recent history in Vietnam, Iraq, Libya, and now in Afghanistan, has proven beyond any doubt. Meanwhile, UN human rights chief warns that she has credible reports of summary executions in areas of Afghanistan under Taliban control CIA Director William Burns visited Kabul on Monday to meet with the Talibans top political leader, a US official said. The official told The Associated Press the meeting between Burns and Abdul Ghani Baradar came amid the ongoing evacuations at the Kabul airport. The Washington Post first reported Burns meeting with Baradar. The US official confirmed the report on condition of anonymity. Burns visited Jerusalem and met with Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, Defense Minister Benny Gantz and Mossad director David Barnea earlier this month. The senior US military commander at the Kabul airport, Rear Adm. Peter Vasely, has been communicating daily with Taliban commanders in an effort to facilitate the evacuation, but the last known contact between the military and Baradar was when Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, flew to Doha, Qatar, to meet with him and other Taliban officials last December. Milley tried to persuade the Taliban to reduce their attacks against Afghan forces, ultimately to no avail. Earlier Tuesday, UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet warned that she had credible reports of summary executions and restrictions on women in areas under Taliban control in Afghanistan, fueling fears of what their rule might hold a week before US forces are set to withdraw. Bachelet urged the Human Rights Council to take bold and vigorous action to monitor the rights situation in Afghanistan in the wake of the Talibans stunning takeover, as she sought to ensure that international attention on the country doesnt wane. Taliban leaders have promised to restore security and tried to project an image of moderation, but many Afghans are skeptical and are racing to the leave the country, leading to chaos at Kabuls international airport. Amid scattered reports, it has been difficult to determine how widespread abuses might be and whether they reflect that Taliban leaders are saying one thing and doing another, or if fighters on the ground are taking matters into their own hands. Leaders from the Group of Seven nations plan to meet later Tuesday to discuss the burgeoning refugee crisis and the collapse of the Afghan government amid wrangling over whether the full US withdrawal of troops could be extended beyond the end of the month to allow more time to evacuate those desperate to leave. US administration officials have refused to be pinned down about whether an extension is likely or even possible given that a Taliban spokesman has warned that August 31 is a red line and that extending the American presence would provoke a reaction. In the meantime, tragic scenes at the airport have transfixed the world. Afghans poured onto the tarmac last week and some clung to a US military transport plane as it took off, later plunging to their deaths. At least seven people died that day, and another seven died Sunday in a panicked stampede. An Afghan solider was killed Monday in a gunfight. Days earlier, a Norway-based private intelligence group said it obtained evidence that the Taliban have rounded up Afghans on a blacklist of people they believe worked in key roles with the previous Afghan administration or with US-led forces. Several Afghans are in hiding, saying they fear such reprisals. When the Taliban last ruled Afghanistan in the late 1990s, the group largely confined women to their homes, banned television and music, chopped off the hands of suspected thieves and held public executions. Bachelet noted that Taliban leaders have recently pledged to respect the rights of women, girls and ethnic minorities and refrain from reprisals. The onus is now fully on the Taliban to translate these commitments into reality, she told the 47-member-state council, which is the UNs top human rights body. Sixty years after Nazi arch-murderer Adolf Eichmann was captured by Mossad agents and brought to Israel for trial, a German media outlet has revealed, for the first time, the identity of the person believed to have turned Eichmann in. Adolf Eichmann walks around the yard of his cell, Ramla Prison, Israel, 1961. The German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung ran a feature article this week describing the role German geologist Gerhard Klammer, who opposed the Nazi regime and who worked with Eichmann in Argentina, played in revealing Eichmann's true identity to the Mossad. According to the report, Klammer worked for the Capri building firm in the Argentinian city of Tucuman, where he met Eichmann, who was employed at the same company under the fictitious name "Ricardo Klement." Eichmann reportedly revealed his true identity to Klammer in the 1950s, and Klammer made multiple anonymous attempts to alert authorities in both Germany and Argentina, hoping they would take action against Eichmann for his war crimes. Gerhard Klammer, a geologist, recognized Eichmann while working together in Argentina and tipped off Israeli spies. Associates of Klammer said that Eichmann's true identity had been an "open secret" in the German community in Argentina and that supporters of the Nazis worked to protect him. But Klammer had opposed the Nazi regime, and therefore sought to have Eichmann face trial. In the 1960s the building company encountered financial difficulties and Eichmann left Tucuman to try and find work in Buenos Aires. At that time, Klammer returned to Germany, where he told a close friend a priest who had served in the German army where Eichmann was and the cover story he had adopted. The photo of Adolf Eichmann (circled) that led to his capture and eventual execution. The two delivered the details of Eichmann's false identity, as well as a picture of him, to Fritz Bauer, the prosecutor responsible for the Eichmann case. Bauer had already heard about Eichmann's whereabouts from a German Jew whose daughter dated Eichmannn's son briefly. The son told the man's daughter about his father's new secret identity, but many details were missing. Klammer's evidence gave Bauer evidence that Eichmann was alive and in Argentina, and the prosecutor reached out to the Mossad, whose agents began searching for him, eventually locating the killer in a small town near the Argentine capital. The rules of good behavior, let's call it that way, during official conversations, even conversations that necessarily have a note of confidentiality, dictate that mobile phones should not be brought into the room where the conversation is taking place. by Tomislav Jakic An unusual scene was recorded by cameras during Angela Merkel's recent meeting with Vladimir Putin in Moscow. It was the last in a long series of meetings between the two statesmen and at the same time a farewell visit of the German Chancellor, who will remain in office until the parliamentary elections scheduled for the end of September. Sometime in the first minutes of the meeting (it is so common to allow cameramen to stay in the room where the meeting is being held), a cell phone rang in the pocket of the head of the German government. It is not remembered when something similar happened at the time of the official talks. Any, anywhere and anytime. Angela Merkel reached into her pocket a little awkwardly, took out her mobile phone and interrupted the call at the touch of a button, and Putin continued to speak and with a somewhat ironic smile said: "We will definitely continue our contacts, even by phone." The event was registered in the world, not everywhere, but only on the margins, as something intaresting. We did not notice that anyone wondered: what really happened and how it is possible that it happened. And that is exactly the question that needs to be asked. Because if in the midst of talks with Russian President the phone rings in the pocket of the German Chancellor, it is not by accident. This simply cannot be accidental. And here's why. The rules of good behavior, let's call it that way, during official conversations, even conversations that necessarily have a note of confidentiality, dictate that mobile phones should not be brought into the room where the conversation is taking place. The reason is very clear: these tiny devices without which, so today's generations think, life is not imaginable, very easily - and without the knowledge, much less consent of their owners - are transformed into listening/spying devices (in addition to giving the exact position at any time of persons carrying them). Since a few years ago it is known that US intelligence agency NSA (National Security Agency) is eavesdropping, and monitors electronic communications of literally countless multitude of people around the world. NSA also tapped the German chancellor's cell phone. She reacted rather lukewarmly to the discovery, saying, "If that's true, then it's not right." It was true, there is no doubt about it, and to say that it is not right, it is the mildest possible formulation, chosen obviously only because it was the Americans. Had it been established by any chance that the Russians or the Chinese are engaged in this work (whom the West is today accusing of waging a cyber war, even trying to prevent the Chinese company Huawei from marketing its products in the West , precisely under the accusation that the company's mobile phones allow Chinese intelligence to monitor not only the movements but also the communication of their owners), reactions would have ranged from a protest note to the withdrawal of the ambassador for consultations. But, the reaction was lukewarm. It is to be assumed that German experts in the meantime did their best (it is very in to use that phrase today) to protect the chancellors cell phone. It is no less likely that they failed to do so. So it can be assumed that Angela Merkels mobile can even today serve as a device for eavesdropping. The Russians are certainly not searching members of foreign delegations who come to talk to Putin to find out if they have cell phones with them. However, this author knows from his own experience (when he accompanied Croatian President Mesic on his meetings with Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin) that members of foreign delegations are asked to put their mobile phones in a small locker with compartments before entering the meeting room. Angela Merkel has been with Putin many times , even in the Kremlin. There is no reason to assume that her delegation was treated differently from other delegations and politicians who come to meet with the Russian president. And even if the chancellor could forget that detail, her protocol could not and should not forget something like that. It is herefore to be assumed that the German protocol consciously let Chancellor to come to talk with Putin with a cell phone in her pocket . Let's move on: only a limited number of people, and not just any people, have the German chancellor's cell phone number. Likewise, it is certainly known, at least to those who must know such things, who these persons are. The Chancellor's daily schedule, including the programs of her stays abroad, is again known only to a limited number of people. Once again: not any people. And that someone who has her number and who knows the plan of her movement consciously calls her just at the time she is talking to the Russian president is impossible. Just as it is impossible that her mobile phone was accidentally activated (although this can happen with so-called smartphones). The call, therefore, was intentional. Had to be. And for what purpose? Only one: to embarrass the German chancellor on the occasion of her farewell meeting with Putin, to portray her - perhaps - in his eyes as someone who knowingly comes with the phone in her pocket to talk to him, so that American (or at least: German) intelligence services could follow every word. Which would make her appear an untrustworthy partner, raising even the question: for how many years is she like this and can she be trusted in anything she says (or said in the past)? From this necessarily the next question emerges: who could have the ability and interest to do such a thing? Theoretically it is possible that it was even the Russians themselves. Just to show her that they know what she was doing, that she brought her cell phone, this potentially tapping device on a conversation with Putin. But apart from making her funny in the eyes of the public (because, let us remember, everything happened in front of tv cameraa) and thus 'repaying the debt' for her agreeing to US sanctions on Russia, though not always enthusiastic, there was no serious reason for such a joke. And because Moscow takes politics seriously, that possibility, although theoretically existent, can be forgotten. Of the actors on the German political scene, there is no one who would have the need to compromise Angela Merkel in the last weeks of her political career. Namely, she does not run in the September elections and withdraws from active politics after them, so she is no longer dangerous to anyone as a possible competitor. This eliminates the Germans. However, there remain those who resented Angela Merkel as the Prime Minister of Germany and one of the most prominent, but also the most influential figures in European and even world politics. Two countries come immediately in mind, but basically one. These are the United States and Ukraine and that is why we say that it comes in fact only to one country, because Ukraine without American help could have not (should have not) staged something like this. Washington will not and cannot forgive the German chancellor for not giving in to pressure and stopping work on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which will provide not only Germany but also Western Europe with natural gas from Russia. It started in the Trump era, with Donald Trump threatening in his own rude way with sanctions every German and European companies that participated in the realization of this project (and accusing falsely Germany of being totally dependent on Russian gas ). Joe Biden, however, gave up sanctions on Germany, but provided for an American-German agreement that if only on paper leaves to Ukraine its privileged position as a country that charges for the transit of Russian gas to Europe through a pipeline which runs on the Ukrainian territory (and sometimes steal gas intended for Europe, when the Russians halt supplies to Ukraine because of unpaid bills). North Stream 2 is nearing completion and obviously nothing can stop it. What 'hurts' And the Americans not only for political reasons (someone resisted them, potentially depriving their 'player' - Ukraine), but also for economic ones. With natural gas provided from Russia (which, at least until now, has never used energy as a means of pressure or political blackmail), there will hardly be anyone in Europe who will agree to buy more expensive liquefied American gas. Enough reasons to at least make a mockery of Angela Merkel at the end of her political career, especially during her meeting with Putin, so disliked by the US. Ukraine, on the other hand, has two reasons to take revenge on the German chancellor. The first is the mentioned Nord Stream 2, against which Ukraine, together with several other countries, the so-called new Europe, all of them former Soviet satellites, cried havoc. With no results! A second is that, although Angela Merkel persistently reiterates that Germany will not recognize "the annexation of the Crimea", she insists on agreement from Minsk which the Ukrainian side does not even thing about of fulfilling (because it would mean that Kiev has to practically give up some key aspects of its anti-Russian policy, at least in Ukraine). So, Ukraine has enough reasons, the only question is: does it have the knowledge to do something like that? On their own - probably. But as Kiev is becoming increasingly an 'American player' in Eastern Europe and on the border with Russia, it is to be assumed that organizing the ringing of German Chancellors cell phone in the midst of her talks with the Russian could not have been staged without American approval, and it is even more realistic to say: without American help. Will the enigma with the ringing of the cell phone of German Chancellor during her meeting with Russian President ever to be resolved, for now remains an open issue. But even if it apparently will be lifted, there will be, at least for the public, no answers to key questions: who was calling and why. The public should treat this as one pretty little story from the sphere of high politics. And nothing more. Because thats what the public is allowed to do: have fun with stories. A thinking public is not desirable, at least in the world we live in. The thinking is reserved for those who eavesdrop. Author is one of the most influential Yugoslav and Croatian journalists, who is covering the international relations for over 50 years and who served as Foreign policy Advisor to Croatian President Stjepan Mesic (2000 2010). The first superpowers summit that, Mr. Jakic personally covered was a Carter Brezhnev meeting in Vienna 1979. 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It also lets people choose what kinds of food works best for themselves and their families, rather than just having to take whatever is provided to them. While ICU beds are filled with patients who need all types of care, most of them in Florida are occupied by COVID patients 55%, which is more than double the number just four weeks ago. Nationally, about 29% of ICU beds are occupied by COVID patients, according to the U.S. Health and Human Services. The city has yet to sign off on the deal, but Hollywood taxpayers the true owners of the land have been anxious to see details on what the developer is offering in return for the rights to build on a 4-acre parcel currently appraised at $35 million. Miramar Police Spokeswoman Tania Rues said the police department had information that led them to believe the teen had a gun but could not elaborate on how the assistant principal knew the gun was in his backpack. A spokeswoman for Broward County Public Schools also said they could not provide information about how it was known the student had a gun with him. Separately, three groups of parents have filed legal challenges to the states rules on masks. All of the lawsuits argue that the state has endangered the health of children because not everyone on campus is masked even as COVID-19 cases surge in Florida. It was very difficult to open the door underwater, Shapshal said. I heard a cry from the back, so that was the first sign that the boy was alive. Now I know its a race against time because now the flood gates are open. The door is open, now the car is filling up with water. In Ohio, Testa will receive treatment including ECMO, according to WPEC, which stands for extracorporeal membrane oxygenation. Its a procedure that takes the workload off the heart and lungs by pumping blood out of the body so it can be oxygenated, and then pumps the blood back in the body. A 24-member board that oversees the nonprofit center was rife with complaints that staff members stonewalled their routine spending questions. Nine board members resigned in disgust. Chief Operating Officer Holland Ryan showed a similar indifference to the Sun Sentinel by ignoring our requests for routine minutes of board meetings. The center has no chief executive and the last two CEOs resigned. After 30 years, their track record should be a lot stronger than this. Jonson and Florida International University professor Eli Beracha analyzed over 100 metro areas, using 25 years of data from Zillow on single-family homes, townhomes and condos. Out of nine metros in Florida, the South Florida area ranked last in overpricing. Lakeland and the Tampa Bay area were the most overpriced in Florida, both at a little more than 31% above where they should be. A British man, who had an expensive Rolex watch stolen from his wrist in Mijas, chased the alleged thieves along the Costa del Sol to Marbella, to recover his 30,000-euro timepiece. The 41-year-old was caught off guard outside his house in Mijas in the early hours of Monday, 23 August, when one of the suspects violently snatched the high-end watch from his wrist. As the thief fled the scene, on a motorbike being driven by an accomplice, the theft victim jumped in his car to give chase. The pursuit ended in the Elviria area of Marbella when the bike rider lost control and crashed. National Police officers who arrived on the scene found one of the suspects a 35-year-old Italian man - hiding nearby, who was arrested. After interviewing the British man the 30,000-euro Rolex was also recovered. The other suspect managed to escape but was later identified and the police believe the pair were part of criminal gang that used the same modus operandi to steal luxury watches. The motorcycle used to carry out the attempted theft was registered in the name of a third person, a 28-year-old Spanish man, who was also arrested and accused of collaborating, as police say that he was aware of the criminal actions that were about to be committed. A strong explosion has rocked Kabul airport this Thursday, 26 August. It happened outside the east gate of the airport where there were also reports of shots being fired. The Spanish military deployed in the country are safe, a spokesperson from Spains Ministry of Defence confirmed. And there is no evidence that it has affected any members of the National Police force who are still there, he assured. Pentagon sources in America have confirmed the blast. "We can confirm an explosion next to the Kabul airport," spokesman John Kirby said on Twitter, saying that they will continue to offer "additional details" once they have them. According to the Al-Jazeera news channel there are 'at least 10 people dead'. Among the many wounded, are American soldiers. Sources point to a possible suicide attack as the source of the explosion. During the day, numerous Western forces had warned of the risk of an attack at the Kabul airport. The United States, the United Kingdom and Australia had asked their citizens and collaborators to leave the area due to the high risk of an imminent attack by ISIS. Countries like Turkey have already begun to remove their troops from Afghanistan, while Belgium and Denmark have announced the end of repatriations. France and Germany, on the other hand, are speeding up their operations. Unlimited website access 24/7 Unlimited e-Edition access 24/7 The best local, regional and national news in sports, politics, business and more! With a Digital Only subscription, you'll receive unlimited access to our website and e-Edition. Our digital products are available 24/7 and are accessible anywhere, anytime. Local Clearfield Area School District Parents ask Clearfield school board to implement mask mandate At the recent Clearfield Area School Board meeting, several residents asked the directors to require masks when school started on Wedesday. Currently, the district is recommending mask wearing for all unvaccinated individuals, but is not requiring it. But with the Delta varient of the COVID-19 virus spreading rapidly in children, several residents asked the board to require masks for all students and staff. Its a tiny piece of fabric. I think my childs life is more important than that, Nicole Yanni of Clearfield said. Please, please protect our children. Please, please require masks. Yanni said she has a child in the school district and also asked that vaccines be required of all staff members. She said Clearfield is currently listed by the Center of Disease Control as having a high transmission rate and scientific studies show that wearing masks, social distancing and vaccines help stop the spread of the virus. If you open our school district with no mask mandate in place, we will have sick children, Yanni said. Dominic Kovach of Clearfield said he is a 2020 graduate of Clearfield Area High School said although the COVID-19 protocols were difficult and caused a lot of turmoil, he was proud of the steps the school district took last year to keep students safe from the COVID-19 and was hoping something similar would be done again this year. He said this isnt an individual decision because people in the schools have contact with people in the community and these measures could save lives. This board has the brilliant opportunity to re-implement some of the steps that were taken last year in order to help curb the affects of the coronavirus, Kovach said. In addition to masks, he said social distancing measures should be implemented and such as staggering the end of class periods. Rachel Kester said she has a child who is 5th grader in the district who is looking foward to returning to school and be a part of the school community again, but said she has some concerns. She said she reviewed the districts health and safety plan and said she doesnt believe it does enough to protect students. She said she knows the plan was developed prior to the new CDC guidelines and asked what would need to happen for the district to change it. What would trigger you reviewing and updating the health and safety plan, Kester asked. And even if a student wears a mask at school, she is concerned about the students eating in a full cafeteria this year instead of having them eat in the cafeteria and the gymnasium as they did last year because students will not be able to wear masks while eating. Kristina Fulton of Clearfield said the question of wearing masks is a public safety issue similar to wearing hard hats in construction zones or wearing seat belts while riding in vehicles, and she said the district should follow the CDC guidelines and require the wearing of masks while inside. This district has a duty and the obligation to follow these guidelines,Fulton said. The school board did not discuss implementing a mask mandate at its meeting. In a brief interview after the meeting, Superintendent Terry Struble said the governor and the state Department of Health could require a mask mandate or the school district on its own could decide it is necessary due to the data it receives. He said the district closely monitors the COVID-19 transmission numbers in the community daily. He said their goal is to have every student in school as much as possible and the district doesnt want to go back to an A-B schedule like last year where students would alternate days when they went to school or using virtual learning instead of in school instruction. So if we start experiencing anything indicating that it is going to take away from those opportunities, then we will go back to the table and revise what we do, Struble said. Struble said the current data of the school community does not indicate that a mask mandate is necessary. Weather Alert ...FLASH FLOOD WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT THROUGH THURSDAY MORNING... The Flash Flood Watch continues for * A portion of central Pennsylvania, including the following areas, Adams, Bedford, Blair, Cambria, Clearfield, Columbia, Cumberland, Dauphin, Franklin, Fulton, Huntingdon, Juniata, Lancaster, Lebanon, Mifflin, Montour, Northern Centre, Northern Clinton, Northern Lycoming, Northumberland, Perry, Schuylkill, Snyder, Somerset, Southern Centre, Southern Clinton, Southern Lycoming, Sullivan, Union and York. * Through Thursday morning. * Heavy to extreme rainfall associated with the remnants of Ida will likely result in significant rapid-onset and inundation flooding. The heaviest rainfall of 4 to 8 inches is expected in the southern portion of the watch area. * Considerable river flooding is forecast with several small streams, creeks, and tributaries in the Juniata and Lower Main Stem Susquehanna River basins expected to crest above minor to moderate flood levels early Thursday. A few points could crest above major flood stage. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... You should monitor later forecasts and be prepared to take action should Flash Flood Warnings be issued. && LOBAMBA Why is government silent on the issue of the 14 people who were allegedly killed by being thrown into a fire by the army and police? This was asked by Nkilongo Member of Parliament Timothy Myeni in the House of Assembly yesterday at the beginning of the sitting. The MP stood on a point of clarification which he said was directed to the Attorney General, Sifiso Khumalo. Myeni said he was deeply hurt and concerned by governments silence on things which touched on the peace and stability of the country, emaSwati and the rule of law. He said the AG must clarify and address the issue of allegations that were circulating in particular on online publications and social media. These issues which include the resignation of the army commander and a high ranking officer in the police, said Myeni. He submitted that there was no word from government to give clarification to the people as there were serious allegations which even go as far as touching or damaging the monarch. Government is quiet and not saying anything. We love the King and we are supposed to defend him during such cases of allegations, he said. Interjected At this point, the Minister of Finance, Neal Rijkernberg, interjected and said as far as he understood the Standing Orders, a point of clarification could be requested if there was a topic that was being discussed or announced by the Speaker. To come with a point of correction in the middle of nowhere on another issue, the standing orders doesnt allow that, said Rijkenberg. However, the Speaker, Petros Mavimbela, said the House should allow the MP to finish his submission and then they would advise him thereafter. MP Myeni continued to state that there were allegations circulating which put the country in bad light. He said they were receiving calls from people who would ask them why the MPs were quiet on the issues. He said while they were still following these allegations they saw the army commander, Jeffrey Tshabalala, resigning. He said Tshabalala did this without addressing the allegations being made about him on whether they were true or false. We then witnessed a senior cop resigning and divulging some secrets which disturbed the whole operation of this country including its peace and stability, said Myeni. He said the AG should clarify the allegations which also touched on the arresting of the three MPs. He claimed it was reported that the MPs were arrested after an order was issued. This does not put the country and judiciary in good light. It is disturbing that there can be such allegations and government remains silent, he said. The MP further said in the circulating allegations through an audio it was alleged that 14 people were thrown into a fire by soldiers. He said, however, government remained silent throughout all these allegations and was not disputing that or giving clarification. We saw in a recent newspaper publication that human bones were discovered at a dumpsite. It is clear that these allegations were seemingly in line with the truth, said Myeni. Allegations He said those were not dog or donkey bones but those of a human being yet there were allegations that people were thrown into a fire. He said as government and MPs, it didnt create a good picture. The MP asked why the House was quiet and not moving a motion to investigate the alleged killing of the people. He said an inquest to investigate where the people who were killed including who those who killed them are, was needed. How is the world and the country viewing us if we keep quiet when people have died, he wondered. He said he felt bad that a woman and a child were also allegedly thrown into the fire. Myeni said it was disheartening that government would remain so silent. He insisted that a judicial inquest must be undertaken. Myeni further alleged that even with high court judges there were allegations that they act on orders and do not work independently. Peaceful He said he was sent by people of Nkilongo to raise this matter which involved the lives of people and also painted the King in a bad light. Myeni said the person who speaks on behalf of the kings office was also silent including the governments spokesperson, to clarify on the issues so that the country could remain peaceful and know that the allegations were not true. He asked his colleagues to support him so that the people in the constituencies would be aware that they had asked questions especially since it was people who were killed and not cows. Why are we quiet? Myeni asked. He said that was the reason they were elected into Parliament; to address such issues if they arose. He thanked the speaker for giving him the opportunity to speak including the MPs who were not present in the House to speak on their behalf. He reiterated that the judicial inquest must be done to show whether the MPs were arrested for legal reasons or because they were ordered. Myeni said if it was an order then clearly none of the MPs were safe. In response, the AG first addressed the Speaker that he should have listened to the submission made by the Finance minister on correcting the MP on when clarification can be sort. He said he had not expected the Speaker to allow Myeni to finish with his submission because by allowing him to do so, the speaker was suggesting that the Nkilongo MP was right. Procedure The AG further said the procedure to follow when bringing questions or motions to Parliament was well documented and it came through an order paper instead of just in the middle of nowhere for one to seek clarification. Khumalo said out of courtesy he would address the Nkilongo MPs concerns. It is unfortunate that the question I was asked by the MP was all over the place and that there were allegations on social media and he is not asking what the legal issues are, Khumalo said. He submitted that he was in Parliament to advise on legal questions and legal issues. He asked about the resignation of people and I fail to understand what the legal issues there are, said the AG. Khumalo further said his phone was available and it was always open for the MPs to call him. It makes me question the motive behind the Nkilongo MPs submission especially because these are allegations on social media, he submitted. The AG said he was now expected to address social media allegations in Parliament. Khumalo said the MP should have simply called him and raised whatever questions so that he would have given him answers in private instead of coming to the House as if the AG was there to humiliate him. He said that was why he was questioning the motive behind the question as if they were addressing issues for TV. He said they should address the issues for solutions. In summary, the speaker advised the Nkilongo MP to bring either a question or a motion to the house so that the issue could be addressed. LUDZIDZINI The Minister of Homes Affairs Princess Lindiwe has declared Saturday, September 4, 2021 as Umhlanga holiday. The minister made this declaration during a press conference held at Ludzidzini Royal Residence yesterday. She encouraged young girls to continue preserving their virginity until marriage. The minister also encouraged Imbali to adhere to COVID-19 regulations. She thanked Their Majesties for considering cancelling the event as the nation tried all in its powers to minimise the spread of the virus. Umhlanga Ceremony is one of the countrys prestigious events which attracts the entire world to cheer Eswatini girls showcasing their chastity before Their Majesties. The event is celebrated at Ludzidzini Royal Residence and ends at Mbangweni Royal Residence. The event, which lasts for seven days is attended by over 100 000 young girls. His Majesty King Mswati III through Imbali Indvuna, Nonduduzo Zubuko, yesterday declared that the event would not be held even this year due to COVID-19. Worth noting is that the event was cancelled due to the pandemic last year. His Majesty King Mswati III says Umhlanga Reed Dance Ceremony was supposed to commence on August 22, 2021, However, the event will not be held due to COVID-19. Means will be made to bring the reed to the royal residences, Zubuko said. The King said the event would continue once the pandemic was over. Previously, young girls were commissioned to fetch the reed at Bhamusakhe at Luyengo while the older ones were commissioned to fetch it at Mpisi farm around Mafutseni. The maidens were supposed to cut the reed tomorrow. On Friday, they were supposed to return to Ludzidzini Royal Residence with the reed. Saturday was supposed to be their resting day before they could deliver the reed on Sunday. Monday was supposed to be the main day where the young girls were expected to showcase their chastity before Their Majesties and the entire world. The main Umhlanga day is normally declared a public holiday. During the main day, the maidens dance to various cultural songs which end with a special dance known as kugiya. NOKWANE One of the key expectations to Lieutenant General Mashikilisana Moses Fakudze, the acting Army Commander is to ensure peace and stability in the country. This task was highlighted by Prince Hlangusempi, the National Chief Defence Officer, who announced the appointment Lieutenant General Fakudze, a General Court Marshal, who once served as an Advocate at the High Court of Eswatini. The prince made the announcement on behalf of His Majesty King Mswati III, who is the Commander-In-Chief of the Umbutfo Eswatini Defence Force (UEDF). When making the announcement during a press conference, which was held at the army headquarters in Nokwane yesterday morning, the national chief defence officer was with the Ministry of Defence Under Secretary (US) Sanele Malambe, who was representing the Principal Secretary (PS) in the ministry, Prince Sicalo, Tindvuna Saddam Magongo and Themba Ginindza, together with senior army officials. The prince said everyone would remember that recently, on Monday to be specific, former Army Commander Jeffery Tshabalala publicly announced his resignation from the position following events which developed and put him as the head of the army in a precarious position. He stated that the former army commander announced his resignation after consulting with Their Majesties. He said the resignation of Tshabalala left a vacant post in the army and the Commander-In-Chief of the military, His Majesty King Mswati III found it worthwhile to replace the former army commander as soon as possible because the position was a critical one. We are here with tindvuna to deliver a report that the King has identified a person who will act in the position of the army commander, the prince said. However, he emphasised that he was not sent to announce a new army commander, because emaSwati know how a person to fill that position was appointed. It is worth noting that usually, the King appoints security chiefs during the forces day, including the army commander, who is announced during the army day. Events The national chief defence officer said due to the surge of COVID-19 cases, some events have been put on hold. However, he said once the situation improves, the Commander-In-Chef will appoint someone who will officially fill the position. In the meantime, he said the countrys operations could not be at a standstill because of the COVID-19 pandemic, thus the King appointed a person, who will lead the military on acting basis, until the new army commander was announced. We are all aware of the prevailing situation in the country and the King would expect the army and the nation to support the acting army commander so that he can ensure there is peace and stability in the country, the prince said. The national chief defence officer emphasised that the acting army commander would be expected do all the work of an army commander until one was appointed and announced. It is worth noting that Lieutenant General Fakudze was among the five senior army officials, who were promoted by the King in 2018, before government introduced the hiring freeze, which also affected promotions in the civil service. The acting army commander was promoted from the rank of major general to his current one; lieutenant general, while the other four senior army officials were elevated from the rank of brigadier general to major general. Again, the acting army commander is one of the people who usually perform rituals during Butimba, which is an official hunting expedition, which is authorised by the King in the country. The hunting which takes place in a chosen game reserve is open to all emaSwati under the instruction of the King. It is worth noting that the appointment of the acting army commander happened against the backdrop of the recently experienced political unrest in the country. About two months ago, there was political turmoil across the country which culminated in looting and vandalism of private and public property, including businesses, some of which were burnt. As a result, dozens of people were killed, while others were left injured and several others were arrested in connection with the criminal offences which took place. According to government, the damages amounted to about E3 billion and approximately 5 000 jobs were left at stake. Briefly about the acting Army Commander Lieutenant General Mashikilisana Moses Fakudze was born on November 12, 1963 at Zombodze. He did his primary and secondary education at Zombodze National School and completed his high school level at St Christophers High School between 1980 and 1981. He enlisted in the UEDF in 1982; as such, he is a member of Inqaba Regiment. Between the years 1984 to 1988, he enrolled at the University of Eswatini where he attained a Bachelor of Arts (B.A) in Law. In 1992, he enrolled in the University of Kwazulu Natal, where he attained his LLB. He served his articles at S.A Nkosi and Company Law Firm. In 1996, he successfully wrote and passed his bar exam. He also served as an advocate at the High Court of Eswatini and in the same year, he was appointed as the legal advisor of the defence force. In 2001, he was appointed by the Commander-In-Chief of the army, His Majesty King Mswati III, as chairman of the General Court Marshal, a position he holds to date. Military courses Legal Aspects of Combating Corruption - United States (2017) International Law of Military Operations United States (2006) Regional Junior Officers Course Botswana (2000) Defence Management South Africa (1998) Legal Aspect of Peace Keeping - United States (1998) Law of War Italy (1996) Military appointments 2018 Lieutenant General 2016 Major General 2013 Brigadier General 2006 Colonel 2001 Lieutenant Colonel 2000 Major 1995 Captain 1990 2nd Lieutenant Mitsumi Distribution, a leading distributor has announced that it will be expanding the companys presence with the opening of new offices in 6 Francophone African countries - Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Senegal, Mauritania, Mali and DRC. Furthermore, it will open another five full-fledged offices in Chad, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Gabon and Mitsumi will have representative offices covering the whole Francophone African countries by the end of the year - to better serve and support the region. The launch of a local presence is part of Mitsumi's ambitious strategy to expand its Pan-African footprint and commitment to grow its business and create more jobs. With the opening of their full-fledged office and logistics unit; Mitsumi will be well positioned to offer dedicated sales/ business support to their customers and partners as well as tap into the significant market potential to increase their client base. Mitsumi has won the distribution rights for leading telco brands such as Samsung, Infinix and Tecno as Africa witnesses high growth in telecom sector. It has also as received distribution rights from Lenovo, enabling the company to strengthen its IT consumer product portfolio further. Commenting Chintan Vyas, Regional Sales Head said: "The opening of our new offices provides us with an important gateway to the West African market, and to support the companys accelerated business momentum and vision. It also marks a major milestone for Mitsumi, as we are now stronger than ever with our presence in 18 countries across Middle East and Africa. Mitsumi completes over two decades; experiencing record growth year on year, due to its strong expertise and commitment towards its customers and channel partners. The new office opening represents a continuation of the companys momentum, along with several new hires - leading the company to continued growth and earning a reputation as a leading and fast-growing distributor in the whole of Middle East and Africa.-- TradeArabia News Service Hot on the heels of oil majors either exiting or cutting back their activities in West Africa, comes news of other players moving to fill the gap in the coastal countries of Sierra Leone, The Gambia and Ghana, for instance. In other West African coastal countries Senegal, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Liberia, and Togo there are also hopes of finding oil fields containing economically viable quantities of oil and gas. AOWs Vice President of Energy and Director of Government Relations, Paul Sinclair, said: AOW in Dubai is going to be a blockbuster. With, the Minister of Energy for the United Arab Emirates, Suhail Mohamed Al Mazrouei, confirming he will set out his commitments to West Africa and beyond, we can only see more success coming to the region, as a result of AOW 2021 in Dubai. In Sierra Leone, one company eyeing the prospects is Cluff Energy Africa. Since Algy Cluff created Cluff Oil in the 1970s, Cluff Energy Africa has operated sustainable and efficient natural resources projects in Tanzania, Ghana, South Africa, Burkina Faso, Zimbabwe, and Ivory Coast. Cluffs new venture, Cluff Energy Africa, established two years ago, has already provisionally been awarded licenses covering 16,000 sq km in Sierra Leone with plans to expand across East and West Africa. He describes exits and divestments by the majors as an enormous opportunity to fill the gap. Despite the volatility accompanying Covid-19, Cluff is confident that the rebound will see oil prices settle at a high watermark and, with the giants of the industry pulling out, a space has been left for smaller and nimbler companies to move in. In addition to smaller players, Russia and China are also looking to consolidate their position in the African commodities market. For Africa, with an electrification rate of only 43 per cent compared to a global average of 87 per cent, the challenge of the energy transition comes as countries grapple with how to deliver energy on a scale to drive growth and development. In The Gambia, Australian company FAR and joint venture partner Petronas have contracted a deep-water drillship for an oil exploration well later this year. The drillship Stena IceMAX will spud the Bambo-1 exploration well in October and November. If successful, a discovery could result in a standalone development which would be The Gambias first oil production The well is expected to take 30 days to drill to a planned total depth of 3,266 m in water depths of 993 m, 500 m south of the Senegal-Gambia border. We are pleased to be recommencing exploration drilling at FAR with this high impact well in The Gambia and with the same drill team that drilled efficiently and safely for the Samo-1 well in 2018," says Cath Norman, FAR Managing Director. "The well will be the first well to be drilled in the Mauritania, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau and Guinea-Conakry (MSGBC) basin since the collapse of the market in the wake of the oil price crash and the Covid-19 pandemic. A discovery of oil offshore Gambia would be extremely significant for FAR shareholders and the people of Gambia and help move Gambia out of energy poverty and to transition from burning heavy fuel oil for power generation." The upstream oil and gas business in Ghana recently received a boost when Eni announced that it has made a significant oil find offshore Ghana, close to its existing Sankofa hub, which would allow it to fast-track production. The Eban-1X well is the second well drilled in CTP Block 4, following the Akoma discovery. Preliminary estimates place the potential of the Eban-Akoma complex between 500 and 700 Mboe in place. Due to its proximity to existing infrastructure, the new discovery can be fast-tracked to production with a subsea tie-in to the John Agyekum Kufuor FPSO, with the aim to extend its production plateau and increase production. Tradearabia News Service As part of his working visit to Akhal province, President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov took part in the ceremony of opening of a new textile complex in the Kaahka district. Speaking at the ceremony, the head of state noted that the new textile complex worth about USD 148 million would annually process 5,000 tons of fine-staple cotton and produce 3,650 tons of high quality yarns, 12 million square meters of various fabrics and 1,200 million pieces finished garments. The new facility will employ 1,300 people. It features equipment from leading world manufacturers. Driving a special electric car, the head of state viewed the workshops of the complex and got acquainted with the specifics of production processes. In conclusion, the Turkmen leader left a memorable entry in the Book of Honorary Guests and donated 10 new buses, a car and 2 trucks for the needs of the new textile complex. TURKMENISTAN.RU, 2021 New Delhi, Aug 26 (UNI) Delhi has now surpassed cities like London, Shanghai, New York and Singapore to rank number one across the globe in terms of CCTVs installed per square mile, announced Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal quoting an analysis appeared in an international magazine. In the analysis of 150 cities across the world, Delhi has topped the list of cities with maximum CCTV coverage globally. The electronic surveillance network here installs 1,826 cameras per square mile, followed by London at 1,138, Chennai at 609, Shenzhen (China) at 520, Wuxi (China) at 472, Qingdao (China) at 415, Shanghai (China) at 408, Singapore at 387, Changsha (China) at 353 and Wuhan (China) 339 among the top 10 cities in the metric. The analysis mentioned only 3 Indian cities feature in the top 20, while Delhi is at rank 1, Chennai is at rank 3, Mumbai is at rank 18 with 157 cameras per square mile. Expressing his delight over the achievement, Kejriwal wrote on Twitter: I feel proud to say that Delhi beat cities like Shanghai, New York and London with most CCTV cameras per square mile across the world. At first, Delhi has 1826 cameras, while at second, London has 1138 cameras per square mile. My compliments to the Delhi Governments officers and engineers who worked on the project like a mission and achieved the feat in such a short time. Officials at the Public Works Department (PWD) of the Delhi Government informed that the process of acquiring and installing 2.75 lakh CCTVs in phase one of the project. A further 1.4 lakh CCTVs are in the process of installation at present, they added. The city government said that the people of Delhi played an active role in the implementation of the CCTV project. "Delhi's public spaces are the best monitored in India and is one of the few cities globally where the community plays an active role in controlling their security. The RWAs and market associations were involved in surveying the locations where the CCTVs should be put up, not just gated colonies but all localities of Delhi, including slums, were covered in the project," a senior government official said. "Under the entire scheme, each RWA/Market Association has 30 to 40 cameras to cover their respective areas. Before CCTV deployment, General Body Meetings with representatives of PWD, Police, RWA/Market Association were conducted to decide the location of the CCTVs, with a form being submitted detailing the same," he added. UNI ASH SHK1650 New Delhi, Aug 26 (UNI) India on Thursday strongly condemned the terrorist attack on a convoy of the Malian Armed Forces on August 19 in the Mopti region in Mali that resulted in the killing of 15 soldiers. We extend our deepest condolences to the families of the soldiers as well as the people and the Government of Mali and wish for the speedy recovery of all the other injured soldiers, a statement from the Ministry of External Affairs said. A car bomb hit a convoy of soldiers in the Mopti region on August 19, which was followed by a hail of bullets. Islamic extremists are believed to be behind the attack. The Malian Army said a vehicle packed with explosives exploded as troops went from the town of Douentza to Boni in the Mopti region. Gunmen then opened fire, killing at least 15 soldiers. UNI RN SB 1228 Tolo News reporter, cameraman beaten by Taliban in Kabul Kabul, Aug 26 (UNI) A reporter with Tolo News and his cameraperson were beaten up on Wednesday by the Taliban in Kabul city while they were working on a report. Reporter Ziar Khan Yaad and his cameraman Baes Majidi were filming footage of jobless people and labourers in Haji Yaqoob square in the Shahr-e-Naw area of Kabul city when the Taliban beat them for unclear reasons, the Afghan news website reported on Thursday. Yaad was working on a report about the increase in unemployed people in Kabul. Kabul, Aug 26 (UNI) Over 20 people were killed, including US citizens, and more than 50 others were wounded as twin explosions ripped through milling crowds outside Kabul airport on Thursday evening. Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said one explosion took place at the Abbey Gate of the airport, while the other one took place near Baron Hotel, a short distance away. "We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US and civilian casualties. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update," he said. The blast occurred among a crowd of Afghans waiting close to the Baron camp who were trying to leave the country, according to an eyewitness, Tolo News said. The Baron camp is adjacent to the airport. According to Asvka News, the number of those dead is over 20 and more than 50 have been injured. It showed a graphic video of several people lying dead with body parts scattered and their belongings strewn across on the ground. Another website, Etilaatroz reported that several foreigners were among those killed in the explosion. The US Embassy in a security alert said there has been a large explosion at the airport, and there are reports of gunfire. "US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates. Those at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," it said. No group has claimed responsibility for the blast. Earlier, the US embassy in Kabul warned US citizens to avoid the airport due to a possible terror attack. UNI RN JAL 2103 Fourth Annual Wyoming Blockchain Stampede Sept. 21-26 at UW A global community of developers, entrepreneurs, legal experts, legislators, researchers, educators and students will attend the fourth annual Wyoming Blockchain Stampede, featuring the Wyohackathon, Sept. 21-26 at the University of Wyoming. The event also will be livestreamed for audiences around the world. The Wyoming Blockchain Stampede, like the new UW Center for Blockchain and Digital Innovation (CBDI), is blockchain inclusive, says Steven Lupien, CBDI director. The stampedes theme, Future Forward, represents our efforts to move ahead in all areas of blockchain, including cryptocurrency, smart contracts and digital assets that will create new entrepreneurial and technological opportunities for Wyoming and the world. Registration, speaking, sponsorship and partnership opportunities are available at www.wyohackathon.io. Among keynote speakers are Caitlin Long, CEO of Avanti Bank in Cheyenne; Wyoming U.S. Sen. Cynthia Lummis; Charles Hoskinson, founder of Cardano; Vitalik Buterin, founder of Ethereum; Stani Kulechov, founder and CEO of Aave; Cal Evans, cryptocurrency lawyer and strategy expert; Julian Sevillano, head of the Digital Assets Group at Promontory Financial Group; Chris Snook, CEO of SDK Co.; Joel Neidig, CEO at SIMBA Chain; Emin Gun Sirer, founder and CEO of Ava Labs; and more blockchain leaders. Event programs include: Sept. 21 -- The Startup Stampede will highlight the companies of the future, with presentations by those who founded them. Companies can sign up at wyohackathon.io/startupstampede.html. Sept. 21-22 -- The Wyoming governors newly appointed permanent Select Committee on Blockchain, Financial Technology and Digital Innovation Technology will hold a public meeting to draft legislation and take stakeholder input. The meeting will be held in Room 506 of UWs Coe Library. Sept. 22 -- The Sandcastle Invitational is a competition for the best and most promising blockchain, AI and other technology startups, with cash prizes awarded. Sept. 22 -- The Stampede Finance Conference offers a deep dive into the evolving world of finance; how blockchain technology is pushing decentralized finance; and what impact that will have. Sept. 23 -- The Stampede Business Conference offers a day of speakers and workshops that will help attendees understand the Wyoming legislative environment, use cases, practical application and business opportunities presented by digital technologies, such as blockchain. Sept. 23 -- The Stampede Law Conference will examine the new laws in Wyoming that impact blockchain and crypto businesses and help form the ecosystem. Sept. 24 -- DAO Day (decentralized autonomous organization) will include speakers and workshops to help attendees understand what DAOs are and why DAOs could change the way companies, communities and other groups are fundamentally organized. Sept. 24 -- Future Forward is a day of speakers and panels discussing initiatives that will drive positive economic development for future generations. Sept. 24-26 -- The Wyohackathon is a competition involving various challenges surrounding the area of blockchain technologies. The Wyoming Blockchain Stampede is presented by CBDI; UWs College of Agriculture and Natural Resources; the College of Business; the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences Department of Computer Science; and the College of Law. Title sponsors are IOHK and Blockchain.com. Presenting sponsors are SIMBA Chain, Blue Ocean Digital Management, Brock Pierce, Harmony and Edge196. Innovator sponsors are Avanti Financial Group and Testamint. Hacker sponsors are Socratic Consultancy and Gresham International. For more information about the Wyoming Blockchain Stampede, go to www.wyohackathon.io; follow on Twitter; join on Telegram at https://t.me/WyoHackathon; connect on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/company/wyohackathon; or visit Facebook. Normal, IL (61790) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 54F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 54F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. remaining of Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. (The Center Square) Over the past 10 months, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents have arrested 8,691 known criminals who have entered the U.S. illegally through the southern border. Combined, they have committed 12,685 crimes in the U.S., according to federal data. Because Border Patrol agents do not have access to criminal records from other countries, they rely on information reported in the National Crime Information Center database. Many individuals arrested by Border Patrol are registered sex offenders who were previously convicted and served time in U.S. prisons. They were released and deported only to reenter the U.S. again illegally this year. The NCIC is a centralized automated database designed to share information among law enforcement agencies including outstanding warrants for a wide range of offenses. Based on information from NCIC, Border Patrol officers have made previous arrests of individuals wanted on charges of homicide, escape, money laundering, robbery, narcotics distribution, sexual child abuse, fraud, larceny, and military desertion. In a recent Laredo, Texas, Border Patrol Sector report, among a group of 20 apprehended this week, one was a Honduran national and registered sex offender with an extensive criminal history. He was convicted of lewd lascivious battery and sexual activity with a minor in 2017 in Florida and was deported in October 2020. His arrest, the Laredo Sector said in a news release, continues to highlight the dangers that illegal immigration poses to our country especially by those individuals who have been previously convicted for sexual misconduct. These dangerous criminals increasingly continue to endanger our communities and show a lack of regard for our countrys laws. In another apprehension, Laredo agents detained a Mexican national wanted for allegations of rape out of Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Sexual violence can have serious psychological, emotional and physical effects on a survivor. CBP collaborates with other law enforcement agencies to bring those allegedly committing these offenses to justice, Acting Laredo Port Director Alberto Flores said. In another arrest in the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) Sector, agents apprehended a convicted murderer from El Salvador. He spent three years in prison in the 1990s for a murder in California, was released, and in 2005 was imprisoned again for re-entry of a deported alien, according to border patrol. They also arrested a Mexican national who had been previously arrested for first degree attempted sexual abuse of a child in Lexington, Kentucky. He was sentenced to one year in prison, registered as a sex offender, and then deported only to reenter the U.S. illegally this month and be caught. Agents also arrested a Honduras national who had been arrested in 2011 in New York City for raping an 8-year-old girl multiple times. He was sentenced to four years in prison, released, and subsequently deported in June 2015. In another arrest, an El Salvador national had a 2009 conviction for sexual battery in Georgia. The individuals were apprehended after attempting to reenter the U.S. illegally this month. This fiscal year, RGV agents working in the busiest sector in Texas also arrested more than 140 migrant gang members affiliated with 10 different street gangs. The Del Rio sector reported a 1,400% surge in the number of sex offenders apprehended by its border agents this year compared to last year. In the El Centro Sector of California, a registered sex offender with previous felony conviction for child molestation in Atlanta, Georgia, was arrested. He had been previously deported and was caught upon illegal reentry. The El Centro Sector has so far arrested and/or removed 38 individuals either convicted or wanted on sexual offense charges so far this fiscal year. As of June 30, Border Patrol agents had arrested 353 illegal immigrants on charges of sex-related crimes, many with prior convictions involving minors. By comparison, during the same period in fiscal year 2020, agents had only apprehended 55 such criminals. The difference represents an increase of 542%. The Biden administration directed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to cancel Operation Talon, a nationwide operation conducted by ICE to remove convicted sex offenders illegally in the U.S. In February, attorneys general from 18 states wrote a letter to Biden, expressing outrage over cancelling Operation Talon, citing criminal statistics. Between October 2014 and May 2018, they note, ICE arrested 119,752 illegal immigrants with criminal convictions, many with prior convictions for sex-related offenses. They included 5,565 sexual assault convictions, 4,910 child molestation convictions, and 675 child exploitation and child pornography or sexual performances convictions. The cancellation of this program effectively broadcasts to the world that the United States is now a sanctuary jurisdiction for sexual predators. This message creates a perverse incentive for foreign sexual predators to seek to enter the United States illegally and assault more victims, both in the process of unlawful migration and after they arrive, the attorneys general wrote. Fort Polk, LA (71446) Today Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%. West Hartford, CT (06107) Today Periods of rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Potential for flooding rains. Low near 60F. Winds NNE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected.. Tonight Periods of rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Potential for flooding rains. Low near 60F. Winds NNE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. 'Battle of the Badges' Today at Stuart Nelson Park By West Kentucky Star Staff PADUCAH - Members of the Paducah Police and Fire Departments are meeting today in the Battle of the Badges, a softball game to raise money for charity.The event begins at 3 p.m. at Stuart Nelson Park field 4, with the slow pitch softball game starting at 4 p.m. Admission is free, however, all donations at the event and proceeds from concessions will be provided to local charities as decided by each department.The police are donating their portion to the Oscar Cross Boys and Girls' Club, while firefighters are giving to the Muscular Dystrophy Association.Officer Dylan Cook is involved in planning the event, and said the idea began fairly simply.Cook said, "Just a couple of the police officers wanted to have some fun and play some softball, and thought that it would be a good idea to get the Paducah Fire Department involved as well, so we just kind of started texting back and forth and it just grew from there."Cook said after one email was sent through the police department, they quickly filled their team. He expects a good, friendly competition, with bragging rights on the line, and hopes they can have an even bigger battle next year."We would love for it to be an annual event and grow bigger. We would love to get some other departments involved and maybe have a weekend tournament," Cook said. "Of course, everything going to charity is the main goal." Missing Paducah Woman Found Safe By West Kentucky Star Staff PADUCAH - The Paducah Police are reporting that Sarah J. Norman has been located and is safe.Norman went missing Thursday as she was last seen in the area of 12th and Broadway wearing a pink jacket and blue jeans. Police said Norman suffers from schizophrenia and hydrocephalus. Drones, Dog Used in Graves County Manhunt By West Kentucky Star Staff GRAVES COUNTY - A five-hour manhunt ended in the arrest of a burglary suspect in Graves County on Wednesday.The Graves County Sheriff's Office said they received a 911 call around noon about a possible burglary in progress in the area of Merit Road.The homeowner was not at home, but received an alert on his phone from a security system that showed a man at his house. The homeowner arrived and noticed a newer model truck parked in his driveway and pulled in and blocked the vehicle in.The suspect had allegedly gone to another residence and was attempting to steal gasoline from a vehicle there. After finding the man on his property, the homeowner held him at gunpoint and called 911.The suspect ran into a cornfield when deputies arrived.While deputies searched for the suspect they discovered his vehicle had recently been stolen from a dealership in Cadiz. A different stolen pickup with Texas plates was recovered from the Cadiz dealership when the dealer learned they had a vehicle stolen from them.Drones from Calloway and Carlisle County were also involved with the search as well as a K9 unit from McCracken County.The search ended around 5:30 pm when the suspect emerged from a field onto KY Highway 80.The man had no identification but claimed to be 37-year-old Rocky A. Autry of Spur, Texas. Police will verify his identity through fingerprint analysis.He was charged with criminal trespass, receiving stolen property valued at over $10,000, criminal mischief, attempted theft, and fleeing or evading. Name of Graves County Shooting Victim Released By West Kentucky Star Staff HICKORY - Detectives with the Kentucky State Police, Post 1 continue to investigate a shooting Tuesday night on Makenzie Circle in Graves County that left one person dead.Police began receiving reports of shots fired near the apartment complexes on McKenzie Circle in Hickory just after 6:30 pm.Police have identified the victim as 28-year-old Darian Williams of Hickory. Preliminary autopsy results show Williams died as a result of multiple gunshot wounds to the body.Detectives continue to gather information and follow all leads to develop a suspect. Anyone with information regarding this situation is asked to contact Kentucky State Police, Post 1 at 270-856-3721 One Lane Open Each Way on I-24 After Fatal Crash By West Kentucky Star Staff CALVERT CITY - A crash that involved four vehicles near Calvert City has claimed at least one person's life.Officials say one lane of traffic is now moving along Interstate 24 in each direction, following an accident reconstruction investigation by Kentucky State Police.An oil tanker truck caught fire in the median after the accident near the 29 mile marker in Marshall County. The remaining oil will have to be pumped out of the trailer before the scene can be cleared, and officials will have to close one side of the interstate for approximately an hour to remove the truck.It's estimated that it could be at least 10 pm before normal traffic resumes through the area.Westbound vehicles have been detouring using KY 453 at exit 31 in Grand Rivers and may use US 62 to rejoin the Interstate at exit 27.Eastbound vehicles are detouring onto US-62 at exit 27 in Calvert City and traveling to Grand Rivers by KY 453 and onto I-24 at exit 31, or they may continue on US 62 until they get to exit 40 at Eddyville. Biden Vows to Finish Evacuations, Avenge US Deaths By The Associated Press KABUL - President Joe Biden vowed Thursday to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite the day's deadly suicide bomb attack at the Kabul airport. He promised to avenge the deaths of 13 U.S. service members killed in the attack, declaring to the extremists responsible: We will hunt you down and make you pay.Speaking with emotion from the White House, Biden said the Islamic State group's Afghanistan affiliate was to blame for the attacks that killed the Americans and many more Afghan civilians. He said there was no evidence they colluded with the Taliban, who now control the country.He asked for a moment of silence to honor the service members, bowing his head, and ordered U.S. flags to half-staff across the country.As for the bombers and gunmen involved, he said, "We have some reason to believe we know who they are ... not certain. He said he had instructed military commanders to develop plans to strike IS assets, leadership and facilities.Gen. Frank McKenzie, the U.S. Central Command chief, said more attempted attacks were expected.The IS affiliate in Afghanistan has carried out many attacks on civilian targets in the country in recent years. It is far more radical than the Taliban, who seized power less than two weeks ago. The most heralded American attack on the group came in April 2017 when the U.S. dropped the largest conventional bomb in its arsenal on an IS cave and tunnel complex. The group more recently is believed to have concentrated in urban areas, which could complicate U.S. efforts to target them without harming civilians.We will respond with force and precision at our time, at the place of our choosing, Biden said. These ISIS terrorists will not win. We will rescue the Americans; we will get our Afghan allies out, and our mission will go on. America will not be intimidated.Biden said U.S. military commanders in Afghanistan had told him it is important to complete the evacuation mission. And we will, he said. We will not be deterred by terrorists.Indeed, Gen. McKenzie, who is overseeing the evacuation operation from his Florida headquarters, told a Pentagon news conference shortly before Biden spoke, Let me be clear, while we are saddened by the loss of life, both U.S. and Afghan, we are continuing to execute the mission,. He said there were about 5,000 evacuees on the airfield Thursday awaiting flights.As many as 1,000 Americans and many more Afghans are still struggling to get out of Kabul.McKenzie said 12 U.S. service members had been killed and 15 were wounded. Later, his spokesman, Capt. William Urban, said the toll had risen to 13 dead and 18 wounded. Urban said the wounded were being evacuated from Afghanistan aboard Air Force C-17 transport planes equipped with surgical units.The Marine Corps said 10 Marines were among those killed. Central Command did not identify the dead by service. It was the deadliest day for U.S. forces in Afghanistan since August 2011, when a helicopter was shot down by an insurgent armed with a rocket-propelled grenade, killing 30 American troops and eight Afghans.In somber, sometimes halting remarks, Biden praised U.S. forces and asked for the moment of silence. Asked later about further actions, press secretary Jen Psaki said that personal calls to families would wait for notification of next of kin and that Biden might travel to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware when the remains of the fallen service members are returned.They were the first U.S. service members killed in Afghanistan since February 2020, the month the Trump administration struck an agreement with the Taliban that called for the militant group to halt attacks on Americans in exchange for a U.S. agreement to remove all American troops and contractors by May 2021. Biden announced in April that he would have all forces out by September.Thursday's attacks, came 12 days into the rushed evacuation and five days before its scheduled completion. Some Republicans and others are arguing to extend the evacuation beyond next Tuesday's deadline.The administration has been widely blamed for a chaotic and deadly evacuation that began in earnest only after the collapse of the U.S.-backed Afghan government and the Talibans takeover of the country. More than 100,000 people have been evacuated so far, Afghans, Americans and others.Thursdays attack was sure to intensify political pressure from all sides on Biden, who already was under heavy criticism for not beginning the pullout earlier. He had announced in April that he was ending the U.S. war and would have all forces out by September.House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California called for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to bring the chamber back into session to consider legislation that would prohibit the U.S. withdrawal until all Americans are out. Pelosis office dismissed such suggestions as empty stunts.After the suicide bombers attack at the airports Abbey Gate, a number of ISIS gunmen opened fire on civilians and military forces, he said. There also was an attack at or near the Baron Hotel near that gate, he said.We thought this would happen sooner or later, McKenzie said, adding that U.S. military commanders were working with Taliban commanders to prevent further attacks.As details of the day's attack emerged, the White House rescheduled Bidens first in-person meeting with Israels new prime minister on Thursday and canceled a video conference with governors about resettling Afghan refugees arriving in the United States.A number of U.S. allies said they were ending their evacuation efforts in Kabul, at least in part to give the U.S. the time it needs to wrap up its evacuation operations before getting 5,000 of its troops out by Tuesday.Despite intense pressure to extend the deadline, Biden has repeatedly cited the threat of terrorist attacks against civilians and U.S. service members as a reason to keep to his plan.In an interview with ABC News, Ross Wilson, the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, said, There are safe ways to get to the airport for those Americans who still want to leave. He added that there undoubtedly will be some at-risk Afghans who will not get out before Bidens deadline.The airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people from the airport and as other countries began shutting down their efforts. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400.The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. Man Pardoned in 2019 Convicted in Federal Court By The Associated Press LONDON - A man pardoned by Kentucky's former governor for a 2014 drug-related killing has been convicted for the same crime in federal court after a two-week trial.Federal prosecutors brought charges against 43-year-old Patrick Baker after he was released from prison when former Gov. Matt Bevin pardoned him on his way out of office in 2019. Baker's family had political connections to Bevin, including hosting a fundraiser for the one-term governor.A federal jury in eastern Kentucky convicted Baker Wednesday on a charge of murder after about six hours of deliberation over two days.U.S. District Judge Claria Horn Boom will sentence Baker on December 21. Prosecutors declined to seek the death penalty, but Baker could serve life in prison on the conviction."At its core, this case was about one thing: Patrick Bakers role in the death of Donald Mills," Carlton Shier, the acting U.S. Attorney for eastern Kentucky, said in a news release Wednesday. Having heard the evidence, the jury found him guilty.Baker was convicted of reckless homicide in Donald Mills death in state court in 2017. He was sentenced to 19 years in prison, but Bevin's pardon released him and erased the conviction. Bevin called the evidence against Baker sketchy, though the former governor did not mention his ties to the man's family.Federal prosecutors said Baker was prosecuted the second time under the dual sovereignty doctrine, which allows state and federal officials to prosecute the same defendant for the same actions without infringing on double jeopardy protections.Bakers lawyer, Louisville attorney Steve Romines, said he would appeal.We felt there was evidence that should have been admitted that was not, he told the Courier Journal.Prosecutors said Baker killed Mills, a drug dealer in Knox County, in 2014 while trying to rob Mills of cash and pain pills. Baker posed as a U.S. Marshal during the crime.Mills pregnant wife and children were held at gunpoint while Baker ransacked the victims home for oxycodone pills, according to the U.S. Attorney. Evidence at the trial including shell casings tied to Baker's pistol and surveillance video showing Baker buying handcuff restraints hours before the killing.Baker's release was one of a slew of pardons by Bevin at the end of his term that drew rebuke from both Democrats and Republicans.Bakers pardon was especially controversial, since his family had held a fundraiser for Bevin the year before, raising $21,500 for the Republicans unsuccessful reelection campaign. Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-16 04:24:45|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KHARTOUM, Aug. 15 (Xinhua) -- Sudan's Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok on Sunday reiterated his country's commitment to exert utmost effort to prevent collapse of situations in Ethiopia. "We cannot stand aside and look at what is happening in neighboring Ethiopia," said Hamdok at a press conference in capital Khartoum. "We will exert all efforts to help maintain Ethiopia united, stable and safe." Hamdok further explained that, within the framework of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), he has made contacts with the IGAD leaders as well as regional and international countries to find a settlement for the conflict in Ethiopia's Tigray region. He described his country's recent decision to recall its ambassador to Ethiopia as "a normal diplomatic procedure," revealing that the Sudanese ambassador has already returned to Addis Ababa to perform his duties. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-11 00:46:36|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close DAR ES SALAAM, Aug. 10 (Xinhua) -- Tanzanian police said Tuesday a 43-year-old woman was killed by marauding elephants in a village in the country's northwestern region of Kagera. Revocatus Malimi, Kagera regional police commander, said the elephants attacked and killed the woman at around 10 p.m. Monday when she was on her way to visit neighbors. According to him, villagers tried to make noise to drive off the elephants. It is unknown how many stray elephants were involved because the accident happened at night. Elephant and rhino populations in Tanzania began to rebound after a government crackdown beginning in 2016 dismantled multiple poaching syndicates. In recent years, incidents of stray elephants killing villagers and destroying farm crops in Tanzania are on the rise despite government efforts to control the animals. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-07-31 13:22:58|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ULAN BATOR, July 31 (Xinhua) -- Mongolia reported 1,286 new COVID-19 infections in the last 24 hours, taking the national tally to 164,155, the country's health ministry said Saturday. More than 7,000 samples were tested across the country in the past day, and the latest confirmed cases were all locally transmitted. Six more deaths were recorded during the same period, bringing the overall death toll to 842, the ministry said. Among the total confirmed cases, 162,900 people have so far recovered from the disease, it added. The Asian country launched a national vaccination campaign against COVID-19 in late February, with the aim of vaccinating at least 60 percent of its population of 3.3 million. So far, around 61 percent of the country's population have been fully vaccinated. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 01:43:37|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KATHMANDU, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist), the largest political party in Nepal, was formally split on Wednesday as a faction registered a new party with the Election Commission. The newly formed Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Socialist) is led by Madhav Kumar Nepal, a former senior leader of the CPN-UML and a former prime minister who has the support of 55 members from the CPN-UML Central Committee. For the registration of the new party, the 55 Central Committee members and 29 members of federal parliament were present at the Election Commission for the verification process in the day. "The commission has registered CPN (Unified Socialist) after it fulfilled the required legal criteria for the formation of a new party," Komal Prasad Dhamala, assistant spokesperson at the commission, told Xinhua. On the same day, the Janata Samajbadi Party headed for a split as well, as a faction of the fourth largest party in Nepal registered a new party named Loktantrik Samajbadi Party, Nepal with the Election Commission. The two new parties are expected to join the government headed by Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba. The elections for local governments are slated for March-April next year, while the general elections will be held by November-December next year. The CPN-UML remains the largest party in Nepal despite the split. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 11:42:27|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close CANBERRA, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Australia and New Zealand have evacuated a further 1,200 people from Afghanistan amid a "deteriorating" situation. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced on Thursday that 1,200 people were flown out of Kabul on six Australian flights and one New Zealand flight on Wednesday night in the biggest evacuation effort since the city fell to the Taliban. It takes the total number of people evacuated from Afghanistan by the two nations to approximately 4,000, which Morrison said was "three times" more than he thought possible. Morrison said the Australian Defence Force (ADF) would continue to do whatever it could to get more people out but warned that "the situation is deteriorating." "But we have to deal with the reality, the terrible, brutal and awful reality of the situation on the ground," he said. Australia has joined the United States and Britain in warning citizens and visa holders not to travel to Kabul airport, with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) warning of a "highly volatile and dangerous" situation. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 11:53:24|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close People walk in Sydney, Australia, Aug. 26, 2021. Australia has reported more than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases for the first time since the start of the pandemic. As many as 1,123 new locally-acquired cases of COVID-19 were recorded across Australia on Thursday morning. Despite the record number of infections, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said in Canberra on Thursday that it was another day of hope with the vaccine rollout continuing to accelerate. (Photo by Hu Jingchen/Xinhua) CANBERRA, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Australia has reported more than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases for the first time since the start of the pandemic. As many as 1,123 new locally-acquired cases of COVID-19 were recorded across Australia on Thursday morning. Despite the record number of infections, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said in Canberra on Thursday that it was another day of hope with the vaccine rollout continuing to accelerate. There were more than 300,000 doses of vaccines administered across Australia on Wednesday, and so far about 32 percent of Australians aged 16 years old and over have been fully vaccinated. Morrison said that the country would finish this week with more than one-third of Australians having had both doses. Of the 1,123 news cases recorded on Thursday, 1,029 were from New South Wales (NSW), Australia's most populous state with Sydney as the capital city. Victoria, the second-most populous state with Melbourne as the capital city, reported a further 80 new cases, and the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) recorded another 14. ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr said a meeting of the health authorities on Thursday night would decide whether to ease Canberra's strict lockdown restrictions but warned it would be a slow pathway out. "There will not be a significant easing of restrictions -- it will be a gentle step forward and this will remain the case through spring," he said. So far, about half the Australian population in NSW, Victoria, and ACT is still in lockdown. As of Wednesday afternoon, there had been 46,728 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Australia, and the number of cases reported in the previous 24 hours was 995, most of which were locally acquired, according to the latest figures from the Department of Health. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 11:57:19|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close WELLINGTON, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- New Zealand reported 68 new community cases of Delta variant of COVID-19 on Thursday, bringing the total number of cases in the country's community outbreak to 277. The total number of community cases in the largest city Auckland is now 263 and 14 cases are in the capital Wellington, Director of Public Health Caroline McElnay told a press conference. One case reported on Wednesday has been reclassified as not a case after being confirmed as a false positive, McElnay said. Of these 68 new cases, 49 of these are Pacific peoples, eight are Asian, three are European, three are Maori, and as yet, the ethnicity is unknown of five, she said, adding that 15 of the current community cases are in a stable condition in hospital. There are no cases in ICU. All of the cases have or are being transferred safely to a quarantine facility, under strict infection prevention and control procedures, including the use of full PPE (Personal Protective Equipment), she said, adding that the two new Wellington cases are household contacts of a current case and were in isolation during their infectious period. "As previously indicated, it's not unexpected to see a rise in daily case numbers at this stage. At its peak last year, New Zealand had a daily total of 89 new cases," McElnay added. There are 154 cases to date which are epidemiologically linked, and a further 123 for which links are yet to be established, McElnay said. New Zealand will remain at the top level 4 national lockdown until midnight Friday, subject to another review on that day. The country has moved to a lockdown since midnight Aug. 17 after the first COVID-19 Delta variant case in the Auckland community was identified. Under the Alert Level 4 lockdown, businesses and schools are closed except for essential ones such as supermarkets, pharmacies and service stations. Meanwhile, New Zealand reported one new case in recent returnees whose travel history is yet to be confirmed. This imported case has remained in a managed isolation and quarantine facility in Auckland, said a Ministry of Health statement. The total number of active cases being managed in New Zealand is currently 314, and the total number of confirmed cases since the start of the pandemic is 2,871, it said. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 16:48:03|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close SYDNEY, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- A research team, co-led by Australian archaeologists, has found the 7000-year-old remains of a teenage female in Indonesia, with the DNA throwing new light on how early people may have migrated to Australia. The discovery, published in Nature magazine on Wednesday, is the first known skeleton from a foraging culture called the Toaleans. Archaeologist Professor Adam Brumm, from Griffith University's Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution, said the remains, which had affectionately been nicknamed Besse, were found curled in a foetal position in a limestone cavern in the province of South Sulawesi, Indonesia. "The Toaleans were early hunter-gatherers who lived a secluded existence in the forests of South Sulawesi from around 8,000 years ago until 1,500 years ago, hunting wild pigs and collecting edible shellfish from rivers," Brumm said. Results from the genomic analysis show that Besse shares about half of her genetic makeup with present-day Indigenous Australians and people in Papua New Guinea (PNG), an island country about 150 km north of Australia. "Essentially, she is a distant relative of modern-day Melanesians and Aboriginal Australians," Brumm said. Thousands of years ago, when sea levels were much lower than now, Australia and PNG were part of the same landmass called Sahul. "These seafaring hunter-gatherers were the earliest inhabitants of Sahul, the supercontinent that emerged during the Pleistocene (Ice Age)," Brumm said. "To reach Sahul, these pioneering humans made ocean crossings... but little about their journeys is known." The earliest evidence of human occupation in what is now Australia was 65,000 years old. The discovery suggests Besse's ancestors could have been among those who first made the voyage across the ocean. "The discovery of Besse and the implications of her genetic ancestry show just how little we understand about the early human story in our region, and how much more there is left to uncover," Brumm said. Another author, Akin Duli from Indonesia's Hasanuddin University said more testing would need to be done to reveal the full genetic legacy of the Toaleans. "But it would now appear that the population history and genetic diversity of early humans in the region were more complex than previously supposed," Duli said. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 18:58:32|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close People receive the COVID-19 vaccine in Bangkok, Thailand, on Aug. 26, 2021. Thailand registered 18,501 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, the fifth consecutive day of less than 20,000 infections, as the country mulls to ease some restrictions in Bangkok and some provinces. (Xinhua/Rachen Sageamsak) BANGKOK, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Thailand registered 18,501 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, the fifth consecutive day of less than 20,000 infections, as the country mulls to ease some restrictions in Bangkok and some provinces. The new daily cases raised Thailand's cumulative infections to 1,120,869. The death toll also rose by 229 to 10,314, according to the Center for COVID-19 Situation Administration (CCSA). The decrease of new cases growth and a continuing surplus of daily recoveries over new infections are driving the government's considerations to ease some lockdown measures, CCSA assistant spokeswoman Apisamai Srirangsan told a press conference on Wednesday. To better curb the spread of highly contagious variants, the Thai government intends to administer around 15 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines per month, up from the previous target of 10 million. As of Wednesday, the Southeast Asian country has administered over 28.8 million doses of vaccines, with nearly 10 percent of its 69 million population having been fully vaccinated. Thailand aims to inoculate 70 percent of its entire population by the end of 2021. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 19:22:26|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close SYDNEY, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Ambassador to Tonga Cao Xiaolin called on the international community to strengthen COVID-19 vaccine cooperation and conduct the global origins tracing in a scientific way. In an article published on Matangi Tonga Online on Tuesday, Cao said the COVID-19 infections are still rising around the world, and vaccines matter much to the fight against the virus. However, outstanding problems such as insufficient vaccine production capacity, inequitable distribution and uneven vaccination still exist globally and the international society need to work together to fill in the immunisation gap between countries. The ambassador said China hosted the first meeting of the International Forum on COVID-19 Vaccine Cooperation virtually in a bid to strengthen global cooperation in this regard. China will also strive to provide 2 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses to the world throughout this year, and offer 100 million U.S. dollars to COVAX, the global COVID-19 vaccine equity scheme. China will also continue to deepen technology transfer and production capacity cooperation with developing countries, support the WTO in making an early decision on waiving intellectual property rights on COVID-19 vaccines. Cao said as Chinese Ambassador to Tonga he is glad that Tonga remains one of the very few countries in the world that is still COVID-19 free. Cao also called for a science-based origins tracing, stressing that no country is entitled to politicizing this scientific issue and use it to attack the others. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 20:29:34|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close NEW DELHI, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- India on Thursday strongly condemned last week's attack on a convoy of the Malian armed forces in Mali, the foreign ministry said. "India strongly condemns the terrorist attack on a convoy of the Malian Armed Forces on 19 August 2021 in the Mopti region in Mali that resulted in the killing of fifteen Malian soldiers," a statement issued by India's foreign ministry said. The attack also left many soldiers wounded. "We extend our deepest condolences to the families of the soldiers as well as the people and the Government of Mali and wish for the speedy recovery of all the other injured soldiers," the ministry further said. Reports said a vehicle packed with explosives was exploded as the convoy was passing through the region. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 20:53:18|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close MANILA, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- A Philippine jail official said two inmates were killed and two policemen injured on Thursday in the shootout during a jailbreak attempt in Metro Manila. Bureau of Jail Management and Penology spokesperson Xavier Solda said the two detainees of Marikina city jail tried to grab a gun from a jail guard on duty, resulting in a shooting. An investigation into the incident is underway, said Solda. Marikina Mayor Marcy Teodoro told local media that two police officers were reportedly wounded. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 21:07:20|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A medical worker inoculates an adolescent with a dose of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Aug. 26, 2021. Cambodia has administered at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccines to 10.07 million people, or 63 percent of the Southeast Asian nation's 16-million population, officials said on Thursday. (Photo by Phearum/Xinhua) PHNOM PENH, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia has administered at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccines to 10.07 million people, or 63 percent of the Southeast Asian nation's 16-million population, officials said on Thursday. Of them, 8.13 million have completed the two-dose inoculation, Ministry of Health's secretary of state and spokeswoman Or Vandine said in a report. "As of Aug. 25, some 88.35 percent of the 10 million targeted adults and 62.87 percent of the 2 million targeted adolescents aged 12-17 have been vaccinated," she said. Cambodia began a COVID-19 vaccination drive in February, targeting to inoculate 12 million people, or 75 percent of the total population, by the end of this year in order to build herd immunity. Most of the vaccines used in the country's immunization program are China's Sinovac and Sinopharm. According to the Chinese Embassy in Cambodia, to date China has provided 22.3 million vaccine doses to Cambodia, of which 3.8 million were humanitarian donations. Cambodian government chief spokesman Phay Siphan called the kingdom's inoculation drive a "great success," expressing his profound gratitude to China for providing vaccines to Cambodia regularly and timely. "If there was no China's strong support, we would not have enough vaccines to inoculate our people. We highly value this generous help," he told Xinhua. "I'd like to say that our joint COVID-19 fight should be a role model for international cooperation and there is no doubt that it will contribute to building a community of shared future between Cambodia and China." Phea Sokheng, a 20-year-old student at the Phnom Penh International University, showed her thanks to the Cambodian government for providing free vaccines and gratitude to China for donating and selling vaccines to the kingdom. "'A friend in need is a friend indeed.' China, your kind support will be engraved in our hearts forever," she told Xinhua. Sokheng, who has been fully vaccinated with Sinovac vaccine, said she was quite confident in the quality and efficacy of the vaccine, saying that it would protect her from COVID-19 and its variants. Cambodia confirmed 423 new COVID-19 cases, including 111 imported ones on Thursday, raising the national total caseload to 90,958, the Ministry of Health said, adding that six more fatalities had been reported, bringing the overall death toll to 1,841. Another 291 patients had recovered, taking the total number of recoveries to 86,993, the ministry added. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 21:16:07|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BANGKOK, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Thailand's fruit exports between January and July increased by 48.3 percent year-on-year and generated 131 billion baht (about 4 billion U.S. dollars), the Ministry of Commerce said on Thursday. Commerce Minister Jurin Laksanawisit stated that the ministry is targeting to obtain at least 180 billion baht (about 5.5 billion U.S. dollars) in revenue from fresh and processed fruit exports this year. Jurin said that the growth of fruit exports was mainly attributed to promotional activities including "Thai Fruit Golden Month" and sales via foreign online trading platforms. "In China alone, Thai Fruit Golden Month activities which were held in eight Chinese cities had generated up to 15 billion baht (about 460 million U.S. dollars) over the first seven months of this year," he said. The minister added that the ministry is planning to run the same promotion in five other Chinese cities later this year. Proactive planning and management strategy will be employed to avoid further COVID-19-induced disruptions such as shipping delay and contamination. Additionally, the Ministry of Commerce disclosed that fruit selling via foreign online trading platforms have so far been successful and will encourage Thai sellers to utilize these effective channels. China, Malaysia, Singapore are the top importers of Thai fruits, especially fresh durian, mangosteen, longan and mango. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 23:24:38|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KATHMANDU, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the Siddhartha Art Gallery in Kathmandu of Nepal is attracting frequent visitors these days with artistic ceramic art works created by artist Gopal Kalapremi Shrestha and his family. An exhibition titled "Where The Wild Things Are" showcases sculptures, utensils, vases, cups, paintings and many more, which appeal to viewers stranded by the epidemic and the ongoing lockdown. Archana Rana KC, 42, spent more than an hour in the gallery with her two children. She was astonished to see diverse themes and artistic collections through the exhibition. "I find this exhibition very thought-provoking, and each collection has different and meaningful themes," she told Xinhua, adding the exhibition could be a perfect place for people to rejuvenate from the COVID-19 chaos. From the entrance, one can see ceramic tiles framed in wooden frames hanging on either side of the gallery. A collection of 11 tiles titled "The Flight of Crows" depicts crows being tangled with barbed wire and kite threads. Another collection of 14 tiles named "Life in Black And White" shows sad and mad human faces signifying uncertainty amid the pandemic. In this section, chaos in both the sky and land is displayed, explained Shrestha. Human life is shown as well with ceramic collections placed artistically between the two walls displaying the ceramic tiles, noted the Nepali artist. He said all the art pieces on display were created during the lockdown that started in late April. To some, the most interesting part of the exhibition is that all the sculptures made by Shrestha are female characters. Right in the middle of the gallery, there is a collection of 12 sculptures titled "Jenny," all women clad in bikini and are sitting playfully atop donkeys. Each donkey has a different zodiac sign printed on its body. "The rider and the donkey appear as playful reflections on the politics of gender and identity," explained Shrestha. Likewise, his other collection "Cows That Want to be Bulls" has meticulously made cows with a hump, symbolically indicating their foray and place-making in a once patriarchal world. Their humps are decorated with a tortoise-shell pattern to symbolize their resilience. Through his "Rise, Rise from the Villages and Settlements" collection, Shrestha depicts nine anthropomorphic horses representing women from different professions like grass cutter, female solider, student, doctor, nurse, dancer and sportswoman, devoting great attention to the varying details and patterns of their attire. Through his "Gaalis" series, Shrestha shares that women, like men, are also prone to be verbally assaulted with "Gaali" that usually likens a person to an animal. In response to these universal scolding terms, he created five works personifying women as Kukurni (Dog), Gadhaini (Donkey), Goruni (Bull), Bandarni (Monkey) and Bhedini (Sheep). "Art is so subjective, everybody has their viewpoints on art and they can describe it in their ways," said KC. "In my view, the artist is trying to compliment women via his art works." "During the COVID lockdown, we were disconnected from the world and we had no options but to stay at home," she added. "The works have shared the frustration people had during the lockdown. I could resonate with these art works." Right below "The Flight of Crows," on the right corner there is a small collection of ceramic utensils by Shrestha's wife, Yamuna, a self-taught artist, which includes vases, cups and bowls painted with floral and animal pictures. She has decorated these utensils with the traditional Mithila art of Nepal. Being displayed on the first floor of the gallery are works by their son, Shushank Kalapremi Shrestha. A fine art graduate, Shushank was gifted with a pair of Chinese shoes by his grandfather around 15 years ago. He took an inspiration from the shoes and made 40 ceramic shoes in the exact shapes and sizes. A collection titled "Jutta" occupies most of the space on the first floor, with the ceramic shoes having cartoon faces like Batman, Joker and Mickey Mouse, and some cartoon characters have their mouths gaping open, displaying teeth or tongues, while some wear bandana masks and others have horns. The younger Shrestha's other unique collection is "The Cups That Can See Me," under which the 12 cups have eyes all around and the cups are glazed with luster and running glazes. Noticeably, these types of glazing are done for the first time in Nepal. His father had tried on this glaze for more than 20 years but failed as it needs preciseness. "I was trying to make this for the past two decades but could not succeed, I'm so happy that my son did it," the father said. The 14th exhibition of Gopal Kalapremi Shrestha, a ceramic artist of 30 years, runs till Sept. 3, and visitors are limited to 10 on each floor and mask wearing is mandatory to check the spread of the coronavirus. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-26 23:50:31|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ISLAMABAD, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Chinese tech giant Huawei and Pakistan's eastern Punjab province's urban development project Ravi Urban Development Authority (RUDA) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to develop the world's largest riverfront safe and smart city. Under the MoU, both sides will join hands to revive the dying Ravi River into a safe and smart green city with all the latest safe and smart city technologies. The memorandum reaffirms an existing one-year healthy relationship between both entities, a handout shared by Huawei Pakistan said on Thursday. Briefing about the project, the handout said that the parties will work together on the key projects known as smart forests and others under RUDA which will act as a developer and Huawei will be the lead technology partner. "The Parties will cooperate on smart forests development across design and construction execution phases by latest technologies such as IoT, cloud computing, big data, AI, data center network, storage and servers, data center facility, intelligent security surveillance system, solar energy, etc," it said. Earlier on Wednesday, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan inaugurated the country's first smart forest covering 1,214 hectares of land to be developed by RUDA with technical assistance from Huawei. Khan said that 10 million trees will be planted in the forest, adding that the growth of every plant would be monitored in collaboration with Huawei that will install sensors inside the forest to alert if anyone cuts trees. He also appreciated RUDA and Huawei's support to build a new safe and smart river forest city and said that he is looking forward to bringing the initiative all over the country. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-27 00:26:19|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ISLAMABAD, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- Three security personnel were killed and three others injured in a landmine blast in Pakistan's southwest Balochistan province on Thursday, a Pakistani government official said. Spokesperson of the Balochistan government Liaquat Shahwani told the media that the incident took place when a roadside planted landmine explosion hit a vehicle of paramilitary Pakistan Levies forces in the Mangi Dam area of Ziarat district of the province. The forces' vehicle was on a routine patrol in the area when it struck the landmine, said police. Following the explosion, rescue teams, police and security forces rushed to the site and shifted the bodies and the injured to a nearby hospital. Police and security forces have cordoned off the area and launched a search operation to arrest the culprits. So far, no group or individual has claimed the attack. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-08-27 05:01:48|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KABUL, Aug. 27 (Xinhua) -- Another huge explosion was heard in the Afghan capital Kabul early Friday, hours after deadly twin bomb blasts left dozens of people dead, including 12 U.S. troops, at the Kabul airport. However, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement on Twitter that it was a controlled explosion by U.S. troops destroying equipment at the airport. Earlier, the Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for the deadly attack on the Kabul airport, saying it was targeting "translators and collaborators with the American army." The U.S. military confirmed that 12 U.S. service members were killed and 15 other wounded in the attack. The twin explosions happened as thousands of people gathered at the airport waiting for evacuation flights to leave the country. Nearly 6,000 U.S. troops have been deployed at the Kabul airport to secure the airlifting operation since the Taliban captured Kabul on Aug. 15. Enditem Addis Abeba The UN country team in Ethiopia said some 2.4 million people are in need of aid in Somali regional state. The report came amid reports of rising malnutrition and impending water shortage in the region. The UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Ethiopia (RC/HC), Dr. Catherine Sozi, visited Somali Region on 23 July to firsthand witness the humanitarian situation, the UN said. During the visit the Ms Sozi discussed with the regional authorities including deputy president Mustafa Muhumed, and Heads of UN and NGO Sub/Field/Hub offices "where she demonstrated the commitment of the UN to strengthen partnerships and address the needs of those most vulnerable in the region." She also visited Qoloji IDP camp and discussed with IDPs and communities hosting them. "The regional president highlighted that 2.4 million people in the region depend on food aid. Malnutrition cases are increasing significantly." The UN said significant resources are also needed to provide a durable solution for the IDPs. As part of a response to a Drought Response Plan, the Government has recently allocated contingency funds with a total amount of ETB 93 million ($US 2.12M) for 93 Woredas, to anticipate water shortage, "which is likely to happen in the coming months." Ms Sozi commended the collective effort by the Government and the humanitarian community in the region, particularly in responding to the humanitarian crises and pointed out that she would mobilize resources to support the response. On the other hand, she also highlighted that the funding on humanitarian and development from the donors decreases significantly. While reiterating the need for collective efforts by the Government, community, and international actors to sustainably resolve the longstanding IDPs issues in the region, she said, "despite the global attention in the northern part of Ethiopia, the IDPs in other regions will not be neglected. As humanitarians, we will work with the Government on how to get a durable solution for the IDPs." It is vital to innovate, explore and engage both the development and humanitarian actors, including the private sector, to combine resources, produce local products, and use the development to prepare for and reduce the impact of humanitarian crises, according to Ms Sozi. Raising the concerns and pressure from the IDPs they are hosting, an elder at the Qoloji IDPs site said: "we are now displaced and worse compared to the IDPs. They receive assistance, but we don't. Our farms are narrow now, and we are not farming to avoid any conflict that it may create. Some sites were used to be farm plots are now IDP camp. Please find a solution for the IDPs and until that, please also consider us." UN/AS More than 250 traders at Alibaba Shopping Mall in Mtwapa, Kilifi County, are in shock after goons demolished their structures and destroyed goods worth millions of shillings. The traders want county officials to help them put up new stalls. They held peaceful demonstrations on Tuesday to protest the destruction of their merchandise, including cereals, vegetables and eggs, by a bulldozer that flattened their shops. The shops were levelled barely three months after the traders relocated from the Mombasa-Malindi highway to the mall. "This destruction happened under unclear circumstances as we had not received any eviction notice or court orders to vacate the premises," said Margaret Wanjiru. "Business had been booming since we relocated but we are now suffering. We want to know who ordered the demolition and we are urging Governor Amason Kingi to build us new structures." Ms Wanjiru said the traders had suffered for years selling their goods on the side of the highway. A majority of them had taken loans to relocate to the mall to boost their businesses, she said. "But now it's tears and pain as everything was destroyed and buried in the rubble. We pleaded with the goons to allow us to salvage our goods, but they refused," she added. Desperate and confused, Everlyne Karembo could not hold back her tears as she collected rice mixed with sand from her rumbled stall. She said traders had lost goods worth millions of shillings. Musa Masantu, a guard, said the goons tore down the stalls using a bulldozer at midnight. It is an awful scene for some proud supporters of the ruling party to see the party they continue to be loyal to being reluctant to address the infightings and divisions within its structures. The party has enjoyed good years of unity, especially under the leadership of the Founding Father and Father of the Namibian nation Dr Sam Shafishuna Nujoma. However, it was after the Nujoma reign when we saw two prominent members (Hidipo Hamutenya and Jesaya Nyamu) of the Swapo party leave to form their own party called the Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP). Swapo suffered its first division as a result of the formation of the RDP, but credit must be given to the leadership of then-party president Hifikepunye Pohamba in ensuring that the party was able to reunite and remain a dominant force at all levels of government. Fast forward, the change of leadership from President Pohamba to President Hage Geingob also produced its own division, which one could say is still to be dealt with effectively and decisively. The current infighting and division within the party started as of July 2015 when Swapo Party Youth League (SPYL) leader Dr Elijah Ngurare, youth league spokesperson Dr Job Amupanda, Dimbulukeni Nauyoma and George Kambala were expelled from the party because of incompatible conduct as per the decision of Nangolo Mbumba, then secretary general of the party. Unfortunately, the manner in which this expulsion was conducted was not procedural. These latter three individuals left the party and formed the Affirmative Repositioning (AR) movement. They then made it their collective responsibility to expose and go after every Swapo member who is either corrupt, or accused of being involved in corrupt activities. That voluntary exercise has been well-received by the public, but caused serious damage to the party, and the past national and local authorities elections pose as serious case studies. Furthermore, Team Swapo and Team Harambee is another division that was created prior to the 6th Swapo congress in 2017, and this division is somehow evident until today. Last year under the guidance of the party president, Swapo held an introspection conference to deal with the infightings and divisions. Although the call for an introspection congress was a brilliant idea, it somehow failed to provide conclusive actions to ease the tension within the party. On one hand, we had a congress aimed at restoring unity within the party, while on the other we have members of the Swapo Party Youth League who are unhappy with people being appointed as members of the National Assembly while there are party members who have been in the structures waiting to move up the ladder. My message to the party is that for as long as the party is divided, and the members are not adapting to modern ways of being and acting, then the party is facing a downfall. What is happening within the Swapo party is quite akin to what has been happening within the African National Congress (ANC) of South Africa. The ANC is reshuffling its cadres from one position to the other, and it is further failing to expel corrupt members. This is because the party is driven by the same cycle and disruptive mindsets, which does not align with the rule of law. Swapo has to find a way to get rid of every corrupt member, irrespective of their contribution to the liberation struggle, or their prominence within the party. The only way to deal with the division and to regain constituencies lost in the previous election first is through expelling corrupt members, and lastly to keep appointing qualified young people in positions of power and authority. The mentality of "we fought for this country" has to come to an end. The fight now is for economic recovery and growth. The country is in debt as a result of corruption and poor decisions by those who claim to have fought for the independence of the Namibian nation. Astonishingly, the party president is not supporting any party member to be his successor, while he was publicly supported for the position he has today by his predecessor. Are you surprised? I am not, because I think it is the right call, given the situation within the party and continuous hunger for power. If the President was to publicly back and support someone for the presidency, then chances of it further spreading the division within the party are high. The problem with the top party members is that they are more worried about positions and how much they take home. They are, however, not aware that carrying out your duties is the secret to excelling and moving up the ladder, something that minister Erastus Utoni used to create a positive image for himself. Swapo has so many businesses and multiple income-generating streams, and yet again because of poor decision-makers, not enough of the party's resources are trickling down to enable party supporters. Very soon, giving people food at rallies will not secure the party the votes.Is the party centred around young people? Even though the SPYL exists, I strongly disagree because the SPYL is mostly made up of members who are not considered to be part of the youth. Furthermore, there is a need to relook the party constitution, which permits someone to be a leader of the SPYL for as long as he or she is not older than 45 years. It should rather be not more than 35 years. When last have you heard the SPYL addressing and challenging youth empowerment, youth unemployment and the availability of opportunities? It is unlikely because they are more focused on power struggles, winning government tenders, and not ideas that will lead to national development. Close Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox Top Headlines Namibia Governance By submitting above, you agree to our privacy policy. Success! Almost finished... We need to confirm your email address. To complete the process, please follow the instructions in the email we just sent you. Error! Error! There was a problem processing your submission. Please try again later. The President has the right to appoint six (6) people to be members of the Swapo Party Central Committee. What is the take of the SPYL on the six appointments? The party is facing a harsh reality if it fails to deal with the struggles within the party. In politics, a serious threat to any democracy is giving power to the unknown. Alternatively, global politics taught us that even party loyalists are able to change sides, especially if the party is unable to deal with internal conflicts. How will such a party be able to deliver on a national stage? Even though time is running out, the remaining few years before the next elections are enough for Swapo to get its house in order, and to reunite the party. However, if the party continues to play politics with the division within its main structures, then it should not be shocked with its performance in the 2024 national elections. Our biggest and most commendable political progress in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) today is Zambia. Taking a look at what happened in Zambia, we could say to ruling parties within the region to step up, as voters are tired of failed governance. analysis Urban green spaces like parks with lawns and trees have well-known benefits for people who live in cities. They help improve air quality, manage floods, reduce noise and keep temperatures down. The United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals recognise the role of green spaces in creating healthy and sustainable urban life . The COVID-19 pandemic has made this even clearer, as green spaces have been used for makeshift hospitals and allowing people to get outdoor exercise even in lockdown. With so many benefits, it may be surprising that African cities aren't doing much to provide and manage these resources. Statistics show an alarming rate of decline in green spaces in African urban areas. The blame is frequently put on rapid urbanisation, low public appreciation of green space, poor planning and weak law enforcement. In the discussions, the perspectives of one group tend to be missed: people living in informal and slum settlements. It's a big group: Africa accounts for about 62% of the estimated one billion slum residents in the world. Also, people in the informal sector contribute more than 80% to Africa's urban economy, making their participation in urban development essential. But city planning practices in many African countries have neglected these dominant informal and slum communities, considering them as a nuisance in the cities. As a result, slum residents lack access to basic essential services, including parks. Our research in the Ghanaian capital Accra aimed to examine how access to, and the control and use of, urban land contributes to the decline of urban green spaces amid rapid urbanisation. We wanted to know what slum residents thought about the importance of these spaces, and how their perceptions informed their attitudes. We found that most of the slum residents had some understanding of the importance of green spaces. This represents an opportunity for city authorities to do more to provide or improve green spaces in slum communities, as they are likely to succeed. Slum residents' experiences and attitudes Accra is Ghana's largest city, with rapid population growth and high land and housing prices. This situation has resulted in the development and expansion of slums and informal settlements, and rapid loss of green spaces in the city. Using two slum communities - Nima and Agbogbloshie - as case studies, we gathered views from 395 slum residents. These communities are among the largest slums in Ghana and are located in ecologically sensitive areas, such as nature reserves, wetlands and stream banks. They have poor sanitary conditions, limited essential services and sub-standard buildings. Their open spaces are in poor condition - including community parks without grass - and are used for activities like hawking. The popular claim in the urban studies literature is that residents of slum communities are mostly concerned with finding space to live but not for recreation. Contrary to this, we found that 93% of the slum residents in our study demonstrated a reasonable understanding of the importance of green city spaces. They acknowledged that these spaces made the environment look more attractive, minimised soil erosion and air pollution, and served social gathering purposes. The remaining 7% of respondents did not perceive green spaces to be important, because they did not have them in their neighbourhoods. Despite these positive perceptions, we found that they did not translate into positive attitudes. The green spaces within slums are fast deteriorating due to interrelated management and behavioural failures. Our research identified encroachment by slum dwellers (35%) and poor cooperation between residents and city authorities to maintain green spaces (54%) as the two major factors contributing to the loss of these areas. On the one hand Ghanaian city authorities are focused on addressing problems of poverty, education and health rather than managing green spaces in slums. On the other hand, many slum residents do little to protect these spaces. They dispose of waste indiscriminately and use the green space for other purposes, including building homes. Our research showed that the slum residents who held positive views about green spaces also showed high interest in the need to protect them. Some had formed community associations such as "keep-fit clubs" and youth groups. However, out of the positive group, only 14% indicated that they actively did anything to help protect spaces in their communities. The results contradict some earlier studies that suggest residents demonstrate positive attitudes towards the management of green spaces because they understand their importance. Policy implications The findings offer two policy insights. First, slum residents understand the importance of having a green neighbourhood. But they are under socio-economic pressures which make it hard to act accordingly. Second, the idea that slum residents do not appreciate green spaces has conditioned some of them to consider park management as the sole duty of government and therefore they do not provide any management support. Close Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox Top Headlines Ghana Urban Issues By submitting above, you agree to our privacy policy. Success! Almost finished... We need to confirm your email address. To complete the process, please follow the instructions in the email we just sent you. Error! Error! There was a problem processing your submission. Please try again later. Nevertheless, city authorities can capitalise on the residents' acknowledgement of the importance of green spaces to provide more education and management. Accra and several other Ghanaian cities, troubled by unprecedented urbanisation and its associated impacts, are fast losing their green spaces, especially in slum and informal communities. The involvement and contribution of slum dwellers is critical. Although they are often neglected in mainstream planning practice and blamed for the rapid loss of green spaces in Ghanaian cities, our findings show they are willing to support initiatives. It is important to pay attention to local perceptions and integrate them into plans, since such perceptions influence attitudes and participation in development initiatives. This can encourage a sense of responsibility for addressing critical urban needs. Patrick Brandful Cobbinah, Senior Lecturer, The University of Melbourne and Michael Odei Erdiaw-Kwasie, Lecturer , Business Sustainability, Charles Darwin University The president said "the heinous action would accelerate the total uprooting of evil in the polity, which members of the Armed Forces are solidly resolved to accomplish in the shortest possible time." President Muhammadu Buhari says the Tuesday attack on the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA), will not dampen the morale of the security agencies in ending banditry and criminality in the country. The president stated this in a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, on Wednesday in Abuja. He noted that the attack, which led to loss of lives, came at a time that the military had put insurgents, bandits, kidnappers, and other types of criminals on the retreat. The president said "the heinous action would accelerate the total uprooting of evil in the polity, which members of the Armed Forces are solidly resolved to accomplish in the shortest possible time." The retired general commiserated with the families who lost their loved ones, and praying God to comfort them. The president vowed that the deceased would not die in vain, as the degenerate act would have consequences that would eventually clean the country of vermin, and emancipate the polity from deliberate, targeted and contrived atrocious acts. He thanked all Nigerians who value and appreciate the efforts of the military, and urged those playing hateful politics with the dastardly act to desist. According to the president, rather than recriminations, this is the time for all patriots and people of goodwill to support and encourage those who are in the vanguard of the battle against wickedness in the land. An attack on the military facility by suspected bandits which claimed the lives of two officers and abduction of one has stunned Nigerians and adds to the growing insecurity across the country. (NAN) A week after 33 travellers were killed in an attack in Rubuka, Jos, in Nigeria's Plateau state, 36 people have again been killed by gunmen in the same area. The gunmen, said to be on a revenge mission over the August 14 killings of the 33 travellers, on Tuesday attacked Yelwa-zangam, behind the University of Jos, in Jos North Local Government, north central Nigeria. They destroyed the access bridge leading to the community before carrying out the raid at about 9pm. The gunmen destroyed property and burned houses. Security operatives have gained access to the village as rescue operations commenced. The Plateau State Police Command has yet to give details of the incident but the attack came after the military alleged a plot by some people to cause unrest in Jos. The reprisals that followed the killing of the 33 travellers led to the closure of the University of Jos, which is reported to have lost a number of students to the ongoing crisis. Ethno-religious and political crisis which enveloped Jos in the last four decades had festered. More than 13,500 people have been killed in communal violence since 1984. The heavy presence of military and police forces ensures a fragile calm in the city. Yaounde Cameroon has turned public buildings on its northern border with Nigeria into temporary housing for former Boko Haram militants. Hundreds of Boko Haram members have been defecting from the Islamist group, including more than two hundred on Sunday. Cameroon says its center for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration, or DDR, in Meri, a northern town on the border with Nigeria, is now home to about 1,500 former Boko Haram militants. Three weeks ago, the center had about 750 former militants. DDR officials in Meri said Tuesday most of the 237 former jihadist members who arrived this week included women and children. One hundred are former Boko Haram fighters, all looking tired, unkempt and hungry, officials said. Thirty-three-year-old Alidou Faizar says he defected from a Boko Haram Camp in the Sambisa Forest located on the Cameroon/Nigeria border. He says is tired of killing and looting and that Boko Haram promised to improve his living conditions when he joined the jihadist group 3 years ago, but he is now poorer, and that he suffers from a guilty conscience reminding him of crimes he committed. He adds that peace is priceless. Faizar said his wish is to return to Abadam, a town in Nigeria's Borno state. Cameroon says close to 900 of the 1,500 former jihadists in Meri are Nigerians. Oumar Bichair, director of the DDR center at Meri, says the center is already at full capacity. He says Cameroon's government has turned public buildings, including a Women's Empowerment Center at Mora, another northern town, into temporary residences for former Boko Haram members. He says the governor of Cameroon's Far North region has suggested that his colleagues in Nigeria's Borno state, considered an epicenter of the jihadist group, should make arrangements for the former militants to voluntarily return to Nigeria. Close Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox Top Headlines Cameroon Legal Affairs By submitting above, you agree to our privacy policy. Success! Almost finished... We need to confirm your email address. To complete the process, please follow the instructions in the email we just sent you. Error! Error! There was a problem processing your submission. Please try again later. Francis Fai Yengo, the DDR country director, says Cameroonian President Paul Biya has allocated funds for the construction of a DDR center that can host 1,500 former militants in Meme, a town located in north along the border with Nigeria. He says Cameroon is grateful that many militants are escaping from Boko Haram camps. "We have to thank ex-fighters for laying down their arms. I am sure that they looked at the bigger picture which is to have peace," he said. "Everyday elites, mayors, people are going to help these ex-fighters. They [civilians] don't only give them [former militants] material things, they [civilians] counsel them [ex-fighters]. You see how very young, vibrant and dynamic ex-fighters are struggling everyday with us to appeal to the others [fighters] in the bush to come [surrender] to have peace." Yengo said Cameroon's president has asked that all fighters who dropped their weapons to be pardoned and reintegrated back into society. He said Nigerians who want to return to their country will be handed to Nigerian government authorities but did not say when. The Multinational Joint Task Force of the Lake Chad Basin, or MNJTF, that is fighting the jihadist group says Nigeria has been informed that many ex-fighters have surrendered in Cameroon and want to return to Nigeria. The task force is made up of troops from Niger, Cameroon, Chad and Nigeria. Nigeria is yet to issue a statement on the possibility of the former militants returning to the west African state. Cameroon's military said the militants surrendered to MNJTF troops stationed at the border around Sambisa Forest. The task force said many militants have been defecting in Cameroon, Nigeria and Chad following the death of Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau. The jihadist group leader was declared killed in May. Mr Falana advised the federal government to meet the demands of the striking members National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) to end the "hostilities" as ordered by the court. Human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, has advised the federal government to meet the demands of the striking National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) members, cautioning against the impression that a court stopped the doctors' ongoing industrial action. The Senior Advocate of Nigeria said in a statement on Wednesday that the National Industrial Court in Abuja "did not grant the order of interim injunction" stopping the strike, contrary to the government's claim and some media reports. He said instead of granting the interim order sought by the government to stop the strike, the court in its ruling delivered on August 23 directed parties - the federal government and NARD - to "suspend all forms of hostilities forthwith pending the hearing and determination of motion on notice." Mr Falana, who attached a copy of the enrolled order of the court to his statement, therefore, advised the federal government "to meet the demands of the resident doctors without any further delay so as to pave way for the suspension of all forms of hostilities in the health sector". He described as "unfortunate" that the federal and state governments despite spending billions of naira to train medical personnel and other professionals "allow them to troop out to serve other countries where conditions of service are qualitatively better that what obtain in Nigeria". PREMIUM TIMES had reported that the court refused to order the striking members to order the striking members of NARD to resume work, amid many news platforms' misleading reports that the court ordered the association to suspend their strike. The judge, John Targema, rather ordered the two parties locked in the industrial dispute -members of NARD and the federal government - "to suspend all forms of hostilities". Government's false claim Shortly after the pronouncement of the court on Monday, the ministry of labour and employment had issued a statement announcing that the court already ordered the doctors to resume work. The statement, which was signed by the ministry's spokesperson, Charles Akpan, said the presiding judge granted the order of interlocutory injunction, "compelling all members of the Defendants/Respondents in all the states of the Federation to suspend the said industrial action," a claim the certified true copy of the order has now shown to be patently false. This newspaper reported that the Monday's ruling asking the parties in the case to suspend hostilities came as a vague answer to the government's application, which specifically sought an order of interlocutory injunction compelling the resident doctors across the country to suspend their industrial action they started on August 2. Our report also indicated that it was the second time the judge would be refusing to order the resident doctors to resume work. His Monday's ruling comes bout four days after rejecting a similar call by a civil society organisation, Rights for All International, last Thursday. The ongoing industrial action by the resident doctors, who constitute the largest number of physicians across Nigeria's tertiary hospitals, has continued to take its toll on the country's already overstretched healthcare facilities. The doctors' grievances are contained in a Memorandum of Action (MOA), endorsed in April by both the striking doctors and the government representatives, including labour and employment minister, Chris Ngige. They demanded, amongst others, payment of COVID-19 inducement allowances and medical and life insurance for frontline doctors. Read Femi Falana's full statement In a move designed to end the industrial action by the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) the Federal Government filed an ex parte motion at the National Industrial Court seeking to restrain the doctors from further continuing with the strike. Close Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox Top Headlines Nigeria Governance Health By submitting above, you agree to our privacy policy. Success! Almost finished... We need to confirm your email address. To complete the process, please follow the instructions in the email we just sent you. Error! Error! There was a problem processing your submission. Please try again later. The court did not grant the order of interim injunction but directed both sides to 'suspend all forms of hostilities forthwith pending the hearing and determination of motion on Notice'. In view of the intervention of the National Industrial court in the dispute the Federal Government should meet the demands of the resident doctors without any further delay so as to pave way for the suspension of all forms of hostilities in the health sector. Since the Federal Government has continued to toy with the health of the people foreign medical treatment for public officers should be banned. It is unfortunate to note that the Federal Government and State Governments which spend billions of Naira to train medical personnel and other professionals allow them to troop out to serve other countries where conditions of service are qualitatively better that what obtain in Nigeria. The dangerous trend must be halted by the governments. Femi Falana SAN Interim Chair, Alliance on Surviving Covid 19 and Beyond (ASCAB) SUB: The former Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi 11, has opened up on how General Sani Abacha, former military Head of State, locked him up... The former Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi 11, has opened up on how General Sani Abacha, former military Head of State, locked him up in Sokoto Prison. Sanusi disclosed this at a triple fold event to mark his 60th birthday. At the event, where HHMS11 SDG challenge, a United Nations initiative which he chairs the advisory council, was launched, Sanusi said he was accused of being a threat to national security at the time. He also made some interesting revelation about his life. "Not many people know that between June 1995 and June 1996, I was in Sokoto prison as a threat to national security under General Abacha," he said. "Many of the articles in this book started after that experiment." Below are other issues highlighted in the book: His love for Nigeria country and his anger at where the country should be but it is not. How he led the first demonstration in his life at the age of 8 at St Anne's school, Kaduna. He has a much stronger network of support in Lagos that was why when he was deposed as Emir and when he was removed as CBN governor, he choose to go to Lagos. His friends end up with High Blood Pressure and sleeplessness because they fear for what will happen to him. Of all the things he is grateful for, his friends are the top most, adding that they came through for him every time he got into trouble. A friend (name not given) has made his private jet available for all his movements making people believe that he owns the jet. Close Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox Top Headlines Nigeria Legal Affairs By submitting above, you agree to our privacy policy. Success! Almost finished... We need to confirm your email address. To complete the process, please follow the instructions in the email we just sent you. Error! Error! There was a problem processing your submission. Please try again later. He has four wives and 13 children and grand children. He is starting a PhD in London at 60 years of age before the end of the year to prove to his kids that they need to aspire to greater height and to contribute to public discuss as a state man. He said he likes his wives because they say very good things about him in public even though he knows he is not so nice He will be studying alongside 6 of his children who will be pursuing first and second degrees respectively. He is passionate about women and girls, adding that for 50 years, the CBN appoint only 4 women as directors but he appoint 8 women as directors the same day to change the narrative. He does not support the break up of Nigeria because he benefitted greatly from the country. He said he would have been contended with life if all he ever attained was the Chief Risk officer of First Bank. He said his intellectual formation has been complete long before now, citing his father, time at St Anne's, Kings College and Ahmadu Bello University as his biggest influence. Nigeria in a bid to contain the spread of bird flu (file photo). Authorities in Delta have confirmed the outbreak of bird flu in the state, with 164,173 birds reported dead. The Commissioner for Agriculture, Julius Egbedi, made this known while addressing a newsmen on Wednesday in Asaba. "Government has taken action to curtail the spread of the disease. "So far, some poultry farms across seven local government areas of the state have been affected by the flu. "With reported figures put at 164,173, we know it may be more than this, but this is the official number from the reported cases. "On June 22, we got a call from some poultry farms in Ughelli on birds dying in their numbers. "We dispatched our team of veterinary experts to the farms and they collected samples which we sent to the Veterinary Institute in Gwon, Jos for analysis. "However, when the result came out, it confirmed a case of the Avian Flu Influenza," Egbedi said. The commissioner said the affected farms are located in Sapele, Udu, Ughelli North, Ughelli South, Oshimili South and Okpe LGAs. "Following the confirmation of the disease, the State Ministry of Agriculture sent experts to go disinfect the affected farms to help curtail the spread," he said. Egbedi advised residents of the state not to panic, saying that the government is working round the clock to ensure the disease is curtailed. "We want to assure the general public and all poultry farmers that government is on top of the situation. There is no need for panic. "We equally want to use this medium to reach out to poultry farmers across the state to report to the ministry of they notice any form of bird deaths. "The state government is alive to its responsibility and will do everything necessary to protect the poultry business which is an integral part of our agriculture economy," Egbedi said.(NAN) The head of struggling dairy business A2 Milk has ruled out backing away from its increasingly volatile Chinese market despite investor uncertainty, announcing a strategic review of the region after a plunge in full-year earnings. Newly appointed chief executive David Bortolussi told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald China, which drives nearly half of the companys sales, was too big to ignore, rejecting suggestions A2 could pull out of the region entirely. a2 Milk CEO David Bortolussi is reviewing the China business. It is both our biggest risk and biggest opportunity, he said. Other markets are relatively small compared to the opportunity we have in China, and many businesses and brands would love to have the position we have in China. I couldnt see myself or our broader management team actively de-prioritising and investing elsewhere. We will go after our Chinese market and invest as heavily as we can there. On Thursday, A2 revealed its revenue for the 2021 financial year fell 30.3 per cent to $NZ1.21 billion ($1.16 billion) and net profit after tax plunged 79.1 per cent to $80.7 million, led by a 66.4 per cent drop in earnings out of its Chinese and other Asian markets. The company did not declare a dividend. In light of this, the company said it would rethink its Chinese operations as part of a wide-ranging review after a number of fundamental changes in the region that have hurt A2s growth. A drop in Chinas birth rate has shrunk the market for infant formula, and the pandemic has also seen a sharp reduction in daigou resellers, which drove a significant chunk of A2s sales into the region. In response, domestic formula producers in China have stepped up to fill the gaps, creating more competitive intensity and faster product innovation. A2s review will focus on maximising its domestic business in China, especially in the mother and baby store channel, and building out its online capabilities in the country. Mr Bortolussi said the business is also assessing ways to make up for the disruption in the daigou channel. Other businesses, such as Treasury Wine Estates, have seen success in focusing growth in other markets after encountering difficulties in China, however, Mr Bortolussi said he was confident the review would help A2 get back on strong footing in the region. However, shareholders were not convinced, sending the stock down 10 per cent to $6.21. Citi analyst Sam Teeger questioned if the companys best days were behind it, raising concerns the business may not be able to resolve its issues. It is both our biggest risk and biggest opportunity. David Bortolussi says the company is retaining its focus on China. It seems like a leap of faith to assume the A2 can turn its fortunes around, he said. The company needs to make material changes surrounding driving growth, innovation and brand positioning in order to address structural headwinds. Mr Teeger said the companys higher than expected earnings in the Australia/New Zealand region was a positive, along with A2s successful efforts to right-size its inventory levels. A2 has been seriously affected by the pandemic and has had to downgrade its earnings forecasts four times throughout the financial year as an expected recovery in its Chinese market did not eventuate and the business was forced to write-down $90 million in nearly out-of-date stock. The company did not provide any specific guidance or sales figures for the start of the new financial year and warned investors conditions would continue to be volatile and challenging, with English label products expected to recover sales slowly and Chinese market growth to be subdued for some time. The Market Recap newsletter is a wrap of the days trading. Get it each weekday afternoon. Within this framework, the Cabinet member affirmed that State ministers are working hard, adding that if Parliament decides not to grant a confidence vote to the group led by Prime Minister Guido Bellido, the work will be continued by other people. "No one is indispensable (...). If Congress does not grant us confidence, well, that is their right, their faculty; it is stated by the Constitution. However, it would not be justified because we are starting the work," he asserted. Likewise, the high-ranking official pointed out that it is not the purpose of this Government or the President of the Republic to dissolve Parliament, noting that the Head of State wants to govern for the sake of the citizenry. "The President does not have that purpose; he has stated it, there is no revanchist purpose or of revenge; he wants to work for Peru and not dwell too much on these things at Congress," he said in remarks to Exitosa radio. He also indicated that the top official is the one who assesses the changes in the Cabinet, as well as the moment in which they should occur. (END) FHG/CVC/MVB Afterwards, they continued towards the Parliament headquarters on foot. In accordance with Article 130 of the Constitution, the President of the Council of Ministers must attend Congress joined by his Cabinet to present the Government's general policy and the principal measures pursued by the Executive Branch. At the event, it was agreed that the Ministerial Cabinet would appear before Congress on August 26 to request the confidence vote from legislators. Earlier this week, the Prime Minister affirmed that the Cabinet's presentation before Congress would address concrete proposals for the benefit of the country. "(We are devoting) our full efforts and good will to outline all the initiatives we have for the good of the country on Thursday," he expressed. The Cabinet chief said he is convinced the country will understand that the Government and President Pedro Castillo are firmly committed to serving more than 33 million Peruvians without causing harm to anyone. El titular de la PCM, @GuidoPuka, llego al @congresoperu acompanado del gabinete de ministros, para solicitar el #VotoDeConfianza. #GobernandoJuntos pic.twitter.com/cePMLg5rvK La presidenta del Congreso, @MaricarmenAlvaP, sostuvo una reunion protocolar con el embajador de Rusia en Peru, Igor V. Romanchenko. Dialogaron sobre la cooperacion entre ambos paises, en el campo economico-comercial, salud, educacion y sobre todo en el parlamentario. pic.twitter.com/cx49mGFfKL "The world is recovering significantly. The prospects for an improvement in the global economy are revised upwards by the principal multilateral organizations. This year, the global economy will increase 6%," the Director of the Association of Peruvian Exporters' Global Business and Economy Research Center (Cien-Adex) Edgar Vasquez stated. To get an idea of the impact of the dynamics he said the world economy grows at an average rate of 3% in a generally quiet period, according to a report published on Wednesday in the official gazette El Peruano "This year, growth will be double (that of the average), led by two driving forces: The United States will experience record growth of 6.4%, while China will grow 9%. This was mainly due to aid packages that are revitalizing the economies of these two countries, thus driving the rest of the world, and, with it, the global economy," the Cien-Adex director explained. The officer noted that this translates into a rapid recovery of international trade, both at export and import levels. "This year, international trade will expand 8%. While recovery is spreading broadly, there are sectors that are clearly more dynamic than others at this juncture, one of them is the food sector," he pointed out. It is precisely in this field that Peru has the chance to develop a food export policy to turn it into the world's pantry. Results According to the CIEN-Adex director, global food imports will grow 12% this year and will reach a record level of US$1.715 billion. "In addition to being significantly important, this is something that will benefit countries such as Peru, which is one of the most important superfood suppliers in the globe ," he remarked. Peru must make the most of markets, particularly at this juncture and in conjunction with the Central Government, of course lay the foundation for sustained growth starting 2022, when the global economy will embark on a path of normalization. (END) DOP/RMB/MVB The COVID-19 pandemic has marked a new era for the global economy. The recovery has demanded several changes, mainly in the food field, since global consumers require much healthier products a trend that is growing considerably.Published: 8/25/2021 The Cabinet Chief stressed that the message bringing the Executive and Legislative Branches together is essentially motivated by the spirit of broadest unity. Titular de la PCM: Nuestra gestion no pretende ser la continuidad de gobiernos anteriores, ni tampoco intenta copiar modelos adoptados en otros paises. Nuestra principal aspiracion es lograr, de forma democratica, cambios importantes en la estructura estatal y economica. pic.twitter.com/T9qu44LoQr A South Korean parliamentary committee voted on Wednesday to recommend amending a law, a key step towards banning Google and Apple from forcibly charging software developers commissions on in-app purchases, the first such curb by a major economy. Apple and Alphabet's Google have faced global criticism because they require software developers using their app stores to use proprietary payment systems that charge commissions of up to 30 percent. In a statement on Tuesday, Apple said the bill "will put users who purchase digital goods from other sources at risk of fraud, undermine their privacy protections," hurt user trust in App Store purchases and lead to fewer opportunities for South Korean developers. Wilson White, senior director of public policy at Google, said "the rushed process hasn't allowed for enough analysis of the negative impact of this legislation on Korean consumers and app developers". Experts said app store operators could assure security in payment systems other than their own by working with developers and other companies. "Google and Apple aren't the only ones that can create a secure payment system," said Lee Hwang, a Korea University School of Law professor specializing in competition law. Others noted that South Korea had some of the most robust legal protections for online transactions in the world, and said app store operators should provide advanced services to bolster profits. "Dominant app store operators with large platforms should by now look to profit from value-added services, not just taking a cut from apps sold on its store," said Yoo Byung-joon, a Seoul National University School of Business professor who specializes in electronic commerce. Based on South Korean parliament records, the amendment bans app store operators with dominant market positions from forcing payment systems on content providers and "inappropriately" delaying the review of, or deleting, mobile content from app markets. It also allows the South Korean government to require an app market operator to "prevent damage to users and protect the rights and interests of users", probe app market operators, and mediate disputes regarding payment, cancellations or refunds in the app market. After the vote from the legislation and judiciary committee to amend the Telecommunications Business Act, dubbed the "Anti-Google law," the amendment will come to a final vote in parliament. (CGTN) YEREVAN, AUGUST 26, ARMENPRESS. Speaker of Parliament of Artsakh Artur Tovmasyan has arrived in Yerevan on a working visit to meet with heads of parliamentary factions and MPs. During the meetings issues relating to the status of Artsakh, the displaced persons, occupied territories, the security and social-economic problems of the people were discussed. The meetings also touched upon the cooperation between the parliaments of Armenia and Artsakh. All the three parliamentary factions of Armenia have expressed readiness for joint work and cooperation. Artur Tovmasyan invited the heads and members of the Civil Contract, Armenia, I Have the Honor factions to Artsakh to attend the special session of Parliament on September 1 dedicated to the 30th jubilee of the Republic. Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan YEREVAN, AUGUST 26, ARMENPRESS. The trilateral negotiations between the Armenian, Russian and Azerbaijani sides on opening Goris-Kapan road still continue, ARMENPRESS reports head of Kapan community Gevorg Parsyan told ARMENPRESS. According to him, apart from blocking the road, no other extraordinary incidents have taken place during this period; the current situation has not affected the settlements of Kapan community in any way. Gevorg Parsyan has no idea when the talks will end or what will be their result, but emphasizes the necessity for a positive outcome of the negotiations. I can only say that the positive outcome of the negotiations is a dire necessity because thats a very important road for us and for Armenia in general, ARMENPRESS reports Kapan Mayor as saying. The National Security Service of Armenia informed that on August 25 at about 23:00 the Azerbaijani side blocked Karmrakar-Shurnukh section of Goris-Kapan road. The people who remained in that zone have been evacuated and works are underway for opening the road. Later, Human Rights Defender of Armenia Arman Tatoyan informed that the Azerbaijani troops blocked also Goris-Vorotan road. MP representing Civil Contract Party Narek Ghahramanyan told ARMENPRESS that he has been assured that the road will be open by the evening. The Speaker of the Artsakh National Assembly is in Yerevan on a working visit. August 26, 2021, 14:51 Artsakh NA Speaker invites heads of Armenian parliamentary factions to Artsakh STEPANAKERT, AUGUST 26, ARTSAKHPRESS: He held meetings with the heads of parliamentary factions and MPs.During the meetings issues relating to the status of Artsakh, the displaced persons, occupied territories, the security and social-economic problems of the people were discussed. The meetings also touched upon the cooperation between the parliaments of Armenia and Artsakh. All the three parliamentary factions of Armenia have expressed readiness for cooperation. Artur Tovmasyan invited the heads and members of the Civil Contract, Armenia, I Have the Honor factions to Artsakh to attend the special session of Parliament on September 1 dedicated to the 30th jubilee of the Republic. Qantas has outlined its international travel plans while posting its full-year results. (Image: Getty). Qantas expects flights to Singapore, the US, Japan and the UK to resume from mid-December, while flights to Bali and Thailand will resume in April next year, the airline has revealed. The Flying Kangaroo outlined its planned restart to international travel on Thursday while posting its full year results. Qantas recorded a $1.8 billion loss following a year defined by frankly diabolical trading conditions, CEO Alan Joyce said. However, as the domestic and international vaccine rollout gathers pace, Qantas has its eye firmly set on reopening international travel. Pending National Cabinets phased reopening of borders, Qantas said it will initially focus on resuming flights to highly vaccinated destinations including North America, Singapore, Japan and the UK from December 2021. WATCH: New Qantas ad has Aussies dreaming of travel. By mid-2022, Qantas plans to return five A380s to its fleet to service the Los Angeles and London routes. It will take longer for flights to Bali, Jakarta, Manila, Bangkok, Phuket, Ho Chi Minh City and Johannesburg to resume, due to their lower vaccination rates. Qantas expects these flights to resume from April 2022. And this all hinges on Australia hitting its 80 per cent vaccination rate by December, Qantas said. Currently 25.14 per cent of the Australian population is fully vaccinated, with projections suggesting 80 per cent will be fully vaccinated by December. Qantas plans: Key dates Mid-December 2021 Flights to Singapore, the US, Canada, UK Fiji and Japan reopen. Flights to New Zealand will resume, provided the two-way bubble restarts. Flights to the UK may be routed through Darwin, if the Western Australian governments conservative approach to its borders limits Perths use as a transit hub. February 2022 Flights to Hong Kong resume. Mid-April 2022 Qantas reopens the remainder of its international Qantas and Jetstar network. The prospect of flying overseas might feel a long way off, especially with New South Wales and Victoria in lockdown, but the current pace of the vaccine rollout means we should have a lot more freedom in a few months time, Joyce said. Story continues Its obviously up to Government exactly how and when our international borders reopen, but with Australia on track to meet the 80 per cent trigger agreed by National Cabinet by the end of the year, we need to plan ahead for what is a complex restart process. The airline can and will adjust its plans if its forced to, he added. The airline has already been forced to amend its international travel itinerary several times as the Delta COVID-19 strain reshaped the global pandemic. Some people might say were being too optimistic, but based on the pace of the vaccine rollout, this is within reach and we want to make sure were ready, Joyce said. Pandemic cost Qantas more than $20 billion By the end of this calendar year, its likely COVID will cost us more than $20 billion in revenue, he said. Weve had to make a lot of big and difficult structural changes to deal with this crisis, and that phase is mostly behind us. As a result were geared to recover quickly, in-line with a national vaccine rollout that is speeding up. Thats largely due to a $12 billion revenue impact over the 2021 financial year. Joyce said times remain tough for Qantas staff, with thousands still stood down due to the prolonged international and border closures. Our focus is getting them back to work as soon as possible, which is why we were ramping up our flying and adding new destinations before the most recent lockdowns, he said. Despite the uncertainty thats still in front of us, were in a far better position to manage it than this time last year. Were able to move quickly when borders open and close. Were a leaner and more efficient organisation. And our requirement for all employees to be vaccinated will create a safer environment for our people and customers. Follow Yahoo Finance on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and Twitter, and subscribe to the free Fully Briefed daily newsletter. If you go WHAT: "In Person," "Intention and Perception" and "All Things Being Blue" WHEN: Open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays and 1 to 5 p.m. Sundays WHERE: Schweinfurth Art Center, 205 Genesee St., Auburn COST: Admission $7 general public; free for members, participating artists and children 12 and younger; masks required inside at all times INFO: Visit schweinfurthartcenter.org or call (315) 255-1553 There are no special plans in place. For this type of event, its entirely outside and social distancing is easy to do, he said. There will be no mask mandates, no temperatures taken at the gate. It was August of 1779 at the height of the American Revolution when the Continental Army launched the Sullivan-Clinton campaign, an effort to punish several tribes of the Iroquois Confederacy that sided with the British during the war. While marching up through the Chemung Valley from what is now Athens, Pennsylvania, the troops encountered and defeated a contingent of British regulars, Loyalist rangers and 1,000 Iroquois warriors in the Lowman area southeast of Elmira. The Sullivan-Clinton forces went on to sweep through western New York, destroying numerous native villages along the way and significantly weakening the alliance between the Iroquois Confederacy and the British. In addition to the reenactors and fans of local history who successfully brought the Battle of Newtown reenactment back, the event also got a boost through more vigorous support from the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, Perine said. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} A final environmental impact statement will be released after the federal and state agencies review the comments. A record of decision will be issued by early 2022. But there are some business and community leaders who believe that the community grid isn't the best choice and want other options to be considered. Destiny USA, the large shopping center in Syracuse, has been a proponent of maintaining highway traffic through the city. Political candidates and elected leaders have also pushed for different options, such as an "iconic bridge" or skyway. Now, they are attaching Tubman's name to those efforts. Tubman, an abolitionist who escaped from slavery and helped free dozens of others, settled in Auburn. Her former residence and the Home for the Aged she established are part of the Harriet Tubman National Historical Park in Cayuga County. Her gravesite is in Auburn's Fort Hill Cemetery. Pauline Copes Johnson, Tubman's great-great-grandniece, is among the Tubman relatives who are supporting the bridge proposal. For months, the Cayuga County Health Department has reported COVID-19 cases based on a certain process. On Wednesday, that approach changed. The health department's situational updates will now include the total number of positive results available through the state's reporting system. This information is updated daily and provides a full count of positive cases, not just those who have been admitted into isolation. Prior to implementing this change, the health department would release the number of new cases admitted. These are individuals whose results were shared with the department, and then an employee would contact them to place the positive case into isolation. Once that process was completed, the department included the admissions in the new and active case counts. But that method doesn't give Cayuga County residents a full picture of what's happening with COVID-19. Cayuga County Public Health Director Kathleen Cuddy previewed the change at the county Board of Health meeting on Tuesday. "We are going to try to report the number of new positives," she said. "We're working on the best way to present that." Bennett told his Cabinet before the trip that he would tell the American president that now is the time to halt the Iranians, to stop this thing and not to reenter a nuclear deal that has already expired and is not relevant, even to those who thought it was once relevant. Biden has made clear his desire to find a path to salvage the 2015 landmark pact cultivated by Barack Obamas administration but scuttled in 2018 by Donald Trumps. But U.S. indirect talks with Iran have stalled and Washington continues to maintain crippling sanctions on the country as regional hostilities simmer. Trumps decision to withdraw from Irans nuclear deal led Tehran to abandon over time every limitation the accord imposed on its nuclear enrichment. The country now enriches a small amount of uranium up to 63%, a short step from weapons-grade levels, compared with 3.67% under the deal. It also spins far more advanced centrifuges and more of them than were allowed under the accord, worrying nuclear nonproliferation experts even though Tehran insists its program is peaceful. Bennett's Washington visit comes weeks after Ebrahim Raisi was sworn in as Irans new president. The FCC said it worked with the Ohio attorney general's office to obtain subpoenas from two dialing service providers showing emails from Burkman and Wohl, including ZIP codes to target and the tape we want to go out. They will have an opportunity to respond before the commission takes action. In emails to The Associated Press on Wednesday, Wohl and Burkman said the Biden administration is looking to distract from the U.S. pullout of Afghanistan and other woes. We will not be deterred or discouraged, Wohl said. Burkman called the proposed fine sad. Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, whose office is prosecuting the men, said this massive fine properly reflects the seriousness of the allegations these two political operatives face. The FCC said it was the first time it issued notice of a fine without first issuing a citation, citing a 2019 change in the law. Follow David Eggert at https://twitter.com/DavidEggert00 Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 HONG KONG (AP) Hong Kong authorities ousted an opposition legislator from his seat Thursday after finding him to be insufficiently loyal amid Beijings tightening grip on the semi-autonomous city. Cheng Chung-tai of the populist Civic Party was disqualified from the legislature after he failed to fulfil the legal requirements and conditions on upholding the Basic Law and bearing allegiance to Hong Kong, the government said in a statement. The Basic Law is Hong Kongs mini-constitution. He was one of two remaining opposition lawmakers in the legislature, after the pro-democracy camp of legislators resigned en masse last year following the disqualification of four of their colleagues. Hong Kongs chief secretary, John Lee, said in a news conference that Cheng was disqualified after an opinion was sought from the territory's national security committee, which said Cheng had failed to comply with the requirements of being a legislator. The committee was set up last year when Beijing imposed a strict national security law that effectively criminalized opposition to the government and silenced dissent. The committee referenced negative behavior from Cheng in seeking public office, Lee said, without describing any specific incidents that led to his disqualification. Just as many others have watched the footage of current events in Afghanistan in horror these past few weeks, I have been filled with a sense of disappointment and grave concern. Of the years I spent in service, some of that time was spent in Afghanistan, the same story many veterans have to tell. But as an officer who was involved with multiple efforts in the region, I find the blame-game that President Biden, his cabinet and the deposed Afghanistan president are playing utterly shameful. The work my fellow soldiers and I did, along with the work of the Afghan people, was nothing short of exemplary, and Im here to tell you why. Many know, but few have experienced, the discipline, hard work and excellence the military employs in all of its operations. The reason we are the most impressive military force in the world is we train the hardest and work the longest to ensure we are the best. This was part of the philosophy we were instilling into the people of Afghanistan to protect their newfound freedoms. The U.S. military is a well-oiled machine that accomplishes the mission and takes ground from our enemies, with soldiers before, during and after my time having carried this tradition dutifully. I can personally attest that with the support of our allies and the confidence we were instilling into the people of Afghanistan, we made significant progress ensuring safety and security in the region. Well Murray Lynch is back and more delusional than ever. His latest, pointless and out-of-touch rant had to do with how warm and fuzzy the decade of the '60 was. I was a little kid in the '60s yet I have vague memories of those days and have read much about the decade since. Martin Luther King assassinated. JFK assassinated. RFK and Malcom X, same fate. Violent protests against the war in Vietnam that ended in death and destruction across the country, most famously the four shot dead at Kent State in Ohio. Yet Murray Lynch wants to return to those days. How about this: Murray can go back and crawl under whatever rock he has been hiding under and try and do exactly that. Matthew Whiting Fleming Love 2 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Some of the cars launching in the Indian market in the month of September. i20 N Line to Seltos X-Line and more, top-five cars launching in September 2 min read . Updated: 26 Aug 2021, 12:25 PM IST From mass-market to luxury and EVs, options for buyers are all set to expand exponentially ahead of the festive period. Share Via Read Full Story Seltos has been a massive success for Kia in India since the Korean company entered the market with it back in 2019. It has propelled sales and put Kia in a position of strength but there is no denying the product has been facing heat in recent times from newer and updated rivals. Enter Kia Seltos X-Line. While it may be a variant update, the Seltos X-Line is quite the looker and could once again spark a whole lot of interest in the vehicle. Kia has not officially revealed a launch date but it is expected that the pricing will be announced first week of the next month. MG Astor MG Astor will be placed as the most affordable car in the company's portfolio. MG Astor SUV will be a conventional ICE counterpart of the MG ZS EV in India but there's a whole lot that the car maker is promising with the new vehicle. In terms of exterior design, there may be some subtle highlights to distuingish it from ZS EV but in the cabin, expect a lot more. Astor SUV will come as the first car from the brand with an Artificial Intelligence (AI) powered personal assistant system. The SUV will also come with autonomous Level 2 technology onboard. (Read more here) The launch of MG Astor is expected in the later part of September. Audi e-tron GT Audi is doggedly determined to expand its EV portfolio in India and after driving in the e-tron and e-tron Sportback here, is all set to now offer e-tron GT. Internationally, the car is present in two trims including the standard e-tron GT Quattro model and a performance-oriented RS e-tron GT. With the launch of the new model, Audi India will become the only luxury car maker in the country to have up to three fully electric models on offer. In the last six months, several automakers around the world have announced recalls for their respective electric vehicles. These are being considered as one of the most expensive recalls in the auto industry's history. These recalls are expected to cost the automakers billions of dollars. Also Read: Are Similar Cars Hyundai Creta 1497 cc|Petrol|Manual 17,67,565*Onwards Get On-Road Price Add to compare Hyundai Venue 1197 cc|Petrol|Manual 11,77,721*Onwards Get On-Road Price Add to compare Hyundai I20 1197 cc|Petrol|Manual 11,43,558*Onwards Get On-Road Price Add to compare lithium-ion batteries in EVs a fire hazard? While the automakers are blamed whenever any EV catches fire, nobody questions the battery manufacturers. As conventional ICE vehicles come with a host of components sourced from different suppliers, the case is similar for EVs as well. Electric vehicles come equipped with batteries that are sourced from different manufacturers. OEMs affected In August 2021, General Motors Company has recalled its Bolt EVs for the third time in nine months. It has added 73,000 new EVs to the list of affected cars. This will cost around $1 billion and the total cost to the recall of affected Bolt EVs is $1.8 billion. On the other side of the Pacific Ocean, Hyundai Motor Company has recalled 82,000 EVs earlier this year. This recall cost the automaker around $900 million. In both cases, batteries manufactured by LG Energy Solutions were reported faulty and had a possible risk of fire. The company even has announced that it will share the cost of the Chevrolet Bolt EV recall with GMC. In the case of Hyundai, the automaker had to spend $332 million for the recall, while the rest was paid by the battery maker. LG Energy Solutions had inked battery supplying deal with Tesla. Why do EVs catch fire? Like the ICE vehicles can catch fire due to their highly combustible fuel or any electrical fault, things can go wrong for EVs as well. Electric vehicles might be equipped with lesser moving parts than their ICE counterparts, but they are equipped with lithium-ion batteries that generate extreme heat while in use. The thermal management system of these EV batteries plays a crucial role in keeping the batteries protected. If the thermal management system is not right for a batter, it can result in a fire incident for the EV, which can be a lethal accident. Over the past few years, demands and sales for electric vehicles have increased. As they have started garnering more attention, the fire incidents involving EVs are making headlines. While the automakers are taking the blame for such incidents, the story behind the story links battery manufacturers. In this case, LG Energy Solutions, a part of LG Chem Ltd., is being linked to the affected electric vehicles. General Motors has said in its latest recall announcement that key components within the battery were damaged. It mentioned that the anode tab of the battery was torn and the separator was folded. These are very basic but essential battery parts, not complex ones. In the case of Hyundai as well, it was found that the batteries had a risk of short circuits. Clearly, these are manufacturing defects, maybe due to negligence and lack of inspection. LG Energy Solutions under scanner Such a massive scale of Ev recall has put LG Energy Solutions under the scanner. The company is about to go for public listing later in 2021 at around $12 billion. It is one of the largest battery suppliers for the majority of the global fleet of electric vehicles. The company has struck deals with Tesla, General Motors to build and supply batteries for the OEMs. Hyundai too announced its partnership with the company to build a $1.1 billion battery-making plant in Indonesia. Larger concern beyond monetary loss Beyond the monetary loss by the automakers, the battery manufacturer and their investors, there are larger concerns. The poor manufacturing quality and defective batteries are putting the lives of many people at risk. This is not only putting human lives at stake but risking the value of the companies and their stakeholders as well. It is a good sign that the automakers are initiating recall for the potentially affected vehicles and replacing the parts with potential hazards. But, such negligence on the battery makers' part can take a lot of lives which can not be replaced at any cost. HOZON Auto, Huawei join hands to develop smart driving tech, digital energy, cloud service Shanghai (Gasgoo)- Chinese EV startup HOZON Auto and Huawei Technologies Co.,Ltd. (Huawei) inked an agreement on August 25 to develop a long-term win-win partnership, aiming to co-advance the ecosystem of intelligent vehicles into a higher level, according to HOZON Auto's press release. HOZON Auto, Huawei sigining agreement; photo credit: HOZON Auto Under the agreement, the two companies will carry out all-around cooperation on smart connectivity, in-car computing, intelligent driving, digital energy, and cloud-based service, on the foundation of such core technologies as IoT (Internet of Things), cloud computing, and big data. The NETA S, which is scheduled to hit the market next year, will be the first model co-developed by HOZON Auto and Huawei. It will use Huawei's MDC (Mobile Data Center) intelligent driving platform and LiDAR technology. Huawei has reiterated many times its resolution not to build complete cars, while stressed that it will focus on ICT technology to help automakers build good cars and become a provider of incremental components for intelligent connected cars. According to a statement released in May, Huawei has chosen BAIC BJEV, Changan Auto, and GAC Group as its strategic partners to support them in developing their own sub-brands. The vehicles armed with Huawei's autonomous driving solution are allowed to bear the HI logo (standing for Huawei Inside) after being authorized by Huawei. Wang Jun, president of Huawei smart car solution business unit, said on April 18 that Huawei planned to invest $1 billion into the research and development of smart driving technologies this year. Besides, the R&D group of its auto business will be expanded to over 5,000 staff members in 2021, of which more than 2,000 will come from the autonomous driving arm, he added. BYD Semiconductor sets up Jinan-based subsidiary after IPO plan halted Shanghai (Gasgoo)- Jinan BYD Semiconductor Co.,Ltd., whose majority shareholder is BYD Semiconductor Co.,Ltd., was set up on August 24, according to the business data provider Tianyancha. The move was considered by industry insiders as part of preparations for the resumption of BYD's plan to list its semiconductor unit. Photo credit: BYD Semiconductor Involving a registered capital of 4.9 billion yuan ($756.675 million), Jinan BYD Semiconductor has a line of businesses covering the manufacturing and sale of discrete semiconductors and semiconductor lighting devices, the manufacturing of electronic components, and the design of integrated circuit chips, and relevant services. Among three shareholders, BYD Semiconductor Co.,Ltd. holds 77.75% stake in the newly-built company. Shenzhen Stock Exchange accepted BYD Semiconductor's IPO application for review in late June this year. According to the draft prospectus, BYD Semiconductor proposed to raise a fund of 2.7 billion yuan ($416.943 million) by issuing no more than 50 million shares. After going public, BYD Company Limited's shareholding in BYD Semiconductor will be diluted to 65.07% from 72.3%. However, the listing plan was suspended earlier this month due to a regulatory investigation into the advisory law firm. BYD Semiconductor said it will strive to resume its IPO plan as soon as possible, while whether the law firm will be replaced or not has not been decided yet. Xiaomi invests in smart parking solution provider AIPark Shanghai (Gasgoo)- Xiaomi Group recently made a strategic investment in AIPark, a Beijing-based smart parking management solution provider, according to an announcement AIPark posted on Aug. 23 via its WeChat account. Photo credit: AIPark The investment is expected to help boost the multi-scenarios business collaboration between AIPark and Xiaomi's smart ecosystems, said AIPark. Founded in June 2015, AIPark is a tech firm with AI smart parking + big data operation platform at its core. The company says it applies the high-level image recognition technology to the commercial use of urban smart parking management, focusing on providing smart solutions for city static traffic in the world. The parking solution supplier manages an App named AIPark (dubbed Aiboche in Chinese), which allows drivers to book parking lots and pay for the service directly via the App. To make its App usable, AIPark upgrades traditional parking spaces into smarter ones by employing its in-house developed visual recognition and video-enabled parking management technologies. In 2020, AIPark completed four rounds of fundraising. Its investors include Gaorong Capital, Asia Green Fund, NIO Capital, China Capital Investment Group, BOCOM International, and other renowned financial institutes. Up until now, AIPark's city-level smart parking solution has been put into commercial use in nearly 30 cities, including Beijing, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Zhengzhou, and Tianjin. Since the announcement of the foray into intelligent EV domain on March 30, 2021, Xiaomi has invested in some companies working on automotive and traffic-related business. Chinese autonomous driving startup ZongMu Technology announced on June 3 the completion of its Series D funding led by Xiaomi Changjiang Industrial Fund, a fund backed by Xiaomi. Chinas Hainan Province releases first license for ICV open road testing Shanghai (Gasgoo)- South China's Hainan Province issued on Aug. 25 its first license that allows self-driving vehicles to be tested on open roads, according to Hainan Tropical Automobile Test Co.,Ltd., the third-party organization responsible for the oversight and management of Hainan's ICV (intelligent-connected vehicle) road tests and pilot applications. Hongqi E-HS3 in road tests; photo credit: Hainan Tropical Automobile Test Co.,Ltd. The significant permit was given to a Hongqi E-HS3, an all-electric SUV model equipped with Hongqi's Level 4 self-driving system. Composed of 4 LiDAR devices, 1 smart camera, 5 millimeter-wave radars, and other high-precision positioning sensors, the perception system of the SUV is able to detect objects up to 200 meters away and is capable of 360-degree real-time perception of surrounding pedestrians, vehicles, and obstacles. An ICV should go through tests in a designated closed testing ground, namely Hainan Automobile Testing Site, to receive the open road test license. Then, the vehicle has to run for 10,000 kilometers on the approved open roads before it goes into highway road tests. The first roads for open ICV road testing in Hainan span 129.2 kilometers, including 7 open roads and 1 highway, and covering Haikou, Sanya, Wenchang and Qionghai. On this date in 1936, a Parker high school, completed five days previously, was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. On this date in 1852, William Cornell Greene, owner of Greene Cattle Co. and of Greene Cananea Copper Co., was born. On this date in 1893, a Phoenix court reporter invented and applied for the patent on a center space bar which would be operated by the thumb for typewriters. On this date in 1928, cyclonic rains lasting nine minutes did $250,000 damage in Phoenix. Friday, Aug. 27 On this date in 1915, four passengers were killed and 16 were injured when a train crashed through the Date Creek bridge. On this date in 1925, Picacho Dam broke and thousands of acres in the vicinity of Picacho and Randolph were flooded. On this date in 1929, the airship Graf Zeppelin sailed over Tucson on its world girdling journey. Citizens watched from their rooftops as the bells of St. Augustine Cathedral were rung. Saturday, Aug. 28 WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden vowed Thursday to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite the day's deadly suicide bomb attack at the Kabul airport. He promised to avenge the deaths of 13 U.S. service members killed in the attack, declaring to the extremists responsible: We will hunt you down and make you pay. Speaking with emotion from the White House, Biden said the Islamic State group's Afghanistan affiliate was to blame for the attacks that killed the Americans and many more Afghan civilians. He said there was no evidence they colluded with the Taliban, who now control the country. He asked for a moment of silence to honor the service members, bowing his head, and ordered U.S. flags to half-staff across the country. As for the bombers and gunmen involved, he said, "We have some reason to believe we know who they are ... not certain. He said he had instructed military commanders to develop plans to strike IS assets, leadership and facilities. Gen. Frank McKenzie, the U.S. Central Command chief, said more attempted attacks were expected. Joes death weighs heavily on me and always will, Ravnsborg said in his statement. Ive often wondered why the accident occurred and all the things that had to have happened to make our lives intersect. Ravnsborg's insistence on remaining in office has opened a divide among Republicans, with him retaining support among some GOP circles. The attorney general has been spotted working booths for local Republican groups at county fairs in recent weeks. But popular predecessor Marty Jackley is already running for his old job and has collected the support of most of the states county prosecutors. Political parties will select candidates for attorney general at statewide conventions next year. Ravnsborg built his political rise on personal connections in the party. It was his dutiful attendance at local GOP events like the one he was returning from when he struck Boever that propelled him from being a party outsider to winning the Republican nomination for attorney general in 2018. Boever's family said they hope Ravnsborg is driven from office one way or another. It is not too late for the state Legislature to resume impeachment proceedings, Jane Boever said. And if they fail us, then its left to the voters of South Dakota to remove him from the ballot box. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 SEATTLE (AP) An organizer of a neo-Nazi campaign to threaten journalists and Jewish activists in three states was sentenced Tuesday to three years in prison after apologizing for what he did and saying he's a changed man. Cameron Shea was one of four members of the neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen Division charged last year with having cyberstalked and sent Swastika-laden posters to journalists and an employee of the Anti-Defamation League, telling them, You have been visited by your local Nazis, Your Actions have Consequences, and We are Watching. The defendant wanted the victims to feel unsafe in their own homes, prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum. Shea, 25, pleaded guilty in April in U.S. District Court in Seattle to two of the counts in the five-count indictment: a conspiracy charge that carries up to five years in prison and interference with a federally protected activity, which carries up to 10. Prosecutors sought a term of more than four years. In a letter to Judge John C. Coughenour, Shea apologized, saying, I cannot put into words the guilt that I feel about this fear and pain that I caused. Scientists will use the observatory to gather data on precipitation, wind, clouds, tiny particles, humidity, soil moisture and other things. Along with a better understanding of the hydrology, they hope to learn more about how wildfires, forest management, drought and tree-killing bugs, for example, play a part in water availability. A big issue in predicting water supply in the West centers on soil moisture and content, said Ken Williams, the lead on-site researcher and Berkeley Lab scientist. The monsoon season largely was a dud across the Southwest for the past two years, which means more melting snow soaks into the ground before reaching streams and rivers when it does rain, he said. Climate experts said during a separate briefing Tuesday that southern Arizona and parts of New Mexico have seen impressive rainfall totals so far this monsoon season, with Tucson marking its wettest July on record. Mike Crimmins, a professor at the University of Arizona, called it an "amazing reversal for the desert city. Some parts of the Southwest have seen as much as four times their normal precipitation levels. But Crimmins noted other spots like Albuquerque, New Mexico, are either at average levels or still lagging. Western leaders and their media outlets have fear-mongered about closer Chinese-Afghan ties since the Taliban's rapid takeover of that country earlier this month. They misportray such an outcome as being aggressively-intentioned on China's part and against their own interests there, which is a false assessment. What few of those commentators acknowledge is that closer Chinese-Afghan ties are natural since these neighboring countries share the same mutually beneficial developmental interests that aren't aimed against anyone else, and even less have realized that their own governments' policies are accelerating this trend. In particular, the U.S. recently froze the Afghan Central Bank's $9.5 billion assets around the same time as the IMF suspended the country's access to funds. This was followed up by the World Bank halting its aid to Afghanistan. The realistic recourse for its internationally unrecognized but de facto Taliban-led government is to rely on other sources of funding, which could lead to China playing a pivotal role in this respect. Either way, it appears inevitable that Chinese-Afghan ties will become even closer than before and at an unexpected pace as well in light of the West's efforts to isolate the war-torn country's Taliban-led government through unilateral financial means. They wanted to punish the Taliban for seizing power but inexplicably expected that it wouldn't seek alternative sources of financing in response, particularly from China as seems bound to happen sooner than later. This makes the West's prediction about closer bilateral ties between those two a self-fulfilling prophecy to a certain extent despite their natural impetus as explained. There are three important lessons to be learned from this observation. The first is that Western-controlled financial institutions are unreliable and arbitrarily discriminate against some of their partners for political reasons. They also sometimes attach political strings to their assistance, which reduces the sovereign decision making of those who receive them. In this context, the West intends to punish the Taliban, but it's really just worsening the socio-economic suffering of average Afghans as always happens whenever it weaponizes these financial instruments for political reasons. The second lesson is cliche and it's that every action of these sort provokes an equal and opposite reaction even if it's unintended or unexpected by those who initiate these dynamics. Although Afghanistan's de facto Taliban-led government has yet to officially request similar aid from alternative sources, it seems to only be a matter of time before they do since they don't have any other choice if they truly aspire to rebuild their country. This means that the West is counterproductively accelerating the same process that it fearmongered about with respect to closer Chinese-Afghan ties, which to be clear, aren't at anyone else's expense. Third, China doesn't attach any political strings to the aid that it or the institutions that it founded extend to their partners. That's actually one of the primary appeals of the country worldwide and the reason why so many countries want to cooperate with it. They understandably want to retain their sovereignty in line with international law and justifiably feel uncomfortable sacrificing some of it to receive much-needed aid from Western countries and Western-led organizations. No matter how much the West denies that it weaponizes these instruments, the whole world knows that they're lying after they cut off financial support for Afghanistan. Looking forward, Afghanistan's future remains bright in spite of the West's attempts to sabotage it through their weaponization of financial instruments against the Taliban, which will only worsen the living standards of average Afghans whether they intend to or not. China is a reliable partner for all since it doesn't attach political strings to its support for anyone. There's no doubt that Chinese-Afghan relations will continue improving and that this will be mutually beneficial. What's most interesting about that though is that this trend will likely be accelerated by the West, but hopefully they'll realize that they have nothing to fear from such an outcome. By Andrew Korybko, a Moscow-based American political analyst. (Source: CGTN) Gage County officials heard nearly two hours of public testimony Wednesday evening regarding wind energy from area residents hoping for more strict regulations. A total of 22 people spoke during the hearing before the County Board of Supervisors regarding proposed changes to the current regulations regarding commercial wind energy. A common theme presented was a desire to increase setback requirements for turbines. One concern discussed was that turbines could harm the viewshed of Homestead National Historical Park. Ross Trauernicht, who is the village chairman of Pickrell, said the one mile setback from towns or villages isnt enough, and would limit potential growth of Gage County communities. One mile is not enough, he said. One mile limits our growth. After one mile our growth would be done. No more housing, no more businesses, no more developments. After one mile we would be done until the windmills are done and gone. Trauernicht suggested a setback of at least three miles from a turbine to the property line of a town or village. Ashley Mason of Beatrice told the board wind turbines could be detrimental to area parks, and asked for increased setbacks to at least three miles from those areas. Parents, the board said, don't have an unlimited right to send their kids to school unmasked, infringing on the rights of other parents who want their children kept safe. DeSantis is not backing down. Ar a news conference Wednesday, the governor warned of additional consequences for defiant schools districts, but didn't elaborate. DeSantis contends those boards are violating the Parents Bill of Rights, signed into law this summer. It gives parents authority to direct their children's education. Those schools districts are violating state law and they are overriding what the parents judgment is on this, he said, stressing repeatedly that cloth masks dont prevent the spread of aerosols. If these entities are going to violate state law and take away parents rights . theres consequences for that, DeSantis added. The state had given Broward and Alachua counties until Tuesday to end their mask mandates. Broward's students began school a week ago with a mask policy in place. State officials have threatened to withhold funding equal to school board salaries if a district doesnt comply. Those funds make up less than 1% of each districts budget. The debate over masks has gotten heated. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. "All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul "Pen" Farthing told Britain's Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the group's rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. In a letter to parliament Thursday, the foreign and defense ministers say that the Netherlands has been told by the United States to leave today and will most likely carry out its last flight later today. They add that in light of the extremely quickly deteriorating situation in and around the airport, evacuees can no longer be assisted by the Netherlands to get access to the airport. LONDON The British, French and Danish militaries have given stark warnings about the security situation at the Kabul airport, where Afghan civilians are scrambling to evacuate ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for foreign troops to leave Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC on Thursday there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport. Other warnings emerged about a possible threat from Afghanistans Islamic State affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country. Heappey conceded that people are desperate to leave and there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. TVs wildest legal drama, The Good Fight , ends its fifth season with chaos in the community courts. Comedy Centrals The Other Two moves to HBO Max for a second season. Brooklyn Nine-Nine sends Jake on a personal mission with an old frenemy. Meet one of the worlds most renowned domino topplers in Lily Topples the World . A selective critical checklist of notable Thursday TV: I thought the craziness would end with 2020, laments lawyer Diane Lockhart (Christine Baranski) in the fifth-season finale of the provocative legal dramedy. No such luck. Fake community courts like Judge Wackners (Mandy Patinkin)and now one staged in the living room of the formidable Judge Vinetta (CCH Pounder)are causing our favorite TV lawyers no end of chaos as events come to a head. With the firms owners paying a visit from Dubai, the pressure is on to keep their drug-kingpin client Oscar Rivi (Tony Plana) out of prison, but these pesky alt-courts are complicating matters. Things get especially heated in Wackners court when revolutionaries hoping to split Illinois into two separate states get rowdy enough to bring back awful memories of Jan. 6. Truth is never decided by whos most noisy, Wackner rules. But will anyone listen? The next four studies examined when and with whom people felt it is especially important to express their love through effort. In one study, we found that people making cookies to comfort their partner during the COVID-19 pandemic were over 20% more likely to choose to mix the dough by hand rather than use ready-to-bake frozen dough than those who were baking cookies to comfort themselves. Overall, making an effort seemed most important when participants were trying to give emotional support or helping someone they were especially close to. In our final study, we tested how companies offering products that support caregiving can make them more palatable to customers by teaming up with smart crib-maker Happiest Baby on an actual marketing campaign. We crafted advertisements for the company that described the SNOO in two different ways: by acknowledging parents efforts (you give the XOXOs, SNOO gives the ZZZs) or by emphasizing how the SNOO makes parenting easier (with SNOO, get ZZZs with ease). After a two-week social media campaign, twice as many people clicked on the ad acknowledging parents efforts compared with the one that emphasized how much it reduced effort. A Montana Army National Guardsman was arrested on suspicion of raping and strangling a woman at the Fort Harrison National Guard base outside Helena. John Clements Newell, 31, of Livingston, is charged with felony aggravated sexual intercourse without consent and felony strangulation. On Aug. 19, a Lewis and Clark County Sheriff's Office deputy responded to Fort Harrison for reports of a sexual assault. The deputy made contact with the victim, who alleged that the previous night Newell had entered her room without permission, raped and strangled her. Court documents state the defendant put his hand on the victim's throat and pinned her against the wall, touched her chest and attempted to kiss her several times. He is also accused of attempting to take off her shirt, pinning her to the bed with his body weight and slapping her several times. The victim was reportedly able to wrestle out of his control, and the defendant allegedly attempted to make small talk with the woman before attacking her again. We hope to hear from them soon, he said. Howard Shen, a district spokesman, said one family with five children arrived in San Diego on Wednesday night. The two other families were out of Afghanistan, but Shen said he could not confirm exactly where they were only that they are safe. That's all we want," he said. Counseling was being made available for the families and for their children's schools. Hashemi said the family back in San Diego was still shaken after their harrowing experience. They are OK now, he said. They need to calm down and forget what theyve seen. In all, the El Cajon families included two dozen children, some of whom witnessed shootings and other violence in and around the Kabul airport in recent days, Hashemi said. The families had each traveled to Afghanistan on their own on different dates and were not part of an organized trip. The families asked U.S. officials for help after being blocked by the throngs of Afghans at the airport desperately trying to escape after their governments rapid collapse and the withdrawal of U.S. troops. "It is one thing to take on the charge of vindicating rights associated with an allegedly fraudulent election," Parker wrote in an order on Wednesday. "It is another to take on the charge of deceiving a federal court and the American people into believing that rights were infringed, without regard to whether any laws or rights were in fact violated. This is what happened here," she added. Parker ordered 12 hours of legal education, including six hours in election law, for each attorney. Her decision will also be sent to the states where the lawyers are licensed for possible disciplinary action there. It was one of the few efforts to wrench fines or other penalties from dubious post-election lawsuits across the U.S. There is no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 election. Indeed, election officials from both political parties have stated publicly that the election went well, and international observers confirmed there were no serious irregularities. During a July court hearing, Powell took "full responsibility" for the lawsuit and compared the legal fight to the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decision that outlawed racial segregation in schools. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may still be awaiting evacuation. And untold thousands of at-risk Afghans are struggling to get into the Kabul airport. As of Wednesday morning, more than 8,600 evacuees have arrived in the U.S. through Virginia's Washington Dulles International Airport, according to figures provided by Grant Neely, a communications advisor for Northam. U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said at a community event Wednesday that officials were looking for additional airports to serve as entry points because Dulles was getting overwhelmed," according to a transcript of his remarks provided by his office. At the airport Wednesday, a steady trickle of evacuees made their way from a holding area, where their papers were processed and they were tested for COVID-19. They were then put on waiting buses that would take them to the Dulles Expo Center or other temporary sites. Some said they had been waiting a day or more at the airport. In contrast with other international arrivals passing through customs with loads of luggage on carts, the evacuees often have had few or no belongings at all. ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) Delivering another blow to what's left of former Gov. Andrew Cuomos legacy, New Yorks new governor acknowledged on her first day in office that the state has had nearly 12,000 more deaths from COVID-19 than Cuomo told the public. The public deserves a clear, honest picture of whats happening. And thats whether its good or bad, they need to know the truth. And thats how we restore confidence, Gov. Kathy Hochul said on NPR. In its first daily update on the outbreak Tuesday evening, Hochul's office reported that nearly 55,400 people have died of the coronavirus in New York based on death certificate data submitted to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That's up from about 43,400 that Cuomo reported to the public as of Monday, his last day in office. The Democrat who was once widely acclaimed for his leadership during the COVID-19 outbreak resigned in the face of an impeachment drive after being accused of sexually harassing at least 11 women, allegations he disputed. The higher number is not entirely new. Federal health officials and some academic institutions tracking COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. have been using the higher tally for many months because of known gaps in the data Cuomo had been choosing to publicize. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursday's attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airport's perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. "All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul "Pen" Farthing told Britain's Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the group's rescued animals. While we respect the courts ruling in La Palma, we will pursue the legal process to retain La Palma as our alternative site. Hawaii remains our preferred location for TMT, and we have renewed our efforts to better connect with the Hawaii community in a meaningful and appropriate way," he said in an email to The Associated Press. Pablo Batista, a spokesman of the Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Accion group, hailed the decision as a big setback for what he called a fraudulent project that he said made fake promises of new jobs for the island. The whole idea of offering the island as a back-up was nothing else but as a strategy to put pressure on the Hawaii plans, Batista said. In a statement, the group also said that the five years that the TIO consortium has lost on La Palma should make it reflect on the arrogant and disrespectful strategy that they have carried out both in Hawaii and in the Canary Islands, emboldened by institutional support and despising the arguments of the opposition to the TMT. The group's concerns echo some of the concerns expressed by those fighting the telescope in Hawaii, said Kealoha Pisciotta, one of the leaders seeking to keep the project off Mauna Kea. A Connecticut woman faces a week in jail and $2,400 in fines after being prosecuted for walking across a thermal area in Yellowstone National Park. "Although a criminal prosecution and jail time may seem harsh, its better than spending time in a hospitals burn unit, said acting U.S. Attorney Bob Murray in a press release. Madeline Casey, 26, of New Hartford, Connecticut, appeared before Magistrate Judge Mark Carman in Mammoth Hot Springs, Wyoming, on Aug. 18 for sentencing. She was charged with walking off the boardwalk in the Norris Geyser Basin to get closer to a thermal pool and geyser. Casey was photographed and filmed venturing off the boardwalk, despite the fact that many signs are posted along the route warning visitors. Boardwalks in geyser basins protect visitors and delicate thermal formations, said Morgan Warthin, Yellowstone public affairs officer. The ground is fragile and thin and scalding water just below the surface can cause severe or fatal burns." Dating back to 1870, more than 20 people have died from burns suffered after they entered or fell into Yellowstones hot springs. Idaho authorities also dropped their restrictions from Stage II to Stage I across much of the forested country bordering Montana on Wednesday. The Lolo National Forest recorded 145 wildfire starts in the 2021 fire season, 81 of which were human-caused. Of those, all but eight were contained at 10 acres or smaller. Gianforte credited that to his request that the Forest Service use a full suppression strategy on wildfires this summer, instead of letting some fires burn in pre-approved ways to reduce fuel buildups. Research across the Pacific Northwest has indicated that fire seasons are burning longer and more dangerously because of extensive fire suppression in past decades. DNRC State Forester Sonya Germann said shed talked with firefighters with 30 years experience who had not seen resources stretched so badly as this year. And she warned that fire risk is predicted to remain above normal through October. This was not a season-ending event we just had, Germann said, referring to the recent shift to cool, rainy weather in western Montana. Theres still a lot of fire season left. Love 1 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1 Federal guidelines say no more than 7% of income should go to child care. By that definition, 88% of Montanans do not have access to affordable child care. That equates to many parents or guardians working reduced hours to avoid high costs, which in turn means lower wages, Watson said. From the child care business perspective wages in the industry often remain low, with the average worker earning a median income of less than $23,000 per year. Wages have been cited by the state as one reason the industry faces significant challenges with employee recruitment and retention. The coronavirus pandemic saw 171 licensed child care facilities close with 21 of those having reopened. But issues finding child care persisted before COVID-19, officials and lawmakers said. This isnt a new problem, the pandemic didnt start this problem, said Rep. Mary Caferro, D-Helena. It may have exacerbated it, but it isnt a new problem. Caferro emphasized that one of the consequences of the child care shortage is children left in unsafe situations. She proposed an unsuccessful amendment to increase reimbursement rates to address the wage issue, saying it is a crisis today we need to do something about. In Butte Silver-Bow, the county has transitioned from issuing quarantine orders to "strongly recommending" quarantine for unvaccinated people, a request that is not binding. A violation of the request carries no penalty. Karen Sullivan, the health officer for the Butte-Silver Bow County Health Department, said efforts by public health officials to keep the public safe are hampered by the inability to issue quarantine requirements. The Montana School Board Association is also recommending that schools not comply with quarantine requirements if they apply only to unvaccinated people, according to an email from the association's Executive Director Lance Melton obtained by The Associated Press. "We want to make sure our members avoid liability that they could incur by helping enforce discriminatory enforcement by county health departments," Melton wrote. Instead, Melton said that when students and teachers are exposed to a positive coronavirus case, they should be sent home regardless of their vaccination status. Many Montana schools are not yet in session, but in states where the school year has already begun, virus outbreaks have forced closures and quarantines applying to hundreds of students. Some Montana school districts have voted to require masks when school begins, but there is no statewide mandate. Gianforte reiterated Tuesday that he would not issue any vaccination or mask mandates in the state. Love 8 Funny 4 Wow 1 Sad 3 Angry 20 Micah Hill, superintendent of Kalispell Public Schools, said he received guidance from Republican Gov. Greg Gianfortes office that confirmed the law means quarantine protocols must be the same for the vaccinated and unvaccinated alike. Hill described that interpretation as a game changer for schools as the highly transmissible delta variant of the virus races through the state. Kalispells Flathead County has among the highest number of active COVID cases with just 41% of the eligible population fully vaccinated. Only 1 in 4 children eligible for a COVID vaccine are vaccinated, according to county health officials. Hill estimates about two-thirds of his staff are vaccinated. If everybody is getting quarantined with a more contagious variant, you could see a lot of people out of school, staff and students, and [that] really threatens the ability of schools to stay open, Hill said. As a result of the law, some Montana county health and school officials have decided to drop quarantine orders. Instead, they are making quarantining an option for exposed students. Participation in the medical monitoring program does not prohibit employees at the Anaconda plant from pursuing civil suits against U.S. Minerals. The company converted black slag from the towering pile along Montana Highway 1 near Anaconda into roofing materials called Black Diamond Abrasive Products. The slag is smelter waste from around 100 years of historic copper processing, and contains a variety of toxic substances including inorganic arsenic. Exposure to arsenic is known to cause lung and skin diseases, including an increased risk of skin cancer, and may also cause cardiovascular effects and other cancers. U.S. Magistrate Judge Kathleen L. DeSoto presided over the arraignment Monday. Sentencing in the criminal case was set for Dec. 10 in Butte before U.S. District Judge Dana L. Christensen. Throughout Montanas long history with mining, operators like U.S. Minerals have sacrificed worker safety for profit. These operators need to know that there are severe consequences to this kind of callous behavior. This is an important case because it not only holds the operator criminally responsible for poisoning its own workers, but it also prevents U.S. Minerals from doing this again anywhere in the country, Acting U.S. Attorney Leif Johnson said. The North Dakota Medical Association, which represents doctors, the North Dakota Nurses Association, the North Dakota Hospital Association and the North Dakota Long Term Care Association this week issued a public letter urging people to get vaccinated. "COVID-19 is quickly surging, and we need your help to keep it from spiraling out of control," the groups said. Paul Carson, an infectious disease specialist and professor of public health at North Dakota State University, said data from several countries show that the vaccines have been less effective at preventing symptomatic infection after the delta variant emerged. However, the vaccines "still hold up quite well" against hospitalization and death, he said. While fully vaccinated people can become infected, they are significantly less likely to be hospitalized or die from the disease than those who are not fully vaccinated, Carson said. Natural immunity to COVID-19 is thought to wane after 90 days, while immunity from vaccines lasts longer. State data show a peak in reinfection three to four months after the state's peak in cases at the end of 2020, according to Health Department Epidemiologist Benjamin Schram. Carson said that someone who has antibodies from catching the disease should still get vaccinated. BEIJING (AP) China went on the offensive Wednesday ahead of the release of a U.S. intelligence report on the origins of the coronavirus, bringing out a senior official to accuse the United States of politicizing the issue by seeking to blame China. Fu Cong, a Foreign Ministry director general, said at a briefing for foreign journalists that scapegoating China cannot whitewash the U.S. If they want to baselessly accuse China, they better be prepared to accept the counterattack from China, he said. China, the U.S. and the World Health Organization are entangled in a feud that centers on whether the virus that causes COVID-19 could have leaked from a lab in the city of Wuhan, where the disease was first detected in late 2019. , ", , , . . Rather than using their power and privilege to preserve freedom and diversity, Americas educated upper class has coalesced around all-or-nothing advocacy, hoping the state does the heavy lifting of social harmonization. [] In 2000, columnist David Brooks wrote Bobos in Paradise, hailing the dawn of a new phase in Americas longstanding story of meritocracy. The bobos were a peculiar breed part bohemian, part bourgeoisie blurring class divides in a way that would introduce a new form of enlightened, activist citizenship in a country with an otherwise ambivalent middle class. The bobos didnt necessarily come from money, and they were proud of that; theyd secured their places in selective universities and in the job market through drive and intelligence exhibited from an early age, writes Brooks in a retrospective essay at The Atlantic. X types defined themselves as rebels against the staid elite. They were as the classic Apple commercial had it the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers. Its the same group that researcher Richard Florida famously called the the creative class educated upstarts who could spin magic and mystery from their ideas and initiatives, transforming enterprises and institutions across whatever cities and streets they touched. Back then, Brooks was optimistic, believing the bobos offered the promise of a more diverse, dynamic, and class-agnostic society. The educated class is in no danger of becoming a self-contained caste, he wrote at the time. Anybody with the right degree, job, and cultural competencies can join. Now, over 20 later, Brooksbelieves he was wrong, calling that earlier prediction naive. Alas, rather than promoting a deeper, wider diversity through decentralized institutions, the creative class continues to push the needle toward greater consolidation and conformity, from land-use regulations to the educational bureaucracy and beyond. To no surprise, its a trend thats been matched by outright resistance among the working class and their counterparts those who feel alienated from opportunity and increasingly cynical about the supposed openness of American society. The bobos or X people, or the creative class, or whatever you want to call them have coalesced into an insular, intermarrying Brahmin elite that dominates culture, media, education, and tech, writes Brooks. Worse, those of us in this class have had a hard time admitting our power, much less using it responsibly. Echoing many of the same themes of his 2012 book, The Social Animal, Brooks highlights three specific areas where power concentration and cultural consolidation have become most pronounced. Education First, [the bobos have] come to hoard spots in the competitive meritocracy that produced us. As Elizabeth Currid-Halkett reported in her 2017 book, The Sum of Small Things, affluent parents have increased their share of educational spending by nearly 300 percent since 1996. Partly as a result, the test-score gap between high- and low-income students has grown by 40 to 50 percent. The children of well-off, well-educated meritocrats are thus perfectly situated to predominate at the elite colleges that produced their parents social standing in the first place. Roughly 72 percent of students at these colleges come from the richest quarter of families, whereas only 3 percent come from the poorest quarter. A 2017 study found that 38 schoolsincluding Princeton, Yale, Penn, Dartmouth, Colgate, and Middlebury draw more students from the top 1 percent than from the bottom 60 percent. Geography Second, weve migrated to just a few great wealth-generating metropolises. A few superstar cities have economically blossomed while everywhere else has languished. The 50 largest metro areas around the world house 7 percent of the worlds population but generate 40 percent of global wealth. Just six metro areas the San Francisco Bay Area; New York; Boston; Washington, D.C.; San Diego; and London attract nearly half of the high-tech venture capital in the world. This has also created gaping inequalities within cities, as high housing prices push middle- and lower-class people out. Over the past decade and a half, Florida wrote, nine in ten U.S. metropolitan areas have seen their middle classes shrink. As the middle has been hollowed out, neighborhoods across America are dividing into large areas of concentrated disadvantage and much smaller areas of concentrated affluence. The large American metro areas most segregated by occupation, he found, are San Jose, San Francisco, Washington, Austin, L.A., and New York. Politics Third, weve come to dominate left-wing parties around the world that were formerly vehicles for the working class. Weve pulled these parties further left on cultural issues (prizing cosmopolitanism and questions of identity) while watering down or reversing traditional Democratic positions on trade and unions These partisan differences overlay economic differences. In 2020, Joe Biden won just 500 or so countiesbut together they account for 71 percent of American economic activity, according to the Brookings Institution. Donald Trump won more than 2,500 counties that together generate only 29 percent of that activity. An analysis by Brookings and The Wall Street Journal found that just 13 years ago, Democratic and Republican areas were at near parity on prosperity and income measures. Now they are divergent and getting more so. If Republicans and Democrats talk as though they are living in different realities, its because they are. Such trends have been pointed out before, and with great care and nuance, whether one looks to Charles Murrays Coming Apart or Yuval Levins The Fractured Republic. Among the bobos-dominated media, however, the divide tends to be characterized through a series of overly simplistic narratives enlightened elites vs. working-class rubes, compassionate globalists vs. blood-and-soil nationalists, open-society liberals vs. closed-society scaredy-cats, diversity-lovers vs. diversity-haters. When it comes to the populist piece of the equation, such narratives contain plenty of truth. But what about the bobos side of the blame? To what extent have diversity and openness become mere buzzwords, backed by little commitment or consequence, and serving instead as fancy fronts for precisely the opposite? Likewise, to what extent does such entrenchment exacerbate the worst elements of the very counterculture it claims to oppose and despise? For all its talk of openness, the creative class is remarkably insular, Brooks writes. In Social Class in the 21st Century, the sociologist Mike Savage found that the educated elite tended to be the most socially parochial group, as measured by contact with people in occupational clusters different from their own. In a study for The Atlantic, Amanda Ripley found that the most politically intolerant Americans tend to be whiter, more highly educated, older, more urban, and more partisan themselves. Rather than using their power and privilege to preserve freedom and diversity, the creative class has largely coalesced around all-or-nothing advocacy, from the culture-warring of woke capitalism to the cookie-cutter conformity of higher education to the fatal conceits of central-planning elites. Rather than freeing civil society to do what it does best, our elites have largely deflected such responsibilities to the state, hoping that top-down control will do the heavy lifting of social harmonization. I didnt anticipate how aggressively we would move to assert our cultural dominance, the way we would seek to impose elite values through speech and thought codes, Brooks explains. I underestimated the way the creative class would successfully raise barriers around itself to protect its economic privilege not just through schooling, but through zoning regulations that keep home values high, professional-certification structures that keep doctors and lawyers incomes high while blocking competition from nurses and paralegals, and more. And I underestimated our intolerance of ideological diversity. When it comes to using policy to correct perceived social inequalities, Brooks points to the right low-hanging fruit: education, zoning, and licensing. I would add price freedom, as well. But at a cultural level, the real source change remains at the lower levels of society, including among the bobos themselves. While the prospects of social and economic mobility may be dimmer than they ought to be, and despite the constant entry of new obstacles and challenges, freedom and opportunity are still widely available across American life. Indeed, outside the realm of policy, we have plenty of work to do. Problems of plenty continue to trickle down from cultural elites into all else, distorting and discoloring our notions about work and vocation, trade and exchange, marriage and family, or wisdom and education. At the level of our cultural imaginations, theres a tug-of-war over the basic meaning of the good society, one that posits the preservation of freedom against the exultation of conformity. In such an environment, we ought to be careful that our resistance doesnt mirror the reactive approach of prevailing elites, promoting our own notions of top-down conformity and methods of conservative-friendly coercion. Instead, we can promote a freedom that flows higher than the narrow dualisms of our age individualism vs. collectivism, localism vs. globalism, and so on. It is up to each of us to be the moral witnesses of such freedom, in our families, churches, schools, businesses, and communities. In an age where social conformity continues to gain cultural esteem, whether promoted by large, private enterprises or through the collectivized power of the state, a revival of the middle layers or mediating institutions of society is sorely needed. As we continue to preserve the liberties that makes a varied witness possible, we can continue building and rebuilding society right where we are. The fraudulent administration is drenched in American blood, they must be charged with murder and treason. None of this had to happen, the people that aided the steal of the last election are also responsible. 10 dead marines, children.............. https://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2021/08/26/live-updates-suicide-bombing-outside-kabul-airport/ They can't handle taking out the trash much less managing this once great nation. Potato head is a sh1t head, sh1totus. An anti-mask Florida dad was arrested and charged with child abuse yesterday after grabbing a student at Fort Lauderdale High School and pushing her against a gate (two videos below). After days of seeing the angry 50-year-old man, Dan Bauman, harassing the school over its mask mandate, the student said, "I've had enough for four days." She then saw that he was recording her and reached for his phone. That's when he attacked her. From The Washington Post: Bauman swiftly grabbed her hand, twisted it and pushed her against the gate, police said. Officers pulled him off the student. Fort Lauderdale police immediately arrested Bauman, who has repeatedly had law enforcement called on him for alleged mask violations, and charged him with child abuse, according to the arrest report. Bauman, 50, was taken to Broward County Jail. Bond has not been set. A lawyer was not listed in jail records, and it is unclear when he is due in court. Earlier in the day before his arrest, the misinformed gentleman told WPOR, "It's against the law, it's against the Parents' Bill of Rights Our belief is it doesn't stop the spread of the virus. It doesn't control it, it does more harm than good." Meanwhile, Florida's daily Covid death rate was up by 612% this week. Rabid anti-mask parent at Fort Lauderdale High School physically assaults a student and is arrested by police. A 50-year-old man hitting a young girl with a mask. Deplorable. pic.twitter.com/a25APyDzCG Kaivan Shroff (@KaivanShroff) August 25, 2021 And another video: Dan Bauman, who I showed in a tweets yesterday harassing administrators at Ft. Lauderdale High, returned today to protest, and was arrested for assaulting a student leaving school wearing a mask. From @MIAagainstFash pic.twitter.com/b5gFsHdwqc Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) August 25, 2021 Top image: Dan Bauman mugshot As the disgraced former president found, words have consequences. Wait, who are we kidding? The Orange Orb of Lies never learned that. And certainly the consequences he faced were far disproportionate from the word garbage he spewed for four years. But now nine lawyers who brought a lawsuit against the state of Michigan over 2020 presidential election results to favor Trump over Biden have been seen as the sham they were by U.S. District Judge Linda Parker. Judge Parker has asked the city of Detroit and the state of Michigan to each count up the costs they incurred defending the lawsuit and submit those totals to her within 14 days. via Yahoo!: "Despite the haze of confusion, commotion and chaos counsel intentionally attempted to create by filing this lawsuit, one thing is perfectly clear: Plaintiffs' attorneys have scorned their oath, flouted the rules, and attempted to undermine the integrity of the judiciary along the way," Parker said in the opening of a scathing 110-page opinion. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of six Republican voters who wanted Parker to decertify Michigan's results and impound voting machines. The judge declined in December, calling the request "stunning in its scope and breathtaking in its reach." The state and Detroit subsequently asked Parker to order sanctions against Sidney Powell, L. Lin Wood and seven other attorneys who were part of the litigation. Parker said lawyers for Trump supporters filed affidavits stuffed with sinister "speculation and conjecture" about the vote-counting process without checking for evidence to support the claims. "I appreciate the unmistakable message she sends with this ruling those who vow to uphold the Constitution must answer for abandoning that oath," said Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, a Democrat. There is no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 election. Indeed, election officials from both political parties have stated publicly that the election went well, and international observers confirmed there were no serious irregularities. Beyond financial reparations for their actions each lawyer has been ordered by Judge Parker to attend 12 hours of legal education, including six hours in election lawwhich sounds like an apt humiliation but will they even learn anything from that? Doubtful. Much like Rudy Giuliani getting suspended from practicing law in New York, the judge is asking each of the states where these lawyers are licensed to review their actions and possibly face more disciplinary action. THAT would be the right consequence. Michael Hyssong, a car enthusiast who goes by Street Speed 717 on YouTube, was charged with "18 criminal counts, including disturbance of waterways and watersheds, misuse of property and waters and littering and polluting waters," when he drove his truck over a creek in rural Pennsylvania, according to Road and Track. From The New York Daily Record: Olmsted thinks nine out of 10 new mothers feel the same way as she does about working in the business. If you get to my age, you're going to be at a crossroads where it's either to have kids and leave or stay in and don't have kids, she said. The Olmsteds first child, Ethan, was born in January of 2019. A daughter Bailey was born in June of 2021. She said she paid her nanny in Buffalo more money than she was bringing home to babysit Ethan. I was losing money by going to work and that wasnt worth it, she said. Unless you are a main anchor, there's really a cap on where you're going to go salary-wise. I basically reached the end of my earning potential and sort of the end of my career trajectory because I had a family now. Her husband asked her why she put herself through the misery and suggested finding something that made her happy. I was stubborn and was like, no I'm not giving up on the dream, but it took me a long time to realize I had changed and that's OK, she said. It's just being a new mom is hard and being a new mom in news feels impossible. Main events Roughly 100 chalk artists from around the world will gather on the grounds of Buffalo RiverWorks to create art on blacktop, the walls and floors of the adjacent grain silo, and on the parking lot. The overarching theme is 1980s entertainment, touching on movies, music, TV and video games, with favorites such as "Ghostbusters," "Donkey Kong," and Guns N' Roses among the possibilities. The artistic energy will be complemented by RiverWorks' restaurant, multiple bars and a slew of other vendors on hand. She also attacked incumbent Mayor Byron Brown, who is waging a November write-in campaign after losing the Democratic primary, as a Republican puppet and "a vigorous defender of the status quo." +3 India Walton, Byron Brown criticize each other's approach to reducing Buffalo violence Both candidates for mayor on Monday held news conferences about where they stand on issues of public safety. Meanwhile, Zellner acknowledged Thursday that he had expressed concern earlier this month after The Buffalo News reported that in 2018, Buffalo police investigated complaints about a man suspected of dealing drugs from Walton's home at 183 Lemon St. The owner of the house said he demanded Walton move out after confronting her with complaints about constant visitors suspected of drug activity which she denies. Police reports obtained by The News indicated that officers followed up on the complaints in the fall of 2018, and the inquiry ended with no criminal charges being filed. Immediately after the story appeared, Zellner noted that his committee had not "officially" endorsed Walton after her primary victory and after he had emphatically promised party support for her. He said then that he would weigh new input from committee members on how to proceed in the general election campaign. "We are not opposed, but if our party leadership has significant concerns, I will listen to them," the chairman said earlier this month. Hearing on whether Brown will be on November ballot may be held soon Brown submitted more than 3,700 signatures on petitions to the Board of Elections Tuesday to secure an independent ballot line called Buffalo Party. Cornerstone Community Federal Credit Union is pushing into Erie County. The Lockport-based credit union the largest in the Buffalo Niagara region plans to open its first Erie County location in October after buying a building at 315 Stahl Road in Getzville, off Millersport Highway. Cornerstone acquired the property from Riverside Federal Credit Union. This will be Cornerstone's sixth location; the other five are in Niagara County. Cornerstone said it bought the Getzville location because it wanted to expand its field of membership, a desire that the credit union said arose from the pandemic. Cornerstone said it distributed Paycheck Protection Program loans worth a combined $8.5 million to 144 area small businesses. Cornerstone has 46,000 members, and its membership is open to anyone who lives, works, worships, goes to school or volunteers in Niagara and/or Erie County. The credit union has about $573 million in assets, ranking it largest among credit unions based in the Buffalo Niagara region. Cornerstone traces its roots to Unit No. 1 Federal Credit Union, which served employees of General Motors' Harrison Radiator division. A Buffalo man accused of abducting a law firm intern at gunpoint from a Pearl Street parking lot on a weekday morning earlier this month, blindfolding her, driving her around and trying to get her to withdraw money from bank machines before letting her go has been charged with kidnapping and robbery, police and court records show. The suspect was identified as Christopher Taylor, 32. He is being held without bail in the Erie County Holding Center. The reported incident took place at about 9 a.m. Aug. 11 a Wednesday at a parking lot on Pearl Street, just north of Chippewa Street. The victim, a law student who was on her way to her internship at a downtown firm, was putting money into a parking pay station in the lot when the suspect allegedly hit the victim's car with his, according to Erie County District Attorney John J. Flynn Jr. "Then he allegedly grabs her," Flynn said. Flynn said the man and woman didn't know each other. "Totally random," he said of the incident. The man allegedly displayed what appeared to be a gun, Flynn said. The man then "put something over her face," Flynn said, so that she couldn't see. The arrest report said she was "blindfolded." Tyrell Patterson-Scott is one of five teenagers charged in separate indictments in the rapes of two child victims, though Patterson-Scott is only charged in the rape and kidnapping of one of the victims. According to the District Attorney's Office, at about 7 p.m. on Nov. 20, 2020, a 16-year-old female victim entered a vehicle with Abdiwahab Sabtow and two juvenile offenders who drove her to park on the West Side instead of their intended destination. The three defendants are accused of forcibly raping the victim at the park. After the initial assault, prosecutors said the suspects drove the girl to another location, where they picked up Patterson-Scott and co-defendant Bryce Baker. The five suspects then allegedly raped the girl again, this time near Broderick Park on West Ferry Street. They then drove her to a home on Dart Street, where the victim was allegedly raped again, then held captive for several hours inside a garage before escaping and calling for help. Niagara County Judge Matthew J. Murphy III will decide Sept. 20 whether a convicted rapist violated the terms of his interim probation by repeatedly viewing online pornography. But the judge decided Wednesday that the public should not be able to read or hear his name from local media outlets. +2 Investigators: Teen rape charge tied to parties where mother supplied alcohol State police say underage drinking at house parties in this home on Mountain View Drive in Lewiston led to allegations of rape of 15- and 16-year-old During a hearing that was open to the public, Murphy ordered reporters from The Buffalo News and WKBW Channel 7 not to use the name of the defendant who is at the center of a crime that came to be known as the "Lewiston party house" case even though his name has been used repeatedly by media organizations since his arrest and can be found in online searches. The defendant, now 20, pleaded guilty in July 2019 to third-degree rape, attempted first-degree sexual abuse and two counts of second-degree sexual abuse. He was eligible for youthful offender status because he was 16 or 17 at the time of the crimes, which occurred in his home in 2017 and 2018 after parties attended by teenage girls at which alcohol and marijuana were allegedly consumed. +2 Teen sentenced to interim probation for rape and sexual abuse in Lewiston 'party house' Niagara County Judge Sara Sheldon says getting through that time to earn youthful offender status without breaking rules is rare. If he fails, risks up to 8 years in Instead of sentencing him, now-retired County Judge Sara Sheldon placed the defendant on interim probation for two years. Under the $20 million wraparound services plan, providers of job training would turn in budgets and submit proposals identifying how many people they would enroll and how much money would be needed to provide direct financial assistance to participants based on the individuals needs. Individualized direct aid would be based on what the enrollees and case managers say is needed to help the trainees finish their training programs. How Buffalo's lottery proposal for $500 monthly checks compares to other cities The "guaranteed income" program Mayor Byron W. Brown has proposed for Buffalo shares the traits of other such initiatives around the country with one exception: More people would participate. The creation of a Neighborhood Improvement/Cleanup Corps, a $9 million initiative over two years, would provide jobs for 50 members and five supervisors. Hiring preference would be for low-income residents who live in neighborhoods of color. In addition to improving parks and other parts of the city, the subsidized work project can help those in the program land better jobs because it is easier for people to find work if they are already employed. FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) Former state Rep. Jonathan Shell, who helped orchestrate Republicans' historic takeover of the Kentucky House, has announced he will run for state agriculture commissioner in 2023. Shell, a former member of House leadership, is looking to relaunch a political career that was derailed in 2018 when he lost his reelection bid to the legislature in the GOP primary. Shell, a fifth-generation farmer from Garrard County, promised to defend agriculture and conservative Kentucky values on every front in announcing his 2023 plans Wednesday. This campaign is about supporting farm families and ensuring that all Kentucky communities, from the most rural to the most urban, understand the importance of our agriculture industry," Shell said. Current Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles, a Republican in his second term, is considering a run for governor in 2023. Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear intends to run for reelection. Republican state Rep. Richard Heath, chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, announced his bid for agriculture commissioner earlier this month. Shell rose quickly through the ranks after being elected to the Kentucky House in 2012. I am sickened to my stomach and absolutely nauseated that I (we) should witness two United States wartime defeats in a span of 46 years. I feel qualified to make my comments because I fought in Vietnam in 1969 with the 173rd Airborne Brigade and my second war in Afghanistan in 2004 as a Blackhawk helicopter pilot (I was in my mid-50s in Afghanistan). The wartime failure in Afghanistan is not a result of the American military men and women. I have witnessed and can attest first-hand to the bravery, the fighting spirit, and the high level of combat training of our military. No, this war was lost in the Oval Offices of Presidents Obama and Biden, and on the floors of the U.S. Congress. This group of politicians did not trust the Joint Chiefs of Staff; people that are highly trained and skilled at leading and directing military operations. No, these elected officials, people without military or wartime experience (save for a few), decided they knew better how to conduct war. As a result, the hands of our fighting forces were often tied preventing them from fighting with the same ferocity as the enemy. IT Management 5 Ideas to Soothe IT Staff Burnout The COVID-19 pandemic has taken its toll on the mental health of students, faculty and staff alike. But IT in particular has borne the brunt of keeping institutions' technology infrastructure afloat through relentless change, often in the face of budget cuts and staffing shortages. Here are ways to help mitigate stress and better support IT teams during this challenging time. Throughout the pandemic, IT teams have been heroes at their institutions, stepping up to support remote learning and administrative work while having to work remotely themselves. Yet taking on all this extra work has come at a cost: More IT workers are feeling overwhelmed and stressed out. In January 2021, Educause conducted a survey of more than 1,500 higher ed IT and technology professionals to gauge the sources and impacts of their stress. Asked which workplace factors were contributing to their stress over the past year, the top answers were "additional responsibilities or increased workload" (43 percent) and "insufficient staffing in key areas of my work" (38 percent). The third factor chosen the most was "uncertainty about the future of my institution and/or career" (30 percent). The recognition that IT teams receive for helping their institutions has to be balanced with some of the concerning results of the survey, said Mark McCormack, senior director of analytics and research at Educause. "People are exhausted. They're taking on extra work in many cases without additional resources or staff, or while facing budget cuts. They have stepped up and saved the day; they've done some fantastic things, but we recognize that working under some of these conditions is not sustainable. There's an opportunity for the institutions to step up and invest in these teams, to give them the support and the resources they need." Faced with an increasingly stressed-out IT workforce, CIOs are trying to find innovative ways to boost morale, maintain work/life balance and enhance communication among teams. We spoke to three IT leaders who offered the following five suggestions, based on their own experiences over the past year and a half. 1) Enhance Communication Some CIOs say transparency and more frequent communication have been key to keeping their teams together. This is especially true for colleges and universities facing budget cuts. In May 2020, two months after the pandemic hit, Ohio University CIO Chris Ament was forced to lay off eight people out of his 175-person IT staff. "That was a not very friendly reminder of the reality of the situation on top of the extra workload, and on top of people dealing with personal issues around the pandemic," Ament said. "We took an approach I would call radical transparency being as open about everything as we possibly could, so that people felt like they had information. That was the best tool we had to mitigate the stress as best we could, and I think it was pretty effective." Orlando Leon, vice president for information technology and CIO for California State University, Fresno, increased the number of check-in meetings with his direct reports and with the whole division of approximately 90 staff members. "During the summer of 2020 we did weekly check-ins of 30 minutes where I would give a brief update, and then I would do an open Q&A," he said. "I continue to host open virtual walk-in hours and I let employees make appointments if they want to just chat about any topic at all. Some people like to do one-on-one sit-downs with the CIO." Showing authentic empathy also is important, Leon noted. During the protests after George Floyd's murder and incidents of anti-Asian violence, he wrote personal notes to Black and Asian-American employees and encouraged them to share their feelings. Leon's team also had members who lost family members to COVID. "That made the pandemic feel even closer to home," he said. "We sent flowers and reached out personally to offer our condolences and offer help." How to Clip Click and hold your mouse button on the page to select the area you wish to save or print. You can click and drag the clipping box to move it or click and drag in the bottom right corner to resize it. When you're happy with your selection, click the checkmark icon next to the clipping area to continue. Gableman has said a thorough investigation into Wisconsin's election was warranted and the intention was not to attempt to overturn the results. Biden's victory has withstood recounts in two counties and multiple state and federal lawsuits, but Republicans passed a series of bills that would toughen absentee voting rules, all of which were vetoed by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. The investigation Gableman is leading is one of several in the state. The nonpartisan Legislative Audit Bureau is conducting a review of the election as ordered by Republicans. That is expected to be done in the fall. And Republican Rep. Janel Brandtjen, chairwoman of the Assembly Elections Committee, issued subpoenas earlier this month to election clerks in Milwaukee and Brown counties seeking voting machines, ballots and other records but legislative attorneys have said they're not valid unless Vos signs them. The clerks in both counties said the subpoenas are being reviewed. Vos has said if Gableman determines that subpoenas are necessary, he will "look into making sure those can happen. Priebus said he was told that subpoenas would be issued in the next week or two. He did not specify whether they would be new subpoenas or if Vos was signing the ones issued by Brandtjen. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Several rounds of thunderstorms that could cause flooding are possible from Thursday night through Friday night, with the greatest threat in western Wisconsin, according to forecasters. Mark Gehring, National Weather Service lead meteorologist, said the storm complexes are expected to gradually weaken as they move across Wisconsin, making the potential for damaging wind and localized heavy rain of 2 inches or more and flooding greater over western Wisconsin. Gehring cautioned that there is uncertainty on the exact timing and track of each thunderstorm complex, and also in the expected weakening trend. And the late summer heat wave will continue, with heat index values again rising well into the 90s for Friday and possibly lower 100's on Saturday, when a heat advisory may be needed, Gehring said. More storms are possible over the weekend, into next week. In Madison on Thursday, look for mostly sunny skies, a high near 88 and northeast winds at 5 to 10 mils per hour turning out of the southeast in the afternoon, the Weather Service said. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) A founding member of the National Union of Peoples' Lawyers (NUPL) was shot dead while his driver was injured in an ambush attack in Cebu City on Thursday afternoon, local police said. According to an initial investigation, lawyer Rex Fernandez sustained several gunshot wounds and died on the spot after still unidentified motorcycle-riding suspects attacked his vehicle at around 4:10 p.m. The incident happened along Salvador Street in Barangay Guadalupe. His wounded driver was brought to the hospital. In a phone interview, Police Maj. Jonathan dela Cerna said Fernandez was also with an unidentified companion inside the car but did not elaborate. Authorities said the two assailants waited for the lawyers vehicle at the corner of Salvador and Good Shepherd streets. Both fled the scene on their motorbike immediately after firing the shots. Police found six empty slugs believed to be from a caliber .45 pistol in the crime scene. In a statement, NUPL President Edre Olalia described Fernandez as a passionate, intense and brave human rights lawyer who, even after becoming inactive in the organization, continued to work on public interest cases, including those filed against activists. Before he was silenced, he castigated the present administration which he had hitherto placed his sincere hope on would bring change, Olalia added. He died disillusioned that it was not meant to be. Rest in peace already Rex. You fought a good fight. Fernandez recently went on a hunger strike against the management of the condominium he was staying at in Mandaue City over utility issues. As of July 24, the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) said 63 lawyers have been killed under the Duterte administration. In an earlier statement, the IBP condemned the assassinations, which it noted have alarmingly increased by as much as 500% compared to previous governments. It had said it was working with the Supreme Court, the Department of Justice, the National Bureau of Investigation and the Philippine National Police to put an end to the rising attacks against its members. The IBP also called on police and investigative agencies to implement specific measures to improve the security of lawyers, judges, and prosecutors and swiftly resolve investigations on the killings. Cebu-based Correspondent Dale Israel contributed to this report. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) Prolonged school closures result in complex problems, including "heightened risk of drop out, child labor and child marriage," the United Nations Children's Fund Philippines said. UNICEF Philippines made this statement as it renewed its call for the reopening of schools in phases, starting with those in low-risk areas. Another year of online classes will officially start next month. "This (reopening of schools) can be done on a voluntary basis with proper safety protocols in place," UNICEF Philippines said in a statement. The Philippines is one of the only five countries in the world that have not yet resumed physical classes since the COVID-19 pandemic started last year, affecting more than 27 million Filipino students, the UN agency pointed out. In 2020, schools across the world were closed for an average of 79 teaching days, while those in the Philippines were shut for more than a year already, UNICEF Philippines Representative Oyunsaikhan Dendevnorov said. "The associated consequences of school closures learning loss, mental distress, missed vaccinations, and heightened risk of drop out, child labor, and child marriage will be felt by many children, especially the youngest learners in critical development stages," she added. Remote learning will still be implemented in the new school year, which starts on Sept. 13, the Department of Education said. The same approach was used during the previous academic year. DepEd has been pushing for limited face-to-face classes, too. But President Rodrigo Duterte has rejected previous attempts to bring students back to the classrooms amid the spread of the coronavirus. While countries worldwide have efforts to provide distance learning, "29% of primary students are not being reached," according to UNICEF. "In addition to lack of assets for remote learning, the youngest children may not be able to participate due to a lack of support using the technology, a poor learning environment, pressure to do household chores, or being forced to work," it added. UNICEF also urged other governments to resume in-person learning as soon as possible and to provide recovery response for students. UNESCO, together with World Bank and UNICEF, called on governments to focus on targeted programs, including effective remedial learning as well as support for teachers to address learning loss and to incorporate technology into their teaching. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines) Thinking of new ways to bond over bottles of beer with friends and family at home or online? Don't worry, we got you covered on how to enjoy a beer call, pandemic-friendly. Truth or Drink Photo from San Miguel Pale Pilsen If you're stuck with your roomies, but haven't really quite gotten to know each other yet, you could go old school with "Truth or Drink". This time we are doing away with the "Dare" part and instead, we are pulling out truths from the participants. Whenever someone refuses to answer a tough question, he has to drink from his bottle of San Miguel Pale Pilsen. Low-cost cosplay contest Photo from Piyato/Shutterstock.com Have all members of your household dress up as their favorite anime, superhero, or video game character. But the catch is they can only use household items like tissues, curtains, spatulas, and water dipper for some LOLs. Include a Q&A portion where a contestant should take a drink from his bottle of San Miguel Pale Pilsen after every sentence in his or her answer. Power Hour and Chill Photo from Pexels For our lockdown version of "Power Hour," watch a horror movie on Netflix and everyone has to drink from his bottle of San Miguel Pale Pilsen whenever someone screams or gets surprised by shocking scenes. Lockdown Debut Photo from Pexels If someone is turning 18 at home, immortalize the entry to adulthood by giving that person his or her first taste of San Miguel Pale Pilsen. Take a picture of the birthday celebrant with other non-minor members of the family holding and drinking their favorite drinks. Stock up on the best beer in town What's a beer call without San Miguel Pale Pilsen, right? You don't have to go far from your homes because San Miguel Pale Pilsen is available at your nearby sari-sari store or supermarkets. You can also have beers delivered straight to your doorstep via smbdelivers.com or ring 8-632-BEER. Truly, we can say, "Kahit Kailan, Walang Iwanan" with San Miguel Pale Pilsen. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines) With the community quarantine due to COVID-19, many of us stayed at home and downloaded various apps on our phones to have convenient access to essential products and services. However, having so many mobile apps from food delivery, shopping, to restaurants can sometimes be very confusing, especially when you need to keep track of all the pop-up notifications, payment transactions, and not to mention, the expensive delivery fees. Here's one app you need to download because it has just about everything you need: the SM Malls Online app. With this app, you can safely and conveniently buy from various trusted essential and retail stores and restaurants from select SM malls and have them delivered straight to your doorstep -- all in one app. By downloading the SM Malls Online app, you can enjoy all these and more, without stepping out of your home: One-stop-shop When you shop on the SM Malls Online app, you don't need to worry about the hassle of multiple online checkouts or multiple costly delivery fees that add up. You can buy all the products you need from your favorite brands all in one online checkout and pay only one delivery fee and just like that it's sent right to your home. That includes the leading international and local retail and dining establishments from SM Mall of Asia, SM Megamall, SM City North EDSA, and SM City Fairview with more SM malls available soon. In-store pickup During check-out, you may also select 'in-store pickup' to get your order when you're already at your chosen mall. Proceed to the specific mall at your own convenience within 72 hours to claim your order, show the seller representative the order ID and other details on SM Malls Online app then you're good to go. Safe virtual shopping experience. For your safety, leading brands and trained riders follow #SafeMallingAtSM protocols in fulfilling your orders on the app. Shopping bags are sanitized and the riders are required to wear face masks and face shields, have their temperature monitored, and maintain a 6-ft. distance when handling your order. Great deals and promos Photo from SM Malls Online As a special treat for first-time app users, SM is offering up to P200 off of shoppers' fave brands when they use the code, SMGOESONLINE, upon checkout with a minimum purchase of P500. Shoppers can also buy from two or more brands and enjoy free shipping when they use the code, 2orMORE, for at least two non-food brands with a minimum of spend P750 or 2orMOREFOOD for at least two restaurants with a minimum spend of P300. This promo is currently available from Aug. 1 - Sept. 30, 2021. Be sure that you have the latest version of the app from Google Play or the App Store so you can enjoy these great deals from SM. Awesome retail and dining brands. Just like other SM malls nationwide, the SM Malls Online Mobile app guarantees Filipinos easy access to a wide array of trusted brands for everything from essentials and restaurants to gadgets and more. Foodies can savor appetizing dishes from places like Manam, Panda Express, Wendy's, Frankie's Buffalo Wings, and Auntie Anne's. Shoppers can also look forward to top brands on the app ranging from clothes to gadgets to beauty like Adidas, Office Warehouse, PC Express, Samsung, The Body Shop, and Watsons. Cyberzone also offers the lowest price guaranteed on gadgets and laptops from Villman, Silicon Valley, PC Express, and more, just in time for online classes and perfect for work-from-home set-ups. Download the SM Malls Online App for free on Google Play or the App Store. For the latest news and deals, follow @smmallsonline on Facebook and Instagram or visit https://gosm.link/SMO6!. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The Duterte administration is hoping to secure a bigger budget for the national anti-communist task force, a move which a lawmaker criticized as misplaced priority amid the raging COVID-19 pandemic. During the House hearing on the proposed 5.024-trillion national budget for 2022, Budget Undersecretary Rolando Toledo said the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) will have a funding of 30.46 billion. The current budget is 19.33 billion A big portion of that amount, or 28.12 billion, will finance the Barangay Development Program, and the rest will go to the programs of the departments of Interior and Local Government, Agrarian Reform, and Social Welfare and Development. Budget Officer-in-Charge Tina Rose Marie Canda explained the higher budget will cover 1,406 barangays from the current 822 barangays. Gabriela Party-list Rep. Arlene Brosas expressed dismay over the proposed budget as it was "not a direct response" to the pandemic. Brosas said there should be more spending for the health care system and Filipinos affected by the crisis. "Dapat tanggalin ang pondo sa NTF-ECLAC (The NTF-ECLAC should be defunded)," she said. The Palace earlier this week defended its request for a bigger budget to end communism, saying that rebellion and terrorism will remain a threat during the pandemic. If they find that it is more appropriate to realign funds from NTF-ELCAC to more priority programs, then we will abide by the changes that the legislature would do on the national budget for 2022, Canda told lawmakers. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) Two leading universities with a storied rivalry are the first picks of a key opposition group for its youth arm. The opposition seeks to ignite school spirit among the youth for 1SAMBAYANs big political fight next year. The group held a virtual launch Wednesday afternoon of its first two student chapters: 1SAMBAYAN Lasalyano and Ateneans for 1SAMBAYAN. Both chapters aim to galvanize its student populace to support the oppositions bid in next years elections. While still mum about her plans in 2022, Vice President Leni Robredo expressed support for both chapters, saying that these show how Filipinos can unite for better governance despite fundamental differences. I am with you in the call for unity. But aside from this, I will reiterate: we should not be the only ones talking here. The challenge is to give our fellow Filipinos a space in our hearts. Be open-minded, listen, understand. Expand the scope of how we can help, she said in Filipino through a video message. Prominent anti-administration figures from both Ateneo and La Salle also delivered messages of support for the new chapters, saying Filipinos can unite for better governance amid differences. Atenean Senator Risa Hontiveros called on the youth to rally around the opposition, emphasizing that young Filipinos should decide the outcome of the 2022 elections. I am certain many of you here, whether Atenean or La Sallian, are witness to each others burgeoning political spirit, each others Animo. We can only really do this successfully and with less doubt through a strong and solid united front, Hontiveros said. On the side of the Green Archers, veteran human rights lawyer Atty. Chel Diokno echoed Hontiveros call to the youth, saying, This is going to be a choice of the kind of leader we want for our country. Do we want a leader who lords it over us, or a leader who serves the people? Inclusivity is key for opposition to win in 2022 polls - analyst Political analyst Prof. Dennis Coronacion welcomed 1SAMBAYANs student chapters launch, saying that the move shows some concrete plans in the coalitions electoral moves. These include tapping the youth vote, and moves to organize its base. He also said the move helps repair the coalitions damaged reputation after several invitations extended by 1SAMBAYAN to prominent politicians to run under its ticket were declined. In June, 1SAMBAYAN named several nominees for its selection process such as Vice President Robredo, Diokno, and legislators such as Senators Grace Poe and Joel Villanueva, and House Deputy Speaker Vilma Santos-Recto. Poe who ran for president in 2016 - said that she still had no plans to mount another presidential run. Villanueva said he was not interested. Recto also turned the nomination down, citing COVID-19 response and legislative duties as her main focus. This is a good recovery on the part of 1SAMBAYAN and at the same time, their decision to reach out to the youth through those universities is also a good move, Coronacion told CNN Philippines in a phone interview. However, he said that the group should have waited for other universities in the country to set up their own chapters instead of just launching it with the Taft and Katipunan-based institutions. They have to invite the other universities and colleges too. Maganda kasi yun na (It is good to reflect) overwhelming yung support, but they have to tap the support of the youth, especially the educated ones. Sila yung (They are the) enlightened, and most of them are against the programs and policies of President Duterte, Coronacion said. He adds, building a coalition of 1SAMBAYAN chapters from different schools nationwide would have helped shed the partys elitist image. Ang (The) number one criticism or point against 1SAMBAYAN is that they are made up of the countrys elites, yun bang hindi kayang maka-konekta sa masa (they seem unable to connect to the masses), Coronacion said. He added that linking with other universities would help their cause. State universities and colleges, as well as technical and vocational schools, should have also been tapped, he said. He also noted three key challenges for 1SAMBAYAN and the opposition in general. These are how to encourage the youth in poor communities to register, how can the young can be inspired to vote, and how to convince them to choose opposition candidates. Coronacion believes that 1SAMBAYAN should also focus on reaching out to out-of-school youth. He believes that out-of-school youth outnumber those who have degrees or are currently enrolled. They have to come up with a strategy to convince these huge sections of the youth population that they should not vote for Duterte and his allies. Mahirap ilatag yung (It is hard to lay down the) agenda ng opposition, and ang hirap din kasi wala naman silang (and the difficulty is that they lack a) unified agenda to begin with, Coronacion said. For its part, 1SAMBAYAN youth convenor Rae Reposar said that the group is planning to launch more chapters, saying that the organizations chapter at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines is already being set up. Were not just expanding in schools. Were expanding in different areas across the Philippines, he said during the launch. Reposar also said, Ateneans and La Sallians should be aware of their educational privileges. He notes that the high costs of education are pushing those in lower socioeconomic classes to apply for scholarships just to be part of the student body. Pag sinasabing La Salle, Ateneo, elitista. But first, kailangan po nating i-acknowledge kasi yung privilege natin na makapag-aral sa mga institusyong ito, he said, adding, because youre growing and youre benefitting from this inequality, may social responsibility ka to also deliver and make it easier for other people. [Translation: People think of La Salle and Ateneo regarded as elitist. We need to acknowledge the privilege of being able to study in these institutions. Because you are growing and benefitting from this inequality, you have the social responsibility to make it easier for other people.] Coronacion said a candidate who appeals to the uneducated youth and informal settlers may turn the tide for the opposition. He noted that it may be good for them to include a candidate who has a rags to riches story or someone who was able to rise from poverty. Another thing that they have to sell is that 1SAMBAYAN is not just for the middle class and upper class, that 1SAMBAYAN is also after the welfare of the members of the lower class, Coronacion stated. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) A lawmaker has filed a bill seeking to provide cash aid and basic goods in exchange for recyclable items. House Bill 9781 filed by Quezon City 5th District Rep. Alfred Vargas authorizes the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the Department of Agriculture, and the Department of Trade and Industry to establish the Incentivized Solid Waste Redemption System. Under the proposed system, individuals and organizations could trade in non-hazardous and recyclable solid wastes "for rice, water, canned goods, basic household consumer items, or cash." "The DENR, DA, and DTI shall determine the reasonable and compliance-inducing exchange values for graduated weights or volumes of solid waste surrendered, provided that the minimum exchange value of one kilogram of non-hazardous and recyclable plastic waste is one kilogram of commercial quality rice or its cash equivalent, while for one kilogram of metallic, non-hazardous, recyclable waste is two kilograms of commercial quality rice or its cash equivalent," a portion of the bill stated. The proposal also includes the creation of a reporting system through which people can report the location of suspected hazardous wastes. It should have a cash reward feature to "encourage the public to help government pinpoint and confirm the exact location of hazardous wastes," according to the bill. In filing the proposed law, Vargas argued that incentive programs on waste management have to "adapt to the needs of the new normal." Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The endorsement of the PDP-Laban faction led by Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi of the Go-Duterte tandem was only a "ploy" to pressure Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte into choosing whether to support the team-up or have Senator Bong Go as her own vice president, an analyst said Thursday. Speaking to CNN Philippines' The Source, legal expert Tony La Vina said Mayor Duterte may have "burned the bridge" with her father after calling him out for offering the two conditions while she has yet to declare her own political plans. President Rodrigo Duterte was initially quoted as saying that he and Go would step aside if her daughter would run for presidency. But Mayor Duterte herself confirmed her father's intent to run and urged him and Go to "own up publicly their decision to run as a tandem." "Because that is really a ploy, the announcement of the Cusi faction of PDP that President Duterte will run as vice president of Bong Go was really nothing but a coercion of Sara so that Sara will accept the father or Bong Go. Because the father still wants to have influence after," La Vina said. La Vina said Mayor Duterte will likely "get her way" this time, even if she and her father do not always see eye-to-eye. Earlier this month, the Cusi-led PDP-Laban faction endorsed the Go-Duterte tandem. This week, President Duterte accepted the offer for him to run for vice president, while Go has yet to speak up on the matter. "I don't think Secretary Cusi did that for himself, I think he did that under the instructions of the President, and that seems to be how President Duterte works, right? Parang nanggugulo, may drama [it's like hes meddling, there's drama]...they have reached a match (with his) own daughter," La Vina said. La Vina noted that the faction may eventually have to dismantle and choose which Duterte they will side on after the daughter revealed her father's conditions. It can be assumed that the younger Duterte will not run under the ruling party anytime soon, he added. "Its a choice they have to make now because Sara Duterte is clearly saying you have to make a choiceIt seems like Sara Duterte will not run for PDP-Laban. That's the big takeaway from yesterday." An official of the regional party Hugpong ng Pagbabago headed by the Davao City mayor said she will likely settle for the mayorship to avoid a Duterte-Duterte tandem. But she herself has yet to declare whether she will run for president. Meanwhile, PDP-Laban secretary-general Melvin Matibag said party officials weren't informed of President Duterte's reported plan to drop his vice-presidential bid if Sara runs for the top government post. While Malacanang has confirmed this, Matibag said it would be better to hear the decision from the President himself. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The local impact of the Delta coronavirus variant on disease severity is still unclear, a Department of Health official said Thursday. Sa ngayon, base sa ating mga nahahanap na Delta cases, hindi tayo nakakakita ng (as of now, based on the Delta cases we found, we do not see) higher rates of severe or critical disease, DOH chief epidemiologist Alethea de Guzman said in an online briefing. Remember, of the 1,273 na Delta cases, less than 2% ay mga (are) fatalities. As of now, we have no evidence that Delta is causing less or more severe disease, she added. On the other hand, some studies conducted abroad suggest that Delta might cause severe disease in unvaccinated people, according to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. What is clear is Delta, which the World Health Organization said has been detected in 163 countries, spreads the fastest among all variants of concern. DOH earlier declared community transmission of the Delta variant in Metro Manila and Calabarzon but said more evidence is needed to say the situation is the same nationwide. Community transmission means the source of infection can no longer be traced. De Guzman said local Delta cases have been detected in all regions except in Bangsamoro. She added one possibility is the Delta cases in Bangsamoro are undetected because of the small number of sequenced samples from the region. Meanwhile, the Alpha and Beta variants have been found in all regions, according to de Guzman. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said they would seek more funds from the government for the health workers meal, accommodation and transportation (MAT) allowance. "We will ask for more (funds) as the grant of MAT to beneficiaries is not included in the 311 million," Duque said during the House Committee on Public Accounts hearing on Thursday, referring to the recently released fund to the agency for the special risk allowance of around 20,000 frontliners. READ: DBM releases P311M in funds for health workers' risk allowance Duque said they had asked for the inclusion of the MAT allowance in the amount requested from the Department of Budget and Management but was told that there was no legal basis for it. The legal basis for the MAT allowance was pointed out by Agusan del Norte 1st District Rep. Lawrence Fortun at the hearing. "I believe the MAT has basis under (Republic Act) 11494...Section 10 (a)(5) states accommodation, transportation and meals for all public and private health workers...that's the legal basis for the grant of meals, accommodation and transportation," he said. Fortun cited Republic Act 11519 which states that the eligibility of RA 11494 "is extended without exception." He said because of this, the previous explanation why the allowance was excluded has no legal basis. "Very specific yung ating batas. Ang intent was to extend the effectivity of the entire (R.A.) 11494 without exception...Why did DBM exclude certain benefits when that is not the intention of Congress? Wala akong makita sa very short na batas na ito na ang meals, accommodation and transportation ay hindi kasama sa ine-extend natin," he said. [Translation: The law is very specific. The intent was to extend the effectivity of the entire R.A. 11494 without exception...Why did DBM exclude certain benefits when that is not the intention of Congress? I see nothing in this very short law that meals, accommodation and transportation will not be included in the extension.] The allotment of such benefits was necessary, Fortun, said because it would provide much needed help to health care workers on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic. The DOH said the MAT allowance will be given to personnel who are actively giving medical services. "More or less, those who will receive SRA plus hazard pay will receive the MAT allowance," said DOH Director Jose Llacuna, Jr. The DBM has not issued a comment on today's hearing. CNN Philippines' Pia Garcia and AC Nicholls contributed to this report. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The Office of Civil Defense (OCD) temporarily closed its central office on Thursday after a number of its personnel tested positive for COVID-19. OCD spokesperson Mark Timbal said 116 or about 30% of the OCD's staff members were infected. The OCD headquarters in Camp Aguinaldo, Quezon City will undergo disinfection until August 30, he added. The central office has a total of 380 workers, of which 218 underwent coronavirus tests. The agency is still awaiting the results of 85 personnel. Timbal said the OCD is making arrangements to test the family members of the infected workers, adding he has since advised them to isolate and limit movement while waiting. In the meantime, OCD services will be available online while staff members work from home. The 24/7 NDRRMC Operations Center will also continue to provide regular monitoring and coordination services, Timbal added. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is also closing its main building in Muntinlupa City Friday for disinfection, according to FDA Director General Eric Domingo. Domingo said 29 of the agency's workers have tested positive for COVID-19 since last week. All cases were "community-acquired" but only have mild symptoms since the workers have all been vaccinated, he added. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The police officer who fatally shot his unarmed neighbors Sonya Gregorio and her son Frank Anthony Gregorio was found guilty of two counts of murder on Thursday. Staff Sergeant Jonel Nuezca was sentenced by the Paniqui Regional Trial Court Branch 106 to reclusion perpetua or up to 40 years imprisonment for each count of murder. Nuezca, who was dismissed from service after the shooting in Paniqui, Tarlac on Dec. 20, 2020, was ordered to pay P952,560. "A 'shoot first, think later' disposition occupies no decent place in a civilized society. Never has homicide or murder been a function of law enforcement," Judge Stella Marie Gandia-Asuncion said in her 18-page decision. The violence was caught on camera and the video went viral on social media. The policeman was seen with his young daughter in a heated discussion with Frank Anthony, whose mother was holding him back. Nuezca's daughter pointed out that "my father is a policeman," to which Sonya replied that she does not care. An enraged Nuezca threatened to kill Sonya before shooting her point-blank in the head, then proceeded to shoot Frank Anthony twice, before firing at Sonya once again while she was already on the ground. [TRIGGER WARNING] The judge said the cellphone video and witness accounts showed that the shots fired by Nuezca were so sudden that the victims were not able to react. She said if the circumstance of treachery is present, the crime is considered murder. "The attack made by the accused was so swift and sudden that the victims were not able to defend themselves. The shots fired were made in quick succession. Hence, the attack made it treacherous," Gandia-Asuncion wrote. The shooting incident stemmed from the firing of a PVC cannon or boga by the Gregorios, but the two parties were previously involved in a property right-of-way dispute. Aside from the brutal killing, Nuezca previously faced homicide raps, six cases of grave misconduct, demotion over robbery and extortion charges, among other issues. Critics slammed the Philippine National Police following the incident, calling an end to police brutality and impunity in the country. The PNP meanwhile welcomed the court's decision, saying justice has finally been served for the Gregorios. Justice is finally served with the conviction of former police sergeant Jonel Nuezca. He was already dismissed from the service long before this conviction which means that all his benefits were already forfeited, PNP chief PGen Guillermo Eleazar said in a statement. He added that Nuezcas case will serve as a lesson that will constantly remind us that as police officers, we are the protectors of the Filipino people, and not their tormentors. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) Two inmates were killed after attempting to break out of the Marikina City Jail on Thursday, Bureau of Jail Management and Penology spokesperson Xavier Solda confirmed. In a statement, the Eastern Police District (EPD) said at around 5:10 p.m., the two detainees grabbed the firearms of one of the jail guards. Solda also told reporters in an interview that the perpetrators - who were facing rape charges - later held one jail nurse and one livelihood officer hostage. A Special Weapons and Tactics or SWAT team immediately responded and the captives were freed at 6 p.m., the EPD said. The perpetrators were killed in a firefight, it added. The hostages were also injured along with a jail officer, who suffered gunshot wounds. The wounded officer was brought to Amang Rodriguez Memorial Medical Center and is currently in critical condition, Solda said. Following the incident, Solda said the police regional director ordered that all jails in Metro Manila be placed on heightened alert. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) -- Sen. Manny Pacquiao's plan to run for president in the 2022 elections "might be a go," but the final decision will be made in about a month, the boxer-turned-politician's close ally said Thursday. Monico Puentevella, Pacquiao's political ally and unofficial spokesperson, told CNN Philippines' The Source on Thursday what the senator told him in a recent conversation. "What I can say is, it might be a go," Puentevella said, noting that Pacquiao will still have to make a formal declaration after talking to various opposition and administration leaders. "As he (Pacquiao) told me, he said, 'go ito' at 2 in the morning, he said, 'go tayo.' And thats the first time he said he had a good rest, a good night's sleep," said Puentevella, who accompanied Pacquiao at the ringside during the senator's fight with Yordenis Ugas in Los Angeles last Sunday. In a text message, Senator Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel III also said the boxer-turned-lawmaker is fit for the next fight after his match in the United States. Pacquiao is expected to announce his political plans in September. "The night after his fight, he said, 'give me a month, and I'll tell you honestly what I will decide on.' Because he wants to talk to everybody," Puentevella said. "After his loss, do political leaders still want him? Do they support him? Do they all see or think that he is the one that can defeat the Dutertes?" He added Pacquiao will first talk to Vice President Leni Robredo after his return to the country. Robredo previously told The Source that she met with the senator at least twice before his fight, in an effort to build a "broader alliance" and find a "common ground" among other political contenders ahead of the polls. READ: Pacquiao to resume talks with Robredo after boxing match, says spox "As Leni the Vice President, the lady said on your program, 'we will meet again.' Yan ang sagot ko (That's also my answer)Now I'm telling you, we will meet the lady and the Vice President again," he said. But does this mean that Pacquiao is also considering a possible vice presidential bid? Puentevella said he does not think so, speaking as the senator's ally. "Wala siguro. Im sorry. Wala sa ulo niya yan (I don't think so. I'm sorry. It looks like he is not thinking about it)," he noted. The PDP-Laban faction led by Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi, meanwhile, hopes the senator would delay his presidential dream for now and join their senatorial slate. The partys secretary-general, Melvin Matibag, said Cusi officially invited Pacquiao to lead their list of Senate bets. I hope that Senator Manny Pacquiao will consider it, he said. Hes not actually abandoning his dream of becoming a president or his presidential bid but merely delaying it and in the process gaining more experience and confidence in the intricacies of governance and leadership. The Cusi wing endorsed Senator Bong Go for president with President Rodrigo Duterte as running mate. However, Puentevella said he does not believe that Go will pull through as he himself is intrigued about whether Filipinos will more likely accept a Duterte-Duterte tandem. Go has not publicly accepted the endorsement so far, but the President said they will both give way to his daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte, if she runs for president. However, the younger Duterte called out her father after telling the public she was offered to choose between endorsing the Go-Duterte tandem or taking Go as her running mate for vice president. She has also not formally declared her plans for the 2022 elections to date. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The Philippine General Hospital is asking the help of volunteer healthcare workers as the COVID-19 referral hospital can no longer cope with the surge in new infections. PGH spokesperson Jonas del Rosario said the hospital's 320 beds allocated for severe COVID-19 cases are already fully utilized. PGH also still can't accept new patients in its emergency room amid the rising number of admissions, he added. Del Rosario said the only way the hospital can open more COVID-19 beds and wards is to increase its workforce with the help of volunteers. "In a way na humihingi na kami ng tulong. Voluntary naman po ito, but we're appealing to them na isang araw na mag-duty ka sa isang buwan, siguro malaking tulong...Parang all hands on deck na," he told CNN Philippines. [Translation: We are asking for help. This is voluntary but we are appealing to them. One day of duty per month will be of great help. This will be all hands on deck.] Del Rosario said they have requested additional manpower from government offices, but they understand that other hospitals are also short-staffed. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The number of new coronavirus infections in the country may soon hit levels that would eclipse its current peak due to ramped-up testing and contact tracing efforts in areas with rising cases, a Department of Health official said Thursday. In the next days or weeks, we will probably be seeing additional peaks, DOH chief epidemiologist Alethea de Guzman said in a media briefing. Posible paring pumalo pa siya pataas habang nira-ramp natin ang ating active case finding, ang ating contact tracing, not just in NCR but in all areas [with] increasing cases, she added. [Translation: Cases may still jump higher while we ramp up our active case finding and contact tracing, not just in NCR (National Capital Region) but in all areas [with] increasing cases]. The country logged a daily average of 15,537 cases from Aug. 19 to 25, higher than the prior weeks peak at 12,897, de Guzman said. PH still at high risk for COVID-19 The Philippines remains at high risk for COVID-19 due to soaring cases these past few weeks, according to the epidemiologist. The risk classification is based on the two-week growth rate of cases and the average daily attack rate. A positive growth rate means infections are increasing, while a negative growth rate indicates that cases are decreasing. The countrys growth rate is at 63% in the past two weeks, slightly higher than the 58% recorded three to four weeks ago, de Guzman said. Meanwhile, the average daily attack rate, defined as the number of infected people per 100,000 population, rose to 12.9 on Aug. 12 to 25, from 7.9 in the previous two-week period. Officials earlier said the higher the attack rate in an area, the higher a person's risk of getting the infectious disease there. NCR Plus composed of Metro Manila, Laguna, Cavite, Rizal, and Bulacan as well as western Luzon, are showing the fastest rise in cases. Meanwhile, Visayas and Mindanao are also experiencing an uptick in case counts, but at a slower pace than Luzon. The epidemiologist also flagged Cagayan Valley, Central Luzon and Calabarzon due to their high healthcare utilization rates, which reached over 70% on Aug. 23. Areas under highest alert Seventy-four cities and provinces are now under the highest COVID-19 Alert Level 4, double the figure nearly three weeks ago. An area is under this alert status is if its case classification is moderate-to-critical risk and the COVID-19 beds are more than 70% occupied, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire earlier said. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) The Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) will pay 60% of in-process claims of hospitals by next week, its top official said on Thursday. PhilHealth President and CEO Dante Gierran told a House hearing that the state insurance agency has 17 billion in the pipeline to pay the dues. "Babayaran talaga 'yan," Gierran said during the chamber's inquiry. "So 17 out of 21 So itong 17 billion, nasa pipeline na ito. Hinihintay na lang po ang dokumentasyon." [Translation: We will really pay. It's 17 out of 21 billion The 17 billion is already in the pipeline. We're just waiting for documentation.] "Next week, babayaran ito60% kung magkano ang amount na dapat bayaran namin doon sa mga healthcare institutions, ay bayaran kaagad 'yan, outright, 60%," he also said. [Translation: Next week, we will pay this...60% of what we need to pay healthcare institutions, we will pay them, outright, 60%.] Gierran added the payment will be done through the Debit-Credit Payment method. The pronouncement came amid the outcry of medical groups, which have warned that disengaging with PhilHealth will be a "natural consequence" if hospitals would not be paid for their claims. The state health insurer earlier issued a circular on the possible conditional stoppage of payment for claims of healthcare providers being investigated for "fraudulent acts, unethical acts and abuse of authority." RELATED: Hospital groups: Ties with PhilHealth 'bound to collapse' Meanwhile, President Rodrigo Duterte also directed PhilHealth to release the badly needed payment for hospitals, his spokesperson Harry Roque said. "Inulit ni Presidente ang kautusan niya kay Atty. Gierran: bayaran 'yan nang bayaran," Roque said during his media briefing. [Translation: The President reiterated his order for Atty. Gierran: Pay what needs to be paid.] "Dahil sa panahon ng pandemya, we cannot afford to lose the cooperation of the private hospitals na nagbibigay po ng 60-70% ng mga pangangailangan nating kalusugan." [Translation: Because of the pandemic, we cannot afford to lose the cooperation of the private hospitals which provide 60-70% of our healthcare needs.] CNN Philippines Correspondent Gerg Cahiles contributed to this report. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 26) After Health Secretary Francisco Duque criticized the limited impact of the government's contact tracing app, an official issued a defense on Thursday that StaySafe has been effective in cutting the spread of the coronavirus. Interior Undersecretary Epimaco Densing said 115 people were prohibited from entering establishments in July alone after their StaySafe apps showed they're positive for COVID-19. "Meron hong 115 na ating kababayan na ayon sa CDRs (COVID-19 data repository system) ng Department of Health ay kumpirmado pong COVID-19 positive na sumubok pumasok sa mga establishimyento. At dahil nagwork ang ating StaySafe, hindi po sila pinapasok sa establishments," he said in a media briefing. "Ito ay isang pamamaraan para pigilan ang potensyal na pagkalat ng COVID-19," he added. [Translation: We have 115 Filipinos who were confirmed to be positive for COVID-19 but tried to enter establishments. They were not able to enter because StaySafe worked. This is one tool to stop the spread of COVID-19.] The government's official contact tracing app is required in all establishments. Customers need to scan the QR code before entering stores. Its main purpose is to inform users if they have been exposed to someone who's infected. Densing said Duque was possibly not updated on how many people are accessing the app when he said it is "very limited" and has "almost no impact" on Wednesday. Densing added that the DILG's information technology group has been asked to alert its personnel if a patient is trying to go out in public so they can get in touch with concerned local government units. The DILG, which is in charge of contact tracing efforts, said over 6.4 million individuals are registered with the StaySafe app. Meanwhile, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque expressed concern over the DOH chiefs remarks. We will ask the DICT to explain kung bakit ganyan ang naging conclusion ni Secretary Duque [why Secretary Duques conclusion was like that]. In any event, thats a cause for concern for the (presidential) palace because alam natin importanteng-importante ang automation para sa [automation is very important for] contact tracing, Roque said. Speaking to CNN Philippines, Contact Tracing czar Benjamin Magalong said the StaySafe app "still helps," especially its digital logbook feature. However, he noted that the challenge is in terms of integrating the digital and manual logs since not all establishments use the app or any other system for contact tracing. This is why they encourage LGUs to develop their own platforms, or make use of the StaySafe app if they do not have any. Magalong said they are also currently finalizing the TanodKontraCOVID (TKC), which will serve as a central platform where all contact tracing apps - including StaySafe - will be integrated. This will be the only source of national and local authorities for information for their contact tracing efforts, he added. The system has been tested in Quezon City and now in some areas in Baguio City for the past three weeks, he said. Magalong added that they are also hoping the joint administrative order for the TKC will be signed in the next two weeks by the DILG, DICT (Department of Information and Communications Technology), DOH, and NPC (National Privacy Commission) in order to implement the platform. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 27) President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday evening once again defended the overlaying of crushed dolomite on the shore of Manila Bay, as he recalled the projects of his administration. During a recorded "Talk to the People" program, Duterte asked Department of Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Roy Cimatu to present the agency's previous initiatives, which included the rehabilitation of Boracay and Manila Bay. Duterte then hit back at critics of the so-called Manila Bay "white sand" project, which had drawn the doubt and ire of experts and environmentalists. "Dolomite is beautiful to the eyes. Period," said the President. "Wag ka nang magtanong kasi hindi naman ninyo kaya kung kayo [Do not ask, because you would not be able to do it]." "For so many years, you had every chance to do it. Was there anybody willing to take the problem by its horns?" he added. The 389-million project aimed to improve the bay's water quality and the coastline's appearance, but it has been heavily condemned as experts deemed it ineffective in actually addressing the area's environmental issues. Other critics called it a waste of taxpayers' money. Marine scientists from the University of the Philippines also said the sand could pose health problems given that dolomite has fine particles which can be inhaled. However, the Health Department denied that the sand could cause adverse health effects. Criticism fell on deaf ears as the government dumped a fresh batch of sand in April this year. But Duterte himself earlier admitted that the sand gets washed away and needs continuous replenishment until there is a "good alternative." (CNN) Hong Kong's national security police are investigating the group behind the city's annual June 4 vigil, which commemorates pro-democracy protesters who died in the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown in Beijing, according to a letter to organizers seen by CNN. The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China must submit personal details of all its directors and members, including their names, dates of birth, addresses, contact information and roles, the police letter said. It also demanded the group formed more than three decades ago to support those protesting for democracy in Beijing provide all meeting records with political groups in Hong Kong, Taiwan and overseas, as well as its source of income. The police letter said the request was made because it was "reasonable to believe" it would help investigate possible crimes against national security. The alliance must provide the information within 14 days, or they could be prosecuted, it added. Hong Kong police confirmed to CNN in a statement that they had requested "certain persons" provide information that is "related to the maintenance of national security," but declined to provide more details. The letter came after public broadcaster RTHK reported this week that the alliance has considered disbanding following Beijing's promulgation last year of a sweeping national security law that criminalizes secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces. In the wake of the legislation, the city's political and social landscape has been transformed. Under the security law, protesters, journalists and pro-democracy figures have been arrested; newsrooms have been raided and forced to shut down; textbooks, films and websites face new censorship; and civic organizations including labor unions have folded after pressure from authorities. The Hong Kong Alliance has held the annual candlelight vigil on the anniversary of the crackdown since 1990. The events of Tiananmen Square began with protesters in Beijing, mostly college students, gathering in the heart of the Chinese capital to mourn the death of an ousted former leader then, to push for governmental reform and greater democracy. In the early hours of June 4, the Chinese military entered the square, with orders to put down the protests. No official death toll has ever been released, but rights groups estimate hundreds, if not thousands were killed. The protests and crackdown have been wiped from the history books in China, censored and controlled. The annual candlelight vigil in Hong Kong has been, for decades, the only mass memorial held on Chinese soil. But the vigil's days appear to be numbered. This year's event was banned by authorities, citing coronavirus restrictions. Hong Kong's Security Bureau also warned that attending or promoting any June 4 rally could violate the national security law and result in imprisonment. This story was first published on CNN.com, "Hong Kong national security police investigate Tiananmen Square vigil organizers." (CNN) Over 100 Afghan journalists and their families arrived in Mexico on Wednesday after requesting humanitarian protection, according to a statement from Mexico's Foreign Ministry. The group of 124 people whose lives would have been in danger in Afghanistan consisted of media workers and their families, including children, according to the statement. They arrived to Mexico City International Airport early on Wednesday. Mexico's Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said the decision to offer protection to the journalists is "congruent with the historical position of Mexico." "It's about those who are risking their lives to inform, to communicate; who are committed to freedom of expression," he said, adding that the group included reporters and local staff members from "many media who have applied for humanitarian visas to Mexico due to the latest events." The foreign ministry added in the statement that the travel and living costs during their stay in Mexico will be covered by private sponsors and civil society organizations. The Committee to Protect Journalists has warned that Afghan journalists face extreme dangers amid the Taliban takeover. At least three female Afghan journalists have been murdered this year, according to Reporters Without Borders (RSF), while one was shot dead by a gunman in December 2020. The New York Times said Wednesday that a group of Afghans who worked for the newspaper, along with their families, were part of the group. According to a statement issued by the Mexican Foreign Ministry, the director of International News for the New York Times, Michael Slackman, thanked Mexico for its support and "the rapid dispatch by Mexico's government of safe transportation for journalists." In the statement, Slackman also urged "the entire international community to follow this example and to continue working on behalf of the brave Afghan journalists who are still in danger." RSF said the Taliban was already imposing harsh constraints on the news media -- even as it made promises about protecting press freedom. "Officially, the new Afghan authorities have not issued any regulations, but the media and reporters are being treated in an arbitrary manner," RSF secretary-general Christophe Deloire said in a statement. The group said that at least ten journalists have been subjected to violence or threats while working in the streets of Kabul and Jalalabad in the past week. Many of the western media that had presence in Afghanistan have evacuated their foreign correspondents and local staff in recent weeks, following the Taliban takeover. This story was first published on CNN.com 'Mexico welcomes more than 100 Afghan journalists fleeing the Taliban' (CNN) Concerns about security around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul have increased based on "a very specific threat stream" from ISIS-K about planned attacks against crowds outside the airport, a US defense official has told CNN. The US believes ISIS-K, which is a sworn enemy of the Taliban, wants to create mayhem at the airport and has intelligence streams suggesting it is capable and planning to carry out multiple attacks, according to the official. The US Embassy in Kabul advised US citizens at a number of gates at the airport to "leave immediately," noting "security threats outside the gates." "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising U.S. citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a U.S. government representative to do so," the alert said. On Tuesday, as he confirmed his decision not to extend the evacuation deadline beyond August 31, President Joe Biden acknowledged the growing threat the group poses to the airport. "Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians," Biden said. Concerns increased after more than 100 prison inmates loyal to the ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan escaped from two prisons near Kabul as the Taliban advanced on the Afghan capital, CNN has learned. One regional counter-terrorism source told CNN that as many as several hundred members of ISIS-K may have escaped from the jails at Bagram and Pul-e-Charkhi, both to the east of Kabul. Both prisons fell to the Taliban shortly before they entered Kabul. A Taliban spokesman would not address reports of the escapes when asked by CNN Wednesday, saying only they were not confirmed. As for the risk of terrorist attacks at and around the airport, a Taliban spokesman said Tuesday: "There have been reports that some ill-wishers want to disrupt the security situation there by attacking and harming people and the media. So don't go close to the airport to avoid being hurt." According to officials in the previous Afghan government, there were approximately 5,000 inmates at the Bagram facility when the US left it in July. They included members of the Taliban, al Qaeda and ISIS as well as ordinary criminals. ISIS-Khorasan is a branch of the terror group that first emerged in Syria and Iraq. While the affiliates share an ideology and tactics, the depth of their relationship with regards to organization and command and control has never been entirely established. US intelligence officials previously told CNN the ISIS-K membership includes "a small number of veteran jihadists from Syria and other foreign terrorist fighters," saying that the US had identified 10 to 15 of their top operatives in Afghanistan. The group's name comes from its terminology for the area that includes Afghanistan and Pakistan: "Khorasan." The US Defense Department Inspector-General for Afghanistan said in a report covering the months April to June of this year that "ISIS-Khorasan exploited the political instability and rise in violence during the quarter by attacking minority sectarian targets and infrastructure to spread fear and highlight the Afghan government's inability to provide adequate security." ISIS-K has formed cells in Kabul, which have carried out a number of devastating suicide attacks in and beyond the Afghan capital since 2016. In May this year, ISIS-K attacked a school for girls in Kabul and killed at least 68 people, wounding more than than 165, most of them girls, according to a Defense Intelligence Agency assessment cited by the inspector general. And in June at least 10 people were killed and 16 others wounded in an attack on the British-American HALO Trust demining charity. ISIS-Khorasan claimed responsibility for the assault on the camp in northeastern Baghlan Province. The group has built up a presence in eastern Afghanistan in recent years, especially in the provinces of Nangahar and Kunar. Last August, the group attacked the main prison in Jalalabad, the capital of Nangahar, in an effort to free dozens of their supporters who had been captured by the Afghan army and police. This story has been updated with the US Embassy warning Americans at certain airport gates to leave. This story was first published on CNN.com, "US concerned about 'very specific threat stream' from ISIS-K against crowds outside Kabul airport" Regulators also look for reporting patterns that can be corroborated by additional evidence. For example, reports of Guillain-Barre syndrome should be more common in people over 50 than in younger adults. This can help researchers identify potential adverse events that were not detected in clinical trials. Because VAERS claims are self-reported, they tell us something about what ordinary people, as opposed to doctors and medical researchers, think about vaccine safety. In other words, people who feel that a vaccine is responsible for a side effect they might be experiencing can log that concern with the federal government, whether or not those claims would stand scrutiny in rigorous clinical testing. Source: AdobeStock / mehaniq41 Only a third of South Korean crypto exchanges have met the minimum requirements to register with the financial regulator ahead of next months deadline with 24 already all but confirming they will close. But political pressure is mounting on the regulator, with a growing group of MPs pushing for an extension. Exchanges have until September 24 to meet the Financial Services Commission (FSC)s registration standards and make formal operating license applications. But thus far, only one the market leader Upbit has managed to do so. With less than a month to go, a staggering 24 trading platforms have effectively thrown in the towel, the FSCs view. A number of exchanges have already told their customers that they are closing, while international trading platforms such as Binance, a popular platform among South Korean bitcoin (BTC) and altcoin traders, have backed away from the market after hearing that they too must register or face punitive measures. Per TVChosun, as well as Donga and Money Today, documents released by an inter-ministerial panel show that out of 63 exchanges, 21 have obtained the Information Security Management System (ISMS) certification that the regulator regards as the most basic requirement of the registration process. But 24 have not even applied for ISMS documentation. The remaining 18, the documents show, have applied for ISMS certification, but are yet to hear whether their applications have been successful. Donga added that should this remainder fail to gain certification before September 24, they too would almost certainly be forced to close. The FSC repeated a warning that exchanges failing to submit their documents before the deadline will have no choice but to close or suspend their operations. And Money Today quoted an FSC official as claiming that customers with funds on non-ISMS certified platforms should take extra care. The official stated that customers could suffer damages when these platforms closed and should take pre-emptive measures, such as withdrawing fiat and virtual assets in advance if necessary. Optimists will hope for a last-gasp reprieve from parliament: A growing number of MPs from the main opposition Peoples Power Party have backed a private members bill that would extend the deadline to March 2022. Per News1 and Asia Kyungjae, lawmakers Yoon Chang-hyeon, Yoon Jae-ok, Yoon Ju-kyung, Sung Il-jong, Cho Myung-hee and Lee Young attended a public meeting along with senior officials and CEOs from leading crypto exchanges such as Bithumb, ProBit, Foblgate and Hanbitco. Cho is the main architect of the bill, but the measure may not make it out of the committee stage in time to beat the deadline. At the meeting, a ProBit executive complained that cryptocurrency exchanges are being treated in the same manner as casinos. Cho stated that while people will suffer from the regulatory measures, the government does nothing but impose taxes a reference to the fact that a 20% tax levy on crypto trading profits will come into force from next year. Lee, meanwhile, called on the regulator to extend the deadline and use the time to make an effort to organize and improve the industry. ____ Learn more: - Upbit is First South Korean Exchange to Apply for Operating Permit - A Crypto Coin Run Could Be Brewing in South Korea - All of South Koreas Crypto Exchanges Fail their Regulatory Audits - Nerve-wracking Wait for S Korean Crypto Investors, 70% of Crypto Firms Sites Down - South Korean Crypto Exchanges Plead for 6 Months of Regulatory Mercy - S Korean Regulator to Force Crypto Overseas Exchanges to Abide by its Rules - Smaller South Korean Crypto Exchanges Begin to Shutdown, Suspend Services - S Korean Presidential Campaign Team Member Jailed for Shilling Scamcoin Part of the Interior Departments work includes identifying potential burial sites at former schools and documenting the names and tribal affiliations of the students buried there. The agency has promised to work with with tribes on how best to protect the sites and respect families and communities. The lawmakers in their letter described the boarding school era as a stain in Americas history. They wrote that revisiting that history undoubtedly will be traumatic for survivors and their communities. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} We are confident that IHS is equipped to consider ways to prevent inflicting or worsening existing intergenerational trauma, the letter reads. The Indian Health Service said Monday that Native American youths are 2.5 times more likely to experience trauma compared to their non-Native peers and that the agency aims to provide a safe, supportive, welcoming, nonpunitive, respectful, healthy and healing environment for all patients and staff. Still, it will take work to ensure services are widely available, as criticism of the Indian Health Service and chronic funding inadequacies have spanned decades and numerous presidential administrations. The pandemic exacerbated health care disparities seen in many Indigenous communities. College editor's pick alert featured Carlisle With vaccine mandate in place, students return to Dickinson College campus Wednesday Dickinson College/Dan Loh Vehicles line up to deliver first-year students on move-in day for the first-year students at Dickinson College Wednesday. Dickinson College/Dan Loh Student volunteers help first-year students move into their dorm rooms at Dickinson College Wednesday. Dickinson College interim President John E. Jones III talks with students on first-year move-in day Wednesday. Dickinson College/Dan Loh Student volunteers help first-year students move into their dorm rooms at Dickinson College Wednesday. Dickinson College/Dan Loh Student volunteers help first-year students move into their dorm rooms at Dickinson College Wednesday. Dickinson College/Dan Loh Student volunteers help first-year students move into their dorm rooms at Dickinson College Wednesday. For the first time in two years, a line of cars snaked through the upper quad of the Dickinson College campus in Carlisle Wednesday. Each one carried a first-year student and all the things they would need to settle in for a full year of in-person instruction. To say that they and the student volunteers and staff who welcomed them were excited might be considered an understatement. Its really exciting. I couldnt be more eager to get started with the students, said interim President John E. Jones III, who mingled with students and their families during the move-in. More than 650 students representing 35 states, the District of Columbia and 23 foreign countries arrived on campus. Getting them there safely took some planning. The delta variant clearly caused all of us to revisit some of the assumptions that we made, Jones said. 'Not easy to leave': Dickinson College president Margee Ensign announces resignation Ensign said she is returning to Yola, Nigeria, this summer to become president of American University of Nigeria, a role she previously held before becoming president of Dickinson in 2017. The college announced in May that all students would be required to be vaccinated following the American College Health Associations recommendation to do so. As case counts in the region increased over the past month, Dickinson instituted an indoor mask mandate. The next step was to make vaccinations mandatory for all faculty and staff. According to the college website, 80% of college employees have already submitted proof of vaccination. Were happy for that, but we want to close that gap, Jones said. Nettie Vernon, an archaeology major from Sugar Valley, said she was looking forward to a new environment and meeting new people, but had been concerned about classes continuing in person given the rise of the delta variant. Since they mandated vaccines, I wasnt as worried, she said. The vaccine has been the ticket to college life returning to something closer to normal. Its really nice to be getting back to a normal kind of life, said Grayson Walker, an economics major from Kennett Square. From all the emails Ive gotten and everything Ive heard from various group chats, it seems like they have a good plan for almost everything. The vaccine requirement allows us some freedom. Were asking students to be mindful of physical distancing, but theyre going to be in classes like they typically are. Theyre going to be eating in the cafeteria, said Angie Harris, associate vice president of student life. Dickinson College to require COVID-19 vaccinations for students this fall Dickinsons decision follows a recommendation by the American College Health Association to require the COVID-19 vaccination for all students living on college and university campuses for the fall 2021 semester. Jones said the college has also put in place a robust testing program since vaccinated people can carry the virus without showing symptoms. Students were also tested prior to arrival on campus and quarantined when appropriate. Jones said Dickinson College has contingency plans if the pandemic worsens again but, at this point, he doesnt see any trends that indicate those plans may be necessary. Dickinson is a residential liberal arts college. If you take the residential part out and you just leave the liberal arts, the hole in that is significant, he said. Dickinson College seminar a lesson in freedom, college prep Im 100% sure I can do it and I am going to do amazing while Im at college. Im just so confident, CV student Yareliz Cordero-Rodriguez said. For Mary Stanley, who traveled to Dickinson from the Nashville area, the concern that in-person classes could be scuttled due to a rising case count has been real. That has always been my biggest thing, she said. In the back of my mind, the big thing would be to be sent home from college, especially going so far away. Amanda Tran, a member of the class of 2024, will be a resident assistant in the newly named Spradley-Young Hall and was on hand to help students move in. Though her first year at Dickinson was marked by the pandemic, she said she was happy for the new arrivals. Im honestly really grateful that Dickinson took those steps since last year so that this year we can bring the class of 2025 back all together, she said. Its so exciting. Theyre all so thrilled to be in college. Its not only the newbies on campus. Harris said student-athletes have been back on campus for a few weeks and she recently chatted with an international student who was last on campus in March 2020. Theyre just so thrilled to see each other again, she said. As staff, were so thrilled. We dont do this work because we like sitting at a computer and looking at a screen and talking to students. Its the interaction, its the connections we make with them that weve been missing for 18 plus months. The state Department of Health reported 66 new cases of COVID-19 and two deaths for Cumberland County Thursday. That brings the county's total case count to 21,951 and the total number of deaths to 540. The county's seven-day average of cases now sits at 52. Its 14-day per capita rate sits at 266.8. The county now has 11 deaths reported for the month of August after reporting three in July and two in June. The county reported 13 deaths in May. Thursday's report included 203 total test results, with 26 probable cases. Comparing just the number of negative tests (137) and confirmed positive tests (40), the county saw 22.6% of its tests come back positive. The number of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 dropped to 42 in Thursday's report, a decrease of two from Wednesday, with 14 in intensive care and four on ventilators. The southcentral region reported 489 cases Thursday. York County reported 174 cases, Dauphin County 65, and Franklin County 53. The Health Department confirmed 3,333 additional new positive cases of COVID-19 in the state Thursday and 27 more deaths. As the hospitality industry, in particular, confronts worker shortages, these apps are helping form an ultra-short-term worker-employee relationship, something that hasn't widely existed in recent decades. Walker noted that even students with no relevant experience could sign up with one of these apps and likely find paid work as brief as a couple of hours that fits their schedule from week to week. In contrast to Stint, Instawork and Gigpro are suited more for skilled or experienced workers who want or need short-term shifts. Collectively, the newer apps represent a variation on the many gig apps that sprang up in recent years from Uber and DoorDash to TaskRabbit and Thumbtack that typically serve households in need of a one-time service. What distinguishes the latest apps is that they link workers with employers that have a steady need for labor but don't necessarily want to commit to permanent hires given the uncertainties from the pandemic. Its no surprise that during COVID, when everything became virtual that these ... marketplaces might have exploded, said Fiona Greig, co-president of the JPMorgan Chase Institute, a global financial thinktank, whose research expertise includes the online platform economy. Dear Editor: Federal, state, and local governments across the country have imposed eviction moratoriums for renters. The courts have upheld them. So renters, perhaps rightly so, cannot be evicted for failure to pay rent. Yet, taxpayers continue to pay for these same renters to collect weekly checks for living expenses. It would be much more appropriate for those payments to go directly to landlords. Its the landlord who has to pay the mortgage, taxes, maintenance, and associated business expenses. If the government, its agencies, and courts insist on eviction moratoriums while rent payments are denied, then there should be a moratorium on any rental property requirement to pay mortgages, insurance, code repairs, and all property taxes. Why is it appropriate to reward renters at the expense of rental property owners? The government provides limited relief to businesses and homeowners who continue to be required to pay property taxes, but it is not nearly enough as evidenced by the recent Sentinel article of Aug. 22. There needs to be a moratorium on taxes and expenses for property and homeowners just as there is for rent. Dear Editor: Fearmongering is a strategy for convincing others to adopt the position of the fear monger. It is a form of bullying praying upon the uninformed, who are made to feel afraid of the consequences of not accepting the version of the fear monger's "truth." Ironically, the position of the fear monger is often rooted in ignorance and fear of change. Fearmongering is a default tactic today used to compel people to think like you. The recipe includes maintaining a level of illiteracy about the thing you are rebuking, misrepresenting that thing through exaggeration and distortion, assigning a label to it that evokes fear, and predicting dire outcomes if it is allowed to exist. What better example of this than the recent letter to the editor, "The military and Marxism." Critical race theory (CRT) does not propose that "individual behavior is insignificant," that correcting systemic racism requires "the tearing up of our Constitution," or "calls for the destruction of American Society." This is the type of rhetoric we have become accustomed to and represents fearmongering at its worst creating fear over even learning about an alternative way of understanding. The option from Digital Ally that Chapman recommended would be a $2,048 upfront cost for the four body cameras and equipment and one year of service. It would then be $1,968 yearly after that. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Davis said they would wait to vote on it until next months meeting after they nail down the final numbers and figure out if they would be locked into a five-year contract. In the most recent budget, the board approved $500 for body cameras. But Davis said they may be able to get to some grant money to help. He said its something the department needs at some point. I'm a fan, he added. I get the aspect of people wanting to know what's going on, (but) for your guys safety. I think it covers you. During the meeting, the board also discussed the Woodlawn Drive project. Joe Gabel with Taylor Engineering and Margaret Yates, the grant administrator for the Southeast Missouri Regional Planning Commission, attended the meeting. They were there to close up the widening part of the project. Yates said the hearing was required to give residents the chance to comment on the completed project. This is the last piece of the puzzle, she added. Davis also discussed the next phase of the project. The Missouri Department of Natural Resources awarded a $50,000 Clean Water Engineering Report Grant to the city of Potosi to evaluate the citys wastewater system. According to a news release, the departments Clean Water Engineering Report Grant program offers funding to small communities for wastewater engineering costs incurred in preparation of a facility plan report. The city will use the grant to develop the report, intended to identify wastewater system improvements needed to continue reliable service to the area, meet permit requirements and reduce inflow and infiltration of stormwater into sewer collection pipes. The facility plan should be complete in January 2023. Water and wastewater systems are essential infrastructure that support the health and economic vitality of a community. Through the grant, the city has an opportunity to assess their plant and identify improvements for efficiency and effectiveness, capacity, and to satisfy public health and water quality regulations. This will help the community plan for future growth and development and determine what actions are needed to address their wastewater needs. Veterans in Defense of Libertys Liberty Riders of America Division is hosting the Third Annual Missouri Vietnam Wall Run 2021, with a leg that includes Fredericktown. This two-day veterans motorcycle event begins on Sept. 17 National POW/MIA Recognition Day and continues Sept. 18. The weekend event will honor Americas POW-MIAs, fallen and all Vietnam veterans. During the 2019 Wall Run, Gov. Mike Parson presented a proclamation recognizing the annual Vietnam Wall Run as the Official Missouri Ride for Remembrance. This statewide motorcycle run will ride to veterans events and the Missouri National Veterans Memorial in Perryville, which has a wall identical to the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} A ceremony with guest speakers will follow, featuring keynote speaker and Medal of Honor recipient Patrick Henry Brady, who was a Dust Off pilot in Vietnam and is the most highly-decorated veteran living. A special guest is also slated to be The Saluting Marine, veteran Staff Sergeant Tim Chambers, USMC. Chambers has become known to the world for standing at attention for hours during the Rolling Thunder event held each spring in Washington D.C. to honor veterans and raise awareness for POW/MIA issues. STOCKHOLM (AP) Her cannons firing a powerful salute, a full-size replica of an armed merchant ship that sank in 1745 sailed into port at the Swedish capital Thursday, ahead of a voyage to Asia next year. Drawing crowds in every port she visits, the nearly 60-meter (197-feet) long Gotheborg of Sweden is billed the worlds largest operational wooden sailing vessel and will be used to promote Swedish businesses and culture, and advocate for sustainability. Its the first time in six years that the three-masted ship has left her home port in western Sweden, so the trip offered a chance to bring the new crew up to speed. The ship is actually made for ocean passages, said 26-year-old Marielle Cocozza, the second in command. Shes missing the oceans and this trip to Stockholm is to prepare us to work together and I think that has been achieved. In 1745, the original Gotheborg ran aground and sank just outside her home port of Goteborg at the end of her third round trip to China. More than 130 men were on board, and all survived. The ship was owned by the Swedish East India Company, which traded with China and completed a total of 132 voyages with 37 vessels until it ceased operating in 1813. The PHA is applying to the city to rezone the property and will lead efforts to finance the venture and receive low-income housing grants. Rental prices have not been determined yet, but all of the apartments will be considered affordable They will pursue tax credit through Low-Income Housing Tax Credit, which accounts for approximately 90% of low-income housing in the United States, but will have to be in line with LITHTC guidelines, which vary. Wardell said the main concerns hes heard from the community are increased traffic, adequacy of provided parking and preservation of existing trees, sidewalks and trails on-site. The project team made some changes to the original plan after hearing these concerns in order to avoid critical slopes and limit the number of trees that would have to be removed. Community members have voiced concerns about parking overflow into the neighboring community of Locust Grove neighborhood. The project has to meet specific parking requirements under zoning laws. PHA Director Sunshine Mathon said the team has evaluated other senior properties that the organization operates in Charlottesville and the surrounding area, such as Carlton Views II and Timberlake Place Apartments to determine an appropriate number of parking spots. PHAs informal assessment of the parking needs is around three quarters of a parking spot per apartment. Previously, employees were expected to get the vaccine, Adams said. Under the new policy, employees can request an exemption from the requirement due to medical or religious reasons, according to the release. The vaccine was previously authorized for emergency use; it did not have full FDA approval. Under that authorization, people had the option to accept or refuse the vaccine, according to the FDAs website. Wendy Horton, the chief executive officer for the medical center, said during the briefing that the FDAs full approval of the Pfizer vaccine was one of many factors that went into the decision to mandate the vaccine. Every week, multiple times a week, we have looked at whats happening nationwide; weve looked at guidance from the CDC and many different organizations to help shape our policy decision, Horton said. I think it was one more aspect of a conversation and really weighing the evidence, along with where we are locally. Whats happening locally with our own vaccination rates, the patient population, and how were doing across the Commonwealth. The science surrounding booster shots is still being reviewed by the FDA and CDC. Shirley said some studies show COVID immunity appears to lessen as time goes by, which results in the need for a booster. The COVID vaccine remains very effective, but we are seeing breakthrough infections, and we hope that booster shots could prevent even mild to moderate disease, she said. Its thought that a third dose could boost that back up. Although immunity may wane, it does not disappear. We have not seen the data that show breakthrough infections leading to hospitalization, or being put on ventilators or dying from COVID, Sifri said. Were seeing infections after vaccinations and that may be all it is. It is an effective vaccine. The question is where is the point where we may need a booster and thats what the CDC and the FDA are going to be looking at. Shirley said the first groups vaccinated in the push to roll out the shots in winter and spring 2021 will be probably be the first to get a booster dose. That means those living in nursing homes and care facilities and health care workers would be first up for the boosters. The operation is really complex, with lots of moving parts and shared responsibilities across many government agencies at the federal, state and local levels, Neely said. Defense officials have not provided specific information on how many Afghans have been processed at Fort Lee or how many are there currently, but an Army spokesperson said the military has capacity for up to 15,000 people at four bases and is working to increase that capacity to 22,000 by the end of this week. The other bases are Fort McCoy in Wisconsin, Fort Bliss in Texas and joint base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New Jersey. The U.S. Northern Command, a joint force established in 2002, is expanding the initiative to include Fort Pickett, near Blackstone, and Quantico, in Prince William County, in coordination with other federal agencies. The program already is using the Dulles Expo Center in Chantilly, in Fairfax, to temporarily house people arriving at Dulles. Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-7th, whose congressional district includes Fort Pickett, said her office is seeking more information from the Defense Department on the bases role and its effect on the surrounding communities. Spanberger also expressed gratitude to the Virginia National Guard, based at Fort Pickett, for its work during this rapidly changing situation. Yes. I will do my part to conserve household energy usage, even if I'm uncomfortable in my home. No. It is too hot to conserve household energy usage. I already conserve, even before ERCOT requested it. Maybe, depending on the reason ERCOT provides and whether or not I am home during that time. Vote View Results Botswanas regulator has found operator BTC (Botswana Telecommunications Corporation) guilty of violating its licence terms by preventing a competitor from accessing high-speed data connectivity. TeleGeography reports that the operator was also found to have priced retail services below their cost of provision. The Botswana Communications Regulatory Authority (BOCRA) has informed BTC that it will be penalised unless the situation is resolved in 30 days. Local outlet Points Chauds reported that ISP Inq.Digital alerted BOCRA that BTC was demanding predatory and excessive wholesale fees for its ADSL service, and that it was preventing ISPs from accessing its faster VDSL technology altogether despite offering VDSL to its retail customers. BTC claimed that its refusal to provide ISPs with wholesale VDSL was a deliberate step taken on its path towards winding down its wholesale business. BOCRA countered with the observation that BTC is still attracting new wholesale clients. With regard to its below-cost pricing, BTC conceded that it was providing its ADSL service to an enterprise client at this rate in order to retain them as a customer; BOCRA however ruled this action to be an unjustifiable breach of BTCs licence. A second data centre is on the cards for Huawei in Mexico, according to reports from an online event marking two years since Huaweis first Latin American data centre opened in Chile. The precise location of the planned site has not yet been revealed. Brazils Sao Paulo and Santiago each saw Huawei data centre openings earlier this year, bringing, with the new Mexican facility, a total of six data centres two each to the companys three Latin America cloud regions in Brazil, Mexico and Chile. The Bnamericas news service reports that each region will have a main site and smaller, supporting data centre. To these can be added eight Huawei availability zones and nine points-of-presence (PoP) for cloud services across Latin America. Nor is activity likely to slow down. Reports indicate a variety of new regions, availability zones and content-delivery networks (CDNs) are due to be launched by Huawei throughout Latin America, including CDNs in Paraguay and Uruguay, before the end of this year. Bnamericas says CDNs in Bolivia, Barbados, Suriname, Belize, Bahamas, Guyana, Jamaica and Nicaragua are likely to follow; they will be served by core data centres in the nearby cloud regions. Latin America seems to be enjoying quite a lot of data centre activity lately, driven by demand from a variety of sectors ranging from media, gaming and tourism to banking retail and mining as well, of course, as government. AWS, Microsoft and Google are also big players in the area, and Oracle recently confirmed the launch of a Mexican cloud region for 2022. As a wildfire approached her Moscow Mountain rental home Monday, Ruth Garfield smelled smoke but was unsure of how close the danger truly was. When she heard a helicopter overhead, Ruth said she went onto her back porch to see if she could catch a glimpse. It was then she saw the fire that would swallow the home roaring up the hill perhaps 30 yards away. Their next pretrial hearing in the federal case is scheduled for Sept. 9. More than two months after Arbery's slaying on Feb. 23, 2020, no one had been charged in his killing. Then cellphone video of the shooting leaked online and a national outcry erupted. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation took over the case the next day and swiftly arrested the McMichaels and Bryan, who recorded the video. All three remain jailed on state murder charges and are scheduled to stand trial on those counts this fall in Glynn County Superior Court. Jury selection in the state case is scheduled to start Oct. 18. The McMichaels and Bryan won't face hate crime penalties at the state level because Georgia's hate crimes law wasn't adopted until after his slaying. At the time Arbery was killed, Georgia was one of just four U.S. states without a hate crimes law. Georgia lawmakers quickly passed one amid the outcry over his death. Attorneys for all three men charged in the case say they committed no crimes. The McMichaels lawyers have said they pursued Arbery, suspecting he was a burglar, after security cameras had previously recorded him entering a home under construction. They say Travis McMichael shot Arbery while fearing for his life as they grappled over a shotgun. The Darkhorse Battalion returned to California in April 2011. After months of intense fighting, theyd largely seized Sangin from the Talibans grip. It came at a heavy price. In addition to the 25 who perished, more than 200 returned home wounded, many with lost limbs, others with scars harder to see. Some who served with the Darkhorse Battalion are having a hard time seeing it any way other than that their efforts, their blood and the lives of their fallen friends were for nothing. Im starting to feel like how the Vietnam vets felt. There was no purpose to it whatsoever, said Sutton, 32, who now works in the veterans services office of a county outside Chicago. We were able to hold our head up high and say we went to the last Taliban stronghold and we gave them hell, Sutton said, only for it all to be taken away. In the blink of an eye. Former Sgt. George Barba of Menifee, California, 34, works as a private security guard near Los Angeles. He and his wife are expecting their first child. He said hes had trouble sorting his feelings about the bleak news from Afghanistan. GENEVA On a hot day, the volunteer firefighters with the Geneva Fire Department could easily drink a case of bottled water, especially during training or an actual emergency. So the delivery of 92 cases of canned drinking water was a welcomed sight Wednesday when a large beer truck pulled up outside the volunteer fire station in downtown Geneva and more than 2,200 cans of water were unloaded. Anheuser-Busch and Adams Beverages donated cases of canned drinking water from its brewery in Cartersville, Georgia. The brewery periodically pauses its beer production to can clean and safe drinking water that is then delivered to communities in times of need, such as following a natural disaster or during sweltering temperatures. Volunteer firefighters put on layers of protective gear to fight fires regardless of the temperature outside. Staying hydrated is important, Geneva Fire Chief Ben Latimer said. The canned drinking water will come in handy for those occasions, he said. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} It will certainly go to a good cause, Latimer said. Since beginning the emergency drinking water program in 1988, Anheuser-Busch has donated more than 86 million cans of clean drinking water to U.S. communities affected by natural disasters and other crises. Dothan City and Houston County Schools are masking up after high numbers of COVID-19 cases in both school systems. The mask requirement across both districts will require all students in pre-K through 12 grades, staff, and visitors to wear masks on campuses while inside buildings, according to a joint press release. It will go into effect on Friday. A joint press conference to be held at 9:30 a.m. Thursday at the Dothan City Schools Board of Education is expected to give the public more details on the mandate. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Both school systems are on the heels of many other Wiregrass school districts that have begun mask mandates after the start of school due to a large number of students being sent home due to a positive COVID-19 test or possible exposure. Dr. Dennis Coe, DCS superintendent, previously told the Eagle the system would not mandate masks unless the administration was directed to do so. However, earlier this week, Dothan City Schools reported 70 positive cases of the virus among its 8,000 students with 200 students isolating after coming into contact with someone with the virus. The number makes up a low percentage of its students in isolation, but the positive case number is nearly double the districts high last year. Coe encourages vaccines for those who are eligible to receive them and wants people to consider the risk that comes with infection as hospitalizations climb among a younger cohort of the population than has been seen previously. In most cases, its not the mortality rate for children, its is not much greater for them than the regular flu, but heres the difference: their parents, the 20- to 40-year-olds with the Delta variant, their parents are the ones who are now lining the halls at Southeast Health and Flowers (Hospital), Coe said. Their parents are the ones who are on ventilators and dying. So, it may not be a huge scare for a child but it is most definitely a concern for anybody in their household or a close family member. Coe and White both said they expect mixed reactions to the mandate from parents though they expect more criticism. It was definitely something I knew I would get flak from, but I feel in my heart that is the right decision for our students, and given those numbers I think I would be foolish and I wouldnt be living up to my responsibility if I didnt pay attention to those numbers and make a call based on that, White said. The Freedom Rides Movement of 1961 sparked bombings and beatings by white mobs, as well as imprisonment for many of the Black and white riders. Yet the movement also brought about the eventual end of segregated transportation in the South. More than 400 people, ranging in age from 14 to 61, participated in the Freedom Rides. In June, July, August and September of 1961, more than 60 Freedom Riders traveled across the South, most of which ended in Mississippi. Upon his release from prison, Patton and 13 other students were expelled from Tennessee A&I now Tennessee State University. The school eventually granted them honorary doctoral degrees 47 years later, in 2008. Patton attended nonviolence workshops led by civil rights champion the Rev. James Lawson, where he was joined by fellow high-profile leaders such as Diane Nash, John Lewis and C.T. Vivian. He later went on to be a truck driver and jazz musician, while also remaining a vocal advocate and educator in the civil rights movement. In the decades after the movement, Rip spent hours sitting with young people in Nashvilles Civil Rights Room questioning them, challenging them, and urging them forward in their own work, Nashville Mayor John Cooper said in a tweet. Rips march was steady, and his call was clear, until the end. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Workers assemble a car in a factory of Ford in the northern province of Hai Duong. Photo courtesy of Ford Nearly 95 percent of auto parts produced in Vietnam are for foreign brands, showing a lack of localization in the industry. Of the 287 items that have been approved by the Ministry of Science and Technology as of Aug. 17, 15 were registered for VinFast cars. The rest were all for foreign brands. A total 226 were for Toyota, 15 for Ford and 10 for Honda. This means Toyota accounts for nearly 79 percent of the registered items. None of these items include parts for Hyundai and Mazda vehicles, although TC Motor (which assembles Hyundai cars) and Thaco (which assembles Mazda cars) have both previously affirmed they had "high" localization rates. TC Motor claims the rate at around 20 percent. Most parts are frames, chairs, and wires that are considered basic. There are no complicated parts like engines and gear boxes. Vietnamese officials have been calling for a higher localization rate of cars produced in the country for over two decades but the target has not been achieved. Italy and Romania have pledged to provide over 1.1 million doses of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine to Vietnam. Italy will give around 801,600 doses of them through global vaccine access mechanism Covax in September, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Romanian ambassador to Vietnam, Cristina Romila, symbolically handed over 300,000 doses to Vietnam at a ceremony Wednesday to Deputy Minister of Health Tran Van Thuan. Deputy Foreign Minister To Anh Dung said Romania was one of the first EU countries to donate Covid-19 vaccines to Vietnam, and requested the country to give as many more as it could spare. Romila said Vietnam was the first Asian country Romania aided with Covid-19 vaccines and would continue to stand with it in the fight against Covid-19. Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh had written to his Italian counterpart, Mario Draghi, requesting Covid vaccine support. Italy is the second largest donor in the EU to the Covax facility, having promised to give 15 million doses and $359 million in cash. It has also promised $2 million for the ASEAN Covid-19 response fund. Vietnam has so far vaccinated over 18 million people with over two million getting two shots. It aims to vaccinate 70 percent of its 96 million population by next year. Vietnam thanked China Tuesday for assisting the nation's Covid-19 fight with two million doses of vaccine against the disease. In a meeting with Chinese ambassador Xiong Bo in Hanoi, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh said he wished Vietnam and China will strengthen exchanges and bilateral cooperation, including cooperation in the Covid-19 fight. A press release by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs also said that the PM thanked China for its valuable and timely support with a donation of two million Covid-19 vaccine doses, saying it showcased the cooperative spirit between the two countries. He also wished that China continues its support for Vietnam by providing more vaccine doses, transferring production technology for vaccines as well as drugs for Covid-19 treatment; and sharing experiences in fighting the pandemic. Xiong Bo said China values its relationship with Vietnam and was willing to consider supporting Vietnam with more Covid-19 vaccine doses in the future. Vietnam has vaccinated around 17.6 million people with at least one Covid-19 vaccine shot. Over 1.9 million people have been fully vaccinated. The country aims to vaccinate 70 percent of its 96 million population by next year. Foreigners residing in Oman queue at the check-in counter at Muscat International Airport ahead of their repatriation flight from the Omani capital, May 12, 2020. Photo by AFP Oman has lifted a ban on travelers from 24 red-listed countries, including Vietnam, and will allow fully vaccinated travelers to enter from September 1. All arrivals will be required to show a negative PCR test result and to have received both doses of any vaccine approved in Oman. The sultanate has approved the emergency use of Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca, Sputnik V, and Sinovac vaccines. All passengers will however be required to take a PCR test on arrival and quarantine for seven days. Oman had added Vietnam to its travel ban list in June due to rising concerns over the Delta variant. Vietnam is currently facing its most challenging Covid outbreak, triggered by the Delta variant, and several countries have banned or imposed stricter quarantine measures for travelers from the country. In the current wave of Covid that began in late April, the country has recorded over 377,000 cases. It has vaccinated 18.09 million people, with 2.04 million getting two doses. The Indo-Pacific is in a position to rebuild in the wake of the pandemic and move forward to an even brighter future, in an even stronger rules-based international order, declared Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in a speech he gave in Singapore. I am confident that through our collective efforts the Indo-Pacific will again rise to the challenge, said Defense Secretary Austin. The answer, he said, involves three components, all of which are rooted in partnership. First, the most urgent task is recovery. We must redouble our fight against COVID and raise up a safer, healthier, and more prosperous future, he stated. Second, we must look further ahead and invest in deterrence as the cornerstone of American security. For decades, we have maintained the capabilities, the presence, and the relationships needed to ward off conflict and to preserve the stability, said Secretary of Defense Austin. Emerging threats and cutting-edge technologies are changing the face and the pace of warfare. So, we are operating under a new, 21st-century vision that I call integrated deterrence, said Defense Secretary Austin. That means using existing capabilities, and building new ones, and deploying them in new and networked ways. Third, the United States is simultaneously working with Taiwan to enhance its own capabilities and to increase its readiness to deter threats and coercion, upholding our commitments under the Taiwan Relations Act, and consistent with our one-China policy, said Defense Secretary Austin. Our supportive partnership with Taiwan is in stark contrast with actions taken by Beijing that continues to destabilize the region. Beijing's claim to the vast majority of the South China Sea has no basis in international law, said Secretary of Defense Austin. Unfortunately, Beijing's unwillingness to resolve disputes peacefully and respect the rule of law isn't just occurring on the water, warned Secretary Austin: We have also seen aggression against India, destabilizing military activity and other forms of coercion against Taiwan, and genocide and crimes against humanity against Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang. We will not flinch when our interests are threatened. Yet we do not seek confrontation, said Secretary of Defense Austin. The ultimate goal is to build a free and open Indo-Pacific region that extends partnership, prosperity, and progress. We are confident that together, said Secretary of Defense Austin, we can build a better and brighter future for all of our children. Located 23 miles south of Libby, the land surrounding the Libby Creek area has been of interest to prospectors since the early 1860s, when it was home to up to 600 miners working at a camp known as Libbysville. By 1876, only one miner was reported to be working the creek, but a second gold rush in 1885 brought another wave of miners to a new camp known as Lake City or Oldtown. A store in the mining camp was supplied by a packstring that brought supplies via a trail from Thompson Falls. Mining on the Creek hit its peak from 1889 to 1909. Hydraulic mining operations began around 1909 and continued until the late 1940s, when mining activities in the area began to trail off. The current gold panning area was acquired through a land exchange in 1987 and opened to the public the following year. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} With their claim just a short walk from Libby Creek, the Northwest Montana Gold Prospectors are continuing a 160-year tradition of prospecting in the area. The Northwest Montana Gold Prospectors started as a local group of mining and prospecting enthusiasts, but over the years it has seen hundreds of members from across the country. These days, it has about 60 active members. SPRING CREEK Fiber internet is on its way to Spring Creek, fulfilling a promise made to the residents two years ago. Mark Feest, CEO of CC Communications, recalled the day he approached the Spring Creek Association Board of Directors at their meeting on Aug. 27, 2019. At the time, CC was one of three vying broadband companies along with SafeLink (now Anthem Broadband) and Choice Broadband chosen for a closer look by the association as it sought a solution to residents internet problems. Feest outlined a plan to lay fiber optic cable in the trench carved out by Southwest Gas Corp. for its Spring Creek expansion. He also promised the SCA would not be obligated to pay any subsidy costs as the cable entered the homeowners association. We would not be asking to pay rent if we were on your property, Feest told the board at the time. He also explained that his company had expanded to other parts of the state, and we have a good handle on our cost. CC Communications has a lengthy history in Nevada, starting with telegraph services in 1889 with a $975 check from Churchill County Commissioners. Seven years later, telephone lines were installed in place of the telegraph lines. ELKO An estimated $25,000 worth of jewelry including a diamond necklace and a Rolex watch was taken from a man who was robbed and beaten inside an Elko convenience store on Aug. 13, according to police reports filed with criminal complaints against three men. The California man and his fiance were passing through Nevada when they stopped at the Maverik on Mountain City Highway about 25 minutes after midnight. A witness said three men approached them and one started talking to the man about his tattoo shop, telling him they should stay in Elko to visit the shop. An officer stated in the police report that a man later identified as Norman Wasson, 37, of Elko appeared to be distracting the victim as another suspect, later identified as Steven Mondragon, strikes him in the back of the head with a wine bottle from the store. Then Mondragon and the third man identified as Norbert L. Lenoir III, 23, of Carlin begin beating on the victim and kicking him. 2 arrested following robbery at Elko convenience store ELKO Two suspects have been arrested and a third is being sought after a man was robbed at a convenience store on Mountain City Highway. It is unclear from surveillance video if Norman strikes (the victim) however; Norman is observed fleeing the scene, the officer reported. The witness said all three men started jumping him. After police were called, the victim was taken to the hospital. The men were not arguing when the attack took place, according to a witness. As we move forward as a board, we feel its important that not only board members but the public have a better understanding of the purpose of the school board and our relationship with the superintendent, and our part in how the schools function in general, Dastrup said. So this training will provide a lot of that information. No hire: School board delays action on superintendent "The district would feel like they more represented if there were more than two board members appointing a superintendent. - Trustee Teresa Dastrup The recent resignations, along with the departure of Superintendent Dr. Michele Robinson and the resignation of Deputy Mike Smith from interim superintendent duties, were amid criticism from the public and action groups regarding Covid-19 mitigation policies. Dastrup said fear might be keeping potential applicants from seeking an appointment to the board, but she believes it could be the right time to unify the community after being divided for so long. Realize that our community is ready to come together and figure this out, she said. We are glad to have your applications and your resumes, and we look forward to those interviews. In-person trainings are scheduled for 9-11 a.m. and 5:30-7:30 p.m. Aug. 27 at Central Office, 850 Elm St. For those unable to attend the trainings, click the link to join in at 9 a.m. or 5:30 p.m. Aug. 27 on Zoom. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. The company will hold on-site vaccine events for employees over the next several weeks, the union statement said. On the cruise side, Disney will require all passengers ages 12 and older to be fully vaccinated on trips to the Bahamas. The decision comes days after that country announced it would not allow ships to enter its ports, including private islands owned by various cruise lines unless eligible passengers are fully vaccinated. The order runs from Sept. 3 through Nov. 1. Earlier this month, 26 crew members and one passenger tested positive for COVID-19 on a Carnival cruise just before the ship made a stop in Belize City. According to a statement from Disney, unvaccinated children must provide proof of a negative COVID-19 PCR test taken between 5 days and 24 hours prior to the cruise and will also be given a second test at the terminal before boarding. We are resuming sailing in a gradual, phased approach that emphasizes multiple layers of health and safety measure, the statement said. States had until last Saturday to decide whether to join the deal, under which companies acknowledged no wrongdoing. Local governments have another five months to decide if they will take part. The team of lawyers that negotiated the settlement said Tuesday that 44 states had opted in, and they hoped the companies would see that as overwhelming support. Alabama, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Washington and West Virginia also rejected the deals, according to reports, and New Hampshire agreed to the settlement with McKesson Corp., AmerisourceBergen Corp. and Cardinal Health Inc., but not drugmaker Johnson & Johnson. "We hope the defendants consider this state participation rate sufficient to continue on for adoption by communities," a statement from attorneys Joe Rice, Elizabeth Cabraser, Peter Mougey, Paul Geller, Chris Seeger, Jennifer Scullion and Jayne Conroy said. The agreement would have the distributors pay $21 billion and Johnson & Johnson pay $5 billion. Nevada would have received $12.8 million per year over 18 years from the distributors and $4.6 million per year for 11 years from Johnson & Johnson, Ford aide John Sadler said. The funds would have been shared with local jurisdictions. After the covid-19 global pandemic, efforts have been made to avoid using geographical information when identifying a disease. However, Havana Syndrome has not benefited from these new international norms. The illness has received more attention in recent days after reports from the State Department showed that a member of Vice President Kamala Harris' staff suffered an "adverse health event." Thought to have suffered from "Havana Syndrome" in Singapore, the case represents one of the highest-profile since reports first came out in 2016. The VP almost canceled her trip to Hanoi Vietnam after the incident. The State Department has not confirmed that the name of the staff member that fell ill but did confirm that this was not the first case of the bizarre health issue seen in Singapore. These reports come after more than 130 other cases involving CIA personnel, diplomats, and US military members were diagnosed with the bizarre illness. What is known about Havana Syndrome? Investigations into both the origins of the illness and the syndrome itself and been milled with scandal. Havana Syndrome represents a new challenge in the relationship between Cold War foes, the United States and Cuba. After five years, no country or entity has been publicly named the responsible culprit, and the cases seem to be growing. Symptoms The symptoms are similar to those of a concussion or mild head injury and can include dizziness, pain, and nausea. The around 130 people who have reported symptoms have also reported memory issues, sensitivity to light, insomnia, and other sleep-related issues. A 2019 study conducted by the University of Pennsylvania found that the brains of those had been altered, including "differences in whole-brain white matter volume, regional gray and white matter volume, cerebellar microstructural integrity, and functional connectivity in the auditory and visuospatial subnetworks. These findings were found after those thought to have Havana Syndrome had scans of their brains compared to a control group. The illness is not contagious, but exactly what causes it is also known. Affected Countries In 2016 and 2017, intelligence officers and diplomats from the US and Canadian embassies in Havana began reporting symptoms, which later became categorized as Havana Syndrome. Since then cases have now been reported in more than nine countries including, China, Russia, Poland, Georgia, Taiwan, Australia, and Colombia. Investigations Investigations into the origins of the illness have faced many challenges. In October 2020, reports of botched investigations on the part of the State Department became public. The New York Times reported that the organization, under the leadership of Secretary Mike Pompeo, had produced inconsistent assessments of patients and events, ignored outside medical diagnoses and withheld basic information from Congress. In addition, reports have shown that a lack of inter-agency cooperation between various US government agencies, including the FBI, CIA, CDC, and State Department, has created challenges in investigating its origins. Also, the NYT has reported that depending on where the instances took place, the Federal government-repossessed differently. Following these reports, embassy staff in China reported similar issues. For those in Cuba, diplomats were supported in seeking treatment, but those in countries like China were used their own personal vacation and time off to recover. However, the United States did not take the same approach after cases were seen in China. No investigation was opened, and the State Department opted to call the cases health incidents rather than Havana syndrome. The New York Times also reported that this could have been done in an attempt to anger the Chinese government. The Baltimore Orioles returned to winning ways, ending a 19-game losing streak by upstaging the Los Angeles Angels 10-6. Orioles break losing streak in style Baltimore celebrated an overdue victory after rallying past Shohei Ohtani and the Angels in MLB action on Wednesday, a five-run seventh inning fuelling the hosts. Trailing 6-2 in the fourth inning and 6-4 in the sixth, the Orioles who were two losses short of the American League (AL) record for the longest skid, an unwanted record set themselves following a 0-12 start in 1988 came from behind. DJ Stewart, Cedric Mullins and Anthony Santander homered for the Orioles, whose losing streak became the longest in MLB history to end with the team scoring 10-plus runs, according to Stats Perform. Two-way Angels star lasted 5.0 innings, allowing five hits, four runs and three homers in Baltimore. Ray keys Jays victory The playoff-chasing Toronto Blue Jays needed a win and they got it thanks to Robbie Ray, who inspired their 3-1 victory at home to the AL Central-leading Chicago White Sox. Blue Jays starter Ray matched his career high by striking out 14 batters over seven innings. Ray allowed five hits and just one run as he became the first ever Toronto left-handed pitcher to record 14 strikeouts in a game. Francisco Mejia's three-run homer in the ninth inning lifted the Tampa Bay Rays past the Philadelphia Phillies 7-4. The Phillies lost but it was still a memorable day for Zack Wheeler, who became the first Philadelphia pitcher to reach 200 strikeouts in 26 games or fewer. Brandon Woodruff dominated, striking out 10 in six shut-out innings in the Milwaukee Brewers' 4-1 win against the Cincinnati Reds. Rockies mask Marquez's struggles The Colorado Rockies split a doubleheader with the Chicago Cubs after winning 13-10 in 10 innings after dropping the opener 5-2. However, Rockies starter German Marquez failed to impress, giving up five runs on seven hits in three innings. He has 10.13 ERA over 13.2 innings in his last three starts. Sano's moonshot! The Minnesota Twins topped the Boston Red Sox 9-6 with help from Miguel Sano, who delivered a 495-foot homer in the third inning the longest in MLB this season. Wednesday's results St Louis Cardinals 3-2 Detroit Tigers Houston Astros 6-5 Kansas City Royals Chicago Cubs 5-2 Colorado Rockies Colorado Rockies 13-10 Chicago Cubs Baltimore Orioles 10-6 Los Angeles Angels Arizona Diamondbacks 5-2 Pittsburgh Pirates Tampa Bay Rays 7-4 Philadelphia Phillies Toronto Blue Jays 3-1 Chicago White Sox Minnesota Twins 9-6 Boston Red Sox San Francisco Giants 3-2 New York Mets Cleveland Indians 7-2 Texas Rangers Miami Marlins 3-2 Washington Nationals Milwaukee Brewers 4-1 Cincinnati Reds Los Angeles Dodgers 5-3 San Diego Padres Yankees at Athletics The red-hot New York Yankees (74-52) will put their 11-game winning streak on the line when they visit the Oakland Athletics (70-57) on Thursday. Jameson Taillon is set to start for the Yankees as the A's counter with James Kaprielian. A staff member installs a video monitoring system for the highest water level of the Miyun Reservoir in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 25, 2021. As of 8 a.m. Beijing time on Tuesday, the water storage volume of the Miyun Reservoir in Beijing reached 3.371 billion cubic meters, a record high. Built in 1960, the reservoir has a total storage capacity of 4.375 billion cubic meters. (Xinhua/Li Xin) Disclaimer The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author's, GMW.cn makes no representations as to accuracy, suitability, or validity of any information on this site and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information. BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- For some time, the United States has been manipulating the COVID-19 origins tracing by distorting facts and hyping up such baseless cliches as the so-called "Wuhan lab leak" theory. The ulterior political motive behind the malicious U.S. acts is to deflect responsibility for its incompetence in tackling the virus and at the same time smear and suppress other countries. In this regard, the world must take a clear-cut stand against such attempts. It is common sense that the origins tracing must and can only be a matter of science. In the face of the global health crisis, countries need to work together with a rational attitude that respects science and facts. Meanwhile, the tracing study must be undertaken by scientists -- the only ones who are qualified to find the source of the virus and its transmission path to humans -- so as to better prevent future risks. Since last year, scientists from many countries around the world have expressed their views that the scientific direction of origins tracing should not be changed, and opposed instrumentalizing the origins tracing work and politicizing a scientific issue. In fact, China has always supported and will continue to participate in the science-based tracing study. Since the early stage of the pandemic, China has been actively cooperating with the World Health Organization (WHO) on the origins tracing of the virus. It shared the genetic sequence of the virus at the earliest possible date and invited WHO experts to China twice for origins studies. The WHO-China joint study report released in March has been prepared in total compliance with the procedures of the WHO, and used a scientific approach. It has been proven to be a valuable and authoritative report that can stand the test of science and time. The report ought to act as the basis and guideline for global origins tracing efforts. Any attempt to repudiate and distort the conclusions of the joint study report is a political manipulation and disrespectful to global scientists and science. However, the United States has been trying to kidnap the WHO and clamouring for another so-called virus tracing against China, which is not only a trampling on the scientific spirit, but also an insult to China's national dignity. China's refusal to such kind of virus tracing is not to hide anything, but to defend its rights and dignity in accordance with the law. China welcomes tracing efforts in a scientific and serious manner, but firmly opposes the so-called tracing work with mischievous intentions that flout science. As a sovereign state, China will never allow certain political forces with ulterior motives to manipulate the issue as they want and scapegoat China as they wish. From the perspective of international laws, linking state responsibility to the source of the virus is groundless and will set a perilous precedent. Moreover, increasing fresh discoveries of early outbreaks of the virus in multiple countries, some of which were earlier than the first cases reported in China, have sparked new thinking in the academic community about the origin and spread of the coronavirus. On origins tracing, Washington's distortion of facts is both a disregard for related international laws and a violation of the principle of presumption of innocence. Behind America's manipulation of origins tracing lies its sinister intention to smear China for its own political gains. On one hand, some U.S. politicians attempt to assign blame to China and stir up anti-China sentiment in America, in hope of chasing votes and distracting the public from their own failure in epidemic response; On the other, by scapegoating and demonizing China, they figure for containing China's development and securing America's global hegemony. Kenneth Hammond, a professor at New Mexico State University specializing in Chinese history, said "American politicians, and their wealthy interests which essentially control them, are very worried about losing their role as the dominant power in global affairs as China re-emerges as a major factor in the development of the world economy and in geopolitical relations." "These elites are anxious to stall or thwart China's development in any way they can," including adopting the relentlessly propagated narrative, he noted. In fact, the international community has more than once said no to America's politicization of origins tracing. Earlier this year, more than 300 political parties, social societies and think tanks from over 100 countries and regions opposed politicizing the disease's origins in a joint statement sent to the WHO Secretariat. Origins tracing requires cooperation, truth and science, instead of smear, lies or political manipulation. It is time for America to wake up to that, and understand that its evil calculation on seeking a "presumption of guilt" against China is doomed to failure. Enditem Editor: Zhang Zhou The Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee released a key publication titled "The CPC: Its Mission and Contributions", Aug. 26, 2021. This July, the Communist Party of China (CPC), founded in 1921, just celebrated its centenary. These hundred years have witnessed profound and transformative change in China. And it is the CPC that has made this change possible. "Over the past hundred years, all the struggles, sacrifices and efforts made by the CPC and by the Chinese people under its leadership have been directed to one goal the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation," the document stated. The document develops into five chapters, including "Serving the People Wholeheartedly", "Realizing the Ideals of the Party", "Robust Leadership and Strong Governance", "Maintaining Vigor and Vitality" and "Contributing to World Peace and Development". "Moving forward, the CPC will continue to pursue people-oriented development as its top priority in governance; moving forward, the CPC will continue to build socialism and continue to adapt Marxism to China's conditions and keep it up to date; moving forward, the CPC will continue to stand on the right side of history and human progress; moving forward, the CPC will continue with its self-reform and maintain its progressive nature and integrity," it said. The document concluded that the goal of building China into a great modern socialist country will surely be achieved, the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation will surely come true, and the Chinese nation will surely make a greater contribution to humanity. SourceXinhua, produced by WXY/GMW.cn Editor: WXY A staff member of Daoxiangcun arranges Chinese pastries in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 25, 2021. Daoxiangcun, a renowned foodstuff company in Beijing, opened a brand-new bakery store based on its founding address, combining the traditional desserts with modern trends. The store has launched a series of innovative products such as Beijing-style tea drinks and creative Chinese pastries. (Xinhua/Jin Liangkuai) Disclaimer The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author's, GMW.cn makes no representations as to accuracy, suitability, or validity of any information on this site and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information. Over the past day, Russia-occupation forces in Donbas violated the ceasefire five times; since Thursday midnight, no ceasefire violations have been recorded, the press center of the JFO headquarters reported. In particular, near Novoluhanske, Russian mercenaries twice fired at the positions of the Ukrainian defenders from hand-held anti-tank grenade launchers and heavy machine guns. Near Travneve, the enemy fired from automatic easel grenade launchers. In the direction of Katerynivka, the armed formations of the Russian Federation fired from automatic easel and hand-held anti-tank grenade launchers, as well as from large-caliber machine guns. In addition, in Luhansk region, the passage of an enemy unmanned aerial vehicle of the Orlan-10 type was recorded crossing the disengagement line. It is noted that there are no combat losses among the Ukrainian military. "As of 7:00 on August 26, no ceasefire violations have been recorded," the report says. In the next two years, it is planned to modernize Desnianska waterworks in Kyiv, as a result of which the entire population of the capital will receive drinking water disinfected using modern European technologies, the website of Kyiv City State Administration reports with reference to the JSC Kyivvodokanal. Today, 40% of tap water in the capital is purified using chlorine-free technologies. This became possible thanks to the modernization of the Dnipro waterworks in 2018-2020 and the construction of a chlorine dioxide production plant. Also, 14 artesian pumping stations were modernized, where electrolysis plants are now used instead of outdated chlorination plants, and the reagent for water purification - sodium hypochlorite - is produced right on the site. The chlorine dioxin production plant was built near the Dnipro waterworks, which provides 30% of the city's water supply. Chlorine dioxide is a powerful disinfectant that maintains the disinfecting effect of water during transport by water supply networks and provides a longer aftereffect than chlorine or hypochlorite. Chlorine dioxide disinfected water has no chlorine flavors or odors. The new water treatment equipment guarantees dosing accuracy, optimal use of electricity and reagents, high quality and improved taste properties of water, as well as safety for plant personnel. In addition, to ensure that the water disinfected using the new technology remains in proper conditions before being fed into the network, without losing its quality, Kyivvodokanal has reconstructed a reservoir of clean water with a capacity of 5,000 cubic meters at the Dnipro waterworks. For the reconstruction, modern German materials were used, which guarantee tightness and protection from the effects of reagents. Thus, the reservoir can be effectively operated for at least another 50 years. The second President of Ukraine (1994-2005) Leonid Kuchma named two important points that he underestimated during his tenure as head of state. "If we take not specific deeds and decisions, but a more general, strategic plan, then there were two important things that I underestimated. The first is the stuffing of our political elite with the remnants of Moscow agents - both direct 'KGB members' and agents of influence ... The second is the potential Ukrainian civil society. It has been ahead of the government for a long time, proving this in the most acute moments of modern history, but for the first time I felt this maturity and this energy during the days of the Maidan," Kuchma said in an interview with the Ukrayinska Pravda ezine. Not a single plane, which was supposed to take Ukrainian citizens and foreigners out of Afghanistan, has been captured by anyone captivity, said Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. "There were threats to our plane, but we solved all these problems. Not a single plane that should take out Ukrainian citizens or should take out Ukrainian citizens and foreigners was caputured or is under someone's control. It was one of the work-related issues, Yevhen [Enin, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine] spoke about it, journalists wrote about it, added details, but there is no hijacking of the plane as such," Kuleba said at an online briefing on Thursday. Ukraine will continue returning its citizens from Afghanistan until it takes out everyone who has expressed such a desire, said Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. "We will not stop returning citizens until we are convinced that we have taken out everyone who wanted to be taken out. Now, given the effectiveness of our actions, we are receiving requests from other countries and international organizations with a request to also take out their citizens or citizens of Afghanistan who cooperated with them. There are many difficulties, we will always give priority to the citizens of Ukraine," Kuleba said at an online briefing on Thursday. He pointed out that about 90 Ukrainian citizens and their family members continue to be in Afghanistan. "Now the specific figure on how many citizens we have in Afghanistan is about 90 people. But these are citizens of Ukraine and members of their families, that is, for example, the husband is a citizen of Ukraine, and the wife and children are citizens of Afghanistan. But since this is a family, we undoubtedly, help them all get out of there," the minister explained. Kuleba noted that Ukraine had already taken out more than 250 Ukrainian citizens, family members and foreigners. "Right now we are being engaged in this - the organization of the next evacuation flight. Ukraine never abandons its own people and will not abandon them," the head of the Foreign Ministry assured. At the same time, the Foreign Minister indicated that he had received new information that the situation at the Kabul airport had become much more complicated and some countries are already beginning to refuse evacuation flights because they cannot guarantee their safety. "I emphasize: all citizens who have declared their desire to be evacuated are in touch with the Ukrainian Embassy in Tajikistan and receive appropriate assistance," Kuleba said. NATO Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoana has named a number of reforms that Ukraine needs to carry out on the way to joining the North Atlantic Alliance. "When it comes to NATO, of course, we are more interested in the issues of national security institutions reform, command and control, interoperability in the Armed Forces, civilian control, political control, parliamentary oversight, intelligence sector reform, which is something that is very complex but also very important. But also there are broader things when it comes to fighting corruption, reforming the judiciary, making sure that the system functions in the rule of law, checks and balances - all these issues are not necessarily defense sector related but also because of the values we embrace," Geoana told Interfax-Ukraine. According to him, therefore, NATO calls on Ukraine to continue to use to the maximum possible extent the annual national program. "I know that this coming December there will be a review together of that program and that is the best way to really see and engage in a number of issues," Geoana said. He said that NATO's adaptation to an ever-changing world is "part of the DNA of this Alliance," and that is why it is so successful. "NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and our leaders agreed in the last summit that we had in Brussels to launch a massive transformation effort when it comes to NATO 2030, the next strategic concept. So I am also encouraging aspirant countries like Ukraine to look of course to the membership part, which is of course of significant interest, but also to anticipate and work with us in the adaptation to a transformative processes which we are now undergoing when it comes to resilience, when it comes to innovation and new technologies, when it comes to space and climate change, defense," the NATO Deputy Secretary General said. Asked if NATO really plans to provide Ukraine with such a list of requirements on the way to the NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP), Geoana said there is a national reform agenda regarding Ukraine's Enhanced Opportunity Partner status, which, according to in his opinion, "is place where this conversation should take place." "Of course there is a political discussion. We understand at the level of the head of state, like President Zelensky, that is a very important political issue. But also there is a practical, there is a pragmatic set of issues that we are doing together. And I think that is the place where on both sides we should look into this," he said. Geoana also called on people "to see what Georgia has been accomplishing, because they have had EOP (Enhanced Opportunities Partner) status a little bit longer than Ukraine." "So I think there is room there to identify the reforms and make sure that you deliver upon the reforms you are committed to," he said. Geoana said that NATO has noticed a number of decisions that have been made by Ukraine recently on the interoperability between the troops of NATO member states and the Ukrainian Armed Forces. "We salute the effort. I know this is an ongoing process. I also know from the experience of my own country that this transformation is not easy. It is also a culture of defense and national security, which is shifting. So we fully recognize the complexity of this transformation. But we say that there is absolutely no substitute for an organic transformation and this is something we encourage for Ukraine to continue on this path," NATO Deputy Secretary General said. He said that NATO recognizes the progress of Ukraine, and encourages to move forward on this path. " Of course, intelligence sector reform is not military reform, but nonetheless it is national security reform. Again that is very important. I mentioned something again which is transformative, its political oversight and civilian control. That is fundamental, that is how we work. Therefore, the work continues. So there is the work in progress. We recognize the progress. Ukraine has done a lot of positive track record in this direction. But there is still a way to go and together we will be engaging on that road," Geoana said. The educational process in Ukrainian schools will begin on time, from September 1, Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal said. "The start of the new academic year. It will begin on time, that is, from September 1, and will take place as usual," Shmyhal said at a government meeting on Thursday. The head of government said that today Ukraine is at the green level of anti-epidemic security, the situation remains under control, which allows educational institutions to start operating as usual. At the same time, he stressed that training should take place in compliance with simple epidemic rules. According to Shmyhal, the schools are prepared and they have everything necessary for this. At the same time, he urged Ukrainian teachers to get vaccinated against the coronavirus disease COVID-19, since this is an important condition of work that guarantees the safety of teachers and students. "I urge once again Ukrainian teachers not to neglect their own safety and to get vaccinated. Ukraine has sufficient quantities of safe vaccines from all leading manufacturers," the Prime Minister said. In the Ukrainian capital's Pechersk, law enforcement officers detained a man for setting fire to the doors of an administrative building, criminal proceedings have been initiated, according to Kyiv police communications department. "Today, August 26, at about 15:20, a message from a passer-by was received by the police in Kyiv. He said that a man had thrown bottles with an unknown substance under the doors of the administrative building on Instytutska Street and on Pylypa Orlyka Street. As a result, the doors of these buildings were set on fire," the police said. Law enforcement officers and specialized services left for the place. The fire of the doors was removed, no one was injured as a result of the incident. It is noted that the commandos promptly detained the attacker, a native of Kyiv region, born in 1970. On this fact, investigators of Kyiv's Pechersk Police Department initiated criminal proceedings under Part 2 of Article 194 (intentional destruction or damage of property) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. The offender was detained in accordance with Article 208 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine. Now all the necessary primary investigative actions are being carried out with him. A suspicion report is being prepared for the detainee. Viktor Medvedchuk, member of the Opposition Platform - For Life faction in the Ukrainian parliament, has filed a second complaint against Ukraine with the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), Renat Kuzmin, Medvedchuk's colleague in the faction, said. "Medvedchuk has lodged a second lawsuit against Ukraine with the ECHR. The first one, as we know, has been accepted by the European court and may be considered on a priority basis soon. This time, it's about a gross violation of the right to defense, the right to a fair trial, and personal liberty. It seems like the Ukrainian government will soon need good lawyers itself," Kuzmin said on Facebook. On February 2, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky enforced a National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) decision on imposing personal sanctions on parliamentarian Taras Kozak of the Opposition Platform - For Life faction, effectively blocking the operations of the 112 Ukraina, Newsone, and ZIK television channels linked to Medvedchuk. On February 19, Ukraine's NSDC imposed sanctions on Medvedchuk, his wife Oksana Marchenko, and companies affiliated with Medvedchuk for funding terrorism. Zelensky enforced this decision on February 20. The same day, the NSDC instructed the government to take measures to nationalize part of the Samara-West oil product pipeline running through Ukraine. A number of media outlets identified Medvedchuk among the pipeline's beneficiaries, but the Opposition Platform - For Life party has said neither he nor his family members have ever had any relation to the pipeline. Zelensky said on April 2 that the Samara-West pipeline now belongs to the state. On May 11, Medvedchuk and Kozak were notified that they were suspected of high treason and an attempt to misappropriate Ukrainian national resources in Crimea. On May 14, the Pecherskyi District Court of Kyiv placed Medvedchuk under round-the-clock house arrest as a restraining measure. Medvedchuk, in turn, filed an appeal with the European Court of Human Rights contesting the measures taken by the Ukrainian authorities. On July 30, Kyiv Court of Appeal upheld the court ruling on Medvedchuk's house arrest. Given the gambling legislation in Ukraine, Ukrainian Gaming Week is a must visit event to a wide audience, not only for industrys actors. After several times the event has been postponed, the exhibition will finally open its doors in Kyiv on September 14-15. Slotegrator, a leading developer of iGaming solutions, will be looking forward to seeing all participants at booth B7. The new country has appeared on the worlds iGaming map - Ukraine. New markets mean new horizons to reach and new opportunities to grab. Hundreds of gambling business actors will visit the exhibition and introduce their latest findings within the industry. They will also give their expert opinion on the viability and sustainability of the Ukrainian market, its risks, and strategies on the path to success. Slotegrator will present its products designed for boosting gambling platforms. Booth B7 will be Slotegrators exhibition island, where all the visitors may take a closer look at different solutions of the company. You will have a chance to learn more about new ones like Telegram casino or Bitcoin casino software , as well as old but gold products like White Label Casino software or game integration . Slotegrator will also participate in networking activities to exchange ideas and perspectives on the newly regulated Ukrainian market along with our partners, who are world-class developers. Delta Air Lines passenger planes are seen parked due to flight reductions made to slow the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), at Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport in Birmingham, Alabama, (Photo : REUTERS/Elijah Nouvelage/File Photo) Delta Air Lines on Wednesday said employees will have to pay $200 more every month for their company-sponsored healthcare plan if they choose to not be vaccinated against COVID-19. The move to add a surcharge to health insurance contributions is the latest tactic by corporate America to push employees to get the shots to fight the pandemic. Advertisement A number of U.S. companies, including Delta competitor United Airlines, have mandated shots for their employees to protect their operations from the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus, which has especially hit parts of the country with lower vaccination levels. President Joe Biden has also urged private businesses to require employees to be vaccinated. Hours after Delta Air announced the surcharge, Canadian rival Air Canada said https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/air-canada-mandates-covid-19-vaccination-all-employees-2021-08-25 workers who are not vaccinated by Oct. 30 will face termination or be sent on unpaid leave. It has also made full vaccination a condition of employment for new employees. Surging coronavirus infections have clouded the outlook for airline companies. American Airlines said https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/american-airlines-warns-august-revenue-rising-covid-19-cases-hit-bookings-2021-08-25 on Wednesday its August revenue was trending below its internal forecast due to a slowdown in bookings and a rise in cancellations. The comments came two weeks after Southwest Airlines issued a profit warning https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/southwest-airlines-says-may-not-be-profitable-third-quarter-2021-08-11, citing the impact of the Delta variant on its business. Shares of U.S. airline companies, however, have risen in the past two days on hopes that Monday's full approval of the Pfizer and BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine by the Food and Drug Administration would drive up the vaccination rate and slow down new infections. In a staff memo, Delta Air Chief Executive Ed Bastian said the monthly surcharge would take effect on Nov. 1. He said the surcharge is necessary to address the financial risk the Atlanta-based airline faces from the decision to not vaccinate. Wade Symons, partner and regulatory resources group leader at global consulting firm Mercer, reckons U.S. companies have reached a "tipping point" for taking stricter measures to motivate employees to get vaccinated. "We anticipate more companies will announce vaccine mandates and surcharges in the coming weeks," he said. The firm's data shows a quarter of U.S. employers with workforces of 500 or more charge employees extra for company-sponsored healthcare plans if they use tobacco. Delta Air did not say whether its employees were subject to any other surcharges. PROOF OF INOCULATION A Delta Air spokesperson said the average hospital stay for COVID-19 has cost the company $40,000 per person. The surcharge would apply to the entire workforce and proof or documentation of vaccination will be needed to avoid it, the spokesperson said. Chris Riggins, spokesman for the Air Line Pilots Association at Delta, said the union does not intend to oppose the proposed surcharge because it would not affect the healthcare plan it has negotiated with the airline for its members. But since most of the pilots are not covered by the union-negotiated plan, Riggins said they would see an increase in their healthcare costs if they decide to remain unvaccinated. In the memo, Bastian said 75 percent of Delta Air's workforce has been vaccinated. However, all the employees who have been hospitalized with COVID-19 in recent weeks were not fully vaccinated, he said. While Delta had refrained from making the shots mandatory for its staff, its latest move was in sharp contrast to the policy being pursued by rivals such as American Airlines and Southwest Airlines, which are "strongly encouraging" their employees to get vaccinated. American Airlines is offering vaccinated employees an additional day off in 2022 and $50 through its employee recognition platform. Bastian said unvaccinated Delta employees will be required to wear masks in all indoor settings, effective immediately. Any employee in the United States who is not fully vaccinated will be required to take a COVID-19 test every week. The mandatory testing will start on Sept. 12. Those who test positive for the virus will be required to isolate and remain out of the workplace, Bastian said. The company will offer COVID-19 pay protection starting Sept. 30 only to fully vaccinated employees who are experiencing a breakthrough infection, he said. Fu Cong, the director-general of the arms control department of Chinese foreign ministry, speaks at a news conference on COVID-19 origin-tracking related issues, in Beijing (Photo : REUTERS/Tingshu Wang) China on Wednesday criticized the U.S. "politicization" of efforts to trace the origin of the coronavirus, demanding without any evidence that American labs be investigated, ahead of the release of a U.S. intelligence report on the virus. The U.S. report https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/us-review-covids-china-origin-unlikely-solve-vexing-questions-2021-08-24 is intended to resolve disputes among intelligence agencies considering different theories about how the coronavirus emerged, including a once-dismissed theory about a Chinese laboratory accident. Advertisement "Scapegoating China cannot whitewash the U.S.," Fu Cong, director-general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' arms control department, told a briefing. U.S. President Joe Biden received a copy and was briefed on the classified report on Tuesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Wednesday. The intelligence community has been "working expeditiously" to prepare an unclassified version for the public, Psaki said without giving a timeline for its release. U.S. officials say they do not expect the review to lead to firm conclusions after China stymied earlier international efforts to gather key information on the ground. China has said a laboratory leak was highly unlikely, and it has ridiculed a theory that coronavirus escaped from a lab in Wuhan, the city where COVID-19 infections emerged in late 2019, setting off the pandemic. Beijing has instead suggested https://www.reuters.com/article/china-diplomacy/analysis-china-pushback-on-covid-19-rights-trumps-push-for-better-relations-with-west-idUSL4N2OV1TJ that the virus slipped out of a lab at the U.S. Army's Fort Detrick base in Maryland in 2019. "It is only fair that if the U.S. insists that this is a valid hypothesis, they should do their turn and invite the investigation into their labs," Fu said. Fu said China was not engaged in a disinformation campaign. The fringe idea once put forward by individual Chinese officials - which lacks any public evidence - has become a Chinese government talking point as it attempts to deflect criticism about its possible role in the origins of the virus. On Wednesday, the Chinese embassy in Washington posted the calls for World Health Organization investigations at Fort Detrick and at the University of North Carolina to its website after it said U.S. media had rejected its editorial submissions. And on Tuesday, China's envoy to the United Nations asked the head of the WHO for an investigation into U.S. labs. A joint WHO-Chinese team visited the Wuhan Institute of Virology but the United States said it had concerns about the access granted to the investigation. "The early days of the pandemic were irrefutably in China, yet China continues to obfuscate and deny the international community the needed access," a senior U.S. administration official said, adding that if a future pandemic were to originate in the United States, it would insist on a "swift and transparent" evaluation. "If there were sound, technically credible reasons for a U.S. investigation, we would of course support it. But there are none," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Republican Senator Marco Rubio, who has argued a Chinese lab leak was plausible, in a statement urged the Biden administration to immediately declassify the report. "The American people deserve to know what our government does and does not know about the origins of COVID-19," Rubio said. A key Congressional panel has been advised it may receive a copy of the classified report on Thursday, according to a Congressional official. U.S. to prioritize troop evacuation in last two days of Kabul operation U.S. Marines provide assistance at an Evacuation Control Checkpoint (ECC) during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Afghanistan, (Photo : Victor Mancilla/Handout via REUTERS.) The U.S. military will continue evacuating people from Kabul airport until an Aug. 31 deadline if needed, but will prioritize the removal of U.S. troops and military equipment on the last couple of days, the Pentagon said on Wednesday. There are about 5,400 troops at the airport, a number that President Joe Biden says is set to go down to zero by the end of the month, depending on cooperation from the Taliban. Advertisement Army Major General William Taylor, with the U.S. military's Joint Staff, told a news briefing more than 10,000 people were at Kabul airport waiting to be evacuated from Afghanistan. He said that in the previous 24 hours, 90 U.S. military and other international flights had evacuated 19,000 more people, bringing the total evacuation number so far to about 88,000. He said one plane had departed every 39 minutes. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said that a total of 4,400 American nationals had so far been evacuated from Kabul, but that he did not know how many were still there. Over the weekend, the number stood at about 2,500. "If you're an evacuee that we can get out, we're going to continue to get you out right up until the end... But in the last couple of days ... we will begin to prioritize military capabilities and military resources to move out," Kirby said. In addition to American citizens, both at-risk Afghans and people from such other countries as Canada and Germany have been evacuated over the past 11 days. Representatives Seth Moulton, a Democrat, and Peter Meijer, a Republican, both of whom served in the Iraq war before running for Congress, said in a statement on Tuesday that they went to Kabul to gather information as part of Congress' oversight role. Kirby said the two members of the U.S. House of Representatives who traveled to Afghanistan on Tuesday had taken up scarce resources. "They certainly took time away from what we had been planning to do that day," he added. The Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) logo is seen on a building in Toronto, Ontario, Canada (Photo : REUTERS/Chris Helgren) Canada's ruling Liberal Party said on Wednesday that if re-elected it would raise corporate taxes on the most profitable banks and insurers to help pay for the cost of the COVID-19 recovery. The Liberals said they would hike the rate to 18% from 15% on all earnings over C$1 billion ($793 million) and vowed to establish a special dividend, so that those same institutions contribute more. The measures are expected to generate C$2.5 billion per year over four years, starting in 2022/23. Advertisement Polls show the Liberals, led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, have a slender lead over their Conservative rivals ahead of the Sept. 20 election. "Given that our banks have posted extraordinarily large profits, have continued to be incredibly successful, including through a pandemic ... we're going to ask them to do a little bit more," Trudeau told a campaign event in British Columbia on the same day that two banks reported big profits. British Columbia is an influential province, accounting for 42 of the 338 seats in the House of Commons. Polls indicate the Liberals face a fight there from the opposition New Democrats, who also appeal to center-left voters. The Canadian Bankers Association criticized the news, saying that "singling out specific economic sectors for special taxation is a proven detriment to economic growth". The Canadian banks index slipped just 0.6% after the announcement, compared with little change in the Toronto stock benchmark, but still ended the day up 0.5% from Tuesday's close. Maria Khoury, senior vice president for North American financial institutions' credit ratings at DBRS Morningstar, said the muted reaction in part reflected skepticism over campaign promises and the broad expectation that some tax increases were inevitable following the flood of government support. Large banks include Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), Toronto Dominion Bank, Bank of Nova Scotia (Scotiabank), Bank of Montreal (BMO) and the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. RBC beat analysts' expectations for third-quarter profit on Wednesday after Scotiabank and BMO did the same on Tuesday. Large insurers include Manulife Financial, Sun Life Financial, Intact Financial and Great-West Lifeco. ($1=1.2617 Canadian dollars) 'One Piece' is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Eiichiro Oda. (Photo : YouTube/Pirate John) "One Piece" Chapter 1023 spoilers have officially dropped, and it teases Luffy's return to Wano Country to face Kaido. But before that happens, Zoro and Sanji will take the spotlight to fight King and Queen. The two will work together to achieve their goal to make Luffy the Pirate King. However, the StrawHat captain has to defeat Kaido first before they can do that, so will it happen in "One Piece" Chapter 1023? Advertisement Warning: The following content is full of spoilers. Read at your own risk. Reddit shared the brief summary from Redo and the new chapter's title, "As Alike as Two Peas in a Pod." Despite Zoro and Sanji's joint attack, King and Queen will remain fine. Sanji will tell Zoro his body feels weird after using the Raid Suit again. Queen, then insults Sanji for looking like a Germa cyborg and asks if his legs are made of a machine. Sanji will stress he is 100% human, but Queen will continuously doubt if a normal person can create fire. He once again questions if he is from the X tribe, which is the Lunalia tribe. Something strange will, then, happen to Sanji. Though it is not bad, he says it is weird. A fire on Sanji's legs will, then, be seen, and firepower rises. Meanwhile, the focus will shift to King in "One Piece" Chapter 1024. Later, Hyogoro and Kawamatsu emerge and talk about Zoro while they watch him fight King. They say they see Ringo's lord, Shimotsuki Ushimaru, and the legendary samurai Shimotsuki Ryuma in Zoro. Elsewhere, fans will witness the fights of Jack vs. Inuarashi, Perospero vs. Nekomamushi, and Raizou vs. Fukurokuju. Fans will also see Inu and Neko transform in Sulong because of the hole in the ceiling. Jack will be in his hybrid form, and from here, the next installment's highlight will be revealed. Momonosuke will transform into a full-blown, 28-year-old adult and become a dragon in front of Luffy. The latter will invite Momo and says they will now return to Wanokuni. Moreover, the Alliance and Beast Pirates' side is now nearly equal, thanks to Tama, Recent Highlights noted. The kid's Kibi Dango helps the Alliance to gain more allies by having them ingest the fruit. So, for them to win this war, a CP-0 member revealed Kaido's prime henchmen must be defeated. Thankfully, after Drake switches teams, the Strawhats defeat the other five. Although what happened to Ulti and Page One is yet to be revealed, King, Queen, and Jack are the only enemies close to Kaido. As "One Piece" Chapter 1023 will focus on the battle against King and Queen, find out if they, too, will be defeated on its release on Sunday, Aug. 29. (Business Times) Gilead Sciences wins reversal of $1.2 billion award in patent case with Bristol Myers Gilead Sciences biotech company is seen after they announced a Phase 3 Trial of the investigational antiviral drug remdesivir in patients with severe coronavirus disease (COVID-19), (Photo : REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo) A U.S. appeals court on Thursday threw out a $1.2 billion ruling against Gilead Sciences Inc, finding a patent on a cancer therapy it was accused of infringing was invalid, in a blow to rival Bristol Myers Squibb Co. The two companies have been embroiled in a case involving accusations that Yescarta, the CAR-T cell cancer immunotherapy from Gilead's Kite Pharma unit, infringed on a patent for a similar therapy from Bristol's Juno Therapeutics. Advertisement Last year, a federal judge increased the damages from a jury trial and ordered Gilead to pay Bristol Myers $1.2 billion in the patent infringement case. The ruling on Thursday by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed the decision. Bristol Myers in a statement said it disagreed with latest ruling and would seek a review of the Federal Circuit's decision. Gilead and Kite's attorney Josh Rosenkranz of Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Gilead shares were up 0.3%, while Bristol shares were off 0.5% in midday trading. The Gilead drug, Yescarta, belongs to a class of cutting-edge cancer treatments known as chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy, or CAR-T, which reprograms the body's own immune cells to recognize and attack malignant cells. Gilead bought Kite Pharma, which developed Yescarta, for $11.9 billion in 2017, with the treatment securing U.S. approval that year. It recorded sales of $338 million in the first six months of this year. A jury in 2019 found that Kite willfully infringed and awarded Juno and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, which licenses the patent to Juno, $778 million. U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez increased the award to $1.2 billion in Los Angeles federal court last year. Memorial Sloan Kettering did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Bristol Myers acquired Juno and its CAR-T program with its $74 billion purchase of Celgene in 2019. Chief U.S. Circuit Judge Kimberly Moore wrote for a unanimous three-judge panel that the relevant parts of Juno's patent were invalid because they lacked a sufficient written description and details. Moore was joined by Circuit Judges Sharon Prost and Kathleen O'Malley in the ruling. During a July oral argument https://www.reuters.com/legal/transactional/fed-circ-probes-validity-cancer-treatment-patent-12-bln-win-2021-07-06, Moore compared the patent's description to trying to identify a specific car by saying it has four wheels. This story corrects paragraph 1 and 2 to show one patent, not patents. Egypt and Italy have signed nine memorandums of understanding (MoU), including on the establishment of an integrated Italian trade and logistics entity in Cairo, according to a statement by the supply ministry on Sunday. Minister of Supply Ali Mosselhi witnessed the signing of the MoUs inked after the conclusion of the second Egyptian-Italian Economic Forum hosted by Cairo last week. Another MoU was signed between the Egyptian Holding Company for Silos and Storage and an Italian company to continue a national plan to set up silos in Egypt, according to the statement. The third deal was clinched between the Egyptian-European Investors Association and the Italian Confederation for Economic Development to set up a centre for the design of leather and furniture products. The other deals include cooperation in the fields of agricultural products, electronics and the real estate sector. Meanwhile, Mosselhi expressed happiness over the success of the Egyptian-Italian Economic Forum's meetings, which he described as a step reflecting the strength of the two countries' economic relations, noting that the signed deals would achieve profits for the Egyptian economy. He extended an invitation for Italian companies to take part in the Mediterranean Forum meeting due to convene in March. Meanwhile, head of the Italian Confederation for Economic Development Jose Romano asserted that the Italian companies are deeply interested in establishing business in Egypt, highlighting the recent measures taken by the Egyptian government to attract and facilitate foreign investments. Short link: German Ambassador in Cairo Cyrill Nunn discussed with Egypts Minister of Transport Kamel El-Wazir ways of cooperation in establishing a control system for the diesel-powered railway network and the modern electric one, according to a statement released by the transport ministry on Tuesday. In a meeting on Tuesday, Nunn and El-Wazir discussed joint cooperation in launching a training, overhaul, and maintenance centre for the railway system to train Egyptian engineers on the latest railway technology and high-speed trains at the hand of German experts. Hailing the mega projects undertaken by Egypt recently in the transport sector, Nunn expressed German companies interest in strengthening cooperation with Egypt in the maritime transport sector. Nunn pointed out that Egypt's policies of developing the transport and railways sector, after carrying out an overhaul of the electric power network, is the same trend followed by developed countries globally. The ambassador praised German companies working in the maritime transport field in Egypt based on the memorandum of understanding signed between Germany's Eurogate and Italy's Contship to manage, operate, and maintain the second container terminal in Damietta Port. He also added that the German logistics companies DB Schenker and Deutsche Post DHL are interested in cooperation with Egypt in the field of transporting goods and establishing logistical areas. Meanwhile, El-Wazir praised collaboration between Egypt and Germany's Siemens in the transport sector in establishing an integrated system for a high-speed electric railway in Egypt. The German Siemens project includes the immediate establishment of a railway line linking Ain Sokhna with the New Alamein city, passing through the New Administrative Capital, as well as 15 stations. The two officials also discussed the latest developments in training 160 Egyptian engineers and technicians in collaboration with German construction equipment manufacturer Herrenknecht on tunnel boring machines. El-Wazir stressed that the Egyptian government follows a comprehensive plan to maximise the system of goods transportation via railways, inland ports, and logistical areas to serve the business community. These ports, according to El-Wazir, are being constructed on a scientific basis. The minister added that Egypt is currently undertaking new mega transportation projects that will link Egypt with neighboring countries. He cited as an example Egypt and South Africa's Cape Town axis, which passes through nine African countries with a length of 10,228 kilometres, 1,155 of which are inside Egyptian territories. The minister also said that Cairo aspires to complete a land road project between Egypt and Chad. Moreover, according to El-Wazir, Egypt plans to establish a road linking Egypts Aswan and Toshka with Sudans Wadi Halfa, as well as a road that links Egypt's Alexandria and Salloum with Libyas Benghazi. Short link: Secretary-General of the Arab League (AL) Ahmed Abul Gheit and the Arab Parliament on Tuesday urged Algeria and Morocco to exercise self-restraint after Algerian authorities cut diplomatic relations with Rabat. Algerias Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra announced on Tuesday the cessation of his countrys diplomatic relations with Morocco, saying that history has proven time and again Moroccos constant hostilities against Algeria. In the wake of Algerias announcement, Morocco expressed its regret for this decision, which is completely unjustified yet expected given the logic of escalation that has been recognised over the recent weeks. The Moroccan foreign ministry added in a statement that the kingdom will remain trustful and sincere to the Algerian people and will continue to work with wisdom and responsibility in order to develop sound and constructive relations with Algeria. In a statement by the Arab League, Abul Gheit voiced his deep regret for the heightened tensions between Algeria and Morocco, urging both Arab countries to avoid further escalation. Both Algeria and Morocco are essential for joint Arab action, an official from the AL general secretariat said in the statement, hoping that they will restore their good relations to maintain stability in the region. The Arab Parliament also voiced its utmost concern over the developments in the relations between the two countries. In a statement, the Arab Parliament called on both countries to prioritise their brotherly ties and work to serve the interests of their peoples. The Arab Parliament called on the two sides to exercise self-restraint and avert further escalation that could harm bilateral relations. It urged Algeria and Morocco to engage in constructive dialogue to deescalate tensions and discuss controversial issues within a brotherly and Arab framework. Algeria and Morocco are both heavyweights in the Arab and regional system and should continue to bear the responsibility of enhancing Arab solidarity and overcoming differences and schisms, the statement continued. The Arab Parliament said it is fully confident in the wise leaderships of the two countries and their ability to ride out the current crisis as soon as possible. The Algerian move to cut ties with Morocco comes after Algeria said it would review its relations with Rabat last week after accusing it of being complicit regarding the deadly forest fires that have been ravaging the Algerian north. The forest fires in Algeria, which broke out on August 9 amid a blistering heatwave, burned tens of thousands of hectares of forest and killed at least 90 people, including more than 30 soldiers, according to the AFP. Algerias foreign minister on Tuesday also accused Moroccos leaders of being responsible for repeated crises and behaviour that has led to conflict instead of integration in North Africa. Lamamras statement, read out on behalf of Algerias President Abdel-Madjid Tebboune, said Moroccos unfriendly, hostile, and despicable acts against his country have started since Algerias independence, citing incidents in 1963 and 1976. Lamamras statement also accused Moroccan security and propaganda services of launching a vile and widespread media war against Algeria and Algerian people and leaders by weaving fictional scenarios, creating rumors, and spreading malicious information. The Algerian FM also referred to a dangerous and irresponsible deviation committed by a Moroccan envoy by addressing what he called the right of self-determination for the brave tribal people who have been subjected to the longest foreign occupation. Algeria demanded clarification from the Moroccan authorities following this incident, Lamamra said, however, the silence of the Moroccan side in this regard, which has continued since July 16 [2021], clearly reflects the political support [provided] by the highest Moroccan authority for this act. The deviation in question that has triggered the current course of action was a statement given by Moroccos envoy to the United Nations Omar Hilale in July expressing support for the right to self-determination for Algerias traditionally restless Kabylie region, a stronghold of the countrys Amazigh (Berber) minority. At the time, Algerias foreign ministry said Morocco had thus publicly and explicitly supported an alleged right to self-determination of the Kabyle people. Hilales comments sparked anger among Algerias political class and on social media, with Algerians defending the countrys territorial unity. Short link: Sudanese Irrigation Minister Yasser Abbas said on Wednesday that the failure to exchange information on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) before the recent unilateral filling of its reservoir caused Sudan to incur heavy expenses. However, in a tweet, Abbas denied that the GERD had any negative impact on the devastating Nile floods Sudan has witnessed this year, which led to the death of dozens and the collapse of thousands of homes. He explained that the amount of water flowing from the Blue Nile into the mega dam after 20 July has been equal to the amount flowing out of it. Ethiopia announced early in July that it would commence the second filling of the GERDs reservoir that month despite Egypt and Sudans rejection of the unilateral decision before a legally binding agreement on the filling and operation of the dam is reached. On 19 July, Ethiopia announced the completion of the second filling, asserting that it has caused no harm to the two downstream countries and claiming that the dam reduces the harm of Nile floods. Despite the unilateral filling of the GERD, water passed through the middle passage of the dam on 20 July. After that, the [amount of] Blue Nile [water] entering the dam is [equal to] what came out of it, Abbas said on Wednesday. This means there has been no impact from the dam on floods this year, Abbas said, affirming that the failure to exchange information with Sudan regarding the dam, however, forced Sudan to take costly precautions [to prepare for the floods] that have had a major economic and social impact [on Sudan]. The minister said that the floods this year witnessed an unexpected amount of water coming from the White Nile, exceeding any amount of flooding the country faced in the past 100 years. The average water flow of the White Nile in the month of July in previous years varied between 70 and 80 million cubic metres per day, however, this years flood season recorded a daily flow ranging from 120 to 130 million cubic metres per day, Abbas explained. Sudan, however, managed to use its reservoirs of the Merowe and Roseires dams to reduce the intensity of the floods. Egypt and Sudan have repeatedly warned of the negative impacts of filling the dam without a binding agreement and highlighted the risks it can cause to people and agricultural lands. The three countries have affirmed on different occasions, including in a United Nations Security Council meeting that was held to discuss the issue last month, that they would like to continue to delegate the African Union to sponsor and mediate the talks between them. Egypt and Sudan, however, have urged the involvement of the United Nations, the United States, the European Union, along with the AU in mediating the talks, a proposal that Ethiopia rejected. Russia and Algeria have also recently proposed to play a positive role in the GERD issue at the request of the three countries. Short link: Minister of Emigration and Egyptian Expatriates Affairs Nabila Makram said Egyptian expats do not hesitate to respond to calls from the homeland concerning the initiatives launched by President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi. In an interview with MENA Board Chairman and Editor-in-Chief Ali Hassan, Makram said that Egyptian expats are aware of the honest and serious will of the political leadership to accomplish development and improve the living conditions of citizens in villages and the countryside. When President El-Sisi speaks to the people of Egypt, he sends messages that touch the hearts of Egyptians, not only at home, but also abroad, she said, referring in this regard to El-Sisis speech at Cairo Stadium in July about the launch of the first conference of the national Decent Life Initiative for the development of the Egyptian countryside. El-Sisi emphasised the importance of linking Egyptian expatriates with their homeland by involving them in the development projects currently being implemented across the nation. Makram thanked the Egyptian expats who donated their resources during the Conference of Egyptian Entities Abroad to the implementation of the Decent Life Initiative and those who are ready to participate in this important national initiative. She also praised the young students who were studying abroad before the pandemic who are now conducting field work for the initiative until it is time for them to return to their universities. Makram said she will also launch in cooperation with Planning Minister Hala El-Said the Model Village in Fayoum Initiative, adding that she contacted Fayoum Governor Ahmed El-Ansari and an Egyptian investor in Kuwait who wants to transform one of Fayoums villages into a model village. Another Egyptian investor in the UAE is also interested in contributing to developing a village in Sohag, she said. Makram asserted that the volume of contributions from Egyptian expats in the states development efforts are sizable, adding that their efforts are divided into promoting Egypts development projects at home and supporting them whether spiritually, financially, or logistically. The ministry is keen on promoting all of the national projects that have been launched by the state and organising visitsfor Egyptian expats to witness the size of the accomplishments being realised at home, especially in light of the rumors and false reports questioning the development efforts exerted by the state that are circulated abroad, she said. She said the second Conference of Egyptian Entities Abroad, which was organised by the Ministry of Emigration, demonstrated Egyptian expats strong desire to participate in the Decent Life Initiative, referring to the projects official platform on social media, which is scheduled to be launched on September 25 through the Zoom application under the auspices of Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly to support this presidential initiative in the US and Canada. During the conference, the ministry was keen on organising field visits for the participants to Qalioubiya governorate to see for themselves the achievements that have been made in terms of improving sanitation, building health centers and schools, and supplying natural gas to households, in addition to other in-progress projects, Makram said. She also mentioned the Speak Arabic Festival that was organised by the ministry as well on the sidelines of the conference with the participation of Egyptian children living abroad. On involving youths Egypts sustainable development, Makram said we have two types of youths abroad: the young people of the second and third generations, and those who are studying abroad under the umbrella of the Emigration Ministry. After they finish their education and return to the homeland, they will be trained in Egyptian ministries and bodies concerned with benefiting the Egyptian state given that many of them are ready to help the state in its development efforts, the minister added. Makram asserted the importance the political leadership attaches to higher education and Egypts universities, saying Egypt now has many international universities such as Galala University, Al-Alamein International University, and New Mansoura University. On the Egypts Voice in Africa Initiative, Makram asserted that the initiatives launched by the Ministry of Emigration align with the directives of the Egyptian state and the vision of the political leadership, which pays great attention to Africa. This encouraged the ministry to take more care of Egyptian communities in the African continent, she said. The minister said she will propose to PM Madbouly to start organising important visits to African countries to listen to the needs of Egyptian communities in the rest of Africa as well as market Egyptian products to the African consumer. Regarding the 4th edition of the presidential initiative dubbed Reviving Roots which targets Egyptian, Cypriot, and Greek youths Makram said that this edition is in line with the interest of the political leadership to not only empower youths, but also involve them in the decision making process. Regarding the latest preparations for the 5th edition of the Egypt Can Conference which will focus on industry and be held under the auspices of President El-Sisi after it was postponed due to the coronavirus Makram said that preparatory dialogue sessions have been held that tackled industrial funding, car industries, spinning and weaving, technology, and other major industrial fields. As for the latest efforts regarding illegal immigration and the presidential initiative Life Saving Boats, Makram asserted that the file has gotten much attention from the government since El-Sisi announced in 2016 that no boat holding illegal immigrants has will set sail from Egyptian soil from that point onwards. This has been a major success of the Egyptian state and its institutions, she added. To maintain this success, President El-Sisi launched the Life Saving Boats Initiative in 2019 and assigned the Ministry of Emigration to implement it. The presidential initiative presents a new methodology to combating illegal immigration, she said. Makram went on to say that the initiative calls for providing alternative chances for illegal immigrants or just helping them to legally immigrate given the fact that it offers immigrants training courses to improve their qualifications and awareness. She noted that the ministrys officials have embarked on field tours of governorates that are hubs for illegal immigration and spoke with civil society organisations that specialise in training youths who want to travel abroad. She also said that training and awareness programmes are underway to prepare trained and skilled workers, adding that immediately after tapping EU markets, Egypt now has trained workers who are able to meet the needs of the EUs labour market. Speaking about the ministrys efforts to reach out to Egyptians living abroad in the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic, Makram said that her ministry was keen on establishing a dialogue with doctors abroad to capitalise on their experiments and ideas on how different world countries have been handling the coronavirus. She, meanwhile, urged all Egyptians abroad to stick to precautionary measures set by their host countries to curb the spread of the virus. Additionally, Makram said that she has been discussing with PM Madbouly about vaccinating Egyptian workers that have plans to travel abroad with jabs that are approved in their destination to facilitate their journey. Short link: Arab countries have tools to apply pressure on Ethiopia to counter its intransigence on the dispute regarding the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), Arab Parliament Speaker Adel Al-Asoumi said on Thursday. Al-Asoumis statement came during a symposium held by Al-Ahram Arabic Gate that was moderated by Maged Mounir, the editor-in-chief of Al-Ahram Arabic Gate and Al-Ahram Al-Massai. The Arab parliament speaker stressed that the GERD issue should not be an issue just for one or two Arab countries Egypt and Sudan but rather an issue for the entire Arab nation, pointing out that it is connected to Arab national security. Al-Asoumi also expressed his faith in the methods of Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi and his ability to manage the GERD file, emphasising that Egypts ability and political clout will ultimately ensure that the file will end in the interest of Egypt and Sudan. He added that the Arab parliament has sought to involve itself in this file in the recent period given its belief that it greatly affects the Arab world as a whole and has been keen to voice its support of Egypt and Sudans efforts. The importance of this Arab voice is that we have dealt with all external parties, especially the UN, given the current crucial stages of this issue, the Arab parliament speaker said, blaming any failure to reach an agreement on the Ethiopian side. The Arab parliament speaker emphasised the need to take a strong Arab stance, to the point where he demanded a boycott of Ethiopia if its intransigence continued, describing the delay in reaching a solution from the Ethiopian side to be against its interest. On the other hand, he said, there is a keenness on the part of the Egyptian and Sudanese sides to develop frameworks for a solution in the interest of the three countries. Egypt and Sudan the two downstream countries have been negotiating for almost a decade now with Ethiopia to reach a legally binding deal on the GERD, the construction of which started on the Blue Nile in 2011. The last round of talks concerning the $4.8 billion Ethiopian hydropower project which was sponsored by the African Union (AU) and aimed to revive the already stalled negotiations since January was held in the AUs chair country the DR Congo in April, but failed to stir the stagnant water, with both Egypt and Sudan blaming Ethiopias intransigence. Last month, El-Sisi said that Egypts approach to the negotiations with Ethiopia over the past ten years has been based on the necessity of reaching a legally binding agreement on the dam in accordance with international norms and constants, stressing that the negotiations with Addis Ababa over the GERD should not go on indefinitely. In early July, the UN Security Council held a session on the GERD, which was held at the request of Egypt and Sudan, in an attempt to settle the dispute over the near-complete dam. The session was described by Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry as an achievement for Egyptian diplomacy given that the GERD-related session was the second following an earlier one held the previous year. El-Sisi has previously assured while addressing Ethiopians that cooperation is better than tussling. I say to our Ethiopian brothers, [we] should not get to a point where you infringe upon a drop of Egypts water, because all options are open cooperation is better to build with each other is better than to disagree and tussle, he said. The president affirmed that Egypts stance on the dam has always been honourable as it respected the desire of the Ethiopian people to develop their country. I had said in the [Ethiopian] parliament that we appreciate development, provided that it does not affect Egypts water interests and I stand by what I said. Egypt relies on the Blue Nile which originates in Ethiopia and is one of the two main tributaries of the worlds longest river and the White Nile, which converge in Khartoum before flowing north through Egypt and into the Mediterranean Sea. Egypt, which is considered one of the most water-scarce countries in the world, receives around 60 bcm annually, mainly from the Nile. However, its needs stand at around 114 bcm, placing the 100-million-plus country well below the international threshold for water scarcity at 560 cubic metres per person annually as opposed to 1,000 cubic metres per person. The country fears that the unilateral filling and operation of the massive hydropower project will significantly diminish its water supply. Short link: Egypts Health Minister Hala Zayed said on Thursday that 1.3 million of state's administrative personnel were vaccinated against coronavirus. During the weekly cabinet meeting, the health minister said the number of COVID-19 vaccination centres increased from 580 to 678 last week in addition to mobile vaccination centres in Matrouh, Qalioubiya, Menouifya, Shariqiya and Suez. She added that vaccination centres are supplied with teams to promote awareness among citizens of the importance of abiding by precautionary measures. The health minister added that the ministry took a number of measures to help travelers get vaccines approved in host countries, saying travelers can now apply for vaccines not only through the ministry's hotline number but also through the website. Zayed added that 250,000 doses of Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine have been given to travelers. The minister said the number of Egyptians seeking to be vaccinated before traveling increased from 260,000 to 760,000 over the past 72 hours. A total of 362,000 vaccination certificates with a QR code were issued in August, she said. Speaking about plans to vaccinate pre-university education staff, she said more than 472,000 have registered across the nation using the ministry's website, stressing that they will get their second dose ahead of the start of academic year. Egypt has imported millions of doses of vaccines of since starting its campaign early this year including the WHO-approved British AstraZeneca vaccine, Johnson & Johnson, the Chinese Sinopharm, and the Russian Sputnik V which has not been approved by the WHO. As many as 6,477,535 vaccine doses have been administered in Egypt through 16 August, according to the WHO. Egypt has recently seen a slight but steady increase in the daily reported cases and is approaching the fourth wave of coronavirus. On Wednesday, Egypt reported 203 new coronavirus cases, the highest single-day increase since 1 July, bringing the total infection tally officially to 289,938 since the outbreak began in February 2020. Short link: Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi urged the cultivation of a distinguished generation of enlightened Muslim imams and preachers as he met on Thursday with Religious Endowments Minister Mohamed Mokhtar Gomaa. Sisi urged that this generation of imams should strengthen the states strategy by promoting rational moderate thought and the principles of true religion and to correct misconceptions, a statement by the Presidency read. The implementation of this strategy comes through the cultivation of this enlightened generation of imams and preachers who can formulate a disciplined religious public opinion, El-Sisi explained. This should be done in a way that adopts the jurisprudence of reality without failing to preserve the principles of the true Islamic law (Sharia), the president noted. During the meeting, the endowments minister briefed El-Sisi on the ministrys efforts to intensify communication with moderate religious institutions worldwide to contribute to spreading moderate thought, and achieving global peace. Gomaa said the ministrys efforts to communicate with these institutions also seek to consolidating the foundations of existence based on mutual respect among peoples and nations and to establish the concept of the national state and the respect of citizenship rights. El-Sisi urged enhancing the efforts aiming to support the financial conditions of imams and ordered intensifying the high-level scientific and cultural programs they receive. This includes the training programs for imams in the International Awkaf Academy and in cooperation with the institutions concerned with building awareness, according to El-Sisi. Over the past few years, El-Sisi has affirmed the need to reform religious discourse as an important element in confronting extremist ideology. This comes especially amid Egypts battle against terrorism especially in North and Central Sinai. Terror attacks have targeted Christian and Muslim worshippers, police and army forces and civilians. Officials have frequently affirmed that the challenge of terrorism must be countered through a comprehensive approach that includes security and ideological solutions. Earlier this week, El-Sisi said the Egyptian state would provide financial support for works of art that develop real awareness of the challenging issues facing the country, including terrorism and the need for the renewal of religious discourse. Short link: Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi said that his country is keen on cementing cooperation with Egypt and Jordan across different fields, notably in the economy, trade and investment. Al-Kadhimi made the remarks during a press encounter that he held Thursday in Baghdad with Head of the Supreme Council for Media Regulation Karam Gabr and editors in chief of the Middle East News Agency (MENA), Al-Ahram, Al-Akhbar, Al-Gomhuria, as well as a number of Arab and foreign journalists. The press encounter comes ahead of an Iraqi summit in Baghdad expected to be held on Saturday to calm tensions between Iran and its Gulf Arab foes and discuss the crises in Yemen and Lebanon. Iraq has invited Egypt, Jordan, Turkey and French President Emmanuel Macron to attend the summit, which is co-organised by France. Leaders from Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey have also been invited. During the press encounter, the Iraqi premier added that electricity linkage and oil projects would benefit the three countries' economies. He noted that Iraq is in need of building political, economic and social partnerships with fellow Arab and Islamic states, along with friendly countries. He went on to say that Iraq looks forward to cooperation with neighboring countries to solve regional crises. Al-Kadhimi stressed that his country seeks to restore normal relations with neighboring states by focusing on cultural aspects and fostering economic ties, in addition to propagating the values of peace, love and fraternity. He shed light on the daily military victories by the Iraqi security forces in northern provinces against the remnants of Daesh terrorist group, otherwise known as the Islamic State, that is trying to gain a foothold in Iraq. He underlined that the Iraqi government prohibits the entry of any weapons into the country outside the state's control. Al-Kadhimi promised that the upcoming general elections in October would be fair and transparent, and that he expects a high turnout from Iraqi voters. The premier affirmed his country's full appreciation for the role played by Egypt under President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi in supporting joint Arab solidarity, and working to achieve security and stability across the region. During the meeting, Gabr conveyed the greetings of President El-Sisi and the Egyptian people to the Iraqi premier, expressing pleasure at what he has seen of the restoration of normal life in the streets of Iraq. This affirms that the country has started to recover and restore its national identity, he said. In the same regard, Gabr noted that Iraq has begun to take serious steps towards development and construction, voicing his appreciation for ongoing efforts in the country that aims to bolster the welfare of the people, as well as to reach further regional and international cooperation. During the press encounter, Iraqi President Barham Salih gave remarks, saying that Iraq appreciates the Egyptian experience in construction and development as well as the restoration of security and stability across Egypt under President El-Sisi. Salih praised the Egyptian experiment in this regard as a role model for Iraq and the countries in the region. El-Sisi and Jordanian King Abdullah II are keen to cooperate with Iraq through their trilateral cooperation mechanism in economic, developmental and other fields, Salih said. They are also keen on continuous consultation with Iraq on the various issues of mutual concern to achieve the interests of the three countries and the countries of the region, the Iraqi president added. Salih affirmed that Iraqs Saturday summit will be a chance for Baghdad to highlight its vision on regional issues and the means of partnership to establish economic cooperation and integration between Iraq, the neighbouring countries and other countries that are allies of the region. The Iraqi president also reaffirmed Iraqs stance defending the Palestinian cause and the right of the Palestinian people in establishing their independent state in accordance with the international legitimacy resolutions. Salih affirmed that achieving peace in the Middle East depends on the necessity of finding a fair solution to the Palestinian crisis. Short link: Egypt affirmed on Thursday solidarity against all forms of terrorism, violence and extremism after two explosions in the Afghan capital Kabul killed dozens of civilians and US military personnel. In a statement by the foreign ministry, Egypt expressed its firm condemnation of the two explosions. The Egyptian government and people extend sincere condolences to the families of the Afghan and American victims who [died] as a result of this brutal terrorism, the statement said. The ministry also expressed wishes for a speedy recovery of the injured, the statement added. At least 60 Afghan civilians were killed and 143 others were injured in the explosions near the Kabul airport early today, AP cited an official as saying on condition of anonymity. Also, 12 US service members have been killed and 15 injured in the twin blasts, US Central Command Commander Kenneth McKenzie said McKenzie blamed Islamic State in Khorasan (ISIS-K), a local affiliate of Daesh, for the attacks, pledging action against the groups elements. The attacks, which targeted the evacuation operation of American and Afghan allies at the Kabul airport, come only days before the deadline set by US President Joe Biden for the US forces to withdraw from the country. Short link: In an Islamic republic where ultimate power rests with supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Raisi inherits a difficult socioeconomic situation. Iran has been been strangled financially by sanctions reimposed by Washington after then US president Donald Trump pulled out of a multilateral nuclear deal in 2018. The country of 83 million people has since been hit by a severe economic crisis amplified by the Covid pandemic. Iran is currently grappling with a fifth wave of infections -- the strongest wave yet. The country recorded its highest single day death toll on Tuesday, with 709 fatalities recorded by the health ministry in 24 hours. The ultraconservative Raisi won a June 18 election marred by record low turnout and an absence of significant competitors. He succeeds moderate president Hassan Rouhani, architect of the political opening that culminated in the 2015 nuclear agreement between Tehran and major powers. But that external opening was torpedoed by Trump and much of Iran's conservative camp. - 'National interests' - The new president was sworn in by parliament in early August, but the outgoing administration remains at the helm until the new cabinet gets legislative approval. The confidence vote in the strictly conservative line-up -- all 19 of them men -- will allow Raisi to begin leaving his mark. The president announced on Saturday that his government's first priority will be the battle against coronavirus, closely followed by the economy. Western powers, Russia and China are all keeping a watchful eye for any sign of willingness by Iran to resume discussions that began in Vienna in April aimed at salvaging the nuclear deal. The parties agreed in late June to meet for a new round of talks, but discussions have yet to resume. In the aftermath of his election victory, Raisi declared on June 20 that he will not permit negotiations just for "negotiation's sake". But he also said: "Any negotiations that guarantee national interests will certainly be supported". The 2015 deal offered Iran an easing of Western and UN sanctions in return for tight controls on its nuclear programme, monitored by the UN. The negotiations in Vienna aimed at reviving this accord -- directly with the remaining parties, indirectly with the US -- seek to bring Washington back into the fold. When the last round of talks finished in June, the plan was to soften US sanctions in exchange for Iran adhering strictly to its nuclear commitments. In retaliation for Trump's withdrawal three years ago and his swingeing sanctions, Iran in effect abandoned most of those commitments. Elsewhere on the diplomatic circuit, one of the first decisions for the new government will be who to send to a Baghdad-hosted regional summit due to take place on Saturday. The summit seeks to ease tensions on a number of fronts and Iraq has said that Raisi himself is among those invited. Along with the prospective ministers, who must each receive parliamentary approval, Iranian cabinets are composed of several vice presidents, who do not require confirmation. How many vice presidents Raisi will appoint is not yet known. But the presidency on Wednesday named Major General Mohsen Rezai, a former Revolutionary Guards chief and among the losers in the presidential poll, as vice president in charge of economic affairs. Short link: Settlers, accompanied by former Knesset member Moshe Feiglin, broke into Al-Aqsa Mosque yards on Thursday via Bab Al Maghrebah. Eyewitnesses said the settlers were strongly guarded by Israeli forces and that they stormed the mosque in groups. The settlers performed Talmudic rituals in the vicinity of the mosque. Short link: The first Turkish troops evacuated from Afghanistan arrived back in Turkey on Thursday. TV footage showed a Turkish Airlines flight carrying 345 soldiers land at Ankara's Esenboga Airport, having departed Kabul on Wednesday evening. Some 600 Turkish troops were based in Afghanistan. ``We aim to complete the transfer as soon as possible,'' Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said in a statement. Short link: The most senior UAE official to visit Qatar since a thaw in the two regional player's relations earlier this year held talks with Qatar's ruler Thursday, both countries' media reported. UAE National Security Advisor Sheikh Tahnoun bin Zayed Al-Nahyan met Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, discussing "bilateral relations and the means to enhance them", the official Qatar News Agency reported. The United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia cut ties and transport links with Qatar in June 2017, alleging it backed radical Islamist groups and was too close to Riyadh's rival Iran. The UAE, Saudi Arabia and their allies restored full relations with Qatar in January after a landmark summit, ending the rift. The UAE's official WAM news agency also reported that the "Emir of Qatar received a delegation headed by Sheikh Tahnoun", adding that they had discussed cooperation "in the economic and trade fields and vital investment projects". The UAE and Qatar remain divided over Doha's perceived support for movements aligned to the Muslim Brotherhood and the two countries' backing for rival groups in Libya's conflict. Sheikh Tanoun met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, one of Qatar's closest allies, for talks last week. Anwar Gargash, a former UAE minister of state for foreign affairs, who now advises the country's president, tweeted a picture of the meeting. "Building bridges of cooperation and prosperity with brothers and friends is... a major pillar of the UAE's policy," he wrote. *This story was edited by Ahram Online. Short link: Related Afghanistan: World in crisis INTERVIEW: Contextualising the Taliban More fear than hope in Afghanistan Gulf rivalry through Afghanistan Trusting the Taliban? An explosion went off Thursday outside Kabul's airport, where thousands of people have flocked as they try to flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. Officials offered no casualty count, but a witness said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded. Western nations had warned earlier in the day of a possible attack at the airport in the waning days of a massive airlift. Suspicion for any attack targeting the crowds would likely fall on the Islamic State group and not the Taliban, who have been deployed at the airport's gates trying to control the mass of people. The Pentagon confirmed the blast, with no immediate word on casualties. Adam Khan, an Afghan waiting outside the airport, said the explosion went off in a crowd of people waiting to enter the airport. Khan, who said he was standing about 30 meters (yards) away, said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who lost body parts. Several countries urged people to avoid the airport earlier in the day, with one saying there was a threat of a suicide bombing. But just days _ or even hours for some nations _ before the evacuation effort ends, few appeared to heed the call. ------ BERLIN _ Germany's defense minister says terror threats in Kabul have become ``significantly more concrete'' as the international evacuation effort from the airport in the Afghan capital is nearing its end. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said on Thursday that the effort is ``now in what is certainly the most hectic, dangerous and sensitive phase. We know that the terror threats have intensified massively and that they have become significantly more concrete.'' She said Germany's foreign ministry told people in Kabul overnight that they should not try to get to the airport on their own, in line with warnings by the U.S. and others. The German military was still flying between Kabul and Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Thursday. It wasn't immediately clear when exactly the German evacuation effort would end. Germany's top military commander, Gen. Eberhard Zorn, said that as of Thursday afternoon German flights had evacuated some 5,200 people from 45 nations, including about 4,200 Afghans. Zorn said two small German helicopters that were flown into Kabul a few days ago, intended to help get individuals to the airport, were flown out to Tashkent overnight. ------ Qatar says it has helped the evacuation of more than 40,000 people from Kabul airport. The small nation on the Arabian Peninsula says most will transit through Qatar after staying in temporary accommodations. Qatar says that ``the evacuation efforts will continue in the coming days in consultation with international partners.'' Qatar also hosts an office of the Taliban and was the site of negotiations between America, the toppled Afghan government and the insurgents. ------ India says it has evacuated most of its nationals from Afghanistan and is doing everything to bring them back home. India's External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told a meeting of political leaders on Thursday that India has operated six flights so far from Kabul after a stunning takeover by the Taliban. ``A few of them (Indians) are still there.'' He didn't give the exact number of Indians and Afghans evacuated so far from Kabul but the Indian media put their numbers around 800. He declined to say how India is going to deal with the Taliban government in Afghanistan. ``The situation in Afghanistan is yet to settle down. I will talk about it later,'' Jaishankar told reporters. New Delhi had stayed away from the Taliban except for back-channel contacts in recent months. It didn't recognize the Taliban government that ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001. ------ France will fully end its operation to evacuate French nationals and Afghans in danger from Taliban-controlled Kabul by Friday evening, Prime Minister Jean Castex said. Beyond this date, "it will not be possible to carry out evacuations from Kabul airport," Castex told RTL radio Thursday. A source close to the government added that the date had been enforced by the plan of the United States, which is providing security at the airport, to pull out by August 31. ------ Pakistan's prime minister has called on the international community to continue engagement with Afghanistan, saying it was a ``way forward to avert any humanitarian crisis and secure peace and stability.`` Imran Khan made his comment during a meeting with David Beasley, executive director of the United Nations World Food Program who met with him in Islamabad. Khan also called for the formation of an inclusive government to ensure peace and avoid an humanitarian crisis, after the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan. The latest development comes as dozens of Afghans continue to enter Pakistan via its land borders. But the number of Afghan people entering Pakistan through land routes has been steadily decreasing since earlier this week. ___ BUDAPEST, Hungary _ Hungary says its army has evacuated all Hungarian citizens from Afghanistan of which the defense ministry is aware. Defense Minister Tibor Benko told a press conference on Thursday that 540 people, among them 57 Afghan families including 180 children, had been evacuated to Hungary from Kabul. Of the Afghan citizens who assisted Hungarian forces in Afghanistan since 2003, the army has evacuated 87%, he said, adding that Hungarian, Afghan, Austrian and U.S. citizens were evacuated during the operation. All of the nearly 100 Hungarian soldiers that participated in the evacuation operation have returned to Hungary, Benko said. No injuries occurred during the evacuation operations, though there were Afghan citizens who sustained injuries prior to their evacuation, he said. Seven Hungarian soldiers were killed during military operations in Afghanistan since 2003, Benko said. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands _ The Dutch government says it is pulling its troops and diplomats out of the Kabul airport over the security situation. In a letter to parliament Thursday, the foreign and defense ministers say that ``the Netherlands has been told by the United States to leave today and will most likely carry out its last flight later today.'' They add that ``in light of the extremely quickly deteriorating situation in and around the airport, evacuees can no longer be assisted by the Netherlands to get access to the airport.'' ___ LONDON _ The British, French and Danish militaries have given stark warnings about the security situation at the Kabul airport, where Afghan civilians are scrambling to evacuate ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for foreign troops to leave Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC on Thursday there was ''very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack'' at the airport. Other warnings emerged about a possible threat from Afghanistan's Islamic State affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country. Heappey conceded that people are desperate to leave and ``there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it.'' French Prime Minister Jean Castex told French radio RTL on Thursday that ``from tomorrow evening onwards, we are not able to evacuate people from the Kabul airport'' due to the Aug. 31 American withdrawal. Meanwhile, Danish defense minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: ``It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul.'' Denmark's last flight, carrying 90 people plus soldiers and diplomats, already had left Kabul. Poland and Belgium have already ended their evacuations from Afghanistan. ___ BERLIN _ The German army says it has sent another military transport plane to Kabul to evacuate further people from the Afghan capital. The army tweeted that the plane departed from Tashkent Thursday morning. Altogether, the German army, or Bundeswehr, has airlifted 5,193 people out of Kabul, 539 of those on Wednesday. The defense ministry tweeted that, ``We could already help many. We will evacuate until the last second.'' Government officials have not said when exactly the German evacuation mission is going to end but it is expected that the country will stop evacuating people with military planes ahead of the Americans' pullout date of August 31. ___ WARSAW, Poland -- Poland's prime minister said that the country has evacuated over 900 Afghan citizens, as the country prepared to end its evacuation mission later Thursday. ``The evacuation action from Afghanistan ends today,'' said Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki at a news conference in Warsaw. Another government official, Michal Dworczyk, said that a total of 44 flights were made transporting over 1,100 people. More than 900 of them are Afghans who have cooperated with Poland for years. He said the last transport with civilians from Afghanistan would land in Poland on Thursday morning. The Afghan ambassador to Poland, Tahir Qadiry, also spoke at the news conference, expressing his thanks to the Polish government and the Polish people and voicing hope that the evacuated Afghan citizens will be able to return home one day. ___ ISTANBUL _ Turkish civilian technicians could help operate Kabul airport after the withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan, a senior Turkish official said Thursday. Ibrahim Kalin, spokesman for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said talks with the Taliban were underway to determine the operation of Hamid Karzai International Airport. ``We can continue the operation of the airport there even after our troops withdraw,'' Kalin told broadcaster NTV. ``Our civilian experts can provide support for the airport and negotiations regarding this are continuing.'' Turkey announced its troops had begun to leave Kabul, where they have been helping guard the airport, on Wednesday evening. Kalin said the troop withdrawal would be completed within 36 hours. Prior to the Taliban taking Kabul on Aug. 15, NATO member Turkey had offered to secure and operate the airport following the U.S. withdrawal. India says most of its nationals evacuated India says it has evacuated most of its nationals from Afghanistan and is doing everything to bring them back home. India's External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told a meeting of political leaders on Thursday that India has operated six flights so far from Kabul after a stunning takeover by the Taliban. ``A few of them (Indians) are still there.'' He didn't give the exact number of Indians and Afghans evacuated so far from Kabul but the Indian media put their numbers around 800. He declined to say how India is going to deal with the Taliban government in Afghanistan. ``The situation in Afghanistan is yet to settle down. I will talk about it later,'' Jaishankar told reporters. New Delhi had stayed away from the Taliban except for back-channel contacts in recent months. It didn't recognize the Taliban government that ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001. Short link: The Kremin says that Russia will closely follow the developments in Afghanistan before making a decision on whether to recognize the Taliban's rule. Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Moscow will watch the Taliban's ``future steps to ensure order and security of the country's citizens and provide security for the Russian diplomats.'' Peskov emphasized that Russia wants to see peace and stability in Afghanistan and hopes that efforts will be taken to stem the flow of drugs coming from the country. Moscow, which fought a 10-year war in Afghanistan that ended with the Soviet troops' withdrawal in 1989, has made a diplomatic comeback as a mediator over the past few years, reaching out to feuding Afghan factions including the Taliban even though the group was added to the Russian list of terrorist organizations in 2003. Short link: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Thursday convened crisis talks after a large explosion at Kabul airport, his office announced. A Downing Street spokesperson said Johnson had been "updated on the situation at the airport in Kabul" and called a meeting of the COBR emergencies committee for later Thursday. Short link: Biden and Bennett were scheduled to meet late Thursday morning for their first face-to-face conversation since Bennett became Israel's prime minister in June. The two will instead meet on Friday. Short link: The Arab Contractors, working in cooperation with El-Sewedy Electric company, successfully installed the first turbine in the Julius Nyerere Hydropower Station and Dam project in Tanzania last week. The $2.9 billion project, a partnership between Tanzanias Electric Supply Company and the two Egyptian companies, is an example, says former deputy foreign minister Mohamed Hegazi,of the benefits that can accrue when Egypt offers its expertise to other African nations, especially in the field of water resources. The dividends, says Hegazi, include enhanced security, and he sees no reason why the Blue Nile states cannot follow the same integrational approach provided the political will is there. A total of nine turbines, with each a capacity of 2,115 megawatts will be installed. When complete, the dam is expected to have a storage capacity of 34 billion cubic meters (bcm), covering an area of 1,200 km2. Egypt and Tanzania have a history of strong ties since diplomatic relations began in 1964, following the formation of the United Republic of Tanzania. President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisis visit to Tanzania in August 2017 gave a major boost to bilateral ties, and in January 2018 Egypt and Tanzania signed the contract to construct the Julius Nyerere Hydropower Station and Dam on the Rufiji River. Construction work began in mid-2019 and is scheduled for completion next year. The continuing work on the Tanzanian dam, in an atmosphere of cooperation, is in stark contrast to the failure of negotiations over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). While Cairo and Khartoum continue to push for a diplomatic solution to the latter, embedded in a legally binding agreement, Addis Ababa is determined to drag its feet. Cooperation over the Julius Nyerere Dam shows once and for all that Egypt is in favour of building developmental projects in African states as long as measures are taken to ensure the interests of all involved parties are preserved, said a diplomat who preferred to remain anonymous. So far, a decade of tripartite negotiations between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia have failed to reach agreement on the filling and operation of GERD. Visits by Algerian Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra to the three states in late July and early August resulted in Algeria being given the green light to play the role of mediator, a development welcomed by both Cairo and Khartoum. Addis Ababa, meanwhile, asked Algiers to play a role in correcting what it described as Arab League misperceptions about the GERD. But unless this, or any future, initiative comes with a clear timetable attached. it will probe another time waster, warned the diplomat. The Tanzanian hydroelectric power station, he added, points an alternative pathway for countries in need of electricity who might otherwise import power from GERDs surplus. When completed, GERD is intended to be the largest dam in Africa. It will have a storage capacity of 74bcm, cover an area of 1,874 km2, and is expected to produce 13,629 gigawatts of electricity annually. Last month Ethiopia declared the second filling of the dam complete. It did not disclose the amount of water retained, though experts believe it could not have exceeded four bcm, far less than the target of 13.5 bcm previously announced by Ethiopian officials. Abbas Sharaki, professor of geology and water resources at Cairo University, says that so far Addis Ababa has been unable to complete even the first phase of the GERD. Addis Ababa had initially announced that the dam would have two working turbines, producing 750 megawatts, 40 months after laying the foundation stone on April 2011, meaning August 2014. The UN Security Council met in early July to discuss the ongoing dispute over the GERD between Ethiopia on the one hand, and Egypt and Sudan on the other. Tunisia submitted a draft resolution to council members which it hoped would be discussed during the session and later put to a vote. Ethiopia slammed the session as an unhelpful distraction to the African Union (AU)-led negotiating process and the Security Council, as had been expected, returned the ball back into the AUs court. The July meeting was the second time the Security Council has met to discuss GERD. During the first session, convened on 29 June, 2020, it advised the parties to return to AU-led negotiations. The talks, held under the auspices of the AU throughout last year, failed to secure an agreement on the dams filling and operations. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Short link: The Africa Singapore Business Forum (ASBF), a platform for business exchange and boosting trade between Africa and Asia, kicked off on Monday for its sixth edition and is scheduled to conclude on 27 August. Organised by Enterprise Singapore, a Singapore government agency dedicated to business growth, the forum gathers over 2,000 business and government leaders from 30 countries to explore partnerships and growth opportunities among countries on the two continents, particularly amid the ongoing challenges imposed by Covid-19. The 2021 edition of ASBF identifies opportunities in key sectors, including digital technology, financing, innovation, manufacturing, sustainability and urban solutions, Sugumaran Devaraja, regional director for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region at Enterprise Singapore told Al-Ahram Weekly. Devaraja said Singapore was committed to working with African companies to develop the post-Covid-19 economy. Noting the resilience of Africa in the face of the pandemic, Devaraja said that this was an unprecedented crisis that had impacted all countries around the world, but that the African economies had shown particular resilience in managing it. The pandemic had thrown curveballs at the various responses of governments, but they had learnt to adapt and evolve their responses depending on their needs, he added. Africa is a diverse region characterised by different cultures, languages, and stages of development, but Devaraja said that despite this diversity the African countries had been quick to set up the Africa Task Force for the coronavirus in the early stages of the pandemic to coordinate responses across the continent. Volunteers had come together to produce an open-source Africa Covid-19 Response Toolkit that allowed any government or public entity to develop further tools to respond to the pandemic, Devaraja explained. Africans are known for their ingenuity and resilience, he added. He noted that when supply chains had been impacted and lockdowns had become inevitable, African businesses and startups had stepped up, some pivoted to medical supply manufacturing. Startups had created new applications to track crowds and supplies and robots and drones had been used to minimise direct human interactions. Digital solutions and technology have been one of the bright spots for Africas development, driven by the mobile revolution, Devaraja said, stressing that this was one area Africa could count on in the recovery trajectory. The Africa region accounts for over 60 per cent of the global transaction value of mobile money in 2021, despite being home to only 16 per cent of the world population, he said. This interest in new banking practices was particularly true for Egypt, where the surge in fintech investment and digital banking growth were paving the way to new recovery paths for the country. The pandemic only expedited the spread of technology across the region and encouraged many African governments to reduce barriers to signing up, he said. Singapore companies have recognised this opportunity and are forging partnerships in healthtech, edtech and fintech in various African markets, he added. According to Devaraja, initiatives such as Boost Africa launched by the African Development Bank and the European Investment Bank aim to harness the regions potential and spur entrepreneurship and innovation across Africa. Meanwhile, the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) will also play a role in this regard. AfCFTA has created the largest free-trade area in the world, based on the over 50 African countries that it brings together under its umbrella, with a combined GDP of $3 trillion. AfCFTA will connect 1.2 billion African consumers in a single market and will reduce trade costs and enable Africa to integrate further into global supply chains, Devaraja noted. This brings tremendous opportunities for companies to diversify their trade and investment mix. Distribution networks will be enhanced, and opportunities in manufacturing, consumer and lifestyle goods, transport and logistics and real estate are set to grow significantly. All these things add to the attractiveness of the region, he said. In Egypt, Devaraja said that the countrys light-manufacturing and garment sectors were expected to benefit from the AfCFTA agreement coming into effect, providing a bigger market for Egyptian manufactured goods. However, the easing of logistics bottlenecks and red tape was key to these materialising, he added. Singapore companies interest in Egypt is due to the countrys growth potential driven by its population size and strategic location, he said. To facilitate more partnerships between companies from both countries, Enterprise Singapore will continue to engage Egyptian companies in order to understand their problems and match them with Singapore companies with the right solutions that can meet their needs, Devaraja said. He said that Singapore companies were exploring investment opportunities in the Suez Canal Economic Zone due to its strategic position, adding that Singapore ports and logistics firms were interested in having a presence there. Singapore food-processing companies were benefiting from Egypts location to manufacture for African countries, he added. We also see opportunities in the infrastructure, hospitality, and digital transformation sectors and greater cooperation in partnerships between Singapore companies and larger Egyptian companies, connecting the technology and innovation ecosystems of both countries to promote Singapore as a destination for Egyptian businesses to set up a presence as a gateway to Asia and for their innovation and research and development (R&D) needs, he said. More trade activity and business visits will resume once the Covid-19 pandemic reduces, he stated. Assessing Egypts policies to alleviate the impacts of the pandemic on its economic and business scene as an emerging market, Devaraja said that Covid-19 had hit just as the reforms of the previous years had been set to begin paying off, with consumer demand rising and salaries catching up to their pre-currency-flotation levels. Thanks to the improved fiscal position of the country and the steps taken to increase regulatory efficiency, financial inclusion, and digitalisation, Egypt was well placed to take the measures necessary to respond effectively to the pandemic with a coordinated response by the government and the private sector, he said. Like the UAE, the Egyptian government had sought to strike a balance between mitigating the spread of the virus and allowing the economy sufficient operating room to sustain the livelihoods of workers and employees, he noted. Singapore companies operating in Egypt across different sectors had said that the economy had been resilient despite the pandemic and had thanked the Egyptian leadership for steering the economy through earlier dark days, he concluded. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Short link: The G7 group of countries failed to persuade US President Joe Biden to postpone the date for the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan at a virtual meeting on Tuesday, with Pentagon Spokesperson John Kirby saying there had been no change to the deadline of completing the evacuation by the end of the month. Kirby added that the US believed it could complete the evacuation on time and suggested that the US and the Taliban were in agreement about the 31 August deadline for the US leaving Afghanistan. Without getting into details, Im not seeing much dissonance between US public statements and conversations with the Taliban, Kirby said. The Taliban have been very clear about what their expectations are, he added. The Pentagon also announced the biggest day so far for the evacuations from Afghanistan, with Spokesman Hank Taylor saying 21,600 people had flown out of Kabul Airport over the previous 24 hours. The apparent coordination between the two sides came after CIA Director William Burns held a meeting with Taliban leaders in Afghanistan on Monday. Adhering to the timetable for the departure of international forces will put more pressure on relations between Washington and its European allies, which had hoped for more time to evacuate the thousands of their citizens and the Afghan citizens who had worked with them from Afghanistan. In a brief pooled interview following the G7 virtual summit, UKs Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the G7 had agreed a roadmap for engaging with the Taliban. He explained he wanted to ensure safe passage for Afghans wanting to flee after the 31 August deadline. Even before the G7 meeting, the European leaders were already planning for the worst. It had been apparent that there were significant differences between Washington and its European allies, and the time was short to bridge the gap with Washington before the meeting called by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, also chair of the G7. Before the summit meeting, statements from European capitals differed from Washingtons position regarding extending the deadline of 31 August for the pull-out of NATO forces from Afghanistan. While London, Paris and Berlin were urging Washington to pressure the Taliban to extend the timetable beyond this date, statements issued by the White House and the Pentagon said that Washington would deal with the question of an extension on a day-to-day basis and it was not yet at the point to seek a change of the deadline with the Taliban. The Taliban had warned there would be consequences if Washington sought to extend the deadline. It wants all foreign evacuations from the country completed by the 31 August deadline. Taliban Spokesperson Suhail Shaheen said that its a red lineIf they extend it, that means they are extending the occupation while there is no need for that. US officials, including Biden, hinted that delaying the departure of international forces from Afghanistan was fraught with risks. Among their fears was a possible attack by the Islamic State (IS) group or Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan on US forces. The British position is that we want to stay longer if it is possible to do so, said UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace. But he said the 1,000 British troops at Kabul Airport would be unable to keep up the operation when the much larger American contingent left. Wallace conceded there was a low probability that the US would be persuaded into delaying the deadline past 31 August, the deadline agreed by Biden after he inherited a peace deal between former US president Donald Trump and the Taliban. I look at the public comments by President Biden, I look at the interviews given by the Taliban, I think its worth the G7 trying, but in the MoD [Ministry of Defence] were planning for the worst and hoping for the best, Wallace said. He argued it would be in the Talibans interest to ensure the airfield remained open. The Taliban needs trade, he said. It needs a population to survive, indeed, the Taliban also needs international recognition and foreign money, so I think its in the interests of the Taliban to keep the airport functioning. Germany said it was in talks with both NATO allies and the Taliban about keeping Kabul Airport open beyond 31 August. The German government also expressed its impatience with the pace of the evacuation effort. Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said the majority of local staff who worked for his country in Afghanistan had not yet left. The French government also believes it will be required to carry out evacuations beyond the 31 August deadline imposed by Washington. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said that we are concerned about the deadline set by the United States on 31 August. Additional time is needed to complete ongoing operations. The differences between Washington and its European allies are not limited to extending the deadline for the departure of NATO forces. There were also differences over the international strategy towards the Taliban and forging a common approach to Afghanistan policy. While Britain led the camp that wanted to threaten to impose economic sanctions against the Taliban if it violated promises to form a representative government or backtracked on pledges to respect the rights of women and girls in education and work, the US did not show any great resolve to use a carrot-and-stick strategy with the Taliban. There is $9 billion in US banks alone belonging to the Afghan government, and some European powers argue that the US could use this as leverage to press the Taliban to cooperate with the international community. But many in the Biden administration fear sanctions might push the Taliban to further militancy, saying that sanctions would harm the Afghan people, of which about 70 per cent of the population already lives at the poverty line. In a significant move showing that Washington wants to engage with the Taliban, Biden sent the head of the CIA to meet the Talibans leader on Monday in the highest-level diplomatic encounter since the militant group took over the Afghan capital. CIA Director William Burns met Taliban leader Abdul-Ghani Baradar in Kabul, US officials told the Washington Post. The newspaper said the talks were likely to have involved the deadline for the US military to conclude its airlift. The G7s inability to break Bidens stance on the evacuation of Afghanistan has left European leaders asking whether the US is still a reliable partner. For them, the worst consequences of the collapse of the Afghan government and the Talibans assumption of power are yet to come. Among the potential repercussions are increased risks from Al-Qaeda and IS terrorism and the prospects of a new refugee crisis on Europes borders, as happened during the Syrian Civil War. If these repercussions materialise, Europe will pay the price because of the geographical proximity that has made it in the past face migrant crises and terrorist attacks. The European leaders assessment is that the Biden administration has created a rift in transatlantic relations that is worse than the rift created by Trumps anti-NATO and anti-EU policies, a senior European diplomat familiar with NATO operations in Afghanistan told the Weekly. Regardless of all Bidens justifications for withdrawing the troops in such a chaotic manner, the conviction in Europe is that American leadership of the world is in retreat and that Europe can no longer protect its security and interests by relying on America. What Biden confirmed through his policies is: America first just like Trump. he added. The G7 meeting was a make-or-break moment in reshaping strategy on Afghanistan. But the meeting, due to the lack of time available for discussion amid the fluidity of events on the ground, left many allies with more questions than answers. Senior British military officers expressed anger over the US strategy, saying it exposed the hollowness of the trans-Atlantic special relationship. France has reason to assume that a unilateralist US president will continue to dominate Western foreign policy and defence. The crisis in Afghanistan will only reinforce the French presidents view that Europe needs an independent foreign and defence policy. Germany is also dismayed by the developments in Afghanistan and Bidens decisions. Armin Laschet, candidate to succeed Angela Merkel as German chancellor, has described Kabuls fall as the biggest debacle NATO has seen since its foundation, and it is an epochal change that we are facing. Japans concern will be to ensure that Washington sticks to its pledge that the Afghanistan withdrawal indicates a reordering of US priorities towards competing with China in Southeast Asia. Tokyos fear is that the withdrawal reflects growing US isolationism. During the G7 meeting, Biden defended the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, saying that it was one of his election promises. He echoed what he had said over the past days that America has no interest in never-ending wars. Instead of a foreign policy based on brutal force, Biden said he sought to enhance his doctrine of smart diplomacy. For Europe and the world, non-military interventions would be a positive shift for US foreign policy, but applying this doctrine in this crisis and the Taliban being the beneficiary of it is what many are dreading in Afghanistan and worldwide. For many, the rebranding of US foreign policy to smart power or soft power in this context has been catastrophic. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Search Keywords: Short link: For nearly four decades, the Middle East has been picking up the pieces of the US strategic folly in Afghanistan and paying the price for its unending wars in the region. The debacle led to the creation of Islamic jihad by CIA proxies that rose during the civil war in Afghanistan following the Soviet invasion in 1979, with devastating consequences for the region and the world. Both governments and societies have shouldered the brunt of the terrorism that has since shaken the Arab and Muslim nations and sparked a clash of civilisations between the West and Islam. The sweeping Taliban victory after the abrupt US withdrawal from Afghanistan this month has brought back memories of the chaos and horror caused by violent terrorist networks and raised fears across the region of the jihadists making a comeback. Some even fear that the Taliban victory could have a broader geopolitical impact on a region already battered by civil wars, regional conflicts, despotism, corruption and underdevelopment. A week after the Taliban stormed into the Afghan capital Kabul, the movement seems to be consolidating its control over Afghanistan, facing few challenges to its renewed theocratic rule. Taliban fighters are using force to break up protests, beating people trying to flee the country at Kabul Airport, and stepping up efforts to arrest people who worked for the former government, particularly in the security services. Most horrifying has been the climate of fear hanging over the battered country, as Afghans remember the Talibans brutal rule by stone-faced insurgents who imposed their harsh interpretation of Islamic law during their short-lived control of Afghanistan in the 1990s. Reactions abroad have been confused, especially from the USs Western allies who scrambled to respond to the crisis after NATO troops were bounced into withdrawing from Afghanistan with little in the way of consultation from the US administration. While US President Joe Biden remains under criticism for his fast retreat, Western governments have sent mixed signals on how to address the new situation in Afghanistan. Some have realised that they will have to grapple with one of their biggest foreign-policy and security challenges in decades and continue their efforts to suppress global terrorism threats and a possible refugee influx. Meanwhile, Pakistan and Iran, Afghanistans neighbouring countries which have nurtured close ties with the Taliban over the years, stand to benefit from the US withdrawal in different but geopolitically significant ways. For Islamabad and Tehran, the retreat removes the US security presence that they believe Washington was using to expand its influence in Afghanistan at their expense. Both Iran and Pakistan hope to make regional strategic gains through the Talibans victory. Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan welcomed the changeover in Afghanistan and said that the Taliban have broken the shackles of slavery. Irans position was straightforward, with President Ebrahim Raisi taunting the Talibans takeover as Americas military defeat. Qatar, the Gulf emirate which has served as a facilitator for the US-Taliban talks and maintains close ties with the Islamist movement, endorsed the movements takeover, with its Foreign Minister Mohamed Bin Abdel-Rahman Al Thani, promising that Qatar will do its utmost to bring a peaceful transition to Afghanistan. The Talibans victory received a warm welcome from like-minded Islamist groups, such as the Palestinian Hamas and Islamic Jihad movements, the Muslim Brotherhood in Sudan and the terror-listed Al-Shabab insurgents in Somalia. Yet, governments and mainstream Arabs remain stunned by the troubled US exit and are taking the Biden administration, even though implicitly, to task over the chaos the withdrawal is leaving behind and the risks of a spillover. Moreover, it is evident that the Taliban comeback in Afghanistan is galvanising many regional actors as policy makers try to reassess their security and strategic calculations as a result of this huge challenge for a terribly fluid region. Whether or not regional policy chiefs have been surprised by the sudden takeover of Afghanistan, or were well prepared for this moment, broader questions have arisen in the wake of the Talibans victory as pessimistic assessments of where things are going are also emerging. The most pressing challenge is the tremendous impact that a strict Islamist system will create in Afghanistan, as most Arab governments are pressing ahead with plans to introduce religious reforms at a time when the region seems to be at a turning point in its unsettled struggle between nationalism and Islamism. The reforms were triggered by the attempts of Political Islam, including the Muslim Brotherhood group, to seize on the popular uprisings of the Arab Spring in 2011 to take power and advance their own agenda, spurring divisions with the largely nationalist and secular sector and religious minorities. Across the region changes are aimed at reforming religious discourse and social behaviour and restructuring religious institutions away from fundamentalism and extremism and not without resistance from traditionalists and Political Islam. The much-needed reforms are being widely viewed as leading to a more open and more tolerant society and a forthcoming path to a broader Islamic reformation and enlightenment. In the long term, the social changes could hopefully end the vicious cycle of nationalism versus Islamism and set the path for democratic reforms. Afghanistans fall to the Taliban has now put all that at stake. The movement has ruled out an elected government, and its spokesmen have made it clear that the group envisages a Sharia basis for governing the country. If Afghanistan is declared an Islamic emirate, in other words if it becomes a country ruled by a religious theocracy as it was in the 1990s, it will be a huge challenge for a terribly weakened region to sustain itself with another Islamist state next door. The largely Sunni Arab world already feels threatened by the Shia-dominated Islamic Republic in Iran that seeks to export its religious model, and an extremist Sunni regime in the Middle East would have a devastating impact on reform endeavours. The second key challenge is the fear that Afghanistan will become a terrorist safe haven again where Arab jihadists can operate and direct their networks back home as they did under the Talibans last emirate. Arabs were among the thousands of jihadists who remained in Afghanistan after the war against the Soviet army in the 1980s and formed the backbone of Osama Bin Ladens Al-Qaeda terror group and other networks spread over the region from Iraq to Morocco. Al-Qaedas relationship with the Taliban seems to be intact, and there are no indications that the group, whose leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri has pledged allegiance to Taliban chief Haibatullah Akhundzada, has or will abandon its networks. While Al-Qaeda could take advantage of its close ties to the group, the Talibans rise could also open up opportunities for the notorious Islamic State (IS) group, which suffered a devastating defeat in Iraq and Syria in 2017, to rise up again and expand. The number of IS members in its branch in Afghanistan, known as the Khorasan Emirate, are estimated at 1,000 fighters, and these have been responsible for dozens of attacks against civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as well as scores of clashes with US, Afghan and Pakistani security forces, over the last few years. The group, which is believed to have established footholds in some of the central and south Asian nations, receives support from the IS leadership in Iraq and Syria and is believed to be reconstituting to launch attacks that will not necessarily be restricted to Afghanistan or the Asian theatre. However different things may be from the way the group behaved during its last run in power, since its return the Taliban have been tight-lipped about the future of these terrorist groups under their rule. Spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid has only promised that Afghanistan wont be used against the United States and its allies. While the Taliban has not made any revisions to its extremist ideology or promised to change, radical groups and even mainstream Islamic political groups have publicly cheered its triumph as a victory by Allah for Islam, and they will look to the movement as a driving force for their resurgence. If that disastrous scenario takes place, it will roll back all the gains that have been made so far in the battle against extremism, and the region will find itself once again trapped in Political Islamism and possibly an IS-like insurgency or one reminiscent of that carried out by returning Afghan veterans in the 1990s. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Search Keywords: Short link: The Taliban of today are not very different from the Taliban of the 1990s. They might act differently for now, but I think in gradual terms we will be seeing a replay of Taliban rule in Afghanistan as it unfolded in the 1990s, commented Ahmed Kamel Al-Beheiri, a researcher on Islamist movements at the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo.Beheiri had been following the statements made by the leaders of the Taliban since their 15 August takeover of Kabul, or rather their retaking of the capital of Afghanistan, since they had also ruled the country from the mid-1990s until the US-led invasion in 2001 in response to the 9/11 attacks blamed on the Afghanistan-based Al-Qaeda group.Some analysts have argued that the Taliban have evolved from being a largely impulsive group of angry, radicalised and armed young men into a genuinely political movement that could make intelligent compromises even if it still relies on arms.But Beheiri rejected this argument. There is no backing for this argument. The ideological base of the Taliban was established early on and remains very much the same. More importantly, the statements of the leaders of the Taliban over the past few days cannot be said to have the support of the grassroots of the movement, he said.It was in the early 1990s that the Taliban came to life. They were essentially a group of students of the Sharia [religious law] that decided around 1994 to act against the communists represented by the rulers of Afghanistan at the time that enjoyed the backing of Moscow, he said. This predominantly Pashtun movement, whose fighters today are estimated to stand at over 60,000, took part in the war against the decade-long Soviet occupation of Afghanistan after 1979. In 1996, it was the Taliban, literally meaning students, that put an end to the civil war among the different groups that had fought against the Soviet occupation of their country.They relied upon direct US support and upon a radical Islamist ideology that they had learned in Saudi-funded teaching centres in neighbouring Pakistan.Beheiri is quick to note that while the Taliban is at heart a Salafi group, this does not fully describe its ideology. I think it is very important when trying to understand what we are faced with today to be aware of various nuances. The worst mistake is to lump everything in together, because while I agree that all groups that carry arms against their own fellow citizens could be qualified as terror groups, things are not black and white, he said.The Taliban, he explained, are Salafi, but they ultimately follow the school of Abu Hanifa Al-Noaman, an 8th-century theologian whose thought has long dominated some Muslim communities in Asia. There is also part of the group with some Sufi affiliations, compatible with the fact that the Abu Hanifa school is less radical in some aspects than other schools adopted by Middle East-based radical Islamist movements.In this sense, they are different from other groups like Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS) group, as they are different in their ideology and consequently in their choices, Beheiri said.The Taliban could be a lot more radical than other Islamist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood in the Arab world. The Taliban dont think the Muslim Brotherhood apply the Sharia correctly, and they blame them for pursuing electoral choices in some contexts, he explained.As a result, while the Taliban have hosted and will likely continue to host Al-Qaeda, because the leaders of the Taliban offered Al-Qaeda a commitment they cannot break because in the Hanifa school this would be a major wrong, they will not carry out military attacks against US targets unless forced to retaliate to an attack initiated by the Americans.There was never any evidence that the Taliban were involved in the 9/11 attacks, Beheiri added. Meanwhile, the Taliban will not apply a democratic political process in Afghanistan because that for them would be contradictory with the cause of applying the Sharia. If one were to examine the intellectual base of the Taliban and compare it to that of some of the other militant movements, one would find many differences, Beheiri said. These intellectual differences prompt conflicts on the ground, and IS has been executing military operations against the Taliban. IS has conducted 86 operations against the Taliban over the past three months, the last six after the Taliban takeover of Kabul on 15 August, he said. These operations have killed and wounded fighters for the Taliban. Moreover, Pakistan did not only help in the training and operations of the Taliban as part of the alliance with Washington against Moscow. It also needed the Taliban to put pressure on India. It is important to note that back in 1996 it was only Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates that recognised the rule of the Taliban over Afghanistan, Beheiri said. And while the political agenda of Riyadh and Abu Dhabi might have changed, this is not the case for Islamabad. Pakistan is not the only regional player that could tolerate Taliban rule in Afghanistan in favour of political gains. This, along with the decision of the US to leave Afghanistan to its fate, could mean the Taliban being enabled to rule for many years to come. In 2018, the US Trump administration started peace talks with the Taliban in Doha. In early 2020, a peace agreement was signed with the Taliban, paving the way for the full withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. The Biden administration delayed the withdrawal for around three months but then executed it in a chaotic way. Beheiri is of the opinion that the US has not just exited Afghanistan, but has left it behind. This means that the US will not worry about how the Taliban end up ruling Afghanistan. Nor, he added, will countries that wish to entertain the political favour of the Taliban, like China and Russia. This means that in a few months the Taliban leaders will likely have to succumb to their radical base and apply a system of rule out of the middle ages. All the statements that the leaders of the Taliban have been making about pursuing participatory rule and including women are political propaganda that will not last for long, Beheiri said. We saw the writing on the wall when the Taliban fighters were prompt to cover pictures of unveiled and even in some cases veiled women on the walls of buildings or the facades of stores, and this is but one sign of their intentions, he said. Beheiri said that the leadership of the Taliban is not likely to come under any real pressure from the international community to refrain from its radical style of ruling, and nor would it put any pressure on the base of the movement to be less radical. Any compromises that the Taliban will likely make will mostly be on the foreign policy front rather than in its internal rule. It is easy to expect some political deals with Pakistan, China and Russia, he said. However, Beheiri agreed that it would be wrong to assume that the rule of Taliban will be uncontested. Iran, he argued, is a possible candidate to contest the Taliban. Already, some voices in Iran have been talking about forces on the border with Afghanistan, and there have been signs that Iran is moving some of its militias out of Syria, where they have been stationed for combat purposes, to put them on the borders with Afghanistan, he said. Some Arab Gulf countries, who have shifted positions on the radical Islamist groups, could also act against the Taliban. The United Arab Emirates has offered refuge to Ashraf Ghani, the former president of Afghanistan, who fled from Kabul before the Taliban takeover. There are already militant Afghan groups that have started to speak of militarily resisting the rule of the Taliban. Beheiri commented that these groups are not without regional backing, both political and financial. Meanwhile, there are countries in the region, including potentially Qatar and Turkey, that might wish to give the Taliban a chance as part of wider support for radical Islamist ideology. Things will likely descend into a tug of war, he said, and it is possibly more a question of when than of if Afghanistan will again enter a period of civil war. It is true that the Taliban of today is not just Pashtun, and it is true that the leaders of the Taliban have successfully managed to integrate members of other components of the Afghan nation, but we cannot expect, for example, that the Northern Alliance [which resisted the Taliban in the 1990s] will just keep silent, Beheiri said. The scope of any civil war will not depend only on the wishes and capacities of the Afghan players, however, Beheiri said. It will also depend on the wishes and capacities of foreign powers to reach out to the Talibans opponents inside Afghanistan. It is very hard to think of a good scenario for Afghanistan, because even if the Taliban are able to avert a civil war, or at least a large-scale civil war, it is hard to think that they will really abandon their radical style of rule that will make the lives of many Afghans very difficult, Beheiri concluded. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Search Keywords: Short link: The Iranian parliament has been discussing the cabinet lineup submitted by the new President Ebrahim Raisi ahead of approving it. The discussions inside the legislature of the Islamic Republic have been largely left out by international media: only English and Arabic-speaking Iranian outlets offer information about what is going on. This is partially related to the fact that the process is not over yet. Due to Covid-19 and endless foreign sanctions on Iran, a huge part of the conversation went to health and socio-economic topics. But some of the results were announced. For example, according to a report by the state-affiliated Tehran Times, parliaments national and security foreign policy committee accepted Raisis nomination of Hussein Amir Abdullahian as foreign minister. Frankly - for Western governments - Abdullahian will be no less fierce than the arguably moderate Javad Zarif, his predecessor. Although Abdullahian stressed that Iran will remain committed to nuclear diplomacy, he said Iran will prioritise national interests and national power. The political science scholar and veteran diplomat worked as the deputy foreign minister for Arab and African affairs under former hardliner president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad was a man the West did not like at all, especially for his controversial statements, including his denial of the Holocaust. Some MPs criticised Abdullahian for using vague terms such as balanced foreign policy and not expressing his position on the US assasination of Qassem Suleimani. But this is not a sign of de-escalation with world powers. Both Javad Owji and Rostam Ghasemi, the two men nominated as ministers of oil and gas and roads and urbanisation, respectively, also worked with Ahmadinejad. Moreover, Raisi wants General Ahmed Vahidi to become his interior minister. Vahidi is a former defence minister who was blacklisted by the United States and wanted by Interpol for his alleged involvement in the bombing of a Jewish cultural centre in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires in 1994. The attack led to the death of 85 people and injury of hundreds. In the 1980s, Vahidi was also the commander of the Quds Force, a wing of Irans Revolutionary Guards that specialises in unconventional warfare and was responsible for the rise of Irans Shia armed proxies across the region. I do not think that it will differ much at all in substance, Kanishkan Sathasivam, director of Salem State Universitys William H Bates Centre for Public and Global Affairs, said of Irans nuclear policy under Raisi. Sathasivam explained that Irans nuclear policy has always been entirely in the hands of the supreme leader, the president, foreign minister and the designated negotiator. The difference, Sathasivam added, will be in the optics and the way in which dealings are handled, because of course Raisi comes with a lot of negative baggage that his Western interlocutors cannot ignore or dismiss. He pointed out that Raisi and his boss Ali Khamenei see the pro-Western and pro-democracy moderates completely defeated at home, while the Americans are driven out of both Iraq and Afghanistan. Sathasivam noted that even a nuclear deal with Iran would put US President Joe Biden at the risk of serious blowback at home with his Democratic Party in the US Congress. The negotiations are currently not going well, because the Iranians believe they have the upper hand over the US/Biden at this point and as such they are holding out for a deal in which they get everything they want (which is the lifting of all sanctions, including those unrelated to the nuclear issue) but without giving the US anything in return beyond what is already in the JCPOA, he stressed. Biden wants a new nuclear deal that includes Irans ballistic missiles and military activities in the region. Since he took office, Western and Iranian delegations have not reached any agreements on this issue. Iran went even further by resuming its nuclear activities in the facilities of Arak and Fordo. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) warned last Wednesday that Iran is using advanced centrifuges to enrich 60 per cent of its above-ground pilot enrichment plant at Natanz. On the following day, the German, French and British foreign ministries revealed grave concern about the IAEAs report. Our concerns are deepened by the fact that Iran has significantly limited IAEA access through withdrawing from JCPOA-agreed monitoring arrangements, the joint statement read. Things will likely grow even worse when the Raisi government takes office. Jason Brodsky, a senior Middle East analyst at the London-based Iran International TV, told Al-Ahram Weekly that Raisis administration is thus far shaping up to be the most sanctioned presidency in the history of the Islamic Republic.The president, first vice president, vice president for parliamentary affairs, chief of staff, defence minister, interior minister, roads minister, oil minister and tourism minister are all sanctioned, said Brodsky. It is an administration that is closer to the Office of the Supreme Leader than its predecessors, and thus tensions with the United States will continue. What is more important than any one minister is that the true powers of the Islamic RepublicIrans supreme leader, his office and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corpsremain in their posts, and will continue to drive the decision-making on the files that most concern the international community, Brodsky concluded. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Search Keywords: Short link: This September a national dialogue commences in Ethiopia to address grievances that have destabilised the country in the past few years, though no details are forthcoming as yet about the roadmap or agenda. The civil war in Tigray has taken over the countrys political scene since its outbreak last November, the northern part of the country becoming a battlefield with thousands dead and thousand others facing famine, turning Ethiopia a source of instability in the volatile Horn of Africa. Despite sanctions imposed by the US in response to alarming reports on the dire humanitarian situation in the region, the Ethiopian government still refuses to sit down for any peace talks with the Tigray forces (TPLF), which Addis Ababa declared a terrorist group earlier this year. It is still not clear whether the national dialogue will include Tigrayans but it is widely believed that the issue will be at the top of the agenda. One Europe-based political scientist who has closely followed the war, feels there are conditions under which the Tigrayans might participate if invited. The planned national dialogue is dead on arrival as it disregards the key actor, the European A Tigrayan professor at Umea University, who preferred to remain anonymous, told Al-Ahram Weekly. The TPLF having been labelled a terrorist organisation and the governments repeated statements that there will be no dialogue with a terrorist organisation makes process disingenuous, if not impractical. If the dialogue is with representatives of Tigray hand-picked by Abiy Ahmed and not with the legitimately elected leaders of the people of Tigray, that would be another ploy meant for media consumption, he added. For a genuine national dialogue and a peaceful resolution of the war, Abiy Ahmed must respect the constitution and agree to return to the situation as it existed before the war. Invading forces must leave all of Tigray. Most importantly, the president must show willingness to peacefully resolve the conflict by doing the bare minimum: lifting the blockade, resuming basic services and facilitating access to humanitarian assistance. If such conditions are met, I dont see why the TPLF wont engage in dialogue and work towards a peaceful resolution of the war. For his part Mulu Beyene, a Tigrayan lawyer pursuing a PhD at the University of Bergen, Norway, feels it is farcical to exclude the warring parties in the Tigray and Oromo regions if the Ethiopian regime is going to undertake a national dialogue. The dialogue recently announced is not even close to addressing the critical challenges the country faces, he told the Weekly. All indications show that the regime intends to talk with like-minded parties and personalities. That is, the regime assumes it will win the many-sided wars and then talk with parties that supported it in post-war Ethiopia. This is simply farcical. I believe a meaningful start would have been to sit with, at least, the Tigrayan and Oromian fighting forces in order to end active hostilities. A negotiated settlement is the way forward. That is, if the TDF and OLA are willing to sit and talk with a genocidal regime. Beyene believes that Addis Ababa has no appetite for negotiations with Tigray. The rhetoric and practice are all for war. He confirmed that the regime realises that no settlement can be reached that will not ensure full accountability for crimes committed in the course of the war. This could mean a total regime change, according to Beyene. As the fighting has now extended beyond Tigray into neighbouring regions, Abiys government summoned capable citizens to fight earlier this month, urging them to join the countrys military, which signalled what can be a military depletion in the numbers of the Ethiopian forces. The move also reveals that Ethiopias 110 million people are being dragged into a conflict that Abiy Ahmed, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, once said would end within weeks. By the initiative of the national dialogue, Abiy Ahmed is obviously buying time; he is regrouping and attempting to recover from recent military losses and the growing unrest in the country, according to Hafsa Mohamed, an executive director at Maandeeq Womens Organisation (MWO), based in Ethiopia. The Ethiopian government cannot adequately respond to a crisis which the majority of the public believe the government created. That does not make any sense. National dialogue does not equal a ceasefire, nor does it result in the immediate end to humanitarian blockades. Also, if Abiy Ahmed was genuine about ending the Tigray genocide, he would not preschedule or plan a dialogue a month into the future, he would call for a dialogue right this minute. Mohamed highlighted the fact that communities across the country and in the diaspora are beginning to side with the Tigray Defence Forces (TDF) and the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA) as the only two entities currently fighting to save the constitution and multinational federalism. Abiy Ahmed cannot overcome the crisis he and the Prosperity Party (PP) produced, she said; they can only be consumed by it. It is only a matter of time. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Search Keywords: Short link: Egypt's Ambassador in Moscow Ehab Nasser said 60 flights will be operating weekly from Russia to the Red Sea resort cities of Hurghada and Sharm El-Sheikh as of 27 August. At a press conference, the Egyptian diplomat said "Egypt warmly welcomes the return of Russian tourists to Hurghada and Sharm El-Sheikh, as it is very important for tourism business organizations and the industry." The ambassador noted that the resumption of regular flights between the two countries will help in boosting their ties, asserting that tourism is very important for the economies of both sides as it creates more job opportunities. He made it clear that aviation movement will be running daily between the two countries. Earlier this month, Russia resumed direct flights to Egyptian Red Sea resort cities after a 6-year hiatus. Russian airlines and EgyptAir started operating of direct flights from Moscow to Sharm El-Sheikh and Hurghada airports on 9 August. In an interview shortly following the resumption of direct flights between Russia and Egypt's Red Sea resort cities, Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Khaled El-Enany stressed that coordination is underway to increase the number of direct flights between the two sides. Russian travellers are a major contributor to the country's tourism industry, a key source of hard currency. Russian tourists in Egypt surpassed 3.1 million in 2014, representing 33 percent of all tourists that year. Short link: Ethiopia expressed its disapproval of Tunisias ongoing preparation to submit its proposal on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) issue to the UN Security Council, describing the endeavour as inappropriate, a statement by Ethiopias foreign ministry read on Thursday. According to the statement, the remarks came in a meeting held in Ethiopia this week between Ethiopias Minister of Foreign Affairs Redwan Hussein with representatives from the upstream riparian states of the Nile Basin. The meeting was held to reaffirm Ethiopias unwavering commitment to equitably utilising the Nile Rivers waters via close consultations with riparian countries, according to the Ethiopian foreign ministry. During the meeting, Hussein said that Tunisias initial GERD proposal was in favour of Egypt and was rightly rejected by the security council. Hussein warned that submitting the proposal again to the council would put all riparian countries in a difficult position. He called for cooperation between the riparian states to reverse the Tunisian proposal, labelling it is unacceptable. The Ethiopian minister warned that such an endeavour will undermine the tripartite negotiations between Egypt, Sudan, and Ethiopia over the GERD. At the request of Egypt and Sudan, the UNSC held a session early last month to discuss the GERD issue, during which, the two downstream countries expressed their grave concerns regarding Ethiopias unilateral acts on the matter. While the two countries have urged Ethiopia to cease its intransigence and sign a legally binding agreement that regulates the filling and operation of the mega dam, Ethiopia announced that it would be proceeding with the second filling of the dam unilaterally nonetheless only a few days before the councils session. As the only Arab non-permanent member in the UNSC in its current session, Tunisia presented a draft resolution aiming to resume the GERD talks between the three countries within six months to reach a legally binding agreement on the dam and immediately suspend the second filling until a consensus is reached. Ethiopia, however, maintained its course and announced the completion of the second filling on 19 July. The three countries have affirmed on different occasions, including in the UNSC session, that they would like to continue to delegate the African Union to sponsor and mediate the talks between them. Egypt and Sudan, however, have urged the involvement of the United Nations, the United States, the European Union, along with the AU in mediating the talks, a proposal that Ethiopia rejected. Russia and Algeria have also recently proposed to play a positive role in the GERD issue. Short link: Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. At least 60 people were killed and dozens wounded. Russia was supposedly reticent but all of the five are expected to join, one diplomat said. Some member countries of the so-called P5 had been discussing the possibility of a meeting for a few days, they added. Guterres sent letters formally inviting the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China to meet on Monday, the diplomats told AFP. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday called a meeting of the permanent members of the Security Council to discuss the chaotic situation in Afghanistan, diplomats said. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahadid, however, tweeted that it was a controlled explosion by US forces destroying equipment at the airport and Kabul residents should not worry. A huge blast rocked Kabul early Friday, heard by AFP staff hours after a deadly twin bomb attack at the airport that was claimed by the Islamic State. Another huge blast heard in Kabul, Taliban say it was not an attack "ISIS will not deter us from accomplishing the mission," he said. "We continue to execute our number one mission, which is to get as many evacuees and citizens out of Afghanistan," said General Kenneth McKenzie. McKenzie said that the US airlift in Kabul will continue despite the attack. Biden and Bennett were scheduled to meet late Thursday morning for their first face-to-face conversation since Bennett became Israel's prime minister in June. The two will instead meet on Friday. President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett have postponed their White House meeting as Biden focused his attention on dealing with the aftermath of deadly explosions near the Kabul airport that targeted U.S. troops and Afghans seeking to flee their country after the Taliban takeover. The bomber "was able today to penetrate all the security fortifications" and get within "five meters (16 feet)" of US forces before detonating his explosives belt, the jihadist group's propaganda arm Amaq said, according to a translation by SITE.Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for a deadly suicide blast at the airport in Kabul on Thursday during the US-led evacuation from Taliban-ruled Afghanistan, the SITE monitoring agency said. "There is no evidence thus far that I've been given as a consequence by any of the commanders in the field that there has been collusion between the Taliban and ISIS in carrying out what happened today," Biden said in an address at the White House. US President Joe Biden said Thursday he has seen no evidence that the Taliban colluded with Islamic State militants in carrying out the deadly attacks in Kabul. Biden, who earlier vowed to continue the evacuation of civilians from Kabul, said there remained an "opportunity for the next several days, between now and the 31st, to be able to get them out." He reaffirmed August 31 as the deadline for US troops to leave Afghanistan, in the wake of a deadly attack on Kabul airport. President Joe Biden vowed Thursday to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite a deadly suicide bomb attack at the Kabul airport. He also promised to avenge the deaths, declaring to the extremists responsible: 'We will hunt you down and make you pay.'' 60 Afghans died in the blast too with 142 other injured according to a report by AP. Twelve US servicemen were killed and 15 injured in two suicide bombing attacks in Kabul on Thursday by Islamic State militants, the head of US Central Command General Kenneth McKenzie said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. A second U.S. official said the complex attack was believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz and condemned the attack. Western officials had warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport, but that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. Russia's Foreign Ministry gave the first official casualty count, but the numbers continued to grow. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. 'Surgeons will be working into the night,'' said Marco Puntin, the charity's manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby also confirmed the blasts and said there were casualties, including among members of the military, but gave no figure. He said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. One official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing military operations, said several Marines were killed. It wasn't clear if other U.S. military troops were among the dead. American officials have said that information is still coming in and they are trying to determine exact numbers of casualties. Even as the area was hit, evacuation flights continued to take off from Kabul airport. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. 'All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47,' Paul 'Pen'' Farthing told Britain's Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the group's rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 _ and the evacuations must end then, too. In Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban's freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was 'clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling.'' But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. 'We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger,'' Sadat said. 'My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping.'' Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. 'The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO,' he said. 'They are looking for them house-by-house at night.'' The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. 'The reality on the ground is the perimeter of the airport is closed. The Taliban have tightened the noose. It's very, very difficult for anybody to get through at this point,'' Canadian General Wayne Eyre, the country's acting Chief of Defense Staff, said ahead of the attack. Lt. Col. Georges Eiden, Luxembourg's army representative in neighboring Pakistan, said that Friday would mark the official end for U.S. allies. But two Biden administration officials denied that was the case. A third official said that the U.S. worked with its allies to coordinate each country's departure, and some nations asked for more time and were granted it. 'Most depart later in the week,'' he said, while adding that some were stopping operations Thursday. All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the information publicly. Danish Defense Minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned earlier: 'It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul.'' Denmark's last flight has already departed, and Poland and Belgium have also announced the end of their evacuations. The Dutch government said it had been told by the U.S. to leave Thursday. But Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, said some planes would continue to fly. 'Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission,'' he said in a tweet. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. Deadly coordinated explosions on Thursday tore through crowds of people at Kabul airport hoping to board flights to safety, as countries raced to evacuate as many people as possible before an August 31 deadline. Here is a round-up of the reaction to the attack following the Taliban's power grab. Britain Prime Minister Boris Johnson condemned the attack as "barbaric", paying tribute to the "phenomenal effort" of those involved in the evacuation operation. "We're going to continue with that operation, we're now coming towards the very end of it in any event," he said, adding that Britain would "keep going up until the last moment". Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab added that personnel had continued to work even "under fire". "We will not let the cowardly acts of terrorists stop us." France French President Emmanuel Macron condemned "with the utmost firmness the terrorist attacks". In a statement, he expressed "his condolences to the families of the American and Afghan victims" and saluted "the heroism of those who are on the ground to carry out the evacuation operations", adding that "France will see them through to the end". Czech Republic Czech Foreign Minister Jakub Kulhanek said: "I strongly condemn the despicable terrorist attack in Kabul. I mourn the death of Afghans and members of the US military." Egypt "Egypt's government and people send their condolences to all Afghan and US casualties who fell victim to gruesome terrorism. Egypt renews its solidarity in combatting all forms of terrorism, violence and extremism," Egypt's foreign ministry said in a statement. Israel Israeli Defence Minister Benny Gantz said: "My thoughts and prayers are with the US troops and the Afghan people in Kabul, following the attacks that recently took place. I extend my condolences for the lives lost and pray for the rapid recovery of the injured. We stand with our American partners." Italy Italy "strongly condemns" the attacks, Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio wrote on Twitter. "No Italian was harmed... I express my condolences to those who lost their lives and my solidarity with the wounded. Italy strongly condemns the attacks," he said. The country's operation to evacuate Afghans and Italian nationals was continuing. Norway Norwegian Foreign Affairs Minister Ine Eriksen Soreide blasted a "terrible act of cruelty" on Twitter. "I strongly condemn the terrorist attack outside #Kabul airport. Innocent civilians trying to leave the country have become victims of this terrible act of cruelty." Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia's Foreign Ministry reiterated in a statement the "Kingdom's position rejecting such criminal acts, which are incompatible with all religious principles and moral and human values". The ministry said it stood "with the Afghan people" and "offered the "kingdom's condolences and sympathy to the families of the victims and the Afghan people". Spain Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said his government sent its "heartfelt solidarity" to those killed in the blasts. "Spain strongly condemns the attack suffered today at the Kabul airport. Our heartfelt solidarity with the victims," he said in a tweet. "The international community stands with the Afghan people, ensuring their rights and dignity. We are working to evacuate as many people as possible," he added. Sweden Swedish Minister for Foreign Affairs Ann Linde said on Twitter: "Our deepest condolences to the families of the US service members that were killed and wounded in today's terrorist attack at Kabul airport. We are grateful for all your efforts in making this historic evacuation operation possible." Turkey Turkey's Foreign Ministry deplored a "heinous" attack which targeted the main gate of the airport. "We have learned with great sorrow that many people died or were wounded as a result of the terrorist attacks that took place in Kabul today," it said. "We condemn this heinous attack in the strongest terms, offer our condolences to the relatives of those who lost their lives and wish a speedy recovery to the wounded," it added. NATO NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said allied forces should continue to evacuate as many vulnerable people as they can from Kabul despite what he branded a "horrific terrorist attack". "Our priority remains to evacuate as many people to safety as quickly as possible," he tweeted. WHO "Appalled that vulnerable people are being exposed to further suffering in Kabul. Civilians must be protected. @WHO is on the ground in #Afghanistan and ready to support health facilities to treat the wounded," said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Short link: Related The battle for the language academy The current conflict in the Arabic Language Academy against the remnants of Islamo-fascist thought has stirred widespread concern and anger among large tracts of society. This is because of the cultural prestige of this institution which is a source of soft power regionally and internationally. In my discussion of the issue in last weeks column, I faulted the government for ignoring the problem rather than applying the same resolve it dedicates to the fight against terrorism which, in fact, feeds on such deviant thought. My friend Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar, the minister of higher education, phoned me as soon as he saw my article. He assured me that the government was, indeed, concerned with this question and that his ministry had already taken steps to challenge the recent elections of the academys board of directors, which is dominated by Muslim Brotherhood affiliates and sympathisers. He said that he had refused to certify the results of the elections and appointed Salah Fadl as acting chairman of the board until such time as proper elections can be held. I had mentioned this in my article, but followed with a question as to what the point would be of holding another round of elections when the composition of academys membership remains unchanged. I suggested appointing a number of prominent intellectuals whom the current academys leadership had prevented from joining it for no sound reason. A prominent example of this type of snub is our great Arab novelist, Naguib Mahfouz, who remained excluded from the academy to the end of his life, despite his prolific literary output, his contribution to the development of literary Arabic and the fact that he is the sole Arab Nobel laureate. We should also note that the academy has never counted a Copt or a woman among its members. We have a major precedent for government appointments to the academys membership. It occurred in 1940, seven years after its official establishment, when King Farouk issued a royal decree bestowing membership on some of the most eminent literary figures of the time. They included Taha Hussein, Ahmed Lotfi Al-Sayed, Mohamed Hussein Heikal, Tawfik Al-Hakim, Abbas Mahmoud Al-Akkad and Ibrahim Abdel-Qader Al-Mazni, who together they ushered the academy into its golden era. Abdel-Ghaffar told me that personally he would have no objection to this idea as long as it was conducted in a manner consistent with the academys charter and the law. According to my information, the academy actually applied to the ministry, in November last year, to change its bylaws. The proposal included a list of ten nominees to vacant positions in the academy. The ministry has yet to take action on this application. Certainly, the speed with which the minister responded to the concerns I raised last week is praiseworthy in its own right, as is his commitment to the rule of law. However, I do hope he will turn his attention to the amended bylaws submitted to his office so as to clear the way for the admission of enlightened intellectuals and writers who will help rescue the academy from the clutches of Islamo-fascist thought. We are still caught in a vicious battle against the pedlars of an ideology that the Egyptian people rose up against on 30 June 2013. The longer those individuals remain in positions of influence, the greater will be their ability to disseminate their dangerous ideas. Although we can take heart at the tangible decline in terrorism thanks to our security agencies concerted operations, we must not forget that terrorist violence derives its raison detre from a perverse ideological foundation that began to take root in society four decades ago. Unless it is totally eradicated, that thinking will continue to work its malignant effect and inevitably breed more terrorism. I was pleased to learn that my fellow journalist Hamdi Rizk too addressed this subject in his well-known column in Al-Masry Al-Youm. Purging the academy of Muslim Brotherhood members and sympathisers in accordance with the law is a battle that has waited for too long, he wrote. The battle for the academy is the battle for Egyptian culture. It is symbolic of the victory of secular forces and an affirmation of Egyptian leadership of linguistic organisations in the Arab world. I was also heartened by several letters. Ambassador Mohamed Al-Dali wrote: The Arabic Language Academy truly suffers from the plague of the age. I am not familiar with the academys bylaws, but why shouldnt the appointment method serve as the solution for selecting suitable members capable of advancing the academy and its lofty message? As for the bylaws, surely there are many legal ways to amend them. Ahmed Morsi, the eminent heritage scholar, wrote: A respectable article on a respectable topic that merits the attention of the linguistic, literary and intellectual communities. The time has come for them to rescue the Arab Language Academy from the mafia that has dominated it for decades. And from the great artist Mostafa Al-Razzaz: A well-merited call for justice and reform for the venerable and worthy Arabic Language Academy. The government and the people should support and settle this matter with the utmost haste, as the academy is an embodiment of Egypts honour as a member of the Arab nation. This is a call that inevitably requires the sponsorship of the Second Republic, and with the same degree of zeal. To which University Professor Fathi Abu Ayana adds that the government and civil society should launch a campaign in the media and the academic community to save the Arabic Language Academy as a beacon for the preservation of our language and a source of Egypts soft power. Equally encouraging was news of an urgent suit filed with the courts to oblige the minister of higher education to accelerate the process of amending the academys bylaws so that the institution can be freed from the remnants of the Muslim Brotherhood and its followers. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Short link: Scenes of thousands of Afghanis crowding the Kabul Airport, sometimes crushed to death while trying to flee the country, are harrowing enough. But they might not be the worst to come out of this country, war-torn for over four decades now, following the astonishing Taliban takeover. At least seven Afghans including a two-year-old girl died were trampled to death while applying for evacuation on board British, American and NATO military and civilian planes outside the British embassy. Jane Ferguson, one of the few Western correspondents still in Kabul, said, the scenes are apocalyptic. People are fainting and dying. Children are going missing. The Biden administrations obsession with a quick withdrawal has led to massive, widespread chaos all over Afghanistan, made worse by the humiliating escape of former Afghani president, Ashraf Ghani while Taliban fighters were hours away from the presidential palace. The Afghan army and security forces financed and equipped for over 20 years in the presence of the US and NATO simply collapsed and disappeared. Taliban leaders have been trying hard to assure the outside world that they are not back in Kabul to implement the same, terrifying regime that marked their short reign, which ended with the US occupation of Afghanistan in late 2001 to retaliate against the Taliban hosting Al-Qaeda, which proudly claimed responsibility for the 11 September attacks. Taliban leaders say they have learned from their mistakes. They have vowed to form an inclusive government made up of different political groups and ethnicities, to respect womens and girls right to education, not to revive their policy of banning women from any appearance in public except with a male guardian and, most importantly, not to let Afghanistan to become a safe haven for militant and terrorist groups from all over the world. However, many Afghanis and most world countries remain doubtful that those pledges are more than lip-service to win international recognition, and would not be carried out on the ground. In the light of past experiences since the country fell into chaos and civil war after the former Soviet Union occupied it to back up its communist allies in 1979, there seems to be more opportunity for the situation in Afghanistan to deteriorate than for it to improve. Many fear the deceptively nonviolent, swift entry of the Taliban into Kabul, and the official new Taliban rhetoric on future moderate rule, will be able to keep the peace, and that civil war will break out as soon as US, British and other troops leave the country within days, or weeks, depending on Bidens decision on how long he would allow US troops to maintain their presence at the airport to evacuate American and a few thousand Afghan nationals after the 31 August deadline he set earlier. The US president seems himself doubtful while offering a few inducements, mainly economic assistance. He told reporters at a recent news conference, the Taliban has to make a fundamental decision. Is it going to attempt to unite and provide for the well-being of the people of Afghanistan, which no one group has ever done for hundreds of years? If so, its going to need everything from additional help in terms of economic assistance, trade and a whole range of things. But it is very hard to believe that the Taliban, with its extremist ideology and leaders, will be able to achieve what no one group has ever done for hundreds of years. Reports on the ground indicate that Taliban fighters have already begun searching homes, hunting for former Afghan leaders they accuse of cooperating with US and NATO allies. Peaceful protests in a few Afghani cities raising the national flag, instead of the white Taliban banner, were met with violence and deadly shots from Taliban fighters holding automatic machine guns. Tajik leaders, including the son of the late Ahmed Shah Massoud, announced that they have already recruited a small army to resist Taliban rule. Meanwhile, Bidens gamble that the Taliban would keep their word in fear of losing US aid could be easily be disregarded, considering the announcements made by more influential neighbours, namely Russia and China, that they were ready to recognise and help the new Afghani government formed by the Taliban. Even the Shiite majority Iran, which nearly went to war with the Taliban in the early 1990s after the slaughter of Iranian diplomats on sectarian grounds, issued friendly statements, though they expressed more joy with the humiliating US withdrawal from Afghanistan. The same applies to India, despite awareness that the Taliban takeover would weaken its interests in Afghanistan and embolden its historic rival, Pakistan, where many Taliban leaders were based for decades. In the worst case scenario, Afghanistan will deteriorate into civil war again; extremist groups, including Daesh or the so-called Islamic State, will find a safe haven where they can move and plan freely, fearing only occasional US aerial raids as the situation is in Yemen or other failed states in Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Regional and influential world countries will pick sides based on their share of whatever gains they can draw from this impoverished, vast country. But those who will pay the heaviest price are the Afghan people who will witness yet another episode in their long, bloody history. *A version of this article appears in print in the 26 August, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Short link: KYODO NEWS - Aug 26, 2021 - 21:03 | World, All The Taliban, which has gained almost complete control over Afghanistan, has asked the United States to retain its embassy in Kabul after the U.S. military pullout by Aug. 31, according to a Taliban official and diplomatic sources. "We would like the U.S. to remain in Afghanistan very much," a senior Taliban official told Kyodo News in confirming that the Islamist group has conveyed that position to Washington. "We will provide absolute security (of the embassy)," he said. According to multiple diplomatic sources, the Taliban have requested the embassy stay put in discussions with the United States in Kabul and in Doha, Qatar, where the political operations of the group have been based in recent years. Indeed, the topic may have been on the agenda of Monday's secret meeting in Kabul between U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns and Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Taliban's de facto leader. Observers say it appears that the Taliban's aim is to avoid a decisive disconnect with the United States and facilitate international recognition of the new Afghan administration to be formed following 20 years of war. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters Wednesday that the Taliban have committed publicly and privately to permitting safe passage from the country for Americans, third-country nationals, and Afghans at risk after the Aug. 31 pullout deadline expires. "We're developing detailed plans for how we can continue to provide consular support and facilitate departures for those who wish to leave after Aug. 31," he said. Asked specifically about the future of the U.S. Embassy -- currently evacuated to Kabul's airport where the military-led evacuation is in full swing -- and whether American diplomats would remain in Afghanistan after the military departs, Blinken said, "We're looking at a variety of options." He did not elaborate except to say "that is primarily going to be a diplomatic effort, a consular effort, an international effort." With an estimated 1,500 Americans remaining in the country, Blinken emphasized that "there is no deadline on our work to help any remaining American citizens who decide they want to leave to do so." Washington's recognition of the new Afghan administration to be ushered in by the Taliban is expected to partly hinge on human rights considerations, especially the protection of women's rights. To that end, Blinken vowed, "I will use, every diplomatic, economic, political, and assistance tool at my disposal...to do everything possible to uphold their basic rights." The Taliban is seeking to build relationships with the international community by insisting it respects women's human rights. Also of international concern is the possibility of Afghanistan again becoming a hotbed of terrorism as it has not broken its ties with radical Islamist groups. The United States has warned its citizens to avoid Kabul airport amid concerns about the potential for attacks by Afghanistan's branch of the Islamic State terror group. Related coverage: Japan continues efforts on Afghanistan evacuation mission amid chaos Xi, Putin agree to join hands to stabilize situation in Afghanistan G-7 vows to ensure safe Afghanistan evacuation, keep Taliban on watch KYODO NEWS - Aug 26, 2021 - 14:46 | All, Japan The Japanese government has lodged a protest against Russia after Moscow said it is holding target practice in waters near a Russian-held island claimed by Japan off the northern main island of Hokkaido, the top government spokesman said Thursday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said Russian authorities issued Saturday a navigation warning covering four days from Thursday as well as Sept. 13-17 over the exercise in what Kato called Japanese waters off Etorofu Island. "We lodged a protest saying it is not acceptable," Kato said at a regular press conference. Kato added the long-standing territorial dispute over what Tokyo refers to as the Northern Territories, comprising four islands, "needs to be fundamentally resolved" and that Japan will pursue negotiations with Moscow "tenaciously." The row over the islands, known as the Southern Kurils in Russia, has prevented the two countries from concluding a postwar peace treaty. Russia wants Japan to recognize that the four islands were legitimately acquired following Tokyo's surrender in World War II, while Japan takes the view that the seizure was illegal. Related coverage: Russia PM visits disputed isle off Japan's Hokkaido Russia PM to visit disputed isle off Japan's Hokkaido Japan protests Russia's military exercise at disputed isles KYODO NEWS - Aug 26, 2021 - 16:39 | All, Japan Former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida said Thursday he will run in the leadership race of Japan's governing Liberal Democratic Party, pitting him against Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga. "I will present new (policy) options by staking my political career" on this race, Kishida said at a news conference as he announced his bid for the Sept. 29 LDP presidential election, making it his second challenge for the top LDP post since September 2020. Kishida, 64, suggested he would launch tough measures against the COVID-19 pandemics, saying, "We need to keep in mind the worst case scenarios." Kishida, who heads an LDP faction with over 40 members, is an advocate for nuclear disarmament and helped realize the 2016 visit by U.S. President Barack Obama to Hiroshima, the first by a sitting U.S. president to the atomic bombed city. Under Kishida's watch as foreign minister, Japan and South Korea reached a "final" agreement in late 2015 over the issue of comfort women in wartime Japanese military brothels. Kishida said that if he were elected LDP president, he would limit the terms of LDP executives -- excluding the president -- to up to three years, a measure he said would prevent the concentration of power. "Holding the party's presidential election, including with Prime Minister Suga, we want to regain people's confidence and safeguard democracy," he said. In his first bid for the 2020 LDP presidential election, Kishida, who hails from a political family in Hiroshima, came second after Suga. Former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba came third. Known for his measured, unemotional demeanor, Kishida served as foreign minister and chairman of the LDP Policy Research Council under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. A graduate of Waseda University, Kishida worked for a bank before his election to the House of Representatives in 1993. He has been elected to the lower house nine times. Related coverage: Japan's ruling party to hold leadership race on Sept. 29 Ex-Foreign Minister Kishida to challenge PM Suga in Japan party leader race FOCUS: Suga's leadership under fire as LDP candidate loses Yokohama vote KYODO NEWS - Aug 26, 2021 - 20:18 | All, World, Japan The following is the latest list of selected news summaries by Kyodo News. ---------- Japan halts use of 1.63 mil. Moderna vaccine doses over contamination TOKYO - Japan's health ministry said Thursday foreign materials were found in some portions of unused doses of Moderna Inc.'s COVID-19 vaccine and the use of around 1.63 million doses manufactured in the same production line has been suspended as a precaution. Japanese drugmaker Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., which is in charge of sales and distribution of the vaccine in the country, said it has yet to see any reports of safety issues. Some of the 1.63 million doses distributed to 863 vaccination centers have already been used. ---------- Taliban asks U.S. to retain embassy in Kabul, guarantees security WASHINGTON/ISLAMABAD - The Taliban, which has gained almost complete control over Afghanistan, has asked the United States to retain its embassy in Kabul after the U.S. military pullout by Aug. 31, according to a Taliban official and diplomatic sources. "We would like the U.S. to remain in Afghanistan very much," a senior Taliban official told Kyodo News in confirming that the Islamist group has conveyed that position to Washington. ---------- PM Suga, Kishida to vie for LDP leadership in Sept. 29 election TOKYO - The ruling Liberal Democratic Party decided Thursday to hold its presidential election on Sept. 29, with Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga facing a challenge by former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida and possibly other LDP lawmakers amid growing public dissatisfaction over the government's coronavirus response. The election, for which campaigning starting on Sept. 17, will effectively be a vote to decide Japan's leader as the LDP controls the House of Representatives, the powerful lower chamber of parliament. ---------- Tokyo Paralympics confirm 1st COVID-19 hospitalization TOKYO - A person involved in the Tokyo Paralympics has been hospitalized with COVID-19, the games organizing committee said Thursday, the first such case linked to the event. In confirming the hospitalization, organizers were keen to reiterate that the largest sporting event for athletes with disabilities is being held safely. ---------- Experts warn of untested COVID cases in Tokyo as average dips TOKYO - Health experts warned Thursday it is too early to judge whether coronavirus cases in Tokyo are on a downward trend, despite relatively fewer numbers in recent days, citing the possibility that many infected people remain untested. The metropolitan government reported 4,704 new infections, with the seven-day rolling average standing at 4,352.9 per day, down 8.8 percent from the previous week. The average dropped for the second straight day after marking its first decline in nearly two months. ---------- Japan continues efforts on Afghanistan evacuation mission amid chaos TOKYO - Japan continued efforts Thursday to evacuate its nationals and local staff working at its embassy and other Japanese organizations in Afghanistan, officials said, amid chaos at the international airport in the capital Kabul with many people unable to reach there. A Japanese Air Self-Defense Force aircraft has been dispatched to Islamabad in neighboring Pakistan, as part of a mission which, according to a diplomatic source, will involve evacuating up to several hundred people from conflict-torn Afghanistan. ---------- Paralympics: Swimmer Suzuki wins Japan's 1st gold of Tokyo Games TOKYO - Swimmer Takayuki Suzuki won Japan's first gold medal of the Tokyo Paralympics on Thursday in the men's 100-meter freestyle S4 category, his second medal of these games and seventh of his career. Suzuki swam 1-minute, 21.58-seconds, overhauling silver medalist Luigi Beggiato of Italy in the second lap to win by 1.63. Roman Zhdanov of the Russian Paralympic Committee team finished third, more than 5 seconds behind Suzuki. ---------- Western Digital in talks to acquire Japan's Kioxia for $20 bil. NEW YORK - U.S. semiconductor giant Western Digital Corp. is in advanced negotiations to acquire its Japanese peer Kioxia Holdings Corp. in a deal worth more than $20 billion, U.S. media reported Wednesday. An agreement could be reached as early as mid-September and Western Digital CEO David Goeckeler would head the merged firm, according to the reports. By Hiroyasu Takayama, KYODO NEWS - Aug 26, 2021 - 13:35 | All, World, Japan Iran's Persian carpet industry is creaking under the weight of U.S. sanctions and the coronavirus pandemic. But its craftsmen may have found a way to innovate their way out of trouble -- weaving miniaturized versions of the traditional rug as substitutes for Japan's ubiquitous "zabuton" floor cushions. Iranian carpet weavers have seen their sales roughly halve in the last few years as rivals in India and Turkey look to grab market share. "We sell 60 percent of our products to Japan because economic sanctions ban us from exporting them to the United States, which used to be our biggest market," explained Mohammad Jafari, a 43-year-old weaver at Zollanvari, a long-established carpet company in Tehran. Jafari and other Zollanvari artisans were putting the final touches to a scaled-down version of a Gabbeh rug, a traditional variety of Persian carpet. Measuring roughly 40 square centimeters, or about the size envisioned for a zabuton cushion, the color scheme is reserved, unlike the brightly colored products exported to the United States. "The product is the polar opposite (of the carpets exported to the United States)," said Jafari. While Persian carpets were exported to more than 30 countries, Japan was the top destination from March to May this year, Iran's Mehr News Agency reported. The Iranian rug industry has been at the mercy of relations between Washington and Tehran. Exports to the United States topped $300 million a year with the thawing of tensions following a nuclear agreement Iran reached with the United States and other major countries in 2015. But exports to the United States have been banned since Washington withdrew from the deal in 2018 under the previous administration of Donald Trump. "Sales and the number of craftspeople (at Zollanvari) have fallen by more than half," Jafari lamented. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has only added to the weavers' plight. "Buyers from abroad have been unable to come," said Ali Jahan, 55, who owns a carpet store in Tehran. "The number of foreign customers has dropped to zero from 50 or so per month," he said. The hand-weaving of carpets in the home had been an important source of work for women in rural villages in Iran. But the steep fall in the volume of work has cast a shadow over the future of the traditional industry. Iranian carpets are woven from wool and silk and originated in a nomadic culture. They are said to have been woven on the Iranian Plateau since ancient times and are now popular items for European and U.S. consumers. The Ardabil Carpet exhibited at a museum in London is considered to be the best example of the craft. Rival carpet makers in India and Turkey are keenly observing the current crisis besetting Iranian producers. In Srinagar in northern India, which is home to the Kashmir carpet, a maker welcomed the U.S. sanctions on Iran as it meant "an increase in our customers." In Turkey, a senior official of the Istanbul Carpet Exporters' Association, although aware of the situation in Iran, said Turkey's production capacity "is limited because the number of weavers has dropped due to the modernization of rural regions." Despite the current difficulties faced by Iranian makers, the Persian carpet retains strong brand power, partly because UNESCO designated it as an intangible cultural heritage of humanity in 2010. Persian carpets will even be on show in Kyoto's famous Gion Festival next year. They will be used as part of the decoration on a giant float that will roll through the city's streets for the first time in nearly 200 years. Woven by women, the Persian carpet has developed through a long history of appreciation by Iranian buyers, said Amir Solemanieh, 42, owner of Miri Collection, a Persian rug shop in Tokyo that arranged the procurement of the new carpets for the float. Related coverage: Japan urges Iran to ensure safe navigation in Persian Gulf Japan urges new Iran president to return to nuclear deal Japan foreign minister planning talks with new Iran president on Aug. 22 KYODO NEWS - Aug 26, 2021 - 20:59 | All, Japan Japan continued efforts Thursday to evacuate its nationals and local staff working at its embassy and other Japanese organizations in conflict-torn Afghanistan, officials said, amid chaos at the international airport in the capital Kabul following the takeover by the Taliban. Japan has already sent three Self-Defense Forces transport planes to Islamabad in neighboring Pakistan and dispatched about 10 personnel from its defense and foreign ministries to Kabul to coordinate with U.S. forces, which are in control of the airport. Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said in a meeting with other members of Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party that the aim is to accomplish the evacuation by Friday, citing how it would be hard to airlift beyond Aug. 31 when the United States pulls out its troops. Government sources also said Japan aims to finish its evacuation mission by Friday. Islamabad is the SDF's base of operation for the mission which, according to a diplomatic source, will involve evacuating up to about 500 people from Afghanistan. SDF aircraft landed at Kabul airport twice on Thursday afternoon, but failed to airlift any people who wanted to flee the country as they were unable to reach the airport, according to the sources. Japan and other countries have been rushing to evacuate their citizens out of the country, after Afghanistan was thrown into turmoil after the Taliban earlier this month returned to power 20 years after being ousted by U.S.-led forces. President Ashraf Ghani fled the country following the Taliban's seizure of the capital on Aug. 15. As of Thursday, the security situation around the airport remains volatile and uncertainty looms over whether evacuation efforts can run smoothly until the Aug. 31 deadline for completing the withdrawal of American troops. Sources familiar with the matter said there are reports of people wanting to flee the country unable to reach the airport on their own as they struggle to get through checkpoints by the Taliban around the airport. The U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan issued a security alert on Wednesday, advising U.S. citizens not to travel to the airport and avoid airport gates "because of security threats outside the gates." Britain has also warned its citizens to stay away from the airport and cited the "ongoing and high threat of a terrorist attack." Setting the stage for the evacuation mission, the SDF have dispatched a C-2 plane, which can carry up to 110 people excluding crew members, as well as two C-130s, each with a capacity of transporting up to 92 people excluding crew members. The C-2 plane and another government plane will transport SDF personnel, equipment and supplies between Islamabad and Kabul, while the C-130s will be used for evacuation purposes. According to the Defense Ministry, the mission will involve about 290 personnel, and it will be the first time the SDF have evacuated foreign nationals from a country. Japanese diplomats were evacuated to Dubai last week after the embassy in Kabul was shut on Aug. 15, but some Japanese working for international organizations remain there. Related coverage: Safety concern aired as Japan rushes to evacuate nationals from Kabul New Delhi: Three militants were killed in an encounter with security forces in Kulgam district of Jammu and Kashmir Sunday, police said, adding three civilians also lost their lives in a blast after the gunfight ended. ALSO READ | IND vs WI Live Updates: Shami removes set Shai Hope to give India edge over visitors "Civilians visited the encounter site immediately after the operation in spite of (our) request not to go there as a thorough search is to be made for explosives once flames douse. They did not listen and visited the spot immediately after the forces withdrew, police said. "Some explosive substance went off, resulting in injuries to civilians. One civilian namely Ubaid Laway, a resident of Laroo, died on the spot," the police official said. Security forces launched a cordon and search operation in Laroo area of Kulgam district in south Kashmir following specific information about the presence of militants in the area, he said. As the forces were conducting the searches, the ultras fired upon them, triggering the encounter, the official said. Police identified the three militants killed as locals. A police officer said that the slain militants are locals and identified the trio as Zubair Lone son of Farooq Ahmad resident of Awhatoo Kulgam (JEM) active since April 26 2018, Shahdil Tantray son of Abdul Rashid resident of Sudershanpora wangam Shopian and Yazil Makro son of Mushtaq resident of Arwani Anantnag, according to reports. ALSO READ | #MeToo: Anu Malik to step down as 'Indian Idol 10' judge? Meanwhile, clashes broke out between groups of youths and security forces in the area. "Police had to use some force to quell the protests and around two dozen persons were injured in the clashes," the official said. Reacting to the encounter, separatist leaders have called for complete shutdown in Kashmir tomorrow. Taking to micro blogging site Twitter, Hurriyat Conference Chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq condemned the attack and called for shutdown on Monday and protest sit-in on Tuesday. Kulgam MLA and CPI(M) leader M Y Tarigami expressed grief over the loss of civilian lives and demanded a probe into the incident. "It is devastating. This needs to be investigated through an impartial probe...We are now tired of crying and demanding, but those who matter have turned a deaf ear," he said. Advisor to the Governor, K Vijay Kumar, and DGP Dilbag Singh also expressed regret over the loss of civilian lives. (With PTI inputs) For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: A 21-year-old man from Nagaland on Thursday drowned at Calangute beach in Goa, according to reports. According to ANI report, the body has been retrieved and sent for post-mortem. A case of unnatural death has been registered at the Calangute police station, ANI tweeted. Goa: 21-year-old man from Nagaland drowned at Calangute beach today; Body sent for postmortem, a case of unnatural death has been registered, further investigation is in progress. ANI (@ANI) October 18, 2018 Meanwhile, further investigation is underway to ascertain the actual incident, it said. Also Read | Afghanistan: US commander survives deadly attack; top general, journalist killed in Kandahar On October 12, a tourist hailing from Madhya Pradesh drowned at Goas Calangute beach and his lifeless body was found the next day morning at nearby Baga beach, triggering concerns over the safety of tourists at the beaches. In 2017, due to the frequent drowning incident along the states beaches, the Goa government announced to enact a law to ban swimming in the sea post sunset and after consumption of alcohol. According to state tourism official, all the beaches in Goa are constantly manned by trained lifeguards for the safety of tourists from sunrise to sunset. New Delhi: India would be the global host for a meet of stakeholders from nearly 100 countries on issues related to maternal and child health, the UNICEF has said. The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health forum will emphasise the importance of people-centred accountability bringing forward the voices and lived realities of women, children and adolescents through innovative programming and creative projects. The forum will be hosted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in collaboration with the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (PMNCH) this December. The UNICEF said saturday that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and former Chile President Michelle Bachelet and chair of PMNCH will deliver the keynote addresses. Also Read | Dengue menace in India claims 80 lives, affects 40,000 people till Sep Gagan Gupta, the Chief of Health at the UNICEF, told PTI that India has made significant progress in improving maternal health and reducing child mortality. "India has performed better than rest of world in this field and the number of under-five children dying has fallen by 30 per cent since 2012, from 1.4 million to 9,89,000," he said. According to a new report by the United Nations Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation, under-five mortality rate in India was recorded below one million in 2017 for the first time in five years. Gupta said the forum to be held on December 12 and 13 at Vigyan Bhawan will see participation from heads of state, ministers, popular champions, and 1,200 partners from nearly 100 countries. Also Read | BJP CEC Meeting: Complete list of candidates "India will get an opportunity to present its success story in improving its maternal and child health at a world stage," he said. Moreover, the forum would also bring various stakeholders on a common stage to share their ideas, he said. This is the second time India is hosting the forum the first was in 2010. Previous chapters of the forum have been held in Johannesburg in South Africa in 2014 and Dar es Salam in Tanzania in 2007. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) claims to have analysed nine phone calls immediately after middleman Manoj Prasad was held in the alleged bribery case against its Special Director, Rakesh Asthana, to allege that there was panic after the middleman's brother got "wind" of the arrest, officials said on Sunday. The investigative agency has registered a case against Asthana on the basis of claims made by a businessman, Sathish Sana, probed by him in a separate case, that he was asked to pay a bribe of Rs 5 crore by Manoj Prasad, an investment banker based in Dubai to get relief from repeated summons and a clean chit in the case, they said. Read More | Delhi Air Quality: No respite in sight as AQI oscillates between 'poor' and 'very poor' Surprisingly, Asthana, the second-in-command in the agency, had intimated the cabinet secretary nearly two months ago that Sana had allegedly paid a bribe of Rs 2 crore to CBI Chief Alok Verma to get relief in the case. The agency, however, claimed Sunday that Sana had appeared before the magistrate and stated that he made payments between December, 2017 and October, 2018 to a middleman, who had cited his purported connection with Asthana to ensure relief for him. On the basis of his claims, the agency arrested Manoj Prasad on October 16 when he was returning from Dubai to allegedly collect an installment of the agreed bribe amount. Nowhere in the statement, which is now part of the FIR, made public nearly five days after registration, Sana had mentioned any direct meeting, interaction or payment of bribe to Asthana. Also Read | Sabarimala Temple Row: Police ask media to vacate Sannidhaman, Pamba on intel of targeted attack as first pilgrim season ends today According to the call data analysis done by the CBI, the phone calls were allegedly exchanged between Asthana and a senior officer of another intelligence agency, who wanted to confirm the details of the middleman's arrest. The calls were also exchanged between the senior officer and the wife of the middleman Somesh Prasad, brother of middleman Manoj Prasad, among others, an officer claimed. The sources claimed that call data records show that four calls were exchanged between Asthana and the senior officer on October 17, 2018, a day after the arrest. They claimed that Somesh Prasad, "somehow" got news of the latter's arrest on October 16, 2018 and immediately called his contact, the senior officer of the intelligence agency on the same day. A call was then made by the officer to Somesh within a minute, they claimed. Next day, the intelligence agency officer allegedly called Asthana to purportedly know the situation. Three more calls were exchanged between the two, the agency claimed. The officer of the intelligence agency also spoke to the wife of Somesh Prasad, they claimed. In addition to the call exchanges, the agency is also depending heavily on the WhatsApp messages recovered from Manoj Prasad's phone, they claimed. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Milan: Fiat Chrysler said Monday it was selling its Italian auto parts unit Magneti Marelli to Japan's Calsonic Kansei (CK) in a deal worth 6.2 billion euros. It said the merged company will rank in the top 10 auto parts suppliers globally with annual sales of 15.2 billion euros ($17.6 billion). There will be a multi-year supply agreement with Fiat Chrysler. This agreement will underscore "the combined entity's commitment to maintain Magnetti Marelli's operations in Italy and sustain its industrial footprint and employment levels," a joint statement said. Also Read | Gold smuggling on rise along India-Myanmar border: Report The deal should be closed in the first half of 2019, it added. CK is controlled by US investment house KKR. Fiat Chrysler said earlier this year that it planned to hive off its auto parts unit. Mike Manley, the new head of Fiat Chrysler, said the deal will boost growth at Magneti Marelli which will remain one of the group's most important business partners. Unions welcomed the deal. "It is a great opportunity for growth," said Fim-Cisl's Marco Bentivogli. "The guarantee on all current employment in our country is important," he added. Also Read | Break the myths about gold loans with Muthoot's MATTU & MITTU Magneti Marelli, founded in 1919, employs some 43,000 people and operates in 21 countries. Sales last year came to 8.2 billion euros. For all the Latest Business News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: In an effort to prevent the poor from committing suicide and save their lives, Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan has announced that he will be paying off loans of over 850 farmers from Uttar Pradesh. Earlier too, Big B said he helped cleared loans of over 350 farmers from Maharashtra It has been a most satisfying experience to give some to them our countrymen that sacrificed their lives for us... 44 families diversified into 112 entities were given out in my small way from Maharashtra, the brave hearts, the SHAHEED. More needs to be done from other parts of the country too. It shall be done. Read | Onions may get cheaper in Delhi as Nafed told to boost supply, Mother Dairy to cut price The 76-year-old actor said that he helped the farmers pay off loans in an effort to prevent them from committing suicide. Over 350 farmers loans that were difficult to pay off, and to prevent them from committing suicide, was paid off some days back too... Earlier farmer loans from Andhra and Vidarbha had been done... Now a list of over 850 farmers from Uttar Pradesh have been identified and their loans amounting to over Rs 5.5 crore shall be taken care of .. the assistance from the bank in question assists in its execution and its benevolence, Bachchan wrote on his blog. Also Read | Reliance Jio festive bonanza: Free calling, unlimited data and 100% cashback Amitabh also revealed his decision to help Ajeet Singh, who appeared on the reality show KBC Karmveer. Tomorrow a contribution to Ajeet Singh, who was on KBC Karmveer, and who works towards forced prostitution and the protection of young girls being kidnapped and forced into this dastardly crime, is being sent to him to help in his most valiant endeavour. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The reported American informal fiat to India to give an assurance that it would buy the F-16 fighter aircraft from the US to avoid sanctions under the Countering Americas Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) for Indias purchase of Russian S-400 missile defence systems is an act of virtual blackmail which is condemnable. ALSO READ | New Delhi: Petrol pumps, CNG dispensing units to remain shut tomorrow While India is believed to have refused to give such an assurance, the pressure on the Narendra Modi government for it is intense. Evidently, there was no lofty goal behind US objections to the Indo-Russian deal. The motivation to deter it was plain and simple expediency. In its final days in office, the Barack Obama administration too had sold F-16s to Pakistan despite the record of the Pakistan government in fuelling terrorism in the Indian sub-continent. It should indeed be amply clear that US claims of deterring an arms race in the sub-continent as elsewhere are hogwash and are dictated by narrow US self-interest. Any attempt to give it a lofty colour is downright ridiculous and an act of hypocrisy. ALSO READ | Jammu and Kashmir: Three civilians among 12 killed in two encounters It is perhaps concessions like these held out by Pakistan that have led to the Americans ignoring Indian submissions of the Pakistani involvement in training, arming and infiltration of terrorists into India, especially Kashmir. The US has constantly paid lip service to putting a stop to such brazen Pakistani activity while looking the other way when it comes to stopping such a nefarious practice. Nirmala Sitharaman is also scheduled to make her first bilateral visit to the US as Defence Minister in mid-December and there is every possibility that the Americans would seek to corner her on the purchase of F-16s or F-18s in the course of discussions there. Other reasons why India is reluctant to buy F-16s is also because they are not compatible with Indias Brahmos missiles and that they have been in Pakistans armoury for three decades. Read | Delhi Air Quality: No respite in sight as AQI oscillates between 'poor' and 'very poor' It is believed that the American presentation of the buy F-16 proposition to India was made as part of active deliberation at the 2+2 Indo-US meeting at which the Americans were represented by Secretary of State Pompeo and Defence Secretary James Mattis while India had External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. A subsequent meeting was held at the Singapore ASEAN summit earlier this month. There was a veiled threat in President Donald Trumps statement to media last week that India would find out the answer to whether the US will impose sanctions on New Delhi sooner than you think. The waiver is indeed dependent on Trump and all eyes are on him. While the waiver under CAATSA would require, among other things, for countries to significantly reduce their reliance on Russian arms, the sanctions would trigger off once New Delhi makes even part-payment for the Russian missile system which could happen as early as this year. Considering that India sorely needs spares of Russian arms bought in the past, expecting this country to stop all Russian defence imports would be unrealistic. ALSO READ | Deepika Padukone and Ranveer Singh are finally tying the knot! That India could be preparing for the eventuality of having to buy the F-16s or F-18s is borne out by the fact that the Indian Air Force has issued an RFI (request for information) for buying 114 fighter aircraft under a competitive bidding process. But that does not necessarily mean opting for F-16 or F-18. All in all, a battle of nerves lies ahead. By insisting on India not buying the S-400s if it wants the sanctions to be warded off, the US is failing to appreciate the fact that India sorely needs these to stave off the challenge from China which has already acquired this advanced missile system which could pose a threat to Indian security interests and consequently jeopardise US global plans. Read | The Spell of Coconut Water: This is what will happen when you drink 'nariyal pani' for a week! Tanzania: The man described as Africa's youngest billionaire said Saturday he is free more than a week after his abduction from a luxury hotel in Tanzania's commercial capital, while police suggested his captors came from South Africa. "I thank Allah that I have returned home safely," said a statement released by the 43-year-old Mohammed Dewji's foundation. It did not give details about the October 11abduction or what led to his release but thanked police for working for his safe return. Dewji, while arriving at the hotel for a workout, had been seized by two masked gunmen who fired into the air before driving away. Regional authorities have said two white men were seen on surveillance video, and they tightened controls at border posts and airports. Also Read | Explosions rock several polling stations in Kabul "We got information that the abductors used the same car that was used to seize him at the Colosseum Hotel and dumped him at gymkhana (sports facility) grounds," Dar es Salaam Regional Police Chief Lazaro Mambosasa said on Saturday. "We found him there physically fit, and we suspect that the abductors are South Africans because he said they were communicating in one of the vernacular from that country." The inspector general of police, Simon Sirro, later told reporters that the captors had demanded a ransom but he didn't divulge the amount or say whether it was paid. Also Read | Afghan parliamentary polls underway despite threats Police seized the vehicle along with an AK-47 assault rifle, two pistols and several rounds of ammunition, Sirro said. The captors had tried to burn the vehicle after dumping the billionaire, he added. Tanzania's Environment Minister January Makamba, in a statement posted on Twitter, said he had spoken with Dewji and "he's the usual Mo. So, he is okay." Forbes magazine in 2016 put Dewji's wealth at USD 1.5 billion. Also Read | Khashoggi died inside Istanbul consulate after fight: Saudi Arabia For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Muzaffarpur (Bihar): A 22-year-old rape victim was allegedly beaten up by her tormentor and his family at her house in Hasanpur Luhari village for refusing to withdraw a case against them, police said Sunday. According to the victim, Gulbahar and his four family members barged into her house Saturday and threatened her to withdraw the rape case. Also Read | Maoists set ablaze nine vehicles in Jharkhand's Hazaribag An FIR has been registered against the main accused Gulbahar and four others in connection with the incident, SHO Dharmendra Pawar said. The victim was reportedly raped by Gulbahar when she was going to her house on August 9, police added. New Delhi : Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh Saturday ordered a magisterial inquiry into the Amritsar train accident and said his government will extend all possible help to the accident victims and their families. Relief operations were in full swing, he added. We are ordering a magisterial inquiry into the incident under the police commissioner who will submit a report in four weeks, Singh said while speaking to reporters after meeting the injured at a hospital in Amritsar. Also Read | Amritsar train driver detained by police, says he got 'all-clear' to move on The Punjab CM ordered the immediate release of Rs 3 crore to District Collector Amritsar for the payment of ex-gratia to the families of the deceased. He also promised to punish the culprits of the tragedy that left 61 people dead and 72 others seriously injured. Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh visits Civil Hospital in Amritsar where injured have been admitted after the #AmritsarTrainAccident yesterday. pic.twitter.com/1E4hMvQEmx ANI (@ANI) October 20, 2018 As many as 59 people died on the spot and 57 sustained serious injuries as a speeding train mowed them down while they were watching the effigy of Ravana burn at a festival event near the Amritsar railway station. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi : After days of stubbornness, Union Minister MJ Akbar on Wednesday relented to the public pressure and resigned from his post over the allegations of sexual harassment as part of the #MeToo movement gripping the country. Akbar, who held the portfolio of Minister of State (MoS) for External Affairs in Narendra Modi cabinet, was accused of sexually harassing women colleagues when he was a newspaper journalist. As many as 20 women came out with their stories of horror faced at the hands of the BJP leader. Akbar, however, denied the allegations and even filed a defamation suit against Priya Ramani the first woman who accused Akbar of sexual harassment. Also Read | On Maha Ashtami, Devi Druga slays the demon: Reactions on MJ Akbar's resignation "Since I have decided to seek justice in a court of law in my personal capacity, I deem it appropriate to step down from office and challenge false accusations levelled against me..." Akbar said in a statement released through news agency ANI. Reacting to Akbars resignation, Ramani said, As women, we feel vindicated by MJ Akbars resignation. I look forward to the day when I also get justice in court. The Opposition Congress termed the resignation a vindication of truth and hailed the women who stood their ground despite the ministers defamation threat and the misuse of power by the Modi government. "To Priya Ramani and all the strong women who spoke up and stood their ground, my immense respect. This resignation is a vindication of the power of truth. More strength to Indias women! #MeTooIndia," Congress spokesperson Priyanka Chaturvedi tweeted. Also Read | Sabarimala Row: Lord Ayyappa Temple opens amid violent protests, women entry stalled Meanwhile, Delhis Patiala House court will begin the hearing in the criminal defamation complaint filed by Akbar against journalist Priya Ramani, who has accused him of sexual misconduct around 20 years ago. Akbar has reportedly hired a battery of 97 lawyers to represent him in the court. However, Karanjawala & Co, the law firm which fighting his case, said that only six will appear on MJ Akbars behalf. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: US President Donald Trump has confirmed that the United States will "terminate" the nuclear deal with Russia, saying that the latter has violated the nuclear weapons treaty agreement. "Russia has not adhered to the agreement. So we are going to terminate the agreement," Trump told reporters in Elko, Nevada, on Saturday. Read | Women in this country are afraid to come out: Rahul Gandhi Trump was referring to the 1987 US-Russia nuclear weapons treaty. He claimed that Russia has been violating the landmark agreement for several years. Read | Kamal Haasan avoids Sabarimala issue, says prefer to talk about beneficial things for women "Russia has violated the agreement. They've been violating it for many years. I don't know why president (Barack) Obama didn't negotiate or pull out. And we're not going to let them violate a nuclear agreement and go out and do weapons (while) we're not allowed to," Trump said. Read More | Ariana Grande hides her 'Pete' tattoo with a band-aid The US-Russia nuclear weapons treaty titled - Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces treaty (INF) - was signed in 1987 by the then two country presidents Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev. The INF banned ground-launch nuclear missiles with ranges from 500 km to 5,500 km, leading to the illimination of nearly 2,700 short- and medium-range missiles. And the treaty that ended the dangerous standoff between US and Soviet kept nuclear missiles out of Europe for three decades. (With inputs from agencies) For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: A powerful bomb, planted under a tractor, was found by locals at the Indo-Myanmar border town of Moreh in Manipur, an official said. The bomb was detected at 10.30 am at Moreh Bazar Ward number 6 locality, some 200 metres from Moreh Police Station in Tengnoupal district, following which the law enforcers were informed, a senior police officer told PTI. According to police report, normal commercial activities between the two neighbouring countries were disturbed for few hours following the recovery of explosive devices in the area. Also Read | Rangana Herath to retire after Galle Test versus England The police rushed to the border town and cordoned off the area before it safely defused the rocket propeller bomb in safer place, they said. We safely defused the bomb at around 2.45 pm at Holenphai area, 3 km from the site where it was found, police said. Normal trade and commerce between the two countries, which was halted for few hours, resumed after the bomb disposal operation, the police officer said. Read More | Hours before Sabarimala closes doors, another woman stopped from entering temple Citizens of both countries are allowed to cross the border for commercial activities from 7 am to 4 pm, the officials said. Moreh town, which is located 110 km from Manipurs capital Imphal and Tamu, located in Sagaing in northwest Myanmar have historically been connected by the umbilical cord for commerce. (With PTI inputs) New Delhi: In honour of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, four Himalayan peaks near Gangotri glacier have been named after him, an official said on . The four peaks named after Vajpayee are located at 6,557, 6,566, 6,160 and 6,100 metres on the right flank of Gangotri glacier, said Colonel Amit Bisht, principal of Nehru Institute of Mountaineering and leader of the mountain climbing team. The peaks have been named Atal-1, 2, 3 and 4, he said. Also Read | Supermodel Karlie Kloss just got married! Check out her wedding pics The climbers team led by Colonel Bisht recently scaled the newly named peaks. The team hoisted the national tricolour on each of the peaks located near Sudarshan and Saifi peaks in Raktvan valley, and returned after the climb on Saturday. Read | Having children taught me what real love is: Chris Hemsworth The expedition, jointly conducted by NIM and the tourism department, was flagged off from Dehradun on by Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat. On September 28, Uttarakhand Tourism Minister Satpal Maharaj had said, We plan to name an unknown peak in the Himalayas after former prime minister Vajpayee. A team of mountaineers will soon start on an expedition in search of it. The idea to christen a peak after Vajpayee was conceived in view of the former prime ministers love of nature and the mountains, Maharaj had said. The former prime minister and Bharatiya Janata Paty (BJP) stalwart passed away at AIIMS hospital in New Delhi on August 16 following multiple organs failure after prolonged illness. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Bangkok / New Delhi: A former Buddhist monk in Bnagkok has been sentenced to 16 years in prison by a court Thailand for raping a 13-year-old girl who he also impregnated. The Ratchada Criminal Court on Wednesday announced two eight-year prison term to Wirapol Sukphol, the monk, who is already serving a lengthy prison sentence. One eight-year term is for violating a minor under 15 and another for rape. Also Read | I don't understand scripts: Shah Rukh Khan The tainted monk is known for his jet-set lifestyle. He appeared in a 2013 YouTube video in his monk's robe aboard a private jet wearing aviator sunglasses with a Louis Vuitton carry-on by his side. Read More | Sophie Turner studied hard to understand her 'Dark Phoenix' role In August, the same court sentenced him to 114 years in connection with funds he fraudulently raised from followers. Legal technicalities capped the earlier sentence at 20 years, meaning he will now serve a 36-year prison sentence, according to AP. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Amritsar: One person was arrested and around 40 others, mostly unidentified, were booked for clashing with security forces and pelting them with stones at the train accident site here, police said Sunday. Earlier in the day, a police commando and a photojournalist were injured when protesters pelted stones and clashed with security personnel who removed them from a rail track where 59 Dussehra revellers were mowed down by a train on Friday. ALSO READ | New Delhi: Petrol pumps, CNG dispensing units to remain shut tomorrow A case was registered under relevant sections, including 307 (attempt to murder) of the IPC, police said. They said protesters were residents of Joda Phatak area and they pelted stones at the moving train when police tried to stop them. The protesters were raising slogans against the state government and demanding resignation of Punjab minister Navjot Singh Sidhu. ALSO READ | IND vs WI: India wins by eight wickets The Punjab police has deployed its personnel, including commandoes, to manage the crowd. The Rapid Action Force was also present in the Joda Patak area, officials said. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The doors to Sabarimala Temple finally closed on Monday night, six days after opening for the first time since the Supreme Court lifted the ban on entry of women of menstruating age. Despite the apex court's verdict not a single woman, aged between 10-50, managed to enter into the Lord Ayyappa temple. Over the past six days, a dozen of women, including activists and journalists, attempted to reach the temple despite being heckled, hassled and threatened, but they were forced to retreat. The iron gates to the shrine were opened on Wednesday and every day since then women of the "barred" age group madebrave but futile attempts to enter the shrine. Six women were prevented from entering the temple Sunday alone. Kerala women's rights activist Rehana Fathima and Hyderabad journalist Kavitha Jakkal, wearing helmets and khaki, and surrounded by a police contingent, could manage to go up to Valiya Nadappandhal, the queue complex located a few metres away from the holy 'pathinettam padi', the 18 sacred steps, but not beyond. Several people, including journalists, were injured on Wednesday as police cracked down on protesters who were up inarms against Kerala's Left Front government for its decision to enforce the Supreme Court order. On Monday, another woman trying to enter into the temple was forced to retreat by agitated protesters amid tight security arrangements. On Monday, police officials asked the media to vacate the areas in and around Sannidhaman and Pamba as they had received inputs of a targeted attack being planned on the media. Bindu, a Scheduled Caste activist, who was proceeding to Pambaat the foothills of Sabarimala temple from where devotees under take an arduous 5 km trek to the shrine, was given police protection at her request, officials said. However, when the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation bus she was travelling on with police personnel was about to reach Pamba, a group of BJP workers and those opposing the entry of girls and women aged between 10 and 50 years into the temple, blocked the road and forced her to alight.The woman was escorted to safety in a police jeep. The police said they would provide protection to the women devotees to reach the temple, but cannot help beyond that. Darshan is something which can be done with the consent of the priest, said Kerala Inspector General S Sreejith had said. (With agency inputs) For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi : The Punjab police on Sunday cleared a section of the railway track in Amritsar which was blocked by agitators seeking action against the organisers of the Dussehra committee following Fridays train accident that left 59 dead and 57 injured. The protestors clashed with police personnel and resorted to stone-pelting in which some several people received minor injuries. The police personnel used force clear off the protesters who were raising slogans against the state government. Also Read | To save Madhya Pradesh citadel, BJP to hire magicians for campaigning in Assembly polls The residents of the Joda Patak area, where the tragic train accident happened, started their protest demanding action against the train driver. The police have deployed its personnel, including Rapid Action Force and commandoes, to manage the crowd. On Friday evening, a high-speed Jalandhar-Amritsar DMU train mowed down as many as 59 people watching the effigy of demon king Ravana burn on the occasion of Dussehra - a Hindu festival that celebrates the victory of good over evil. Also Read | Delhi air quality dips to very poor, likely to worsen in coming days The district administration said that of the 59 people killed in the year's biggest train mishap, 40 have been identified. The Punjab government has announced Rs 5 lakh as ex-gratia for kins of deceased and free treatment for the injured. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Multiple blasts rocked polling booths across Kabul on Saturday, as voting in the legislative elections was underway, official sources said. At least 13 people were killed and more than 130 wounded in multiple explosions across Kabul. Hundreds of polling centres failed to open due to technical glitches and lack of staff. The Italian NGO Emergency said 37 people had been taken to its trauma hospital in Kabul, including a dead child. An Independent Election Commission (IEC) employee was killed and seven others were missing after the Taliban attacked a polling centre in the northern province of Kunduz, destroying ballot boxes, provincial IEC director Mohammad Rasoul Omar said. The Taliban claimed it carried out 166 attacks on voting locations, checkpoints and military sites on Saturday morning. Taliban issued several warnings in the days leading up to the poll, calling on candidates to withdraw from the race and for voters to stay home. At least ten candidates out of more than 2,500 contesting the lower-house election have been killed. Election organisers, who have been skewered over their shambolic preparations for the long-delayed ballot, extended voting until for 360 polling centres after hiccups with voter registration lists and biometric verification devices caused lengthy delays. Also Read | Amritsar train driver detained by police, says he got 'all-clear' to move on The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, which has spearheaded international efforts to keep Afghan organisers on track, on Almost nine million people registered to vote in the parliamentary election, which is more than three years late. But attacks across the country on are likely to deter many from turning up at the nearly 5,000 polling centres. VIEW | Happy birthday Candice Swanepoel: The Angel's best fashion moments when she is not in the VS lingerie Preliminary results will be released on November 10 but there are concerns they could be thrown into turmoil if the biometric verification devices are broken, lost or destroyed. Votes cast without the controversial machines will not be counted, the IEC has said. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Two Army men have been injured in an encounter between militants and Security forces at Pathan Pulwama in Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday. Firing from both sides are underway, according to NN sources. ALSO READ | Dengue menace in India claims 80 lives, affects 40,000 people till Sep Jammu and Kashmir: Encounter breaks out between terrorists & security forces in Pulwama's Pathan. More details awaited ANI (@ANI) October 20, 2018 For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: As per the latest directive by Reserve bank of India (RBI), the deadline to comply with storing of data relating to payment systems within India to expire on October 15. More than 15 payment firms including Visa and Mastercard will also fall in line if these norms are not followed. But, these directives are still not followed and if RBI do not make any changes in these rules then buyers may face difficulties during this festive season. RuPay Card A recent launched initiative by the Indian government, RuPay credit or debit card will not be affected at all after October 15. However, only Mastercard and Visa card holders will be affected after the expiry of the deadline. Several global payments firms including Mastercard, Visa and American Express raised the issue with the finance ministry on October 5 requesting the government to increase the deadline or provide ease with the guidelines. Also read | Fuel price to be slashed soon? PM Modi to meet oil company heads today A source close to government said, The RBI is unlikely to extend the deadline or ease the guidelines. Payment companies have been given sufficient time of six months. Theres no question of going back on the data localisation plan. But, the fact of the matter remains the same, there are more Mastercard and Visa card holders in India as compared to RuPay which may will create huge problem for the online buyers after the expiry of the deadline. For all the Latest Business News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi : Dalbir Singh, the man who played the character of demon king Ravana at the Ramleela in Amritsar, was among the 59 people who died in the tragic train accident on the auspicious evening of Dussehra that turned into woebegone. Singh had just finished his role as Ravana and was walking on tracks towards the Joda Phatak to get a better view of burning effigy when he saw the speeding train approaching him and over a hundred others. Before he could warn people, the train crushed him along with 59 others. Also Read | Amritsar Train Tragedy: Punjab CM orders magisterial probe into the accident Saddened by the death of her son, Dalbir Singhs mother Sawan Kaur could not speak more but appeal the government to secure the future of her daughter-in-law and an eight-month-old grandchild. "I appeal to the govt to provide a job to my daughter-in-law. She also has an eight-month-old baby," ANI quoted Sawan Kaur as saying. She said her son had been playing different roles in Ramleela for over a decade. This time he played the role of Ravana. "For more than 20 years, people from adjoining villages gather at the vacant plot at Joda Phatak, barely 50 metres from railway tracks, to watch the celebrations, the grieved mother said while tears rolled down the cheeks of Singhs widow who sat next to her mother-in-law in numbness. Also Read | Amritsar train driver detained by police, says he got 'all-clear' to move on Meanwhile, people of the area staged a sit-in and raised slogans against the state government. They were demanding action against the train driver, alleging that he didnt slow down the train despite the presence of huge crowd on tracks. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Imphal: High tariff duties coupled with an increasing gap in gold prices between India and Myanmar has led to an upsurge in smuggling of the yellow metal across the international border, a report compiled by anti-smuggling unit of Imphal customs division has said. Manipur shares a 398-km-long porous international border with the neighbouring country. An official of the customs division feels facilitating "free movement" of citizens for a stipulated period from Manipur's border town of Moreh to adjacent Namphalong market in Myanmar has made the conflict-ridden state "more prone to illicit trafficking of contraband gold". India and Myanmar border have a Free Movement Regime (FMR) which allows people living along the border to travel 16km across the boundary without visa restrictions. Also Read | Rupee gains 8 paise to 73.24 against US dollar in early trade "This unhindered movement across the border and lure or easy money have made Manipur a soft target for smugglers," the official added. Last year, the anti-smuggling unit report stated, a whopping recovery of 137.4 kg gold, worth around Rs 40 crore, was made in Manipur alone. The recovery from the entire northeast region amounted to 267.2 kg of gold, worth Rs 84.12 crores. In 2016, the customs division had seized 16.15 kg gold, valued at Rs 10 crore. Also Read | Sensex bounces 321 points in early trade on positive Asian cues "The report suggests that Manipur accounts for 45 per cent of the total contraband gold recovered from the region last year. The seized gold often finds its way to the state and other parts of the country as it has no markings to indicate the place of origin," the customs official said. As of September this year, 42 cases have been registered and contraband gold worth Rs 12 crore recovered, RK Darendrajit, Assistant Commissioner, Imphal Customs Division, told PTI. In November, last year, an individual was apprehended from Lokchao area in Tengnoupal district with 26.6 kg gold. "Unlike other security agencies which make contraband gold recoveries through random frisking, we rely on intelligence inputs to make arrests and recoveries," Darendrajit stated. Pointing out that "those arrested in the border area mostly act as carriers for a commission of around Rs 2000", he said it was hard to trace the kingpins as the highly-organized rackets operate very cautiously. Also Read | India leads UK's Scotch whisky exports boom The "carriers", in order to deceive the security agencies, often conceal gold bars in their body parts to avoid detection on the Imphal-Moreh National Highway, another official, who did not wish to be named, told PTI. "In August this year, two men were apprehended with 12 gold biscuits worth Rs 62 lakh inside their rectum," he said. Interestingly, some of them even paint the valuable yellow metal in silver to hoodwink the customs division sleuths, he said. Nonetheless, the consignments bound for mainland India, including metropolitan cities of Delhi and Kolkata, reach destinations as the demand for gold never wanes, the official added. For all the Latest Business News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Aizawl: The National Congress Party (NCP) on Thursday said that the party would contest five of the 40 seats of the Mizoram Legislative Assembly in the forthcoming election scheduled on November 28. The party is planning to contest from Hachhek, Dampa, Mamit, Aizawl East-I and Aizawl West-I Assembly constituencies, NCP Mizoram state unit president Lalawmpuia Chhangte told reporters. Read More | #MeToo LIVE | Delhi court to record Akbar, other witnesses' statements in defamation case on October 31 Chhangte said he will visit Delhi on Monday to get the names of candidates approved from the NCP leadership. The candidates names would be announced after the approval by the NCP leadership, he said. However, in view of the appeals made by the NGO Coordination Committee, the NCP is yet to decide on fielding nominees from two seats - WestTuipui and Tuichawng - in Chakma Autonomous District Council areas. Also Read | Bigg Boss12: Surbhi Rana calls Sreesanth mentally unstable, stubborn and immature The committee had appealed to all political parties not to list candidates from the Chakma community from these two specific seats. The NCP plans to contest the two seats only if other parties field candidates belonging to the Chakma community, Chhangte said. He said that the NCP has chances of winning the Hachhek and Mamit seats. In the 2013 assembly polls, the party had bagged 2,467 votes and 2,368 votes respectively. The NCP has been contesting Assembly polls in Mizoram since 2003. New Delhi : Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday offered condolences to Indian President Ram Nath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the deaths of 59 people in the tragic Amritsar train accident during the Dusshera celebrations. I offer my deepest sympathies over tragic consequences of an accident on railways in Punjab. I ask to convey my words of sympathy and support to families and friends of killed people and to wish the soonest recovery to those injured, a Kremlin statement shared on its official website said. Also Read | Amritsar train tragedy toll rises to 59; Railways says clear case of trespassing As many as 59 people were killed while scores others sustained serious injuries after a DMU train ran over a crowd gathered near the tracks to watch the effigy of demon-king Ravan burning. The authorities said that the death toll could likely go up as many of the injured were in critical condition. As the Ravan effigy set on fire and firecrackers went off in the sky, people could not hear the sound of the train approaching them. Read More | Jamal Khashoggi died inside Istanbul consulate after fight, admits Saudi Arabia However, few were lucky to notice the closed level crossing, an indication of a train, but others standing on tracks for a better and safe view were crushed by the speeding train. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: A Delhi court Saturday framed molestation charges against former TERI chief R K Pachauri in a case of alleged sexual harassment lodged by his former colleague. Metropolitan Magistrate Charu Gupta put Pachauri on trial for the offence punishable under sections 354 (outraging modesty), 354 A (making physical contact, unwelcome and sexually coloured remarks) and 509 (teasing and using vulgar gesture and actions) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). Read | Amritsar train tragedy toll rises to 61; Railways says clear case of trespassing The charges were framed after Pachauri, who was present in the courtroom, pleaded not guilty and claimed trial. Advocate Ashish Dixit, appearing for the accused, sought a speedy trial after which the court put up the matter for further proceedings on January 4, 2019. On February 13, 2015, an FIR was registered against Pachauri and he was granted anticipatory bail in the case on March 21, 2015. Read | After China alert, Assam districts bordering Arunachal Pradesh told to prevent 'major catastrophe' The former TERI chief had earlier secured an interim order from Additional District Judge making it mandatory for media houses to publish or telecast the coverage of the case with a title that in any court, the allegations have not been proved and they may not be correct. This order had also said when such information is published in any page of a magazine or report, then it should be in middle of the page in bold letters and it should be five times larger than the font in which the article is being published. Over 1,400-page charge sheet was filed by the Delhi Police on March 1, 2016, saying there was sufficient evidence against Pachauri that he had sexually harassed, stalked and threatened the complainant. Read | #MeToo: Sapna Bhavnani launches scathing attack on Amitabh Bachchan; says your truth will come out soon A supplementary charge sheet was filed in March 2017 after the police said it had retrieved several deleted e-mails and chats exchanged between the accused and the complainant. The final report had said the deleted WhatsApp chats, text messages, retrieved from the cell phones, computer hard disks and other devices, were not fabricated. Read | Namaste England vs Badhai Ho: Box-office clash this week The charge sheet, which was filed a year after the former research analyst of TERI lodged the complaint, had said Pachauri had committed offences under various sections of IPC. Pachauri has denied all the allegations against him. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi : A 70-year-old man was allegedly stoned to death by some monkeys in a village Baghpat, putting the police in a fix as the deceaseds family wants an FIR to be registered against them. The incident took place on October 17 in Tikri village of the district. Circle officer Ramala Rajiv Pratap Singh told PTI that the deceased was sleeping near a pile of bricks when some monkeys jumped on the bricks. The pile of bricks collapsed and fell on Dharampal, leaving him injured. He was taken to hospital where he succumbed. Also Read | Amritsar Train Tragedy: Punjab CM Amarinder Singh promises all help to victims Giving a different narrative, Krishnapal Singh, the brother of the deceased, in his complaint has said that Dharampal was collecting woods for a havan when he was attacked by the monkeys. Bricks were thrown at his head and chest, and he succumbed to injuries at the hospital. We have submitted a written complaint against the monkeys, but the police are terming it as an accident, he said. He said they will now meet senior officials and request them to initiate action in this regard. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Tanzania's president on Wednesday said five people are dead, including three police officers, after a gun battle with an armed man near the French Embassy in Dar es Salaam. It was not immediately clear whether the shootout in the heavily guarded diplomatic area was a terror attack. Liberatus Sabas, Tanzania's head of police operations, said the gunman attacked two police officers, took their guns and then "began shooting sporadically towards the French Embassy." "He then took cover at a structure next to the French Embassy where he continued shooting," Sabas said. Inspector general of police Simon Sirro told reporters the armed man was a foreigner and police believe he was from Somalia. Sirro also warned the attack could be linked to the jihadist insurgency in neighbouring Mozambique, where a growing number of African nations are jointly pursuing the fighters. The confrontation occurred shortly after President Samia Suluhu Hassan addressed security officials in another part of the city, Tanzania's commercial hub. The president later said three police officers, a member of the auxiliary police and the armed man were killed, and she ordered an investigation. The U.S. Embassy in a security alert warned citizens to avoid the area. The shootout occurred not far from the scene of the deadly bombing in 1998 at the U.S. Embassy. Taliban opens Doors to Afghanistan for Pak, trade rises by 50% Taliban and the Northern Alliance agreed not to attack each other Pakistan: Terrorists belonging to banned outfit were killed during raid The Saudi-led Arab coalition launched extensive airstrikes on Houthi positions and their reinforcements in Yemen's central province of Marib in the past 24 hours. According to a military source statement, the airstrikes targeted the Houthis in four frontlines in the western districts of Sirwah and Rahabah, killing dozens and destroying several vehicles carrying weapons and combatants. The UN has warned that the offensive on Marib, which hosts nearly 1 million internally displaced people, could lead to a major humanitarian catastrophe. The Houthis commenced in February a major offensive on Marib in an attempt to seize control of the oil-rich province, the government's last northern stronghold. Meanwhile, the Houthi-run al-Masirah TV reported 17 coalition airstrikes in Sirwah and Rahabah in the last 24 hours, without providing further details. The UN's recent peace proposal to end the war was publicly rejected by the Houthi group. Yemen's civil war flared up in late 2014 when the Iran-backed Houthi group seized control of much of the country's north and forced the internationally recognized government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa. The Saudi-led coalition intervened in the Yemeni conflict in March 2015 to support Hadi's government. South African Airways to resume flights in September Water for Rs. 3000, a plate of rice for Rs. 7500, starving people at Kabul airport Taliban and Northern Alliance begin talks, both agreed on ceasefire South African Airways (SAA) will restart the operation of flights on September 23. Over15 months after it was grounded in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, the SAA said in a statement. South African Airways CEO Thomas Kgokolo said, "After months of diligent work, we are delighted that SAA is resuming service and we look forward to welcoming onboard our loyal passengers and flying the South African flag, and w continue to be a safe carrier and adhering to Covid-19 protocols." Ngokolo added that the Airways will start by flying from Johannesburg to Cape Town, Accra (Ghana), Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of Congo), Harare (Zimbabwe), Lusaka (Zambia) and Maputo (Mozambique). They will add destinations in response to market conditions. "There is a profound feeling of enthusiasm within Team SAA as we prepare for takeoff, with one common purpose -- to rebuild and sustain a profitable airline that once again takes a leadership role among local, continental, and international airlines. "As we are now poised for takeoff, we see this as a major milestone for SAA and the country," Kgokolo said. South African Airways faced financial problems despite numerous government bailouts and resorted to a business rescue last year. Taliban and Northern Alliance begin talks, both agreed on ceasefire Mullah Abdul Qayyum served 6 years in US jail, and Taliban gave him ministry Taliban's brutal from! Also killed innocent children to spread panic, photos went viral Home Politics Nepal-India border talks, supposed to be held every year, in limbo since 2019 Kathmandu, August 26 Whereas issues related to a failure to ensure effective border management are rife, Nepal-India border management talks have not taken place since 2019 although they were supposed to happen every year. Officials on both sides blame the Covid-19 pandemic that troubled the world since early 2020 as a reason why the talks could not take place. However, developments of incidents show the map dispute between the two countries about the Kalapani-Limpiyadhura region has affected the dialogue process. While other bilateral mechanisms have done their meetings regularly virtually, India appears disinterested in the border issue. It has been learned that Nepal has proposed twice holding a meeting even virtually since then, but India did not respond to the proposal both of the times. The two countries had formed a Boundary Working Group (BWG) in 2014 to discuss and resolve all existing and potential border issues. The group was mandated to hold a meeting every year, but no meeting has taken place since the sixth one in Dehradun in 2019. There are two separate bodies, an official team and a joint field survey team, working under the BWG. They have also turned dysfunctional with the BWG failing to hold a meeting. Aging & Disability Resource Center Nebraskas Aging and Disability Resource Center (ADRC) is the best place for you, family, friends, caregivers and providers to get information about long-term services and supports for older adults and persons with disabilities. The ADRC is the one-stop shop at the community level to help you make informed decisions about long-term services and supports. It is a collaborative effort between aging and disability organizations. The ADRC will assist: Persons age 60 and over Persons with disabilities of any age Family members, caregivers, advocates and providers for these groups The Nebraska ADRC will provide: Information and Assistance. Our ADRC Options Counselors will help you with your questions and concerns about long-term care. Do you have questions about: Living arrangements related to long-term care In-home services such as housekeeping, personal care, respite, equipment, care coordination Paying for long-term care services Health promotion, prevention Adult protective services, abuse, neglect, financial exploitation Mental health services Financial and other basic needs such as food, shelter, Medicaid, Medicare, etc. Legal issues such as consumer rights, advocacy, power of attorney, guardianship, etc. ADRC Options Counselors are available Monday through Friday 8:00 AM to 4:30 PM for callers or walk-in visitors. To schedule an appointment, call (402) 444-6444. Options Counseling Making decisions about long-term care services can be difficult. An Options Counselor can provide unbiased information that is relevant to your needs, preferences and goals. This person-centered service supports you in making informed choices about long-term care service options. We can meet with you, your family and caregivers in person to talk about what is available to meet your current and future needs for care. ADRC Options Counselors are available Monday through Friday 8:00 AM to 4:30 PM for callers or walk-in visitors. To schedule an appointment, call (402) 444-6444. You can also look at the ADRC website with statewide information for you, your family and caregivers: https://nebraska.arounja.org/ The website has information that includes: Services A library with information on health, medications, symptom checker Legislation at the State and Federal level Assistive devices Prescription drug assistance Fall prevention Medicare My Personal Health Record (My PHR), to organize and store your medical and health care information. And much more The ADRC is here to help you navigate through what can be a consuming and complicated maze of services and programs. We will collaborate and partner with multiple community providers to obtain and access information and services for you. All of our information and assistance is free and confidential. Aged & Disabled Medicaid Waiver AD Medicaid Waiver Program The AD Medicaid Waiver program is available through the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services to those individuals who qualify. The program provides older adults and adults with physical disabilities options for home and community-based services who would otherwise require long-term care in a nursing facility. This waiver provides an array of services to help adults live at home. A person must have physical and health needs that require nursing facility level of care and must be eligible for Medicaid. To make a referral contact the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services Division of Developmental Disabilities by: Email: DHHS.ADWaiverApp@nebraska.gov or Telephone: 1-877-667-6266 ENOA Services Coordination Participants and/or their legal representatives are required to select a services coordination provider to be enrolled in the AD Medicaid Waiver program. ENOAs highly skilled professional services coordinators provide participant driven comprehensive assessments, care planning and ongoing case management. This participant-centered approach ensures the participants choices, preferences and rights are at the forefront of the services participants receive while maintaining their health, welfare and safety. This waiver allows Medicaid money to be used to purchase services that are not usually considered medical such as the following: Home care/chore: Includes necessary personal cares, housekeeping activities, meal preparation, essential shopping, and supervision. Adult day services: A structured program of activities in a supervised setting outside of the participants home which provides for health and social needs. Respite care: Temporary relief for the usual caregiver from the stress of providing continuous care. Assisted living: An array of support services provided in a home environment. Assistive technology & support: Specialized medical equipment and supplies. Meal delivery: Provides a meal prepared outside the clients residence and delivered to the residence. Personal emergency response systems: Communication connection system to access emergency help. For more information about ENOAs Services Coordination Please call ENOA at 402-546-1870 or 1-888-554-2711. Description For centuries, horses have inspired art and artists. Undeniably connected to humans through their soulful majesty, the equestrian world has been translated in landscapes, furniture, and sculpture and throughout the decorative arts. Jewelry, regarded as one of the most personal mediums, worn on the body and gifted from generation to generation, beautifully celebrates horses. Equestrian jeweler, Karina Brez, debuts new designs for her acclaimed Horse LUV collection, with eighteen styles across rings, necklaces and earrings. In addition, Brez will be showing these never-before seen pieces in Sag Harbor, New York, at the Keyes Art Gallery from August 26-29th, 2021. The trademarked Horse LUV collection, by Karina Brez, has always combined the form of two horses into a heart, a symbol for those who love horses, and an heirloom for connecting those who have a shared endearment for horses. In its latest iteration, Brez has further abstracted the outline of the horses in Horse LUV, making the heart more prevalent and open. Both 18K solid gold and mixed gold and diamond styles are available, in either white, rose, or yellow gold. Timeless and elegant, Horse LUV uniquely captures the bond between human and horse, within ones everyday style. The Keyes Art Gallery showcases works of both celebrated and emerging designers, in Sag Harbor, NY. Julie Keyes, Owner of Keyes Art Gallery says, Karina Brez is an artist, and her medium is jewelry. She is fantastic! We are honored to have her sharing her work in-person, for the long weekend in the gallery. From Thursday August 26th through Sunday August 29th, 2021, Karina Brez will be meeting and greeting clients in person at Keyes, with a champagne reception. Keyes Art Gallery hours are 10:00 AM-10:00 PM EDT Thursday through Saturday, and 10:00 AM-7:00 PM EDT on Sunday; the gallerys address is 45 Main Street, Sag Harbor, NY. Visit the gallery online at https://www.juliekeyesart.com/, or contact Keyes via email at info@juliekeyesart.com , or call 631-808-3588. To book an appointment for the Sag Harbor Pop-Up, contact Karina Brez at 561-400-4085 or email info@karinabrez.com. Workforce White House COVID group extends leave for feds to get vaccinated Agencies are required to offer leave-eligible feds at least four hours of administrative leave per vaccine dose, according to a Wednesday update of the White House-led Safer Federal Workforce Task Force's website. Employees that have adverse reactions will be eligible for up to two days of administrative leave. If they need more than that, they can be covered by emergency paid leave granted by the American Rescue Plan Act or by sick leave, the guidance states. As part of a Biden administration policy announced in late July, all federal employees are required to either be vaccinated or follow stringent testing and masking requirements. Federal employees who get vaccinated outside of work dont get administrative leave or overtime, according to the website. Finally, the new guidance clarifies that feds can obtain administrative leave when taking a family member to get vaccinated. Feds can get up to four hours per dose. This decision is "based on President Biden's direction that the federal government should work aggressively to maximize the number of people receiving the COVID-19 vaccination," the website states. According to the Centers for Disease Control, 73.4% of American adults have received at least one dose. The new guidelines landed soon after the Food and Drug Administration issued full approval for the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, and an official vaccination mandate for all service members was issued by the Department of Defense. Workforce GOP lawmakers seek answers on SSA's acting leadership A group of Republican lawmakers want the Government Accountability Office to weigh in on the authorities and term of the acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration, who was put in place after President Joe Biden ousted top Trump-appointed SSA leaders in July. Unions at the agency had been pressuring the president to fire top leaders at the agency for months, alleging that they were a key factor in the agency's embattled relationship with its unions. Now, five Republicans want answers from Comptroller General Gene Dodaro, the head of GAO, on the authorities of Acting Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi, formerly the agency's deputy commissioner for retirement and disability policy. "Now, as SSA must ensure beneficiary service as we face a choppy road of recovery from the pandemic, Social Security employees and beneficiaries have been thrown into an unfortunate state of uncertainty and discontinuity driven by politics," the lawmakers wrote in an Aug. 24 letter. They asked for answers by Sept. 15. The letter's signees are Sens. Mike Crapo (R- Idaho), ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee; Tim Scott (R-S.C.), ranking member of the Special Committee on Aging; Todd Young (R-Ind.), ranking member of the Subcommittee on Social Security, Pensions and Family Policy in the Finance Committee; and Reps. Kevin Brady (R-Texas), ranking member of the Ways and Means Committee; and Tom Reed (R-N.Y.), ranking member of the subcommittee on Social Security in the Ways and Means Committee. The group called the firing of former SSA Commissioner Andrew Saul and former Deputy Commissioner David Black was "unlawful." Both had been appointed to fixed terms by former President Donald Trump and confirmed by the Senate. At the time, a White House official provided this statement to FCW. "Since taking office, Commissioner Saul has undermined and politicized Social Security disability benefits, terminated the agency's telework policy that was utilized by up to 25% of the agency's workforce, not repaired SSA's relationships with relevant Federal employee unions including in the context of COVID-19 workplace safety planning, reduced due process protections for benefits appeals hearings, and taken other actions that run contrary to the mission of the agency and the President's policy agenda," the official said. The ousters followed a June Supreme Court ruling finding that job protections given to the director of the Fair Housing Finance Agency, which has a similar structure to SSA, were unconstitutional. Saul's six-year term was set to run through 2025. The position's terms allow the commissioner to be fired by the president after a finding of "neglect of duty or malfeasance in office." Black's six-year position was also Senate-confirmed, but its terms allow the president to remove the person in the position without an adverse finding. "To date, neither the President nor the White House has provided the public with any findings of neglect of duty or malfeasance in office with respect to Commissioner Saul," they wrote. The Federal Vacancies Reform Act governs who can fill vacant Senate-confirmed position and for how long. GAO has the responsibility of notifying the executive branch of potential violations of the law. The Republican lawmakers are asking Dodaro to weigh in on whether Kijakazi's appointment complies with the law and determine when her appointment might extend past the 210-day period allowed under the law. The lawmakers also want to know who would be acting commissioner if the 210 day mark passes with no nominee for a new SSA commissioner. (Updates with Hungary govt bond auction results, market reaction) By Anita Komuves and Krisztina Than BUDAPEST, Aug 26 (Reuters) - Hungary cut back its government bond sales on Thursday at its first auction since the central bank announced on Tuesday that it would start winding down their purchases, as markets were concerned about the effects of the start of the tapering. The Hungarian central bank raised its base rate by 30 basis points to 1.5% on Tuesday to rein in inflation and said it would trim weekly bond purchases to 50 billion forints ($168.79 million) from 60 billion starting this week. The Government Debt Management Agency (AKK) auctioned three series of bonds and sold 35 billion forints ($118.25 million)worth of government bonds versus a 55 billion offer. The AKK sold 5-year bonds at an average yield of 2.31%, up from 2.09% at the previous auction two weeks ago. Ten-year bonds were sold at an average yield of 2.88%, up from 2.84%. Fifteen-year bonds were sold at an average yield of 3.28%, up from 3.17% at the end of July. "With the central bank taking a step back, there is some uncertainty at the market... investors will need a few more auctions to become confident that yields will stabilise," a fixed-income trader in Budapest said. Yields have climbed up 4-6 basis points since the auction, with yields rising the most in the middle section of the curve, he said. "Overall the National Bank of Hungary's tapering steps seem very cautious and is unlikely to deliver meaningful tightening in monetary conditions," Citigroup analysts said in a note. "Therefore, the FX and the interest rates channels remain the key tools for the NBH to curb inflation." The forint was down 0.28% on the day at 348.82 per euro, after hitting a two-month high on Wednesday. Some analysts said the NBH could slow the pace of its rate hikes from September, with the strong forint helping to curb inflation. Citigroup analysts said the expected rate hikes to slow to 15 basis points from next month if August consumer price data confirmed easing of domestic pressures and the forint held around 350 to the euros helping contain imported inflation. Elsewhere, the Czech crown edged down 0.11% to 25.566. The Polish zloty was little changed trading at 4.5740 against the common currency. The forint has outperformed its peers, firming 4% this year, followed by a 2.6% rise by the Czech crown. Unlike the Hungarian and Czech central banks, which have been hiking interest rates, the Polish central bank has stayed put in the face of rising price pressures across the region. "The situation on the zloty market is slightly improving. This is mainly related to the recent improvement in moods in the core markets," Maciej Madej, an analyst at DM TMS Brokers said in a note. He added the zloty was still relatively weak compared with regional peers because of different central bank policies. Stocks in the region were mostly down, with Warsaw leading losses, falling 0.4%. CEE SNAPSHO AT MARKETS T 1213 CET CURRENC IES Latest Previous Daily Change bid close change in 2021 EURCZK= Czech EURHUF= Hungary 0 EURPLN= Polish EURRON= Romania EURHRK= Croatia EURRSD= Serbian 0 Note: calculated from 1800 daily CET change Latest Previous Daily Change close change in 2021 .PX Prague 1286.05 1290.020 -0.31% +25.21 0 % .BUX Budapes 50962.4 51093.80 -0.26% +21.03 t 7 % .WIG20 Warsaw 2315.86 2325.19 -0.40% +16.73 % .BETI Buchare 12314.6 12274.70 +0.33% +25.59 st 5 % .SBITOP Ljublja <.SBITOP 1198.19 1200.97 -0.23% +33.01 na > % .CRBEX Zagreb 1962.00 1958.40 +0.18% +12.80 % .BELEX1 Belgrad <.BELEX1 796.76 800.95 -0.52% +6.43% 5 e 5> .SOFIX Sofia 567.92 570.68 -0.48% +26.90 % Yield Yield Spread Daily (bid) change vs Bund change in Czech spread Republi c CZ2YT=R s CZ5YT=R s CZ10YT= s Poland PL2YT=R s PL5YT=R s PL10YT= s FORWARD 3x6 6x9 9x12 3M interba nk Czech 1.63 2.08 2.22 0.97 Rep Hungary 2.15 2.31 2.33 1.61 Poland 0.42 0.64 0.87 0.21 Note: are for ask FRA prices quotes ********************************************* ***************** ($1 = 296.2300 forints) ($1 = 295.9800 forints) (Additional reporting by Alan Charlish in Warsaw; Editing by Tomasz Janowski and Rashmi Aich) LAS VEGAS, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Alterra Home Loans LLC, an independent mortgage bank headquartered in Nevada, announced today it has promoted Marc Hernandez to president following his leadership and contributions as Alterra's executive vice president of retail lending. Hernandez, who was appointed to the role by previous President and Co-Founder Jason Madiedo, will be responsible for sales, operations, and marketing. Marc Hernandez promoted to president of Alterra Home Loans. Hernandez joined Alterra in 2015 when he established a branch in Chicago and ultimately grew a regional presence for the company. He later moved into a divisional leadership position overseeing Alterra's East Coast production where he was instrumental in driving results for the company. Hernandez brings with him 17 years of mortgage industry experience in both sales and operations, including roles at Countrywide, Bank of America, and Huntington Bank. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Information Systems from the University of Notre Dame. "Marc's a by-product of our culture and a prime example of our commitment to professional growth and grooming our leaders so they can be promoted from within. He knows the mortgage business well, but more importantly, he knows the people side of the business and excels at working well with a wide range of personalities," said Madiedo. "In an industry that's constantly changing, Marc has an incredible ability to articulate his vision, set the direction for the company and execute. A successful leader needs to be very curious about what needs to change, and Marc is always challenging the status quo and questioning what we as an industry and company can do better. I also love that we were able to grow another Latino leader into our industry. I'm proud of that." Madiedo, who will continue to serve as CEO of Panorama Mortgage Group which owns the Alterra brand, selected Hernandez for the position not solely because of his innate talent, but also because of the emotional intelligence, leadership skills and critical thinking he regularly demonstrates. As just one of a handful of Hispanic mortgage banking presidents in the country, Madiedo views Hernandez's promotion as a continuation of the diversity to which Alterra is committed. Story continues "Alterra has a strong, client-focused foundation and truly outstanding culture where driven professionals thrive. I'm eager to help the company reach the next level of success and growth by enhancing our product offering, investing in our technology platform, and inspiring our team of top-tier talent," said Hernandez. "My goal is to build a best-in-class operations platform and explore strategic opportunities that will enable Alterra to better serve our clients and be part of a larger national conversation among independent mortgage bankers." Miguel Narvaez, chief revenue officer of Alterra and Panorama Mortgage Group believes Hernandez is the perfect choice for Alterra's future. "At Panorama Mortgage Group, it is our belief that our industry is on the precipice of a new generation of mortgage leaders, and we consider it a priority to empower and prepare leaders like Marc Hernandez. We strongly believe in investing in practitioners who are striving to become future leaders. In the history of our industry, there has never been a more important time to provide a path for mortgage entrepreneurs to become the mortgage leaders of tomorrow." About Alterra Home Loans Alterra Home Loans is a minority-owned, Nevada-based retail lender that provides mortgage loans and refinancing services to new and existing homeowners. With branches throughout the U.S., Alterra is committed to helping consumers "build wealth through homeownership" by offering high quality financial mortgage solutions that are supported by sophisticated tools, better processes and innovative products. Alterra's inclusive approach to mortgage lending is focused on helping consumers of all cultures, especially those who are underserved, attain financial security and create a better life for themselves and their children by achieving the American Dream. Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/alterra-home-loans-promotes-marc-hernandez-to-president-301363738.html SOURCE Alterra Home Loans Attorney Christopher Vernon of Vernon Litigation Group has been recognized in the 28th Edition of "The Best Lawyers in America" for his work in Bet-the-Company Litigation, Commercial Litigation, ad Securities/Capital Markets Law NAPLES, Fla., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Attorney Christopher Vernon of Vernon Litigation Group has been recognized in the 28th Edition of The Best Lawyers in America. He has earned this recognition since 2009. For his 2022 recognition, Best Lawyers recognized Attorney Vernon's outstanding legal work in three practice areas: Bet-the-Company Litigation (litigation that threatens an entire business or company) Commercial Litigation (litigating on behalf of companies and their interests, or for cases involving two partners within a legal dispute) Securities/Capital Markets Law (variety of litigation with a focus on representing financial brokers) Best Lawyers is a renowned, nationwide organization that reviews and honors outstanding legal professionals. It relies on peer reviews to conduct its annual evaluations of attorneys in all states, so the information gathered to make a final selection is accurate, insightful, and unbiased. Nearly 11 million confidential evaluations were reviewed for the 28th Edition. When the annual members are announced, only up to 6% of all practicing attorneys in the United States and who practice in nearly 150 areas will be listed as members. More information about Best Lawyers can be found by visiting www.bestlawyers.com. Inquiring parties can visit www.vernonlitigation.com for more information about Attorney Christopher Vernon and Vernon Litigation Group. Vernon Litigation Group Chris Vernon | 239-319-4434 Cision View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/attorney-christopher-vernon-recognized-in-28th-edition-of-the-best-lawyers-in-america-301363859.html SOURCE Vernon Litigation Group (Bloomberg) -- Kuaishou Technology tumbled the most in nearly three weeks after reporting a wider-than-expected loss as the short-video giant increased spending to retain users. The stock sank as much as 12.5% in early trading Thursday, the most since Aug. 6. Monthly and daily active users slid from the previous quarter and its net loss of 7 billion yuan ($1 billion) exceeded the 6.25 billion yuan projected, even as sales rose a better-than-expected 49% to 19.1 billion yuan for the three months ended June. Kuaishou, the operator of Chinas most popular short-video platform after ByteDance Ltd.s Douyin, is grappling with an influx of rivals from Bilibili Inc. to Tencent Holdings Ltd.s WeChat. Its going on a spending spree to try and maintain loyalty among the countrys youth, deploying a generous marketing budget into newer areas like e-commerce and gaming. Its selling and marketing expenses more than doubled to 11.3 billion yuan in the second quarter, with overseas businesses accounting for about a third. But even as it boosted spending, revenue from live streaming shrank 14%, a steeper decline than in the previous three months. While acquiring overseas users looks cheaper versus at home in China, we ultimately question the profit potential of Kuaishous overseas adventures, especially in the context of Tiktoks much greater scale - yet significant enduring losses, said Bernstein analysts led by Robin Zhu. Read more: Kuaishou Faces Risk of Margin Erosion, Regulation: Street Wrap Away from the business, Kuaishou has shed roughly $180 billion in valuation since notching a record shortly after its February debut. Beijings campaign to rein in big tech has ignited a trillion-dollar selloff in Chinese equities and up-ended industries from education and e-commerce to ride-sharing. Kuaishou is now trading below its listing price, after state media urged tighter regulation of internet video content and share lockups expired for some investors. Story continues Read more: Kuaishou Loss Deepens After Media Call for a Video Clampdown The company has recently turned abroad and toward advertising in its search for new revenue. Online ads have surpassed virtual gifts to become Kuaishous biggest cash cow, with founder Su Hua projecting a 60% revenue contribution by the year-end. But Chinas for-profit tutoring ban and a resurgence of Covid-19 cases globally will likely deal a blow to advertising revenue from the edtech and travel sectors. What Bloomberg Intelligence Says: Kuaishous continued rapid growth of online advertising revenue may fuel sales growth above consensus for the remainder of 2021 after 2Q revenue topped estimates. Kuaishou is diversifying its revenue streams away from traditional live-streaming with a big push into e-commerce marketing. Though heavy investment to grow the new marketing business is driving losses in the near-term, Kuaishous adjusted Ebitda loss narrowed 21% sequentially, suggesting a path to profitability in 2022. -- Matthew Kanterman and Tiffany Tam, analysts Click here for the research While Kuaishous overseas revenue is still negligible compared to ByteDances TikTok, Sus company intends to close the user gap with its bigger foe in countries like Brazil and Indonesia. Thats despite it shutting down the Zynn video app this month, ending a year-long attempt to challenge TikTok in the U.S. In June, the company chalked up 180 million monthly users in overseas markets, up from 150 million in April. Read more: Billionaire Who Missed Out on TikTok Is Trying to Beat It (Updates with share performance, analyst comment) More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2021 Bloomberg L.P. NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Dr. Carmen Renee' Green , M.D., a fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine, is the new dean of the CUNY School of Medicine (CSOM) at The City College of New York. She is the second dean of the Harlem-based medical school established in 2015 in partnership with Bronx-based St. Barnabas Hospital (a part of the SBH Health System). Dr. Carmen R. Green is the new Dean of the CUNY School of Medicine at CCNY. The CUNY School of Medicine is an expansion of City College's Sophie Davis School of Biomedical Education, which was founded in 1973. The medical school houses a novel 7-year BS/MD program and one of the oldest physician assistant programs in the US. It is the only school in the US that has eliminated the MCAT as a barrier to access to medical careers and integrates medical education within the undergraduate curriculum. It is the only public medical school in Manhattan and is known for producing excellent and diverse health professionals who are leaders in providing primary care and serving in health professional shortage areas. "The CUNY School of Medicine at City College is one of our great contributions to New York society and I am thrilled that it is poised to benefit from the visionary leadership of Carmen Green," said Dr. Vincent Boudreau , president of The City College. "Dr. Green comes at a pivotal time in our national deliberations about public health and the need to serve the whole people. Her background positions the School of Medicine to be a critical voice in that conversation." Green joins CSOM from Michigan Medicine, the academic medical center of the University of Michigan, one of the world's premier research universities with 19 schools and colleges nationally ranked for excellence in education, research, and clinical care. Green, tenured at U-Michigan, is a pain medicine physician and anesthesiologist. While at U-Michigan she held several senior faculty positions including: Professor, Anesthesiology (Medical School); Professor, Obstetrics and Gynecology (Medical School); Professor, Health Management and Policy (School of Public Health); Faculty Associate, Program for Research on Black Americans at the Research Center for Group Dynamics (Institute for Social Research); Faculty Associate, Institute for Health Policy and Innovation; and The inaugural Associate Vice President and Associate Dean for Health Equity and Inclusion. At U-Michigan, Green completed an anesthesiology residency and pain medicine fellowship. She is considered one of the top pain doctors in the country by US News and World Reports and a top doctor and anesthesiologist. She provided care for patients at Michigan Medicine's Back and Pain Center. Story continues Green's health policy and research interests focus on pain, disparities, and the social determinants of health. She is also an expert in minority and women's health, aging, and diversity in academic medicine. Dr. Green was also the Director of the Healthier Black Elders Center at the NIH-funded Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research. Her published articles focused on the "unequal burden of pain" shouldered by minorities and race-based disparities in hospital security calls, and are considered foundational. A graduate of U-M Flint (BS) and Michigan State University College of Human Medicine (MD), Green is a member of Alpha Omega Alpha National Medical Honor Society. As a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy fellow at the National Academies, she worked in the US Senate on the Health Education Labor & Pensions Committee and the Children & Families Subcommittee where she was instrumental in developing the National Pain Care Policy Act, included in the Affordable Care Act and passed by the US Congress (2010). Among Green's numerous honors for community and scientific service are the John Liebeskind Pain Management Research Award and the Elizabeth Narcessian Award for Outstanding Educational Achievements. She was the inaugural Mayday Pain and Society fellow, a Hedwig van Ameringen Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine fellow, and a fellow of the Gerontological Society of America. She serves on advisory boards for the NIH, US Secretary for Health and Human Service, and American Cancer Society and is frequently invited to speak to national and international audiences including at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Conference Center in Italy. Green will also be the Anna and Irving Brodsky Medical Professor and Professor in CCNY's Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership . She takes up her appointment as CSOM Dean in Oct. 2021. Contact: Jay Mwamba, 212.650.7580, jmwamba@ccny.cuny.edu Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ccny-appoints-carmen-renee-green-md-and-health-policy-expert-new-dean-of-cuny-school-of-medicine-301363888.html SOURCE City College of New York, Office of Institutional Advancement and Communications AACHEN, Germany, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ -- Next.e.GO Mobile SE, the German Electric Vehicle manufacturer company producing affordable, purpose-built and sustainable urban electric vehicles based on its disruptive technologies and unique microfactory, announced today that its majority shareholder, nd Industrial Investments B.V., part of international private equity company nd Group B.V. has successfully closed a series C equity funding round of $ 57M for the company. The funding round, participated by existing investors as well as new ones, enables e.GO to accelerate its effort in transforming the urban electromobility, by enhancing the production of its e.GO Life platform, driving the development of additional models and offering unique value adding features to the customers including the battery swap. The funding round also highlights the investors' confidence in e.GO's successful trajectory and the progress it has made in becoming one of the only western independent Battery Electric Vehicle companies that are actually in production and delivering cars to customers. "We are very pleased with the success of the Series C funding but, above that, with the vote of confidence from our investors. The team at e.GO is determined, more than ever, to drive the much-needed transformation to carbon-free urban mobility by offering an electric vehicle like no other." says Ali Vezvaei, Chairman of the Board at Next.e.GO Mobile SE. Next.e.GO Mobile SE Next.e.GO Mobile SE, headquartered in Aachen, is a manufacturer of electric vehicles and sustainable mobility systems. Around 400 employees of Next.e.GO Mobile SE are working in agile teams on various cost-effective, particularly durable and sustainable electric vehicles for short-distance traffic. ND Group B.V. nd Group B.V. is a Private Equity and Holding company, headquartered in the Netherlands. Founded in 2008, the firm is primarily focused on EV, Alternative Energy, Fintech, HealthTech, Industrial assets and real estate. Story continues Contact: Next.e.GO Mobile SE Public Relations Lilienthalstrae 1 52074 Aachen T +49 241 47574-227 presse@e-go-mobile.com ND Group B.V. Public Relations Flight Forum 880 5657 DV Eindhoven, The Netherlands Phone: +31 40 30 40 50 1 press@nd.net Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/german-electric-vehicle-manufacturer-nextego-successfully-closes--57-m-series-c-funding-round-301362839.html SOURCE Next.e.GO Mobile SE Cision View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/August2021/26/c6049.html Patient Needs and Insights Drive New Era of Global Kidney Research, Discovery, and Personalized Treatments WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The American Association of Kidney Patients (AAKP), the largest independent kidney patient organization in the USA, and its strategic partners at the George Washington University (GW) School of Medicine and Health Sciences (SMHS) continue to make a unique impact in the international battle against kidney diseases. Their 2021 annual Global Summit on Kidney Disease Innovations focused on expanding patient consumer choices and improved health outcomes, engaged a combined audience of over 20,000 viewers across 80 countries, exceeded their 2020 virtual attendance record established at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, and continues to draw viewers worldwide to their online content. The Global Summit is a key component of AAKP's The Decade of the Kidney , an AAKP global initiative ( read article ) launched in 2019 for the 2020-2030 decade to help U.S. and international policymakers better address the devastating human and societal costs of kidney diseases based on patient-defined priorities. (PRNewsfoto/American Association of Kidney) The Global Summit has accelerated engagement in an expanding international consortium of influencers, led by patient consumers and advocates, committed to a new era in kidney medicine marked by more inclusive clinical trials, greater use of patient insight data, personalized medicine, and disruptive technologies including artificial implantable and wearable kidneys. The patient-led consortium includes academic and medical researchers, clinical trial designers, innovators, capital market investors, companies, non-governmental and faith-based organizations, as well as elected and appointed government leaders across the globe. Kidney patients worldwide are demanding an end to outdated dialysis care, characterized by staggeringly high mortality rates, and greater access to new products and solutions aimed at detecting, preventing, and treating kidney diseases earlier and in ways that improve quality of life and decrease dependency and disease-related unemployment. They are also organizing and coordinating their policy and grassroots efforts in a sophisticated effort to advance more common sense regulatory and payment reforms that prioritize patient needs and fully support the timely entry of new, safe products into global consumer markets. Based on the ongoing success and rapidly expanding interest in The Global Summit, AAKP and GWU have already opened pre-registration for the May 2022 Global Summit on Kidney Disease Innovations . All 2021 Global Summit virtual presentations are available OnDemand through the AAKP website and AAKP YouTube channel . Story continues Dr. Dominic Raj, Co-Chair of The Global Summit, a Professor of Medicine, Biochemistry and Genetics and Biostatistics and Epidemiology, and Director of the Division of Kidney Diseases and Hypertension at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, stated, "As a researcher in molecular biology and genetics, I seek to personalize medicine by genes and molecular pathways, but I think it is more important to personalize by patient needs. This, I believe, is the key take home message from The Global Summit and I am very proud of my colleagues across the globe who are actively incorporating the unique insights of kidney patients in their research and discovery of new therapies to prevent and treat the growing spread of kidney diseases." Hilde Vautmans, Member of the European Parliament (MEP), Chair of MEP Kidney Health, and Deputy Coordinator for the Committee on Foreign Affairs for a Renew Europe (EU) provided a virtual presentation in which she praised kidney patients worldwide for their efforts to work alongside government leaders in the fight against kidney diseases. Further, Vautmans invited greater cooperation among elected leaders in the European Parliament and the U.S. Congress, especially among like-minded members of the U.S. Congressional Kidney Caucus, stating, "This battle is difficult. And I can speak from experience here, but [] change is possible [] but we can and have to act more. In Europe but also in the United States. I always say we need more awareness, more funding and more innovation. Today I want to add a fourth element and that is collaboration, because as we all are aware and all are witnessing, diseases know no borders. So, let's work together []We share a common goal, on both sides of the Atlantic: We must further improve the lives of people with Kidney Disease!" The 2021 Global Summit included over 15 panels featuring over 40 patient and medical experts along with a menu 29 expert videos covering COVID-19 kidney-related issues, diversity in clinical trials, APOL-1 genetic research, diabetic kidney disease (DKD), nutrition, and telemedicine. Executives from top companies in the kidney space underscored the importance and value of patient insights in science, discovery, and the development of new drugs, devices, and diagnostics. Emphasizing the key role patients play in the new era of kidney medicine were leaders from Bayer Pharmaceuticals, Baxter International Inc., bioMerieux, CareDx, Inc., CSL Behringer, Novartis, and Sangamo Therapeutics, Inc. They were joined by key policy and innovation leaders including Barbara L. Bass, MD, Vice President for Health Affairs, Dean of the GW School of Medicine and Health Sciences, and CEO of the GW Medical Faculty Associates (USA); Vivekanand Jha, MBBS, MD, DM, PHD, FRCP, FAMS; Executive Director, The George Institute for Global Health (AU) and President, International Society of Nephrology (IND); Fokko Wieringa, PhD, Principal Scientist, IMEC of The Netherlands and the Dutch Kidney Foundation (EU) and a member of The Kidney Health Initiative (USA); Murray Sheldon, MD, Associate Director for Technology and Innovations, Center for Devices and Radiological Health, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (USA); Jack Kalavritinos, Founder and Principal, JK Consulting and member of the APCO Worldwide International Advisory Council and Health Advisory Board (USA). Richard Knight, President of the American Association of Kidney Patients, a former hemodialysis patient and 14-year kidney transplant recipient, stated, "Kidney disease is a devastating disease that is rapidly expanding and negatively impacting patients, families, and economies throughout the world. Future innovations in kidney medicine depend upon greater patient engagement through fully inclusive clinical trials and research, and the GW School of Medicine and Health Sciences is an established global leader in this field. I thank Dean Dr. Barbara Bass, Dr. Dominic Raj, and our new European Union ally Hilde Vautmans for their deep respect for patients and their concerted efforts to unite patients, clinicians, and policy-makers in the fight against all kidney diseases." Knight (read CJASN article) is a former U.S. Congressional staff member and business consultant who serves on the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) Advisory Council, and as the Co-Chair of the Community Engagement Committee for the Kidney Precision Medicine Project (KPMP). Paul T. Conway, Co-Chair of The Global Summit and AAKP Chair of Policy and Global Affairs, a former peritoneal dialysis patient and 24-year kidney transplant recipient, stated, "AAKP and our friend and ally Dr. Dominic Raj envisioned The Global Summit on Kidney Innovations as a unique international event aimed at accelerating cooperation among patients, researchers, clinicians, and policy professionals. Kidney patient consumers worldwide demand and deserve far greater care choice and are well aware of the value they bring as partners to pioneers developing the next generation of diagnostics, devices, and biologics. AAKP has expanded our collaborations with patient groups worldwide to advance innovation and to support all who share our sense of urgency and intent to transcend legislative, regulatory, and payment barriers that limit care choice and delay entry of new, safe treatments into the global consumer markets." Conway (read CJASN article) is a former Chief of Staff of the U.S. Department of Labor and serves on the External Expert Panel of National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), Kidney Precision Medicine Project (KPMP), the American Board of Internal Medicine's Nephrology Specialty Board, and is a Patient Voice Editor for The Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. AAKP has formal partnerships with the multiple international kidney patient organizations including in support of The Global Summit, The Decade of the Kidney, and the growing international kidney innovation consortium, including: Argentina-based Asociacion Solidaria de Insuficientes Renales (ASIR) ; European Kidney Patients' Federation (EKPF) and the European Kidney Health Alliance (EKHA) ; and United Kingdom-based Renal Patient Support Group . AAKP will be announcing multiple additional global partnerships throughout the remainder of 2021 and 2022. AAKP leaders and their global allies have carried the key messages of The Global Summit into other global forums, including the University of Washington's Center for Dialysis Innovation's recent IDEAS Summit, where Dr. Murray Sheldon of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration conducted a presentation on the expanding international kidney innovation consortium . Future presentations on the key learnings and messages of The Global Summit and the international kidney innovation consortium will be conducted at the AAKP Annual National Patient Meeting September 24-25, 2021, and at the American Society of Nephrology's, 2021 Kidney Week , November 4-7, the largest kidney professional conference in the world. Voices in support of AAKP's expanding global partnerships and international collaborations include: Mr. Colm Clifford, kidney patient and AAKP Global Ambassador in the Republic of Ireland: "Change happens when a collective voice sends a strong message that change is required. This begins from the grassroots. While it may eventually be signed off with the stroke of a pen, it's the strong collective voice that can't be ignored that drives that to happen. In kidney disease, after The Global Summit, I'm confident we really are moving forward and it's an exciting time to be involved." Daniel Gallego, President of the European Kidney Patients' Federation (EKPF): "We are more than happy that the AAKP reached out to us to enforce the collaboration of kidney patients worldwide to really give a push for innovation and new therapies that will enhance quality of life of kidney patients, contributing to expand our daily life activities. EKPF strongly believes that in creating these therapies, patients should be included and in the driver's seat to reach next level therapies. Together we can create and extend a platform that is responsible for the long-overdue innovation that kidney patients are waiting for." Raymond Vanholder, President of the European Kidney Health Alliance (EKHA): "Collaboration for improvement of kidney therapies can really benefit by moving boundaries. We are delighted with the expansion of our international collaboration by teaming up with AAKP. At EKHA we strongly believe in the empowerment of patients to enhance quality of life where possible. We therefore adopted their 'Decade of the Kidney' program to create awareness for the unmet needs of kidney patients. An important part of this collaboration will exist in setting the political agenda at the level of the EU and USA to push for real innovative therapies and corresponding funding to realize them." Dr. Maria Eugenia Vivado Duran, President of the Argentina-based Asociacion Solidaria de Insuficientes Renales of Buenos Aires; AAKP Global Ambassador: "ASIR joins together with AAKP in support of the rights of the kidney patients and to share in efforts to further medical innovations that will better prevent and treat kidney diseases and improve the quality of life for kidney patients." Dr. Vivado Duran, a pediatrician and AAKP Global Ambassador, was diagnosed with kidney disease in 1979 during her second pregnancy. She was on hemodialysis for many years and in 2001, received a kidney transplant from a deceased donor, allowing her to continue working for patients, educating the community, and enjoying her family. She has been president of ASIR for four consecutive terms and does everything in gratitude to her anonymous kidney donor. Dr. Shahid Nazir Muhammad, Specialist Biomedical Scientist, The University of the West of England (UWE) and Academic Lead, on behalf of The Renal Patient Support Group (RPSG), United Kingdom: "Future research integrating perceptions to acknowledge CKD as a condition with diverse morbidities and investigations to explore educational needs is mission critical. The Renal Patient Support Group (RPSG) is a place where awareness and research meet and encourages healthcare service and support in comprehensible proportions. Innovation is good to an extent. However, timely and targeted education relating CKD and recommendations with a solid focus is where best practice between pediatric and adult nephrology, tackling health inequalities is pinnacle to ensure that CKD patients are not forgotten and become unpeople (disenfranchised), and there is kidney disease awareness on an international level." Ms. Vasundhara Raghavan, caregiver to a son with kidney disease and the AAKP Global Ambassador in the United Arab Emirates: "An international consortium of kidney patient organizations will be a catalyst to drive many innovations and bring in much-needed changes in the kidney patient ecosystem. The consortium can help execute cross border treatments for paired kidney transplants possible through an international donor bank. Sharing of best practices, knowledge, and resources will aid the kidney patient community immensely. A collaborative platform such as this will help us gather momentum in kidney research, patient advocacy, and provide financial aid to needy patients. The needs of kidney patients are best expressed by them. They are going through the arduous journey and having firsthand knowledge of what works best for them. Patients driving these discussions will help bring conclusive decisions on policy matters directly impacting them. Through this platform they will have a channel to voice their opinions and get to share their experiences to a wider community. Getting patients involved early on in these discussions is extremely critical and the value addition that they will provide to the conversation will be vastly practical." AAKP and GW SMHS thank their 2021 Global Summit sponsors. Gold Level: Horizon Therapeutics and Travere Therapeutics; Silver Level: CareDx, Inc.; Patron Level: Hansa Biopharma and Sanofi Genzyme; and Supporting Level: AstraZeneca and Eurofins Transplant Genomics. Information on the 2022 Global Summit is available at https://aakp.org/programs-and-events/global-summit/ . About the American Association of Kidney Patients (AAKP): Since 1969, AAKP has been a patient-led organization driving policy discussions on kidney patient consumer care choice and treatment innovation. By 1973, AAKP patients had collaborated with the U.S. Congress and White House to establish dialysis coverage for any person suffering kidney failure, a U.S. taxpayer supported effort that has saved over one million lives. In 2018, AAKP established the largest U.S. kidney voter registration program, KidneyVoters. Over the past decade, AAKP patients have helped gain lifetime transplant drug coverage for kidney transplant recipients (2020); new patient-centered policies via the White House Executive Order on Advancing American Kidney Health (2019); new job protections for living organ donors from the U.S. Department of Labor (2018); and Congressional legislation allowing HIV positive organ transplants for HIV positive patients (2013). Follow AAKP on social media at @kidneypatient on Facebook, @kidneypatients on Twitter, and @kidneypatients on Instagram, and visit www.aakp.org. The Global Summit on Kidney Disease Innovations is produced by AAKP's national strategic media partner, Briar Patch Media, which provides creative consulting and full-service media video production and post-production for corporations, non-profit organizations, individuals throughout the U.S., and several international locations. About the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences: Founded in 1824, the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences (SMHS) was the first medical school in the nation's capital and is the 11th oldest in the country. Working together in our nation's capital, with integrity and resolve, the GW SMHS is committed to improving the health and well-being of our local, national, and global communities. Visit their website at smhs.gwu.edu . MEDIA CONTACT: Jennifer Rate Marketing & Communications Manager jrate@aakp.org (813) 400-2394 Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/global-kidney-innovation-summit-accelerates-international-consortium-301364025.html SOURCE American Association of Kidney Patients TOKYO, Aug 25 (Reuters) - Japan's Nikkei stock average erased early gains to end lower on Wednesday, as investors turned cautious ahead of U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's remarks later this week, offsetting a rebound in Toyota Motor and other related stocks. The Nikkei share average edged down 0.03% to close at 27,724.80, while the broader Topix inched up 0.08% to 1,935.66. The Nikkei rose as much as 0.6% earlier in the session, following an overnight solid finish of all three major U.S. stock indexes, with the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq closing at all-time highs. "There were no particular reasons to boost stocks today except gains on Wall Street, and investors have become cautious about rallies in the U.S. markets," said Hideyuki Suzuki, general manager at investment research for SBI Securities. "Toward the end of the week, investors will remain cautious as they await comments at the Jackson Hole meeting." On Friday, the Federal Reserve will have its annual economic symposium, traditionally held at Jackson Hole, though this year it will take place virtually due to the pandemic. The focus remains squarely on Powell's remarks for any clues regarding the timeline for Fed's tapering of asset purchases. Technology shares dragged the Nikkei, with medical services platform M3 losing 1.43%, while chip-related stocks Tokyo Electron and Advantest falling 0.49% and 0.77%, respectively. Sentiment was also weighed down by concerns about the worsening wave of new COVID-19 infections. Japan is set to expand a state of emergency to eight more prefectures, taking the total to 21, as a surge in cases overwhelms its hospitals. Toyota Motor, which has shed 3.27% this month, rose 2.29%. Its shares fell recently after it announced a global production cut. Nissan Motor rose 1.52%, while Toyota's autoparts maker Denso advanced 2.25%. Steel makers also climbed, with JFE Holdings jumping 5.07% and Nippon Steel rising 2.79%. (Reporting by Junko Fujita; editing by Uttaresh.V and Rashmi Aich) Middlefield Canadian Income PCC Net Asset Value Middlefield Canadian Income PCC Middlefield Canadian Income - GBP PC (a protected cell company incorporated in Jersey with registration number 93546) Legal Entity Identifier: 2138007ENW3JEJXC8658 Net Asset Value As at the close of business on 25 August 2021 the estimated unaudited Net Asset Value per share was 128.83 pence (including accrued income). Investments in the Companys portfolio have been valued on a closing price basis. Enquiries: JTC Fund Solutions (Jersey) Limited 01534 700 000 LAS VEGAS, NV / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / MJ Harvest, Inc. ("MJHI") (OTCQB:MJHI) announced today that MJHI and its portfolio company PPK Investment Group, Inc. ("PPK") completed the acquisition of certain assets of Oklahoma-based AOK Ventures, Inc. ("AOK"). AOK manufactures and sells the Sublime brand of cannabis products in Oklahoma. In exchange for funding a portion of the acquisition price, MJ Harvest acquired 15% of PPK, increasing MJHI's ownership stake in PPK to 25%. The assets acquired through the acquisition of AOK will be held by PPK. The acquisition price was $2,500,000 for the equipment, trademark license agreement and cannabis licenses, subject to adjustment based on a final inventory of the equipment on hand at the closing date. The acquisition price was funded with shares of MJHI common stock plus a note payable, subject to adjustment after completion of the physical audit of all assets. The shares were priced at $0.36 per share representing the 20-day volume weighted average price prior to closing. AOK may also receive additional shares of MJHI stock if revenues from the business exceed projections for the 12 months immediately following the close of the acquisition. The earnout consideration will be calculated at 15% of the revenue amount over projections with the additional shares valued at the 20-day volume weighted average price at the calculation date. As part of the acquisition, AOK has agreed to transfer to PPK, subject to regulatory approval, the license granted by the Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority to produce, manufacture and sell marijuana products in the state of Oklahoma. The assets comprise an industrial kitchen and leased facility in Tulsa, Oklahoma, a lease on a processing, storage and distribution facility in Oklahoma City, and equipment necessary to operate the kitchen and vans for delivery. The Tulsa kitchen produces over 90 different cannabis products. The kitchen assets include approximately 50 pieces of commercial food quality manufacturing equipment. The kitchen is completely equipped and will allow PPK to immediately begin manufacturing the Sublime products plus additional products marketed under the Country Cannabis and Chronic brands in Oklahoma, with plans for immediate expansion to add other cannabis products. Story continues Central to the acquisition of AOK was the trademarks for the Sublime brand established by Consensus, IP LLC, an affiliated company of AOK. Prior to the acquisition, AOK manufactured, marketed and sold the Sublime brand of cannabis products through a licensing agreement with Consensus. With the completion of the acquisition, PPK is now the sole and exclusive licensee of the Sublime brand in Oklahoma. Pursuant to the license agreement, PPK will pay Consensus a royalty on all gross sales of all Sublime products sold by PPK in Oklahoma. MJHI now owns 25% of PPK with options to acquire up to 100% of PPK at any time prior to March 31, 2023, provided any increase can then be accomplished in accordance with Oklahoma law. Patrick Bilton, Chief Executive Officer of MJ Harvest, Inc., commented: "We are pleased to deliver to our shareholders this great news. Sublime is a recognized and respected cannabis brand that has nationwide appeal. By acquiring rights to manufacture and distribute the Sublime brand through PPK's existing distribution channels, we add another recognized product line for dispensaries to carry and we expand the reach of the Sublime brand to PPK's 1000+ customers in Oklahoma. Our goal is to make all the brands we associate with some of the most widely recognized cannabis brands in Oklahoma and then to expand to other states." PPK is currently operating in Oklahoma, is in the process of expanding into Arizona and South Dakota and is exploring several other expansion opportunities in various other markets, including California. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements and information. Although the forward-looking statements in this release reflect the good faith judgment of management, forward-looking statements are inherently subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to be materially different from those discussed in these forward-looking statements. Readers are urged not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this release. No assurances are, or can be given, that the results of operations of the AOK brands acquired by PPK will be profitable or generate historic revenue levels. The Company assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statement to reflect any event or circumstance that may arise after the date of this release. CONTACT: MJ Harvest, Inc. 9205 West Russell Rd., Ste. 240 Las Vegas, NV 89148 Telephone: 954.519.3115 Tcktsllc@earthlink.net @HARVESTMJ SOURCE: MJ Harvest, Inc. View source version on accesswire.com: https://www.accesswire.com/661451/MJ-Harvest-Inc-and-PPK-Investment-Group-Inc-Complete-Acquisition-of-Oklahoma-Based-Cannabis-Related-Assets-of-AOK-Ventures-Inc The Biome Summit 2021 will help fuel debate, drive innovation and advance action on cardiovascular disease as a critical public health issue MONTREAL, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ - Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc., in partnership with C2 International is hosting the first ever Biome Summit in Canada. A unique, collaborative multi-stakeholder platform, the Summit this year aims to address the pressing issue of cardiovascular disease across the country. Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Logo (CNW Group/Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc.) As the second leading cause of preventable death in Canada1, heart disease will claim a life every five minutes2. A problem of this scale cannot be solved alone. By joining forces with companies with a commitment in cardiovascular health, patient organizations, opinion leaders in the healthcare industry, tech startups and academic institutions, Novartis' goal is to collaborate, innovate and tackle this critical issue in new ways. By leveraging the power of partnerships to raise awareness for cardiovascular disease, the Biome Summit will ultimately create a blueprint for long-term cardiovascular healthcare transformation. "The toll heart disease takes on the health and wellness of Canadians is heavy and is often lasting. We see this every day in our hospitals and in our communities. At the CCS, the development of evidence-based programs and initiatives that contribute to the advancement of cardiovascular health is a priority, as a way to support strong heart teams in a heart healthy Canada," says Dr. Marc Ruel, President of the Canadian Cardiovascular Society (CCS). The Biome Summit builds on the intent and purpose of the company's Biome Innovation Hub, which Novartis launched in Canada last fall. The Biome Innovation Hub aims to bring together key players in the healthcare and technology space to collaborate on the future of care systems, using data and innovative digital technologies to create better solutions to improve the patient experience. "Our aim as a company is to reimagine healthcare through innovation, and to do so effectively we believe partnership and collaboration is critical. We are powering the Biome Summit to bring cardiovascular disease mortality to the forefront of public discourse, to provide a catalyst for impactful partnerships, meaningful conversations, and actionable innovation with the aim of accelerating progress on this major Canadian health challenge," said Andrea Marazzi, Country Pharma Organization Head, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc. "I want to thank the partners who have committed to joining us on this journey and welcome others with an interest in collaborating or learning more." Story continues The Biome Summit 2021 will broadcast live from studios in Edmonton and Toronto, and will include a hybrid event from Montreal, which will allow participants to connect from all over Canada, engage on burning questions in cardiovascular care and create a dialogue intended to map out clear actions to help solve the challenges around cardiovascular disease and care. An innovation challenge for university students and startups is also part of the program and will engage tomorrow's thinkers in developing solutions for the future. The Summit will debut on September 13 and run through October 2021. Novartis is partnering with C2 International, convener of communities both online and in-person, to produce the Biome Summit series. The Montreal-based creative shop brings over a decade of experience to the table and has previously created eco-systems for Fortune 500 companies. "We are thrilled that C2 International can bring its particular convening expertise to this issue," says President Jacques-Andre Dupont. "We believe in the fundamental power of human connections and are pleased to contribute to building a blueprint for change for cardiovascular care." UNITING A DIVERSE ECOSYSTEM The Biome Summit will bring together healthcare professionals, patient organizations, government, and private organizations to discuss, debate and drive real solutions. This year's roster of key players includes Shoppers Drug Mart, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Heart&Stroke, Diabetes Canada, the University Hospital Foundation, and the Canadian Heart Patient Alliance (CHPA): Shoppers Drug Mart "Canadians look to us to deliver world class support and innovative health solutions to help manage chronic conditions such as heart disease," said Jeff Leger, President, Shoppers Drug Mart Inc. "We believe this year's Biome Summit is an opportunity to collaborate with other key players in the healthcare space, and a chance to bring about meaningful change and improvements to cardiovascular care in Canada." Amazon Web Services (AWS) To deliver patient-centered care, healthcare organizations need to increase the pace of innovation and unlock the potential of data, all while keeping health information secure and private. AWS empowers companies of all sizes to accelerate digital transformation and improve patient engagement and outcomes leveraging purpose-built services and solutions. "This initiative builds on our strategic collaboration with Novartis, and we are excited to work with a cross-functional group of experts to deliver patient-centered, equitable care. Leveraging AWS can accelerate the digitalization of healthcare and life sciences data to drive improved outcomes at a lower cost," said Dan Sheeran, Director, Healthcare and Life Sciences at AWS. Diabetes Canada "At Diabetes Canada, we believe the road to sustainable solutions will be made not through solitary discovery, but through collaboration, innovation and sharing of strengths and best practices. Annually, people living with diabetes account for 30 per cent of strokes and 40 per cent of heart attacks, and it's coming together, in events such as this, we can rethink and reshape the way we handle chronic disease in Canada," said Laura Syron, President and CEO of Diabetes Canada. University Hospital Foundation As an agent of hope, the University Hospital Foundation's purpose is to continuously seek, inspire and lead bold solutions to seemingly insurmountable challenges and ignite new discoveries in health. The Biome Summit is an excellent opportunity for the University Hospital Foundation to help transform the health system and improve health outcomes for Canadians. "We recognize that a unified, integrated approach is required to continue to improve patient care and health outcomes for patients with cardiovascular disease," said Dr. Jodi L. Abbott, President & CEO of University Hospital Foundation. "By using innovative approaches to philanthropy, including new partnerships such as the Biome Summit with Novartis, and bold ideas to bring the right people, resources and solutions together, we are dedicated to improving health and reducing the devastating impact of disease in our community." Canadian Heart Patient Alliance All of us have persons we love who have suffered the devastating effects of heart disease, including stroke, heart attack, or heart failure. What is even more devastating is the knowledge that many of these outcomes are preventable or significantly lessened. The Canadian Heart Patient Alliance (CHPA), a national network of patients and families affected by cardiovascular conditions, is pleased to have the opportunity to work in partnership with other stakeholders in the healthcare ecosystem and to take part in the inaugural Biome Summit. "Awareness, education, and engagement of patients and the public are critical to the success of this initiative for change," said Durhane Wong-Rieger, Chair of CHPA. VOICES TO DRIVE CHANGE Among the driving voices who will be present during the Biome Summit series are: The Honourable Tyler Shandro, Minister of Health, Government of Alberta Dr. Jodi Abbott, President & CEO, University Hospital Foundation Ann Aerts, President of the Novartis Foundation Haseeb Ahmad, Global Head, Value Access & Commercial Development at Novartis Tim Brown, Chairman, IDEO and kyu Dr. Denise Campbell-Scherer, Professor, Department of Family Medicine and Associate Dean of the Office of Lifelong Learning and Physician Learning Program, Department of Family Medicine Ashesh Desai, Executive Vice President, Pharmacy and Healthcare at Shoppers Drug Mart Kirstin Hammerberg, Executive Director, Strategy, Sid Lee Tim Murphy, Vice President, Health, Alberta Innovates Daniel Slater, Worldwide Head, Culture of Innovation at Amazon Web Services (AWS) Durhane Wong-Rieger, Chair, Canadian Heart Patient Alliance & President & CEO, Canadian Organization for Rare Disorders Dr. Shelley Zieroth, Cardiologist, Director SBH Heart Failure and Transplant Clinics, Head Medical Heart Failure Program, WRHA Cardiac Sciences Program, President Canadian Heart Failure Society See detailed program Join to commit For accreditation, media are invited to follow this link. About Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc., a leader in the healthcare field, is committed to the discovery, development and marketing of innovative products to improve the well-being of all Canadians. In 2020, the company invested $45 million in research and development in Canada. Located in Dorval, Quebec, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc. employs approximately 1,000 people in Canada and is an affiliate of Novartis AG, which provides innovative healthcare solutions that address the evolving needs of patients and societies. The company prides itself on its commitment to diversity and to nurturing an inclusive and inspiring environment. Novartis is recognized as a Great Place to Work, ranked among the Top 50 Best Workplaces in the country and is proudly named on the 2021 Best Workplaces for Women in Canada and Best Workplace for Mental Wellness lists. For further information, please consult www.novartis.ca. About C2 International C2 International is a year-round convener of communities. Through rich experiences and compelling content in person and online, C2 International unlocks business ecosystems' value by helping clients mobilize, engage, expand and monetize their communities. C2 has created a range of programs encompassing online and live events, content creation and community management. C2 International has delivered award-winning events, strategies and programs in 36 cities worldwide in North America, Europe, United Arab Emirates, Asia and Africa. The flagship proprietary event, C2 Montreal, has been voted the #1 Business Conference for the last four years in a row. C2 International is a member of kyu, a renowned international collective of leading companies such as IDEO, Sid Lee, Kepler and SY Partners comprised of more than 3,000 creative and strategy professionals. See c2.biz for more information. SOURCE Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc. Cision View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/August2021/26/c2696.html (Bloomberg) -- Oil declined, capping a three-day rally, as investors await a Federal Reserve address that may provide clues about its approach to paring stimulus. Futures in New York slid 1.4% on Thursday after gaining nearly 10% over the previous three sessions. The Federal Reserves Jackson Hole symposium will offer insights on how the central bank will ease stimulus, a move thats viewed as negative for commodities including oil. That concern is shifting investments toward the U.S. dollar. Most of the gains this week came from funds exiting short positions to net out their activity before the meeting, according to traders. The aggregate trading volume for West Texas Intermediate futures was at the lowest level for the year on Thursday. Since the Federal Reserve has indicated its considering reducing asset purchases, the market is back to worrying about that, said Bob Yawger, director of the futures division at Mizuho Securities. The rally we saw this week was basically on thin liquidity, and therefore, wouldnt have lasted anyway. Oil has been volatile this month, clawing back some losses this week after the worst streak of declines since October 2019. The European Union will discuss on Thursday whether to reimpose curbs on U.S. visitors as virus cases spike, while the oil market will be looking for any changes to production policy from the OPEC+ alliance when the group gathers on Sept. 1. Most Federal Reserve officials agreed last month they could start slowing the pace of bond purchases later this year, judging that enough progress had been made toward their inflation goal, while gains had been made toward their employment objective, according to the minutes of the FOMCs July 27-28 meeting. Meanwhile, shrinking U.S. stockpiles, a rebound in Indian demand and Chinas containment of its latest outbreak are providing some positive signs for the market, but virus-related restrictions on mobility still remain in place in many regions. Story continues More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2021 Bloomberg L.P. By Ivana Sekularac and Aleksandar Vasovic KORENITA, Serbia, Aug 26 (Reuters) - Four years from now, fields in the Jadar river valley in western Serbia where Djorjde Kapetanovic grows corn and soy to feed his cattle will be turned into a waste dump for Europe's biggest lithium mine. Rio Tinto in July committed $2.4 billion to its Jadar project as global miners push into metals needed for the green energy transition, including lithium, which is used to make electric vehicle batteries. The Jadar project, once completed, would help make Rio a top 10 lithium producer, just as demand for EVs booms. Opposition to the project is growing, however, because of concerns about possible environmental damage and protest rallies have become more frequent. In April, thousands gathered in Belgrade to protest against widespread pollution in the Balkan country and against the lithium mine near Loznica, 142 km (88 miles) southwest of the capital. Once it reaches full capacity, the mine is expected to produce 58,000 tonnes of refined battery-grade lithium carbonate per year. That would make it Europe's biggest lithium mine in terms of production, Rio said. In the village of Korenita, dairy farmer Kapetanovic said the mine, if opened, could leave him without income. Part of his land where he grows crop to feed his animals will be turned into a dump for mining waste, known as tailings, with compensation from the company. Other areas of his land, his house and a cattle shed will be outside the mine, leaving Kapetanovic worried about exposure to possible pollution. "Who would want to buy products made on the outskirts of the mine?" said Kapetanovic, who produces 10 tonnes (22,000 lb) of meat and 90,000 litres (23,775 gallons) of milk per year, making him one of the bigger producers in the Loznica area. Rio Tinto Serbia CEO Vesna Prodanovic said the Anglo-Australian miner would meet all European Union and Serbian environmental regulations, including on the treatment of wastewater. Story continues "There's simply no way for the construction to start without securing licences (and) if all those (EU standards) are not adhered to," she said in an interview. "We take into account precipitation levels, prescribed dust levels. We take into consideration everything there is in the field. We are making all studies and tests to get clear data about what is the current situation in the area." One study, commissioned by Rio on the mines environmental impact, concluded the mine should not be built as it will cause "irredeemable damage to the biosphere", an abstract obtained by Reuters found. "The implementation of the planned activities, especially the disposal of industrial waste, will significantly impair biodiversity in the entire area of the planned works," the study by Belgrade Universitys Faculty of Biology said. "In ... primary zones of (the mine's) influence, there will be complete and direct destruction of habitats with the disappearance of all organisms that inhabit them." Rio said the biodiversity study was part of a wider feasibility study and it would conduct further research to "support the most advanced and most expensive solutions in nature protection, which would minimise the impact". ECONOMIC BOOST Lithium is central to the European Union's plans to secure an entire supply chain of battery minerals and materials as the use of electric vehicles increases. Serbia, which sits on the world's 11th largest lithium reserves, is working its way through the accession process to join the EU. For its own economy, the Jadar project is one of Serbias biggest foreign investments to date and could help to tackle rising unemployment in the Balkan country. Rio said the project would create about 2,100 construction jobs and inject approximately 200 million euros ($235.32 million) per year into the domestic supply chain. Energy minister Zorana Mihajlovic told Reuters that Serbia aimed, like the EU, to secure the entire production chain, including a potential battery plant and an electric vehicle plant. Rio's Serbia CEO said the company's studies estimated the project would add 1 percentage point to Serbia's $51.4 billion annual GDP. It would also boost Loznicas municipal budget by 60-70% annually, she said. In June, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, who is under fire for supporting the project, said a referendum would be held to allow people to decide whether it should go ahead. The absence of further details on the referendum has worried opponents. In July, Loznica municipal assembly, which is dominated by Vucic's Serbian Progressive Party and its allies, formally gave a green light for mine construction by approving a new municipal plan for land allocation. Contacted by Reuters, the president's office had no immediate comment. Rio has bought nearly half of the land required for the mine, which will be spread over roughly 387 hectares. Some $100 million of Rio's investment has been earmarked for environmental protection, but activists say that is insufficient to compensate for potential damage. One major concern for environmentalists is Rio's plan to put waste dumps in the Korenita and Jadar rivers valley, an area prone to flash flooding. In 2014, Korenita river flooding caused a closed mine's tailings dam to overflow, spilling toxic waste onto agricultural land. Rio Tinto said it planned to convert the liquid waste into "dry cakes" to make it easier and safer to store and is planning for once-in-a-millennium floods in its construction. ($1 = 0.8499 euros) (Editing by Amran Abocar and Barbara Lewis) (Repeats with no changes to text) * PM Ardern to announce reopening strategy on Thursday * Labour shortages hurting businesses, spurring inflation * Nurses, midwives calling for better wages and conditions By Praveen Menon WELLINGTON, Aug 9 (Reuters) - Under pressure from businesses and public sectors facing a worker shortage that policymakers fear will fuel inflation, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is due to unveil plans this week to reopen the country's borders. Ardern garnered global praise for containing local transmission of COVID-19 via an elimination strategy, imposing tough lockdowns and slamming New Zealand's international border shut in March 2020. However, that tactic is now straining an economy heavily reliant on an immigrant workforce, leading to higher costs and lower output. The dairy, horticulture, housing, services, health and broader public sector have all reported acute staff shortages, and called on the government to raise border blocks. The pressures were visible on Monday when around 1,500 hospital midwives walked off the job, citing overwork due to "critical shortages". More than 30,000 nurses are due to strike later this month for the second time since June, seeking better pay and working conditions https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/thousands-nurses-go-strike-new-zealand-2021-06-09 amid the staff shortages. "We rely on internationally qualified nurses to meet our staffing needs but with the borders closed we are not getting any," said New Zealand Nurses Organisation industrial services manager Glenda Alexander. "Kiwis are not coming into nursing as they are put off by the workload and the low pay," she added. "Nurses are burning out, they are getting sick themselves and are constantly worried that they will make mistakes that could affect their patients." The hospitality sector has been similarly stretched. About 2,000 eateries stopped service and turned off lights https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/new-zealand-industry-ire-grows-closed-borders-worsen-labour-shortages-2021-07-07 last month as part of a two-month campaign to draw the government's attention to the severe shortages chefs and other skilled labour. Story continues Ardern has indicated she will remain cautious when she on Thursday outlines her government's six-month plan for public health and border control. "Any changes to border settings will be carefully considered in phases, based on risks," she said on Monday. "We have come too far and gained too many freedoms to rush at this next step and go backwards." Ardern last week opened one-way quarantine-free travel for seasonal workers from Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu, all countries with no active COVID cases, to address labour shortages in the horticulture industry. New Zealand has recorded about 2,500 COVID-19 cases, including 26 deaths, among the lowest in the world and a track record that helped Ardern retain power in a blowout relection https://news.trust.org/item/20201017103350-zahf7 last October. The last reported case of local transmission was in February. The roadmap will be based on the findings of a report by experts including epidemiologists titled "Reconnecting New Zealanders to the World." Still, businesses are pressing for the plan to include the resumption of labour imports, sooner rather than later. The country's unemployment rate is at pre-COVID levels, with more jobs than skilled workers. The underutilization rate, a measure of how many people are working less than they would like, is at a record low. The labour shortages are pushing up costs as employers pay more to keep staff. Annual inflation reached a record 3.3% in the second quarter, much higher than central bank predictions. CHANGING TRACK Economists think the pressures will force the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) to tighten monetary policy next week to avoid overheating of the economy. "Monetary and fiscal policy quite possibly overachieved in creating demand," said ANZ Chief Economist Sharon Zollner. The government pumped stimulus through wage subsidies while the RBNZ dished out a NZ$100 billion quantitative easing programme in pandemic-induced polices that has caused rising inequality https://www.reuters.com/world/the-great-reboot/how-new-zealands-much-admired-covid-19-response-helped-fuel-housing-crisis-2021-04-16 and worsened a housing crisis. A major concern for Ardern and policymakers is the Delta coronavirus variant, which is raging in neighbouring Australia and the world. Delta-fuelled outbreaks across Australia led Ardern to last month suspend the so-called "travel bubble" that allowed quarantine-free travel between the two countries. Experts have warned that the arrival of Delta into New Zealand would result longer lockdowns, particularly given only 21% of the country has been fully vaccinated. "It (Delta) is much more dangerous than other strains of COVID," Ardern said. "It changes our risk calculation in the same way that it's changed everyone's risk calculation." (Reporting by Praveen Menon; editing by Jane Wardell) By Dhirendra Tripathi Investing.com Taiwan Semiconductor stock (NYSE:TSM) rose 0.8% higher in Thursdays premarket trading after a report in The Wall Street Journal that said the company plans to hike prices of its chips by 10% to 20%. According to the report, prices of most advanced chips could rise by around 10% while less advanced chips could get pricier by as much as 20%. Shares of Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), one of TSMC's biggest customers, traded a tad lower premarket. TSMC accounts for more than half of the global semiconductor foundry market by revenue, according to Taiwanese research firm TrendForce. The companys decision to raise prices comes in the backdrop of an unprecedented shortage of chips, triggered by work-from-home demand for mobiles, laptops and other digital devices as well as automobiles as more technology gets embedded in them. Related Articles Taiwan Semi Gains on Report It Is Raising Chip Prices 10%-20% S&P 500 opens slightly lower, taper talks in focus Wall Street Opens Mixed After GDP, George Comments; Dow up 50 Pts Company provides eco-friendly carsharing services to Posterity Scholar House in Fort Wayne PLANO, Texas, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- In keeping with their dedication to promote mobility and support communities, Toyota Motor North America (TMNA) and Toyota Financial Services (TFS) have partnered with Indianapolis-based real-estate development firm Black and White Investments (BWI) to provide fully integrated, eco-friendly personal carsharing services to the residents of the newly opened Posterity Scholar House (PSH) in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Residents can reserve Toyota plug-in hybrid electric vehicles online via Toyota's personal carshare mobile app, SI Share, offering access to transportation without the costs of owning and maintaining a personal vehicle. Additionally, Toyota is working with project partners to explore electrification concepts to further benefit the property's residents and neighboring community. Toyota to provide eco-friendly carsharing services to Posterity Scholar House in Fort Wayne First of its kind in the state of Indiana, PSH is a sustainable urban revitalization initiative and net-zero energy housing solution. The 44-unit apartment community provides affordable housing that increases quality of life while decreasing the total cost of living for low- to middle-income individuals (specifically, single parents enrolled in school) and families by focusing on utility, transportation and rental costs. The energy-efficient property features state-of-the-art technology, as well as an ecological and comprehensive education center of community-based programs and services, including the Toyota carshare program. The carshare pool currently consists of four Prius Prime plug-in hybrid electric vehicles and is managed by Toyota's Strategic Innovation Lab, which also handles vehicle insurance and maintenance. Toyota is working with PSH developer and property manager, BWI, and project collaborator Energy Systems Network (ESN) to install electric charging stations for those vehicles (each powered by the property's 287KW solar array). The company will continue to assess the priorities of the PSH project, as well as the needs of its residents, as it considers the addition of other vehicle types in the future. Story continues "Toyota's carsharing program is ideally suited for a community like this, where some residents may not have their own cars," said Stacey Miller, national manager, TFS Strategic Innovation. "We are pleased to not only help provide access to transportation, but to contribute in an eco-friendly way. These plug-in hybrid vehicles will enable Posterity Scholar House residents to easily travel anywhere within the Fort Wayne city limits and return home with plenty of charge remaining." To make the vehicle charging experience as easy and streamlined as possible, Toyota is simplifying the process for carshare users renting a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle for a short period of time and is hoping to soon provide open access to all public charging networks through an "electric charging pass" that consolidates public charging costs into a single bill. Toyota is also contributing to PSH's energy efficiency by managing the charging times of each plug-in hybrid vehicle individually, in order to minimize the electricity demand at PSH while ensuring each vehicle is fully charged when needed to fulfill the transportation needs of the residents. "The Posterity Scholar House is improving the quality of life for so many residents through a commitment to providing affordable and sustainable housing and transportation options," said Paul Mitchell, president and CEO of Energy Systems Network. "The technology innovations are serving as a model for future developments throughout Indiana that will positively impact many more lives." For more information, please visit www.strategicinnovationshare.com/scholarhouse. About Toyota Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for more than 60 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands plus our 1,800 dealerships. Toyota has created a tremendous value chain and directly employs more than 47,000 in North America. The company has contributed world-class design, engineering, and assembly of more than 40 million cars and trucks at our 14 manufacturing plants, 15 including our joint venture in Alabama that begins production in 2021. Through its Start Your Impossible campaign, Toyota highlights the way it partners with community, civic, academic and governmental organizations to address our society's most pressing mobility challenges. We believe that when people are free to move, anything is possible. For more information about Toyota, visit www.toyotanewsroom.com. About Toyota Financial Services Toyota Financial Services (TFS) is the finance and insurance brand for Toyota in the United States, offering retail auto financing and leasing through Toyota Motor Credit Corporation (TMCC) and Toyota Lease Trust. TFS also offers vehicle and payment protection products through Toyota Motor Insurance Services (TMIS). The company services Lexus dealers and customers using the Lexus Financial Services brand. As of March 31, 2021, TFS employed approximately 3,600 team members nationwide, and had assets totaling over $133 billion. It is part of a worldwide network of comprehensive financial services offered by Toyota Financial Services Corporation, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Toyota Motor Corporation. We announce material financial information using the investor relations section of our website (www.toyotafinancial.com) and SEC filings. We use these channels, press releases, and social media to communicate about our company, our services and other issues. While not all information we post on social media is of a material nature, some information could be material. Therefore, we encourage those interested in our company to review our posts on Twitter at www.twitter.com/toyotafinancial. Media Contact: Derrick Brown 469-486-9065 (PRNewsfoto/Toyota Motor North America) Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/toyota-drives-mobility-sustainability-for-indiana-affordable-housing-community-301363424.html SOURCE Toyota Motor North America UR solidifies its position as the FIREHAWK helicopter completions center in support of growing demand in the US and internationally An S-70 FIREHAWK helicopter operated by CAL FIRE can transport firefighters, drop water on wildfires from its 1,000-gallon (3,785 liter) belly tank, and perform hoist rescues. An S-70 FIREHAWK helicopter operated by CAL FIRE can transport firefighters, drop water on wildfires from its 1,000-gallon (3,785 liter) belly tank, and perform hoist rescues. ENGLEWOOD, Colorado, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- United Rotorcraft, a division of Air Methods Corporation, has awarded Sikorsky, a Lockheed Martin company, a contract for five S-70 Black Hawk helicopters. The bulk order will enable United Rotorcraft, as the only company authorized by Sikorsky to modify Black Hawk aircraft to the FIREHAWK configuration, to quickly deliver these new production aircraft for aerial firefighting in support of public agencies battling increasingly destructive wildland fires. The FIREHAWK helicopter is fast becoming one of the most powerful and effective aerial firefighting assets in California, attacking and extinguishing wildfires before they spread out of control, said Larry Alexandre, United Rotorcraft president. Acquiring five S-70 Black Hawk aircraft from Sikorsky with deliveries over the next 7 to 18 months confirms United Rotorcrafts commitment to the FIREHAWK helicopter and its mission, and ensures their availability to support future demand from U.S. Western States or firefighting agencies around the world. Sikorsky will produce the five S-70 Black Hawk aircraft at Lockheed Martins PZL Mielec manufacturing line in Poland. Deliveries to United Rotorcrafts 55,000+ square foot completions facility in Colorado are expected between early 2022 and mid-2023. The first aircraft received will be configured as a FIREHAWK helicopter for the State of Colorado, which announced its contract with United Rotorcraft on Aug. 16. Sikorsky and United Rotorcraft have worked closely for 25 years to develop, test and upgrade two S-70 variants of the FIREHAWK helicopter for the Los Angeles County Fire Department, CAL FIRE and the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department, said Jason Lambert, vice president of Sikorsky Global Commercial and Military Systems. We applaud United Rotorcrafts bold leadership to bring the toughest, safest, most reliable fire suppression and rescue helicopter in existence today into the hands of first responders sooner than ever. Story continues To modify a Black Hawk helicopter to the Firehawk configuration, United Rotorcraft installs and integrates a 1,000-gallon (3,785-liter) external water tank system to the aircrafts belly. Fingertip controls allow pilots to drop the precise amount of water with high accuracy and refill the tank via a retractable snorkel in 60 seconds or less while hovering 10 feet over a water source. United Rotorcraft works hand in hand with public agencies to further customize the aircraft, as needed, from communications and navigation systems, to cabin interiors, transforming the FIREHAWK into a true multi-mission aircraft, with the ability to transport up to 12 firefighters, provide medical care on board, or perform search and rescue operations. Thirteen S-70 FIREHAWK helicopters currently fighting fires across California are operated by CALFIRE, Los Angeles County Fire Department, and San Diego Fire Rescue Department. Five more contracted aircraft are on the way. About United Rotorcraft United Rotorcraft, a division of Air Methods Corporation, (www.unitedrotorcraft.com) specializes in the design, manufacture and installation of ground and aerial mission critical equipment for front line workers, from firefighting and law enforcement, to HEMS and Medevac. About Lockheed Martin Headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, Lockheed Martin Corporation is a global security and aerospace company that employs approximately 114,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services. Media Contacts Ramy Nasralla, 346-786-1487, Ramy.Nasralla@airmethods.com, www.unitedrotorcraft.com Frans Jurgens, 203-615-8293, frans.m.jurgens@lmco.com, www.lockheedmartin.com/firehawk Black Hawk and FIREHAWK are registered trademarks of Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation. S-70TM is a trademark of Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation. Attachment Revenue growth driven by organic growth from the expansion of Wishpond's sales team and inorganic growth from the Invigo and PersistIQ acquisitions. VANCOUVER, BC, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ - Wishpond Technologies Ltd. (TSXV: WISH) (OTCQX: WPNDF) (the "Company" or "Wishpond"), a provider of marketing-focused online business solutions, announces it has filed its interim consolidated financial statements and management's discussion and analysis ("MD&A") for Q2-2021, representing the three and six months ended June 30, 2021. Copies of the Interim Financial Statements and MD&A are available on the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Wishpond (TSXV: WISH, OTCQX: WPNDF) (CNW Group/Wishpond Technologies Ltd.) Ali Tajskandar, Wishpond's Chairman and CEO commented: "Second quarter 2021 was another tremendous quarter for Wishpond as we once again achieved record quarterly revenue with 73% year-over-year growth. In fact, our US revenue grew by over 100% despite the negative currency headwinds in the quarter. We are very pleased with the progress we have made with our first two acquisitions, Invigo and PersistIQ, which continue to perform well. During the second quarter we launched our Appointments product, which came from the Invigo acquisition, and the Outbound Sales Solution, which came from the PersistIQ acquisition. We are beginning to witness the synergistic benefits of our acquisitions through cross selling the Company's products and services across the different parts of the growing organization. Our positive Q2 results and momentum position us for strong year-over-year growth in the back half of 2021." Second Quarter 2021 Financial Highlights: Wishpond achieved record quarterly revenue of $3,226,877 during Q2-2021, an increase of 73% compared to revenue of $1,868,341 generated in Q2-2020. The increase in revenue was primarily driven by higher organic growth from the Company's incremental investment in its sales team and inorganic growth from the positive contribution of its Invigo and PersistIQ acquisitions. Wishpond's revenue was negatively impacted in the second quarter by the weakening of the US dollar. Had this decrease in exchange rate not occurred, the Company estimates consolidated revenues would have been higher by approximately $272,709 as compared to the exchange rate in Q2-2020. Revenues were also negatively impacted by an initial acquisition accounting adjustment related to PersistIQ's deferred revenue balance resulting in a negative impact of approximately $133,389 in the second quarter. Wishpond achieved Gross profit (1) of $2,238,143, representing an 86% increase from Q2-2020, driven by an increase in overall revenue. Wishpond achieved a Gross margin (1) percentage of 69% during Q2-2021, compared to Q2-2020 at 64%. During Q2-2021, Wishpond had negative Adjusted EBITDA (1) of $320,027 compared to positive Adjusted EBITDA (1) of $201,708 in Q2-2020. The decline in Adjusted EBITDA is attributable to a higher level of operating spend primarily as a result of increased headcount in the Company's sales and product development teams in preparation for future growth. As at June 30, 2021, Wishpond had $10,065,393 in cash and no long-term debt.. Second Quarter 2021 Business Highlights: Story continues On April 14, 2021, Wishpond launched its Marketing Funnels product, a new feature that allows for progressive lead profiling and upselling opportunities. Such features represent a powerful addition to the landing page editor, increasing its effectiveness at profiling and converting new leads. On April 22, 2021, Wishpond launched its new fully managed Outbound Sales Solution by its subsidiary, PersistIQ. This new solution features an enhanced sales automation platform and a service package that gives B2B small business owners access to PersistIQ's award-winning technology, outbound sales strategies and a team of experts to help accelerate growth. On May 12, 2021, the Company's common shares began trading under on the OTCQB Venture Market (" OTCQB ") under the ticker " WPNDF ". On June 24, 2021, Company's listing on the OTCQB was upgraded to the OTCQX Best Market (" OTCQX "), and its common shares began trading on the OTCQX as of June 24, 2021. On June 16, 2021, Wishpond launched its new Appointments product, a new feature that enables businesses to offer automated scheduling to their clients. The new product represents the first feature integration of EverGenius software into Wishpond's platform which comes from the Company's acquisition of Invigo Media. On June 30, 2021, the Company announced a partnership with Stukent, Inc. ("Stukent"), a digital courseware provider, to introduce new real-world digital marketing and social media assignments with Wishpond's technology on Stukent's platform. Events Subsequent to June 30, 2021: On July 14, 2021, the Company announced that the Depository Trust Company ("DTC") has made Wishpond common shares eligible for electronic deposit at DTC. The Company believes that the opportunity to clear and settle trades in its common shares on the OTCQX should provide a more seamless experience for its U.S. shareholders. Normal Course Issuer Bid: On June 7, 2021, the Company announced that the Notice of an Intention it filed to make a Normal Course Issuer Bid (" NCIB ") was approved by the Exchange. Under the NCIB, the Company may acquire up to an aggregate of 2,590,389 common shares, representing 5% of the issued and outstanding shares of the Company as at June 3, 2021, for a one-year period from June 11, 2021 to June 10, 2022 or earlier should the Company complete its repurchases prior to such date. The board of directors of the Company (the "Board") believes that the recent market prices of the Company's common shares (the "Shares") do not properly reflect the underlying value of such Shares. As a result, depending upon future price movements and other factors, the Board believes that the purchase of the Shares would be a desirable use of corporate funds in the best interests of the Company and its shareholders. No shares were purchased in conjunction with the NCIB during the six months ended June 30, 2021. After June 30, 2021, the Company has purchased 15,500 common shares at an average trade price of $1.327 per share in conjunction with the NCIB approved by the Exchange on June 7, 2021. The 15,500 common shares purchased under the NCIB have been subsequently cancelled. Outlook: Wishpond is on track to achieve strong revenue growth in Q3-2021 driven by increased capacity in the Company's sales team, positive contribution from its acquisitions and new product related revenues. The investments made in the first half of the year in expanding Wishpond's sales and product development teams are already beginning to have a beneficial effect on the Company's financial performance. As such the Company expects to return to positive EBITDA in the second half of the year. In addition, Wishpond has developed a robust pipeline of potential acquisition opportunities that could add revenue and EBITDA growth as well as expand the Company's product and market capabilities. "We have a strong balance sheet to execute on the desirable acquisition opportunities in front of us," said Juan Leal, Wishpond's Chief Financial Officer. "The Invigo and PersistIQ acquisitions have proven to be accretive to Wishpond's financial profile and we are committed to following a similar disciplined acquisition and capital allocation plan to maximize shareholder value when making new acquisitions." Selected Financial Highlights: The tables below set out selected financial information relating to Wishpond and should be read in conjunction with Wishpond's annual consolidated financial statements, including the notes thereto, and MD&A for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021 and June 30, 2020, copies of which can be found under Wishpond's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Three- months ended June 30, 2021 $ Three- months ended Mar 31, 2021 $ Three- months ended June 30, 2020 $ Six- months ended June 30, 2021 $ Six- months ended June 30, 2020 $ Revenue 3,226,877 2,890,580 1,868,341 6,117,457 3,531,314 Gross profit 2,238,143 1,796,936 1,204,631 4,035,079 2,254,577 Gross margin 69% 62% 64% 66% 64% Adjusted EBITDA(1) (320,027) (318,779) 201,708 (638,806) 198,098 Net increase (decrease) in cash during the period (1,142,712) 3,902,559 504,649 2,759,847 578,608 Cash - end of the period 10,065,393 11,208,105 848,144 10,065,393 848,144 Reconciliation to Adjusted EBITDA Three- months ended June 30, 2021 $ Three- months ended Mar 31, 2021 $ Three- months ended June 30, 2020 $ Six- months ended June 30, 2021 $ Six- months ended June 30, 2020 $ Income (Loss) before income taxes (1,517,758) (1,194,769) 30,479 (2,712,527) (143,379) Depreciation and amortization 199,919 159,101 95,899 359,020 191,023 Interest expense 2,520 3,584 6,795 6,104 14,655 EBITDA (1,315,319) (1,032,084) 133,173 (2,347,403) 62,299 Stock based compensation expense 573,610 561,943 33,509 1,135,553 59,483 Loss on remeasurement of contingent consideration liability 234,933 - - 234,933 - Other expenditures 71,524 45,176 10,208 116,700 53,929 Acquisition related expenses 53,953 106,250 - 160,203 - Earn-out remuneration 52,266 - - 52,266 - Foreign currency losses (gains) 9,006 (64) 24,818 8,942 22,387 Adjusted EBITDA (320,027) (318,779) 201,708 (638,806) 198,098 Footnotes: 1 EBITDA, EBITDA margin, adjusted EBITDA, monthly recurring revenue, annualized run rate, gross profit and gross margin are not financial measures recognized by generally accepted accounting principles ("GAAP"), do not have any standardized meaning prescribed by GAAP and therefore may not be comparable to similar measures presented by other entities. See "Cautionary Statements - Non-GAAP Financial Measures". On Behalf of the Board of Wishpond "Ali Tajskandar" Chairman and Chief Executive Officer About Wishpond Technologies Ltd. Based out of Vancouver, British Columbia, Wishpond is a provider of marketing-focused online business solutions. Wishpond's vision is to become the leading provider of digital marketing solutions that empower entrepreneurs to achieve success online. The Company offers an "all-in-one" marketing suite that provides companies with marketing, promotion, lead generation, and sales conversion capabilities from one integrated platform. Wishpond replaces entire marketing functions in an easy-to-use product, for a fraction of the cost. Wishpond serves over 3,000 customers who are primarily small-to-medium size businesses (SMBs) in a wide variety of industries. The Company has developed cutting-edge marketing technology solutions and continues to add new features and applications with great velocity. The Company employs a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) business model where substantially all the Company's revenue is subscription-based recurring revenue which provides excellent revenue predictability and cash flow visibility. Wishpond is listed on the TSX Venture Exchange under the ticker "WISH". For further information, visit: www.wishpond.com. Cautionary Statements - Non-GAAP Financial Measures In this press release, Wishpond has used the following terms ("Non-GAAP Financial Measures") that are not defined by International Financial Reporting Standards ("IFRS"), but are used by management to evaluate the performance of Wishpond and its business: earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization ("EBITDA"), adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization ("Adjusted EBITDA"), gross profit and gross margin. These measures may also be used by investors, financial institutions and credit rating agencies to assess Wishpond's performance and ability to service debt. Non-GAAP Financial Measures do not have standardized meanings prescribed by GAAP and are therefore unlikely to be comparable to similar measures presented by other companies. Securities regulations require that Non-GAAP Financial Measures are clearly defined, qualified and reconciled to their most comparable GAAP financial measures. Except as otherwise indicated, these Non-GAAP Financial Measures are calculated and disclosed on a consistent basis from period to period. Specific items may only be relevant in certain periods. [See the disclosure under the heading "Non-GAAP Financial Measures" in Wishpond's most recent Management's Discussion and Analysis ("MD&A") for a discussion of Non-GAAP Financial Measures and certain reconciliations to GAAP financial measures.] The intent of Non-GAAP Financial Measures is to provide additional useful information to investors and analysts, and the measures do not have any standardized meaning under IFRS. The measures should not, therefore, be considered in isolation or used in substitute for measures of performance prepared in accordance with IFRS. Other issuers may calculate Non-GAAP Financial Measures differently. Non-GAAP Financial Measures are identified and defined as follows: Gross profit and Gross margin: The Company defines " gross profit " as revenue less cost of sales and " gross margin " as gross profit as a percentage of revenue. Gross profit and gross margin should not be construed as an alternative for revenue or net loss determined in accordance with IFRS. The Company believes that gross profit and gross margin are meaningful metrics in assessing the Company's financial performance and operational efficiency. EBITDA and Adjusted EBITDA: EBITDA and Adjusted EBITDA should not be construed as alternatives to net earnings, cash flow from operating activities or other measures of financial results determined in accordance with GAAP as an indicator of Wishpond's performance. The Company defines " Adjusted EBITDA" as EBITDA less foreign currency losses (gains), net other expenditures (income), and stock-based compensation. The Company believes that Adjusted EBITDA is a meaningful financial metric as it measures cash generated from operations which the Company can use to fund working capital requirements, service future interest and principal debt repayments and fund future growth initiatives. EBITDA margins : EBITDA margin is a profitability ratio that measures earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, as a percentage of total revenue. Monthly recurring revenue: Normalized measure of predictable monthly revenue. Forward-Looking Statements Statements that are not reported financial results or other historical information are forward-looking statements or forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws (collectively, "forward-looking statements"). This press release includes forward-looking statements regarding the Company, its subsidiaries and the industries in which they operate, including statements about, among other things, expectations, beliefs, plans, future operations, origination of additional targets in which the Company may hold an interest and acquisition opportunities for the Company, business and acquisition strategies, opportunities, objectives, prospects, assumptions, including those related to trends and prospects, and future events and performance. Sentences and phrases containing or modified by words such as "anticipate", "plan", "continue", "estimate", "intend", "expect", "may", "will", "project", "predict", "potential", "targets", "projects", "is designed to", "strategy", "should", "believe", "contemplate" and similar expressions, and the negative of such expressions, are not historical facts and are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Readers are cautioned to not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Actual results and developments may differ materially from those contemplated by forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in forward-looking statements in this press release are reasonable, such forward-looking statements have been based on expectations, factors and assumptions concerning future events which may prove to be inaccurate and are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, certain of which are beyond the Company's control, including, but not limited to, the risk factors discussed in the continuous disclosure materials of the Company which are available under the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement and are made as of the date hereof. The Company disclaims any intention and has no obligation or responsibility, except as required by law, to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/wishpond-achieves-73-revenue-growth-and-record-revenue-in-second-quarter-2021-301363326.html SOURCE Wishpond Technologies Ltd. Cision View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/August2021/26/c8375.html ALEX TREBEK has to be turning over in his grave. The powers that be created a monumental mess trying to come up with a replacement for the man who turned Jeopardy! into the most successful TV game show of all time. Last week, Mike Richards, who is the producer of Jeopardy!, was hired as Trebeks permanent replacement, but five days later he stepped down because of offensive comments he once made. The show, whose fall season begins in early September, is back to square one. Now Jeopardy! is steeped in controversy and mired in political correctness. What a mess! It really didnt have to be. All the producers had to do was to select a replacement back in December and keep on chugging. But no! The front office had to drag the replacement quest out for eight months with guest host after guest host. This was all supposed to be a tribute to Trebek, but what it has turned into is a fiasco. Trebek had incurable cancer and the shows producers knew he would not last long. Why didnt they have his replacement lined up? I dont think that would have hurt Trebeks feelings, because he loved Jeopardy! and wanted it to continue after he was gone. For that to happen, some other host would have to take over. We want to make sure that all our [ancestors] lived and died for is not lost, said the Rev. Charles Wormley of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Spotsylvania. We want to make sure our voting rights are not taken away from us in any manner, shape or form. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Gary Holland, a Stafford resident and assistant pastor at Word of Faith Christian Fellowship Church in Dumfries, noted that Gov. Ralph Northam signed a bill in March that authorized jurisdictions to allow early voting on Sundays and allocated funds for it. Electoral boards in Fredericksburg and Caroline County have decided not to conduct Sunday voting and King George County is not going to consider it. Stafford Countys Electoral Board is scheduled to make a decision Friday and Spotsylvania is still weighing the possibility. Early voting in Virginia begins Sept. 17 for the Nov. 2 election. The most important thing that we can do collectively as a people is to ensure our votes are protected, said the Rev. Moe Petway, president of the Spotsylvania County branch of the NAACP. Too many lives have been lost too many things have happened in the pastbeatings, lynchings, house burningsfor us to sit back and allow anyone to deter us from voting. We must protect that at all costs. WAVERLY, Tenn. (AP) Matthew Rigney and Danielle Hall were sleeping with their four children in the Tennessee apartment they had just moved into two weeks earlier when the flash flooding struck. "We woke up and water was filling our apartment," Rigney told WTVF-TV. The normally shallow and sedate Trace Creek just 20 feet (6 meters) away had overflowed, turned by record-breaking rainfall into a raging torrent. "We heard a loud boom and it was the door busting in," Rigney said. The couple grabbed the children and ran into a back bedroom, but the water kept rising. Hall climbed out a window to go for help, while Rigney clung to the kids: 7-month-old twins Ryan and Rileighana in his arms, 19-month-old Brayla on his hip and 5-year-old Maleah wrapped around his neck. Once outside, Hall was immediately knocked off her feet by the rushing floodwaters but was able to grab hold of a tree. It was from there that she watched her husband and oldest two kids clamber up onto the roof. To her horror, she did not see the twins. The Republican Party of Virginia on Thursday asked a court to remove Democrat Terry McAuliffe from the November ballot, arguing that his elections paperwork did not meet the state's guidelines because it was a missing a signature. The lawsuit, filed in Richmond Circuit Court, argues that McAuliffe never signed his declaration of candidacy form, a step in the process to qualify for the primary and general election ballot. It also claims that two McAuliffe staffers who signed on as having witnessed McAuliffe signing the document did so falsely. McAuliffe's campaign derided the lawsuit as a "desperate" attempt to clear the path for his Republican opponent. McAuliffe, governor from 2014 to 2018, is running for another term as the state's top official against Republican Glenn Youngkin, a former private equity executive vying to become the first Republican elected statewide in 12 years. "McAuliffes declaration, lacking his signature and falsely signed by two purported witnesses, is plainly in violation of Virginia law and should have been rejected by the [board of elections] and the Department of Elections. It was not," reads the lawsuit. A FEW WEEKS ago, an ice cream company declared war on Israel. Shortly afterward, there were multiple articles explaining why this was necessary. But the many arguments and accusations became disorganized and contradictory. In order to prevent further confusion in the anti-Israel community, I am presenting a basic guide to the Unending Sins of Israel as an aid to the modern anti-Semitic propagandist: 1) Frame the struggle to destroy Israel as a fight for human rights. Correlate it with the civil rights movement, and downplay those inconsequential differences between non-violent protest and the glorification of terrorism. 2) Emphasize that the Israelis are not permitting refugees to return to their homes. Do not mention these refugees would be from the 1948 war and their descendants, and that their goal is to destroy the country. 3) Charge Israel with apartheid. This word demands moral indignation as well as the head of the perpetrator. Virtually everyone on the planet knows someone who has been to Israel and can verify its not true. This does not matter. People who need to hate look for reasons to hate. Give them one. IT SHOULD come as no surprise that Christianity remains the largest faith tradition in every state in the United States, including Virginia. What is surprising is that Islam is now the second largest religious group in the commonwealth, narrowly edging out Judaism, according to a new report by the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia. According to the Pew Research Center, 73 percent of Virginia residents self-identify as Christian, with 20 percent self-identifying as religiously unaffiliated or Nones. Evangelical Christians make up the largest segment of Christians (19 percent), followed by mainline Protestants (11 percent), and Catholics (8 percent). Just 6 percent of Virginians say they belong to a non-Christian faith. That Other category includes Islam (1 percent), Judaism (1 percent), and Buddhism (1 percent). Adherents of other world faiths such as Hinduism make up less than 1 percent of the population. A Pew Research survey in 2020 found that three in 10 Americans (28 percent) and 49 percent of white Evangelical Protestants said the COVID-19 pandemic has actually strengthened their faith, more than in any other economically developed countries. Only 4 percent of Americans said the pandemic has weakened their faith. The Blair Public Library and Technology Center will be hosting a traveling exhibit, Thinking Money for Kids, thanks to a national grant. The exhibit will open with a kick-off event at 10 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 28, at 2233 Civic Drive in Blair. The 1,000 square foot exhibit will be on display through Saturday, Sept. 18. This is a multimedia, interactive exhibit using games and activities with a fun storyline to help children understand what money is, its function in society, money choices, and money values such as fairness, responsibility and charitableness. The grant is sponsored by the ALA (American Library Association) and FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority). This museum-quality exhibit is traveling the country to only 50 libraries in the nation chosen to host the exhibit. Host libraries were selected by a peer-reviewed, competitive application process. The Blair library is the only library chosen in all of Nebraska and western and central Iowa. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} CROWN POINT A Lake Station man with a previous sex abuse conviction was wanted Tuesday on charges alleging he repeatedly raped a teenage girl after persuading the girl's relative to allow her to babysit his children. Bradley W. Franchville, 28, is accused of repeatedly sexually assaulting the girl between May and October 2019 in a Merrillville motel room. The girl was between the ages of 14 and 15, according to Lake Criminal Court records. He's charged with one count of rape and two counts of sexual misconduct with a minor. The girl told investigators Franchville claimed he would be working while she watched his children, but he never worked, court documents state. The girl alleged Franchville picked her up from school on one occasion and took her back to the motel room. After his wife left for work, he placed his three kids in a bathtub and left them alone while he raped the girl on a bed, court records state. The girl told police she began screaming and Franchville said, "If you love me, then you will let me finish." Franchville was accused of making a similar statement when he sexually assaulted a 14-year-old girl in May 2013 in Porter County, The Times previously reported. When those in the crowd of more than 1,000 students indicated that there were Fiji members in attendance, none stepped forward to speak, prompting the crowed to again chant "shut it down." A march headlined Wednesday's demonstration, as those in the large crowd mobilized in a line that stretched longer than 200 yards. Protesters first headed east on R Street from the fraternity house, turned north onto 16th Street, then down Vine Street to 19th. Participants stopped briefly near the Beadle Business Center and University Health Center, where organizers spoke into a bullhorn. "No more rapists in our faces," the crowd chanted. University police officers in cruisers accompanied the crowd, flashing lights to ensure traffic didn't approach the demonstrators. From the Beadle Center, the march continued south down 19th Street and back down R Street, where the crowd gathered again in front of the Fiji house. Lincoln Fire and Rescue crews treated and transported two demonstrators to local hospitals, both of whom suffered from ailments brought on by heat, organizers said. The temperature at the Lincoln Airport at midnight was a muggy 80 degrees. An attack outside Kabul airport claimed by Islamic State (IS) extremist group has killed at least 72 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, bringing more chaos to the scene ahead of an August 31 deadline for the completion of the withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan. Two suicide bombers struck near the Abbey Gate at the Kabul airport, where a huge number of Afghans had amassed in the hopes of getting on a flight out of the war-torn country, despite several security warnings. Gunmen also opened fire on civilians and military forces, the Pentagon said. The Islamic State-Khorasan (ISIS-K) extremist group claimed responsibility for the attack, saying in a statement that one of its suicide bombers had targeted "translators and collaborators with the American army." The United States and its allies had been urging civilians to stay away from the airport because of a threat of a suicide attack by Islamic State's Afghanistan-Pakistan chapter, which has been responsible for some of the deadliest attacks in those countries in recent years. Emergency, an Italian nongovernmental organization that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients were wounded in the attack, in addition to six who were dead when they arrived. Influx of patients is continuous. It hasnt stopped so far. We received men, women and children. They are all Afghan civilians," the charity tweeted. Afghanistans TOLOnews agency posted to Twitter images said to be from the aftermath of the attack appearing to show wounded people with bloodied clothes being moved in wheelbarrows. The Taliban said that it "strongly condemns the bombing targeting civilians at Kabul airport." U.S. President Joe Biden addressed the nation after the attack, vowing to retaliate against ISIS-K. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said in televised comments from the White House on August 26. But the terrorist attacks will not deter the United States from its mission to evacuate thousands of American citizens, allies, and at-risk Afghans from Afghanistan, Biden said. "We will not let them stop our mission. We will continue the evacuation," Biden said, adding that more than 100,000 people had been taken out of the country in the past 12 days. Asked how the bombers were able to approach U.S. forces, General Kenneth McKenzie, the head of U.S. Central Command, said there had "clearly been a failure" from the Taliban forces checking people outside the airport. He said the United States would "try to make all our practices better as we go forward." British Prime Minister Boris Johnson also vowed to continue the evacuation effort following what he called the "barbaric" terrorist attack. "We are going to keep going up until the last moment" as the August 31 deadline rapidly approaches, he said. French President Emmanuel Macron said France will seek to protect and evacuate French nationals, people from allied countries, and Afghans as long as the conditions will be met at the airport. A massive airlift of foreign nationals and their families as well as some Afghans has been under way since the day before Taliban forces captured Kabul on August 15, capping a swift advance across the country as U.S. and allied troops withdrew. The United States has been racing to carry out the airlift before its military is set to fully withdraw from the country on August 31. It was unclear how many Westerners who wanted to leave were still in Kabul, but one Western official said an estimated 1,500 U.S. passport and visa holders were trying to get to the airport, a figure also advanced by Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The massive airlift had been accelerating as foreign nationals and their families, as well as some Afghans who worked for the international effort, try to flee hard-line Taliban rule. On August 26, France said it will no longer be able to evacuate people from Afghanistan from the evening of August 27 onward, while other NATO members -- including Canada, Germany, Belgium, and Hungary -- said they have ended their operations to extricate personnel and Afghan citizens who aided them. Russia said it had evacuated around 360 of its citizens from Afghanistan on August 25, while some 100 Russians remain in Afghanistan and have chosen to stay there for now. While Western troops were working inside the airport to keep the evacuation moving as fast as possible, Taliban fighters guarded the perimeter. Ahmedullah Rafiqzai, an Afghan official working at the Directorate of Civil Aviation at the Kabul airport, told Reuters before the blasts that it would be easy for a suicide bomber to attack the corridors, and that warnings are unlikely to be heeded because of people's "determination to leave this country" is so great "that they are not scared to even die." "Everyone is risking their life, he said. Since the Taliban swept into Kabul, the United States and its allies have flown out more than 88,000 people, including 19,000 in the past 24 hours. The U.S. military says planes are taking off the equivalent of every 39 minutes. Blinken told a news conference in Washington there was no deadline for the effort to help people who want to leave, both Americans and others, and that it would continue for "as long as it takes." The Taliban has said foreign troops must be out by the end of the month and ruled out any extension of the deadline. They have encouraged Afghans to stay, while saying those with permission to leave will still be allowed to do so once commercial flights resume. The Taliban has promised to return Afghanistan to a secure state and to exercise a softer brand of rule, pledging it won't seek revenge on those who opposed the group or roll back progress on human rights. But many Afghans fear a repeat of the Taliban's brutal interpretation of Shari'a law, as well as violent retribution for working with foreign militaries, Western missions, or the U.S.-backed government. With reporting by Reuters, AP, and AFP Colorado Springs, CO (80903) Today Cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 84F. Winds S at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 57F. SSE winds shifting to N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 60%. President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett have postponed their White House meeting as Biden focused his attention on dealing with the aftermath of deadly explosions near the Kabul airport that targeted U.S. troops and Afghans seeking to flee their country after the Taliban takeover Choose from more than 300 tea varieties and participate in a Chinese tea ceremony at Yellow Mountain Tea House in Old Colorado City. While the tea is made in front of you, youll learn the best way to brew and steep tea. yellow-mountain-organic-tea.com Carlotta Olson A lunar rover designed by Golden-based Lunar Outpost will collect dust and other material from the South Pole of the moon in a mission scheduled late next year. The company is among 10 space startups selected for the Amazon Web Services Space Accelerator program that began in May and will conclude next month. Colorado Politics senior political reporter Joey Bunch is the senior correspondent and deputy managing editor of Colorado Politics. His 32-year career includes the last 16 in Colorado. He was part of the Denver Post team that won the Pulitzer Prize in 2013 and he is a two-time finalist. The Federal Aviation Administrations top regulator for space flight says his agency is struggling to keep up with the rapid growth of the commercial space industry as it wrestles with new issues including whether it should ensure the safety of space tourists and which of them should get commercial astronauts wings. Wayne R. Monteith, a retired Air Force general who served for years in space billets in Colorado Springs is now the FAAs associate administrator for commercial space transportation. He told a Space Symposium crowd at The Broadmoor Wednesday that to a large extent, hes trying to keep his agency out of the way of the rush to space. A regulatory agency can either be an accelerator or an inhibitor of industry, he said. We choose to be an accelerator. Monteiths agency has overseen commercial space launches since the 1980s, but it used to be a small job. Just a decade ago, the agency licensed a single commercial launch over the course of the year. This year, Monteith expects to authorize more than 60 launches, and expects the pace to accelerate for years to come. But a license to launch is nothing like a drivers license. Fender benders and wrong turns are permitted as long as no one gets hurt. About 15 percent of the launches we license have a mishap, Monteith said, using the space industrys polite word used to replace harsher terms including explosion, crash, and massive fireball. But all of those mishaps dont move a whisker of Monteiths post-Air Force gray beard unless they wind up impacting the group he calls the uninvolved public. We do public safety, not mission assurance, he said. Even the military is keeping its hands off the exuberant commercial space industry. Lt. Gen Stephen Whiting, who heads the Space Forces Space Operations Command in Colorado Springs said all of his stars cant stop someone elses private trip to the stars. The Department of Defense and Space Force are not regulatory agencies, he said Wednesday. The military has long helped commercial space interests avoid in-orbit collisions by offering tracking data on objects in space, but thats heading to the Department of Commerce. The civilian agency is working with commercial firms, including several in Colorado Springs that will help prevent orbital traffic jams. They are standing up that capability, Whiting said. And the new space capabilities created by commercial space entities have generals seeing future military possibilities. Im super excited by that, Whiting said of space tourism. But before you strap yourself to a rocket, read the fine print. If things go wrong, Monteiths agency wont send so much as a sympathy card. Right now we operate under an informed consent regime, Monteith said. In other words, let the flyer beware. Monteith warned, though, that mishaps for manned space flight that escalate to what he called catastrophe, have consequences. The worst case is a catastrophic failure, he said. Then, we will regulate. Monteith is very interested in regulations governing whether those who survive their tourist ride to space will get a federal trophy to remember the trip. Right now, anyone who reaches 50 miles above the planet and can fit into a wide definition of flight crew is entitled to federal astronauts wings. But Monteith is figuring out whether paying passengers should get the honor. Right now I dont want to be in the business of who gets the duty title of astronaut. But we are in it, he said. There are 14 COVID-19 outbreaks in Colorado schools confirmed over the past week, the first such clusters identified this academic year. One hundred and fourteen students have been infected in the new outbreaks, along with 17 staff members, according to data published every Wednesday by the state Department of Public Health and Environment. Of the 14 outbreaks, nearly all had no mask mandate at the time their outbreaks were identified. Only Jefferson County Public Schools, which instituted its mask order last week, is a district with an outbreak and such a requirement. Two others Douglas County Public Schools and Adams County's District 27J reported the outbreaks the day after their county health department implemented the requirement. Children are significantly less likely to experience severe disease, hospitalization or death from COVID-19 infections than older people, experts have long maintained. Gov. Jared Polis said last week that fewer than 20 adolescents are currently hospitalized, out of more than 800 total patients. Hospital capacity, including at Colorado's pediatric facilities, continues to be solid, Polis told reporters Wednesday. Of the 14 school outbreaks, Jefferson County's has the fewest affected students: only one, according to the data. Six staff members from the district have been infected. Jefferson County Public Schools implemented its mask order Aug. 17, six days before the school-based outbreak was reported. One district, Montrose County's West End Public Schools, has moved its elementary, middle and high schools into virtual learning. The closures were announced Aug. 18, the same day the district moved to virtual. School started there Aug. 9. "Due to an increase in illnesses and multiple confirmed COVID cases throughout the district, the Naturita Elementary, Nucla High and Nucla Middle schools will be closed to in person learning for the next ten days," the district wrote on its website. "Students will be switching to a remote learning platform as of Thursday, August 19, 2021 through Thursday, August 27, 2021." Mesa County Valley School District and Douglas County each have four school outbreaks. In El Paso County, Falcon County School District 49 has two. Three of the districts with outbreaks based in Douglas, Arapahoe and Adams counties are now under mask orders, generally. At the time of several of their outbreaks, however, none of them required masks. Two other outbreaks in those counties were identified Aug. 24, a day after the Tri-County Health Department instituted its mask order. The Adams County Commission voted Tuesday to opt out of the order, a day after it was implemented. The commissioners also voiced support for masks and frustration with how the order was implemented. Douglas County's commission voted to opt out last week, though its school district has continued the order and voiced strong support for it at a school board meeting Tuesday night. The outbreak figures, taken from school districts that largely have thousands, if not tens of thousands, of students, do not take into account total cases within those districts, nor do they account for quarantines. A message to the state Department of Public Health and Environment seeking quarantine data was not returned Wednesday. The governor stressed Wednesday that his priority with schools remains in-person learning. He said the state will have a "serious conversation" with districts that don't implement measures like masking and have to move to remote learning because of high rates of spread. Only one person shot Eric Schnaare at a Lakewood apartment. Two defendants each said the other did it. They were tried together, and a jury convicted both of them. Now, the Court of Appeals has reversed the convictions for one defendant. Colorado Springs police arrested a 50-year-old registered sex offender on Wednesday on suspicion of committing new crimes against children. Thomas Patrick Perkins was arrested without incident at the downtown Colorado Springs police operations center on Wednesday, police said. Perkins was arrested on suspicion of crimes related to the sexual exploitation of children by authorities with the Internet Crimes Against Children task force, which is comprised of local and federal investigators. In 2010, Perkins was convicted of attempting to solicit a child for prostitution in Central City. Hes now being held at the criminal justice center until he appears before a judge. A top Senate Democrat signaled that in light of explosion attacks in Kabul that killed four U.S. Marines, patience with President Joe Biden's Afghanistan evacuation strategy is wearing thin. "As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We can't trust the Taliban with Americans' security," New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement on Thursday. Though he did not name the president directly, the statement was an apparent swipe at the Biden administration for working with the Taliban to secure passage through Taliban-controlled areas. "This is a full-fledged humanitarian crisis, and the U.S. government personnel, already working under extreme circumstances, must secure the airport and complete the massive evacuation of American citizens and vulnerable Afghans desperately trying to leave the country," Menendez said. Asked Sunday on whether he trusts the Taliban, Biden told reporters: "I don't trust anybody." "So far, the Taliban has not taken action against U.S. forces. So far, they have, by and large, followed through what they said, in terms of allowing Americans to pass through, and the like," Biden said. "We'll see whether or not what they say turns out to be true." Other top Congressional Democrats have not gone as far as Menendez following the attack. Most have simply called for stability, offered prayers, or stated that they are monitoring the situation. "We must do everything we can to stabilize the situation outside the airport so that we can resume evacuations of American citizens, SIVs [Special Immigrant Visa applicants], and the Afghans most in danger as soon as possible," Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement. CLICK HERE FOR LATEST ON AFGHANISTAN CRISIS Republicans have been much harsher in criticizing Biden, with No. 3 House Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York saying there is "blood on his hands." Menendez and Warner, as well as Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jack Reed of Rhode Island, have said that their committees will probe the "flawed execution" of U.S. withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and why the U.S. was not "better prepared for a worst-case scenario involving such a swift and total collapse of the Afghan government and security forces." Original Location: Top Senate Democrat swipes at Biden: Cant trust the Taliban Washington Examiner Videos The Space Symposium, the four-day convention held this week in Colorado Springs that brought together the foremost leaders of space defense, industry and research, was a testament to the speed with which human involvement in space is accelerating. But as technology advances, some policy experts hope to see sustainable and ethical behavior in space that matches technology's pace. The space industry benefits humanity from research into climate change to the development of cancer drugs. With accessibility to space rapidly expanding, however, world leaders say they see a need to regulate human behavior beyond the reaches of our atmosphere. A panel featuring the heads of global space agencies, and a speech from Chirag Parikh, the executive secretary for the National Space Council, addressed the future of ethical behavior in space at the symposium Wednesday, which took place at The Broadmoor hotel on Colorado Springs' southwest side. "We must be committed about space not just for the sake of space," Parikh said. "But for the value of the citizen." Parikh cited diversity, sustainability and education as values the international space community should prioritize. Panelists such as Giorgio Saccoccia, president of the Italian Space Agency, Dr. Josef Aschbacher, director of the European Space Agency, and NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, the former U.S. senator and representative, also expressed the need for regulations to promote sustainable practices and safety in space. "We cannot talk about the sustainability of our planet without talking about sustainability of what's around our planet," Saccoccia said. Ayn Su Woodward, a space law and policy advisor for the Global Space Exchange, a hub that shares information about organizations, people and products in the space industry in order to break down barriers, said beyond institutional and government guidance, incentives for industry also will be necessary to protect space and humanity. And the stakes are high if we don't do enough to ensure boundaries in space, Woodward said. "I think you could have a very dangerous repetition of colonialism where you have certain super wealthy, well resourced countries expanding their power to the detriment of other communities who don't have such a grand military and solid economy," Woodward said. That's why Mikaela Dobbin, a master's student at the University of Colorado at Boulder studying astrodynamics and satellite navigation, helped create an ethics-based course for undergraduate students in her field. Dobbin wanted to help send more students into the workforce who were ethically aware in order to elevate the industry as a whole. "We found it was a really good opportunity to introduce some difficult ethics topics that aren't necessarily brought up in our day-to-day aerospace lives," Dobbin said. Private companies such as Houston-based Nanoracks, which helps provide access to space by launching research payloads into low-orbit and small satellites to the International Space Station, already are trying to work toward sustainable efforts in space. Nanoracks developed a hardware kit that can attach to space debris allowing it to be moved and reused as infrastructure in orbit, said Alexandra Coultrup, a recent master's graduate who works on the project for the company. "The majority of the people in the space industry are doing what we're doing because we believe we can make the world a better place," Coultrup said. In this July 29, 2021, file photo, Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., speaks at a news conference held by members of the House Freedom Caucus on Capitol Hill in Washington. Boebert has disclosed that her husband earned more than $800,000 consulting for an energy firm in 2019 and 2020, during her run for Congress in Colorado. Boebert made the disclosure in her personal financial filing this week with the House of Representatives. DES MOINES A Council Bluffs mother is suing the state to end its ban on schools enacting face mask requirements. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in a district court in Polk County on behalf of Frances Parr, who has two young children who attend Council Bluffs public schools.The suit names Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, state Public Health Director Kim Garcia and state Education Director Ann Lebo as defendants. The ban was approved by the Republican-led Iowa Legislature and signed into law by Reynolds, also a Republican, in May. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} The suit says the ban violates the rights of Parrs children and other students to attend school without a threat of contracting COVID-19 or the delta variant, the symptoms of which could lead to hospitalization, permanent physical harm, emotional harm and even death. The suit notes the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends all students and staff wear face masks inside school buildings and includes a statement from the childrens pediatrician, who wrote of the dangers of children who contract COVID-19. Congress provided hundreds of millions of dollars to shore up the nation's election system against cyberattacks and other threats, but roughly two-thirds of the money remained unspent just weeks before last year's presidential election. A recently released federal report says the states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories had spent a little more than $255 million of $805 million in election security grants through Sept. 30 of last year, the latest figures available. States were given leeway on how and when to spend their shares because election concerns and potential vulnerabilities of voting systems vary widely across the country. Several election officials cited two main reasons for the slow pace of spending: More than half the money wasn't allocated until the 2020 election was less than a year away, giving election officials and state lawmakers little time to make major spending decisions. And the coronavirus pandemic upended last year's election planning, forcing officials to focus on safety at the polls and pivot to provide more early voting and mail-in balloting. Security was still on everybodys mind, but it took a back seat to just making sure that the election ran without it just having a total meltdown, said Don Palmer, chairman of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, which issued the report. The undocumented immigrant family seated at tables at a La Joya, Texas Whataburger coughed, sneezed and wheezed, while not complying with the numerous safety protocols posted throughout the restaurant, according to the LaJoya Police. A concerned customer left to wave down a police officer, who stopped to investigate. The undocumented family all looked sick and told the cop theyd been apprehended days earlier by the US Border Patrol. Upon being released, they were taken to hotels where the non-profit Catholic Charities paid the tab. According to La Joya police Sergeant Manual Cansas, everyone thats staying at that hotel is COVID-19 positive. He said that his department cant stop the undocumented from leaving hotels to travel to other locations throughout America. The manager of another hotel, the Texas Inn & Suites, informed local authorities that the Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley had booked rooms at his hotel, to house undocumented immigrants detained by the Border Patrol. President Biden falsely claims the COVID-border crisis was caused by forces beyond his control, yet President Trump had, by 2020, largely secured our southern border. Why cant Biden? Danville police have arrested a 22-year-old suspect after gunfire erupted at a shopping center Wednesday afternoon, but authorities stressed it was not a random act of violence. It was about 4:30 p.m. when officers responded to a call at Nordan Shopping Center at 211 Nordan Drive, police wrote in a news release. An occupied vehicle was the intended target and was struck by gunfire while fleeing the scene, the release stated. One store front was struck by a single bullet as well. There were no injures in the shooting. Police have identified Jimel Deshawn Southern as the suspect. He was located at a home on Arnett Boulevard at about 1 a.m. Thursday and taken into custody without incident. Southern knew the intended victims and this is not a random act of violence, authorities wrote in the release. Following the incident, officers visited businesses in the center to let workers and customers know the scene was safe. Southern has been charged with two counts of attempted malicious wounding, two counts of use of a firearm in the commission of a felony and one count of shooting into an occupied vehicle. The investigation is ongoing. The Mexican government will start technical discussions with the U.S. government to evaluate how to handle safe, orderly and regulated immigration on the border, Velasco said. Mexico is not legally obligated to receive returning migrants who are not Mexican citizens, and most of the asylum seekers are not. During the Trump administration, the Mexican government said it was cooperating with the program for humanitarian reasons. Although migrants were granted humanitarian visas to stay in Mexico until they had their U.S. hearings, they often had to wait in dangerous areas controlled by cartels, leaving them vulnerable to being kidnapped, assaulted, raped or even killed. Others were transported by bus to parts of southern Mexico or invited to return to their home countries. Mexico technically could block the program by refusing to accept migrants asked to stay in Mexico under the Migrant Protection Protocols, or MPP. But analysts like Tonatiuh Guillen, former head of Mexicos migration agency, consider that unlikely given the countrys history of cooperation with the U.S. Guillen said Mexican officials will probably go along even though the country doesnt have sufficient resources to deal with an influx of asylum seekers at the border and nonprofit shelters south of the border are overwhelmed. It is critical that if we are to take on the challenges we face that we do it in a way that is collaborative, that we must empower leaders in every sector, including of course government but community leaders, business leaders, civic society, if we are to maximize the resources we collectively have, she said. In her news conference, Harris also fielded questions on the chaotic U.S. exit from Afghanistan, but did not respond directly when asked how the U.S. would evaluate success in the evacuation mission. At a time when U.S. officials have warned of possible terrorist threats against Americans attempting to leave the country through Kabul's airport, Harris also ignored a question on whether Americans are safer now that the U.S. has departed the country. On her trip back to Washington, Harris will stop at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii to meet with servicemembers. She had planned also to stop in California to appear with Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is facing a recall attempt. But Harris scrapped that stop to head straight to Washington, her office announced. She has been briefed on developments in Kabul and will continue to be updated as she makes her way back to Washington, the White House said. It was with interest tinged with a sense of dread that I read the recent opinion piece in the Bulletin (ANOTHER VIEW: A rally that lacks integrity, Aug. 6). The rally by a group of ReTrumplicans billed as election integrity is very concerning as it evoked memories of the Jan. 6 rally promoted by the former president that resulted in one of the most frightening and disgraceful events in recent history. One can only imagine the sea of camouflage, body armor and possibly weapons that were on display. It is my sincere hope that this rally was not a repeat of Jan. 6 during and after the upcoming November elections. Unfortunately there are many, especially on the Fox network, who are supporting the idea that violence is justified to get the result you want or to change any results you dont like. Lets consider this rally slogan, election integrity. Thats a nice thought and maybe a good bumper sticker. But to what end? NEW YORK A study from Israel says COVID-19 carries a far higher risk of heart inflammation than Pfizers coronavirus vaccine. Researchers in Tel Aviv estimate there were three cases for every 100,000 people vaccinated with the Pfizer shot. But risk of it was 11 per 100,000 in people who were infected with the virus. The finding were published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine. Dr. Grace Lee is an infectious disease expert at Stanford University and says the paper is the first to assess the potential risks of vaccination in the context of understanding the potential benefits of vaccination. Previous reports have linked the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines to inflammation of the heart muscle. The problem was mainly seen in male teens and young men, who developed chest pain a few days after vaccination. U.S. health officials say they have confirmed about 800 vaccine-associated cases total of two types of inflammation in the heart muscle and in the lining of the heart. The Clalit Research Institute researchers looked at hundreds of thousands of people who were vaccinated and not vaccinated. Separately, they looked at unvaccinated people who were infected or not. RALEIGH North Carolina school boards will have to vote monthly on whether to require face masks be worn under legislation approved by state lawmakers. The General Assembly passed Wednesday a wide-ranging coronavirus bill for schools touching on things such as graduation requirements, grading of schools, driving privileges for students and use of remote instruction. One requirement mandates that those school boards that require masks must have monthly votes on whether to continue or modify the policy. The requirement comes as 90 of the states 115 school districts have opted to require masking, at times over the objections of parents in their communities. In the past month, 37 school districts reversed their decision to go mask optional due to the surge in COVID-19 cases from the delta variant. Rep. John Torbett, a Gaston County Republican who helped work on the compromise bill, said school masking policies should be constantly reviewed. Most boards meet once a month, Torbett said Wednesday. It gives them an opportunity to go look back and see what they want to state for the next coming month. Senate Bill 654 unanimously passed in the Senate and had only one no vote in the House. It now goes to Gov. Roy Cooper. A Johnston County high school teacher has been sent home for refusing to follow the school districts requirement to wear a face mask in school. Aurora Preston, an English teacher at South Johnston High School in Four Oaks, argues that it should be her constitutional right whether she wears a face mask. She faces up to nine weeks of unpaid leave and could lose her job as a result of her decision to not mask up on campus. It is not the job of government agencies to dictate when and where it is appropriate to utilize the rights afforded to me by being a citizen of the US, Preston said in a statement Wednesday. It is their job to uphold the Constitution affording these rights to all of the citizens all of the time. If someone disagrees with that stance, it would that persons right and its wonderful to have that choice to do so. The school district said in a statement Wednesday that it will not comment on confidential personnel matters. The district said the decision to require that masks be worn indoors by students and school employees was based on guidance from health officials. Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper is likely to veto the bill if it reaches his desk, as he has previously criticized the measure. It could also get stalled in budget negotiations between Berger, Cooper and House Speaker Tim Moore. Democrats argue Republicans crafted the bill to placate unfounded concerns among staunch conservatives ahead of the 2022 and 2024 elections. They also say the bill would stymie conversations by dissuading teachers from discussing Americas history of racism and lingering effects of slavery. Indoctrination is fake news, said Sen. Gladys Robinson, a Guilford County Democrat. As a matter of fact, its more than that. Its a bold-faced lie. There is no indoctrination. What we need to do is step in our lane and let them (educators) go into theirs. The latest action in North Carolina follows a national trend of Republican-controlled legislatures looking to combat certain ideas they associate with critical race theory, a complex framework legal scholars developed in the 1970s and 1980s that centers on the idea that racism is systemic in the nations institutions and serves to maintain the dominance of whites in society. There are too many children being shuttled off to detention centers, he said. Mohammed added that hes glad North Carolina will finally lose the stigma of being the only state in the country that specifically allowed 6-year-olds to be brought to court. But hes disappointed it didnt happen sooner, he said, as well as disappointed that in the end the legislature only agreed to raise the age to 8. Rep. Marcia Morey, a former Durham County District Court judge turned House Democrat who introduced bills last year and this year seeking to raise the age of juvenile jurisdiction, said she is pleased that the state is making progress but she, too, wanted the legislation to go further. Morey said she doesnt agree with the reasoning of the bill that subjects kids accused of the equivalent of felonies to a different standard than of misdemeanors. If they dont have the capacity to proceed with misdemeanors, she doesnt understand why they would have that capacity if it is a felony, she said. These are young children that need to be directed to services or counseling, Morey said. President Joe Bidens handling of Afghanistan has few vocal defenders. What they lack in numbers, though, they make up for in unity of message: The press is being too hard on Biden, they say. The president is a victim of a press corps desperate to show they do not have a liberal bias. Its the overt editorializing from the press that has made Bidens Afghan record unpopular editorializing that reflects the medias alliance with national-security hawks. On Aug. 22 and 23, White House chief of staff Ron Klain used his Twitter feed to publicize five critiques of the medias coverage of Afghanistan. But the theory of press bias that Biden and some of his cheerleaders have adopted is wrong. It isnt consistently hawkish. It wasnt in 2005-07, when seemingly every day brought grim news from Iraq. Looking further back, coverage of the Vietnam War, especially after the first few years of U.S. involvement, was hardly favorable toward military action either. So why is Biden taking so much flak? There are at least eight better explanations than the ones coming from the White House. With the discovery of a first mosquito with the West Nile Virus in Fresno, local health officials warn that the insects carry a number of diseases including Zika, Dengue, Chikungunya and St. Louis encephalitis. Removing undrained water in unmaintained swimming pools, yard drains, plant water trays, or pet water dishes, will help lower the number of the potentially disease-carrying insects in your backyard. " " Monserat Ramos, 3, is from Los Angeles. She's still not eligible to get any COVID-19 vaccine. Should her parents consider off-label use to get her vaccinated anyway? Francine Orr/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images Now that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, that means it can legally be used off-label. The million-dollar question is should doctors prescribe it for young children for whom no COVID-19 vaccines are recommended? There's a lot to unpack here, so let's begin with the FDA approval. Advertisement Pfizer COVID-19 Vaccine Gets Full FDA Approval On Aug. 23, 2021, the FDA announced it approved the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for the prevention of COVID-19 infection in people age 16 years and older. The vaccine will be marketed under the brand-name Comirnaty. The vaccine has been administered to millions of Americans under the emergency use authorization (EUA). This designation, which has also been granted to COVID-19 vaccines manufactured by Moderna and Johnson & Johnson's Janssen Pharmaceuticals, enables the FDA to accelerate the review of medical countermeasures, such as vaccines, to make them available during public health emergencies, such as a global pandemic. The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine will continue to be administered to adolescents ages 12 through 15 under the EUA. No vaccine is currently recommended for children younger than 12. Before a medication is approved, the manufacturer must submit clinical data and other information to the FDA for review showing that the drug is safe and effective for its intended uses. The approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine means the FDA has deemed that, despite any side effects, the benefits of the medication outweigh the risks. " " The Food and Drug Administration fully approved the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for people age 16 years and older Aug. 23. That means it can legally be used off-label. PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images Advertisement What Is Off-label Use? Doctors have the authority to prescribe an FDA-approved medication for unauthorized use sometimes called off-label use if they judge that it is medically appropriate for a particular patient. However, drug companies cannot market a medication for any use that the medication is not already approved for. As many as 20 percent of all medications are prescribed for off-label use, including these FDA-approved drugs: Hypertension drug prazosin (brand name Minipress) is often used to treat nightmares related to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The female fertility drug clomiphene (brand name Clomid) is sometimes used to treat male infertility. The beta-blocker propranolol (brand name Inderal), used to treat hypertension, is occasionally used to treat anxiety. Now that the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 has been fully approved by the FDA, it can legally be prescribed off-label by physicians on a case-by-case basis. Considering that, as of the week ending Aug. 19, the AAP reported 180,000 new cases of COVID-19 among children and adolescents, and coupled with the fact that doctors are beginning to worry that the delta strain may be more dangerous to children, the question has been floated whether to vaccinate younger children, off-label. Both the American Association of Pediatrics (AAP) and the FDA are warning against it. And many doctors agree. "I support the AAP recommendation," Landon S. Combs, M.D., FAAP, BCCI, a pediatrician at Holston Valley Medical Center in Gray, Tennessee, says via email. "These types of decisions are made with the best interests of the patients and public in mind." " " A nurse gives a young boy a dose of the Pfizer vaccine at a clinic at Lyman High School in Longwood, Florida, the day before classes begin for the 2021-22 school year. The vaccine still will continue to be administered to adolescents ages 12 through 15 under the emergency use act. Paul Hennessy/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images Advertisement Why Not Give the Vaccine to Children Off-label? One concern is that off-label prescribing has been linked to a higher rate of side effects 44 percent greater compared to when medications are given for indications for which they are approved, according to a 2016 JAMA Internal Medicine study of 46,021 adults. Another is that the dose of the adult vaccine is much higher than the doses being tested in children younger than 12, the AAP said in a statement. Health officials don't want children getting doses that are too large because it could expose them to more side effects. Nor do they want doctors trying to calculate what dose would be safe for young children. Instead, says Yvonne Maldonado, M.D., FAAP, chair of the AAP Committee on Infectious Diseases, in the statement, "We should do this based on all of the evidence for each age group, and for that we need the trials to be completed. I know parents are anxious to protect their children, but we want to make sure children have the full benefit of ongoing clinical trials." Clinical trials for the COVID-19 vaccine in children younger than 12 are currently underway. In July, the FDA urged Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, makers of the two mRNA vaccines, to expand their clinical trials in children ages 5 to 11 to 3,000 children, according to The New York Times. Doing so will help uncover any side effects, such as a rare heart inflammation that's been seen in vaccinated people younger than 30. "With the possibility of different ages requiring different dosages, waiting for the results of those studies before emergency authorization for use and/or approval for use is granted follows those tenets of making decisions based on the best interests of the patients and the public," Combs says. "We are all hoping for rapid but thorough research that will allow approval for all children as soon as possible to end this pandemic." In the meantime, Combs recommends that patients continue to practice social distancing when and where possible, limit trips and exposure, continue with wearing masks for age-appropriate groups, taking appropriate measures to prevent spread (such as hand-washing and not touching one's own face or mask), and quarantining if they become ill with the virus. "While we wait for a vaccine to be authorized for younger children, it's important that everyone who is eligible now get the vaccine," adds AAP President Lee Savio Beers, M.D., FAAP, in the statement. "That will help reduce the spread of the virus and protect those who are too young to be vaccinated." Now That's Interesting Within hours of the FDA approving Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine Monday, Aug. 23, several companies and school systems, as well as the Pentagon, said they would begin enforcing vaccine mandates that were contingent on the FDA's approval. South Lake Tahoe and Tahoe City on the west shore had the nations worst air pollution at midmorning Wednesday, reaching 334, in the hazardous category of the 0-500 Air Quality Index, according to AirNow, a partnership of federal, state and local air agencies. South of Tahoe, Rick Nelson and his wife, Diane, had planned to host a weekend wedding at Fallen Leaf Lake, where his daughter and her fiance had met. However, the smoke caused most of the community to leave. The sun was an eerie blood orange, and the floats and boats in the lake were obscured by haze Tuesday. In the end, the Nelsons spent two days arranging to have the wedding moved from the glacial lake several hours southwest to the San Francisco Bay Area. Everybodys trying to make accommodations for the smoke. And I think its becoming a reality for us, unfortunately, Diane Nelson said. I just think that the smoke and the fires have gotten bigger, hotter and faster-moving. Climate change has made the West warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make the weather more extreme and wildfires more destructive, according to scientists. The only gripe Ive got is that you quit making the maple sticks, he said. The alleged incidents occurred in 2015 and in 2018, according to court documents filed Aug. 16. Marsh at one time worked as a maintenance worker at Glenwood Inc., a facility for adults with disabilities. Each count is a felony. The first count can bring imprisonment of two to (no more than) 100 years, a maximum fine of $50,000 or both. The other two counts could result in life in prison or a fine of not more than $50,000, or both. The criminal filing by the state attorney general's office does not say where the alleged incidents took place. Prosecutors also asked that Marsh be told to stay away from Glenwood. The judge however noted that Glenwood was on a major roadway in a small town and that having something such as a large distance restraint could be difficult. If youd put a 500-foot restriction on him hed have to leave town because he couldnt get food, Cybulski said. The state also said there was the specter of a conflict for the judge, as it is a small community in which he and Marsh are longtime residents. In many of Montanas best wheat growing areas, grasshoppers beat farmers to the harvest. For the most part, were looking at less than five bushels to an acre, said Shelley Mills, of Valley County Extension. And when you think about our lentils, they couldnt get the lentils because the crop was so short. Every crop was short. Wheat was like eight inches tall and headed-out. It is hard to harvest crops so stunted that farm equipment cant make the cut without being damaged by rocks. Valley County anchors a region that normally produces 45% of Montanas spring wheat and is the epicenter for pulse crops like chickpeas and lentils. There are a few farmers in this northeast corner of the state that, because of its abundance refer to the area as the "platinum rectangle", a little jab at the productive northcentral part of the state known as the Golden Triangle. No ones crowing this year. LONDON (AP) French President Emmanuel Macron held talks with top Irish officials in Dublin Thursday, focusing on a major overhaul of taxes on the worlds biggest multinational companies. During the one-day state visit his first to Ireland Macron met with President Michael Higgins and Taoiseach Michael Martin. Ireland is not among the approximately 130 countries that backed an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) deal which would see minimum corporation tax set at 15% worldwide. Ireland's rate is currently 12.5%. The proposal, supported by all Group of Seven nations, seeks to deter complex avoidance schemes that have cost governments billions in revenue. Macron said while he believed a common framework made sense for a post-COVID-19 world, it was not for France to put pressure on Dublin to sign up to the agreement. Martin said significant challenges remained before his government could accept the deal, but maintained that Ireland was engaging constructively in the discussions. The taoiseach hailed France as Irelands now nearest neighbor within the European Union, following the U.K.s departure from the trading bloc. Tabor, Cebull and Robinson should be honest with the public, and just admit that they arent listening to the majority of Montanans and dont care about what we want in regard to wildlife management. Theyre not listening to thousands of hunters represented by organizations that strongly opposed these bills in the legislative session and in front of the commission on Friday. Theyre not listening to the dozens of Montanas career biologists and other wildlife professionals who have publicly and vehemently opposed these measures and cautioned against politicians setting wildlife policy and veering away from fair-chase, science-based wildlife management. Theyre ignoring the fact that grizzly bears have been caught and injured in snares in Idaho and ignoring the fact that there are absolutely no consequences for trappers in Montana who incidentally snare federally-protected or other species. These and other substantive issues were repeatedly raised Friday but with no questions, debate or consideration whatsoever by Tabor, Cebull and Robinson. Its clear they are being driven by their own ideological hatred of wolves, and a narrow cross section of trappers and outfitters who could care less about fair chase, and stand to profit from the use of these unethical practices. Tabor, an outfitter himself, put forward Fridays proposal. Cebull is on the board of pro-trophy hunting Safari Club in Montana. Baumler was the Montana Historical Society's interpretive historian in Helena from 1992 to 2018. She is the author of 13 books and dozens of articles on Montana. Applications taken for hunting camp extentions The Rocky Mountain Ranger District of the Helena - Lewis and Clark National Forest will again be accepting applications for 25 hunting camp extensions in the Beaver-Willow road closure area. These hunting camp extensions enable folks to enjoy a more remote experience in the forest and stay beyond the 16-day limit enforced across national forests in Montana. Applicants will be selected using an anonymous lottery-style process until all 25 camps are authorized. The Rocky Mountain Ranger District will accept applications between Aug. 31 and Sept. 15. Applications must be received (not postmarked) in the district office by close of business (4:30 p.m.) Sept. 15. The drawing will be on or after Sept. 16. Applicants will be notified of the results of the drawing by close of business on Sept. 17. As of Tuesday morning, five acts have withdrawn from the festival. First, Bristols JP Parsons announced his exit on Aug. 11. This has been an extremely hard decision to make, Parsons said in a statement posted to his Facebook page, but I have to do everything I can to keep my family safe. Secondly, headliner Jason Isbell released a statement of requirements for everyone attending his concerts. He requires either proof of vaccination or a negative test for COVID taken within 72 hours of the event. Rhythm & Roots concluded that, according to Tennessee state law, they could not impose such specific requirements. Isbell withdrew quickly thereafter. Im just trying to keep people from getting sick at my concerts, Isbell said on CBS This Morning. Three more acts followed in pulling out of Rhythm & Roots. They are Yola, Morgan Wade and Annabelles Curse. For context, out of 97 acts announced in the original lineup for this next months Rhythm & Roots, the tally currently sits at 92. ABINGDON, Va. Washington County Commissioner of Revenue Mark Matney wants to get rid of the countys farm equipment tax. Its an extra tax, said Matney, who made an impassioned plea to drop the tax at Tuesdays meeting of the Washington County Board of Supervisors. But the board especially Chairman Dwayne Ball raised objections. This year, with bills due Nov. 1, Matney expects to collect $124,533 from 726 farmers who pay the tax on equipment, including tractors, hay balers and four-wheelers, Matney said. Ball questioned whether its fair to single out this tax and not drop others while also expressing concerns that the county needs the revenue. We have a $19 million courthouse to pay for and schools to modernize, Ball said. Farm equipment is taxed at the same rate as personal property: $1.70 per $100 of assessed value, said Matney. New equipment is taxed for 10 years. If you buy a tractor here, youre supposed to pay tax in Washington County, Matney said. By law, youre supposed to report that to my office. Over a decade, the tax on a new $50,000 tractor would be more than $4,000, according to Matney. On Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy in Kabul issued a security alert warning American citizens away from three specific airport gates, but gave no further explanation. Senior U.S. officials said the warning was related to ongoing and specific threats involving the Islamic State and potential vehicle bombs, which have set U.S. officials on edge in the final days of the American drawdown. The officials insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss ongoing military operations. Blinken said the State Department estimates there were about 6,000 Americans wanting to leave Afghanistan when the airlift began Aug. 14, as the Taliban took the capital after a stunning military conquest. About 4,500 Americans have been evacuated so far, Blinken said, and among the rest some are understandably very scared. The 6,000 figure is the first firm estimate by the State Department of how many Americans were seeking to get out. U.S. officials early in the evacuation estimated as many as 15,000, including dual citizens, lived in Afghanistan. The figure does not include U.S. Green Card holders. About 500 Americans have been contacted with instructions on when and how to get to the chaotic Kabul airport to catch evacuation flights. Gretchen Catherwood felt like she could feel in her hands the red sweater shed been folding the moment she learned her son was dead. Her phone buzzed with messages from the family shes assembled since that horrible day: the officer whod dodged the flowerpot; the parents of others killed in battle or by suicide since; her sons fellow fighters in the storied 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, nicknamed the Darkhorse Battalion, that endured the highest rate of causalities in Afghanistan. Many of them call her Ma. Outside of this circle, shed seen someone declare what a waste of life and potential on Facebook. Friends told her how horrible theyd felt that her son had died in vain. As she exchanged messages with the others whod paid the price of war, she worried its end was forcing them to question whether all they had seen and all they had suffered had mattered at all. There are three things I need you to know, she said to some. You did not fight for nothing. Alec did not lose his life for nothing. I will be here for you no matter what, until the day I die. Those are the things I need you to remember. The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine was the first to receive an emergency use authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in December. And as of Monday, it is the first COVID-19 vaccine to receive full approval from the FDA for people over 16. Its a milestone moment in the prolonged public health crisis. The status upgrade may not affect the lives of people who have already received one or two of the 200 million Pfizer doses that have been administered in the U.S., but its a game changer for the millions of Americans who arent vaccinated. Why? Because although a small portion of people are adamantly opposed to getting immunized against COVID-19 for ideological or mystical reasons, many of those who are unvaccinated arent dug in on the position. In fact, a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 31% of those who have yet to receive a shot said they would be more likely to do so after the FDA gave full approval. Fantastic. Now they have no excuse not to get a shot of the Pfizer vaccine, other than finding one. Moderna could receive full approval for its mRNA vaccine as soon as next month. Infrastructure and construction policies are weaker than in wealthier nations. Slavery under the Spanish, then the French, marked centuries of exploitation, including by Americans. Southern politicians and the planter class feared Haitian slave revolts might spread to these shores. Instead, the United States occupied Haiti from 1915 to 1934 and helped prop up the murderous Duvalier dictatorship to prevent the islands becoming the next Cuba. The well-intended creation of the nongovernmental organization (NGO) system in the 1960s led to a weakening of Haitian institutions, which critics say made it easier for foreign companies and NGOs to bypass Haitis central government, further weakening self-governance by Haitians. Considering its turbulent history, the people of the island and their relatives in the Haitian diaspora, particularly in Miami, deserve praise for their often tireless efforts to help their fellow Haitians. In recent years, the money sent back to Haiti in remittances a record high of $3.8 billion last year, according to the Haitian Times accounts for at least a third of the islands economy. Now, once again, the island looks to the outside world for help, although with great reluctance, considering its long history of corrupt and corrupting outside influences. Textile company Nufabrx ranked 50th on the 2021 Inc. 5000 list, which comprises the top 5,000 fastest-growing private companies in the country. Some well-known companies gained exposure in the past through the Inc. magazine list, including Microsoft and Under Armour, according to a news release from Nufabrx. Its an unbelievable honor to be recognized by the Inc. 5000 as one of the fastest-growing companies in the nation, Schindler said in the release. Nufabrxs growth is a true testament to our incredible team and their remarkable vision. When the idea of putting medicine in clothing was just a dream in my dorm room, I never imagined we would get to this point so quickly. We will celebrate this win with plenty of champagne as a company; and deep down, we know this is just the beginning. Onwards and upwards! CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) Blue Origin launched artwork painted on a capsule and a moon-landing navigation experiment into space Thursday, a month after sending founder Jeff Bezos on the companys first passenger flight. No one was aboard for Thursday's 10-minute flight, which included other experiments from NASA and others. The paintings by Ghana artist Amoako Boafo were on three parachute panels on the outside of the capsule at the very top. Boafo painted a self-portrait as well as portraits of his mother and a friends mother, explaining a mother's love comes from a place that is out of this world," said Blue Origin launch commentator Kiah Erlich, a company official. Schoolchildren from Ghana tuned into the launch webcast, according to Blue Origin. The Utah-based Uplift Aerospace Inc. commissioned Boafo's work, Suborbital Triptych", as part of its new art-in-space program. The New Shepard rocket blasted off from West Texas on Blue Origin's 17th trip to space. The booster landed upright several minutes after liftoff. The fully automated capsule continued to an altitude of 66 miles (105 kilometers) before parachuting down nearby. The damage from Fred is just as bad worse in some parts of Haywood and western North Carolina. You cant fully prepare for that level of destruction. The people of Humphreys County had no idea a disaster could happen like the one Fred spawned that swept away towns and communities. But you cant stop water. You can try to manage it, you can resolve to live with it, but there is no way to conquer it. Take some of the people who lived high on the hills and mountains around Canton. Some folks escaped flood water from Frances and Ivan but were left homeless from landslides. Same with Fred. We were lucky with Hurricane Hugo. It wasnt like the Great Flood of 1916 that literally isolated Catawba County. All bridges and trestles were washed away, and high water took a long time to go away. Now, the destruction is beyond belief for many communities and towns. It would be the right thing to do to find a way to help. I didnt get any assistance when Hugo struck. Big deal. I didnt lose my house, my transportation, or the lives of friends and family. When we get knocked down, we get up. We rebuild. Sometimes, when things go from devastating to total loss, we need help. Let us not forget that when people we dont know suffer the unimaginable. We have no way of knowing when our turn will come. Reach Larry Clark at wryturlc@yahoo.com 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 Australia has completed the rollout of advanced mobile location technology which makes it possible to pinpoint the exact spot from which a triple zero call is made. A statement from Communications Minister Paul Fletcher said all users with an upgraded Android handset or an iPhone would be able to access the technology. Two kayakers in South Australia were saved using the technology, after they were caught in strong winds three kilometres offshore, saving a great deal of expenditure on an air and sea search, the statement said. Fletcher urged all mobile phone users to upgrade their handsets so that the technology would be available to them. Time is critical when you are in a life or death situationthat is why Advanced Mobile Location technology is so important, he said. It allows triple zero to send you help as quickly as possible. About 27,000 calls are made to the number every day about 78% originate from a mobile phone. The statement said AML would work with Android phones running version 4.1 and higher, with the Google Play Services installed. iPhone users would need to upgrade to version 14.3 of iOS to have access to AML. Telstra runs the triple zero service and has been working with both Apple and Google, and mobile services in the country, to test the technology. Alzheimer's Jeep Run to be held CHARLESTON The second Alzheimers Jeep Run will be held Saturday, Aug. 28. All vehicles are welcome to join and will meet at the Brick House Bar and Grill in Charleston at 10 a.m. and will take off at 11 a.m.. The ride will include music, food and prizes. Pheasants Forever banquet in Mattoon MATTOON The 19th annual Lincoln Heritage Pheasants Forever banquet will be held Saturday, Aug. 28, at the Mattoon Eagles Club. Money raised benefits conservation efforts in Coles and Cumberland counties. The evening includes a meal, games, live and silent auctions, and thousands of dollars worth or prizes like guns, hunting- and outdoor-related equipment, artwork and collectibles. Reserve tickets at lincolnheritagepf@gmail.com or call 217-246-8680. Charleston Library offering apple craft CHARLESTON Celebrate Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year) at the Charleston Carnegie Public Library by grabbing a Take & Make apple craft and making it at home. Kids Take and Make crafts are designed for ages 3-12. This apple craft will be available for pick up at the KidSpace desk from Monday, Aug. 30,to Sunday, Sept. 12, while supplies last. Supplies you will need at home are glue or glue stick, safety scissors, and crayons/colored pencils. Parental supervision is advised. Instructions are included. This is a free childrens program, open to the public. A library card is not needed to participate. For further information, please call 217-345-1514. Embarras volunteer conservation day CHARLESTON The Embarras Volunteer Stewards will hold a Conservation Day at 9 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 4, with Grand Prairie Friends for their first-Saturday-of-the-month volunteer workday at Warbler Ridges. Meet at the red shack near the end of Daileyville Road (CR 470 N), south of Charleston. All are welcome, and no prior experience is necessary. Sturdy footwear and gloves are recommended. Tools are provided. Visit www.embarrasstewards.org for more information. To receive email notifications, contact thorsenhutton@gmail.com. Postcard show set in Collinsville COLLINSVILLE A total of 25 professional postcard dealers from nine states are slated to gather for the upcoming 45th annual Metro East postcard show in Collinsville. The show will be held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday, Sept. 3, and 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 4, at the Collinsville VFW Hall, 1234 Vandalia St. (Highway 159). Dealers from Illinois, Missouri, Michigan, Kansas, Arkansas, Alabama, Minnesota, Iowa, Indiana, California, Texas and Tennessee will offer over one million vintage (1890s1960s) picture postcards and supplies to collectors. For more information, contact Tom Snyder at 618-531-4189 or by email at the.snyders@charter.net. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Stay up-to-date on what's happening Receive the latest in local entertainment news in your inbox weekly! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Mental health clinicians will be partnered with Chicago police officers to answer calls for service in two neighborhoods starting Monday as part of a new mental health response in the city, officials said. The rollout of the much-debated and anticipated co-responder pilot program, which will include police officers trained in mental health response, was highlighted at a Wednesday roundtable discussion Mayor Lori Lightfoot hosted to announce the launch of a public health campaign that aims to destigmatize issues around mental health. The Monday start does not include a second alternative response model, one that fully substitutes mental health clinicians for officers, that was preferred by several aldermen and community organizations. But Lightfoot and Chicago Department of Public Health Deputy Commissioner Matt Richards said the non-police model will be phased in, a process that was dictated by the mental health professionals who will be on the front lines of the response. What we heard from our mental health partners is people were comfortable with a phased approach, Richards said. We are really committed to this and we are building for the long haul. We want to approach it in a very responsible manner that assures our patients, our team are being supported the best possible way. Activists and aldermen supporting a non-police model had called for a plan to allow clinicians and paramedics to respond to non-life-threatening calls through a dedicated emergency line. To many, police officers simply are not equipped to respond to calls of people experiencing mental health-related distress. They argue the very presence of police, with sirens, flashing lights and guns, can increase anxiety and tension. In communities of color, the concern over how police will respond to a person in crisis is even greater, considering the long-standing mistrust minority communities have for officers and the fact that recent high-profile police-abuse deaths have involved Black victims. Indeed, the mayors plan was met with criticism from the groups who have been lobbying for the non-police version of such a plan, saying the pilot also appears too small. The fear and escalation with the police presence is always going to be a problem, said Arturo Carrillo, a social worker who works as an organizer for the Collaborative for Community Wellness. The pilot is so small scale. Its only one shift. When asked Wednesday by the media about the commitment to a non-police model, Lightfoot responded by saying: The answer is unequivocally yes, because we also know in certain circumstances, particularly when we are looking at people that are ODing, people that are having mental health crisis related to drug addiction, police are never the best answer. Will they be somewhere in the periphery to make sure everything is fine? The answer is yes. We want to see what are the right circumstances for a clinician-only response. The new response is modest at its start two separate teams that include a paramedic, clinician and police officer assigned to ride together over one shift in the Gresham and Town Hall districts. The shifts were chosen based on history of calls for such service, officials said. Lightfoots comments came as Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed into law a measure requiring all 911 emergency services involving a mental health crisis to create a mental health first responder team in conjunction with implementation next summer of the new 988 federal mental-health hotline. Known as the Community Emergency Services and Support Act, the law will require that 911 call center operators coordinate with a mobile mental and behavioral health services system established by the state Department of Human Services Division of Mental Health. The state will provide training and guidance to mobile health units and police officers aimed at equipping them to respond to those events. State Rep. Kelly Cassidy, D-Chicago, said there are a handful of local jurisdictions that have adopted a mental-health first responder model, which means that a 911 call in a mental health crisis will get a mental health response as opposed to a law enforcement one. But Illinois is the first state to declare that wherever you live in our state, you will get an appropriate response to your call for help. The Community Emergency Services and Support Act also became known as the Stefon Watts Act in honor of a 15-year-old who suffered from autism who was shot and killed in his home in a knife-wielding encounter with Calumet City police in February 2012. Pritzker said the pandemic has exacerbated the need for improved mental health services, saying more than half of Illinoisans reported a decline in their mental wellness during the COVID-19 outbreak and mitigation orders that followed. He also signed into law another measure making Illinois the third state in the nation to require insurance cover substance use and mental disorders. This is a sea change that will not only help Illinoisans get the care that they need, but will reaffirm our commitment to the basic principle that just like physical health, mental health care is essential not optional, Pritzker said. Sponsoring state Sen. Laura Fine said Illinois was at a critical juncture. We are facing two public health crises right now: COVID-19, and an ongoing mental health and addiction crisis that has been made worse by this pandemic, she said. However, too often, weve seen that when people try to access treatment, they are wrongfully denied care because their health plan will not tell them it is medically necessary. At Wednesdays event in Chicago, Lightfoot was joined by doctors and community health workers to launch the Un[ ]spoken campaign that aims to combat the negative stigma surrounding mental health and increase awareness of the publicly funded mental health resources in the city. The campaign, which launches Monday, will include links to a website that has a resource finder and testimonials of Chicagoans telling their stories of mental health struggles and recovery. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 KANKAKEE, Ill. Two men were killed and another was injured Thursday morning in a shooting near the courthouse in the small northern Illinois city of Kankakee, authorities said. Kankakee Police Chief Robin Passwater said officers arrested two men and recovered multiple firearms, including one long gun, at the scene. The two people who were fatally shot were Hispanic men in their mid-20s, and the third man who was shot is undergoing surgery, Passwater said during a news conference Thursday afternoon. Officers were dispatched to the courthouse in response to a shots fired call at about 9:50, he said. Kankakee County Sheriff Mike Downey told WGN TV earlier that the shooting happened between the courthouse and the county jail. Passwater did not talk about a possible motive for the shooting and did not take any questions. Kankakee is a community of about 26,000 people located about 60 miles south of Chicago. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 To the extent that COVID has been a major influence on the economy going back to early next year, the final chapter on this difficult story has yet to be written. Expiring federal benefits A total of 26 conservative-leaning states have ended their participation in the two programs since June. Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed on July 2 a Republican-sponsored compromise that requires DES to withdraw early from the PEUC and MEUC programs. No veto override vote has been attempted. The Senate Bill 116 compromise also makes permanent changes to work-search requirements that significantly stiffen eligibility criteria, such as a claimant must respond within 48 hours of an employers interview request. The upcoming expiration of the enhanced unemployment insurance compensation programs also is apt to weigh on labor force participation, said John Quinterno, principal with South by North Strategies Ltd., a Chapel Hill research company specializing in economic and social policy. Quinterno expressed concern that when the two federal programs expire, people, especially the long-term unemployed, tend to drift out of the labor force entirely. Were seeing evidence of that in states that let the programs lapse early, Quinterno said. In those states, unemployment is decreasing, yet employment isnt. Concerned about COVID-19? Sign up now to get the most recent coronavirus headlines and other important local and national news sent to your email inbox daily. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Winston-Salem police arrested a second male teenager Wednesday in connection with Sundays shooting death of a woman, authorities said. Detectives consulted with the Forsyth County District Attorneys Office before a 14-year-old boy was charged with murder in the death of Donna Rebecca Blackmon, 61, of East 14th Street, police said. The Winston-Salem Police Departments SWAT team arrested the teenager at 2:27 p.m. Wednesday without incident, police said. Blackmon was hit by a bullet fired from East 14th Street and died in her husbands arms in the early-morning hours Sunday. Police say the gun was fired by a juvenile. The juvenile was among a group of people who were riding back and forth along 14th Street and firing weapons, according to a report from WGHP/Fox 8, the news-gathering partner of the Winston-Salem Journal. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Lorenza Blackmon said his wife died from a shot that came through the wall and hit her in the back. Police responded to a report of the shooting about 4:25 a.m. in the 1200 block of East 14th Street, and found Donna Blackmon injured in the boarding house where she lived on the second floor with her husband. Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools officials are demanding a Greensboro janitorial services company complete background checks on all of its employees after one of them was accused of exposing himself at Lewisville Middle School on Wednesday. The employee was contracted to work as a custodian for the school system. Charles Edward Holland, 24, of North Peace Haven Road was charged with felony indecent exposure where the defendant is over 18 and the victim is under 16, a news release said. Holland is accused of exposing his penis in front of several girls in a hallway outside a bathroom on Wednesday and then masturbating, an arrest warrant said. Holland is specifically accused of exposing himself to at least one 12-year-old. The Forsyth County Sheriffs Office arrested him, and he is in the Forsyth County Jail on a $10,000 bond. He is scheduled to appear in Forsyth District Court on Friday. Court records show Holland was previously charged with two counts of felony indecent exposure in two separate incidents where the victim was 16. One was in March 2016 and another was in September 2016. Both happened in Mecklenburg County. Court records show that Holland pleaded guilty on May 30, 2017 to two misdemeanor counts of indecent exposure and was sentenced to 30 days in jail and 24 months of supervised probation. Jones declined to comment Wednesday and referred questions to Sharpe, who did not immediately return a message seeking comment. Jones did not file a written answer to the lawsuit before the settlement was reached. According to the lawsuit, the nurse began working for Thompson in 2017, after Baptist took over management of Wilkes Medical Center. For four years, their relationship was professional and platonic, the lawsuit said. Thompson also was the nurses physician, performing several medical procedures on the woman. Then, on May 17, Thompson told the nurse that he was having problems in his marriage and that she was attractive. He further told her that he was interested in having a relationship outside of work, according to the lawsuit. Thompson later apologized, and the nurse thought this was an isolated incident, the lawsuit said. About a month later, on June 11, Thompson, while in his truck, told the nurse that he had audio and video recordings on his cellphone that contained highly personal, confidential, and potentially damaging information about her, the lawsuit alleged. The recordings were of conversations that the nurse had with someone else. The lawsuit did not provide details about the contents of the recordings. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Winston-Salem police are continuing their search for a missing woman who is related to Forsyth County Sheriff Bobby Kimbrough Jr. Diamond Tierra Kimbrough, 21, was last seen in the 1200 block of Reynolds Forest Drive in Winston-Salem, authorities said. As of Wednesday, police had no leads to Kimbroughs whereabouts, said Kira Boyd, a police spokeswoman. Police are asking for the publics help in finding Kimbrough. Kimbrough is a Black woman with long black hair and brown eyes, police said. Kimbrough is 5 feet 7 inches tall and weighs about 150 pounds. The N.C. Center for Missing Persons has issued a Silver Alert for Kimbrough because she is believed to suffer from dementia or some other cognitive impairment, the center said in a statement. Diamond Kimbroughs direction of travel is not known, the center said. Her vehicle is a black 2009 Mazda 5 with N.C. license plate, BBV-7658. Bobby Kimbrough has said on his Facebook page that Diamond Kimbrough is his cousin. The sheriff issued a statement Wednesday about the missing woman. Committee members are also considering asking telecommunications companies to preserve phone records of several people, including members of Congress, to try to determine who knew what about the unfolding riot and when they knew it. With chants of hang Mike Pence," the rioters sent the then-vice president and members of Congress running for their lives and did more than $1 million in damage, and wounded dozens of police officers. Records requests are typically the starting point for investigations, and the committee is expected to conduct a wide-ranging review as it builds a public record detailing the chaos on Jan. 6. That inquiry could take more than a year, until the end of the congressional session. The demands are being made for White House records from the National Archives, along with material from the departments of Defense, Justice, Homeland Security and Interior, as well as the FBI and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The committee is also seeking information about efforts within the Trump administration to push the presidents baseless claims of election fraud and any efforts to try to overturn the results of Novembers election or to impede the peaceful transfer of power. A less-is-better approach has worked for three state Republican senators in getting at least one healthcare reform bill through the legislature. On Monday, the state House approved Senate Bill 462 by a 100-3 vote. The bill passed the Senate by a 48-1 vote on May 5. SB462 has been sent to Gov. Roy Cooper, who has 10 days to sign or veto the bill, or let it become law without his signature. The bill focuses on limited changes to the states controversial certificate of need (CON) program. The N.C. Healthcare Association, which typically opposes bills that would weaken or eliminate certificate of need laws, said it did not oppose SB462. The state must issue a certificate of need before a health care system or other medical provider can build a facility, buy equipment or offer a surgical procedure. It affects 28 health care sectors. The law took effect in 1978. The primary goal of the law is to prevent unnecessary duplication of services within a community or region as a means of controlling costs. The bills odds of clearing the Senate are considered promising given that Sen. Bill Rabon, R-Brunswick, and chairman of Rules committee, is one of its three primary sponsors, along with Sens. Paul Lowe, D-Forsyth, and Michael Lee, R-New Hanover. Rabon, a cancer survivor, has said SB711 would not serve as a gateway to recreational marijuana use. The bill requires the medical marijuana system be self-sustaining from a revenue perspective following initial money to set up the system. The funding would come mostly from license fees and a monthly fee equal to 10% of the gross revenue derived from the products sold at the medical cannabis centers. The bill previously was amended to reduce the number of medical cannabis centers from eight to four, two of which would be located in one of the states 20 Tier 1 counties likely Mecklenburg and in the Triangle. Forsyth and Guilford counties are in Tier 2. Sen. Michael Lee, R-New Hanover, has said the reason for not having revenue projections yet is that North Carolinas approach is different from that of other states with medical marijuana laws. After the sale, NPPD served notices of default seeking termination of their power purchase agreements. And the wind farms filed the lawsuits in U.S. District Court of Nebraska. Last year, U.S. District Judge Laurie Smith Camp said the wind farms had shown "as a matter of law that they did not default on their obligations under the PPAs." Because of that, she wrote, "NPPD is permanently enjoined from terminating the PPAs in reliance upon its alleged events of default." NPPD appealed to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, which on Tuesday agreed with Smith Camp's ruling. Judge L. Steven Grasz of Omaha, one of the three 8th Circuit judges who heard the case, said the panel concluded that the transfer of ownership interests of the wind farms' parent companies did not trigger the change-of-control provision in the PPAs. A corporate parent that owns shares of a subsidiary does not traditionally own or have legal title over the subsidiary's assets, he wrote. Point of Departure, the falls major exhibition at Sheldon Museum of Art, takes its name from a 1964 album by jazz pianist Andrew Hill, a recording that reaches back toward Bach, but nearly 60 years after it was recorded, continues to point to the future. In similar fashion, the paintings that fill Sheldons north galleries reach back to a point just after abstractions mid-20th century peak and take non-objective painting forward for six decades, pointing toward what is yet to come. Impressively, the visually striking, intellectually and historically rich exhibition is primarily drawn from Sheldons collection of 20th and 21st century art that is unmatched by any other university museum in the country. We have so much abstraction and were well known for abstraction, starting in 1910, said Wally Mason, Sheldons director and chief curator. We shifted from abstract painting to abstract sculpture during George's (Neubert) tenure. But we always acquired some. In my time, this is something were continuing to do. Other hospitals, including Nebraska Medicine in Omaha, followed suit in reducing elective surgeries. Ricketts on Thursday issued a new directed health measure that will take effect Monday and run for one month that requires the state's hospitals to stop doing elective surgeries that can be safely postponed for at least four weeks. The governor said the moves are similar to ones he made last year to deal with surging COVID-19 hospitalizations and that they were done in consultation with chief executive officers and chief medical officers at the state's hospitals. He also said he will consider making additional moves in the future if the number of available hospital beds continues to decline, such as restricting capacity at certain venues. Though COVID-19 patients make up about 11% of all hospitalizations, they are only occupying about 8% of the state's hospital beds. In November, more than 20% of the state's beds were occupied by COVID-19 patients at one point. Ricketts reiterated his opposition to mask and vaccine mandates, even as he acknowledged that getting vaccinated is the best way to manage the pandemic. The 18-year-old picked up the accuser from 17th and R streets a block from the Fiji house and took her to Bryan East Campus, Reed said, where they reported a sexual assault to LPD, which turned it over to UNL police. Reed said the accuser identified a 19-year-old man as the person who allegedly sexually assaulted her at the fraternity house. "If youre a young man who somehow thinks this is cool think again. It is unacceptable," Green said in his statement to students. "No means no. And if you violate that, and we can prove it you have no place on our campus." Police are employing "trauma informed investigating" to look further into the incident, Reed said, moving at the pace of the accuser with techniques focused on providing care, comfort and empathy for the 17-year-old. The university said there is no evidence to corroborate reports the accuser was found laying on the fraternity house's lawn with cuts and bruises. Rumors alleging the accused man, who has not been arrested or charged, had fled the country were not true, according to university and police sources. The student has left UNL, returned home and hired an attorney. "No means no. "We believe women." First gathering on the steps of UNL's student Union across the street from the Phi Gamma Delta, or Fiji, house, protesters trickled out onto R Street and then consumed the entire block, inching closer to the fraternity's front door as the night dragged on. Police intervened only when some demonstrators hopped a thigh-high stone wall and stood on the fraternity's front lawn, where UNL police officers told protesters they were trespassing. Ramzah said the department's goal was ensuring students had a safe environment to express their right to protest. One demonstrator had contact with police after he entered the fraternity house's lawn and tried to take someone's bullhorn, Ramzah said, though the police chief wasn't sure if the man was actually detained or if he was just escorted away from the crowd. There were tense moments scattered throughout the night, when the crowd's rhetoric escalated with calls for the accused to show his face and for demonstrators to "burn it down," referring to the fraternity house. LONDON (AP) A cafe in Scotland's capital where author J.K. Rowling wrote some of the Harry Potter books has been damaged in a fire. The Elephant House in Edinburgh suffered smoke and water damage after a blaze broke out at the patisserie next door on Tuesday. More than 60 firefighters and 12 fire engines were deployed to tackle the blaze. The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service said one of its crew members was taken to hospital as a precaution and later released. Images showed the cafe with its front windows gone, a ruined interior and debris lying outside. Owner David Taylor told the BBC he was "devastated" by the extensive damage to his business. He said the cafe would likely be closed for months for repairs. The Elephant House is a regular stop for Harry Potter fans and long bore a sign declaring itself as the "birthplace" of the fictional young wizard. Rowling has disputed that, saying she began writing the magical stories before she moved to Edinburgh. But she confirmed she frequented the cafe while penning some of the seven-book series. But he said it was Bidens fault for sticking to the agreement, and then failing to get out U.S. citizens and Afghan allies before the sudden collapse of the Afghan government and Army. A full pull-out was always a bad option, Sasse said. Weve been on a bad path for 18 months. (The Taliban) are not trustworthy. These are folks who not only want to kill their own people and oppress women and girls, they are willing to harbor certain terrorist groups. He would have preferred that the U.S. keep a long-term presence in Afghanistan at Bagram Air Base, about 25 miles from Kabul, the hub of U.S. operations during its nearly 20-year occupation. The decision to abandon Bagram was always a crazy idea, Sasse said. It was a really useful asset to have, west of China. Now he fears for the safety of up to 1,500 U.S. citizens who are still in Afghanistan, according to the State Department. He worries they could be stuck there if they arent able to get past Taliban checkpoints and reach Kabuls airport to board an evacuation flight. (The administration) put themselves into a situation where we depended on the good will scare quotes of the Taliban, Sasse said. The Taliban believes they have the momentum, and they can dictate the terms. Mighty Mouse returns to the Nebraska State Fair this year after six or seven years, said Gary Zaitshik, one of the managers of Wade Shows. Mighty Mouse, also known as the spinner coaster, is a multi-level ride that occupies the biggest footprint of any ride on the midway, Zaitshik said. It takes six semitrucks to transport Mighty Mouse and a large crane to set it up. Teenagers also are fond of Street Fighter 360, which will be back this year, Zaitshik said. Another popular attraction is Vertigo, a swing ride in which riders are pulled up on a tower and then quickly twirled around. Wade Shows will also provide the traditional favorites, such as Tilt-a-Whirl, the Spider, a Ferris wheel and a merry-go-round. Many people might not realize it, but Wade Shows operates the sky tram at the State Fair. Fairgoers dont realize the expense of a carnival ride, Zaitshik said. Some of the rides on the midway would take $2 million to replace. For a variety of reasons, some rides dont make it to an event as scheduled. But Wade Shows makes sure that if one drops out, its replaced with one of equal value. The rides will be spread a little farther apart this year because of COVID-19. The decision to use the groups grants to fund the installation of ethanol blenders at privately owned gas stations marked a clear departure from the agencys past grants. The higher-rated grant applications that were passed over, including a restoration of saline wetlands near Lincoln, represented the types of projects the Environmental Trust has previously funded. And the boards shift on conservation easements which aim to preserve private property, often by taking it out of agricultural production has changed the composition to the board. Gov. Pete Ricketts has declined to renew the appointments of at least one member who supported conservation easements, which have been criticized in some rural counties for taking land off the tax rolls. Regardless of the arguments that can be made for these as matters of policy, the debates surrounding the Environmental Trust are now focused on people rather than the nature that the group is statutorily supposed to conserve, enhance and restore. Texas is claiming the headquarters of California companies at more than four times the rate of its nearest competitor, according to a study by McKinney-based Spectrum Location Solutions and Stanford Universitys Hoover Institution released Tuesday. The Lone Star State won 114 California corporate relocations from Jan. 1, 2018, to June 30 of this year, 89 more than Tennessee, which had the second-most wins in that period. Forty-one of those companies planted corporate flags in North Texas. The Austin area claimed 57, Houston got nine and the San Antonio area attracted six. Study authors Joseph Vranich and Lee Ohanian cited high taxes, harsh regulatory policies and rising energy and utility costs as factors contributing to the California exodus. Moving a company to Texas, theres a sense of calmness and a sense of certainty, said Vranich, a longtime critic of Californias business environment who moved his own firm out of the state in 2018. Regulations per se are not bad. But having some stability in knowing what they are, how much they might change, that stability is evident in Texas. RACINE Some local residents have found success in reducing debt and increasing their savings thanks to a city program that offers free financial counseling. The Racine Financial Empowerment Center opened its doors less than nine months ago and already its clients have significant debt reduction through the free one-on-one counseling sessions. Since opening in December, the center has conducted 313 counseling sessions with 124 clients and those clients have now jointly reduced their non-mortgage debt by $100,891 as of Aug. 20. In addition to reducing debt, the FECs first 124 clients have succeeded in increasing their savings by more than $73,100, and 16 clients have increased their credit scores by more than 35 points. Im thrilled that the Racine FEC has already helped City residents reduce more than $100,000 in debt, said City of Racine Mayor Cory Mason. I applaud the work that our Racine FEC counselors are doing and am so proud of the City residents who have come forward already to get help from the FEC. The FEC is truly making a difference and this milestone is proof of that. UPDATED: New information was provided to The Journal Times on Thursday with updated ESSER Funding Data, resulting in changes to the expected funds for school districts. The Joint Finance Committee is still reviewing the DPI's proposed allocations. Data in this story has been updated to reflect the more recent numbers. Racine County schools are receiving nearly $97 million in COVID-19 pandemic aid from the federal government. School leaders say short-term help wont close gaps between students and leaves the most vulnerable kids no better off. In March 2020, the pandemic led Wisconsin schools to close their doors and attempt to continue educating virtually. Through Zoom, Google Classroom and a slew of other online tools, educators did what they could. Gaps appeared anyway. Congress made more than $160 billion available in the short term to help schools close those gaps as the pandemic continues. School leaders say this one-time aid is not the answer. Year-over-year funding is needed, they say, but state and national leaders have been slow or unwilling to commit to substantial, permanent change. This new money wont last, nor will it bring substantive change, according to local educational leaders. Unprecedented loss The 2020-21 academic year was no easier than the year prior. Schools debated how best to continue educating while keeping their students safe while still trying to educate them, implementing remote, hybrid and in-person options. As COVID-19 cases began to dwindle, so did restrictions. But, students had already paid the price. On average, students were five months behind in math and four months behind in reading at the end of the 2020-21 school year, according to research by McKinsey and Company. Local districts were no exception. Districtwide, Racine Unified School District had 4,553 students failing at least one class the first semester of the 2018-19 school year and 4,801 the first semester of 2019-20. The first semester of the 2020-21 school year, however, the district had 5,086 students failing at least one class. Burlington Area School District saw the number of students failing at least one class between Dyer Intermediate, Karcher Middle and Burlington High schools rise from 97 to 164 to 339 over the last three full school years. Short-term aid, short-term solution To mitigate this unprecedented learning loss, Congress set up the Elementary And Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) Fund, which has been added to repeatedly since March 2020 to now include more than $165 billion. Wisconsin is receiving about $3.04 billion of that. The funds are a series of one-time grants, the last of which will be available through September 2024. Of that $3.04 billion, Racine County school districts received about $99 million combined, according to data compiled by the Associated Press. Milwaukee Public Schools received $10,658 in ESSER funding per student and RUSD received $4,846 per student. Meanwhile, Waterford High School received $834 per student. The funds were allocated to states based on the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, amended by 2015s Every Student Succeeds Act, which provides financial assistance to educational agencies and schools with higher numbers of children from low-income families. For instance, MPS has 74,683 students; 31.6% of them come from families with incomes below the poverty line and 44.3% come from families receiving food stamps (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, aka SNAP), according to the National Center for Education Statistics. In RUSD, there are 17,529 students; 19.8% of the students come from families with incomes below the poverty level, according to NCES. Of RUSD families, 33.3% of them receive food stamps or SNAP benefits. Conversely, just 1.5% of the 1,064 students Waterford High serves live below the poverty line, according to NCES, and 10.1% of its students come from families that receive SNAP benefits. The surrounding community of Waterford High, according to the same data, has a median household income of $92,336; compared to $41,838 for MPS or $55,116 for RUSD. A caveat of the funding is funds state governors are permitted to allocate, otherwise known as Governors Emergency Education Relief (GEER) Grant Program, which is coming in two waves. This program, according to Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers office, allowed the governor to award funds to the districts most impacted by COVID-19, based on recommendations from the state Department of Public Instruction. The recommendations from DPI, Agni said, were based on four categories: Percentage of students scoring below basic on English language arts. Percentage of students from economically disadvantaged families. Percentage of households with no electronic devices. Percentage of households with no internet. Those in the top 35% of all LEAs (Local Education Agencies) based on the criteria were deemed to be the most impacted by school closures, and thus eligible for GEER funds, Evers Press Assistant Chet Agni said in an email. This resulted in awarding funds from GEER I to 156 LEAs and three tribal schools. Evers has awarded, via DPI, $46.6 million to 156 Wisconsin LEAs and 3 Tribal Schools. While GEER I was based on an application and need basis, the University of Wisconsin will receive all of GEER II to assist with COVID-19 testing plans, according to Agni. Districts are still waiting to find out exactly how much theyll be getting in the third wave of ESSER funds. However, ESSER I and II have widely been earmarked, or even already spent. Three of the largest districts in the county Racine Unified School District, Burlington Area School District and Waterford Union High School District reported spending a large portion of funds on technology and virtual offerings to assist with remote learning. Some spending so far, more in store Waterford High School District Superintendent Lucas Francois said a majority of the ESSER I funding in his district went towards covering tuition for JEDI Virtual School, a public charter school that collaborates with districts, as well as hot spots so students could actually access online learning. The district, Francois said, also used services from Hapara, a Google Classroom management service. Then, in the second round of ESSER, we used all of those funds for our JEDI tuition for our students that were receiving online instruction, Francois said. Similarly, RUSD invested ESSER I funds for immediate student, family and staff needs resulting from the transition to remote learning as well as COVID-19 safety measures. The district is still finalizing plans for ESSER II and III, though plans involve COVID-19 preparedness, learning loss and mental health support, technology, continued staff employment and services to special populations, according to RUSD spokeswoman Stacy Tapp. Tapp emphasized that very few plans are set in stone and that things may change based on community feedback, which overwhelmingly supported addressing and overcoming barriers to learning, in-school social and emotional learning, assessing and addressing learning loss, outreach and services to special populations, increasing access to nutritious foods and leverage community organizations to meaningfully engage with parents and other stakeholders. No plans are set in stone yet, with the exception of things related to preparedness and response to COVID-19 since these pertain to the health and safety of students, staff and families, Tapp said in an email. While WUHS has yet to receive the ESSER III funds, it will likely be used to reimburse devices that were provided to students, such as Chromebooks and iPads, according to Francois. The reality of the funding, he said, while helpful, was that it is one-time and would likely not be the factor that helps districts catch their students back up. For schools nationwide, there were the many unforeseen costs associated with the pandemic such as masks, hand sanitizer or higher rated air ventilation filters, which can help reduce the transmission of COVID-19, according to the CDC. These costs, Francois explained, meant the ESSER funds are going to be short-lived. So, there really wasnt any new money; it just replaced some of the additional costs that schools had to incur in order to operate, Francois said. So similarly, going forward, we still have a gap of knowledge that was lost when students were not in school, that we need to remediate. And these funds, although helpful, are not going to cover the full costs of services and staffing that were going to need to give students the extended time that they need to catch back up and to even propel forward in the years to come. Unsure on usefulness For a time earlier this year, Wisconsins Republican budget-writers put $2.3 billion of Wisconsins ESSER funding in jeopardy by not budgeting a federal minimum in funding for Wisconsin to qualify to receive the money; conservatives argued that, if the federal government is going to give so much, why should Wisconsins taxpayers need to chip in? Republicans later moved the money around and the 2021-23 state budget was signed by Evers. But even during that time, BASD School Board President Peter Turke said he was unsure how useful the ESSER funds would actually be. Now, Turke said he is still unsure. With ESSER funds came specifications on what they could be used for. While saying he was grateful for the funds, as they would help the district offset costs caused by the pandemic, he held more hope for discussions at the state level about a possible increase in special education funding. To me, that would be vital, because thats something that were underfunded on, Turke said. And every year, we have to pull from our general fund balance. And we want to make sure our special ed kids, obviously, receive an outstanding education. During a community feedback event last month, RUSD leaders were also acutely aware of the limited capacity of the funding. Their presentation began with a warning in a red box: Funding cliffs are typical when federal relief aid stops. Each district expressed gratitude for the funding, but seemed to land on the same page school district budgets, as always in Wisconsin, will be tight. When asked what needs to happen for true remediation to occur, Francois said there needs to be recurring sources of funding. We are already living within our means because of the state imposed revenue caps, Francois said. But if we want to go above and beyond the services that we deliver traditionally every day in and day out, and try to do more to remediate the kids above and beyond the normal school day, we need recurring funds. Love 0 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. I detect fear in the minds of some of our Republican State Senators that teaching the history of racism in our public and charter schools will damage our students, especially our white students. Throughout our recent history, when white students were taught the truth about systemic racism, many have become white allies and have stood ready to help. Learning that Black people were denied, by state and local laws, the right to vote did not affect the self-esteem of white students. In fact, when many older students learned of this violation of all Americans constitutional rights, they filled buses and spent a summer in the South working to register Black people to vote. They acted as white allies at a critical time. During the Civil Rights Movement, legislation opened public accommodations for Black people and people of color. Learning that people were denied access to hotels, restaurants, stores, theaters, schools, and so many places did not make white students hate themselves. In fact, it led to changes in the laws that many of them, acting as allies, embraced. According to Michael Eric Dyson in his recent book, Long Time Coming, since 2007 through 2012, two Black people were killed every week by white police. Last summer after the murder of George Floyd, thousands of white youth, acting Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I am not sure about the universe. Albert Einstein. I wonder what he would think if he were alive today? Our joke of an Assembly leader attended a rally in Alabama with Rump who was booed when he suggested people should be vaccinated against the virus. At a rally earlier in Alabama, M.T.G. was applauded when she said Alabama had the lowest vaccinated rate of any state. I have been thinking of a place to send all the anti-vaxxers, maybe Alabama? I have a hard time feeling sorry for unvaccinated people who die of the virus. I also do not feel sorry when a drunk driver not wearing a seat belt crashes into a tree and dies. I would not feel sorry for a person who went to the zoo, jumped into the tiger enclosure and was killed. But at least in these two examples, they are not infecting others with stupidity. Anti-vaxxers are potentially infecting others with the virus. One grows out of young, but stupid is forever. Parents around the country are protesting mask mandates for students, many not old enough to get the vaccine. This is beyond stupidity; child neglect is more like it. 1. Yes. An unvaccinated worker is a potential health liability for the entire workforce. 2. Yes. But it should only be required in some businesses, like health care or food service. 3. No. The requirement shouldnt be forced on employees; its a discriminatory practice. 4. No. Not only should they not require COVID shots , but no proof of vaccination either. 5. Unsure. Its a hard choice between public safety concerns and personal freedoms. Vote View Results KEARNEY Robbing $150 from a convenience store at the Minden I-80 interchange has a Lincoln man facing prison time. Jeremy Anderson, 22, of Lincoln pleaded no contest in Buffalo County District Court to felony robbery of the Fort Kearny Trading Post at 1730 Keystone Road, 6 miles east of Kearney. A no contest plea is neither an admission nor denial of guilt, but the plea is treated the same as a guilty plea. Judge John Marsh accepted his plea and ordered the Nebraska Probation Office to do a presentence investigation on Anderson. Findings of that report including background information on a defendant, family and criminal history, employment record and a substance abuse evaluation will help Marsh to issue an appropriate sentence, which is scheduled in September. Anderson remains in custody at the Buffalo County Jail on a $50,000 bond. Around 2:04 p.m. April 11 an employee at the convenience store/gas station reported a man with a black hoodie came into the store to purchase a drink. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Believe it or not, there are still plenty of places in the U.S. where theres no cell phone service and, as a result, no way of navigating with your smartphone on the spot. You might have to use brace yourself a map. Remember maps? Theyre made of paper, and no matter how hard you swipe, tap or pinch, they don't change. Maps dont have pop-up ads or cookies that track your searches; they might have pictures of local attractions around their edges instead. And while folding maps might be a lost art, reading them isnt. As my wife and I plan to drive cross-country, were bringing an atlas of maps as a backup. Its bulky and you have to turn the pages. But we want to be prepared for the unexpected. 8 reasons to bring a map Its a good idea to bring a map on a road trip as a backup, says Michael Tischler, Ph.D., director of the National Geospatial Program at the U.S. Geological Survey, or USGS. When I was a kid, we always had a Rand McNally road atlas in our car, Tischler says. But there's more than just the nostalgia factor. Here are a few times when you could be glad to have an old-fashioned map: On Aug 24 at about 11:11 a.m. the Dunn County Emergency Communications Center received a 911 call from a construction crew working at a construction site 390th St. in the Town of Menomonie reporting 2 males were down and had possibly been struck by lightning. One male was reported to be not breathing. The Dunn County Sheriffs Office and Menomonie Fire and Rescue responded to the scene. Two male patients were located -- one suffering from suspected serious injuries and the other was not breathing. Immediate medical attention was given to both patients, however despite efforts to revive the 60-year-old male, he was pronounced deceased at the scene by The Dunn County Medical Examiners office. The other patient, a 20-year-old male, was transported to Mayo Eau Claire by Menomonie Fire and Rescue with a suspected serious injury. Preliminary investigation shows a crew was working on a pole shed construction. They were working under a partial roof. The two injured employees were on ladders when lightning struck in the area. Both were knocked off their ladders. The crew had stopped working due to weather and when the weather broke they started to work again. Shortly after starting to work again the lighting struck. This case remains under investigation by the Dunn County Sheriffs Office and the Dunn County Medical Examiners Office. Everybody 2 years old or older in Winona will need to wear a mask starting at 12:01 a.m. Thursday when indoors in public, according to a mandate issued Wednesday after the declaration of a local emergency. Face masks are also recommended when outdoors if proper distancing is not possible. Winona Mayor Scott Sherman said Wednesday in a statement from the city, "Masks allow our community to keep businesses open and allow our students and children to learn in a safe environment. The health and safety of all Winonans is of prime concern and masks, among other tools, help us to stay safe and healthy." Locations included in this mandate include, but are not limited to, restaurants, bars, stores, gyms, and other businesses. People can take off their masks if they are seated at tables within restaurants and bars. Exceptions for this mandate includes if a person is unable to wear a face covering due to a medical, disability or developmental condition. Other exceptions are listed on the city of Winona's website. If people go against this mandate, they will be asked to leave businesses. If they do not leave the business, police can be called and trespassing citations may be issued. USDA staff worked with village to fund their water and sewer project earlier this year through the Water & Environmental Program with a $1.3 million loan and $972,000 grant. This project will include new water distribution lines to provide clean, safe and reliable water in the resettlement areas, including a new well. The sewer improvements will be designed to assist in preventing sewer backups related to previous flooding incidents and allow for the relocating of residential and commercial development out of the floodplain into proposed resettlement sites. This project included $1 million in leveraged funds through the Department of Housing and Urban Development Community Development Block Grant. USDA is here to be a strong partner to our rural communities so they can build back better and more resilient in times of natural disasters, said Michelle Wallace, USDA Rural Development Wisconsin Acting State Director. Through our Community Facilities & Environmental programs, we continue to maximize the affordability of communities infrastructure needs by stretching our dollars further when we partner with other state and federal agencies. The Aug. 24 announcement includes funding from the Community Facilities Loan and Grant Program and the $150 million in grants included in the Additional Supplemental Appropriations for Disaster Relief Act. More than 100 types of projects are eligible for Community Facilities funding. Under the Biden-Harris Administration, Rural Development provides loans and grants to help expand economic opportunities, create jobs and improve the quality of life for millions of Americans in rural areas. This assistance supports infrastructure improvements; business development; housing; community facilities such as schools, public safety and health care; and high-speed internet access in rural, Tribal and high-poverty areas. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 For many FFA members, receiving the State FFA Degree is the pinnacle of their FFA career. During the 92nd Wisconsin FFA Convention held in July at the Alliant Energy Center in Madison, 304 members from across the state realized that lofty goal. As FFA members progress through their junior and high school careers, they are able to earn the Discovery Degree, Greenhand Degree and Chapter FFA Degree at the chapter level. The Wisconsin State FFA Degree is the highest degree an FFA member can obtain on the state level. The highly coveted American FFA Degree is awarded at the National FFA Convention and Expo each year to less than 1% of FFA members making it one of the organizations highest honors. The State FFA Degree has several requirements of scholarship, leadership, volunteerism and work experience in agriculture. This year's state degree recipients represent 124 FFA chapters from across the state. Members from the De Soto FFA Chapter receiving this honor include: Keith Kunert of De Soto, April Haakenson of Ferryville, and Alex Scoville of De Soto. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Students will be under all manner of pandemic-related stresses as they hit classrooms for the new school year, but there is a lot of help available to make the transition back to school easier. Dr. Lisa Gwynn, a pediatrician and medical director for the Pediatric Mobile Clinic at the University of Miami, says her best advice for parents whose children are anxious or are having a difficult transition back to school is to follow Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendations, talk with your child every day and communicate regularly with teachers. Some students havent seen their pediatricians during the pandemic, so Gwynn advises parents to watch for any new health issues that crop up and make sure kids are up to date on their other vaccines. Signs to watch for in kids for anxiety, depression Parents also should watch for signs of anxiety and depression such as not wanting to get up in the morning or resistance to going to school, said Gwynn. Beginning-of-school jitters are normal, but parents need to see if something above and beyond is going on, said Dr. Elizabeth Pulgaron, a psychologist and associate professor of clinical pediatrics at UM. Eating and sleeping disruptions and tantrums, this is above and beyond. Refugees from Afghanistan have arrived at Fort McCoy in Wisconsin and up to 10,000 more could do so in the coming weeks, U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson said Wednesday after meeting with base officials. The western Wisconsin base is one of three military installations nationwide that has been processing people evacuated from Afghanistan since the country fell to the Taliban. Johnson, a Republican, visited Fort McCoy along with Republican state lawmakers and some military veterans. Democratic Gov. Tony Evers was also there separately and met with refugees, U.S. Northern Command Gen. Glen VanHerck and Maj. Gen. Paul Knapp, the leader of the Wisconsin National Guard. Johnson doesnt believe refugees from Afghanistan are being properly vetted. The senator expressed those doubts Wednesday after he and five Republican state legislators got a tour of facilities housing refugees at Fort McCoy. During a press conference after the tour, Johnson criticized the Biden Administrations withdrawal of military forces from Afghanistan and its management of the ensuing refugee crisis. The first refugees arrived at Fort McCoy Sunday. Its not organized. Its not pre-planned. Its chaos, Johnson said. It was a disaster ... There isnt enough lipstick to put on this pig. La Crosse area leaders called on members of Congress to take bolder action on climate change at an event Thursday. At the event, which was hosted by Citizen Action of Wisconsin and Building Back Together at Western Technical College, local officials and activists spoke out on the ways climate change is impacting the region, urging for more initiatives to combat the crisis. Speakers spoke about the climate initiatives already underway in the area, such as solar panels and electric buses, but said that as communities face harder budgets, theyll need more help to continue these efforts. We have an entire population within La Crosse that are saying yes to sustainability, said Mayor Mitch Reynolds, but that city also needs to fund things such as fire departments, bike infrastructure and parks in an equitable way. And frankly we dont have enough resources to do that, Reynolds said. HELENA, Mont. (AP) Several parents are suing Missoula public schools over a mask requirement as the school year in Montana is set to begin amid a new wave of COVID-19 cases. An attorney representing parents of students in Missoula public schools said the requirement is in violation of the states constitution, which guarantees individuals the right to make their own medical decisions. Lawyer Quentin Rhoades said Thursday that there isnt sufficient scientific evidence that children wearing masks prevents the spread of the coronavirus for the government to override that individual right. The Missoula public schools superintendents office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit. An online fundraiser organized to cover the costs of filing the lawsuit raised $10,000 as of Thursday. Matt Stivers, who donated $100 to the cause, wrote that his son has difficulty breathing while wearing a mask because of a heart defect. RICHMOND, Va. (AP) Gov. Ralph Northam's administration received notification Wednesday that the Department of Defense had authorized the use of Marine Corps Base Quantico to house Afghan refugees, as well as a national guard installation in central Virginia. Less than a week remains before most students in Wisconsin will return to classrooms for their second first day of school under the coronavirus pandemics shadow, but how their day will look differs by district. Each public school district has its own COVID-19 protocols and thresholds for when if at all masks are required indoors this fall. Most have discontinued in-house virtual learning options that they started or bolstered last year, but many are offering an outsourced replacement for students who want to continue their education remotely. The News Republic and Daily Register gathered information on mask policies and virtual learning from 14 districts in Sauk and Columbia counties, finding it on their websites, in school board meetings or by contacting their superintendents. Mask policies remain fluid, but six districts in Sauk and Columbia counties have based their thresholds on local community transmission of COVID-19. The CDC recommends indoor masking for everyone age 2 and older, regardless of vaccination status. Seven have adopted an optional masking policy for some or all grade levels regardless of local spread of the disease. MADISON, Wis. (AP) University of Wisconsin System President Tommy Thompson on Thursday urged the Legislature and Gov. Tony Evers to set up a task force to re-examine every aspect of higher education in the state. Thompson told WisPolitics.com President Jeff Mayers during a Zoom interview that the UW System is falling behind other states. The system lacks a robust distance learning program, has too many buildings and too many campuses duplicate courses, he said. We just keep doing the same things and we're going to end up with the same result, he said. More (student) debt, more buildings, more classrooms. It's time for us to be controversial and take a look. What's in the best interest of the student? Thompson, a former Wisconsin governor, didn't lay out any specific goals for the proposed task force but complained that no one has given me the ability to go out and compete. You know me, I don't want any state to come into Wisconsin and take anything from us. Republican legislators essentially held system funding flat in the 2021-23 state budget. The GOP also gave the system about $629 million for building projects. Evers, the former state superintendent of schools, had asked for $1 billion. MADISON, Wis. (AP) A Republican state senator from Wisconsin who opposed mask and vaccine mandates and then developed pneumonia after testing positive for COVID-19 was in stable condition Wednesday after being placed on a ventilator, his spokesman said. State Sen. Andre Jacque, 40, tested positive for COVID-19 earlier this month and was hospitalized Aug. 16. He was placed on a ventilator Monday night, spokesman Matt Tompach said in providing the first update on his condition in a week. Sen. Jacque was intubated and placed on a ventilator Monday evening, Tompach said. While his condition is currently stable, the days and weeks ahead will continue to be an incredibly stressful and difficult time for Sen. Jacques family. He said that future updates would be provided as necessary. Placing COVID-19 patients on a ventilator is often the last option of treatment when a patient is struggling to breathe. Some patients who are placed on ventilators do recover. Jacque said Aug. 16 that he had tested positive the previous week after testifying at a packed committee hearing while not wearing a mask. Jacque opposed mask mandates and requirements for vaccinations. It wasnt known whether Jacque was vaccinated. WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden vowed Thursday to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite the day's deadly suicide bomb attack at the Kabul airport. He promised to avenge the deaths of 13 U.S. service members killed in the attack, declaring to the extremists responsible: We will hunt you down and make you pay. After a brief hiatus in 2020 because of COVID-19, Dutch Wonderland's Happy Hauntings event will continue this October. Happy Hauntings will happen over the span of six days, starting Saturday, Oct. 16. It will continue after that from noon to 8 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays leading up to Halloween. Families can expect to see themed rides, special treats and the Dutch Wonderland Trick-or-Treat trail hosted in the park's Exploration Island. We are thrilled to welcome guests back to the Kingdom for Kids this fall, said General Manager James Paulding in a press release. So many guests enjoyed being back in the park this season, and we know Dutch Wonderland fans will be pleased Happy Hauntings has officially returned. Weekend one-day tickets for Dutch Wonderland cost $49.99 for those ages 3 to 59 and $39.99 for those older than 60. A season pass for 2022 costs from $79.99-$169.99 per person and includes admission to Happy Hauntings this year. For more information, visit dutchwonderland.com. WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealands government has extended a strict nationwide lockdown through Tuesday as it tries to quash its first outbreak of the coronavirus in six months. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Friday the government expects to keep Auckland, where most of the cases have been found, in full lockdown for at least two more weeks. But she expects most other parts of the country can ease restrictions slightly from Wednesday. The announcement came as health authorities reported 70 new daily cases, the most yet in the outbreak, which has grown to nearly 350 cases in total. Ardern said there was evidence the lockdown was working and new case numbers were beginning to level off. She said she remained committed to the strategy of eliminating the virus entirely. MORE ON THE PANDEMIC: U.S. may reach 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths by Dec. 1. AP-NORC poll: Half of US workers favor vaccine, mask mandate in workplaces Illinois Gov. Pritzker requires educators, health workers to get vaccine U.S. virus surge breaks hospital records amid rising toll on kids Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine HERES WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING: LAS VEGAS -- A man from the Las Vegas area won the $1 million grand prize Thursday to cap an eight-week coronavirus vaccination jackpot program. Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak created the program to boost enthusiasm for COVID-19 shots. The prize winners were introduced by their first name and last initial at a live event hosted by the governor at the Las Vegas Convention Center and aides at the Sierra Arts Foundations Riverside Gallery in Reno. The program called Vax Nevada Days launched June 17 with $5 million in federal coronavirus relief funds. State health data showed the percentage of vaccinated state residents increased about 10% between the time the prize pool was announced in mid-June and when it ended Thursday. FRANKFORT, Ky. Kentuckys governor said Thursday that the latest wave of grim COVID-19 statistics would have triggered a statewide mask mandate indoors if he still wielded the authority to take such action. But the Kentucky Supreme Court recently shifted pandemic-related decisions on masking and other issues to the Republican-dominated legislature, Gov. Andy Beshear said. So the Democratic governor used his bully pulpit to continue urging people to mask up when indoors, away from home. The Bluegrass State has reached uncharted territory with the prolonged escalation of virus infections, hospitalizations and patients in intensive care, he said at a news conference. On Wednesday, Kentucky reported 65 virus-related deaths. It also notched its third-highest daily number of new COVID-19 cases as the highly contagious delta variant overwhelms many hospitals. On Thursday, Beshear reported new record highs in Kentucky, with 2,115 virus patients hospitalized, including 590 in intensive care and 345 on ventilators. The state suffered 27 more virus-related deaths and had 5,401 new COVID-19 cases, its second-highest daily total of the pandemic. The escalation caused more than 10,000 COVID-19 infections reported statewide in the past two days, and 4,600 children tested positive for the virus in the last three days, he said. LINCOLN, Neb. Nebraskas hospitals are even more crowded now than they were at the height of the coronavirus pandemic in November, Gov. Pete Ricketts said Thursday as he announced a staffing emergency to try to address a severe shortage of health care workers. The states hospitals were treating a 3,162 patients as of Wednesday, up from 3,074 on Nov. 20, when the number of known cases was at its all-time high. Most of the recent hospitalizations arent virus-related, however, and Ricketts said the increase was driven by patients seeking treatment for other medical problems. According to state data, hospitals are currently treating 337 virus patients about 11% of total hospitalizations. In November, the hospitals counted 987 virus patients, accounting for 32% of hospitalizations. Ricketts said he declared the emergency after consulting with the states hospital administrators. But he stopped short of calling it a COVID-19 emergency, which would allow the state to once again disclose daily case information. MEMPHIS, Tenn. The president of CEO of the Memphis-based St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital said in a letter Thursday that parents should protect their children by insisting that they wear masks in the classroom. In his letter, Dr. James Downing mentioned Tennessee Gov. Bill Lees recent executive order allowing parents to opt out of mask mandates issued by school districts. Many school systems are complying with the Republican governors order, but Shelby County Schools in Memphis and the school district in Nashville are defying it and still requiring students and staff to wear masks in school buildings. Some parents have protested mask mandates outside schools and at board meetings, arguing that mask-wearing by their children should be their choice. Downing wrote that masks are safe to wear and they help prevent the spread of COVID-19. Protesting mask mandates puts an agenda before childrens health, Downing wrote. This stance is not rational. Stop the arguments and the protests. Stand up as a community and do what is right to protect children." BUENOS AIRES, Argentina A federal prosecutor is accusing Argentine President Alberto Fernandez of apparently violating his own pandemic restrictions decree by joining a dozen other people at his wifes birthday party. The action by prosecutor Ramiro Gonzalez means Fernandez could face a criminal investigation. The party was held last year at the presidential residence at a time when the government had banned social gatherings to impede the spread of COVID-19. Investigators began looking into the case when a photo circulated this month showing Fernandez together with his wife Fabiola Yanez and other unmasked people standing around a table with with remnants of a party. The government acknowledged that the photograph was taken on July 14, 2020, at a moment when restrictions were in place. The president publicly apologized. While the president is in no risk of going to prison for such an offense, it has dented his image ahead of Novembers legislative elections. MONTGOMERY, Ala. - Alabama is seeing a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases in school-age children, with more than 5,000 cases reported last week an increase officials say is likely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant and is causing some schools to temporarily switch to remote learning. The Alabama Department of Public Health said last week, 5,571 children ages 5 to 17 were reported to have COVID-19. That compares to 702 cases in school-aged children during the same week last year, a time when more than half of students were studying remotely and a less contagious variant was circulating. State Health Officer Scott Harris pointed to delta variant as the most likely explanation. The numbers are staggering, Harris said of the increase We want to remind people that everyone needs to be vaccinated who is eligible, that is everyone 12 and up. We strongly recommend universal masking in schools. Hospitalizations and deaths in children remain relatively rare, according to state numbers. Of the nearly 2,900 patients in state hospitals with COVID-19 on Thursday, fewer than 50 were children, according to the Alabama Hospital Association. OFALLON, Mo. Missouri is opening antibody treatment centers in several counties in the hopes that theyll keep some high-risk patients with COVID-19 from dying or becoming critically ill. Monoclonal antibody infusion treatment will be available for 30 days at sites in Jackson, Pettis, Scott, Butler and Jefferson counties. Two more sites will be added later in the St. Louis area. The state is spending $15 million on the centers and believes they could treat up to 4,000 people over the next month. The initial site was set up last month in southwestern Missouri, a region hit hard by the delta variant surge. Health officials said 588 people have been treated at an infusion center in Springfield. Katie Towns, the health director for Springfield and Greene County, said in a news release that the treatment has undoubtedly saved lives in our community. The drugs are lab-made versions of virus-blocking antibodies that help fight off infections. Antibody treatments are among the few therapies that can lessen the effects of COVID-19, and they are seen as an option for those with mild-to-moderate cases who arent yet in hospitals. On Thursday, the states COVID-19 dashboard showed that hospitalizations rose by 84, to 2,352. The state cited 2,161 newly confirmed cases, bringing its pandemic total to 622,081. The state also has reported 10,409 COVID-19 deaths since the onset of the pandemic. DETROIT The head of the 397,000-member United Auto Workers union says its against requiring members to be vaccinated against the virus that causes COVID-19. New President Ray Curry says if any of the 700 companies that employ union members wants to impose such a requirement, it would be subject to bargaining with union officials. Curry told reporters Thursday that the union encourages members to get vaccinations and consider boosters when they are available. But the union respects members wishes if they dont want to be vaccinated for religious, medical or personal reasons, he said. The UAW would be against mandates even if infected workers could endanger fellow employees, Curry said. We also believe that the employers and the employees that we represent in those locations still have a voice, and we will have to take those things under consideration, he said. No employers have contacted the union about requiring vaccines or imposing additional health care costs on employees who arent vaccinated, Curry said. MOSCOW Russia reported a one-day record of 820 coronavirus deaths. The national coronavirus taskforce says the number of new daily infections reached 19,630. That follows a consistent ebb since the beginning of the month when 22,800 cases were reported. The previous record for deaths was 819 on Aug. 14. Russia has reported more than 6.8 million confirmed cases and 179,243 confirmed deaths. NEW ORLEANS A Louisiana teenager has died of COVID-19. The coroner in East Baton Rouge Parish on Thursday confirmed the death of 14-year-old Patrick Sanders III from the city of Baker. Baton Rouge media report that Sanders, who died Wednesday, was a football player at Baker High School. Sanders death came days after the state reported the death of an infant. Children under 18 made up about 30% of cases reported Thursday in Louisiana. The state reported more than 5,100 new probable and confirmed coronavirus cases Thursday and 72 confirmed deaths. Hospitalizations statewide stand at 2,729, down from more than 3,000 earlier this month. Vaccinations in Louisiana are increasing, with nearly 60,000 doses administered since Monday. First shots have been given to about 49% of the states population. FRANKFORT, Ky. Kentucky and Texas have joined a growing list of states that have surpassed their record for hospitalized coronavirus patients. The two states on Wednesday reported the most COVID-19 patients in their hospitals since the start of the pandemic. At least six other states Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi and Oregon have already surpassed their records amid a national surge in the virus. The latest spike is fueled by the highly contagious delta variant of the virus among those who are unvaccinated. In areas with low vaccination rates, doctors have pleaded with their communities to get inoculated to spare overburdened hospitals. They have also sounded the alarm about the growing toll of the delta strain on children and young adults. Nationwide, COVID-19 deaths are averaging more than 1,100 a day, the highest level since mid-March. New cases per day are averaging over 152,000, turning the clock back to the end of January. As of this week, the number of people in the hospital with the coronavirus was around 85,000, a level not seen since early February. NEW YORK The U.S. is projected to reach nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths by Dec. 1. Thats the prediction from the nations most closely watched forecasting model. But health experts say that toll could be cut in half if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. Some behavior changes already may be flattening the curve in a few places in the South where the coronavirus has raged this summer. An Associated Press analysis shows the rate of new cases is slowing in Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas. The projection from models at the University of Washington indicates deaths will rise to nearly 1,400 a day by mid-September, then decline slowly. Deaths are currently averaging 1,100 a day in the U.S., turning the clock back to mid-March. The projection is an additional 98,000 Americans will die by the start of December, for an overall U.S. death toll of nearly 730,000. Update: Matthew Mindler was found dead in Manor Township on Saturday, Aug. 28. His death has been ruled a suicide. Click here to read more. Editor's note: A previous version of this story stated Mindler is 20 years old. Police have clarified that Mindler is 19. Police are searching for a 19-year-old Millersville University student who has been missing since Tuesday. Matthew Mindler of Hellertown, a first-year student, was reported missing Wednesday night, according to university police, who said he hasnt been seen in his room and also hasnt returned calls from family members. He was last seen about 8:11 p.m. Tuesday exiting his residence hall at West Village, walking toward a parking lot near Centennial Drive, police said. At the time, Mindler was wearing a white Millersville University hoodie with black stripes on its arms, as well as a black backpack, jeans and white sneakers, police said. Mindler has not attended classes since Tuesday, according to university officials. According to The Morning Call, as well as an IMDb page with Mindler's name, Mindler has worked as an actor as recently as 2016, including on 2011's "Our Idiot Brother" with Paul Rudd and soap opera "As the World Turns." University police said they have been speaking with Mindlers mother while also working with campus staff, who are helping to locate the missing student. University officials said they also have notified local police departments about Mindler and filed a missing adult report with the National Crime Information Center. Anyone with information about Mindlers whereabouts has been asked to contact university police 717-871-4357 or to contact the local chief, Pete Anders, directly at 717-871-5972 or peter.anders@millersville.edu. Information can also be reported anonymously through the Millersville LiveSafe Safety App, officials said. EL CAJON, Calif. (AP) Three families from a San Diego suburb have made it out of Afghanistan after they went to the country earlier this summer to visit relatives and got stuck there amid the chaos following the Taliban's takeover, officials said Thursday. Five other families from El Cajon were still trying to get out, and U.S. government officials along with California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa were working on their safe return. The suburb, east of San Diego, has a large refugee population. Many of the families had gone to Afghanistan in May and early June, weeks before the crisis unfolded, so their children could see their grandparents and other relatives. Officials initially said six families from El Cajon were trapped there but later learned there were a total of eight families from the city trying to get out of the country. We have more work to do and under extremely difficult conditions, Issa said in a statement. Fraidoon Hashemi, an Afghan who works as a community liaison for the Cajon Valley Union School District, said he has been in contact with the families and on Thursday was awaiting word from those who remain. All the families have children attending various schools in the district. He said he was growing concerned because of news that two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport Thursday. We hope to hear from them soon, he said. Howard Shen, a district spokesman, said one family with five children arrived in San Diego on Wednesday night. The two other families were out of Afghanistan, but Shen said he could not confirm exactly where they were only that they are safe. That's all we want," he said. Counseling was being made available for the families and for their children's schools. Hashemi said the family back in San Diego was still shaken after their harrowing experience. They are OK now, he said. They need to calm down and forget what theyve seen. In all, the El Cajon families included two dozen children, some of whom witnessed shootings and other violence in and around the Kabul airport in recent days, Hashemi said. The families had each traveled to Afghanistan on their own on different dates and were not part of an organized trip. The families asked U.S. officials for help after being blocked by the throngs of Afghans at the airport desperately trying to escape after their governments rapid collapse and the withdrawal of U.S. troops. The school district became aware of the problem after a relative of one of the families reached out to say their child would be late starting the school year, which began Aug. 17. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan. It was unclear if that included all the El Cajon families. Some are U.S. citizens; others have U.S. residency. Despite travel warnings from the U.S. government, many felt an urgency to go to the country after not being able to see their extended families because of travel bans from the coronavirus pandemic, Hashemi said. Most of the El Cajon families came to the United States on a special immigrant visa after having worked for the U.S. government or U.S. military in Afghanistan, officials said. The visa allows in only the person and their spouse and children. Superintendent David Miyashiro said the families are particularly scared because of the upcoming Aug. 31 deadline for the United States to complete its withdrawal. Miyashiro said he could not provide more details since the children and their parents could be in danger. This story corrects the spelling of district community liaison Fraidoon Hashemi's last name. PHOENIX (AP) The Supreme Court's decision to order the reinstatement of the Remain in Mexico immigration policy is sparking criticism from advocacy groups and praise by former President Donald Trump. It's also prompting promises by the Biden administration to keep pushing back against a lower court's decision to reactivate the policy, which forced people to wait in Mexico while seeking asylum in the U.S. The high court's decision, which came late Tuesday, said the Biden administration likely violated federal law by trying to end the Trump-era program, known as the Migrant Protection Protocols. The ruling raised many questions, ranging from whether a legal challenge would prevail to the practical effects of reinstatement if it stands. WHAT'S NEXT FOR THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION? The Department of Homeland Security said it was taking steps to comply with the high court's decision while the Biden administration appeals. The administration could try again to end the program by having the department provide a fuller explanation for its decision to end Migrant Protection Protocols. White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Wednesday the administration had appealed a district court decision that the Supreme Courts order sprang from, and would continue to vigorously challenge it. Trump, meanwhile, welcomed the court order and said the Biden government must now reinstate one of my most successful and important programs in securing the border. During Trumps presidency, the policy required tens of thousands of migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. to turn back to Mexico. It was meant to discourage asylum seekers, but critics said it denied people the legal right to seek protection in the U.S. and forced them to wait in dangerous Mexican border cities. U.S. immigration experts note that no matter what happens over the long term, the Biden administration has wide discretion on how much it would reimplement the policy if appeals are unsuccessful. It could reimplement it on a very small scale for families who meet certain criteria from very specific nationalities, or it could do something broader, said Jessica Bolter, associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington. HOW IS MEXICO REACTING? Mexicos Foreign Relations Department refused to say late Wednesday whether the government will allow the U.S. to reinstate the policy of sending asylum seekers back across the border to wait for hearings on asylum claims. Roberto Velasco, Mexicos director for North American affairs, said the court ruling is not binding on Mexico. He stressed that Mexicos immigration policy is designed and executed in a sovereign manner. The Mexican government will start technical discussions with the U.S. government to evaluate how to handle safe, orderly and regulated immigration on the border, Velasco said. Mexico is not legally obligated to receive returning migrants who are not Mexican citizens, and most of the asylum seekers are not. During the Trump administration, the Mexican government said it was cooperating with the program for humanitarian reasons. Although migrants were granted humanitarian visas to stay in Mexico until they had their U.S. hearings, they often had to wait in dangerous areas controlled by cartels, leaving them vulnerable to being kidnapped, assaulted, raped or even killed. Others were transported by bus to parts of southern Mexico or invited to return to their home countries. Mexico technically could block the program by refusing to accept migrants asked to stay in Mexico under the Migrant Protection Protocols, or MPP. But analysts like Tonatiuh Guillen, former head of Mexicos migration agency, consider that unlikely given the countrys history of cooperation with the U.S. Guillen said Mexican officials will probably go along even though the country doesnt have sufficient resources to deal with an influx of asylum seekers at the border and nonprofit shelters south of the border are overwhelmed. Still, more than 70 Mexican, U.S. and international NGOs have sent a letter asking President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador not to accept the U.S. court decision. I dont think either Mexico or the Biden administration want to reimplement MPP at its maximum capacity right now, Bolter said. If it is reimplemented at a low level, it will have serious consequences for the families or other migrants who are subjected to it. But overall, I think its unlikely to drastically change the policy landscape at the border. HOW ROBUST WAS THE PROGRAM IN RECENT YEARS? Immigration specialists note that Migrant Protection Protocols already had been significantly scaled back during the pandemic as officials began using public health protocols to swiftly expel migrants. The Trump administration placed roughly 6,000 migrants into the program from April 2020 to January 2021 a fraction of the more than 71,000 migrants placed into the program overall, said Bolter. It launched the program in January 2019. Clearly, it wasnt operating at the level it had been operating before, but there definitely were still people being placed into it, said Bolter. She added that the program was largely being used for migrants who Mexico refused to take back under pandemic-era health protocols known as Title 42. Victoria Neilson, managing attorney with CLINICs defending vulnerable populations program, noted that since the pandemic far fewer migrants have been placed in the MPP program, with many expelled from the border under the health protocols initiated under the Trump administration and continued by President Joe Biden. WHAT ABOUT TITLE 42 EXPULSIONS? The State Department is holding talks with the Mexican government as the administration reviews the Trump-era protocols to determine how they can be implemented while Title 42 is in effect, said a Homeland Security official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention renewed the Title 42 public health powers early this month. The administration has emphasized that Title 42 is not an immigration authority, but a public health authority, and its continued use is dictated by the CDC's analysis of the public health situation. While Title 42 expulsions continue, the U.S. for now has suspended the processing into the U.S. of people who were returned to Mexico under Migrant Protection Protocols during the Trump administration. In recent weeks, Central American migrants expelled under Title 42 have been flown by the U.S. into Mexico's south, sparking concerns by U.N. agencies about vulnerable migrants who they say need humanitarian protection. The U.S. government has intermittently flown Mexicans deep into Mexico for years to discourage repeat attempts, but flights that began this month from Brownsville, Texas, to the Mexican state capitals of Villahermosa and Tapachula, near the Guatemalan border, appear to be the first time that Central Americans have been flown deep into Mexico. Taxin reported from Orange County, California. Maria Verza in Mexico City and Ben Fox and Mark Sherman in Washington contributed to this report. HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) One Pennsylvania state senator's campaign to carry out former President Donald Trump's vision of a full forensic investigation into last year's election has blown up into an intra-party war and a political opening for Democrats. It is also something Republican officeholders can seemingly no longer ignore. Previously dismissive of it we don't need to relitigate 2020, he said in June the state's top Republican senator came out after weeks of being labeled the chief obstacle and declared his support for the undertaking. I am 100% behind it, Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman, R-Centre, told a pro-Trump online show host Monday. Meanwhile, a behind-the-scenes intracaucus struggle blasted into the open over the past week in a public feud between Corman and state Sen. Doug Mastriano, a Trump loyalist and the figurehead for bringing an Arizona-style election audit to Pennsylvania. Corman the son of a state senator generally viewed as preferring consensus over hardball politics now faces calls for a primary challenger, even as he and Mastriano made the rounds of right-wing broadcasters to accuse each other of being the true obstacle to an audit, and claim the mantle of being the true champion of an audit. Corman's sudden show of support for an audit comes amid what GOP officials around Pennsylvania say is rank-and-file unrest and growing interest in primary challenges to Republican lawmakers who seem unwilling to more forcefully take on the past election, and future elections. Trumps false claims of a stolen election have been debunked by the courts, his own Justice Department and numerous recounts, and the prospect of a review modeled on the widely discredited audit dragging out in Arizona worries some Republican Party officials in politically divided Pennsylvania. Republican state lawmakers had, to this point, avoided the subject by pointing to hearings they held, reports they produced and legislation they drafted to, in their view, fix Pennsylvania's election law. While Corman and other Republican senators generally avoid repeating Trumps baseless election claims, they still perpetuate the idea that Democrats cheated by distorting the actions of Democratic state judges and officials leading up to last years election as unconstitutional or illegal." It hasn't satisfied enough Republican voters, apparently. Despite Democrat Joe Biden beating Trump by more than 80,000 votes in Pennsylvania, an audit has fast become a Republican litmus test on the crowded campaign trail for governor and U.S. Senate. The state Republican Party has sought to raise money off it while groups supporting an audit have sprung up and begun holding events. Its a very big deal, said Kristine Eng, the chair of Centre County's Republican Party, Corman's home turf. It is something that people really want to start looking into because we all know something wasnt right. So Im glad that our legislators are acknowledging the will of the people and working to do the audit. Meanwhile, state lawmakers are out of step with an idea popular with candidates and county party chairs: repealing the 2019 state law that vastly expanded mail-in voting, even though it would surely be vetoed by Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf. The law, called Act 77, passed with near-unanimous Republican support right before Trump began baselessly attacking mail-in balloting as rife with fraud. A lot of that primary pressure goes back to Act 77, Washington County GOP chair Dave Ball said. I think that both the House and Senate lawmakers, unless they take some significant action on Act 77, theres going to be a lot of people who are going to want to primary people who voted for Act 77. The Democratic Party hasn't been idle, either. It has repeatedly blasted Corman as too cowardly to stand up to right-wing conspiracy theorists and run ads online against three Republican senators in moderate southeastern Pennsylvania who are up for re-election next year. Bucks County voted for Joe Biden, but Bob Mensch is doing nothing to protect his voters ballots and privacy against a sham election audit, the party wrote in a Facebook ad it ran. For his part, Corman has tried to signal that the audit he envisions will avoid the partisan pitfalls of the one run by Arizona's Senate GOP. Still, doubters among the Senate GOP suggest that backers of an audit really just want to overturn the election and reinstate Trump. That is the underlying rationale for many who support an audit," Sen. Gene Yaw, R-Lycoming, wrote on his Senate website about people contacting his office. "Unless there is a coup, which is not going to happen in the United States, the 2020 election is over. Follow Marc Levy on Twitter at www.twitter.com/timelywriter Lancaster County should remain entirely within one congressional district when the state redraws maps this year, the countys two Republican commissioners say. In a 2-1 vote Wednesday, the board passed a resolution urging that all of Lancaster County stay within one congressional district when lawmakers in Harrisburg approve a new map that would take effect in 2022. (Being in one congressional district) has benefited the citizens of Lancaster County over the years, Commissioner Josh Parsons, who voted in favor of the resolution, said. Our hope is that that will continue so that our voice in congress is not diluted. Parsons was joined in favor of the resolution by fellow Republican Commissioner Ray DAgostino, who said Lancaster county was without question stronger united than divided." Commissioner Craig Lehman, the boards lone Democrat, was opposed to the resolution, saying he felt it was more important to have fair districts than district that avoid splitting counties. He told LNP|LancasterOnline that the board did not pass a similar resolution during the 2011 redistricting process. Parsons noted that Bucks County had passed a similar resolution unanimously in a bipartisan vote in June, and that for most of Lancaster Countys history the county has been contained in one district. From 1931 to 1981, the county was wholly within one district. It was split between congressional districts in the 1980s and 1990s, before returning to one district in 2001. In 2011 it was again split between separate districts until 2018 when the Pennsylvania Supreme Court threw out that map for excessive gerrymandering and the new map returned the county to a single district that also includes part of southern York County. Berwood Yost, director of the Center for Opinion Research and the Floyd Institute for Public Policy at Franklin and Marshall College, said he thinks most people would agree with the idea of keeping the county whole. "People tend to think it is better to keep communities intact when you redistrict, said Yost, who also teaches courses in research methods and public health. They prefer you dont split municipalities. I think it makes intuitive sense to people to keep counties together. The problem, however, is that Lancaster County does not have a high enough population to be its own district, Yost said, and will need to be combined with one or more other counties in some way. David Thornburgh, CEO of the nonpartisan good-government group Committee of Seventy, said he had not heard of such resolutions before but thinks it is productive and encouraging. Its making the statement that Lancaster County is a community, it has an identity and common culture, he said. Its sort of a tangible expression of a general sentiment. The General Assembly is expected to approve a new congressional district map later this year, but so far no specific legislation has been proposed. As lawmakers prepare to redraw Pennsylvanias congressional and state legislative districts, 64% of registered voters believe the states redistricting process needs reform, according to a Franklin & Marshall College Poll released last week. Whats more, two in three Pennsylvania voters, across political ideology, support creating an independent citizen commission to redraw the states legislative districts, according to the poll. The new results are consistent with past F&M polls in 2018 and 2019, showing redistricting reform has been widely popular in the state for the past several years. Districts are redrawn every 10 years, after each U.S. Census, and the process has already begun in the wake of the 2020 Census results. Voters dont like gerrymandering, and they dont think legislators should be drawing their own maps, said Carol Kuniholm, the executive director of redistricting advocacy group Fair Districts PA. But instead of working on redistricting reform these last few years, a group of lawmakers will begin doing exactly what voters dont want them to do: choosing their own district lines. Its too late to change the system this time around, so advocates are turning their sights to reforms that would take effect after the next Census in 2030. The reapportionment committee, tasked with redrawing the states legislative districts, is accepting public comment and map suggestions. It will also host a number of public hearings for voters to submit testimony on how they think the lines should be drawn. House Republicans will also host seven regional hearings around the state, accepting testimony on congressional district proposals. The southcentral Pennsylvania hearing will be held on Oct. 13 at 4 p.m. at York College. New state and congressional district maps will take effect for the 2022 election cycle. Legislature and Congress This year will be the first time that lawmakers redraw the lines since 2018, when the state Supreme Court ruled that the congressional district map drawn after the 2010 Census had been illegally gerrymandered to benefit the Republican Party. Pennsylvania will also lose a congressional seat this time around, knocking it from 18 congressional districts to 17, based on Pennsylvanias low population growth. Lawmakers redistrict through two processes: For the 17 congressional districts, state lawmakers in Harrisburg will draft new congressional maps and approve them through legislation, which Gov. Tom Wolf can approve or veto. For the states 253 legislative districts, a group of the four majority and minority leaders of each chamber and a Supreme Court-appointed fifth member (called the reapportionment commission) approve the legislative districts for the next 10 years. In an email to LNP, House Speaker Bryan Cutler, a Republican from Peach Bottom, defended the current redistricting process, calling it transparent, thorough, and fair, adding that the process is set up with checks and balances to ensure both parties have a fair say. He pointed to extra public hearings and an online mapping tool -- which are not required by state law -- as new ways House Republicans hope to increase transparency and engagement in the redistricting process. Cutler is not part of the commission, but he holds the most powerful position in the House, giving him the ability to to fast-track legislation he prioritizes. (Cutler has said that is not his leadership style and its up to the Republican Caucus and committee chairs to decide what legislation the House considers.) Pressure from advocates, citizens Its unlikely Pennsylvanias legislative leaders will change how the state redistricts unless there is massive public pressure in support of it, two Franklin & Marshall political scientists who work on the poll said last week. Day-to-day concerns like jobs, income COVID -- things like that are much, much stronger motivators, said Stephen Medvic, a Franklin & Marshall College government professor who works on the poll. If we were going to see redistricting reform, were going to have to see a real groundswell of support. But if someone is going to get active on an issue, its probably not gonna be something like this. Kuniholm said she disagrees, and that redistricting advocacy groups have already proven they have widespread support in the state through providing lawmakers with a petition of 100,000 signatures asking for reform, submitting hundreds of letters to the editor from constituents across the state in local newspapers and meeting with more than 200 state legislators. Theyve heard from us, but what weve pretty much proven is theres no avenue to translate a groundswell of support into legislation; that seems to be very clear, Kuniholm added. Cutler said he does not oppose an independent commission or other redistricting reforms, but added that voters already have the opportunity to determine how the state redistricts by who they elect to state office. Ultimately, the voters determine who is involved in the process by picking their legislators and Governor, Cutler added. Reform plan died in 2018 The state Senate passed a Republican-led bill to create a new redistricting process in 2018, working alongside Fair Districts PA and other redistricting reform advocates for several years to draft the legislation. Sen. Ryan Aument, R-West Hempfield Twp., offered a last-minute amendment to create judicial districts that Democrats called a poison pill, an accusation that Aument rejected at the time. The legislation later died under more than 600 amendments offered in the House. In fact, a number of members made the point of saying that they thought the regional approach to judicial districts made a lot of sense and required further review, Aument told the Philadelphia Inquirer in 2018. For Kuniholm, the last-minute changes to their proposal -- and lack of movement since -- shows an unwillingness from lawmakers to take on the issue. We started advocating for this in January 2016, it was plenty of time, Kuniholm said. Its not an issue of time, its that the leadership doesnt have any interest at all in giving up their power to draw the maps. Pennsylvanias legislative system is broken, she said, pointing to a number of widely popular policy reforms that state lawmakers still havent addressed, such as instituting red-flag laws to remove firearms from people who are in immediate danger to themselves or others. In a 2019 F&M poll, for example, 62% of respondents strongly supported laws that would allow courts to seize a persons firearms if they are judged a threat to themselves or others. But regardless of public sentiment, committee chairs and party leaders have the ability to block legislation from ever being considered in the state. Once a bill is referred to a committee, a committee chair can decide whether it is considered -- or whether it will die in committee. Limited options in Pennsylvania Some states have a process called Citizens Initiative, which is a process where the public can force a referendum on the ballot by petitioning the government. Pennsylvania does not have this option. Kuniholm and Fair Districts PA have discussed suing the state on the basis that the Legislature is being run unconstitutionally by blocking popular policies from ever getting considered, and infringes on Pennsylvanians inalienable and indefeasible right to alter, reform or abolish their government in such manner as they may think proper, per the state constitution. Pennsylvanians can submit written testimony or their own map at redistricting.state.pa.us/comment/ or paredistricting.com/input WASHINGTON (AP) Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan, a figure that suggests the U.S. may accomplish its highest priority for the Kabul airlift rescuing U.S. citizens ahead of President Joe Bidens Tuesday deadline despite growing concerns of terror threats targeting the airport. Untold thousands of at-risk Afghans, however, still are struggling to get into the Kabul airport, while many thousands of other Afghans already have been flown to safety in 12 days of round-the-clock flights. On Wednesday, several of the Americans working phones and pulling strings to get out former Afghan colleagues, women's advocates, journalists and other vulnerable Afghans said they have seen little concrete U.S. action so far to get those Afghans past Taliban checkpoints and through U.S-controlled airport gates to promised evacuation flights. Its 100% up to the Afghans to take these risks and try to fight their way out, said Sunil Varghese, policy director with the International Refugee Assistance Project. Blinken, echoing Biden's earlier declarations during the now 12-day-old evacuation, emphasized at a State Department briefing that evacuating Americans is our top priority. He added, Were also committed to getting out as many Afghans at-risk as we can before the 31st," when Biden plans to pull out the last of thousands of American troops. On Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy in Kabul issued a security alert warning American citizens away from three specific airport gates, but gave no further explanation. Senior U.S. officials said the warning was related to ongoing and specific threats involving the Islamic State and potential vehicle bombs, which have set U.S. officials on edge in the final days of the American drawdown. The officials insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss ongoing military operations. Blinken said the State Department estimates there were about 6,000 Americans wanting to leave Afghanistan when the airlift began Aug. 14, as the Taliban took the capital after a stunning military conquest. About 4,500 Americans have been evacuated so far, Blinken said, and among the rest some are understandably very scared. The 6,000 figure is the first firm estimate by the State Department of how many Americans were seeking to get out. U.S. officials early in the evacuation estimated as many as 15,000, including dual citizens, lived in Afghanistan. The figure does not include U.S. Green Card holders. About 500 Americans have been contacted with instructions on when and how to get to the chaotic Kabul airport to catch evacuation flights. In addition, 1,000 or perhaps fewer are being contacted to determine whether they still want to leave. Blinken said some of these may already have left the country, some may want to remain and some may not actually be American citizens. We are providing opportunity," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said of those Afghans, who include dual Afghan-American citizens. "We are finding ways to get them to the airport and evacuate them, but it is also their personal decision on whether they want to depart. On a lighter note, the U.S. military said an Afghan baby girl born on a C-17 military aircraft during the massive evacuation will carry that experience with her. Her parents named her after the planes call sign: Reach. She was born Saturday, and members of the 86th Medical Group helped in her birth aboard the plane that had taken the family from Kabul to Ramstein Air Base in Germany. Two other babies whose parents were evacuating from Afghanistan have been born over the past week at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, the U.S. military hospital in Germany. In Washington on Wednesday, Blinken emphasized that the U.S. and other governments plan to continue assisting Afghans and Americans who want to leave after next Tuesday, the deadline for Biden's planned end to the evacuation and the two-decade U.S. military role in Afghanistan. That effort will continue, every day, past Aug. 31, he said. Biden has cited what he U.S. says are rising security threats to U.S. forces, including from an affiliate of the Islamic State terror group, for his determination to stick with Tuesday's withdrawal deadline. Germany has said Western officials are particularly concerned that suicide bombers may slip into the crowds surrounding the airport. The U.S. Embassy has already been evacuated; staff are operating from the Kabul airport and the last are to leave by Tuesday. Biden said this week he had asked his national security team for contingency plans in case he decides to extend the deadline. Taliban leaders who took control of Afghanistan this month say they will not tolerate any extensions to the Tuesday deadline. But Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen tweeted that people with legal documents will still be able to fly out via commercial flights after Tuesday. U.S. troops are anchoring a multinational evacuation from the airport. The White House says the airlift overall has flown out 82,300 Afghans, Americans and others on a mix of U.S., international and private flights. The withdrawal comes under a 2020 deal negotiated by President Donald Trump with the Taliban. Refugee groups are describing a different picture than the Biden administration is when it comes to many Afghans: a disorganized, barely-there U.S. evacuation effort that leaves the most desperate to risk beatings and death at Taliban checkpoints. Some Afghans are reported being turned away from the Kabul airport by American forces controlling the gates, despite having approval for flights. U.S. military and diplomatic officials appear to still be compiling lists of eligible Afghans but have yet to disclose how many may be evacuated and how private Americans and American organizations said. We still have 1,200 Afghans with visas that are outside the airport and havent got in, said James Miervaldis with No One Left Behind, one of dozens of veterans groups working to get out Afghans who worked with the U.S. military during Americas nearly 20 years of combat in the country.. Were waiting to hear from the US. government and havent heard yet. Marina LeGree of Ascend, a U.S.-based nonprofit that worked to develop fitness and leadership in Afghan girls and young women, described getting calls from U.S. officials telling the groups interns and staffers to go to the airport for evacuation flights, only to have them turned away by American forces keeping gates closed against the throngs outside. One Afghan intern who went to the airport with her family saw a person killed in front of them, and a female colleague was burned by a caustic agent fired at the crowd, LeGree said. Its heartbreaking to see my government fail so badly, said LeGree, the groups American director, who is in Italy but in close contact with those in Kabul. U.S.-based organizations, speaking on background to discuss sensitive matters, cite accounts from witnesses on the ground as saying some American citizens, and family members of Afghans with green cards, still were having trouble pushing and talking their way into the Kabul airport for flights. Kirby said the U.S. military will preserve as much airlift capacity at the airport as possible in the coming days, ahead of Tuesday's deadline. The military will continue to evacuate needed populations all the way to the end, he said. But he added that in the final days and hours there will have to be a balance in getting out U.S. troops and their equipment as well as evacuees. Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor, the deputy director of regional operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said U.S. forces had conducted another helicopter mission beyond the perimeter of the airport to pick up people seeking to evacuate. The number of U.S. troops at the airport has dropped by about 400, to 5,400, but the final withdrawal has not begun, Kirby said Wednesday. Associated Press writers Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida, contributed to this report. An explosion injured one person and leveled an Amish-owned commercial building in Jackson Township, Lebanon County, Wednesday morning. Fire crews were called to Lapp Carriage Shop on 372 King St. around 8 a.m. for a reported fire, according to a press release from Pennsylvania State Police. The fire was contained shortly after it started. Lapp Carriage Shop made carriages for horse and buggies. It is not immediately clear what caused the explosion, but it leveled the shop and damaged surrounding homes. A young was airlifted to the Lehigh Valley Burn Center and was confirmed to be in stable condition as of last night according to Mike Shaak, deputy fire chief for the Keystone Hook and Ladder Company in Myerstown. No other injuries were reported. The explosion is under investigation by Pennsylvania State Police trooper John Burns. Throughout the morning, Amish arrived at the site to lend support, according to a report in the Lebanon Daily News. A former Chester County teacher is facing charges after police say he sexually assaulted a student between 2014 and 2016. The Oxford Borough Police Department arrested Luis Morales, 56, of West Chester, for sexually assaulting a student between 2014 and 2016 at the Nottingham Elementary School in Phoenixville Area School District teacher in Oxford, according to a news release. Morales taught English as a Second Language until 2016, and most recently worked at the Phoenixville Area School District. He was suspended from that district in June, police said. The student was asked to stay after school when the assaults took place, according to police. The abuse stopped in 2016. Morales is charged with multiple counts of aggravated indecent assault, institutional sexual assault, corruption of minors and related offenses. Morales is free on bail, and is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on Sept. 28. Police continue to investigate, and anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Christopher Coverly, Oxford Borough Police at 610-998-0032 ext. 302. THE ISSUE As LNP | LancasterOnlines Tom Lisi reports, three Lancaster County school districts have policies that appear to contradict a federal order requiring mask-wearing on school buses, and its unclear if any federal, state or local authority plans to do anything about it. Eastern Lancaster County School Districts stated policy is that students can ride school buses unmasked if they choose, a stance that is at odds with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention order that makes masking mandatory on school buses. Ephrata Area School Districts policy recognizes the federal order, but it says the district wont take any action if students fail to comply. Donegal School Districts policy is similar to Ephratas. The CDC order that makes masking mandatory on school buses also requires bus operators to enforce masking. Ephrata and Elanco begin school next week. Donegals first day of school was Tuesday. The complete abdication of responsibility for the safety of schoolchildren is what gets us so angry. This is like a twisted game of tag, in which school officials, bus operators, state elected officials and federal health officials all are screaming: Not it! We are not going to enforce the CDC school masking guidance and school bus order, theyre saying. We are not going to concern ourselves with the recommendations issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics and Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health. We are going to pass the buck to someone else. Not it! Not it! Not it! And the losers of this sorry game are schoolchildren, whose health is being treated as an afterthought. But dont worry, kids! If some of you start getting sick with COVID-19, then someone might address the problem. The decision-makers dont want to do the right thing until they have to, lest they offend the parents shouting freedom! (Freedom from what, were not sure because theres nothing freeing about illness.) Wolf speaks On Wednesday, we learned that Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf whose silence on masking in schools has been deafening finally roused himself to ask the Republican-controlled state Legislature to pass a mask mandate for K-12 schools and child care centers. As if thats going to happen. The Pennsylvania General Assembly wanted to run the show during crises hence their push for the constitutional amendments on the May primary ballot curtailing the governors emergency powers but its members mostly are on a prolonged paid vacation (part-time legislating on full-time salaries apparently is exhausting). State Sen. Ryan Aument, of Mount Joy, a member of the state COVID-19 Vaccine Joint Task Force, actually has tweeted his opposition to mandatory mask-wearing in schools. And hes one of the more moderate members of the GOP Senate Caucus. So were guessing that state lawmakers arent going to rush back to Harrisburg to heed the governors call to work on a bill requiring masks in schools and child care facilities. Were also guessing that Wolf knows this. We hope hes not merely attempting to distance himself from any responsibility for what may be about to befall the schoolchildren of the commonwealth. If hes trying to make a point not it! hes made it. But this is a time for sound decision-making, not point-scoring. Unfortunately, we are paralyzed by ideological divides over what should be straightforward public health matters. And no one seems to want to make the tough, necessary decisions. Policymaking by polling The Eastern Lancaster County School District encourages mask-wearing in its schools, but doesnt require it. A poll of residents indicated most didnt want mandatory masking. Gary Buck, vice president of the Elanco school board, said board members sought advice from health care professionals about how much danger COVID-19 now posed to students. They must not have spoken with Dr. Alexandra Solosko, who wrote in an LNP | LancasterOnline column last week that she has taken care of countless children with COVID-19 in our inpatient unit at Lancaster General Hospital, including many previously healthy children who have ultimately developed respiratory failure, heart damage, neurological complications and shock. So the Elanco board caves on mandatory masking because of a resident poll, even though the CDC and local pediatricians say its necessary. And the district wont even enforce mask-wearing on school buses, where children are crowded together, often with the windows closed, allowing for the potential spread of the highly infectious delta variant. This, despite the fact that the CDC says that persons must wear masks over the mouth and nose when traveling on nonpersonal, noncommercial transportation, including school buses. And transportation operators must use best efforts to ensure that any person on the conveyance wears a mask when boarding, disembarking, and for the duration of travel. Those "best efforts" include refusing service to people who dont wear a mask. As LNP | LancasterOnlines Lisi noted, Its less clear, though, what happens if an operator, like a school district or the bus company it hires, doesnt follow the order. Buck said Elanco solicitor Jeff Litts advised board members that the wording of the CDC order makes it unenforceable. And the bus operators serving Elanco and Ephrata are figuring, well, if school officials are not requiring masks, then their bus drivers wont wear them, either. Not it! It is up to the driver on whether theyre vaccinated, and whether to wear a mask or not, said Dave Schlotter, safety and operations manager at Lebanon-based Brightbill Transportation, the school bus operator hired by Elanco. Not-so-great expectations Meanwhile, in an Aug. 9 letter to parents, Donegal Superintendent J. Michael Lausch said the district is encouraging voluntary compliance with the CDC order, but it will not deny school transportation services or impose disciplinary measures upon students for non-compliance. Essentially the same letter was sent to families by the Ephrata Area School District on Aug. 3, Lisi reported. The letter said a CDC order requiring mask-wearing on public transportation applies to school buses and the expectation is that students are to wear masks while passengers on school buses. But Ephrata parents, like Donegal parents, were assured that noncompliance would have no consequences. So much for reinforcing expectations. When Lisi asked about enforcement of its masking mandate, CDC spokesperson Scott Pauley said in an email that the agency strongly encourages and anticipates widespread voluntary compliance. (How very naive.) And to the extent permitted by law, Pauley wrote, the CDC will be assisted with implementation by other federal partners, including the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Department of Homeland Security. But requests for comment made to those federal departments went unanswered Monday and Wednesday. The CDC spokesperson also said the agency would accept state and local assistance, but a spokesperson for Gov. Wolfs office did not directly answer whether the state would be involved in enforcing the CDC order. Ephrata police Chief John Petrick said the mask order was a matter of school policy, and his department wont get involved. Thats something thats between the school district and the CDC, Petrick said. And Lancaster County, of course, doesnt have a public health department that could weigh in on these matters. Not it! Not it! Not it! This article appears in the August 27, 2021 issue of Executive Intelligence Review. Afghanistan and the BRI Extending the Belt and Road to Afghanistan The Geo-Economics of Growth [Print version of this article] Hussein Askary is a Board Member of the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden (BRIX), and is the Southwest Asia coordinator for the Schiller Institute. View full size USMC/Victor Mancilla Aug. 18The hasty withdrawal of U.S., British, and other North-Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) troops from Afghanistan after 20 years of a failed war on terrorism can potentially become an inflection point towards a new era in world politics. The comparisons with the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Saigon, Vietnam in 1975 is somewhat inaccurate. There is now a new mechanism and a constellation of regional and global powers willing to bring peace, stability, and economic development to Afghanistan with well-defined plans along the Belt and Road Initiative. The comparison should rather be with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. This means that a terrible era is potentially ending and a new one is being ushered into world politics, overturning decades and centuries of destructive zero-sum geopolitics, great games, and never-ending war. If calmly and wisely approached, this new situation has the potential of reaching peace through economic development and win-win cooperation. The key to this new policy is the integration of Afghanistan into the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). There are great risks embedded in the chaotic situation left by NATO in Afghanistan. The best possible policy to minimize, if not totally negate the risk, is to make sure that the peace and reconciliation initiatives contain the reconstruction of the economy as the main item on the agenda. Role of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Following 20 years of military operations by the United States, Britain and their allieswith at least 71,000 civilians killed in both Afghanistan and Pakistan these forces were hastily withdrawn in July and August of this year. The Taliban, the purported target of the Afghanistan war and the main antagonists of NATO and the Western-backed Afghan government, expanded their control over every part of the country. While the Western mass media was filled with panicked reporting about the rapid onslaught of the Taliban in many parts of the country, cooler heads in China, Russia, Pakistan, Iran, and many Central Asian nations, and even in India, were busy arranging a flurry of diplomatic moves to both contain the situation and to get the Taliban and the Afghan government in Kabul into peace and reconciliation talks. View full size CGTN Wang Yi, the Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Affairs Minister, had already visited several Central Asian capitals in July to discuss the situation. On July 14, the Foreign Ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which includes all the above nations, plus other Eurasian nations, held a meeting in Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan. At the SCO meeting, Wang Yi said that due to the hasty withdrawal of the U.S. and NATO troops, Afghanistan is once again faced with the grave challenge of moving toward war or peace, chaos or stability. He proposed a five-point initiative, the third point of which was working together to boost a reconciliation process to ensure that no civil-war scenario develops, in line with the principle of Afghan-led and Afghan-owned. All neighboring countries of Afghanistan have a stake in this situation and have influence on certain Afghan factions and groups, making them suitable brokers of peace and reconciliation. Point five of the Chinese proposal urged the SCO to continue to contribute to peace and reconstruction in Afghanistan. The SCO should make active use of existing cooperation mechanisms in economy, trade, culture, and other fields to support Afghanistan in enhancing its capacity for independent development and achieving genuine and sustainable development. Integrating Afghanistan into regional economic development plans and structures will insure durable peace. No Peace Without Development It is this latter point which was neglected in the past twenty years when the focus was placed only on the use of military and security measures, warfare which has had devastating consequences on the nation. According to certain estimates, an incredible US$ 2.2 trillion was spent on this war, while the overall cost of the American wars since September 11, 2001, has reached US$ 6.4 trillion. Almost none of that was used to build infrastructure, housing, hospitals, schools, power, or water management systems. This is six times the amount China has invested in the BRI since 2013. But China has built thousands of kilometers of railways and roads, power plants, ports, airports, and water management systems across Eurasia and Africa. Those differences, and the potential for positive change, are the reasons the current case of Afghanistan could become an inflection point in current world history concerning the philosophy and achievement of peace through economic development rather than military force. Afghanistan and the BRI Contrary to its previous position as a buffer zone between the Russian and British Empires in the geopolitical Great Game, Afghanistan is perfectly positioned to become a bridge between northern Eurasia and South Asia, and between East Asia and West Asia. It is squeezed between two of the main BRI corridors; the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) to the south of its border, and the China-Central Asia-Iran-Turkey New Silk Road Corridor to its north. Afghanistan formally joined the BRI in May 2016 during a visit by the Chief Executive of Afghanistan, Dr. Abdullah Abdullah, to China, in which the Afghan and Chinese Foreign Ministers signed a Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation under the BRI. The Afghan Foreign Ministry stated then that given its location at the crossroads of Central, South, and Southwest Asia, Afghanistan is well placed to partner with China and connect to the wider region via BRI. Afghanistan also became a member of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), in 2017. However, due to the situation in the country, and the U.S.-China antagonism, no infrastructure or other projects were launched jointly. Interestingly, China managed to include the BRI as part of the United Nations mission in Afghanistan, and Article 34 of the 2017 UN Security Council Resolution 2344 states that it welcomes and urges further efforts to strengthen the process of regional economic cooperation, including measures to facilitate regional connectivity, trade and transit, including through regional development initiatives such as the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road (the Belt and Road) Initiative, and regional development projects. Almost one year ahead of the U.S. and NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan, Wang Yi reached a nine-point consensus at the Inaugural China-Central Asian Countries Foreign Ministers Meeting on July 16, 2020. Of interest here is Point Three, which states that the parties will make more efforts to synergize the Belt and Road Initiative and the development strategies of Central Asian countries, expand trade and provide more common ideas and concrete actions on the development of a Silk Road of Health and the Digital Silk Road. Point Eight, which concerns Afghanistan, stated: China and Central Asian countries all support the peace and reconciliation process in Afghanistan and stand ready to play a constructive role in promoting intra-Afghan negotiation, restoring peace and stability, advancing Afghan economic recovery and strengthening regional cooperation. In another important development, the joint statement of the Fourth China-Afghanistan-Pakistan Trilateral Foreign Ministers Dialogue in June 2021, stressed that the three sides reaffirmed that they will deepen cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative, Regional Economic Cooperation Conference (RECCA), Heart of Asia Istanbul Process (HoA-IP) and other regional economic initiatives. Connectivity between the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and Afghanistan was a key element in this dialogue. RECCA, which is mentioned in the joint statement, is an initiative launched by the Foreign Ministry of Afghanistan to join together all the different connectivity and development corridors connecting Afghanistan to its neighbors and larger regions. It has published several studies on these corridors and how they will benefit Afghanistan and enhance stability and security in the country and the larger region. This article appears in the August 27, 2021 issue of Executive Intelligence Review. Build Haitis Infrastructure Now! [Print version of this article] View full size USAID/Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance Aug. 21How desperately Haiti is in need of infrastructureviable roads, airports, reliable transportation, hospitals and moreis once again displayed before the eyes of the world, this time in the very slow pace at which humanitarian assistance is making its way to the southern and western parts of the country affected by the most recent earthquake on August 14. The area most severely affected by the earthquake is home to about 1.5 million people80 miles from the capital of Port-au-Prince, to which overland transportation is a risky venture due to poor roads and security problems posed by armed gangs. Almost nothing is getting to remote villages because aid can only be directed to population centers close to airstrips where airplanes can land. According to the government of Haiti, as of this writing, the death toll is nearing 2,200, with hundreds of still-missing people believed to be buried under rubble. More than 12,000 people have been injured and some 600,000 are estimated to need humanitarian aid as a result of the earthquake. Over 150,000 homes were destroyed, and many people now living without a roof over their heads, suffered the most recent tropical storm unprotected, creating conditions for the increased development of frequently fatal diseases. View full size Valter Campanato/Agencia Brasil Dr. Carissa F. Etienne Many of the few health facilities that existed before, were also destroyed in the earthquake. Dr. Carissa Etienne, the Pan-American Health Organization Director, reported on August 18 that twenty-four healthcare facilities were damaged or destroyed in the three departments hardest hit by the earthquake. She called on the international community to respond quickly to meet Haitis immense needs for healthcare personnel, supplies, equipment, and patient transportation, in order to restore health services in the affected areas and ensure adequate water and sanitation to prevent increases of diarrheal, respiratory and skin diseases, and also administer COVID vaccinations. A Manmade Disaster The Schiller Institute issued a call on August 18 for immediate international action to aid Haiti. Titled Implement LaRouches 2010 Rebuilding Program in Haiti Now: The 2021 Earthquake Can Not Be Allowed To Be a Further Descent into Hell! it explains: Had American statesman Lyndon LaRouches program to rebuild Haiti been implemented, in response to the devastating Jan. 12, 2010 earthquake, which killed between 250,000 and 300,000 people, this impoverished nation would not be suffering the level of death and destruction so far wrought by the August 14 earthquake that measured 7.2 on the Richter scale. And the carnage will become much greater as a series of tropical storms hit, which are expected to be rolling in, perhaps one after another. People are terrified. They have once again been abandoned by the United States and its international partners, left to perish in extreme poverty, disease, and misery. View full size VOA Lyndon LaRouche, the statement continues, immediately responded to the 2010 earthquake by calling for an emergency reconstruction program for Haiti, for which, he said, the U.S. had a special responsibility. He called on the Army Corps of Engineers to first deploy to rescue and relocate up to 1 million homeless Haitians from Port-au-Prince to higher ground before the rainy season arrived and unleashed a dangerous health and sanitation crisis for these destitute citizens; he then proposed a comprehensive program to focus on building infrastructurefor sanitation, water management, irrigation, earthquake-proof housing, transportation, agriculture, etc. LaRouche also recommended that the U.S. sign a 25-year treaty with Haiti, a treaty agreement to reestablish the efficient sovereignty of the nation of Haiti, after the destructive effect of this and preceding difficulties. We make a contract with the government, as a treaty agreement, between the United States and Haiti, to assure the rebuilding of their country, in a form in which it will actually be a functioning country which can survive. For that 2010 statement, see https://larouchepub.com/pr/2010/100222lar_haiti.html. On March 20, 2010, EIR published a 20-page package elaborating on the physical economic parameters required to begin reconstruction, and identifying the Malthusian outlook and interests that would fiercely oppose it. President Barack Obama refused to implement LaRouches proposal, and instead abandoned Haiti to the whims of foreign NGOs which lack the largescale logistics and infrastructure-building capabilities required to actually transform the situation, should they even want to do so. Ten months later, in October 2010, a cholera epidemic swept Haiti, precisely as LaRouche had warned would happen were internationally supported, largescale recovery efforts not carried out. Thousands of Haitians who had survived the earthquake but were still living in flimsy tents, exposed to the elements and without access to adequate food or sanitation services, now succumbed to cholera. Nor was the needed modern infrastructure built after the cholera epidemic killed so many people. But in 2017, Chinas Southwest Engineering Municipal Design Research Institute, working with the Haitian firm, Bati Ayiti, drew up plans for a $30 billion infrastructure program, which was to begin by investing $4.7 billion in constructing modern sanitation, housing, and transportation, from the bottom up, in the capital, Port-au-Prince. The project never materialized. EIR was told that it was the International Monetary Fund which stepped in to maintain the deadly living conditions forced on Haitians. The IMF informed the Haitian government that its funding would be cut off, should it allow the private project to proceed. Not Acting When You Can, Amounts to Genocide In the midst of the fall 2010 cholera epidemic, Helga Zepp-LaRouche was invited to send a message to a meeting in Cap Haitien on the subject of how to save Haiti, which had been organized by a leader of the Regional Youth Coalition of North and Northeast Haiti (COREJENE) who was in touch with the LaRouche movement in Canada. Interest was extraordinary. Some 2,500 students, businessmen, journalists, and local politicians showed up on Nov. 26 for that meeting, a dramatic demonstration of Haitians thirst for new ideas. Zepp-LaRouche began her address, played at the opening of the meeting, with a proposal: Let us start to make an international mobilization to save the Haitian people and organize for a full reconstruction of Haiti, so that everybody in this country can have a decent life. And lets call it Operation Frederick Douglass. The history of Haiti has been intertwined with that of the United States from the outset of both nations, she explained. Haitis 1804 independence was she emphasized, the first successful rebellion of slaves in the Americas, which occurred after the American Revolution, and defeated the military of the colonial powers of Spain, England and Napoleonic France. And since that time, the fate and history of Haiti has been extremely closely connected to that of the United States. Haiti supported the American Revolution and was allied with Alexander Hamilton. Haiti was punished for this through blockades and quarantines. This was changed again when Lincoln became President in the 1860s, and then the U.S. finally diplomatically recognized Haiti. At that time, Frederick Douglass became the plenipotentiary to Haiti. Under great American presidents, such as Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, U.S. and Haitian relations blossomed; under anglophiles like Woodrow Wilson, Haiti was invaded and occupied, or Obama, who refused to come to Haitis aid, she noted. Zepp-LaRouche outlined the series of proposals her husband had made throughout 2010 for an internationally supported, 25-year long reconstruction effort. We must think in terms of a generation of development for Haiti, she argued, if Haiti is not to face continual catastrophes. See https://larouchepub.com/eiw/public/2010/eirv37n47-20101203/eirv37n47-20101203_037-operation_frederick_douglass_zep-hzl.pdf for Operation Frederick Douglass. View full size Brady-Handy Studio Frederick Douglass, June 1, 1880. Her 2010 warning is as applicable today as it was then: The unfolding catastrophe which is happening in Haiti right now is a mirror of what will happen to the rest of the planet if the attitude towards this beautiful country is not changed dramatically . The present horrifying condition of the victims in Haiti are a total indictment of the U.S. administration and the international community, a catastrophe which was visible for so long and predictable that it would happen . Not acting when you can, amounts to genocide. Lets mobilize for Operation Frederick Douglass, and lets make that the first cause of an international alliance for development until Haiti is saved and rebuilt. This transcript appears in the August 27, 2021 issue of Executive Intelligence Review. [Print version of this transcript] Megan Dobrodt Moderators Opening Remarks Megan Dobrodt is a member of the Board of Directors of the LaRouche Legacy Foundation. This is an edited transcript of her opening remarks as moderator of Panel 2 of the August 14, 2021 LaRouche Legacy Foundations first online seminar: On the 50th Anniversary of LaRouches Stunning Forecast of August 15, 1971: So, Are You Finally Willing To Learn Economics? View full size LaRouche Legacy Foundation Megan Dobrodt The LaRouche Legacy Foundation was founded in late 2019 at the initiative of Helga Zepp-LaRouche, with a mission of making accessible and disseminating the lifes works of Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. to promote their study and assimilation around the world, with a goal of making LaRouches great discoveries a conscious part of policy making, and therefore the shaping of civilization into the new paradigm. To that end, the LaRouche Legacy Foundation has undertaken several initiatives, one of which is embodied in this first online seminar in which you are participating. Other areas of our initiative are to publish the complete works of Lyndon LaRouche, Volume I of which I will hold up here. Volume II is expected later this year. Volume I is available here on the website, www.larouchelegacyfoundation.org. Another area of our initiative, which we are just embarking on, is to create a full, online digital archivea Presidential-style online library of Lyndon LaRouches works. I would encourage everyone to go to the website and subscribe to our email list to receive updates on that. Now, to our panel. The discussion in Panel 1 focused on Lyndon LaRouches unique discoveries in the science of physical economy, and the role that his forecasts and his personal interventions played throughout the 20th and the first half of the 21st Centuries. As I hope you gathered from that earlier discussion, Lyndon LaRouche was a scientist, in the highest sense of that word. All scientists are, essentially, forecasters. They apprehend the future before anyone else, detecting the presence of a universal principle which has been acting in the present, but up until that moment of discovery, has not been a conscious part of mankinds domain of action. This morning in Panel 1, Helga Zepp-LaRouche discussed this as a prescience, a foresight, this Promethean power. And, as we learned in that earlier panel, this insight into the unique place of the human mind in universal creation, was key to LaRouches discoveries in physical economics. For more than fifty years, LaRouche forecast not just inevitabilities, but more so, the potential, the possibilities that belonged to a future, guided by new principles, both newly-discovered and newly-created. And that is why LaRouches genius resonated with Presidents of nations, physicists, students, artists, and many others, with whom LaRouche and his wife, Helga, formed great and productive life-long friendships. To lead us into our discussion in this second panel, the theme of which is Earths Next Fifty Years, were going to hear from one of those great friends, Norbert Brainin, who was the first violinist of the famous Amadeus Quartet, and with whom both Lyndon and Helga LaRouche had a very special bond. After that, well hear, once again, from Lyndon LaRouche himself, who will introduce you more fully into the top of this afternoons discussion. So, here is [a video excerpt of] Norbert Brainin, speaking at a seminar on September 20-22, 1995 at the Dolna Krupa Castle in Bratislava, Slovakia, which is sponsored by the Schiller Institute and the Slovakia Friedrich Schiller Foundation, headed by Dr. Jozef Miklosko (whom we had the privilege of hearing from this morning). And the seminar is on the topic of Motivfuhrung, or motivic thorough composition, a concept which is very much at the center of economic forecasting. Mr. Brainin speaks in German with English subtitles. [Begin video:] View full size Schiller Institute Norbert Brainin Norbert Brainin: I am really here to illustrate Motivfuhrung. It is close to my heart. Ive carried it around with me for a long time, and it never really resonated with anyone else; and the only person who immediately understood it was Lyndon LaRouche, and that is the bond between us. The contemporary researchers, the Mozart and Haydn researchers, they absolutely dont understand it. They notice it, they know it exists, and have also written about it, but beyond that, they dont deal with it at all. [Speaking after a performance by a string quartet]: Good, thank you. There is hardly a note in there, that cannot be traced back to the principal motif. That is the most important thing about the whole matter of Motivfuhrung. And it is an important step in the entire development of the art of composition. Its a watershed, Id even say. It is of utmost importance. It lends a certain unity to the entire composition which is not immediately apparent when youre listening: You hear only the music, but you feel that everything is organic. Haydn, for example, before he created his Op. 33his previous quartet opus was Op. 20, nine years earlier, and he didnt know how he could keep on with it. And then, he hit on it. And he called it Motivfuhrung, an altogether new method of composing. The next composer to employ this method was Mozart. He had gotten to know the Op. 33 quartets in Vienna. I dont know if Haydn had spoken about it, but the fact of the matter is, Mozart understood it immediately. Beethoven adopted this method. He saidthere must be a statement somewhere, in a letter or somewherebefore I knew this method, I could not consider myself a full-fledged composer. It is a revolution without parallel, and has implications not only for music, but also for life, for politics, for economics, for poetry, for science. In this sense, these composers are scientists. They are not merely note writers and composersthere are lots of thosebut this handful of musicians are scientists, and philosophers of the first rank. [End video.] The entire seminar can be seen here. Megan Dobrodt: And now, well hear from Lyndon LaRouche, speaking at a Schiller Institute Conference in 2011. As youll hear in this [video] clip, LaRouche elaborates that principle addressed by Brainin, and brings us to the broader, underlying considerationthe principle which is the foundation for our topic on this panel: what is determining, and what will determine, mankinds future. [Begin video:] Lyndon LaRouche: [speaking to a July 3, 2011 European Schiller Institute Conference]. This is truly the most important of all strategic questions we have to face today: the fact that the human species is absolutely unique in its capabilities. Theres no other species in the universe, ever known to have existed, or could existeven though we have not fully explored, of course, the Crab Nebula or similar parts of the great galaxy which were involved in, called the Milky Way. There may be many species with cognitive powers out there. Our organization in the United States has spent a good deal of effort on concentrating, inclusively, on just this question: How old is life? How long has life existed in this galaxy, or within some place in it? What is the nature of mankind, which has been on this planet only for a few million years? There was no human being on this planet, to the best of our knowledge, until a few million years ago. And yet, were talking about billions of years of this galaxy, during which all living processes known to us have come into existence. And all life is creative, but theres a sad part: that over 95% of all known living species have been rendered extinct, as failures, in their time. The question, therefore: Why, in these timeswhen we have entered a period in which there will be more great kills of living processes, at this phase of the movement of the Solar System through the galaxywhy should we be so presumptuous as to imagine that human life is not about to disappear as the dinosaurs did in the last great kill?... View full size Schiller Institute Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. What is there in us, that is not in other living species known to us, that might, somehow, miraculously, pronounce a destiny for our human species which we grant to no other living species? The name for that specific quality, which we know in the human species, which does not exist in any other known living species, is a quality of creativity, which is absolutely unique to mankind. So, what is human then? What is it about us thats potentially humanwhich is human naturally, but potentially humanwhich will enable us to survive where no kind of animal species ordinarily could survive? Because we are able to develop a form of mind, which is not delimited by the notion of five senses, of five original senses. And it is when we go beyond that, into higher realms, and when we attune our minds orientation to experiments which do that, that mankind manifests the true distinction of mankind from other species. And demonstrates a potentiality, for the ability of mankind to survive, where no animal species would have the kind of capability needed to make the kinds of adaptation by which man can cause his own survival: This is called creativity!... And therefore, what we have to do, you have to have a population which is sensitive to this aspect of the human mind. This aspect of the human mind is the location of human creativity. And the promotion of that aspect of the human experience, Classical artistic culture as an expression of the principle of metaphor, is the principle of ordinary discovery, principled discovery. And when you take this kind of thinking over into the department of the practice of physical science, the same thing! And there, you have an example of the role of Classical musical composition, as in the illustrative cases of both Max Planck and Albert Einstein, in particularand Vernadsky also! You get a demonstration that in the department of Classical artistic composition, in which the mind is experimenting with the attempt to discover principles, and expresses the yearning for that experimental result as the incentive of creativity for the human mind. That is creativity. It is getting outside the ordinary habits, or habituation, of life. And its on that, on the sensitivity to the senses we dont have, but which exist in the universe, and which we discover as existing in the universe; or, we may even create a new principle in the universeand that has been done before! Its when we think in those terms, rather than the vulgar sense of argument and all the interpretations and so forth which dont mean a damned thing in the end!that creativity lies. The problem of society today, is that this precious knowledge, which I deem personally, precious, because of the way Ive experienced it, is the secret of humanity, and supplies the sense of intention, of purpose, which impels us in directions of discovery, to discover principles, universal principles, of physical and related action, which cannot be defined by the modes of so-called sense-perception. What moves you in great music, in a great performance, is not sense-perception: Its something which lies independent of sense-perception, which grips you! Because it comes outside the domain of your sensorium! Theres a kind of magic and mystery in the great achievements in musical performance, for example, the greatest ones: Because its a contrast among various kinds of sense-perceptual activityyou find something which grips you more than anything else, you can not define a single sense which is responsible for it! It comes like magic. Its not magic: Its really humanity. [End video.] Megan Dobrodt: As with Panel 1, our audience today and our speakers on this panel are from around the world. Ill give a quick overview, before introducing our first speaker. First, well be hearing from Jacques Cheminade, who is the head of the Solidarite et Progres party in France, and a former Presidential candidate. Well hear from Roberto Fritzsche and Eduardo Fernandez from Argentina, presenting ideas on LaRouches relative potential population-density. Well then hear from Harley Schlanger of the Schiller Institute, a long-time friend, collaborator of, and spokesman for Lyndon LaRouche in the United States. Then well hear from Fred Huenefeld, another Board Member of the Schiller Institute, like Harley, and a political leader in the United States from Louisiana. Well hear from Sen. Theo Mitchell, a long time friend of Lyndon and Helga LaRouche, and a former State Senator from South Carolina. And finally, well have a group of presentations to end our panel on the topic of LaRouche in the Universities, and the recruitment of a new generation of young people. In that, well hear from Gretchen Small, of the LaRouche Legacy Foundation; Itos Valdes, of the Philippine LaRouche Society; Carolina Dominguez, of Mexico, along with some of her young collaborators from Colombia and Mexico; and Jose Vega, from the United States. I want to remind everyone that you can email us at questions@larouchelegacyfoundation.organd please do email us with your questionsduring and after the panel presentations. This editorial appears in the August 27, 2021 issue of Executive Intelligence Review. EDITORIAL Rush Afghan Economic ProjectsTalk with Government-in-Formation [Print version of this editorial] Aug. 21The Schiller Institute hosted an international webcast today, Now, More Urgent Than Ever: AfghanistanOpportunity for a New Epoch for Mankind, bringing together speakers with wide experience, from six nationsUnited States, Germany, Pakistan, Canada, and Italy. Three main themes were struck repeatedly in the dialogue: Toss out the endless wars paradigm completely, talk to the new Afghan government-in-the-making, and get economic projects going. Push for quick economic development, was the advice by Helga Zepp-LaRouche in her opening remarks. Saying that whats happened in Afghanistan marks the end of a system, maybe not as big as the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Soviet Union, but as portentous. There has been a deep-seated problem of conducting never-ending wars, and geopolitical games. This must stop, and it goes beyond Afghanistan as such. She stressed also that, It is high time to change the axiomatic assumptions about Russia and China. Besides Zepp-LaRouche on the panel, there were Lt. Col. Ulrich Scholz (ret.) (Germany), a military and philosophy expert; Pino Arlacchi (Italy), former head of the UN Office for Drug Control (1997-2002), now a professor at Sassari University; Hassan Daud Butt (Pakistan), CEO, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province Board of Investment; Ray McGovern (U.S.), former CIA analyst and co-founder of the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS); and Prof. Nipa Banerjee (Canada), senior fellow at the School of International Development and Global Studies (University of Ottawa), who served 33 years in the former Canadian International Development Agency, and was the head of the Canadian governments aid program in Afghanistan from 2003 to 2006. A question was taken up from Khalid Latif, director of the Center of Pakistan and International Relations (COPAIR). The co-moderators of todays event, Dennis Speed and Diane Sare, pointed out that todays discussion is a continuation of the dialogue of the July 31 Schiller Institute event, Afghanistan: A Turning Point in History After the Failed Regime-Change Era, and several of the same individuals are involved. Sare noted the importance of the Schiller Institute in restoring the dialogue process, saying that, people are losing the ability to have a dialogue these days. Instead, we have ideological hysteria, as seen right now, with the fixation on accusations and blame over the logistics of the Kabul evacuation process, with no vision for the people and the future. Within two weeks of the Schiller Institutes July 31 event, presenting a development overview for Afghanistan and the region, the 20-year U.S./NATO military action came to an end. The Taliban took over Kabul, the capital. Today there were meetings in Kabul among Taliban political director Abdul Ghani Baradar, former Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, Afghan High Council for National Reconciliation head Abdullah Abdullah, and others toward an eventual formation of a government, to be announced some time shortly after August 31, when the evacuation period concludes. What we dont need now, said Prof. Arlacchi, is Talibanologyspeculating on their intentions and hypotheticals. Many others agreed, making the point that the intentions to be focused upon, are those of the major powers: What do the U.S. and the European Union intend to do? Will they, for example, work together with other major powers of Russia, China, and India as well as immediate neighbors of AfghanistanIran and Pakistan, and the Central Asian nations to the north, on humanitarian aid and economic initiatives? One in three of the 39 million people in Afghanistan is food insecure. There are dozens of thousands of internally displaced people, and thousands are fleeing the nation. All this, with the COVID-19 pandemic continuing. Arlacchi reported his own past experience on a wool factory project in Kandahar Province, involving successful negotiations with the Taliban governor. In the July 31 dialogue, Arlacchi reported on the success in nearly eradicating all opium poppy cultivation over the period 1998 to 2000, through his UN program, in conjunction with the Taliban. Opium production then roared back after the U.S./NATO 2001 invasion. Arlacchi said emphatically today, We should start to make plans on narcotics elimination right now. On the question of accountability of the Taliban new government and projects, Ray McGovern raised the point that you can and should have a truthful monitoring process, which could come, for example from the United Nations. He raised the specific example of how the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction (SIGAR), set up by Congress some years back, actually kept truthful accounts on what the U.S. and NATO were doing in Afghanistan, which documented that U.S. officials were lying about progress there all along. Prof. Banerjee strongly agreed on this point. These SIGAR documents, published in 2019 by the Washington Post, were described by McGovern as the one useful thing done by the Washington Post in the last 20 years. Principal author Craig Whitlock has just released his new book, The Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War. The features of economic development for the region were summarized by Butt, whose Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province in Pakistan borders Afghanistan, which has national endowments of minerals, water, hard-working people. He stressed that, when the Afghanistan government is strong and stable, it can reach out to China, and work with the Belt and Road Initiative, and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, in which it already has observer status. It can become a crossroads of the region. In the past, this very region was referred to as a land of a thousand cities, Zepp-LaRouche stated in concluding the discussion. The idea of the New Silk Road, is again to create conditions for hundreds and thousands of new citiesscience centers, and beautiful, modern new cities. The old paradigm is crashing down, not just in Afghanistan. War can no longer be a means of solving problems. Xi and Putin Explore Efforts To Achieve Afghan Peace in Phone Call Today Aug. 25, 2021 (EIRNS)Chinas President Xi Jinping discussed the issue of Afghanistan with Russian President Vladimir Putin by phone today, along with the broader strategic situation. Putin said the current evolution of the situation in Afghanistan shows that the external forces policy of forcibly implementing their political model will not work and will only bring destruction and disaster to the relevant countries. Russia and China share similar positions and common interests on the Afghan issue. The two leaders also reiterated their commitment to their bilateral relationship, calling the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the signing of the Sino-Russian Treaty of Good-Neighborliness, Friendship and Cooperation this year a new starting point for their relationship. Xi said that with the fluctuation of the pandemic, the two should deepen vaccine research and development cooperation to secure the global vaccine supply chain. He drew the implications of the U.S. failure in Afghanistan, which showed that trying to impose some system that was not in tune with the culture and norms of the country was doomed to failure. Only the wearer knows whether the shoe fits, he said. Which system works in China and Russia, only the people living there can say. China and Russia must deepen anti-interference cooperation and firmly control the future and destiny of their respective countries in their own hands, he said. On Afghanistan, Xi Jinping emphasized that China respects Afghanistans sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity, pursues a policy of non-interference in Afghanistans internal affairs, and has always played a constructive role in the political settlement of the Afghan issue. China is willing to strengthen communication and coordination with all parties in the international community, including Russia, and encourages all parties in Afghanistan to negotiate to build an open and inclusive political structure, implement a moderate and stable domestic and foreign policy, and completely cut off all contacts with various terrorist organizations, and cooperate with countries around the world, especially the neighboring countries. Putin expressed satisfaction with the development of China-Russia relations, observing that both countries had suffered greatly during the World Anti-Fascist War, which marks the 76th anniversary of its end in 2021. Under the current situation, the two sides should maintain close strategic coordination, firmly support each other, defend the victory of World War II, and safeguard the historical truth, he said. According to the Kremlin readout, the leaders expressed readiness to step up efforts to counter the threats of terrorism and drug trafficking emanating from Afghanistan and emphasized the importance of achieving peace as soon as possible and preventing the spread of instability to neighboring regions. It order to do this, the Presidents intend to use the potential of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization as much as possible, among other things. The two leaders also agreed to step up bilateral contacts and close cooperation, above all between the foreign ministries. EIR LEAD EDITORIAL FOR THURSDAY, AUGUST 26 , 2021 The Entire Institutional Structure of the Trans-Atlantic World Is Crumbling Aug. 25, 2021 (EIRNS)Stepping back from the whirlwind of daily events around Afghanistan, its clear that what we are witnessing in that theater, and worldwide, is the crumbling of the entire institutional structure on which the British neo-liberal order has been based over the last half century. The British ranting and railing against President Biden, because he has not delivered the world they wished to see, were better directed against the gods themselves and their warning: Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad. The G7 showed what its made of earlier this week, with their failed effort to get the U.S. to commit hara-kiri to defend the British policy of perpetual Malthusian warfare. And now Mario Draghi is carrying out Londons bidding (as usual), by calling for a G20 meeting to also address Afghanistan, which will likely prove equally irrelevant. Put that together with the reports earlier this week that the only actual multilateral lending for physical-economic activity now comes only from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the BRICS New Development Bank (with the World Bank and the various central banks all tracked totally on the Green New Deal speculative bubble), and the picture of a systemic collapse of a dysfunctional world order comes into focus. As Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche stated emphatically in her weekly webcast today: I said immediately when the decision was clear that the U.S. and NATO troops would leave, that this was a changemaybe not quite as significant as the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, but of that type. Namely that a whole system is coming to an endthe Responsibility to Protect, humanitarian interventions, the endless wars of the last 20 years, and so on. This policy clearly has completely failed. This is a failure of the neoliberal system big time. An article by Asia-expert Michael Shuman in The Atlantic fearfully addressed what could be coming into existence to replace that dying system, warning that a China-led world order is moving forward, and that if they succeed, the blow to the U.S. could be a heavy one. Under the headline An Early Test Case for a China-Led World: Beijings policies now that the Taliban is in charge will provide clues as to how it views global leadership, Shumans article begins by noting: For those of us wondering what kind of superpower China might be, well soon get some clues in, of all places, Afghanistan.... The U.S. withdrawal also presents Beijings leaders with an opportunity: to solidify their dominance in a region they consider their backyard and, even more, to play the role of hero by succeeding where Washington failed. Beijings Afghan policy will also be something more, though: a test of its entire worldview, and the specific form of international relations it has created.... Shuman admits that both the U.S. and China want stability in Afghanistan, but denies that there is really common ground. But while the U.S. and China both fear an unstable Afghanistan will become a haven for militancy once again, they dont at all have a common purpose.... The Taliban has responded positively to Beijings overtures and seems ready to allow China a significant role in Afghanistan.... Beijing will likely try to hold the Taliban to its word [of not harboring terrorists] with ample economic aid and infrastructure projects under Chinas Belt and Road Initiative.... Yet if China succeeds, the blow to the U.S. could be a heavy one. Helga Zepp-LaRouche continues to provide an entirely different approach to the crisis: the U.S. and Chinaand other nationshave a common interest in Afghanistan, around a policy to achieve peace through development. The U.S. should join with China, Russia, Pakistan, Iran, India and other neighbors of Afghanistan, to promote the most rapid possible integration of Afghanistan with the Belt and Road Initiative. 2020 Census Reveals 2.9% Increase in L.A.s Black Population The number of African Americans in Los Angeles grew by 2.9% according to the 2020 Census, which nearly mirrors the citys 2.8% population increase over the last 10 years for a current total of 3,898,747 people in L.A. The statistics were disclosed at a special meeting of the L.A. City Council Redistricting Commission on August 19. The commission is charged with using census data to recommend a redistricting plan that outlines the boundaries of council districts (CDs) and each area should be largely equal in population. This census data, together with other sources such as the American Community Survey (ACS) and the community of interest public testimony weve received and will receive in the future, will help inform the commission in drawing council district maps in an inclusive and transparent way for the City of Los Angeles, said Fred Ali, chair of the Redistricting Commission. ADVERTISEMENT The mission of the Los Angeles City Council Redistricting Commission is to make sure that all community members have fair and equal representation on the Los Angeles City Council, he added. To assist the 21 board members in fulfilling their duties, Commission Executive Director Frank Cardenas, City Demographer David Ely and Paul Mitchell of Redistricting Partners presented key findings and results from the census. Their report noted that the majority of L.A.s African Americans reside in four districts CD 8 totaled 84,644 Blacks, which is 33% of the total population of 255,573 people. CD 9 summed up 32,397 Blacks, 12.7% of the districts 254,230 inhabitants. CD 10 tallied 51,490 African Americans, 20% of the areas 255,950. CD 15 counted 30,307 African Americans, which is 11.7% of 258,320 residents. The census category CVAP, Citizen Voting Age Population, cited a decrease in Black residents in 11 of the citys 15 council districts and significant reductions in CDs 8, 9 and 10. For CDs 8, the number of African American voters equated to 75,713, which is 52.4% of the council districts total CVAP of 144,534, CD 9 25,687, 24.7% of 104,088 people and CD 10 48,916, which is 33.3% of 146,734 total CVAP. Populations determined by neighborhood council (NC) boundaries were also shared. Among the NCs logging the greatest increases in people were Chesterfield Square (CD 8), which grew from 6,388 to 7, 131 for a 12% surge and Broadway-Manchester (CD 9), which jumped from 26,768 to 29,359 for a 10% rise. The NC list of greatest decreases included Arlington Heights (CD 10) from 21,483 to 20,188 for a 6% decline and West Adams (CD 10) from 22,925 to 21,737 for a 5% fall. Neighborhoods based on state law are the real building blocks of [council] districts. The real idea of redistricting is bringing communities together instead of dividing them in terms of representation and voting power, said Mitchell, who noted that his staff will provide information on how many neighborhoods are kept whole, how many are split and whether its split multiple times during the process of proposing new district boundaries. Also, the census data will be updated to incorporate 90,000 people in the prison population, whose numbers will be added to the neighborhoods where they were living before incarceration. ADVERTISEMENT The L.A. City Council Redistricting Commission will hold a series of public meetings to solicit input from residents about resources, desires, histories and experiences that impact and define their neighborhoods. The board includes Charisse Bremond-Weaver, the Rev. Eddie Anderson and Valerie Lynne Shaw, who have mounted a campaign to persuade Blacks to participate in the process to help ensure inclusive representation, secure needed assets, and maintain a strong community. The next public hearing is set for Saturday, August 28, at 10 a.m. where the commission will hear testimony focused on Council District 10. To attend via Zoom, visit https://bit.ly/LACCRCZoom or https://zoom.us/join; Meeting ID No. 161 545 4787. The public can also listen and participate in the meeting by calling (669) 254-5252 or toll free at (833) 568-8864. Use Meeting ID No. 161 545 4787, press #, and press # again when prompted for participant ID. For more information on the Los Angeles City Council Redistricting Commission, visit https://laccrc2021.org/ Americas Booster Shots Draws Criticism from Some World Leaders caption: ADVERTISEMENT The announcement by the Biden-Harris administration to begin providing booster shots to combat Covid-19 has drawn the ire of the world community. The World Health Organization (WHO) responded to the announcement that the doses the third shot for those who received either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines immoral and unconscionable. Were planning to hand out extra life jackets to people who already have life jackets, while were leaving other people to drown without a single life jacket, Dr. Michael Ryan, the emergencies chief at WHO, remarked. The organization said poorer countries including many in Africa have little access to vaccines, and America should provide doses to those nations. If none of us are safe until all of us are safe, why are we talking about booster shots while less than 2 percent of Africas population is fully vaccinated? tweeted Ahmed Ali, a researcher, and advocate of evidence-based policies. Global data shows that 32 percent of the worlds population has received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, and 24 percent are fully vaccinated. Approximately 4.84 billion doses have been administered globally, and 34.95 million are now provided each day. The data shows that just 1.3 percent of individuals in low-income countries have received at least one dose. In the United States, health officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that 189.9 million people or 57 percent of the total population have received at least one dose. Approximately 163.9 million people or 49 percent of the U.S. population are fully vaccinated. Some richer countries hoard vaccines, asserted Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, the regional director of Africa for the WHO. They make a mockery of vaccine equity, Dr. Moeti insisted. U.S. officials countered that while the country plans to administer 100 million booster shots by the end of the year, America will distribute 200 million more vaccines globally. President Biden noted that America already had shipped abroad 600 million vaccines. ADVERTISEMENT I know that some world leaders who say America shouldnt get a third shot until other countries got their first shot. I disagree, President Biden remarked. We can take care of America and help the world at the same time. The rise of the delta variant has further necessitated a booster shot, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy stated. Its normal for immunity or the protection you get from the vaccine to decrease over time, Dr. Murthy continued. We knew that delta as a variant was different, and it may have impacted the protection we were getting. Cal Sec. of State Weber, Atty Gen Bonta Break Down Your Voting Rights California Secretary of State Shirley Weber and Attorney General Rob Bonta said they are laser-focused on ensuring that the states gubernatorial recall election on Sept. 14 is safe, fair, and accessible to every voter that visits a polling place or votes by mail. As vote-by-mail ballots make their way to every active registered voter across the state, Weber and Bonta are asking Californians to review the California Voter Bill of Rights, learn more about the states voting protections and make a plan to cast their ballot. Weber and Bonta were speaking during a virtual news conference held last week and livestreamed on the California Department of Justice website to explain voters rights. ADVERTISEMENT Its about helping voters make their voices heard, Bonta said. California voters should know their rights. Its an essential part of helping our election safe and secure. If (voters) believe that they have been denied of any of these rights or aware of any election fraud or misconduct, please let us (the Department of Justice) know. County elections officials across the state are required to mail each registered voter a vote-by-mail ballot. Voters can return their ballots by mail or through other options made available by their county elections officials or go in-person to the polls. Despite the devastating impacts of the global pandemic, nearly 17.8 million Californians were able to safely and securely vote during the 2020 General Election. That was the largest voter turnout in almost 70 years. Registration numbers continue to rise to over 22 million. Democracy clearly matters to the people of California, Weber said. To ensure that the outcome of the upcoming recall election reflects the will of the people, Californians have my commitment and that of the Attorney General to protect the right of every eligible voter regardless of party to cast their ballot. ADVERTISEMENT Bonta said that every vote-by-mail ballot comes with a postage-paid envelope and, as long as it is postmarked by election day, Sept. 14, it is valid. On election day, the California Department of Justice (DOJ) will be on call to provide additional assistance to the Secretary of States Office. The departments will work in tandem to enforce Californias election laws where needed through a team of attorneys and administrative staff across the state, Bonta said. During the news conference, Weber addressed Californians in county jails serving a misdemeanor sentence. She said a misdemeanor does not affect your right to vote if you are awaiting trial, on parole, on probation, on mandatory supervision, on post-release community supervision, on federal supervised release, and a person with a juvenile wardship adjudication is eligible to vote. But a person serving a state prison sentence in a county jail or state correctional facility is not allowed to register to vote or vote. Once a person has finished serving their prison term, the right to vote is restored. However, the emancipated must register online or by filling out a paper voter registration card. We dont have these laws that keep people on parole or probation or a felon from voting, Weber said. Were saying that everyone has a right to vote other than those who are currently incarcerated in federal and state prisons. The California Voter Bill of Rights is available on the Secretary of States website in nearly 30 different languages, including English, Spanish, Chinese, Hindi, Japanese, Khmer, Korean, Tagalog, Thai, and Vietnamese. To download the California Voter Bill of Rights in your language, visit: https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/voter-bill-rights. Cal State LA chemistry faculty member receives this years Outstanding Professor Award Cal State LA recognized Krishna Foster for her excellence in teaching and outstanding achievements during the University Convocation 2021. Foster, a professor of chemistry in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, was presented a 2021 Cal State LA Outstanding Professor Award during the August 19 event. Recognized as a history maker in the fields of education and science, Foster strives to help students develop an awareness of the skills and attributes of professional scientists and assist those who are Ph.D. bound to succeed in this aspiration. ADVERTISEMENT Read Related: Cal State LA chemistry professor recognized as Minority Access National Role Model Foster is co-director of the Minority Opportunities in Research (MORE) programs and director of the National Institutes of Health-funded Research Initiative for Scientific Enhancement (RISE) program at Cal State LA. More than 180 MORE fellows from groups traditionally underrepresented in the sciences have obtained their Ph.D. degrees in STEM fields in the past 20 years. Foster actively explores innovative pedagogical techniques while instructing courses in general, atmospheric and physical chemistry. She aims to develop inquisitive students with refined problem-solving skills who will become leaders in their chosen professions sensitive to the role of chemists and chemistry in the modern world. She has mentored more than 40 students in directed research experiences. Her research interests include determining the role of polycyclic aromatic compounds on the oxidizing capacity of the lower atmosphere, identifying reduced phosphorus oxyanions in natural environments and chemical education. She has co-authored 24 publications on these topics. An Altadena resident, Foster received a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her postdoctoral research conducted at UC Irvine and in the High Arctic resulted in two Science magazine features. Confronting Covid, Recalls and General Republican Madness: No Reliable Remedy Except Resistance In the midst of all the natural and unnatural disasters plaguing the world, raging fires, floods and hurricanes, the global pandemic of COVID-19 and oppression of various subtle and savage kinds everywhere, small-mindedness, mendacity and racist madness still hold sway in home sweet home America. With Marvin Gaye playing in the background, it makes us want to holler, throw up both hands, the way they do our lives, let alone what they be doing to others. So much for the fantasy narrative of striving to become a more perfect union. Actually, we would settle for earnest attempts and urgent actions for a just, equitable and good society, leaving aside the illusions for movies and make-believe Hollywood is most known for. Yet, there are people protesting the evil mask, dismissing its value in preserving health and saving lives, including their relatives and their own as well as others. And there are those in states and communities where hospitalization and death rates are the highest from the coronavirus, rejecting and denouncing the vaccine as conspiracy, poison or deep state pablum and propaganda, depending on the mood and mindset they and their audiences are in. Moreover, the Republicans, not all, but the overwhelming madcap and mean-spirited majority in California are pursuing a recall, exploiting misdirected anger, counting on lack of clarity about the issues, and cultivating confusion by laying out the mad maze of lives their orange idol and White supremacist emperor nursed and nurtured them on for years. They are part of those who are working hard everywhere to deny our value and right to vote, our right to a life of dignity, free from oppression and open to limitless possibilities. ADVERTISEMENT Thus, they belong to a larger league of Trumpian adorers, advocates and allies. Like their model and medium, the white and orange emperor of the North and Nordics, they have, in this time of pandemic and immunity vulnerabilities, willed themselves to be immune to truth, reason and empathy for others, and other such suspicious and suspect human emotion. Indeed, the right wing and wrong-minded religious, political and lay leaders and persons among them seem immune to truth, though not from the fiction, fantasy and falsehood they feed and seem to flourish on. Also, they appear immune to reason, though not to rationalizations and obsessive readiness and willingness to attempt to justify the irrational, immoral and grossly unworthy of human thought and practice. And they seem immune to empathy for others, but not to the vulgar individualism that inoculates them against empathy and other moral sensitivities one rightly expects from other humans. Indeed, it seems in this context of polarization, hatreds and hostilities on virtually every level and in every area of life, there are those who are too busy doing wrong to be bothered with such trifles as truth, such rubbish and reason and such undermining and useful emotion as human empathy. We have to protect ourselves, they cry out as they buy or hire the appropriate guns, board up, barricade and hunker down and ferret out and find convenient enemies everywhere they can dominate, deprive and degrade. And of course, this always means targeting and attacking the vulnerable and less powerful everywhere, in this state, this country and around the world. Likewise, it means initiating and denying unnatural disasters like climate change and fracking-caused earthquakes, as well as the unnatural disasters of racism, colonialism and imperialism and all the varied kinds of violent domination, deprivation and degradation they impose. And this pattern and practice of rejection of truth and commitment to falsehood, this resistance to reason and embrace of irrationality and this rejection of empathy for others and the practice of callousness are evident, not only in domestic policy, but also in international policy. For evil, injustice and oppression, like charity, begins at home and spreads abroad. Thus, the racist hatred, hostility and violence directed and continuously against Native Americans, Africans, Latina/os and Asians here finds its overseas parallels and counterparts in the occupation of Haiti, the suppression of Philippine independence, the seizure of Hawaii and Puerto Rico, and the Pacific Island nations of Samoa, Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands. This does not include the other imperial and imperialist interventions in Latin America and around the world. Clearly, one of the current expressions of this will to power over and deep disregard for others rather than a commitment to shared power and shared good in the world is on stark display in what Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health Organization calls vaccine apartheid. It is the hoarding of the vaccine against COVID-19 for the high-income (White dominant) countries, refusing to equitably share with the low-income (people of color) countries, and prohibiting them from producing their brands. This is playing out in Pres. Bidens decision to give all Americans, vulnerable and well, a booster shot. Quoting Martin Luther King, this brought the issue in the field of (our) moral vision in compelling ways for several reasons. First, because it does reflect a vaccine apartheid that is morally wrong, unjustifiable and unnecessary, and as Nana Anna Julia Cooper defined oppression of human beings, even unjust and unnatural. Indeed, Nana Anna stated, We take our stand on the solidarity of humanity, the oneness of life and the unnaturalness and injustice of all special favoritisms, whether of sex, race, country or condition. ADVERTISEMENT Clearly, there is the special favoritism of race, country and condition and ultimately sex in places where women are placed at the end of the line in medical and social services and support. Moreover, this wrong-headed and hard-hearted decision still deprives millions of people around the world of available vaccine, unused and in many cases, unwanted by millions of Americans for various reasons. This in turn poses long term serious risks to Americans, for they cannot remain or be healthy in a global society and world when peoples are constantly traveling, moving and coming in contact with each other. For in spite of the rants repeated from Viking shamans at the Capitol and throughout the country, science and medical experts rightly maintain that global vaccination is the only way to prevent the spread of this virus and the development and appearance of new and more deadly variants. This position Biden has taken and many support silently or aggressively reflects a narrow concept of both health and human interests. It fails to recognize that health is a shared good and that there is no lasting safety in healthcare for a few and not for all. And they do not see or willfully refuse to see that an out-of-control virus in the world will eventually ruin even the lives of the people with high incomes but low concern for the health and lives of others. We are ever at the crossroads of history, where we must listen to the voice of our ancestors, draw on our best moral and social practices and intensify the struggle to bring and sustain good in the world. Indeed, they enjoin us to stand up in the midst of savage oppression and sinister silence and bear witness to truth and set the scales of justice in their proper place among those who have no voice, the vulnerable, the devalued and disempowered. In a word, we must honor our historical and ongoing role as a moral and social vanguard in this country and the world. And we must bear witness thru words, work and struggle that oppression in any form is immoral, unjust and unnatural and there is no reliable remedy except in righteousness, relentless and transformative struggle. Dr. Maulana Karenga, Professor and Chair of Africana Studies, California State University-Long Beach; Executive Director, African American Cultural Center (Us); Creator of Kwanzaa; and author of Kwanzaa: A Celebration of Family, Community and Culture and Essays on Struggle: Position and Analysis, www.AfricanAmericanCulturalCenter-LA.org; www.OfficialKwanzaaWebsite.org; www.MaulanaKarenga.org. Desperation and Despair in Haiti as Relief Efforts Stall Desperation has accompanied despair in Haiti following the deadly earthquake that claimed more than 2,100 lives and a tropical storm that further decimated the island nation. Relief remains scarce, and residents reportedly have grown so impatient that they attacked supply vans and a caravan carrying former president Michel Martelly, who visited a hospital in Les Cayes offering supplies. ADVERTISEMENT The United Nations estimated that 40 percent of Haitis 12 million residents need emergency aid, but flash flooding and landslides have many relief workers fearing illness and disease. Wes Comfort, a recovery and response lead at Heart to Heart International, told Time Magazine that his medical team chose to sleep on their car hoods to protect themselves. Everyone is very wary of sleeping indoors, Comfort declared. We camped out and listened to the aftershock rattle the tin roof of the mayors office. Weather officials said large parts of Haiti experienced as much as 15 inches of rain, leading to flooding and deadly mudslides. Multi-story buildings immediately collapsed while rescuers pulled many survivors from under heaps of rubble in the countrys southern peninsula. In what is already a challenging time for the people of Haiti, I am saddened by the devastating earthquake that occurred in Saint-Louis du Sud, Haiti, President Joe Biden said in a statement. ADVERTISEMENT We send our deepest condolences to all those who lost a loved one or saw their homes and businesses destroyed. I have authorized an immediate U.S. response and named USAID Administrator Samantha Power as the senior U.S. official to coordinate this effort. Through USAID, President Biden said America supports efforts to assess the damage and assist efforts to recover those injured and those who must now rebuild. Haiti has suffered near-unprecedented damage from previous earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural disasters in recent years. Earlier this summer, Haitian President Jovenel Moise was assassinated in his home. The presidents murder touched off a wild manhunt for his assassins and threw the country into political chaos. Many in the nation suffer from poverty, and reportedly gang violence is rampant. The earthquake struck near the town of Petit Trou de Nippes, which isnt far from the nations capital, Port-au-Prince. The cities of Les Cayes and Jeremie bore the brunt of the quakes fury. Scientists reportedly noted that the quake possessed a seven-mile depth and residents 200 miles away in Jamaica felt the trembles. The 7.2 magnitude topped the devastating 2010 quake in Haiti that measured 7.0. Getting aid to Haiti is paramount. World Central Kitchen in Northwest, D.C., plans to distribute 30,000 meals per day in the earthquake and storm-ravaged nation. With an increasing number of climate disasters, were going to continue to work hard and do everything that we can to support, said Nate Mook, the CEO of World Central Kitchen Mook noted that JetBlue had provided an airplane to the nonprofit for the mission. World Central Kitchen uses locally sourced ingredients to make traditional Haitian dishes like chicken and vegetable stew over rice and beans in Haiti. The organization plans to deliver meals to hospitals, emergency crews, and families, Mook noted. The Red Cross also responded. The international organization has provided first aid and shelter and assistance with search and rescue operations. Preventing and controlling the transmission of COVID-19 and guaranteeing access to water, hygiene and sanitation are essential for volunteers on the ground, Red Cross officials said in a statement. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) sent 15 tons of essential goods to Haiti and more than 37 tons of aid, including shelter tool kits, tarps, buckets, jerrycans, kitchen sets, blankets, personal protection equipment, and mosquito nets. Officials activated a humanitarian corridor in the Dominican Republic and collected prepositioned non-food items (NFIs) for at least 4,500 people, the Red Cross stated. The United States remains a close and enduring friend to the people of Haiti, and we will be there in the aftermath of this tragedy, President Biden declared. Enrollment Increases for HBCUs Howard University enjoyed a more than 15 percent enrollment increase during the pandemic, and officials at the historically Black college expect those numbers to increase this fall. This has the potential to be our largest freshman class ever, Anthony Wutoh, Howards Provost and chief academic officer, told reporters. Up north from D.C., Bowie State reportedly expects an 8 percent increase in overall enrollment this fall. ADVERTISEMENT The increase in enrollment at Howard and Bowie State reflects whats happening at historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) around the country. Some observers believe the calls for racial justice after the murder of George Floyd and the global awareness of the Black Lives Matter movement have contributed mightily to the rise in enrollment at HBCUs. We are attracting students who have a significant interest in social justice and an interest in addressing what they see as the ills of society, Wutoh told NBC News. At Morgan State University in Baltimore, two gifts from philanthropists MacKenzie Scott and Calvin and Tina Tyler totaling $60 million have assisted. The Biden-Harris administration eliminated millions of dollars in debt through the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act. In May, university officials noted they had received 14,600 undergraduate applications for 2021-22, shattering 2019 totals by more than 58 percent, reported universitybusiness.com. ADVERTISEMENT Morgan State also pulled in 1,200 housing applications, up more than 50 percent from 2019. We have faced challenges during the pandemic and have seen some of our natural growth stifled as a result. However, what these record numbers of applications are revealing is that educational attainment is still very important to a great number of people and that there is a tremendous appetite to receive that education at Morgan, university President David Wilson told universitybusiness.com. What weve put in place here at the university, in terms of programs and opportunities, is unique and attractive to both traditional and nontraditional students. We look forward to capitalizing on this monumental interest and building for the future. Vice President Kamala Harris, actors Samuel L. Jackson and the late Chadwick Boseman, are among the many famous individuals who graduated from an HBCU. According to the Rutgers Center for Minority Serving Institutions, approximately one-third of HBCUs have experienced record increases in applications and enrollment. Our enrollment continues to rise and increase year over year, Bowie State President Aminta Breaux said. I dont think theres just one spark. I do think its a culmination. FDA Approves Pfizer Vaccine, Public Health Stress Social Measures to Stay Safe Earlier this week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the license for the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for the prevention of COVID-19 disease for individuals 16 and older. The licensing approval was announced after another thorough evaluation of safety and effectiveness. Muntu Davis, MD, MPH, a Los Angeles County Health Officer, is grateful for the approval and hopes it will ease the minds of those concerned about taking the vaccine. The COVID-19 vaccine is safe and remains the most powerful tool we have to both lower our risk of infection and protect against serious illness and death from COVID-19 if infected, said Davis. We are grateful to the many scientists and researchers who have worked tirelessly to develop and evaluate the vaccines during the most challenging public health crisis of our lifetime. He continued, We are also grateful to the FDA for their thoughtful analyses and review processes to ensure that we can have the highest confidence that the vaccine is safe and effective. I hope the milestone of this vaccines full approval gives those that were waiting to get vaccinated the confidence to now take this important step. ADVERTISEMENT As of Monday, August 23, Public Health reported seven new deaths and stated 2,331 new cases of COVID-19. There were 1,722 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 with 16% of nearly 7,940,000 individuals testing positive with symptoms. Public Health identified 1,385,505 positive cases of COVID-19 across all areas of L.A. County and a total of 25,078 deaths. Cases across the Southland: Los Angeles County shows 1,313,497 cases, Long Beach with 59,520 cases and Pasadena with 12,488 cases. According to race and ethnicity, COVID-19 statistics show: American Indian/Alaska Native with 2,214; Asian with 62,563; Black with 60,494; Hispanic/Latino with 683,509; Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander with 4,830; White with 155,140; those of other race and ethnicity with 111,937 and 232,810 under investigation. Dr. Davis stated masks stay an essential part in fighting COVID-19 as well as social distancing when necessary and hygiene. The other tools to help reduce and prevent transmission are wearing a mask, keeping your distance, avoiding crowds and poorly ventilated spaces, and washing your hands frequently. For more detailed information on COVID-19 vaccination plans in L.A. County and to sign up for a vaccination newsletter, visit: www.VaccinateLACounty.com For more information and statistics on COVID-19 in Los Angeles County, please visit http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/ ADVERTISEMENT Always check with trusted sources for the latest accurate information about novel coronavirus: *Los Angeles County Department of Public Health http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/media/Coronavirus/ *California Department of Public Health https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/Pages/Immunization/ncov2019.aspx *Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019- ncov/index.html Spanish https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/index-sp.html *World Health Organization https://www.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus *LA County residents can also call 2-1-1 Google Partners With Anaheim Union High School District For Certificates The Anaheim Union High School District is taking part in a first-of-its-kind program with Google to offer students specialized training in data analytics, IT support and project management. The partnership with AUHSD is Googles first with a public school district offering online Google Career Certificates to prepare students for entry-level roles in high-growth fields. Im thrilled that The Anaheim Union High School District and Google are bringing the Google Career Certificates to the school district to help students obtain the digital skills they need to thrive, Rep. Lou Correa, D- Santa Ana, said in a statement. Their investments today will help ensure the workforce of tomorrow is strong. The courses are designed and taught by Google employees over Coursera. They include more than 150 practice and graded assessments, quizzes and writing assignments. The certificates can be credited toward a four-year degree at select colleges and universities, and are available in 100 community colleges in the United States. Course graduates also have the option of applying to over 130 companies, including Coursera, Infosys and Google. The Data Analytics Certificate explores analytical skills, concepts and tools like SQL, Tableau, RStudio and Kaggle, used in introductory data analytics roles. The certificate will be offered at Anaheim High School, Cambridge Virtual Academy, Katella High School and Magnolia High School The IT Support Certificate teaches the fundamentals of operating systems and networking and troubleshooting problems using code. The program will be offered at Cypress High School, Loara High School, Magnolia High School and Western High School. ADVERTISEMENT The Project Management Certificate reviews industry-standard tools and methods including project management systems, and key soft skills like stakeholder management, problem-solving and influencing. It will be offered at Cambridge Virtual Academy. The Google IT Support Certificate has the most graduates of anycertificate on Coursera, 53% of whom identify as Black, Latino, female orveteran, and 82% of graduates report a positive career impact within six monthsof graduating, according to the district. Hawkins to Preach at The New Earth Christian Church The Rev. Dr. Cassandra Mmabatho Hawkins of Los Angeles will be the keynote preacher at The New Earth Christian Church (TNECC) Sunday, during the 10 a.m. worship service via Zoom. Dr. Hawkins is the director at Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF) South Bay in Redondo Beach. CEF is a Bible-centered organization composed of born-again believers whose purpose is to evangelize boys and girls with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and to establish (disciple) them in the Word of God and in a local church for Christian living. She is responsible for teaching the gospel, training volunteers, running the Good News Club for children, preaching and overseeing the daily operations. The Good News Clubs and 5-Day Clubs take place in neighborhood settings such as homes, schools and community centers all over the world and are designed to bring the Gospel of Christ to children on their level in their environment. ADVERTISEMENT CEF provides classes to train their workers and other Christians who minister to children. Dr. Hawkins teaches and trains these volunteers. This has been core to the ministry since it was founded in 1937. Training is offered throughout the USA and around the world through seminars, conferences, and formal courses. CEF Press produces Teaching materials for the public. Many products are translated into over 200 different languages and distributed around the world. Dr. Hawkins obtained a Doctor of Ministry degree from Word of God University. She is a member of Future World and Delta Sigma Theta. In her spare time, she enjoys singing, acting and directing plays. In 2020, Dr. Hawkins was honored as a VIP Member for 2020 by P.O.W.E.R. (Professional Organization of Women of Excellence Recognized) for her outstanding contributions and achievements in the field of religion. TNECC First Lady Erma Dozier heads the Sunday School Dept. at the church and is a graduate of the CEF program, where she first met Dr. Hawkins. TNECC Sr. Pastor Larry Dozier said, I have attended some of Dr. Hawkins classes and she is an outstanding speaker. Our parishioners will be entertained, informed, and inspired on Sunday. How fortunate we are that she has accepted our invitation. To attend the worship, log on at ADVERTISEMENT https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84711497735?pwd=cWlPT1k2MWFCaWorQVk5MU9TZHBidz09 Meeting ID Number: 847 1149 7735 Passcode: 148839 To learn more, call (424) 340-9007 or visit newearthchristian.org. L.A. Churches Present Mini-Homes to Skid Row Homeless On Thursday, August 12, Yes We Can! Worship Center, led by Pastor Sherman D. Manning, and McCoy Memorial Baptist Church, headed by Dr. R.A. Williams, teamed up to sponsor Homes 2 Go. The event, which featured the presentation of five miniature homes to a group of unhoused people, was held at the Union Rescue Mission in downtown Los Angeles. The mini Homes 2 Go was invented by 17-year-old, Jordan Szigeti-Larenne of Orange County, who designed and built the mobile home prototype to provide shelter and privacy for people living on the street. With the help of members of McCoy Baptist, 10 Homes 2 Go were made in the churchs parking lot and final adjustments were recently to put to units to good use. It was a blessing to be able to partner with Dr. R.A Williams and McCoy as we sponsored Jordans Homes 2 Go project. Jordan and his father came to me many months ago and requested my help. I immediately contacted Dr. Williams and ask him to partner with me, said Manning, whose ministry mainly assists the homeless community. ADVERTISEMENT The Mini Homes 2 Go are mobile carts designed to provide unhoused individuals with privacy, shelter, storage, and portability. In case of emergencies, the cart can be configured into the toilet with privacy. The module includes a foldable bed with a covering, which offers privacy as well as protection from inclement weather. Also, each unit can be transformed into a cushioned sofa, a dining table, a storage area, and much more. Jordan and the church members who helped construct the mobile homes on wheels were excited to aid those less fortunate. Its a blessing to be able to partner with Jordan and see some of our veterans get off the ground and have a little privacy and dignity, said Williams. Im just happy to be able to help people, said Jordan, who came up with the idea to create a mobile home after seeing so many homeless people in his community. Jordan says the beds cost about $250.00 to make in parts and added, But this will keep people off the ground and sheltered from most outside elements, semi-permanently. McCoy Baptist First Lady Debbie Williams said its heaven-sent having a partnership with Manning and Jordans Homes 2 Go project. To be a part of the construction of five mobile homes; it was great to see our youth department actually manufacture the homes and give back to the community like this, and to see the smiles on the veterans and young ladies faces, she said. David, a homeless man who said he was an ex-marine, lives outside of the Union Rescue Mission. He met Manning a few months ago and had been waiting patiently for his new home. Im very happy and grateful to receive this and want to thank Pastor Manning, Jordan, and the church. Now, Im good for winter when it comes. David said. Another homeless man who received one of the beds was overwhelmed by Jordans act of kindness and ingenuity. Im just amazed that a 17-year-old did this, D said. Looking at Jordan, he proclaimed, You are going places because you have a great heart and a great brain. First, you need the heart, so that you are guided on a righteous and obedient path and you have to have the brains in order to create the impossible. But you have both, Jordan. And that will take you far. According to an observer, The event was touching and magnificent. It was about race relations. It was about breaking the spirit of me-ism and us-ism. We had Catholics working with atheists, Jewish lawyers working with Baptist preachers and White people, Black people and Hispanic people all working together. Another onlooker shared, These temporary homes have elevated people six inches off the concrete until they find permanent housing. Derrick Williams, an 18-year-old from Mccoy Baptist Church, initially had mixed feelings about the project. When I first heard about the project I believed it was a waste of time, but when I created my first home and gave it to someone in need I seen the importance and the creativity in it. Overall, it was a great experience that I will expose more of my friends too, he said. Jordan is off to college now and we wish him Gods anointing. We plan to make 20 more Homes to Go when he returns home for Thanksgiving! said an excited Pastor Manning. To learn more, visit yeswecanworshipcenter.org or call (213) 858-2608. ADVERTISEMENT This article has been updated Mozee Named General Manager of Citys StreetsLA Bureau L.A. native Keith Mozee, who began his city career as a truck driver, oversees the largest street network in the nation Keith Mozee believes in doing his best, regardless of the task, and that mindset paved the way for his journey from truck driver to general manager of StreetsLA, the Los Angeles city department formerly known as the Bureau of Street Services. I believe in doing things to the best of my ability perseverance. Be willing to work harder than the next person. When you see something negative, respond with the positive. Do the right thing, advocates Mozee, who has found great success by engaging these philosophies. As executive director of one of L.A.s most visible agencies, Mozee oversees the largest street network and urban forest in the nation. In addition, he manages the city services that residents and businesses request on a daily basis such as filling potholes, trimming trees and repairing sidewalks. ADVERTISEMENT Acknowledging the vastness of his duties, Mozee said, The amount and scope of work is tremendous. StreetsLA is responsible for 23,000 lanes miles of streets, 800 miles of alleys, 700,000 trees in the urban forest and 9,000 miles of sidewalks. The agency, which is comprised of 1,100+ employees, also issues permits, directs the citys sidewalk vending program, and protects the public right of way. Basically, said Mozee, We make peoples lives safe through the work that we do and were always looking for ways to improve how we work with communities. Improving relationships with community members falls in line with his desire to do his best, an attitude hes demonstrated since joining StreetsLA in 1989 after applying at a job fair held at Audubon Middle School, which happened to be his alma mater. A native of Los Angeles, Mozee grew up in the citys Leimert Park area. When he stopped by the job fair, then-Mayor Tom Bradley was there along with representatives of several city departments. So, Mozee applied and was hired as a light truck operator by the bureau. Coming up in the bureau, I worked in various positions. I went from truck operator where I filled a lot of potholes, then to paving crews, and then to motor sweeping. In time, I was able to promote and start running crews as a supervisor, superintendent and general superintendent, he recalled. In addition, Mozee enrolled in college, completed several courses in street maintenance technology and earned a Bachelors degree in urban studies and planning from CSU Northridge. The education boosted his career options and helped him promote to upper level jobs. In 2016, he was appointed assistant director where he served as StreetsLAs chief operations officer. At that point, doing his best had catapulted Mozee to oversee the bureaus Street Renewal, Engineering, Construction Services and Emergency Operations Divisions. He also was assigned as the Racial Equity Officer and the COVID-19 Safety Officer. With such extensive experience, its no surprise that Mayor Eric Garcetti nominated him as the StreetsLA general manager and the City Council confirmed Mozee for the job on July 1. ADVERTISEMENT His goals for StreetsLA include approaching infrastructure with a non-traditional viewpoint. As he explained, In the future, as we go into neighborhoods and areas, were not just going to pave the street. Were [also] going to fix the sidewalk, prepare an access ramp and plant trees. Well also look at mobility and bus shelters as part of the sidewalk transportation program and a year or two after that, we will review our sustainability efforts. Perhaps increase our tree planting and look at things like bio-diversity and natural wildlife in areas, which are really important to us to support. Workforce development is another area that Mozee will focus on. Employees will receive more information about available educational sessions along with college courses that result in certifications or degrees. Also, with an increasing number of women serving in the field, Mozee hopes it will lead to increased diversity in the management ranks. We have women who are engineers, architects, motor sweeping operators, part of concrete and paving crews, and working on pothole trucks. Gender equity is very important to us too along with racial equity, making sure that people are treated equally and fairly, he stressed. We want to be transparent about training opportunities, so employees can [take advantage of] upward mobility. We also want to diversify our middle management. Although we are diverse we can do better as far as promoting people of color and women, noted Mozee, who also serves as an adjunct professor at L.A. Trade-Technical College. StreetsLA aims to add staff to the bureau as well. The agency is authorized to have 1,500 employees, so about 400 vacancies currently exist. The general manager plans to work with Targeted Local Hire, an alternate job pathway into city civil service jobs that recruits individuals from the vulnerable and underserved populations, and utilize other employment strategies to expand the workforce. One advantage of working at StreetsLA is that many entry-level positions only require a high school diploma. You dont need a college degree to start at StreetsLA, except for positions like an engineer or architect. When I started, I didnt have a degree. I started in the labor force and worked up through management by obtaining my degree, said the executive director, who added that some courses qualify for tuition reimbursement based on an employees union affiliation. Other concerns will likely arise during Mozees tenure, but whatever the issue, putting forth his best to his staff and community members will be a guiding factor as he moves forward. In fact, Mozee invites the public to communicate with StreetsLA to help the agency give its best to your neighborhood. Anyone can call 311 to request services. If you feel the need to meet and talk with us, we will meet and talk with you, he insisted. We believe in meeting with different stakeholders like neighborhood councils and block clubs. Reach out [to us]. Tell us what you need and the services that you want in your neighborhood. To learn more, visit streetsla.org or call 311 for a service request. NAACP, Black Leaders Demand Congress Act on Voting Rights With voter suppression laws taking shape in Texas, Georgia, Arizona, and just about every GOP-led state in the nation, NAACP President Derrick Johnson is pleading for Democrats and the White House to show a sense of urgency. In a scathing op-ed, Johnson said, we cannot out-organize voter suppression. We organized in November to put people in office to address the issue of voter suppression. We did not organize in November to let elected officials off the hook to organize again and overcome a new hurdle. Voters did their job as citizens, and now theyre simply asking elected officials to do their job to protect our right to vote, Johnson remarked. ADVERTISEMENT Nearly six decades after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and civil rights activists led the 1963 March On Washington for Jobs and Freedom, that helped establish voting rights for millions of Black Americans, African American leaders will again descend on the nations capital to demand Congress protect the rights. Martin Luther King III, Yolanda King, Andrea Waters King, and others plan to march with more than 140 organizations and thousands of Americans on Saturday, August 28, to advocate for eliminating the Jim Crow filibuster and passing three critical voting rights bills the For the People Act, John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, and the Washington D.C. Admission Act. The mobilization comes just months after Black voters overcame significant barriers to the vote and organized their communities to change the course of the country and now ask that the White House and Congress do their part to protect our democracy and stand on the right side of history, the leaders said in a news release. Martin Luther King III plans to appear this week on the National Newspaper Publishers Association live morning news program, Let It Be Known, to discuss the march and voting rights. In his op-ed, Johnson declared that voting rights shouldnt be a partisan issue. Yet the contentious dispute on whether to defend every Americans right to vote has taken center stage in Congress, and for an unnecessary amount of precious time. Read Related: 53 Years After MLKs Assassination, Children of Civil Rights Icon Fight Voter Suppression ADVERTISEMENT He continued: With time not on our side, there is no reason we should still be debating whether to pass a civil rights bill that will indubitably strengthen our fractured democracy by achieving the one goal our nations essence depends on lending a voice to the people. Johnson contradicted Republican Congressman Mike Johnson of Louisiana, who infamously and erroneously stated that it is easier for eligible Americans to vote than ever before in American history. State legislators around the country have introduced more than 400 bills that will make it more difficult for Americans to exercise their constitutional voting rights, and at least 18 states have passed such legislation, Johnson wrote. Ingrained in these attacks on voting rights are generations-long patterns of discrimination targeting communities of color, particularly Black communities. The overwhelming evidence of voter suppression speaks to this truth: It is easier for privileged, eligible Americans to vote than ever before in American history. Any decision not in favor of significant voting legislation under consideration by Congress will cost the lives of millions of Americans whose very voices are jeopardized, Johnson insisted. For instance, in May, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey signed legislation to ban curbside voting, consequentially forbidding poll workers to set up curbside voting centers and preventing voting machines from being stationed outside a polling place, Johnson noted. While many proponents argue that this restriction is rightfully erected to honor the integrity of our elections, this rationalization completely disregards the lack of accommodating resources for the elderly and people with disabilities and the overall safety and wellness of voters who reside in a state where COVID-19 vaccinations are abysmal and infection rates are rising. When signing the 1965 voting rights legislation, President Lyndon B. Johnson understood that the right to vote is an issue of human dignity, Johnson continued. He once said, It is wrong, deadly wrong, to deny any of your fellow Americans the right to vote in this country. There is no issue of states rights or national rights. There is only the struggle for human rights. Elected officials hold the invaluable key to ensuring that our future elections are fair and accessible. Those in power who have given an oath to serve their district, their state, and inherently their country have a responsibility to commit to their purpose of guaranteeing that the people they represent and champion will be heard and not be silenced. Recall Election Heats Up: Gov. Newsom Trades Fire with Larry Elder Until recently, Gov. Newsoms strategy for responding to the litany of attacks hes received from Larry Elder, the Republican frontrunner in the upcoming Sept. 14 recall election has been to not respond directly to them.Newsoms responses have focused on his accomplishments, indirectly alluding to Elders attacks, and especially warning voters that if Republicans succeed in the recall Trumpism would be in charge of the state.But a little over a week ago, as Newsom spoke before phone bankers at Hecho En Mexico restaurant in San Jose hebrought up a number of Elders positions that clash with the views of a majority of Californians. Elder, a former lawyer and Los Angeles-based conservative talk radio host, is opposed to a minimum wage. He is skeptical about climate change. He supports school choice and offshore drilling. He is against school mask mandates and would eliminate vaccination validation and mandatory testing for those who are not vaccinated. He actually wrote an op-ed saying women are not as smart as men on issues of civic affairs, on issues of economics, on issues of politics, Newson said. ADVERTISEMENT Last week, Newsoms campaign released an ad that features a picture of Elder with Trump. Elder has pushed back on the association with Trump. The idea that theyre trying to characterize my campaign as some sort of extension of you-know-who is unfair to me, Elder told ABCs Eyewitness News. I am an insurgent candidacy 1.7 million Californians signed the recall petition. A quarter of them were Independents and Democrats who voted for the man just two years earlier. Regarding Trump and the legitimacy of 2020 presidential election, Larry Elder flipflopped after he told the Sacramento Bees editorial board on Aug. 2 that he did not believe that Joe Biden stole the election. Later, on his talk radio show The Morning Answer, after receiving backlash in conservative circles for disagreeing with Trump, Elder changed his tune. He claimed the Sacramento Bee sound bite had been edited. So, do I believe that there were all sorts of shenanigans in the election? Absolutely. But Joe Biden is sitting there in 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and Donald Trump is in Florida so lets just move on and try to figure out what we can do to win in 2024, Elder said. Elder blames Newsom for Californias homelessness crisis and the unaffordable housing market. According to him Newsom is responsible for unreasonable COVID-19 restrictions and heavy-handed environmental regulations. Recently Elder went toe-to-toe with progressive radio host Tavis Smiley, who broadcasts from KBLA Talk 1580 in Los Angeles. Smiley challenged Elder on his opposition to reparations for African Americans for the atrocities of slavery and the financial losses Blacks suffered due to Jim Crow laws and systemic racism. Systemic racism is not the problem, Elder said. Instead, he blamed the welfare state, which, he says, is the reason the Black family unit has been torn apart. ADVERTISEMENT While Elder conceded that statistics on fatherless Black family units could have been largely due to the after-effects of chattel slavery and Jim Crow laws in the past, he does not think those factors are relevant to the discussion today. Elder has long held the position that the racial wealth disparity is mostly concentrated at the top of Americas wealth pyramid and is therefore not indicative of systemic racial bias. Lately, Elders campaign has been on the defensive. He is being investigated by the California Fair Practices Commission (FPPC) about his candidate disclosure form. His Republican opponents have joined Newsom and the media asking him to explain past controversial statements he has made and he has responded to questions about what hes said about Blacks, women, climate change, and other topics not explicitly defending or denying them. Among the most damaging has been revelations made by his ex-fiancee Alexandra Datig, a former high class call girl who worked for Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss. Datig accused Elder of verbal and emotional abuse, including intimidation with a .45 revolver gun. Elder has denied Datigs allegations, calling them a distraction. In the face of growing scrutiny, Elder insists that his opinions and convictions about issues facing Black people in America are all his own and not the regurgitated talking points of a controversial president (Trump). A lot of people bring up systemic racism since Ive been campaigning, and I find it really bizarre. America has never been less racist than now, Elder said in a conversation with Eyewitness News. Recognizing Rev. Jesse Jacksons Perseverance during his fight Against COVID-19 The core of the Black community felt the heaviness in the air when news broke about Rev. Jesse Jackson and his wife, Jacqueline, who was hospitalized after contracting COVID-19. Many civic leaders sent strength and healing energy towards the couple. On Friday, January 8, Associated Press recorded the day Rev. Jackson received the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine at the Roseland Community Hospital in Chicago. As of August 21, 2021, Jackson and his wife have been administered to a hospital after they both tested positive for coronavirus, according to a statement made Saturday. The Jacksons are being treated at the Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, both Rev. Jackson and Mrs. Jackson are in the age bracket where they are most susceptible to the outcome of the virus being more severe. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the risk increases for people in their 50s and increases in 60s, 70s, and 80s. Any preexisting conditions can also make one more likely to get severely ill with COVID-19, Jackson and his wife both have underlying medical conditions. ADVERTISEMENT As a civil rights leader, Rev. Jesse Jackson laid the groundwork for the Black community to see themselves progressing. He traveled the world, carrying a message of humanity and equality across the globe. This is not Jacksons first health battle; he was diagnosed with Parkisons disease back in 2017. According to National Public Radio (NPR), Jackson was 76-years-old when he announced the diagnosis. Yet the longtime civil and social activist never stopped moving, he added in his statement that Parkinsons was not a stop sign. Read Related: Rev. Jesse Jackson releases statement regarding battle with Parkinsons disease Recent reports state that doctors are currently monitoring both of their conditions. Their current status has been described as fairly well. The Jacksons have been stationed in separate rooms since the weekend. Family members have been vocal with their health updates, The health status of both my parents is unchanged, one of their sons, Jonathan Jackson, said in a Tuesday statement. They continue to rest comfortably and to receive treatment. Jackson has served as a beacon of hope in the Black community. Physical evidence of his battle for justice includes the Rainbow PUSH Coalition (RPC), an organization he founded to home in on social change. The RPC is a multi-racial, multi-issue, progressive, international membership organization fighting for social change. When describing the organization, Jackson stated, Our mission is to protect, defend, and gain civil rights by leveling the economic and educational playing fields, and to promote peace and justice around the world. ADVERTISEMENT Jacksons mission has always been clear, unity among humanity. As an advocate for civil rights and social change, Rev. Jackson earned over 40 honorary doctorate degrees. His words hold value at major colleges and universities, such as Howard, Yale, Princeton, Morehouse, Harvard, Columbia, and Standford. Jackson is an Honorary Fellow of Regents Park College at Oxford University in the UK. He is also inducted into Englands prestigious society. Throughout his accolades, Jacksons purpose stayed true. His goal is to see equality for all, and he is steadfast in the mission. Up until the alert of the viral contraction, Jackson was fighting for voting rights. On August 4, the social activist was at the capital, carrying out his duty of seeking change. Rev. Jackson was captured on Twitter stating, Everybody matters. Jackson continued, Stop the filibuster, Rev Jackson said. The filibuster is a tool the right-wing uses to suppress voter registration. We want our votes to count. We must vote. Our votes must count. Jackson never stopped moving and putting forth change. Celebrities and multiple organizations have sent uplifting thoughts and healing energy towards the recovering family, sending their warmest regards. Representative Hakeem Jeffries, who represents the eighth Congressional District of New York, including large parts of Brooklyn and a section of Queens, posted on Twitter, Praying for the health and strength of Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. and his wife Jacqueline. Martin Luther King III is the oldest son and oldest living child of civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr. He stated, Sending strength, love, and prayers to Rev. Jesse Jackson and Jacqueline Jackson. Please keep them in your prayers so that they may have a quick recovery. Texas Congressman Joaquin Castro who shares the passion for equality among the human race also took to Twitter and stated, Sending strength and prayers to Rev. Jesse Jackson and his wife Jacqueline. Fellow activist Rev. Al Sharpton posted the following message on Twitter, Let us all pray for Rev. and Mrs. Jesse Jackson. They need our sincere and intense prayers. Prayer changes things!!! Rev. Jackson is a fighter, he has seen many frontiers with unique issues that seemed impossible to come out of, but he went in anyway. To the collective community, Rev. Jackson is synonymous with strength and perseverance. Jackson has proven with his decades of dedication, that his mission will continue to live through his actions. Jackson is known to beat all odds. The L.A. Sentinel would like to also send positive thoughts towards the expedited recovery of the Jackson family. Respect a loving look at the great Aretha Franklin There is no question that the great, late Aretha Franklin could sing. God blessed her with a set of pipes but what the movie Respect, directed by Liesl Tommy, showed us is that it took her some time to find her voice. In the lead role playing the legend is Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls) which was Franklins personal wish to play her on-screen and its also clear, from the film, that Ms. Franklin almost got what she wanted. What makes Respect so interesting is that Tommy wanted the world to know that this great artist struggled and it was that energy that shaped Franklins signature sound. ADVERTISEMENT Originally the film was set to be released in 2020, but COVID-19 derailed that. There is no question this film celebrates Franklins accomplishments while celebrating her power as an African-American woman moving through the power of civil rights pushing her into her role as an advocate. Here, there is great pleasure in listening to Hudson step into the vocal stylings of Franklin as she recreated many of her famous songs. And there is no question of the emotional impact when Hudson pushes into her re-imagining of Otis Redding single that lends the film its name. Franklins faith was an important part of her life, and the film, Respect begins and ends with her singing in church. The creative team also made the case that her soulful sound was rooted in her religious upbringing a daughter of the south, her people being hard-working sharecroppers, and her father C.L. Franklin (Forest Whitaker), a circuit preacher. One of her most beloved albums is Amazing Grace, a 1972 gospel album that still sends tingles up and down the spines of listeners. This project has a very interesting history. ; Amazing Grace, which was filmed by director Sydney Pollack for a documentary wasnt released until after her death (2018) because she blocked it for decades. Penned by Tracey Scott Wilson (Fosse/Verdon) she keeps the tone pitch-perfect and she didnt turn away from dealing with Franklins drinking problem. It was Franklin who believed she had a demon tucked into her personality. Franklin did not grow up poor but she did have a challenging childhood, giving birth at the age of 12 with an over-protective father who tried to influence her life and career. The story begins with young Aretha (Skye Dakota Turner) singing in church and Tommy makes the smooth choice, using the camera in a 360-degree tour of the church and then back, to her all grown up and skittish around her father and her first husband, Ted White (Marlon Wayans). ADVERTISEMENT There is some irony in her life, with the song Respect being one of the greatest female empowerment anthem ever written but Franklin, didnt live by it for a long time. She allowed Ted to remove C.L. from her life, where he stepped in as her manager, and it was clear that he had an anger management problem, balling his fists whenever he got angry. Franklin worked hard but after nine albums and not a single break-out hit, she switched labels to Atlantic, taking the sage advice of legendary producer, Jerry Wexler (Marc Maron) to record in Muscle Shoals, Ala. To her surprise, the recording studio was staked with White men and it was there that she cut I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You, bringing the soulful sound that would define the rest of her career. Its also interesting to discover how well connected her father was and she counted Martin Luther King Jr., Sam Cooke, and Dinah Washington (Mary J. Blige) among a wide circle of family friends. But Franklin learned the meaning of her song, Respect and eventually walked away from Ted. His outbursts become too much for her and she began to follow her passions. Then Franklin tells Jerry that she wants to do Amazing Grace in the tone that perfectly reflects the legend she became. No one can deny that Aretha Franklin is one of the most important vocalists to ever live. What makes the film Respect so good is that Hudson, who can also sing, offers her a glimpse of an uncertain woman who found her voice, her style, and finally .the respect she earned. Respect starring Jennifer Hudson, Forest Whitaker, Marlon Wayans, Audra McDonald, Marc Maron, Tituss Burgess, Mary J. Blige. MPAA Rating: PG-13. Running time: 145 MIN. Tropical storm feeds growing anger in quake-stricken Haiti Heavy rain from Tropical Storm Grace forced a temporary halt Tuesday to the Haitian governments response to the deadly weekend earthquake, feeding the growing anger and frustration among thousands who were left homeless. Grace battered southwestern Haiti, which was hit hardest by Saturdays quake, and officials warned some areas could get 15 inches (38 centimeters) of rain before the storm moved on. Heavy rain also drenched the capital of Port-au-Prince. The storm hit Haiti late Monday, the same day that the countrys Civil Protection Agency raised the death toll from the earthquake to 1,419 and the number of injured to 6,000, many of whom have had to wait for medical help lying outside in wilting heat. ADVERTISEMENT As rains soaked the earthquake-damaged city of Les Cayes on Tuesday, patience was running out in the Western Hemispheres poorest nation. Haitians already were struggling with the coronavirus, gang violence, worsening poverty and the July 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moise when the quake hit. Bodies continued to be pulled from the rubble, and the smell of death hung heavily over a pancaked, three-story apartment building. A simple bed sheet covered the body of a 3-year-old girl that firefighters had found an hour earlier. Neighbor Joseph Boyer, 53, said he knew the girls family. The mother and father are in the hospital, but all three kids died, he said. The bodies of the other two siblings were found earlier. Illustrating the lack of government presence, volunteer firefighters from the nearby city of Cap-Hatien had left the body out in the rain because police have to be present before it could be taken away. Another neighbor, James Luxama, 24, repeated a popular rumor at many disaster scenes, saying that someone was sending text messages for help from inside the rubble. But Luxama had not personally seen or received such a message. ADVERTISEMENT A throng of angry, shouting men gathered in front of the collapsed building, a sign that patience was running out. The photographers come through, the press, but we have no tarps for our roofs, said one man, who refused to give his name. The head of Haitis office of civil protection Jerry Chandler acknowledged the situation. Earthquake assessments had to be paused because of the heavy rain, and people are getting aggressive, Chandler said Tuesday. About 20 soldiers finally showed up to help rescuers at the collapsed apartment building. The lack of adequate aid was made more apparent by the fact that the only help that arrived was from poorly equipped volunteers. All we have are sledgehammers and hands. Thats the plan, said Canadian volunteer Randy Lodder, director of the Adoration Christian School in Haiti. Sarah Charles, assistant administrator for USAIDs Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs, said its disaster response teams were forced to suspend operations as the storm arrived Monday, but members were back Tuesday to assess its impact and continue helping. We do not anticipate that the death toll related to this earthquake will be anywhere near the 2010 earthquake, where more than 200,000 people were killed, Charles told reporters. The scale of the damage was not comparable to 2010, she said, adding: Thats not what were seeing on the ground right now. John Morrison, public information officer for the Fairfax Co. (Va.) Urban Search and Rescue, said its team was still trying to find survivors. Two U.S. Coast Guard helicopters ferried searchers to six stricken communities Monday. The team reports that food, health care services, safe drinking water, hygiene and sanitation and shelter are all priority needs, Morrison said. He also noted, we have not yet found any signs of persons alive trapped in buildings. The rain and wind raised the threat of mudslides and flash flooding as Grace slowly passed over southwestern Haitis Tiburon Peninsula before heading toward Jamaica and southeastern Cuba. Forecasters said it could become a hurricane before hitting Mexicos Yucatan Peninsula. Officials said the magnitude 7.2 earthquake destroyed more than 7,000 homes and damaged nearly 5,000, leaving some 30,000 families homeless. Hospitals, schools, offices and churches also were demolished or badly damaged. We are in an exceptional situation, Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry told reporters Monday as the tropical storm approached. In Jeremie, Police Commissioner Paul Menard denied a social media report of looting after the quake. If it were going to happen, it would have been on the first or second night, Menard said. Structural engineers from Miyamoto International, a global earthquake and structural engineering firm, visited hard-hit areas Monday to help with damage assessment and search-and-rescue efforts. Chief among their duties was inspecting government water towers and the damaged offices of charities in the region, said Kit Miyamoto, the companys CEO and president. Miyamoto said he has seen places struck by earthquakes build back stronger. He said the destruction in Port-au-Prince from the devastating 2010 earthquake led masons and others to improve building practices. People there felt the Saturday morning quake, centered about 75 miles to the west, and rushed into the streets, but there were no reports of damage in the capital. Port-au-Prince building is much better than it was in 2010 I know that, Miyamoto said. Its a huge difference, but that knowledge is not widespread. The focus is definitely on Port-au-Prince. Mohammad Daoud Sultanzoy is the mayor of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan. The Taliban has taken control of the city but has kept him in office. The mayor has some words of advice for the militant group. Sultanzoy spoke with VOA's Afghanistan Branch on Monday. He said if the Taliban does not listen to the peoples interests and dreams they, too, will be seen as a group that advanced religious, ethnic and regional interests. "And their reputation will be damaged." Sultanzoy is a well-known politician with no connections to the Taliban. He was among a few senior officials who were permitted to keep their jobs after the Taliban took power in Kabul on August 15. Most other leaders resigned or fled the country. Sultanzoy said the Taliban called him the day after entering Kabul, home to about 5 million people. The Taliban asked him to continue to do his job. "So I went to work," he said. "Until I'm told otherwise, I'll continue to work. This is my country. I don't work for any individual or group. I serve my city's residents. I'm from Kabul, and I'll live in Kabul." Sultanzoy is a pilot by training. He served in the Afghan parliament from 2005 to 2010 and ran for president in 2014. He lost the 2014 election to Ashraf Ghani, who later named Sultanzoy a top adviser. Ghani later put him in charge of the capital in March 2020. Like many other former Ghani allies, Sultanzoy criticized the former president for fleeing the country. Ghani did not tell members of his own government. "As members of the cabinet, we should have been informed," Sultanzoy said. "At least we should have had a meeting." In an August 18 video message from the United Arab Emirates, where he is now living, Ghani defended his decision. He said he was "forced to leave" Afghanistan to avoid more violence. Much of the worlds attention is on the evacuation of thousands of Americans and Afghans from Kabul. Afghanistan still lacks a new national government. But city officials have continued to provide basic services, Sultanzoy said. He said efforts had already started to remove barriers on streets and sidewalks. "Once security is restored, all these barriers should be removed," he added. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid spoke to reporters in Kabul on Tuesday. He said the city has also restarted collecting waste. But there are problems. With the lack of security, some city residents have started building illegal housing at night, Sultanzoy said. The Taliban has not yet formed a new government. But they have started hiring new police officers after thousands resigned their jobs after the militants captured the city, Sultanzoy said. And Mujahid said the former head of Kabul's traffic police has been renamed to his position. "Kabul has a city government. This government should be allowed to function," Sultanzoy said. "That's why I didn't quit my job, because if I had quit my job, it would have been very irresponsible. It would have been an act of treason." Im Dan Novak. Shaista Lami reported this story for Voice of America. Dan Novak adapted it for VOA Learning English. Mario Ritter, Jr. was the editor. _______________________________________ Words in This Story advance v. to help the progress of something regional adj. having to do with a part or area of a country reputation n. the common opinion that people have about someone resident n. someone who lives in a particular place restore v. to bring something back to an earlier state evacuation n. an effort to remove people from a dangerous place or situation allow v. to permit; to let happen function v. to work; to operate The American military says 12 service members were killed and 15 more wounded in attacks Thursday at the international airport in Afghanistan. At least 60 Afghans at the Kabul airport entrance also were killed. General Kenneth McKenzie is head of the United States Central Command, which is leading U.S. forces at the airport. He said the attacks included two suicide bombings followed by mass shootings. He added that the U.S. will find out who was behind the attacks and take action against them. McKenzie said American troops are continuing with the mission of evacuating U.S, citizens, third-country nationals, Special Immigrant Visa holders, U.S. embassy staff and Afghans at risk. He added, "We are continuing to bring people onto the airfield. We just brought a number of buses aboard the airfield over the last couple or three hours The plan is designed to operate under stress and under attack. And we will coordinate to make sure it's safe for American citizens to come to the airfield. An Afghan official told the Associated Press at least 60 Afghan civilians were also killed at the airports entrance. Emergency, an Italian non-profit group, said it was treating more than 60 wounded at a nearby hospital. John Kirby is the spokesman for the U.S. Department of Defense. Kirby said on Twitter that there were two explosions, one outside the airports Abbey Gate and the other nearby at Baron Hotel. Adam Khan, an Afghan waiting near the airports Abbey Gate, told the AP that one bomb exploded in a crowd of people near him. He said several people appeared to have been killed and others, wounded. Reuters reported a video by an Afghan that shows blood and bodies in a street filled with wreckage. The second explosion was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, gathered in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. The U.S. and other Western nations had warned earlier in the day of a possible attack at the airport. The U.S., Australia, Britain and New Zealand advised their citizens not to go to the airport. Australias foreign minister said the area was under a very high threat of a terrorist attack. The Islamic State later claimed responsibility for the attack. A Taliban spokesman said his group strongly condemns Thursdays attack. The group also said many Taliban fighters, on guard outside the airport, were among the wounded. American forces secured the airport but the Taliban group is controlling the city and the surrounding area. Evacuation is ending A crowd of Afghans has been massing outside airport gates hoping to leave the country following the sudden capture of Kabul by the Taliban. Last week, hundreds of people ran alongside an American military transport plane as it tried to take off. Some climbed onto the sides of the aircraft in hopes of finding a way out of the country. The U.S. and Western countries have removed nearly 100,000 people from Afghanistan in the past 12 days. Most are Afghans who worked with the countries. The AP reported that evacuation flights continued to take off from Kabul airport even as the area was attacked. President Joe Biden has already ordered American troops to leave by August 31. Biden said earlier in the week, The sooner we can finish, the better. Each day of operations brings added risk to our troops. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that there could be as many as 1,500 American passport holders waiting for evacuation from Afghanistan. Some countries have already ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats. Canadian forces halted their evacuations of around 3,700 Canadian and Afghan citizens on Thursday, saying they had stayed as long as they could. The Islamic State in Afghanistan Fighters loyal to Islamic State began appearing in eastern Afghanistan at the end of 2014. Western intelligence services said the group has a reputation for extreme violence. They said the group is fighting the Taliban both for ideological reasons and for control of local drug industry profits. I'm Caty Weaver. Hai Do adapted this story for VOA Learning English based on reporting from Associated Press, Reuters and VOA. Caty Weaver was the editor. _____________________________________________________________ Words in This Story evacuate - v. remove people from a dangerous place stress - n. physical force or pressure coordinate -v. to act or work together reputation - n. the common opinion about someone or something ideological - adj. belong to a set of ideas or beliefs United States Vice President Kamala Harris has urged Vietnam to join the U.S. in putting pressure on China over its territorial claims in the South China Sea. The statement by Harris came during a visit to Vietnam on Wednesday. We need to find ways to pressure and raise the pressureon Beijing to abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Harris said. She was speaking to reporters at the start of a meeting with Vietnamese President Nguyen Xuan Phuc in Hanoi. She added that steps are needed to challenge (Chinas) bullying. She was speaking of Chinas territorial claims in the South China Sea. China claims large parts of the South China Sea. It says its claims come from historical usage of the waterway. But other nations also claim territory in the sea. Countries with claims include Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines and Brunei. Taiwan also claims parts of the sea. China has angered other nations in recent years by creating small man-made islands in disputed areas. It has built military structures and placed military equipment on some of the land. In 2016, an international court ruled against China's historical claims to areas of the sea in a case involving the Philippines. China rejects that ruling. Harris also expressed support for sending an additional U.S. Coast Guard ship to Vietnam to help defend its security interests in the disputed waterway. And she promised the U.S. would keep a strong presence in the South China Sea to challenge China. One day earlier during a visit to Singapore, Harris said Chinas actions to press its territorial claims in the South China Sea amounted to intimidation. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin answered Harris comments on Wednesday. Wang accused the U.S. of seeking to defend U.S. hegemony and its own interests. China firmly rejects the U.S. deployment of law enforcement forces in the South China Sea, Wang told reporters. Such activities represent U.S. meddling that affects peace and stability in the area, Wang added. Harris will remain in Vietnam until Thursday. U.S. officials said her visits to Singapore and Vietnam aimed to strengthen U.S. ties in Southeast Asia to balance China's growing military and economic influence. Harris announced a series of new partnerships and support for Vietnam in areas including climate change, trade and the COVID-19 pandemic. She said the United States will send 1 million additional injections of the Pfizer vaccine to Vietnam. This will bring the total U.S. vaccine donations to the country to 6 million. The U.S. will also provide $23 million to help Vietnam with efforts to carry out vaccinations and prepare for future disease threats. The Defense Department is also providing 77 freezers to store vaccines throughout the country. On Wednesday, Harris announced the launch in Hanoi of an office of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The office is meant to be a center for dealing with infectious disease issues across Southeast Asia. Additional U.S. aid to Vietnam includes investments to help the country move to cleaner energy systems and to expand the use of electric vehicles. It also includes millions of dollars in aid to help clear unexploded weapons left over from the Vietnam War. Im Bryan Lynn. The Associated Press and Reuters reported on this story. Bryan Lynn adapted the reports for VOA Learning English. Mario Ritter, Jr. was the editor. ___________________________________________________ Words in This Story abide v. accept or obey challenge v. to express disagreement with ideas, rules or someones authority bully v. to purposely frighten someone who is smaller or weaker than you intimidate v. to intentionally make fearful or timid hegemony n. the position (especially countries) of being the strongest and most powerful meddle v. try to have influence over things that are not your responsibility stability n. the quality of not being likely to change or move freezer n. a device that can keep things at freezing temperatures American Vice President Kamala Harris visit to Vietnam was delayed for a few hours on Tuesday. Officials said two possible cases of Havana Syndrome among American workers in the country led to the delay. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday that the cases had not been confirmed and did not involve anyone traveling with Harris. Havana Syndrome is the name for a series of mysterious health incidents first reported by American diplomats and other government employees in the Cuban capital in late 2016. Sufferers reported hearing loud noise, loss of balance, intense head pressure, and vision problems. Many continued to experience these or other health problems for some time. Similar unexplained incidents have since been reported by U.S. officials and family members in other countries, including Germany, Austria, Russia and China. Especially worrying are the discoveries of at least two possible incidents around Washington, D.C. One happened near the White House last November. What causes the syndrome? Following the reports from Havana, U.S. officials told the Associated Press and other news organizations that the diplomats had been exposed to a sound device that operated outside the range of normal hearing. It was not immediately clear if the device was a weapon or had some other purpose. Officials added investigators were looking into the possibilities that the incidents were carried out by a third country such as Russia. Russia denied any involvement. The University of Pennsylvanias Center for Brain Injury and Repair did a study in 2018 to compare the brain images of 40 Americans stationed in Havana with other healthy individuals. The study found evidence that American diplomats experienced some form of brain injury in Havana. Another study, published last December in the National Academy of Sciences, identifies directed, pulsed radio frequency energy to be the most probable cause of Havana Syndrome. James Giordano is a professor at Georgetown University. He has worked with the State Department on investigating the Havana cases. Giordano told the AP last May that there is evidence of brain injuries in several people, suggesting they may have been affected by radio waves. He identified two possible sources. One is a device used to directly target people. Another is a tool that used energy waves for intelligence gathering. Some scientists, however, disagreed with the findings. Robert Baloh is a medical doctor from the University of California, Los Angeles. He and Robert Bartholomew of Botany College in New Zealand wrote in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, the most likely explanation for the recent outbreak of mysterious symptoms in Cuba and elsewhere is mass psychogenic illness. A mass psychogenic illness is when people learn of sickness among others in their group and begin to feel sick themselves. In June, lawmakers passed the HAVANA act to provide support to Americans who might have brain injuries from likely directed energy attacks. Senator Susan Collins of Maine said those who have undergone these attacks while serving our country should be treated the same way we would treat a soldier who suffered a traumatic injury on the battlefield. William Burns is the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, or CIA. He told NPR in July that Havana Syndrome is real and its serious. Burns added, "I am absolutely determined and I've spent a great deal of time and energy on this in the four months that I've been CIA director to get to the bottom of the question of what and who caused this. I'm Caty Weaver. Hai Do wrote this story for VOA Learning English with additional reporting from the Associated Press. Caty Weaver was the editor. ________________________________________________________ Words in This Story vision - n. the ability to see exposed - adj. not protected or covered range - n. a group of different things pulse - v. to produce a strong, regular beat frequency - n. the number of times that something like a sound wave or radio wave is repeated symptom - n. a change in the body or mind which indicates that a disease is present traumatic - adj. causing someone to become very upset in a way that can lead to mental and emotional problems determined - adj. having a strong feeling that you are going to do something Avery said her favorite scene is when the four main characters played by Wil Wheaton, River Phoenix, Jerry OConnell and Corey Feldman leap from a railroad trestle to avoid an oncoming train. In addition to people leisurely strolling, downtown Brownsville was filled with classic cars harking back to the 1950s, including a pristine 1958 Buick Century used in the movie. The car, once owned by Ruth Lafayette, now belongs to her granddaughter, Karen Grant of Lebanon. Dark green and white, it looks as if it just rolled off the assembly line, down to its gleaming chrome engine portholes a status symbol of its time. Grant said her grandmother was paid about $80, and the car is clearly seen in at least one shot. Its been in the family since new, she said. I love todays event. 'Stand By Me' has so many fans worldwide. Its great that people want to relive it and come to Brownsville. Its exciting for Brownsville. Ken Smith wipes the sweat off of Firebug as they finish a ride at Hells Gate State Park earlier this week in Lewiston. Smith is training Firebug to be a performance horse who will follow in the hoofprints of her mother that placed second at the Pendleton Roundup, competing in barrel racing a The Santa Barbara County Sheriffs Coroners Bureau on Thursday identified a man and a woman from Santa Maria, and a Solvang man killed in two separate vehicle collisions along Highway 101 in Goleta on Wednesday. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Abbott bans mandates on COVID-19 vaccines for governmental agencies regardless of whether they have full FDA approval Aditya Atholi graduated from Center High School and Rice University. He has worked at the local, state and federal levels of government. He is a former Marine artillery officer who currently lives and works in Deep East Texas. Please register or log in to keep reading. No credit card required! Stay logged in to skip the surveys. The U.S. Senates bipartisan deal would invest billions in critical infrastructure for Wisconsin, repairing our crumbling roads and bridges while investing in our economy to ensure every Wisconsinite has the tools they need to thrive. These billions translate into real, good-paying jobs for countless workers throughout our state. Its an echo that can reverberate for generations. Unfortunately, current Sen. Ron Johnson stood against this bi-partisan legislation. He voted against creating this opportunity for working-class Wisconsinites. For years, at every turn, Johnson has stood against working across the aisle to deliver for our communities. That has got to end. We need leadership in Washington, D.C., that will put aside partisan fights to do whats right and time and again, Johnson has shown hes not interested. In the Senate, I will never stop working relentlessly to address the concerns I hear from people throughout our state. And what I hear from Wisconsinites is this: The infrastructure package is a good first step, but we need to do more. Too often, a moment of aspiration quickly fades away into business as usual. Too often we never seem to get to the second step, and the third step. With Kathy Hochul officially taking over the reins as New York's governor, a historic number of women are currently leading U.S. states a push towards equality and representation that could continue into next year's midterm elections. There are now nine women serving as governor in the U.S. That ties a record that was set in 2004 and matched in 2007 and 2019, but it's still well shy of gender proportionality. Story continues after gallery Taking over on short notice for a scandal-plagued predecessor in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, Hochul began her tenure Tuesday with more than enough challenges for a new administration. She also began with an historic opportunity: Hochul is the first woman to hold one of the most prominent governorships in the U.S. "New York as a whole has been a tough place for women to break into the highest levels, because there is very much a tight set of powerful gatekeepers," said Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. "And unfortunately even in 2021 women are still seen, in effect, as newcomers," she said. This approach didnt mean the U.S. would never go to war: We did so in 1983 in Grenada to topple a Marxist government and rescue American students. We did so in 1989 in Panama to remove a dictator blamed for drug trafficking. Most notably, we did so in 1991 to evict Saddam Husseins army from Kuwait. Whether these wars were wise and necessary is subject to debate. But in each case, we did what we set out to do and got out. Success, however, bred amnesia. President George W. Bush had little choice but to invade Afghanistan after Osama bin Laden used it as a base for the 9/11 attacks. But once the Taliban were defeated and al-Qaida was on the run, Bush chose to stay in an effort to cultivate freedom, democracy and prosperity. It was the antithesis of the Powell Doctrine: an ill-defined mission that lay beyond our core competence and was not essential to our security all without an exit strategy. It has been clear for years that our efforts in Afghanistan were not working. But three presidents chose to prolong our involvement rather than admit futility. What we learned when President Joe Biden refused to continue the war is that our failure exceeded our worst assumptions. We didnt know what was really going on in Afghanistan, and we didnt know we didnt know. We were clueless in Kabul. NAMPA (AP) The Canyon County Sheriffs Office says a California man has been charged with kidnapping after he was found in a hotel with an 11-year-old girl from Nampa. The sheriffs office said in a prepared statement Wednesday that they began investigating on Monday after the girl was reported as a runaway. When they couldnt find her through her friends, investigators searched the childs cellphone records and found frequent communication with a person who had a California phone number. The sheriffs office said further investigation led deputies to find the child at a hotel with a 20-year-old man. Brian Sangjoon Lee of Granada Hills, California, was arrested on first-degree kidnapping charges. He is being held on $1 million bond. Online court records do not show if he has been assigned an attorney, and a call to the Canyon County public defenders office went unanswered Wednesday afternoon. Lee has not yet had an opportunity to enter a plea. The Canyon County Sheriffs Office said investigators believe the girl met Lee through an online gaming program, and that Lee agreed to travel from Los Angeles to Idaho to bring the child back to his home. IDAHO FALLS Chad Daybell waived his right to a speedy trial Tuesday. Under Idaho Code 19-3501 a defendant must be tried within six months of being tried unless the trial is postponed. If a trial is not set within six months of a criminal charge being filed and the prosecution does not request a postponement with reason, the case can be dismissed. Daybell is scheduled to undergo a jury trial starting Nov. 8. The waiver of his right to a speedy trial means the jury trial will likely be delayed. A hearing is scheduled Oct. 5 to discuss a motion to conduct the trial elsewhere. Daybells defense attorney, John Prior, has argued it is not possible for his client to get a fair trial in eastern Idaho due to the heavy news coverage. Daybell is charged with multiple felonies, including three counts of first-degree murder. The charges came nearly a year after Joshua J.J. Vallow and Tylee Ryan, the children of his wife Lori Vallow, were found buried in his yard months after law enforcement had begun investigating their disappearance. He is also charged for the death of his previous wife, Tammy Daybell, who died a month before Chad Daybell married Vallow. The Magic Valley Energy open house caught my attention because of the technology side of the event. I felt so welcomed in a place I had never been to by all of the MVE professionals. My favorite part of the day was when I learned how diverse the work field is with a wind project. I mentioned I had an interest in law and also engineering, and fairly quickly, they shared ways to combine both in the renewable energy field, Jimenez said. I realize the need for renewable energy is the way we change the damage to the earth. If the world wants to see a positive change in our planet, we can no longer talk about what we should do, but rather take action on what needs to be done. We are seeing some very, very sick patients in that 30 to 50 range, and I think, unfortunately, thats the group that has gotten that message Oh, you dont need to get (the vaccine), youre not at risk (of COVID-19), Kern said. Well, anybody that ends up in an ICU runs the risk of significant long-term complications. If youre that critically ill, the risk to you is real. This surge in hospitalizations is stretching hospital resources throughout the state. St. Lukes announced two weeks ago the hospital system was pausing certain elective surgeries and procedures due to the increase. Jeppesen said, during Tuesdays media briefing, that hospitals are trying to make space for patients, but its becoming harder to find solutions, such as transferring people between hospitals. As a result, health care administrators throughout the state have begun discussing crisis standards of care. Kern said this is when hospitals would have to make decisions on who can or cant receive treatment due to a lack of resources. This is a step that hospitals in Idaho have not had to take, so far, during this pandemic, Kern said. But if it gets to the point where all the resources in the state are tapped, hospital administrators and the department of health and welfare will have to hold those conversations. Its something that any physician in America is just appalled to even talk about because weve never seen anything that stretched our resources to the point where we said, theres literally no nurse or bed available, Kern said. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 7 Angry 1 The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which are named in the suit, declined to comment, citing the pending litigation. Vineyard Wind, a joint project of a Danish company and a U.S. subsidiary of the Spanish energy giant, Iberdrola, also declined to comment. But the American Clean Power Association, a group that represents renewable energy companies, stressed the project has undergone a lengthy environmental review, permitting and public comment process. "It appears this lawsuit is being brought by residents motivated by aesthetic concerns as much as anything alleged in their complaint, Tom Vinson, a vice president with the association, said in a statement. Vallorie Oliver, a Nantucket resident, acknowledged that visibility of the towering structures which could be as tall as 850-feet (260 meters) and eclipse Bostons 790-foot (240 meter) Hancock Tower is among the group's concerns. But she argues federal officials also havent provided adequate research to back up their claims that the wind project will have minimal impact on right whales and other marine life. Microsoft, meanwhile, said it would invest $20 billion in cybersecurity over the next five years and make available $150 million in technical services to help local governments upgrade their defenses. IBM plans to train 150,000 people in cybersecurity over three years, Apple said it would develop a new program to help strengthen the technology supply chain, and Amazon said it would offer to the public the same security awareness training it gives to employees. Top executives of each of those companies were invited to Wednesday's meeting, as were financial industry executives and representatives from the energy, education and insurance sectors. A government initiative that at first supported the cybersecurity defenses of electric utilities has now been expanded to focus on natural gas pipelines, the White House said Wednesday. Though ransomware was intended as one aspect of Wednesdays gathering, a senior administration official who briefed reporters in advance said the purpose was much broader, centered on identifying the root causes of any kind of malicious cyber activity and also ways in which the private sector can help bolster cybersecurity. The official briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity. PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) Oregon will deploy crisis teams of hundreds of nurses, respiratory therapists, paramedics and nursing assistants to regions of the state hardest hit by a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations that have stretched hospitals to the limit, Gov. Kate Brown said Wednesday. The state has finalized a contract with a medical staffing company that will send up to 500 health care providers to central and southern Oregon, where hospitals have been slammed by a surge in coronavirus patients, most of them unvaccinated. Smaller teams will also head to long-term care facilities around the state. COVID-19 hospitalizations have increased 990% in Oregon since July 9, according to health officials. The personnel from Jogan Health Systems will head to Bend, Redmond, Medford, Ashland, Grants Pass and Roseburg and can move as conditions required, Brown said. The plan also calls for 60 additional nurses and clinical staff from provider AMN Healthcare, but plans for where those medical workers will be have not been finalized. The deployment of crisis response teams should provide some welcome relief to our hospitals, Brown said. The hospital crisis we are facing isnt just about beds its about having enough trained health care professionals to treat patients." Opinion: Like 90% of Americans, I was in favor of the war in Afghanistan. We were fighting the fight against terrorism and we were going to win. So, what the hell went wrong? Like most Americans, I remember exactly where I was on September 11, 2001. I was the Executive Producer at WROC-TV in Rochester, NY. It was a typical Tuesday morning (I remember it was a Tuesday without looking it up) and I was preparing for the morning meeting when breaking news came over the national morning shows. A plane had crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Like all of Americas news outlets I was shocked but not panicked. The speculation was that a small plane had flown off-course, lost control and crashed into the building. I wandered into the News Directors office and watched the coverage. A few minutes later the morning weatherman an Air Force veteran named, ironically enough as events unfolded, James Monroe came in with an urgent look on his face. Thats not a Cessna, he explained. The hole in the building was too big. He figured it was a commercial airliner. While this conjecture heightened our awareness of the event, there was still no panic. Maybe 10 minutes later the second plane hit the South Tower and the whole world changed forever. That same day, authorities evacuated the Xerox Building in downtown Rochester, which was the tallest building in the state outside of New York City. Within a day, camouflaged soldiers wielding automatic weapons patrolled our tiny airport. I estimate I worked about 160 hours that month. I don't like being told what to do. Never have, said Rodriguez, 54. I'm going to wear mine no matter what. Just like whenever I go into a store. That's my choice. Many large retailers, grocery store chains, food manufacturers and other companies have aggressively encouraged vaccinations with bonuses, time off, information campaigns and on-site vaccination access. Janet Haynes of Topeka, Kansas, an education consultant who works part time as a package handler at a warehouse, said she struggled in March to get an appointment, putting herself on various waiting lists before she finally got a call. Now that vaccines are widely available, Haynes said she is frustrated with people who are reluctant to get them and she would support a requirement at her warehouse, where she dodges co-workers who flout a mask rule. We get so hung up on democracy and freedom, but the reality is that your freedom can't exist at the expense of someone else's loss, said Haynes, adding that she recently had a breakthrough case of COVID-19 and credits the vaccine for her swift recovery. We are not going to be free until we get vaccinated. The AP-NORC poll of 1,729 adults was conducted Aug. 12-16 using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 3.2 percentage points. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Citizens in need of a COVID-19 test are encouraged to call their primary care physician, local urgent care clinics or CVS pharmacy for testing. If you are uninsured or cannot afford a COVID-19 test, you can call the McDowell County Health Department at 828-652-6811 to schedule a test. The next drive-thru testing clinic will be held Monday, Aug. 30 at the McDowell County Health Department from 9 to 11 a.m. The COVID-19 Vaccine Call Center (828-803-4552) is staffed from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day, seven days a week. Please call the hotline if you have questions or would like to set up an appointment to get your vaccine. The COVID-19 vaccine is free and there are multiple vaccine locations around our county to choose from including: McDowell County Health Department, Ingles, Walmart, CVS, Atrium Health Physician Practices and McDowell Family Pharmacy in Old Fort. First dose vaccine appointments can also be booked online by visiting http://www.myspot.nc.gov. Homebound citizens who want the vaccine but are unable to reach a vaccination site are encouraged to contact the Vaccine Call Center (828-803-4552) to have the vaccine delivered and administered at their home, according to the news release. Investigators began looking into the case when a photo circulated this month showing Fernandez together with his wife Fabiola Yanez and other unmasked people standing around a table with with remnants of a party. The government acknowledged that the photograph was taken on July 14, 2020, at a moment when restrictions were in place. The president publicly apologized. While the president is in no risk of going to prison for such an offense, it has dented his image ahead of Novembers legislative elections. MONTGOMERY, Ala. - Alabama is seeing a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases in school-age children, with more than 5,000 cases reported last week an increase officials say is likely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant and is causing some schools to temporarily switch to remote learning. The Alabama Department of Public Health said last week, 5,571 children ages 5 to 17 were reported to have COVID-19. That compares to 702 cases in school-aged children during the same week last year, a time when more than half of students were studying remotely and a less contagious variant was circulating. State Health Officer Scott Harris pointed to delta variant as the most likely explanation. Lt. Col. Georges Eiden, Luxembourgs army representative in neighboring Pakistan, said that Friday would mark the official end for U.S. allies. But two Biden administration officials denied that was the case. A third official said that the U.S. worked with its allies to coordinate each countrys departure, and some nations asked for more time and were granted it. Most depart later in the week, he said, while adding that some were stopping operations Thursday. All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the information publicly. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told RTL radio his country's efforts would stop Friday evening. Danish Defense Minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul. Denmark's last flight has already departed, and Poland and Belgium have also announced the end of their evacuations. The Dutch government said it had been told by the U.S. to leave Thursday. But Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said some planes would continue to fly. Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission, he said in a tweet. Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain A Phase 2 trial led by City of Hope, a world-renowned research and treatment center for cancer and diabetes, suggests that adding the novel ataxia telangiectasia and Rad3-related (ATR) inhibitor drug berzosertib to standard-of-care chemotherapy for patients with metastatic urothelial cancer does not extend progression-free survival. Chemotherapy drugs cisplatin and gemcitabine are typically given to people with cancer cells that line the urethra, bladder, ureters and renal pelvis. Yet, cisplatin-based therapies do not cure these patients, and attempts to combine with novel therapies have failed to extend survival. It was thought that adding the ATR inhibitor drug berzosertib, which disrupts DNA damage repair and induces tumor cell death, could increase the efficacy of current therapies. "We know that chemotherapy damages DNA. Cancer cells can outsmart this process by repairing DNA damage," said Sumanta "Monty" Pal, M.D., clinical professor in City of Hope's Department of Medical Oncology & Therapeutics Research. "Many experts thought berzosertib could disrupt that system and prevent cancer cells from repairing their damaged DNA." "It's important to report trials with a null result," he added. "If we don't do cautionary Phase 2 trials, we may end up investing finances and people's lives in larger Phase 3 clinical trials without seeing any tangible gains in patient survival." The randomized Phase 2 study, published today in JAMA Oncology, included 87 patients across 23 cancer centers affiliated with the National Cancer Institute. The control arm received cisplatin with gemcitabine alone, and the experimental arm received the same treatment plus berzosertib. Patients were followed for up to three years. Median progression-free survival for both groups was eight months, but inferior overall survival was observed in the experimental group. An estimated 83,730 people will be diagnosed with bladder cancer and some 17,200 people will die from the disease this year, according to the American Cancer Society. About 9 out of 10 people with bladder cancer over 55 years old. "One challenge with berzosertib is that when combined with chemotherapy, it greatly decreases a patient's white blood cells and platelets," Pal said. Future efforts should focus on biomarker-based treatment options that could help identify which patients would benefit most from either monotherapy or rational combinations with less negative impact on bone marrow. "The key is to focus on other novel treatments for bladder cancer in the domain of precision medicine and immunotherapy," Pal said. "It's important to find therapies that improve patient outcomes beyond what we see with cisplatin alone, which is very modest." Explore further Drug with new approach on impeding DNA repair shows promise in first clinical trial More information: "A randomized phase II study comparing cisplatin and gemcitabine with or without berzosertib in patients with advanced urothelial carcinoma," JAMA Oncology (2021). Journal information: JAMA Oncology "A randomized phase II study comparing cisplatin and gemcitabine with or without berzosertib in patients with advanced urothelial carcinoma,"(2021). Credit: CC0 Public Domain The cost of raising a child with a rare genetic disorder was significant but the economic burden could be reduced by earlier diagnosis and targeted treatment, a new study has found. The research, led by the Murdoch Children's Research Institute (MCRI), supports the addition of Fragile X syndrome and chromosome 15 imprinting disorders including Angelman, Prader-Willi and Chromosome 15q duplication syndromes to the newborn bloodspot screening test (heel prick test). The four rare disorders studied are characterized by varying degrees of intellectual disability, autism and behavioral problems. About 135 people are born with one of these syndromes each year in Australia. MCRI researcher Dr. Emma Baker said the financial burden of caring for a child with one of these rare conditions was substantial with costs disbursed across out of home care, special education, equipment support, medications and visits to health professionals and hospitals. But Dr. Baker said higher levels of intellectual functioning were associated with lower yearly costs, suggesting that the economic impact could be reduced by earlier diagnosis and targeted interventions. The study, published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, involved 108 Australian families recruited from disorder specific support groups and organizations. Angelman syndrome incurred the highest yearly costs per person at $96,994, followed by Prader-Willi syndrome ($57,576), Chromosome 15q duplication syndrome ($52,130) and Fragile X syndrome ($33,221). The research found that for every point increase in child's intellectual functioning the total yearly costs were reduced by $734. Many with these syndromes are more than 30 points below the IQ of what is typically seen in developing children. "Many infants with these syndromes are not diagnosed within the first year of life," Dr. Baker said. "For Prader-Willi syndrome, diagnosis in infancy allows for early initiation of growth hormone treatment, which has shown to improve intellectual functioning when started in the first 12 months of life, while early targeted interventions such as speech, physical, and behavioral therapies are reliant on early diagnosis." Dr. Baker said the long-term care of patients with these syndromes also put pressure on the health sector. "Severe seizures occur in more than 80 percent of people with Angelman syndrome and Chromosome 15q duplication syndrome and they require ongoing monitoring and treatment throughout life," she said. "For Prader-Willi syndrome, being overweight and obese is reported in 40 percent of children and adolescents, and in up to 98 percent of adults, which significantly increases the risk of chronic conditions if not prevented." MCRI Associate Professor David Godler said early diagnoses for these syndromes was now possible using a specialized screening method called Methylation Specific-Quantitative Melt Analysis recently developed by MCRI researchers. The one-step test can be used to screen for the four syndromes simultaneously by looking at the number of chemical modifications or marks called methylation added to affected genes, which are not present at such high or low levels in children without these disorders. Associate Professor David Godler said given the huge costs associated with these conditions and potential savings to Governments and affected families if diagnosis was made in the first year of life, the research findings support the test being considered for addition in the newborn bloodspot screening program. Anu Madan's daughter, Arika, 2, was diagnosed with Angelman syndrome, at eight months of age. To help with Arika's condition she receives speech, hydro, occupational and physio therapies, takes anti-seizure medication, and sees a team of specialists. Ms Madan said the economic cost of raising a child with a genetic disorder had also taken a huge toll on the family. "The NDIS covers a lot of the expenses but not everything," she said. "The medical equipment needed isn't cheap so we try to source second-hand equipment at markets where we can. On top of that we have the cost of all the specialist appointments, which easily mount up." Ms Madan wants Angelman syndrome to be included on the newborn bloodspot screening program to spare other families the prospect of a late diagnosis and delayed treatment. "If we had been better prepared and known what to expect things would be different," she said. We waited eight months for a diagnosis and then faced huge wait times to see specialists. "If this disorder had been diagnosed at birth she would have received support so much sooner and her motor and cognitive skills wouldn't be as poor." Researchers from The Royal Children's Hospital, the University of Melbourne, La Trobe University, University of Technology Sydney, Foundation for Angelman Syndrome Therapeutics, Prader Willi Syndrome Australia, Genetics of Learning Disability Service, Genetic Services of Western Australia and Dup15q Australia also contributed to the findings. Explore further Study evaluates quality of life and the burden of care with PraderWilli syndrome More information: Emma K. Baker et al, The Cost of Raising Individuals with Fragile X or Chromosome 15 Imprinting Disorders in Australia, Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders (2021). Journal information: Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders Emma K. Baker et al, The Cost of Raising Individuals with Fragile X or Chromosome 15 Imprinting Disorders in Australia,(2021). DOI: 10.1007/s10803-021-05193-4 (HealthDay)Even before COVID-19, college could be a challenging experience, but a new study suggests those stresses are much higher for female students. Still, in the face of a continuing pandemic, all students may need interventions to develop healthy coping strategies, the study authors said. "They're balancing work, classes, relationships and familyand then now you're throwing COVID on top of that," said study author B. Sue Graves, an associate professor in Florida Atlantic University's department of exercise science and health promotion, in Boca Raton. "Our study was before COVID, but they were stressed enough with those other issues." For the study, the researchers surveyed students who were registered for one of a few different health and wellness classes: yoga; Pilates; and a class in which students learned about weight management, handling stress, exercise and other components of healthy living. The investigators compared men and women under age 30, looking at their levels of stress and their coping mechanisms for those stresses. "Having COVID on top of all this just really is taking their coping mechanisms to another degree, in my opinion, but that's an observation. Of course, I don't have any specific data for that," Graves said. "I thought they were stressed enough in a normal situation." Who suffers the most? The study found that female students had higher levels of stress than their male peers did. According to the report, women used four coping strategies to deal with stress: self-distraction; emotional support; instrumental support; and venting. Some of those coping strategies are effective and some less so. Women are also blaming themselves and others for their stress, the findings showed. Just over 34% of undergraduate college students said the top impediment to learning was their stress, according to the Spring 2019 Health Assessment by the American College of Health Association cited in the study. The stressful environment makes college students vulnerable to mental health problems, including anxiety, depression, self-harm and suicidality, the researchers added. Past research by others has uncovered different results, Graves noted, suggesting that may be due in part to when the studies were done, such as at the beginning of a term versus close to finals time, which is when this study was conducted. The latest findings suggest that more universities should address stress and coping with it for incoming students, especially freshmen and sophomores. "The fortunate thing is many universities do have really good health services and support services, but some of the students don't use them and I think sometimes we might need to do a little bit better job getting that [information] out," Graves said. "If students can locate those and find them, I think sometimes that helps them take that next step." The findings were published online Aug. 12 in the journal PLOS ONE. Jeffrey Arnett, a research professor in the department of psychology at Clark University in Worcester, Mass., takes a different approach to the idea of reducing stress and anxiety among college students, though he notes that past studies have often found that women and girls of all ages do experience higher levels of stress and anxiety. "My thinking lately is that we're thinking of stress and anxiety in the wrong way. We always assume, as this article seems to assume, that stress and anxiety are bad and the less of it you have the better, but I don't really think that's true," said Arnett, who was not involved in this study. "I think stress and anxiety can be healthy to a certain extent." Arnett suggested that stress and anxiety can be a motivator, inspiring a person to study more for a test they're feeling anxious about. "Some people do experience stress and anxiety to a point where it is debilitating. It's overwhelming. They feel bad. They feel like they can't handle it all. That's obviously not good," Arnett said. In that case, some positive ways to reduce anxiety can be talking to a friend or loved one and exercising, he said. Arnett suggested there is a sweet spot to anxiety, somewhere between feeling motivated and feeling overwhelmed. "I think it's different for different people, but I think when it interferes with your activities, instead of motivates your activities, then it's past that sweet spot," Arnett said. Explore further Better understanding student stress during the pandemic Copyright 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved. In this Aug. 20, 2021, file photo, two visitors peer into the room of a COVID-19 patient in the intensive care unit at Salem Hospital in Salem, Ore., as a nurse dons full protective gear before going into the room of another patient. Gov. Kate Brown announced Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, that the state has contracted with a medical staffing company to provide up to 500 health care workers to hospitals around the state to help respond to the surge in patients due to the delta variant. Credit: AP Photo/Andrew Selsky, File The U.S. is projected to see nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths between now and Dec. 1, according to the nation's most closely watched forecasting model. But health experts say that toll could be cut in half if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. In other words, what the coronavirus has in store this fall depends on human behavior. "Behavior is really going to determine if, when and how sustainably the current wave subsides," said Lauren Ancel Meyers, director of the University of Texas COVID-19 Modeling Consortium. "We cannot stop delta in its tracks, but we can change our behavior overnight." That means doubling down again on masks, limiting social gatherings, staying home when sick and getting vaccinated. "Those things are within our control," Meyers said. The U.S. is in the grip of a fourth wave of infection this summer, powered by the highly contagious delta variant, which has sent cases, hospitalizations and deaths soaring again, swamped medical centers, burned out nurses and erased months of progress against the virus. Deaths are running at over 1,100 a day on average, turning the clock back to mid-March. One influential model, from the University of Washington, projects an additional 98,000 Americans will die by the start of December, for an overall death toll of nearly 730,000. The projection says deaths will rise to nearly 1,400 a day by mid-September, then decline slowly. But the model also says many of those deaths can be averted if Americans change their ways. Medical staff move COVID-19 patient who died onto a gurney to hand off to a funeral home van, at the Willis-Knighton Medical Center in Shreveport, La., Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021. The hospital in northwestern Louisiana thought the COVID-19 pandemic was letting up. Then came the ongoing surge caused by the delta variant. Credit: AP Photo/Gerald Herbert "We can save 50,000 lives simply by wearing masks. That's how important behaviors are," said Ali Mokdad, a professor of health metrics sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle who is involved in the making of the projections. Already there are signs that Americans are taking the threat more seriously. Amid the alarm over the delta variant in the past several weeks, the slump in demand for COVID-19 shots reversed course. The number of vaccinations dispensed per day has climbed around 80% over the past month to an average of about 900,000. White House COVID-19 coordinator Jeff Zients said Tuesday that in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, "more people got their first shots in the past month than in the prior two months combined." Also, millions of students are being required to wear masks. A growing number of employers are demanding their workers get the vaccine after the federal government gave Pfizer's shot full approval earlier this week. And cities like New York and New Orleans are insisting people get vaccinated if they want to eat at a restaurant. Half of American workers are in favor of vaccine requirements at their workplaces, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Early signs suggest behavior changes may already be flattening the curve in a few places where the virus raged this summer. An Associated Press analysis shows the rate of new cases is slowing in Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas, some of the same states where first shots are on the rise. In Florida, pleas from hospitals and a furor over masks in schools may have nudged some to take more precautions. A patient with COVID-19 on breathing support lies in a bed in an intensive care unit at the Willis-Knighton Medical Center in Shreveport, La., Tuesday, Aug. 17, 2021. The hospital in northwestern Louisiana thought the COVID-19 pandemic was letting up. Then came the ongoing surge caused by the delta variant. Credit: AP Photo/Gerald Herbert However, the troubling trends persist in Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia and Wyoming, where new infections continue to rise steadily. Mokdad said he is frustrated that Americans "aren't doing what it takes to control this virus." "I don't get it," he said. "We have a fire and nobody wants to deploy a firetruck." One explanation: The good news in the springvaccinations rising, cases declininggave people a glimpse of the way things used to be, said Elizabeth Stuart of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and that made it tough for them to resume the precautions they thought they left behind. "We don't need to fully hunker down," she said, "but we can make some choices that reduce risk." Even vaccinated people should stay vigilant, said Dr. Gaby Sauza, 30, of Seattle, who was inoculated over the winter but tested positive for COVID-19 along with other guests days after an Aug. 14 Vermont wedding, even though the festivities were mostly outdoors and those attending had to submit photos of their vaccination cards. "In retrospect, absolutely, I do wish I had worn a mask," she said. Sauza, a resident in pediatrics, will miss two weeks of hospital work and has wrestled with guilt over burdening her colleagues. She credits the vaccine with keeping her infection manageable, though she suffered several days of body aches, fevers, night sweats, fatigue, coughing and chest pain. "If we behave, we can contain this virus. If we don't behave, this virus is waiting for us," Mokdad said. "It's going to find the weak among us." 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Credit: CC0 Public Domain As more and more health care systems across parts of the U.S. push up againstor beyondtheir capacity amid widely circulating COVID-19 infections, questions about how hospitals can continue to care for patients have taken dire form. Hospitals are now filled to the brim with unvaccinated patients. Concerns over how best to ration care for scores of sick have prompted conversations about how to prioritize available beds and resources, should things get even worse, and how to continue persuading the pool of unvaccinated to get jabbed amid a widening emotional toll on hospital workers. And as more health care workers share their testimony from the bedsides of the sick, growing frustration over the sheer number of unvaccinated patients taking up beds has some wondering: Can doctors refuse to treat, or decline to see, patients who are unvaccinated? In the case of COVID-19 patients in need of critical care, not only would refusing to administer treatment be highly unethical, it would violate a physician's duty of care, which can carry legal implications, say several Northeastern experts. "As an emergency department doctor, you treat who is in front of you," says Robert Baginski, associate clinical professor and program director of the physician assistant program at Northeastern. "To do so is a legal obligation, and their vaccination status doesn't change that." According to federal law, under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, any patient who is hospitalized needing emergency care must be treated regardless of the circumstances, including that person's insurance status or ability to pay. Providers can be fined and even prosecuted for violations of the statute. But when it comes to non-emergency situations, doctors are legally able to refuse patients for a variety of reasons, provided they are not doing so because of some aspect of the patient's race, gender/sexuality, or religion, says Timothy Hoff, professor of management, healthcare systems, and health policy at Northeastern. So, in theory, doctors can dismiss patients who do not need urgent care because of vaccination status. But it still raises some ethical questions, Hoff says. For example, a physician who wants to mitigate the spread of COVID may view taking on unvaccinated patients as a risk to their safety or the safety of their staff. "Health care professionals face threats and risks every day in the line of their work," Hoff says. "To the extent that some of them may see this as adding to that risk, you have to kind of see it through that lens." However, a doctor would have to explain the reasons for refusing treatment and offer to connect the patient with an alternative provider, especially if care was ongoing, according to Baginski. Otherwise, it could be a breach of the duty of care doctrine. Alternatively, if the reason a physician refused to treat a patient who is unvaccinated was simply to incentivize them to get the jab, then that would seem "ethically problematic" because it can "erode trust in the profession," says Patricia Illingworth, a philosophy professor and an ethics expert at Northeastern. "Trust is critical for successful doctor-patient relationships," Illingworth says. "Patients won't go to the doctor if they don't trust the doctor, and if they do go, they may not tell the truthboth of which can cause great harm." But some health care professionals have taken a harder stance on vaccination in an effort to influence patients to get innoculated amid rising case numbers and hospitalizations. Last week, an Alabama doctor took to social media and declared he would no longer be seeing unvaccinated patients, stating that "COVID is a miserable way to die and I can't watch them die like that." Illingworth says there are "good reasons" to think that those who refuse to get vaccinated are, themselves, acting unethically. Some have argued that physicians have "duties of stewardship" to protect public health and the broader community, and as such may be justified in deciding not to treat unvaccinated patients, she says. "I believe people have a moral responsibility to be vaccinated barring good medical reasons that suggest otherwise," Illingworth says. "Patients who don't vaccinate but rely on the protection that comes from being in communities of vaccinated people (herd immunity) are free riding, and risking harm to others." Vaccination status should not factor into who gets treatment and who doesn't, unless it's to determine a patient's condition, Baginski says. He says it's vital that health authorities continue to urge that everyone get vaccinated, but not at the expense of care. "Health care professionals are frustrated and tired," Baginski says. "It's not that we want to deny patients care. We're tired, we're at risk, we're doing absolutely everything that we can." n this Friday, Jan. 29, 2021 photo, The Carnival Dream cruise ship arrives as construction work is underway for Carnival Cruise Line's new Terminal F, which will be the homeport to the Carnival Celebration cruise ship at PortMiami, in Miami. Cruise companies are adapting to a changing landscape amid a rise in COVID-19 cases that is threatening to dampen the industry's comeback.Credit: AP Photo/Lynne Sladky Joel Steckler was eager for his first cruise in more than a year and a half, and he chose the ship that just two months ago became the first to accept passengers again after a long pandemic shutdown. Steckler was fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and that was enough to resume cruising, under initial guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Now, the 63-year-old from Long Island, New York, is going to postpone the trip he had planned for Saturday amid new, tighter guidelines prompted by the delta-variant-fueled surge in cases and breakthrough infections. "You just have to make a personal decision," said Steckler, who takes medication that suppresses his immune system and changed his plans after consulting his doctor. "You don't want to be in a position where you are sick on a cruise and you have to fly home or somehow get home." Cruise lines have detected infections among vaccinated crew members and passengers, including in an elderly traveler who recently died. Last Friday, the CDC began advising travelers who are at a higher risk for severe COVID-19 illness to avoid cruises. It is also recommending that passengers show both a recent negative COVID test and proof they've been immunized. In addition to the surging delta virus, the CDC changed its cruise guidelines for high-risk groups because of the close proximity of ship passengers, the limited options for care on board and the challenges of medically evacuating travelers at sea, Centers spokeswoman Kristen Nordlund said Tuesday. In this Tuesday, June 22, 2021 photo, the Celebrity Edge cruise ship is docked at Port Everglades, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Cruise companies are adapting to a changing landscape amid a rise in COVID-19 cases that is threatening to dampen the industry's comeback.Credit: AP Photo/Lynne Sladky, File Some cruise linesand cruise destinationsare also revising their own guidelines. Starting Sept. 3, the Bahamasa favored stop for cruisesis requiring all passengers 12 and older to be vaccinated against COVID-19 as a condition for ships to dock. That has prompted companies including Disney Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean and Carnival to announce this week that they are adopting the same requirement. The companies will ask for a government vaccination card or a record from a health care provider. They've been able to do so in Florida after a federal judge this month temporarily blocked a state law banning cruise lines from requiring passengers to prove they're vaccinated. The companies are also once again requiring masks in indoor areas of the ships and other places where people gather. "Unfortunately, no venue on land or at sea is COVID-free right now," Carnival Corp. said in a written statement. Carnival commented on the case of a vaccinated 77-year-old woman who later came down with the virus. The company said the woman "almost certainly did not contract COVID on our ship," suggesting she was already infected when she embarked. In this Saturday, June 26, 2021 photo. The Celebrity Edge is moored at Port Everglades, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Cruise companies are adapting to a changing landscape amid a rise in COVID-19 cases that is threatening to dampen the industry's comeback.Credit: AP Photo/Marta Lavandier Neither cruise lines nor the federal government are reporting how many cases they have had on their ships. They have only acknowledged that there have been infections. Officials in Belize, however, recently reported that 26 crew members and one passenger of a Carnival cruise shipall of whom had been vaccinatedtested positive for COVID-19. They said all of them had mild or no symptoms, and were in isolation. Jaime Katz, an analyst who covers the cruise industry for the Morningstar financial services company, said while many high-risk travelers might postpone their trips, others will continue to book for the future, betting that the current wave of cases will subside by the time their ship sails. "Flexible booking and cancellation policies have made cruising more palatable for nervous travelers," he said. Companies are offering full refunds if people test positive for COVID-19 or decide to cancel after a cruise line shortens the length of a planned trip. Royal Caribbean International is also offering to fly people home if they or anyone in their party test positive during the cruise. Chris Woronka, a Deutsche Bank analyst who follows the leisure industry, said cruisers, including those over 65, are an avid bunchso eager to get back on the water that they won't easily be dissuaded by the current COVID surge and more stringent travel requirements. "I don't think this is permanent unless we're dealing with delta 2.0 or whatever the next one is," Woronka said. Explore further 27 people aboard Carnival cruise test positive for COVID-19 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Amid reports of waning COVID-19 immunity, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is expected to officially approve a third dose of messengerRNA vaccines for the general public. Moderna and Pfizer are mRNA vaccines. The FDA has already approved a third COVID-19 vaccine dose for those who have compromised immune systems, as part of their primary vaccine series. That third vaccine is not considered a booster. However, Mayo Clinic experts say the pending FDA approval for a booster vaccine does not mean the general public should go out and get a third dose of vaccine, whenever they think they need it. The timing for a booster is important and designed to give extended immunity protection. Sooner is not necessarily better and these experts have other concerns. "We're certainly aware of news reports that people, on their own, are going out and getting a third dose," says Dr. Gregory Poland, an infectious diseases expert and head of Mayo Clinic's Vaccine Research Group. "I would urge caution about that. We don't have a lot of data on that and we want to do this in a manner that offers the most benefit and the least risk." Dr. Melanie Swift, co-chair of the Mayo Clinic COVID-19 Vaccine Allocation and Distribution Work Group, agrees. "There are some things we don't know about that," says Dr. Swift. "One is that they could develop more side effects and are at more risk of adverse reactions. We don't think so, but we would have to actually study that or follow the population to find out." She adds, "Secondly, while we have an adequate vaccine supply to meet this current booster recommendation we don't have a limitless supply of vaccine," says Dr. Swift. She explains that boosters are anticipated for the population that's already been vaccinated, but vaccines to be authorized for children over the coming months need to be anticipated, too. "We don't want people just going out and getting vaccinated, soaking up the available supply," says Dr. Swift. "If they have a healthy immune system and got their full first series, they should expect to be covered for at least eight months after that series so they don't need to go out and get an early booster." "We're in this unusual situation where we've got a group of people we can't convince to get the first dose, despite all the data," adds Dr. Poland. "And then a group of people where we don't yet have the data that are going out on their own and getting third, fourth and fifth doses. We have no idea what the consequences of that might be yet." Finally, Drs. Swift and Poland encourage people to follow the science and talk with their health care providers. Explore further What you need to know about COVID-19 booster shots 2021 Mayo Clinic News Network. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Credit: CC0 Public Domain An analysis of data from 1.5 million people has identified 579 locations in the genome associated with a predisposition to different behaviors and disorders related to self-regulation, including addiction and child behavioral problems. With these findings, researchers have constructed a genetic risk scorea number reflecting a person's overall genetic propensity based on how many risk variants they carrythat predicts a range of behavioral, medical and social outcomes, including education levels, obesity, opioid use disorder, suicide, HIV infections, criminal convictions and unemployment. "[This study] illustrates that genes don't code for a particular disorder or outcome; there are no genes 'for' substance use disorder, or 'for' behavior problems," said joint senior author Danielle Dick, Ph.D., Commonwealth Professor of Psychology and Human and Molecular Genetics at Virginia Commonwealth University. "Instead, genes influence the way our brains are wired, which can make us more at risk for certain outcomes. In this case, we find that there are genes that broadly influence self-control or impulsivity, and that this predisposition then confers risk for a variety of life outcomes." The study, "Multivariate analysis of 1.5 million people identifies genetic associations with traits related to self-regulation and addiction," was published today in the journal Nature Neuroscience and was conducted by a consortium of 26 researchers at 17 institutions in the United States and the Netherlands. It was led by Dick; Philipp Koellinger, Ph.D., professor of social science genetics at the University of Wisconsin Madison and Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam; Kathryn Paige Harden, Ph.D., professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin; and Abraham A. Palmer, Ph.D., professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego. The study is one of the largest genome-wide association studies ever conducted, pooling data from an effective sample size of 1.5 million people of European descent. The researchers' genetic risk score has one of the largest effect sizesa measurement of the prediction powerof any genetic risk score for a behavioral outcome to date. "It demonstrates the far-reaching effects of carrying a genetic liability toward lower self-control, impacting many important life outcomes," said Dick, a professor in the Department of Psychology in the College of Humanities and Sciences and the Department Human and Molecular Genetics in the School of Medicine at VCU. "We hope that a greater understanding of how individual genetic differences contribute to vulnerability can reduce stigma and blame surrounding many of these behaviors, such as behavior problems in children and substance use disorders." The identification of the more than 500 genetic loci is important, the researchers said, because it provides new insight into our understanding of behaviors and disorders related to self-regulation, collectively referred to as "externalizing" and that have a shared genetic liability. "We know that regulating behavior is a critical component of many important life outcomesfrom substance use and behavioral disorders, like ADHD, to medical outcomes ranging from suicide to obesity, to educational outcomes like college completion," Dick said. Characterizing the genetic contributions to self-regulation can be helpful in myriad ways, she said. "It allows us to better understand the biology behind why some people are more at risk, which can assist with medication development, and it can allow us to know who is more at risk, so we can put early intervention and prevention programs in place," she said. "Identifying genetic risk factors is a critical component of precision medicine, which has the goal of using information about an individual's genetic and environmental risk factors to deliver more tailored, effective intervention specific to that individual's risk profile." The researchers noted, however, that having a higher risk profile isn't necessarily a bad thing. "For example, CEOs, entrepreneurs and fighter pilots are often higher on risk taking," Dick said. "DNA is not destiny. We all have unique genetic codes, and we're all at risk for something; but understanding one's predisposition can be empoweringit can help individuals understand their strengths, and their potential challenges, and act accordingly." Explore further Cannabis use disorder: another COVID risk factor More information: Multivariate analysis of 1.5 million people identifies genetic associations with traits related to self-regulation and addiction, Nature Neuroscience (2021). www.nature.com/articles/s41593-021-00908-3 Multivariate analysis of 1.5 million people identifies genetic associations with traits related to self-regulation and addiction,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41593-021-00908-3 For more information about the study and its findings, please visit this FAQ. Journal information: Nature Neuroscience HUP patient Stacy Haley received free-flap reconstruction surgery after receiving a double mastectomy. Credit: University of Pennsylvania The future of medicine is often imagined to include some sort of high-tech or shiny device. But many cutting-edge therapies are fundamentally about using and improving upon what the body already has. There's CAR T therapy that uses engineered versions of the body's own immune cells to fight cancer. And for patients needing surgical interventions, there is autologous surgery. Autologous surgery, implanting a patient with something taken from their own body instead of implanting a synthetic material or one from another donor, is continuing to be a go-to technique in various areas of surgical medicine. "I've been placing autologous slings for 12 years," said Ariana Smith, MD, a professor of Urology and the director of Pelvic Medicine and Reconstructive Surgery at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. "They offer patients peace of mind because they know the material being used to address their health concern is literally a piece of them." For patients with stress urinary incontinence (a leakage of urine during physical movement such as laughing or sneezing) and pelvic organ prolapse (when the tissue and muscles of the pelvic floor no longer support the pelvic organs), a longstanding method has used surgical mesha piece of synthetic material surgically placed to reinforce the vaginal wall or support the urethra or neck of the bladder. Those tissues can weaken overtime due to childbirth, injury, weight gain, and in some cases, surgical complications. While mesh, placed carefully by an experienced surgeon, may be a suitable and successful implant for many patients, autologous surgery is an alternative. It looks like this: Removing a small piece of tissue above the muscle near the bikini line, the surgeon uses sutures to configure the tissue into a sling, makes a vaginal incision, and positions the sling under the urethra or neck of the bladder. The autologous sling functions exactly like a mesh would, providing support and preventing leakage when a patient coughs, sneezes, laughs, or exercises. The use of autologous tissue eliminates the risks of infection seen with synthetic materials and reduces the risk for subsequent surgery due to erosion of foreign materials. While studies are ongoing, clinicians and researchers believe that using slings or other materials from a patient's own body may limit the chance that their body treats the device as a foreign invader. "While the patient's tissue may be in a new place and arranged differently, it's still familiar to their immune system," Smith said. Autologous tissue surgery looks even better in light of an increasingly critical eye placed on mesh. After reports that transvaginal mesh, weakened, moved, or caused major complications for some patients, the FDA banned transvaginal mesh prolapse kit sales in April 2019, saying that those who make the products "have not demonstrated reasonable assurance of safety and effectiveness for these devices." "When properly trained surgeons use and have used mesh with the right kind of patients, risks of these dangerous events decreases substantially," Smith said. "At Penn Urology, we use approved mesh in certain situations and when patients have been appropriately counseled on the risks and benefits. But we also receive countless referrals from around the region to treat patients who have had complications from mesh surgery and who may benefit from an autologous sling or prolapse surgery." Looking to plastic surgery, it's easy to see other benefits of autologous surgery. Joseph Serletti, MD, chief of Penn Medicine Plastic Surgery, regularly performs autogenous free-flap surgery, otherwise known as non-implant based breast reconstruction surgery, for those who have had their breast or breasts removed, usually due to cancer or cancer risk. This technique uses excess lower abdominal fat and skin that is removed and transferred to the chest to create a new natural breast mound, avoiding the use of a breast implant. Surgeons at Penn Medicine perform more free flap surgeries in the United States than any other provider. The result is a breast that will change naturally along with the rest of the body and tissue that does not have to be replaced like some implants do. It also looks, feels, and "behaves," like traditional breast tissue. "There is a huge emotional component to plastic surgery," Serletti said. "As plastic surgeons, we're concerned with helping patients feel good, and that means feel good about their bodies, too." "As doctors, we should always be seeking novel ways to bring the best care to patients, whether that's with the latest invention or through innovative techniques," Smith said. "Autologous surgery is invaluable because, in one way, it often provides more with less." Explore further Surgery for stress urinary incontinence doesn't cause pelvic cancer Fig.1 Protein distributions in a conically laminated calcium oxalate structure in a kidney stone. (a) Multicolor immunofluorescence staining image. (b) IF image of osteopontin. (c) IF image of prothrombin fragment 1. (d) IF image of calgranulin A. Credit: Tanaka Y. et al., Scientific Reports Up to 15% of people will experience kidney stones, and for 50% of those that do, they will recur. It is therefore important to understand as much as possible about how kidney stones form to improve both prevention and treatment. A team of scientists led by Osaka University and Nagoya City University has reported a technique that provides the most detailed picture of kidney stone components yet, shedding new light on the processes involved in stone formation. Their findings are published in Scientific Reports. Most kidney stones are primarily made of calcium oxalate (CaOx) crystals. The CaOx makes up about 90% of the kidney stoneknown as the mineral componentwhile a mixture of numerous different proteins provides what is known as the protein matrix. Determining how these different components interact is key to understanding the complex multi-step kidney stone-formation processes, and consequently providing better outcomes for patients. Many different methods have been used to analyze the structure of kidney stones. However, none have been able to show multiple proteins and the inorganic crystal structure at the same time. The researchers used a technique developed for geology to obtain very thin slices of real kidney stones. They then labeled three different proteins in the stone sections with fluorescent labels with distinct colors. The labelsgenerally used for biological experiments such as cancer screeningallowed the proteins to be observed using a microscope, revealing the distribution of each protein in relation to the CaOx crystals. "We were able to determine the locations of three different calcium-binding proteins that are essential to the formation of kidney stones," explains study corresponding author, Associate Professor Mihoko Maruyama. "This gave us an indication of how the proteins participate in CaOx crystal growth." Two of the proteins were found to be incorporated into the CaOx crystals, whereas the third protein was distributed around the crystals. Yutaro Tanaka, the first author, and researchers also determined that the proteins inside the CaOx crystals were arranged differently depending on the particular type of CaOx crystal involved. "We hope that the insight we have gainedin addition to future findings that will be possible thanks to our techniquewill lead to better experiences for kidney stone patients," says Associate Professor Atsushi Okada, another corresponding author from the medical field. "Both the dissolution and prevention of kidney stones could be a reality for patients in the future." The article, "Multicolor imaging of calcium-binding proteins in human kidney stones for elucidating the effects of proteins on crystal growth," was published in Scientific Reports. More information: Yutaro Tanaka et al, Multicolor imaging of calcium-binding proteins in human kidney stones for elucidating the effects of proteins on crystal growth, Scientific Reports (2021). Journal information: Scientific Reports Yutaro Tanaka et al, Multicolor imaging of calcium-binding proteins in human kidney stones for elucidating the effects of proteins on crystal growth,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-95782-1 Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain The Clalit Research Institute, in collaboration with researchers from Harvard University, analyzed one of the world's largest integrated health record databases to examine the safety of the Pfizer/BioNTech BNT162B2 vaccine against COVID-19. The study provides the largest peer-reviewed evaluation of the safety of a COVID-19 vaccine in a nationwide mass-vaccination setting. The study was conducted in Israel, an early global leader in COVID-19 vaccination rates. Previous efforts to characterize vaccine safety have relied on voluntary active reporting by vaccinated individuals, which is known to be incomplete. The present study relies on the analysis of millions of anonymized electronic medical records, which are far more comprehensive. Furthermore, in order to provide the necessary context for interpreting vaccine safety findings, this study is the first to examine a wide range of adverse events both among vaccinated individuals and among unvaccinated individuals who were infected with the coronavirus. Thus, two separate analyses were conducted: Vaccination Outcomes Analysis: 884,828 vaccinated individuals aged 16 and over were carefully matched with 884,828 unvaccinated individuals based on an extensive set of sociodemographic, geographic and health-related attributes. Individuals were assigned to each group dynamically based on their changing vaccination status (235,541 individuals moved from the unvaccinated cohort into the vaccinated cohort during the study). Rates of the 25 potential adverse events within three weeks following either vaccine dose were compared between the two groups. This analysis took place from December 20, 2020, the launch of Israel's national vaccination campaign, through May 24, 2021. Infection Outcomes Analysis: To provide context for the vaccine safety findings above, a separate analysis was conducted that estimated the rates of the same 25 potential adverse events among 173,106 unvaccinated individuals who were infected with the coronavirus, compared to 173,106 carefully matched controls who were not infected with the coronavirus. This analysis took place from March 1, 2020 (the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in Israel) through May 24, 2021. The vaccine was found to be safe: Out of 25 potential side effects examined, 4 were found to have a strong association with the vaccine. Myocarditis was found to be associated with the vaccine, but rarely2.7 excess cases per 100,000 vaccinated individuals. (The myocarditis events observed after vaccination were concentrated in males between 20 and 34.) In contrast, coronavirus infection in unvaccinated individuals was associated with 11 excess cases of myocarditis per 100,000 infected individuals. Other adverse events moderately associated with vaccination were swelling of the lymph nodes, a mild side effect that is part of a standard immune response to vaccination, with 78 excess cases per 100,000, appendicitis with 5 excess cases per 100,000 (potentially as a result of swelling of lymph nodes around the appendix), and herpes zoster with 16 excess cases per 100,000. In contrast to the relatively small number of adverse effects associated with the vaccine, high rates of multiple serious adverse events were associated with coronavirus infection among unvaccinated patients, including: Cardiac arrhythmias (a 3.8-fold increase to an increase of 166 cases per 100,000 infected patients), kidney damage (14.8-fold increase; 125 excess cases per 100,000), pericarditis (5.4-fold increase; 11 excess cases per 100,000), pulmonary embolism (12.1-fold increase; 62 excess cases per 100,000), deep vein thrombosis (3.8-fold increase; 43 excess cases per 100,000), myocardial infarction (4.5-fold increase; 25 excess cases per 100,000), and stroke (2.1-fold increase; 14 excess cases per 100,000). The research was conducted by Dr. Noam Barda, Dr. Noa Dagan, Yair Ben-Shlomo, Dr. Eldad Kepten, Dr. Jacob Waxman, Reut Ohana and Prof. Ran Balicer from the Clalit Research Institute, Dr. Doron Netzer of Clalit Health Services, as well as Prof. Miguel Hernan and Prof. Marc Lipsitch of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Prof. Isaac Kohane of the Department of Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School, and Prof. Ben Reis of Boston Children's Hospital and Harvard Medical School. This study focused on adverse events that may develop in the short to medium term after vaccination, and those with clinical significance. The study did not focus on common immediate symptoms such as redness and discomfort at the injection site or fever. Symptoms that occurred within 6 weeks of the vaccine (three weeks after each vaccine dose) were defined as an adverse event of the vaccine if they occurred more frequently among the vaccinated group compared to the control group. The results of this study validate and complement the previously reported findings of the Pfizer/BioNTech Phase-III randomized clinical trial, which, with 21,720 vaccinated individuals, could not precisely and comprehensively assess vaccine safety. The present study's large size allows a more detailed assessment of the vaccine's safety across a wider range of adverse events. "The extensive nationwide rollout of Israel's COVID-19 vaccination campaign provided the Clalit Research Institute with a unique opportunity to assess, through its rich and comprehensive digital datasets, the safety of the vaccine in a real-world setting, without needing to rely on individual-driven active reporting of side-effects" said Prof. Ran Balicer, senior author of the study, Director of the Clalit Research Institute and Chief Innovation Officer for Clalit. "These results show convincingly that this mRNA vaccine is very safe and that the alternative of 'natural' morbidity caused by the coronavirus puts a person at significant, higher and much more common risk of serious adverse events. These data should facilitate informed individual risk-benefit decision-making, and, in our view, make a strong argument in favor of opting-in to get vaccinated, especially in countries where the virus is currently widespread," added Prof. Balicer, who also serves as Chairman of Israel's National Expert Advisory Team on COVID-19 response. "This study sheds light for the first time on the significant side effects of the coronavirus vaccine. Since this is a more comprehensive analysis based on electronic medical records, these are more reliable assessments than those published to date which have relied on voluntary active reporting systems," explains Doron Netzer, Chief Medical Officer of Clalit's Community Health Division. Prof. Ben Reis, Director of the Predictive Medicine Group at the Boston Children's Hospital Computational Health Informatics Program and Harvard Medical School, said, "To date, one of the main drivers of vaccine hesitancy has been a lack of information regarding potential side effects of the vaccine. This careful epidemiological study provides reliable information on vaccine safety, which we hope will be helpful to those who have not yet decided about vaccination." He continued, "Those who have hesitated until now to get vaccinated due to concerns about very rare side effectssuch as myocarditisshould be aware that the risks for this very same side effect are actually higher among unvaccinated infected individuals." Prof. Miguel Hernan, Director of the CAUSALab and Professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, said, "This research is a perfect example of how randomized trials and observational healthcare databases complement each other. The original trial of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine provided evidence of its safety, but the estimates were too imprecise given the small sample size. This analysis of Clalit's high-quality database emulates the design of the original trial, uses its findings as a benchmark, and expands upon them to confirm the vaccine's safety on a wide range of adverse events. This combination of evidence from randomized trials and observational studies is a model for efficient medical research, something which is especially important in COVID times." Prof. Marc Lipsitch, Director of the Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics and Professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, said, "In all studies of vaccine safety, a major challenge is to ensure that those we are comparing to identify the vaccine's side effects are similar in the other characteristics that may predict whether they will experience these side effects. This is especially hard in the context of a rapidly growing, age-targeted vaccine campaign. Clalit's extraordinary database made it possible to design a study that addressed these challenges in a way that provides tremendous confidence in the inferences that come out of the study." The research was funded in part by the newly announced Ivan and Francesca Berkowitz Family Living Laboratory Collaboration at Harvard Medical School and Clalit Research Institute. "The strengthening of the scientific collaboration between Harvard and Clalit made possible by the Berkowitz Living Laboratory Collaboration is already bearing fruit and giving us a foretaste of the value of healthcare systems instrumented for research," said Prof. Isaac Kohane, Chair of the Department of Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School and co-Director of the Ivan and Francesca Berkowitz Family Living Laboratory Collaboration along with Professor Balicer. "Israel offers a unique environment in which to study the vaccine and its effects, and this study is an excellent example of what can be accomplished through such close scientific collaborations." More information: Noam Barda et al, Safety of the BNT162b2 mRNA Covid-19 Vaccine in a Nationwide Setting, New England Journal of Medicine (2021). Journal information: New England Journal of Medicine Noam Barda et al, Safety of the BNT162b2 mRNA Covid-19 Vaccine in a Nationwide Setting,(2021). DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa2110475 Provided by Clalit Research Institute (HealthDay)More than one-quarter of older adults who use alcohol are not asked about their drinking by their physician, according to a study published online July 29 in Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research. Pia M. Mauro, Ph.D., from Columbia University in New York City, and colleagues used the 2015 to 2019 National Survey on Drug Use and Health to identify 9,663 U.S. adults (65 years of age) who used alcohol and had a past-year health care encounter. Gender differences in the prevalence of alcohol screening and discussions with health care providers were assessed. The researchers found that 24.68 percent of men and 27.04 percent of women reported no alcohol screening or discussions. Men were more likely than women to be questioned about drinking frequency, amount, or problems related to drinking. Women were 22 percent more likely to report alcohol screening only but were 18 percent less likely to discuss alcohol with providers than men. The odds of reporting alcohol discussions were lower among women (adjusted odds ratio, 0.67) versus any alcohol screening only compared with men. "Given the increased risk for harms of alcohol use with aging, older adults should be screened and counseled regarding their alcohol use," the authors write. Explore further Seniors rarely discuss their drinking with their doctors Copyright 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved. Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain COVID-19 vaccine makers Pfizer and BioNTech have joined forces with Brazilian pharmaceutical company Eurofarma to distribute doses in Latin America, the companies announced Thursday. Production will start next year and at full capacity will produce 100 million finished doses, the statement said. "Everyoneregardless of financial condition, race, religion or geographydeserves access to lifesaving COVID-19 vaccines," Pfizer chief Albert Bourla said in the statement. "Our new collaboration with Eurofarma expands our global supply chain network to another regionhelping us continue to provide fair and equitable access to our COVID-19 vaccine." Brazil is a global pandemic hotspot, hitting a new daily record of more than 1,300 deaths on Monday with a total death toll of nearly 575,000second only to the United States. As the fast-spreading Delta variant presents new challenges, protests have erupted in the country over the government's handling of the crisis and slow vaccine rollout. Eurofarma will receive drug products and finish the vaccine doses for distribution. Eurofarma President Maurizio Billi called the deal a "milestone" for the nearly 50-year-old company. "At such a difficult time as this one, being able to share this news fills us with pride and hope," he said. According to Pfizer and BioNTech, the companies have shipped more than 1.3 billion vaccine doses to more than 120 countries and territories in every region of the world, and aim to provide a billion doses annually to low- and middle-income countries in 2021 and 2022. The companies last month announced a similar deal with Biovac in South Africa, with the goal to deliver up to 100 million doses a year to the 55 countries of the African Union. Explore further US orders 200 mn more Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine doses 2021 AFP Credit: CC0 Public Domain Among all patients with neuroendocrine tumors (NETs), the risk of dying of cancer was higher than that of dying of other causes, but mortality varies by primary tumor site, according to a new study published in the August 2021 issue of JNCCNJournal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network. It is the first population-based cohort study to describe factors associated with cancer-specific death after a NET diagnosis. "Neuroendocrine tumors are very unique in that they are often slow growing indolent cancers. They have very heterogenous behaviors. While some metastatic tumors can threaten patients' survival, other localized tumors do not. Therefore, it was important to understand cause of death and the exact burden of cancer on mortality in different sub-groups of patients with NETs," said lead author Julie Hallet, MD, MSc, University of Toronto. "Our results show that some patients with non-metastatic NETs are more likely to die of other causes than NET. This is crucial to inform patients and make decisions regarding treatment. It is important to make sure that treatment does not present a higher risk than the NET itself. For example, small pancreas, stomach or rectal NETs can be safely monitored." The retrospective study of 8,607 patients whose health data were stored at ICES, the not-for-profit research institute in Toronto, Canada, found that the highest risks of cancer-specific death occurred in patients with bronchopulmonary and pancreatic NETs. For non-metastatic gastric, small intestine, colonic, and rectal NETs, the risk of non-cancer death exceeded that of cancer-specific deaths. Advancing age, higher material deprivation, and metastases were associated with higher hazard ratios of cancer-specific mortality; while being female and having a higher comorbidity burden were associated with a higher proportion of cancer-unrelated death, according to the researchers. "This article sheds an important light on the complex issue of predicting long term survival and the factors associated with it in NETs," said Whitney S. Goldner, MD, Professor in the Division of Diabetes, Endocrinology, and Metabolism at the Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center; and Vice-Chair of the NCCN Guidelines Panel for Neuroendocrine Tumors. "NETs are a very heterogeneous group of malignancies, so they require individualized treatment recommendations for each primary tumor site. It is insightful to learn about the different patterns of both cancer and non-cancer specific mortality specific to primary tumor site as well as other contributing factors. This article will be helpful to inform future guidelines regarding monitoring and treatment of different NETs and enable providers to provide NET site-specific counseling." Researchers also noted that examination of factors associated with cancer-specific and non cancer-related death showed that efforts to address cancer-specific death in NETs "should include special considerations for older adults and socioeconomically deprived patients to ensure they can access and receive care during their cancer journey." Explore further Study reveals patient age not so important in determining colorectal cancer growth More information: Julie Hallet et al, Risk of Cancer-Specific Death for Patients Diagnosed With Neuroendocrine Tumors: A Population-Based Analysis, Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (2021). Julie Hallet et al, Risk of Cancer-Specific Death for Patients Diagnosed With Neuroendocrine Tumors: A Population-Based Analysis,(2021). DOI: 10.6004/jnccn.2020.7666 Provided by National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Credit: CC0 Public Domain The best way to keep COVID cases out of businesses and schools while maintaining some in-person presence is to create two rotating groups, a French study showed Thursday. Several research institutions including the CNRS and the University of Paris mapped real-world contact networks using data from a high school, a primary school and a business in France. They then used the networks to simulate the spread of coronavirus from a single case, testing what method of partial teleworking would most efficiently mitigate an outbreak. They looked at scenarios in which an entire population would alternate its presence daily or weekly, as well as scenarios in which populations would be divided into two groups rotating daily or weekly. For all three settings, two groups rotating weekly work best to slow transmission of an infection, the study published in the journal PLOS Computational Biology concluded. The second most effective method is to have two groups rotate daily, it found. Alternating the presence of a whole population of students or workers on a weekly or daily basis, however, was found to be least effective for social cohesion. Researchers used information on real-world interactions between individuals and simulated the spread of coronavirus using known information about the virus's behaviour. They accounted for the fact that COVID can be contagious before symptoms appear and included random "super-spreader" events in their models. In a baseline scenarioa primary school with normal attendancethere was a 27 percent chance that a positive case will lead to an outbreak, which is defined as one person infecting at least five others. But that likelihood falls to just 12 percent if the population is divided into groups that rotate weekly. The risk is only slightly higher for groups that rotate daily, 12.3 percent. The weekly rotation model is also the most efficient at delaying an outbreak and at limiting the overall number of infections. But these strategies only work if the amount of virus circulating in the local population remains limited. If the average number of persons infected by a single case is more than 1.7, "then none of these strategies, except for the full-time telecommuting, suffices to prevent the onset of an outbreak", the study says. But if the virus is spreading at a rate of 1.4 new cases for each infected person, "all four of these strategies are satisfactory and manage to curb the epidemic", the study shows. An in-person return to school is planned for all students in France next week. A system of weekly rotating groups applied to some middle- and high-schools across the country could return if cases start to rise again, officials have said. Explore further When thinking about reopening schools, the rate of community transmission is a key factor More information: Simon Mauras et al, Mitigating COVID-19 outbreaks in workplaces and schools by hybrid telecommuting, PLOS Computational Biology (2021). Journal information: PLoS Computational Biology Simon Mauras et al, Mitigating COVID-19 outbreaks in workplaces and schools by hybrid telecommuting,(2021). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1009264 2021 AFP Credit: CC0 Public Domain Giving young children the world's first malaria vaccine RTS,S/AS01 E and antimalarial drugs before the rainy season could substantially reduce cases of life-threatening malaria in the African Sahel, suggests a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The randomised trial was coordinated by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) with partners Institut de Recherche en Sciences de la Sante, Burkina Faso, and the Malaria Research and Training Centre, University of Science, Technology and Techniques of Bamako, Mali. It followed nearly 6,000 children aged 5-17 months in Burkina Faso and Mali, two countries with a very high burden of malaria. After three years, the combination of seasonal administration of antimalarials (known as Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention/SMC) and vaccination lowered clinical episodes of malaria, hospital admissions with WHO-defined severe malaria, and deaths from malaria by about 70% compared to Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention alone1. SMC is the approach currently used in both countries. The researchers say this new combination approach has the potential to prevent malaria in large parts of Africa where malaria cases remain high and where malaria is transmitted seasonally, and that the results are important evidence for decision-makers on the use of malaria vaccines. Seasonal vaccination with RTS,S/AS01 E was also found to be as effective as four annual courses of SMC in protecting against clinical malaria. After nearly two decades of progress, the decline in malaria cases and deaths has stalled in recent years in a number of countries. According to the World Health Organization's (WHO) 2020 World Malaria Report there were 229 million malaria cases and an estimated 409,000 malaria deaths in 2019, with most occurring in children under five years old. Professor Brian Greenwood from LSHTM and a member of the research team, said: "The world has made great strides in tackling malaria but the pace of progress has slowed considerably in recent years. We urgently need new interventions, particularly in many parts of the Sahel and sub-Sahel where the burden of malaria remains very high. "We aimed to find out if RTS,S/AS01 E could be more effective in areas with seasonal transmission by giving children three doses of the vaccine before the malaria transmission season, and then a booster dose before the rainy season over subsequent years. The results are very striking and could pave the way for a potential new approach to malaria control." In 2018, the World Health Organization and RBM Partnership to End Malaria joined with countries to launch a 'High burdenHigh impact' programme focusing on the countries where the burden of malaria remains high and where novel approaches to malaria control are needed. Six of the 10 African countries in this programme are in the African Sahel and sub-Sahel, including Burkina Faso and Mali. In these countries, malaria occurs predominantly during just a few months of the year. SMC, which involves giving anti-malarial drugs sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine and amodiaquine to young children every month during the rainy season, is highly effective in preventing malaria. Despite this, malaria is still the main cause of death and hospital admissions among the more than 20 million children under the age of five in most areas where SMC is now deployed. A large Phase 3 trial has previously found 3 doses of RTS,S/AS01E vaccine provided about 50% protection over a one year period. However, in the months immediately after vaccination, efficacy is much higher, about 70%. In this double-blind, randomised controlled trial, 6,000 children were split into three intervention groupsone that received the RTS,S/AS01 E vaccine alone, another that received SMC alone, and a third that received a combination of vaccine and SMC2. The team found that a combination of the RTS,S/AS01 E vaccine and SMC was more effective than either the vaccine or SMC alone. Episodes of clinical malaria, hospital admissions with WHO-defined severe malaria and deaths from malaria were reduced by 62.8%, 70.5% and 72.9% respectively in the combination group compared to the SMC alone group. Similarly, these outcomes were reduced by 59.6%, 70.6%, and 75.3% respectively in the combination group compared to the vaccine alone group. Professor Daniel Chandramohan from LSHTM and member of the research team, said: "The results of the trial were much more successful than we had anticipated. Our work has shown a combination approach using a malaria vaccine seasonallysimilar to how countries use influenza vaccinehas the potential to save millions of young lives in the African Sahel. Importantly, we didn't observe any new concerning pattern of side effects. "Further research is now needed to examine how seasonal malaria vaccination could be delivered most effectively at scale." There was some evidence that efficacy of the combined intervention against clinical malaria was higher in the few months after the primary series of vaccination than after the booster doses, but efficacy was seen in each year of the study. While the drugs currently used for SMC remain effective in the study areas, if resistance to them increases without available alternatives, seasonal vaccination with RTS,S/AS01 E could be a potential solution. Professor Jean-Bosco Ouedraogo, Institut de Recherche en Sciences de la Sante, Burkina Faso and member of the research team, said: "I am really proud of the contribution of our African research teams to these fantastic results. I hope that this evidence will be taken into account by decision-makers as a new additional strategy for saving children's lives in Africa. "A collaboration among malaria endemic countries and with northern partners is essential to succeeding against malaria, including in the Sahel countries. Our work is part of this logic of south-south and north-south partnership with these impressive successful results." Professor Alassane Dicko, Malaria Research & Training Centre, (MRTC) Bamako, Mali, and member of the research team, said: "Our results showed that seasonal vaccination with RTS,S/AS01 E is as effective as seasonal malaria chemoprevention. This new malaria tackling tool could mean the disease is no longer the primary cause of death or hospital admissions in our settings for the very first time. "This is wonderful news for malaria control. We look forward to a quick policy decision and addition of this new tool to reduce the intolerable burden of malaria in our region." Dr. Pedro Alonso, Director of the WHO Global Malaria Programme, said: "We welcome this innovative use of a malaria vaccine to prevent disease and death in highly seasonal areas in Africa. RTS,S is the first malaria vaccine that has already reached more than 740 000 children through routine childhood vaccination in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi in a landmark pilot implementation, through which more than 2.1 million malaria vaccine doses have been delivered. "The level of vaccine uptake by families over a relatively short period shows strong community demand for the vaccine and the capacity of childhood vaccination programmes to deliver it." In light of the initial positive results of this Phase 3 trial, children are continuing in the trial in their assigned groups for a further one or two years until they reach the age of five years when, in Burkina Faso and Mali, they will no longer be eligible to receive SMC. The findings from this extension study will be available in 2022. The authors acknowledge limitations of the study, including that both antimalarials and the RTS,S vaccine were given under trial conditions, thus achieving very high levels of coverage. If seasonal vaccination is recommended as a routine intervention in countries with highly seasonal malaria, more research will be needed to determine how this intervention can be delivered most effectively within routine programmes. More information: Daniel Chandramohan et al. Seasonal Malaria Vaccination with or without Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention. New England Journal of Medicine, 2021. Journal information: New England Journal of Medicine Daniel Chandramohan et al. Seasonal Malaria Vaccination with or without Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention., 2021. Cholesterol oversupply from ApoE4 astrocytes promote A production in neurons. Credit: Jinsoo Seo New research published in Stem Cell Reports has found elevated cholesterol supply from astrocytes to neurons in the model of Alzheimer's disease (AD) brains, suggesting that modulating brain cholesterol could be explored in the search of treatment options for the devastating, degenerative disease. AD, the most frequent cause of dementia, affects an estimated 24 million people worldwide. With very limited treatment options, scientists are looking for ways to understand the disease better. One hallmark of AD is the emergence of so-called beta-amyloid plaques, clumps of beta-amyloid protein accumulating in the brain and thought to be toxic to adjacent neurons. The causes for Alzheimer's disease and the formation of beta-amyloid plaques are still largely unknown but genetic studies found that a gene called APOE, which is involved in cholesterol metabolism and transport, is linked to AD in the elderly. The APOE gene exists in different versions in people, APOE2, APOE3 and APOE4, but the APO4 gene comes with a relatively higher risk of developing AD. Curiously, in the brain, it's mostly the supporting cells called astrocytes rather than the neurons that make ApoE protein. To find out if the APOE4 gene in astrocytes relates to AD, Jinsoo Seo and colleagues with the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST), South Korea, used human-induced stem cells carrying different versions of the APOE gene to make neurons and astrocytes in the lab, and to study their interaction. The researchers found that astrocytes carrying the AD-associated APOE4 gene released more cholesterol than astrocytes with APOE3. The scientists noticed that the neurons exposed to higher cholesterol had distinct changes to their cell membranes, the outer layers of the cell which normally contain cholesterol. Further, this high cholesterol content in cell membranes was directly related to the increased production and secretion of beta-amyloid by the neurons. This work illustrates how different versions of the APOE gene in astrocytes can influence beta-amyloid production in neurons, and how cholesterol oversupply from ApoE4 astrocytes might promote the formation of toxic beta-amyloid plaques in AD patients. Explore further Neuroscientists discover roles of gene linked to Alzheimer's More information: APOE4-carrying human astrocytes oversupply cholesterol to promote neuronal lipid rafts expansion and A generation, Stem Cell Reports (2021). Journal information: Stem Cell Reports APOE4-carrying human astrocytes oversupply cholesterol to promote neuronal lipid rafts expansion and A generation,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.stemcr.2021.07.017 Provided by International Society for Stem Cell Research Credit: CC0 Public Domain Tailored mobile messaging is an effective intervention strategy to reduce tobacco waterpipe smoking in young adults, according to a new study published by researchers with the Center for Tobacco Research at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer CenterArthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCCJames). Researchers report their findings in the Aug. 26, 2021, online first issue of the American Journal of Public Health. This is the first study to demonstrate the effectiveness of a tailored mobile messaging intervention to support smoking cessation in youth tobacco hookah users, study authors say. "In the United States, hookah tobacco smoking is most prevalent among young adults. Our study is one of the first to demonstrate that a tailored mobile messaging intervention can motivate young adult hookah smokers to quit. This technology-based intervention is scalable to implement at the population-level," said Dr. Darren Mays, principal investigator of the study and a member of the OSUCCCJames Cancer Control Research Program. Mays is an associate professor in the Ohio State College of Medicine Division of Medical Oncology. Study methods and results For this study, researchers recruited 349 waterpipe (also known as a hookah) tobacco users between the ages of 18 and 30. All participants were recruited between 2018 and 2020 and then randomized into one of three trial armstwo intervention arms and a control arm. All participants underwent baseline evaluation prior to the beginning of the six-week intervention trial to gauge perceived associated "riskiness" of smoking, personal motivation to quit, waterpipe smoking frequency and cessation. Individuals in the two intervention arms received six weeks of messaging sent via their personal mobile phones and designed to increase motivation to quit smoking, including both visual cues and specific messages about the long- and short-term health harms, toxicant exposure and addictiveness of water pipe tobacco use. Message content was developed to address misconceptions about risks of waterpipe tobacco use in young adults, based on previously published research. In the untailored intervention arm, all participants received the same message content. In the tailored intervention arm, the message content was personalized to participants' frequency of waterpipe tobacco use, how risky they believed water pipe smoking to be, and to their responses to text messages during the intervention. The control arm received no intervention. Participants were assessed again at the end of the intervention (six weeks), three months, and six months. Study results showed that 49% of individuals who received tailored mobile messaging quit smoking waterpipe tobacco at 6 months 20% more compared to participants who did not receive any mobile intervention. At the six-month follow-up, results also showed that individuals who received the tailored mobile messaging intervention but did not quit smoked waterpipe tobacco less frequently than those in the control arm. The tailored mobile messaging intervention targeted water pipe tobacco smoking specifically, but did not target other tobacco use. "Waterpipe tobacco smoking is often associated with other tobacco use among young people. As a public health community, we are very concerned about rising rates of dual- and poly-tobacco product use, particularly among adolescents and young adults. In the future it will be important to study how our intervention affects use of water pipe along with other tobacco products, such as cigarettes and electronic cigarettes, among young people," Mays added. Explore further Flavored tobacco a major factor in the popularity of waterpipe smoking, study finds More information: Tailored Mobile Messaging Intervention for Waterpipe Tobacco Cessation in Young Adults: A Randomized Trial, American Journal of Public Health (2021). Journal information: American Journal of Public Health Tailored Mobile Messaging Intervention for Waterpipe Tobacco Cessation in Young Adults: A Randomized Trial,(2021). DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2021.306389 Credit: The Conversation Chances are you may not be not familiar with the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, or VAERS. Co-managed by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration, VAERS was established in 1990 to detect possible safety problems with vaccines. Unfortunately, the anti-vaccine movement has used this once-obscure database to spread misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine. VAERS is ripe for exploitation because it relies on unverified self-reports of side effects. Anyone who received a vaccine can submit a report. And because this information is publicly available, misinterpretations of its data has been used to amplify COVID-19 misinformation through dubious social media channels and mass media, including one of the most popular shows on cable news. Reports to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System are not verified before they're entered into the database. That makes VAERS fertile ground for vaccine misinformation. https://t.co/1HRwjnNUxe Poynter (@Poynter) May 5, 2021 We are political scientists who study the social, political and psychological underpinnings of vaccine hesitancy in the U.S. In our recently published research, we argue that VAERS, despite its limitations, can teach us about more than just vaccine side effectsit can also offer powerful new insights into the origins of vaccine hesitancy in the U.S. What the side effects database was designed to do Medical experts at the Department of Health and Human Services are well aware of VAERS' limitations. Rather than taking each individual report at face value, regulators remove clearly fraudulent reports. Demonstrating this, anesthesiologist and autism advocate James Laidler once used the system to report that a vaccine turned him into the "Incredible Hulk," which was only removed after he agreed to have the data deleted. Regulators also look for reporting patterns that can be corroborated by additional evidence. For example, reports of Guillain-Barre syndrome should be more common in people over 50 than in younger adults. This can help researchers identify potential adverse events that were not detected in clinical trials. Because VAERS claims are self-reported, they tell us something about what ordinary people, as opposed to doctors and medical researchers, think about vaccine safety. In other words, people who feel that a vaccine is responsible for a side effect they might be experiencing can log that concern with the federal government, whether or not those claims would stand scrutiny in rigorous clinical testing. Consequently, VAERS reports might not only document people's negative experiences with vaccination, but also their attitudes toward vaccination. People may be more likely to report side effects, for example, in response to media stories about vaccine safety concerns. If reports to VAERS increase following these stories, then the reporting system may be functioning similarly to a public opinion poll. It could reflect, in part, public attentiveness to and concern about potential side effects. To see if this is the case, we examined a well-known case of vaccine misinformation: the since-retracted paper that claimed a link between the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine to childhood autism. Credit: The Conversation Is a fraudulent study responsible for MMR vaccine skepticism? In 1998, former physician Andrew Wakefield and his colleagues published a since-retracted paper claiming that the MMR vaccine could cause autism in children. Although the study was rife with unreported conflicting interests and data manipulation, it nevertheless garnered significant media attention in the late 1990s. Some journalists and researchers have since argued that the paper played a major role in inspiring MMR vaccine hesitancy. While this is plausible, there hasn't been evidence to support the argument. Virtually no opinion polling about MMR existed prior to the publication of Wakefield's paper. Consequently, researchers have not been able to directly observe whether or not the study influenced how Americans think about the MMR vaccine. VAERS data, however, could offer some clues. In our study, we examined whether the number of VAERS reports following publication of Wakefield's paper was significantly greater than expected based on typical report numbers prior to its publication. We found that the number of adverse event reports for MMR increased by about 70 reports per month following publication of the paper. This is significantly greater than what we would expect by chance based on previous reporting frequencies. Notably, we did not find a similar effect for other childhood vaccines in the same time period. This further underscores the power this since-debunked study has had in shaping public opinion about the MMR vaccine. Importantly, we also found that adverse event reporting rates rose in tandem with negative media coverage of the MMR vaccine. Following the publication of Wakefield's paper, television and print news published significantly more stories about MMR than before the paper was published. These results suggest that Wakefield's article influenced how much more attentive Americans were about the MMR vaccine. VAERS: A double-edged sword In recent months, interest in the side effects reporting system has been growing exponentially. Google search engine trends suggest that more Americans have been looking up VAERS than ever before. The trend began shortly after emergency use authorization of the first COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S. and has continued to increase until a peak in early August. This search behavior is likely a result of increased media attention to VAERS, particularly by right-leaning news outlets. According to the data from media research platform Media Cloud Explorer, there have been 459 stories in mainstream national news outlets, such as CNN or the U.S. Today, mentioning VAERS since December 2020. In right-wing media outlets such as Fox News, The Daily Caller and Breitbart, however, coverage soared to 3,254 storiesover seven times more than mainstream news media. Consequently, VAERS data could be seen as something of a double-edged sword. On one hand, it has been weaponized by the anti-vaccine movement and political actors on the right to sow doubt and distrust about COVID-19 vaccinations. On the other hand, this data could also tell public health researchers something useful about how American vaccine skepticism might ebb and flow in response to events like the brief pause in Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine administration, or fluctuations in the tone of media coverage about COVID-19 vaccines. VAERS data may even offer an important advantage over public opinion polls which, with the exception of weekly vaccine uptake polls, have typically been administered much less frequently. Our research cautions that media attention to discredited vaccine-related claims may undermine public confidence in vaccination. How to avoid another wave of misinformation To ensure that VAERS is used properly, journalists and scientific researchers can team up to guide the public on how to interpret new findings. Journalists should, in our view, contextualize their coverage within a broader body of scientific evidence. Scientific researchers can aid in this by helping journalists accurately portray studies on vaccine side effects, clearly outlining their methodologies and results in accessible language. By working together, researchers and journalists can take constructive action to address vaccine hesitancy before it has a chance to germinate. Explore further EXPLAINER: How activists target CDC vaccine tracking system This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Credit: CC0 Public Domain The global COVID-19 pandemic has forced many people to live in relative isolation for more than a year. As adolescents return to school, public health experts caution parents to pay close attention to signs of tobacco use among teens. While there has been a decline in smoking traditional cigarettes among youth as well as adults, e-cigarette use continues to increase. Experts express concern about rising rates of dual- and poly-tobacco product use, particularly among adolescents and young adults. "Youth have gone through a rollercoaster of changes during the last year and a half during the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic. These dramatic and persistent changes take a toll and can cause anxiety, depression and stress that lead many to cope through smoking," said Theodore Wagener, director of the Center for Tobacco Research at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer CenterArthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCCJames). "Tobacco products have become much more widely available with the introduction of alternative combustible devices like electronic cigarettes and waterpipesand research suggests they can be just as addictive as traditional cigarettes. More research is critically needed to put science behind the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's regulation of these products to protect the public's health." Launched in 2020, the Center for Tobacco Research (CTR) brings tobacco experts from across Ohio Stateincluding psychology, epidemiology, biostatistics, environmental health, health communications, chemistry, biochemistry, cancer biology and lawtogether to conduct collaborative research aimed at increasing scientific knowledge to help regulate tobacco products effectively in a way that best serves individual and public health interests. The evidence-based tobacco research program enables these teams to study electronic cigarettes (also known as e-cigs or vapes) and other combustible products like waterpipes (also known as hookahs) and cigars, as well as traditional cigarettes. Researchers with the CTR are investigating everything from buying behaviors influenced by mass media campaigns and the health effects of specific product ingredients to new methods of encouraging tobacco product cessation or preventing youth and young adults from beginning to use tobacco products in general. One example of this collaboration is the Buckeye Teen Health Study, which explores the differences in e-cigarette and tobacco product use among boys and young men in rural and urban areas, and how marketing and advertising affects their behavior, especially as it relates to the dual use of tobacco products and how vaping could be a gateway to more harmful nicotine products. "We check in with participants every six months, which helps us track their behaviors over a long period of time and into adulthood," said Amy Ferketich, an Ohio State College of Public Health researcher and member of the OSUCCCJames Cancer Control Research Program who leads the Buckeye Teen Health Study. "We found that the participants in the study who were e-cigarette users were much more likely to transition to cigarettes or smokeless tobacco." Another current study at the CTR discovers links among different tobacco-related products. For example, it is estimated that 38% of young people who smoke hookah also use e-cigarettes. Researchers are now examining how cessation programs for teens that target one product can lead to reductions in the use of all nicotine products. The scientists say this is especially important because studies suggest that youth vape and hookah users are more likely to not only continue to vape but also to smoke traditional cigarettes or use other nicotine delivery products. Changing How Tobacco Research Is Conducted A cross-institutional collaboration based in Ohio State's comprehensive cancer research program, the CTR is a 7,600-square-foot-dedicated space for tobacco studies. It brings together faculty and staff from six colleges to conduct collaborative laboratory and clinical research studies. The facility has six negative-pressure rooms and a control room that allows for communication between research staff and participant rooms. Biological samples can be processed and stored onsite. This set-up, said Wagener, allows investigators to measure and observe how people are using cigarette, e-cigarette and hookah products in real time in a controlled environment without risk to staff and other study participants. "This is a game changer for accuracy of data collected, because it gives a far more accurate picture of nicotine exposures and health risk versus relying on self-reported estimations from the tobacco user as was done in the past," added Wagener. "Our research center is unique in that it brings together clinical psychologists, public health researchers, chemists and medical oncologists, all working together on the same study. The perspectives of all these different disciplines allow us to find answers to big questions and develop impactful solutions." Explore further Youth using e-cigarettes three times as likely to become daily cigarette smokers A Dallas County Health and Human Services nurse completes paperwork after administering a Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine at a county run vaccination site in Dallas, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/LM Otero Kentucky and Texas joined a growing list of states that are seeing record numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in a surge that is overwhelming doctors and nurses and afflicting more children. Intensive care units around the nation are packed with patients extremely ill with the coronaviruseven in places where hospitalizations have not yet reached earlier peaks. The ICU units at Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital in Georgia typically have room for 38 patients, and doctors and nurses may have only two or three people who are very sick, said Dr. Jyotir Mehta, medical director of the ICU. On Wednesday, the ICU had 50 COVID-19 patients alone, roughly half of them relying on ventilators to breathe. "I don't think we have experienced this much critical illness in folks, so many people sick at the same time," Mehta said. He said talking to family members is difficult. "They are grasping for every hope and you're trying to tell them, 'Look, it's bad,'" he said. "You have to tell them that your loved one is not going to make it." In New Mexico, top health officials warned Wednesday that the state is about a week away from rationing health care. The number of coronavirus patients needing care at hospitals jumped more than 20% in a day. "We're going to have to choose who gets care and who doesn't get care," state Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. David Scrase warned. "And we don't want to get to that point." In Idaho, state leaders called on residents to volunteer to help keep medical facilities operating. Texas and Kentucky on Wednesday reported more COVID-19 patients in their hospitals than at any other time since the pandemic began, 14,255 and 2,074, respectively. The Texas record is based on U.S. Department of Health and Human Services data. At least six other statesArkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi and Oregonhave already broken their hospitalization records. In Texas, nearly 47% of the population is fully vaccinatedbelow the national average of almost 52%and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has banned mask and vaccine mandates. Many counties and school districts have defied his mask ban. In Kentucky, just under 48% of the population is fully vaccinated, and public health officials have blamed the lag in part for the state's surge. Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear's COVID-19 restrictions expired in June, and the GOP-controlled legislature has blocked him from issuing new mask requirements or capacity limits. A Dallas County Health and Human Services nurse, right, injects a woman with her second dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine at a county run vaccination site in Dallas, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. According to the unidentified woman receiving the shot, her employer required all employees to be vaccinated. Credit: AP Photo/LM Otero Nationwide, COVID-19 deaths are running at more than 1,100 a day, the highest level since mid-March, and new cases per day are averaging over 152,000, turning the clock back to the end of January. As of early this week, the number of people in the hospital with the coronavirus was around 85,000, a level not seen since early February. The surge is largely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant among people who are unvaccinated. In areas where vaccination rates are particularly low, doctors have pleaded with their communities to get inoculated to spare overburdened hospitals. They have also sounded the alarm about the growing toll of the variant on children and young adults. Children now make up 36% of Tennessee's reported COVID-19 cases, marking yet another sobering milestone in the state's battle against the virus, Health Commissioner Lisa Piercey said Wednesday. She said the state had 14,000 pediatric cases in the last seven daysa 57% increase over the previous week. In South Carolina, students will again be required to wear masks on school buses starting Monday as COVID-19 cases among children and students rise rapidly. Nearly 30% of new cases in South Carolina in the past two weeks have been in people 20 and under. During the same time in 2020, about 17% of cases were in children and teens, according to state officials. Anderson Lopez Castillo, a nurse who cares for seriously ill COVID-19 patients at UAB Hospital in Birmingham, Alabama, said treating people as young as 16 in critical care has become an additional strain on top of a nearly yearlong ordeal that left him questioning his choice of a profession. "Initially we saw a lot of older people getting it. It was like, 'OK, we can tackle this. Even if it is stressful, even if it's a dangerous virus, it'll probably not be that bad on us as nurses taking care of these older patients,'" he said. Castillo, 24, said he now sees the virus making young people very sick, and it makes him and other young nurses think of their own mortality. "There's definitely a little subconscious thought in the back of all of our heads going, 'You know, that could be us,''' he said. ___ This story has been corrected to reflect that nearly 47% of Texas' population is fully vaccinated, below the national average. Explore further Arkansas reports new record for COVID-19 hospitalizations 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Image of the ultrastructural morphology exhibited by the 2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV). Credit: CDC Most symptoms of COVID-19 in hospitalized patients are resolved within 12 months, however, around one half still experience at least one persistent symptom, a study of 1,276 patients from Wuhan, China, published in The Lancet, has found. Around one in three people still experienced shortness of breath and lung impairments persisted in some patients, especially those who had experienced the most severe illness with COVID-19 (at 12 months, 35.7% patients who underwent additional lung health tests had diffusion impairmentsreduced flow of oxygen from the lungs to the bloodstream [87/244]). Overall, COVID-19 survivors were less healthy than people from the wider community who had not been infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus (matched for age, sex and pre-existing conditions). Professor Bin Cao, from the National Center for Respiratory Medicine, China-Japan Friendship Hospital, China, said: "Our study is the largest to date to assess the health outcomes of hospitalized COVID-19 survivors after 12 months of becoming ill. While most had made a good recovery, health problems persisted in some patients, especially those who had been critically ill during their hospital stay. Our findings suggest that recovery for some patients will take longer than one year, and this should be taken into account when planning delivery of healthcare services post-pandemic." Long-term effects of COVID-19 have been widely reported and are an increasing concern. A previous study (by the same researchers) reporting outcomes from 1,733 hospitalized COVID-19 survivors after six months found that around three-quarters of patients had persistent health problems. The new study includes 1,276 patients from the same cohort to assess their health status after 12 months. Patients had been discharged from Jin Yin-tan Hospital in Wuhan, China, between 7 January and 29 May 2020. They underwent detailed health checks at six and 12 months (taken from the date they first experienced symptoms of COVID-19) to assess any ongoing symptoms and their health-related quality of life. These included face-to-face questionnaires, physical examinations, lab tests, and a six-minute walking test to gauge patients' endurance levels. The average (median) age of patients included in the study was 57 years. Patient outcomes were tracked for an average (median) of 185 days (six-month check) and 349 days (12-month check). Many symptoms resolved over time, regardless of the severity of initial COVID-19 disease. The proportion of patients still experiencing at least one symptom after one year fell from 68% at six months (831/1,227) to 49% at 12 months (620/1,272). This decrease was observed regardless of the severity of COVID-19 the patients had experienced when hospitalized. Fatigue or muscle weakness was the most commonly reported symptom with around half of patients experiencing this at six months (52%, 636/1,230), falling to one in five patients at one year (20%, 255/1,272). Almost one third of patients reported experiencing shortness of breath at 12 months, which was slightly higher than at six months (30% at 12 months [380/1,271] vs 26% at 6 months [313/1,185]). This was more prevalent in patients who had been the most severely ill and had been on a ventilator during their time in hospital (39%, 37/94), compared to those who had not required oxygen treatment (25%, 79/317). At the six-month check, 349 study participants underwent a lung function test and 244 of those patients completed the same test at 12 months. The proportion of patients experiencing diffusion impairment did not improve from six months to 12 months and this was seen across all groups regardless of how ill they had been when hospitalized (Scale 3, no supplemental oxygen required during hospitalization: 21% at 6 months [12/57], 23% at 12 months [13/56]; Scale 4, required supplemental oxygen: 26% at 6 months [32/124], 31% at 12 months [36/117]; Scale 5-6, required ventilation during hospitalization: 57% at 6 months [39/69], 54% at 12 months [38/70]). Also at the six-month check, 353 study participants given a chest CT scan. Around one half of them showed lung abnormalities on their scan and were offered a repeat scan at 12 months (52.7%, 186/353). Of the 118 patients who completed the scan at 12 months, the proportion of patients with abnormalities decreased substantially across all groups but was still high, particularly in the most critically ill group (Scale 3: 39% [11/28]; Scale 4: 40% [21/52]; Scale 5-6: 87% [33/38]). At the 12-month check, 1,252 of the patients reported their work status before and after being discharged from hospital. Around half of the patients had retired before COVID-19 (53%, 658/1,252), reflecting the older age of the study group (median age of 57 years). Of the patients who had been employed full or part-time before falling ill, the majority had returned to their original job (88%, 422/479) and most had returned to their pre-COVID-19 level of work (76%, 321/422) within 12 months. Among those who did not return to their original work, 32% cited decreased physical function (18/57), 25% were unwilling to do their previous role (14/57), and 18% were unemployed (10/57). Compared with men, women were 1.4 times more likely to report fatigue or muscle weakness, twice as likely to report anxiety or depression, and almost three times as likely to have lung diffusion impairment after 12 months. People who had been treated with corticosteroids during the acute phase of their illness with COVID-19 were 1.5 times as likely to experience fatigue or muscle weakness after 12 months, compared to those who had not been treated with corticosteroids during their illness. The authors say these findings will be important to follow up in future research to better understand why COVID-19 symptoms persist in some people. When compared with people of the same age, sex and pre-existing health problems who had not had COVID-19, hospitalized survivors were more likely to experience pain or discomfort at 12 months (29% COVID-19 survivors [337/1,164] vs 5% wider community [53/1,164]). They were also more likely to experience mobility problems (9% [103/1,164] vs 4% [41/1,164]). All of the symptoms recorded in the study questionnaire were more prevalent in people who had had COVID-19, compared with people from the wider community who had not had COVID-19. Lixue Huang, one of the study authors, from Capital Medical University and China-Japan Friendship Hospital, China, said: "We did not have baseline data for the study participants from before they fell ill with COVID-19. However, the health status of matched people from the community who have never had COVID-19 gives us a useful comparison and can help us to understand the impact of the disease on survivors' quality of life." Mental health is an important consideration in the recovery of COVID-19 patients. Slightly more patients experienced anxiety or depression at one year than at six months (23% at 6 months [274/1,187] vs 26% at 12 months [331/1,271]) and the proportion was much greater in COVID-19 survivors than in matched people from the wider community (26% [300/1,164] vs 5% [59/1,164]). Xiaoying Gu, one of the study's authors, from Institute of Clinical Medical Sciences, China-Japan Friendship Hospital, China, said: "We do not yet fully understand why psychiatric symptoms are slightly more common at one year than at six months in COVID-19 survivors. These could be caused by a biological process linked to the virus infection itself, or the body's immune response to it. Or they could be linked to reduced social contact, loneliness, incomplete recovery of physical health or loss of employment associated with illness. Large, long-term studies of COVID-19 survivors are needed so that we can better understand the long term physical and mental health consequences of COVID-19." The authors note their study was focused on a single hospital and so patient outcomes may not be generalisable to other settings. Additionally, the study included only a small number of patients who had been admitted to intensive care (94/1,276) and findings relating to the most critically ill patients should be interpreted with caution. A Lancet editorial published at the same time says: "As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, the need to understand and respond to long COVID is increasingly pressing. Symptoms such as persistent fatigue, breathlessness, brain fog, and depression could debilitate many millions of people globally. Yet very little is known about the condition With no proven treatments or even rehabilitation guidance, long COVID affects people's ability to resume normal life and their capacity to work. The effect on society, from the increased health-care burden and economic and productivity losses, is substantial. Long COVID is a modern medical challenge of the first order." It continues: "The scientific and medical communities must collaborate to explore the mechanism and pathogenesis of long COVID, estimate the global and regional disease burdens, better delineate who is most at risk, understand how vaccines might affect the condition, and find effective treatments via randomised controlled trials. At the same time, health-care providers must acknowledge and validate the toll of the persistent symptoms of long COVID on patients, and health systems need to be prepared to meet individualized, patient-oriented goals, with an appropriately trained workforce involving physical, cognitive, social, and occupational elements. Answering these research questions while providing compassionate and multidisciplinary care will require the full breadth of scientific and medical ingenuity. It is a challenge to which the whole health community must rise." More information: 1-year outcomes in hospital survivors with COVID-19: a longitudinal cohort study, The Lancet (2021). DOI: www.thelancet.com/journals/lan (21)01755-4/fulltext Journal information: The Lancet 1-year outcomes in hospital survivors with COVID-19: a longitudinal cohort study,(2021). DOI: doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)01755-4 (HealthDay)More than 171 million people are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 in the United States, but the highly infectious Delta variant has left some with "breakthrough" cases nonetheless. These cases were anticipated, because the COVID vaccines weren't designed to eliminate all virus infections, but rather to lower a person's risk of severe illness and hospitalization. Even now, "being vaccinated gives you a 93% chance of not landing in the hospital with COVID. Those are pretty good odds," said Dr. Luis Ostrosky, chief of infectious diseases at McGovern Medical School at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. Nevertheless, if you're a vaccinated person who suspects you have a breakthrough infection, you probably have many questions about how to protect those around you and manage your illness. How sick am I likely to get? "Most of the people with breakthrough infections seem to have a particularly mild disease, complaining mostly of upper respiratory symptoms like drippy nose, a slight cough," Ostrosky said. "We see a lot of headaches. That's about as much as most people are going to be feeling." He added that some will also have low-grade fevers or fatigue. All these symptoms can usually be treated with over-the-counter remedies. A much smaller percentage of people with breakthrough infections will get very sick, said Dr. Aaron Glatt, chief of infectious diseases at Mount Sinai South Nassau in Oceanside, N.Y. The risk of severe illness is higher in people with compromised immune systems or chronic health problems. "What I tell people is if you have been identified as having had a breakthrough episode you should see your physician, and he or she should help you decide which category you fall into," Glatt said. What if I've been exposed to someone who tested positive for COVID? The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says vaccinated people exposed to COVID don't have to quarantine unless they develop symptoms. They should wear a mask indoors for 14 days following exposure. But experts firmly suggest that even vaccinated people get a COVID test, since they could be potentially contagious even if they don't develop any symptoms. "I think it's reasonable that everybody be evaluated," Glatt said. "If they are vaccinated, they should get tested." When should I get tested for COVID? Fully vaccinated people should get tested three to five days after coming into close contact with a COVID-infected person, even if they don't have symptoms, according to the CDC. Experts also recommend you get tested for COVID if you develop any symptoms related to the infection, even if you're vaccinated. "Most people are presenting with mild headaches or stuffy nose, so they say, 'It's my allergies.' What I like to tell people is that in COVID times there's no such thing as just allergiesif you have symptoms, you need to be tested," Ostrosky said. Glatt agreed, noting that something as minor as sniffles, sore throat or congestion could be a symptom of a breakthrough infection. "It doesn't have to be a full-blown shortness of breath and cough," he said. "Only a small, small percentage get significant illness." What should I do if I have a breakthrough infection? Vaccinated folks infected with COVID should follow the standard isolation procedures set forth by the CDC, staying out of public and away from others for 10 days after symptoms first appear or a test comes up positive. "They absolutely should not go to work. They're highly contagious," Glatt said. "The fact that you're vaccinated and you have COVID doesn't mean that you're not contagious." You should also isolate from other people in your household, staying in your room to protect everyone else from your infection. "The old isolation rules apply exactly the same," Ostrosky said. "Whether you're symptomatic or not, you need to isolate for at least 10 days. After those 10 days, you can go out." Ostrosky added that immune-compromised people might need to spend up to 20 days in isolation. If I test positive, should everyone else in my house get tested? "If you or somebody in your household or in your immediate social sphere tests positive, that should trigger an exposure investigation," Ostrosky said. "All those people should first get quarantined and then tested on day three to five after the exposure." Anyone who's been in close contact with you should also get tested. The CDC defines "close contact" as having been within 6 feet of a COVID-infected person for a total 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period. Who should I tell about my breakthrough infection? Experts suggest you follow whatever rules are in place at your workplace about reporting your breakthrough infection to your employers. "We recommend you disclose to your employer so they can take the appropriate workplace actions," Ostrosky said. You also should think seriously about any places where you might have had close contact with others, and reach out to people you might have infected, Ostrosky and Glatt said. "If you've exposed people, in my humble opinion you have an ethical responsibility to tell them, 'I exposed you,'" Glatt said. Do I need to get tested again after my isolation? You're free and clear after 10 days in isolation, so long as your symptoms are improving and you haven't had a fever for at least 24 hours. You don't have to get retested. "We no longer recommend routine testing after you test positive. We know that after 10 days the virus, even if you test positive, is not infectious anymore," Ostrosky said. Could a booster shot help protect me from a breakthrough infection? The White House has announced that the fully vaccinated can receive a booster shot of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines eight months after they got their second dose. The program will start the week of Sept. 20, if the CDC and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration give it the green light. Ostrosky and Glatt both think these boosters could help improve people's ability to fight off a breakthrough infection. "We're starting to get data primarily from Israel and other countries that have been collecting the data systematically showing that antibodies do decrease gradually over time. We're also starting to find out there's a correlation between antibody levels and protection," Ostrosky said. "The logical conclusion is that as your antibodies wane, it's a good idea to get a booster to boost those antibody levels and protect you." However, Glatt said there's still much to learn about just what kind of added protection boosters will provide. "There definitely is a role for boosters, but we're not sure what that role will be for any individual patients at this point other than the highly immunocompromised patients," he said. "I do think that boosters will help us get this under control, to a certain extent." More information: The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about COVID-19 The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about COVID-19 quarantine and isolation procedures Copyright 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved. Ambassador of Belarus P.Vziatkin presents copies of the Credentials at the Foreign Ministry of Tanzania On August 25, 2021 the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Belarus to Kenya and Tanzania non-resident, Pavel Vziatkin, met with the Acting Permanent Secretary in the status of the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation of Tanzania, Anisa Mbega. During the meeting, Belarusian Ambassador presented copies of his Credentials. The sides noted a significant potential for the development of bilateral relations in a number of spheres with a special emphasis on the expansion of economic ties and trade between Belarus and Tanzania. The parties also outlined the necessity of creating a legal framework for the cooperation between the two countries. print version THE PHILIPPINES has extended the travel ban on travelers from India and nine other countries until August 15 to prevent the further spread... Stegmann's favorite part of the experience was the printing workshop. They created their own ink combining soot, for pigment, egg yolk, for viscosity and alcohol, to help it dry correctly. She thought it was fun to learn how to do something from scratch, but in particular she remembers one man who was struggling to get his ink right. It was too fluid and the leaf didnt turn out right. So, he tried again. This time the leaf turned out beautifully, positioned right next to the sloppy one. Its just one of those general things: Just try again and then it will eventually work, she said. I like that. Across the garage from Lais work are four small screens with hanging headphones, on each screen Bastian Hoffman gives a tutorial on how to fix a problem nobody asked him to fix. In one video, part of his Today I want to show you collection, he deconstructs a candle and then remakes it. In another he shows how to turn your workspace into a sheet of paper. A third video shows him constructing a permanent puddle and in the fourth he makes a bike that always cycles in the mud literally always. With an increasing number of hearing aids and PSAPs being sold directly to consumers, advocates are eager for the FDA rules to come out, because they worry about the confusion caused by the array of choices with none having the FDAs full seal of approval. The FDA delaying regulations has done more harm than good, because the direct-to-consumer market is filling the void and people are doing what they want, and we dont know the quality of these devices, said Barbara Kelley, executive director of the Hearing Loss Association of America, a consumer advocacy group. The law, sponsored by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), gave the FDA until August 2020 to issue regulations. Last year, after missing that deadline, FDA officials said the covid-19 pandemic had delayed the rule-making process. Many in the hearing aid industry are concerned about the unchecked competition likely to come with allowing consumers to buy aids on their own without an evaluation by a hearing specialist. Brandon Sawalich, CEO of Starkey, the largest U.S.-based hearing aid company, said consumers need expert assistance to test their hearing, buy an appropriate aid, properly fit it and fine-tune its settings. Britain warns attack on Kabul airport could come within hours; Biden, Israeli PM to meet for first time; MLS seeing boost in popularity. Here are this morning's headlines. MIAMI (AP) Joel Steckler was eager for his first cruise in more than a year and a half, and he chose the ship that just two months ago became the first to accept passengers again after a long pandemic shutdown. Steckler was fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and that was enough to resume cruising, under initial guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Now, the 63-year-old from Long Island, New York, is going to postpone the trip he had planned for Saturday amid new, tighter guidelines prompted by the delta-variant-fueled surge in cases and breakthrough infections. You just have to make a personal decision, said Steckler, who takes medication that suppresses his immune system and changed his plans after consulting his doctor. You dont want to be in a position where you are sick on a cruise and you have to fly home or somehow get home. Cruise lines have detected infections among vaccinated crew members and passengers, including in an elderly traveler who recently died. Last Friday, the CDC began advising travelers who are at a higher risk for severe COVID-19 illness to avoid cruises. It is also recommending that passengers show both a recent negative COVID test and proof they've been immunized. California has not executed anyone since 2006, and Newsom has imposed a moratorium while he is governor. But voters narrowly upheld the death penalty in 2012 and 2016. Five of the seven justices were appointed by Democratic governors who oppose capital punishment. Liu was appointed by then-Gov. Jerry Brown. Liu took the unusual step of writing not only the majority opinion, but also a separate 30-page opinion in which he argued the state's death penalty process could be deemed unconstitutional under a different legal argument not currently before the court. There is a world of difference between a unanimous jury finding of an aggravating circumstance and the smorgasbord approach that our capital sentencing scheme allows, he wrote. He noted in the majority opinion that Colorado, New Jersey, Nebraska, and Utah all have included a reasonable doubt standard in their death penalty laws. Although that is not binding on California, he said other states' experience shows that including reasonable doubt and jury unanimity standards can work. Of 1,077 death sentences imposed since 1978 in California, 230 more than 1 in 5 have been reversed by either the California Supreme Court or a federal court, according to a March report by the Office of the State Public Defender titled Californias Broken Death Penalty. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Under the deal, Sackler family members would give up ownership of the company and contribute $4.5 billion in cash and control of charity funds. They would also have to get out of the opioid business in other countries eventually. Most of the funds they would contribute plus future profits from the new company would be used to pay to deal with the crisis through a variety of programs including anti-opioid education, housing people who are homeless and addicted to opioids and connecting those with opioid use disorder with treatment. Some funds are also to be used to pay some individual victims or their families amounts expected to range from $3,500 to $48,000. Overdoses from both prescription opioids and illicit ones such as heroin and illegally made fentanyl have been linked to more than 500,000 deaths in the U.S. since 2000. Among those speaking in the hearing were two people touched by opioids. One, Maria Ecke, a Connecticut woman whose son died of an opioid overdose in 2015, told the judge that there should be a new vote on the plan for loved ones of overdose victims who are now living a life of heartache, depression and loneliness from this drug. Are the Sacklers or their lawyers willing to clone my dear son or bring him back to help me in my old, disabled and feeble age? Ecke asked. I dont think so. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Though Arntzen doesn't support the masking policy, universal masking in schools remains the recommendation of the CDC. The SD2 policy has also garnered support this week from organizations including St. Vincent Healthcare, the Billings Clinic, St. John's United, RiverStone Health and the Billings Chamber of Commerce. "We want to make Montana proud," Arntzen said. "Use your voice, use your family, use your friends, your neighbors. Talk to those teachers, visit with them." Event organizers on Tuesday night reiterated their support of teachers and also the unions representing teachers and staff at Billings schools. The Billings Education Association Board of Directors put together a statement Monday night addressing the masking requirement in schools and responding to a memo Superintendent Greg Upham had sent out Sunday to district employees. The memo from Upham outlined how instances of refusal to follow or enforce the masking policy would be deemed insubordination and result in five days of unpaid leave, with the option for a teacher or staff member to return earlier if they agree to adhere to the masking policy. Further refusal could result in an employee's contract being terminated, the memo said. Three teachers were on unpaid leave over the masking policy as of Tuesday evening. The same number of teachers had been on unpaid leave Monday. BRAILA, Romania (AP) Romania and Japan celebrated a century of diplomatic relations on Thursday with officials from both countries visiting the site of what will be one of Europe's longest suspension bridges. The bridge in the eastern city of Braila will cross the Danube River and is a joint venture between Japans IHI Infrastructure Systems Co. Ltd. and Italian company Webuild. The project is expected to cost 411 million euros ($483 million) and the bridge will boast a central span of 1.12 kilometers (0.7 miles). The bridge, which is almost equal in length to San Franciscos Golden Gate Bridge, is around 55% complete and is expected to be fully operational by the end of 2022. Ionut Ciurea, director of Pro Infrastructure Association, a nongovernmental organization that monitors major road infrastructure projects in Romania, told The Associated Press that the new bridge will bring significant regional benefits. The bridge is a turning point, Ciurea said. Its important for the whole country. Its definitely one of the biggest transport infrastructure projects in the country. It basically connects the port of Constanta to the whole region, Moldova and especially the Danube Delta. Ive had a lot of fears over the past few weeks: fear for the people of Afghanistan who suffered for two decades through a brutal conflict strung along by the promise of a better future, only to have that future evaporate in a single weekend. Fear for the mental health of the men and women who spent part of their lives in the country fighting for what they thought would be meaningful change. Fear for those who sacrificed loved ones to a long conflict that has now amounted to next to nothing but a 20-year stain on American history, billions of dollars lost that could have gone to our own poor and infrastructure, and barbaric conditions for the Afghan people. Im not afraid for anyones political career. We stayed in Afghanistan for 20 years to save face. What Biden did took humility. We could continue the illusion for the foreseeable future, if we wanted. Buy more time with more lives. But what is the hope of that? There are few solutions that would stop the Taliban's takeover. There may not even be one. I wish like many who served that this wasnt the case. I wish we had made a real difference. I wish we had done better. We owe so much we cannot give back to the people of Afghanistan. Americans are glad we are out of Afghanistan. Majorities from both left and right agree. I, like many liberals, am glad this 20-year fools errand is ending. The outrageous thing is we agree (gag) with the former guy. In principle. Yep. The Republican National Committee has scrubbed their website of a page heaping praise on their guy for his genius plan, for a peace agreement between Trump and Taliban rebels, without Afghan government approval. Anxious to pull out before the election, his plan was chaotically flawed. Trump also released 5,000 Taliban prisoners. Now, Republicans cant think of what to say about Dear Leaders fingerprints on the withdrawal debacle. As expected, the right and their hounds are scurrying to hang this albatross around the neck of Joe Biden. Some on the left are also criticizing this as Bidens catastrophe. Nope. Booby prize goes to President Obama for letting the fiasco drag on indefinitely. The scrappy second-place contender for worst president of all time, George W. Bush, owns this disaster. He started it. And the biggest loser is Trump, for trying to escape the Afghanistan morass as an election stunt without considering the consequences. Facts are hard. The Republican Party was founded in the 1850s on the principle of stopping the spread of slavery to emerging American territories: they were dedicated to expanding civil rights and equality before the law, fostering economic development, and building public infrastructure. Republican politicians have since given us the National Park System, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Interstate Highway System, and the Americans with Disabilities Act; they worked across party lines and got the country what it needed. Despite some hiccups, the GOP was a responsible faction for a good chunk of time. Recently, the Republican Party has lost its way preferring small-minded appeals to Christianity, fear of social and cultural progress, and baseless claims of disruptions to economic and social stability instead of any actual policy goals or philosophy of government. And this new dynamic of the GOP makes one wonder if they have any business being on any voters ballot at all. David Salet, Arlee You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 16 Funny 3 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 3 On Aug. 17, narcotics investigators saw Christian in a home on Orchid Lane in Valdese, and a car stolen from Toyota Camry that had been stolen from Gastonia outside the home, the release said. Christian was found hiding in a closet when investigators entered the home, and methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia were seized during her arrest. The vehicle was towed and secured for the victim. She was taken to the magistrates office and served with the listed charges, along with outstanding warrants for felony probation violations, failure to appear and out-of-county felony indictments for possession of methamphetamine and heroin, the release said. Christians criminal history dates back to 2005 when she was convicted of conspiracy to commit robbery with a dangerous weapon, according to the North Carolina Department of Public Safety. That was her only conviction until 2017, when she was convicted of possession with intent to sell a Schedule II controlled substance, simple assault and larceny. She also has been convicted of another count of larceny and a count of felony possession of a Schedule I controlled substance, NCDPS records showed. Christian was issued a total $155,000 secured bond for her charges this week, the release said. Shes due in Burke County District Court on Sept. 9, according to court records. Two COVID-19 clusters have been reported at two separate Burke County Public Schools. The Burke County Health Department informed Burke County Public Schools of a cluster of COVID-19 cases at Table Rock Middle School and Drexel Elementary School, according to a press release from BCPS on Wednesday. The clusters are thought to be associated with the schools open houses on Aug. 19. Based on local and state guidance, classes will remain in-person and the district does not plan to move the schools or particular classrooms to remote learning at this time, the release said. The NC Department of Health and Human Services defines a cluster as a minimum of five confirmed diagnostic cases with illness onsets or initial positive results within a 14-day period and plausible epidemiologic linkage between cases. We will have extra staff in the buildings this evening conducting a thorough cleaning of the schools, BCPS Superintendent Dr. Mike Swan said in the release. We will continue other mitigating factors as well and remind students to properly wear their masks, practice social distancing when possible and wash their hands often. They said while a mask mandate is not in place, it is effective. The Carolinas HealthCare System Blue Ridge dashboard showed 42 COVID-19 patients in the hospital Thursday, with 34 of those patients unvaccinated, and 18 virus patients in the intensive care unit, of which 16 were unvaccinated. It also showed five of 16 ventilators in use, with four of those patients unvaccinated. The health care systems COVID-19 virtual hospital had 282 patients on Thursday, up from 258 patients on Wednesday. NCDHHS reported 8,620 new cases Thursday, with a daily percent positive rate of 13%, and 3,552 people hospitalized across the state. The state also reported a total of 14,272 deaths, up from 14,212 deaths due to the virus on Wednesday. While some in Burke County are getting a vaccine, vaccination rates remain low. Of Burke Countys total population, 41% (37,331 residents) have been at least partially vaccinated, and 38% (34,140 residents) have been fully vaccinated. The county health department has doses of the Moderna vaccine, and some doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine while supplies last, its briefing said Thursday. WILTON Artys Ice Cream & Grill has become a favorite dining spot in Wilton. With its burgers, ice cream and great service, the restaurant has gained fans from all over Iowa. Owner Sakir Alimoski has now launched a food truck Artys on Wheels that debuted at the Wilton Founders Day weekend. This has been months in the making, Alimoski said. People are always saying to me that they wish we were in this town or that town, and now I can be without actually having to commit to a physical location. For me, this is like a fun challenge that is going to turn into a pretty big expansion. Alimoski said there were a few kinks during Founders Day, and it took time for the crew to find their rhythm. The first hour and a half was hectic, and in my mind I was thinking Why did I do this? This was a mistake, but once we figured everything out, it was smooth sailing, he said. Having a food trailer is like owning an RV when it comes to the tanks and the generators. That was all new to me, but I had a lot of good friends that know campers and were able to help figure things out. We also had to be a lot faster when it came to serving food and figure out the flow. COLUMBUS JUNCTION Thanks to a grant from the Iowa Economic Development Authority (IEDA), the Tyson Plant in Columbus Junction soon will join every other Tyson plant with an upgrade to its slaughtering process. The project will upgrade the process from the use of electrical shocks to stun pigs before slaughter to the use of carbon dioxide to render the pigs unconscious. According to the IEDA, the process provides a superior quality of meat. On Friday, the IEDA announced Tyson would receive about $540,000 in tax credits to be used for the renovations on its killing floor. According to a press release from the authority, A subsidiary of Tyson Foods, Tyson Fresh Meats is a leading supplier of premium beef and pork. In Louisa County, the company produces pork products and plans to enhance the processing at the facility with new machinery, equipment and modifications. The project represents a capital investment of nearly $15.4 million and was awarded tax benefits through the HQJ program. It is expected to create 10 jobs, of which eight are incented at a qualifying wage of $19.65 per hour. Tyson was one of five Iowa businesses that received tax incentives with that program. The new four-bedroom house in Charlotte, North Carolina, was Crystal Marie and Eskias McDaniels personal American dream, the reason they had moved there from pricey Los Angeles. A lush, long lawn, 2,700 square feet of living space, gleaming kitchen, and a neighborhood pool and playground for their son, Nazret. All for $375,000. Pre-qualifying for the mortgage was a breeze: They had high credit scores, earned roughly six figures each and had saved more they would need for the down payment. But two days before they were supposed to sign, in August 2019, the loan officer called Crystal Marie with bad news: The deal wasnt going to close. It seemed like it was getting rejected by an algorithm, she said, and then there was a person who could step in and decide to override that or not. She was told she didnt qualify because she was a contractor, not a full-time employee even though her co-workers were contractors, too. And they had mortgages. Crystal Maries co-workers are white. She and Eskias are Black. I think it would be really naive for someone like myself to not consider that race played a role in the process, she said. He accused the U.S. of hyping the lab leak theory and trying to shift the blame onto China, and implied the coronavirus might be linked to high-level American research labs, suggesting the United States invite WHO to investigate some of its installations. Marion Koopmans and her WHO-recruited colleagues listed a number of priorities for further research, including conducting wider antibody surveys that might identify places where COVID-19 was spreading undetected, both in China and beyond, testing wild bats and farm-raised animals as potential reservoirs of the virus, and investigating any credible new leads. Some other scientists fear the best opportunities to collect samples might have been missed during the first few weeks after some of the earliest human cases appeared linked to a Wuhan seafood market. Chinese researchers collected hundreds of environmental samples immediately after the coronavirus was found, but it is unclear how many people or animals were tested. Once you have wildlife traders shifting over to other kinds of employment because theyre worried about whether theyll be able to do this anymore, that window starts to close, said Maciej Boni, a Pennsylvania State University biology professor who has studied virus origins and was not part of the WHO team. SEOUL, South Korea (AP) North Korea will convene its rubber-stamp parliament next month to discuss efforts to salvage an economy strained by pandemic border closures after decades of mismanagement and U.S.-led sanctions. The Norths official Korean Central News Agency said Thursday the Supreme Peoples Assembly will meet on Sept. 28 in Pyongyang to discuss economic development, youth education, government organizational matters and other issues. The report didnt mention any plans for discussions on foreign policy. Talks between the United States and North Korea have stalled since the collapse of a summit between former President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in 2019, when the Americans rejected the Norths demand for a major easing of economic sanctions in exchange for a partial surrender of its nuclear capabilities. Kim has since pledged to bolster his countrys nuclear deterrent while urging his people to stay resilient in a struggle for economic self-dependence in the face of U.S. pressure. But experts say Kim is now facing perhaps his toughest moment as he approaches a decade in rule, with North Korea maintaining a border lockdown indefinitely to keep out the coronavirus and with no prospect in sight to end international sanctions. American officials are in contact with about 500 American citizens to try to get them safely out of the country, the U.S. official said. Blinken described ongoing efforts to reach the final 1,000 Americans, ahead of the U.S. withdrawal. Were aggressively reaching out to them multiple times a day, through multiple channels of communication phone, email, text-messaging to determine whether they still want to leave, he said. WASHINGTON Germanys top military commander says 21 German citizens were picked up during an overnight helicopter mission in Afghanistan that was flown by U.S. forces. Gen. Eberhard Zorn said Wednesday that U.S. troops flew the helicopter and German forces picked up the evacuees. The Pentagon acknowledged that there was a U.S. military helicopter flight into Kabul overnight to gather evacuees and take them to the airport to be flown out of the country. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby and Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor said this was the third such helicopter rescue flight done by the military during the ongoing evacuation. They declined to say who the passengers were or provide any other details. The Guam Economic Development Authority attends the ASD Market Week Trade Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, promoting Made in Guam products. Joining GEDA special projects coordinator Melvin Tabilas, seated center, is Everything Guam managing director Marie Guerrero, left, and Denanche chief executive officer Lenny Fejeran, right. Naval Air Station Sigonella Command Master Chief Anna Wood carries an Afghanistan evacuee off a U.S. Air Force C- 17 Globemaster III at Naval Air Station Sigonella, August 22, 2021. The Guam Department of Education is investigating the rioting that occurred Aug. 23 at Southern High School. You have permission to edit this article. Edit Close Editor Zaldy Dandan is the recipient of the Best Editorial Writer Award of the Society of Professional Journalists, and the CNMI Humanities Award for Outstanding Contributions to Journalism. His three books are available on amazon.com Parents know their own children better than their teachers know them. Better than their childrens doctors know them. Better than school administrators know them. Better than school district representatives know them, he said. And they definitely know their children better than the other parents of the children in their class. Cooper's decision, which he expects to issue Friday, will, for now, decide the legality of strict mask mandates imposed in 10 of the state 67 countywide school districts, including most of the largest. Defying the governor and the state Board of Education, the districts have said students must wear masks in class unless their parents provide a note from a doctor. The districts represent about half of the state's 2.8 million public school students. DeSantis has said districts may only impose a mask mandate if parents can opt their child out with a note from themselves. A few districts have done that, but most districts have left it up to parents. Both sides have indicated that if they lose, they will appeal Cooper's decision to a higher court. So I knew to expect that when my darling crossed on June 4. On the morning of the 5th, I asked him, Howre you doing, Sweetheart? His immediate response was, Im standing tall and flying high! The truth is that after five years of watching Denyss body fail him, painful section by section and after many surgeries leave him bedridden, skeletal, with muscles atrophied and then contracting so that he could not be repositioned in the least without horrible pain, and all this time, he was so courageous, noble about it all, it was a blessing when he crossed, and my heart is thrilled for him and I feel no loss because were still using Gods WIFI daily, with the tenderness of love and joy and promise. A further truth is that I did not put Denyss obituary into the paper, because I could not afford the cost to explain adequately what he meant to everyone on Earth, all those he loved and left behind. How he organized all the California colleges for Robert Kennedy in his campaign for president. How he was asked to do the same for all the western colleges as the campaign went on. How he was a few feet ahead of the senator when Sirhan stepped out of the shadows and shot Kennedy behind the right ear and in the shoulder, How that knocked the hope out of Denys and so many other hearts leaving them no Earth to stand upon. I encourage any person willing to consider Yousef Baigs left-wing drivel to exit the far left's echo chamber. Shut down the social media, turn off the TV and read a newspaper that is created in a traditional method with actual investigative journalists and devoid of censorship. It is a paper for people who love stability and factual information. Read it for yourselves dont take my word or Yousefs word for it. Eric Hoffer describes freedom as an awesome burden in his book The True Believer. Granted that this may be the case for some people, because freedom requires personal responsibility and scrutiny of motivation, character and action. The better the character of a people, the more likely they will preserve and value their own freedom. And so why is it that the sacrificing of concentration camp prisoners to harvest organs so repulsive to a well-formed conscience? Well, aside from the obvious revolting form of murder, it also violates the ultimate natural right, the right over one's most precious personal property, one's own person. Let's face the fact that the CCP is perverse in the extreme. They are not harmless and the Epoch Times beautifully defends freedom and keeps track of the mess. Pikeville, KY (41501) Today Showers early, then clearing overnight. Low 59F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Showers early, then clearing overnight. Low 59F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%. Talks between Biden and Zelenskyy kicked off at the White House Google appeals EUR 500 million fines imposed by French regulators Israeli FM: US plan to reopen consulate in Jerusalem is 'bad idea' Armenian FM: There are no talks on delimitation and demarcation of borders Armenian FM briefs his Iranian counterpart on consequences of Azerbaijan's illegal invasion Digest: Armenian soldier killed at Ararat positions, Azerbaijan returns Karabakh citizen injured Human rights activist: We have indisputable evidence of 80 more Armenian POWs being captured by Azerbaijan Artsakh parliament holds special session dedicated to 30th anniversary of declaration of Karabakh independence Azerbaijan prosecutor general complains about Russia peacekeepers in Karabakh Armenia opposition MP: Azerbaijanis throw burning wheels at several Gegharkunik Province villages Caucasus Heritage Watch: Azerbaijanis destroy Makun Bridge in Karabakh Russias Lavrov: Armenia is our ally Soldier, 39, killed after Azerbaijan opens fire on Armenia positions Russia, Azerbaijan deputy FMs discuss implementation of Karabakh agreements Armenia army General Staff chief meets with 3-month training camp reservists Armenia health ministers adviser appointed deputy head of UCLA Promise Armenian Institute Prosecutor's Office: Numerous injuries found on Artsakh citizen returned by Azerbaijan Artsakh President appoints new labor, social, migration affairs minister Armenia national airline to be named Fly Arna Armenia defense minister pays working visit to some military units Pashinyan: I am convinced that Armenia-Uzbekistan mutual relations will further develop 615 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia Moody's leaves Armenia sovereign rating unchanged Russia peacekeepers ensure order, security in Karabakh on Knowledge Day Psaki: US partners with Turkey, Qatar on Kabul airport Artsakh to mark Independence Day anniversary for first time without Armenia top leadership attendance President to Armenia students: Learn to overcome challenges, to pursue dreams without despair Five missing after US Navy helicopter crashes off California coast Armdaily.am: Armenia President reacts to recent events taking place in Syunik Province Newspaper: Azerbaijan carrying out large-scale construction in Artsakhs Shushi Newspaper: Armenia authorities compile 'blacklist' of opposition MPs Biden calls Afghanistan evacuation mission extraordinary success Armenian Foreign Minister and CSTO Secretary General discuss Armenian-Azerbaijani border situation Merkel says that Germany is trying to establish contact with Taliban Digest: More on COVID-19 in Armenia, armed robbery takes place in Yerevan Russia FM calls on Azerbaijan to unconditionally release Armenian POWs Russias Lavrov: Rhetoric of both sides of Karabakh conflict needs to be moderated Armenias Mirzoyan: We will respect Afghanistan peoples choice Armenia FM: No negotiations on peace agreement with Azerbaijan underway Eurasian Development Bank wants to become one of largest creditors of Armenia economy Armenia Investigative Committee: Man found dead with gunshot wound inside car in Yerevan Lavrov: In talks with Armenia FM we will separately discuss Nagorno-Karabakh situation Opposition MP: Positive signals being exchanged with Turkey are new trap for Armenia Armenia FM: Tense situation in region is consequence of Azerbaijan's destructive policy ECtHR ruling: Ambassador to Sweden, Iceland to get compensation from Armenia government Armenia, Russia FMs hold tete-a-tete meeting Armenia ex-president Kocharyan, former deputy PM Gevorgyan case court hearing not held Ombudsman: Azerbaijan MOD aims to cover up their criminal acts against Armenia civilian population Fallen soldiers family stages protest outside Armenia government building No electricity in court where Armenia 2nd president Kocharyan, ex-deputy PM Gevorgyan criminal case is heard Armenia ex-president Kocharyan, former deputy PM Gevorgyan criminal case court hearing resumes 524 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia OSCE Minsk Group new Russian Co-Chair visits Azerbaijan Armed robbery occurs at bank branch in Yerevan shopping mall 37,000 first-graders start school in Armenia Armenia PM congratulates Kyrgyzstan President on Independence Day anniversary Some 30,000 people evacuated in California due to wildfires Russia peacekeepers hold humanitarian action for Nagorno-Karabakh children Dead body of man, 37, with gunshot wound is found in car in Yerevan Newspaper: Artsakh independence anniversary to be celebrated without Armenia top leadership for first time in history Newspaper: Armenia authorities trying to cause rift among parliament opposition factions, MPs Armenia PM goes on short vacation UN Security Council adopts Afghanistan resolution Pentagon announces US completion of evacuation out of Kabul airport Armenia ombudsman reaffirms Azerbaijan soldiers deliberate starting fire near Sotk, Kut villages of Gegharkunik Ukraine and Armenia to cooperate in attracting investments Armenian Ministry of Education and French Embassy sign cooperation agreement Israeli Defense Minister meets with the President of Palestine Uzbekistan completely closes border with Afghanistan IAEA: North Korea seems to have restarted nuclear reactor EU recommends restoring restrictions on US tourists Digest: Turkey talks normalising relations with Armenia, soldier injured in Karabakh Dollar drops in Armenia Azerbaijans Aliyev calls Karabakh Armenians hated enemy Azerbaijan president: Current course of events shows that Karabakh conflict would never be resolved peacefully Divine Liturgy served in Armenian church of Turkeys Malatya for first time since 1915 (VIDEO) Economist: Armenia exports growth connected with external factors Opposition Armenia Faction MPs health grows worse in prison Moscow Armenian Theater actor dies during performance Artsakh FM: Azerbaijan, with Turkeys complicity, sending militants from Afghanistan to occupied part of Karabakh Opposition Armenia Faction MP summoned to Special Investigation Service Officer charged with Azerbaijans capturing of 62 Armenia soldiers in Artsakh: They were forces 15 times greater FM: Armenian captives in Azerbaijan are subjected to torture Lawyer of Armenia officer accused in 62 Shirak residents case: How was connection cut off on day of Azerbaijan attack? Health ministry: 275,138 people so far vaccinated in Armenia against coronavirus Russia peacekeepers in Karabakh carry out actions to find drones Confusion arises during Armenia appellate court hearing of case of ex-President Kocharyan, others Armenia 2nd president Kocharyans lawyer submits to appellate court motion to cancel or reduce bail Prosecution in case on Armenia 2nd President Kocharyan, others: Charge should be re-qualified Artsakh Investigative Committee: Azerbaijan soldier who entered Martakert city apartment is arrested 275 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia Armenia appellate court continues considering lawyers, prosecutors appeals in ex-President Kocharyan, others' case Armenia FM to pay working visit to Russia Coronavirus casualties worldwide exceed 4.5m One dead, 2 injured after road accident in Armenia town Brazil unveils largest Buddha statue in country Unidentified gunman opens fire inside Toronto shopping mall Explosions occur in Kabul Monday morning Armenia ombudsman: Azerbaijan soldiers deliberately set fires near Sotk, Kut villages Biden declares major disaster in US State of Louisiana The Kapan-Goris interstate road remains closed off, and the Azerbaijanis do not demand anything specific yet. The mayor of Kapan, Armenia, Gevorg Parsyan told about this to Armenian News-NEWS.am. "During the talks, the Azerbaijanis said that the reason for [their] blocking the road was that two Armenian servicemen allegedly attacked an Azerbaijani serviceman and hit him with a bayonet. Of course, this is absolute nonsense," Parsyan added. To note, the Armenian Ministry of Defense has denied this incident involving an Armenian soldier. The mayor of Kapan said that new negotiations are expected in order to reopen the Kapan-Goris road. "The Armenian and Russian border troops are present," he added. Also, Parsyan stated that the Azerbaijanis had closed the road at 8pm on Wednesday. "Our citizens were in that section [of the road] with their cars, but they have come out accompanied by Russian border guards. There are no affected," said the mayor of Kapan, and he added that the local civilian population was not being evacuated. MOSCOW. For the first time, the command of the Russian peacekeeping contingent has organized a mobile outside reception in remote villages of the Martakert region of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh), reported the press service of the Russian Defense Ministry. The outside reception was located in the Vank village hospital where there is also a hotline for searching for missing servicemen, providing humanitarian aid, employment, and gathering information on other problematic topics. "Today, five tons of food was given to refugee families and large families," said Dmitry Tusidi, a representative of the Russian peacekeeping contingent in Artsakh. Also, the military doctors of the medical detachment of the Russian peacekeeping contingent held a consultation in the local hospital as part of a medical campaign, and provided qualified medical assistance to 150 residents of Vank. The program of the government wants to create the impression that nothing has happened in the previous three years, the borders of our state have not been changed, an entire generation has not died. The head of the opposition "Armenia" Factionand former defense ministerSeyran Ohanyan stated this during Thursdays National Assembly (NA) debates on the program of the new government. "The government's program does not fully correspond to the state's problems. Especially this mismatch of risks, dangers, and programs content is the main and major drawback. There is no clear assessment of the military-political situation. The fragility and risks of the security environment, Turkey's entry into the South Caucasus did not compel to make a strategic defense review and have a reform plan for the armed forces. For example, reducing the term of [military] service is untimely and a populist step," he said. According to Ohanyan, the new governments proposed program does not correspond to the growing uncertainties facing Armenia and Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh). "We reject the psychology of the loser, entering into the illusion of untimely and unfounded peace with Azerbaijan. At the moment, the blockade of Armenia will lead to a deep blockade for Artsakh and Armenia," Ohanyan emphasized. According to him, the criticism voiced by the Armenian authorities that the opposition is not constructive towards the government's program is groundless. "I believe [that] during the formation of the NA bodies, even during those discussions, we force debates, make sectoral comparisons, criticize, present the shortcomings of the documents, make proposals. Whether it will be accepted or not is your business. But at the same time, there was no speeches of self-criticism and a clear assessment of the situation also in the speeches of the political majority," the head of the "Armenia" Faction added. The Azerbaijani armed servicemen have just blocked the road from Goris to Vorotan in Syunik Province of Armenia; it is the section depicted in the photo. This fact has been confirmed by alarming calls submitted to the Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) of Armenia and their inspections. The ombudsman of Armenia, Arman Tatoyan, on Thursday wrote about this on Facebook. This is an interstate road that secures the normal movement of the civilian population of Armenia; it is directly connected with the normal life of people. These criminal actions of the Azerbaijani armed servicemen violate the right to free movement, and have completely disrupted peoples normal life. Itself their presence on these roads is a violation of the right to life of people and their other internationally guaranteed fundamental rights. After blocking the interstate road in the past of Davit Bek village of Kapan community (Shurnukh-Karmrakar part) by the Azerbaijani armed forces around 11 pm last night, the movement of people through this section has been also restricted, Tatoyan added. The Goris-Kapan road section which was closed off by the Azerbaijanis as of 11pm yesterday is about 10 km away from Shurnukh village, the latters mayor, Hakob Arshakyan, told Armenian News-NEWS.am on Thursday. "It is the section of the road located in the territory of Armenia; it is called 'Chayzami.' It is in ourArmeniaspart even by GPS. On the way from Shurnukh to Kapan [city], they [i.e., the Azerbaijani soldiers] are on the left side of the road. They probably have brought down equipment, placed [there] so that they would not let the cars pass," said the village head. Shurnukh, in fact, is now deprived of the road to Kapan. To note, the Azerbaijanis have blocked a section of the Goris-Kapan motorway as of 11pm Wednesday, and they refuse to reopen it. About four dozen cars on this road section were evacuated at night. And the Office of the Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) of Armenia reported that at around 12:20pm on Thursday, the Azerbaijani servicemen have closed off as well the road leading from Goris city to Vorotan village in Syunik Province. Ever since Wednesday night when the Azerbaijani soldiers have closed off the Goris-Kapan motorway of Armenia, the villages of Shurnukh, Vorotan and Bardzravan have been deprived of their main roads connecting to Goris and Kapan cities, whereas their alternative roads are in such a bad condition that the villagers cannot use them yet. "There are field roads leading to Tatev [village] from near the forest, but they are in very bad condition, it is not possible for an ambulance or another car to travel along there; it is only possible to move by off-road vehicles. That is why the traffic is closed now. People are going, buying food from outside, but they still can't," Onik Avagyan, the head of Bardzravan village, told Armenian News-NEWS.am. Shurnukh village mayor Hakob Arshakyan told Armenian News-NEWS.am that it can be said that they were under blockade. "We have an alternative road with the project which the Red Cross would fund; it refused. Now we are discussing with the border troops the issue of such a road whereby at least food enter, or, God forbid, there will be an issue of transporting a patient or evacuation," Arshakyan said, noting that the situation in the village is normal. According to the mayor of Shurnukh, it will take 10 to 15 days to put the alternative road of the village in order. The village of Vorotan also has an alternative road, which, however, is difficult to pass, and therefore the locals cannot use it. According to Kapan mayor Gevorg Parsyans information, Russian peacekeepers brought bread to Vorotan today. As reported earlier, the Azerbaijani soldiers have blocked a section of the Goris-Kapan motorway as of 11pm Wednesday, and they refuse to reopen it. About four dozen cars on this road section were evacuated at night. At the moment, the Kapan-Goris motorway is closed near Vorotan. And according to the mayor of Kapan, respective negotiations are not underway yet, but they are planned later in the day. And the Office of the Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) of Armenia reported that at around 12:20pm on Thursday, the Azerbaijani servicemen have closed off as well the road leading from Goris city to Vorotan village in Syunik Province. Negotiations on reopening the Goris-Kapan motorway have resumed Thursday at around 3pm. Kamo Avanesyan, Deputy Governor of Syunik Province of Armenia, told about this to Armenian News-NEWS.am. "There were negotiations in the morning, then they stopped, then they resumed in the afternoon. Trilateral [i.e., Armenian-Russian-Azerbaijani] negotiations are underway. We are waiting for a positive result so that the issue is resolved today, the road is [re]opened. It will be clear by 6pm," Avanesyan said, noting that the Azerbaijani side, however, first refused to meet with the Armenian side, but then agreed. As reported earlier, the Azerbaijani soldiers have blocked a section of the Goris-Kapan motorway as of 11pm Wednesday, and they refuse to reopen it. About four dozen cars on this road section were evacuated at night. At the moment, the Kapan-Goris motorway is closed near Vorotan. And the Office of the Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) of Armenia reported that at around 12:20pm on Thursday, the Azerbaijani servicemen have closed off as well the road leading from Goris city to Vorotan village in Syunik Province. Azerbaijan claims that its soldier had gotten lost, but there is reason to believe that this soldier had come to Martakert, Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) for other purposes, according to WarGonzo. In particular, according to sources, this soldier had a smartphone with a large number of photos and videos which show the location of various facilities of the Russian peacekeeping forces and the movement of Russian equipment. In addition, exactly one day ago, according to WarGonzo reporters, another "upsetting incident" took place in the Lisagor area, with the involvement of an Azerbaijani, the details of which, however, are not reported. The impression is that the Azerbaijani MP's statement about Artsakh, the Azerbaijani soldiers closure of the Goris-Kapan motorway in Armenia, the incident with Azerbaijani soldier in Martakert, and the situation in the Lisagor region are part of Azerbaijan's strategy towards Artsakh to destabilize the region, WarGonzo writes in its Telegram channel. Story Highlights 73% of K-12 parents satisfied with quality of oldest child's education Homeschooling has returned to its pre-pandemic level Majority of U.S. adults now dissatisfied with K-12 education WASHINGTON, D.C. -- As U.S. children head back to classrooms amid another COVID-19 surge, 73% of parents of school-aged children say they are satisfied with the quality of education their oldest child is receiving. Twenty-eight percent of parents are "completely" and 45% "somewhat" satisfied, which is essentially unchanged from one year ago when satisfaction fell after the pandemic forced schools to close to in-person instruction. Line graph. Percentage of parents of students in kindergarten through twelfth grade who say they are completely or somewhat satisfied with the quality of education their oldest child is receiving since 1999. Currently, 73% of K to 12 parents are completely or somewhat satisfied. It was 72% in 2020 and 82% in 2019. Gallup has tracked parents' satisfaction with the education received by their students in kindergarten through high school annually since 1999 when a record-high 83% were generally positive. Since then, satisfaction has averaged 76%, with a recent high reading of 82% in 2019. The latest 73% satisfaction, from an Aug. 2-17 poll, is at the low end of the historical range and comes as the highly transmissible delta variant is causing a surge in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations in the U.S. Unvaccinated Americans, including all children under the age of 12, are at a higher risk of contracting COVID-19. Home Schooling Returns to Pre-Pandemic Level At the start of the last school year, before any vaccines were available, Gallup data showed a significant decrease in public school attendance and an increase in home schooling, based on parent reports of the type of school their oldest child attends. "Home schooling" is defined for respondents in the survey as "not enrolled in a formal school but taught at home." However, the latest data shows home schooling has fallen from 10% in 2020 to 4% now, thereby returning to the pre-pandemic level, while public schooling has rebounded to 83%. Type of School U.S. K-12 Students Will Attend Will your oldest child attend public, private, parochial, charter school -- either in person or remotely -- or will they home-school this year? By "home-school," we mean not enrolled in a formal school, but taught at home. 2018-2019 2020 2021 % % % Public school 82 76 83 Private school 7 6 7 Home school 4 10 4 Charter school 5 5 4 Parochial school 3 2 1 GALLUP More Americans Dissatisfied With K-12 Education in U.S. Gallup has also tracked Americans' satisfaction with the quality of K-12 education, generally, in the U.S. annually since 1999. For the past two years, U.S. adults were about as likely to say they were satisfied as dissatisfied with the quality of U.S. K-12 education, however the public now tilts more dissatisfied (54%) than satisfied (46%). The low point in overall satisfaction was 36% in 2000 when education was a key issue in the U.S. presidential election. The 53% high point in satisfaction was in 2004 as Republicans were overwhelmingly positive about the results of President George W. Bush's "No Child Left Behind" education reform law in his reelection year. Line graph. Americans' satisfaction with the quality of education U.S. students in grades kindergarten through twelfth grade receive since 1999. Currently 46% of Americans are completely or somewhat satisfied and 54% are somewhat or completely dissatisfied. Satisfaction with K-12 education in the U.S. has edged down or remained steady since 2019 among nearly all key demographic subgroups. The one exception is Democrats, among whom satisfaction has risen from 50% in 2019 to 63% this year. Although partisans have not always differed significantly in their satisfaction with primary and secondary education, there have been other instances of partisan divergence. Specifically, this was the case at the start of the presidencies of George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump, when party loyalists became more likely to express satisfaction. In addition to the current disparities among partisans, satisfaction among Americans in several other demographic subgroups -- including gender, age and income -- is markedly different. Women, older adults and lower-income Americans are more likely than their counterparts to say they are satisfied with K-12 education. Meanwhile, there are no significant differences by parental status or educational attainment. Recent Trend in Satisfaction With U.S. Education, by Key Subgroups % Completely/Somewhat satisfied with the quality of education children in grades K-12 receive 2019 2020 2021 % % % U.S. adults 51 50 46 Gender Male 49 49 42 Female 52 50 49 Age group 18-34 48 44 42 35-54 52 52 43 55 and older 54 52 49 Parent of school-aged child K-12 parent 59 55 42 Not K-12 parent 49 48 47 Annual household income Less than $40,000 59 56 51 $40,000-Less than $100,000 48 49 39 $100,000 or more 47 46 43 Party identification Republican 51 50 34 Independent 50 45 39 Democrat 50 55 63 Education College graduate 45 48 44 No college degree 53 51 46 Gallup Implications This is the second school year that is starting during the coronavirus pandemic, and administrators continue to face significant challenges in keeping students safe while making sure they meet their academic milestones. Some K-12 students are only now resuming a full-time school schedule, and others are returning to classrooms for the first time since March 2020. While there has been great debate about the appropriate protocols to follow to limit the spread of COVID-19 in schools, there is broad agreement among educators and public health officials and political leaders on both sides of the aisle that children learn better and are mentally and emotionally healthier when they are learning in classrooms rather than remotely. The Centers for Disease Control and Protection and American Academy of Pediatrics have stressed the importance of prioritizing in-person instruction for K-12 students this school year. Parents' satisfaction with their child's education is likely tied to a combination of factors, including academic rigor and support from teachers and administrators, but in this age of COVID-19, limiting exposure to it is probably also on the list. How well administrators and teachers ensure students are academically on track and healthy both physically and emotionally will likely play into parents' satisfaction with their education in the near future. To stay up to date with the latest Gallup News insights and updates, follow us on Twitter. Learn more about how the Gallup Poll Social Series works. View complete question responses and trends (PDF download). Recently released 2020 census data documented the ongoing trend toward a more diversified United States populationmore Americans identify as multiracial, the number of Hispanics increased significantly with the accompanying downturn of the non-Hispanic white population, and the population blossomed because of immigration as the birth rate dipped. While these shifts were expected, according to professor Ira Sheskin and associate professor Justin Stoler in the University of Miami Department of Geography and Sustainable Development, both demographers highlighted the political drivers and the implications for sociopolitical tensions as the significant takeaways from the 2020 data. Sheskin particularly noted changes to the census form and process that in likelihood influenced responses. According to data from the 2020 census, the multiracial population, measured at 9 million in 2010, increased by 276 percent to 33.8 million people. The non-Hispanic white population fell from 63.7 percent to 57.8 percent in 2020, the lowest on record, driven by falling birthrates among white women compared with Hispanic and Asian women. The Hispanic or Latino population, which includes people of any race, grew by 23 percent to 62.1 million in 2020. This incredible diversification, particularly in urban areas, is not new, noted Stoler, a geographer and epidemiologist. These are population trends and local dynamics that people have been following, that continue to bear out, and that we expect to continue over the next decades. Theyre shaping cities, shaping neighborhoods, and really shaping politics. Yet Stoler noted a concerning paradoxthe trend of increasing segregation within the diversity. Cities are becoming more diverse, but people are increasingly living in neighborhoods where most people look like them, he said. So, it looks diverse on paper, but when youre interacting with communities and neighborhoods, it doesnt always feel that diverse. Some of these effects are part of the ongoing legacy of redlining and other segregationist policies. While Miami is the perfect example of immigrant neighborhoods, where residents often live in enclaves with those of similar ethnicity or from the same home country, this same pattern is emerging in midwestern cities where growth is not associated with immigration, Stoler pointed out. The trend reflects how polarized weve become as a society, he said. If diversification also increases segregation, then its probably not helping, Stoler said. Its not helping people learn to understand what its like to walk in other peoples shoes, to have empathy, to see the difficulties people face in stereotypesand it probably only makes the tension worse, he added. One of the mysteries of the 2020 data is if these patterns of simultaneous diversification and segregation are going to continue or are we going to seewhat many people may wantdiversity without the segregation, he noted. Sheskin highlighted the significance of the drop in the growth rate, which fell to 7.35 percent. Except for the Great Depression period of 1930-40, this is the lowest weve had in history, he said, adding that this low growth bodes poorly for the economy. He explained the multiplier effect that population growth fuels: the need for new homes and the construction and materials needed to build them. U.S. women are birthing fewer children1.7 per, while the figure needs to average 2.1 for the population not to declinehe pointed out. This argues that if you want to grow the economy, either you have to convince people to have more kids or to allow in morenot fewerimmigrants and refugees, Sheskin said. The birth rate has dropped because women are waiting to have children and children are expensive, he explained, adding that policies such as free preschool could serve as incentives to reverse the shift. He indicated that the second pending infrastructure package before Congress, to be voted on in September, does include social infrastructure funding which speaks to this issue. Sheskin, who teaches research methodology and has lent his expertise in developing error-resistant forms to the Florida State Attorneys office, among others, referred to important changes between the forms used in the 2010 and 2020 census. He highlighted the more crowded 2010 Census form that used a smaller font for the pages regarding racial identity as compared to the 2020 form, which provided a separate page for each person in a household and positioned a key identity question at the top of the page. Theres much more space [on the 2020 census] and the questions for indicating race and ethnic origin are more clearly visible, he said. The 2010 census was filled out and returned by mail, while the 2020 census, still delivered by mail, was largely filled out online, he explained. We know that if you change the way youre doing a surveytelephone, mail, or internetyou get different answers to some questions, Sheskin said. I do believe there was a significant increase in people being of two or more races, but I dont think it was as high as the data indicate nor do the Census people themselves. Sheskin attended a webinar offered by the Census Bureau in advance of Aug. 12 (data release date) where the agency reflected on the new information. Stoler noted the societal responses to the fact that the U.S. population is growing more diverse. In places where the most rapid diversification is happening, such as in some of the swing states changing from red to blue, Georgia for example, were seeing this political backlash, he said. And it may get worse before it gets better. Its in places where people feel threatened by diversity that socially and politically its likely to become the ugliest. Because of the way the census data is collected, Stoler suggested that the diversification is probably even greater than the recorded shifts. But while the downside to these population shifts portends greater societal tension, he sees an upside. This is otherwise a wonderful trend that underscores what America is always supposed to be and to stand forthe melting pot, salad bowl, or whatever metaphor you want to use, Stoler declared. Maura Loyola, the coordinator for the Retention Initiative for Student Excellence at Oklahoma State University, recently competed in the Miss U.S. Latina Pageant in Miami, Florida. OSU RISE coordinator takes her shot at Miss U.S. Latina Pageant Media Contact: Jordan Bishop | Communications Specialist | 405-744-9782 | jordan.bishop@okstate.edu When Maura Loyola walks down the hall to her fourth-floor Scott Hall office every day, no one ever thinks anything about her stride. However, a few weeks ago, that was all anyone could talk about as she strolled down the runway at the Miss U.S. Latina Pageant in Miami, Florida. Loyola, the reigning Miss Oklahoma Latina, competed against 18 other women in the annual pageant on Aug. 8. Like many pageants, it had categories in swimsuit, evening gown, traditional wear and an interview portion. It was a whirlwind for Loyola, whose day job is the coordinator for the Retention Initiative for Student Excellence (RISE) program at Oklahoma State University. It was out of my comfort zone and that was one of the reasons where I thought, When else am I going to be able to do something like this. When is this opportunity going to come along? Loyola said. Down in Miami, it was out of my comfort zone and not something that I am used to, not something that I grew up doing, but all of the other women were very nice and just having a bond formed between us because there were 19 of us. Working on my walk is completely different than when I am walking down Scott Hall, but it is a wonderful experience. Loyola didnt place, but she congratulated the eventual winner, Roxette Solis of Washington. A first-generation college student, Loyola became involved in pageants as an undergraduate, when she won the Miss Hispanic OSU pageant in 2014. Her mentor, Angela Vivar, was also a former Miss Oklahoma Latina, as well as the RISE coordinator when Loyola started school at OSU. She helped me prepare for this pageant with my walk and interview skills and just different things like that, Loyola said. She was the biggest one to help me prepare for this. She was my mentor ever since I was a freshman, and I wouldnt be in this role where I am without her. Loyola said Oklahoma has no board running a statewide Miss U.S. Latina competition. So as a former Miss Hispanic OSU, she instead applied to the national competition itself, which then crowned her Miss Oklahoma Latina. Since there is no state organization, Oklahoma hasnt had an entrant every year, but Loyola hopes more women continue to represent the state because she knows how important it is to have that representation. I think it is important because it is a space for us, Loyola said. One of the differences for Miss U.S. Latina compared to other pageants is that we have a cultural component. We each brought different cultural outfits that were representative of our heritage, our nationality and just being able to showcase that. Just being able to be proud of that and having a space to be proud of that. Loyola grew up in California but moved to Oklahoma during high school and attended Edmond Santa Fe. Her parents are Mexican immigrants with her father, Tito, from Guanajuato, and her mother, Elvira, from Jalisco. Maura Loyola (center) with her mother, Elvira, and father, Tito, at the U.S. Miss Latina Pageant in Miami, Florida. They were able to come to Miami, along with her sister Alejandra, to watch her compete in the pageant. They were so proud, Loyola said. I am so proud of them because they got to Miami on their own, and Miami was awesome because everyone speaks Spanish and my parents were able to communicate with everybody, whereas here in Oklahoma, it is a little bit harder. They told me they were so proud because they never thought I would do something like this. We had family and friends watching the live stream on their Facebook. Just beautiful to have that support from my family in Mexico and in the United States. For the competition, Loyola wore a traditional dress she purchased from a Mexican boutique in Los Angeles and an evening dress made by Oklahoma designer Sherri Hill. She purchased them through Poshmark. Being Miss Oklahoma Latina was basically a second job for Loyola. It is a second job, Loyola said. That role, that responsibility, just having that platform to be able to do what the Miss Latina wants to do. I want to do education. I am very passionate about higher education, so I want to continue to do events like that. Maura Loyola (middle left) represented Oklahoma in the Miss U.S. Latina Pageant. Roxette Solis of Washington was declared the winner. It is a lot to add to her day job, but she enjoys it all. As a RISE scholar and now the RISE coordinator, she interacts with a lot of students who are first generation, minorities or members of the LGBTQ community. She works with around 60-70 students and provides them support, checks in on them to see how classes are going and gives workshops over topics like time management and goal setting. I came here in February 2019, but this is my fifth year working with the university, Loyola said. It has just been beautiful being on this side, and the students all have different goals and different passions, different majors that they want to accomplish. Anything that I can do to help them get to that next step and just being able to help them has been beautiful. My first class of students graduated in May, so I was able to go to their graduation and watch it come full circle, which was beautiful. Loyola said it helped a lot to have OSU be flexible with her schedule so she could go compete. She credited Dr. Jason Kirksey, OSUs vice president for institutional diversity; Dr. Jovette Dew, OSUs director of multicultural affairs; and Chris Bingham, coordinator of the Inclusion Leadership Program, for helping her make time to participate in the pageant. We are always willing to support each other, Dew said. She has given so much for our students. I was so happy to see her shine and pursue her dream. She is confident and courageous. As for whats next, Loyola said she is willing to serve as a mentor to anyone who needs it, just like Vivar was to her. She is working toward getting her masters in social work from the University of Oklahoma and hopes that her success can inspire other girls. Just that representation that you are a female, first gen, daughter of immigrants, Loyola said. I want girls to think, If she can go through college and get her bachelors and reach her goals, then I can reach my goals, too. It is beautiful. Tulsa gala honors Burns and Ann Hargis for their leadership Media Contact: Mack Burke | Editorial Coordinator | 405-744-5540 | editor@okstate.edu Former Oklahoma State University President Burns Hargis showed off his piano skills at the sixth biennial A Stately Affair in Tulsa. It was a delightful surprise when he took to the piano keys and played Aint Misbehavin and Let the Good Times Roll. And the good times did roll as the fundraiser recognized both Burns and Ann Hargis as the events Icons for their significant contributions to Tulsa and Oklahoma, as well as their unwavering support for OSU-Tulsa and OSU Center for Health Sciences. This years gala raised more than $1.3 million. Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum proclaimed June 24 as Burns and Ann Hargis Day and handed the couple a key to the city during the gala at Cox Business Convention Center. Its a great honor for me tonight as the mayor of Tulsa to say how grateful we are for the leadership of Burns and Ann Hargis and what theyve meant for our city, Bynum said. [Burns] is someone who focused the Stillwater team on Tulsa, which I am especially thankful for. OSU-Tulsa trustee John OConnor co-chaired the gala with his wife, Lucia. What an incredible night to be a Cowboy, John OConnor said. Burns and Ann, thank you for your leadership. Were so grateful for each of you. The connection between Tulsa and OSU has flourished during Burns Hargis 13 years of transformative leadership. OSU-Tulsa has created pathways to higher education through new academic programs and partnerships as the citys public, metropolitan urbanserving research university. New OSU-Tulsa initiatives under the leadership of President Pamela Fry include the college Park partnership with Tulsa Community College, the OSU College of Professional Studies and the 100 Points of Truth and Transformation. During her time as OSU-CHS president, Dr. Kayse Shrum expanded access to medical care throughout the state with rural health initiatives and the opening of the new OSU College of Osteopathic Medicine at the Cherokee Nation, the first tribally affiliated medical school in the country. OSU Center for Health Sciences partnership with the new Veterans Hospital in Tulsa, the National Center for Wellness and Recovery, and the Hardesty Center for Clinical Research and Neuroscience are each remarkable achievements in advancing the landgrant mission for all Oklahomans. This is the best job in the world. Weve been so blessed to have this job, and Tulsa has been such a special part of our time here. - Burns Hargis, former president of Oklahoma State University A Stately Affair raises money for scholarship funds that benefit students at OSU-Tulsa and OSU Center for Health Sciences. Its hard to put into words what it feels like to have financial security while in school, said Lynsey Baxter, an OSU-Tulsa materials science and engineering Ph.D. student. I know many students who were thinking about dropping out of their programs because they dont have the financial stability that they or their families need, Baxter said. Gracious donations, like the ones given for A Stately Affair, are what give a lot of us the accessibility to pursue our dreams and passions that we otherwise might not be able to achieve. Kailee Roe is a medical student at OSU College of Osteopathic Medicine and one of the OSU-CHS students who benefits from a scholarship. Of course it helps out financially, but its also a good morale booster because you realize that it is a difficult journey, but someone out there realizes your end goal and what you aspire to be and they are kind of supporting you along the way, Roe said. The Hargises have enthusiastically united the broad OSU community of students, employees, alumni and donors behind a bold vision of a modern landgrant university that unites disciplines to better prepare students for success. The results have been historic. Under Hargis leadership, OSU saw record enrollment and record fundraising, with pledges and cash surpassing the $1 billion Branding Success campaign goal nearly two years ahead of schedule. In total, OSU raised more than $2 billion in private support and added more than 81,000 new donors during his presidency. In an effort to build on those new donors, the OSU Foundation established the 21st Century Cowboys group to reach alumni who graduated after the year 2000. Several members attended this years gala to salute the Hargises. Burns has made a huge difference in our university and its perception across the country, said Jay Helm, an Oklahoma State Regent for Higher Education. Burns and Ann, I hope you take with you all the heart and love and admiration from your fans and friends. Ann Hargis said the reason the gala is such a hit is because of the students. Thats what generates us to have such passion to see these bright, talented students having a wonderful opportunity thanks to all of you, and watching them flourish going into their adult lives, she said. This is the best job in the world, Burns Hargis said. Weve been so blessed to have this job, and Tulsa has been such a special part of our time here. Story By: Sara Plummer and Aaron Campbell Photos By: Mike Tedford Hong Kong shares slip for second day Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index closed down more than 200 points on Thursday. Image: Shuttestock Hong Kong and regional shares were mostly down on Thursday, despite Wall Street logging another day of record highs. The Hang Seng Index opened slightly lower and saw its losses widen during the day, slipping by as many as 438 points before finishing down 278 points, or 1.1 percent, at 25,415. Turnover was HK$138.6 billion. The worst blue-chip performer, AAC Technologies slumped 10 percent, after Citibank lowered its target price following the smartphone component maker's earnings miss. Shenzhou International tumbled 5.1 percent, following the sportswear manufacturer's announcement that its half-yearly profit fell 11 percent. Xiaomi slid 3.6 percent, after Bank of America trimmed its target price to reflect competition in the mainland smartphone market. The company had posted a 140-percent jump in interim net profit. Kuaishou sank nearly 10 percent, after several banks drastically cut its target price following its results announcement. The biggest winner on the local benchmark, Mengniu Dairy, rose 3.5 percent after it reported a 140 percent surge in interim profits. The Shanghai Composite Index slipped 1.1 percent, while the blue-chip CSI300 index gave up almost two percent. The Shenzhen Composite Index retreated 1.5 percent. But Taiwan was 0.1 percent firmer. The Nikkei in Tokyo edged up just under 0.1 percent, and Seoul's Kospi declined 0.6 percent, after South Korea's central bank lifted its policy rate by 25 basis points its first raise in almost three years. Australian shares retreated 0.6 percent, and Singapore inched up less than one percent. SIUs Diversity Week events look toward a more inclusive future by Christi Mathis CARBONDALE, Ill. Southern Illinois University Carbondale will celebrate its rich history of diversity and inclusion while also looking toward a more diverse, equitable and inclusive future during Diversity Week 2021. The activities start Monday, Aug. 30, and run through Sept. 3. Known for a longstanding tradition of diversity dating back to the universitys inaugural class of 143 students, SIUs 2021 celebration will include guest speakers, discussions, special presentations, training sessions and a dance performance from the award-winning Infinite Flow Dance group. All of the events are free and open to the campus community and the public. We have the unique opportunity to educate our community on diverse cultures and address the differences that exist among us, all the while seeing our inclusive excellence on display, said Paul Frazier, vice chancellor for diversity, equity and inclusion. Envisioning Inclusivity is the theme for the cross-campus collaborative celebration. Frazier encourages students, faculty, staff and community members to check out the schedule of events and plan to attend those that will challenge and inspire you. Find the complete schedule of events for Diversity Week online. For more information, email diversity@siu.edu or call 618-453-1186. Meet and greet, dance performance launches celebration Noting last years inaugural celebration was completely virtual, organizers are excited this years Diversity Week features a mix of in-person activities and online and hybrid events. Chancellor Austin Lane kicks off Diversity Week as he and a variety of guest speakers share their visions for diversity, equity and inclusion at SIU during a campus meet and greet from 3 to 4:30 p.m., Monday, Aug. 30 in the Student Center Ballrooms. Participants will also be able to check out the assorted tables and booths, meet with representatives of SIU student organizations, units and departments as well as campus and community organizations while learning about resources and efforts to create a more inclusive environment. Then, the celebration moves to Shryock Auditorium for the Infinite Flow Dance performance at 6 p.m. Infinite Flow, an award-winning inclusive dance company established by Marisa Hamamoto, features dancers with and without disabilities. The groups mission is to promote inclusion, dismantle biases, help people learn about themselves and bring everyone together through their dance experience. Promoting justice, designing change On Tuesday, Aug. 31, Sasha Costanza-Chock, director of research and design at the Algorithmic Justice League and an associate professor at Northeastern Universitys College of Media Arts and Design, will lead a hybrid Design Justice presentation from 5 to 6 p.m. in Morris Librarys John C. Guyon Auditorium. The discussion will focus on how to create and promote community-led practices that promote justice. It can also be viewed remotely via the event link at diversity.siu.edu/diversity-week. SIUs strategic plan, diversity initiatives highlight Sept. 1 events SIU President Daniel Mahony and Sheila Caldwell, the SIU System vice president for antiracism, diversity, inclusion and equity, will host a virtual conversation from noon to 1 p.m. on Sept. 1. The discussion will highlight steps each of the SIU campuses will take to fight racism. The link to the event will be at diversity.siu.edu/diversity-week. Disability advocate Haben Girma, the first deaf and blind graduate from Harvard Law School, is a guest speaker at 5 p.m. in Guyon Auditorium at Morris Library. A disability rights advocate and author, Girmas honors include being recognized in 2013 as a Champion of Change by President Barack Obama. The presentation can also be viewed by a Zoom link on SIUs diversity website. Chancellor Lane and guests will then host a panel discussion from 6 to 8:30 p.m. in Guyon Auditorium on Envisioning Inclusivity: A Campus Conversation on Diversity. The discussion will focus on equity and inclusion issues and goals for the campus. Focus on inclusivity, diversity continues Sept. 2 An eclectic mix of events throughout the week will address various issues pertaining to inclusivity, racism, diversity and equity. The schedule includes: Teaching in a World of Bad-Faith Actors and Arguments a virtual presentation by Jonathan Friedman of PEN America, 11-12:30 p.m. While campuses are often a place for the exchange of ideas, they can also became a place of polarization, heated disagreement, trolling, harassment and bad-faith arguments, so Friedman will help people realize the importance of a good faith approach to the exchange of ideas and opinions. The City We Became 3:30-4:30 p.m., Communications Building, Kleinau Theatre. A live presentation by Reynaldo Anderson, associate professor of communication at Harris-Stowe State University and executive director of the Black Speculative Arts Movement. His presentation examines the intersections of identity in the five boroughs of New York City and how this relates to issues of intersectionality, in general and how we individually embrace inclusivity. He will discuss his work, his vision for Afrofuturism and his own family legacies that trace back to Africa. Navigating a Biracial Identity through Art 5-6 p.m., SIU School of Law, Hiram H. Lesar Law Building Auditorium. J. Leigh Garcia, a biracial Dallas artist, will explore the artistic expressions of identity, and in keeping with her own ancestral roots, the complex relationships between Texans and Mexicans, especially regarding the racialization and displacement of unauthorized Latinx immigrants. Garcia has worked collaboratively with various art partners on projects including: Women Against Hate United By Love, Resiliencia and Sone Milpa. The Diversity Week closing ceremony and mixer is from 1 to 3 p.m., Friday, Sept. 3, in Morris Librarys first floor rotunda. Everyone is invited to join Meera Komarraju, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs, and the Chancellors Task Force on Diversity and Inclusion in a time of reflection on the weeks activities and conversations about personal visions and goals for inclusivity, diversity and equity on the SIU campus for this academic year and the future. Sponsors include the Office of the Chancellor; Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; Disability Support Services; Office of Student Engagement; Graduate and Professional Student Council; Undergraduate Student Government/Black Affairs Council; College of Liberal Arts; Paul Simon Public Policy Institute; Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies; Sustainability Office; School of Law; School of History and Philosophy; and Library Affairs. SIU is committed to protecting the community, so all those attending the Diversity Week events must wear masks in shared indoors spaces and follow current campus and state pandemic safety protocols. Rep. Seth Moulton. AP Photo/Cheryl Senter The two lawmakers that secretly visited Kabul said Biden's August 31 deadline is needed. They said they previously wanted it extended, but saw that getting everyone out is impossible. They said keeping the deadline means having a "working relationship with the Taliban after our departure." See more stories on Insider's business page. The two lawmakers who made an unannounced trip to Kabul as the US was desperately trying to evacuate people said the trip convinced them that Biden's August 31 military-withdrawal deadline for evacuations was necessary. Democrat Rep. Seth Moulton and Republican Rep. Peter Meijer chartered a plane to Kabul airport and stayed there for several hours on Tuesday. In a statement, they said they went to conduct "oversight" on the efforts to evacuate Americans and allies. Their trip was condemned by White House, Pentagon, and State Department officials. In a Wednesday interview with The New York Times, they said the trip had changed their minds about extending Biden's deadline. They had previously lobbied for Biden to extend it. Moulton said: "Almost every veteran in Congress wants to extend the August 31 deadline, including us, and our opinion on that was changed on the ground, because we started the evacuations so late. "There's no way we can get everyone out, even by September 11. So we need to have a working relationship with the Taliban after our departure. And the only way to achieve that is to leave by August 31." Meijer added: "It is utterly bizarre and baffling that we're in this position. To go from having the Taliban as an adversary we're seeking to kill, to relying upon them for security, coordinating to make sure things run smoothly. "It's a complicated situation that's impossible to understand if you're not on the ground and yet critical to saving the lives of tens of thousands. "There are tireless diplomatic officials there who have been working around the clock to clear backlogs, to work on the permissions needed to land in order to make sure all of this goes smoothly." Read the original article on Business Insider Police are seeking two suspects in a burglary and shooting reported in early August at the Oakwood Apartments in Carrboro. A resident of the apartments at 605 Oak Ave. told police they came home late at night on Aug. 5 to find people in the home. The resident and a friend chased the suspects from the apartment, and one of the suspects fired a shot at them as they fled through the complex, police said. Police said in a news release Thursday that they are looking for Tayquan Tylee Kenshon Pierre, 18, who has been charged with shooting into an occupied dwelling, first-degree burglary, larceny after breaking and entering, possession of a stolen vehicle, and felony conspiracy. Pierre also was charged Aug. 9 in Chapel Hill with felony breaking and entering to a motor vehicle; resisting, delaying or obstructing; and contributing to the delinquency of a minor, Carrboro police spokesman Capt. Anthony Westbrook told The News & Observer in an email Thursday. Court records show Pierre has a Sept. 17 hearing on those charges. Police also are seeking a 16-year-old suspect in the Aug. 5 crime. Police have not released that suspects name, because the suspect is under 18 years old. That person is charged with shooting into an occupied dwelling, first-degree burglary, and larceny after breaking and entering, police said. At least one of the suspects knew the victims in the break-in and shooting, police said. It is an isolated incident, and there is no ongoing threat to the public, they said. Carrboro police are looking for Tayquan Pierre, 18, in connection with an Aug. 5 shooting and break-in on Oak Avenue. Carrboro crimes The incident is one of three crimes involving guns that was reported in Carrboro in August. On Aug. 2, someone in a passing car fired multiple shots at a car in the parking lot of the Wendys restaurant in downtown Carrboro. Police reported three people were injured when the car in which they were attempting to flee the gunfire flipped over in the restaurants driveway. The other incident happened Sunday when two men got into a fight around 1:35 a.m. inside Salon Monterrey. The event venue is behind the Monterrey Mexican Restaurant at Carrboro Plaza, located at 104 N.C. 54. One man involved in the fight pulled a handgun and fired multiple shots, one of which hit the victim in the chest, police said. Story continues The gunman, who also is under 18 years of age, was arrested and charged. The victim was treated at UNC Hospitals. Carrboro police have reported 13 incidents involving a firearm this year, which includes handguns, rifles and shotguns, according to data that Westbrook provided to The N&O. The department has averaged just under 15 incidents a year since 2015, the data showed. That included 16 gun-related incidents last year. The most reported in one year was in 2018, when there were 22 incidents, including a murder, Westbrook said. Other incidents included assault by pointing a gun, discharging a firearm in town limits, robbery, and assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill, he said. Carrboro is a very safe place to live and work, but we are not immune to the problems of the world, Westbrook said in an email Wednesday to The News & Observer. Violent incidents in Carrboro involving firearms are infrequent, and having three within a month is rare. Anyone with information about the Oak Avenue break-in or the suspects charged in that crime can call Carrboro Investigator Trey Kennedy at 919-918-7412 or leave an anonymous tip with CrimeStoppers at 919-942-7515. Many parents want to ensure that their kids are in classrooms where they and their families are respected and embraced. However, as a psychologist and researcher who has studied LGBTQ parents relationships with schools for over a decade, I have found that LGBTQ parents often have specific concerns when it comes to inclusion and acceptance. [We have] always been very upfront that we are a family with two moms, reported one parent in my research. If the [school] was going to have an issue, we wanted to get the vibe early so we could find an alternative so our child didnt have to suffer due to their closed-mindedness. LGBTQ parents who live in less gay-friendly communities are more likely to describe feelings of mistreatment by their childrens schools. Such experiences may prompt parents to confront negative treatment. Based on my research and surveys with hundreds of LGBTQ families, here are suggestions for how LGBTQ caregivers can advocate for themselves and their children if they run into stigma or ignorance. The statements quoted below are from various participants in my research. 1. Talk to the school pre-emptively I always tell the teachers in advance that I am a transgender gestational parent so they dont think my kids are lying when they say their father gave birth to them. Engage the school in a conversation about your family prior to the start of the school year. Explain the basic details of your family, what your child calls each parent, and other important adults in your childs life such as the donor or birth parents. Ask if they have any questions or would like you to suggest some resources. 2. Get involved My presence in these spaces is a constant reminder to the staff that there is a gay parent in the room. Join the PTA or Diversity Committee, or attend their meetings and gradually seek out leadership positions. Volunteer in the classroom or at school events. 3. Provide input and suggestions We bought books for the class library about different kinds of families, and arranged for PFLAG [a national advocacy group for LGBTQ+ people] and local LGBTQ groups to present to staff at our kids schools. Story continues Several children's picture books that have LGBTQ characters Highlight for schools where paperwork can be more inclusive, such as Parent 1 and Parent 2 instead of Mother and Father. Provide input about how celebrations, curriculum and classroom visuals could be more inclusive of LGBTQ-parent families, or donate inclusive books or other materials. 4. Investigate policies Establish whether the school has procedures in place for dealing with sexist, homophobic and transphobic behavior at school. What are their policies against bullying? If sexual and gender identity and expression are not covered in such policies, advocate for including them. 5. Talk to your children We have told them that every family is different. We told them that some people dont understand these differences and to feel free to come to us at any time if they have questions. Check in with your children about what they are experiencing at school. Use general questions, such as What is your teacher like? or Tell me about recess today. Convey that you will listen to them if something is going on at school, and youll talk together about how to handle it. 6. Empower your children Theres a lot of Thats gay or Youre gay. When someone says to my daughter, Your moms gay, she says, Actually, she is. Build your childs confidence and sense of pride. If possible, connect them to other children with LGBTQ parents. This can make a difference in terms of their self-esteem. Help them develop a repertoire of potential responses to teasing such as telling a teacher, ignoring it or responding to an insensitive question with a straightforward set of facts. Consider outlining or role-playing possible scenarios. 7. Get support We did a presentation to the first grade class. With the schools permission, we shared how our family was created, and other parents joined in and shared their stories as well so as to not single out our son. Find a community of other LGBTQ parents at school, in your community or online. You may also find allies in non-LGBTQ parents who want diverse and inclusive schools. Benefits of inclusive schools Research has shown that attending schools where LGBTQ topics and historical figures are incorporated into the curriculum, or where there are supports for LGBTQ people, benefits the mental health and self-esteem of children with LGBTQ parents. Having classmates who also have LGBTQ parents can also help. Furthermore, children with LGBTQ parents who attend LGBTQ-inclusive schools may be less likely to experience bullying than those who attend schools with more negative environments. One study found that children of LGBTQ parents who attended schools without LGBTQ issues in the curriculum showed higher levels of withdrawn and aggressive behavior, along with more social problems. Undoubtedly, LGBTQ parents are also thinking about the schools quality and reputation, class sizes, safety and ability to meet their childrens needs and interests. In seeking out inclusive schools and advocating for their children, LGBTQ parents should be sure to give themselves a break. It is impossible to fight or win every battle, and the reality is that LGBTQ parents should not have to fight these battles at all. [Over 110,000 readers rely on The Conversations newsletter to understand the world. Sign up today.] This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Abbie E. Goldberg, Clark University. Read more: Abbie E. Goldberg does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. As the Aug. 31 deadline to leave Afghanistan approaches, the Biden administration is working to withdraw the remaining U.S. military service members as well as evacuate the thousands of Afghans who worked for the U.S. government over the past 20 years. U.S. Marine Corps veteran Charlie Reeder, who served two tours in Afghanistan, told Yahoo Finance that he hoped the president would extend the deadline to leave the country in order to ensure the safe evacuation of those Afghans. You literally put these people in a death sentence if you do that, if you do not extend that deadline and actually work and get all these people out, said Reeder. Push the Taliban out of Kabul, out while you do it, so everyone has a safe passage to the airports, and [can] get home, get back to wherever they want to goYou cant abandon them. On Wednesday U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that of the 6,000 American citizens who were identified in Afghanistan, at least 4,500 of them and their families have been evacuated since mid-August, and that the State Department was reaching out to the remaining contacts. Courtesy: Charlie Reeder Reeder is part of a digital Dunkirk group working to help Afghan interpreters and other natives who aided the U.S. war effort over the past 20 years get out of the country. This evacuation effort is being conducted by a collection of veterans, military officials, civilians, defense agencies, and collaborators from around the world. Although U.S. troops have not fully withdrawn from the country yet, the Taliban is already punishing and killing Afghan interpreters, says Reeder, who is worried about his former interpreter who has been left to fend for himself. Hes in extreme danger. They are actively hunting him. Hes had to move locations around 10 to 12 different times. Theyve harassed his family members, and his family has suffered multiple assaults since this week...began, said Reeder. Hes not the only one. They have actual groups that are going around, door-to-door hunting these people. Story continues On Wednesday, U.S. officials said an additional 19,200 American and Afghan citizens had been evacuated from Afghanistan, but thousands more still need help. Nobody likes the Taliban over there Reeder, who was a corporal in the Marines, served two tours in Afghanistan as a heavy machine gunner and a third as a defense contractor for AECOM, a global infrastructure firm. He readily admits that he has struggled to assess the merit of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan. It would be worth it, said Reeder. At least getting the people out that put everything on the line to help us accomplish our mission overseas, if we get them home, great. Then I will have some form of accomplishment for our time served there. While many veterans have expressed anger for the "20 wasted years" in Afghanistan, others are in favor of exiting Afghanistan by September 11. Courtesy: Charlie Reeder I understand their need to have [the U.S. exit the country] and why they want this war to finally be over, said Reeder. It's been 20 years, it's been a drain on everyone, emotionally, physically, and financially, to continue to do this, and it's cost the lives of thousands of Americans, tens of thousands of Afghans and hasn't really accomplished much at the end of the day. As the Taliban takes over Afghanistans government, the U.S. is right back to square one, said Reeder. So in any civilian's eyes why would we continue to keep fighting this? Me and many other vets are of the opposite opinion that we still need to continue to fight in Afghanistan and make sure that that country is secure, he said. Sometimes that looks like nation building and in a sense yes, it is, but you can't pound a country into the ground for 20 years and then leave and say it's your problem now. You just can't do that. Leaving Afghanistan without securing the safety of Afghans who risked their lives to help the U.S. during the war would hurt Americas credibility around the world, says Reeder. Nobody will ever trust us again if that's what we do, he said. More from Sibile: How nude lipstick got Targets attention Remote work: How to tell your boss you dont want to return to the office Heres how much return to the office commutes will cost you in these cities Delta variant wreaking havoc on Americas return to office plans Olympic athlete on the mental game: One hurdle at a time An Afghan street vendor in Mazar-i-Sharif. The city is home to a small community of Uyghurs. Earlier this week, as the dust began to settle on the Taliban's blistering takeover of Afghanistan, a small group gathered at a house in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. The guests arrived discreetly, in ones and twos, keen to avoid attention. They were elders from the city's Uyghur community, plus some family members and others who joined from different cities via Skype. The mood in the house was fearful. There was only one topic of conversation: escape. A middle aged man began making calls to activists in Turkey, seeking help. One didn't answer. Another one who did pick up said he would do everything he could for them, but right now there was not much he could do. The group urged the man calling to keep trying, keep making more calls, but there was no good news. Eventually, after nightfall, the guests left, as carefully as they had arrived, even more despondent than before. "We have no one to help us right now," one told the BBC after the meeting. "We are terrified," he said. "Everyone is terrified." Like millions of other Afghans, the country's Uyghurs are waking up to a different reality this week, one in which the Taliban is in charge. Like other Afghans, the Uyghurs fear a worse existence under the Taliban. But they also fear something else: greater influence for China. There are about 12 million Uyghurs in China, concentrated in the northwestern Xinjiang province. Since 2017, they and other Muslim minorities have been subjected to a state campaign of mass detention, surveillance, forced labour, and, according to some accounts, sterilisation, torture and rape. China routinely denies all human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and says its camps are vocational centres designed to combat extremism. Many of Afghanistan's Uyghurs - thought to number about 2,000 - are second generation immigrants whose parents fled China many decades ago, long before the current crackdown began. But their Afghan ID cards still say "Uyghur" or "Chinese refugee", and they fear that if China enters the vacuum left by the US, they could be targeted. Story continues "That is the biggest fear for Uyghurs in Afghanistan now," said a Uyghur man in his fifties in Kabul, who said his family had not left their house since the Taliban took power. "We fear the Taliban will help China control our movements, or they will arrest us and hand us over to China," he said. All the Uyghurs in Afghanistan who spoke to the BBC said they had been effectively hiding at home since the Taliban seized the country, communicating only occasionally by phone. "We are like a living dead people now," said another Uyghur man in Kabul. "Too scared even to go outside." A father in Mazar-i-Sharif described hiding in the house with his wife, children and extended family. "It's been 10 days now sitting at home, our lives are on hold," he said. "It is written clearly on our ID cards that we are Uyghur." A facility in China's Xinjiang region believed to be a detention camps for Uyghurs The fear of China is not unfounded. The Chinese state has in recent years extended its crackdown on the Uyghurs beyond its borders, using aggressive tactics to silence people or in some cases detain and render them back to Xinjiang. Data published in June by the Uyghur Human Rights Project suggests at least 395 Uyghurs have been deported, extradited, or rendered since 1997, though the real figure may be much higher. "China has invested heavily and established close diplomatic relations with states in central Asia, and the result is Uyghurs in those countries being targeted by local police and Chinese agents," said Mehmet Tohti, a prominent Uyghur activist in Canada. "We know from those previous examples that close diplomatic ties with China results in persecution of Uyghurs." China may be considering a similar strategy with the Taliban. The alliance is unlikely in some ways - the Taliban has some historic connections with Uyghur militants, the very forces China says pose a threat to its security. But the Taliban also has a history of cooperation with China, which shares a short land border with Afghanistan, and analysts say the superpower's ability to provide technology and infrastructure - and lend legitimacy - to a new Taliban regime would likely trump any kind of solidarity with Uyghurs. "China's belt and road project has given it a lot of economic leverage over countries with which it cooperates, and in exchange Uyghurs are often scapegoated," said Bradley Jardine, an analyst who has studied China's economic and political presence abroad. "The Taliban will be hoping for economic concessions and much needed investment from China, and Afghanistan's Uyghurs could, to put it crudely, end up a bargaining chip." In July, China invited a senior Taliban delegation to Tianjin, where foreign minister Wang Yi said he expected the group "to play an important role in the country's peace, reconciliation and reconstruction process". The Taliban pledged they would "not allow anyone to use Afghan soil against China". Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi met Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar in July The Uyghurs in Afghanistan know about this meeting - news of the growing diplomatic relationship has spread through Ugyhur communities across the country. And they know about China's recent history of pursuing Uyghurs abroad. "We all know about the Taliban relationship with China, and we fear they will come first for the people who fled," said a Uyghur woman in Mazar-i-Sharif who grew up in Xinjiang. "We have stopped shopping or leaving the house at all," she said. "We are living in fear. We need help. Please help." Unlike some other potentially at-risk groups in Afghanistan, the Uyghurs do not have a state ally to work on their behalf - a fact which might make them more vulnerable under Taliban rule. "This is a community without state representation of any sort," said Sean Roberts, a professor at George Washington University and author of The War on the Uyghurs. "They are watching other countries lift out people who are either citizens or have some sort or ethnic connection - Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, etc. But the Uyghurs, I think, must feel like nobody speaks for them right now." Efforts are being made by non-governmental groups to get Uyghurs out, but they face the same obstacles as everyone else. Abdulaziz Naseri, a Uyghur refugee living in Turkey, told the BBC he had collected a list of names with the help of Uyghurs inside the country and was submitting it via activist groups to government officials in the US, UK and Turkey. "We are doing our best to get them out," Naseri said. But in Mazar-i-Sharif, many miles from Kabul, getting out feels like a long shot. Even in the unlikely scenario a family were offered seats on a flight out of the capital, it's a two-day journey by car, through Taliban checkpoints where they fear presenting their ID. "As a Muslim, we say having no hope is the devil's mindset," said the father in Mazar-i-Sharif. "But from the time I was born in Afghanistan, all I remember is war. Forty years of war, one after another," he said. "I no longer worry about myself, only my children, especially my daughters. I had hoped they would become educated and become doctors." None of the family has ever set foot in China. They have only read about the detention camps and the alleged abuses in Xinjiang. The father fears life under the Taliban because he can remember it. "But we fear China more," he said, "because we cannot imagine it." The U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan warned Americans trapped in the country not to travel to the Kabul airport due to security threats, and urged those at specific airport gates to get out immediately, in a startling statement early Thursday. "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising U.S. citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a U.S. government representative to do so," the statement from the embassy read. "U.S. citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," the embassy added. The warning underscored the chaos and uncertainty on the ground outside the Kabul airport, where hundreds of Americans still have been attempting to get out of the country. U.S. troops have been stationed at the airport, though a heavy Taliban presence has been reported outside the grounds, with persistent concerns about potential terrorism. President Biden has aimed to stick to an Aug. 31 deadline to withdraw U.S. troops from the country, though the White House has said contingency plans were being discussed, amid criticism from lawmakers in both parties that it would be too unsafe not to extend the deadline. Concerns have also been raised about Special Immigrant Visa holders reportedly being blocked by the Taliban from accessing the airport. The Biden administration has said it didn't trust the Taliban, but repeatedly has called on the Islamic militant group to allow people to safely access the airport and to refrain from violence. SECRETARY BLINKEN PUTS A NUMBER ON AMERICANS CURRENTLY STUCK IN AFGHANISTAN Americans who were on their way to the airport or who were waiting at the gates were warned in the message to "be aware of their surroundings," and to monitor local media in order to "adjust your plans based on new information." Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that he believed less than 1,000 American citizens were still in Afghanistan and attempting to leave. Story continues Blinken said there were 6,000 Americans who wanted to leave Afghanistan on August 14 and 4,500 of them have been evacuated within the last 10 days. He added that 500 of the remaining number have been instructed on how to leave within the last 24 hours. That leaves roughly 1,000 Americans left in the country, but Blinken said he believed the actual number was lower for a variety of reasons, including situations where Americans wanted to stay or already had left without notifying the government. "From the list of approximately 1,000, we believe that the number of Americans actively seeking assistance to leave Afghanistan is lower, and likely significantly lower," Blinken explained. EXCLUSIVE: SENIOR AFGHANISTAN OFFICIAL: AFGHAN GOVERNMENT, NOT TALIBAN, STILL LEGITIMATE AUTHORITY White House press secretary Jen Psaki was caught flat-footed during a daily news briefing Wednesday when she was asked about a group of California students who are trapped in Afghanistan. Psaki was asked if she knew about an L.A. Times report that a group of students and their parents from California's El Cajon Valley School District were currently stranded in Afghanistan. The reporter asked, "The L.A. Times has a story saying that a group of students and their parents are in Afghanistan. Do you have any more information on that or is that?--" "I do not. Who have recently traveled into Afghanistan?" Psaki stated in response, appearing confused about the report cited. Americans, allies, Afghans who assisted coalition forces and others who are vulnerable to Taliban violence struggle to flee Afghanistan since the central government collapsed to insurgents on Aug. 15. Fox News' Kelly Laco and Jessica Chasmar contributed to this report. Ancestry.com opened the worlds largest digitized and searchable collection of Freedmens Bureau and Freedmens Bank records to the public this week. Why it matters: Free access to these records kept during Reconstruction can help African Americans find missing family links prior to 1870. Get market news worthy of your time with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free. The big picture: The Freedmens Bureau was established in the South in 1865, as the Civil War wound down, to help formerly enslaved people transition to free citizenship by helping them settle public or abandoned lands, providing access to courts, education and medical care. Among the 3.5 million records now available are labor contracts, rations, apprenticeships and marriage certificates. Yes, but: "Out of all the states, Florida has the least number of records," professional genealogist Nicka Sewell-Smith told Axios. "Its all on 15 rolls of microfilm. Louisiana has, like, 160 rolls." Florida had just a handful of Freedmens Bureau field offices the closest to Tampa Bay was at Ocala, and the only office south was at Key West. At least part of the reason: Florida was still frontier and had so few citizens 187,748 in 1870, making it one of the least populated states, with fewer people than even tiny Rhode Island. Explore the records here. More from Axios: Sign up to get the latest market trends with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free By Colin Packham CANBERRA (Reuters) -There is a high threat of a terrorist attack near the airport in Kabul, Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne said on Thursday, as Canberra urged its citizens and those with a visa for Australia to leave the area. Australia has been evacuating its citizens and visa holders for more than a week from Kabul airport, where Canberra had urged people to travel in order to be ready for transport. Late on Wednesday, Australia changed its advice to those in the area, which Payne said was based on heightened concerns of an attack. "There is an ongoing and very high threat of a terrorist attack," Payne told reporters in Canberra. The warning heightens the risk that scores of Afghans holding visas for Australia could be left behind as Canberra readies to end its evacuation programme. Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who has previously said Australia will unlikely be able to evacuate everyone, declined to comment on whether Australia would continue flights up to the Aug 31 deadline the Taliban insists must be adhered to. Morrison said Australia has now evacuated about 4,000 people out of Afghanistan after another 1,200 people were flown out overnight. Many of these remain in the United Arab Emirates, Morrison said, while 639 have been evacuated to Australia. Australia was part of a NATO-led international force that battled the Taliban and trained Afghan security forces in the years after the militants were ousted in 2001. More than 39,000 Australian military personnel served in Afghanistan and 41 were killed there. (Reporting by Colin Packham; Editing by Peter Cooney and Lincoln Feast.) BEIRUT (Reuters) - The judge leading the investigation into last summer's Beirut port blast issued a subpoena for caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab on Thursday after he failed to show up for questioning, Lebanon's state news agency reported. Judge Tarek Bitar, who is leading the inquiry into the explosion, issued requests in July to question Diab and other top officials, including Major General Abbas Ibrahim, head of the powerful General Security agency, and several former ministers. The blast, caused by large quantities of ammonium nitrate stored unsafely for years, killed hundreds, injured thousands and destroyed large swathes of the capital. More than a year on, no senior official has been held accountable, angering many Lebanese. The inquiry into the explosion repeatedly stalled with the first lead judge removed in February after a court granted the request of two of the former ministers he had charged with negligence for the disaster. Requests by Bitar to lift the immunity of several members of parliament and to question top officials have also stalled. Diab's session was postponed to Sept. 20, the news agency said. A judicial source told Reuters that should Diab fail to attend the September session, the judge would have the right to issue an arrest warrant. Diab, who has said he is innocent of any wrongdoing connected to the blast, was not immediately available for comment. (Reporting by Maha El Dahan and Laila Bassam; Editing by Nick Macfie) The Wrap Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and Rep. Dan Crenshaw were among those who declared Tuesday that a video showed Taliban fighters flying an American helicopter and hanging someone from it. The New York Post was duped, too, but wasnt quite as credulous. The Post wrote in its story on the man suspended from the helicopter that it was not immediately clear exactly how he is attached or if he is alive. In fact, he was alive. The video was posted from a now-suspended account, but another video of the same Anish Shrivastava's life has been molded by the events of the day he was born: September 11, 2001. From his uncle skipping work at the World Trade Center that day to attend his birth to how Shrivastava celebrates his birthday, 9/11 is never far away. Shrivastava was one of approximately 13,000 children born in the United States the same day al-Qaeda hijackers crashed two planes into the twin towers killing almost 3,000 people. But few can likely claim that their arrival helped save a life. Shrivastava was born at 10:05 am on that Tuesday morning 20 years ago in a hospital in Princeton, New Jersey, just outside New York. The South Tower had fallen six minutes earlier and the North Tower would collapse in a little more than an hour. In the hospital waiting room sat his father Ashish and Ashish's brother, Manish, glued to the television. Shrivastava's uncle watched with horror as the tower that housed his office crumbled into a pile of debris and toxic ash. On impulse, he had made a last-minute decision to cancel a meeting that morning so he could welcome his nephew into the world. "We're connected by fate. We're very close," Shrivastava says of his uncle. His mother Jaya says that her son had not been due until September 21 or 22. "He was there for a reason," she told AFP. Shrivastava was a young boy when he was made aware of the seismic events of his birthday. Shortly before he started school, his parents decided to tell him, in broad strokes, the story of that day, before he heard it from someone else. For Ashish, it was important to tell his son not just about the tragedy but also the "positives" that came from it: the volunteers, the heroes, the moments of unity. As Shrivastava prepares to turn 20 next month, he says he chooses not to mark his birthday on its actual date. "Obviously, we don't celebrate on that day. We usually just try to wait a couple days for that," he says. Story continues Instead, Shrivastava usually volunteers with the non-profit MyGoodDeed, which runs charitable services on 9/11, including food distribution. "I tried to give back to the community... to obviously mourn those who passed, but also to take a lesson from it that we can build back to something better," he said. Through MyGoodDeed, Shrivastava has met other people born on 9/11. Like many youngsters his age he enjoys video games, music and reading. But his father believes the weight of their birth date has matured their generation earlier. - 'Connected' to NYC - "Their way of thinking about life is a bit different. And I look at it in a very positive way. Those kids really brought a ray of hope in this society," said Ashish. Shrivastava says his birthday has "impacted my mindset about what my role is." "Just learning the lessons that I did from being born on that day and how that's kind of shaped me. It has given me that purpose of, one day I hope to help people in some kind of way," he said. Shrivastava admits he won't necessarily open a food bank or something like that but does want to make a difference to lives in "a real way." For now, the softly spoken 19-year-old is focused on his studies at college, where he is in his third year. Accepted by several universities, Shrivastava chose to study just three hours north of Manhattan in upstate New York. Once he graduates in finance, probably in 2023, he cannot see himself working anywhere other than in the city of the World Trade Center. "I feel like I'm connected with New York in a lot of ways," says Shrivastava. tu/pdh/bfm Britain's Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden - Kirsty O'Connor/AFP via Getty Images Brussels has warned it could stop sharing data on criminals and suspected terrorists with Britain and tear up a Brexit data transfer deal if the UK diverges too far from flagship EU laws. After the Culture Secretary revealed post-Brexit plans to overhaul pointless web cookie requests and red tape imposed on business, the European Commission said it would be monitoring the reforms very closely and warned it could cancel a data sharing deal at any time. An EU official told The Telegraph member states could consider stopping sharing data about criminals or suspected terrorists. This would include anti-terror measures, such as sharing data such as passenger name records. It came after Oliver Dowden confirmed in an interview with The Telegraph that the Government is looking to diverge from key parts of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which came into force in 2018. The announcement was praised by a number of Tory MPs, who have long argued that GDPR, which governs how data and peoples personal information is collected and used, is overly prescriptive and bureaucratic. Describing the proposals as the data dividend of Brexit, Mr Dowden said new British data privacy laws would be more proportionate, help cut costs for businesses, and enable greater innovation, which will drive growth and opportunities and jobs. However, legal experts said the move risked putting the UK on a collision course with Brussels, which believes GDPR has been highly influential in driving up data privacy standards across the world. Asked about the proposals, a Commission spokesman suggested it could suspend, terminate or amend its UK data adequacy agreements, covering the lucrative commercial transfers of data and law enforcement cooperation after Brexit. "When adopting the adequacy decisions, the Commission was fully aware of the risk of divergence of the UK system from the EU system," he said. "This is why, in the case of events that negatively affect the level of protection...the adequacy decision can be suspended or terminated or amended at any time." Story continues Cake and eating it Influential Dutch liberal MEP and data privacy campaigner Sophie in 't Veld told The Telegraph it is obvious that the adequacy decision will fall if the UK chose to deviate from standards it agreed to only just a few months ago. She described the move to change the law as "the umpteenth example of the having-your-cake-and-eating-it attitude of the UK Government." Birgit Sippel, a German MEP, added: If these general principles were not respected, the EU Commission would be obliged to revoke the adequacy decisions, which could have serious implications for the UK economy. Their comments suggest the European Parliament, which has often taken a stronger position on data privacy than the Commission, may push for the data deals to be suspended. However, Axel Voss, a German MEP with the centre-Right European People's Party, said he had sympathy with the UK proposals but cautioned it should not jeopardise EU-UK data transfers. "You do not have to have 100 per cent identical GDPR," he told The Telegraph. "I have sympathy with the idea of reducing the burden of businesses in the GDPR." "You can balance things better than we do in the GDPR but you have to be careful if there is to be an exchange of data between the UK and the EU, you must have the adequacy of the systems in mind." While Mr Dowden has insisted there is absolutely no reason why the changes should change the EUs determination, the British Chambers of Commerce also said British firms needed concrete assurances that the reforms would not put our adequacy relationship with the EU at risk, either directly or through legal challenges. The Confederation of British Industry said alignment with GDPR will help to safeguard the UKs digital economy but suggested it could support divergence that helped to reduce the high administrative burden placed on businesses. Separately, David Davis, the former Brexit Secretary, who has campaigned on data privacy, also urged the Government to tread carefully, adding: Our privacy must be safeguarded and should not be thrown away in a frantic red tape cutting exercise." Congressional candidate Kimberly Klacik says her fellow Black conservative made false statements about her in a June 22 video posted to social media Conservative talking head Candace Owens has never been one to mince words and now thats gotten her into some legal trouble. According to The Baltimore Sun, the political commentator is being sued by Kimberly Klacik, another Black conservative, for defamation. Klacik, a former Republican congressional candidate, alleged that in June, Owens made false statements about her in an Instagram video which caused her to lose a book deal and led to several politicians backing out of her fundraising events. As a result, she is now suing for a whopping $20M. In the video in question, posted on June 22, Owens accused Klacik of being a stripper, claimed that her charity Potential Me is fraudulent and says Klacik is guilty of tax fraud, campaign fraud, and money laundering. At one point she even implied that Klacik is using drugs. Candace Owens, Kimberly Klacik (Getty Images) When the video was first posted, Klacik tweeted, She has falsely accused me, private citizens & businesses of federal crimes so I would like this to play out in court rather [than] social media. Baseless character assassination has no place in political dialogue Klaciks lawyer Jacob Frenkel told The Sun. The defendant chose to use her huge social media platform to attack a respected Baltimore political figure; we are using the proper forum the power of the courts to respond. The detail in Ms. Klaciks lawsuit speaks for itself. The lawsuit, filed in Baltimore, also claims that Klacik asked Owens to remove the 44-minute video on several occasions, but that Owens not only refused to comply but also continues to support and encourage the harassment of Klacik. As theGrio previously reported, Klacik first made national headlines last August after her eye-catching campaign ad suggesting Democrats dont care about Black voters went viral. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Democrats dont want you to see this. Theyre scared that Im exposing what life is like in Democrat-run cities, the 38-year-old wrote in the caption for the ad, titled Black Lives Dont Matter to Democrats. Story continues Thats why Im running for Congress, she continued. Because All Black Lives Matter Baltimore Matters And Black people dont have to vote Democrat Help us win. On the first night of the Republican National Convention, Klacik who at the time was running to represent Marylands 7th Congressional district, represented for years by the late Rep. Elijah Cummings slammed Joe Biden, at the time the Democratic presidential candidate, for essentially treating Black voters like sheep. Joe Biden believes we cant think for ourselves that the color of someones skin dictates their political views, she opined. Were not buying the lies anymore you and your party have ignored us for too long. And yet, the Democrats still assume that Black people will vote for them, no matter how much they let us down and take us for granted, she continued. Nope. Were sick of it and not going to take it anymore. The days of blindly supporting the Democrats are coming to an end. Owens has not yet responded to the lawsuit. Have you subscribed to theGrios new podcast Dear Culture? Download our newest episodes now! TheGrio is now on Apple TV, Amazon Fire, and Roku. Download theGrio today! The post Candace Owens sued for $20M in defamation lawsuit appeared first on TheGrio. Aug. 25This story will be updated. AUGUSTA, Maine Maine lawmakers who unsuccessfully tried to ban corporations owned or influenced by foreign governments from spending in state referendums filed on Wednesday to put their effort on the 2022 ballot. It marks the fifth referendum effort targeting Central Maine Power Co. dating back to last year and comes as an outgrowth of the political fight over the utility and its $1 billion hydropower corridor to bring Hydro-Quebec power to the regional grid through western Maine. Gov. Janet Mills vetoed a bill that would have prohibited companies including Hydro-Quebec, a provincial-owned utility from spending on referendums. CMP and its allies argued that the bill would unfairly kneecap it from fighting back against a November 2021 referendum aiming to stop the corridor project. Hydro-Quebec has put more $9 million into a political committee here. The proposed law would be modeled after that bill from Sen. Rick Bennett, R-Oxford, and another from Rep. Kyle Bailey, D-Gorham. It would prevent foreign governments and their affiliates from spending on referendums and candidate campaigns while increasing disclosure requirements. It would force media outlets to remove ads violating the law and call on Maine's congressional delegation to back an anti-corruption constitutional amendment "Maine elections belong to Mainers, and not to wealthy foreign interests," Rep. Kyle Bailey, D-Gorham, who will be leading the campaign effort and ran the 2016 campaign that established Maine's ranked-choice voting system, said in a statement. Proponents will likely try to begin collecting signatures as quickly as possible to hit the January 2022 deadline to get a question on the ballot next fall. CMP critics are also trying to get up to two questions on the fall 2022 ballot that would force a public buyout of the major electric utilities' infrastructure and replace them with a consumer-owned utility. The Guardian As sovereign nations, Indigenous groups are using their authority to make their own rules to protect students and teachers A mural on the Navajo reservation in Shiprock, New Mexico. Photograph: Andrew Hay/Reuters Native American tribes across the handful of US states with bans on school mask mandates have asserted their powers as sovereign nations to defy the orders, with some also implementing their own testing and vaccine directives for tens of thousands of students and faculty in schools on t Delta Air Lines is imposing a $200 monthly surcharge for the health insurance of unvaccinated employees. This is a very slippery slope. (Associated Press) At first glance, the decision by Delta Air Lines on Wednesday to charge unvaccinated workers an extra $200 a month for health coverage seems to make sense. The airline estimates it costs $50,000 in insurance claims every time an employee is hospitalized with COVID-19. "This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company," Delta's chief executive, Ed Bastian, said in a memo. There's a cold logic to that: People who are more likely to get sick should pay more for health insurance. But where does this slippery slope take us? Should people with cancer, or a genetic predisposition for cancer, pay more for coverage? How about people with diabetes or heart disease? These can be very expensive ailments. Should drinkers pay more for health insurance than teetotalers? What about the obese and overweight? In theory, any employer offering group coverage could impose surcharges on workers it believes are engaging in unhealthy behavior or who are increasing the organization's healthcare costs. "The airline wont say it, but this is a tax on bad behavior," said Dana Goldman, dean of the USC Sol Price School of Public Policy. "The unvaccinated generate real costs to a business because of increased screening and hospitalizations and shortsightedness is not a protected class." Although it appears Delta is trying to encourage healthy behavior rather than punish employees' recklessness, he told me, "it is a fair question where the tax on bad behavior ends." I heard the same from other healthcare experts. Barak Richman, a law professor at Duke University, said, "Delta is trying to cut through the noise and convey something important to its employees you need to get vaccinated." At the same time, he said, "we have to be very careful about imposing higher risk costs on some over others." As a person with Type 1 diabetes, I'm familiar with Delta's argument. I've heard it before. Story continues My genetic misfortune represents thousands of dollars in annual medical costs for insulin, a blood-sugar monitor, an insulin pump and regular checkups. In light of all that, shouldn't I pay more for coverage than someone without all these fixed costs? The answer, of course, is no, for one very simple reason: Everyone can get sick. Health insurers manage this risk by having a large pool of policyholders, healthy and sick, contribute regularly to a big pot of money, from which the insurer pays people's medical expenses. If you never get sick, well, you're very lucky from a healthcare standpoint, even if you may feel shortchanged after years of premium payments. If you do get sick and odds are you will at some point then your years of premiums are now paying off. This is what you planned for. Delta is trying to pressure the unvaccinated to behave more responsibly during a global public health crisis. "Freedom of choice" is a selfish and foolhardy rationale for refusing to be vaccinated. Needless to say, if prior generations of Americans had behaved this way, we'd still be facing thousands of deaths annually from smallpox, polio and other illnesses that have been largely eradicated thanks to widespread vaccination programs. Delta's Bastian said about three-quarters of the company's roughly 75,000 employees are already vaccinated. So he's targeting the remaining 19,000 or so who have chosen, for whatever reason, to forgo getting shots. The "aggressiveness" of the Delta variant, he said, "means we need to get many more of our people vaccinated, and as close to 100% as possible." He's absolutely correct. And because some wildly imprudent public figures have chosen to politicize vaccines during a pandemic, it's now up to employers to take the lead in safeguarding the population. A growing number of companies are making vaccination a condition of employment, or at the very least a prerequisite for entering the workplace. Goldman Sachs this week became one of the latest businesses to adopt this reasonable approach. Turning the fiscal screws on the sick or potentially sick, on the other hand, while perhaps an effective way of influencing people's behavior, is just bad public policy. Taken to its logical extreme, it means anyone who, for any reason, represents a greater financial risk to America's $4-trillion healthcare system should pay more. Not everyone sees it this way. Frank Lichtenberg, a professor of healthcare management at Columbia Business School, told me Delta is simply responding to some employees' personal choices. "Most people dont choose to have cancer, diabetes, heart disease and other illnesses, although their lifestyles may increase their risk of doing so," he observed. Lichtenberg also noted that the higher probability of unvaccinated workers making other Delta employees sick represents what economists call a "negative externality" an action that could cause harm to others. "Most economists believe that imposing financial penalties, such as taxes, is an appropriate way to address negative externalities," he said. I asked if smokers should similarly pay more for coverage in light of their potentially harmful personal choice. "Life insurance premiums are higher for smokers," Lichtenberg replied. "I don't see why it wouldn't be reasonable for health insurance premiums to also be higher for smokers." In fact, the Affordable Care Act allowed insurers to charge smokers up to 50% more than nonsmokers. "Hardly any did, possibly because of difficulties in verifying smoking status," said Joseph P. Newhouse, a professor of health policy and management at Harvard Medical School. "That seems to cut a bit against the slippery slope argument." Or it reflects a recognition among insurers that they'd catch hell from millions of smokers for imposing surcharges on behavior that's been around since the country's foundation. California is among a handful of states that prohibits imposing higher insurance rates on smokers. California lawmakers wanted to make clear that no one should be discriminated against when it comes to health insurance even when unhealthiness is a personal choice. I appreciate where Delta's coming from. Unvaccinated people are a danger to themselves and others, and they represent a greater financial risk to businesses. But the slippery slope is very real. Delta's case for a $200 rate hike is based almost entirely on economic reasoning unvaccinated workers are more likely to be hospitalized and hospitalization is expensive. If you or anyone you know has a chronic illness, this should be taken very seriously. Sick people can be costly to treat, and this is a liability for insurers and employers. One solution is to follow the example of almost all other developed countries and affordably cover the entire population with a single-payer insurance system. Another is to penalize the sick, or the potentially sick, with higher coverage costs. Call it healthcare tough love. Or call it what it really is: inhumane. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times. Aug. 26A large group of community members, many associated with local Christian churches, attended Bakersfield City School District's Tuesday night meeting, mostly to speak against the content of the district's resource library for LGBTQ students. For the first time since the pandemic began, the crowd in attendance was so large that there wasn't enough room to fit everyone inside the main meeting room, and the crowd outside cheered as they listened in to the speakers. "There is a steady push to adjust the thinking of children to accept new lifestyles, new LGBT vocabulary, who a boy is, who a girl is," Judith Olson told the board. She read from one book in the library about children who identify as nonbinary, which means they may not identify as a boy or a girl. The district's Pride library is aimed at addressing bullying issues targeted at the LGBTQ community. On the district's agenda Tuesday was an update of its bullying policy, which mentioned the LGBTQ community. However, the topic of the library had come up during the previous meeting. Superintendent Mark Luque said he met with church leaders before the board meeting when he heard there were fliers going around about the BCSD meeting. He said that the district failed to communicate appropriately about the resources. He said he hopes to build understanding, if not forgiveness, with the community. "What we are trying to accomplish in our district is to ensure that we have safe spaces for every single child and family member," Luque said. The resource library now has a note appended to it that states that it is offered to teachers as an option to "foster a safe and inclusive learning environment in the event discrimination, harassment, intimidation, and/or bullying occurs related to LGBTQ+ students and families." The note states that teachers are not required to teach from the library. In fact, a teacher must ask permission from Instructional Support Services to teach lessons from this resource guide. There is an opt-out form for parents. Story continues The note also states that the library is part of the district's compliance with the state's Safe Place to Learn Act. The law has a Kern connection: It is also known as Seth's Law, for Seth Walsh, a Tehachapi teen who killed himself at age 13 after being bullied at school for being gay in 2010. David Goh, senior pastor of The Garden, thanked the board for clarifying how parents can opt out, so that religious communities can withdraw when they find that the curriculum being taught conflicts with their own deeply held values, which include teachings on marriage and sexuality. "Of course, we are adamantly opposed to the bullying of any child, and we would certainly want to partner with you in creating a safe and respectful environment for all students," he said. "We also just ask that the same respect be granted to us as parents and that we could partner together for the education of our children." Lillian Lopez asked the district to also send a letter home to parents at the beginning of the year to allow parents to opt out. She said she felt that the issues of bullying and suicide were being used as reasons to push ideology on students that should be discussed at home. Board member Chris Cruz-Boone vowed to preserve the Pride library in her board comments. "That Pride library that people are afraid (that) being on our website will somehow corrupt our youth: that needs to be here. That needs to be there, because queer people exist," she said. "They exist in our classrooms and they exist in our district, and they need a place to go to learn about why they are different." The district's new opt-out form states: "In the event bullying and discrimination towards an LGBTQ students occurs within my student's classroom...," and the parent can answer that they either do or do not give permission for their child to "participate in the LGBTQ Antibullying/Nondiscrimination Inclusive lessons." Most of the speakers at Tuesday's meeting spoke on LGBTQ issues and the board voted to give them extra time to speak. Many also spoke against the state's masks mandate and critical race theory. Angelo Frazier, a pastor of RiverLakes Community Church and volunteer chaplain of the Bakersfield Police Department, was one of those speakers who touched on many of these issues in his comments. He told the board that the district needed to return to reading, writing and arithmetic. "Families are mad, they are really mad with what is going on," he told the board. Frazier told the board that no man or woman can fully transition into the opposite sex. He said critical race theory will institute "a new era of racial segregation." Some attendees brought signs advocating for recalling Gov. Gavin Newsom. One man threatened to recall the board members in his comments. Another woman spoke of her work collecting signatures on the recall campaign. Congressmen Seth Moulton and Peter Meijer made a secret visit to Kabul on Tuesday as the US military carried out desperate and urgent evacuation in the face of threat from the Taliban (Getty Images) An unannounced trip made by two congressmen to Kabul this week amid an intense evacuation effort has come under heavy criticism from Pentagon and other representatives of the House, who have called the act reprehensible. Republican Peter Meijer and Democratic Seth Moulton secretly slipped into war-torn Afghanistan on Tuesday this week, stating that they went to the ground zero to observe the evacuation efforts. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Lashing at the two war veterans for making the visit during a critical moment, former CIA official Paul Mudd told CNN that mere criticism of their actions is too polite. Two members of congress without the support of their party want to bypass Disneyland and take an Instagram trip to Afghanistan because they want some eye candy for a bunch of constituents, the ex CIA official said in an interview to the CNN. He added that President Joe Biden had flagged the situation as too dangerous for the US military to stay on in the south Asian country. However, congressman Meijer dubbed the criticism as laughable and accused the Biden-led administration of hiding facts of the situation unfolding in Afghanistan from Americans. Mr Meijer said: The opprobrium from the Defence Department, from the White House, from the State Department is, frankly, laughable. Right now they have done everything they can to obstruct the situation, to deny this reality, and, frankly, to hide facts from the American people, he told Fox News. The duo also released a statement saying that as congressmen, the two have a duty to provide oversight on the executive branch. Explaining their secret visit, they said in a statement: We conducted this visit in secret, speaking about it only after our departure, to minimise the risk and disruption to the people on the ground, and because we were there to gather information, not to grandstand. The Pentagon has also delivered a staunch criticism to the secret visit that flouted several important bureaucratic checks and was conducted without any coordination with diplomats and military commanders engaged in the evacuation. Story continues Pentagon press secretary John Kirby confirmed that even they were not kept in the loop about this visit. We were not aware of this visit, and we are not encouraging VIP visits to a very tense, dangerous and dynamic situation inside that airport and Kabul in general, Mr Kirby said. The secretary, I think, would have appreciated the opportunity to have had a conversation before the visit took place, he said, adding that the two congressmen took time away from the tasks planned for the day. Disapproving the secret visit further, the Pentagon official said: To say there wasn't a need to alter the day's flow, including the need to have protection for these members of Congress, that wouldn't be a genuine thing for me to assert. First information to the US military about the congressmens visit was when their aircraft was inbound at Kabul, officials told Fox News. The secret visit also came under the scanner for using resources that could have been otherwise used for two more refugees instead. And by the way, ask them for the two seats they took out. For all their concerns about refugees, what happens to the two refugees who didnt get those seats? former CIA official Paul Mudd asked. However, the legislators clarified in their statement that they left Kabul on a flight with empty seats. Read More The Taliban: Who are they, who are the leaders and what do they want? Who funds the Taliban and how? What rules will the Taliban impose on women in Afghanistan? Derriford Hospital in Plymouth has experienced a surge in COVID patients, forcing it to declare an 'internal critical incident'. (Getty) A hospital in Devon has declared an 'internal critical incident' due to a surge in coronavirus patients. University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust, which runs Derriford Hospital in Plymouth, said the step had come after it experienced its highest level of COVID occupancy of the third wave. Around 97% of the hospital's beds are reportedly currently occupied, with bed occupancy averaging around 95% in recent months. The trust has warned it expects the situation to get worse. In a statement, Jo Beer, Chief Operating Officer at University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust, said: "The Trust entered an internal critical incident on Monday. This is an internal protocol to focus all departments on immediate de-escalation actions whilst in OPEL4 (the highest level of escalation)." Such a step includes measures such as cancelling non-urgent meetings in order to increase 'release clinical time back to the wards', the statement said. It added: "The incident was declared due to high bed occupancy and a sustained high level of Emergency Department attendance converting into an above-average level of admission. "We are experiencing our highest level of covid occupancy of the third wave and expect this to increase further as a result we have reconfigured our bed capacity to manage both covid and non-covid capacity but this needs continual review. Pressure is also being felt in the regions wider health and social care system, this presents some impact on the ability to discharge patients into the community care settings when medically fit." Read more: Pen Farthing stuck at Kabul Airport with staff and animals after Taliban 'block evacuation' Watch: What UK government COVID-19 support is available? According to government figures, Plymouth has recorded an average of 192 new cases per day for the week to 17 August, the most recent date for which complete data is available. In the current wave, new daily case numbers spiked at 468 on 15 July then dropped sharply, but rose again to 271 on 17 August. Story continues COVID number have also risen nationally, with a total of 35,847 new positive cases recorded on 25 August - a rate of 339.3 cases per 100,000 people. The government figures showed 236,796 positive cases in the seven days up to 25 August - up 25,558 on the previous seven days. In a video message, Deputy Medical Director Paul McArdle said the hospital was experienced "high operation pressures", with large number of people attending its Emergency Department, including 130 people at 11pm on Tuesday night, which he said would usually be much quieter. He said the pressures of coronavirus numbers was affecting both patients and staff and had forced the hospital to introduce measures such as the cancellation of routine surgery, and the "unpalatable step" of restricting access for visitors. He urged people to consider other possible ways of seeking medical attention, but said they are still offering emergency treatment for those serious ill or injured. He also urged people to take up their COVID jab, saying it will help reduce the pressures on the health service. Watch: Do coronavirus vaccines affect fertility? The man who shot and killed Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, Sirhan Sirhan, could be a free man as of Friday, with prosecutors reportedly saying they won't oppose his parole petition. The 77-year-old spent the past 53 years in prison in California. He is scheduled to face the California parole board on Friday for the 16th time. AL QAEDA, ISIS-K, AND A TRIO OF HAS-BEENS: THE PLAYERS IN TALIBAN-LED AFGHANISTAN Sirhan was initially sentenced to death for the murder, but California temporarily outlawed capital punishment, and his sentence was downgraded to life in prison. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is supporting Sirhan's bid for parole because he said he believes Sirhan was falsely accused of the murder of his father, according to the Washington Post. He also reportedly wants the case to be reopened and thinks that Sirhan was set up to take the fall for the murder. Sirhan confessed to the murder in 1968 but claims he has no memory of the incident. He might have been hypnotized in part of a grand conspiracy, his lawyer said. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Sirhan's parole has been denied 15 times, but George Gascon, Los Angeles County's district attorney, said he will be impartial in the decision. "The role of a prosecutor and their access to information ends at sentencing," Alex Bastian, special adviser to Gascon, told the Washington Post. "The parole board's sole purpose is to objectively determine whether someone is suitable for release ... If someone is the same person that committed an atrocious crime, that person will correctly not be found suitable for release." Washington Examiner Videos Tags: News, RFK Jr., JFK, Crime Original Author: Matthew Miller Original Location: Could Robert F. Kennedy's convicted assassin soon be a free man? Gerardo Sanchez, the mayor of San Luis, Ariz., has heard enough from Republican governors who have sought to blame the latest spike of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. on migrants crossing the border to seek asylum. For any governor to blame the crisis of COVID on the asylum seekers, who are people who are seeking protection, its really not fair, Sanchez, a Democrat, told Yahoo News. Its just another way to blame somebody else for [a] lack of personal responsibility, in my opinion. Sanchez is also a physicians assistant in the border town of 25,000 residents, and has watched firsthand as the Delta variant surges among those who have refused to get vaccinated. While he acknowledges that some migrants crossing the border into the U.S. have later tested positive for COVID-19, he bristles at the suggestion that they are in any way the root of the current surge in cases. An asylum seeker and his child are detained by U.S. Border Patrol near Yuma, Ariz., in April. (Jim Urquhart/Reuters) Yes, there are some positive COVID patients who are crossing the border, but you dont have to be undocumented, you dont have to be an asylum seeker, to be positive for COVID, Sanchez said. This is our third wave now [in the U.S.]. Weve had two big waves, we cannot all blame them. Its just an easy way, or a scapegoat, to blame someone else. Im seeing a lot more unvaccinated people, who did not want to get vaccinated, and the more severe cases are those. Among the most vocal of the GOP governors linking the current COVID spike to the rise in the number of immigrants crossing the border seeking asylum are Arizonas Doug Ducey and Floridas Ron DeSantis. Joe Biden has taken to himself to try to single out Florida over COVID. This is a guy who ran for president saying he was going to shut down the virus. And what has he done? Hes imported the virus from around the world by having a wide open southern border, DeSantis said at an Aug. 4 press conference. Ducey sent a letter to President Biden in July asking him to keep in place Title 42, a Trump-era public health policy that allows for the expulsion of immigrants in an effort to slow the spread of COVID-19. Story continues A woman seeking asylum is tested for COVID-19 at the bus station in Brownsville, Texas, in March. (Veronica G. Cardenas/Reuters) As Arizona continues to deal with the man-made crisis at our border, ending Title 42 will threaten the health and safety of not only Arizonans, but all Americans, Ducey said in his letter. In the month of July, Customs and Border Protection encountered more than 200,000 people at the U.S. border with Mexico, a number not seen in two decades. As of now, migrants are not automatically tested for the coronavirus when taken into custody. They are tested only if there are obvious or serious signs of symptoms associated with the virus, according to the New York Times. While Republicans like Ducey and DeSantis have portrayed the U.S. border as wide open, CBP has, using Title 42, expelled more than 750,000 people who have crossed into the country since March 2020, and that practice has continued during the Biden administration. For Sanchez, theres a logical flaw in the argument that seeks to blame immigrants for the recent Delta surge, especially given tepid vaccination rates in the U.S. A migrant family from Brazil seeking asylum struggles up an embankment after crossing the dammed Colorado River from Mexico in Yuma, Ariz., in June. (Eugene Garcia/AP) I mean, this is our third wave now. Whats going to happen when the coming weeks come? Are we going to blame someone else? Lets take personal responsibility. Im going to emphasize that personal responsibility. Its really easy to blame someone else for your irresponsibility or your lack of responsibility, Sanchez said. In Florida, a state that does not share a border with Mexico and where the test positivity rate for COVID-19 stands at nearly 25 percent, the focus on migrants seeking asylum is especially galling to Sanchez. Its very difficult to hear some politicians start blaming and pointing fingers while not even half of our population is vaccinated, he said. ____ Read more from Yahoo News: COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) Denmark's Parliament is expected to end a nurses' strike Thursday by implementing a previously rejected pay proposal, a rare intervention in a country with a labor market model that calls for employers and unions to agree on work conditions through collective bargaining. The compromise proposal from the Social Democratic government would end the strike that started in mid-June on Saturday. It would give Danish nurses a 5% salary increase over three years - terms they rejected in March when they voted against a 3-year pay deal their union leadership had approved. Nurses who work for the Danish Regions, a government employer which manages Denmarks health care system, argued they have been underpaid for years. The walkout by nurses started in mid-June with around 10% of the work force and gradually increased to include a greater share, although those involved in caring for COVID-19 patients did not participate. The strike resulted in the cancellation of thousands of planned surgeries. The government on Wednesday cited a backlog of what the Danish Health Authority estimated was 35,500 delayed operations as the reason it decided to step in with a law applying the rejected pay agreement. Lawmaker's in the 179-seat parliament were expected to approve the proposal on Thursday with the support of the center-right opposition. In Denmark, the government seldom intervenes in wage negotiations and only does so as a last resort in the absence of an agreement between public employers and unions. One of the most fascinating aspects of Boston Dynamics transition into a commercial organization is watching the company -- and its partners -- figure out real-world jobs for Spot. Theres no question that the tech is impressive, but theres always been the broader subject of usefulness beyond the companys initial purpose of serving as off-road pack mules. Weve seen some interesting examples since Spot first went on sale, including inspection for constructions sites and potentially dangerous settings -- from nuclear power plants to off-shore oil rigs. There have also been some, shall we say, more controversial gigs, including Spots time as an electronic K9 for the NYPD. But maybe finding the perfect job for Spot entails thinking both outside the box and Earths gravitational pull. NASAs JPL in California has been working with the quadrupedal robot for a couple of years now, first as part of a DARPA challenge and now as a potential way to explore extraterrestrial caves. For this weeks installment of Actuator, we spoke to JPL NeBula Autonomy Project lead Ali Agha about the partnership. How long has NASA been working with Spot? We have been working with the SPOT robots for about two years now. We initially integrated our NeBula autonomy and AI solutions on the Spot robot as one of our robots participating in the DARPA Subterranean challenge competition. However, since then we have extended the application of these robots and JPLs NeBula autonomy solution to planetary cave exploration and surface exploration as well as terrestrial disaster response and mining efforts. What is the advantage of using legs (as opposed to wheels) on the Martian surface? Imagine a no-road terrain on Earth. The ability to walk will allow traversing different elements of such a terrain much better than a typical wheeled vehicle. Similarly, legged locomotion can potentially enable totally new missions when exploring extreme and challenging terrains on planetary bodies in the solar system beyond our home planet. Story continues [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HpWIhFFD54?version=3&rel=1&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&fs=1&hl=en-US&autohide=2&wmode=transparent&w=640&h=360] How closely does NASA/JPL work with a company like Boston Dynamics on a project like this? We have had an amazing collaboration with Boston Dynamics and work closely with them. On our project, JPL and Boston Dynamics efforts are highly synergistic. At JPL, we develop autonomy and AI solutions (called NeBula) acting as the robot brain to enable fully autonomous exploration of extreme and challenging environments with very minimal (to none) prior information about the terrain or environmental conditions. NeBula is agnostic to the choice of robotic platform and can be used on wheeled rovers, legged platforms, as well as drones. On the other hand, Boston Dynamics is developing cutting-edge incredible robotic locomotion systems that can maintain the stability of the system over extreme environments. As a result, the combination of an autonomy solution like NeBula with a capable locomotion system like Boston Dynamics Spot opens up avenues for totally new classes of planetary and terrestrial missions. I know autonomy is a big piece of this. Do the robots need to be able to function with no human intervention? Yes, autonomy is the main focus of our project. In planetary exploration, specifically, when exploring underground caves, there is no, or very minimal, prior information about the environment. Further, when robots enter the cave, they typically lose communication with the surface and are on their own to accomplish the mission objectives. As a result, autonomy is a crucial capability to enable such missions to accomplish mission goals with no human intervention when the robot is out of communication exploring previously unseen terrains and environments. To this end, JPL has been developing autonomy and AI solutions (called NeBula) acting as the robot brain, which is now being paired with Boston Dynamics Spot robots as the robot body. We're becoming a newsletter soon! Please sign up to get Actuator in your inbox as soon as the first issue hit! For free! Image Credits: Bryce Durbin/TechCrunch A bit closer to Earth (as in, roughly 100 to 150 feet above our heads), Alphabets Wing announced this week that its approaching 100,000 drone deliveries two years after launching in the Brisbane-adjacent city of Logan, Australia. The announcement follows recent insight into Amazons struggles in the drone delivery space. The company told TechCrunch, I think well launch new services in Australia, Finland and the United States in the next six months. The capabilities of the technology are probably ahead of the regulatory permissions right now. Image Credits: Wing A closer look at some of those 100,000 deliveries: 10,000 cups of coffee 1,700 childrens snack packs 1,200 hot chooks (roasted chicken, in Australian) 2,700 sushi rolls 1,000 loaves of bread Image Credits: Coco Speaking of food, LA-based Coco just raised $36 million for its delivery robots. The round brings its total funding up to $43 million. The UCLA spinout is currently piloting its 50-pound, remote-piloted robots in a variety of Los Angeles neighborhoods. The company tells TechCrunch: We are currently operating in Santa Monica and in five different L.A neighborhoods. Later this year we are expanding into a number of other major U.S. cities. We have partnered with national restaurant brands like SBE (Umami Burger) and are actively scaling across many locations, and we are serving a wide range of family operated restaurants like Bangkok West Thai in Santa Monica and San Pedro Brewing Company in Los Angeles. We are out of the pilot phase and are launching with dozens of new merchants every day. Image Credits: Spyce Meanwhile, California-based fast casual salad chain Sweetgreens just acquired Spyce. Built by MIT alums, the company develops kitchen robotics, which it has rolled out in a pair of Boston-based restaurants. Sweetgreens eventually plans to implement these in some of its 120+ locations, though no timeline has been given as of yet. In this weeks small-ray-of-sunshine-in-an-otherwise-horrifying-situation news, a team of young women roboticists managed to evacuate Kabul amid the Taliban takeover. The team has found refuge in Mexico on a 180-day humanitarian visa, with an option to extend their stay. From now on forward we will have opportunities for many more achievements in our lives, and thus be part of the fight for a better life," team member Fatemah Qaderyan said at a press conference on their arrival in the country. "Although we are far from our homes, we will always be united and thanks to your help we will achieve it, thank you very much, we really appreciate having all our things here in Mexico with us." The team also made international headlines in 2017, as they entered the U.S. on a 10-day parole, in spite of the Trump administrations executive order banning entry from predominately Muslim countries. Image Credits: Tesla (opens in a new window) Before we go, a thought on the Tesla robot. Or, rather, a story. A few years ago, I was asked to be on a panel discussing robots for a group of people who werent really familiar with the field. Thats fine. Theres a lot to be said for getting outside your comfort zone. At the end, we opened things up to Q&A. As is nearly always the case with these things, the first question -- well, it wasnt a question really. It was more of a laundry list of things the asker would like to see a robot do. She went on to describe a small drone that flies from surface to surface, cleaning different parts of the house. I told her it sounded great, and Id love to see her invent it. Point is, I think the vast majority of people outside of robotics have an entirely unrealistic idea of whats possible with technology today. Theres a reason iRobot spent the better part of a decade banging its head against the wall, working out a robot that can vacuum floors. Theres also a reason that the Roomba is really the only semi-ubiquitous home robot. Always be wary of robots announced onstage as a press event. Im not saying a Tesla robot is impossible. Im just saying we have to temper our expectations of what is. Sometimes you go in expecting a robot and get someone in a spandex onesie doing the Dougie: Image Credits: Tesla Tamarius Blair Davis, 22, has been charged with second-degree murder (Miami-Dade Police Department/AP) A gunman fatally shot a tourist who was eating dinner with his family at a Miami Beach restaurant in Florida on Tuesday night as he tried to protect his one-year-old son, according to police and a family member of the victim. Dustin Wakefield, the 21-year-old victim, was allegedly shot by Tamarius Blair Davis, 22, because he was high on mushrooms, which made him feel empowered, according to the arrest report cited by the Associated Press (AP). The gunman reportedly approached the patio area of the La Cerveceria restaurant at 6.30pm (local time) and picked Wakefield at random before shooting him. The victim and his family, from Colorados Castle Rock, were on a vacation in Miami. The accused allegedly pointed a gun at the baby, after which Wakefield stood up between the gunman and the baby and got shot, Mike Wakefield, the victims uncle, was quoted as saying by the Miami Herald. A short video, obtained by news channel WSVN-TV soon after the shooting, reportedly shows the gunman dancing with the gun in his hand as others in the restaurant are heard screaming. This guy came in with a gun, waving it, saying its time to die. He pointed the gun at his son and Dustin said, hes only a boy. He shot him multiple times on the ground, Mr Wakefield, who was not present during the incident, but heard the account from his family, said. He said his nephew used to work in construction. He loved his family. He loved being a dad, he added. The accused fled the restaurant after the shooting and was found in a nearby alley, from where he was taken into custody, police said. Mr Davis was found by police officers lying spread eagle on his back and smiling. He curled up into a fetal position on his side before again rolling onto his back as officers approached him. Mr Davis then reportedly started screaming, I give, I give, I give as the officers flipped him onto his stomach and handcuffed him, reported AP. A black handgun was found by the police nearly 10 feet away from the man. The accused had traveled to Miami Beach with friends, his father Tommy Davis told AP. He added that his son never had mental heath issues and no prior arrest record. Mr Davis, who is from Norcross, Georgia, has been charged with second-degree murder. Employees of a prominent Gainesville commercial real estate firm whose offices were stormed by an armed SWAT team this summer could face felony charges after a criminal investigation said they bilked their former employer out of a cache of confidential documents and deals worth millions. According to sworn complaints filed late Tuesday and early Wednesday in Alachua County Circuit Court, police detectives accused Colliers International employees Lauren Edwards, 24, Daniel Drotos, 34, and Rory Causseaux, 59, of stealing dozens of trade secrets and proprietary documents and $2 million worth of deals from Bosshardt Realty Services, their former employer. The trio faces charges of felony theft or embezzlement of trade secrets and felony scheming to defraud and obtain property. Michael Ryals, who is listed as executive director on the companys website, is named as a co-defendant in Edwards and Drotos complaints. Edwards did not answer her phone or reply to an email regarding the criminal complaint. A message left with her attorneys secretary was not returned prior to publication. Bosshardt Realty and Colliers International, two of the areas most prominent real estate firms, have been embroiled in a two-year legal dispute over allegations that Aaron Bosshardt, the head of Bosshardt Realty, withheld hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid commissions owed to Drotos and Ryals. On June 25, following the highly publicized SWAT raid, Drotos and Ryals filed a second lawsuit alleging that Bosshardt abused the legal process by providing false and defamatory information to law enforcement that interfered with existing litigation and inflicted emotional distress. Melissa Redon, a marketing executive at Bosshardt Realty, said the firm uncovered evidence of document theft while preparing to respond to Drotos and Ryals civil claims that Bosshardt shorted them on commission payments. She said Aaron Bosshardt filed a standard police report and that he received no special treatment from local law enforcement. Story continues Its been hard to not try to tell our side of the story, even within our brokerage to kind of protect our agents and protect the integrity of the investigation, we havent been able to provide any real details, Redon said. Its unclear how the newly unveiled criminal charges will impact Drotos and Ryals civil lawsuits. The new complaint against Edwards alleges that in January 2019, two months before the group ended its employment contract with Bosshardt, Drotos sent a request to Appfiles, Bosshardts file service provider, asking for instructions on how to download and transfer corporate documents to an external hard drive. Appfiles rebuffed Drotos inquiry and redirected him to Bosshardt. According to detectives, Drotos never received permission from Bosshardt to copy or access the files. One month later, in response to an email from Edwards, investigators say Drotos sent Edwards a list of coveted documents and directed her to download them. Authorities say Edwards later transferred approximately 160 internal files from Bosshardts file server to her private Gmail account. Christian Oldenburg, Colliers executive managing director, also instructed Edwards to email the documents to him so he could disseminate them to the rest of the group, the court records said. Oldenburg has not been named as a defendant in any of the open cases. He did not respond to phone calls Wednesday regarding the criminal complaint. In October 2020, detectives obtained a search warrant for Edwards email records and found that she had later forwarded those same files to Drotos, Ryals and other members of the Drotos-Ryals Group at Colliers International. Among the documents discovered during the search were contracts, commission sheets, financial records, legal information, listings and detailed lists of sellers and prospective buyers. Investigators said the documents would have provided Drotos and Ryals with an unfair business advantage. Attorney Ron Kozlowski, who represents Drotos and Ryals, said he has faith in the investigative process but disputes the notion that his clients stole trade secrets. This is commercial real estate, Kozlowski said. In my experience, I dont even know what a trade secret is in terms of commercial real estate under the facts that we have here. There were no trade secrets that Mr. Ryals and Mr. Drotos couldve taken with them from Bosshardt. Bosshardt says hes remained quiet until now about the situation involving his former employees to protect the investigative process. We have been patiently awaiting the truth to come out, Aaron Bosshardt said. We are grateful for the time and energy this case has been given. None of this has been easy, but we are hopeful that the conclusion is near and justice will be served. No court dates have yet been set for the cases, which Gainesville police referred to the State Attorneys Office, who will next decide whether to prosecute them. _ This story was produced by Fresh Take Florida, a news service of the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications. The reporters can be reached at walter.harwood@ufl.edu and annawilder@ufl.edu. This story has been updated to reflect that firm employees could face felony charges. A complex attack involving at least two explosions outside the airport in Kabul on Thursday killed 13 U.S. service members and injured at least 15 others, the Pentagon said. The attack also killed and wounded a number of Afghan civilians. An Afghan official told Associated Press that at least 60 Afghans were killed and 143 others were injured in the attack. Let me be clear: While were saddened by the loss of life, both U.S. and Afghan [lives], were continuing to execute the mission, Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, said at a press briefing on Thursday. McKenzie confirmed earlier reports that a suicide bomb exploded outside one of the main gates at Hamid Karzai International Airport. He said another bomb went off in the vicinity of the Baron Hotel, which is near the airport and is often frequented by Americans in Kabul. Smoke rises from an explosion outside the airport in Kabul on Thursday. (Wali Sabawoon/AP) McKenzie also confirmed that ISIS-K, an affiliate of the Islamic State terrorist group in Afghanistan, is believed to be responsible for the attacks. He said U.S. officials believe it is the groups desire to continue those attacks, and we expect those attacks to continue. ISIS-K is also an enemy of the Taliban. Asked whether the U.S. would take military action against those responsible, McKenzie said, Yes. If we can find who is associated with this, we will go after them. On Thursday evening, President Biden, speaking somberly from the White House, vowed to hunt down those who carried out the attack. We will not forgive, we will not forget, we will hunt you down and make you pay, he said. Biden added that officials have some reason to believe we know who [the ISIS-K leaders] are, and we will find ways of our choosing, without large military operations, to get them. Yahoo News The Hamid Karzai airport has been the site of a massive airlift operation by the U.S. military to evacuate tens of thousands of Americans, at-risk Afghans and citizens of allied nations out of Afghanistan following the Talibans takeover of the country less than two weeks ago. Story continues McKenzie told reporters that the suicide bomber likely made it past Taliban checkpoint outside the airport and was being screened by U.S. Marines for entry at the gate when the attack occurred, highlighting the threats to U.S. troops who are facilitating the airlift. We dont want to let somebody on an airplane with a bomb, McKenzie said. Ultimately, Americans have got to be endangered to do these searches, theres really no other way to do it. McKenzie said he doesnt think theres any reason to believe the Taliban intentionally let the attack happen. Clearly, if they were able to get up to the Marines at the entry point of the base, theres a failure somewhere, he said. Still, McKenzie said, U.S. officials have asked Taliban leaders for help providing additional security around the airport, given threats of another possible attack. They have a practical reason for wanting us to get out of here by Aug. 31, McKenzie said of the Taliban, who, he said, want to reclaim control of the Kabul airfield. As long as we kept our common purpose aligned, theyve been useful to work with. Biden reiterated this point on Thursday, saying that "no one trusts" the Taliban, but that U.S. officials are counting on the group's self-interest. Its not a matter of trust, Biden said, it is a matter of mutual self-interest. The U.S. has been racing to evacuate as many people from Afghanistan as possible before Aug. 31, when the last American troops are scheduled to withdraw from the country. Earlier this week, Biden confirmed that he intends to stick with that withdrawal deadline, despite calls to extend it. He cited the growing threat that ISIS-K poses to U.S. troops on the ground in Kabul. Every day were on the ground is another day we know ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport, Biden said Tuesday. The sooner we can finish, the better. As of Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that more than 4,500 American citizens and their immediate family members had been evacuated from Afghanistan, and that up to 1,500 others were still waiting to leave. At the Pentagon on Thursday, McKenzie said that before the attack, 104,000 people had been airlifted out of the Kabul airport. Medical staff bring an injured man on a stretcher for treatment after the explosions on Thursday. (Wakil Koshar/AFP via Getty Images) ____ Read more from Yahoo News: A suicide bomb attack Thursday outside the Abbey Gate at Kabul's airport in Afghanistan killed 13 U.S. service members and injured at least 18 more, U.S. officials said making it the deadliest day for U.S. troops in 10 years. Officials told Fox News late Thursday that those killed included 10 Marines, two Army soldiers and a Navy corpsman, correcting earlier reports that 12 Marines were killed. The suicide bomb attack was followed up by a firefight by Islamic State gunmen at the gate, where the night before there had been 5,000 Afghans and potentially some Americans seeking access to the airport to flee. Crowds had gathered for days seeking to escape the country, and there had been multiple warnings of a terror threat to the area particularly from the Islamic State. LIVE UPDATES ON AFGHANISTAN SUICIDE BOMB ATTACKS The Pentagon confirmed the initial explosion as well as a second attack at the Baron Hotel, where Americans have gathered in the past for rescue and evacuation. Marine Corps Gen. Kenneth McKenzie Jr. said two suicide bombers were assessed to be ISIS fighters. "The threat from ISIS is extremely real," he said. "We believe it is their desire to continue those attacks, and we expect those attacks to continue, and we're doing everything we can to prepare for those attacks." Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin issued a statement on the attacks. "On behalf of the men and women of the Department of Defense, I express deepest condolences to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and wounded in Kabul today," he said. "Terrorists took their lives at the very moment these troops were trying to save the lives of others." "We mourn their loss. We will treat their wounds. And we will support their families in what will most assuredly be devastating grief," he said. "But we will not be dissuaded from the task at hand." More than five hours after the attack, President Biden had still not issued a statement about the attack. He is scheduled to speak at 5 p.m. ET. Story continues It was not clear the extent of the injuries suffered by the troops, and how many others were hurt in the large crowds that regularly gathered at the airport seeking to flee the Taliban. However, it marks the deadliest day for U.S. troops since insurgents in Afghanistan shot down a U.S. Chinook helicopter in August 2011 which killed 38 people, including 31 U.S. troops. The Taliban had moved quickly through the country ahead of the planned U.S. withdrawal at the end of the month, catching the U.S. off guard and leading to chaotic scenes at Kabul airport and a mass evacuation effort. As of Thursday, 104,000 people had been flown out, including 5,000 U.S. citizens. The Pentagon said about 1,000 Americans may still be in the country. AMERICANS AT KABUL AIRPORT GATES URGED BY US EMBASSY IN AFGHANISTAN TO LEAVE IMMEDIATELY There are currently 5,200 U.S. troops at the airport and thousands of Afghan evacuees still on the tarmac waiting to be evacuated. U.S. planes have been leaving every 40 minutes out of the airport. A source briefed on the situation told Fox News that there are hundreds of Islamic States fighters in the vicinity and warned that attacks are "likely to continue." "Taliban has essentially completely stopped letting Afghans through," the source said, adding that they are "mostly" letting Americans through, but many are staying away due to the ISIS threat. "Military continues to retrograde and depart airport. Almost a certainty that Americans will be left behind," the source said. "They will have to be extracted after the fact through either Taliban negotiation or unconventional means." President Biden had faced significant pressure, both at home and from international allies, to delay the withdrawal date, but has so far pledged to stick to that timeline. Former President Donald Trump issued a statement, sending "deepest condolences to the families of our brilliant and brave Service Members whose duty to the U.S.A. meant so much to them." "Our thoughts are also with the families of the innocent civilians who died today in the savage Kabul attack," he said. "This tragedy should never have been allowed to happen, which makes our grief even deeper and more difficult to understand." The bombing came hours after the State Department warned Americans outside the gates of the Kabul airport to "leave immediately" due to the increasing terrorist threat. Blinken had said Wednesday there was a "very real possibility" of an attack. In an alert on Thursday, the State Department confirmed a large explosion and reports of gunfire and said: "U.S. citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates at this time." "U.S. citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate or North Gate now should leave immediately," the bulletin said. A White House official told Fox News that President Biden has been briefed on the explosion. Biden had been scheduled to meet with his national security team Thursday morning. Vice President Harris has also been briefed on the situation. Fox News' Chad Pergram and Jacqui Heinrich contributed to this report. The claim: 75 Florida doctors staged a walkout to protest unvaccinated patients On Aug. 23, dozens of Florida doctors gathered in Palm Beach Gardens to hold a press conference urging Americans to get vaccinated against COVID-19. The week before 1,486 Floridians were reported to have died from COVID-19. Following the event, confusion about whether the physicians had walked out on patients in need of care sparked controversy. MSNBC's "Morning Joe" characterized the press conference as a "walkout" several times. Fact check: Post about COVID-19 vaccine mandates from government, vaccine companies is partly false Just moments ago more than 75 doctors staged a walkout to protest the number of COVID patients coming to the hospitals who have not been vaccinated, host Joe Scarborough said. He then spoke with NBC's Kerry Sanders who was reporting from the event. Both Scarborough and Sanders called the gathering a walkout several more times. Doctors present at the press conference took issue with the characterization of the event as a walkout stressing that they did not walk out on patients in need. MSNBC later corrected its description of the event, but not before confusion spread on social media. "Group of Florida doctors stage walkout to protest unvaccinated patients," claimed one Aug. 23 Instagram post. One Aug. 23 tweet by Chuck Castello claimed, BREAKING REPORT: More Than 75 Doctors WALK OUT OF SOUTH FLORIDA HOSPITAL Rather Than Treat the Unvaccinated Castello told USA TODAY he saw the terminology in several news reports. Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro responded to one misleading reiteration. Fact check: COVID-19 vaccine protects both the person vaccinated and those around them If this is the new standard that failure to take measures to alleviate your own health problems are punishable by doctors refusing treatment the extension of this logic to obesity will certainly be something, he tweeted on Aug. 23 and received more than 18,000 likes. Story continues That tweet then inspired an online squabble between Shapiro and celebrity blogger Perez Hilton. USA TODAY reached out to several posters, including Shapiro, for comment. Emergency Room physicians Dr. Ethan Chapin and Dr. JT Snarski speak out as a group of doctors and administrators gathered in Palm Beach Gardens early Monday morning, August 23, 2021 to support vaccinations and the wearing of masks in their fight against COVID-19. The entire physician staff of Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center was invited, as well as doctors from other area hospitals. MSNBC aired a correction the press conference was not a walkout The next day "Morning Joe" host Mika Brzezinski corrected the use of the term walkout as claimed in the Aug. 23 show. In the report yesterday we referred to the doctors event as a simulated walkout. And we learned afterward that many thought that meant the doctors left patients unattended, she said. Those doctors gathered either before going on shift or after working long shifts on the COVID wards. She interviewed Dr. Rupesh Dharia, an internal medicine specialist who attended the press conference. He called the gathering a community outreach. MSNBC did not respond to USA TODAYs request for comment. Doctors say the event was not a walkout Several doctors that worked to organize the press conference said participants did not walk out on patients. Dr. Jennifer Buczyner, a neurologist, told USA TODAY the characterization of the event as a "walkout' was incorrect. This was a community physician driven-press conference. That was made very clear, she said. The narrative, unfortunately, was chosen and spun. Dr. Jennifer Buczyner of Jupiter Medical Center speaks as a group of physicians and administrators gathered in Palm Beach Gardens early Monday morning, August 23, 2021 to support vaccinations and the wearing of masks in their fight against COVID-19. The entire physician staff of Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center was invited, as well as doctors from other area hospitals. Buczyner shared an internal email regarding planning for the event with USA TODAY. The email characterized it as a Community Get Vaccinated event with the stated purpose to encourage our community to get vaccinated and take this seriously. Voices and manpower are needed! The event was scheduled to start at 6:15 a.m. in the parking lot outside Dharias office and end just before 7 a.m. The words walkout and protest were never used and doctors were not encouraged to neglect their medical duties. Buczyner said roughly 75 physicians attended the event. According to other attendees, these doctors came from various practices and none are known to have neglected patient care to attend. Dr. Rupesh Dharia speaks as a group of physicians gathered in Palm Beach Gardens Monday morning, August 23, 2021 to speak in support of masks and vaccines and address questions about COVID and our community. The entire physician staff of Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center was invited, as well as doctors from other area hospitals. Dr. Naveen Reddy, a gastroenterologist who attended the event, responded to claims that the press conference was a walkout in an Aug. 23 Twitter thread. This is trending today with Hippocratic Oath & since I was there I want to point out a couple of things. This isnt a real 'walkout' in that we all went to work. One cardiologist came after doing an overnight cath and I left to do an EGD then office, ASC, & 3 hospitals, he wrote. Fact check: Ivermectin is not a proven treatment for COVID-19 Nobody was saying that we will not treat patients or that people who havent been vaccinated are bad people. We are just encouraging people to follow the science and not to listen to people who just talk to make a name for themself, he wrote in another tweet. Our rating: False Based on our research, we rate FALSE the claim that 75 Florida doctors staged a walkout to protest unvaccinated patients. The Aug. 23 press conference was a gathering that doctors attended outside of their work hours. Multiple attendees confirmed doctors did not neglect patients. MSNBCs Morning Joe corrected the mischaracterization in the next days broadcast. 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: Aug. 24 Florida doctors' gathering was not a walkout Will parents be permitted to exclusively determine if their children wear face masks at school or will public health officials determine whats best for Florida public school students during a pandemic? The answer to that question will be issued soon by Leon County Circuit Judge John Cooper following Wednesdays conclusion of a three-day hearing in his Tallahassee courtroom not only watched closely in the Sunshine State, but nationwide. Cooper is expected to issue his ruling this week in a lawsuit filed by parents from seven counties asking him to nix an executive order by Gov. Ron DeSantis that allows parents to ignore mandatory mask mandates imposed by school boards. Plaintiffs, nine couples and individual parents with children under age-12 who attend school in Broward, Duval, Hillsborough, Miami-Dade, Orange, Palm Beach and Pinellas counties, maintain DeSantis order violates districts authority under the state constitution, denies due process and is arbitrary and capricious. The state contends DeSantis June 30 executive order meets all constitutional criteria and that the recently-adopted House Bill 1059, the Parents Bill of Rights Act, also requires districts cede to parents in decisions regarding their children. On Aug. 17, the states Board of Education (BOE) agreed the Alachua and Broward school boards violated DeSantis order and HB 1059 by imposing mask mandates and should be docked state funding the equivalent of school board/administrator salaries. In addition, some officials could be removed from posts. However, emboldened by support from President Joe Bidens administration, the number of school boards defying DeSantis since the trial began has doubled with the Orange County School Board Tuesday becoming the 10th. As of Wednesday, nearly half of Floridas 2.9 million K-12 students were attending schools that require masks despite the governors and BOEs threats. During the first two days before Cooper, both sides made their cases with former Leon County Judge Charles Dodson representing the plaintiffs and Michael Abel serving as state attorney. Story continues On Monday, Dodson said the Florida Constitution and gives local school boards the authority in health and safety matters affecting students and that COVID-19s delta variant affects children more than previous strains. He cited guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) and the 7,000-member American Academy of Pediatrics that schools require masks be worn by all. On Tuesday, DeSantis defended his policy, reiterating, We believe that parents can make decisions about their childs health and safety. The governor testified that studies show masks are ineffective in slowing COVID-19i transmission. There is zero controversy about the data, but it was almost as if that data didnt exist, he said. Dr. Jay Battacharya, a Stanford University medical researcher who has been among DeSantis advisers since last spring, testified for the state Tuesday and Wednesday. "Certainly, there is no high-quality evidence to support the assertion that mask stops the disease from spreading," Bhattacharya said. "Sometimes, you'll hear about people saying, 'My mask protects you even if it doesn't protect me.' I'll say there is no randomized evidence in the literature, at all, that supports that notion." Dodson Wednesday concluded by arguing Floridas Constitution prohibits the governor and BOE from legally banning school masks, citing a that stipulates local boards shall operate and supervise the schools. Dodson retired in January after serving 12 years in Leon County court. Last August, he ruled Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcorans order requiring schools reopen and offer the full panoply of services or lose state funding was unconstitutional. Dodson directed local school districts be given authority to open or close schools based on local conditions. That order was stayed by the 1st District Court of Appeals (DCA). Washington Examiner Videos Tags: States, News, Florida, Judge, Ron DeSantis, Coronavirus Original Author: John Haughey, The Center Square Original Location: Florida judge to rule on challenges to DeSantis mask mandate ban Richard Grenell, President Donald Trump's former acting director of national intelligence, called for airstrikes in Afghanistan on Thursday after the deadly explosions at Kabul's airport. The twin explosions killed at least a dozen people and wounded many more. Four American service members were killed, according to multiple reports that cited U.S. officials. "Get out. No more. They've had their help for 20 years," Grenell tweeted. "We must now use technology and airstrikes to protect us against threats to U.S. national security." CLICK HERE FOR THE LATEST ON THE AFGHANISTAN CRISIS This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. U.S. officials said the first explosion was a suicide attack, but they have yet to confirm the nature of the second bombing. Politicians must be held accountable for the crisis in Afghanistan, Grenell added. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER "Our military have done a great job protecting us," he said. "They are heroes. The politicians made a mess." Washington Examiner Videos Tags: News, Afghanistan, War in Afghanistan, Bombing, Richard Grenell, National Security, Foreign Policy Original Author: Luke Gentile Original Location: Former Trump intelligence chief Richard Grenell calls for airstrikes in Afghanistan KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike IS. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. U.S. officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. Story continues One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airports perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. Even so, the airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people away.. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. ___ Faiez reported from Istanbul, Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. People evacuate Kabul airport. Fatimah Hossaini The US will continue to evacuate Americans and allies despite multiple deadly bombings outside the Kabul airport. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of the US Central Command, said the US will continue its mission. "The plan is designed to operate under stress and under attack," he told reporters on Thursday. See more stories on Insider's business page. The US will continue to evacuate Americans and allies despite multiple deadly bombings outside the Kabul airport, Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of the US Central Command, said at a press conference on Thursday afternoon. "We're continuing to execute the mission. Our mission is to evacuate US citizens, third-country nationals, special immigrant Visa holders, US embassy staff, and Afghans at risk. Despite this attack, we are continuing this mission," he said. "To do anything less - especially now - would dishonor the purpose and sacrifice these men and women have rendered our country and the people of Afghanistan." McKenzie said US troops are continuing to bring people onto the airfield and will keep processing and evacuating people through the original military withdrawal date of August 31. "The plan is designed to operate under stress and under attack," he said. "And we will coordinate to make sure it's safe for American citizens to come to the airfield. If it's not, we'll tell them to hold and work other ways to get them to the airport. We'll continue to flow them out until the end of the month." He added: "ISIS will not deter us from accomplishing that mission." At least 12 US service members and at least 60 Afghans were killed in dual attacks on Thursday at Hamid Karzai International Airport, where crowds of people had gathered, desperate to evacuate Afghanistan since the Taliban took over. Fifteen additional US service members were injured and at least 140 Afghans were injured in the explosions, according to Afghan officials. The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the deadly blasts in a Thursday statement. Story continues McKenzie said the threat from ISIS remains "extremely real" and he expects attacks against US troops and Afghans will continue. President Joe Biden's decision to pull all US forces out of Afghanistan by the end of the month has been broadly criticized by both Democratic and Republican lawmakers. Rep. Adam Schiff, a California Democrat who chairs the House Intelligence Committee, has insisted that the military should stay in the country "as long as is necessary to get all US persons out, and to meet our moral and ethical obligation to our Afghan partners." Read the original article on Business Insider Men stand behind barbed wire fencing at the Kabul airport. SHAKIB RAHMANI/AFP via Getty Several European countries, Canada, and New Zealand finished their evacuations from Afghanistan. American forces are scrambling to finish the US evacuation before the August 31 deadline. At least 95 Afghans and 13 US troops were killed in blasts near Kabul airport on Thursday. See more stories on Insider's business page. Spain, New Zealand, and Australia are the latest countries to finish their evacuation mission from Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, CNN reported Friday. Germany and Canada finished evacuations Thursday, and Poland and Belgium wrapped up on Wednesday, Reuters and the Associated Press reported. General Wayne Eyre, Canada's acting chief of defense staff, said allied countries have to leave before the US can finish its evacuations, the report said, and that military flights evacuated around 3,700 people. "I have received emails from people that I worked with during my tours in Afghanistan who are desperate to get out or get their families out," he told the AP. "Their pleas and the photos of the families in terrible situations that accompany many of them are heart wrenching. They tear at our souls." The Czech Republic ended its evacuation mission last week. "We cannot risk the lives of our diplomats and of our soldiers any longer," Marcin Przydacz, a Polish deputy foreign minister, told the AP. Some countries are still racing against the clock to wrap up their evacuation efforts. Italy's Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said its evacuation mission will end on Friday, according to CNN. France will likely end its evacuation ahead of the US, according to a government official quoted in the AP report. "Due to extreme tension on the ground ... and the scheduled departure of American forces, these evacuations are a true race against time," government spokesman Gabriel Attal told the AP. The US and UK are still scrambling to evacuate citizens and allies as the August 31 deadline to leave the country looms, and the threats to people outside the airport increase. UK defense secretary Ben Wallace said they would likely finish on Friday, according to CNN. Explosions outside the Kabul airport on Thursday killed at least 13 US service members and nearly 100 Afghans. The explosion occurred outside Abbey Gate, where many people have crowded daily trying to get into the airport to get out of Afghanistan. Read the original article on Business Insider BERLIN (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel has cancelled her planned trip to Israel on Aug. 28-30 due to the tense situation in Afghanistan, a government spokesperson said on Thursday. "Both sides agree that the chancellor's visit will be arranged at a later date, the spokesperson said. (Reporting by Kirsti Knolle, editing by Emma Thomasson) Aug. 26Air Force units stationed in Hawaii are supporting what the White House today called "one of the largest airlifts in world history, " with U.S. military and coalition flights out of Kabul airport in Afghanistan relocating approximately 88, 000 people since the end of July. A C-17 Globemaster III cargo carrier aircrew made up of 15th Wing active-duty at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam and 154th Wing Hawaii Air National Guard airmen "have assisted multiple missions from Ramstein Air Base, Germany, " Pacific Air Forces said. U.S. defense officials previously noted the need for additional aircrews to keep a large fleet of C-17s flying into and out of Kabul airport. Approximately 19, 000 people were evacuated from Kabul over a period of 24 hours ending early this morning, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said today. "This is the result of 42 U.S. military flights which carried approximately 11, 200 evacuees, and 48 coalition flights which carried 7, 800 people, for a total of 90 flights out of Kabul, " Psaki said, noting there was a flight about every 39 minutes. The 42 U.S. military aircraft included 37 C-17s and five C-130s. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said "north of 4, 400 " Americans have been evacuated, with about 5, 400 of 5, 800 U.S. troops still at the airport. Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor, deputy director of the Joint Staff for regional operations, said today that there are more than 10, 000 people at the airport awaiting departure. Air Force Gen. Tod Wolters, commander of U.S. European Command and NATO's supreme Allied commander Europe, said 55 flights have been received at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, with 5, 783 evacuees "on deck " there. Three flights went into Naval Air Station Sigonella in Italy with 662 evacuees. On Monday, the first set of flights departed Ramstein for the continental United States and to date, a total of 1, 605 evacuees have made the trip, he said. Story continues "And at this time, we've had zero security incidents. And a security incident is defined when we witness an evacuee exhibit malign behavior and we have to put that evacuee in a holding cell. We have had no incidents, " Wolters said. Wolters added that "we want to screen for COVID in all levels. And once the evacuees arrive, we have a medical screening segment." Over 7, 000 evacuees have been processed and just under 100 needed "to go to an additional tent " after they were initially medically screened, he said. Less than 25 needed additional medical treatment at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, he said. (Getty Images/iStockphoto) An Indiana tourist was attacked on Monday by a grizzly bear in Alaskas Denali National Park, but managed to walk away after deploying pepper spray. The unnamed man survived the attack from a mother grizzly bear, who had one or two cubs nearby. The bear charged the hiker, who received puncture wounds to his calf, left ribs, and left shoulder, but managed to walk 1.5 miles to the Eielson Visitor Centre, where he and was picked up by a bus. Park rangers received a 911 call from the transit bus driver, as the man got first aid from medical professionals who were holidaying in the park and riding the bus. The man was picked up by an ambulance and transported to Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, where he remains in a stable condition. The man was hiking alone through dense fog when he was charged at by the grizzly, which knocked him down before he was able to use his bear spray. Due to the apparent defensive nature of this attack, there are no plans to locate the bear involved, the NPS said in a statement. Female bears with cubs are naturally defensive of their young, especially when surprised. There is no indication that this bear is unusually dangerous. Backcountry travel around the area has been suspended for one week in Denali National Park. An estimated 300350 grizzlies roam the north side of the Alaska Range, where salmon supplies are rich. Most bears will avoid humans if they hear them coming, states the National Park Service (NPS). Hikers should make their presence known on trails, by carrying a bell and travelling in larger groups where possible. According to NPS advice, if a grizzly bear clacks its teeth, stick out its lips or huffs, its a warning you are too close. Try not to make sudden movements if you are confronted with a grizzly bear. A defensive bear will keep its head low, while a bear on the attack will keep its head high and its ears erect, if its the latter you should fight back. Bears may bluff their way out of an encounter by charging and then turning away at the last second, says NPS advice. Story continues Talk to any bear you are confronted with in low tones and use pepper spray if the bear gets close enough when charging, states advice. Play dead if you are being attacked by a grizzly bear (not a black bear) and have no weapon but dont play dead until the bear is right upon you. Wait until the bear leaves for several minutes after an attack, before you try to move from the area. Read More Trump says executive privilege will protect phone records but FBI veteran disagrees Capitol police officers sue Donald Trump and his allies over riot Biden in Situation Room as Pentagon confirms US casualties in Kabul airport explosion As officials in Broward County, Florida, approached the 2021-2022 school year, they did so with a measure of optimism. According to School Board Chair Rosalind Osgood, educators and district leaders had a lot of hope about moving our students back into face-to-face school environments in their loving school families and communities where we could love and support each other and help each other academically, where we could provide the mental health support that we need. We attempted to do that, and all hell broke loose. Dr. Osgood was recounting what its been like to be on the front lines of the COVID-19 mask wars in the past few weeks. Protesters have burned masks outside a school board meeting. Others have videotaped students going into schools wearing masks. And through it all, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has berated local school officials for passing mask mandates for students and threatened to withhold funding for districts with such laws. It has been horrific for board members, she said. Dr. Osgood was one of several school leaders who joined a panel discussion on Thursday co-sponsored by The 74 and the Progressive Policy Institute that examined the question of how to restart education safely despite the ongoing threat of COVID-19. What is happening is something that is immoral and unacceptable, she said of the ways that Gov. DeSantis and others have politicized what should be a public health issue. There is absolutely no conscience for the lives of human beings. As school board members we are people; we are human beings; were living every day with people dying, people being impacted with COVID-19 and people being left with life-long implications. Related: Waiting for Someone Else to Blink: Next Move DeSantis as Florida Districts Refuse to Rescind Mask Mandates Dallas School Superintendent Michael Hinojosa has been fighting a similar battle in his state with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. He too described a sense of optimism as recently as June, as the 2020-2021 school year came to a close. By that time, the daily count of new COVID cases in Dallas County had fallen to 100 per day. Story continues But with the dawn of the new school year, almost immediately, we started seeing the cases go up, up, up, up. Dr. Hinojosa said it was time for bold steps. But there was one problem: In May, Gov. Abbott had issued an executive order forbidding school districts to impose mask mandates. Dr. Hinojosa said he concluded that the order was not enforceable and started consulting with leaders of other urban school districts. We had a call with all the urban superintendents and the same was happening in every urban county in Texas, when all the people are so close together. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Then I asked my team to give me a plan that I was going to execute within 24 hours and challenge the Governor, Dr. Hinojosa said. We challenged the Governor, and now 60 school districts in the state of Texas have joined us in defying the Governor. The battle over whether students should be forced to wear masks is hardly over. Gov. Abbott and his administration has sought to overturn mandates imposed in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and other cities. So far, lower courts have generally upheld the local school districts, while the state Supreme Court has sided with the Governor. (All eight of the high courts current justices are Republicans, as is Gov. Abbott.) In fact, shortly before Dr. Hinojosa spoke to the panel on Thursday he learned that the Supreme Court had sided with Gov. Abbott in blocking the mask mandate in San Antonio. At least for now, the mask mandate in Dr. Hinojosas district stays in place. Maritza Guridy, Northeast Regional Organizer for the National Parents Union, had caustic words for the Governors of Florida and Texas, whom she described as people in power playing games of chess with peoples lives. She added: This is not about infringing on peoples freedoms; this is about keeping children alive, keeping our future citizens safe and away from harm. The Dallas Superintendent and other speakers on the panel spoke forcefully about the need to have children in classrooms and not in remote learning environments. He noted that his district was 95 percent ethnic minority and 90 percent economically disadvantaged. Our parents dont have the option to work from home, he said Our parents are in the service industry; theyre running this beautiful city. He said about half the districts students returned to in-person learning last October. And the once that came back have learned a lot more than the ones that stayed out. Guridy, a mother of six, offered a personal testimonial to the value of in-person learning. My rising second-grader, when she was finally able to go back in school when they started hybrid instruction back in March in Philadelphia, she was able to get on the honor roll just because of that contact, face-to-face, with her teacher. Michael Mandel, chief economic strategist for the Progressive Policy Institute, said that once the pandemic itself is finally under control, governments will need to spend significant money to make up for the vast amounts of learning loss experienced by students during the pandemic, particularly those in disadvantaged communities. He pointed to one study that looked at extending the school year by an extra month, which would cost $75 billion across the nation. That sounds like a lot of money, he acknowledged, but the potential payoff is impressive: $1.2 trillion over the next three decades. Thats equal to about a $16 return for every dollar invested, he said, and when youve got an investment like that, this is a no brainer. Related: Sign up for The 74s newsletter Kankakee County Sheriff Mike Downey, left, and Kankakee Police Chief Robin Passwarer follow a shooting near the Kankakee County Courthouse, Thursday morning, Aug. 26, 2021, in Kankakee, Illinois (AP) Two people are dead and another is injured after an early-morning shooting outside the county courthouse in Kankakee, Illinois. Local police have several suspects in custody, and Kankakee mayor Christopher Curtis called the attack a targeted incident. The scene of the shooting is now secure, according to the Kankakee County Sheriffs Office. We are asking everyone to avoid the area as the investigation continues, the sheriffs office wrote on Facebook on Thursday. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. No officers were injured in the shooting, and none fired their weapons. Kankakee, a city of about 25,000 people 60 miles south of Chicago, has closed city buildings and schools are on lockdown as a precaution. Aerial news footage of the site showed a cluster of police officers in the area, as well as what appears to a large blood stain on the pavement. From our sixth floor window, you could see people scattering and moving away from the Kankakee County Courthouse, Michael Taylor, who owns a newspaper in the area, told ABC 7 Chicago. This is something in my 30 years of journalism, and living in Kankakee County, that Ive never even seen or even heard of anything like this in the area. State and local police were reported on the scene as part of an ongoing investigation into the shooting, which occurred about 100 yards from the courthouse, on its south side, near the facilitys jail. A witness working on the roof of a nearby building told the Kankakee Daily Journal that he saw someone with an AK-47-type gun argue with another individual, armed with what appeared to be a pistol, in the middle of the road near the courthouse, before shooting them multiple times. Another witness said she took pictures of a shooter with a long-barrel-style gun. A press briefing was scheduled for later on Thursday. The Independent has reached out to Kankakee police for more information. There have been at least 452 mass shootings in the US in 2021, according to the Gun Violence Archive, part of more than 26,685 total injures from gun violence across the country. If trends continue, this could be the worst period for school shootings in decades. Busloads of European and Afghan evacuees were harassed by the Taliban and blocked from entering the airport in Kabul on Wednesday, according to a government document obtained by Yahoo News. According to the document, just three of seven buses that had been scheduled to drop off evacuees at Hamid Karzai International Airport were allowed into the airfield on Wednesday after being forced to wait outside for 12 hours. Earlier in the day one of the buses, carrying 21 Bulgarian evacuees, was stopped by Taliban forces, who began taking passengers off the bus and shooting into the air at a roundabout at or near the airports commercial entrance. Taliban fighters at a checkpoint in Kabul. (Khwaja Tawfiq Sediqi/AP) The document, an update from the Department of Homeland Security Office of Intelligence about current and emerging threats, was issued on Thursday and designated law enforcement sensitive. The chaotic encounter between evacuees and the Taliban described in the document took place hours before two deadly explosions killed several people, including 12 U.S. service members and Afghan civilians, outside the airport on Thursday. Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, confirmed the attacks at a press briefing Thursday, telling reporters that a suicide bomb exploded outside one of the main gates at the airport, followed by another bomb in the vicinity of the Baron Hotel, which is near the airport and is frequented by Americans in Kabul. He said that at least 15 other U.S. service members were injured in the attacks, and that a number of Afghan civilians were also killed or wounded. An Afghan official told Associated Press that at least 60 Afghans were killed and 143 others were injured in the attacks. U.S. officials suspect that Islamic State Khorasan (ISIS-K), an Afghanistan and Pakistan affiliate of the ISIS terrorist group and an enemy of the Taliban, is responsible for the attacks. The airport has been the site of an operation by the U.S. military to evacuate tens of thousands of Americans, at-risk Afghans and citizens of allied nations out of Afghanistan following the Talibans takeover of the country less than two weeks ago. U.S. officials had been relying on the Taliban to provide safe passage to the airport for Americans and others seeking to leave the country. Story continues A man is taken for treatment after being wounded at the Kabul airport during the attacks on Thursday. (Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images) Before the bombings, McKenzie said, 104,000 people had been airlifted from the Kabul airport. He said evacuation operations would continue despite the threat of additional attacks, noting that there were currently 5,000 evacuees on the ramp at the airport waiting to be airlifted. Let me be clear: While were saddened by the loss of life, both U.S. and Afghan, were continuing to execute the mission, he said. The U.S. has been racing to evacuate as many people from Afghanistan as possible before Aug. 31, when the last American troops are scheduled to withdraw from the country. Earlier this week, President Biden confirmed that he intends to stick with that withdrawal deadline despite calls to extend, citing the growing threat that ISIS-K poses to U.S. troops. Every day were on the ground is another day we know ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport, Biden said Tuesday. The sooner we can finish, the better. Additional reporting by Jana Winter. ____ Read more from Yahoo News: President Joe Biden's push for more Americans to use electric vehicles is creating angst amongst some Iowa ethanol advocates who argue the single-track goal could come at environmental and economic costs. Why it matters: Electric vehicles create more competition at the gas pump, potentially hurting Iowa farmers' pockets who rely on corn and ethanol sales. But we also need more drastic steps towards slowing climate change. Get market news worthy of your time with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free. Driving the news: This month, Biden released an infrastructure plan that aggressively pushes electric vehicles as a way to cut carbon emissions and boost domestic car and battery manufacturing. It sets a goal that 50% of all new cars sold in 2030 should be zero-emissions models. Yes, but: The plan scarcely mentions biofuels, which has led to criticism from Iowa Republicans and Democrats, as well as ethanol advocates. What they're saying: Ethanol can also help reduce carbon emissions, but not if the federal government undermines it by primarily funding the electric vehicle industry, said Monte Shaw of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association. "Whenever D.C. tries to pick a one-size-fits-all solution ... it doesn't do as good a job of achieving their stated goal as if you allow some competition in the marketplace," Shaw said. Change is happening whether Iowa likes it or not, but liquid fuels still aren't going anywhere, said Matt Russell of Iowa Interfaith Power & Light. But an ethanol vs. electric debate is highly partisan, which leaves no winner at the end, Russell said. Instead, they should coexist like Des Moines' fleet of electric cars and biodiesel dump trunks. Like this article? Get more from Axios and subscribe to Axios Markets for free. Members of ISIS-K stand in front of their weapons as they surrendered to the government in Jalalabad, Nangarhar, Afghanistan on November 17, 2019. Wali Sabawoon/Getty Images ISIS-K claimed responsibility for a deadly attack in Kabul that killed at least 13 US service members. The Taliban and ISIS-K, the Islamic State's Afghanistan affiliate, are sworn enemies. ISIS-K "will attempt to erode the Taliban's governance and attack the Taliban's religious legitimacy on the ground," one expert said. See more stories on Insider's business page. President Joe Biden and his advisors in recent days warned of the potential for an attack by ISIS-K as US troops scrambled to evacuate thousands of people via the Kabul airport. On Thursday, there was a deadly blast outside Hamid Karzai International Airport in Afghanistan's capital city. The Pentagon confirmed that at least 13 US service members were killed in the attack, and at least 18 were wounded. Dozens of Afghans were also killed and wounded. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, head of US Central Command, attributed the fatal explosion to ISIS-K. The terror group also officially claimed responsibility for the blast. "The threat from ISIS is extremely real," McKenzie said during a press conference on Thursday. "We believe it is their desire to continue those attacks, and we expect those attacks to continue." Earlier in the week, Biden said, "Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians." ISIS-K is the Taliban's sworn enemy ISIS-K - the Islamic State in Khorasan Province or ISIS-Khorasan - is the Islamic State's affiliate in Afghanistan. Khorasan is the historic name for the region in Central Asia that includes parts of Afghanistan. The Taliban and ISIS-K are sworn enemies and have been fighting for years. ISIS-K views the Taliban as apostates, and not devout enough in terms of its approach to Islam. The group's leaders denounced the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan, The New York Times reported. Along these lines, ISIS-K has an interest in conducting attacks that would induce chaos, embarrass the Taliban, and make it harder for the militant group to tighten its grip over Afghanistan. Story continues The Taliban's victory "puts significant pressure on ISIS to demonstrate its continued relevance to global jihad, which will make ISIS more dangerous as it attempts to prove the organization's capability and relevance," Jennifer Cafarella, a national security fellow at the Institute for the Study of War, told Insider. "Spectacular attacks in Afghanistan and attempts to conduct such attacks in the West are highly likely in coming weeks and months," Cafarella added. "ISIS will attempt to erode the Taliban's governance and attack the Taliban's religious legitimacy on the ground." Amira Jadoon, an assistant professor at the US Military Academy at West Point, agreed, telling Insider that ISIS-K "will seek to exploit the current volatility in Afghanistan to launch attacks to increase their own political relevance and sow discord." ISIS-K 'remains a potent threat' ISIS-K first emerged in 2015, and staged attacks as early as April of that year. This was less than a year after ISIS took over a large swath of territory in Iraq and Syria, declaring a caliphate (which has since collapsed). "[ISIS-K] has received support from the Islamic State's core leadership in Iraq and Syria since its founding in 2015," per a 2018 report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). As the Islamic State lost territory, it "increasingly turned to Afghanistan as a base for its global caliphate," CSIS said. Militants who left the Taliban (in both Afghanistan and Pakistan) were among the founders of the group. "ISIS had sent representatives to both Pakistan and Afghanistan. They were essentially able to co-opt some disaffected Pakistani Taliban and a few Afghan Taliban [members] to join their cause," Seth Jones, an Afghanistan specialist at CSIS, told NPR. The current leader of ISIS-K is Shahab al-Muhajir, and the group is assessed to have somewhere between 1,500 to 2,000 fighters in Afghanistan, according to a UN report from June. The group has been "forced to decentralize," the UN said, and is primarily made up of cells spread out across the country that act autonomously but share the same ideology. "Despite territorial, leadership, manpower and financial losses during 2020" ISIS-K "continues to pose a threat to both the country and the wider region," the UN report said. The UN said that in the first four months of 2021 alone, ISIS-K conducted 77 attacks in Afghanistan. This marked a significant increase from the same period in 2020, where the number of attacks claimed by or attributed to ISIS-K stood at 21. "ISIS-K has struggled to gain a large foothold in Afghanistan but it remains a potent threat and one of the most important affiliates to the ISIS global organization," Cafarella said. Though ISIS-K experienced "significant declines in its operation capacity" since it first emerged, it "renewed its violence" over the past two years, Jadoon added. "Its underlying sources of strength remain: it has access to a sizeable militant pool for recruitment, porous borders, and an extensive network in Pakistan," she said. "ISIS-K will continue to use the peace deal as propaganda against the Taliban, and may also try to recruit more radical members of the Taliban or other militants who feel marginalized." Read the original article on Business Insider The U.S. military says the Islamic States affiliate in Afghanistan was behind the deadly suicide bombing attacks in Kabul on Thursday that killed numerous U.S. service members, which won't surprise Western intelligence officials or the ruling Taliban. CENTCOM Commander, General Kenneth McKenzie said Thursday afternoon that 12 U.S. service members were killed and 15 more were injured, noting the suicide bombers are "assessed to have been ISIS fighters." The general said he believed the suicide bomber made it through Taliban lines and was at a U.S.-controlled "interface point" when he detonated himself. We believe it is their desire to continue those attacks, and we expect those attacks to continue," McKenzie warned. If we can find out who is associated with this, we will go after them. He said the United States believed ISIS would like to conduct more walk-in suicide attacks, as well as suicide car bombs or rocket attacks. The terror group has claimed responsibility for the attack. 11 MARINES, NAVY MEDIC AMONG DEAD AS KABUL CASUALTIES CLIMB CLICK HERE FOR LATEST ON AFGHANISTAN CRISIS The U.S. has relied upon the Taliban to maintain security checkpoints around the Kabul airport, even amid confirmed reports Americans had been threatened and beaten by Taliban guards when trying to make it to the gates to board planes. The general said they would continue to ask the Taliban to assist with security, saying he hadn't seen evidence the Taliban let the attack occur. The Taliban, the Haqqani Network, and al Qaeda are deeply intertwined in Afghanistan, and the Taliban has integrated Haqqani Network leaders and fighters with al Qaeda links into its command structure. ISIS-K has long clashed with the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan, claiming Taliban rule is illegitimate. Former Pakistani Taliban militants founded ISIS-K in an attempt to recruit Taliban defectors, and it seems to have some connections with the Haqqani Network. The web of relationships and chaos in Kabul could make assessing the full culpability for Thursdays deadly suicide bombings difficult. Story continues President Joe Biden said as recently as Friday there would be consequences for the Taliban if there was an attack on U.S. forces or a disruption of U.S. evacuation operations. Weve made clear to the Taliban that any attack any attack on our forces or disruption of our operations at the airport will be met with a swift and forceful response, Biden said. Were also keeping a close watch on any potential terrorist threat at or around the airport, including from the ISIS affiliates in Afghanistan who were released from prison when the prisons were emptied. And because they are, by the way to make everybody understand that the ISIS in Afghanistan are the have been the sworn enemy of the Taliban. A report from the United Nations in July said one member state estimated ISIS-Ks strength was between 500 and 1,500 fighters, while another assessed that it may rise to as many as 10,000 over the medium term. The report noted ISIS-K was largely underground and clandestine and is led by Shahab Muhajir. The U.N. said one member state contended Muhajir may also have been previously a mid-level commander in the Haqqani Network, and he continues to maintain cooperation with the entity and provides key expertise and access to [attack] networks. The report said some member states have reported tactical or commander-level collaboration between ISIL-K and the Haqqani Network, but others strongly deny such claims. The report said: "Authorized movement of personnel with a tacit understanding that both groups benefit from certain joint venture attacks is also likely, as such attacks project a weakening security situation that undermines public confidence in the Government and clearly benefits both ISIL-K and the Haqqani Network. The UN report warned one member state has suggested that certain attacks can be denied by the Taliban and claimed by ISIL-K, with it being unclear whether these attacks were purely orchestrated by the Haqqani Network, or were joint ventures making use of ISIL-K operatives. ISIS-K conducted dozens of attacks in Afghanistan in 2020 and 2021. The U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan recorded 77 ISIL-K claimed and/or attributed attacks during the first four months of 2021, an increase of just 21 such attacks in the same period in 2020. The lead inspector general for Operation Freedom's Sentinel released a May report warning that ISIS-K was strengthening itself in 2021. "After a string of major defeats and setbacks last year, ISIS-K regained strength this quarter... The group has maintained a steady operational tempo and retains the ability to carry out terrorist attacks in Kabul and other major cities ... ISIS-K has replenished its ranks by appealing to disaffected members of the Taliban, the watchdog's May report said. ISIS expanded into the Khorasan region in 2015, which is thought to include Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and parts of Central Asia. The ISIS-K affiliate was founded by commanders in Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, and its affiliate founders pledged allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2014. Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar Akhund is believed to be the Taliban's top commander, but Haibatullah Akhundzada is considered the "Leader of the Faithful" by the Taliban. Current al Qaeda leader Ayman Zawahiri, Osama bin Ladens second-in-command who took over the group after a U.S. special forces raid killed bin Laden in Pakistan, reportedly swore allegiance to Akhundzada in 2016. Bin Laden pledged allegiance to Taliban founder Mullah Omar. Sirajuddin Haqqani, the deputy emir of the Taliban, also currently leads the day-to-day activities of the Haqqani Network, according to the State Department, which explained that the Haqqani Network is allied with the Afghan Taliban and al Qaeda. The U.S. has designated Sirajuddin as a terrorist. The National Counterterrorism Center said the Haqqanis are considered the most lethal and sophisticated insurgent group targeting U.S., Coalition, and Afghan forces. Members of the Haqqani Network had been put in charge of at least some of Kabul's security. Al Qaeda also maintains a strong presence in Afghanistan, and it has continued its more than two-decade alliance with the Taliban after conducting terrorist attacks that killed 3,000 Americans. A UN report said: The primary component of the Taliban in dealing with Al-Qaeda is the Haqqani Network. Ties between the two groups remain close, based on ideological alignment, relationships forged through common struggle and intermarriage. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Pentagon inspector general Sean ODonnell wrote in February that while the Taliban opposes and actively fights ISIS members in Afghanistan, the Taliban continues to maintain relations with al Qaeda." Washington Examiner Videos Tags: News, ISIS, al Qaeda, Afghanistan, Taliban Original Author: Jerry Dunleavy Original Location: ISIS-K, the terror group that killed US troops in Kabul, and its complicated relationship with the Taliban As desperate Afghans crowd Kabul airport trying to get on any evacuation flights to flee the Taliban, officials have warned of another jihadist threat: the Islamic State group. President Joe Biden said there is "an acute and growing risk" of an attack at the airport by the group's regional chapter, called Islamic State-Khorasan or ISIS-K. The United States, Britain and Australia have told people to leave the area for safer locations. When asked directly about the threat, a Taliban spokesman acknowledged a risk of "nuisances" causing trouble in a chaotic situation they blamed entirely on the US-led evacuation. What is Islamic State-Khorasan? Months after the Islamic State declared a caliphate in Iraq and Syria in 2014, breakaway fighters from the Pakistani Taliban joined militants in Afghanistan to form a regional chapter, pledging allegiance to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The group was formally acknowledged by the central Islamic State leadership the next year as it sunk roots in northeastern Afghanistan, particularly Kunar, Nangarhar and Nuristan provinces. It also managed to set up sleeper cells in other parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan, including Kabul, according to United Nations monitors. Latest estimates of its strength vary from several thousand active fighters to as low as 500, according to a UN Security Council report released last month. "Khorasan" is a historical name for the region, taking in parts of what is today Pakistan, Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia. What kind of attacks has it carried out? The Islamic State's Afghanistan-Pakistan chapter has been responsible for some of the deadliest attacks of recent years. It has massacred civilians in both countries, at mosques, shrines, public squares and even hospitals. The group has especially targeted Muslims from sects it considers heretical, including Shiites. Last year, it was blamed for an attack that shocked the world -- gunmen went on a bloody rampage at a maternity ward in a predominantly Shiite neighbourhood of Kabul, killing 16 mothers and mothers-to-be. Story continues Beyond bombings and massacres, IS-Khorasan has failed to hold any territory in the region, suffering huge losses because of Taliban and US-led military operations. According to UN and US military assessments, after the phase of heavy defeats IS-Khorasan now operates largely through covert cells based in or near cities to carry out high-profile attacks. What is IS-Khorasan's relationship with the Taliban? While both groups are hardline Sunni Islamist militants, there is no love lost between them. They have differed on the minutiae of religion and strategy, while claiming to be the true flag-bearers of jihad. That tussle has led to bloody fighting between the two, with the Taliban emerging largely victorious after 2019 when IS-Khorasan failed to secure territory as its parent group did in the Middle East. In a sign of the enmity between the two jihadist groups, IS statements have referred to the Taliban as apostates. How has IS reacted to the Taliban victory in Afghanistan? Not well. Islamic State had been highly critical of the deal last year between Washington and the Taliban that led to the agreement for withdrawing foreign troops, accusing the latter of abandoning the jihadist cause. Following the Taliban's lightning takeover of Afghanistan, a number of jihadist groups around the world congratulated them -- but not Islamic State. One IS commentary published after the fall of Kabul accused the Taliban of betraying jihadists with the US withdrawal deal and vowed to continue its fight, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors militant communications. What is the threat at Kabul airport? US officials say Kabul airport, with thousands of US-led foreign troops surrounded by huge crowds of desperate Afghans, is under high threat from IS-Khorasan. A flurry of near-identical travel warnings from London, Canberra and Washington late Wednesday urged people gathered in the area to move to safer locations. They have not provided any specific details about the threat. "ISIS-K is a sworn enemy of the Taliban, and they have a history of fighting one another," Biden said Sunday. "But every day we have troops on the ground, these troops and innocent civilians at the airport face the risk of attack from ISIS-K." Some military transports taking off from Kabul airport in recent days have been seen launching flares, which are normally used to attract heat-seeking missiles. bur-qan/fox/mtp JERUSALEM (AP) Israel said that it would be easing commercial restrictions on the Gaza Strip and expand entry of goods to the Palestinian enclave following days of heightened tensions. The announcement came after hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated Wednesday near the Israeli border, calling on Israel to ease a crippling blockade days after a similar gathering ended in deadly clashes with the Israeli army. Hamas kept the crowds from approaching the barrier, and the protests ended without a repeat of Saturdays intense clashes that left one Palestinian dead and an Israeli border policeman critically injured after being shot from point-blank range. The defense ministry body in charge of Israels crossings with the Palestinian territory said in a statement late Wednesday that it would increase imports of new vehicles, goods and equipment for civilian projects in the Gaza Strip, and issue more permits for Gazan businessmen to enter Israel starting Thursday. The easing of restrictions would be conditional upon the continued preservation of the regions security, and could be further expanded if the border situation improves, the body, known as COGAT, said. Hamas officials said Egypt would also be partially reopening its key border crossing with the Gaza Strip Thursday, after closing it in a bid to persuade Hamas, the Islamic militant group ruling the territory, to reimpose calm. Egypt has been trying to broker a long-term cease-fire between the enemy sides since Mays 11-day war that killed around 260 Palestinians and 13 people in Israel. Israel and Hamas have fought four wars and numerous skirmishes since 2007, when the militant group seized power in Gaza in an armed coup following its victory in the Palestinian elections. Israel and Egypt imposed a devastating blockade since Hamas took control, which Israel says is necessary to keep Hamas from rearming. ROME (Reuters) - Afghan forces fired into the air to disperse crowds near Kabul airport on Thursday and not at a departing Italian military transport plane, as originally reported, a government source said, quoting intelligence assessments. Earlier, a defence source in Rome said the C-130 transporter, carrying almost 100 Afghan civilians, had come under fire minutes after take off from Kabul. There was no immediate official comment on the incident. An Italian journalist told Sky TG 24 that she had been aboard the plane along with 98 Afghan civilians when it appeared to be targeted by machine gun fire. "The pilot reacted promptly and implemented manoeuvres to avoid being hit within minutes of taking off from Kabul. There was a bit of panic," said the journalist. Italy is one of a number of countries looking to evacuate thousands of foreigners and Afghans following the collapse of a Western-backed government in Kabul and the arrival of Taliban forces into the city. (Reporting by Angelo Amante; Writing by Crispian Balmer; Editing by Frances Kerry and John Stonestreet) Northampton, MA --News Direct-- CNH Industrial IVECO is committed to sustainability IVECO, a brand of CNH Industrial, just launched its IVECO Ambassador programme which aims to raise awareness of the brands values on different themes. The programme is kicking off with the Sustainability theme, with the first Ambassadors being recognised for their belief in natural gas and contribution to protecting the environment by running their vehicles LNG and bio-LNG. Also linked to Sustainability is IVECOs Plant the Future reforestation project, which aims to highlight IVECOs commitment to CO 2 reduction and the environment. IVECO has launched the IVECO Ambassador programme to give a voice to customers, enthusiasts and partners who share the brands values on different themes, and recognise their actions in these areas. As a pioneer and European market leader in natural gas technology, IVECO has started the programme with the Sustainability theme, aiming to raise the profile of natural gas and highlight the brands commitment to the environment. The first IVECO Ambassadors have been selected for being transporters who share the brands belief in natural gas and contribute to protecting the environment by running IVECO LNG and bio-LNG vehicles in their fleet. Through this project, IVECO aims to give them a voice, as they tell the story of their experience with natural gas and the benefits for their operation. The project is up and running in the markets where natural gas is most widely available, such as Italy, France and the UK. In parallel, IVECO has launched the Plant the Future project as part of its commitment to carbon reduction. It has partnered with reforestation organisations to plant an IVECO international forest, made up of tree planting projects in different countries. In Germany, IVECO will plant a tree for every NEW IVECO S-WAY natural gas and used IVECO Stralis NP sold via the PLANT-MY-TREE reforestation project created to off-set carbon emissions. It aims to plant at least 1,000 trees to compensate for over 1,237 tonnes of CO 2 over the next 99 years. Story continues In Italy, IVECO has partnered with e-commerce platform Treedom, which will plant 300 trees 30 in Italy and the rest in other parts of the world. A number of these trees will be dedicated to the countrys IVECO Ambassadors, who will receive a code that will enable them to choose their tree and where to plant it. In Poland the brand has partnered with Ecobal, an organisation dedicated to forest protection, which will plant 5,000 tree seedlings on a 5-ha site to increase the biodiversity of the area and support compensation of the CO 2 emission. Giandomenico Fioretti, IVECO Head of Alternative Propulsion, commented: At IVECO, we believe that natural gas has a key role to play on the path to zero-carbon transport. In long-haulage, this alternative propulsion technology is the mature solution available today to reduce the environmental impact of the transport sector. This positive impact can be even stronger with biomethane. Today, biomethane accounts for 17% of natural gas used in transport. Its use is set to grow significantly in the coming years, as new fuelling stations come on stream and its benefits become better known. With initiatives such as the IVECO Ambassador programme we want to increase awareness of the advantages of biomethane for transporters. IVECO has pioneered natural gas technology for more than 20 years, spearheading the transition to this sustainable fuel in transport. With more than 45,000 natural gas vehicles sold, it is the European market leader and the first manufacturer to offer a natural gas-powered heavy-duty truck specifically designed for international long-haul missions. The IVECO S-WAY has exceptional autonomy of up to 1,600 km in the LNG version and provides a truly green and profitable solution with best-in-class Total Cost of Ownership. The natural gas distribution network is developing fast, keeping pace with the growth in sales of natural gas-powered vehicles. It currently counts 4,021 refuelling stations according to the NGVA (Natural & bio Gas Vehicle Association). This network can also be used to distribute biomethane, so that a dedicated infrastructure is not necessary to transition to bio-LNG. Currently it is supplied as a blend or under customers order. However, production volumes of biomethane are growing and this sustainable fuel is becoming increasingly available. View additional multimedia and more ESG storytelling from CNH Industrial on 3blmedia.com View source version on newsdirect.com: https://newsdirect.com/news/iveco-launches-projects-to-promote-the-benefits-of-natural-gas-and-its-key-role-in-decarbonizing-transport-677631709 Newport Beach Dr. Grant Robicheaux, and his girlfriend, Cerissa Riley, sit inside a courtroom during a hearing at Orange County Superior Court in Santa Ana on Aug. 19. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times) An Orange County Superior Court judge on Thursday approved a request by state prosecutors to drop a host of rape charges against a Newport Beach surgeon and his girlfriend. Lawyers for Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, who took over the case from the Orange County district attorneys office last year, plan to focus their case around two women who say they were attacked in 2016 and 2017, according to court records. Orange County Superior Court Judge Frank Ospino's ruling is the latest twist in a case that's been mired in controversy since it began in 2018 when then-Orange County Dist. Atty. Tony Rackauckas painted Grant Robicheaux, 40, and Cerissa Riley, 34, as sexual predators who used their good looks to prey on vulnerable women, drug them and take them back to their Newport Beach home to sexually assault them. "Amendments to charging documents are routine and mundane," Ospino said as he delivered his ruling. "There is nothing mystical, magical or rare about this. What makes it different in this case is frankly the tortured history of the case." Robicheaux was originally charged with sexually assaulting seven women. Riley, a former schoolteacher, was originally charged with five assaults. The couple have denied any nonconsensual sex. Last month, an Orange County Superior Court judge dismissed charges related to allegations lodged by two of the seven women after they told prosecutors they had been dragged through the mud by the district attorneys office and no longer wanted to participate in the case. The couple now faces felony charges of kidnapping, assault with intent to commit a sex offense and administering a drug to facilitate rape related to two alleged assaults, one in October 2016 and one in April 2017, court records show. One woman met Robicheaux and Riley in 2016 while she was out with her roommate in Newport Beach, prosecutors say. The woman woke up topless in Robicheaux's home and screamed for help, which prompted neighbors to call 911, according to court documents. Story continues The following year, Robicheaux who had begun talking with another woman in her early 20s on a popular dating app agreed to meet the woman in person at a Newport Beach eatery, court records show. Riley showed up at the April 2017 meeting and posed as a friend. They went to a bar where prosecutors allege the womans drinks were drugged. Authorities say the woman woke up in the couples home and ran to the bathroom, where she locked herself inside until the next morning. Riley faces a separate charge of furnishing cocaine to the woman in the 2017 incident. Robicheaux faces felony charges based on allegations that he poisoned the same woman's food or drink and gave her PCP. He is also charged with possession of mushrooms, ecstasy and GHB all misdemeanors and two felony charges for possession of assault weapons that were discovered during a search of his home in 2018, according to court records. The defendants have pleaded not guilty to all charges and have denied any wrongdoing. Defense attorney Philip Cohen, who represents Robicheaux, said that while he did not object to the amended charges, he plans to seek a complete dismissal of the case for outrageous government conduct. "The way this has been handled from Day One ... is outrageous," Cohen said. "I truly believe that all fairness that Grant and Cerissa were entitled to went out the door long ago, and I truly believe an outrageous government conduct dismissal is appropriate." Prosecutors from the attorney generals office announced in May that they wanted to focus the case on just one woman. At the time, they said they didnt have enough evidence to prove allegations beyond a reasonable doubt related to the other women who have accused the couple. Since then, an attorney representing the woman in the alleged 2016 attack told prosecutors about a cellphone that contained potential evidence that could corroborate the woman's claims. Prosecutors reconsidered dismissing the charges after those discussions, attorneys said. The case, which Deputy Atty. Gen. Yvette Martinez has called a "political firestorm," has faced a series of delays since charges were first filed against the couple nearly three years ago. After beating Rackauckas in a contentious race for Orange County district attorney, Todd Spitzer sent a letter to the California attorney general asking the state office to take over prosecution of the case, which was discussed extensively during the D.A. campaign. After the state declined, Spitzer assigned two deputy district attorneys to conduct a review of all the evidence. The unusual move came after a prosecutor pointed out serious proof problems with the case, Spitzer said at the time. Over three months, prosecutors looked at thousands of photographs and videos that had been taken from the couples computers, hundreds of hours of audio recordings, thousands of pages of documents and tens of thousands of text messages between Robicheaux and Riley spanning a four-year period. Ultimately, they determined there was insufficient evidence to prosecute. Spitzer, who had accused his predecessor of overreaching in the case to bolster his reelection campaign, sought to dismiss all charges against the couple. The request, however, was denied last year by Orange County Superior Court Judge Gregory Jones. Instead, Jones removed the district attorneys office from the case and ordered it be turned over to the state attorney generals office. During a hearing last week, a woman who alleges that Robicheaux raped her in 2009, pleaded with the judge not to dismiss charges related to her assault. This case is a complete travesty, she said. Ive already begged a judge not to dismiss my case, and here I am again. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times. Reuters Videos LOCATION: Paris, FranceThis dinosaur skeleton is going under the hammerIt's expected to fetch up to $1.77 million'Big John' is the largest triceratops dinosaurever discovered by paleontologistsNAME: Alexandre Giquello, Drouot Auction House Auctioneer:"Prices are dictated by the market and by its pace. There are very few sales and very few buyers. I imagine that there are about 10 buyers worldwide for this kind of piece. On the contrary, for paintings, there are a lot of potential buyers. Here there are only a few buyers so the prices get more refined as sales go about, but it's still very hard to make estimations."'Big John' roamed the lands of South Dakotamore than 66 million years agoHe's named after the owner of the land where his remains were found House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), addresses a news conference about Afghanistan at the Capitol in Washington on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021, after a briefing by Biden administration officials on the situation in Afghanistan. (Sarahbeth Maney/The New York Times) WASHINGTON The Republican Party is united in its criticism of President Joe Bidens chaotic military withdrawal from Afghanistan. But the crisis has also exposed a deep internal divide between party leaders over relocating Afghan refugees at home. Many Republican lawmakers have accused Biden of abandoning the Afghan interpreters and guides who helped the United States during two decades of war, leaving thousands of people in limbo in a country now controlled by the Taliban. But others including former President Donald Trump and Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the minority leader have sought to fold the issue of Afghan refugees into the anti-immigrant stance of the partys far right. They are criticizing Biden not simply for leaving the Afghans behind, but for opening the United States up to what they characterized as dangerous foreigners. Sign up for The Morning newsletter from the New York Times Well have terrorists coming across the border, McCarthy said last week on a call with a group of bipartisan House members, according to two people who were on the call, where he railed against the Biden administrations handling of the withdrawal. He also brought up the issue of migrants entering the country along the U.S.-Mexico border in his discussion of Afghans being evacuated. In fact, the Afghan evacuees fleeing the Talibans return are subject to extensive background checks by intelligence officials to receive Special Immigrant Visas, a lengthy and complex process available to those who face threats because of work for the U.S. government. In the past, it has taken years for applications to be processed. In a statement Tuesday, Trump suggested, without evidence, that unvetted Afghans were boarding military flights and that an unknown number of terrorists had already been airlifted out of Afghanistan. The former president has also criticized the evacuation of vetted Afghans from Kabul, arguing that military planes should have been full of Americans. Story continues The unusual split is pitting traditional conservatives, who are more inclined to defend those who have sacrificed for America, against the anti-immigrant, anti-refugee wing of the party. And it is a fresh test of Trumps power to make Republican leaders fall in line behind him. The core divide within the Republican Party, post-Trump, is on immigration, said Frank Luntz, the Republican pollster. The Republican Party used to be the party of immigration, and Trump changed all of that. The debate highlights the larger ideological divide within the party between America First isolationists like Trump and Republicans who believe maintaining strong alliances and U.S. influence abroad benefits the countrys security. For now, the faction of the Republican Party that supports helping Afghan translators and refugees resettle in the United States is larger than the one warning of any potential dangers that could accompany their resettlement. A recent CBS News/YouGov poll found that 76% of Republicans, and 79% of independents, supported efforts to bring Afghans who have helped the U.S. here. And in two focus groups of Trump voters conducted last week in Georgia and Wyoming by Sarah Longwell, an anti-Trump Republican strategist, the vast majority said that we should be taking the interpreters and refugees, with some caveats about proper vetting, Longwell said. She attributed that feeling to a level of patriotism that is lacking when those voters look at migrants crossing the Southern border. At a gut level, these are people who fought with us in a war, Longwell said. On the issue of Afghan refugees, McCarthy has walked the same tightrope that he has on other issues, trying to appease the two sides of the party. He has stated publicly that we owe it to these people, who are our friends and who worked with us, to get them out safely if we can. But he has also leaned into the nativist, Trumpian side, giving voice to the generalized, inchoate fears about foreigners entering the country. Traditionally, evangelical groups and Christian charities that wield influence on the right have supported refugee resettlement, prompting elected leaders who are dependent on their support to follow suit. But other lawmakers have echoed the fear and anger McCarthy expressed on the bipartisan call. Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Mont., warned that once Afghans are resettled in the U.S., they could bring additional people. The chaos were seeing is not an excuse to flood our country with refugees from Afghanistan, said Rosendale, who is running for reelection. And Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., criticized her states Republican governor for saying he was open to the states accepting refugees. Will this bring chain migration too? she asked on Twitter, referring to family-based immigration. How much will it cost GA taxpayers in Gov assistance? Last month, the House passed a bill to distribute an additional 8,000 visas for translators. Greene voted against the bill along with other Republicans, including Reps. Andy Biggs of Arizona, Lauren Boebert of Colorado and Mo Brooks of Alabama. Anti-refugee policies have been at the core of Trumps nativist appeal since he entered the political arena in 2015 warning that Mexican rapists were going to bring drugs and crime into the country. Trump and his allies supported a travel ban, which suspended immigrant and nonimmigrant visas to applicants from seven countries, five of which had Muslim majorities. Their rallying cry was the construction of a wall along the Southern border to keep migrants out. And they barred the entry of Syrian refugees into the United States. But some Republicans who in the past have fallen in line with Trumps immigration policies are finding themselves on the other side of the Afghan refugee debate. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., a onetime moderate who was elected to her partys No. 3 House post after winning Trumps endorsement, signed a letter alongside progressive Democrats calling on Biden to commit to saving Afghan allies. Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., released a statement expressing concern for the Afghan allies being harassed and abused by the Taliban. President Biden should commit to staying in Afghanistan until we have rescued every American citizen and those Afghans who risked their lives for American troops, said Cotton, an Army veteran who served in Afghanistan and Iraq. And Alyssa Farah, the former communications director in the Trump White House, said helping Afghans who served alongside U.S. forces was a moral imperative. To those on the right suggesting they arent vetted and we shouldnt be willing to take them in: they were vetted enough to be co-located with U.S. forces and to put their lives on the line to help them, Farah said. Those opposing relocating refugees to the U.S. are egregiously misreading public sentiment, especially within the Christian community in the U.S. Stephen Miller, a former policy adviser to Trump known for hard-right immigration policies, dismissed the split and said he believed his party would ultimately coalesce around opposition to letting Afghans resettle in large numbers across the country. Theres an enormous amount of agreement among conservatives that there is no desire among the American public at all for a large-scale resettlement of generalized refugees, he said. With right-wing hosts on Fox News like Laura Ingraham and Tucker Carlson aligning with the anti-refugee wing of the party, Longwell, the Republican strategist, said that the open question was whether Republican sentiment that America was morally obligated to help Afghan allies diminishes after two weeks. Is it really our responsibility to welcome thousands of potentially unvetted refugees from Afghanistan? Ingraham said on her prime-time cable news show last week. Some Democrats have noticed the fissure among Republicans who have typically fallen in line behind Trump and are hopeful it could be a sign that the former presidents grip on the party has diminished. I have members from the progressive left of the Democratic Party all the way to the most hawkish, all agreeing we need to get vulnerable Afghans out, said Rep. Tom Malinowski, D-N.J., who served as an assistant secretary of state during the Obama administration. Malinowski has been pressing the White House to commit to keeping troops in Kabul until all Americans and Afghan allies are safely evacuated. Maybe its an opportunity for some of my friends on the other side to make the GOP the party of Reagan, not Trump, when it comes to refugees, he said. Other Democrats said it was unrealistic to expect Republicans to break from Trumps grip. They will toe the line and parrot Trumps nativism, said Philippe Reines, a former adviser to Hillary Clinton at the State Department. When he preaches Afghanistan didnt send its best, his whole temple will say amen. For now, the GOP remains united in capitalizing on Bidens first major foreign policy crisis as a way to chip away at the standing of a president who ran on competence. The America First Policy Institute, a group formed by former top officials in the Trump administration, has already run online ads replaying some of the footage of chaos at the Kabul airport, contrasting it with Bidens promise that there would be no circumstance where youre going to see people being lifted off the roof of an embassy of the United States from Afghanistan. 2021 The New York Times Company Twin explosions ripped through the area surrounding Kabuls Hamid Karzai Airport, killing at least twelve and injuring at least 15 American troops, and disrupting the weeks-long, last-ditch evacuation effort underway nearby, the Pentagon confirmed during a Thursday afternoon briefing. One suicide bomber detonated an improvised explosive device Thursday morning just outside the airports Abbey Gate, where thousands of Afghans had massed to await evacuation, while a second suicide bomber struck shortly thereafter outside the Baron Hotel, a popular waiting point for Afghans and Americans seeking access to the airport in recent days. The Pentagon believes both explosions were carried out by ISIS, Marine General Kenneth McKenzie, commander of the U.S. Central Command, said during the briefing. ISIS subsequently claimed responsibility for at least one of the bombings. McKenzie added that he doesnt believe the Taliban allowed or orchestrated the attack, and said that the military has been sharing information with the Taliban, which has resulted in some attacks being thwarted. The death toll is the second highest for any single day of the 20-year war and the troops killed Thursday were the first Americans killed in Afghanistan since February 2020. The exact number of casualties from both blasts remains unclear but the figures may be as high as 40 dead and 120 wounded, according to hospital workers who spoke to the New York Times. McKenzie said he did not yet know what the bombs were made of or how powerful they were. Evacuations were continuing at the airport despite the attacks, according to the Pentagon, though it is unclear whether would-be evacuees were being allowed through the surrounding gates. The Taliban condemned the attacks in a Thursday morning statement but suggested that the U.S. should have prevented them, saying they occurred in an area where the U.S. is responsible. The airport chaos comes one week after President Biden said that his administration had made clear to the Taliban that any attack on U.S. forces at the airport would be met with a swift and forceful response. Story continues The British military warned hours before the blast that an attack on the airport was imminent and the State Department issued an alert warning Americans not to travel to the airport due to the threats. McKenzie acknowledged during the briefing that the attack was expected, saying we thought this would happen sooner or later. A number of U.S. allies subsequently announced that they were halting evacuation flights out of Kabul due to security concerns. Thousands of Afghan allies and European citizens remain in Kabul, looking for a way out. Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced Wednesday that some 1,500 Americans remain in Afghanistan but said that less than 1,000 of them were actively seeking to leave. More from National Review Shuler said the AFL-CIO wants to see the PRO Act passed in its entirety, but is open to other strategies that may be more piecemeal. (Photo: Seb Daly via Getty Images) The executive council of the AFL-CIO held a special meeting last week to name their next leader, following the death of the labor federations longtime president, Richard Trumka. For the first time in the organizations history, they chose a woman. Liz Shuler, 51, had served as the federations second-in-command under Trumka since they were elected together in 2009. Despite the sad and unusual circumstances of the succession Trumka died on Aug. 5 of a heart attack, at age 72 Shuler said assuming the presidency marked a historic moment for women in the labor movement. I am extremely humbled by it, she said in an interview. We are a movement of women. We are finally stepping into the leadership positions, and really bringing the voices and hopes and dreams of women in our movement into the decision-making roles. Shuler takes the reins at a critical time. The AFL-CIO is not a union but a league of 56 of them, responsible for advancing the interests of member unions and the labor movement as a whole. With Joe Biden in the White House and Democrats holding threadbare control of Congress, unions have an invaluable but probably short window to accomplish big legislative goals, like passing an infrastructure package and landmark labor law reforms. Meanwhile, union membership is still hovering near a historic low, with a mere 6.3% of private-sector workers belonging to a union, despite Americans increasingly favorable view of organized labor. I spent my formative years basically in an all-male environment. Its a school of hard knocks. You have to toughen up." Shuler said her predecessor was at the top of his game when he died. Trumka was close with the Biden White House and had probably achieved his maximum political influence. But Shulers backers say the last 12 years have prepared her for the top role at the federation, and they see her bringing stability at a turbulent time. Shes been a loyal second to Rich, so you dont always see her leadership abilities because shes been in the background a lot, said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, one of the federations largest unions. But any of us who know her have a lot of confidence in her. She has become really respected among many of the leaders and she always has our back. Story continues She added, Liz can move the agenda without missing a beat. A major piece of that agenda is overhauling labor law so that its easier for workers to join unions. Democrats in the House have passed a sweeping bill that would accomplish that the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, or PRO Act but the bill does not have enough support in the Senate to overcome a filibuster. Some union officials have advocated for getting whatever pieces of the PRO Act they can through budget reconciliation, a process that could allow Democrats to pass reforms on a party-line vote if all Democratic senators join the effort. Some Democrats think a provision that would create fines against companies for illegal union-busting could pass muster under reconciliation rules. Both unions and Democrats have insisted they want to pass the PRO Act in its entirety, but Shuler said they would have to consider other options, given the political realities. Were going to continue to make the demands but we also have to be creative. We have to work to get every bite at the apple we can find, she said. Were in the first year of an administration, and we have multiple years in front of us of opportunities to reform this law. So were going to pursue both [strategies]. One criticism of Trumkas tenure was that the federation focused too much on advocating for policies on Capitol Hill, rather than trying to rebuild the labor movement through rank-and-file organizing. Asked if she had any regrets about how things had been run at the AFL-CIO over the past 12 years, Shuler said they should have developed a greater culture of experimentation to boost collective bargaining. There is plenty of testing going on within the labor movement these days. One example is the Fight for $15, a union-funded effort to improve pay and working conditions in fast food and other low-wage industries. The campaign, spearheaded by the Service Employees International Union, which is not an AFL-CIO member, has won higher wages for workers around the country but has done so mostly outside of traditional collective bargaining agreements. Shuler said the federation needs to operate on two tracks: trying to pass legislation like the PRO Act, but also looking at new strategies even though they might fail. You have to take risks and experiment. A lot of people are afraid to make those mistakes, youll be criticized, Shuler said. But if youre not making mistakes youre not doing anything. Youre sitting around comfortably. Shuler came up in organized labor through the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, part of the federations building trades wing. While cultures vary from one union to the next, the building trades as a whole still carry a reputation as being unwelcoming to women. Shuler said she worked in a local union that represented mostly power linemen but branched out into organizing clerical workers in the industry, many of them women. I spent my formative years basically in an all-male environment, she said. Its a school of hard knocks. You have to toughen up and be able to push through on your agenda. If theres something you feel strongly about, you gotta get creative because there are those barriers when youre young and female. For some progressives, Shulers closeness with the building trades is a cause for concern. The AFL-CIO can be a fractious enterprise, and the building trades often stand across from the more liberal service-sector unions on contentious issues like how to address climate change. I have been stereotyped my whole life, and I look forward to defying stereotypes. They also wonder where Shuler will come down on progressive priorities like police reform. As In These Times reported, Shuler was part of an AFL-CIO subcommittee that produced a report rejecting calls for the federation to cut ties with police unions following the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Like Trumka, Shuler has advocated for trying to change the culture of police unions rather than separate from them. Shuler told HuffPost that it was wrong to assume she would line up with the building trades amid internal fights over the federations direction. I have been stereotyped my whole life, and I look forward to defying stereotypes, she said. After choosing Shuler to serve out the rest of Trumkas term, the executive council tapped Fred Redmond, a longtime United Steelworkers official, as her replacement. Redmond is the first Black man to serve as the AFL-CIOs secretary-treasurer. The federations vice president is Tefere Gebre, who came to the U.S. as an Ethiopian refugee in the 1980s. The AFL-CIO says the trio comprise the most diverse leadership team the federation has ever had. But leadership could change soon. Top officials are selected at the AFL-CIOs quadrennial convention, where member unions vote for officers on a per-capita basis, meaning the larger unions have more sway. Trumka was slated to step down at the end of this term, and Shuler was expected to run to replace him. She was also expected to be challenged possibly by Sara Nelson, the charismatic president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA. Nelson is beloved by progressives but has rankled many in the building trades with her public support of a Green New Deal. The AFL-CIO delayed its next scheduled convention until June 2022, citing the pandemic. Shuler will enter the confab as an incumbent president, one with a nine-month record to be debated. For now, Shuler said she is focused on getting an infrastructure bill over the finish line, and rallying the federations unions around the new leadership. The federation is the glue. You take 56 different unions, its 56 different perspectives and cultures and opinions, Shuler said. What Ill strive for is to bring as much unity as I can. This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated. Associated Press Defense attorneys for the men charged with killing Ahmaud Arbery wont be allowed to present evidence of the slain Black mans past legal problems when their clients stand trial for murder, a Georgia judge ruled. Gregory and Travis McMichael, a father and son, and their neighbor William Roddie Bryan Jr. are awaiting trial this fall for chasing and killing 25-year-old Arbery last year as he ran in their neighborhood outside coastal Brunswick. Attorneys for the McMichaels wanted the jury to hear about Arberys past run-ins with law enforcement, including two arrests, to cast doubt on prosecutors' contention that he was merely an innocent jogger. (Photo: PeopleImages via Getty Images) For many of us, lipstick is the ultimate bad romance great for the few seconds it takes to shoot a glamorous selfie, but then prone to disappear, flake off or otherwise leave you disappointed. Nothing can smear you, dry you out or let you down quite the way lipstick can. TrinnyWoodallcan relate. The fashion advisor, columnist, former host of What Not to Wear and founder of beauty brand Trinny London still recalls her worst lipstick encounter of the smearing kind. I was wearing a beautiful white dress and needed to do a quick change, she told HuffPost. I had on bright red lipstick, but I forgot all about it and pulled that gorgeous dress over my head. The lipstick left a huge stain all the way down, and I could never get it out. Sigh. Many of us can share similar tales of lipstick woe especially since we started wearing face masks but there is reason for hope, thanks to a bounty of next-gen products that can set you up with all-day lips that still look great. If you feel like life would be easier if you just applied lipstick directly to the rim of your coffee cup and declared defeat, dont give up hope these experts are here to help. Whats in long-lasting lipstick, anyway? For a better understanding of whats really happening when you open up a tube and pucker up, Michelle Wong, the chemistry Ph.D. behind Lab Muffin Beauty Science, explained the science behind the beauty. No-smear lipstick was invented by female chemist Hazel Bishop, founder of cosmetics company Hazel Bishop, Inc., in 1948, Wong said. It became a massive hit immediately after launching in 1950. The formulation used bromo acid dyes to get the lipstick to last, but those dyes caused dryness. The Bishop formulation used lanolin in an attempt to counteract that effect, but lips that looked dried out were still common with those earlier products. . (Photo: Hazel Bishop Company) Modern long-lasting formulations include polymers and solvents to create a more durable film. But thats not always a perfect solution, Wong said. Story continues Long-lasting lipstick films need to stay in place, so theyre more rigid than a comfortable creamy formula, and they contain fewer soft, moisturizing ingredients, she said. The film can also bunch up over time and leave bare patches, as your lips move and as the film interacts with saliva, food and drinks. Lipstick started to veer into the long-lasting territory when silicones started to be popularized in makeup formulas starting in the mid- to late 90s, allowing brands to claim a product could last all day, makeup artist Jamie Dorman told HuffPost. Adding silicones to a formula with waxes and pigments creates a longer-lasting and smoother look and feel, while preventing bleeding into lip lines. Things are different when it comes to liquids. With many liquid long-lasting lipstick formulations, waxes are left out of the formulation, and the product is mostly a mix of silicones and pigments, Dorman said. This makes the product last longer, but it also eliminates those skin-protecting waxes. That can result in chapped, dry lips if youre not intentional about hydrating and moisturizing during lip prep. Pregame like a pro with the right lip prep Makeup artist Kathy Jeung outlined the prep steps that will help you get the best possible appearance and staying power from your long-wear lipstick: Exfoliate. Start with an exfoliating lip scrub that will remove any dry bits of skin. (Wong suggests just buffing your lips with a damp cloth.) Why is this especially important for long-lasting lipstick? Long-wear lip color tends to collect in drier areas, makeup artist Diane da Silva told HuffPost. Exfoliating lips just before application ensures a smoother application that looks fresher, longer. Hydrate. Do this right when you start doing your makeup, so the moisture has time to truly sink in, Jeung said. My favorite lip preparation trick is to apply Blistex lip ointment first, then Lucas Paw Paw ointment over that. Blot. Right before lipstick application, use a tissue to lightly blot excess moisture from lip edges. Pencil. Using a lip pencil will always help lipstick stay on better and will also help guide the ultimate shape for your lips, Jeung said. Another prep tip is to apply a primer before your lip products.Primers are fantastic for moisturizing and smoothing out lips, as well as helping with longer wear, Wong said. Starting with something like a primer can help, and blotting between each application really helps, Woodall advised. For those of you who like to apply setting spray over traditional lipstick, Wong says youre better off looking for a long-lasting lipstick: Setting sprays can help, but theyre not as effective as just using a long-wear lip product in the first place. Woodall also suggested a technique wed never heard before: using one kind of lipstick for the top lip, and a different kind for the bottom lip. Put the lipstick thats slightly drier in texture on the bottom lip, and it will provide a real pop of color, she said. Then put a matching-color lip gloss on the top lip for hydration. Here are some of the products that makeup experts recommended. HuffPost may receive a share from purchases made via links on this page. Prices and availability are subject to change. Skingasm photo credit TK? This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated. Related... By Ben Klayman and Subrat Patnaik (Reuters) -Lordstown Motors Corp's new chief executive said on Thursday his focus will be on making sure the electric vehicle maker successfully rolls out its pickup truck in the face of intense regulatory scrutiny. After that, raising further necessary funds will take care of itself. The Ohio-based startup appointed Daniel Ninivaggi as CEO, handing over the reins to the former employee of investor Carl Icahn, sending shares up as much as 41%, before they later fell back to a 16.5% gain. "Job No. 1 is to make sure we stay on track from a production standpoint," Ninivaggi told Reuters in a telephone interview. "Without that, you can't raise capital." While Lordstown is working to launch the Endurance truck, it will work in parallel on raising further funds, he said, adding he had spoken with a lot of people from his past since he was named CEO, but not yet Icahn. "The financing is going to come when people believe in the product and the production," Ninivaggi said. "If they believe the story and we prove to them that we hit these milestones, I'll have a lot of friends," he added, referring to potential investors. The company's founder and largest shareholder, Steve Burns, resigned as CEO in June following an internal investigation into claims made by short-seller Hindenburg Research. Industry veteran Ninivaggi has also overseen Icahn Enterprises' automotive aftermarket service network and parts distribution businesses. Ninivaggi, who serves as the chairman for autoparts maker Garrett Motion Inc, has also been a director at companies including Motorola Mobility, Navistar International and Hertz Global Holdings. Last month, Lordstown said a hedge fund had committed to purchasing up to $400 million of the startup's shares over a three-year period. Executives said that the firm was exploring other financing options, including debt. Lordstown, which hung an "open for business" sign on its northeastern Ohio plant earlier this month, has struggled with the launch of its Endurance pickup truck. Story continues The company will compete with industry leader Ford Motor Co, which is launching the F-150 Lightning electric pickup next spring. Ninivaggi said demand for electric pickups will outstrip supply for a while, so there will be enough business for both Ford and Lordstown. Lordstown still faces a lot of scrutiny from federal prosecutors in Manhattan and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission related to its merger with a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) and statements it previously made about preorders for its vehicles. Ninivaggi said the probes won't distract from Lordstown's launch efforts and they don't need to be settled prior to the company raising further funding. (Reporting by Subrat Patnaik and Akanksha Rana in Bengaluru, and Ben Klayman in Detroit; Editing by Rashmi Aich and Steve Orlofsky) A homeowner used a machete to fight off a man burglarizing his home early Wednesday, Texas cops say. El Paso police said the homeowner awakened around 4:15 a.m. to glass breaking in his home, according to KTSM. When he went to investigate, he saw a man outside his home with a metal rod breaking windows, the TV station reported. Armed with a machete, the homeowner told the intruder to leave, the El Paso Times reported. When he refused, they got into a fight and the homeowner struck the man in the face with the machete, the newspaper said. The suspect, 22-year-old Carlos Esteban Villaescusa, fled from officers before being apprehended in a neighbors backyard, CBS 4 reported. Police said he also trespassed into a second home on the block and broke a window in another home. Villaescusa was hospitalized with serious wounds, and will be taken to a local jail when he is released, KVIA reported. He faces charges of burglary, evading arrest, criminal mischief and criminal trespassing. Man whips out machete after girlfriend struck and killed while on bike, Texas cops say Armed parents confront machete-wielding woman near childs birthday party, CA cops say Man terrorizes customers with machete at Dollar General store, South Carolina cops say JOHOR BAHRU, Malaysia (Reuters) - As the world scrambles to inoculate people against COVID-19, one store owner in Malaysia is finding his paper vaccines have become popular prayer offering items during a religious festival to honour the deceased. The Hungry Ghost festival, celebrated by Buddhists and Taoists across Southeast Asia, centres on a belief that the spirits of the dead return to Earth during the seventh month of the Chinese Lunar calendar. During this time, people leave out food items for the dead and burn incense and intricate offerings made of paper resembling things the deceased may have wanted. This year, a box set of a syringe and two vaccine vials made of paper are among the fastest-selling items for the festival at Raymond Shieh Siow Leong's religious goods store in the southern Malaysian city of Johor Bahru. "The COVID-19 situation in our country is quite serious and many people passed away before receiving the vaccine. I hope this product can help the deceased to fulfil their dying wish," Shieh said. Shieh said he started making the paper vaccine sets in early August, producing about 30 to 50 sets a day. Each set costs 22.80 ringgit ($5.45) and Shieh said he had sold more than 200 sets so far. "We made this paper vaccine to test the water of the market, but we didn't expect the reaction to be this good. The orders keep coming, and we have to work overtime until late at night to make this product," he said. Malaysia has one of the highest rates of COVID-19 infections and deaths in Southeast Asia with a total caseload of almost 1.6 million and a death toll of 14,818. About 57% of the population has received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. A Muslim-majority country, about 20% of Malaysia's 32 million people practise Buddhism, the second-most prevalent religion. ($1 = 4.1870 ringgit) (Reporting by Lim Huey Teng; Editing by Ana Nicolaci da Costa and Karishma Singh) Former Malian prime minister Soumeylou Boubeye Maiga was arrested on Thursday as part of a corruption investigation, his lawyer Kassoum Tapo said. Maiga, 67, was a close ally of former president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who was overthrown by strongman Colonel Assimi Goita in August 2020. A member of the Supreme Court, who requested anonymity, also told AFP that Maiga had been arrested as part of a judicial investigation into "damage to public assets." He is being questioned in connection with the allegedly fraudulent purchase of a presidential plane in 2014, when Maiga was serving as defence minister. Mali's government auditor investigated the purchase and found that officials had embezzled public money by overbilling for the plane. A senior Malian civil servant, who declined to be named, suggested that many other figures could get caught up in the probe. "This could be the beginning of a big shakeout," he said. Maiga, who also previously served as foreign minister and head of the intelligence service, is believed to be well connected in Mali's security establishment, and has been accused of financing pro-state militias. He was appointed Keita's prime minister in 2017 but resigned in April 2019 over a massacre in the centre of the country that left 160 people dead. Mali has been struggling to contain a jihadist insurgency that first emerged in the north, before spreading to the centre of the country and neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger. Thousands of people have been killed and hundreds of thousands have been displaced in the conflict, crippling an already impoverished country. Army officers led by Goita deposed Keita last year after weeks of protests over his failure to defeat the jihadists and anger over perceived government corruption. sd/thm/lal/eml/ri Variety Joe Rogan, the mega-popular podcaster who has questioned the necessity of the COVID vaccine on his show, revealed to his fans that he was sick from coronavirus and has to postpone a live show. Rogan took to Instagram on Sept. 1 to share a message titled I GOT COVID. My apologies, but we have to [] SEOUL, Aug 26 (Reuters) - North Korea's Supreme People's Assembly (SPA), the isolated state's rubber-stamp parliament, will meet on Sept. 28 to discuss economic policy and other issues, state media reported on Thursday, as the country faces mounting economic crises. On the agenda are "modification and supplementation" of the national economic plan, as well as laws related to city and country development, education and recycling, KCNA news agency reported. The North's parliament rarely meets and usually serves to approve decisions on issues such as governing structures and budgets that have been created by the state's powerful Workers' Party, members of which form the vast majority of the assembly. The decision to convene the parliament came at a plenary meeting of the SPA's standing committee on Tuesday, KCNA said. North Korea's economy suffered its biggest contraction in 23 years in 2020 as it was battered by continued U.N. sanctions, COVID-19 lockdown measures and bad weather, South Korea's central bank has estimated. North Korea has not confirmed any COVID-19 cases, but closed borders and imposed strict prevention measures, seeing the pandemic as a matter of national survival. In June, leader Kim Jong Un said the country faced a "tense" food situation, citing the pandemic and last year's typhoons. This summer has seen another round of damaging storms, raising concerns that the harvest could be affected. (Reporting by Josh Smith; Editing by Christopher Cushing) A Navy SEAL veteran who was on the team that killed Osama bin Laden said it's time to "kill people" and "drop our stupid rules of engagement" after U.S. service members were killed in Kabul on Thursday. The loss of American life is "shameful," and the United States needs to step up and fix the situation, Robert O'Neill said. "It's difficult, but it's not really that hard to do. It's going to be dangerous," O'Neill said after four U.S. service members were confirmed killed. After his interview, eight more were reported dead. "We need to re-establish and expand our footprint what we're doing there. We need to really drop our stupid rules of engagement." 11 MARINES, NAVY MEDIC AMONG DEAD AS KABUL CASUALTIES CLIMB CLICK HERE FOR LATEST ON AFGHANISTAN CRISIS The American military needs to get the word out and be "chaotic," he told Fox Business. They need to "let them know, 'Anyone outside right now with a gun, we're going to kill you,'" he said. "It's time to move, time to kill people, and time to rescue people." These objectives will not be accomplished if Americans try to negotiate with the "terrorists," O'Neill continued. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER "We have American blood on our hands. It's all of us," he said. "We need to get into the fight together. This is one nation we have a common enemy, and just because we don't think we're at war with someone doesn't mean they're not at war with us." Washington Examiner Videos Tags: News, Navy SEALs, Afghanistan, Terrorism, Osama bin Laden, Military Original Author: Luke Gentile Original Location: Navy SEAL who shot bin Laden says it's 'time to kill people' after Kabul terror attacks Vietnam Iraq Afghanistan U.S. military presence in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Credit - Getty Images (3) Once again, we are we seeing Americans being airlifted to safety amidst chaos and defeat, abandoning many of those who helped us. There will be much finger-pointing and political posturing about who is to blame. We can have those conversations. But the question no one is discussing is why for decades successive administrations of both parties continue to involve us in wars that not only we dont win, but that for years we keep on fighting even when we know we cant win and our objectives in those wars are confusing and malleable. If you look back over the history of our war in Afghanistan, it was clear as early as 2002 that we didnt fully understand what we were doing there anymore or how to go about doing it. Yet we remained for nearly 20 more bloody years. Why do we keep doing this? How can we stop? We get into these wars on the recommendations of presidents who are influenced by their staffs, most of whom are selected by the president and share the presidents viewpoint. These come after we are already involved militarily. Before the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, Green Berets were advising the South Vietnamese armed forces, our Air Force was bombing North Vietnamese supply routes in Laos, and our Navy was supporting South Vietnamese raids against the North Vietnamese coastline. Before the October 2002 authorization of the use of force (AUF) in Iraq, we were operating a no fly zone, and had military bases in several neighboring countries, a clear signal we were prepared to use military force if Saddam Hussein didnt behave. A decade before the October 2001 AUF in Afghanistan the CIA had been helping the Taliban fight the Russians and we had supplied them with sophisticated weapons. One month before that resolution, President Bush was openly talking about the war on terror. What debates there were over these AUFs were largely full of jingoism and rah-rah warrior language, the last thing we want when committing our young to their possible deaths. Story continues Most Americans dont seem to care about any of this until, after a series of escalations, the national pain crosses some hard to define threshold and the American people want out. The policy makers usually do not want out. Their reasons range from genuine belief in the wars objectives to self-serving fear of being blamed for failure and the ensuing damage to their political or bureaucratic careers. We often hear about fighting to defend American interests. There are a host of American interests ranging from protecting American citizens abroad to protecting American trade and markets. If were being honest most U.S. foreign policy focuses on the latter. There is nothing wrong with this. They are American interests. They are just not worth killing and dying over, ever. Yes, we need to defend American interests, but with the powerful tools of the Departments of State, Justice, Commerce, the Treasury, and the intelligence services, not those of the Department of Defense. Yes, we need to hunt down terrorists, but terrorists are not trying to destroy the foundation of American democracy; they are generally using terror to try to change U.S. foreign policy by killing innocent people with highly symbolic attacks against such targets as the Twin Towers, the Pentagon and the satiric newspaper Charlie Hebdo, or by making us afraid to use airplanes. These are criminal acts. They are not attempts to overthrow our government. They do not threaten our values; they threaten our lives. By giving terrorists, as we have proclaimed for 20 years, the status of being involved in a war against the U.S., we give them the prestige of warriors, which aids their recruiting and propaganda efforts and builds their morale. Moreover, holding them for years as prisoners of war without trial is a direct violation of American values and our hypocrisy helps fuel their recruiting. Instead, we need to rethink our entire approach to the so called war on terrorism. Terrorists commit criminal acts which should primarily be in the province of international courts and police, such as Interpol, the FBI, and the French Gendarmerie Nationale. These organizations can be greatly aided by organizations such as British MI6, the American CIA, and the French DGSE. Only rarely should they be aided by the judicious use of special military units, such as the SEALS, who are trained and designed to strike and get out. Unleashing the awesome and massive power of the American military should only be done to defend against threats to our democracy and the values and hard-won rights of its citizens. Since World War Two, we have repeatedly used this power unwisely, resulting in a humiliating cycle of wasted lives and money. But there are a wide range of ways to stop this. One way is getting more combat veterans, who have personally experienced wars horrible costs, involved in decision-making, reigning in the corruptive elements of the military-industrial complex, and weeding out people whose careers are more important than whats good for the country. But the best and overriding means of ending this cycle, however, is to get back in touch with what ultimately is worth fighting for. In Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq we sacrificed our young and spent massive amounts of money fighting to build nations that look and think like we do, a. goal that most Americans dont really care about, especially when they dont face getting drafted. In those wars there was no direct threat to Americans that our fundamental values would be taken from us. The reason we lose these wars is that our opponents are fighting for something they care about very much indeed. Read More: American Leaders Made Defeat in Afghanistan Inevitable These rights and values are broadly defined and open to interpretation. There is no hard line about when these rights and values are jeopardized enough to go to war. That is why our founders required that the Congress declare war, not the President, so that Congress can debate and discuss our choices. At best, in our current political balance, just over half of the American electorate has voted for a President and the policy debate about using military force takes place among people who work for and are chosen by the President. The Congress is a broad representation of the American people and therefore has a much better chance of expressing in open debate the wide range of opinion about what is at stake and how scared we should be about it. The debate should range over numerous interpretations and judgements, but then there is a vote. The result of the vote is an unambiguous hard line. What follows then is the strongest military organization in the world doing its Constitutional duty to fight or not fight and members of Congress having to go back to their states and districts to justify and defend their vote in open debate before their electorate. Politicians have sensitive antenna about voter opinion. If the American people decide they want out of a war, the Congress has far more incentive to do so than the Executive. Members of the House face a vote every two years. The President only faces a vote if the decision came in the first half of a two-term presidency. The rights and values that I really care about, and I think Im with a vast majority of Americans, are those clearly articulated in our nations founding documents. I will fight if someone tries to take away from me and those I love the rule of law, trial by jury, the writ of habeas corpus, and a government with nobody above the law. I will fight to preserve government of the people, by the people, and for the people. I will fight to defend the self-evident truths that all people are created equal and have an unalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of individual fulfillment. I will fight to protect those I love from violence. And I will fight to preserve a constitution that has wisely established a balance of power between the three branches government, which we are in danger of losing not from external threat, but from dereliction of duty. We have sent our young to fight espousing these values, but we send them off to countries most Americans couldnt locate on a map, and few really care about. Worse, too many people in power in those countries dont really care about these values either, other than to mouth the rhetoric of American democracy to secure massive amounts of money and materiel, which in turn fuels massive amounts of corruption, both political and societal. In Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan we found ourselves involved in civil wars where the opposing sides were battling for power and control, not American values. In Vietnam we sided with a corrupt post-colonial government dominated by minority Catholics in a majority Buddhist nation. The South Vietnamese government was seen by the North Vietnamese government, not incorrectly, as stooges of the U.S. We saw the North Vietnamese government, not incorrectly, as a totalitarian police state that ruled its people by terror. In Iraq we deposed a dictator who led a totalitarian police state ruling by terror who headed a minority Sunni Muslim government in a majority Shiite country. We put the Shiites in power by stripping the Sunnis of theirs and immediately were caught up in a civil war between the now deposed Sunnis fighting the American-blessed Shiites. In Afghanistan we kicked out the Taliban because we said, not incorrectly, that they were harboring al-Qaeda who had seriously hurt our people and were also horrible and repressive. However, instead of staying focused on eliminating al-Qaida and their leader, Osama bin Laden, we replaced the Taliban government with one riven with corruption and we also exacerbated tension between rival tribes and warlords. We then found ourselves in the middle of yet another civil war when the Taliban returned to fight against the new government. We often hear the old shibboleth that were fighting them abroad, so we wont have to fight them at home. That comes from a time when the only means of projecting power through violence was to invade someone elses country. The last nation that could have credibly invaded our own shores was Japan at the peak of its naval power in 1941 and they wouldnt have gotten off the West Coast. The Taliban and the NVA were never capable of storming the beaches at Santa Monica. Sending in our ground forces to fight them on foreign soil so we wont have to fight them on our own is a specious argument. What threatens America today are nations with long-range missiles that can be launched intercontinentally from bases deep within their own territory or from submarines. We face cyber-attacks. We face possible chemical weapons attacks. We do not face invasion by China, Russia or North Korea. We are way better and far more experienced in amphibious warfare than any of these nations, and we would fail if we tried to invade them. Sending in military forces to establish lasting governments in our own image has been demonstrated as a bad idea three times now. Democracy cant be exported. It has to be home grown over a long time. Those ideals expressed in our founding documents didnt just arrive in America full-blown in 1776; they developed over centuries in England and Western Europe through the sacrifices of brave men and women who suffered terrible torture, were burned alive, and spent decades in filthy prisons to establish them. The U.S. endured one of the bloodiest civil wars in history to affirm them. And even today in the U.S. were still fighting and debating how to uphold these sacred values. Telling nineteen-year-old Marines or paratroopers that they were fighting and losing friends in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan to protect American democracy and American values was seen as bullshit. It is. Protecting American democracy must be a truthful statement, or it will not sustain the morale of those doing the fighting nor the will of the American people to endure the pain of war no matter what the cost and how long the war takes. The last time Congress declared war was June 4, 1942, when we declared war against Romania, Hungary, and Bulgaria, then allies of Nazi Germany. American presidents have gone to war ever since then without Congress fulfilling its Constitutional responsibility. True, Congress has passed authorizations for the use of force. These, however, fall far short of a declaration of war, primarily because of the symbolism of a declaration of war. They also land the decision and the blame for possible failuresquarely with the Presidency. Authorizing someone else to take responsibility for a decision is very different from taking responsibility yourself. However imperfect, an openly debated Declaration of War focused on a threat to our fundamental values is one of our best safeguards against repeating the mistakes we made in Vietnam and then repeated in Iraq and now in Afghanistan. We will continue to repeat those mistakes unless we have open, vigorous, and continuing debates about what we are fighting for and why it matters. Aug. 26NORTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. Ocean State Job Lot, the region's premier discount retail chain with 146 stores throughout the Northeast, is pleased to announce that its recent "Buy-Give-Get" program has resulted in the collection of 30,000 backpacks, all of which are being donated to the children in need, including children of military families, prior to the start of the 2021-2022 school year. As part of the "Buy-Give-Get" program which ran from July 8th through August 2nd, any customer who bought a backpack at OSJL for $15.00 and gave it back to the store as a donation to children in need, got a $15.00 Crazy Deal Gift Card to be used for a future purchase at any Ocean State Job Lot store. The Ocean State Job Lot Charitable Foundation partnered with the New England Patriots Foundation and the USA Veterans Military Support Foundation, both of which collected school supplies through their own networks as part of the program, to distribute the backpacks to children in need, including children of military families, across the region. On August 17th, volunteers from OSJL's stores and Rhode Island-based distribution center and corporate office gathered at Foxborough Terminal near Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, MA to help stuff a portion of the backpacks with donated school supplies. Beginning August 18th, the school supply-stuffed backpacks were distributed to children across New England, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. "The results of our 'Buy-Give-Get' program are a true testament to our customers' generosity and a salute to the military families in our communities," said David Sarlitto, Executive Director, Ocean State Job Lot Charitable Foundation. "With our customers' support and the help of the New England Patriots Foundation and the USA Veterans Military Support Foundation, we're working to deliver all 30,000 of these backpacks before the first school bells ring in each of the states where we have stores." The family of Palestinian activist Nizar Banat, who died in Palestinian custody in June, stepped up its quest for international justice on Thursday, turning to British police and the UN. Banat -- a leading critic of the Palestinian Authority and its 86-year old president Mahmud Abbas -- died after security forces stormed his home in the flashpoint city of Hebron and dragged him away. A post-mortem found he had been beaten on the head, chest, neck, legs and hands, with less than an hour elapsing between his arrest and his death. Banat's family has said it has no confidence in the PA's capacity to deliver justice, and called for an international probe. A statement from the family's lawyers, the British firm Stoke White, said they have asked Britain's Metropolitan Police to open an investigation under the principle of universal jurisdiction. For a small number of serious offences, Britain's courts can hear cases even if the alleged crimes were committed abroad. Stoke White also said it had asked multiple branches of the United Nations human rights system to open investigation, including the Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions and four special rapporteurs. Ghasan Khalil Banat said his brother's "murder" was a "tragedy for our family, but also a tragedy for the Palestinian people." "The so-called investigation that was carried out into his murder is an embarrassment and the PA should feel ashamed of it," he said in the statement. The head of international law and Stoke White, Hakan Camuz, said: "Responsibility for the murder of Nizar Banat very clearly lies with the senior leadership of the Palestinian Authority including President Mahmud Abbas and Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh." Shtayyeh and the PA have promised accountability over Banat's death. Camuz accused the PA of a long-standing bid to silence dissent. "They cannot be allowed to get away with this and this is why we are submitting these complaints and petitions to the British police and the UN," he said in the statement. The UN and the European Union this week raised alarm over a spate of arrests of activists by Palestinian security forces since Banat's beath, warning the PA appeared to be cracking down on basic freedoms across the West Bank, a territory occupied by Israel since 1967. bur-cgo/bs/par Good Morning America The Justice Department on Monday alerted several federal judges that an outspoken attorney representing at least 17 alleged rioters charged in connection with the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection is reportedly hospitalized and possibly incapacitated after testing positive for COVID-19, leaving the bulk of his cases effectively at a "standstill" and his clients "without counsel." The California-based attorney, John Pierce, currently represents more defendants charged in the riot than any other defense lawyer -- including multiple alleged members of the Proud Boys group and a number of individuals accused of assaulting law enforcement officers. In recent weeks, an associate at Pierce's law firm, Ryan Marshall, has appeared in Pierce's place during multiple hearings, where he offered conflicting reports about the status of Pierce's health. A plastic surgeon is speaking out against excessive Botox and facial filler. Dr. Steve Harris created a diagram to point out how filler and Botox can distort facial proportions. An alienized face has large, flat lips with a crisp border, a winged brow bone, and a chiseled jawline, he said. Visit Insider's homepage for more stories. A plastic surgeon is warning against what he calls an epidemic of facial "alienization" caused by bad filler. Dr. Steve Harris, plastic surgeon and founder of the Harris Clinic in London, says the distorted look comes from doctors enabling clients to get procedures based on filtered images they see on social media. To illustrate what an "alienized" face might look like, Harris took images of someone with a natural look and altered their proportions to show how excessive Botox and filler can change the face. Video: Dermatologists debunk 13 Botox myths "In many cases the distortions are so severe that they cannot be associated with our species," Harris told Insider. An alienized face is characterized by large and flat lips with a crisp border, a winged brow bone, sharp "Maleficent cheeks," and a very chiseled jawline, according to Harris. "Some people present naturally with certain features in the presented simulation, but the problem is creating these in others and making everyone look the same," Harris wrote in his Instagram caption. Harris' diagram uses arrows to point out where the cheeks have been made more angular, the jaw has been sharpened, and the shape of the lips has been altered. Filters and photoshopped images of celebrities are to blame for 'alienization,' Harris said Harris says filters on Snapchat, Instagram, and TikTok can distort how people see themselves, which can cause them to ask for procedures that create an unrealistic look. "Influencers and celebrities who have been alienized will no doubt affect the perception of their followers," Harris said. Story continues Another reason facial alienization has become so common is the willingness of plastic surgeons to comply with this "new normal," he said. "Alienization also takes place when the practitioner is highly qualified and this may be attributed to greed or a gross lack of artistic acumen," Harris said. "Image disorders may explain why some practitioners and patients simply do not see the distortions." He hopes to use his diagram to bring awareness of the trend and fight it. "I think that a doctor who is conforming to alienization is not fulfilling his or her duty of care to first, do no harm," Harris said. Read the original article on Insider LONDON (Reuters) - British police said on Thursday they had arrested a man after processed meats and microwaveable products at three supermarkets in west London were injected using a number of needles. The Little Waitrose, Sainsbury's Local, and Tesco Express stores were closed following the incident which took place on Wednesday evening. Police were called after reports the man had shouted abuse at people, and had entered the shops on Fulham Palace Road and injected food products. "It is currently unknown as to how many items have been contaminated, or what with," the Metropolitan Police said in a statement. "Investigations are on-going to establish if other businesses in the area are involved in the incident." People who bought food from the supermarkets on Wednesday evening were advised to throw it away. The man is being questioned on suspicion of contamination of goods with intention of causing public harm. (Reporting by Costas Pitas; editing by Michael Holden) Prosecutors working for Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody grilled Broward County Public Schools top spokesperson late last month over her involvement in organizing an April 23 rally outside of school district headquarters in support of then-Superintendent Robert Runcie, who was arrested on a perjury charge two days earlier. Transcripts of the sworn testimony of Chief Communications Officer Kathleen Koch from July 29 were filed with Broward County circuit court this week and it is part of the states perjury case against Runcie and the districts former general counsel, Barbara Myrick. Its not clear why prosecutors would be interested in Koch organizing the protest. Its not illegal for her to do so, although at least one of the nine members of the Broward School Board called her involvement in the event inappropriate. Board member questioned Kochs involvement in rally As one board member, I feel that it is inappropriate for the head of the school districts communications department to be involved in such an event and I believe that energy and attention should have been directed towards students and educators instead, District 3 Board Member Sarah Leonardi said in an email to the Miami Herald Wednesday. The rest of the board did not respond to requests for comment on the matter. Leonardi said she did not know that Koch was involved in organizing the rally until she read about it in a July 18 article in the South Florida Sun Sentinel. Leonardi also said she was bothered that the school districts TV channel, BECON, was at the event filming along with cameras from local TV news stations. During the April workshop in which the board discussed the arrests of Ms. Myrick and Mr. Runcie, I stated publicly that I thought it was inappropriate for district cameras to film the rally that took place, she said. Both prosecuting and defense attorneys who spoke to the Miami Herald on background said prosecutors could be looking for anything in Kochs testimony, from perjury to whether district computer equipment was used in any way to put together the rally. Story continues Statewide prosecutor Richard Mantei, according to the transcripts, told Koch that because his office subpoenaed her, she was compelled to come here and give testimony, which gives you effective use immunity for most things. What that means is if you walked in here and told me today that you committed some kind of crime on the way up the stairway, we wouldnt be able to use that statement against you in prosecution for that crime. Okay, he said. However, there is one important thing that isnt covered, and that is perjury. Kylie Mason, spokeswoman for Moodys office, said Thursday she could not comment on the ongoing case. Sent notes to her work email account Neither Koch nor her attorney, Jonathan Osborne, returned text messages and emails seeking comment. Koch said in her testimony that she used her personal computer to contact people about the rally on her own time, but she did inadvertently send notes she wrote about the event to her work email account. I dont know why I sent it, Koch told Mantei, according to the transcripts. Along with Kochs testimony, prosecutors also filed her notes with details about whom she contacted and planned to contact about the gathering, as well as chat records from the school districts Microsoft TEAMS communication service, in which other top administrators discussed their support for Runcie and Myrick. We love you RR and Barbara J. Myrick, Daniel Gohl, the districts chief academic officer, wrote on the TEAMS chat on April 27. Kochs notes, which appear quickly typed with multiple typos, start with, Wednesday. Spoke with RR about event, agreed. He advised law firms. According to the notes, Runcie told Koch he would take the idea to the executive committee of a local organization known as the Broward Workshop. Runcie did not return a text seeking comment on the prosecutors questioning Koch. Koch wrote in her notes that Keith, who she told prosecutors is Keith Koenig, chief executive officer of City Furniture, told her he would get a public relations firm he uses to distribute a press release Koch wrote to the media. Koenig told the Miami Herald that he asked the PR firm, Smith & Knibbs, to distribute the press release, which was sent Thursday night, April 22, but he doesnt remember Koch being involved. As I remember it, the rally was my idea, Koenig said. Linda Lewis, who emailed the press release to media outlets on behalf of Smith & Knibbs, did not respond to a question asking who organized the rally. Koch told prosecutors that she put together the PR materials, but did not distribute them. I planned the event. I did not execute it, Koch told prosecutors, according to the transcripts. In her notes, Koch wrote that she did not want to be seen at the rally. I will be in the [headquarters building and] am meeting PR firm early, but do not want to be visible in any form at the [event] itself to school board members [or] the media, which might ask me [about] Mr. Runcie. When prosecutors asked Koch about that part of her notes, she said she meant she did not think it would be appropriate for her to be there. It was a community support for the superintendent. And for me to be there as an employee of the district, I think would be a distraction, she said, according to the transcripts. Rally attended by many to support Runcie Dozens turned out for the rally to support Runcie. Attendees included business, community and religious leaders including Koenig, Bob Swindell, CEO of the Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance, state Sen. Perry Thurston, Pastor Derrick Hughes of First Baptist Piney Grove, Kathleen Cannon, president and CEO of United Way of Broward County, Brian Johnson of the NAACP and Sidney Calloway, chair of the Urban League of Broward County. Both Runcie and Myrick received large payouts from the School Board after agreeing to resign from their positions in May before their contracts expired. Runcie, who pleaded not guilty, received a severance package of $754,900. Myrick is also fighting the case. She pleaded stands mute. She walked away from her position with a severance package worth more than $226,000. They were both indicted as part of a grand jury Gov. Ron DeSantis requested in February 2019, in response to the mass shootings at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland a year earlier. Seventeen students and faculty members were killed in the attack. The grand jury was tasked with investigating whether school districts committed fraud when they solicited and accepted millions of dollars from a state bond issue contingent on implementing safety measures required by the Legislature in the wake of the tragedy. Runcie, 59, is accused of lying to the grand jury about whether he spoke to anyone before he testified on March 31 and April 1 about the line of questioning of prosecutors. Myrick, 72, is accused of disclosing grand jury proceedings; grand jury testimony is conducted in secret. Vickie Cartwright replaced Runcie as interim superintendent earlier this month. Robert F. Kennedy. Harry Benson/Hulton Archive/Getty Images For the first time, prosecutors will not oppose the release of Sirhan Sirhan, the man convicted of murdering Robert F. Kennedy in 1968. Sirhan, 77, will go before a two-person parole panel on Friday, with a new lawyer who plans to argue that he doesn't pose a threat to society and has had a clean record in prison. Kennedy was shot on June 5, 1968, at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, shortly after winning California's Democratic presidential primary. Sirhan was arrested at the scene and convicted in 1969 of first-degree murder. He was sentenced to death, which was reduced to life with possibility of parole in 1972 when the state abolished the death penalty. Sirhan has been in prison for 53 years, and this will be his 16th parole hearing. Last year, Los Angeles County elected a new district attorney, George Gascon, who said he would support the release of certain inmates who have served their mandatory minimums and are older and at low risk of re-offending. Gascon's office told The Washington Post while prosecutors will not attend the Friday parole hearing, they also do not plan on sending the board a letter supporting Sirhan's bid for release. The Kennedy family also hasn't formally submitted any letters for or against parole, the Post reports. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told the Post in 2018 he does not think Sirhan killed his father, and this week said while he supports Sirhan's application for parole and believes there was a second gunman involved in the assassination, he will not participate in the parole process. You may also like Naked baby chasing money on Nirvana's iconic 'Nevermind' album cover is suing band, claiming child pornography Actor suspected of participating in Capitol attack arrested in California The Afghanistan evacuation timeline is a negotiation, not a decision New Orleans Saints wide receiver Michael Thomas is seeking more than $1 million for a two-month rental allegedly gone wrong, TMZ reports. According to the report, Thomas is suing the landlord of his offseason rental in the luxury Los Angeles enclave of Bel Air after he claims he was repeatedly disturbed and denied the return of his $60,000 deposit. TMZ obtained court records of the lawsuit in which Thomas claims he paid $60,000 in rent per month for two months in addition to the deposit, all in advance. He intended to use the six-bedroom, eight-bathroom abode equipped with a gym and a pool to conduct offseason training in private. He claims that the owner agreed to leave him in peace during his stay and that representatives of the property owner instead repeatedly showed up at the home unannounced, disturbing his training program. He also claims that the home's pool, garage doors and kitchen appliances all had problems, per the report. He stayed at the property from Feb. 4 to April 5. He's seeking more than $1 million in damages and the return of his $60,000 deposit, claiming breach of lease. How he reached the $1 million-plus figure isn't clear. Michael Thomas claims his offseason workouts were repeatedly interrupted in the lawsuit. (Kyle Ross/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) Is suit related to ankle-surgery drama? This all happened prior to Thomas' June surgery to correct a high-ankle sprain that sidelined him for much of the 2020 season. It's unclear if Thomas is claiming anything related to the extension of his injury in the suit. Thomas could have had surgery in January immediately after the end of the Saints' season. For reasons not clear, he opted to have the procedure in June and will now be sidelined for the start of the season with a timeline that extends to October. The timing of his surgery led to offseason sniping between Thomas and head coach Sean Payton. Obviously, we would have liked that [surgery] to have happened earlier than later and quite honestly it should have, Payton told reporters in July. Story continues Thomas tweeted this in August: This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Yahoo Sports' Charles Robinson reported that the two sides recently met amid trade speculation and are not expected to split after positive talks. The Ted Bundy story has already been oft picked over, from the books of Ann Rule to the recent Netflix film Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile, starring former teen heartthrob Zac Efron as the notorious serial murderer. What more can be said about him? It seems we still need to understand why he did what he did, which is the central question of the new film No Man of God, directed by Amber Sealey, written by Kit Lesser, which explores the relationship between Bundy and FBI agent Bill Hagmaier, who forged a strange kind of friendship in the last years of Bundys life. No Man of God is not a biopic of either Bundy (Luke Kirby) or Hagmaier (Elijah Wood). Rather, it is a portrait of their short but significant connection, hashed out in an interview room in Florida State Prison from 1985 to 1989. Hagmaier was a rookie agent at the newly formed National Center for Analysis of Violent Crime who volunteered to interview Bundy in prison in hopes of understanding his motivations for committing the rapes and murders for which hed been convicted and sentenced to death. The goal was to use Bundy to further develop knowledge of serial killers and potentially even close a few cases. No Man of God is not unlike a special episode of David Finchers FBI profiling Netflix series Mindhunter: a young agent gets a little too close to a seductive psychopath in the search for answers that might serve a bigger cause. But theres something almost soulful in the way that Woods Hagmaier transcends the danger of getting too close to someone like Bundy. He respects and trusts him as much as he condemns him, both figuratively and literally. He always tells the truth, which starkly contrasts with Bundys twisted, self-aggrandizing personal rhetoric. There are a few themes that Bundy repeats again and again in No Man of God: that Hagmaier just wants to understand him, and its in this understanding, this seeing of Bundy as a person and not a monster, that they are able to find a sliver of room for friendship. He also repeatedly reminds Hagmaier that they could just as easily swap places in this life, a mantra that seems to be more of a comfort to Bundy than a statement of fact. Story continues No Man of God is impeccably and carefully directed by Sealey, and the craft on display is remarkable. Karina Silva's precisely off-kilter cinematography animates the claustrophobic room where Hagmaier and Bundy hold their conversations. Clarice Jensen's unsettling electronic score commingles with the camera work to build a sense of achingly slow-burn tension. Abstract interstitial montages let off a bit of steam with a propulsive electro soundtrack, marking the passing of time with images of the menacing and the mundane. The film is beautifully acted by Wood and Kirby; Kirby is especially compelling in such a challenging role, equal parts cajoling, grandiose and terrifying. His Bundy is mystifying yet always humane. However, theres a nagging feeling that persists during No Man of God as one struggles to discern why this film exists or what its trying to say. While it explores this unique dynamic between these two men, a relationship that made Hagmaier a legend in criminal profiling, it doesnt feel particularly illuminating about Bundy. What Hagmaier concludes is that Bundy committed these crimes because he wanted to, and that he should pay for his actions with his life. Its almost frustrating that it doesnt have more to impart than that, but perhaps thats all there is. Katie Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times. (Reuters) - Even for a city as used to violent death as Kabul, the scenes after twin blasts https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/western-nations-race-complete-afghan-evacuation-deadline-looms-2021-08-25 tore through crowds thronging outside the airport in hope of evacuation were apocalyptic. For one man, a former employee of an international development group with a U.S. special immigrant visa, the day began early. He joined thousands of people around the airport hoping to clear the gates and get onto one of the flights ferrying in and out in the final days of the airlift. He had been in the queue near the airport's Abbey Gate for around 10 hours when, at around 5 p.m., a powerful explosion went off. "It was as if someone pulled the ground from under my feet; for a moment I thought my eardrums were blasted and I lost my sense of hearing," said the man. "I saw bodies and body parts flying in the air like a tornado taking plastic bags ... into the air. I saw bodies, body parts, elderly and injured men, women and children scattered in the blast site. "It is not possible to see doomsday in this life, but today I saw doomsday, I witnessed it with my own eyes." The man did not wish to be identified, because in a city now under Taliban rule, many associated with the former Western-backed government and civil society groups that grew up around it fear reprisals. The Taliban have sought to reassure Afghans that they would respect their rights and were not out for revenge. Kabul has endured frequent suicide attacks in the 20 years since the Taliban were first driven from power, and the city's residents have grown used to police and security teams sealing off the blast sites and carrying away the dead and wounded. Today, as the wounded were helped away or carried off in wheelbarrows, it was shocked survivors who were left to stumble over the bloodstained corpses of dozens flung by the blast into a sewage ditch. Story continues "Today there was no one to handle the issue and move the bodies and the wounded to hospital or take them out of sight of the public," the witness said. "Dead bodies and wounded were lying in the road and in the sewage canal. The little water flowing into it had turned into blood. "Physically, I am OK ... but I don't think the mental wound and the shock I sustained from today's blast will ever let me live a normal life." (Writing by James Mackenzie; Editing by Mike Collett-White) "William" is refusing to take a coronavirus vaccine because he fears Indonesia's military will use the country's inoculation programme to poison him and wipe out his fellow Papuans. Decades of conflict, racism and human rights abuses are fuelling Covid conspiracy theories among his neighbours at a time when their breakaway region is facing a renewed threat from the pandemic. "I won't take a vaccine if it's brought here by Indonesia," William, who asked not to use his real name, told AFP. He said that he would gladly sign up for any dose administered directly by the World Health Organization. "But (many people) here are worried that if the jabs come through Indonesia they'll be replaced with some other chemical substance that will kill us," he added. There is no evidence of a genocidal plan by Indonesia, which has drafted the armed forces to help run a nationwide vaccination drive, including in Papua. But a widespread hatred of the military runs deep in the region, located on the eastern edge of the Southeast Asian archipelago nation and just north of Australia. Security forces have been accused of committing atrocities against Papuan civilians during decades of fighting between a rebel independence movement and government troops. Much of this conflict has centred around William's hometown of Timika, near the world's biggest gold mine -- a potent symbol for Papuans of the region's exploitation and environmental devastation. - 'Trauma of violence' - Indonesia, as with many countries, has found its efforts to fight the pandemic hamstrung by both limited vaccine supplies and hesitancy driven by the spread of online disinformation. The spread of unfounded rumours in Papua mirrors a similar phenomenon across the border in Papua New Guinea, an independent nation with stronger cultural and historical ties to Papua than the rest of Indonesia. Social media posts there falsely claimed to show evidence of locals being forcibly vaccinated in a mass medical trial, and even suggested that the vaccine campaign as part of a racial genocide plot. Story continues Papua's long history of conflict and mistrust has created a wide audience for fearful rumours. "The conflict has been going on for so long (that)... whatever the central government is doing will appear suspicious," said Adriana Elisabeth, a Papua expert at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences. Appeals by local activists have done little to lift low vaccination numbers among Papuans, which stand at fewer than 30,000 -- less than one percent of the region's population. Papua has sailed through earlier waves of the pandemic relatively unscathed, with its 40,000 confirmed infections a tiny fraction of Indonesia's total. But it is now threatened by the highly contagious Delta variant that has wreaked havoc elsewhere in Indonesia and other parts of Southeast Asia, and its underfunded health system is ill-equipped to navigate a crisis. Authorities have blamed low take-up rates on social media hoaxes and say Papuan church leaders have also stoked doubts over the seriousness of the pandemic and staged mask-burning demonstrations. "The military is just an excuse," said Aaron Rumainum, head of the illness prevention division at Papua's health agency, adding that it was mostly civilians handling vaccinations. "But we are not giving up. We'll focus on those who are keen instead of the ones who reject vaccines." - 'You'll become weak' - Jakarta took control of Papua in the 1960s after a UN-sponsored vote to incorporate the former Dutch colony into Indonesia -- a ballot widely viewed as rigged. That set off decades of conflict in Papua, where the largely Christian and ethnic Melanesian population shares few cultural ties with the rest of Muslim-majority Indonesia. Papuans routinely face anti-black discrimination in the rest of the archipelago. Two years ago, the arrest of young Papuans studying in the city of Surabaya sparked riots that left dozens dead in the remote region. The region has also been on tenterhooks since rebels assassinated Indonesia's top intelligence chief there in April, prompting a crackdown and the designation of local separatists as "terrorists". Protests have broken out this month against the vaccination programme and broader anger over Papua's subservient status. Security forces responded by arresting and beating civilians, according to local media reports and rights groups. The heavy troop presence on the streets was driving rumours that it was meant to limit independence-seeking Papuans' movements rather than reduce infections. "There are soldiers and police everywhere," said Marcus Dogopia, a resident of provincial capital Jayapura who has also resolved not to seek a Covid vaccine. "The jabs aren't safe for us. When you get vaccinated you'll become weak and won't be able to move around," he added. str-bur/pb/gle Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota. AP Photo/John Raoux Gov. Kristi Noem blasted conservative podcast host Matt Walsh from her official Twitter on Wednesday. "Eyes up here, Matt," she wrote after Walsh made misogynistic comments about her appearance. The Twitter spat came after Noem declined to ban COVID vaccine mandates for private businesses. See more stories on Insider's business page. South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem fired back at Matt Walsh, a conservative podcaster, on Wednesday night after he made misogynistic comments about the governor on the Daily Wire. Walsh made the misogynistic comments in the midst of criticizing Noem for declining to pre-emptively ban vaccine mandates for private businesses, which other conservative governors have done. "No use for Kristi Noem," said Walsh. "Kristi Noem is a very attractive woman, so she's got that going for her." "As far as I can tell that's the only reason why she was ever looked at as some sort of 2024 potential frontrunner," said Walsh. "The hype and everything that she's gotten from conservative media is entirely based on the fact that she's an extremely attractive woman, which she is! "But, you know, you put 50 pounds on her and another 20 years I don't think she gets any of the hype," said Walsh. In response, the South Dakota governor tweeted a clip of Walsh's comments and called out his "horrible misogyny." This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. "Instead of engaging in a debate about the proper role of government and how it isn't conservative to tell people how to do business, [Walsh] stooped to horrible misogyny," she wrote. "Eyes up here, Matt." But Walsh doubled down on his comments, responding to Noem's tweet directly and accusing her of pulling the clip from Media Matters, a liberal watchdog group, and using it to attack fellow conservatives. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Walsh followed up by calling those upset by his misogynistic comments "a bunch of ridiculous, whiney babies." Story continues This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Meanwhile, Noem tweeted at Ben Shapiro, another right-wing podcaster and Walsh's boss at the Daily Wire, from her campaign account. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. "Hey [Shapiro] tell [Walsh] I was roping bulls (maybe he's a steer?) bigger than him when I was in my teens. He couldn't walk a day in my shoes." Read the original article on Business Insider US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrives for a briefing on Afghanistan at the US Capitol on August 24, 2021 in Washington, DC. Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said there are about 1,500 Americans left in Afghanistan. He said the State Department is in "direct contact" with 500 of them and is working on helping them get to the airport safely. Blinken insisted there would be no deadline in helping Americans and Afghan allies leave the country, even as an August 31 cutoff nears. Visit Insider's homepage for more stories. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the US believes there are as many as 1,500 Americans left in Afghanistan. The State Department is in "direct contact" with 500 of these US citizens and is working on helping them get to the airport safely for evacuation, Blinken said in a press briefing on Wednesday. Of the other 1,000, Blinken said the department is still trying to verify their identities - as some may claim to be Americans but are not - and also confirm their plans. He said there also might be some who do not plan on leaving the country. Blinken gave an update on the number of Americans evacuated since August 14, saying at least 4,500 people have left, with 500 US citizens brought out of Kabul in the last 24 hours alone. As an August 31 cutoff date for US troop withdrawal closes in, the Secretary of State added that there would be no deadline in helping Americans and Afghan allies leave the country. "There is no deadline on our work to help any remaining American citizens who decide they want to leave to do so, along with the many Afghans who have stood by us over these many years and want to leave and have been unable to do so," he said. "That effort will continue every day past August 31st." The Taliban had previously said it would not allow departures past next week's cut-off. However, speaking on Wednesday, Blinken said the Taliban had "made public and private commitments to provide and permit safe passage for Americans, for third-country nationals, and Afghans at risk going forward past August 31st." Story continues According to the State Department, more than 82,300 people have been safely evacuated out of Kabul since August 14, and 19,000 were evacuated in the past day alone. Meanwhile, the US, UK, and Australia have warned of security threats at the Kabul airport. The US embassy in Afghanistan has advised US citizens to avoid going to the airport due to a "specific" and "credible" threat. It said those who are at the airport should leave immediately, unless they've received "individual instructions from a US government representative to do so." The UK foreign office warned of "an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack," without giving details, and asked its citizens to move away from the airport. Australia Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne also told reporters in Canberra Thursday that citizens and visa holders should leave the airport due to an ongoing security threat, reported Reuters. Read the original article on Insider GOP Governor Noem (Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved) The governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem, has slammed conservative podcast host Matt Walsh for horrible misogyny. Instead of engaging in a debate about the proper role of government and how it isnt conservative to tell people how to do business, @MattWalshBlog stooped to horrible misogyny. Eyes up here, Matt, tweeted Ms Noem following comments on the Daily Wire host show on Wednesday, in which he said: Kristi Noem is a very attractive woman, so shes got that going for her. As far as I can tell, thats the only reason why she was ever looked at as some sort of 2024 potential frontrunner. The hype and everything that shes gotten from conservative media is entirely based on the fact that shes an extremely attractive woman, which she is. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. He added: But you know, you put 50 pounds on her and another 20 years, I dont think she gets any of the hype. Because outside of that, shes just a, just your standard corporatist establishment Republican whos not interested in doing anything. Mr Walsh has disagreed on Gov Noems stance on business vaccine mandates and her not banning businesses from introducing Covid-19 vaccine mandates, if they choose to do so. One of the states largest employers, Sanford Health, has announced that all employees should get vaccinated by 1 November. This is the right thing to do for our patients and residents, people and communities, said Bill Gassen, president and CEO of Sanford Health, in a statement. As more contagious Covid-19 variants continue to spread and threaten our communities, we must do everything we can to protect each other and our loved ones. Dakota House of Representatives speaker Spencer Gosch wants to pass a bill to make Covid-19 vaccination status strictly confidential medical information. Gov Noem has resisted taking action on such a bill. A prominent Trump loyalist, Gov Noem has been talked up as a potential Republican presidential candidate in the future. The state of Florida has recovered $5 million of the $7.5 million paid to the former CEO of the Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence and her staff, Attorney General Ashley Moody and Gov. Ron DeSantis said during a Thursday morning press conference. Tiffany Carr, who resigned in November 2019 from the agency she had worked at for more than two decades, will pay $2.1 million cash, according to a settlement agreed to with the state. The insurance companies representing the former FCADV officers will pay more than $1.7 million to the Department of Children and Families and a court-appointed receiver. Carr was accused of defrauding the state and federal governments by manipulating her board of directors to pad her salary in a scheme that gave her more than $7.5 million over three years. The organization will also be dissolved, its assets liquidated, and former FCADV officers Patricia Duarte and Sandra Barnett will pay a total of $60,000. The coalitions foundation, a separate entity created with the sole purpose of supporting the Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence, will also be dissolved and $1.1 million will be distributed directly to the 42 domestic violence centers the coalition was intended to support. The power that this group was given for almost 20 years and their misrepresentation of appropriation of state and federal funds is inexcusable, should not have happened, and it cannot be allowed to happen in other organizations that may be getting funding from the state of Florida, DeSantis said at a press conference in Orlando. You got to have accountability and transparency. That was obviously lacking with this organization for many, many years. In a statement, Carrs attorney, Chris Kise, defended her behavior, noting that the settlement does not admit any liability and she agreed to repay the money to eliminate the uncertainty, burden, and expense of further protracted litigation. He said she wanted to ensure the proceeds would be distributed for the benefit of the victims of domestic violence. Story continues The settlement, which was approved Thursday by Leon County Circuit Court Judge Angela Dempsey, will resolve two civil lawsuits filed by the state against Carr, a lawsuit by the state-appointed receiver, and two lawsuits filed by the Hanover Insurance and Travelers Insurance, which each represented the coalition and its board of directors. The scheme The Florida House, working on information first disclosed by the Miami Herald, discovered a scheme by the coalition and some members of its board of directors to pad the salary of Carr and her deputies and allow them to cash in paid time off with funds intended to be used to help victims of domestic abuse. During that time, documents provided to the House Public Integrity and Ethics Committee showed a small group of members of the board, appointed by Carr, operated as the compensation committee and padded her compensation while she claimed she had a brain tumor but produced no evidence of a medical condition. This is how the scheme worked, Moody said at the press conference. Carr stacked the Florida Coalition of Domestic Violence board with beneficiaries of the organizations funding. And then at the end of the year, when the organization was supposed to return its money that was not given directly to the domestic violence centers to the state, it was then that she would arrange for the modification of her compensation in the form of bonuses, raises and, particularly, take paid time off. This allowed them to conceal the excessive compensation to Tiffany Carr. Paid time off was shown as a liability. It would not be reported immediately as compensation. Documents show that Carr was allowed to cash in more than $5 million of paid time off at an agency that is primarily funded with state and federal taxpayer dollars, while domestic violence victims across the state were denied services. Carrs attorney responds Kise noted, however, that the Department of Children and Families, which had oversight over the coalition, had access to all the coalitions certified financial audits, including paid time off provisions. He said the agency never raised a question about the accrual of paid time off, which her contract allowed her to convert into cash. While the politicians have crowed about excessive compensation and filed numerous lawsuits, no actual explanation or evidence was ever offered as to which portions of Ms. Carrs fully transparent compensation were improper, or even why her compensation was improper, i.e., what guidelines, policies, standards, rules, laws, or regulations were allegedly violated, he wrote. To the contrary, the attorney general admitted in court Ms. Carr never made any false statement to the board or the boards chair in order to induce the salary, bonuses and PTO benefits she received and the board had the authority to award Ms. Carr whatever compensation it deemed appropriate. Moody noted the compensation was so excessive it triggered an excessive executive compensation tax liability under IRS rules costing a nonprofit $1 million in tax penalties. Kise said the tax payment was expected by Carr. She made arrangements for a private donor to contribute funds sufficient to cover the tax liability associated with her payout. They knew this was coming. Moody, however, called the behavior despicable and said it should not be tolerated in the State of Florida. She vowed that anyone entrusted by voters or the state to do the work of the state will be held to an extremely high standard, not only in the function of their work, but in terms of their integrity and the integrity of the office in which they are trusted. The lawsuits The attorney generals complaint, filed in the Second Judicial District in Leon County, was merged with a second lawsuit filed by the Florida Department of Children and Families. The complaints accused Carr and her deputies of engaging in an accounting shell game from 2016 through 2019 and asked the court to order Carr to return the money. The U.S. Department of Justice also opened a criminal investigation last year, but there has been no sign that has progressed. The state alleged that the compensation plan involved a pattern of giving generous bonuses and [paid time off] allotments near the end of fiscal years, in order to wipe out any remaining excess funds rather than return them to the DCF, as the contract required. After the Herald first reported Carrs lucrative salary in July 2018, the complaint notes, FCADV sought to justify CEO Carrs lavish compensation and a document may have been forged, backdated, and slipped into FCADVs files to support that position. Carr, 52, resigned as the Miami Herald drew attention to her compensation package. She cited poor health but then took a contract with FCADV as a paid consultant. At the time, Carr owned four homes, most notably a $2 million estate in North Carolina. The private nonprofit agency had the exclusive contract to handle domestic violence services at the states 42 domestic violence shelters. After the House investigation in 2020, DeSantis signed House Bill 1087 into law, which severed the state contract with FCADV. The coalition was then ordered dissolved by Leon County Circuit Court Judge Ronald Flury in March 2020, and its operations were transferred to DCF. Flury also appointed a receiver to access the funds from the centers foundation. Carr lives in North Carolina and refused to respond to requests to appear before the House committee when it was investigating the coalition. Moodys complaint sought to recover all or part of the estimated $7.5 million paid to Carr. In June 2021, DCF moved everything out of the FCADV offices in Tallahassee. The building is now up for sale, with an asking price of $825,000. More aggressive oversight DCF is scheduled to choose a private vendor to replace the Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence next month. The state will select from two vendors to provide training, legal and technical services to the states 42 domestic violence centers, run the 24-hour domestic abuse hotline and distribute grants to the centers. According to the invitation to negotiate, the state has learned from its mistakes of the past. DCF has concluded, for example, that it will assume a more aggressive oversight role than it had when Carr was in charge. After DCF almost eliminated its domestic violence office positions over the last decade, the agency said, it now will re-establish an appropriately staffed program office as well as retain positions to provide robust contract management and oversight. The final decision about how to procure DV [domestic violence] services is intended to address the issues noted above by significantly strengthening the departments ability to administer and oversee the program, the invitation to negotiate stated. As part of that, DCF said it would abandon the policies that led to conflicts in the program, such as the opportunity for Carr to put DCF staff members or their family members on her payroll. The negotiations to reach the settlement began in January and extended through August with several different parties. According to the settlement, $3.1 million of the cash recovery will go directly to the Department of Children and Families when it is approved by the court. The settlement also allows for additional recoveries from the sale of FCADVs assets, including its former Tallahassee headquarters. Mary Ellen Klas can be reached at meklas@miamiherald.com and @MaryEllenKlas John Binns, a 21-year-old American who now lives in Turkey, told the Wall Street Journal that he was behind the T-Mobile security breach that affected more than 50 million people earlier this month. The intrigue: Binns said he broke through the T-Mobile defenses after discovering an unprotected router exposed on the internet, after scanning the carrier's internet addresses for weak spots using a publicly available tool. Get market news worthy of your time with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free. I was panicking because I had access to something big, he wrote in Telegram messages to the Journal. Their security is awful. Generating noise was one goal, Binns said. He declined to say whether he sold any of the information he stole, or whether he was paid for the hack. The big picture: It was the third major data leak the network has disclosed in the last two years, per WSJ. T-Mobile is the second-largest U.S. mobile carrier, housing the data of around 90 million cellphones. Background: Some of the information exposed in the breach included names, dates of birth, social security numbers and personal ID information. The breach is being investigated Seattle's FBI office, according to the Journal. More from Axios: Sign up to get the latest market trends with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free The T-Mobile customer data breach might not have been a sophisticated data breach in fact, it might have been relatively trivial. The hacker claiming to be responsible for the attack, John Binns, told the The Wall Street Journal in a discussion that T-Mobile's security was "awful." Binns reportedly broke through by using a readily available tool to find an exposed router, and took a week to delve through customer data stored in a data center near East Wenatchee, Washington. Binns, who provided apparent evidence to back up his claims of involvement, said he breached T-Mobile and stole the data to create "noise" that drew attention to him. He came forward to highlight his claims he had been kidnapped in Germany and placed into a fake mental hospital. There wasn't any evidence to support that allegation. T-Mobile declined to comment on Binns' claims in response to the Journal. It previously stated that it was "confident" it had closed the security holes used in the breach, which compromised sensitive info for more than 54 million active and former customers. The incident is the third breach in two years, and suggests that T-Mobile is still struggling to offer security that matches its rapidly growing customer base. It only hired a new security leader earlier in 2021, for instance. If Binns' claims are accurate, though, the ease of the attack is also frightening it only took a casual hack to put tens of millions of people at risk of fraud and other data crimes. The company may need to scramble if it's going to reassure customers that breaches will be rare going forward. TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan's government said BioNTech SE COVID-19 vaccines are available earlier than expected and it is striving to obtain them in competition with other countries. Reuters reported on Wednesday that Taiwan could get its first delivery of the German-made vaccines one month ahead https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/taiwan-get-biontech-shots-early-china-delays-approval-source-2021-08-25 of schedule as a delay in regulatory approval of the shot for use in mainland China made a surplus available for the island. Taiwan's tortured bid for the vaccine, jointly developed with Pfizer Inc, has become an issue of high political and diplomatic drama, after Taiwan accused China of blocking a deal earlier this year, which Beijing denied. China claims democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory. Taiwan's government subsequently allowed tech giants Foxconn, its billionaire founder Terry Gou, and TSMC to negotiate on its behalf for the shot. A $350 million deal https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/taiwans-foxconn-tsmc-confirm-350-mln-covid-19-vaccine-deal-2021-07-11 for 10 million shots inked last month, which will be donated to the government for distribution. In a statement late on Wednesday, Taiwan's Central Epidemic Command Centre said it had been informed by TSMC an additional batch of vaccines made for BioNTech's Chinese sales agent Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group Co Ltd will "leave the factory" in the second part of August. "This batch of vaccines is earlier than the first batch of supply scheduled by the donor units. Many countries are actively striving to get them. If Taiwan does not strive for them, this batch of vaccines may be sent to other countries." The vaccines were originally meant for "elsewhere" and have Fosun's name on them in Chinese, and while this was not what Taiwan originally had in mind it is acceptable, it added. "As long as the quality of the vaccine is ensured, the labelling method can be given flexibility, so the government can accept it." Story continues TSMC did not immediately respond to a request for comment. BioNTech on Wednesday declined to comment. One of the initial sticking points was the Taiwan government's insistence the vaccines come from Germany in their original packaging, rather than anything that implied Taiwan was having to take the vaccines from China, politically unacceptable for many Taiwanese. While BioNTech Chief Executive Ugur Sahin said in April he expected its COVID-19 vaccine would win approval from the Chinese authorities "by June at the latest", no approval has been granted yet. The shot is approved in Chinese-run Hong Kong and Macau. (This story refiles to correct typo in first name of Foxconn founder in paragraph 4) (Reporting by Ben Blanchard and Yimou Lee; Editing by Lincoln Feast.) A Taliban spokesperson on Wednesday said no proof exists that implicates Usama bin Laden in the Sept. 11 terror attacks despite a mountain of evidence that connects the deceased al Qaeda leader to the airline hijackings that hit the World Trade Center and Pentagon. During an interview with NBC News's Richard Engel from Afghanistan, Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid made the claim in response to a question about whether the country will again become a base for terrorism as the Biden administration prepares for the withdrawal of U.S.troops. "When Usama bin Laden became an issue for the Americans, he was in Afghanistan. Although there was no proof he was involved, now we have given promises that Afghan soil won't be used against anyone," he said. BIDEN: US WITHDRAWAL CONTINGENT ON TALIBAN'S COOPERATION When asked if he really believes bin Laden wasn't involved in Sept. 11 attacks in 2001, Mujahid doubled down. "So it sounds like, even now, after all this, you're accepting no responsibility," Engel responded. "There is no evidence. Even after 20 years of war, we have no proof he was involved," Mujahid replied. "There was no justification for war. It was [an] excuse for war." In a taped message released in 2004, Bin Laden admitted he ordered the Sept. 11 attacks in which 19 hijackers took over four American commercial planes and crashed them into the World Trade Center towers in New York City and the Pentagon. The fourth jet crashed into a field in Pennsylvania after a passenger revolt. American troops invaded Afghanistan after a bombing campaign in response to the 2001 attack and the Taliban's refusal to hand over al Qaeda leaders, who were provided sanctuary, including bin Laden. The terror leader was killed May 1, 2011 by Navy SEALs in Pakistan. A 9/11 Commission report noted that the "9/11 attack was driven by Usama Bin Laden." "As final preparations were under way during the summer of 2001, dissent emerged among al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan over whether to proceed," the report said. "The Taliban's chief, Mullah Omar, opposed attacking the United States. Although facing opposition from many of his senior lieutenants, [bin Laden] effectively overruled their objections, and the attacks went forward. Story continues "Upon this political and ideological foundation, [bin Laden] built over the course of a decade a dynamic and lethal organization," the report continued. "He built an infrastructure and organization in Afghanistan that could attract, train, and use recruits against ever more ambitious targets. He rallied new zealots and new money with each demonstration of al Qaeda's capability. He had forged a close alliance with the Taliban, a regime providing sanctuary for al Qaeda." Evacuations are underway in Afghanistan as Afghans who worked with U.S. forces are fleeing the country amid a swift takeover by the Taliban. Biden said this week that he is sticking to an Aug. 31 deadline for American troops to leave. "These are our happiest moments," Mujahid said. KABUL, Afghanistan The political leader of the Taliban has outlined his vision for Afghanistan, one in which women and religious minorities will be given rights in accordance with the movements interpretation of Islamic law, and where terror groups will not be given safe haven to carry out attacks abroad. In a rare interview, Abdul Ghani Baradar on Wednesday described the withdrawal of the U.S. and its allies as being "in the best interests of the American people." Washington's "longest and most useless war will end, American troops will return home after 20 years, and Afghanistan will get rid of the presence of foreign forces," he said in response to written questions. Image: Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar speaks at a signing ceremony of the U.S.-Taliban agreement in Qatar's capital Doha on Feb. 29, 2020. (Karim Jaafar / AFP - Getty Images file) The comments come amid the withdrawal of American and allied troops and fears the reinstated Taliban will continue the oppressive, theocratic regime that ended 20 years ago. Baradars insistence that Afghanistan will not become a springboard for terrorist attacks was tested on Thursday when two explosions rocked Kabul airport following warnings by the U.S. and others of an imminent attack. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said on Twitter that an unspecified number of U.S. service members, as well as a number of Afghans, were killed in what he described as a "complex attack." Two U.S. intelligence officials said the assumption is that an IED attack was carried out by the Islamic State group's Afghan affiliate, ISIS-K. The Taliban is an enemy of the ISIS offshoot. The Taliban's attempts to present a less extreme image to the world have been met with skepticism from Kabul to Washington. And early reports of repression as well as violence and chaos at Kabul airport have further undermined its PR offensive. "Religious minorities, like other Afghans, will have rights, their religious ceremonies will be free and supported," Baradar said. "Women will be given rights in accordance with Sharia," he added, referring to Islamic law but not elaborating exactly what that would entail. Story continues When the group last ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, it imposed an austere interpretation of Sunni Islam onto the population, and barred women from attending school, holding jobs and leaving home without male chaperones. Women also had to wear burqas covering the face. Its government was toppled by a U.S.-led invasion in 2001 following the 9/11 attacks, which were orchestrated by Osama bin Laden, the Al Qaeda leader, who was being harbored by the Taliban. Though the Taliban denies bin Laden was behind the attacks, claiming it has never been presented with evidence, it is now seeking to reassure the U.S. and others that it will not let militant groups use Afghanistan as a base from which to launch attacks on the West. "No one is allowed to use our territory to pose a threat to other countries," Baradar said. "No one should feel threatened by Afghanistan." The explosion outside Kabul airport Thursday came after warnings from U.S. officials about possible attempts by ISIS-K to attack people attempting to board flights and flee the country. Baradar said the Taliban has "very good ground for domestic security, stability and unity" and that its domestic policy was for Afghans to have a "comfortable and prosperous life." Earlier Thursday, NBC News interviewed another of the Taliban's senior figures, Zabihullah Mujahid, who has acted as its leading spokesman and is likely in line for a top role in its new government. He, too, said women would be allowed education and careers but only within the Taliban's interpretation of Islamic law. A day earlier, he warned in a news conference that working women should stay at home until Taliban fighters had been "trained" how to approach and speak with them. He told NBC News that reports that its militants have already taken women as forced brides were "propaganda from the old regime." If Afghans want to leave on flights currently shuttling out of Kabul's airport, he said, "it is their choice." But he said that "we don't want our countrymen to go to America. Whatever they have done in the past, we have given them amnesty. They should stay. We need young, educated professionals for our nation." While President Joe Biden says he is withdrawing in order to "end America's longest war," Mujahid said that "without a doubt the Taliban are victors" of the two-decade conflict. "There was no justification for this war. It was an excuse for war," he said. Richard Engel, Gabe Joselow and Ahmed Mengli reported from Kabul, and Alexander Smith from London. The same day Texas Gov. Greg Abbott reissued his ban on vaccine mandates and passports a judge ruled against his ban on mask mandates, issuing a temporary injunction, according to reports. District Court Judge Tonya Parker said in her ruling the mask ban violates Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins authority to prioritize public health during the coronavirus pandemic, FOX 4 in Dallas reported. (In Texas, county judges are equivalent to county executives.) Abbotts executive order bans a requirement for the shot even if it is fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration, as the Pfizer vaccine was this week, according to the Texas Tribune. The governors previous order banned vaccine mandates only for those products under emergency approval. Parkers injunction will likely be appealed to the court of appeals and the Texas Supreme Court. DESANTIS, ABBOTT SCHOOL MASK RULES IN LINE WITH MANY FOREIGN COUNTRIES "Its a victory for humans who live in Dallas County against the virus," Jenkins said of the ruling, according to the Dallas Morning News. "I hope well all take off our red hat and our blue hat and put on our human hat and listen to doctors." Abbott spokeswoman Renae Eze said in a statement, "Governor Abbotts resolve to protect the rights and freedoms of all Texans has not wavered. The Office of the Attorney General has successfully defended the Governors executive orders in the past, and we are confident they will do so again." Jenkins recently issued an emergency order that required people to wear masks inside Dallas County buildings, public schools and businesses, according to FOX 4. The governor also reportedly plans to add the vaccine mandate issue to the Texas legislatures current packed special session. "Vaccine requirements and exemptions have historically been determined by the legislature, and their involvement is particularly important to avoid a patchwork of vaccine mandates across Texas," Abbott said in a statement, the Tribune reported. Story continues His order says "no governmental entity" can require the vaccine but keeps exceptions for places like nursing homes. Abbott himself is vaccinated and has encouraged Texans to get their shots. The legislature is in its second special session with 17 items already on the agenda. A quorum was finally restored in the House after dozens of Democrats staged a multi-week walkout in an effort to prevent the passage of a controversial voting rights bill. An entire community in Texas rallied together to save a 15-year-old deaf dog that had fallen down a storm drain and was trapped for two days. Andrea Tankersley, the dogs owner, told WFFA "people were hearing animal sounds, but they were hearing them all over the neighborhood." The dog, Zoey, was finally discovered on Saturday stuck in a drainage pipe. The Arlington Fire Department, police, paramedics and other workers worked around the clock to tear up the street to rescue her. AFD has released video footage of the dramatic 10-hour rescue operation that involved multiple agencies from the City of Arlington. Community members had also helped out by delivering water and pizza to the workers. In the video, rescue crews can be seen tearing deeper into the earth until hitting the pipeline where Zoey was trapped. WOMAN FINDS HEARTBREAKING POEM WITH SHELTER DOG'S PAPERWORK: I COME WITH BAGGAGE A firefighter reportedly suggested that a skateboard would be useful in getting the dog out of the pipe. Thats when a local kindergartner, Hunter, offered his. "He was just so enthusiastic about helping us," police officer Kristi Weill told WFFA. "It was just so heartwarming." Rescue crews used the skateboard to get Zoey out. Video footage and pictures show the dog caked in mud, looking disoriented as shes pulled to safety. "Everyone has been so helpful," officer Weil added. "There have been cheers of joy, and tears when Zoey was rescued. And I love seeing the community turn out and cheer a successful end to this." Madera County health officials in northern California on Monday issued warnings to the public after high amounts of harmful algae were reported in a lake. Staff from the Central Valley Water Board have put out signs around Hensley Lake warning people about harmful bright green algae in the water, urging pets and children to stay away from the algae, which contains toxins that are dangerous to humans and animals if ingested. There are different types of toxic algae, but they all still are a threat to human and animal health. University of Southern California expert Dr. David Caron told reporters, "many water bodies around the country, not just in California ... are reaching a tipping point." Back in July, harmful blue-green algae prompted beach closures and warnings in Vermont, Rhode Island and Ohio. Officials have said the death of a Northern California family also may be linked to toxic algae, although no official cause of death has been released. The U.S. Forest Service in July reported toxic algae was found earlier in the summer in area roughly three miles north of where the family was found. The new Hensley Lake warning is less than 50 miles away from where the family was found. EAST COAST: Harmful blue-green algae prompts beach closures What is toxic algae? In balanced ecosystems, the tiny aquatic plants can grow quickly and usually occur in late summer or early fall. "You have a higher risk of that happening in the summer, and that's because of higher heat and more stagnant water. That's especially important for freshwater environments," Dr. Erika Holland, assistant professor of biological sciences at California State University of Long Beach, told USA TODAY. When nutrients are right in the water, the bloom can grow and during that process harmful cyanotoxins can be released. They're typically visible because of their bright color in the water or as a foamy layer near the surface. Holland said it, "may look like a colorful oil spill." Story continues Doug Plitt, Operations Project Manager with the U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers at Hensley Lake, told ABC 30 that a general reaction to look for would be: "Your skin may be irritated, you may notice a rash developing. If you've ingested it, typically you'd get a dry mouth, possibly nausea or vomiting, a headache, or diarrhea." Blue-Green Algae or pond scum, cyanobacteria harmful algae. Can it kill humans? Toxic algae can be fatal if a person drinks water from a bloom that contains certain toxins. In California, the most alarming toxin is domoic acid, which can disrupt normal nerve signaling in the brain, causing disorientation and seizures. It can cause death to fish, seabirds, marine mammals and even people. Although the tiny organisms are regularly there, concentrations of them can create enough toxins to seriously sicken people primarily children and be deadly to pets. "It can be from anywhere from just a little bit sick to it can cause death within a couple hours or days, depending on how much you are exposed to," Holland said. She added if you are exposed to it and possibly ingested it, you should take a picture of the water and go to an emergency room and contact poison control. For pets, it's best to get them to a veterinarian as soon as possible. Where is toxic algae found? The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says to look for local advisories before going near lakes, rivers, and oceans. Holland said that toxic algae can be found all across the globe and you can usually tell it's presence by it's smell. "Oftentimes, it's really almost like it hurts your nose. It's like an acid almost that burns in your nose a little bit," she said. "In freshwater, it would be more putrid." Boat activity can move the water around and algae can be concentrated in coves. Officials are warning visitors away from those areas. California State Water Resources has a map where people can voluntarily report where harmful algae is located. Recent reports show they've been spotted throughout the state, but mostly in the north. Was toxic algae to blame for a California family's death? Local authorities are trying to determine what caused the mysterious deaths of Northern California family in the Sierra National Forest. John Gerrish, Ellen Chung and their 1-year-old daughter, Muji, were reported missing on Aug. 16 and shortly after, they were found dead alongside the Merced River along with their family dog. An autopsy done on the family gave no conclusive cause as to how the family died, but it did rule out blunt force trauma and gunshot wounds as no physical evidence was found. Mariposa County Sheriffs Office spokesperson Kristie Mitchell said the investigation would be treated as a hazmat situation. "We aren't specifically saying this is carbon monoxide, we aren't saying it's toxic algae, we aren't saying that it couldn't be something else. What we wanted to do was just take extra precautions because there are additional hazards in the area," Mitchell told USA TODAY. "That's a hard question to answer. We aren't ruling anything out at this point." Holland said authorities would be able to tell if the family died from toxic algae by chemicals present in their tissue, which could be detected in a toxicology report. Contributing: Burlington Free Press This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Toxic algae blooms in California can be deadly, health officials warn A mask vending machine in Singapore. Some of these machines will be retrofitted to become TraceTogether token replacement machines. (PHOTO: Reuters/Edgar Su) SINGAPORE TraceTogether token replacement vending machines will be rolled out at selected shopping malls as well as all 108 community clubs/centres (CCs) from next Monday (30 August). This will allow users to replace their tokens at any time of the day. The Smart Nation and Digital Government Group (SNDGG) said in a media release on Wednesday (25 August) that it has worked with Temasek Foundation to retrofit the foundation's mask vending machines into token replacement vending machines. Each vending machine holds about 1,400 tokens and can be used to replace tokens that are out of battery or are not working. The machine will allow for a token to be replaced if the previous collection was at least 60 days ago. "Two vending machines were deployed at NEX and Sun Plaza on 26 July," it added in the media release. "Public feedback has been positive, and SNDGG will be rolling out vending machines to all 108 CCs as well as selected malls with high footfall. The roll-out is expected to be completed by end-October." The malls which will have the token replacement vending machines are: AMK Hub, Bedok Mall, Bugis Junction, Bukit Panjang Plaza, Causeway Point, Century Square, Chinatown Point, City Square Mall, Clementi Mall, Compass One, East Point, Great World City, IMM, Jcube, Jurong Point, Lot One, NEX, Northpoint City, Resorts World Sentosa, Sun Plaza, Tampines Mall, The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands, Thomson Plaza, Tiong Bahru Plaza, Velocity, Waterway Point, West Gate, White Sands. Free-delivery service for 1st-time token users In addition to the vending machines, SNDGG is launching a free delivery service for first-time TraceTogether token users. The public can access this service via the TokenGoWhere website, and make a request by logging in with their Singpass account. With the rollout of TraceTogehter token vending machines at more locations, the number of Token booths at CCs will be scaled back. Booths will remain in areas with a higher concentration of seniors who may require more assistance when replacing their tokens. Story continues Meanwhile, the 17 token replacement booths at malls will cease operations on Tuesday after vending machines have been deployed in their place. Stay in the know on-the-go: Join Yahoo Singapore's Telegram channel at http://t.me/YahooSingapore Travelers are canceling flights amid the summer surge in COVID-19 cases. The Transportation Security Administration reported its lowest air travel numbers of the summer on Tuesday and Wednesday after hitting its highest traffic of the year at the beginning of August. More than 1.4 million people went through TSA checkpoints Tuesday and 1.5 million on Wednesday, the agency reported. It's a large decrease from the 2.2 million reported in early August. A new survey from Cars.com found "rising concerns" forced a fifth of those planning to fly to cancel their tickets and drive instead. "There's a lot more anxiety with airlines, with hotels, with cruise lines and all members of the travel industry right now compared to just a couple of months ago," said travel analyst Henry Harteveldt. Harteveldt said business travel could take a hit, too. "We're going to see more and more of these meetings getting moved online as companies try to figure out how to keep their employees safe," he said. In Maryland, Louise Miller, who is immunocompromised, should be on her way to North Carolina to see friends, but with COVID deaths spiking due to the highly transmissible Delta variant, her plans changed. "It just seemed like a lot of travel to an area that I didn't feel particularly comfortable in," Miller said. "When you're 70. Life's too short." Some officials are urging travelers to reconsider their plans. Hawaii's governor is discouraging incoming travel as hospitals are at capacity. The European Union is also reconsidering allowing Americans into the region over surging cases. Thousands evacuate Lake Tahoe area as Caldor Fire burns closer How U.S. interests have changed since the start of Afghanistan war CDC lacking data on breakthrough COVID-19 infections TUNIS (Reuters) - Tunisia has stopped at least 50 officials, politicians and businessmen from travelling abroad since the president seized governing powers last month, Amnesty International said on Thursday. "President Kais Saied has made widespread use of arbitrary travel bans in Tunisia while bypassing the judiciary," it said, adding that the total number of people affected was likely "far greater" than the 50 cases it documented. The office of the president did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Saied said late on Monday he was indefinitely extending emergency measures he announced on July 25 that included removing the prime minister, freezing parliament and lifting immunity of its members, moves his foes call a coup. While Saied's intervention appears to have widespread popular support and has not triggered a violent crackdown, it has thrust Tunisia into a constitutional crisis and cast doubt on its democratic gains since the 2011 revolution. He has said his actions are legal and were needed to save Tunisia from collapse, has denied he would become a dictator and said restrictions on travel have only been used temporarily against those suspected of corruption or security threats. However, authorities have detained or put under house arrest several officials and politicians, while border police have prevented others from travelling, raising fears for the rights won in 2011. Saied has also sacked some security officials and figures in central and regional government, while police have detained people they say were involved in corruption in the phosphate industry. "If Tunisian authorities want these measures to be seen as legitimate steps in the name of fighting corruption or ensuring state security, they need to devise a narrow and accountable means of doing so," Amnesty said. Imen Labidi, a judge, was stopped as she was about to board a flight to Turkey for a family holiday, held for two hours and then told she could not leave Tunisia based on an Interior Ministry notice, Amnesty said. Anouar Benchahed, a parliamentary member from the Attayar party which backs Saied, was stopped as he was travelling to France on Aug. 15 and later said in a tweet that Saied's moves constituted a coup. (Reporting By Tarek Amara, editing by Angus McDowall and Bernadette Baum) (Reuters) - The United States has administered 365,767,674 doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the country as of Thursday morning and distributed 434,582,185 doses, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said. Those figures are up from the 364,842,701 vaccine doses the CDC said had gone into arms by Aug. 25 out of 430,118,615 doses delivered. The agency said 202,961,676 people had received at least one dose while 172,171,009 people are fully vaccinated as of Thursday. The CDC tally includes two-dose vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech, as well as Johnson & Johnson's one-shot vaccine as of 6:00 a.m. ET on Thursday. (Reporting by Manojna Maddipatla in Bengaluru) WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. embassy in Kabul advised U.S. citizens not to travel to the Hamid Karzai International Airport at this time, according to an embassy security alert issued on Wednesday. Citizens already at the airport's Abbey Gate, East Gate, and North Gate were advised to leave immediately, said the security alert. The alert, posted on the embassy website, gave no reason for why it was issued. It followed warnings by U.S. President Joe Biden and other administration officials of a threat by Islamic State to evacuation operations as crowds thronged airport gates, desperate to leave following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. The alert advised Americans to "be aware of your surroundings at all times, especially in large crowds." (Reporting by Jonathan Landay and Idrees Ali; Editing by Chris Reese) (Bloomberg) -- Here is a snapshot of whats happening with Iran, its nuclear talks and energy markets. Latest developments The top American negotiator in the Iranian nuclear talks said Washington is prepared to make compromises on difficult issues if Tehran does the same. In a sign the U.S. recognizes the shift to hardline politics in Iran following the election of Ebrahim Raisi as president, Robert Malley said on Wednesday he hopes the Islamic Republic returns to the negotiating table with a realistic approach. The talks -- to revive a 2015 accord that limited Irans nuclear program in return for U.S. sanctions relief, including on oil exports -- have stalled since June. The U.S., European Union, Russia and other powers are waiting for Raisi to say when diplomats can start a seventh round of negotiations in Vienna. Malleys comments came as Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett prepares to meet Joe Biden in Washington on Thursday. Bennett will put pressure on Washington to abandon the talks. Israel has long said the nuclear accord gives Iran the ability to build an atomic bomb more easily. Bennett, prime minister since June, said hell present an orderly plan that we have formulated in the past two months and which will curb Irans atomic activities and its regional aggression. On Wednesday, Iranian lawmakers approved most of Raisis cabinet proposals, installing the anti-Western conservative Hossein Amirabdollahian as foreign minister and Javad Owji, a petroleum engineer, as oil minister. Amirabdollahian will steer the talks when they resume and has stressed that Irans fate wont be tied to the nuclear deal, as it prioritizes mending relations with Arab neighbors and building trade ties in Asia. Latest coverage Iran Installs Government, Moving Closer to Resuming Atomic TalksBiden, Israels Bennett to Weigh Iran Strategy in Talks ThursdayNuclear Inspectors Seek to Plug Gaps Observing Irans ProgramBennett to Tell Biden Israel Will Continue Covert Iran AttacksU.S. Iran Envoy Says Ready to Compromise in Nuclear Talks Story continues Oil Oil snapped a three-day rally, with Brent crude dipping 0.3% to $72 a barrel in early trading on Thursday. While traders are wary of a resurgence in Covid-19 cases, shrinking U.S. stockpiles, a rebound in Indian demand and Chinas containment of its latest outbreak are providing some positive signs for the market. Crude prices are still up around 10% this week. With the nuclear talks stalling, oil investors have reduced their expectations of Iran returning to global oil markets this year. Should there be a deal, many expect Tehran to be able to boost production by around 1 million barrels a day within months. Agenda Thursday: Biden and Bennett meet in Washington Sept. 1: OPEC+ meets to discuss whether to push ahead with a planned oil-production increase in October More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2021 Bloomberg L.P. WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senator Marco Rubio on Thursday released a statement "demanding answers" from the Biden Administration about a Reuters report the U.S. has approved license applications worth hundreds of millions of dollars for China's Huawei to buy chips for its growing auto business. Huawei, the world's largest telecommunications equipment maker, has been hobbled by trade restrictions https://www.reuters.com/world/china/exclusive-trump-admin-slams-chinas-huawei-halting-shipments-intel-others-sources-2021-01-17 imposed by the Trump administration on the sale of chips and other components used in its network gear and smartphones businesses. But in recent weeks and months, people familiar with the application process told Reuters https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/exclusive-us-approves-licenses-huawei-buy-auto-chips-sources-2021-08-25 the U.S. has granted licenses authorizing suppliers to sell chips to Huawei for such vehicle components as video screens and sensors. The approvals come as Huawei pivots its business toward items that are less susceptible to U.S. trade bans. "The Biden Administration cannot be allowed to hide this approval from the public," Rubio said. "Officials need to come forward with what actions they took and why. It is not in America's economic or security interests to help Huawei. Instead of granting waivers, the Biden Administration should be increasing penalties and restrictions on Huawei and other Chinese tech companies." The Biden administration, through the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security, has been reinforcing the hard line https://www.reuters.com/technology/biden-administration-adds-new-limits-huaweis-suppliers-2021-03-11 on exports to Huawei, denying licenses to sell chips to Huawei for use in or with 5g devices. But auto chips are generally not considered sophisticated, lowering the bar for approval. One former government official said they were "non controversial" while a chip industry source said "old chips for cars don't harm U.S. national security." Story continues The Commerce Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment but earlier said it "continues to work with our interagency partners to apply consistently the licensing policies articulated in the Export Administrations Regulations (EAR) to restrict Huawei's access to commodities, software or technology for activities that could harm U.S. national security and foreign policy interests." Rubio was not alone in his criticism. Senator Tom Cotton criticized the approvals, as did the top Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the House Armed Services Committee. "The Bureau of Industry and Security's mission is to protect national security and regulate industry not be its advocate through a permissive licensing regime," said the Foreign Affairs committee ranking member Michael McCaul. The lead Republican on the Armed Services committee, Mike Rogers, urged the administration "to immediately reverse this decision before further harm is done to U.S. national security." (Reporting by Chris Sanders and Karen Freifeld; editing by Edward Tobin) Members of the UK Armed Forces continue to take part in the evacuation of entitled personnel from Kabul airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan August 19-22, 2021. LPhot Ben Shread/UK MOD Crown copyright 2021/Handout via REUTERS James Heappey warned that an attack at Kabul airport was likely, and told people not to go there. He said on Thursday morning UK time that the attack could happen in the next few hours. His warning comes after the US warned Americans to avoid Kabul airport over ISIS-K threats. See more stories on Insider's business page. The UK Minister for the Armed Forces has warned that an "imminent, lethal attack" could happen at Kabul airport as early as Thursday morning. James Heappey told Sky News that the "grim reality" is that intelligence has got "ever more certain" that an attack could happen at the airport or in the centers used to screen refugees looking to leave Afghanistan. When asked by Sky News on Thursday morning UK time if an attack could happen in the next few hours, Heappey said: "Yes." He also told the BBC on Thursday that people should stop trying to get to the airport. "There is now very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack, and hence why the Foreign Office advice was changed last night, that people should not come to Kabul Airport, they should move to a safe place and await further instructions," he said. "I can't stress the desperation of the situation enough. The threat is credible, it is imminent, it is lethal. We wouldn't be saying this if we weren't genuinely concerned about offering Islamic State a target that is just unimaginable." He told Sky News the government was looking at ways to keep people safe. "We are doing our best to look at what other alternative provisions we might be able to make, but obviously we won't be advertising those because that would simply make the alternative routes a target in themselves." It comes after the US warned Americans to avoid traveling to Kabul airport over "specific" threats from ISIS-K, the Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan. Thousands of people, including foreign citizens, are still at the airport, looking to leave Taliban rule. Read the original article on Business Insider Members of the National Guard are seen in the Speakers Lobby at the door where Ashli Babbitt was killed during the January 6th assault on the US Capitol. Photo from January 25, 2021. Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call/Getty Images The Capitol Police Officer who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt on Jan 6 revealed his identity for the first time. USCP Lt. Michael Byrd, in an interview with NBC News's Lester Holt, said he "tried to wait as long as I could" before pulling the trigger. Since Jan. 6, former President Trump and his allies has sought to make Babbitt into a martyr. See more stories on Insider's business page. The US Capitol Police Officer who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt revealed his identity for the first time in an interview Thursday evening with NBC News's Lester Holt. USCP Lt. Michael Byrd opened up about the events of Jan. 6 and how he believes he "followed my training" after spending "countless years and preparing for such a moment." The officer said it was a "last resort" to pull the trigger, which he said was the first time he had shot his weapon in his 28 years on the force. "I tried to wait as long as I could," he told Holt. "I hoped and prayed no one tried to enter through those doors. But their failure to comply required me to take the appropriate action to save the lives of members of Congress and myself and my fellow officers." He disputed claims that he acted with a political agenda in fatally shooting Babbitt. "I do my job for Republican, for Democrat, for white, for Black, red, blue, green," he said. "I don't care about your affiliation." Byrd, who is Black, detailed the threats he's received from Trump supporters in the months since then. "They talked about killing me, cutting off my head," Byrd said, adding that he was also a target for racist attacks. "It's all disheartening because I know I was doing my job." Byrd also discussed his recent exoneration by an internal investigation conducted by Capitol Police. In April, the Justice Department announced that no charges were being brought against the officer, and there are no further investigations of the incident expected. Story continues "I owned up to it. I was penalized for it. I moved on," he said. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Babbitt was shot in her left shoulder as she attempted to climb through a shattered window and enter the Speaker's Lobby behind the House chamber, where members of Congress were evacuating. Byrd said he "could not fully see [Babbitt's] hands or what was in the backpack" she wore as she climbed through the broken glass. A graphic video played during the second impeachment trial of former President Trump in February of this year showed the moment Babbitt was shot. "Nothing will stop us," tweeted Babbitt - an Air Force veteran who was the only rioter killed by police on January 6 - a day before she died. "They can try and try and try but the storm is here and it is descending upon DC in less than 24 hours.dark to light!" Babbitt was an apparent follower of the Q-Anon conspiracy theory and often tweeted threatening messages about Democratic politicians. In the months since her death, former President Donald Trump has sought to make a martyr out of Babbitt. "Who shot Ashli Babbitt? Why are they keeping that secret?" Trump asked in a phone interview with Fox News in July. "Who was the person that shot an innocent, wonderful, incredible woman, a military woman?" Trump also baselessly suggested that a Democratic official may have been connected to her death. "I've heard also that it was the head of security for a certain high official, a Democrat," he said. "And we'll see, because it's going to come out." Babbitt has also been praised by far-right Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, who tweeted in May, "They took her life. They could not take her pride." This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Read the original article on Business Insider The Washington Post this week published a correction and a rebuttal to a humor column after backlash over the writer's take on Indian food as "the only ethnic food in the world based entirely on one spice." In his weekly column in The Washington Post Magazine, Gene Weingarten penned a list of foods he doesn't like to sarcastically dispute criticism that he "like a toddler I seem to categorically dislike, and whine about, many foods." Along with Old Bay seasoning, balsamic vinegar, bleu cheese ("rhymes with 'eeuuu cheese'"), he listed Indian food. "The Indian subcontinent has vastly enriched the world, giving us chess, buttons, the mathematical concept of zero, shampoo, modern-day nonviolent political resistance, Chutes and Ladders, the Fibonacci sequence, rock candy, cataract surgery, cashmere, USB ports ... and the only ethnic cuisine in the world insanely based on entirely one spice," Weingarten wrote in the original version of the column. "If you like Indian curries, yay, you like Indian food!" said the original text, according to screenshots. "If you think Indian curries taste like something that could knock a vulture off a meat wagon, you do not like a lot of Indian food. ... It is as though the French passed a law requiring a wide swath of their dishes to be slathered in smashed, pureed snails," the two-time Pulitzer Prize winner added. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. On Monday, "Top Chef" and "Taste the Nation" host and executive producer Padma Lakshmi tweeted screenshots of the article and asked: "What in the white nonsense is this?" On Wednesday, she wrote for The Washington Post that Weingartens column "is unintentional anti-humor, regurgitating an unimaginative, racist joke with no punchline." "His writing, besides being racist and lazy, is simply not funny," she added. Lakshmi, who was born in India and wrote the "The Encyclopedia of Spices and Herbs: An Essential Guide to the Flavors of the World," also provided a brief review of the word "curry," which was coined by colonizers and has been used in racial slurs against people of Indian descent. Story continues This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. "For generations, people have slung racist insults about the stinky foods of immigrants: Italians with garlic, Irish with cabbage, Koreans with kimchi and, yes, South Asians with curry. It was never funny," she wrote. "Whats puzzling is that editors and copy editors let his words through. Does The Post still have so little diversity among editors that this mini-screed raised no red flags?" she said, bewildered that such a take would make it to press in 2021. She pointed out that the paper's food section editor had nothing to do with the piece. Related: Desi Americans say the British colonial term curry doesnt represent what they grew up eating and are refusing to cater to the Western gaze. In response to pushback on the piece, Weingarten defended himself repeatedly. "Took a lot of blowback for my dislike of Indian food in todays column so tonight I went to Rasika, DCs best Indian restaurant. Food was beautifully prepared yet still swimming with the herbs & spices I most despise. I take nothing back," he wrote in a since-deleted tweet. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. But The Washington Post added a correction at the top of his column that read: "A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that Indian cuisine is based on one spice, curry, and that Indian food is made up only of curries, types of stew. In fact, Indias vastly diverse cuisines use many spice blends and include many other types of dishes." The Indian food portion of the article was amended. Lakshmi said the correction addressed the factual errors "but not the root of the issue: the bigotry." In response to Lakshmi, Weingarten said that "from start to finish," including the illustration depicting Weingarten as an adult baby in a high chair with a bib on, "the column was about what a whining infantile ignorant d---head I am." This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. "I should have named a single Indian dish, not the whole cuisine, & I do see how that broad-brush was insulting," he said. "Apologies. (Also, yes, curries are spice blends, not spices.)" A public school district in Washington state is pausing a program that required some student -athletes and coaches to wear tracking devices on their wrists to trace COVID-19 during practices. "These have been shelved. We will not put them back into place at all. What we're going to do is allow the coaches and the parents to make the decision," Eatonville School Board director Matt Marshall said Wednesday night during a school meeting. The school district did not immediately respond to Fox News's request for comment on the pause. WASHINGTON PUBLIC SCHOOL REQUIRES STUDENT ATHLETES TO WEAR TRACKING MONITORS TO TRACE COVID The development comes after some parents voiced outrage over the program, and some attendees of the Wednesday meeting were spotted wearing t-shirts saying, "UNMASK OUR CHILDREN." "Its just one more thing theyre doing to the kids through this whole covid thing," father of Eatonville High School students, Jason Ostendorf, told The News Tribune this week. "The vaccine, now be tracked when youre at practice. Where does this end? I feel like this is an experiment on our kids to see how much we can put them through before they start breaking." "I have an issue with a device being put on my child, who's done nothing wrong, to monitor their movement," Ostendorf added in additional comments to KING 5. "I actually appreciate what the school here tried to do, to allow our kids the ability to play here. I just think the method was all wrong." HOMESCHOOLING SPIKE EXPECTED TO CONTINUE DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC, EVEN AS SCHOOLS REOPEN The district had said earlier this week that both vaccinated and unvaccinated athletes who play on teams with high contact and moderate indoor contact, such as volleyball, basketball and wrestling, were required to wear the devices. The tracking devices, which were paid for by federal funds, were worn during practice to trace the proximity of one player to others in the event of a positive coronavirus case. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP "We received grant funding (known as ESSER III) that specifically included provisions to support higher-risk athletic programs, and we used some of those funds to pay for athletic proximity monitors," a statement from the district on Tuesday read. "We are using these monitors for high contact and moderate indoor contact sports. The monitors are for both staff (coaches) and students on the field, regardless if they are vaccinated or unvaccinated. If a student or coach tests positive, we will have immediate information regarding athletes and coaches contacts, so we can more tightly determine who might need to quarantine." At least 13 US service members, including several Marines, were killed and 18 injured after an explosion occurred outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Thursday, the Pentagon said. An unknown number of Afghan civilians were killed and wounded in the suicide bombing that was believed to have been carried out by ISIS, US officials said, adding they were still working to calculate the total loss. It was the most US service members killed by hostile forces in Afghanistan on a single day since 2011. These fallen heroes answered the call to go into harms way to do the honorable work of helping others, US Marine Corps Commandant David Berger said in a statement. We are proud of their service and deeply saddened by their loss. The Pentagon said Friday that there was only one suicide bombing outside the Kabul airport, and not two explosions as it had originally claimed. The agency had initially said that a second explosion had taken place near the Baron Hotel, which is close to the airport. I can confirm that we do not believe there was a second explosion at or near the Baron Hotel...that it was one suicide bomber, Army Maj. Gen. William Hank Taylor said in a press briefing on Friday. Were not sure how that report was provided incorrectly. The airport has been the site of chaos, panic, and fear since the Taliban took over the country. Large crowds of Afghan families have been waiting outside its gates in increasing desperation to escape on the last few flights out of Afghanistan before the US withdrawal deadline of Aug. 31. The explosion at the airports Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack, Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said on Thursday. Multiple outlets reported that dozens of injured people were arriving at a hospital in Kabul. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and injured, Kirby said in a statement. Officials initially reported that 12 service members had died and another 15 were injured. Late Thursday evening, Capt. Bill Urban, a public affairs officer for US Central Command, said an additional service member had died from his wounds in the attack at Abbey Gate and that the number of those injured had risen to 18. Story continues The wounded service members were being evacuated on C-17s equipped with surgical units. We continue to provide the best possible medical care to those injured, Urban added. Marine Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr. of CENTCOM said the threat from ISIS is extremely real. We believe it is their desire to continue those attacks and we expect those attacks to continue, McKenzie said in a press briefing Thursday afternoon, adding that US forces would go after those responsible. We are working very hard right now to determine who was associated with this cowardly attack and we are prepared to take action against them. He explained that at the gate where the attack occurred, US service members have been conducting physical screenings of people before allowing them onto the airfield, a task that requires them to be close to thousands of people. Theres really no other way to do it, McKenzie said. Ultimately, Americans have got to be in danger to do these searches. The Taliban are also conducting similar searches before people reach the US checkpoint, he added, noting that sometimes those searches have been good and sometimes not. McKenzie said that while it was clear there was a failure in the process that allowed a suicide bomber to reach the gate, he wasn't sure how they had gotten through. He noted that despite the bombing, the US will continue to focus on evacuations, saying that 1,000 Americans remained in the country. At least 104,000 people have been evacuated so far. In an address to the nation Thursday evening, President Joe Biden again defended his decision to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan, and he vowed to track down those who ordered the attack. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. In the hours since the explosion, members of Congress appeared to criticize the administrations decision to coordinate with the Taliban to secure the airports perimeter. Politico on Thursday reported that as part of that strategy, US officials had provided the insurgents with the names of Americans and Afghan allies cleared to enter the airport. In a statement, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Bob Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat, said, As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We cant trust the Taliban with Americans security. Biden said he couldnt say with any certitude that such a list existed but described situations where the US military had contacted the Taliban to tell them to provide entry to buses of people. No one trusts them, he said. Were just counting on their self-interest to continue ... their activities, and its in their self-interest that we leave when we said and that we get as many people out as we can. The explosion took place a day after the US Embassy had warned Americans to stay away from the airport and avoid airport gates, citing security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport. Both the British and Australian governments issued similar warnings to their citizens, saying there was an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack. Be aware of the potential for violence and security threats with large crowds, the Australian Embassy warned its citizens. Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. If youre in the area of the airport, move to a safe location and await further advice." Multiple journalists in Afghanistan reported feeling another possible explosion late Thursday, which a Taliban spokesperson attributed to US forces destroying equipment. During the briefing, McKenzie said he could not confirm if there had been additional explosions. More on this (Bloomberg) -- Western Digital Corp. is in talks to merge with Japans Kioxia Holdings Corp. in a deal that could unite two technology storage providers, according to a person familiar with the matter. A deal, which could be worth more than $20 billion, may be reached by mid-September at the earliest if negotiations are successful, the person said, asking not be identified because the matter is private. Talks could still fall apart and Kioxia, which is closely held, is still also pursuing an initial public offering, the person added. A spokesman for Kioxia said the company is preparing for an IPO at the right time and declined to comment on market rumors and speculation. A representative for Western Digital declined to comment. Western Digital shares rose 7.8% in New York after the talks were reported by the Wall Street Journal, giving the company a market value of about $20 billion. Toshiba Corp., which spun off Kioxia in 2018 and remains a large shareholder, gained 2.1% in Tokyo. Samsung Rival A combination of the longtime joint venture partners would create a bigger competitor for Samsung Electronics Co. in the market for memory chips used as storage in portable devices and computers. Toshiba, the inventor of flash memory, sold a majority stake in Kioxia in 2018. That type of chip is taking over for data storage from hard disk drives, Western Digitals main product. Kioxia and Western Digital had combined sales of about $17 billion in flash memory chips last year, according to IDC Corp. Samsung had $18.6 billion. Industry sales jumped 37% in 2020. Western Digital has provided Kioxia with funds for capital expenditure and research and development in return for production out of its Japanese partners plants. The relationship has been fractious in the past involving a bitter dispute when Western Digital, under a previous chief executive officer, tried to acquire Kioxia when Toshiba was suffering financial difficulties as a result of its nuclear power divisions troubles. Story continues Kioxia filed for an IPO last summer in which shareholders including Toshiba and Bain Capital were planning to sell shares. (Updates with Toshiba share in fourth paragraph) More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2021 Bloomberg L.P. Lynchburg Chief of Police Ryan Zuidema said the city, like many across the country, is seeing an increase in violent crime and both the perpetrators and victims are becoming younger. So its critical we get to these young men and young women long before they get an opportunity to be taken out by the streets, he said. He told Kaine he hopes part of the bill is to get job training for adults because many of the children struggling do not have parents at home. And thats what they need, they need positive role models, which a lot of these folks in this room, kind of wrap their services around to make sure were doing that for them to be successful, he said. Kaine said three quarters of the bill is focused on child care, pre-K and community college but the other quarter has a heavy investment on workforce development. Kaine said he is working to phase in universal pre-kindergarten that is a mixed delivery not only for public schools but the private pre-K providers as well. Universal preschool is a movement to use public funding to ensure high-quality preschool is available to all families. While most of Virginias growth in recent years has been concentrated in the northern parts of the state, Lynchburg and several of its surrounding counties have seen steady population growth as residential areas continue to develop. According to population numbers released by the U.S. Census Bureau in early August, the City of Lynchburg and Bedford, Campbell and Appomattox counties have all seen increases in population since 2010. Amherst and Nelson counties both saw a slight decline, of about 3.2% and 1.6%, respectively. Some of the areas largest growth came in Bedford County. Though there is an apparent 15.7% increase in the countys numbers, from a population of 68,676 in 2010 to 79,462 in 2020, it is in large part due to the reversion of the City of Bedford back to a town in 2013. After the City of Bedford became a town, its residents again were counted among the population of the county. The 2010 census reported 6,222 residents in the city, and including that population number into the countys 2010 count means the county has actually seen about a 6.1% population growth, from 74,898 in 2010 to 79,462. Bedford County Administrator Robert Hiss said, as Roanoke goes and Lynchburg goes, so goes Bedford County. President Tsai Ing-wen has made headlines in Japan, after getting a shot of the Taiwan-developed Medigen vaccine on Monday. A report by Tokyo-based TBS News noted that the injection was live-streamed to set an example for her country. In related news, Japanese public broadcaster NHK used the name "Taiwan", when introducing the island''s Paralympic national team. Just as it did during the Olympic opening ceremony, Japans NHK used the name Taiwan when introducing the islands Paralympic athletes. It was a choice well received by Japanese internet users. One said, Ive been waiting in front of the TV to hear this sentence. Another said, Just as expected, they said Taiwan. Another one proclaimed, Taiwan is Taiwan. This week in Japan, Taiwan has garnered attention for another reason. President Tsai Ing-wen on Monday received a shot of the Taiwan-made Medigen COVID vaccine. She made headlines in Japan. The news reports detail how the injection was livestreamed, to boost public confidence in the vaccine. British aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth has held its first drill with the Japanese Self-Defense Forces off the south of Okinawa, a demonstration of the Royal Navy's increasing presence in the Indo-Pacific. Japan's Defense Ministry said Wednesday that the SDF conducted a drill with the British carrier strike group the previous day. U.S. and Dutch forces also participated, in a show of force intended to counter China's growing military presence in the Pacific. A key element of the drill was the deployment of U.S. and U.K. F-35B fighter jets, which can execute short takeoffs and vertical landings. Japan is purchasing these aircraft to bolster its defenses in the Nansei Islands. These islands -- just a stone's throw from Taiwan -- have few runways long enough for more conventional fighter jets. The workout closed with the allied ships sailing in formation -- led by the Queen Elizabeth and flanked by Japanese Hyuda-class helicopter destroyer JS Ise and amphibious assault ship USS America. The three ships were followed by the HMS Defender, HMS Kent, USS The Sullivans, USS New Orleans, Dutch ship HNLMS Evertsen and Japanese destroyer JS Asahi. - Nikkei Kanagawa Prefectural Police have arrested a 34-year-old man on suspicion of violating the prefectures Ordinance on Juvenile Protection. Daisuke Komatsubara, 34, a Saitama Prefecture resident employed at Tokyo's Adachi Ward office, is accused of committing lewd acts with a 17-year-old high school girl in September last year, Sankei Shimbun reported. Police said Komatsubara engaged in sexual acts with the girl, who is from Fujisawa City, Kanagawa Prefecture, for about two hours from 3 p.m. on Sept 16 at a hotel room in Kawasaki City. Police said that on Sept 23, Komatsubara allegedly pressured the girl to take nude photos of herself on a smartphone and then send them to his smartphone. According to police, the girl made a post on a social networking site alluding to what happened. When a police cyber patrol discovered the post, they questioned her and learned of Komatsubaras involvement. Police said Komatsubara has admitted to the charge. Intense heat hit wide areas of Japan on Thursday. Weather officials are warning of high temperatures also during the night and on Friday. Temperatures soared to 35.7 degrees Celsius in central Tokyo. That is the first time in two weeks and the second time this summer that the capital was hit by a temperature of 35 degrees or above. The Meteorological Agency says a high pressure system staying south of Japan has covered large areas of the country, causing the mercury to shoot up. The daytime high in Sano City in Tochigi Prefecture reached 37.2 degrees. It was 37 degrees in Koshu City in Yamanashi Prefecture, 36.8 degrees in Isesaki City in Gunma Prefecture, 36.6 degrees in Shingu City in Wakayama Prefecture, and 36.2 degrees in Toyama City in Toyama Prefecture. Weather officials say overnight lows are expected to remain at 25 degrees or more mainly in the Kanto and Tokai regions. They are advising people to use air conditioning and stay hydrated even at night. Scorching heat is expected to continue on Friday in western and eastern Japan. Daytime highs are forecast to reach 36 degrees in the cities of Kyoto, Nagoya, Gifu and Iida. The Meteorological Agency and the Environment Ministry have issued heatstroke alerts for several areas. Michael Nader, the actor known for playing Farnsworth "Dex" Dexter on the hit soap "Dynasty" and for his role on "All My Children," has died at age 76. The Missouri-born star's manager, Richard Schwartz, confirmed to USA Today that he died in his California home on Monday after a short battle with cancer. A statement from Nader's wife, Jodi Lister, to Michaelfairmantv.com, read: "With heavy heart, I'm sharing the news of the passing of my beloved, Michael. We had 18 wonderful years together with the many dogs we fostered and adopted." Nader's acting career spanned several decades after he landed his first acting gig in William Asher's 1963 comedy "Beach Party." In 1978, he secured his first soap job as Kevin Thompson on "As the World Turns." He rose to prominence in 1983 when he joined the cast of "Dynasty" as the love interest of Alexis Carrington, played by Joan Collins. DES MOINES A Council Bluffs mother is suing the state to end its ban on schools enacting face mask requirements. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in a district court in Polk County on behalf of Frances Parr, who has two young children who attend Council Bluffs public schools. The suit names Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, state Public Health Director Kim Garcia and state Education Director Ann Lebo as defendants. The ban was approved by the Republican-led Iowa Legislature and signed into law by Reynolds, also a Republican, in May. The suit says the ban violates the rights of Parrs children and other students to attend school without a threat of contracting COVID-19 or the delta variant, the symptoms of which could lead to hospitalization, permanent physical harm, emotional harm and even death. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} The suit notes the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends all students and staff wear face masks inside school buildings and includes a statement from the childrens pediatrician, who wrote of the dangers of children who contract COVID-19. He has always offered the children a compassionate, caring connection, helping children thrive. Childrens Square is grateful to Dr. Schierbrock for his leadership and commitment to making the community a place where children can have the vision for their future, the courage to try and the will to succeed, Schierbrock thanked the Human Services Advisory Council. Its always been a pleasure for me to work at Childrens Square, he said. Multiple times I had tried to retire from the board, and they wouldnt let me. It was always hard for me to say no because of the mission of Childrens Square. Ive been privileged to serve with a lot of great people from the community. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Terri Wilson, director of the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program at Connections Area Agency on Aging, was honored with the Arlene Steege Award, which is reserved for a human services professional. Terri is pretty awesome, said Aubury Kutchara, Connections director of community engagement, who presented the award. She has really grown our fundraising. Shes an awesome person at that, and I will greatly miss her. Wilson is not leaving the agency but will be switching to a home visitation case manager position. The Legislature decided it was a serious menace. Unfortunately, the governor appears to be treating it like its an inconvenience to big business, Stoltze said. Carter said attorneys have heard from dozens of Iowans suffering economic hardships after having been initially promised by the state they would be eligible for the aid through early September. Reynolds spokesman Pat Garrett said the governor believes we cannot continue to pay able-bodied people to stay home." He said the number of people looking for jobs at unemployment offices and participating in the state's labor force has increased since May. This was not only the right decision, but also in accordance with the law and this lawsuit has no merit, he said. Reynolds is one of 26 governors, mostly Republicans, who have taken similar steps, ahead of the Sept. 6 date that the federal aid will expire. Lawsuits have been filed challenging the cuts in several of those states, including Ohio, Texas and Florida, and have had mixed success so far. An amended Iowa lawsuit filed Wednesday names four plaintiffs and estimates the class could involve 55,000 who have been illegally deprived life-sustaining benefits." ONAWA (AP) Two people are jailed after they allegedly stole copper from electrical substations in northwest Iowa, causing power outages and thousands of dollars in damage, authorities said. Monona County Sheriff Jeff Pratt said in a news release that Craig Keller, 40, of Onawa, and Whitney Reynek, 30, of Tekamah, Nebraska, were arrested Monday. Monona County emergency dispatchers received numerous calls Saturday evening of fires at electrical stations in the western half of the county, The Sioux City Journal reported. Workers with Northwest Iowa Power Cooperative discovered someone had removed copper from grounding rods in the substations, Pratt said. Sheriffs deputies recovered items from the substations and other burglaries on Sunday at a rural Whiting, Iowa, home. Among them are Senate Minority Leader Zach Wahls, D-Coralville of Coralville, Cedar Rapids City Council members Ashley Vanorny, Dale Todd and Pat Loeffler, Marion City Council members Will Brandt and Colette Atkins, Ely Mayor and Council Members Eldy Miller, Kay Hale, Judy Wery, Ely City Council and Ben Symonds, Hiawatha City Council members Dick Olson, Aime Wichtendahl and Rob Archibald, Bertram City Council member Bill Mulholland, and Robins mayor and council member Chuck Hinz and Dick Pilcher. BOHANNON RAISES $100K: Christina Bohannon, the newly announced Democratic candidate in Iowas 2nd Congressional District, announced her campaign raised more than $100,000 in its first 24 hours. Bohannon is the first Democrat to announce her candidacy in the 2nd District, which is currently represented by Republican freshman Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks. STATEHOUSE ENDORSEMENT: EMILYs List, a national organization that works to get pro-choice women elected to public office, endorsed Democrat Andrea Phillips in a special election for a seat in the Iowa House. Phillips is running against Michael Bousselot in House District 37, which is in Ankeny. The vacancy was created with the recent passing of former Rep. John Landon. The special election is September 14. DES MOINES A Council Bluffs mother is suing the state to end its ban on schools enacting face mask requirements. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in a district court in Polk County on behalf of Frances Parr, who has two young children who attend Council Bluffs public schools. The suit names Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, state Public Health Director Kim Garcia and state Education Director Ann Lebo as defendants. The ban was approved by the Republican-led Iowa Legislature and signed into law by Reynolds, also a Republican, in May. The suit says the ban violates the rights of Parrs children and other students to attend school without a threat of contracting COVID-19 or the delta variant, the symptoms of which could lead to hospitalization, permanent physical harm, emotional harm and even death. The suit notes the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends all students and staff wear face masks inside school buildings and includes a statement from the childrens pediatrician, who wrote of the dangers of children who contract COVID-19. We have used your information to see if you have a subscription with us, but did not find one. Please use the button below to verify an existing account or to purchase a new subscription. We joined the Capitol Police to uphold the law and protect the Capitol community, the group of officers said in a statement released by their lawyers. On Jan. 6 we tried to stop people from breaking the law and destroying our democracy. Since then our jobs and those of our colleagues have become infinitely more dangerous. We want to do what we can to make sure the people who did this are held accountable and that no one can do this again. The documents requested by the House committee this week are just the beginning of what is expected to be a lengthy, partisan and rancorous congressional investigation into how the mob was able to infiltrate the Capitol and disrupt the certification of Democrat Joe Bidens presidential victory, inflicting the most serious assault on Congress in two centuries. Committee members are also considering asking telecommunications companies to preserve phone records of several people, including members of Congress, to try to determine who knew what about the unfolding riot and when they knew it. With chants of hang Mike Pence," the rioters sent the then-vice president and members of Congress running for their lives and did more than $1 million in damage, and wounded dozens of police officers. Four of the five placed under surveillance after arriving in France were close to a man suspected of links to the Taliban, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin has said. That man, who has remained in the restricted zone, admitted belonging to the Taliban. He bore arms at a blockade in Kabul, the interior minister said this week, but also helped in the evacuation of the French Embassy, assisting the French army, citizens and journalists. French intelligence agents were tracking the five via geopositioning and saw on Monday that one of them had left his restricted zone, Darmanin said on Tuesday. He arrived in Paris last weekend and was immediately placed under watch, along with the four others, at the hotel east of Paris, and ordered not to leave. The interior minister, who ordered the special surveillance for the five, insisted in an interview Tuesday with France Info that there were no slip-ups in checking evacuees. The main suspect slipped through the cracks in the chaotic evacuation last weekend, but Darmanin said he was identified during a thorough identity check at the French air base in Abu Dhabi, used by France as a transit point for evacuees. By Wednesday night, France had evacuated more than 2,000 Afghans and more than 100 French, authorities said. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Rivera, in his countersuit, argues that he was hired by Citgo not PDVSA, as the state oil company is known to develop a strategic plan to develop an independent identity separate from its controversial parent. While the amount was deemed suspiciously high by Citgos new management, Rivera argues that considering the billions of dollars at stake with Citgos public and business stature in jeopardy, Citgo obviously deemed the fee reasonable. But PDV USA, the affiliate that managed the contract, never paid the final $30 million owed him under the agreement. Rivera says he performed all the required work and only received objections when the Venezuelan opposition took control of PDVSAs U.S. assets. Lawyers for Citgo did not immediately return a request for comment. Rivera is a former high-ranking state legislator who shared a house in Tallahassee with Rubio, who was the state House speaker at the time. He has been embroiled in several election-related controversies since then, including orchestrating the stealth funding of an unknown Democratic candidate to take on his main rival in a South Florida congressional race and a state investigation into whether he hid a $1 million contract with a gambling company. He has never been charged with a crime. Washington, PA (15301) Today Partly cloudy skies. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 52F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 52F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Staff Writer Brad Hundt came to the Observer-Reporter in 1998 after stints at newspapers in Georgia and Michigan. He serves as editorial page editor, and has covered the arts and entertainment and worked as a municipal beat reporter. Thank you for Reading! We hope that you continue to enjoy our free content. The guy on the right honestly even kind of looks like Scar. Reply Thread Link omg he really does Reply Parent Thread Link he was in old Reply Parent Thread Link and ironically, he's voicing mufasa. Reply Parent Thread Link well then the bigger question is if he's practiced his curtsy Reply Parent Thread Link that was literally my first thought! Reply Parent Thread Link hes english too so im hoping they mixed it up and he is scar otherwise theyre switching accents? Reply Parent Thread Link yup - his face is something... Reply Parent Thread Link I believe in Barry Jenkins. Reply Thread Link No Jason Weaver, though ? Wow. Reply Thread Link This director and these actors for a damn Lion King prequel? An ugly "live-action" one at that? Reply Thread Link [ Spoiler ] although I was shocked that it turned into a (Pusha T voice)"You are hiding a child!" movie. Ok, in Barry Jenkins we trust. Also, Kelvin was so charming in The High Note Reply Thread Link same on all accounts! i still listen to some of his songs from that soundtrack Reply Parent Thread Link I somehow missed this was being made. I don't mind the CGI animation tbh, I know people always hate on it but I thought it was okay. Reply Thread Link Also, are they going to acknowledge that Simba and Nala are siblings or cousins? Reply Thread Link NO my thoery is nala's mom was on a solo journey and was accepted into the pride bc mufasa is a kind lion Reply Parent Thread Link I lost interest in the remake when Simba grew up lol (I fell asleep in the middle of Can You Feel The Love Tonight). I could've watches those bb cubs for hours. Reply Thread Link Aaron Pierre('s character) was so gorgeous and sad in The Underground Railroad Reply Thread Link Whomst asked for this? Reply Thread Link Me when I was 10-12, but I wanted it tradicionally animated :( Reply Parent Thread Link I love Barry Jenkins but can we stop with remakes, prequels and sequels of classics /every show or movie made 10 + years ago. Come up with some original shit Hollywood. No one is asking for this. Reply Thread Link uh Reply Thread Link the original name for Scar. You think his parents named him "Scar"? Damn. I did haha. Honestly this whole prequel could be cool visually, but storywise is already predictible. Scar Taka is jealous. Mufasa doesn't want to be king. Mufasa meets Sarabi. Taka loves Sarabi. Taka gets scar from trying to best Mufasa. Mufasa has deep talk with Rafiki. Scar meets hyenas. Fade to black. Reply Thread Link As one of the few people who can appreciate how lovely TLK2: Simba's pride is, I'm absolutely here for this. I mean, just FUCKING LOOK AT THESE CUTIES Reply Thread Link That movie deserves an Oscar for the 'Not One Of Us' scene alone. Reply Parent Thread Link lol disney really is creativly bankrupt Reply Thread Link right? its kind of hilarious Reply Parent Thread Link guess it matches their morals then Reply Parent Thread Link A shell of its former self. Reply Parent Thread Link The new issue of Billboard Magazine features an interview with BTS where they discuss HYBE , military enrolment and chart manipulation allegations. .@BTS_twt gets candid about their busy workload, business innovations, and the future of the band. Go inside the business of #BTS and the challenges ahead in the #BTSxBILLBOARD cover story: https://t.co/LCKuDHckIv pic.twitter.com/J8LXq1P9UD billboard (@billboard) August 26, 2021 On their expected military service: The seven men all have a lot more weighing on their minds these days. Their importance as cultural ambassadors for South Korea has become so great that this past December, in an unprecedented move, the countrys government changed a law, allowing the group to wait until age 30 to enlist in the military. (Previously, it had been 28.) But with Jin turning 30 at the end of 2022, BTS faces a lengthy period with at least one member missing and should they all choose to serve at the same time, as some stock analysts in South Korea have predicted, a group hiatus could last about 18 months (the minimum length of service). It would be interesting to see if Jin and Suga actually leave for military service at the end of the year. Maybe there might be another postponement if they get a Grammy nomination? or the six members might have to do the Grammys without Jin (you know Suga will not go if they are nominated) Surprisedly, the topic of the recent chart allegations came up. The ARMY fanbase have recently been seen to be exploiting loopholes in the music chart rules by crowd funding huge buying sprees of the BTS english singles (through Paypal and by forming NGOs no less!). BTS has been encouraging this by releasing six digital versions (seven by tomorrow besties!) of Butter and two physical versions and encouraging fans to buy them directly from their webstore which has no limit or cap. So while the other singles on the Hot100 typically rely on streaming, airplay and then sales, the recent BTS track Butter has been mostly propelled by sales. RM had this to say in response to the allegations: "These efforts have buoyed the groups singles, as they have sailed to the top of the charts despite BTS weaker streaming numbers and radio airplay than some of its pop contemporaries. Its a fair question, says RM of allegations that ARMYs work amounts to chart manipulation. But if there is a conversation inside Billboard about what being No. 1 should represent, then its up to them to change the rules and make streaming weigh more on the ranking. Slamming us or our fans for getting to No. 1 with physical sales and downloads, I dont know if thats right ... It just feels like were easy targets because were a boy band, a K-pop act, and we have this high fan loyalty. To be honest, I never thought Billboard would ever question BTS and HYBE about the chart allegations as they seem to be very pro BTS. Also their charts and rules are the ones in question here. All in all, it's a very informative article and can be found at the source. (source) Last week a judge halted the latest Alaskan oil project following a year of disappointment due to the Covid related drop in oil demand and the cancellation of project after project as the green transition takes hold. Its hard not to be concerned over the future of Alaskan oil. As locals say they need Alaskan oil for jobs and income, Biden and other forces seem insistent on curbing production in the oil-rich region. Just last week, a U.S. judge rejected approvals for a large oil project on Alaskas North Slope, already approved by ex-President Trumps administration in 2020, largely due to environmental concerns. ConocoPhillips Willow Project in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska previously approved development included three drill sites, associated processing facilities, gravel roads, and pipelines on the North Slope, with the potential for further development in the future. The project was expected to produce as much as 160,000 bpd of oil, meaning a total of around 590 million barrels over three decades. In addition, the project would have created around 1,000 construction jobs and 400 long-term operations jobs. Is it for this reason that many locals are battling it out against environmentalists and international agencies to keep the states oil and gas industry running for as long as possible. With an economy largely built on energy, many believe that halting oil and gas developments will leave Alaska with high levels of unemployment and significantly reduced revenue levels. Alaskan oil and gas has already been hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic, which left thousands unemployed and saw the lowest levels of Alaskan oil production in over 40 years. In 2020, Alaska lost around 3,000 oil and gas jobs, a reduction from 10,000 employed in the industry to fewer than 6,900, representing the lowest employment rate in the industry in 30 years. This is a trend that looks set to continue following the inauguration of President Biden in January this year, who made his stance on climate change and his intended shift away from oil and gas clear; as well as recent landmark reports on the need to replace fossil fuels with renewables over the next decade by both the IEA and the IPCC. This August, Biden has once again been bashed for his movement away from national oil, as several complain that its costing both jobs and the national economy, while the U.S. continues to rely on foreign oil to meet its needs. Biden was criticized by U.S. and Canadian oil supporters earlier this month when he plead with Saudi Arabia and OPEC+ to increase output in order to stabilize international oil prices. Oil majors and politicians suggested that North America would not be in this situation if new projects had been carried out, and output had returned to pre-pandemic levels. After Bidens request was denied earlier this month, much of the public reiterated this sentiment, as millions of Americans are currently facing ever-rising gasoline prices in the wake of a global pandemic. The Governor of Alaska, Mike Dunleavy, sent out a strong message to Biden and the federal judge on their decisions to move away from fossil fuel production in the oil-rich Alaskan region. Dunleavy stated, Make no mistake, todays ruling from a federal judge trying to shelve a major oil project on American soil does one thing: outsources production to dictatorships & terrorist organizations. This is a horrible decision. We are giving America over to our enemies piece by piece. The Willow project would power America with 160,000 barrels a day, provide 1000s of family-supporting jobs, and greatly benefit the people of Alaska. Related: House Democrats Seek More Oil Drilling Bans However, the mismanagement of oil revenue in Alaska cannot be overlooked. Despite establishing the Alaska Permanent Fund in 1976 as a means of investing a percentage of the states oil revenue in investments in bonds, stocks, real estate, infrastructure, and private entities for the future of the economy, the Alaskan government and big oil operators have been repeatedly criticized for spending on shareholder interests rather than giving oil revenue back to Alaskans themselves. In addition, Alaskan oil revenue had been declining long before the pandemic hit, with the government facing a deficit of $1.5 billion at the beginning of 2020. With the largest oil field discovered in North America, Alaskan oil boomed in the late 1960s and following decades. However, it has been in a state of decline since its peak in 1988, falling from a production level of 2 million bpd to under 1 million bpd in 2002. By 2020, Alaska was producing around 460,000 bpd of oil. So, while we can blame Biden and environmentalism for the recent loss in Alaskas oil economy and its rising unemployment levels, Alaska must respond to the decades of decline that came before. It may still have a few years left in it, with existing production remaining relatively steady, but one thing is sure, Alaska must invest more heavily in its non-oil sector if it hopes to thrive once again. By Felicity Bradstock for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: BP is spinning off its assets in Iraq by setting up a joint venture with PetroChina which will manage Iraqs largest oilfield Rumaila as the UK-based supermajor is looking to invest more in low-carbon energy sources and become a net-zero business by 2050. BP and PetroChina are creating a new standalone joint venture company, Basra Energy Co. Ltd., to run Rumaila together with Iraqi state-held Basra Oil Company, BP said in a statement carried by Bloomberg. The new venture will have access to external financing, the supermajor said. The new joint venture will operate Rumaila through 2034, when the current contract expires, and will allow BP and PetroChina to continue investing in the oilfields operations, the supermajor said in a statement to Reuters. The Iraqi government approved on Tuesday BPs spin-off plan, Iraqs oil minister Ihsan Abdul Jabbar Ismaael said in a separate statement. BPs spin-off in Iraq doesnt come as a surprise. Reports have been circulating for more than two months that the supermajor was considering creating a separate company to manage its Iraqi assets. In June, The Wall Street Journal reported that BP was considering spinning off its oil assets in Iraq, including its holding in the worlds third-largest oilfield, Rumaila. BP was said to be working on the plan to create a new company together with China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), the owner of PetroChina, which is BPs partner in the field alongside the Iraqi state-owned Basra Oil Company. BPs presence in Iraq began in Kirkuk in the 1920s when the company that is now known as BP helped Iraq to locate, produce, and export oil from Baba Gurgur, which was the largest oil field in the world at the time. Rumaila, the third-largest producing field in the world, is estimated to have around 17 billion barrels of recoverable oil remaining, according to BP. With BP as an operator, the Rumaila oilfield produces 1.5 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil, or around a third of the crude oil pumped in OPECs second-largest producer after Saudi Arabia. Oil production at Rumaila has increased by 40 percent since 2010. By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: The Permian Basin looks strong until at least 2025 despite challenges from Biden's alternative energy push, with oil output climbing steadily after its dip during the 2020 pandemic, as companies rush to consolidate their assets while demand remains high. We are seeing the number of mergers and acquisitions in the oil-rich region of the USA level out as companies vie for the best position while demand and oil prices are at their highest in years. Firstly, Callon Petroleum announced on 5th August it would be acquiring Primexx Energy Partners for $788 million to expand its Delaware basin assets to over 110,000 net acres. Primexx reportedly produced 18,000 bpd of oil equivalent from its 35,000 acres in the second quarter of 2021, offering Callon a significant production boost. Then just the next week, Surge Energy announced its acquisition of the leasehold interest and wells from Apache Corporation in Howard Country, Texas, at a cost of $37.5 million. The acquisition expects to boost Surges production levels by around 800 bpd, as well as adding 14 drilling locations. That same week, the U.S. Energy Development Corporation stated it would be investing $21.8 million at the heart of the Permian Basin. The exploration & production firm entered into a joint venture with Midland-based Atlantic Energy Partners to develop and operate three horizontal wells in Ward County, Texas, expected to come online by Q2 of 2022. This builds upon U.S. Energys $30 million investment in a three-well pad earlier in 2021. Related: Oil Glut In Asia Worsens Jordan Jayson, CEO of U.S. Energy, stated of the move, "This joint venture comes at an ideal time as we expand our footprint in the Permian Basin and the market continues to recover from COVID-19 with the drilling of new wells." This appears to be the resounding sentiment of the oil industry in the Permian region, with firms moving quickly to consolidate assets as a means of ensuring they profit from one of the strongest U.S. oil zones before demand falters and green policies create a shift away from oil and gas. For example, earlier this year, Bonanza Creek Energy and Extraction Oil & Gas announced a $2.6 billion all-stock merger, establishing one of Colorado's largest oil and gas drillers. In general, it seems major U.S. oil companies are taking the lead within the region, as rumours this summer suggest Devon Energy Corp. and ConocoPhillips are battling it out for Royal Dutch Shells portfolio within the region, expected to be worth around $10 billion if sold. Chevron Corp. may also be in the running for the West Texan assets. This move comes as many international supermajors are being pushed to invest more heavily in low carbon and renewable energy projects, in an eventual movement away from fossil fuels. This has led several major firms to reconsider their investments, focusing on key strategic regions and low-carbon oil and gas developments. Matthew Kaes Vant Hof, chief financial officer at Diamondback, stated of changes in the Permian, Consolidation is important, its going to keep happening. Theres going to be a few large basin champions in each basin, majors included. Further consolidation within the region looks set to continue as oil and gas output has stabilised significantly in recent months, driving energy firms to act quickly to ensure their spot in the region. In 2019, output in the Permian Basin totalled over 4.3 million bpd of oil, peaking at 4.7 million bpd in December of that year. However, in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, oil production stagnated, falling from 4.8 million bpd between January and March back to 4.3 million bpd the rest of the year. Based on recent changes in demand, production levels are now expected to reach an average of 4.9 million bpd by mid-2022, a figure that could remain stable until around 2025. As demand eventually wanes and green policies push producers away from high-carbon oil and gas output, the Permian Basin will also play its part in the transition to renewable energy production, particularly through solar and wind developments. Several new developments are taking the push for decarbonisation into account. For example, the Whistler pipeline came into full commercial operation this summer, allowing for the transportation of 2 billion cubic foot per day of natural gas from the Waha Header in Reeves County to Agua Dulce. The Whistler pipeline is expected to reduce the quantity of gas flares in the region, which have been criticised for causing major damage to the environment and adding to climate change. Occidental has already established one large-scale solar project in the Permian, a 16-megawatt solar farm powering oil and gas operations in Texas, and this is expected to be the first of many for Occidental alone. We could eventually see solar panels spreading across the Basin, which is well situated to catch the sun. In fact, a 2020 report by the Permian Strategic Partnership presented several solar and wind farms across the Basin in both New Mexico and Texas, suggesting they could provide as much as $283 million and $77 million in financial output, initially powering gas and oil operations before they are used as independent power sources in the renewables boom. The report explains, With more than 92.3 billion barrels and nearly 300 trillion cubic feet of untapped oil and natural gas sitting below the surface and a limitless supply of wind and solar, energy production in the Permian Basin is expected to continue to grow for decades to come. At present, the main commitment in the region appears to be consolidation, getting as many assets in the Permian as possible to make gas and oil operations profitable while demand and prices are high. But as more wind and solar projects are installed, this could power the future of the basin. By Felicity Bradstock for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee are proposing more offshore drilling bans and higher fees and royalty charges on the oil and gas industry to raise funds for wildlife conservation efforts, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday, citing a document circulated among lawmakers it had seen. Democrats sitting on the Natural Resources Committee propose increased royalties for oil and gas pumped on public lands and want new fees for idled oil wells and the inspection of oil and gas infrastructure, among a dozen measures to raise more money from the oil and gas sector, according to the plan seen by Bloomberg. All the additional levies on the fossil fuel sector are designed to raise $5.6 billion, some of which is planned to be used in a $550-million funding scheme for wildlife conservation. The document prepared by staff on the Natural Resources Committee also proposes an offshore drilling ban in the Pacific, the Atlantic, and the eastern Gulf of Mexico. The central and western Gulf of Mexico areas, which currently pump around 17 percent of Americas crude oil, are not part of the offshore drilling ban plan. The proposal is subject to revisions before a vote next week, while Republican staff members on the committee told Bloomberg they had heard of such a document but it hadnt been sent to them. Even if the proposal passed at the committee, it faces a lot of opposition in Congress, including from Democrats from major oil producing states. President Joe Biden ordered in January a review of the current U.S. leasing regulations in federal waters and on federal land, suspending new leases while the review lasts. The move drew criticism from the oil industry, which says that the temporary moratorium on new lease sales undermines Americas economy and energy security while raising the need to import more crude oil. Earlier this week, court documents showed that the Biden Administration would resume oil and gas leasing on U.S. federal lands later this year. By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Last year, we made a financial projection for the price of electricity long term, with or without decarbonization (Electricity decarbonization is not that expensive, so lets get on with it, Society of Utility and Regulatory Financial Analysts, April 2020). We concluded that decarbonized electricity would cost more primarily because battery storage costs so much. Mind you, we werent talking about a big price jump that anyone would notice in the typical familys budget, for example, but nevertheless, a higher price for clean energy. A number of academic papers have concluded otherwise, but they depended on assumptions that might be optimistic. We wanted to stick with what we knew, and not assume that all would end well. If the high cost of battery storage is one of the major impediments to some type of clean energy transition then what is required is a reduction in the cost of energy storage. And we were concerned about that prospect, because the drop in storage costs over the past two decades looked like this: FIGURE 1: Index of cost of energy storage per KWH (2000=100) That looks like the curve seems to be flattening out. We might need something new to change the picture, to bend the curve as some like to say. And then this news comes along. A group of venture capitalists and investors including Bill Gates, Temasek (Singapores state holding company), Macquarie (the Australian infrastructure investor) and steel group ArcelorMittal have joined MIT engineers to finance a company, Form Energy, that claims that its iron-air battery can deliver electricity for 100 hours at one-tenth the cost of lithium-ion batteries. This new technology is said to feature easily sourced components, no Chinese rare earth materials, modular installations, and perhaps even the batteries may not burst into flame. Form Energy has already raised over a quarter billion dollars from investors and announced a deal to provide 150 hour energy storage to Great River Energy, a generation and transmission cooperative in Minnesota. This 150-hour battery contrasts with existing grid-scale lithium-ion batteries that provide energy typically in bursts of between two and four hours. A utility would be able to tolerate a whole lot of intermittent generation from wind and solar with that type of storage. Great River plans to completely phase out its coal-fired generation as a result. Were finance types and not engineers so were not writing today to attest to the veracity of the companys claims. We know venture capitalists raising new funds tend to accentuate the positive to put it mildly. But this is a group that has to be taken seriously and if they continue to acquire significant utility clients they, and more importantly their technology, will get real traction. We want to examine briefly what happens if their seemingly extravagant claims prove to be genuine. So we took another look at the price of electricity, assuming that the industry achieves a zero carbon goal by 2039. Our original study, presented at an industry conference in 2020, calculated that in 2019 dollars the price of electricity in the US would rise from an average of 10.7 cents per kilowatt hour in 2019 to 16.2 cents without major decarbonization efforts, a business as usual case by 2039. US electricity prices in our study rose to 22.7 cents per KwH with decarbonization in 2039. Next, lets assume that Form Energys claim about the real cost of its battery storage is even close to accurate. If so, our back of the envelope calculation shows the price of decarbonized electricity in the US in 2039 falling into the 14-17 cent per KwH range. And that calculation may not reflect additional savings from reduced transmission expenditures. At this point its too early to get hung up on precision. This is the point: the degree and level of reduction in battery storage costs predicted by Form Energys new product is a game changer. It has the potential to completely change the discussion about decarbonization of electricity and the related role of storage. What is interesting to us, given the enormous capital intensity of the electric energy transition ahead, is that this new battery type could meaningfully reduce prospective capital spending needs. In business type articles we tend to focus on winners vs losers. The clear loser here is natural gas as a boiler fuel for electric power generation. Coal also but coal is already uneconomic relative to gas, and becomes even more so if we assume carbon taxes are likely soon. The key for us is that natural gas has been the boiler fuel of choice for many utilities transitioning from coal-fired power generation. This fast transition to natural gas-fired baseload power generation, especially given the US utility industrys checkered past with respect to climate change denialism, has long been a concern for us. Any degree of political blowback could result in potential stranded asset risk for utilities that leaned heavily into new gas-fired baseload power generation. Given that each day brings another supposed climate-related disaster to the publics attention, we dont think its a stretch to anticipate a popular demand for a more rapid transition to cleaner forms of electricity productionespecially those that would not meaningfully raise prices. Up until now, the US utility industry has transitioned to natural gas power generation in large central station plant formats for its scalability, reliability, and access to plentiful domestic fuel sources. But a relatively inexpensive 100 hour plus utility-scale storage battery is as disruptive a technological force for the electric utility industry as anything we have ever seen. By Leonard Hyman and William Tilles for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: While the world looks on with growing concern at the political play unfolding in Afghanistan with the takeover of the Taliban, another sidebar to this developing story that is slowly creeping into public consciousness is the vast treasure-trove of minerals in that country, and how the Taliban government will exploit it. One estimate by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) given years ago had pegged the worth of Afghanistans untapped mineral resources at U.S. $1 trillion. Some Afghan officials have said the actual figure could be three times more. Afghanistans mountains contain a wide range of critical resources, including copper, gold, oil, natural gas, uranium, bauxite, coal, iron ore, rare earths, lithium, chromium, lead, zinc, gemstones, talc, sulphur, travertine, gypsum, and marble. However, even before the U.S. entered its borders 20 years ago, Afghanistan had struggled to tap those reserves. Two decades later, the situation is not very different. During its time in the country, the U.S. did not get into the mining of these metals and minerals because of the high risks. Now, with the Taliban in control, it remains to be seen how it will use these resources to its advantage. What makes these resources especially attractive to countries like China and Russia is the fact that some of the minerals could power the transition to renewable energies in the future. Afghanistan rare earths For example, lithium is a crucial element to make electric car batteries, solar panels and wind farms. The International Energy Agency forecast global lithium demand will grow by over 40 times by 2040. In a 2010 memo the U.S. Department of Defense described Afghanistan as the Saudi Arabia of lithium, Reuters reported. As such, the country could be as important for the global supply of the battery metal as the Middle Eastern country is for crude oil. As of the time of the comparison, lithium batteries were already widely used for electronic devices. However, it had not yet become apparent how much lithium would be needed for electric vehicle (EV) batteries and the transition to lower carbon emissions across industries. A USGS 2017/18 report noted that Afghanistan had deposits of spodumene, a lithium-bearing mineral, but failed to provide estimates of its tonnage. The 2019 Afghanistan report made no mention of lithium at all. But records show that Afghanistan does, however, hold 1.4 million tons of rare earth minerals, a class of 17 elements widely used in consumer electronics and military equipment. Copper Copper is another commodity that is in Afghanistan. Despite the recent drop in prices, with prices soaring to more than $10,000 per metric ton earlier this year, thats another attractive proposition for the new rulers. Chinese companies signed contracts to mine one of the worlds largest untapped copper deposits in Afghanistan about 10 years ago, in a sparsely populated area of Logar province, about 40 kilometers southeast of Afghanistans capital, Kabul. In 2007, China Metallurgical Group Corporation had leased the giant Mes Aynak copper ore deposit for 30 years, taking out 11.5 million tons of copper from it. Mes Aynak, meaning small copper deposit in Dari, is a large deposit with an estimated value of $50 billion (317 billion yuan) based on earlier estimates. However, not much came out of these efforts. Taliban and China Although the Talibans takeover may deter foreign investors, China and Russia could be willing to do business with them. Following the Talibans entry into Kabul, China said it was ready to have friendly and cooperative relations with Afghanistan. As part of its efforts to dominate clean energy manufacturing, China has become a major buyer of minerals. It is also leading the world in separating and refining them to make them useful for batteries and other technologies. China has also invested in mining projects abroad, including cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Francis Fannon, who served as assistant secretary of state for energy resources during the Trump administration, warned it might be a matter of time before the Taliban began cooperating with China, which already dominates the vital minerals supply chain. Jane Nakano, a senior fellow in the Energy Security and Climate Change Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, was quoted as saying that Afghanistan had a wealth of mineral resources that was more likely to be developed under Chinese-Taliban cooperation than under the Western engagement there in the past. By AG Metal Miner More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Protesters gathered in front of the Minnesota State Capitol a day after the states Supreme Court allowed construction on the Enbridge Line 3 oil pipeline to proceed, calling on the Minnesota governor and President Joe Biden to stop the project. Were here in ceremony. Were here to assert our treaty rights and our right to exist and our right to clean water, said one of the protesters, the founder of an organization called the Resilient Indigenous Sisters Engaging Coalition. Line 3 violates our treaty and all the treaties along the Mississippi because the water flows. This is a peoples problem, this is not just a Native issue here, Nancy Beaulieu added, as quoted by the Associated Press. The protest was ignited by the Minnesota Supreme Courts decision to refuse to hear an appeal that was filed by the opponents of the pipeline replacement project. With its decline to hear the appeal, the Supreme Court basically affirmed the decision of the Minnesota Court of Appeals, which had affirmed in June the approvals of the Line 3 project issued by Minnesota state regulators. They have arrested 800, almost 900 people all for a Canadian corporation to make a buck in the middle of climate chaos, Winona LaDuke, executive director of Honor the Earth, an Indigenous environmental group, told the AP in an interview. Its poor policy and its worse practice and were here to ask the governor why he continues with such egregious policies and how were going to change that. The Line 3 replacement project involves, as the name suggests, the replacement of the existing pipeline built in the 1960s with a new one across North Dakota, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. The replacement will increase the capacity of the pipeline by 370,000 bpd to 760,000 bpd. It will also make the infrastructure safer, according to Enbridge. The company also says it had taken into account Indigenous concerns about the pipeline and addressed them. By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: The temperature at the Lincoln Airport at midnight was a muggy 80 degrees. The alleged assault that prompted the protests was the 103rd rape reported to UNL Police since 2005 and the 78th such incident reported since 2015, according to data reviewed by the Journal Star. Another rape was reported eight hours after the alleged assault at the Fiji house. The actual number of attempted rapes on UNL's campus is likely much higher, according to Marcee Metzger, the executive director of the local victim advocacy organization Voices of Hope. In the hours before the second night of protests, Metzger told the Journal Star that most sexual assaults aren't ever reported to campus police, not just at UNL, but at colleges across the country. She said demonstrations like the ongoing gatherings outside of the Fiji house can help prompt sexual assault survivors to make belated reports. "I think it's really important that there's accountability," Metzger said in a phone interview. "Voices of Hope stands in solidarity with the survivors of sexual violence who are experiencing this, but also those protesters who are out there saying, 'Please pay attention to this.'" Even if a mandate had four votes of support on the City Council, that would not be enough to override a potential veto from Mayor Jean Stothert, who came out Tuesday against another mask mandate. Still, Councilman Pete Festersen, who led the first mask measure to passage, said Wednesday that he continues to look at the issue. Festersen released a statement saying: When public health experts make the determination that action is needed, it should be taken seriously. I will continue discussing it with council members and the mayor, but theres no consensus at the moment. Meanwhile, the City of Lincoln and Lancaster County will implement a renewed mask mandate starting Thursday. The diverging developments Lincoln and Lancaster Countys unilateral move and Douglas Countys request and rejection highlight different state statutes regulating the two local health departments. Lincolns department is organized as a city-county health department through one part of state public health law. Even Gov. Pete Ricketts has acknowledged Lincoln has a carve out in the law, and the state has not challenged Lincolns moves in court. DES MOINES A Council Bluffs mother is suing the state to end its ban on schools enacting face mask requirements. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in a district court in Polk County on behalf of Frances Parr, who has two young children who attend Council Bluffs public schools. The suit names Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, State Public Health Director Kim Garcia and State Education Director Ann Lebo as defendants. The ban was approved by the Republican-led Iowa Legislature and signed into law by Reynolds, also a Republican, in May. The suit says the ban violates the rights of Parrs children and other students to attend school without a threat of contracting COVID-19 or the delta variant, the symptoms of which could lead to hospitalization, permanent physical harm, emotional harm and even death. The suit notes that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends all students and staff wear face masks inside school buildings and includes a statement from the childrens pediatrician, who wrote of the dangers to children who contract COVID-19. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved ivermectin in both people and animals for some parasitic worms and for head lice and skin conditions. The FDA has not approved its use in treating or preventing COVID-19 in humans. Using any treatment for COVID-19 thats not approved or authorized by the FDA, unless part of a clinical trial, can cause serious harm, the FDA said in a warning about the drug. Hydroxychloroquine was approved by the FDA to treat malaria and certain autoimmune conditions. The World Health Organization has said there is no evidence that the drug is effective at reducing the chance of severe illness or death from COVID-19, and warns that when used in COVID-19 patients, it can increase the risk of heart rhythm problems, blood and lymph disorders, kidney injury, liver problems and failure. One of the group's members is Dr. Kirk Milhoan, a pediatric cardiologist and senior pastor at Calvary Chapel South Maui. He outlined his treatments in a videotaped discussion with Pang. It involves using hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin as early treatment options. He said he disagrees with the FDA and maintains his early treatment protocol is an option for people who, like himself, dont want to get vaccinated. Later Wednesday, Maui's mayor condemned the off-label use hydroxychloroquine and the ivermectin as treatments for COVID-19 in response to reports about it being used to treat people on Maui. For copyright information, check with the distributor of this item, Honolulu Star-Advertiser. But he said it was Bidens fault for sticking to the agreement, and then failing to get out U.S. citizens and Afghan allies before the sudden collapse of the Afghan government and Army. On Thursday, the Problem Solvers Caucus issued a statement urging Biden to extend the evacuation deadline to rescue as many U.S. citizens and Afghan allies as possible. U.S. Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., is a member of the bipartisan group. As Democrats and Republicans, we stand united in our commitment to protecting U.S. citizens, diplomats, intelligence officers, and our foreign partners who are currently attempting to flee Afghanistan," the group's statement said. "It is apparent that the Administrations set date for departure from Afghanistan on Aug. 31 does not provide enough time to evacuate all American citizens and our partners. We respectfully call on the Administration to reconsider its timeline and provide a clear plan to Congress that will result in the completion of our shared national objectives. A full pull-out was always a bad option, Sasse said. Weve been on a bad path for 18 months. (The Taliban) are not trustworthy. These are folks who not only want to kill their own people and oppress women and girls, they are willing to harbor certain terrorist groups. They are in the opposite direction of the majority of Greek society, which wants to protect public health," he said. Speaking on Skai TV, Kikilias announced the start of a pilot program to have mobile vaccination units administering shots in town squares outside churches. The program would start this Sunday on the island of Crete, the minister said, and would expand to the country's main cities. Greece has been seeking to boost its vaccination drive with a series of incentives. It has been seeing a steady increase in confirmed coronavirus cases and deaths, as well as hospitalizations and intubations, over the past several weeks. ICU beds for COVID-19 patients are more than 69% full, while regular COVID-19 wards are 45% full, health ministry figures show. On Tuesday, Kikilias said that significantly more than 90% of patients who are in COVID ICUs are unvaccinated," without specifying whether some of them had received one vaccine dose and weren't yet fully vaccinated. More than 11 million vaccine doses have been administered, with 5.6 million people now fully vaccinated in this country of about 11 million people. JERUSALEM (AP) Israel said that it would be easing commercial restrictions on the Gaza Strip and expand entry of goods to the Palestinian enclave following days of heightened tensions. The announcement came after hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated Wednesday near the Israeli border, calling on Israel to ease a crippling blockade days after a similar gathering ended in deadly clashes with the Israeli army. Hamas kept the crowds from approaching the barrier, and the protests ended without a repeat of Saturdays intense clashes that left one Palestinian dead and an Israeli border policeman critically injured after being shot from point-blank range. The defense ministry body in charge of Israels crossings with the Palestinian territory said in a statement late Wednesday that it would increase imports of new vehicles, goods and equipment for civilian projects in the Gaza Strip, and issue more permits for Gazan businessmen to enter Israel starting Thursday. The easing of restrictions would be conditional upon the continued preservation of the regions security, and could be further expanded if the border situation improves, the body, known as COGAT, said. As a veteran who served three decades in the Air Force, I knew that when we signed our names on the dotted lines to give our all in service to our country, we relinquished our time with our parents, spouses, children and friends. Some of us give the ultimate sacrifice and will never get to experience the life we fight so hard not only to protect, but to instill around the world freedom. Unfortunately, the very dream of freedom we fought so hard to protect in the United States and build in the Middle East has been shattered with the Biden administrations botched withdrawal from Afghanistan. As I join the world in watching the horrifying scenes of people so desperate to flee the impending Taliban rule that they would rather fall to their deaths with the single hope that clinging to the wheels of a plane might grant them freedom, I think of those who served in Iraq and Afghanistan fighting for that very idea of freedom. I think of the men and women who came back battered and bruised, missing limbs and suffering from PTSD. I think of their families who watch the news and wonder if their loved ones sacrifice was all for nothing. We are witnessing one of the worst international crises that has hit our nation. The delta variant is fueling a troubling upsurge in COVID cases in Nebraska, which now exceed the states initial peak in May 2020. Hospitals are postponing elective surgeries because COVID cases are taking up an increasing number of beds. Some school districts have had to quarantine classrooms due to outbreaks of the virus. This threat cant be simply willed away, and its crucial that elected officials and the public realize that point. This situation requires an energetic, effective response one guided by health science and supported by elected leaders. Its hard to exaggerate the importance of that task. If Nebraska fails at it, the state will be at risk of remaining on an ongoing loop from the virus threat. The disruptions and health concerns would continue, to everyones frustration. Wishful thinking isnt enough. We need to break this cycle with sound action. And as much as possible, we need to do so in a spirit of unity. But Nebraska at present is falling short, as events this week demonstrated. The photo along with hundreds of other such photos published in U.S. newspapers is the very opposite of news. It merely reflects the dangerous and false belief that getting a shot is, in any physical sense, painful. To the extent that such photos induce ignorant or irrational people to avoid getting the vaccine, they are in a very real sense responsible for the infections and deaths that result. I write as a World-Herald subscriber for more than 70 years. Rob Bligh, San Antonio, Texas Say no The fact that the FDA approved the Pfizer shot for COVID really shows how corrupt our government agencies have become. As of Aug. 13 the national VAERS data show 595,620 adverse events, including 13,608 deaths from the COVID injections. The swine flu vaccine effort was halted after 35 deaths and 500 cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome. One can honestly ask, What is going on here? Have they lost their minds? The people of this country need to stand up and say an emphatic no to this shot! Cindy Miller, Blair, Neb. Turn to experts Doelger City by Woody LaBounty November 1999 Lying south of Golden Gate Park, and far beyond Stanyan street, lies a vast tract of waste and barren lands, whose topographical arrangement is hourly changing through the shifting of the restless sands, and yet whose favorable positionin the direct line of our westward growth which is as inevitable as faterenders it a most desirable region for investment and for the founding of lovely and healthful homes.Baldwin's Real Estate Guide, August 1887 I drive down 41st Avenue, between Kirkham and Lawton Streets in the Outer Sunset District. There are more parking places in this one block than in all of North Beach right now. I stop the car and get out, lean on the trunk, and breathe in the light mist on a quiet, treeless block. When these houses were first sold in the 1930s, each had strips of green grass straddling the driveway. By the time I came around almost all the mimi-lawns had been paved over, and as a boy from the Richmond District, I thought of the Sunset as the strange land that didn't have any trees. There are no businesses. No one walks by. I am alone with stucco homes on either side of me running off into the distance in razor-straight lines. Each house sits squarely on a 25-by-120-foot lot, and the windows reflect the gray fog bank that sits at the beach ten blocks away. I stand on the edge of Doelger City. Hot Dogs to Homes No man had a greater impact on the Sunset District than builder Henry Doelger. Eighty years ago, Doelger ran a hot dog stand on the corner of 7th Avenue and Lincoln Way, and most of the land west of him was empty sand dunes. 1 In the mid 1920s, Henry joined his older brother Frank in the real estate business, and began building homes on a line in the dunes that maps identified as 39th Avenue. Frank died relatively young, and Henry became the driving force of the company, adding another brother, John. A romantic newspaperman recounted Henry Doelger's first years as a builder: "There was only one way to sell homes out in the Sunset District of San Francisco in those days; you hammered a few nails along with the carpenters and when a prospective buyer came along, off came the coveralls, and presto, instant real estate salesman. "That's what Henry did!" Although they may have started off sporting coveralls with the common man, the Doelger brothers worked their way into prosperity by building affordable houses on the open sand dunes and scrub south of Golden Gate Park. They competed with the Gellert brothers and the Stoneson brothers, Chris McKeon, and Ray Galli to fill in the western blanks of the city grid. From 1934 to 1941, the Doelgers reigned as the largest homebuilders in the country, tossing up two wood-framed stucco houses a day. Doelger weathered the Great Depression with help from Bank of America, which loaned his the company over $75,000,000. By the late 1930s, the newly-created Federal Housing Administration made home purchases realistic for middle-income buyers, and the sand that blanketed the western half of the peninsula for a thousand years quickly disappeared under concrete streets, stucco homes, and big automobiles. Suburbia in the City Many scoff at these "Avenue" houses as precursors of conformist suburban architecture that prevailed in the years following World War II. People call them "ticky-tacky." One local architecture guide postulated that Sunset District houses were "made with a set of giant cookie cutters." But the houses stand in good repair sixty years after their construction. Doelger used redwood framing andas opposed to many large-scale developersmade sure his product was well-built. There is some visual interest as well. Even with assembly-line standardization, the majority of Sunset row houses sport subtle, if sometimes cartoonish, style elements. A curlicue of French Provincial, a cornice of Spanish Colonial tile, and an angled Streamline Moderne lintel can be present in three adjoining stucco housesan architectural metaphor for the American melting pot. Doelger and his brothers constructed homes in the Richmond District, Golden Gate Heights, and along MacArthur Boulevard in Oakland. During World War II, the company created over 3,000 units of defense housing in the East Bay and South San Francisco. After the war, Henry masterminded the Westlake subdivision in Daly City, where parts still feel like a time machine trip to California circa 1957, a daydream of idealistic suburbia in Technicolor. Westlake became Henry Doelger's masterpiece, but in most people's memory, his legacy is tied to the area roughly bounded by 27th and 39th Avenues and Kirkham and Quintara Streets, what he called in newspaper ads, with bravado, "Doelger City." Bibliography: Samuel C. Chandler, Gateway to the Peninsula, Official History of Daly City, CA: David Gebhard, The Guide to Architecture in San Francisco and Northern California;Sally B. Woodbridge and John M. Woodbridge, Architecture, San Francisco, The Guide; Marquis James and Bessie R. James, Biography of a Bank, The Story of Bank of America. Contribute your own stories about western neighborhoods places! BLOOMINGTON The City of Bloomington is requesting comments on the May draft of the Lake Bloomington and Evergreen Lake Watershed Management Plan. The draft includes a detailed assessment of current conditions such as water quality, pollution loading and existing practices, and notable features and attributes including land use, geology, hydrology and soils. The draft is informed by current and historical data and provides strategic recommendations or projects. Written comments will be accepted online, by mail or in person at The Hub, 115 E. Washington St., Suite 103 in Bloomington, and at an open house on Aug. 24 from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Davis Lodge, 25449 Davis Lodge Road in Hudson. Comments will be accepted until Sept. 20. After the meeting and all comments have been received, the City will request authorization from the Illinois Environment Protection Agency to finalize the plan. The City of Bloomington, McLean County Soil and Water Conservation District and Northwater Consulting developed the Lake Bloomington and Evergreen Watershed Management Plan with funding provided by the City of Bloomington, Illinois Farm Bureau and the Illinois EPA's 319(h) Grant. Community members can view the draft plan and comment form online at cityblm.org/government/departments/public-works/project-updates/draft-lake-bloomington-evergreen-lake-watershed-plan. Questions may also be emailed to jdarter@cityblm.org. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. EAST ST. LOUIS A federal judge has noted "serious ongoing" violations to the rights of transgender prison inmates in Illinois which must be "immediately addressed." Chief Judge Nancy J. Rosenstengel in southern Illinois said in a memorandum and order earlier this month that the Illinois Department of Corrections has made some changes ordered in 2019 following a class-action lawsuit. But correctional officers and other staff have not had any training in new procedures regarding transgender inmates. "There are still serious violations of Plaintiffs' constitutional rights happening every day," Rosenstengel said. That includes delays in treating inmates and a failure to monitor the health of inmates receiving hormone therapy and properly adjusting the dosage. Rosenstengel also noted a lack of appropriate medical are and more suicide attempts, more threats of suicide and ongoing harassment. "Our clients have endured years of suffering, waiting for IDOC to simply provide basic health care," said inmates' attorney attorney John Knight, LGBTQ & HIV Project Director at the ACLU of Illinois. An IDOC spokeswoman said the agency has "implemented a number of initiatives to improve the quality of transgender care" and "is committed to ensuring world class care for transgender individuals in custody." Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 NORMAL For Len Meyer, the right voice is more than a matter of preference. It's true that speaking in a deeper tone fits Meyer's sense of self the best: Meyer is transgender/nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, but expresses their gender in a way that leans masculine in dress, overall appearance and vocal sound. "One of my values in life is to live authentically. Before I transitioned nine years ago, I had been dealing with gender identity issues for a long time," said Meyer, of Bloomington. "When I changed my name in 2012 and began living as Len, it was like, 'That's who I've always been from the beginning.' For me, being able to have the voice that sounds right, have my body match who I am, have my name match who I am, really helps me live an authentic life." It's also true that speaking in a deeper tone can become a matter of safety in just a few seconds. "If I go into a women's bathroom, most likely I will be verbally assaulted," Meyer said. "I don't necessarily feel comfortable going into the men's bathroom, but it's easier for me to go into the men's bathroom and, if I have to speak, the lower my voice is, the safer I am in that scenario." Meyer noticed that taking testosterone helped, but they still felt something was missing. That was where a unique program at Illinois State University came into play for Meyer in late 2019. At Fairchild Hall, within ISU's Eckelmann-Taylor Speech and Hearing Clinic, there's now a full-fledged voice therapy program specifically aimed at aligning a person's voice with their gender. The program open to anyone interested is largely led by clinical educator Tricia Larkin and graduate students completing clinical hours for their degrees. Although the pandemic has curtailed its in-person offerings, the program's reputation has grown significantly since its first days when it wasn't really a formal program at all. A 20-year veteran speech pathologist from a school in LeRoy who made the jump to a clinical position at ISU, Larkin was approached by graduate students exploring the topic of transgender voice care for their theses in late 2016. At the time, there was no formal gender-affirming voice care of the kind in McLean County. "It was really the students who provided the impetus," Larkin said. "They're like, 'If we know this and don't do anything about it, then shame on us.' We decided we weren't going to ignore what we knew is the right thing to do." *** Larkin, who jokes easily about being a "middle-aged, white cisgender woman," did some studying, conferred with voice training specialists in the Communication Sciences and Disorders program at ISU and, with the help of graduate students serving as clinical educators, welcomed the program's first two clients in August 2017. "We've grown from that point on and dedicated a lot of time and investment into the community to making sure that we're staying relevant," Larkin said. "What I hear from my clients is, 'This made such an important change in my life. I feel more comfortable being in public because my gender will be perceived more accurately.'" Meyer can attest to that, being one of around two dozen clients the program has served thus far. Meyer and Larkin connected early in the program's development and Meyer would meet with graduate students who'd chosen to work in gender-affirming therapy. "That way, when they do go to the clinic, they've already met someone who's transgender," Meyer explained. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Although the clinic operates on a semester-based schedule, clients can stay in the program for as long as they feel is necessary. Sometimes that's a few weeks and sometimes that's a year. For Meyer, who decided to undertake the program after serving as a sort of liaison to it, months felt more appropriate. "It takes a lot of work, because you have to think about, 'Where's my voice? Am I breathing the right way?'" Meyer said. "Once I hit that three- or four-month period, I was kind of like, 'OK, now I know I'm on the right track. I know the things I'm doing are working.'" It's a work in progress for everyone clinicians and clients alike. "I was in choir in high school it kind of reminded me of that," Meyer said. "Learning how to get my voice out of my head and down deeper in my chest until it was a matter of exercising my jaw, exercising ways of opening my mouth, where I'm breathing from when I'm taking a breath, that kind of thing." Sarah Greenberg, a graduate student who worked with one client last year on voice therapy, said she'll take what she learned from the experience with her into the professional sector. She wants to work with children, she said, and realized the principles she learned are equally applicable to them, too. "The graduate student clinicians were a little nervous, especially online, because it can be hard to make a good impression, but I think everyone learned a lot," she said. Of her own lessons, she added, "Every single person is different, and to assume all sorts of things about people that might be LGBTQ that's not helpful." *** While the COVID-19 pandemic stalled some of the program's growth, Larkin said, it also created a new opportunity: remote therapy. When graduate students and clients pivoted to online meetings, Larkin said it opened up the chance for people without reliable transportation to participate in the program. "If you have a diverse gender identity and you think you need to address your communication, we are the only option in ... this Central Illinois area," she said. "There have been barriers to care and strangely, COVID-19 has addressed some of those barriers because we've moved to Zoom. I feel well-supported by our administration and they hope the telepractice piece can remain in place." The way Meyer sees it, services aimed specifically at LGBTQ needs have increased in number over the past several years, but there's still work to be done. With the clinic established formally and remote services now on the table, Meyer said the focus is shifting toward how to make gender-affirming care available for those who can't afford the program's sliding-scale fees. "Tricia and I have talked about ways that we can fund the clinic so that we can get more folks into it," Meyer said. "I felt totally grateful to have the privilege of paying for it, but there are some trans folks who are homeless or unemployed or both who don't have that access and they need it. I know that she is working with other organizations to figure out ways that we can help fund these people. "As a trans person, I want to make sure that this particular service continues to happen in Bloomington-Normal and in Central Illinois because there's so many folks that need the care and need access to care." Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 NORMAL The "granddaddy" of Corvette car shows is returning to its roots for a 50th annual celebration. The Bloomington Gold Corvettes USA car show, started in 1973 at the McLean County Fairgrounds, will be held June 10-11 at Illinois State University, it was announced Tuesday. "This is the best I've felt about a community welcoming us, and that's been very important in our decision in coming here," Guy Larsen, president and owner of Bloomington Gold Corvettes USA, told The Pantagraph on Tuesday. "It's going to be lively; it's going to be exciting. We're looking forward to being back." As many as 15,000 people are projected for the event. A Corvette parade along historic Route 66 also in in the works. The event, which has been billed as the world's largest Corvette show, started as the Bloomington Corvette Corral, with 125 Corvettes and 30 vendors. For 19 years, Bloomington-Normal served as a hotspot for Corvette owners and fans to gather and buy and sell auto parts. Bloomington Gold also held the Guinness World Record for the longest tour of any single marque with 2,223 Corvettes lined up in a row. For one week, thousands of corvettes would come into town and tens of thousands of attendees would come for the show," Larsen said during a Tuesday press conference to announce the event. "The hotels were full, the restaurants were busy, Veterans Highway was like a Corvette thoroughfare for cars all over. Springfield, St. Charles, Champaign and, most recently, Indianapolis also have hosted the event. Normal Mayor Chris Koos, Bloomington Mayor Mboka Mwilambwe and ISU President Terri Goss Kinzy joined Larsen and Crystal Howard, president and CEO of the Bloomington-Normal Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, Tuesday for a press conference announcing the return. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} "Really, it's recognizing too that we are a resource for our community, not just a university," Kinzy told The Pantagraph. "I think our students are going to be really excited, and I think we're going to have a lot of our students here participating." "This is going to be a great gift for us," Howard said. Despite a return of festivals and activities, attendance has not fully reached pre-pandemic levels, according to local officials. "We've been doing a lot of great things for outdoor events," Howard said. "It's the indoor events that have been lagging behind." Howard said it is promising to see the car show incorporate both indoor and outdoor elements for people to enjoy. Koos and Mwilambwe said they remember when the car show was held in Bloomington-Normal. Mwilambwe, a student at the time, recalled thinking how he wished to own a Corvette himself one day. Koos said, In the '70s and early '80s, it was an incredible event for the community. No matter where you went, you were aware that this Corvette show was going on." He added, "The fact that its coming back here just adds additional excitement to the show and gives it some new life by returning to its roots. Now with Illinois State University facilities available to them, I think its going to take off again. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Two people were killed and another was injured Thursday morning in a shooting near the courthouse in the small northern Illinois city of Kankakee, the mayor said. Dredge Masters Limited has received a commendation for refurbishing the Children's ward at the Korle-Bu teaching hospital (KBTH). The leading provider of cutting-edge modern technological dredging services in Ghana and across the African continent had taken the move as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility. The Chief Executive Officer of KBTH, Dr. Opoku Ware Ampomah, commended Dredge Masters for heeding their call to give the second floor of the Child Health Department a facelift. According to him, one unique aspect of this department was its heroic deeds in constantly and tirelessly working to saving the lives of children. Hence, he commends the leaders and staff of the department for their tremendous work in saving lives. The staff at this department are doing a solid work and need to be commended, cautioning that any nation that jokes with the health of its children does so at its peril, he noted. Dr. Opoku Ware Ampomah said about 6,000 children are admitted yearly at the department not only with normal cases but also with very complicated ones. "We all must come together and support the Korle Bu Child Health Department to secure the health of our children, the CEO of KBTH appealed. He assured that management of the hospital will ensure that the facilities provided are maintained to give quality service. The Head of the Child Health Department, Professor Christabel Enweronu Laryea, was full of gratitude towards the work done by Dredge Masters. We are very grateful to Dredge Masters and Jospong Group of Companies for coming to our aid. It is one of the biggest supports the department has received, she elatedly expressed. She lamented that it was very difficult managing the ward, in terms of its infrastructure, many of which were in a very deplorable state, especially looking at the fact it was one of the oldest departments of KBTH. She said so many Ghanaian children have passed through the department. She furthermore called on other cooperative bodies, NGOs to help restore other floors of the department. According to the Deputy Managing Director of Dredgre Masters Limited Mr. Samuel Borquaye, the refurbishment forms part of the Company's Corporate Social Responsibilities. Mr. Borquaye in his address stated that Dredge Masters, a subsidiary of the Jospong Group of Companies(JGC) is eager to embark on such projects as part of their efforts in reaching out to the communities. "Indeed as a company, we own it as special responsibilities to reach to our communities to offer as such support as we can. However, it is sometimes difficult to identify relevant projects that will be impactful and sustainable, so when the call came for us to support this project, we were very happy knowing the kind of impact that it will have on our children and the country, he said. According to him the project which cost 1,823,200.41 Ghana cedis will serve as an impaction of lives. Adding that the project which about three months to be completed includes; removal and replacement of aluminium framed and sliding windows, removal and replacement of defective doors with half air cubon doors among other things. The rest includes the provision of kitchen cabinet and painting of the entire facility, providing of artwork for the children, removal and replacement of all floor tiles in the washrooms, all offices and all other rooms at the unit, changed the entire Belfast sinks, mounted hand sanitiser dispensers, paper towel handrail, tissue dispensers, automatic hand dryers, fixed new water closets, wash hand basins, showers, taps and mirror in the various washrooms of the department. Additionally, he said Dredge Masters changed the main furniture of the ward which included the provision of three (3) fire extinguisher, four (4) 42 Samsung Smart TVs, twenty- two (22) bedside lockers, eight (8) conference chairs, four (4) writing tables, four (4) swivel chairs, one (1) Microwave, one (1) metal cabinets with glass, one (1) BP Sphygmomanometer of different size of Cuff, one (1) Pulse Oximeter among others. Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Authorities in Nigerias central Plateau state have imposed a 24-hour curfew in the state capital Jos after gunmen killed at least 18 people during a raid on Tuesday night on a mainly Christian community. Some reports suggest the death toll is well over 30. Officials say 10 suspects have been arrested in connection with the latest violence on the outskirts of the city. The state has seen years of frequent deadly communal clashes and there has been growing tension in recent weeks following the killing of dozens of Muslims in the state capital. Witnesses and officials say the attackers stormed Yelwan-Zangam community in the night, moving from house-to-house, shooting and hacking people to death as well as setting homes ablaze. The authorities say the attack appeared carefully planned because a bridge linking the community with Jos city was destroyed before the killings. Its not yet clear why the community was targeted. But Plateau state has suffered years of deadly ethnic and religious violence as well as clashes between farmers and herders. The killing of dozens of Muslim travelers by a mob in a Christian-dominated neighbourhood earlier this month has also fuelled tension in and around the state capital. This is happening as Nigerias security situation continues to worsen with various armed groups unleashing violence. On Tuesday, gunmen attacked the countrys top military training academy killing two officers and abducting another. Source: BBC Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video BBC presenter Lisa Shaw died due to complications from the AstraZeneca vaccine, a coroner concluded today in what is believed to be the first time a Covid jab has officially been ruled the underlying cause of death in the UK. The otherwise healthy 44-year-old, who worked for BBC Radio Newcastle, died in May after developing headaches after getting her first dose of the British-made vaccine. Newcastle coroner Karen Dilks heard Ms Shaw suffered from blood clots in her brain which caused a deadly stroke. She was admitted to the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle after complaining of headaches. The inquest, which lasted less than an hour, heard that the condition linked to the AstraZeneca vaccine was extremely rare. Overall there have been 417 cases of blood clotting after the AstraZeneca vaccine out of nearly 50million doses administered, according to the UK medical watchdog. The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) says the rate was about 15 per million injections. Seventy-two Britons have died as a result of the complication but Ms Shaw's case is believed to be the first to be officially attributed to the jab by a coroner. The clotting complication, which appears to occur at a higher rate among young people prompted UK health chiefs to recommend all under-40s get Pfizer or Moderna instead. Source: Dailymail.co.uk 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 Three persons including a woman, have been killed by a herd of stray elephants in Yunyoo/Nasuan and the East Mamprusi Municipality of the North East Region after the animals raided the area on Wednesday afternoon. One of the deceased identified as, Mr Fuseini Mbieni, aged 42 is said to have been killed by the stray animals after he attempted to ward them off his farm. Two unidentified persons were also attacked and killed after taking shots of the animals. The animals said to have migrated from their habitation in a forest reserve in neighbouring Togo to graze in the area also destroyed large acres of farmlands. The Daily Graphic gathered that; the aggrieved residents also launched an attack on the animals and gunned down three of them following the incident. They, however, later shared the meat among themselves. Briefing The Acting North East Regional Police Public Relations Officer, Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), Mr Robert Anabiik Anmain confirmed the incident to the Daily Graphic and said police had commenced investigation into the matter. He explained that the animals raided the area and an attempt by the residents to ward them off destroying their crops, the elephants stamped on one of the farmers, killing him instantly, adding that The body of the deceased farmer is completely mutated. The animals then moved to different communities and killed two persons. He said the bodies have since been conveyed to a morgue at the Baptist Medical Centre in Nalerigu for autopsy. Eyewitness account According to an eyewitness, Mr David Kpatia the residents were following the stray elephants and taking some shots so later I saw the aggressive elephants attacking two of the deceased persons who were at close range with them, stepping and killing them instantly". He said of the one deceased, Fuseini Mbieni who was a resident of Gbintiri was also killed on his farm after he attempted to ward off the rampaging elephants. Elephants raid This is not the first time elephants have attacked residents in the Northern part of the country. Last year, residents in the Nabdam District of the Upper East Region who farm along the wildlife forest reserve in Sakote had their farmlands destroyed by stray elephants. About 300 acres of farmlands were destroyed with an estimated damage cost of GH80,200. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video An Official of the Town Planning Department of La_ Nkwantanan Madina Municipal Assembly has embarked on a demolition spree on supposed Government Reserved Lands within the La- Nkwantan Madina Municipal Assembly with the excuse that the demolition exercise has been duly sanctioned by the Assembly. This is in view of the fact that Government is yet to appoint a new Municipal Chief Executive to the municipality. The exercise has so far seen the demolition of several hundreds of Stores and other properties of businessmen women and residential property owners. The affected people say no adequate notice was given before embarking on the exercise. The situation has brought untold hardship to occupants of those said lands, especially during this time of COVID- 19, which has largely affected the fortunes of the generality of businesses, the world over. With Governments globally giving stimulus packages to businesses to keep them afloat, LANMMA, the Municipal Authority has chosen to compound the already dire situation of business on Government lands within their jurisdiction. The said official, Offei Odame is said to be carrying out this exercise without the permission of the assembly. Sources within the assembly say the exercise was not sanctioned by the assembly thus making the said officer complicit in illegal demolition. On Thursday the said officer clashed with officials from the Ghana Highways Authority who came to visit the site opposite the Accra Training Technical College ( ATTRACO). According to them, the assembly has no right to demolish properties especially when the assembly had earlier been accused of selling the land to other individuals before the present occupants. This is after a woman showed up claiming occupancy to the whole ATTRACO stretch of lands. According to the official from Ghana Highways " You are from the planning department of the assembly what does this demarcation tell you. Why to sell lands to individuals in the past when you know it is government lands". Source: Daniel Adu Darko/Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The National Chief Imam, Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharubutu, on Thursday (26 August) made a GHC50,000 donation to the National Cathedral project. He made the donation when the board of trustees for the National Cathedral project paid a courtesy call on him at his office. The board of trustees of the National Cathedral Secretariat has rolled out the Ketewa Biara Nsua initiative to raise half of the US$200 million needed to build the edifice. Ghanaians are being encouraged to make a GHC100 donation towards the project. The Vice-President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, has also urged Ghanaians of all religious persuasions to voluntarily contribute to the construction of the National Cathedral. Plans for the construction of a National Cathedral continues to generate lively debate, and although the government insists it will be funded by the private sector and serve as a multi-purpose national edifice, some have raised concern about its usefulness and cost. Speaking at the Adabraka Official Town branch of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana on Sunday 22 August 2021, Dr Bawumia underscored the importance of the Cathedral, and urged all to help build it for Ghana and for the glory of God. As you all know, there are efforts to build a National Cathedral. It is very important that we build the Cathedral. It is a voluntary exercise; anybody who wants to contribute can contribute. I have contributed, and I will contribute some more. So I encourage everybody to think about it, and lets build it. It is not for anybody. It is for Ghana and for the glory of God, he said. A voluntary, national contribution for the construction of the Cathedral would further cement Ghanas standing as a religiously-diverse country living at peace with itself. Ghana is Africas second most peaceful country, with adherents of many religions living and working together to build the nation. The construction of the Cathedral would be add further to our enviable record of peaceful co-existence, he said. Features of cathedral The president Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, accompanied by senior members of the Clergy, laid the foundation stone for the Cathedral on 5 March 2020 to signal the start of construction. A National Cathedral Secretariat has since been set up to raise funds from individuals and the private sector for its construction, while work continues apace. The cathedral will house a series of impressive chapels, a baptistery, a 5000-seat two-level auditorium, a grand central hall, music school, choir rehearsal, art gallery, shop and multi-use spaces. It will also be home to Africas first Bible Museum and Documentation Centre, dedicated to Christianity and nation-building in Ghana. A new ceremonial route and landscape will be linking the Cathedral site to Ghanas prominent, celebratory landmarks Independence Square, Osu Cemetery, the State House and Africa Unity Circle. Source: asaaseradio.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The family of the late social media activist, Ibrahim Muhammed, alias Kaaka, has appealed to the Office of the National Chief Imam to intervene in investigations into the death of their relative to speed up the process and ensure that justice is served. The family said they were unhappy with the delay in the ongoing investigations, saying that two months after the murder, the police had failed to provide proper updates on the state of investigations conducted into the case and, therefore, wants the intervention of the Chief Imam, Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharubutu. We have been denied our voice and we, therefore, appeal to the Chief Imam to use his authority to bring us justice. This is because the law court cannot give the justice that his voice can provide, the spokesperson for the family, Mr. Nafiu Mohammed, said when the family visited the Chief Imam at his residence in Accra yesterday to discuss the death of their relative and the events that followed, with him. They also used the opportunity to commend Sheikh Sharubutu for visiting Ejura to ensure peace when tension was brewing in the area. Background Kaaka was killed in Ejura in the Ashanti Region on June 26, this year, for what many have attributed to his social activism which made the government unpopular, especially the agitation by the #FixTheCountry movement. According to a police report, unknown assailants attacked him at his family house with clubs. His murder sparked widespread agitation and protests, which saw the killing of two more indigenes during a confrontation with a joint police and military team, amid the firing of gunshots. No update We have avoided saying anything publicly about this whole investigation because we wanted to believe that justice would be done and that the police would take their time to do their work properly. We never saw that happen. Till date, no one in the Ghana Police Service has called the family of Kaaka to update us on the work being done to bring us justice. It is almost as if we are not humans. We have had to find out everything from the media, Mr. Mohammed said. He further complained that there was a calculated attempt to misdirect the public and cause them to conclude that Kaakas brother, Mr. Iddi Mohammed, was involved in the murder. That, he said, had compounded the familys grief and made them lose hope that the police were committed to truth and justice in the case. Calm The National Chief Imam expressed his condolence to the family for the loss and urged them not to inflame passions but rather remain calm and allow the law to take its course. He prayed to Allah to ease their pain and replace whatever the family had lost. He assured them that he would let his advisory board get involved in the matter to ensure that justice was served. The Chief Imam also urged the family to present an official petition to the office for it to be referred to the advisory board, so that it could start probing into the case. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video THE VOLTA Regional Health Directorate has cautioned the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) to stop misinforming the public about claims that government was denying Volta COVID-19 vaccines in order to reduce population in the area. According to the Health Directorate, the region has not been denied the COVID 19 vaccines since the commitment of government towards ensuring the health and safety of all Ghanaians has been abundantly demonstrated in the Volta Region. The Health Service however, explained that training programme is underway for the commencement of vaccination in the region after August 25, 2021. They are wondering why the NDC did not contact the GHS with their concern or seek clarification since they are opened to all. The Directorate stated that it is working tirelessly with all relevant stakeholders to implement all available interventions to help reduce the spread of COVID-19 in the region. Last Sunday August 22, 2021, the National Democratic Congress in the Volta Region accused government of adopting biological strategy to reduce the population in the Region by denying them of COVID-19 vaccination. The Volta NDC said there is no vaccination ongoing in the region, despite the fact that the vaccination is taking place in other regions of the country. A statement issued by Sorkpa K. Agbleze, NDC Volta Regional Communications officer put the blame on the Volta Regional Minister, Dr. Archibald Letsa for unavailability of vaccination in the region. They are wondering why although the Volta Region has been declared by the Ghana Health Service as a hotspot with worryingly rising cases, yet no vaccination is currently taking place. However, the Volta Regional Health Service said Volta Region has been integral part of the national planning process for the deployment of vaccines which has solely been on principles of science and equity in it response dated August 24, 2021 to the NDC statement. The Region has ridden on the back of a reliable and robust Expanded Programme on the Immunization to deploy 25,800 doses of the Astrazeneca in all the 18 districts according to the phase one of the national deployment plan. This first phase covered majority of health workers, significant proportion of frontline security officials involved in the response activities and vulnerable proportion. An allocation of the recent deployed Johnson & Johnson and Astrazeneca vaccines has also been made available to the Volta Region. The deployment of these vaccines will follow right after after the training and implementation meeting that will be concluded on August 25, 2021, a statement signed by Dr. Thomas S. Letsa, the Regional Director of Health Service stated. The Service continued that the vaccine will be deployed across the region in the coming days in several phases according to the phased implementation strategy that has been developed. Source: Daily Guide Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Former Member of Parliament (MP) for Mion Constituency in Northern Region, Mohammed Abdul Aziz, says the recent rise in ritual killings in the country is worrying and a threat to the countrys security. In an interview on TV3 New Day, he said the recent murders will not only destruct national security but also have negative psychological effects on citizens. Mr Aziz said the urge of young people to get rich overnight was a contributing factor to the increase in ritual murders due to the demand of, usually, body parts from fetish people. The National Builders Corps (NABCO) initiative is temporary and would not curb the issue of unemployment in the country. The former lawmaker recommended that government must work towards creating sustainable jobs for citizens, especially the youth, to avert them from engaging in unlawful acts. He further stated that government should also create suitable conditions for private sector businesses to thrive in order to employ more people. He stated that the Minister of Information should work towards passing a Broadcasting Law to regulate the contents displayed by media houses on their platforms. National Communications Directorate, National Disaster Management Organization (NADMO), John Ayisi, who was also a panellist on the same programme said government recognizes the need to create sustainable jobs to totally eradicate unemployment. He explained that the NABCO scheme was a stop-gap measure to unemployment in the country. This, he said, was commendable. The National Communications Directorate stated that the issue of creating permanent employment was a process and government is working towards it to achieve desired goals and objective. Mr Ayisi added that investigations by the CID into recent ritual killings should be meticulous to effectively manage resources and meet their responsibility for crime prevention. Source: 3news.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Two opposition Members of Parliament (MPs) have petitioned the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) to investigate some seven deaths and eight injuries that occurred during the 2020 Presidential and Parliamentary Elections. The MPs, Mr Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, the representative of North Tongu constituency and Mr Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah, the representative of the Ellembelle constituency, in their petition presented to CHARJ today lodged a complaint against the Minister of the Interior, the Minister of Defence as well as the Inspector General of Police of the Ghana Police Service and the Chief of Defence Staff of Ghana Armed Forces. The MPs want disciplinary action as well as the prosecution of the officers that caused death and injuries during the polls. They are also seeking compensation for the victims or their representatives. Complaint Their complaint is restricted to the Techiman South, Odododiodio, Ablekuma Central, and Savelugu constituencies in the Bono East, Greater Accra and Northern Regions of the Republic of Ghana respectively. It relates to the manner in which the Ghana Police Service and the Ghana Armed Forces discharged their constitutional and statutory mandates in the constituencies. "In the case of the Ghana Armed Forces, their conduct in furtherance of the purpose of the National Election Security Taskforce (NESTF) did not promote the development of Ghana as prescribed by article 210(3) of the 1992 Constitution, as their conduct caused damage to life, limb and property," the petition reads. "Regarding the Ghana Police service, the manner in which they carried out their functions to further the purpose of the NESTF undermined their constitutional obligation under article 200(3) of performing their traditional role of maintaining law and order". Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Former NDC Central Regional Chairman, Bernard Allotey Jacobs, has complimented Chief Justice, Kwasi Anin-Yeboah following his vindication from a bribery scandal. The Chief Justice was accused by a private legal practitioner, Kwasi Afrifa of demanding a $5 million bribe to deliver a favourable judgment in a case involving his client. Due to this allegation, a Civil Soceity Organization, Alliance for Social Equity and Public Accountability (ASEPA), petitioned President Nana Akufo-Addo to remove the Chief Justice from office but the President, after studying a report on the case, resolved that the petition is ''unmeritorious and unwarranted''. It is "devoid of any basis warranting the setting up of a committee under Article 146 (6) to undertake the very serious business of removing a Chief Justice from office". ". . the Supreme Court in interpreting article 146 (6) had in mind unmeritorious and unwarranted petitions such as the instant one. The petition is dismissed accordingly, the President said in an official statement dated August 20, 2021. Justice Kwasi Anin-Yeboah has also denied the allegation and called on the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service to investigate the matter. It is also reported that Lawyer Kwasi Afrifa's client (a Chief) has refuted the lawyer's claims saying he (the client) never accused the Chief Justice of asking for money to deliver a judgement in his favour. Making his submissions on the matter, Allotey Jacobs described the Chief Justice as a ''Deputy Christ''. He believed for the Chief Justice ''to be risen to a certain level in society, especially leadership in a country'' means he is ''anointed by God. God then has declared how your destiny should be, so a person like this is a Deputy Christ. The law is vested in him''. Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The General Secretary of the NPP, John Boadu, on Wednesday, 26th August, 2021, toured some constituencies in the Greater Accra Region, to participate in the ongoing Constituency Annual Delegates Conference of the Party. His rounds took him to some conference centres in the Odododiodoo and Okaikoi North Constituencies. The NPP is currently holding constituency annual delegates conferences across all the 275 constituencies of the country as mandated by the Party Constitution. However, in view of the COVID-19 restrictions, the Party has insisted that the 2021 Conferences be held on zonal basis, and in groups of 250 delegates on the average, within the 7-day period, starting from 21st to 27th August. Addressing the conference at the centres, John Boadu thanked the delegates comprising mainly of polling station executives and electoral area coordinators, for working assiduously to retain the NPP government in the last general elections. The chief scribe of the governing party used the opportunity to encourage the polling station executives to put the party interest first ahead of the nationwide rollout of fresh membership registration. He also expressed contentment with their adherence to the health protocols. The General Secretary was accompanied by the Greater Accra Regional Chairman, Divine Agorhom; Deputy General Secretary, Mr. Nii Laryea Squire, and a Deputy Communications Director of the Party, Yaw Preko. Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video 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. The Executive Director of the Institute for Energy Policies and Research (INSTEPR), Kwadwo N. Poku, has alleged that the acquisition of $36 million electric meters in 2016 was a grand scheme designed by some NDC appointees to defraud the state. He has, therefore, petitioned the Special Prosecutors Office to investigate the circumstances under which the deal was cooked, but the country never benefitted even though all the contract sum of $36 million was paid. In his petition to the Special Prosecutor, Kissi Agyebeng, the Executive Director said that the reports show that key appointees within the NDC government in 2015/16 planned this transaction to defraud the state through acquisition of electric meters for ECG. After our press release on this transaction and published by various leading newspapers, the Institute received further information and reports which affirmed our initial belief that this transaction was a grand scheme of fraud. We have therefore submitted these reports to the Office of the Special Prosecutor to investigate and prosecute this former government appointee and their accomplice, he said. He explained that what is disturbing from this information is that the Energy sector has become an area where people entrusted with the finances of this country, seem to siphon millions of state money into private accounts. Most of our civil servants will stand aloof because of job security. All the checks and balances in our public sector are ignored when a Minister writes that money should be moved, or this payment should be made. We have come across numerous questionable payments totaling over GH112, 596,555.88 to a company called First Grace Limited within 2015 and 2016. There is also a payment of GH238,633,370.61 paid out to 21 companies through a government agency, for whom these companies have done no work or engaged in a contract. All these information is included in our petition to the Special Prosecutor. Fraud Uncovered According to Mr. Poku, the Ministry of Power through the Ministry of Finance under the Mahama-led NDC administration, made a payment of $36 million to a company called L&R Investment and Trading Company Limited for the supply of single-phase and three-phase electric meters to Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG). He said the total contract price for the supply of the meters were $39,999,566.44, to be supplied over a period of twenty-six (26) weeks, but when the contract was signed, an advanced payment of $12 million was allegedly made to L&R Investments plus a Letter of Credit (LC) of $24 million and ever since, nothing has been heard about the deal. According to him, in September 2016, the Ministry of Power wrote to the Managing Director of ECG, informing him of an $80 million financing secured by the government for the procurement of electric meters and said the letter stated that local Ghanaian companies will be given $40 million. Messrs. L&R Investments and Trading Company, whose local representatives are Messrs First Grace Limited, were given $40 million. The ministrys letter instructed the managing director of ECG to initiate discussion with the said suppliers with the view of entering into contract for the supply of these electric meters. The ministry also asked for immediate response to their letter to facilitate cabinet and parliamentary approval, Mr. Poku alleged. He continued that the management of ECG on their part upon receipt of the ministrys letter engaged Messrs. L&R Investments and six local Ghanaian companies. After ECG had evaluated the proposal from L&R Investment, a pre-contract meeting was held in October 2016, between the technical team of ECG and the Managing Director, in the name of Mr. Tao Wenhui for L&R Investment. He said at this meeting, the Scope of Supply, Technical Classification, Due Diligence, Pilot Studies, Factory Acceptance Tests (FAT) and Training of ECG metering Staff were discussed and agreed, adding the two key conditions before the supply of the meters after signing the contract were the pilot study to assess the meters for two months and the Factory Acceptance Tests (FAT). $12m Payment Mr. Poku said that after the contract was signed and L&R given an initial payment of $12 million, the meters that were to be provided as samples (200 electric meters) for the pilot studies were not sent to ECG and the agreed travel of three representatives from ECG to undertake the Factory Acceptance Tests in China before the manufacturing of the said meters did not take place. Without any of these conditions being met, the management of ECG was sent shipping documents for containers of meters at Tema Port. ECG informed L&R Investment that they cannot accept the containers because they have not followed the process agreed to as per their contract. After months of back and forth with L&R Investments, the containers of meters were cleared from the Tema Port to stop the accrual of demurrage. The meters in the containers were not the specification as per the supply contract, Mr. Poku alleged. According to Mr. Poku, when the $12 million was paid, only $4 million was transferred to prepare for the containers that brought the meters that did not meet the specifications of the ECG. INSTEPR was told that the said contract was terminated in 2017 after legal consultations on the non-performance by L&R Investment. This company after months of not conforming to the agreed conditions of their contract, went ahead to discount the $24 million Letter of Credit (LC) given to them under the contract. We have sighted documents that state that on the 16th of August 2017 at a time when Capital Bank Limited had ceased to be a bank under the laws of Bank of Ghana, Capital Bank discounted the LC and made a payment of USD $22.5 million to L&R Investment, he added. He said INSTEPR wants the government to find out why no action has been taken in four years to trace the people behind L&R Investment and Trading Company in Ghana and also probe why the initial $12 million was paid to First Grace Limited, and the people behind this company, as well as Capital Banks role in the whole deal. We do not want to draw any conclusion since this matter should be under investigation, but I am sure every Ghanaian will agree with me that we need some answers and accountability now from our leaders on this fraudulent transaction, he added. Source: Daily Guide Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The National Executives of the ruling New Patriotic Party(NPP) Constituency Officers Welfare (NCOW), on Wednesday 11th August 2021, paid a courtesy call on Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto, Minister for Food and Agriculture at his office at the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to present a citation for being a distinguished patriot to the party and the country as a whole. The National Executive of the welfare association of the Constituency officers led by the Secretary of the Association, Jeffrey Edward Osei, who doubles as the NPP Constituency Chairman of Ayawaso West Wuogon, presented a citation to Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto, a man christened as the Legend due to his peerless contributions to Ghana and Africa in the sector of Agriculture especially at the very vicious and grievous periods of the COVID-19 pandemic. Presenting the citation to the Minister, the Secretary of NCOW noted that, before the Workshop which saw the inauguration of a welfare scheme for the constituency officers, Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto was notified by the Association and he came to the aid of the Association as typical of the Minister regarding his commitment, dedication and passion for the Tradition of the Party. Speaking to the media after the presentation, Jeffrey Edward Osei added that, due to Dr Owusu Afriyie Akotos selfless contributions toward the success of the workshop, the Leadership of the Welfare Scheme in addition to the entire NPP constituency officers are full of gratitude, and as a result, would like to express our appreciation and also seek for Gods blessings and favour for him in all his endeavours. It is also the Associations fervent prayer that the purpose, visions and goals of the Minister for the Party and Nation realise fruition, he added. The citation reads Thank you, Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto for your many invaluable and indispensable contributions to the NPP and the Country as a whole. Your unquestioned loyalty, dedication, and enormous contribution toward establishing the NPP Constituencies Officers Welfare deserve praise and commendation. We applaud and honour you for your stupendous contribution to the creation of this welfare scheme and other human-centred activities. Continue soaring higher in your endeavours. Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto however commended the Association for their show of gratitude and pledged to continue to support them in all their activities for continued strengthening and sustenance of the base and tradition of the Party. The successful workshop, which birthed the inauguration of the NPP Constituency Officers Welfare, was held at the Capital View Hotel, Koforidua, Eastern region between 16th and 18th July 2021. The Workshop was held at the behest of the NPP Constituency Chairmen across the 275 constituencies of the Country. The primary objective of the workshop was to institute a Welfare Scheme for NPP Constituency Executives. The earlier proposed name for the Scheme was the National Constituency Chairmen Welfare Fund(NCCWF) but was later changed to NPP Constituency Officers Welfare upon further and broader consultations. Source: Daniel Adu Darko/Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video STC Managing Director, Nana Akomea, has urged the Greater Accra Regional Minister, Henry Quartey to empower Municipal Chief Executives (MCEs) or District Chief Executives (DCE) to enforce the law in their various communities for the right to be done even in his absence. "With that when they're not enforcing the law, they can be held responsible," he said. Nana Akomea who was contributing to a panel discussion on Peace FM's morning show 'Kokrokoo' said if Henry Quartey doesn't take such steps, things will go back to the way they were. Recalling a conversation he had with the Regional Minister, he said: "I commended him (Henry Quartey) for the work hes doing but told him that if he doesnt take care he will become like a blowman; where theres action only when he's around. If for instance a structure is placed at a wrong location, the one in charge of the area like the MCE needs to be penalized and that will serve as a deterrent for others, and with that even if youre not around the right thing will be done". "If theres punishment, people will start doing the right thing," he added. Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Plastic models allow students to use building blocks to simulate DNA synthesis. Left: The models reflect both the form and function of DNA. Right, top: A protein in the cell membrane. Right, bottom: Protein synthesis taking place on a ribosome (green). Credit: Kathy Vandiver It's a cloudy July afternoon in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and MIT Edgerton Center Instructor Amanda Mayer is using brightly-colored plastic to build proteins. She takes a small yellow block and moves it to the end of a chain of blue and green ones, clicking it into place. "Congratulations," she says to the four high school students guiding her hand over Zoom. "You've all become synthetic biologists." Together, the group has assembled a model of the complex molecules found in their food and bodies. "I used to think proteins were just one thing," says a high school student named Fatima, who has the same blocks laid out before her at home. "Now I know that what I ate has lots and lots of amino acids in it." Mayer is one of two biologists who are crafting models and lesson plans that schoolteachers around the countryand the world: How cells use DNA to make proteins. Both she and Kathy Vandiver, MIT Edgerton Center advisor and director of the Community Outreach Education and Engagement Core at the MIT Center for Environmental Health Sciences, discovered their love for sharing biology with schoolchildren after completing their Ph.D.s. Vandiver, who spent 16 years teaching middle school science before joining MIT in 2005, created classroom models throughout her career. In 2008, Mayer joined her at the Edgerton Center, helping her perfect the lessons and activity booklets that accompany the models. The duo uses their sets to teach students and schoolteachers, as well as nurses and biotechnologists. "This is about helping other people learn more about biology, and making it much more accessible," Vandiver says. Creating life: From blueprints to building blocks In school, students learn that DNA determines the features they inherit from their parents, like the color of their eyes. This is because DNA contains the instructions for making proteins, which in turn make up our cells. Vandiver says that even though protein synthesis is the one lesson that every biology teacher has to teach, proteins don't always get the attention they deserve. "DNA is the glamour moleculeit's on T-shirts everywhere," she says. "But DNA just stores the instructions for building proteins. They do all the work in the cell." Vandiver believes that if students are to grasp tricky processes like protein synthesis, they need more than just the labeled diagrams found frequently in science classrooms. Tactile decision-making is a much more engaging method of learning than looking at a diagram, or even watching a video, she says. "When you watch a cell do different things, you can still tune out. But here, you have to make a decision." Since students can learn by doing, they're also not held back by the pressure to master vocabulary, a typical hurdle in the biology classroom. The models are useful for various levels: A sixth grader may use them simply as building blocks, while older students can use clever design details to learn higher-level concepts, such as directionality and bond strength. Vandiver and Mayer are careful to put as much thought into the lessons that accompany the models. For a protein to do its job, its building blocks must be strung together in the right sequence. The standard classroom strategy for teaching protein synthesis is a chronological one, Vandiver says, in which the information stored in DNA is first transferred to another molecule called RNA, and then finally to proteins. "But it's so confusing for the students. They're going through this multitude of steps, and they have no idea what they're making," she explains. Over the years, as Vandiver and Mayer taught thousands of students of different ages at the MIT Museum, they observed that students learned protein synthesis much better if they already knew what the end product looked like. So, in their lessons, students begin with a finished protein, containing a specific sequence of amino acids. Then they start from scratch, learning and following the body's steps for putting those pieces together. Working with teachers Throughout the year, Mayer and Vandiver hold workshops for teachers in Massachusetts, Texas, and Arizona, training them how to use the kits. With the help of a grant, they've distributed sets to 30 of Boston's public high schools for teachers to use in their classrooms. Mayer says that after working with the kits, teachers understand the material much betterand feel more confident about teaching it. "Teaching teachers is fantastic," she says. "Think of all the students they'll teach in their lifetimes, and how many biologists they're going to create by making students excited about doing this." The DNA kits are being used in other countries, as well: Vandiver has trained teachers in Italy, India, China, Singapore, Cambodia, and Mexico. And when the center occasionally hosts students from abroad, Mayer and Vandiver hold workshops for them. They also work with local students. For the past five summers, MIT's biology department has partnered with the LEAH Knox Scholars program to host talented high-school students from communities underrepresented in science. Every year, the Edgerton Center kicks the program off by offering the students a crash course in molecular biology. "With the DNA kits, I actually felt like I was inside the cell in some way," says Breetika Maharjan, a high-school senior who attended one of the workshops. "It wasn't like a boring high-school textbook with just words." Looking ahead Mayer and Vandiver say they've still got a lot to do. Since 2014, they've been importing the parts for their kits from Singapore and assembling them in Cambridge with the help of volunteers; this allows them to offer the kits to educators at cost. They have a new set on chromosomes on the way, and they're constantly designing lessons for new audiences such as nurses, who may soon be caring for patients with DNA-tailored treatment plans. "The number one comment we get from people after they go through our lessons and play with this is, "Oh wow, if I had this, I would probably have liked biology. I might even have become a biology researcher,'" says Mayer. Vandiver believes the kits are successful because they embody Doc Edgerton's memorable motto about teaching: "The trick to education," she quotes, "is to not let them know they're learning anything until it's too late." Explore further School can be scary in a pandemic. A new app helps teachers know how kids are feeling Flames from the French Fire consume a cabin on Highway 155 in Sequoia National Forest, Calif., on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Noah Berger California weather was heating up and winds were shifting Thursday as more than 14,000 firefighters battled wildfires up and down the state, including a major blaze they hoped to keep out of the Lake Tahoe resort region. Onshore winds from the west and southwest were changing direction to offshore, blowing out of the north or northeast, and fire weather watches were to go into effect in Northern California by the end of the week, the National Weather Service said. The Caldor Fire, the nation's top-priority for firefighting resources, grew to more than 213 square miles (551 square kilometers) southwest of Lake Tahoe but containment remained at 12%, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Smoke stained the normally blue skies over the alpine lake but the pollution level Thursday morning was reduced to "unhealthy," down two levels of severity from 24 hours earlier when it was "hazardous," according to the U.S. Air Quality Index. Assigned resources have grown to nearly 2,900 firefighters, 21 helicopters, 245 engines and dozens of bulldozers since the early days of the fire, which began Aug. 14, and suddenly exploded, gutting the community of Grizzly Flat. Ongoing damage assessments have counted 637 homes, businesses and other structures destroyed. A firefighter tries to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Statewide there were 14 large fires, including a blaze that erupted Wednesday in Southern California, which has so far escaped the scale of wildfires plaguing the north all summer. The South Fire about 45 miles (72 kilometers) east of Los Angeles covered 700 acres (283 hectares) after destroying 18 homes, commercial and other structures. Fire activity decreased after the early hours but it remained uncontained on mountain slopes. In the southern Sierra Nevada, the 9-day-old French Fire covered more than 34 square miles (88 square kilometers) and was 19% contained. Some structures were seen burning in Sequoia National Forest and it posed threat to numerous communities on the west side of Lake Isabella, a popular outdoor recreation area northeast of Bakersfield. Meanwhile, California's Dixie Fire, the second-largest in state history at 1,167 square miles (3,022 square kilometers) was 45% contained in the Sierra-Cascades region about 65 miles (105 kilometers) north of the Caldor Fire. Nearly 700 homes were among almost 1,300 buildings that have been destroyed since the fire began in early July. The French Fire burns along Highway 155 in Sequoia National Forest, Calif., on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Noah Berger A firefighter works on a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A firefighter tries to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Homeowners Jose Lamas, center, his wife, Maria Covarrubias, right, and his daughter Astrid Covarrubias walk through the smoke after visiting their burned-out home from the South Fire in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Vehicles are seen burning as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Homeowner Jose Lamas, right, and his daughter Astrid Covarrubias survey the charred debris left in his burned-out home from the South Fire in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Homeowner Maria Covarrubias reacts after seeing her home burn down from the South Fire in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Firefighters watch as a helicopter drops water at the South Fire burning in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A firefighter tries to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A sculpture is seen at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Firefighters watch as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Flames from the French Fire consume a structure on Highway 155 in Sequoia National Forest, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Noah Berger A fire truck moves to a safer position as the French Fire jumps Highway 155 near Alta Sierra in Sequoia National Forest, Calif., on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Noah Berger Animals stand near a fence while a firefighter works to extinguish flames from the South Firea, at a farm in Lytle Creek, near Rialto, Calif., in San Bernardino County on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A firefighter is silhouetted while extinguishing hotspots from the South Fire in Lytle Creek, near Rialto, Calif., in San Bernardino County on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Smoke rises from the mountains as the South fire burns in San Bernardino County north of Rialto, Calif., seen from Fontana, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. In Southern California, an unknown number of remote homes and outbuildings burned after a fire broke out Wednesday afternoon and quickly ran through tinder-dry brush in mountains northeast of Los Angeles. Evacuations were ordered, and crews mounted an air attack to keep the South Fire from the tiny communities of Lytle Creek and Scotland near the Cajon Pass in San Bernardino County. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo Chiu Firefighters take a rest while working against the South Fire in Lytle Creek, near Rialto, Calif., in San Bernardino County on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A small fire burns in the shell of a vehicle near a burning house at the South Fire in Lytle Creek near Rialto, Calif., in San Bernardino County on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Nationally, 88 large fires were burning Thursday in 13 mainly Western states, according to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho. Climate change has made the West warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make the weather more extreme and wildfires more destructive, according to scientists. Explore further California wildfire dangers may be spreading to the south 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. A firefighter tries to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A wildfire that burned several homes near Los Angeles may signal that the region is facing the same dangers that have scorched Northern California this summer. The fire in San Bernardino County erupted Wednesday afternoon, quickly burned several hundred acres and damaged or destroyed at least a dozen homes and outbuildings in the foothills northeast of Los Angeles, fire officials said. Crews used shovels and bulldozers and mounted an air attack to keep the South Fire from the tiny communities of Lytle Creek and Scotland. About 600 homes and other buildings were threatened by the blaze along with power transmission lines and 1,000 residents were under evacuation orders. By nightfall, firefighters appeared to have gained the upper hand and few flames were seen. But the blaze was worrying because Southern California's high fire season typically comes later in the year when strong, dry Santa Ana winds blast out of the interior and flow toward the coast. After a few cooler days, California's southern region was expected to experience a return of hot weather into the weekend that could boost wildfire risks. In addition to dangerously dry conditions, the region faces firefighting staffing that is increasingly stretched thin, said Lyn Sieliet, spokeswoman for the San Bernardino National Forest. A firefighter works on a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu "Some of our firefighters that we normally have on our forests are working on fires in Northern California, or Idaho and Washington," she told KTLA-TV. "We don't have the full staff that we normally do." The largest fires in the state and in the nation were in Northern California, where they have burned down small mountain towns and destroyed huge swaths of tinder-dry forest. The Caldor Fire has destroyed 500 homes since Aug. 14 in the Sierra Nevada southwest of Lake Tahoe, including much of the tiny hamlet of Grizzly Flats. It was 12% contained and threatened more than 17,000 structures. Buck Minitch, a firefighter with the Pioneer Fire Protection District, was called to the fire lines last week while his wife fled their Grizzly Flats home with their two daughters, three dogs, a kitten and duffel bag of clothes, the San Jose Mercury News reported. A firefighter tries to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Hannah Minitch evacuated to her parents' property and the next morning received a text from her husband showing only a chimney where their house once stood. The two wept briefly during a telephone call before he got back to work. "'We've got nothing left here,'" she recalled him saying. "'I've got to go protect what's left for other people.'" At times the wind-driven fire was burning 1,000 acres (405 hectares) of land per hour and on Wednesday it was less than two dozen miles (37 kilometers) from Lake Tahoe, an alpine vacation and tourist spot that straddles the California-Nevada state line. There weren't any evacuations in Tahoe but the fire continued to cast a sickly yellow pall of smoke over the scenic region. The communities of South Lake Tahoe and Tahoe City on the lake's west shore had the nation's worst air pollution at midmorning Wednesday, according to AirNow, a partnership of federal, state and local air agencies. Homeowners Jose Lamas, center, his wife, Maria Covarrubias, right, and his daughter Astrid Covarrubias walk through the smoke after visiting their burned-out home from the South Fire in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Vehicles are seen burning as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Homeowner Jose Lamas, right, and his daughter Astrid Covarrubias survey the charred debris left in his burned-out home from the South Fire in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Homeowner Maria Covarrubias reacts after seeing her home burn down from the South Fire in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Firefighters watch as a helicopter drops water at the South Fire burning in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A firefighter tries to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A firefighter tries to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu A sculpture is seen at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Firefighters watch as the South Fire burns in Lytle Creek, San Bernardino County, north of Rialto, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu Firefighters conduct a firing operation to burn fuels Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP A tree torches along Centennial Drive Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP Vehicles burn and explode in a bursts of flames Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP A utility pole and several outbuildings were damaged if not destroyed in the Idaho Maryland spot fire Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP A tree burns along Whispering Pines Lane in Grass Valley while the Bennett Fire approached Idaho Maryland Road, prompting evacuations Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP Burning vegetation sends hot ash and smoke into the air along Whispering Pines and Centennial Drive that prompted evacuations Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP Flames ignite in dry vegetation off of Idaho Maryland Road Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP Trees burn while a Cal Fire Captain works near the intersection of Whispering Pines Lane and Centennial Drive, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021 in Grass Valley, Calif. Northern California wildfires that have burned hundreds of homes were joined by a blaze east of Los Angeles that also destroyed buildings and may signal that the south will face the same dangers.Credit: Elias Funez/The Union via AP Smoke rises from the mountains as the South fire burns in San Bernardino County north of Rialto, Calif., seen from Fontana, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. In Southern California, an unknown number of remote homes and outbuildings burned after a fire broke out Wednesday afternoon and quickly ran through tinder-dry brush in mountains northeast of Los Angeles. Evacuations were ordered, and crews mounted an air attack to keep the South Fire from the tiny communities of Lytle Creek and Scotland near the Cajon Pass in San Bernardino County. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo Chiu Meanwhile, California's Dixie Fire, the second-largest in state history at 1,160 square miles (3,004 square kilometers), was burning only about 65 miles (104 kilometers) to the north. It was 45% contained. Some 700 homes were among nearly 1,300 buildings that have been destroyed. In the southern Sierra Nevada, there was growing concern as the French Fire expanded near Lake Isabella, a popular fishing and boating destination. About 10 communities were under evacuation orders. The fire has blackened 32 square miles (83 square kilometers) since Aug. 18. Smoke from the fires had fouled air farther south. The South Coast Air Quality Management District issued an advisory through Thursday morning for large portions of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties. Nationally, 92 large fires were burning in 13 mainly Western states, according to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho. Climate change has made the West warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make the weather more extreme and wildfires more destructive, according to scientists. Explore further Crews struggle to stop fire bearing down on Lake Tahoe 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain We are emotional beings and this matters deeply in our personal lives but also in our working lives, perhaps nowhere more so than in the face-to-face service industries. New research in the International Journal of Quality and Innovation, has looked at the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on what is commonly referred to as "emotional labor performance," the workplace management of emotions that are integral to a worker's performance. Niamh Lafferty and Sarah MacCurtain of the Kemmy Business School at the University of Limerick in Castletroy, Limerick, Ireland, and Patricia Mannix McNamara of the School of Education there, explain that the emergence of a global pandemic caused by an airborne virus meant that the public and workers alike have been for many months now obliged to wear a face covering, a protective mask, to reduce the risk of spreading the disease and to some extent catching it. "By the nature of emotional labor, employees rely on both the ability to read service users' emotions and the ability to express appropriate emotional displays in response," the team writes. "In simpler times, employees could assess non-verbal expressions of emotion through facial recognition and respond with facially recognizable emotions evidenced in expressions such as a smile or one of concern," they add. A face covering obviously precludes the normal appreciation of visual cues, such as smiles and frowns that we expect of our interactions with other people. This "new normal" has led to significant modifications to the interactions between service users and the people providing a service. The new normal represents uncertainty and struggle for so many people. There are major challenges that have arisen in the time since we first recognized the pandemic nature of the virus formally known as SARS-CoV-2 and the disease it causes, COVID-19. However, from the perspective of those researching emotional labor, the widespread wearing of face coverings actually presents a new research opportunity to better understand the interactions between provider and user in ways that are not possible when facial expressions are wholly visible to each party in such an interaction. "This mask-wearing time provides an exceptional opportunity to test [the] relevance, significance, and impact [of emotional labor] in a way that previously could never have been achieved," the team writes. Explore further When faces are partially covered, neither people nor algorithms are good at reading emotions More information: Niamh Lafferty et al, Donning the mask: the impact of Covid-19 on emotional labour performance, International Journal of Quality and Innovation (2021). Niamh Lafferty et al, Donning the mask: the impact of Covid-19 on emotional labour performance,(2021). DOI: 10.1504/IJQI.2021.117187 A male-like female white-necked Jacobin hummingbird being released after capture and tagging. Credit: Irene Mendez Cruz Much like in human society, female hummingbirds have taken it into their own hands to avoid harassment. By watching white-necked Jacobin hummingbirds in Panama, researchers discovered that over a quarter of females have the same brightly colored ornamentation as males, which helps them avoid aggressive male behaviors during feeding, such as pecking and body slamming. This paper appears August 26 in the journal Current Biology. "One of the 'aha moments' of this study was when I realized that all of the juvenile females had showy colors," says first author Jay Falk, who is now a postdoc at the University of Washington but led the research as a part of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. "For birds that's really unusual because you usually find that when the males and females are different the juveniles usually look like the adult females, not the adult males, and that's true almost across the board for birds. It was unusual to find one where the juveniles looked like the males. So it was clear something was at play." Male white-necked Jacobin hummingbirds are known to have bright and flashy colors, with iridescent blue heads, bright white tails, and white bellies. Female Jacobins, on the other hand, tend to be drabber in comparison, with a muted green, gray, or black colors that allow them to blend into their environment. Falk and his team, however, found that around 20% of adult females have showy colors like males. A white-necked Jacobin of an unknown gender visits a data-logging feeder in Gamboa, Panama installed by the researchers. Credit: Jay Falk As juveniles, all females have the showy colors, but this 20% of females doesn't change to the muted color as they age. It is not clear whether this phenomenon is genetic, by the choice of the hummingbird, or due to environmental factors. However, the researchers found that it is probably the result of the female hummingbirds trying to evade harassment, including detrimental aggression during mating or feeding. "Hummingbirds are such beloved animals by many people, but there are still mysteries that we haven't noticed or studied," says Falk. "It's cool that you don't have to go to an obscure unknown bird to find interesting and revealing results. You can just look at a bird that everyone loves to watch in the first place." The left and center images show adult female and adult male plumages, respectively. Right image shows juvenile plumage. Credit: Artwork by Jillian Ditner, Cornell Lab of Ornithology. To learn why some female hummingbirds kept their showy colors, the researchers set up a scenario with stuffed hummingbirds on feeders and watched as real hummingbirds interacted with them. They found that hummingbirds harassed mainly the muted colored female hummingbirds, which is in favor of the hypothesis that the showy colors are caused by social selection. Furthermore, most females had showy colors during their juvenile period and not during their reproductive period. This means that the only time they had showy colors is precisely during the period when they're not looking for mates. In combination with other results from the study, this indicates that it is not sexual selection causing the phenomenon. In the future studies, Falk and his team hope to use the results of the variation between female white-necked Jacobins to understand how the variation between males and females in other species may evolve. Explore further Young male fruit flies make females fight each other more More information: Current Biology, Falk et al.: "Male-like ornamentation in female hummingbirds results from social harassment rather than sexual selection" DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.07.043 Journal information: Current Biology , Falk et al.: "Male-like ornamentation in female hummingbirds results from social harassment rather than sexual selection" www.cell.com/current-biology/f 0960-9822(21)01033-2 Well head after all the Fracking equipment has been taken off location. Credit: Joshua Doubek. Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 3.0 In a perspective piece that appears in the journal Science, Elaine Hill, Ph.D., an economist in the University of Rochester Medical Center Department of Public Health Sciences, calls for tighter regulation and monitoring of unconventional oil and gas development, commonly called fracking, as more evidence points to the negative health consequences of the practice. The debate over fracking is often viewed through either an economic lens that emphasizes jobs and energy independence, or an environmental one that warns of the damage to air and water quality and human health. Because fracking technology has been operating on a significant scale in the U.S. for the past two decades, the scope of the public health impact due to long-term exposure to air, water, and noise pollution is only now becoming clear. The rising toll in the form of increased rates of chronic diseases, stress on rural health care providers, and growing need for mental health and addiction services, ultimately diminish the economic returns for communities that host the fracking industry. "Many of the impacts have lifelong consequences on individual well-being, including future health, education, and labor market outcomes," said Hill and co-author Lala Ma, Ph.D., with the Department of Economics at the University of Kentucky. Hill's research focuses on the complex local health, environmental, and economic implications of oil and gas extraction in the U.S. Her previous research was the first to link shale gas development to drinking water quality and has examined the association between shale gas development and reproductive health, and the subsequent impact on later educational attainment, higher risk of childhood asthma exacerbation, higher risk of heart attacks, and opioid deaths. The perspective piece accompanies a study in Science that shows increased concentrations of four chemicals associated with fracking in the surface water near well sites, suggesting that wells could be a source of pollution in drinking water. These findings highlight one of the barriers to understanding, and mitigating, the health impacts of fracking as these operations are often shrouded by "trade secrets" and lax oversight. The new study contributes to the need to rethink regulations and monitoring systems, and require regulatory agencies to collect and release reports of additional chemicals in order to better assess the long-term health impacts, according to Hill and Ma. "Understanding the exposure pathways at play is necessary for policy to effectively control the environmental damages from these operations tightening the stringency of currently regulated chemicals should be considered," said the authors. Explore further Study links hydraulic fracking with increased risk of heart attack hospitalization, death More information: Elaine Hill et al, The fracking concern with water quality, Science (2021). Journal information: Science Elaine Hill et al, The fracking concern with water quality,(2021). DOI: 10.1126/science.abk3433 Credit: Josh Bowell , Author provided In just five years, greater glidersfluffy-eared, tree-dwelling marsupialscould go from vulnerable to endangered, because Australia's environmental laws have failed to protect them and other threatened native species. Our new research found that after the greater glider was listed as vulnerable to extinction under national environment law in 2016, habitat destruction actually increased in some states, driving the species closer to the brink. Now, they meet the criteria to be listed as endangered. Despite this, the federal government has put forward a bill that would further weaken Australia's environment laws. If Australia wants to ditch its shameful reputation as a global extinction leader, our environmental laws must be significantly strengthened, not weakened. Why is the greater glider losing its home? At about the size of a cat, greater gliders are the largest gliding marsupial in the world, and can glide up to 100 meters through the forest canopy. They nest in the hollows of big old trees and, just like koalas, they mostly eat eucalypt leaves. Greater gliders were once common throughout the forests of Queensland, New South Wales, and Victoria. However, destructive practices, such as logging and urban development, have cut down the trees they call home. The rapidly warming climate and increasingly frequent and severe bushfires are also a major threat. Together, these threats are causing the greater glider to rapidly disappear. For our new study, we calculated the amount of greater glider habitat destroyed in the two years before the species was listed as vulnerable under Australia's environment law, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC) Act. We then compared this to the amount of habitat destroyed in the two years after listing. In Victoria, we measured the amount of habitat that was logged. In Queensland and NSW, we measured the amount of habitat cleared for all purposes, including logging, agriculture, and development projects. What we found The amount of greater glider habitat logged in Victoria remained consistently high, with a total of 4,917 hectares logged before listing compared to 4,759 hectares after listing. And of all forest logged in Victoria after listing, more than 45% was mapped as greater glider habitat by the federal government, according to our research paper. A dark morph greater glider in a patch of old growth forest in Munruben, Logan City, south of Brisbane. Credit: Josh Bowell State-owned forestry company VicForests is responsible for the lion's share of native forest logging in Victoria. The Conversation contacted VicForests to respond to the arguments in this article. A spokesperson said: "There are 3.7 million hectares of potential Greater Glider habitat in Victoria under the official habitat model. The most valuable areas of this habitat are set aside in conservation reserves that can never be harvested." The total area harvested by VicForests in any year is around 0.04% of this total potential habitat. In Queensland, habitat clearing increased by almost 300%, from a total of 3,002 hectares before listing compared to 11,838 hectares after listing. The amount of habitat cleared in NSW increased by about 5%, from a total of 15,204 hectares to 15,890 hectares. We also quantified how much greater glider habitat was affected by the 2019-2020 Black Summer bushfires, and found approximately 29% of greater glider habitat was burnt. Almost 40% of this burnt at high severity, which means few gliders are likely to persist in, or rapidly return to, these areas. As a result, earlier this yearjust five years after listingan assessment by the Threatened Species Scientific Committee found the greater glider is potentially eligible for up-listing from vulnerable to endangered. Why was habitat allowed to be cleared? Development projects can take decades to be implemented after they've been approved under the EPBC Act. Therefore, a lot of the habitat cleared in NSW and Queensland was likely to have been approved before the greater glider was listed as vulnerable, and before the 2019-2020 bushfires. Once a project is approved, it is not reassessed, even if a species becomes vulnerable and a wildfire burns much of its habitat. This means the impact of clearing native vegetation can be far greater than when initially approved. It also means it can take many years after a species is listed until its habitat is finally safe. In Victoria and parts of NSW, the forestry industry is allowed to log greater glider habitat under "regional forest agreements". These agreements allow logging to operate under a special set of rules that bypasses federal environmental scrutiny under the EPBC Act. A small bulldozer used for tree thinning in Queensland, May 2017. Credit: WWF-Australia The logging industry is required to comply only with state regulations for threatened species protection, which are are often inadequate. In 2019, the Victorian government updated the protection measures for greater gliders in logged forests. However, these still allow logging of up to 60% of a forested area authorized for harvest, even when greater gliders are present at high densities. The spokesperson for VicForests said the company prioritizes live, hollow-bearing trees wherever there are five or more greater gliders per spotlight kilometer (a 1 kilometer stretch of forest surveyed with torches). But this level of protection is limited and is unlikely to halt greater glider decline, as the species is highly sensitive to disturbance. In May 2020 the Federal Court found VicForests breached state environmental laws when they failed to implement protection measures and destroyed critically endangered Leadbeater's possum and greater glider habitat. Despite this, earlier this year, the Federal Court upheld an appeal by VicForests to retain their exemption from the EPBC Act. This ruling means VicForests will not be held accountable for destroying threatened species habitat, even when it is found in breach of state requirements. The spokesperson for VicForests said the company takes sustainable harvesting seriously. "VicForests operations are subject to Victorian laws, and enforced by the Office of the Conservation Regulator (OCR) and Victorian courts when necessary. The recent federal court appeal decision has not changed that fact." They add that VicForests surveys show greater gliders continue to persist in recently harvested areas, under its current practices. "VicForests has not seen any evidence that even a single Greater Glider has died as a result of our new harvesting approach." A greater glider found in burnt bushland, Meroo National Park, NSW, December 2019. Credit: George Lemann, WWF-Australia The government isn't learning its lesson The EPBC Act is currently undergoing a once in a decade assessment that considers how well it's operating, with a recent independent review criticizing the EPBC Act for no longer being fit for purpose. Our new research reinforces this, by showing the act has failed to protect one of Australia's most iconic and unique animals. And yet, the federal government wants to weaken the act further by implementing a streamlined model, which would rely on state governments to approve actions that would impact threatened species. There's a raft of reasons why this would be problematic. For one, state environmental laws operate independently, and don't consider what developments have been approved in other states. Cutting down trees may seem insignificant in certain areas, but without considering the broader impacts, many small losses can accumulate into massive declines, like a death by a thousand cuts. As a case in point, despite the devastation of greater glider habitat from the Black Summer fires in NSW, the Queensland government have recently approved a new coal mine, which will destroy over 5,500 hectares of greater glider and koala habitat. What needs to change? The greater glider is edging towards extinction, but there is still no recovery plan for this iconic marsupial. Adding to this, new research suggests there are actually three species of greater glider we could be losing, rather than just one as was previously thought. Significant effort must be invested to create a clear plan for their recovery. Because Australia has such a rich diversity of wildlife, we have a great responsibility to protect it. Australia must make important changes now to strengthennot weakenits environmental laws, before greater gliders, and many other species, are gone forever. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Genomics, proteomics, metabolomics, transcriptomicsrapid advances in high-throughput biomedical technologies has enabled the collection of data with unprecedented detail from the growing number of omics. But, how best to take advantage of the interactions and complementary information in omics data? To fully exploit the advances in omics technologies to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of the biological processes underlying human diseases, researchers from Regenstrief Institute and Indiana, Purdue and Tulane Universities have developed and tested MOGONET, a novel multi-omics data analysis algorithm and computational methodology. Integrating data from various omics provides a more holistic view of biological processes underlying human diseases. The creators have made MOGONET open source, free and accessible to all researchers. In a study published in Nature Communications, the scientists demonstrated that MOGONET, short for Multi-Omics Graph cOnvolutional NETworks, outperforms existing supervised multi-omics integrative analysis approaches of different biomedical classification applications using mRNA expression data, DNA methylation data, and microRNA expression data. They also determined that MOGONET can identify important omics signatures and biomarkers from different omics data types. "With MOGONET, our new AI [artificial intelligence] tool, we employ machine learning based on a neural network, to capture complex biological process relationships. We have made the understanding of omics more comprehensive and also are learning more about disease subtypes that biomarkers help us differentiate," said Regenstrief Institute Research Scientist Kun Huang, Ph.D., who led the study. "The ultimate goal is to improve disease prognosis and enhance disease-outcome predictions." A bioinformatician, he credits the diversity of the MOGONET research group, which included computer scientists as well as data scientists and bioinformaticians, with their varying perspectives, as instrumental in its development and success. He serves as director of data sciences and informatics for the Indiana University Precision Health Initiative. The researchers tested MOGONET on datasets related to Alzheimer's disease, gliomas, kidney cancer and breast invasive carcinoma as well as on healthy patient datasets. They determined MOGONET handily outperformed existing supervised multi-omics integration methods. "Learning and integrating intuitive recognition, MOGONET could generate new biomarker disease candidates," said study co-author Regenstrief Institute Affiliated Scientist Jie Zhang, Ph.D., a bioinformatician. "MOGONET also could predict new cancer subtypes, tumor grade and disease progression. It can identify normal brain activity versus Alzheimer's disease." Drs. Huang and Zhang plan to expand this work beyond omics to include imaging data, noting the abundance of brain images for AD and cancer-related pathology images which can teach MOGONET to recognize even cases it had not previously encountered. Both scientists note that following rigorous clinical studies, MOGONET could support improved patient care in many areas. In addition to Drs. Huang and Zhang, authors of "MOGONET integrates multi-omics data using graph convolutional networks allowing patient classification and biomarker identification" are Tongxin Wang, Ph.D., and Haixu Tang, Ph.D., of Indiana University, Wei Shao, Ph.D., of IU School of Medicine; Zhi Huang of IU School of Medicine and Purdue University; and Zhengming Ding, Ph.D. of Tulane University. Dr. Wang worked in Dr. Huang's laboratory. Dr. Ding, formerly of Indiana University, is an expert in the field of machine learning. Explore further Improved statistical methods for high-throughput omics data analysis More information: Tongxin Wang et al, MOGONET integrates multi-omics data using graph convolutional networks allowing patient classification and biomarker identification, Nature Communications (2021). Journal information: Nature Communications Tongxin Wang et al, MOGONET integrates multi-omics data using graph convolutional networks allowing patient classification and biomarker identification,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-23774-w NASA's Perseverance Mars rover will abrade the rock at the center of this image, allowing scientists and engineers to assess whether it would hold up to the rover's more powerful sampling drill. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech In its search for signs of ancient microbial life on Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover is once again preparing to collect the first of many rock core samples that could eventually be brought to Earth for further study. This week, a tool on the rover's 7-foot-long (2-meter-long) robotic arm will abrade the surface of a rock nicknamed "Rochette," allowing scientists to look inside and determine whether they want to capture a sample with the rover's coring bit. Slightly thicker than a pencil, the sample would be sealed in one of the 42 remaining titanium tubes aboard the rover. Should the team decide to acquire a core from this rock, the sampling process would be initiated next week. The mission attempted to capture their first record of the crater floor on Aug. 6 from a rock that ultimately proved too crumbly, breaking into powder and fragments of material too small to be retained in the sample tube before it was sealed and stored within the rover. A close-up of the rock, nicknamed Rochette, that the Perseverance science team will examine in order to determine whether to take a rock core sample from it. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech Perseverance has since trucked 1,493 feet (455 meters) to a ridge nicknamed "Citadelle"French for "castle"a reference to how this craggy spot overlooks Jezero Crater's floor. The ridge is capped with a layer of rock that appears to resist wind erosion, a sign that it's more likely to hold up during drilling. "There are potentially older rocks in the 'South Seitah' region ahead of us, so having this younger sample can help us reconstruct the whole timeline of Jezero," said Vivian Sun, one of the mission's scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. The team has added a step to the sampling process for this coming attempt: After using its Mastcam-Z camera system to peer inside the sample tube, the rover will pause the sampling sequence so the team can review the image to ensure a rock core is present. Once a sample is confirmed, they will command Perseverance to seal the tube. Although the pulverized rock eluded capture in the initial sample-acquisition effort, the first sample tube still contains a sample of Martian atmosphere, which the mission had originally planned to acquire at a later time. "By returning samples to Earth, we hope to answer a number of scientific questions, including the composition of Mars' atmosphere," said Ken Farley, Perseverance's project scientist at Caltech in Pasadena, California. "That's why we're interested in an atmospheric sample along with rock samples." While atop Citadelle, Perseverance will use its subsurface radar, called RIMFAXshort for Radar Imager for Mars' Subsurface Experimentto peer at rock layers below it. The top of the ridge will also provide a great vantage point for Mastcam-Z to look for other potential rock targets in the area. A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust). Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis. Explore further Mars rover comes up empty in 1st try at getting rock sample More information: For more about Perseverance: mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/ and nasa.gov/perseverance Credit: CC0 Public Domain Traditionally, natural resources in the United States have been managed for productive uses, meaning resource extraction. To acquire and maintain leases of publicly owned resources such as oil and gas, timber, and rangelands, the resources must be put to certain "productive uses." Purchasing rights to natural resources to conserve them, rather than for extraction, is typically not an option. PERC Vice President of Research Shawn Regan and PERC Senior Fellows Bryan Leonard, Christopher Costello, and Dominic Parker along with Suzi Kerr, Andrew Plantinga, James Salzman, V. Kerry Smith, and Temple Stoellinger have published a paper in Science on the role non-use rights play in conserving natural resources, titled "Allow 'nonuse rights' to conserve natural resources." The authors argue that "use-it-or-lose-it" requirements, coupled with narrow definitions of valid "uses," limit environmental groups from participating in markets to conserve publicly managed natural resources. Such restrictions can bias resource management in favor of extractive uses, even when environmental groups are willing to pay more. By allowing for non-use rights, environmentalists can express their values in the marketplace, rather than relying on political, legal, or administrative processes. "If environmental groups are willing to pay more to protect an area than industry groups are to develop it, then the land clearly ought to be protected," says author Shawn Regan on the subject of what he calls conservation leasing. If done thoughtfully, allowing for non-use rights can improve the status quo of public resource management for the following reasons: Non-use rights can reveal the economic value of conservation. Environmentalists have shown interest in participating in such markets, and granting them further access through non-use rights could expand conservation efforts. Non-use rights, if secure and well-defined, could deliver more lasting conservation outcomes that are not dependent upon shifting political winds. A rights-based approach allows for greater flexibility in responding to changing market and environmental conditionsfor example, those posed by a changing climate. A rights-based approach can limit conflict by compensating existing leaseholders. This paper is the result of a PERC workshop that brought together experts in resource management, economics, and conservation to think creatively about how to extend market tools like price signals and property rights to natural resource conservation. Explore further Formal community forest management policies often lead to reduced access, resource rights More information: Let environmentalists acquire extraction rights to conserve natural resources, Science (2021). Journal information: Science Let environmentalists acquire extraction rights to conserve natural resources,(2021). DOI: 10.1126/science.abi4573 Provided by Property and Environment Research Center Credit: CC0 Public Domain Physical activity among young people can be improved by well-designed and delivered online interventions such as 'exergames' and smartphone apps, new research shows. According to a review study carried out at the University of Birmingham, children and young people reacted positively in PE lessons to the use of exergames, which deliver physical activity lessons via games or personalized activities. Changes included increases in physical activity levels, but also improved emotions, attitudes and motivations towards physical activity. The study, published in Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy is one of the first to examine not only the impact of online interventions on physical behaviors in non-clinical groups of young people but the effects of digital mediums on physical activity knowledge, social development and improving mental health. The evidence can be used to inform guidance for health and education organizations on how they can design online interventions to reach and engage young people in physical activity. The authors analyzed 26 studies of online interventions for physical activity. They found three main mechanisms at work: gamification, in which participants progress through different levels of achievement; personalization, in which participants received tailored feedback and rewards based on progress; and information, in which participants received educational material or guidance to encourage behavioral change. Most of the interventions were focused on gamification or personalisation and the researchers found the majority of studies (70%) reported an increase and/or improvement in outcomes related to physical activity for children and young people who participated in online interventions. Primary school age pupils in particular who participated during PE lessons benefited. Lead author Dr. Victoria Goodyear, in the University of Birmingham's School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Science, said: "We find convincing evidence that PE teachers can use online learning to boost attitudes and participation in physical activity among young people, particularly at primary school age. There's a real opportunity here for the PE profession to lead the way in designing meaningful and effective online exercise opportunities, as well as an opportunity to embed positive approaches to exercise and online games and apps at an early stage." More information: Students' perceptions of fitness testing in physical education across primary, secondary, and pre-university school levels: a motivational profiles perspective, Students' perceptions of fitness testing in physical education across primary, secondary, and pre-university school levels: a motivational profiles perspective, DOI: 10.1080/17408989.2021.1953458 Credit: CC0 Public Domain Setting a price just below a round number ($39.99 instead of $40) may lead consumers into thinking a product is less expensive than it really isbut it can sometimes backfire on sellers, a new study shows. Researchers found that this "just-below" pricing makes consumers less likely to upgrade to a more expensive version of the product or service, such as a bigger size or higher-end trim on a car. The just-below price that makes a product itself seem like a good bargain also makes the leap to the premium product seem too expensive, said Junha Kim, lead author of the study and doctoral student in marketing at The Ohio State University's Fisher College of Business. "Going from $19.99 to $25 may seem like it will cost more than going from $20 to $26, even though it is actually less," Kim said. "Crossing that round number threshold makes a big difference for consumers." Kim conducted the study with Joseph Goodman and Selin Malkoc, both associate professors of marketing at Ohio State. Their research was published Aug. 26, 2021 in the Journal of Consumer Research. The threshold-crossing effect held for everything from coffee and face masks to streaming services to cars and apartments in seven different experiments, Goodman said. "We found this effect works in experiential categories, as well as products. It replicated very consistently," he said. In one field study, the researchers set up a coffee stand on the Ohio State campus for two days, rotating the prices regularly. About half the time, they offered a small coffee with a "just below" price of 95 cents or a larger cup upgrade for $1.20. In order to choose the upgrade option, customers had to cross that $1 round-number boundary. Roughly every hour, they changed the price of the small cup to $1 and increased the price of the larger cup by 5 cents to $1.25. While the larger cup was now more expensive than before, so was the smaller cup. Critically, both prices were on the same side of the $1 boundary, which the researchers predicted would make customers more likely to choose the upgrade. How did customers respond? Well, 56 percent of them upgraded to the larger cup when they didn't have to cross the round-number boundary to upgrade ($1 to 1.25). But only 29 percent did when the smaller cup was at the just-below price of 95 cents and they had to cross the $1 threshold for the larger cup. "In other words, we sold more of the large coffee when it was objectively more expensive than it was earlier ($1.25 vs. $1.20)," Malkoc said. "It was amazing how increasing pricesfrom a $1.20 to $1.25actually increased sales. It is a testament to how strong the effect was." The effect also worked for larger purchases with multiple upgrade options, findings showed. In one study in the lab, college students were more likely to say they would choose a more expensive car and apartment option when the base price was just above a round number rather than just below. That included scenarios where participants had multiple upgrades to choose from. These findings fit in well with studies that have found threshold-crossing effects in other parts of life, Kim said. "Research has shown that going across a state boundary makes a destination seem farther away," Kim said. "It is crossing that threshold that makes a difference. In our studies, the round number is like the state boundary, magnifying the perception of a difference in price." One reason that this effect works so well is that people often don't have a good idea of what the "right" price of a product or service should be, Goodman explained. So consumers look for some context to help understand if what they're buying is expensive or inexpensive. "For many of the things we purchase, price is perceptual. We have a feeling about whether the price is right or not," Goodman said. "In our study, people often said an upgrade purchase seemed less expensive when the base price was above the round number, even though it was objectively more expensive." There are some conditions where the threshold-crossing effect doesn't happen. One is for small price differences on expensive items. It also doesn't work on people who are familiar with prices for a product or servicefor example, those who book hotels on a regular basis. People who know prices well aren't affected because they don't rely on their perceptions, as many of the participants in this research did, Malkoc said. "As consumers, we need to realize that our perceptions are often flawed. We need to rely on actual numbers and not just our sense of what the numbers are," she said. Explore further Shoppers more likely to pay for upgrades when extra cost is an 'add-on,' study finds More information: Junha Kim et al, The Threshold-Crossing Effect: Just-Below Pricing Discourages Consumers to Upgrade, Journal of Consumer Research (2021). Journal information: Journal of Consumer Research Junha Kim et al, The Threshold-Crossing Effect: Just-Below Pricing Discourages Consumers to Upgrade,(2021). DOI: 10.1093/jcr/ucab049 A large fire tore through a scientific space research centre in northern Sweden on Thursday, destroying part of the rocket launch pad, officials said. The fire broke out early Thursday "during a scheduled static firing test of a solid rocket motor" and was under control by late afternoon when "post-extinguishing work" was being conducted, Esrange Space Centre said in a statement. Located in the town of Kiruna, the centre is a base for scientific research with high-altitude balloons, studies on the aurora borealis phenomenon (also known as the Northern Lights), sounding rocket launches and satellite tracking, among other things. No injuries were reported, though some staff were taken to hospital for a check-up. The fire damaged "part of the sounding rocket launching infrastructure", Esrange Space Centre said. "The full extent of damages and consequences for launching operations cannot yet be assessed," it said. Explore further Image: Esrange launch tower 2021 AFP Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Are the kids alright? The answer is complicated. The usual chaotic back-to-school period is now unusualmarked by a COVID-19 delta variant surge and continued vaccine hesitancy in some parts of the country. All 50 states closed schools to in-person instruction at some point during the 20192020 academic year, and the closures continued for more than a year in many districts throughout the country. Now, some students are returning to full-time, in-person instruction for the first time in 18 months, including nearly 600,000 students enrolled in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation's second-largest public school system. Students in the nation's largest districtNew York Citywill return to school in mid-September. While limiting children's exposure to the virus, school administrators, staff and families must also manage educational setbacks and mental health challenges intensified by lockdowns and remote learning. How will schools address mental health challenges? Pedro Noguera, the Emery Stoops and Joyce King Stoops Dean of the USC Rossier School of Education, studies ways in which schools are influenced by social and economic conditions as well as demographic trends in local, regional and global contexts. "Beyond the logistics related to opening schools safely, it is equally important for educators to be prepared to respond to the academic, social and emotional needs of their students," Noguera said. "Several studies have shown that many kids experienced significant mental health challenges as a result of the prolonged quarantine and substantial learning loss." "This is not a normal year, and we shouldn't expect children to adjust smoothly at the beginning of it," advised Erica Shoemaker, chief of clinical services in the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the Los Angeles County+USC Medical Center and a clinical associate professor of psychiatry and the behavioral sciences at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. "We anticipate that children will find the re-entry into school to be anxiety-provoking after so many months at home," Shoemaker said. "Kids are worried about whether their friends will still like them, whether their teachers will be disappointed if they have learning difficulties and about being exposed to COVID." She said kids may be more anxious, more overwhelmed and more excited than in a usual year, which could result in them being more moody, irritable, clingy or defiant and needing more rest than usual. The response to re-entry may vary based on personality type: Socially confident kids may adjust quickly and thrive, but adjusting to the hustle and bustle of school may be challenging for shy children who preferred being at home. "Adults should try to be gentle with themand with themselvesduring this transition period, which may last well into the fall of this year," Shoemaker advised. For back to school concerns, seeking help early is key Julie Marsh, a professor of education policy at USC Rossier, agreed that the pandemic has tested the limits of children, families and educators alike. "As we start up a new year amidst unwelcome uncertainty and risk, we must continue to prioritize not only addressing the unfinished learning of last year but also the social-emotional needs of students, as well as school staff, teachers and administrators who have faced their own critically important yet often overlooked challenges." Marsh, who specializes in research on K-12 policy and governance, added that the federal government is providing an unprecedented amount of funding to support students' mental health. Research must track these investments, their effects and their sustainability over time, she said. "Many children have been living under exceptionally difficult conditions including food insecurity, housing insecurity, health issues and loss of family members to the pandemic," said Dorian Traube, an associate professor at the USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work. "We need to expect a greater-than-normal number of students in distress." Traube, whose research focuses on using technological solutions to provide early childhood health, education and parent support services, said it's critical to seek help right away for kids who are grappling with mental health challenges. Education was the biggest pandemic hardship for many low-income families There is increasing evidence that school closures have had adverse impacts on the education and socioemotional well-being of children, particularly in low-income minority communities, according to a new report published by the USC Center for the Changing Family. Ashlesha Datar is a senior economist at the Center for Economic and Social Research at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and the co-author of the report, which focused on COVID-19 hardships among Los Angeles families in public housing. "We expected to see food insecurity and income and job stability to be the biggest challenges in this community," Datar said. "We were pleasantly surprised to see that they were not big hardships, likely due to the federal and local safety net programs. Instead, children's education was the biggest hardship for these families." Datar explained that children in low-income, minority households "faced critical gaps in the technological and parental support that was needed for the remote learning model to work for them." "There was no safety net for kids' education," she said. The digital divide widened during remote learning At the start of the pandemic, 1 in 4 K12 households in Los Angeles County lacked both a personal computer and broadband internet at home, USC research showeda huge barrier to distance learning required by pandemic-related lockdowns. The problem was even worse among Los Angeles Unified School District students, with 1 in 3 living in households without high-speed internet or a computer. The USC-California Emerging Technology Fund survey on statewide broadband adoption found that the share of K-12 families connected to broadband through a computer device jumped from 86% in 2019 to 93% in 2021, driven by school or district programs put in place after the onset of the pandemic. However, the survey found the transition to remote learning was challenging for many families, particularly for Latinx families whose primary language is Spanish. "There's an opportunity here to leverage the lessons of the pandemic and extend solutions beyond the pandemic," said Hernan Galperin, the principal investigator of the study and an associate professor at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. "For students to succeed, families need access to computers, reliable broadband and the ability for parents to participate in the learning process," he said. "That participation involves close communication with teachers, supporting students with homework and monitoring their progress. These are key elements for student success in the digital age." USC Rossier's Marsh said that along with prioritizing the unfinished learning of last year and the social-emotional needs of students, schools should work to help students who were impacted by the racial reckoning of the past year and a half. Schools should address "long-standing concerns about over-surveillance, low academic expectations and racism," she said. "In addition to targeting academic and non-academic support to low-income, Black and Latinx communities," she added, "we must also attend to the needs of students with disabilities and English learners, for whom remote instruction by and large did not work." Explore further Impact of COVID school closures on literacy and numeracy in 2020 was relatively small in Australia A colony of Greater Mouse-eared bats in western France undergoes an annual check-up to help understand and safeguard the protected species. It could be a scene from a bad horror movie: Torchlights slice through the darkness inside a church in western France as the building echoes with the shrieks of hundreds of bats. But these creatures of the night are scaring no one. They are having their annual check-up, as scientists try to unravel the secrets of an animal whose fiendish reputation has eclipsed its many gifts to the world. Dozens of Greater Mouse-eared bats are passed from hand to handgloved to avoid a biteby volunteers and scientists in Saint Martin's church at Noyal-Muzillac, in Brittany. Each bat is painstakingly examined, its sex, height and weight noted, its blood taken, teeth checked for wear, translucent wings stretched out and inspected. A male pup, born just a few weeks ago in the church rafters, is hanging upside down by its claws in a tube placed on a weighing scale: 19.7 grams (0.7 ounces). Once the physical assessment is finished, the latest addition to the colony is implanted with a tag, no bigger than a grain of rice. "They put a little microchip like you would a dog or a cat, it's called a pit tag, under the skin on these bats when they are babies and they release them," said Emma Teeling, head of zoology at University College Dublin. How bats are an integral part of the planet's ecosystems. This is a ritual that has been repeated every year for a decade by the organisation Bretagne Vivante, which captures and checks the entire colony to help understand and safeguard this protected dark-furred species. Why lavish so much attention on such a maligned creature? Because they are one of the world's most endangered animalsthreatened by habitat loss and by human persecution. Seeds and super powers Long demonised as fanged monsters or vectors of disease, the pandemic has done little to improve bats' image, after the World Health Organization said the coronavirus likely originated in the animals. Rodrigo Medellin, who co-leads the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Bat Group, said he has never worked harder to defend them. But the only mammal capable of flight has a lot more to offer than viruses and vampire legends. If you have ever sipped coffee, eaten a taco or worn a cotton t-shirt, you can thank bats, Medellin told AFP. At Saint Martin's church in Noyal-Muzillac, Brittany, volunteers and scientists painstakingly examine each bat. Fruit-eating species help disperse seeds from tree to tree, while some bats are indispensable pollinators. Some species can swallow half their weight in insects each night, according to Bat Conservation International. "They are the best natural pesticide," said Medellin, of Mexico's Universidad Nacional Autonoma, adding that even tequila can be traced to millions of years of bat pollination of the agave plant. "The benefits we receive from them are so huge and so different that they touch every day of our life," said Medellin. But it is not just what bats do that makes them special. They also have an array of innate talents that fascinate scientists. Engineers are inspired by their natural sonar, enabling them to fly low and find their way thanks to echolocation. And yes, they can harbour viruses like coronaviruses or Ebola. But why do they not fall ill? Climate change is increasingly taking its toll flying foxes in Australia have been devastated by heatwaves. Bats also seem to have evolved a way to slow down the ageing process, said Teeling, whose lab in Ireland is exploring how these creatures stay healthy almost until the end of their lives. Little animals typically "live fast, die young", she said, explaining that a reduced body size often means a fast metabolism: the lifespan of a mouse is often measured in months, while a bowhead whale can live for over a century. "In nature, when you look at the body size of something, you can predict how long they are going to live for," she said. Not bats. The Greater Mouse-eared Bats that Teeling and her colleagues study do not exceed eight centimetres (just over three inches), but they can live up to 10, or even 20 years. In 2005, researchers in Siberia captured a Brandt's bat that had been tagged 41 years earlier, estimating it had lived nearly 10 times longer than expected for its size. 'Ecological traps' From the tiny two-gram "bumblebee bat", to the giant Philippine flying fox with its 1.5-metre (five-foot) wingspan, bats make up a fifth of all terrestrial mammals. Although little animals typically 'live fast, die young', bats seem to have evolved a way to slow down the ageing process. But some 40 percent of the 1,321 species assessed on the IUCN's Red List are now classified as endangered. "We are losing species all over the world," said Julie Marmet, chiropterologist (bat expert) at the National Museum of Natural History in France. Bats have been "resilient" for 50 million years, she told AFP, but today's changes are "far too fast for species to adapt". Human actions are to blame, as with the biodiversity crisis gripping the entire planetwhich will come under the spotlight at the IUCN congress in early September. Deforestation and habitat loss is the primary driver. Many species live in trees and the 40 percent that live in caves depend largely on forests for foraging, said Winifred Frick, chief scientist at Bat Conservation International. Climate change is also increasingly taking its toll. Flying foxes in Australia have been devastated by heatwaves, while in the United States thousands of Mexican free-tailed bats have been killed by hypothermia. In the United States, thousands of Mexican free-tailed bats have been killed by hypothermia after being lured by milder winters into abandoning their habitual migration south. Lured by milder winters into abandoning their habitual migration south, many of these little bats have taken to staying in their roosts under bridges in Texas during the cooler months. These bridges over waterways look like "restaurants" for bats, said Frick, but it also represents an "ecological trap". During the last winter, there was a particularly cold snap in Texas. "Thousands and thousands of bats died during that big freeze," she said. Hunted and harassed Modern human infrastructure has become a perilous obstacle course. Already victims of collisions with cars, they must now avoid wind turbinesstudies suggest half a million are killed every year in the US either by the blades or the deadly effects of the forceful air movement. Even the automatic motion sensors that illuminate the stairways of apartment blocks can turn a short stopover for migrating pipistrelles into a waking nightmare. As well as collisions with cars, wind turbines and even the automatic motion sensors that illuminate the stairways of apartment blocks can be perilous for bats. Normally these matchbox-sized bats only fly at night, said Andrzej Kepel, of the Polish association Salamandra. But when they try to continue with their migration after a couple of days in these stairways, they trigger the sensor and the lights turn on. "So they land," said Kepel. Again and again they try to leave and every time the lights flick on, stopping them. Their cries can attract others. "After several days, there are hundreds of bats in the staircase and people are panicking," he said. Bats can end up starving to death. Inside caves, they are still not safe. Whether it is tourists shining torches or the incursions of those collecting bat guano to use as fertilizer, the slightest disturbance can be devastating. Especially since most bat species only have one baby per year, unusually for such a small mammal, said Marmet. Bats are one of the world's most endangered animals, threatened by habitat loss and human persecution. So "if there is a problem in a colony, it's over." Hunted for meat or sport by people in Southeast Asia and Africa, they also fall prey to other animals. In Jamaica, for example, cats have staked out the cave of a colony of critically endangered bats. "We've documented within an hour cats taking about 20 bats, ripping their wings off and snacking on them," said Frick. Vampires to Vatican So who is frightening who? Bats have not always had a bad reputation. In Mayan culture they played a major role in the forming of the universe. But in the Western world they have been unwittingly typecast as mascots of Halloween and horror films. While just three types of bats in South America are (animal) blood-drinking "vampires", when Bram Stoker wrote "Dracula" in the 19th century it tarnished the reputation of the whole family. Bat benefits: Fruit-eating species help disperse seeds from tree to tree, while some bats are indispensable pollinators. "That is the moment bats began to be accused of being envoys of the devil, being evil, and filthy, and bringing diseases," said Medellin. Batman was helpless to redress the balance. Even Pope Francis last year likened people in a state of sin to being "like 'human bats' who can move about only at night". But many of those who spend time with bats end up loving them. "They are cute! We get attached to them," says Corentin Le Floch, of Bretagne Vivante. In the church of Noyal-Muzillac, it's snack time and a Greater Mouse-eared bat is nibbling on a wriggling mealworm. He gets a quick caress of his little pointy ears and then: freedom. Explore further Could bats hold the secret to healthy ageing? 2021 AFP In this Oct. 7, 2014, file photo, protesters block vehicles from getting to the Thirty Meter Telescope groundbreaking ceremony site at Mauna Kea, Hawaii. A judicial decision from Spain's Canary Islands has put a halt on an alternative plan to build a giant telescope unpopular in Hawaii, which is the preferred location. Construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope on Hawaii's tallest mountain, Mauna Kea, has been stalled by opponents who say the project will desecrate land that's sacred to some Native Hawaiians. Credit: Hollyn Johnson/Hawaii Tribune-Herald via AP, File A Spanish judge in a decision cheered by environmentalists has put a halt to backup plans for the construction of a giant telescope in the Canary Islandseliminating at least for now the primary alternative location to the preferred spot in Hawaii, where there have been protests against the telescope. Construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope, or TMT, on Hawaii's tallest mountain, Mauna Kea, has been stalled by opponents who say the project will desecrate land held sacred to some Native Hawaiians. Telescope officials had selected the alternate location near an existing scientific research facility on the highest mountain of La Palma, one of the Spanish islands off the western African coast, in the Atlantic Ocean. But an administrative court in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the capital of the Spanish archipelago, ruled last month that the 2017 concession by local authorities of public land for the tentative project was invalid. The ruling was dated on July 29, but only became public this week after local media reported about the decision. In the ruling obtained by The Associated Press, Judge Roi Lopez Encinas wrote that the telescope land allocation was subject to an agreement between the Canary Astrophysics Institute, or IAC, and the telescope's promoter, the TMT International Observatory (TIO) consortium. But the judge ruled that the agreement was not valid because TIO had not expressed an intention to build on the La Palma site instead of at the Hawaii site. This July 14, 2019, file photo shows a telescope at the summit of Mauna Kea, Hawaii's tallest mountain. A judicial decision from Spain's Canary Islands has put a halt on an alternative plan to build a giant telescope unpopular in Hawaii, which is the preferred location. Construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope on Hawaii's tallest mountain, Mauna Kea, has been stalled by opponents who say the project will desecrate land that's sacred to some Native Hawaiians. If it can't be built in Hawaii, telescope officials have selected the alternate location on the highest mountain of La Palma, a Spanish island off Africa's western coast. But a court there ruled last month in a decision that just emerged that a public concession for the site was invalid. . Credit: AP Photo/Caleb Jones, File The judge also sided with the plaintiff, the environmental group Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Accion, in rejecting arguments by TIO's legal team and the island's government that the land concession was covered by an international treaty on scientific research. An official for the Canary Islands High Court said questions about the ruling could not be answered because other court officials in a position to answer the questions were on vacation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to be named in media reports. The island's local elected government chief, Mariano Zapata, said it was "sad" that advocacy groups "are so occupied by administrative matters instead of environmental issues." "I wish we were all in the same boat with the intent of creating jobs in the La Palma island so it can keep being an international reference on scientific research," Zapata said. His government estimated last year that the telescope would generate 500 permanent jobs and at least 400 million euros ($470 million) in investment. Scott Ishikawa, a spokesperson for the consortium hoping to build the telescope, said that the consortium plans to appeal the ruling. "While we respect the court's ruling in La Palma, we will pursue the legal process to retain La Palma as our alternative site. Hawaii remains our preferred location for TMT, and we have renewed our efforts to better connect with the Hawaii community in a meaningful and appropriate way," he said in an email to The Associated Press. This July 24, 2009 file photo shows the Gran Telescopio Canarias, one of the the world's largest telescopes, at the Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos on the Canary Island of La Palma, Spain. A judicial decision from Spain's Canary Islands has put a halt on an alternative plan to build a giant telescope unpopular in Hawaii, which is the preferred location. Construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope on Hawaii's tallest mountain, Mauna Kea, has been stalled by opponents who say the project will desecrate land that's sacred to some Native Hawaiians. If it can't be built in Hawaii, telescope officials have selected the alternate location on the highest mountain of La Palma, a Spanish island off Africa's western coast. But a court there ruled last month in a decision that just emerged that a public concession for the site was invalid. Credit: AP Photo/Carlos Moreno, File Pablo Batista, a spokesman of the Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Accion group, hailed the decision as a big setback for what he called a "fraudulent" project that he said made "fake promises" of new jobs for the island. "The whole idea of offering the island as a back-up was nothing else but as a strategy to put pressure on the Hawaii plans," Batista said. In a statement, the group also said that "the five years that the TIO consortium has lost on La Palma should make it reflect on the arrogant and disrespectful strategy that they have carried out both in Hawaii and in the Canary Islands, emboldened by institutional support and despising the arguments of the opposition to the TMT." The group's concerns echo some of the concerns expressed by those fighting the telescope in Hawaii, said Kealoha Pisciotta, one of the leaders seeking to keep the project off Mauna Kea. "I'm glad that they challenged it, because like here, the challenge helps bring awareness to TMT's not only lack of following the process, but caring for the environment and Hawaiians' sacred site," she said. Explore further Spain will get giant telescope if Hawaii doesn't, group says 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Credit: CC0 Public Domain As scientists continue to explore the wide-ranging effects of heat stress on the health of dairy cattle, a new study by researchers from the University of Florida, published in the September issue of JDS Communications, adds to the growing understanding of the negative influences of heat stress, not just throughout the lifespan but across generations. With the goals of evaluating the effects of in utero heat stress on overall fetal and organ growth, particularly organs associated with immune function, and examining the cellular mechanism of altered passive immunity in neonatal bull calves after maternal heat stress, the team exposed pregnant Holstein cows to the extreme heat of the Florida summer and gathered data about the resulting offspring, comparing these against data on calves born to cows provided with cooling measures during late pregnancy. The team found that calves born to heat-stressed cows had lower birth weights, lower weights of organs, including the heart, liver, kidneys, thymus, and spleen, and higher rates of cell death in the intestine. The lower birth weights observed by the researchers suggest reduced placental function and earlier delivery, with less progressed fetal development. The lower weights of the heart, liver, and kidneys among calves born to heat-stressed dams also suggest compromised placental and fetal development. Senior author Geoffrey E. Dahl, Ph.D., of the University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA, explains that "Calves, like all young animals, are prone to elevated rates of mortality and morbidity in the neonatal period, and preterm birth may further exacerbate that problem. Early-life losses may result from organ immaturity and dysfunction, notably of the gastrointestinal tract and the immune system." The team suggests that reduced weights of the thymus and spleen may be associated with slowed fetal growth and compromised immune function, as these organs play important roles in the development of a robust immune system. The higher rate of intestinal cell death among calves born to heat-stressed cows suggests that these calves may have a reduced ability to absorb immune factors from colostrum, essential to the transfer of maternal immunity to the immature and vulnerable calf, in the critical first hours after birth. "Passive uptake of immunoglobulins from colostrum is the only mechanism of immunoprotection in the bovine," Dahl points out. The authors speculate that decreased nutrient uptake and reduced immune function following gestational heat stress may lead to reduced health and growth of the calf in the long term. Dahl notes that "acceleration of gut closure appears to occur even before birth and before colostrum consumption. Thus, it may be challenging to reverse after birth, so management efforts should focus on cooling pregnant cows during late gestation." As the dairy industry continuously strives to improve animal welfare and environmental and financial sustainability, such research is of greater importance than ever. Explore further Heat stress in gestating dairy cows impairs performance of future generations More information: B.M.S. Ahmed et al, Maternal heat stress reduces body and organ growth in calves: Relationship to immune status, JDS Communications (2021). B.M.S. Ahmed et al, Maternal heat stress reduces body and organ growth in calves: Relationship to immune status,(2021). DOI: 10.3168/jdsc.2021-0098 Credit: CC0 Public Domain Can toxic algae kill humans? California health officials are warning of these poisonous blooms Madera County health officials in northern California on Monday issued warnings to the public after high amounts of harmful algae were reported in a lake. Staff from the Central Valley Water Board have put out signs around Hensley Lake warning people about harmful bright green algae in the water, urging pets and children to stay away from the algae, which contains toxins that are dangerous to humans and animals if ingested. There are different types of toxic algae, but they all still are a threat to human and animal health. University of Southern California expert Dr. David Caron told reporters, "many water bodies around the country, not just in California ... are reaching a tipping point." Back in July, harmful blue-green algae prompted beach closures and warnings in Vermont, Rhode Island and Ohio. Officials have said the death of a Northern California family also may be linked to toxic algae, although no official cause of death has been released. The U.S. Forest Service in July reported toxic algae was found earlier in the summer in area roughly three miles north of where the family was found. The new Hensley Lake warning is less than 50 miles away from where the family was found. What is toxic algae? In balanced ecosystems, the tiny aquatic plants can grow quickly and usually occur in late summer or early fall. "You have a higher risk of that happening in the summer, and that's because of higher heat and more stagnant water. That's especially important for freshwater environments," Dr. Erika Holland, assistant professor of biological sciences at California State University of Long Beach, told USA TODAY. When nutrients are right in the water, the bloom can grow and during that process harmful cyanotoxins can be released. They're typically visible because of their bright color in the water or as a foamy layer near the surface. Holland said it, "may look like a colorful oil spill." Doug Plitt, Operations Project Manager with the U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers at Hensley Lake, told ABC 30 that a general reaction to look for would be: "Your skin may be irritated, you may notice a rash developing. If you've ingested it, typically you'd get a dry mouth, possibly nausea or vomiting, a headache, or diarrhea." Can it kill humans? Toxic algae can be fatal if a person drinks water from a bloom that contains certain toxins. In California, the most alarming toxin is domoic acid, which can disrupt normal nerve signaling in the brain, causing disorientation and seizures. It can cause death to fish, seabirds, marine mammals and even people. Although the tiny organisms are regularly there, concentrations of them can create enough toxins to seriously sicken peopleprimarily childrenand be deadly to pets. "It can be from anywhere from just a little bit sick to it can cause death within a couple hours or days, depending on how much you are exposed to," Holland said. She added if you are exposed to it and possibly ingested it, you should take a picture of the water and go to an emergency room and contact poison control. For pets, it's best to get them to a veterinarian as soon as possible. Where is toxic algae found? The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says to look for local advisories before going near lakes, rivers, and oceans. Holland said that toxic algae can be found all across the globe and you can usually tell it's presence by it's smell. "Oftentimes, it's really almost like it hurts your nose. It's like an acid almost that burns in your nose a little bit," she said. "In freshwater, it would be more putrid." Boat activity can move the water around and algae can be concentrated in coves. Officials are warning visitors away from those areas. California State Water Resources has a map where people can voluntarily report where harmful algae is located. Recent reports show they've been spotted throughout the state, but mostly in the north. Was toxic algae to blame for a California family's death? Local authorities are trying to determine what caused the mysterious deaths of Northern California family in the Sierra National Forest. John Gerrish, Ellen Chung and their 1-year-old daughter, Muji, were reported missing on Aug. 16 and shortly after, they were found dead alongside the Merced River along with their family dog. An autopsy done on the family gave no conclusive cause as to how the family died, but it did rule out blunt force trauma and gunshot wounds as no physical evidence was found. Mariposa County Sheriff's Office spokesperson Kristie Mitchell said the investigation would be treated as a hazmat situation. "We aren't specifically saying this is carbon monoxide, we aren't saying it's toxic algae, we aren't saying that it couldn't be something else. What we wanted to do was just take extra precautions because there are additional hazards in the area," Mitchell told USA TODAY. "That's a hard question to answer. We aren't ruling anything out at this point." Holland said authorities would be able to tell if the family died from toxic algae by chemicals present in their tissue, which could be detected in a toxicology report. Explore further Harmful algal bloom becomes detectable along western Lake Erie 2021 USA Today Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Ultrafast electron microscope in Argonnes Center for Nanoscale Materials. Credit: Argonne National Laboratory. Everyone who has ever been to the Grand Canyon can relate to having strong feelings from being close to one of nature's edges. Similarly, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have discovered that nanoparticles of gold act unusually when close to the edge of a one-atom thick sheet of carbon, called graphene. This could have big implications for the development of new sensors and quantum devices. This discovery was made possible with a newly established ultrafast electron microscope (UEM) at Argonne's Center for Nanoscale Materials (CNM), a DOE Office of Science User Facility. The UEM enables the visualization and investigation of phenomena at the nanoscale and on time frames of less than a trillionth of a second. This discovery could make a splash in the growing field of plasmonics, which involves light striking a material surface and triggering waves of electrons, known as plasmonic fields. For years, scientists have been pursuing development of plasmonic devices with a wide range of applicationsfrom quantum information processing to optoelectronics (which combine light-based and electronic components) to sensors for biological and medical purposes. To do so, they couple two-dimensional materials with atomic-level thickness, such as graphene, with nanosized metal particles. Understanding the combined plasmonic behavior of these two different types of materials requires understanding exactly how they are coupled. In a recent study from Argonne, researchers used ultrafast electron microscopy to look directly at the coupling between gold nanoparticles and graphene. "Surface plasmons are light-induced electron oscillations on the surface of a nanoparticle or at an interface of a nanoparticle and another material," said Argonne nanoscientist Haihua Liu. "When we shine a light on the nanoparticle, it creates a short-lived plasmonic field. The pulsed electrons in our UEM interact with this short-lived field when the two overlap, and the electrons either gain or lose energy. Then, we collect those electrons that gain energy using an energy filter to map the plasmonic field distributions around the nanoparticle." In studying the gold nanoparticles, Liu and his colleagues discovered an unusual phenomenon. When the nanoparticle sat on a flat sheet of graphene, the plasmonic field was symmetric. But when the nanoparticle was positioned close to a graphene edge, the plasmonic field concentrated much more strongly near the edge region. "It's a remarkable new way of thinking about how we can manipulate charge in the form of a plasmonic field and other phenomena using light at the nanoscale," Liu said. "With ultrafast capabilities, there's no telling what we might see as we tweak different materials and their properties." This whole experimental process, from the stimulation of the nanoparticle to the detection of the plasmonic field, occurs in less than a few hundred quadrillionths of a second. "The CNM is unique in housing a UEM that is open for user access and capable of taking measurements with nanometer spatial resolution and sub-picosecond time resolution," said CNM Director Ilke Arslan. "Having the ability to take measurements like this in such a short time window opens up the examination of a vast array of new phenomena in non-equilibrium states that we haven't had the ability to probe before. We are excited to provide this capability to the international user community." The understanding gained with regard to the coupling mechanism of this nanoparticle-graphene system should be key to the future development of exciting new plasmonic devices. A paper based on the study, "Visualization of plasmonic couplings using ultrafast electron microscopy," appeared in the June 21 edition of Nano Letters. In addition to Liu and Arslan, additional authors include Argonne's Thomas Gage, Richard Schaller and Stephen Gray. Prem Singh and Amit Jaiswal of the Indian Institute of Technology also contributed, as did Jau Tang of Wuhan University and Sang Tae Park of IDES, Inc. Explore further A catalyst that controls chemical reactions with light More information: Haihua Liu et al, Visualization of Plasmonic Couplings Using Ultrafast Electron Microscopy, Nano Letters (2021). Journal information: Nano Letters Haihua Liu et al, Visualization of Plasmonic Couplings Using Ultrafast Electron Microscopy,(2021). DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.1c01824 Psychiatrist Bjarte Vik reports in his doctoral dissertation that the most vulnerable women received the least thorough police investigations after reporting a rape. Credit: Colourbox Women already considered vulnerable visited the sexual assault center in Trondheim far more often than others. Vulnerable women were also more often subjected to moderate violence and suffered more bruises. And yet, the police investigated their cases less thoroughly. These are some of the conclusions reached by psychiatrist Bjarte Vik at St. Olav's hospital in Trondheim in her doctoral dissertation from NTNU. Vik's doctorate is new, but the data stems from the period 2003 to 2010. Vik used this material because he had access to to a unique link: Few previous studies anywhere have been based on data where police and hospital records were linked in rape cases. Reviewed 223 rape cases "Our research group investigated a total of 223 rapes of vulnerable women," says Vik. The researchers linked criminal cases (investigative material) in rape cases with hospital records from the Trondheim sexual assault center at St. Olav's hospital, which gave them a unique data set. The women were considered vulnerable if they met at least one of the following criteria: Intellectual or physical developmental disability Mental health problems Alcohol or drug abuse Previously experienced sexual abuse Majority of cases were vulnerable women "We found that almost 60 percent of the women who sought out the abuse clinic in Trondheim had at least one of the mentioned vulnerability factors, and 29 percent had more than one vulnerability factor," says Vik. He also discovered that the more vulnerability factors were present in a woman, the more often the rape led to moderate violence. The most vulnerable women also received the least thorough police investigations after reporting the rape. The number of reported rapes has risen sharply in Norway in recent years, from around 400 at the beginning of the 1990s to close to 2000 now. At the same time, the proportion of rapes that end in prosecution and conviction has decreased. The probability of a less thorough police investigation was twice as high if you were a particularly vulnerable woman. "This finding could have several reasons. But even though vulnerable women are sometimes more skeptical than less vulnerable women about cooperating with the police, we found a difference in investigation quality," says Cecilie Therese Hagemann, head physician at the sexual assault center in Trondheim. She is also an associate professor at NTNU. A lot has happened with investigations in recent years Here's what John Ola Volden, a section leader for investigation, joint unit for intelligence and investigation at Trndelag police district, has written about this research: The data that has been reviewed is historical data. The criminal cases are 11 to 18 years old. A lot has happened with investigations in recent years. Completely different requirements have been developed for investigating criminal cases. New investigation methods have been implemented and we work in a different way. Among other things, several investigative steps are now taken in the initial phase to ensure better quality when we interrogate and gather trace evidence. In 2014, the Trndelag police district conducted a major investigation into the 50 most recently prosecuted rape cases. All cases were thoroughly reviewed according to established criteria. The background for the investigation was an acknowledgment that our results within this case category (rape of adults) were sub-standard. The result of the investigation was that the police district focused on these cases and implemented measures, including training patrol crews, introducing new routines, creating professional positions with special responsibility for rape cases and specialization of investigators in these cases. These measures quickly had a positive effect. Today, the police district has a case processing time for rape cases (from received case to prosecution decision) of about 130 days, with a clearance rate of about 40 percent. In the last four years, the police have undergone reforms in which the specialist groups have been further strengthened so that our ability to conduct effective, high-quality investigations has increased. Today, virtually all criminal cases contain evidence in the form of electronic tracing. Strengthening these groups has enabled us to obtain and interpret this electronic evidence in a much improved and more precise way than before. The police provided descriptions of the investigative steps that are usually included when investigating a rape case. Good investigative work is characterized by thorough interrogations of victims and suspects and possibly of other witnesses. This involves carefully investigating the scene of the incident, and the police collecting and analyzing biological evidence that could contribute to obtaining the perpetrator's DNA and other evidence. Neat and clear record keeping is also very important in all stages of the investigation. Alcohol less often involved The victims without vulnerability factors were often young students who became susceptible to being victimized after consuming large amounts of alcohol, often by someone they were only slightly acquainted with. A disturbing finding was that as many as five percent of the women who visited the abuse clinic had an intellectual disability. In the cases of vulnerable victims, the women had not consumed as much alcohol prior to the rape. This finding indicates that alcohol was less "necessary" for abusers to be able to subject these women to sexual abuse. "That one party has an obvious vulnerability exploited by another party, apparently systematically, seems to be a common phenomenon among individuals who seek out easy victims," Vik says. Intellectually disabled are susceptible A disturbing finding was that as many as five percent of the women who visited the sexual assault center had an intellectual disability. This rate is ten times higher than the registered incidence of intellectual disability in Norway's general population. Little research is being done on rape of individuals with certain types of health problems. But some data exist, including from the United States, that indicate that people with an intellectual disability have a seven times greater risk of being raped than the general population. "This problem has also been referred to as 'the epidemic no one talks about'", says Vik. The Nordic paradox The number of reported rapes has risen sharply in Norway in recent years, from around 400 at the beginning of the 1990s to close to 2000 now. At the same time, the proportion of rape cases that are prosecuted and convicted has decreased. "More than 80 percent of the reported rapes are not investigated by the police. This doesn't necessarily mean that the officer doesn't believe the person reporting, but that the burden of proof is often too weak for the case to be taken to court," says Hagemann. Norway is not alone. This is what Amnesty International calls the "Nordic paradox": The high degree of equality and women's liberation that has been achieved in many areas in the Nordic countries does not apply in the case of rape. There is no indication that the extent of sexual abuse in Norway has decreased in the last 50 years. The prosecution rate for rape cases reported to the police has been alarmingly low for many years and has also decreased in all the Nordic countries in recent years. Never the victim's fault Research on sexual assault of people with various forms of vulnerability is scarce. The topic is also controversial, because "rape myths" still held by many assert that the victim's vulnerability puts them at fault.. "It's always been important for us to convey that a rape is never the victim's fault. At the same time, it is important to convey the great extent of sexual abuse that takes place in our society against vulnerable women. With this information, politicians, health professionals, police and the judiciary can invest more resources in preventing this type of abuse in the future," says Vik. Vik is employed as a psychiatrist for individuals with autism, intellectual disability, ADHD and Tourette's syndrome, among others. Explore further Justice system chips away at women's rights More information: Bjarte Frode Vik et al, Is police investigation of rape biased by characteristics of victims?, Forensic Science International: Synergy (2020). Bjarte Frode Vik et al, Is police investigation of rape biased by characteristics of victims?,(2020). DOI: 10.1016/j.fsisyn.2020.02.003 Bjarte Frode Vik et al, Psychosocial Vulnerability Among Patients Contacting a Norwegian Sexual Assault Center, Journal of Interpersonal Violence (2016). DOI: 10.1177/0886260516659657 Journal information: Journal of Interpersonal Violence Credit: Shutterstock At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, school closures meant more than 90% of the world's learners had to study virtually or from home. The internet, already an invaluable educational tool, has therefore become even more important for students. One of students' most common internet activities, both in schools and in home schooling, is online searching. This means teachers, and those parents currently standing in for teachers, need to help students develop skills for searching online. So what can parents do to support their children when tasks sent home from school require them to search for information online? And what can they do to extend such work for gifted students or when the work sent home runs out? Teachers and parents can have an influence on a child's internet skills. Indeed, their search success is related to the amount of adult guidance and explicit instruction they receive. Unfortunately, research suggests some teachers don't offer such explicit instruction. Some also have trouble structuring (and providing support for) student online search tasks that go beyond lower-order skills. Evidence even exists of a lack of search skills among teachers and parents themselves. The following three tips may help. Focus on 'learning to search' as well as 'searching to learn' Making the "invisible" processes behind searches more visible improves the online information-seeking of both teachers and students. In this way, educators (be they temporary or professional) should design activities that foreground the search process itself. This makes students more aware of what goes on "behind the scenes" of a search and of their ability to affect these processes. How might you do this? In one Queensland study, students were asked to sort 12 picture cards. The cards were designed so three "categories"animals, transport modes and countrieswere obvious at first. Students easily sorted the cards into these categories. But they were then challenged to recognize any other sorting options, much like Google does every second of every day. When "kangaroo" was removed from the "animals" pile and placed alongside "Australia" instead, for example, students were quick to assemble the remaining cards in a similar fashion. This activity encouraged discussions about just how many different ways not 12 but 200 million cardsor websitescould be sorted. It's a reminder of how important it is to clearly specify what you want from Google, helping it to sort its 200 million websites. Become more critical users of the web Educators sometimes set tasks that are too broad for students and likely to return millions of search results. Many will probably be irrelevent or inaccurate. Teachers may also set tasks that encourage students to use Google as a mere encyclopedia, which requires only passive lower-order learning. Just like picture cards can be categorised in different ways, so can online search content. Credit: Shutterstock If we instead want students to engage in higher-order thinking, greater structuring of search tasks is needed. Educators can start this by setting specific requirements for the results students work with. Perhaps ask them to find one website from Australia (try adding "site:.au" to the end of queries) and one from Englandthis could be particularly interesting around the time The Ashes are played. Perhaps students are told to find some sources from before the year 2000 and others from the previous 12 months (select "Tools" then "Any time" in the dropdown menu). Asking students to purposefully find websites with conflicting information and to describe how they decided which to believe requires that they compare, evaluate and analyze. The number of results a search engine returns can help indicate the quality of your query and make finding reliable information more efficient. In school, students report that they typically don't consider the number of results returned and have little experience in limiting or increasing these results. In Australian home-schooling too, parent-educators and students rank "limiting/expanding searches" as one of the hardest steps in search. Now that students know a little more about how Google must sort websites, ask them to alter their query to rearrange the top five or ten results returned. Challenge them to reduce the (likely millions of) results returned to just 10,000, 1,000 or even ten. Students explain that when it is only the final product or outcome of searching that "counts" or is graded, their focus is upon that and never the search process itself. This changes when tasks are more structured and specific requirements and guidance are given. Students then focus more upon gathering quality information. Shift your thinking about search Attitudes have proven more important than available resources or even teacher skill when it comes to increasing students' authentic technology-enabled learning. Many limiting attitudes about search need to be turned around to ensure students get the most out of Google. We can start switching attitudes about what to search for and how by using the tips above. But what if your child doesn't want to listen to you during search? This is commonly reported. Students don't always see their teachers as good information sources during search either. And it's true, some teachers and parents still have much to learn about using Google. However, my study, which tested the "generational digital divide" concept among Australian home-schoolers, found the parent-educators (the older generation) were stronger searchers than their kids, the so-called "digital natives." Perhaps students can learn more about search from their parents. The answer is unlikely to be forcing your children to recognize your strengths and their weaknesses. Instead, shifting young people's attitude to search, and encouraging them to realize it is sometimes hard and frustrating, can help. When it comes to schoolwork, data from over 45,000 students in 12 countries tell us internet research is "by far the most frequently recorded use of ICT." Educators who focus upon "learning to search" as well as "searching to learn," who encourage critical use, and begin to challenge attitudes about Google will be better placed to help students capitalize on the unprecedented educational opportunities online search can provide. Explore further School can be scary in a pandemic. A new app helps teachers know how kids are feeling This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. GLENS FALLS The entire staff of the Adirondack Regional Chamber of Commerce has been selected to receive this years Henry Crandall Award. In the past, the award has been given to individual recipients who have brought about improvements to the community and demonstrated commitment to Crandall Public Library. But the trustees for Crandall Public Library, the group that hands out the award each year, changed how they viewed the award in light of the contributions from the staff and volunteer members of the chamber. The ARCC, headed by Michael Bittel, is made up of 21 board members and 23 ambassadors who represent more than 700 members throughout Warren, Washington, Essex and northern Saratoga counties. Kathy Naftaly, library director, said chamber staff has gone above and beyond serving its members, and consistently worked to support the library and area nonprofits, particularly during the pandemic. Were honored to recognize the staff and volunteers of the chamber for their many significant contributions, she said in a statement. Ive voiced my concerns before about potentially losing the voice of all the different towns in this county because we are very different upcounty, downcounty, he said. The Bolton, Chester and Warrensburg town boards had passed resolutions opposing any change. Bolton Supervisor Ronald Conover said the current system is working wonderfully. The county has a strong tax base and finances and the departments are functioning well. He does not see the need to have another layer of government. A change to a legislature would hurt the smaller communities as their voice would be diminished. I think our diversity is our strength. I think we should be celebrating it. Not destroying it, he said. Braymer said she is pushing for a change because she does want all the communities to have an equal voice. However, right now, that is not happening. She said some supervisors have a disproportionate level of influence for the number of constituents they represent. Braymer added that there is not a lot of overlap between town issues and county issues. Supervisors can handle the day-to-day issues at their towns and could work with their county legislator if there is an issue. WILTON The Upstate Conservative Coalition is searching for a new venue to host Scott Presler after the owners of the original location wanted to avoid a scene with the appearance by the anti-Muslim activist. Presler was originally scheduled to speak at a voter registration drive on Wednesday at Gavin Park in Wilton. The event was sponsored by the campaign of U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-Schuylerville, the Saratoga County Republican Committee and the Rise PAC. However, the rally was canceled because a Rise staffer contracted COVID. The group was still going to meet to knock on doors and sign up voters. Then, it was announced that Presler would be speaking at the Wilton Elks Club next Tuesday at 7 p.m. Presler served as a strategist for Act for America, an organization the Anti-Defamation League and Southern Poverty Law Center called the largest anti-Muslim hate group in the country. Presler also helped organized multiple protests to challenge the legitimacy of the 2020 election, leading up to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. David Buchyn, of the Upstate Conservative Coalition, said the Elks Club was getting nasty messages on its Facebook page. LAKE GEORGE The Lake George Battlefield Park Alliance has elected several new officers and trustees including a new president. Dr. Lyn Karig Hohmann is stepping down after 10 years as president. She said in a news release that the board and the alliances membership have been instrumental to accomplish the goal of creating a Visitor Interpretative Center, which will open later this summer. Hohmann singled out the efforts of Dr. Russell Bellico as the inspiration for developing the center and spending countless hours to ensure the historical accuracy of the displays. The center will be housed in the new headquarters building of the Lake George Park Commission. Hohmann is staying on the board. The alliances new president is John DiNuzzo, of Trumbull, Connecticut, and Lake George, who was formerly the vice president and a board member since 2016. The new center will house artifacts and exhibits relating to the French and Indian War and American Revolution battles that took place in and around the park, as well as displays related to Native Americans who fished and hunted there. Editor: Recently the Glens Falls Chronicle editorialized a diatribe against the president of the United States. I made a pointed but unpublishable rebuttal. One refutation, however, warrants publication in the Chronicles circulation area. That is the assertion that President Biden irresponsibly abandoned the mission in Afghanistan, and directly "jeopardized Americans, our allies and countless Afghans who trusted us." Those of us who live in the shadow of Fort William Henry know full well that the time to negotiate the safe passage for the withdrawal of forces, civilians and materials is at the time of surrender. We also know that notwithstanding the good faith negotiations of honorable combatants, bad things may happen. The dishonorable, twice-impeached, former president, Donald J. Trump, unconditionally surrendered to the Taliban without making any provisions for the safe conduct and withdrawal of forces, allies, American civilians and the countless Afghans who trusted us, never mind his abandonment of arms and materials to the enemy. BRIGANTINE Commander Max Slusher retired last week from the U.S. Navy and Navy Reserve after more than 41 years of service. Slusher was the honored guest at a reception of close friends and family members to celebrate his retirement at the Elks Lodge in Brigantine on Saturday, Aug. 21. While retiring from the Navy/Navy Reserve, Slusher will continue to serve as director of Business Development for the Atlantic County Economic Alliance. Commander Slusher grew up in Ocean City and was educated at Saint Augustine Preparatory School, Stockton University, University of Delaware and Rowan University. Commander Slusher enlisted in April 1979 and attended boot camp, Basic Electronic and Electricity school, and Electronic Technician Phase I and Phase 2 schools. Seaman Slushers first assignment was Submarine Support Facility, Detachment 404, New London, Connecticut. Commander Slusher received a direct commission from the enlisted ranks in 1992 and attended Navy Supply Corps School in Athens, Georgia, and was assigned to Navy Mobile Construction Battalion Twenty-One in Lakehurst. Commander Slusher served 28 years of commissioned service, predominantly in expeditionary units throughout the Navy, culminating with a commanding officer tour with Navy Cargo Handling Battalion Eleven, Jacksonville, Florida. LOWER TOWNSHIP Naval Air Station Wildwood (NASW) Aviation Museum will be celebrating the 25th anniversary AirFest over Labor Day weekend. AirFest returns to a four-day format, Sept. 3-6, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day. Highlighting the weekend will be an appearance by the Greater Philadelphia Chapter of Tuskegee Airmen, Inc. Presenters include Tuskegee Airman Dr. Eugene Richardson Jr. and Alma Bailey-Cadet Nurse at Tuskegee, Alabama. Their presentation will take place at 11 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 4. Born in 1925, Dr. Richardson served in the Army Air Corps during WWII. He was a member of the group that became known as the Tuskegee Airmen. In February 1944, Eugene went to Tuskegee, Alabama, for pilot training and subsequently received his pilots wings and officers commission on March 11, 1945. George W. Bush presented the Congressional Medal of Honor to Dr. Richardson and his fellow Tuskegee Airmen in 2006. Alma Bailey, also born in 1925, served in the United States Cadet Nursing Corps. The program was conducted at Tuskegee University, Alabama, which is the home of the celebrated African American airmen of WWII. The war came to an end before her graduation but gained experience and training in psychiatric and practical nursing. Alma worked in the nursing field from 1943 until 1987. This show will be focused on Monarch butterflies and other pollinators as a natural lead in to our Monarch Festival on Sept. 26, explains Gretchen Whitman, sanctuary director. All artwork is for sale, with a portion of sales going to support the Nature Center of Cape May. The show will remain on exhibit for the month of September. The Harbor Gallery is located at New Jersey Audubons Nature Center of Cape May at 1600 Delaware Ave., Cape May. The Nature Center will follow all CDC COVID safety guidelines. A self-taught photographer, Tina Giaimo started taking photos at an early age using a Kodak Brownie camera, encouraged by her shutterbug parents. Originally influenced by the work of Ansel Adams and Eliot Porter, she later discovered the nature photography of Art Wolfe and Jim Brandenburg. Tinas love of the outdoors and nature found her traveling the highways and byways where she developed her own style of catching the spirit of nature. For this show she has aimed her camera at butterflies, dragonflies, bees and other pollinators, as she is a strong advocate of the importance of creating and maintaining habitat for these most important creatures. Tinas photographs have been published in many magazines and coffee table books. She is the owner of Spirit Catcher Photographer located at 31 Perry St. in the Carpenters Square Mall in Cape May. Local top story Egg Harbor Township girl, grandfather spend summer building Hobbit door Edward Lea, Staff Photographer Jim Swank, 67, of Somers Point, and his 12-year-old granddaughter Kassie Johnston, of Egg Harbor Township, spent the summer building a Hobbit door, inspired by the books of JRR Tolkien, that now lives at Swank's home. Edward Lea, Staff Photographer Kassie learned to use power tools, such as a jigsaw and a bandsaw, to build the door. Jim Swank, provided Kassie Johnston, 12, of Egg Harbor Township, builds a replica of the door from "The Hobbit" with the help of her grandfather, Jim Swank, at his Somers Point home. She completed the work over the summer. Jim Swank, provided A little free library built by Kassie Johnston, 12, of Egg Harbor Township, with the help of her grandfather Jim Swank, sits in front of Kassie's home. She completed the work last summer. SOMERS POINT During summers off from school, some kids go on vacation. Others go to camp. When Kassie Johnston returns to Alder Avenue Middle School next week, chances are shell be the only one who spent her summer building a Hobbit door. Ive learned that I like doing a lot of work, but I also learned that its different than what it seems to be on TV, Kassie, 12, said of building the 6-foot-tall, 5-foot-wide wooden door that now serves as a gate into her grandfathers backyard. Its very satisfying knowing that you did all the work and that it worked out good. The door itself is about 5 feet in diameter, painted green with yellow trim and has a red, star-shaped handle at the center. A metal dragon decoration is mounted beneath a row of 2-inch lag bolts. A mermaid serves as the knocker. And a tiny green birdhouse sits atop the frame, mounted by Kassie herself, although she said that was the hardest part of the whole project. It began when I gave her The Hobbit, which was my favorite book, and I tried to get her to read it. And she kept saying, Oh no, I didnt start it, said Jim Swank, 67, of Somers Point, Kassies grandfather. New Jersey recognizes County Teachers of the Year TRENTON A high school science teacher from Egg Harbor Township, a Cape May kindergarten teacher and a preschool teacher in Upper Deerfield Township are among this years 2021-22 County Teachers of the Year, the state announced Wednesday. Swank takes care of Kassie every Wednesday during the summer. And for the past two years, the two have planned special projects to pass the time. Last year, Kassie and Swank built a little free library they installed outside Kassies Egg Harbor Township home. Im always trying to figure out what we can do thats different that we never did before, Swank said. We went horseback riding. Were going whale watching. To entice Kassie to read the book by JRR Tolkien, Swank suggested their summer project be building a door just like that of the books main character, Bilbo Baggins. She read the book, and then we decided we would try to build a Hobbit door. But I said, You got to do it. Im just here to show you how, Swank said. Kassie used a jigsaw, and a bandsaw, and did all the cutting. She screwed in the lag bolts by hand, to get a feel for the work. The construction took about four Wednesdays, not counting the time it took to plan and purchase supplies. Swank said he wanted Kassie to be involved from start to finish, and they even calculated how much it would cost to build the project as a contractor, with parts and labor about $1,400. I knew it was going to take some time, Kassie said. My favorite part was getting to be creative with it, the painting, choosing colors. The hardest part was standing on the ladder, just because its scary. Kassie and Swanks construction projects began two years ago when, as part of a fifth-grade assignment, Kassie had to build a mouse trap car. Kassie said she asked her grandfather for help. His reaction: Cool. Murphy announces COVID-19 'vaccine or testing' mandate for all school and state workers Gov. Phil Murphy on Monday announced all school and state employees, including those at public colleges, will be required to be vaccinated by Oct. 18, or undergo at least weekly testing. Kassie said she thinks what she has learned about woodworking will be useful later in life, and might inspire her to take a woodshop course in high school. Definitely when Im older and I buy a house, if theres (renovation) work, simple things that I can do myself, then I wont need to pay someone to come in and do it, she said. Swank said he likes working with Kassie and teaching her a life skill, but also getting to bond. It was really a great experience, he said. It was good to spend time with him and get to learn how to do it because not everyone especially my age knows how to build and do woodshop stuff, so getting to learn that is a unique thing, Kassie added. And I think thats cool. Related I cant imagine, these are my sons rooms, Islam said as she pointed to the front of the house where the Mercedes nearly crashed. What if that car had went through the windows? Am I at fault for having a corner house? Its ridiculous. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Recreational marijuana businesses have their eye on Egg Harbor Township EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP Municipal officials have been receiving emails and calls from all over Safety concerns from residents have been building for months. Earlier this year, residents attended Township Committee meetings to let officials know trucks have been using their streets as a shortcut between the pike and the expressway. Cars drive past their homes at twice the speed they should, the residents have said. If someone wants to drive north from the pike to Delilah Road and not use Windsor Drive, they either have to take crowded English Creek Avenue to the west or Spruce Avenue to the east. Gaud and Islam said they want the township to install metal guard rails at Delilah Road and Windsor Drive and put speed bumps throughout the neighborhood because the stop signs are often ignored. Egg Harbor Township committee to revisit Delilah Oaks traffic issues EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP The Township Committee will revisited the Delilah Oaks traffic issue. Morshed said he was in the hospital about five days, and since then has had plastic surgery to repair damage to his face, where the assailants kicked him. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Thuggery by supporters of Atlantic City needle exchange abominable and intolerable New Jersey and Atlantic City officials for many years have patiently worked to relocate soci I have two platinum plates near my left eye, Morshed said. I have neck pain, headache, a little bit short-term memory loss. He also struggles with his emotions, which his doctors have told him is normal after a head injury. Morshed will soon have an MRI to make sure his head injuries are improving. I have to stand up to drug dealers and activities in Atlantic City, Morshed said. When I tried to get off of that parking lot to Florida Avenue, unfortunately one car blocked me, he has said. It was dark, and I didnt know what was going on. I get out of my car and was going to ask them why, Why you guys block me? Morshed said another car pulled up and blocked another exit. He said three passengers in that car were armed with guns. One of the attackers told him not to go against the citys needle exchange, which was up for repeal by council at the time, Morshed has said. Without the medicinal license, the company would still pursue an adultuse license for the site, which would need the township to amend its ordinance. Were very committed to the location, Reilly said. Donohue said township officials were planning to meet with Insa soon. NJ regulators approve rules for recreational cannabis market TRENTON New Jersey's cannabis regulators on Thursday approved rules to set up the recreati In Northfield, Polistina said the ordinance allowing some retail cannabis sales in the business district could be approved quickly. In fact, that was part of his stated reasoning for moving forward the other ordinance banning sales at the last meeting, because the ordinance approving sales would not need to be reintroduced and advertised. But the issue was not on the agenda for Tuesdays council meeting. Polistina said the issue would be discussed with the full council at a future meeting. The Northfield sales ban won in a narrow vote along party lines, with three Democrats voting against and three Republicans voting yes. A fourth Republican member abstained, leaving the tie-breaking vote to Republican Mayor Erland Chau. ATLANTIC CITY Emergency repairs for the Venice Lagoon bridge at North Ohio and Kuehnle avenues have been completed ahead of schedule, Mayor Marty Small Sr. said Thursday. Immediately we are preparing to resume normal operations, including trash pickup, police, fire, EMS and NJ Transit resuming a normal bus schedule over the bridge, Small said during a news conference. Temporary structural shoring has been done, said City Engineer Uzoma Ahiarakwe of the bridge serving the Venice Park neighborhood. We are going back to the original weight limit of 20 tons. Officials added a 3-ton weight limit in late July, after an inspection found the substructure to be a safety hazard. Small also outlined the citys plans to replace what he calls bridge No. 1 in Venice Park also on Ohio Avenue but crossing the Penrose Canal near East Riverside Drive. Atlantic City to install temporary trash receptacles for Venice Park residents ATLANTIC CITY While the city works to repair one of the bridges in Venice Park, manual tra Ahiarakwe said there has been a preconstruction meeting on bridge No. 1, and there is a signed contract and notice to proceed. We are looking at in a week or so work will commence, Ahiarakwe said. But first the Atlantic City Municipal Utilities Authority must remove a water pipe from under the bridge so it can be demolished. TRENTON New Jerseys Supreme Court released a progress report Wednesday on the state judiciarys efforts to address racial disparities in the court system, an effort begun a year ago in the aftermath of George Floyds killing at the hands of police in Minneapolis. The plan identified nine areas of focus, from jury selection to juvenile fines to reforming probation practices to implicit bias training. In the past year, the plan has resulted in measurable benefits to people of color and others who historically have been underserved by or marginalized within the justice system, the court wrote. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Among the reforms were the vacating of many open warrants, the automatic expungement of minor marijuana offenses and the early termination of parole supervision in some cases. The judiciary also developed a system to allow court users to resolve some traffic offenses remotely without having to make a court appearance, an option used by tens of thousands of people since last summer, according to the court. Last month, the Supreme Court approved new jury selection questions and additions to model jury instructions, aimed at reducing the effects of implicit bias. Those will be implemented later this year. Buena should allow fire district to reopen I served the Borough of Buena in various capacities since 1982 emergency medical technician, firefighter, dispatcher, police officer, board of education and councilman. I know and understand the issues that face its council. The inability of the public to attend public meetings has done nothing but add frustration to this matter. A schism that lay dormant for 80 years has reopened, pitting one area against another. I reviewed the ordinance council used to dissolve Fire District No. 1. Its evidence in support of the dissolution was violations as cited by New Jersey, and the financial violations that were found by its audit. The state violations have been corrected to the satisfaction of the state of New Jersey. The financial violations have also been corrected, as stated by the boroughs auditor. Furthermore, District 2 committed the same financial violations, but no corrective action was undertaken by the borough against that district. It was in their meeting minutes with Mayor Zappariello and Councilman DAllesandro in attendance that these deficiencies were discussed. There is a legal term that describes that type of non-feasance disparate treatment. I don't understand why we wouldn't do everything we can to keep our kids safe in schools this fall and why we wouldn't use every resource available to us to do so, House Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst, D-Windsor Heights, said about the decision to reject federal assistance. It makes no sense to me why we wouldn't want to take additional resources that are given to us to make our schools even safer. In April, Reynolds announced on national TV she had rejected the federal aid because the state did not need it. They sent an additional $95 million to the state of Iowa to get our kids back in the classroom by doing surveillance testing. And I said, Weve been in the classroom since August. Heres your $95 million back, she said then. The governors office also has stated that 65 percent of Iowas eligible population, which does not include children younger than 12, has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Vaccine are the best tool to protect against COVID-19, Reynolds spokesman Pat Garrett said in a statement this week. Mask-wearing is another mitigation strategy, but long-term use can come with its own costs, he said. Ultimately, parents know the health of their children best, which is why the governor supports parental choice over mandates. I believe Heathers original 10-year sentence was a travesty of justice and likely influenced by the outrageously large amount ($150,000) that the Chicago judge ordered to be sent to Indonesia for her defense, he said in a statement. Macks immediate deportation upon release leaves open the question of whether she will face charges when she sets foot in the United States. The U.S. Attorneys office in Chicago declined comment, but one legal expert said there is a possibility though slim that she could face charges if an investigation reveals she was involved in paying a bribe before sentencing. Charging her with murder again is impossible, but as a U.S. citizen you cant pay bribes to anyone, so thats how they could try to prosecute her, said Phil Turner, a former federal prosecutor. But Turner said such charges are unlikely. Upon her release from prison, Mack can under Indonesian law be reunited with her daughter, who is now 6. But Seran said Mack, who has not seen the little girl for more than 18 months because authorities halted prison visit because of the coronavirus pandemic, has asked Indonesian authorities to let the girl remain with her foster family until she can return to Bali. Illinois 4-H at the University of Illinois Extension, in collaboration with Illinois Department of Innovation & Technology, hosted the first ever 2021 eSports Competition at the Illinois State Fairgrounds in Springfield, IL. There were 4 events: 2 Minecraft competitions in the morning, a Republican Glen Evans has announced his candidacy for Illinois state Senate, District 36. Current state Sen. Neil Anderson, R-Andalusia, was drawn out of the district during the Democrat-controlled state legislature remapping process, leaving the seat open for the 2022 election. Evans is an ordained minister and a member of Laborers Local 309, where he served as auditor from 2016 to 2018. He said he was inspired to run for state Senate because Democratic policies in Illinois "seem to primarily benefit the Chicagoland area." "While many in Illinois continue voting robotically Democratic, the Republican party has seen rising support," Evans said. "More and more persons are choosing the Republican policies (and) tax breaks. Motivation (is) rising gradually in Springfield, Illinois." Evans said his priorities were leadership, job creation, tax breaks and "giving a voice back to those who are not heard" and "putting the power back into the hands of the people who wish to see all succeed. "We have too long given our leaders too much autonomy (by) not holding them responsible for silencing the voices of people in our own communities," he said. "I want to change that. The American dream is in the heart of every American and in the eyes of every Illinois resident and business." CHICAGO When Maribel Cordero told her two children in 2016 that she had breast cancer but that she couldnt afford treatment, the two grabbed empty cans the next day and set out to ask for donations at their school, the mother recalls. They thought that with the little money they collected, I was going to be able to pay for the surgery I needed, said Cordero, 54, who lives in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood. Though she was told that her stage 2 cancer needed to be treated immediately, she was denied urgent treatment because she did not have any type of health insurance. As an immigrant from Mexico living in the country without permission, she does not qualify for federal programs that offer health coverage and she cant afford private insurance. There was no way to pay for the treatment so I thought: Im going to die and who is going to care for my children? She managed to get treated several weeks later through charity care. Now a cancer survivor, the mother faces the long-term effects of the illness, which include copays for multiple doctor visits a month and a bill of more than $3,000 monthly for medicines. While she said her husband and children pitch in to make sure she gets the medicine she needs, a less stressful solution is on the way. Many became jobless and many reached the brink of starvation. Traffickers took full advantage of such situations, he said. According to UNICEF, the U.N. children's agency, the number of children working worldwide increased to 160 million in June 2021. It warned that an additional 9 million could be at risk by the end of 2022 due to the pandemic. On Thursday, some parents appeared at the automobile repair shops soon after the raid and pleaded with police and activists to let their children go. He is working hard, right? He is not stealing, smoking marijuana, or drinking alcohol, said the mother of one of the children. She said she only allowed him to work because schools were shut and he was whiling away his time. Sharma said rehabilitation of rescued children is key. The former employers will be made to pay unpaid wages and the children will be helped in obtaining various government benefits, including admission to schools, he said. For more than three decades, Satyarthi and the organization he founded have worked to rescue children and create awareness to keep them in school. The group says it has helped rescue more than 9,000 working children since April 2020 and assisted in the arrest and prosecution of 260 traffickers. Satyarthi won the Nobel Peace Prize along with Pakistani activist for female education Malala Yousafzai. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Think how many schools, highways, bridges and parks could have been created with that money. Of course, those figures understate the cost of war. For families such as the Youngs, the cost has been immeasurable. Tears still flow freely 11 years after his death. And his was one of nearly 7,000 American servicemen and servicewomen killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. At least 801,000 people have been killed by direct war violence in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and Pakistan. Many were civilians. "You know all politicians lie," Jerry Young said. "They will say things that arent true or they will vote for something they really dont believe in because someone did them a favor." While he had a strong opinion about the integrity, or the lack of it, exhibited by our elected officials, his opinion on the Afghanistan war is muted. "I really dont have an opinion on what is happening over there other than its sad. Its like when Osama bin Laden was killed, some reporter called and wanted our opinion. What are we supposed to say? We are glad hes dead?" For Rock Island native Tyler Carroll, the war was almost half his lifetime ago. The 41-year-old, was one of the first soldiers to fight in Afghanistan after 9/11. Citizens are not born, they are made. The best making is sustained, not episodic. Yet for most Americans, the practice of democracy is at best episodic and narrow: voting every few years, then watching in consternation from afar as paid activists, lobbyists, and elected officials run the show. All Americans are affected by democratic dysfunction, so we need sustained, inclusive ways for citizens to connect, learn and collaborate about democracy. We can start by learning about human behavior and its interaction with larger forces shaping American life. First, abundant research shows humans tend to favor and gravitate toward people like themselves. Second, this tendency fuels a variety of cognitive biases that make it harder for humans to understand and get along with people unlike them. These include going along with our group to get along, seeking and trusting information that confirms our group's views, and seeing members of outside groups as more alike and those of our in-group as more diverse. Third, when these human biases face new conditions daily absorption in electronic media, media algorithms that feed us what we like and believe, and communities more segregated by class and political affiliation our biases are magnified in ways that aggravate democratic dysfunction. Last week, the South Dakota Science and Technology Authority dedicated the Rounds Operations Center to honor former governor and current U.S. Sen. Mike Rounds for his efforts to bring Sanford Underground Research Facility to Lead. Friday's dedication was followed by a ribbon-cutting ceremony and a picnic luncheon for staff and guests. Rounds, who was governor of South Dakota when efforts ramped up to secure the Homestake Gold Mine as a future underground research laboratory, thanked the SDSTA for the recognition and pointed to the partnerships that made the creation of SURF possible. The joy of discovery is not something we get when we do things alone. You get it when you do things with other people, Rounds said Friday. This undertaking brought together the scientific community, political community, engineering community and technological community. In the end, it took people who want to get things done, setting their differences aside and working together. Casey Peterson, chairperson of the SDSTA board of directors, said it was a daunting task to obtain the property and turn a mile-deep wet hole into a world-class science facility. Please log in to keep reading. Enjoy unlimited articles at one of our lowest prices ever. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} In saddle bronc, the eight-man field featured a quarter of Elsheres, a legendary South Dakota rodeo family. JJ Elshere, the elder member of the nights foursome, 41 years young, bested son, Talon, and nephews Carter and Trey with a 79.5 effort, the second-best trip of the night behind the 80-point ride of Jay Em, Wyomings, Wyatt Hageman. Though a half point shy of the top spot on the leaderboard, JJ chose to look on the bright side though the competitive nature that has catapulted the Hereford rancher to five NFR appearances was on display as well. I know I could have rode a lot better, but it was still fun to be here with all the boys and have a roll with them because probably there wont be too many more times when we are all going to be at the same spot, Elshere said before adding with a wry grin. I had a great time, but I know I couldve done better." South Dakota barrel racers Lisa Lockhart (Oelrichs) and Jessica Routier (Buffalo) could have done better as well. Lockhart went wide on the second barrel while Routier and her mare, Missy, the last duo out on the night, found the footing less than ideal. She said if the numbers continue to dramatically increase she would come back to the board with a recommendation for a temporary mask mandate. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} The RCAS School Board has been vocal in its dissent against mask mandates, instead advocating for families to choose what is best for the health of their children. The letter commends school boards for keeping schools open last year and says the co-signers fully support decisions to open schools in person this year, but that they recognize there is a significant risk to students, staff, and the wider community if sufficient mitigation strategies are not implemented. The letter specifically cited universal mask-wearing as the most effective strategy. Simon gave the RCAS Board concrete evidence of mask effectiveness on Monday, telling them that of the 1,246 students that were infected with COVID last school year, not one of those cases originated from people who wore masks. The Federal Emergency Management Agency noted in a report on the fire that social, political, and economic concerns will increase as the fire progresses toward the Lake Tahoe Basin. The agency did not immediately respond to a request to elaborate beyond that statement. Visitors are still crowding the highway that loops the massive lake and riding bikes and walking the beaches, but many are wearing masks. The lake, known for its water clarity and the granite peaks that surround it, has been shrouded in dense smoke that has reached hazardous levels. The Lake Tahoe Visitors Authority reversed its advice from earlier in the week and recommended tourists postpone their travel. Previously the group that promotes tourism on the south side of the lake advised letting visitors decide whether to cancel their trips amid smoke and approaching fire. Carol Chaplin, the president and CEO, said hotels and lodges were in lockstep with public safety officials. They understand that this is not the experience that their guests are used to or look forward to, she said. Irvin issued an emergency proclamation Thursday so the city that's home to Heavenly Ski Resort can be better prepared if evacuation orders come and be reimbursed for related expenses. I never saw him. I never saw him, Ravnsborg told the detectives. Noem called on Ravnsborg to resign in February after the investigation concluded, but Ravnsborg resisted those calls, saying he was still capable of fulfilling the duties of his office and asking that he be given due process under the law. Three law enforcement groups, the South Dakota Fraternal Order of Police, the South Dakota Chiefs of Police Association and the South Dakota Sheriffs Association, joined the governors calls for him to step down. The Republican-dominated Legislature considered impeaching the attorney general this year, but momentum quickly died out and lawmakers decided to wait until after the criminal proceedings to consider whether to proceed. House lawmakers said Wednesday that they were still digesting what the plea deal meant for possible impeachment. Republican state Rep. Steve Haugaard, an ally of the attorney general, said an impeachment seemed unlikely, especially given that new details about the crash won't come out at a criminal trial. They said reducing the wolf population would reduce attacks on livestock and boost deer and elk herds. A primary change in wolf hunting in Idaho allows the state to hire private contractors to kill wolves and provides more money for state officials to hire the contractors. The law also expands killing methods to include trapping and snaring wolves on a single hunting tag, using night-vision equipment, chasing wolves on snowmobiles and ATVs and shooting them from helicopters. It also authorizes year-round wolf trapping on private property. In Montana, state wildlife authorities earlier this month approved a statewide harvest quota of 450 wolves, about 40% of the states wolf population. Methods for killing wolves that were previously outlawed can now be used. Those include snaring, baiting and night hunting. Trapping seasons have also been expanded. On a related front, the Center for Biological Diversity in May asked Fish and Wildlife for an emergency relisting of gray wolves in Idaho and adjacent states. The Idaho Department of Fish and Game on Monday responded on that subject with a letter to Haaland stating that despite headlines to the contrary, 2021 Idaho legislative changes do NOT in fact call for killing 90% of Idahos wolves or for wolf eradication. The maintenance of the health of the public has been a part of this country before the American Revolution. As early as 1701, Massachusetts established protocols for quarantine of individuals with smallpox. As our country developed, so did permanent departments of health, tasked with fighting infectious disease. While public health departments have expanded beyond infectious disease over the years, they still spend much of their resources fighting infectious pathogens. According to the Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services website, their mission is Improving and Protecting the Health, Well Being and Self Reliance of all Montanans." When it comes to making public health decisions, the Department may advise individuals about actions needed to maintain health and well-being, while their recommendations reflect what is best for society as a whole. They are not a health care provider for individuals, they are the health care advisers for the public. Their recommendations are based in science and should never be influenced by politics. We at Ravalli Family Medicine have nothing but the utmost respect for the staff of Ravalli County Public Health and for Dr. Carol Calderwood. As we reminded the public last year, when we spoke out in favor of Dr. Calderwood, she has always made the tough decisions that protect the population of this county. The email came the week after Lt. Col. Matthew D. Hanley, head of the departments Bureau of Field Operations, which patrols more than 74,000 miles of state roads and interstate highways throughout Virginia, announced the return to normal enforcement activity after reducing it during periods of 2020 and 2021 when COVID-19 cases were spiking across the state. It appears ... that many of you are not aware that we have returned to normal enforcement activity. 4, 5 or 10 tickets for a week of work is unacceptable, Desaulniers email reads. There is no reason you should not be writing 5 tickets minimum on a typical day (thats one every two hours). If you are on free patrol, you should be writing more if you want to remain on free patrol. I realize that some weeks court, crashes, weather, etc. factor in but they do not justify the pitiful enforcement numbers I am seeing. Let me be clear that the evals you got for the last performance cycle took into account the reduced enforcement periods and that those same numbers will not result in similar evaluations for this cycle. Virginia has become the hub of a widening effort to resettle thousands of people evacuated from Afghanistan as the United States prepares to withdraw troops from the Taliban-controlled country by Aug. 31. Fort Lee, near Petersburg, is one of four U.S. Army posts that the government is relying on to temporarily house Afghans with special immigrant visas and their families. The first 221 immigrants under Operation Allied Refuge 206 adults and 15 infants arrived at Fort Lee on July 30. Fort Lee and three other Army posts Fort Bliss in Texas, Fort Dix in New Jersey and Fort McCoy in Wisconsin can handle up to 25,000 people. In the Richmond area, local businesses are helping collect donated supplies for the refugees headed for Fort Lee. The supplies needed include personal hygiene products, travel kits for both men and women, snacks (that are manufacturer wrapped), and games, toys, puzzles, and coloring books for children. Woody and Nelsen Funeral Homes said all five of its Richmond-area locations will accept donated supplies, which it will deliver to the Islamic Center of Virginia, which will get the items to Fort Lee. Stoney had previously said he would appoint Reid to the role permanently once she was healthy enough to return. I cant go into much detail about anything else because its a personnel matter, but Ive expressed my gratitude for her service to the city and she certainly will be missed, Stoney said in an interview Wednesday evening. Appointed by the mayor with the approval of the City Council, the chief administrative officer is charged with managing the citys daily operations, making them the citys highest-ranking unelected administrator in the citys government. In his previous role, Saunders, who had been the mayors chief of staff since the beginning of his first term, oversaw a team of policy advisors and assistants to the mayor, helping to develop initiatives and goals for the administration. Saunders previously worked as a policy advisor to Gov. Terry McAuliffe and chief of staff to First Lady of Virginia Dorothy McAuliffe, according a biography on the citys website. Saunders sits on the board of visitors of the College of William& Mary and holds a masters in public administration from Indiana University. He graduated from the Virginia Executive Institute and the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative. Joes death weighs heavily on me and always will, Ravnsborg said in his statement. Ive often wondered why the accident occurred and all the things that had to have happened to make our lives intersect. Ravnsborg's insistence on remaining in office has opened a divide among Republicans, with him retaining support among some GOP circles. The attorney general has been spotted working booths for local Republican groups at county fairs in recent weeks. But popular predecessor Marty Jackley is already running for his old job and has collected the support of most of the states county prosecutors. Political parties will select candidates for attorney general at statewide conventions next year. Ravnsborg built his political rise on personal connections in the party. It was his dutiful attendance at local GOP events like the one he was returning from when he struck Boever that propelled him from being a party outsider to winning the Republican nomination for attorney general in 2018. Boever's family said they hope Ravnsborg is driven from office one way or another. It is not too late for the state Legislature to resume impeachment proceedings, Jane Boever said. And if they fail us, then its left to the voters of South Dakota to remove him from the ballot box. The Republican Party of Virginia on Thursday asked a court to remove Democrat Terry McAuliffe from the November ballot, arguing that his elections paperwork did not meet the states guidelines because it was missing a signature. The lawsuit, filed in Richmond Circuit Court, argues that McAuliffe never signed his declaration of candidacy form, a step in the process to qualify for the primary and general election ballot. It also claims that two McAuliffe staffers who signed on as having witnessed McAuliffe signing the document did so falsely. McAuliffes campaign derided the lawsuit as a desperate attempt to clear the path for his Republican opponent. McAuliffe, governor from 2014 to 2018, is running for another term as the states top official against Republican Glenn Youngkin, a former private equity executive vying to become the first Republican elected statewide in 12 years. McAuliffes declaration, lacking his signature and falsely signed by two purported witnesses, is plainly in violation of Virginia law and should have been rejected by the [board of elections] and the Department of Elections. It was not, reads the lawsuit. The omission of McAuliffes signature from his Declaration, compounded by false witness attestations, is fatal to his candidacy under Virginia law. The provision in the law that the commission meetings be open to the public saved the day. The public let their outrage be known, and the commission reversed its decision to base the new districts on the old gerrymandered districts. However, there will be more opportunities for partisan mischief before the maps go to the General Assembly for approval. The public needs to persist with their oversight to keep the partisans in check. ROCKY MOUNT With more than 600 students in quarantine, and the number increasing by the day, the Franklin County School Board used an emergency meeting Wednesday to reinstate measures such as tri-fold desk shields, intended to reduce the number of potential COVID-19 exposures sweeping the school system. The board did not make any changes to the face mask policy adopted unanimously at their contentious Aug. 9 meeting, though a board member tried, only to be told the law wouldnt allow it. At that meeting, with an combative audience full of anti-mask sentiment, the sharply divided board reached a compromise that required masks for all students and staff but explicitly stated that no paperwork would be required for those seeking exemptions. Eleven days into the school year, at least 1,225 students have mask exemptions about 20% of the student body as opposed to 15 in the previous school year, Assistant Superintendent Sue Rogers said. Similarly, 83 staff members have exemptions in 2021-22, as opposed to just one in 2020-21. I think weve demonstrated to the community and our students to look for loopholes and to look for ways around things, said Gills Creek District board Representative Jon Atchue. All students will be issued a laptop for at-home use and parents or students needing technical support may email bontechsupport@rcps.us. The school is scheduled to reopen for in-person instruction on Sept. 1, pending clearance from the health department, according to the release. We have been prepared for this possibility, said Ken Nicely, the countys superintendent. We are very empathetic to the hardship that quarantining and temporary closures cause for students, families, and staff and we are here to offer support. We are grateful to have resources in place to continue with the process of teaching and learning, regardless if that instruction is remote or in person, and will work with the health department to re-open the school as soon as possible. Parents may pick up three days of meals (breakfast and lunch) from 9:30 to 10 a.m. on Friday, Aug. 27. Meals should be refrigerated promptly after pick-up. If needed, an additional meal pick up time will be on Sept. 1 from 9:30-10 a.m. Ma was hired in 2014 as an assistant professor in the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures, and exceeded expectations in annual evaluations for the next five years, according to the lawsuit. However, the department chair said he was uncomfortable with Mas goatee in 2019 and told him he needed to shave, the filing stated. Ma had a goatee in observance of his Daoist religion, according to the lawsuit, and no one at VMI had previously complained about it. While the department later voted unanimously to support Ma for tenure, a recommendation letter reportedly made a brief reference to his professional demeanor and said he did not dress appropriately. In March 2020, the departments Tenure and Promotions Committee denied him tenure solely based on alleged concerns about Professor Mas professional appearance, the lawsuit states. A general order at VMI requires faculty to meet certain dress code requirements. For civilians, beards shall be maintained; otherwise, grooming standards shall be the same as uniformed faculty, it states. The U.S. is projected to see nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths between now and Dec. 1, according to the nation's most closely watched forecasting model. But health experts say that toll could be cut in half if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. In other words, what the coronavirus has in store this fall depends on human behavior. Behavior is really going to determine if, when and how sustainably the current wave subsides, said Lauren Ancel Meyers, director of the University of Texas COVID-19 Modeling Consortium. We cannot stop delta in its tracks, but we can change our behavior overnight. That means doubling down again on masks, limiting social gatherings, staying home when sick and getting vaccinated. Those things are within our control, Meyers said. The U.S. is in the grip of a fourth wave of infection this summer, powered by the highly contagious delta variant, which has sent cases, hospitalizations and deaths soaring again, swamped medical centers, burned out nurses and erased months of progress against the virus. NEW YORK (AP) Half of American workers are in favor of vaccine requirements at their workplaces, according to a new poll, at a time when such mandates gain traction following the federal government's full approval of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine. The poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that about 59% of remote workers favor vaccine requirements in their own workplaces, compared with 47% of those who are currently working in person. About one-quarter of workers in person and remote are opposed. Keep scrolling for the latest charts tracking vaccinations and virus cases The sentiment is similar for workplace mask mandates, with 50% of Americans working in person favoring them and 29% opposed, while 59% of remote workers are in favor. About 6 in 10 college graduates, who are more likely to have jobs that can be done remotely, support both mask and vaccine mandates at their workplaces, compared with about 4 in 10 workers without college degrees. Christopher Messick, an electrical engineer who is mostly working from home in Brunswick, Maryland, said he wrote to his company's human resources department to ask that employees be required to get vaccinated before they are recalled to the office. She considers her son and others who took their own lives to be casualties of war every bit as much as those killed in action. When the Taliban swept back into control of Afghanistan just before the fifth anniversary of her son's death, she felt relief that a war that left more than 2,400 Americans dead and more than 20,700 wounded had finally come to an end. But there was also sadness that gains made by the Afghan people especially women and children may be temporary. "As a mom, this kind of stabs you, because would he still be around, would any of these young men still be around if this whole war hadn't happened?" she said. "But I try to gently correct people when they say this was a waste or this was all for nothing. Because that's not true. We don't know what impacts it's had on the safety of our country, on the safety of the Afghan people." ___ Some who served with the Darkhorse Battalion are having a hard time seeing it any way other than that their efforts, their blood and the lives of their fallen friends were all for nothing. "I'm starting to feel like how the Vietnam vets felt. There was no purpose to it whatsoever," said Sutton, 32, who now works in the veterans services office of a county outside Chicago, helping military vets get care. At the heart of CRT is the concept of equity (not equality, which is an important distinction). The proponents of CRT believe in equality of outcome, with all Americans ending up at the same place, rather than the meritocracy implied by equality of opportunity. Which brings us to the fundamental question: What does CRTs better world look like? I can see Dr. Kings vision of a world in which we are all equal before the law, treat one another as we wish to be treated, and succeed or fail based on our own merits. But CRTs world of equity is indescribable at best and insidious at worst. What makes that world better for everyone? In effect, CRT only exists to empower a select few in acting out their perceived sense of grievance through racist vengeance against those whom they determine are always undeservedly, of course better-positioned in life. CRT seeks to control the allocation of money other peoples money with its proponents grifting their way to success through seven-figure consulting contracts. Every Thursday, Santa Ynez Valley News editors will reach into the newspaper's 90-years of digital archives to offer you "Throwback Thursday," reminiscing about the rich history of the Santa Ynez Valley. To access this memory and more, subscribe to SYV News digital archives at SYVNews.com/archives. [Trump won the district by just under 19 points in 2016 and just under 18 points in 2020.] Every single person I've talked to all the way from Chesterfield County all the way to Horry County, not a single person yet has told me that they wanted to impeach the president. Not a single person yet has told me that they wanted to shut down. Not a single person yet has told me that they want to be masked or they want their children to be masked. Tom Rice is the very example of the political elite, the upper class, that believe that they know what's best for the citizens as opposed to the citizens and their constituents knowing what's best for them. Therefore, Tom Rice needs to be retired from his position and we need to put somebody in place that listens to the people: a real American that represents real Americans. Question: The Seventh Congressional District is essentially divided into two parts: the Pee Dee and the Grand Strand. These two parts are very different. How does your message speak to someone in the Pee Dee? Answer: My message is really simple. It shouldn't be that complicated. It's simply this: your voice has not been heard, your voice has been betrayed and you haven't been represented in D.C. After all, that is the point of a representative to be the voice or the conduit of the people. Congressman Tom Rice has called for President Joe Biden to resign. Rice issued a statement Thursday afternoon after two suicide bombing attacks near the Hamid Karzai International Airport that left 11 service members dead and 15 more injured. The news out of Kabul is devastating, Rice said. Well Joe, youve proven yourself incapable of handling your job as Commander in Chief. You ignored your advisors, rushed this haphazard withdrawal without appropriate conditions and before evacuating our citizens and friends. Your ineptitude has now cost at least 12 American lives. He said that all options were on the table to hold Biden accountable. President Biden, you yourself said The Buck stops here., Rice said. Do the American people a favor. Resign and turn the job over to someone who can handle it. My prayers continue to be with the injured, our troops, and all those in harms way. Rice also criticized Biden for not speaking to the American people sooner on the attacks. Unusual Fourth Circuit panel affirms federal convictions and death sentence for Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof | Main | Notably high-profile cases now the focus of parole decision-making August 25, 2021 "Crime trends and violence worse in Californias Republican-voting counties than Democratic-voting counties" The provocative title of this post is the title of this press release from the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice promoting its new report titled "Californias Republican Counties Have Worse Crime Trends And Higher Violent Crime Rates Than Democratic Counties." Here is much of the press release: A report released today by the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice finds that, compared to the 35 California counties that voted Democratic in the 2020 presidential election, the states 23 Republican-voting counties have higher rates of violent crime, including homicides. For decades, Republican candidates and elected officials have demanded a get-tough approach to crime that generated more arrests, more imprisonments, and longer prison sentences. As a result, a person is 58 percent more likely to be arrested and 41 percent more likely to be incarcerated in a Republican-voting county than in a Democratic-voting one. Likewise, 12 of the 13 highest-incarceration counties vote Republican, while 16 of the 18 lowest-incarceration counties vote Democratic. But have the hardline approaches pursued by Republicans officials actually reduced crime? Just the opposite. Republican-voting counties are seeing lesser declines in crime and higher rates of crime, particularly violent offenses and homicides, compared to their Democratic-voting counterparts. The report finds: Violent and property crime rates have declined most rapidly in Democratic-voting counties. Homicide rates in Republican-voting counties are now 28 percent higher than in Democratic-voting counties. The homicide death rate among White people in Republican-voting counties is on par with people of color in Democratic-voting ones, challenging widely held beliefs about violence in urban communities of color. Republican-voting counties experience higher rates of drug, alcohol, and gun deaths than Democratic-voting counties, particularly among White residents. Republican-voting counties pay less in state and local taxes per capita but rely more heavily on Californias costly prison system. The gaps between urban/suburban-Democratic and exurban/rural-Republican California are widening, contributing to extremist politics and intractable divisions. Thirty years ago, the states cities experienced the worst economic hardships and highest rates of violent crime. Today, these issues have shifted to its exurbs, small towns, and rural areas. California, like the rest of the country, suffered a major increase in homicide in 2020. This disturbing development has prompted calls by Republicans, and some Democrats, to roll back criminal justice reforms and reinstate tougher arrest and imprisonment policies. Yet these get-tough campaigns ignore an important reality that Democratic-voting counties, which are more likely to embrace progressive reform, now see fewer violent crimes and homicides per capita than Republican ones. I lack the empirical chops (and the time with the start of a new semester) needed to dig into the particulars of this report to assess its analysis. I do know that the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice is a progressive organization "whose mission is to reduce societys reliance on incarceration as a solution to social problems." And I would be eager to hear from certain persons at Crime & Consequences, which is located in California and has folks blogging here with a distinct set of criminal justice views, about their take on this notable new report. A few of many prior recent related posts: August 25, 2021 at 05:37 PM | Permalink Comments Post a comment Notably high-profile cases now the focus of parole decision-making | Main | California Supreme Court turns back broad challenge to state capital procedures August 26, 2021 Might Oklahoma really try to move forward with seven executions over the next six months? The question in the title of this post is prompted by this new local article headlined "Oklahoma AG requests execution dates for seven state death row inmates." Here are the basics: Oklahoma Attorney General John OConnor late Wednesday asked the Court of Criminal Appeals to set execution dates for seven death row inmates, including Julius Jones. The action comes after the state put the death penalty on hold following the 2014 botched execution of Clayton Lockett, the 2015 execution of Charles Warner using the wrong drug, a review of the protocol and litigation. OConnor asked that Jones execution date be set for Oct. 28. Jones, who has waged a public relations campaign claiming innocence, is set for a Sept. 13 commutation hearing before the Pardon and Parole Board. However, with the OConnor filing seeking an execution date, that could change to a clemency hearing a later date, said Tom Bates, Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board director. The board has scheduled a meeting for next week to discuss the potential resumption of executions and the scheduling of clemency hearings. Jones was convicted of the 1999 murder of Edmond businessman Paul Howell. OConnor asked the court to set a Feb. 10 execution date for James Allen Coddington, who was sentenced to death for the 1997 killing of Albert Hale in Oklahoma County. He also requested that a Dec. 30 execution date be set for Donald Anthony Grant. He was sentenced to death for the 2001 murders of Del City motel workers Brenda McElyea and Suzette Smith. An Oct. 7 date was requested by John Marion Grant Grant, who was sentenced for the 1998 killing of Gray Carter, a prison kitchen worker at the Dick Connor Correctional Center in Hominy. Wade Greely Lay, sentenced to death for the 2004 killing of a Tulsa security guard Kenny Anderson, was petitioned to be sentenced on Dec. 9. The court was also asked to set a Jan. 20 execution date for Gilbert Ray Postelle. Postelle was convicted at trial of killing four people in 2005 outside a trailer in Del City. He received the death penalty for two of the murders. A execution date of Nov.18 was requested for Bigler Jobe Stouffer. Stouffer was sentenced to death for the 1985 killing of Putnam City teacher Linda Reaves. I believe the have only been four state executions nationwide since the start of the pandemic nearly 18 months ago, so I am inclined to assume that this request for multiple execution dates over the next six months from the Oklahoma AG is mostly a symbolic effort primarily intended to signal the AG's eagerness to move forward with executions and to keep capital proceedings moving along. But when former US AG William Barr announced his intent in 2019 to restart federal executions after a long delay, I underestimated just how effectual a motivated AG could be in getting the machinery of death back in action. So stay tuned. August 26, 2021 at 12:42 PM | Permalink Comments A bit ironic that the state where a key Supreme Court case showing the justices (including Kennedy) was not in the mood to take very seriously the idea that lethal injection can be problematic (only more firmly later on in an opinion by Gorsuch) arose out of Oklahoma. Only a bit -- repeatedly, these cases rejected by the Supreme Court turn out to not result in an execution. The state courts or some other state action results in blocking the execution. Here, we had an extended moratorium. As Prof. Lain recently noted, time has not made lethal injection seem much more reliable overall. But, since 1990, Oklahoma executed over 100 people. So, yes, I can see them wanting to get back into the execution business. 3-5 executions seem possible. Next up anyway is Texas, next month. Posted by: Joe | Aug 26, 2021 8:25:13 PM I could have sworn the death machinery there was already running in high gear. After all, they had 14 more COVID fatalities just in the last 48 hours or so. Then you also have the thousands of recent new cases. So throwing in another 7 deaths from executions just seems like gilding the lily at that point. But I guess it gives an idea of what the state views as its biggest priority. https://www.koco.com/article/oklahoma-reports-more-than-4100-new-covid-19-cases/37406568 https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/education/2021/07/23/oklahoma-governor-kevin-stitt-rules-out-school-mask-mandates-not-planning-covid-emergency-order/8071575002/ Posted by: kotodama | Aug 27, 2021 11:01:35 AM Post a comment "Crime trends and violence worse in Californias Republican-voting counties than Democratic-voting counties" | Main | Might Oklahoma really try to move forward with seven executions over the next six months? August 26, 2021 Notably high-profile cases now the focus of parole decision-making Perhaps in part because the federal system abolished parole nearly 40 years ago through the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, parole practices and parole reform often do not get the most attention in broad debates about criminal justice and sentencing policies. But the majority of states still have parole as part of their justice systems, and this 2019 Prison Policy Initiative report makes the case that "most states show lots of room for improvement" in their parole practices. I have general parole issues on the mind because two new press pieces about a couple of high-profile cases serve as a useful reminder of the import of parole decision-making and the array of actors who can impact this decision-making: From The Hill, "Prosecutors for first time not opposing parole for RFK assassin Sirhan Sirhan" Los Angeles prosecutors for the first time have decided not to oppose the release of Sirhan Sirhan, the man convicted of assassinating former Sen. Robert F. Kennedy (D-N.Y.) in 1968. The Washington Post reported that Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascons office is remaining neutral in the case and will not be present at Sirhan's parole hearing on Friday. While prosecutors had opposed Sirhans release in 15 previous parole hearings, Gascon upon taking on his role in December 2020 said his offices default policy would be to not attend parole hearings and to instead work to submit letters in support of inmates who have served mandatory minimums and no longer pose a threat to society. From The Guardian, "Black police groups call for ex-Black Panther jailed for 48 years to be released" A coalition of current and retired Black police officers is calling for the release on parole of Sundiata Acoli, a former Black Panther member who has been incarcerated for 48 years for the 1973 murder of a New Jersey state trooper. Four Black law enforcement groups have joined forces to press the case for Acolis parole almost half a century after he was arrested. In an amicus brief filed with the New Jersey supreme court, they call his continued imprisonment an affront to racial justice and accuse the parole board of violating the law by repeatedly refusing to set the prisoner free. August 26, 2021 at 12:25 PM | Permalink Comments Post a comment "When the Conditions Are the Confinement: Eighth Amendment Habeas Claims During COVID-19" | Main | "Crime trends and violence worse in Californias Republican-voting counties than Democratic-voting counties" August 25, 2021 Unusual Fourth Circuit panel affirms federal convictions and death sentence for Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof I noted in this post from May 2021 that an unusual Fourth Circuit panel had to be assembled to hear the capital appeal of Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof because all the member of the Fourth Circuit were recused. The mass recusal resulted from the fact that now Circuit Judge Jay Richardson was in the U.S. Attorneys Office in South Carolina in 2017 and the lead prosecutor on the Roof case. And it meant that Judge Duane Benton of the Eighth Circuit, Judge Kent Jordan of the Third Circuit and Senior Judge Ronald Gilman of the Sixth Circuit considered Roof's many issues on appeal. That trio of judges today handed down a 149-page opinion in United States v. Roof, No. 17-3 (Aug. 25, 2021) (available here). The per curiam opinion starts and concludes this way: In 2015, Dylann Storm Roof, then 21 years old, shot and killed nine members of the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church (Mother Emanuel) in Charleston, South Carolina during a meeting of a Wednesday night Bible-study group. A jury convicted him on nine counts of racially motivated hate crimes resulting in death, three counts of racially motivated hate crimes involving an attempt to kill, nine counts of obstructing religion resulting in death, three counts of obstructing religion involving an attempt to kill and use of a dangerous weapon, and nine counts of use of a firearm to commit murder during and in relation to a crime of violence. The jury unanimously recommended a death sentence on the religious-obstruction and firearm counts, and he was sentenced accordingly. He now appeals the convictions and sentence. Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. 1291 and 18 U.S.C. 3595(a), we will affirm.... Dylann Roof murdered African Americans at their church, during their Bible-study and worship. They had welcomed him. He slaughtered them. He did so with the express intent of terrorizing not just his immediate victims at the historically important Mother Emanuel Church, but as many similar people as would hear of the mass murder. He used the internet to plan his attack and, using his crimes as a catalyst, intended to foment racial division and strife across America. He wanted the widest possible publicity for his atrocities, and, to that end, he purposefully left one person alive in the church to tell the story. (J.A. at 5017.) When apprehended, he frankly confessed, with barely a hint of remorse. No cold record or careful parsing of statutes and precedents can capture the full horror of what Roof did. His crimes qualify him for the harshest penalty that a just society can impose. We have reached that conclusion not as a product of emotion but through a thorough analytical process, which we have endeavored to detail here. In this, we have followed the example of the trial judge, who managed this difficult case with skill and compassion for all concerned, including Roof himself. For the reasons given, we will affirm In capital cases, it is pretty common for the losing party to seek en banc review. But, as was discussed in my May post, it is unclear whether and how an additional 12 judges would get appointed by designation in order to properly consider any en banc petition that might come next. Roof can, of course, proceed now to seek certiorari from the U.S. Supreme Court (which will surely happen eventually even if he does seek en banc review). A few of many prior related posts: August 25, 2021 at 04:34 PM | Permalink Comments "His crimes qualify him for the harshest penalty that a just society can impose." That wouldn't be the death penalty, but "just" in this context would be as found by the Supreme Court. Posted by: Joe | Aug 25, 2021 5:13:06 PM Agree with Joe. For en banc, is 12 mentioned because 12 + the initial 3 = 15, which is the same number of non-senior judges currently on CA4? I think it wouldnt be hard to scrounge up 12 more judges if needed. But would the size of the en banc court sitting by designation necessarily have to match that of an ordinary CA4 en banc court exactly? It seems like at least an open question. Also, for en banc it would be quite interesting to have some judges writing separate opinions, whereas here you just had a per curiam. PS its Judge Benton not Burton. Posted by: kotodama | Aug 25, 2021 8:59:27 PM BTW, the recusal thing was discussed here in the past, but I still find it a bit much that the whole circuit recused themselves. I realize this case is rather unique. Posted by: Joe | Aug 26, 2021 10:03:23 AM Thanks for the correction, kotodama, and I have fixed the name in the post. My numerology is based on the fact that the Fourth Circuit has 15 authorized active judgeships. So that would be the usual en banc voting number, which I presume should be replicated. I say that because I think we would surely have thought it weird an problematic if somehow this first panel of designated judges for the initial appeal was comprised of only 2 judges or was 5 judges or some other number other than the usual 3 judges for a circuit panel. I also wonder who makes these calls and decides on the substitute judges. In less unusual settings, I assume it is the circuit chief in charge. But that judge is here recused, so it must be someone else. Chief Justice Roberts is the circuit Justice for the Fourth Circuit. I would guess he is somehow involved in running this show, but I do not know the rules of judicial administration to speculate whether there could be more to the story (e.g., should CJ Roberts appoint a Fourth Circuit Chief Judge by designation who then makes key decisions here or does he just do it himself? Is there any worry that whatever might be the Chief's possible role at the Fourth Circuit, it then impacts his SCOTUS work when the Roof case comes to SCOTUS?). This is all likely academic, as I cannot imagine any group of 12 new designated circuit judges voting 8-4 to consider this case en banc (presumably the three panel members will all vote against). Then, again, I could imagine certain possible designated judges being eager to write a concurrence or dissent from a negative en banc vote in order to try to encourage a SCOTUS cert. grant. One last point --- can you tell I find this fascinating? --- however this plays out on direct appeal, the Fourth Circuit will likely have to confront these issues again if/when Roof brings a 2255 action and appeals that collateral attack. And if he eventually brings a successor 2255 (imagine if the Roper age limit for who can be executed gets raised to 21 sometime in the 2030s), a panel of designated judges will be needed to decide if he can under AEDPA. Posted by: Doug Berman | Aug 26, 2021 10:59:52 AM I find it quite interesting too, obviously because, as Joe observes, it's such an unusual arrangement. On the point about the initial panel size vs. a potential en banc panel size, I think there are some key distinctions. This is hardly an area where I claim expertise, but I did a little basic research and found some relevant info. On the initial panel, that size is specified exactly by statute. 28 U.S.C. 46 provides that in typical situations, it must be a 3-judge panel. But for en banc it's different. No exact size is required; instead, the statute just states that an en banc panel ordinarily "shall consist of all circuit judges in regular active service." So the size will vary for each court depending on how many active judges there are. I certainly agree that, here, the path of least resistance in the event of en banc would just be to replicate the existing composition of CA4 precisely--that is, by adding another 12 assigned judges. But I don't think that's strictly required. Again, the size of the en banc panel isn't specified numerically, but just as a function of each individual court's personnel. I also think you can argue that in a case like this where "all circuit judges in regular active service" are recused anyway, there's no requirement to match the numbers exactly. Of course, if en banc does in fact happen, the most conservative approach would be to compensate completely for all the recusals, and I suspect that's how it would play out. As to who makes the call, my research indicates that CJ Roberts is the ultimate decider. 28 U.S.C. 291(a) provides: "The Chief Justice of the United States may, in the public interest, designate and assign temporarily any circuit judge to act as circuit judge in another circuit upon request by the chief judge or circuit justice of such circuit." So, here, if Gregory (the CA4 chief judge) wasn't recused even for the purposes of making an assignment request, then he requested from Roberts, and Roberts took it from there. Or, if Gregory was recused, as Prof. B. notes, Roberts is the circuit justice anyway, so he could just "request" assignments from himself(!). Either way, Roberts makes the final call. I don't know that his role as assigner is necessarily a cause for recusal at SCOTUS either. Presumably, there is no difference in which judges are assigned and they're all expected to apply the law (here, CA4 law) in the same way as another assigned judge would. In other words, Roberts isn't "stacking the panel" (an accusation that's been leveled at the PTO director) to achieve a desired outcome. And if simply making assignments were adequate grounds for recusal, then Roberts would be recused every time a case with an assigned circuit judge came up for SCOTUs review. That seems a little excessive. Of course, this is also not a typical case. Yet another thing that would be fascinating, especially for me as a patent wonk, is, if en banc does in fact happen with 12 additional judges, could a Fed Circuit judge end up on the panel? Criminal matters are of course totally absent from that court's docket, so it'd be quite amusing if one of the judges had a role in deciding a DP appeal. And speaking of this case playing out for many years, what if Biden wins another term and the DP moratorium remains in place? Does that mean an appeal on that issue isn't ripe yet? I have no idea. Finally, I agree with Joe that the recusals are way overboard. But I guess they don't want to take even the slightest chance of creating an appeal point, and so are being excessively cautious. Posted by: kotodama | Aug 27, 2021 12:47:27 PM Post a comment Road-trip surgeon brings hope of health to rural Cameroon Mobile hospital: Georges Bwelle operates on an inmate with hernia at Nkongsamba prison in remote Cameroon "Are you feeling OK?" surgeon Georges Bwelle asks the prisoner lying on a makeshift bed. He picks up his scissors and forceps and returns to operating on a small hernia. The music playing in the room next door in the rural jail grows louder, and the doctor sings along. During the week, Bwelle, 49, is a top doctor specialising in intestinal surgery at the main hospital in Yaounde, the capital of Cameroon. At the weekend, though, he takes to the road. He heads a lively team of volunteers who cram into a minibus and head out into remote areas -- a tiny mobile clinic that provides basic healthcare to those in need. Today, his NGO, called ASCOVIME, has gone to the prison at Nkongsamba, a town lying in green hills about 350 kilometres (215 miles) northwest of Yaounde. The team is welcomed by the prison administrator and an NGO called Agriculture for Africa, which is hosting the trip. Today, almost 500 prisoners and their families will be examined. A clean room is provided near the cells. "It's perfect," says Bwelle. Immediately, a chain of volunteers forms to bring in the equipment, transforming the room into a small field hospital, complete with departments for general medicine, ophthalmology, dentistry and even minor surgery. The inmate, 35, emerges from the operating room, his hernia now fixed. "Thank God I have been freed from this ailment -- the doctors looked after me," he says, clearly moved. - Huge needs - Bwelle's drive to help others can be traced to his childhood. Born into a family of modest means, the young Bwelle saw his father's health deteriorate because of the lack of access to a specialist doctor following a road accident. After his studies, Bwelle began to travel throughout his country. "With the little money I had, I bought medicines and treated three or four people, then 10, then 100," he told AFP. Little by little, a team of doctors with a panoply of skills gathered around him. Story continues In 2008 he set up ASCOVIME, an acronym in French meaning Association of Skills for a Better Life. Today, the NGO carries out about 40 missions a year, provides medical consultations to 40,000 people, carries out around 1,400 operations and gives school equipment to 20,000 children. In Cameroon, a central African country of about 25 million people ruled for more than 38 years by Paul Biya, almost four people in 10 live below the poverty line and life expectancy is around 60. Most of the time, ASCOVIME visits rural areas where health care is scarce and difficult to access, including two English-speaking regions plagued by separatist conflict, and the far north, affected by jihadist incursions by the Boko Haram group. "In every village, there is at least one medical hut run by a nurse, often a Cameroonian government employee," he explains. But the needs are almost limitless -- "the main problem is poverty and lack of equipment." The most frequent medical complaints are malaria, joint pain and hernias -- diseases linked to working the land, says Bwelle. - Volunteers' joy - In a summer camp atmosphere, the bus -- its sides emblazoned with the English words "Local initiative to reduce people suffering" -- traces its route to the rhythm of traditional Cameroonian music. Dressed in shorts and a navy blue sweatshirt, Bwelle, who also teaches at the University of Yaounde, adds his voice and claps his hands. He grabs his young proteges by the shoulder, tells jokes, and beams. "It's a bit silly, but I love making people smile. And for me, that means treating those who need it," Bwelle says. Emmanuella Mounjid, a sixth-year medical student, is one of the weekend volunteers. "I am learning a lot about medicine. Specialist doctors come with us and answer our questions," she says. "But the experience is the richest at the human level. There is nothing more beautiful than receiving a smile." amt/dyg/pbr/ri/spm BOSTON (AP) As COVID-19 cases surge around the country, a majority of Americans say they support mask mandates for students and teachers in K-12 schools, according to a new poll, but their views are sharply divided along political lines. U.S. Capitol Police officers who were attacked and beaten during the Capitol riot filed a lawsuit Thursday against former President Donald Trump, his allies and members of far-right extremist groups. SIOUX CITY -- A judge has ruled that a construction worker who was injured after coming into contact with a city-owned power line can not sue the city of Sibley, Iowa, for negligence. U.S. District Judge Linda Reade granted the city's motion for summary judgment, saying that Iowa's public duty doctrine, which says that an individual can't sue a state, county or city for a breach of duty or obligation owed to the public at large, bars Victor Maldonado's claim. Reade entered a judgment in favor of the city Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Sioux City and ordered the case closed. Maldonado was injured in September 2018 while working on a rain gutter renovation on a building at 839 Third Ave. in Sibley. He said in his suit that he was handling an aluminum downspout when a city-owned and operated electrical distribution line sent a high-voltage current through the downspout and his body, causing him to fall 20 feet off the roof to an alley below. Maldonado, of Worthington, Minnesota, suffered electrical burns, facial and cranial fractures, a brain injury, loss of function in limbs and blindness in one eye. He sued the city in May 2020, saying the power line was too close to the building and did not comply with safety codes. Maldonado sought more than $75,000 in damages. SIOUX CITY -- Lawyers for a man charged with murder in a fatal Sioux City shooting are seeking to prevent statements he made to police shortly after he was detained from being used at trial. In a motion filed Wednesday, Orange City, Iowa, attorneys Michael Jacobsma and Jared Weber said Sioux City police officers did not read Lawrence Canady his Miranda rights before questioning him and continued to interrogate him after he invoked his right to refuse to answer questions and asked for a lawyer. "Therefore, all statements made by the defendant to police as a result of their interrogation of the defendant should be suppressed and excluded from use at trial by the state," Jacobsma and Weber said in their motion. Their motion did not specify the content of any of the statements Canady made to police. A hearing has not yet been scheduled. Canady, 21, of Sioux City, has pleaded not guilty of first-degree murder, willful injury and serious assault in connection with the May 1 shooting death of Martez Harrison outside Uncle Dave's Bar, 1427 W. Third St. Canady's trial is scheduled for Dec. 7 in Woodbury County District Court. SIOUX CITY -- Two incumbents and two challengers filed paperwork to run for Sioux City Council by Thursday's deadline. First-time candidates Ike Rayford and Matthew O'Kane will join incumbents Dan Moore and Alex Watters on the Nov. 2 ballot. The top-three vote getters will win four-year terms that start in January. Since Councilman Pete Groetken will not be seeking another term, Sioux Cityans will elect at least one new face. O'Kane is a K-12 virtual art teacher for the Sioux City Community School District. His father, James D. O'Kane, once served on the Woodbury County Board of Supervisors. Matthew O'Kane told The Journal Thursday that his candidacy is about "hope for a brighter future." Rayford, a corporate audio visual technician who owns a corporate training and facilitation business, has served as Sioux City NAACP chapter president since early 2018. Rayford said he feels it's time to "have a voice from a diverse background" on the council. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} "I personally feel like the time is right to step up and try to help continue building on what we've already built on as a city," Rayford said Thursday. "I just feel like it's my time to give back and serve the citizens of Sioux City." Ung's comments and demeanor during the meeting riled many of opponents, some of whom accused him of demeaning minorities, and even "smirking" at speakers during their presentations. The Republican supervisor ended his remarks by telling the audience that one way to help lower jail costs is to tell people to follow the 10 commandments and the American derivatives of that. Tell people to stop breaking the law. Jen Pellant, a spokeswoman for the Western Iowa Labor Federation, objected to Ung's portray of those incarcerated in the county jail. "I have concerns that youre sitting up there conflating evil with criminality, were talking about a county jail here, not a federal supermax prison, and youre acting like youre housing a bunch of Jeffrey Dahmers, Pellant said. "These are your constituents. These are the members of your community. People make mistakes.'' In another instance, Ung disputed a statement made by Winnebago Tribal member Tricia Etringer, who said she was tired of jails targeting Black, Indigenous, People of Color, or BIPOC. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} "None of that matters if I go and rob a liquor store," Ung replied. "If I commit a crime, I do it as Matthew Ung, not as a BIPOC community member." In a video posted on his Facebook page, Dr. Rob Karas said ivermectin is one of nine medications he's prescribed for COVID-19 to inmates at the jail and has been administering there since October. Karas said no inmates are forced to take the medication and they can refuse it. Karas said the jail has had 531 virus cases and zero deaths and only one inmate hospitalized. In a Facebook post, Karas said 67% of the jail's inmates have been vaccinated against the virus. Karas, who said he has had COVID-19 twice and has taken ivermectin, defended administering it to patients. Do you want us to try and fight like we're at the beaches of Normandy or do you want me to tell what a lot of people do, which is go home and ride it out and go to the ER when your lips turn blue?" Karas said. The American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas criticized the drug being prescribed to inmates, citing the FDA's warnings about the drug. The group said it was seeking additional records about the drug's use from the sheriff's office and from the health provider. They need to stop this practice immediately," ACLU of Arkansas Executive Director Holly Dickson said. None of the jail's inmates administered ivermectin were state prisoners being held by the facility, the state Department of Corrections said. The department and its medical services provider are not providing ivermectin to any of its inmates, spokeswoman Cindy Murphy said. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Investors are set for a new and busy week of economic releases, including U.S. jobs data for August and flash eurozone inflation figures. India, Australia and Canada will also report their second quarter economic growth. "If the speech turns out to be a non-event, the follow-up market risk event will be the jobs report next week, which will provide more concrete data in steering the timeline of tapering ahead," Yeap Jun Rong at IG said. Wall Street indexes fell on Thursday after two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked the desperate crowds trying to flee Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike the Islamic State militant group, which claimed responsibility. Technology and communication companies led the broad sell-off, with 10 of the 11 sectors in the S&P 500 closing lower. The benchmark fell 0.6% to 4,470 and broke its five-day winning streak. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gave up 0.5% to 35,213.12 and the Nasdaq composite lost 0.6% to 14,945.81. The three major indexes are still on track for weekly gains. Its a bummer for sure, Sue Prom, co-owner of Voyageur Canoe Outfitters, wrote on her blog Wednesday. People have canoe trips planned that have to be cancelled, folks are being evacuated from their cabins and homes and theres smoke in the air. Fire fighters are exhausted and peoples nerves are frayed. Business owners are wondering how they will make it through the winter without the income they were expecting during the last two weeks of August and potentially into September. It isnt all gloom and doom though. No lives have been lost, there have been no significant injuries and damage to private property has so far been relatively little." ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) The Maryland State Board of Education voted Thursday for an emergency regulation to require children and adults to wear masks in K-12 schools statewide to help stop the spread of COVID-19. While most of Maryland's 24 jurisdictions already have mandated masks in schools, five counties have not - Carroll, Cecil, Dorchester, Somerset and Worcester counties. The 14-member board's vote was 11-1 for the regulation, with two board members absent. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended universal mask-wearing for teachers and students inside school buildings this fall, citing the rapid spread of the delta variant. Most states allow school districts to set their own mask policies. Maryland would join California, Illinois and Louisiana in deciding to require masks for students and teachers statewide, if a state legislative committee gives final approval. Susan Getty, a board member, noted that about half of the state's students are not even eligible for a vaccine at this time because of their age. People 12 and over are eligible to be vaccinated. Getty said mandating mask-wearing is an additional strategy to protect students, especially against the highly contagious delta variant. Murphy, who was elected in 2017 after two terms of Republican Chris Christie, is seeking to become the first Democrat to win reelection in New Jersey in more than four decades. Polls show him with a lead over Ciattarelli, a former state Assembly member and small business founder with an accounting background. Murphy is a self-styled progressive and has signed a number of liberal measures that Christie blocked, including a phased-in $15 minimum wage, higher taxes on the wealthy and legalized recreational marijuana. Murphy also signed tighter gun control bills and bills to expand paid sick leave for workers. He's also piloted the state through the coronavirus pandemic, with surveys showing him getting decent grades for his handling of the outbreak. The state has among the highest percentages of people fully vaccinated in the country. It also has among the highest per capita death rates from COVID-19 in the country. Klobuchar said Manchin wants to talk with Republicans who may support the bill and if that doesn't work out, then talks will move toward changes to the filibuster rule. We have been negotiation with Sen. Manchin and working with him," Klobuchar said. Republicans say the changes amount to a federal takeover of elections, which are administered in at the state and local level. The measure, known as the For the People Act, would affect virtually every aspect of the electoral process, curbing the influence of big money in politics, limiting the partisan considerations in the drawing of congressional districts and expanding options for voting. It would create minimum voting standards, such as same-day and automatic voter registration, early voting and no-excuse absentee voting. This simply puts in national voting standards that are overwhelmingly popular with the public," Klobuchar said. She said it would put in place many measures nationally that Wisconsin already has, such as same-day voter registration and guaranteed early voting. Instead of pushing for the voting bill Wednesday, Klobuchar and Baldwin should have been fixing the Biden administrations ongoing crisis in Afghanistan," said Republican National Committee spokeswoman Preya Samsundar. Shes down to Earth, shes smart, shes compassionate. Shes going to be the last one to toot her own horn, Alm said. McCullen previously served as a lawyer for United Public Workers and was a law clerk for Hawaii Supreme Court Associate Justice Paula Nakayama. She spent nearly five years in her first career teaching Hawaiian studies and language at Waianae High School. She earned her bachelor and law degrees from the University of Hawaii and graduated from high school on the Big Island. She told senators she is also of Korean, Japanese and Portuguese ancestry. McCullen said she was from a working class family. Her father was an Aloha Airlines baggage handler and her mother a lei maker. Ige had initially appointed Dan Gluck to the appeals court, selecting him from a list of names provided by the Judicial Selection Commission as required by state law. Gluck attempted to withdraw his name from the confirmation process after large numbers testified against him, but doing so would have created confusion over how the next appointment would be made. The Senate went ahead and voted not to consent to his appointment, which allowed the governor to make another appointment. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 The company completed a bankruptcy sale of its assets and operations in June to Conexio Care, Inc. and Coras Wellness and Behavioral Health. The settlement agreements and consent judgments between Connections and the United States must be approved by the bankruptcy court, and the final amount of any recovery will be limited by the availability of funds in the bankruptcy estate. The False Claims Act settlement partially resolves a whistleblower lawsuit filed by two former Connections employees, who are continuing to pursue additional claims against the company and former CEO Catherine Devaney McKay. Federal authorities are also continuing to pursue claims for violations of the Controlled Substances Act against McKay and two other Connections executives, William Northey and Steven Davis. Davis has denied the allegations against him and sought to have them dismissed. A judge has yet to rule a motion by McKay arguing that some of the allegations are barred by the passage of time, and that the government should be forced to provide a more definite statement providing specific details regarding the basis for other allegations. Prosecutors filed a motion last week seeking a default judgment against Northey for failing to respond to the complaint. WASHINGTON (AP) The Republican Party of Virginia filed a lawsuit Thursday asking the courts to remove Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe from the ballot for failing to sign an official form declaring his candidacy. The McAuliffe campaign dismissed the suit as desperate" and Trumpian. McAuliffe won a June primary election for the Democratic nomination. But the lawsuit argues that McAuliffe should be disqualified from running in the November general election because of the omission of his signature a move election experts say is unlikely. "The declaration must be declared legally insufficient, and McAuliffe must be disqualified from appearing on any general election ballot, Republicans wrote in a complaint filed in Richmond Circuit Court. Renzo Olivari, a McAuliffe spokesperson, dismissed the suit, saying the campaign had submitted the required paperwork. "This is nothing more than a desperate Trumpian move by the Virginia GOP to deprive voters of a choice in this election because Terry is consistently leading in the polls," he said in a statement. Grimms case began after his mother notified school administrators that he had transitioned to a boy as a result of his medical treatment for gender dysphoria. That was at the start of his sophomore year at Gloucester High School. Grimm was initially allowed to use the boys restroom. But after some parents complained, students were told their use of restrooms and locker rooms shall be limited to the corresponding biological genders or a private restroom. Grimm filed his lawsuit in 2015 and argued that he suffered from urinary tract infections from avoiding school bathrooms as well as suicidal thoughts that led to hospitalization. The case then pinballed through the federal courts. It became a federal test case when it was supported by the administration of then-President Barack Obama. It was scheduled to go before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2017. But the high court hearing was canceled after President Donald Trump rescinded an Obama-era directive that students can choose bathrooms corresponding with their gender identity. Grimm's case was heard again in U.S. District Court in Norfolk in 2019 and by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2020. Both ruled in his favor. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 OMAHA Congressman Don Bacon called Thursday's deadly attack at the Kabul airport "horrific" and said the U.S. needs to evacuate everyone who is still stranded in Afghanistan. "We can do it. Give us a new plan Mr. President. Our military is more than prepared to do this," Bacon said in a tweet. The 2nd District Republican also said in a statement: Our nations prayers go out to those who were injured and to the families of the reported 12 U.S. servicemen killed in this horrific attack. We also pray for the safety of our troops as we finish carrying out this mission, and for the stranded American citizens and our Afghan allies who are still in the area desperately trying to escape." He also said in the statement: This disaster will be remembered as one of the worst foreign policy fiascos in our nations history and the repercussions will be felt for a decade. Members of Nebraska's congressional delegation reacted Thursday to news that two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to the airport. U.S. officials said the violence killed 11 U.S. Marines and one Navy medic. At least 60 Afghans were killed. Sen. Deb Fischer also called the attack devastating. Sasse spared no criticism, though, in an interview Wednesday with The World-Herald. He said the Trump administration should never have negotiated with the Taliban, much less agreed to withdraw U.S. forces by May 1 of this year. But he said it was Bidens fault for sticking to the agreement, and then failing to get out U.S. citizens and Afghan allies before the sudden collapse of the Afghan government and Army. A full pull-out was always a bad option, Sasse said. Weve been on a bad path for 18 months. (The Taliban) are not trustworthy. These are folks who not only want to kill their own people and oppress women and girls, they are willing to harbor certain terrorist groups. He would have preferred that the U.S. keep a long-term presence in Afghanistan at Bagram Air Base, about 25 miles from Kabul, the hub of U.S. operations during its nearly 20-year occupation. The decision to abandon Bagram was always a crazy idea, Sasse said. It was a really useful asset to have, west of China. DES MOINES -- A Council Bluffs mother is suing the state to end its ban on schools enacting face mask requirements. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in a district court in Polk County on behalf of Frances Parr, who has two young children who attend Council Bluffs public schools. The suit names Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, state Public Health Director Kim Garcia and state Education Director Ann Lebo as defendants. The ban was approved by the Republican-led Iowa Legislature and signed into law by Reynolds, also a Republican, in May. The suit says the ban violates the rights of Parrs children and other students to attend school without a threat of contracting COVID-19 or the delta variant, the symptoms of which could lead to hospitalization, permanent physical harm, emotional harm and even death. The suit notes the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends all students and staff wear face masks inside school buildings and includes a statement from the childrens pediatrician, who wrote of the dangers of children who contract COVID-19. DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) A western Iowa mother of twin boys is suing the state over its law banning schools from ordering face masks to be worn as a way to protect students against COVID-19. Frances Parr, of Council Bluffs, sued the state, Gov. Kim Reynolds and several state officials Monday in Polk County District Court. The lawsuit seeks an order requiring the state to issue a universal mask mandate for all students and school personnel until a voluntary plan can be implemented that segregates mask-wearing students and staff from those who opt not to wear masks. Parrs children were set to start first grade in the Council Bluffs Community School District this fall, but she is now teaching them at home over fears for their safety. Iowa is among nine states that have banned schools from implementing universal mask mandates. Last week, President Joe Biden ordered his education secretary to explore possible legal action against Iowa and other states that have blocked school mask mandates. The reason were not doing a COVID emergency is because this is a hospital staffing emergency. Were being very specific, Ricketts said at a news conference, noting the increase in non-virus hospitalizations. Some health officials have been critical of the decision to stop releasing the detailed information, arguing that it makes it harder to track the the virus and potentially slow its spread. We are in many ways flying blind, said Dr. James Lawler, one of the leaders of the Global Center for Health Security at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. The new staffing emergency waives various state licensing and education requirements for health care workers to try to encourage more people to take jobs at Nebraska hospitals. Ricketts said it will continue through at least the end of the year. The Republican governor also issued a health order, effective Monday, that will require hospitals to limit certain non-essential surgeries that can be postponed four or more weeks to ease pressure on health care workers. Joes death weighs heavily on me and always will, Ravnsborg said in his statement. Ive often wondered why the accident occurred and all the things that had to have happened to make our lives intersect. Ravnsborg's insistence on remaining in office has opened a divide among Republicans, with him retaining support among some GOP circles. The attorney general has been spotted working booths for local Republican groups at county fairs in recent weeks. But popular predecessor Marty Jackley is already running for his old job and has collected the support of most of the states county prosecutors. Political parties will select candidates for attorney general at statewide conventions next year. Ravnsborg built his political rise on personal connections in the party. It was his dutiful attendance at local GOP events like the one he was returning from when he struck Boever that propelled him from being a party outsider to winning the Republican nomination for attorney general in 2018. Boever's family said they hope Ravnsborg is driven from office one way or another. It is not too late for the state Legislature to resume impeachment proceedings, Jane Boever said. And if they fail us, then its left to the voters of South Dakota to remove him from the ballot box. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1 PARIS (AP) An Afghan evacuee under surveillance in France for possible indirect links to the Taliban was convicted and given a suspended sentence Wednesday for leaving the hotel where he was restricted and traveling to Paris. HANOI, Vietnam (AP) U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris said Thursday she raised issues of human rights abuses and restrictions on political activism in her conversations with Vietnamese leaders this week, but offered no indication those talks bore fruit. CANBERRA, Australia (AP) Qantas Group posted a 2.35 billion Australia dollar ($1.7 billion) pandemic-related annual loss on Thursday and forecast Australia will reopen to international travel in December. WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealand says it was not able to get everybody it wanted out of Afghanistan in time before the deadly attacks near Kabuls airport brought its rescue mission to an end. The Islamic State offshoot that Americans blame for a deadly suicide attack outside the Kabul airport coalesced in eastern Afghanistan six years ago, and rapidly grew into one of the more dangerous terror threats globally. When asked during her testimony, she said: "(No), because I pay other people to read them and tell me what's in them and advise me on what I should do or not do." Megan confessed to pushing the sale through because it was the only home in Malibu in her price range and wanted her children to go to a new school there. She also gave birth to her third child three months after the purchase, which Megan believes led to her failing to realize the gravity of the situation. The star said in her testimony: "Well, for me it's hazy. I just had a baby. So I was concentrating on that. I remember that the estimate came in very high. We didn't have that kind of money sitting around where I could fix it and be okay. "So there were a lot of discussions about me needing to go back to work pretty quickly after having the baby, in case I was going to have to fix this. I don't recall exactly. It was high. I believe the first estimate was high. Upwards of $500,000." Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 This article originally ran on celebretainment.com. Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Zoe Kravitz has finalised her divorce from Karl Glusman. The Big Little Lies star and Karl have officially gone their separate ways after almost two years of marriage, eight months after Zoe filed for divorce in December 2020. According to People magazine, a New York judge signed off on the pairs divorce on Monday (23.08.21). Zoe and Karl began dating in 2016 and got engaged in 2018 before they tied the knot in June 2019 at her father Lenny Kravitzs home in Paris, France. Just a few months before the Batman star filed to divorce Karl, the couple had celebrated their one-year wedding anniversary via Instagram. Zoe had posted a picture from her wedding day, and had written: "one year. (sic)" Karl also paid tribute to his wife on social media, describing Zoe as his "best friend". The actor wrote at the time: "Not the year we expected... but I feel like if we can make it through this, we can take on anything. I love you. More than anything." Karl praised the movie star as he marked their anniversary. To start, these sites recommend two things: Honestly assess your companion's ability to travel, and make sure he or she is carrying or wearing some kind of identification in case you get separated. The sites make it clear that your experience will vary depending on the status of your companion's disease. I can attest to that. My husband was diagnosed with Alzheimer's in 2011, and our travel options have changed dramatically as his disease has advanced. Nonetheless, we have traveled over the last decade by air and auto, beginning in 2013 with a trip to New York and then Europe to see family and friends. It was a kind of farewell tour while my husband could still (sort of) recognize his siblings. The trip was not without its challenges. In Frankfurt, Germany, a place neither of us had been, we took a stroll to help us adjust to a new time zone. Throughout the walk, my husband insisted that not only had he visited the town in his 20s but had lived there for nearly a year. It wasn't until the next day that I understood he thought we were still in New York. Our six-hour plane ride to Germany hadn't registered. 'CANDYMAN' (Rated R for bloody horror violence as well as language, including some sexual references) A "spiritual sequel" to the horror film "Candyman" (1992) that returns to the now-gentrified Chicago neighborhood where the legend began. 'THE COLONY' (Rated R for some violence) Set in the distant future, a female astronaut, shipwrecked on the long-decimated Earth, must decide the fate of the wasteland's remaining populace. 'VACATION FRIENDS' (Rated R for drug content, crude sexual references and language) A couple meets up with another couple while on vacation in Mexico, but their friendship takes an awkward turn when they get back home. 'HABIT' (Rated R for strong drug content, pervasive language, sexual content, bloody violence and brief nudity) A street smart party girl gets mixed up in a violent drug deal and finds a possible way out by masquerading as a nun. Burned If there were a class in "how to be a heterosexual man," lesson one would be how to answer a woman's questions about her appearance. She'll insist you give an honest answer to the classic gotcha question: "Do I look fat in this dress?" Always lie. Well, unless you are held at gunpoint or threatened with disemboweling with a steak knife or rusty pliers. In which case, also lie. Admittedly, this advice is at odds with the black-and-white notions of honesty and deception drilled into us from an early age: Honesty, good! Lying, evil! If we lie, terrible things will happen to us such as cancer of the nose (as seen in that lie-arrhea-prone puppet, Pinocchio) or pants that spontaneously explode into flame. "For centuries, philosophers and ethicists have railed against deception," note business school professors and researchers Joseph Gaspar and Maurice Schweitzer. The belief that deception is always evil and harmful was preached by the Christian bishop St. Augustine, "who claimed that 'every lie is a sin.'" Philosopher Immanuel Kant "argued that 'The greatest violation ... is lying.'" These beliefs are baked into our culture and "permeate modern thinking." Gaspar and Schweitzer define deception as "the transmission of information that intentionally misleads others." That sounds pretty awful. However, they suggest, "Think about what you should do when your grandmother asks if you enjoyed her meatloaf" or "your friend asks if you enjoyed her wedding reception." In situations like these, lying "might be the exactly right thing to do" (tempting as it might be to tell your friend you wish you'd been given a choice: attending the reception or or being repeatedly electrocuted via a car battery attached to your nipples). These feelings-preserving falsehoods are "prosocial lies." "Prosocial" is psych professor-ese for "intended to help other people." Prosocial lies mislead but also benefit the person we're lying to, explain Gaspar and Schweitzer. It's basically benevolent deception: deception in service of kindness and even respect. For example, when a friend fails to show up at your party, "they might (respectfully) cite an illness" instead of admitting that they stayed home to binge-watch season seven of "Bosch." Reflecting on the merits of prosocial lying, they argue that "deception has been unfairly disparaged" because "scholars have conflated deception with the pursuit of self-interest." Schweitzer, in "Friend & Foe" (co-authored with fellow B-school professor Adam Galinsky), advocates that the truth be judiciously told or withheld. The bottom line: "Is it ethical to tell prosocial lies? Our answer is yes. And we'd even take this claim a step further." Instead of telling our kids never to lie, "we should teach them the guiding principle of benevolence" and advise them to make "careful and deliberate choices when they face a conflict between telling the truth and being kind." "For tasks that really matter for future success, honesty may be the best route to take," advise Schweitzer and Galinsky. For example, taking a junior colleague aside and being gently but painfully honest telling them how their performance fell short can be prosocial, helping them in the long run by alerting them to corrections they need to make. "But when a task really doesn't make much difference like your grandmother's meatloaf prosocial lies can be just the right thing." The same goes for situations that no amount of honesty can change. Take your friend asking you where she lands on the 1-to-10 hotitude scale. She probably believed she was seeking an honest review, and it's reasonable that you took her at her word. However, she was probably fishing not for the truth but for reassurance that she's pretty. Judicious honesty is the right amount of honesty at the right time. For a personal example, I'm pretty slim, but there is no pair of skinny jeans in which I do not look like a redhead stuffed into a sausage casing. There's a time to gently hint that I might put a pair of skinny jeans out to pasture, and it's not moments after I strut into a party all Alkonwursty but in the cold light of several days afterward. You'll be doing your sworn job as my friend, looking after my interests, but in a way that allows me to enjoy myself at the party instead of hiding under a parked car with the cat till it's over. Skeptical Science New Research for Week #34, 2021 Posted on 26 August 2021 by doug_bostrom AMS State of the Climate in 2020: Pay Attention Only a couple of weeks ago the IPCC released its AR6 Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis synthesis report, the latest of a series of comprehensive, deeply sourced periodic updates describing our best understanding of how Earth's climate functions, and how it will malfunction if we misbehave and thereby alter the system, the "how we can change the climate, and what will happen if we do" perspective on anthropogenic climate change. The report focuses on matters relatively abstract with respect to our daily lives. This latest IPCC report tilts more to the perspective of what will happen in the future, and why. This week sees the American Meteorlogical Society (AMS) publish what might be called the third leg of our climate change information perch, State of the Climate in 2020 (PDF, 26MB), the "knowing what we do, how are we doing?" assessment from the best of our information at our closest fully recorded moment in time. Similarly to the IPCC's AR6, this is a massive review and synthesis of research literature from a broad span of domains connected by climate change but (naturally given it's the AMS) with a more meteorological bent. Compared to the AR6, this is a more observationally based effort. Taking into account authors of works cited to describe the present climate situation, as with the AR6 there are thousands of researchers contrbuting to this synopsis. So, how are we doing? In a nutshell, we're not living up to our potential. A few excerpts from the report's executive summary (PDF, 11MB) paint for us the general picture, not a hypothetical scenario but what is happening now: All major greenhouse gases, including CO2, reached new record high concentrations for the year. The annual global average carbon dioxide concentration at Earths surface was 412.5 0.1 ppm, 2.5 0.1 ppm more than in 2019, and the highest in at least the past 800,000 years. The year-overyear increase in the global CO2 levels has tripled over the past half century, from an average of 0.8 0.3 ppm yr1 in the 1960s to 2.4 0.4 ppm yr1 in the 2010s. In the cryosphere, alpine glaciers around the world continued to lose mass for the 33rd consecutive year, while permafrost temperatures were record high at many observing sites in both mountain and polar regions. Record high spring temperatures in central Siberia led to rapid snowmelt that contributed to the fourth-smallest snow cover extent in May for the Eurasian continent and record smallest in June. In 2020, the globally averaged ocean heat content was at a record high, and the global sea surface temperature was the third highest on record, surpassed only by 2016 and 2019. The annual global mean sea level set a new record for the ninth consecutive year, rising to 91.3 mm above the 1993 level, the year when satellite measurements of this indicator began. The ocean absorbed about 3.0 billion more metric tons of anthropogenic carbon dioxide than it released into the atmosphere in 2020. This is the highest amount since the start of the record in 1982 and almost 30% higher than the average of the past two decades. More carbon dioxide stored in the ocean means less remains in the atmosphere, but also leads to increasing acidification of the waters, which can greatly harm or shift ecosystems. The average surface air temperature over Arctic land areas in 2020 was the highest in the 121-year record, with notably high temperatures over north-central Siberia during most of the year. This was the seventh straight year with an annual temperature more than 1C higher than the 19812010 average. On 20 June, a temperature of 38C was observed at Verkhoyansk, Russia (67.6N), provisionally the highest temperature ever measured within the Arctic Circle. In August, the time of year with the least amount of ice cover in the Arctic, the Laptev and Kara Seaswhich border northern Siberia and where extreme warmth prevailed in 2020 had sea surface temperatures as much as 5.5C above the 19822010 average for the month due to exceptionally low summer sea ice extent. An atmospheric rivera long, narrow region in the atmosphere that transports water vapor from subtropical and midlatitudes brought extreme warmth to parts of Antarctica during austral summer. On 6 February, Esperanza Station reached 18.3C, the highest temperature ever recorded on the continent, surpassing the previous record set in 2015 by 1.1C. The warmth also led to the largest late-summer surface melt event in the 43-year record, affecting more than 50% of the Antarctic Peninsula and impacting elevations as high as 1,700 m. And of course there's a lot more; the report is substantially a matter of observational derivation and there's a torrent of events to describe. The AMS SoC by its nature is not leavened by including obvious hints to improvement embedded in parameters, etc. This report is mostly a matter of quantified facts of just-recorded history, obvious warning signals denied to our cost. What's reported in the AMS 2020 SoC is as we'd expect according to work such as that found in the latest IPCC AR6 scientific synthesis. Consilience will happen, whether or not we're ignorant of what we've done. Fortunately again per the IPCC AR6 we're not ignorant. People who claim otherwise are laboring with problems not connected with actual ignorance about how our climate functions, how we can change it,what will happen as we have done and continue to do. Those things we know, mostly leaving as our main mystery that of why human nature leads us to denial and evasion (as it happens, most editions of New Research sport at least a few articles delving into exactly the latter topic). 113 articles by 578 contributing authors Physical science of climate change, effects Impacts of Multi-timescale Circulations on Meridional Heat Transport Liu et al. International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.7357 Observations of climate change, effects State of the Climate in 2020 Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society Open Access 10.1163/9789004322714_cclc_2016-0201-003 First Observations of a Transient Polynya in the Last Ice Area North of Ellesmere Island Moore et al. Geophysical Research Letters 10.1029/2021gl095099 (provisional link) Rapid attribution of heavy rainfall events leading to the severe flooding in Western Europe during July 2021 Effects of climate change on the valley glaciers of the Italian Alps Serandrei-Barbero et al. Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-2021-241 The heat wave of October 2020 in central South America Marengo et al. International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.7365 Spatio-temporal analysis of land surface temperature for identification of heat wave risk and vulnerability hotspots in Indo-Gangetic Plains of India Rao et al. Theoretical and Applied Climatology 10.1007/s00704-021-03756-0 (provisional link) Characteristics of climate extremes in China during the recent global warming hiatus based upon machine learning 10.1002/joc.7354 Impacts of climate change-related flood events in the Yangtze River Basin based on multi-source data Yang et al. Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2021.105819 On the emergence of human influence on surface air temperature changes over India. Dileepkumar et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 10.1029/2020jd032911 Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects Subseasonal-to-Seasonal Extreme Precipitation Events in the Contiguous United States: Generation of a Database and Climatology Dickinson et al. Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-20-0580.1 Linking Warm Arctic Winters, Rossby Waves, and Cold Spells: An Idealized Numerical Study Jolly et al. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences 10.1175/jas-d-20-0088.1 The Role of a Tropopause Polar Vortex in the Generation of the January 2019 Extreme Arctic Outbreak Lillo et al. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences 10.1175/jas-d-20-0285.1 (provisional link) Design of a temperature error correction method used for meteorology and climate research 10.1002/met.1972 Nonstationary weather and water extremes: a review of methods for their detection, attribution, and management Slater et al. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/hess-2020-576 Tracking heatwave extremes from an event perspective Lo et al. Weather and Climate Extremes Open Access 10.1016/j.wace.2021.100371 (provisional link) Climate change in a changing world: Socio-economic and technological transitions, regulatory frameworks and trends on global greenhouse gas emissions from EDGAR v.5.0 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102350 Temperature emergence at decision-relevant scales Harrington Environmental Research Letters Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac19dc Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects Co-occurrence of California drought and northeast Pacific marine heatwaves under climate change Shi et al. Geophysical Research Letters 10.1029/2021gl092765 Regional Flood Risk Projections under Climate Change Sharma et al. Journal of Hydrometeorology Water Resources Research Open Access pdf 10.1175/jhm-d-20-0238.1 (provisional link) Multi-model ensemble projections of soil moisture drought over North Africa and the Sahel region under 1.5, 2, and 3 C global warming Impacts of Tropical Cyclones on the Caribbean under future climate conditions Kleptsova et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans 10.1029/2020jc016869 Changes in the ENSO-ISMR relationship in the historical and future projection periods based on coupled models Varikoden et al. International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.7362 The fate of the Caspian Sea under projected climate change and water extraction during the 21st century Koriche et al. Environmental Research Letters Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1af5 South America climate change revealed through climate indices projected by GCMs and Eta-RCM ensembles Reboita et al. Climate Dynamics 10.1007/s00382-021-05918-2 (provisional link) High-resolution dynamical downscaling for regional climate projection in Central Asia based on bias-corrected multiple GCMs 10.1007/s00382-021-05934-2 Global and regional estimation of carbon uptake using CMIP6 ESM compared with TRENDY ensembles at the centennial scale Peng et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 10.1029/2021jd035135 (provisional link) Volume and heat transport in the South China Sea and Maritime Continent at present and the end of the 21st century 10.1029/2020JC016901 Projected changes in the season of hot days in the Middle East and North Africa Varela et al. International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.7360 Index- and model-dependent projections of East Asian summer monsoon in CMIP6 simulations Tian et al. International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.7361 Changes in mean and extreme temperature and precipitation events from different weighted multi-model ensembles over the northern half of Morocco Balhane et al. Climate Dynamics Open Access pdf 10.1007/s00382-021-05910-w Exposure of the population of southern France to air pollutants in future climate case studies Cholakian et al. Atmospheric Environment 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2021.118689 Changes in the frequency of global high mountain rain-on-snow events due to climate warming Lopez-Moreno et al. Environmental Research Letters Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac0dde Toward an in-depth evaluation of the ecosystem component of CMIP6 Earth system models Zai-Chun Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2021.08.006 Polar amplification in idealized climates: the role of ice, moisture, and seasons Feldl & Merlis Geophysical Research Letters 10.1029/2021gl094130 Simulation and estimation of future precipitation changes in arid regions: a case study of Xinjiang, Northwest China Du et al. Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03192-z Advances in climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection (provisional link) Performance evaluation of CMIP6 global climate models for selecting models for climate projection over Nigeria 10.21203/rs.3.rs-642786/v1 Evaluation of the Performance of CMIP5 and CMIP6 Models in Simulating the Victoria ModeEl Nino Relationship Wang et al. Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-20-0927.1 Evaluating Diurnal Rainfall Signal Performance from CMIP5 to CMIP6 Lee & Wang Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-20-0812.1 Empirical and Earth system model estimates of boreal nitrogen fixation often differ: A pathway toward reconciliation Hupperts et al. Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.15836 Assessment of Extreme Precipitation Indices over Indochina and South China in CMIP6 Models Tang et al. Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-20-0948.1 Changes of South-Central Pacific Large-scale Environment Associated with Hydrometeors-Radiation-Circulation Interactions in a Coupled GCM J L F et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 10.1029/2021jd034973 Cryosphere & climate change Effects of climate change on the valley glaciers of the Italian Alps Serandrei-Barbero et al. Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-2021-241 (provisional link) The distribution and evolution of supraglacial lakes on 79 N Glacier (north-eastern Greenland) and interannual climatic controls First Observations of a Transient Polynya in the Last Ice Area North of Ellesmere Island Moore et al. Geophysical Research Letters 10.1029/2021gl095099 Paleoclimate Retreat of the Antarctic Ice Sheet during the Last Interglaciation and implications for future change Golledge et al. Geophysical Research Letters 10.1002/essoar.10504661.1 Global Oceanic Overturning Circulation Forced by the Competition between Greenhouse Gases and Continental Ice Sheets during the Last Deglaciation Zhu et al. Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-21-0125.1 Glacial mode shift of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation by warming over the Southern Ocean Oka et al. Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-021-00226-3 Milankovitch, the father of paleoclimate modeling Berger Climate of the Past Open Access pdf 10.5194/cp-17-1727-2021 Biology & climate change Not all species will migrate poleward as the climate warms: the case of the seven baobab species in Madagascar Tagliari et al. Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.15859 Late to bed, late to rise warmer autumn temperatures delay spring phenology by delaying dormancy Beil et al. Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.15858 (provisional link) Climate-induced outbreaks in high-elevation pines are driven primarily by immigration of bark beetles from historical hosts 10.1111/gcb.15861 Synergistic effects of warming and eutrophication alert zooplankton predatorprey interactions along the benthicpelagic interface Zhang et al. Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.15838 Thirty-eight years of CO2 fertilization have outpaced growing aridity to drive greening of Australian woody ecosystems Rifai et al. Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-2021-218 (provisional link) Diverging growth performance of co-occurring trees (Picea abies) and shrubs (Pinus mugo) at the treeline ecotone of Central European mountain ranges 10.1016/j.agrformet.2021.108608 Frequent locally absent rings indicate increased threats of extreme droughts to semi-arid Pinus tabuliformis forests in North China Zhao et al. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology 10.1016/j.agrformet.2021.108601 (provisional link) Vegetation grows more luxuriantly in Arctic permafrost drained lake basins 10.1111/gcb.15853 (provisional link) Growing faster, longer or both? Modelling plastic response of Juniperus communis growth phenology to climate change 10.1111/geb.13377 GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry (provisional link) Dynamic global vegetation models underestimate net CO 2 flux mean and inter-annual variability in dryland ecosystems 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1a38 Variability in black carbon mass concentration in surface snow at Svalbard Berto et al. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-39 Historical increases in land-derived nutrient inputs may alleviate effects of a changing physical climate on the oceanic carbon cycle Lacroix et al. Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.15822 Global and regional estimation of carbon uptake using CMIP6 ESM compared with TRENDY ensembles at the centennial scale Peng et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 10.1029/2021jd035135 (provisional link) Assessing the Relative Climate Impact of Carbon Utilization for Concrete, Chemical, and Mineral Production 10.1021/acs.est.1c01109 (provisional link) Integrating Ecosystem Patch Contributions to Stream Corridor Carbon Dioxide and Methane Fluxes Tropical deoxygenation sites revisited to investigate oxygen and nutrient trends Stramma & Schmidtko Ocean Science Open Access pdf 10.5194/os-17-833-2021 Carbon dynamics at the river-estuarine transition: a comparison among tributaries of Chesapeake Bay Bukaveckas Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-2021-209 Continental-scale controls on soil organic carbon across sub-Saharan Africa von Fromm et al. SOIL Open Access pdf 10.5194/soil-2020-69 Accelerated increase in vegetation carbon sequestration in China after 2010: A turning point resulting from climate and human interaction Chen et al. 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Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-671 CO2 removal & mitigation science & engineering A review of CO2 adsorbents performance for different carbon capture technology processes conditions Lai et al. Greenhouse Gases: Science and Technology 10.1002/ghg.2112 Decarbonization (provisional link) Reducing CO 2 emissions by targeting the worlds hyper-polluting power plants Carbon pricing and supporting policy tools for deep decarbonization; case of electricity generation of Sri Lanka Herath & Jung Carbon Management 10.1080/17583004.2021.1966514 Conceptualizing and achieving industrial system transition for a dematerialized and decarbonized world Singh & Chudasama Global Environmental Change 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102349 Unilateral Phase-Out of Coal to Power in an Emissions Trading Scheme Eichner & Pethig Environmental and Resource Economics Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10640-021-00589-3 Grid impacts of highway electric vehicle charging and role for mitigation via energy storage Mowry & Mallapragada Energy Policy 10.1016/j.enpol.2021.112508 Geoengineering climate A scenario of solar geoengineering governance: Vulnerable states demand, and act Schenuit et al. Futures Open Access 10.1016/j.futures.2021.102809 Black carbon Variability in black carbon mass concentration in surface snow at Svalbard Berto et al. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-39 Aerosols Opportunistic Experiments to Constrain Aerosol Effective Radiative Forcing Christensen et al. Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-559 Radiative Forcing of Nitrate Aerosols from 1975 to 2010 as Simulated by MOSAIC Module in CESM2-MAM4 Lu et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 10.1029/2021jd034809 Climate change communications & cognition Climate skeptics identity construction and (Dis)trust in science in the United States Sarathchandra et al. Environmental Sociology 10.1080/23251042.2021.1970436 Not a Big Climate Change Guy Semiotic Gradients and Climate Discourse Adams Environmental Communication 10.1080/17524032.2021.1964998 Understanding the importance of sexism in shaping climate denial and policy opposition Benegal & Holman Climatic Change 10.1007/s10584-021-03193-y (provisional link) Effects of consensus messages and political ideology on climate change attitudes: inconsistent findings and the effect of a pretest 10.1007/s10584-021-03200-2 Support for mitigation and adaptation climate change policies: effects of five attitudinal factors Rubio Juan & Revilla Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11027-021-09964-3 Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change (provisional link) Co-production of knowledge reveals loss of Indigenous hunting opportunities in the face of accelerating Arctic climate change 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1a36 Assessment of the impacts of climate change and variability on water resources and use, food security, and economic welfare in Iran Kiani Ghalehsard et al. Environment, Development and Sustainability 10.1007/s10668-021-01263-w Nonlinear shifts in infectious rust disease due to climate change Dudney et al. Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-021-25182-6 (provisional link) Vulnerability and impact of climate variability on Peruvian artisanal fisheries 10.1080/17565529.2021.1964423 (provisional link) Diminishing weed control exacerbates maize yield loss to adverse weather 10.1111/gcb.15857 Climate change, power, and vulnerabilities in the Peruvian Highlands Heikkinen Regional Environmental Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10113-021-01825-8 Improving rangeland climate services for ranchers and pastoralists with social science Wardropper et al. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 10.1016/j.cosust.2021.07.001 (provisional link) Increases in extreme heat stress in domesticated livestock species during the twenty-first century 10.1111/gcb.15825 Climate change shifts forward flowering and reduces crop waterlogging stress Liu et al. Environmental Research Letters Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1b5a Hydrology & climate change Effects of climate and irrigation on GRACE-based estimates of water storage changes in major US aquifers Scanlon et al. Environmental Research Letters Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac16ff Regional Flood Risk Projections under Climate Change Sharma et al. Journal of Hydrometeorology Water Resources Research Open Access pdf 10.1175/jhm-d-20-0238.1 (provisional link) Multi-model ensemble projections of soil moisture drought over North Africa and the Sahel region under 1.5, 2, and 3 C global warming The fate of the Caspian Sea under projected climate change and water extraction during the 21st century Koriche et al. Environmental Research Letters Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1af5 Humans, climate and streamflow Villarini & Wasko Nature Climate Change Open Access 10.1038/s41558-021-01137-z Impacts of climate change-related flood events in the Yangtze River Basin based on multi-source data Yang et al. Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2021.105819 (provisional link) Future Changes in the Indian Ocean Walker Circulation and links to Kenyan Rainfall 10.1029/2021JD034585 Climate change economics Does financial development influence renewable energy consumption to achieve carbon neutrality in the USA? Lahiani et al. Energy Policy 10.1016/j.enpol.2021.112524 Climate change adaptation as a global public good: implications for financing Khan & Munira Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03195-w Mobilizing private adaptation finance: lessons learned from the Green Climate Fund Stoll et al. Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03190-1 (provisional link) Climate effects on US infrastructure: the economics of adaptation for rail, roads, and coastal development Corporate Emissions-Trading Behaviour During the First Decade of the EU ETS Abrell et al. Environmental and Resource Economics 10.1007/s10640-021-00593-7 The burden of climate action: How environmental responsibility is impacted by socioeconomic status Lerner & Rottman Journal of Environmental Psychology 10.1016/j.jenvp.2021.101674 Temperature and Exports: Evidence from the United States Karlsson Environmental and Resource Economics Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10640-021-00587-5 Climate change mitigation public policy research (provisional link) Risk? Crisis? Emergency? Implications of the new climate emergency framing for governance and policy 10.1002/wcc.736 Cost of non-uniform climate policies Cherp Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-021-01133-3 The surprisingly inexpensive cost of state-driven emission control strategies Peng et al. Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-021-01128-0 The climate and health benefits from intensive building energy efficiency improvements Gillingham et al. Science Advances Open Access pdf 10.1126/sciadv.abg0947 (provisional link) Global scenarios of resource and emission savings from material efficiency in residential buildings and cars 10.1038/s41467-021-25300-4 (provisional link) Revising the EU ETS and CORSIA in times of the COVID-19 pandemic: challenges for reducing global aviation emissions (provisional link) Phasing out fossil fuel subsidies in the EU? Exploring the role of state aid rules 10.2139/ssrn.3725464 (provisional link) Framing the just transition: How international trade unions engage with UN climate negotiations 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102347 (provisional link) Climate change in a changing world: Socio-economic and technological transitions, regulatory frameworks and trends on global greenhouse gas emissions from EDGAR v.5.0 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102350 Support for mitigation and adaptation climate change policies: effects of five attitudinal factors Rubio Juan & Revilla Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11027-021-09964-3 Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research Global evidence of constraints and limits to human adaptation Thomas et al. Regional Environmental Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10113-021-01808-9 Determinants of climate change adaptation strategies in the coastal zone of Bangladesh: implications for adaptation to climate change in developing countries Kabir et al. Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change 10.1007/s11027-021-09968-z Urban-Scale Evaluation of Cool Pavement Impacts on the Urban Heat Island Effect and Climate Change AzariJafari et al. Environmental Science & Technology Open Access pdf 10.1021/acs.est.1c00664 (provisional link) Interrogating effectiveness in climate change adaptation: 11 guiding principles for adaptation research and practice Climate change adaptation as a global public good: implications for financing Khan & Munira Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03195-w From climate adaptation to climate justice: Critical reflections on the IPCC and Himalayan climate knowledges Chakraborty & Sherpa Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03158-1 Collective action problems and governance barriers to sea-level rise adaptation in San Francisco Bay Lubell et al. Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03162-5 Mobilizing private adaptation finance: lessons learned from the Green Climate Fund Stoll et al. Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03190-1 (provisional link) Climate effects on US infrastructure: the economics of adaptation for rail, roads, and coastal development Sustainability challenges of adaptation interventions: do the challenges vary with implementing organizations? Rahman Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change 10.1007/s11027-021-09966-1 (provisional link) A climate resilience research renewal agenda: learning lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic for urban climate resilience Collective action problems and governance barriers to sea-level rise adaptation in San Francisco Bay Lubell et al. Climatic Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03162-5 Building Urban Climate Change Adaptation Strategies: The Case of Russian Arctic Cities Bobylev et al. Weather, Climate, and Society 10.1175/wcas-d-21-0004.1 (provisional link) Climate change impacts and urban green space adaptation efforts: Evidence from U.S. municipal parks and recreation departments 10.1016/j.uclim.2021.100962 The climate justice pillars vis-a-vis urban form adaptation to climate change: A review Mohtat & Khirfan Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2021.100951 Climate change impacts on human health Spatio-temporal analysis of land surface temperature for identification of heat wave risk and vulnerability hotspots in Indo-Gangetic Plains of India Rao et al. Theoretical and Applied Climatology 10.1007/s00704-021-03756-0 Climate change and womens health: A scoping review Desai & Zhang Zhang GeoHealth Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10505892.1 Climate change impacts on human culture (provisional link) Co-production of knowledge reveals loss of Indigenous hunting opportunities in the face of accelerating Arctic climate change 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1a36 Other Risk Researchers Views About the Goal of Trying to Ensure Policymakers Consider Scientific Evidence Besley & Schweizer Risk Analysis 10.1111/risa.13813 The Making of a Metric: Co-Producing Decision-Relevant Climate Science Jagannathan et al. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society Open Access pdf 10.1175/bams-d-19-0296.1 Using systems thinking and causal loop diagrams to identify cascading climate change impacts on bioenergy supply systems Groundstroem & Juhola Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11027-021-09967-0 Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives State of the Climate in 2020 Open Access 10.1163/9789004322714_cclc_2016-0201-003 (provisional link) Interrogating effectiveness in climate change adaptation: 11 guiding principles for adaptation research and practice 10.1080/17565529.2021.1964937 A brief history of usable climate science Coen Climatic Change 10.1007/s10584-021-03181-2 Keep climate policy focused on the social cost of carbon Aldy et al. Science 10.1126/science.abi7813 (provisional link) Risk? Crisis? Emergency? Implications of the new climate emergency framing for governance and policy 10.1002/wcc.736 Dynamics, impacts, and future projections of Arctic rapid change Xian-yao & Tingjun Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2021.08.007 Climate services promise better decisions but mainly focus on better data Findlater et al. Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-021-01125-3 Obtaining articles wihout journal subscriptions We know it's frustrating that many articles we cite here are not free to read. One-off paid access fees are generally astronomically priced, suitable for such as "On a Heuristic Point of View Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light" but not as a gamble on unknowns. With a median world income of US$ 9,373, for most of us US$ 42 is significant money to wager on an article's relevance and importance. Here's an excellent collection of tips and techniques for obtaining articles, legally. Unpaywall offers a browser extension for Chrome and Firefox that automatically indicates when an article is freely accessible and provides immediate access without further trouble. Unpaywall is also unscammy, works well, is itself offered free to use. The organizers (a legitimate nonprofit) report about a 50% success rate The weekly New Research catch is checked against the Unpaywall database with accessible items being flagged. Especially for just-published articles this mechansim may fail. If you're interested in an article title and it is not listed here as "open access," be sure to check the link anyway. How is New Research assembled? Most articles appearing here are found via RSS feeds from journal publishers, filtered by search terms to produce raw output for assessment of relevance. Relevant articles are then queried against the Unpaywall database, to identify open access articles and expose useful metadata for articles appearing in the database. The objective of New Research isn't to cast a tinge on scientific results, to color readers' impressions. Hence candidate articles are assessed via two metrics only: Was an article deemed of sufficient merit by a team of journal editors and peer reviewers? The fact of journal RSS output assigns a "yes" to this automatically. Is an article relevant to the topic of anthropogenic climate change? Due to filter overlap with other publication topics of inquiry, of a typical week's 550 or so input articles about 1/4 of RSS output makes the cut. A few journals offer public access to "preprint" versions of articles for which the review process is not yet complete. As it is the journal's decision to do so, we respect that and include such items in New Research. These are flagged as "preprint." The section "Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives" includes some items that are not scientific research per se but fall instead into the category of "perspectives," observations of implications of research findings, areas needing attention, etc. What does " (provisional link) " mean? When the input list for New Research is processed, some articles do not produce a result from the journal databases we employ. Usually this is because the publisher has not yet supplied information to doi.org for the given article. In these cases and in order to still include timely listing of articles, we employ an alternate search tactic. While this method is usually correct, sometimes the link shown will lead to an incorrect destination (available time does not always permit manual checking of these). We invite readers to submit corrections in comments below. Each edition of New Research is reprocessed some two weeks after intitial publication to catch stragglers into the DOI ecosystem. Many "provisional links" will end up being corrected as part of this process. Suggestions Please let us know if you're aware of an article you think may be of interest for Skeptical Science research news, or if we've missed something that may be important. Send your input to Skeptical Science via our contact form. Journals covered A list of journals we cover may be found here. We welcome pointers to omissions, new journals etc. Previous edition The previous edition of Skeptical Science New Research may be found here. Care and Feeding is Slates parenting advice column. In addition to our traditional advice, every Thursday we feature an assortment of teachers from across the country answering your education questions. Have a question for our teachers? Email askateacher@slate.com or post it in the Slate Parenting Facebook group. My daughter just started first grade. Last year, there were five kindergarten classes of about 16 students each. This year there are four first grade classes. We found out today that she doesnt have a single kid from her old class in her new class. Is this typical? I mean, just by chance, I would think shed have three to four other kids from her previous class in her class this year? My husband thinks maybe they are already breaking the kids into tracks? Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement She had perfect grades last year, and we didnt get any info about her not getting along with others; she got the best friend award at the end of kindergarten. Is this weird? My husband went to a tiny rural school where he had the same classmates for years, while I moved all the time and went to many different elementary schools so we just dont know. Its Lonely Over Here Dear Lonely, Nope, not weird! Elementary teachers do develop class rosters with some degree of intention, but the decisions are usually based on rationale about students social-emotional needs, not academic tracking, and its not an especially dramatic or high-stakes selection process. More like, Student A was socially anxious last year, so he might do well placed with Teacher B, who is especially nurturing and encouraging, or Students C and D really struggled to get along last year, so lets split them up. Or, most likely in your case, Letter Writers Daughter had a great kindergarten year and got along with everyone; shell be fine wherever we put her. Whatever the rationale, I can assure you pretty confidently that it was not an attempt to isolate your daughterher class placement is due to some combination of random luck and a smooth and uneventful kindergarten year. Shell do great in first grade! Advertisement Ms. Bauer (middle and high school teacher, New York) Slate needs your support right now. Sign up for Slate Plus to keep reading the advice you crave every week. Last year I home-schooled my son Z due to COVID. Z is an only child and will always be an only child. Hes very charming, if occasionally aggressive or clingy, but I think its normal for his age. I was planning to return him to school at least for this year, but given the state of COVID and its variants, Im not sure what to do. I found out that masks will be optional at school and social distancing is only 3 feet. This has led my husband and me to want to home-school for another year. Advertisement Advertisement My question is about his social development. Teachers I talk to freak out that I taught him kindergarten myself. Most family insist he will be a serial killer loner if he doesnt interact with a classroom of kids each day. How damaging would it be if I home-school him for first grade? Everyone talks about how important these first couple of years are for social development, but I dont want to put my son at greater risk. I dont want to damage him, but I dont want him to get sick or die. How much socialization does he need with kids his age to avoid damage and being able to function as an adult down the road? For the record I was properly socialized K-12, and I am weirder than just about anyone I know. Advertisement Advertisement All Anxious About the Social Stuff Dear AAAtSS, COVID has presented many challenges to parents, especially those with young children. While I believe strongly that socialization is one of the main benefits to early learning, missing out on a couple years will not condemn your son to the life of a serial killer. Youre right to be concerned about the schools minimal approach to COVID protections. If the districts COVID protocols dont live up to your expectations, you should prioritize keeping your child safe. And if you choose to keep him home, it doesnt mean he cant socialize entirely. Consider what key social skills and behaviors a child gets from classroom experiences. Things like sharing, empathy, and team dynamics are best learned through peer-to-peer experience. It will be very important to create situations for your son to learn and hone these skills with other kids his age. Advertisement You might consider a home-schooling collective where families who home-school get their kids together for common classes, sporting activities, and play sessions. See if you can find one thats on the same page as you with COVID precautions and protocols. If not, regular trips to a neighborhood park could be a great first step, too. Advertisement Mr. Hersey (second grade teacher, Washington) My daughters 7 (shell be 8 in October) and about to start third grade. A pattern has existed in her educational experience so far that Im really hoping to break starting this year. According to her preschool teacher, my daughter didnt show much interest in the academic lessons that were being taught in class. I sent her to a kindergarten prep summer camp to help her get ready for elementary school, and I signed her up for Kumon for extra support. I didnt get much feedback from her counselors at the camp, but once she started kindergarten, her teacher made it quite clear pretty early on that she was behind academically when compared to her peers. Advertisement My daughter continued to struggle throughout kindergarten to keep up with the pace of the curriculum, but with extra help from one of the special ed teachers, her performance improved enough that she was able to move on to first grade without having to go to summer school. First grade somewhat mirrored kindergarten: She was behind most of the year, received extra help and was able to pass. With my 74-year-old father and asthmatic teen daughter to think of, my husband and I decided to keep my 7-year-old at home for most of the third grade. She struggled with distance learning, and her teacher recommended that we have her evaluated for a learning disability. She scored mostly average on all of the tests they administered and only very slightly below on tests that evaluated her working memory. They concluded that her shyness and lack of confidence had a lot to do with her struggles. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Having her home for distance learning revealed to me that it takes her longer than her peers to master a particular skill. We were able to get her reading skills up with a private tutor, but now shes struggling in math. She returned to school during the middle of April and received extra help in both reading and math after school, which allowed her to pass the necessary assessments, but her progress report showed more than a few areas that are still in need of improvement. Advertisement She has continued to see her reading tutor periodically throughout the summer, but Im concerned that shes not prepared enough for third-grade math. How can I help my daughter break the cycle of struggling for most of the year and then catching up at the end? I know its hurting her confidence when she sees her friends being able to read books and do math problems that she has trouble with. Shes told me on more than one occasion that she doesnt think shes smart. When shes around family and friends, shes so bright, well-spoken, and clever. People are so surprised when they hear she has trouble in school. It baffles me a bit as well. Advertisement Advertisement Is it worth having her evaluated again? Perhaps they missed something? Or is this just a challenge that shes going to have to work through on a yearly basis? Always Playing Catch-Up Dear Always Playing, While it may be worth having your daughter evaluated again, I suggest you wait. Its often difficult to identify learning disabilities in younger students, and many times, the transition from the lower primary grades to the upper grades is marked by changes in the way kids learn and are taught. Its hard to predict how these changes will affect learning, so I would wait for at least a year before asking for another evaluation. My suggestion is to take all that you have written in your letter and discuss it with your daughters teacher. Youve done an excellent job outlining the problem. Explain the history, state your concerns, and ask for a plan to be put into place that will help your daughter realize greater success this year. This should include regularly scheduled communication between you and the teacher so that extra help can be provided in a timely manner when needed, either at home, school, or ideally in both places. I would also look to establish a positive support systemagain both at school and at homewith the goal of boosting your daughters self-confidence and self-image by celebrating successes whenever they come. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement A strong home/school connection will allow you and your daughters teacher to work closely this year to fill in any gaps before they widen into chasms. Mr. Dicks (fifth grade teacher, Connecticut) I have a son who is 5 and will start kindergarten this month. He displays ADHD tendencies (well have a formal evaluation soon) and is very willful. He always has a reason why he cant or shouldnt do the things you ask him to do, and a willingness to argue (or tolerate punishment) for longer than it would have taken him to actually do the thing. Nevertheless, we have tried to mold him into a respectable citizen by requiring him to do chores like laundry. Under our supervision, he has to load his laundry and put away the clean, dry clothes. We dont make him fold his clothes or match his socks, though, because I am tired of arguing with him. He has plenty of drawer space and his clothes dont crease, so I dont think its a fight worth having right now. Advertisement Enter my mother. She is an extremely capable person, and I was never organized, fashionable, or hard-working enough for her. Shes now a highly regarded teacher of her native language in a public elementary school in my hometown. She told me that when teachers in the public schools see kids with mismatched socks, the kids are warned to straighten up, and I was setting my son up for problems by not matching his socks. Advertisement I am worried about her comment about schools and socks. My mom will keep me up half the night arguing over inconsequential matters until I give in, so I cant really ask her for any more details or expect her to give objective answers. I am already afraid that my sons behavior will land him in trouble in kindergarten (like it does to a minor extent in preschool), and I dont want his socks to add to the trouble. On the other hand, I cant fathom why any teacher would care about socks. Do kindergarteners in public school (besides the ones taught by my mom) actually get in trouble for wearing mismatched socks? Advertisement Advertisement Should My Mom Put a Sock in It? Dear SMMPaSiI, No. For many reasons, the two most important being that what your child wears does not affect how your son learns, and teachers penalizing kids for their clothes is ethically dicey. Your kid will be fine. Ms. Sarnell (early childhood special education teacher, New York) More Advice From Slate My daughter is a freshman in high school, and she recently got an assignment in life sciences that seems inappropriate. The assignment is for the kids to identify someone in their family who died of cancer, and then students are supposed to research that kind of cancer and create a poster presentation to display for the entire school. This seems like a terrible idea, and an invasion of privacy. Should I talk to the teacher? Theres a military adage, often attributed to Gen. Omar Bradley: Amateurs talk strategy, professionals talk logisticswhich may explain why Americas military strategies often fail, but our logistics succeed brilliantly. Case in point: Afghanistan, where our strategy was ill suited to the country but our logisticsseen most vividly in the ongoing evacuationhave been stunning. Whatever President Joe Bidens failings in planning the withdrawal, once it got going, the inflow of planes and outflow of passengersmore than 100,000 people evacuated since Aug. 14 (as of midafternoon Aug. 25)have been impressive. (Im referring simply to the speed and timing of planes landing, loading, and taking off inside the airport, not the violent mayhem going on outside the gates, which is another matter.) Advertisement This sort of inflow and outflowmoving troops, weapons, ammunition, as well as the food, water, fuel, and spare parts to sustain them for a long time from one place to another, quickly has long been the United States militarys most formidable strength. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Subscribe to the Slatest Newsletter A daily email update of the stories you need to read right now. We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again. Please enable javascript to use form. Email address: Send me updates about Slate special offers. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms Sign Up Thanks for signing up! You can manage your newsletter subscriptions at any time. The classic tale is the Berlin airlift of 1948. The Soviet Union blocked access to West Berlin by way of roads, rails, and canals, so the United States and Britain supplied the city by airdelivering 2.3 million tons of food, fuel, and other essentials in 278,000 airdrops over an 11-month span, at its peak landing one plane at the citys airport every 30 seconds. (Finally, Josef Stalin lifted the blockade, though tensions over Berlin continued for another 13 years.) Advertisement Gen. Curtis LeMay was the U.S. commander of the airlift, and its success got him promoted to run the new Strategic Air Command, which was in charge of the U.S. atomic arsenal. It made sense. The Berlin airlift involved intricately plotting the movement of supplies to airplanes, airplanes across the Atlantic to Berlin, then back again after unloading the supplies. At the time, atomic war was seen in the same way: load A-bombs on the planes, fly them over the Soviet Union, drop the bombs, and fly back, without crashing into one another or running out of fuel on the way. The U.S. war strategy was to destroy as much, and as quickly, as possible. In other words, for many years, nuclear war planning was logistics planning. Advertisement Advertisement Americas strength at military logistics predated the atomic age. In World War II, several German generals were master tacticians on the battlefield, but the Allies won mainly because of the United States superiority in stufftanks, planes, ships, weapons, troops, and the logistical planners who put them all together at the right times and places. But the idea dates back further still. Conrad Crane, longtime historian at the U.S. Army War College, said in an email: Beginning with the Civil War, our way of war has relied heavily on our industrial might and on waves of material and technology. Like many military historians, Crane points to Russell Weigleys classic 1973 book The American Way of War, which argues that U.S. military commanders have fought on principles of attrition or annihilation, or both, since the dawn of the republic. During the War of Independence, when resources were scant, Gen. George Washington drew the British into the interior of the continent, drawing them away from their fleets and attacking them in isolation. Later, commanders relied on large masses of firepower to destroy enemy forcesthen, in the air and atomic eras, enemy cities. Advertisement Advertisement Since the 1970s, there have been some attempts to alter this American way of war. In the small wars against Latin American guerrillas, and in the counterinsurgency wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, some commanders have adopted strategies relying more on securing the population than on killing bad guys for its own sake. But even then, the Americans have fallen back on the more tried-and-true tools of air power and artillerymore discretely applied versions of what Weigley called annihilationto crush the enemy. Advertisement The temptation to pursue this course is alluring, in part because amassing firepoweror any other military asset in large quantitiesis a matter of mathematics: how to deliver x tons of material (troops, airplanes, bombs, supplies) across y miles in z amount of time, given the resources at hand. You can calculate the answer with precision and certainty. Advertisement By contrast, strategyhow to best use your resources to win a waris a more nebulous business. It requires knowledge not just of military tactics (which itself is less scientific than logistics) but also of history, politics, economics, and cultureabout your own country and the country where youre fighting. The logisticians know how to get a job done, if it can be done. During the latter part of the Iraq war, the Air Force chief of staff, Gen. T. Michael Buzz Moseley, refused to use his scarce supply of planes to transport drones to the battlefield. Like most senior Air Force officers at the time, he believed bombs should be dropped from planes flown by pilots, not from drones controlled by remote joystick operators. Moseley also refused to airlift a new model of armored troop-carrying vehicle, saying it couldnt fit in the planes. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates fired him and replaced him with Gen. Norton Schwartz, the head of the Air Forces Transportation Commandthe first time the job was filled by someone who hadnt flown combat planes. Schwartzthe logisticianfigured out a way to airlift the drones and the troop carriers. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement What were seeing inside Kabul airport right now are officers trained in the tradition of Schwartz, experts in the science of moving stuff around. But Schwartz wouldnt have been better than Moseley, or anyone else, at figuring out how to win the war in Iraq. And the crews inside the airport dont have any great ideas on how to keep disaster at bay, beyond their narrow mission, in Afghanistan, not even the deadly chaos just outside their gates. Nor does anyone expect them to. Thats the stuff of strategy. Its a lot harder, and it goes against the spirit of the American way of war. Thats why American strategy sometimes looks like the work of amateurs. Further complicating the Afghanistan evacuation effort is the threat of an ISIS attack at the Kabul airport that has served as a hub for Western nations airlifting citizens and allies out of the country. That threat appeared to materialize Thursday evening in Kabul with reports of an explosion near the airport. Afghanistans already tenuous security situation was roiled by the Taliban takeover of the capital city nearly two weeks ago, but after days of a negotiated exit process that allowed evacuees to get to the airport. The new threat is in the form of terror attacks at the hands of ISIS Afghan affiliate, Islamic State Khorasan, or ISIS-K. Advertisement The ISIS threat has been deemed significant enough that the U.S. embassy warned American citizens Wednesday night against traveling to the Kabul airport or congregating at the gates leading into the complex. Australia and the U.K. have both issued warnings that there was now a high threat of a terrorist attack. The ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan has already carried out dozens of attacks in the country this year and U.S. intelligence says the potential threats now include suicide bombers mixing in among the throngs of people trying to get into the airport and even mortar attacks against the airfield itself. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Subscribe to the Slatest newsletter A daily email update of the stories you need to read right now. We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again. Please enable javascript to use form. Email address: Send me updates about Slate special offers. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms Sign Up Thanks for signing up! You can manage your newsletter subscriptions at any time. The Taliban and the ISIS affiliate are rivals in Afghanistan, each looking to assert control in the chaotic aftermath of the U.S. withdrawal. The threats lay bare a complicated dynamic between the Taliban, Al Qaeda and the Haqqani network, and their bitter rival, ISIS-K, in what analysts say portends a bloody struggle involving thousands of foreign fighters on both sides, the New York Times reports. An attack on the airport, current and former American officials said, would be a strategic blow to both the United States and the Taliban leadership, which is trying to demonstrate that it can control the country. Such a strike would bolster ISIS-Ks stature in the jihadist world, but that opportunity greatly diminishes after the last American Marine or soldier pulls out. Sex workers have gravitated to OnlyFans in recent years because it allows them to connect with customers directly. They could set their own employment terms and their own prices. The website took a 20 percent cut off the top, and the workers pocketed the rest. This system seemed to be working for everyoneuntil the past week, when OnlyFans abruptly announced it would be kicking sex workers off the platform. And then, just as abruptly, it said: Never mind. Sex workers can stay. Advertisement Charlotte Shane, author of the memoir Prostitute Laundry, says this fiasco was exemplary of sex work in the United States precisely because it was so messy and very strange and very unpredictable. On Thursdays episode of What Next, I talked to her about the legal precariousness of sex work and where OnlyFans creators go from here. Our conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Mary Harris: Can you tell me the story of OnlyFans, like how the site came to be? Was it always an outlet for sex workers? Charlotte Shane: It was founded in 2016 by this man, Tim Stokely, who had a history in the adult industry. OnlyFans official stance for a long time has been kind of like, no, were for everyone. They dont usually say explicitly that theyre happy to host porn providers, porn creators. But they will say we are for everyone and we support a diverse community. Diverse community is their euphemism. Advertisement That means not just sex work. Well, they are adamant about that. They always want to say they host fitness influencers. Theyre very proud of all the celebrities they have. But the fact is that Tim Stokely, this man who founded it, had a history in the adult industry creating sites that were catering to the adult industry. And then this other man, Leo Radvinsky, who now owns a majority stake in it, also has a past in porn. So they have a past in porn as businessmen, as far as we know not performers. But that was part of what I think made it frustrating for sex workers as well, when the sites official statements would try to disavow sex workers. Because it was very obvious, just looking at these two mens history, like, no, you understand the adult industry and you have existed in that space for a while to try to make money off of it. Advertisement Advertisement Do we know why they were backing away from being identified with sex work? I think all of that maneuvering is explicable from a business standpoint. If they had aggressively said from the start we are only for adult creators, that probably would scare off some of the Instagram influencers and chefs and even skateboarders who are happy to play with the idea that theyre posting naughty things or private things, but dont want people to start saying, Youre not a skateboarder anymore, youre a porn star. So they dont want to drive away creators unnecessarily by really aggressively saying this is just a space for sexually explicit content. Thats one thing. Advertisement But the other is just that you acquire a target on your back instantly if you say, We are going to become the premier destination for sexually explicit content on the internet, because there is so much hostility to the adult industry. So them playing dumb is, of course, what sex workers themselves have kind of done throughout time. You know, the whole thing with escorts, where your escort website very clearly states in huge letters, Youre only paying for my time. Youre not paying for something sexual to happen between us. I always call it, like, implausible plausible deniability. You always have to pretend that whats actually going on isnt going on because it is so risky to just come out and say, yeah, this is what Im doing. Advertisement Advertisement Looking at whats happened over the last week or two with OnlyFans, I think it really becomes clear who all these content gatekeepers are and how they affect the way you receive your content. I was surprised that OnlyFans has an app, but that app doesnt feature a lot of the top creators for the site because app stores simply wont allow it. Yeah, app stores wont allow any apps for adult content. The internet kind of has never shaken its reputation from the very early days of being kind of like a cesspool of sex. I am sympathetic to civilians who might think, look, if youre, lets say, a woman who is willing to provide this sort of sexual engagement, why dont you just put up a website and put your menu on your website and say, If you want to have a phone conversation, its this much. If you want to do a cam show, its this much. And if you want me to send you pictures, its this much? Why dont you just throw up a website? But as a sex worker, you cannot get a payment processor to agree with that for you. So, yeah, you can put up your website and you can try to do workarounds. You can say, You have to contact me. Ill give you my Venmo handle or my Cash App handle, but its all these extra levels of effort and basically obstacles. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement In any other business, you dont want to create more obstacles for people to buy. You want to make buying easy for them. And sex workers cant do that, because we dont have the type of systemic or institutional support that a lot of other small-business owners can rely oneven when the work is legal. Its not illegal for me to ask for someone to send me $50 and then talk to them about sex over the phone. Thats not illegal. But if I go to Stripe and I say, can I set up payment through my site so people pay me money to talk to them about sex on the phone? Theyre gonna say, Absolutely not. Get out of here. Never come back again! Advertisement Youre bringing up another gatekeeper, which is banks, whove been increasingly flexing their muscles around explicit content online. And a lot of people before what happened with OnlyFans had brought up what happened with Pornhub a little bit earlier. Yeah. I suppose its helpful to remind people that federal prosecutors, in the United States especially, have really latched on to tracking the movement of money as a way to come after people. You know, famously, thats how they got the mob, where its like, oh, the mob is murdering people. But the way you go after them is to say, you guys are racketeering and money laundering. So theyve applied those same sort of tools to people in the sex industry. And I think what then makes the sex industry so radioactive is you facilitate one transaction for a recording in which theres someone in the recording whos 16 years old, and you could be looking at serving time in federal prison. You dont get a fine. You dont get a warning. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Some would say maybe you should face federal time, like thats someone whos underage and maybe the contact was nonconsensual. What should the punishment be for someone whos hosting that kind of content? Well, thats the thingyou have multiple players, right? You have the person who created the content. Then you have, possibly separately, the person who uploaded the content. You have, again, possibly separately, the platform hosting the content. And then you have, again, separately, the bank that let money pass through hands for this content. So it gets complicated. Banks dont like risk. Mastercard doesnt want to be attacked for facilitating trafficking, child porn, whatever. So they just kind of say all of this is too high-risk for us. We dont want anything to do with it. Advertisement This is like using a sledgehammer for something that unfortunately requires tweezers. Charlotte Shane So with Pornhub, the credit card companies basically said, were out. They made this decision at the flip of a dime. And all of a sudden there was no way to pay for your content, right? Yeah. So it was this New York Times op-ed, basically, by Nicholas Kristof, who is a big crusader against the sex industry, where he just kind of leveled these accusations at Pornhub. It really was that quick. His article came out and Visa, Mastercard, and Discover were like, all right, were done with that. Like, hands off. Advertisement Those awful things do happen on sites like Pornhub and OnlyFans, but what the people who run those sites would say is that the incidents of nonconsensual, abusive imagery are actually way higher on maybe a Twitter or a Facebook, on a different kind of social media site, and why are we the ones who are being cracked down on? Advertisement Yeah, youre absolutely right. I mean, does rape happen in hotels? Oh, absolutely. People are raped in hotels. Do we shut down every hotel because of that? No. So this is like using a sledgehammer for something that unfortunately requires tweezers. And theres this stunning report that Facebook has something like, in a year, 20 million violations in terms of what looks like child sexual exploitation material. MindGeek, the company that owns Pornhub, had I think a little less than 13,300. So that number is so dwarfed by Facebooks number that its not even in the same universe. But people dont want to go after Facebook. Advertisement One of the owners of OnlyFans has been very explicit in blaming the banks for this initial decision to pull out of having sexual imagery available on the sitethese places were denying payment, essentially, to our creators, and we needed to step in in some kind of way. But all of this makes their strategy of dancing around their sexual explicitness make more sense, where you can kind of see it as, if we look more like Facebook, maybe well get treated like Facebook, even though we have all of this very explicit content here. Advertisement Advertisement Absolutely. Yes. I think you hit the nail on the head. And I spoke with an organizer who said, I think OnlyFans is courting celebrities as a form of protection against this type of targeting. I dont know if thats accurate. But I think youre absolutely right that if OnlyFans can enter the cultural landscape and really kind of get a grip there as this clearinghouse for all sorts of fan content, content for fans, it does become a lot messier to take it down. You spoke to a bunch of OnlyFans creators earlier this year for an article in the New York Times Magazine. And they sort of alluded to the fact that they thought it was only a matter of time before OnlyFans disappeared. And now theyve kind of gotten this warning shot. What do you think those people will do now? Do you stay with the site thats almost ghosted you? Advertisement Clients are really resistant to changing platforms as long as the platform exists. So I do hope this maybe buys some time for creators to connect with particularly the people whove spent the most on them and acquire their contact information and hopefully bring those people with them wherever they go next. But I think its really hard for sex workers to decide to leave if the clients stay there, because its more advantageous to just make as much as you can with OnlyFans for as long as you can, before you do face the inevitable and move to a different platform. Advertisement Advertisement Youve really laid out this kind of roller coaster for sex workers, where sites pop up, sites disappear, the same things keep happening over and over again. Im wondering what you think would need to change to get off this roller coaster, to have sex work be safe and not be constantly moving sites. Advertisement I think there would just have to be overwhelming, vocal, financial, public support of sex workers and sex worker rights. And just saying: enough criminalization. We dont want another law. We dont need another suite of laws against trafficking. Theyre on the books, weve got em. The laws are there. And we dont want people focusing on busting prostitutes, like this is not where we want energy directed. And more and more people really do want to support us, support them. Subscribe to What Next on Apple Podcasts Get more news from Mary Harris every weekday. After The Food and Drug Administration fully approved the Pfizer vaccine on Monday, Joe Biden implored rule-makers to mandate shots. If youre a business leader, a nonprofit leader, a state or local leader, who has been waiting for full FDA approval to require vaccinations, I call on you now to do that, said president Biden. While vaccine mandates were allowed prior to the approval, the official stamp of FDA approvalsalong with surging caseshas led many experts and news outlets to note that we should start seeing more and more mandates. Advertisement Indeed, many companies and local governments announced them this week. Which workers and customers are now required to get their shots, or leave? Weve rounded up as many of the new mandates as we could find. Military personnel Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement A timeline for when service members have to get vaccinated will appear in the coming days, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said on Monday. As of Wednesday, no specific dates have been mentioned, but according to The Associated Press, troops are expected to receive shots in weeks not months. In total, more than 1.3 million troops are expected to get vaccinated. Those who wont follow the requirement might face administrative and disciplinary repercussions, said Kirby. Walt Disney World employees Walt Disney corporation reached a deal with Service Trades Council Union, which represents approximately 43,000 Disney Cast Members on Monday, according to which union workers at Disney World in Florida should be fully vaccinated by Oct. 22. The rule will impact employees, working in hotels, shops, attractions, and food and beverage. Anyone who won`t agree to get a shot will lose their job. (Disney had already required its non-union workers to get a vaccine by the end of September.) Advertisement United Airlines staff On Aug. 6, the company announced that its employees must be fully vaccinated within 5 weeks of the FDA approval. Those who are not will be fired. United Airlines, which has 67,000 employees, has become the first major U.S. carrier to impose a mandate. Advertisement Delta Air Lines employees The company announced Wednesday that starting on Sept. 30 unvaccinated workers who have to skip work due to testing positive for COVID will no longer have pay protection. Moreover, starting from on Nov. 1, unvaccinated employees will be required to pay an additional $200 per month to stay on the company`s health plan. This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company, said CEO Ed Bastian in a memo, mentioning high cost of treating COVID patients who require hospitalization. Advertisement Advertisement CVS workers CVS as of Monday requires its corporate staff, as well as nurses and care managers to receive the vaccine by Oct. 31. Pharmacists working in retail stores will have more timeuntil Nov. 30. New hires are asked to get their first shot before their first day at work. City of San Francisco employees In June, the city issued an announcement saying that employees would be given 10 weeks to be fully vaccinated following the FDA approval. The clock starts ticking today, said Carol Isen, director of San Franciscos Department of Human Resources on Monday. She added that the deadline is Nov. 1. New York state and city university students, New York City teachers Advertisement New York City public school principals, teachers, and other staff should get at least one dose of vaccine by Sept. 27, announced New York mayor Bill de Blasio Monday. The decision applies to around 150,000 employees. In July, De Blasio said that all city employees, including teachers, should get vaccinated or start testing for COVID weekly by Sept. 13. But after FDA approval, school staff no longer have an option of testing. Also, on Monday, the State University of New York required students (and strongly encouraged faculty and staff) to get fully vaccinated in 35 days. The same day, the City University of New York mandated students to get inoculated by Sept. 27. Advertisement New Jersey teachers and state workers All public and private school personnel, as well as state employees, including faculty and staff at state colleges and universities need to be fully vaccinated by Oct. 18, Governor Phil Murphy announced Monday. But theres a loophole, which not all mandates include: those who dont get vaccinated may instead to get tested for COVID every week. Oregon teachers and health care workers Last week, Governor Kate Brown announced that health care workers and K-12 schools teachers and staff would have 6 weeks after FDA approval to get fully inoculated, which means the requirement will now kick in in October. Also, Eastern Oregon University required students and employees to provide vaccination proof within 60 days of FDA approvalso, starting in November. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Louisiana health workers and university students Following the FDA approval, Louisiana State University and the University of New Orleans announced that they would require their students to get vaccinated. However, they didnt provide the timeline so far. Ochsner Health, a hospital system in Louisiana, also urged its employees to get fully inoculated by Oct.29. Those who refuse vaccination will be suspended from work for 30 days until they receive a vaccine. Then, if they still fail to meet the requirement, they will lose their job. Michigan university students and employees Oakland University issued a statement Tuesday, saying that students, faculty and staff, planning to attend classes in-person, must get their first shot by Sept. 3, and the second one (for Pfizer and Moderna vaccines) by Oct. 1. Before FDA approval, vaccine mandate applied only to students living in residential housing. Advertisement Minnesota university students and staff The University of Minnesota announced Monday that it would require students to receive the vaccine. Details regarding the timing are expected in the coming days. Faculty and staff can either get vaccinated or continue to get tested regularly. West Virginia hospitals employees The West Virginia University Health System, the largest private employer in the state, announced Monday that staff is required to get inoculated by Oct. 31. The policy will impact 20 hospitals and 5 health institutes that are part of the system in West Virginia, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Advertisement Advertisement Missouri health workers CoxHealth, based in Springfield, Missouri, told employees Monday that they should receive their first vaccine dose by Oct. 15. Workers who do not will be placed on two weeks of unpaid leaveand then, if they still havent gotten a shot, terminated. Employees who choose not to be vaccinated and do not have an approved exemption will need to find a job somewhere else, says the companys statement. Employees of various energy companies Chevron said Monday it will require its offshore workers in the Gulf of Mexico and its onshore support personnel to be vaccinated by Nov. 1. Employees traveling internationally must also receive a vaccinebut a deadline has not been provided yet. Another oil producer, Hess Corporation, also mandated its personnel working in the Gulf of Mexico to be fully vaccinated by Nov. 1. Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society. August 25 Covid update Spain: 163 fatalities but incidence dips below 300 The downward curve in coronavirus contagion continues but ICU patient numbers remain high The most recent coronavirus update published by the Ministry of Health on Wednesday evening reports a further 10,781 confirmed cases in the previous 24 hours, but while case numbers remain stable another 163 Covid-related deaths have been added to the toll since the pandemic first reached Spain early in 2020, taking the total to 83,690. At the same time there are also 1,760 Covid patients in intensive care units across the country, just 9 fewer than the day before, accounting for 19.2 per cent of all available beds. In terms of hospital admissions, on the other hand, the figure dropped by over 300 to 7,657 (or 6.5 per cent of occupied beds), although the figures remain alarmingly high in Madrid and the north African enclave of Melilla. Incidence rates The overall 14-day cumulative incidence rate in Spain as a whole dropped below 300 for the first time since July 8, standing at 291, although it is still well over the extreme risk threshold of 250. The figure is now around 59 per cent lower that at the height of the fifth wave in late July, but it should also be remembered that on the same date last year it was significantly lower at the figure was far lower at 176: by late August 2020 the figures were beginning to rise again as the summer drew to a close, and despite the progress of the vaccination campaign there remain worries that the same could happen in 2021. The 7-day rate remains under half the 14-day figure at 126 and while this state of affairs continues it can be expected that there will most likely be further decreases over the next few days. Despite the improvement in the overall situation, only Asturias, the Canaries and the Comunidad Valenciana among Spains 17 regions present rates below the extreme risk threshold of 250, recording figures of 130, 196 and 232 respectively. The next lowest figure is in Catalunya (252), while at the other end of the scale are Extremadura (498 and still rising), the Basque Country (380) and La Rioja (375). In terms of age groups, all sectors above the age of 40 are below the 250 threshold, while the highest rates are still reported in teenagers (609) and those aged between 20 and 29 (482). Vaccination data Following the administration of 374,000 doses on Tuesday, the number of people fully vaccinated against Covid-19 in Spain has reached 31,930,874, equivalent to 67.3 per cent of the population. 35,950,365 people have received at least one vaccine dose, representing 75.8 per cent of the total population. The last group to be included in the immunization consists of teenagers, and with the return to school and university imminent the proportion in this age group to have received their first vaccine dose has now reached 63.4 per cent. However, so soon after the invitation to vaccinate was extended to teenagers relatively few of them (just 18.3 per cent) have received their second doses. In the 20-29 age group the equivalent proportions are 71 per cent with at least one dose and 49.5 per cent fully vaccinated. Image: Archive From grazing sheep to internationally recognised resort. Demanovska Dolina marks 100 years of tourism Concerns of the famous architect who helped develop the valley one century ago have materialised. Font size: A - | A + Many people who head to the Liptov region to spend a holiday would have a hard time imagining how the area looked 100 years ago. The inconspicuous Demanovska Dolina valley in that time was only known to locals and people who came here for work. This changed in 1921 when Czech speleologist Alois Kral, with the help of locals, Adam Misura, Oto Hrabala and Jarmila Vranova researched dried-up lowest draught of Demanovka River. They found a cave and named it the Temple of Freedom. Demanovska Freedom Cave (Source: Unsplash/Jakub Micuch) Their discovery marks the beginning of tourism in Demanovska Dolina, today the most visited valley of the Low Tatras. Tourists are lured by the longest cave system in Slovakia, which by now stretches to about 43 kilometres and may yet grow bigger as new parts of the cave system continue to be discovered. Tourists are also familiar with the Jasna ski resort and the cable car that can take them up to Chopok, the second highest peak of the Low Tatras mountains. A valley where sheep grazed in the past turned into a paradise for tourists and skiers with everything that entails, Darina Bartkova, chair of the Regional Organisation of Tourism (OOCR) Liptov, told The Slovak Spectator. But before reaching the caves centenary, a debate transpired on how much construction is too much for the valley and how to better protect the countryside and preserve character of the country. Cave lured the first tourists Before tourism became the main feature of Demanovska Dolina, the valley was just a regular spot for shepherds and lumberjacks. All the manual work related to the logging of trees, processing and transporting trunks, was not only hard and demanding but also dangerous. The same was true for shepherds of sheep and cattle. Life was extremely hard in the mountains from the onset of autumn until the highly expected arrival of spring. People would not enter the mountains unless they really needed to, reads a book issued on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Demanovska Dolina village, 1964-2014. 26. Aug 2021 at 18:39 | Nina Hrabovska Francelova One of Bratislava's most controversial real estate projects gets the green light The approval comes after years of protests and changes. Font size: A - | A + One of the most controversial rental projects in Petrzalka and Bratislava as such has been given the green light by the municipal authorities. The Bratislava City Hall accepted the proposal put forward by the developer Subcentro, which was initially reviewed and scaled-down. The developer only succeeded upon their second application. The working name of the up-and-coming project is Nove Domino (New Domino). It is now in the final stages of approvals as it awaits a thumbs up from the Petrzalka construction office. Compared to the original plan, the project is smaller in size, with the developer promising to move parts of the complex further away from existing apartment blocks. Years of protests 26. Aug 2021 at 20:29 | Tomas Vasuta Jennifer Brown, matriarch of the Brian Brown Stable, will be honoured as the 2021 Lady Pace honouree by the Delaware (Ohio) County Fair. Born in Bellefontaine, Ohio, and raised on a 40-acre farm, Brown has been around horses her whole life. Her grandfather, uncle, mom and aunt all drove and trained racehorses on a small scale at Ohio county fairs. In 1988, Jennifer and Brian Brown married, and the couple has two children who are active in the sport: Beau, a trainer-driver; and Jessica McCown, a trainer. Jennifer serves as the stable bookkeeper and overall organizer. The Browns have conditioned many champion horses, such as Prsntpretnperfect, Lost For Words, Blazin Britches, Colors A Virgin, Candys A Virgin, Beach Memories, Workin Ona Mystery, Fear The Dragon and Downbytheseaside. Jennifer is the backbone of the Brown Racing Stable, noted Tom Wright, Delawares director of racing. Their success is a direct result of her hard work. Jennifer Brown will be honoured in a winner's circle ceremony on Jug Day (Sept. 23). (Little Brown Jug) After earning a win at Red Shores Charlottetown in his three starts during Gold Cup Week, Daddy Let Me Drive ($5.50) was triumphant upon returning to his home track, Inverness Raceway, on Wednesday. The seven-year-old son of I Can Only Imagine overcame mild road trouble on the backstretch before blitzing past early pacesetter Windmeredontmatter just past a :59.2 first half mile, and then parried a stout challenge from Sunshine Lou en route to a 1:56.4 victory, his fastest in Nova Scotia this season. Windmeredontmatter salvaged second, 2-3/4 lengths behind, while Sunshine Lou faded to third. Rodney Gillis drove 25-time winner Daddy Let Me Drive in the evening's $1,400 pacing featurefor owner-trainer Donald Beaton. To view Wednesday's complete results, click the following link: Wednesday Results Inverness Raceway. The other nine states with no limits on individual donors to candidates are: Pennsylvania, Indiana, Alabama, Iowa, North Dakota, Nebraska, Texas, Utah and Oregon. Twenty-two states prohibit corporate contributions to political campaigns and 23 states set limits. Aside from Virginia, the other four states with no such limits are Oregon, Utah, Nebraska and Alabama. Zamarripa said 14 states provide some sort of public financing options for campaigns. In some states, Zamarripa said, candidates are encouraged to raise enough money in small donations to demonstrate their candidacies have enough public support to warrant public funding. Candidates then agree to forgo high-dollar contributions. In other states, candidates who agree to limit expenditures to a certain amount receive matching funds from the state. Senators earlier this year killed Simons bill that would have banned personal use of campaign money, a measure that cleared the House of Delegates with no opposition. Senators instead promised to study campaign finance reform. Gering Civic Center staff hurried around Saturday afternoon to fill the demand for seating as the room filled to the brim with quilt-curious individuals who were there to listen to internationally acclaimed quiltmaker Ricky Tims as a part of the International Quilt Museums (IQM) Mary Ghormley Lecture Series. The free event was originally slated for last summer, but canceled due to the pandemic. However, Tims was still able to make it out to western Nebraska from his home in Colorado this year for his first speaking engagement in over a year. Tims kept the crowd engaged from the very beginning with his Nebraska underwear story all the way to the end as he pitched his latest classes, projects and even his recent novel. His natural storytelling abilities captivated those in attendance. Tims started out in the creative world as a musician. When a family heirloom sewing machine was about to get tossed because no one wanted it, he decided to take it in, and began what would soon be a famous career in quilting. Tims has won all kinds of awards for his quilts and his influence in the quilting community, but he said thats not why he continues the work that he does. You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Residents will receive $25 vouchers as part of an incentive program made available by the town of Little Elm and the Little Elm Economic Development Corporation. The Plano ISD Board of Trustees (pictured) voted 6-1 in favor of a district-wide mask mandate that, barring contrary instruction from the Texas Education Agency or other authorities, will last until Sept. 24. After months of preparation, the new Walmart Distribution Center in Troutman is ready to begin hiring. The retail giant is planning on using the 1 million-square-foot facility on Murdock Road, which was purchased in late December 2020 for $69 million, as a high velocity fulfillment center for its growing e-commerce business. The facility is expected to create 500 full-time jobs for the area. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} To be able to offer new, gainful employment to central North Carolina is a huge win for the town of Troutman and this region, Teross Young, mayor of Troutman, said. We are so excited for the distribution center to be in our town and the economic opportunities and future growth of this area that is sure to stem from having Walmarts high velocity fulfillment center in our community. We are excited to welcome Walmart and what this opportunity will mean for our area in terms of economic development. The e-commerce facility will work closely with the Iredell County Economic Development Corp. to provide full-time positions and specialized roles. It also will work with the mayors office on the recruitment and hiring process. DAMASCUS, Va. A quaint, boutique short-stay lodge in the heart of downtown Damascus has opened for business, expecting to woo more travelers to the trail town. After a yearlong restoration to an existing building, Brinkwaters Hotel held an open house last week to spotlight the business that will rely heavily on the towns tourism population. I think Damascus is on the verge of a small-town renaissance bringing economic vitality back to the rural town, said Trey Waters, who, along with business partners Eric and Emily Brinker of Blowing Rock, North Carolina, has refashioned a former business site into a 13-room lodging facility. The new business will cater to outdoor enthusiasts who are attracted to what the Damascus area has to offer. Waters believes Damascus is a prime location for their new business venture because of its proximity to the Virginia Creeper and Appalachian trails. People come to Damascus and stay one night. They ride the Creeper Trail and go home. Were trying to create the opportunity for two- or three-day stays. Ive often heard that people come and enjoy Damascus and then go stay in Abingdon because were at capacity in town. Our business was an attractive opportunity to turn space into a nightly rental program, said Waters. Port of Longview employees will have to pay the new state long-term care payroll tax after the commission did not vote Wednesday on covering the cost. Commissioner Jeff Wilson said after hearing from the public, he would prefer that each of our employees as an individual has to go through what everybody else is. He added that he did not want to reward the state by paying in to the tax pool. We should step aside and just let the chips fall where they fall, Wilson said. If the employees dont like it, they have recourse like writing a letter to the governor. Commissioner Doug Averett said he agreed with Wilson on a lot of what youre saying, but whether or not we pay the payroll tax or the employees pay it, its still going to get paid and I want to take that burden off our employees. Commission President Allan Erickson said while there are millions of victims in the state we cant do anything about, I would like us to take a look at alleviating the burden of our employees. Erickson suggested paying the tax just in calendar year 2022 to see what happens in the Legislature, but ultimately, the commission did not vote on the measure. Huckleberry picking season has hit its peak in Washington. Many families will be heading into the mountains over the next few weekends, plucking berries from bushes they have visited for years. For members of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe, the tradition holds much deeper roots. Huckleberries are one of the first foods that hold special cultural significance, Cowlitz tribal council member Cassandra Sellards Reck said. Starting Wednesday, Cowlitz Indian families headed into the Sawtooth Berry Fields and more isolated spots across the state to follow the traditions of their ancestors. This is an event that connects them all back to the mountains and the first foods. We humble ourselves and rejuvenate our spirits, Sellards Reck said. Sellards Reck said shes been picking huckleberries during the summer for as long as she can remember. The tradition came from the Cowlitz Indians on her mothers side of the family and the German immigrants on her fathers side, who also picked the berries as food. Cowlitz Indians traditionally believe the berries offer nutritional and small medicinal benefits. Sellards Reck said the act of gathering the berries often includes prayers of thanks for the harvest and bushes split up so members of all ages can participate. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Cowlitz County has seen the first change in its chief of staff position since the role was established in 2017. Axel Swanson left the position Friday to take a new job as managing director for the Washington State Association of County Engineers, a smaller affiliate of the Washington State Association of Counties. County finance director Kurt Williams was appointed as the interim chief of staff. Swanson served as a county commissioner between 2006 and 2010, then worked for the Association of Counties as a researcher before he was hired as Cowlitz Countys first chief of staff. The position serves as the liaison between the elected commissioners and the everyday administrative work done by the county departments. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Swanson said he was looking forward to working with public works departments across the state on upcoming projects. While he was happy with the work hed done as the chief of staff, Swanson acknowledged the last year had made balancing the range of opinions voiced by county commissioners more difficult. Theres no doubt COVID-19 has changed the dynamics. Its made things more challenging, added another complex layer to something thats already challenging, Swanson said. We want to have those exceptions for when it really make sense, but the overriding emphasis is we feel a moral obligation to try to get to 100%, Neville said. We will get really close to 100% because the delta variant is so contagious weve got to do everything possible to keep our community safe and our patients safe and the folks who work with us safe. Neville said PeaceHealth is monitoring how many workers dont want to get the vaccine, but expects most people will get vaccinated, particularly with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approving the Pfizer vaccine. The organization is eager to talk to any caregivers with concerns about getting vaccinated, he said. The few who end up not getting vaccinated, its heartbreaking to us, Neville said. Again, the overriding clinical imperative for us as healthcare providers is to provide the safest care possible for our patients and to do that we feel we have to take a stance and try to work through that as best we can. PeaceHealth has plans to bring in a supplemental workforce to step in for as many as 5% of our unvaccinated colleagues who may choose to depart, according to a statement from the hospital. Concerned about COVID-19? Sign up now to get the most recent coronavirus headlines and other important local and national news sent to your email inbox daily. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. The Santa Catarina state government says the Indigenous people involved in the current court case invaded the land in 2009. The Xokleng people say the original extent of their territory was progressively diminished by encroaching agribusiness and that they never left the area. Bolsonaro has repeatedly said Indigenous people control far too much land relative to their population their territories cover 14% of Brazil, most in the Amazon and has been outspoken about his desire to promote rural development. Together with farm interests, he has argued that the 1988 cutoff had already been established by an earlier court ruling. Changing it now would create chaos, he said in a television interview on Wednesday. If that happens, we will immediately have in front of us hundreds of new (Indigenous) areas to be demarcated, he told farming-focused station Canal Rural. In addition to the losses for the rural producer many have family occupying that land for more than 100 years those lands that today are productive could cease to be productive. Some of the people marching on Wednesday held banners that read Bolsonaro Out and "Indigenous territory is life. Samsung has announced that all its TVs come with a useful feature that you might not know about. The company can remotely disable a TV if it is stolen. Samsung is tackling the issue of stolen TVs from warehouses in South Africa by enabling this feature, which is called Television Block. The blocking system is intended to be implemented in respect of televisions that have been obtained by users through unlawful means and in some cases, stolen from the Samsung warehouses. According to Samsung, TV Block is a remote, security solution that detects if Samsung TV units have been unduly activated, and ensures that the television sets can only be used by the rightful owners with valid proof of purchase The company aims to mitigate against the creation of secondary markets linked to the sale of illegal goods, both in South Africa and beyond its borders. It is already pre-loaded on all Samsung TV products. In keeping with our values to leverage the power of technology to resolve societal challenges, we will continuously develop and expand strategic products in our consumer electronics division with defence-grade security, purpose-built, with innovative and intuitive business tools designed for a new world. This technology can have a positive impact at this time, and will also be of use to both the industry and customers in the future, said Mike Van Lier, Director of Consumer Electronics at Samsung South Africa. The blocking will come into effect when the user of a stolen television connects to the internet, in order to operate the television. Once connected, the serial number of the television is identified on the Samsung server and the blocking system is implemented, disabling all the television functions. Should a customers TV be incorrectly blocked, the functionality can be reinstated once proof of purchase and a valid TV license is shared to serv.manager@samsung.com. As an organisation we acknowledge the critical role in giving our customers and client the peace of mind. Working together, we can overcome the impact of the unprecedented disruption to business, as experienced by many of us recently. We will continue to review the situation and will make adjustments as necessary to ensure business continuity for all, concludes Van Lier. Credit: CC0 Public Domain A new paper from the University of Surrey and the University of Cambridge has detailed how two relatively unexplored semiconducting materials can satisfy the telecommunication industry's hunger for enormous amounts of data at ever-greater speeds. Light-emitting diode (LED)-based communications techniques allow computing devices, including mobile phones, to communicate with one another by using infrared light. However, LED techniques are underused because in its current state LED transmits data at far slower speeds than other wireless technologies such as light-fidelity (Li-Fi). In a paper published by Nature Electronics, the researchers from Surrey and Cambridge, along with partners from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, examine how organic semiconductors, colloidal quantum dots (CQDs) and metal halide perovskites (perovskites), can be used in LED-based optical communications systems. The research team explored efforts to improve the performance and efficiency of these LEDs, and they considered their potential applications in on-chip interconnects and Li-Fi. Dr. Aobo Ren, the co-first author and visiting postdoctoral researcher at the University of Surrey, says that "there's excitement surrounding CQDs and perovskites because they offer great promise for low-power, cost-effective and scalable communications modules." "Although the conventional inorganic thin-film technologies are likely to continue to play a dominant role in optical communications, we believe that LEDs based on these materials can play a complementary role that could have a sizeable impact on the industry." Hao Wang, the co-first author and Ph.D. student at the University of Cambridge, says that "future applications of LEDs will not be limited to the fields of lighting and displays. The development of LEDs based on these solution-processable materials for optical communication purposes has only begun, and their performance is still far from what's required. It is necessary and timely to discuss the potential strategies and present technical challenges for the deployment of real-world communication links using these LEDs from the material, device and system aspects." Professor Jiang Wu, the corresponding author from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, says that "photonic devices for the Internet of Things (IoT) and 6G communication systems need to be high-speed, low-cost and easy to integrate. Organic semiconductors, CQDs and perovskites are promising materials that could be used to complement and/or compete with conventional inorganic counterparts in particular optoelectronic applications." Dr. Wei Zhang, the corresponding author and Senior Lecturer from the University of Surrey, says that "IoT and 6G communication systems represent a trillion-dollar market in the next few years. We are proud to collaborate with the top research teams in this field and accelerate the development of emerging data communication technology for rapid entry to the market in the next decade." More information: Aobo Ren et al, Emerging light-emitting diodes for next-generation data communications, Nature Electronics (2021). Journal information: Nature Electronics Aobo Ren et al, Emerging light-emitting diodes for next-generation data communications,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41928-021-00624-7 Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain A small Swiss town acknowledged late Wednesday that it had underestimated the severity of a cyberattack, following reports the personal data of the entire population was exposed online. The small, picturesque town of Rolle, on the shores of Lake Geneva, acknowledged last week that it had been the victim of ransomware attack, and that data on some administrative servers had been compromised. But the municipal government in the town of some 5,400 inhabitants insisted that only small amounts of data had been affected, and that all the information had been restored from backup copies. The town administrative chief Monique Choulat Pugnale told the Swiss daily 24 heures at the time that it was "a weak attack", which only affected email servers that "did not contain any sensitive municipal data". But according to an investigation published by the Le Temps daily Wednesday, the attack first detected on May 30 had in fact been "massive". The paper cited an unnamed cybersecurity expert on the "dark web" saying it had taken him only 30 minutes to turn up thousands of Rolle municipal documents. The documents, he said "are personal and extraordinarily sensitive." Rolle municipality, which has filed a criminal complaint in the case, acknowledged in a statement late Wednesday that it "underestimated the severity of the attack (and) the potential uses of the data. The town said it "admits with humility a certain naivete towards the stakes when dealing with the dark web and malicious hacks", and said it had set up a taskforce to deal with the crisis. It did not go into details about the kinds of information that had been exposed, but Le Temps said its journalists had seen spreadsheets with data on all inhabitants. That data included names, addresses, dates of birth, social security numbers and residency permit information for non-Swiss nationals. In some cases, religious affiliation was also listed. School records had also been found, with list of students' grades, as well as information on children who had contracted COVID-19. Forms used to evaluate the performance of communal employees were also found, as were some criminal records, according to the paper. 2021 AFP Credit: CC0 Public Domain During the pandemic, some major cities across the country saw an exodus, accompanied by a dip in rental pricesbut Miami is experiencing just the opposite. Drawn by the year-round sunshine and beaches, the city became a destination for people from places like New York, Chicago and San Francisco. With the help of Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, Miami pitched itself as tech's newest hot spot, with Microsoft, venture capital firm Founders Fund and private equity giant Blackstone, among others, opening offices. Miami was dubbed the future capital of cryptocurrency. While this may mean more jobs, housing advocates say they see Miami suffering the same fate as tech's original hot spot, the San Francisco Bay Area. When companies like Facebook and Google were rapidly expanding in the early 2000s, San Francisco and the greater Bay Area saw housing prices soar. Many traditionally low-income, immigrant neighborhoods were soon flooded with newcomers with high-paying tech jobs. As prices went up, so did evictions and displacement, and eventually San Francisco became the most expensive city in the country. Just before the pandemic began last year, the average price of a home in San Francisco was $1.46 million and the average rent on a two-bedroom apartment was $4,600 a month. Now, there is concern that it could happen here. "Tech is really hurting Miami in terms of housing costs," said Ned Murray, the director of the Florida International University Metropolitan Center. "We can't talk about the economy without talking about housing, they're so interrelated. ... What's happening now is a hyper-level of gentrification. It's unbelievable to see it happening so quickly." The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment in the city of Miami is currently $2,748 a month, a 17% increase year over year. In the three years before the pandemic, average rents were relatively stable, ranging between $2,200 and $2,450 for a two-bedroom apartment. In April of this year, rent prices began to climb dramatically, according to data from Zumper. Between June and July alone, Miami rents increased by 5.3%, making it one of the highest increases in rent prices in the country. The average price to purchase a home in the city of Miami is $414,625, up 12% year over year. Robert Rexach, who worked as a graphic designer for a cruise company before being laid off during the pandemic, says he's seen what he calls a "San Francisco-ization" occurring in South Florida, where only the elite can afford to live. "The cost of living is still too high for what I'm earning," Rexach said, adding he's only able to afford to live in Miami thanks to a kind landlord who hasn't raised the rent on his one-bedroom apartment in the Roads for years, keeping it at $1,150/month. "People are going to get priced out." The transformation and gentrification is so similar to San Francisco's that Miami-area nonprofits are turning to organizations in the Bay Area for guidance. Chris Gil works for the Mission Economic Development Association, based in one of the most gentrified neighborhoods in San Francisco, and is advising the Allapattah Collaborative, a nonprofit that works to empower small, local businesses in the neighborhood. He says Miami's geographically limited space to build more housing and the new wave of tech and finance companies with well-paid workers who want to live in urban centers are among the characteristics that mirror San Francisco. It means that centrally located, traditionally affordable neighborhoods like Allapattah, Little Haiti and Little Havana are ripe for gentrification. Those neighborhoods are already seeing rapid development. Allapattah, with its proximity to downtown, the airport and its waterfront location on the Miami River, has caught the eye of developers. Mileyka Burgos-Flores, the founder of the Allapattah Collaborative, says many of the new buildings going up aren't being built for the people who have long lived in Allapattah, where the median income is $34,510. "We like tech but we need to understand better what happened in San Francisco," she said of Suarez's push to lure tech companies from the Bay Area to Miami. "Tech is fine, but to subject a city that is surviving a pandemic, one of the poorest cities in the country, with a horrible education system and high percentage of immigrants who don't speak English and aren't digitally includedthere is a lot on the line for us." Explore further Crypto exchange Blockchain announces move to Miami, with plans to create 300 jobs 2021 Miami Herald. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. College of Coastal Georgia students are back on campus for their fall semester, and the college is continuing to encourage all on campus to get vaccinated and to wear face masks amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Americans are hurting and we are on the edge of another financial cliff as distribution deadlines loom and the future availability of rental assistance funds is jeopardized, he said. The Treasury Department has repeatedly tweaked its guidance to encourage states and local governments to streamline the distribution of the funds. The Biden administration has also asked states to create eviction diversion programs that aim to resolve disputes before they reach the courts. On Wednesday, Treasury released additional guidance to try to speed up the process. This includes programs to allow tenants to self-assess their income and risk of becoming homeless among other criteria. Many states and localities, fearing fraud, have measures in place that can take weeks to verify an applicant qualifies for help. Treasury also said states and localities now can distribute money in advance to landlords and utility providers in anticipation of the full satisfaction of (the) application and documentation requirement." And they approved providing money for tenants who have outstanding rental debt in collection, which would make it easier for them to find new housing. Abbotts last order regarding vaccine requirements, issued July 29, said no governmental entity can compel any individual to receive a COVID-19 vaccine administered under an emergency use authorization. While there is a new state law that acted as a backstop for Abbotts previous order if a vaccine received full approval, it was not as sweeping as the order and left the door open to new mandates. There specifically appeared to be the fresh potential for cities, counties and school districts to require their employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19. San Antonio Independent School District had already announced mandatory employee vaccinations, prompting a lawsuit from Attorney General Ken Paxton. District officials said Wednesday they will move forward with the mandate despite Abbotts latest order. We strongly believe that the safest path forward as a school district is for all staff to become vaccinated against COVID-19, the district said in a statement. As the pandemic has surged again in Texas, Abbott has broadly resisted vaccine and masks requirements, prohibiting local officials from issuing them. That stance has been particularly controversial with school districts, several of which have defied the governor and instituted mask requirements. Paxton has vowed to fight all of them in court. Your president, not mine, in his continuing withdrawal from Afghanistan has equipped an enemy infantry (up to 20 to 30 divisions) with the arms, materiel and equipment that was abandoned by the Afghan defense forces during our surrender. In my opinion, the name of Joe Biden and Benedict Arnold now can be uttered in the same breath. America has sacrificed its currency in blood and treasure and is now a paper tiger. In my opinion, the presidents action has bordered on treasonous, materially aiding an enemy, abandoning NATO, other allies and American citizens behind enemy lines. There has been great hand-wringing that we are flying terrorist al-Qaida personnel to the U.S. In all probability more have come over the Mexico border in the past eight months. Please implore Congress to resurrect the House Un-American Activities Committee . I pray that God will save this once great, proud but now failing nation. The blind cannot see what they cannot see. Richwood, TX (77531) Today Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 79F. Winds light and variable.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 79F. Winds light and variable. Patrick Kopke pleaded no contest Tuesday to three charges stemming from theft he committed as the Nebraska State Fairs financial officer in 2019. Kopke pleaded no contest to three charges of theft by unlawful taking totaling $5,000 or more, which is a Class IIA felony. Hall County District Court Judge Andrew Butler accepted the plea and ordered a presentence investigation. Kopke, 30, will be sentenced at 9 a.m. Oct. 22. The sentencing will include a restitution hearing. Class IIA felonies carry a possible punishment of up to 20 years in prison. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Kopkes attorney, Justin Kalemkiarian of Lincoln, said no deal was reached. There was no plea agreement, but he did plead no contest, Kalemkiarian said Wednesday. In court Tuesday, Kalemkiarian said, the attorney told the judge that Mr. Kopke did not want to drag the State Fair Board through a trial and did not want to cost the state the expense of going to trial, flying in witnesses, and did not want to use the courts resources on a trial. He wanted to take full responsibility for his actions. The theft was committed in February, July and September 2019. ISABELLA, Minn. (AP) Officials in the Superior National Forest said Thursday that the ongoing drought has created tinderbox conditions in northeastern Minnesota as firefighters continue to battle an uncontained wildfire, while rain that's expected to fall in coming days is unlikely to provide much help to crews who are growing tired. Crews have been working on fighting and suppressing wildfires since the spring, and Minnesota's wildfire season is not likely to end until snowfall. These are just tinderbox conditions, Superior National Forest Supervisor Connie Cummins said during a situation update for Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith and Gov. Tim Walz. The Greenwood Lake fire has already burned 25,991 acres (40.61 square miles) in Minnesota's Arrowhead region. Incident Commander Brian Pisarek said 12 seasonal homes or cabins are among the more than 50 structures that have been lost. Pisarek said about 300 people are currently evacuated. We got a little bit of rain today so we dont expect much fire growth today, he said Thursday, adding that firefighters are using the day to prepare for winds that are expected to come on Monday. So far, more than 400 firefighters are working to contain the fires, and more help has been requested. Fog My neighbors, who are wonderful people, had family over yesterday and they asked me to come over and man the camera for a group portrait. I was happy to be asked. Ginny just wanted me to take a few pictures with her phone, which I did, but I also brought my X-T1 along as...backup?! It was hot and the air was extremely humid. Just from taking the magic 50 (meaning, the XF 35mm /1.4) out of the air conditioning into the humidity, the lens fogged over! I had to wipe it off twice. Which just goes to show, it's always something. I've had lenses fog up when I bring them indoors from intense cold (tip: put camera and lens into a couple of plastic baggies before coming inside), but never the other way around before. Both the phone and Fuji pictures "turned out" very nicely. Lulu I should mention that Lulu died last Friday. It went about as well as it possibly could haveshe was relaxed and supported and not in any kind of distress. I could write a 5,000-word essay on the experience but I thought there might be a few of you who might want to know. It's been very different around our house this week. She had a good life and a good and timely death, for which I'm grateful. I miss her. After months of getting up in the middle of the night to take her out I'm having difficult relearning how to sleep through the night. I'll keep trying. Melt-in-your-mouth melon In food news, I scored a coup yesterdayHoneybee Dave from up the hill (you remember Dave) let it out that he knows who grows the best melons in the whole area. When Dave makes a pronouncement like that, my ears perk up. I got the directions to a Mennonite farm and got over there yesterday and bought two cantaloupe. The farmer (no picture, because Mennonite) explained to me in detail how to choose good ones. Well, they didn't look like much, but [eyes widen] I've now tasted the grail of cantaloupelordy, lordy. Melt-in-your-mouth and bursting with glorious complex flavor. A different level altogether from the supermarket version. I get to have the second one for breakfast as soon as I finish this*. And I got to taste Dave's own "Standish Stilton" homemade cheese, too. Another incredibly complex flavor, another rare treat. Life is good, and goes on. Mike *It was just as good. My word. ADDENDUM: Darn, I forgot to mention this. Remember that Solar Seiko I bought in June? (Quartz watch, runs off a battery recharged by light so you never have to change the battery.) It's been running for two months and four days now, and it's not yet a full second slow. My other Seiko has been running for a little less than two months, and it isn't a whole second off either, but it's fast. Considering that Seiko claims an accuracy of 15 to 20 seconds a month, both these very ordinary watches are far exceeding their spec so far. Book o' the Week Bystander: A History of Street Photography by Colin Westerbeck and Joel Meyerowitz (Laurence King Publishing, 2017). First published in 1994. In this revised edition, the story of street photography is brought up to date with a re-evaluation of some historical material, the inclusion of more contemporary photographers, and a discussion of the ongoing rise of digital photography. The above is a link to Amazon from TOP. Here's Bystander at The Book Depository. The following logo is also a link: Original contents copyright 2020 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.) Featured Comments from: Nicholas Hartmann: "So sorry to hear about Lulu. Maybe it went as well as it could have, but Im sure it still wasnt good. Treasure Butters, and all your two- and four-legged friends. Byu the way today is National Dog Day (our dog thinks that every day is National Dog Day, and that the particular dog being honored is him)." Mike replies: Thanks to you and to everyone for the kind thoughts. I only wish my brother had been as lucky...to have lived to a ripe old age and then be spared suffering. Robert Roaldi: "I'm 68 and I've probably never gone more than two or three days since childhood without eating cantaloupe, although I sometimes substitute other melons. It's probably only during vacations that I don't eat them because fruit is rarely on restaurant menus. I don't eat dessert; fresh fruit is my dessert. I know people who rarely eat fresh fruitI find that bizarre. I'm saddened to hear about Lulu." Starting Sept. 1, Texans ages 21 and older will be allowed carry handguns without training or a license as long as they are not legally prevented from doing so. Gov. Greg Abbott said the law protects American gun rights. Some law enforcement officers worried the law may increase crime rates while putting officers and civilians in danger. Do you support Texas becoming a constitutional carry state? You voted: The best bang for your buck! This option enables you to purchase online 24/7 access and receive the Sunday, Tuesday & Thursday print edition at no additional cost * Print edition only available in our carrier delivery area. Allow up to 72 hours for delivery of your print edition to begin. Print edition not available for Day Pass option. CARBONDALE SIU Chancellor Austin Lanes worst nightmare came in the form of a phone call in the middle of the night Sunday when he learned one of his own a freshman was taken from this earth too soon. This is what we all fear the most; they don't teach any of us how to handle moments like this, Lane said Wednesday. I received a call from our chief of police at 3:47 a.m. as soon as I saw his name I knew something was wrong. For a third time this week, a community came together to mourn the death of 18-year-old Keeshanna Jackson, the SIU student killed by gunfire on Cherry Street over the weekend. This time, it was Wednesday in the Student Center Ballrooms and they did so through music, tears and the encouraging words from Carbondales faith community. In the days prior, more than 200 gathered at a candlelight vigil Sunday night, and dozens attended an anti-violence rally Tuesday in Jackson's honor. Chancellor Austin Lane began crying as he spoke saying the death of a student is his and any other administrators worst nightmare. Lane said Jacksons death was a tragedy. He said those who knew and loved her described her as fun to be around and said she always had something to talk about. But if youre having trouble getting in contact with someone, you can call 311, go to 311.chicago.gov, or download the CHI311 app to request a wellness check by the city. City resources: Public libraries, Park District and cooling centers when theyre open You can go to one of the citys 75 public libraries to cool down libraries have different hours of operation, so check before you go by looking online or calling ahead. The Chicago Park District also has 30 field houses you can hang out in, according to a news release, and there are splash pads and pools. You can search for water parks, splash pads and swimming pools at the Park District website: chicagoparkdistrict.com. Some pools and parks may be closed, so its best to call ahead. A list of Park District cooling centers can also be found on its website. The city also has six cooling centers and deploys cooling buses, which are available when the Office of Emergency Management and Communications heat warning plan is activated, according to OEMC spokesperson Mary May. Among the motions are two separate other acts motions, with the state asking that it be allowed to present to the jury two past incidents involving Rittenhouse, one in which includes a video that shows a person the state identifies as Rittenhouse punching a girl during a dispute on Kenoshas lakefront, along with another video in which a voice can be heard which the state identities as that of Rittenhouse. In that video, the person the state identifies as Rittenhouse says Bro, I wish I had my (expletive) AR, Id start shooting rounds at them, while the video shows several people leaving a CVS pharmacy. According to the state motion, the video was taken two weeks before Rittenhouse admitted he shot the three men. According to the state, Rittenhouse believed the people in the CVS video were shoplifting. For the bills that are vetoed, lawmakers will return in the fall to consider overrides or acceptance of the governors changes. Most of the remaining 82 bills were sent to him at the end of June, so the 60-day clock coincides with the end of this week for all but a few of them. Below are a few of the bills he has acted on in recent days. Other bill action Sex education: Pritzker on Friday signed Senate Bill 818, which creates a new personal health and safety curriculum for grades K-5, and a sexual health education curriculum for grades 6-12. The bill received resistance from Republican lawmakers and religious groups for its culturally appropriate guidelines, including education on gender identities, different types of families, sexual orientation, consent and a womans options during pregnancy. Parents can opt their students out of the coursework without penalty, and each individual school district may determine whether it will teach sex education. If a district offers the subject, the curriculum must use all or part of the curriculum established by the bill. The actual statewide curriculum would be developed by the Illinois State Board of Education by Aug. 1, 2022. Families and advocates of two inmates who died in separate events in the Iroquois County Jail in Watseka last year will demand answers at a protest in Springfield Thursday. The gathering will take place at noon at Comer Cox Park. Protesters are expected to march to the Illinois State Police headquarters at 801 S. Seventh St., stopping at the Sangamon County Jail at the Sangamon County complex on the way. That is where Jaimeson Cody, 39, of Divernon fell unresponsive after correctional officers used Tasers when Cody resisted health checks and attempts to handcuff him on April 27. Cody was taken to Memorial Medical Center where he was pronounced dead just after 4:30 a.m. the next day. Cody's death was classified as a homicide by Sangamon County Coroner Jim Allmon with the official cause of death listed as "restraint asphyxia in the setting of methamphetamine intoxication." Mya Hendrix of the Illinois Prisoner Rights Coalition said a representative from Education and Action Together was scheduled to speak about Cody at the rally. A representative from EAT referred a State Journal-Register reporter back to Hendrix. And then consider what a disheartening sentence that is in 2021. Youd think that fight was won long ago. And in a sense, it was. It was won in 1870 with ratification of the 15th Amendment. It was won in 1915 when the Supreme Court struck down the so-called grandfather clause. It was won in 1965 with passage of the Voting Rights Act. Now we are required to win it yet again, eight years after the Supreme Court tore the heart out of the Voting Rights Act, with gleeful Republicans passing new laws designed to suppress the Black vote. Progress shadowed by setback. Dreams deferred. It is the story of our lives. Im tired, said the great man, in an America so long past that telephones had rotary dials, TV was in black-and-white and Barack Obama was a 5-year-old boy living in Hawaii. And indeed, there was about King a palpable exhaustion as he addressed that America, standing there in shirt sleeves, face puffy, mopping at sweat that trickled down his neck, describing how it felt to live under constant threat of death. I must confess, Im tired, he said yet again. Given the shipping crisis, the added costs are too much. Every dollar were spending to pay the added costs of tariffs is another dollar we cant reinvest in our employees and our business. And now, even despite acknowledging in the past that the trade war was harmful and shortsighted, President Joe Biden has so far failed to bring it to an end. Its unsustainable, and President Biden needs to work with United States Trade Representative Katherine Tai to repeal the tariffs that are still in effect. It is a simple fact that Americans are buying more goods from Asia than ever as our appetite for imported merchandise continues to grow. Attempts to stem the growth of imports in favor of domestic products the trade war chief among them have failed. Despite this, importers are still being forced to pay double and triple what they normally would to get the goods that Americans demand, thanks to the taxes created by the tariffs. The Biden administration needs to show it is prepared to relieve small businesses of the additional taxes theyre paying when importing Chinese goods the very goods that American consumers crave. Elden also wants any new versions of the album altered. If there is a 30th anniversary re-release, he wants for the entire world not to see his genitals, Mabie said. When the cover was shot, Nirvana was a little-known grunge band with no sense they were making a generation-defining album in Nevermind," their first major label release, whose songs included Smells Like Teen Spirit, Come as You Are and Lithium. Elden's father was a friend of the photographer, Kirk Weddle, who took pictures of several swimming babies in several scenarios at the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center in Pasadena, California. Cobain chose the image depicting Spencer like a sex worker grabbing for a dollar bill that is positioned dangling from a fishhook in front of his nude body with his penis explicitly displayed, the lawsuit says. Elden has recreated the image several times, always with clothes or swim trunks on, for anniversaries of the album's release, and he has expressed mixed feelings about it in interviews that have grown increasingly negative through the years. He told the New York Post in 2015 that it was cool but weird to be part of something so important that I dont even remember. He added, Itd be nice to have a quarter for every person that has seen my baby penis." Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 To honor South Carolina State Universitys 125 years of education and service, Interim President Alexander Conyers on Wednesday issued a special $1.25 million challenge to the universitys supporters. Lets face it. Students today now have more choices than theyve ever had, Conyers said in announcing the campaign. So its up to us to do our very best to create a unique experience that not only attracts the student, but one that makes parents feel good about the decision their student is making to attend SC State. We are ever so mindful that in order to implement these various initiatives we need money. So today I am proud to announce the kickoff of a $1.25 million campaign, Conyers said. Borrowing a phrase from the universitys Alma Mater, the theme for the campaign is Ready All to Do and Dare, a rally call to action. At SC State, the campus community does what it takes to succeed and dares to go beyond expectations. How many of those same talking heads even mention that the Taliban offered to turn over bin Laden upon presentation of evidence that he was behind the 9/11 attacks? Or that then-President George W. Bush declined the offer and chose to invade anyway? Any? It's not just Afghanistan or foreign policy. From the delta variant panic-pandering of "public health authorities" and mainstream media, one wouldn't know that COVID-19 deaths in the US are at a quarter of their pandemic high. Or, given the constant emphasis on "the chillllllllllldren," that COVID-19 has killed fewer than 400 Americans (out of a total of nearly 625,000) in the under-18 age bracket since the pandemic began. Those "public health authorities," with the aid of compliant media, have given themselves whiplash over the last 18 months from constantly reversing themselves on policy and science, entreating us all to trust them and hide under our beds. No Ministry of Truth had to "rectify" the public record to put these whoppers over on us. The information is freely available and easily accessible. But the mainstream media either don't want us to know it, or can't be bothered to know it themselves. And, for the most part, the same is true of the rest of us. As Orwell's language framers would put it, "doubleplusungood." Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 "This technology is not a silver bullet that will get rid of all illegal robocalls but it will reduce them and allow you to feel more comfortable knowing who's calling you," Wilson said. "But right now, smaller companies don't have to implement it until June 30, 2023, even if they do a high volume of illegal robocalls. That's a loophole we need to close as quickly as possible." The attorneys general say some of the smaller phone companies are benefitting from the extension and are also responsible for originating or facilitating high volumes of illegal robocalls that spam Americans and lead to financial or personal data loss. Without the STIR/SHAKEN technology in place, these smaller companies are failing to take a necessary step to minimize the continued onslaught of illegally spoofed robocalls that harm residents. While the hope is the call to the FCC will not fall on deaf ears and action will be forthcoming, the battle against robocalls is a daily one that will continue even with the new technology fully in place. Here are ways consumers can avoid becoming victims of robocall schemes: Hang up the phone. Don't press one to speak to a live operator. And don't press any other number to get off the list. If you respond by pressing any number, it will probably just lead to more robocalls. This subscription will allow existing subscribers of The World to access all of our online content, including the E-Editions area. NOTE: To claim your access to the site, you will need to enter the Last Name and First Name that is tied to your subscription in this format: SMITH, JOHN If you need help with exactly how your specific name needs be entered, please email us at admin@countrymedia.net or call us at 1-541 266 6047. The most recent data on vaccinations shows a higher percentage of incarcerated people have been inoculated against COVID-19 than the staff working in the states prisons. Kentucky and Texas joined a growing list of states that are seeing record numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in a surge that is overwhelming doctors and nurses and afflicting more children. Intensive care units around the nation are packed with patients extremely ill with the coronavirus even in places where hospitalizations have not yet reached earlier peaks. The ICU units at Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital in Georgia typically have room for 38 patients, and doctors and nurses may have only two or three people who are very sick, said Dr. Jyotir Mehta, medical director of the ICU. On Wednesday, the ICU had 50 COVID-19 patients alone, roughly half of them relying on ventilators to breathe. I dont think we have experienced this much critical illness in folks, so many people sick at the same time, Mehta said. He said talking to family members is difficult. They are grasping for every hope and youre trying to tell them, Look, its bad,' he said. You have to tell them that your loved one is not going to make it. In New Mexico, top health officials warned Wednesday that the state is about a week away from rationing health care. The number of coronavirus patients needing care at hospitals jumped more than 20% in a day. PIERRE, S.D. South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg will avoid a trial and take a plea deal on misdemeanor traffic charges in a crash last year in which he hit and killed a man who was walking along a rural highway, a prosecutor said Wednesday. Beadle County States Attorney Michael Moore, who is one of two prosecutors on the case, told The Associated Press that there wont be a trial and there will be a plea entered, but he declined to discuss further details of the arrangement. The plea will be entered Thursday, when Ravnsborgs trial was scheduled to begin, he said. Moore said a judges order that bars state officials from discussing details of the investigation prevented him from disclosing further details. The attorney generals office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Ravnsborg, the states top law enforcement officer, was charged with three misdemeanors that each carry sentences of up to 30 days in jail and up to a $500 fine. The widow of Joseph Boever, the man who was killed at age 55, has indicated that she plans to file a wrongful death lawsuit against the attorney general. When it comes to COVID precautions inside the state facilities, Martin said most of the departments protocol which aligns with guidance for prisons set out by the Centers for Disease Control has stayed the same throughout the pandemic. Sanitation, distancing, face coverings and other PPE are still in effect. The only policy relaxed in recent months, Martin said, was to begin allowing some in-person visits this summer, as long as residents and visitors were separated by plastic barriers. In late July, an inmate at the Wyoming Honor Farm confirmed in a letter to the Star-Tribune that visitation had slightly opened up, after months of only video visits (The Star-Tribune is aware of this persons identity, but has chosen to preserve their anonymity out of fear of retaliation). They also said that masks continue to be required for anyone inside the facilities, and can only be taken off outside if you are at least six feet away from anyone. An internal memo obtained by the Star-Tribune dated July 23 shows quarantine protocol for a unit in WMCI. During quarantine, which lasts for 14 days after a resident of a certain unit tests positive, meals and commissary items are delivered to cells directly. Video visits are also cancelled while a resident is in active quarantine. Three Wyoming inmates have died from the coronavirus, according to WDOC. The deaths came during the winter spike in cases, after months of Wyoming being among only a handful of states without an inmate COVID death. Now, according to data from the Marshall Project, just four states have seen fewer deaths among prison residents related to the coronavirus. Follow city and crime reporter Ellen Gerst on Twitter at @ellengerst. Concerned about COVID-19? Sign up now to get the most recent coronavirus headlines and other important local and national news sent to your email inbox daily. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. In recent weeks, the topic of election integrity has even become a wedge issue between U.S. House candidates Sen. Anthony Bouchard (R-Cheyenne) who has contested claims of rampant voter fraud in Wyomings elections and Rep. Chuck Gray (R-Casper), who mounted an unsuccessful effort to bring the Wyoming Department of Audit under Legislative oversight for the purpose of auditing elections. Bouchard is a traitor, one member of the Telegram group wrote. Totally agree, another responded. I think we are to flood Chuck gray with phone calls. He is the one that went to Arizona. Rep. Dan Laursen (R-Powell), who is supportive of national election integrity efforts, traveled to South Dakota earlier this month to attend Lindells symposium. What Lindell produced during the forum even if only halfway or a little bit true should be concerning to everyone, Laursen said. Even the slightest bit of doubt should be enough to compel an audit, he said. Would it be wise for us to at least do one? It might be, Laursen, a member of the Wyoming House Freedom Caucus, said. I dont know if the Secretary of State would ever be interested. To put peoples minds to ease Its pretty darn important, I think. The biggest dangers, Gierau said, are signals from elected officials boosting irresponsible allegations. CODY (Aug. 18) Despite all of the efforts the newly formed Wyoming Wildlife Task Force has made this summer, we doubt there will be many changes to Wyoming Game & Fish policies. The Task Force has been touring the state conducting public forums to see how the public feels about some of these issues. We applaud the G&F for discussing these issues even if no changes are made. Lee Livingston, one of the local representatives on the Task Force, said the biggest concern voiced by the public this summer is the proposal under consideration to alter the dispersal for licenses of the big five game species to a 90% resident/10% non-resident allocation. Currently the regulations for the big five bighorn sheep, moose, mountain goat, bison and grizzly bear - are allocated 75%resident/25% non-resident. Resident hunters, of course, want the change to make more licenses available to them. Arguments good arguments can be made to support the current ratio as it provides good tourism-related jobs in the non-peak season. AS majority State-owned First Citizens Bank (FCB) ponders whether to participate in the new Additional Public Offering of shares in publicly listed Barita Investments Ltd, dozens of financial executives in Jamaica are more concerned to find out the details of a company called Barita Finance. I never knew I was being abused... There was no hitting, no drinking, no cussing Nah that wasnt abuse; it wasnt happening because he was a pundit- so I would think. He was God sent. But yet still I always felt unworthy; I always felt abandoned Do you have a news tip? Want to share good news story, or do you have information that should see the light of day? Then we want to hear from you. More here Tucson Airport Authority: The Arizona Airports Association awarded Tucson Airport Authoritys Mike Smejkal its Presidents Award. Smejkal is the vice president of planning and engineering for TAA, leading a team that completes the TAAs planning, environmental, design and construction projects for Tucson International Airport and Ryan Field. He previously served as the senior director of development services and director of engineering for the TAA. Before joining the TAA, Smejkal was a project manager and engineer for a Midwest-based consulting engineering firm. The AzAA honor is representative of the lasting positive impact Smejkal has made with the TAA, a news release said. Vantage West: Vantage West Credit Union was awarded a $1.8 million grant from the Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) Fund. The credit union will use the grant to support community credit needs amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Vantage West received the highest dollar amount possible and was one of only four Arizona credit unions to receive an award. The credit union will deploy the grant funding over the next 18-24 months. The U.S. Department of the Treasury distributes CDFI grant funds to expand credit and financial services through a network of financial institutions who have demonstrated a commitment to underserved markets and populations. Founded on the belief that healthcare should be simpler, more affordable and a whole lot more caring, Devoted Health is a next-generation Medicare Advantage (MA) plan working to dramatically improve the health & well-being of older Americans. Devoted Health combines the capabilities of both an insurance plan and a provider of healthcare (payvidor) with a proprietary software platform that helps deliver exceptional service and the best people-powered support to its members. Devoted Health partners with top doctors and hospitals, uses industry-leading technology, and goes beyond a traditional health plan model with a staff of dedicated health guides who help every member get the highest quality care - the right care in the right place at the right time. Dramatically improving the health and well-being of older Americans by treating every member as we would our own family, Devoted Health is one of the fastest-growing Medicare Advantage (MA) plans in the United States, currently available to members in Arizona, Florida, Texas and Ohio. For more information, go to www.devoted.com or follow us on Twitter @DevotedHealth. Elizabeth O'Brien, FLG CEO, says, "FLG is pleased to serve as a solutions-based instructional design partner for University of Phoenix. On Women's Equality Day, and every day that follows, we are committed to creating economic opportunities for military spouses, which is a population that is 92% female. We look forward to creating pathways together for this population with University of Phoenix." National Womens Equality Day is celebrated each year to recognize the hard work and sacrifice that went into the passing of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. In 1971, August 26th was established as National Womens Equality Day. Since then, this annual day of recognition reminds us of the struggles women have faced and continue to face, including in the workplace. In fact, University of Phoenixs 2021 Career Optimism Index found that 30% of women, in particular those with dependents, associate stress with their careers, and 52% of these women want to develop their career skillsets, but dont know where to begin. Additionally, a recent Harris Poll commissioned by the University shares more of the inequity story. That study found 38% of women continue to feel that equal pay is out of reach and that men have more access to opportunities for advancement, like getting a raise or leading high-profile projects. Lee was taken to a local hospital with a gunshot wound to the arm, a non-life-threatening injury. Jove was not hurt in the incident. Tucson Police Chief Chris Magnus described Lee's release without bond as beyond frustrating in a tweet Wednesday morning. Mike Storie, who represents the Tucson Police Officers Association, agreed with Magnus. This is insanity, Storie said. Ive never seen anything like it. Now weve released that guy with literally zero supervision and released the sergeants name. Lees release comes the same week the Pima County Attorneys Office unveiled a set of principles that will lead away from cash bail. According to a press release from the Pima County Attorneys Office, if an arrestee poses an ongoing threat to the community, they should be held. If the arrestee does not pose an ongoing threat, prosecutors will recommend release from custody and articulate the conditions of release that will assist the person in returning for their next court date. When asked for a comment, the Tucson City Court, the Superior Court and the Pima County Attorneys Office all said they do not comment on pending cases. After the deadline for city of Tucson workers to prove theyve been vaccinated passed on Tuesday, 354 employees could face a five-day, unpaid suspension for not getting a vaccine, according to the city. In a 6-1 vote Aug. 13, the City Council decided to make COVID-19 vaccinations mandatory for all city employees. The ordinance required all unvaccinated employees to provide proof of at least their first vaccine dose by Aug. 24 or face a five-day suspension. The ordinance was approved with the caveat that if 750 unvaccinated employees submitted proof of at least their first vaccination by Aug. 20, the mandate wouldnt go into effect. That didnt happen, and now the citys human resources department is working out the logistics of imposing suspensions while verifying requests for exemptions. The citys employee vaccination data shows 830 full-time and 70 part-time employees are unvaccinated about 21% of the total workforce. The city said 96 full-time and 124 part-time employees did not submit attestation forms to prove their vaccination status. According to the city, 12%, or 546 employees, of the citys 4,390-member workforce submitted exemption requests for medical or religious reasons the mandate allows for. Army Sgt. 1st Class Frank G. Vejar was 19 years old when he was killed in the Korean War. The Douglas soldier was accounted for nearly 70 years later. Vejars remains will be returned to Douglas for burial, Department of Defense officials said Tuesday. The date has yet to be determined. The soldiers remains were accounted for April 14, 2020, but his family only recently received its full briefing on his identification, officials said. His relatives could not be reached for comment. On Nov. 30, 1950, Vejar was a member of Heavy Mortar Company, 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division. The teen-ager was reported missing in action when his unit was attacked by Chinese Communist forces near the Chosin Reservoir, North Korea. Following the battle, he was not recovered at the time, and he was not identified among remains returned to the U.S. immediately after the war, officials said. Bessel said most of the patients are in the 20- to 60-year-old range. Thats in sharp contrast to early in the pandemic when it was seniors, those 65 and up, filling the beds, she said. We believe that this, of course, is directly related to the vaccination rates of those that are in that age group of 65-plus, she said, who were early priorities and have a vaccination rate that is quite high. Among patients with COVID currently hospitalized at Banner, 96% are unvaccinated. Bessel used that factor to urge others to roll up their sleeves. Elective patients and revenues Last year, facing high occupancy rates at hospitals, Gov. Doug Ducey ordered the facilities to halt elective procedures to preserve bed space for patients with COVID and other ailments that required immediate care. Ward said at the time that the hospitals agreed with Duceys order. However, it is having dire financial consequences, she said then, as hospitals lost revenue from more lucrative procedures such as knee surgeries and hip replacements. Thats a lot of financial bleeding thats happening. Tucson restaurateur Carlotta Flores was in the middle of a dental exam earlier this month when she got the news. Forbes magazine had named her one of its 50 Over 50 women in business who arent letting age slow them down. So very humbling, Flores, who heads her familys Si Charro restaurant group that includes the flagship El Charro Cafe, said of making Forbes Vision list of women making a difference in society and culture through health care, the arts and other areas. It is one of four 50 Over 50 lists compiled by the business magazine from more than 10,000 nominations it received early this year. Flores, 74, is in prestigious company that includes fashion designer Eileen Fisher, Google engineering Vice President Marian Croak, actress and activist Geena Davis, ABC News President Kimberly Godwin and Texas oil company owner Marsha Hendler. I represent a lot of women that maybe theyre not Kamala Harris, but maybe, in their own life, they are, Flores said. Vice President Harris was included in the initial list, released in June, that also had Miami Marlins GM Kim Ng, BioNTech biochemist and Senior VP Katalin Kariko, Walgreens CEO Rosalind Brewer and Greys Anatomy producer/creator/screenwriter Shonda Rhimes. Former Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, Equality Now Global Executive Director Yasmeen Hassan and Library of Congress librarian Carla Hayden are on the Impact list, released in July; a fourth list, dubbed Investment, is coming out soon. Forbes teamed up with MSNBC Morning Joe cohost Mika Brzezinskis Know Your Value movement last December to launch the magazines 50 Over 50 project highlighting women over 50 who have achieved significant success later in life and are continuing to make an impact. Initially, the magazine was going to create a single list, but after the overwhelming response, it expanded the project to highlight more women. Flores appears to be the only restaurateur so far to be included after being nominated by her longtime friend Gloria Alvillar and longtime admirer Rosalie Crowe. The pair also tapped Tucson publicist Norma Gentry, who works with Si Charro, to help compile information for the nomination. Nominating Flores was Crowes idea and it came two days before the March 1 deadline. Crowe said she had been watching Brzezinski on Morning Joe when the host announced the fast-approaching deadline. I was thinking we ought to get someone from out here, not just your standard CEOs. And I thought of Carlotta right away, said Crowe, a retired journalist who knows Flores through their volunteer work with the University of Arizona Chicano/Hispanic Student Affairs & Resource Center. The trio scrambled to put together a convincing argument that Flores deserved to be recognized. Alvillar sent the nomination with just hours to spare. As soon as she hit send on her computer, she realized she had left off information about the number of employees 400 now, 500 pre-pandemic that Flores has and the number of restaurants, which also includes licensing agreements for their brands at several airports and MGM Grand Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. Alvillar, who worked for 30 years at the University of Arizona including leadership roles in facilities management and University Libraries, called Forbes editor Maggie McGrath to see if she could amend the nomination. While she had the New York editor on the phone, Alvillar gushed about Flores and Tucson and invited McGrath to visit. I told her we are the UNESCO City of Gastronomy. We will take you around. You will not only eat at El Charro, we will take you to all of the restaurants. Youre just going to have a ball here, Alvillar recalled of the conversation. I said, Youve got to meet (Flores). You give us so few words to tell you about the magic of this woman and this city. I wanted her to know that this is just an amazing, amazing person. Flores said the nomination took her by surprise, even though she had spoken with McGrath two days before the list was announced on Aug. 12. McGrath told Flores she was a finalist and interviewed her. Flores chalked up the experience initially as just one more best-of list that will probably come with an ask for some nominal fee as so many national listings do. But when the news of the lists hit social media, Flores said she realized it was legit. I cant grasp it totally yet, she added. Flores and the other nominees share one thing in common: A pay-it-forward mindset and resolve to work to solve some of societys biggest issues, including health care access for all, food security, rights for the differently-abled and much more, McGrath said in a written statement. Flores has been paying it forward since she took over El Charro in 1972 from her aunt Monica Flinn, El Charros founder. Flinn had run the restaurant since opening it in 1922 and at age 90 was looking for her successor. Flores and her husband, Ray Sr., came home from California with their two young children their daughter was born a year or so later in Tucson to take over the restaurant. Even in the early days, Floress son Ray said his mother was involved in the community, serving on boards and volunteering her time and the restaurants food to charitable events. My mom would always tell me sometimes you have to give more than you get if you want to get somewhere, said Ray Flores, who helps run the family business. My mom volunteered constantly, she was on boards constantly. She just got engaged. She was always involved. Looking at her story and history of building something, of course you look up to her, said Maria Mazon, chef-owner of Boca Tacos y Tequila who has been leaving her own mark on Tucsons culinary landscape in recent years. Oh shoot, she did it! And now that the times are hard, she keeps opening and reinventing what she built. Its what she built that got her where shes at. She deserves it, Mazon added. When you are building something, you dont think about in the future. Imagine what she just dreamed up and look what she has now. Contact reporter Cathalena E. Burch at cburch@tucson.com. On Twitter @Starburch Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Outside the courthouse, he said, Were on the front end of this. Well see what develops as I begin to go through discovery and I figure out what the facts are. Demps was charged last week with one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud, 35 counts of wire fraud and 34 of interstate transportation of stolen property. The indictment accuses him of writing clerk's office checks to accomplices who cashed them at Columbus banks. Much of the money is still unaccounted for, Hyde said. The detention motion filed last week said Demps wired or caused to be wired over $500,000 to various locations in Africa between 2010 and 2018. The money primarily went to Africa, and Cameroon specifically," Furtak testified. She said it went to 40 people in countries including Nigeria, Senegal, Gabon, Gambia, Ecuador and Canada. Furtek said Demps wired money so often that Western Union eventually refused his business, suspecting him of laundering money. Demps then began having others wire money for him, and sending it through another service or from an account of his own in Columbus, Furtek said. Owners of stolen or impounded vehicles have to pay towing costs and storage fees before their vehicles are returned. It is a system fraught with potential for abuse, Duggan said. The amounts of money that are involved are just breeding potential for abuse. Since 2017, the city has terminated contracts with some companies and changed the practice where a company could find a stolen vehicle and then claim the tow work, Duggan said. We had evidence that it appears some of the towers were in cahoots with the car thieves, he said. After we stopped that practice, the car theft rate dropped significantly. Duggan said he will withhold judgment until he sees what develops from Wednesday's searches, but added that no one has been charged. Its never good when the Feds are delivering search warrants, he said, adding that the FBI has not shared any details of their investigation with him. In 2018, Fiore, of Grosse Pointe Shores, was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison for his role in the bribing of a suburban official for help with a municipal towing contract. If you have a dinner party that you plan to have for three people, and 30,000 people show up, youre going to have a problem, U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee, who oversees the decades-old settlement agreement that governs custody conditions for the children, said at a recent hearing. The infrastructure is not set up for tens of thousands of people coming in at one time, and somehow the paradigm has to shift to figure out how to deal with these types of numbers. U.S. border authorities reported more than 18,000 encounters with unaccompanied immigrant children in July, up 24% from a month earlier. The rise comes in the busiest month yet for the Biden administration on the border, with a total of nearly 200,000 encounters even though crossings are typically expected to slow during the summer. According to a government report in early August, the Department of Health and Human Services had nearly 15,000 children in its care but only 11,000 licensed shelter beds for the immigrant children. Using large-scale facilities can fill this gap, though advocates said the government would do better by expanding licensed shelters where children are given case workers, recreation and six hours of education on each weekday. Novak said that the law cited in the complaint makes a contempt charge the only remedy. But with the legislature not in session, he said, there is no authority to file such charges. Brnovich, however, said that isn't the case. He pointed out that there were prior subpoenas for some of the same materials, including one set issued in January when lawmakers were in session. And Brnovich noted that a trial judge rejected arguments at that point from the county that the subpoenas were not valid, concluding that the Senate has the right to what it determines is necessary for its own investigations. "Assessing electoral integrity, examining potential legislative reforms to the electoral process, confirming the accuracy and efficacy of vote tabulation systems, investigating whether to modify or improve powers delegated to a county, and evaluating the competence of county officials in performing their election duties each constitute a valid legislative purpose," Brnovich wrote, quoting from the trial judge. And he said that is true even if one of the original purposes of subpoenas issued as far back as December were to see if the election results could be challenged. SEOUL, South Korea (AP) South Koreas vice defense minister on Thursday called for North Korea to resume cooperation under a 2018 military agreement on reducing tensions, which the North has threatened to abandon over U.S.-South Korean military exercises. The agreement, which created buffer zones along land and sea boundaries and no-fly zones above the border to prevent clashes, has been crucial in maintaining stability between the Koreas as their relations worsened in recent months, Vice Defense Minister Park Jae-min said in an interview with The Associated Press. While there havent been major skirmishes, North Korea has held back from some critical parts of the agreement, including forming a joint military committee to maintain communication and avoid crisis situations and jointly searching for remains from the 1950-53 Korean War. Since the collapse of its nuclear diplomacy with the Trump administration in 2019, North Korea has suspended all cooperation with South Korea and threatened to scrap the inter-Korean military agreement while expressing anger over the Souths joint military exercises with the United States, which it insists are invasion rehearsals. The allies describe the drills as defensive in nature but have downsized them in the past few years to provide space for diplomacy and because of COVID-19. LONDON (AP) A former Royal Marine who runs an animal charity in Afghanistan said Thursday that he, his Afghan staff and dozens of dogs and cats were caught in the chaotic aftermath of a suicide attack outside Kabuls airport as they sought to get a flight out of the country before evacuation efforts end. The attack involving two explosions and gunfire hit near a gate where people gathered attempting to get into the airport. At least 13 people were killed, and U.S. officials said American troops were among the injured. Were fine but everything is chaos here at the moment, Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47." Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with about 200 of the groups rescued animals. OPINION: "The "Tucson Fight For 15 is a bad bill for Tucson. Now is the time for us to take a hard look at our future. Will there be opportunities for our children? Grandchildren?" writes Tucson business owner Joshua Jacobsen. Heres what the bill actually says: schools cant force students to learn that they are inherently bad because they are a certain race. Schools cant discourage students from treating people of every race equally. Every requirement of the law falls into one of those two categories. It specifically allows the teaching of historical facts, including any atrocity perpetrated by one race on another. It does forbid teachers from asserting that past atrocities by one race make current members of that race responsible for those atrocities, or predisposed to committing them again. Students of every race deserve the opportunity to forge their own path, free of racial baggage. While that may still be a dream, further burdening them at the schools they are required to attend is not the solution. Tulsa Public Schools Carnegie Elementary School will be closed for a second day Friday due to staff absences. A decision about Mondays classes will be made by 5 p.m. Sunday. If the campus remains closed beyond Friday, families will have the opportunity to pick up their students Chromebooks and chargers for distance learning, according to a letter from the schools principal, Krista Blanche. Drive-through meal service will be available for Carnegie students outside the school building from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Friday. Seven of Carnegies 23 teachers called in sick Thursday and, via a statement, Blanche said she was unable to secure enough substitute teachers or make other arrangements to safely cover those classes. A Tulsa Public Schools spokeswoman said Thursday morning that those absences were not due to close-contact COVID-19 exposure quarantines. Classes start at Carnegie at 7:35 a.m. and the schools only bus stop pickup is scheduled for 7:10 a.m. With teachers scheduled to report for work less than 30 minutes before classes start, notifications started going out to parents about the Thursday closure at 7:14 a.m. via email, text message and Facebook. Jones was convicted of the 1999 murder of Edmond businessman Paul Howell. OConnor asked the court to set a Feb. 10 execution date for James Allen Coddington, who was sentenced to death for the 1997 killing of Albert Hale in Oklahoma County. He also requested that a Dec. 30 execution date be set for Donald Anthony Grant, who was sentenced to death for the 2001 murders of Del City motel workers Brenda McElyea and Suzette Smith. An Oct. 7 date was requested for John Marion Grant, who was sentenced for the 1998 killing of Gay Carter, a prison kitchen worker at the Dick Connor Correctional Center in Hominy. A Dec. 9 execution date was requested for Wade Greely Lay, sentenced to death for the 2004 killing of a Tulsa security guard, Kenny Anderson. The court was also asked to set a Jan. 20 execution date for Gilbert Ray Postelle, who was convicted of killing four people in 2005 outside a trailer in Del City. He received the death penalty for two of the murders. A execution date of Nov. 18 was requested for Bigler Jobe Stouffer, who was sentenced to death for the 1985 killing of Putnam City teacher Linda Reaves. Stonewall Public Schools Superintendent Greg Lovelis told the Tulsa World that Tatum taught at Stonewall Elementary, McLish Middle School, and McLish Public Schools for a total of 21 years total. She absolutely loved teaching and touched a tremendous number of lives during her tenure. Mrs. Tatums love for reading was passed along to many students through her commitment to the Accelerated Reader program at Stonewall Elementary, Lovelis said. When I think about Mrs. Tatum, I think of reading and how her students adored her like a grandmother. Words cant express the sadness I feel for her colleagues, students, and family members. She was so excited for this school year. Tatums page on her schools website includes a personal note to parents, along with her cellphone number and email address in case they ever needed any help from their childs teacher. By a 3-2 count, the Tahlequah school board rejected a resolution Wednesday to join a lawsuit challenging a state law barring public school districts from requiring masks on campus. What we are talking about is not about masking or not masking, board member Ed Myers said. This is whether we want to be a part of a lawsuit against the state of Oklahoma. I was informed by a board member that we have three responsibilities: to hire the superintendent, to set a budget, and to make policy. I dont see this as an issue that we need to be taking on. If at some point in time there is a change of the policy from the state on masking changes, then we can consider whether we can develop a masking policy. Among other provisions, Senate Bill 658 prohibits boards of education for public school districts from enacting a mask requirement unless a state of emergency is declared by Gov. Kevin Stitt for that specific area. The governor has repeatedly said he has no plans to make such a declaration. Filed in Oklahoma County District Court, the lawsuits current plaintiffs include the Oklahoma State Medical Association and a group of parents of children with serious medical conditions who are enrolled in public schools in Tulsa, Broken Arrow and Norman. The Biden administration put Oklahoma on notice Wednesday that a new state prohibition on mask mandates in schools may violate individual student rights and local school districts authority to protect students and employees. Speaking from the White House on Wednesday afternoon, President Joe Biden said he had directed U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona to use his oversight authority or even take legal action if appropriate. Biden said the country needs collaboration in the fight against COVID-19, not politicians capitalizing on the public health crisis by turning mitigation measures into political disputes for their own political gain. He added: Were not going to sit by as governors try to block and intimidate educators protecting our children. On Wednesday, Cardona said he sent communications to Arizona, Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Utah concerning their new state-level prohibitions on universal mask mandates by schools. Yesterdays sentencing is a prime example of an orderly process that preserves public safety and delivers justice in the lawful, appropriate venue, tweeted the Muscogees. The Muscogees later issued a statement challenging Stitt. McGirt is not the biggest problem or threat to Oklahoma, it read. For a very real threat to Oklahoma, no one needs to look further than the effects of COVID-19. The most harmful lie here, though, is the notion that the Supreme Courts McGirt ruling creates a public-safety nightmare for victims and law enforcement. This is false. Every crime in Oklahoma falls under local, state, federal or tribal jurisdiction. No matter where it happens in the state, criminals are arrested, prosecuted and face justice. Cherokee Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. also went after Stitt. Its disappointing to hear a governor of Oklahoma fail to understand the basic facts of the states relationship with tribes, Hoskin said in a written statement. But that is consistent with how he and his new attorney general (OConnor) have approached McGirt: its never been about the facts or about supporting victims, but about undermining tribal sovereignty. With 80% of the money still waiting to be used, the federal government offered new incentives Wednesday for local officials to move faster in distributing emergency rental assistance, but Tulsa already seems well ahead of the curve. Nationwide, officials have distributed only $5.1 billion of the $25 billion in federal stimulus money set aside for people who have fallen behind on rent payments during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new data from the U.S. Treasury. The city of Tulsa, however, has already distributed more than 52% of its share of the federal funds, according to the Treasury, going through the money far faster than most cities. Oklahoma City, for example, has distributed only 28% of its allocation. The pace raises a different question for local officials: If Tulsa is going through the funding so quickly, will the city run out of money before the current Emergency Rental Assistance Program is set to end in September 2022? No one needs to worry, said Jeff Jaynes, the executive director of Restore Hope Ministries, a nonprofit group that is administering Tulsas rental assistance program, or ERAP. Despite Democrat Joe Biden beating Trump by more than 80,000 votes in Pennsylvania, an audit has fast become a Republican litmus test on the crowded campaign trail for governor and U.S. Senate. The state Republican Party has sought to raise money off it while groups supporting an audit have sprung up and begun holding events. Its a very big deal, said Kristine Eng, the chair of Centre County's Republican Party, Corman's home turf. It is something that people really want to start looking into because we all know something wasnt right. So Im glad that our legislators are acknowledging the will of the people and working to do the audit. Meanwhile, state lawmakers are out of step with an idea popular with candidates and county party chairs: repealing the 2019 state law that vastly expanded mail-in voting, even though it would surely be vetoed by Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf. The law, called Act 77, passed with near-unanimous Republican support right before Trump began baselessly attacking mail-in balloting as rife with fraud. McAmis also wrote in the court filing that McGirt previously served just two years of a five-year prison term after he was convicted of sodomizing two young boys in Oklahoma County in a 1988 case and clearly attempted to groom a third boy into compliance. He has single handedly caused a lifetime of damage to multiple young children, McAmis wrote of McGirt. The leniency that the defendant was shown at the time of his first convictions for sexually abusing children obviously served as an ill-effective deterrent. McAmis noted to the judge Wednesday that McGirts lack of remorse for his crimes is stunning. But McGirts attorney, Richard OCarroll, argued in court filings that federal prosecutors were seeking revenge against his client for successfully arguing that the state did not have jurisdiction to try him in the first place. The government disclaims the notion of punishing Mr. McGirt for upending criminal jurisprudence in Oklahoma, still an undercurrent of anger and retribution pervades this case, OCarroll wrote. The Attorney General and county prosecutors are holding rallies blaming the courts. News articles of supposed injustice are in the national media, he continued. He said the rollout will start slowly with 20 to 30 infusions for the first few days and increase, it is hoped, to 200 to 400 infusions a week, Terry said. Oklahoma State Department of Health Chief Medical Officer Dr. Gitanjali Pai said the treatment is FDA authorized for emergency use for those COVID patients who are more likely to get severely ill and require hospitalization. The treatment has been shown to reduce the risk of hospitalization and death when administered early to those with mild to moderate symptoms, Pai said. According to recent studies, these treatments have shown anywhere from a 70 to 85% reduction in going to the hospital or death, Pai said. Factors placing patients at a higher risk for severe symptoms and therefore qualifying them for antibody treatment include some common comorbidities, age of 65 or older, obesity and chronic lung disease. The treatment is not authorized for those who are already hospitalized with COVID or those who may require oxygen due to COVID, she said. Terry said officials will provide a phone number in the near future to schedule the procedure. Moderna has also applied to the FDA for full approval of its vaccine. Johnson & Johnson hopes to do so later this year. There are two basic facts here that lead to an indisputable conclusion: COVID-19 is a potentially deadly disease, and the vaccine is uniquely powerful in protecting against it. Yet just over half of the U.S. population is fully vaccinated. In Oklahoma, its less than 43%. We are frustrated by those who refuse vaccination and other commonsense steps to keep themselves and others safe. The vaccine is free, safe, effective and widely available throughout the United States. People in other nations would desperately grasp at the opportunities that Americans are refusing for no good reason. Refusing to be vaccinated or to wear masks when going into indoor public places allows the virus to continue spreading and offers it opportunities to grow more virulent. Oklahomas seven-day average is 2,271 new cases a day. The disease has killed more than 9,000 Oklahomans. Sadly, more are going to die, and the vast majority of those are people who did not get vaccinated. The administration of Da Nang City in central Vietnam has decided to allow certain markets and grocery stores to reopen in the next few days, provided they follow a new list of social-distancing regulations set out by government officials, deputy chairman Ho Ky Minh said on Wednesday evening. Considering the results of recent COVID-19 testing, authorities will lift a ban on some traditional markets as long as the neighborhoods where the markets are situated are marked as yellow zones, or areas with low risks of infection, and the sellers are from such zones as well. The number of stalls permitted to reopen at each market must not exceed 30 percent of its total stores in order to ensure social distancing. Only vendors who have been inoculated with at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine and have tested negative twice for the coronavirus can work at the markets. These vendors will be retested every three days. Approved markets will be open from 7:00 am to 11:00 am each day and customers are limited to 50 per hour and a total of 200 per day, Minh said. Customers must be representatives of management boards of residential areas who are responsible for helping households do the shopping. Only 30 percent of grocery stores in green zones, or infection-free areas, are allowed to resume provided their staff have received at least one jab of the vaccine. These grocery stores must also be located in open, spacious areas. We absolutely wont allow grocery stores in alleys to reopen because the risk of infection is high, said Nguyen Van Quang, secretary of the Da Nang Party Committee. The Da Nang Department of Industry and Trade previously reported that peoples food reserves had depleted, resulting in an increasing demand for shopping over the past few days that cannot be fulfilled by the few supermarkets and convenience stores which remain open. To meet this demand, the department proposed the municipal Peoples Committee allow supermarkets, convenience stores, and distribution businesses to resume their full capacity. At the same time, the department suggested the reopening of traditional markets and grocery stores, the establishment of mobile food selling stalls and temporary markets, and the mobilization of more personnel into helping citizens go shopping for food. Grocery stores as well as wholesale and traditional markets in the city have been closed since late July after cases of COVID-10 were detected on site. Da Nang has accumulated 3,561 infections since the current wave hit Vietnam on April 27. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Since the COVID-19 pandemic started in 2020, foreigners living and working in Vietnam have been striving in many ways to overcome life's challenges. Aside from finding personal balance for themselves, they have also formed small groups to go through this difficult time together. They have even implemented many meaningful projects to support the local Vietnamese community. Feeling blessed to be in Vietnam "I think Im exceptionally lucky to be in Vietnam for the whole of 2020, as our lives were largely normal despite all that was transpiring around the world," said Nilisha Bhimani, an Indian entrepreneur who now lives with her husband in District 2, Ho Chi Minh City. "We were able to settle in peacefully, make friends and acquaintances, explore Ho Chi Minh City, and travel to other places within Vietnam." Currently, Bhimani's work-related plans have been stalled due to the pandemic. However, while the COVID-19 crisis is deepening worldwide, the businesswoman says she still looks at the positive side of things. She lives in an apartment building so it is not too challenging to buy essentials. "Yes, things are not as easily available as they were before, especially bread and certain vegetables, but overall, we are able to manage," she said. "The local Vietnamese staff within the building and supermarket are very helpful and thanks to Google Translate, the language barrier is not a big deal." Meanwhile, Shireen Nathaniel, a teacher at an elementary school in Ho Chi Minh City, has encountered a few struggles with the language barrier. Living in a blockaded area, Nathaniel says she has no clear idea when the blockade will be lifted because it is hard for foreigners to access up-to-date information in English, while communication with the local community is quite restricted. "Despite some support from the lovely Vietnamese people in my area, generally speaking, the lack of information in English about directives and visa regulations has caused a lot of confusion and worry within the expat community," she said. Living in Vietnam for two and a half years, the British female teacher was unable to work and had many worries around finances as well as anxieties about the virus during the first social distancing period last year. This time, Nathaniel says she is lucky enough to be able to work remotely. Nevertheless, at a time when nothing is certain, anxiety and feelings of isolation caused by the blockade at times still occur to her. "I'm grateful to be in Vietnam where I have -- up until recently -- been able to live a relatively normal life," she shares. For Linda Beck, she arrived in Vietnam from Finland in 2014. Initially, she only intended to stay for a few months, then gradually fell more in love with the country and the people. Since the pandemic hit, many local businesses have faced difficulties in keeping their operations afloat, and Beck's is one of the few that have been fortunate enough to survive and thrive. Linda Beck is seen in a photo she provided Tuoi Tre News. She created an app that allows users to showcase their talents such as singing, dancing, rapping and then compete with other players over the phone. Social distancing and quarantine have made these types of apps more popular for users to relieve stress and kill time, as well as connect with one another. "I feel grateful because my app only requires users to have a smartphone to participate, without needing to meet face-to-face," Beck says. "Currently, the number of people downloading the app is increasing rapidly. "I think it's because people have more time to explore new apps, especially with the aim to entertain themselves and reduce stress. "I hope that when this challenging period passes, we all can look back and learn to appreciate the smallest things in life. "Nowadays, I miss waking up early every morning to get ready for work." She is grateful for how Vietnam has made sure to fight this battle against COVID-19 to stop the spread of the virus, Beck says. Connecting and sharing Beck, Bhimani, and Nathaniel are all involved in communities dedicated to foreigners living and working in Ho Chi Minh City. There, they find the necessary information and sharing that help them overcome difficult times. Bhimani is a member of Girl Gone International (GGI) and International Ladies in Vietnam (ILV), both of which are online communities for women. They organize online events to ensure their members do not feel mentally isolated or unstable because of the pandemic. GGI has weekly Zoom calls for members to meet virtually and share their feelings. Meanwhile, ILV has introduced weekly online Coffee Mornings where members can get together, chat and bring more positive energy to the group. Beck is also a member of GGI. Like Bhimani, she has also made new connections in the community and supported one another during the health crisis. "Everyone suffers at some point in their lives, no matter who you are, what you went through or where you came from," she says. "We cannot compare pain; we cannot compare struggle as we are all different and in that way handle things differently. We are all unique and so are our feelings. "Without the women in the community, everything in my life would have been so much harder. "I have received support and found a lot of friendships from people I've never even met in real life." Nilisha Bhimani is seen in a photo she provided Tuoi Tre News. In addition to GGI, there are many other communities where expats in Ho Chi Minh City can get involved such as Viral Kindness Saigon, which focuses on spreading positivity, and Help Saigon's Homeless, a community that donates, packs, and delivers food to the homeless around the southern city, according to Nathaniel. "You can also reduce feelings of isolation by responsibly fostering or adopting a rescue cat or dog through charities like I-PAW Saigon or ARC," she says. Recently, Nathaniel and other GGI members have organized a campaign to pack food parcels for people in rough circumstances in the city. To overcome the stress caused by social distancing, she keeps herself busy and occupied with work and projects. Besides, she also learns to be kind and love herself, especially on days when she feels anxious or demotivated. "Social distancing can be very isolating so I think just staying 'connected' is important," the woman remarks. "Check in with your loved ones regularly. "Be kind to yourself and others. "Things may be tough right now, but I feel lucky to be in Vietnam. "I wouldn't want to be anywhere else!" Living with positive energy "I strongly believe that there is always a lot to be grateful for, no matter what the situation. There are so many people around the world struggling to make ends meet. My husband and I feel lucky to have been able to live our lives normally for most of this outbreak. I am also thankful for all the networks we've been able to build here in a short span; it makes us feel like we are not alone," Bhimani shares. Taking it one day at a time, she counts her blessings along the way, learning to be grateful in challenging situations instead of focusing on the negatives. Beck mentions she always reminds herself about all the positive things that are still happening despite the pandemic. Anh Tran, a founding member of the GGI Ho Chi Minh City community, shares that since the social distancing period started, the community has organized many online activities focusing on the mental health and well-being of its members. GGI was founded in 2010, and currently has over 500,000 international women in more than 200 local communities worldwide. "We strive to ensure women who live far away from home can get through social distancing periods without feeling isolated or completely alone during the pandemic. We also look forward to contributing to the local community in Ho Chi Minh City and its struggling residents, as we care about the well-being of the city that is our home away from home," Anh says. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! The Italian government has decided to aid Vietnam with 801,600 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine to help the Southeast Asian country cope with the COVID-19 pandemic. The donated jabs are expected to be delivered to Vietnam in early September through COVAX Facility, a global vaccine-sharing scheme, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Wednesday. This is the outcome of the countrys 'vaccine diplomacy' efforts, including Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinhs letter to Italian President Mario Draghi, the ministry added. This donation demonstrates the Vietnam-Italy strategic partnership and the solidarity of the Italian government and people with their Vietnamese counterparts in difficult times, the ministry commented. Accessing many vaccine supplies is now an urgent task for Vietnam to feed its vaccination campaign to drive back the coronavirus. Italy has become the second-largest donor in the European Union to the COVAX Facility, with a commitment of 15 million vaccine doses and US$359 million. As one of the development partners of ASEAN, Italy has recently pledged to provide an additional $2 million to the 10-member blocs special fund for COVID-19 response. In recent times, many European countries have also donated vaccines to Vietnam. On Wednesday, the foreign ministry received 300,000 AstraZeneca vaccine doses donated by Romania, and expressed thanks to the Romanian government and people for their valuable and timely support. Vietnam had received vaccine donations from many other countries, including six million doses from the U.S., more than three million from Japan, 415,000 from the UK, 700,000 from China, and 12,000 from Russia. Australia, France, and Hungary have promised to gift Vietnam 1.5 million, 670,000, and 100,000 vaccine jabs, respectively. Vietnam has so far got about 24 million vaccine doses while it needs to obtain as many as 175 million doses to inoculate two-thirds of its 98-million population. By Wednesday evening, the numbers of people receiving the first and second vaccine shots nationwide had amounted to over 16 million and two million, respectively, the Ministry of Health reported. The country has documented 381,363 COVID-19 cases, including 169,921 recoveries and 9,349 deaths since the pandemic hit the country in early 2020, the ministry said. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! United States Vice President Kamala Harris launched the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Southeast Asia Regional Office in Hanoi on Wednesday within the framework of her official three-day visit to Vietnam. The launch ceremony was attended by Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh, Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long, and health ministers and officials from other ASEAN member states and Papua New Guinea. The facility, located on Ngo Quyen Street in downtown Hanoi, is one of the CDCs four regional offices, joining the Eastern Europe/Central Asia office in Georgia, the Middle East/North Africa office in Oman, and the South America office in Brazil. Opening an office in Hanoi strengthens the CDCs ability to meet its mission of protecting Americans and people of the region by responding more rapidly to health threats and building key relationships to tackle shared health priorities, the U.S. agency stated in a press release. Deputy PM Minh said that healthcare cooperation has been a highlight of Vietnam-U.S. ties, as well as Washingtons relationship with the Southeast Asian region as a whole. We welcome the U.S.s decision to open a regional office in Hanoi to show the development and vast potential of the two nations comprehensive partnership, Deputy PM Minh said. Vietnam will create favorable conditions for the effective operation of this office. Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh speaks at the ceremony in Hanoi, August 25, 2021. Photo: Nguyen Khanh / Tuoi Tre With the launch of its new CDC office, the U.S. intends to help grow public health infrastructure across Southeast Asia, according to Vice President Harris. The U.S. is currently training epidemiologists, investing in research, and supporting the creation of emergency management systems. It has so far pledged US$500,000 to the ASEAN COVID-19 Response Fund to support the purchase of more vaccines, as well as provided more than $150 million in emergency assistance to the region, Vice President Harris stated. The CDCs longstanding partnership with ASEAN has strengthened public health laboratories, emergency operations centers, and surveillance systems, all of which are being called upon during the current pandemic, said CDC Director Rochelle Walensky. This new regional office will build upon these existing partnerships and help us grow stronger together, Walensky continued. Priorities for the new regional office include building tomorrows public health workforce, expanding regional public health laboratory training, developing innovative programs to improve health for mobile and migrant populations, ensuring a coordinated response to public health emergencies through networked emergency operation centers, and strengthening the early warning system for the detection of zoonotic and emerging infectious diseases, the CDC said in its press release. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! The U.S. Embassy in Vietnam and a local agency have signed a lease agreement for building a new embassy complex in Hanoi, in the presence of visiting U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris. Charge d' Affaires of the U.S. Embassy in Vietnam Christopher Klein and Bui Duy Cuong, director of the Hanoi Department of Natural Resources and Environment, signed the agreement at a ceremony on Wednesday. Chairman of the citys administration Chu Ngoc Anh and U.S. Vice President Harris, who is on a three-day visit to Vietnam starting Tuesday evening, were among the participant in the ceremony. The new embassy campus, to be built at a cost of US$1.2 billion, will be located on a 3.2-hectare land lot in Cau Giay District under a 99-year lease. The compounds architecture is inspired by Ha Long Bay, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Quang Ninh Province, while the landscapes around it highlight the tradition of rice cultivation, like the topography of the Red River and the Mekong Delta. The U.S. Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations is responsible for location selection, design, construction, relocation, and management in relation to the new compound, while U.S.-based EYP Architecture & Engineering Group is in charge of architecture. The new embassy campus will be a modern urban space embodying the culture and vitality of the Vietnamese capital city, and become a symbol of cooperation, friendship, and development for years to come, the embassy said. The project is in the design process and its groundbreaking will take place at an appropriate time in the future, the diplomatic agency added. A senior U.S. official told the press this event will help the U.S. and Vietnam become more connected in the future. "The U.S. Embassy celebrated the 25th anniversary of normalization in 2020, and formalizing the lease agreement allows us to look ahead to the next 25 years and beyond of U.S. engagement in Vietnam," the official said. After the two countries normalized their diplomatic relations in 1995, the Vietnamese government has been committed to giving the U.S. a site to build its embassy in Hanoi, according to the U.S. Embassy. In 2019, both sides agreed to the current location for the new compound of the embassy. In other news related to the activities of visiting Vice President Harris, the official announced a U.S donation of an additional one million Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine doses to Vietnam at her meeting with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh on Wednesday. The U.S. had donated five million Moderna vaccine jabs to Vietnam. On the same day, Harris attended the launching ceremony for the Southeast Asia regional office of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Hanoi. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Check out the news you should not miss today: Politics The chemistry team of the Vietnam Peoples Army on Wednesday participated in the 'Safe Environment' category within the framework of the International Army Games 2021 at Korla military base in China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the Vietnam News Agency reported the same day. Society Thanks to diplomatic efforts to seek vaccine supplies, Vietnam expects to receive three to four million more doses of COVID-19 vaccine by August 29. U.S. Vice President Kamala D. Harris on Wednesday launched the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Southeast Asia Regional Office in Hanoi to strengthen the disease control bodys ability to meet its mission of protecting Americans and people of the region by responding more rapidly to health threats wherever they occur and building key relationships to tackle shared health priorities, the U.S. Embassy announced in a press release the same day. The World Bank and the Institute for Social Development Studies have recently signed a financing deal worth US$2.75 million for a project on strengthening COVID-19 response capacity at the grassroots level in Vietnam, the Vietnam News Agency reported on Wednesday. Ho Chi Minh City has administered the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine to more than 76 percent of people aged above 18 and fully vaccinated 3.1 percent of its population, deputy director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Health Nguyen Hoai Nam said at a press conference on Wednesday. The southern province of Binh Duong on Wednesday reported a record of 12,115 coronavirus patients being discharged from hospitals, according to the province's steering committee for COVID-19 prevention and control. Hanoi authorities have sanctioned nearly 33,000 cases of violating COVID-19 epidemic prevention and control regulations during the past month, with fines nearing VND50 billion ($2.1 million), the local Department of Information and Communications said on Wednesday night. Around 100 homeless people in Ho Chi Minh Citys District 4 were vaccinated on Wednesday against COVID-19 and offered temporary accommodations at a local school before being transferred to a social support center, as part of the citys effort to take care of vulnerable people adversely impacted by the pandemic. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Hanoi officers booked a total of 1,237 violations of coronavirus safety rules and collected VND1.9 billion (US$83,375) in fines from 3:00 pm on Tuesday to 3:00 pm on Wednesday, according to the city's Department of Information and Communications. Of these, 1,127 were fined for unauthorized outdoor travels, while the others were fined for failing to don face masks in public, the municipal information authority reported. As of 3:00 pm on Wednesday, local forces had imposed nearly VND50 billion (US$2.2 million) worth of fines on over 33,000 violations regarding pandemic prevention rules since stringent movement curbs were implemented on July 25. Out of those cases, 26,718 were booked for unnecessary outdoor travels, 2,897 were penalized for failure to wear face masks in public, while the others were sanctioned for discarding used masks in wrong places or breaking safe distancing rules. Over 30,000 cases were fined, whereas six cases were transferred to police for criminal charging. Officers also handled hundreds of cases where non-essential businesses flouted shutdown orders in areas at high risk of infection, or where individuals refused to take COVID-19 tests when required by authorities. Traffic on Hanoi streets is still crowded at times, while the number of epidemic safety rule breaches is on the rise. The capital has recorded 3,005 local infections since the fourth virus wave hit the country on April 27. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Authorities in the northern Vietnamese province of Son La managed to evacuate 656 residents to safety before a flood swept through more than 80 hectares of crops in the early hours of Wednesday morning. Scattered showers and thunderstorms struck Son La on Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning, with heavy rains reported in Muong La District, Cao Viet Thinh, an official of the provincial Steering Committee for Disaster Prevention and Search and Rescue, said on Wednesday afternoon. Downpours in Nam Pam Commune led to a flash flood on Nam Pam Stream in Muong La. Between 3:00 am and 4:00 am on Wednesday, local authorities ordered the evacuation of 656 people in the district, according to Thinh. Evacuees took shelter in the local cultural house and school before returning to their houses at 6:00 am the same day, once rains stopped and the water level receded. The flash flood did not cause any loss of life, but swept away one house, covered two others with mud, caused a landslide onto one house, and put another 31 houses at high risk of landslides. It also destroyed 82.58 hectares of rice, maize, and vegetables. Flooding caused severe damage to Provincial Highway 109, washing away many sections of the road. Huoi Hoc - Huoi Co Street suffered a landslide on a one-kilometer stretch of the road. A 300-meter section of a major road from Ban O to Ban Le, two nearby villages, was also eroded. We will relocate directly affected households to planned areas in late August or early September, said Thinh. In August 2017, a terrible flash flood in Nam Pam left dozens of people dead and missing, many residents homeless, and several infrastructure projects damaged beyond repair. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! The Ministry of Health logged more than 11,500 domestic COVID-19 cases on Thursday, along with over 18,000 recoveries and 318 deaths. Thirty-six provinces and cities recorded 11,569 local cases whereas a separate six infections were imported from abroad, the health ministry said. The health ministry had documented 12,093 locally-infected patients on Wednesday. Above 5,600 of the latest local cases were found in the community while the remaining were detected in isolated areas or centralized quarantine facilities. Ho Chi Minh City reported 3,934 of the new domestic infections, down by 1,360 patients; Binh Duong Province 4,868, up by 739; Dong Nai Province 743; Long An Province 449; Tien Giang Province 354; Da Nang 144; An Giang Province 131; Khanh Hoa Province 131; Dong Thap Province 116; Kien Giang Province 112; Can Tho City 72; Ben Tre Province 55; and Hanoi 50. Since the fourth COVID-19 wave began in Vietnam on April 27, the country has confirmed 388,814 community transmissions in 62 out of its 63 provinces and cities. Ho Chi Minh City stays atop with 194,100 patients, followed by Binh Duong Province with 86,050, Dong Nai Province with 20,471, Long An Province with 19,495, Tien Giang Province with 8,509, Dong Thap Province with 6,432, Khanh Hoa Province with 5,993, Bac Giang Province with 5,842, Da Nang with 3,705, and Hanoi with 3,055. By comparison, Vietnam confirmed 106 community cases in the first wave from January 23 to April 16, 2020, 554 in the second from July 25 to December 1, 2020, and 910 in the third from January 28 to March 25, 2021. The ministry recorded 18,567 recoveries on Thursday, bringing the total to 188,488 recovered patients. The death toll has climbed to 9,667 after the health ministry documented 318 fatalities the same day, including 242 in Ho Chi Minh City and 46 in Binh Duong Province. The Southeast Asian country has detected an accumulation of 392,938 cases since the COVID-19 pandemic first hit it on January 23, 2020. Health workers gave 430,924 vaccine doses on Wednesday. More than 18.5 million vaccine shots have been administered in Vietnam since the country rolled out vaccination on March 8, with over 2.1 million people having been fully vaccinated. The Vietnamese government expects to obtain 175 million shots of various vaccines, including 51 million Pfizer-BioNTech jabs, by early 2022. It set a target of immunizing two-thirds of a population of nearly 98 million people against COVID-19 by the first quarter of next year. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Married at First Sight psychologist Mel Schilling has joined the UK series. She joins Paul C. Brunson and Charlene Douglas as Season 6 expands with format changes introduced by the Australian series plus rows, cheating and scandal in tow. The Australian MAFS was a ratings drawcard in the UK during lockdown and production halts. I think one of the most exciting things is weve borrowed or copied some of the format elements from the Australian series, which was really popular here, Schilling told Radio Times. So things like dinner parties where all our couples come together and its that melting pot of emotion and dinner really, and maybe a drink or two, and of course, the commitment ceremonies as well where our couples actually need to make that decision to stay or leave and have a chat with us about their relationships each week. The British series gets underway on E4 next week. It isnt clear if Schilling is departing the Nine series or simply juggling, umm, commitments. Sarah Ferguson has responded to threats of legal action by FOX News management following her Four Corners report on Monday. And she vows there is much more to come in Part 2 next week. Speaking to ABC Radio presenter Virginia Trioli she said, Were not in fear of anything. The only thing that we are ever in fear of is not doing justice to important stories. That might sound pompous, but its trueit seems to me that there are along with the virus and its depredations there are a fewer more important stories to look at in America right now. Ferguson maintains it was FOX News insiders who piqued her interested in the story. It was FOX News insiders who told us the story of what was happening. Its FOX News insiders who were worried about what was happening inside this ratings juggernaut. FOX News declined a Four Corners interview but sent the broadcaster a statement: The use of former disgruntled employees, some of whom were not part of the company during our coverage of the U.S. presidential election and its aftermath, completely discredits any credibility of this program. As for the events of January 6th, Congressional hearings and the Biden Justice Department not only did not implicate Fox, but other media companies were cited as platforms for inciting and coordinating the Capitol riots. We stand by our coverage with our millions of viewers who make us the most-watched cable television network. I did everything I could to try and persuade FOX that it would be a better story with them in it. And it would be, theres no question. I would have really enjoyed interviewing the FOX executives about that period, Ferguson maintains. ABC concurred in a statement the report was based on multiple on-the-record, on-camera interviews with people who were employed by FOX News who give first-hand, verifiable accounts of their own experiences. FOX News was given a detailed outline of the proposed program early on as part of the request for FOX staff to appear and Four Corners tried every avenue to get FOX to provide its point of view. It tried for two months to secure an interview with FOX Corp CEO Lachlan Murdoch and made a series of requests for various other senior FOX representatives, as well as for Rupert Murdoch. It also submitted written questions. The responses and information that were provided are incorporated in the program. Despite the decision not to participate in interviews, communication between Four Corners and FOX was extensive throughout the preparation of the story. FOX was very helpful in providing footage and background briefings on material, including up to the night the program was being finished. The story was rigorously tested against the ABCs Editorial Policies and the ABC stands by it. Ferguson teased, I just say this Episode One was good, Episode Two really heats up. Episode One was kind of laying out the landscape for how FOX got to this point. Episode Two is where the big lawsuits that are now underway in America against FOX for their role in spreading the big lie those those lawsuits are underway. Fun times ahead. Four Corners airs 8:30pm Monday on ABC. Tyler, TX (75702) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low around 75F. Winds light and variable.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low around 75F. Winds light and variable. Last month, MaxAB, the Egyptian B2B e-commerce platform that serves food and grocery retailers, raised one of the largest Series A on the continent, to the tune of $40 million. Today, it has raised a $15 million extension from existing investors -- RMBV, IFC, Flourish Ventures, Crystal Stream Capital, Rise Capital, Endeavour Catalyst, Beco Capital and 4DX Ventures -- bringing its total Series A fundraise to $55 million. The company, founded by Belal El-Megharbel and Mohamed Ben Halim in 2018, manages procurement and grocery delivery to shops in Egypt. Store owners can use the platform to purchase goods, request delivery or logistics to move the goods, and access a customer support team. When CEO El-Megharbel spoke to TechCrunch during its first Series A tranche, he said MaxAB, which operates in Egypt alone, was looking to expand across the Middle East and North Africa besides launching new product offerings and growing its team. Today's announcement marks MaxAB's first step toward regional scale. The startup is announcing the acquisition of Morocco-based B2B e-commerce and distribution platform WaystoCap for an undisclosed amount. Niama El Bassunie co-founded WaystoCap with Mehdi Daoui, Anis Abdeddine and Aziz Jaouhari Tissafi in 2015. The company was originally a cross-border trade platform for transacting business goods in Africa. That business model got WaystoCap into Y Combinator's Winter batch in 2017, making it the first company accepted from Morocco. The company subsequently raised a $3 million seed round. WaystoCap took its cross-border services to Ivory Coast and Togo, and at some point, was processing over $3 million worth of transactions per quarter. However, since its pivot to a similar model to MaxAB, in that it connects retailers with suppliers across Morocco, WaystoCap has pulled out from both countries while growing to a network of over 8,000 retailers in Morocco. Story continues El-Megharbel mentioned to TechCrunch that MaxAB's plan to move into Morocco coincided with WaystoCap's bid to raise new funding (the last time the company took venture capital was in 2017) and push further into the Moroccan market. But both companies agreed to work together rather than compete with each other. "I love the team. They share the same values and they're on a mission that is using a tech-enabled supply chain to optimize food distribution across the continent," he said in an interview. "For us, our strategy is to build a global team that can think local and execute properly. And we figured out that they're already a perfect fit for that." While the acquisition signals MaxAB's move into Morocco, it also shows the company's entry into the Maghreb markets -- Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia, where there's little or no contest. MaxAB says more than 70,000 retailers across both platforms will "benefit from its technology, expanded end-to-end supply chain solutions and business intelligence tools as well as WaystoCaps knowledge and expertise." El Bassunie will take over the position as the managing director at MaxAB Morocco. Commenting on the acquisition of her startup, she said, ... We are thrilled to play a pivotal role in the new all-star team being created and led by experienced, innovative entrepreneurs to establish a regional market leader in food and grocery supply. We are looking forward to continuing our close working relationship with our new team and taking the business to its next phase. The Maghreb market is new territory for MaxAB and the acquisition positions it as the most funded and largest B2B e-commerce platform for retailers and suppliers. Moroccos growing tech hub offers huge potential and the acquisition of WaystoCap empowers MaxAB to become a truly global team with a targeted local approach, setting the company on track to be the leading B2B retail and grocery platform in the Middle East and Africa. "At the end of the day, what we want to do is build a tech-enabled supply chain, in all the African countries, in the Middle Eastern countries, and then connect them together. That's where the magic happens. This is where we can actually have a real impact by putting the right amount of food at the right place at the right time, and minimizing the waste which MENA cannot afford," said MaxAB CEO El-Meghabel. MaxAB's acquisition of WaystoCap is the second local cross-border acquisition that has played out in Africa this week. On Monday, Nigeria and Canada-based mobility startup Plentywaka announced the acquisition of Stabus, its counterpart in Ghana, for an undisclosed amount. From a narrower consolidation perspective, Kenyan consumer experience platform Ajua acquired Kenyan AI and ML messaging and payments company WayaWaya, early in April. WaystoCap is also the second YC-backed company in Africa to exit, after Paystack got bought by Stripe for more than $200 million last October. Professor Eman Ghoneim Awarded NSF Grant to Unearth Ancient Egyptian Settlements Eman Ghoneim, professor in the UNCW Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences and director of the Space and Drone Remote Sensing Lab, has been awarded a three-year, $203,874 grant from the National Science Foundation to unveil the ancestral Nile River course and its defunct branches. Using remote sensing, geographical information system, historical, archeological, geomorphological and geophysical field surveys, Ghoneim will lead an interdisciplinary team of researchers from Macquarie University (Australia), the National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics (Egypt), and the University of Memphis to map the Niles ancestral water system to develop the geochronological framework for the study region. The team will use geophysical equipment and advanced radar and infrared satellite imaging technology from NASA, German Aerospace Center and the European Space Agency satellites to penetrate the Sahara sand and unveil subsurface terrain. From a societal perspective, our project is important because of the wide presence of ancient sites in the proximity of unmapped paleoriver systems both in the USA and globally and the large human population near these sites that could affect their preservation or extinction. Discovering the ancient Nile and having a more refined idea of where ancient Egyptian settlements were possibly located in relation to it can drastically improve our cultural heritage conservation measures and raise awareness of these sites for modern development planning, said Ghoneim. This summer, Ghoneim led a field expedition in the desert of Sudan in search of sandy buried drainage systems as part of a $75,000 grant from the Richard Lounsbery Foundation. Born in Egypt, Ghoneim earned a bachelors and masters in physical geography from Tanta University and a Ph.D. from University of Southampton, UK. In 2018, she received the Distinguished Teaching Professorship Award and the Board of Trustees Teaching Excellence Award, UNCWs highest honor. She was also honored with the prestigious 2021 UNC Board of Governors for Excellence in Teaching Award. #CAS #RESEARCH The indicators demonstrate that the negative trends of climate change worsen every year. Therefore, protection of every tree and natural water source must be a concern for all people from every corner of our planet and crimes against the natural environment are crimes against all humanity, Head of Department Center of Analysis of International Relations (AIR Center) Fuad Chiragov and Head of International Cooperation Department the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources Emin Qarabagli write for Brussels Morning. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) reports that the natural environment is a neglected victim of armed conflicts and conflicts have been the single most important predictor of the decline of certain wildlife populations between 1946 and 2010. International humanitarian law forbids using the natural environment as a weapon and also forbids deliberate attacks against the natural environment. A fact often overlooked or neglected by the international community and perhaps of much greater importance for the future of the entire South Caucasus region, is the environmental cost of occupation and conflict. During the active phase of the Karabakh war and the occupation years, the natural environment was damaged and ruthlessly exploited. Cities and villages that were home to up to one million people were completely erased and demolished. The once-blossoming city of Agdam was so destroyed that the representatives of the international media called it the Hiroshima of the Caucasus. The loss of Azerbaijans control over these territories and the lack of adequate international monitoring enabled crimes to be committed against the natural environment. The former occupied territories of Karabakh used to host extensive forests populated with native trees and shrubs, rare species of animals and plants and abundant water reserves. Before the war, dozens of rare species of animals and plants were protected in the state reserves and other protected areas. The depredatory behaviour towards the environment for three decades will still have a negative effect on the lives of the millions of people of the region in the coming decades. In the past 27 years, Azerbaijan has appealed to the international community several times to investigate the information about the illegal disposal of nuclear and radioactive waste in these territories. During the occupation years, every summer saw massive wildfires in the occupied territories because of the lack of an effective fire-management system and/or because of indifference. This fact was well-documented by the OSCE fact-finding mission in 2006. The report documented that the series of massive wildfires overran an area amounting to 163.3 km2 in the eastern part of the Armenian-occupied Azerbaijani territories in the summer of 2006. On September 7, 2006, a resolution entitled The situation in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan by the UN General Assembly in regard to the incidence of massive fires stressed the necessity of urgently conducting an environmental operation and called for an assessment of the short-and long-term effects of the fires on the environment of the region and measures for its rehabilitation. After the liberation of the occupied territories, Azerbaijan has been trying to evaluate and calculate all the damage to residential areas, infrastructure and environment and to clear the territories of landmines that had been laid for thirty years. It is a costly and time-consuming activity that will probably take many years. At the same time, Azerbaijan seeks to appeal to the international community to stop the continuing pollution and damage of the environment in the region. Gajaran Copper-Molybdenum Plant and the Gafan Ore Refinery in Armenia continue ruthlessly to contaminate the drinking water source that is the Okhchuchay river (called the Voghji River in Armenia), which flows into the Araks river and thence into the Kura river and finally into the Caspian Sea. In other words, the pollution of Okhchuchay river puts at risk the wellbeing of millions of people as well as the fauna and flora of the region. The German Company CRONIMET is an active player in the Armenian mining sector and the main shareholder (60%) of the Gajaran Copper-Molybdenum Plant and the Gafan Ore Refinery. Many environmentalists remain completely dissatisfied with CRONIMETs response to the environmental impact of the companys activity. The German Embassy in Azerbaijan claims that the German company sold its shares in 2019. Also, according to the German Ambassador, the company is a private one and thus CRONIMET cannot bear any legal and/or criminal responsibility when the concerns were addressed to the German Embassy. In fact, according to German laws and regulations, the criminal offence leading to corporate criminal liability does not necessarily have to be committed in Germany. If a company has its seat in Germany, corporate criminal liability can also arise from criminal offences committed abroad if they are linked to the companys business. Unfortunately, Armenia has not yet joined the Helsinki Convention on Transboundary Watercourses adopted in 1992. This international document serves as a mechanism for strengthening the measures and global cooperation aimed at achieving the environmentally sound management and protection of the transboundary surface and ground waters. Since Armenia denies any obligation before the international community for protection of the environment under law, the only way to stop this crime is increasing awareness and international pressure. What we see is that the government of Armenia and the German company are trying to avoid any kind of legal or moral responsibility for continuing damage to the environment. Therefore, the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources of Azerbaijan has made approaches to international organisations, about the environmental hazards and the critical situation in Okhchuchay, including the raising of public awareness on environmental risks for the river and its ecosystem in the face of continuous pollution by Armenia. The people of Azerbaijan also hope that the environmental costs of the conflict and the obligations of all responsible parties will be evaluated with due attention according to the principles of international law. Since the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan, the international community is facing two serious problems. The first is recognition/nonrecognition of the new regime in Kabul. The second is the migration issue. Considering that the bordering countries are in no hurry to accept refugees, the main burden falls on the Western states that rushed to announce the need to evacuate all those who wish. G7 Summit and situation on the ground Yesterday, on August 24, an emergency online meeting of the G7 countries was held with the participation of the leaders from the US, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Great Britain. It was also attended by NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, European Council President Charles Michel, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. The G7 countries agreed on a unified nonrecognition of the Taliban (a movement banned in the Russian Federation). As for the Afghan refugees, the EU and the US are ready to host everyone wishing to leave Afghanistan. The only issue lacking solidarity is the timing of the troops' withdrawal. US President Joseph Biden announced that by August 31, all foreign troops must leave Afghanistan. France, Great Britain and Germany, realizing they wont be able to evacuate all the refugees by the end of August, ask to extend the deadline. The situation on the ground is becoming more extreme with every passing day. 10 days before the summit, about 60,000 people were evacuated from Afghanistan - both foreigners and Afghans who had worked for the armed forces of the American Coalition for 20 years. By the morning of August 24, 37 US military aircraft and 57 planes of allied countries with more than 20,000 people on board flew from Kabul. The United States has already received 70,000 Afghans, Germany - over 4,000. Great Britain promises to accept 20,000 refugees, but not all this year. Evacuated Afghans first are stationed at military bases in Germany, and from there they are transported to the US. Why are Afghans leaving their homeland? There are three main reasons for this. First, citizens and officials who have collaborated with the pro-American administration fear retaliation by the Taliban. Second, some citizens do not see any prospects under the harsh Sharia regime that restricts the rights of women and students. Third, the economic situation in Afghanistan can worsen anytime. The country already ranks last in terms of GDP per capita, and with international isolation (if the Taliban is not recognized), the situation will become even more despairing. Economic stability has already been eroded. This year, another deadly drought struck the country, destroying 40% of the crops. The UN estimates that 20 million people will need humanitarian assistance. The current food supply will be depleted by September. If the West leaves and does not provide humanitarian aid to the Taliban, the humanitarian catastrophe in the country wont be avoided. Germany has already pledged to provide 600 million euros. However, the lack of commercial flights has hampered the shipment of food and medicine. The banking system is currently blocked. Foreign banks have terminated their cooperation with local counterparties. The IMF froze 370 million dollars tranche due to nonrecognition of the Taliban. In such conditions, the number of those wishing to live a life of Rilley in Germany and Austria is growing every day. The Taliban do not approve of the Wests evacuation efforts. It has already threatened with "consequences" and "reaction" if the US and its allies do not withdraw from the country by August 31. The movement banned Afghans from entering Hamid Karzai International Airport. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson responded with a demand from the Taliban "to guarantee safe passage until August 31 and beyond ... for those who want to leave the country. If the new rulers of Afghanistan do not agree to this, then, according to Johnson, the G7 has "very significant leverage - economic, diplomatic and political." Europe hopes for Russia's support Meanwhile, the Taliban continue to cosy up to Turkey, China and Russia. After announcing Ankara as the "main partner", the representative of the organization's political office in Qatar, Mohammad Naim, praised good relations with Moscow and Beijing. "China is a neighbouring country, and we have good relations. The same applies to Russia." These curtsies provoke the quiet envy of NATO leaders. At the G7 online summit, Johnson warned that Russia and China would become the key actors in Afghanistan after the US withdrawal. At the same time, the Europeans admit that it will be difficult to complete the safe evacuation of refugees without Russias support. British Foreign Minister Dominic Raab recently said: We are going to have bring in countries with a potentially moderating influence like Russia and China, however uncomfortable that is. At the recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel asked him to assist with humanitarian aid and evacuation of German servicemen. Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi asked to postpone the G20 summit scheduled for October to discuss Afghanistan - apparently, the EU needs China, Russia and Turkeys support. The bottom line is that the EU and the US are doing a bunk and hope that Russia and China will help them. Soon will see how Putin and his Chinese partner Xi Jinping will respond to NATO's request. The anniversary of the 44-day Second Karabakh War that became victorious for Azerbaijan, is approaching: three-quarters of the region returned to Baku, and a Russian peacekeeping contingent was deployed on the rest of the territory, where ethnic Armenians compactly live. However, the situation is far from being completely stabilized. According to some observers, there is a risk of a new military escalation - in recent months, shootings have become more frequent, both on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and directly in Karabakh, regularly resulting in casualties on both sides. In this article, we will analyze Baku and Yerevans positions, the main obstacles to sustainable peace and assess the prospects for achieving it. What Baku managed to squeeze out of its victory Victorious Azerbaijan is systematically promoting the implementation of the trilateral agreement of November 9, 2020. (Speaking about the fulfilment by the parties of the agreement provisions, we also mean the "war of interpretations", which the parties permanently wage among themselves). Let us briefly list the goals that Azerbaijan has been able to achieve since November 10, 2020. The main achievement is the bloodless transfer of the Lachin (with the exception of the 5-kilometer Lachin corridor), Kelbajar and Aghdam regions to Azerbaijan. With the exception of a two-week hitch during the return of the Kelbajar region, when the Armenian side, through the mediation of Moscow, requested additional time (as it turned out, to burn property and cut down forests), the process went without delays and serious incidents. The Armenian armed forces were also withdrawn from the border areas of the Gubadly and Zangilan regions that were under Armenian occupation at the time of the signing of the trilateral agreement. This is rarely mentioned, but the trilateral document says nothing about these territories, and Armenia had to withdraw its troops from there under the military pressure of Azerbaijan. Inaccurate maps and Armenian servicemen left in Azerbaijan Another Bakus goal - to receive maps of minefields from Yerevan - was achieved only partially, in exchange for a certain number of Armenian soldiers who were in Azerbaijani prisons. However, according to Ilham Aliyev, the accuracy of the transferred maps is only 25%. Therefore, the issue of the Armenian servicemen remaining in Azerbaijan and being considered saboteurs was removed from the agenda. Yerevan, which did not justify American and Russian guarantees regarding the fidelity of the maps, seems to have accepted the failure of the negotiations on the fate of its servicemen. Thus, the Armenian authorities have not yet brought up this issue neither at home nor in the international arena. Transport corridor as a bone of contention Yet, Azerbaijan has failed to achieve the opening of the Zangezur corridor. There are two main reasons why Azerbaijan and Armenia cannot come to understanding on this issue. The first problem is the corridors extraterritoriality. In accordance with the trilateral agreement, control over transport communications between mainland Azerbaijan and Nakhchivan should be provided by the border troops of the Russian FSB. Clause 9 of the agreement reads: "All economic and transport links in the region are unblocked. Armenia guarantees the safety of transport links between the western regions of Azerbaijan and the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic in order to organize the unimpeded movement of citizens, vehicles and goods in both directions. The Russian Federal Border Service secures transportation. By agreement of the Parties, the construction of new transport communications (highlighted by the author) will be provided, linking the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic with the western regions of Azerbaijan. " Baku evaluates these words as a strong argument in favour of the fact that transport links with Nakhchivan will have an extraterritorial status of a corridor. After all, if the Lachin corridor functions under similar agreed conditions and Armenians freely travel to Karabakh, then there must also be a Zangezur corridor, through which Azerbaijanis could freely reach Nakhchivan. The only difference is that in one case, control is exercised by Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh, and in the other - by the FSB border troops on the territory of Armenia. But Yerevan denies any "corridor logic", insisting that nothing is written directly in the agreement about the creation of a "corridor". Recently, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has reaffirmed this stance. The second issue is the type of transport communications. Baku insists on both railway and road connection with Nakhchivan. Ilham Aliyev underlines the necessity of the road connection, while Yerevan insists only on the railway connection. Indeed, the trilateral agreement underscores the construction of new transport communications - precisely not one, but many and new ones. The railway communication between the mainland of Azerbaijan and Nakhchivan operated in Soviet times, and therefore this line cannot be called the new one. Azerbaijan refers to this fact, demanding the construction of a highway through Armenia to its exclave. Failed withdrawal of troops from Karabakh Another bone of contention is the issue of the presence of the Armenian military on the territory of the deployment of the Russian peacekeeping contingent. According to the 4th clause of the trilateral agreement, "the peacekeeping contingent of the Russian Federation is deployed simultaneously with the withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces. The duration of the stay of the peacekeeping contingent of the Russian Federation is 5 years with automatic extension for next 5-year periods if none of the Parties declares the intent to terminate the application of this provision 6 months before its expiration. In fact, the withdrawal of Armenian troops from the peacekeepers' deployment zone has never happened. Moreover, according to the Bulletin of the Russian Ministry of Defence of July 14, "On July 13, from 20.27 to 20.53, indiscriminate shooting was observed between the units of the armed forces of Azerbaijan and Armenia in the north-west area near the city of Shusha." This was immediately noticed in Baku. Later, the peacekeepers changed the wording to "armed formations of Nagorno-Karabakh," provoking even greater irritation among the Azerbaijanis, who perceived such an interpretation as an allusion to the subjectivity of the separatist regime. Baku recalls that the trilateral statement refers to the "withdrawal of Armenian troops", regardless of whether these troops are the regular army of the Republic of Armenia or military formations from among the local Armenians. Thus, this situation provokes mistrust of the Azerbaijani side to the activities of the peacekeepers. The status issue Over the past 10 months after the war, Pashinyan has achieved a lot: he was able to win parliamentary elections, consolidate power and neutralize the threat of a military coup. The early parliamentary elections process gave Armenia a certain respite from the Azerbaijani diplomatic (but not military) pressure. Now that Pashinyan has strengthened his position as prime minister, Yerevan is putting forward the following thesis: "The conflict is not over, negotiations on the status of Karabakh should be conducted within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group." Ilham Aliyev, in turn, declares that the conflict is over, the status issue is resolved, and the OSCE Minsk Group can deal with humanitarian issues, for example, raising confidence-building measures and other issues of secondary importance from the point of view of real politics. The OSCE Minsk Group itself (represented by the co-chairs of France and the United States) is clearly unhappy with this formulation of the issue and wants to deal with the status of Karabakh. Russia, the third co-chair, is taking a wait-and-see approach and proposing not to fuss about the status at least at this stage. The issue of border delimitation became a problem for Pashinyan. While the prime minister was busy with domestic politics and elections, the Azerbaijanis occupied all the strategic heights on the border, putting the Armenian authorities in an uncomfortable position as they forgot to send their soldiers to guard the borders. Baku is likely to increase pressure on Yerevan on this issue, pushing it to start the process of mutual recognition of borders, and, therefore, recognition of Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan. Prospects for solving problems In recent weeks, there has been a clear tightening of rhetoric on the part of official Baku on issues that cannot be resolved: on the withdrawal of Armenian troops from the territory of the temporary responsibility of the Russian Ministry of Defense and on the creation of the Zangezur corridor. The Ministry of Defense of Azerbaijan, the Foreign Ministry, and President Aliyev himself, declared the inadmissibility of the Armenian Armed Forces transfer to Karabakh through the Lachin corridor. At the same time, Baku does not hide its concern about Armenia's intentions to restore the army at the expense of military supplies from Russia. According to the Azerbaijani authorities, such a development will contribute to the toughening of Yerevan's position in the negotiations with Baku and block the achievement of a peace treaty, the path to which lies through the mutual recognition of the territorial integrity. If Armenia prioritizes the issue of the status of Karabakh as a precondition (read, the independence of the separatist entity existing within the responsibility area of the Russian Ministry of Defense), peace in the region will not be achieved. In planning their actions in the Karabakh direction, both Azerbaijan and Armenia are looking forward for the next five years. In less than five years, the question of extending the mission of the Russian peacekeeping contingent in Karabakh will arise. During this period, Yerevan will try to restore and reform, taking into account the lessons of last year's war, its defeated army in order to have at least some aces in negotiations with military superior Azerbaijan. Perhaps Russia will help Armenia in this striving, trying to restrain the strengthening of the Turkish positions in the region. Baku also is not going to sit idly by. According to the leaked information, there are new large-scale Azerbaijani-Israeli agreements on military supplies. There are also reports about regular flights of military transport staff from Israel to Azerbaijan. In the worst-case scenario, the next five years the region will see an arms race, an outbreak of violence on the border and in Karabakh and intense diplomatic and information war amid the risk of an actual military conflict by 2025. If Baku does not get the Zangezur corridor, it is likely that the issue of the further functioning of the Lachin corridor will arise squarely. From a geopolitical point of view (especially if Moscow makes a decision to re-equip the Armenian army), Russia risks of pushing Azerbaijanis towards even greater integration with Turkey. But there is also a more optimistic scenario, according to which Azerbaijan is provided with an extraterritorial Zangezur corridor that will operate, as stipulated in the trilateral agreement, under Russian control. Thus, all the guarantees that Baku gave on the functioning of the Lachin corridor will automatically remain in force. By ensuring the disarmament of Armenian militants in Karabakh, the Russians will become the only military force in the area of its responsibility in the region, tying Armenia even more closely to itself. Thus, Moscow will secure Bakus favour on the issue of extending the Russian mission in Karabakh, and the risks of a new war in the region will be levelled. The question is which path Moscow will choose - turning the South Caucasus into a zone of economic cooperation and predictability, or preserving it as a region of chronic conflicts and instability to use it in its own interests and sell arms to both sides. China, Russia and Iran will hold joint maritime exercises in the Persian Gulf around late 2021 or early 2022, according to Russian Ambassador to Iran Levan Dzhagaryan who was cited in a report by RIA news agency on Monday. Dzhagaryan said the drills are to "ensure the safety of international shipping and the fight against sea pirates." As Global Times writes, it is vital for China, Russia and Iran to ensure the safety of international shipping. Most of Russia's international trade is carried by cargo ships. Iran also relies on shipping for its oil exports. China's imports of oil and gas and some other foreign trade depend on shipping as well. To ensure the safety of shipping is to safeguard the economic security of the three countries. Therefore, it is normal to see China, Russia and Iran cooperate in terms of navy, especially their joint efforts against regional hegemony and sea pirates. When reporting the news of the drills, the New York Post mentioned that, "The news comes as the US struggles to complete its withdrawal from Afghanistan." China, Russia and Iran are friendly partners. The three countries are engaging in cooperation in various fields, and as regional countries, are keeping a close eye on the ever changing Afghanistan situation. The US' hasty withdrawal will inevitably lead to a crisis and uncertainty in Afghanistan. The three countries' cooperation in this regard will help maintain Afghanistan's domestic peace and prevent the spread of terrorist forces. But their main consideration for the joint military drills is to secure the safety of international shipping of the Persian Gulf, and has little to do with the Afghanistan situation. The joint military exercises among China, Russia and Iran are of the political significance. This shows that China and Russia firmly support Iran in maintaining its legitimate foreign trade, especially via shipping. Beijing and Moscow support Tehran's reasonable demand concerning the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action on the Iranian nuclear issue, and encourage Iran to strengthen its capabilities to guarantee regional security. This can prevent Western forces from deeply interfering in the regional affairs in the Persian Gulf and Iran's internal affairs. China and Russia may hope to boost Iran's military capabilities by virtue of the drills as well, so that Iran can effectively counter the threat from the Western countries. The New York Post especially mentioned that the drills will be conducted by "three of America's biggest adversaries." Another article by US state media mouthpiece Voice of America in April asserted that Beijing was roping in Tehran and Moscow to form a threesome of "autocracies" and rally against a "democratic" group. Cooperation among China, Russia and Iran is centered on mutual benefits and win-win, rather than forming an alliance and engaging in confrontation. Take China and Iran. Iran can provide China the much-needed oil, and Iran hopes to increase its economic strength by expanding its energy exports. Now, the US is imposing its ideology on all of the countries. It has been trying to forcefully divide the international community into two camps. It is even eyeing for hosting the Summit for Democracy. The US' shameful record in democracy and human rights is widely known. The US' move could only make the international community realize the hypocrisy of US democracy and human rights. The US turns a blind eye to the severe situation of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has resulted in the death of more than 600,000 lives in the US. Washington is not qualified to talk about "democracy and human rights." Its attempt to create a so-called democratic alliance is doomed to fail. When dealing with international relations, most countries think about their own interests rather than dancing to the US rhythm. Washington thought it could lead the other countries by the nose by touting out the so-called democratic values. But such a baton does not work anymore. These countries eye pragmatic interests, and will not serve US hegemony. A roadmap for an artificial intelligence sector is part of Turkey's digital transformation that seeks to make the country a global competitor in technology. Turkey aims to push the artificial intelligence sector to contribute 5 percent towards the countrys GDP by 2025, it has revealed in its first strategic artificial intelligence (Al) plan, TRT World writes. The strategy was launched in a public event held by the Presidencys Digital Transformation Office and the Industry and Technology Ministry on Tuesday. The strategy foresees employing at least 50,000 people in the sector as one among 24 other objectives in its plan by 2025. The ceremony was attended by artificially intelligent characters and holograms where Turkeys plans were presented. The five-year roadmap was launched at Turkey's Informatics Valley in Gebze, Kocaeli, and was developed with the collaboration of private, public, and academic groups. In August, the National Artificial Intelligence Strategic Plan report was published with a preface from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, stating, The field of artificial intelligence is not a matter of choice, but one of the biggest bearers of our development goals. The major tenets of the artificial intelligence (Al) strategy include realising actions of decision-making, exploring meaning, and learning in dynamic conditions unique to intelligent creatures by computer or computer-controlled machines, according to the official report. We have made the national artificial intelligence (Al) strategy to ensure that the digital transformation is most beneficial to society, said Musyafa Varank, Minister of Industry and Technology, indicating that Turkey is one of the few countries to develop such a plan. The artificial intelligence will be an indispensable part of economic and social fields in the very near future, Varank also said while explains the plan's socio-economic aims. The plan outlines six priorities primarily centered around supporting Turkey's Al initiatives and strengthening international cooperation in this field by training artificial intelligence specialists and increasing employment , encouraging research, entrepreneurship, and innovation, reaching to quality data and technical infrastructure, and expediting structural and workforce transformation. The government would like to commercialise applications developed and prioritise in public procurement and boost the number of MSc graduates specialized in AI technology by at least 10,000. We will enter the top 20 countries in the international artificial intelligence indices, Ali Taha Koc, Head of the Digital Transformation Office of the Turkish Presidency said during the ceremony, highlighting the importance of becoming an accurate Al data-sharing country. The strategy forecasts a two-fold increase in market size and global AI expenditures within five years. It also strives to enhance Turkey's economic and technological independence by reinforcing indigenous infrastructure and a structural transformation. Efforts are still ongoing to establish institutions and unicorns similar to The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) Artificial Intelligence Institute . When compared to the 2,000 US and Chinese startups, the number in Turkey is low at approximately 200 companies. Two more Russian defense ministrys Il-76 planes with people evacuated from Afghanistan have landed at Chkalovsky airport near Moscow. Two first planes landed at Chkalovsky earlier on Thursday, Il-62 and Il-76. There were around 100 people, mostly Russian nationals of the Afghan origin, onboard the Il-76 plane. One of those evacuated told journalists he had spent five months in Afghanistan. He said he had come to that country to visit his relatives but got stuck "because of the political situation." "It is cold here. And I also have a feeling of security," he shared his impressions after the arrival in Moscow. Thus, all the four planes the Russian defense ministry sent to Afghanistan to evacuate people have returned home. The Russian defense ministry evacuated more than 500 people, citizens of Russia, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) member states and Ukraine, from Afghanistan by four military transport aircraft at the instruction of President Vladimir Putin. The planes took off from Kabul on Wednesday. They made stopovers in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to drop off citizens of these countries. Units of Armenian Armed Forces resorted to provocation against Azerbaijan, trying to make arson in the direction of Azerbaijan's Sadarak district, according to the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry on Aug.25. In recent days, the Armenian side, with the help of local media and foreign media sponsored by Armenians, has been spreading misinformation about the shelling of the border regions of the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic, especially the village of Arazdayan, by Azerbaijani troops. Non-combat losses, especially suicides, in the Armenian army, the myth of the invincibility of which was destroyed by the 44-day Patriotic War and which is now in chaos, have been dispelled. To hide this, the Armenian side is trying to create a negative image of Azerbaijani army, spreading false information, and the situation is aggravated by shelling of Azerbaijani positions. In the direction of Arazdayan-Sadarak on the Armenian-Azerbaijani state border, hostile provocations are being made against personnel, weapons and equipment, various methods are regularly used to inflict environmental damage on Azerbaijani territories. Azerbaijani units resolutely suppress these provocations of Armenia. Taking pictures of the Armenian-Azerbaijani state border in the direction of Arazdayan-Sadarak, the ecological terror committed by the Armenian military, as well as the shelling of Azerbaijani positions has been witnessed. The fires started by Armenian vandals, who were unable to do anything useful for humanity, set fire to their positions. As it can be seen on the video, Azerbaijani soldiers extinguished the fire. The Azerbaijani side created conditions for extinguishing the fire. But a few days ago, while extinguishing the fires, the Armenians fired at the employees of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic, and one firefighter of the ministry was shot dead. Armenia, which continues to misinform its people and the world community, spreads a lie that the road in the direction of Yerevan-Arazdayan-Kerki was also shelled. During the filming towards Arazdayan, it was observed that the road was in full working order. During filming, several plainclothes men were seen walking between positions on the opposite side. If Azerbaijan allegedly breaks the ceasefire and opens the fire first, then why are the Armenian army soldiers acting so comfortably? Because the Armenian side is well aware that the Azerbaijani army has never opened fire first. Therefore, the Armenian command deliberately involves its servicemen in provocations on the front line in civilian clothes. During the filming, it was seen that the conditions of hostilities are under the full control of special forces units, and provocations by Armenian vandals on the border with Nakhchivan are resolutely and will be prevented. The Armenian Parliament has approved today the governments program of activities designed for 2021-2026 by a vote of 70. The parliamentary opposition boycotted the voting. The head of the Hayastan (Armenia) alliance Seyran Ohanyan stated that the government's program is not in tune with the current situation in the country. The program consists of 6 sections: security and foreign policy, economy, development of infrastructures and human capital, law and justice, and institutional development. The debates on the program were interrupted by scuffles between the pro-government and opposition lawmakers, who hurled at each other bottles and chairs. The Office of Armenias Prosecutor General said it will order an inquiry into two scuffles provoked by MPs in the parliament. It said a preliminary study of the video recordings of August 25 session shows that some lawmakers demonstrated behavior that is unbecoming of the representative of the legislative body and disrespectful attitude towards the citizens watching the session live, which was accompanied by obscene expressions and the use of violence. Taking this into account, the Prosecutor General referred the video recordings to the Special Investigation Service for the legal assessment of the incident. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyans Civil Contract party won 53.91% of the votes in the June 20 snap parliamentary elections and controls 71 seats in the new National Assembly. The Hayastan (Armenia) alliance, headed by a former president Robert Kocharyan controls 29 seats (21.09% of the votes) and another alliance called Pativ Unem (I Have the Honor), led by Artur Vanetsyan, former chief of the National Security Service, has 7 seats (5.52%). Earlier, during the presentation of the government program Pashinyan said that Armenia is ready to open regional communications with Azerbaijan. "As Armenia should get a road to Russia and Iran through the territory of Azerbaijan, so Azerbaijan should get a road for communications with its eastern regions [from exclave Nakhchivan to the main territory of the country] through the territory of Armenia," Pashinyan stressed. The PM also noted that demarcation and delimitation of borders with Azerbaijan must be started as quickly as possible. "I regret that due to political noise it wasnt possible to achieve the planned result in the spring. The unstable situation on a number of sections of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border is a serious threat to the start of these processes," Pashinyan noted. Two Armenian soldiers attacked Azerbaijani border guard Ruslan Shiraliyev, who was on duty on the border-combat point, located in the direction of the Gerus-Kafan road section near the Ashagy Jibikli village of the Gubadli region, according to the State Border Service. In a hand-to-hand fight, the Armenian soldiers wounded Shiraliyev with a bayonet knife. According to the report, the Armenian military, seeing that other border guards came to the rescue, fled, taking advantage of the dense forest. Soldier Shiraliev was immediately evacuated to the military hospital of the State Border Service, and now there is no threat to his life. All responsibility for what happened lies with the Armenian side, and an adequate response will be given to this provocation. The first batch of Turkish troops evacuated from Afghanistan landed in the country's capital on Thursday, according to flag carrier Turkish Airlines. The first plane carrying Turkish soldiers who decided to be evacuated from Afghanistan landed in Ankara at 11.45 a.m. local time (08:45 GMT), said a Turkish Airlines Press Office statement. The group of 345 Turkish Armed Forces personnel initially traveled from the Afghan capital Kabul to Islamabad, Pakistans capital, via a Turkish Air Force transport plane, then proceeded to Ankara on a Turkish Airlines flight. Two more evacuation flights are set to take off from Istanbul on Monday, depending on demand, Anadolu Agency reported. The Taliban takeover of Kabul last week set off a wave of evacuations via the Kabul airport, with a Taliban deadline of next Tuesday, Aug. 31, to finish the evacuations looming. The victory in Second Karabakh War is Azerbaijan's historic victory, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said at the ceremony of providing apartments and cars to families of martyrs, veterans, and heroes of the war. "In recent years, I have had numerous meetings with the families of martyrs and disabled veterans of the Karabakh war. In all our meetings before the war, I said that we would return our lands at any cost, we would return Karabakh, we would restore our territorial integrity, we would avenge our martyrs, and this is exactly what happened. Azerbaijan has restored justice, has restored international law, has returned its lands and has avenged the blood of its martyrs," he said. Today, in the months that have passed since the war, a completely different atmosphere prevails at our meetings with the families of martyrs and veterans of the Karabakh war. Whereas in previous years we always paid tribute to the memory of our martyrs and promised to take revenge for them, today we can proudly say that we did not leave the blood of our martyrs unavenged, we have restored justice, we have driven the enemy our of our lands and inscribed our name in the history of the world as a victorious nation, the head of state said. Today, President Ilham Aliyev added, great work is being done and should be done to perpetuate the memory of the martyrs of the first and second Karabakh wars and to keep them in our hearts. The provision of the families of martyrs and Karabakh war veterans with housing was one of the key directions of our policy, and this is still the case today. At the same time, of course, this process will last for a certain time because this problem will be completely eliminated in the near future. At the same time, we must be more active in conveying the truth about the Second Karabakh War to the world community. This topic must also be in the forefront of education of our youth. Because our victory in the Second Karabakh War, in the Patriotic War is a historic victory for us, the head of state added. According to him, huge work has been done to date for families of martyrs, war veterans within the state policy. Ilham Aliyev noted that Azerbaijani people will live proudly as citizens of the victorious country and as victorious people since now. Today, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva have attended a ceremony to give out apartments and cars to families of martyrs, war disabled and heroes of the Patriotic War in Absheron district. Irans parliament approved all but one of President Ebrahim Raisi's big-name nominees for a cabinet of hardliners that will have the task of implementing his plans to ease U.S. sanctions and tackle worsening economic hardship. The hardline-dominated parliament approved anti-Western Hossein Amirabdollahian as foreign minister. A former ambassador to Bahrain, Amirabdollahian was deputy foreign minister for Arab and African affairs between 2011 and 2016. He was deputy chief of mission at Iran's embassy in Baghdad from 1997-2001. Parliament also approved the nomination of Javad Owji, an ex-deputy oil minister and managing director of the state-run gas company, as oil minister. Raisi's nominee for the education ministry was rejected by lawmakers for issues including lack of experience in the subject, Reuters reported. Raisi's cabinet includes several commanders of the Guards like Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi, a former defence minister and commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, the Quds Force. Raisi was sworn into office on Aug. 5. The issue of Afghanistan requires an exchange of opinions and information between Russia and the United States, and the mechanism of such contacts has been set, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Thursday. "These contacts emerge as the need arises, but the mechanism of contacts has been established. Certainly, the situation requires an exchange of opinions and information, so, of course, with a great degree of probability, these contacts will surely continue," the Kremlin official said in response to a question on whether the high-level contacts between Moscow and Washington are planned on the subject of Afghanistan. The spokesman reiterated that earlier this week Secretary of Russias Security Council Nikolai Patrushev held a phone conversation with U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan. Peskov noted that Russias position with regards to the number of Afghan nationals the country is ready to receive has not yet been shaped, and this work is underway by migration authorities and Russias Foreign Ministry. "There is no formed stance with regards to this," the Kremlin official said. "The work is underway both along the lines of migration authorities and along the lines of the Foreign Ministry," he added. "The situation is changing, a lot of questions still remain, the position will be formulated as things clear up," the spokesman explained. After the Biden administration had announced the end of Washingtons 20-year-long military operation in Afghanistan and the launch of its troop pullout, the Taliban (outlawed in Russia) embarked on an offensive against Afghan government forces. Russia will allow the resettlement of around 1,000 Afghan nationals following the Taliban's (terrorist group outlawed in Russia) sudden takeover of Afghanistan, an Afghan diaspora leader said. Chairman of the Afghan Diaspora in Russia Ghulam Mohammad Jalal made the remarks as huge crowds remained outside Kabul airport, with thousands of Afghans hoping to flee the threat of reprisals and repression and Western forces rushing to meet an Aug. 31 evacuation deadline. Russia has cleared entry for Afghans with Russian passports and work and residence permits as well as students at Russian universities, Jalal said. They have received approval, now theyre waiting in line to fly to Russia at the first technical opportunity when the airport is opened, RIA Novosti cited him as saying as saying. Jalal added that discussions are ongoing regarding Afghan graduates of Russian universities and relatives of those who have received clearance to ensure that militants disguised as refugees do not infiltrate their ranks. President Vladimir Putin warned of an influx of terrorists posing as asylum seekers from Afghanistan earlier this week. Were also afraid of that, the diaspora leader said. Who knows wholl be among these refugees, the main thing is that there are no undesirable persons among them. Russia will deliver four Su-30SM multirole fighters to Kazakhstan, Director of Russias Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation Dmitry Shugayev told a briefing on Wednesday. "Work continues to implement a contract on the delivery of another batch of four such fighters to our Kazakh partners by the end of 2022. So far, 20 advanced Su-30SM fighters have been delivered to the Republic of Kazakhstan," Russias military cooperation chief said. Su-30SM multirole fighters are arriving for the Air Force of Kazakhstan under an agreement with Russia and as part of the program of rearming the republics armed forces. The Su-30SM is a generation 4++ two-seat super-maneuverable all-weather fighter jet. The deliveries of Su-30SM fighters from the Irkutsk Aviation Enterprise began in 2015. Turkey has begun evacuating its armed forces from Afghanistan after evaluating the current situation and conditions, the Ministry of National Defense said in a statement late Wednesday, referring to the Taliban's takeover of the war-ridden country. "Turkish Armed Forces returning to their homeland with pride of successfully fulfilling task entrusted to them," it added. Since 2002, the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) have operated in Afghanistan under the U.N., NATO, and bilateral agreements to contribute to the peace, welfare, and stability of the Afghan people, the statement said. It added that the Turkish troops intervened together with the soldiers of other countries during the chaos and ensured security at the Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. As many as 1,129 civilian Turkish citizens were evacuated through military aircraft during the process, the statement noted. Withdrawal from Afghanistan could be completed in 36 hours, Presidential Spokesperson Ibrahim Kaln also said during a televised interview later in the day. Our troops completed their duty successfully, he added. Civilian experts could provide support in running Kabul airport, Kaln further added. We have to act in line with the realities on the field. The official also added that Turkey is in contact with Iranian authorities regarding a possible migration flow, Daily Sabah reported. Concerns about security around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul have increased based on "a very specific threat stream" from ISIS-K (terrorist group outlawed in Russia) about planned attacks against crowds outside the airport, a US defense official has told CNN. The U.S. believes ISIS-K, which is a sworn enemy of the Taliban (terrorist group outlawed in Russia), wants to create mayhem at the airport and has intelligence streams suggesting it is capable and planning to carry out multiple attacks, according to the official. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul advised U.S. citizens at a number of gates at the airport to "leave immediately," noting "security threats outside the gates." "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising U.S. citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a U.S. government representative to do so," the alert said. Concerns increased after more than 100 prison inmates loyal to the ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan escaped from two prisons near Kabul as the Taliban advanced on the Afghan capital, CNN has learned. Many resources in society have been mobilized for testing, vaccination and medical quarantine, which has improved service quality and helped businesses earn revenue. On July 30, the Ministry of Health (MOH) released an urgent dispatch signed by MOH Minister Nguyen Thanh Long on mobilizing medical facilities for the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. Hotels used as medical facilities As a steward on international flights during the pandemic, Nguyen Thanh Trung has completed his medical quarantine period at a hotel in Hoan Kiem District in Hanoi. The fee for the quarantine period was paid by the airline where he works. For Trung, the quarantine at the hotel was a new experience. He received adequate medical care in modern facilities. Workers at the hotel were available round the clock. I had nutritious meals every day. They helped me enjoy my quarantine time, Trung said. A recent survey found that demand is high for hotels for quarantine. According to the HCM City Tourism Department, in the first days when paid quarantine was launched, the users were mostly foreign specialists, managers and investors entering Vietnam. They are willing to pay for good services and safe quarantine. But now, all citizens from overseas entering HCM City can register to spend their quarantine time at hotels and pay for it. The Ministry of Health recently asked the Prime Minister to allow resorts, hotels, guesthouses and dormitories to be used as facilities for treating mild Covid-19 patients. The fees and the regime of treatment will be stipulated by MOH and Ministry of Finance (MOF). The facilities receive, supervise and give initial treatment to mild or asymptomatic Covid-19 patients, which eases the overloading at hospitals and helps prevent the spread of the coronavirus in the community. The model was successfully implemented on a trial basis in Bac Giang, and then in HCM City. Analysts say that turning hotels and resorts into quarantine zones was a good solution, because no one can say for sure when the pandemic will end. According to Savills Vietnam, eight hotels were put into use as quarantine facilities in the second quarter, raising the total number of hotels for quarantine in HCM City to 25. The facilities provide more than 3,000 rooms. In Hanoi, 10 3-5-star hotels have been chosen to serve as quarantine facilities. This improves service quality, but also helps hotel owners get revenue. Other cities and provinces such as Da Nang, Nha Trang and Hoi An have turned some hotels into quarantine zones. HCM City became the first locality in the country to digitize hotel booking and transportation of F1 cases and international guests on August 1. This might be used as a solution for concentrated quarantine facilities. Many resources in society have been mobilized for testing, vaccination and medical quarantine, which has improved service quality and helped businesses earn revenue. Analysts predict that the number of people under quarantine will rise sharply in the time to come. In such conditions, using existing accommodation facilities for quarantine is a good solution. People will have more choices, while the overloading at existing quarantine zones will be eased. It also offers financial benefits to hotels, which have been paralyzed for nearly two years. A report by Savills Vietnam showed that the average hotel room occupancy rate in 2020 reduced 44 percent YoY. According to the General Statistics Office (GSO), due to Covid-19, the number of foreign visitors to Vietnam decreased by 79.5 percent last year compared with 2019 to 3.7 million. Private healthcare sector The private healthcare system was mobilized to participate in the fight against Covid-19 early, especially for testing and vaccination. Many private hospitals are now willing to receive and treat Covid-19 patients. Medlatec General Hospital, for example, participated in the second campaign for Covid-19 testing in the community, and carried out 130,000 tests out of 800,000 of the entire city on August 18-20. In HCM City, FV Hospital in District 7 is also one of the private hospitals participating in the Covid-19 vaccination campaign. Pham Thi Thanh Mai, Managing Director of FV Hospital, said that FV is equipped with a storage warehouse system certified by the HCM City Pasteur Institute that meets requirements to store 800,000 doses of AstraZeneca, 200,000 of Moderna and 600,000 of Pfizer at the same time. At present, every team is composed of three nurses, one doctor and one administrative officer. With 100 nurses, FV can provide 10,000 injection shots each day at the hospital and at mobile injection points. If working seven days a week, FV can vaccinate 250,000 people a month, thus helping the city speed up the pace of vaccinations, Mai said. The participation of private hospitals in the fight gives more important resources to HCM City to treat Covid-19 patients. According to the HCM City Healthcare Department, as of July 27, four private hospitals had registered to treat Covid-19 patients. At a recent meeting with leaders of private hospitals, Long noted that some private hospitals have divided into two parts to treat Covid-19 and other patients. Long told the hospitals to register with the HCM City Healthcare Department and inform them of the number of beds reserved for usual healthcare services and for Covid-19 patients. Duy Anh New ways to save VN tourism industry The gradual opening of international routes and the pilot opening of some tourist sites for foreign tourists are among important solutions in efforts to save the aviation, tourism, hotel and service industries. Through vaccine diplomacy, Vietnam has so far received millions of vaccine doses from the support of the international community. Last week, vaccine diplomacy was more active than ever as the Government established a working group on vaccine diplomacy and the Prime Minister sent a letter to EU leaders and talked on the phone with the leaders of AstraZeneca and Pfizer - the two leading vaccine producers in the world. These activities show the very high determination and serious involvement of the Government to seek sources of vaccine supply as as soon as possible. The important "front" The working group on vaccine diplomacy meets for the first time. Vietnam is experiencing the fourth outbreak of Covid-19, the strongest since this virus appeared in Vietnam on January 23, 2020. The number of new infection cases reported on August 20 and 22 exceeded 11,000 per day. In the Vietnamese government's relentless efforts to control the epidemic, vaccine diplomacy has become a key point, not only in accessing and importing vaccines but also in opening up opportunities for technology transfer and local production of vaccines, creating the most sustainable vaccine supply for Vietnam in the short and long term. Vaccine diplomacy is essentially taking advantage of bilateral and multilateral relationships through international organizations, countries and corporations to increase Vietnams access to Covid-19 vaccines. On August 13, the Government established a working group on vaccine diplomacy led by Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son. The group members are high-ranking officials from the ministries of Foreign Affairs, Health, National Defense, Public Security, Industry and Trade, Science - Technology and the Government Office. Three days later, the working group had its first meeting to evaluate and review the initial results and future tasks. Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son told the media that in the current situation, vaccine diplomacy is a very important "front". The working group now focuses on mobilizing international partners and organizations to continue providing vaccine aid, and promoting cooperation in production and technology transfer of vaccines, drugs and medical products for Vietnam as soon as possible. It also exerts efforts to find, connect and urge foreign partners in negotiating, importing and receiving vaccines, drugs and medical products. According to Mr. Son, through vaccine diplomacy, Vietnam has so far received millions of vaccine doses from the support of the international community. This not only directly serves epidemic prevention, but also has very significant internal, external, political, national defense, security and socio-economic aspects. Using all diplomatic channels, with relentless effort and determination Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh talked on the phone with AstraZeneca Group's General Director Pascal Soriot on August 19. To implement the vaccine strategy, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh held phone talks with the Prime Ministers of 16 countries; sent letters and telegrams to leaders of 22 countries and 10 international organizations to promote "vaccine diplomacy", achieving a number of important results. On August 18, Vietnamese President Nguyen Xuan Phuc sent a letter to the President of the European Council Charles Michel, and Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh sent a letter to Ms. Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, asking the EU to provide vaccines to Vietnam. On August 12, French President Emmanuel Macron wrote on Twitter that to win the battle against the epidemic, access to vaccines must be universal and equal. This is why France has shared 670,000 doses of vaccine with Vietnam, as part of the COVAX program. The Polish government on August 17 decided to give over 501,000 doses of Astra Zeneca vaccine and essential medical equipment worth US$4 million to Vietnam. Poland is also willing to cede 3 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to Vietnam. Vietnam is the first non-European country that Poland has provided vaccine and medical equipment aid. On August 19 and 20, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh talked on the phone with AstraZeneca Group's General Director Pascal Soriot and Pfizer Chairman and CEO Albert Bourla the two leading producers of Covid-19 vaccines in the world. The Prime Minister suggested that AstraZeneca and Pfizer speed up the delivery of vaccines to Vietnam. Leaders of the two corporations pledged to make every effort, find all options to speed up the delivery of vaccines to Vietnam, and support Vietnam in receiving transfers and other forms of vaccine delivery from countries in the future. Tuan Minh Vaccine diplomacy working group to promote fast access to Covid-19 vaccines: foreign minister Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son, head of the newly-established government working group on vaccine diplomacy, talks with the media about the groups tasks and role. This is the time to review the relationship between Vietnam and the US, Pham Quang Vinh, former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, and former Vietnamese Ambassador to the US (2014-2018) told VietNamNet on the occasion of US Vice President Kamala Harris visit to Vietnam. US Vice President Kamala Harris. Photo: Reuters In your opinion, what is the message of the US Vice President's visit to Southeast Asia this time? When a vice president, the number two figure of the United States, pays a visit to the region, even in the first months of her term, the first message is undoubtedly that Southeast Asia is very important in relations with the US. The US attaches importance to Southeast Asia in the common strategy on the Asia-Pacific and Indo-Pacific regions. President Biden, referring to national security guidance, stressed that the Indo-Pacific - a dynamic region in both geostrategy and geo-economics - is one of the focuses of the US and this country. Affirming its engagement with this region, the US is strongly re-consolidating the partnership system and at the same time wishes to work with all countries to build a rule-based order for peace, security and prosperity. The US Vice President chose two countries for this trip, Singapore and Vietnam, which - from the US perspective - have the momentum for bilateral cooperation development and play a significant role in regional peace and security. What can you say about the time of the visit? Firstly, the new US administration started its term in late January 2021 and since then the US and the world have been in a very special situation: the time for prevention of the Covid-19 pandemic. This is also the time for the new administration to implement a series of internal and external strategies. The US has begun to implement foreign strategies in both Europe and Asia. As the US more clearly shapes and implements its foreign strategy actively, the Asia-Pacific becomes a very important region. The US attaches great importance to ASEAN and its state members as multilateral and bilateral partners. It seems that after a period of focusing on domestic affairs and disease prevention, after the initial phase of being a little distracted from Southeast Asia, this is the time, through high-level visits, the US strongly affirms its desire to be associated with the region. At this time, the US and countries in the region have many similar interests in cooperation to maintain peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific, prevent the Covid-19 epidemic, and maintain economic growth and supply chains. Ambassador Pham Quang Vinh. How do you evaluate the Vietnam - US relations so far this year? Under Mr. Biden's administration, Vietnam - US relations continue to develop, which is clearly reflected in the continued communication of the two sides at all levels. While the epidemic is complicated, the economic and trade relations between the two countries continued to develop. Last year, two-way trade reached more than $90 billion and it was $53 billion for the first half of this year. The US continued its cooperation with Vietnam in dealing with war consequences such as cleaning up Bien Hoa airport, and mine detection and disposal. Recently, the two sides signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in searching, gathering and identifying Vietnamese martyrs' remains. In July, the US transferred a Hamilton-class coast guard ship to Vietnam. In short, the US always attaches importance to and wants to further promote bilateral and multilateral relations with Vietnam. The US has continued to affirm the guiding principles of the relationship such as emphasizing respect for each other's political institutions, and an independent, strong and prosperous Vietnam. What do you think about the relationship between the US and the region, and particularly Vietnam, in the coming time? The Vietnam-US relationship is already at a strategic level, and broadly speaking, this relationship is both comprehensive and strategic. A dynamically developing Southeast Asia, with a shaped regional structure, is actively contributing to peace and security to the benefit of each country and the whole region. Powers in the world all support the central role of ASEAN. The US will continue its engagement with the region and attach importance to the role of ASEAN. What will be the cooperation between the US and ASEAN when both traditional and non-traditional security challenges arise? Regarding disease prevention, the US has made a series of commitments to help countries around the world, especially Southeast Asia. To date, the US has donated 23 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines along with equipment and cash to ASEAN countries, including Vietnam. This is the time to review and rename the relationship between Vietnam and the US to match the actual level of cooperation. In fact, Vietnam-US ties are both strategic and comprehensive as mentioned above. Dieu Thuy The total number of COVID-19 cases in Vietnam reached 410,366 as 12,920 new infections were reported on August 27 evening. Local residents in An Giang province get vaccinated against COVID-19. (Photo: VNA) Out of the cases recorded on the day, only 19 were imported and the rest were domestic cases. HCM City led the country in the number of new cases again with 5,383, followed by Binh Duong (4,187), Dong Nai (996), Long An (454), Tien Giang (312), Da Nang (202), Tay Ninh (132), Khanh Hoa (131), Quang Binh (125) and Dong Thap (122). New patients were also found in An Giang (91), Binh Thuan (87), Hanoi (77), Can Tho (72), Thua Thien Hue (70), Dak Lak (63), Ba Ria - Vung Tau (59), Nghe An (57), Ben Tre (31), Binh Dinh (29), Thanh Hoa (28), Kien Giang (28), Phu Yen (21), Tra Vinh (19), Binh Phuoc (17), Hau Giang (15), Vinh Long (14), Quang Tri (13), Quang Ngai (9), Soc Trang (8 ), Ca Mau (8), Ninh Thuan (6), Ha Tinh (6), Quang Nam (5), Ninh Binh (5), Ha Nam (4), Gia Lai (4), Son La (3), Bac Lieu (3), Bac Ninh (2), Bac Giang (2) and Hai Duong (1). Out of the domestic cases, 6,627 were reported as community infections as they were found in communities outside quarantine areas and locked down zones Reports from health officials on August 27 also said 386 deaths have been recorded. They include 356 deaths reported during the day in HCM City (287), Binh Duong (34), Dong Nai (13), Khanh Hoa (10), Long An (7), Da Nang (2), Ben Tre (1), Soc Trang (1), Thanh Hoa (1), and 30 recorded in Phu Yen from the beginning of the month. This brings the countrys death toll to 10,053. A total of 10,126 patients were given the all-clear, bringing the number of recoveries to 198,614. There are eight cities and provinces that have gone 14 days without new cases, which are Quang Ninh, Bac Kan, Tuyen Quang, Lai Chau, Hoa Binh, Yen Bai, Ha Giang and Kon Tum. As of August 27, more than 18.8 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered, with 2,235,013 people having been fully inoculated./. Source: VNA At the foot of Long Bien Bridge, the Phao (Float) hamlet, or hamlet of the poor, is experiencing tough days because of the pandemic. Nguyen Van Duoc, head of Phao Hamlet Nguyen Van Duoc, 75, head of Phao hamlet, said there are 35 families in the hamlet with 121 members living in temporary tents set on rafts in the middle plain of the Red River. The residents are from many different provinces and cities, but they share the same thing difficult circumstances, he said. People take any jobs to earn a living. Strong people went to the city to work as porters, while weaker people collect scrap for sale. But after the pandemic broke out, they lost their jobs. The path from the middle alluvial plain to Long Bien Bridge has now been locked to prevent the spread of the virus. People have to take another route to the market, which takes more time. Like other Hanoians, the residents in Phao hamlet received shopping coupons. However, according to Duoc, many families dont have money to buy food at the market. Local residents have also received support from Ngoc Thuy Ward authorities. All families have received rice and instant noodles. People also can also access vaccinations under the national vaccination program. However, difficulties still persist in their lives. They have heard about benefactors who donate food on the shore, and about zero dong supermarkets, where they can go to pick up the food. However, no one wants to leave their homes, because they dont have the necessary documents and they may be fined. Pham Thi Thu, 64, and her husband, Nguyen Duc Luong, 60, from Nam Dinh, have been living there for 30 years. They dont have children, and Luong has a defect on one eye. Previously, I collected scrap. But I cannot do this anymore. I am afraid of going out. If I get infected, I will have no one to rely on. I would rather stay at home and eat what I can get. Rice and vegetables are enough to get by, he said. Nguyen Van Binh, 70, from Thanh Hoa, said that he doesnt have much money, so he rarely goes shopping. I have to save money, in case I catch disease and need to buy drugs, he explained. A representative of Ngoc Thuy Ward said that local authorities understand the conditions of the residents, so, in addition to necessities, the authorities have given financial support of VND200,000 to every family. With a wish to join forces with the whole country to fight the pandemic, VietNamNet has launched the program Tiep suc day lui dai dich cung VietNamNet. The program aims to give food and essential necessities to the poor, freelance workers and unemployed people affected by the Covid-19 epidemic, as well as to centers for social protection and those who still cannot access aid packages. The program also aims to help equip hospitals, quarantine zones, and medical units with modern equipment. Those who need support can call 19001081 (from 8 am to 8 pm), or send information to banbandoc@vietnamnet.vn Benefactors can give support in two ways Remitting money to VietNamNets account, or donating food, essentials, machines and medical equipment In Vietnam: Account No 0011002643148 Vietcombank Exchange Overseas: Bank account VIETNAMNET NEWSPAPER - The currency of bank account: 0011002643148 - BANK FOR FOREIGN TRADE OF VIETNAM - SWIFT code: BFTVVNV X Remitting money from overseas: Vietnam Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Industry and Trade, Dong Da Branch Address: No 183 Nguyen Luong Bang Street, Dong Da District Swift code: ICBVVNVX126 VietNamNet Head Office: Hanoi: 3rd Floor, CLand Building, No 156 Xa Dan 2 Street, Dong Da District HCMC Office No 408 Dien Bien Phu Street, District 10 Bao Khanh - Tien Dung Food supply ensured for HCM City, southern region during stay-at-home period Food supply has been ensured for HCM City and the southern region during the social distancing period, according to a working group supporting the COVID-19 fight in the southern region. According to the press release, children begin believing that math is for boys, not girls as early as the second grade and by the time they reach high school 41% of girls count themselves out of STEM jobs. Troop 7511 Scout Lucille Pethel, 13, of Waco, said she already loves science and math and that science is her favorite subject. Science is very important, especially now with everything that is happening, Lucille said. More people are realizing we need science more than anything. She said knowing how to properly manage and create technology is important and that STEM programs offer a foundation to everything we use in our lives. Engineering and mathematics, we need that in everyday life, Lucille said. You wouldnt have anything if someone wasnt engineering your stuff and using math and science and technology to make it. Lucille, who has been in Girl Scouts eight years, said teaching girls STEM lets them know they can do anything boys can. The test is a self-administered, shallow nose swab. Results will be available 48 hours to 72 hours after taking the test. There are 200 tests available per day. Registration is required at mycovidappointment.com or at 833-213-0643. The expense for the test will be billed to insurance or to the federal program for the uninsured. No one will be turned away for lack of insurance. SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) The state of Washington on Thursday ordered the killing of one or two wolves from the Togo pack in Ferry County in response to repeated attacks on cattle. The state Department of Fish and Wildlife said nonlethal deterrents used by three different ranchers had not stopped the attacks. The department had documented one dead and three injured calves since June 24. The attacks were attributed to the Togo pack. Three occurred within the last 30 days. Removing individual wolves is one of the toughest decisions we face and is never taken lightly, said Julia Smith, wolf policy lead for the department. Those communities and WDFW staff have worked diligently to protect their livestock and meet expectations, and the season has been relatively quiet until now. August and September are typically months in which wolf-livestock conflict peaks, so this is not unexpected." The pack consists of five adult wolves and four pups, the department said. Ranchers tried a variety of approved methods to deter the wolves including using range riders, removing sick or injured cattle and properly disposing of dead cattle but those methods failed, the department said. The rise of the delta variant makes this small risk worth taking, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. The FDA should allow EUA to go forward without requiring up to six months of safety data and a significant increase in the number of kids in Phase 3 studies. This would permit Pfizer to seek emergency use authorization for younger children in September, as it had originally planned, and receive authorization soon after, far before the FDAs projected midwinter date. Faster authorization will save tens of thousands of child hospitalizations, hundreds of child deaths and, through reduced spread, thousands of adult lives. The Pfizer vaccine for those 12 and older received full FDA approval on Monday, which allows doctors to prescribe it to children under 12 in what is called off-label usage. This could lead to yet another COVID-19-related health disparity, since the vaccination advantage is likely to go to the children of parents who have the time and money to seek out physicians offering such vaccinations. Extensive off-label vaccination might not emerge if the FDA speeds up the authorization process of the vaccine for younger children. Parents who want to wait for more data could still do so the safety evidence that will emerge from millions of children who would now be vaccinated. Public option was to be the big health care idea of 2021. Once again, its time to recall the dog-eared pages of Ecclesiastes. In June, headlines announced that Nevada Governor Steve Sisolak had signed SB 420, making Nevada the second state (after Washington) to create a public option health insurance plan health insurance sold by the government, to compete with private plans. This second state moniker was relayed by the Associated Press, ABC News, Kaiser Health News and others. In 2019, a Politico article similarly called Washington the first state to test the idea of a public option. Nope. Journalists, scholars, and readers should remember Ecclesiastes 1:9 There is no new thing under the sun. Under Nevadas blazing sun, the states public option health plan is nothing new. The 1990s and early 2000s were littered with the carcasses of failed public option plans. To claim that Nevada is the second state with a public option requires a carefully selected prepositional phrase: in the 2020s, perhaps, or since the Affordable Care Act became law in 2010. Otherwise, the second-state claim is equivalent to my proclaiming that Robert Graboyes is the second American to drink a cup of coffee, while leaving out the qualifiers in the Graboyes home and on August 16, 2021. I join with WFM and its supporters in promoting the effort to build an expansion to the current facility in order to serve Wacos growing population and continuing need for physicians, in addition to supporting our community with important education and direction during times of health emergencies such as we are currently experiencing. Harry Harelik, Waco Just rewards Your article on preachers being silent on COVID-19 shots [Saturdays Trib] tells of a number of ministers who either support getting the shots, not getting the shots or not mentioning them to their congregations. Most ministers are quick to tell of how often they read the Bible. As I read this article, there was not a one of them who gave the simple answer as to how to fight the pandemic and other issues facing this country. Second Chronicles 7:14 gives the simple answer: If my people who are called by my name shall humble themselves and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. Lindley said masks are an effective mitigation strategy against COVID-19. Even though they are not popular, they do not hinder the learning environment, he added. The pastor said parents in the district have told him they feel that the school districts leaders are not taking the situation seriously enough, making them afraid to send their children to school. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Very specific and particular health concerns have been shared with the administration, and those concerns have seemingly gone unheard, Lindley continued. He concluded by urging the district to make masks mandatory for all students, staff and visitors, regardless of vaccination status. Why would we not do everything we can to protect the most vulnerable in our community? he asked. Lindley was not on the agenda for the meeting, and as a result the school board members could not respond to his requests, but President Dave Nygren thanked him for his comments. Later in the meeting, Superintendent Jason Libal discussed the issue, saying other school districts that are requiring masks are different than Ashland-Greenwood. He and the administration continue to monitor the situation and are working closely with Three Rivers to communicate and collaborate. Thanks for reading! Log in to continue. Enjoy more articles by logging in or creating a free account. No credit card required. ARMY Army unveils solicitation for $10B IT product contract The Army has officially kicked off the bidding on its potential $10 billion, multiple-award ITES-4H contract for acquiring enterprise IT products from industry. Companies have a deadline of 5 p.m. Eastern time on Sept. 24 to get their proposals in for this fourth iteration of the IT Enterprise Solutions hardware vehicle, the Army said in a contracting notice Wednesday. At least 17 awards are planned with the intent to reserve seven for small businesses. However, the Army said that second number is contingent on whether seven small businesses are in the competitive range. Delivery work will take place over five base years and up to five individual option years if the Army exercises them all. Product categories the Army called out in the solicitation include servers, workstations, thin clients, desktop computers, notebook computers, storage systems, networking equipment, imaging equipment and support devices. The Army also wants companies to include in their proposals a variety of potential finance options for offerings such as on-premise leasing of computing resources, data processing systems and data storage options. Incumbents on the current ITES-3H contract are World Wide Technology, Force 3, Telos Corp., Wildflower International, Zivaro, PC Connection, Nana Regional Corp., Dynamic Systems, IBM, CDW-Government, Iron Bow Technologies, MicroTech, Unicom Systems, ID Technologies, Dell Technologies, Government Acquisitions and Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Approximately $3 billion in task order spending has been obligated against ITES-3H with World Wide Technology leading the pack on $726.3 million in awards, according to Deltek data. Second on the list is Iron Bow on $515.8 million, followed by CDW-G on $358 million and then ID Technologies on $288 million. Rounding out the top five takers of task orders is Nana Regional Corp. on $160 million. PEOPLE Serco Group hires global maritime lead Serco Group has hired nearly two-decade defense industry veteran Kai Skvarla as head of international maritime programs for all of the government services companys divisions. Skvarla will report directly to Chief Executive Rupert Soames and work directly with the geographic and division-level CEOs on maritime opportunities in their regions, Serco said Thursday. Those regions include the Americas, which he will be based in out of the office in Herndon, Virginia. Skvarla intends to travel to Sercos other regions on a regular basis. More specific to the U.S., the company's Serco Inc. subsidiary has prioritized Navy programs as avenues for growth. That push included the acquisition two years ago of the now-former Alion Science and Technology naval engineering business. Most recently, Skvarla was president of naval architecture firm BMT Designers & Planners and spent 11 years at that company altogether. BMT credits his six years of being president as coinciding with a 26-percent compound annual growth rate. Prior to BMT, Skvarla was naval shipbuilding program manager for the Coast Guards National Security Cutter program. WATERLOO Authorities continue to investigate a fatal shooting that erupted at one of the busiest intersections in the city during a torrential downpour on Tuesday afternoon. The name of the deceased is still being withheld pending family notification, but police said the victim is a local man. An autopsy is pending, and investigators continue to talk to witnesses. We are still out looking for people and talking to people, said Maj. Joe Leibold with the Waterloo Police Department. Officers collected security camera videos from nearby homes and businesses, but they are asking the public to submit any other photos or videos they may have. Videos can be submitted through an online portal at waterloopdia.evidence.com/axon/citizen/public/washingtonstreetshooting. No arrests have been made, but officers searched an address on Langley Road following the shooting. The shooting broke out at about 4:30 p.m. Tuesday in the 1100 block of Washington Street, which is also Highway 218, in front of the Kwik Stop 3 convenience store. Officers found the victim in the grass median with a gunshot wound, and a blue Dodge unattended and half pulled of the stores driveway. More than 1,000 kindergarten through 12th-grade students participated to some degree in the districts recently completed summer school programs. Lindaman said those programs and future years summer school will be funded using the ESSER dollars along with other extended learning opportunities the district plans to provide. Over three years, she noted, that is expected to cost almost $10 million. Among many other things, that includes the expense of several additional credit recovery teachers. Cedar Falls Community Schools also held an expanded summer school program. In addition, it planned to spend funds on new interventionist positions, before- and after-school learning, one-on-one tutoring and credit recovery. Some funding will also be used to fully implement professional learning communities, which includes teachers and other staff who work together to help students succeed in class a process that was suspended last year due to the pandemic. Waverly-Shell Rock Community Schools planned additional elementary school staff to support interventions for academically struggling students. The district may use some of its federal funds for a summer school program next year. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} I remember long nights, scary days and repeated operations to graft the huge wounds. I also remember his spirit, his courage and his indomitable will. I also remember that his wife and kids stood by him and helped him remember the reasons for the struggle and gave him support so he wouldnt fail. Clabby recalled having to learn how to walk again after the accident, and even today, walking is becoming more difficult. These days he is not able to venture out into the hot weather because his sweat glands were damaged, leaving his body unable to cool itself. But ultimately, he believes he would have been toast that day if he hadnt been wearing a dual cartridge mask. If I hadnt had that on, all I would have had to do was take a deep breath or a breath of any kind, and it would have fried my lungs, and I would have been dead within a very short time, he said. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Moving forward In the weeks and months after the accident, it took Clabby an hour to get dressed in the morning. He couldnt stand up by himself. His wife, Donna, bathed him and drove him places all while taking care of their children. The family describes her as a superhero. DES MOINES A Council Bluffs mother is suing the state to end its ban on schools enacting face mask requirements. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in a district court in Polk County on behalf of Frances Parr, who has two young children who attend Council Bluffs public schools. The suit names Gov. Kim Reynolds, state Public Health Director Kim Garcia and state Education Director Ann Lebo as defendants. The ban was approved by the Republican-led Iowa Legislature and signed into law by Reynolds, also a Republican, in May. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} The suit says the ban violates the rights of Parrs children and other students to attend school without a threat of contracting COVID-19 or the delta variant, the symptoms of which could lead to hospitalization, permanent physical harm, emotional harm and even death. The suit notes the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends all students and staff wear face masks inside school buildings and includes a statement from the childrens pediatrician, who wrote of the dangers of children who contract COVID-19. Kimberlee Reimer/Getty Images As soon as Lois Whelan heard about a COVID-19 vaccine making the rounds for animals, she decided she would inoculate her dog and cat if given the opportunity. But the 71-year-old Fort Lauderdale, Florida, resident may have to wait awhile. Scientists are just starting to test an experimental COVID-19 vaccine on zoo animals, such as tigers, bears, gorillas and ferrets. Studies have shown that humans can pass the coronavirus to their cats and dogs, and zoo animals are also at risk of catching the virus. Epidemiologists and public health officials worry that some animal species could foster the disease and allow it to mutate. Whelan thinks that a pet vaccination could be important, despite the small likelihood that her dog and cat will get COVID-19. But what if? she asks. Lions and tigers and bears get shots This summer some zoos have begun vaccinating animals with an experimental dose created solely for critters. Veterinary pharmaceutical company Zoetis is donating more than 11,000 doses of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine for animals to nearly 70 zoos, as well as sanctuaries, universities and conservation programs throughout 27 states. The goal is to protect susceptible species from sickness and death, according to the company. At the Bronx Zoo, in New York, lions and tigers contracted COVID-19 in April 2020, followed by a troop of critically endangered western lowland gorillas, who received supportive care at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park in early 2021. In June two lions died at a zoo in India after testing positive for COVID-19. "Zoos, these days, harbor some animals that are highly endangered in their natural environment..., says Dorothee Bienzle, veterinarian and immunologist at the Ontario Veterinary College at the University of Guelph in Canada. We really can't afford to lose any more of them." California's Oakland Zoo has vaccinated about 50 animals already, starting with bears, mountain lions, tigers and ferrets. The San Diego Zoo kicked off its vaccination campaign with nine great apes, and the Denver Zoo began with gorillas and big cats. Beetaloo Operations Update Sydney, Aug 26, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Empire Energy Group Limited ( ASX:EEG ) ( OTCMKTS:EEGUF ) is pleased to provide shareholders with an update regarding the operations in Empire's 100% owned and operated EP187 tenement, located onshore Northern Territory in the Beetaloo Sub-basin.- Carpentaria-1 vertical hydraulic fracture stimulation and flow test data confirms the flow of liquids rich gas to surface and its composition with contributions from all four stimulated zones of the middle Velkerri shales, with strong contributions from the B shale and C shale- Empire intends to recommence flow testing operations on the Carpentaria-1 vertical well in late September- Northern Territory work program approvals for the next phase of work in EP187 are nearing completion- Planning for the next phases of Empire's EP187 appraisal programs including seismic acquisition and horizontal appraisal drilling is well advanced- Senate Inquiry into the Beetaloo Cooperative Drilling Program has resulted in a supportive resolution and the continuation of the programCarpentaria-1 Flow Testing UpdateAs previously advised to shareholders, the Carpentaria-1 vertical well was fracture stimulated across the Middle Velkerri A, Intra A/B, B and C shales. Following initial well clean up, the well flowed at a peak rate of >1.6 mmcf / day and an average flow rate of 0.25 mmcf / day over a 17-day test period including a final rate of 0.25 mmcf / day. The well was shut-in on 16th July 2021 to comply with COVID-19 operating restrictions.Empire intends to recommence flow testing operations (subject to any further COVID-19 related issues) in late September. This will provide further valuable data to inform technical decisions regarding future appraisal work including the drilling of horizontal appraisal wells targeting the most prospective zones.Carpentaria-1 Zonal Contribution AnalysisInitial zonal contribution and produced gas analysis has been completed on the gas samples taken from the Carpentaria-1 well production test.During production testing, gas samples were regularly taken for analysis to determine the relative production contribution of each of the 4 zones. The percentage contribution of each of the target shale horizons is illustrated in the well log in link below*.Carpentaria-1 Gas Composition AnalysisGas composition data has been obtained from gas sampled during the initial phase of production testing of the Carpentaria-1 vertical well. All four of the open zones were co-mingled during the extended production test and sampling was undertaken on surface at a separator. Therefore, the gas composition data is representative of a combination of all four zones. Multiple gas samples were taken during the flow testing period. Consistent with the mudlog readings during drilling, which indicated drier gas in deeper zones and more liquids-rich gas in shallower zones, the existence of liquids-rich gas and very low CO2 was identified.Once flow testing operations recommence, Empire's technical team will collect additional gas samples and undertake further analysis of zonal contribution and produced gas data to plan for future appraisal activities including the drilling of the proposed Carpentaria-2 horizontal well. That well is likely to be in the northern part of the resource area where the target shales are mapped to be more than 200m deeper than at the Carpentaria-1 location.Northern Territory work program approvals for the next phase of work in EP187 are nearing completion.Beetaloo Cooperative Drilling Program UpdateThe Federal Government's Beetaloo Cooperative Drilling Program ("the Program") provides incentives to companies across the Beetaloo Sub-basin to accelerate activities through the provision of grants to offset up to 25% of the cost of drilling and associated works. The result of this Program will be the accelerated development through to production of gas and potentially liquids from the Beetaloo, providing energy security to Australia's East Coast and economic development for the Northern Territory and its regions.Empire is now progressing its plans consistent with this Program including the drilling and completion of fracture stimulated horizontal appraisal wells and seismic acquisition with the goal of expediting its rapid commercialisation strategy through pipelines adjacent to its development areas.As announced on 8th July 2021, Empire has received approval for grant funding of up to $21 million to support the drilling and flow testing of up to 3 horizontal fracture stimulated wells.Empire recently made submissions to a Senate Inquiry into the Program. Empire's evidence to the inquiry made clear that Empire followed due and proper process at all times in relation to its grant applications.Yesterday, the Senate resolved not to disallow the Program which can now proceed as planned.*To view tables and figures, please visit:About Empire Energy Group Ltd Empire Energy (ASX:EEG) (OTCMKTS:EEGUF) holds over 14.5 million acres of highly prospective exploration tenements in the McArthur and Beetaloo Basins, Northern Territory. Work undertaken by the Company since 2010 demonstrates that the Eastern depositional Trough of the McArthur Basin, of which the Company holds 80% has very considerable conventional and unconventional hydrocarbon potential. The Beetaloo sub-Basin, in which Empire holds a substantial position, has independently assessed world class hydrocarbon volumes in place with a major ramp up in industry activity underway to appraise substantial discoveries already made by major Australian oil and gas operators. Empire Energy is an experienced conventional oil and gas producer with operations in the Appalachia region (New York and Pennsylvania). Empire has been successfully developing and producing oil and gas since 2006. Investor Webinar Presentation Perth, Aug 26, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - BPH Energy ( ASX:BPH ) is pleased to advise shareholders and investors that the Company will be presenting as part of the free Broker Briefing Investor Webinar on Thursday 26 August 2021.Date: 26 August 2021Time: 11:30am AEST / 9:30am AWSTPresenter: Executive Chairman and Managing Director, David Breeze presenting at 11:50am AEST / 9:50am AWSTThe Company invites shareholders, investors, and media to participate in this digital event by registering online via the link below:Participants will be able to submit questions via the panel throughout the presentation, however, we encourage shareholders and investors to send through questions via email beforehand to info@brokerbriefing.comTo view the presentation, please visit:About BPH Energy Limited BPH Energy Limited (ASX:BPH) is an Australian Securities Exchange listed company developing biomedical research and technologies within Australian Universities and Hospital Institutes. The company provides early stage funding, project management and commercialisation strategies for a direct collaboration, a spin out company or to secure a license. BPH provides funding for commercial strategies for proof of concept, research and product development, whilst the institutional partner provides infrastructure and the core scientific expertise. BPH currently partners with several academic institutions including The Harry Perkins Institute for Medical Research and Swinburne University of Technology (SUT). More than 1,300 vintage cars are heading to Albuquerque. These vehicles are street rods, customs, muscle cars and street machines and will be on hand at Expo New Mexico beginning Friday, Aug. 27, as part of the National Street Rod Associations Route 66 Street Rod Nationals. The NSRA has events across the United States. A few years ago, the association was looking for an event to be held west of Oklahoma City, and Albuquerque fit the bill. This is the second year for the event, which began in 2019. There was no event in 2020. Art Sena, NSRA South Central Division director, says there are cars coming in from as far away as Tennessee. He says there will be cars from California, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado and Las Cruces. Its always interesting to see the creativity it takes to rebuild these cars, Sena says. They may look like a restored car, but there are body modifications and more. Its amazing to see. Sena says more participants and spectators are expected this year than at the 2019 event. We had 785 in 2019, he says. Were always looking to grow the event. Much of the Expo New Mexico grounds will be used for the event, along with many of the buildings, which will house a large number of manufacturer and dealer displays and other attractions. Sena says the NSRA defines a street rod as a modernized vintage vehicle built before 1949. These vehicles are equipped with the latest options available on the latest-model vehicles, including disc brakes, air conditioning, cruise control and tilt steering wheels. Most of those attending have updated the engine and drive train to enable the owner to cruise down the highway in comfort and safely maintain the speeds traveled by more modern vehicles. Included in this event are muscle cars, those factory-produced high-horsepower machines from the 60s, 70s and 80s, along with the classics cars of the 50s, Sena says. Sena says that the event is excellent for spectators to attend and that those who take time to attend will be treated to the sights and sounds of some of the most beautiful, best-constructed vintage vehicles ever assembled in one place. One of the special attractions for the spectators is that they can walk right up to the vehicles and check each one out close up, as they are not roped-off or otherwise confined, he says. All are in the open and can be examined top to bottom, front to back, inside and out. Sena is no stranger to rebuilding vehicles. Hes rebuilt four vehicles a 1941 Chevy coupe, a 1951 Chevy pickup, a 1956 Chevy two door and a 1948 Chevy sedan delivery. After a year of being away from events, were hoping the community will come out to support the event, he says. Car culture is something New Mexicans enjoy and we have plenty to see and experience. GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz. A body found at the Grand Canyon is believed to be a Hungarian man who was reported missing in July, authorities said. The body believed to be Gabor Berczi-Tomcsanyi, 45, was found Monday about 430 feet (131 meters) below the rim at Yavapai Point, Grand Canyon National Park officials said Wednesday. Berczi-Tomcsanyi was a Hungarian national who lived in Hong Kong and who was traveling in the U.S. Southwest, park spokeswoman Joelle Baird told The Associated Press. It is believed Berczi-Tomcsanyi entered the park on or around July 19, park officials said in a statement. His family reported him missing on July 29 to Las Vegas police. The car he was driving was located Aug. 19 at a park visitor center with his belongings in it, which prompted an air and ground search. The National Park Service and the Coconino County Medical Examiner were conducting an investigation, and Baird said no information was available on his cause of death. Police have identified the first man who was shot by officers last week as 33-year-old Eric Padilla. Padilla was shot Aug. 15 by officers who were investigating an auto theft. The officers said Padilla produced a firearm on them. He died at the scene. The Journal could not reach family members on Wednesday. On Aug. 19 four days after Padilla was killed four officers and an armed robbery suspect were injured in a shoot-out along a busy Northeast Albuquerque street. Officer Mario Verbeck was critically injured and remains in the hospital, as does the suspect James Ramirez, of Los Angeles. On Aug. 20, Albuquerque police shot and critically injured David Martinez. They said he was armed with a rifle and attempting to carjack a truck when they shot him. Martinez was reportedly on life support earlier this week. Deputy Chief Eric Garcia said officers were conducting an auto theft investigation that led them to the Walmart in the 2200 block of Wyoming NE. The officers watched a man and woman get out of a stolen vehicle, Garcia said, and when they approached the pair on Menaul near Northeastern, Padilla fled. He said Padilla produced a firearm on the officers and the officers fired their weapons. The woman was detained at the scene. An Albuquerque Police Department spokesman said she was not charged with a crime and was released. Padilla has a lengthy history of receiving or transferring stolen motor vehicles and other crimes, according to court records. He was one of seven people shot by Albuquerque police officers this year. Three of those people died. Officials say an upgrade to the public safety radio system earlier this year proved its worth last week during a massive manhunt for a suspect following a shootout that injured four officers. Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina said the updated radios were paramount in communicating with other agencies in order to provide a quick response. Following the heroic moments our officers put their lives on the line last week, agencies were able to immediately respond to the scene and provide assistance due to these much needed upgrades, he said. Rebecca Atkins, an Albuquerque Police Department spokeswoman, wrote in a news release that the city spent $38 million to upgrade the radio system that agencies within Bernalillo County, Valencia County and Rio Rancho use to communicate with one another. She said new radios were issued to APD and Albuquerque Fire Rescue personnel, as well as staff at the Animal Welfare Department, the Office of Emergency Management and the Department of Municipal Development in March 2021. Atkins said the previous system was antiquated, there were fears it would fail during significant events, different law enforcement agencies were not always able to connect with one another, and there were areas of the city and county including parts of the West Side, the East Mountains and inside some buildings where the radios didnt work. Atkins said legislators and the governor contributed the bulk of the funding for the upgrades and the city of Albuquerque and Bernalillo County also contributed. As we work on staffing up the department, were also modernizing the tools that officers need to do their jobs, said Mayor Tim Keller. The upgrades have solved significant issues that were chronic with the old system, like being outdated, and often being patched together with spare parts purchased online on sites like eBay because they were no longer available from manufacturers. When the New Mexico Legislature enacted the Charter School Act, over 20 years ago, they realized authorizers, school districts or the Public Education Commission would require funds to support their work with the charter schools they authorize. Rather than providing additional funding to support innovation and choice in public schooling, the Legislature permitted up to 2% of the charter schools State Equalization Guarantee (SEG) to be used by their authorizer to cover the cost of authorizing and overseeing the charter school. The up to wording in statute is important as explained below. For several years, the Public Education Commission (PEC) and the Charter School Division (CSD) of the Public Education Department (PED) have used only 50-75% of the SEG withheld from state charters. For several years PED has used the remaining withheld SEG to fund internal operations that do not administratively support the CSD or the PEC. For the upcoming year, this will be around $1.3 million. The spending of these funds by PED for internal operations bypasses the appropriation authority of the Legislature, goes against state statute and deprives charter schools of their full funding. The PED is funded via an appropriation of the Legislature and various grants to support all public schools in New Mexico, including state charters. Grants and other funds awarded to PED must be appropriated by the Legislature, and only a small portion of federal grants is allowed to be used for administrative support. These additional withheld SEG funds being used by the PED are essentially an unappropriated slush fund. PED is statutorily required to provide educational, curriculum, special ed, budget, financial and other support for all public schools in New Mexico including state charters via its legislatively approved budget. Unlike state general funds, unused SEG funds given to schools do not automatically revert to the General Fund. The PED reverts millions of dollars each year, so the use of state charter school SEG funds is not necessary and denies state charter schools from providing some services. For some charter schools this is over $40,000 annually. Since PED is funded by the Legislature to support all public schools in NM, the PED should not also receive a percentage of withheld SEG from state charters for its operations outside of the direct administrative support to CSD and PEC. In May the PED entered an MOU with the PEC giving the PED permission to use a disproportionately large percentage of the 2% along with any remaining SEG funds unspent or encumbered by March 1 of each fiscal year. For the current fiscal year, this amounts to $1.3 million of the approximately $2.9 million withheld from state charter schools. Over the years, this has amounted to millions of dollars not going to state charter schools and their students. I have discussed this with several legislators and the LFC who believe the MOU and the use of these funds by PED are improper and perhaps illegal. Ideally, the Legislature would separately fund the CSD and the PEC as most other state agencies are funded. All unspent amounts of the 2% SEG withheld by the PED should be returned to the state charters before the end of the fiscal year. These funds would be extremely helpful to students in state charters, including those covered by the Yazzie-Martinez judgment against the state of New Mexico and PED. As an elected Public Education Commissioner, I have asked the state auditor to investigate and require PED to stop using State Charter SEG funds for internal operations, except as allowed per state statute. As an African American, I am dismayed the Biden administration has done little to promote and sustain Black businesses. August is Black Business Month, a time to celebrate these businesses, but few people know it. Few people acknowledge it. And the president is ignoring it. The contributions of the African American community and its businesses are monumental, their influence felt directly or indirectly throughout our cities, towns and hamlets. There have been so many strides and accomplishments in the Black business community as more entrepreneurs have made their mark nationwide. We are now well into Black Business Month, a time when all of us should acknowledge and appreciate these important establishments. African Americans own 2 million companies, and these account for about 10% of all U.S. businesses and 30% of all minority businesses. Black-owned businesses create jobs, resources and make communities thrive. It is crystal clear, however, that President Biden has failed these champions of business across our nation. The liberal policies of the Biden-Harris administration have not served these businesses well, and Democratic leaders are on the wrong side of Black economic empowerment. First of all, the Biden economy has meant hard times for Black businesses. They have been disproportionately hurt by the pandemic, facing an uneven recovery compared to white business owners. A recent survey showed 67% of Black owners believed it would be at least another six months before their revenue would return to pre-pandemic levels, versus 59% for their white counterparts. African American entrepreneurs are closing their doors at more than twice the rate of their white counterparts. This says a lot. Bidens push to move the MLB All-Star Game based on lies about Georgias election law severely impacted Black-owned businesses. Even Bidens top economic advisor admitted the Georgia boycott was meant to hurt small businesses. About 30% of Atlanta businesses are Black-owned. But theres more. Bidens refusal to stand up to those who defund police is having a devastating impact on Black businesses and employees. Crime is skyrocketing, particularly in African American communities. While Black businesses were looted and set ablaze last year, Democrats called them peaceful protests and many refused to condemn Antifa for fueling these riots. Meantime, Black-owned businesses have been hit particularly hard as Biden supports paying Americans not to work. Its created a labor shortage, something thats been a disaster for minority businesses. Any further COVID lockdowns will continue to sting Black businesses. Finally, the Biden administration is playing politics with the futures of young Black entrepreneurs. A survey shows higher numbers of Black parents want school choice for their kids. Another poll found that 75% of Black parents want the ability to choose their childs public school regardless of ZIP code. This is a powerful message. COVID-19 shutdowns have disproportionately hurt Black students, something that will inevitably lead to opportunity and achievement gaps. Is this supporting our Black businesses and communities? No. The bottom line is the Biden-Harris administration is stifling Black economic empowerment. Radical policies are putting a hold on such advancement. Its shocking and shameful that the liberals in Washington have done nothing to address this serious problem. Meanwhile, Republican policies that support keeping our economy open, lowering taxes, eliminating bureaucratic barriers to entry, promoting school choice, safe communities and border security will prove to be more impactful for Black businesses. Jewll Powdrell is a small-business owner and executive committee member of the Republican Party of New Mexico. Just a little over two weeks into the school year, COVID-19 has been confirmed at about half of the schools in the states largest district, although officials remain confident that classroom spread is minimal. There were COVID cases reported at 68 Albuquerque Public Schools properties last week, accounting for 139 total cases among students and staff, according to data APS publishes on its website weekly. That was up from 27 sites and 85 cases the week before. Weve seen a steady increase since returning to school, which is not surprising, said Monica Armenta, a spokeswoman for the school district. We have seen COVID at at least 50% of all our schools. And what were seeing is almost exactly what you would get when you take a close look at community spread. She said COVID cases at schools closely mirror how the virus is trending in the part of the city where the school is located. District officials believe there have been few cases of classroom spread, evidenced by relatively few numbers of positive cases at each individual site that has reported COVID this school year, Armenta said. None of the districts public schools has closed because of COVID. Armenta said APS currently doesnt have a set threshold for when a school will close. Theres are so many nuances to this, the circumstances can change. Its just not as simple as telling you when you get to X amount (the school will close), Armenta said. This is a case by case situation, and right now, today, the only thing I can say definitively is we havent had to close a school. If an APS student or teacher tests positive for COVID, he or she will have to isolate for a minimum of 10 days, or until all symptoms have been gone for 24 hours. During that isolation period, students can still complete homework assignments for their teachers, but they wouldnt necessarily attend school virtually, said Kristine Meurer, the executive director for APS Student, Family, and Community Supports Division. Individuals who are determined to have had close contact with a COVID-positive individual will also have to quarantine, Meurer said. There are exceptions to that, such as if the person is fully vaccinated and symptom free, he or should would not have to quarantine. In a public briefing Wednesday, Dr. David Scrase, who leads the state departments of health and human services, said the reopening of schools makes vaccination and indoor mask-wearing all the more important. We have no plans whatsoever at this time to return to virtual learning, he said. We know kids learn better in in-person school. We just have to keep them safe. The Public Education Department last week dropped a rule that would have shut down schools for a period of time if there were four rapid response protocols taken at a school in a 14-day window. At this time, the NMPED is not closing schools but rather working with schools to develop enhanced COVID response plans, said Carolyn Graham, a spokeswoman for the PED. COVID cases have been confirmed at schools throughout the state. PED data shows that last Friday, there were 245 total COVID cases reported to the PED from schools in 23 counties. Graham said about 20 schools have temporarily closed voluntarily to in-person learning because of COVID cases, including Cleveland, Los Lunas, Goddard and Belen high schools. In Albuquerque, the Native American Community Academy, a charter school, is closed until Sept. 7 because of COVID, according to the PED. Journal staff writer Dan McKay contributed to this report. The jarring confessions of a self-proclaimed serial rapist and killer have potentially handed local police resolution to several cold cases on a silver platter. One murder charge has been filed in the case of a 21-year-old UNM student who was stabbed to death as she walked home 33 years ago. A second murder charge looks likely in one of Albuquerques most notorious unsolved homicides in which the 18-year-old daughter of a novelist was gunned down in 1989 as she drove home. Police say both of the young women were victims of opportunity who fell prey to a man who held a grudge against women because they didnt like guys who try to be nice. Albuquerque Police Department Police Chief Harold Medina also announced Tuesday that Paul Apodaca confessed to a third murder, in 1988, though police have not released any details in that case. Medina says the 53-year-old Apodaca has also admitted to three rapes before being sent to prison in 1995 for raping a teenage family member. Wracked with violence, Albuquerque is more than ready to learn details that solve multiple murders and rapes even if they were committed decades ago. If verified by law enforcement, Apodacas jailhouse confessions might finally bring closure for multiple families and victims. Apodaca is charged with killing Althea Oakeley in June 1988 while he was a security guard. Her family was frustrated with APD and hired two detectives, to no avail. Sadly, author Lois Duncan, who committed herself to finding who shot and killed her 18-year-old daughter, Kaitlyn Arquette, east of Downtown in July 1989 did not live to see Apodaca implicated. She died in 2016. Duncan mentioned Apodaca as a suspect as far back as 1993. Apodaca is reportedly confessing because the word of God has helped him overcome this struggle. Whatever his motive, police must double-check every word Apodaca says. Multiple families and the city as a whole are watching and counting on it. This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers. U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh toured New Mexico on Wednesday, visiting an abandoned natural gas well, a Native American reservation, job corps members and union workers while promoting two massive spending bills being considered by lawmakers. But Walsh said that as America continues its economic recovery, his biggest concern at the moment is the delta variant of COVID-19. My concern is that if we dont keep this under control I hope we dont have to go back to a situation where we have to start shutting things down again, Walsh told the Journal. That would be detrimental to businesses and people if we have to go back to where we were. Walsh, a former mayor of Boston who joined President Joe Bidens Cabinet in March, did much of the tour with Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez, D-N.M. They were in the Four Corners area Wednesday morning at an abandoned natural gas well. They then met with tribal officials at the Jemez Pueblo Governors Office, toured the Albuquerque Job Corps Center and met with union workers. Leger Fernandez, like most other Democrats, supports both the $1 trillion infrastructure bill and a $3.5 trillion budget resolution. Both bills, which outline spending priorities of the Biden administration, are being considered in Congress. Thats $4.5 trillion of guess what building things, Leger Fernandez said to a group of young adults in training programs at the Albuquerque Job Corps Center. So guess what the training you are getting now is going to be important and essential, because you are going to help us build our country. For example, Leger Fernandez said, the spending bills contain about $4.7 billion for cleaning up orphaned natural gas wells, some of them in New Mexico. We went to an orphaned well site that is right next to a school, Leger Fernandez said. What that $4.7 billion is going to do is to help the state of New Mexico clean up those abandoned wells. And what does that mean? Jobs. NMA Ventures, a homegrown venture fund that prominent angel investors launched in 2018, is spreading its wings with a new, regionally focused fund now rebranded as OneTen Capital. Unlike NMA Ventures original $4.2 million fund, which focused exclusively on New Mexico-based companies, Fund II will also invest in startups in other states, including Arizona, Utah and Colorado. Its expansion into the Rocky Mountain area gave rise to the funds new name, said Managing Partner Dorian Rader. The OneTen name derived from our location the 110th meridian west line of longitude runs down the Rocky Mountains, Rader said in a statement. It speaks to our new regional approach. NMAs first fund pooled a mix of public and private commitments, included a $1.6 million contribution from the New Mexico State Investment Councils Catalyst Fund, which is authorized to provide up to 40% of the value of a fund that focuses only on early-stage investments in New Mexico-based companies to help grow the local startup economy. The remaining $2.6 million in Fund I came from private investors. Since 2018, NMA has funded five companies, with investments generally ranging from about $300,000 to $600,000. One startup failed, but the others are going strong, including two that have since raised larger rounds of capital from other venture firms after further developing and proving their technologies. That includes mPower, a homegrown firm that weaves tiny solar cells into a flexible, lightweight mesh for space and terrestrial applications. That company has now raised $5.25 million in private equity and employs 16 people. NMA also invested in WaveFront Dynamics, which built an advanced eye-measurement system to provide customized sight correction for difficult-to-treat patients. Its raised $3 million to date and expects to reach 21 employees by year-end. These investments help create jobs, NMA co-founder and General Partner Sherman McCorkle told the Journal. They help people who are busting their fannies to build their companies into successful ventures that benefit the community. But with investment opportunities growing beyond New Mexicos borders, Rader and McCorkle began raising money this summer for OneTen Capital. Theyre targeting a $5 million to $7 million raise, but this time only with private investors Weve seen wonderful deals regionally in the last few years that we want to get in on, Rader told the Journal. We have connections in regional states, so we can leverage those partnerships and syndicate out deals. Apart from geo diversity, Fund II will particularly concentrate on investing in women- and minority-owned startups, Rader said. Companies founded by females and people of color make up the lowest percentage of startups that get funded, she said. About 50% of our Fund I startups are deliberately diverse. We want to expand that focus in Fund II. PHOENIX An Arizona county that has resisted parts of a subpoena issued by the state Senate as it reviews how it handled the 2020 election must turn over everything the Senate wants or lose all its state funding, the state attorney general said Thursday. Attorney General Mark Brnovich issued the decision after a Republican senator asked him if Maricopa Countys refusal to hand over routers, passwords and other items the Senate says it needs to complete the unprecedented partisan review violated state law. The county has turned over its vote-counting machines, servers and huge amounts of data but balked at handing over routers it uses county-wide and passwords it says it does not control. But the county board of supervisors has said the routers were never connected to election tabulation equipment but were used by every county department, including the sheriffs office, and that turning them over would compromise sensitive law enforcement information. Brnovich, also a Republican, said that refusal to comply with the Senates subpoena violates state law and triggers another law that penalizes counties, cities or towns that have policies in conflict with laws enacted by the Legislature. The county has until Sept. 27 to comply or it will lose all the revenue it gets from the state about 25% of its budget, which was $2.8 billion in 2020. County spokesman Fields Moseley said the Board of Supervisors will be meeting with lawyers to decide on a response. The board is controlled 4-1 by Republicans but has been increasingly at odds with the Senate over its 2020 election review, which board members say is being conducted by incompetent consultants who are spreading conspiracy theories. Earlier, a lawyer for the county urged Brnovich to reject the complaint, arguing the subpoena is unenforceable because lawmakers are not in session. A Maricopa County Superior Court judge ruled in February that previous subpoenas were valid. Our courts have spoken, Brnovich said in a statement. The rule of law must be followed. The county could try to fight the attorney generals conclusion in court. And Brnovichs solicitor general, Beau Roysden III, wrote that nothing in his written report should be read as suggesting that county board cannot resolve the violation by turning over the materials, or negotiating a settlement with the county that resolves its security concerns. The decision comes after a report on the vote recount to state Senate Republicans was delayed yet again Monday after the supporter of former President Donald Trump who was hired to lead the effort and several others involved contracted COVID-19. It was the latest delay for the review, which is led by a small computer security consultant called Cyber Ninjas. It has so far taken more than double the 60 days it was originally supposed to take. The report was commissioned by Senate Republicans and funded mostly by Trump allies promoting his unsupported election fraud narrative. It will not be immediately made public. Rather, two senior Republican senators will review it along with their lawyers and advisers to decide whether the findings are supported by evidence. Election experts have been highly critical of the review, which Senate President Karen Fann launched late last year as Trump and his allies hunted unsuccessfully for reasons to block the certification of Democrat Joe Bidens victory in the presidential election. CHANDLER, Ariz. An explosion at a strip mall print shop in a Phoenix suburb blew off the roof and scattered debris around the building, seriously injuring four men inside the business, authorities said. The cause of the explosion was not immediately known, but authorities were checking for a possible gas leak in a parking lot next to the building, said Chandler Fire Battalion Chief Keith Welch, a department spokesman., Welch also said it was unclear if the injured were employees or customers of the print shop. Dr. Kevin Foster, director of the Arizona Burn Center in Phoenix, said two of the men were in critical condition in an intensive care unit with the other two in serious condition. But all four of them were expected to recover. Foster didnt identify any of the victims, saying they were all young males who appeared to suffer second-degree propane flash burns to their arms, hands, thighs and legs. A branch library, a preschool and about a dozen businesses in the strip mall were evacuated. No injuries were reported apart from the people who were inside the print shop but a few nearby businesses were damaged, Welch said. Authorities evacuated about 25 homes adjacent to the parking lot where authorities were checking for a gas leak, Welch said. News video showed the building of Platinum Printing severely damaged, with debris scattered around the building, including on top at least one parked car. It was a pretty devastating explosion, Welch told reporters. The inside of the building is completely destroyed, and if you get closer to the building, the walls have been pushed out. The print shops website said it provides construction documents to architects, builders and contractors. The incident drew a huge response, with about 50 emergency vehicles and over 100 personnel from seven different agencies. Remember back to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, where uncertainty about the path of the virus and its effects on the local and national economy reigned? Well, after a brief hiatus earlier this year, that economic uncertainty is back in a big way as cases surge in New Mexico and across the country, according to Nick Sly, assistant vice president and Denver branch executive for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. Weve returned to a point where uncertainty is really changing peoples behaviors, Sly said during a presentation hosted by the Economic Forum of Albuquerque Wednesday. During his presentation, Sly said the national economy has begun recovering from the effects of the economic downturn associated with the pandemic, as the national unemployment rate dropped to 5.4% in July, nearly half of what it was a year prior. But Sly said case surges associated with the Delta variant have created a national environment similar to what we saw at the beginning of the pandemic, where the gaps between positive and negative economic forecasts are once again wider than usual. Sly said it remains unknown whether consumers, who have slowly begun spending more on services over the last several months, will continue to do so. I think there is a profound level of uncertainty about how consumers are going to respond to the path of the pandemic, Sly said. Until businesses understand how consumers will respond, Sly said they may behave more conservatively, putting off large equipment or land purchases, which may harm the still-fragile economic recovery. Sly added that small businesses, which have already disproportionately struggled during the pandemic, may be affected more severely than larger ones, given that they generally have fewer resources and more limited cash reserves to weather tough times. Sly said that trend disproportionately impacts New Mexico, where around one-third of the labor force is employed by a small business. More generally, Sly noted that the economic recovery in New Mexico has differed from the nations. In other states, challenges getting people to return to the labor force have largely been confined to the leisure and hospitality sector. In New Mexico, however, Sly said those challenges are apparent in sectors ranging from manufacturing to finance. Theres been a significant decline in labor force participation here in New Mexico, in a state that was already among the lowest in its labor force participation, he said. In addition to expanded unemployment benefits, Sly pointed to concern about finding childcare and uncertainty about whether schools will remain open as things that may be keeping New Mexicans from returning to the labor force. Going forward, Sly said New Mexicos labor force participation rate will be a key metric to watch, adding that encouraging New Mexicans to begin looking for jobs again will be essential as the state looks to put the economic downturn in the rearview mirror. I think the labor market discussion in New Mexico is one about getting people not just into jobs, but thinking about how to participate in the labor market, Sly said. Stephen Hamway covers economic development, health care and tourism for the Journal. He can be reached at shamway@abqjournal.com.

LAGOS, Nigeria Gunmen have released some of the children kidnapped from a school in northern Nigeria back in May, some of whom were as young as 5 years old, the schools head teacher said late Thursday. Abubakar Garba Alhassan told The Associated Press that the freed students were on their way to the state capital, Minna, but added he could not confirm the exact number freed. Authorities have said that 136 children were abducted along with several teachers when gunmen on motorcycles attacked the Salihu Tanko Islamic School in Niger state. Other preschoolers were left behind as they could not keep pace when the gunmen hurriedly moved those abducted into the forest. Alhassan did not provide details of their release, but parents of the students have over the past weeks struggled to raise ransoms demanded by their abductors. There was no immediate comment from police of the Niger governors office. The release, though, came a day after local media quoted one parent as saying six of the children had died in captivity. More than 1,000 students have been forcibly taken from their schools during those attacks, according to an AP tally of figures previously confirmed by the police. Although most of those kidnapped have been released, at least 200 are still held by their abductors. The government has been unable to halt the spate of abductions for ransom. As a result, many schools have been forced to close due to the concerns about the kidnapping risk. After one abduction at a university in Kaduna state earlier this year, gunmen demanded hundreds of thousands of dollars in ransom. They killed five other students to compel the students parents to raise the money, and later released 14 others. Sony Pictures Movie As fans await for the first official preview of the movie, an unfinished version of the trailer has made its way out online, confirming several rumors of the plot details. Aug 23, 2021 AceShowbiz - Eager fans of MCU have gotten an early look at "Spider-Man: No Way Home" footage, albeit without Sony Pictures' consent. A clip of what looks like a teaser trailer of the movie has leaked online. The original video, which first surfaced on TikTok, has been quickly taken down "in response to a report from the copyright owner," but bootleg version of it keeps being reposted on Twitter. Sony and Marvel Studios have not addressed the leak. Meanwhile, the leaked trailer seems to be unfinished as it is still missing some key visual effects. It, however, does confirm several rumors about the plot details. [SPOILER ALERT!] In the video, Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is dealing with the aftermath of the big reveal in "Spider-Man: Far From Home". Desperate to get his old life back, he seeks the help of Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) to undo what Mysterio did with the big reveal. The trailer confirms the reports that the film will be a multiverse-spanning adventure, with Doctor Strange warning Peter to be careful of what he wishes for. The video then ends with the appearance of Alfred Molina's Doctor Octopus. Fans have long waited for the first trailer of "Spider-Man: No Way Home", with Kevin Feige, president of Marvel Studios, assuring that the trailer will be released before the film hits theaters. "We have the third in our Homecoming trilogy with Sony and Jon Watts and with Tom Holland," he recently said. "I can only guarantee there will be a trailer before the movie comes out." The sneak-peek video is expected to come out this week as Sony is set to hold its annual presentation at CinemaCon in Las Vegas on Monday, August 23, though there's no guarantee that it will be followed by an online release immediately after the presentation. Plot details of the upcoming Spider-Man movie have been kept under wraps, but Zendaya Coleman, Jacob Batalon and Marisa Tomei have been confirmed to reprise their respective roles. Tobey Maguire's and Andrew Garfield's version of Spider-Man. Jamie Foxx's Electro and Emma Stone's Gwen Stacy are rumored to appear in the movie as well. "No Way Home" is still directed by Jon Watts, who helmed the previous two installments, with the script written by Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers. The movie is slated for a December 17 release in the United States. Instagram Celebrity After the coronavirus took the life of his grandmother, aunt and uncle, the 'Jungle Cruise' actor stresses that getting a jab is 'an act of compassion' to 'protect those who are vulnerable.' Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - "Jungle Cruise" star Edgar Ramirez is urging fans to get vaccinated against COVID after revealing he has lost friends and loved ones to the virus. The Venezuelan actor has taken to Instagram to reveal the coronavirus which killed his grandmother a month ago has claimed the lives of his Aunt Lucy and Uncle Guillermo, who collapsed and died on Sunday. "In less than 24 hours, COVID had taken both of their lives," Edgar writes. "We had not yet collected my aunt's ashes when we were due to incinerate my uncle's body. Only this past weekend I lost 3 relatives to COVID-19." Ramirez, who also lost his cousin Rafael on Monday, August 23, lamented, "None of them had been vaccinated. None had access to a vaccine in Venezuela, where they died." "Meanwhile, in the United States a large number of people unfortunately are willing to snub the very vaccine my family would have taken in an instant, like millions of people around the world who just don't have access to one. No one who has access to a vaccine should be dying of COVID 19." "I beg you to please read this post carefully. It is the most painful and the most intimate thing I have had to publish in my life, but I think it is important to share it." He urged, "Don't do it for yourself. Do it to protect those who are vulnerable, those with immune deficiencies, and all others who can get very sick if infected... To get a vaccine is an act of compassion." The actor shared a video of a conversation with Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Chief Medical Advisor to the President of the United States, about the importance of being vaccinated. "It was a powerful conversation, full of vital information," he wrote. "I also hope this interview can serve as a starting point for a conversation with the people in your life who are hesitant about getting vaccinated. I respectfully invite you to just have the conversation." "Lastly, I encourage you all to follow science and truthful information, and please, please, PLEASE... If you can, GET VACCINATED, so you can help save those around you." WENN/Derrick Salters Music According to an announcement shared on the 'Bum Bum Tam Tam' rapper's Instagram page, the concert will take place at the Oasis Wynwood in Miami on Friday, September 3. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Future is helping the people of Haiti who have been devastated by a recent earthquake. More than a week after the deadly disaster, the "Bum Bum Tam Tam" rapper announced that he will host a benefit concert at the Oasis Wynwood in Miami. The MC, real name Nayvadius DeMun Wilburn, broke the news via Instagram on Wednesday, August 25. He shared a short clip along with a message that read, "I would love for all my friend, family, music industry, fashion, and all other industries, and people as a whole to stand up for Haiti." "I want to use my voice to do whatever I can to support Haiti during these tragic times and will be doing a benefit concert on September in Miami," the message continued. "For info & tickets visit oasismiami.tixr.com/haitibenefit." No further information is available regarding how long the concert will be. It also remains unclear whether any other artists will be hitting the stage along with Future. Future is not the only musician who offers help to the victims. Haitian-Amercian rapper Zoey Dollaz previously announced his own relief efforts. Encouraging his Instagram followers to donate some supplies, he wrote, "I NEED ALL MY FRIENDS , MY FANS MY SUPPORTERS IN ON THIS ONE WITH ME." "I AM NOT SENDING THIS OUT , PERSONALLY PHYSICALLY ME AND MY TEAM AND PERSONAL FRIENDS ARE GOING TO HAITI OURSELVES AND DELIVERING THESE DONATIONS TO MY HAITIAN PPL IN NEED," he continued. "IM NOT IN NEED OF MONEY USE THE MONEY TO BUY THESE ITEMS LISTED." Zoey then turned to Twitter to call out his peers who remained silent in the wake of the earthquake. "All these f**k a** rappers that's always using Zoes this and zoes that in their raps and I got Haitians in Miami this and that using Us to sound cool I don't see a single post from none of u F**k boys about Haiti but y'all be ready to use our lingos and act like we yall hittas," he argued. Celebrity The actor famed for his portrayal of Farnsworth 'Dex' Dexter, is described by his wife Jodi Lister as 'a beautiful and fascinating man with many talents and skills' after he passed away at his home. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - "Dynasty" star Michael Nader has died, aged 76. The actor, who also appeared on daytime soap "All My Children", lost his battle with cancer at his home in California on Monday, August 23. "With heavy heart, I'm sharing the news of the passing of my beloved, Michael," Nader's wife Jodi Lister wrote in a statement. "We had 18 wonderful years together with the many dogs we fostered and adopted." "Recently, Michael was so thrilled to reconnect with his friends from the cast of 'Dynasty' during Emma Samms' virtual event to help raise funds for Long-Covid research. He was a beautiful and fascinating man with many talents and skills. I will miss him forever." Nader married his love of surfing and acting by landing roles in American International's string of 1960s beach movies, including "Beach Party" and "Beach Blanket Bingo", while he also had a recurring role on TV series "Gidget", opposite Sally Field. He also appeared on "As the World Turns", "Magnum, P.I." and "Bare Essence", but he was best known for his portrayal of Farnsworth "Dex" Dexter on "Dynasty" - the third husband of Joan Collins' Alexis Colby. He appeared on "All My Children" from 1991 to 1999 and again in 2000 and 2001. Nader would later speak openly about his substance abuse issues that prompted soap bosses to fire him - he was arrested in 2001 for attempting to sell what was reported as a bag of cocaine to an undercover police officer. He sued ABC, unsuccessfully, claiming that producers had reneged on their pledge to rehire him if he sought and completed treatment for his addictions. Instagram Celebrity Mourning the passing of the 'Paint It Black' rocker, the British musician admits in a new interview that he personally reached out to Ronnie Wood upon hearing the sad news. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Faces drummer Kenney Jones has paid tribute to the late Charlie Watts, saying, The Rolling Stones have lost their "heartbeat." The British musician praised the "Paint It Black" rocker for his enormous contribution to the legendary rockers' sound. "Charlie's playing with The Stones, he put a swing in their beat, just like I put a swing in our beat. It's the secret ingredient he had, which was to provide those swing beats," Jones told BANG. "He was the heartbeat of the band, their backbone." Jones, who toured with Watts in 1983 for ARMS Charity Concerts to raise money and awareness for multiple sclerosis research, said Charlie was "a gentleman all the way through." "He wasn't outrageous, he wasn't a Keith Moon!" Kenney added, referring to the eccentric Who drummer, who passed away in 1978. "Charlie was a nice guy. I knew him in the days when he was drinking and I knew him in the days when he gave up drinking, he was a gentleman all the way through. We would talk to each other about old times." On hearing the news of Watts' passing on Tuesday, August 24, Jones called his Faces bandmate, and Rolling Stones guitarist, Ronnie Wood. "I called him immediately after I found out, he answered straight away, I said, 'I'm sorry.' We both knew it was going to happen, but Ronnie said, 'We knew it was going to happen but it doesn't matter how much you prepare for it, you're never prepared.' " Ronnie, Kenney, and former Faces frontman Rod Stewart reunited recently to record the first new tracks for the band since 1973. Celebrity The adult star, who pleaded not guilty, is facing twelve counts of forcible rape, seven counts of forcible oral copulation, and four counts of sexual penetration by a foreign object among others. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Porn icon Ron Jeremy has been indicted on more than 30 sexual assault counts involving 21 alleged victims. The 67-year-old adult star, who was arrested last summer (2020), pleaded not guilty on Wednesday, August 25. A grand jury returned the indictment last week (August 19). His charges include 12 counts of forcible rape, seven counts of forcible oral copulation, and four counts of sexual penetration by a foreign object. He is also facing charges of performing a lewd act upon a child under the age of 14 or 15 and sodomy by use of force. Jeremy is scheduled to return to court for a hearing on October 12. The alleged crimes reportedly took place between 1996 and 2013. Stuart Goldfarb, a lawyer for Jeremy, said in a statement, "His position is the same as it was when they issued the criminal complaint. He is innocent of all charges." Meanwhile, District Attorney Gascon added, "Far too often, survivors of sexual assault suffer in isolation. We must ensure that survivors have all options available to help with recovery, including trauma-informed services for healing and support to report such crimes." Last year (2020), Deadline sources claimed 14 other new cases against the subject of documentary "Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy" were denied by the Los Angeles District Attorney because they were "outside the statute of limitations." Nicknamed "The Hedgehog," Jeremy has been among the best-known and most prolific performers in the adult film industry since the 1970s. If convicted of all charges, Jeremy could face a sentence of more than 330 years to life in state prison. Instagram Celebrity Hope for Haiti thanks the Hollywood couple for their generosity that will help establish mobile clinics to those most in need and finance food delivery distribution costs from World Central Kitchen. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds have donated $10,000 (7,270) to aid charity bosses at Hope for Haiti following the devastating earthquake that shook the nation on August 14. Social media managers for the nonprofit took to Instagram on Tuesday, August 24 to thank the celebrity couple for its generosity. "Our entire organization would like to thank @vancityreynolds and @blakelively for their generous donation to our #HaitiEarthquake Response & Recovery efforts," the caption on the group's post read. In the caption, the nonprofit organization also revealed that the generous donation from the "Deadpool" actor and the "Gossip Girls" alum "will help empower our team to continue to respond in the hardest-hit areas of southern Haiti in the days and weeks to come." TMZ later confirmed the specific amount that was donated, adding the funds will help establish mobile clinics to those most in need, as determined by the country's Ministry of Health. The donation will also help finance food delivery distribution costs from World Central Kitchen. The 7.2-magnitude earthquake cost over 2,000 people their lives, according to NBC News, and two days after the natural disaster, rainfall from Tropical Depression Grace caused dangerous flooding in the already hard-hit area. The country is also experiencing political unrest following the assassination of President Jovenel Moise last month (July 2021), while dealing with the rise of coronavirus cases. Prime Minister Ariel Henry issued a month-long state of emergency on August 15. Instagram Celebrity Candace is being sued for accusing the former Republican congressional candidate of campaign fraud, money laundering, illegally using drugs and being a 'madame' of a strip club. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Candace Owens is not afraid of forthcoming legal battle with Kimberly Klacik. Having found herself being sued for defamation by the former Republican congressional candidate, the conservative commentator laughed off the $20 million lawsuit. The 32-year-old took to her Twitter account to share her reaction. "LOLLL [two crying laughing emojis] Kimberly Klacik is a former stripper fraud who has me blocked on EVERY social media account since I exposed her shady FEC filings. She launched an obviously frivolous lawsuit (read it) about me calling her a 'madame' to distract/avoid questions about her FEC filings," she first penned. "Every person who gave to her campaign should demand answers about where her money went - particular, to 'Fox & Lion LLC' as well as to 'Pearl Events'-. Any journalists who wants to be taken seriously should look into her FEC filings," Candace added. "It's the GOP story of the year." After attaching a link to her June Instagram video for the root of the story, Candace noted, "She is also frivolously suing journalists who investigated this video and determined I was telling the truth." She concluded her message by writing, "Tick-tock, Kimberly Klacik!" Candace Owens laughed off Kimberly Klacik's defamation lawsuit. Kimberly has accused Candace of making false statements about her and her lifestyle in the Instagram clip. In the footage, Candace claimed that Kimberly was a "madame" of a strip club who commited campaign fraud, money laundering and illegal drug use. The lawsuit stated that the back-and-forth between Kimberly and Candace began after the former responded to the latter's tweet. In the said post, Candace criticized President Joe Biden for declaring Juneteenth a national holiday. "Sometimes I wonder when (if ever) Black America will wake up to the psychological warfare and perpetual brainwash to believe everything is racist," so read Candace's tweet, to which Kimberly replied, "Believe it or not, many in 'Black America' are very aware the fight is about classism rather [than] racism. Unfortunately, the loudest mouths with the largest platforms represent the majority. This might come to a shock to you because of your lack of engagement with black people." Of the lawsuit, Kimberly's attorney Jacob Frenkel said in a statement, "Baseless character assassination has no place in political dialogue." Jacob added, "The defendant chose to use her huge social media platform to attack a respected Baltimore political figure; we are using the proper forum - the power of the courts - to respond. The detail in Ms. Klacik's lawsuit speaks for itself." Instagram Celebrity The rapper, who previously accused Georgia police department and Absolute Trailers owners of racially profiling him, admits that he was in the wrong and that he was 'legally arrested' for driving with a suspended license. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Yung Bleu has issued a lengthy apology Georgia police department following his recent run-in with the law. The "Moon Boy" artist took to his Instagram account to apologize to the Gainesville Police Department after he accused them of racial profiling him earlier this week. In the Wednesday, August 25 post, Yung Bleu admitted that he was in the wrong and realized that he was "legally arrested" for driving with a suspended license. "I apologize for taking my anger out on the Gainesville police department . instead of the business who lied and manipulated the situation," so he said, referring to a trailer dealer called Absolute Trailers. "I was embarrassed and in disbelief of what happened so I directed My energy towards the wrong people. My energy will now be directed towards Absolute trailers because there lies could have turned to a possible deadly situation for Me," he noted. "Officers were moving off what they were told by this establishment. That I was a 'Fraudulent Thief' before even knowing my name or interacting with us." He then said that he would not let this slide and he would "use my platform to make an example and create possible change in this community for the good." Yung Blue added that he will sue Absolute Trailers for "Discrimination and profiling." He concluded, "Hopefully this promotes fair service to all black peoples in this community." "I admit when I'm wrong! Even tho I did not agree with all the methods used of detainee me my licens was suspended and I was arrested legally. I was furious about what lead the police to me ! This all stemmed from the vicious lies told by this establisment Absolute Trailer so that's were i will be focusing my energy," Yung Bleu wrote in the caption. Earlier this week, Yung Blue tried to buy a trailer at Absolute Trailers when the owner of Absolute Trailers called the local police. Police arrived shortly after the call, but because he thought that the cops had no reason to question him, Yung Blue left the place. However, he was then pulled over by another police and was subsequently arrested for driving with a suspended license. After being released from jail, the rapper didn't take time to blast both Absolute Trailers and the Gainesville Police Department, accusing them of racial profiling. Instagram/WENN/Avalon Celebrity The 'Kim Possible' actress, who starred alongside the actor on 'Even Stevens', explains why she no longer talks to the 'Transformer' star in a YouTube video titled 'Why I Don't Talk To Shia LaBeouf'. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Christy Carlson Romano got candid about her relationship with former co-star Shia LaBeouf. The actress, who starred alongside the actor on "Even Stevens", explained why she no longer talks to Shia in a YouTube video titled "Why I Don't Talk To Shia LaBeouf". To answer the question, Christy simply said, "We weren't really close." However, that was not the only reason, because she admitted thatshe felt snubbed by him when he won his Daytime Emmy. "Everybody always asks me this question," she shared. "To be honest, I don't even know if we were ever really friends, but we were co-workers. We had this very good on-screen chemistry. People assumed that we were -- in real life -- brother and sister, and that -- in real life 00 I had an influence over what this guy did. Watch 'Honey Boy' and it's like he's a completely traumatized young man at the same time that I'm working with him." "We were these young kids put in this very unique situation. We had very raw talent. He had a knack for comedy and my comedy as a lot more of a straight man. And so we were like an instant comedic team," Christy said. "People just assume you know people because you work with them. You really don't." She went on to share that it was only later that she learned of the "hardship" Shia went through as a child. "Honestly, when I look back, I just feel stupid. I know I'm not stupid because I care," she recalled. "And I think I did care even then. And I think that's why we had a little bit of animosity." The "Kim Possible" actress also admitted to being jealous of Shia's success. "I know that he cares a lot about that timeframe. Not only because of a movie that he did and exposing all that stuff that was going on behind the scenes," she shared in the video. "But also because when he did the performance art piece, he had such love in his face when he watched Even Stevens and he was smiling." When it comes to whether she's interested in seeing the "Transformers" actor again, Christy said, "I have a very specific life. I am sober, I don't drink alcohol. I have a very specific amount of time and energy that I can put towards having anyone in my life. That's for business, that's for pleasure, that's for anything, I just don't have a ton of time." "If I'm around somebody or taking the time to invest in a friendship, it needs to be with somebody that I can trust understands and respects me on an equal level. I'm not sure how he ever felt about me. To be honest with you. He never really let me know. I feel like there was a missed opportunity to bond," she added. Twitter TV According to legal documents filed at Manhattan Supreme Court, the ex-top producer of the ABC talk show sexually assaulted two employees between 2010 and 2015 on different occasions. Aug 26, 2021 AceShowbiz - Michael Corn is facing legal action from two ABC staffers. Having been accused of sexually assaulting two female employees, the former executive producer of "Good Morning America" was slapped with a lawsuit. Among the alleged victims is current producer Kirstyn Crawford. In legal docs filed on Wednesday, August 25 at Manhattan Supreme Court, Crawford claimed that Corn kissed her head and touched her leg in an Uber after a work party back in 2015. "Corn grabbed Crawford's hand and told her that he wanted to be able to help her with her career," so read the suit. "He grabbed Crawford's head and pulled it into his chest and kept telling her to 'just relax' and kept asking 'Why are you tense?' " Aside from Crawford, Corn was accused of assaulting another staffer, Jill McClain, in 2010 while on a flight and in 2011 during a trip to London. McClain, however, is not a plaintiff but is supporting Crawford's case. "ABC knew or should have known that Corn had a propensity to sexually harass female colleagues and that he perpetuated a hostile work environment at ABC," the suit alleged. "As early as 2017, ABC learned of Corn's sexual assault on Plaintiff. Yet ABC did nothing to protect Plaintiff or remove Corn from his position of power." "Indeed, Plaintiff has reason to believe that ABC was also aware of other women who complained against Corn," it continued. "Instead, ABC looked the other way, elevated Corn through the ranks due to his commercial success as a producer, and facilitated the hostile workplace that Corn cultivated through his influence over subordinates' careers, sexual harassment, gaslighting, and anger management issues." Corn himself has denied the allegations made against him. "I vehemently deny any allegations that I engaged in improper sexual contact with another woman," he said in a statement provided by his lawyer, Elizabeth Locke. Corn additionally dubbed Crawford's claims "demonstrably false." WENN Celebrity The 'Revenge' actress and her actor husband Josh Bowman are over the moon to introduce their first child on social media after the couple welcome baby daughter Iris. Aug 27, 2021 AceShowbiz - Former "Revenge" co-stars Emily VanCamp and Josh Bowman are new parents after welcoming their first child. VanCamp, who met and fell in love with Bowman on the set of the TV drama in 2011, has announced the birth of baby daughter Iris via Instagram. "Welcome to the world our sweet little Iris Our hearts are full," she wrote beside a photo of the newborn clutching mum's finger. Mum and dad announced their engagement in May 2017 and wed at the end of 2018. The couple rarely talked about their relationship in interviews. Emily's pregnancy was also kept under wrap. The baby's birth comes roughly three months after Emily's 35th birthday. Meanwhile, husband Josh turned 33 in March. "Best day with the very best human [love emoji] Happy birthday my love!" she shared a picture of the actor and wrote a sweet caption. Emily has wanted to start her own family for a long time. "I find myself dreaming about it all the time. In your late 20s, you start to realize you can't call yourself a baby anymore," she said in a 2014 interview. In a separate chat, she explained why she's broody, "When your sisters are having babies you just want to jump on the bandwagon." 'I'm really busy and I feel like I kind of want to be the kind of mom I want to be. With this schedule , I think I'll let that happen and I'll see where I'm at," she continued. SHASTA COUNTY, Calif. - CAL FIRE said the forward progress of the Rock Fire has been stopped and there is a hose lay around the fire. Crews will stay at the scene for about four hours to mop up. Residents on Rock Creek East Rd. east of Wilson Hill Rd. are now in an evacuation warning as of 3:18 p.m. Wednesday, according to the Shasta County Sheriff's Office. The Rock Fire is in the area of Rock Creek Rd. and Ole Ave. For the #RockFire burning in eastern Shasta County neat Ole Avenue and Rock Creek Road. Evacuation orders are being reduced to evacuation WARNINGS. Fire personnel remain on scene. @CALFIRESHU pic.twitter.com/lo7rTDmzGR Shasta Co. Sheriff (@ShastaSheriff) August 25, 2021 This is a developing story. Action News Now will keep you updated with new information on-air and online. SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. (AP) Thousands of firefighters are trying to box in a California wildfire that's advancing toward Lake Tahoe and has shrouded the popular vacation spot in ash and yellow smoke. The Caldor Fire is less than 20 miles southwest of the lake that straddles the California-Nevada state line. It has destroyed at least 461 homes since it began Aug. 14 in the Sierra Nevada. It's still threatening more than 17,000 structures. Fire officials say it's the nation's top priority for fire resources. The Lake Tahoe area had the nation's worst air pollution again on Wednesday. The Caldor Fire has burned 162,182 acres and is 11% contained as of Wednesday morning. REDDING, Calif. - Redding Police Department reported that officers seized nearly a quarter pound of fentanyl from a motel room in downtown Redding. Redding police said it was the result of a joint investigation between the Redding Police Department's Neighborhood Police Unit, the Shasta Interagency Narcotics Task Force, and the Department of Homeland Security's Regional Fentanyl Task Force. Officers said they pulled over 41-year-old Kenneth Thomas Justus of Redding for a traffic stop on Tuesday. Officers said during the stop they determined that Justus possessed a "significant quantity" of fentanyl. The Redding NPU authored a search warrant for Justus' motel room. Inside officers said they found fentanyl and $3,000 in cash. In total, the Redding NPU said they seized just over a third of a pound of fentanyl. SHASTA COUNTY, Calif. - James Earl Watkins has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, according to the Shasta County District Attorneys Office. Watkins appeared in court on Wednesday to be sentenced after he pleaded guilty to a 1995 cold case murder of Christine Munro. Watkins also admitted to three allegations for kidnapping, robbery and lying in wait, according to the DAs Office. RELATED: Man pleads guilty for 1995 murder of Christine Munro Munro, a mother of four and a nurse, was jogging on the south side of the Sacramento River Trial on June 24, 1995, when she was attacked. The case was reviewed in late 2019 and in January of 2020 fingernail scrapings were submitted. In June, a possible match returned and matched Watkins who was serving a 14-year sentence at the time in a Texas state prison for a robbery. RED BLUFF, Calif.- A man wanted for questioning in the death of his ex-girlfriend in Washington State was found in the Red Bluff area after the Shasta Inter-agency Narcotics Task Force used automatic plate reading technology to determine his location. On Monday at 3:30 p.m. the investigation was turned over to Red Bluff Police as the suspect Michael Mathwig,38, was considered armed and dangerous. Mathwig's vehicle was found in the parking lot of Walmart at 10:14 p.m. by Red Bluff Police. Mathwig came out of the store and tried to drive away but was stopped by officers. Mathwig yielded to officers after being boxed in a part of the parking lot. He was taken into custody and booked into the Tehama County Jail. The Red Bluff police assisted with evidence and extraditing Mathwig back to Bremerton Police detectives to stand trial. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen have targeted crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport, in the waning days of a massive airlift that has drawn thousands of people seeking to flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. An Afghan official says at least 60 Afghans were killed and 143 wounded. U.S. officials said 12 U.S. service members were killed, including 11 Marines and a Navy medic. A U.S. official said the complex attack was believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the two blasts were near an airport entrance and a short distance away by a hotel. REDDING, Calif. - Police arrested a teen Thursday morning who matched the description from a stabbing that left a person in critical condition on Wednesday night on the 3300 Block of South Market St., according to the Redding Police Department. The 17-year-old suspect was arrested a block away from where the stabbing occurred walking on Terrill St. while wearing blood-stained clothing that matched surveillance video from the incident. Redding Police arrived at a call of a man down on South Market St. at 11:02 p.m. Police found a man unresponsive with a stab wound in the middle of the roadway. The man was transported to a local hospital where he remains in critical condition. The southbound lane of South Market St. was closed from 11:15 p.m. to 5:40 a.m. while investigators conducted their search. Video surveillance from a business in the area depicted the victim being viciously attacked for an unknown reason in a parking lot. The suspect then fled on foot and the victim collapsed from his injuries on South Market St. after running, according to police. The teen was arrested and booked into Shasta County Juvenile Hall for attempted murder. The reason for their actions remains unknown. Merge Infinity Networks full-service digital advertising alliance, Chimp&z Inc wins the social media marketing mandate for the leading science-based skincare brand, The Derma Co. Along with creating, managing, and executing end-to-end digital campaigns and strategies, the agency will also be responsible for social content and product photoshoots. The account was won post a multi-agency pitch and will be handled by the agencys Gurugram office keeping social communications a notch up to drive digital sales. The Derma Co. employs Artificial Intelligence to accurately diagnose consumers' concerns and their team of dermatologists curate regimes to address the issues. The advanced clinical formulations contain potent ingredients in the right concentration that are safe and effective to heal skin concerns. Chimp&z Inc will craft social media strategies for a science-backed filter-free communication with the consumers to highlight the brands vision, innovation, and offerings. On the association, Ghazal Alagh, Co-founder, The Derma Co., said, Skincare has evolved over the years and consumers are looking for specialized products for their skin concerns that are safe and effective. The Derma Co. has a wide portfolio of science-backed skincare solutions with potent ingredients in the right concentration that will help our consumers to heal their skin from within and reveal their filter-free skin. Chimp&z Inc resonates very well with our approach and through this partnership, we aspire to keep our audience engaged on social media and create a paradigm shift in skincare. We are delighted to partner with Chimp&z Inc for handling strategic and creative responsibilities for The Derma Co." Commenting on the win, Angad Singh Manchanda, CEO & Co-founder, Chimp&z Inc said, "We are elated to work on creating powerful social communications for a brand like The Derma Co., which thrives on making the Indian market vocal, and top-notch in skincare solutions. Their AI-driven methods hold a lot of potential for advancement in the beauty care sector. The dedicated team at Chimp&z Inc is excited to work on their social media amplification front and aspires to achieve game-changing results. This will lay the foundation of a close partnership that can yield phenomenal results in the days to come." The COVID-19 vaccination drive across India is picking up pace, thanks to the combined efforts of public hospitals and private healthcare providers. While people are getting vaccinated, they have many doubts and questions on post-vaccination hygiene and care. On the other hand, some individuals become completely negligent towards hygiene norms after their vaccine dose, believing they are completely immune. Acknowledging these concerns and to address them, an interesting initiative has been announced. Cinthol Health Plus, the health soap brand from Godrej Consumer Products Ltd (GCPL), and Fortis Hospital Vadapalani have joined hands for a post-vaccine sensitization programme. The objective is to create awareness around post-vaccine precautions, dos and donts while encouraging citizens to keep following hygiene norms even after the vaccination is done. The week-long pilot of this programme has already started at Fortis Hospital, Vadapalani (Chennai), where a post-vaccine kit will be given free of cost to those getting vaccinated at the hospital. Being built on the strong association with protection outdoors, Cinthol Health Plus is a health soap that gives all-round protection with a refreshing fragrance. Fortis Healthcare, a leading private sector healthcare provider in India and across its network hospitals has been at the forefront of the vaccination drive with 24 hospitals across India engaged in administering vaccinations. Cinthol Health Plus has conceptualized the post-vaccine sensitization kit along with Fortis Hospital, incorporating key hygiene messages that can inform and empower people. The carefully curated kit contains a COVID-19 booklet capturing important dos and donts in an easy to understand language. The kit also includes safety and hygiene products, including Cinthol Health Plus germ protection soap, sanitizer, masks, gloves, face shield, face wipes, among others. Commenting about the initiative, Sunil Kataria, CEO - India and SAARC, Godrej Consumer Products Limited (GCPL), said, Vaccination is the most important part to beat the COVID-19 virus. As a brand, Cinthol Health Plus has always inspired people to take on ones duties fearlessly with its assurance of protection from germs. Our post-vaccine sensitization program is a humble step to contribute to the massive national COVID-19 vaccination drive. The strategic partnership with Fortis will facilitate a direct connect with individuals taking their vaccine dose. We are confident that the pilot program in Chennai will lead to a positive impact and inspire many more such initiatives across cities. Speaking on the partnership, Dr. Sanjay Pandey, Zonal Director, Fortis Hospitals, Chennai said, We are delighted to partner with Cinthol Health Plus to raise awareness among the public about the need of maintaining basic hygiene during COVID. In many cases, post vaccination, there is misconception in the minds of people that they can ignore basic hygiene Sanitising, Masking and Social Distancing (SMS). While there is no doubt that the current two-dose vaccines will surely protect an individual from ending up in ICU or getting cured with minimal infection, medical experts are still in the process of learning and understanding the vaccines longevity, virus mutations and behaviour. Even before the vaccine, individual discipline protected everyone from the virus spread. Today, it is still necessary to maintain that discipline and follow SMS even after getting vaccinated. We sincerely request every individual to follow SMS principle to contain community spread and remain protected. Earlier this month, Google announced a slew of new policies and updates in order to give kids and teenagers a safer experience online. In India, Google has tied up with Amar Chitra Katha, a 54-year old Indian publishing company which publishes Indian comics and graphic novels, to come up with internet safety lessons for young users in eight Indian languages. This has been done as part of Googles global Be Internet Awesome programme. An enhanced Google Safety Centre has also been launched with stress on a strong regional connect. In a company blog, Google stated that it intends to give young users more control over their digital footprint. In the coming weeks, well introduce a new policy that enables anyone under the age of 18, or their parent or guardian, to request the removal of their images from Google Image results. Of course, removing an image from Search doesnt remove it from the web, but we believe this change will help give young people more control of their images online. In a move to tailor product experiences for kids and teens, Google will change the default upload setting on YouTube to the most private option available for teens in the 13-17 age group. To help minors discover content in a safe environment, in the coming months Google will turn SafeSearch which helps filter out explicit results when enabled on for existing users under 18 and make this the default setting for teens setting up new accounts. Along with these, Google further said that it will be expanding safeguards to prevent age-sensitive ad categories from being shown to teens, and will block ad targeting based on the age, gender, or interests of people under 18. The Tech giant will start rolling out these updates across its products globally over the coming months. Our goal is to ensure were providing additional protections and delivering age-appropriate experiences for ads on Google, it said in its blog. The last one and a half years have been tough for the nation. One piece of bad news has followed another. The mood of the country, thanks to the pandemic has been a bit down. Amid all this, there are reports of our vaccination program not speeding up as expected. In part, this is due to the vaccine hesitancy, which has been fuelled by the spread of rumours and fake news. Namaste India Dairy, as one of Indias leading brands decided to tackle this hesitancy but, with a difference. They along with their agency, ADK-Fortune Communications Pvt. Ltd., a WPP company and part of Wunderman Thompson South Asia Group, felt the need of the hour was to craft a message encouraging vaccination, but with a light and humorous touch. The film looks at a typical Indian scenario where blind faith is mixed with a little misunderstanding around a fictional Teeke Vaale Babji that ends up having unintended consequences. Commenting on the reason behind taking this route, Mr. Atul Santosh, Marketing Head, Namaste India Dairy, said, Namaste India Dairy wanted to do its bit for the countrys vaccination drive by celebrating life, with all its quirk and humour. The core idea blends in with what we stand for as a brand. This will hopefully nudge people to get vaccinated to protect themselves and the nation at large. Elaborating on the same, Nakul Sharma VP and ECD ADK -Fortune, said, It was a very challenging brief from Namaste India as we had to use humour to make a serious point. The team rose to the challenge and believe that the end product drives home the message in a memorable and fun way. Credits- Client: RSPL Ltd. Brand: Namaste India Dairy Brand Team: Atul Santosh, Anuj Ahlawat, Nitin Mishra, Yash Shirivastav Agency: ADK Fortune Communications Pvt. Ltd. Managing Partner: Subroto Pradhan ECD: Nakul Sharma, Tirtha Ghosh Creative Team: Arpit Agarwal Account Management: Juhi Behl, Siddhant Choudhry Production House: ESP Films Pvt. Ltd. Director: Dhruv Grover Music Director: Dhruv Grover Producer and editor: Harry Bal and Puneet Dogra Post Producer: Niharika Singh The mind-bending Drama series The Sinner is back! The show returns with an interesting and mind warping exciting new plot for a season 2. Set to air on 27th August, weeknights at 9PM, Zee Cafe is going to give you the nerve wrecking thrill you seek. The premise follows Detective Harry Ambrose played by Bill Pullman, as he returns to his hometown and investigates secrets that the inhabitants are determined to keep buried. Chilling much? Join us to watch the brand-new season of The Sinner on Zee Cafe from 27th August onwards every day at 9PM. After almost 15 years, Detective Harry Ambrose is returning to his hometown of Keller, Upstate New York, to help investigate a double murder with Heather Novack, an old acquaintance's daughter who has just made detective. A couple was found dead, apparently poisoned, in a motel room. Their kid confesses to killing his own parents and since he was brought up sheltered, he doesnt quite grasp the idea of death. When Det. Harry uncovers a much larger and disturbing case behind it, he is determined to get to the bottom of it. Get ready for another intriguing season of Zee Cafes hot new prospects. Dont miss out on this one. A powerhouse of independent actors sets pace for an engrossing series revolving around crime in this all-new season of The Sinner airing August 27th on Zee cafe To know more about Zee Cafe, follow us on @ZeeCafe, @ZeeCafe and @zeecafeindia Success! An email has been sent to with a link to confirm list signup. Today's post is excerpted from Children's Health Defense. Businesses across the USA are starting to mandate Covid vaccination. A local day and residential program service provider is mandating by mid-October. They will review exemptions, but unvaccinated employees, contractors or board members will be subject to twice weekly testing. The vaccinated CAN contract and spread COVID - but they do NOT need to be tested unless they have symptoms. I see a false security looming. Delta Airlines plans to charge a $200 health insurance penalty to the unvaccinated. Folks on Facebook are saying "smokers pay a penalty on life insurance, so it's OK." Will actuarial tables be applied to every aspect of life? Meantime, we are a nation rife with obesity - the reason for myriad health issues - which then predict severe Covid. Why haven't we encouraged Americans to LOSE WEIGHT since Spring 2020? At just 5 pounds a month, Americans could have lost some 85 pounds. And greatly improved their health. Lifestyle choices are MORE than whether or not you get vaccinated. ### Dr. Peter McCullough Tells RFK, Jr.: The Vaccines Are Failing On the RFK, Jr. The Defender Podcast, Dr. Peter McCullough discussed a new study by the Oxford University Clinical Research Group and how the Pfizers vaccine, at 17% to 42% efficacy, doesn't meet the regulatory standard of 50% efficacy for vaccines. Why is the world experiencing such a prominent outbreak of the Delta variant when so many people have been vaccinated? Dr. Peter McCullough, a consultant, cardiologist and vice chief of medicine at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, Texas, addressed those questions and more on the RFK Jr. The Defender Podcast. New research shows people who are vaccinated against COVID are more susceptible to the Delta variant, said McCullough, pointing to a pre-print study by the prestigious Oxford University Clinical Research Group published Aug. 10 in The Lancet. Read more here. John Hopkins, a crop farmer and beef producer in northwestern Illinois, recently ordered some new hay equipment and is planning to buy a used combine as well. He has lots of company this year with higher commodity prices enabling equipment purchases. It gives you a chance to update machinery when there is a little more income, he said. This year he is replacing mower conditioner equipment. He ordered it in July and is expecting delivery in October for next years hay season. He usually replaces that equipment every three or four years. He also bought a round baler this year. The Hopkins operation includes a couple hundred head of cattle on pasture, finishing their own calves and buying more calves to finish. They also grow corn, soybeans and wheat. Buying used He is also in the process of buying a used combine. For him a used combine is the best buy. We typically buy a good one thats a couple of years old, he said. Usually they trade in combines after about four years, but hes had the last one for seven or eight years. Doug Foss, who farms in Grundy County in northeast Illinois, also decided to buy a used combine this year. Id never driven a rotary combine. The cash flow is there, so I did it, he said of purchasing his first, a 2003 John Deere 9650 rotary combine. He bought it from a seller in Indiana. Hopkins has noticed that people are buying things from farther afield now. Part of this trend comes from the popularity of online sales and auctions. Hopkins has seen that first hand in his familys auction business, Public Auction Service, which his grandparents started in Polo about 75 years ago. MALTA, Mont. At 4M Farms, Anna Merriman drives the tractor pulling the chisel down the field, preparing the fields for winter wheat planting. We have decided to plant winter wheat this year, and Im knocking some weeds down, preparing for seeding, Anna said, adding she has been working the fields for a couple of days. She lightly discs any weeds that have cropped up in order to have as clean of fields as possible to plant organic winter wheat into. Anna operates 4M Farms with her husband, Cliff, and kids, Beau and Courtney. We are not sure what variety of winter wheat we are planting yet, but we are looking for something with higher protein, she said. Cliff has called their agronomy service to see what organic winter wheat seed would be available. It looks like there is a shortage of seed this year, Anna said. I assume it is because of the drought. Anna added they were told there could be a shortage of organic spring wheat this year, as well. At the farm, the cow/calf pairs are grazing on what was left of the spring-planted crops that their insurance adjustor zeroed out. Heat, no rain, and grasshoppers decimated all their crops this year. The pairs are grazing crops and doing well, she said. They still have water in the two reservoirs and in a pit, so they dont need to haul water out to the pairs. We are not having to haul water at this point. Courtesy of JNS; Photo credit: Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90. Palestinian security forces on guard at the closed Rafah border crossing to Egypt in the southern Gaza Strip. As an American, I didnt think Id be afraid to be Jewish in France. But I am. A major consequence of the turmoil in Afghanistan today caused by the refusal of President Joe Biden to alter his unilateral timetable to exit Kabul, is that it increased the damage inflicted on allies and friends, and has led to the possible demise of the special relationship between the UK and the U.S., which projected power and influence in securing a cohesive Western approach in the world. In these circumstances, it is pertinent to ask. Is the special relationship fact or fiction? The term was coined by Winston Churchill in his Iron Curtain speech at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri on March 5, 1946, eager to maintain the relationship of close allies in World War II. The concept was that the level of cooperation between the two countries in trade, commerce, military affairs, intelligence sharing, is unparalleled among world powers. The special relationship has always been uneven. At times, relations between leaders of the two countries have appeared close: Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan rode horses together and danced in the White House. and there appeared to be cordial rapport between Tony Blair and Bill Clinton. But there were always American skeptics of the meaningfulness of the relationship, even before Churchills speech. Dean Acheson was caustic, Britain has lost an empire and has not yet found a role. The two countries differed over issues, such as the Arab-Israeli war in 1973, the issue of a nuclear alert, and British policy in Northern Ireland. President Barack Obama declared in April 2016 that the UK would be at the back of the queue in any U.S. trade deal if Brexit took place. However, the relationship has been worsened by the U.S. unilateral action, the virtual exclusion by Biden of the UK. as well as other NATO members, from conversations and decisions over Afghanistan. The relationship seems to have reached a low point. The special relationship has always been partly based on cordiality and warmth between the two leaders as well as on political factors. Biden seemed to have little interest in what Boris Johnson thought, and refused for a day and a half to talk to him on the phone. The operation in Afghanistan was technically a NATO operation including the UK, and all members of NATO have been affected by the dramatic consequences of the unilateral, if not isolationist, U.S. withdrawal. Realistically, the UK has realized it is a junior partner, at best a restraining force, of the U.S. British political leaders have been scathing over U.S, policy and actions. Former prime minister Tony Blair, who took Britain into Afghanistan in 2001, asserted that the abandonment of Afghanistan and its people is tragic, dangerous, and unnecessary. The world is now uncertain of where the West stands because it appears that the U.S. decision to withdraw and its execution was driven less by grand strategy than by political calculation. A tangible demonstration is needed to show that the West is not in retreat. One suggestion of the Boris Johnson government is that the UK work alongside Russia and China to exercise a moderating influence over the Taliban. Former Prime Minister Theresa May echoed this. Perhaps the most moving and passionate criticism of Biden was made by Conservative MP, Tom Tugendhat, chair of the British foreign affairs committee, a Catholic of Jewish ancestry and a former reservist intelligence officer. He called Biden shameful for blaming the Taliban victory on a cowardly Afghanistan military. In the House of Commons, he was pained to see the U.S. Commander in Chief call into question the courage of men I fought with. Those who have never fought for the colors they fly should be careful about criticizing those who have. Biden has refused to extend the deadline for evacuations from Kabul beyond August 31, though Boris, as well as Macron and Merkel, want the airlifts to go on longer. The humiliated Boris explained that he had urged Biden to extend the date of the U.S. withdrawal and would continue U.S .emergency airlifts as long as possible but Biden had refused and stood squarely behind his original decision. At the virtual G7 meeting on August 24, 2021, Boris asserted that the UK will continue to conduct airlifts right up to the last moments while pleading with the Taliban to let people leave after August 31. Boris said after the meeting, that what was done at the G7 is that the leading Western powers agreed not just a joint approach to dealing with the evacuation, but also a roadmap for the way in which we are going to engage with the Taliban. For Britain, the time when the UK could rely on a special relationship to project power and influence in a cohesive Western approach seems to have come to an end. Winston Churchill, who was so concerned for Atlantic solidarity, must be saddened. Image: Public Domain To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Recently, Apple announced that it will deploy a new algorithm, NeuralMatch, to monitor iMessages and images on its devices. The ostensible purpose is to scan for photos containing nudity sent by or to children and also for photos of nude or seminude children. If a number of suspect images are backed up to an iCloud account, they will be decrypted and inspected, and the user reported to law enforcement. Police could then investigate or prosecute the user for possession of child pornography or for child sex abuse or other offenses. But, well-intentioned as the motive may sound, this is a matter of grave concern for privacy. Once such surveillance is begun, it opens the gates for other tech firms to follow suit, and worse, for warrantless scans for nefarious government purposes. Coming as it does from Apple, this is a curious development in the U.S. For although Apple has bent over backward to please the Chinese government on its surveillance and censorship needs, it has vehemently resisted assisting the U.S. government. It has refused to unlock cellphones for criminal investigations and prosecutions, citing concerns about protecting the data and privacy of its customers. It has received -- and objected to -- at least 10 requests from federal courts for extracting data from locked iPhones. But now, in a complete turnabout, if Apple thinks (or its algorithm decides) that certain images are illegal, it will cooperate with the authorities. In 2016, the FBI asked Apple to unlock a phone used by one of the Islamic terrorists who attacked the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health, murdering 14 people and injuring 22. Apple declined, citing a corporate policy to never undermine the security features of its products. Following another terrorist attack at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola, Florida, in 2019, Apple again rejected a government request to unlock the perpetrators phone. Then-Attorney General William Barr insisted that tech companies have an obligation to give law enforcement access to encrypted devices, but Apple refused. It said doing so would weaken encryption and thus jeopardize the data security of its customers. This sacrosanctity of customer privacy, however, is not applied to its customers in China, who live under the oppressive gaze of a government that monitors every aspect of their lives. Apple assembles nearly all its products in China -- in sweatshops linked through a maze of shell companies to a gulag the Western media is blind to -- and earns a fifth of its revenue there. While it preaches about civil liberties in the U.S., it has a different policy for China. The personal data of Chinese customers is stored on servers run by a state-owned Chinese firm and encryption is not part of the equation. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) can now access emails, text messages, documents, photos, and location details of all Apple users in the country. Apple even acquiesced to government requests for censorship of apps and the creation of a blacklist of apps that criticize the Chinese government. Also suspect, along with Apples NeuralMatch initiative, is the U.S. governments sudden concern about the fight against the sexual exploitation of children. The Biden administrations policies, in fact, have enabled human trafficking at our southern border. Children have been discovered delivered to unvetted sponsors in the U.S. by actual sex offenders. Says Texas Governor Greg Abbott, President Bidens reckless open border policies have created a humanitarian crisis that is enriching the cartels, smugglers, and human traffickers, who often prey on and abuse unaccompanied minors. And this government hasnt really been serious about sex offenses either. During the coronavirus pandemic, sex offenders, even those with multiple offenses, were released from jail, some after serving just a few days. During the shutdown, the police department in Oakland, California, suspended its I.D. and Offender and Registry Unit. The city has close to 900 registered sex offenders, and half of them were in violation of registration requirements -- which can ordinarily prompt arrest and incarceration. Neighboring San Francisco issued temporary waivers for sex offender registration, and Los Angeles relied solely on phone interviews. The idea of scanning devices for allegedly criminal material comes from China. In 2008, the CCP required the installation of Green Dam, an intrusive filtering software, ostensibly to protect children from harmful internet content but including the ability to block political and religious content and to actively monitor individual computer behavior. The parallels with NeuralMatch -- down to the excuse that its for protecting children -- are uncanny. Its well known that China has one of the most sophisticated and extensive Internet filtering systems in the world -- the Great Firewall -- one which Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and all big companies doing business in China have abetted. After Beijing blocked Google in 2010, the company hastily introduced a censored version of its site. These firms have readily signed on to pledges for internet censorship, and complied with Chinas well-developed content regulation system, turning a blind eye to the repression of Falun Gong, Uighurs, and anyone opposed to the government. The magnitude of Chinas internet surveillance and monitoring regime may be gauged from the following facts. In 2013, the government was employing an estimated two million people to monitor internet content. When enterprising citizens started using VPNs to circumvent the firewall, the Great Cannon was deployed to intercept communications with any Chinese server not employing cryptographic protections. The software can adjust and replace content as it travels around the internet. And internet usage is so restricted that individuals who share rumors or lies -- a rumor according to the CCP is that which is sent to more than 5,000 people or shared more than 500 times -- faces defamation charges and up to three years in jail. Three Chinese citizens were arrested simply because they reported on the recent massive floods in China, their causes, and the death toll, and disseminated pictures of drowning victims. China, despite the censorship and surveillance, did enjoy a period of openness on the internet. As Yaqui Wang writes, For many years, the internet in China was seen as a channel for new thinking, or at least greater openness; Chinese citizens could go online to expose government corruption and criticize leaders. Online discussions were relatively free and open, and users, especially younger ones, had developed a penchant for learning and debating big ideas about political systems and how China should be governed; until President Xi Jinping decided to change that. In December 2015, three years after taking charge, at the World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, he declared his intent: freedom of information flow, idealized by the West, is an anathema to the CCP and the Chinese government. Are we moving towards a situation no different from China, with a government that uses tech companies -- much like the Chinese government uses state-controlled shells for surveillance and other skullduggery -- as the vanguard? In view of Apples willingness to work within the constraints of the repressive Chinese internet system, the companys past refusal to assist with U.S. government criminal cases, and the lack of a comprehensive American plan to put an end to the sexual exploitation of children, can the stated objectives of the proposed NeuralMatch surveillance system be believed? Or is the real plan for Apple to lead the way to internet censorship and control in the U.S.? With social media giants censoring conservative speech and any information contrary to the government narrative, there is reason to believe that we are approaching the end of an era of freedom on the internet. For such censorship -- enforced via tech and social media firms -- amounts to a social credit system that promotes one viewpoint and punishes anyone who dares to gainsay the accepted narrative. This is a frightening prospect. Banning and criminalizing speech that is critical of the government is usually the first step towards totalitarianism. Image: Alexis Bailey -- Freepngimg To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Theres a cancer growing on the presidency. The president displays symptoms of delusion and even dementia, but it is unlikely that he will resign from office. The president is so addled that even if his family were to stage an intervention, he would still cling to power. You see, the president knows things that the rest of us dont. The president knows that handing over an entire nation to terrorists and arming them with sophisticated weaponry was unavoidable; it had to happen. So, how do we irradiate, medicate, surgically excise, or otherwise treat our little cancer problem licking obscene quantities of ice cream? If the president wont resign, then Congress should impeach and remove him from office. Impeachment, however, starts in the House of Representatives, and that body is led by Nancy Pelosi, who just oversaw two failed impeachments of the dread Orange Man, Donald Trump, the ultimate outsider. Given that, how likely is it that Pelosi would go after the ultimate insider and a member of her own party? Besides, Nancy is more fixated on enacting more trillion-dollar spending bills than on rescuing thousands of Americans stranded in Afghanistan. If Speaker Pelosi wont initiate impeachment, then House members could replace her with someone who would. But how likely is such a coup? Such a revolt would require not only Republicans but Democrats as well. How many House Democrats have the backbone to go after the Wicked Witch of the West? If impeachment is unlikely, then Biden could be removed by officials of the executive branch who invoke Section 4 of the 25th Amendment. But theres no precedent for that; Section 4 has never been invoked. Also, such a move would implicate the very officials resorting to the 25th, as they bear some of the responsibility for the chaos that is the Biden administration. If its unlikely that the 25th Amendment will be used to remove our senile president, then its a dead letter. If not now, when? But why bother repealing an amendment when were living in post-constitutional, post-legal America? Since Congress and the careerists of the administrative state are too feckless and corrupt to remove a dangerous and destructive president, it then falls to the military to do so. Another avenue for excising our cancerous president was put forth by Colonel Richard Kemp on Mark Levins August 22 show on Fox News, and thats the court-martial. But as commander in chief, the president is the overlord of the military; could he even be court-martialed? Col. Kemp is a British officer and was probably opining about what should be done about the Afghanistan debacle that has so dishonored America and her military. According to a brief piece up at Cornell Law, we read in reference to the president: Nor, is he subject to court-martial or other military discipline. The reason the military cant court-martial the commander in chief seems to be nothing more than his being a civilian. However, chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley is not a civilian but an active member of the military. In 2019, the Supreme Court affirmed that military retirees can be court-martialed. Indeed, in 2020 a naval appeals court found that a Navy retiree was properly court-martialed and convicted for a crime committed after he had left active duty. So, although retired, it would seem that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is also subject to court-martial, despite having achieved the rank of four-star general. (It should be noted that Austin had to be granted a waiver by both houses of Congress for his nomination to be considered by the Senate. One wonders why Austin even took the job of Secretary of Defense since he sits on the boards of defense contractor Raytheon and other concerns. Perhaps such lucrative cushy positions clouded Austins judgment.) So Milley and Austin can be court-martialed. With the pullout from Afghanistan, Milley and Austin are responsible, in part, for the most colossal debacle in living memory, and it was all preventable, despite what Biden says. These two men have stained the honor of the military, brought embarrassment to the nation, and set back international relations for years. If America is in a state of decline, it is because of men like Milley and Austin. It didnt need to come to this. When Biden gave the idiotic order to withdraw from Afghanistan, Milley and Austin could have resigned, and then gone public with their misgivings about the order. Or, they could have undermined Biden, as some did with Trump. But now, the only way that Gens. Milley and Austin can salvage anything of their reputations, and how history treats them, is to initiate the removal of the president with the 25th Amendment. If Milley and Austin did initiate or take part in a removal of the president, they could be spared the ignominy of court-martial and be allowed to resign. If not, then they should rot in a military prison. If the military cant or wont court-martial these men, then theres something rotten at the core of the corps. Given the colossal goat rodeo of the Afghanistan withdrawal, if neither Milley and Austin take part in the removal of the president nor receive court-martials, its difficult to see how any self-respecting young American would want to enlist in the U.S. military. Theyll need to reinstate the draft. Jon N. Hall of ULTRACON OPINION is a programmer from Kansas City. Image: Marc Nozell To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. In an earlier article, I summarized the good news about the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, I will attempt to review the Bad and Ugly news about the pandemic. The mainstream media, some public health authorities, and the pharmaceutical industry have engaged in a massive disinformation campaign. This campaign has focused on using fear to get everyone to take an experimental vaccine as the only way to get out of the pandemic. On Sunday, Biden urged Americas employers to make vaccination a condition of employment and expressed a hope that all Americans would be vaccinated. Why? What is the agenda if vaccinating everyone is not medically necessary? (It is not!) The Bad 1) The COVID-19 death count has been artificially elevated to maximize fear. Californias fifth-most populous county revised its COVID-19 death count down by 22% after reviewing the cases for the last 18 months. Washington and Minnesota previously also lowered their counts. It is likely that overcounting happened across our country. 2) The PCR test for COVID-19 is flawed in many ways and led to overcounting cases. Two weeks ago, the CDC and FDA quietly said they would abandon the PCR test for COVID-19 in December 2021, acknowledging it did not work. They also alluded to the fact that the PCR test could not distinguish between COVID and the flu. Did the flu go away last year? No, many cases were counted as COVID-19. The CDC and FDA also now admit that they did not have any physical samples of the COVID-19 virus so they used common cold Coronaviruses and human cells to make a less accurate test. Covid-19 testing has been inaccurate and ramped up cases for fear. 3) The new mRNA vaccines are far from safe. While the VAERS reporting system now has over 10,000 deaths (EU 20,000 deaths) after the vaccine, a whistleblower with the CDC says the actual count is closer to 50,000 and not being reported. Adverse reactions, including anaphylaxis, blood clots, neurologic injury, and spontaneous abortion have approached 650,000 patients in the USA. After only eight months of vaccination, longer-term side effects remain unknown. Instead of a push to vaccinate everyone, the vaccination program should be stopped. 4) The mRNA vaccine is not safe in pregnant women. An article in the New England Medical Journal showed a rate of spontaneous abortion of 12% which is close to what is normally expected and the conclusion was the vaccine was safe to give. However, the study was skewed to include mostly women in the third trimester (84%). The remaining women in the 1st and 2nd trimesters had a 75% spontaneous abortion rate (96 out of 127). (See the footnotes to Table 4 in the article). The CDC also tried to hide this. Pregnant women should not take the experimental vaccine. 5) The most prestigious medical journals have been part of the disinformation. The Lancet, the top medical journal in Europe, had to retract a study saying Hydroxychloroquine was not working on COVID-19 when it was proved that there was no data for the study. This did not happen by accident. The Lancet also published a statement signed by several scientists saying the COVID-19 virus could not have possibly come from the Wuhan lab. With evidence mounting now that this is exactly what happened the Lancet cannot admit it was wrong. Faith in our medical leaders is waning. 6) Antibody Dependent Enhancement (ADE) may be happening. One initial concern about making a Coronavirus vaccine was ADE. Now reports are beginning to come in from countries that are heavily vaccinated, such as Israel, that vaccinated people are getting sick and may have more serious illnesses than those not vaccinated. If the death rate of the vaccinated is higher than the unvaccinated this would be very scary. 7) The mRNA vaccines are not 95% effective as touted. Efficacy is likely closer to 40-70% but more data is needed. Reports coming in from Israel and states like Massachusetts show high numbers of vaccinated people (over 50%) in the hospital with COVID-19. Those that chose vaccination now looking at endless booster injections (the same vaccine that did not work very well the first time?) every six months (see #3 and #6). The Ugly All evidence seems to be pointing to the COVID-19 virus being engineered in the Wuhan virology lab and released there. Despite his denials, Dr. Fauci and our government have been involved in gain of function research for Coronaviruses for a long time. The response of our government, some health authorities, and the media seems aimed more at social change and control than it is aimed at public health and ending the COVID-19 pandemic. It is not about public health and ending the pandemic when: faulty PCR testing has been used to inflate cases and maximize fear; some protests/riots (Antifa/BLM) are deemed OK and others are not; death counts from COVID-19 were inflated to maximize fear; safe, cheap, and effective medicines to treat COVID-19 are ignored; our Southern border is open and illegal immigrants are not being tested (20% +) or allowed to enter regardless of their COVID status; experimental vaccines are pushed 24/7 as the only solution; prestigious medical journals fabricate data to maximize fear; Swedens success without masks and lockdowns is ignored; Privileged people get funerals and the rest dont; scientific data on the futility of masking and lockdowns are ignored; there is a push to vaccinate people with extremely low risk of illness (e.g., children); media and government censor alternate views of pandemic/vaccine information; serious vaccine side effects are ignored and there is no informed consent to the vaccine; every 2 months there is a new Greek letter variant with no outcome data to scare us. The why of the above behavior remains mysterious, at least in part. Money is always a motivator for vaccine production, but this effort goes beyond monetary gain. Many postulate that the goal is either the Great Reset or Socialism or remaking our society. Vaccine passports could be a gateway to monitoring everyone all the time. Another postulate due to concerns about climate change is that COVID-19 and the vaccine are meant as a means for depopulation. Does the vaccine affect fertility? That still hasnt been evaluated. More deaths have been associated with the vaccine than any other vaccine in our history. Why hasnt there been any inquiry into vaccine-related deaths? Will ADE come into play in the future winter seasons? Americans need to resist further attempts at medical tyranny related to the pandemic. We do not need to be afraid of COVID-19. We need to be more afraid of our pandemic managers/government/media response to COVID-19. I am with Rand Paul (another M.D.) in his call to resist peacefully. No more lockdowns or masking. We need to preserve the freedom to choose our medical treatments and not be persecuted for that choice. The vaccinated and the unvaccinated need to come together to stop the hysteria, fear, and efforts to control us. Advocate for Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine to be used immediately. Americas Frontline Doctors and Front Line Critical Care Alliance have protocols to treat and prevent COVID-19/variants. Another excellent article to read on medical tyranny is by Brandon Smith. France, England, and Italy have begun to protest against more medical tyranny. Will America see what is happening, wake up, and fight for its freedom? Image: Nancy Pelosi and pals without their masks. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. A few days ago, hackers in Iran managed to hack the security cameras of the notorious Evin prison in Tehran. By releasing some of the videos copied from CCTV, they were able to show a very small portion of what is going on in this prison to the public. In different scenes of these videos, the truth of what is really going on in Iranian prisons, like prisoners being mistreated and beaten by the prison security officers, is demonstrated. The situation is completely opposite to what is shown in the regime's propaganda films. For example, in a scene, a person seems unconscious and is dragged on the ground like a corpse and pulled up the stairs of the building. YouTube screen grab. Interestingly, in the same scene, a prison clerk who comes downstairs, regardless of the man's tragic condition, and without even asking a question, passes over the man's unconscious body and continues his way. It is clear that the clerk is used to these scenes. The released footage, although not taken from torture chambers and political prisoners' wards (as it is likely that no cameras were installed in those chambers so that torturers could work safely), is so disturbing that it provoked a widespread reaction within Iran. It became so intense among the Iranian people that even some members of parliament, who are well aware of what goes on in prisons, offered concerned comments in order to calm the situation. It's interesting to know that a person named Mohammad Mehdi Haj Mohammadi, who is in charge of the country's prisons, offered an apology and took responsibility for the behavior of the prison guards. But he apologized not to the Iranian people, but to Ali Khamenei, the regime's supreme leader, as well as to the prison guards, whose efforts he said would not be ignored under the influence of these mistakes. The reason for his apology is clear. It was not because of the mistreatment of prisoners by the prison guards, but because of the disclosure of a small part of what is happening in Iranian prisons and the exposure of some of the guards to the public. And now, instead of trying to hold the prison chief and prison guards accountable, they are looking for the hackers who exposed these crimes. It is like what happened during the 2009 uprising when news was leaked of the death under torture of many detained protesters in Tehran's infamous Kahrizak prison. A doctor who refused to announce the cause of the deaths as heart attacks was killed by the security forces. For many years, the released prisoners, and the regime's opposition groups in particular the MEK, who have been fighting against the mullahs' regime since the beginning of the revolution have reported the torture and ill treatment of prisoners to the international community. Many of the MEK-supporters and members had to go through similar kinds of tortures and were killed in prison. There is an ample amount of evidence in this regard. But since there has been no real-time footage clips, audiotapes, etc. of all the brutalities that were and still are taking place in Iran's prisons, the Iranian regime consistently denies any ill-treatment of prisoners. This is the first time that the regime has been forced to accept such brutal treatment of prisoners. Even when Zahra Kazemi, an Iranian Canadian photographer and journalist, was arrested and tortured to death by the regime security forces in 2003, the Iranian regime refused to accept responsibility for her murder and did not allow her body to be sent to Canada since the evidence on her body of torture and murder was clear. It should be noted that this led to the severance of Canada's diplomatic relations with Iran, which is ongoing. It is noteworthy that Mr. Javaid Rehman, the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Iran, in his latest report, mentioned a serious escalation of human rights violations. This report is scheduled to be presented at the next meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council. Iran has not allowed any special rapporteurs on human rights to enter the country during the last thirty years. Recently, in her annual report to the 47th session of the U.N. Human Rights Council, which took place from June 21 to July 13 in Geneva, U.N. commissioner for human rights Michelle Bachelet described the human rights situation in Iran as worrying. Also Amnesty International issued a statement on August 25 : [I]t is shocking to see what is going on behind the walls of Evin Prison and the abuse shown in the films are just the tip of the iceberg of torture in Iranian prisons. Torture such as imprisonment in a cubic-meter cage or coffin for several months or flogging to death and many other tortures are not seen at all in these films. Keep in mind that these events are coincidental to the appointment of Ebrahim Raisi as Iran's new president. Raisi, who was directly involved in the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners in 1988, was installed as the new president in June in a sham election organized by Khamenei. He is presently on the blacklist and sanctioned by the United States and European Union for his role as the judge ordering these killings. Incidentally, at the same time, one of Raisi's accomplices in this massacre, Hamid Nouri, assuming that no one would remember him after 33 years, traveled to Europe in November 2019 and was identified by some of the survivors of those years and was arrested in Sweden because of their complaint. He is currently on trial in Stockholm for "crimes against humanity," "genocide," and "torture" of the political prisoners in 1988. In this trial, a significant number of prisoners who managed to escape from Iranian prisons (or it is better to say escaped from the Iranian regime?) testified in court against this criminal and torturer. His trial is expected to continue until the end of the year and point to Ebrahim Raisi's role in this massacre. The release of recent footage from Evin Prison, which has been widely spread and shared both in Iran and around the world, will certainly tie the hands of Western governments that claim to respect and prioritize human rights. These governments now will have to choose between human rights values and appeasing the Iranian regime and prioritizing economic interests. The majority of Iranians want to topple the current dictatorship and establish a free democratic government based on the separation of religion and state. They expressed this desire peacefully with the widespread boycott of Khamenei's recent sham elections. Cyrus Yaqubi is a research analyst and Iranian foreign affairs commentator investigating the social issues and economy of the Middle East countries in general and Iran in particular. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. The politicians' statements, news reports, and video images coming out of Australia have been shocking. A nation that was once as free as any in the British Commonwealth has become a complete tyranny, right down to shooting politically incorrect dogs. However, Australia's truckers (or at least, some of Australia's truckers) are vowing to end the tyrants' rule and bring sanity back to that continent. In his superb book, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global Power, Niall Ferguson made the point that, of all the world's former colonies, it was the colonies that once belonged to the British empire that fared best, starting with America. The reason was that the British created an honest civil service mostly staffed with indigenous people who were able to continue after the British left and because the British, even in their colonies, imparted their tradition of liberty. Therefore, it's been shocking to see the governments in former British colonies use the excuse of COVID to become total tyrants. New Zealand has been almost perpetually locked down since COVID emerged and Canada has been using COVID as an excuse to shut down religion and free speech along with its borders. But it's Australia that went truly insane. The land we Americans associate with Crocodile Dundee and Steve Irwin turns out to be a land populated by evil nannies and frightened children. I could go on at length, but I'll let Tucker Carlson fill you in on what's been happening Down Under: It turns out, though, that not everyone in Australia is cowed. The Daily Expose, a British publication that pushes back against the pro-left, pro-government propaganda from the BBC, found something interesting: Video messages from Australian truck drivers have surfaced in some of the alternative social media sites in recent days stating that they are going to take their country back, by going on strike and creating a blockade that will choke the supply chain. They are warning Australians to prepare, and stock up on food and basic necessities while they do this. They claim to have widespread support among "truckies" and also among military veterans. They recently had a "snap" protest in Sydney where dozens of trucks spanning miles lined up blowing their horns in a sign of solidarity against tyranny. A Rumble video has footage of some of these truckers stating their plans and asking for citizen support: To be honest, I have no idea whether this will work. After all, given that Australia has turned out its military to maintain the lockdown, it's clear that the tyrants in government aren't playing tiddlywinks; they're playing for keeps. However, I remember how Lech Waesa and his fellow Gdansk shipyard workers, in 1980, created the Solidarity movement that was the first major political movement to stand against the Soviet Union. (Poland, after all, was just a satellite of the Soviet Union.) There was a straight line between the shipyard workers' strike and the fall of the Berlin Wall nine years later and the Soviet Union's final demise in 1991. Keep an eye on events in Australia, because it will show just how far the new Western tyrants are willing to go when it comes to retaining the power that COVID gave them. Image: One of the Australian truckers. Rumble screen grab. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. "In government, the secret is Integrity. Use it, and you'll be like the polestar: always dwelling in its proper place, and other stars turning reverently about it. "If you use government to show them the Way and punishment to keep them true, the people will grow evasive and lose all remorse. But if you use Integrity to show them the Way and Ritual to keep them true, they'll cultivate remorse and always see deeply into things." Confucian Analects We have a complete lack of integrity in every facet of our government, leading to a lack of faith by the people. Is it ironic to choose ancient Chinese wisdom to explain this? Nope. What we have done by installing Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and the Democrat-run Congress is sell our country's soul. The beneficiary will be the Chinese communists. Hopefully, we haven't gone too far to wrest it back if we can just wake up our impotent congressional toadies and weak-wristed courts and demand that they find the cojones to take appropriate, immediate, drastic action to end this threat to our existence. The worst, most in-your-face example, by far, is what's happening in Afghanistan. Coupled with our chaotic border, we are inviting a violent and destabilizing reign of terror aimed squarely at our homeland. The Biden administration was installed through deceit, and it is rapidly (finally!) becoming an albatross, even to Democrats. Biden's actions have exposed the abject degradation of our government. We knew that Biden sold out to the Chinese well before he assumed office, and he proves it every day, with the most recent example being his plattering up billions in sophisticated weaponry, served like luxury hors d'oeuvres, for our enemies to take from within Afghanistan, and turn against us. Even if it all goes to Pakistan, not China, terrorism against us will serve them. Biden's given the Chinese a gift, his actions clearly demonstrating to the world that we are a toothless paper tiger. They will take advantage every way they can. Listen to people who have firsthand knowledge of what's happening to our citizens in Afghanistan, including the phone calls some of them have recorded with friends trying to help from here. The inhumanity of Biden's ineptitude is treasonous, and I'd never use that word without intention. Listen to our citizens' anguish. They face torture and death, and they know it. They are trapped, with nowhere to turn and no faith in the military and our government to rescue them. The government doesn't even know how many people need rescue. Biden opted to close Bagram Airbase first, destabilizing our mission, and then he pulled the last 2,500 troops all so that he could crow about symbolism on the anniversary of 9/11. This decision has destroyed twenty years of progress in a matter of weeks. He's installed ruthless, soulless caveman barbarians, posing as a government. He's had to rush in triple the number of troops he wanted to remove to deal with the chaos he created, all micromanaged by superiors safely watching from D.C. He's betrayed the trust of every single Afghan citizen who chose to help us, now all marked for death, along with their entire families, except, of course, girls of marriageable age (whatever that is over 9?), who will be enslaved. Biden's actions have destroyed U.S. credibility on the world stage. Lies by the media, the tech moguls, as much as Biden himself, are to blame. They created this monster. They've all collectively betrayed our citizens, our allies, and the world. Other governments know it, and we've lost our standing as a great nation because of it. We are a country that threw integrity overboard, and we are reaping predictable results. We have no border; we have no idea who is in our country, or who is coming. Our government values the refugees of the world over its own citizenry. Remember border stability, financial stability, our growing economy, our ability to supply our own energy needs, our excellent relationships with our allies, the respect by our enemies? We had four years of peace under Trump, and in eight months, we're on a trajectory to doom. We who endeavor to live with integrity have always seen through the farce. We've shouted, but nobody listened. Greed and a thirst for absolute power permeate our government-tech complex. Biden used Hunter as a playing piece as he sold out to China, so the Chinese have moved ever closer to power over us. But it doesn't even stop with him. Everyone, from the highest echelons of power to the Deep State peons, has a stake in our ruination for their personal gain. Too bad we're all getting the bill. Their gain will prove illusory, as our economy and strength crumble. The greatest country in the world could be destroyed in just a few months more. We can only hope it's not too late to stop it. Image: Our military is reduced to giving bottles of water to people who either are dead men (and women) walking or will bring sharia (which 99% of Afghans support) to America. Department of Defense. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Australia is planning ahead for mass detentions of people in the name of suppressing COVID. A thousand-bed facility that won't be ready until the end of the year is being constructed about a hundred miles inland from Brisbane, in Queensland, Australia. The left-wing Labor Party premier of Queensland celebrates the news: BREAKING: A dedicated regional quarantine facility will be built at Wellcamp Airport near Toowoomba. As we contend with the dangerous Delta variant, we need fit-for-purpose quarantine facilities. #covid19 pic.twitter.com/sv1qEHUL1Z Annastacia Palaszczuk (@AnnastaciaMP) August 26, 2021 Thats why weve taken decisive action to build this new 1000-bed, dedicated facility under a joint agreement between the Palaszczuk Government and the landowner @Wagner_Corp. Wagner Corporation expects the first stage of the facility to be delivered for use by the end of 2021. Annastacia Palaszczuk (@AnnastaciaMP) August 26, 2021 We are up against the highly infectious Delta variant that is sweeping the world. We need to take action. Thats why were building a new dedicated quarantine facility at Wellcamp Airport near Toowoomba. pic.twitter.com/m0JxkSbX21 Annastacia Palaszczuk (@AnnastaciaMP) August 26, 2021 Australia has already turned its military against its own citizens to hunt down protesters, and even a man who is COVID-positive and left his home. The loss of basic freedoms is being protested, but not by overwhelming numbers sufficient to dissuade the power-hungry politicians. The public, in fact, is being told by media to be grateful when a few liberties are conditionally restored: #BREAKING: From September 13, NSW residents that are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 will be given new freedoms. Residents of hotspots can leave home for an hour of recreation on top of their exercise hour, while people in other areas can meet five others outdoors.#9News pic.twitter.com/exbgztAbwQ 9News Sydney (@9NewsSyd) August 26, 2021 Hat tip: Matt Vespa. Photo credit: Twitter screen grab. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Joe Biden still isn't done congratulating himself on the great job he's claimed to have done on Afghanistan, and already he's cutting jokes about Americans left behind. Here's the outrageous exchange, according to Matt Margolis of PJMedia: But, when asked about the situation after a briefing on cybersecurity from NBC's Peter Alexander, Biden treated it like a joke. "What will you do if Americans are still in Afghanistan after the 8/31 deadline?" Alexander asked. That's when the White House cut off the audio feed. But Biden's response was heard by those who were in the room, and by Alexander, who said that Biden jokingly replied, "You'll be the first person I call." What kind of answer is that? Where does this sarcastic jocularity come from? And does it disgust anyone that the White House tried to cut that feed off, the better to keep that perfectly authentic exchange from the public? It follows from Kamala Harris's giggling response three days ago in Singapore to a reporter's question about Americans stranded in Afghanistan, suggesting that it's a prevalent view from the top. Even from the point of view of saving their own political skin, it doesn't make sense. It's as if Jimmy Carter's failed presidency, which went down in smoking ruins in the Iran hostage crisis, was now a laughing matter for this merry bunch. One wonders when it's going to devolve into a full Vincent Pricestyle horse laugh amid the rubble and flames. As Margolis notes: There's nothing funny about Americans being left behind under Taliban rule. Nothing at all. It's made all the worse now that news has gotten out about 20 schoolkids from El Cajon, California, traveling with parents on a summer field trip, are stranded, still unable to get through to the Kabul airport, with many in their county and community quite worried at this point. Some unknowledgeable people have asked why the heck anyone would travel to Afghanistan at all, but that's a bad line of questioning. Joe Biden had assured for months that there was no danger of a Taliban takeover, to start. Two, based on local reports, they may have been Afghani immigrants, the area is loaded with Iraqi Chaldean Christian immigrants, many of whom vote Republican, and for Afghani immigrants, that would be a very friendly area with shops that sell their favorite foods (even the local Walmart does), others who speak at least some of their language, and a general community that knows what war is. Blaming the victims, in this case, doesn't work, and the kids are in genuine danger now. What kind of heartless president laughs that off, particularly with a chop-licking Taliban looking for someone to make an example of in their lifelong quest to humiliate America just a little more? Biden, at best, seems to be profoundly out of touch with reality. His "narrative" to the American public, after all, has been that the airport access is clear, with the Taliban doing all it can to ensure its open access, and "any American who wants to go home, we will get you home." For the California kids and worried parents and community, those claims sound pretty hollow right about now. Could it be that he didn't know that these kids, among thousands, actually, are among the stranded? It seems plausible that someone would have briefed him on it, and he fell asleep or forgot about it as soon as he was told. The worst that one can conclude is that Biden does know and couldn't care less. That was evident enough in some of his early addresses, where, as I noted here, he was one cold, heartless bastard on the entire matter, blaming everyone but himself for the Afghanistan fiasco of his own making, starting with his insult to Afghani grunt soldiers all supposedly being cowards (someone should ask this sneering draft-dodger about the tens of thousands of Afghani soldiers and police who have died fighting the Taliban over the past two decades). After that, he told terrified Afghanis who've just lost their country that he'd be sure to speak up for them at the United Nations, so never mind about the tangible protections they'd just lost with his setup for the Taliban takeover. Worst of all, he pretty well told America's veterans that they'd wasted their time and lives fighting for Afghanistan as they had in this war, but to cheer up: he was there as their hero now, ensuring that nobody would ever fight a war like that again, which was supposed to be their "reward" for all that blood, sweat, and tears over the past 20 years. It was repulsive, leaving America's Afghan war vets feeling a kinship with America's Vietnam veterans, spat on by hippies at America's airports. Could Biden's making light of the grave situation be a function of his not caring, or a calculation that by joking about it, the public will laugh the whole thing off with him? If so, he's going to be in for a surprise. Either way, this is one unfit commander in chief. Anyone with that little concern for trapped American schoolkids in an atrocious hellhole, left behind by his own incompetence, doesn't deserve to be president. He ought to be thrown out, but he'd be replaced by a laughing hyena not all that different from him. Voters will just have to put a hostile Congress in front of him in 2022 or deal with more of these grotesque insults from a greedy, corrupt, bad-judgment monster who really doesn't feel anything human at all. Image: Screen shot from CBS 8 News San Diego video via shareable YouTube. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. President Biden's feckless handling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan will have a significant impact on the future of the U.S. President Biden claimed he had a choice "either to follow through on that [Trump's withdrawal] agreement or be prepared to go back to fighting the Taliban." He chose to follow through on the agreement, albeit without its tough conditions, which among other things included a requirement from the Taliban to share power. The chaos that has resulted was a result of not the withdrawal itself, but the inept way it was carried out. Pulling out troops first, abandoning the strategic Bagram airbase without telling the Afghani military, leaving civilians to fend for themselves without troops to protect their departure, and leaving billions' worth of military hardware for the Taliban to get its hands on have led to this chaos. The president weakly claimed he wanted to avoid further bloodshed, as did the swiftly fleeing president of Afghanistan. The way the withdrawal was implemented will only guarantee further bloodshed on a massive scale. The fall of Afghanistan is a historical disaster of epic proportions. It may rival the fall of Constantinople. Afghanistan is not called the Graveyard of Empires for nothing. The Soviets left Afghanistan in 19881989, and the Soviet Union was officially dissolved in December 1991. British M.P. Lord Forsyth of Drumlean claimed, "It is very hard to overestimate the scale of the catastrophe following the Biden administration's disastrous implementation of the decision to withdraw from Afghanistan." British M.P. Lord Blencathra believes that "Biden may have condemned the world to Chinese domination in future and the end of western liberal democracy." He continued, "This is not like Saigon; it is far worse. The Viet Cong had no agenda outside Vietnam but Afghanistan is now under the control of Islamist fanatics who want to wage war on every Western democracy." Former British prime minister Tony Blair stated, "America's retreat is imbecilic and tells our enemies we don't have any interests or values worth defending. Friends and foes ask: is this a moment when the West is in epoch-changing retreat?" How will the Biden administration deal with the massive hostage crisis we are about to witness? When not on vacation, its first response is to deny that there is a problem. In her August 23 press briefing, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki indignantly stated, "I think it's irresponsible to say that Americans are stranded. They are not." However, national security adviser Jake Sullivan told Meet the Press on August 22 that there are "several thousand" Americans still stranded in Afghanistan. On August 17, the Daily Mail reported that 40,000 Americans were stranded in Afghanistan. No one knows the actual number. How do you plan an evacuation when you don't know how many people need to be evacuated? Press secretary for the Defense Department John Kirby told reporters the U.S. military does not know how many Americans remain in Afghanistan. The Iran crisis involved only 52 American hostages. The Iranians were able to humiliate the Carter administration for 444 days. How will the Biden administration deal with hundreds and possibly thousands of hostages? The media will have a field day with heart-wrenching stories. As an example, there are more than 20 students and 16 parents from El Cajon, California who visited Afghanistan on summer vacation. They were unable to get to the airport. One reason Americans cannot get to the airport is Taliban roadblocks. John Kirby has acknowledged that some Americans have been beaten by the Taliban in Kabul. He reassured us that the Biden administration has "communicated to the Taliban" that the attacks are unacceptable. Even Democrat Rep. Adam Schiff believes that getting all Americans out of the country by 8/31 is unlikely. If it is necessary to re-enter Afghanistan, the American military will be facing a well equipped adversary. Between 2002 and 2017, the United States gave the Afghan military an estimated $28 billion in weaponry. One U.S. official claimed, "Everything that hasn't been destroyed is the Taliban's now." This would include 40 aircraft UH-60 Black Hawks, scout attack helicopters, and ScanEagle military drones; 600,000 infantry weapons including M16 assault rifles; 2,000 armored vehicles; and 16,000 night-vision goggle devices. What kind of assistance can we expect from anti-Taliban Afghans? In addition to the problems arising in Afghanistan, the withdrawal will inspire forces throughout the world to challenge the U.S. President Biden claimed that we got rid of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. Almost immediately after he made this claim, Kirby stated, "We know that al-Qaeda is a presence as well as ISIS in Afghanistan." These terrorists may be headed to the U.S. The Defense Department's Automated Biometric Identification System has flagged up to 100 of the 7,000 Afghans evacuated as prospective recipients of Special Immigration Visas as potential matches to intelligence agency ties-to-terrorism watch lists. Vladimir Putin has rejected the idea of airlifting people from Afghanistan to countries near Russia, or even in Russia. He claims he did not want "militants showing up here under cover of refugees." John Dietrich is a freelance writer and the author of The Morgenthau Plan: Soviet Influence on American Postwar Policy (Algora Publishing). He has a Master of Arts degree in international relations from St. Mary's University. He is retired from the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Department of Homeland Security. He is featured on the BBC's program "Things We Forgot to Remember:" Morgenthau Plan and Post-War Germany. Image: Screen shot from video posted by Hindustan Times via shareable YouTube. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. As a kid growing up in a Cuban Catholic home, I remember waking up on January 6 and rushing to see gifts the Three Wise Men had left us. Kids in the U.S. had Santa Claus, and we had Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, the three men who brought gifts to the baby Jesus. Last January 6, some people got out of control and charged the U.S. Capitol. It was immediately called an "insurrection" and got President Trump impeached. So where are we now? It appears that a lot of people, especially in the news media, have a little explaining to do, as Julie Kelly wrote: The Justice Department now seems to be prepping the ground for a major letdown. "The FBI has found scant evidence that the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol was the result of an organized plot to overturn the presidential election result," Reuters reported August 20. Nearly all of the cases, four former and current law enforcement officials said, are "one-offs" while roughly five percent are associated with so-called militia groups. "FBI investigators did find that cells of protesters, including followers of the far-right Oath Keepers and Proud Boys groups, had aimed to break into the Capitol. But they found no evidence that the groups had serious plans about what to do if they made it inside," the unnamed sources told Reuters. So something happened, but not an effort to overthrow the U.S. government or an insurrection. Looking back, my gut feeling turned out to be right. I recall going locally on TV and saying I did not think the rioters were Trump-supporters. Why not? Because violence and chaos were never part of Trump rallies. Did you ever hear of Trump-supporters burning cities or attacking the police? Secondly, I always wondered about Capitol security. How could a major U.S. federal building be this unprotected? What if real terrorists with bombs had actually attacked the Capitol? So drop the probe unless we are looking into who decided to leave the Capitol unprotected. Thank God we are getting our January 6 back the day that brings back so many childhood memories in Cuba. PS: You can listen to my show (Canto Talk). Image: Blink O'fanaye To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. You may have heard that the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 shot received FDA approval this past Monday. Politicians, national health officials, and journalists are breathless with excitement about how this approval will finally induce the remaining "vaccine-hesitant" into stepping forward to receive their jab. The FDA even has a press release on its website about it. There's just one problem. If you read the actual letters that the FDA sent to Pfizer on August 23, 2021, you'll see that the FDA did no such thing. In the sense that the term "FDA approval" is generally understood, this drug is not approved by the FDA. It is still under EUA (Emergency Use Authorization). It is still an experimental drug. The FDA sent two letters. The first one was a letter of BLA (Biologics License Application) approval, and the second was a letter of EUA extension to COMIRNATY. The BLA approval letter approves Pfizer's application for a license to label its COVID-19 drug with the brand name COMIRNATY. This letter also spells out the terms and requirements for nine additional clinical trials over five years, and yearly status reports, to study the acknowledged occurrences of myocarditis and pericarditis that have followed the administering of the Pfizer shots. This license to label and manufacture is not a full approval of the drug, which clearly is still subject to many years of clinical trials. The EUA extension letter extends the term of the EUA for the current drug and authorizes (licenses) the experimental use of the brand-name drug COMIRNATY. In the first paragraph on page 2, this letter references the license approval letter. In the second paragraph on page 2, the August 12 EUA is re-issued to include the name-branded drug in the emergency use authorization, and to add "language regarding warnings and precautions related to myocarditis and pericarditis." In the last paragraph on page 4, the EUA nature of the drugs is re-iterated, and COMIRNATY is additionally authorized for use for individuals aged 12 through 15 years. The mRNA gene therapy shots are still experimental. Mandating them is still wrong by a wide variety of ethical standards. Dr. Meryl Nass, M.D. found the truths that the FDA buried in the blather of these letters and offers a theory about why it was done this way. The drug-manufacturers were granted immunity from liability for the drugs produced under the EUAs. The granting of the license re-applies the customary liability for injury and death caused by the product. Pfizer, the health officials, and the politicians get to take a fictitious victory lap for the "approval," while Pfizer-BioNTech continues to stealthily enjoy immunity from product liability because there are many millions of the unlicensed doses on the shelves and in the manufacturing pipeline that will be administered first. The licensed version will not arrive on shelves or be jabbed into arms for many months to come. Of great concern, considering the factual content of the FDA EUA letters to Pfizer, is the breezy way the press release on the FDA website repeatedly uses the words "approve" and "approval" in reference to the Pfizer drug. If only there were a word for intentionally saying things to the public that do not match reality... COMIRNATY seems like an unusual name for anything, much less a cutting-edge-technology gene therapy. Out of idle curiosity, I ran the name through an anagram solver. For a result, it gave TIROMANCY, which is divination or prophecy by examining how curds form during the coagulation of cheese. How apropos. That's something I'm willing to try for forecasting the results of the next election! To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. How about this for a poll question: Would Donald Trump, as president, have been more effective than President Biden in overseeing the evacuation from Afghanistan? Yes or no? Does anyone doubt that more than half of respondents would mark yes? Next, in his August 20 presser, Biden asserted: "The evacuation mission is dangerous." This statement, arguably, deserved a one-word question from reporters: "Why?" Simple common sense would have it that Biden's recognition that the situation in Afghanistan is "dangerous" now implies that he miscalculated, terribly, on the goodwill of the Taliban in setting August 31 as the inflexible deadline for removal of all U.S. troops from a country that is about to relapse into 7th-century Islamic rule which brings the country back to where it was when the mission in Afghanistan began under the Bush-Cheney administration. The Bush-Cheney mission, in retrospect, was initiated without a congressional declaration of war, and, certainly, without reference to Gen. MacArthur's sage advice in his April 19, 1951 Farewell to Congress, noting, in part, "War's very object is victory, not prolonged indecision." This great American then asserted: "In war, there is no substitute for victory." As we experience from afar the immediacy of TV reports of our catastrophe in Afghanistan, what else are we to conclude but that the past two decades amounted to "prolonged indecision" leading to anything but "victory"? Isn't it time to return to the explicit provision in Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution to the clause asserting that the decision to make war is for Congress? Isn't it time to turn away from the unconstitutional advice secretary of state Dean Acheson gave President Truman to send our troops to Korea without action first from Congress? (See McCullough's biography, Truman, p. 789, Touchstone paperback). Shouldn't we have learned that it is the determination of Congress to make war that reflects a national consensus to send troops into battle for victory, not for a result leading to national humiliation? Another poll question comes to mind to underscore the political aspect of the current chaotic situation in Afghanistan: Would Speaker Pelosi, if Donald Trump had been re-elected president, now be calling for his third impeachment over the evacuation situation in Afghanistan? Yes or no? Does anyone seriously doubt that well over half the respondents would agree that Pelosi would have drafted an article of impeachment decrying the "invitation to humiliation" if Donald Trump were still president? Perhaps the media shrink from raising questions that would put Biden at a disadvantage vis-a-vis Trump, fearing that people might start clamoring for another Trump presidential term. But what about a statement from the House Republican caucus? A statement by all House Republican members should accept the responsibility the Constitution gives them: the decision to make war is for Congress to determine, not the White House acting in concert with a select few. And a House Republican statement should also reaffirm the sage advice Gen. MacArthur gave Congress, seventy years ago, which might be rephrased this way: do not declare war if you will not see it through to victory. Image via Max Pixel. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Court ruling could have doubled this years PFD if Dunleavy hadnt already vetoed it YS Jagan Takes A Short Holiday To Shimla:- Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy has been staying in his Tadepalli residence and he rarely made a public appearance in the recent months because of the coronavirus pandemic. From the past few days, there are speculations that YS Jagan will fly to Europe along with his family for a short holiday. But the young politician hasn't applied for a holiday before the CBI Court as he has been facing charges of corruption and he has to apply before the court if he has plans to fly abroad on an official or personal visit. The rumors came to a rest after the Chief Minister's Office confirmed that YS Jagan will fly to Shimla along with his family. YS Jagan flew to Shimla this morning along with his family and he will celebrate his 25th wedding anniversary on August 28th in the hill station. As per the update, YS Jagan will be back to Amaravati on 31st and will be available from September 1st. Though the family of YS Jagan wanted to fly abroad, they decided to fly to Shimla considering the coronavirus and the travel restrictions. YS Jagan along with his family will land in Chandigarh this afternoon and will travel to Shimla on road. YS Jagan's meeting with Tollywood film celebrities which is planned during the last week of August is now pushed to September. (Video Source: Hmtv News) (Image source from: Twitter.com/ANI) DRDO's Advanced Chaff Technology Is An Innovation:- On August 25th, DRDO revealed about the advanced chaff technology that can be used to safeguard the IAF's fighter jets. This can provide passive jamming against the infra-red and radar threats. DRDO collaborated with a Pune-based facility to develop this advanced chaff material along with a cartridge. Ravindra Kumar, the Director of Defence Lab in Jodhpur announced it during a press conference and he said that the advanced chaff is a defence technology that can be used to protect the fighter aircraft from radar threats. Counter Measure Dispensing System (CMDS) is used to ensure the survivability of the aircraft. DLJ developed advanced Chaff material & chaff cartridge-118/I in collaboration with High Energy Materials Research Laboratory, Pune meeting qualitative requirements of IAF, which has started process of induction of this technology after completion of successful user trials: DRDO pic.twitter.com/yCgS2NTjWd ANI (@ANI) August 19, 2021 This CMDS will provide passive jamming against the Infra-Red and radar threats. The importance of the technology is that a less quantity of chaff acts as a decoy to deflect the missiles of the enemies to ensure the safety of the fighter aircraft. The technology is given to the industry for production in large quantities so that it meets the annual rolling requirement for the Indian Air Force. Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh had lauded the DRDO, IAF for developing such critical technology and he called it an innovative move. He congratulated the teams who are associated with the development. Android Headlines offer bite-sized data on various areas to keep readers of todays tech scene entertained and up-to-date. The site provides a glimpse of what is happening when it comes to Android and tech news. Though it may fail to offer a full picture, its readers are in the know. Over the years, technology has drastically revamped industries worldwide. Android Headlines believes in informing its readers about the world that is now virtually connected. 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PLEASE NOTE: ALL ONLINE PURCHASES ARE AUTOMATIC RENEWALS UNLESS YOU EMAIL JPAYNE@ANNISTONSTAR.COM OR CONTACT CUSTOMER SERVICE @ 256-235-9253.... Purchase an online subscription to our website for $7.99 a month with automatic renewal. Each online subscription gives you full access to all of our newspaper websites and mobile applications. To cancel you may contact Customer Service @ 256-235-9253 or email JPAYNE@ANNISTONSTAR.COM For a limited time, for NEW SUBSCRIBERS ONLY a NEW ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION is just $59.99 for the first year. Existing customers do not qualify for the specials! After the first year, well automatically renew your subscription to continue your access at the regular price of $69.99 per year. Please note *Your Subscription will Automatically Renew unless you contact Customer Service To Cancel* VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis on Thursday named the first woman head of a Vatican dicastery or administrative and religious department. The pope appointed a nun, Sister Alessandra Smerilli, FMA, as the interim Secretary of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development. She was also appointed as a delegate of the Vatican Covid-19 Commission, Vatican News reported. Sister Smerilli was named "to replace Msgr. Bruno Marie Duffe and Fr. Augusto Zampini, respectively Secretary and Assistant Secretary of the same Dicastery, both of whom have returned to their dioceses." The Italian religious sister has served as an Undersecretary at the Dicastery since March 2021. According to the Holy See Press Office, Pope Francis has "ordered that management team of the Vatican Covid-19 Commission be composed" of Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, Prefect of the Dicastery, Sister Smerilli, and Father Fabio Baggio, Undersecretary of the Migrants and Refugees Section. Born in the Italian town of Vasto (Chieti) in 1974, Sister Smerilli has been the Undersecretary of the Dicastery since March 2021, as well as coordinator of the Economic Taskforce of the Vatican Commission Covid-19. As Secretary she takes the place of Msgr. Bruno-Marie Duffe, who left the Dicastery in July, and as delegate of the Task Force she replaces Father Augusto Zampini. The latter is also leaving the Dicastery and returning to serve in his home diocese in Argentina. "I am grateful to the Holy Father," said Sr. Smerilli, "for the challenging task he has called me to take on, and I pray the Lord will help me honor this call in a spirit of obedience to the Church, with the humility, passion, creativity and ability to listen that it requires. My desire and commitment are to be able to serve the mission of the Church to the best of my ability, for as long as the Pope sees fit." After thanking her superiors, Sr. Smerilli said she was certain she could "count on the spirit of communion and collaboration of the entire Dicastery, as well as the many international partners who collaborate with the Covid Commission, for the integral promotion of the person and the care of creation by promoting and developing those principles of the Church's social doctrine to which Pope Francis constantly calls us for the construction of a better world." A statement from Father Augusto Zampini was also posted on the Dicastery's website. "I am grateful to the Holy Father for entrusting me with the challenging task of coordinating the Vatican Covid-19 Commission and serving as the Dicastery's assistant secretary. Now that the Commission is ready to enter a new phase, and in communion with my bishop, I have asked Pope Francis for permission to return to my Diocese. I am confident that under the leadership of Sister Alessandra Smerilli the Commission will be able to continue the healing journey to help both people and the planet out of this difficult situation." The Azores, Switzerland, and Canada are among seven locations being added to the Governments green travel list. Denmark, Finland, Liechtenstein and Lithuania are also being moved to the list. The decision means all travellers arriving in the UK from those locations will be exempt from coronavirus quarantine requirements. To view this content, you'll need to update your privacy settings. Please click here to do so. Thailand and Montenegro are being added to the red travel list, meaning arrivals must enter a quarantine hotel. The changes will be implemented from 4am on Monday. The Azores are a Portuguese archipelago in the mid-Atlantic, and are open to UK holidaymakers. Canadas addition to the green list is likely to increase the number of Canadian visitors to the UK. But the North American country continues to ban entry to British nationals. Travel lists, which determine the quarantine and testing requirements for people arriving in the UK, are updated every three weeks. Many popular tourist destinations such as Spain, France and Greece are on the amber list, which means returning travellers who are not fully vaccinated must self-isolate at home for 10 days, take one pre-departure test and two post-arrival test. Fully vaccinated travellers are exempt from quarantine, but must still take one pre-departure test and one post-arrival test. Sean Doyle, British Airways chief executive, said: Despite our world-leading vaccination programme, the UKs economic recovery remains far behind our more pragmatic European neighbours, which are already reaping the rewards of a rapid recovery. It cannot be right that although 77% of us have been fully vaccinated we have a much more costly, prohibitive and restrictive testing regime than everyone else, when data suggests just four out of every 1,000 travellers tests positive for coronavirus on their return to the UK, less than the overall rate at home. These stats strongly suggest PCR tests should only be needed following a positive lateral flow test. We also need to urgently end the uncertainty caused by the constant threat of changes to countries traffic light status. Our green list is much smaller than that of the US and EU, despite no new variants being transported into the UK. A spokesman for Airlines UK, the industry body representing UK-registered carriers, said the small number of green destinations is making international travel from the UK more expensive, burdensome and uncertain compared to our neighbours. He went on: Too many families are having to look over their shoulders for rule changes and pay through the nose for tests, with no sign from Government that this will change. As has already happened across Europe, its time for a more proportionate system where tests are dropped for the fully vaccinated and from destinations where Covid risks are low, with tougher measures targeted at a small number of high risk countries. Shadow transport secretary Jim McMahon warned that any loosening of restrictions carries with it risks, particularly from variants that could undermine the progress we have made on vaccines. The final stages of the evacuation effort in Afghanistan are under further strain after a warning that a highly lethal terror attack could be launched within hours. Armed forces minister James Heappey said on Thursday there is very credible reporting of an imminent and severe threat to Kabul airport. He called on those queuing outside Hamid Karzai International Airport to move to safety amid concerns over an affiliate of the so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan, know as Isis-K. The threat is heaping extra pressure on the operation to help people flee the nation captured by the Taliban, with Tuesdays deadline for foreign troops to leave fast approaching. Passengers disembark from a Voyager after arriving at RAF Brize Norton from the Middle East (SAC Samantha Holden RAF/Ministry of Defence PA) Mr Heappey told BBC Breakfast: The credibility of the reporting has reached the stage where we believe there is a very imminent, a highly lethal, attack, possible within Kabul. And, as a consequence, weve had to change the travel advice to advise people not to come to the airport, indeed to move away from the airport, find a place of safety and await further instruction. He told LBC radio the possible attack could come within hours, adding: I dont think anybody should be surprised by this Daesh, or Islamic State, are guilty of all sorts of evil. But the opportunism of wanting to target a major international humanitarian mission is just utterly deplorable but sadly true to form for an organisation as barbarous as Daesh. The defence minister acknowledged the extraordinarily challenging decision people trying to flee are facing because they also fear for their lives by leaving the queue and potentially having to remain in Afghanistan. And so I think there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it, he told BBC Radio 4s Today programme. The warning to stay away from Kabul airport is a stark change in tone from a week ago when Boris Johnson said the situation had been stabilising. Eight RAF flights managed to lift 1,988 people from Kabul within the past 24 hours, Mr Heappey said, taking the total since the Taliban began its march to power to 12,279. He said Britain has 11 more flights scheduled out of Kabul for Thursday but declined to say whether that will be the end of the operation, citing the security of troops on the ground. But its climax is rapidly approaching after US President Joe Biden rejected calls from the Prime Minister and other allies to delay his withdrawal date for the remaining US troops. They are providing security at Kabul airport, meaning other allied forces are expected to have to wind down their evacuation efforts and depart ahead of the Americans. With the main route to flee under threat, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace reportedly told MPs that crossing the Afghanistan border in order to leave would be a better option. The Government has previously said it will increase diplomatic support in neighbouring countries to process refugees who escape from Afghanistan. On Wednesday, it was believed nearly 2,000 people assessed as eligible under the Afghan relocations and assistance policy (Arap) remained on the ground. But Mr Heappey said the number outstanding is now potentially half of the previous estimate. The latest plane carrying evacuees from Afghanistan to Britain has arrived in the country in the early hours of Thursday. The Ministry of Defence (MoD) says an RAF Voyager aircraft carrying around 250 people from Kabul landed at the Brize Norton base in Oxfordshire soon after midnight. MoD figures show more than 11,500 people have now been airlifted to the UK since the evacuation mission Operation Pitting began on August 13 as the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan ahead of the US-led withdrawal of western troops from the country. This includes embassy staff, British nationals, those eligible under the Afghan relocation and assistance policy (Arap) programme, as well as some evacuees from allied countries. British nationals and Afghan evacuees after disembarking at Brize Norton (Jacob King/PA) The Arap programme is designed to allow those Afghans who helped the UK forces, and therefore are at risk of persecution by the Taliban, to leave the country. The MoD said the UK has evacuated some 7,000 Afghan individuals and their families. The flight took to more than 11,500 the number of people airlifted to the UK from Kabul since August 13 (Jacob King/PA) The number of British citizens who still need evacuating, as well as those who hold dual citizenship, remains unclear. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said every hour will be used to help people flee and declined to rule out UK forces having to depart by the end of Friday. Media watchdog Ofcom has announced it has withdrawn from a diversity scheme run by an LGBT charity. The organisation said in a statement it has withdrawn from the Stonewall diversity champions programme because taking part poses a conflict or risk of perceived bias. Stonewall describes the scheme as the leading employers programme for ensuring all LGBTQ+ staff are free to be themselves in the workplace. To view this content, you'll need to update your privacy settings. Please click here to do so. More than 900 organisations in the UK have signed up to the scheme, which aims to promote inclusion in the workplace. Ofcom said it is confident it can move ahead positively, without continuing with the diversity champions programme. It added that in recent months there has been significant scrutiny of some of Stonewalls policy positions. In Ofcoms case, we have considered whether our relationship with Stonewall poses a conflict or risk of perceived bias. Stepping back from the diversity champions programme, in light of this, is the right thing to do. As the communications regulator, an important part of our responsibility to ensure we remain impartial and independent at all times. Other organisations including the Equality and Human Rights Commission and the Cabinet Office have also reportedly quit the scheme in recent months. A Stonewall spokeswoman said: We respect Ofcoms decision and will continue to work with them in their role as the UKs communication regulator. It is sad, however, that involvement in a programme that supports an inclusive workplace for LGBTQ+ employees should be in any way regarded as an unimpartial act. As with every membership programme, organisations come and go depending on what works best for their inclusion journey at the time, and were very proud of the work weve done with Ofcom and wish them the best in their ongoing efforts to support all of their LGBTQ+ employees. Its a simple human right that everyone, including LGBTQ+ staff, is free from discrimination and prejudice at work, and our Diversity Champions programme is one way for organisations to be supported in this. Qantas aims to restart flights to and from Britain in mid-December, in plans linked to the Covid vaccine rollout in Australia and in several of the airlines major destinations. The carriers initial focus pending Australian government acceptance will be on countries with high vaccination rates, including the UK, Japan, Singapore, Canada and the US, the airline said in a statement. Australias government has drafted a plan to begin the gradual reopening of international borders once the country reaches a vaccination rate of 80%, which looks likely to be achieved in December. Flights to countries with low vaccination rates are expected to be delayed until next April, including Indonesia, South Africa, Thailand and Vietnam, Qantas said. Qantas CEO Alan Joyce says the Covid vaccine rollout means Australians should have a lot more freedom in a few months time (Steve Parsons/PA) Qantas said its ability to fly non-stop between Australia and London was expected to be in strong demand post-Covid. The airline said it was investigating using Darwin as a transit point, instead of its existing Perth hub, due to tight border control policies in Western Australia amid the pandemic. Darwin has been Qantass main entry for repatriation flights during the Covid crisis. The prospect of flying overseas might feel a long way off, especially with New South Wales and Victoria in lockdown, but the current pace of the vaccine rollout means we should have a lot more freedom in a few months time, Qantas Group chief executive Alan Joyce said. The responsibility of getting a new drama on the murder of Stephen Lawrence right weighed very heavily, its executive producer has said. The new three-part ITV programme, titled Stephen, is a sequel to the 1999 programme about the case titled The Murder Of Stephen Lawrence. Steve Coogan will play DCI Clive Driscoll, who led the investigation that saw two of the killers finally convicted of murder 18 years later. Doreen and Neville Lawrence (Michael Stephens/PA) The black teenager was killed in 1993 in a racist knife attack by white youths in south London. Executive producer Mark Redhead said there was a big responsibility to tell the stories of Stephens parents Neville and Doreen Lawrence. That responsibility to get this right weighed very heavily on me, because it is Neville and Doreens lives, he said. Like Baroness Lawrence does, I want something positive to emerge from the tragedy of Stephens death. I have the most incredible admiration for Doreen and Neville. It is remarkable how they have turned something so negative into a force for good. In terms of telling this story, it is really important that we try and shine light into dark corners and face those things. Thats part of the process of making this country a better place. It is something I care about very deeply as I think most people do. Most people share the values that we promulgate in the drama. Steve Coogan (Ian West/PA) Coogan labelled his character as a beacon of the honest, decent, hard-working, methodical policeman and said the story is an important one to tell because it shows that things can be achieved by a conscientious work ethic. Lots of things are achieved that way, but they go uncelebrated because they appear to be undramatic and undynamic. Its an acknowledgement of those people. He added: I dont often play decent people, I normally play people who are dysfunctional. And so, I wanted to play Clive. I wanted to play a decent person. Neville Lawrence said a whole new generation of people need to know about the murder of my son and what followed after that. There are also other families who have gone through the same thing we went through all those years ago and are still going through. We need to remind them so people can try and understand a little bit about the pain that families like us and lots and lots of other families who have lost loved ones in similar situations have suffered and are still suffering. Stephen airs on ITV on Monday at 9pm. Krispy Kreme is ramping up its efforts to encourage customers to get the COVID-19 vaccine. This week, the company unveiled its second free doughnut promotion for vaccinated people, and it's even sweeter than the first one. Two days after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration gave full approval to the Pfizer vaccine, Krispy Kreme announced that customers who show proof of vaccination will be able to get two free doughnuts every day at their local store between Aug. 30 and Sept. 5, and and one free doughnut daily for rest of year. Customers who have received at least one vaccination shot are eligible for the weeklong Show Your Heart" offer and can choose from the chain's Original Glazed Doughnut or a limited-edition Original Glazed Heart Doughnut. The special heart-shaped treat will also be available for sale throughout the week. Krispy Kreme is giving away two free doughnuts to vaccinated people for one week. (Krispy Kreme) In March, Krispy Kreme launched its first free doughnut promo and announced that customers who had received at least one jab and show a valid vaccine card could score a free glazed doughnut every day at participating locations through the end of 2021. The campaign has been quite popular (Krispy Kreme has given away 2.5 million+ Original Glazed doughnuts so far), and it'll continue through the end of the year. But the company was inspired to step things up a bit once the FDA officially approved the Pfizer vaccine. "We all hoped we'd be near the end of this pandemic by now. We're not," Krispy Kreme's chief marketing officer Dave Skena said in a press release. "So, please consider getting vaccinated if you've not done so already. And then enjoy and share two amazing doughnuts with our heart-felt thanks." Krispy Kreme started the trend of incentivizing customers to get the vaccine by offering edible freebies. In April, many other companies followed suit, including Shake Shack, Budweiser and Nathan's Famous. But not everyone was eager to cash in on the sugary doughnut deal. Shortly after Krispy Kreme launched the promo, the company faced backlash from some critics who argued that the offer discriminated against those who don't want the vaccine. At the time, Krispy Kreme addressed vaccine hesitancy, calling it "a highly personal decision." The chain also offered a free coffee and doughnut to all customers on Mondays through May 24, whether or not they were vaccinated. Related: One doctor pointed out that eating a donut a day could lead to a 15-pound weight gain over the course of a year. Other critics expressed concern about the health effects of a free daily doughnut. In response to this sentiment, writer Kate Bernyk penned an NBC News op-ed arguing that it was a form of fat-shaming and food-shaming. "I think for me, it wasn't about the doughnut," she wrote. I think that it's just another opportunity to pass judgment on someone's choices or the way someone looks." TODAY Food asked Krispy Kreme CMO Dave Skena what inspired the company to release this second doughnut promo, despite the backlash it had received in previous months, and he explained that the chain is passionate about "Acts of Joy." He also referenced the other free doughnut promotions the company has rolled out for health care workers, students, teachers and other groups throughout the pandemic. Related: The medical establishment's fatphobia and the harms it causes patients is well established. Yet some people felt the need to scaremonger about doughnuts. "We are a warm and generous brand. Providing free Original Glazed doughnuts to those who get vaccinated is another gesture that we hope sweetens peoples lives as the country tries to put this virus behind us," said Skena. "Like many sweet treats, our doughnuts are an occasional indulgence best enjoyed in moderation and we know thats how most of our guests enjoy them," he added. "Were certainly not asking people to get a free Original Glazed doughnut every day; were just making it available through the end of the year to show support to those doing their part to make the country safe by getting vaccinated." U.S. Marines with Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force - Crisis Response - Central Command, provide assistance during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan, August 20, 2021. Lance Cpl. Nicholas Guevara/U.S. Marine Corps/Handout via REUTERS THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY LOS ANGELES (Reuters) Several dozen schoolchildren and adult relatives, all Afghan refugees newly resettled in California, ended up stranded in Afghanistan after traveling back to their homeland over the summer to visit loved ones, San Diego-area school officials said on Wednesday. Six families consisting of about 16 adults and 24 students from the Cajon Valley Union School District in the San Diego suburb of El Cajon were among thousands clamoring to leave Afghanistan amid the Taliban takeover as U.S. troops began pulling out, according to district officials. Michael Serban, head of the district's Family & Community Engagement (FACE) program for immigrant students, said one of the six stranded families - comprising four students, a 2-year-old child and two adults - had since made it out and returned safely to El Cajon. The fate of the five other families was not immediately known, he said. Serban and district spokesman Howard Shen said school officials were working with two members of California's U.S. congressional delegation - Representative Darrell Issa and Senator Alex Padilla - to contact the missing families and get them back to the United States. "We dont have any operational details," Serban told Reuters. "For the safety of the families, they just let us know they're working on it." In 10 days since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, the United States and its allies have mounted one of the biggest air evacuations ever, bringing out more than 88,000 people. The operation is due to end next Tuesday, but is expected to shift its focus in the final two days to military personnel from civilians. Cajon Valley school officials became aware of their students' plight when one family visiting Afghanistan contacted a FACE community liaison officer on Aug. 16 to report difficulties it faced making it back to California in time for the first day of classes on Aug. 17. As the situation in Kabul deteriorated, school district officials learned through local contacts and social media that five more families were likewise stuck in Afghanistan, most in the Afghan capital, and needed help getting out, Serban said. All six families are part of a larger community of refugees from Afghanistan who settled in El Cajon in recent years, including a few hundred young Afghan immigrants among the 17,000 students enrolled in Cajon Valley schools, Serban said. A large portion of the school district's student body also consists of immigrants from Iraq, Syria and various Latin American countries - a major factor in the establishment of the district's FACE program, he said. Serban said it was not unusual for members of those communities, including Afghan immigrants, to venture back to their homelands "when they feel it's safe to go" for summer vacations with family still living in their native countries. School officials worry that an untold number of other vacationing Afghan-American immigrants may have found themselves stranded in Kabul without a school-based community liaison or anyone else they feel they can trust in the United States to reach out to for help. Express your opinion! Fill out this form to submit a Letter to the Editor. Submit Feature Your News Online $25.00 / for 30 days Highlight your business' news for just $25! We'll feature your content on our News From Local Business section & our Marketplace front page to give it maximum exposure for the next 30 days. MILTON, Ga. The Broadwell Building in Downtown Crabapple is sporting two new murals that celebrate Miltons history. Students from the University of Georgia Arts Department, with assistance from the Milton Historical Society, recreated the murals on the longstanding building at the corner of Broadwell Road and Mid Broadwell Road earlier this month. The murals, facing both roads, depict the Worlds Largest Crabapple on a white background with a blue border. They are recreations of murals that were originally painted in the 1960s to celebrate the founding of the community and to launch the foundation of the Crabapple Festival around six decades after the Broadwell Building was constructed. Milton Historical Society President Jeff Dufresne said the artwork will serve as a gateway to the community. Murals are public works of art, as a part of placemaking, that give the consensus of the community, what is this place all about, what is its narrative, he said. I think we all want to have a sense of place, and I think Milton does have a sense of place. It is a bucolic, former agricultural community where there is a love of the land, and [the murals] reflect on a time where days were simpler, and they are a celebration of who we are. Dufresne said the Crabapple community was founded with a log cabin schoolhouse constructed in 1874 near a large crabapple tree. The Broadwell Building was constructed in 1907, and the building that now houses the JRL Coal Co. has previously served as a dry goods store, lodging house, a hall for community meetings and dances, and an antique shop. When the Statham (family) bought the building in the mid-1960s, the original mural was painted, and the first Crabapple Festival was launched, Dufresne said. The murals were recreated by UGA students Katie Eidson, Gabrielle Poteet, and Alondra Arevalo under the direction of professor Joseph Norman. The project was under the umbrella of the Color the World Bright initiative by the Lamar Dodd School of Art at UGA that has also recreated murals in other Georgia cities, including Hartwell and Tignall. Bill Lusk, a board member on the Milton Historical Society and former City Council representative, created a mural committee and worked with the Statham family to bring the murals back to life. The city also gave the greenlight by declaring the murals were grandfathered, so the effort could be completed without bureaucratic red tape. In general, murals can create a sense of place and make residents and visitors feel welcome, Dufresne said. I think this mural in particular celebrates Miltons unique identity. Its interesting how a large, durable brick canvas can create a storyline for the city. It has also sparked interest in residents learning more about the area. I was delighted to see the feedback and curiosity, Dufresne said. It kind of leads people to want to know more about this place, whether its their own heritage or those around them. Its a great community engagement project and a great vehicle to tell the story about a place. We're glad you're here. Enjoy an unlimited number of stories and podcasts, for free, right now. Then sign up to get some of our newsletters, which are also free, right now. Subscribe Owosso, MI (48867) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 48F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 48F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Online Access for Print Subscribers. Do you have a print subscription with the Argus-Press? If yes, then click here to enjoy complimentary access to our Online Content! YEREVAN, AUGUST 26, ARMENPRESS. An Azerbaijani soldier has been placed under arrest by Artsakh authorities after unlawfully crossing the border and breaching into an apartment in the town of Martakert, the Artsakh prosecution said. The Azerbaijani serviceman, identified as Jamil Babayev, was apprehended by Artsakh police and national security service officers in an apartment on Teryan Street in Martakert on August 25. Babayev is arrested and charged with illegal border crossing, threatening to kill the children in the apartment and espionage. Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan Support local journalism Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by making a contribution. Sharon Stone will be given the Golden Icon Award at next month's Zurich Film Festival. The 63-year-old actress will appear in person at the 17th Zurich Film Festival - which runs from September 3 to October 3 - to receive the festival's highest accolade. The ceremony will then be followed by a screening of the film which earned her an Oscar nomination, Martin Scorsese's 1995 movie 'Casino', before the 'Basic Instinct' star gives a talk about her 41 years in Hollywood. And Stone is "thrilled" to be receiving the accolade. She said: It is an honour to engage with the global community and celebrate the profound depth of our art. "I am thrilled to be recognised in this capacity. The festival's artistic director Christian Jungen hailed Stone as "a true icon" and a "woman who (Alfred) Hitchcock would have loved" as he praised her acting abilities and qualities as a person. Jungen said: Sharon Stone is a true icon of the seventh art. She is a woman that Hitchcock would have loved. "Her distinguishing qualities include an irresistible charm, a great human depth, the talent to play a whole range of roles and the ability to captivate an audience like no other. "At a time when the film business was dominated by men, she stood her ground to fight against sexism and in doing so became a major role model for many women in the film business. Irrfan had hundreds of questions, which made me very happy about his involvement as an actor For the kind of films, I make, it is fundamental for the artists and crew to feel as one family. Thats why we were nervous about Irrfan, says Mostofa Sarwar Farooki. Mostofa Sarwar Farooki is one of the best-known filmmakers of Bangladesh, the pioneer of the new-wave cinema movement in the country. Hes the auteur of about 22 works, both film and TV, and has won various international accolades. Farooki recently launched is first web-series Ladies and Gentlemen on Zee5 Global, and is excited by the response it has got around the world, both from the critics and public (the channel goes to 190 countries). The web-series is the directors individualistic take on the #MeToo movement, and hes pleased that the web-series has generated discussions in many countries, including India. The director has always favored streaming platforms, and in fact two of his early films, Television (2012), Ant Story (2014) were streamed on Netflix. His latest film to stream on Netflix, is Doob No Bed of Roses, where the lead is played by none other than the great Irrfan Khan. In fact, this was one of his last films, and he even co-produced the movie. Excerpts from a freewheeling interview with the dynamic Bangladeshi filmmaker: What made you choose the #MeToo subject, for your maiden web-series Ladies and Gentlemen on Zee5 Global? My interest for different aspects of the male-female relationship and its power dynamics has always been there. Ive also long been thinking of the finer fabrics of a story where the abuser is a successful artist, and the abused is his fan, and thats how this story came about. Why did the story suddenly become a crime thriller? The murder needed to happen, as I needed to tap on the male rage that I see in our society. A crime in response to another crime forms a criminalised society. I wanted to touch upon the broader theme of society and state. How have the viewers reacted to the Web-Series? The audience responses have been amazing. There have been lots of discussions, which was very heartwarming to see. You seem to have a brilliant cast. They are some of the best artistes working in Bangladeshi films and television. Do you personally believe that women are stronger than men, as your film portrays? If we are talking about endurance, adaptability, swimming against the tide, determination, then my answer would probably be Yes! How important are OTT platforms to you? OTT is going to impact the film industry in a massive way. Theatrical windows for independent or auteur films are increasingly shrinking. So filmmakers all over the world are increasingly looking forward to OTT platforms. Audiences are also becoming more used to home viewing, especially after Covid. Im happy that two of my earlier films were streamed on Netflix. I wish that my last film Saturday Afternoon could also be streamed there, especially as its been banned in my country (the story is based on the real-life terrorist shooting in a well-known Dhaka cafe) It seems that almost every film of yours has caused a controversy, including Doob with Irrfan Khan? Well, unfortunately, most of my films have had their share of problems with either the censor board or the conservative mind. Doob was banned for a while too. That was because the film was inspired by some real-life events. Actually most of my films are inspired by real-life stories. That particular story of Doob shook Bangladeshi society, and I thought that the shake-up would offer our society a great opportunity to introspect and evolve. Why did you cast Irrfan Khan in the film? Because of his eyes, as those had the rare capacity of expressing sadness and indifference at the same time. Did he accept the role easily? Well, I sent him the script, and I also sent him links of some of my earlier films. He watched them without sub-titles, and said he enjoyed them, especially the way I dealt with my characters. What was it like, directing Irrfan Khan? To be honest, when I cast him, there was anxiety in my unit because we had not handled artists of his stature. For the kind of films, I make, it is fundamental for the artists and crew to feel as one family. Thats why we were nervous about Irrfan. But when we started filming with him, I must admit that we never ever felt we were dealing with a global star. He never imposed himself, and his presence was never felt in the unit. He was silently blooming, like a wild flower on the street side. Your films are noted for the outstanding performances of your cast. How do you manage that? I always have an intense relationship with my actors. I explain the character as deeply and clearly as possible. And they participate in the process of interpretation by throwing a barrage of questions. The more I receive questions from actors, the clearer the nuances of the character become. Irrfan had hundreds of questions, which made me very happy about his involvement as an actor. Thinking actors are always questioning actors. Is it true that Irrfan Khan did not want his voice to be dubbed, and spoke his own dialogues in the film? Yes. Hes a thorough professional, and learnt Bengali in 3 months! He confessed that it was not an easy language to learn, but he never gave up. Tell us about your next film. Im doing an English-language film No Lands Man which is an international production. The film deals with identity madness thats going on in full scale across the globe. The subject allows me to step into new areas. I literally had to cover new grounds, since the film is set in the US, Australia, India, Pakistan. How did you manage to shoot in so many countries during Covid? We were lucky that we completed the physical shoots by January 2020. But the post-production has got delayed because of Covid. Do you have a great cast again? Well, Nawazuddin Siddiqui plays the male lead, and the female lead is played by Australian actress Megan Taylor Mitchell. Theyve both given a highly engaging performance, which Im sure will have a strong impact on the audience. AR Rahman created the music, which has lifted the film to another level. I believe the subject, treatment, emotions of the film, will reach out to wider audiences around the world. Nearly 1,200 fishermen and representatives of the Koli community staged a protest outside the BMC headquarters All Maharashtra fishermen joint action committee stage a protest 'Jan Akrosh Mocha' at Azad maidan, over various issues across the Mumbai coastal belt region, in Mumbai. (Photo: PTI) Mumbai: Fisherman from Mumbai and neighbouring areas have opposed the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation's (BMC) plan to relocate fish vendors from the historical Crawford Market here. Nearly 1,200 fishermen and representatives of the Koli community from across the city and neighbouring areas like Dahanu, Vasai, Thane and Raigad on Wednesday staged a protest outside the BMC headquarters in south Mumbai, said Devendra Tandel, president of the Akhil Maharashtra Machhimar Kriti Samiti (AMMKS). They opposed the BMC's plan to shift fish vendors from the Crawford Market in south Mumbai to Airoli in Navi Mumbai and other parts of the metropolis, he said. The BMC has already demolished the fish market in Mumbai's Dadar area, he pointed out. The Crawford Market acts like an agriculture produce marketing committee (APMC) of fish trade and shifting vendors to Airoli would affect the business, Tandel claimed. He said fish vendors should instead be relocated nearby or somewhere in Dadar. Joint Municipal Commissioner Ramesh Pawar met the AMMKS delegation though they had sought a meeting with BMC Commissioner I S Chahal, he said, adding that they did not receive any assurance from the civic body. In a representation submitted to the BMC, AMMKS demanded temporary relocation of fish vendors to Carnac Bunder and Cotton Green areas in Mumbai, until a new shed is built for them at the Crawford Market. San Angelo, TX (76909) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 73F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 73F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Bernard Wayne Taylor, 81, passed away Aug. 12, 2021. He is survived by his wife, Karen Taylor; brothers, Gerald, Harold (Loretta) and Charles (Marlena); mother-in-law, Thelma Brown; and numerous nieces and nephews. He worked as an educator at TVCC in Athens, Texas for many years before retir Set to be unveiled online as a racer next week, ahead of its arrival in Munich for the event that kicks off on September 7, because racing is a key part of Cupras DNA, the show car will offer a first glimpse into the SEAT sub-brands new urban electric vehicle, reportedly related to the future Volkswagen ID.1.It will enter production in 2025, the automaker claims, and it is likely that it will be built around the VW Groups MEB entry platform. Rumor has it that it might be followed by a crossover, similar in size to the SEAT Arona, which will be a sister model to the upcoming Volkswagen ID.2 The latter is also believed to be previewed by a concept at the Munich Auto Show in less than two weeks from today, but thats a story for another time.Together with the announcement, Cupra has also released a teaser image and a short video of the study.Tweaking it in Photoshop using our basic skill set reveals a wide body design that looks similar to the sought-after Toyota GR Yaris , presumably on a slightly smaller scale. It has fat rear fenders and a gigantic wing sitting on the tailgate, with an integrated light strip thats interrupted only by the Cupra logo, it too backlit.The short clip shared on the Spanish automakers official channels reveals other bits and bobs of the UrbanRebel Concept, without spilling the beans on its design. Thus, all we can do at this point is wait for Cupra to uncover it in a few days unless it gets leaked by then. Back in early August, a section of the Michigan State Highway M-32, in Alpena, was run over by the forces of the Michigan National Guard, the U.S. Air Force, and the Air Force Special Operations Command.The military was there, operating on a closed section of the highway, as part of the Northern Strike 21-2 exercise. Somehow, the military drill ended up needing aircraft to land on a highway - it was for the first time in the history of the post-war United States when military aircraft intentionally landed on a civilian road.The exercise involved a number of machines, including A-10 Thunderbolts and C-146A Wolfhounds. And it was those Thunderbolts that stole the show, as they are true war monsters.In the time that has passed since the exercise, countless videos have been released showing the performance of these winged beasts because, even if the highway was closed, people still flocked to the sides to see the exercise unfold. But late last week, another video below popped online, showing the preparations for the drill, the flight to the landing destination, and, above all, the moment when one of these A-10s touches down only to take off a short moment after that.The video, the first one available below, was shot by Senior Airman Alex Miller, deployed with the Air Force's 355th Wing, one of the units taking part in the Northern Strike 21-2 exercise.But before you dive into it, a quick recap of what the Thunderbolt, also known as the Warthog, is all about: two General Electric turbofan engines that give it a top speed of 420 mph (676 kph), a seven-barrel Gatling gun called Avenger that can fire rounds from 4,000 feet (1,200 meters) into an area of just 40 feet (12 meters) in diameter and, as of now, the proven capability to land on public highways. EV kWh NEDC Great Wall is the company that owns Ora and a luxury brand called WEI. When the latter started teasing another retro concept for the same automotive event, we thought it was completely new. It isnt: it is an Ora Punk/Ballet Cat with different components.Regardless of the name this new concept will have, just check its profile and tell us if you cant find the similarities. The C-pillar is what makes it more evident that the WEI concept is just an Ora Punk/Ballet Cat, but theres more: all the doors match, as well as the inner part of the fenders, which were not stretched to receive the different headlights and taillights that the WEI concept presents.Great Wall also modified the front hood so that it looked like a 1950s generic American car. The tailgate received a round bump that seems to house a spare tire. Yet, the profile of the WEI concept shows these were adaptations to something that already existed. Unfortunately for Great Wall, these changes were not very effective in hiding the original vehicle.We would not be surprised if WEI decided to sell this concept with a higher price tag. If it were just meant to present a new style or anticipate a future vehicle like concepts usually do it would be utterly unique in terms of appearance, not a car that is clearly based on one that is going into production soon.That said, we bet the WEI concept will offer the same LFP battery packs used by the Punk/Ballet Cat. They have two options: 47.8and 59.1 kWh, withranges respectively of 401 km and 501 km in the Ora EVs. WEI could also offer a different battery pack with ternary cells and more energy (and range).We know cost-cutting is essential and that reusing is one of the three sustainability Rs. However, it is disappointing that Great Wall did that to a concept car that already uses a production vehicle that is a copycat of the VW Beetle . Were sure it could do a lot better. Schroder is appalled that the automaker, which decided to switch over one of its cafeterias to a vegetarian-only at the behest of Green political forces Schroder opined on a social media post in defense of delicious currywurst.Volkswagen still produces their tasty branded sausages and serves them up in other staff cafeterias - and even sells them in local supermarkets - and during 2019 alone, the German auto giant cranked out 7 million of the spicy, meaty delights.And the currywurst has a historical meaning to Germans as it was invented in Berlin after the war in 1949. The recipe includes sliced pork sausage, which is then submerged under a blanket of spiced ketchup and dosed liberally with curry powder. These health-questionable meals are often accompanied by fries or with a small bread roll.In perhaps the most brutish twist to the story, Germany's favorite cafeteria chow saw its ranking drop below, of all things, Spaghetti Bolognese.The change was largely powered by an initiative proposed during the German election cycle in 2013 from the Green Party, which called for company cafeterias to offer one meat-free day per week as a way to cut down on greenhouse gases resulting from meat production.The plan interrupts currywurst production, which has been a staple at VW since 1973. And if you dont think the meaty delights have been an entrenched part of the gustatory culture at VW, think again. The Currywurst actually carries a Volkswagen part number and the casings are marked Volkswagen Originalteil or Volkswagen Original Part and should you wish to place a bulk order, ask for part 199 398 500 A. DOHC Very small even by the standards of the day, the first-generation Corolla had a little bit of prestige over the Datsun 1000 thanks to the 1.1-liter engine. Toyota even offered a two-speed automatic with a column shifter known as the Toyoglide A20, an evolution of the Powerglide-derived A10 from 59.Improved over almost two decades, the Corolla saw a huge shift in the 1980s. I am referring to the switch to front-wheel drive as well as the New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. joint venture between Toyota and General Motors. The first U.S.-built models were made in California at the NUMMI production facility thats currently owned and operated by Tesla.The fifth-generation Corolla wasnt only front-wheel drive, though. Remember the AE86 from the Initial D anime? The Hachiroku is a legend in its own right, mostly thanks to its rev-happy engine and tail-happy driving characteristics. For the sixth-generation Corolla, the compact econobox gained all-wheel drive and a 16-valvelayout for every single motor.Moving on to the 12th generation, the U.S. market has finally received a hybrid option that costs less than a brand-new Prius. Capable of more than 50 miles to the gallon (4.7 liters per 100 kilometers) on the combined testing cycle, the fuel-sipping powertrain will be complemented by a hotter option under the Gazoo Racing umbrella. The GR Corolla is likely to feature the 1.6-liter engine of the GR Yaris, which isnt available in the United States.It's also worth mentioning that a compact crossover by the name of Corolla Cross has entered the lineup for the 2022 model year. Made in Alabama and offered with front- and all-wheel drive, the high-riding body style is certain to help Toyota reach the 51,000,000 milestone very soon. The Afghanistan situation hundreds of thousands of people desperate to flee their country with few safe and accepting places to go is just one sign of a future that will be shaped by a growing migration crisis. Why it matters: Whether because of violence, persecution, climate change or economic distress, rising numbers of people will leave the only homes they've known in search of a safer and better life abroad even as the politics in destination countries sours on accepting them. By the numbers: Even before their government collapsed in the face of American military withdrawal prompting a mad dash for safety by people who'd worked with the U.S. and feared Taliban persecution Afghans were fleeing their country in huge numbers. According to UN data, 1.5 million Afghans fled to Pakistan in 2020, while another 780,000 escaped to neighboring Iran. That's just one part of a growing migration crisis around the world on the U.S. southern border, officials reported nearly 200,000 encounters with migrants in July, the highest monthly total in nearly two decades. Dangerous migrant boat departures from northern Africa to southern Europe have been increasing in recent months, and more than 1,100 people have died crossing the Mediterranean so far this year. The big picture: 82.4 million people worldwide had been forcibly displaced from their homes as of the end of 2020, more than twice the total in 2011. Nearly half of them had been forced to leave their countries of origin, with the rest displaced internally. Those numbers are only likely to grow. According to a study from last year, more than 1 billion people globally could be displaced by 2050 because of climate change and its destabilizing effects. Between the lines: Growing numbers of migrants and refugees are escaping their homes at the very moment when international politics toward migration have turned sharply negative. According to the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, last year fewer than 35,000 refugees out of 20.7 million were actually resettled in a new country a fraction of 1%. Greece which saw nearly 1 million refugees enter its territory after the 2015 Syrian crisis is erecting a 25-mile-long, heavily surveilled fence along its border with Turkey to stop asylum seekers from Afghanistan. In the U.S., the Supreme Court on Tuesday blocked the Biden administration's efforts to roll back former President Trump's "Remain in Mexico" policy for asylum-seekers coming to the southern border. The White House itself has expedited deportations and repeatedly urged migrants to not come to the U.S. Context: What's unfolding is one of the mega-trends of the 21st century: more people willing and often forced to leave their homes, and a colder welcome in destination countries, including the U.S. A recent Harvard/Harris poll found that 80% of Americans think undocumented immigration is a "very serious" or "somewhat serious" problem, while 64% think the government should institute stricter border policies to reduce the border flow, leaving the political landscape on immigration "incredibly polarized," notes Dick Burke, the CEO of the immigration services company Envoy Global. European leaders fearful of another populist backlash are resistant to taking on Afghan refugees, with EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell Fontelles saying recently that member states want to ensure no wide-scale migratory move toward Europe. The pandemic led to unprecedented border closures around the world, which choked off both documented and undocumented migration while possibly setting a template for future restrictions. What they're saying: "If the principal political and economic binary of the world 20 years ago was left versus right, today it's open versus closed," says Alec Ross, a former U.S. diplomat and the author of the forthcoming book "The Raging 2020s." What's next: While politics and public opinion are trending in the direction of a closed world, other factors point toward the need for more migration, not less. Low fertility rates mean that aging rich countries will need more people even as population growth continues in many of the countries that are already generating migrants and asylum-seekers. The economic benefits of immigrants including asylum-seekers are real, and the U.S. will "definitely need them if were going to economically compete with China," writes economist Noah Smith. The bottom line: A more open world may be the right one for both altruistic and self-interested reasons, but getting there requires dismantling both physical and political barriers. A relevant bill has been proposed by the Investigative Committee. It was published on a joint website of draft legal acts for public debate earlier this week. The Committee said that the purpose of the measure is to show appreciation for the fact that citizens stood by the armed forces during the war. This shows a humanitarian approach to those who committed crimes connected with military service, it said. No exact official statistics is available yet to show how many people may be amnestied under the bill, but it is believed that it may concern scores or even hundreds. More than 1,600 criminal cases were launched in Armenia in connection with the 44-day war in Nagorno-Karabakh and the bulk of them concerns soldiers and officers who allegedly deserted, refused to perform their military duties or committed other crimes and offenses related to military service. The draft says that amnestied will be citizens who are suspected, charged with or convicted for committing minor offenses or crimes of medium gravity both before September 27, 2020, when the war in Nagorno-Karabakh broke out, and during the period between the cessation of hostilities on November 9, 2020 and the lifting of martial law in Armenia on March 24, 2021. While there is no large-scale public debate about the amnesty draft yet, early assessments by human rights activists appear positive. One of them, Vardan Harutiunian, believes that among other things prisons should be unloaded in Armenia. It is not always imprisonment and punishment that corrects a person. Sometimes it is a social situation that changes people more, he said. The last time Armenia declared amnesty was in 2018. That amnesty that followed that years velvet revolution and was timed to the centennial of the establishment of the short-lived first Armenian republic concerned more than 4,600 people. Any amnesty, any pardon is reconciliation in a broad sense. But we can speak more substantively on the current initiative when there is a finalized draft or an adopted law, Harutiunian said. Meanwhile, Norayr Norikian, a lawyer specializing in military cases, voiced concerns that such an act of amnesty may send a wrong message to society and encourage more offenses in the future. It may give rise to political speculations that amnesty is for those who refused to go to war or carry out orders during the war, those who deserted military posts, because if you look at the nature of offenses and crimes against the order of military service you may get a perception that amnesty can be applied in relation to persons charged under all these articles. It may turn out that people may get the wrong impression that the state may show a similar humanitarian approach towards them if they, for example, evade the army draft as conscripts or reservists or do not comply with orders while in service, the lawyer said. The amnesty bill was put up for public discussions until September 7. After that, it is supposed to go to the parliament for discussion and adoption. His statement came amid reports that Azerbaijan closed the section late on August 25, interrupting traffic between two parts of the mountainous region. Armenias National Security Service said negotiations with the Azerbaijani side, which were reportedly conducted by Russian border-guards deployed in the area, on the re-opening of the road which also provide interstate connection with Iran continued in the morning. Pashinian reminded that still in his address on December 19, 2020 he spoke about problems related to the Goris-Kapan section and that a political decision had been made for which he was fully responsible. He quoted an excerpt from his December address: Today, Russian border troops and other forces are fully represented in Syunik. We are talking about the Goris-Vorotan-Shurnukh section, and this is a completely new security situation. Of course, as a result of all this, transport and logistical difficulties may arise, uninterrupted operation of some of our roads may become complicated, but these are solvable problems, we have made efforts in this direction, including through having a trilateral document. Pashinian reminded about accusations being made by the opposition that his government sought to sign some document behind the peoples back. Did we sign a trilateral document? No, we did not have a trilateral document, he said. Instead, according to Pashinian, the Defense Ministry announced an arrangement with the Russian military under which, in particular, Russian border-guards would be deployed at the Goris-David Bek section to ensure uninterrupted traffic, while Armenian and Azerbaijani border troops would be deployed on the opposite sides of the line of contact. We did not provide information only about the sectors that could pose additional risks to our national security, also to avoid situations similar to one we have today, Pashinian explained. As for what happened last night on the Shurnukh section of the Goris-Kapan interstate road, Pashinian said: We are talking about the 21-kilometer section, which was outside the territory of Soviet Armenia according to the maps of the Soviet Union. The Azeris came to those places and closed them, citing an incident in which an Azerbaijani border-guard was allegedly stabbed by people who came from the Armenian side. We officially say that the information about the stabbing does not correspond to the reality. We urge the Azerbaijani side to provide us with evidence of the incident so that we can understand what happened. But this [closing of the road] contradicts what is written in the Defense Ministrys December 19, 2020 agreement that was reached between Armenia and Russia, by which that arrangement was confirmed. But no trilateral statement that I said was being prepared was eventually signed. At the same time, Pashinian rejected claims that part of Syunik is now disconnected from the rest of Armenia, noting that anticipating the situation the government has worked actively to provide an alternative route through what he described as a normal dirt road between Kapan and Aghvani, which he said is now being asphalted at a fast pace. The State Border Service of Azerbaijan claimed on August 25 that two Armenian soldiers committed a stabbing attack against an Azerbaijani border-guard on the Goris-Kapan section of the road. Armenias Defense Ministry on Thursday categorically denied that any such incident happened, describing Bakus statement as a sheer lie and another piece of Azerbaijani disinformation. Meanwhile, ethnic Armenian authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh today said that on August 25 a serviceman of Azerbaijans armed forces identified as Jamil Babayev was apprehended at an apartment in the Armenian-controlled town of Martakert. Officials in Stepanakert said the detained Azerbaijani soldier is suspected of planning to commit murders. Azerbaijans Defense Ministry said that Babayev, against whom a criminal case had been launched, left the psychiatric department of Ganjas hospital without permission and presumably crossed into the Karabakh territory controlled by Russian peacekeepers. Only ruling Civil Contract faction members took part in the vote that went 70 to 0 in favor of the program. The two opposition factions, Hayastan and Pativ Unem, that harshly criticized Pashinian and his governments action plan during the debate opted out of the vote. Under the program presented in parliament by the prime minister the Armenian government, in particular, pledges to do its part in ensuring peace and stability in the region, raising the security and providing better economic conditions for citizens of Armenia. According to Pashinian, ensuring the security, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Armenia, a fair solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh problem, and creating a favorable external environment around Armenia will remain priority tasks for his government. Pashinian, in particular, pledged large-scale reforms in the army and active foreign policies to improve Armenias external security. As an important security factor, Pashinian singled out Armenias strategic alliance with Russia and the countrys membership in the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization. From the point of view of regional stability, he also noted the importance of continuing negotiations within the framework of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europes Minsk Group co-chaired by Russia, the United States and France aimed at determining the final status for Nagorno-Karabakh. The Armenian leader said that opening up regional infrastructures will also be important for his government in the context of creating a stable regional environment in the wake of last years war in Nagorno-Karabakh, which Pashinian acknowledged has essentially changed Armenias external environment. The Armenian premier stressed, however, that the process should not take place at the expense of the security and vital interests of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. Pashinian also said that the government program envisages the deployment of border troops instead of army units at some sections of the frontier and the establishment of a foreign intelligence service in the next five years. In terms of the economy, Pashinian said that as part of the 2021-2026 action plan the minimum monthly salary in Armenia will be raised from the current 68,000 drams ($138) to 85,000 drams ($172). The Armenian government estimates that in 2021-2026 the average annual economic growth rate will be at the level of 7 percent. The plan envisages that it could be up to 9 percent a year in case of favorable external conditions. The program envisages that by 2026 the level of poverty in the country will drop below 10 percent, while extreme poverty will be stamped out. Pashinian said that Armenia will also continue to develop its infrastructure, including roads. In presenting the program to the government last week he said the European Union has made a package of 2.6 billion Euros (about $3 billion) available to Armenia in the next four years for that purpose. These projects, Pashinian said, will include the construction of a 60-kilometer-long road connecting the towns of Sisian and Kajaran in Armenias southern Syunik province, the construction of reservoirs and other infrastructure and education projects. Pashinian said that 300 schools and 500 kindergartens will be built or renovated in Armenia in the next five years. He said that the governments goal is also to equip all 1,400 schools across Armenia with engineering and natural science laboratories. Pashinian also mentioned that every third and subsequent child in all families regardless of their social status will receive 50,000 drams (about $100) a month until the age of six. In their speeches, representatives of the opposition continued to criticize Pashinian, claiming that he and his government mishandled last years war with Azerbaijan, the fight against the coronavirus and failed to ensure better living standards for people. Opposition critics also claimed that Pashinians promise that Armenia will do its part to try to open an era of peace in the region is a prelude to a new capitulation. Pashinian and members of the ruling partys faction in parliament rejected the criticism. The debate over the governments action plan in parliament proceeded in a tense atmosphere, with three brawls breaking out between pro-government and opposition lawmakers. PHOENIX (3TV/CBS 5) - For months, GOP Senate President Karen Fann has been saying the partisan election audit she ordered had nothing to do with overturning or decertifying the election. But the moneymen who largely paid for the disputed election review say otherwise. Maricopa County takes preemptive shot at upcoming report on election audit Richer also questioned the Cyber Ninjas' credibility, the Florida-based business hired by the GOP-led Senate to conduct the audit funded partly with taxpayer money. "Maybe what we see is we see a flipping of the Electoral College and a place we've never been before. It's totally unprecedented in our country, but I will tell you what if that's the case and the outcome of the election was what we believe it is, then something needs to happen," said Michael Flynn, Donald Trump's former national security advisor. He said that with former Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne. Both are strong supporters of the 45th president, have pushed baseless conspiracy theories about the 2020 election and reportedly run pro-Trump organizations that have contributed millions to pay for the audit in Maricopa County. "Mike, will you agree that if they find nothing there, I'll come out and apologize?" asked Byrne. "I'll stand there with Patrick on an international stage and say, 'We were wrong,'" said Flynn. "And I'm sorry we put this country through this, but if we're right, maybe there's another court of action," said Byrne. But that "other course of action" won't include overturning the Arizona election results, according to Terry Goddard, the former Democratic attorney general, who said there is no legal process to overturn the election certified by Republican Gov. Doug Ducey. Mexicos Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, left, welcomes members of the original Afghan all-girls robotics team, who have received threats from the Taliban, after arriving at the Benito Juarez International Airport in Mexico City, Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. After extensive international efforts and coordination from a diverse group of volunteers to evacuate the team, the girls are now begging the international community to help get their family to safety with them. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo) Bakersfield, CA (93308) Today Mainly clear skies. Low 62F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Mainly clear skies. Low 62F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Bluefield, WV (24701) Today Rain showers this evening with mostly cloudy conditions overnight. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.. Tonight Rain showers this evening with mostly cloudy conditions overnight. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%. Beginnings, Construction of the Astoria Column - N. Oregon Coast History Published 08/19/21 at 7:05 PM PDT By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff (Astoria, Oregon) Soaring some 700 feet above the north Oregon coast town, the Astoria Column is one of the most recognizable features of the Pacific Northwest coastline. Sitting on 600-foot-high Coxcomb Hill, the column itself juts upwards another 125 feet, with 164 steps up to the top. The Oregon coast icon has always had lofty ambitions. Its painted exterior chronicles the history of the town including Lewis & Clark's stay around here but beyond that its beginnings were inspired by the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Indeed, city bigwigs over a century ago hoped to create something that would rival that immense wonder. Astoria back in 1898 was a place full of wonders, at least to people at the time. Like the rest of the world, newfangled inventions were making life more interesting, convenient and at times certainly more dangerous. That eagerness for the future while still honoring the past was overflowing in Astorian's minds as its centennial was approaching. Locals here were hoping to whoop it right. It was that year the idea of an Eiffel Tower-like structure on the Oregon coast came to be, but such progress moved slowly and well into the next century. In 1911, the town's centennial brought at least an electric sign to the top of the hill that read 1811 1911. Those 100-year celebrations provided plenty of fundraising for the city, and it wound up with lots of funds to further the idea, purchasing the land of Coxcomb Hill in 1914. Among the major donors was John Astor, a descendant of John Jacob Astor, for whom the town was named. Meanwhile, locals had hoped a road would be built up there, but that didn't exactly happen until one town leader named Chitwood carved a pathway up by his own means. That year meant a big celebration again in the new park, now named Astor Park. In 1917, Chitwood appeared on the scene again and helped create a massive flagpole atop the hill. Between there and 1922, progress stalled. That year, a fire devastated downtown Astoria and all thoughts of any tower were tucked away, deemed too expensive in the midst of the civic rebuilding efforts. In 1925, the concept was reinvigorated by Ralph Budd, president of the Great Northern Railway, who wanted to build numerous markers across the U.S. celebrating the pioneers of the West. Under his aegis, the project moved rather quickly. It was he who talked to New York architect Electus Litchfield, and in turn they got together with artist Attilio Pusterla about his sgraffito painting technique for creating the history mural. Initially, they wanted to create only a massive flagpole in that spot, but the idea soon became a structure that featured the events in Astoria from the Corps of Discovery to the building of the railroads here. In December of 25, Budd made the announcement of the monument on Coxcomb Hill itself. Once again, the Astor family of New York played a major part, this time with philanthropist Vincent Astor donating money - he was the great-grandson of the original Astor. The following month, at the start of 1926, architect Litchfield started work, and a column that was 100 feet high was steadfastly taking shape now. Litchfield drew inspiration from Roman and Parisian cultures, both modern and ancient. The idea now was to have a platform that visitors emerged upon that provided a grand view of the Oregon coast, while the exterior would not honor only the pioneers but the regional tribal original residents as well. On March 8, construction began. Workers first excavated a large area and then created a base of concrete some 30 feet square and ten feet thick. The column would rest in that. By the end of April, the towering construct had all of the concrete walls poured and dried and it was then ready for its makeup job. According to the Friends of Astoria Column: The costs were carefully itemized: $15,000 for A.B. Guthrie and Company for construction, $2,875 to Portland Wire and Iron Works for the spiral staircase, $1,000 in architect fees for Electus Litchfield, and $7,500 for artist Attilio Pusterla and his supplies. From the winter through early summer the artist worked on the concepts for his sgraffito-style masterpiece but he wasn't there yet. He arrived in mid June, and as the dedication date had been set for the 22nd, Pusterla was worrying the locals. Finally, on July 1 he and his apprentices began the process. They did not quite finish in time, with only three sections completed as the dedication extravaganza commenced. Dedicating the Astoria Column (photo courtesy Friends of Astoria Column) Still, Oregonians were thrilled. Some 8,000 people were in attendance, with three days of festivities that rivaled the Oregon State Fair by a few dimensions. Painting and repainting the Astoria Column were not finished possibly ever. Pusterla himself assisted in a few retouches before passing away in 1941. The Astoria Column was closed during World War II and used as a military navigational facility, then reopened in 48. Numerous restorations were done over the decades, and in the early 80s the Friends of the Astoria Column were created to further assist in maintaining the legacy of the Oregon coast landmark. Hotels in Astoria/Seaside - Where to eat - Astoria Maps and Virtual Tours MORE PHOTOS BELOW More About Oregon Coast hotels, lodging..... More About Oregon Coast Restaurants, Dining..... Coastal Spotlight LATEST Related Oregon Coast Articles Back to Oregon Coast Contact Advertise on BeachConnection.net All Content, unless otherwise attributed, copyright BeachConnection.net Unauthorized use or publication is not permitted Beaumonts Holiday Inn Express Hotel and Suites near Parkdale Mall has revealed a new renovation and upgrade of its 81-room property. The hotel, owned and operated by Triangle Resort Investments, has been a convenient meeting place and stop for travels off Eastex Freeway since it was built in 2010. Triangle Resort Investments acquired the property in 2019. The company said the renovation was focused on giving an updated and more comfortable look to all of its guest rooms and public spaces in the hotel. The hotel features a fitness center and outdoor pool and spa, as well as 250 square feet of meeting space. Guest rooms feature contemporary styling, comfortable king or two queen beds, a sitting area with a lounge chair, work desk, safe, coffeemaker, small refrigerator and microwave. A new location for 5.11 Tactical is celebrating a grand opening in Beaumont on Saturday. The company based in Irvine, California, is a supplier of tactical gear, outdoor clothing, footwear and other apparel. Its newest location is at 4255 Dowlen Road in Suite B, near Parkdale Mall. 5.11 is offering special rewards for customers who attend the celebration from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., including a gift card valued anywhere between $15 to $511 for the first 50 people in line. Customers can also get 20% off their entire purchase, a special-edition Beaumont patch, entrance to an hourly drawing for gear and other give-aways. The name 5.11 comes from the origin of its first product, rock climbing pants specially made by founder Royal Robbins after completing a climb in Yosemite National Park and noticing how his clothes werent suitable. The number 5.11 is a reference to the most difficult climb listed in the Yosemite Decimal System. The Pompano Club is now open for dinner, furthering its goal of giving Mid-County residents a chance to return to the past enjoy the iconic dinner-club-turned-local-landmark. The clubs restaurant is now open 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays and 4 p.m. to 11 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays. It also has a newly renovated bar area with hand-crafted drinks. New ownership has been working to restore the club to service since December and recently celebrated its first summer season. The Pampano Club was closed in May 2020 the result of COVID-19 lockdowns that made regular activities impossible. This ended 45 years of business. The club, which was rebranded as Bentons in 2018 after Tropical Storm Harvey, was renovated in 2019 with help from a $50,000 grant by the Port Neches Economic Development Corp. Have news about new and changing businesses in the area? Send us a tip at localnews@beaumontenterprise.com jacob.dick@beaumontenterprise.com twitter.com/jd_journalism BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) Thousands of Indigenous people marched toward Brazils Supreme Court on Wednesday to pressure justices expected to issue a ruling with far-reaching implications for land rights. Wearing feather headdresses and with their bodies painted, they sang and danced along their 5-kilometer (3-mile) route. The group, which has been camping all week in the capital behind the National Theater, is comprised of some 6,000 people from 173 ethnic groups across the country, according to Association of Brazils Indigenous Peoples, a rights group and one of the organizers. Justices will be evaluating a lower court's ruling that invalidated a claim by some Indigenous people in Santa Catarina state to what they say is their ancestral territory. The lower court based its decision on allegations the group wasn't occupying the land in October 1988, when Brazils constitution was signed after the nations return to democracy, which the group denies. The Indigenous people were frustrated that the court didn't start discussing the case Wednesday. The majority of justices have yet to vote on another contentious debate, regarding the constitutionality of the Brazilian central banks autonomy. Protest organizers say the courts decision could be the ruling of the century, because negating the 1988 benchmark would force judges across the country to impose that understanding on similar pending cases, and also affect the fate of a related, controversial bill advancing in Congress. President Jair Bolsonaro suggested Wednesday that overturning the lower court's ruling would prompt new requests to officially recognize hundreds of Indigenous territories. His attorney general filed a request to the country's top court seeking to stop the Indigenous people from gathering, citing pandemic protocols that the president himself has repeatedly ignored. Justice Luis Roberto Barroso denied the request, saying he believed demonstrators were taking precautions. Farming groups argue the 1988 cutoff date provides certainty regarding property law, but rights defenders say it ignores the fact many Indigenous people had been forcibly expelled from their lands, particularly during the military dictatorship, or may not have formal means to prove possession. The criteria isnt functional for determining whether or not a territory was traditionally occupied because there are diverse contexts, diverse groups that for many reasons werent on their territories in 1988, said Samara Pataxo, a lawyer for the association. Pi Surui, from the 7 de Setembro village in the Amazon rainforest state of Rondonia, said he had come to the capital to make clear that Indigenous territory is more than just land. It is sacred, our history, our life, Surui, 23, said at the encampment. We have the right to grow our crops and sell our livestock, our fish, live sustainably. We are also adapting to the new times, balancing our needs and advances as human beings, but without losing our culture. The Santa Catarina state government says the Indigenous people involved in the current court case invaded the land in 2009. The Xokleng people say the original extent of their territory was progressively diminished by encroaching agribusiness and that they never left the area. Bolsonaro has repeatedly said Indigenous people control far too much land relative to their population their territories cover 14% of Brazil, most in the Amazon and has been outspoken about his desire to promote rural development. Together with farm interests, he has argued that the 1988 cutoff had already been established by an earlier court ruling. Changing it now would create chaos, he said in a television interview on Wednesday. If that happens, we will immediately have in front of us hundreds of new (Indigenous) areas to be demarcated, he told farming-focused station Canal Rural. In addition to the losses for the rural producer many have family occupying that land for more than 100 years those lands that today are productive could cease to be productive. Some of the people marching on Wednesday held banners that read Bolsonaro Out and "Indigenous territory is life. Jose Miguel Vivanco, executive secretary of Human Rights Watch for the Americas, took to Twitter to oppose the cutoff date, which he said large landholders and Bolsonaro allies are supporting in order to expel Indigenous people. Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen, who often advocates for Indigenous and environmental causes, also spoke out against it on social media. Separately, the lower house of Congresss Constitution and Justice Committee in June approved a bill that would officially establish Oct. 1988 as the reference date for Indigenous people seeking full protection of their territories to have been occupying the land. There are more than 200 such pending requests, mostly for small territories located outside the Amazon rainforest. The bill is awaiting a floor vote. A court ruling upholding the 1988 date would add legal backing to that bill in Congress, said Pataxo, the lawyer. If the court strikes down the prior ruling, that would weaken the bills momentum by providing justification to challenge its constitutionality in the future. Brazil has 421 officially recognized Indigenous territories that are home to 466,000 people, according to the nonprofit Socioenvironmental Institute. At a Tuesday night vigil ahead of Wednesday's march, Indigenous people held lights and carried banners, one of which read: Our history doesn't begin in 1988. We have resisted for more than 12,000 years. ___ Associated Press writer Debora Alvares reported this story in Brasilia and AP writer David Biller reported from Rio de Janeiro. WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealands government has extended a strict nationwide lockdown through Tuesday as it tries to quash its first outbreak of the coronavirus in six months. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Friday the government expects to keep Auckland, where most of the cases have been found, in full lockdown for at least two more weeks. But she expects most other parts of the country can ease restrictions slightly from Wednesday. The announcement came as health authorities reported 70 new daily cases, the most yet in the outbreak, which has grown to nearly 350 cases in total. Ardern said there was evidence the lockdown was working and new case numbers were beginning to level off. She said she remained committed to the strategy of eliminating the virus entirely. ___ MORE ON THE PANDEMIC: U.S. may reach 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths by Dec. 1. AP-NORC poll: Half of US workers favor vaccine, mask mandate in workplaces Illinois Gov. Pritzker requires educators, health workers to get vaccine U.S. virus surge breaks hospital records amid rising toll on kids ___ Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine ___ HERES WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING: LAS VEGAS -- A man from the Las Vegas area won the $1 million grand prize Thursday to cap an eight-week coronavirus vaccination jackpot program. Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak created the program to boost enthusiasm for COVID-19 shots. The prize winners were introduced by their first name and last initial at a live event hosted by the governor at the Las Vegas Convention Center and aides at the Sierra Arts Foundations Riverside Gallery in Reno. The program called Vax Nevada Days launched June 17 with $5 million in federal coronavirus relief funds. State health data showed the percentage of vaccinated state residents increased about 10% between the time the prize pool was announced in mid-June and when it ended Thursday. ___ FRANKFORT, Ky. Kentuckys governor said Thursday that the latest wave of grim COVID-19 statistics would have triggered a statewide mask mandate indoors if he still wielded the authority to take such action. But the Kentucky Supreme Court recently shifted pandemic-related decisions on masking and other issues to the Republican-dominated legislature, Gov. Andy Beshear said. So the Democratic governor used his bully pulpit to continue urging people to mask up when indoors, away from home. The Bluegrass State has reached uncharted territory with the prolonged escalation of virus infections, hospitalizations and patients in intensive care, he said at a news conference. On Wednesday, Kentucky reported 65 virus-related deaths. It also notched its third-highest daily number of new COVID-19 cases as the highly contagious delta variant overwhelms many hospitals. On Thursday, Beshear reported new record highs in Kentucky, with 2,115 virus patients hospitalized, including 590 in intensive care and 345 on ventilators. The state suffered 27 more virus-related deaths and had 5,401 new COVID-19 cases, its second-highest daily total of the pandemic. The escalation caused more than 10,000 COVID-19 infections reported statewide in the past two days, and 4,600 children tested positive for the virus in the last three days, he said. ___ LINCOLN, Neb. Nebraskas hospitals are even more crowded now than they were at the height of the coronavirus pandemic in November, Gov. Pete Ricketts said Thursday as he announced a staffing emergency to try to address a severe shortage of health care workers. The states hospitals were treating a 3,162 patients as of Wednesday, up from 3,074 on Nov. 20, when the number of known cases was at its all-time high. Most of the recent hospitalizations arent virus-related, however, and Ricketts said the increase was driven by patients seeking treatment for other medical problems. According to state data, hospitals are currently treating 337 virus patients about 11% of total hospitalizations. In November, the hospitals counted 987 virus patients, accounting for 32% of hospitalizations. Ricketts said he declared the emergency after consulting with the states hospital administrators. But he stopped short of calling it a COVID-19 emergency, which would allow the state to once again disclose daily case information. ___ MEMPHIS, Tenn. The president of CEO of the Memphis-based St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital said in a letter Thursday that parents should protect their children by insisting that they wear masks in the classroom. In his letter, Dr. James Downing mentioned Tennessee Gov. Bill Lees recent executive order allowing parents to opt out of mask mandates issued by school districts. Many school systems are complying with the Republican governors order, but Shelby County Schools in Memphis and the school district in Nashville are defying it and still requiring students and staff to wear masks in school buildings. Some parents have protested mask mandates outside schools and at board meetings, arguing that mask-wearing by their children should be their choice. Downing wrote that masks are safe to wear and they help prevent the spread of COVID-19. Protesting mask mandates puts an agenda before childrens health, Downing wrote. This stance is not rational. Stop the arguments and the protests. Stand up as a community and do what is right to protect children." ___ BUENOS AIRES, Argentina A federal prosecutor is accusing Argentine President Alberto Fernandez of apparently violating his own pandemic restrictions decree by joining a dozen other people at his wifes birthday party. The action by prosecutor Ramiro Gonzalez means Fernandez could face a criminal investigation. The party was held last year at the presidential residence at a time when the government had banned social gatherings to impede the spread of COVID-19. Investigators began looking into the case when a photo circulated this month showing Fernandez together with his wife Fabiola Yanez and other unmasked people standing around a table with with remnants of a party. The government acknowledged that the photograph was taken on July 14, 2020, at a moment when restrictions were in place. The president publicly apologized. While the president is in no risk of going to prison for such an offense, it has dented his image ahead of Novembers legislative elections. ___ MONTGOMERY, Ala. - Alabama is seeing a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases in school-age children, with more than 5,000 cases reported last week an increase officials say is likely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant and is causing some schools to temporarily switch to remote learning. The Alabama Department of Public Health said last week, 5,571 children ages 5 to 17 were reported to have COVID-19. That compares to 702 cases in school-aged children during the same week last year, a time when more than half of students were studying remotely and a less contagious variant was circulating. State Health Officer Scott Harris pointed to delta variant as the most likely explanation. The numbers are staggering, Harris said of the increase We want to remind people that everyone needs to be vaccinated who is eligible, that is everyone 12 and up. We strongly recommend universal masking in schools. Hospitalizations and deaths in children remain relatively rare, according to state numbers. Of the nearly 2,900 patients in state hospitals with COVID-19 on Thursday, fewer than 50 were children, according to the Alabama Hospital Association. ___ OFALLON, Mo. Missouri is opening antibody treatment centers in several counties in the hopes that theyll keep some high-risk patients with COVID-19 from dying or becoming critically ill. Monoclonal antibody infusion treatment will be available for 30 days at sites in Jackson, Pettis, Scott, Butler and Jefferson counties. Two more sites will be added later in the St. Louis area. The state is spending $15 million on the centers and believes they could treat up to 4,000 people over the next month. The initial site was set up last month in southwestern Missouri, a region hit hard by the delta variant surge. Health officials said 588 people have been treated at an infusion center in Springfield. Katie Towns, the health director for Springfield and Greene County, said in a news release that the treatment has undoubtedly saved lives in our community. The drugs are lab-made versions of virus-blocking antibodies that help fight off infections. Antibody treatments are among the few therapies that can lessen the effects of COVID-19, and they are seen as an option for those with mild-to-moderate cases who arent yet in hospitals. On Thursday, the states COVID-19 dashboard showed that hospitalizations rose by 84, to 2,352. The state cited 2,161 newly confirmed cases, bringing its pandemic total to 622,081. The state also has reported 10,409 COVID-19 deaths since the onset of the pandemic. ___ DETROIT The head of the 397,000-member United Auto Workers union says its against requiring members to be vaccinated against the virus that causes COVID-19. New President Ray Curry says if any of the 700 companies that employ union members wants to impose such a requirement, it would be subject to bargaining with union officials. Curry told reporters Thursday that the union encourages members to get vaccinations and consider boosters when they are available. But the union respects members wishes if they dont want to be vaccinated for religious, medical or personal reasons, he said. The UAW would be against mandates even if infected workers could endanger fellow employees, Curry said. We also believe that the employers and the employees that we represent in those locations still have a voice, and we will have to take those things under consideration, he said. No employers have contacted the union about requiring vaccines or imposing additional health care costs on employees who arent vaccinated, Curry said. ___ MOSCOW Russia reported a one-day record of 820 coronavirus deaths. The national coronavirus taskforce says the number of new daily infections reached 19,630. That follows a consistent ebb since the beginning of the month when 22,800 cases were reported. The previous record for deaths was 819 on Aug. 14. Russia has reported more than 6.8 million confirmed cases and 179,243 confirmed deaths. ___ NEW ORLEANS A Louisiana teenager has died of COVID-19. The coroner in East Baton Rouge Parish on Thursday confirmed the death of 14-year-old Patrick Sanders III from the city of Baker. Baton Rouge media report that Sanders, who died Wednesday, was a football player at Baker High School. Sanders death came days after the state reported the death of an infant. Children under 18 made up about 30% of cases reported Thursday in Louisiana. The state reported more than 5,100 new probable and confirmed coronavirus cases Thursday and 72 confirmed deaths. Hospitalizations statewide stand at 2,729, down from more than 3,000 earlier this month. Vaccinations in Louisiana are increasing, with nearly 60,000 doses administered since Monday. First shots have been given to about 49% of the states population. ___ FRANKFORT, Ky. Kentucky and Texas have joined a growing list of states that have surpassed their record for hospitalized coronavirus patients. The two states on Wednesday reported the most COVID-19 patients in their hospitals since the start of the pandemic. At least six other states Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi and Oregon have already surpassed their records amid a national surge in the virus. The latest spike is fueled by the highly contagious delta variant of the virus among those who are unvaccinated. In areas with low vaccination rates, doctors have pleaded with their communities to get inoculated to spare overburdened hospitals. They have also sounded the alarm about the growing toll of the delta strain on children and young adults. Nationwide, COVID-19 deaths are averaging more than 1,100 a day, the highest level since mid-March. New cases per day are averaging over 152,000, turning the clock back to the end of January. As of this week, the number of people in the hospital with the coronavirus was around 85,000, a level not seen since early February. ___ NEW YORK The U.S. is projected to reach nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths by Dec. 1. Thats the prediction from the nations most closely watched forecasting model. But health experts say that toll could be cut in half if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. Some behavior changes already may be flattening the curve in a few places in the South where the coronavirus has raged this summer. An Associated Press analysis shows the rate of new cases is slowing in Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas. The projection from models at the University of Washington indicates deaths will rise to nearly 1,400 a day by mid-September, then decline slowly. Deaths are currently averaging 1,100 a day in the U.S., turning the clock back to mid-March. The projection is an additional 98,000 Americans will die by the start of December, for an overall U.S. death toll of nearly 730,000. Dhaka was trying to evacuate 15 of its nationals and 160 young Afghan women who had been studying at a university in Bangladesh, a diplomat said Thursday, as two suicide bombers struck crowded areas outside the international airport in Afghanistans capital, killing dozens. A source with Bangladeshs Ministry of Foreign Affairs who spoke on condition of anonymity said the group slated for evacuation via a chartered flight from Kabul was not affected by the bombings and still waiting in vehicles near the airport for permission to enter. The fate of future evacuations was unclear in the aftermath of Thursdays attacks, however. The two simultaneous bombings hit late Thursday, hours after Western embassies urged people to leave the area due to the threat of a terror attack by the regional branch of the Islamic State group. We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of U.S. & civilian casualties, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said on Twitter, referring to an area near the airport typically jammed with would-be evacuees. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate, Kirby said. Video footage from the scene showed what appeared to be dozens of corpses, and witnesses at the scene said that the blasts were followed by gunfire, Reuters news agency reported. Taliban official Suhail Shaheen said the two explosions took place in an area managed by U.S. forces. We strongly condemn this gruesome incident and will take every step to bring the culprits to justice, Reuters quoted him as saying. Zabihullah Mujahid, the Talibans main spokesman, told AFP that between 13 and 20 people were killed and 52 wounded in the twin blasts. Twelve U.S. servicemen were among those killed, according to a Pentagon press briefing. Very critical Earlier, a Bangladeshi diplomat described to BenarNews efforts underway to evacuate 15 Bangladeshis and 160 Afghan students from the Asian University of Women in Chittagong who were stranded in their home country. They required permission from the Taliban and U.S. military to go to the airport. They dont know when they will be able to fly, but they are trying, Zahangir Alam, Bangladeshs envoy to Uzbekistan, told BenarNews. He said that UNHCR, the U.N. refugee agency, was coordinating the attempted departure. The situation at Kabul airport is very critical. Thats why we are not sure when the journey will start, Zahangir said. As Bangladesh currently has no diplomatic mission in Afghanistan, Zahangir has been remotely coordinating evacuations, communicating directly with his countrymen from Tashkent, he said. In Dhaka on Thursday, speaking to reporters before the bomb blasts, Foreign Minister A.K. Abdul Momen gave limited information about the evacuation efforts. We are trying to bring back the Bangladeshis who are in Afghanistan. But we are not disclosing the procedures. There is a fluid situation in Kabul. Thats why we do not want to make any mistakes, he said. Till now we have traced 29 Bangladeshis in Afghanistan, a senior foreign ministry official, Mashfee Binte Shams, told reporters at the same press conference. Of them, about five people have already returned to Bangladesh while more 15 are waiting to go back home. Our effort to bring back the rest is underway. Kabuls international airport has been the scene of mass evacuations since the Taliban took control of the country 11 days ago, weeks after the United States withdrew military forces that were part of an international coalition backing the government. Thousands of American troops subsequently returned to assist the evacuation effort. Four years after the Myanmar military attacked ethnic Rohingya communities in western Rakhine state, burning villages, killing residents, and driving hundreds of thousands as refugees across the border with Bangladesh, sympathy has grown for the stateless Muslim minority, sources in the country say. The militarys 2017 scorched earth campaign, which was launched in response to attacks by Rohingya insurgents against police posts in Rakhine, has since been described by international rights groups and foreign governments as constituting acts of genocide and crimes against humanity. Wednesday marked the fourth anniversary of the beginning of the 2017 attacks. The suffering of the Rohingya is now being recognized across Myanmar, where the same brutal tactics used against the minority group have been turned on ethnic majority Bamar civilians by the military junta, which deposed the elected government on Feb. 1. On Tuesday, Myanmars shadow National Unity Government (NUG), formed in opposition to military rule, expressed sympathy for the Rohingya displaced as refugees and vowed to hold Myanmars military accountable for its crimes not only against the Rohingya but against other people in Myanmar. The military has committed atrocities everywhere, Aung Myo Min, the NUGs Minister for Human Rights, told Radio Free Asia (RFA). During the past four years, they have committed mass killings and acts of sexual violence against the Rohingya people, and this has led to hundreds of thousands of Rohingya civilians fleeing across the border to Bangladesh. On this four-year anniversary, we should not just mourn those losses. We should also provide justice and closure for the victims. And we should remember the lessons learned from the past so that this history will not repeat itself again in the future, he said. In June, the NUG unveiled plans to amend the countrys constitution to give citizenship to the Rohingya, who are not recognized as an official ethnic group in Myanmar and are often viewed as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Recognizing the Rohingya as citizens represents a sharp break from the policies deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi pursued toward the beleaguered group during her 2016-21 tenure. She refused to even say the word Rohingya in public and staunchly defended the Myanmar military against crimes against humanity charges in 2019 at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. A common enemy It is encouraging to see that many people in Myanmar have begun to see the truth, U.K.-based Rohingya activist Tun Khin said, recalling the many years of prejudice suffered in Myanmar by the Rohingya. We have all seen that the militarys brutalities are not limited to the Rohingya, Tun Khin said. He cited the killing by Myanmar security forces of at least 1,016 anti-junta protesters and other civilians, in a running tally maintained by the Bangkok-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP). They are now committing atrocities in cities like Yangon and Mandalay. It is now very clear that the military regime is our common enemy, and that we all have to eliminate the militarys power in order to end its rule, Tun Khin said. People in Myanmar have definitely grown in sympathy toward the Rohingya people, said Thin Zar Shoon Lae Yi, a youth activist and civil society leader in Myanmar, adding that many in the country were previously unaware of the suffering experienced by the Muslim minority group. Also, people were not free to talk about the Rohingya issue, and the military and its supporters directed a lot of hate speech and propaganda against them. As civil society groups, we tried to counter these things by providing fact checking and holding interfaith discussions, he said. The attitude of the NUG toward the Rohingya has also contributed to the shift in public opinion, Thin Zar Shoon Lae Yi said. People always look for moral leadership when it comes to controversial issues, he said. I feel positive about the [change in] peoples attitudes toward the Rohingya. We will become better people ourselves by having sympathy toward them. We want to go home Khin Maung, a Rohingya who is sheltering at a refugee camp in Bangladesh, told RFA that he wanted to go back to his former home in Myanmar. It has now been four years since the military drove us out, and we are still mourning for the people who died in the attacks, he said. And though we have lived for four years in the camps, were not happy here. We want to return to the country where we lived and grew up. We have no freedom or security in the camps, and were not receiving any education here. Its also hard for us to make a living. Sen. Jeff Merkley, a member of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, joined a bipartisan group of 19 senators on Wednesday who called on the Biden administration to issue a Rohingya genocide designation, calling the move long overdue. Failure to do so will only further embolden the perpetrators of ongoing abuses against the Burmese people, Merkey said in a statement. It will also undermine the administrations principled recognition of genocide in other parts of the world if such determinations are not applied consistently, he said. The Myanmar Service of Radio Free Asia produced this report. BenarNews is affiliated with RFA. Relatives of Sonia and Frank Anthony, a mother and son who were shot dead by an off-duty policeman, bid goodbye to them at their funeral in Paniqui, Philippines, Dec. 20, 2020. A Philippine court sentenced a police officer to life in prison on Thursday for shooting dead two neighbors during a heated argument last December. The double-homicide put a spotlight back on extrajudicial deaths in the Philippines, where human rights groups have criticized President Rodrigo Dutertes government for thousands of killings by police in the nations crackdown on illegal drugs. The Tarlac Regional Trial Court convicted the defendant, Jonel Nuezca, of two counts of murder for killing Sonia Gregoria, 52, and her son, Frank Anthony, 25. The incident shocked Filipinos after a video of the brazen shooting went viral on social media. Nuezca was off duty when he gunned down his two neighbors during the daytime. [A] shoot first, think later disposition occupies no decent place in a civilized society. Never has homicide or murder been a function of law enforcement. The public peace is never predicated on the cost of human life, Judge Stella Marie Gandia-Asuncion said in her 18-page decision. [J]udgment is hereby rendered finding the accused Jonel Nuezca y Mostales guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the crime of murder (two counts). The court also ordered Nuezca to pay nearly a million Philippines pesos (U.S. $20,000) to the heirs of the victims. The judge noted that the victims did not know during the span of commotion and altercation that the accused [had] a gun. The attack was so swift and sudden that the victims were not able to defend themselves. The shots fired were made in quick succession, Gandia-Asuncion said in the ruling. Nuezca shot the mother and son dead after a heated argument with them on Dec. 20 in Paniqui, a town in northern Tarlac province, according to details provided in court. The officer had confronted the duo about their use of the boga a PVC pipe that is typically used to make a loud noise during the Christmas holidays here, police said. The conversation turned into an argument over a long simmering property dispute. Nuezcas young daughter could also be heard shouting at their neighbors. Nuezca drew his handgun a 9-mm Beretta pistol and shot mother and son in the head, the police said. He walked away from the crime scene but surrendered to the authorities later in the day. The crime was filmed on a mobile phone and later uploaded on Facebook by a witness. In June, a Filipino police officer in plain clothes was filmed shooting a 52-year-old woman in the head over an argument. That officer has been fired and is in jail. And in November 2018, three policemen were convicted for the murder of a 17-year-old boy incorrectly identified as a drug pusher. The Philippines has seen its share of near-daily killings tied to the Duterte administrations violent drug war. Police figures put the number of suspected dealer and addicts slain at 8,000 so far. Rights groups claim that hundreds more have been killed, including those slain by pro-government vigilantes. For his part, Duterte has vowed to continue with his war on narcotics despite the wrongful deaths. He has said these killings could have been carried out by rival drug gangs who want to make it appear that vigilantes were to blame. Jeoffrey Maitem in Cotabato City, Philippines, contributed to this report. Bennington, VT (05201) Today Rain. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Rain. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Bennington, VT (05201) Today Rain likely. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Rain likely. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Features Editor Jennifer Huberdeau is The Eagle's features editor. Prior to The Eagle, she worked at The North Adams Transcript. She is a 2021 Rabkin Award Winner, 2020 New England First Amendment Institute Fellow and a 2010 BCBS Health Care Fellow. A Pittsfield resident's concerns about the odd habits of a crane that's arrived in the neighborhood have NatureWatch columnist Thom Smith wondering if the concerning behavior is more of a case of misidentification. Could the young crane really be a great blue heron? Business writer Tony Dobrowolski's main focus is on business reporting. He came to The Eagle in 1992 after previously working for newspapers in Connecticut and Montreal. He can be reached at tdobrowolski@berkshireeagle.com or 413-496-6224. Theory Wellness to pay nearly $300,000 for failing to pay workers proper wages 282 employees are owed hundreds of thousands of dollars, according to investigation by Attorney General's office Pittsfield officials expect to receive an additional $4 million in federal pandemic money, bringing the total to over $40 million. Residents want the city use some of the money for affordable and accessible housing opportunities, mental health services and better supports for families with "at-risk" children or youths. Community News Editor / Librarian Jeannie Maschino is community news editor and librarian for The Berkshire Eagle. She has worked for the newspaper in various capacities since 1982 and joined the newsroom in 1989. U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on Tuesday, Aug. 24. Missy Elliott's iconic sound and legendary looks will go down in history, but it was a rough start when the artist first came on the scene. The 50-year-old who is most known for her classic hits like "Work It," "Get Ur Freak On," and "The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly), spoke about during an interview with Doja Cat, published Tuesday (Aug. 24) in Interview magazine, not fitting into the cookie-cutter mold as in artist. Sometimes you gotta take a chance. I never felt like I fit in, period. I don't think there was a lane for the music that we did, Elliott said, responding to Dojas comment that she had really funky and weird songs in the works. The only reason they found a lane is because I was rapping over the tracks. But at first, I don't think people understood the music. RELATED: Missy Elliott Paved the Way For Every Brilliant Music Video This Year The four-time Grammy-winning artist also gave advice and some words of wisdom to new artists who are up and coming in the music industry. One thing I always say to people is, coming into this industry, we're just doing what we love to do, and nobody tells us about the ups and downs, Elliott said. We think we're about to be famous, we're about to get mad bread, and that's it. It's a whole lot that comes with this, and a lot of people don't come in prepared, and that's why they go through anxiety and depression. Missy Elliott, the evolutionary performer, and producer, hailing from Virginia, has stood the test of time with her one-of-a-kind music. Frequently collaborating with Timbaland, the pair have worked with Aaliyah, Tweet, Lil' Kim, and others. In 2019, Elliott was presented with the MTV Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award. New York state senator Brian Benjamin is slated to become the next lieutenant governor, according to The New York Times. The 44-year-old Manhattan representative, originally from Harlem, would be the second Black man to hold the position, joining the administration led by the first woman to serve in the Empire States top position. The first Black man in the role was David Paterson, who also served as the 55th governor from 2008 to 2010. Gov. Kathy Hochul became the first woman governor after Andrew Cuomo resigned earlier this month. RELATED: New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo Drops N-Word During Live Radio Interview A 165-page report released after a five-month investigation into Cuomos actions outlined what Attorney General Letitia James called violations of both federal and state law. The findings by prosecutors include allegations of unwanted and nonconsensual touching and sexual comments by Cuomo. Since February, at least seven women have come forward and recounted unwelcome interactions with the governor, including several former aides. Cuomo was also facing impeachment, and if convicted, lawmakers could have barred him from ever running again for statewide office. By resigning, he preserved the ability to run. Its unclear how the Assembly will proceed on impeachment. On Aug. 10, Hochul tweeted that Cuomos resignation was the right thing to do. News WCPS cuts quarantines with mask mandate in less than two weeks Aaron Mudd / AARON MUDD /amudd@bgdailynews.com Warren County Public Schools Superintendent Rob Clayton addresses reporters Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021, to announce a sudden drop in the districts quarantine numbers after implementing a mask mandate. Less than two weeks after Warren County Public Schools implemented universal masking in its schools, student quarantines have dropped to 834 from more than 1,700, Superintendent Rob Clayton told local media Tuesday. As many as 100 district staff members are currently quarantining and monitoring for symptoms after exposure to COVID-19. Speaking during a news conference at the districts central office, Clayton said none of those staff members were exposed due to school contacts. Warren County Public Schools opted to start the school year with masks as a recommendation rather than a requirement. During the first few days of the school year, quarantines ballooned to 700 and then to more than 1,700 students. That prompted Clayton to implement a mask mandate in the districts schools, which was then superseded by Gov. Andy Beshears own mask mandate Aug. 10. Since the mask mandate was required 10 days ago, weve seen our quarantines drop by 50%, Clayton said. Clayton said the district is also seeing a drop in COVID-19 cases among students, which on Tuesday totaled at least 248 cases, according to the districts online dashboard. At least 25 district employees have tested positive for COVID-19. Because of reduced risk of exposure, Kentucky Department for Public Health guidance exempts students from quarantining if students who were at least 3 feet away from an infected student (and) if both students were engaged in consistent and correct use of masks and other K-12 prevention strategies were in place. Still, when asked by a reporter about whether the district will report student and staff quarantines via its online dashboard, Clayton said WCPS will continue not to do so. We do not publicly disclose the quarantine numbers on our dashboard, Clayton said. The primary reason is because we feel like it creates some confusion. We dont want to incite fear. We dont want to increase the anxiety thats already there. During a news conference last week, Beshear said there is a duty to do that. ... If you have a lot of COVID in your schools, please be transparent. In 18 months, Ive yet to have any individual tell me what conclusion, what judgment, you can draw based on the number of quarantines in an organization, Clayton said last week, responding to the governors comments. School districts arent currently required to report quarantines, but theres nothing stopping them from doing so. Other school districts in the region, such as the Bowling Green Independent School District, make their quarantine totals available on the districts online dashboard. As of Monday, BGISD had 208 quarantines between school or household close contacts. It reported 82 active student COVID-19 cases and 13 active employee cases. Asked by the Daily News if the district will require students and staff to get the coronavirus vaccine after it won full Food and Drug Administration approval on Monday, Clayton said the districts leadership has not had those conversations. Weve not entertained any discussions about requiring the vaccine, Clayton said. He added that about 60% of the school districts staff are vaccinated. Asked by a reporter at the news conference if there is a particular threshold the district would have to cross before moving to virtual instruction, Clayton pointed to factors like staff availability, local hospital capacity and other local conditions. Staff in the district have been pushed to the brink, Clayton said. The district has had trouble finding bus drivers to fill vacancies amid the pandemic, even resorting to offering sign-on bonuses to entice new drivers. Call ahead to confirm events. Due to COVID-19, many events have been canceled but hosting organizations might not have updated their entries. Email Blast Success! An email has been sent to with a link to confirm list signup. Error! There was an error processing your request. Daily News Headlines & Events Email Blast Would you like to receive a digest of each day's headlines & events from The Daily News by email? Signup today! The Amplifier Headlines & Events Email Blast Would you like to receive a weekly digest of headlines & events from The Amplifier by email? Signup today! Daily News Hosted Events The Daily News is a proud host of community enrichment events. Join our Daily News Events mailing list to learn about the next event we are planning. Sign up now. Manage your lists Spearfish, SD (57783) Today Cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low around 60F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low around 60F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph. A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones (Proverbs 14:30). I heard a joke recently about two store owners who were bitter rivals. Their stores were directly across the street from one another, and they spent their days sitting in the doorway, keeping track of whose store had the most customers. If one got a customer, he would smile in triumph at the other. One night an angel appeared to one of the store owners and said, God has sent me to teach you a lesson. He will give you anything you ask for, but I want you to know that whatever you get, your rival will get twice as much. Would you like wealth? Ask what you will, but he will get twice as much. Do you want a long and happy life? It is yours, but he will live twice as long. You can be famous, your children can be famous, whatever you desire! But whatever it is, he will get twice as much. The man frowned, thought for a moment, and said, All right, make me blind in one eye. Whether its the wicked queen envying the beauty of Snow White, King Saul envying the popularity of David, or our children envying their friends new bike, we all can fall into the trap of envy. Its the subtle whisper...why you and not me? Its a feeling of sadness that comes over your heart because of another's success, and its feeling glad over their failure. Envy is ugly and completely unchristian. It's no wonder Shakespeare called envy the green-eyed monster! We find envy everywhere and it affects us all. Envy can rise between friends, over something as trivial as the size of a flashy new engagement ring. Or maybe spouse envy Your husband did what!? He fixed the stove, he mowed the grass, he took the garbage out without being asked!? Wow, my husband never does any of those things! And of course, there is job envy, like when people have regular 9-to-5 jobs, with weekends off to go boating on the lake or to relax by the pool...makes me sick... Oh, did I let that slip out? Photo credit: Getty Images/CarlosDavid.org A suicide bombing outside of the Kabul airport has left 13 U.S. service members injured and at least 169 civilians dead as Afghanistan continues to descend into chaos following President Biden's withdrawal decision. According to the Associated Press, officials are still trying to determine the number of casualties in what the Pentagon described as a "complex attack" that included multiple explosions. U.S. officials said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing operations. https://t.co/iRwtbGQhq8 The Associated Press (@AP) August 26, 2021 We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update. John Kirby (@PentagonPresSec) August 26, 2021 Bill weighed in on the situation on Twitter... As predicted, the Jihadists are trying to kill as many civilians as possible in Afghanistan. Bombing at Kabul Airport today. President Biden is severely damaged because of this. Bill O'Reilly (@BillOReilly) August 26, 2021 Four U.S. Marines were among those killed in the explosions at Kabul airport, and three were wounded, the U.S. ambassador told staff, an official said https://t.co/ntFB0m9iDQ The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) August 26, 2021 At least 10 US service members have been killed outside the airport in Kabul from US officials according to our Pentagon team. Bret Baier (@BretBaier) August 26, 2021 Indonesia, the Fourth largest country in the world severely underserved in cancer care Leader in precision radiation medicine, Stockholm-based Elekta announced that it has established a permanent legal entity in Indonesia's capital, Jakarta in order to address the unmet need for high-quality, modern cancer care. Radiation therapy is a critical component in treating cancer and is considered necessary in the treatment of over half of all cancer patients. However, according to GLOBOCAN, more than 15,000 linear accelerators are required globally to close the gap between countries with sufficient cancer resources and those without. Indonesia, for example, has fewer than 80 active devices serving a population of almost 275 million inhabitants. Shaun Seery, Elekta's Senior Vice President Asia Pacific, says, "Indonesia is a highly underserved market when it comes to radiation therapy. Our ambition is to close the gap through organic growth and establish a presence where we will make an impact. This direct presence will allow us to support customers and ensure they can offer their patients access to the best cancer care available." Elekta, the market leader in Indonesia, aims to provide customers with enhanced service, support, and order fulfilment, as well as access to the latest education and training. The study involved over 140,000 patients in 116 countries A study led by the University of Birmingham and Edinburgh experts has been awarded the Guinness World Records title for the worlds largest scientific collaboration - involving over 140,000 patients in 116 countries. The record for Most authors on a single peer-reviewed academic paper is now held by the Universities of Birmingham and Edinburgh after 15,025 scientists around the globe contributed to major research into the impact of COVID-19 on surgical patients. Funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), the researchers concluded that patients waiting for elective surgery should be treated as a vulnerable group and access COVID-19 vaccines ahead of the general population potentially helping to avoid thousands of post-operative deaths linked to the virus. This could be particularly important for Low- and Middle-income Countries (LMICs) where access to vaccination remains limited and mitigation measures such as nasal swab screening and COVID-free surgical pathways to reduce the risk of virus-related complications are not available for many patients. Overall, the scientists estimated that global prioritisation of pre-operative vaccination for elective patients could prevent an additional 58,687 COVID-19-related deaths in one year. The COVIDSurg Collaborative international team of researchers published its findings in BJS, Europes leading surgical journal, after studying data from 1,667 hospitals in countries including Australia, Brazil, China, India, UAE, UK and USA. The report also highlights the gap in diagnostic services in India, particularly in rural India Indian vaccine manufacturers face a crucial shortage of equipment including small- and large-scale bioreactors and fermenters, according to Infomerics report on Pharma Industry: Trends and Prospects. The report reveals that the steep 50 per cent rise in the cost of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) is pinching the industry hard and raises doubts on the availability of drugs and could lead to shortages, particularly of those that are key in COVID therapy. While nearly 70 per cent of the countrys APIs are imported from China, the dependence rises to 90 per cent for certain life-saving antibiotics like cephalosporins, azithromycin and penicillin. Since these medicines are under price control, companies are forced to absorb the higher cost, raising questions about their viability. In this scenario, over time, certain medicines could disappear from retail shelves. The report also highlights the gap in diagnostic services in India, particularly in rural India. This led to a scramble to urban areas for healthcare with attendant implications for loss of wages and the high cost of travel, testing and treatment. It makes a strong pitch for digital technology, which can be a catalytic element of the transformation of the healthcare scenario in India. The success stories in diverse parts of India, viz., Rajasthan, Arunachal Pradesh, Telangana, Kerala, Haryana, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand, and Maharashtra need to be replicated at the wider national level to bring about a perceptible improvement in the rural healthcare system. The report mention further states that given the state of the rural healthcare system in the country and the meagre expenditure on health earmarked in the Union Budget (the overall spending on health varied from 1.3 per cent of the GDP in 2010-11 to 1.5 per cent and 1.8 per cent of the GDP RE for 2019-20 and BE for 2020-21, respectively), there are strong and compelling reasons for enhancing the expenditure on the healthcare system in India. The report highlights some catalytic initiatives of the government including the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for the promotion of domestic manufacturing of critical key starting materials (KSMs)/and Drug Intermediates and APIs, and the JanaushadhiPariyojana to make available quality medicines consumables and surgical items at affordable prices for all and reduce out of pocket expenditure of consumers/patients. The report is optimistic about the future of the sector. Despite being wrecked by COVID, the pharma industry grew 37 per cent year-on-year and 15 per cent sequentially in Q1FY22. The growth was driven by sales of COVID treatment drugs and other drugs. The cost of manufacturing in India is approximately 33 per cent lower than that of the US. Therefore, the industry can benefit from these attributes and accordingly scale up production, productivity and efficiency. But the realisation of this potential necessitates harnessing economies of scale to move to a newer and higher orbit. It also recommended that the industry explore new and innovative options to generate and sustain new revenue streams. The increased demand for healthcare and insurance, for example, opens new avenues for investment, particularly in areas like chronic therapies for diseases such as cardiovascular, anti-diabetes, anti-depressants and anti-cancer treatment. H.E.A.L has already undertaken relief projects worth Rs. 55 Crore in partnership with various corporates Round Table India (RTI), a service organisation, has launched Project H.E.A.L (Healthcare Enhancement for Active Living) with the aim to facilitate the improvement of medical infrastructure across the country. At launch, H.E.A.L has already undertaken relief projects worth Rs 55 Crore in partnership with various corporates. Project H.E.A.L entails movable or permanent infrastructure intervention such as building augmentation/repairs, creation of special wards, toilets, donation of medical equipment like ventilators, COVID-19 vaccine refrigerators, oxygen line systems, oxygen concentrators, ambulances and hospital cots. Donations worth Rs 12 crore have been made by members to facilitate and improve medical facilities across the country. Some projects which have been initiated under Project H.E.A.L include: This past Women's Month we've once again been reminded just how much society as a whole needs to correct the many injustices women continue to endure, just because of their gender. Josephine Buys In your own words, who is the woman, Josephine Buys? Tell us about some of your career highlights. What led you to become CEO of the PRC and what do you want to achieve in your position? Tell us more about your vision for collaborative media research. What advice can you give women in media and marketing? Who are your female role models and how have they helped shape the person you are today? What has been your biggest triumph and perhaps, regret? Is there something you think people would be surprised to learn about you? You have a passion for reading and the written word. Why is it so important to you? One way we can do this is to profile successful women who excel at what they do so they can be held up as beacons of light and role models to others. To give women the hope that, whatever their personal circumstances, they too can navigate the obstacles they face and claim their rightful place in their chosen field.The South African Publisher Research Council (PRC) is headed up by a woman who has the vision, tenacity and drives to succeed in a fractured world. Interviewed by Kim Browne, this is her story...I was made in Ireland, born in London, came to South Africa for a year when I turned 21 and never left! I am optimistic, punctual, forthright, dedicated, a mentor, a mentee, a slow cyclist and a logophile.I joined my first publishing house, Avonwold on Baker Street in Rosebank, selling classified ads in a building and decor directory. This was my first experience of what would become my career fix: Media pioneering, in this case, launching new titles.From national sales manager at the launch of GQ South Africa, I careered up to advertising sales director of FHM during the peak of its highest circulations and ad revenues, before leaving for Cape Town to launch the highly accoladed Property Magazine.During my early 30s, a career diversion followed as I consulted to SMMEs on growing their businesses online, which sealed my passion for developing brands in the digital space. I was the founding CEO and produced the Bookmark Awards for IAB SA before my current role as CEO of the PRC; returning to the publishers I have long served throughout my career, as they navigate their way around audiences shifting online and grapple with how to monetise this migration.To quote the esteemed Britta Reid, Media buyers and sellers need an agreed currency with which to trade: The [South African] industry needs to work towards one solution that meets the needs of both the marketing and media fraternities, to facilitate informed investment decision-making.To that end, I firmly agree with Reid, its time to move from media defined by type (print, TV, radio, online) to media consumption (reading, viewing, listening and browsing) and for our sector to come together and unanimously agree to a future-ready solution to avoid a dark future for the audience measurement.Unlocking cross-media, audience-centric insights to enable optimum performance of each medium to fuel content and advertising decisions and deliver cost efficiencies, can only be done (to the best of our ability) if we, as an industry sector, come together and collaborate in the creation of a cross-media audience measurement solution.During the recent PRC #WomenInJournalism campaign recognising the role of female journalists as custodians of truth in our democracy, I noticed a common thread in all their answers to a similar question; what would they tell their younger selves? It was overwhelmingly to find courage. This resonates with me, so I would say: Have courage. In your decisions, your actions and yourself.My mother and her best friend, my godmother Josephine. I admire how they teamed up to raise an unplanned baby while building a life in a new city in another country while qualifying as nurses.Former Huffington Post editor-in-chief Ariana Huffington. From founding Huffington Post in 2005 to AOLs acquisition in 2011, which became the first commercially run US digital media company to win a Pulitzer Prize.Im grateful to my first female role model in my career, who gave me my first senior executive position with what felt like an immense amount of responsibility. I had, what I now know to be, imposter syndrome. In hindsight, I think she knew very well that the shoes shed offered me were big to fill (and in a sense, perhaps took a gamble on me), but she also believed in me (before I fully believed in myself) and was an inspiring example of the kind of boss (lady) I wanted to be. She was a mentor before I knew I wanted to be one.Producing and hosting the IABs Digital Summit and Bookmark Awards 2015-18, to serve the industry that has given me my career, was one of my greatest privileges and gave me a sense of triumph. I dont have any regrets concerning my career, every door that opened or closed was part of the journey to where I am today.Im told Im pretty good at accentsAccess to knowledge, education, jobs, careers and the digital economy starts with reading and writing. Its essential for our continents burgeoning youth, to ensure every child can read for meaning. **This article was originally published on the Everlytic blog on 20 August 2021 Sharon Mukwevho Recommend content or products by audience segments. Tailor promotions and messages by audience segments. Trigger emails based on shopper/visitor behaviours. GIFs and hover-over imagery; Interactive product carousels and images; Scrolling images to showcase services or offerings; Design-mode options (light or dark mode); Gamification elements, like rewards, quizzes, and prize draws. Communication trends keep changing as technology advances. One thing that remains constant is that bulk communication via SMS and email campaigns is consistently effective. In this post, well go through some trends and bulk communication tips that will help you reach your SMS and email marketing goals.To stay on top of your game as a marketer, you need to constantly monitor the latest email marketing trends and projections. From user-generated content to interactive emails, here are some top trends that have been taking over inboxes this year.User-generated content is free (thats the best part) and can be used in your emails. Think about including customer testimonials, poll results, or even photos of your customers enjoying your products or services in your emails to boost trust and showcase social proof.Also, remember to include a solid call to action (CTA). A study found that emails with a single call-to-action increased clicks by 371%! Use a CTA in your emails or on social media to direct users to a survey or poll to gather data or motivate them to submit testimonials and reviews.Personalisation starts with the basics, like the recipients first name and can progress to more detailed personal data, like location, or product/service acquired. Hyper-personalisation , on the other hand, is more than just personalisation of certain elements of a campaign. It uses a combination of behavioural and real-time data from several channels for more customised marketing. This makes it possible for tailored products, services, and ads to be sent to specific audiences. Heres how you can make hyper-personalisation work for you:As technology advances, interactive content is growing more and more popular. It increases engagement and isnt hard to incorporate into your email campaigns. There are many ways you can add interactiveness into your emails, including:Interactive emails can also be used as part of personalisation to show products based on gender, age, or to send people messages that are unique to them.In todays world, youre probably more concerned about your data privacy than ever before. To get and increase the trust and loyalty of your email recipients, you must guarantee POPIA compliance For example, use email notifications to let customers know of any upcoming privacy changes and focus on how youre protecting their information. This works in your favour because it will help improve your companys ethics.Give subscribers the option to unsubscribe from your emailing lists too. This is a standard rule across data privacy laws and complying to it will not only reduce your chances of being reported to the authorities, but itll help you focus on people who are genuinely interested in what you have to offer.The power of SMS marketingThe use of SMS (aka text messaging) has increased across industries and continues to grow thanks to its efficiency. Its a personal marketing channel and results in about 90% of messages being read within the first three minutes of delivery.With the high rate of mobile use internationally, SMS marketing is a very effective form of direct marketing. As a result, many banks, ecommerce stores, news outlets, and local communities are using SMS as part of their transactional strategies.You can use transactional SMS messages in response to customer actions to support them through the customer journey. Common transactional SMSs include opt-in welcome messages, shipping updates, order confirmations, and one-time pins.Text messaging and email can work hand in hand, strengthening both marketing efforts. Some email marketing services even have SMS-to-Email functionality that combines the power of email with the reach of SMS.This functionality allows you to send a shortened link to an online version of an email via SMS, tracking which contacts read them. For example, if you send out an email, you can trigger an SMS two days later to people who didnt open the initial email.SMS and email integration ideasConsumers arent one-dimensional. Using both email and SMS in your marketing will improve your customer engagement, boost retention, and increase touchpoints for data collection. Here are three examples of how the two can be integrated successfully:Bottom line? Bulk communication works efficiently and effectively when the right marketing techniques are used. Keep up with SMS and email trends and best practices to help you reach your marketing goals. Armed with a BSc Civil Engineering and BCom (Hons) in Financial Analysis and Portfolio Management from the University of Cape Town, Roxanne Wylie worked as a structural engineer for four years before moving to OIM Consulting as a management consultant. Roxanne Wylie, management consultant at OIM Consulting Why did you choose this career path? Describe a typical work day What do you love most about your job? What is the best advice anyone has given you? What advice would you give your younger self? Tell us some of the buzzwords floating around your industry currently? How do you achieve a work/life balance? What is the most valuable lesson you have learnt? I enjoy solving problems and seeing sustainable change. The projects we work on have quick turnaround times while having a significant long-term impact on the companies and the people we work with.There isnt one! Depending on the project and the phase the project is in, the daily requirements change. Generally, it would be going through to the client and heading out to which ever department Im working with that day. Once there I interact with the people, ask questions, assess progress, and see what needs to be done. Often, I sit in on meetings, observe and ensure they are running effectively.I enjoy the fact that every project is different. Every mine and every person I work with requires something else. I like figuring out ways to ensure everyone gets what they need. Its always a challenge starting a new project, and needing to adapt and figure out the new environment, but I thrive on building that trust with the client and working together to see their vision turn into reality.If you want it, work for it.Direction is more important than speed.Remote work, new normal, turnaround time, sustainabilityIm not so sure I have achieved it, but when I get close it usually involves me planning well and keeping track of work and personal things on the same calendar. By adding 5pm: go for a run, so I dont realise it when its already dark outside. this also helps me (where possible) to not over commit to delivering something first thing the next morning.People are more resilient than you think, they can handle hearing the word no. "There is no force more powerful than a woman determined to rise" - W.E.B. Dubois - Amy Benn the Co-Lab lead, who is a young female leader striving to inspire other women to step into the Innovation and Tech Space; - Alusizo Tshakatshela, whose dedication and commitment to future skills has seen her grow and develop from Co-Lab intern to full time lab technician; - Thembeka Gumede, was a youth worker for a local NGO, iThemba Lethu and who was recently appointed as the KZN regional manager for Edunova, another NGO committed to build IT and digital skills through a female train the trainer model of learning to impact local high school learners. They use the co-working space and digital studio for working, training and workshops respectively. - Lethu Shandu is a DUT Alumni who is a robotics trainer and has done some training in the lab for students on Saturdays to build their digital literacy and future skills; - Amahle Nala a rising female entrepreneur fashionista who uses the Co-Lab machinery to cut and assemble the boxes needed for her clothing to be delivered to her customers; - Thando, is a local school girl who uses the laptops and workspace in the lab to do her homework in the afternoons to improve her school work, project research whilst building her IT skills and capabilities. Amy Benn Amahle Nala Edunova Team Thando and Alu Alusizo Above: The many faces of the women who benefit from the Innovation Co-Lab from Co-Lab lead, Amy Ben and entrepreneur Amahle Nala to the Edunova team and Innovate Durban lab technician Alusizo and school learner Thando! Womens Month is an intentional opportunity for all South Africans to celebrate the extraordinary achievements and contributions that women make to build and sustain our rainbow nation. This month (and every other month of the year for that matter) Innovate Durban honours a fundamental truth: that when women succeed, we all succeed.So as the month of August wraps up, Innovate Durban takes a moment to recognise the many women who had a fundamental impact in the communities and organisations they represent through the Innovation Co-Lab in Cato Manor, and they include:It is this dynamic diversity that inspires the female tribe to rise and rebuild the Co-Lab in Cato Manor, and invite other women in this community, corporates and industry to please support these efforts. For more information on how to partner now, please contact CEO Aurelia Albert on nabrud.etavonni@ailerua or Co-Lab Lead Amy Benn on nabrud.etavonni@yma to play your part in strengthening women in innovation, education and business! Democrats passed legislation Tuesday that would federalize Americas electoral system, giving President Joe Bidens Department of Justice (DOJ) significant control over election law. The House passed H.R. 4, the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2021. The bill passed 219-212, with Democrats strongly in favor of the bill and Republicans largely against the bill. Democrats named the bill after the late Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), a prominent civil rights activist. The legislation would radically transform Americas electoral system. The legislation would mandate that any state and its political subdivisions would have to obtain preclearance from the Department of Justice (DOJ) or the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia before making changes that might affect voting rights. A state and its political subdivision would be subject to preclearance for a ten-year period if: 15 or more voting rights violations occurred in the state during the previous 25 years; 10 or more violations occurred during the previous 25 years, at least one of which was committed by the state itself; or Three or more violations occurred during the previous 25 years, and the state administers the elections. A political subdivision as a separate unit shall also be subject to preclearance for a 10-year period if three or more voting rights violations occurred there during the previous 25 years. States must also notify the public of changes to voting practices. The legislation would also mandate that courts must consider the history of voting discrimination in the state or political subdivision. But these triggering events need not be bona fide violations of voting rights. As a practical matter, if leftwing groups were to file lawsuits against Democrat-controlled cities for ordinary election integrity safeguards and the city were to admit fault and settle instead of fight it in court, that surrender would count toward the tally triggering preclearance requirements for the entire state. House Republicans railed against the legislation: Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) said that the legislation should not fool Americans: HR. 4 is HR. 1 (2.0), don't be fooled. Cancels common-sense voter ID requirements Blocks states from updating voter rolls Allows for electioneering Federalizes America's elections Gives the DOJ power to veto state election law HR. 4 isn't for the people. Congressman Byron Donalds (@RepDonaldsPress) August 24, 2021 Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-AZ) said, H.R. 4 gives the Biden DOJ authority to designate a voter ID law as a voting rights violation or as evidence of voting discrimination. H.R. 4 is an unconstitutional way for the federal government to dictate elections and a way to weaken the vote of the American people! H.R. 4 gives the Biden DOJ authority to designate a voter ID law as a voting rights violation or as evidence of voting discrimination. H.R. 4 is an unconstitutional way for the federal government to dictate elections and a way to weaken the vote of the American people! Congresswoman Debbie Lesko (@RepDLesko) August 24, 2021 #HR4 is nothing more than another Pelosi power play to federalize our elections. This unconstitutional attack hampers states ability to conduct free and fair elections, eliminates commonsense voter ID requirements, and gives DC bureaucrats veto authority. Im voting NO, Rep. Drew Ferguson (R-GA), the Republican chief deputy whip, said. Sean Moran is a congressional reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @SeanMoran3. Apel na OSN: Proboha, pomozte! 26. 8. 2021 cas cteni 2 minuty Nargis Nehan, byvala minstryne afghanske vlady, v slzach zaprisaha OSN, aby zasahla do konfliktu v jeji zemi. Under the name of Taliban, under the name of Jihad, and the name of Isis, different countries are waging proxy war. Speaking to @jonsnowC4, Nargis Nehan, a former minister with the Afghan government tearfully implores the UN to intervene in the ongoing conflict in her country. pic.twitter.com/bakg29nmcc Channel 4 News (@Channel4News) August 26, 2021 0 1557 Nargis Nehan: Afghanistan je zeme, ktera je obeti nahradnich valek uz nekolik desitek let. A vidime, ze pod jmenem Taliban, pod jmenem dzihad, a pod jmenem Isis vedou ruzne zeme nahradni valky. A dnes jsem tak zdrcena, ze jim chci rict verejne, Stydte se, ze kvuli sve vlastni politicke strategii nam opakovane nicite zivot. Zabijite nase lidi a bezostysne vedete dal tuto nahradni valku. Musite s tim prestat. Vsichni vedi, co kdo pacha. Vsichni vedi, ze pod zasterkou techto nasilniku a teroristu vedou tuto valku staty. A oni to proste nechteji zastavit. Je to pro ne hanba.Moderator: Co muze svet udelat? Co chcete, aby svet udelal?Nargis Nehan: Mely by do toho vstoupit Spojene narody a mely by usporadat krizovou schuzi o Afghanistanu. Mely by jasne jmenovat ty zeme, ktere vedou v Afghanistanu nahradni valku. A mely by jim v tom bud zabranit, anebo je naprosto zablokovat a uvalit na ne financni sankce. Aby zastavili tuto katastrofu, ktera se odehrava v Afghanistanu.Moderator. Mate vubec nejakou nadeji, ze Spojene narody budou jednat? Zatim jsou desive zticha.Nargis Nehan: To je pro nas velkym zklamanim. Ze prisli a mysleli: Co je demokracie? Co jsou vseobecna lidska prava? Co jsou prava zen? Ale pak co je rovnost a co je spravedlnost? Ale dnes, kdyz jde o to, aby jednali, vidime, ze mlci, jak rikate, naprosto straslive mlci. A historie si to bude pamatovat. Historie to nezapomene. V roce 2002, kdyz prisli a intervenovali v Afghanistanu, nasim dojem bylo, ze vsichni dospeli k zaveru, ze Afghanistan jako cely narod straslive trpel a ze si zaslouzi uz oddech. Ale ted, po dvaceti letech vidime, ze ne, ze k tomu zaveru nedospeli. Namisto toho oni chteji, abychom pokracovali. Chteji vrazdit nase lidi. Chteji cekat a divat se a videt, co se deje. Tohle je trapas pro 21. stoleti. Pro cely svet. To, co se deje v Afghanistanu, a vy nedelate dost na to, abyste tomu zabranili. What's Included With a Digital Only subscription, you'll receive unlimited access to our website and e-edition. Our digital products are available 24/7 and are accessible anywhere, anytime. If you have any questions or need further assistance, please call our customer service team at 814-368-3173 or email nfinnerty@oleantimesherald.com. The head of the organization that represents 4,000 physicians in the province says his group is quite appreciative of the provinces decision to tighten public health restrictions. Advertisement Advertise With Us The head of the organization that represents 4,000 physicians in the province says his group is "quite appreciative" of the provinces decision to tighten public health restrictions. On July 28, Doctors Manitoba president Dr. Kristjan Thompson, an emergency room doctor, sent a letter to then health minister Heather Stefanson and chief public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin, which indicated Thompsons support for mandatory vaccinations in the health-care sector. He also outlined how such a policy could be achieved, he said. In the letter, he asked what would happen to individuals who have legitimate health reasons or those who choose not to get vaccinated, and, "what sort of protocols will physicians put in place to protect both themselves and their patients plus other colleagues they work with," Thompson said. "Doctors Manitoba have been advocating for a long time," Thompson said. "Weve been advocating for strong public health measures to ensure that patients in Manitoba are safe and to curtail the severity of the fourth wave." With Tuesdays announcement which ordered, among other things, mandatory face mask wearing indoors in public spaces and compulsory vaccinations for specific workers Thompson said Doctors Manitoba is supportive of "the governments action for vaccination in other sectors and compulsory mask-wearing." "Were quite appreciative and supported that decision and really the action we take today and tomorrow will dictate the severity of the fourth wave," he said. But he doesnt know what the fourth wave will look like. "The fourth wave is going to be, by and large, a wave of unvaccinated individuals. You see this in other jurisdictions. Its sort of the wave of the unvaccinated." Thompson echoed acting deputy chief public health officer Dr. Jazz Atwals words from Tuesdays press conference to discuss the modelling of the fourth wave. "We know from our local data, we know from national data with other provinces and international data the effectiveness of that vaccine to prevent those severe outcomes," Atwal said. "Some have said this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated right now, and I think there is a lot of evidence supporting the impact on unvaccinated individuals and severe outcomes because of COVID," Atwal said. "Even more concerning," Thompson said, "were seeing a lot of, especially in the U.S., more pediatric cases or younger patients. Obviously that is a concern, absolutely, and something we want to avoid at all costs." However, with an already stressed health-care system, Thompson acknowledges there is the possibility of sending patients to other provinces for health care. "That is certainly a risk. I hope in my heart of hearts that wont be the case. "That reality is a last resort, that I hope we dont have to utilize it again, but it is an option. I really hope capacity is being built and built upon," he said. "If we get to a point where we even have to talk about sending people out of province, thats already a sign were not prepared." However, Thompson is confident physicians are prepared for the next wave. "But we need the infrastructure. We need health-human resources in place." Nursing resources in Manitoba are strained, he said. "You could have all the ventilators and beds in the world, but if you dont have the nurses, physicians, the respiratory therapists, janitorial staff to staff these beds and operate those ventilators, it doesnt matter." But Thompson said his organization is pleased with the provinces decision on Tuesday. "Were glad of the outcome." "The bottom line is, the right decision has been made. Now its up to Manitobans to get vaccinated. To wear their masks and to follow the recommendations of public health officials. Physicians are going to be there for their patients. If they have any questions about getting vaccinated, if theyre hesitant, were really encouraging patients to call their doctors." kkielley@brandonsun.com A week after unveiling their vaccine policy for the upcoming fall semester, the Brandon University administration provided some more details about their approach on Thursday morning, this time with much stronger language. Advertisement Advertise With Us A week after unveiling their vaccine policy for the upcoming fall semester, the Brandon University administration provided some more details about their approach on Thursday morning, this time with much stronger language. According to a news release from BU, the school is now requiring all "faculty, staff, and students to provide either proof of full vaccination or proof of a recent negative COVID-19 test before they are able to come to campus." The release went on to state that staff and students must be fully immunized by no later than Oct. 31, falling in line with the provinces new public sector mandate that was announced earlier this week. "This is an interim administrative decision made in the interests of providing some clarity and fairness to students and faculty, as well as offering the safest possible educational experience for the fall term," Thursdays statement from BU reads. These details about vaccine requirements were noticeably absent from BUs Aug. 19 announcement, which strongly hinted at mandating vaccines for staff and students, but fell just short of stating it outright. However, the BU administration did admit on Aug. 19 that the development of their vaccine policy would be an evolving process throughout the remainder of the summer and into the fall, as they continued to consult with various members of their university community. "We continue important dialogue with employee, faculty, and student groups, as well as our Board of Governors, and will ensure that our final policy is reflective of this dialogue," Thursdays statement read. "Many questions remain, and we will continue to consult with our community as we draft our full vaccine policy, which will be completed as soon as possible." BU officials also reminded the public on Thursday morning that in-person classes for their fall term will be limited to 25 people or less, with all other courses taking place online. On top of that, all on-campus activity will be subject to a strict mask mandate, physical distancing regulations and enhanced sanitization measures. Members of Assiniboine Community College, Brandons other major post-secondary institution, also unveiled their vaccine policy on Aug. 19, stating that "this policy would generally require all students, staff, contractors and visitors to the campus to be vaccinated." However, ACC officials havent provided any further details about their vaccine mandate, including a timetable on when staff and students must be fully immunized, as of Thursday morning. Pick up a copy of Fridays edition of the Brandon Sun for more details on this story. kdarbyson@brandonsun.com Twitter:@KyleDarbyson The province announced COVID-19 vaccine mandates for front-line employees on Tuesday, but emergency services in Brandon have so far held off on mandating their own employees get the shot. Advertisement Advertise With Us The province announced COVID-19 vaccine mandates for front-line employees on Tuesday, but emergency services in Brandon have so far held off on mandating their own employees get the shot. In an email, Brandon Police Service Chief Wayne Balcaen said officers are not currently required to get the vaccine. "The Police Service has not contemplated the subject of mandatory vaccinations, at this time," he wrote. Similarly, Brandon Fire and Emergency Services Chief Scott McDonald said in an email the organization was still reviewing the provinces move for firefighter/paramedics. "At this time we are currently reviewing the information put forward in yesterdays announcement," he said. Provincial employees who work with vulnerable people will be required to be fully vaccinated for COVID-19 by Oct. 31 or be tested up to three times per week, Premier Brian Pallister said. "In previous waves, the lockdown, the intense public health restrictions were really our only tool," chief provincial public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin said. "Now we have a much better tool, and thats vaccination." The move is aimed at blunting a fourth wave of the virus, which is already underway in other parts of the country. The list of provincial employees includes doctors, nurses, teachers, educational support staff, correctional officers and other public servants who work in "high-risk" settings. Federal workers are also under a vaccine mandate. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced earlier in August federal public servants would be required to get the shot. Manitoba RCMP officers fall under the federal vaccine mandate but spokesperson Paul Manaigre said on Tuesday he did not have a specific timeline of when all officers would receive both doses. Manitoba Court of Queens Bench judges and their assistants will also be subject to a vaccine mandate, the Winnipeg Free Press reported on Wednesday. The provincial court and appeals court set their own rules for vaccination. dmay@brandonsun.com Twitter: @DrewMay_ Advertisement Advertise With Us It turns out Brandonites love their fairs. The Provincial Exhibition of Manitoba has so far raised nearly 70 per cent of its $350,000 fundraising goal for the year with its Love a Fair campaign, according to a press release. The Brandon-based organization launched the campaign in January 2021 after nearly all in-person events were shelved as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This included The Royal Manitoba Winter Fair, the Manitoba Summer Fair, Manitoba Ag Ex and more. Love a Fair is aimed at keeping the Provincial Exhibition of Manitoba afloat through fundraisers such as online auctions, drive-thru meals, selling meat packs, and the Your Name in Stone at the Dome fundraiser. Businesses in the community have contributed as well, such as Tim Hortons with the Love a Fair Donut campaign, Swiss Chalet and Harveys and De Nardi Fine Wines in Winnipeg. "Thank you to all our partners and members of the community for the support and encouragement over the last 18 months. We would not be standing where we are today if it werent for you," the press release reads. "While we are optimistic about being able to hold events in the near future, your ongoing support is crucial for organizations, like the Provincial Exhibition of Manitoba, to be able to pull through during this difficult time." Two events are scheduled for the fall: Midway Madness from Sept. 2-6 and Manitoba Ag Ex from Oct. 27-30. Midway Madness comes to Brandon every five years and is planned to feature 16 rides for teenagers and adults and 16 rides for younger children. Proof of full COVID-19 vaccination will be required for everyone over 12 years of age. The Brandon Sun Anyone looking to succeed Brian Pallister as leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Manitoba and premier of Manitoba will have to cough up a fair chunk of change to do so. Advertisement Advertise With Us Anyone looking to succeed Brian Pallister as leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Manitoba and premier of Manitoba will have to cough up a fair chunk of change to do so. The party announced the rules for the race to replace the retiring Pallister in a media release Tuesday morning including a $25,000 entry fee. Interested candidates will have to pay an entry fee of $25,000 and sign up at least 1,000 new or renewed party members in order to qualify. By comparison, leadership candidates looking to replace former federal Conservative leader Andrew Scheer last year had to pay a fee of $200,000 plus a $100,000 refundable compliance deposit to join the race. Potential candidates have until Sept. 15 to secure their nomination, and potential voters have until Sept. 30 to join the party and receive a mail-in ballot. On Oct. 30, votes will be counted and a new leader declared. Every member of the party will get a single vote for the next leader. "Executive council expressed its gratitude to Brian Pallister for his contributions as our leader for the last nine years," PC leadership election committee chair George Orle stated in the release. "They wish to conduct the election quickly and in a fair and open manner so that we can focus on leading Manitobas pandemic recovery," Pallister announced his intention to leave politics during a media availability in Brandon on Aug. 10. So far, only former health minister Heather Stefanson is the only candidate to step forward, with endorsements from 24 of her caucus colleagues. The Winnipeg Free Press reported on Tuesday that Rossmere Progressive Conservative MLA Andrew Micklefield has been stripped of his duties as government whip for the duration of the leadership campaign after he endorsed Stefansons leadership bid last week. In the meantime, Midland MLA Blaine Pedersen will fulfil those duties. Another MLA touted as a potential candidate, Families Minister Rochelle Squires, announced in a Facebook post Tuesday that she would not be running. "I became the MLA for Riel, and subsequently a minister of the Crown, with intention of serving my community, listening to the people, and being a voice for those without a platform," Squires wrote. "Collectively, I feel weve lost our way, and for my part in that, I am deeply sorry. My desire is to find a way back to being the leader I initially set out to be. "My riding and community deserve an MLA focused on steering us through this fourth wave of the pandemic, and then helping the families and businesses rebuild and regain things lost during this difficult time." Finance Minister Scott Fielding had expressed interest in running after Pallisters retirement announcement, but The Canadian Press reported on Tuesday that he would not run and is backing Stefanson for the job. cslark@brandonsun.com Twitter: @ColinSlark The province still hasnt unveiled a plan to fill the health-care gap impacting international students in post-secondary education, based on comments chief provincial public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin made during Tuesdays COVID-19 news conference. Advertisement Advertise With Us The province still hasnt unveiled a plan to fill the health-care gap impacting international students in post-secondary education, based on comments chief provincial public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin made during Tuesdays COVID-19 news conference. When asked if the Manitoba government would give international students access to immunization cards, which will be required to access certain services during the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, Roussin provided a single-sentence response. FILE University of Manitoba international student Callum Morrison, shown with his dog Bobby outside of his Altona home in late June, says he is fed up with the provinces empty words when it comes to vaccination cards, especially since the province launched the program in early June. "I think theres been work all along on that, so were going to continue to try to work out those types of details," he said. Roussins response on Tuesday mirrors the short statement he made about the issue on July 5, where he mentioned that "I dont have any specifics to share or an exact date on when we can announce anything, but there will be something upcoming." However, University of Manitoba international student Callum Morrison told the Sun that he is fed up with the provinces empty words when it comes to this topic, especially since the province launched its immunization card program in early June. "I think thats complete nonsense, because its been over two and a half months now," Morrison told the Sun on Wednesday. "At this point, its will. Theres no political will to give it to international students." Morrison also spoke to the Sun about this issue in early July, pointing out that international students alongside groups such as foreign workers and military personnel cannot access these immunization cards due to the fact that they do not qualify for a Manitoba health card in the first place. Even though international students can try to use their official vaccination record in lieu of an immunization card, Morrison is worried these unusual documents wont be accepted as proof of full immunization across the board. "I guarantee you this will be a problem because I already have problems accessing health care without a Manitoba health card," Morrison said in July. Now that the fall semester is only a couple weeks away, Morrison is getting worried that the province wont resolve this discrepancy in time, with no meaningful updates having been given throughout the summer. "Im just getting frustrated when they keep giving this response," he said. "You cant say youre working on it when youre clearly not working on it." This health-care gap has been an ongoing issue since mid-2018, when the Progressive Conservative government repealed a clause in the Manitoba Health Services Insurances Act that gave college and university students from abroad access to universal health care. Even though the PCs will install a new leader this coming fall, Morrison remains skeptical this change in management will move the needle on this issue, especially since the current front-runner is former health minister Heather Stefanson. But the U of M student, originally from Scotland, is comforted by the fact that many Manitoba universities seem to be taking the needs of international students much more seriously in the lead-up to the fall semester. Brandon University administration, for example, made a point of mentioning international students in a recent statement about their new vaccine policy, promising that these individuals will be accommodated if they didnt have the opportunity to get vaccinated before the beginning of the fall semester. While the finer details of BUs vaccine policy havent been finalized yet, Brandon University Students Union president Olufunke Adeleye, who is an international student herself, is confident that the administration will act in good faith on this front. "Weve been in constant communication with the administration," she said. "They invited us into their faculty council meetings, so theres definitely been opportunities to give our opinions about it and they want to work with us." But in terms of working with members of the province, representatives from the Canadian Federation of Students-Manitoba believe that a different approach is required, especially if they want to restore consistent health-care access for everyone. Earlier this month, CFS-Manitoba launched a new online tool designed to help people call the health ministers office directly, with a pre-loaded script designed to help the caller rebut any talking points that are thrown at them about denying health cards to international students. CFS chairperson Alexandra Koslock told the Sun that this campaign is only the beginning, since the organization plans to apply more pressure and attack this issue on multiple fronts throughout the 2021-22 academic year. "Thats means doing work locally in the next year," she said. "We also want to work more broadly with folks in other jurisdictions across the country to really bring attention to the importance of health-care as a human right across Canada." Anyone wanting to utilize CFS-Manitobas new call tool can do so by visiting cfsmb.ca/campaigns/healthcareforall-call-the-minister. kdarbyson@brandonsun.com Twitter:@KyleDarbyson During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Manitobans were directed to stay at home and often to self-isolate. But what if they had nowhere to go? Advertisement Advertise With Us During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Manitobans were directed to stay at home and often to self-isolate. But what if they had nowhere to go? Many community resources were inaccessible, so vulnerable people were left in a desperate situation. A new program called "Ask Auntie" was created as a response to the pandemic, and the immediate need to support and advocate for Brandons vulnerable, precariously housed and Indigenous populations. "For stay-at-home orders ... many of our clients that we engage with were left out of the loop in that decision making, so, unfortunately, it was hard for them to even gain shelter during the pandemic," said Teague Luhr, Ask Auntie assistant. The Ask Auntie program was developed at the Brandon Neighbourhood Renewal Corporation. In its current capacity, the program officially launched in May, Luhr said, "however weve been doing this work from the corner of our desk at the BNRC offices for years now." He added, "Its nice to finally have funding secured and have some concrete structure so that we can do this full time." Funding is provided through the federal governments Reaching Home program, through the Indigenous Homelessness funding stream. Ask Auntie developed partnerships within the community to provide direct support to vulnerable people, as well as provide alternative accommodation for isolation. "At the peak of COVID-19 in its first wave, we rapidly re-housed about 50 clients or so just to get them off of the streets and into good, safe shelter." Temporary shelter was provided at the Redwood Inn, for individuals without shelter who needed to self-isolate. "The reason why we provided those efforts was due to just a lack of systems to provide that basic type of protection for our clients," Luhr said. "So we saw an obligation to do it, and we organized and mobilized those efforts on our own." Ask Auntie based their model off of an existing program in Toronto; a call centre for the vulnerable population. The Toronto program is a pathfinding resource, but without direct outreach or advocacy. "We utilized that model, but we worked it into a framework where we could still provide that one-on-one engagement," Luhr said. As the program is Indigenous-focused and Indigenous-led, Luhr said they wanted to highlight the important role of an auntie. An auntie provides general support, unconditional care and wisdom. "So we thought the role of an auntie was the perfect role to summarize what our efforts would be." Florence Halcrow, Ask Auntie co-ordinator, said there are a lot of vulnerable people in the community, and the pandemic only exacerbated their troubles. "They were finding it hard to get resources especially with everything shut down," she said. "People are having a lot of mental health issues throughout this, because theres no one to talk to, and a lot of people, a lot of the homeless population, the vulnerable population, are having a really rough time." Another hurdle for many of their clients was a lack of basic necessities, including identification. "What we noticed was for these clients, without ID, they were almost systemically barred from gaining access to government assistance or other programs they required," Luhr said. The program began efforts to help clients get these important documents, such as birth certificates, MPI IDs and health cards. "They needed one ID to get the other, to start a bank account, or get a job, or apply for (Employment and Income Assistance)," Halcrow said. "People are so happy when they get their IDs, they feel like theyre someone." Ask Auntie acts as a pathfinding resource, after assessing needs. Clients are connected with community supports, thanks to many partnerships the program has with various offices in the community. The work is focused around trauma-informed, harm-reduction, and Indigenous perspectives. Individual support plans are provided, for a wide array of service needs. "With lived-experienced workers who know many of the challenges that individuals and families face, especially when navigating systems traditionally colonial in nature," states the programs mandate. "We prioritize advocacy and community collaboration to best meet the needs of those we serve." One client by the name of Allen said the Ask Auntie program was a life-saver. "If it werent for them I might have met my maker," he said. "They made me survive." During the first wave of the pandemic, Allen was homeless and wound up in the hospital with pneumonia. Ask Auntie was able to help him find resources and housing, and is turning things around. Ask Auntie recently secured partnerships with the United Way of Brandon and District, the Sexuality Education Resource Centre and the Manitoba Metis Federation to add an outreach position. Over the summer months, they have hosted different programming and events, with many taking place at Princess Park. Beading workshops, pop-up vaccine clinic and community barbecues to name a few. On Aug. 27 they are hosting Art Day in the Park from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in Princess Park. Looking to the future, Luhr said their hope is to build bridges between already established and existing agencies and the Indigenous community. "Weve seen a lot of success in our collaborative networking and engagement and we just want to see that collaboration carry on forward," he said. "Were always open to new partnerships and were really, really set on embodying the premises of truth and reconciliation." Agencies such as 7th Street Health Access Centre and Westman Mobilization Hub can refer clients to Ask Auntie. Organizers also encourage people to reach out directly, over the phone (204) 729-2490, Ask Auntie Brandon on Facebook or in person at the BNRC office, 440 Rosser Avenue. Twitter: @jillianaustin jillianaustin.news@gmail.com Harrisonburg, VA (22807) Today Evening clouds will give way to clearing overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Evening clouds will give way to clearing overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. Weather Alert ...FLASH FLOOD WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT THROUGH LATE TONIGHT... The Flash Flood Watch continues for * Portions of Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia, including the following areas: in Maryland, Central and Eastern Allegany, Extreme Western Allegany, Garrett and Washington. In Virginia, Clarke, Frederick VA, Page, Rockingham, Shenandoah and Warren. In West Virginia, Berkeley, Eastern Grant, Eastern Mineral, Eastern Pendleton, Hampshire, Hardy, Jefferson, Morgan, Western Grant, Western Mineral and Western Pendleton. * Through late tonight. * A prolonged period of heavy rainfall will continue through this evening. Rainfall amounts of 2 to 4 inches are expected, with localized amounts up to 6 inches possible. * This amount of heavy rainfall will not only result in the potential for considerable flash flooding of creeks and small streams, but also the potential for river flooding on the main stem rivers. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... You should monitor later forecasts and be prepared to take action should Flash Flood Warnings be issued. && Harrisonburg, VA (22807) Today Cloudy skies this evening will become partly cloudy after midnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Cloudy skies this evening will become partly cloudy after midnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. Here at CBD we are all for equal opportunity. And it seems this newspapers journalistic endeavours have given political figures from both sides equal opportunity to get really, really mad at us. Adem Somyurek. Credit:John Shakespeare Earlier this week we brought you news that former Liberal Party operative Marcus Bastiaan had launched defamation proceedings against this company for revealing last August his involvement in alleged branch stacking. If the case reaches court federal MPs Kevin Andrews and Michael Sukkar could be potential witnesses. And on the other side of the political fence, potty-mouthed former Victorian Labor minister Adem Somyurek has filed his 122-page writ in his defamation action against Nine, owner of this masthead, 60 Minutes and The Sydney Morning Herald, and journalist Nick McKenzie. In June last year, Somyurek starred in a multi-platform journalistic expose which described him as a factional kingpin. He was caught on tape uttering such bon mots as f--- the Premier, describing a Labor colleague as a f---ing psycho bitch and calling members of Young Labor little passive-aggressive gay kids. If Alisha Messina had her time again, she would have never altered her nose. But in 2014, following the fallout of an abusive relationship, she decided to get a rhinoplasty to fix a tiny depression on one side of her nose. Alisha Messina wants to warn other Australians about the dangers of cosmetic surgeons. Credit:Justin McManus Any decent surgeon would have turned me away, the Melbourne resident said. There was nothing to fix. I wasnt in a good place mentally. I was striving for perfection. She enlisted the help of a Sydney-based cosmetic surgeon a decision she would regret for years to come. More than two years after the first WestConnex motorway tunnel opened in Sydney, the NSW government is yet to meet a condition of approval by dedicating two lanes of Parramatta Road solely to public transport. A lack of progress in adhering to the approval condition comes amid delays to the completion of traffic studies crucial to long-term plans for thousands of new homes along the Parramatta Road corridor. One of the justifications for WestConnex was that it would remove traffic from Parramatta Road. Credit:Wolter Peeters The conditions imposed on the 2016 approval of the M4 East tunnels between Homebush and Haberfield included a requirement for at least one lane in each direction on Parramatta Road to be exclusively used for public transport. The condition did not impose a deadline. Greens MP Jamie Parker said the mantra that there was no set deadline to meet the condition shows just how hollow promises from this government are. NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro made a report to police last year that he was being harassed by content creator Jordan Shanks, after a series of videos were published on YouTube including two now at the centre of a defamation case. In a statement made to the Fixated Persons Investigation Unit in April this year seen by the Herald Mr Barilaro detailed meeting with two detectives in his office on December 2, 2020, the day after Mr Shanks posted a video on his Friendlyjordies channel titled I called John Barilaro...He Answered. NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro, pictured this week. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer The politician said his chief of staff organised for four Friendlyjordies videos to be placed onto a USB for police. Mr Barilaro said he first became aware of the Friendlyjordies channel in July 2020 and asked his staff to block Mr Shanks, however he is continuously bombard[ed] on social media by hashtags mentioned in the videos including #bruz and #PorkBarilaro. NSW has reported 1029 new local cases and a further three deaths on Thursday, as it was announced outdoor gathering rules in the state would be eased. Regional NSWs lockdown will also be extended to September 10, Premier Gladys Berejiklian said, following additional cases in the states west. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian addresses the media on Thursday. Credit:Janie Barrett The three people who died were all men who lived in western Sydney. The men in their 30s, 60s and 80s were all at home and were not vaccinated. COVID can impact in a very serious way on all age groups, and there is no room for complacency, Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant said. She urged any COVID-19 cases to not hesitate in calling an ambulance if their symptoms deteriorate. A Sydney man arrested in Iraq over a dispute between his employer and the Central Bank of Iraq has been sentenced to five years prison and fined $12 million. Robert Pether, who had been working for an engineering company on the new bank headquarters in Baghdad for the past four years, was arrested in Iraq on April 7, about a week after he entered the country. He and his Egyptian colleague have been in an Iraqi prison since then. Robert Pether, who has been detained in Iraq since April, pictured with his three children. His wife, Desree Pether, said he was tricked into entering the country by the Iraq Central Bank, which was locked in a contractual dispute with his Dubai-based employer CME Consulting. At this moment, I just spoke to him, and he said this is a life sentence, she said. Community leaders have accused the Queensland government of being hugely disrespectful by not consulting them before announcing a major quarantine facility for the region. Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk travelled to Wellcamp Airport on the citys outskirts on Thursday morning to announce her government would go it alone without federal funding or assistance for a new quarantine facility on the airports grounds. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk (centre) inspects the site for the second quarantine facility in Toowoomba on Thursday. Credit:Matt Dennien Asked whether the Prime Minister or even the local mayor knew about the announcement before she fronted the media, Ms Palaszczuk said, Im quite sure he does now. Toowoomba Regional Council Mayor Paul Antonio learnt about the announcement while driving back from an event at Oakey this morning, and said he was very disappointed by the state governments handling of the issue. Loading People are entitled to their views, people are entitled to criticise, theyre entitled to have, you know, theories and views on all manner of things - thats fine, he said. No ones criticising that, but at some point the question has to go back, well, whats your alternative? If the best youve got is open the schools against medical advice, and then have kids bring this home into family, after family, after family. Thats not a strategy that I will pursue, theyre not choices that I will make, theyre not real options in fact - theyre not real options at all. Asked if schools would move back to classroom teaching this term, Mr Andrews said he did not have certainty on whether the health situation would allow that to happen. I simply cant pretend that we have absolute certainty with this, were going to have to see how things unfold, Mr Andrews said. I dont want to see kids in hospital, I just dont. Well think about this long and hard, well look at the data and as soon as we can get the schools open and everything else as well ... we will. The key to that is everybody following these rules. Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton said that, during this COVID-19 outbreak in particular, children had transmitted the virus. There is a risk from children to other children and from children to adults, he said. He urged parents whose children had coronavirus symptoms to get them tested for it. A closed playground in Melbournes Flagstaff Gardens. Credit:Joe Armao Professor Sutton said airborne transmission rather than surface contamination was the concern behind the closure of playgrounds after he was asked about a case of transmission he flagged last week. Its probably not through surface contamination that it occurred so its probably through airborne transmission for kids, Professor Sutton said during Thursdays COVID-19 update. Im not concerned that its a hygiene issue of playgrounds needing to be wiped down. Im concerned that its transmission between kids getting close, and we know that they dont physically distance in a playground. Sure, well encourage them some kids might wear masks in those circumstances, but a lot will just be in very close contact with complete strangers so thats a concern. Victoria on Thursday recorded 80 new local COVID-19 cases as health authorities declared as dozens of new exposure sites were added, including exposure dates at two primary schools. Of Thursdays new locally acquired cases, 39 were in quarantine for their entire infectious period. The cases were recorded from more than 56,200 tests. Loading Sixty-seven are linked to the current COVID-19 outbreaks, and authorities are investigating the acquisition source for the remaining 13 cases. Victoria recorded no new cases in its hotel quarantine in the past 24 hours. Victorian COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar 240 of Victorias 600 active coronavirus cases were people under the age of 20. Seven people in the state who are in hospital with COVID-19 are aged in their 20s, and one is an infant. We see this very much as an outbreak really impacting the young people in our society and, of course, their families and households, the people they live with, Mr Weimar said. He also provided a breakdown of how the 67 linked cases were connected to existing outbreaks: 20 linked to Shepparton and the Royal Melbourne Hospital outbreak (including 18 in Shepparton); 15 linked to MyCentre childcare in Broadmeadows; Nine linked to Hobsons Bay/Wyndham cluster; Four to Newport Football Club; Three to CS Square Caroline Springs; Two to City of Port Phillip/St Kilda East; One to Altona Gate Shopping Centre; One to Brighton; One to Brunswick East; One to Glenroy; One to Sunbury and Nine are household contacts of unlinked cases. Thursdays figures came as the states health authorities identified dozens of new exposure sites, including the vacation care program at primary school in north-east Melbourne. Northcote Primary Schools outside school hours care program was declared a tier 1 exposure site over three days: Wednesday, August 18 between 2.45pm and 6.45pm; Thursday, August 19 between 7.15am and 9.45am and 2.45pm and 6.45pm; and Friday, August 20 between 7.15am and 9.30am and 2.45pm and 6.45pm. Tier 1 means anyone who attended the program during the specified timeframes has to immediately get tested and quarantine for 14 days. Other new exposure sites listed on Thursday included the Coles at Corio Village in the suburbs of Geelong and a petrol station in nearby Lara. Both were tier-2 exposures. An Indonesian restaurant near Albert Park and a nearby toilet were also added to the official list along with several tram routes. The emergency department at Monash Medical Centre in Clayton was added as a tier-1 site on Wednesday evening. A person with the virus was in the waiting area on Saturday afternoon. Authorities have said that anyone who was there between 3.35pm and 6.30pm is required to get tested for COVID-19 and isolate for 14 days. A primary school in Shepparton was also added to the states list, which now includes more than 800 sites. Several retail outlets in the area were also declared tier 2 exposure sites, including Big W at Shepparton Marketplace, a post office in Shepparton south, and a bakery. Shepparton residents have been struggling to source groceries, baby formula, nappies and medicine, and residents not in mandatory isolation have said it is hard to find places to buy essential supplies. Some supermarkets have shut down because they are exposure sites or have lost staff to quarantine, while others have been forced to cut opening hours and reduce delivery and click-and-collect options. However, Goulbourn Valley health officials said on Thursday that thousands of residents may be allowed to exit their 14-day isolation early as it considered downgrading some exposure sites from tier one to tier two. Independent Shepparton MP Suzanna Sheed said: The situation in Shepparton is a crisis and the mood is very anxious. Loading For a town that would normally pull together, we simply dont have the resources now. So we need the army, we need people driving trucks and distributing all the goods through the town. The Shepparton COVID-19 cluster grew to 66 cases on Wednesday, and about 40 Australian Defence Force personnel have been deployed to the city. Mr Andrews said more Australian Defence Force personnel would likely be sent to Shepparton. There are substantial additional people on the ground today and that will build over time with public servants, general duties people, people from all across regional Victoria, he said. Well stick with the community of Shepparton and give them all the support that they require in this, their time of need. He said authorities had provided additional support to Food Share and the Red Cross. There will be a request I think for some ADF personnel, thatll be made through Emergency Management Victoria to support us in that work [in Shepparton], Mr Andrews said. As soon as were in a position to be able to update you on that we will. Victoria still has chance at zero says expert, Sydney less so Professor Brendan Crabb from the Burnet Institute said Victoria can still return to zero COVID-19 community transmission, but Sydney may be too far into its outbreak. He said Victoria has two options stay in lockdown until the state returns to zero cases and having a higher quality of life later in the year or start leaving lockdown with a high amount of virus in the community. Professor Crabb, an infectious diseases expert, told ABC 774 on Thursday afternoon both options required the state to get to a high number of double-vaccinated people and Victoria should aim for zero. However, he is concerned Sydney may have too many cases to return to zero. More than 1000 Afghans with Australian visas remain stuck in Kabul after credible threats of suicide bombers and other terrorist attacks appeared to close their last window for escape. Australia, Britain and the United States all updated their travel advice on Thursday morning, warning people not to attempt the dangerous journey to the airport in Afghanistans capital. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told Sky News UK on Thursday evening (AEST) that the intelligence had become ever more certain that an attack could take place where evacuees were being processed in Kabul. An Australian Army soldier carries an Afghan child while assisting a family aboard the RAAF C-17A Globemaster at the Hamid Karzai International Airport. The terror risk has left some 1000 Afghans with Australian visas trapped in Kabul with no way to get out before the August 31 deadline for evacuations set by the Taliban, which swept back into power last week as international forces withdrew. From next month, people who live outside the local government areas of concern can gather in groups of five people, including children. All adults must be fully vaccinated and the gathering must be held outdoors in a persons LGA or within 5 kilometres from home. Loading In the areas of concern, households with all adults vaccinated will be able to gather outdoors for recreation, including picnics, for one hour, in line with existing rules. This is in addition to the one-hour allowed for exercise. Parents and students will also learn how and when schools will resume when the governments plan is unveiled on Friday. The plan will include kindergarten to year 2 and year 11 going back first, followed by year 6. There will also be changes to the HSC examinations, which will be delayed until early November. The freedoms mark the first step in the plan out of lockdown, with the government insisting the state will lead the way in living with COVID once 70 per cent vaccination rates are reached. About 6.2 million jabs have been administered across NSW so far, with one third of the population fully vaccinated. The Premier on Thursday put the community and industries on notice to prepare for mid-October, when NSW is expected to reach its next target and open up to people who are fully vaccinated. Were calling upon industry and citizens to get ready for when we hit that 70 per cent double dose. We are already starting to work with industry stakeholders on how we can go back to safely open up, she said. Get fully vaccinated, you still have time to make sure that when you start opening up, you have those options to live a freer life. Ms Berejiklian gave her strongest warning yet that unvaccinated people would miss out on certain freedoms even once the state reached 80 per cent vaccination. Credit:Illustration: Matt Golding These arent necessarily decisions government is making. Organisations will be able to choose whether they welcome people onto their premises ... who dont have the vaccine. Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant said she believed Australia had the potential to be one of the most vaccinated countries in the world with more than 90 per cent coverage. For me, the skys the limit, she said, urging the need for equity to ensure vulnerable groups received their jabs as soon as possible. Dr Chant said Merrylands, Guildford, Auburn, Granville, Greenacre, Blacktown and surrounding areas were key suburbs of concern, describing the new outdoor freedoms as baby steps recognising the serious situation we are in. She encouraged people with symptoms not to be deterred from calling an ambulance despite strains on the states hospitals. There are 698 COVID-19 patients admitted to hospital, with 116 in intensive care. Forty-three of those require ventilation, while hospital cases are aged from their 20s to their 70s. The lockdown in regional NSW will be extended by another two weeks as high case numbers persist, with another 35 in western NSW and six in the far west reported on Thursday. Deputy Premier John Barilaro said regional NSW was on a knifes edge. Credit:James Brickwood Deputy Premier John Barilaro said the decision was made to protect communities in the regions, describing the situation as a tinderbox ready to explode. Loading We are on a knifes edge in the regions. We need to take pressure off the health system, he said, pointing to cases in the Hunter New England and Central Coast, as well as new sewage fragments causing concern in Tamworth, Merimbula, Cooma and Brewarrina. Healthcare workers in NSW are now required to be vaccinated after Health Minister Brad Hazzard formally signed a public health order bringing the mandate into effect. Under the order all staff in health settings, including doctors, nurses, cleaners and administrative staff, must have a first dose of vaccine by September 30, and their second by November 30. Alternatively, they must have their second appointment booked to continue working. Washington: US President Joe Biden has vowed to hunt down and punish the terrorist leaders behind the explosions that killed at least 60 Afghan civilians and 13 US soldiers outside the international airport in Kabul. After the deadliest day for the US in Afghanistan in a decade, Americas top military leaders warned that they were bracing for more terrorist attacks in coming days. The suicide bombings, which terrorist group ISIS-K claimed responsibility for, came just days before the scheduled withdrawal of all US troops from Afghanistan next Tuesday. US President Joe Biden vowed to hunt down the perpetrators of the attack. Credit:Bloomberg Speaking at the White House after the attacks, Biden said: To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: we will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. In todays Russia, Navalny made clear, hours spent watching state television and movies chosen by the warden are the experience of a political prisoner, a status Amnesty International has assigned to Navalny. Gone are the shifts of heavy labour in mining or forestry and the harrying by criminals and guards alike that was the hallmark of the Soviet gulag for political prisoners. You might imagine tattooed muscle men with steel teeth carrying on with knife fights to take the best cot by the window, Navalny said. You need to imagine something like a Chinese labour camp, where everybody marches in a line and where video cameras are hung everywhere. There is constant control and a culture of snitching. Despite his circumstances, Navalny was upbeat about Russias future prospects, and he outlined his strategy for achieving political change through the electoral system even in an authoritarian state. The Putin regime is an historical accident, not an inevitability, he wrote, adding, It was the choice of the corrupt Yeltsin family, a reference to former president Boris Yeltsins appointment of Putin as acting president in December 1999. Sooner or later, this mistake will be fixed, and Russia will move on to a democratic, European path of development. Simply because that is what the people want. As he has before, Navalny criticised Europe and the United States for the economic sanctions it has imposed on Russia for its meddling abroad and its repression of dissidents, including himself. He said sanctions harmed ordinary Russians and risked alienating a broad constituency inside Russia that is a natural ally. Sanctions, he said, should target only the top oligarchs who prop up Putins government, instead of the dozens of largely obscure figures who have been hit so far. The truly powerful have largely avoided sanctions, he said, by retaining an army of lawyers, lobbyists and bankers, fighting for the right of owners of dirty and bloody money to remain unpunished. Loading Through the 20th century and earlier, prison in Russia was a crucible that forged or broke dissidents and writers, moulded leaders and crushed pluralistic politics. The modern experience of a Russian political prisoner, Navalny said, is mostly psychological violence, with mind-numbing screen time playing a big role. Navalny, 45, described five daily sessions of television watching for inmates, the first starting immediately after morning calisthenics, breakfast and sweeping the yard. After some free time, theres a two-hour spell in front of the screen, lunch, then more screen time, dinner, and then more TV time in the evening. During one afternoon session, playing chess or backgammon is an acceptable alternative. Loading We watch films about the Great Patriotic War, Navalny said, referring to World War II, or how one day, 40 years ago, our athletes defeated the Americans or Canadians. During these sessions, he said, I most clearly understand the essence of the ideology of the Putin regime: the present and the future are being substituted with the past the truly heroic past, or embellished past, or completely fictional past. All sorts of past must constantly be in the spotlight to displace thoughts about the future and questions about the present. The approach of lengthy, enforced television watching, while taken to extremes at Penal Colony No. 2, is not unique to the site, where inmates in politically hued cases have been incarcerated before. It sprang from a penal reform in Russia begun in 2010 to boost guards control over inmates through their day and to reduce the sway of prison gangs. The intent is not so much brainwashing as control, experts on the Russian prison system say. Loading Everything is organised so that I am under maximum control 24 hours a day, Navalny said. He said he had not been assaulted or threatened by fellow inmates but estimated that about one-third were what are known in Russian prisons as activists, those who serve as informants to the warden. During his first weeks in the penal colony, Navalnys limbs numbed, either from lingering effects of the nerve agent poisoning or from a back injury from riding in a prison van. He also went on a 24-day hunger strike, raising alarms about his health. His neurological symptoms eased when guards stopped waking him hourly at night, ostensibly to ensure he wasnt plotting an escape. I now understand why sleep deprivation is one of the favourite tortures of the special services, he said. No traces remain, and its impossible to tolerate. He said he gets along well with other inmates and that they sometimes cook snacks in a microwave. When we cook, I always remember the classic scene from Goodfellas when the mafia bosses cook pasta in a prison cell, he said. Unfortunately, we dont have such a cool pot, and pasta is forbidden. Still, its fun. Navalny conceded that he has struggled to remain visible in Russian politics through a tumultuous period as the government has clamped down on the opposition and the news media. The protests that erupted after disputed Belarusian elections last year spooked the Kremlin, he suggested. The Putin governments other worry, he said, was the electoral strategy he has devised and calls smart voting. Under the strategy, Navalnys organisation endorses the candidates it thinks have a chance of winning in regional and parliamentary elections, which will be held next month. The Kremlin was so concerned about the upcoming elections, he said, that it engineered a crackdown this year not just on his group and other activists but on moderate opposition politicians, civil society groups and independent news media outlets like Meduza, Proekt and Dozhd television. Navalny suggested that while the crackdown may prove to be a tactical success for Putin, it may also be a long-term liability. Putin solved his tactical question: not allowing us to take away the majority in the Duma, Navalny said, speaking of the Russian Parliaments lower house. But to achieve this, he had to completely change the political system, to shift to a principally different, far harsher level of authoritarianism. Navalny suggested the move underscored a principal weakness of Putins political system. While leftists and nationalists are represented by parties loyal to Putin, there is no stable, pro-Kremlin centre-right party representing the countrys emerging middle class of relatively prosperous, city-dwelling Russians. Lansdale, PA (19446) Today Thunderstorms, some strong this evening giving way to periods of light rain late. Potential for flooding rains. Low 59F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Thunderstorms, some strong this evening giving way to periods of light rain late. Potential for flooding rains. Low 59F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Global oil majors may be teaming up with investment funds that are already in the race to acquire Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL), a document detailing steps needed to complete India's biggest showed. Billionaire Anil Agarwal's Vedanta group as well as two US funds -- Apollo Global and I Squared Capital - had last year submitted initial bids to buyout the government's entire 52.98 per cent stake in India's third-biggest oil refiner and second-largest fuel retailer. Detailing the 'Next Step', the 'Brief Note on Disinvestment' said Transaction Advisor and Asset Valuer are to submit an inception report, bidders have to complete due diligence of the company and sale purchase agreement has to be finalised. Also, "security clearance" of bidders may be needed "since consortiums are being formed", it said without giving details. The bidding process allows for other interested parties to join and form a consortium with any one of the bidders which had submitted an expression of interest (EoI). Firms run by Indian billionaires Mukesh Ambani and Gautam Adani as well as global oil majors such as Royal Dutch Shell, BP and Exxon did not submit an EoI for acquiring at the close of the deadline on November 16, 2020. However, several top oil producers from the Middle East and Russia's Rosneft were said to be interested in which would give the buyer access to over 14 per cent of India's oil refining capacity and 23 per cent fuel market share. But they hadn't submitted any bids. Industry sources said it was possible that one of the global oil majors or a Middle East oil producer may be teaming up with the investment funds already in race. Ambani's Reliance Industries Ltd and Adani group are "extremely unlikely" to join the race, a source said. Steel magnate Lakshmi N Mittal, who runs an oil refinery in Punjab in joint venture with Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd, was considered a potential candidate but sources said he was not interested in BPCL whose acquisition will cost nearly Rs 80,000 crore at current market trading price. The document showed financial bids will be called after submission of asset valuation report and business valuation report by Asset Valuer and Transaction Advisor respectively. Reserve price will be fixed thereafter and price bids will be opened after that. If its bid is accepted, the bidder quoting the highest price will be called to executive share purchase agreement and make payment. Open offers required under the extant guidelines/approvals shall follow, it said. BPCL owns 35.30 million tonnes of oil refining capacity spread over three refineries at Mumbai, Kochi in Kerala and Bina in Madhya Pradesh. It has 18,768 petrol pumps and 6,169 LPG distributors. (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.) Aviation regulator Directorate General of (DGCA) on Thursday lifted a ban on 737 MAX aircraft, two and a half years after it was grounded globally. The ban had followed two crashes killing 346 on-board. India, besides China, was the only major aviation market for the Chicago-headquartered not to allow the aircraft to resume service so far. While the Federal Aviation Administration in the US allowed 737 MAX to fly again last November, China has conducted test flights and is likely to approve soon. Worldwide 17 operators have permitted operation of 737 MAX aircraft. 34 have been operating 345 aircraft with 2,89,537 hours of flying with no untoward reporting. For the foregoing reasons, the ban on 737 MAX aircraft is rescinded, head Arun Kumar wrote in a circular. Indian low-cost carrier SpiceJet has one of the largest order book of the aircraft with 13 delivered and 142 in waiting. The airline said it would reintroduce the aircraft by the end of September. Rakesh Jhunjhunwala-backed airline Akasa is also in talks with for buying up to 100 737 MAX aircraft. An aircraft technician with experience of working on the 737 MAX aircraft said around 15 days of work would be required on each aircraft to make them fit to return to the skies. The work will include installing new hardware and software changes for the flight-control systems, operation checks, multiple inspection checks and then a test flight before the regulator declares the aircraft airworthy, he explained. Changes to the flight control system have been mandated by the FAA as accident investigators said that an automated flight-control system, called MCAS, was responsible for the fatal crashes. This software update will take around two to four hours for each aircraft. Around 200 hours of maintenance work will also have to be done on each aircraft including de-preservation of the aircraft. Since the aircraft were in long-term storage, they will have to be brought out of preservation. In addition, there would be pilot training and updating of the engineering manuals, he said. Boeings projection suggests in India will need more than 2,200 new jets worth almost $320 billion over the next 20 years. In a statement released to stock exchange, SpiceJet said it had entered into a settlement with Dublin-based Avolon- a major lessor of the 737 MAX aircraft. I am delighted to share that our 737 MAX will be back in the air soon. The MAX aircraft will play a major role in our future expansion. With a better and a more efficient fleet back in operation, we expect a significant reduction in our operating costs improving our bottom line, SpiceJet CMD Ajay Singh said. SpiceJet said it suffered loss of business due to the grounding and had sought compensation from Boeing. Over the last eight quarters since 737 MAX was grounded, the airline has booked other income of around Rs 1,400 crore as compensation. However, auditors have maintained theres no virtual certainty that the compensation would materialise. SpiceJet has realised and received Rs 275 crore from Boeing as on date and with the on-going negotiations, the balance compensation is expected to be received in the near to medium term, according to sources in the know. The airline may also agree to waive off the same if Boeing in return restructures the lease rentals with longer tenure. on Thursday said it will start eight new during the first week of September, connecting cities including Dehradun, Indore and Lucknow. " will operate new flights between Delhi-Lucknow, Lucknow-Jaipur, and Indore-Lucknow effective September 1, while the flights connecting Delhi and Dehradun will commence from September 5," the airline said in a statement. Sanjay Kumar, Chief Strategy and Revenue Officer, IndiGo, said these eight new flights will not only improve accessibility, but also cater to the increased travel demand from Delhi, Lucknow, Jaipur, Dehradun, and Indore. (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.) Global and domestic players eligible under the governments production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme for IT hardware, have asked the ministry of electronics and information technology (MEITY) for a substantial increase in incentives as well as in the tenure of the scheme, as they are finding it difficult to get global brands to undertake contract manufacturing in India for laptops and tablets. Global laptop brands feel it is cheaper to import the devices into the country at zero duty from their production bases in China and Taiwan. Hence, there is little incentive for them to ... To become a successful entrepreneur, it is important how one treats their co-workers, co-founder Arjun Malhotra told Delhi government school students on Thursday. Malhotra was interacting virtually with students as part of a series under the Entrepreneurship Mindset Curriculum. "To become a better and successful entrepreneur, it is important how you treat your co-workers," he said. Malhotra said that as a team leader, one should always support and encourage team members. "You must make the people working with you feel important, this will increase their ability to work. Every night before sleeping, think about all the work done by you during the day and if you have done something wrong, then the next day apologize to the person concerned, your behaviour will help you move forward": he told students. "During the start of HCL, I believed that micro-processors would bring a big change in the computer world, so I left my job and started along with my friends. When you do any work, think about how to save time, how to improve it, when you start doing this, then there will be no such problem for which you do not have a solution," Malhotra said. He told students to always try to find smarter people than themselves and listen to their words carefully. Giving the mantra of 'learning leads to achievement', Malhotra said that one should always be ready to learn and keep learning as it will help them move forward. "You can be an expert in any one subject, but apart from that, you should always be ready to learn other things. To grow as an entrepreneur, it is necessary to act as an all-rounder," 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.) Along the Arabian Sea, the Indian city of Jamnagar is a money-making machine for Asias richest man, Mukesh Ambani, processing crude oil into fuel, plastics and chemicals. Its also where the billionaire is making his newest bet: a $10 billion investment in green energy. In a swath of arid land, to the citys southwest, Ambanis Ltd., owns the worlds biggest oil refining complex. Its a sprawling network of plants and pipelines that can process 1.4 million barrels of petroleum a day in an operation covering half the area of Manhattan. In fiscal 2021, Reliance generated about 45 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions from its own operations, which puts the company among the top such emitters in India, according to data on other tracked by Bloomberg. Much of that came from its Jamnagar refineries. Next door, in a nod to a changing--and warming--world Ambani is now building factories that make more environmentally friendly products like solar panels, electrolyzers, fuel cells and batteries. On the face of it, the new investment is a sharp pivot for a giant conglomerate whose fortunes have been linked to oil refining for decades. Yet even as Ambani, 64, touts the shift to less polluting options, crudes byproducts will remain one of the biggest drivers of the $80 billion fortune thats made him the worlds 12th richest man. Reliance gets nearly 60% of its $73 billion in annual revenue from its oil-related business, which is so lucrative that its attracting other investors. The Middle Eastern energy firm Saudi Aramco is in discussions for the purchase of a roughly 20% stake in Reliances refining and chemicals business. Ambanis conglomerate is also investing in global expansion projects for the petrochemicals business thatll last for decades. Even if its new energy operations take off, they will contribute only 10% of Reliances total earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization by fiscal 2026, while oil-to-chemicals will stay at about 33%, Sanford C. Bernstein analysts estimated in July. Thats making Jamnagar a location that highlights a broader tension in the energy transition: While the worlds biggest fossil fuel are rushing to placate investors--and chase profits--by adding clean power sources, that doesnt signal a quick retreat from polluting fuels. Its a contrast playing out even as climate scientists escalate warnings about the fallouts of human-caused global warming. M.V. Ramana, an energy policy scholar and professor at University of British Columbia, said it would be hard for Reliance to dissociate from fossil fuel businesses that create emissions. If you look at what Reliances trajectory has been, it is one of expansion of its fossil fuels business, Ramana said. Shifting dramatically away from the more polluting oil-to-chemicals business is difficult because it is going to affect their bottomline, he said. Reliance didn't respond to requests for comment. At its annual shareholders' meeting in June, Ambani acknowledged the need for change. The age of fossil fuels, which powered economic growth globally for nearly three centuries, cannot continue much longer. The huge quantities of carbon it has emitted into the environment have endangered life on earth,'' he said. Reliance has said it will make its operations carbon neutral by 2035 with the help of projects that offset emissions. Top emitters There are also plans to arm the 7,500-acre Jamnagar refinery-and-petrochemicals complex with solar power, green hydrogen and carbon dioxide capture and usage technologies. To curb pollution, about 2,200 acres of land within the facility have been converted into a green pasture, growing mangoes, guavas and medicinal plants. The sites scope is so vast that its rubbed off on the citys economy. The facility stands near miles of salt pans, its stacks towering over the low-rise houses in surrounding villages. Reliances logo is seen at the airport, on the numerous gas stations it operates, malls and the banners of its telephone service Jio. Jamnagar now has multi-storeyed apartments and luxury cars running on its roads. The Ambani firm has over the last 10 years invested about $15 billion to boost profits from its legacy oil refining and petrochemicals businesses, including $4 billion to convert petroleum coke one of the dirtiest refinery by-products into gas needed to power the massive Jamnagar complex. Its also said it will spend $6 billion ramping up natural gas production from the depths of the sea along with joint venture partner BP Plc. In addition, the Reliance-BP joint venture is adding more fuel stations. BP didnt respond to a request for comment. Reliances Scope 1 carbon dioxide emissions--those caused directly by a companys operations--surged 60% in the year ended March 2020 to 47.5 million tons, mainly because it started using petcoke produced from the refineries internally, instead of selling it to customers outside, according to the companys latest annual report. A year later, emissions came down to 45 million tons. India is one of the worlds biggest consumers of oil, and demand is only rising as its middle class buys more vehicles, and consumes more products like plastic bottles and paint that are made from petrochemicals. Many Indian cities, including capital New Delhi, are among the worlds most polluted. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched a national clean air program. Covid India The new Reliance green venture will be spread over 5,000 acres of land. Ambani has said a key focus will be to create products for producing solar power, an area where India has long lagged China. When of this size announce such ambitious plans, it gives a great fillip to the decarbonization goals of the nations and the world at large, said Shantanu Jaiswal, head of India at BloombergNEF. Still, moving away from polluting fossil fuels for economic reasons is hard not just for Reliance, but for the nation as a whole. India has insisted that developed nations take larger initial steps to cut emissions so that poorer nations dont feel the economic strain. A tanker docked at the Port of Sikka, home to Reliances Jamnagar Marine Terminal. India is one of the worlds biggest consumers of oil, and demand is only rising. (Photo: Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg) The Jamnagar refinery has spawned a whole generation of entrepreneurs. The billions of dollars Reliance has invested has significantly boosted the local economy, said Chandrsinh Ramsinh Jadeja, 52, who developed a business doing construction work for Reliance in Jamnagar. Farmers earned money, sent their kids to school and purchased land elsewhere, tens of thousands of jobs were created. Reliance earned a net profit of 537.4 billion rupees ($7.2 billion) in the year ended March, the most by any Indian company. Ambani has in recent years expanded into retail and built his digital business with investments from big names like Facebook Inc. The mammoth Aramco deal under discussion showed how important the oil-to-chemicals enterprise remains to his future. In 2019, Ambani estimated that such a deal would lock in about half-a-million barrels a day of Saudi crude for processing at Reliances refineries. The latest about the deal boosted the companys shares by as much as 2.7% and Ambanis net worth by more than $1 billion. Reliances diversification into green energy is a starting point, its a welcome shift. But the business is evolving, said Kanika Chawla, program manager for UN-Energy, which leads inter-agency collaboration on sustainable energy. Its not a change in regime. has tied up a project term loan of Rs 4,016 crore for the first phase of its plant expansion plans. The company said it signed a financial agreement with a consortium of banks led by State Bank of India for the assistance. A statement from said the funds will be used to set-up a 450,000-tonne-per-annum (KTPA) polypropylene plant at its Vadinar refinery in Gujarat. The loan facility carries a tenure of over 15 years. The project is proposed to be funded with a mix of debt and equity. "The company is already in possession of required land and does not need to acquire fresh parcels for the upcoming project," Nayara said. Alois Virag, Chief Executive Officer, said, "The financial closure brings to fruition our growth plans to become one of the largest integrated energy and petrochemicals complexes in the country. The demand for polypropylene is expected to grow at around 10 per cent per annum. The construction of the first phase of the petrochemicals project is expected to be completed in 2023." Nayara Energy had first announced its plans to expand into petrochemicals at the Vibrant Gujarat Summit in 2019. In August 2017, Nayara Energy (then Essar Oil) was acquired by international investors, Rosneft and an investment consortium comprising of global commodity trading firm, Trafigura and UCP Investment Group. The company owns and operates Indias second largest single site refinery at Vadinar, Gujarat with a current capacity of 20 million tonnes per annum. Nayara Energys fuel retail network consists of over 6000 outlets across India. Dear Reader, Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. 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Digital Editor Walmart-owned digital payments firm is processing 1.5 billion transactions a month and now about 80 per cent of all these users are from tier-2 and beyond cities, said Sameer Nigam, founder and chief executive officer at So, I know payments for a fact have started solving the financial inclusion problem, said Nigam during a fireside chat with YourStory Founder Shradha Sharma at Converge@Walmart, the flagship event of Walmart Global Tech India, along with founder and CTO Rahul Chari. Every other category and sector including foodtech and e-commerce, started in the metros and then reached small towns and cities. We have about 20 million-odd merchants, 16 (million) of them are Tier-2 and beyond, said Nigam. So, where people had to travel more to pay their bills and were sending money to villages and small towns, all of that is happening on the phone. Four years ago, everything changed in India and it is called the Jio effect. Smartphones with cheap data have meant that all basic services have shifted to the phone. In 2015, there were about 100-120 million people participating in the e-commerce economy which has grown. But payments are already about 3.5 times that in 5 years. have had support for 8-10 languages now for five years. Less than 15 per cent of people choose another language. On the customer service side, more than 50 per cent of people want to talk in their native language. Nigam said if people want to use the app in English but they want to talk in any other language in the country, that problem has to be solved. Rahul Chari said given the infrastructure problems in the country, technology is the only way one can leapfrog. Whenever PhonePe takes on any problem statement, it looks at it from the lens of can it be scaled to the entire population?. There is almost a maniacal focus on trying to improve at scale, said Chari. He said if there is one thing about PhonePe that echoes with all its 300 million users is the reliability and speed of the transaction. PhonePe is focusing on leveraging technology to make the product much simpler for Tier-2 and Tier-3 customers who may be coming onto the platform or on the internet for the first time. For scaling up such initiatives and expansion across the country, last year in December, PhonePe signed a deal to raise $700 million in primary capital at a post-money valuation of $5.5 billion from existing Flipkart investors, including Tiger Global, led by Walmart, the worlds largest retailer. E-commerce firm Flipkart had done a partial spin-off of PhonePe, which will help it to access dedicated, long-term capital to fund its growth ambitions, including going public by 2023. We needed a runway. We said we want somebody who is giving us long term capital. For the first few years obviously, it was Flipkart, now there is Walmart, said Nigam. I remember meeting with Mr. Penner (Greg Penner, chairman of the Walmart Board of Directors) and Steuart Walton and they were talking about a generational shift, of about 25 years. I was like I havent ever thought that far - 10 years, yes, 25 years is ridiculous when you are in tech. We have been lucky. We had very patient capital which means the founders have been able to focus inwards - culture, theme, process, all of it. Another factor that played a key role in the success of the company is that among the first 50 employees at PhonePe, many of them are a part of the core leadership team. Many of them were ex-Flipkart. Some were people Nigam or Chari had worked with in other parts of their career. When you have 40 to 50 people who are getting back together for a second run, you start with knowing each others strengths and weaknesses and you start with a very high trust and transparency model, said Nigam. One of the ambitions is to deepen its penetration into financial services, whose size could touch $340 billion in the next few years. The aim is to provide financial inclusion to 1 billion Indians. We are all extremely excited about financial services which include insurance mutual funds, said Chari. The opportunity really is for us to rethink how financial services have been done so far. Like, does this person really need health insurance and if so, what kind of health insurance?. PhonePe is in a fierce battle with rivals such as Google Pay, Amazon Pay, and Alibaba-backed Paytm, which are making significant inroads into the financial services market as well as payments. It has a store platform on the PhonePe app, and the firm has digitized 20 million kiranas. I think we have stayed true to the idea of opening up the market to everyone. No (competition) for the sake of competing, said Nigam. We are a PPI and we sell third party gift cards from a company owned by Amazon. We are in bill payments and we work with people who are all our direct competitors. There is an Airtel payment bank, Jio Payment Bank. We think of everyone as our partners. Thought PhonePe is more in Bharat than the metros from a user base perspective, Nigam said in the next five years, the firm has to go through a relatively complex and large redesign. Most of the existing leadership is going to be focused on carrying the payments vision forward, making sure it hits the next milestone of 500 million in 2022. But we want to get to 900 million people in the next 8 to 10 years, said Nigam Whenever the market gets to them we want to be there. We'll never lose sight of that vision. Public sector major, Authority of India Ltd (SAIL), is looking at bringing down its borrowings to Rs 20,000 crore by the end of the current financial year. Soma Mondal, chairman SAIL, said that by year-end the aim is to reduce total borrowings at a level of Rs 20,000 crore depending on prices and demand situation. She was speaking on the sidelines of an event to mark the inauguration of MSTCs corporate office building in Kolkata. At the end of the first quarter of the financial year, had said that it had reduced Rs 5,063 crore of gross borrowings during the quarter. During FY21, net debt had decreased by Rs 16,131 crore to Rs 35,350 crore (as on December 31, 2020). Booming steel prices, especially in the second half of last year, had led private and public sector to deleverage. However, the second Covid-wave dampened domestic demand over the past few months. Mondal said that domestic demand is picking up and the price trend is stable. Flat products are stable and long product is showing indication of an increase. she said, adding that post-Covid, construction activities had picked up. For the year, SAILs capex is pegged at Rs 8,000 crore. Earlier, during a media interaction, Union steel minister, Ram Chandra Prasad Singh, said that there was no scope for a rethink on the dissolution of the raw materials division (RMD) headquarters of from Kolkata, as the process was complete. Once a process is complete, there is no scope for a rethink, he said. The minister was in Kolkata to inaugurate the new corporate office of MSTC. Steel price Steel prices, though, have come off their highs now, but were surging since November last year. User industries, especially MSMEs, had raised concerns around rising steel prices. The minister said that steel is a deregulated sector and about 86 per cent of production was accounted for by the private sector. It is a cyclical industry. Covid had impacted supply even in the international market, which led to the increase in prices, said Singh. However, he pointed out that international prices were still 15-20 per cent higher than domestic prices. Responding to a question on what kind of cost overrun higher steel prices had led to in government projects, the minister said that in some it was 8 per cent and in some, 9 per cent. On the MSME sector, he said that it was one of the largest employers. There are many government schemes to support the sector. We are supporting them and will continue to do so. has doubled the frequency of its scheduled freighter flights to Kunming and Wuhan in from two to four per week. The increase in flights came into effect last week ahead of the festive season which sees import of mobile phones and electronic goods from and comes in the backdrop of disruption at Shanghai airport. The disruption caused due to Covid-19 cases among the airport staff at Shanghai has led to cancellation of flights and restriction on loads. Air freight charges have gone up too and shippers are exploring trucking of export goods from Shanghai to alternate airports in for onward carriage. China is an important market for SpiceXpress and we have increased our frequency to Wuhan and Kunming, an airline spokesperson said. The non operation of passenger flights between India and China has already led to curtailment of capacity, said Bharat J Thakkar, past president of Air Agents Association of India. Shippers and importers are looking at alternate routes and some are even flying via Hong Kong as carriers are not accepting shipments for Shanghai, he added. Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific, however, said it is not seeing a significant impact on its flights. Cathay Pacific has resumed most of its freighter services to and from Shanghai airport this week. Our passenger services between Hong Kong and Shanghai continue to operate as scheduled. From India, our operations are largely unaffected. We continue to operate weekly freighters and cargo-only-passenger flights and remain agile to scale our operations based on the given demand, the airline said. Walmart, the worlds largest retailer, is tripling its sourcing from India to about $10 billion a year by 2027, said Judith McKenna, president, and chief executive officer of International, the segment which includes the companys operations outside the US. To achieve this, we are growing our sourcing team in India, said McKenna, during a fireside chat with YourStory Founder Shradha Sharma at Converge@Walmart, the flagship event of Global Tech India. has a 20-year history of sourcing from India and already exports more than $3 billion worth of Made-in-India goods each year to 14 markets worldwide. McKenna said the company has expertise in processes such as international standards and demand forecasting that businesses need to get ready to export. It walks with entrepreneurs every step of the way to make sure they are successful. MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises) are a big focus for us. She said the Coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic highlighted the importance of Walmarts flexible, agile and diversified global supply chain. India has long played a big role and will continue to do so, said McKenna. The Bentonville-based company (in Arkansas) is locked in battle with US rival Jeff Bezos-founded Amazon, Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliances JioMart, and Tata-owned BigBasket for dominance in Indias online retail market through Flipkart, which it bought for $16 billion in 2018. Digital payments giant PhonePe also came to Walmart as part of the acquisition. Indias retail market is estimated to reach over $1 trillion by 2025. McKenna said the Covid-19 pandemic also accelerated Indias digitalization journey, with online shopping and contactless payments becoming more popular. Kiranas doing last-mile delivery for Flipkart saw delivery income increase about 30 per cent in 2020, she said. Innovations from India are also helping Walmart improve retail around the world. India is a source of talent and technology for Walmart globally. Our people in India have a relentless passion to innovate and problem-solve, putting the customer at the center of everything, said McKenna. For instance, an India-developed sales forecasting solution is helping Walmart stores in Mexico and China improve the availability of fresh foods and reduce waste. A Flipkart-developed advertising platform is helping our Chilean business tailor ads and gain insights. Also, PhonePe, which eases payments friction for more than 300 million users and is digitizing 25 million kiranas, is helping Walmart think differently about financial access in Mexico, said McKenna. Flipkart is also betting big on social commerce, which is the use of social network communities to drive e-commerce sales. Social commerce is expected to be about a $70 billion market opportunity in the next few years. Flipkart recently launched Shopsy, an app that enables Indians to start their online businesses without any investment. With Shopsy, Flipkart aims to enable over 100 million online entrepreneurs in the next few years as they reap the benefits of digital commerce. We are very excited about Flipkarts new Shopsy. It is a world-first foray into social commerce for us, said McKenna. It provides a very low entry barrier for people to start a business and is also a fun and easy way to introduce people to online shopping. MSMEs also require training and support to help them get export-ready. McKenna said entrepreneurs with big dreams can get export-ready by learning business skills, embracing world-class processes and technologies, and building a network of business contacts. Here the companys Vriddhi program is playing a key role. Walmart Vriddhi trains people to help them scale and grow their business in the domestic market and for export with Walmart or other Entrepreneurs can learn how to lead teams, do responsible sourcing, put a business plan together, get financing, and manage the health and business impacts of the pandemic. Technology is not just about e-commerce, but also helps you be more efficient and competitive, said McKenna. When MSMEs on the Flipkart platform were hit with labor shortages and supply chain challenges because of the pandemic, Flipkart helped them use technology to anticipate consumer demand and find solutions. When Afghan in India held a protest in Delhi on August 23, sisters Dia and Diyana were at its forefront, one wrapped in the Afghan flag while the other held up a placard, appealing to the United Nations to help the people of the war-torn nation. Dia (10) and Diyana (12), residents of an Afghan enclave in south Delhi, should be learning and playing, but at this tender age, the sisters braved it out in a hot weather, expressing their concern about the children, particularly girls, in since its takeover by the "We are scared. We know what the are, even though we were not born when they first took over our homeland. And, we know how insecure the children and women are feeling in our homeland right now," said the elder sister. Along with their parents, the sisters had gone to take part in the protest held in front of the United Nations High Commissioner for (UNHCR), the UN Refugee Agency in south Delhi's Vasant Vihar. The protest which started on Monday, have since been relayed, and the are refusing to relent from their position until their demands are met, which includes issuing of support letters from the UN agency to allow migration to other countries and better opportunities in India. On August 23, when the protest began, a large number of Afghan refugees had gathered there, drawn from Delhi and neighbouring cities. Among them were scores of children, as young as a two-year-old Nihanz who came with her family members from Bhogal and took part in the demonstration riding her mother's shoulders. Women power was evident at the protest, and participation by young girls, brought the focus on their plight, their vulnerability to the current circumstances and their sheer hopelessness of living a pitiable refugee life, even as descended further down the spiral of uncertainty. Holding a poster, Zuleikha Khadarkhil, 10, sat quietly next to her eight-year-old brother Mohammed Rameen, who raised vociferous slogans against the Taliban, when most children of his age are playing with toys and not taking part in a protest that may have global ramifications. While Zuleikha was silent, the image on the poster she held screamed about the plight of girls and their bleak future. There were no words on the moving artwork, just a sketch of a young girl depicted in a traditional Afghani costume, almost matching what the young protester had worn, with sadness in her eyes and one arm outstretched, reaching out for a book, signifying the curbs that the imposes on freedom and education of girls and women. "As refugees we feel insecure, as children we feel insecure, as girls we feel insecure, more so now after what has happened in our I have a terrible feeling about the young girls and women of Afghanistan. How will they be treated now," she lamented. Rameen and Zuleikha had come to the protest with their parents from Tilak Nagar, where a small community of Afghans reside. The protest has been led by Afghan Solidarity Committee (ASC), an umbrella organisation of Afghan refugees in India. The crowd shouted slogans like 'we want future', 'we want justice', 'no more silence' and clapped and cheered each other, as many others held banners bearing messages like 'UN Geneva help Afghan Refugees' and 'Issue resident visas to all Afghan refugees'. The Taliban swept across the country this month, seizing control of almost all key towns and cities in the backdrop of withdrawal of the US forces that began on May 1. On August 15, the capital city Kabul also fell to the Taliban, even as a large number of Afghans attempted in vain to flee the war-torn nation. The insurgent forces have now sought to portray themselves as more moderate than when they had imposed a brutal rule in the late 1990s. But many Afghans remain sceptical of this and fear the return of the "regressive" regime. The hopelessness and dejection among the children about their future was unmistakable, with Tamanna, 10, who had come from Noida, echoing Zuleikha's sentiments. "With the current situation, the future seems all dark for us, stuck between a poor refugee life with almost no education or job opportunities, and the horror of the Taliban back home, she rued. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Centre must conduct a caste census in view of the "popular" sentiment and the BJP should resolve its "inner conflict" evident in some leaders supporting the demand and others taking a contrary stand, a key political aide of Bihar Chief Minister said here on Thursday. The remarks came from Upendra Kushwaha, a former Union minister who is now the parliamentary board head of the JD(U) controlled by the Bihar chief minister, days after the latter met Prime Minister Narendra Modi heading an all-party delegation from the state to discuss the issue. Bihar, where politics has been dominated by the numerically powerful OBCs, is witnessing a consolidation of sorts of parties in support of the demand ever since the Centre told Parliament that enumeration of only the SCs and the STs was under consideration. This has left the chief minister, an old NDA partner, and his arch rival Lalu Prasad, who heads the RJD and whom he had unseated from power, on the same page. Initially, the state BJP seemed to be in agreement with the demand and its legislators even voted in favour of the two resolutions seeking a caste based census which got passed unanimously. However, the Centre's recent averment has dropped signals that the top leadership might be taking a different view resulting in state leaders, especially those from the upper castes, criticising the demand for caste census, calling it a 'divisive exercise'. "There is conflict within the BJP over the issue. Some of its leaders are speaking in favour, some are speaking against. They need to set their house in order, Kushwaha, who was a Union minister under Modi, said. He had briefly parted ways with Kumar and floated Rashtriya Lok Samata Party. Kushwaha, who recently merged his RLSP with the JD(U), a move seen as part of Nitish Kumar's strategy to consolidate his Kurmi-Koeri support base, also scoffed at suggestions that with not much time left for census, a headcount for all castes might have to wait for a decade. "What is the problem in this digital age? You just have to insert an additional column of caste..... I do not pay much heed to pointless objections. I am hopeful that the meeting of our CM with the PM will bear fruit and the Centre will do the needful," said Kushwaha, a strong votary of reservation politics who has been advocating quotas in the judiciary and the private sector. The JD(U) leader, whose reported remark at a seminar here the previous day warning of a crisis within the NDA in the event of the demand for caste census going unheeded has created ripples, sought to scale down his pitch. "We do not have any reason to think about such a scenario. Our CM has said he was hopeful of a positive response from the Centre. I share the optimism," said Kushwaha. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) India on Thursday reported a net increase of 11,398 in active cases to take its count to 322,327. Indias share of global active cases now stands at 1.84 per cent (one in 54). The country is tenth among the most affected countries by active cases. On Wednesday, it added 46,164 cases to take its total caseload to 32,558,530 from 32,512,366 an increase of 0.1%. And, with 607 new fatalities, its Covid-19 reached 436,365, or 1.34 per cent of total confirmed infections. With 8,040,407 more Covid-19 vaccine doses being administered on Wednesday, Indias total count of vaccine shots so far reached 603,846,475. The count of recovered cases across India, meanwhile, reached 31,788,440 or 97.63 per cent of total caseload with 34,159 new cured cases being reported on Thursday. Now the tenth-most-affected country by active cases, third by deaths, second by total cases, and first by recoveries, India has added 236,276 cases in the past 7 days. India now accounts for 1.84% of all active cases globally (one in every 54 active cases), and 9.76% of all deaths (one in every 10 deaths). India has so far administered 603,846,475 vaccine doses. That is 1854.64 per cent of its total caseload, and 43.27 per cent of its population. Among Indian states, the top 5 in terms of number of vaccine shots administered are Uttar Pradesh (70935839), Maharashtra (59560229), Gujarat (47612439), Rajasthan (45895537), and Madhya Pradesh (45325000). Among states with more than 10 million population, the top 5 in number of vaccine shots per one million population are Kerala (829329), Uttarakhand (760178), Gujarat (745431), Delhi (735033), and J&K (611425). Backwards from here, the last 1 million cases for India have come in 28 days. The count of active cases across India on Thursday saw a net addition of 11,398, compared with 2,776 on Wednesday. States and UTs hat have seen the biggest daily net increase in active cases are Kerala (10959), Maharashtra (435), Mizoram (418), Andhra Pradesh (384), and Odisha (97). With 34,159 new daily recoveries, Indias recovery rate stands at 97.63%, while fatality rate remained unchanged at 1.34%. The Indian states and UTs with the worst case fatality rates at present are Punjab (2.72%), Uttarakhand (2.15%), and Maharashtra (2.12%). The rate in as many as 14 is higher than the national average. Indias new daily closed cases stand at 34,766 609 deaths and 34,159 recoveries. The share of deaths in total closed cases stands at 1.75%. Indias 5-day moving average of daily rate of addition to total cases stands at 0.1%. Indias doubling time for total cases stands at 488.5 days, and for deaths at 497.9 days. Overall, five states with the biggest 24-hour jump in total cases are Kerala (31445), Maharashtra (5031), Andhra Pradesh (1601), Tamil Nadu (1573), and Karnataka (1224). Among states with more than 100,000 cases, the five with worst recovery rates at present are Kerala (95.09%). India on Wednesday conducted 1,787,283 to take the total count of tests conducted so far in the country to 513,129,378. The test positivity rate recorded was 2.6%. Five states with the highest test positivity rate (TPR) percentage of tested people turning out to be positive for Covid-19 infection (by cumulative data for tests and cases are Goa (14.72%), Dadra & Nagar Haveli-Daman & Diu (14.72%), Sikkim (12.79%), Kerala (12.71%), and Maharashtra (12.18%). Five states with the highest TPR by daily numbers for tests and cases added are Kerala (19.03%), Manipur (10%), Meghalaya (9.15%), Mizoram (8.24%), and Sikkim (5.4%). Among states and UTs with more than 10 million population, five that have carried out the highest number of tests (per million population) are Delhi (1350810), J&K (958881), Kerala (855772), Karnataka (628422), and Telangana (614400). The five most affected states by total cases are Maharashtra (6437680), Kerala (3883429), Karnataka (2942250), Tamil Nadu (2605647), and Andhra Pradesh (2006191). Maharashtra, the most affected state overall, has reported 5031 new cases to take its tally to 6437680. Kerala, the second-most-affected state by total tally, has added 31445 cases to take its tally to 3883429. Karnataka, the third-most-affected state, has reported 1224 cases to take its tally to 2942250. Tamil Nadu has added 1573 cases to take its tally to 2605647. Andhra Pradesh has seen its tally going up by 1601 to 2006191. Uttar Pradesh has added 21 cases to take its tally to 1709173. Delhi has added 65 cases to take its tally to 1437550. The on Thursday turned down the state government's plea seeking rectification of its recent order in which it stayed the operation of section 5 of the new anti-conversion law. Section 5 of the Gujarat Freedom Of Religion (Amendment) Act, 2021 mandates that religious priests must take prior permission from the district magistrate for converting any person from one religion to another. Moreover, the one who got converted also needs to "send an intimation" to the district magistrate in a prescribed form. "We do not find reason to make any changes in the order passed by us on August 19," a division bench of Chief Justice Vikram Nath and Justice Biren Vaishnav after hearing the arguments put forth by state Advocate General Kamal Trivedi. Trivedi, on behalf of the state government, told the bench that section 5 of the Gujarat Freedom Of Religion (Amendment) Act, 2021 was there ever since the original law was enacted in 2003 and it has nothing to do with marriage per se. He tried to convince the judges that a stay on section 5 would actually stay the application of the entire law itself, and no one would approach the authorities for seeking permission before getting converted. On August 19, the high court stayed sections 3, 4, 4A to 4C, 5, 6 and 6A of the amended Act pending further hearing, saying they "shall not operate merely because a marriage is solemnised by a person of one religion with a person of another religion without force or by allurement or by fraudulent means and such marriages cannot be termed as marriages for the purposes of unlawful conversion". Trivedi told the court that section 5 does not use the word "marriage" and it deals with permission from the district magistrate for conversion, either before or after marriage, or even in cases without marriage. "Since there is a stay on section 5, no one will come for the permission even if it's a voluntary conversion without marriage. They will say that the high court had stayed the rigors of section 5. It is meant for such propositions where everything is willingly done. This order means the whole law now stands stayed," said Trivedi, while urging the bench to lift the stay on section 5 by rectifying the previous order. "The other sections which have been stayed are related to marriage, while section 5 is for legal voluntary conversion. Under that section, if someone goes to the priest, the priest has to take the permission. It deals with lawful conversion. Why a section dealing with lawful conversion should be stayed?" asked Trivedi. However, the bench told Trivedi that it is his own interpretation that the court has stayed the prior permission part for all sort of conversions. "If a bachelor wants to get converted, he will require that permission. We have not stayed it. We have stayed the conversion through marriage only. That's what we have said in the order," Chief Justice Nath said while rejecting the state government's plea. The Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act, 2021, which penalises forcible or fraudulent religious conversion through marriage, was notified by the BJP-led state government on June 15 this year. Similar laws have also been enacted by BJP governments in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. Last month, the Gujarat chapter of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind filed a petition in the HC, claiming that some of the amended sections of the state's new law were unconstitutional. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) India on Thursday airlifted 35 people including 11 Nepalese nationals in a military aircraft from but could not evacuate over 140 others as they could not reach the airport due to precarious security scenario and restrictions imposed by the Taliban, people familiar with the development said. On Wednesday, India firmed up a plan to evacuate at least 180 people from in a C-17 transport aircraft of the Indian Air Force and almost all formalities were completed for the mission, they said. However, more than 140 people, mostly Afghan Sikhs and Hindus, could not reach the Hamid Karzai international airport in view of multiple check posts and other restrictions imposed by the Taliban, they said. After delaying its take off for several hours, the aircraft left for India this morning with 24 Indians and 11 Nepalese nationals. "Op Devi Shakti in action! @IAF_MC flight with 24 Indian and 11 Nepalese evacuees from is on its way to Delhi. #DeviShakti," External Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi tweeted in the morning. The people cited above said the security situation around the Kabul airport deteriorated further in the last couple of days due to which the Afghans and other people could not reach it to board the IAF aircraft. On Thursday, two explosions took place outside the airport amid a scramble by various countries to evacuate their citizens and Afghan partners from Kabul before the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of American troops from the war-ravaged country. The Associated Press reported quoting Russian officials that at least 13 people were killed in the twin suicide bombings. American forces have been handling the security at the Hamid Karzai international airport in Kabul. Thousands of Afghans have been crowding around the Kabul airport for over a week, in a desperate attempt to flee the country fearing the Taliban's brutality. Under its mission "Operation Devi Shakti", India has already evacuated over 800 people after Kabul was captured by the on August 15. Several G-7 leaders requested US President Joe Biden to extend the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of American troops. However, Biden said the US is trying to stick to the timetable. In the last few days, India has stepped up efforts to evacuate its citizens as well as its Afghan partners from Kabul in view of the deteriorating security situation in the Afghan capital and other parts of the country. On Tuesday, 78 people, including 25 Indian nationals and a number of Afghan Sikhs and Hindus, were airlifted to Delhi from Dushanbe, a day after they were evacuated from Kabul to the Tajik city. India evacuated 392 people including two Afghan lawmakers in three different flights on Sunday. The seized control of Kabul on August 15. Within two days of the Taliban's capture of Kabul, India evacuated 200 people, including the Indian envoy and other staffers of its embassy in the Afghan capital. The first evacuation flight brought back over 40 people, mostly staffers at the Indian embassy on August 16. The second aircraft evacuated around 150 people including Indian diplomats, officials, security personnel and some stranded Indians from Kabul on August 17. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Chief Minister Basavaraj S Bommai on Thursday met Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya and requested him to supply 5 lakh doses of Covid vaccine daily to the state. In the meeting, Bommai updated the Union minister on measures taken to control spread of the pandemic. "I informed that the state has planned 5 lakh a day programme from next month. And the minister has assured support to meet the demand of the programme," Bommai told reporters after the meeting. Mandaviya informed that the Centre will give more doses of vaccines from September-October onwards to all states, including Karnataka, he said, adding that the state will start preparing for this programme immediately. Earlier, the Centre had provided 3.5 lakh doses of vaccine a day. Last week, it was increased to 4-4.5 lakh doses a day. "Yesterday, we touched 5 lakh doses a day. In future, we plan 5 lakh doses a day," Bommai said. Later, he also called on Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan with whom he discussed about the National Education Policy. Pradhan informed that he will hold a workshop with the state government to understand the work undertaken by it under the policy, Bommai said. He said after full preparations, he will invite the Union Minister for the launch of primary and secondary level of education as per the new policy. Bommai further said he discussed about state textile and industries related issues with the Union Commerce and Textile Minister Piyush Goyal, who has assured full support to the state. "There is a plan for a mega textile programme. The minister has asked us to send a proposal," he said. Bommai also called on BJP National General Secretary and in-charge of affairs Arun Singh and discussed party-related issues. Water Resources Minister Govinda Karjol, Health Minister K Sudhakar, Member of Parliament Shivakumar Udasi and principal secretary to the chief minister Manjunath Prasadh were also present in the meeting. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The surge in COVID-19 infections in continued with the daily cases soaring past 30,000 for the second consecutive day on Thursday, even as opposition and public health experts attacked the state government's alleged "carelessness" and "unwise" decisions for the spike. today clocked 30,007 fresh cases, which is slightly lower than yesterday's 31,445 virus infection. Health Minister Veena George, who reviewed the state's COVID-19 situation two days ago, today blamed the violation of home quarantine directives for the worsening situation and cautioned against the increased indoor transmission of at homes. Taking a serious note of the situation in Kerala, Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla on Thursday reviewed the situation and the steps taken to contain the alarming graph of the virus in the southern state. The home secretary reviewed the COVID-19 situation and the steps taken to contain the spread of the virus in the southern state and gave a number of suggestions, a home ministry official said. The meeting in which Bhalla took stock of the situation in Kerala also discussed issues related to containment strategy and medical infrastructure, the official added. Several top officials of the Centre and the state government attended the meeting, which was held through a video-conference Amid concerns of rise in cases in Kerala, the central government said the southern state is the only one reporting over 1 lakh active COVID-19 cases, while four states have 10,000 to 1 lakh active cases and 31 states have less than 10,000 active cases. It noted that 58.4 per cent of the total COVID-19 cases last week were reported from Kerala. The central government said the months of September and October will be crucial in pandemic management and cautioned that festivals should be celebrated in accordance with COVID-19-appropriate behaviour. Addressing a media briefing in New Delhi today, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan reiterated that the country is still in the midst of the second wave. Quoting a recent study by the health department, Kerala Health Minister said 35 per cent of people in the state were found to have been infected with the disease from home. The present situation is that when one person in the house gets infected, the disease is transmitted to other members also, she said in a statement and urged people to strictly abide by the directives of the government to keep the disease at bay. The minister said only those who have the required facilities at houses should prefer home quarantine and others should shift to domiciliary COVID-care centres (DCCs). George advised those placed under home quarantine not to step out of their room and asked all members of the house to wear masks to avoid risk of indoor transmission. She also released a set of directives to be followed by the people to fight the disease Her statement came hours after the Kerala government faced flak from its political opponents and public health experts for its alleged "carelessness" and "unwise" decisions regarding COVID-19 management, which according to them has led to the rise in cases and TPR in the southern state. The TPR, which was 19.03 per cent on Wednesday, also showed a slight dip today at 18.03 per cent. The last time it had crossed the 19 per cent mark was three months back on May 26 when it was 19.95 per cent. Attacking the state's ruling CPI(M)-led LDF government, Union Minister of State for External Affairs and Parliamentary Affairs V Muraleedharan attributed this to the "carelessness" of the Left government, which according to him was more focused on celebrating the anniversary of the Moplah riots rather than managing COVID-19. "Carelessness of the state government was the reason for this," he said and added that the Left government was "more focused on celebrating the anniversary of the Moplah riots". "That is not the priority. Dealing with COVID-19 should be the priority," he said while addressing the media in New Delhi. A similar view was expressed by senior Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala, who on Thursday told reporters that the state government has failed to prevent spread of COVID-19 in the state and demanded that Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan apologise to the people. The senior MLA in the state Assembly also alleged that the "carelessness" of the state was the reason behind the rise in COVID-19 cases in Kerala. Talking to PTI, well-known public health expert Dr S S Lal blamed the absence of a clear-cut COVID management strategy, the keeping of the scientific community away from decision making and the "unwise" decisions taken at the bureaucratic level for the present fast spreading of the disease. Lal, who unsuccessfully contested in the recent Assembly election on a Congress ticket, also urged the CPI(M)-led government to release the health data related to the virus infection to evaluate the actual situation prevailing in the state. "The government is hiding all data related to the COVID-19. We are unable to analyse the actual COVID situation in the state due to the unavailability of the data. If we are able to access it, we can figure out the basic facts like which age group is most affected and so on," he said. In their briefing in New Delhi, ICMR Director General Balram Bhargava said vaccines are disease modifying and not disease preventing so it is very important to continue the use of masks even after vaccination. Bhushan said, "We are still in the midst of the second surge of COVID-19 in our country. The second surge has not yet concluded. It is not over and therefore, we have to maintain all necessary precautions, particularly in light of our experience that after every festival we see a spike." "The coming months of September and October are crucial for us because we would be celebrating a few festivals. Thus festivals have to be celebrated with Covid-appropriate behaviour," he added. The government said 41 districts in India were reporting a COVID-19 weekly positivity rate of more than 10 per cent. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Election Commission on Thursday unveiled a new initiative to reach out to new voters by sending them a personalised letter along with their voter identity card. Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar launched the initiative. The new voters will get a personalised letter from the Commission when they are sent their voter identity cards. The package would include a voter guide for new voters along with a congratulatory letter and a pledge for ethical voting, the Commission said in a statement. The initiative was launched during a two-day SVEEP (Systematic Voters' Education and Electoral Participation) consultation workshop. The agenda of the workshop was to review state SVEEP plans and conduct extensive deliberations on the important aspects of SVEEP for a comprehensive strategy for the forthcoming assembly elections. Addressing the participants, Chandra observed that each voter interacts with the election machinery at two critical stages -- enrollment and polling day. He stressed that the field teams should ensure that the enrolment process is seamless and polling experience remains pleasant and hassle free for the voters. He said it is imperative that we evaluate our strategy and current interventions at regular intervals, identify critical gaps and address the challenges to devise deliverable action points. The CEC emphasised that implementation of the strategy at the ground level is important. Election Commissioner Kumar said the need for communication is self evident in today's world. He highlighted the role of social media and the new mediums of communication in outreach efforts. He felt partnering with district level local icons will help strengthen our messaging with our voters. Election Commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey, while interacting with the teams on the previous day, highlighted the importance of synergy between the use of social media and traditional forms of communication in the SVEEP strategy. Pandey said that the state teams should further conduct similar workshops and deliberations with district electoral officers and their teams in respective states. The two-day consultation workshop was attended by chief electoral officers and SVEEP nodal officers from Goa, Punjab, Manipur, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand which are ging to polls early next year. To broaden the idea and knowledge exchange, senior officers from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting were also invited for the workshop. Systematic Voters' Education and Electoral Participation programme is the flagship programme of the Election Commission for voter education and awareness, spreading voter awareness and promoting voter literacy in India. (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.) Nine new judges, including three women, whose appointments to the have been cleared by the Centre, are likely to be sworn-in on August 31 by Chief Justice of India (CJI) N V Ramana, apex court sources said on Thursday. President Ram Nath Kovind has signed the warrants of their appointment including that of Justice B V Nagarathna, who is in line to become the first woman in September 2027. Sources said that four out of nine new apex court judges are chief justices of different high courts and they need some time to wind up their administrative and judicial work there. They said in all the high courts, Friday is the last working day of the week and the judges need at least one working day to wind up their work there. With a sanctioned strength of 34 judges, the as of now has 10 vacancies. Once the new judges will take oath next week, the top court will have only one vacancy. Besides Justice Nagarathna, the third senior-most judge of the Karnataka High Court, the other women judges who have been appointed to the apex court are Justice Hima Kohli, the Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court, and Justice Bela M Trivedi, the fifth senior-most judge of the Gujarat High Court. The chief justices of different high courts who have made it to the are -- Abhay Shreeniwas Oka (Chief Justice of the Karnataka High Court), Vikram Nath (Chief Justice of the Gujarat High Court) and Jitendra Kumar Maheshwari (Chief Justice of the Sikkim High Court). Besides them, Justice C T Ravikumar of the Kerala High Court and Justice M M Sundresh of the Madras High Court have also been appointed to the top court. Senior advocate and former Additional Solicitor General P S Narasimha has also been appointed as a judge of the apex court. The apex court, which came into being on January 26, 1950, has seen very few women judges since its inception and in the last over 71 years has appointed only eight lady judges starting from M Fathima Beevi in 1989. Presently, Justice Indira Banerjee is the lone serving woman judge in the apex court after her elevation on August 7, 2018 from the Madras High Court where she was serving as the Chief Justice. While high court judges retire at the age of 62, the retirement age of Supreme Court judges is 65. Justice Nagarathna, born on October 30, 1962, is the daughter of former E S Venkataramiah. The Supreme Court collegium had last week recommended to the Centre these nine names for appointing them as judges of the apex court. The recommendation by the Supreme Court's five-member collegium headed by Ramana at its meeting on August 17 puts an end to the 21-month-long logjam over appointment of new judges to the top court. The impasse over the appointment had led to a situation in which not a single name for the judgeship in the apex court could be recommended after the superannuation of the then CJI Ranjan Gogoi on November 17, 2019. Three out of these nine new judges are set to become the CJIs. Justice Vikram Nath is in line to become the CJI upon retirement of sitting apex court judge Justice Surya Kant in February 2027. Justice Nath would be succeeded by Justice Nagarathna, who would have a tenure of over a month as the head of the judiciary. Senior advocate Narasimha would succeed Justice Nagarathna as the CJI and would have a tenure of over six months. (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.) Left parties on Wednesday hit out at the Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, claiming that is a plan to "sell" India's assets and it will be "disastrous". Sitharaman on Monday launched the NMP in an effort to list out the government's infrastructure assets to be sold over the next four years. Addressing the media, she said the budget identified infrastructure as the key focus for public expenditure. The NMP comprises a four-year pipeline of the government's brownfield infrastructure assets. "CAMOUFLAGED in jargon that speaks of 'monetisation of de-risked assets', the BJP-led NDA government has announced its plan to sell out India's public sector," the CPI(M) said in an editorial in its mouthpiece People's Democracy. The party also said that the finance minister "conveniently side-stepped" key issues. "In sum monetisation, while justified as a process through which resources for investment in greenfield infrastructure projects is to be mobilised, is nothing but a scheme to expand the terrain of operation of big business, so that the latter can earn high returns either at the expense of the consumer or the state exchequer. It is a scheme to engineer a transfer of income and wealth to those at the apex of the wealth pyramid," it said. The party also said that there is "little clarity" on how the government would ensure that private managers of assets would provide services of acceptable quality. Putting in place a regulatory regime for the purpose can be costly and time consuming, leading to neglect and a decline in the quality of more expensive services. It also alleged that the scheme, which the party said was "scandalous" was aimed to fatten the "bottom line of chosen business" houses and would not contribute significantly to the creation of new assets. "The government claims that Rs 111 lakh crore will be invested over five years in projects included in the so-called Infrastructure Pipeline. The Rs 6 lakh crore to be realised from asset monetisation is only about five per cent of that. The Modi government is justifying handing over wealth created with public money over decades to big business to get itself five per cent of the planned investment in infrastructure over the coming five years. This is nothing but a scam parading as a plan," it said. The CPI in a statement also criticised the NMP stating that it was a continuation of the "government's anti-people economic policies". "Disastrous monetisation continues. All of us know that monetisation is one step short of direct sale and of national assets. Thus the government's anti-people economic policies continue," CPI general secretary D Raja said in a statement. The response of the government to the questions raised by political parties and trade unions is not at all convincing, but it clearly shows that the government abdicates its responsibility to revive the economy from recession and shows its shameless commitment to help the corporate houses and big business houses to loot the national assets, he alleged. The of India calls upon people to intensify struggles against these retrograde policies, Raja said. The NMP comprises a four-year pipeline of the central government's brownfield infrastructure assets. Besides providing visibility to investors, it will also serve as a medium-term roadmap for the asset monetisation initiative of the government. The government proposes to raise Rs 6 lakh crore through this measure. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Thursday directed that erstwhile Unitech promoters Sanjay Chandra and Ajay Chandra be shifted from here to Mumbai's Arthur Road Jail and Taloga jail in Maharashtra. A bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and M R Shah said that two reports of Enforcement Directorate about the conduct of Sanjay and Ajay and connivance of staff in flouting the orders and undermining the jurisdiction of the court have raised some serious and disturbing issues. In the circumstances, we order and direct that both the accused, Sanjay Chandra and Ajay Chandra be shifted from Tihar Central Jail to the premises of Arthur Road Jail, Mumbai and Taloja Central Jail, Mumbai, respectively, the bench said in its 27-page order. It said that the video conferencing facility at the Jails to which the accused are being transferred shall be made available so as to enable them to record their presence in the court proceedings where their presence is required. "A copy of this communication shall be forwarded by the Registrar (Judicial) of this Court to the Director General of Police, Maharashtra so that necessary arrangements can be made immediately for housing the accused at Arthur Road Jail and Taloja Central Jail," the bench said. It directed that Delhi Police Commissioner personally hold inquiry forthwith about the conduct of staff with regard to Chandras and submit the report to the court within four weeks. In this backdrop, we are of the view that the Commissioner of Police must make an immediate enquiry into the contents of the communication dated August 16, 2021 addressed to him by the Directorate of Enforcement so that all the officers and staff of Tihar Central Jail who may be complicit in the violation of law are held accountable, the bench said. It added that this process should commence immediately and a report should be filed within a period of four weeks on the action which has been taken pursuant to the communication dated August 16, 2021. The bench clarified that the enquiry shall be conducted by the Commissioner of Police, Delhi personally and shall not be delegated to any other officer. The top court said that the ED's status report contains a copy of a letter dated August 16, 2021 written by the Assistant Director of ED to the Delhi police commissioner. It said that the letter contains details of the manner in which the premises of Tihar Central Jail have been misused by the accused for engaging in illegal activities by flouting the jail manual, making transfers of assets and dissipating the proceeds of crime and influencing witnesses and attempting to derail the investigation. The contents of ED's communication dated August 16, 2021 raise serious and disturbing issues. What is of concern to the Court is that the jurisdiction of this Court is sought to be undermined in complicity with the jail staff, if the contents of the letter are true, the bench said, adding, the second status report elaborates upon several aspects which have been adverted to in the communication to the Commissioner of Police. It said that letter's content and the material which has come on the record indicate that, despite the orders of this Court, irregularities are taking place within the precincts of the Tihar Central Jail where the two accused have been lodged. These activities undermine the authority of the Court and will derail the investigation which has been ordered by the Directorate of Enforcement, the bench said. It asked the Enforcement Directorate to proceed ahead with the investigation expeditiously saying that the probe in the matter has been proceeding at a tardy pace and the Court should be apprised of the status of the investigation within a period of four weeks from today. The bench posted the matter for hearing after six weeks and sought a status report of ED by then. The top court noted that its order of May 9, 2019, adverts to the status report filed by M/s Grant Thornton, who were appointed as Forensic Auditors to assess the financial dealings of Unitech Ltd, which indicates that the auditors were not provided complete access to all electronic records, including those which were in possession of the Chief Financial Officer, Unitech Ltd. In this backdrop, the Court recalled the facilities which had been made available to the accused - Sanjay Chandra and Ajay Chandra, former Directors of Unitech Limited who were lodged in Tihar Central Jail. The Court directed that they shall not be entitled to any additional facilities apart from those which are available in normal course in terms of the jail manual, the bench said. Making a startling revelation in the top court, the ED during the hearing said it has unearthed a secret underground office in South Delhi here which was being operated by erstwhile Unitech founder Ramesh Chandra and visited by his sons Sanjay and Ajay when on parole or bail. ED which has been investigating money laundering charges against the Chandras' and Unitech Ltd, said in its report that both Sanjay and Ajay have rendered the entire judicial custody meaningless as they have been freely communicating, instructing their officials and disposing of properties from inside the jail in connivance with the prison staff there. (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.) Accusing a section of the and AIUDF of being in cahoots with the in Assam, TMC leader Sushmita Dev has said there is a "vacuum" in the opposition space in the state and the Northeast which her new party can fill. Dev, who was one of the national spokespersons of the and its women's wing chief, switched over to the TMC last week. She feels her joining the TMC will not come in the way of an alliance between the two parties at the national level as politics is not about charity". She said the Congress, too, is inducting people from other parties. "It is indeed a big change and step in my thirty-year-old political career. Politics is also about being relevant and serving the people. Certain decisions that the took in the greater interest of the party had a negative impact in the area from where I come. I had felt that if we lose the 2021 election, we won't have the face to ask the electorate to vote for us again, Dev told PTI in an interview. The former Congress MP from Assam's Silchar questioned the "intent" of the Congress and opposition parties like the AIUDF of fighting against the in and the Northeast. "We allied in to defeat the But what was demoralising was that after we lost the elections, several leaders of Congress, AIUDF and some other opposition parties started praising the chief minister. A section of leaders of these opposition parties is hand in gloves with Himanta Biswa Sarma ( CM). "My question is if the mainstream opposition parties have joined hands with the BJP, then where is the opposition in Assam. Who will oppose the anti-people policies of the BJP?" she asked. Noting that revival of the Congress in Assam and the Northeast is a tough task, Dev said, "There are some defeats from which you can recover and stand on your feet, and there are some defeats after which it is tough to make a turnaround." When asked what prompted her to join the TMC, she said her former party was not in a position to take on the BJP in the region. "Changing my ideology was out of the question. I am anti-BJP and will continue to oppose their divisive politics. After the assembly elections in five states, Congress lost in Assam, Puduerry, Kerala....but Mamata didi managed to sail through and stop the BJP juggernaut. She is a national leader after her spectacular victory," she said, explaining the reason for her quitting the Congress. She said the Congress, which ruled Assam for decades, is "confused". "There is an opposition vacuum in Assam and the TMC will fill this gap. they are serious about it," she said. Dev said the TMC, Mamata Banerjee and party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee are serious about fighting the BJP in Assam and other states of the Northeast but currently the main focus is on the 2023 Tripura assembly polls. When asked whether her switchover to the TMC would impact the Congress-TMC unity at the national level, Dev replied in the negative. "The TMC has made it clear that it is not poaching leaders from other parties, but if anyone is inspired by Mamata Banerjee, then they are welcome. Congress too inducts leaders from other parties such as BJP, Shiv Sena, TRS. They also induct people from diametrically opposite parties," she said. Dev, however, refrained from commenting on the accusations of a "drift in the Congress" and said the party has an able leadership. She said it was too early to comment on who will be the leader of the opposition alliance if it takes shape ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. "It is a pertinent question and it has to be answered. But the Lok Sabha polls are still three years away. It's still too early. First, we have to tell the nation that we can work together and then prove that we are a formidable force. We have to walk the talk on issues against the government and take it to task. Then at an appropriate time we can answer this question," she said. Speaking on the issue of the CAA and NRC in Assam as her new party TMC has opposed both, Dev said CAA is a half-baked solution by the BJP but maintained that the issue of the stateless people under the NRC in Assam has to be addressed. "I am neither in favour nor in opposition to CAA. The CAA evoked emotions in Assam which is what BJP wanted. Now that the election is over, they have gone silent. It is a half-baked solution. What I said was that those who were left out of the National Register of Citizens in Assam cannot remain stateless. There has to be a solution within the constitutional framework. But BJP twisted and misinterpreted my statement," she 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.) Some of those evacuated from have tested positive for COVID-19 and they have been isolated and are being treated, the government said on Thursday. Responding to a question at a press conference, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said, "Whoever lands (in India) they are given anti-polio vaccine because wild polio is still prevalent in and Pakistan. We have also made arrangement that all of their RT-PCR tests are done and some of them have tested positive." He said over 400 people have been evacuated from so far. Bhushan said those who tested positive for the have been isolated and are being treated. He said, "Several people have been sent to ITBP camp in Chawala (Delhi) where they are quarantined and they will stay there for 14 days and from there it will be decided where they have to be sent." India on Thursday evacuated 24 of its citizens and 11 Nepalese nationals in a military aircraft from Kabul in the backdrop of further deterioration in the security situation in the Afghan capital. It has earlier evacuated its embassy personnel, other Indian nationals and some Afghan nationals, including Hindus and Sikhs. The swept across Afghanistan this month, seizing control of almost all key towns and cities including Kabul in the backdrop of the withdrawal of the US forces. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) India may not see a terrible third wave, but it has to prepare for the worst, Narendra Kumar Arora, co-chairman of the Indian Sars-Cov-2 Genomics Consortium (INSACOG), told Business Standard. Amid concerns around booster shots and fears of a third wave, Arora said decision on such a dose would be taken depending on the local context. That the US and Israel are giving these shots is noted but our decision will be based on our data. We have suffered Delta already. And Delta has attacked them now, Arora said. He said the booster dose was dependent on epidemiology ... Captains of the have hit out at the government for not walking the talk on reducing taxes. The government is considering modifying the Faceless Assessment Scheme meant to cut down the physical interface between taxpayers and the More on those stories in our top headlines this morning Top taxpayers may get flexibility to exit faceless assessment scheme The Centre is looking at modifying the ambitious Faceless Assessment Scheme (FAS) meant to cut down the physical interface between a taxpayer and the Among other things, the change could offer flexibility to the top rung of taxpayers whose income exceeds Rs 200 crore. Read more... R C Bhargava, Venu Srinivasan face off with govt on auto GST rate In a rare face off, captains of the have hit out at the government for not walking the talk. At an industry event in the capital on Wednesday, R C Bhargava, chairman of Indias largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki, and Venu Srinivasan, chairman of TVS Motor, questioned the governments intent to support the auto sector. Revenue secretary Tarun Bajaj sat in the audience listening, before his turn came to counter them. Read more... Mukesh Ambani is going green but it's oil that fuels Reliance's bottomline Along the Arabian Sea, the Indian city of Jamnagar is a money-making machine for Asias richest man, Mukesh Ambani, processing crude oil into fuel, plastics and chemicals. Its also where the billionaire is making his newest bet: a $10 billion investment in green energy. Read more... FM Sitharaman asks PSBs to conduct credit outreach programme across India Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday asked public sector banks (PSBs) to reach out to various sectors, especially export, to address their credit needs in order to keep up the momentum of the stimulus for economic revival. She also told them to conduct a credit outreach programme in every district of the country, starting October. Read more... China's tech crackdown could be music to the ears of Indian start-ups The Chinese government is imposing severe restrictions on their tech companies whether it is on data security, marketing practices or floating an IPO. Should this be music to the ears of Indian start-ups and home-grown private equity (PE) funds? Ask Indian start-ups and the answer is a resounding yes. Read more... With accounting for 68 per cent of the fresh COVID-19 cases in the country, Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla on Thursday reviewed the situation and the steps taken to contain the alarming graph of the virus in the southern state. Of the 46,164 fresh cases recorded in the country in the last 24 hours, 31,445 were in The home secretary reviewed the COVID-19 situation and the steps taken to contain the spread of the virus in the southern state and gave a number of suggestions, a home ministry official said. The meeting in which Bhalla took stock of the situation in also discussed issues related to containment strategy and medical infrastructure, the official added. Several top officials of the Centre and the state government attended the meeting, which was held through a video-conference. A central team, which visited Kerala recently, had also flagged issues relating to the containment strategy adopted by the state, another official said. According to official data, Kerala is the only state in the country reporting over one lakh active COVID-19 cases, while four states have active cases in the range of 10,000 to one lakh and 31 have less than 10,000 active cases of the infection. Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, who visited Kerala on August 16, announced a special package of Rs 267.35 crore for the southern state to strengthen its health infrastructure. During his visit, Mandaviya had a meeting with Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, Health Minister Veena George and officials. He also announced that the Centre would provide all possible help to the state. Besides, it was promised that an amount of Rs 1 crore would be made available to each district in Kerala to create a pool of medicines. With 46,164 people testing positive for the infection in a day, India's COVID-19 tally has climbed to 3,25,58,530, while the number of active cases has shot up to 3,33,725, the Union health ministry said on Thursday. The death toll due to the viral disease has gone up to 4,36,365 with 607 fresh fatalities, according to the ministry's data. (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.) About 165,000 workers in the registered themselves on the e-Shram portal on the first day of its launch on Thursday. The portal, which aims to build a comprehensive database of unorganised workers in the country, would ensure the formalisation of the workforce, industry bodies said. After unveiling the portal, Labour and Employment Minister Bhupender Yadav said there were an estimated 380 million workers in the unorganised sector, and the platform would help provide the benefits of various central and state welfare schemes to them, particularly in times like these. There are varying estimates of the number of unorganised workers. According to the Economic Survey (2018-19), 93 per cent of the total workforce in India is in the According to an estimate, the total workforce in the country is 450 million. Ninety-three per cent of this comes to 418.5 million. Workers registered on the portal would be given accidental insurance cover. They will be eligible for Rs 2 lakh on death or permanent disability and Rs 1 lakh in case of partial disability. Yadav said the registration process was made simple so that every worker was covered. He informed that up to four workers can register through one mobile handset. Those who don't have mobile handsets can go to the nearest centre and get themselves registered by giving even thumb impressions, he said. Since migrant workers keep changing their economic activities, their registration could be updated through just an SMS, the minister said. He said various trade unions were consulted before launching the portal. Union leaders wanted to know whether various sectoral schemes would be merged into one. To this, Yadav replied that no scheme would be merged. Confederation of Indian Industry Director General Chandrajit Banerjee said building a national database on unorganised workers was central to the effort towards the formalisation of the workforce. Taken together with the reform of labour laws through the four labour codes, this measure represents a major turning point in the labour environment of the country, he said. Yadav emphasised on cooperative federalism for making last-mile delivery of the schemes. Labour and Employment Secretary Apurva Chandra said the data would be shared with state governments. About Rs 704 crore has been budgeted for the portal for a period of five years. The portal will have a database of all kinds of workers in the These workers are of many kinds such as migrant workforce, street vendors, and domestic workers. It will also have a database on gig and platform workers. For this purpose, the labour minister had launched the logo of the portal on Tuesday. As part of the process, the workers will be issued an e-SHRAM card containing a 12-digit unique number. A worker can register himself using his Aadhaar number and bank account details, apart from filling other necessary details like date of birth, home town, mobile number, and social category. Minister of State for Labour and Employment Rameswar Teli said the card would be valid across India in line with the one nation, one ration card scheme. India on Thursday announced new regulations for operating drones, bringing down compliance burden by shortening the approval process, allowing self-certification, and reducing documentation. The rules will replace the Unmanned Aircraft System Rules, 2021, which came into effect only in March this year. The requirement of a new set of rules was felt after industry said the existing rules were tough to follow for drone companies, many of which are new-age start-ups. The new drone rules usher in a landmark moment for this sector in India. The rules are based on the premise of trust and self-certification. Approvals, compliance requirements, and entry barriers have been significantly reduced, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a tweet. This will create history. We think an ecosystem should be established to create a revolution, said Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, adding he thought India would become a hub of drone manufacturing by 2030. He added that simultaneously the government was working on giving approval to the Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLoS) operations for drones. While Visual Line of Sight flights are dependent upon and operated within the pilots line of sight, BVLoS allows drones to fly beyond the visual range, lowering the cost of operation and making it feasible to deploy drones for commercial purposes like food or medicine delivery or air taxi. The time is not far when like taxis that you see on roads, like Uber, etc., you will see taxis in the air under the new I believe this is very possible, he said. The decision to simplify the licensing requirements, relax operational curbs, and reduce penalties for operators was taken at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in July, just days after the terror attack in Jammu using drones, said people in the know. The meeting was attended by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, and National Security Advisor Ajit Doval. Sources said while there were concerns about the security aspect of drones, top government officials were of the view that restricting the drone industry would stifle a sunrise sector which holds significant promise for the future. The Ministry of Civil Aviation and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation had recently short-listed three firms - Throttle Aerospace, ANRA Technologies, and Dhaksha Unmanned Systems -- to start trial for BVLoS operations. Multiple changes have been proposed to the new regulations. The number of forms to be filled out to seek authorisation before operating a drone has been reduced from 25 to six; multiple approvals required earlier like unique authorisation number, unique prototype identification number, certificate of conformance, certificate of maintenance, import clearance, acceptance of existing drones, operator permit have now been abolished. The rules also increase the coverage of drones from 300 kilos (kg) to 500 kg, and will include heavy payload-carrying drones and drone taxis. The new drone rules remove security clearance before any registration or licence issuance, reduce yellow zone from 45 kilometre (km) to 12 km from the airport perimeter, and allow the use of micro drones (for non-commercial use) and nano drones without remote pilot licence. The penalty, in case of non-adherence to the new rules, will not exceed Rs 1 lakh. "The issuance of these rules marks a new era in the Indian drone ecosystem which has a market potential of more than Rs 50,000 crore and can create 500,000 professional jobs in the next five years. The regulations, which cover drones up to 500 kg, shall open up opportunities for indigenous manufacturing of delivery drones and drone taxis, making India future-ready. The establishment of the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Promotion Council, which includes industry and academia, showcases that the government recognises drone technology as one of national importance," said Smit Shah, director, Drone Federation of India. The Centre may promote the adoption of drones and unmanned vehicles through the constitution of an Unmanned Aircraft Systems Promotion Council, according to the rules, which would facilitate development of a business-friendly regulatory regime, including automated permissions, establishment of incubators and other facilities for the development of unmanned aircraft system technologies, involvement of industry experts and academic institutions in policy advice, and organising competitive events involving unmanned aircraft systems and counter-unmanned aircraft system technologies. However, there is still work to be done. An interactive airspace map with green, yellow, and red zones (depending upon national security) will have to be developed on the digital sky platform. No flight permission will be required up to 400 feet (ft) in green zones and up to 200 ft in the area between 8 km and 12 km from the airport perimeter. We have started working with states and defence organisations for them to identify the red, green, and yellow zones. This will take another two months, following which the digital sky platform will be live, said Scindia. India's air safety regulator said on Thursday it had cleared Boeing Co's 737 MAX aircraft to fly with immediate effect, ending its nearly two-and-a-half-years of regulatory grounding in a key travel market for Boeing. Ltd, India's second-largest airline by market share and the only one in the country to fly the 737 MAX aircraft, said earlier in the day it had signed a settlement with lessor Avolon on leases for the aircraft. has more than 100 737 MAX planes on order. Around 175 countries have allowed the 737 MAX to return to service following a safety ban, with 30 airlines already restarting their MAX aircraft services. China is now the only major market where regulators are yet to give the MAX a go-ahead. Boeing earlier this month conducted a test flight of the 737 MAX plane in China. Boeing and did not immediately respond to Reuters' requests for comment after the regulator's nod. On March 13, 2019, all planes were grounded in India by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) after the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX plane on March 10 near Addis Ababa, which had left 157 people, including four Indians, dead. Aircraft manufacturer Boeing has been modifying the 737 MAX plane since March 2019 so that various countries' regulators, including the DGCA, permit its passenger flight operations again. In its order dated August 26, 2021, the stated that the operation of planes are permitted "only upon satisfaction of applicable requirements for return to service". A senior official confirmed that the ban on 737 MAX planes' commercial flight operations has been lifted. (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.) Indian Association on Thursday said it has urged the government to include under the tax rebate scheme RoDTEP (Remission of Duties and Taxes on Exported Products) with an aim to encourage exports from the sector. The government on August 17 announced rates of tax refunds under the export promotion scheme RoDTEP for 8,555 products, such as marine goods, yarn, dairy items. Under the RoDTEP, various central and state duties, taxes, and levies imposed on input products, among others, would be refunded to exporters. The association said that India is well-positioned to become a major player in the global market if it can harness the emerging opportunities through price competitiveness. However, steep increases in the cost of cultivation, transportation, and logistics have adversely impacted the price competitiveness of Indian tobacco, it said in a statement. As there is no level playing field in the international market, India's exports of unprocessed tobacco have fallen sharply, it claimed. "Indian Tobacco Association appeals to the government to include tobacco in the RoDTEP scheme and encourage exports through aggressive promotion schemes," it said. The global competitiveness of the Indian has also been severely affected due to factors like subsidies being provided to tobacco in countries like Zimbabwe, Tanzania, the EU, and the US. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The government on Thursday announced the new "Drone Rules, 2021," which ease the approval process, allow self certification and reduce the documentation and fees, were welcomed by the industry. These rules replace the Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Rules, 2021, which came into force in March this year. "The new Drone Rules usher in a landmark moment for this sector in India. The rules are based on the premise of trust and self-certification. Approvals, compliance requirements and entry barriers have been significantly reduced," Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a tweet on Thursday. The Ministry of Civil Aviation has reduced the number of forms to be filled to operate from 25 to 5 and the types of fees charged from the operator has been reduced from 72 to 4. The rules increase coverage of from 300 kg to 500 kg, and will include heavy payload-carrying and drone taxis. Besides, the new drone rules remove security clearance before any registration or licence issuance, reduce yellow zone from 45 km to 12 km from the airport perimeter, and allow the use of micro drones (for non-commercial use) and nano drones without remote pilot license. "The issuance of these rules marks a new era in the Indian drone ecosystem which has a market potential of more than Rs 50,000 crore and can create 500,000 professional jobs in the next five years. The regulations, which cover drones up to 500 kg, will open up opportunities for indigenous manufacturing of delivery drones and drone taxis making India future ready. The establishment of the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Promotion Council which includes industry and academia showcases that the government recognises drone technology as a technology of national importance," said Smit Shah, Director, Drone Federation of India. The Centre may promote the adoption of drones and unmanned vehicles through the constitution of an Unmanned Aircraft Systems Promotion Council, according to the Rules, which would facilitate development of a business-friendly regulatory regime, including automated permissions, establishment of incubators and other facilities for the development of unmanned aircraft system technologies, involvement of industry experts and academic institutions in policy advice; and organising competitive events involving unmanned aircraft systems and counter-unmanned aircraft system technologies. Industry body National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom) also welcomed the rules. "Approvals eased, coverage up to 500kg, #NPNT later with min 6 month lead time, nominal fee, low penalty, 12km yellow zone from airport & drones upto 200ft allowed in 8-12km from airport. Boost to #innovation #Startups," the policy arm of NAsscom tweeted. The penalty, in case of non observance of the new Rules, would not exceed Rs one lakh. The process will involve the Director General or an officer authorised by the Central Government or a State Government or Union Territory Administration, being satisfied that "a person has contravened or failed to comply with the provisions of these rules". India has been appointed as the transaction adviser for strategic of IDBI Bank, and the firm will assist the government in the sale for Re 1. About 7 firms, including KPMG, had bid to act as transaction advisor for strategic These were Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India LLP, Ernst and Young LLP, ICICI Securities, JM Financial Ltd, KPMG, RBSA Capital Advisors LLP and SBI Capital Markets. placed the lowest bid of Re 1, and was selected as the transaction adviser, said an official. The near-zero bid could make one of the largest players in managing deals in the financial services space if sale is a success, said another official. KPMG's presence in India is already strong and well known in the financial services space, the firm said in response to Business Standard's queries. "With regards to the sale, DIPAM is running the process for selecting a transaction advisor. Hence we would refrain from commenting on the ongoing process," KPMG said. Firms have been placing near-zero bids to manage privatisation of large public sector undertakings as a means to improve their portfolios and establish credentials in respective sectors. Deloitte had recently bid Re 1 to manage the privatisation of Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL), and was appointed as the transaction adviser. KPMG would be required to advise the government on the modalities and the timing of the strategic disinvestment of IDBI Bank, and prepare a scheme to successfully implement the sale. It will have to execute a non-disclosure agreement and provide appropriate information to bidders. Besides this, KPMG will finalise the sale process through bidding or auction, and assist the government in fixing the reserve price considering the valuation of IDBI Bank. The government is looking to sell its 45.48 per cent shareholding in IDBI Bank. Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), which owns 49.24 per cent, will also offload its stake to transfer management control to the new buyer. Markets regulator on Thursday came out with detailed modalities for implementation of the accredited framework, a move expected to open up a new channel of raising funds from sophisticated The regulator has issued guidelines on eligibility criteria for accredited (AIs), procedure as well as validation for accreditation, procedure to avail benefits linked to accreditation and flexibility to investors to withdraw "consent", according to a circular. had earlier this month introduced the concept of "accredited investors" in the Indian securities market. A person will be identified as an accredited investor on the basis of net worth or income. Individuals, HUFs, family trusts, sole proprietorships, partnership firms, trusts and body corporates can get accreditation based on financial parameters specified by the regulator. Under the framework, AIs may avail flexibility in minimum investment amount (lower ticket size) or concessions from specific regulatory requirements applicable to investment products. This is subject to conditions applicable for specific products or services under the rules. The regulator said subsidiaries of depositories and stock exchanges will issue an accreditation certificate to such investors. It further said subsidiaries of recognised stock exchanges can carry out the accreditation process. This is subject to the condition that the stock exchange should have minimum 20 years of presence in the Indian securities market and should have a networth of at least Rs 200 crore. Among other criteria, the exchange needs to have nation-wide terminals and should have investor grievance redressal mechanisms in place, including arbitration and presence of Investor Service Centres (ISCs) in at least 20 cities. Accreditation agencies will be responsible for verification of documents submitted by applicants, timely processing of applications and issuance of accreditation certificate, maintaining data of accredited investors and verification of accreditation status. Eligible subsidiaries will have to make an application to through the concerned stock exchange or depository for recognition as an accreditation agency within three weeks. The accreditation agency will issue a certificate to the applicant as an AI. Each certificate will have a unique accreditation number, name of the accreditation agency, PAN of the applicant and validity of accreditation. In respect of validity of accreditation, Sebi said if the applicant meets the eligibility criteria for accreditation for the preceding one year, the accreditation will be valid for a period of one year. "If the applicant consistently meets the said eligibility criteria for accreditation in each of the preceding three years, the accreditation shall be valid for a period of two years," Sebi said. With regard to eligibility criteria for AIs, Sebi said an individual, Hindu Undivided Family (HUF), family trust or sole proprietorship can be an accredited investor if their annual income is at least Rs 2 crore or net worth is at least Rs 7.50 crore, with at least half of it in financial assets. Such entities with a combination of at least Rs 1 crore annual income and a net worth of Rs 5 crore, with at least half in financial assets, can also become an accredited investor. For trusts other than family trusts, a net worth of at least Rs 50 crore would be required to qualify as accredited investors. For corporates, a net worth of Rs 50 crore will be must. In case of a partnership firm, Sebi said each partner independently will have to meet the eligibility criteria for accreditation. "In case of accreditation of individual investors, HUFs and Sole Proprietorships, the value of the primary residence of the individual, Karta of HUF and the Sole proprietor respectively, shall not be considered for calculation of net worth," Sebi said. Explaining the procedure to avail benefits linked to accreditation, Sebi said prospective investors will have to submit a copy of the accreditation certificate and an undertaking to the investment provider saying such investor has the ability to bear the financial risks associated with the investment. In the undertaking, it needs to be mentioned that such investor has the necessary knowledge and means to understand the features of the investment product, including the associated risks. Sebi said investors will have the flexibility to withdraw their consent and discontinue availing benefits of accreditation subject to certain conditions. "An investor who withdraws consent after availing the benefit of lower ticket size shall be required to increase the investment to the minimum amount that is stipulated under the applicable regulatory framework for the particular investment product, within the timeframe specified in the client agreement," Sebi said. If an investor who has availed concessions in the regulatory framework withdraws the consent furnished to the investment provider before the expiry of the client agreement, the investments already made shall be 'grandfathered' -- that is such investments shall continue to be reckoned as investments by an AI, it added. With effect from the date of withdrawal of consent, any further transaction will be in accordance with the applicable regulatory framework, the regulator noted. "Investors in pooled investment products which are launched exclusively for AIs, in which concessions to regulatory framework have been availed, shall not have the flexibility to withdraw their consent," Sebi said. The client agreement will have to provide the modalities for withdrawal of consent and consequences of the investor withdrawing the consent. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The government is considering to reopen for Classes 6 to 8 from next month, a state minister said on Thursday. The government had earlier reopened for Classes 9 to 12 across the state in the last week of July with 50 per cent cap on attendance. But these classes are being held only on specific days a week. Talking to PTI, Minister Inder Singh Parmar said, "We have made up our mind to reopen from next month the middle (Classes 6 to 8), which have remained shut due to But we are extra cautious to take a call on it in view of the pandemic." His statement comes at a time when private schools are demanding reopening of schools for all classes in the state. At least 45,000 private schools affiliated to the Board of Secondary have announced to stage sit-in protests across the state from September 2 to demand reopening of schools for all classes in compliance with the COVID-19 norms. Parmar said he would seek Chief Minister Shivraj Singh's approval by this month end over the plan to reopen the schools (for Classes 6 to 8). "First we have plans to reopen middle schools with limited students on specific days a week. We are thinking over it. After that we will think about resumption of classes for primary schools (Classes 1 to 5) with safeguards in place," he said. When asked about the MP Private School Association's (MPPSA) demand of reopening schools for all classes immediately, Parmar said the government was also thinking on those lines, but at the same time taking into consideration the situation. He said the government was thinking about increasing the number of days for holding classroom sessions for the students of Classes 9 to 11. MPPSA president Ajeet Singh said that during their protest next month, private schools will not suspend online or physical classes for the students of Classes 9 to 12 held on different days in a week. Asked about MPPSA's demand that the government clear their dues for providing to the unprivileged children under the Right to Education (RTE), the minister said the state is yet to make payments to the institutes who have not completed their paperwork. "A system would be put in place to ensure the pending dues problem does not arise for this year," Parmar added. Replying to a question over the private schools being firm on launching their protest next month, he said that in democracy they have freedom to do so. "We have a responsibility. If something happens to a child due to coronavirus, the school and the government will face the heat," he added. Madhya Pradesh reported five fresh positive cases on Wednesday. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) has accepted the proposal of the Department of Financial Services (DFS) to extend the tenure of three managing directors and chief executive officers (MDs and CEOs) and ten executive directors (EDs) of The has approved the extension of tenure of S S Mallikarjuna Rao, MD and CEO of Punjab National Bank, until January 31, 2022, when he is due for superannuation. The appointments panel has also approved a two-year extension for Atul Kumar Goel, MD and CEO of UCO Bank as well as A S Rajeev, MD and CEO of Bank of Maharashtra. The DFS had written to the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) suggesting the extension of tenure of MDs and EDs of to ensure stability and continuity at state-owned lenders amid the pandemic even as the Board Bureau identifies new candidates for the role of bank chiefs. The has also approved a two-year extension to Bank of Baroda ED Ajay K Khurana, ED of Canara Bank A Manimekhalai and P R Rajagopal, Bank of India ED. Terms of Sanjay Kumar and Vijay Dube (Punjab National Bank), Gopal Singh Gusain and Manas Ranjan Biswal (Union Bank of India), Vikramaditya Singh Khichi (Bank of Baroda), Shenoy Vishwanath Vittal (Indian Bank), and Alok Srivastava (Central Bank of India) as EDs have been approved for an extension until their age of superannuation. The DFS, in a letter to DoPT, had also suggested extending the term of Shanti Lal Jain, the former ED of Bank of Baroda for two years. However, earlier this month, Jain was appointed the MD and CEO of Indian Bank for a period of three years. Reserve Bank on Thursday extended the scheme for encouraging deployment of Point of Sale (PoS) infrastructure to covered under the PM SVANidhi programme in tier 1 and 2 centres. The Payments Infrastructure Development Fund (PIDF) scheme, with a corpus of Rs 345 crore, envisages creating 30 lakh new touch points every year for digital payments in tier-3 to tier-6 centres. The scheme, operationalised in January this year, has now been extended to select in tier 1 and 2 centres. Launched in June 2020, the PM Street Vendor's AatmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) scheme is aimed at helping impacted by the coronavirus pandemic to resume their livelihood activities. It facilitates collateral-free working capital loans of up to Rs 10,000 of one-year tenure to approximately 50 lakh street vendors. In a statement on Thursday, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said it has now decided to include street vendors identified as part of the PM SVANidhi scheme in tier-1 and tier-2 centres as beneficiaries under the PIDF scheme. As hitherto, the street vendors in tier-3 to tier-6 centres will continue to be covered under the scheme, it added. "This decision to expand the targeted beneficiaries under the PIDF scheme will provide fillip to the Reserve Bank's efforts towards promoting digital transactions at the grass-root level," the central bank said. Out of PIDF's total corpus of Rs 345 crore, RBI's contribution is Rs 250 crore and Rs 95 crore is from major authorised card networks in the country. PIDF seeks to increase payments acceptance infrastructure by adding 30 lakh touch points -- 10 lakh physical and 20 lakh digital payment acceptance devices every year. (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.) Two explosions outside Kabuls airport caused an unknown number of casualties and deaths less than a week before US forces are due to depart. A number of US & civilian casualties were caused by one blast outside the Abbey Gate used by people seeking to flee Afghanistan, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said. He called it a complex attack and it came after US and Nato officials warned their citizens to avoid heading toward the airport. Reports said at least 13 people were killed, citing a Taliban security official, and that Taliban guards were wounded in the blasts. The blast occurred around the time President Joe Biden was scheduled to meet with his national security team about the situation in Afghanistan. He has since been briefed in the White House Situation Room, according to an official. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is being kept updated on developments at Kabuls airport and will host a meeting of the governments emergency committee, later this afternoon, his office said in a statement. The explosion happened within a large crowd at the Abbey gate where people are being screened and processed by the Americans, Mustafa Shah, an Afghan who was near the blast and took a wounded friend to the hospital, said in a phone call. Shah said he saw body parts on the ground and 10-15 people who appeared to be dead. Afghans and other people trying to flee Kabul have packed around the airport trying to get onto one of the many military flights leaving the country. After the explosion, European military officials sent a message to citizens in the country saying, Get away from the airport. Very, very, very dangerous situation. Go now! according to Dina Haynes, a lawyer who got a client into the compound a few minutes before the explosion. While it wasnt immediately clear who or what caused the explosion, earlier in the day, American and Nato allies had warned their citizens against traveling to the airport because of the credible and imminent risk of attacks. Biden specifically cited Islamic State Khorasan, an offshoot of the terrorist group, as a potential threat, this week. Theyre real and significant challenges that we also have to take into consideration the longer we stay, starting with the acute and growing risk of an attack by a terrorist group known as ISIS-K, an ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan, which is a sworn enemy of the Taliban as well, Biden said Tuesday. Every day were on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians. The government has made an urgent update to its travel advisory for Afghanistan, warning people to steer clear of due to an ongoing and high threat of a terrorist attack, which will hamper the urgent airlift and rescue operations. The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said on Wednesday that the situation in the region remains volatile, with the advice being for British citizens and other evacuees to find a safe location and await further advice. The development is related to threats of an Islamic State (ISIS) affiliate, dubbed Islamic State Khorasan or ISIS-K, which is known for conducting suicide bombings and car bombs. The security situation in remains volatile. There is an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack, the FCDO updated travel advisory reads. Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai Airport. If you are in the area of the airport, move away to a safe location and await further advice, it says. It comes as the US and Australia have issued similar alerts and American President Joe Biden had alluded to this threat when he announced his decision earlier this week not to extend the August 31 exit deadline for US-led NATO troops in the country after the takeover. is currently being defended and run by the US, which has 5,800 troops on the ground. However, they are dependent on support which leaves the troops vulnerable. The government said its operation to remove British nationals, as well as Afghans who worked for the and other vulnerable individuals, is moving at a significant pace. According to the Ministry of Defence, more than 11,000 people have been evacuated with the help of 1,000 UK troops since August 13 when the advance was mounted. The total also includes British embassy staff, British nationals, those eligible under the UK government's relocation programme Afghan Relocation and Assistance Policy (ARAP) and some evacuees from allied countries. On Wednesday, UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said that about 2,000 people have been airlifted back to the UK in the last 24 hours and that "the system is operating at full speed". "We will use every last remaining hour and day to get everyone we can back, the British nationals, the Afghans who worked so loyally for us, we are getting the Chevening scholars back, also women's rights defenders and journalists," he said. UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace told members of Parliament that some Afghans wanting to flee to Britain may be better off trying to reach one of the country's borders and making their way to a third country. (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.) Chinese technology shares fell sharply, snapping a three-day rally as earnings from a number of firms failed to meet investor targets. The Hang Seng Tech Index closed 1.9% lower in Hong Kong. The index was weighed down by live streaming giant Kuaishou Technology and electronics component maker AAC Technologies Holdings Inc., which both fell by at least 9.2% after missing estimates. The continued drop comes after the governments shock ban last month of profits at tutoring companies, which triggered a selloff of about $1 trillion in Chinese shares listed globally. Investors are concerned that even with the huge loss in market value seen already, fragile sentiment leaves the technology sector vulnerable to further losses. After the technical rebound in the last few days, the market is lacking momentum amid profit taking as investors are still watching out for any new regulation, said Daniel So, a strategist at CMB Securities Ltd. in Hong Kong. Kuaishou reported a wider-than-expected loss as it increased spending to retain users. Monthly and daily active users also slid from the previous quarter. Its shares, which were listed in Hong Kong earlier this year, have lost more than 80% of their value since a February peak. Meanwhile, Chinas CSI 300 Index dropped 2%, its first decline in four days, as investors offloaded shares of liquor makers including Kweichow Moutai Co., which fell 4.2%. The baijiu giant is stressing product price stability ahead of holidays in coming months, according to a media report. The liquor sectors drop is more of a temporary pullback following recent gains, said Capital Securities analyst Gu Xiangjun. In a sign that the recent market volatility has drawn the attention of Chinas top leadership, a senior official on Thursday sought to allay fears that Beijings campaign to achieve common prosperity means uniform egalitarianism and could hurt entrepreneurship. Han Wenxiu, a senior official at the Communist Partys central financial and economic affairs commission, said at a press briefing that the authorities will promote the welfare of all people and make the pie bigger and divide it well. Han added that China will create more opportunities for all to become wealthy and avoid falling into the trap of welfarism. President said China will strive to hit key economic and social development targets set for this year, even as authorities maintain an aggressive approach to containing Covid-19. In a front page article in the Peoples Daily Thursday, Xi said China should push for high-quality development and better coordinated policies around development and safety. He was speaking during a visit to Chengde in the northern province of Hebei this week where he visited several projects including a farm and an elderly care facility. In his remarks Xi stressed the importance of building prosperous rural areas, saying industrial development is the top priority of Chinas rural revitalization efforts. Local governments should strengthen the construction of rural infrastructure and public service systems, fill the gaps in public health services, and promote a healthy and environmentally friendly lifestyle, he said. To build a modern socialist country, China must build both a prosperous city and a prosperous countryside, Xi said. Policy Support The comments come amid signs that Chinas V-shaped economic recovery is slowing as sentiment is weighed by a broader regulatory overhaul of key sectors including education, technology and property. At the same time social distancing restrictions to curb the spreading delta variant is weighing on consumer sentiment. While the weakening in activity isnt yet at a point to threaten Beijings relatively modest growth target of above 6% for this year, the latest signaling suggests the government and central bank will increase their support for growth, said Tuuli McCully, Singapore-based head of Asia-Pacific economics at Scotiabank. Consumer spending seems soft and youth unemployment has increased -- these developments will get policy makers attention, she said. Therefore, I expect additional policy support. That will likely take the form of targeted fiscal measures to support employment and another cut in the reserve requirement ratio for banks in order to support small and medium-sized businesses, McCully said. Latest indicators show a weakening in the economy, aside from last years higher base, that will curb the growth rate in coming months. Even so, the economy is still operating within a reasonable range, Yu Changge, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Fiscal Sciences, wrote in a commentary published in the official Economic Daily newspaper, which is managed by the State Council and the Party Central Committee. Economic growth is still in line with expectations, Yu said. The recent slowdown in retail sales and investment reflects a higher base in the second half of last year, while exports continued to perform better than expected, he said. The government should avoid using large-scale stimulus, and make good use of the budgeted fiscal spending to effectively drive investment, Yu said. Xis visit to Hebei comes on the back of his recent push to promote common prosperity by redistributing wealth in the country and driving down income inequality. He chaired a high profile meeting last week that outlined plans to target excessive incomes and encourage wealthy groups to give back to society. One way of doing that will be to make the pie bigger and divide it well, Han Wenxiu, a senior official at the partys central financial and economic affairs commission, said at a press briefing in Beijing Thursday. Authorities will push for high-quality development, raise the income of urban and rural residents, gradually reduce the gap in distribution, and resolutely prevent polarization, he said. has approached academics and policy experts about forming a commission to advise it on global election-related matters, said five people with knowledge of the discussions, a move that would allow the social network to shift some of its political decision-making to an advisory body. The proposed commission could decide on matters such as the viability of political ads and what to do about election-related misinformation, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the discussions were confidential. is expected to announce the commission this fall in preparation for the 2022 midterm elections, they said, though the effort is preliminary and could still fall apart. ALSO READ: Facebook allows users in Afghanistan to instantly lock their accounts Outsourcing election matters to a panel of experts could help sidestep criticism of bias by political groups, two of the people said. The company has been blasted in recent years by conservatives, who have accused Facebook of suppressing their voices, as well as by civil rights groups and Democrats for allowing political misinformation to fester and spread online. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebooks chief executive, does not want to be seen as the sole decision maker on political content, two of the people said. Facebook declined to comment. If an election commission is formed, it would emulate the step Facebook took in 2018 when it created what it calls the Oversight Board, a collection of journalism, legal and policy experts who adjudicate whether the company was correct to remove certain posts from its platforms. Facebook has pushed some content decisions to the Oversight Board for review, allowing it to show that it does not make determinations on its own. Facebook, which has positioned the Oversight Board as independent, appointed the people on the panel and pays them through a trust. The Oversight Boards highest-profile decision was reviewing Facebooks suspension of former President Donald J. Trump after the Jan. 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol. At the time, Facebook opted to ban Mr. Trumps account indefinitely, a penalty that the Oversight Board later deemed not appropriate because the time frame was not based on any of the companys rules. The board asked Facebook to try again. In June, Facebook responded by saying that it would bar Mr. Trump from the platform for at least two years. The Oversight Board has separately weighed in on more than a dozen other content cases that it calls highly emblematic of broader themes that Facebook grapples with regularly, including whether certain Covid-related posts should remain up on the network and hate speech issues in Myanmar. A spokesman for the Oversight Board declined to comment. Facebook has had a spotty track record on election-related issues, going back to Russian manipulation of the platforms advertising and posts in the 2016 presidential election. Lawmakers and political ad buyers also criticized Facebook for changing the rules around political ads before the 2020 presidential election. Last year, the company said it would bar the purchase of new political ads the week before the election, then later decided to temporarily ban all U.S. political advertising after the polls closed on Election Day, causing an uproar among candidates and ad-buying firms. The company has struggled with how to handle lies and hate speech around elections. During his last year in office, Mr. Trump used Facebook to suggest he would use state violence against protesters in Minneapolis ahead of the 2020 election, while casting doubt on the electoral process as votes were tallied in November. Facebook initially said that what political leaders posted was newsworthy and should not be touched, before later reversing course. The social network has also faced difficulties in elections elsewhere, including the proliferation of targeted disinformation across its WhatsApp messaging service during the Brazilian presidential election in 2018. In 2019, Facebook removed hundreds of misleading pages and accounts associated with political parties in India ahead of the countrys national elections. Facebook has tried various methods to stem the criticisms. It established a political ads library to increase transparency around buyers of those promotions. It also has set up war rooms to monitor elections for disinformation to prevent interference. ALSO READ: Facebook 'shelved' report that made it look bad on Covid misinformation There are several elections in the coming year in countries such as Hungary, Germany, Brazil and the Philippines where Facebooks actions will be closely scrutinized. Voter fraud misinformation has already begun spreading ahead of German elections in September. In the Philippines, Facebook has removed networks of fake accounts that support President Rodrigo Duterte, who used the social network to gain power in 2016. There is already this perception that Facebook, an American social media company, is going in and tilting elections of other countries through its platform, said Nathaniel Persily, a law professor at Stanford University. Whatever decisions Facebook makes have global implications. Internal conversations around an election commission date back to at least a few months ago, said three people with knowledge of the matter. An election commission would differ from the Oversight Board in one key way, the people said. While the Oversight Board waits for Facebook to remove a post or an account and then reviews that action, the election commission would proactively provide guidance without the company having made an earlier call, they said. Tatenda Musapatike, who previously worked on elections at Facebook and now runs a nonprofit voter registration organization, said that many have lost faith in the companys abilities to work with political campaigns. But the election commission proposal was a good step, she said, because they're doing something and theyre not saying we alone can handle it. British Prime Minister said on Thursday that the "overwhelming majority" of people eligible for evacuation from have now left Johnson also reiterated that the UK government will do "everything we can" to get those remaining out of the country soon after warnings were issued of an "imminent" and "very lethal" terrorist attack from an Islamic State (ISIS) affiliate dubbed Islamic State Khorasan or ISIS-K. Speaking to reporters during a visit to British military's Permanent Joint Headquarters in north London to meet troops involved in evacuation efforts in Afghanistan, Johnson said, "around 15,000" people have already been evacuated by British troops. "We've got the overwhelming majority of those to whom we owe that debt out of Afghanistan," said Johnson. "In the time we have left, which may be as I'm sure everybody can appreciate quite short, we'll do everything we can to get everybody else," he said. "We are coming now to the end of this phase in any event," he said, in reference to the operations. The US has set a deadline of August 31 for the withdrawal of its troops, with President Joe Biden rejecting calls from Johnson and other allies for an extension. Johnson insisted the US deadline would not mark the end of the UK's efforts to help people wanting to flee the Taliban-controlled country, adding that the current airlifts were just the "first phase". "Even beyond the US deadline of the 31st of this month, we hope to be able to continue to say to people, well you can come out, he said. Amid concerns the could block off exit routes for citizens, the British Prime Minister warned the group they must allow people to leave to benefit from engagement from the rest of the world. "What we're hoping, and this is the key point that the G7 agreed, is that the understand that if they want to engage with development aid, they want to unlock those billions of funds, they want to have a diplomatic, political relationship with the outside world, then the safe passage for those who want to come out is the key precondition," Johnson said. Johnson also said his government had to be "transparent about the risks" posed by ISIS-K. His comments come following a stark warning by British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey that the UK had "very, very credible" intelligence that Islamic State militants are planning an imminent attack on those gathering at in an attempt to flee Afghanistan. Overnight on Wednesday, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said that the situation in the region remains volatile, with the advice being for British citizens and other evacuees to find a safe location and await further advice. "The security situation in Afghanistan remains volatile. There is an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack, the FCDO updated travel advisory reads. "Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai Airport. If you are in the area of the airport, move away to a safe location and await further advice, it says. The threat has strained the operation to get as many people out of Afghanistan as soon as possible following its takeover by the (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 an interview with Pakistan-based ARY News, spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said that is like a second home for the He pledged to deepen strategic ties with the country. shares its borders with We are traditionally aligned when it comes to religion, the people of both the countries mingle with each other. So we are looking forward to further deepening of ties with Pakistan, Mujahid said In another interview, Spokesperson Suhail Shaheen urged the community to help start a new chapter in their lives leaving the 20 years of war behind. Our message to them is that we just finished the war and we are leaving that chapter behind. It is a new chapter and the people of need help. All countries should assist us financially to help the people of Afghanistan build their lives. 70 percent of the people of Afghanistan are living under the poverty line. The country has faced destruction and bloodshed in the last 20 years of war. We will appreciate any help to the people of Afghanista, he told CNN-News18. Meanwhile, Prime Minister on Thursday called for the formation of an inclusive government in Afghanistan and asked the community for positive engagement with Kabul as a way forward to avert any humanitarian crisis and ensure peace and stability in the war-ravaged country. Over 3,000 tourists have visited other designated tourist areas beyond Phuket in since a new program took effect on August 16, the country's Centre for Economic Situation Administration said. The "Phuket Sandbox 7+7 Extension" program reduces the mandatory stay in the resort island for fully vaccinated travellers from 14 to seven days, after which another seven days can be spent in alternative tourism hotspots in Krabi, Phang-Nga or Surat Thani, reports Xinhua news agency. "The program signifies the progress of Thailand's plan to gradually reopen to fully vaccinated travellers." said Yuthasak Supasorn, Governor of the Tourism Authority of (TAT). More destinations will be added to the list, once the preparation of appropriate measures on health and safety are fully in place, he added. So far, there have been a total of 24,190 tourists visiting the country under the Phuket Sandbox scheme, which was launched on July 1, allowing vaccinated foreign tourists from low-and-medium-risk countries to visit the island without undergoing a two-week quarantine. The primary countries of origin of these travellers are the US, the UK, Israel, France and Germany. Tourism is regarded as a key driver for the Thai economy. The country attempts to restore the sector and prepare for a nationwide reopening for vaccinated foreign visitors by mid-October. --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.) The Talibans military takeover of was swift and decisive. Forming an inclusive government to avoid another civil war is proving to be much harder. The militant group has been holding meetings in Kabul with Hamid Karzai, the first president after the U.S. invasion, and Abdullah Abdullah, No. 2 in the ousted administration, after leader fled the country earlier this month. The Talibans membership is drawn largely from the majority ethnic Pashtun population, which is most dominant in the southern part of the country. Despite having the upper hand now, the realizes any stable governing formation will need to include influential warlords and representatives from ethnic Uzbeks, Tajiks and Hazaras. Without that, the country risks falling into the same sort of internal conflict that erupted in the 1990s. Here Are the Shadowy Leaders Now Running Afghanistan Here are the leaders the needs to have on board: Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Former Prime Minister, 72 The former prime minister of and leader of the once powerful Hizb-e-Islami political party is a long-time survivor in Afghan Once part of the Mujahideen fighters who were trained by the U.S. during the Cold War era to fight the Soviet Union in the 1980s, Hekmatyar has been both an ally and an enemy of the Taliban over the last 25 years. He has been sanctioned by the U.S. as a specially designated global terrorist. After U.S. and NATO troops arrived in in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, he supported suicide attacks on coalition troops and had close links with Al Qaeda. In a recent interview he supported a dialogue and elections to decide the next Afghan government, and hes currently participating in discussions with Taliban leaders. Hekmatyars deep and well-established links with Pakistans intelligence agencies make him a crucial player. Hamid Karzai, Former President, 63 Hamid Karzai Hamid Karzai is now at the negotiating table with the same people who once wanted to kill him. As the world watched the country descend into chaos -- with the Taliban entering Kabul, and his successor Ghani fleeing -- Karzai posted a short video message announcing his resolve to stay in the country. Even though the message had little impact on the unfolding chaos in Kabul, it was especially powerful because he appeared with his young daughters. During his time as president, Karzai who has studied in India, fell out with the U.S over its use of drones and his refusal to sign a security pact that wouldve let U.S. troops stay beyond 2014. Abdulllah Abdullah, Former CEO, 60 For the doctor-turned-politician, events in Afghanistan have come full circle. He was once an adviser to the leader of the Northern Alliance, Ahmad Shah Massoud, who fought the Russians and the Taliban. Now Abdullah, an ethnic Tajik, is negotiating a peaceful transfer of power with the Taliban. Striking peace deals in Afghanistan isnt easy and few know this better than Abdullah. He leads the High Council for National Reconciliation, which was expected to lead the now-dead intra-Afghan peace talks. Abdullah ran for president twice and came very close to victory in 2014. A dispute over the results prompted former Secretary of State John Kerry to fly in and broker a power-sharing deal between Ghani and Abdullah. Abdul Rashid Dostum, Warlord and Former Vice President, 67 Abdul Rashid Dostum The Uzbek warlord leader is another Afghan political veteran who has switched allegiances several times over four decades of fighting. He was a big part of the Northern Alliance, which fought the Taliban when they were last in power from 1996 to 2001. Dostum backed Ghanis government and was vice president for six years from 2013. He has been accused of war crimes, including mass killings and ordering the rape of a political rival, all of which he has denied. He spent several years in Turkey on health grounds, though rivals accused him of trying to escape facing justice in Afghanistan. Dostum flew back to Afghanistan just as the Taliban was making rapid territorial gains, and he was expected to defend the iconic northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif from the militants. But the city fell as swiftly as the rest of country, forcing Dostum to flee. Its unclear where he is currently. Amrullah Saleh, Former Spy Chief and Vice President, 48 The former vice president of Afghanistan declared himself the legitimate caretaker president when former president Ghani fled the country. Saleh, who joined Ghanis government in 2017 as interior minister and also led Afghanistans intelligence agency, has survived multiple assassination attempts by the Taliban, including one last September. Saleh is in the northern Panjshir valley, his stronghold. He appears to have teamed up with Tajik leader Ahmad Massoud, who has vowed to fight the Taliban. Ahmad Massoud, Rebel Leader, 32 Ahmad Massoud The son of the slain Tajik Mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud could emerge as the face of the resistance against the Taliban. But that depends on whether he gets substantial help from overseas. In an op-ed in the Washington Post last week, the U.K.-educated Massoud wrote that his fighters were prepared to once again take on the Taliban. Still, he added that their stores of weapons and ammunitions would run out unless our friends in the West can find a way to supply us without delay. Massoud is currently in talks with the Taliban, which have sent fighters around his stronghold in Panjshir province north of Kabul. Ata Mohammad Noor, Provincial Leader, About 57 Ata Mohammad Noor, an ethnic Tajik leader, has been involved in wars in Afghanistan since the Soviet invasion and was among the Talibans fiercest enemies. He was governor of the northern Balkh province, the most prosperous in Afghanistan, until he was removed by Ghani in 2018. As the provincial capital of Mazar-e-Sharif fell to the Taliban, Noor fled along with his one-time rival Dostum. Earlier this year as the Taliban gained momentum, Noor was one of the first to call for new militias and a peoples uprising to fight the militants. On Twitter, Noor alleged the surrender of the Afghan forces was part of a larger organized and cowardly plot and he vowed to fight on. He is currently in Uzbekistan. Mohammad Karim Khalili, Hazara Leader, About 71 The former vice president is a prominent figure from the minority Hazara ethnic group. Khalili was part of the delegation of senior Afghan politicians who went to Pakistan after the Talibans Aug. 15 takeover of Kabul. In a Facebook post last week, he said he hoped the Talibans top leadership would form a stable political order. The future of Afghanistan depends on it, he said. Shares of Tech were trading lower for the third straight day, down 2.4 per cent at Rs 1,441.60 on the BSE in intra-day trade on Thursday, in an otherwise firm market. The stock was quoting at its lowest level since its listing on Friday, August 20, 2021. With the past three days' 8.7 per cent fall, the market price of Tech has declined 11 per cent from its issue price of Rs 1,618 per share. Tech, a company that operates online platforms for buying and selling of vehicles, had made a weak debut on the bourses as the companys shares ended at Rs 1,500, a 7 per cent discount to its issue price on the BSE on day of listing. However, the initial public offering (IPO) of the company had received a strong response from the investors, with the issue garnering 20.3 times subscription. The IPO was an offer-for-sale worth Rs 2,998 crore. The company had raised Rs 900 crore from anchor investors ahead of its issue. On August 20, there was some institutional buying in the stock post listing as Goldman Sachs Trust, Jupiter India Fund and Plutus Wealth Management bought shares worth Rs 275 crore. However, the names of the sellers were not ascertained. CarTrade Tech is a multi-channel auto platform provider company. The company operates various brands such as CarWale, CarTrade, Shriram Automall, BikeWale, CarTradeExchange, Adroit Auto, and AutoBiz. The platform connects new and used automobile customers, vehicle dealers, vehicle OEMs, and other businesses to buy and sell different types of vehicles. The company offers a variety of solutions across automotive transactions for buying, selling, marketing, financing, and other activities. An increase in aggression by competition fueled by large amounts of global appetite to participate in this industry in India could impact the positioning of CarTrade Tech and its profitability, the brokerage firm Nirmal Bang Securities said in IPO note. On the financial front, the companys revenue in financial year 2020-21 (FY21) has seen de-growth owing to the Covid-19 impact but is expected to stabilize in the medium term. Amongst the industry players, CarTrade is the only profitable company which is a positive sign, according to analyst at Religare Broking. Bank of India said its board approved the opening of Qualified Institutional Placement (QIP) on August 25 and the floor price of Rs 66.19 per equity share. The capital issue committee of the bank at its meeting approved and adopted the preliminary placement document cum application form for the issue and authorised the opening of the issue on Wednesday (August 25, 2021), Bank of India said in a regulatory filing. The state-owned bank is raising funds to fund business growth and meet regulatory compliance. The bank may at its discretion offer a discount of not more than 5% on the floor price so calculated for the Issue. Shares of Bank of India rose 2.04% to settle at Rs 64.90 yesterday. Bank of India is a public sector bank. The Government of India held 90.34% stake in Bank of India as on 30 June 2021. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Power stocks were trading with gains, with the S&P BSE Power index rising 32.69 points or 1.19% at 2789 at 09:50 IST. Among the components of the S&P BSE Power index, Adani Transmission Ltd (up 5%), Adani Power Ltd (up 4.99%),Adani Green Energy Ltd (up 4.6%),Thermax Ltd (up 3.56%),Indian Energy Exchange Ltd (up 2.32%), were the top gainers. Among the other gainers were ABB India Ltd (up 1.78%), K E C International Ltd (up 0.83%), Siemens Ltd (up 0.82%), and NHPC Ltd (up 0.19%). On the other hand, Power Grid Corporation of India Ltd (down 1.28%), NTPC Ltd (down 0.7%), and Tata Power Company Ltd (down 0.44%) moved lower. At 09:50 IST, the S&P BSE Sensex was up 97.55 or 0.17% at 56041.76. The Nifty 50 index was up 32.5 points or 0.2% at 16667.15. The S&P BSE Small-Cap index was up 156.45 points or 0.6% at 26117.95. The S&P BSE 150 Midcap Index index was up 31.25 points or 0.39% at 8042.16. On BSE,1713 shares were trading in green, 833 were trading in red and 104 were unchanged. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) In an apparent bid to woo ahead of the assembly polls early next year, Chief Minister has made several pro- announcements including withdrawing cases against them for stubble burning and launching a one-time settlement (OTS) scheme for interest waiver on their electricity dues. According to a senior official, the chief minister while interacting with a delegation of progressive the previous day said, All the cases of stubble burning against the farmers will be withdrawn and decision will also be taken to revoke the fine imposed on them. The government will also ensure that because of power dues, no electricity connection of the farmers will be snapped and OTS scheme will be brought to waive interest on the power dues," he said. The chief minister also said cane price will be increased and a decision in this regard will be taken after talks with all the stakeholders. He said sugar mills of western region will start functioning from October 20 while mills of Eastern region will begin operation from October 25. The chief minister said dues of cane to the tune of Rs 1.42 lakh crore pending since 2010 were paid by the government and before the start of the next crushing season, all pending payments will be cleared. The state had done a record 56 lakh MT purchase of wheat from farmers on the minimum support price despite the adverse conditions due to the pandemic. For the last few years, the Supreme Court has been prodding the Centre and the state governments to stamp out stubble burning, especially in Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan and western Uttar Pradesh, which aggravates air pollution in Delhi every year in October-November. The government move to revoke stubble burning cases is seen as an attempt to woo farmers to counter their agitation against the new farm laws. Farmers particularly from western along with those from other states are on the warpath with the BJP-led government at the Centre over three agri legislations. The Samyukta Kisan Morcha, which is spearheading the stir at the borders of Delhi, has declared that it will mobilise support against the saffron party in the upcoming state polls in The announcements made by the chief minister are being seen as part of efforts to pacify the agitating farmers, who are a key factor on many seats particularly in the western part of the state. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) India's wearables market grew 118.2 per cent year-on-year in the June 2021 quarter at 11.2 million units with strong shipments from homegrown brands in earwear and watches fuelling this growth, according to research firm IDC. The second wave of COVID-19 had a marginal impact as the overall wearable (which includes smartwatches, wrist bands and earwear) shipments declined by 1.3 per cent sequentially in the June quarter. Partial lockdowns, weekend curfews, and disrupted supply chains resulted in a skewed slump in the early-quarter shipments, IDC said. However, unlike last year the market was quick to recover as the vendors stocked the channels to fulfil the pent-up consumer demand in the quarter, it added. IDC India Research Manager (Client Devices) Jaipal Singh said the robust growth in wearable is attracting brands who have businesses around devices and accessories to expand their presence across all wearable categories. "Thus, the influx of new entrants remains a key driver of growth. As we approach the festive season, vendors and channel partners are gearing up for record level of demand with the intention of further corrections in the prices," Singh added. Singh noted that an upside of over 35 per cent seems an easily achievable feat in the second half of 2021 when compared to the same period last year. "However, vendors will be selective in their channel inventory with focus remains on e-tailers as concerns around COVID-19 third wave still prevails in the country," he added. Watches continued to be the fastest-growing category accounting for 81.2 per cent share in the wristwear category that includes watches and wristbands - up from 35 per cent a year ago. The earwear category also maintained its momentum, doubling its shipments in the June quarter and remains the largest category (in terms of number of units shipped) in the wearables market in India. As per the data, earwear category logged shipment of 9.2 million units, wrist band was 372,000 units and watch 1.6 million units in the June 2021 quarter. IDC said over the quarters, the watch form factor seems to be appealing to the consumers, and Indian brands have been quicker to leverage this trend and align their device portfolio. "Among the top five (watch) brands, three spots are captured by Indian brands, while Huami (Amazfit) and Realme are at third and fifth positions, respectively. Noise continues to be the leading player in the overall watch category for five straight quarters with a 28.6 per cent share in Q2 2021," it added. Boat ranked second with 26.9 per cent share. Fire-boltt, another homegrown brand, entered at fourth position in just three quarters of starting its business in this category. Xiaomi maintained the numero uno spot in the wristband category with 38.9 per cent share, followed by Oneplus (21.7 per cent) and Titan 21.3 per cent share. "Affordability has been the key for Indian brands, and these brands have been immensely successful in gaining a significant portion of the watch market with competitive pricing, aggressive marketing, and faster adoption of new features," Anisha Dumbre, Market Analyst (Client Devices) at IDC India, said. This new generation of homegrown brands are digitally native, aware of their limitations and selectively targeting the gaps. "However, they need to be watchful of the China-based brands, who going forward will be aggressive by introducing more sub-brands and leveraging the ecosystem play," Dumbre added. Boat's aggressive shipments and diverse portfolio helped it gain 45.5 per cent share in the earwear category (and 39.6 per cent share of the True Wireless Stereo (TWS) or earbuds segment) in the June quarter, IDC said. OnePlus finished second with an 8.5 per cent earwear category share in the second quarter. "Even in the earwear category, the homegrown brands have a strong dominance as their share has reached 71.5 per cent in Q2 2021 from just 31.2 per cent in Q2 2020. Ptron, Zebronics, Noise, Portronics, Boult Audio, and Truke were among the key prominent brands that supported the dominance of homegrown brands in this category," it added. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Tech giants like Apple, Google, and have promised US President to help him improve infrastructure in the wake of several high-profile hacking cases against government agencies and energy infrastructure. The meeting at the White House on Wednesday was attended by Alphabet and CEO Sundar Pichai, CEO Andy Jassy, CEO Tim Cook, Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella and IBM Chair and CEO Arvind Krishna, along with representatives from other industries. The tech honchos made Biden familiar with how they are addressing the growing cyber threats. "The reality is, most of our critical infrastructure is owned and operated by the private sector, and the federal government can't meet this challenge alone," Biden told the announced that it would work with its suppliers to "drive mass adoption of multi-factor authentication" as well as providing new security trainings, incident response, and vulnerability remediation, reports The Verge. said it would spend more than $10 billion over the next five years to strengthen US and the software supply chain. said it would invest $20 billion in the next five years, while planned to offer a multi-factor authentication device to all Amazon Web Services (AWS) account holders for free. The meeting comes in the wake of several incidents like the massive Solarwinds hack, the Kaseya ransomware attack and the Colonial Pipeline shutdown resulting from a cyber-attack. Alarmed at repeated cyber-attacks on the country, Biden in May signed an executive order, implementing new policies to improve national cybersecurity. "Protecting our nation from malicious cyber actors requires the federal government to partner with the private sector. The private sector must adapt to the continuously changing threat environment, ensure its products are built and operate securely, and partner with the Federal Government to foster a more secure cyberspace," he wrote in the executive order. The executive order was passed after the Colonial Pipeline Company, which is the largest refined-products pipeline in the country, was forced to shut down due to a cybersecurity attack on May 7. Since February, the Biden administration has been working to remediate the SolarWinds attack and change federal IT practices to protect against similar attacks in the future. --IANS na/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.) Here is todays ranking of the 10 most-read news stories in China, in economics, finance and current affairs, to help give you a sense of whats trending in the Chinese language sphere. Chinese social media users have been paying close attention to the countrys proposed investigation of a U.S. laboratory. They are also following the Fukushima wastewater release and Chinas role in Afghanistans power transition. 1. Chinese TV host accused of rape Chinese TV host Qian Feng (external source, in Chinese) was accused of sexual assault and suspended by broadcaster Hunan Television. The state-run Peoples Daily said in a commentary on the case Tuesday that the law will not wrong a good man, nor will it spare a bad man. 2. WHO head calls for two-month vaccine booster halt WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (external source, in Chinese) on Monday called for a two-month moratorium on Covid-19 vaccine booster shots to reduce global vaccine inequity and prevent the emergence of new coronavirus variants. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Photo: VCG 3. University clears Zhang Wenhong of academic fraud Chinas elite Fudan University has concluded that the doctoral thesis of Zhang Wenhong met all the criteria required at the time of submission, and issued a statement on Monday exonerating the top epidemiologist from accusations of plagiarism, according to the local official newspaper Shanghai Daily. 4. Shanghai bans training institutions from poaching schoolteachers with high salaries Shanghai on Tuesday issued a ruling banning private training institutions (external source, in Chinese) from poaching schoolteachers with the lure of high salaries and stressing that those engaged in subject-based training must have appropriate teaching qualifications. 5. Taliban warns of consequences if U.S. delays withdrawal The Taliban will not agree to extend the deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops (external source, in Chinese) from Afghanistan and warned of consequences if the Aug. 31 deadline is not met. 6. 100 million parcels delivered to Chinese countryside daily Ma Junsheng, director of the State Post Bureau (external source, in Chinese), said Tuesday that China Posts parcel delivery network serves 98% of the countrys townships and 50% of villages. Of the 300 million express shipments the state-run postal service makes nationwide each day, 100 million packages go to rural areas. 7. Taliban official meets Chinese ambassador in Kabul Senior Taliban leader Abdul Salam Hanafi (external source, in Chinese) met with Chinese Ambassador to Afghanistan Wang Yu in Kabul on Tuesday, a Taliban spokesperson said. 8. Fukushima nuclear effluent to be discharged through undersea tunnel The Japanese government and Tepco (external source, in Chinese) have reportedly finalized plans for effluent from the Fukushima nuclear power plant. It will be diverted to the sea 1 kilometer out from the coast through the construction of an undersea tunnel. 9. Embassy says U.S. media declined to publish article on Covid origin tracing The U.S. Embassy in Washington (external source, in Chinese) said U.S. media outlets it approached refused to publish its explanation of Chinas stance on Covid origin tracing. The embassy reiterated the argument made by some Chinese officials that the virus may have come from a U.S. laboratory. 10. China proposes investigation of U.S. laboratory Chinas Permanent Representative in Geneva Chen Xu (external source, in Chinese) sent a letter to the WHO on Tuesday regarding the origin studies of the coronavirus, proposing an investigation into the U.S. Armys Fort Detrick and the University of North Carolina. Translated by intern reporter Chen Bingyi. Caixin has not independently verified the veracity or accuracy of all of the headlines or stories. The daily ranking of most-read news stories among Chinese people, about China and global affairs, is jointly provided to you by Caixin Insight and HANA Data, an artificial intelligence technology team. The key indicators calculated on the list are based on mass data sourced from Chinas mainstream social media platforms and online news websites. Click here for a detailed introduction of our methodology. Here you'll find our latest collection of Caledonian-Record reports on the coronavirus outbreak and local response, from the beginning of April. Our January, February and March stories are here: https://www.caledonianrecord.com/news/local/our-coronavirus-coverage/collection_5885178c-692e-11e Become A Subscriber A subscription opens up access to all our online content, including: our interactive E-Edition, a full archive of modern stories, exclusive and expanded online offerings, photo galleries from Caledonian-Record journalists, video reports from our media partners, extensive international, national and regional reporting by the Associated Press, and a wide variety of feature content. The beach strand of Atlantic Beach stretches out in this image taken by the Atlantic Beach Fire Departments search and rescue drone. Several towns on Bogue Banks are using the devices to monitor conditions and assist with other operations. (Michael Simpson photo) Students observe a sea turtle during a field trip to the N.C. Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores in this undated photo. Scholarships are available for teachers to help with the cost of the trips. (N.C. Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores photo) NC woman charged with murder of cerebral palsy patient after she left her in hot car for 5 hours The company is at work on a third feature in the franchise as well a new feature, Fleak, which is at the financing and pre-sale stage. Launched last year, Aurora Studios develops, produces, and distributes high-end quality films with commercial potential from Finland. It recently launched the Finnish Impact Film Fund, a 5.5M ($6.4M), a private equity fund aimed at financing film and tv content. Haikala, CEO and co-founder of Anima Vitae, said in a statement: With this strategic partnership with Aurora Studios we will be able to further develop our capabilities and services and guarantee that our studio stays at the forefront of our industry. The partnership gives us a unique opportunity to develop future success stories. This is the natural next step in the direction we embarked on over 20 years ago. Photo: The Canadian Press Metis and Cree mother Cindy Gladue is shown in this undated handout photo presented as a court exhibit. A former long-haul trucker from Ontario is currently serving time in an Alberta prison for killing Gladue in his Edmonton hotel room a decade ago. Bradley Barton was sentenced last month to 12 1/2 years in prison, but is appealing his conviction and sentence. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO Court of Queen's Bench of Alberta A former long-haul trucker from Ontario who is in an Alberta prison for killing a woman in an Edmonton hotel room a decade ago is appealing his conviction and sentence. Bradley Barton was sentenced last month to 12 1/2 years for manslaughter in the death of Cindy Gladue, a Metis and Cree woman who bled to death in a bathtub at the Yellowhead Inn in June 2011. Medical experts testified Gladue had four times the legal limit of alcohol in her system when Barton performed a sexual act that caused a severe wound to her vagina. Barton, 53, told his trial that he arranged to pay Gladue for sex and was shocked when he woke the next morning to find her body. It was the second trial for Barton after a jury found him not guilty in 2015 of first-degree murder, a verdict that sparked rallies and calls for justice for Indigenous women across the country. Defence lawyer Dino Bottos, in the notice of appeal, says the trial judge made several errors and that the 12 1/2-year sentence is excessive and unreasonable. Barton's second trial heard that he had searched for graphic and violent videos nine days before Gladue was found dead. "The trial judge erred in admitting evidence of internet searches performed by the appellant" which created more prejudice against Barton instead of making a probable point, Bottos writes in the notice. Bottos also argues that an appeal is necessary because Barton's search history was unlawfully seized, which violated his charter rights. The appeal notice also says Barton disagrees with the trial judge's conclusion that consent is "vitiated," or invalid, if there is a "commercial sex transaction resulting in death when the accused is reckless as to the risk of serious bodily harm." The Crown has already filed an appeal of the sentence, arguing that it is unfit and not proportional to the gravity of the offence. Photo: The Canadian Press Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is courting the votes of Canada's oldest citizens those most likely to actually cast a ballot with a promise to increase federal aid to lower-income seniors. Trudeau is in Quebec City this morning, where he is promising a re-elected Liberal government will hike the guaranteed income supplement by $500 for individuals and $750 for senior couples. The Liberals say this will help 2.2 million seniors. In last spring's budget the Liberals made good on a 2019 campaign promise to hike the Old Age Pension by 10 per cent for seniors over the age of 75, but that doesn't kick in until next year. A one-time payment of $500 was sent earlier this month to seniors over 75 who qualify for the pension. As Trudeau nears the end of the second week of the campaign the Liberals are facing more adversity than they expected from voters, amid the crisis in Afghanistan and ongoing anxiety about the fourth wave of COVID-19. Photo: The Canadian Press A group of major Canadian long-term care operators will require COVID-19 vaccination for all staff this fall. Chartwell Retirement Residences, Extendicare, Responsive Group Inc., Revera Inc., and Sienna Senior Living issued a joint statement today about the plan. The group says employees who arent fully vaccinated as of Oct. 12 will be placed on unpaid leave of absence. Vaccination will also be required for new hires, students and other personnel working with the companies. The group says they dont expect the new policy to impact staffing levels. Thousands of long-term care residents have died from COVID-19 since the pandemic began as homes across the country dealt with major outbreaks. The coalition of home operators says unvaccinated staff are more likely to bring the virus to work as infection rates increase. They say the policy will help reduce the need for isolation and other restrictions on residents if outbreaks occur. Photo: Twitter Green Party Leader Annamie Paul says she has been receiving threats online from people saying they will show up to disrupt her campaign events. Paul says in a news release her party has not had any hecklers at its events, but party members are alarmed about what they have seen on social media. She says social media has made it easier to provoke people and there is a need for accountability and education strategies to address the issue. A recent project done by the Samara Centre for Democracy found that more than of quarter of the 350,000 Twitter comments sent to incumbent candidates during the first week of the federal election campaign were considered toxic. Executive director Sabreena Delhon says the research, which looked only at Twitter, found 20 per cent of the tweets were on the low or middle end of a toxicity scale, containing insults, sexist language or rude comments. She says a further seven per cent of the tweets were "severely toxic," and included hateful, aggressive comments or threats of violence. Photo: The Canadian Press U.S. Capitol Police officers who were attacked and beaten during the Capitol riot filed a lawsuit Thursday against former President Donald Trump, his allies and members of far-right extremist groups, accusing them of intentionally sending a violent mob on Jan. 6 to disrupt the congressional certification of the election. The suit in federal court in Washington alleges Trump worked with white supremacists, violent extremist groups, and campaign supporters to violate the Ku Klux Klan Act, and commit acts of domestic terrorism in an unlawful effort to stay in power. The suit was filed on behalf of the seven officers by the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. It names the former president, the Trump campaign, Trump ally Roger Stone and members of the extremist groups the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers who were present at the Capitol and in Washington on Jan. 6. Two other similar cases have been filed in recent months by Democratic members of Congress. The suits allege the actions of Trump and his allies led to the violence siege of the Capitol that injured dozens of police officers, halted the certification of Democrat Joe Bidens electoral victory and sent lawmakers running for their lives as rioters stormed into the seat of American democracy wielding bats, poles and other weapons. A House committee has started in earnest to investigate what happened that day, sending out requests Wednesday for documents from intelligence, law enforcement and other government agencies. Their largest request so far was made to the National Archive for information on Trump and his former team. The requested documents are just the beginning of what is expected to be lengthy, partisan and rancorous investigation into how the mob was able to infiltrate the Capitol and disrupt the certification of Democrat Joe Bidens presidential victory, inflicting the most serious assault on Congress in two centuries. In a statement Wednesday evening, Trump accused the committee of violating long-standing legal principles of privilege. Executive privilege will be defended, not just on behalf of my Administration and the Patriots who worked beside me, but on behalf of the Office of the President of the United States and the future of our Nation, Trump said. Committee members are also considering asking telecommunications companies to preserve phone records of several people, including members of Congress, to try to determine who knew what about the unfolding riot and when they knew it. With chants of hang Mike Pence," the rioters sent the then-vice president and members of Congress running for their lives and did more than $1 million in damage, and wounded dozens of police officers. The demands were made for White House records from the National Archives, along with material from the departments of Defense, Justice, Homeland Security and Interior, as well as the FBI and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The committee so far has heard from police officers who were at the Capitol on Jan. 6. In emotional testimony, those officers spoke of how afraid and frustrated they were by the failure of law enforcement leaders to foresee the potential for violence and understand the scope of planning by the Trump backers. A Capitol Police officer who fatally shot protester Ashli Babbitt was cleared months ago of criminal wrongdoing and was cleared internally by the department this week, and was planning to reveal his identity in an NBC interview to air Thursday. Long before the days of the home computer, when media commentators were more unbiased and less fiercely partisan than today, it was a ritual in our house to watch the Sunday morning talk shows broadcast from Washington, DC. NBCs Meet The Press has aired since 1947, and was always my favourite, but I havent watched it for quite a while since the network apparently became a mouthpiece of the Democratic Party, along with CNN, while Fox News is equally preferential towards Republican rhetoric. Its not just American media at fault, as trying to find the truth from many global news outlets has become as difficult as picking the fly-droppings out of the pepper. I happened to be channel-surfing last Sunday when up popped Meet The Press and of course the topic was Afghanistan. What two veteran reporters had to say was certainly food for thought. The networks chief foreign affairs reporter Andrea Mitchell, and the New York Times' Pentagon correspondent, Helene Cooper were in total agreement about how dreadfully shambolic the withdrawal from Kabul was being handled by the Biden administration, and yet how predictable it all was to the both of them, having covered Bidens very long political career. Both referenced controversial opinions he voiced while sitting on, and at times chairing, the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee dating back about 25 years. Both noted his trademark arrogance and stubbornness in refusing advice from the Pentagon and National Security about maintaining a military presence at the Bagram Air Base. They also severely criticized Biden for presenting a series of misleading statements in the previous week, while discussing the Taliban's lighting speed overthrow of the Afghan army. In these days with so much fake news frequently cast around by media outlets worldwide, it was indeed refreshing for my cynical and jaundiced eyes to see two female veterans in the twilight of their journalistic careers. Both unafraid of their employers blatant partisanship, as they fearlessly depicted the hapless U.S. president as little more than trying reprise the role of a muscle-bound Rambo in Afghanistan. Bernie Smith, Parksville Photo: Pat Bell The body of a person killed in a North Vancouver building collapse on Wednesday has been recovered. Lower Lonsdale residents felt their apartments shake as a structural collapse occurred next door to their buildings at the former Cineplex Esplanade site, at Chesterfield Avenue, between West First Street and Esplanade at 9:45 a.m. RCMP confirmed one person had died and another had been taken to hospital after the building under demolition had a structural failure of some sort, causing it to partially collapse. Sgt. Peter DeVries said personnel at the scene had determined one person had been trapped in the rubble and as a result of catastrophic injuries had died. DeVries said rescue crews were not able to immediately recover the body because the site was considered too dangerous. Fire Chief Greg Shalk said the Heavy Urban Search and Rescue task force from Vancouver Fire Rescue Services was called in to assist with the operation due to the severity of the situation. David Boone, assistant chief with VFRS, said the team was able to recover the victims body from the debris around 5:30 p.m. Wednesday. The workers identity has not been released by officials. We responded with 25 team members including our structural collapse engineers and relied upon our engineers to provide a critical analysis of the structural stability of the building components compromised and structure remaining in place, he said. We developed a plan that included the requirement to stabilize some compromised structural elements and went to work to establish safe access to the victim. We were able to do so and remove debris from the victim, and packaged and removed the victim from the space found. Boone said the victim was passed off to B.C. Coroner Services and RCMP. DeVries said a second worker who had been injured had been taken to Lions Gate Hospital, with non-life-threatening injuries. Shalk said the worker, now in hospital, was operating machinery when the collapse occurred, and fire crews were able to pull them out of the machine. North Vancouver RCMP's Serious Crime investigators have now taken over the investigation to determine whether or not there was any criminality involved in the collapse. Photo: VPD Police dog Mando was bitten by a man (who he also bit) after an incident Aug. 26 in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. Police are recommending charges against a suspect after he fled from police and ended up biting a police dog. Thursday morning (Aug. 26), the suspect allegedly threatened several people and kicked at a resident's door in a Downtown Eastside social housing complex, according to a media release. The Vancouver Police Department was called around 5 a.m. When they arrived the suspect fled the scene. Officers were able to track him to a building near Keefer and Abbott streets. With them was police service dog Mando. "The suspect allegedly resisted arrest and bit Police Service Dog Mando, which was assisting in the arrest," states the VPD in the release. "With help from the injured dog, officers were able to gain control of the man and place him in handcuffs." The suspect was also bitten by the police dog, and had to go to a hospital for treatment. Mando only sustained minor injuries. Police don't state who bit first. Police are recommending multiple charges in the incident. Yanceyville, NC (27379) Today Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. The California Department of Education (CDE) Nutrition Services Division is sending this notice to all statewide participants in the Child Nutrition Programs in response to a Disaster Declaration on August 24, 2021 by President Biden for Lassen, Nevada, Placer, and Plumas counties. Today, President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. declared that a major disaster exists in the State of California and ordered Federal aid to supplement State, tribal, and local recovery efforts in the areas affected by wildfires beginning on July 14, 2021, and continuing. The Presidents action makes Federal funding available to affected individuals in the counties of Lassen, Nevada, Placer, and Plumas. Assistance can include grants for temporary housing and home repairs, low-cost loans to cover uninsured property losses, and other programs to help individuals and business owners recover from the effects of the disaster. Federal funding also is available to state, tribal, and eligible local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations on a cost-sharing basis for emergency protective measures, limited to direct federal assistance in the counties of Lassen, Nevada, Placer, and Plumas. Guidelines on Disaster Relief For information on President Bidens disaster declaration, please refer to the White House Briefing Room web page . For information on Governor Newsoms emergency proclamation, please refer to the Office of Governor Gavin Newsom web page . For information on the CDE Resources for California Wildfires, please refer to the CDE Resources for California Wildfires web page. For information on the CDE Disaster Relief Guidelines, please refer to the CDE Disaster Relief Guidelines web page. For information on disaster assistance and resources in California, please refer to the CDE Disaster Resources web page. For information on emergency resources from federal, state, and local agencies, please refer to the Governors Office of Emergency Services (OES) website . Reimbursement Claims Submission Flexibility The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) can authorize the CDE to allow school food authorities, institutions, and sponsors to submit claims beyond the 60-day submission requirement. Claims submitted after 60 days, as a result of a disaster, are not subject to the one-time exception for late submissions. For more information on late claim submission due to disasters, refer to the USDA Policy Memoranda SP 46-2014, CACFP 12-2014, SFSP 18-2014 web document at USDA Food and Nutrition Disaster Assistance web page . For assistance with submitting your claim, contact your Child Nutrition Fiscal Service Analyst on the CDE Nutrition Services web page. Use of U.S. Department of Agriculture Foods during a State and Federally Declared Disaster Disaster relief organizations may designate schools as community feeding sites or request that schools provide their USDA Foods to other feeding sites. USDA Foods can be released on request to recognized disaster relief organizations such as the American Red Cross or the OES. Information regarding USDA Foods usage, reporting, and claiming procedures during a disaster can be found in Management Bulletin 02-401 on the CDE Use of USDA Foods in Disaster Feeding web page. The Disaster Feeding Guidance for School Food Service using USDA Foods can be downloaded from the CDE Food Distribution Guidance, Manuals, and Resources web page. Contact Information If you have any questions regarding this subject, please contact the following programs: School Nutrition Programs (SNP) & Summer Meal Programs Angela Blackney, SNP Specialist, by phone at 916-445-5723 or by email at ablackney@cde.ca.gov. Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) Annie Hohn, CACFP Specialist, by phone at 916-651-7066 or by email at Annie.Hohn@dss.ca.gov. Food Distribution Program Augie Aguilar, Food Administration Unit Manager, by phone at 916-445-4850 or by email at aaguilar@cde.ca.gov. Questions: Nutrition Services Division | 800-952-5609 Last Reviewed: Wednesday, August 25, 2021 Pakistan anticipates rise in cement exports to Afghanistan 26 August 2021 On 15 August the Taliban took over Kabul and declared their rule over Afghanistan. Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said at his first press conference that the Taliban would continue trading with neighbouring countries and steps would be taken to promote trade. Business people and traders in Pakistan widely welcomed the announcement and the Pakistan stock exchange (PSX) and the country's bilateral trade with Afghanistan saw a short term sudden rise. According to Spectrum Research, the local bourse settled the last week on a positive note by adding 430 points as Afghan uncertainties ease and the new government is likely to recognised by big economies. Moreover, the anticipated increase in Pakistan-Afghan trade kept investors alive in the market throughout the week. The cement stocks also supported the positive sentiments in anticipation of the rise in cement export to Afghanistan. Pakistan's cement industry, mainly northern players, are also enthusiastically watching the Afghanistan political situation as cement mills here export a large quantity of cement to Kabul. A cursory look of export data suggests that shipments to Afghanistan have been on a continuous decline in the past 10 years from nearly US$2bn in FY11 to less than US$1bn in FY20. If exports to Afghanistan increase, the cement sector may be a crucial beneficiary (Pakistan exported 4.7Mt of cement to Afghanistan in FY11 versus just 2.5Mt in FY21). Moreover, in the medium to longer-term, provided Afghanistan remains stable, Pakistan may finally link up with the central Asian republics in a trade and energy corridor. This vision has been in place since at least the 1990s, observed by an analyst at IMS Research. Moreover, media reports rebuke that the previous Afghan government was more dependent on India, Iran and its central Asian neighbours for its trade needs. Therefore, it bought fewer Pakistani products, especially cement and iron, to meet its requirements. AHL Research Analysts said that in the longer term, stability in Afghanistan bodes well for the entire region in general and Pakistan-Afghanistan relations in particular. This could be a game-changer for Pakistan in terms of economic development as Afghanistan can function as a link between Pakistan and central Asia. Moreover, Afghanistan's geographical location relies on neighbouring countries for transit to its other trading partners. Therefore, the opening of trade routes will benefit Afghanistan and aid Pakistan's CPEC expansion, a step that will help establish Pakistan as a regional trade corridor. Published under Buena Vista, CO (81211) Today Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Potential for heavy rainfall. Low 49F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Potential for heavy rainfall. Low 49F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. This service applies to you if your subscription has not yet expired on our old site. You will have continued access until your subscription expires; then you will need to purchase an ongoing subscription through our new system. Please contact The Chanute Tribune office at 620-431-4100 if you have any questions Chatham, VA (24531) Today Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 62F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%.. Tonight Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 62F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Chatham, VA (24531) Today Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low 62F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%.. Tonight Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low 62F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. The MaryEllen Locher Scholarship Fund at CHI Memorial Foundation is scheduling presentations for Mels Club, a breast health education program for teen and college-aged women.Mels Club equips and educates students in three key areas: myths and misconceptions regarding breast cancer; facts, warning signs and prevention; and tools and training in how to do a breast self-exam.Mels Club was launched in 2014. Now beginning its eighth year, Mels Club has educated thousands of girls in area schools on the importance of breast health beginning at an early age.We want young women to understand that being aware of their breast health is necessary, normal, and natural, said Cindy Pare, MaryEllen Locher Scholarship Fund coordinator. Younger women tend to believe breast cancer is a disease for their moms or grandmothers. Through Mels Club, we empower them to take control of their health as young adults.The program uses a curriculum developed by the Prevent Cancer Foundation in cooperation with the Howard University Cancer Center. A breast cancer survivor shares her personal story during the presentation.Mels Club presentations are available for high school and college-aged young women in schools, church youth groups, or civic and community agencies. The program is usually taught in health, wellness, or physical education classes in area schools. Each student is given a packet of information to take home and share with other women in their families.Officials said, "While breast cancer statistically impacts older women at a higher rate, younger women are affected as well. Breast cancer is the most common form of cancer in women ages 15 to 39, according to national statistics. About 12,000 women under 40 are diagnosed with breast cancer every year. In young women, the disease tends to be diagnosed in its later stages and be more aggressive. Young women also have a higher mortality rate and higher risk of metastatic recurrence (return of breast cancer in areas beyond the breast)."The MaryEllen Locher Scholarship Fund is a college scholarship program for the children of breast cancer patients. The organization was founded as an independent non-profit in 2002 by MaryEllen Locher, a long-time news anchor and health reporter for WTVC in Chattanooga. Formerly known as the MaryEllen Locher Scholarship Foundation, it merged with CHI Memorial Foundation in January 2021.Ms. Locher started the foundation during her own battle with breast cancer. She passed away in 2005 after her third bout with cancer. In the past 19 years, the fund has awarded 540 scholarships totaling $981,000.To schedule a Mels Club presentation, contact Cindy Pare at Cynthia_Pare@memorial.org, or call 423-495-4124. More information can also be found at memorial.org/MELScholarshipFund.Online donations to the MaryEllen Locher Scholarship Fund can be made at memorial.org/foundation. Checks can be mailed to CHI Memorial Foundation, 2525 deSales Ave., Chattanooga, Tn. 37404. Please make a notation to direct to the MEL Scholarship Fund on the memo line of check. As the Tennessee College of Applied Technology (TCAT) senior instructor of massage therapy at Chattanooga State Community College, Renee Johnson is a big fan of Career and Technical Education (CTE) and the opportunities it provides to her students. Ms. Johnson is a former graduate of the program she now heads and was recently named August advisor of the month by the National Technical Honor Society (NTHS). Ms. Johnson believes in her students and wants them to enjoy their experience as they work toward obtaining certification. Im most proud of all their community outreach and leadership in their careers, shared Ms. Johnson. Before COVID, we would often win the gold (medal) in the SkillsUSA Community Service contest. Massage Therapy is often one of the first departments to volunteer their skills during community service events such as working with the homeless, underprivileged, and low-income groups; while on campus, the students work at health fairs or at other special days and events sponsored by the college. The NTHS is an educational nonprofit organization that serves as the honor society for CTE. During a year filled with disruptions due to the pandemic, Ms. Johnson made it a point to encourage instructors to encourage students. If a student is just below the cutoff (to join NTHS), suggest to them how the student can receive honors, stated Ms. Johnson. In addition to promoting postsecondary education, NTHS awards annual scholarships, recognizes superior achievement, helps to build career portfolios with professional letters of recommendation, and provide access to global and technical networks. Students that enter NTHS are our best students, and it is a great way to honor them and their achievements, shared Dr. Jim Barrott, executive vice president, TCAT. We are very pleased that Ms. Johnson was recognized by NTHS for her dedication to the Chattanooga Chapter; she is a marvelous student advocate, added Dr. Barrott. Ms. Johnson is licensed massage therapist with specialties in hospital-based, pediatric and equine massage. The Chattanooga State TCAT Massage Therapy program is a member of the National Certification Board for Therapeutic Massage and Bodywork, the American Massage Therapy Association, and Associated Bodywork and Massage Professionals. The two-semester class boasts a 100 percent job placement rate with average earnings of more than $47K. Food City CEO and President Steve Smith says downtown Chattanooga will have a new mixed-use Food City on Broad Street and West 13th Street by Spring 2023. During a short press conference on Wednesday afternoon, he spoke briefly about new stores coming to downtown, East Ridge and Bartow County. Weve been working with downtown stakeholders and design professionals to develop it in a unique way, another spokesman said. In order to conform with form-based code, this mixed used development will also consist of 16,000 square feet of complimentary two-level office and retail space along Broad, and six, two-story townhouses along West 13th. President Smith said Broad Street Food City will serve as the anchor of the project that will be centered around a 53,000 square foot supermarket. This store will contain a bakery, deli, Asian wok, a food bar, and other similar amenities. Well have one of the largest seating areas, with over 115 seats, of any store in our company, Mr. Hunt said. He said the store will have a Starbucks and home delivery as well. We anticipate that the store will be open by the Spring of 2023, the CEO said, and are confident it will be a fun place to dine and shop, and will be a complimentary addition to the neighborhood it is in. He said Food City will own all three locations, but that the downtown store will sit on leased property that will also be developed. He said the store in East Ridge, which is planned to open in Summer 2022, is being converted from a blighted piece of property. The CEO said he hopes it will become the catalyst for other redevelopment projects in the area. In addition to great food, we anticipate being able to offer beer and wine in a friend-welcoming atmosphere, added Dan Glei, Food City senior vice president of merchandising/marketing. The downtown Chattanooga store will include an in-store bakery and deli offering fresh baked goods, deli meats, cheeses, hot foods, fireplace, fresh sushi, hickory smoker, pizza oven, Asian wok, fresh food bar offering a variety of soup, salad and fruit selections, a beer and wine tasting station, expanded outside dining area, and one of the companys largest seating areas, with over 115 total seats. The food court will offer a restaurant-quality experience for breakfast, lunch, and dinner into the evening, said officials. Full-service meat and seafood departments will offer pre-marinated/seasoned oven ready products, a complete selection of top-quality meats, including Certified Angus Beef. In-house meat cutters will be available to hand cut steaks and fresh meat to order. Expanded grocery, frozen food, and produce departments will go well beyond the normal fare with a huge selection of gourmet, international, and specialty items. The Food City Floral Boutique will be staffed with a designer seven days per week, offering a full assortment of fresh-cut floral arrangements, bouquets, gift items, and more. Rapid checkout service will be provided by five check-out lanes and 10 self-checkouts. The location will also feature a Food City Pharmacy, equipped with a private consultation room and walk-up outdoor pick-up window. Several award-winning energy saving concepts will also be included, ranging from energy efficient glass cooler doors, parking lot lights, and refrigeration systems to motion sensors, and 100 percent LED lighting, it was stated. Successful communities offer a complete mix of useswith jobs, goods, services, and culture accessible within a short walk or bike from home, said Mayor Tim Kelly. As Chattanooga continues to grow, this new Food City is a shining example of how quality urban design and land use can make our downtown more livable and connectedand, by bringing fresh healthy food to a neighborhood that needs it, more equitable. River City Company is excited to welcome Food City to Broad Street in Downtown Chattanooga," said Emily Mack, River City Company president and chief executive officer. "By listening to community voices and using urban design principles, the store will match local architecture and serve as a tremendous asset providing fresh and healthy food within walking distance to downtown residents and employees. Food Citys second location, a 54,000 square foot supermarket and Gas n Go fuel center, will be located at the intersection of Ringgold Road and Bales Avenue in East Ridge. The new store will replace the companys existing location across the street and is expected to open early Summer of 2022. The East Ridge store will include an in-store bakery and deli offering fresh baked goods, deli meats, cheeses, hot foods, large cafe seating area, fireplace, fresh sushi, hickory smoker, pizza oven, fresh food bar offering a variety of soup, salad and fruit selections, and full-service catering and event planning. Full-service meat and seafood departments will offer pre-marinated/seasoned oven ready products, a complete selection of top-quality meats, including Certified Angus Beef. In-house meat cutters will be available to hand cut steaks and fresh meat to order. Expanded grocery, frozen food, and produce departments will go well beyond the normal fare with a selection of gourmet, international, and specialty items. The Food City Floral Boutique will be staffed with a designer seven days per week, offering a full assortment of fresh-cut floral arrangements, bouquets, gift items, and more. Rapid checkout service will be provided by six check-out lanes and seven self-checkouts. The location will also feature a Food City Pharmacy, equipped with a private consultation room and walk-up outdoor pick-up window, Food City Gas N Go including diesel fuel, GoCart curbside pick-up, Starbucks cafe, offering a wide assortment of blended hot and cold coffees and beverages, as well as an assortment of breakfast sandwiches and pastries, and a Tennessee Valley Federal Credit Union in-store branch bank location. Several award-winning energy saving concepts will also be included, ranging from energy efficient glass cooler doors, parking lot lights, and refrigeration systems to motion sensors, 100 percent LED lighting, and open rafter ceilings. Officials with the city believe the amount of added services the new store plans to offer will draw shoppers from well beyond the East Ridge area, including the Brainerd area, Missionary Ridge, and parts of North Georgia. Andy Roque Espinosa, 30, pleaded guilty to murdering 15-year-old Zachary Meija of Lyerly, Ga. After a sentencing hearing, Judge Kristina Cook Graham sentenced Espinosa to serve the remainder of his natural life in the Department of Corrections without the possibility of parole. Espinosa went to his girlfriends residence in Lyerly on Dec. 9, 2020, where he sometimes lived. Upon entering the home, Espinosa lay in wait until his girlfriends son Zachary returned home from school. Espinosa then stabbed Zachary multiple times with a knife, killing him. Just prior to the murder Espinosa had asked in an online forum What does if feel like to kill someone? At the time of the murder, another minor child was in the residence. The evening prior to the incident, Zachary Mejia had defended his mother and the other child during an argument between Espinosa and Zacharys mother. During the sentencing hearing, Espinosa made a statement where he blamed his actions on his tough life and on the victim. District Attorney Chris Arnt, of the Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit, blasted Espinosas excuses and described this murder as a heartless act of evil. Zacharys family and friends presented close to two hours of moving victim impact testimony; describing the type of young man that Zachary was and the loss they have experienced with his absence. Zachary Mejia would have turned 16 on Dec. 22, 2020, 13 days after he was killed. It was remarkable to see what an impact that Zachary had on others in his young life, said prosecutor Arnt. While there is little solace in a case like this, the defendant will never be free to harmanyone else again. Following the hearing, the Mejia family gathered together in prayer. The prosecutor said, "The brave and courageous actions of Chattooga County Deputy Derek Mitchell and Deputy Alan Garmany, who rendered aid and secured the scene for Chattooga Sheriff Mark Schrader, should be acknowledged." Chattooga County Sheriffs Office Investigators Jason Burrage and Chad Spraggins, assisted by Agent Steve Rogers of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, led the investigation and assisted with the prosecution of the case. The case was prosecuted by ADA Clayton Fuller and District Attorney Arnt. Victim advocate Cara Parris worked with Zacharys family during the course of the case. Cleveland State Community College welcomed students back from Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming as part of the Student Wildlands Adventure Program (SWAP). SWAP is a student exchange program that allows students to gain experience in other parts of the country at little or no expense to them. During the students' week-long adventure, they had the opportunity to learn up close about North Americas most interesting predators that live in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Students paired with biologists in the natural habitat of wolves, grizzlies and wolverines. One of the highlights of the trip was meeting with the Grand Tetons National Park grizzly bear biologist and talking about grizzly management. Students were able to hike one of the dens of grizzly 399, the most famous brown bear mother in the world. Sydney Crayne graduated CSCC in the Spring this year and was able to enjoy the trip to Yellowstone. Her favorite experiences were the observation of wolves and hiking to the grizzly den. According to Ms. Crayne, she pictures herself like the biologist on the trip, helping preserve the important parts of the ecosystem. This part was special because I really felt immersed and connected to the wildlife and land, said Ms. Crayne. Being able to crawl into a bear den while listening to the bear manager speak about the importance of his job and how he manages the bears was very interesting. While visiting Yellowstone, students got to discuss threatened and endangered species with a biologist from the Caribou-Targhee National Forest and later hiked to a goshawk nest. Eighteen students learned about mammal migration, wildlife diseases, large mammal conflicts with humans and historic elk feeding grounds. Experiences like these are what gives students who see a future in wildlife a chance to get a glance at what their career could hold. said Robert Brewer, CSCC associate professor. Ms. Crayne is attending the University of Tennessee Knoxville with a major in wildlife management and minors in forestry and GIS mapping. Her career plan is to become a wildlife biologist. Shes thankful for an opportunity like this to be able to see what she can look forward to in her career. It meant a lot to me because I never had the money nor the resources to go on a trip like this, said Ms. Crayne. Being able to see a completely new environment and knowing I could potentially be working out west opened my eyes to all the options I have for the future, and made me even more certain that I had chosen the correct career path. Mr. Brewer is co-founder of the SWAP program. One of the reasons this program was started was to broaden the horizons of natural resource majors. We strive to give students a once in a lifetime experience that they could not do on their own, said Mr. Brewer. It is about expanding horizons, shaping lives, and changing the world by giving the underserved segment of our college community the opportunity to see new places, learn about cultural differences, and learn about natural resource management outside their home area. CSCC is the only two-year school in Tennessee with a student chapter of The Wildlife Society. Membership in this student chapter allows students to meet with and compete against senior institutions. It also allows students to meet with and discuss their future with professionals in the field and advisors from senior institutions. For more information on the SWAP or The Wildlife Society programs, contact Mr. Brewer at 423-473-2342, or by email at rbrewer@clevelandstatecc.edu. The Forestry, Wildlife and Fisheries program at CSCC was recognized as the Outstanding Instructional Program for 2020 by The Community Colleges of Appalachia, and Mr. Brewer was recognized as the 2020 Conservation Educator of the Year by The Tennessee Wildlife Federation. Every day and every night in Hamilton County, a small cadre of critical care nurses ventures forth to serve in the intensive care units in Chattanoogas hospitals. Equally another crowd rejoins the fight against COVID in our emergency rooms as floor nurses tending to the very sick who cant find room in the ICUs but who are every bit as noble and as brave as our Infectious Disease physicians themselves. But just as a majority of our COVID patients are dismissed, our front-liners are irreplaceable. They are all tired, near exhaustion. And this week, when I read that some of these troopers feel unappreciated and all but overlooked in the daily pressure cookers, I came up with a simple way some of us who know these men and women nurses could bombard them with the gratitude of strangers. What if some of us got a sheet of stamps, some simple index cards and blank envelopes and sent them a series of notes: Hang in there you are loved and What you do to the least of these you do unto Me, and Keep on keeping on, kid. Nothing on social media can touch a handwritten note that comes in the mail.What if some of us got a sheet of stamps, some simple index cards and blank envelopes and sent them a series of notes: Hang in there you are loved and What you do to the least of these you do unto Me, and Keep on keeping on, kid. Dont know any of these angels? Write a COVID patient instead. Call around to some churches, or the hospitals. They share names. Heck, address it to The Shortest ICU nurse on the night shift. Loving people is easy. It is more fun to be an anonymous provider but if you have a personal relationship, by all means identify yourself. Send a pile to Surgical ICU, the ER nurses lounge. Lets just let them know we care. Heres your bonus if you aint too wordy. Several months ago Sofia Stewart, a writer on Your Tango.com, compiled a list of encouraging one-liners to share in the coronavirus pandemic. If you mailed just one of the 50 for what, every day for nearly two months, think of the domino effect it might have among our weary and downtrodden. Think of what one of these simple gems might have in your husbands coat pocket, on your freshman daughters pillow, or to a recent widower. The big thing is to make sure you rally our COVID front-liners who are treating a lot of those we love WITH LOVE. * * * 50 GREAT LINES TO ENCOURAGE OUR COVID NURSES AND STAFFS (Complied by Sofia Steward of YourTango.com) 1. THE THREE BS: Wake up, be kind, be amazing, be grateful, repeat. 2. There's a lot of fear in the world right now don't let it grab ahold of you. "Never let your fear decide your fate." 3. Choose to be happy in quarantine. "Happiness is a conscious choice." 4. Everything will be okay. "Don't worry, be happy." Bobby McFerrin 5. The change will always come with challenges. If it doesnt challenge you, it wont change you. 6. Being boring is never okay. You didnt wake up today to be mediocre. 7. Our journey through life is like kidney stones. This too shall pass." 8. You can be the reason for someones tomorrow. Be someone who makes someone else look forward to tomorrow. 9. Laughter is the best medicine. Life is better when youre laughing. 10. Youre tough. Life is tough my darling, but so are you. 11. Think positively and good things will happen. "What you think, you become." 12. Action speaks louder than words. Well done is better than well said. Ben Franklin 13. Put on the right pants. Put on your positive pants. 14. Its all about perspective. One day or day one. You decide. 15. We don't know what will happen next with coronavirus, so take things slow. "Taking it one day at a time." 16. Keep your eye on the prize and use this time to work on yourself. Don't be pushed by your problems. Be led by your dreams." 17. Its cheesy but it works. Its a good day to have a good day. 18. Look at each day with a new set of eyes. Every morning we are born again." Buddha 19. Use your time at home in quarantine to learn as much as you can. The wisest mind has something yet to learn." George Sanayana 20. How do you know somethings worth it? You are enough." 21. Only one rule when it comes to love things. Fall in love with as many things as possible. 22. The best analogy to life. Being an adult is like folding a fitted sheet. No one really knows how. 23. Its important to have a good tribe. Your vibe attracts your tribe. 24. Be smart with your life decisions. Do one thing every day that scares you." Mary Schmich 25. Let your yesterday be jealous. Make today so awesome, that yesterday gets jealous. 26. Failure always leads to success. "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." Thomas Edison 27. Never give up on your dreams. "When you cease to dream you cease to live." Malcolm Forbes 28. Reach for something new and exciting (and a little scary). "A goal should scare you a little and excite you a lot." Joe Vitale 29. There's a difference between living and existing. "May you live every day of your life." Jonathan Swift 30. Don't let others tear you down. "Put on your positive pants." 31. Greatness starts with failure. Failure is another stepping stone to greatness." Oprah Winfrey 32. Spend your time wisely. "It's the same life, whether you spend it crying or laughing." 33. Bruce Lee gives the best advice. "The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus." Bruce Lee 34. Sometimes getting through hell is the only way. If you're going through hell, keep going." Winston Churchill 35. Be anything but ordinary, and you won't be replaced. In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different." Coco Chanel 36. Even the hard days have blessings. "What seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise." Oscar Wilde 37. If you don't try then you already lose. You miss 100 percent of the shots you don't take." Wayne Gretzky 38. Our success speaks enough. "The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success." Bruce Feirstein 39. It takes rain to make a rainbow. "The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain." Dolly Parton 40. Don't wait around, make your own best day ever. "Create your own sunshine." 41. Life reveals its beauty in time. "The longer I live, the more beautiful life becomes." Frank Lloyd Wright 42. Now's a better time than ever to rest and work on yourself. "Rest and be thankful." 43. First, believe before you take any action. You must expect great things of yourself before you can do them." Michael Jordan 44. Start with yourself. "Happiness is an inside job." 45. This time is just another opportunity for something great. "Trust the timing of your life." 46. It's okay to feel sad or scared. You will overcome it. "There's bravery in being soft." 47. Keep your mind in the right place. "Positive mind. Positive vibes. Positive life." 48. Exhaust your resources. Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can." Arthur Ashe 49. Small things sometimes matter the most. Do small things with great love." Mother Teresa 50. We will rise again, better than we were before. "We fall. We break. We fail. But then we rise, we heal, we overcome." * * * Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler said Thursday that Northwest Georgia registered an all-time low unemployment rate in July as the number of employed rose more than 4,100. "We are seeing positive labor market data across the state, said Commissioner Butler. The unemployment rate is down in every region, county, and metropolitan statistical area reflecting the strength of our states economy. Career opportunities remain high for job seekers as we continue to see rising jobs numbers in metro and rural areas throughout Georgia. In Northwest Georgia, the unemployment rate was down one and one-tenth percentage points to 2.7 percent over the month. A year ago, the rate was 6.6 percent. The labor force decreased in Northwest Georgia by 376 and ended the month with 423,181. That number is up 17,790 when compared to July of 2020. Northwest Georgia finished the month with 411,805 employed residents. That number increased by 4,150 over the month and is up by 33,231 when compared to the same time a year ago. The number of unemployment claims went down by 33 percent in Northwest Georgia in July. When compared to last July, claims were down by about 90 percent. Employ Georgia, the GDOLs online job listing service at employgeorgia.com showed about 4,852 active job postings in Northwest Georgia for July. The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency Fisheries Division presented its 2022-24 fishing regulation proposals during the Tennessee Fish and Wildlife Commissions August meeting held in Cookeville. The public is invited to provide comments on the proposals. The deadline for comments on proposed fishing regulation changes is Sept. 14. To provide comments, email TWRA at fishingreg.comments@tn.gov, or write to TWRA Fisheries Division, 5107 Edmondson Pike, Nashville, Tn. 37211. The TFWC will vote on the commercial regulations at its Sept. 16-17 meeting to be held in Kingsport and bait and sportfish regulations at its Oct. 21-22 meeting to be held in Bolivar at Lone Oak Farms. If approved, the bait and sport fishing changes would become effective March 1, 2022. Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park will host a 45-minute ranger-led program on Saturday, Sept. 11, at 2 p.m., exploring the fugitive status of enslaved African Americans from North Georgia families which lived in and around present-day Chickamauga Battlefield. This program begins at the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center, then participants will caravan to the Alexander House site, off Alexanders Bridge Road. Water is recommended and chairs are welcome for this program as well. Officials said, "Although Walker and Catoosa counties did not have the enslaved population density of many central coastal Georgia counties, the human depravity associated with the institution of slavery nevertheless oozed into the North Georgia countryside. In fact, the largest enslaver in Catoosa County, Georgia, according to the 1860 Slave Schedule, lived within the current boundary of Chickamauga Battlefield. However, upon closer examination, 5 of the 35 enslaved people owned by John P. Alexander were listed as 'fugitives from the state.' What does this phrase mean? Where did these 'fugitives' go, and how did they get there? These questions and others will be examined as part of the parks participation in International Underground Railroad Month." For more information about programs at Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, contact the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center at 706-866-9241, the Lookout Mountain Battlefield Visitor Center at 423-821-7786, or visit the park website at www.nps.gov/chch. Elections work is involved, and not limited to a couple weeks a year SPOKANE - Voting is a process - one as essential to our democracy as yeast is to making a good loaf of bread. On it's surface, that process involves the voter opening their ballot, reading and learning about candidates and measures up for consideration, properly making their choice and then sealing and returning said ballot. That's on the surface. Like an iceberg, most of what takes place at the Spokane County Elections Department - and similar departments around the state - happens beneath the surface and between voting cycles. For county Auditor Vicky Dalton, those cycles are not limited to the few weeks around election day. "In reality, about half the year is spent in an election cycle," she said. The department runs four elections each year, special elections in February and April, a primary in August and the general in November. Each election cycle begins six weeks prior to election day and 2-3 weeks after until that election is certified by the Spokane County Canvassing Board. Counting ballots The sexy part of the voting process - if there is one - starts once ballots begin to return, just under three weeks before election day under Washington's all-mail-in voting system. Ballots come to the Elections Department located in a former Graybar Electric warehouse on West Maxwell purchased by the county in 2001 via mail bags if retrieved from drop boxes or in postal trays if returned by mail. Ballots are run through a sorting machine, which cost $320,000 when purchased in 2006, that scans a bar code on the return envelope unique to that specific voter. The sorter also scans and stores the voter signature on the envelope in the department's data base where election workers at monitors in another room pull up those signatures and compare them to the appropriate voter signature on file. The sorted ballots are placed in blue bins, and after the signatures have been verified, are run through the sorter a second time. "Envelope signatures that did not match the signature in the voter's record are separated (and) a letter is sent to the voter within 24 hours with instructions to cure the signature," Dalton said. Envelopes with signatures that match are sorted into red bins by voter precinct to be tabulated. They are then taken to another part of the large sorting room where election employees open the return envelopes. The return envelopes and unopened security envelopes are placed in separate bins and taken to another room where the return envelopes are put in boxes for storage, the security envelopes are opened and the ballots placed in red bins then placed on wheeled racks. The racks of ballots are wheeled into a Voted Ballot Room first, and then into the tabulation room. An "Opening Sheet" follows the ballots throughout this process, beginning with the separation of the security envelope from the return envelope. The Opening Sheet has a bin number and the number of ballots in each bin. The number of ballots in each bin must match at each stage; the number of ballots must match the number of return envelopes and the sheet is signed/initialed and dated at each stage. The tabulation room has three tabulation stations, which consist of a scanner and a laptop loaded with tabulation software. Dalton said the county uses software manufactured by Clear Ballot. Election workers take bins from the stack, review the Opening Sheet, and begin putting ballots into the scanner, monitoring their progress on the laptop. At the end of scanning each bin, which is labeled by precinct, the ballots are placed in a cardboard box, and another sheet with the date, election type and tracking number placed over that precinct. This prevents precincts from getting mixed together and allows for future recounts should one be required. Access to the tabulation rooms is restricted to election workers only. That access - including outside of election cycles for maintenance and software updates - can only be done by certain people using a card reader system. Dalton is not one of these. "Since I have no reasons to be in there, my badge cannot be used to unlock the door," she said. Also in the tabulation room are a pair of adjudicator stations where two individuals review ballots where questions arise regarding the voter's intention, such as partially filled in ovals, crossed out names and circles around voter responses. Trained election workers review these ballots, utilizing a reference manual with examples of voter intentions if needed, to determine what the voter's selection may be. All of the data inputted in the tabulation room goes into a server that is located in the room and is not connected to any outside office system or the internet. "It's totally and completely isolated," Dalton said. Fifteen minutes before the voting information is to be released on the department's website and to the Secretary of State's office, the Clear Ballot software tabulates the votes for their respective candidates or decisions on measures. That information is then downloaded to a memory stick formatted for the data, and then uploaded to the two websites via a separate office PC. "These are special memory sticks that are totally wiped clean after we upload and not reused for any purpose," Dalton said. Life between cycles This process continues, albeit in reduced manner as fewer ballots arrive, over the next several days until all ballots properly postmarked by election day are counted. But there's no rest as election workers turn their sights on the next election - which in this case is the Nov. 2 General Election. Ballots for the general election must be designed by Sept. 2 so they can be mailed to the printer on Sept. 3. That's to enable the department to mail the approximately 5,400 ballots to military and overseas area voters by mid-September. In the 2020 General Election, the county distributed - mostly by mail - ballots to 363,108 registered voters. Providing an extra challenge for the upcoming election is that two items to appear on the ballot are being contested in court. One of those is regarding the city of Spokane's Proposition 1, which would amend the city's charter to adopt the Spokane Cleaner Energy Protection Act. The other is concerning allegations that Spokane City Council Position 4 candidate Tyler McMaster has not lived in the city for at least a year, a requirement for public office in Spokane. Dalton said she has county lawyers and a couple court judges assigned to resolving these issues, and believes this can be done by Aug. 27 so as not to delay the ballot printing process. One of the biggest tasks for election employees is updating voter information. Each election the department receives delivery information from the U.S. Postal Service where ballots were returned due to voters no longer living at their indicated addresses. Often the ballots are forwarded if there is a forwarding address on file, but Dalton said USPS still notifies the department the voter is no longer living there. They also receive information from the Department of Licensing of voters who have changed the current address on their vehicle licenses, but haven't updated their voter information. And, there are ballots that are returned as undeliverable due to forwarding addresses no longer being on file. Dalton said the department deals with "thousands" of these each year. "We send a lot of mail that are not ballots just trying to track people down," she added. Voters can make sure there is no delay in receiving a ballot by updating their information at VoteWa.gov, as well as doing so at the Election's Department. There are also physical items to be updated between voting cycles. Drop boxes throughout the county need to be cleaned, repaired and sometimes repainted while relationships with officials at remote voting assistance locations - such as CenterPlace in Spokane Valley and the Student Engagement Hub at Eastern Washington University - is updated. Upgrades and maintenance to machinery such as the ballot sorter and the tabulation scanners is also needed, as are software updates from Clear Ballot. This is done by visits from company employees, who enter the locked and sealed tabulation room only with one other individual an authorized county elections employee. "Nothing comes in over the internet, nothing is mailed, emailed or shipped," Dalton said. "It's an actual person from the company that comes in and with people there from my staff do the update or upgrade to the computers or to the scanners." Legislative intent Finally, Dalton and staff must deal with new laws coming from the Legislature in Olympia. One of those from the previous session was a requirement for all elections departments to assemble, print and mail physical voter's guides. Those voter's guides had to be in place for the Aug. 3 primary election. That meant adding a 32-page pamphlet to the over 40,000 pounds of paper the Spokane County Election's Department typically mails to voters - amounting to 235,000 pamphlets county-wide. Another off-cycle election change is dealing with the requirements of Engrossed Substitute House Bill 1078 which changed voting for those convicted of a felony. Among several things, the measure eliminated the two-step approach to provisional and permanent restoration of a person's voting rights and replaced with the automatic restoration of those rights to individuals not "serving a sentence of total confinement under the jurisdiction of the DOC (Department of Corrections). That includes individuals released from corrections centers but still subject to community custody. The new legislation takes effect Jan. 1, 2022. "If you're behind bars, you can't vote," Dalton said. "If you're not behind bars, you can vote. It's that clear. It's that simple." John McCallum | Cheney Free Press Primary election ballots are inserted into a tabulator by workers at the Spokane County Elections Department. The tabulator consists of a scanner and a laptop loaded with election data software. The change requires updates to the voter's oath taken when registering and agreed to when signing ballot return envelopes. Secretary of State Kim Wyman's Communication Director Kylee Zabel said the text of the former is dictated in ESHB 1078, while the latter is being worked on by Wyman and county auditors throughout the state. "In this case, our office has the authority to draft new language and adopt into the WAC (Washington Administrative Code)," Zabel said. "This is also happening prior to 2022, but the new language has not been finalized yet." And as if this isn't enough to do between cycles, Dalton added that election workers need training, at least 20 hours yearly to maintain their certifications. And, now and then, they need some time off as well. "All workers in the elections office are employees, even if they work only a few hours a year," Dalton said. "We do not use volunteers in our office." John McCallum can be reached at jmac@cheneyfreepress.com. In this July 16 photo, nurses and doctors in the CoxHealth Emergency Department in Springfield, Missouri, don personal protective equipment to treat patients with COVID-19. As the Delta variant fills hospitals with patients, a shortage of hospital staff and nurses is emerging. An artists rendering of the Legends Resort & Casino that Cherokee Nation Businesses hopes to build in Pope County, Arkansas. Author, literary scholar, and social media dynamo Karen Swallow Prior joins Heather for an engrossing discussion on what it means to build a platform. They dive right into the debate that is taking over much of Christian influencer cultureis a huge social media platform a byproduct of pursuing ones call, or is it the call itself? Karen explains what she believes it means to be truly called and questions the unhealthy desperation to be published that she sees among some writers. Warning: This episode may ruffle a few feathers, but it will also stir conviction! Karen Swallow Prior is a research professor of English and Christianity and Culture at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. Her books include Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me and On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Books. She is co-editor of Cultural Engagement: A Crash Course in Contemporary Issues and has written articles for Christianity Today, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, Relevant, The Gospel Coalition, and many others. Also, in our #GrowingViral segment, meet Madison Hart. Madi is a lover of Jesus, books, and the great outdoors, and has created a blog that she hopes will make you feel less alone. You can find Madi and her blog on Instagram @Ms Inklings. Reach out to Heather Thompson Day on Twitter @HeatherTDay and Instagram @heatherthompsonday. Viral Jesus is a production of Christianity Today Host and creator: Heather Thompson Day Producer: Loren Joseph Executive Producer: Ed Gilbreath Director of CT Podcasts: Mike Cosper Calif. church offers religious exemption letters for people opposed to COVID vaccine Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A church in California that has a history of defying pandemic lockdown orders is offering religious exemption letters for people opposed to being vaccinated against COVID-19. KCRA News reports that after Sunday services last week, there were long lines of people waiting to pick up exemption letters from Destiny Christian Church in Rocklin, led by Pastor Greg Fairrington. Some say they traveled over two hours to get a letter. Fairrington told the outlet that he doesn't believe vaccine requirements are "right." "America is a free country. We have freedom of religion, and if a person has a moral objection to taking the vaccine, we want to come alongside of them," he said in a video interview. Destiny Christian Church, which averages 10,000 people online and in-person for its worship services, recently sent a statement to the Los Angeles Times explaining the importance of the exemption letters. Fairrington said the church has gotten thousands of phone calls from doctors, nurses, educators, and first responders, in tears, fearing that their livelihoods hang in the balance because of their religious convictions. The vaccine poses a morally compromising situation for many people of faith, stated Fairrington. The religious exemptions we are issuing speak to that, honor that, and affirm that. Earlier this month, Fairrington and his wife, Kathy, led their congregation in a prayer for those who work in healthcare, education or other fields threatened with losing their job because they refuse to get the COVID-19 vaccine on moral grounds. Michelle Mello, a professor of law and medicine at Stanford University, told the Times that she believes the exemption letters are irrelevant since most workplaces and the courts already recognize bona fide and sincere religious exemptions. You have to do one of two things to protect other people from the risk that you pose to them, Mello told The Los Angeles Times, getting vaccinated or getting tested regularly. Thats not a mandate. A mandate is when you withhold an important benefit because a person declines to receive vaccination. As the COVID vaccine becomes more widely available, many schools and businesses have required workers and others to get vaccinated or, if exempted for medical or religious reasons, to submit to wearing face masks in public and getting tested regularly. While Destiny Church has offered to provide religious exemption letters, other Christian bodies like the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York have refused to allow their clergy to give such exemptions. In a memorandum dated July 30, Chancellor John P. Cahill informed all clergy and staff that there is no basis for a priest to issue a religious exemption to the vaccine. Pope Francis has made it very clear that it is morally acceptable to take any of the vaccines and said we have the moral responsibility to get vaccinated, wrote Cahill. By doing so [a priest] is acting in contradiction to the directives of the Pope and is participating in an act that could have serious consequences to others. The archdiocese concluded that while a person is free to exercise discretion on getting the vaccine based on his or her own beliefs, their clergy should not be active participants to such actions. Fairrington made headlines earlier this month when he urged congregants to vote to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom during the recall election on Sept. 4. He told The Sacramento Bee that Newsom's policies during the pandemic have had "traumatic consequences for families, schools, communities, and the church." Newsom came under fire as his administration enacted restrictions on in-person worship services during the COVID-19 pandemic. Several churches disobeyed the guidelines and some challenged them in court. In April, the U.S. Supreme Court vacated a lower court ruling against South Bay Pentecostal Church, which sought injunctive relief against the restrictions. Kabul terror attacks: 13 US soldiers among those killed in twin explosions Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Editor's note: Details in this report may change as updated information is released. Two coordinated explosions carried out by suicide bombers near the Kabul airport Thursday killed over 60 people, including U.S. soldiers, and wounded scores of others, reinforcing concerns about the safety of Americans in the country following the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan. The attacks came after the U.S. State Department warned Americans to avoid going near the Hamid Karzai International Airport following reports of an imminent attack by the Islamic State-Khorasan (ISIS-K) on Afghans and Americans attempting to flee the country. A suicide bomber carried out the first explosion near Abbey Gate, which resulted in numerous Afghan and American casualties. The second was a car bomb near Baron Hotel, which is adjacent to the Abbey Gate and is where British troops process Afghans before they depart on evacuation flights. Baron Hotel is also where 169 U.S. citizens were rescued last week after they were unable to make it past the crowds and Taliban checkpoints. According to officials, 11 Marines and one Navy Corpsman were killed in the first suicide bombing and 15 other soldiers were wounded. Initially, it was believed that four Marines had been killed and three others were wounded after the U.S. Ambassador to Kabul told staff about the death toll from the suicide bombings, according to The Wall Street Journal. Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby first acknowledged the suicide bombing near Abbey Gate in a tweet sent at 9:44 a.m. ET Thursday: We can confirm an explosion outside Kabul Airport. Casualties are unclear at this time. We will provide additional details when we can. In a subsequent tweet, sent nearly an hour later, Kirby confirmed that the explosion near the Abbey Gate of the Kabul airport has resulted in an unknown number of casualties. We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties, he added. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. Republicans quickly pointed the blame for the terror attacks at President Joe Biden. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., the chair of the House Republican Conference, alleged that Joe Biden has blood on his hands. The buck stops with the President of the United States. This horrific national security and humanitarian disaster is solely the result of Joe Bidens weak and incompetent leadership. He is unfit to be Commander-in-Chief, she wrote in a scathing post on Twitter. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, called on Biden to fix the mess you created. Maintaining that we are still at war, he added: You didnt end the war, you just gave the enemy new advantage. Go on offense, establish superiority, and dont leave until all our citizens and allies are safe. The explosions in Afghanistan come less than a week before the Aug. 31 deadline to withdraw all U.S. troops from the South Asian country. Even before the explosions, Republicans had criticized the Biden administrations handling of the Afghanistan exit. On Wednesday, after U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters at a press conference that no more than 1,500 Americans remain in Afghanistan, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., accused the State Department of misleading the public. Just two hours before Tony Blinken told America that there were 1,500 of their fellow citizens stranded in Afghanistan, one of his aides briefed congressional staff and said there were 4,100, Cotton told Fox News Bret Baier on Special Report Wednesday. Something tells me they didnt get 2,600 American citizens out in the span of two hours today, so the State Department still, nearly two weeks on, cannot answer the simple question of how many Americans we have stranded in Afghanistan. Earlier Wednesday, multiple news outlets, including National Review, reported on the 4,100 figure that the administration provided to Congress earlier in the day. They later issued a retraction when the State Department alleged that the official who shared that number with Congress misspoke. Blinken explained at the press conference that the numbers are difficult to pin down in absolute precision at any given moment because U.S. citizens are not required to register at embassies when visiting foreign countries, making the government unsure of exactly how many people are in the country at any given time. Cotton also pushed back on Blinkens vow that the U.S. will continue to provide consular support and facilitate departures for those who wish to leave after Aug. 31. According to Cotton, In a normal country with a normal government, say an American visiting Great Britain, if you lost your passport, youd go to the embassy and consular services would help you get your passport or at least get temporary documents to leave the country. Were not going to have an embassy in Afghanistan. The planned withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan marks the end of the war in Afghanistan, which spanned nearly two decades. In an appearance on Sinclair Broadcast Groups The National Desk Monday, Adam Andrzejewski, the CEO of the nonprofit transparency organization OpentheBooks.com, noted that the war effort has cost American taxpayers $83 billion. Andrzejewski elaborated on how after the U.S. began to exit from Afghanistan, much of its military equipment has fallen into the hands of the Taliban, which has rapidly gained control of the country. He reported that the Taliban now control 75,000 military vehicles, this is about 50,000 tactical vehicles, 20,000 Humvees, each Humvee on average costs about [$100,000] a piece. They control about 1,000 mine-resistant vehicles and even about 150 armored personnel carriers. Theres about 208 airplanes and helicopters; a lot of these aircraft are very sophisticated. Just 20 of the aircraft are the A29s and thats the super attack planes. These planes, again very sophisticated, latest in technology, each one of them costs up to $21.3 million. Then you got the helicopters, like the black hawk helicopter, and each one of those costs up to $21 million." Andrzejewski warned that due to the Taliban gaining control of U.S. military equipment, a terrorist gun show that never ends will likely break out. He detailed how additional U.S. military equipment remains unaccounted for, including about 350,000 M4s and M16 rifles, 60,000 machine guns, 25,000 grenade launchers and 2500 modern cannons. Ultimately, our failure in Afghanistan is a spiritual one Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment When I first wrote about the situation in Afghanistan over a month ago, no one could have imagined it would unfold into such a catastrophic situation. The American people deserve an explanation of how we lost a war after sacrificing the lives of thousands of Americans, spending over a trillion dollars, and possessing the greatest military force on the planet. In my opinion, ultimately, our failure in Afghanistan is a spiritual one because our policies no longer reflect our Christian values. But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive,....2 Timothy 3:1-2 The terrible miscalculation of the capabilities and willingness of the Afghan army and national police to defend their nation is primarily the result of systemic corruption. Countless private contractors, military personnel, and US diplomats siphoned away billions of dollars in US taxpayer funds to train these forces while largely ignoring the fact that many were not meeting the benchmarks required to build capacity. In some instances, the soldiers and police officers were listed on the payroll but never received the training. Though the Americans involved knew the Afghans were often demoralized and lacked the will to fight, the programs received a rubber stamp of completion, and the money continued to flow. The lack of oversight by US officials allowed for bribery, fraud, and extortion to run rampant while also empowering abusive warlords and their militias. As one former Army ranger and West Point graduate wrote in a blog as if written by the Taliban to Americans, "Your retired Generals "earn" tens of thousands of dollars talking to your political, industrial, and financial leaders about "teams, winning, and discipline." It's a mockery of the war they refused to fight. We urge you to continue following their vacuous personalities so we can further watch your once great nation collapse. Your statesman and elected officials are spineless, narcissistic, and more cowardly than your Generals. They crave power over you above all else." It is a tragic perspective coming from a member of our elite fighting force who spent three tours of duty in Afghanistan. Not only have American diplomats and personnel engaged in egregious examples of financial deceit, but the majority of them also do not value or understand the impact of religion not their own and not that of our adversaries. Suppose the majority of our policymakers do not factor into their decision-making that God will judge their actions. How then can they understand a people who clearly state ALL their actions are determined by obedience to their god? The Taliban have pledged an oath to their radical interpretation of Islam and their desire to uphold its draconian laws for society and the state. The statement from President Biden that the Taliban is undergoing an ``existential crisis about whether they want legitimacy on the global stage" completely disregards the Taliban's unwavering commitment to the Islamic state. The Taliban would never sacrifice their eternal goals in exchange for a seat at the "table" with nations they have vowed to subdue or conquer. Their intent was simply to get the US to withdraw from Afghanistan, and they had no interest in power-sharing with a democratic regime. To claim otherwise is at best naive and, at worst, dangerously ignorant. Finally, the worst example of "hearts that have grown cold" is the fact that the US withdrew its troops and abandoned thousands of US citizens without an exit strategy. With the horrible conditions at the Kabul airport and the total lack of planning for the evacuation of Americans throughout Afghanistan up to 500 miles from Kabul, US officials continue to insist on the August 31st deadline for withdrawal. Despite the reports of people being beaten or trampled to death in their attempt to reach the airport, we do not hear of any revised plan to secure their evacuation by other means, possibly through neighboring countries. Our top national security officials, intelligent agencies, and military personnel should have had an effective strategy to protect national security interests in Afghanistan BEFORE we exited and chaos ensued. Ironically, just one week before the hasty withdrawal, our counter-terrorism apparatus released the latest Homeland Security bulletin that claims one of the significant threats of domestic terrorism emanates from Americans who question the results of the 2020 election or new COVID restrictions. Sadly, it seems our government is so misguided that it focused on vilifying its own citizens instead of saving thousands of them from a terrorist regime overseas. Despite these moral failures, the Gospel reminds us that when it seems darkness is covering humanity, followers of Christ are the sons of light and of the day. But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation 1 Thessalonians 5. With thousands of new Afghan immigrants coming to our shores, we suddenly have the chance to call them to the redemptive power of salvation in Jesus Christ. I have a dear friend who lived as an Iraqi in a refugee camp in Berlin, Germany. The local church wanted to invite the new refugees as guests but did not have a translator. Even though my friend was a devout Muslim at the time, the pastor hired her anyway. The church opened its doors to the refugees, providing meals and teaching them the truth of the Gospel in Arabic. The wisdom and open-hearted nature of this pastor not only led to the most miraculous conversion of my friend but also several of the other attendees! We have to BELIEVE in the power of the Gospel and simply create its way to work. The new immigrants are being uprooted from their homes not by choice but by the tyranny of the Taliban and its evil religion. Providing opportunities for them to hear of the free gift of salvation from a loving God and His Son is precisely the type of comfort they need. Let us see this as a divine opening to bring glory out of tragedy and turn a diplomatic failure into a victory for the Kingdom. Former Satanist says he converted to Christianity after having out-of-body experience in Hell Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Worshipping the devil, practicing witchcraft and delving into the occult world for decades alongside family members who were practicing witches are all memories ex-Satanist John Ramirez has of the life he lived for 35 years before turning to God. Ramirez, who is now 57 and an evangelist, said he will never forget the night 22 years ago when he made the decision to walk with the Lord Jesus Christ. On that evening in 1999, Ramirez said that God gave him a "life-altering, out-of-body experience" in which he transcended from his bodily form and went on a train that he knew was traveling to "Hell rapidly. In a recent interview, Ramirez told The Christian Post that during his out-of-body experience, he remembers sitting on the train, going faster than anything on the planet. "There also were people on the train and I could see the terror of fear on them, but I couldnt see their faces," he said. "They knew they were going somewhere and they knew they were not coming back." "Also, Jezebel was on the train, which is a demon principality, yelling from across the aisle, calling me a traitor in demonic tongues. The train made an explosion right into Hell and the doors were opened," he added. "When I came off the train in Hell, I stepped onto the ground and the ground was breathing like a human being. I encountered people in Hell that were in the occult that were still alive on the earth. God told me sometime later that these individuals were not going to repent. He said what he experienced was life-transforming, similar to the transformation of Apostle Paul. Today, he is an evangelist for Jesus Christ, seeking to win souls around the world and setting the captives free by the power of the Holy Spirit. Following that night in 1999, Ramirez has devoted the past two decades to preaching the holy Gospel and sharing his testimony globally of Gods goodness in His life. He has also authored several books, including Out of the Devil's Cauldron: A Journey from Darkness to Light. He is set to release his new book on Oct. 12, Conquer Your Deliverance: How to Live a Life of Total Freedom. His ministry, John Ramirez Ministries, offers multiple programs, books and courses on spiritual warfare available online. He said his mission in Christ is to fight the good fight against the kingdom of darkness and point people to the cross of Jesus Christ. Ramirez has made appearances in various regions to share his testimony. The evangelist was first introduced to the occult at the age of 8 by his Puerto Rican parents, who practiced Santeria. The belief system blends spirit worship and animal sacrifice with aspects of Roman Catholic teaching. Ramirez often shares with others how he was once trained to be part of a satanic cult by witches and warlocks and how he became a high-ranking warlock in the highest level of the occult casting powerful witchcraft spells and "controlling entire regions and astro projecting and cursing regions under the name of Satan and his kingdom." Eventually, Ramirez said he sold his soul to the devil in a diabolical, blood-soaked ritual." In his testimony, Ramirez shares how he would actively recruit souls into this unholy kingdom by haunting the bars and clubs of New York City by night to find his next victims. The love of Jesus Christ is in my heart and what He has done in my life is truly supernatural, Ramirez told CP. There are a lot of people who have been hurt by witchcraft and demonic forces, and I am here now to set others free because God freed me." "I am free in Christ," he added. "I know my purpose and my destiny today in Christ. Ramirez said one of the greatest tricks of the enemy is to pretend to make life easier and let people play into the great deception. People dont know these consequences lead them straight to Hell. People want a microwave-effect," he detailed. "When I was in the devil's kingdom, it was like a microwave: You get it fast and you lose it fast. But the devil comes to collect later." For Ramirez, it is a special and worthy experience to put his faith in God. He stressed that "when [people] sell their souls to the devil, they are giving away their purpose and their destiny. Everyones soul belongs to God, and no one truly sells their soul to the devil because their soul will always belong to God, their Creator," he said. "But, selling your soul to the devil is another way of saying you are devoting your focus, allegiance and time to the devil. You are making a commitment to something that isnt worthy and that is not a good return in the end." But even people who sell their soul to the devil, Ramirez added, will have to "face God at the end of time in the final judgment." "God has the final say," he said. Ramirez recently made a guest appearance in California. He shared a sermon, his testimony and participated in a Q&A for an audience at the Explosive Spiritual Warfare & The Prophetic event livestreamed on YouTube on July 17. At the event, Ramirez told viewers that God is calling him for East Coast and West Coast ministries and ministries around the world. He said God has plans for California and the world for Jesus Christ. Theres a spirit of pride and religion that are running Hollywood, and the altar of Satan is [located] in Hollywood, he said as a response to an audience members question. We are going to take Hollywood back from California. "Gods going to give an eviction notice to the enemy and around the world," he said. He advised churches to never leave your post because God never created anyone to run [from where He is calling them to go]. Coming from a past lifestyle where he attended church in the daytime and practiced witchcraft at night, Ramirez told the crowd that they could be a generation of people who know how to fight, shake, dismantle and uproot the demonic assignment of their lives. Truthfully, a religious spirit is a demonic spirit. That is the same spirit that killed Jesus. The spirit of religion is a spirit that is a cancer that is killing the Church within, and the devil is into religion, he contends. The only way you can have Jesus is when you have a real encounter. ... The fight has been won at the cross. Jesus said, It is finished, which means [He] did everything to fight your fight. Jesus did everything to equip the saints to fight the good fight. He believes "many Christians run from where God is calling them to go by sweeping their assignment from God under the rug. Many, he preached, have been running away and not confronting the enemy who is in front of them." "It is time to stop talking about the enemy and its time to confront," he concluded. "The battle has been won through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Antony Blinken: No more than 1,500 Americans remain in Afghanistan; 4,500 evacuated Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment With less than a week until the deadline for the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, the U.S. State Department estimates that no more than 1,500 Americans seeking to be evacuated remain in the country. Secretary of State Antony Blinken gave an update on the number of Americans remaining in Afghanistan during a press conference Wednesday, saying: Our first priority is the evacuation of American citizens. Since Aug. 14, we have evacuated at least 4,500 U.S. citizens and likely more. More than 500 of those Americans were evacuated in just the last day alone. The U.S. and allied forces have evacuated approximately 88,000 people since Aug. 14, mostly Afghans. Based on our analysis, starting on Aug. 14, when our evacuation operations began, there was then a population of as many as 6,000 American citizens in Afghanistan who wanted to leave, he said. Over the last 10 days, roughly 4,500 of these Americans have been safely evacuated, along with immediate family members. He added, Over the past 24 hours, weve been in direct contact with approximately 500 additional Americans and provided specific instructions on how to get to the airport safely. He noted that for the remaining roughly 1,000 contacts that we had, who may be Americans seeking to leave Afghanistan, were aggressively reaching out to them multiple times a day, through multiple channels of communication. During a bipartisan news conference outside the U.S. Capitol today, Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, accused of administration of kowtowing to the Taliban and setting a deadline before the evacuation is complete. The conditions at the airport are very ... severe. ISIS-K is there. The Taliban and ISIS-K dont get along; they cant control them, McCaul, the Republican Leader of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said. So theres a major terror threat at the airport right now. I think thats some of the urgency that the administration is walking into the August 31st deadline. He asserted that the withdrawal should be based on conditions on the ground when the mission is accomplished, not an arbitrary timeline. For Gods sake, were the United States of America. Were going to let the Taliban dictate how we exit and when we exit? That has weakened us, our standing in the world, when we are bowing down to the Taliban and letting them dictate the terms of our surrender, McCaul added. Other members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee who were at the news conference included Rep. Andy Kim, D-N.J., who urged Biden to continue to evacuate all Americans and those with special immigrant visas, and Reps. August Pfluger, Ronny Jackson, both of Texas. Actors Parker Young and Adhir Kalyan were also there and urged the president to extend the deadline. At the State Department, Blinken told reporters that the U.S. is working to determine whether they still want to leave and, if so, enabling them to get the most up-to-date information and instructions to them for how to do so. Some may no longer be in the country; some may claim to be Americans but turn out not to be. Some may choose to stay. Well continue to try to identify the status and plans of these people in the coming days. Blinken concluded that From this list of approximately 1,000, we believe the number of Americans actively seeking assistance to leave Afghanistan is lower, likely significantly lower. The secretary of state described the statistics he presented as dynamic calculations that we are working hour-by-hour to refine for accuracy. Responding to a question from a reporter, Blinken indicated that the figures he provided regarding the number of U.S. citizens remaining in Afghanistan do not include green card holders. Blinken also explained why the numbers are difficult to pin down in absolute precision at any given moment. He specifically mentioned that the U.S. does not require Americans traveling overseas to register at U.S. embassies in foreign countries upon either entry or departure. The specific estimated number of Americans in Afghanistan who want to leave can go up as people respond to our outreach for the first time. And it can go down when we reach Americans who we thought were in Afghanistan who tell us theyve already left, he asserted. There could be other Americans in Afghanistan who ignored public evacuation notices and have not yet identified themselves to us. Blinken added that other reasons why the number of Americans remaining in Afghanistan might frequently fluctuate include discovering that many people who contact us and identify themselves as American citizens, including by filling out and submitting repatriation assistance forms, are not, in fact, U.S. citizens, something that can take some time to verify. There are Americans who are still evaluating their decision to leave based on the situation on the ground, that evolves daily and, in fact, evolves hourly. Some are understandably very scared. Each has a set of personal priorities and considerations that they alone can weigh. Blinken also addressed concerns about the Aug. 31 deadline for withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan. After reiterating that Biden had requested contingency plans in the event of a longer-than-expected stay in the country, he stressed that There is no deadline on our work to help any remaining American citizens who decide they want to leave to do so, along with the many Afghans who have stood by us over these many years. That effort will continue every day past Aug. 31, he vowed. The Taliban have made public and private commitments to provide and permit safe passage for Americans seeking to leave after Aug. 31. China: Police arrest 10 kids, 18 adults in raid on worship gathering Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Police in China raided a small group of Christian worshipers from a heavily-persecuted house church in southwestern Chinas Sichuan province and arrested almost everyone, including an infant less than 1 year old, nine children and 18 adults. Officers from Chenghua District Mengzhuiwang office forcibly entered the home of a church member, He Shan, where the small group of Early Rain Covenant Church was meeting for worship on Sunday, CBN News said. The police claimed to have received a call reporting an illegal gathering there, the church wrote on its Facebook page, persecution watchdog International Christian Concern reported, identifying the gathering as the Treading Water small group and the preacher as Dai Zhichao. Preacher Dai asked the officers to show proper documents but the police ignored him and forcibly entered brother Hes home. In the process, the preacher was injured on his arm, as were other men who tried to help. Dais phone was also confiscated, ICC said. A church member told ICC that many people were beaten by the police after being held in detention. When the children were rowdy, the police officers threatened to hit them on their heads, ICC said. Police later released most of them, but Preacher Dai and brother He were put under administrative detention for 14 days. Brother He also received a fine of 1,000 RMB ($154). Open Doors USA, which monitors persecution in over 60 countries, estimates that there are about 97 million Christians in China, a large percentage of whom worship in what China considers to be illegal and unregistered underground house churches. Over two years ago, authorities shuttered the 5,000-member church ERCC, broke down the doors of church members and leaders homes, and arrested more than 100 people. Police continue to harass and track church members, according to a recent report from the U.S.-based group China Aid. ERCC, led by Pastor Wang Yi, has not been able to gather in person since it was shut down in 2018 when its pastor and other leaders were arrested. Wang was later sentenced to nine years in prison on charges of subversion of power and illegal business operations. Gina Goh, ICCs regional manager for Southeast Asia, commented: The latest raid against ERCC, though nothing novel, shows a worrying trend that house churches are frequently subjected to harassment like this in the name of law enforcement, where legally flawed Revised Regulations on Religious Affairs have been employed by Beijing to crack down on house churches around the country. Goh added that the Chinese Communist Partys constant fear of unregistered churches is both pathetic and preposterous, as it underscores President Xi [Jinping]s insecurity toward any critical mass. There is absolutely no regard for religious freedom. Goh previously said, Beijing seeks to intimidate the leaders in hopes that the churches will dissolve due to fear. Their plot will not succeed, thanks to the resiliency of the Chinese house church. They survived the Cultural Revolution, and they will survive Xis era as well. Under the direction of President Xi, officials from the CCP have been enforcing strict controls on religion, according to a report released in March by China Aid. Authorities in China are also cracking down on Christianity by removing Bible apps and Christian WeChat public accounts as new highly restrictive administrative measures on religious staff went into effect this year. China is ranked on Open Doors USAs World Watch List as one of the worst countries in the world when it comes to the persecution of Christians. The U.S. State Department has also labeled China as a country of particular concern for continuing to engage in particularly severe violations of religious freedom. Potters House charity, churches raising aid for 25K Haitian families after massive quake Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A group of churches that includes the charity arm of Bishop T.D. Jakes The Potters House are raising aid for approximately 25,000 families affected by the recent severe earthquake in Haiti. United MegaCARE, the humanitarian group of The Potter's House, announced Monday that they were joining Perfecting Faith Church of New York and Tabernacle of Glory in Miami, Fla. to provide relief to Haitians in need. T.D. Jakes Ministries emailed The Christian Post comments from the leadership of United MegaCARE, explaining that they had a history of sending aid to Haiti in times of crisis. For this latest endeavor, our objective is to meet the immediate need following both the 7.2 magnitude earthquake earlier this month and Tropical Storm Grace, stated the charity group. Were currently focused on helping offset the cost of relief kits (and efforts) currently underway with our partners on-the-ground in Haiti and partners making their way to Haiti. United MegaCARE told CP that they expect to ship the supplies by the end of the month, noting that they have yet to fail in meeting the objectives we set out to do when helping those in need. Our financial contributions to our team members on the ground in Haiti is part of our Phase 1 relief efforts. Supplies like tents, PPE, non-perishable food and emergency supplies are all part of the kits being developed, they explained. Our Phase 2 relief efforts are currently in development following an additional on-site assessment of the people, their needs and future requirements. The timeline for Phase 2 relief efforts are not yet finalized. Earlier this month, Haiti experienced a magnitude 7.2 earthquake, which was greater in severity than the earthquake that hit the Caribbean nation in 2010 that killed over 300,000 people. The epicenter of the earthquake from earlier this month was near the town of Petit Trou de Nippes, which is located 93 miles from the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince. Archdeacon Abiade Lozama of St. Sauveur Episcopal Church in Les Cayes told The New York Times that the streets were filled with screaming and people searching for loved ones. People are sitting around waiting for word, and there is no word no word from their family, no word on who will help them, Lozama explained. When such a catastrophe happens, people wait for word or some sort of confidence from the state. But theres nothing. No help. Haiti's Civil Protection Agency announced on Sunday that the current death toll for the earthquake is approximately 2,200, with over 300 still missing and more than 12,000 injured. Biden admin. may partially repeal rule protecting Christian student groups at universities Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment The Biden administration is reviewing a federal rule that prohibits public universities and colleges from, among other things, removing the funding of religious student organizations whose leadership policies conflict with campus anti-discrimination rules. The U.S. Department of Education posted a blog entry last Thursday written by Acting Assistant Secretary for Office of Postsecondary Education Michelle Asha Cooper, announcing a review of the "Free Inquiry Rule." Certain aspects of these regulations impose additional requirements on Department of Education higher education institutional grant recipients, wrote Cooper. The Department is currently conducting a review of those regulations while keeping in mind the importance of several key elements, including First Amendment protections, nondiscrimination requirements, and the promotion of inclusive learning environments for all students. In November 2020, the Trump administration passed a final rule centered on protecting the rights of religious student groups at public colleges and universities. The rule, known as the Improving Free Inquiry, Transparency, and Accountability at Colleges and Universities regulation, is also called the Free Inquiry Rule. The rule came partly in response to legal battles centered on Christian student groups facing punishment from public universities for not allowing non-Christians or those who refuse to adhere to biblical sexual ethics to become leaders of their student clubs. It revised existing regulations to clarify how educational institutions may demonstrate that a religious organization controls them to qualify for the exemption provided under Title IX, 20 U.S.C. 1681(a)(3), to the extent Title IX or its implementing regulations would not be consistent with the religious tenets of such organization. According to the summary of the rule, the regulation was created in response to then-President Donald Trump signing Executive Order 13864 in March 2019, as well as recent litigation regarding student rights. These regulations also require a public institution to not deny a religious student organization any of the rights, benefits, or privileges that are otherwise afforded to other student organizations, stated the summary. In the blog entry, Acting Assistant Secretary Cooper also wrote that following the review, the Education Department expects to publish a notice of proposed rulemaking in the Federal Register to propose rescinding parts of the Free Inquiry Rule. Throughout this process and beyond, public colleges and universities must ensure protection of First Amendment freedoms, including religious freedom and freedom of association, which long predate the Free Inquiry Rule, she continued. Compliance with nondiscrimination requirements must be in a manner consistent with the First Amendment. We urge public colleges and universities and their students to engage thoughtfully on these matters ... Americans United for Separation of Church and State, which, alongside American Atheists, is challenging the Free Inquiry Rule in court, celebrated the announcement. We applaud the Department of Education for its willingness to reconsider this harmful regulation, and for sending the message to colleges, universities and their students that this wrong may soon be righted, said Richard B. Katskee, vice president and legal director of Americans United, in a statement. We anticipate that the Biden administration will agree with us that discrimination has no place in our public colleges and universities even if religion is used to justify it. The Trump-era rule came as several religious student groups filed lawsuits after their universities de-recognized them as official campus groups because their leadership policies required that their leaders be Christian and adhere to their statements of faith. In April, a federal court sided with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, which sued Wayne State University after its official student club status was revoked in 2017. Not being recognized as an official club means that the group can't access benefits that campus groups receive, such as reserving meeting rooms for free and applying for campus funding. Judge Robert H. Cleland of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan ruled that other student groups were allowed to restrict their leadership based on sex, gender identity, political partisanship, ideology, creed, ethnicity, GPA or attractiveness. However, the small group of Christians ... were denied [student organization] benefits because they require their Christian leaders to be ... Christian. Other courts have also ruled in favor of other Christian student groups, including another InterVarsity chapter that filed similar lawsuits against the University of Iowa. Greg Jao, director of external relations for InterVarsity Fellowship, said in a statement last November that the Trump-era rule was "necessary because some universities would give official recognition only to certain faith-based groups, while rejecting others." What made the student groups who were denied recognition different? They expected their student leaders to agree with their religious beliefs," Jao said in a statement. "The recognized groups did not. Universities should welcome all religious groups equally, in order to encourage tolerance, pluralism and religious diversity. Ismail Royer, director of the Islam and Religious Freedom Action Team for the Religious Freedom Institute, a supporter of the "Free Inquiry Rule," stated last year that This new regulation is an important policy for Muslim student organizations because it allows them to select their own leaders and define their own mission by their faithsprinciples. According to Royer, This right should be reserved for all student religious organizations, and not usurped by university officials based on their own shifting, unpredictable standards. FDA gives full approval to Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine for ages 16 and up Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has announced the official approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine months after granting it an emergency use authorization status. In an announcement Monday, the FDA said that the Pfizer vaccine, first made available under EUA last December, was the first COVID-19 vaccine to get full approval for people 16 years and over and will be marketed as Comirnaty. Acting FDA Commissioner Dr. Janet Woodcock stated the approval is a milestone as we continue to battle the COVID-19 pandemic. While this and other vaccines have met the FDAs rigorous, scientific standards for emergency use authorization, as the first FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccine, the public can be very confident that this vaccine meets the high standards for safety, effectiveness, and manufacturing quality the FDA requires of an approved product, Woodcock said in a statement. While millions of people have already safely received COVID-19 vaccines, we recognize that for some, the FDA approval of a vaccine may now instill additional confidence to get vaccinated. Todays milestone puts us one step closer to altering the course of this pandemic in the U.S. Last November, Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech announced that they developed a vaccine that was reportedly over 90% effective in preventing COVID-19 in those without evidence of prior infection. The following month, the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine for emergency use to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus in the United States and abroad. Based on the longer-term follow-up data that we submitted, todays decision by the FDA affirms the efficacy and safety profile of our vaccine at a time when it is urgently needed," Pfizer Chief Executive Officer Albert Bourla said in a statement Monday. "About 60 percent of eligible Americans are fully vaccinated, and infection, hospitalization and death rates continue to rise rapidly among unvaccinated populations across the country." Bourla said that he is hopeful that the full approval will "increase confidence in our vaccine, as vaccination remains the best tool we have to help protect lives and achieve herd immunity." "Hundreds of millions of doses of our vaccine already have been administered in the U.S. since December 2020, and we look forward to continuing to work with the U.S. government to reach more Americans now that we have FDA approval," Bourla concluded. The FDA's announcement comes not long after former President Donald Trump implored supporters at a rally in Alabama over the weekend to get vaccinated just as he and his family did before he left office in January. I recommend, take the vaccine! declared Trump, who nevertheless expressed opposition to mandating vaccination. I did it. Its good. Take the vaccines It is working. The weekend rally was not the first time that Trump urged his supporters to get vaccinated. In March, the former president said on Fox News that he would recommend people get vaccinated. Its a great vaccine, and its a safe vaccine, Trump said at the time. Despite the push by many to get more Americans vaccinated, some, including immunologist and physician Dr. Hooman Norchashm, have expressed concern about the potential dangers of vaccinating people who either have or had COVID-19. In a recent interview, Norchashm said that while he supports the COVID-10 vaccines, he said it is a mistake to apply this "therapy" in a "one-size-fits-all" fashion. "We are deploying this vaccine in the midst of an outbreak where literally millions of people across the United States and the world have already had natural infections and are therefore immune," he said. "The idea of vaccinating someone who is already immune is a violation of medical necessity as a principle of medical ethics. And it has the potential to do harm. The reason why I am critical is not so much about the vaccine itself. I think the vaccine is an amazing technological feat. I received the vaccine myself. I advocate for all non-immune Americans to get this vaccine as soon as possible. But the problem is its indiscriminate application to folks who do not stand to benefit from it." In a letter to health officials in January, Norchashm wrote that the "goal of maximally and quickly vaccinating the population is the correct and laudable public health goal." But [we need to] robustly mitigate against known and rationally prognosticated dangers to the minority subset of persons at risk of harm," he wrote. I am recommending to you, as our lead FDA regulators, not to gloss over the real possibility that vaccinating persons with pre-existing SARS-CoV-2 viral antigens in their tissues could cause that subset of people grave immunological harm and especially the frail with cardiovascular disease. Jesse Jackson, wife Jacqueline remain hospitalized for COVID-19 Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Civil rights leader the Rev. Jesse Jackson, 79, who was fully vaccinated in January, and his 77-year-old wife, Jacqueline, remained hospitalized with COVID-19 on Monday, according to their son, Jonathan Jackson. The Jacksons were responding positively to treatments at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, their son told The Associated Press. She had been real lethargic with flu-like symptoms [and] went to the hospital Friday, Jonathan Jackson told ABC7. Then it was diagnosed that she and my dad both had contracted COVID. She is having some oxygen, but is able to function and breathe on her own without a respirator. Nothing severe. Because of her age and her current health, it is more challenging. In a statement Monday, he added: We are ever mindful that COVID-19 is a serious disease and we ask that you continue in prayer for my parents, as we remain prayerful for yours. A spokesperson for the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, a nonprofit and political action group founded by Jesse Jackson, told the network that Jaqueline Jackson is not vaccinated. In a separate statement, the organization added: There are no further updates at this time. We will provide updates as they become available. Jesse Jackson, the two-time candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, was diagnosed with Parkinsons about four years ago and had received two doses of the Pfizer vaccine. Civil rights activist Al Sharpton tweeted his support for the couple, writing: Let us all pray for Rev. and Mrs Jesse Jackson. They need our sincere and intense prayers. Prayer changes things!!! Radio host Donnie Simpson wrote on Twitter Saturday night, Praying tonight for Rev. Jesse Jackson and his wife, Jacqueline. Theyre both in the hospital with COVID. No details on how bad the symptoms are, but the fact that theyre hospitalized tells me that our prayers are needed. A former Baptist minister, Jackson was also an aid to Martin Luther King Jr. and played a leading role in the U.S. civil rights movement in the 1960s. Speaking to activists in London about the civil rights struggle, Jackson said in 2013 that Jesus was an occupier. Jesus was an occupier, born under a death warrant, a Jew by religion, born in poverty under Roman occupation, explained the veteran activist at the event near Saint Pauls Cathedral, according to MSNBC. He continued, Gandhi was an occupier, Martin Luther King was an occupier, [Nelson] Mandela was an occupier. Jacqueline Jackson is also known for her civil rights activism who's advocated for numerous causes worldwide. The couple has five children together. Over 22 dead, including twin babies, after flooding in Tennessee; dozens missing Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment About two dozen people were killed, including two babies who were swept from their fathers arms, and dozens of others were missing as of Sunday afternoon after catastrophic flash flooding in Middle Tennessee, officials said. Humphreys County Public Information Officer Grey Collier said 22 people had lost their lives due to Saturdays flooding. The county reports that about 50 others remained missing as of Sunday afternoon, according to CBS News. Authorities fear the number could rise as rescue crews were still searching door to door. The dead included twin 7-month-old babies who were swept from their fathers arms in Waverly. The family told WTVF that the babies went underwater and disappeared. Their bodies were later found by first responders. Humphreys County received up to 17 inches of rain in less than 24 hours Saturday, which likely shattered the Tennessee record for one-day rainfall by more than 3 inches, according to the National Weather Service. The floodwaters had receded by Sunday, but large amounts of debris could be seen, including wrecked cars and demolished buildings. In downtown Waverly, business owner Kansas Klein was quoted as saying that he saw two girls holding on to a puppy and clinging to a wooden board, but the current was too fast. He later heard that a girl with a puppy and another girl had been rescued downstream but wasnt sure it was them. Klein said that the storm devastated low-income housing area, Brookside. "[B]uildings were knocked down, half of them were destroyed," Klein explained. "People were pulling out bodies of people who had drowned and didnt make it out. It was something like the quickness of a tornado, I guess. Someone described it as a tidal wave, Waverly Mayor Buddy Frazier was quoted as saying by WKRN. It makes you feel good when youre dealing with a situation like this and you see youre not in it by yourself. Your neighbors are with you and everyone starts pulling together. In his remarks from the Roosevelt Room at the White House on Sunday, President Joe Biden expressed his deepest condolences for the sudden and tragic loss of life due to this flash flood. I know we've reached out to the community and we stand ready to offer them support," he said. "I've asked the Administrator to speak to Governor [William Byron] Lee of Tennessee right away, and we will offer any assistance they need for this terrible moment." Va. school board votes against enacting trans pronoun, bathroom policy amid concerns Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A school board in Virginia has voted to reject state regulations that would require schools to let trans-identified students choose their own names and gender pronouns and have access to the private facilities that correspond with their gender identity. The Newport News School Board voted 5-1 last week to reject a motion to adopt the revised state guidelines on the treatment of trans-identified students, which were created in response to legislation passed last year by the Virginia General Assembly. U.S. Congressman Bobby Scott, a Democrat whose congressional district includes Newport News, took to his official Twitter account to denounce the school board vote. Disappointed by this move to discriminate against transgender students & defy state/federal law. All students deserve to feel welcome at school, tweeted Scott last week. The Board should review the severe harm that not implementing these policy changes will have on student health & reverse its decision. According to the Code of Virginia, under 22.1-23.3, titled Treatment of transgender students; policies, the state education officials provide to each school board model policies concerning the treatment of transgender students in public elementary and secondary schools that address common issues regarding transgender students in accordance with evidence-based best practices and include information, guidance, procedures, and standards. These policies included, among other things, complying with applicable nondiscrimination laws, maintaining a safe and supportive learning environment free from discrimination and harassment for all students and protecting student privacy and the confidentiality of sensitive information. Many attendees stepped forward during last week's school board meeting, arguing both for and against the state policies on trans-identified students. One of the speakers, a local minister, argued that the Virginia Code section violated parental rights, stressing that these children, and youth, they really belong to the parents. They dont belong to the state or the federal government. Parents should not be punished as abusers because they dont identify with their childs choice of gender identity, Pastor Russell Evenson of the 1,200-member World Outreach Worship Center said, warning that the policy could lead to unnecessary child custody issues. Another speaker argued that the policy is taking rights from parents and that children were being indoctrinated, his comments eliciting cheers from those in attendance. One supporter of the state policy, a man who had two children enrolled in the school system, claimed that supporting the preferred gender identity of students reduces their chances of committing suicide. I would have no problems or concerns whatsoever if there are transgender people in the bathroom with me or with my children, said the speaker. One woman, who called herself a concerned citizen and the mother of a gay son, spoke out against the policy, claiming that it was discriminatory to biological males and females by forcing them to share single-sex facilities with each other. The Daily Press reports that board members who voted against the policy stated that they want more information about the district's planned procedures. Another meeting on the topic is scheduled for Thursday. Earlier this month, another Virginia school board, the Loudon County School Board, voted 7-2 to pass a policy similar to the model policies laid out by the state education department. In response, Loudon County Public Schools teachers filed a complaint, asking a court to stop the newly passed policy from taking effect, citing constitutional objections. DULUTH, Minn. (AP) U.S. Forest Service officials on Wednesday extended the closure of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness after Minnesota's largest wildfire doubled in size. The Greenwood Lake fire burning in the Superior National Forest in northeastern Minnesota grew to about 30 square miles (77 square kilometers) Monday, and four new smaller fires ignited within the BWCA. By Wednesday, the size was estimated at 34 square miles (88 square kilometers). Forest officials decided to keep the popular wilderness closed another week, to Sept. 3, dealing a blow to tourists who spent months planning their trips there and to the outfitters and other businesses serving the 1 million-acre Boundary Waters. Its a bummer for sure, Sue Prom, co-owner of Voyageur Canoe Outfitters, wrote on her blog Wednesday. People have canoe trips planned that have to be cancelled, folks are being evacuated from their cabins and homes and theres smoke in the air. Fire fighters are exhausted and peoples nerves are frayed. Business owners are wondering how they will make it through the winter without the income they were expecting during the last two weeks of August and potentially into September. It isnt all gloom and doom though. No lives have been lost, there have been no significant injuries and damage to private property has so far been relatively little." On Wednesday, officials also closed Forest Service lands along the scenic upper Gunflint Trail, a dead-end paved road deep into the wilderness, including the Trails End and Iron Lake campgrounds and the Magnetic Rock Hiking Trail. The closure will last at least a week. That followed an order from the Cook County Sheriff's office Monday for residents in that area to prepare in case they eventually need to evacuate. The road itself and resorts along it remain open. There are now 13 fires burning in the Superior National Forest, although not all are being actively fought and some have been contained, the Star Tribune reported. The Petit, Gabi, Rice Bay and Second Creek fires started Monday in the BWCA. Several fires caused by lightning have burned in the wilderness during this summers drought conditions, while the much bigger Greenwood Lake fire just to the south has forced the evacuation of about 280 homes and cabins since it was spotted Aug. 15 about 15 miles (24 kilometers) southwest of the town of Isabella. Forest officials have also kept a nervous eye on fires burning just across the Canadian border, in Ontarios Quetico Provincial Park, which led them to close some parts of the Boundary Waters north of Ely earlier this summer. But when the John Ek fire took off late last week, forest officials decided to close the entire wilderness area as a precaution. They said that fire and the Greenwood Lake fire had stretched their resources too thin to ensure the safety of paddlers and campers. Neither fire grew much Tuesday thanks to better weather, Forest Service officials said. More than 400 crew members are fighting the forest fires. President Joe Biden on Thursday night promised to hunt down the terrorists responsible for Thursdays suicide bombings outside the Kabul airport that killed 12 U.S. service members and injured 15 others, noting that he has already directed the Pentagon to develop operational plans to strike ISIS-K assets, leadership and facilities. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, the president said. President @JoeBiden: "To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone wishing America harm, know this we will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay." pic.twitter.com/uDLdbZv69X Mediaite (@Mediaite) August 26, 2021 ISIS-K, an offshoot of the Islamic State and an enemy of the Taliban based in eastern Afghanistan, has claimed responsibility for the attacks, which they say were martyrdom. The group really tracked quite closely with the evolution of al-Qaeda and developed a similar kind of decentralized model really in response to U.S. counterterrorism pressure, Colin Clarke, a counterterrorism analyst with security consulting firm Soufan Group, told ABC News. Clarke estimates the groups size to be between 1,500 to 2,200 fighters. ISIS-K attacks have been on the rise in the country in 2021, according to the United Nations. We will respond with force and precision at our time, at the place we choose, at the moment of our choosing, Biden said on Thursday. These ISIS terrorists will not win. The president also emphasized that the evacuation will continue despite the attacks. We will not be deterred by terrorists, he said. We will not let them stop our mission. We will continue the evacuation. The Kabul airport has been operating as a hub for evacuations as troops help Americans and Afghans flee to safety on flights departing the country. As many as 1,500 Americans remain in Afghanistan, as do an estimated 50,000 to 65,000 interpreters who assisted U.S. troops during the war as translators. Large groups of people, including women and children, have gathered outside the airport gates, hoping to be allowed on a flight as they try to escape the Talibans rule. These American service members who gave their lives were heroes heroes whove been engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others, Biden said on Thursday. Theyre part of an evacuation, an airlift that is like any other seen in history, with more than 100,000 American citizens, American partners, Afghans who helped us, and others taken to safety in the last 11 days. Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby called the bombings a complex attack. Terrorists first set off a bomb near the Abbey Gate outside the Kabul airport before detonating a second explosive close to the nearby Baron Hotel. Full details about how many casualties occurred are not yet known, and anonymous Afghan health officials gave conflicting numbers to The New York Times, with one saying 60 were confirmed dead and 140 wounded and another saying 40 died and 120 were wounded. U.S. CENCOM Commander General Kenneth McKenzie confirmed on Thursday that 12 service members died, 15 other were injured, and a number of Afghans were killed or injured. During the address, Biden also spoke emotionally of his son, Beau Biden, who served in the Iraq War and in Kosovo, noting the grief he suffered after Beaus death from brain cancer following his service. [My wife Jill and I] have some sense, like many of you do, of what the families of those brave heroes are feeling today. It feels like youre getting sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest. Theres no way out, Biden said. My heart aches for you, and I know this: We have a continuing obligation, a sacred obligation to all of you families of those heroes. Biden called U.S. troops part of the backbone of America, the spine of America, the best our country has to offer. Were outraged, as well as heartbroken, the president said. Click here to read the full article. At least 13 U.S. service members and dozens of Afghans were killed in a pair of suicide bombings outside the Kabul airport on Thursday. ISIS-K, an offshoot of the Islamic State that opposes the Taliban, has claimed responsibility for the attack, which came as the U.S. works to evacuate thousands of Americans and Afghan civilians from the nation following the Talibans takeover less than two weeks ago. The devastation on Thursday has not deterred desperate Afghans from attempting to flee, as thousands returned to the Hamid Karzai Airport on Friday looking for a way out ahead of the August 31st pullout deadline for U.S. forces. Reports have varied as to the number of Afghans who died in the attack. NBC News reported Friday morning that the total was 113, citing an unnamed Health Ministry official. This would bring the total number of people who died in the attack to at least 125. NBC News also reported that at least 180 others had been injured. The deaths of the 13 American service members are the first U.S. military fatalities in Afghanistan since February of 2020, and the most who have died in a single day since August of 2011. U.S. Central Command Commander General Kenneth McKenzie briefed the media on the attacks on Thursday, confirming reports that the explosions took place near the Abbey Gate, a main entrance to the Hamid Karzai Airport, and in the vicinity of the nearby Baron Hotel, and that they were followed by gunmen opening fire on civilian and military forces. Gen. McKenzie added that the U.S. believes the suicide bombings took place as American troops were screening Afghans before allowing them into the airport. This is close up work, he said. The breath of the person you are searching is upon you. While we have overwatch in place, we still have to touch the clothes of the person thats coming in. I think you all can appreciate the courage and dedication that is necessary to do this job. He closed by emphasizing that the evacuation mission will continue. ISIS will not deter us from accomplishing the mission, I can assure you of that, he said. Click here to read the full article. Not satisfied with banning mask mandates and undeterred by catching Covid-19 himself, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed an executive order on Wednesday banning local governments from imposing vaccine mandates. The order comes as Covid cases and hospitalizations continue to skyrocket across Texas. One of the new cases belonged to Abbott. The governors office announced on August 17th that he tested positive and that he was receiving Regenerons monoclonal antibody treatment. Abbot has since tested negative, and credited the vaccine as the reason his infection was, according to him, brief and mild. Nevertheless, Abbott will not allow any local governments to impose mandatory vaccinations. No governmental entity can compel any individual to receive a Covid-19 vaccine, the order issued Wednesday said. The order, which applies to all government agencies, states that any public or private entity that is receiving or will receive public funds cannot require a consumer to provide proof of vaccination in order to receive a service or enter a venue. Abbott had already banned vaccine mandates earlier this month, but that order was based on the vaccines being under FDA emergency use authorization. The FDA issued full approval for the Pfizer vaccine this week, leading Abbott to issue a new ban with new language. Vaccine requirements and exemptions have historically been determined by the Legislature, and their involvement is particularly important to avoid a patchwork of vaccine mandates across Texas, Abbott said in a statement on the governors website. Abbott also sent a letter to the states legislature, asking them to consider putting a ban on vaccine mandates into law. Local governments may push back against Abbotts order, as they have done with his ban on mask mandates. Some school districts including Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio issued mask mandates despite the governors order outlawing them. Judge Tonya Parker, of the 116th Civil District Court, blocked blocked Abbotts ban on mask mandates in Dallas, and on Tuesday upheld her ruling that Abbotts order violates the countys ability to mitigate the spread of Covid. San Antonio, however, will have to remove its mask mandate for public schools following a ruling by the Texas Supreme Court handed down on Thursday. Texas already has a relatively low vaccination rate, with just under 47 percent of residents ages 12 and older fully vaccinated. States with low vaccine uptake are seeing more hospitalizations and deaths than states with higher rates of vaccination. Texas is no exception. According to data from the CDC, the state has a seven-day average of 12,758 patients hospitalized with the virus, which is only 1,000 patients away from surpassing the states last hospitalization peak in January. The surge in Covid patients has brought the states hospital system to near capacity, with ICUs approaching 94-percent capacity, according to HHS, while some emergency rooms have shuttered due to lack of staff and resources. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike IS. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. U.S. officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airports perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. Even so, the airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people away.. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. ___ Faiez reported from Istanbul, Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. New law could give jail time to Texas drivers who hit pedestrians In 2020, there was a 9 percent increase in the number of Texans on foot who were killed by drivers. Texas law banning abortion as early as six weeks goes into effect More than 100 patients were being treated at one clinic before the law took effect. Eds: This story was supplied by The Conversation for AP customers. The Associated Press does not guarantee the content. Stephanie J. Nawyn, Michigan State University (THE CONVERSATION) Since the Taliban took control of Afghanistans capital, Kabul, on Aug. 15, 2021, there has been a frenetic evacuation of foreigners and Afghan nationals. Thousands of these Afghans assisted the United States government, which now puts them in danger. The United States provides a special immigrant visa to resettle such individuals. But applicants are facing long backlogs, and immigrant advocates have appealed to the Biden administration to increase the processing speed. Many of these advocates are religious organizations. Since the April 2021 announcement of U.S. troop withdrawals, faith-based organizations like Lutheran Immigrant and Refugee Services, World Relief, National Association of Evangelicals and the Jewish nonprofit HIAS, have implored the Biden administration to evacuate Afghans. Faith-based voluntary agencies are preparing to receive as many Afghan refugees as possible. This is part of a long history of religious involvement in refugee policy, in which most religious leaders support receiving refugees. However, as a refugee studies scholar, I have observed signs that such widespread support may be waning, particularly among white conservative Christians. Religious advocacy on behalf of refugees The idea of welcoming the stranger is central to Christianity, Judaism and Islam. It originally arose from cultures born in deserts, where leaving someone outside the city gates could be a death sentence. Religious leaders often connect that ethic to a responsibility to shield refugees and other immigrants from violence and oppression. Starting in the late 19th century, and during the Holocaust, faith communities appealed to the U.S. government to welcome Jews seeking safety from persecution. They also advocated for allowing Armenians, who were murdered en masse by leaders of the Ottoman Empire, to immigrate to America. After World War II, an alliance between Protestant, Catholic and Jewish organizations finally swayed policymakers to adopt a more humanitarian-focused U.S. foreign policy. The U.S. then joined with other nations to sign the 1951 Geneva Convention, a U.N. agreement that established the rights of refugees to legal protection. Among the conventions main tenets is a global ban on sending refugees back to countries where they will be unsafe. This sometimes requires resettling refugees in a safer country. Faith-based organizations have been partnering with the U.S. government ever since. The sanctuary movement Between 1951 and 1980, the government resettled refugees in the U.S. on an ad hoc basis without spending much on assisting them. During this time, faith-based organizations filled in gaps to ensure refugees got off to a good start. Religious groups also advocated for asylum seekers, people who arrived seeking protection without first getting refugee status. Between 1980 and 1991, almost 1 million Central Americans crossed the U.S. border seeking asylum. From the start, the government denied most of their petitions. Many Christian and Jewish leaders advocated on behalf of these migrants. They preached sermons, lobbied the government and organized protests calling for protecting Central American asylum seekers. Hundreds of religious communities provided sanctuary, usually inside houses of worship, and gave them legal support. In 1985 the Center for Constitutional Rights sued the federal government on behalf of the American Baptist Church, Presbyterian Church USA, the Unitarian Universalist Association, the United Methodist Church and four other religious organizations, claiming discrimination against Salvadoran and Guatemalan asylum seekers. The government later settled the class-action lawsuit, allowing temporary protection for those asylum seekers. Faith-based nonprofits supporting refugees today Ever since Congress passed the 1980 Refugee Act, creating the current system of refugee resettlement, U.S. faith-based organizations have played a central role in it. There are nine national voluntary agencies that work directly with the government, six of which are faith based: One is Jewish, one Catholic, one evangelical Christian and three are mainline Protestant. These groups arrange for refugees to find housing, land jobs and enroll in English classes. They do so regardless of the newcomers own religions or their countries of origin. In my research, I have found that staff at faith-based organizations commonly use religious rhetoric to justify their work and to describe their commitment. At the same time, religiously based refugee organizations frame their efforts using interfaith language. They invoke the ethical imperative to provide asylum and refuge in ways that cross-cut multiple religious traditions as they collect and disburse money and household goods and mobilize volunteers. The Jewish dimension is helping people realize that America is a place that welcomes all, and helping people that have come from a land where maybe sometimes being a Jew was considered worse than dirt, a director of a local office of HIAS, formerly known as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, told me. Do we apply those same kinds of principles to other communities that we help? Absolutely. The director of a Catholic Charities office echoed that sentiment. We have a saying, he told me. We help people not because they are Catholic, but because we are. Changing religious politics? Despite the deep foundation of religious belief and morality for granting asylum, this connection may have frayed, at least for some communities. In response to a record number of people displaced globally, especially people who are not white, Im seeing signs that the moral framework supporting asylum is giving way in some quarters to support for restrictive policies that avoid any moral or international obligation to asylum seekers. This became clear when the Trump administration enacted its zero tolerance policy to arrest anyone crossing the border without documentation including people with babies and toddlers. Government agents and contractors separated nearly 4,000 children from their parents, sparking outrage. Many faith leaders spoke out against the child separation, like prominent evangelical leader Franklin Graham, without directly criticizing aggressive border enforcement. But many were more pointed in their comments, specifically calling out immigrant exclusion as antithetical to their religious beliefs. Mainline Protestant, Jewish, Mormon, Catholic and evangelical Christian groups all released statements against tighter immigration enforcement itself. What was unusual is that some conservative Christian groups lobbied in favor of strengthened immigration enforcement. This was a break from the past. While there have been theological differences between conservative and mainline Protestant Christians on a number of issues, welcoming the stranger had been one point upon which Christians generally agreed. [Youre smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversations authors and editors. You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter.] Race and racial politics are intertwined with this split. There now appears to be an inverse relationship in the U.S. between religious identity and support for asylum among white Americans. In a Pew survey conducted in May 2018, only 43% of white Protestants and 25% of white evangelical Christians thought that the U.S. had a responsibility to accept refugees. Conversely, 63% of Black Protestants and 65% of the religiously unaffiliated thought that the nation has that responsibility. It is unclear whether this represents an overall downward trend in white Christian support for people seeking safe haven. Faith leaders and those working in faith-based resettlement organizations that I have spoken with recently enthusiastically support accepting as many Afghan refugees as possible. Whether there will be such support broadly among Americans of faith remains to be seen. This is an updated version of a piece originally published on Oct. 31, 2018 The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts. The Conversation is wholly responsible for the content. LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) Arkansas reported 32 new COVID-19 deaths Thursday, as the University of Arkansas said it would no longer allow its parking lots to be used for a motorcycle rally that's drawn complaints over being held during the state's virus surge. The Department of Health said the state's COVID-19 death toll since the pandemic began reached 6,806. The state also reported more than 2,300 new coronavirus cases. Arkansas ranks fifth in the country for new cases per capita, according to figures compiled by Johns Hopkins University researchers. The state reported more than 31,000 vaccine doses given, a major spike compared to recent days. A Health Department spokeswoman, however, said some of the doses reported Thursday were data adjustments and did not occur in the previous 24 hours. The number of people in the state hospitalized with COVID-19 dropped by 43 to 1,325. The number of COVID-19 patients on ventilators dropped by two to 352, a day after the state hit a new high. There are 528 COVID-19 patients in the state's intensive care units. Thirty of the state's ICU beds are currently available, though it was unclear how many are equipped for COVID-19 patients. The state on Tuesday ran out of ICU beds for coronavirus patients, the first time that happened since the pandemic began. The University of Arkansas said it was canceling its agreement for the Bikes, Blues and BBQ rally scheduled to begin next month to use the Fayetteville campus' parking lots. The move comes a day after Washington Regional Medical Center urged that the event, expected to draw hundreds of thousands of people, be postponed. Organizers for the rally did not immediately respond to an email. The voicemail listed for the event's number was full. We have determined and informed the organizers of the BB&BBQ event that we believe it is in the best interest of the community that we terminate the license agreement that would have allowed organizers to use university parking lots for this years event," UA Spokesman Mark Rushing said in an email. Dr. Nitesh Paryani, a third-generation radiation oncologist in Tampa, Florida, recently was forced to make a decision that he says he and his family have never had to make in 60 years of treating patients. A nearby hospital was working to transfer a cancer patient to a location that had adequate treatment options. Paryani said he regularly accepts such patients, but for the first time, could not do so due to the number of those sick from COVID-19. "We just didn't have a bed. There was simply no room in the hospital to treat the patient," he told CNN's Chris Cuomo in an interview Wednesday. The latest COVID-19 surge, due largely to the more transmissible delta variant, is pushing emergency rooms to the brink. Some states are reporting an overflow of ICU patients as well as staff shortages due to burnout and illness. "Delta is just ripping through the hospitals in ways that we couldn't have imagined and the strain it's causing on the health care system is unimaginable," said Paryani, the medical director of Tampa Oncology and Proton. Florida, which is home to roughly 6.5% of the nation's population, has about 17% of U.S. COVID-19 hospitalizations, according to data Wednesday from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. At least 100,317 people are reported to be hospitalized for COVID-19, of which, 17,164 are in Florida. Paryani, who also shared his experiences in an op-ed in The Washington Post, said the cancer patient was later admitted to another facility nearby. Hospitals in the area, however, are beginning to hold off on procedures due to lack of beds, demonstrating that the surge is not only impacting COVID-19 patients; critical care for those in urgent need is slowing down and harder to find. "What we are seeing is just a tremendous amount of patients coming in. The other day, our emergency room had a 12-hour wait. Almost every hospital in the city is on diversion, meaning they don't have room to take transfer patients," Paryani said. "Patients who need complex care simply can't access it. This kind of strain is something we've never seen before." Paryani urged Americans to get vaccinated, calling it "the best tool we have" to overcome the pandemic. "We're seeing in the hospitals, greater than 90% of the people that are admitted in the ICUs are unvaccinated. There is no question that the vaccine is the best option we have. It is also the cheapest option we have. It is the most effective, and there's really no reason that people should be avoiding the vaccine," he said. "There's not a single patient that we've had to intubate because of a complication from the vaccine. The people we're intubating, the people that are on life support, the people that are dying are the ones that are not vaccinated." SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) Californias top court rejected an attempt to make it harder to impose the death penalty, ruling Thursday in favor of the current system where jurors need not unanimously agree on aggravating factors used to justify the punishment. Jurors already must unanimously agree to impose a death sentence, and to do so must decide that aggravating factors outweigh mitigating circumstances. But they do not have to unanimously agree on each specific aggravating factor, the California Supreme Court said in a 7-0 decision. Those factors include things like having multiple or prior victims, the slaying being gang-related or spurred by a victim's race or religion, or the murder being "especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel, manifesting exceptional depravity. The justices upheld that longstanding practice in a case that otherwise could have undermined the death sentences of the most populous state's nearly 700 condemned prisoners. The death penalty might be fairer if the state did make changes, Associate Justice Goodwin Liu wrote for the court. He noted that the state attorney general's office also agreed that such a requirement would improve our system of capital punishment and make it even more reliable and that state lawmakers should consider the change. "Nevertheless, to date our Legislature and electorate have not imposed such requirements," Liu wrote, and the court found there is no such mandate in state law or the constitution. The justices also rejected requiring that both the death sentence and the specific aggravating circumstances be justified beyond a reasonable doubt. That level of proof is currently required for criminal convictions but not in sentencing decisions. I am pleased to see that the California Supreme Court has unanimously rejected a call to overturn decades of clear precedent, said Criminal Justice Legal Foundation Legal Director Kent Scheidegger, who wrote a brief supporting the death penalty. A ruling otherwise, the foundation said, would have had a devastating impact on hundreds of well-deserved judgments for horrible crimes. Defense attorneys argued that current sentencing practices in capital cases violate the constitutional requirement that verdicts be both unanimous and beyond a reasonable doubt. Gov. Gavin Newsom was one of those seeking stricter standards when he took the unprecedented step of filing a brief arguing that current practices spur racial discrimination. The higher threshold was also supported by a minority of district attorneys including Chesa Boudin in San Francisco and George Gascon in Los Angeles. Newsoms brief written by two professors at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law tracked other critics who contend the death penalty process is inherently racist because Black people are disproportionately excluded from juries in capital cases. But those more sweeping objections do not bear directly on the specific state law questions before us, Liu wrote. Nor did the court find evidence of prosecutorial basis against Black jurors in the Los Angeles County case of Donte Lamont McDaniel, 42. He was sentenced to death in 2009 for the murders of 33-year-old George Brooks and 52-year-old Annette Anderson and two counts of attempted murder on behalf of the Bounty Hunter Bloods street gang. The court upheld his conviction and sentence. It doesnt change the fact that the death penalty system in California does discriminate against people of color, particularly Black defendants. And theres ample data to demonstrate that, said Elisabeth Semel, co-director of the UC Berkeley Death Penalty Clinic and co-author of Newsoms legal brief. Newsom spokeswoman Erin Mellon said the court missed an opportunity to fix one of the many flaws in Californias death penalty. Executions are irreversible and the process discriminates not only on race but against those who are poor or mentally ill, she said. California has not executed anyone since 2006, and Newsom has imposed a moratorium while he is governor. But voters narrowly upheld the death penalty in 2012 and 2016. Five of the seven justices were appointed by Democratic governors who oppose capital punishment. Liu was appointed by then-Gov. Jerry Brown. Liu took the unusual step of writing not only the majority opinion, but also a separate 30-page opinion in which he argued the state's death penalty process could be deemed unconstitutional under a different legal argument not currently before the court. There is a world of difference between a unanimous jury finding of an aggravating circumstance and the smorgasbord approach that our capital sentencing scheme allows, he wrote. He noted in the majority opinion that Colorado, New Jersey, Nebraska, and Utah all have included a reasonable doubt standard in their death penalty laws. Although that is not binding on California, he said other states' experience shows that including reasonable doubt and jury unanimity standards can work. Of 1,077 death sentences imposed since 1978 in California, 230 more than 1 in 5 have been reversed by either the California Supreme Court or a federal court, according to a March report by the Office of the State Public Defender titled Californias Broken Death Penalty. TORONTO (AP) Canada has ended evacuations from Kabul's airport, a Canadian general said Thursday, as the clock ticks down on dramatic Western efforts to help people flee the Taliban takeover ahead of a full American withdrawal. General Wayne Eyre, the country's acting Chief of Defense Staff, said the last evacuation plane has left and the vast majority of Canadian personnel are gone. Eyre said allied countries have to leave before the Americans can wrap up their mission. Canadian military flights evacuated about 3,700 people. The reality on the ground is the perimeter of the airport is closed. The Taliban have tightened the noose. Its very, very difficult for anybody to get through at this point, Eyre said. At this point all of our allies have ceased personnel recovery operations, from my understanding. U.S. President Joe Biden has said he is sticking to his Aug. 31 deadline for completing the U.S. pullout as the Taliban insisted he must, ramping up pressure on the already risky airlift from Kabul to get out as many people as possible in the coming days. We stayed in Afghanistan for as long as we could. We were amongst the last to cease evacuation operations," Eyre said. We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone who was so desperate to leave. That we could not is truly heartbreaking, but the circumstances on the ground rapidly deteriorated. Canada and European allies pressed for more time but lost the argument, and as a practical matter were forced to end their evacuations a couple of days before the last American troops leave. Eyre said the feeling of helplessness and guilt that arises from having to leave people behind can be overwhelming. I have received emails from people that I worked with during my tours in Afghanistan who are desperate to get out or get their families out. Their pleas and the photos of the families in terrible situations that accompany many of them are heart wrenching. They tear at our souls, he said. The Taliban wrested back control of Afghanistan nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks. Their return to power has pushed many Afghans to flee, fearing reprisals from the fighters or a return to the brutal rule they imposed when they last ran the country. Canada was one many countries taking part in the evacuation of people facing Taliban reprisals from Kabuls airport. Over 1,000 refugees are in Canada now. Canada has plans to resettle 20,000 Afghan refugees. The final Canadian evacuation flight left Kabul, Canadian Immigration Minister Marco Mendicino tweeted. The majority are Afghan refugees in search of a new life in Canada. Over a thousand have arrived, and well welcome more in the days and weeks to come. AMHERST, Va. (AP) Amherst County is temporarily closing all public secondary schools after a COVID-19 outbreak, officials said. A person who tested positive and entered a building without notifying staff is the source of many positive cases, Superintendent Rob Arnold said Wednesday. The Virginia Department of Health recommended the closure that affects Amherst County High School, Amherst and Monelison middle schools and the Amherst Education Center, news outlets report. The schools will be closed from Thursday until at least Sept. 2. Elementary schools are not affected. Students must provide a negative COVID-19 test result before returning Sept. 2. Students who refuse can return Sept. 7. Students who test positive or show symptoms must contact their schools for a return date, Arnold said. The state health department will provide a testing clinic Tuesday. Teachers will provide links to students and follow normal class schedules. Healthy students are expected to attend. Staff are expected to report as normal because health officials believe staff can distance appropriately during virtual learning, Arnold said. School officials urged parents to monitor their children for COVID-19 symptoms and notify their childs school if a child tests positive or is exposed to it. DOVER, Del. (AP) Students in one Delaware school district will switch to virtual classes for two days next month during the Firefly Music Festival. Capital School District Superintendent Dr. Vilicia Cade announced this week that classes will be held virtually on Sept. 23 and 24 while the four-day festival takes place at the Dover International Speedways Woodlands, WDEL-FM reported. ASHLAND, Ala. (AP) An east Alabama cabinet factory is planning a $15 million expansion that will create more than 200 new jobs, Gov. Kay Ivey's office said Thursday. Wellborn Cabinet Inc., a family-owned business which already employs more than 1,300 people in rural Clay County, will add four buildings to its plant in Ashland, which makes bath and kitchen cabinets. The project includes a mill, a paint facility, day care and health facilities. GREENVILLE, S.C. (AP) The fiance of a South Carolina woman reported missing in March 2020 has been charged with her death. With the assistance of the U.S. Marshals Task Force, the Gwinnett County Sheriffs Office and the Gwinnett County Police Department, authorities Tuesday arrested Michael Lee Wilkerson during a traffic stop in Buford, Georgia, multiple news outlets reported. He is being held at the Gwinnett County jail with no bond and is awaiting extradition to Greenville, South Carolina. It was unknown if he has an attorney who could speak on his behalf. Markus Schreiber/AP BERLIN (AP) German Chancellor Angela Merkel has called off a planned weekend visit to Israel because of the situation in Afghanistan, the German government said Thursday. Merkel was due to travel to Israel on Saturday for her first trip to the country since Naftali Bennett succeeded Benjamin Netanyahu as prime minister. Her visit had been due to last until Monday. RACINE, Wis. (AP) A Republican attorney who has tried unsuccessfully to overturn the results of Wisconsins 2020 presidential election filed a lawsuit Thursday alleging that Racine city officials did not turn over election-related documents as required by the state open records law. The lawsuit came from Erick Kaardal, an attorney for the conservative Thomas More Society and a former secretary and treasurer for the Republican Party of Minnesota. He has been trying to prove that a group with ties to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg had too much influence over the voting process in Wisconsins five largest cities. HANOI, Vietnam (AP) U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris said Thursday she raised issues of human rights abuses and restrictions on political activism in her conversations with Vietnamese leaders this week, but offered no indication those talks bore fruit. Were not going to shy away from difficult conversations. Difficult conversations often must be had with the people that you otherwise may have a partnership with, she said at a news conference in Hanoi on Thursday. Harris said she spoke with Vietnamese leaders in particular about the release of political dissidents, but did not describe the outcome of those conversations. Vietnam has faced criticism for restrictions on freedom of expression and on the press and a crackdown on people it deems political dissidents. But Harris didn't respond when asked why the U.S. criticizes China for similar abuses, but is seeking a stronger partnership with Vietnam. Her comments capped a weeklong trip to Southeast Asia during which she met with top officials in Singapore and Vietnam in a bid to strengthen U.S. engagement in the region to counter Chinese influence there. Harris unveiled a number of new U.S. agreements and aid for both countries in areas including cyberdefense cooperation with Singapore and coronavirus aid to Vietnam, which is struggling with a new surge in the virus and low vaccination rates. But on Thursday, she turned her attention to issues surrounding civil liberties and human rights in Vietnam. Harris participated in what her team billed as a changemakers event with activists working on LGBTQ rights and climate change. It is critical that if we are to take on the challenges we face that we do it in a way that is collaborative, that we must empower leaders in every sector, including of course government but community leaders, business leaders, civic society, if we are to maximize the resources we collectively have, she said. In her news conference, Harris also fielded questions on the chaotic U.S. exit from Afghanistan, but did not respond directly when asked how the U.S. would evaluate success in the evacuation mission. Harris also ignored a question on whether Americans are safer now that the U.S. has departed the country. A suicide bomb attack later Thursday attributed to the Islamic State groups Afghanistan affiliate killed at least 13 U.S. service members and many Afghan civilians at the Kabul airport. Harris later released a statement saying: Our country is grateful to all our women and men in uniform, and in particular, those working today to get Americans and our Afghan partners out of harms way. And we will complete that mission." On her trip back to Washington, Harris stopped at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii to meet with servicemembers. She had planned also to stop in California to appear with Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is facing a recall attempt. But Harris scrapped that stop to head straight to Washington, her office announced. She has been briefed on developments in Kabul and will continue to be updated as she makes her way back to Washington, the White House said. While Harris has emphasized that her visit to Southeast Asia is intended to foster a positive relationship with countries in the region and expand U.S. cooperation and involvement, she also ramped up Biden administration rhetoric toward China, issuing repeated warnings to Beijing to end its aggression in the disputed South China Sea. We need to find ways to pressure and raise the pressure, frankly, on Beijing to abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and to challenge its bullying and excessive maritime claims, she said Wednesday. Harris avoided the unscripted gaffes that overshadowed her first foreign trip, to Guatemala and Mexico in the spring, where her declaration to migrants do not come and her flip dismissal of questions about her refusal to visit the border drew criticism from both Republicans and Democrats. Harris took questions from reporters at multiple points that trip, and sat for an extended cable news interview. In Asia, Harris stayed focused on her meetings with officials and Biden administration talking points on China. While questions surrounding the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan dominated her first day in Singapore, Harris emphasized the same message delivered by President Joe Biden and his aides that the U.S. must remain focused on the evacuations, and not recriminations about what went wrong. BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) More than 100 staff members with Indiana Universitys biology department are calling for a department building once named after a 19th century IU president who supported eugenics to be renamed after a noted Black faculty member. A petition signed by 144 members of the Bloomington campus biology department urges school leadership to rename the Biology Building in honor of James Holland, an award-winning teacher and endocrinologist who died in 1998, The Herald-Times reported. IU biology professor Armin Moczek, who sits on a diversity, equity and inclusion committee that spearheaded the renaming petition, said Hollands impact is still felt in the department. He was the first African American to earn a doctorate from the department in 1961. He returned to IU in 1967 as an associate professor, became a full professor in 1974 and stayed until his death in 1998. Moczek said Holland was a pioneer in his field who also opened doors for others and mentored IU students of diverse backgrounds. He really exemplified dedicated and competent leadership and exemplified creating opportunities for those whose biographies, backgrounds and socioeconomic conditions, etc., make it just a little harder to have their talents find their way into academia, he said. I really admire this, its something I aspire to, and having a building named in his honor, I see no downside to it. IU President Pamela Whitten has received the petition, which will first head to the University Naming Committee, said IU spokesman Chuck Carney. The building was formerly known as Jordan Hall, getting its name from David Starr Jordan, who was a proponent of eugenics, the practice of controlled selective breeding of humans often carried out through forced sterilization. In the past year, IU has dropped Jordan's name from campus buildings and landmarks and begun the process of renaming them amid a nationwide movement to get rid of Confederate monuments and other racially offensive symbols. Jordan, who was an IU professor of zoology from 1875 to 1885, wrote in a book about his belief that humanity would thrive only if the fittest were promoted. He served as IUs president from 1885 until 1891 and later became the first president of Stanford University. He died in 1931. SEATTLE (AP) Judges say crime and public safety issues around the King County Courthouse in downtown Seattle are causing potential jurors to decline to serve, making it more difficult to fill juries. The Seattle Times reports public safety issues around the downtown courthouse, the seat of county government, have festered for years but have been made worse during the pandemic as downtown office workers largely stayed home and homeless encampments in the area proliferated. Of particular concern for us is the amount of feedback were receiving from prospective jurors who are indicating that theyre unwilling to serve as jurors in our trials, King County Superior Court Judge Patrick Oishi, the courts assistant presiding judge, said Wednesday. Jurors and witnesses, Oishi noted, are required to come to court. Oishi said anxiety has been particularly high among people at the courthouse for the last several weeks, since a man was charged with sexually assaulting a woman in a courthouse restroom in late July. King County District Court; which handles civil suits, misdemeanors and felony preliminary hearings, has 10 locations throughout the county, only one of which is in the downtown Seattle courthouse. We dont have trouble getting jurors in other locations, said District Court Judge Susan Mahoney, the chief presiding judge of the court. In fact, they will contact us and say, Can I serve somewhere else? Jury duty is not optional if you get a summons. And while judges do have the option of issuing a penalty, up to issuing a bench warrant, for jurors who opt out, they rarely, if ever, do. Safety issues at the courthouse date back years. In 2019, a judge ordered the Third Avenue entrance of the courthouse to be closed because of safety and security concerns. The County Council subsequently approved $600,000 in emergency funding for sheriffs deputies to provide security outside the courthouse, even though the downtown streets fall under the jurisdiction of Seattle police. Seattle recently cleared a large homeless encampment at nearby City Hall Park after 33 judges wrote to the citys parks superintendent asking for it to be shut down. MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) A lawyer in Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey's office was arrested Wednesday on charges of using a computer to solicit or exploit a child, jail records show. Chase Tristian Espy was booked into the Jefferson County Jail on the charges. Court records were not immediately available to show the details behind the accusation. The 36-year-old was released on a $30,000 bond Thursday, according to court records. OZARK, Mo. (AP) A man accused of shooting at law enforcement officers for several hours in southwest Missouri has been charged with 12 felonies. Jenson Wayne Faught, 33, was charged with multiple counts of first-degree assault and armed criminal action after the confrontation Tuesday in southern Christian County near Ozark. He pleaded not guilty on Thursday. WINDOW ROCK, Ariz. (AP) The Navajo Nation on Wednesday reported 57 new COVID-19 cases 20 more than the previous day plus one more death. The latest numbers pushed the tribes totals to 32,374 coronavirus cases and 1,399 known deaths since the pandemic began more than a year ago. Nearly 90 organic dairy farms in the Northeast, including 28 in Vermont, will lose their contracts with an organic dairy company when it stops buying milk in the region by the end of August of next year, Vermont's agriculture secretary said Thursday. Danone, parent company of Horizon Organic, notified farmers last week, including a total of 61 in Maine, New Hampshire, and New York, according to Vermont Agriculture Secretary Anson Tebbetts. The multinational food products company Danone did not respond to an email seeking comment. The company told Vermont officials that it did not want to transport milk from the region to its plant in New York and will focus their business on larger farms in Midwest and West, Tebbetts said by email. They will buy milk from larger farms and drop farms in our region, he said. The company plans to stop buying milk in the Northeast by Aug. 31, 2022. It's devastating to these farm families but also has implications for the state economically and the organic dairy industry in Vermont, said Maddie Kempner, policy director for the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont. It will be a challenge for the 28 Vermont organic farms to find another buyer because the organic market currently is not in a position to take on more milk or farmers, Tebbetts said. Currently, there are three other buyers getting organic milk from Vermont farms. Not having a buyer for your milk is a really severe position to be in for these farmers, Kempner said. So we're doing our best to make sure we're seeking solutions for alternative markets for their milk but also make sure the farmers feel as individually supported as possible. NOFA-VT is part of a task force aimed at saving the farms that the Vermont Agriculture Agency has put together, in which farmers, organic buyers and the congressional delegation will take part, Tebbetts said. Danone's decision to end its contracts in the region is another hit to the overall dairy industry in Vermont, which each year loses farms, as conventional operations struggle with low milk prices paid to them and farms gets bigger. Kempner said it points to a loophole in organic regulations that allow large-scale organic farms to produce milk more cheaply. Over the years some operations have used a lack of specificity in the rule to continually transition conventional animals in and out of organic production. This undercuts dairy farmers who operate with integrity, according to the National Organic Coalition. Organic Valley, a cooperative of family farms around the country, does not yet know if there's any way it can help the farmers in the Northeast, said CEO Bob Kirchoff in a written statement. Organic farming is facing the same crisis weve seen in conventional agriculture consolidation, industrialization, get big or get out,'" he said. "It will take a lot of people working together to solve it, but we all must be bold enough to believe we can. _____ This story and its headline have been corrected to show that 89 farms are affected, not nearly 120, and that 61 of them are in Maine, New Hampshire and New York, not 89. SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) State agencies in New Mexico have spent $5.8 billion in federal pandemic relief grants as they try to shore up household income, childhood nutrition, public education and internet service. A briefing from the budget and accountability office of the state Legislature shows that the state has spent more than half of its $10.1 billion share of federal funds through 130 grants. About $3.8 billion has been spent on mandatory programs such as unemployment insurance and Medicaid. And the federal government is making permanent an increased benefit under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or food stamps. Agencies could be hard-pressed to spend nearly $4 billion in optional spending before the offers expire, according to the spending report outlined Wednesday by staff with the Legislative Finance Committee. The pressure to pay out grants before they expire could lead to uncompetitive contracting through emergency exemptions, the evaluation warned. The legislative analysts pointed to $5.6 million in marketing and advertising contracts awarded by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham's administration for the state's rental assistance program. While previous guidance from the committee has recommended setting price limits for such contracts, emergency exemptions were used in this case. There has been no progress reported on the administration's proposed program to provide special oversight on federal relief spending. Some lawmakers said Wednesday they would like to see more details from state agencies on what the money is being used for. States, cities and counties with populations over 250,000 are required by the federal government to submit interim, quarterly and annual reports on the use of their recovery funds. The first report is due Aug. 31. Missouri is opening antibody treatment centers in several counties in the hopes that they'll keep some high-risk patients with COVID-19 from dying or becoming critically ill. Monoclonal antibody infusion treatment will be available for 30 days at sites in Jackson, Pettis, Scott, Butler and Jefferson counties. Two more sites will be added later in the St. Louis area. The state is spending $15 million on the centers and believes they could treat up to 4,000 people over the next month. Gov. Mike Parson said in a statement that the goal is that these infusion centers will help relieve hospital strain and health care worker fatigue as we move forward with our efforts to get more Missourians vaccinated. The initial site was set up last month in southwestern Missouri, a region hit hard by the delta variant surge. Health officials said 588 people have been treated at an infusion center in Springfield. Katie Towns, the health director for Springfield and Greene County, said in a news release that the treatment has undoubtedly saved lives in our community. The drugs are lab-made versions of virus-blocking antibodies that help fight off infections. Antibody treatments are among the few therapies that can lessen the effects of COVID-19, and they are seen as an option for those with mild-to-moderate cases who arent yet in hospitals. BJC Healthcare in St. Louis has been offering the treatment since November with great success, said Dr. Maya Jerath, co-lead for monoclonal antibody treatment at BJC and a professor of medicine at the Washington University School of Medicine. Jerath said just 3% to 5% of patients at BJC who receive the antibody treatment end up being hospitalized, "which is a lot lower than you would expect with the kind of patients that they are because this is being used in high-risk patients. Among the factors that put people at higher risk are old age, obesity, diabetes and heart disease. Demand is especially high in states that have low vaccination rates and crowded hospitals, such as Missouri, Florida, Louisiana and Texas. The White House said recently that federal shipments of the drugs increased five-fold in July to nearly 110,000 doses. The main antibody drug is Regeneron, which the U.S. government purchased in mass quantities. Regeneron is the drug former President Donald Trump received while he was hospitalized with COVID-19 in October. Jerath said infusion treatment is not a substitute for COVID-19 safeguards such as getting vaccinated and wearing a mask in public settings. No medicine that you take after the fact is going to work as well as preventing yourself from getting it, Jerath said. Infusion treatments began Wednesday at Truman Medical Center in Kansas City. The other sites are expected to begin operation within days. The state's COVID-19 dashboard on Thursday showed that hospitalizations rose by 84, to 2,352. The state cited 2,161 newly confirmed cases, bringing its pandemic total to 622,081. The state also has reported 10,409 COVID-19 deaths since the onset of the pandemic. DOVER, Del. (AP) Three people have been found dead at a Dover home, Delaware State Police said. Troopers called to the home on John Collins Circle in the Rodney Village neighborhood on Tuesday morning found the three people dead, police said in a news release Thursday. The Division of Forensic Science has removed the bodies from the home and an autopsy will be conducted to determine the cause and manner of the deaths, police said. There is no safety concern for the community, police said. The investigation is continuing and police said more information will be released as the case develops. MIAMI (AP) Video released by a team of federal investigators shows more evidence of extensive corrosion and overcrowded concrete reinforcement in a Miami-area condominium that collapsed in June, killing 98 people. The National Institute of Standards and Technology also announced Wednesday it will conduct a five-pronged investigation into the Champlain Towers South collapse, which will be led by Judith Mitrani-Reiser. She is a Cuban-born engineer who grew up in Miami. We are going into this with an open mind and will examine all hypotheses that might explain what caused this collapse," Mitrani-Reiser said. Having a team with experience across a variety of disciplines, including structural and geotechnical engineering, materials, evidence collection, modeling and more, will ensure a thorough investigation. The video shows densely packed steel reinforcement in various sections of the building, along with extensive corrosion where one column met the buildings foundation. The corrosion on the bottom of that column is astronomical, Dawn Lehman, a professor of structural engineering at the University of Washington, told the Miami Herald. She said that amount of corrosion should have been obvious and documented as part of the 40-year inspection that was ongoing when the building in Surfside, Florida, collapsed June 24. If theres that amount of corrosion, this should have been fixed, she said. The images show beams, walls and columns that appear to be overcrowded with steel reinforcement, which suggests potential weaknesses, she explained. There is no reason there should be that kind of bar congestion, Lehman said. The risk posed by congested vertical rebar in columns would have been even worse in spots where the rebar overlapped, which is known as lap splice regions, Abieyuwa Aghayere, a Drexel University engineering researcher who also reviewed the video, told the newspaper. While it's already congested with rebar, at the splice regions, it would have been even further congested, Aghayere told the Herald. He said he was struck by how powdery and white the concrete in columns appeared in the newly released video. Stone-like aggregates used to strengthen concrete during construction typically remain visible but they were not in the images from the collapse site. The white color just stuns me, Aghayere told the newspaper. He added that instead of seeing aggregate material mixed into the concrete, its just homogenous, which is likely indication of saltwater damage. He said it is impossible to tell from just the images whether the concrete used in original construction was weaker than the designs called for, or whether the apparent weakness was due to damage over time. It doesnt look like normal concrete to me. Whats going on? Aghayere said. LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) Nebraska's hospitals are even more crowded now than they were at the height of the coronavirus pandemic in November, Gov. Pete Ricketts said Thursday as he announced a staffing emergency to try to address a severe shortage of health care workers. The state's hospitals were treating a 3,162 patients as of Wednesday, up from 3,074 on Nov. 20, when the number of known cases was at its all-time high. Most of the recent hospitalizations aren't virus-related, however, and Ricketts said the increase was driven by patients seeking treatment for other medical problems. According to state data, hospitals are currently treating 337 virus patients about 11% of total hospitalizations. In November, the hospitals counted 987 virus patients, accounting for 32% of hospitalizations. Ricketts said he declared the emergency after consulting with the states hospital administrators. But he stopped short of calling it a COVID-19 emergency, which would allow the state to once again disclose daily case information. Nebraska stopped publishing daily information in July, but now releases weekly data without as much detail. Ricketts announced the end of the official state virus emergency in late June. The reason were not doing a COVID emergency is because this is a hospital staffing emergency. Were being very specific, Ricketts said at a news conference, noting the increase in non-virus hospitalizations. Some health officials have been critical of the decision to stop releasing the detailed information, arguing that it makes it harder to track the the virus and potentially slow its spread. We are in many ways flying blind, said Dr. James Lawler, one of the leaders of the Global Center for Health Security at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. The new staffing emergency waives various state licensing and education requirements for health care workers to try to encourage more people to take jobs at Nebraska hospitals. Ricketts said it will continue through at least the end of the year. The Republican governor also issued a health order, effective Monday, that will require hospitals to limit certain non-essential surgeries that can be postponed four or more weeks to ease pressure on health care workers. Ricketts said state officials will continue to monitor the situation and take other steps as appropriate," but declined to give specifics. He said the number of non-virus patients is likely up because of people who had postponed medical treatment earlier in the pandemic. He also repeated his opposition to mask and vaccine mandates, although he has repeatedly urged residents to get vaccinated voluntarily and said that vaccines are safe and effective. The state denied Douglas County's request to impose a mask requirement earlier this week. Ricketts said his administration would continue to focus on hospital capacity, as it has throughout the pandemic. He said the goal is to ensure that hospitals beds and ventilators are available for anyone who needs one, and the state has consistently met that benchmark. ___ Follow Grant Schulte on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GrantSchulte U.S. Border Patrol agents encountered a group of migrants covered in clay and rescued several others found in railcars, authorities said. During the mid-morning of Wednesday, agents conducting train inspections near Hebbronville apprehended 15 migrants. Agents noticed that the migrants were covered in powdered clay and assisted with the decontamination of the individuals. KANKAKEE, Ill. (AP) Two men were killed and another was injured on Thursday in shootings outside a northern Illinois courthouse stemming from a long-running internal gang dispute, authorities said. The shootings occurred after one of the victims, Victor Andrade, emerged from the Kankakee County Courthouse and was fatally shot by Antonio Hernandez, Kankakee Police Chief Robin Passwater said during a news conference. PAWTUCKET, R.I. (AP) Members of the Narragansett Indian Tribe in Rhode Island are upset that they were not consulted before a statue of one of the state's earliest English settlers was put up in Pawtucket this week. The Rev. William Blackstone after whom the Blackstone Valley region is named settled the area in the 1630s at a time when the Indigenous population was brutally oppressed, tribal members told WPRI-TV. HOUSTON (AP) The Texas Supreme Court on Thursday temporarily blocked a mask mandate issued by San Antonio and Bexar County for their public schools a blow to efforts by some cities, counties and school districts to defy Republican Gov. Greg Abbotts ban on such measures. The ruling came in a lawsuit by San Antonio and Bexar County, one of at least nine that have been filed by cities, counties and school districts against Abbott over his ban on mask mandates. Amid a surge in COVID-19 cases that have overwhelmed many hospitals across the state, at least 11 counties and cities and 63 school districts or systems in Texas have imposed mask mandates to slow the spread of COVID-19. Abbott has argued that a law known as the Texas Disaster Act gives him broad power in deciding how best to respond to emergency situations, including whether to ban mask mandates during a pandemic. In an emergency order issued last month, Abbott reaffirmed his ban on mask mandates by any state, county or local government entity. The counties, cities and school districts say Abbott has exceeded his authority. Dallas and Harris counties, two of the states most populous counties, are among those that have imposed mask mandates. Last week, a judge granted Bexar County and San Antonio a temporary injunction that put Abbott's ban on hold pending trial in that lawsuit. The Texas Attorney Generals Office asked the state high court to stay the injunction. The Texas Supreme Court had previously stayed temporary restraining orders issued in favor of Bexar County, San Antonio and Dallas County. In its order Thursday, the court said oversight of decisions on mask mandates has been up to the governor and that status quo should remain in place while the courts examine the issue. This case, and others like it, are not about whether people should wear masks or whether the government should make them do it. Rather, these cases ask courts to determine which government officials have the legal authority to decide what the governments position on such questions will be, the court said. The court has not yet made a final determination on the legal issues surrounding mask mandates. The Texas Supreme Court has sided with the law, and the decision to enforce mask mandates lies with the governors legislatively-granted authority. Mask mandates across our state are illegal, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement. In a statement on Facebook, San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg said, Were not going to let an ongoing court battle distract us from the real fight against COVID-19. Get the vax. Wear a mask. Its likely that other cities, counties and school districts that have won temporary restraining orders or temporary injunctions allowing them to have mask mandates will also be subject in the comings days to similar rulings that also put their mandates on hold, said Dale Carpenter, a law professor with the Southern Methodist University School of Law in Dallas. The writing is on the wall and Abbott, a Republican like all the justices on the Texas Supreme Court, will probably win in the end, Carpenter said. One issue that might complicate the mask mandate debate is an admission by lawyers for the Texas Attorney Generals Office that neither Abbotts office nor the attorney general has the authority to enforce the governors ban or the $1,000 fine that comes with violations. Such enforcement would be up to local district attorneys. Every day that passes that we dont have a definitive ruling from the Texas Supreme Court is a good day for these local officials, school officials who want to impose mask mandates, Carpenter said. It seems to me they want to buy time during the worst surge of this delta variant. Every day they can buy with a mask mandate in place, is a small victory as far as theyre concerned in the pandemic. They may not win in the end, but at least they will have done what they could for the time being. ___ Follow Juan A. Lozano on Twitter: https://twitter.com/juanlozano70 WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealand says it was not able to get everybody it wanted out of Afghanistan in time before the deadly attacks near Kabuls airport brought its rescue mission to an end. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Friday she is not yet sure how many people were left behind or whether they were New Zealand citizens, residents or visa holders. She said the New Zealand military had gone to great lengths to try and find people in recent days and had been able to fly several hundred people to safety. We went to extraordinary efforts to bring home as many as we could who were either New Zealanders or who had supported New Zealand. But the devastating thing is that we werent able to bring everyone, Ardern said. And now, we need to look to see what we can do for those who remain. Both Ardern and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison strongly condemned the attacks that took place Thursday. Morrison described them as evil and inhuman. ___ MORE ON AFGHANISTAN: Kabul airport attack kills 60 Afghans, 12 US troops Explainer: How dangerous is Afghanistans Islamic State? Was it worth it? A fallen Marine and a wars crushing end Biden left with difficult choices after deadly Kabul attacks Female Afghan robotics team hopes to work for country UK animal charity staff caught up in deadly Kabul blast Afghanistans top high school graduate fears for her future Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan ___ HERES WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING: TIRANA, Albania The Albanian government said that a first group of Afghans evacuated from their country arrived early Friday. A government spokesman confirmed the arrival without giving more details. A civilian airplane of the Egyptian Almasria Universal Airlines was seen landing at the Tirana international airport with men and women, children and old people leaving it. A government spokesman, speaking anonymously due to security reasons of the operation, said before the planes arrival that 171 Afghans were expected. The Afghans were first taken to military tents, where they had a rapid virus test, other medical and psychological assistance, registration before being moved to hotels. The government has said the Afghans may stay at least a year while proceeding with applications for special visas for final settlement in the U.S. Prime Minister Edi Rama has said that the tiny Western Balkan country may house up to 4,000 Afghans. Albania was among the first to offer temporary shelter to the Afghans leaving their country after all western military left and the Taliban took power. ___ SEOUL, South Korea South Korea says it strongly condemns the Kabul airport attack, saying terrorism cannot be justified for whatever reason. South Koreas Foreign Ministry said Friday it will join international efforts to root out terrorism and conveyed deep sympathy to those killed during the attack and their family members. South Korea had already evacuated 391 Afghans to Islamabad before Thursdays attack occurred. The ministry said 378 of them came to South Korea on Thursday and the other 13 are to arrive later Friday. They had worked for South Korean-run facilities in Afghanistan or were their family members. ___ WASHINGTON House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has ordered the flags at the U.S. Capitol to be flown at half-staff in honor of the U.S. service members and others killed in the attack in Afghanistan. The speakers office said she had ordered the flags lowered Thursday after the bombings outside the Kabul airport in Afghanistan. The toll of service members who died has risen rose to 13, according to Capt. Bill Urban, spokesman at Central Command. The latest number of injured is now 18, all of whom were in the process of being evacuated from Afghanistan on specially equipped C-17s with surgical units. At least 60 Afghans also died. ___ WASHINGTON -- President Joe Biden presided over a moment of silence for U.S. service members on Thursday following attacks at the Kabul airport that killed at least 60 Afghans and 12 Americans. Biden held his moment of silence for those in uniform during somber remarks at the White House. Suicide bombings and gunfire killed 11 Marines and one Navy medic attacks the U.S. is blaming on the local affiliate of the Islamic State. The American service members had been carrying out screenings at the gates of the airport, where thousands of Afghans have crowded in for nearly two weeks in hopes of an evacuation. These American service members who gave their lives its an overused word, but its totally appropriate here were heroes, Biden said. ___ WASHINGTON President Joe Biden says the U.S. servicemembers who were killed in attacks outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, were heroes. Addressing the nation from the White House, Biden says they were engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others. At least a dozen U.S. servicemembers were killed in Thursdays attacks, along with scores of Afghans. Biden addressed those responsible for the attack, telling them, We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attacks. ___ DUBAI, United Arab Emirates The Islamic State groups affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attack outside the Kabul airport. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport on Thursday, killing at least 60 Afghans and 12 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The IS branch, known as The Islamic State-Khorasan Province after a name for the region from antiquity, said in its claim of responsibility that it targeted American troops and their Afghan allies. The statement carried a photo of what the militant group said was the bomber who carried out the attack. The image shows the alleged attacker standing with the explosive belt in front of the black IS flag with a black cloth covering his face, only his eyes showing. The statement made no mention of a second suicide bomber or gunmen. The claim could not be independently verified. IS also said the bomber managed to get past Taliban security checkpoints to come within 5 meters (yards) of a gathering of U.S. soldiers, translators and collaborators before detonating his explosives. It said Taliban were also among the casualties. The extremist IS group has battled the Taliban, which it views as traitorous for agreeing to a peace deal with the United States. The statement also said the bomber got around U.S. security measures and that the camp that was targeted was where U.S. forces were gathering paperwork for those whove worked with the military. ___ WASHINGTON President Joe Biden is set to speak following the deadly explosions outside the airport in Kabul that killed 12 U.S. service members and scores of Afghans. The White House says Biden will address the nation from the White House at 5 p.m. on Thursday. Two suicide bombers and gunmen struck crowds of Afghans waiting in Kabul to flee life under the Taliban on departing flights. A U.S. operation airlifting American citizens and vulnerable Afghans to other countries is set to end Tuesday, a deadline set by Biden. The Islamic State groups affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attack. Biden has been under intense pressure to extend the evacuations beyond Tuesday, but repeatedly has cited the threat of attack for sticking to his deadline. ___ WASHINGTON The State Department says it is tracking roughly 1,000 American citizens who it believes may still be in Afghanistan, as evacuation efforts proceed despite deadly suicide attacks outside the Kabul airport. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had said Wednesday that some 1,500 U.S. citizens were still thought to be in the country but the department said Thursday that it confirmed about 500 of them had been evacuated. In the meantime, it said another 500 people claiming to be Americans wanting to leave had gotten in touch with the U.S. Embassy but that it expected the majority of them would turn out not to be U.S. citizens. Of the 1,000 Americans the department believes to be in Afghanistan, it said about 75% were making preparations to leave. ___ WASHINGTON The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation from Afghanistan says the United States will go after the perpetrators of the Kabul airport attacks if they can be found. Gen. Frank McKenzie said the attacks on Thursday were believed to have been carried out by fighters associated with the Islamic State groups Afghanistan affiliate. He said the attacks, which killed 12 U.S. service members, would not stop the United States from continuing its evacuation of Americans and others. McKenzie warned there are still extremely active security threats at the airport in the Afghan capital. We expect these attacks to continue, he said, adding that Taliban commanders have been asked to take additional security measures to prevent another suicide bombing on the airports perimeter. He said he sees no indication that the Taliban allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. Also Thursday, Defense Secretary LLoyd Austin suggested the evacuation will go on and expressed his deepest condolences to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and wounded in Kabul today. Terrorists took their lives at the very moment these troops were trying to save the lives of others, he said. We mourn their loss. We will treat their wounds. And we will support their families in what will most assuredly be devastating grief. But we will not be dissuaded from the task at hand. To do anything less especially now would dishonor the purpose and sacrifice these men and women have rendered our country and the people of Afghanistan, the statement also said. ___ DUBAI Saudi Arabia says it strongly condemns the Kabul airport attack and reaffirms that such criminal acts contradict religious principles and human values. The kingdom said on Thursday that it extends its deepest condolences to all those killed and wounded. The Saudi Foreign Ministry statement added that Saudi Arabia stands with the people of Afghanistan at this time. Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron also condemned in the stronger terms the attacks at Kabul airport. Macron expressed in a statement France's condolences to the families of victims and praised the heroism of those on the ground who are carrying out the evacuation operations. Also later Thursday, Albanias foreign minister strongly condemned the attacks at the Kabul airport. In a tweet, Olta Xhacka condemned the horrific terrorist attack, adding that our hearts and our prayers go out to all those who lost their loved ones. Albania, a NATO member country since 2009 and aspiring to join the European Union soon, will be one of the transit hubs for the Afghans evacuated from their country. Prime Minister Edi Rama said the country could house up to 4,000 Afghans. The first group may arrive early Friday. We remain committed to guarantee the lives and security of all our Afghan allies, said Xhacka. ___ WASHINGTON U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was briefed by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in a phone call after the attacks in Kabul on Thursday that also killed at least 12 U.S. service members, including 11 Marines and one Navy medic. Pelosis office dismissed the House Republican leaderships calls to bring Congress back into session as empty stunts amid the extraordinary evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan. Right now, American heroes are risking & giving their lives to execute an extraordinarily dangerous evacuation, Pelosis spokesman Drew Hammill said on Twitter. Whats not going to help evacuate American citizens is more empty stunts & distraction. ___ WASHINGTON U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that those responsible for the attack in Kabul on Thursday will be sought and brought to justice. The New York Democrat said in a statement that he had just spoken to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin about the heinous attacks on U.S. personnel and the Afghan partners. I strongly condemn this act of terrorism and it must be clear to the world that the terrorists who perpetrated this will be sought and brought to justice, he said. Meanwhile, the U.S. House Republican leader called on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call the Congress back into session so lawmakers can consider legislation would prohibit the Aug. 31 withdrawal until all Americans are out of Afghanistan. Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California said, It is time for Congress to act quickly to save lives. A return to session before the deadline is highly unlikely. The Democrats aligned with President Joe Biden hold majority control and are not expected to consider such legislation to alter the withdrawal date. Republicans have been highly critical of Bidens handling of the situation in Kabul. ___ BERLIN The German defense minister says her country has ended its evacuation mission in Afghanistan. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said the last of the German military aircraft and troops arrived in Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Thursday evening. She said that, in all, Germany evacuated 5,347 people from at least 45 nations, including more than 4,000 Afghans. Germany hadnt publicly specified ahead of time when exactly its flights would end but other European nations also have been wrapping up their evacuation efforts ahead of an Aug. 31 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops. Kramp-Karrenbauer said the last flights had been loading at the time of Thursdays attacks just outside the airport and the German commander then set in motion plans for an emergency departure. She added that the attacks we saw this afternoon have made clear that an extension of the operation in Kabul was not possible. The security situation on the ground, and also the Talibans decision not to tolerate an extension beyond Aug. 31, made it impossible. The minister said Germany offered a medevac plane that was overhead at the time to bring out wounded from other nations but according to my information, that wasnt the case so far. She said the plane, which flew on to Tashkent, will be provided if needed. ___ ISLAMABAD Pakistans prime minister say the international community should help the Afghan Taliban to restore peace after their takeover of Afghanistan. Imran Khan spoke at a gathering of his ruling party on Thursday; the speech was televised. The remarks are the most openly supportive by Khan of the Taliban since they swept into Kabul on Aug. 15 and practically took over the entire country. Khan says the Taliban are talking about peace and the world community should help them. He added that the Taliban have stated that they want to form an inclusive government, respect human rights and not allow anyone to use the Afghan soil to stage attacks. The prime minister a famous former cricket player who turned to politics and became a conservative Islamist said the Afghan people need peace. Khan's speech came shortly before twin suicide bombings and gunmen outside the Kabul airport killed at least 13 people and wounded 15 wounded. Several Marines were killed and a number of other American military were wounded. Pakistans foreign ministry said children were among those killed and added that Pakistan condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. ___ LONDON British Prime Minister Boris Johnson says the barbaric bomb attack at Kabul airport has caused many casualties, but that the U.K. evacuation operation in Afghanistan will continue for a bit longer. The U.S. says several Marines were among those killed when two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans outside the airport on Thursday. Johnson offered condolences to the U.S. and Afghanistan, saying Americans very sadly have lost their lives, and there were also many Afghan casualties. He said Britain would continue with the evacuation operation, though were now coming towards the end of it. He said that what this attack shows is the importance of continuing that work in as fast and as efficient manner as possible in the hours that remain to us. Johnson did not say when the British effort would end. U.S. forces are due to leave the airport by Aug. 31, and other countries missions will have to wrap up before then. Several countries have already announced the end of their airlifts. ___ TEHRAN, Iran Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said Afghanistan's neighbors should support the formation a broad-based government in Kabul. Raisi spoke on Thursday during a meeting with visiting Pakistani foreign minister to Tehran, saying other nations should only play the role of a facilitator for establishing a broad-based and inclusive government with presence of all people and groups. The remarks were posted on Raisi's website. He said Iran has hosted some 4 million Afghan refugees in the past four decades and it has supported the people of Afghanistan. The presence of Western nations in the region would not be conducive to its security, he alleged. Iran has seen the presence of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq as a threat on its doorstep. It has welcomed the U.S. evacuation even as it cautiously looks to the next moves by the Taliban. Unlike in 1998, when Iran came to the bring of war with the Taliban over the killings of several Iranian diplomats in Afghanistan after the Taliban came to power, Iranian state media have in recent weeks claimed that the Taliban have changed and pose no threat to Iran. Critics, however, warn that the Taliban will return to their anti-Iranian stance as soon as they shore up their full control of Afghanistan. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands The foreign minister of the Netherlands says the last Dutch diplomats and troops have flown out of Kabul as the international airlift winds down and that her thoughts are now with the people left stranded in the Afghan capital. Foreign Affairs Minister Sigrid Kaag said in a tweet on Thursday: Its terrible to have to leave Afghanistan this way after 20 years. She says her thoughts are with people left stranded in Afghanistan after the international flights out of the country end. Kaag also said the Netherlands and its allies remain committed to helping all those entitled to return or evacuate and to continue to support the Afghan people. The Netherlands has in recent days flown more than 20 flights out of Kabul to airports in the region. More than 1,700 people have been flown back to the Netherlands, including over 1,000 Afghans who worked with Dutch forces and diplomats. ___ TBILISI, Georgia The government of Georgia says about 2,000 people have been evacuated from Afghanistan to Tbilisi, the countrys capital. A government statement on Thursday said NATO cargo planes are making daily flights from Tbilisi to Kabul and that evacuations are also conducted by charter flights. The former Soviet republic is not a NATO member but in recent years has cooperated closely with the alliance. The statement said Georgia is cooperating with international institutions including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to evacuate their personnel from Afghanistan. ___ WASHINGTON Sen. Robert Menendez, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, in a statement called the situation unfolding in Kabul a full-fledged humanitarian crisis. He said that U.S. government personnel, already working under extreme circumstances, must secure the airport and complete the massive evacuation of Americans citizens and vulnerable Afghans desperately trying to leave the country. I understand that American personnel were among the casualties and my prayers are with the victims of this cowardly attack and their families, Menendez said. As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We cant trust the Taliban with Americans security. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands NATO chief has condemned the twin suicide bombings at the Kabul airport as a horrific terrorist attack that targeted desperate Afghans trying to leave the country and the alliances efforts to evacuate them from Afghanistan. Jens Stoltenberg said on Twitter after the explosions on Thursday: I strongly condemn the horrific terrorist attack outside #Kabul airport. My thoughts are with all those affected and their loved ones. Our priority remains to evacuate as many people to safety as quickly as possible. The bombings struck outside Kabuls airport, where large crowds of people trying to flee Afghanistan have massed, killing at least 13 people and wounding 15, according to Russian officials. Western nations had warned earlier in the day of a possible attack at the airport in the waning days of a massive airlift. ___ LONDON A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the explosion near the Kabul airport. Paul Pen Farthing said the group was outside the airport when the blast occurred on Thursday. Were fine but everything is chaos here at the moment, he told Britains Press Association news agency. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47. Weve been in the airport, and back out of the airport; the whole things a mess, he added. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. They have been stuck outside Kabuls airport as they try to get a flight out. He spoke as reports emerged of two suicide bombings outside the airport that killed at least 13 people and wounded another 15. U.S. officials meanwhile have said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. ___ DUBLIN French President Emmanuel Macron said the situation has seriously deteriorated near the Kabul airport after several explosions happened in the last hours. Speaking in a news conference during a visit to Dublin, Ireland, Macron said we are facing an extremely tense situation that makes us coordinate obviously with our American allies and call for the utmost caution in a context we dont control. He added France will seek to protect and evacuate French nationals, people from allied countries and Afghans as long as the conditions will be met at the airport. Macron said he did not have more details about the circumstances of the explosions. The Russian Foreign Ministry has said there were two suicide bombings outside Kabul airport that killed at least 13 people on Thursday and wounded another 15. U.S. officials meanwhile have said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. ___ MOSCOW The Russian ambassador in Afghanistan says 360 Russian citizens have been flown home from Kabul. Ambassador Dmitry Zhirnov said in televised remarks Thursday that all those Russians who wanted to leave Afghanistan were taken home the previous day aboard four Russian Defense Ministry planes. He said that along with 360 Russians, the planes also evacuated 38 nationals of other ex-Soviet nations. Zhirnov said that the embassy was now trying to help a few Russians who were unable to leave for logistical reasons. He noted that about 100 Russians who remain in Afghanistan havent expressed a desire to leave. The Russian Foreign Ministry says the flights were organized with the assistance of the Taliban and the United States, which controls Afghanistans airspace. The ambassador said that Russian diplomats in Kabul are also working to help about 400 Afghan students who have enrolled Russian universities travel to Russia for studies. He said the embassy maintains close contacts with the Taliban. ___ WASHINGTON The acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, says the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News on Thursday, he would not give details and did not say whether the threat remained. Wilson also said there remain safe ways for Americans to reach the airport for evacuation. He said there undoubtedly will be Afghans who had worked with or for the U.S. in Afghanistan who will not be able to get out before the U.S.-led evacuation ends. ___ TORONTO Canada has ended evacuations from Kabuls airport, a Canadian general said Thursday, as the clock ticks down on dramatic Western efforts to help people flee the Taliban takeover ahead of a full American withdrawal. General Wayne Eyre, the countrys acting chief of Defense Staff, said all the other countries have to leave the airport before the Americans can wrap up their mission. Canadian military flights evacuated about 3,700 people. We stayed in Afghanistan for as long as we could. We were amongst the last to cease evacuation operations. We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone who was so desperate to leave. That we could not is truly heartbreaking, but the circumstances on the ground rapidly deteriorated, Eyre said. U.S. President Joe Biden has said he is sticking to his Aug. 31 deadline for completing the U.S. pullout as the Taliban insisted he must, ramping up pressure on the already risky airlift from Kabul to get out as many people as possible in the coming days. Canada and European allies pressed for more time but lost the argument. Canada is one many countries taking part in the evacuation of people facing Taliban reprisals from Kabuls airport. Over 1,000 refugees are in Canada now. Canada has plans to resettle 20,000 Afghan refugees. ___ BERLIN Germanys defense minister says terror threats in Kabul have become significantly more concrete as the international evacuation effort from the airport in the Afghan capital is nearing its end. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said on Thursday that the effort is now in what is certainly the most hectic, dangerous and sensitive phase. We know that the terror threats have intensified massively and that they have become significantly more concrete. She said Germanys foreign ministry told people in Kabul overnight that they should not try to get to the airport on their own, in line with warnings by the U.S. and others. The German military was still flying between Kabul and Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Thursday. It wasnt immediately clear when exactly the German evacuation effort would end. Germanys top military commander, Gen. Eberhard Zorn, said that as of Thursday afternoon German flights had evacuated some 5,200 people from 45 nations, including about 4,200 Afghans. Zorn said two small German helicopters that were flown into Kabul a few days ago, intended to help get individuals to the airport, were flown out to Tashkent overnight. ___ WARSAW, Poland A deputy foreign minister in Poland said on Thursday that his country is looking for the family of 13-year-old Afghan boy, Fawad, who got separated from his parents in the crowd pressing on the Kabul airport. Fawad has been brought to safety in Poland but his parents' whereabouts were not immediately known. Marcin Przydacz said that Fawads parents could have been evacuated on another flight to a Western country, such as the United States or Britain, but have not yet been localized. The first appeal for help in finding Fawads family, with the boys photo was made on Twitter by Polands government official, Michal Dworczyk, on Tuesday. ___ LONDON Britains prime minster says the overwhelming majority of people eligible to come to Britain have been evacuated from Afghanistan, but time is running out on the airlift. Boris Johnson said about 15,000 people have left Kabul airport on Royal Air Force flights. He said that in the time we have left, which may be -- as Im sure everybody can appreciate -- quite short, well do everything we can to get everybody else. U.S. forces are due to leave the airport by Aug. 31, and other countries missions will have to wrap up before then. Visiting a military base in London where the British evacuation effort is being coordinated, Johnson said Britain hoped to continue evacuations after the end of the month, and urged the Taliban to facilitate it. Johnson said the safe passage for those who want to come out is the key precondition for development aid and access to international funding for Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. ___ BRUSSELS The European Union still has a skeleton staff in Kabul working to evacuate people as the end of airlifts from the chaotic airport looms. A number of European nations have said that they are ending their evacuation efforts ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. European Commission foreign affairs spokesman Peter Stano said Thursday that a small EU team will be on the ground as long as necessary in order to complete the evacuation operations. He declined to give more details, saying he didnt want to share more details because they are operating in an environment which is not exactly friendly. Stano says that more than 400 Afghans who worked for the EU in Afghanistan, along with their families, have already been evacuated. He adds that there are still some people who we need and want to get out but would not give more detail, citing operational reasons. Commission spokesman Eric Mamer says that the 400 Afghan EU workers and their families are in the process of being transferred to member states who offered places. He called discussions about their relocation a very intense process but adds that members of the 27-nation bloc are very clear that they are they are willing to help accommodate the EUs Afghan staff. ___ MOSCOW The Kremin says that Russia will closely follow the developments in Afghanistan before making a decision on whether to recognize the Talibans rule. Russian President Vladimir Putins spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Moscow will watch the Talibans future steps to ensure order and security of the countrys citizens and provide security for the Russian diplomats. Peskov emphasized that Russia wants to see peace and stability in Afghanistan and hopes that efforts will be taken to stem the flow of drugs coming from the country. Moscow, which fought a 10-year war in Afghanistan that ended with the Soviet troops withdrawal in 1989, has made a diplomatic comeback as a mediator over the past few years, reaching out to feuding Afghan factions including the Taliban even though the group was added to the Russian list of terrorist organizations in 2003. ___ BUCHAREST, Romania Romanias Supreme Council of National Defense says Romania will contribute a maximum of 200 troops to NATO missions to evacuate and relocate Afghan citizens. The NATO operation will, in principle, consist of taking Afghan citizens from temporary bases in Kuwait and Qatar and relocating them to temporary stationed bases on the territory of allied states, the supreme council said in a statement after a meeting Wednesday. The council said that Romanian troops would contribute for a maximum of six months and that operations would start in August. The security council also said that during the meeting it decided further steps would be taken to bring Afghan citizens, such as journalists, human rights activists, magistrates, and students to safety in Romania. It did not provide further details on how or when this would happen. Romanian authorities have earmarked a number of Afghans for evacuation to Romania, but none could make it safely to Kabul airport last week when Romania carried out three evacuation flights, officials said. The security council also said in the meeting that Afghanistans swift takeover by the Taliban may have security consequences for Romania, due to the dangers posed by extremism, terrorism, the export of instability in the region, drug and arms trafficking, (and) illegal migration. ___ LONDON A former Royal Marine who runs an animal charity in Afghanistan says he, his Afghan staff and dozens of dogs and cats are stuck outside Kabuls airport as they try to get a flight out of the country. Paul Pen Farthing appealed to the Taliban to allow the group safe passage into the airport. He tweeted to Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen that we have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage. Truly would like to go home now. Farthing has been pressing for days to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. Dominic Dyer, a British animal campaigner who is assisting Farthing, said a plane had been chartered and was due to leave the U.K. later Thursday for Kabul. Farthings supporters have clashed with Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, who refused to airlift the animals on a Royal Air Force plane. saying I have to prioritize people at the moment over pets. The U.K. defense ministry later said it would help Farthing, his group and the animals leave on the privately funded chartered jet. Armed Forces Minister James Heappey said Thursday that U.K. forces at the airport would facilitate the flight. He told ITV that the difficulty is getting Pen into the airfield. ___ HELSINKI Finland said Thursday it had evacuated 51 people from Kabul to the Nordic country, adding that its total number of evacuees has risen to close to 340 people. The Finnish Foreign Ministry wrote on Twitter that Finland too had assisted four people on their way to other countries Wednesday when the people were evacuated. Cooperation is power, the ministry wrote, adding that Finland in total had assisted 30 persons from our partner countries. ___ MILAN The Afghan director of a school for girls dedicated to an Italian newspaper correspondent killed in Afghanistan is trying desperately to gain access to the Kabul airport for evacuation, with anxiety growing as the end of flights nears. Shir Ahmad Mohammadi has sent messages to contacts in Italy as well as Italian officials in Kabul, saying that the Taliban are not allowing him and his family near the airport, Corriere della Sera reported on Thursday. Help me, I cant go on. The Taliban are not allowing us to pass. They are asking for U.S. documents that we dont have, Mohammadi wrote. He is the director of a school in Herat province named for Maria Grazia Cutuli, a Corriere correspondent killed in 2001. He traveled by bus with his wife and two daughters, finding himself in the capital controlled by the Taliban and with foreign troops by now closed off in the airport. I served female students in Afghanistan, giving them the chance to study in the name of your country. Now it is time that I think of my daughters, and try to get them to safety, he wrote. I have my two daughters with me, what should I do, I cannot leave them to be treated in this way. I have to take care of their security and their dignity. That is why I made this trip. He said his wife and daughters are under increasing strain. I dont know how long we can keep going in these conditions, Mohammadi wrote. ___ WARSAW, Poland Poland says the reason it has halted its evacuation flights was so that the United States could meet its Aug. 31 deadline to quit Kabul. That is the date when the last U.S. soldier is to leave Kabul airport, Deputy Foreign Minister Marcin Przydacz said Thursday, but to make that possible all others must leave first. Przydacz said that some countries have not yet evacuated all their citizens and associates and for this reason they were continuing their evacuation missions. Poland however has met its evacuation goals and ended its mission. Przydacz said that no matter how long the mission would have taken and how many people would have been evacuated, if a Polish diplomat or a soldier got hurt, the mission would not have been a success. Przydacz said it was a difficult decision to wrap up the evacuation but that today, with such high level of terrorist threat, amid the growing instability, we see no possibility of putting the lives of our people at risk any longer. They have really done an immense job. He mentioned the consuls at the spot, finding people in the crowd, diplomats in various countries securing instant permission for Polish planes to fly over their territory, and officials in Warsaw who worked round the clock to bring people to safety. Poland has evacuated some 1,300 people in 14 flights, through Uzbekistan. Some 200 of the evacuees were rescued at the request of other countries, and of the IMF. The last group arrived Thursday morning. Przydacz said that Poland will be ready to air lift more people if commercial flights from Afghanistan are restored. ___ ISTANBUL The first Turkish troops evacuated from Afghanistan arrived back in Turkey on Thursday. TV footage showed a Turkish Airlines flight carrying 345 soldiers land at Ankaras Esenboga Airport, having departed Kabul on Wednesday evening. Some 600 Turkish troops were based in Afghanistan. We aim to complete the transfer as soon as possible, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said in a statement. ___ COPENHAGEN, Denmark The foundation created by toymaker Lego and its parent company say they will donate 100 million kroner ($16 million) to support vulnerable children in Haiti and Afghanistan. The humanitarian crises that are happening in Haiti and Afghanistan are unimaginable and only intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic, said Thomas Kirk Kristiansen, chairman of the LEGO Foundation. Since May 2021, more than 500,000 people have been displaced in Afghanistan. As for Haiti, the Aug. 14 violent earthquake that was followed by a tropical storm has left half-a-million Haitian children with limited or no access to shelter, safe water, health care, and nutrition. With COVID-19 still (being) an imminent threat to the health and safety of Haitis population, the loss and damage associated with these most recent natural disasters only further compounds the dire situation so many children and families are experiencing, they said in a joint statement. Based in Denmark, the Lego Foundation and parent company KIRKBI A/S said that they had partnered up with, among others, two U.N. agencies -- UNICEF and UNHCR as well as Education Cannot Wait, a global fund to transform the delivery of education in emergencies. ___ DUBAI, United Arab Emirates Qatar says it has helped the evacuation of more than 40,000 people from Kabul airport. The small nation on the Arabian Peninsula says most will transit through Qatar after staying in temporary accommodations. Qatar says that the evacuation efforts will continue in the coming days in consultation with international partners. Qatar also hosts an office of the Taliban and was the site of negotiations between America, the toppled Afghan government and the insurgents. ___ NEW DELHI India says it has evacuated most of its nationals from Afghanistan and is doing everything to bring them back home. Indias External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told a meeting of political leaders on Thursday that India has operated six flights so far from Kabul after a stunning takeover by the Taliban. A few of them (Indians) are still there. He didnt give the exact number of Indians and Afghans evacuated so far from Kabul but the Indian media put their numbers around 800. He declined to say how India is going to deal with the Taliban government in Afghanistan. The situation in Afghanistan is yet to settle down. I will talk about it later, Jaishankar told reporters. New Delhi had stayed away from the Taliban except for back-channel contacts in recent months. It didnt recognize the Taliban government that ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001. ___ ISLAMABAD Pakistans prime minister has called on the international community to continue engagement with Afghanistan, saying it was a way forward to avert any humanitarian crisis and secure peace and stability. Imran Khan made his comment during a meeting with David Beasley, executive director of the United Nations World Food Program who met with him in Islamabad. Khan also called for the formation of an inclusive government to ensure peace and avoid an humanitarian crisis, after the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan. The latest development comes as dozens of Afghans continue to enter Pakistan via its land borders. But the number of Afghan people entering Pakistan through land routes has been steadily decreasing since earlier this week. ___ BUDAPEST, Hungary Hungary says its army has evacuated all Hungarian citizens from Afghanistan of which the defense ministry is aware. Defense Minister Tibor Benko told a press conference on Thursday that 540 people, among them 57 Afghan families including 180 children, had been evacuated to Hungary from Kabul. Of the Afghan citizens who assisted Hungarian forces in Afghanistan since 2003, the army has evacuated 87%, he said, adding that Hungarian, Afghan, Austrian and U.S. citizens were evacuated during the operation. All of the nearly 100 Hungarian soldiers that participated in the evacuation operation have returned to Hungary, Benko said. No injuries occurred during the evacuation operations, though there were Afghan citizens who sustained injuries prior to their evacuation, he said. Seven Hungarian soldiers were killed during military operations in Afghanistan since 2003, Benko said. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands The Dutch government says it is pulling its troops and diplomats out of the Kabul airport over the security situation. In a letter to parliament Thursday, the foreign and defense ministers say that the Netherlands has been told by the United States to leave today and will most likely carry out its last flight later today. They add that in light of the extremely quickly deteriorating situation in and around the airport, evacuees can no longer be assisted by the Netherlands to get access to the airport. ___ LONDON The British, French and Danish militaries have given stark warnings about the security situation at the Kabul airport, where Afghan civilians are scrambling to evacuate ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for foreign troops to leave Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC on Thursday there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport. Other warnings emerged about a possible threat from Afghanistans Islamic State affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country. Heappey conceded that people are desperate to leave and there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told French radio RTL on Thursday that from tomorrow evening onwards, we are not able to evacuate people from the Kabul airport due to the Aug. 31 American withdrawal. Meanwhile, Danish defense minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul. Denmarks last flight, carrying 90 people plus soldiers and diplomats, already had left Kabul. Poland and Belgium have already ended their evacuations from Afghanistan. MADISON, Wis. (AP) University of Wisconsin System President Tommy Thompson on Thursday urged the Legislature and Gov. Tony Evers to set up a task force to re-examine every aspect of higher education in the state. Thompson told WisPolitics.com President Jeff Mayers during a Zoom interview that the UW System is falling behind other states. The system lacks a robust distance learning program, has too many buildings and too many campuses duplicate courses, he said. We just keep doing the same things and we're going to end up with the same result, he said. More (student) debt, more buildings, more classrooms. It's time for us to be controversial and take a look. What's in the best interest of the student? Thompson, a former Wisconsin governor, didn't lay out any specific goals for the proposed task force but complained that no one has given me the ability to go out and compete. You know me, I don't want any state to come into Wisconsin and take anything from us. Republican legislators essentially held system funding flat in the 2021-23 state budget. The GOP also gave the system about $629 million for building projects. Evers, the former state superintendent of schools, had asked for $1 billion. Evers spokeswoman Britt Cudaback didn't immediately respond to a message seeking comment on whether the governor would consider Thompson's request. Neither did aides for Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu. Thompson, who was also health secretary under former President George W. Bush, was once a Republican icon in Wisconsin. But his party has grown far more conservative since he left office and he finds himself at odds with Republican leadership after he refused their demands to get approval from the Legislature's rules committee before implementing any COVID-19 protocols on campuses. Thompson has refused to implement a vaccinate mandate on campuses, but he has left it up to chancellors to impose mask mandates. All the campuses except La Crosse have done so. The rules committee's co-chairman, Sen. Steve Nass, has threatened to sue because the panel hasn't granted permission for any such policies. Thompson has said the Legislature doesn't run the UW System. At least one high-ranking Republican leader has sided with Thompson. Assembly Majority Leader Jim Steineke tweeted Thursday that he doesn't support a lawsuit, saying it would only add more confusion during an already stressful time. Thompson also told Mayers that he won't seek to become the system's permanent president. The regents selected him to serve on a interim basis last year after the search for a permanent president stalled. A new search committee started meeting this month. Thompson, who will turn 80 in November, said he thinks he has about six months left in the president's office. He wants to use that time to transform the system's outdated computer and financial system, saying nobody understands the technology because it is so old. He ended the interview by saying: "I guess I did a lot of talking. I'm sure all the people will be writing me letters disagreeing with me. But that's the way life is. I'm not afraid to make decisions. ___ This story was first published on Aug. 26. It was updated on Aug. 27 to correct the spelling of Jeff Mayers' last name. ___ Follow Todd Richmond on Twitter at https://twitter.com/trichmond1 NEW YORK (AP) The chief executive of the sexual harassment victims advocacy group Time's Up resigned Thursday amid outrage over revelations that its leaders advised former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's administration after he was first accused of misconduct last year. Times Up CEO and president Tina Tchen said in a statement that she's spent a career fighting for positive change for women but was no longer the right person to lead the #MeToo-era organization. I am especially aware that my position at the helm of TIME'S UP has become a painful and divisive focal point, where those very women and other activists who should be working together to fight for change are instead battling each other in harmful ways, she wrote. The group's chief operating officer, Monifa Bandele, will serve as interim CEO. Tchen's resignation comes after the Aug. 9 departure of the organization's chair, Roberta Kaplan. Both women had been the target of ire from Time's Up supporters over the idea they had offered any help to Cuomo, who resigned Monday, three weeks after an investigation overseen by New York's attorney general concluded he sexually harassed at least 11 women. The report detailed Cuomo's attempt to discredit his first public accuser, Lindsey Boylan, after she accused him last December of making inappropriate comments, but before she explicitly detailed allegations of unwanted touching and kissing. Text messages obtained by The Washington Post show that Tchen initially discouraged other Time's Up leaders from making any public comment about Boylan's allegations. Later, top Cuomo aide Melissa DeRosa asked Kaplan her attorney to review a letter the governor's supporters intended to circulate attacking Boylan's credibility. Ms. Kaplan read the letter to the head of the advocacy group Times Up, and both of them allegedly suggested that, without the statements about Ms. Boylans interactions with male colleagues, the letter was fine, the report said, without explicitly naming Tchen. The letter was ultimately never released. Later, after Boylan expanded on her allegations against Cuomo, T ime's Up called for an investigation. Boylan noted Thursday that Tchen's resignation statement didn't include an apology. Its sad that @TinaTchen still cant take responsibility for the harm shes caused, Boylan tweeted. That sentiment was echoed by another Cuomo accuser, Charlotte Bennett. Instead of offering a sincere apology to the survivors, activists and allies shes harmed, @TinaTchen goes out the same way our former Governor did listing her accomplishments, pointing the finger at others, and attempting to justify her inexcusable behavior. Good riddance. Tchen declined further comment. Time's Up got its start in January 2018 amid outrage over sexual misconduct by the film producer Harvey Weinstein. More than 300 women in entertainment from television powerhouse Shonda Rhimes to actresses Reese Witherspoon and Eva Longoria signed an open letter that established them as founders. Its high-profile debut continued with that month's Golden Globes, in which attendees donned black and sported Time's Up pins to call attention to the movement for gender equality. Tchen previously served as an assistant to then-President Barack Obama, chief of staff to then-first lady Michelle Obama and executive director of the White House Council on Women and Girls. She co-founded the Time's Up Legal Defense Fund in 2017, along with Kaplan and two other women. The fund was established to help everyday survivors with legal costs, and had raised nearly $22 million less than a year after its founding. In a statement Thursday, the Time's Up board praised Tchen's tenure, saying she has made a difference in the lives of so many and we are grateful for her hard work and impact. But accepting her resignation was a measure of accountability, the board said. This isn't the first time the advocacy group has been roiled by leadership issues. Tchen took the helm in 2019, after former WNBA president Lisa Borders stepped down as president and CEO following sexual misconduct allegations against her own son. Tarana Burke, the founder of #MeToo and a member of Times Ups extended board, offered her perspective on the troubled waters earlier this week to The Associated Press. She described Times Up as a young organization with good intentions thats now grappling with how to wield power. I think they have to do a lot of soul searching and at the end of the day," she said. It may come out the other end to be that they have to figure out how to work differently, that they have to relinquish some of the power and they have to sacrifice some of the wins in order to do the work well, in the way that people trust. ___ Associated Press reporter Jocelyn Noveck contributed to this report. Students across Texas can count on Whataburger to be a beacon of light at the end of a long night of studying or socializing, but the burger chain is giving San Antonio college kids an added boost. The San Antonio-based company partnered with the San Antonio Food Bank to help the University of Texas at San Antonio reopen the main campus student resource room. Now officially named the UTSA Whataburger Resource Room, the facility provides food items, toiletries, school supplies, and essentials free of charge year-round for Roadrunners. "Food insecurity is a common obstacles for some college students across the country," a UTSA spokesperson tells MySA. "UTSA is part of the solution to fight hunger by offering students more food and daily necessities, allowing them to focus on their educational goals and achieve success." Over the summer, the pantry underwent major renovations to gloss up the space for students. The room is now co-branded with Whataburger's signature orange decor and UTSA spirit. For downtown students, that UTSA campus also has a resource room supported by Whataburger, according to a news release. The help is part of Whataburger's companys Feeding Student Success Program. The company also opened at resource room at Grambling State University in Louisiana. Students aren't able to order the Whataburger menu at the resource rooms, but they can get branded products, such as pancake mix, condiments, and school supplies. Whataburger says online that more resource room openings are planned. UTSA says the pantry opened in 2017 and has served 11,000 students since. The newly renovated Main Campus Whataburger Resource Room is located in the Student Union (SU 1.04.06). The Downtown Campus Whataburger Resource Room can be found in the Durango Building (DB 1.306). Both are open during the fall semester Monday-Friday from 12 p.m. to 4pm and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Florida, FL (34429) Today Thunderstorms. Low 73F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%. Locally heavy rainfall possible.. Tonight Thunderstorms. Low 73F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%. Locally heavy rainfall possible. Wilkes-Barre, PA (18701) Today Rain early...then remaining cloudy with showers overnight. Low 56F. Winds NNE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Rain early...then remaining cloudy with showers overnight. Low 56F. Winds NNE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected. Last year, the Pew Research Center examined partisan trust, and distrust, of a range of news media outlets, finding in part that Republicans placed lower trust in a variety of measured news sources than Democrats. Recently, the Center for Media Engagement, in partnership with Trusting News, surveyed more than three thousand local news readers who consider themselves conservative or right-leaning. In a report, the Center for Media Engagement noted higher levels of trust for local media than national outlets, and recommended several ways that local outlets might rebuild trust with conservative readers. CJR spoke with Gina Masullo, the studys primary researcher, about conservative audiences, local media, and the difficulty of building trust in a politicized social environment. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. What led to your most recent research? Were really interested in this idea of bridging divides, with the media connecting with audiences that dont trust them, or feel alienated by them. We do a lot of research about trust in the general population, not just among conservatives. And I want to stress that distrust in news is a problem across political groups. In this project, we were particularly interested in conservatives, because their distrust is particularly pronounced, and their trust is lower than people that have other political beliefs. In general, studies have shown that Americans trust local news a lot more than national news. And thats exactly what we found among the conservatives we surveyed. Was there a sense among your survey participants that local media was more conservative? Sign up for CJR 's daily email I dont think you can extrapolate from the interviews that people felt that local news was more conservative. More that they saw value in what they got in local news: they felt like it told them information about their communities, and it was valuable to them. I think you can also sort of infer from what they said that, to them, local issues tend to be less partisan in general. If you care about whether theres a dog park in your community, thats not really a partisan issue. They felt like local news was invested in their community, and that made them more trusting. Theres a dilemma here for reporters: how to maintain trust while reporting on ostensibly non-partisan issues that have been co-opted and politicized. Is there any way around that dynamic? Theres no magic wand, unfortunately. Weve found things that do increase trust, but theres no magic wand. And thats frustrating, but also realistic, because it took a long time to develop this distrust. On the one hand, we had people who said, during interviews, We just want the facts. We dont want any interpretation. We dont want the narrative. But some of the examples they gave, what they saw as a narrative, someone else might see as just facts. Journalists are in a tricky situation. You dont want to create a false equivalency between two topics; you dont want to pretend that theres considerable evidence that climate change is not caused by humans. If local journalists have more relationships in their communities, that engenders trust. I dont think youre completely going to persuade anyone, certainly not among the more extreme voices on the rightor the left, for that matter. Its a problem that cant be fixed easily. But we can chip away at the problem. Our main takeaway is that conservatives feel like they are stereotyped and painted with a broad brush in the media. Often the conservative voice quoted in a story is one many people feel doesnt represent them, and might be more extreme. So the answer to that is, talk to more people. As one person said, dont just interview the person with the pickup truck and the Confederate flag off the back. I think journalists can think about their language in a story, think about their word choice, and get to know more conservatives in their community, so that they understand there are multiple conservative points of view. It seems to me that local news publishers have had to work increasingly hard to appear nonpartisan. But theyve also struggled to retain audiences in a lot of places for myriad reasons: because of social-media platforms, because of a failing business model, because of the ubiquity of alternative information. Do you think the research that youve done shows the potential to build an audience? I think this study points to a potential to grow audiences for local news. We found participants trusted their own local news site more than national news. The more connections you make with members of this community, the more you build on that. And while we found that Fox News was the source people most mentioned most frequently as the one they trusted the most, that was only 29 percent of people. And our survey didnt specify whether they meant the Fox News affiliate, or national Fox News, or Tucker Carlsonwe need more research to fully understand that. One thing I think was notable was that people find local news less valuable when theres a lot of wire copy. It seemed like they almost resented it when there was wire copy in local news. Journalists understand why: staffs have been cut, people have been laid off, people arent buying subscriptions. There are legitimate reasons for the wire copy. But it undermines peoples sense of why they love local news, which is the local part of it. When does it become journalistically irresponsible for newsrooms to build trust with readers? I dont think I can say exactly where that line is. Newsrooms have to negotiate that themselves. The people who were interviewed and surveyed in our study definitely have an interest in, and desire for, local news, so I think it would be ill-advised for local news organizations not to try to reach that audience. But there are some people who are unreachable. I certainly dont advocate that news organizations pander to an audience just to make money. I think thats wrong. You want to be writing the truth. And if youre writing the truth, and the truth upsets members of your audience, then you may have to just let them go. Still, based on our interviews, I think there are a lot of people who could be legitimately brought into a local-news audience in a more full way. And I think that is valuable. Its a better business decision to have a larger audience. And its better for democracy as a whole if theres a larger swath of people who are in the conversation together. Is it right to prioritize conservative audiences when there are a lot of audienceslike people of colorthat have never been served by legacy local newsrooms in the way that they should be? I dont think its an either/or. I dont think if you try to increase your conservative audience you have to depress your liberal audience or your audience of color. We have done some research in Black and Hispanic communities, and the takeaways are very similar to those from our recent work: misunderstandings, stereotypes, painting with a broad brush. Now, communities of color are an oppressed audience. Conservatives are not an oppressed audience. There is a difference between them. But everybody in a local-news audience wants to feel heard. The Journalism Crisis Project aims to train our focus on the present crisis, and to foster a conversation about what comes next. We hope youll join us. (Click to subscribe!) EXPLORE THE TOW CENTERS COVID-19 CUTBACK TRACKER: Over the past year, researchers at the Tow Center have collected reports of a wide range of cutbacks amid the pandemic. Theres an interactive map and searchable database. You can find it here. Below, more on recent media trends and changes in newsrooms: LOCAL NEWS CONTRIBUTES TO MISINFO: Though Facebook recently shared data on their most popular posts, the New York Times reported last week that the company had shelved an earlier report because of concerns about public relations. The first quarters most viral story, a disaggregated Chicago Tribune story about a doctors death two weeks after he received a COVID vaccine, demonstrates how news media can contribute to misinformation, and how the fractured media ecosystem can skew and elevate such stories, Joshua Benton wrote for Nieman Lab. (Elsewhere, the Washington Post reported on Facebook users making good-faith attempts to persuade people to get vaccinated against COVID-19). MORE GANNETT NEWSROOMS UNIONIZE: In New Jersey, three Gannett-owned newsrooms have announced intentions to unionize, joining three other Gannett-owned papers in the state that took steps to unionize earlier this year, Poynter reported. The newly-established APP-MJC guild is made up of editorial staff at the Asbury Park Press, the Courier News, and the Home News Tribune. There is no local news without local journalists, the guild wrote in a statement. We have unionized to preserve our high quality local news coverage and to build a better, more stable future. LOCAL TEXAS NEWSROOMS CONTINUE NEGOTIATIONS: In Texas, three recently unionized newsroomsthe Dallas Morning News, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and Austin American-Statesmanare fighting for their first contracts, with negotiations at the McClatchy-owned Star-Telegram and the Gannett-owned American-Statesman moving at a slower pace, Texas Observer reported. LOCAL PAPER INVESTS IN PRINT: The Berkshire Eagle, a locally-owned Massachusetts publication that announced print cutbacks amid the pandemic, has purchased a new printing press. When I announced last year that we were reducing The Eagles print editions from seven to five days a week, I also told you that we had adopted a long-term strategy of Being Digital, President Fred Rutberg wrote. Judging from the mail I received, many of you surmised that we had decided to abandon print, and that the announced reduction in print frequency was the beginning of the end of The Berkshire Eagle print edition. That was not the case last year, and it is not the case now. STUDENT NEWSPAPERS CUT PRINT: The pandemic dealt a blow to print products at student news outlets across the country, Nieman Lab reported. Some mourned the loss, but Nieman Lab reporter Hanaa Tameez tweeted, Im thrilled about the financial freedom this will give the editors to innovate and bring the journalism to readers in mediums they actually consume. NEWSROOMS LAUNCH INITIATIVES TO SUPPORT MARGINALIZED GROUPS: In the UK, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism has launched an initiative called The Peoples Newsroom, which will share business resources and mentorship opportunities to help journalists of color launch community newsrooms in the country, according to the Press Gazette. And Serena Chow, former editor-in-chief of Wesleyan Universitys student newspaper, established a fund to support low-income student journalists of color, NBCU Academy reported. A lot of students of color who come from low-income backgrounds depend on multiple campus jobs, Chow told NBCU. So coming into a paper that publishes twice a week is not a feasible time commitment. That really skewed whos in our newsroom. Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Lauren Harris is a freelance journalist. She writes CJR's weekly newsletter for the Journalism Crisis Project. Follow her on Twitter @LHarrisWrites. TOKYO (AP) The operator of the wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant said Wednesday it plans to build an undersea tunnel so that massive amounts of treated but still radioactive water can be released into the ocean about 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) away from the plant to avoid interference with local fishing. The operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, said it hopes to start releasing the water in spring 2023. TEPCO says hundreds of storage tanks at the plant need to be removed to make room for facilities necessary for the plants decommissioning. An official in charge of the water discharge project, Junichi Matsumoto, said TEPCO will construct the undersea tunnel by drilling through bedrock in the seabed near its No. 5 reactor, which survived the meltdowns at the plant, to minimize possible underground contamination or leakage of radioactive ground water into the tunnel. Increasing amounts of radioactive water have been stored in about 1,000 tanks at the Fukushima Daiichi plant since 2011, when a massive earthquake and tsunami damaged three reactors and their cooling water became contaminated and began leaking. The plant says the tanks will reach their capacity late next year. The government decided in April to start discharging the water, after further treatment and dilution, into the Pacific Ocean in spring 2023 under safety standards set by regulators. The idea has been fiercely opposed by fishermen, residents and neighboring countries including China and South Korea. The offshore discharge using a pipeline enclosed inside a concrete tunnel is an attempt to minimize the reputational damage that would occur if the contaminated water is released close to marine life off the Fukushima coast. Under the plan released Wednesday, the water will be released at a depth of about 12 meters (40 feet) below the oceans surface, said Matsumoto, who works for Fukushima Daiichi Decontamination & Decommissioning Engineering Co., a company created by TEPCO. A pipeline enclosed in undersea tunnel is safer than simply laying a pipe under the seafloor in the event of a major earthquake or tsunami, he said at a news conference. TEPCO plans to dilute the contaminate water with large amounts of seawater to reduce the concentration of radioactive materials below allowable limits. Plant workers are to sample the water ahead of its release and examine samples of seawater from multiple locations daily. Japan has obtained the International Atomic Energy Agencys agreement to cooperate in the water sampling and monitoring. The controlled release, with an annual cap on radioactive materials, will continue for about 30 years, or until the plants decommissioning ends, Matsumoto said. TEPCO said it plans to apply to the Nuclear Regulation Authority for a safety review of the tunnel plan after gaining support from local fishermen and other residents. It hopes to start construction so the discharge can start in spring 2023. The government on Tuesday adopted an interim plan that includes a fund to cushion the impact of any negative reports about the discharge and compensate fisheries and other local businesses for any damage. Japanese officials have said the ocean release is the most realistic option for disposing the water, which they say is required for the decommissioning of the plant. Government and TEPCO officials say tritium, which is not harmful in small amounts, cannot be removed from the water, but all other isotopes selected for treatment can be reduced to safe levels before release. About the photo: College students hold banners during a press conference demanding the withdrawal of Japanese governments decision to release treated radioactive water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant damaged in the 2011 earthquake and tsunami, near the presidential Blue House in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, June 11, 2021. The sign reads Ban on Japanese seafood imports. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon) Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. MEXICO CITY (AP) Mexicos state-owned oil company said Tuesday the possible remains of two missing subcontractors had been found on one of its oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico following a weekend fire. Petroleos Mexicanos said it had restored about 17% of the lost production caused by the fire at the platform. The company, known as Pemex, said that by Aug. 30 it hoped to restore all of the 421,000 barrels per day in production knocked out by the blaze. The platform caught fire after a gas leak during maintenance Sunday, killing five workers and leaving two others missing. Forensic tests were being carried out on the possible remains to see if they belonged to the missing workers. Pemex Director Octavio Romero said the apparent remains were found in a control room on the platform where temperatures reached around 1,800 degrees (1,000 degrees Celsius). Such heat would have burned the bodies beyond recognition. The fire at the processing platform in the Ku-Maloob-Zaap field caused the shutdown of 125 wells in the field. That knocked out production equivalent to about one-quarter of Mexicos daily output of almost 1.7 million barrels per day. The platform is used to compress gas to re-inject it into wells to stimulate oil pumping and to supply electricity to wells. Romero said 25 wells that produce about 71,000 barrels per day had already been brought back on line and that an additional 29 producing 110,000 barrels should be back up within 36 hours. Romero said some of the workers killed were carrying out routine maintenance and cleaning of gas lines on the platform. The maintenance work was being carried out by subcontractors from two firms. Six workers were injured in the blaze, and one was in serious condition. Romero said Monday investigations are continuing into the cause of the accident. This was the result not of an equipment failure, not of a lack of maintenance, but rather of planned (maintenance) work, where what occurred is known as an accident, Romero said. Why did it occur? That is something we will find out in coming days. The administration of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has gone on a ruthless cost-cutting campaign, and critics have said that spending cuts along with Pemexs staggering debt loads may have affected investment, safety and maintenance. Romero hotly denied that. This is not due to an issue of lack of investment, as some media outlets have said, Romero said. It is an issue related to the inherent risks of the oil industry. The accident comes less than two months after another Pemex pipeline in the same Gulf field leaked, causing a strange subaquatic fireball that the company said was caused by a bizarre chain of events, including a lightning storm and a simultaneous gas pipeline leak. A leak in an underwater pipeline allowed natural gas to build up on the ocean floor and once it rose to the surface on July 2, it was probably ignited by a lightning bolt, the company said. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. BOSTON A federal appeals court on Wednesday upheld the jury convictions of Insys Therapeutics Inc founder John Kapoor and four other company officials, over their roles in a scheme to bribe doctors to prescribe addictive opioids and defraud insurers into paying for them. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston ruled 3-0 that unalloyed greed drove the defendants to market the fentanyl spray Subsys to pill mill doctors, who would then prescribe it to patients with no medical need. In a 138-page decision, Circuit Judge Bruce Selya wrote that Insys and Kapoor, who had been chief executive, deserved great credit for developing Subsys to treat cancer pain, but in the pursuit of profit turned what should have been a blessing into a curse. Kapoor, 77, was convicted in 2019 and is serving a 5-1/2-year prison sentence. He remains the highest-ranking pharmaceutical executive convicted for helping fuel the U.S. opioid epidemic https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-states-rush-meet-deadline-join-26-billion-opioid-settlement-2021-08-19. His co-defendants Michael Gurry, Sunrise Lee, Joseph Rowan and Richard Simon were sentenced to terms ranging from one to 2-3/4 years. Kapoors lawyer declined to comment. Lawyers for the other defendants and the U.S. attorneys office in Boston, which prosecuted the case, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Prosecutors said Insys used sham speaker programs, ostensibly to educate the medical field, as a means to pay bribes and kickbacks to doctors who then prescribed Subsys, often to non-cancer patients. Kapoor also directed efforts to defraud insurers that were reluctant to pay for Subsys, prosecutors said. Fentanyl is an especially potent opioid, up to 100 times stronger than morphine. Insys, based in Chandler, Arizona, filed for bankruptcy protection in 2019. A lower court judge had set aside some of the jurys findings, but the 1st Circuit restored the original verdicts. The appeals court also set aside the defendants restitution and forfeiture orders, apart from Kapoors forfeiture, and ordered them recalculated. Kapoors punishment included $59.8 million of restitution and a $1.9 million forfeiture. Stay up to date on COVID-19 Get Breaking News Sign up now to get our FREE breaking news coverage delivered right to your inbox. Were you an online subscriber to the Clearwater Progress prior to October 2020? Your subscription can be validated to continue access on our new site. Simply verify the email address associated with your subscription and you will be good to go! From the start, none too fragile theatre in Akron has produced plays that offer the darker and more disturbing sides of the modern zeitgeist. Works like Neil LaButes In a Forest, Dark and Deep, Johnna Adams Sans Merci, and Matt Pelfreys Pure Shock Value take the stage rather than an Beachwood, OH (44122) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 59F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 59F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. Rabbis and staff of more than eight Northeast Ohio synagogues rushed to get out the word and implement new, and in some cases virtual, High Holy Days service schedules as the COVID-19 Delta variant presented an unexpected setback for large, in-person gatherings. The health and safety of our community is paramount, Rabbi Allison Vann of Suburban-Temple Kol Ami in Beachwood told the Cleveland Jewish News Aug. 19. Vann co-signed an Aug. 18 letter with seven other rabbis indicating they were canceling indoor services. The Delta variant is incredibly contagious and transmissible, she said. The more we can do to keep our community safer, thats our responsibility. It comes with a lot of grief and sadness. I would have much preferred for us to be together. I miss everyone. The statement, also signed by Rabbi Robert Nosanchuk of Anshe Chesed Fairmount Temple in Beachwood; Rabbi Enid Lader of Beth Israel-The West Temple in Cleveland; Rabbi Stephen Weiss of Bnai Jeshurun Congregation in Pepper Pike; Rabbi Steve Segar of Kol HaLev in Pepper Pike; Rabbi Joshua Skoff of Park Synagogue in Cleveland Heights and Pepper Pike; Rabbi Lauren Werber of Temple Bnai Abraham in Elyria; and Rabbi Jonathan Cohen of The Temple-Tifereth Israel in Beachwood, said it was a decision each of the congregations reached on their own and it was not a decision that any of us take lightly. Noting they came to the decision due to the uptick in COVID-19 Delta variant cases in both vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals, the rabbis wrote, We know that most vaccinated individuals will be protected from severe illness. Still, the risk is very real and very serious, the statement read. Of great concern is that those of us who are vaccinated can still contract COVID, have no symptoms and still pass it onto others. While many congregations, including Suburban Temple, prepared to flex in case of a rise in COVID-19 cases, the decision was made with a heavy heart by other rabbis as well. Nosanchuk, senior rabbi at Fairmount Temple, said he was hearing from fully vaccinated congregants as early as July that they were contracting COVID-19. By mid-July they were telling me, Ive been fully vaccinated, but I was at a gathering and I got COVID, he told the CJN. Nosanchuk said part of the decision-making process among clergy at Fairmount Temple entailed protecting the community. He said he and others want to be able to look back and be able to say they did what they could to protect the community. Another hope, he said, was that the decision might galvanize some more people to get vaccinated. Prompting the Aug. 18 letter was a Zoom call by the Jewish Federation of Cleveland in Beachwood, which featured two doctors from University Hospitals who spoke about the Delta variant: Dr. Daniel Simon, who is president, chief clinical officer and scientific officer for University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center, and Dr. Joan Zoltanski, chief health officer at University Hospitals. Fairmount Temple is still holding Shabbat services in person and plans to open its religious school in person. Of large social gatherings indoors, Nosanchuk said, Its just too great a risk, and its a growing risk right now. While Rabbi Noah Leavitt, spiritual leader of Oheb Zedek Cedar Sinai in Lyndhurst, was not one of the signers of the Aug. 18 letter, he too decided to hold High Holy Day services in a rented tent, rather than indoors. It worked out really well for us last year, Leavitt told the CJN Aug. 24. There was something powerful (about) davening Neilah with the rain coming down around us, adding there was a greater sense of community. Leavitt said he discussed the decision with congregants and with other rabbis across denominations. Rabbi Scott Roland, spiritual leader of Congregation Shaarey Tikvah in Beachwood, said he intends to hold services indoors, although he cautioned that decision could still change. Right now, our plans are still to be in person, masked and socially distanced, Roland told the CJN Aug. 24. That could change as we get closer to Rosh Hashanah, but we are hoping that it will not. Roland said his congregation of 250 member units makes it feasible to meet indoors and maintain distance more easily than some larger and smaller congregations. We will also be livestreaming our services, for those who are unable or prefer not to meet in person, he said. Rabbi Matt Eisenberg at Temple Israel Ner Tamid is offering a panoply of ways to attend services among them in person indoors. His temple recently underwent a $1.2 million renovation and expansion that included a new sanctuary with a state-of-the-art air circulation system, he said. While most will be masked at High Holy Days, Eisenberg said it will not be a rigid requirement, with seating set aside indoors for a small number of people for whom masking is not feasible. The sanctuary will be set up with about 50% seating capacity, he said. We are having services inside and outside, in person and virtually, Eisenberg told the CJN Aug. 24. We are doing all of the above. Last year, the Mayfield Heights temple held High Holy Days programming outdoors with a giant screen. Since then, the company that made that arrangement possible has gone out of business. With the renovation of our sanctuary and the new construction, for the last year we have been doing all sorts of upgrades to the audio and video possibilities, Eisenberg said. He said the temples sound system will allow congregants to pick up audio on Wi-Fi from anywhere on the campus by cellphone and outdoors underneath a 20-by-40-foot canopy, which will be set up for the High Holy Days. There will also be video screens set up in classrooms for people to watch in smaller numbers if they wish. Services will also be livestreamed, available on Facebook Live and on YouTube, he said. We realize everything in life has risk, and we are diligently working to mitigate the risk as much as is possible, along with allowing people to be together, Eisenberg said. Were trying to have that human touch. COFFEY, Mo. [mdash]John Nelson Eacret, 73, Coffey, MO passed away Tuesday, August 24, 2021 at his home. He was born on September 16, 1947 in Portland, Oregon the son of Earnest and Rachel (Stone) Eacret. On July 7, 2007, he married Joan A. Hughes in Tracy, Missouri. She survives of the home. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, August 25) Senators on Wednesday criticized Health Secretary Francisco Duque III for letting other agency officials answer questions directly addressed at him. Secretary Duque I respect you but please, you dont pass it on, said Senate Blue Ribbon Committee chairman Richard Gordon after the official intended to turn over a question to one of his undersecretaries. You have to man up and answer the question yourself, because that shows weakness. Kaya ka napagdududahan dahil di ka sumasagot [You are being doubted because you dont answer] forthrightly and I dont think thats your intention, the lawmaker further said. Sen. Grace Poe echoed Gordons sentiments. Hindi pupwede na parang ide-delegate lagi sa mga kasamahan sa trabaho, kundi mismo ang namumuno ng ahensya ang may responsibilidad, reminded Poe. [Translation: You cant always delegate things to your co-workers, because the one leading the agency should hold the responsibility.] The Health chief has frequently called on undersecretaries and directors to answer questions directed at him in recent probes held both by the Senate and the House on the agency. State auditors recently flagged deficiencies in how the DOH handled its budget, adding that they undermined its efficient response to the pandemic. When you are head of agency and cannot answer for your agencys actions, you are incompetent! tweeted Senate President Tito Sotto, who also took part in Wednesdays hearing. Senators have criticized the Health chief a number of times as the country continues to grapple with the COVID-19 health crisis. Just recently, they urged him to stop blaming others and step up amid complaints from health workers who have yet to receive promised benefits. The Cabinet official was likewise called out for his rant against the Commission on Audit, with lawmakers coming to the defense of state auditors who, they said, were just fulfilling their mandate. RELATED: Binay repeats call for Duques resignation: More pandemic solutions than distributing face masks, shields Despite the amount of criticism Duque has faced, he has been consistently defended by President Rodrigo Duterte. The chief executive said over the weekend that he will stand by the official even if it will bring me down. READ: Duterte will never fire Duque, but will accept his voluntary resignation After being canceled in 2020, the Boardwalk Arts Festival is set to return on Sept. 11 in Bethany Beach. On Friday, both students and teachers will unite at 3 p.m. on Old Main lawn to urge Penn State to implement a vaccine mandate and other coronavirus protocol, an event hosted by faculty members in the Coalition for a Just University. Please join us for the Student-Faculty Rally to Vaccinate Penn State - Aug 27 https://t.co/IMs2p352Xv Coalition for a Just University at Penn State (@cju_psu) August 25, 2021 The "Student-Faculty Unity Rally" is open to people from all over Pennsylvania, the CJU said, and those who attend should wear masks and practice social distancing. Attendees are also encouraged to bring signs with messages directed toward the administration. The goal of the rally is to send a clear message to university officials who have ignored previous student and faculty statements pushing for a vaccine mandate. During a virtual town hall meeting on Aug. 3, President Eric Barron announced the university would not mandate vaccinations, though Penn State "is not impartial to them," and an immediate indoor mask mandate soon followed for all students, faculty, staff and visitors. "We want to create space for expressions of support for a vaccine mandate at Penn State and expressions of concern about our unsafe conditions for teaching and learning," the CJU said. The rally follows the open letter, which the CJU officially delivered to Penn States Board of Trustees and administration during its initial Rally to Vaccinate Penn State on Aug. 13 in front of Old Main, has garnered more than 1,260 faculty and 1,750 undergraduate and graduate students, staff, alumni, parents and community members as of Wednesday night. The Penn State Faculty Senate, University Park Undergraduate Association and the Graduate and Professional Student Association have all asked Penn State to enforce a vaccine requirement. Instead of mandating full vaccination status, the university has thus far encouraged vaccinations by offering certain rewards and prizes for uploading vaccination cards to health records. Penn State said 83% of on-campus students provided proof of coronavirus vaccination as of Monday. Currently, students and faculty who do not provide proof of vaccination with the university are required to take a weekly coronavirus test. Students on and off campus will be tested weekly until they can provide proof they are fully vaccinated. MORE CAMPUS COVERAGE The world is finally transitioning back to old-fashioned, in-person communication, which is quite a contrast from Zoom calls that have become familiar. However, the return to normal is bringing about a call to uphold some of the flexibility the pandemic offered within the workplace. Congressman Mark Takano, a California Democrat, has introduced legislation in Congress to institute a four-day work week following the pandemic, which would reduce the standard work week to 32 hours. According to Takanos website, a shorter work week would result in better work-life balance, less need to take sick days, heightened morale and lower childcare expenses, among other benefits. Penn State students have mixed opinions on this bill and varying ideas about how the traditional work week has been altered as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Erica Jackson said she thinks a four-day work week could help people adjust to working in person and make getting into the swing of things an easier process. People are so used to being at home, Jackson (sophomore-communication sciences and disorders) said. It will force [people] back into social interactions. Jackson said she believes there will be an adjustment factor for people who have not been commuting to work like usual or who have been spending extended time with families. Allie Heath also said she thinks the bill would definitely be a good idea. It might be easier to ease back into things, Heath (freshman-nursing) said. Some people might be dealing with other issues. While Heath said she believes having lenience with work during the pandemic produced laziness, it did allow people to take care of things at home. MORE CAMPUS COVERAGE Jonathan Yourchak worked in a pharmacy and restaurant last summer at the onset of the pandemic, and he said he believes having a four-day work week could especially help students ease back into the regular work schedule. Yourchak (sophomore-secondary English education) said he had a hard time focusing when everything was over Zoom. Working through [the pandemic] has given me a sense of self-importance and appreciation for the people who work, Yourchak said. Other students, such as Era Pasha, said they are against a four-day work week. Pasha (sophomore-kinesiology) said he thinks a lot of people have been relying on government funding and taking advantage of it. I feel like keeping a five-day work week will motivate people to get back to work, Pasha said. A four-day work week doesnt make much of a difference. A better alternative would be to do virtual or in person and alternate. Neil Koons said he is also unsure of a four-day work week, but he said Congress might as well try it and see what happens. Koons (junior-physics) said he believes going back to commuting could negatively affect the way people think about their jobs. Not having to go to work for a full week could motivate people, Koons said, but the flexible schedule put in place because of the pandemic could be a negative if people arent focused and stop working entirely. Hannah Kim said she believes the flexible schedule would be a positive change. Kim (senior-environmental resource management) said she thinks it could benefit employees mental health. She said she has seen how eager people are to come back to school and predicts employees would also be eager to go back to work to reestablish human connections. Although Kim acknowledged less work might be done for the company with less hours put in per week, she said she can only see a positive side for the individual. Giving people that one extra day to relax and catch up on stuff they need to do would be good for them. MORE CAMPUS COVERAGE In response to the Centre Region Council of Governments letter, which was drafted on Aug. 19, President Eric Barron said Penn State will continue to encourage, but not require the coronavirus vaccine for students and faculty. Dennis Hameister, the Centre Region Council of Governments chairman, wrote it would like to congratulate Penn States current coronavirus protocols, but he shared the councils concern for community members and the possibility of interacting with unvaccinated students. "A majority of our members feel that requiring all students to be fully vaccinated to live on campus or participate in campus activities would create a safer and more comfortable environment for all of those that live, work, and play in the Centre Region," Hameister wrote. The Centre Region Council of Government letter strongly encourages Penn State to require the vaccine for students. In a virtual town hall earlier this month, Barron said the university is "not impartial to vaccination" but will not mandate it at this time. Currently, nine of the 14 institutions in the Big Ten Conference have enacted vaccine mandates, including Minnesota, Indiana, Rutgers, Northwestern, Maryland, Illinois, Michigan, Michigan State, and Ohio State. However, some of the aforementioned institutions will allow individuals to remain unvaccinated if they are tested weekly. Additionally, Barron wrote in the letter out of 13,428 students who have moved into residence halls for the fall semester, over 82% of them are fully vaccinated. Barron also said a total of "72% of full-time staff" members are fully vaccinated. The council wrote that mandating the vaccine would [provide] a high level of comfort for [Centre County] residents and offered to to assist in any manner that furthers the betterment of our shared residents and our communities. Barron concluded his letter by saying he believes the council should focus on the productive partnership between the university and the Centre Region Council of Governments created at the beginning of the pandemic. MORE CAMPUS COVERAGE If you care about elections and democracy beyond what you glean from a Facebook meme, the next week is the time to plug into fact, even if it's not as sinister as fiction. Reform has been a long time coming, amped up by one mans ego, but what happens from Denver to D.C. in the next few weeks will stretch its legs generations into the future if were lucky. I question how truth and facts stand up to chicken conspiracies. Have you heard this one? In Arizona, it was advanced that a Republican Maricopa County supervisor threw the race to Joe Biden with fowl play. Clint Hickman's family owns a commercial egg ranch west of Phoenix, and a barn fire back in March cooked 163,000 hens. As is completely logical, goofball site Gateway Pundit hatched the theory, based on a Facebook post, that Hickman stole a truckload of ballots, shredded them and fed them to his birds. Go on. Then five months after the election he got nervous that remnants of the ballots, which of course were printed in China, could be CSI'd from the barnyard poop. The only solution was to set his family business ablaze to cover his tracks. The sheriffs department felt the need to note, The arson investigation revealed no election ballots." We are through the looking glass, Alice. Back in the real world on Tuesday, the U.S. House passed the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act aimed to combat Republican states that have passed new voting laws spurred by the myth of a stolen election. The measure passed on a party-line vote and moves to the Senate which has a more narrow and challenging partisan gap. The legislation is named for the late congressman from Georgia who was beaten savagely on the Edmund Pettus Bridge as he marched for voting rights in Alabama in 1965, which led to the original Voting Rights Act in the months that followed. In 2013, the Supreme Court ruled that the standards for fair elections in the act were outdated and unnecessary. Further, this past July a high court ruling limited the ability to collect someone else's ballot to relative or caregiver, and in another ruling disqualified any ballots cast in the wrong precinct. The right to vote has been sacred to our country since our founding, but since the Big Lie, states across the country have tried to enact restrictive, anti-voter laws," Democratic Rep. Jason Crow of Aurora said after Tuesday's vote. "It's never been more urgent than it is today to protect the right to vote. The bill promises a lot: Gives plaintiffs more ability to seek an injunction over voting rights violations before an election Allows federal courts to block voting changes until a final ruling is made Allows the federal government to review enacted but not-yet-implemented changes Allows the Justice Department to have federal election observers present wherever discriminatory practices are a risk Requires reasonable public notice for proposed voting changes. Creates a grant program to help small jurisdictions comply with the bills requirements For the big picture, I turned to Colorados best-informed expert, Amber McReynolds. She was Denvers director of elections until 2018, when she left to lead the national Vote at Home Institute. She's since become a prominent voice in the national debate over voter integrity, and Coloradans should be proud to call her one of us. An update is overdue, she told me. I think it's a different type of protection now, Amber said, comparing the old voting rights law to the proposed one. Technology has changed systems. Voting methods have changed, so even when the Voting Rights Act was passed to allow voting by mail, for instance, that was still largely for military voters or voters with specific issues for why they were doing it. There was no other early voting. All these things are new. Online voter registration, same day registration, all this stuff has changed the dynamics of elections. In May the U.S. Senate confirmed Amber to the U.S. Postal Service Board of Governors. A voting-by-mail expert was a good addition to the 12-member board, since Trump implicated the post office as one of the conspirators against him in states, like Colorado, that vote by mail. This was not a partisan issue, Amber said. Basically one person made it a partisan issue mixed in with election conspiracies. What does that say to the public when you have a magnifier in the White House who lost and refuses to accept the outcome, even though the election officials have certified it and the audits havent shown anything happened. Not all the news about elections is fractious, though. Amber also sits on the first Colorado Independent Redistricting Commission. This year, for the first time, legislative and congressional political boundaries will be drawn by the independent commissions. Heretofore, they were drawn by mostly the majority party in the legislature to reward incumbents with a friendly electorate, then sorted out just enough in the courts. Most of the time these decisions are made by political pundits and politicos trying to angle for their vision in closed rooms at the Capitol, and then they wind up in the court system, Amber said. Up until this point, it has been driven by partisans who want to win. Now it's being driven by four Democrats, four Republicans and four independents on two commissions, and it's all out in the open. She called that transformational. I call that democracy, though it would be more entertaining if it involved an electoral sacrifice of chickens. Amber is the level head we need working on these decisions, not Gateway Pundit. I'm an independent, I could care less who people vote for, she told me, but I deeply care about the system and the process, and so seeing it defamed, whether it was a Democrat doing it or a Republican, I would call that out, and I have. This year our dine and drink business locations throughout the Gorge have suffered with closures. You can help support your favorites by purchasing take out and gift cards. Many of these business will offer curb-side delivery and some will deliver to your home. Lets keep the Gorge going strong! The Missourians Opinion section is a public forum for the discussion of ideas. The views presented in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Missourian or the University of Missouri. If you would like to contribute to the Opinion page with a response or an original topic of your own, visit our submission form Marshall D. Pridemore, 98, of Westville, passed away on Sunday, August 29, 2021, at OSF Sacred Heart Medical Center in Danville, IL. he was born on November 23, 1922, in Danville, Illinois, the son of Joseph and Iva (Hensley) Pridemore. He was united in marriage to Caroline Lipowsky on Febru What's Included With a Digital Only subscription, you'll receive unlimited access to our website and e-edition. Our digital products are available 24/7 and are accessible anywhere, anytime. If you have any questions or need further assistance, please call our customer service team at 319-283-2144 or email circ@oelweindailyregister.com. Corsicana, TX (75110) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low around 75F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low around 75F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph. Weather Alert ...HEAT ADVISORY IN EFFECT FROM NOON TODAY TO 7 PM CDT THIS EVENING... * WHAT...Heat index values of near to just over 105 expected. * WHERE...Portions of central, southeast, southwest and western Arkansas. * WHEN...From noon today to 7 PM CDT this evening. * IMPACTS...Hot temperatures and high humidity may cause heat illnesses to occur. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... Drink plenty of fluids, stay in an air-conditioned room, stay out of the sun, and check up on relatives and neighbors. Young children and pets should never be left unattended in vehicles under any circumstances. Take extra precautions if you work or spend time outside. When possible reschedule strenuous activities to early morning or evening. Know the signs and symptoms of heat exhaustion and heat stroke. Wear lightweight and loose fitting clothing when possible. To reduce risk during outdoor work, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration recommends scheduling frequent rest breaks in shaded or air conditioned environments. Anyone overcome by heat should be moved to a cool and shaded location. Heat stroke is an emergency! Call 9 1 1. && Norland College in Bath, England, is the most prestigious school if you'd like to become a top-level nanny and add pizzazz to the title. Most nanny grads go on to work for high-profile people, such as the Royal Family or Mick Jagger. Once let out into the world, the college has guaranteed employment, and salaries can range up to $170,000 a year. But what warrants this highly paid position? Well, as if guiding a child from their early years and supporting them in their mental and social growth isn't enough on their plate, the title of nanny only begins to describe the skills needed to become a Norlander, as they deem it. Founded by Emily Ward in 1892, her goal was to create a professional space that would allow those who wanted this type of intensive first-class nanny training, mimicking the principles of Froebel, the German educationalist who invented kindergarten. And with those context clues, you already know that the process is none other than strict. Continue Reading Below Advertisement Typically becoming long-time caregivers for the children of renowned people, Norland nannies' four-year training gives them ample knowledge from preparing easy sushi children's recipes to controlling a skidding car should the paparazzi be after them or a kidnapping underway. They're also taught cyber-security and anti-terrorism strategies provided by British military intelligence officers. Nannies are not exempt from learning self-defense practices- taekwondo being the martial art of choice. But being a Norlander relies on the details, such as mastering the profiterole is a must, especially in the dramatic event of a children's birthday party. In the colleges' curriculum, understanding what it takes "to throw the perfect teddy bear's picnic" is critical. They also learn to sew children's clothing. This piece was written by the Cracked Shop to tell you about products that are being sold there. Mostly gone are the days when you had to get your weed from a dude in his thirties who hangs out with high school kids and smoke it in a sealed room under a tarp in a cave. Weed's everywhere these days, and unless you live in one of those unfashionable and culturally backward states, you can get high just about anywhere you want. Seriously, head outside in Boston or Denver and start smoking a joint in front of a police officer. She might just ask you for a hit. The biggest inconvenience, really, is that you may not have time to roll up a joint or your regular piece might be a little too cumbersome for your pocket or bag. If that's the case, check out the Simple One-Hitter. Continue Reading Below Advertisement The Simple One-Hitter has been expertly designed and curated for a quick boost to your day. It's made from inert aluminum and uses patent-pending airflow technology to dissipate heat, allowing for a smooth, tasty draw. Plus, it's extra sturdy, so it won't crack or shatter when dropped, which it will be. We get it. You can adjust the bowl size from .1x to 2x the standard one-hitter, so depending on your mood, you'll soon find yourself in a better one. The chamfered tip even makes it extra easy for consistent packing, and when you're done, the single-screw disassembly provides simple deep cleaning so you can really get in there and clear up the pathways. It's your perfect little buddy that fits in your pocket, purse, or behind your ear like some kind of beatnik. No judgment. You like to smoke. Don't be weird about it. Pick up a Simple One-Hitter for 28% off $25 at just $17.99 today. Or go ahead and get two for 36% off $49 at just $31.99. Prices are subject to change. It seems that suddenly a lot of people have not only gotten religious, but deeply concerned with making principled religious stands. Well, at least with making one principled religious stand. Not getting vaccinated. As more and more vaccine mandates are being rolled out for schools and businesses, hospitals and government agencies, it is putting people who are resistant to the jab in a quandary. They dont want the vaccination, but they also dont want to lose their job. Seemingly to the rescue come religious exemptions. Almost every vaccine mandate allows for demonstrable medical exemptions as well as demonstrable religious exemptions. The first can be clearly demonstrated; the second is trickier. There are legitimate religious exemptions. If you are part of the Christian Science Church (which, despite its name, is most certainly not a part of historic Christian orthodoxy), you do not believe in medicine at all. To take an aspirin, much less a vaccine, is in direct violation of your faiths beliefs. But thats pretty much it. Every major world religion Christianity, Islam, Judaism puts significant emphasis on principles calling for staying healthy through every available medical means to prevent infection as well as doing whatever it takes to preserve human life. Even more to the point, there is not a single major world religion that objects to vaccines, including the vaccines for COVID-19. Consider Christianity. The Catholic Church does not oppose vaccines and Pope Francis has said that ethically, everyone should have one. On the Protestant front, Russell Moore of Christianity Today and former head of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, noted that we should spread the gospel, not a virus (so get vaccinated), and that it is primarily misinformation driving the hesitancy to avoid vaccination. Hes right. The six biggest myths being believed are: The vaccines arent safe because they were developed quickly. Thousands of people have died from the vaccines. The vaccines are experimental and werent tested thoroughly. Natural immunity is always stronger than vaccines. The vaccines arent safe for pregnant women. The vaccines change your DNA. You can read why each is based on misinformation here and here. Yet in Louisiana, Attorney General Jeff Landry created a form for those who object to mask and vaccine mandates, allowing them to assert that they do not consent to forcing a face covering on my child, who is created in the image of God. I believe that our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and that I am called to honor God in how I care for my body. As a Christian pastor, theology professor and former seminary president, I will need someone to explain to me why wearing a face mask in a pandemic is at odds with being created in the image of God. If the idea is that the image of God is captured in our face, that would be news. Two thousand years of Christian theology has placed that firmly in the camp of having a soul and being able to respond to and be in a relationship with the living God. It has nothing to do with whether our face is covered. And yes, we are called to honor God in how we care for our body. But again, it is only misinformation that would say taking the vaccine is being purposefully harmful to your body. Even more misguided is the idea that the vaccine is more harmful to your body than the COVID-19 virus and its many variants. If you want to hold to a the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit argument, then here are the facts: More than 600,000 people have died from COVID in the U.S. alone; 600,000 have not died from the vaccine. So which most honors the body as the temple of the Holy Spirit? A vaccine to protect against COVID or to allow COVID to enter your body? Particularly now that the Pfizer vaccine has received full FDA approval. Anthony Fauci, considered Americas leading medical adviser on matters related to epidemiology over multiple administrations Republican and Democrat has said religious exemptions are something we should look at. If there is a legitimate religious exemption, fine. I am one of the people who respect the tenets of religion. But if people make it up, and its really a philosophical reason and theyre saying its religious, thats not good. No, its not. And because no major world religion would say its tenets support such an exemption, it seems more philosophy than faith. This is why few expect such attempts to stand up in court. As employment law attorney Joshua Van Kampen noted regarding Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits religion-based discrimination, it was never intended to allow employees to circumvent public health and safety requirements. Going further, he said that if, for example, someone received a flu shot but then cited religion to avoid the COVID-19 vaccination, that likely wont pass a legal challenge. Van Kampens law firm has received numerous requests to represent people trying to cite religious exemptions to avoid getting vaccinated. Theyve turned down each one. Those cases are not going to be meritorious in our opinion, Herrmann said. I honestly have no interest in getting into a vaccine debate with anyone. I have understood those who have had genuine vaccine hesitancy in the early roll-out of the vaccine. But now with full FDA approval, I hope they will make a fresh evaluation of that hesitancy. I obviously support those who have genuine medical conditions and whose primary care physicians are cautioning them to wait. What I have little patience for are those who insist on clinging to misinformation or who refuse vaccination in order to make a political point. Even more repugnant to me are those who would try to bring Jesus into this for a personally and/or politically motivated religious exemption. They dont want to be forced to get the vaccine, so they use Jesus. That is making a mockery of not only authentic spirituality, but a mockery of Jesus Himself. And God will allow many things, but one thing He will not allow, is to be mocked. James Emery White Sources Maureen Groppe, Trust God to be our healer: As COVID-19 vaccine mandates grow, so are requests for religious exemptions, USA Today, August 16, 2021, read online. Adelle M. Banks, Russell Moore: Sickness, death from COVID-19 likely reducing some vaccine hesitancy, Religion News Service, August 10, 2021, read online. Susie Webb, Charlotte churches offer religious exemptions from vaccine mandates. Will they work? The Charlotte Observer, August 14, 2021, read online. About the Author James Emery White is the founding and senior pastor of Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, NC, and the ranked adjunct professor of theology and culture at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, where he also served as their fourth president. His latest book After I Believe is now available on Amazon or your favorite bookseller. To enjoy a free subscription to the Church & Culture blog, visit ChurchAndCulture.org, where you can view past blogs in our archive and read the latest church and culture news from around the world. Follow Dr. White on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @JamesEmeryWhite. When we hear about men mentioned in the Bible, we do not as often learn about more obscure people. Jehoiakim is a man from Scripture who we can learn a lot through his choices. He was actually known as an evil king, but we can gain great wisdom from his story. Who Was Jehoiakim in the Bible? Jehoiakim became the king of Judah when he was 25 years old and he reigned for 11 years (2 Kings 23:16). His name appears in 2 Kings, 1 Chronicles, and Jeremiah. He was the son of Josiah and Zebidah. Pharaoh Necho, the king of Egypt, killed King Josiah in battle and after his burial, the people anointed Jehoahaz and made him the next king. Pharaoh Necho made his older brother Jehoiakim the new king and demanded silver and gold be paid. Jehoiakim taxed the land and got the money from the people. Bible Study Tools further explains, On the death of his father his younger brother Jehoahaz (=Shallum, Jeremiah 22:11 ), who favoured the Chaldeans against the Egyptians, was made king by the people; but the king of Egypt, Pharaoh-necho, invaded the land and deposed Jehoahaz ( 2 Kings 23:33 2 Kings 23:34; Jeremiah 22:10-12 ), setting Eliakim on the throne in his stead, and changing his name to Jehoiakim. When Jehoiakim was ruling, King Nebuchadnezzar from Babylon invaded the land, and the Bible says that Jehoiakim became his vassal for three entire years until he turned against the evil king. (2 Kings 24:1) 2 Kings 24 tells us that Jehoiakim, unfortunately, set an example of evil for generations to come. 2 Kings 24:3-4 says, Surely these things happened to Judah according to the Lords command, in order to remove them from his presence because of the sins of Manasseh and all he had done, including the shedding of innocent blood. For he had filled Jerusalem with innocent blood, and the Lord was not willing to forgive. Jehoiakim does not have a good reputation to this day. He did not do what was honoring to the Lord or helpful to his people. Jeremiah 22:18 even says, Therefore this is what the Lord says about Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah: They will not mourn for him: Alas, my brother! Alas, my sister! They will not mourn for him: Alas, my master! Alas, his splendor! In the book of Jeremiah, he describes the murder performed by Jehoiakim. Uriah prophesied in the name of God and told the city the same message as Jeremiah. King Jehoiakim wanted to kill him. Uriah heard and ran to Egypt but was found and brought back to the king and he killed him with the sword (Jeremiah 26:20-24). What Was His 'Deadly' Mistake? Jehoiakims deadly mistake was breaking and burning the truth on the scroll written by the prophet of God. In the time of Jeremiah, Jehoiakim was reigning and wanted to conceal the message from the Lord because it would make him look bad. Jehoiakim cared more about his own pride than obedience and humility before the Lord. Devotions by Crosswalk shares, Unlike his godly father Josiah, Jehoiakim was a ruthless ruler. At that time, Jeremiah instructed his secretary Baruch to record the judgment of God on a roll (scroll) of a book, and write therein all the words that I have spoken to you against Israel, and against Judah, and against all the nations(Jeremiah 36:2-21) After Jehudi had read three or four leaves (of the scroll, Jehoiakim flew into a rage, snatched it from Jehudi, and), he cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the fire that was on the hearth, until all the roll (scroll) was consumed in the fire (36:23). But, that was all he could do. It was beyond his power to destroy the truth that the scroll contained. What Happened to Jehoiakim after His Mistake? After Jehoiakim destroyed the scroll is when Nebuchadnezzar took over. Jehoiakim was captured by Babylon and then Nebuchadnezzar made him his puppet on the throne of Judah. Jehoiakim finally tried to stand up against the pagan nations, but unfortunately, he lost his life in the process. His entire reign was a twisted scheme from the beginning on behalf of the Egyptian and Babylonian kings. Christianity.com shares, Jehoiakim came to a violent end in the eleventh year of his reign. His body was cast out ignominiously on the ground, and then was dragged away and buried. After Jehoiakim was killed by the Babylonians, Nebuchadnezzar gave his own son Jehoiachin the position of king over Judah. He hoped to continue to have power over the people of God. How Can We Avoid Becoming like Him? This account might seem far off from our current day realities. However, we can learn a lot from Jehoiakim even if we arent royalty. Pause Before Taking Action: We do not read anywhere that Jehoiakim tried to avoid taking the throne against his brother when offered by the Pharaoh. Jehoiakim had his own selfish ambition that led to more devastation. He was manipulated from the start first by Egypt, then by Babylon. I would argue that he never truly ruled anyone. He was always in service to another. He did not have the true authority and support like a healthy ruler. His first move led to a second and so on; Jehoiakim stumbled into a very deep pit in which he could have avoided if he paused, prayed, and sought wise counsel. Have you been offered a raise in which you will get a large paycheck, but you will never see your family? Has someone asked you to be in a leadership position, but you just dont feel a peace about the organization? Has a man asked you out on a date, but you know that he does not love the Lord as you do? Pause. Think about the further consequences if you go against the Holy Spirit. We can learn from Jehoiakim not to be hasty. Do Not Hide Gods Messages: Nowadays, it is so easy to water down the truth of the Gospel and the Bible. We can be tempted as a church in a post-Christian society to try to relate so much so that we are actually tearing out and burning up the truth of Scripture. We see a Bible verse we know wont sit well with the culture and we try to hide the message that the Lord gave to us. We try to hide the hard lessons from the Word of God because we are overly concerned about offending others when Jesus taught us to share truth in love. May we be very careful not to also try to hide the truth of Scripture, but to share it with a heart of compassion to this broken world. Run from the Enemy: We do not see Jehoiakim flee from the enemy until the end of his life. May we take that as a warning not to allow the devil to have a foothold over us. May we cut off any sinful habits and be bold enough to set boundaries with unhealthy individuals. Our Sins Can Hurt Others: One of the saddest aspects of sin is that one persons decisions can hurt anothers life. Jehoiakims decisions negatively affected others such as Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (Daniel 1). Our choices do not just have a role in our own lives, but also in those around us. May we ask the Lord for the grace and strength to love Him and love others through living by the Spirit in His strength. We all sin and fall short, but may we have the self-awareness of how our decisions and our words are powerful. Photo credit: Getty Images/webking Emma Danzeys mission in life is to inspire young women to embrace the extraordinary. One of her greatest joys is to journey with the Lord in His Scriptures. Emma is a North Carolina resident and green tea enthusiast! She is married to her husband Drew and they serve international college students. She enjoys singing, dancing, trying new recipes, and watching home makeover shows. During her ministry career, Emma recorded two worship EP albums, founded and led Polished Conference Ministries, ran the Refined Magazine, and served in music education for early childhood. Currently, she is in the editing stages of her first two writing projects: a Bible study on womanhood and a non-fiction book on singleness. You can visit her blog at emmadanzey.wordpress.com This article is part of our People from the Bible Series featuring the most well-known historical names and figures from Scripture. We have compiled these articles to help you study those whom God chose to set before us as examples in His Word. May their lives and walks with God strengthen your faith and encourage your soul. 4 Things You May Not Know About Abraham in the Bible 20 Facts You May Not Know About Moses from the Bible Who Was Mary Magdalene in the Bible? Who Were the 12 Disciples of Jesus? Who Was Isaiah & Why Was He Important? A Border Patrol agent watches as a group of migrants walk across the Rio Grande at the U.S.-Mexico border in Del Rio, Texas, in this June 15, 2021, file photo. BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) Huge gaps between air quality sensors in the western U.S. have created blind spots in the warning system for wildfire smoke plumes sweeping North America this summer, amid growing concern over potential health impacts to millions of people exposed to the pollution. Government programs to alert the public when smoke pollution becomes unhealthy rely on about 950 permanent monitoring stations and dozens of mobile units that can be deployed around major fires. Those stations are heavily concentrated around major cities on the West Coast and east of the Mississippi River a patchwork that leaves some people unable to determine local risks from smoke, including in rural areas where air quality can quickly degrade when fires ignite nearby. The problem persists far beyond fire lines because wildfire smoke travels for thousands of miles and loses its tell-tale odor yet remains a danger to public health. The monitoring gaps underscore what officials and public health experts say is a glaring shortage of resources for a type of pollution growing worse as climate change brings increasingly long and destructive wildfire seasons to the U.S. West, southern Europe and eastern Russia. Microscopic particles in wildfire smoke can cause breathing issues and more serious problems for people with chronic health conditions. Long-term effects remain under study but some researchers estimate chronic smoke exposure causes about 20,000 premature deaths a year in the U.S. Its a very frustrating place to be where we have recurring health emergencies without sufficient means of responding to them, said Sarah Coefield, an air quality specialist for Missoula, Montana. You can be in your office just breathing smoke and thinking youre OK because youre inside, but youre not. Missoula, perched along the Clark Fork River with about 75,000 people, is surrounded by mountains and has become notorious as a smoke trap. All across the region are similar mountain valleys, many without pollution monitors, and smoke conditions can vary greatly from one valley to the next. Montana has 19 permanent monitoring stations. That's about one for every 7,700 square miles (20,000 square kilometers) or an area almost as big as New Jersey. New Jersey has 30. Data on air quality is particularly sparse in eastern Montana, where smoke from a 266-square-mile (690-square-kilometer) fire on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation got so bad this month that officials closed a health clinic when air filters couldnt keep up with the pollution. The smoke prompted tribal authorities to shield elders and others who were at risk by extending an evacuation order for Lame Deer, a town of about 2,000 people that sits beneath fire-scarred Badger Peak and is home to the tribal government complex. But on the same day, Lame Deer and surrounding areas were left out of a pollution alert from state officials, who said extremely high smoke particle levels made the air unhealthy across large areas of Montana and advised people to avoid prolonged exertion to protect their lungs. A pollution sensor on the reservation had burned in the fire, and the nearest state Department of Environmental Quality monitor, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) away, showed an air quality reading of good." That left tribal officials to judge the pollution hazard based on how far they could see a crude fallback for areas without monitors. On a scale of one to 20, I would say the smoke was a 19, tribal spokesperson Angel Becker said. What makes it difficult is that Lame Deer is sitting in between a couple of ravines, she added. So when you get socked in (with smoke), it just sits here and thats not good for elders or kids that have asthma or any breathing issues. Doug Kuenzli, who supervises Montanas air quality monitoring program, said regulators recognize the need for more data on smoke but high-grade monitors can be prohibitively expensive $10,000 to $28,000 each. Oregon expanded its network over the past two years with five new monitors along the state's picturesque coastline where smoke only recently became a recurring problem, said Tom Roick with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. We're seeing more prevalence of wildfire smoke and increased intensity, Roick said. It's not because we have more monitoring; it's getting worse. Throughout the West, public health officials have struggled to get the message about dangers of smoke to at-risk communities, such as migrant workers who spend lots of time outdoors, people in houses without air filters and the elderly. Children, too, are more at risk of health problems. That's no small subset of society: People over 65 and children under 18 make up about 40% of the U.S. population, said Kaitlyn Kelly, a wildfire smoke pollution specialist with the Washington Department of Health. The Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday announced $7 million in spending on research to come up with better strategies and tools to detect and lessen exposure to wildfire smoke. Recipients included Stanford University and University of California, Berkeley, which will look at how to communicate with low-income, hard-to-reach communities to reduce their exposure to wildfire smoke. The number of unhealthy air quality days recorded in 2021 by pollution monitors nationwide is more than 10 times the number to date in each of the last two years, according to the EPA. Wildfires likely are driving much of the increase, officials said. Rapid technological advancements mean households can buy their own monitoring equipment for around $250. The equipment is not as reliable as government stations, officials said, but the data from many of the privately owned sensors is now displayed on an interactive smoke exposure map by the Environmental Protection Agency and Forest Service. Although inaccurate readings have been reported for some consumer-grade sensors, officials said they can help fill blind spots in the government's network. The number in use is fast increasing from about 6,000 private sensors last year to more than 10,000 currently, according to EPA. There's still gaps, Kelly said. The low-cost sensors are the first step in filling in the gaps where we don't have (government) monitors. In Missoula, a small non-profit group founded to bring attention to global warming is going beyond warning people about smoke. It's providing makeshift air filters and portable air cleaners to the homebound elderly and impoverished households. Vinette Rupp, a 74-year-old Missoula woman who received a portable air cleaner, said she can almost taste it when the smoke gets thick in town. Neighbor Maureen Fogarty, 67, who has lung cancer and suffers from breathing problems, said her coughing has eased since she got one of the filters. Well it's a lifesaver because I can breathe easier now, Fogarty said. The way it is, you know, you've got to come and go and youre bringing in the unhealthy air, and its gonna affect you. Climate Smart Missoula, which provided the portable air cleaner, also makes and distributes filters through a local food bank. Costing about $30 apiece versus $150 or more for a manufactured unit the do-it-yourself purifiers are endorsed by public health officials. They're crafted from box fans with high-efficiency furnace filters duct-taped to the back to trap pollution particles as air passes through. Climate Smart Missoula Director Amy Cilimburg said she and a colleague have built roughly 200 of them, paid for largely with donations. Our strategies for dealing with wildfire smoke were pray for rain, or leave town, or suffer and that seemed inadequate, Cilimburg said It's kind of caught up with us, even though scientists have told us it's coming. I felt like we needed to get to work. ___ Rama reported from Missoula. Associated Press writer Drew Costley contributed to this story from Fairfax, Virginia. ___ Follow Matthew Brown on Twitter: @MatthewBrownAP BELLE PLAINE, Kan. (AP) Education officials overseeing more than $1.1 billion in federal pandemic aid for Kansas schools say districts are spending much of the money to meet the mental health needs of students and staff. Some Kansas districts are hiring additional counselors and social workers, while others are working with community mental health centers to provide services during school hours so students and staff don't have to leave the campus, said Tate Toedman, assistant director of special education at the Kansas Department of Education who works with districts on relief fund expenditures. Another widespread practice is hiring intervention specialists who can work one-on-one or in small groups to fill in learning gaps that have become apparent following months of remote learning, he said. It reduces stress on the teacher by getting those students ready for the core curriculum. The other major trend, he said, is spending to upgrade curriculum for academic coursework as well as what educators call social-emotional learning, which includes skills such as social awareness, problem solving and decision making. That often involves professional development for staff. Since March 2020, the federal government has provided $190 billion in pandemic aid to the nation's schools, an amount that is more than four times what the U.S. Education Department spends on K-12 schools in a typical year. The aid averages nearly $2,800 per student, but it varies widely by district and state, according to an analysis by The Associated Press. Nationwide, high-poverty areas received much more under the funding formula. In the history of public education, there has never been an investment of federal funds at this level, so it needs to be as transformational as it can be, said Susan Willis, chief financial officer for Wichita public schools, the states largest district. In Kansas, the aid averages nearly $2,400 per student, but that varies among the states 286 school districts. For large school districts in Wichita, Topeka and Kansas City, it averages more than $5,000 per student. Hutchinson Public Schools averages more than $2,900 per student, while Shawnee Mission got more than $1,300 per student. In western Kansas, the Holcomb school district has received a bit more than $1,900 per student. The Wichita school district, for example, is getting more than $263.7 million over three rounds. It used the first chunk in what it calls reaction mode to the pandemic investing primarily in technology, Willis said. The district purchased 8,000 iPads for its prekindergarten to second grade students and 9,075 laptops for students in the other grades. Its second round went mostly for counseling and other mental health initiatives such as hiring more counselors, psychologists and social workers and expanding hours for paraprofessional aides, she said. They have not yet dipped into their third, and largest infusion of aid, which will be more forward looking. Many Kansas schools expect to spend much of the money on capital improvements to address air quality concerns sparked by the pandemic; replacing windows so they can open to bring in outside air and upgrading HVAC systems in aging school facilities. In Wichita, the average age of school buildings is 60 years old. By contrast the De Soto school district a more affluent and rapidly growing suburban Kansas City district has more modern facilities and does not need to upgrade its HVAC systems or technology, said Superintendent Frank Harwood. Instead, De Soto has added specialists in literacy, autism and special education. It has hired more nurses and a social worker, as well as more teachers to reduce class sizes. It also plans to offer retention incentives to encourage teachers to return for the school year. Multiple school districts across the state have already submitted plans for what's called premium pay for staff. The state doesn't have a number yet for how many districts are offering retention pay. It is certainly something every school district is actively discussing and many are going to go that route, said Dean Zajic, state federal coordinator for special education who helps overseeing pandemic spending. Holcomb School Superintendent Scott Myers said his district is putting its pandemic aid into an expanded social-emotional approach to working with students. It hired two student advocates at its middle school and high school, and four homebound instructional liaisons, whose salaries are covered by pandemic funds for four years. And by that time, it will be in our DNA on how we do things, Myers said. So yeah, I would think it will flat out help transform our supports ... It will prove the point that we need to keep those positions. GUILFORD A local anti-drug advocacy coalition is calling on town leaders to follow the lead of several other Connecticut municipalities and ban the retail sale of marijuana. The leaders of the Guilford Developmental Assets for Youth group published a letter Monday calling on the Board of Selectmen to take action to prohibit retail dispensaries, after state lawmakers voted earlier this year to legalize the sale and use of recreational marijuana. The letter focused mostly on marijuana use by children and teens, which the group conceded would be a problem, whether or not local officials ban sales in Guilford. The letter was signed by three DAY organizers. We are going to have that problem, and we cannot ... close our eyes to the damage that this will cause to some of our children, the letter said. We are requesting the ban as a message to Guilfords parents and kids that marijuana consumption is a significant health risk for kids. Lisa Ott, one of the groups cochairs, said Thursday she has a meeting scheduled with Guilford First Selectman Matthew Hoey to follow up on the letter. Under Connecticuts recreational marijuana law, its largely up to cities and towns to dictate where marijuana can be purchased, either through zoning rules or town ordinances. Retail sales are expected to begin late next year, once the state establishes a permitting system. We know this is coming down the road, Ott said. Weve really been trying to get people to realize the implications that are involved. Hoey said that town officials are not considering specific proposals to regulate marijuana sales as of Thursday, and that the first discussions on the topic will be held at a Board of Selectmen meeting in early September. The town already has an existing prohibition on medical marijuana dispensaries dating back to 2016, though, Hoey said, he had no clear indication at this point about how residents feel about the possibility of recreational sales. This is somewhat of a progressive community, so it wouldnt surprise me if it went either way, Hoey said. According to a document sent out this month by the South Central Regional Council of Governments, at least four other towns in the region Wallingford, Southington, Durham and Meriden have proposed new rules or regulations on the sale of recreational marijuana. Along the Shoreline, municipalities such as Guilford have also had to contend with decisions about whether to allow beach goers and tourists to smoke cannabis in public areas now that it is legal to possess. Hoey told Hearst Connecticut Media last month that, for the time being, marijuana would likely be treated similarly to tobacco, with smoking banned from public beaches and parks. The group said the town should go further than that, pointing to the increased potency of the drug and the potential for other forms, such as gummies, to be marketed to children. DAY especially [wishes] to emphasize that most Guilford teens underestimate the risks of marijuana, the letter reads. The commercialization of marijuana will lead to increased advertising and access to marijuana, and increased teen addiction. Ott said the group, formed in 2009, has approximately 225 members consisting of parents, youth, law enforcement and other volunteers. Delta Air Lines will charge employees on the company health plan $200 a month if they fail to get vaccinated against COVID-19, a policy the airline's top executive says is necessary because the average hospital stay for the virus costs the airline $50,000. CEO Ed Bastian said that all employees who have been hospitalized for the virus in recent weeks were not fully vaccinated. The airline said Wednesday that it also will stop extending pay protection to unvaccinated workers who contract COVID-19 on Sept. 30, and will require unvaccinated workers to be tested weekly beginning Sept. 12, although Delta will cover the cost. They will have to wear masks in all indoor company settings. Delta stopped short of matching United Airlines, which will require employees to be vaccinated starting Sept. 27 or face termination. However, the $200 monthly surcharge, which starts in November, may have the same effect. This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company," Bastian said in a memo to employees. The surcharge will only apply to employees who don't get vaccinated and won't be levied for spouses or dependents, a Delta spokeswoman said. Delta is self-insured and sets premiums for its plans, which are administered by UnitedHealthcare. The company spokeswoman had said the average hospital stay costs $40,000, contradicting the figure that Bastian used in his memo, and Delta later said both figures reflected a range of the average bill. Bastian said that 75% of Delta employees are vaccinated, up from 72% in mid-July. He said the aggressiveness of the leading strain of the virus means we need to get many more of our people vaccinated, and as close to 100% as possible. I know some of you may be taking a wait-and-see approach or waiting for full (Food and Drug Administration) approval, he told employees. With this weeks announcement that the FDA has granted full approval for the Pfizer vaccine, the time for you to get vaccinated is now. A growing number of companies including Chevron Corp. and drugstore chain CVS announced they will require workers to get vaccinated after Monday's FDA decision. United and Delta already require new hires to be vaccinated. Two smaller carriers, Hawaiian and Frontier, have said they will require either vaccination or regular testing for current employees. Other major U.S. airlines, including American and Southwest, said Wednesday that they are encouraging employees to get vaccinated but have not required it. Deltas requirement for weekly testing of unvaccinated employees will start Sept. 12, and the requirement that the unvaccinated wear masks indoors takes effect immediately. Fueled by the now-dominant delta variant of the virus, new reported cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. have topped 150,000 a day, the highest level since late January. Nationally the rate of increase has slowed, but the variant threatens to overwhelm emergency rooms in parts of the country. On Tuesday, Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia, where Delta is based, ordered members of the National Guard to 20 hospitals across the state to help deal with a surge that is larger than the national average. Southwest, Spirit and Frontier have blamed the rise of the delta variant for a slowdown in customers booking flights, and U.S. air travel remains down more than 20% from pre-pandemic 2019. In his message to employees Bastian referred to the fast-spreading strain of the virus as B.1.617.2, which is used by scientists to identify its lineage. The Delta CEO's effort to avoid using the more commonly known delta variant did not go unnoticed and B.1.617.2 began trending on Twitter Wednesday. ___ David Koenig can be reached at www.twitter.com/airlinewriter BRIDGEPORT A San Diego paralegal is accused of breaking into a Trumbull home in the early morning and threatening to kill the residents with a shovel. Terrifying does not do this situation justice, said Bridgeport lawyer Michael Fitzpatrick, who represents the Trumbull family. My clients are still very shaken up over this incident. They had no idea who this man was, it appears he just stumbled upon their house. But just hours after his arrest, Clifford Bell was free after posting $750,000 bond. He declined comment as he left the Golden Hill Street courthouse. Bell, 32, of San Diego, was charged with home invasion, first-degree burglary, second-degree threatening, disorderly conduct, interfering with an officer, sixth-degree larceny and first-degree criminal trespass. During Bells arraignment Thursday afternoon, Senior Assistant States Attorney Nicholas Bove urged Superior Court Judge Kevin Doyle to set a high bond for Bell. But Bells lawyer for the hearing, Assistant Public Defender Cristina Angelone, urged leniency, arguing Bell has a successful career as a paralegal at a prominent California law firm and no criminal record. The judge set the bond at $750,000 and continued the case to Sept. 21. The family is very appreciative of how quickly police responded, Fitzgerald said later. According to Trumbull police, shortly after 5:30 a.m. on Aug. 15, they received a call of a burglary at a home on a small residential street off Park Avenue. When officers arrived, police said the residents of the home were locked in their bedrooms, yelling there was a man in their home. Police said the homeowner told officers she had woken up to get a glass of water when she noticed the hall light was on. She was then confronted in the hallway by Bell, who was dressed only in his underwear and was carrying a shovel, police said. Police said Bell lunged at the woman, telling her he was going to kill her. The woman then screamed for her husband and both she and her husband ended up locking themselves in their bedroom, police said. Police said Bell then entered the homes garage where he began breaking items with the shovel. While he was occupied doing that, officers got into the home and evacuated the couple and their son, police said. Police said officers then rushed into the garage and took Bell into custody following a brief struggle. Police said Bell was taken to St. Vincents Medical Center for evaluation and treatment of minor injuries. In the meantime, police said they received a call from a neighbor that a shovel had been taken from his backyard and apparently used to damage his BMW sedan. PHOENIX (AP) The Supreme Court's decision to order the reinstatement of the Remain in Mexico immigration policy is sparking criticism from advocacy groups and praise by former President Donald Trump. It's also prompting promises by the Biden administration to keep pushing back against a lower court's decision to reactivate the policy, which forced people to wait in Mexico while seeking asylum in the U.S. The high court's decision, which came late Tuesday, said the Biden administration likely violated federal law by trying to end the Trump-era program, known as the Migrant Protection Protocols. The ruling raised many questions, ranging from whether a legal challenge would prevail to the practical effects of reinstatement if it stands. ___ WHAT'S NEXT FOR THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION? The Department of Homeland Security said it was taking steps to comply with the high court's decision while the Biden administration appeals. The administration could try again to end the program by having the department provide a fuller explanation for its decision to end Migrant Protection Protocols. White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Wednesday the administration had appealed a district court decision that the Supreme Courts order sprang from, and would continue to vigorously challenge it. Trump, meanwhile, welcomed the court order and said the Biden government must now reinstate one of my most successful and important programs in securing the border. During Trumps presidency, the policy required tens of thousands of migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. to turn back to Mexico. It was meant to discourage asylum seekers, but critics said it denied people the legal right to seek protection in the U.S. and forced them to wait in dangerous Mexican border cities. U.S. immigration experts note that no matter what happens over the long term, the Biden administration has wide discretion on how much it would reimplement the policy if appeals are unsuccessful. It could reimplement it on a very small scale for families who meet certain criteria from very specific nationalities, or it could do something broader, said Jessica Bolter, associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington. ___ HOW IS MEXICO REACTING? Mexicos Foreign Relations Department refused to say late Wednesday whether the government will allow the U.S. to reinstate the policy of sending asylum seekers back across the border to wait for hearings on asylum claims. Roberto Velasco, Mexicos director for North American affairs, said the court ruling is not binding on Mexico. He stressed that Mexicos immigration policy is designed and executed in a sovereign manner. The Mexican government will start technical discussions with the U.S. government to evaluate how to handle safe, orderly and regulated immigration on the border, Velasco said. Mexico is not legally obligated to receive returning migrants who are not Mexican citizens, and most of the asylum seekers are not. During the Trump administration, the Mexican government said it was cooperating with the program for humanitarian reasons. Although migrants were granted humanitarian visas to stay in Mexico until they had their U.S. hearings, they often had to wait in dangerous areas controlled by cartels, leaving them vulnerable to being kidnapped, assaulted, raped or even killed. Others were transported by bus to parts of southern Mexico or invited to return to their home countries. Mexico technically could block the program by refusing to accept migrants asked to stay in Mexico under the Migrant Protection Protocols, or MPP. But analysts like Tonatiuh Guillen, former head of Mexicos migration agency, consider that unlikely given the countrys history of cooperation with the U.S. Guillen said Mexican officials will probably go along even though the country doesnt have sufficient resources to deal with an influx of asylum seekers at the border and nonprofit shelters south of the border are overwhelmed. Still, more than 70 Mexican, U.S. and international NGOs have sent a letter asking President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador not to accept the U.S. court decision. I dont think either Mexico or the Biden administration want to reimplement MPP at its maximum capacity right now, Bolter said. If it is reimplemented at a low level, it will have serious consequences for the families or other migrants who are subjected to it. But overall, I think its unlikely to drastically change the policy landscape at the border. ___ HOW ROBUST WAS THE PROGRAM IN RECENT YEARS? Immigration specialists note that Migrant Protection Protocols already had been significantly scaled back during the pandemic as officials began using public health protocols to swiftly expel migrants. The Trump administration placed roughly 6,000 migrants into the program from April 2020 to January 2021 a fraction of the more than 71,000 migrants placed into the program overall, said Bolter. It launched the program in January 2019. Clearly, it wasnt operating at the level it had been operating before, but there definitely were still people being placed into it, said Bolter. She added that the program was largely being used for migrants who Mexico refused to take back under pandemic-era health protocols known as Title 42. Victoria Neilson, managing attorney with CLINICs defending vulnerable populations program, noted that since the pandemic far fewer migrants have been placed in the MPP program, with many expelled from the border under the health protocols initiated under the Trump administration and continued by President Joe Biden. ____ WHAT ABOUT TITLE 42 EXPULSIONS? The State Department is holding talks with the Mexican government as the administration reviews the Trump-era protocols to determine how they can be implemented while Title 42 is in effect, said a Homeland Security official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention renewed the Title 42 public health powers early this month. The administration has emphasized that Title 42 is not an immigration authority, but a public health authority, and its continued use is dictated by the CDC's analysis of the public health situation. While Title 42 expulsions continue, the U.S. for now has suspended the processing into the U.S. of people who were returned to Mexico under Migrant Protection Protocols during the Trump administration. In recent weeks, Central American migrants expelled under Title 42 have been flown by the U.S. into Mexico's south, sparking concerns by U.N. agencies about vulnerable migrants who they say need humanitarian protection. The U.S. government has intermittently flown Mexicans deep into Mexico for years to discourage repeat attempts, but flights that began this month from Brownsville, Texas, to the Mexican state capitals of Villahermosa and Tapachula, near the Guatemalan border, appear to be the first time that Central Americans have been flown deep into Mexico. ___ Taxin reported from Orange County, California. Maria Verza in Mexico City and Ben Fox and Mark Sherman in Washington contributed to this report. NEW YORK (AP) Half of American workers are in favor of vaccine requirements at their workplaces, according to a new poll, at a time when such mandates gain traction following the federal government's full approval of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine. The poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that about 59% of remote workers favor vaccine requirements in their own workplaces, compared with 47% of those who are currently working in person. About one-quarter of workers in person and remote are opposed. The sentiment is similar for workplace mask mandates, with 50% of Americans working in person favoring them and 29% opposed, while 59% of remote workers are in favor. About 6 in 10 college graduates, who are more likely to have jobs that can be done remotely, support both mask and vaccine mandates at their workplaces, compared with about 4 in 10 workers without college degrees. Christopher Messick, an electrical engineer who is mostly working from home in Brunswick, Maryland, said he wrote to his companys human resources department to ask that employees be required to get vaccinated before they are recalled to the office. Messick, who is vaccinated, said he doesnt just worry about his own health. He said he also doesnt want to worry about getting a breakthrough infection that could land an unvaccinated co-worker in the hospital. I dont want sit an office for eight hours a day with someone who is not vaccinated, said Messick, 41. The people who are anti-vax, I see them as selfish." So far, many vaccine requirements are coming from private companies with employees who have mostly been able to work from home during the pandemic. The companies, including major tech companies and investment banks, have workforces that are already largely vaccinated and consider the requirement a key step toward eventually reopening offices. Goldman Sachs joined that trend Tuesday, telling employees in a memo that anyone who enters its U.S. offices must be fully vaccinated starting Sept. 7. In contrast, few companies that rely on hourly service workers have imposed vaccine mandates because the companies are concerned about losing staff at a time of acute labor shortages and turnover. Exceptions include food processing giant Tyson Foods and Walt Disney World, which reached a deal this week with its unions to require all workers at its theme park in Orlando, Florida, to be vaccinated. The AP-NORC poll was conducted before the FDA granted full approval of Pfizer's vaccine, which some experts and employers are hoping will persuade more people to get the shot and support mandates. Drugstore chain CVS said this week that pharmacists, nurses and other workers who have contact with patients will have to be inoculated, but the company stopped short of requiring the vaccine for other employees such as cashiers. The AP-NORC poll showed high support for vaccine mandates among those who say they work in person in a health care setting, with 70% approving of vaccine requirements at their workplace. The poll also showed divisions along racial lines. Seventy-three percent of Black workers and 59% of Hispanic workers who are more likely than white workers to work in front-line jobs support mask mandates at their workplaces, compared with 42% of white workers. In addition, 53% of Black and Hispanic workers support vaccine mandates at their workplaces, as do 44% of white workers. Despite mixed support for mandates among in-person employees, 71% of those workers said they themselves are vaccinated. Mike Rodriguez, a maintenance worker at an auto dealership in Florida, said he got the vaccine in the spring after a diabetes diagnosis gave him a sense of urgency. But he said he leans against supporting a vaccine mandate at his job and does not mind that masks are not required. I don't like being told what to do. Never have, said Rodriguez, 54. I'm going to wear mine no matter what. Just like whenever I go into a store. That's my choice. Many large retailers, grocery store chains, food manufacturers and other companies have aggressively encouraged vaccinations with bonuses, time off, information campaigns and on-site vaccination access. Janet Haynes of Topeka, Kansas, an education consultant who works part time as a package handler at a warehouse, said she struggled in March to get an appointment, putting herself on various waiting lists before she finally got a call. Now that vaccines are widely available, Haynes said she is frustrated with people who are reluctant to get them and she would support a requirement at her warehouse, where she dodges co-workers who flout a mask rule. We get so hung up on democracy and freedom, but the reality is that your freedom can't exist at the expense of someone else's loss, said Haynes, adding that she recently had a breakthrough case of COVID-19 and credits the vaccine for her swift recovery. We are not going to be free until we get vaccinated. ____ The AP-NORC poll of 1,729 adults was conducted Aug. 12-16 using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 3.2 percentage points. ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) Pilots reported low clouds the morning a sightseeing plane crashed near Ketchikan, killing all six people on board, according to a federal report released Wednesday. The National Transportation Safety Board released the preliminary report into the Aug. 5 crash of a plane that was carrying five tourists off a cruise ship and the pilot. The report did not include details like a probable cause, which are typically released much later. MONROE - Face masks could not hide the excitement as students and educators came back together Thursday. All Monroe schools opened their doors for full in-person learning after more than a year of upheaval, with students and staff navigating instruction at home and hybrid learning models, with some in-school instruction sprinkled in. It is so great to greet all of our students for the first day of school, Superintendent Joseph Kobza, who started his day at Masuk High greeting students, said. Unlike last year where we started off with a hybrid schedule, we welcomed all of our students back for the first day this year, Kobza said. We had the normal first day excitement at all of our schools, but it was great to see so many kids back at the high school. Between hybrid and remote learning last year, Kobza said the high school spent most of the year under 50 percent occupancy. That wasnt the case today, Kobza said. The kids looked genuinely excited to be back in school for what will hopefully become a more traditional year as it progresses. From Masuk, Kobza moved on to Monroe Elementary School. We know that the pandemic has left students with a lot of unfinished learning, Kobza said. We built time into our schedules at all three levels elementary, middle, and high school for flexible time for students to meet with teachers and receive the help they need to access their grade level or subject specific curriculum. Board of Education Chair Donna Lane said everyone is excited for the new school year. We are happy to get 100 percent of our students back into the classrooms learning, Lane said. The administrative team has worked extremely hard on reopening plans to ensure the safety of all our staff and students. The team has tried to restore an environment that resembles the pre-COVID school system, Lane added. The district currently has 3,313 students, with 250 kindergartners enrolled. Kobza said the district also has added 12 new teachers. In the event a student is exposed to COVID-19, Kobza said the districts quarantine policy for students who are fully vaccinated will follow the guidelines established by the state education department, in conjunction with the Connecticut Department of Public Health. If a fully vaccinated student is in close contact with a confirmed COVID case, they would not need to quarantine provided they remained asymptomatic, Kobza said. Following the guidance from the DPH, students who are masked and maintaining three feet of social distance also will not be quarantined provided they remain asymptomatic, he said. But students who are not vaccinated and not able to maintain at least three feet of distance in the classroom will need to quarantine, Kobza said. Because of the new guidelines for quarantine from six feet to three feet, Kobza said the district is anticipating fewer students quarantined this year compared to last year. We are hopeful to avoid situations where entire classes would need to be quarantined, Kobza said. At the elementary level, teachers will keep their Google classrooms updated for students to continue to receive assignments. Staff will check in with students who will be quarantined. At the secondary level, Kobza said teachers will also maintain their Google classrooms for assignments. Students will have the opportunity to observe the classes virtually. Teachers will not be expected to teach simultaneously remotely and in-person if one or more students in a class must quarantine, Kobza said. We learned last year that synchronous teaching was much less effective for all students, Kobza added. In an effort to increase vaccination rates, the schools partnered with the Town Health Department and Emergency Operations Team at the end of the last school year to do a vaccination clinic for all students 12 and older. The schools are providing information for parents looking to get their children vaccinated, but do not plan to have another clinic. We sent out a recent survey to parents to inquire about holding an additional clinic but did not have many families indicate that they would participate, Kobza said. Since we didnt get enough response to be able to hold another clinic, we directed parents to both Rite Aid and Walgreens in town. Both of which are administering the Pfizer vaccine for individuals 12 and older." brian.gioiele@hearstmediact.com BRIDGEPORT - A man free on bond in an attempted robbery case has been accused of holding up a Fairfield bank Wednesday morning. Police said after robbing the Key Bank on the Post Road, William Johnson hailed a taxi for his getaway. He was arrested on East Main Street in Bridgeport. These are serious allegations, Senior Assistant States Attorney Nicholas Bove said during Johnsons arraignment in Superior Court on Thursday afternoon. He urged Judge Kevin Doyle to set a high bond. The judge agreed and ordered the 41-year-old Johnson held in lieu of $250,000 bond. He continued the case to Sept. 14. Police said shortly before noon on Wednesday they received a call of a robbery at the Key Bank. When officers arrived on the scene, the bank manager told them the robber had just left in a silver taxi, police said. Police said the teller told officers the man had pointed what appeared to be a wrapped gun at them and demanded cash. He then fled with more than $10,000. Police said the taxi was traced to East Main Street. Bridgeport police were notified and stopped the taxi at the intersection of East Main Street and Beardsley Park Terrace. Officers immediately surrounded the taxi, pointing rifles at Johnson who was sitting in the back seat, police said. They said he surrendered without incident. Police said they recovered a bag containing cash from the bank but no gun. In May 2019, Johnson was arrested by Hartford police and charged with attempted third-degree robbery. He was released after posting $200,000 bond, according to court records. Kentucky and Texas joined a growing list of states that are seeing record numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in a surge that is overwhelming doctors and nurses and afflicting more children. Intensive care units around the nation are packed with patients extremely ill with the coronavirus even in places where hospitalizations have not yet reached earlier peaks. The ICU units at Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital in Georgia typically have room for 38 patients, and doctors and nurses may have only two or three people who are very sick, said Dr. Jyotir Mehta, medical director of the ICU. On Wednesday, the ICU had 50 COVID-19 patients alone, roughly half of them relying on ventilators to breathe. I dont think we have experienced this much critical illness in folks, so many people sick at the same time, Mehta said. He said talking to family members is difficult. They are grasping for every hope and youre trying to tell them, Look, its bad,' he said. You have to tell them that your loved one is not going to make it. In New Mexico, top health officials warned Wednesday that the state is about a week away from rationing health care. The number of coronavirus patients needing care at hospitals jumped more than 20% in a day. Were going to have to choose who gets care and who doesnt get care, state Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. David Scrase warned. And we dont want to get to that point. In Idaho, state leaders called on residents to volunteer to help keep medical facilities operating. Texas and Kentucky on Wednesday reported more COVID-19 patients in their hospitals than at any other time since the pandemic began, 14,255 and 2,074, respectively. The Texas record is based on U.S. Department of Health and Human Services data. At least six other states Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi and Oregon have already broken their hospitalization records. In Texas, nearly 47% of the population is fully vaccinated below the national average of almost 52% and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has banned mask and vaccine mandates. Many counties and school districts have defied his mask ban. In Kentucky, just under 48% of the population is fully vaccinated, and public health officials have blamed the lag in part for the state's surge. Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear's COVID-19 restrictions expired in June, and the GOP-controlled legislature has blocked him from issuing new mask requirements or capacity limits. Nationwide, COVID-19 deaths are running at more than 1,100 a day, the highest level since mid-March, and new cases per day are averaging over 152,000, turning the clock back to the end of January. As of early this week, the number of people in the hospital with the coronavirus was around 85,000, a level not seen since early February. The surge is largely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant among people who are unvaccinated. In areas where vaccination rates are particularly low, doctors have pleaded with their communities to get inoculated to spare overburdened hospitals. They have also sounded the alarm about the growing toll of the variant on children and young adults. Children now make up 36% of Tennessees reported COVID-19 cases, marking yet another sobering milestone in the states battle against the virus, Health Commissioner Lisa Piercey said Wednesday. She said the state had 14,000 pediatric cases in the last seven days a 57% increase over the previous week. In South Carolina, students will again be required to wear masks on school buses starting Monday as COVID-19 cases among children and students rise rapidly. Nearly 30% of new cases in South Carolina in the past two weeks have been in people 20 and under. During the same time in 2020, about 17% of cases were in children and teens, according to state officials. Anderson Lopez Castillo, a nurse who cares for seriously ill COVID-19 patients at UAB Hospital in Birmingham, Alabama, said treating people as young as 16 in critical care has become an additional strain on top of a nearly yearlong ordeal that left him questioning his choice of a profession. Initially we saw a lot of older people getting it. It was like, OK, we can tackle this. Even if it is stressful, even if its a dangerous virus, itll probably not be that bad on us as nurses taking care of these older patients, he said. Castillo, 24, said he now sees the virus making young people very sick, and it makes him and other young nurses think of their own mortality. Theres definitely a little subconscious thought in the back of all of our heads going, You know, that could be us,' he said. ___ This story has been corrected to reflect that nearly 47% of Texas' population is fully vaccinated, below the national average. ___ Associated Press reporters around the country contributed to this report. HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) A woman who was acquitted by reason of insanity of slashing a Hartford police officer with a knife in 2018 was committed Wednesday to a maximum-security psychiatric hospital for 38 years. Chevoughn Augustin had faced attempted murder and assault charges for the attack on Officer Jill Kidik, who was stabbed in the neck and suffered lacerations to her jugular vein and trachea while responding to a landlord-tenant disturbance at an apartment building. Police officials said she nearly died and they credited maintenance workers with saving her life. Digital transformation has been pushing change in the retail banking space for decades. And for credit unions, those shifts have come in big wavesmobile apps, text-based communication, online portals, and even a greater focus on finding new members online with better SEO practices, search rankings, and online reviews. But as we see more and more digital demands from consumers in every industry, the requirements for credit unions will continue to keep pace. Members want to bank with credit unions that understand customer experience, are technology focused, and implement digital transformation at every step of the member journey. Take a look at the four ways digital transformation trends shaping retail banking today: Members want personalized communication Personalized communication is at the forefront of digital transformation for every industry. And credit unions are no different. A recent study found that for 53% of consumers, if they can message with a brand directly theyre more likely to shop. For credit unions, offering one-to-one communication can increase opportunities for mortgages, car loans, checking account sign ups, and more. Personalized offers and the right customer context added into these conversations can make the difference between a member feeling known or just another number for your branch or brand. The appeal of credit unions is often based on the local and personalized touch members receive. Instead of traditional forms of communication that dont convert well and struggle with personalizationi.e. email with a 20% open ratetry the communication method 90% of consumers prefertexting. Digital transformation takeaway: Offering personalized offers and communication isnt enough if you arent communicating on the right platform. Add texting to your toolbelt as the preferred member channel. Allow members to text directly from search, your website, and even a saved number in their phones. Members are looking for you online Online search is the beginning of the retail banking customer journey. We know that 90% of loan and mortgage consumers head to Google before they select a mortgage provider and bank near me searches are up more than 60% in the past two years. Searches for banking terms are growing and so is the desire to not only be present online, but offer online banking. For 80% of Americans, digital banking is preferred over visiting a brick-and-mortar branchand this trend in digital transformation for consumers just adds to the requirement for credit unions to show up online where future members are looking. Plus, as consumers spend more and more time on their mobile devices (averages are up to nearly four hours per day per user), its not surprising that more than 60% of Googles traffic comes from a mobile device. And all of that traffic leads to more member growth and spending for credit unions. Digital transformation takeaway: Showing up online should be a high priority for your credit union. Focus on positive reviews, star ratings, an updated Google My Business listing, and SEO to capture leads and increase member growth. Members want a simplified digital experience Beyond expectations to bank solely online, find new banking options online, and even communicate with credit unions online (via text or web chat), members are looking for convenience and speed in every area of their life. We see these expectations taking hold in 2-day shipping, grocery curbside delivery, and even restaurant food delivery right to consumers front doors. For credit unions, reviewing the member journey and revising areas that add too much friction is critical to keep up with digital transformation expectations. Examples include easy access to communicationtexting directly from a Google My Business listing, faster answers to questionsoffering 24/7 web chat and easy-to-navigate FAQs on your website, and convenient access to critical documents and informationsending loan documents and other forms for appointments via text. Digital transformation takeaway: Review your member customer journey and identify ways to add speed and convenience at every touchpoint. Consider converting landlines to textable numbers, adding web chat to your website, and texting documents in real time during mortgage and other loan appointments. Members are ready for virtual meetings The COVID-19 pandemic fast-tracked more than contactless payments and curbside pickup. It accelerated expectations and comfort with virtual meetings. Video conferencing has long been part of other industries, such as healthcare and tech, but in banking, its a convenience credit unions and other financial institutions need to consider now. Virtual meetings add convenience and speed to the member journey that often starts and converts onlinefrom search to loan application in many scenarios. More than 80% of consumers want an immediate response when they have a questionadding a video chat or video meeting option can satisfy the expectation. Plus, with screenshare and real-time document sharing, virtual meetings can be more convenient than in-person meetings. Digital transformation takeaway: Implement more convenience to your member journey and keep up with digital expectations with virtual meetings. Consider moving web chat or text conversations directly to video conversations or setting video appointments with real-time doc sharing and form signing. Ready to improve the member journey at your credit union? Start by assessing your customer satisfaction scores. Check out this article, How Financial Institutions Can Improve Customer Satisfaction Scores, for five tips and tricks to improve the member experience. Cullman, AL (35055) Today Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 64F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 50%.. Tonight Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 64F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 50%. Elizabeth City, NC (27909) Today Variable clouds with scattered showers and thunderstorms, mainly late. Low 68F. Winds WSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 60%.. Tonight Variable clouds with scattered showers and thunderstorms, mainly late. Low 68F. Winds WSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 60%. Dalton, GA (30720) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 64F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 64F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Donald Lee Brock, Sr. 83 of Tunnel Hill passed away Tuesday August 31, 2021 at Hamilton Medical Center. He was preceded in death by his parents, Charles and Thelma Brock; his brother Jerry Brock and brother-in-law, John Marcus. Donald is survived by his sons, Donald Lee Brock, Jr. (Jay Ann) A&C Reporter Krista Kroiss writes for the Arts and Culture desk. In her free time she loves playing guitar with her rock band, watching movies, and reading books. If you have a movie you want her to review, send her an email! Advertisement THE MACRO SETUP OVERVIEW: US stocks set another round of all-time highs Gold prices move back into consolidations after a false bearish breakout Fed rate hike odds lag US Treasury yield curve movement JACKSON HOLE GOES VIRTUAL, AGAIN In this weeks edition of The Macro Setup, featuring Dan Nathan and Guy Adami, we discussed the impact of the Federal Reserves upcoming Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium across various assets classes, including gold, Bitcoin, and stocks. Fed Chair Jerome Powell is due to speak at Jackson Hole this Friday, August 27 at 10 ET/14 GMT, but the announcement that the event would be moving to a virtual setting may have taken some wind out of the speculative sails that a taper announcement would be coming. After all, if the Fed doesnt feel comfortable having its annual meeting in person, policymakers likely feel like its enough of a threat to the US economy that stimulus efforts are still required. US rates markets are acting consistent with this hypothesis. Tapering isnt tightening, and while throughout 2021, particularly the past few months, the US Treasury yield curve has been behaving if tapering may be coming soon, Fed rate hike odds (vis-a-vis Eurodollar spreads) have not. Now that the 2s5s10s butterfly is flattening again, markets are downgrading the likelihood that a taper announcement is imminent. Reduced odds of an imminent Fed taper announcement have spilled across asset classes. The US Dollar (via the DXY Index) may have experienced a false bullish breakout after hitting fresh yearly highs last week, substantiated by the reversal in EUR/USD rates. Ultimately, the rally in EUR/USD may be short-lived, but nothing may frustrate traders more than USD/JPY, which is struggling to produce gains alongside rallying US stock markets as taper odds decline. *For commentary from Dan Nathan, Guy Adami, and myself on the US Dollar (via the DXY Index), the US S&P 500, gold prices, among others, please watch the video embedded at the top of this article. CHARTS OF THE WEEK Eurodollar Futures Contract Spread (September 2021-DECEMBER 2023) versus US 2s5s10s Butterfly: Daily Rate Chart (January 2021 to August 2021) (Chart 1) GOLD PRICE TECHNICAL ANALYSIS: DAILY CHART (JULY 2020 TO AUGUST 2021) (CHART 2) EUR/USD PRICE TECHNICAL ANALYSIS: DAILY CHART (MARCH 2020 TO AUGUST 2021) (CHART 3) --- Written by Christopher Vecchio, CFA, Senior Strategist Gregory (Greg) Boggs of Greenup, age 68, died on August, 20 2021, at Kings Daughters Memorial Center.. Gregory is survived by his wife of 43 years, Tina (Madden) Boggs; his daughter Jennifer (Boggs) Brown and son in law Bill Brown, of South Portsmouth; his daughter Anna Collister and son in Sunbury, PA (17801) Today Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming mostly clear overnight. Low near 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming mostly clear overnight. Low near 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected. Sunbury, PA (17801) Today Rain ending this evening. Partial clearing overnight. Potential for flooding rains. Low near 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch.. Tonight Rain ending this evening. Partial clearing overnight. Potential for flooding rains. Low near 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch. Remainers. Do you remember them? They were the people who, in some cases, attempted to frustrate Britains withdrawal from the EU in spite of a democratic vote. Well, the Remainers havent all gone away. Some of them are having a field day. Theres an awful lot of gloating going on in Parliament and the Press. Most of it is thoroughly misplaced and utterly wrong-headed. Gloat One arises from the empty shelves in some supermarkets, which ardent anti-Brexiteers attribute to a shortage of foreign lorry drivers they claim has been caused by our leaving the EU. Gloat Two concerns what Remainers see as the humbling of Global Britain as we are ignored by President Joe Biden over Afghanistan. They assert that, separated as we are from our former EU partners, and ditched by the United States, we are in effect all alone in the big, bad world. The Remainers haven't all gone away. Some of them are having a field day. Gloat One arises from the empty shelves in some supermarkets, which ardent anti-Brexiteers attribute to a shortage of foreign lorry drivers they claim has been caused by our leaving the EU. Indispensable Let me return later to the empty shelves, and concentrate first on our alleged isolation and humiliation. It is true that we have been shafted by Mr Biden. He pulled the plug on a war in which the lives of 457 British servicemen and women were lost, and many billions of pounds of taxpayers money spent, without consulting us. As I wrote last week, the U.S. has turned out to be an overbearing and unreliable ally. But where Remainers get it wrong is in supposing that our predicament is unique. It isnt. France, Germany, Italy and Canada have also lost lives and spent billions in Afghanistan, albeit on a smaller scale than Britain. And Sleepy Joe has dumped them in exactly the same way. Theyre certainly not happy about it. Last week President Emmanuel Macron of France had a fraught telephone conversation with Mr Biden in which he emphasised that the West had a moral responsibility to evacuate Afghan allies and not to abandon them. In its subsequent account of the phone call, the White House excised Mr Macrons more colourful language. And in a Zoom meeting of G7 leaders on Tuesday, President Biden rejected calls from Britain, France and Germany to extend the deadline so that more Afghan lives could be saved. Gloat Two concerns what Remainers see as the humbling of Global Britain as we are ignored by President Joe Biden (pictured) over Afghanistan. They assert that, separated as we are from our former EU partners, and ditched by the United States, we are in effect all alone In Germany there has been much criticism of Mr Biden. Markus Soder, the governor of Bavaria and an ally of Chancellor Angela Merkel, has said the U.S. should provide funding and shelter to people fleeing Afghanistan because it bears the main responsibility for what has happened. The fact is that most of Americas allies are angered by blundering Biden and they must be asking themselves, just as we are asking ourselves, whether it is sensible ever to rely on Washington quite so much again. Instead of exulting in Britains supposed isolation, patriotic Remainers should be wondering whether Boris Johnson isnt in a perfect position to rescue something out of the shameful debacle of Afghanistan and in so doing repair some of the bitter wounds left by Brexit. For if the U.S. is an inconstant friend intent on partially withdrawing from the world, it follows that second-tier powers such as Britain, France and Germany which have relied so much on Uncle Sam since World War II should be looking more to one another in the future. As Europes leading military power, a short nose ahead of France, Britain would be indispensable in any rebalancing of old alliances. To be blunt, France and Germany and the others cannot do without us in a world in which America is less proactive. Here I can hear a one-word objection: Macron. This clamorous Napoleonic retread and inveterate critic of Brexit loses no opportunity to throw ball bearings under Boris Johnsons hooves. Many will say that it is ludicrous to imagine forming any alliance with this infuriating popinjay. My answer is that Macron is not France, and he wont be around for ever. It is even possible that he will be sent packing by French voters in next Aprils presidential elections. Lets hope so. Few are seriously interested in Macrons notion of a European Army. Angela Merkel has paid lip service to it, but nothing is ever done, not least because the Germans have no desire to pay for it. It is true that we have been shafted by Mr Biden. But where Remainers get it wrong is in supposing that our predicament is unique. It isnt. France, Germany, Italy and Canada have also lost lives and spent billions in Afghanistan (pictured, Kabul airport on August 16) By contrast and notwithstanding Mr Macrons ceaseless anti-British tirades Anglo-French military cooperation is a successful reality. The Franco-British rapid reaction force is able to deploy 10,000 men and women on land, sea and air. It is more formidable than the so-called Franco-German brigade. I dont suggest for a moment that a more introverted America will cease to be Britains most important ally. Her military resources are vastly greater than those of any other western country. Despite everything, there remain strong ties of friendship and history between our two nations. Lesson But a gradual shift is taking place. It was President Trump who envisaged the U.S. unilaterally withdrawing from Afghanistan, and President Biden who cheerfully executed it. Thats two high-handed and isolationist Presidents from opposing parties in succession. Only a fool would ignore the lesson. At that G7 meeting on Tuesday we saw Britain, France and Germany acting together, though unable to get Mr Biden to see sense. That coming together of fundamentally like-minded countries with many common interests should be seen as a portent of things to come. Far from being the setback to Global Britain that some Remainers suggest, this is an opportunity for Boris Johnson to put the divisions of Brexit behind us by reaching out to allies in equal need. By the way, I dont suppose any western alliance is going to find it easy to do business with the narrow-minded and bigoted Taliban. Afghanistan is a disaster zone, but it offers the possibility of enhanced cooperation with old friends in other fields. Better things may lie ahead. Celebration The same can be said about those empty shelves which have occasioned so much cheer among obdurate Remainers. Although there may be shortages caused by a lack of lorry drivers no milkshakes at McDonalds or chicken at Nandos these are likely to be temporary. Covid is one factor behind the dearth of drivers. Brexit is another inasmuch as several thousand of them have returned to the EU and have so far not come back. But isnt this a cause for celebration? The low wages of lorry drivers were kept down by the plenitude of East Europeans prepared to work for poor pay. The same effect was felt across the British industry. It was one reason why many people voted Leave. Having fewer East European drivers will entail shortages in the short term. That in turn will lead to employers (who have benefited greatly from cheap labour) raising pay rates. And that will in due course attract more home-grown people to lorry driving. Instead of gloating over the empty shelves, and seeing them as one more horrible manifestation of Brexit, Remainers should be delighted that the wages of lorry drivers, for so long depressed by cheap labour, are at last increasing. Equally, Remainers should be glad at the thought that Britain and its former EU partners find themselves in the same boat set adrift by Sleepy Joe, and are capable of finding common cause if only they have the imagination. A Seychelles giant tortoise, a species previously thought to be a strict herbivore, has been filmed chasing and eating a baby bird in a horrifying and amazing attack, with researchers stating it was the first documented example of deliberate hunting in the wild by the species News Report A message from the Duke and Duchess of Sussex: Following todays deeply upsetting news, we call on our fellow world leaders to join us in our bid to save baby birds. We believe in the shared strength and spirit of our global Community. Whilst continuing to hold the Seychelles giant tortoise in our deepest respect, we also empathise with the many layers of pain felt by that little baby bird. Every little baby bird has earned the inalienable right to fly. That is why we are proud to join with our friends at KFC and Nandos in establishing our new LovelyBird Foundation. At the same time, every giant tortoise must surely be allowed to eat what it wants, when it wants. Those of us who are privileged to count ourselves hugely respected royal philanthropists will continue to strive to build bridges between these two communities. As a giant tortoise gobbles up a baby bird, Harry and Meghan try to build bridges... 'Every little baby bird has earned the inalienable right to fly. At the same time, every giant tortoise must surely be allowed to eat what it wants, when it wants' (stock image) Our world is exceptionally fragile right now. Every time a baby bird is gobbled up by a giant tortoise, a little piece of each of us is gobbled up with her/him/them, whether we realize it or not. Even the smallest action has powerful consequences. When one of us is nibbled, all of us are nibbled. Its so easy to feel powerless in the face of this ongoing narrative of species domination. But, with a little effort, we can put our shared values into action together. We urge those in positions of global influence to do all they can to advance dialogue between the baby bird community and close colleagues and representatives of the giant tortoise. Every inhabitant of our beautiful planet human being, baby bird, giant tortoise has earned the right to our compassion. The solution is clear. We must learn to utilize the power of storytelling to embrace a narrative of our shared humanity and duty to truth through a compassionate lens. Its that simple. Visit Compassion@Archewell to help ensure our future as a planet by investing in RoyalSussexComp luxury items, including scented candles, activewear, fragrances, and vitamin supplements. As an international community, it is the decisions we make now to alleviate suffering for both the consumer and the consumed that will prove our humanity. All of us, world leaders and deeply cherished, thoroughly modern members of the British Royal Family alike, love to eat wholesome and nutritious food. Yes, few activities are more pleasurable than placing a jungle-fresh, organic dish into our mouths. 'We hope and pray our good friend the giant tortoise will, in time, take full ownership of his bird consumption whilst continuing to prioritize his own mental health.' (Pictured: The Duke and Duchess of Sussex) But we also love to hop around barefoot in the sun, our little feet glorying in the texture of the leaves and grass below, free from the fear of being eaten alive. The sacred time we spend with loved ones is so important time spent learning, laughing, growing, sharing and venturing to break boundaries and try something new, different and flavorsome for our mid-day meal. We believe mentorship is just one way to help giant turtles and little birds build bridges. We fervently hope that, one day soon, our shared dream will come true, and the giant turtle will be glad to offer itself up as an appetizing health-giving buffet for the baby bird. That is why we are today reaching out to the leaders of the giant turtle community to join our global effort by contributing 40 minutes of mentorship to support little birds re-entering the jungle. Emboldened by our shared belief in humanity, we have faith in the power of our collective well-being to shape our pressing needs. We hope and pray our good friend the giant tortoise will, in time, take full ownership of his bird consumption whilst continuing to prioritize his own mental health. Under the auspices of our new foundation, Tortoisewell, we hope to embrace all tortoises across our planet giant, dwarf or medium-sized into our shared community of hope. Through the unifying power of Zoom, we have already nurtured close friendships among key influencers in the turtle/tortoise community. We are proud to have hosted Raphael, Donatello and Splinter from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, alongside our good non-turtle friends Oprah Winfrey, George Clooney and James Corden. That is the sum turtle of our endeavors. Yes: this is what our shared humanity has tortoise. After a long day, fewer things signify that it's time to relax and drift off to a world away from the daily grind than a small snifter glass containing a pure, authentic tequila. As you sit back and switch off, your tastebuds will be transported to Mexico, which is where tequila originates. Close your eyes and imagine balmy sunsets, beautiful beaches and cute colorful cobbled towns. Of course, this will only happen if your drink contains blue agave from Mexico, and if 100 per cent of the tequila is made from the agave. By law, a spirit can be called tequila if it contains a minimum of 51 per cent agave and producers can fill out the rest with whatever cheaper spirit they like, which will mask the flavors and potentially leave you with a nasty hangover. The best tequilas in the world are made in Los Altos de Jalisco, where the soil is red, and the agave plants are known for being big, juicy and sweet with delicious fruity notes But the more you educate yourself about the drink's history and origins, the more likely you are to find an authentic tequila. Even among the 100 per cent agave tequilas, you'll notice subtle variations in the taste if you sip and savor them slowly just like you would a whisky or cognac. The first thing to bear in mind is that the spirit's final flavor correlates to the region where the tequila has been made and the way the blue agave plant has been grown and harvested. Similar to Champagne, tequila can only truly be called tequila when it comes from one of the five designated states in Mexico that have the government designation to make and produce it. Nestled in the highlands of Jalisco in the Los Altos region, the town of Arandas is known both for its architecture as seen in the San Jose Obrero church (left) and tequila production (right) It's not just the quality of the plant that creates the best tequila, but it's also the people who farm it - and the community in Arandas is the lifeblood of Tequila Cazadores The most well-known tequila state is Jalisco, which is the birthplace of the drink, but it can also come from parts of Guanajuato, Michoacan, Nayarit, and Tamaulipas. All of these states have excellent conditions for blue agave to thrive and local distilleries to make tequila while the crops are ripe But as they are geographically distinct, you'll find different weather conditions and altitude levels across all five states, which affects soil composition and the growth of the blue agave. The first ever tequila distillery opened in the town of Tequila in the state of Jalisco in the early 1600s and the first ever commercial operation followed there 150 years later. Now almost 300 years on, there are several reasons why several of the best tequila brands loved by drinkers from around the world still make their authentic recipes in the special area of Jalisco. Unparalleled highland soil When you're tasting different tequilas, one of the first things you'll be able to distinguish is the difference between those made in the highlands, which are grown at heights of around 6,000 feet, and those grown in the lowlands closer to sea level. The quality of the soil reflects the quality of the tequila, and the rich soil in the highlands of Jalisco creates a sprit that's fruity, citric and floral in taste with a long finish The historic town of Tequila, which is known for its production of the popular spirit, is itself found in the highlands of Jalisco state in Mexico Experts say highland tequilas tend to be fruity, citric and floral in taste with a long finish due to richer soil that allows the agaves to grow sweeter. One of the best examples of this is Tequila Cazadores, which has been produced in the town of Arandas in the Jalisco highlands since 1922. The recipe remains a family secret, but the rolling fields of blue weber agave native to the area make a drink of exceptional flavor. This agave has been nourished by rich earth as it flourishes, and you won't find quality like it anywhere else in the world. A community that pulls together Even the best quality blue agave doesn't magically transform into tequila. It needs a community of workers for harvesting, distilling and bottling - and then more to feed and support the people that are directly involved in the production process. Tequila Cazadores ensures that the jimadores who farm the agave plant in the Jalisco highlands are paid fairly so they can take care of their families and support the local economy The town of Arandas in Jalisco is home to Tequila Cazadores, with the spirit having been produced there for nearly 100 years since 1922 Laborers who harvest the agave are called jimadores and they work with both dedication and passion. One agave pina can weigh up to 200 pounds and it's expected that a crew of jimadores will move fast through a plantation and harvest between 3,000 to 4,000 kilograms of agave over six hours. In Jalisco, where towns revolve around tequila, for brands like Tequila Cazadores it is essential that the workers are paid fairly, so this region is home to some of the best jimadores in the world, as well as skilled distillers that are at the top of their craft. With a good wage in their pocket, the workers are able to take care of their families and have money to spend in the town's businesses to support their local economy. When you drink tequila from Jalisco, part of what you're tasting is the heart and soul of the entire region's people, as well as the luscious blue agave. Inspiration from local legends In Jalisco, tequila has been distilled for hundreds of years and the brands that have stuck around are the ones with a truly unique flavor appreciated by Mexicans first and only scaled up if the locals give it the seal of approval. Tequila Cazadores is steeped in history and tradition, having been created nearly one hundred years ago from a family recipe that had been passed down through generations For example, Tequila Cazadores was created in 1922 and its name, which translates to The Hunters, was inspired by a majestic deer standing tall in a field of blue agave. After being served on a small scale to friends and family, the first commercial distillery opened in 1973 and has been going from strength to strength ever since. The same 1922 recipe is used and the image of the stag standing tall is still part of the heritage, with all bottle labels featuring a powerful image of the regal beast. A commitment to sustainability You're more likely to be able to sip on your tequila with a clear conscience when it originates from Jalisco as the region is home to some seriously hi-tech but sustainable production facilities. To create the best tequila in the world, it's important that the distillation, fermentation and maturation processes are sustainable and eco-friendly from start to finish As the entire state relies on specific weather conditions for its soil, workers in the distilleries understand the importance of making the production process eco-friendly and sustainable to keep the climate as it is. Zero waste is a key factor, especially with environmentally responsible brands like Tequila Cazadores. Its tequila goes through a seven step fully sustainable and zero waste production process, including double distillation, double fermentation and a careful maturation process. By choosing a drink that's sustainably made, you're playing your part in ensuring that top quality tequila can be produced and enjoyed by future generations. Princess Charlene of Monaco showed 'no emotional bond' towards her husband Prince Albert in photographs showing the couple and their two children reunited in South Africa, according to a body language expert. Charlene, 43, has finally been reunited with Albert, 63, and their six-year-old twins Jacques and Gabriella after almost three months apart - with her family flying out to be with her in her home country as she recovers from a mystery operation. The princess, who is originally from Cape Town, and was last seen in Monaco in January, shared professional photographs of the family reunion on Instagram yesterday saying she was 'thrilled' to have her loved ones back. However, Judi James told FEMAIL that rather than being the loved-up reunion photo one would expect of a couple surrounded by split rumours, the royals' poses suggested 'no signs of connection between awkward-looking Albert and Charlene'. Princess Charlene of Monaco has finally reunited with her husband and children after almost three months apart. The absence of Charlene from Monaco, which has involved missing a string of high-profile events, has led to speculation around the state of her marriage Former Olympic swimmer Charlene has been in her native South Africa for months after contracting a 'serious sinus infection', with the family having last been together at the start of June, when Albert and the children flew out to be with the princess. Two weeks ago Charlene underwent a 'four-hour operation under general anaesthesia', although it was not made clear whether this was linked to the sinus infection. Yesterday she shared a series of photos cuddled up with her children with the caption: 'I am so thrilled to have my family back with me (Gabriella decided to give herself a haircut!!!) Sorry my Bella I tried my best to fix it,' referring to her daughter's choppy fringe. Later, she then shared two snaps with just Albert as the casually-dressed couple posed together on a bridge. Albert and Jacques and Gabriella will stay with Charlene while she recovers, the palace previously announced - and although it is not clear how long their trip will be, the princess will not return to Monaco until at least the end of October. The absence of Charlene from the principality, which has involved missing a string of high-profile events, has led to speculation around the state of her marriage, after news emerged that Albert is facing a paternity suit over a love child born in the early years of their relationship. Here, expert Judi explains the body language of Charlene and Albert in their latest reunion snaps... 1. OVERKILL GESTURE In the second collection of images shared by Charlene, the royal is captured hugging Albert closely (pictured) In the second collection of images shared by Charlene, the royal is captured hugging Albert closely, while a second shows her standing by his side as she leans on him. 'They provide more of what was lacking in the photos with the children, claimed body language expert Judi. She added: 'In the first pose, the couple could barely be closer, posing torso to torso and face to face, with Charlenes arm around Alberts neck in a clinging and rather possessive-looking hug that could almost be described as an overkill gesture. 'Their eyes are fixed on what looks like another camera, making this a posed shot rather than anything more genuinely intimate but the message of affection and physical closeness is there all the same.' She continued: 'Charlene looks a little needy here and that face-pressing is an unusual gesture with the mouths side-to-side rather than kissing or using eye contact. 'It looks a little impulsive, which seems to be prompted by her rather than him as she is actually hunched into his torso and more clingy in the embrace. 2. CHARLENE'S 'SAD EYES' The second image in the set sees the couple side-by-side as they stand together on a bridge without their children (pictured) The second image in the set sees the couple side-by-side as they stand together on a bridge without their children. Albert is looking more comfortable than he did in the group shots here, with some matching casuals and one hand on his hip suggesting raised levels of confidence, said Judi. The second pose looks more relaxed and natural, with Albert front-on to camera and with his chest slightly splayed and puffed to signal much higher levels of confidence than he did in the poses with the children. Charlene has again placed her arm around his upper shoulder in a gesture of possession here and she has her right hand fingers close to his neck while her left hand rests on his shoulder as though keen to show him off for the camera. However, the body language expert suggests Charlene looks sad, explaining: Alberts smile is more convincing than hers here. His eyes are crinkled and the corners of his mouth are curled upward in a symmetric mouth smile. Charlenes eye expression suggests sadness in both of these poses though and although she is smiling, the corners of her mouth are pulled slightly downward, suggesting mixed emotions. 1. AWKWARD ALBERT Judi suggested Albert looked 'tense and awkward' while standing on the outside of the family photographs, released earlier in the day. She said: 'Given the rumours of a possible split and worries about Charlenes health it would be expected that when the couple did finally get together for a "reunion" photo they would at the very least adopt a PR-prompted "denial" pose that would suggest the marriage was very much on track. 'Instead we have these poses of a reunion that only looks partial. This is Charlene reuniting with her two children but her husband Albert looks awkward and peripheral.' Body language Judi James suggested Albert looked 'tense and awkward' while standing on the outside of the family photographs (pictured) 2. NO TOUCHING The body language expert went on to suggest there was 'no physical touch, closeness or even eye contact' between the royal couple when photographed with their children. 'There are no signs here of any direct connection between Albert and Charlene,' said Judi. 'The way the poses have been constructed it looks as though they have been done very much on Charlene's terms, with her uncomfortable-looking husband entering her more casual and spontaneous world.' She continued: 'Charlenes body language here defines her as a free spirit and she seems to be making no compromises to signal emotional or even empathetic bonds with her husband via her poses. 'There is no physical touch, closeness or even eye contact between them in the photos she has chosen for social media.' Charlene, 43, who was last seen in Monaco in January, shared professional photographs of their reunion on Instagram (pictured) 3. FORCED SMILE 'In his smart-casuals behind his family, Albert is left looking awkward and tense,' suggested Judi. The body language expert claimed: 'His smile looks rather forced and his body poses lack signs of spontaneity. 'Stretching out to lean his hand on a tree or placing a hand on his sons shoulder, his awkwardness suggests he is trying to look part of the synchronised group but falling short, as though casual is not really his thing.' 4. MIRRORING MUM Play time! Twins Jacques and Gabriella climb a tree in one of the photos shared on Instagram Judi claimed Charlene's two children were 'mirroring' her casual, 'very non-royal' appearance, with the mother sporting a camouflage jacket. Meanwhile, Princess Gabriella opted for a purple dress with an animal print collar and Prince Jacques donned a matching coat like his Charlene's. The body language expert said: 'Charlenes look is very non-royal here and her children seem to happily mirror that. 'Sitting on the ground with her legs splayed she is a world away from the more formal elegance of royal life with her body language making her look relaxed.' 5. A 'RING OF CLOSENESS' Double trouble: The twins last saw their mother in June, when the family flew out to South Africa Judi suggested Charlene and her two children displayed a 'ring of closeness' in the reunion photographs, while 'awkward' Albert sat on the 'peripheral'. She said: 'The bonding with her children looks powerful and, with her daughter copying her trend for radical haircuts and her son performing a peace V-sign behind her, they could easily have been a group snapped having fun at a summer festival. 'The three cuddle together using both arms to form rings of loving closeness and empathy,' she added. How Charlene and Albert made solo outings in South Africa and Monaco during seven months apart January 27 - Charlene is pictured with Albert for the Sainte Devote Ceremony in Monaco. March 18 - Charlene is pictured at the memorial for the late Zulu monarch, King Goodwill Zwelithini at the KwaKhethomthandayo Royal Palace in Nongoma, South Africa April 2 - Charlene posts an Instagram picture of herself, Albert and their twins Jacques and Gabriella for Easter. It is unknown where the image was taken. May 8 - Albert, Jacques and Gabriella attend a Grand Prix event in Monaco without Charlene May 10 - Albert attends Monaco Gala Awards in Monaco without Charlene May 18 - Charlene shares her first picture from her conservation trip in South Africa June 1 - Prince Albert II, Jacques and Gabriella attend event at Oceanic Museum in Monaco June 3 - New photos emerge of Charlene on her conservation trip June 5- Charlene puts on a united front as she shares a photo with her family to mark her niece's fifth birthday with her brother's family and Albert and the twins in South Africa June 7 - Albert and the twins attend the World Rugby Sevens without Charlene June 17 - Prince Albert attends Red Cross Summer concert in Monte Carlo with his sister Princess Caroline of Hanover June 18 - Prince Albert appears alone Monte Carlo TV Festival June 24 - Charlene's foundation releases a statement saying the royal is unable to travel and is undergoing procedures for an ear, nose and throat infection July 2 - Charlene and Albert mark their 10th anniversary separately. 'This year will be the first time that I'm not with my husband on our anniversary in July, which is difficult, and it saddens me,' Her Serene Highness Princess Charlene said in a statement. July 3 - Albert appears with glamorous niece Charlotte Casiraghi at the 15th international Monte-Carlo Jumping event, which is part of the Longines Global Champions Tour of Monaco, July 27 - Prince Albert attends Olympics alone in Tokyo August 13 - Charlene undergoes a four-hour operation. The reason is not announced August 25 - Charlene shares photos of Prince Albert, Gabriella and Jacques visiting her in South Africa Advertisement In recent weeks, lifestyle magazines across Europe have speculated feverishly that the royal couple could be headed for divorce. Charlene has been in South Africa since at least March, with media reports suggesting she is looking for a house there. The prince, who already supports two illegitimate children, is alleged to have been in a relationship with a Brazilian woman which resulted in a daughter in 2005. The claim, which his lawyers dismissed as a 'hoax', is particularly painful as he was dating Charlene at the time, having met in 2000. However, Charlene has publicly supported her husband, and the palace have reiterated she is only in South Africa because she's unable to fly. On August 13, the Monaco palace released a statement saying Charlene was to undergo surgery. It read: 'Princess Charlene will undergo an operation today, Friday, August 13, for four hours under general anaesthesia.' On June 3, Charlene shared photograph of her family on safari in South Africa as her twins and husband flew to the country to celebrate her niece Avia's fifth birthday. In a snap showing the last time they were seen together, Albert, Jacques and Gabriella, were joined in an open top car by Charlene's brother Sean Wittstock, 37, and his children. She captioned it with a simple heart emoji. In earlier snaps, the family gathered around a birthday cake with Sean, his wife Chantell, 34, their eldest son Raigen, 7, and the birthday girl. 'Happy 5th Birthday, Aiva! Love, Auntie Charlene,' she wrote. Princess Charlene, who has been well enough to conduct interviews from South Africa and has been seen out and about, has used the time to promote her anti-poaching initiative, Chasing Zero Charlene's last formal engagement was on January 27 when she joined Albert for the Sainte Devote Ceremony in Monte Carlo. She has not been seen at home since. Instead she has been keeping followers updated through social media posts and media interviews, in which she has spoken candidly about missing her children and described her husband as 'her rock'. Speaking to South Africa Radio 702's host Mandy Wiener last week, the royal said: '[It's] very frustrating, terribly frustrating. I can't wait to get back to them, I can't wait to see my children.' Charlene revealed: 'It's the longest period I've actually been away from Europe, let alone my children, but I'm FaceTiming them most days and they've been here and will be returning to see me again after my procedure. 'It's an amazing opportunity [to be here] but I'm very sad I can't be with my children this summer in Europe.' She added that she was initially only supposed to be in her native South Africa for ten to 12 days for a conservation trip with her Princess Charlene of Monaco foundation. However, the royal had a problem 'equalising her ears' and was told by a doctor that she was suffering from a serious sinus infection. 'It's taken time to address the problem that I'm having,' explained Charlene. 'I cannot go into full detail, but I cannot force healing so I will be grounded in South Africa until the end of October. 'The reason being I cannot fly above 3,000 metres otherwise I'll have a problem with my ears. Albert and the twins paid a brief visit to South Africa in early June (pictured), the Palace has confirmed, but they otherwise keep in touch via video link. They are pictured with Charlene's brother Sean Wittstock, 37, and his son Raigen, seven, and daughter Aiva, five 'I feel well, I feel good, it's just obviously a waiting game for me, but I've had a great opportunity to understand a little bit more about South Africa, the environment, the needs and it's been wonderful to be back in South Africa, and I think at this time it's crucial that people are aware of certain things via my foundation.' Charlene joined the video interview from bush country in the KwaZulu-Natal region. Princess Charlene's trials and tribulations in the Monaco royal family 1987 - Bea Fiedler, a German topless model, claims her son Daniel was the prince's son. 1992 - An American national files a paternity lawsuit against the Prince, claiming that he was the father of her daughter, Jazmin Grace. 2000 - Princess Charlene meets Prince Albert at the Mare Nostrum swimming competition in Monte Carlo 2005 - In May, a former flight attendant claims that her youngest son, whom she named Alexandre Grimaldi-Coste, was Prince Albert's child. She states that his parentage had been proven by DNA tests requested by the Monegasque government. On 6 July, a few days before he was enthroned on 12 July, the Prince officially confirms via his lawyer Lacoste that Alexandre was his biological son. 2006 - After a DNA test confirmed the child's parentage, Albert admitted, via statement from his lawyer, that he is Jazmin Grace's father. 2010 - Princess Charlene and Prince Albert announce their engagement 2011 - Princess Charlene was said to have bolted two days before the royal wedding after hearing Prince Albert had a third love child during their relationship. It was alleged that Charlene tried to flee home to South Africa three times before her 'arranged marriage', at one point taking refuge inside her country's embassy in Paris. Monaco officials were said to have coaxed her back by brokering a deal between the Prince and his reluctant bride that she provide him with a legitimate heir. After that she would be free to leave of her own free will. During the wedding, Charlene was in floods of tears, while her husband looked on impassively. Later in the year, Princess Charlene confessed she felt 'very lonely' in Monaco 2012 - Princess Charlene was reported to be 'depressed' at her failure to provide her husband with a legitimate heir. 2014 - Pregnancy was announced in May. In December Charlene gave birth to twins Princess Gabriella and heir to the throne Prince Jacques. 2017 - Princess Charlene visits Africa, tells media: 'I am African and this is my heritage. It will always be. It's in my heart and in my veins.' 2019 - In a rare interview, Princess Charlene confessed it is 'sometimes hard to smile' and said the year had been 'very painful'In another interview, she said she found motherhood 'exhausting' 2020 - Charlene debuts a shocking half-shaved hairstyle. It is announced Prince Albert of Monaco will appear in court in the new year to fight explosive claims he fathered a third love child with a secret girlfriend before marrying his now wife Princess Charlene. 2021 - January 27 - Charlene is pictured with Albert for the Sainte Devote Ceremony in Monaco. It is the last time she has been seen in Monaco this year. Advertisement She has also shared videos released by the Monaco royal palace to mark her and Albert's 10th wedding anniversary, which took place in July. The couple spent the milestone thousands of miles apart. But royal sources have suggested the princess has 'no plans' to return soon. A palace source told Paris Match: 'The Princess has, for the time being, in reality, no intention of returning.' The separation is also affecting Charlene's relationship with the people of Monaco. Stephane Bearn, easily the most high-profile and trusted Royal commentator in France, uses an impeccably sourced piece in the latest Paris Match to discuss the torturous separation. He describes subjects in Monaco becoming increasingly angry about their runaway Princess, as they criticise everything from Charlene's mood swings to her appearance. 'In Monaco, since the departure of Charlene, tongues have loosened,' Mr Bearn writes. 'In the whirlwind of a hard-nosed court, her fine shine is rubbing off. Her sad looks are regarded as haggard. 'Disappointed Monegasques talk about her anger, her whimsical moods, which are as changeable as her hair.' Referring to the couple's twins, who until now have remained in Monaco with their nannies, Mr Bearn writes: 'The Palace had to invoke a suffering Princess so often that the Monegasques today find it hard to believe. 'By crying wolf, the mother of Jacques and Gabriella would have discredited and isolated herself.' During her trip, Charlene also debuted a dramatic new shaved hairstyle. She showcased the 'French crop' hairdo - featuring a longer strip on top of the head and dramatically shaved back and sides - in snaps shared on her charity's Instagram page in late May. The royal first stepped out with a dramatic half-shaved head in December 2020 but has since gone even shorter and bolder with the cut. Charlene and Albert's marriage has been plagued with rumours from the start. The couple met at the Mare Nostrum swimming competition in Monte Carlo in 2000, announced their engagement in 2010. Former Olympic swimmer Charlene reportedly tried to flee Monaco for her native South Africa on three separate occasions before the royal wedding after discovering Albert had allegedly fathered a love child - his third - while they were together. Monaco officials were said to have coaxed her back by brokering a deal between the Prince and his reluctant bride, saying she could leave once she had provided him with a legitimate heir. One source said at the time: 'Charlene will provide an heir, then if things don't go well, she will receive a generous divorce settlement once she's served a decent amount of time.' Charlene was seen in floods of tears on her wedding day in 2011. Just one year after their wedding, it was reported that Charlene was 'depressed' at her failure to provide her husband with a legitimate heir. Her pregnancy was announced in May 2014, and in December that year she gave birth to twins Princess Gabriella and heir to the throne Prince Jacques. In the 10 years since, Charlene has rarely spoken publicly of her experience. In 2017, the Princess made an emotional return to Africa, where she spoke about how much the continent means to her. 'I am African and this is my heritage. It will always be. Its in my heart and in my veins,' she told Eyewitness News. Last year she admitted life was 'very painful', saying: 'I have the privilege of having this life, but I miss my family and my friends in South Africa and I'm often sad because I cannot always be there for them.' It's been a tumultuous start to the year for the royal, after news emerged that her husband is facing a paternity suit over a love child born in the early years of their relationship. The 34-year-old claimant who cannot be named for legal reasons says she had a passionate affair with Albert, leading to the birth of their daughter whose name is also classified on July 4, 2005. Albert received a handwritten letter from the child, who is now 15, in September last year reading: I don't understand why I grew up without a father, and now that I have found you, you don't want to see me. Legal papers were also filed, as lawyers for the claimant called on Albert to undergo a DNA test just as he did before finally being identified as the father of two illegitimate children born in the 1990s and early 2000s. In January, Charlene spoke publicly for the first time since the allegations, telling Point de Vue: 'When my husband has problems, he tells me about it. I often tell him, "No matter what, no matter what, I'm a thousand percent behind you. I'll stand by you whatever you do, in good times or in bad." The mother-of-two went on to say she also often tells her husband she will 'protect him' and will 'always be by his side.' A photographer has revealed how she travelled 42 hours across three continents to surprise her best friend with a Coles mud cake for her birthday. Imogen Blow, 25, documented her journey from Perth to London while carrying the iconic $4.80 chocolate cake through customs, three airports, two 10-hour flights, four trains and even the toilet when she needed to go. Following a long-haul trip, Imogen was finally reunited with her friend Tori who was living in the UK after the pair hadn't seen each other in six months. Much to their delight, the cake arrived in one piece. 'The cake honestly tasted as good as the day I got it. Or maybe it was just the placebo effect of the blood, sweat and tears of transporting it,' Imogen told Daily Mail Australia. 'The hardest part was shielding it from people stuffing their bags on it in the overhead baggage storage.' Scroll down for video Photographer Imogen Blow (pictured) has revealed how she travelled 42 hours across three continents to surprise her best friend with a Coles mud cake for her birthday Following a long-haul trip, Imogen was finally reunited with her friend Tori (pictured holding the mud cake) who was living in the UK after the pair hadn't seen each other in six months The trip happened in 2018 - but video of the travelling mud cake resurfaced earlier this week after Imogen posted it on TikTok. The video shows the cake heading to the airport via a car, going through customs before it was tucked behind a suitcase in the overhead lockers on a flight. The scenes show Imogen holding the cake through Abu Dhabi airport before making they make the next flight to London. The cake travelled through four trains before surprising the birthday girl at a park. After the friends hugged, Imogen can be heard saying 'happy birthday', to which Tori responded: 'Oh my god, is this a Woolies mud cake? You're an angel.' Following the trip, Imogen, who's the founder of Ginger Imagery, said carrying the cake was 'more effort than I thought it was going to be. Travelling with such a delicate item.' Imogen said she lives near a Coles supermarket so she quickly grabbed the mud cake when she was 'running late' for her flight. 'I didn't realise the Woolies mud cakes were superior. I'm copping a lot of flack for it now though, whoops. I guess I will have to do it again, maybe I'll try a Bunnings snag next time?' she told Daily Mail Australia. The 25-year-old documented her journey from Perth to London while carrying the iconic $4.80 chocolate cake through customs, three airports, two 10-hour flights, four trains and even the toilet when she needed to go Her video has since been viewed more than 89,000 times, with many laughing about how her friend mistaken the Coles mud cake for Woolworths. 'Imagine getting it half way across the world and she clearly loves the Woolies one, not Coles,' one joked. Another said: 'You did all that and you got the Coles one, not Woolies,' while one added: 'Even your friend knows Woolies is better.' Many asked her how she got the cake through customs, to which she replied: 'I legit just walked by, they didn't mind.' While others questioned how she got the cake out of the country. 'You can leave Australia with pretty much anything. They are real strict on travellers bringing things in,' Imogen explained. Imogen jokingly said she 'regrets' not getting a Woolworths mud cake, adding: 'I can't believe I messed up that bad.' The video shows Tori eating the cake after it travelled across three continents to get to her Her TikTok video comes nearly three years after she first posted the footage on her YouTube channel. 'Two 10+ hour flights, four trains and it is still the best mud cake on this planet. Can confirm it is the only Coles mud cake that has seen the light of the Northern Hemisphere,' she wrote at the time. One person asked her why she had taken the cake to the toilet with her, to which she responded: 'Airport security has been upped, leaving suitcases alone outside may result in a mass security pile up as they think it could be a bomb. 'Unfortunately nowadays cakes are no different. Leaving cakes outside could result in the bomb squad being called, and myself being arrested. Either that or someone will eat it,' she said, laughing. A creative woman has impressed hundreds online after transforming an old cabinet into a stylish home bar. Nicole, from South Australia, upcycled the huge piece of furniture and refreshed the look with a lick of blue paint. After sharing images to a popular Facebook group, Nicole admitted she had 'no idea' what she was doing but was happy with the end result. The cabinet originally looked outdated with a dark varnished look, but was converted into an incredible bar with battery-operated LED Lights and slide-out ice maker. Before: The huge cabinet originally looked outdated with a dark varnished look After: Nicole, from South Australia, upcycled the huge piece of furniture and refreshed the look with a lick of blue paint Nicole used blue paint from Bunnings Warehouse and bought the ice maker from eBay for $140. 'My hydration station. I had no idea what I was doing. Love the people at Bunnings, Gawler S.A.....always so helpful!' she wrote online. The middle cabinet drawer and doors were also removed to allocate space for the ice maker. Once the paint had dried, Nicole placed a Jack Daniel's bar mat on the counter along with her collection of spirits. 'My hydration station. I had no idea what I was doing. Love the people at Bunnings, Gawler S.A.....always so helpful!' she wrote online The middle cabinet drawer and doors were also removed to allocate space for the ice maker The social media post was quickly flooded with comments and words of praise from others who approved of the DIY project. 'Wow! What a fantastic idea! It looks AMAZING!' one woman wrote. 'This is incredible!' another added, a third said: 'I should have done this!' The easy idea also acted as inspiration for others to upcycle old furniture rather than opting to buy new pieces. A dermal therapist has created a skincare range that women are claiming has banished their acne in as little as three days. Gabrielle Singh launched Cosmology Skincare in 2018, with the aim of tackling an array of complexion issues caused by the tricky Australian climate. Just three years later, the brand has become a runaway success, with hundreds of before and after pictures shared on Instagram that show just how effective Cosmology's products are in action. A dermal therapist has created a skincare range that women are claiming has banished their acne in as little as three days (founder Gabrielle Singh pictured) BEFORE AND AFTER: Gabrielle Singh launched Cosmology Skincare in 2018, with the aim of tackling an array of complexion issues caused by the tricky Australian climate (pictured before and after use) BEFORE AND AFTER: Devotees of the brand say products like the Purifying Serum ($66), Hydrating Milk Cleanser ($56) and Daily Moisturiser ($76) have helped to soothe their problem skin (pictured) There are four different ranges, depending on your skin type: the Rejuvenating range, the Purifying range, the Resurfacing range and the Pro range (pictured) The four skincare ranges in detail * REJUVENATING RANGE: A range that works on the specific signs of ageing. The products hydrate and plump the skin, repairing DNA and regenerating skin renewal. * PURIFYING RANGE: A range that has been developed to bring solutions to acne-prone skin. The products remove dirt and un-clog pores without stripping the skin using acids and active ingredients. * RESURFACING RANGE: A range that is focused on treating skin texture, improving aspects of elasticity, volume and brightness. The products reduce the appearance of scars and pigmentation. * PRO RANGE: A range that has been developed for use alongside clinical treatments. The products are perfect for use alongside treatments like skin needling, and laser and chemical peel treatments. Advertisement Devotees of the brand say products like the Purifying Serum ($66), Hydrating Milk Cleanser ($56) and Daily Moisturiser ($76) have helped to soothe their problem skin and get rid of pimples in as little as three days with dedicated use. There are four different ranges, depending on your skin type: the Rejuvenating range, the Purifying range, the Resurfacing range and the Pro range - and each of these are designed to help with different concerns. 'Having a background in skin, I know what clients and individuals face on a daily basis and I don't believe one product is suitable for every skin concern,' Gabrielle told FEMAIL. 'The idea for Cosmology appeared after years of working with different skin concerns, treatments and products, trying to find an effective combination of formulas and routines, and allowing clients to visibly see improvements in the appearance of their skin.' Gabrielle added: 'Cosmology was established to target the different skin concerns found in Australia, a place where sun damage is real and the climate can get to extremely low and extremely high temperatures. 'Our country has a unique lifestyle, revolving around salt water, sweat and lots of sun exposure, with skin becoming genetically prone to hyper-pigmentation.' Those who have tried the products have shown off how their complexions have transformed in days or weeks. Just three years after launch, the brand has become a runaway success with clients (products pictured) 'This is one of my absolute favourite products in my skin routine,' one reviewer wrote of the eye cream. 'The texture of the cream leaves my very delicate skin under my eyes, feeling soft and hydrated. Highly recommend.' Another added: 'This product is liquid gold. Whenever my eyes are looking tired and have dark bags I can always count on this product to help me look fresh and renewed. Love love.' BEFORE AND AFTER: Reviews online are glowing, with many sharing before and after pictures of their skin (pictured) Gabrielle (pictured) shared her tips for reducing 'maskne', or the specific acne many are suffering from in the wake of having to wear masks everywhere during the COVID-19 pandemic Gabrielle also shared her tips and tricks for reducing 'maskne', or the specific acne many are suffering from in the wake of having to wear masks everywhere during the COVID-19 pandemic. 'Maskne is a real struggle and it can be really hard to prevent breakouts occurring with the regular use of masks, but you can help it when you look at your skincare routine,' she told Daily Mail Australia. 'I suggest using products that help to calm the skin to avoid any irritation from occurring. 'Products like a gently cleanser that won't strip your skin, and also ingredients like lactic acid, as this helps to promote cell turnover, improves our skin's texture, cleans our pores and leaves your complexion looking more radiant.' The dermal therapist's other tips for treating 'maskne' include double cleansing at night, single cleansing in the morning and looking for skincare that includes ingredients like niacinimide and other anti-inflammatories. 'Change your pillowcase regularly and clean your phone too,' Gabrielle added. 'This is a big one that so many people don't do and it can lead to breakouts.' For more information about Cosmology Skincare, please visit the website here. Australians are raving about an affordable body wash from a Melbourne skincare brand, with many crediting it for curing spots and dryness caused by face masks. Customers say The Base Collective's $32 Magnesium and White Tea Body Wash has cleared up a range of conditions including mask-related acne, flaky patches, and eczema in a matter of weeks. One man even claims a year of showering with the body wash has cured his Morgellens disease, a rare condition caused by fibres gathering beneath the skin which results in a near-constant stinging and 'crawling' sensation. Packed with powerful natural ingredients including aloe vera juice and almond and avocado oils, the fragrance-free product is so popular that one sells online every minute. Australians are raving about a $32 body wash from Melbourne skincare brand The Base Collective, with many crediting it for curing ailments including acne, dry patches and eczema (Pictured: A customer's arm before and after using the product) Packed with powerful natural ingredients including aloe vera juice and almond and avocado oils, the fragrance-free body wash (pictured) is so popular that one sells online every minute The Base Collective co-founder, Cassie Sanghvi, used her background in pharmaceutical cosmetics to create a skincare line specially for sensitive skin types. Each product including the body wash is pH-balanced, which means they are gentle enough even for those with eczema prone skin, while still being effective at scrubbing away dirt, sweat, oil and traces of makeup. 'We are receiving a lot of anecdotal feedback from customers who are seeing pleasing results with eczema and sensitive skin concerns,' Ms Sangvhi told Daily Mail Australia. She added: 'It's not surprising from a formulation perspective as we specifically designed the wash with sensitive skin in mind.' All The Base Collective products is pH-balanced, which means they are gentle enough even for those with eczema prone skin, while still being effective at scrubbing away dirt, sweat, oil and traces of makeup The body wash has attracted glowing reviews on the brand's website, with satisfied shoppers calling it 'soothing' and the perfect antidote to persistent dryness. 'So soothing, my skin feels so soft and hasn't had any dry patches like it normally does,' one woman wrote. A second added: 'I use this everywhere including the face its that gentle. Non drying and nicely hydrating. Has helped calm down my sensitive skin.' 'I've been using this for a few weeks now and my dry eczema skin has gone,' added a third. 'I was skeptical but it's been so good. Love that it doesn't have a scent also.' One mother said the body wash 'worked wonders' on her eight-year-old son's itchy, irritated skin. However some said the texture of the product was too watery for their liking and would not be purchasing it again. An elderly woman living alone in Sydney who was 'going without food' during the city's gruelling lockdown was forced to write to a friend begging for $20 to buy groceries. A member of the Facebook community group for Cremorne and Neutral Bay, north of the CBD, said she knew of a woman who had barely eaten or left her house since the shutdown started nine weeks ago on June 26. In desperation, the woman is said to have written to a friend in South Australia asking for the paltry sum of $20 to spend on food. Once she received the money, the woman finally ventured to a supermarket where a local community volunteer noticed her distress and helped her with her shopping. The charity worker who shared the story online urged Sydneysiders to watch out for their vulnerable neighbours and elderly relatives who may be struggling to get basic necessities as lockdown rolls on. A member of the Facebook community group for Cremorne and Neutral Bay said she knew of a woman who had barely eaten or left her house since Sydney's shutdown started on June 26 New South Wales reached another grim milestone on Thursday chalking a record 1,029 cases overnight - the state's highest daily total since the pandemic began in early 2020. Three unvaccinated residents, men in their 30s, 60s and 80s from the city's west and south-west, also died overnight while Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced new freedoms for those who are double vaccinated from September 13. 'I am putting out a story I have just heard about an elderly lady in Cremorne who is on her own and not eating as she could not get out or sort out how to get food in the lockdown,' the woman wrote on Facebook. 'Luckily one of our volunteers found her in the local supermarket and helped her. She was on her own and had to send a letter to a friend in South Australia to send her $20.' Services available to the elderly and vulnerable in lockdown - Older Persons Advocacy Network (OPAN) Call 1800 700 600 8am to 8pm Monday to Friday and 10am to 4pm Saturday to be connected to the aged care advocacy organisation in your state or territory. - Community Care Kitchen Australia Anyone struggling to find money for food can contact the emergency relief hotline on 0459 425 818. - Care2Share Meal Sharing Australia This Facebook group allows people to donate food and essentials to those in need by posting their offerings online. Members in need can contact posters directly and receive donations through private messages. Advertisement The volunteer ended her post with a plea to readers, asking them to look out for the elderly and isolated. 'If they are doing it tough let us know and we can organise a package for them - this is also for families who have lost jobs and suffering,' she wrote. 'We are sending out food to the west and inner-west but can help our own. Please keep your eyes and ears out.' It is not clear which charity organisation is being referred to. Daily Mail Australia has contacted the woman for comment. Her post revealed the heartwarming community spirit of North Sydneysiders, racking up dozens of responses with many offering to lend a hand to anyone in need. Community support workers are urging Sydneysiders to watch out for vulnerable neighbours as the city's gruelling lockdown rolls on (stock image) 'This is just heartbreaking. I'm near the IGA in Cremorne and more than happy to help,' one woman replied. A second added: 'Oh bless that's so hard and sad to hear, I hope she is ok. Would do anything to help.' Others said the woman should be registered with My Aged Care so she can be connected to a home support service. Meanwhile some offered suggestions of simple ways to make life easier for the elderly. 'When I'm out on my dog walk I always ask older people if they are ok, and if anything I can do for them. They love my dog so we have a bit of a chat about dogs. Poor things,' said one woman. A mother was left stunned after her daughter she hadn't seen for 18 months surprised her by dressing up as a waiter at a local pub to serve her drinks. Spanish teacher Sophie Nugent, who lives in Doha, Qatar, with her husband, had not been able to return to the UK for more than a year because of travel restrictions - and came up with a plan to make her reunion with her mother extra special. After secretly booking a flight home, Sophie surprised her mother Emma and her stepfather Paul while they were having drinks at a pub in Rawdon, West Yorkshire. Her sister Sasha filmed the moment Sophie, dressed in a white shirt and black trousers like the rest of the staff, approached the table with drinks, wearing a face mask and sunglasses to conceal her identity. Sophie Nugent surprised her mother, Emma, At a Leeds pub after not seeing each other for 18 months Emma was visibly shocked when the waitress revealed herself to be Emma's daughter and gasped before getting up to give her a cuddle As she whipped off her glasses and mask to reveal her face, her mother was left open-mouthed with shock. Emma said: 'I'd wondered a few times how I would feel when I saw Soph again. I thought I would cry or jump up and down, but I was completely paralysed with shock.' Sophie added: 'I've got to admit, I was taken aback at just how shocked my mom was - she's not usually lost for words!' The reunion was made even more special because Sophie and her husband recently tied the knot in Qatar, with her family unable to make the journey for the big day. Currently, when entering the UK from Qatar, those who are not fully vaccinated will still have to quarantine. Sophie's sister, Sasha, was in on the surprise and made sure to be the one to collect the order to give to Sophie who was hiding elsewhere Sophie stayed in character throughout the charade and even apologised for not have the correct wine before her mum had time to notice who was serving Emma thought she would jump up and down when she saw Sophie again but instead she was paralysed with shock. Pictured: Sophie with her family after returning from Qatar Sophie planned the surprise a week ahead of her return home in mid-July. Sasha helped arrange the pub visit and Sophie waited hidden inside, ready for the big reveal. Once Emma, Sasha and Paul were seated and had ordered their drinks, Sasha made a secret trip to the bar and asked the staff if Sophie could carry the order to their table instead. She returned to the table and text Sophie to give her the signal. Emma approached the table and took off her sunglasses and mask but stayed in character by apologising to her mother for not having the correct wine. Sophie spent four weeks with her family after arriving back in the UK. Pictured: Sophie with her family after returning from Qatar Sophie has had a wonderful visit home since being reunited with her family. Pictured: Sophie with her family after returning from Qatar Emma initially stared wide-eyed at her daughter, unable to speak, before the women hugged. Emma added: 'It was the best surprise that I have ever experienced and I'm so happy that we've been able to spend four weeks together, it has been fantastic.' Sophie said: 'I've been blown away by the response of my return to England, it has been an amazing visit home.' A doctor has warned women in their 20s could be going through perimenopause without realising due to a lack of understanding about the symptoms. Dr Louise Newson, from Stratford-upon-Avon, appeared on Lorraine to explain she did not even know enough to recognise when she was going through the perimenopause in her early 40s. Perimenopause refers to the time during which your body makes the natural transition to menopause, marking the end of the reproductive years. Also called the menopausal transition, it can occur up to 10 years before the menopause itself. Dr Newson, who now runs the Menopause Doctor website, suffered from a low mood, fatigue, irritability and migraines. Other symptoms include decreased fertility, hot flushes and trouble sleeping, loss of bone and changes to cholesterol. Dr Louise Newson said that perimenopause was like having a 'demon in her head telling her to shout' as she revealed she was incorrectly refused HRT and offered antidepressants instead Dr Newson, author of Preparing for the Perimenopause and Menopause, explained several of her patients are young women, including one 14-year-old who only had one natural period before she started going through perimenopause. Explaining that there's no test for perimenopause, she said: 'It's about the woman trying to understand, to track her period, to monitor symptoms and to learn that the perimenopause can occur a decade before the menopause. 'The average age in the UK is 51, so most women in their 40s will be perimenopausal. But one in 100 women under 40 have an early menopause.' This in turn means that women in their 20s and 30s could be going through it. She told host Christine Lampard on to say that women have been 'turned away' from HRT for years because of 'misinformation' and that treatment is an effective way of 'reducing the risk of disease'. She went on to say that women have been 'turned away' from HRT for years because of 'misinformation' and that treatment is an effective way of 'reducing the risk of disease'. What is Perimenopause? Perimenopause, or menopause transition, begins several years before menopause. It's the time when the ovaries gradually begin to make less estrogen. It usually starts in women's 40s, but can start in their 30s or even earlier. Perimenopause lasts up until menopause, the point when the ovaries stop releasing eggs. In the last 1 to 2 years of perimenopause, this drop in estrogen speeds up. At this stage, many women have menopause symptoms. The average length of perimenopause is 4 years, but for some women this stage may last only a few months or continue for 10 years. Perimenopause ends when women have gone 12 months without having their period. SOURCE: WebMD Advertisement 'There has been so much misinformation for years', she said. 'People have thought of the menopause as something that causes a few hot flushes and we can get through it. 'But when we understand it is a hormone deficiency that has health risks that affects all women directly and men indirectly and also there is treatment available. 'We've been turned away from HRT for the last 20 years because people have been given misinformation. If there's no treatment for something we just sort of thought well we'll get through it. 'But actually there is treatment, there's evidence based treatment. There's ways of working out what is going on and reducing the risk of disease. We have to change the narrative to improve women's future health.' Pointing to her own experience, she said perimenopause was like having a 'demon in her head telling her to shout' as she revealed she was incorrectly refused HRT and offered antidepressants instead. 'It's completely ironic because I was developing my menopause website,' she said. 'I was 45 and I was starting to feel very tired, very irritable and cross with my family. 'It was like I had a demon in my head telling me I could shout and it didn't matter, I was also getting migraines and waking up in the night.' The mother, who penned Preparing for the Perimenopause and Menopause, put her symptoms down to 'working too hard' but eventually realised she was going through the perimenopause and was keen to start treatment. 'I knew that HRT provides more benefits than risks', she said. 'I went to my local GP who told me incorrectly that he couldn't give me HRT because it was dangerous and offered me anti-depressants which might help my low mood. So I had to go and seek help elsewhere.' Two brothers who made a documentary about how different cultures view people with Down's Syndrome have revealed some 'very dark places' they visited during their trip - even coming across someone who claimed to be able to 'cure' the condition for money in Hanoi, Vietnam. Nick Bourne, 29, filmed his experiences travelling the world with his brother Alex, 26, who has Down's Syndrome, for their film Handsome, which will be released later this month. The pair experienced Speaking on This Morning today, Nick said that they made the documentary because they were 'anxious' about what Alex's future holds, and because there was 'nothing else like it'. Viewers quickly took to Twitter after the segment, with one writing: 'Love the brotherly bond with Alex and and his big brother on.' Nick Bourne, 29, (right) filmed their experiences travelling the world with his brother Alex, 26, (left) who has Down's Syndrome, for their film Handsome, which will be released later this month Nick admitted that he was 'a little bit ashamed growing up, of Alex', but that he feels it's important to accept his feelings to move on. 'I love him now', he said. 'I think it's important to do something that so you are truthful and say it's okay to have those feelings and recognise them and learn and move on from them.' He went on: 'Just kind of at parties, social events, at school it was just I didn't to be want him around my friends because he was different. But that feeling is okay, let's talk about it and recognise it.' Nick added he did the documentary because he felt 'there was nothing like it' out there. Nick admitted to hosts Ruth Langsford and Eammon Holmes that he was 'a little bit ashamed growing up, of Alex', but that he feels it's important to accept his feelings to move on Nick and Alex visited Cornwall, New York City, Mumbai and Hanoi to make their documentary - recalling an incident where a scammer offered to 'cure' Alex for $100 He said: 'I always felt maybe when Alex grows up, there will be fears and anxiety about when my parents go, hope are we going to cope. What's on the horizon for Alex so it was important to do I felt and there's nothing like it.' In the documentary, Nick and Alex visited Cornwall, New York City, Mumbai and Hanoi - recalling an incident where a scammer offered to 'cure' Alex for $100. 'When we started making it we thought this was going to be a very loving fun adventure, but we came across people who were different to Alex and I', said Nick. 'Down's Syndrome was something they didn't want to talk about and by the time we got to Vietnam there were some very dark places we went to. Viewers quickly took to Twitter after the segment, with one writing: 'Love the brotherly bond with Alex and and his big brother on.' 'As brothers i'm thinking, I don't want to push the boundaries too far but it was important to show it for an audience to tell the truth 'We saw someone who said if we give them $100 there's a 60 per cent charge Alex could be cured and they take money from tourists who are happy to pay this.' Viewers were touched by the pair's story with one taking to Twitter to write: 'What a beautiful story. If this teaches you anything today. Never take life for granted. Push yourself and never have regrets. A really beautiful inspirational story for anyone with a disability or with Down's Syndrome.' Another said: 'We take life for granted so much, and we can be so selfish. Their bond is unbreakable, what a beautiful story. ' 'What an amazing love between these brothers', wrote a third viewer. A Missouri mom and registered nurse is urging pregnant women to get vaccinated against COVID-19 after losing her own baby due to the virus. Vanessa Alfermann, 33, was 22 weeks pregnant last November when she and her husband both contracted COVID-19 but while her symptoms were otherwise mild, they did cause a dangerous placental abruption that sent her into early labor. She soon gave birth to a baby boy named Axel, who at 18 weeks premature died almost immediately after being born. Alfermann, who was immunized a month later when the vaccine received emergency approval, is now fighting vaccine misinformation and warning other pregnant women to get the shot. 'Theres so much misinformation out there thats killing people and its frustrating,' she said. 'I speak out about this for Axels legacy.' Tragic: Vanessa Alfermann, 33, was 22 weeks pregnant last November when she and her husband both contracted COVID-19 She had mild symptoms like a headache and loss of smell and taste. But after some back pain and cramps, she went into labor prematurely and delivered a baby who didn't survive Alfermann, a registered nurse at Missouri Baptist Sullivan, has a son and stepdaughter and was excitedly awaiting the arrival of another child last fall when she tested positive for the virus. 'My husband had symptoms and he tested positive and the next day I also tested positive,' she told Good Morning America. 'I never had shortness of breath but was just really tired,' she went on, adding that she also experienced headaches and loss of taste and smell. But 10 days after positive test, she also began experiencing back pain and cramps, and went to the OBGYN to get checked out. 'The baby was fine [in an ultrasound] but my white blood cells were really high and they said I had an infection from COVID and gave me an antibiotic and some muscle relaxers to go home with,' she recalled. 'The next morning at about 1:30 I got up and realized I was in labor.' COVID-19 had caused blood clots in her placenta which led to dangerous placenta abruption, which sent her into early labor Alfermann hadn't been vaccinated because it wasn't yet available, but she has since had the shot Alfermann was just 22 weeks pregnant, two weeks shy of the 24 weeks when a fetus is considered viable. With her husband in isolation, Alfermann's mother-in-law drove her to the hospital, where she soon gave birth to baby Axel, who died almost immediately. 'Within a half hour from me getting there and getting up to the [labor and delivery] floor, Axel was born. I didnt even get to hold him. The NICU people held him and he took his breath with them and then he passed away,' Alfermann said. She learned that blood clots in her placenta due to COVID had caused a placental abruption, a condition in which the placenta separates from the wall of the uterus before birth. The condition is dangerous for both mother and baby, as the fetus can be deprived of oxygen and the mother can die as well. 'It was mind-blowing because dont think youre going to get a blood clot on your placenta,' Alfermann said of possible COVID symptoms. Speaking out: She is urging pregnant women to get vaccinated Campaign: The CDC recommends pregnant women get vaccinated, but three out of four in the US have not '[You think] youre going to be put on a ventilator because you cant breathe. I went through all of these emotions but I also thought if this is whats coming, what COVID does, it just scared me.' Alfermann went on to get vaccinated in December, said while she was happy to get the shot, she was heartbroken that she hadn't been able to get it sooner 'I could still be waiting to have my baby boy,' she said. 'Its very bittersweet.' She is now urging other pregnant women three out of four of whom in the US are unvaccinated to get the shot as well. The CDC has recommended the vaccine for pregnant women, and pointed out that COVID-19 can be particularly dangerous for them. COVID-19 can cause pregnant women to deliver prematurely, and one doctor told GMA that her hospital has seen more stillbirths among COVID-positive pregnant patients. A Texas mother-of-four has revealed how she quit her full-time job to become a dumpster diver, after discovering that she could make a staggering $1,000-a-week by selling discarded items she found in the trash. Tiffany She'ree, 32, from Dallas, and her husband Daniel Roach, 38, met in September 2016. They both had kids from prior relationships - Kaylee, 17, and Blake, eight, from Daniel's side, and Mia, nine, and Ruxton, seven, from Tiffany's side - and have since merged into one big happy family. Around the time that they met, Tiffany saw a YouTube video of a group of girls out dumpster diving and decided she wanted to try it for herself. After going out for the first time in January 2017 and finding a box of brand new makeup worth around $1,200 in makeup and skincare products she returned home to Daniel and showed him her haul. Money making: Texas mother-of-four Tiffany She'ree, 32, quit her full-time job in order to become a dumpster diver - after discovering she could make $1,000 from selling 'trash' Unique: Tiffany first began experimenting with dumpster diving in late 2016 when she saw a video about it on YouTube - and on her first mission she found $1,200 worth of beauty items Sharing is caring: The mother and her husband Daniel Roach, 38, both had two children from other relationships when they met and became a blended family of six The next night, they went out together to see what they could find and since then they haven't stopped. 'Daniel and I met through Tinder and had our first date at the Rainforest Cafe,' said Tiffany. 'I told him that I was a package deal with my two kids and he told me he was too - we've been together ever since. 'I'd never heard of or thought about dumpster diving before I randomly saw a video on YouTube of these girls dumpster diving. When I saw the haul they came back with I knew I had to try it for myself.' For nearly five years, they've consistently rummaged through their dumpsters locally and further afield to do everything from house decoration to clothing themselves and their kids, as well as selling their valuable finds. Just over a year ago, in 2020, Tiffany quit her job as a canteen sever to pursue dumpster diving full-time. Lucrative: Tiffany proudly shows off her dumpster hauls online - particularly on TikTok where she has become something of a viral sensation Wow: She visits many different dumpsters while out on her trips, resulting in a wide variety of products, from fashion items to toys to beauty products Big-ticket item: In recent months, Tiffany has found a number of pricey kitchen appliances and tech items, including this $750 Delonghi coffee maker Score! Tiffany has even managed to find some big-ticket items like this smart TV, which she pulled out of a dumpster Under fire: She has been documenting her hauls on TikTok - where she has two million followers - showcasing items like this $250 turtle habitat that she found 'Daniel and I went out diving together and since then it's been consistent for almost five years now. A little over a year ago I quit my job to do this full-time,' she said. One man's trash... some of the priciest items Tiffany has pulled out of dumpsters Ulta makeup and skincare $1,200 Delonghi Cappuccino Maker $750 Samsung Galaxy Watch $270 Zoo Med Turtle Habitat $250 Vera Bradley backpack $145 Advertisement 'We've furnished at least 75 per cent of our house with dumpster finds, from couches to tables and chairs to decor and more.' Through dumpster diving, she's been able to support herself entirely including paying her half of bills and living costs which come to around $800 to $1,000 a week. She now runs a popular TikTok account, which has two million followers who eagerly await updates on her dumpsters 'scores'. The mother-of-four targets dumpsters outside of big-name stores, which fill up the trash with items that have been discarded for a variety of reasons - from slightly damaged packaging to returns that cannot be re-sold due to store policies. Her TikTok account documents hauls from companies like Victoria's Secret, Bath & Body Works, Bed Bath & Beyond, Party City, and Ulta - with Tiffany proudly showing off huge 'scores' from each one. Among her more valuable finds in recent months are a $750 coffee machine from Bed Bath & Beyond, and hundreds of dollars worth of unopened makeup products. Major: She has also recovered hundreds of dollars worth of beauty products from outside of Ulta stores - landing unopened items from brands like Clinique and Laura Mercier Watch this! Another costly item that was recently recovered by Tiffany's husband Daniel is this $270 Samsung smart watch Variety: When she goes to big stores like Burlington, there is no telling what Tiffany will end up finding in the dumpster Brand new: This haul saw Tiffany snagging headphones and plenty of men's boxer shorts - all of which were still in their original packaging and appeared to be brand new Fashion favorites: She also found a supply of bags from Vera Bradley - which can cost up to $150 each Many of her followers are keen to let her know how much she inspires them, and she regularly receives messages from people sharing their finds and telling her she's inspired them to start diving too. However, Tiffany does come under fire from some critics, who have accused her of being 'homeless', and have suggested that dumpster diving is the same as 'stealing'. However, the mom-of-four regularly claps back at her trolls, pointing out that the items she is taking out of the dumpsters would likely have gone into landfill had she not 'saved' them, while insisting that she is 'doing nothing wrong'. She also urges others not to judge a book by its cover, claiming that dumpster diving has unfairly been labeled as 'nasty' or 'dirty'. Tiffany is also constantly surprised by the items she finds in the dumpsters, which range from homeware to beauty products to big-ticket tech items like televisions and kitchen appliances. 'I've found bedsheets, pillows, blankets, towels, little odds and ends, even pet products like cat trees and dog cages,' she said. 'So far in 2021 alone, I've saved at least $3,000 - in previous years, I was saving this across the whole year so 2021 has definitely been a better year.' On sale: Tiffany and her family sell the items that they find in dumpster at garage sales Something for everyone: Many of the items that Tiffany finds have been discarded by stores and she makes sure to hit dumpsters that are located outside of retailers Family time: Tiffany is more than happy to share her love of dumpster diving with her kids Globally, 2.01 billion tons of waste is generated annually, with at least 1.3 billion tons going to landfill every year. Proponents of dumpster diving argue that it helps reduce the amount of waste going to landfill and has a positive impact on the planet. The legality of dumpster diving varies from country to country - in America, it was found to be legal by the U.S Supreme Court in 1988 whereas in England and Wales it may qualify as theft under the Theft Act of 1968. Tiffany has had her TikTok videos removed by the platform multiple times for violating their community guidelines as they claim her videos include 'illegal activities and unregulated goods'. 'I just really want to show people what's possible through dumpster diving,' said Tiffany. 'I had never heard of TikTok before and then the first video I posted on there just blew up and I immediately gained fifty thousand followers. 'It went viral so I just kept posting and inspired a lot of people to go dumpster diving. 'I definitely still get negative comments but I think it's ninety per cent positive nowadays. 'I'm happy that I'm saving items from landfills and doing my bit to help the environment and keep the planet clean.' Bridget Malcolm has opened up about having a panic attack because her driver smelled like the man who allegedly sexually assaulted her when she was a teen, saying she 'lost a decade' of her life to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The Australian model, 29, detailed the incident in a candid TikTok on Wednesday, less than two months after she shared a video about how she was sexually assaulted multiple times before she was 18. 'Earlier this week, I was in a Lyft and my driver smelled like my childhood abuser and that resulted in me, for the entire duration of the hour-long drive, sitting there being triggered, feeling frozen, having a lot of anxiety, feeling intensely uncomfortable, and just basically panicking because I was having lots of flashbacks,' she recalled. Scroll down for video Sharing: Bridget Malcolm, 29, opened up about her recent panic attack in a candid TikTok video, explaining she has post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) Hard to handle: The Australian model explained that she panicked during her hour-long Lyft ride last week because her driver 'smelled like my childhood abuser' 'And then when I finally finished the drive and I got out of the car, I proceeded to have a panic attack and this is my life,' continued Malcolm, who said she suffers from PTSD from the abuse. The former Victoria's Secret model explained that something like a smell can trigger her to have flashbacks and panic attacks, saying: 'I basically feel like I'm a teenager all over again.' Malcolm went on to share her frustration that the legal system doesn't value women's voices and fails survivors like herself. 'I want to know why are women's voices not believed and not counted as important,' she said. 'I lost a decade of my life to dealing with symptoms and the fall out from the actions of this one person. Why is my voice not important enough to be counted?' Feeling ignored: Malcolm went on to share her frustration that the legal system doesn't value women's voices and fails survivors like herself Malcolm claimed that she tried to press charges against the person who had sexually assaulted her, but she was told 'there wasn't enough evidence,' even though she provided emails, witness statements, and corroboration. 'It's like how much more do you need? How much more of my life do you need to take from me?' she asked. 'Anyway, I'm alright. I'm well in recovery, and I am learning to live with the actions of this one person, but it makes me really f**king mad, like really, really angry. 'And I guess if the legal system fails women like me who are survivors of sexual trauma, especially of a historical nature, I guess I'll just make TikToks about it.' Malcolm ended her video with a message to others who are facing similar struggles in their own lives. 'To all my fellow survivors out there, I say you are strong, you are powerful, the actions of one person does not have to dictate the rest of your life,' she said. 'Get into therapy and find your strength.' Opening up: Malcolm's latest TikTok comes less than two months after she shared a video about how she was sexually assaulted multiple times before she was 18 Frustrating: The former Victoria's Secret star (pictured in 2015) claimed she tried to press charges against the person who assaulted her but was told there wasn't enough evidence Malcom, who has more than 60,000 TikTok followers, has been using her platform to speak out against the fashion industry while detailing the alleged abuse she experienced as a teen model. 'By the age of 18, I'd lived in three countries alone,' she said in a post from June 30. 'I traveled to all continents except for Antarctica. I'd been groomed by a much older man. I'd been sexually assaulted multiple times.' She claimed that her agencies pressured her to lose weight, saying she was repeatedly told to 'do cocaine' and have 'lots of sex' while she was underage to drop pounds from her already thin frame. Malcolm recounted struggling with her gender identity, anorexia, orthorexia, anxiety, and depression during this period in her life. 'I couldn't socialize without drinking. I was developing quite the reliance on Xanax and Ambien in order to get me through the night. And that was before I turned 18,' she explained. 'It didn't get better from there. Voice: Malcom, who has more than 60,000 TikTok followers, has been using her platform to speak out against the fashion industry while detailing the alleged abuse she experienced Happy: The model recently shared that she is now 'two-plus years sober' and 'four years in recovering from an eating disorder,' saying: 'I feel the best I've ever felt' 'Eight years later on my 26th birthday I had a nervous breakdown and I couldn't leave my house for a year without panic attacks and severe anxiety. I also had a bout with suicidal ideation which was terrifying. That was four years ago.' Malcolm said she is now 'two-plus years sober' and 'four years in recovering from an eating disorder,' which is why she feels strong enough to speak out against the industry. 'I'm happy. I'm balanced. I'm strong and I feel the best I've ever felt,' she shared. 'The reality is, I couldn't talk about my experiences before I reached this place because I would have intense PTSD flashbacks. I would have panic attacks and I wouldn't be okay. 'But I am okay now, and that's why I'm speaking out.' Such wonderful news that Madonna's daughter Lourdes has become the face of 'inclusion and diversity' for Swarovski crystals! For who could be more representative of inclusion and diversity than the daughter of a pop star multi-millionairess whose progress through life so far could arguably be represented by the hot knife of nepotism slicing through a pat of privilege butter over and over again. Lourdes says this is not true, because she paid her own college tuition fees from the money she got modelling. Some might say she only got the lucrative modelling jobs because she was Madonna's daughter but perhaps I am being harsh. Such wonderful news that Madonna's daughter Lourdes has become the face of 'inclusion and diversity' for Swarovski crystals! Now 24, Lourdes has certainly inherited the best of genes from her mother and father Carlos Leon, along with developing a tattooed street style all of her own. However even her greatest fans, of which I am sure there are many, must admit there is nothing obviously special about her; surely nothing that would attract the attention of global brands such as Marc Jacobs and Stella McCartney, for whom she has fronted advertising campaigns except the lustre of her celebrity lineage. 'People think I'm this talentless rich kid who's had everything given to her, but I'm not,' Lourdes told American Vogue magazine this month. I hear you, Sis! While it warms the very cockles of my heart to see this independent role model get out there in the world under her own fragrant steam, I prefer the more honest approach of someone like TV presenter and fitness expert Chloe Madeley, who admits that having famous parents in this case the broadcasters Richard and Judy boosted her career. 'I was accused of nepotism,' she said recently. 'It was true, therefore it hurt.' Now 24, Lourdes has certainly inherited the best of genes from her mother and father Carlos Leon, along with developing a tattooed street style all of her own It is so rare for anyone who benefits from celebrity nepotism to actually admit their success might be due to others. It's a touchy subject! Their egos can't take it! Yet one might have hoped that the kind of oily favouritism from which Lourdes Leon and her ilk so richly benefit would have little place in the post-Covid world; a world in which society might look less favourably upon the antics of the unjustly entitled who gobble up all the access and opportunity denied to others, and hopefully re-evaluates what is truly important, perhaps even bringing down the curtain on vapid celebrity endorsements once and for all. But don't hold your breath. Lourdes is busy, busy, busy promoting the wares of Swarovski, a jewellery company which sells everything from 20 pineapple-shaped magnets to a 1,700 rhodium-plated necklace called the Hyperbola Choker. There are payment plans in place for those young men and women who, unlike Lourdes, cannot afford the crystal cuffs or the stud earrings or the sparkly 900 evening bags and, really, nothing screams inclusivity like the words 'four interest-free payments of 225'. And judging by their announcement, Swarovski clearly think they have signed up some potential Nobel Prize winner onto their books. 'Model, actress, linguist, academic and activist, Lourdes personifies the spirit of Swarovski,' gushes the company, which is a hyperbola choker all of its own. Actress? She was in one of her mum's pop videos, but that hardly makes her Meryl Streep. They could have added cosmetic-ologist (Lourdes launched her own make-up range when she was 14) and couturier (she designed a range of clothes a few years later). Yet she failed to make much of an impact with either, despite them being the kind of golden chances which many far more talented young people can only dream about. This month Lourdes is on the cover of American Vogue, even if it is no secret that she like King Kong and Julia Roberts before her is most famous for not shaving her armpits. 'Yeah, come at me, Bro,' is apparently what she says to anyone who criticises her intimate grooming choices. It's the pits, it really is. To me, hairy Lourdes sums up the very, very worst of celebrity nepotism this lucrative knotweed that chokes the talent pool across all the glamour professions in particular, making it difficult for ordinary kids without connections or a famous name to stick even a crampon in the foothills of fame and fortune. At a time when so many youngsters are struggling with pandemic-stunted lives and careers through no fault of their own, you would think that someone like Madonna's daughter might be more tactful and discreet about her success. But Lourdes clearly didn't get the empathy memo, Bro. Of course, she is not the only SAD (Sons And Daughters of famous people) to trade on her name. Look at the Jaggers. In no special order of merit we have Jade (jewellery designer), James (musician), Georgia (model), Gabriel (model) and Elizabeth (model). For who could be more representative of inclusion and diversity than the daughter of a pop star multi-millionairess whose progress through life so far could arguably be represented by the hot knife of nepotism slicing through a pat of privilege butter over and over again Meanwhile lacklustre photographer Brooklyn Beckham is the human embodiment of parental hope over prodigal no-talent expectation, while over in Hollywood, Destry Spielberg, daughter of director Steven, has hit back at claims she has benefited from nepotism. 'I have literally been trying to get into the film industry for over seven years now. No matter who you are, it is hard,' wailed Destry, who is shortly to direct a film starring Hopper Penn (son of Sean) with a script written by Owen King (son of Stephen). Elsewhere, Demi Moore appeared in a swimwear campaign with three of her daughters, while Spandau Ballet member Martin Kemp's Marks & Spencer advertising campaign with son Roman has helped make his boy a millionaire at 28. Bradley Walsh has been making television programmes with his son Barney, while Maya Hawke, daughter of Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke, was cast in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon A Time In Hollywood. Would they really have got there without their famous names or is each one an opportunity denied to someone else? Next month 19-year-old Tilly Ramsay, daughter of chef Gordon, will appear as a contestant on this year's Strictly Come Dancing after working her way up the hard way, via appearances on her dad's television programmes. All these showbiz liberals, these darlings of democracy who are so keen on equality, fraternity and individual rights except when it comes to prioritising and pushing their own kids down the flume of fame. Nepotism gets you through the door, say the SADS, but it rarely allows you to stay if you don't prove yourself. What they don't understand is that getting through the door in the first place is everything. It is all that matters. What you do on the other side is up to you, but how sad if all you can do is flog a lot of overpriced diamante brooches. A holo gesture by Abba Can it really be true that ABBA are to go on tour again? Only with digitalised holograms onstage instead of the real thing? Why bother? Last year I went to see the Whitney Houston hologram tour when it had its world premiere in Sheffield. Whitney once hoped that no matter what people took from her, they couldn't take away her dignity. Some hope. Due to the mawkish wonders of technology, the long dead star was dug up and reborn as an unconvincing effigy shuffling about onstage like a silvery ghost. I'd hate to see ABBA degrade themselves in a similar manner. Wouldn't it be better to remember them in their glory, not as a soulless, money- spinning mirage? Who could live without it, I ask in all honesty? I know that I can. The death of Charlie Watts seems oddly shocking, for it always felt like The Rolling Stones would go on for ever. And even if they didn't, then rock solid Charlie would. He was always the most virtuous Stone, the clean-living one with the happy marriage, the folded shirts in the leather suitcases he took on tour, the impeccable suits, the well-ordered life. It feels like a pillar of society has come crashing down and that even the Stones might roll no more. Not so fast. We hear that the Stones will resume their tour next month as planned with a replacement drummer. The show must go on! Is that admirable or just lucrative? You never know with Mick. Troglodyte news. Women's feet have spread out because they have been wearing flat shoes during the pandemic. Now thousands of us are finding it painful to squeeze our tootsies back into the tyranny of high heels and are refusing to return to the hell of the totter. Perhaps we should throw the shoes away and wear the shoe boxes instead? Meanwhile, Elle Seline will become the first woman to compete in the Ms Great Britain pageant without wearing make-up. Who says we are not making strides but backwards or forwards? It is hard to say. Another week, and another serving of Sussex syrup... Oh no! Not the Sussexes again. Each week I hope and pray that Meghan and Harry will somehow manage to stay out of the headlines, cleave to the shadows, enjoy the sacred privacy they claim to love so much instead of invading it themselves with such startling regularity. Why? Because I don't want to keep writing about this pair of prestige-soaked, perma-peeved eco-smugs; this couple dishing it out while lapping it up in their luxury Californian mansion. I don't want them inside my head, bleating about climate change and poverty, while taking private jets to play polo. Still! Or complaining about how hard done by they are; this poor pair of ragamuffins having to scratch out a living on the millions Mummy Diana left in her will. Without that inheritance, H&M 'wouldn't have survived' they claim. That is rather like saying a squid wouldn't have survived without water, a bird couldn't fly without the wind beneath its wings, or a Prince couldn't bounce without a lovely trampoline of cash beneath his feet. You mean Harry had to dip into his inheritance? Please God, no! Anything but that. Within their fortress of privilege, Harry and Meghan have yet to scrape an acquaintance with the economics of the real world, no matter how much we all wish they would. We also learn this week that they considered naming the royal who made the allegedly racist remark before Archie's birth. However, Meghan told Oprah (keep up) that revealing it would be 'damaging to them'. If the couple were so upset by this event which they have turned into an international incident why wouldn't they stand by their principles and get the whole thing out in the open? Instead, they chose the sneaky way, like they always do. Theirs is the route of the unauthorised biography and the unofficial spokesman, they prefer to leave it to others to pump out their propaganda while they get to maintain a discreet silence. It's utterly shameless. And all of it aimed at rocking the monarchy they say they love, but seem to want to destroy. Say a prayer for those left behind Afghans who worked for the West fear retribution and let us hope that those who wish are given safe passage to the UK. Yet as the situation deteriorates into unthinkable scenes, I am admiring of those who are staying behind like Mahbooba Seraj, founder of the Afghan Women's Network. She says she has responsibilities to hundreds of young women in her care, and no one is going to force her to leave her country. There are other equally worried but resolute women who have little choice but to stay, including a head teacher who says she has 700 girls to take care of and that this is not the time to leave the country, it's the time to stay. Keep them in your thoughts and prayers. How does taking your top off save the planet? It's infuriating that the police and the Government do so little to stop Extinction Rebellion protesters bringing London to a standstill. Where are the vats of hot oil and the tumbrils when you need them? Not to mention the refreshing draughts of tear gas and some good old fashioned kettling. I jest! But perhaps the more pertinent question is this why did protester Laura Amherst feel she had to take her bra off? The 31-year-old student danced topless near Oxford Circus this week to 'draw attention to climate change'. Well she was certainly drawing attention to something, and it wasn't the greater refinement of womankind. Many males who until that moment had very little interest in climate change issues hugely appreciated Laura's efforts while many expert bystanders seemed to be of the opinion that Laura was showing off a new boob job. Can this be true? Can a woman with cosmetically enhanced curves really call herself a vegan eco-warrior, as Laura does? Breast implants are made of medical grade silicone which is tested on animals, is not biodegradable and takes up to 500 years to decompose, longer if left in a landfill. Perhaps the truth is that lovely Laura has been blessed by nature and simply wants to give something back. Greggs has delighted fans by launching their Pumpkin Spice Latte today, the earliest date that it's ever been available in the UK. The 1.95 popular autumnal drink is made with a blend of freshly ground coffee, pumpkin spice flavour syrup and steamed milk and topped with sweet, tasty cream and a sprinkle of spiced sugar. In a sign that the lacklustre summer is really over and autumn is here, the drink has been launched more than five weeks earlier than usual. Last year, the coffee chain announced the return on 1st October. Starbucks, who invented the Instagram-friendly beverage in 2003, is usually the first coffee shop to add the drink to their autumn menu, but is yet to bring it back to UK stores this year. Greggs has delighted fans by launching their Pumpkin Spice Latte today, the earliest date that it's ever been available in the UK. However, the beloved PSL was launched in US and Canadian Starbucks stores last week, and is expected to be seen in the UK coffee shops soon. Gregg's beverage is made using Fairtrade Arabica and Robusta coffee beans from Peru, Colombia, and Tanzania, slow-roasted to create an extra-flavoursome brew. Though Greggs is famous for menu items such as the Vegan Sausage Roll and Steak Bake, it's coffee offering is equally as popular, selling 1.5m cups each week more than 150 per minute. To give customers the opportunity to beat the crowds and guarantee their first taste of Pumpkin Spice this year, Greggs has its very own click + collect service via its website and app. It's also available via Just Eat for customers who want to enjoy the spice at home Hannah Squirrell, customer director at Greggs, told FEMAIL: 'The return of the fan-favourite Pumpkin Spice Latte to our menu will no doubt delight our customers nationwide. Though Greggs is famous for menu items such as the Vegan Sausage Roll and Steak Bake, it's coffee offering is equally as popular, selling 1.5m cups each week more than 150 per minute 'Coffee is exceptionally popular among our customers and we're excited to be bringing back another delicious offering to our extensive range.' While Starbucks first launched the drink in the US 17 years ago, British chains have created their own versions in recent years. Embracing the US trend for autumnal drinks both Pret and Greggs both sold a Pumpkin Spice Latte last year, while Costa sold a 'Bonfire Latte'. Over the years, Starbucks has evolved the drink to align with shifting consumer trends, with diverse variations to cater to all preferences, including a vegan option and a cold brew. The most recent launch in the US, includes a fruity new Apple Crisp Macchiato, flavoured with apple, brown sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg, and topped with a pie-like lattice of caramelised-spiced-apple drizzle. Makers hope it will be approved by October when an WHO expert panel meets Trial looked at 6,000 between age of five and 17 months in Burkina Faso and Mali A 'game-changing' malaria vaccine developed by British scientists could save the lives of millions of young children in developing countries. The jab, made by Brentford-based pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, was found to reduce the risk of severe disease and death by more than 70 per cent. Results from the trial of nearly 6,000 children aged between five months and 17 months in Burkina Faso and Mali surpassed all expectations. Despite over a dozen vaccines being in development for malaria, which kills more than 400,000 people a year globally, there is no approved jab. Researchers from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) who carried out the latest trial are confident that the World Health Organization (WHO) will recommend the vaccine when an expert panel meets in October. GSK has not revealed how much the jab will cost but claims it was developed to 'to contribute to global health' rather than make large profits. Children in Africa are currently prescribed antimalarial medicines four times each year during certain seasons to guard against the disease. Around 400,000 people die every year from malaria globally, with children accounting for more than two thirds of the fatalities, 90 per cent of which occur in sub-Saharan Africa. Children are particularly vulnerable to malaria because, unlike adults, they have yet to develop the necessary immunity to defend themselves against the disease. So if they become infected, the parasite multiplies quickly and destroys their red blood cells, causing fever, vomiting, diarrhoea and anaemia - a lack of red blood cells in the body. If not treated within 24 hours, the disease can cause severe illness and death. Scientists have found a potential new approach to tackling malaria that could save millions of lives [Stock image] The trial followed some 6,000 children aged between five months and 17 months in the two West African countries, both of which have a high burden of malaria [Stock image] GSK's vaccine contains a protein also found on the malaria parasite which is combined with a hepatitis B protein. Together, they form non-infectious particles which appear virus-like to the immune system and train it to fend off the real malaria parasite. What is malaria? Malaria is a life-threatening disease caused by Plasmodium parasites that are transmitted to people through the bites of mosquitoes - specifically infected female Anopheles mosquitoes. There are five species of parasite that cause malaria in humans, two of which pose the greatest threat. The first - P. falciparum - accounted for the majority of cases in Africa, the South-East Asia Region, Eastern Mediterranean and the the Western Pacific. The second, called P. vivax, is the predominant parasite in the Region of the Americas. Symptoms Malaria is an acute febrile illness, which is generally defined as a fever that subsides by itself in three weeks. In the case of malaria, the fever is accompanied by headache and chills. The symptoms may be mild to begin with, but if not treated within 24 hours, P. falciparum malaria can progress to severe illness, often leading to death. Children with severe malaria frequently develop one or more of the following symptoms: severe anaemia, respiratory distress, or cerebral malaria. Multi-organ failure in adults is also frequent. Who is at risk? In 2019, nearly half of the world's population was at risk of malaria. Most malaria cases occur in sub-Saharan Africa, but South-East Asia, Eastern Mediterranean, Western Pacific and Americas are also at risk. The groups at highest risk include: infants, children under the age of five, pregnant women and patients with HIV/AIDS, as well as non-immune migrants and mobile populations. Prevention and treatment There are a number of ways to prevent malaria, with 'vector control' - the control of the mosquitoes themselves - being seen as the most effective. The WHO recommends insecticide-treated mosquito nets and indoor residual spraying - as being effective against the insects. Antimalarial medicines can also be used to prevent malaria, such as chemoprophylaxis, which suppresses the blood stage of malaria infections, thereby preventing malaria disease. Vaccines There is currently only one vaccine to date that has shown it can significant reduce malaria, and life-threatening severe malaria, in young African children - RTS,S/AS01 (RTS,S). It acts against P. falciparum, the most deadly malaria, and is found to prevent approximately 4 in 10 cases. Source: World Health Organization Advertisement It also contains an adjuvant, an ingredient used in some vaccines that helps create a stronger immune response. The vaccines - called RTS,S/AS01E - works by preventing the parasite from infecting cells in the liver. Once the parasite reaches the liver, it multiplies and reenters the bloodstream, which enables it to infect red blood cells, often leading to severe illness. The new trial followed some 6,000 children in the two West African countries, both of which have a high burden of malaria. The children were divided into three groups, either receiving the vaccine alone, routinely used antimalarial medicines, or both treatments. The medicine, called 'seasonal malaria chemoprevention', or SMC, is given to children four times each year during the rainy season to protect against the disease. Among the two groups who received the vaccine, the children received three doses of the jab to prime the immune system in April, May and June ahead of the malaria season beginning in July. If approved, youngsters would also need a yearly booster shot until they are at least five years old. The combination of the vaccine and the medicine was the most effective, reducing death by nearly 72.9 per cent. Additionally, it slashed malaria cases by 62.8 per cent and hospitalisations from severe malaria by 70.5 per cent. The researchers hope this new combination approach has the potential to prevent malaria in large parts of Africa where cases remain high and where the disease is transmitted seasonally. Professor Brian Greenwood from LSHTM said while there have been 'great strides' in tackling malaria, progress has slowed in recent years. He said: 'We urgently need new interventions, particularly in many parts of the Sahel and sub-Sahel where the burden of malaria remains very high. 'We aimed to find out if RTS,S/AS01E could be more effective in areas with seasonal transmission by giving children three doses of the vaccine before the malaria transmission season, and then a booster dose before the rainy season over subsequent years. 'The results are very striking and could pave the way for a potential new approach to malaria control.' Professor Daniel Chandramohan from LSHTM and a member of the research team said the combined treatment had the potential to be a 'game-changer,' adding: 'The results of the trial were much more successful than we had anticipated. 'Our work has shown a combination approach using a malaria vaccine seasonally - similar to how countries use influenza vaccine - has the potential to save millions of young lives in the African Sahel. 'Importantly, we didn't observe any new concerning pattern of side effects. 'Further research is now needed to examine how seasonal malaria vaccination could be delivered most effectively at scale.' Professor Alassane Dicko, of the Malaria Research and Training Centre in (MRTC) Bamako, Mali, said: 'This new malaria tackling tool could mean the disease is no longer the primary cause of death or hospital admissions in our settings for the very first time. 'This is wonderful news for malaria control. We look forward to a quick policy decision and addition of this new tool to reduce the intolerable burden of malaria in our region.' Professor Jean-Bosco Ouedraogo, Institut de Recherche en Sciences de la Sante in Burkina Faso, said: 'I am really proud of the contribution of our African research teams to these fantastic results. 'I hope that this evidence will be taken into account by decision-makers as a new additional strategy for saving children's lives in Africa.' Gareth Jenkins, director of advocacy at the Malaria No More charity, said: 'Today's RTS,S result is yet another example of the fruits of UK science leadership and funding in collaboration with international partners on the global stage. 'This government could be the government that helps end malaria for good but, to claim that mantle, it must continue to invest in the research projects our brilliant scientists and institutions need.' Hundreds of patients could miss out on blood tests over the next three weeks because of a shortage of test tubes, it has been revealed. American medical company Becton Dickinson, which makes vials for the NHS, announced serious supply chain issues across the UK. And NHS England and Wales both issued guidance to doctors to stagger regular tests for non-urgent conditions including screening for pre-diabetes, allergies and certain blood disorders. The NHS has also paused some fertility testing but vital screening for life-threatening illnesses including cancer and HIV will continue as normal. Demand for tubes for Covid testing coupled with a lack of lorry drivers and UK border challenges have led to the shortfall, Becton Dickinson said. Britain has been blighted with supply chain issues across multiple industries, with gaps seen on supermarket shelves and McDonald's running out of milkshakes. Retailers today called on the government to issue temporary visas for EU workers to plug a lorry driver shortage that threatens to disrupt Christmas. Hundreds of patients could miss out on blood tests over the next three weeks because of a shortage of test tubes, it has been revealed Why is there a supply-chain crisis? A lack of lorry drivers and food processors is being partly blamed on the new Brexit visa regime introduced on January 1, which penalises lower-skilled migrants in favour of those with qualifications. But global factors are relevant too, bosses say, including Chinese port closures and a lack of shipping containers. US Vice President Kamala Harris urged Americans to buy Christmas toys early due to a shortage there. Nick Allen, chief executive of the British Meat Processors Association, told MailOnline Britain has so far been unable to shake its dependency on EU workers who have been leaving due to the pandemic. The supply of new workers is also being held back by stricter visa rules introduced on January 1. The most common complaint among UK retailers and food producers is the shortage of lorry drivers, which the Road Haulage Association currently puts at 100,000. Thousands of prospective drivers are waiting for their HGV tests due to a backlog caused by lockdown, while many existing ones have left the UK after Brexit or to be back with their families during Covid. Importers are also suffering a financial hit, with dramatically rising transport costs caused by a global lack of shipping containers and a slowdown in freight movements resulting from port closures. Chinese authorities recently shut Ningbo-Zhoushan port, which is one of the world's largest container terminals, due to a Covid outbreak. Gary Grant, founder and executive chairman of toy chain the Entertainer, said the cost of shipping a container from Asia had increased from $1,700 to more than $13,000 (8,000) over the past year. Advertisement The NHS guidance said GPs should 'reduce non-essential (non-clinically urgent) testing'. This includes stopping vitamin D testing except in exceptional circumstances and deferring routine infertility testing unless the patient is over the age of 35. It also says allergy testing is 'not a priority at this time' unless there is clinical need, and that routine wellness screening is 'not a priority'. The guidance also advises against stockpiling tubes. It says: 'Clinicians and local pathology laboratories should review their current local practices in line with this guidance with a view to reducing the number of tests and impacted products used without impacting on urgent care.' The Covid pandemic has led to a shortage of tubes for blood testing which use many of the same raw materials and components as those used for PCR testing in laboratories. And this has been exacerbated by a backlog of routine blood testing that hospitals are now trying to catch up with. Becton Dickinson told the BBC it has faced 'continued transportation challenges' on top of the issues caused by Covid. A spokesperson said: 'Suppliers are also challenged to meet increased demand for raw materials and components. 'We are balancing the frequency of preventive maintenance leading to plant shutdown to provide continuing supply of products, and we are working closely with our raw material suppliers, transport agencies and other necessary third parties to minimize supply disruptions.' The Department of Health said: 'Patient safety and continuity of care is our priority and we are working to ensure there is minimal possible impact on patient care. 'The health and care system is working closely with BD to put mitigations in place to resolve any problems if they arise.' It comes after The British Retail Consortium, which represents major retailers, urged business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng to push for emergency measures to plug a shortfall of 90,000 lorry drivers. Tesco chairman, John Allan, backed giving temporary visas to EU workers, while Richard Walker, managing director of Iceland, said lorry drivers should be added to the government's essential and skilled workers list to allow those based abroad to apply for a 'skilled worker visa'. But ministers are said to be against relaxing visa requirements in light of 4.7 per cent of the population remaining unemployed, according to the latest figure from the Office of National Statistics. 'They [retailers] know what the answer is, it's just expensive,' a Whitehall source told The Times. 'There are millions of people unemployed and 90,000 vacancies. They need to pay more and offer training. Government is not going to budge on that.' Coral Rose, Boss of Country Range group, a wholesaler that supplies catering products for schools, care homes and schools, said issues facing the food service sector were 'getting worse'. 'The shortage of drivers is the key issue,' she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. 'We're taking drastic action like buying smaller delivery vehicles because there is going to be increased pressure when schools reopen and people return to their offices. 'So the office is going to get worse. We would like the government to introduce a temporary visa scheme as a quick fix and then more training to increase the number of drivers in the longer term.' American workers are favorable to COVID-19 vaccine mandates at their jobs, a new poll suggests. The survey, conducted by Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, found that half of employees are in favor of vaccine requirements at their workplaces. Just over a quarter, 26 percent, oppose such measures. The data are released at a time when such mandates gain traction following the federal government's full approval of Pfizer-BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine. President Joe Biden has also pushed private employers to institute these types of mandates. There has been opposition to these mandates from some Republican politicians, though. Half of Americans support COVID-19 vaccine mandates at work. People currently working remotely are more likely to support the mandates than those who are currently in-person Black and Hispanic workers are more likely to support these vaccine mandates than white workers, according to the poll. Pictured: A woman in Arleta, California, gets vaccinated The poll, which was conducted between August 12 and August 16, included 1,729 participants. It showed that about 59 percent of remote workers favor vaccine requirements in their own workplaces, compared with 47 percent of those who are currently working in person. An even 26 percent of both in-person and remote workers oppose the mandates. The sentiment is similar for workplace mask mandates, the poll found, with 50 percent of Americans working in person favoring them and 29 percent opposed. Just under 60 percent of remote workers are in favor of mask mandates as well. About six in ten college graduates, who are more likely to have jobs that can be done remotely, support both mask and vaccine mandates at their workplaces, compared with about four in ten workers without college degrees. The poll also showed divisions along racial lines. Seventy-three percent of black workers and 59 percent of Hispanic workers - who are more likely than white workers to work in front-line jobs - support mask mandates at their workplaces, compared with 42 percent of white workers. In addition, 53 percent of Black and Hispanic workers support vaccine mandates at their workplaces, as do 44 percent of white workers. Despite mixed support for mandates among in-person employees, 71 percent of those workers said they themselves are vaccinated. Christopher Messick, 41, an electrical engineer who is mostly working from home in Brunswick, Maryland, said he wrote to his company's human resources department to ask that employees be required to get vaccinated before they are recalled to the office. Messick, who is vaccinated, said he doesn't just worry about his own health. He said he also doesn't want to worry about getting a breakthrough infection that could land an unvaccinated co-worker in the hospital. 'I don't want sit an office for eight hours a day with someone who is not vaccinated,' said Messick. 'The people who are anti-vax, I see them as selfish.' Biden has been a major proponent of these types of measures, urging private employers to start requiring employees to get jabbed to keep their jobs. 'I'm pleased to see the private sector stepping up as well,' Biden said during a news conference earlier this month. 'In the last week, AT&T, Amtrak, McDonald's, they all announced vaccine requirements. '...Over 200 health systems, more than 50 in the past two weeks, have announced vaccine requirements. 'Colleges and universities are requiring more than five million students to be vaccinated as they return to classes this fall. All this makes a difference.' Last month, Biden announced new requirements for federal workers and contractors, requiring them to either sign a form attesting they had been vaccinated, or follow string masking and distancing guidelines. The U.S. military will also begin to require the COVID-19 vaccine among the other shots it requires of its members. So far, many vaccine requirements are coming from private companies with employees who have mostly been able to work from home during the pandemic. The companies, including major tech companies and investment banks, have workforces that are already largely vaccinated and consider the requirement a key step toward eventually reopening offices. Goldman Sachs joined that trend Tuesday, telling employees in a memo that anyone who enters its U.S. offices must be fully vaccinated starting September 7. In contrast, few companies that rely on hourly service workers have imposed vaccine mandates because the companies are concerned about losing staff at a time of acute labor shortages and turnover. Exceptions include food processing giant Tyson Foods and Walt Disney World, which reached a deal this week with its unions to require all workers at its theme park in Orlando, Florida, to be vaccinated. Tyson have received pushback for their policy from Arkansas Republicans, though, questioning representatives from the poultry company for hours about their policy at a hearing earlier this month. The AP-NORC poll was conducted before the Food and Drug Administration granted full approval of Pfizer's vaccine, which some experts and employers are hoping will persuade more people to get the shot and support mandates. Drugstore chain CVS said this week that pharmacists, nurses and other workers who have contact with patients will have to be inoculated, but the company stopped short of requiring the vaccine for other employees such as cashiers. The AP-NORC poll showed high support for vaccine mandates among those who say they work in person in a health care setting, with 70 percent approving of vaccine requirements at their workplace. Since the first cases of COVID-19 were detected in the U.S., almost no states have been more different in their approaches to the pandemic than California and Florida. In March 2020, California Gov Gav Newsom closed bars and indoor dining at restaurants, limited large gatherings, implemented mask mandates and instituted stay-at-home orders. By comparison, his East Coast counterpart, Gov Ron DeSantis, has issued very few measures, lifting almost all restrictions in September 2020. DeSantis has refused to mandate face coverings and signed an executive order preventing Florida schools from requiring children to wear masks. Despite these contrasting methods, both states ended up with the same outcome in early 2021. Historically, when adjusting for population, Florida had 8,306 cases and 117 deaths per 100,000 residents and California had about 8,499 cases per 100,000 residents and 130 deaths per 100,000. Back in February 2021, the states were reporting between 200 and 400 cases per million people and 10 to 20 deaths per million, showing a very similar curve over the first two months of the year. However, these similarities ended after the Indian 'Delta' variant became dominant in the U.S. and a surge of cases swept the Sunshine State. Now, Florida is recording a seven-day case rate 4.5 times higher than California, a hospital rate four times higher and and average death rate nearly twice as high. Back in February 2021, the states were recording similar Covid case rates with California reporting 214 cases per 100,000 and Florida reporting 254 cases per 100,000. Currently, California is 159.09 infections per 100,000 (blue line) while Florida is reporting 704.14 infections per 100,000 (yellow line), a rate 4.5 times higher On February 6, California reported 7.23 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 while Florida reported 5.28 deaths per 100,000. As of Monday, California's death rate is 0.35 per 100,000 (blue line) compared to Florida's rate of 0.65 per 100,000 (yellow line), nearly twice as high When analyzing raw numbers, California appears to have done worse than Florida. The Golden State has 4,280,215 total COVID-19 cases and 65,399 total deaths - both of which are the highest in the nation - according to data complied by Johns Hopkins University. By comparison, Florida is reporting 3,071,489 total infections and 42,252 fatalities. Dr Stuart Ray, a professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins University, said that California fared worse than Florida during the most recent thirds wave due to a delay in lockdowns. 'Florida did institute some measures that were relative preemptive, they were done in time to contain some of the early spread,' he told DailyMail.com. 'In California, my sense was that it was ineffective and it happened quite late. Their winter lockdown happened after people had already moved around quite a bit.' However, population size must be accounted for. California has about 40 million residents and Florida has about 22 million. When adjusting for this metric earlier this year, the states were recording roughly the same amount of cases. CDC data shows California reporting 214 Covid cases per 100,000 on February 6, 2021 while Florida reported 254 cases per 100,000. Both states a similar curve with a spike in cases around January 1 - as the winter surge led to rapidly rising rates of cases and deaths - with infections starting to tail off a few weeks later. But after the Delta variant began dominating in early July and people gathered to celebrate Independence Day, California and Florida both saw cases rise. California's Department of Public Health recommended that people wear masks indoors regardless of vaccination status and is requiring school staff to either show proof of full vaccination or be tested at least once per week. Comparatively, DeSantis issued executive orders banning mask mandates and vaccine passports for certain businesses. Ray said it's plausible that a factor in Florida's divergence from California due to the lack of shutdowns as Delta took over. 'What we see is with the Delta variant that it's so infectious, it circumvents some of the single layer approaches we have,' he said. Each state saw their Covid cases per 100,000 peak on August 13, but while California reported 217.65 cases per 100,000, Florida reported 708.96 cases per 100,000. As of Monday, Florida is seeing 704.14 infections per 100,000 - 4.5 times as high as California's 159.09 infections per 100,000, according to CDC data. Florida is reporting 16,604 Covid patients hospitalized with COVID-19 and a rate of 80 hospitalizations per 100,000 California has 8,579 patients hospitalized with the virus and rate of 20 hospitalizations per 100,000, which is four times lower than that of Florida Deaths followed a similar trajectory. On February 6, Florida reported 5.28 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 while California reported 7.23 deaths per 100,000. Once more, their curves appear similar with fatalities spiking around mid-January, which were a few weeks behind the rise in cases due to deaths being a lagging indicator. And while each state saw deaths rise starting in mid-to-late July, Florida saw a much more exponential rise. The state each peaked on August 10, but while California reported 0.66 deaths per 100,000, Florida reported 5.79 deaths per 100,000. CDC data shows that, as of Monday, Florida's death rate is nearly twice as high as California's at 0.65 per 100,000 compared to 0.35 per 100,000. In California, Gov Gavin Newsom closed bars and indoor dining at restaurants and implemented mask mandates to control the COVID-19 pandemic. After cases began rising again in summer 2021, restrictions were implemented Comparatively, Florida Gov Ron DeSantis issued very few closures or restrictions and has refused to mandate face coverings, even during the recent surge How do the states compare when it comes to COVID-19 hospitalizations? In early February, California's rate was about 24 hospitalizations per 100,000 while Florida's was about 22 per 100,000. As of Wednesday, data from Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) show that Florida and California have the highest and third highest number of patients hospitalized with the virus. Florida is reporting 16,604 Covid patients hospitalized and California has 8,579 patients. And while both these numbers are high, the rates differ dramatically. In the Sunshine State there are roughly 80 hospitalizations per 100,000 compared to 20 hospitalizations per 100,000 in California, a four-fold difference. Worth noting, when it comes to hospitalizations, is age. More than one-fifth, or 21 percent, of Florida's population is at least 65 years old with 4.6 million out of the state's 22 million identifying as senior citizens. Comparatively, just 15 percent of California's population is elderly with six million out of 40 million aged 65 and up. This means more residents in Florida are susceptible to a virus that preys on the elderly. Ray said that with the spread of the Delta variant the biggest lesson is that human behavior can affect case and death rates. 'We have learned a lot in the course of this pandemic including that our behavior can change the course,' he said. 'While rates are high, change behaviors to try to mitigate the loss of life and health especially in our most vulnerable community members.' The U.S. is projected to see nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths between now and December 1, according to a new forecasting model. As of Thursday, the country is recording a seven-day rolling average of 1,100 virus-related fatalities per day, which has not been seen since mid-March. Forecasts published this week by the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) project an additional 98,000 Americans will die by the start of December for an overall death toll of nearly 730,000. However, health experts say that number could be cut in half - to around 46,000 additional deaths - if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. In other words, what the coronavirus has in store this fall depends on human behavior. A new model from IHME predicts that an additional 98,000 Americans will die of COVID-19 between now and December 1 for a total of 727,949 deaths (purple dotted line), but the total can be cut to 678,065 if everyone wears a mask in public (green dotted line) Early signs suggest behavior changes may already be flattening the curve in a few places where the virus raged this summer. Pictured: Medical staff move COVID-19 patient who died onto a gurney to hand off to a funeral home van, at the Willis-Knighton Medical Center in Shreveport, Louisiana, August 18 The U.S. is in the grip of a fourth wave of infection this summer, powered by the highly contagious Indian 'Delta' variant, which has sent cases, hospitalizations and deaths soaring again. The surge has swamped medical centers, burned out nurses and has resulted in patients needing to be sent out-of-state for treatment. Dr Lauren Ancel Meyers, director of the University of Texas COVID-19 Modeling Consortium says this progress can be regained, if Americans double down again on masks, limit social gatherings, stay home when sick and get vaccinated 'Behavior is really going to determine if, when and how sustainably the current wave subsides,' she said. 'We cannot stop Delta in its tracks, but we can change our behavior overnight. Those things are within our control,' Meyers said. According to the model, the U.S. is expected to hit 727,949 COVID-19 deaths by December 1. The projection says deaths will rise from 1,100 per day to 1,400 a day by mid-September, then decline slowly. In an absolute worst-case scenario, if vaccines and other mitigation measure are not enough to contain the spread, then America could see the death toll rise to 797,506 by the end of the year. But the model also says many of those deaths can be averted if Americans wears masks in public, regardless of vaccination status. In that case, the U.S. would see 678,065 deaths by December. 'We can save 50,000 lives simply by wearing masks. Thats how important behaviors are,' said Dr Ali Mokdad, a professor of health metrics sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle who is involved in the making of the projections. Already there are signs that Americans are taking the threat more seriously. The projection says deaths will rise from the current 1,100 per day to 1,400 per day by mid-September, then decline slowly (purple dotted line) Amid the alarm over the Delta variant in the past several weeks, the slump in demand for COVID-19 shots reversed course. The number of vaccinations dispensed per day has climbed around 80 percent over the past month to an average of about 900,000. White House COVID-19 coordinator Jeff Zients said on Tuesday that in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, 'more people got their first shots in the past month than in the prior two months combined.' Also, millions of students are being required to wear masks. A growing number of employers are demanding their workers get the vaccine after the federal government gave Pfizer-BioNTech's shot full approval earlier this week. And cities like New York and New Orleans are insisting people get vaccinated if they want to eat at a restaurant. Half of American workers are in favor of vaccine requirements at their workplaces, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Early signs suggest behavior changes may already be flattening the curve in a few places where the virus raged this summer. An Associated Press analysis shows the rate of new cases is slowing in Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas, some of the same states where first shots are on the rise. In Florida, pleas from hospitals and a furor over masks in schools may have nudged some to take more precautions. However, the troubling trends persist in Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia and Wyoming, where new infections continue to rise steadily. Mokdad said he is frustrated that Americans 'aren't doing what it takes to control this virus.' 'I don't get it,' he said. 'We have a fire and nobody wants to deploy a firetruck.' One explanation: The good news in the spring - vaccinations rising, cases declining - gave people a glimpse of the way things used to be, said Dr Elizabeth Stuart of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and that made it tough for them to resume the precautions they thought they left behind. 'We don't need to fully hunker down, but we can make some choices that reduce risk,' she said. Even vaccinated people should stay vigilant, said Dr Gaby Sauza, 30, of Seattle, who was inoculated over the winter but tested positive for COVID-19 along with other guests days after an August 14 wedding in Vermont, even though the festivities were mostly outdoors and those attending had to submit photos of their vaccination cards. 'In retrospect, absolutely, I do wish I had worn a mask,' she said. Sauza, a resident in pediatrics, will miss two weeks of hospital work and has wrestled with guilt over burdening her colleagues. She credits the vaccine with keeping her infection manageable, though she suffered several days of body aches, fevers, night sweats, fatigue, coughing and chest pain. 'If we behave, we can contain this virus. If we don't behave, this virus is waiting for us,' Mokdad said. 'It's going to find the weak among us.' Pregnant women are one of the least vaccinated groups in America and now are suffering a surge in Covid hospitalizations. Only 23 percent of pregnant women in the U.S. are vaccinated, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). What's more, white mothers-to-be are more than twice as likely as black mothers-to-be to have received their shots. As cases and hospitalizations rise due to a surge of the Indian 'Delta' variant, many expecting women are ending up in the hospital. While pregnant women were always eligible for the vaccines, they were not universally recommended to receive them until recently. COVID-19 hospitalizations among pregnant women are beginning to surge as the virus strikes one of the least vaccinated groups in America (file image) Only 23% of pregnant women are vaccinated, with black women in particular having a low vaccination rate under 12% None of us has ever seen this magnitude of really, really sick women at one time,' Dr Akila Subramaniam, an associate professor at the University of Alabama's Birmingham Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine, told NBC News. She reports that the number of pregnant women being admitted with the virus has tripled in recent weeks. Case growth among the women makes sense considering their low vaccination rate. Less than a quarter of pregnant women have received their jabs, with black mothers especially falling behind - with less than 12 percent getting the shots. At 35.2 percent, Asian pregnant women are most likely to be vaccinated, followed by 26.6 percent of white expecting mothers, and 19.2 percent of Hispanics. They have been eligible to receive the vaccine since the first shots received authorization in December, though there were caveats. Unlike the general population, the CDC did not give a blanket recommendation to get the vaccine at first. Due to potential concerns of the long term risks of the vaccine on the mother and unborn child, health officials advised them to speak with their doctor before getting the shots. The CDC announced earlier this month that it was confident in data that found the vaccine was not a danger to expecting mothers or their children. Pregnant women are also more likely to suffer from severe complications from the virus if they contract it. 'Many people don't realize how easy it is to get this virus, how transmissible it is, and how, if you are pregnant, how severely ill you can get,' Dr Brenna Hughes, chief of the Duke University Medical Center's Division of Maternal Fetal Medicine in Durham, North Carolina, told NBC News. 'Most people who are otherwise young and healthy think that they might not be as severely ill. But we have clearly seen that is not the case.' Hughes reports a surge of pregnant women being hospitalized with COVID-19 at her ICU as well. They are also quicker to go from feeling fine to needing urgent medical care. 'Their deterioration is quicker,' said Dr Todd Rice, director of Vanderbilt's ICU in Nashville, Tennessee. 'They go faster from needing a little bit of oxygen to [needing] a lot of support.' The virus can cause harm to the pregnant woman and their child long term. A woman who contracts the virus at some point during her pregnancy is more likely to give birth prematurely. If she has an active Covid case while she is giving birth, the woman is at an increased risk of dying during birth. Over 109,000 COVID-19 cases have been reported among pregnant women since the pandemic began in March 2020, with 18,000 requiring hospitalization and 131 dying. Hughes told NBC pregnant women are at an increased risk of complications from the virus because their lungs do not have the came capacity to expand when pregnant. Natural immunity from previous COVID-19 infection may offer stronger protection against the Indian 'Delta' variant than immunity from full vaccination, a new study suggests. Researchers compared people who had received two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine to unvaccinated individuals who had recovered from the virus. They found that participants with natural immunity were up to 13 times less likely to contract Covid than those who were given two jabs. The team, from Maccabi Healthcare and Tel Aviv University note that their study - which has not yet been peer-reviewed - has many limitations including the more highly transmissible Delta variant being dominant at the time and participants not being required to be tested. The study looks at breakthrough infections and does not discourage vaccination with a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) finding unvaccinated people still have five times as many COVID-19 infections and 29 times as many hospitalizations as those who've had their shots. Participants who were double jabbed were 5.96 times more likely to be infected and 7.13 times more likely to experience symptoms, a new study found After three months, risk of infection was 13.06 times higher among immunized individuals and they were 27 times more likely to experience symptoms For the study, published on pre-print server medRxiv.org, the team looked at more than 800,000 people split into three groups. This included people who received both doses of the Pfizer vaccine and never had Covid, unvaccinated people who previously been infected, and people had the virus and has also received a single dose of the vaccine. The study was conducted after the Delta variant became dominant in Israel, which has been shown to more easily evade vaccines than older strains. Researchers found that fully vaccinated but people were much more likely to have a 'breakthrough' Covid infection than people with natural immunity for the disease. Overall participants who were double jabbed were 5.96 times more likely to be infected and 7.13 times more likely to experience symptoms including cough, fever and shortness of breath. They also looked at the likelihood of vaccination after three months. Researchers found, in this instance, likelihood of infections at 13.06 times higher among immunized individuals and they were 27 times more likely to experience symptoms. People who had recovered from the virus and had been vaccinated were even less likely to have a breakthrough infection. The team notes that there are several limitations. Firstly, the study only examines protection offered by the Pfizer vaccines and does not address other approved vaccines or extra protection that a third dose provides. Secondly, while the study controlled for factors such as age, sex, and region of residence, there might be differences in behaviors of the groups - such as social distancing and mask wearing - that weren't accounted. Dr Andrew Croxford, an immunologist from the UK, also points out that someone who previously tested positive for COVID-19 is not likely to get re-tested for reinfection. 'If you've tested positive and isolated for weeks with significant disruption, how likely are you to get tested again as opposed to thinking "I've already had it so it's surely something else"?' he tweeted. 'Are people who decline vaccination, or people with previous infection, less likely to get tested?' However, if the findings are confirmed by peer review, it could have implications for 'This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, ' the authors wrote. 'Individuals who were both previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 and given a single dose of the vaccine gained additional protection against the Delta variant.' PSYCHOLOGY THE TRUTH ABOUT LIES by Aja Raden (Atlantic 9.99, 320 pp) Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies, sang Fleetwood Mac in 1987. And my, have people delivered. Donald Trump is said to have told 30,573 lies while in office, while Boris Johnson, as we all know, can be economical with the truth. I had a friend who lied to me serially over more than 30 years, about absolutely everything. He is my friend no longer. But Aja Raden, an American writer, sees lies as a completely normal part of life, something to be understood rather than condemned. She says human beings evolved to tell lies, that our children only start operating in the real world when they have mastered the ability to tell untruths. Theres no one who doesnt lie occasionally. American writer Aja Raden, tells the stories of several classic cons in a new book about the value of lying in normal life (file image) Even George Washington, when he said I cannot tell a lie, was telling an absolute whopper. Her main point is that for someone to lie successfully, there needs to be someone else who swallows that lie hook, line and sinker. Think of the last piece of really juicy gossip you were told. You didnt check whether it was true or not before you started spreading it yourself. Of course you didnt! Neither did I. Over nine hugely entertaining chapters, Raden tells the outrageous stories of several classic cons and illustrates the mechanisms by which they all work, using both contemporary and historical examples. Its core question, she says, is Why do people believe what they believe? We blindly trust certain facts: things were taught, things we can observe or work out for ourselves. Once we know these things, we never really question them again. Its called an honesty bias. Without this tendency to trust, to assume, to simply believe, every human on earth would be born starting from scratch, unable to benefit from the knowledge of the collective. But its the honesty bias that allows us to be rooked by conmen, serially lying friends and unscrupulous U.S. presidents. Our strength, as so often, is also our weakness. She begins with what she calls the Big Lie, in which the untruth is so enormous that to disbelieve it actually threatens our sense of collective reality. So if someone says to you, I own land on Mars and Im selling time-shares, you might believe that because no one would say something like that if it were untrue, surely? (My brother did believe it and bought me some land there for my birthday a few years ago.) THE TRUTH ABOUT LIES by Aja Raden (Atlantic 9.99, 320 pp) So she gives the example of Gregor MacGregor, a broke Scottish aristocrat of the early 19th century who joined the Royal Navy in search of fame and fortune. He became a mercenary in central America, where he claimed to have chanced upon the magical kingdom of Poyais, a land of plenty brimming with untapped natural resources. Returning to London he sold shares in Poyais to the great and good, and persuaded seven boatloads of men, women and children to relocate there to make their fortunes. When they arrived they discovered Poyais did not exist, that there was just the Mosquito Coast of central America, short on untapped natural resources but well equipped with mosquitoes. Most of them died, and when a few managed to return to tell their stories, MacGregor escaped to Paris, where he told the same Big Lie again and sold more shares in something that did not exist. Next up is the Shell Game, the street hustle whereby you have to guess which of three shells on a table has a ball underneath it. The ball has meanwhile been removed by sleight of hand so the answer is none of them, but by then you have already lost the fiver you put down on the one you thought it might be. Raden explains that we dont see everything we think we see, that our brain fills in the gaps. This is how so much stage magic works, persuading you that you are seeing what you havent seen, and that you havent seen what you might well have seen but not processed. In later chapters she looks at the Guru Con, at the way Rasputin befuddled the House of Romanov in pre-revolutionary Russia, the pyramid schemes of Bernie Madoff and bitcoin; and the selling of snake oil as a patent medicine in the Wild West, which went on long after supplies of genuine snake oil had run out. Its all huge fun. I assume its true. But if she had made some of it up, I wouldnt be at all surprised. TRIO by William Boyd (Penguin 8.99, 352 pp) TRIO by William Boyd (Penguin 8.99, 352 pp) Its 1968. America is bombing Vietnam, there is revolution on the streets of Paris and, in Brighton, gentlemanly film producer Talbot Wyse is presiding over the fractious shoot of a movie with the whimsical title of Emily Bracegirdles Extremely Useful Ladder To The Moon. Like the other characters who make up the titular Trio of William Boyds 16th novel, Talbot has a secret which, if it came out, might allow him to be true to himself. His leading lady, Anny Viklund, is carrying on an affair with her co-star while her current lover, a French philosopher, remains in Paris and her ex-husband is on the run from the FBI. Meanwhile Elfrida Wing, a novelist unhappily married to the films director, is drowning the pain of her husbands infidelity in vodka. Boyds bittersweet comedy asks searching questions about authenticity in life, love and art. LOOK AGAIN by David Bailey (Pan 10.99, 384 pp) LOOK AGAIN by David Bailey (Pan 10.99, 384 pp) David Baileys mother, Glad, predicted that Youll end up like all of us, driving the 101 bus. The young Bailey was determined he would do no such thing. After National Service in Singapore, he landed a job with fashion photographer John French. Baileys subversive originality was perfectly in tune with the anarchic energy of the 1960s and he took some of the decades most iconic images. He was equally at ease with the Kray brothers and legendary beauties such as Jean Shrimpton, Catherine Deneuve and Penelope Tree (he had affairs with many of his models and married several of them). At 83, he shows no sign of mellowing: his outrageously entertaining memoir, written with James Fox, glitters with famous names from Mick Jagger to the Queen (even she didnt escape the famous Bailey cheek: when he photographed her, he asked if her jewellery was real). THE NEXT FIFTY THINGS THAT MADE THE MODERN ECONOMY by Tim Harford (Bridge Street 9.99, 352 pp) THE NEXT FIFTY THINGS THAT MADE THE MODERN ECONOMY by Tim Harford (Bridge Street 9.99, 352 pp) Tim Harford is an economist and broadcaster with a gift for making his subject fascinating and comprehensible to non-economists. His previous book, Fifty Things, was a series of quirky essays on the radical social change brought about by such inventions as the wheel and the internet. This sequel takes a close look at everyday inventions that we take for granted, but which, nevertheless, have a huge impact on our lives. Harford considers culture-changers from bricks (used to build the tower of Babel), bicycles (and their role in empowering women), and spectacles (there is a global epidemic of short-sightedness among children and no one knows why). Witty, informative and endlessly entertaining, this is popular economics at its most engaging. My wife passed away in May. We held several accounts with NS&I. I notified it online of her passing on 12 May, by completing the required form, and was told it could take up to five weeks to deal with this. I continued to telephone customer services after not hearing anything and the date was repeatedly pushed back before it eventually said it had no record of being informed. Without this being sorted, I am not able to get a grant of probate which means I cannot move into a retirement facility all while I am grieving my wife. Why is it taking so long to sort? C.T., via email An NS&I customer was left in the lurch after the firm delayed releasing his funds for months Grace Gausden, consumer expert at This is Money, replies: Firstly, I am very sorry to hear about the passing of your wife. I am also sorry to hear about the customer service you have experienced at the hands of NS&I when trying to organise you and your wife's finances - it is not what anyone needs while grieving. After contacting NS&I shortly after your wife's death and requesting to find out how much you had in your accounts plus to have all funds withdrawn so you could complete probate, you were told it would take a matter of weeks to be sorted. However, after phoning at the beginning of June for an update, you were told it would be a further two weeks and in the middle of June, you were told, again, it would be yet another two weeks wait. During this phone call you asked the representative to confirm they had received your online application and they confirmed it was in the system waiting to be dealt with. You subsequently wrote a letter to NS&I complaining about the delay, clearly stating you needed confirmed totals of funds held in your wife's name at her date of death to be able to obtain a grant of probate. GRACE ON THE CASE Our weekly column sees This is Money consumer expert Grace Gausden tackles reader problems and shines the light on companies doing both good and bad. Want her to investigate a problem, or do you want to praise a firm for going that extra mile? Get in touch: grace.gausden@thisismoney.co.uk Later you were to find there was 54,784.99 in your wife's individual account, 10,431.38 in your joint bond and 11,176.23 in your direct saver a total of 76,392.60. This is a substantial amount that you not only needed to know the sum of to start probate but also wanted to receive so you could begin the process of moving to a retired living facility. As a result of your complaint, you received a letter at the end of June stating NS&I had no record of being informed of your wife's death. Enclosed with the letter was a form to complete and a request for a death certificate which you returned the same day and enclosed a further request for fund totals. Another letter came a day later asking for a copy of your wife's will, and another copy of the death certificate. These were sent by recorded delivery at the beginning of July. Despite the letter being received, you had not heard anything further so called the company again. The operative said your request would be dated from 5 July - not the original date you advised them of 12 May - and would take approximately two more months. NS&I repeatedly told the customer it would take another few weeks with no updates given This is despite the fact they confirmed your original application was received in mid-May. Surely your case should have been high priority? You explained yet again that without the information requested you are not able to get a grant of probate meaning the whole estate is in limbo. You added that as you are 80 years-old and not in great health, as well as grieving your wife, the whole process was becoming increasingly stressful. I was sorry to hear about your troubles and understood how time sensitive the issue was, therefore, I contacted NS&I to find out why it as unable to speed up the process for you. Fortunately, it was apologetic and sympathetic to your problem, with the firm paying out the full amount within a matter of days as well as issuing an apology. A spokesperson for NS&I said: 'Our team has looked into this and they dealt with the late Mrs T's NS&I holdings on 20 July. 'The two joint accounts for Mr and Mrs T have been transferred solely into Mr T's name. 'A letter was sent to Mr T dated 20 July explaining this, and it also includes a repayment form for Mrs T's sole NS&I holding, as well as valuation statements for all Mrs T's NS&I accounts as at the date of her death. 'NS&I did receive notification of Mrs T's death on 12 May via the online bereavement claim form as Mr T says. This was processed on 25 June when NS&I requested sight of Mrs T's Will and Death Certificate. 'NS&I received these documents on 5 July, with the bereavement claim then being dealt with on 20 July. The processing of Mr T's late wife's estate has taken longer than usual due to delays in NS&I's back office processing. 'Due to a strict Covid-19 related lockdown coming into force in Chennai, India, NS&I's offices in Chennai, where some back office processing tasks are dealt with, were closed from 24 May until 10 June, reopening on 11 June. 'During this time, NS&I worked to move processes back to our UK sites in order to minimise disruption to our customers. At present, the majority of NS&I's processes are working to normal timescales, but there are still some delays. 'We would like to apologise to Mr T for any distress that these delays have caused at what we understand is an extremely difficult time for him.' Hopefully now you can begin the process of selling up and moving into the retirement facility. I hope NS&I has learnt a lesson here - those who are grieving should be treated more sensitively in my opinion, and given the highest of priorities. Grace on the Case ticks past the 300k mark... It has now been 37 weeks of Grace on the Case and we have helped readers claw back 320,000. This has included 106,000 for a reader whose husband had died unexpectedly and was waiting for a payment from Legal and General. It also includes an Amazon customer who was waiting on over 5,000 worth of funds after the site took months to verify her sellers account. If you have a consumer issue that you need help with, contact Grace on the Case at grace.gausden@thisismoney.co.uk. Hit and miss: This week's naughty and nice list Each week, I look at some of the companies that have fallen short of expected standards as well as those that have gone that extra mile for customers. Miss: Reader, Anton, has expressed his disappointment with Samsung. He said: 'I purchased a new TV through Samsung's website for 999. 'It claimed to give a 150 cashback to all purchases and in April, I received a code to claim the money back. However, after months of frustration I am still having no luck with Samsung to get this money. 'I have been given the run around and sent from department to department. I was told people will get back to me but received arguably the worst customer service I have encountered.' After I contacted Samsung about this, it revealed that you had actually not provided all of the necessary information needed to claim. A spokesperson for Samsung said: 'We're sorry to hear your reader has experienced difficulties. Our special offers are validated by providing purchase information and product serial numbers within a clearly stated timeframe. 'In this instance, the customer hadn't supplied the correct information within the timeframe which is why we were unable to provide the cashback. 'We always want our customers to be satisfied and have worked with Anton to validate the claim on this occasion and resolve the matter.' Fortunately, you have now received the cashback but next time it may be worth reading the terms and conditions carefully. One customer had trouble getting a cashback from Samsung after purchasing a television Hit: This week, reader Jan, wanted to praise energy firm, British Gas. She said: 'Due to a change in my mother's circumstances, we needed to address her financial situation and contacted British Gas. 'She has always been more than happy with their service especially the Home Contract covering her gas boiler. 'She is 89 years old and due to diminishing mobility needs to keep warm. I explained to British Gas about my mum's circumstances and the customer service agent was kind, helpful, informative and addressed my query brilliantly. 'During the conversation he referred me on to a colleague who was also extremely helpful and friendly and resolved the Home Contract costs which was an excellent outcome.' Happy to hear you received such a warm response. The property market is facing the worst shortage in fresh listings since 2015, property portal Zoopla has warned. While buyer demand remains strong, stock levels are down more than 26 per cent compared to last year's average leaving prospective buyers battling it out for the most in-demand properties. Total listings are also 33 per cent lower than they were this time in 2018 and 2019. One in 20 UK homes changed hands over the past year, compared to one in 25 two years ago. Low stock levels: The property market is facing the worst shortage in fresh listings since 2015, new findings from Zoopla have revealed Supply problems are worst for homes priced up to 350,000, which Zoopla said was 'reflective of where average affordability lies' for buyers. 'Its the supply of three and four bed family homes that is most stretched,' the report added. 'The narrowing in choice of homes to buy, especially for family houses, means the market will start to slow naturally during the rest of the year and into next, as buyers wait for more stock to become available. 'While we anticipate a strong start to 2022 in line with seasonal trends, there will be a slow reparation of stock throughout the first half of the year.' The average time taken between listing and an agreed sale is now 26 days, down from 49 days in 2019. Problematic: Demand is outstripping supply in the property market While the average flat in the UK has increased in value by 1.2 per cent in the past year, the average house has increased by 7.6 per cent over the same period, according to the data. Increased activity among first-time buyers and investors is also absorbing stock, while failing to replenish it. This huge 'mismatch between supply and demand' is triggering property price hikes in many parts of the country, according to Zoopla. Year-on-year, property prices grew by 6 per cent in July, which was slightly lower than the 6.3 per cent growth rate seen in the year to June. The average value of a home across the UK is now 234,000. The headline rate of growth is expected to 'moderate' slightly down to around 4 or 5 per cent by the end of the year, Zoopla said. Price spikes: The sharpest jumps in house prices are emerging in areas with lower-than- average values The surge in prices was expected to wane in certain areas, as the impact of the stamp duty holiday fizzles out and the Government withdraws stimulus packages like the furlough scheme. At a regional level, property price growth has been highest in Wales and Northern Ireland, which have both seen annual property price growth rates of over 9 per cent. Prices in the North West of England have also risen sharply. At city level, Liverpool continues to lead the way with price growth of 9.4 per cent over the past year, resulting in an average uplift of 11,731 per property. Manchester and Belfast have seen property prices jump more than 7 per cent in the past year, while in London prices have climbed by just 2.5 per cent. Grainne Gilmore, head of research, at Zoopla, said: 'The post-pandemic "reassessment of home" - households deciding to change how and where they live - has further to run, especially as office-based workers receive confirmation about flexible working, allowing more leeway to live further from the office. 'This means higher levels of demand will still be evident, and potential vendors with family houses to sell could be in pole position. 'However, the lack of supply, especially for family houses, means the market will start to naturally slow during the rest of this year and into next year, as buyers hold on for more stock to become available before making a move. 'As we move into 2022, there will be a strong start to the year in line with seasonal trends, but after that, a return to more usual levels of activity among first-time buyers, the effect of the ending of the stamp duty holiday, and some buyers waiting for more stock to become available will result in a slow repairing of stock levels through the first half of the year.' Zoopla pointed out that the supply of newly-built homes, which slowed temporarily due to the hiatus in the construction industry during the first lockdown, is also still down 11 per cent in England. An interior designer who abused a bottle shop worker when he asked her to wear a face mask indoors has described herself as 'unvaccinated, untested and unafraid' of Covid-19. Katherine Militello was caught on CCTV waving a supposed exemption letter in the face of Glenorie Cellarbrations store manager Alan in Sydney's north-west on July 23. The store manager said he felt Ms Militello was 'aggressive and rude' and did not trust the legitimacy of the letter, so he refused her service. But the mother-of-one told Daily Mail Australia she has a genuine medical exemption, admitting: 'I did not handle the rejection of service in a gracious manner'. Ms Militello, whose Instagram account has been reported for allegedly 'inciting violence' and supporting anti-lockdown protests, said she is a woman of Christian faith and was 'distraught' when the CCTV footage was shared online. 'The very public display on my very private battle has left me nothing short of devastated... It has left me distressed to the point of throwing up,' she said. Katherine Militello (pictured with her husband) claims she had a medical exemption for not wearing a mask. She also is vocal about her anti-vaccine and anti-mask stance online On Ms Militello's Instagram account, she describes herself as 'unvaccinated, unmasked, untested, unafraid and unapologetic'. 'Doing it for the kids,' she posted. She has previously promoted her anti-vaccine stance on Instagram, describing herself as a 'freedom keeper'. The freedom keeper movement is a combination of thousands of people across each Australian state who either don't believe Covid exists or are actively ignoring lockdown orders. They claim to be advocates for human rights and offer unfounded and incorrect vaccine advice, while also promoting illegal rallies and protests. A woman who claims to know Ms Militello said she is a vocal anti-vaxxer and has encouraged those closest to her not to be afraid of Covid. 'She thinks it's a conspiracy,' one woman said. Ms Militello previously promoted her anti-vaccine stance on Instagram, describing herself as a 'freedom keeper' Viral CCTV footage captured a Sydney bottle shop manager being berated by a maskless woman after refusing to serve her Since the video was shared, Ms Militello said she's been 'sick at the thought of leaving home' and fears performing basic tasks, including going to the grocery store. 'I have not been able to face people within my beloved communities and networks. During such a time of crisis and great divide, we all need to become united. 'Life is hard enough and each of us are dealing with it as best as we can.' Shopkeepers are entitled to ask a customer to wear face masks indoors and Sydneysiders are also required to wear masks outdoors. But Alan told Daily Mail Australia he would not serve any customer who was aggressive, regardless of exemptions. Ms Militello also describes herself as 'unvaccinated, unmasked, untested, unafraid and unapologetic' The woman snatched the piece of paper of the counter as the manager takes the bottles of the shelves 'Like most other businesses, we won't serve someone if they're rude or aggressive,' he said. 'She was not swearing, but she was being very aggressive, I think the video speaks for itself. 'We have signs from NSW Health that say wearing a mask is a condition of entry. It (the note) looked fabricated, and she was being rude.' The manager said NSW Health signs are situated at the store's entrance Ms Militello allegedly failed to check in with the QR code or take note of the masks-only sign at the front of the store - but was far from the only one. 'We have had about 20 people come in without masks in the last two weeks,' he said. NSW Police said the incident was reported and officers responded, but no fines were issued nor was any formal action taken. Under NSW Health rules, a customer's entry to a shop can be refused if they are not wearing a mask. 'It is a matter for the occupier of each premise to exercise judgment on what is appropriate for their premises and for the well-being of their staff and customers,' the NSW Government website reads. Ms Militello has since removed her Facebook and Instagram pages. On Ms Militello's Instagram account, she describes herself as 'unvaccinated, unmasked, untested, unafraid and unapologetic' South Dakota's attorney general will plead no contest to running over and killing a man before driving off after a Republican event last year. State Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg will no longer go to trial on Thursday for charges of careless driving, using a mobile phone and failing to stay in his lane the night he struck and killed Joseph Boever, 55, on September 12. Ravnsborg maintained he believed that he had hit a deer, even though investigators say Boever's glasses flew into his car after the impact. Beadle County States Attorney Michael Moore, who is one of two prosecutors on the case, said 'there wont be a trial and there will be a plea entered,' but he declined to discuss further details of the arrangement. Moore said a judges order that bars state officials from discussing details of the investigation prevented him from disclosing more. The attorney general's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg (left) struck and killed Joe Boever (right) in the hit and run on September 12 but told cops he believed he had hit a deer A photo of the Ford sedan that South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg was driving on September 12 when he he struck and killed a pedestrian. He faces misdemeanor charges Ravnsborg, the state's top law enforcement officer, was charged with the three misdemeanors that each carry sentences of up to 30 days in jail and up to a $500 fine. Ravnsborg attorney, Tim Rensch, told the The New York Times, that the careless driving charge would be dropped as part of the plea deal, meaning the scandal-hit AG faces a maximum of 60 days in jail, and a $1,000 fine. The charges don't affect the Republican's qualification to hold the office of attorney general in South Dakota, and Ravnsborg says he wants to stay on. But top Republicans in the state have called for him to step down and have pushed for the state Legislature to impeach him. South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, pictured, had called on Ravnsborg to resign Gov. Kristi Noem, a fellow Republican, had issued a statement simply saying, 'I believe the Attorney General should resign.' State Representative Jamie Smith, a Democrat, who had sponsored an impeachment resolution against Ravnsborg, added that the impeachment efforts would depend on how the case ultimately ends. 'I still don't think he's able to do his job effectively, and so we're going to have to see,' he told The NY Times. 'This is a big cloud hanging over that office.' Republican state Rep. Steve Haugaard, an ally of the attorney general, said an impeachment seemed unlikely, especially given that new details about the crash won't come out at a criminal trial. Lawyers for victim's widow Jenny Boever said in a statement that they would be filing a wrongful death lawsuit against Ravnsborg, partly in the hopes of getting answers to lingering questions about the crash. 'The family deserves answers to what happened that night. The Attorney General should be held accountable for his actions, just like anyone else,' lawyer Scott Heidepriem said in the statement. Heiderpriem did not immediately reply to the Daily Mail's request for comment. Nick Nemec, Boever's cousin, added in a statement, 'As a family we are very disappointed in the decision to charge Mr. Ravnsborg with only three misdemeanors, none for killing a man.' 'I am convinced, despite his claims otherwise, he saw Joe in the moment before the crash.' Boever, second from the right, pictured with his wife Jenny, third from the right, and relatives. Jenny plans to file a wrongful death suit against that state attorney general Witnesses at the fundraiser have vouched for the attorney general that they didn't see him drinking alcohol and that he did not seem 'impaired in any way shape or form'. Pictured: Ravnsborg sitting near the stage at Rooster's Bar and Grill in Redfield on the night of the crash Elected to his first term in 2018, the attorney general initially told authorities that he thought he had struck a deer or another large animal while he was driving home to Pierre in him 2011 Ford Taurus from a Republican fundraiser late on Sept. 12. He said he had searched the unlit area with a cellphone flashlight and didnt realize he had killed a man until the next day when he returned to the scene on U.S. 14, near Highmore. But in videos released by Gov. Kristi Noem this year, criminal investigators confronted Ravnsborg with gruesome details of the crash, including that Boever's eyeglasses were found inside Ravnsborg's vehicle. At one point, they told him: 'His face was in your windshield, Jason. Think about that.' Ravnsborg seemed unsure in the videos about how he had swerved onto the shoulder, but detectives told him bone scrapings were found on the shoulder's rumble strip. 'I never saw him. I never saw him,' Ravnsborg told the detectives Crash investigators said in November that Ravnsborg was distracted when he veered onto the shoulder of the highway where Boever was walking. But prosecutors took months more to make a charging decision in the crash, launching an investigation that considered cellphone GPS data, video footage from along Ravnsborgs route and DNA evidence. A toxicology report taken roughly 15 hours after the crash showed no alcohol in Ravnsborgs system, and people attending the fundraiser said he was not seen drinking alcohol. Noem called on Ravnsborg to resign in February after the investigation concluded, but Ravnsborg resisted those calls, saying he was still capable of fulfilling the duties of his office and asking that he be given due process under the law. Three law enforcement groups, the South Dakota Fraternal Order of Police, the South Dakota Chiefs of Police Association and the South Dakota Sheriffs Association, joined the governors calls for him to step down. The North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation interviews South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg on September 30 about the hit and run in which Joseph Boever was killed Nick Nemec is pictured surveying the ares of the 14 Highway in Highmore, South Dakota, where their cousin was struck and killed Boever's truck is pictured after he was struck. He had crashed his truck and was walking back to it at night to retrieve it when he was struck Tire tracks are seen on the side of US Highway 14 near the area where Ranvsborg struck Boever as he drove home from a Republican fundraiser in September The Republican-dominated Legislature considered impeaching the attorney general this year, but momentum quickly died out and lawmakers decided to wait until after the criminal proceedings to consider whether to proceed. House lawmakers said Wednesday that they were still digesting what the plea deal meant for possible impeachment. Republican Rep. Tim Goodwin, who has called for Ravnsborg to resign, didnt drop the possibility of a fresh effort to remove him from office. It would require a special session, which can be called either by the governor or by two-thirds of both the House and Senate. 'Theres still one person that died, and hes our senior law enforcement officer,' Goodwin said. Ravnsborgs attorneys filed a motion last month alleging that Boever's alcoholism and prescription drug abuse led at least one family member, a cousin, to believe that a depressed Boever killed himself by jumping in front of Ravnsborgs car. Ravnsborg hasn't said whether he will seek a second term next year, but his predecessor, Marty Jackley, is running for his old job. Jackley served for 10 years in the post before losing the Republican primary for governor to Noem in 2018. Outspoken Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny said he is forced to watch state-run propaganda eight hours a day as a political prisoner, and if he nods off during one of the broadcasts a guard will yell at him to wake up. In his first interview from prison, Navalny compared his experience at Russian Penal Colony No. 2 to a Chinese labor camp, saying he is forced to watch propaganda five times a day as part of an 'awareness raising' program. 'You might imagine tattooed muscle men with steel teeth carrying on with knife fights to take the best cot by the window,' he told the New York Times. 'You need to imagine something like a Chinese labor camp, where everybody marches in a line and where video cameras are hung everywhere. There is constant control and a culture of snitching.' Alexei Navalny has long been an outspoken critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin In his first interview since being imprisoned, Navalny said he is forced to watch eight hours of state propaganda each day His days starts, he said, with morning calisthenics, breakfast and sweeping the yard, followed immediately by 'screen time' in which he watches videos glorifying the history of Russia. He then gets some free time, he said, followed by two more hours in front of the TV, lunch, more screen time, dinner, and then even more time watching propaganda. One afternoon session could be replaced by a game of chess or backgammon. The guards monitor the inmates, though, as they watch the state propaganda, not allowing them to read or write and yelling 'Dont sleep, watch!' if they start to nod off. 'We watch films about the Great Patriot War,' Navalny said of World War II, 'or how, one day 40 years ago, our athletes defeated the Americans or Canadians.' It is during these sessions, he said, that he truly understands 'the essence of the ideology of the Putin regime: The present and the future are being substituted with the past - the truly heroic past, or embellished past or completely fictional past. 'All sorts of pasts must constantly be in the spotlight to displace thoughts about the future and questions about the present.' The practice sprang from a penal reform in Russia in 2010, the Times report, to boost guards' control over inmates throughout their day and reduce the sway of prison gangs. Experts say the intent is not so much about brainwashing, as it is about maintaining control. 'Everything is organized so that I am under maximum control 24 hours a day,' Navalny told the Times. He estimated that about one-third of his fellow inmates are 'activists' who serve information to the warden, but said, all things considered, he gets along with the other inmates in his cellblock. Navalny is being held at the Russian Penal Colony No. 2, which he compared to a Chinese labor camp Navalny has been in the facility since he returned to his home country after receiving treatment for a Russian nerve agent Navalny has been an outspoken critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and was imprisoned in March after returning to his home country from Germany, where he was receiving treatment after being poisoned by Russian spies with nerve gas Novicnok. Novichok was the chemical weapon which nearly killed former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury, England, in March 2018. A local woman died later from contact with Novichok, the BBC reports. The Kremlin denies poisoning Navalny and has maintained his prison sentence is not political. In his first few weeks in prison, Navalny said his limbs were numb, either from lingering effects of the nerve-agent poisoning, or from a back-injury from riding in a prison van. He went on a 24-day hunger strike, when he said he couldn't get treatment for the pain, raising concerns about his health. But, he said, the neurological symptoms started to ease when guards stopped waking him up every hour at night to ensure he wasn't planning to escape. 'I now understand why sleep deprivation is one of he favorite tortures of the special services,' he said. 'No traces reman, and it's impossible to trace. Still, Navalny remains upbeat about the future of Russia, calling Putin's regime a 'mistake' Still, Navalny remained upbeat about the future of the regime of Vladimir Putin, calling it a 'mistake,' and insisting that one day it would end. 'Sooner or later, this mistake will be fixed, and Russia will move on to a democratic, European path of development. Simply because that is what the people want,' he said. He also repeated criticisms of the United States and European governments for sanctions on Russia, which he said harm Russian people rather than those in power, as the truly powerful oligarchs retain 'an army of lawyers, lobbyists and bankers, fighting for the right of owners of dirty blood money to remain unpunished.' Navalny has not been silent since his jailing in March, releasing a letter from prison and also managing several social media posts, but the interview with the Times was the first since his imprisonment. This month, he was charged with new crimes that could prolong his jail time by three years. If found guilty, he could only be released after 2024, the year Russia is scheduled to hold a presidential election. His Anti-Corruption Foundation has organized a 'smart voting' campaign to encourage people to vote for opposition leaders - posing a potential blow to Putin's United Russia party is expected to struggle. In response, Russian officials have reportedly been disrupting an app designed by Navalny's team to organize the tactical voting effort. According to Reuters, officials were disrupting the app with equipment that uses a technology called Deep Packet Inspection, which can analyze internet traffic, identify the data flows of particular services and block them. The government ordered all internet providers, including mobile operators, to install that equipment in 2019 after Russia passed legislation known as its 'sovereign internet' law - one in a series of moves by authorities to tighten internet controls that stirred fears among internet freedom advocates that Russia was tacking towards a stricter China-style vision of internet control. A killer pardoned by the former Governor of Kentucky after his family raised funds for the lawmaker's reelection campaign has been convicted of the same murder in a federal court. An Eastern Kentucky jury convicted Patrick Baker, 43, on a federal charge of murder committed during a drug trafficking crime after about six hours of deliberation over two days. He was pardoned by former Governor Matt Bevin in 2019, months after the Republican lost his bid to be re-elected for a second term in office. Baker killed Donald Mills, a known drug dealer, during a dispute in 2014, prosecutors said, but Baker's defense says a different man killed Mills and blamed Baker. His latest conviction does not fall foul of double jeopardy laws banning a person from being tried for the same crime twice, because the 2017 conviction was on state charges. The 'dual sovereignty doctrine' allows state and federal officials to prosecute the same defendant for the same actions without infringing on double jeopardy protections. Baker's lawyer, Louisville attorney Steve Romines, said he would appeal. 'We felt there was evidence that should have been admitted that was not,' he told the Courier Journal. Patrick Baker, who was pardoned by a Kentucky governor who had political ties with, was convicted of the same murder in federal court. Former Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin's pardoned Baker in 2019. Baker's family raised more than $20,000 for his failed reelection campaign Baker's release from prison in 2019 came just months after Gov. Matt Bevin's unsuccessful run for a second term, which Baker's family raised $21,500 for donated thousands more, the Courier Journal reported. The murderer's brother and and sister-in-law also gave $4,000 to Bevins campaign on the day of the fundraiser. Baker said his family's donations and ties to the governor had no impact on Bevin's decision to pardoned Baker on his way out the door in 2019. Bevin called the evidence against Baker 'sketchy,' though the former governor did not mention his ties to Baker's family. He also claimed Baker's 'drug addictions' had led him to fall in with the wrong people, and further muddied the waters of the case against him. He pardoned Baker despite the Kentucky Court of Appeals upheld Bakers conviction in 2018, a year before his release, writing in a unanimous ruling that 'there can be no doubt, on review of the proof as a whole, evidence of Bakers guilt was overwhelming.' During his final month of office, Bevin pardoned or commuted the sentences of 428 people, including 336 mostly white drug offenders. He also pardoned prisoners convicted of serious crimes such as murder, manslaughter, and rape. Baker has been convicted again of murdering Donald Mills, pictured, in 2014 Kentucky Senate President Robert Stivers has since called for the US Attorney's Office to investigate the spate of pardons. After Wednesday's guilty verdict, U.S. District Judge Claria Horn Boom said, 'At its core, this case was about one thing: Patrick Bakers role in the death of Donald Mills. Having heard the evidence, the jury found him guilty.' Baker will be sentenced in December. Prosecutors declined to seek the death penalty, but Baker could serve life in prison on the conviction. He was convicted of reckless homicide in Mills' death in state court in 2017 while posing as a federal agent trying to rob him of cash and pain pills. Mills' pregnant wife and children were held at gunpoint while Baker ransacked the victims' home for oxycodone pills, according to the U.S. Attorney. Evidence at the trial including shell casings tied to Baker's pistol and surveillance video showing Baker buying handcuff restraints hours before the killing. He was sentenced to 19 years in prison, but Bevin's pardon released him and erased the conviction. At least three California families that were trapped in Kabul have been successfully evacuated from Afghanistan. Congressman Darrell Issa (R-CA 50th District), who has been working to bring San Diego area families back to the United States amid the Taliban takeover, confirmed to DailyMail.com that 13 individuals had been freed. Earlier Thursday, the Cajon Valley Union School District confirmed that a family of eight six children and two adults had safely evacuated Afghanistan and arrived in the U.S. It is unclear if they have made it back to California yet. Officials are not clear on specifically how many Californians remain trapped in Afghanistan at this time, however, they are working around-the-clock to help bring people home, Issa said. Sixteen parents and more than two-dozen students, ranging from preschoolers to high schoolers, from the San Diego suburb of El Cajon, which has a large Afghan refugee population, traveled to Afghanistan over summer break to visit grandparents and other relatives. The families are among an estimated 1,500 Americans still trapped in Afghanistan following a rapid Taliban takeover of the country on the heels of the US pulling out after a 20-year occupation. Six California students trapped in Afghanistan have returned to the United States while at least 18 others and their parents remain stranded in the country. The families are among thousands of Americans still trapped in Afghanistan following a rapid Taliban takeover of the country on the heels of the US pulling out after a 20-year occupation (Pictured: Kabul airport on Aug. 26) A spokesperson for Rep. Issa (pictured) says the congressman's office aided in the successful freeing of two San Diego families who were trapped in Kabul, totaling 13 people. They are actively working to free more individuals Issa was contacted by local school officials, as well as several families, indicating that families with several children were among those trapped in Kabul. After working non-stop for more than a week, the congressman and his staff were able to begin the successful process of getting people out of the Taliban-controlled country. 'This is great news, the result of tireless work by our team to ensure that our people aren't left behind in Afghanistan,' Issa said in a press release. 'But while we have made extraordinary progress, there are so many more Americans stranded in Afghanistan. We have more work to do and under extremely difficult conditions.' Issa said that while he 'could not be more pleased at what has been achieved so far,' the evacuation of these two families is only the 'start to finally bringing our community back together and bringing our people home'. The representative's office notes that while these families have been evacuated from Afghanistan, they have not yet made it back to the states. Meanwhile, the Cajon Valley Union School District announced that one family has returned home safely. Fraidoon Hashemi (pictured), an Afghan who works as community liaison for the school district, says the El Cajon families, like many in Kabul, have witnessed shootings and other violence in and around the airport in recent days, noting: 'Nobody is doing well' 'One of our families did arrive in the United States and are home safe. Which we are completely ecstatic about,' Michael Serban, Director of Family and Community Engagement, told NBC 7. Fraidoon Hashemi, an Afghan who works as community liaison for the school district, says the El Cajon families, like many in Kabul, have witnessed shootings and other violence in and around the airport in recent days. They have been blocked by the throngs of Afghans at the Kabul airport desperately trying to escape following their government's rapid collapse and the withdrawal of U.S. troops. 'Nobody is doing well,' said Hashemi, who has spoken to the families. 'They are trying their best to get to the airport, get to their gates and get on an airplane. The situation is very horrible.' The families have asked the U.S. government for help after being unable to board their flights back to California. Issa says he is 'working diligently to determine the facts on the ground, any bureaucratic barriers that can be removed, and the best ways to help those stranded leave Afghanistan and return home safely'. 'We won't stop until we have answers and action,' he wrote in a statement provided to NBC 7. His office told the TV station that the rest of the El Cajon families could return home as early as Friday morning. However, he said there are still several other San Diego area families trapped in Afghanistan. Issa has reached out to the White House and state department for assistance. 'Initially it was three families, then six families and it continues to grow. So, it's now dozens of people from our region. I want to make it clear, we're not worried about if they are in the 50th, or slightly over where the artificial line is, and neither is Sara Jacobs. This is for all of us to be doing,' Issa said. Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-CA 53rd District) echoed Issa's claim saying: 'Heartbreaking to see so many local folks, including so many kids, unable to get out of Afghanistan. My office has been working on hundreds of similar cases, and it underscores how great the need is to get American citizens, Afghan allies, and partners out.' Rep. Darrell Issa tweeted on Wednesday that he was working wit the federal government to get the El Cajon families home The families had each traveled on their own on different dates and were not part of an organized trip. School Board President Tamara Otero said the families had tickets to fly out of Afghanistan, 'but unfortunately they were not able to get to the airport.' 'The biggest concern is that the Taliban closed the airport,' Otero said. The Cajon Valley Union School District became aware of the problem after a relative of one of the families reached out to say their child would be late starting the school year, which began Aug. 17. Many of the families arrived in Afghanistan in early May and June, months before the crisis unfolded and the country's president fled as the Taliban seized power. Superintendent David Miyashiro said the families are particularly scared because of the upcoming Aug. 31 deadline for the United States to end its withdrawal. 'Just like you and I, they had used the summer to go back to see their relatives,' Miyashiro told NBC 7. 'No one felt that were going to be unsafe or unable to return.' 'What happened in Afghanistan was unexpected for everybody,' echoed Hashemi. 'Everyone was shocked that in one week, everything changed.' The district said it could not provide more details about the stranded families since the children and their parents could be in danger. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan. It was unclear if that included all the El Cajon families. Some are U.S. citizens; others have U.S. residency. Despite travel warnings from the U.S. government, many felt an urgency to go to the country after not being able to see their extended families because of travel bans from the coronavirus pandemic, Hashemi said. School Board President Tamara Otero said the families had tickets to fly out of Afghanistan, 'but unfortunately they were not able to get to the airport.' Adding: 'The biggest concern is that the Taliban closed the airport' (Pictured: Evacuation at Kabul airport on Aug. 24) Michael Serban (pictured) said that although families are trapped, officials still have 'a lot of hope' Most of the El Cajon families came to the United States on a special immigrant visa after having worked for the U.S. government or U.S. military in Afghanistan, officials said. The visa allows in only the person and their spouse and children. Hashemi, who came to the United States on a special visa in 2015 and is now a U.S. citizen, said he normally would have also gone back to Afghanistan for summer vacation so his four children could visit their grandma. However, his family did not travel this year because his son's passport had expired during the pandemic. He feels fortunate now for having been inconvenienced. Hashemi said the students will likely need a lot of support when they return. 'Im sure they are going to be affected emotionally,' he said, adding: 'Their teachers miss them. We all miss them. We hope to see them all back to school.' Cajon Valley school board president Tamara Otero said it's been stressful too for those waiting for their return. 'It's killing us right now,' Otero told The San Diego Union-Tribune. 'We are so worried about our students that are stuck there. We'll do the best we can to get them out.' While there is still a lot of fear amongst the El Cajon families, district leaders also say they are hopeful. 'There is just a lot of hope,' said Serban. 'We know that one family arrived today back to the United States and are home safe we still have approximately six others information changes, but that is where we are at right now we are happy to have at least one family home right now.' El Cajon resident, Navy veteran, and former intelligence analyst, Amanda Matti told DailyMail.com Wednesday that she was working with Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, Rep. Jacobs, and a group of volunteers to help an El Cajon family of six get into the airport. Matti, who lives in El Cajon, declined to give further information about the family they are currently helping until they are safely inside. 'They are literally stuck at the West gate right now.' She was first connected to the family a few years ago when her non-profit volunteer group helped them resettle in El Cajon. Matti also noted that last weekend she helped a former El Cajon family of five escape Afghanistan. That family was flown to Washington DC and will head to their current home in Portland, Oregon. El Cajon Mayor Bill Wells, also speaking with DailyMail.com Wednesday, said that he is 'sick over what's happening in Afghanistan. This is a shameful chapter for our country.' He confirmed that Rep. Issa's office has taken charge of the situation. 'Being the mayor of a city, I have limited ability to help with foreign affairs but I will do anything that I can,' he said. During Wednesday's press conference Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, was asked about the El Cajon families but referred the question to the State Department. President Biden announced Tuesday that he plans to stick to his original deadline to have all Americans evacuated from Afghanistan by the end of the month. Over the weekend, US military officials reported they have been forced to find new routes to Kabul's international airport as the ISIS-K terror group posed a threat to citizens and Afghan allies. The Afghan capital's airport remains the only way in or out of the country. San Diego County has been hub for refugees since the Vietnam War providing yet another comparison of the Taliban's take over of Afghanistan to the fall of Saigon. Records show that following the fall of the Vietnam's largest city over 50,000 refugees flocked to San Diego County within six months. Social services were set up in the area to process and aid the influx of people. This paved a path for other waves of displaced people to come to the area making it a hub for refugees. From 2016 to 2020 San Diego County saw thousands of Afghan refugees escape to the area. The US Refugee Admissions Program prioritizes relocating people to places where they have established families or communities pushing the current relocation of Afghan refugees to San Diego County. A Navy SEAL accused of murdering an ISIS prisoner of war became 'untouchable' after Donald Trump intervened in his case and pardoned him, a new book reveals. Eddie Gallagher, 42, was accused of killing dozens of Iraqi civilians including a schoolgirl and an elderly man armed with just an empty jug, during his deployment in 2017. In 2019, he was tried for stabbing an injured 17-year-old ISIS POW to death and was convicted of posing with the dead body as if it were a hunting trophy. Trump, however, saw him as a 'real-life Rambo' and gave him an invitation to meet in person at Mar-a-Lago, his private club in Florida. The former president pardoned Gallagher and personally ensured that disciplinary action, which could have kicked him out of the SEALs, the Navy's most elite unit, wouldn't be taken against him. Retired Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher was acquitted by a military jury in 2019 of stabbing a 17-year-old ISIS fighter to death but was convicted of unlawfully posing for photos with his dead body According to a new book by journalist David Philipps, when one of Gallagher's men challenged him about the killing he left him stunned by saying: 'Next time I'll do it when you're not around' Gallagher's case drew widespread controversy with President Trump repeatedly intervening on his behalf. Gallagher and his wife Andrea met with Trump and First Lady Melania at Mar-a-Lago back in 2019 following his acquittal for murder A new book by Pulitzer Prize-winner and New York Times journalist David Philipps reveals the full extent of the allegations against Gallagher and his dark past which raises fresh questions about Trump's support. In Alpha: Eddie Gallagher and the War for the Soul of the Navy SEALs, published Tuesday, also throws up deep questions about the culture at the SEALs, which are best known for killing Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in 2011. Philipps, spoke with more than two dozen current and former SEALs and read through more than 9,000 pages of confidential and court documents, including text messages that were used during Gallagher's trial. He reveals that the incident which led to Gallagher's trial came in early 2017 when Alpha Platoon, which he was commander of, was deployed to Mosul in Iraq to flush out ISIS militants. Gallagher was known in the SEALS as a 'seasoned badass' and was well respected by his platoon while they were training for the mission. But once they got into Iraq, Gallagher started 'acting like he's lost his mind', as Special Operator First Class Craig Miller put it. He began 'brooding like a character in Heart of Darkness', the book that inspired 1979 film Apocalypse Now, about a colonel who goes mad in the Vietnam War. Alpha: Eddie Gallagher and the War for the Soul of the Navy SEALs, published Tuesday, reveals the full extent of the allegations against Gallagher and his dark past 'Suddenly Eddie seemed to be consumed by the dark possibilities of the next six months in combat, as if the prospect of mayhem, killing, and death were some ghoulish type of opportunity,' the book says. Rather than take his men on missions, every day Gallagher would find a spot where he could shoot at ISIS fighters and civilians as if he was 'playing American Sniper', the 2014 war drama film based on former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, who has the most kills in US military history. A grim joke going round the platoon was that 'Eddie Gallagher puts the laughter in manslaughter.' On May 3, 2017, the first day of a new offensive, Iraqi soldiers informed troops over the radio that they were bringing an injured ISIS soldier back with them. Over the radio, Gallagher is said to have told his men: 'No-one touch him. He's mine'. Gallagher kneeled over the body of the wounded boy, later identified as 17-year-ol Moataz Mohamed Abdullah, who was motionless having been injected with a sedative. Members of Alpha platoon saw Gallagher pull out a three-inch knife he kept with him in a black leather sheath across his belt - and stab it into Abdullah's neck. Gallagher pulled it out and put it back in again, causing an 'eruption' of blood to come out. Special Operator First Class Corey Scott, a medic in the platoon, saw it all and was 'too shocked' to do anything. Fellow SEALs say Gallagher started acting like he 'lost his mind' after arriving in Iraq - where he would reportedly find a spot where he could shoot at ISIS fighters and civilians as if he was 'playing American Sniper' Members of the Alpha platoon say they saw Gallagher pull out a three-inch knife (pictured) he kept with him in a black leather sheath across his belt - and stab it into Abdullah's neck Gallagher was arrested and charged with multiple allegations, the most serious of which was murdering the POW which was a war crime. He is seen leaving military court with his wife Andrea Gallagher during lunch recess on July 2, 2019 'He was too overwhelmed to think or act. His special operations medical training had readied him for scores of high-stress situations. The one where the platoon chief stabs a sedated POW was not one of them,' Philipps writes. Scott thought to himself that 'this was a crime, this was murder.' Special Operator Craig Miller, who also witnessed the act, characterized it as 'an assault against everything he believed the SEALs stood for,' according to the book. But then after Gallagher's encouragement the men all stood around Abdullah's body for a photo - not everyone realized what had happened moments earlier. Gallagher took his own solo photo with Abdullah's 'head by the hair with his right hand, like he was holding the antlers of a prize buck'. 'In his left hand he gripped his custom-made hunting knife. He looked straight into the camera, confident but not smiling, in a classic hunter's pose,' Philipps writes. When one of Gallagher's men challenged him about the killing he left him stunned by saying: 'Next time I'll do it when you're not around.' The platoon continued their tour but Gallagher's behavior would only get even worse, the book says. On one occasion, he mistakenly thought one tower was clear of ISIS fighters but it wasn't and one of his men got shot and others were nearly killed. Gallagher continued going out on his sniper mission but his targets appeared to be unarmed civilians. Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher (pictured with his wife Andrea after his acquittal in 2019) was accused of killing dozens of Iraqi civilians including a schoolgirl and an elderly man The former president pardoned Gallagher and personally ensured that disciplinary action wouldn't be taken against him Special Operator First Class Dylan Dille realized he would have to fire warning shots at them - to stop his boss from killing them first. With each passing day Gallagher became 'more unglued' and began screaming in his sleep so often it seemed to his platoon that he was 'going mad.' His men did not realize it but Gallagher was secretly addicted to a powerful painkiller and was popping Provigil pills to keep himself awake on long missions which left him amped and acting like the 'Energizer Bunny.' He was also injecting himself with testosterone to help build muscle at the gym. Towards the end of the tour, Gallagher also began to carry around a steel hatchet that he had delivered to the front lines. In a text to the friend who sent it to him, he said he wanted to 'bury' it in somebody's skull - but thankfully he never did. According to Philipps, the men began to realize that all along their 'enemy had not been ISIS but their chief.' That was especially the case for Petty Officer First Class Joe Arrington, who one day watched as a shot came out from a sniper tower which hit an elderly man carrying nothing more than an empty plastic jug. Gallagher kept bragging about the numbers of ISIS fighters he had shot as if he was manufacturing his own mythology as an expert marksman. But based on what his men were seeing, there was 'little doubt' he was killing civilians. The Weekly documentary series in 2019 revealed text messages in which Gallagher's platoon members discussed his alarming behavior One occasion was when Special Operator First Class Joshua Vriens, a sniper, saw a group of four school-age girls walking along unarmed. He heard a shot fire from a US sniper tower and 'saw a girl clutch her stomach and go down.' Vriens thought that 'shooting an innocent child was so evil, so disgusting' that only ISIS had done it. But when he told his comrades they corrected him: Gallagher told them he took the shot. It was shocking but as Philipps writes, the truth was that there had been warning signs about Gallagher his whole life. He was the son of a West Point Graduate and Army officer but he lacked discipline and was kicked out of high school for fighting and barely graduated. After bouncing around dead end jobs he signed with the Navy in 1999 at the age of 19. He repeatedly tried to become a SEAL but only after they were unable to meet their recruitment goals during the early 2000s during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan did he make the cut. Even though Gallagher was lauded for being aggressive and worked his way up to command his own platoon, there were plenty of signs he was a 'darker, meaner human being' than his superiors thought. He was openly homophonic and talked about how transgender people should be 'dropped in the ocean', Philipps writes. He hit a student he was supposed to be teaching and was quietly reassigned. Gallagher had also been known to make racist remarks, such as one time shortly before his deployment in 2017, when he told a former colleague who said he was going to a Black Lives Matter protest: 'Are you going down there? Run those n****** over.' According to Philipps, the couple gave interviews knowing that Gallagher was a 'real-life version of Rambo made for the Trump era' and the former President wouldn't be able to resist getting involved Gallagher, 42, was the son of a West Point Graduate and Army officer but he lacked discipline and was kicked out of high school for fighting and barely graduated On a tour of Afghanistan in 2010 Gallagher was accused of shooting a girl that a target was using as a human shield in order to neutralize him. He later said about the incident: 'You gotta break a couple eggs to make an omelet.' In late 2016, before going to Iraq, Gallagher texted a friend that 'we just want to kill as many people as possible.' When Alpha Platoon returned to their base in San Diego after their tour of Iraq, they reported Gallagher to their superiors who reluctantly asked their bosses to start an investigation. In interviews with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) special Operator First Class Dylan Dille estimated Gallagher shot 20 to 50 people, and maybe five of them were legitimate targets. Miller said that Gallagher was 'freaking evil' while Vriens said that he was 'toxic'. Scott told NCIS: 'You could tell he was perfectly OK with killing anybody that was moving.' NCIS investigators raided Gallagher's home in Florida and found his iPhone from his deployment. On it was the photo of him posing with the dead ISIS child soldier's head and his hunting knife in his hand. In a text he sent nine days after the killing Gallagher told a friend: 'Good story behind this one, got him with my hunting knife.' Gallagher was arrested and charged with multiple allegations, the most serious of which was murdering the POW which was a war crime. But Gallagher's wife Andrea started the pushback and created a website called JusticeforEddie.com which portrayed him as a war hero and asked for donations - more than $500,000 poured in. She appeared on Fox News more than a dozen times between December 2018 and his trial in June the following year. Their target was one person they knew was likely watching: the President of the United States. They knew that Gallagher was a 'real-life version of Rambo made for the Trump era' and the former President wouldn't be able to resist getting involved. For Trump, who attended a military academy and was obsessed with the Armed Forces, Gallagher was the perfect poster boy. As Trump once put it, he wanted to 'bomb the s***' out of ISIS - and he was about as sympathetic to their fighters. According to author David Philipps, the men began to realize that all along their 'enemy had not been ISIS but their chief' Trump began Tweeting about the case and even before Gallagher went on trial, said he would pardon him. But as the commander-in-chief, it was a complete subversion of the military justice system. When Trump heard that Gallagher was in a grim military prison he called Richard Spencer, the Navy Secretary at the time, and told him to 'get Eddie Gallagher out of solitary confinement'. The next day nothing had changed so Trump called again. He told Spencer: 'I thought I told you to get Gallagher out'. When Spencer protested, Trump said: 'I don't give a s***, get him out of there. Do I have to give you a direct order?' Spencer obliged and Trump said: 'Okay I want you to call over to Pete Hegseth at Fox and tell him what you're doing'. A White House operator came on saying she was connecting the call. Trump announced the move on March 30, 2019 with a Tweet that read: 'In honor of his past service to our Country, Navy Seal #EddieGallagher will soon be moved to less restrictive confinement while he awaits his day in court. Process should move quickly! @foxandfriends'. The trial was a disaster for the prosecution when the lead prosecutor was ordered off the case amid claims he tried to spy on the computers of a lawyer for some of the SEALs. Scott, who privately visited Gallagher in the run up to the trial, unexpectedly turned hostile and refused to back up crucial parts of the case. Scott even took the credit for killing Abdullah by cutting off his breathing pipe because he feared he would be tortured by the Iraqis, the court heard. The jury of serving military personnel cleared Gallagher of everything apart from posing with the photo of Abdullah's dead body. He was sentenced to four months in prison, two months of docked pay and a reduction in rank one step. With time served he was a free man. As Philipps writes: 'After the trial, Eddie had put on his uniform and returned to his job at the Navy. 'He was back in the system, still technically a sailor under control by the chain of command, and yet, the command all knew they had no control over him. They couldn't do anything to Eddie because President Trump had his back. He was untouchable'. But for Trump the idea of Gallagher losing even his rank was too much and he ordered the military to reinstate him. When Trump got wind of a disciplinary investigation by Navy commanders to kick Gallagher out of the SEALs he put a stop to it, and fired Spencer, his Navy Secretary. Gallagher 'seemed to realize he had top cover from a fellow pirate in the White House', Philipps writes. Amid the fallout, the Navy dropped charges against a good friend of Gallagher's and three other SEALs who were facing charges in the 2012 beating death of a detainee in Afghanistan. Law enforcement 'quietly dropped' the conspiracy to commit perjury investigation into Scott, who dramatically changed his testimony in court. Five months after Gallagher's trial Trump pardoned him and invited him to a meeting at Mar-a-Lago in Florida where they were photographed smiling together. Philips writes that while Trump's actions were disturbing, the Gallagher case raises profound issues about the culture of the SEALs as well. Gallagher never gave his platoon an explanation for what he did but they suspected it was because of his obsession with SEAL lore. Philipps writes that while high tech weapons allowed SEALs to kill an enemy from hundreds of yards away there was 'nothing closer, more visceral, more badass, than the silent blade of the World War II frogmen' - and Gallagher's nickname was 'Blade'. In fact Gallagher's actions were a 'learned behavior passed down from the men who had come before him'. The book says: 'He was part of an unsanctioned subculture in the SEALs that prized killing above nearly everything else, including, in some cases, the rule of law. 'And in his own way, he may just have been trying to fit in'. Queensland will build a new 1,000-bed regional quarantine facility despite the federal government shutting down the idea in June, after the state halted its hotel quarantine system for interstate travellers desperate to escape Covid-ravaged NSW and Victoria. The new facility will be built in partnership with wealthy Queensland businessman John Wagner whose family own the adjacent Wellcamp Airport near Toowoomba. 'We need regional quarantine facilities, it's a no brainer,' Ms Palaszczuk said. 'We don't need people in hotels, we need them in regional facilities.' The facility is expected to be finished by the end of this year when 500 beds will open, expanding to 1,000 beds by the first quarter of next year. The Wellcamp Airport at Toowoomba, owned by the Wagner family, would be adjacent to the new quarantine facility For the next fortnight people entering Queensland will not be permitted to enter on a right of entry pass and would need to reapply for a border pass (pictured - travellers wearing masks in Queensland) Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said she hoped the facility would end the need for hotel quarantine in the Brisbane CBD. She said on Wednesday that interstate and international arrivals meant the state's hotel quarantine system was full and Queensland was 'being loved to death'. A two-week delay on people entering hotel quarantine for 14 days was implemented with barely two hours notice, catching out many individuals and families who were in the process of relocating. Ms Palaszczuk said the Queensland government had pushed for the facility at Wellcamp since January. 'It could have been built by now,' she said. She said that if Prime Minister Scott Morrison didn't know about the announcement, 'he does now'. A proposal for the facility had earlier been rejected by the federal government in June because it did not meet Commonwealth guidelines for regional quarantine. 'If we want to open our country up and we want to open our states up, regional quarantine is part of the answer,' Ms Palaszczuk said. 'This is going to be better than Howard Springs,' she said, referring to the quarantine facility south of Darwin. Details about the cost of the project, which would be run by the Wagners, would remain commercial in confidence. Around 400-450 jobs would be generated by construction of the facility, which had already started. The facility at Toowoomba would be in addition to the one being constructed by the federal government at the Damascus Barracks at Pinkenba, in Brisbane's inner east. Mr Morrison addressed the announcement in his press conference on Thursday. 'She [Ms Palaszczuk] has been at liberty to do that for months,' he said. 'We have made a very clear that that facility did not meet the national guidelines, and that is why we are going forward together at Pinkenba. 'They have made that decision and they could have done that months ago if that's what they wished to do. Good for them. I wish them every success.' Ms Palaszczuk said fears Toowoomba Hospital would be overwhelmed by Covid patients once the facility was built would be be addressed by airlifting patients to Covid-equipped hospitals in Brisbane. She defended the project against suggestions it would eventually become a white elephant. 'If you build it, they will come,' she said. 'There's a whole range of reasons people still have to travel.' 'If this had been built when we first asked the Federal government, we potentially wouldn't have had to make the decision yesterday to delay hotel quarantine for two weeks,' Heath Minister Yvette D'Ath said. New rules for those who need to quarantine in a hotel when relocating to Queensland will require people to book a room in the hotel facility before they travel and re-apply for a border pass (Brisbane's Hotel Grand Chancellor, pictured) From 12pm Wednesday people entering Queensland will not be permitted to enter on a right of entry pass and would need to reapply for a border pass to be allocated a time to enter in another fortnight (pictured - travellers wearing masks in Queensland) Queensland announced no new cases of community-acquired Covid on Thursday. Two further cases were recorded in hotel quarantine. Meanwhile one man, Cameron McBryde, told ABC Brisbane on Thursday that he, his partner and two young children were due to relocate to Queensland from Melbourne at 3pm after the sudden decision to shut hotel quarantine had come into effect at midday. His family had vacated their Melbourne residence and all their belongings were in a truck on the way to Queensland when he discovered the family would not be able to fly into the state. 'I went to the airport and the ladies at Virgin advised me that if my border pass wasn't valid, I would have been returned on that plane,' he said. 'The decision was obviously very rash because no one at the Covid hotline had any idea of what was happening. He said he was also $800 out of pocket because the airfares, booked months ago, could not be refunded. 'They should have let me in that day. I can't reapply for a pass until September 8... I'm in limbo until then. 'I'm self-employed, everything's in that truck. 'The need to take in refugees for humanitarian reasons, I get that, but I don't see why it comes at the cost of creating refugees in our own country.' Health Minister Yvette D'ath said people who had to reapply for a border pass as a result of yesterday's decision could ask for an exemption based on 'exceptional circumstances' Exemptions also exist for people accessing medical treatment or other special circumstances including bereavement. She said yesterday the decision was implemented quickly to prevent a rush of people to the airport to get on flights. 'What we'd have was an even greater problem because we'd have even greater surges than what we have seen over the last couple of weeks.' 'We are really concerned about the pressure that the hotel quarantine system is putting on our resources,' Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said in her Wednesday morning press conference. 'While we have allowed genuine relocations for work and other purposes, it has overwhelmed our hotels and it has to be stopped for at least the next fortnight,' she said. 'Queensland is being loved to death.' There were currently 5,114 people in 22 quarantine hotels - 3,257 from interstate and 1,857 from overseas - the largest number since the hotel quarantine system was put in place in the state. Between August 9 and 20, 2,750 people received border passes to relocate to Queensland, the premier said, including 1,983 people in one week. 'We do not have any room at the moment,' Ms Palaszczuk said. 'We're being stretched to the limit. It's too much pressure, it's putting our workers and our community at risk. 'We don't want to see Delta coming into our community.' She said Queensland Police and the health department had put the proposal to her to shut down hotel quarantine for a fortnight, saying there had even been requests from the Commonwealth government to help resettle refugees from Afghanistan as a result of the Taliban's takeover. Queensland Police stop trucks at the Queensland border - every vehicle is being checked under current border restrictions Queensland Police stop vehicles on the border with NSW at Coolangatta. New border measures require essential workers entering Queensland to have had at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine Strict border controls between Queensland and NSW are in place as the Delta outbreak that originated in Sydney continues to spread The new rules require individuals to book a room in a quarantine facility before they travel to Queensland. They must also re-apply for a border pass, including returning Queensland residents. 'Anyone who's not already on a flight at midday will not be able to arrive simply on a right of entry pass,' Health Minister Yvette D'Ath said. 'Everyone who's a Queensland resident, or seeking to relocate, will need to reapply for their pass.' Ms D'Ath said passes would be reissued in the next fortnight, allocating each applicant a time period to arrive in Queensland so hotel room capacity could be managed. Ms Palaszczuk said the state had recently seen 'surges' above the cap on international arrivals, necessitating the new hotel quarantine rules. 'I want people to come home,' she said. 'If people want to relocate here, I want them to relocate here but we just have to do it in a sensible and orderly fashion.' Queensland Police Deputy Commissioner Steve Gollschewski told the Today Show the quarantine system needed to be 'reset' in the next fortnight. 'Of course we want Queenslanders to come back in,' he said. 'But we have a system that is really, really struggling with the numbers coming in... many our health workers and our police have to balance all the other things they have to do as well. 'We had to reset the system and [get] a system more sustainable for us. 'If we can ask for patience we will get that system fixed in the next couple of weeks. If people have a compelling reason to come back they can apply for an exemption. We are not locking everyone out.' The man who assassinated Sen. Robert F. Kennedy in 1968 could be released on parole Friday after prosecutors said they won't oppose his parole petition. Sirhan B. Sirhan, now 77, has spent the last 53 years in a San Diego prison and is scheduled to stand in front of a California parole board for the 16th time on Friday. His last parole hearing was in February 2016. He was originally sentenced to death, but California briefly outlawed capital punishment and his sentence was reduced to life in prison, with that loophole also giving him the chance to seek freedom. Robert Kennedy Jr. is supporting Sirhan's bid for freedom because he does not believe he is the man who killed his father. In 2018, he visited Sirhan in prison and told him he did not think he was responsible for the shooting. Sirhan confessed to the killing immediately after it happened in Los Angeles in 1968 but he has maintained for years that he has no memory of it. Robert Kennedy Jr. said in 2018 that he believes someone else killed his father, and that Sirhan was set up to take the blame for it. He wants the case to be reopened. LA County District Attorney George Gascon hasn't indicated whether or not he will reopen the case and it's unclear if Sirhan plans to file an appeal. Prosecutors have opposed his parole efforts 15 times but LA County's new DA, George Gascon, is choosing to remain impartial this time. Sirhan Sirhan - pictured hearing speaking at his 15th parole hearing in February 2016 - will be up for parole again on Friday Sirhan was convicted of killing the up-and-coming Sen. Robert F. Kennedy - pictured here hours before he was shot - in June 1968 and spent more than half a century behind bars Kennedy Sr. Is lying on his back after taking a bullet to the head. He died a day later Sirhan was arrested at the scene of the Los Angeles political murder, but maintains that he doesn't remember shooting RFK or confessing Gascon's office will not attend Sirhan's parole hearing, nor do they plan to send a letter in support of him. 'The role of a prosecutor and their access to information ends at sentencing,' Alex Bastian, special adviser to Gascon, told The Washington Post. 'The parole board's sole purpose is to objectively determine whether someone is suitable for release. 'If someone is the same person that committed an atrocious crime, that person will correctly not be found suitable for release. However, if someone is no longer a threat to public safety after having served more than 50 years in prison, then the parole board may recommend release based on an objective determination.' Former Maryland lieutenant governor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend said in 2018 that she supported her brothers calls for a new investigation into their fathers killing. Sirhan was arrested on June 5, 1968 at the scene of Kennedy's Los Angeles assassination and convicted of first-degree murder after he confessed, but he has maintained over the years that he has no recollection of the day of the confession. Sirhan Sirhan is pictured here with his attorney, Russel E. Parsons Sirhan was sentenced to death but when California temporarily abolished the death penalty, his sentence was reduced to life Kennedy Sr. had just finished delivering his victory speech to cheering supporters at Los Angeles' Ambassador Hotel when he decided to walk through the hotel kitchen. He had stopped to shake hands with a busboy who had delivered food to his room the day before when he was shot in the head. He died the next day. His death came six years after his brother, President John F Kennedy, was shot and killed in Dallas on an official visit. Former US Marine Lee Harvey Oswald was blamed for the assassination, which shocked the world, and was shot dead by vigilante Jack Ruby just two days later, sparking subsequent claims of a cover-up. Sirhan's lawyers have asserted that he may have been hypnotized and framed as part of a vast conspiracy. In 2018, Robert Kennedy Jr. revealed to The Washington Post that he'd visited Sirhan in prison in December 20187. 'I went there because I was curious and disturbed by what I had seen in the evidence. 'I was disturbed that the wrong person might have been convicted of killing my father. 'My father was the chief law enforcement officer in this country. I think it would have disturbed him if somebody was put in jail for a crime they didnt commit,' he said. Nearly two years ago to the day - late August 2019 - Sirhan was stabbed by a fellow inmate at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility and hospitalized. Naturalized Americans could have their citizenship revoked thanks to a computer program that searches for concerning activity - with broad categories including anything deemed 'derogatory'. The program, called ATLAS, is used by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and is hosted on servers owned by web e-commerce giant Amazon. DHS stated on their website in a November update that ATLAS was created 'to automate, streamline, and support accurate exchange of data' among immigration authorities and the DHS, and 'to support biometric and biographic-based screening and vetting of immigration requests.' But they have come under fire for refusing to offer more details on how citizens are flagged up for potential denaturalization. The system uses data such as fingerprints, social media profiles and the FBI's terror watchlist to run cross-checks and unify processing. But privacy campaigners and immigration advocates argue that it is open to abuse, and deploys too broad a range of datasets - posing an unnecessary threat to millions of immigrants. Many of those targeted will be Muslim, activists say. 'ATLAS should be considered as suspect until it is shown not to generate unfair, arbitrary, and discriminatory results,' said Laura Bingham, a lawyer with the Open Society Justice Initiative, which filed Freedom of Information requests to try and obtain more details of the program. Immigrants who were deported from the U.S. are seen returning to Guatemala on August 19. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is using a computer program to analyze the data from immigrants' records, but advocates say it is too broad a net and flags people unfairly She told The Intercept: 'From what we are able to scrutinize in terms of the end results - like the disparate impact of denaturalization based on national origin - there is ample reason to consider ATLAS a threat to naturalized citizens.' The program, housed on Amazon's servers as of last year, is shrouded in secrecy and DHS refused to answer many of the questions posed by Open Society Justice Initiative and Muslim Advocates, who jointly filed the FOIA requests. ATLAS is housed on servers powered by Amazon DHS would not explain how exactly ATLAS works or what rules it uses to determine when an immigrant should be flagged to potentially have their citizenship revoked. They would not say how many immigrants have had their U.S. citizenship rescinded as a result of ATLAS's research. But an October 2019 press release from the DHS's Citizenship and Immigration Services division (USCIS) reported that the program that year processed more than 16 million 'screenings' and generated 124,000 'automated potential fraud, public safety and national security detections requiring further analysis and manual review by USCIS officers.' Immigrants are put through the ATLAS system when a migrant 'presents him or herself' to the USCIS. That can be when 'new derogatory information is associated with the individual in one or more U.S. Government systems' - an example given is detecting 'fraud patterns in immigration benefit filings either pre- or post-adjudication.' Immigration advocates filed FOIA requests to try and find more information from DHS, but still do not have an accurate picture of how ATLAS works The DHS states, according to The Intercept: 'ATLAS contains a rules engine that applies pattern-based algorithms to look for indicators of fraud, public safety, and national security concerns.' Deborah Choi of Muslim Advocates said that ATLAS was designed to find reasons for revoking citizenship. 'The whole point of ATLAS is to screen and investigate so that the government can deny applications or refer for criminal or civil or immigration enforcement,' she told The Intercept. 'The purpose of the secret rules and predictive analytics and algorithms are to find things to investigate.' People who ATLAS flags for further inspection will then have their cases investigated by DHS employees. Joe Biden was elected on a promise to make the immigration authorities more humane and accountable, and in his first week in office issued a directive to 'ensure that these authorities are not used excessively or inappropriately.' The February 2 declaration ordered the creation a Naturalization Working Group, which had a 90 day deadline for presenting Biden with 'a strategy outlining steps the Federal Government should take to promote naturalization'. Biden wrote: 'Consistent with our character as a Nation of opportunity and of welcome, it is essential to ensure that our laws and policies encourage full participation by immigrants, including refugees, in our civic life; that immigration processes and other benefits are delivered effectively and efficiently; and that the Federal Government eliminates sources of fear and other barriers that prevent immigrants from accessing government services available to them. 'Our Nation is enriched socially and economically by the presence of immigrants, and we celebrate with them as they take the important step of becoming United States citizens. 'The Federal Government should develop welcoming strategies that promote integration, inclusion, and citizenship, and it should embrace the full participation of the newest Americans in our democracy.' Their report details ways in which naturalization processes can be improved, such as eliminating scams and encouraging training for the citizenship tests. A homeless man was filmed brawling with a young tourist in New York City's Times Square on Wednesday after reportedly stalking the tourist and launching an unprovoked attack. Video obtained by DailyMail.com shows the homeless man, wearing only rags around his neck and shorts, seemingly walking past a tourist in a white t-shirt who lifts his arms in defense as the homeless man starts to attack him. The man in the white t-shirt then tries to kick the homeless man and appears to egg him on in the apparent brawl, which is said to have seen the tourist get punched in the mouth. The apparently homeless man was later filmed being grabbed by the police who tell him to 'Stop moving, stop fighting,' as the homeless man continues to squirm. One officer could be see taking out her taser moments before the homeless man grabs onto one of the officers, who flips the suspect onto the ground as he keeps flailing. After police bring him to his feet, the homeless man could be heard telling someone of screen: 'You're dead to me, you're dead to me, everyone is dead to me.' The apparent victim in the white t-shirt was also filmed following the incident holding an ice pack to his mouth as a woman next to him tells the police what had transpired. Video obtained by DailyMail.com shows a homeless man walk toward a tourist in a white t-shirt and apparently try to attack him as the victim tried to fend him off The suspect kicked the man and reportedly started punching him, landing a blow to his mouth Good Samaritans were eventually able to break up the fight and keep the homeless man detained before the cops arrived on the scene The attack allegedly began after the homeless man and two tourists were in a scuffle, according to witness Mario Froehlich. He said the 'two people that looked a little bit younger' seemed disturbed by what was happening, but he had his earbuds in at the time and did not really hear much until he saw the homeless man follow the tourists across the street and took his earbud out. 'I heard him yelling at the two kids,' Froehlich told DailyMail.com. 'I was like "Really? I wonder what's going on here.' The next thing he knows, Froehlich said, the man started taking off his overcoat and starts charging at the tourist in the white t-shirt. 'He starts throwing kicks at the kid,' Froehlich recounted, 'the kid's like forced to defend himself and eventually lands a punch right in the face, in the mouth actually.' At that point, Froehlich said, he decided to intervene. 'And at that point, we're over there, we're breaking them up, me and another guy and it was just absolutely insane.' 'I've seen this guy time and time again,' said Froehlich, who lives on Long Island, 'but he's never really been violent. 'But today, it was just crazy. I've never seen something like that.' He said he put his hands on the man's chest to break up the brawl, when the suspect grabs him by the shoulders and tells him: 'I'm one man, I am one man.' 'I'm like "I don't get what this had to do with this because I just saw you throw three punches at the other guy. I don't are if you're one man, just don't put your hands on the other guy." In the end, Froehlich said, he was able to detain the man until the police showed up. DailyMail.com has reached out to the New York Police Department for more information. He was later seen trying to squirm away from the police officers who were trying to arrest him, as one officer takes out her taser The female officer tells the suspect to 'Stop moving, stop fighting' At one point, the suspect appears to grab one of the officers But the officer managed to flip him onto the ground They were then able to handcuff him and take him into custody Still, the man continued to flail and police had to hold him down After police bring him to his feet, the homeless man could be heard telling someone of screen: 'You're dead to me, you're dead to me, everyone is dead to me The attack comes amid a surge in crime throughout New York City, with three shootings occurring in the tourist trap since the beginning of May, when two adults and a four-year-old girl named Skye Martinez were hit with stray bullets. Farrakhan Muhammad, the alleged gunman, had reportedly started shooting over a street vendor 'turf war.' He allegedly fled the Big Apple after the shooting and was arrested days later in Florida. Then on June 27, a U.S. Marine was injured in another shooting, when he was hit by a ricocheting bullet at W. 45th St. and Seventh Ave., police said. A break-dancer, 16-year-old Avon Darden, had allegedly tried to shoot a rival dancer when he hit Samuel Poulin, 21, in the back as he and his wife and family walked past. The teen later handed himself over to cops at the Midtown South precinct station house accompanied by his mother. And on July 13, NYPD officers responded to calls reporting shots fired around 12:40 a.m. near 7th Ave. and 41st St. in Midtown, when at least four shots were fired after a white Mercedes clipped a 32-year-old motorcyclist in the bus lane - leaving him with knee and elbow injuries, according to the New York Daily News. A 22-year-old friend of the motorcyclist confronted a group of men standing by the car when someone in the group started firing, cops told the Daily News. The Mercedes then sped off as the alleged shooter fled on foot. Avon Darden, 16, handed himself over to cops at the Midtown South Precinct station house ten days after a shooting that left two adults and a four-year-old injured. He is pictured in surveillance footage while cops searched for him Darden reportedly has been arrested for three felonies Samuel Poulin, 21, was hit in the back by a ricocheting bullet as he walked with his family near the Marriott Hotel on W. 45th St. around 5:15 p.m. on June 27 But just one day after the July 13 shooting, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said business' leaders concerns about gun violence in Times Square is insulting to cops. The business leaders near Times Square had ripped the de Blasio administration, claiming he has not taken 'immediate action' to stop the gun violence after a third shooting incident was reported in three weeks in the tourism hotspot. Tom Harris, president of the Times Square Alliance, told the New York Daily News that the shootings have 'got to stop' and that the shooting incident on Wednesday was 'just the latest in an unacceptable cycle.' 'We cannot wait for a new mayor,' Harris said. 'The de Blasio administration needs to stop making excuses and develop effective strategies and take immediate action.' He added: 'We need to refocus, reenergize, and support our police officers so they can do their jobs and prevent crimes.' De Blasio's spokesman Bill Neidhardt slammed Harris in comments to the Daily News for criticizing the city's failure to stop the rising tide of crime in the Big Apple. 'Everyone wants to fight back against gun violence and stop these shootings,' Neidhardt said - adding that the NYPD has added more police to the area. 'What is not productive is Tom Harris insulting the police officers who have come from across the city to Times Square in a good faith effort.' Mayor Bill de Blasio's spokesman claimed on Wednesday that a New York City business leader's concerns about gun violence in Times Square is 'insulting' to cops Meanwhile, crime is on the rise in the Big Apple. According to the latest New York City crime statistics, there have been 7 percent more shootings in the city so far this year when compared to the same time period last year. There are also 4.4 percent more shooting victims. Felony assaults have risen by 5.2 percent, while misdemeanor assaults have risen 2.4 percent. The number of grand larcenies has also increased 1.6 percent over last year, with grand larcenies from cars up 19.3 percent. And hate crimes have also risen 95 percent over last year. Millions of Australians locked down inside their stuffy flat will be able to enjoy the company of their furry friends with bans on pets outlawed. Strata rules for apartment buildings often imposed a blanket ban on pets, sometimes retroactively, causing distress for many residents. NSW has now forbidden such rules, only allowing strata committees to ban specific troublesome animals, and regulate how pets are managed inside the building. Pets can be removed if they are deemed aggressive towards neighbours, damage property, or have an unpleasant odour. Millions of Australians locked down inside their stuff flat will be able to enjoy the company of their furry friends with bans on pets outlawed Owners corporations will also be able to set reasonable conditions on how pets are kept, such as whether they have to be supervised on common property or enter and exit through a dedicated entrance or lift. The change follow a detailed review of the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 and extensive public consultation, which focused on animals in strata schemes. Money expert Effie Zahos said the news, which came on International Dog Day, was a good move for making apartment living more comfortable. Owners corporations will also be able to set reasonable conditions on how pets are kept, such as whether they have to be supervised on common property or enter and exit through a dedicated entrance or lift 'So essentially what this (change) means... it is great news for people who live in apartments, own them, have a dog or wanted a dog... but they couldn't because there was a (previous) ban on them in their bylaws,' she said in the Today show. 'In some NSW regional areas, people can't find accommodation if they have a pet. These rules need to change.' Regulation Minister Kevin Anderson said the rule change was fairer for both residents and owners corporations. 'Research tells us that Australia has one of the highest rates of pet ownership in the world, with 61 per cent of households including a pet in their family, and 91 per cent of households owning a pet at some point in their lives,' he said. 'We have implemented fair and sensible regulations that prevent schemes from introducing blanket bans on keeping pets in apartments.' The NSW government has lifted the blanket banning of pets living in apartments during lockdown (pictured, a couple with their dog in Bondi) Previous bylaws made it difficult for some renters in NSW to keep animals under their roof - but those days are now officially over (pictured, a couple exercising in Sydney's east with their dog) Mr Anderson said it was crucial to find the right balance between renters, owners, and strata rules when keeping pets - especially during a pandemic - where companionship is vital for so many people. 'As a dog owner myself I understand how important pets are for families in this state, and their companionship cannot be understated, particularly during the current pandemic,' he said 'Living in strata is becoming more popular and while we don't want strata residents deprived of the benefits of owning a pet it's also important the amenity of neighbours and others in the building isn't impacted.' NSW Fair Trading will offer support, advice and mediation for residents and owners corporations who are unsure about the new rules and how they apply to them. Unresolved disputes can also be escalated to the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal where appropriate. Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued an executive order on Wednesday banning cities or counties in the state from issuing vaccine mandates regardless of FDA approval status, even as more private employers go the opposite direction in requiring their workers to get vaccinated. Abbott's executive order bans any state or local mandates to require Texans to be vaccinated against COVID-19, either as employees or to access public services or benefits. It comes as the battle over vaccine mandates heats up, with private employers such as Delta Air Lines fining employees who refuse to get vaccinated, and Democrat mayors such as Chicago's Lori Lightfoot vowing to require the shots for all city employees. The new order in Texas does not apply to private employers, which in the US generally have the right to require workers to get vaccinated. Instead it specifically prohibits mandates from government entities. Abbott, a Republican, issued his new ban in an executive order to fill a loophole left by the full FDA authorization of the Pfizer vaccine. He had previously banned the requirement of vaccinations under emergency use authorizations. 'COVID-19 vaccines are strongly encouraged for those eligible to receive one, but have always been voluntary for Texans,' stated Abbott's new order. 'No governmental entity can compel any individual to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.' Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued an executive order on Wednesday banning cities or counties in the state from issuing vaccine mandates (file photo) The new order in Texas does not apply to nursing homes, state supported living centers, assisted living facilities, or long-term care facilities. Abbott has asked the state legislature to take up the question of vaccine mandates and consider whether state and local governments should be able to require shots or passports. 'Vaccine requirements and exemptions have historically been determined by the Legislature, and their involvement is particularly important to avoid a patchwork of vaccine mandates across Texas,' Abbott said in a statement. Texas joins 11 other states that have banned vaccine mandates through legislation or executive order, including Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Utah. All have Republican governors. Though the issue of vaccine mandates continues to be highly politically polarized, most Republican officials tend to support the right of private employers to require vaccines for employees, viewing the issue as best handled privately between workers and companies rather than by government fiat. 'I don't think the government should intervene. I think employers and employees should make those choices on their own,' Rep. Andy Barr, a Kentucky Republican, told WLEX-TV on Wednesday. 'That's the way it should be.' Employment law in the US generally gives employers the right to require workers to get vaccinated, as long as the policy is job-related and consistent with business necessity, and provides for reasonable exemptions. More and more companies are exercising this right. Delta Air Lines became the latest on Wednesday, telling unvaccinated employees they will have to pay an additional $200 per month for their company-sponsored healthcare plan. In Chicago, Mayor Lightfoot told a press conference on Monday that shots 'are absolutely going to be required' hours after the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine for over-16s - taking it beyond its emergency authorization phase. Delta Air Lines has become the latest American company to mandate the coronavirus vaccine as the airline told unvaccinated employees they will have to pay an additional $200 per month for their company-sponsored healthcare plan Mayor Lori Lightfoot told a press conference on Monday that shots 'are absolutely going to be required' hours after the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine for over-16s - taking it beyond its emergency phase (file photo) The FDA ruling prompted the Pentagon to order all 800,000 active service members to get the shot, while private firms including Delta Airlines and Goldman Sachs also told their staff to get the vaccine. President Joe Biden has already signed an executive order requiring millions of federal staff to either get vaccinated or abide by a regular COVID testing scheme. New York City, San Francisco, and New Orleans have all ordered vaccine passport rules requiring proof of vaccination to access public venues such as restaurants, theaters and gyms. In Texas, Abbott also has banned state and local government mandates for wearing masks -- an order that faced a setback in court on Wednesday, when District Court Judge Tonya Parker ruled against the ban. In her ruling she determined the mask mandate ban violates Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins' authority to prioritize public health during the coronavirus pandemic, FOX 4 in Dallas reported. Abbott's ban on mask mandates has also met with resistance from the Texas Education Agency who has, for now, suspended enforcement of the mask mandate ban in the state's public school systems. Nine counties, dozens of school districts and the city of El Paso have defied the Abbott mask mandate ban, and some of the state's most populous counties have asked for court orders to overturn or block enforcement of the ban. 'Although this is an important victory, its really not a victory against a person or an entity,' Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins, the county's leading elected official, said at a news conference. 'Its a victory for humans who live in Dallas County against the virus.' Texas is currently grappling with a COVID surge, fueled by the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus, as the state reported the most COVID-19 patients in its hospitals since the pandemic began. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reported 79 percent of the 85,874 Texas intensive-care unit beds are full, about 30 percent of them with COVID-19 cases. Overall COVID-19 hospitalizations were a record 14,255 Wednesday, beating the January 11 record of 14,218 reported by the Texas Department of State Health Services. According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in Texas 16,249,146 people, or 56 percent, of the state has received at least one dose, while overall, 13,446,300 people, 46 percent of Texas's population, has been fully vaccinated. Emergency Room nurses tend to patients in a hallway at the Houston Methodist The Woodlands Hospital on August 18, 2021 in Houston, Texas Reactions to Abbott's ban on vaccine mandates have been mixed, with some praising the governor and others saying the order disregards the growing COVID crisis in the state. 'Wow. Just when we think you couldnt prove your disregard for Texans health any further Have you seen the statistics from School Districts? Universities? Hospitals?? Anti-mask, Anti-Vax it seems like Anti-Texan at this point Gregory,' one person tweeted. While another person tweeted: 'Thank you Thank you Governor for respecting and supporting our freedom of choice.' 'At what point will this extend to all vaccines? Abbotts mismanagement of this health crisis is epic. Get this guy out of here,' someone else tweeted. Last month, Biden said he was weighing whether to require all federal workers to be vaccinated against COVID-19 after the CDC recommended that people fully vaccinated against COVID-19 should go back to wearing masks indoors in regions where infections were on the rise. When asked about mandatory vaccinations for federal employees Biden said he was considering it. 'That's under consideration right now,' he said, 'but if you're not vaccinated you're not nearly as smart as I thought you were.' He added that masking and vaccination were the best way to avoid a repeat of the lockdowns the country endured last year. TV star Katie Price has reportedly told friends she 'cannot face' the prospect of a court appearance after allegedly being attacked in a 'bust up' at her home. The media personality and model, 43, was taken to hospital following the alleged incident at her Essex property at around 1.30am on Monday. She was pictured the following day with bruises to her face as part of an interview with the Sun newspaper. A man in his 30s has been bailed after being arrested on suspicion of assault, theft and coercive control following the alleged altercation. Friends of the mother-of-five reportedly told the Sun last night that she is 'mentally fragile' and 'cannot face' a court appearance. Friends reportedly say it has left Katie in a 'nightmare situation' and could result in the case being dropped. The media personality and model, 43, was taken to hospital following the alleged incident at her home at around 1.30am on Monday. She was pictured the following day with bruises to her face (pictured) as part of an interview with the Sun newspaper A man in his 30s has been bailed after being arrested on suspicion of assault, theft and coercive control following the alleged altercation. Pictured: Police at the scene The friend told the paper: 'She (Katie) absolutely stands by her account of events of that night given to police, but upon reflection isn't sure she's mentally strong enough to go through yet another court appearance. 'She doesn't want to be dragged through the mill, and her private life scrutinised by all and sundry. Katie doesn't see any other way out.' Victims of alleged criminal offences are often required to give evidence in court. Though they can requests screens to hide them from viewer of the alleged culprit or culprits, they still face the often stressful process of cross-examination by lawyers. Courts are also publicly open to all adult members of the public, meaning everything said in open court is repeatable, including in media reports. A police spokesman said: 'We have a duty of care to gather all evidence relating to this case and our inquiries continue.' A source close to the investigation said its officers will be engaging with Katie in the coming days. It comes as Katie's boyfriend, Carl Woods was pictured for the first time since it was revealed his reality star girlfriend was the victim of the alleged attack. The former Love Island star, 32, was seen walking the couple's dog in Essex on Tuesday, after it was claimed that the 50,000 engagement ring he gave her had also been taken during the assault. Katie's boyfriend, Former Love Island star, Carl Woods, 32, was seen walking the couple's dog in Essex on Tuesday, after it was claimed that the 50,000 engagement ring he gave her had also been taken during the assault Carl's outing came as a source close to Katie told MailOnline that Katie has already returned to work following the assault. The insider revealed: 'She is exhausted but Katie is back to work like a true professional. 'The police investigation is ongoing but neighbours have been coming forward with information to help the police'. Katie's reported reluctance to attend court comes following a string of previous courtroom dramas. Last year she was ordered to pay 25,000 in damages to her cage-fighter ex-husband Alex Reid after leaking details of their sex life. She has also been disqualified from driving six times. She was handed a two-year disqualification in October 2019 after she opted to withhold the identity of the person who had been driving her signature pink Range rover that was involved in a collision in Bexley the year before. Katie was also warned last year that she could face prison if she did not turn up to court for a bankruptcy hearing. One of Australia's top doctors believes the nation's healthcare systems are not adequately prepared to cope with an influx of Covid patients once lockdowns are scrapped later this year. With hospitals in Covid-ravaged Sydney and Melbourne already under pressure, Australian Medical Association President Dr Omar Khorshid said the Federal Government must focus on four key areas: funding, capacity, staff and processes. Under Scott Morrison's re-opening plan agreed by all state and territory leaders, lockdowns become 'less likely' when 70 per cent of over 16s are fully jabbed and only 'highly targeted' when 80 per cent are vaccinated. Australian governments are being urged to urgently prepare the nation's healthcare system. Pictured: Ambulances lined up at Westmead Hospital in Sydney's west Doherty Institute modelling, on which the plan is based, predicts there would be 12,337 hospitalisations and 1,457 deaths in six months with a 70 per cent vaccination rate and partially successful testing and tracing. In that scenario, there would be 2,733 ICU admissions which would take up 40 per cent of Australia's surge capacity of 7,000 ICU beds. With optimal testing and tracing these figures would come down to just 88 hospitalisations, 21 ICU admissions and 13 deaths nationally. But in an ABC radio interview on Thursday morning, Dr Khorshid said the Morrison Government should be planning for a worst case scenario where hospitals may be overwhelmed. 'We want the plan for opening up to look at hospital capacity and recognise that will be the biggest constraint,' he said before listing his four concerns. 'Number one, money. Because delivering healthcare in a Covid outbreak will be more expensive,' he said. 'Number two, capacity. Have we got enough hospitals, have we got the right type of hospitals, have we got enough ICU beds? 'Number three, staff. What's your plan for staff, how do we get more given that we don't have open borders to bring in people from overseas?' Dr Khorshid said the fourth issue of processes included setting guidelines on when and for how long staff should isolate after being exposed to Covid. A nurse takes a man's information before administering the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine in Melbourne. There are fears off isolation requirements causing health staff shortages Royal Melbourne Hospital has been left severely short staffed after hundreds of workers were ordered to isolate due to an outbreak of 50 infections sparked by a Covid-positive patient from Shepparton in Victoria's north. 'Number four, processes. Furloughing staff, approaches to Covid. How do you run a general practice when people want to bring their child in with a cough or a cold or are concerned it could be Covid,' Dr Khorshid said. 'Are GPs going to wear full PPE every day, are they going to run their clinics like a Covid clinic every day? 'There's a whole lot of process planning that hasn't been done, and that's something that we're calling for.' The Morrison government's 2021-22 budget sets out a record $121.4 billion healthcare spend, taking total Covid spending commitments to $25 billion since March 2020. In an ABC radio interview on Tuesday, Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt listed the key hospital preparations that were already under way. He said Australia has 7,500 ventilators available and only 40 are being used. Dr Omar Khorshid (pictured) said governments should be planning for the worst case scenario where hospitals are overwhelmed On staff shortages, Mr Hunt said the government was 'making sure that we have additional staff training [and] that we had additional staff coming into the system, returning nurses and others'. 'We're both preparing the system and vaccinating at record levels,' he said. Daily Mail Australia has contacted Mr Hunt's office for further comment. It comes after Westmead Hospital - one of Sydney's biggest - declared a 'yellow emergency' as it struggles under the weight of growing Covid-19 cases in the city's west. On Tuesday the hospital reduced ambulance arrivals for Covid-19 patients for a 24-hour period and transferred several critical patients to other Sydney metropolitan hospitals. There are currently 698 Covid-19 cases admitted to hospital in NSW, with 116 people in intensive care, 43 of whom require ventilation. NSW Health says it currently manages about 500 intensive care beds but has a surge capacity of about 2000 when required. A Taliban leader has announced that music will be banned in Afghanistan and women will be required to travel with a male chaperone on trips that last several days, even as he promises the Taliban will be more liberal than they were 20 years ago. In an interview with the New York Times, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said while women will eventually be allowed to return to work and go on trips to school, and hospitals, they would need a male chaperone for trips that last several days. And music will be banned in the country. 'Music is forbidden in Islam, but we're hoping that we can persuade people not to do such things, instead of pressure them,' Mujahid said. Still, he said, things will be different under this Taliban rule than the previous regime. 'We want to build the future and forget what happened in the past,' he said, rejecting reports that the Taliban is already extracting vengeance on those who opposed them and are trying to reimpose the harsh restrictions on women that made them notorious when they first took control in 1996. In an interview with the New York Times, Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said while women will eventually be allowed to return to work and go on trips to school, and hospitals, they would need a male chaperone for trips that last several days He suggested to the New York Times that the Taliban will let women return to their jobs in the future - as long as they wear a head covering - and said concerns that the Taliban would once again force women to stay inside or cover their faces are baseless. During their previous time in power, Afghan women could only leave the house in a burqa - a shapeless covering which covers the head and entire body, with only a fabric mesh to see out of. He also said that those with proper travel documents will be able to leave the country, and that his regime will not hunt down former interpreters and others who have worked with the American military over the years, but expressed frustration at American evacuation efforts. 'They shouldn't interfere in our country and take out our human resources: doctors, professors and other people we need here,' Mujahid said. 'In America, they might become dishwashers or cooks. It's inhuman.' But, he said, he is still hopeful that the Taliban could build good relationships with the international community, saying they have already cooperated with international leaders on issues like counterterrorism, opium eradication and the reduction of refugees to the West. Taliban fighters stood guard at a checkpoint in Kabul, Afghanistan The Taliban promises they will be more liberal under their new regime The terrorist group had previously been in control of Afghanistan from 1996 - 2001 Mujahid's remarks come one day after he announced at a press conference that women should remain inside 'until we have a new procedure' in place, while the Taliban trains its forces not to harass women. 'We are worried our forces, who are new and have not been yet trained very well, may mistreat women,' he said. 'We don't want our forces, God forbid, to harm or harass women.' In the meantime, he said, women's salaries will be paid in their homes, echoing what Ahmadullah Waseq, the deputy of the Talibans cultural affairs committee, told the Times: that the Taliban has 'no problems with working women' as long as they wear hijabs. Mujahid expressed his frustration with America's efforts to evacuate Afghanis who helped the military over the past 20 years. Here evacuees are seen boarding a Coeing C-17 Globemaster III during an evacuation at Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport Afghans line up outside a bank to take out cash as people keep waiting at Hamid Karzai International Airport to leave the country after Taliban's takeover Many who want to leave the country are still stuck waiting at the airport But under the old Taliban rule, women were not allowed to attend school and faced public flogging if they were found to have violated morality rules, like one requiring that they be fully covered. At the time, the Times reports, the Taliban also said the restrictions on women will be temporary. 'The explanation was that the security was not good, and they were waiting for security to be better, and then women would be able to have more freedom,' said Heather Barr, the associate director of women's rights at Human Rights Watch. 'But of course in those years they were in power, that moment never arrived - and I can promise you Afghan women hearing this today are thinking it will never arrive this time either.' She said the Taliban is only claiming to be more liberal as they have the world's media attention on them. 'They're trying to look normal and legitimate and this will last as long as the international community and the international press are still there,' she said. 'And then we'll see what they're really like again.' US citizens are told to STOP coming to Kabul airport due to terror threat leaving up to 1.5K including 23 California students stranded: Blinken BLAMES them for not leaving earlier as CIA start helicopter rescue missions American citizens trying to get in to Kabul airport and leave the country were told on Wednesday night to immediately leave the area, due to a new and sudden terror threat. 'Due to threats outside the Kabul airport, US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates unless you receive instructions to do so,' the State Department tweeted on Wednesday night. 'Those at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately.' The order to leave the gates was issued at 3:30am local time in Kabul on Thursday morning. Fears are mounting that the Islamic State affiliate in the region, ISIS-K, could try and launch an attack on the crowds masses outside the airport. Joe Biden on Tuesday warned that ISIS-K were believed to be attempting to target departing jets, as he explained why it was unlikely that U.S. forces will remain in the area beyond August 31. Up to 1,500 Americans are still trapped in Afghanistan and the U.S. is still relying on the Taliban to allow safe passage to Kabul airport with just six days before the deadline, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said in a press conference on Wednesday. Blinken gave his first briefing on the airlift operation and the bid to get all citizens and Afghan allies out amid reports the CIA has joined U.S. troops in helicopter rescue missions outside the airport perimeter. Thousands of people are still trying to leave Afghanistan as U.S. troops start leaving and evacuation flights begin to wrap up, but are being stopped and beaten by insurgents on their way. Among those left are 23 school children from California Cajon Valley Union School District and 16 parents who visited the war zone on a summer trip to see extended family and haven't been able to leave. Blinken blamed Americans still on the ground for not leaving fast enough after first being warned earlier this year to leave Afghanistan as soon as possible, but said there would be 'no deadline' in helping those who still want to leave. He spoke as a CIA officer told DailyMail.com that American civilians and Afghan allies have just 72 hours before evacuations end and Biden cracked a joke about the evacuation crisis at a cybersecurity summit. NBC reporter Peter Alexander asked the president what he would do if there were Americans trapped in Afghanistan after August 31. The microphone was cut before Biden could reply, but he cracked a smile and said 'You'll be the first person I call.' Blinken said the US has been in 'direct contact' with roughly 500 confirmed U.S. citizens and 'provided specific instructions for how to get to the airport safely.' The State Department said there are roughly 1,000 other people whose status is still being established. 'We're aggressively reaching out to them multiple times a day,' he said of those 1,000 people, adding they're looking 'to determine whether they still want to leave and to get them the most up-to-date information and instructions for them on how to do so.' 'Some may no longer be in the country. Some may have claimed to be Americans but turn out not to be. Some may choose to stay,' Blinken said 'We'll continue to try and identify the status and plans of these people in the coming days.' A short time later a journalist covering Afghanistan wrote on Twitter that the Taliban blocked all roads leading to Kabul airport. Only Afghans 'accompanied by foreigners' are reportedly allowed through. 'Taliban refused to let a friend, a dual Afghan-Australian citizen, from entering airport today,' Frud Bezhan wrote. Blinken announced Wednesday that up to 1,500 Americans - 500 who are verified US citizens - are still stuck in Afghanistan About 4,500 U.S. citizens and immediate family members have been evacuated over the last 10 days. As many as 6,000 Americans who wanted to leave Afghanistan were in the country when the Taliban took Kabul last week. Biden posted a statement to Twitter on Wednesday afternoon vowing to help people still stuck there but did not provide further explanation. 'We're going to do everything that we can to provide safe evacuation for Americans, our Afghan allies, partners, and Afghans who might be targeted because of their association with the United States,' the president wrote. The CIA has joined the US military in evacuation efforts, launching clandestine operations to rescue Americans in and outside of Kabul, the Wall Street Journal reports. The military's operations have been more limited in comparison, focusing on US citizen trapped within the Afghan capital. CIA operations include air and ground missions and use US military helicopters under the agency's control. At least two dozen Americans students and parents are among those still stuck in Kabul. After taking a summer trip to visit grandparents and other extended family, 24 students and 16 parents from the Cajon Valley Union School District are trying to get to the airport with less than a week before the US leaves the country. the LA Times reports. Cajon Valley Superintendent David Miyashiro said that officials who work with the school district's FACE program as interpreters and liaisons were contacted by a family concerned its student would lose a seat in the classroom last week when classes began, a local CBS affiliate reports. The concern was echoed by several other families who missed their scheduled flights home for the first day of school on August 17. The district said they arrived on special U.S. military visas, and states the trip was not school-sanctioned. Officials at the district just outside of San Diego said the students are safe but that it's not certain when they could return home. A family of five from the same school district is back in the U.S. after escaping from Afghanistan, 10 News reports. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said today she has 'no additional information' on the stranded students when asked and appeared confused at the report. 'I'm happy to take their information if there's something more detailed,' she said. The U.S. has ramped up their airlifts and have evacuated 19,000 people in the last 24 hours and have already started pulling out military forces with just six days until the deadline, which Biden has promised to stick to. Desperate Afghan men, women and children have swarmed the airport in a bid to get out amid fears of an attack from the Islamic State offshoot ISIS-K and 10,000 evacuees are inside the gates waiting to get out. Hundreds of people gather near an airport evacuation control checkpoint. American civilians and Afghan allies have just 72 hours before evacuations end, a CIA officer told DailyMail.com Fears of a stampede toward the airport are concerning officials as the withdrawal winds down and people grow more desperate to flee American troops and the CIA have been conducting rescue missions to get people stranded outside of the airport to safety 'It is hard to overstate the complexity and danger of this effort. We are operating in an hostile environment, in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban, with a very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack,' Blinken said Wednesday. Asked to take responsibility for the chaos, he responded: 'I take responsibility. I know the president has said he takes responsibility.' 'There will be plenty of time to look back at the last six or seven months, to look back at the last 20 years and to see what we might have done differently, as well as sooner or more effectively,' he said. Blinken said right now his 'entire focus is on the mission at hand.' It was also revealed that a military operation recovered 'less than 20 people' by helicopter from Kabul under cover of darkness and brought them safely to the airport for evacuation. It comes in addition to two other operations outside the airport walls confirmed by the Pentagon, including a mission to bring 169 Americans 'over the wall' that Biden announced Monday. 'So last night, during the period of darkness, there was an operation to be able to go out and safely evacuate evacuees back into Kabul. They're at [Hamid Karzai International Airport], and they're safely there preparing to be evacuated,' Army Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor said at a Pentagon briefing Wednesday. In a White House briefing the same day Psaki said the administration suspected many of the 1,000 prospective Americans who may be looking to leave are dual-citizens or 'people who may not be ready to leave for a variety of reasons.' 'For many of these Afghans, this is their home. And yes they are dual-citizens, yes it is absolutely our responsibility to make sure we are reaching out to them multiple times. We are providing opportunity, we are finding ways to get them to the airport to evacuate them, but it is also their personal decision on whether they want to depart,' she said. During the briefing Psaki was asked how the Biden administration will determine whether every American who wants to leave will get to do so by the deadline. The press secretary clarified that some of those Americans could 'have not yet decided to depart by August 31.' 'We know that is a potential, so therefore we're looking at a range of options for how we can allow them to depart and enable them to depart after that date and time,' she said. All children aged 12 to 15 could start receiving coronavirus jabs in coming weeks with the federal government confident about vaccine supply. The expert immunisation panel will on Friday brief a national cabinet meeting of state and territory leaders about expanding the rollout across that age bracket. Education Minister Alan Tudge said he hoped approval would be granted to vaccinate 12- to 15-year-olds. 'We're doing one million jabs every three days. We've got enough vaccines, they're coming in in the millions,' he told ABC radio on Thursday. The expert immunisation panel is set to brief a national cabinet meeting on Friday about expanding the Covid vaccine rollout to all children aged 12 to 15 He said 220,000 children in that age group with compromised immune systems, underlying health conditions or who are Indigenous had already received a jab. Planning is underway to vaccinate children aged 12 to 15 in schools and a proposal to allow families to receive jabs at the same time is being worked on. Unvaccinated younger people are increasingly making up a larger proportion of coronavirus cases around Australia. Mr Tudge said there was no country in the world that had approved vaccines for children under 12. 'While some kids are getting the virus, it doesn't seem to cause significant illness compare to the adult population,' he said. Some experts have raised concerns about the lingering effects of the virus on children. Australian Medical Association president Omar Khorshid said parents should not panic about children being exposed to the disease. 'We don't need to be terrified about the thought that our children might get COVID,' he told the ABC. 'They're more robust than we are, they're going to get through it more likely than we are.' Dr Khorshid said data from the United States on vaccinating children under 12 was not expected until September to October. 220,000 children aged 12 to 15 with compromised immune systems, underlying health conditions or who are Indigenous have already received a jab The AMA president is urging national cabinet to ensure the health system is ready for cases to rise when the nation reopens. 'We want the plan for opening up to look at hospital capacity and to recognise that will perhaps be the biggest constraint,' he said. The Australian Private Hospitals Association is urging the prime minister, premiers and chief ministers to adopt a national consistency on mandatory vaccination for hospital workers. Australia has fully vaccinated 31.56 per cent of its population aged 16 and 54.37 per cent have received one jab National cabinet will meet amid rising tensions over the national plan which links vaccine coverage to reducing lockdowns and opening borders. NSW is in the grips of a major crisis with another record 919 cases and two deaths on Wednesday, taking the national toll to 986. Victoria recorded 45 new cases, while there were nine in the ACT. Australia has fully vaccinated 31.56 per cent of its population aged 16 and 54.37 per cent have received one jab. A New York City man with 90 prior arrests has been indicted on hate crime charges after he allegedly slashed a subway commuter's face while hurling racist and homophobic slurs. Ramon Castro, 55, was arraigned Wednesday afternoon before Supreme Court Justice Toni Cimino on a seven-count indictment charging him with assaults in the first and second degree as a hate crime, criminal possession of a weapon, aggravated harassment and possession of drugs. The incident took place at around 3.10am on July 6 between Castro - who has more than 90 arrests on his record - and a 34-year-old victim who has not been identified. It came weeks after Castro was freed over a double burglary he is said to have carried out. According to a press release from the district attorney's office Ramon allegedly yelled: 'I hate Latinos and f****t people' at a man who was standing near a Subway station at the corner of 77th Street and Roosevelt Avenue in Flushing, Queens. Ramon Castro (pictured), 55, has been charged for hate crimes after slashing a man in the face on a NYC Subway platform while using racial and homophobic slurs Castro was arraigned Wednesday afternoon before Supreme Court Justice Toni Cimino on a seven-count indictment charging him with assaults in the first and second degree as a hate crime, criminal possession of a weapon, aggravated harassment and possession of drugs Castro then allegedly attacked the innocent victim, cutting the man on his left cheek using a wooden stake. Images of him taken in the wake of the alleged attack were shared by the New York Police Department afterwards. The defendant then ran away from the scene and the victim was taken to Elmhurst Hospital Center where he had to get sixteen stitches to close the wound on his face - eight on the outside of his cheek and eight on the inside. Castro, was ordered to return to court on November 22, 2021 and faces up to 15 years in prison if found guilty. According to the NY Post Castro is homeless and was last released from custody in June after two alleged burglaries thanks to bail-reform laws. Police busted him for allegedly breaking into a nightclub where he stole an ATM machine and then again when he robbed a bar, as reported by the Post. He is being held on a $250,000 bail, city corrections records show. The incident took place at around 3.10am on July 6 between Castro - who has more than 90 arrests on his record - and a 34-year-old victim who has not been identified near a subway station at the corner of 77th Street and Roosevelt Avenue in Flushing, Queens Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz (pictured) said of the hate crimes in a statement: 'Attacking others because of their ethnicity or who they love is never acceptable' Throughout New York, crime has been increasing in almost all categories. New York Police Department Commissioner Dermot Shea has called for reform amid the crime surge, arguing that the 'soft on criminals experiment' has been a disaster When cops interviewed the suspect he allegedly said: 'Homosexuals are OK but not when you're an adult.' Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said of the hate crimes in a statement: 'In Queens, we value our diversity. Attacking others because of their ethnicity or who they love is never acceptable. 'It will not be tolerated here. We will now seek to bring this defendant to justice for his alleged hate crimes.' The Queens attack is just the latest in a string of crime throughout New York amid a growing crime wave in the Big Apple, with more and more assaults happening in broad daylight. Two men beat up a Brooklyn homeowner over shared driveway using a wooden bat and their fists, then taunted the victim's pregnant wife when she recorded the attack on her phone, police said According to NYPD data, felony assaults are up 5.2 per cent from last year, as of August 22, with misdemeanor assaults up 2.4 per cent. Murders have decreased, from 291 reported during the same time frame in 2020 to 287 reported thus far in 2021. There have also been 7.1 per cent more shooting incidents, with 4.4 per cent more victims. Grand larcenies have also increased 1.6 per cent, with grand larcenies from automobiles reaching an increase of 19.3 per cent. Rapes have increased 6.1 per cent and hate crimes have nearly doubled. On Monday cell phone footage showed the moment a 39-year-old victim was walking along East 15th Street near Kings Highway at 7.20am when two men attacked him in front of a car service shop not far from his Midwood home. The men, dressed in all-black, beat up the Brooklyn homeowner over a shared driveway using a wooden bat and their fists, then taunted the victim's pregnant wife when she recorded the attack on her phone, police said. Police say the incident occurred at approximately 5.22pm Saturday in Brooklyn's Brownsville neighborhood On Saturday chilling surveillance footage showed a knife-wielding man stabbing a 25-year-old on a Brooklyn sidewalk. The victim was holding a pizza box and chatting with another individual when the suspect, who appeared to be passing with a group of friends, casually walked over and began stabbing him repeatedly. Also on Saturday, a man bludgeoned a subway passenger with a hammer, purportedly for looking at him 'the wrong way'. The attack took place at the Union Square station around 9pm. The suspect, since identified as Jamar Newton, 41, allegedly struck the 44-year-old victim in the back of the head after an argument, causing him to fall onto the tracks. The victim was transported to Bellevue Hospital, where he required seven stitches to close his head wound. He was listed in stable condition. Newton was arrested at around 6pm Sunday when officers spotted him running away from an 18-year-old boy in the 125th Street subway station in Harlem. He was charged with assault, reckless endangerment, criminal possession of a weapon and robbery. Police say surveillance footage showed Jamar Newton, 41, twirling an object - believed to be a hammer - in his hand as he walked over to a man off-screen on the other side of the platform. He bludgeoned the subway passenger, purportedly for looking at him 'the wrong way' Newton was later seen calmly leaving the Union Square Station. He was arrested less than 24 hours in Harlem Last Friday morning a woman was beaten with a metal pole while waiting for the G train. And earlier in the month another man was randomly attacked by an alleged Iraq War veteran swinging a hatchet outside of the Chase Bank in Lower Manhattan. The suspect struck the 50-year-old victim three times in the head and once in the leg. The victim was left bleeding on the sidewalk until paramedics were able to bandage his head and transport him to an nearby hospital where he underwent two surgeries. The man is now in stable condition. His attacker believed to be Aaron Garcia, 37, of Yonkers was arrested after allegedly going through a rampage around town. He was charged with attempted murder and assault. Former The View Host Meghan McCain criticized Vice President Kamala Harris for laying flowers at the site where McCain's father was shot down during the Vietnam War, saying that Harris should be focused on evacuating people from Afghanistan. Harris tweeted a photo of herself Wednesday laying flowers at a monument on Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi, where John McCain almost drowned in 1967 after being shot down while flying a US Navy bombing mission. He was then captured by the North Vietnamese and held as a prisoner of war for five-and-a-half years. Her tweet said: 'Today, on the three-year anniversary of his passing, I paid my respects to an American hero, Senator John McCain' 'At this site in 1967, then-Lieutenant Commander McCain was shot down. We honor his sacrifice in Vietnam, and the sacrifice of all our men and women in uniform.' But Meghan was quick to take offense, and responded: 'If you want to honor my dads legacy on this anniversary of his death - you would spend every second making sure every single American and Afghan ally is out of harms way.' Kamala Harris was criticized by Meghan McCain after sharing this snap of where McCain's father John was shot down while fighting in the Vietnam WAr On Wednesday, she asked the VP to ensure 'every single American and Afghan ally' is saved The vice president brought flowers to the memorial, located at Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi She visited Vietnam to show support amid tensions with China over the South China Sea 'He was nothing if not someone who understood sacrifice and loyalty to the people he served with.' Harris, a Democrat from California, was elected to the Senate in 2016 and served about a year and a half alongside McCain, who represented Arizona. McCain was considered a 'moderate' Republican, and is credited with saving Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act from being repealed during the Trump administration. He ran against Obama in the 2008 presidential election, became one of the Trump administration's most vocal Republican critics, and died of cancer in August 2018 aged 81. The late Republican was born in 1936 in the Panama Canal Zone. His father was a four-star admiral, and he followed in his footsteps when he enrolled in the US Naval Academy, graduating in 1958. Meghan McCain, left, has criticized the Biden administration's withdrawal from Afghanistan. Late Sen. John McCain of Arizona was in the Navy when his plane was shot down in Hanoi in 1967. He was then taken in as a prisoner of war for five-and-a-half years The US has evacuated 87,900 people from Afghanistan since the end of July, according to the White House. The US has operated multiple military, and some commercial, flights in a quest to save as many people as they can from Taliban rule, though many argue the efforts are falling short. Meghan has posted videos of Afghans trawling through sewage outside of the Kabul airport, desperate to to be saved by US forces. She's previously criticized the Biden administration's handling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, which the US has occupied since 2001. 'Biden is unfit to lead and I am nothing short of disgusted he and his staff can't seem to be bothered to leave their vacation during an international crisis of our own creation,' the former host has said. Above, hundreds of people gather near an Air Force plane at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan The US has evacuated 87,900 people from the Central Asian nation since the end of July Harris met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, right, Wednesday in Hanoi 'There should be an emergency congressional hearing before more innocent lives are lost. My heart is broken, this tragedy will absolutely haunt our country. Also every single Afghan refugee fleeing must be granted a safe haven in America!' Republicans are lauding the Supreme Court for upholding what they claim is 'the most effective' policy in deterring illegal immigration at the southern border as it ruled Tuesday Joe Biden must start sending migrant families back to Mexico. 'The Supreme Court's decision to reinstate the Migrant Protection Protocols [MPP], known as the 'Remain in Mexico' policy, is a major victory for our state, our nation, and for the safety and security of our communities,' Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott said in a Wednesday statement. Mark Morgan, Customs and Border Protection Commissioner under Trump, told DailyMail.com that MPP 'absolutely was a game changer.' 'It was absolutely an effective deterrence to those to risk their lives to come to find what they knew were false asylum claims,' he continued. Abbott said in his statement: 'This decision will halt the Biden administration from skirting its duty to enforce federal immigration laws and will reduce the record number of migrants entering our country illegally.' The governor of the Lone Star State lamented that his state has had to take on the role of the federal government by combatting the flow of people and drug smuggling at the border it shares with Mexico. Republicans praised the Tuesday Supreme Court ruling that Joe Biden's administration must reinstate a program sending migrant families arriving illegally in the U.S. back to Mexico as they wait to hear if they've been granted asylum Trump-era CBP Commissioner Mark Morgan (pictured) told DailyMail.com the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) was 'absolutely was a game changer. It was absolutely an effective deterrence to those to risk their lives to come to find what they knew were false asylum claims' All six conservative judges ruled Joe Biden needed to reverse his end to the MPP commonly referred to as the Remain in Mexico program. All three liberal justices ruled against it 'Texas will continue to fight back against President Biden's disastrous open-border policies while working to secure the border and keep our communities safe,' he said. Upon entering office, Biden halted the MPP, which is more commonly referred to as the 'Remain in Mexico' program. On Tuesday, however, the 6-3 conservative majority Supreme Court panel ruled that he must reimpose the program. Chad Wolf, who served as Trump's acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said Wednesday of the administration pausing the program: 'Fraudulent asylum claims were overwhelming the system in 2019, and once again are today thanks to President Biden's self-inflicted, far worse crisis.' 'Meanwhile, individuals who do meet the criteria for refuge under U.S. law will face a backlog filled with those fraudulent claims,' he added in a Wednesday statement on the Tuesday Supreme Court decision. 'MPP is essential to a functioning humanitarian system and to America's national security,' Wolf said. 'It is a welcome development that the Supreme Court has delivered this rebuke to the Biden administration, and a win for any American concerned about the Biden border crisis.' The Trump-era MPP requires people to wait in Mexico while seeking asylum in the U.S. 'The policy required illegal aliens to wait in Mexico while their asylum claims were adjudicated, rather than being released into the United States on the promise they would show up for their court datesomething the majority never did,' Wolf said in his statement on the ruling. 'We also know that the overwhelming majorityas many as 90 per centof illegal aliens applying for asylum do not qualify for it under the law,' he added. 'MPP made clear that this form of catch-and-release was no longer acceptable, and as a result, fraudulent asylum claims at the border drastically declined.' Texas Governor Greg Abbott (left) called MPP 'one of the most effective policies in solving the 2019 border crisis' and former acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf (right) also praised the Supreme court decision With the three liberal justices in dissent - Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan - the court's majority opinion said the administration likely violated federal law in its efforts to rescind the program. The short unsigned order declared that the Biden administration had failed to show that rescinding the policy 'was not arbitrary and capricious.' It was unclear precisely which justices voted to end the stay and if any had recused themselves or been absent from the vote. A federal judge in Texas, U.S. District Judge Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk, had previously ordered that the program be reinstated last week. The Biden administration appealed to the 5th U.S. Circuit Appeal in New Orleans and asked for a delay in re-implementing the program while the case makes its way through the court system, but that was denied on Thursday. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito ordered a brief delay on Friday to allow the full court time to consider the administration's appeal for the stay. The high court's order in the case means the case will now continue to proceed through the courts and be heard by an appeals court - and it could ultimately return to the Supreme Court, as noted by The New York Times. As the court case proceeds, the administration must make a 'good faith effort' to restart the program. Biden suspended the program on his first day of office and the Homeland Security Department officially ended it in June Migrants arrive at El Ceibo, Guatemala, on Thursday after being deported from the US and Mexico A Border Patrol agent processes a group of migrants in Sunland Park, New Mexico, on July 22 There also is nothing preventing the administration from trying again to end the program. 'If you apply a consequence, it's supposed to deter,' Morgan told DailyMail.com in a Wednesday phone call on the 'Remain in Mexico' program. 'So what we did was, we closed that loophole,' he said. 'No longer could you come to the border with a family [and that] was your passport into the United States.' The American Civil Liberties Union called on the administration to present a fuller rationale for ending Remain in Mexico that could withstand court scrutiny. 'The government must take all steps available to fully end this illegal program, including by re-terminating it with a fuller explanation. What it must not do is use this decision as cover for abandoning its commitment to restore a fair asylum system,' said Omar Jadwat, director of the ACLU's immigrant rights project. Formally known as the Migration Protection Protocols, the policy required tens of thousands of migrants seeking asylum in the United States to turn back to Mexico. It was meant to discourage asylum seekers but critics said it denied people the legal right to seek protection in the U.S. and forced them to wait in dangerous Mexican border cities. Judge Kacsmaryk ordered that the program be reinstated in response to a lawsuit filed by the states of Texas and Missouri, whose governors have been seeking to reinstate some of the hardline anti-immigration policies of the Trump administration. The Biden administration argued in briefs that the president has 'clear authority to determine immigration policy' and that Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas had discretion in deciding whether to return asylum seekers to Mexico. In its brief to the Supreme Court on Friday, the administration argued that the policy had been dormant for more than a year. The Biden administration argued that abruptly reinstating it 'would prejudice the United States' relations with vital regional partners, severely disrupt its operations at the southern border, and threaten to create a diplomatic and humanitarian crisis.' The Trump administration largely stopped using the 'Remain in Mexico' policy at the start of the pandemic, at which point it began turning back virtually everyone crossing the Southwest border under a different protocol - a public health order that remains in effect. The Trump-era policy that Biden can't escape The MPP program was initiated in 2019 and deported certain migrants at the southern border to Mexico pursuant to Section 235(b)(2)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). The Department of Homeland Security suspended the program on January 21, 2021, the day that President Joe Biden was inaugurated. Since then, no new individuals have been enrolled and the DHS terminated the program on June 1. Under the policy, those who were eligible could register online to confirm eligibility to begin processing into the United States while remaining in Mexico. Those who the U.S. government determined to be eligible for processing would be contacted by facilitating organizations and provided instructions for accessing a designated staging location, where they would complete a health questionnaire and undergo testing for COVID-19. At staging sites, facilitating organizations would provide legal orientation and support before being transported to designated ports of entry for processing into the United States. The MPP enrollees that made it this far into the program could then be released by DHS while their cases make their way through immigration court. Source: Department of Homeland Security Advertisement The Biden administration said the pre-pandemic policy had been 'largely dormant' for months during the Trump administration even before the outbreak of COVID-19. President Joe Biden suspended the program on his first day of office and the Homeland Security Department ended it in June. Texas and Missouri argued that the Biden administration had not gone through proper administrative procedures in ending the policy, a legal argument that was repeatedly successful in some of the legal challenges brought against Trump administration immigration policies. Kacsmaryk was nominated to the federal bench by Trump. The 5th Circuit panel that ruled Thursday night included two Trump nominees, Andrew Oldham and Cory Wilson, along with Jennifer Walker Elrod, nominated to the appeals court by President George W. Bush. The Trump administration previously filed an emergency application to continue its Remain in Mexico policy after it had been blocked by a federal appeals court. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit had said the policy was causing 'extreme and irreversible harm' because it was at odds with federal law and international treaties. The Biden administration had requested that the Supreme Court dismiss the Trump-era court case in June. In July, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was asked whether President Joe Biden believed he has executive authority to determine where Afghan nationals await decisions on their applications for Special Immigration Visas. The reporter noted the similarities to the Trump-era Remain in Mexico policy and the current housing of Afghan nationals in nations like Qatar while they await decisions on their SIVs. 'Well, it's a different program, obviously - which I know you're conveying. And what we are trying to determine is U.S. facilities and bases that are located in different parts of the world where we can house these brave and courageous individuals while their processing continues,' Psaki said. She added: 'And it's already law, so we are - we are in a position where we can make a decision to relocate individuals from Afghanistan to these third-party countries.' The number of children under age 18 apprehended at the border was 834 on August 5, according to Health and Human Services. The 30-day average is just 512. Just 612 children in HHS custody were released to parents and guardians, meaning the total number of migrant children held by the US increased by more than 200. A new report says encounters at the border reached 210,000 in July alone a new 21-year high The number of children traveling alone who were picked up at the border reached an all-time high of more than 19,000 in July, according to preliminary numbers shared with the Associated Press by David Shahoulian, assistant secretary for border and immigration policy at DHS. It's just a sign of a greater influx - 210,000 migrants crossed into the US along the southern border in July. It's the highest one-month total in 21 years, according to the Department of Homeland Security. More than 188,000 migrants were encountered by law enforcement in June - compared to 33,000 in June 2020. Director Spike Lee announced he is re-editing the final episode of his 9/11 documentary after admitting he believes a conspiracy theory that the attacks were caused by a controlled demolition. 'I'm Back In The Editing Room And Looking At The Eighth And Final Chapter Of NYC EPICENTERS 9/112021. I Respectfully Ask You To Hold Your Judgment Until You See The FINAL CUT,' read a statement Lee posted on an HBO exclusive platform. Also included were views of experts who have closely studied the 9/11 attacks, including S. Shyam Sunder, who led a lengthy investigation for the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and who has debunked conspiracy theories about the terror attacks. Lee's decision to make final edits and to release previews featuring scientists seem to be efforts of damage control. The about-face comes after rising criticism that the documentary didn't offer an even balance of arguments, and even sided with conspiracy theorists by giving them a platform just weeks ahead of the 20th anniversary of the atrocity. Spike Lee announced that he is re-editing the final episode of his documentary on 9/11 after backlash he faced for featuring conspiracy theorists He was discussing his new documentary series New York City Epicenters 9/11 to 2021 1/2, which includes interviews with a conspiracy theory group The last episode, which will air on the 20th anniversary of the attacks, includes several members of 'Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth' - a group that has suggested the United States government was involved with the collapse of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. In an interview with The New York Times on Monday, Lee admitted he believed the that 7 World Trade Center skyscraper could have not collapsed because of the heat, and rather seemed like an internal demolition. The original WTC 7 was a 42 story building constructed in 1987, which was filmed tumbling to the ground after the Twin Towers collapsed. Some angles showed the seemingly undamaged tower collapse onto its own footprint sparked, which controlled demolition claims. But footage from the other side of the building shows a huge gash caused by falling debris. World Trade Center 7 included a New York bureau for the CIA, sparking further conspiracies of an inside job. But units in the building were available for anyone to rent, and experts insist there was no government plot to destroy it. Critics have argued that conspiracy theorists' and scientists' arguments should not be presented to the public as if they were in the same realm of expertise. Jeremy Stahl, editor for Slate, wrote in an article for the magazine: 'In terms of conveying facts, this is a bit like presenting Covid-19 vaccine skeptics in a debate alongside Anthony Fauci, or Holocaust deniers alongside the Simon Wiesenthal Center, or a clique of climate change skeptics alongside the authors of the United Nations IPCC report' But Lee has defended the content of his series, saying that viewers are entitled to hear arguments from both sides. 'My approach is put the information in the movie and let people decide for themselves. I respect the intelligence of the audience,' he said. The documentary also includes interviews with New York politicians like Senator Chuck Schumer and Mayor Bill de Blasio, along with various health care workers, firefighters and activists. He said the New York Police Department declined to be interviewed in his documentary due to his views on police. When Times reporter Reggie Ugwu asked Lee about the group's inclusion in the documentary series, Lee responded: 'I mean I got questions, and I hope that maybe the legacy of this documentary is that Congress holds a hearing, a congressional hearing, about 9/11.' Ugwu then asked Lee if he believes the 'official explanations' for the World Trade Center collapse on September 11, to which Lee claimed: 'The amount of heat that it takes to make steel melt, that temperature's not reached. 'And then the juxtaposition of the way Building 7 fell to the ground - when you put it next to other building collapses that were demolitions, it's like you're looking at the same thing,' Lee said in the interview. At that point, Ugwu asked Lee why he believes in 9/11 conspiracies but does not support conspiracy theories about vaccines or the 2020 election, to which Lee quipped: 'People are going to think what they think, regardless. 'I'm not dancing around your question,' he said. 'People are going to think what they think.' He noted: 'People have called me a racist for Do the Right Thing. People said in Mo' Better Blues, I was anti-Semitic, She's Gotta Have It that was misogynist. 'People are just going to think what they think,' Lee said. 'And you know what? I'm still here, going on four decades of filmmaking.' Smoke and flames were seen billowing out of the twin towers before they ultimately collapsed All that was left of the Twin Towers in the aftermath was steel The wreckage of WTC7 is pictured after the 9/11 attacks - the way in which it collapsed after the Twin Towers sparked conspiracy theories it had been brought down by explosives The new building which replaced the original World Trade Center 7 is pictured here, but the conspiracy theories continue The controlled demolition theory has been around since the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 terror attacks, when Building 7 was hit by debris from the Twin Towers and was damaged by fires, which burned for seven hours until it was completely destroyed at about 5:20 p.m. Some proponents of the theory suggest the building was demolished because it may have served as an operational center for the demolition of the Twin Towers, while others suggest that government insiders may have wanted to destroy files about corporate fraud. Loose Change film producer Dylan Avery once said he thought the destruction of the building was suspicious because it housed a CIA office, an outpost of the Secret Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the city's emergency command center. But United States Special Operations Command has said anyone could have rented space in the building. The National Institute of Standards and Technology also investigated the claims and 'found no corroborating evidence for alternative hypotheses suggesting that the World Trade enter towers were brought down by controlled demolition using explosives planted prior to September 11, 2001.' 'Instead, photographs and videos from several angles clearly show that the collapse initiated at the fire and impact floors, and that the collapse progressed from initiating floors downward until the dust clouds obscured the view.' Lee has been a top Democratic donor and has campaigned for far left politicians over the past few years. Lee has been a major Democratic donor and has campaigned for far left politicians In 2012, FOX reports, he hosted Obama in a fundraiser at his Manhattan home, then in 2016, he campaigned for Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders ahead of the primaries, even appearing in a radio ad for the senator. Then in 2019, Lee hosted a sold-out fundraiser for now vice president Kamala Harris in Martha's Vineyard. He has said the NYPD declined to be interviewed in his new documentary due to his unflattering portrayal of the police in the past. 'The only people who said no was NYPD,' Lee said in the interview. 'They don't look good in this. 'And that footage [of police officers assaulting Black Lives Matter protesters in 2020] does not lie. They were cracking heads.' An Afghan girl born aboard a US military plane as it came into land in Germany as her family was fleeing Taliban rule was named Reach after the aircraft's code name. The baby's mother went into labor on Saturday while flying from a staging base in Qatar to the Ramstein Air Base. As soon as the plane landed, military medics helped the woman deliver her baby in the cargo hold of the plane. 'They named the little girl Reach. And they did so because the call sign of the C-17 aircraft that flew them from Qatar to Ramstein was Reach,' said Gen Tod Wolters, commander of US European Command. US Air Force medics at Ramstein Air Base in Germany help an Afghan mother off the C-17 airplane - call sign Reach 828 - moments after she delivered a baby aboard the aircraft. The baby would later be named, Reach, after the aircraft The Air Mobility Command revealed that the mother was having complications when she went into labor during the flight en route to a US military base in Germany. The aircraft commander decided to descend in altitude to increase air pressure inside the plane, stabilizing the mother Reach was delivered after the military plane landed and taken to a medical facility in good conditions The code for C-17 cargo planes is usually 'Reach' followed by a number. According to tweets from the US Air Mobility Command, the mother started having complications shortly after going into labor so the aircraft commander descended in altitude to increase pression, saving her and the baby's life. When the flight landed, personnel from the 86th medical group at the Ramstein base came aboard and delivered Reach, who was later transported with her mother to a nearby facility. Reach and her parents now await relocation to the US. 'As you can well imagine, being an Air Force fighter pilot, it's my dream to watch that young child called Reach grow up and be a US citizen and fly United States Air Force fighters in our Air Force,' said Wolters at a Pentagon briefing. Army Captain Erin Brymer, the nurse who delivered Reach, told CNN that she was expecting the worst and hoping for the best. 'When the baby came out screaming! And we were able to put her directly on the mom's chest and get her breastfeeding right away. 'I was like, 'Okay, we're good here,' she said. She called the baby's delivery 'the coolest moment of my life.' A medical officer assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division speaks with an Afghan woman and helps her with her child as part of the ongoing non-combatant evacuation of US civilian personnel In this image provided by the U.S. Marine Corps, children wait to be evacuated, at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Monday, August 23 Of the 7,000 people evacuated from Kabul who had passed through US bases in Europe since August 20, only 100 required medical care. Of those 100 people, 25 have been admitted to a local hospital and 12 have already been discharged. Two other babies were born after their mothers landed at the Ramstein base, Wolters said. The Pentagon said on Wednesday that 88,000 evacuees have left Afghanistan since evacuation efforts started, but thousands are still awaiting evacuation flights as the deadline for complete withdrawal approaches. Qantas is set to replace Perth as the airline's departure point for its lucrative non-stop flights to London in response to Western Australia's strict Covid border rules. The airline said it was considering using Darwin as a hub for the route from December when it expects 80 per cent of Australians to be vaccinated against Covid-19 and the international border to re-open. WA Premier Mark McGowan has declared he intends to keep his state's border shut even when Australia reaches that vaccination coverage level. 'Qantas' ability to fly non-stop between Australia and London is expected to be in even higher demand post-Covid,' a spokesman for the airline said on Thursday. Qantas has said it is planning to replace Perth as the departure point for its non-stop flights from Australia to London due to WA Premier Mark McGowan's strict Covid border policies Qantas said it was considering using Darwin as a hub for the route from December when it expects 80 per cent of Australians to be vaccinated against Covid-19 and the international border to re-open 'The airline is investigating using Darwin as a transit point, which has been Qantas main entry for repatriation flights, as an alternative (or in addition) to its existing Perth hub given conservative border policies in Western Australia. 'Discussions on this option are continuing.' Qantas first started offering the first-of-their-kind non-stop flights to London from the WA capital - a 15,000km journey that takes 17 hours - in March 2018. The announcement came as Qantas revealed plans to restart international flights from December 2021 - just in time for Australia's Christmas travel rush. Qantas said it expected the country to reach the 80 per cent vaccination target in December - triggering the re-opening of international borders as part of 'Phase C' of the federal government's path to pandemic normality. The first available travel routes will be to destinations with high vaccination rates including the United States, Canada, the UK, Singapore, Japan and New Zealand, Qantas told the Australian Securities Exchange. Residents are seen wearing masks in Darwin on August 16. Qantas said it was considering using the city's airport as the starting point for the non-stop route Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce said Australia's rapid vaccination rollout would make international holiday travel possible again for the first time in almost two years, despite lockdowns in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra. 'The prospect of flying overseas might feel a long way off, especially with New South Wales and Victoria in lockdown, but the current pace of the vaccine rollout means we should have a lot more freedom in a few months' time,' he said. 'It's obviously up to government exactly how and when our international borders re-open, but with Australia on track to meet the 80 per cent trigger agreed by National Cabinet by the end of the year, we need to plan ahead for what is a complex restart process.' Qantas plan for international travel MID-DECEMBER: Singapore, the United States, Japan, United Kingdom and Canada using Boeing 787s New Zealand if travel bubble reopened with Australia Airbus A330s, and 737s and A320s for services to Fiji FEBRUARY 2022: Hong Kong APRIL 2022: Bali, Jakarta, Manila, Bangkok, Phuket, Ho Chi Minh City and Johannesburg APRIL 2022: Budget subsidiary Jetstar to resume international flights JULY 2022: Sydney to Los Angeles on A380s NOVEMBER 2022: Sydney to London via Singapore with Darwin instead of Perth as a possible transit point Advertisement The airline said flights to cities with low vaccination rates and high Covid-19 case numbers will not restart until at least April 2022. Those destinations include Bali, Jakarta, Manila, Bangkok, Phuket, Ho Chi Minh City and Johannesburg. Australians have been banned from travelling overseas for a holiday since March 2020, when the pandemic began, and have had to obtain permission from Australian Border Force for compassionate or business reasons. Qantas made a full-year after tax loss of $1.728billion in the year to June 30. Australians have been banned from travelling overseas for a holiday since March 2020, when the pandemic began, and have had to obtain permission from Australian Border Force for compassionate or business reasons. Qantas made a full-year after tax loss of $1.728billion in the year to June 30 With international holidays banned and state borders closed, the airline relied on its freight business to survive with overseas cargo transport a surprisingly lucrative income earner in fiscal year 2021. 'Demand for air cargo capacity remained extremely strong through FY21 due to a surge in online shopping in the Australian market and the belly space lost due to the cancellation of most international passenger flights,' Qantas said. 'Qantas Freight was able to capitalise on this demand, delivering a record profit that significantly offset the costs of the Groups grounded international operations.' Annastacia Palaszczuk has bizarrely copped criticism from Queenslanders for posting a selfie of her glamorous new hair and makeup look online while a pile of papers marked 'urgent' sit unattended in the background. The premier showcased her striking makeover during Wednesday's Covid press conference, shedding her typical natural look in favour of deep red lipstick and freshly curled locks. Later that evening she fired up her Twitter account to share a selfie of her done-up appearance as she sat behind her office desk. 'Thanks for all the work you're doing, Queenslanders. Keep staying safe,' she wrote. But eagle-eyed social media users looking at the photo suggested the premier should deal with the 'urgent' files she had sitting on her desk rather than racking up 'likes' on the platform. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk posted a selfie (pictured) on Twitter hours after showcasing her glam new look at Wednesday press conference 'Finish the work in the "Urgent" tray before taking your selfies,' one person said. 'You literally have work marked "Urgent". Really great time to stop and take a selfie and show off your nice little purse,' another wrote. 'What's the ETA on those urgent files?' A third said. Daily Mail Australia has reached out to the premier's office for comment. Others slammed the premier for taking personal snaps while the state's Covid vaccination rates remain low and hard border closures are keeping families separated and crippling the local economy. 'Make sure you whack that two inches of make up before your selfie. I have not seen my son since March this year cause of these stupid lock downs. Miss him so much,' one person commented. 'You post a photo of yourself smiling when you've just made families homeless with no notice whilst in transit with valid permits issued by your government. Sickening,' another added. 'Get off Twitter and Facebook and fix our pathetic vaccination rate. FFS,' a third comment read. One person asked: 'Just get your hair done and fell the need to share?' while another questioned: 'Was this meant for Instagram?' 'Perhaps take your share of returning overseas travellers, then go and get your hair done! Enjoy your no tourism summer,' someone else said. Unimpressed Queenslanders urged the premier to deal with the state's Covid crisis before uploading selfies on social media One person suggested Ms Palaszczuk posted the selfie because she 'felt cute', in reference to the viral meme phrase But not everyone was disgruntled by the premier's post, with some praising her revamped image and thanking her for running the state. 'Looking very glam there premier! And doing a bloody good job too,' one person complimented. 'I know this is off point but you look stunning!' Another wrote. 'Looking very pretty and healthy,' someone else said. 'Liking the new hairdo Premier, thank you for all you do for us Queenslanders,' a fourth added. It comes as Ms Palaszczuk announced Queensland had paused its hotel quarantine program for domestic travellers from NSW, Victoria and the ACT for two weeks amid capacity pressures as it avoids another Covid outbreak. Ms Palaszczuk said with 5,114 people in hotel quarantine, including 3,257 domestic arrivals, the system's 22 hotels are under too much strain. Ms Palaszczuk debuted her glam new look at Wednesday's Covid update (pictured) where she announced Queensland had paused its quarantine program for domestic travellers 'So we simply just do not have any room at the moment, we are reassessing, we are looking at other options, but Queensland is being loved to death,' Ms Palaszczuk told reporters on Wednesday. Anyone from NSW, Victoria or the ACT with a border exemption pass, except extraordinary exemptions, will need to reapply to enter. A new system is being set up to allocate specific hotel quarantine rooms for travellers from September 8. Ms Palaszczuk said the federal government's evacuation of personnel from Afghanistan, which she supports, was also putting pressure on capacity. She said Queensland isn't considering following South Australia with a trial of home quarantine to reduce pressure. Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young said it was not as simple as involving more hotels either. New rules for those who need to quarantine in a hotel when relocating to Queensland will require people to book a room in the hotel facility before they travel and re-apply for a border pass (Brisbane's Hotel Grand Chancellor, pictured) 'They need to be vaccinated, they need to be trained in using PPE, they need to be trained in infection control, and we've just reached that capacity,' she said. 'That's why we just need a pause to recalibrate.' While Queensland may have avoided an outbreak, the government still sees a risk from the Delta variant outbreak in NSW. At present only certain essential workers who have had at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine are allowed to drive into Queensland. About 120 Australian Defence Force troops have arrived to backup border police at checkpoints. Acting Chief Superintendent Rhys Wildman says four checkpoints will have two ADF personnel operating on a 24 hour basis, monitoring all avenues of access to Queensland along the border. He added that the pausing of hotel quarantine for two weeks has seen a drastic reduction in vehicles crossing the checkpoints. 'We're sort of averaging 2000-2500 vehicles a day now crossing the checkpoints, which is a drastic reduction,' he said. Queensland recorded no new cases of Covid-19 on Thursday. The Duchess of Sussex, 40, was among the people who went to the TV regulator after an orchestrated social media campaign spearheaded by his 'woke' critics including several Labour MPs, who accused him of racism, sexism and mocking suicide on Good Morning Britain in March (left). But this morning Mr Morgan was completely cleared of breaching Britain's broadcasting code and Ofcom called attempts to silence the MailOnline columnist a 'chilling restriction on freedom of expression'. Mr Morgan wrote afterwards: 'I'm delighted that Ofcom has so emphatically supported my right to disbelieve the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's incendiary claims to Oprah Winfrey, many of which have since been proved to be untrue. This is a resounding victory for free speech and a resounding defeat for Princess Pinocchios. In light of this decision - do I get my job back?' Hours later ITV revealed they 'have no current plans to invite him to present Good Morning Britain'. A source said: 'Piers decided to leave. We accepted his decision'. Reacting to today's ruling, which will infuriate the Sussexes, ITV News royal editor Chris Ship, who appeared on one of the shows that attracted 57,000 complaints, tweeted (right): 'So what does ITV do about Piers Morgan's job at Good Morning Britain now Ofcom has cleared him and the TV network of a breach of the broadcasting code?' Veteran broadcaster Bill Neely, who has worked for the BBC, ITV and most recently NBC's Chief Global Correspondent tweeted Mr Morgan and said: 'Congratulations. Important ruling for you and for the whole of broadcasting in the U.K. A pillar of our freedom reinforced'. Sky News' Editor at Large Adam Boulton wrote: 'Ofcom is doing a splendid job standing up for freedom of speech and presenters' right to be sceptical of the rich and powerful'. Advertisement A $39 million mansion in New Jersey sold for $4.6 million due to its substantial need for upgrades and the $168,000 annual property tax bill that comes with owning the property. While the 1926 Gloria Crest mansion, known as the 'White House of Englewood,' was made to be the perfect home for self-proclaimed Polish royal Stefan Poniatowski, it left much to be desired for the modern day buyer, and spent eight years on the market before finally selling for almost $35 million less than its original listing price. 'The estate is stunning and grandiose, but it's definitely not for the faint of heart,' said Michelle Pais, founder of Signature Realty NJ who sold the home. The Gloria Crest mansion sits at 83 N Woodland St., in Englewood The property was built in 1926 and is knows as the White House of Englewood It features nine full bathrooms and five half bathrooms with classic designs The estate features gold decorations, eight bedrooms, nine full bathrooms, five half bathrooms and covers 4.9 acres at 83 N Woodland St. The marble entry has a double staircase, and there are multiple living rooms, one of which has a fireplace. It also houses a home theater, gym, infinity pool and a cabana that overlooks the property's private lake. Although the Mediterranean-style villa is said to capture the 'grandeur of a classic Hollywood estate,' the style is considered dated, and it will likely be completely renovated by its new owner. Pais and her team worked relentlessly to finally find a buyer for the home since it was first listed in 2013, the NY Post reported. The home was originally set to sell for $39 million before the price dropped to $25 million in 2014. The following it year it went down to $24 million and then dropped again by half in 2018. In 2019, the priced went even lower to just below $10 million before settling on the $4.6 million price this year. Pictured, one of eight bedrooms within the mansion The Mediterranean-styled villa includes gold decorations throughout its interior The home originally belonged to Stefan Poniatowski, a self-proclaimed Polish royal The buyers, who wished to remain anonymous, will also enjoy an undisclosed discount to the $168,000 annual property tax bill. The originally belonged to Poniatowski and his wife Elizabeth, the daughter of a prosperous Paterson silk mill owner. Poniatowski took over the silk manufacturing business before going bankrupt in the 1929 stock market crash. Edward Turn - CEO of Control Equity Group, which offers facility management and security for commercial properties - paid $4.8 million for the home in 2000. Turen had taken out mortgages on the home for more than it was worth, causing it to nearly go into foreclosure auction in 2017. A British Army surgeon has told of how he used his experience as a new father to settle a baby passed over a wall to troops in Kabul. Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Caesar, a trauma and orthopaedic surgeon from 16 Medical Regiment, Royal Army Medical Corps, has been working in a hospital set up for injured personnel and Afghans going through the evacuation process at Kabul airport. He said the injuries he had been treating ranged from gunshot injuries, flashbang injuries, and people who have been crushed in the crowd, to those who had run out of medication and those suffering in the heat. 'There have also been an unexpectedly high number of children being passed to us and being dealt with by the hospital,' Lt Col Caesar said. 'The baby that was handed over the wall to the US Marines ended up here at the Role 2 hospital, and amongst many other children that were separated from their parents, were looked after by the staff here in the Role 2.' A British Army surgeon has told of how he used his experience as a new father to settle a baby passed over a wall to troops in Kabul. Pictured: A baby being handed to American troops at Kabul airport on August 19 Viral images have shown babies and young children being handed over to troops, often over walls topped with barbed wire at Kabul airport. 'Both the Norwegians, the US and ourselves took turns taking care of those children and offering them the pastoral care that they needed while they waited to be either shipped on to a safe destination or reunited with their parents,' Lt Col Caesar said. And he said the baby who had been passed over the wall to US Marines to avoid being crushed, believed to be between two and three months old, had struggled to settle while being fed by a colleague. He said: 'As a recent father of a 14-month-old, I have a little more experience of dealing with small children, and so we took her for a walk, walked around the hospital, managed to burp her a few times. 'She seemed to settle, and she then sat with me for another half an hour. 'So while she gently settled down, and she was handed on to one of the nursing staff who managed to rock her off to sleep. Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Caesar (pictured), a trauma and orthopaedic surgeon from 16 Medical Regiment, Royal Army Medical Corps, has been working in a hospital set up for injured personnel 'That baby I believe has now been reunited with her mother, and she was moved on to a safe location outside of Afghanistan.' Lt Col Caesar said although he never knew what was going to come through the door - and the numbers of people coming through were 'much higher than expected' - he felt it was 'absolutely necessary' that troops were in Afghanistan. 'I don't think anyone foresaw the crushing sea of humanity at the gate and how they were going to be affected by the situation. 'There was also the unpleasant situation where people got onto the runway. 'We were very concerned at that point that we will be dealing with large numbers of casualties that could have overwhelmed this facility.' Viral images have shown babies and young children being handed over to troops, often over walls topped with barbed wire at Kabul airport. Pictured: A U.S. Marine holds a baby during the evacuation at a Kabul airport Lt Col Caesar was first deployed to Camp Bastion in Afghanistan 18 months after enrolling as an Army reservist in 2011. After returning, he transferred to full-time regular service. He said success for the troops would mean 'no coalition forces significantly injured or left behind, no injured UK service personnel, and as many Afghan nationals who wish to leave being brought to safety'. And added: 'It's so sad to see all this ongoing human suffering but conversely when people are at their lowest, we are able to help them.' Desperate Britons and Afghans cleared for evacuation are reportedly paying private security firms more than 5,000 to help them escape the clutches of the Taliban, it has been reported. The firms are reportedly charging $7,500 dollars (approximately 5,500) to give those willing to pay a safe passage past Taliban fighters and to Kabul airport. But most of the money is actually being used to pay off the Taliban anyway, UK defence sources have told the Guardian. It comes as yesterday Taliban officials announced a new edict banning Afghans from leaving the country. Roadblocks and check points were set up across Kabul to prevent access to the airport where western forces are carrying out a rapid evacuation. It is believed the rescue mission could end within the next 36 hours. However, the US is now warning to those wishing to evacuate not to come to the airport amid security concerns. Meanwhile, the UK's Defence Secretary last night warned some of those trying to flee the Taliban may be better off heading for the border rather than hoping for a flight out. As evacuation efforts entered their final hours, Ben Wallace appeared to signal in a briefing to MPs that there are few places left on British planes. There is also an increased terror risk from jihadists ISIS-K, with US officials last night saying there was a 'very real risk' of an attack by the terror group. The firms are reportedly charging $7,500 dollars (approximately 5,500) to give those willing to pay a safe passage past Taliban fighters and to Kabul airport. Pictured: Security personnel assist with evacuation of the people waiting outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan Meanwhile, the UK's Defence Secretary (pictured left: Ben Wallace) last night warned some of those trying to flee the Taliban may be better off heading for the border rather than hoping for a flight out. Around 150 flights left Kabul airport yesterday as Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab (pictured right) insisted the UK will use every hour left to rescue vulnerable Afghans Questioned about what Afghans who have been offered student places or fellowships in the UK should do, he said: If they think they can make it to a third country, that may be a better option. Pressed by a Tory backbencher, Mr Wallace added: I recommend that they try and make it to the border because it is higher profile going to the airport that is where the Taliban will be focusing their efforts at the moment. There was no suggestion however, that Afghans who have been told by western officials to travel to the airport for evacuation should alter that plan. Meanwhile, troubling video today showed thousands of Afghans attempting to flee the country via the Pakistan border. The footage shows a huge crowd of people at Spin Boldak, a southern village on the border with Pakistan, queuing up at the border gates. Troubling video today showed thousands of Afghans attempting to flee the country via the Pakistan border. The footage shows a huge crowd of people at Spin Boldak, a southern village on the border with Pakistan, queuing up at the border gates Meanwhile, crowds of people wait outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, yesterday as the evacuation mission continues Some of those trying to flee the Taliban may be better off heading for the border rather than hoping for a flight out, the Defence Secretary admitted last night. Hundreds of people gather near an evacuation control checkpoint during ongoing evacuations at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul 'We're leaving in 72 hours - it doesn't matter who's left on the ground,' says former CIA agent American civilians and Afghan allies have just 72 hours before evacuations from Kabul end, a former CIA officer and terrorism expert has claimed. Sam Faddis, who served as the head of the Counter Terrorism Center's Weapons of Mass Destruction unit, said sources in the Pentagon, military officers in Kabul and other former intelligence agency officers have told him that flights for civilians out of the Afghan capital will actually end in the next three days. The alleged deadline has not been officially announced or verified, but raises fears that American citizens could be left behind in the Taliban-occupied city. On Tuesday President Joe Biden confirmed that US forces will be leaving the country by August 31, a date agreed with the Taliban - but Faddis claims American civilians currently in the city have a far shorter deadline. 'Biden decided we're pulling out within 72 hours. We're gone, and it doesn't matter who's left on the ground,' the ex-CIA officer told DailyMail.com. Advertisement The frantic race to rescue the last 2,000 Afghan allies was underway last night as the Daily Mail learned all UK troops must leave Afghanistan by the weekend. Around 150 flights left Kabul airport yesterday as Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab insisted the UK will use every hour left to rescue vulnerable Afghans. But the grim reality is that many hundreds including heroic Afghan interpreters will be left to the clutches of the Taliban after Tuesdays deadline for international troops to leave. A US order that Britain must pull out its 1,000 soldiers and officials before the US begins its withdrawal has reduced the time available to process the final claims. US commanders have also insisted on two to three days to conduct a unilateral extraction of their 6,000-strong force, meaning the last UK troops are expected to fly out on Sunday. The order came as the Taliban further tightened its grip on the airport, using checkpoints to block anyone not holding the necessary paperwork and demanding bribes from those who did. Afghans and foreign citizens suffered beatings. Video footage showed an Australian with blood streaming down his face from a head wound after he was confronted by Taliban guards. There were estimated to be 10,000 Afghans crammed outside the gates to the airport. UK commander Brigadier Dan Blanchford said they faced harrowing and extreme conditions. Meanwhile, the US last night issued an order for those evacuating not to come to the airport, due to a security risk. The order, to US citizens, urged them not to come to the airport gates unless the receive 'individual instructions' to do so. Those at three of the gates, Abbey, East and North, were also told to leave 'immediately'. The UK also issued similar warnings yesterday. Since the start of the operation, the RAF has flown out 11,474 people, including almost 7,000 vulnerable Afghans. It has evacuated more than 2,500 UK nationals, 341 British Embassy officials and around 1,000 nationals from 38 nations. The figure of 2,000 awaiting rescue could rise, with the last freedom flight possibly tomorrow. Around 150 flights left Kabul airport yesterday as Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab insisted the UK will use every hour left to rescue vulnerable Afghans. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster There were estimated to be 10,000 Afghans crammed outside the gates to the airport. UK commander Brigadier Dan Blanchford said they faced harrowing and extreme conditions. Pictured: Afghans line up outside a bank to take out cash as people keep waiting at Hamid Karzai International Airport Raab denies he was 'lounging around' on holiday while Kabul fell Dominic Raab today denied he was 'lounging around on the beach' while Kabul fell as he defended his delayed return to the UK from a luxury break at a five-star resort in Crete. The Foreign Secretary arrived home on the evening of Sunday August 15 after he opted to work remotely as the situation in Afghanistan deteriorated. Mr Raab said he was 'engaged from a hotel room, my family was on the beach, not me' and that he 'checked in on them episodically'. The Tory frontbencher said 'the stuff about me being lounging around on the beach all day is just nonsense' as he insisted the 'sea was actually closed, it was a red notice'. Mr Raab remains under pressure to quit over his handling of the crisis and this morning he admitted that 'with the benefit of hindsight I wouldn't have gone away'. Advertisement There are special cases still to be processed Afghans to be offered sanctuary in the UK due to the likelihood they will be targeted by the Taliban. British troops face an increased threat of a terrorist attack from jihadis. At the airport, a young Afghan woman told the BBC that Taliban forces were treating the crowds of waiting civilians like animals. Before she boarded a flight, she said: Today after three days, I finally got into the airport and I have my flight. It took us 18 hours to get through one of the gates . The airport is completely surrounded by Taliban forces and theyre being as brutal as they can to the people. Theyre shooting at people, theyre beating people. I have mixed feelings. On the one hand Im travelling to a safer country anything right now is better than being in a country led by the Taliban. 'On the other, Im leaving behind everything my life, my work, my dreams, my hopes. I really desperately want to one day come back to Kabul and see Kabul free of the Taliban. Amid the horror, there was also humanity. A British officer described looking after a baby girl after she child became separated from her mother in the crush. Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Caesar of 16 Medical Regiment, said: We took her for a walk around our hospital, managed to burp her a few times. She seemed to settle. One of the challenges in this sort of environment is never really knowing who is going to come through the door. We have to be prepared for every eventuality. Fortunately as a recent father myself I have a bit of experience in dealing with small children. She was later reunited with her mother before being evacuated. A heart-breaking announcement for those who remain is expected imminently, according to political sources. The crowds are expected to be told, perhaps today, that evacuations for civilians are no longer possible. At the airport, a young Afghan woman told the BBC that Taliban forces were treating the crowds of waiting civilians like animals. Before she boarded a flight, she said: Today after three days, I finally got into the airport and I have my flight. It took us 18 hours to get through one of the gates.' Pictured: A C-17 Globemaster lll lands on the runway as evacuees from Afghanistan debark a C-17 Globemaster Two paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security while a C-130 Hercules takes off during a evacuation operation in Kabul Tobias Ellwood, chairman of the Commons defence committee, said: We are down to the last hours. 'It is vital we communicate with those waiting outside the airport to prevent panic and loss of life, confirming what has happened. They will have to be told, sadly, that no more evacuation flights are possible ahead of the August 31 deadline and that, as from then, only military withdrawal flights will be taking off. Plans to sweep away swathes of the EU's flagship data laws could spell the end of 'pointless' web cookie warnings and red tape, the Culture Secretary will announce on Thursday. In what is the first post-Brexit shake-up of the UK's digital economy, Oliver Dowden is set to outline how Britons' data can be used more flexibly. Speaking to The Telegraph, Mr Dowden said the Government intends to peel away from key parts of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation, which came into force in 2018. GDPR, which governs how people's personal information is collected, has been criticised for being too bureaucratic and overly prescriptive. Mr Dowden suggested the new reforms would also cut down on cookie banners, which are used by websites to secure users' consent for storing their data. At present under the GDPR rules, sites have to give users a genuine choice over whether to say 'yes' or 'no' to cookies which process and share their personal data. Plans to sweep away swathes of the EU's flagship data laws could spell the end of 'pointless' web cookie warnings and red tape, the Culture Secretary will announce on Thursday Ministers are also said to be planning to shake up Britain's data watchdog. The Government is set to appoint John Edwards, who is currently New Zealand's privacy commissioner, to head up the regulator. Mr Dowden described the reforms as a 'data dividend' of Brexit and said the new British framework would be 'more proportionate'. He added that it would help to cut costs for businesses and enable 'greater innovation' which will also 'drive growth and opportunities and jobs'. Mr Dowden said the Government intends to peel away from key parts of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation, which came into force in 2018 However, the EU continues to trumpet GDPR as having improved data privacy standards across the world, meaning the UK could trigger fresh tensions with the bloc by deviating from the rules. The plans will also likely be scrutinised by privacy campaigners who fear further online profiling of individuals and greater massing of personal data by big companies. Mr Dowden said the reforms would bring an end to 'pointless bureaucracy' and 'box ticking' but would still protect people's privacy. Two siblings were banned from a charter school in California after they refused to wear masks because of religion reasons, as the whole campus was placed on lockdown. Victoria and Drew Nelson, of Temecula, were forced to leave school grounds on their first and last day of class at Springs Charter School. Administrators said the students were asked to either comply to wear the mask or leave their classrooms. Drew, a senior, was sent to the principal's office but when Victoria refused to leave the classroom, her teacher evacuated the students in her class and blocked Victoria from following them. 'When I would go left, she would follow me. I was trying to go around her and she would block me so eventually I just gave up,' Victoria, who was a junior, told FOX in an interview after the incident. Drew(left) and Victoria Nelson (right) were banned from attending Springs Charter School after they refused to wear masks during their first day of classes School resource officers were called when Victoria refused to leave the classroom. 'I need you to stand up or we will have to physically remove you from the classroom,' said the principal to her She recorded a conversation she had with the principal after she was called in. 'I need you to stand up or we will have to physically remove you from the classroom,' said the principal. 'Please don't touch me,' the teenager replied. After the incident, the school released a statement saying there are not religious exemptions for mask mandates in school settings in the state of California. Victoria said she loved the school and would miss it, but was disheartened by how she was dismissed. She told Fox she wasn't making up excuses to avoid having to wear a mask, and that she was standing up for what she believed in. 'We thought the school would care about what be believe in, but they didn't even care enough to listen.' she added. Eventually police a school resource officer (SRO) was called. SROs are called when there is an imminent threat to the students and staff, but the school refused to elaborate on the threat Victoria and Drew posed, citing privacy concerns. The parents hadn't made requests for religious exemptions. The school released a statement saying that there were no exemptions of the kind for school mask mandates in California While Veronica and Drew are now learning from home, their parents will meet with the school district soon In a statement, the school said: 'As a public charter school, Springs Charter Schools is requiring to comply with all CDPH orders, including the mask mandate, in order to protect the health and safety of our staff and students, which is our highest priority. 'To this end, students and staff are required to wear a mask while in school facilities. 'There are no religious exemptions in the state mask order, nor has the right to an exemption even been recognized by the supreme court because it's a neutral law of general application to protect public health.' California law stipulates that K-12 students don't need to mask up when outdoors at school, but must wear the face coverings at all times while inside. Gary Nelson, the father of the banned students, also voiced preoccupation over the growing tension amid mask mandates. 'This is just getting beyond and beyond,' he said Victoria and Drew will have access to an entire curriculum studying from home, but their parents will meet with the school district soon. A legal expert backed the school's statement and told FOX there were no religious exemption for school mask mandates. 'Regardless of whether or not you're deeply religious or an atheist, Muslim or a Christian, it applies to you,' Jessica Levinson said. A laid-back councillor wasn't embarrassed to have accidentally live streamed his bizarre antics to hundreds of voters - he revelled in it. Allan Robinson, 54, a champion jockey and former NRL Footy Show favourite, joked around while preparing for a Newcastle Council zoom meeting on Tuesday night. But he was seemingly unaware his ad-lib ocker performance was being viewed by many at home. The larrikin proudly told his colleagues his wife Michelle had cooked him 'some beautiful salmon', before adding 'you little beauty'. Larrikin jockey and councillor Allan Robinson told the audience watching the Newcastle Council meeting online his wife Michelle (pictured right) had cooked him 'some beautiful' salmon, before declaring 'you little beauty' Cr Robinson was then informed by a visibly embarrassed council chief executive Jeremy Bath that the zoom meeting was not a private affair. The veteran rider wasn't fussed, jokingly declaring to the audience and fellow councillors he 'didn't marry his wife for her looks, it was for her cooking'. When another councillor then interjected, a blunt Cr Robinson said it would be best to 'stop b***hing and get on with it'. Robinson has been riding professionally for over 40 years after starting out with master Newcastle trainer Paul Perry as a 14-year-old. In 1998, at the peak of his powers, Robinson showed his class in the saddle, riding the most winners in a single season by any jockey in Australia. Former NRL Footy Show favourite Allan Robinson has always been a polarising figure in the eyes of some A number of Robinson's councillors from Newcastle City seemed far from impressed at the jockey's ad lib comments He has saluted in a record 2118 races, earning a reputation as a legend in horse racing circles. But as prolific as he has been at the winning post in his glittering career, Robinson has also courted plenty of controversy. Affectionally known as Robbo, he was suspended more than 100 times - a world record - and took on countless race stewards in on-track disagreements resulting in negative headlines for the sport of kings. Cr Robinson's move into local politics as an Independent in the Hunter region, north of Sydney, has been equally colourful. He angered many after labelling the Newcastle lord mayor 'fatso', said another councillor was a 'big chunky woman', and called an openly gay councillor 'custard', a report into code of conduct breaches revealed in July. CEO Jeremy Bath informed Robinson his comments were being 'live streamed to the masses' After getting his start as a teenager, Allan Robinson has ridden 2118 career winners in a glittering career as a jockey When questioned why he called the lord mayor 'fatso' in an email to a ratepayer, Cr Robinson said he 'doesn't think highly of her' and wondered 'how much it costs council to have the makeup done every time you see her on TV'. He also went onto say Cr Carol Duncan was a 'big chunky woman' and 'f**king unit'. The report concluded Cr Robinson's behaviour caused, comprised or involved intimidation or verbal abuse and constituted harassment or bullying behaviour. He has since been dropped from the Independents' ticket ahead of the next election in Newcastle - and many believe Cr Robinson is on borrowed time as a councillor in the Steel City, despite his revered status with locals. Anti-vaccination protesters threaten to send thousands of vials of Covid jabs into the bin in a wicked campaign to sabotage the vaccine rollout. Anti-vaxxers have taken to social media and encrypted search engines in a co-ordinated effort to stympie the nation's efforts to vaccinate the population by deliberately failing to turn up for vaccination appointments. As a result, thousands of bookings have gone begging and vital supplies of vaccines are being wasted. A source within Victoria's health department has told Daily Mail Australia authorities are aware of the 'wicked' campaign that threatens to extend lockdowns across Australia. Militant Anti-vaccination protesters are attempting to sabotage the vaccine roll-out People line up outside the Covid vaccination hub at the Royal Melbourne Showgrounds in Melbourne on Wednesday Health workers prepare Pfizer vaccinations at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre mass vaccination hub WHAT IS DUCKDUCKGO? DuckDuckGo is effectively a search engine similar to Google that promises to keep your dealings a secret from authorities. 'It is a myth that you cant be tracked while using so-called Incognito mode,' its website states. 'In fact, Incognito mode mainly just deletes information on your computer and does nothing to stop Google from saving your searches, nor does it stop companies, Internet service providers, or governments from being able to track you across the Internet. 'By contrast, DuckDuckGo search is completely anonymous.' 'DuckDuckGo search gives you truly private search results without tradeoffs in result quality,' it boasts. 'We have everything youve come to expect in an online search experience, and a few that make searching the Internet not only private, but also a bit more fun!' Advertisement The campaign has been described by those within the health department as 'disgusting'. It is understood anti-vaxxers have directed their followers to encrypted messenger apps such as Telegram in addition to the DuckDuckGo search engine to spread their vile campaign. Victoria's health department did not respond to Daily Mail Australia's questions on Wednesday and Thursday. But the health worker insider, who wished to remain anonymous, said health workers were well aware of the attempts to undermine the state's vaccine rollout. 'It's disgusting because they are encouraging people to make fake appointments and not turn up,' the source said, It is understood the campaign was thrown into top gear last week - before hundreds of anti-vaxxers joined in an ugly 'freedom' protest through Melbourne's CBD. The AstraZeneca and Pfizer vaccines carry a shelf life of just six months. Earlier this month, the Federal health department revealed hundreds of thousands of doses of Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines had been wasted because people did not turn up for their appointments or were administered wrong. In Victoria, about 10,000 people a day are cancelling or failing to turn up to their Covid-19 vaccination appointments, Mr Andrews revealed just days ago. Health officials have warned vaccination is the nation's only way out of repeated lockdowns. Battle lines were drawn in Melbourne on August 21 where 'freedom' protesters went head-to-head with Victoria Police Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews on Thursday urged Victorians to continue to make appointments to get the jab A drive through patient gets vaccinated at the western health drive through Covid-19 vaccination centre in Melton earlier this month Health Workers prepare to start the drive through Covid-19 vaccination centre in Melton on August 8 'Vaccines expire and if you have 25 bookings and just two turn up, heaps of people are missing out,' the source said. 'This is our only way out of this. If you want get out of lockdown you shouldnt be sabotaging the system.' On Thursday, New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced a range of new 'freedoms' for those residents that get the vaccine. From September 13, anyone who is fully vaccinated and lives outside of an area of concern can gather in groups of up to five in their own local government area or within 5km of their home. Residents living in households where all adults have been vaccinated in one of Sydney's 12 hotspots will be allowed outside together for another hour on top of their one-hour exercise limit. The state leader said NSW was on track to fully vaccinate 70 per cent of its population by as early as mid-October. Millions of Australians have received the vaccine on the promise of more freedoms once they've had both jabs. A business can refuse entry or service to anyone as long as they don't breach anti-discrimination laws based on race, age, gender or disability under existing laws and have the backing of Prime Minister Scott Morrison to do so. 'We all believe in freedom, but we also believe in people being healthy. 'And the simple fact is, if you're not vaccinated you present a greater health risk to yourself, to your family, to your community and others about you,' he said. The National Cabinet will meet on Friday to discuss a proposal to link certain freedoms to a vaccine passport once 70-80 per cent of the population is fully vaccination. Freedoms could include attending It could be key to going to sporting events, concerts and businesses will have the right to turn away people who aren't vaccinated. Victoria recorded its largest spike in Covid cases on Thursday since the second wave, with 80 new infections overnight. Those include 13 mystery infections, and 41 who were in the community while infectious. More than 30,000 Victorians were vaccinated on Wednesday, with large queues stretching out of vaccine hubs. Mr Andrews urged frustrated Victorians to continue their efforts to receive the vaccine despite the current delays. 'I would encourage people to go back and stick to it, because it is the way out of restrictions and out of our hospitals being overwhelmed and our way back to normal life,' Mr Andrews said. 'You have to be patient. There is no choice, but there are appointments that can be made.' Protesters march through the streets during an anti-lockdown rally in Melbourne on August 21 A Taliban spokesperson says there's no proof Al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden was behind the various attacks against the US on September 11, adding that the US used him as an 'excuse' to invade Afghanistan in 2001. 'When Osama Bin Laden became an issue for the Americans, he was in Afghanistan,' said Zabihullah Mujahid in an interview aired on NBC Nightly News Wednesday in which he promised the country will no longer be a safe haven for terrorists. 'Although there was no proof he was involved, now we have given promises that Afghan soil won't be used against anyone.' Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid made the comments on NBC Nightly News Wednesday As the Afghanistan evacuation speeds up, @RichardEngel presses a Taliban spokesperson over their claims that things will be different. pic.twitter.com/Gy7Rj4R7U4 NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt (@NBCNightlyNews) August 25, 2021 Al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden admitted to planning the September 11 attacks in a 2004 taped statement, but a Taliban spokesman says there's 'no proof' he was behind the attacks Mujahid was then pressed further by NBC journalist Richard Engel, who said: 'So it sounds like, even now, after all this, you're accepting no responsibility?' He answered: 'There is no evidence. Even after 20 years of war we have no proof he was involved.' 'There was no justification for this war, it was excuse for war.' Mujahid make the remarks despite Bin Laden admitting to ordering the attacks in 2004. 'To the American people, my talk is to you about the best way to avoid another Manhattan,' he said in a taped statement in which he urged Americans to stay out of Middle East affairs. 'I tell you: Security is an important element of human life and free people do not give up their security.' The hijackings of September 11 killed 3,000 people, most of them at the World Trade Center in downtown Manhattan A 9/11 Commission report concluded that the '9/11 attack was driven by Osama bin Laden,' according to Fox News. 'As final preparations were under way during the summer of 2001, dissent emerged among Al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan over whether to proceed,' the report said. 'The Taliban's chief, Mullah Omar, opposed attacking the United States. Although facing opposition from many of his senior lieutenants, [bin Laden] effectively overruled their objections, and the attacks went forward.' The US invaded Afghanistan in 2001 after Al-Qaeda, founded and led by Osama bin Laden, planned the airplane hijacks that killed a total of 2,977 people at the Pentagon in Washington, DC, the World Trade Center in New York City and in Pennsylvania. Al Qaeda was based in Afghanistan at the time, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. Days after the attacks, then-President George W. Bush called on the Taliban to turn in the Al Qaeda leaders responsible. Bin Laden managed to flee Afghanistan, and was killed by a team of Navy SEALs in May 2011 after he was found to be hiding in Pakistan. 'The Taliban must act, and act immediately. They will hand over the terrorists, or they will share in their fate,' he said on September 20. President George W. Bush called on the Taliban to turn in al-Qaeda leaders responsible for the attacks. Al-Qeda was based in Afghanistan at the time The US military and British forces began a bombing campaign against the Taliban on October 7, 2001. Now, almost 20 years later, the US is withdrawing from the Central Asian nation by President Joe Biden's deadline of August 31. The Taliban ruled Afghanistan for five years until the US invaded in 2001. They're now back in charge after they stormed the presidential palace in the Afghan capital of Kabul on August 15, sending Afghan President Ashraf Ghani fleeing to the United Arab Emirates. The White House revealed today that over the last 24 hours, 42 American flights dealt with the bulk of evacuations - transporting 11,200 from Kabul - meaning the U.S. has evacuated and facilitated the evacuation of approximately 87,900 people on U.S. military and coalition flights since the end of July. The US is focused on vulnerable people, such as women and girls, who were oppressed during the previous Taliban regime, and on those who helped the US and Afghan militaries against the Taliban during the war. On Wednesday, Mujahid, the Taliban spokesman, also told the New York Times that the regime was pleading with Afghans not to leave the country. 'We don't want our countrymen to go to America. Whatever they've done in the past, we have given them amnesty. We need young educated professionals in our nation, but if they want to leave it's their choice.' He also told women not to worry, claiming that reports that the Taliban are going around marrying girls as young as 12 as spoils of war are unfounded. 'They are our sisters, we must show them respect, they should not be frightened,' he said. 'Women should be proud of us, not scared. This is propaganda from the old regime. We have no evidence of a single case (of marrying girls).' The tax office has issued a stern warning to Australia's 600,000 cryptocurrency investors who think their Bitcoin wealth is untraceable. Bitcoin on Wednesday climbed above $69,000 for the first time since May. With the cryptocurrency back in vogue Tim Loh, an assistant commissioner with the Australian Taxation Office, issued a warning to those hoping to hide their wealth. 'The ATO matches cryptocurrency to individuals' tax returns helping us ensure investors are paying the right amount of tax,' he said. 'We estimate that over 600,000 taxpayers have invested in crypto assets in recent years.' Scroll down for video The tax office has issued a stern warning to Australia's 600,000 cryptocurrency investors who think their Bitcoin wealth is untraceable. Bitcoin on Wednesday climbed above $69,000 for the first time since May (pictured is a stock image) Like share investors, those who buy and sell cryptocurrency have to pay a capital gains tax if they make a profit and this must be declared on a tax return. Cryptocurrencies, like shares, are also increasingly being bought over exchange platforms that provide data to the tax office. But peer-to-peer trades between individuals are harder to track unless the tax office obtains records from phone companies. Bitcoin has had a volatile year, climbing above $80,000 in March when billionaire Tesla chief Elon Musk announced he had bought $US1.5billion of the world's most valuable cryptocurrency and would accept it as payment for his electric cars. It then dived to $45,000 by May after he changed his mind on the grounds mining cryptocurrencies with complex mathematical formulas used too many fossil fuels. In early August Fred Schebesta, the millionaire co-founder of the Finder comparison website, was predicting Bitcoin would reach $61,000 by the end of 2021. But with Bitcoin on Thursday worth $67,000 Mr Schebesta, a cryptocurrency investor, updated his forecast to have the cryptocurrency hitting $87,000 by Christmas, and still reaching $338,000 by 2025. 'Bitcoin going up in value is great. But what's better is when Bitcoin goes up in value slowly because it shows strength,' he told Daily Mail Australia. With the cryptocurrency back in vogue Tim Loh, an assistant commissioner with the Australian Taxation Office, issued a warning to those hoping to hide their wealth 'When it goes up too fast it means it's going to potentially come crashing back. 'Whereas this run up has been really nice and slow and considered. 'This shows extreme strength, for me, and I think this will create a real strong base for Bitcoin to go much much, much higher.' Mr Schebesta said other cryptocurrencies like Ethereum, used for business transactions, were now pulling up Bitcoin as bargain hunters looked for alternatives before coming back to Bitcoin. 'When Etherium ran up, it pulled Bitcoin up for the first time, which I think is a really interesting new pattern where other coins can also pull Bitcoin up where in the past, Bitcoin was the one that pulled everything else up,' he said. In early August Fred Schebesta, the millionaire co-founder of the Finder comparison website, was predicting Bitcoin would reach $61,000 by the end of 2021. 'Think of the stock market. If the two biggest stocks suddenly go up, then everyone looks at the other stocks and thinks they now look pretty cheap relative to them. 'So everyone buys the other stocks as well. So that's what started happening, the second biggest stock started really rallying, and then the first one looked cheap.' Ethereum on Thursday was worth $4,300, still a fraction of Bitcoin's $67,000. Australians have until October 31 to lodge their tax return if they are doing it themselves or have until May 15 next year if they are going through a tax accountant. Those working from home can claim a flat 80 cents an hour rate on their tax return for the last financial year, ending on June 30, or use the lower 52-cent rate and manually add up their phone, internet and electricity expenses. Mr Loh said the tax office was this year targeting cryptocurrency investors and those who overclaimed on their work-from-home expenses. 'This year, we're focused on work-related expenses including working from home, income and deductions for rental properties and capital gains tax on cryptocurrency, shares and property,' he said. A supermarket worker has been praised for standing up to a mother who refused to wear a mask inside his store. The woman was shopping at the Four Squares grocery store in Torbay, Auckland on Tuesday when she was approached by the staff member. After being asked to wear a mask while inside the store, the woman begins filming, insisting she has a medical exemption before hurling abuse at other shoppers. An anti-masker has gone viral after filming herself arguing with workers at a New Zealand grocery store for not complying with the national mask mandate 'This is our shop. Can you please wear a mask,' the worker politely asks. When asked to see her medical exemption, the woman argues back, saying she doesn't need to provide proof. 'I don't need to give you any information, other than the fact that I'm medically exempt.' She accuses the worker of breaking the law when he informs her they can refuse service if she does not comply to the national mandate and wear a mask in their store. 'I'm not breaking the law,' he hits back. 'This is my shop and this is my duty for the safety of other customers.' The woman then goes on to claim she does not have a printer and cannot print her proof of exemption as the library is not open. He then asks to see the digital copy from the government website. 'Sure, I'll show you everything,' she says before continuing to argue with the worker, telling him to call the police to settle the matter. 'I haven't done anything wrong,' she claims. The woman is repeatedly asked to leave politely by the workers when she refuses to show them her medical exemption from the rules The worker then repeatedly says 'please' while gesturing towards the door in a desperate bid to get the woman to leave. Another shopper, who is wearing a mask, calls out: 'Just wear a mask.' The woman calls her 'another Nazi' and a 'little Gestapo helper'. The video ends as the woman is repeatedly asked by the worker to leave his store while she continues to argue with him. 'We're not going to let you shop here,' he states. Masks have been mandatory for people in New Zealand accessing essential services in their level 4 lockdown Police have been notified of the incident at the store. 'A woman in the store had reportedly become verbally abusive towards staff and other customers at the store after refusing to wear a face covering,' said Waitemata east area commander Inspector Stefan Sagar . 'Police attended the store shortly afterward but the woman had already left the area. Police will be making further enquiries into the matter including reviewing CCTV footage. This is not the first time the same woman has infamously gone viral. Earlier this year in March, a similar video of her challenging a police officer over playground lockdowns took social media by storm. After being removed from a playground during New Zealand's level 3 lockdown, she shared the video online stating: 'Choose your side, buddy. Freedom or communism' to the officer. Police had been called to the incident in Browns Bay after reports that a woman had cut the warning tape off the playground so children could use it. During the level 3 lockdown, playgrounds were closed for use to prevent the spread of the virus. Locals have praised the workers for the calm manner in which they dealt with the situation and expressed their disappointment at her actions Locals have given praise to the grocery store workers for the calm way that they dealt with the woman, expressing their disappointment at her actions. 'I support the lovely staff of 4 Square,' one woman wrote. 'They work hard and long hours, and are always so polite.' 'Her behaviour was so disturbing,' another woman wrote. 'Filming us and accusing us of being 'Nazis' when we pointed out that she needs to wear a mask under lockdown when doing groceries. After witnessing that I've so much more respect for our incredible essential workers who put themselves at risk on so many levels,' she continued. 'She is well known in the community for this intimidating behaviour. There would have been no way she would listened to the staff,' another local wrote. A spokesperson for the grocery store chain, Foodstuffs, Antoinette Laird commented on the calm manner with which they managed the situation. 'Our Four Square team showed an unbelievable amount of patience towards this customer who we think is being extremely inconsiderate to our team who have been working tirelessly for days to ensure the needs of their community are met.' Defence Minister Peter Dutton has apologised to a group of SAS soldiers who were threatened with the sack following the Brereton inquiry into alleged war crimes in Afghanistan. 'If people have been wrongly accused and they've now been cleared of that, then I do apologise for what they've been through, what their families have been through,' Mr Dutton told 2GB's Ray Hadley. 'If people have got criminal charges to answer then thats a matter for the courts but for the rest we move on from that chapter now and I want us to concentrate on the amazing work of the ADF in our country's name.' Thirteen soldiers from the Special Air Service Regiment were sent show cause notices late last year asking why they should not have their employment terminated. The notices were based solely on supposedly 'credible information' of war crimes contained within the multi-million dollar Brereton report. Special forces soldiers who faced the sack following the Brereton inquiry into alleged war crimes in Afghanistan have been told they can stay in their jobs. Special Operations Task Group soldiers are pictured mission in northern Kandahar province in 2013 Defence Minister Peter Dutton has apologised to a group of SAS soldiers who were threatened with the sack following the Brereton inquiry into alleged war crimes in Afghanistan All the soldiers were long-serving SAS members - some of them decorated for bravery - and the unproven allegations against them included taking part in unlawful killings. Daily Mail Australia exclusively revealed last week those soldiers still in the regiment threatened with termination had been told no further action would be taken against them. Mr Dutton has already reversed a decision made in the wake of the Brereton inquiry to revoke a citation awarded to about 3,000 special forces soldiers who served in Afghanistan. 'Defence has gone through a process,' Mr Dutton told Hadley. 'And I said when I came into this portfolio that I wanted to have the back of our soldiers and to make sure that they hear that message very clearly.' 'The focus that I want at the moment is on the work of the SAS - they're in Afghanistan. One of the SAS soldiers whose termination was withdrawn is understood to have been deployed this week to help evacuate Australians from Kabul as it falls to the Taliban. Pictured is an Australian rescue flight out of Kabul last week 'There will be anxious wives and spouses, girlfriends and mums and dads and kids who just want their dad to return as quickly as possible. 'The work they're doing there is quite remarkable and the work of the SAS over many decades has been absolutely remarkable.' At least one of those SAS members whose termination was withdrawn has already been deployed to help evacuate Australians from Kabul as it falls to the Taliban. A source close to some of the SAS members who were informed they no longer had to justify their continued employment said the show cause notices had been another 'knee-jerk' response by Defence. 'The reality is our defence force can't possibly consider these people to be war criminals because otherwise you wouldn't arm them with a weapon and send them back in,' the SAS source said. The decision comes as questions are being raised about the military hierarchy's handling of Australia's withdrawal of Afghanistan and a royal commission into shockingly high rates of veteran suicides has been announced. The show cause notices threatened imminent 'administrative action' and were issued in November after the release earlier that month of the Brereton report. 'Usually, once you've been issued with a notice to show cause it doesn't really matter what you say in response, you just get terminated,' the SAS source said. At least 13 soldiers from the SAS were sent show cause notices late last year asking why they should not be sanctioned or have their employment terminated. An Australian soldier from the Special Operations Task Group is pictured during the Shah Wali Kot offensive in May 2013 NSW Supreme Court judge Paul Brereton conducted a four-year inquiry into alleged war crimes in Afghanistan for the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force. No one has been charged with any war crimes, prosecutions are unlikely for years and much of the evidence given before Justice Brereton would not be admissible in court. Retired major Heston Russell, who served in Afghanistan with the 2nd Commando Regiment, has warned former colleagues were struggling with ongoing uncertainty in the wake of the Brereton report. 'Some of the families have been involved with this inquiry since it started four years ago and still haven't had any resolution,' he told Network Seven in February. More than 500 Afghanistan war veterans have taken their lives and 25 reportedly committed suicide in only two months after the release of the Brereton report. Justice Brereton found 'credible information' that 25 Australian special forces personnel had been responsible for 39 unlawful killings in Afghanistan, along with cover-ups and other misconduct. Those killings including cases where new SAS patrol members were allegedly told to shoot a prisoner to achieve their first kill in an 'appalling practice' known as 'blooding'. The ABC Four Corners program aired footage in 2020 of this Afghan man being shot dead by an Australian SAS member in the village of Deh Jawz-e Hasanza. Daily Mail understands the Afghan was a Taliban target on the Coalition Forces Joint Priority Effects List The 465-page, heavily-redacted Brereton report blamed the alleged killings of unarmed Afghans by Australians in part on a 'warrior' culture among special forces soldiers There was also evidence of 'body count competitions' and troops covering up unlawful killings by staging skirmishes, planting weapons and retrospectively adding names to lists of Taliban targets, Justice Brereton found. The heavily-redacted 465-page Brereton report blamed the alleged killings in part on a 'warrior' culture among special forces soldiers. Key findings from the Brereton report: Special forces were responsible for 39 unlawful killings, most were prisoners, and were deliberately covered up. Thirty-nine Afghans were allegedly unlawfully killed in 23 incidents, either by special forces or at the instruction of special forces. None of the alleged killings took place in the heat of battle. All the alleged killings occurred in circumstances which, if accepted by a jury, would constitute the war crime of murder. There have been 25 alleged perpetrators identified either as principals or accessories. Some are still serving in the ADF. Advertisement Australian Defence Force chief Angus Campbell said some SAS patrols had 'taken the law into their own hands', adding that 'rules were broken, stories concocted, lies told and prisoners killed'. General Campbell said 'none of the alleged unlawful killings were described as being in the heat of battle.' One of the killings was labelled in the report as 'possibly the most disgraceful episode in Australia's military history' but details were completely redacted. General Campbell apologised for any unlawful killings of prisoners, farmers and other civilians, adding the troops allegedly involved had left a 'stain' on Australia. 'To the people of Afghanistan on behalf of the Australian Defence Force I sincerely and unreservedly apologise for any wrongdoing by Australian soldiers,' he said. 'And to the people of Australia, I am sincerely sorry for any wrongdoing by members of the Australian Defence Force.' General Campbell went on to outline how the 'self-centred warrior culture' had led to 'cutting corners, ignoring and bending rules'. The Brereton report suggested 19 serving or former soldiers could face prosecution for war crimes and the findings were being reviewed by a special investigator for the Australian Federal Police. The Chief of Army, Lieutenant General Rick Burr, subsequently said Defence officials had begun a process that could lead to the sacking of 13 SAS soldiers. It is understood most of those 13 soldiers were among the 19 who Justice Brereton recommended for prosecution. The soldiers issued show cause notices were mostly from the SAS Regiment's 2 Squadron, with a smaller number from 3 Squadron. Some were identified by Justice Brereton as being 'trigger pullers' in unlawful killings, or accessories in alleged murders carried out by other SAS members. Some were accused of giving false evidence to the Brereton inquiry investigators. Despite all the claims of war crimes against the soldiers, their versions of events have ultimately been preferred over what was found in the Brereton report. Witnesses who appeared before the inquiry were compelled to answer questions, even if they incriminated themselves, and were forbidden from discussing their evidence with their comrades. Information obtained by the inquiry under compulsion and any evidence derived from it will be inadmissible in any criminal proceedings against those individuals. Billionaire Seven West Media chairman Kerry Stokes offered to bankroll the legal costs of all special forces soldiers accused of war crimes and misconduct. More than 500 Afghanistan war veterans have taken their lives and 25 reportedly committed suicide in only two months after the release of the Brereton report. Stock image of Australian soldiers In January, the SAS members who were subject to adverse findings by Justice Brereton provided written responses to the show cause notices through their lawyers. In March, some of the soldiers were told they would have medical discharges approved rather than have their employment terminated. Others heard nothing more until several weeks ago when they were told no further action would be taken against them. The SAS source said soldiers had been condemned without proper evidence and Defence was now backtracking on their decision to sack them. 'They were so quick to announce their action against these "potential war criminals" but they haven't been quick to announce their inaction.' Serving and former SAS members feel the entire regiment is being punished for unproven allegations against a few of their number. They complain that non-commissioned officers such as sergeants and corporals are being singled out for blame rather than those further up the chain of the command. No action has been taken against any of the senior members of the ADF responsible for overseeing the work of the Special Operations Task Group in Afghanistan. A number of those whose show cause notices were revoked were leaving the regiment anyway after becoming disgruntled by their treatment, the source said. General Campbell announced in November that 2 Squadron would be disbanded but Daily Mail Australia understands that in the interim rather than taking formal action all its members have been moved out to other squadrons. General Campbell had also said the Meritorious Unit Citation awarded to about 3,000 members of the Special Operations Task Group who served in Afghanistan between 2007 and 2013 would be revoked. Mr Dutton overturned that decision in April, saying only those soldiers who had a formal finding of inappropriate behaviour made against them would lose their citation. More than 26,000 Australian personnel served in Afghanistan between 2001 and 2014 and 41 were killed. Following the withdrawal of United States troops after 20 years of war, the Taliban has in recent weeks re-taken most of Afghanistan, including the capital Kabul. Defence has been contacted for comment. Any serving or former member of the Australian Defence Force or their families in distress can contact the Defence All-Hours Support Line on 1800 628 036. Defence Family Helpline: 1800 624 608. Open Arms - Veterans & Families Counselling: 1800 011 046. A list of welfare support services is available here. A three-star general in the Afghan Army has blamed Donald Trump, Joe Biden and his own former president for his country's rapid fall to the Talivan. Sami Sadat said Trump's peace agreement with the Taliban in February 2020 essentially set the doomsday clock in motion. Biden's tone and disrespect towards the Afghan army showed a 'growing sense of abandonment by our American partners', Sadat said. And he blasted former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani for addressing his people and saying he was going to save them, and then fled 48 hours later. 'I never even had a chance,' Sadat said in a New York Times op-ed, claiming the political leaders' decisions meant that the Afghan army 'lost its will to fight.' 'There is an enormous sense of betrayal here. Mr. Ghanis hasty escape ended efforts to negotiate an interim agreement for a transition period with the Taliban that would have enabled us to hold the city (of Kabul) and help manage evacuations. 'Instead, chaos ensued resulting in the desperate scenes witnessed at the Kabul airport. 'It was in response to those scenes that Mr. Biden said on Aug. 16 that the Afghan forces collapsed, "sometimes without trying to fight." But we fought, bravely, until the end. We lost 66,000 troops over the past 20 years; thats one-fifth of our estimated fighting force.' Sami Sadat, a three-star general in the Afghan army, said Afghanistan's defeat was an international political failure more than a military loss Sadat said his troops were demoralized by Biden's words and tone US military couldn't engage in with the Taliban as they slaughtered the Afghan army and overtook the country because of Trump's February 2020 peace treaty Sadat admitted the Afghan army isn't without its issues and without blame for the loss, but the US and Afghan governments left them without guidance. He told of how in the final days of the fight against the Taliban, US jets would hover overhead and 'spectate' while his forces took in the Taliban. Trump's peace deal with the Taliban 'put an expiration date on American interest in the region' and 'emboldened the Taliban' because the U.S. military wouldn't engage in conflict. The peace deal brokered by the US didn't extended to Ghani and the country's infant democracy, which the Taliban didn't acknowledge as its government. '(The Taliban) could sense victory and knew it was just a matter of waiting out the Americans. Before that deal, the Taliban had not won any significant battles against the Afghan Army. After the agreement? We were losing dozens of soldiers a day,' Sadat said. Sadat said Trump's peace treaty with the Taliban 'emboldened the Taliban' because they weren't going to have to face power of the U.S. military Afghans make their way through a flooded street towards a nearby airport entrance to try their chance at evacuating out of the country, in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 25, Then Biden announced he would continue Trump's plan, announced the August 31 withdrawal and 'that's when everything went downhill,' the commander said. 'The Taliban had a firm end date from the Americans and feared no military reprisal for anything they did in the interim, sensing the lack of U.S. will,' Sadat said. Contractors left - taking with them software that tracked vehicles and ground drones and choppers - air support was gone and ammunition dried up. Meanwhile the Taliban used improvised explosive devices, mostly as car bombs, and snipers. Then there was the internal corruption and cronyism in the military and Ghani's government, Sadat said, which saw unqualified people parachuted into top jobs because of family connections. 'The final days of fighting were surreal,' he said. As Afghan soldiers died trying to hold their ground, Sadat said U.S. fighter jets 'circled overhead, effectively spectators.' 'Our sense of abandonment and betrayal was equaled only by the frustration U.S. pilots felt and relayed to us being forced to witness the ground war, apparently unable to help us,' Sadat said. 'Overwhelmed by Taliban fire, my soldiers would hear the planes and ask why they were not providing air support. Morale was devastated. Biden's August 31 deadline gave the Taliban 'a firm end date' Afghan President Ghani fled the country when it was clear the country was going to fall to the Taliban The result has been deadly chaos outside the gates of the Kabul airport 'Across Afghanistan, soldiers stopped fighting. We held Lashkar Gah in fierce battles, but as the rest of the country fell, we lacked the support to continue fighting and retreated to base. 'My corps, which had carried on even after I was called away to Kabul, was one of the last to give up its arms only after the capital fell.' He insisted that the rise of the Taliban wasn't a military loss, but an international political failure. Premier Daniel Andrews has lashed out at 'selfish' Victorians infected with Covid-19 who waited days to get tested as the state's current outbreak worsens. Victoria recorded 80 new cases on Thursday in a dramatic escalation to its outbreak, almost double the number of infections recorded a day earlier. Only half of the latest cases were in quarantine while infectious, while 13 are mystery cases not yet linked to the outbreak. Premier Andrews is frustrated about the high number putting off getting tested after symptoms develop and with some infectious in the community for up to eight days. He implored Victorians to stop making selfish choices by getting tested as soon as symptoms develop and to follow the rules. 'One of the commonsense, practical things you can do if you have symptoms today: Get tested today,' he pleaded. Victoria's outbreak has worsened with 80 new cases on Wednesday 'Don't, for heaven sake, wait eight days and literally infect everybody you can't anywhere near in that eight period,' 'Please, do not be visiting friends and family because the visitor no-one knows about the coronavirus. 'You are taking it with you to the people you love. You do not want them to get sick so do not act in a selfish and irresponsible way.' He directed much of his tirade towards younger Victorians ,with 240 cases under the age 20. 'You would have to say that the bias tends towards a younger group, and if people aren't happy with me being honest about that, they will need to come to terms with that, because it's a fact,' Mr Andrews said. 'There are, in this outbreak, some younger people who are waiting too long to get tested.' 'When you register a symptom, you cannot wait seven or eight days, as regrettably, some of the positive cases did wait a long time before going to get tested.' '(It) meant they were in a community, out there unknowingly infecting other people and often the people they love the most.' Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews slammed 'selfish' Victorians infected with Covid-19 who waited up to a week before being tested (pictured, Melburnians at a vaccination hub) Victorians who continue to visit friends and family during lockdown have also contributed to rising case numbers. 'You need to do the right thing and follow the rules and that means no-one to your house and you are not going to anyone else's house,' he said. 'Stay at home and stop going out, it is very simple. 'The longer we do that, the longer we'll be locked down. It's evidenced by the fact we're reporting more numbers, it spreads the virus. 'If you visit a friend and think 'it's all good, someone else can follow the rules, I'm not going to', it's not just you visiting your mate, it's the coronavirus as well.' Three in every four cases have occurred before symptoms have been developed. 'So it is really critically important as well to minimise those contact, to not go out if you don't have to and to absolutely wear a mask and maintain social distancing in all the circumstances that you can,' chief health officer Professor Brett Sutton said. 'Because it is a highly infectious virus and so testing is critically important but you have to assume that you could be infectious, even without symptoms, at any time and the idea that you're not in the right suburb, there's been no cases here, there's been no significant transmission identified around where I live or where I work might be true today but it may not be you don't know until it's been identified and this virus has moved silently and with stealth across Melbourne and into regional Victoria. 'So please don't say, 'I'm not at risk because I'm not in this demographic or in this part of Melbourne or in this workplace or in this particular sector.' 'You are at risk if you're in Victoria, if you're in Australia.' The Premier is concerned people are infectious in the community for up to eight days Thursday's 80 cases is Victoria's highest daily increase recorded this year. The state has not had this many new cases in a day since last September as its deadly second wave wound down. The Shepparton outbreak in regional Victoria 190km north of Melbourne has grown to 67 after 18 new cases were recorded in the last 24 hours. Emergency relief services have been rushed to the town where 17,000 of Shepparton's residents are currently isolating. The Shepparton outbreak has forced many businesses to reduce opening hours, as staff remain in isolation, including supermarkets and pharmacies. The state's deputy emergency management commissioner, as well as other senior departmental officials are on their way to Shepparton to coordinate relief. 'It is no different to a bushfire or flood. The emergency management architecture will be in place but it will be in the main very, very simple things - taking food to people's doorstep, getting scripts filled,' Mr Andrews said. 'The focus is on getting everybody in Shepparton things they need when they need them.' Around 33,932 Victorians (pictured) rolled up their sleeves for the jab on Wednesday while thousands more booked their appointment online About 50 ADF personnel have arrived to support Goulburn Valley Health with testing and door-to-door checks and the premier said a request for further support would be made. Of the 36 cases being treated in hospital across Victoria, 11 are in intensive care, including eight on a ventilator. Almost 56,248 Victorians came forward for testing on Wednesday while 33,932 rolled up their sleeves for the jab. Another 200,000 made bookings to get their jabs, despite the state government's vaccination website crashing on Wednesday. Hundreds more were turned away after queuing for hours at the state's vaccination hubs. More than 830,000 vaccination bookings over the next four weeks were made available from 7am Wednesday, including 450,000 first-dose Pfizer appointments. But within minutes of bookings opening at 7am, the website appeared to buckle. Emergency relief has been rushed to the regional town of Shepparton (pictured), where 16,000 residents are currently in lockdown. The town recorded 18 new cases on Thursday Many young people reported receiving a '500 internal server error' after waiting in the queue to book their appointment, while others were told they were ineligible for the vaccine. Mr Andrews' teenage daughter Grace was among those who spent all day on and off trying to log on before she was finally able to book an appointment for this Sunday. 'I would encourage people to go back and stick to it, because it is the way out of restrictions and out of our hospitals being overwhelmed and our way back to normal life,' he said. 'You have to be patient. There is no choice, but there are appointments that can be made.' The state's exposure sites list has ballooned past 800, including the emergency department of Monash Medical Centre which is now listed as a tier one exposure site. Victoria is recruiting 350 overseas doctors and nurses to ease pressure on a hospital system facing hundreds of workers being furloughed due to coronavirus exposure, including at Royal Melbourne Hospital and Goulburn Valley Health. Melbourne is the middle of its sixth lockdown after recording 80 new cases on Thursday, its highest number of new daily infections in almost a year Hundreds of residents at two residential towers in Melbourne were also plunged into isolation after Covid-positive cases visited the two sites. Public health alerts have been issued for a Housing Commission block at 140 Brunswick Street in the inner-northern suburb of Fitzroy and for The Standard Apartment Complex on Bay Street in beachside Brighton. Anyone who lives in the buildings along with those who may have visited during the times specified by the Victorian health department, are now under strict quarantine orders for up to 14 days. It comes as a busy emergency ward at the Monash Medical Centre in Clayton was also flagged as an exposure site after an infected case sat in the fast track waiting room on Saturday between 3.20 and 3.35pm. An urgent public health alert has been issued for a tower block at 140 Brunswick Street (pictured) in Fitzroy, Melbourne, after a Covid case visited the site An infected Melburnians also visited The Standard Apartment Complex on Bay Street in Brighton (pictured), sending residents into quarantine Latest Covid exposure sites in Victoria on Wednesday Some individuals will be Tier 1 contacts and required to quarantine for 14 days and the Department will contact them directly with this advice. Others will be Tier 2 and must get tested urgently and isolate until you have a negative result Brighton The Standard - Apartment Complex 209-211 Bay Street Brighton VIC 3186 - Case attended venue from August 20 to 25 all day. Fitzroy Brunswick Street - Residential Towers 140 Brunswick Street Fitzroy VIC 3065 - Case attended venue August 18 to 25 all day. Clayton Monash Medical Centre Emergency Department Clayton - Clinic Waiting Room (Fast Track) 246 Clayton Road Clayton VIC 3168 21/08/2021 3:35pm - 6:30pm Case attended venue - Tier 1 Clayton Monash Medical Centre Emergency Department Clayton - Triage Waiting Room 246 Clayton Road Clayton VIC 3168 21/08/2021 3:20pm - 3:35pm Case attended venue. Some individuals will be Tier 1 contacts and required to quarantine for 14 days and the Department will contact them directly with this advice. Advertisement Patients and staff who were in the hospital's triage waiting room during the same time have also been informed they must immediately get test and self isolate. Some residents at the apartment complexes will be subject to Tier one health orders meaning they will be in isolation for 14 days. Others who were not in close proximity to the infected cases will face Tier two orders and have to urgently get tested and stay at home until they receive a negative result. Shaggy-haired Sydneysiders who've been unable to get a haircut during lockdown will have to wait longer, with the re-opening of hairdressers not among the city's new 'freedoms'. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced a relaxation of some lockdown rules at Thursday's Covid update but the re-opening of 'personal care services' such as hairdressers and beauty salons were not among them. However, it's believed a government crisis cabinet meeting on Wednesday rejected the idea because they'd be seen to be 'picking favourites' - and NSW residents would be able to get haircuts, but not receive breast cancer screening or have elective surgery. Earlier this month Ms Berejiklian suggested hairdressers would be among the services that could potentially re-open in Greater Sydney where both stylist and client were vaccinated. Sydneysiders will have to wait for haircuts after NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian did not include the reopening of hair salons in the city's new 'freedoms' Ms Berejiklian hinted hair dressers could soon be able to open if staff and clients are both fully vaccinated 'Potentially, if someone that's providing a service is vaccinated and their client is vaccinated, we feel much more comfortable in relaxing that restriction on August 29,' she said. Instead, Ms Berejiklian announced that from Monday September 13, anyone who is fully vaccinated against Covid-19 and lives outside of an area of concern can gather in groups of up to five in their own LGA or within 5km of their home. The change has already been dubbed the 'vax picnic' rule. Social media reaction to the absence of haircare in the announcement of the new rules was swift. 'I need a f***ing haircut, not a picnic,' Twitter user Lara6683 posted. 'They shouldn't be opening anything at all with our case numbers'. Perth-based Tweeter JulsC44 joked: 'When will you be getting your haircuts from Gladys? Stay safe NSW'. Political journalist Samantha Maiden defended the wisdom of the decision. 'As dystopian as the whole NSW "treat" is, outside recreation is a lot more sensible than haircuts inside with stylists who are too young to be double vaccinated when there's 1,000 cases a day,' she posted. 'Bring on the outdoor haircuts tho?' Joh Bailey hair salon (pictured) was a major exposure site when Sydney's Delta outbreak first began in June Australians flocked to social media to weigh in on Ms Berejiklian's latest restriction changes In June, when there were only 65 cases linked to the Indian delta cluster which led to the current outbreak, the Joh Bailey hair salon in Double Bay in Sydney's eastern suburbs became the centre of a Covid scare when a male hairdresser from Western Sydney who worked in the city salon tested positive for the virus. He passed it on to three of his close contacts and fears grew that up to 900 clients had been exposed to the strain. Hairdressers, massage salons and nail and beauty salons then closed on June 26 as Greater Sydney entered lockdown and are yet to re-open. Ms Berejiklian said the new rules were the best compromise between meeting the state's mental health needs and preventing transmission of the virus. Other changes include residents living in households where all adults have been vaccinated in one of Sydney's 12 LGAs of concern will now be allowed outside together for another hour on top of their existing one-hour exercise limit. Sydneysiders in those areas though must schedule the additional recreation time outside their 9pm-5am curfew. Chinese officials exploited Vice President Kamala Harris' plane delay to Vietnam on Tuesday by sending a diplomat to offer the country two million COVID vaccines ahead of Harris's announcement that the US would donate a million shots. Harris was set to announce a United States donation of 1 million Pfizer doses to the people of Vietnam on her trip, in an effort to build closer ties with the former enemy to draw back Chinese influence in the area, according to the Washington Post. But when Harris' team experienced a three-hour flight delay, after her office was made aware of an investigation into two possible cases of the so-called Havana Syndrome in Hanoi, Chinese officials took advantage. They sent their ambassador to the country, Xiong Bo, to met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and offer 2 million doses of its own Sinopharm COVID vaccine. Sinopharm's vaccine is less effective at preventing COVID than the Pfizer shot, and blocks around 79 per cent of infections - whereas Pfizer is believed to be around 94 per cent effective against the virus. In return, the Vietnamese prime minister thanked Bo and said his country 'does not ally with one country to fight against another,' state-run media reported. Vice President Kamala Harris was set to announce the United States' donation of 1 million COVID vaccine doses to Vietnam, but when her plane was delayed, Chinese officials reportedly sent their diplomat, Xiong Bo, right, to meet with the Vietnamese prime minister and offer the country 2 million COVID vaccine doses Harris finally announced the donation of the Pfizer vaccines in a meeting on Wednesday, and said they would begin to arrive within the next 24 hours Vietnam is seeing a surge in COVID cases, mainly due to the highly virulent Delta variant, according to the Post, with Ho Chi Minh City - formerly known as Saigon - under strict lockdown, enforced by the military, which is delivering food to residents. China's vaccine donations would go to the Vietnamese military, while the United States' donation - which Harris announced on Wednesday - was intended for the general public. She said the doses would begin to arrive within the next 24 hours, as the United States opens a regional branch of the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Hanoi. In total, the Post reports, the United States has donated 6 million COVID vaccine doses to the country, while China sent 500,000 doses to the country in June. Harris visited the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology (NIHE) on Thursday where she was accompanied by director Dang Duc Anh She visited the NIHE in Hanoi, where 270,000 doses of Pfizer vaccine arrived and wore a mask while touring the facility The Vice President spoke to the media at the facility as she stood in front of boxes of the vaccine bearing a US flag on the front Her visit comes as the US plans to provide $23 million in American Rescue Plan and emergency funding to help Vietnam expand distribution and access to vaccines And in addition to the new vaccine doses, the U.S. will provide $23 million in American Rescue Plan and emergency funding through the Centers for Disease Control and the United States Agency for International Development to help Vietnam expand distribution and access to vaccines, combat the COVID-19 pandemic and prepare for future disease threats. The Defense Department is also delivering 77 freezers to store the vaccines throughout the country. Harris visited the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology (NIHE) on Thursday, where 270,000 doses of Pfizer vaccine arrived. She was accompanied by the director of the NIHE Dang Duc Anh as she took a tour of the facility and spoke to the media. Vietnam is seeing a rise in COVID cases as the Delta variant spreads In total, the United States has donated 6 million COVID vaccine doses to the country, while China sent 500,000 doses to the country in June But the vice president's arrival was delayed Tuesday due to what US officials called an 'anomalous health incident' in Hanoi, an apparent reference to the so-called 'Havana syndrome' which has afflicted US diplomats in several countries including China and Russia. The syndrome was first noticed at the US Embassy in Havana, Cuba in late 2016. Diplomats there complained of a variety of vague symptoms, including sudden vertigo, nausea, headaches and head pressure, sometimes accompanied by a 'piercing directional noise,' according to CNN. Some have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries and continue to suffer from debilitating headaches and other health issues years later. A Senate committee said earlier this year that the number of suspected cases appeared to be on the rise. It is not clear what causes the syndrome and it has led to unproven allegations that Russians or others used sonic or other high-intensity electronic devices to physically harm US diplomats. The delay, the Post reports, enabled China to deliver its own COVID vaccines to the country amid tensions on the South China Sea, where China has expanded its influence into other country's territories. The US vice president's arrival in Vietnam was delayed due to an 'anomalous health incident' in Hanoi, an apparent reference to the so-called 'Havana syndrome' Vice President Kamala Harris met with Vietnam Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh to discuss China's growing influence in the South China Sea on Wednesday Vietnam has been competing with China - its top trading partner - over territorial claims to the sea, asking the United States to become stronger in resisting China's militarization of the sea. Several countries claim overlapping territory in the resource-rich waters, and an international tribunal in 2016 rejecting Beijing's historical claim to most of the waters. But China has been building up runways and deploying military hardware on anti-ship and surface-to-air missiles in the disputed waters, according to the Washington Post. The U.S. has disputed their claims to the water through freedom-of-navigation naval operations, noting a need to safeguard billions of dollars in trade that flows through the sea that connects East Asia with the Indian Ocean. In her meeting with Vietnamese President Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Harris called on officials to help prevent China's control of the trade route. 'We need to find ways to pressure and raise the pressure, frankly, on Beijing to abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and to challenge its bullying and excessive maritime claims,' Harris said at a meeting with Vietnamese officials. She also expressed her support for the deployment of another U.S. Coast Guard vessel off the coast of Vietnam to help defend its interests in the South China Sea, and added that the United States will 'maintain a strong presence in the region.' China hit back at the accusations through its state media on Wednesday, accusing the US of hypocrisy in attempting to 'coerce and intimidate' countries in the region in its 'scheme to contain China'. 'While pointing a finger at China and accusing it of 'coercion' and 'intimidation', Harris wilfully ignored her own hypocrisy in attempting to coerce and intimidate regional countries to join Washington in its scheme to contain China,' the state run China Daily said in an editorial responding to Harris's comments in Singapore. 'It seems that the United States' only commitment to Southeast Asia is its dedicated efforts to drive a wedge between the Southeast Asian nations and China,' it added. The German Special Forces Command (KSK) successfully evacuated more than a dozen of its citizens in Kabul by using 'Little Bird' helicopters from the American SOAR unit that killed Osama Bin Laden. It is the German army's first air evacuation mission in Afghanistan, after having completely withdrawn their troops from the now Taliban-ruled country back in June. Initially, Airbus H145M helicopters belonging to the Germans were going to be used for the secret operation. But after safety concerns, MH-6 Little Bird helicopters from the SOAR unit, best known as the Night Stalkers, were employed for the mission. US Army members assigned to the unit were also present for the mission. The Little Bird helicopters can fly down streets and below roof levels, and have a surgical aim at targets. They are specifically tailored for situations like the ongoing crisis in Afghanistan. MH-6 Little Bird choppers belonging to the US Army's famed SOAR unit were spotted at Kabul Airport last week, and have since been used to rescue German citizens trapped in the city American 'Little Bird' helicopters (pictured) from the Night Stalkers unit that killed Osama Bin Laden were used by the German KSK to recue German Citizens to Kabul's airport (FILE PHOTO) It was the KSK's first air evacuation mission in Afghanistan, after Germany withdrew its remaining troops on June (FILE PHOTO) Initially, Airbus H145M helicopters (pictured) belonging to the Germans were going to be used for the secret operation, but after risk concerns the Little Bird helicopters were used instead. (FILE PHOTO) The German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung reported that this was the KSK's fourth operation, with previous ones being conducted from the ground. The newspaper also reported that the German Army, known as Bundeswehr, had reportedly said that 'the window to save people [was] closing.' The Bundeswehr added that it could carry its last evacuation flights on Friday, and operations from ground could close even earlier, as the August 31 deadline for American troops to leave Afghanistan approaches. Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby and U.S. Army Major General Hank Taylor hinted at an operation of similar nature. The mission described by Taylor, which could be the same in which the KSK and the Night Stalkers worked alongside, took evacuees who were in dangerous territory to the Hamid Karzai International in Kabul, where they will then flee Afghanistan. Kirby said there were less than 20 people rescued, and refused to provide additional details. With more than two decades of experience flying over Kabul, the Night Stalkers are exceptionally regarded among foreign military counterparts for their unrivaled training and aircraft. They are also highly trained to work in close cooperation with other foreign and national branches of the military. The Night Stalkers' degree of involvement in the evacuation of Afghan refugees and American citizens from Afghanistan has not been disclosed as of yet, but their aircraft has been spotted at Hamid Karzai Airport. According to The Drive, they might be the very last American force to leave Afghanistan, as their MH-60s and MH-47s do not have to be broken down into pieces and loaded into airlifters like other war aircraft. Their Little Bird helicopters are sufficiently small to be loaded onto a large variety of transport aircraft. A source told The Drive how well the high-end war aircrafts paralleled the Night Stalker's extensive training and expertise. 'This is exactly what the unit was created to support. Surgical strike and hostage/isolated personnel rescue. 'It's not just the sexy gadgetry, but the fact that these people are ready, able, and absolutely committed to their mission, regardless of the risks or the odds. 'It's truly remarkable. Buttons and switches are neat, but it's what young men and women on the ground stand ready to do that's magic,' the source said. A Black Hawk helicopter belonging to the 160th Special Operations Airborne Regiment (SOAR) has been spotted at Kabul Airport Black Hawk helicopters and AH/MH-6 'Little Bird' helicopters had previously been snapped at Hamid Karzai Airport in recent days. The Black Hawk's nose was seen covered with canvas, in what may have been an attempt to hide its classified features, while the Little Birds were snapped covered with a black tarpaulin, behind a Turkish Airlines airliner. At least eight of the Little Birds belonging to the regiment, also known as the Night Stalkers, have arrived at the airport in recent days, according to The Drive. Their double-rotored MH-47 Chinook choppers have also been spotted there. The impressive aircraft were spotted even as President Biden refused to send US troops into Kabul on rescue missions, citing fears of a Taliban or ISIS attack on them. British and German forces have both been deployed into Taliban territory to rescue their citizens as well as refugees. The US military has also launched several less ambitious missions, with the growing fleet of Night Stalker aircraft a possible sign of things to come. A third photo showing Black Hawks and Chinooks belonging to the Night Stalkers regiment at Kabul Airport Little Birds - named because of their small size - are small enough to be stuffed into C-130 Hercules aircraft - and flown within minutes of being unloaded. They are small, highly maneuverable choppers that can be flown into tight spaces, and which are packed with fearsome weaponry, including machine guns and missiles. Both the Little Birds and larger Black Hawk choppers use 7.62mm and .50 caliber machine guns to make 'strafing runs' while on missions. MH-60 Black Hawks and MH-47 Chinooks are larger types of helicopters capable of in-flight refueling, making them ideal for longer missions. Top secret stealth Black Hawks were used in the mission to kill bin Laden. One crashed during the mission, and was blown up by US troops in a bid to hide its secrets. A Little Bird chopper is pictured. They are small, packed with weapons, and highly-maneuverable It is likely that the 160th SOAR and the special operators they carry will be the last Americans to leave Hamid Karzai International Airport. At some point, the US will end its patrol at the airport, requiring a speedy getaway in an easy to maneuver aircraft flown by highly-trained service personnel. After president Biden announced U.S. troops would withdraw from Afghanistan, Kabul airport has been filled with Americans and American allies attempting to flee the Taliban-controlled region safely. Kabul airport is currently surrounded by the Taliban and presents U.S. troops a special challenge if they were required to go behind enemy lines to recue any Americans trapped in Kabul. The 160th SOAR currently have a fleet o MH-47 Chinooks (pictured) in Afghanistan that could be utilized at any time American troops have not ventured past Kabul to assist Americans who couldn't get to the airport, with Biden coming under increasing pressure as UK and German forces were revealed to have sent forces into Taliban-controlled territory to evacuate citizens and embassy workers. On Friday the White House confirmed that the U.S military used three military helicopters to rescue 169 Americans outside Kabul Airport who were trapped at a nearby hotel. When asked why the U.S has not extended their perimeter beyond Kabul airport Biden said it was to avoid the risk of having U.S. forces and civilians of being attacked by terrorist groups, including ISIS. 'The reason why we have not gone outit's likely to draw a lot of unintended consequences,' he said Friday. But British and French allies have gone beyond the boundaries of Kabul airport and sent troops into the city to help recover their citizens. Evacuees load on to a U.S. Air Force Boeing C-17 Globemaster III during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul Washington officials have no firm number for how many Americans are in Afghanistan but on Friday, they suggested for the first time that military chiefs would send helicopters to retrieve anyone who is stuck behind enemy lines in Kabul if the signal is raised. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, speaking shortly after President Joe Biden, said troops simply hadn't received a request from Americans trapped in Kabul to rescue them. The military has brought Night Hawk team members into Kabul in what appears to be preparations to bolster its rescue efforts. The helicopters were used to kill Bin Laden in 2011. 'The President was clear we'll do whatever we have to do. There have been sporadic reports of some Americans not being able to get through checkpoints. By and large, Americans are able to get to the airfield. 'There hasn't been that demand signal. Most Americans are getting through the checkpoints and getting on. I'm not suggested that in every case it's going unimpeded. 'We will obviously do whatever we can and if there's a need to do this, and it's an operation that we can talk about, we'll talk about it.' President Biden has insisted that 'every American who wants go leave' will be able to, promising 'we will get you home, and claimed he has not been criticized by foreign governments for his handling of the crisis, despite admonishment from the world's press for it. No one from the White House, Pentagon or State Department can give a firm number on how many Americans are still trapped in Afghanistan and with every passing minute that they are not saved, the likelihood of them becoming Taliban hostages grows. Last week, Biden said he believed that up to 15,000 Americans may be trapped in Afghanistan, as well as up to 65,000 Afghanis the US wants to resettle. So far, 28,000 have been airlifted out of the country. The US is telling its citizens they must navigate their way through the fighters and crowds to somehow get to get to the front of the line at the airport, where around 50,000 are waiting to board flights. Barnaby Joyce has slammed Annastacia Palaszczuk's hard border closure, saying she is on the 'wrong side of history'. The Queensland Premier on Wednesday blocked people from Victoria, NSW and the ACT relocating to the Sunshine State for two weeks because Brisbane's quarantine hotels are full and she refuses to allow home quarantine. Mr Joyce said the NSW-Queensland border closure has disrupted locals' lives and insisted that most Australians no longer support state border closures. Barnaby Joyce (pictured) has slammed Annastacia Palaszczuk's hard border closure, saying she is on the 'wrong side of history' 'We had the idiot position at one stage where a person's front gate was in Queensland, the house was in NSW and they had to get a permit to drive out or drive in,' he told Sky News Australia on Thursday. 'This is the sort of lunacy that's happening'. The Deputy Prime Minster said the premier was 'not reading the tea leaves' in terms of how Australians feel about Covid-19 restrictions and insisted she was 'on the wrong side of history'. 'People have moved on... what people were highly supportive of and right behind maybe some months ago, now they just want their lives back,' he said. 'The only job you have now is to work to a process of giving Australia back the liberties and freedoms that all the people who voted for you were born with.' Ms Palaszczuk (pictured) has defended her border closure, insisting it is necessary to keep out Covid It comes after Ms Palaszczuk announced she would move ahead with her state's own quarantine facility at Toowoomba, being built by the Wagner Group, without federal support. Construction is already underway with 500 beds to be operating by the end of the year with another 500 to come online by the first quarter of 2022. 'This is going to be a great boost for our defence against the Delta virus in this country and, in fact, I believe we need regional facilities right across the country,' Ms Palaszczuk told reporters. 'We are going to be dealing with Delta for some time and if we want to open Australia, we want to open our states up, regional quarantine facilities are the second part of the answer - the first part of the answer is vaccines.' The facility will have single, double and family rooms in cabin-style accommodation without any adjoining hallways. The state will lease it from the Wagners for one year, initially, with guests to be bussed there from Brisbane and the Gold Coast. Deputy Premier Steven Miles said health and policing staff arrangements are still being worked out. Any virus patients will be treated at the state's five existing Covid-19 hospitals. Ms Palaszczuk announced she would move ahead with her state's own quarantine facility (pictured is construction) at Toowoomba, being built by the Wagner Group, without federal support Mr Miles said the facility is the first step towards replacing hotel quarantine, which is inadequate against Delta. 'We can ensure that it replaces current hotel quarantine usage,' Mr Miles said. Prime Minister Scott Morrison, and Toowoomba Mayor Paul Antonio, did not know about the premier's announcement beforehand. 'Well I think he does now,' Ms Palaszczuk said. Mr Morrison said the federal government wouldn't support the state's project, but it would not stand in the way either. 'To have people quarantine there rather than in hotels, that is entirely a matter for the Queensland government,' he told reporters. 'And they have made that decision, and they could have done that months ago, if that's what they wished to do.' Queensland Police stop cars in Coolangatta at the Queensland border on August 25. Locals need a permit to cross the border Ms Palaszczuk on Wednesday said there were more than 5114 people in hotel quarantine, including 3257 domestic arrivals, which was putting too much strain on the system's 22 hotels. Hotel quarantine has been paused for NSW, Victorian and ACT travellers for two weeks until new system, which will allocate specific rooms for travellers, is set up. Queensland police said people can still apply for an exemption to enter the state if they have a compelling reason, over the next fortnight. Elsewhere, about 120 Australian Defence Force troops are backing up police at NSW border checkpoints. At present, only certain essential workers who have had at least one vaccine dose are allowed to drive into Queensland. The state recorded no new local cases of COVID-19 and two cases in hotel quarantine on Thursday. With AAP The University of Nebraska-Lincoln is shutting down a frat house that was already on probation while it investigates an alleged rape that has led to huge protests on campus for two nights in a row. The incident took place Monday between 11.30pm and midnight at the Phi Gamma Delta frat house, according to the university police crime log. It was reported shortly after at 3.47 am Tuesday, and word spread quickly through social media. Lincoln station KOLN reports that the victim was a 17-year-old sorority girl, though this has not been confirmed by police or the university. Cops are investigating, but no arrests have been made. By Tuesday night, nearly 1,000 students had gathered outside the fraternity mere hours after the rape was reported, according to the Lincoln Journal-Star, calling for the school to ban the organization for good. Video circulating on social media purports to show members of the frat peeking out of their blinds and laughing at the protesters outside as they chant the name of the alleged perpetrator. The University of Nebraska-Lincoln has temporarily suspended the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity, above, after an alleged rape took place inside their frat house Monday night Very large protest outside the fraternity Phi Gamma Delta (FIJI), across the street from the UNL Student Union. R Street closed from 16th to 14th, as LPD & UNLPD are just overseeing at least 1,000 students here.@LLCScanner @1011_News pic.twitter.com/TunjQ0bsoI Ryan Swanigan (@TheRyanSwanigan) August 25, 2021 Video circulating on social media purports to show members of the frat house laughing as crowds outside chant the name of the member accused of sexual assault Chancellor Ronnie Green said Wednesday that the university is taking the allegation 'very seriously' and that it will be shutting the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity - also known as Fiji - while it looks into the claims. 'The Phi Gamma Delta (Fiji) fraternity at UNL is currently under probation for previous violations of university policy. We are closing the fraternity house and suspending operations of the Fiji chapter while this investigation is ongoing, due to potential violations of that probation. This is the responsible action to take for everyone involved. 'We are committed to creating a safe campus environment for our students, faculty and staff. No one should be a victim of sexual assault or harassment, and we have taken a number of steps to provide additional support and reporting mechanisms for our campus. On Tuesday, students could be heard chanting, 'No means no!' outside of the frat house, which is located directly across the student union. A woman with a bullhorn said: 'Women are not protected on this campus.' Crowds could be seen spilling over to the student union across the street, where people sat on the large concrete staircase leading up to the building. No arrests have been made in the case as of Wednesday night. The allegation is the 103rd rape or attempted rape reported to UNL police since 2005, says the Journal-Star. It's also the 78th such incident reported since 2015. Eight hours after the alleged rape at the Fiji house, university police received a report of a different rape at the Abel Hall building, which houses 'many of the First Year Learning Communities,' according to the university. Chancellor Ronnie announced the temporary shutdown Wednesday following huge protests A petition to ban Phi Gamma Delta from campus gathered 134,000 signatures by Wednesday A commenter on the petition said they've been assaulted by a member of the same frat A Change.org petition to ban the Fiji fraternity 'forever' was started Tuesday night. It has since gathered more than one s134,000 signatures - more than five times the number of students at UNL. A comment on the petition states: 'I was sexually assaulted by a FIJI member when I was an undergraduate student. I know numerous others who were raped and molested by FIJI members. We ALL took it to Title IX and discouraged us from taking our assaults to the police. These assailants were suspended, expelled, etc., but never found 'guilty.' And FIJI is still there. Men like this are still there. FIJI is a petri dish for rape culture. They don't belong in the UNL Community.' KMTV reporter Jon Kipper tweeted that video of the Fiji members laughing was 'LITERALLY Airdropped to people at the protest, from those in the Fiji frat...who, um...didn't have the most productive attitude about this.' Rob Caudill, Phi Gamma Delta's international executive director, said the fraternity 'does not tolerate sexual violence.' 'The international fraternity is working with the university and will take appropriate action pending the findings of the investigation,' he said. Facebook is in talkes to form an independent election commission comprised of experts to help it decide how to run political adverts and stamp out fake news ahead of the 2022 midterms. The proposed commission would help Facebook navigate the qualms of today's political ads and what to do about election-related misinformation, after years of the social media giant facing scrutiny over its handling of such matters, The New York Times reported. Facebook is expected to officially announce the commission this fall in preparation for the 2022 U.S. midterm elections, but sources said the plan was still in its infancy and could fall apart before then. Facebook did not immediately respond to DailyMail.com's request for comment. The social media giant is reportedly looking to implement an election commission to help advice the handling of political ads and election-related fake news Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has had to repeatedly testify at Capitol Hill over his company's decision making process. Pictured, Zuckerberg testifying remotely to the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee last October A normal election commission is a body charged with overseeing the fair implementation of a country's electoral process. Facebook's commission would be similar to its independent Oversight Board, which was launched in 2018 to oversee whether the company was correct to remove certain posts from its platforms. The Oversight Board has allowed Facebook to sidestep criticism as it shows that it does not make decisions on its own as the board is led by a collection of legal, policy, and journalism experts. The board is paid through an independent trust. Outsourcing election matters to experts in a similar matter would help curb complaints from both conservatives and liberals regarding post deletions and allowing misinformation to fester online, sources told the NY Times. Facebook had first experienced a wave of complaints going back to the 2016 presidential election, when it faced issues of Russian agents manipulating the platforms advertising and social media posts. During the 2020 election, Facebook faced criticisms for changing the rules around political ads. The social network had initially barred the purchase of new political ads the week before the election and then banned all political advertising after the polls closed, causing an uproar, the NY Times reported. Facebook also faced election-related problems in the 2018 Brazilian presidential election through its WhatsApp messaging service and in India's 2019 national elections. Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly testified in front of congress regarding his companies decisions to remove posts and its mismanaging of rampant fake news. The Oversight Board ruled against Facebook's decision to ban Trump indefinitely Donald Trump, left, criticized Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg following his two year ban from the social media giant's platforms. Pictured, Trump and Zuckerberg in 2019 The Oversight Board was thrust into the spotlight earlier this year when it reviewed Facebook's suspension of President Donald Trump after the Jan. 6 riots at the U.S. Capitol. Facebook had banned Trump indefinitely from their platform and Instagram, but the Oversight Board deemed the penalty 'not appropriate.' Trump was later banned for at least two years. 'Next time I'm in the White House there will be no more dinners, at his request, with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife. It will be all business!' Trump wrote in a statement from his 'Save America' PAC. The Oversight Board also looked over Facebook's policy to block misinformation regarding the coronavirus and the vaccines against it, which was eventually lifted this May. In April of last year, Facebook had announced that it was imposing limits on harmful misinformation about COVID-19 Sources told the NY Times that while the Oversight Board is seen as a reactionary tool to something that has been posted, the election commission would proactively provide assistance before Facebook has to make a decision. Tatenda Musapatike, who previously worked on elections at Facebook, said that while many have lost faith in the social media giant's ability to handle political posts, the forming the commission would be a step in the right direction. 'They're doing something, and they're not saying, "We alone can handle it."' A decorated Iraq War veteran has blasted the Pentagon's newly-announced vaccine mandate as 'tyrannical' and 'deeply wrong.' Rob Smith, 37, told DailyMail.com: 'As someone who raised my right hand, wore the uniform, and served for five years including combat duty in Iraq, I think a vaccine mandate for soldiers is deeply wrong and an invasion on the civil liberties of Americans.' He added: 'However, once people raise their hands and take that oath they are, in fact, as much property of the US Military as any weapon, tank, or ship. 'So they don't really have a choice. I just wish our leaders valued freedom instead of tyranny.' Smith served in the US Army for five years, and completed two tours of the Middle East. He was awarded the Army Commendation Medal and Combat Infantry Badge, and now works as a commentator and podcaster. He has previously spoken on how he found it harder to come out as a conservative than to tell people he was gay. Smith spoke as all US service members must get their Covid-19 vaccine as soon as possible now that the Pfizer-BioNTech jab is fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). More than 800,000 service members out of around 1.4 million still need to get their shots, according to Pentagon data. Decorated Iraq War Veteran Rob Smith (pictured), 37, told DailyMail.com that he thinks 'a vaccine mandate for soldiers is deeply wrong and an intrusion of civil liberties of Americans' Those who haven't gotten a shot face a wide range of punishments if they don't, from sitting down with a doctor to have the 'risks' of refusing explained all the way up to a court martial. Military law experts say it is possible that a service member who refuses could be dishonorably discharged, but most will likely face a far less significant punishment. Service members are already required to get up to 17 different vaccines, depending on where in the world they are stationed, including jabs for measles, mumps, diphtheria, hepatitis, smallpox and the flu. Of active duty forces, 68 per cent are fully vaccinated and 76 per cent have at least one dose, according to Pentagon press secretary John Kirby. Data is less clear for reserve and National Guard members. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin directed commanders to impose an 'ambitious timelines for implementation' and to provide regular updates on vaccination. The Army has the lowest vaccination rate, where 40 per cent are fully vaccinated and 57 per cent have one dose. The Navy has the highest, where 73 per cent are fully vaxxed and 79 per cent have at least one dose. Kirby said the goal was to get the force inoculated 'as soon as possible' but did not lay out a timeline. The figures come as the Indian Delta variant surges across the United States, with more than 150,000 new infections and 1,408 new deaths recorded across the country on August 24. Other employers have ordered staff to be vaccinated before they return to the office, with investment bank Goldman Sachs the latest to issue such a policy on Tuesday. Asked what would happen to service members who refused a vaccination, Kirby noted that they could apply for a religious or medical exemption, and if those were denied, would have a chance to sit down with a physician and sit down with the chain of command so they could communicate the 'risks' service members incur in refusing to get vaccinated. Ultimately, Kirby said, the mandate is a 'lawful order,' and said that commanders have a 'wide range of tools [to encourage forces to get vaccinated] short of UCMJ,' insinuating the matter could be taken up in military court. 'I can't give you an exact answer on every single hypothetical,' Kirby said, refusing to say what direct consequences would be. The Pentagon has for weeks said such a mandate was in the works. 'To defend this Nation, we need a healthy and ready force,' Austin said in the memo. 'After careful consultation with medical experts and military leadership, and with the support of the President, I have determined that mandatory vaccination against coronavirus diseaseis necessary to protect the Force and defend the American people.' A total of 34 service members have died from Covd-19 and 1,998 have been hospitalized. 'Mandatory vaccinations are familiar to all of our Service members, and mission-critical inoculation is almost as old as the U.S. military itself,' Austin wrote in the memo. Austin noted in the memo there will be exemptions for medical reasons and a narrow religious exemption. Military Law attorney Mike Hanzel said that vaccine requirements exist for operational readiness so troops can be deployed at a moment's notice. 'Historically, militaries don't work if people are not operationally ready and they are not deployable,' Hanzel explained. 'If Pearl Harbor happens, or 9/11 happens, people need to be ready at a moment's notice to deploy. And if they are sick, they're not going to be ready.' David P. Sheldon, another Military Law attorney, said for those who don't take the vaccine: 'In essence, the charge would be you are violating Article 92 by refusing a direct order,' Sheldon said. 'And the direct order, in this case, would be to get the vaccine Of those 12 and older who are eligible, 71.2 per cent of the US population has gotten and 60.4 per cent have gotten both jabs. The Pfizer vaccine was granted final approval by the FDA on Monday after receiving Emergency Use Authorization in December. Moderna has also applied for full approval of its vaccine, and Johnson & Johnson has said it hopes to do so later this year. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, said Tuesday Americans can expect many more vaccine mandates now that a jab is fully authorized. 'You're gonna see a lot more [vaccine] mandates because there will be institutions and organizations which previously were reluctant to require vaccinations, which will now feel much more empowered to do that,' Fauci said on MSNBC's Morning Joe. 'That could be organizations, businesses, colleges, universities. We're even seeing it with the military already.' President Biden, in a speech on Monday, urged companies to now start requiring vaccines. 'As I mentioned before, I've imposed vaccination requirements that will reach millions of Americans,' he said. Biden signed an executive order requiring federal employees and contractors to either get vaccinated or adhere to a regular Covid testing scheme. 'Today I'm calling on more companies ... in the private sector to step up with vaccine requirements that will reach millions more people. 'If you're a business leader, a nonprofit leader, state or local leader, who has been waiting for FDA approval to require vaccinations, I call on you now to do that, require it.' Advertisement An Australian citizen beaten by the Taliban while desperately trying to reach Kabul airport is believed to be in hiding but his worried family fear it is 'only a matter of time' before Islamist militants hunt him down. The man, who was born overseas but lives and works as a barber in Adelaide, was assaulted as he headed to Hamid Karzai Airport along with his cousins - thought to include three men and two women. Distressing video shows the man with blood running down his face and splattered across his polo shirt, crying out that he is an Australian citizen who was trying to reach the airport. 'I am an Australian citizen but they hit me,' the bloodied man says, the video cutting out with the sound of gunshots and screaming. The man's brother, who lives in Sydney, told Daily Mail Australia on Thursday that he has been repeatedly calling his sibling - but his phone is switched off. The Afghan migrant's devastated wife told the ABC she had briefly managed to get in touch with her husband after the incident, but several hours have passed since she heard from him. 'I was devastated. I was thinking, what should I do? What can I do?' said the woman, who reportedly requested his name be withheld. A man claiming to be an Australian citizen was beaten bloody by Taliban guards at a checkpoint in Kabul on Wednesday, after the Taliban vowed to block any more people from going to the airport The wife has pleaded with authorities to find the man and take him to safety. The family has heard that the man was given 'poor medical treatment' after the assault and had been let go by the Taliban. The man is believed to be in hiding. However, relatives have also heard claims of Islamist militants going 'door to door' since. 'His life is in major danger and it's only a matter of time for the Taliban to find him,' his cousin told the Mail on Thursday. The man lives in Australia and has family who live in multiple states It comes as Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade issued urged its citizens not to head to the airport as the situation deteriorates further in the Afghan capital. 'Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. If you're in the area of the airport, move to a safe location and await further advice,' the department said. 'The situation in Afghanistan remains highly volatile and dangerous.' It is understood the man was in Australia until June when he went to Afghanistan to visit a sick relative, but became trapped by the Taliban's rapid takeover of the country. A source close to the family said that one of the women accompanying the man had a phone hidden under her headscarf. She has since messaged her Australian relatives to say the family has been split up and sent to different locations. The assault took place despite Joe Biden demanding that the Taliban 'allow access to the airport for those who are transporting out and no disruptions to our operations', in return for withdrawing US troops by August 31. Desperate Afghans waded through a sewage ditch on the outskirts of Kabul airport on Wednesday while pleading with soldiers guarding the opposite bank to put them on a plane out of the country as time runs out to flee Taliban rule Troops force back a desperate Afghan man trying to enter the airport (left) while hundreds of others stand up to their knees in a filthy drainage ditch as the plead to be allowed to board flights out of the country Fears are growing that crowds could try to storm the airport once civilian mercy flights stop, or that opportunistic terrorists could attack the densely-packed crowd Keeping to that deadline means civilian mercy flights will have to stop in the coming hours so that planes can be diverted to evacuate troops. Overnight 1,200 people were evacuated from Afghanistan on four Australian and one New Zealand flight overnight. Almost 4000 Australians, Afghan visa holders and people from allied nations have been airlifted from chaos in the Afghan capital since the operation began. Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Thursday said the number had far exceeded the government's expectations going into the mission. 'It is a highly dangerous situation, we have been very honest about the nature of these challenges and the likelihood of being able to achieve everything that we would hope to achieve,' he told reporters in Canberra. 'But we have to deal with the reality. The terrible, brutal and awful reality of the situation on the ground.'' Biden has committed the US to withdraw by August 31, a decision that western allies warn will mean thousands of Afghans who were promised sanctuary being left behind The Taliban has said it will now block all Afghan citizens from reaching the airport, meaning that those who are not already outside the gates face little prospect of being able to escape American troops and their allies have evacuated some 70,000 people from the airport since the Taliban took power on August 14, but the effort falls far short of the more-than 100,000 that western nations had promised to take A US marine comforts a child at Kabul airport as the evacuation operation nears it end, with US allies saying flights could stop within the next 24 hours A US marine carries a child towards an evacuation aircraft at Kabul airport as the final mercy flights depart the country How Biden has backed himself and his allies into a corner and now has little choice but to follow the Taliban's lead Surrounded on all sides by the Taliban, babysitting a humanitarian crisis, and reliant on a single runway as an escape route - this is the situation faced by thousands of western troops at Kabul airport. Though Joe Biden likes to give off the impression that he is still calling the shots in Afghanistan - warning the Taliban yesterday that evacuation flights must be allowed to proceed unimpeded - in reality he has 6,000 men and women in harm's way, and he knows it. With all other US forces already out of the country, the troops at Hamid Karzai Airport are badly isolated and - as UK defence secretary Ben Wallace pointed out on Tuesday - all the Taliban need to do to cut them off further is to land a few mortars on the runway. Biden tacitly acknowledged the situation on Tuesday when he told Americans that 'the sooner we can finish [evacuating], the better,' adding that 'each day of operations brings added risk to our troops.' In short, western forces are woefully unprepared for any sort of confrontation with the Taliban - meaning Biden has little option but to sing to the Islamists' tune. Perhaps the starkest example of the new power dynamic was the Taliban's announcement last night that it will now block Afghans from reaching the airport - a statement that was issued at almost the same time Biden demanded that people be allowed through. It came as little surprise to learn that Taliban fighters were paying no attention to Biden today - beating one Australian man bloody as he headed to the airstrip while turning others back. The only way to stop them, as former head of the British armed forces General Sir Richard Barrons told the BBC, would be 'to leave the airport, and fight the Taliban to go and get these people.' 'I just don't see that as a credible proposition,' he added. As Ben Barry of the International Institute for Strategic Studies put it to The Telegraph: 'The UK and the US need to recognise that the country is under new management. 'The Taliban won They are the landlord and the last thing you want to do is upset the landlord.' Advertisement Some European nations have already ended their mercy missions. Poland has stopped flights, and both Hungarian and French jets are expected to take off for the final time within hours. That has sparked renewed desperation among crowds of refugees at the airport, with hundreds of Afghans wading into an open sewer underneath walls where western troops stand guard today - waving papers at them in the hopes of being picked up. Fears are now growing that civilians could rush the runway and trigger a deadly stampede in a repeat of the horror scenes from last week, or else opportunistic terror groups such as ISIS could attack packed crowds - fears that will only grow as troop numbers dwindle. British foreign secretary Dominic Raab admitted that the UK's mercy mission is now into its final hours with some 4,000 people - 1,250 western citizens and 2,500 Afghans - still left to rescue, though he did not say exactly when the final flight will leave or how many people may be left behind. Mr Raab was also forced to admit that the coming days will present 'maximum danger' for British troops, fearing both a 'Saigon' moment with crowds rushing planes and threats of a 'spectacular' terrorist attack. But, Mr Raab insisted, Britain will keep flying planes out of the country until the last possible moment in the hopes of getting as many people out as possible. One British soldier, speaking anonymously to the Daily Telegraph, said his 'biggest fear' is a stampede at the airport and that 'the civilians might try and get in any way they can and potentially put us all at risk.' 'Unfortunately the quantity of civilians arriving is something we cannot control, with the majority of them not being eligible to be evacuated,' he said, adding: 'I and many others have seen a few mentally disturbing scenes. I think there will be more of that.' Outlining rough plans for the British withdrawal, defence sources said the first move will be for troops to leave the Baron hotel where they have been processing paperwork of those wishing to leave the country. Next, soldiers will hand over control of Abbey gate - located on the south east side of the airport - to US forces. But exactly how and when they will leave the airport entirely is being kept a closely-guarded secret, amid fears that the news of a full exit could spark a rush of desperate people at the gates. Underlining the risks, one defence source told The Telegraph: 'It could be the airfield gets compromised by a massive incursion. It could be that the Taliban have an element that wants to put up a fight in the last days. It could be that ISIS wants to do a 'spectacular'.' Meanwhile Angela Merkel - who was first elected Chancellor in 2005, just four years into the war - gave a speech to the German parliament summing up the conflict as she prepares to leave power later this year. Admitting that leaving Afghanistan now leaves her with a 'bitter' feeling, she insisted the west's 20-year campaign had not been in vain and that trying to bring democracy and stability to the region was 'worth doing'. In a shot at Biden's decision to withdraw, she added: 'That the overall deployment literally stands and falls with the stance of the militarily strongest member of the alliance, the U.S., was always clear to us. 'We will continue the evacuation operation for as long as possible, in order also to make it possible for Afghans who worked with us for security, freedom, the rule of law and development to leave the country.' She did not give a date for when the last German evacuation flight would leave but said there are around 500 troops currently helping with the effort, some of whom are still in the country. Even after the effort ends, she said, Germany will work to see if it could continue to help people by 'among other things through civilian use of Kabul airport.' Biden also admitted to the danger facing troops on Tuesday as he announced his decision on the deadline, saying: 'The sooner we can finish, the better... each day of operations brings added risk to our troops.' The Pentagon said on Wednesday that US forces have 'been very clear' with the Taliban 'about what credentials we are willing to accept' for people trying to get to the airport. 'By and large, with caveats' people have been getting through checkpoints, spokesman John Kirby said, adding 'we also have other means to get people in.' 'When we have reports that someone credentialed is not being let in, we are making that clear to Taliban leaders they need to let them in,' Kirby said. California Gov. Gavin Newsom's administration is supporting a plan that would pay people struggling with drug addiction to stay sober. Called contingency management, Newsom's administration is asking the federal government permission to pay for the treatment through Medicaid Embattled California Governor Gavin Newsom, who faces a recall election in September, wants to use hundreds of thousands of taxpayer money to pay addicts to stay off certain drugs, including cocaine and methamphetamine. Frustrated by out-of-control increases in drug overdose deaths, California's Democratic leaders are looking at multiple plans to potentially become the nation's first state to provide the incentives. A similar proposal is moving through California's Democratic-controlled Legislature. It's already passed the Senate with no opposition and is pending in the Assembly, where it has a Republican co-author. The process is fairly straightforward: Addicts earn small incentives or payments for every negative drug test over a period of time. Most people who complete the treatment without any positive tests can earn a few hundred dollars. They usually get the money on a gift card. It's called 'contingency management' and Gov. Gavin Newsom has asked the federal government for permission to use tax dollars to pay for it through Medicaid, the joint state and federal health insurance program for the poor and disabled that covers nearly 14 million people in California. The federal government has been doing this for years with military veterans and research shows it is one of the most effective ways to get people to stop using drugs like cocaine and methamphetamine, stimulants for which there are no pharmaceutical treatments available. 'I think there is a lot in this strategy for everyone to like,' said state Sen. Scott Wiener, a Democrat from San Francisco and author of the legislature bill. 'Most important of all, it works.' Wiener's bill would require California's Medicaid program to pay for the treatment across the state. Newsom's plan would as well, but his proposal would allow counties to choose whether to participate. Democratic state Sen. Scott Wiener has introduced a bill to pay people struggling with drug addiction to stay sober. People would earn small payments for every negative drug test over a set period of time. The measure has already passed the Senate without opposition and is pending in the Assembly How much it would cost depends on how many people participate. A program covering 1,000 people could cost as much as $286,000. California's total operating budget of more than $262 billion. There is 'clear and convincing evidence' that the treatment works to keep people sober from drugs like methamphetamine and cocaine, according to an analysis by the California Health Benefits Review Program. However, while research shows it is effective in keeping people sober during the program, the effect doesn't last much beyond six months after treatment concludes. California, like most of the country, has struggled with opioid abuse, including drugs like prescription painkillers and heroin. But overdose deaths from stimulants in California nearly quadrupled between 2010 and 2019, and the problem has gotten even worse since. Preliminary data from the first nine months of 2020 - when much of the state was locked down because of the coronavirus- shows stimulant overdose deaths jumped 42% compared to 2019. Homeless people do drugs on the streets of the Tenderloin district in San Francisco, California on April 13, 2020 While opioids have several pharmaceutical treatments available to help people get sober, there are none for stimulants like methamphetamine and cocaine, often leaving people to their willpower to kick the habit. 'There is a clear kind of hole in regards to treatment services for individuals who have a stimulant use disorder,' said Jaycee Cooper, director of California's Medicaid program. 'At this point (contingency management) is the only thing people are pointing to that has been effective.' Contingency management is not widely used because it's not clear if state and federal law allow Medicaid money to pay for it. California has a law prohibiting people from profiting or receiving 'kickbacks' from treatment programs. Wiener's law would clarify contingency management is legal under state law. Whether it violates federal law is still a question. 'We don't think it does,' Wiener said, noting the Biden administration has signaled its interest in the treatment. The San Francisco AIDS Foundation, a nonprofit agency, runs a small, privately-funded contingency management program. It's where Tyrone Clifford, who was addicted to meth, enrolled because they promised to pay him for every negative test over 12 weeks. Tyrone Clifford, who was addicted to meth, enrolled in a program run by the San Francisco Aids Foundation that has been running a small privately-funded contingency management program for years. Clifford completed the program without a positive test and used the money he received to buy a laptop computer so he could go back to school His first payment was $2. That increased slightly with each subsequent negative test for a total of about $330. 'I thought, I can do 12 weeks. Ive done that before when my dealer was in jail,' he said. 'When Im done Ill have 330 bucks to get high with.' Clifford did make it through the program without a positive test. But instead of using the money to buy more drugs, he bought a laptop computer so he could go back to school. He says he hasn't used methamphetamine in 11 years and now works as a counselor at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, helping people who had the same addiction problems he did. Clifford, 53, said earning the money didnt matter much. Unlike some who struggle with drug addiction, Clifford always had a job and a house and was never much in danger of losing either. But he said watching his account grow with each negative test motivated him more than any other treatment program did. 'You watch those dollar values go up, there is proof right there that I am doing this,' he said. 'By no means is anyone getting rich off this program.' Clifford acknowledged the program doesn't work for everybody, but added his treatment included extensive group and individual counseling sessions that kept him accountable and made him feel part of a community. Clifford said he considers the treatment a success even if people don't make it without a positive test. 'They are trying something,' he said. If California starts paying for contingency management treatment through Medicaid, Clifford said he thinks it would mean an explosion in similar programs across the state. Australians are being targeted with fraudulent phone calls and emails from fake police officers threatening them with 20 years in prison if they don't hand over money. The Australian Federal Police on Wednesday said it had received hundreds of reports of scammers pretending to be AFP officials in an attempt to steal personal information in recent months. The fraudsters tell victims there is suspicious activity linked to their bank account before asking for information including their Medicare card number or address. In another version of the scam, Australians are threatened with fake arrest warrants and told to deposit money into a nominated bank account or buy online vouchers. Pictured: An example of a fake arrest warrant Australians are being threatened with by scammers pretending to be Australian Federal Police officers The fraudsters tell victims there is suspicious activity linked to their bank accounts before demanding personal information (stock image) One elderly woman reported being scammed out of $16,000 by fraudsters using that strategy to gain her trust. The AFP has released an example of a letter being sent by the scammers with the subject line 'arrest warrant issued and court action required against your name'. The letter threatens to 'take action through the local courthouse', where the recipient could be fined $30million and sentenced to up 20 years in jail. In other cases, victims only stopped short of transferring funds after speaking to family and friends and realising they were being defrauded. An AFP spokesman said the calls even appear to be from a legitimate police number, but that the force would never demand payment over the phone. The force has urged those in doubt about the authenticity of the calls to look up the official AFP number for their state and speak to a genuine employee. The AFP has released an example of a letter being sent by the scammers with the subject line 'arrest warrant issued and court action required against your name' 'We want to stress that the AFP and the Australian Government more generally will never seek payment for fines or other matters over the phone,' the spokesman said. 'AFP employees will never ask for money transfers, Bitcoins or online vouchers such as iTunes and GooglePlay.' Detective Superintendent Jayne Crossling said the scammers were often stealing from the most vulnerable members of the community. The force has urged those in doubt about the authenticity of the calls or emails to look up the official AFP number for their state and speak to a genuine employee 'Scammers take advantage of people's trust in authorities and fear of doing the wrong thing,' Detective Superintendent Crossling said. 'Victims can feel an array of emotions from helplessness and humiliation to anger and guilt - but it is important to know you are not to blame and help is available.' 'The sooner people report fraud where the victim has suffered any financial loss, the better the chances that banks or authorities can help have funds returned.' Between January 1 and August 15 this year, Australian fraud watchdog Scamwatch said it has received more than 28,900 reports of scammers impersonating government workers. The most commonly-impersonated authorities are the Australian Taxation Office, the Department of Home Affair and Service Australia, according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. A shopping centre on the NSW Central Coast has been evacuated due to a bomb scare. Police were called to Bateau Bay Square on Bay Village Road in Bateau Bay after a threat was made around 1.15pm on Thursday. Reports online claim the threat was made on a post box outside a St George Bank at the shopping mall. Bateau Bay Square (pictured), in the NSW Central Coast, has been evacuated due to a bomb threat Residents in Bateau Bay, around 100km north of Sydney, are currently under stay-at-home orders under Covid lockdown restrictions in place across NSW. It remains unclear how many people were in the centre at the time of the evacuation. Officers searched the scene but found there was no threat to the public's safety. 'Police have cleared the scene and declared the area safe after finding no threat to the public,' a NSW spokesperson said. Stores in the centre have since reopened. Inquiries continue. Dramatic footage reveals the moment Texas first responders saved a 15-year-old deaf dog that had fallen down a storm drain and been trapped there for two days. In the video, accompanied with a heroic score, Arlington Fire Department, Police, paramedics, and others worked tirelessly for 10-hours straight to break through the street and into the storm drain to pull out Zoey. The shaken dog, caked in mud, allows herself to be easily handled by the rescue workers as they all celebrated the successful rescue. Arlington, Texas, first responders successfully rescued Zoey, a 15-year-old deaf dog, who was trapped in a storm drain for two days on August 21 The dog, caked in mud, allowed herself to be easily handled by the rescue workers Zoey appeared to suffer from no serious injuries or bruises from the ordeal Zoey's owner, Andrea Tankersley, told local WFFA that after her dog went missing, 'people were hearing animal sounds, but they were hearing them all over the neighborhood.' 'The difficult part is she's deaf,' Brennan Tankersly said. 'So we're calling out to her, calling out to her, of course knowing it's not any good but you can't help it.' The deaf dog was eventually discovered to be stuck in a nearby drainage pipe on Aug. 21, where rescue workers arrived shortly. Members of the local community came out to cheer on the long rescue effort, with a kindergartner even offering his skateboard to help slide Zoey out of the pipe. 'Everyone has been so helpful,' officer Kristi Weil added. 'There have been cheers of joy, and tears when Zoey was rescued. And I love seeing the community turn out and cheer a successful end to this.' The rescue effort lasted 10 hours, beginning with workers breaking through the street They were able to successfully pull out Zoey, who was frightened by the experience Zoey's condition was checked before she was returned to her owner Andrea added that it was 'miraculous' that Zoey suffered no serious injuries after the ordeal. There have been multiple instances of animals getting stuck in storms drains in the past. In 2019, a dog named Benji was rescued from a storm drain in Las Vegas, and in 2016, firefighters in Sacramento, California, rescued eight kittens from drowning in a storm drain. Vice President Kamala Harris held a roundtable discussion on LGBTQ and disabled rights with Vietnamese social advocacy organizations in Hanoi on Thursday. Harris has been closing out her visit to Southeast Asia, which also saw her donate a million Pfizer vaccines to Vietnam, amid criticism of her reluctance to speak on the Afghanistan crisis. A photo from the roundtable posted by a reporter for The New York Times show Nguyet Van Do, the founder and director Live & Learn for Environment and Community, was one of the attendees. It was not yet clear who else participated. Her team billed the roundtable discussion as a 'changemakers' event with civil society and business leaders before beginning the trip back home to the U.S. - ending the weeklong trip to Singapore and Vietnam. Harris had taken the trip in a bid to strengthen U.S. relations with the two countries and affirm the commitment to a region that's grown increasingly important to American efforts to counter China's influence globally. Vice President Kamala Harris held a roundtable discussion on LGBTQ and disabled rights with Vietnamese social advocacy organizations in Hanoi on Thursday. Harris has been closing out her visit to Southeast Asia, elevating activists in a region of the world known for its challenges and restrictions to human rights Her presence in Southeast Asia comes amid criticism of the Biden administration's handling of the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan and her apparent reluctance to speak on the crisis. During her trip, Harris had met with leaders in both Singapore and Vietnam to discuss ways in which the U.S. can deepen economic and defense ties. She unveiled new agreements with Singapore to combat cyberthreats and tackle climate change, and aid to Vietnam to develop economic opportunities and combat the coronavirus, among other things. Harris also spent the trip ramping up Biden administration rhetoric toward China, issuing repeated warnings to the country to end its aggression in the disputed South China Sea. 'We need to find ways to pressure and raise the pressure, frankly, on Beijing to abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and to challenge its bullying and excessive maritime claims,' she said Wednesday. On her trip home, Harris will make a stop at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii to meet with servicemembers. She'll then turn her focus to U.S. politics at an event in the San Francisco area for California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is facing a recall attempt. Chinese officials exploited Harris' plane delay to Vietnam on Tuesday by sending a diplomat to offer the country two million COVID vaccines ahead of Harris's announcement that the US would donate a million shots. Her team billed the roundtable discussion as a 'changemakers' event with civil society and business leaders before beginning the trip back home to the U.S. Harris was set to announce a United States donation of 1 million Pfizer doses to the people of Vietnam on her trip, in an effort to build closer ties with the former enemy to draw back Chinese influence in the area, according to the Washington Post. But when Harris' team experienced a three-hour flight delay, after her office was made aware of an investigation into two possible cases of the so-called Havana Syndrome in Hanoi, Chinese officials took advantage. They sent their ambassador to the country, Xiong Bo, to met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and offer 2 million doses of its own Sinopharm COVID vaccine. Sinopharm's vaccine is less effective at preventing COVID than the Pfizer shot, and blocks around 79 per cent of infections - whereas Pfizer is believed to be around 94 per cent effective against the virus. Vice President Kamala Harris met with Vietnam Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh to discuss China's growing influence in the South China Sea on Wednesday In return, the Vietnamese prime minister thanked Bo and said his country 'does not ally with one country to fight against another,' state-run media reported. Vietnam is seeing a surge in COVID cases, mainly due to the highly virulent Delta variant, according to the Post, with Ho Chi Minh City - formerly known as Saigon - under strict lockdown, enforced by the military, which is delivering food to residents. China's vaccine donations would go to the Vietnamese military, while the United States' donation - which Harris announced on Wednesday - was intended for the general public. She said the doses would begin to arrive within the next 24 hours, as the United States opens a regional branch of the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Hanoi. In total, the Post reports, the United States has donated 6 million COVID vaccine doses to the country, while China sent 500,000 doses to the country in June. And in addition to the new vaccine doses, the U.S. will provide $23 million in American Rescue Plan and emergency funding through the Centers for Disease Control and the United States Agency for International Development to help Vietnam expand distribution and access to vaccines, combat the COVID-19 pandemic and prepare for future disease threats. Vice President Kamala Harris was set to announce the United States' donation of 1 million COVID vaccine doses to Vietnam, but when her plane was delayed, Chinese officials reportedly sent their diplomat, Xiong Bo, right, to meet with the Vietnamese prime minister and offer the country 2 million COVID vaccine doses The Defense Department is also delivering 77 freezers to store the vaccines throughout the country. But the vice president's arrival was delayed Tuesday due to what US officials called an 'anomalous health incident' in Hanoi, an apparent reference to the so-called 'Havana syndrome' which has afflicted US diplomats in several countries including China and Russia. The syndrome was first noticed at the US Embassy in Havana, Cuba in late 2016. Diplomats there complained of a variety of vague symptoms, including sudden vertigo, nausea, headaches and head pressure, sometimes accompanied by a 'piercing directional noise,' according to CNN. Some have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries and continue to suffer from debilitating headaches and other health issues years later. A Senate committee said earlier this year that the number of suspected cases appeared to be on the rise. It is not clear what causes the syndrome and it has led to unproven allegations that Russians or others used sonic or other high-intensity electronic devices to physically harm US diplomats. The delay, the Post reports, enabled China to deliver its own COVID vaccines to the country amid tensions on the South China Sea, where China has expanded its influence into other country's territories. Meanwhile, former The View Host Meghan McCain criticized Harris on Wednesday for laying flowers at the site where McCain's father was shot down during the Vietnam War, saying that Harris should be focused on evacuating people from Afghanistan. Harris tweeted a photo of herself Wednesday laying flowers at a monument on Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi, where John McCain almost drowned in 1967 after being shot down while flying a US Navy bombing mission. He was then captured by the North Vietnamese and held as a prisoner of war for five-and-a-half years. Her tweet said: 'Today, on the three-year anniversary of his passing, I paid my respects to an American hero, Senator John McCain' 'At this site in 1967, then-Lieutenant Commander McCain was shot down. We honor his sacrifice in Vietnam, and the sacrifice of all our men and women in uniform.' But Meghan was quick to take offense, and responded: 'If you want to honor my dads legacy on this anniversary of his death - you would spend every second making sure every single American and Afghan ally is out of harms way.' 'He was nothing if not someone who understood sacrifice and loyalty to the people he served with.' Kamala Harris was criticized by Meghan McCain after sharing this snap of where McCain's father John was shot down while fighting in the Vietnam WAr On Wednesday, she asked the VP to ensure 'every single American and Afghan ally' is saved The vice president brought flowers to the memorial, located at Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi Harris, a Democrat from California, was elected to the Senate in 2016 and served about a year and a half alongside McCain, who represented Arizona. McCain ran against Obama in the 2008 presidential election, became one of the Trump administration's most vocal Republican critics, and died of cancer in August 2018 aged 81. The late Republican was born in 1936 in the Panama Canal Zone. His father was a four-star admiral, and he followed in his footsteps when he enrolled in the US Naval Academy, graduating in 1958. The US has evacuated 87,900 people from Afghanistan since the end of July, according to the White House. The US has operated multiple military, and some commercial, flights in a quest to save as many people as they can from Taliban rule, though many argue the efforts are falling short. Meghan has posted videos of Afghans trawling through sewage outside of the Kabul airport, desperate to to be saved by US forces. She's previously criticized the Biden administration's handling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, which the US has occupied since 2001. 'Biden is unfit to lead and I am nothing short of disgusted he and his staff can't seem to be bothered to leave their vacation during an international crisis of our own creation,' the former host has said. 'There should be an emergency congressional hearing before more innocent lives are lost. My heart is broken, this tragedy will absolutely haunt our country. Also every single Afghan refugee fleeing must be granted a safe haven in America!' Qantas is already taking bookings to Singapore with international flights set to resume from mid-December. The flying kangaroo airline started accepting bookings to the Asian financial hub on Thursday morning, hours after it announced overseas flights would resume when 80 per cent of Australians were fully vaccinated. The federal government is yet to formally repeal the ban on overseas holiday travel but air tickets for Singapore are now available. Prices for a Qantas flight from Sydney just before Christmas, one way, start at $741 for economy. Scroll down for video Qantas is already taking booking to Singapore with international flights set to resume from mid-December. The flying kangaroo airline started accepting booking to the Asian financial hub on Thursday morning, hours after it announced overseas flights would resume when 80 per cent of Australians were fully vaccinated Airfares for destinations like Singapore went on sale on Thursday morning even though the federal government is yet to formally announce the end of the travel ban for overseas holidays. Prices for a Qantas flight from Sydney just before Christmas, one way, start at $741 for premium economy A day before the Qantas announcement, Trade and Tourism Minister Dan Tehan hinted Australia's travel bubble with New Zealand would be expanded to include the likes of Singapore. 'When we see 80 per cent are fully vaccinated, outbound international restrictions will be lifted and travel bubbles will be expanded,' he told Parliament. 'So not only will we have the travel bubble with New Zealand but the Pacific Islands, Singapore, South Korea, Japan, the US, the UK are all possibilities that we'll be able to extend our travel bubbles to.' Travellers from Australia are already on Singapore's favoured list, despite lockdowns in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra, with no pre-Covid test required before boarding a flight. Only China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Canada, Germany, New Zealand and Macau are also in Singapore's special category. Qantas is expecting Australia to reach the 80 per cent vaccination target in December - triggering the re-opening of international borders as part of 'Phase C' of the federal government's path to pandemic normality. A day before the Qantas announcement, Trade and Tourism Minister Dan Tehan hinted Australia's travel bubble with New Zealand would be expanded to include the likes of Singapore Qantas plan for international travel MID-DECEMBER: Singapore, the United States, Japan, United Kingdom and Canada using Boeing 787s New Zealand if travel bubble reopened with Australia Airbus A330s, and 737s and A320s for services to Fiji FEBRUARY 2022: Hong Kong APRIL 2022: Bali, Jakarta, Manila, Bangkok, Phuket, Ho Chi Minh City and Johannesburg APRIL 2022: Budget subsidiary Jetstar to resume international flights JULY 2022: Sydney to Los Angeles on A380s NOVEMBER 2022: Sydney to London via Singapore with Darwin instead of Perth as a possible transit point Advertisement The first available travel routes will be to first-world destinations with high vaccination rates including the United States, Canada, the UK, Singapore, Japan and New Zealand, Qantas told the Australian Securities Exchange. Those routes will be serviced by Boeing 787s, Airbus A330s, 737s and A320s for flights to Fiji. The resumption of international flights is also based on National Cabinet scrapping caps on returning Australian travellers who are fully vaccinated. Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce said Australia's rapid vaccination rollout would make international holiday travel possible again for the first time in almost two years, despite lockdowns in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra. 'The prospect of flying overseas might feel a long way off, especially with New South Wales and Victoria in lockdown, but the current pace of the vaccine rollout means we should have a lot more freedom in a few months' time,' he said. 'It's obviously up to government exactly how and when our international borders re-open, but with Australia on track to meet the 80 per cent trigger agreed by National Cabinet by the end of the year, we need to plan ahead for what is a complex restart process.' The airline said flights to cities in Asia and South Africa with low vaccination rates and high Covid-19 case numbers would not restart until at least April 2022. Those developing world destinations include Bali, Jakarta, Manila, Bangkok, Phuket, Ho Chi Minh City and Johannesburg. Qantas said it also plans to restart flights between Australia and New Zealand from mid-December 2021 as long as the trans-Tasman bubble had re-opened by that date. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern closed the bubble on July 23 following outbreaks of the virus in NSW and Victoria. Qantas is expecting Australia to reach the 80 per cent vaccination target in December - triggering the re-opening of international borders as part of 'Phase C' of the federal government's path to pandemic normality Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce said Australia's rapid vaccination rollout would make international holiday travel possible again for the first time in almost two years, despite lockdowns in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra IG market analyst Kyle Rodda said the international travelling public was likely to pay higher Qantas airfares as its weakened key rival Virgin Australia gave up trying to wrest away market share, as it did before the pandemic For London flights, Qantas is also exploring turning Darwin into a transit point instead of Perth with Western Australia's Labor Premier Mark McGowan hinting he would maintain hard border closures even with an 80 per cent vaccination rate. 'Qantas' ability to fly non-stop between Australia and London is expected to be in even higher demand post-Covid, it said. 'The airline is investigating using Darwin as a transit point, which has been Qantas main entry for repatriation flights, as an alternative (or in addition) to its existing Perth hub given conservative border policies in Western Australia. 'Discussions on this option are continuing.' IG market analyst Kyle Rodda said the international travelling public was likely to pay higher Qantas airfares as its weakened key rival Virgin Australia gave up trying to wrest away market share, as it did before the pandemic. 'If you are looking forward to that trip overseas you're going to be paying a little bit of a premium for it,' he told Daily Mail Australia. Qantas said it expected the country to reach that target in December - triggering the re-opening of international borders as part of 'Phase C' of the federal government's path to pandemic normality 'The survivors of this crisis, they do have greater pricing power because there's less competition in the market and there's pent-up demand at a time where supply is really quite disrupted.' The Qantas announcement follows the airline revealing plans to make Covid vaccinations mandatory for all its employees. The 2,000 frontline staff including cabin crew, pilots and airport workers will have until November 15 to get jabbed, while the 20,0000 remaining workers have until March 31 next year. The airline said the decision for mandatory vaccinations was made 'as part of the national carrier's commitment to safety'. Cabin crew, pilots and baggage handlers will need to be fully vaccinated by November 15, with other staff having until March 2022 get two jabs of either AstraZeneca or Pfizer. The first available travel routes will be to destinations with high vaccination rates including the United States, Canada, the UK (pictured is London), Singapore, Japan and New Zealand, Qantas told the Australian Securities Exchange 'There will be exemptions for those who are unable for documented medical reasons to be vaccinated, which is expected to be very rare.' Australians have been banned from travelling overseas for a holiday since March 2020, when the pandemic began, and have had to obtain permission to leave the country from Australian Border Force for compassionate or business reasons. Qantas made a full-year after tax loss of $1.728billion in the year to June 30. With international holidays banned and state borders closed, the airline relied on its freight business to survive with overseas cargo transport a surprisingly lucrative income earner in fiscal year 2021. 'Demand for air cargo capacity remained extremely strong through FY21 due to a surge in online shopping in the Australian market and the belly space lost due to the cancellation of most international passenger flights,' Qantas said. Australians have been banned from travelling overseas for a holiday since March 2020, when the pandemic began, and have had to obtain permission from Australian Border Force for compassionate or business reasons. Qantas made a full-year after tax loss of $1.728billion in the year to June 30 'Qantas Freight was able to capitalise on this demand, delivering a record profit that significantly offset the costs of the Groups grounded international operations.' The airline told shareholders it expected a reopening of Australia's border to see international flight capacity increase in 2022. Mr Rodda said more Covid outbreaks could disturb Qantas' international flights and described the announcement as one based on optimistic assumptions. 'The company is setting itself a very ambitious target, it's also politically motivated in the sense that it knows that it wants to express its view on the need to be able to get the industry back to normalcy,' he said. 'The virus will be fairly persistent and we'll continue to see disruptions to Covid-sensitive industries like airlines.' Older workers who are allowed to work from home after the pandemic ends will delay retirement, the Office of National Statistics has said. A survey by the ONS showed that 11 per cent of older workers in Britain say they will stay in their jobs longer if working from home compared to just 5 per cent of those not working from home. The ONS said that the decision to delay retirement by those aged over 50 could be beneficial for the economy. It estimated that if the work rate for people aged 50 to 64 matched those aged 35 to 49 it could boost the economy by 88billion - the equivalent of more than 5 per cent to the GDP. Workers aged 50 and above who are allowed to continue working from home after the pandemic ends will delay retirement, the Office of National Statistics has said (stock image) The ONS also reported that working from home all or some of the time has benefits for both older workers themselves and their employers. For example, workers said they were more productive at home and there was a decrease in absenteeism. The ONS said: 'This could be because those working from home have less exposure to illness. 'Also, when unwell, those working from home may be more likely to feel able to work than those who travel to a workplace.' During lockdown 45 per cent of women and 38 per cent of men in their 50s switched to home working. Those in managerial and professional posts were most likely to work remotely. The ONS said that older workers have been asking for flexibility for some time and that implementing it could encourage them to stay on if it improves work life balance. According to a survey conducted by Saga in 2018, when asked what workplaces should do to become more welcoming to older workers, 78 per cent of those aged 50 years and over said that workplaces should introduce flexible working including working from home arrangements. The ONS said that early retirement was often a choice for those who can afford it while others leave because of ill-health or caring responsibilities. But those who have access to comprehensive support and flexible working to allow them to manage their ill-health or caring responsibilities are more loyal to their employer and are more likely to remain in work, the ONS said. However, although the ONS said it appears that working from home all or some of the time has benefits for both older workers themselves and their employers, it warned that remote working was not for everyone. 'While it may help some older workers stay in the labour market for longer it may also entrench existing inequalities,' it said. 'Those who were less likely to have been able to switch ... are more likely to have poor health, to live in deprived areas, to have lower or no qualifications and to have lower wellbeing than those who did not. 'From the individual older worker's perspective, their wellbeing and work life balance improves, health issues, appear to be better accommodated and there is some evidence that working from home facilitates older workers to remain in the labour market for longer.' A mother-of-five separated from her family has been forced to hug her husband over barricades blocking NSW residents from entering Queensland. The woman decided to stay and run her business on the Queensland side of Tweed Heads, after a hard border closure was introduced on July 23. Her husband and five children, including a six-month-old child, stayed at their home across the NSW border. A photo of the couple embracing highlights the tragic reality faced by families separated due to border closures. 'Many families have been split up and unable to attend work, unable to see family that are literally only kilometres away,' a friend of the couple said to 7 News. A mother-of-five has been captured hugging her husband and child over barricades separating NSW and Queensland after she was forced to stay in the Queensland side of Tweed Heads to run her business Gold Coast hotel manager Katrina Morris, who has been blocked from entering NSW, told the publication she hadn't seen her daughter for two weeks after the teenager stayed in the southern state to complete her HSC. 'I don't know when I can go back. I'm told four weeks, 10 weeks. It's the unknown I think,' Ms Morris said. Fed-up residents living on either side of the border attended a protest on August 22 in reaction to new restrictions, which are likely to remain in place until at least the end of October. Only workers with a border pass and proof of at least one Covid-19 vaccination are able to cross into Queensland. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palazczuk defended the hard closure after backlash over the decision. 'They have stay-at-home orders in NSW for a purpose,' Ms Palazczuk said. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palazczuk has received backlash for the border restrictions she imposed, and a protest which took place on August 22 reacted to new restrictions introduced Up to 2,000 people, including one man on horseback, congregated at both sides of the border at about 12pm on Sunday for the protest. The rally resulted in the arrest of nine people and more than 50 fines handed out for breaching public health orders. Ms Palaszczuk said she had made offers to the NSW government to move border checkpoints south, including the town in Queensland but received no reply. A border bubble in place in previous lockdowns was burst after the NSW Covid outbreak spread to regional areas. Essential workers will now have to have received at least one dose of a Covid vaccine to pass through the border About 120 Australian Defence Force personnel arrived at the border checkpoints to assist border police on Wednesday The bubble included south Queensland and northern NSW communities. 'If the Queensland Government reinstated the border bubble then it would immediately reunite separated families, allow border residents to return to work, open up schools and create a sense of ease within the community,' a Tweed Heads resident said. Australian Defence Force personnel arrived on Wednesday to assist border police patrolling the checkpoints. About 120 troops travelled to the border and Acting Chief Superintendent Rhys Wildman said the four checkpoints will have two ADF personnel stationed at all times to monitor those crossing the border. An animal charity boss who witnessed today's suspected suicide bombing on Kabul airport said his vehicle was targeted by AK-47-wielding gunman and his driver was almost 'shot in the head'. Pen Farthing, who founded the Nowzad shelter in Kabul, currently has 200 dogs and cats in a travel container outside the airport as he waits to board an evacuation flight. The former Royal Marine, who was in a car when the incident occurred, said: 'We're fine but everything is chaos here at the moment. 'All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47. 'We've been in the airport, and back out of the airport; the whole thing's a mess. There's not much more I can say at the moment, I need to make sure the animals and everyone is safe.' Two separate explosions have rocked Kabul with at least 13 casualties including children and three US soldiers among the wounded just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terror attack. Before news of the attack emerged, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace blasted Mr Farthing's supporters for claiming he had blocked a flight to rescue the animals, saying it was a 'total myth'. Meanwhile, Boris Johnson denied he had had any influence on the rescue attempt after being asked to intervene by his wife, Carrie, who is a vocal animal rights activist. Pen Farthing, who founded the Nowzad shelter in Kabul, said he was caught up in today's suspected suicide bombing A suicide bomb has caused a huge explosion outside Kabul airport with 'unknown casualties' just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terrorist attack Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby said: 'We can confirm an explosion outside Kabul airport. Casualties are unclear at this time. We will provide additional details when we can' In a series of tweets, Mr Wallace criticised 'bullying, falsehoods and threatening behaviour' towards Ministry of Defence staff. He said: 'Let's get some facts out there: One. No one, at any stage has blocked a flight. 'This is a total myth and is being peddled around as if that is why the pet evacuation hasn't taken place. Two. I never said I would not facilitate. I said no one would get to queue jump. 'Three. The issue, as those desperate people waiting outside the gates know too well, has always been getting processed through the entrances. It can take over 24 hours. There is no point turning up with a plane until the passengers / pets are airside. 'Suicide bomb' kills 13 at Kabul airport: TWO explosions and gunfire rip through crowds, causing multiple casualties including children By Jack Newman and Nick Craven for MailOnline At least 13 people including children and US soldiers have been killed in two separate explosions near Kabul airport just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terror attack. One of the blasts ripped through a crowd of Afghans gathered at the Abbey gate of the Hamid Karzai airport, and another hit Barons Hotel, followed by gunfire and mass panic. Images from the scene show scores of bloodied people being carried away in wheelbarrows after one of the bombers detonated in a sewage canal-way packed with people overlooked by US troops. The devastation could spell the end of the airlifts before the August 31 deadline, with Germany already pulling out all its military planes, potentially leaving thousands stranded under Taliban rule. Meanwhile an Afghan man queueing to enter the airport said the explosion hit the middle of a crowd of thousands, and he saw many injured and maimed people and was told of multiple fatalities. Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby said: 'We can confirm an explosion outside Kabul airport. Casualties are unclear at this time. We will provide additional details when we can.' A Number 10 spokesman said Boris Johnson has been updated on the situation and will chair a COBR meeting later this afternoon, while Joe Biden has also been briefed. Advertisement 'Four. As people were processed ARAP (Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy), LOTR (Leave outside the Immigration Rules) etc they were called forward. Once processed and on the airfield they are marshalled on to a plane. As I have said we will facilitate at all stages but the priority will be people not pets.' Mr Wallace went on to say there had been no 'U-turn' over the issue, calling for critics to allow civil servants and the military to deal 'with one of the most dangerous and challenging evacuations for a generation'. He added: 'The bullying, falsehoods and threatening behaviour by some towards our MOD personnel and advisors is unacceptable and a shameful way to treat people trying to help the evacuation. They do their cause no good.' Since the collapse of the Afghan government, Mr Farthing and his supporters have campaigned to have his staff and their families as well as 140 dogs and 60 cats evacuated from the country in a plan he has dubbed Operation Ark. Reports have suggested the Prime Minister's wife Carrie stepped in to push for his rescue. Asked about the reports today, Mr Johnson said: 'I've had absolutely no influence on any particular case, nor would that be right. 'That's not, that's not how we do things in this country.' This morning, Mr Farthing issued a plea on Twitter to ensure his 'safe passage' into Kabul airport. Addressing the Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen, Mr Farthing said: 'Dear Sir; my team & my animals are stuck at airport circle. We have a flight waiting. Can you please facilitate safe passage into the airport for our convoy? 'We are an NGO who will come back to Afghanistan but right now I want to get everyone out safely.' He added: 'We have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage. Truly would like to go home now. Let's prove the IEA are taking a different path.' His friend and supporter Dominic Dyer, from Milton Keynes, said a privately funded plane had been due to land on Friday from Luton airport, but plans had to be scrapped due to security fears. Before news of the attack emerged, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace blasted Mr Farthing's supporters for claiming he had blocked a flight to rescue the animals, saying it was a 'total myth' Today shocking footage emerged of the animals gasping for breath inside the packed container Mr Dyer said another plane is now waiting in a 'neighbouring country' but cannot land in Kabul until Mr Farthing is granted entry into the airport. He said: 'We have a plan in place and we can act swiftly, but not until he's granted entry into the airport. 'It's a complicated situation and the door is closing, the next 24 to 48 hours are crucial - we need it to happen before then to avoid him, his staff and the animals becoming stuck in the country. 'There are options for him to go back to his centre and hunker down or he could try and leave the country on the road - but there are fears over the Taliban closing the borders, so it's unclear what's going to happen.' Earlier today, Armed Forces minister James Heappey said British forces could not move 'desperate Afghans' to make way for Mr Farthing's pet rescue mission - as harrowing footage emerged of dogs suffering from the heat while stuck in a container outside Kabul airport. Mr Heappey said that while the former Royal Marine deserved praise for staying behind with his staff and animals until they are evacuated, giving them priority over other desperate people waiting to leave 'doesn't feel like the right thing to do'. Taliban militants have blocked Mr Farthing's convoy carrying 173 cats and dogs from entering Kabul airport to flee Afghanistan - as he warned the animals could soon die from heat exhaustion after being left for more than ten hours in a sweltering travel crate. Today shocking footage emerged of the animals gasping for breath inside the packed container. Summing up the situation this morning, Armed Forces minister James Heappey suggested it would be wrong to prioritise Mr Farthing and his animals for processing over other applicants. He told Sky News: 'For him, it is a grim reality of these situations that as a British national we would seek to expedite his passage into the airport but he, commendably, has said that is not what he wants to do. 'He is asking us, the Americans and the Taliban for safe passage but I am afraid safe passage is also other words for being brought to the front of the queue. 'And I just wonder how you feel about having to make a decision whereby we move lots of desperate Afghans out of the way to bring him through because of the profile and the support he has. That doesn't feel like the right thing to do. It gives me no pleasure to say that though.' The blast took place near the Baron Hotel at the Abbey Gate of the airport where huge crowds had gathered in an attempt to enter the airport Mr Farthing had decided to travel to the airport after Boris Johnson personally overruled Defence Secretary Ben Wallace to allow the evacuation flight to go ahead following an intervention from his wife, Carrie, according to reports. Mr Wallace had been adamant he would prioritise 'people over pets' for evacuation, and the suggestion the PM reversed his decision at the vocal animal rights activist's urging sparked a huge political row last night. An MoD spokesman told Sky News the claim was a 'lie'. Mr Farthing has commissioned a private plane from a Polish operator which he plans to fly to Tajikistan before returning to Britain. The jet is expected to leave Luton later today, animal rights campaigner Dominic Dyer told the BBC. Mr Farthing, founder of animal charity Nowzad, had made a midnight dash to the airport when he and his team were rushed by 15 armed fighters, one of whom fired a gun over their heads. Mr Farthing, who has previously fought in Afghanistan, tried to flee the country with 25 staff and their families along with 94 dogs and 79 cats and two trucks loaded with food and supplies in case they got stuck. But during their race across the city last night, they were stopped at a Taliban checkpoint by a group of militants. 'About 15 guys jumped out and levelled their guns at us,' Mr Farthing told The Sun: 'Then one of them had an ND [a negligent discharge]. Luckily he was a s*** shot and it went over our heads. 'I very rarely hear Afghans swear in English but I heard a few words then. Mr Farthing appealed directly to the Taliban on Twitter in a desperate bid to secure the release of the animals Mr Farthing said he has been in touch with British forces but they said they are powerless to intervene. Today he appealed directly to the Taliban on Twitter in a desperate bid to secure the release of the animals. Addressing Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen, Mr Farthing wrote: 'Dear Sir; my team and my animals are stuck at airport circle. We have a flight waiting. Can you please facilitate safe passage into the airport for our convoy? 'We are an NGO who will come back to Afghanistan but right now I want to get everyone out safely. 'We have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage. Truly would like to go home now. Let's prove the IEA are taking a different path.' The Government is still scrambling to evacuate thousands of British nationals trapped at Hamid Karzai International Airport Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has repeatedly expressed his frustration about the row, and complained yesterday about the limited resources available to the British military evacuation effort being 'diverted' by attempts to rescue the animals. According to Sky News, Mr Wallace addressed the issue during a call with MPs on Wednesday afternoon, complaining that soldiers in Kabul had been diverted by having to deal with the Nowzad evacuation. 'What I can tell you, and it is a bit upsetting, is that I have soldiers on the ground who have been diverted from saving those people because of inaccurate stories, inaccurate lobbying that have diverted that resource,' he is reported to have said. 'And that is not something I would be proud of, and I've been very straight and consistent throughout.' Mr Farthing was held at the checkpoint for an hour before they were finally allowed to drive across the city to the airport. They arrived there at 2am but they still remain behind the blockade unable to enter the transport hub. Mr Johnson is said to have personally intervened in the row at the urging of his wife, Carrie (they are seen in Cornwall during the G7 meeting) Staff have parked their trucks in the shade in an effort to keep the animals cool and have been spraying the crates with water. The Government is still scrambling to evacuate thousands of British nationals trapped at Hamid Karzai International Airport - which fell under Taliban control last week. Animal rights campaigner Dominic Dyer, a friend of Mr Farthing, told MailPlus that the u-turn on animal evacuations followed an intervention from the Prime Minister's wife Carrie Johnson - a keen supporter of animal welfare issues. But the claim was quickly dismissed by the Ministry of Defence, with a spokesperson reportedly telling Sky News that they were a 'lie'. All healthcare staff in New South Wales will be made to get a Covid-19 jab or risk losing their jobs under new public health orders. A vaccination mandate was announced on Thursday for all health staff working in NSW, in an effort to ensure the safety of staff and patients in state hospitals. Healthcare workers will now be required to have at least one dose of the vaccine by September 30, and to be fully immunised or be booked in for their second jab by November 30 to continue working. A new jab mandate imposed on Thursday now requires all NSW healthcare workers (pictured) to be fully vaccinated for Covid-19 by November 30 Among staff working for NSW Health, 20 per cent are still unvaccinated, despite having priority access in the Covid-19 vaccination rollout since February. Health Minister Brad Hazzard urged staff to come forward and get jabbed to help ease pressure on the public health system, with more than 1,200 healthcare workers have entered isolation each day in the past week. 'Many health workers in NSW are already vaccinated but if all of our staff are vaccinated it will provide greater protection for patients, visitors and other health staff,' he said. Eight in ten health staff (pictured) have already been vaccinated but an incredible 20 per cent are still withholding from the jab 'The public and private health systems have a responsibility to implement every possible measure to provide a safe work environment for their staff and most importantly, safe circumstances for their patients.' Mandatory Covid-19 vaccination will apply to all health staff in NSW in order to allow them to continue working, with eight in ten workers already vaccinated. An exemption has been granted for workers with underlying medical conditions. Jabs for contagious diseases such as influenza, chicken pox, measles and whooping cough are already compulsory for frontline workers. Healthcare staff must provide proof of their vaccination status to their employer by September 30 or face losing their jobs. NSW frontline health workers (pictured) must receive at least one dose by September 30 and be fully vaccinated by November 30 It comes as Qantas also made vaccination mandatory, requiring all of its 22,000 employees to be fully immunised against Covid-19 earlier this week. Cabin crew, pilots and airport workers must receive both jabs by November 15 with the remainder of workers to be vaccinated by March 31 next year. 'Having a fully vaccinated workforce will safeguard our people against the virus but also protect our customers and the communities we fly to,' said Qantas Chief Executive Officer Alan Joyce. As part of the national airline's commitment to safety Mr Joyce has 'strongly encouraged' all staff to get jabbed, even offering paid time off to receive the vaccine. Fully-vaccinated Sydneysiders will soon enjoy greater freedoms from September 13 after Gladys Berejiklian reached a target of getting six million jabs in arms by the end of August a week early. Fully vaccinated Sydney-siders will soon be able to enjoy greater freedoms from September 13 - such as outdoor gatherings including up to 5 people (pictured, Sydneysiders in Marrickville) From September 13, residents who have received both jabs and live outside the LGAs of concern will be able to attend outdoor gatherings of up to five people within 5km of their home. For those who live in the LGAs of concern households with all adults vaccinated will be able to gather outdoors for recreation, including picnics, for up to one hour. The NSW government released the roadmap on Thursday, showing which restrictions will be eased once the state reaches 70 and 80 per cent vaccination coverage levels. At 70 per cent fully-jabbed, officials said family, industry, community and economic restrictions will be lifted for those who are fully vaccinated. Once the state hits a 80 per cent coverage level, restrictions will be further eased for businesses, the wider-community and the economy. Fully-vaccinated residents will still be banned from gathering in each other's households, with Ms Berejiklian making it clear 'outdoors' does not mean backyards. Shoppers could face paying more for food if lorry drivers are given 'substantial' pay rises by firms that are trying to plug the shortfall of 100,000 drivers, supermarkets have warned. Bosses at the Road Haulage Association said the pay rises offered by firms in need of new drivers could force supermarket bosses to pass the costs on to customers. Retailers and restaurant chains, including Nando's and McDonald's, have been hit by product shortages as meat packers and other manufacturers have also faced significant worker shortages. It comes as retailers are calling on the government to issue temporary visas for EU workers to plug the shortage that is threatening to disrupt Christmas. The Government introduced a seasonal worker visa scheme in December for 30,000 workers, primarily for the summer fruit picking season, but meat processors were excluded. Rod McKenzie, managing director of policy and public affairs at the Road Haulage Association, told PA that the shortage of drivers needs urgent Government action and firms have offered better incentives and pay deals to secure potential recruits. 'Certainly drivers' pay is increasing, often by quite substantial amounts,' he said. 'This in turn is a cost that will need to be passed on, and given the tight profit margins of most haulage operators that means their rates to customers will have to go up. 'In turn, this may mean more of us paying higher prices for goods, services and shopping - including food prices - going forward.' The British Retail Consortium, which represents major retailers, demanded business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng to push for the emergency measure to plug a shortfall of 90,000 lorry drivers One supermarket boss also told PA that increasing wages for drivers will result in inflationary pressure for retailers. 'Paying drivers more, in itself isn't the solution as it is resulting in them making choices about the level of working hours and balancing reduced hours along with weekend working. 'It will also create more inflationary pressure in the sector, which no one clearly wants. 'To ease the pressure we need the Government to quickly allow us to access the EU labour market, whilst the industry must also play its part in increasing the driver pool through fast-track driver programmes and apprenticeships.' The leading food retailer also warned that the food supply issues facing the UK are now embedded and won't improve unless direct action in the short, medium and longer term is taken. It is clear that driver shortage is having a material impact across the entire food supply network but it is equally clear that this is a systemic issue, which can't be simply fixed. 'The pingdemic certainly didn't help matters but that isn't the main issue in play here.' The Road Haulage Association added that the situation is 'not getting better' and warned that the long period of time needed to train new drivers means Government action is needed. 'We wrote to the Prime Minister a month or two back stressing the urgency of this and haven't heard anything since,' Mr McKenzie said. 'It feels like they want to tough it out but we it means these issues will keep going and going.' The British Retail Consortium, which represents major retailers, demanded business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng to push for the emergency measure to plug a shortfall of 90,000 lorry drivers. Tesco chairman, John Allan, backed the idea, while Richard Walker, managing director of Iceland, said lorry drivers should be added to the government's essential and skilled workers list to allow those based abroad to apply for a 'skilled worker visa'. Tesco chairman, John Allan, backed the idea of giving EU drivers visas to help keep Britain moving Why is there a supply-chain crisis? A lack of lorry drivers and food processors is being partly blamed on the new Brexit visa regime introduced on January 1, which penalises lower-skilled migrants in favour of those with qualifications. But global factors are relevant too, bosses say, including Chinese port closures and a lack of shipping containers. US Vice President Kamala Harris urged Americans to buy Christmas toys early due to a shortage there. Nick Allen, chief executive of the British Meat Processors Association, told MailOnline Britain has so far been unable to shake its dependency on EU workers who have been leaving due to the pandemic. The supply of new workers is also being held back by stricter visa rules introduced on January 1. The most common complaint among UK retailers and food producers is the shortage of lorry drivers, which the Road Haulage Association currently puts at 100,000. Thousands of prospective drivers are waiting for their HGV tests due to a backlog caused by lockdown, while many existing ones have left the UK after Brexit or to be back with their families during Covid. Importers are also suffering a financial hit, with dramatically rising transport costs caused by a global lack of shipping containers and a slowdown in freight movements resulting from port closures. Chinese authorities recently shut Ningbo-Zhoushan port, which is one of the world's largest container terminals, due to a Covid outbreak. Gary Grant, founder and executive chairman of toy chain the Entertainer, said the cost of shipping a container from Asia had increased from $1,700 to more than $13,000 (8,000) over the past year. Advertisement But ministers are said to be against relaxing visa requirements in light of 4.7% of the population remaining unemployed, according to the latest figure from the Office of National Statistics. 'They [retailers] know what the answer is, it's just expensive,' a Whitehall source told The Times. 'There are millions of people unemployed and 90,000 vacancies. They need to pay more and offer training. Government is not going to budge on that.' Coral Rose, Boss of Country Range group, a wholesaler that supplies catering products for schools, care homes and schools, said issues facing the food service sector were 'getting worse'. 'The shortage of drivers is the key issue,' she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. 'We're taking drastic action like buying smaller delivery vehicles because there is going to be increased pressure when schools reopen and people return to their offices. 'So the office is going to get worse. We would like the government to introduce a temporary visa scheme as a quick fix and then more training to increase the number of drivers in the longer term.' On Wednesday, it emerged that Greggs has been unable to restock popular products, including its chicken bake, the chargrill chicken oval bite, and several chicken-filled baguettes. It is the latest national chain, joining McDonald's, Nando's, KFC, Beefeater and Subway, to warn customers about shortages of key ingredients and products. Deliveries of bread, milk and fresh produce to supermarkets and convenience stores have been disrupted, while supplies of canned and bottled drinks are rationed in some areas. Haulage and retail industry leaders say the UK has a shortage of 90,000-100,000 drivers and they are calling on the government to take urgent action amid fears that crucial Christmas deliveries will be disrupted. They argue that HGV drivers should be added to a list of essential and skilled workers so people from the EU can be given visas and allowed into the country to keep food on plates. The managing director of Iceland, Richard Walker, said it is criminal that drivers are not eligible for these visas, yet they are available to visiting ballerinas and concert pianists. Pictures posted by Twitter users this week show how Greggs has been among those hit by supply chain issues He warned the delivery disruption is 'impacting the food supply chain on a daily basis'. Now ONLINE deliveries could be hit amid strike threat By Isabella Nikolic for MailOnline Online shopping deliveries from Asos, Argos and other major retailers could be hit after drivers for Yodel and DHL threatened strike action over pay. A consultative poll of 200 drivers working for DHL saw a 98 per cent vote for industrial action over the offer of a one per cent pay rise. It will now go to a full ballot of members by the Unite union who recently won a higher pay rise for beer delivery drivers after a threatened strike which was subsequently called off this week. A nationwide shortage of HGV drivers has put those in the trade in a stronger position when it comes to negotiating new pay deals. It comes as lorry drivers at delivery giant Yodel are being balloted on whether to take industrial action over pay and conditions. The GMB union said more than 250 of its members will vote in the coming weeks on whether to launch a campaign of action. Advertisement He said: 'Things like bread and other fast moving lines are being cancelled in about 100 stores per day, soft drinks are 50per cent less in terms of volume. So it is having an effect at shelf.' Mr Walker admitted that some stores are selling out of bread and then struggling to replenish' the shelves. 'We have a lot of goods to transport between now and Christmas and a strong supply chain is vital for everyone,' he said. 'The reason for sounding the alarm now is that we have already had one Christmas cancelled at the last minute, and I would hate this one to be problematic as well.' Industry experts say the shortage is the largely the result of a double-whammy of Brexit, which led to thousands of EU drivers going home, and coronavirus. Lockdown hit the training of new drivers and some 40,000 HGV driver tests were cancelled. Significantly, the average age of a British lorry driver is put at 56=57 and not enough young people have joined the industry against a background of long hours, poor conditions and pay. Mr Walker told the BBC's Today programme: 'I would not say it is not an inevitable consequence of Brexit. It is a self-inflicted wound caused by the government's failure to appreciate the importance of HGV drivers as skilled workers. 'On the skilled worker list are ballerinas and concert orchestra musicians, but not HGV lorry drivers - so let's add them to the list. It's 'criminal' that they are not on the list.' Tesco chairman, John Allan, backed the idea of giving EU drivers visas to help keep Britain moving. 'The best and most straightforward solution would be for the industry to bring in skilled drivers from elsewhere,' he said. The supply of popular Christmas products is likely to be hit by domestic labour shortages and issues with global shipping Tesco stores are currently suffering intermittent disruption, but Mr Allan said: 'There is absolutely no reason for customers of Tesco, or I suspect other chains, to panic buy.' Looking ahead to Christmas, he said: 'We are running very hard just to keep on top of existing demand and there isn't the capacity to build the stocks we would like to see. 'So in that sense I think there may be some shortages at Christmas. But again I wouldn't want to over-dramatise the extent to which that would be the case. I think it's very easy to make a drama out of a modest crisis.' Steve Murrells, chief executive of the Co-operative Group, said the ongoing food shortages 'are at a worse level than at any time I have seen'. He said the disruption has been driven by 'Brexit and issues caused by Covid', and the firm is retraining staff as lorry drivers to help fill vacant roles. A heartbroken husband who has been battling Covid-19 in hospital is about to be released from intensive care, but now has the grim task of telling his young children their beloved mother is not coming home. Sako Isaako's wife Ianeta, 30, became the youngest woman in New South Wales to die from coronavirus after she collapsed at her home in Emerton, Sydney's west on Monday. The beloved mum had tested positive to the virus only a few days earlier, but her health rapidly deteriorated. Sako Isaako has the grim task of telling his children - AJ, Deon and Mia - their mother Ianeta, 30, has died of Covid-19 Struggling to breathe and 'very sick', she collapsed in front of Mr Isaako and their children, forcing him to made a desperate Triple-0 call to paramedics. Grief-stricken and distraught Mr Isaako has just emerged from the ICU at the Nepean Hospital on Thursday after also contracting the virus. Their children - AJ, Deon and Mia - who remain sheltered from the news of their mother's tragic death, have not tested positive for Covid and are in the care of their grandparents and aunt. A cousin of Mr Isaako said he's lying in the hospital bed with 'his phone on his chest' texting family asking how the children are. 'As soon as there's a message about the children he texts back because he has difficulty breathing and speaking,' the family member told the Daily Telegraph. 'Sako has made progress and was very sick at one stage but was determined to get better for his children - he didn't want to leave them orphaned. 'The children don't know yet what's happened to their mum yet. Sako will tell them when he comes out. He's heartbroken.' The devastated family say they hope her tragic death will convince some anti-vaxx relatives to get the jab. Ms Isaako was not against vaccination - but it's understood some members of her extended family dressed in t-shirts with anti-vaccine slogans and joined the massive crowd that marched through Sydney's CBD on July 24. 'She wasn't at the protest, she did not support anti-vaxxers,' one relative told The Daily Telegraph. 'We understand that there are some people in our circle who are against it, but we have health workers in our family too and we've been encouraging everyone to get vaccinated.' They added they hoped Ms Isaako's death would be a wake up call for some to reconsider their views. Tens of thousands of protesters marched in an anti-lockdown rally in Sydney on July 24 (pictured) in what was feared to be a super-spreader event NSW Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant confirmed on Wednesday that Ms Isaako was not vaccinated. 'Please do not delay care because we do not want to see consequences from delayed care,' Dr Chant said. Health officials added that anyone who has a positive Covid test and feels breathless or dizzy should call an ambulance immediately, as it is one of the warning signs that the body is struggling to fight the virus. 'Suko has the biggest heart and loves his family, his three children are everything... He says he will fight the virus... for them,' a close relative said, adding he was too sick to respond to wellwishers. Ms Isaako would frequently be on the sidelines for AJ and Deon's rugby games and Penrith RSL Junior Rugby Club shared their condolences on Facebook. Police were called to the family's home on Helena Avenue in Emerton around 3pm on Monday, following reports the mother was found unresponsive (pictured, ambulances outside the house) 'Our hearts are breaking and our thoughts are with your beautiful children, loving husband and wider family,' the footy club said. Her sister Lisa Baker said she was a cornerstone of her large family - who were now relying on each other for support. Mr Isaako's construction colleagues in the CFMEU also shared a message. 'All at the CFMEU are rocked by the news and we extend our sincerest condolences to Mr Isaako, his family and friends,' the union wrote. A GoFundMe page setup on Wednesday has raised almost $50,000 in a matter of days. 'Condolences to the Isaako family & Baker Family Stay strong Sako for your beautiful kids,' one doner wrote. 'Ianeta, I will always remember you as a kind and happy person. Sending love to you and your family,' another said. Ianeta Isaako (pictured with her husband Sako) passed away after she was infected with Covid-19 NSW Health confirmed NSW Health said the mother-of-three, 30, died of Covid-19 at her home in Emerton in Sydney's western suburbs (pictured, PPE-clad emergency workers at the scene) NSW Police said officers were called to a property on Helena Avenue in Emerton, Blacktown, at about 3pm on Monday, following reports a woman was found unresponsive. 'Sadly, NSW Health has been notified of the death of a person who had Covid-19,' a spokesperson said at the time. 'A woman in her 30s from Sydney's west died at home.' Neighbours said they would often see the family in the street. 'There was a few of them in there, I think they might have lived next to their grandparents,' one neighbour said. 'They were a nice young family, you'd always see them playing out the front with their kids... very sad she was in her 30s I think, it's way too young.' Sydney's outbreak, which swelled by a record 1,029 cases on Thursday, is seeing more and more young people infected and even hospitalised. The family live in Blacktown (pictured) one of the areas being most badly hit by a wave of Covid cases 'Till we meet again my dear sister. Our babies are safe sissy. I love and miss you so much,' another relative said. 'Thank you to all our family and friends who have reached out, this was our final goodbye to our sweet Ianeta, ohh too soon way too soon,' a relative wrote. 'My heart is broken,' another simply said. 'I know there is nothing in this world matters anymore, when death takes the most beautiful part of your heart. I want you to think of what she would've wanted you to do,' another added. Her death comes as brave young Sydneysiders fighting the virus in hospital made a similar desperate plea for the nation to get vaccinated. Advertisement Twelve 12 US serviceman have been killed and 15 more have been injured in two bomb attacks outside Kabul airport today, while reports suggest explosions across the city have continued into the night. Jihadist splinter group ISIS-K are believed to be behind the two earlier blasts outside the gates of Kabul airport, where thousands of Afghans have been awaiting for evacuation by Western forces. Senior health officials in Kabul say the death toll could be as high as 90, with 150 more people believed to be injured. General Kenneth F. McKenzie, the Head of U.S. Central Command, tonight confirmed 12 US soldiers have died and at least 15 have been injured in attacks. They include 11 US marines and a Navy medic. It is the deadliest attack against US Forces in 10 years. Speaking at a press conference in the US tonight, General McKenzie told reporters: 'As you know, two suicide bombers, assessed to be ISIS fighters, detonated in the vicinity of the Abbey Gate at the airport and in the vicinity of the Baron Hotel. Islamic State claim responsibility for deadly Kabul airport attacks and post picture of alleged suicide-bomber on social media site By Charlotte Mitchell for MailOnline Jihadist group Islamic State (IS) have tonight claimed responsibility for the devastating twin attacks that struck Kabul, killing 12 US troops and at least 60 Afghan civilians. The group posted a statement claiming responsibility from their Telegram account on Thursday, following the attacks earlier today. The two explosions, one of which hit Kabul airport, the other a nearby hotel, had been blamed on ISIS-K, a regional affiliate of the so-called Islamic State. The splinter group operates in parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Abdul Rehman Al-Loghri of ISIS-K was allegedly the suicide bomber responsible for one of the blasts, according to a twitter post. Abdul Rehman Al-Loghri of ISIS-K was allegedly the suicide bomber responsible for one of the blasts, according to a twitter post The blasts killed at least 90 people, including 12 US servicemen, and injured more than 150 others. Founded in 2015, ISIS-K followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia. Prior to Thursday's attacks, the US had warned that the group would likely target the thousands of people gathering at Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport as they attempt to flee the country following the Taliban takeover on August 15 and before the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of US and NATO forces. The organisation has already carried out roughly 100 attacks against civilian targets and another 250 involving US, Afghan or Pakistani security services, most of them chronicled via mobile phone videos then broadcast online. In May, ISIS-K killed at least 68 Afghans and injured another 165 when they detonated three car bombs outside the Syed Al-Shahda school for girls in Kabul. The vast majority of the victims were young pupils the Islamist group regard as legitimate targets because they do not believe women and girls should be educated. Advertisement 'The attack on the Abbey Gate was followed by an attack by ISIS gunmen, who opened fire on civilian and US forces. 'At this time, we know that 12 US service members have been killed in the attack and another 15 have been injured. A number of Afghan civilians were also killed or injured.' General McKenzie, under questioning from reporters, also said it was being 'assumed' by US officials that one of the suicide-bombers was being searched to go through the airport gates when he detonated his device. In a stark warning, he also said the US believed Kabul could face more attacks in the near future, saying: 'We believe it is their desire to continue these attacks and we expect those attacks to continue and we're doing everything we can to be prepared for those attacks'. UK defence officials say they do not believe any British troops or Government officials have been killed in the attacks, which Islamic State (IS) have tonight claimed responsibility for. Officials had earlier said splinter group ISIS-K - a regional offshoot of IS - were behind the attacks. IS today made the claim via a Telegram post, in which they included a picture of one of the alleged suicide bombers. It comes amid reports of a third blast and fourth blast in Kabul tonight. Reporters on the ground say the blast were heard near to the airport this evening, while social media reports suggest the third explosion may have been a landmine triggered by a Taliban vehicle. No details have yet been released, though US officials say they have also received reports of further explosions. Local news outlets suggested 'several' further explosions have been heard in Kabul today. However a Taliban spokesperson tonight said these came from US troops destroying ammunition near to the airport - a move which suggests American forces may soon be ready to clear out of Kabul. The two earlier bombings - which come after warnings by US and UK officials of an 'imminent' terror attack - could now spark an immediate end to the West's frantic evacuation efforts in Afghanistan. NATO countries, including Denmark, have already stopped their evacuation efforts this evening, while the gates to the airport have now been sealed by US troops in the aftermath. However Boris Johnson, who this evening chaired an emergency COBRA meeting at Downing Street, insisted the UK will continue its evacuation flights. UK officials earlier today said there were a dozen evacuation flights still scheduled to leave Kabul. The US also confirmed it plans to continue with its evacuations. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab tonight offered his condolences to the US over the deaths of 12 service members. 'They paid the ultimate sacrifice while helping others reach safety,' Mr Raab said in a statement, before adding: 'The UK and US remain resolute in our mission to get as many people out as possible.' Meanwhile President Joe Biden has today faced a barrage of criticism from opponents in the States. Republican members accused the President of having 'blood on his hands', while Georgia Republican Jody Hice tonight called for the Democrat leader and his Secretary of State Antony Blinken to resign. But the President put on a defiant front this evening and promised retaliation against ISIS-K, warning the terrorist group 'we will strike back'. 'We will not forgive, we will not forget. We will hunt you down and we will make you pay,' he said during a speech at the White House tonight. He promised the US would 'respond with precision' and vowed to continue the US evacuation saying: 'America will not be deterred'. WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT BELOW A man injured in the Kabul terrorists attacks on Thursday arrives at hospital to be treated. Among those killed in the two bomb attacks were 11 US Marines and one Navy medic As many as 12 US serviceman are thought to have died in two bomb attacks outside Kabul airport, while reports suggest a third explosion has been heard in the capital tonight. Pictured: Horrifying images (which have been muzzed) show the victims of one of the blasts outside Kabul airport today Wounded women arrive at a hospital for treatment after two blasts, which killed at least five and wounded a dozen, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021 Just hours earlier desperate Afghans were seen queuing in front of a barrier to Kabul airport waiting to be evacuated by US soldiers President Joe Biden has been briefed on the attack which took place at the Abbey gate of the Hamid Karzai where there were also reports of gunfire Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby said: 'We can confirm an explosion outside Kabul airport. Casualties are unclear at this time. We will provide additional details when we can' Medical staff bring an injured man to a hospital in an ambulance after two powerful explosions, which killed at least six people, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021 An injured man is wheeled into hospital in Kabul after a series of bomb attacks on the city's airport, believed to have been carried out by ISIS-K Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport on Thursday night after two explosions and gunfire ripped through crowds Injured Afghans are removed from Kabul airport in the Baron Hotel, next to the airport in Kabul, after a suicide bomb attack on Thursday evening Afghan people who want to leave the country continue to wait around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 26, 2021 British soldiers secure the perimeter outside the Baron Hotel, near the Abbey Gate, in Kabul, following the terror attack The soldiers had to secure the perimeter last night following the attack by ISIS-K on Kabul Airport, which killed 12 US troops A timeline of the Kabul airport attack Around 3.30am Afghan local time: The US issues a warning telling its citizens not to come to Kabul airport unless specifically told to. Crowds outside the airport are told to disperse 'immediately' due to the threat of a terror attack. 1.30pm: The UK's Armed Forces minister James Heappey, during a round of TV interviews in the UK, admits an attack by terror group ISIS-K is 'imminent'. 5.30pm: Panic erupts among crowds outside Kabul airport as gunshots are heard. Initial reports suggest the shots were fired at an Italian C-130 plane as it took off from the airport. However intelligence reports later suggest the shots were fired into the air in an attempt to disperse the crowds. 6.15pm: A suicide bomb is detonated outside the Baron Hotel near to Kabul Airport. The hotel has been housing Western journalists. It has also been used as a staging post by western nations for evacuation. The blast is reportedly followed by small arms gunfire. 6.20pm: The Pentagon confirms the first blast. The Taliban immediately confirm a number of deaths. 7.30pm: The Pentagon confirms a second bomb has been detonated this time outside the Abbey Gate a British controlled access point to Kabul airport. It is believed the blast took place in open access sewers where Afghan evacuees were yesterday seen waiting to be processed. 7.35pm: The two blasts are confirmed by Western officials. At least 13 people are confirmed to have died, many more are thought to have been injured. Officials say the attacks were likely carried out by terrorist group ISIS-K. 9.15pm: The Taliban condemns the terrorist attacks. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid says his group 'strongly condemns' the bombings and is paying close attention to security. The group say the death toll may be as high as 40 people. Reports suggest four US Marines have died in the attacks. 10.30pm: A third blast is heard in Kabul. Reporters on the ground say they have heard the blast near to Kabul airport. Senior health officials say the death toll is now at least 60. Reports from Associated Press say 12 US service personnel have died, including 11 Marines and a Navy medic. 11pm: Marine General Kenneth McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, confirms a dozen US soldiers have died in the attacks. He says as many as 15 are injured. He says two ISIS suicide bombers carried out the attack, along with ISIS gunmen. *Times are all based on local time in Afghanistan Advertisement It comes as officials say as many as 90 people, including children, were killed in two separate explosions near Kabul airport today - just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terror attack. The first blast was set off by a suicide bomber outside the Barons Hotel where British troops, journalists and UN officials have been staying during frantic evacuation mission by Western forces. It was then followed by gunfire and mass panic before a second explosion ripped through a crowd of Afghans gathered at the Abbey Gate of the Hamid Karzai airport. Taliban, who this evening condemned the 'evil' attacks, say there have been at least 40 deaths. Officials later said the figure had risen to at least 90. However, in a press conference this evening, Mr Johnson said the attacks would not stop the UK's evacuation mission. He said: 'It is not going to interrupt our progress, we are going to get on with this evacuation.' 'There were always going to vulnerabilities to terrorism and opportunistic terrorist attacks, we condemn them, I think they are despicable, but I am afraid they are something we had to prepare for.' Images from the scene show scores of bodies piled up on the streets and bloodied people being carried away in wheelbarrows, with one emergency hospital treating 60 wounded people after six died on their way there. An Afghan man queuing to enter the airport said the explosion hit the middle of a crowd of thousands, and he saw many injured and maimed people near where US troops were stationed. An Afghan translator, named only as 'Carl', who witnessed the attacks, said a baby girl died in his arms after trying to save her when spotting her on the ground. Another at the scene, a man from Liverpool who travelled to Afghanistan to save his family claims he saw 'hundreds' of people were blown up in front of him. Habib Rahman, 30, who has lived in Toxteth for almost 15 years, travelled to Afghanistan last week to bring his family back to the UK after the Taliban took control of the capital. While queuing at the airport, Habib was just a few yards away from the Abbey Gate of Kabul's airport, where one of the two suicide bomb blasts went off this afternoon. He told the Liverpool Echo: 'We were just a few yards away from where the incident happened. I have seen people run out and passing, each covered in blood. 'I saw hundreds of people blown up in front of me. I won't sleep because of the blood I have seen today.' Habib and his family suffered minor injuries in the explosion but said they were safe. 'I need to get back, I need to get to a safer place. I have kids and we are in extreme danger,' he added. A US official said ISIS-K, a splinter of the terror group who are the sworn enemy of the Taliban, are 'definitely believed' to have carried out the attack. Many had feared an attack could derail the evacuations, with the airport a likely target with crowds rushing to escape and many Western troops stationed at the transport hub. Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby said: 'We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US and civilian casualties. 'We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update.' In a later statement, he added: 'We can confirm that a number of US service personnel were killed in today's complex attack at Kabul airport. A number of others are being treated for wounds. 'We also know a number of Afghans fell victim to this heinous attack. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and injured.' A Number 10 spokesman said Boris Johnson has been updated on the situation. The Prime Minister chaired a COBRA meeting this evening. Mr Biden was in the US' Situation Room for much of the day. Emmanuel Macron said he may struggle to evacuate 20 buses with French citizens on board at the airport gate and says he is in negotiation with the Taliban to secure their release. Meanwhile, Norway became the first country to officially halt its evacuation plans, with Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Soereide telling Norwegian broadcaster TV2: 'The doors at the airport are now closed and it is no longer possible to get people in.' A suicide bomb has caused a huge explosion outside Kabul airport with 'unknown casualties' just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terrorist attack In this frame grab from video, people attend to a wounded man near the site of a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan A person who was hit by the suicide bomb at Kabul airport is carried away from the blast in a wheelbarrow Taliban fighters stand on a pickup truck outside a hospital as volunteers bring injured people for treatment after two powerful explosions outside Kabul airport Moments before the attack, a huge crowd of Afghan civilians and US soldiers are seen massing near the Abbey Gate where the second explosion struck The blast took place near the Baron Hotel at the Abbey Gate of the airport where huge crowds had gathered in an attempt to enter the airport Smoke rises from a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. Taliban officials say as many as 40 people have been killed in the attack US President Joe Biden faces calls to resign as Republicans accuse him of having 'blood on his hands' over Kabul attack Republicans, outraged about the terrorist attacks in Kabul that left US personnel dead, accused President Biden of having 'blood on his hands,' as Sen. Lindsey Graham urged the US to take back control of Bagram airbase after reports of two explosions at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul. 'I have advocated for days that the Bagram Air Base should be reopened as the Kabul airport is very difficult to defend and has been the only evacuation outlet,' the South Carolina Republican wrote on Twitter. 'We have the capability to reestablish our presence at Bagram to continue to evacuate American citizens and our Afghan allies. The biggest mistake in this debacle is abandoning Bagram.' An ISIS-K suicide bomber blew himself up amid the swarms of people outside the airport Thursday, killing at least 13, including four US Marines. ISIS-K is also a sworn enemy of the Taliban. A second explosion was reported nearby a short time later at the airport's Abbey Gate, where crowds of Afghans have been gathering for more than a week in the hope of being put on one of the evacuation flights out. The State Department has warned Americans to evacuate the area immediately. 'I urge the Biden Administration to reestablish our presence in Bagram as an alternative to the Kabul airport so that we do not leave our fellow citizens and thousands of Afghan allies behind. It is not a capability problem, but a problem of will,' Graham said. 'The retaking of Bagram would put our military at risk, but I think those involved in the operation would gladly accept that risk because it would restore our honor as a nation and save lives.' Lawmakers were briefed on the situation this week by Biden's national security team. Meanwhile, Democrat Foreign Affairs Committee chair Sen. Bob Menendez, said: 'This is a full-fledged humanitarian crisis and US government personnel ... must secure the airport.' 'As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We can't trust the Taliban with Americans' security.' House GOP leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy called on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to bring back the House so that lawmakers can be briefed on the situation. 'Today's attacks are horrific. My prayers go out to those who were injured and the families of those who were killed. I also continue to pray for the safety of our troops, the stranded American citizens, our allies and Afghan partners who remain in the area. Our enemies have taken advantage of the chaotic nature of the withdrawal,' the California Republican said in a statement. 'It is time for Congress to act quickly to save lives. Speaker Pelosi must bring Congress back into session before August 31 so that we can be briefed thoroughly and comprehensively by the Biden Administration and pass Representative Gallagher's legislation prohibiting the withdrawal of our troops until every American is out of Afghanistan.' Advertisement Officials do not believe there were any British casualties from the blasts. Nato secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg tweeted: 'I strongly condemn the horrific terrorist attack outside Kabul airport. My thoughts are with all those affected and their loved ones. 'Our priority remains to evacuate as many people to safety as quickly as possible.' UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres also condemned the attack. His spokesperson said: 'This incident underscores the volatility of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan, but also strengthens our resolve as we continue to deliver urgent assistance across the country in support of the Afghan people.' Tom Tugendhat MP, who served in Afghanistan, said: 'The attack on innocent people at Kabul airport simply trying to escape the horror of Taliban rule shows exactly who the group has brought with them. 'The pattern is well established - from Nigeria and Mali to Syria and Iraq whenever Islamist extremists take power, terror follows.' Meanwhile another Tory MP slammed Joe Biden's leadership, saying: 'He is not responsible for the day to day stuff but this is a strategic disaster of very significant proportions. 'He could have done something about it, he says he couldn't, but there was a chance to do something about it. Unfortunately he didn't. 'There was an initial disaster of Trump's making, unfortunately Biden didn't think he had the ability to turn it around, I wish he had. 'There is always going to be chaos when you're leaving somewhere on a forced deadline. 'You are always going to run into potential difficulties and dangers and chaos if you are trying to get out of a collapsing state. 'The question is, did it have to be a collapsing state? No, it didn't have to be but we chose to leave and we chose to abandon 20 years of work.' They said: 'At what point do you actually say we have got to get the troops out because there is no more good that they can do by keeping them there or there is a diminishing amount of good that they can do and by keeping them there effectively we are beginning to make targets of them.' The condemnation of President Biden's withdrawl also continued in the aftermath of the attack, with Former US National Security Adviser, Gen McMaster, warning the attack was 'only the beginning'.. Mr McMaster, who served as a senior US officer in Afghanistan, told BBC News the US had prioritised 'getting the hell out of there, regardless of what the consequences will be' and that the attack at Kabul airport was 'what happens when you surrender to a terrorist organisation'. A former Royal Marine who was near to the explosion close to Kabul airport has said his vehicle was targeted by a gunman amid the chaos. Paul Farthing, known as Pen, who founded the Nowzad shelter in Kabul, is aiming to get 200 dogs and cats out of the country alongside his animal shelter staff. Mr Farthing, who was outside the airport in a car when the incident occurred, told the PA news agency: 'We're fine but everything is chaos here at the moment. 'All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47. 'We've been in the airport, and back out of the airport; the whole thing's a mess. 'There's not much more I can say at the moment, I need to make sure the animals and everyone is safe.' Tory MP Nus Ghani said she was on the phone to somebody outside Kabul airport when one explosion happened, tweeting: 'Explosion at Kabul airport. I was on the phone to an Afghan outside the airport when he heard the explosion. The blast was outside The Baron Hotel, at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport. Westerners were staying in the hotel before their evacuation flights An Afghan man queueing to enter the airport said the explosion hit the middle of a crowd of thousands, and he saw many injured and maimed people and was told of multiple fatalities Images from the scene show scores of bloodied people being carried away from the bombsite with witnesses saying they saw 'so many hurt' Witnesses told Sky News the suicide bomber had detonated a device in a sewage canal-way packed with people and that there were 'definitely' civilian casualties A man who appears to be holding his bloodied and injured arm is seen after the explosion 'We will find you and we will make you pay': Joe Biden promises retaliation against ISIS-K US President Joe Biden promised retaliation against jihadist group ISIS-K over the killing of 12 US service personnel. The President put on a defiant front this evening and promised retaliation against ISIS-K, warning the terrorist group 'we will strike back'. 'We will not forgive, we will not forget. We will hunt you down and we will make you pay,' he said during a speech at the White House tonight. He promised the US would 'respond with precision' and vowed to continue the US evacuation saying: 'America will not be deterred'. Advertisement 'Praying that he gets away safely and we get his family safe passage out of this nightmare.' Earlier, gunfire to disperse the thronging crowds at the airport was initially thought to have targeted a plane transporting 100 civilians to safety. A source from Italy's Defence Ministry had said shots were fired at the Italian C-130 plane minutes after take-off but it was not damaged. But intelligence reports now claim the gunfire was to disperse crowds gathered at the airport and was not directed at the departing plane amid the panic. An Italian journalist told Sky TG 24 that she had been aboard the plane along with 98 Afghan civilians when it appeared to be targeted by machine gun fire. 'The pilot reacted promptly and implemented manoeuvres to avoid being hit within minutes of taking off from Kabul. There was a bit of panic,' said the journalist. Earlier, armed forces minister James Heappey said there was 'very credible reporting' of a 'severe' attack which could happen 'within hours' by ISIS-K, the sworn enemy of the Taliban who want to cause mayhem in the new regime. The US, Britain and Australia had already told their citizens to flee the airport over the terror threat with Western forces still stationed at the transport hub. Meanwhile Afghans who had been told to stay away from Kabul airport are instead flocking to Pakistan and Iran in a bid to escape after the UK told them to head to the border, while many countries have announced they are ending their airlift operations from today. A large explosion has ripped through crowds at Kabul airport's Abbey Gate, with reports of multiple casualties and the eruption of gunfire following the blast Medical and hospital staff bring an injured man on a stretcher for treatment after two powerful explosions, which killed at least six people, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021 A man who was injured in the blast is carried in a wheelbarrow while his head is covered to stem the bleeding The large explosion at Kabul explosion filled the air with smoke (left), while those injured in the suicide bomb attack were carried away from the scene A view after two explosions reported outside Hamid Karzai International Airport, the center of evacuation efforts from Afghanistan since the Taliban took over in Kabul, People injured in the blast arrive at a hospital in Kabul as they are helped inside the medical facility Heappey, speaking before the attack, told the BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'There is now very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack. 'It's an extraordinarily challenging situation both on the ground and as a set of decisions to be taken here in Whitehall because people are desperate, people are fearing for their lives anyway. 'And so I think there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. I can only say the threat is severe.' Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks with military personnel as he visits the Permanent Joint Headquarters to view the strategic command of Operation Pitting which is overseeing units from armed forces engaged in Afghanistan evacuations in Kabul Italian intelligence officials say gunfire at Kabul airport was not directed at their plane transporting 100 Afghan civilians to safety after military sources said they were fired at A US soldier holds up a sign indicating a gate is closed as hundreds gather at Kabul airport holding documents in a bid to flee despite security fears over a potential terror attack 'within hours' Planes are lined up at Kabul international airport today as the rescue mission to evacuate thousands is still ongoing ahead of the August 31 deadline Founded in 2015, the ISIS splinter group's followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia Afghan nationals are desperately fleeing to the border after they were told to stay away from Kabul airport. They are making crossings into Pakistan at Spin Boldak where huge crowds were seen, Angur Ada and Torkham. They are also rushing to safety at border crossings in Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. Many are still hoping to board flights at Kabul airport despite the Taliban and Western nations warning them to stay away He added: 'I can't stress the desperation of the situation enough, the threat is credible, it is imminent, it is lethal. 'And we wouldn't be saying this if we weren't genuinely concerned about offering Islamic State a target.' Meanwhile Colonel Richard Kemp, former head of British forces in Afghanistan, said a terror attack could be carried out by any of Al Qaeda, ISIS or the Taliban. He told BBC Breakfast prior to the attack: 'That threat of terrorist attack, whether it's from Taliban, the Islamic State, or Al Qaeda, it could equally be all three of those groups. 'The fact that people are talking about Islamic State doesn't make that the most likely threat. US soldiers stand guard inside the airport walls while desperate civilians gather outside the gates in a bid to escape the Taliban Armed forces minister James Heappey, speaking prior to the bombings, said that there is 'very credible reporting' of a 'severe' attack A minister has warned that a 'very serious' terror threat at Kabul airport is 'imminent' as thousands desperately try to flee Afghanistan. Pictured: people waiting outside Hamid Karzai airport Passengers line up to board a US Air Force flight from Kabul amid the mass evacuation of stranded citizens Paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct a security patrol during evacuations from Hamid Karzai International Airport today Afghan nationals line up and wait for security checks in Pakistan before entering through a common border crossing point in Chaman 'I think that threat has existed right the way from when this evacuation began, and I have no doubt that our forces are fully aware of the threat and already, for days now, have been taking measures to try and mitigate it, to prevent something like that happening. 'But, clearly, there could be a terrorist attack of some sort against the forces in the airport, maybe forces outside the airport, and of course the people trying to get in.' America, Britain and Australia all told their citizens in the early hours of Thursday to immediately leave the area over fears of a deadly blast from jihadists. But a Western diplomat in Kabul said areas outside the airport gates were 'incredibly crowded' again despite the warnings. What is ISIS-K? ISIS-K is one of six or seven regional offshoots of the Islamic State - the K stands for the Khorasan region, which historically encompasses parts of modern day Iran, Central Asia, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. ISIS-K was begun in 2014, as a splinter group from the Pakistani Taliban, and its original leaders were from Pakistan. In 2015 it was recognized by ISIS's leaders in Iraq and Syria, and in January 2016 declared a terrorist organization by the State Department. Its strongholds are eastern Afghanistan, straddling the border with Pakistan in Nangarhar province, and the north of Afghanistan. In 2018 the group was weakened in the north of Afghanistan, and in 2019 severely beaten back in the east. But in 2020 they regrouped and launched a series of devastating terror attacks. Advertisement US officials said last night there was a 'very real risk' of an attack by the terror group who are the Taliban's rivals. 'Due to threats outside the Kabul airport, US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates unless you receive instructions to do so,' the US State Department tweeted on Wednesday night. 'Those at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately.' The order to leave the gates was issued at 3.30am local time in Kabul on Thursday morning. Planes departing from the US have been departing every 39 minutes in the rush to evacuate as many citizens as possible before the August 31 deadline. In total, around 88,000 people have been airlifted from Kabul airport since evacuation efforts began, the Pentagon said on Wednesday, but up to 1,500 Americans and 400 Britons still remain on the ground. Already, military cargo planes leaving Kabul airport have launched flares to disrupt any potential surface-to-air missile fire as fleeing Afghan troops abandoned heavy weapons and equipment across the country in their collapse following America's withdrawal of troops. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson today stressed that August 31 would not mark the end of the UK's commitment to helping those who wish to flee Afghanistan. Johnson told broadcasters that although the 'lion's share' of eligible people had now been removed from the country, he recognised 'there will be people who still need help'. Asked whether this would be challenging amid reports of the Taliban blocking the roads, Mr Johnson said: 'What we're hoping, and this is the key point that the G7 agreed, is that the Taliban understand that if they want to engage with development aid, they want to unlock those billions of funds, they want to have a diplomatic, political relationship with the outside world, then the safe passage for those who want to come out is the key precondition.' Some countries have begun to even pull their soldiers and diplomats out, fearing potential attacks and likely signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told French radio RTL on that 'from tomorrow evening onwards, we are not able to evacuate people from the Kabul airport' due to the upcoming American withdrawal. Armed Taliban fighters wait for lunch at a restaurant in Kabul while sitting with their guns amid the chaos at the international airport Thousands of Afghans rush to the Hamid Karzai International Airport as they try to flee the Afghan capital of Kabul The threat is heaping extra pressure on the operation to help people flee the nation captured by the Taliban Western nations warned of a possible attack on Kabul's airport, where thousands (pictured today) have flocked as they try to flee Taliban-controlled Afghanistan in the waning days of a massive airlift A source close to the government added that the date had been imposed on France by the plan of the United States, which is providing security at the airport, to pull out by August 31. The source added that France would do everything to keep its operation in place for as many more hours as it can, saying that the evacuation of civilians would wind up several hours before the formal end of the mission when military and remaining embassy services would leave. The French foreign ministry has indicated that the final evacuations of civilians from Kabul by France would be late on Thursday or Friday morning. Meanwhile, Danish defense minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: 'It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul.' Denmark's last flight, carrying 90 people plus soldiers and diplomats, already had left Kabul. And the Dutch government said it would stop evacuation flights from Kabul today in what it acknowledged was a 'painful moment' that would leave some people behind. Already, Poland and Belgium have ended their evacuations from Afghanistan. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan grew out of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even-more extreme view of Islam, riding on a wave when the militants seized territory across Iraq and Syria. Naming themselves after Khorasan, a historic name for the greater region, the extremists embarked on a series of brutal attacks that included a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul that saw infants and women killed. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan. However, their advance across the country likely saw IS fighters freed alongside the Taliban's own. Armed forces minister James Heappey said there is 'very credible reporting' of a 'severe' attack which could happen 'within hours' by ISIS-K Troubling video showed thousands of Afghans attempting to flee the country via the Pakistan border. The footage shows a huge crowd of people at Spin Boldak, a southern village on the border with Pakistan, queuing up at the border gates US paratroopers inspect weapons during an evacuation operation at Kabul airport amid growing fears of an imminent terror attack CNN reported Thursday that they believe ISIS-K wants to create mayhem at the airport and has intelligence streams suggesting it is capable and planning to carry out multiple attacks. Analysts told on Wednesday night that the intelligence likely came from intercepted calls, amid fears recently-freed prisoners could mount the attacks. Concerns increased after more than 100 prison inmates loyal to the ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan escaped from two prisons near Kabul as the Taliban advanced on the Afghan capital. Taliban fighters stormed the jails at Bagram and Pul-e-Charkhi, both to the east of Kabul, shortly before the capital city fell, as hundreds of ISIS-K fighters were freed. Joe Biden on Tuesday warned that ISIS-K were believed to be attempting to target departing jets, as he explained why it was unlikely that US forces will remain in the area beyond August 31. The UK last night told its Afghan allies to head for the border rather than attempt to get into Kabul airport where US and British forces are winding down their operations. As evacuation efforts entered their final hours, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace appeared to signal in a briefing to MPs that there are few places left on British planes. Afghans walk through a security barrier as they enter Pakistan through a common border crossing point in Chaman The UK last night told its Afghan allies to head for the border rather than attempt to get into Kabul airport where US and British forces are winding down their operations. Pictured: Taliban fighters at a restaurant in Kabul Questioned yesterday about what Afghans who have been offered student places or fellowships in the UK should do, Mr Wallace said: 'If they think they can make it to a third country, that may be a better option.' Pressed by a Tory backbencher, Mr Wallace added: 'I recommend that they try and make it to the border because it is higher profile going to the airport that is where the Taliban will be focusing their efforts at the moment.' There was no suggestion however, that Afghans who have been told by western officials to travel to the airport for evacuation should alter that plan. Heappey said the 'window of opportunity to evacuate people is closing' ahead of the August 31 troop withdrawal deadline. He said: 'We will do our best to protect those who are there. There is every chance that as further reporting comes in we may be able to change the advice again and process people anew but there's now guarantee of that. 'But... the window of opportunity to evacuate people is closing. It's not as simply a case of we can pause, deal with the threat and pick up where we left off.' He said there will be 11 more flights out of Kabul on Thursday but declined to say whether there will be more on Friday, citing the security of troops. A Pakistani paramilitary soldier checks travel documents of an Afghan before crossing the border into Afghanistan through a common border crossing point in Chaman Meanwhile, troubling video yesterday showed thousands of Afghans attempting to flee the country via the Pakistan border. The footage shows a huge crowd of people at Spin Boldak, a southern village on the border with Pakistan, queuing up at the border gates. It comes amid reports that desperate Britons and Afghans cleared for evacuation are still trapped in Kabul and are being charged more than 5,000 by local 'private security firms' to help them escape the clutches of the Taliban. The firms are reportedly charging $7,500 dollars (approximately 5,500) to give those willing to pay a safe passage past Taliban fighters and to Kabul airport. But most of the money is actually being used to pay off the Taliban anyway, say UK defence sources. Meanwhile, crowds of people wait outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, yesterday as the evacuation mission continues Pressed by a Tory backbencher, Mr Wallace added: 'I recommend that they try and make it to the border because it is higher profile going to the airport that is where the Taliban will be focusing their efforts at the moment.' Around 150 flights left Kabul airport yesterday as Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab insisted the UK will use 'every hour left' to rescue vulnerable Afghans Some of those trying to flee the Taliban may be better off heading for the border rather than hoping for a flight out, the Defence Secretary admitted last night. Hundreds of people gather near an evacuation control checkpoint during ongoing evacuations at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul Private security firms are charging terrified Britons who are cleared for evacuation but trapped in the chaos of Kabul Desperate Britons and Afghans cleared for evacuation are reportedly paying private security firms more than 5,000 to help them escape the clutches of the Taliban, it has been reported. The firms are reportedly charging $7,500 dollars (approximately 5,500) to give those willing to pay a safe passage past Taliban fighters and to Kabul airport. But most of the money is actually being used to pay off the Taliban anyway, UK defence sources have told the Guardian. It comes as yesterday Taliban officials announced a new edict banning Afghans from leaving the country. Roadblocks and check points were set up across Kabul to prevent access to the airport where western forces are carrying out a rapid evacuation. Meanwhile, the UK's Defence Secretary last night warned some of those trying to flee the Taliban may be better off heading for the border rather than hoping for a flight out. As evacuation efforts entered their final hours, Ben Wallace appeared to signal in a briefing to MPs that there are few places left on British planes. Advertisement The frantic race to rescue the last 2,000 Afghan allies was underway last night as the Daily Mail learned all UK troops must leave Afghanistan by the weekend. Around 150 flights left Kabul airport yesterday as Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab insisted the UK will use 'every hour left' to rescue vulnerable Afghans. But the grim reality is that many hundreds including heroic Afghan interpreters will be left to the clutches of the Taliban after Tuesday's deadline for international troops to leave. A US order that Britain must pull out its 1,000 soldiers and officials before the US begins its withdrawal has reduced the time available to process the final claims. US commanders have also insisted on 'two to three days' to conduct a unilateral extraction of their 6,000-strong force, meaning the last UK troops are expected to fly out on Sunday. The order came as the Taliban further tightened its grip on the airport, using checkpoints to block anyone not holding the necessary paperwork and demanding bribes from those who did. Afghans and foreign citizens suffered beatings. Video footage showed an Australian with blood streaming down his face from a head wound after he was confronted by Taliban guards. There were estimated to be 10,000 Afghans crammed outside the gates to the airport. UK commander Brigadier Dan Blanchford said they faced 'harrowing and extreme conditions'. Since the start of the operation, the RAF has flown out 11,474 people, including almost 7,000 vulnerable Afghans. It has evacuated more than 2,500 UK nationals, 341 British Embassy officials and around 1,000 nationals from 38 nations. The figure of 2,000 awaiting rescue could rise, with the last freedom flight possibly tomorrow. Around 150 flights left Kabul airport yesterday as Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab insisted the UK will use 'every hour left' to rescue vulnerable Afghans. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster There were estimated to be 10,000 Afghans crammed outside the gates to the airport. UK commander Brigadier Dan Blanchford said they faced 'harrowing and extreme conditions'. Pictured: Afghans line up outside a bank to take out cash as people keep waiting at Hamid Karzai International Airport 'We're leaving in 72 hours - it doesn't matter who's left on the ground,' says former CIA agent American civilians and Afghan allies have just 72 hours before evacuations from Kabul end, a former CIA officer and terrorism expert has claimed. Sam Faddis, who served as the head of the Counter Terrorism Center's Weapons of Mass Destruction unit, said sources in the Pentagon, military officers in Kabul and other former intelligence agency officers have told him that flights for civilians out of the Afghan capital will actually end in the next three days. The alleged deadline has not been officially announced or verified, but raises fears that American citizens could be left behind in the Taliban-occupied city. On Tuesday President Joe Biden confirmed that US forces will be leaving the country by August 31, a date agreed with the Taliban - but Faddis claims American civilians currently in the city have a far shorter deadline. 'Biden decided we're pulling out within 72 hours. We're gone, and it doesn't matter who's left on the ground,' the ex-CIA officer told DailyMail.com. Advertisement There are 'special cases' still to be processed Afghans to be offered sanctuary in the UK due to the likelihood they will be targeted by the Taliban. British troops face an increased threat of a terrorist attack from jihadis. At the airport, a young Afghan woman told the BBC that Taliban forces were treating the crowds of waiting civilians 'like animals'. Before she boarded a flight, she said: 'Today after three days, I finally got into the airport and I have my flight. It took us 18 hours to get through one of the gates . 'The airport is completely surrounded by Taliban forces and they're being as brutal as they can to the people. They're shooting at people, they're beating people. 'I have mixed feelings. On the one hand I'm travelling to a safer country anything right now is better than being in a country led by the Taliban. 'On the other, I'm leaving behind everything my life, my work, my dreams, my hopes. I really desperately want to one day come back to Kabul and see Kabul free of the Taliban.' Amid the horror, there was also humanity. A British officer described looking after a baby girl after she child became separated from her mother in the crush. Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Caesar of 16 Medical Regiment, said: 'We took her for a walk around our hospital, managed to burp her a few times. She seemed to settle. 'One of the challenges in this sort of environment is never really knowing who is going to come through the door. We have to be prepared for every eventuality. 'Fortunately as a recent father myself I have a bit of experience in dealing with small children. She was later reunited with her mother before being evacuated.' At the airport, a young Afghan woman told the BBC that Taliban forces were treating the crowds of waiting civilians 'like animals'. Before she boarded a flight, she said: 'Today after three days, I finally got into the airport and I have my flight. It took us 18 hours to get through one of the gates.' Pictured: A C-17 Globemaster lll lands on the runway as evacuees from Afghanistan debark a C-17 Globemaster Two paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security while a C-130 Hercules takes off during a evacuation operation in Kabul A heart-breaking announcement for those who remain is expected 'imminently', according to political sources. The crowds are expected to be told, perhaps today, that evacuations for civilians are no longer possible. Tobias Ellwood, chairman of the Commons defence committee, said: 'We are down to the last hours. 'It is vital we communicate with those waiting outside the airport to prevent panic and loss of life, confirming what has happened. They will have to be told, sadly, that no more evacuation flights are possible ahead of the August 31 deadline and that, as from then, only military withdrawal flights will be taking off.' Afghanistan's chilling new face of terror: 'ISIS-K' slaughter patients in their hospital beds, bomb girls schools... and see the Taliban as far too liberal. Their latest victory? Joe Biden is running scared of them, writes GUY ADAMS ISIS-K are thought to be the likely source of a potential terror attack at Kabul airport, which officials fear is 'imminent' with 'lethal' consequences. The terrorist splinter group are a sworn enemy of the Taliban and experts believe they want to cause chaos for the new regime while a large presence of foreign troops is stationed in the country. Guy Adams explores the roots of the murderous Islamists who have already carried out a series of deadly attacks in the Middle East, amid fears of further violence. Dressed in white coats and carrying stethoscopes, three young men walked unchallenged into Kabul's 400-bed Sardar Mohammad Daud Khan hospital and made their way to the upper floors. Then, outside the building, situated opposite the heavily fortified US Embassy, there was a loud bang. The noise, from the detonating suicide vest of a comrade, acted as a signal for the trio to pull a selection of hand grenades and AK-47 assault rifles from beneath their medical clothing, before opening fire. By the time the chaos had died down, several hours later, more than 30 doctors and patients had been killed and roughly 50 more wounded. Further casualties included the three attackers, who were shot by Afghan special forces, plus the original suicide bomber, and a fifth member of the terror gang who had detonated a car bomb inside the hospital complex. A former Pakistani Taliban commander called Hafiz Saeed Khan (middle) led ISIS-K until he was killed by a drone strike in 2016 Their brazen and pitiless attack, which unfolded in broad daylight one afternoon in March 2017, was carried out in the name of ISIS-K, a local branch of the notorious global terror network. Founded in 2015, its followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia. The terror group is now such a threat that fear of an attack by Isis-K is being used to justify the US's refusal to delay its withdrawal from Kabul Airport after the August 31 deadline set by Joe Biden. In a statement released on Tuesday night, the US President claimed: 'Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians.' The White House seems to believe ISIS-K (who regard the Taliban as dangerous liberals) is about to organise a wave of attacks in an effort to destabilise its efforts to form a government. If so, then any foreign troops, including soldiers from Britain's 16 Air Assault Brigade currently guarding Kabul airport, would represent very high-profile targets indeed. The organisation has already carried out roughly 100 attacks against civilian targets and another 250 involving US, Afghan or Pakistani security services, most of them chronicled via macabre mobile phone videos then gleefully broadcast via the internet. One particularly vile film, circulated in June 2017, celebrated the work of a group of child recruits to ISIS-K known as the 'cubs of the caliphates'. Founded in 2015, its followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia The film showed two of them both dressed in black and seemingly under 12 years of age forcing terrified captives to kneel on the ground. They proceeded to pull back the heads of the men (who were apparently accused of spying), rant at the camera and execute them via a single shot to the skull. More recently, in May this year, ISIS-K killed at least 68 Afghans and injured another 165 when they detonated three car bombs outside the Syed Al-Shahda school for girls in Kabul. The vast majority of the victims were young pupils the Islamist group regard as legitimate targets for the sin of being educated while being female. The attack, which came after a period in which Western air strikes had killed thousands of the terror network's supporters and at least three of its leaders, served as a bloody reminder of its ongoing ability to bring carnage to the streets of Afghanistan. ISIS-K published this photo in an effort to project unity and strength just days before hundreds of fighters admitted defeat and surrendered The very fact that a US President is admitting that his policy is being governed by a perceived threat from ISIS-K represents a major coup for a hitherto fairly low-profile organisation. It first made headlines in January 2016, when the Pentagon announced that the group had been designated as a Foreign Terrorist organisation. This made assisting them a criminal offence and allowed US troops on the ground to actively pursue members (under previous terms of engagement they usually had to wait until the group attacked them before responding). The organisation's chosen first Emir, or leader, was a former Pakistani Taliban commander called Hafiz Saeed Khan. His foot-soldiers were largely people who had defected from the Taliban as was his canny PR chief, Sheikh Maqbool, who was charged with ensuring that the group's grisly attacks gained worldwide attention. They were appointed at the behest of ISIS's (then) top dog Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who was facing difficulties in his stomping grounds of Syria and Iraq, so began funnelling cash to Khan in order to establish a new stronghold in the East. Initially, their activities were limited to suicide bombings and small arms attacks targeting civilians, along with the odd kidnapping, but that was enough to prompt close attention from the US, who succeeded in killing Khan via a drone strike in July 2016. A member of the Afghan security forces is seen holding the black and white Islamic State flag in the Afghan city of Jalalabad in August 2020, after ISIS-K launched a 20-hour gun battle to attack the air field and storm a prison, releasing their fighters. Joe Biden on Tuesday warned that ISIS-K posed a significant threat to the evacuation efforts in Afghanistan His successor Abdul Hasib masterminded the hospital attack mentioned above, and was famed for both ordering fighters to behead local elders in front of their families, and to kidnap women and girls so they could be forced to 'marry' his fighters, that is, become sex slaves. He perished in a special forces raid on his compound in which two US troops died in April 2017. Later that month, the US dropped the largest non-nuclear bomb in its arsenal a GBU-43 Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) also known as the 'Mother Of All Bombs' on a key ISIS-K cave and tunnel system in Afghanistan's Nangarhar province. Around 100 of their troops perished. A series of drone strikes then wiped out both of Hasib's successors, Abu Sayed and Abu Saad Orakzai, and roughly 80 per cent of the group's troops, reducing their estimated strength from between three and four thousand to under 800 followers by the end of 2018. Yet like so many militant groups in the benighted history of Afghanistan, they have since proved almost impossible to eliminate completely. The deaths of successive leaders have ended up being largely symbolic, since they have been quickly replaced by experienced peers shipped in from other ISIS strongholds. New foot-soldiers have been recruited via slick propaganda videos outlining its global aspirations to create an Islamist caliphate across Asia, governed by Sharia law, before eventually '[raising] the banner of al-Uqab above Jerusalem and the White House'. An ISIS-K leader identified as Abu Haidar is pictured with his seven fighters in an undated image. The men were all killed during a clash with the Afghan forces in Nangarhar province, the heartland of ISIS-K This ambition equates to the defeat of both Israel and the United States (and therefore the imposition of their twisted view of life on those countries). The group's current leader is believed to be Shahab al-Muhajir, also known as Sanaullah. A United Nations report published in February said that he took over in June 2020. The communique announcing the appointment, written in Arabic and translated into Pashto, referred to al-Muhajir as an experienced military leader and one of the 'urban lions' of ISIL-K in Kabul who had been 'involved in guerrilla operations and the planning of suicide and complex attacks.' While Sanaullah's reign may be bad news for Afghans, he's currently thought to have little to no capacity for mounting terror attacks in the West. He is instead focusing on a mission to rid Afghanistan and other parts of its home territory of foreign 'crusaders' who 'proselytize Muslims' as well as 'apostates'. That in turn may explain why America is so anxious to withdraw from Kabul: once US troops are home, they are no longer in his organisation's firing line. For the Afghans left behind, escaping ISIS-K's reign of terror will not be nearly so simple. Thousands of school students in New South Wales are reportedly set to return to their desks in October to face delayed final-year exams which will now be held in November. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian is said to be making the announcement at Friday's daily Covid briefing press conference, according to Sky News. The NSW crisis cabinet is understood to have considered scrapping the vital exams entirely this year because study and teaching has been thrown into chaos by lockdown. But the resultant potential mental health damage was considered too great and the October return and November HSC plan was reportedly approved instead. Thousands of students in New South Wales are reportedly set to return to their desks in October to face delayed HSC exams which will now be held in November. (Pictured, a student waiting to be vaccinated at Sydney's Qudos Arena pop-up clinic) The state government has been trying to vaccinate all 75,000 Year 12 students to enable the return to class ahead of the intense four-week exam schedule. Pushing the exams back from the current October 19 start date would give the health department a few more vital weeks to carry out the vaccination drive, and impinging on the summer holidays was less impactful because travel is forbidden. NSW hit another Australian record 1029 number of Covid cases overnight on Thursday with three more unvaccinated people dying, aged in their 30s, 60s and 80s. The age demographic of those being infected by the deadly Delta variant has skewed much younger, with 5,389 cases of those aged 10-19 now in Australia. NSW state government has been trying to vaccinate all 75,000 Year 12 students ahead of the intense four-week exam schedule to enable the return to class. (Pictured, students being vaccinated at Sydney's Qudos Arena pop-up clinic) With Covid numbers continuing to rise in NSW, plans have also reportedly been considered to restrict face to face exams to areas where Covid cases are low. (Pictured, a stock image of students in class at a Sydney school) As numbers continue to rise, plans have also been considered to restrict face to face exams to areas where Covid cases are low, according to The Guardian. However this appears to have been dismissed for unfairly punishing students in the 12 local government areas of concern in Sydney's west and south-west. The crisis cabinet has also reportedly considered limiting HSC exams to key subjects like English and maths, with the rest of the HSC mark based on school assessments. Some schools may also struggle logistically to maintain social distancing between desks and students in exam conditions if they are running a full schedule of exams. Covid requirements could see the exams taking up all of a school's classrooms which may delay a return for students in other Year classes. The NSW state government's crisis cabinet has also reportedly considered limiting HSC exams to key subjects like English and maths, with the rest of the HSC mark based on school assessments. (PIctured, a stock image of a schoolgirl in class) Some schools may struggle to maintain social distancing between desks and students in exam conditions if they are running a full schedule of exams and require all classrooms to be used. (Pictured, Year 12 students await their vaccinations at Sydney's Qudos Arena) But despite that, as well as Year 12 students in early October, Sky News said NSW is also looking at a plan for a return of kindergarten, Year 6 and Year 11 pupils. Sky News said the NSW crisis government had set a double-dose vaccination trigger point somewhere between 70 and 80 percent that would allow the additional return to school influx. Education Minister Sarah Mitchell told the Sydney Morning Herald the NSW Education Standards Authority met on Tuesday and considered a number of options. She added; 'What I am focused on and what we are working towards is a situation where the HSC goes ahead in a safe way so students can sit their public exams and finalise their 13 years of education.' The partner of Olympic and world champion snowboarder Alex 'Chumpy' Pullin has revealed the heartbreaking text she had to send after she learned of his drowning. Ellidy Pullin, a swimwear model from Sydney's northern beaches, met Chumpy at a party hosted by mutual friend Aussie surfer Laura Enever and the pair had been trying to conceive a child through IVF in 2020. Tragically in June last year Chumpy drowned while spearfishing at Palm Beach on the Gold Coast after suffering a suspected shallow water blackout. The incident left her breaking the tragic news to friends and family, with no other way to explain it to mates other than 'Chumpy passed away'. Ellidy Pullin (pictured) is pregnant with Chumpy's 'miracle' child and has opened up about the day she learned of his tragic drowning Heartache: Olympic snowboarder Alex 'Chumpy' Pullin's widow Ellidy has spoken out about her 'bittersweet' pregnancy following the athlete's tragic death at age 32 Ms Pullin revealed earlier this year amid her crushing grief she learned she was pregnant with Chumpy's 'miracle' child, less than 12 months on from his passing. In an article she wrote for Vogue Australia this week, Ms Pullin whose maiden name is Vlug, went into detail about the day she learned her partner had died, saying she dismissed a number of early signals something was wrong. She explained she shared a kiss with the the 32-year-old before he left to go on a spearfishing adventure from their Gold Coast home. Later on that day a neighbour told her off-hand that a man had been pulled from the water at Palm Beach but she thought nothing of it. Even after a police officer pulled up at her house, the news he was about to tell her had not even crossed her mind. 'I remember the pin-drop moment when the policeman asked me whether my partner had tattoos, to which I answered, "yes, an axe on his chest", and his eyes spoke the words he couldn't deliver,' she wrote. 'I remember fumbling with my phone as I tried to call Chumpy's parents, not entirely grasping what I was supposed to be telling them.' She said she then turned her attention to her friends and revealed the gut-wrenching message she had to send them. 'I remember writing "Chump passed away" in perhaps the strangest text I'll ever send to my closest girlfriends.' She spoke of how her mind revisits that 'shattering' day continuously, trying to connect the dots - that her memories might provide some new piece of information other than the facts - that Chumpy went spearfishing and did not return. Though now, a year later, she is a little more reflective - saying maybe those memories are to remind her how far she has come as she prepares to be a mother. Mother-to-be: 'I feel a deep-seated sadness that Chumpy won't get the chance to play dad, a role that would have come so naturally to him,' she said in the interview Ellidy announced the news of her pregnancy sharing a heartwarming post on Instagram earlier this year. 'Bubba Chump coming this October', she captioned the post, receiving well-wishes from pro-surfers Mick Fanning and Alana Blanchard in the comments. 'When my love had his accident, we all held onto hope that I'd be pregnant that month. We'd been trying for a baby', the model captioned the image. 'IVF was on our cards but it wasn't something I ever imagined I'd be tackling on my own. Bittersweet like none other, I've never been more certain or excited about anything in my entire life.' Ellidy recently spoke about retrieving sperm from her late partner in the hours after his death on her podcast, Darling, Shine! Under Queensland legislation, sperm can be removed posthumously when a designated officer declares their belief that the deceased wouldn't object. The consent of the immediate family - including Chumpy's parents - is also required before any sperm can be retrieved. An IVF specialist assists with the retrieval, with a recommended removal timeframe of between 24 and 36 hours after death. Ellidy admitted it was quite an undertaking, with everyone having to sign off on legal documents, while also dealing with coroners, lawyers and doctors. 'I go through a lot every day and I will forever grief, that never leaves you, but I was always so sure of one thing - that I was always going to have this bub,' she said '[It was] incredibly fortunate we had the resources and the means to make this happen in such crucial time,' she added. Ellidy said her pregnancy is 'the most bittersweet thing in the world', but added that she was determined to parent a child with Chumpy. 'I'm not saying it's going to be easy or a walk in the park. I have a lot ahead of me, I've got big shoes to fill,' she continued. 'I've got to be a dad and a mum in one, and not just any dad, I've got to be a Chumpy dad.' She added: 'I go through a lot every day and I will forever grief, that never leaves you, but I was always so sure of one thing - that I was always going to have this bub.' This is the hair-raising moment a young boy escaped injury after a fan fell from the ceiling onto him as he ate dinner with his family. Footage captured in Bac Ninh, Vietnam, shows the family of six sat on the floor for dinner when the young boy hears a noise and looks up towards the ceiling. Just seconds later, the fan crashes onto the floor and the blades land in-between the child and two family members sat either side of him before the young boy's mother rushes towards him. The boy appears to hear a noise and looks towards the ceiling as he sits down for dinner with his family in Bac Ninh, Vietnam, on July 8 Just moments later the ceiling fan plummets towards the floor as the family eat their meal During the footage, which was filmed July 8, the family enjoy their dinner when the young boy appears to hear a noise. As he looks towards the ceiling, the fan falls onto the floor and the blades land in-between the young boy and two other family members. The boy's mother immediately rushes towards him and strokes his head as he gets to his feet and walks away unscathed. She checks the young boy for any signs of injury as another family member lifts the fan and moves it away. The ceiling fans crashes onto the floor and the blades land in-between the child and two family members The child's mother rushes towards him to check for any injuries as another family members move the fan away One family member told Viral Hog: 'The whole family was eating when the ceiling fan fell right between us. Luckily no one was hurt.' Following the scenes, viewers took to social media to describe their relief that the family were unharmed. One person wrote: 'Wow! So happy that no one got hurt!! That's awful!' While another user added: 'I am happy that nobody got hurt.' Extinction Rebellion, the environmental campaigning group, left 120 tonnes of rubbish on London's streets when they last took over the capital, an MP has warned. The mess cost taxpayers 50,000 to clean up after they shut down major roads and streets in London in October 2019 in a bid to encourage the Government to tackle climate change. Nickie Aiken, Conservative MP for Cities of London and Westminster, revealed the cost of the demonstration to her constituency as the activists target London's streets again. The former leader of City of Westminster Council told the Telegraph: 'The disruption to local people and businesses is immeasurable. Conservative MP Nickie Aiken has claimed Extinction Rebellion left 120 tonnes of rubbish on London's streets when they last took over the capital in October (pictured in Trafalgar Square) Extinction Rebellion protestors demonstrate outside the Treasury building on October 3, 2019 'I was told by the council that last time Extinction Rebellion were here for two weeks, they cleared 120 tons of rubbish left behind. 'That added 50,000 to their costs. This is local people's council tax. 'Westminster and the City of London are considered very wealthy areas, but I want to remind people that actually it's not all about wealth. 'There are major areas of deprivation in central London and 25 per cent of homes are social rented. 'The wealthy who live here have gone for the summer, so it's those who live here permanently and can't escape who are living with this so-called 'beautiful chaos'.' Extinction Rebellion started a fortnight of action earlier this week and brought parts of London, including Oxford Circus and the West End, to a standstill. Protesters camp at the Trafalgar Square during an XR demonstration on October 12, 2019 Chaos: In this file photo taken on October 07, 2019 activists gather on Westminster Bridge during a demonstration by the climate change group Extinction Rebellion in central London Extinction Rebellion protesters demonstrating on Oxford Street, London, on October 12, 2019 The action began on Monday when protestors set up a giant pink table by Leicester Square in a bid to encourage 'crisis talks' and asking the Government to 'come to the table'. The group said the demonstration was to urge the UK Government to immediately stop all new fossil fuel investments. On Tuesday, four members of Extinction Rebellion Fashion Action glued themselves to the front door of Selfridges on Oxford Street. They were wearing a dress which displayed the messages: 'Fashion is addicted to dirty oil' and 'Code red for fossil fuel fashion'. Other members of the protest poured fake oil over the activists and then proceeded to pour fake oil over the windows of the iconic British department store to further highlight the fashion industry's increasing reliance on fossil fuels, they said. The following day a large number of protestors blocked Oxford Circus with another giant pink table with a banner reading 'come to the table'. Police form a ring around a pink structure the demonstrators erected on Wednesday afternoon in Oxford Circus, central London, during the group's 'Impossible Rebellion' series of actions Pictured: The protesters rammed the streets in Piccadilly Circus earlier this week - blocking commuters from getting by - and blurted out rehearsed speeches through a microphone A group also gathered outside the Brazilian Embassy and another group gathered at Piccadilly. Elsewhere, demonstrators from sister group Animal Rebellion were joined by some XR activists and glued themselves to tables in the Leicester Square McDonalds in a bid to encourage the fast food giant to switch to a plant based menu. The Metropolitan Police have arrested 236 people for a variety of offences in connection with the demonstrations since Sunday. In response to yesterday's action, a spokesman for the force said: 'Officers encouraged people to leave but as the assembly did not disperse conditions were imposed at 15.47hrs under s14 of the Public Order Act. 'Officers subsequently began arresting those who refused to comply, and specially trained officers are safely removing those locked on or glued in situ. 'This is a complex operation, where the safety of the public and those protesting is actively taken into consideration.' Pictured: Extinction Rebellion protesters gather at Oxford Circus on Wednesday afternoon An Extinction Rebellion spokesman said: 'As Westminster Council will confirm, the 50,000 figure was a 'service' cost, meaning the total cost of council services that were temporarily redeployed during our two-week October 2019 protests. 'There was no additional money spent by the council and no additional cost to the taxpayer. 'The 120 tons of rubbish collected took place over a two-week period. To put that figure into comparison, during London's New Year celebrations 2016-17, Westminster cleared up 85 tons of rubbish from just one night. 'As anyone who has been to an Extinction Rebellion protest will know, we are scrupulous about clearing up after ourselves and ask rebels to respect the spaces they're in and take their rubbish home. Why don't you come down and see for yourself?' MPs have called for PCR travel tests to be scrapped for the fully vaccinated after official data showed just four in a thousand bring Covid back to the UK. Only 0.4 per cent of double-jabbed Brits returning from abroad at the end of July had contracted the virus, according to a study being reviewed by ministers. Travellers have been left livid after prices for PCR tests rocketed despite poor service from many of the 400-plus government-approved companies. The Government requires international travellers arriving in England to test before travel, and on arrival in the UK. Holidaymakers who had only had one dose were twice as likely to be infected (0.8 per cent) while 1.2 per cent of unvaccinated travellers had Covid. It means even among unvaccinated people, the proportion of people testing positive around one in 83 is less than the general population in England and Wales. According to the Office for National Statistics, the countries saw around one in 80 catch the virus last week But part of the reason for PCR testing is also to stop variants coming into the country, officials have stressed. And four in 1,000 positive tests for double jabs still equates to 400 infected people who have been double-jabbed arriving in the UK every day. The data from Government accredited PCR provider Cignpost which is being studied by Health Secretary Sajid Javid is based on the private firm's 11,000 tests on arrivals a day. It comes after Mr Javid this week warned 82 travel testing companies included on the official gov.uk list that they could be removed from it for advertising misleading prices, accusing them of 'cowboy behaviour'. Only 0.4 per cent of double-jabbed Brits returning from abroad at the end of July had contracted the virus, according to data from Cignpost MPs have called for PCR travel tests to be scrapped for the fully vaccinated after official data showed just four in a thousand bring Covid back to the UK. Pictured: A woman receives a PCR test The new data has prompted calls for No10 to replace costly PCR tests for travellers who have had both doses of the jab to amber and green countries with cheaper lateral flow swabs. The travel PCR scheme has been mired in controversy since it was announced earlier this year. It required people returning to the UK to take a test before and on arrival. The number of tests that are needed is dependent on your arrival from either a green or amber country or your vaccination status. Arrivals from red countries must still use quarantine hotel facilities. The average cost of a single Covid traveller test remained above 90 despite a vow two weeks ago by Mr Javid to drive down prices. Conservative chairman of the all-party Future of Aviation group Henry Smith said the data shows PCR tests for amber and green countries should be ditched for the fully-vaccinated. He told the Telegraph: 'The data really makes the case for a much simpler and straightforward testing regime.' And others have called for the Government to move towards using lateral flow antigen tests for all travel. Daniel Sleat, head of research at the Tony Blair Institute, told MailOnline: 'As the Tony Blair Institute has been arguing for some months, we believe the Government should fully embrace antigen testing for travel. 'Right now we think the NHS should bring spare PCR testing online for travel, at cost, with travel testing fully moving to antigen testing by next year.' But lateral flow tests have higher rates of false positives, according to Cignpost. This graphic shows the basic process of a PCR test for coronavirus The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said it is ready to take enforcement action over a range of dodgy practices that cause misery for holidaymakers. Pictured, Heathrow airport Figures show they can miss up to 40 per cent of asymptomatic Covid carriers. Watchdog warns PCR Covid test providers they are breaking the law with misleading pricing and slow results A watchdog has delivered a stark warning to PCR Covid test providers that they are breaking the law with misleading pricing and delays in giving results. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said it is ready to take enforcement action over a range of dodgy practices that cause misery for holidaymakers. The behaviours include hidden charges and advertising cheap tests which are only actually available in very small quantities or are not available at all. The CMA also insisted it will not tolerate failure to give results within promised timescales, and refusing to provide consumers with refunds where tests are not provided on schedule. The sabre-rattling comes after the Government announced this week that 82 companies face being removed from the Gov.uk list if they advertise misleading prices. An open letter from the CMA tells providers that if they treat customers unfairly then it or Trading Standards can take action. They must 'immediately review their practices and policies to make sure they are in line with the requirements of consumer law and to make any changes where necessary'. Advertisement Cignpost founder Nick Markham said the company recorded positive tests in 10 per cent of arrivals from India in April when the Delta variant began to take hold in the UK despite flyers taking lateral flow tests before travel. He said: 'PCR tests are more accurate so they capture those cases that antigen will miss. 'You can also sequence PCR tests which you cannot do with antigen and this gives you an early indication if there are new variants of concern out there.' It comes after the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) warned PCR test providers they are breaking the law with misleading pricing and delays in giving results. The CMA said it is ready to take enforcement action over a range of dodgy practices that cause misery for holidaymakers. The behaviours include hidden charges and advertising cheap tests which are only actually available in very small quantities or are not available at all. It also insisted it will not tolerate failure to give results within promised timescales, and refusing to provide consumers with refunds where tests are not provided on schedule. The Government announced this week that 82 companies face being removed from the gov.uk list if the keep advertising misleading prices. Its website features a list of test providers which travellers can use, to make it easier to find test providers. But a recent Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) review discovered they were displaying lower prices on its website than people would have to pay in reality once they get to the checkout. Health Secretary Sajid Javid said it is 'absolutely unacceptable' for companies to take advantage of holidaymakers and the action is part of a clampdown on 'cowboy behaviour'. Regular spot checks of testing providers advertised and actual prices will be carried out this week, he said. An open letter from the CMA tells providers that if they treat customers unfairly then it or Trading Standards can take action. They must 'immediately review their practices and policies to make sure they are in line with the requirements of consumer law and to make any changes where necessary'. CMA general counsel Sarah Cardell said: 'PCR test providers should be in no doubt that they need to get on the right side of the law. If they don't, they risk enforcement action. 'Our advice today will also help people by setting out exactly what they should expect for their money. 'This warning goes hand in hand with action taken by Government this week, and is the latest step in our work to tackle rip-off prices and bad service. 'We continue to work closely with DHSC in reviewing this market and will be providing further advice to DHSC on action that can be taken.' Which? Travel editor Rory Boland said: 'This intervention from the regulator is positive news; however, this laundry list of problems has left travellers struggling for months to choose a trustworthy, reliable test provider and having to pay the financial penalty when things go wrong. 'The Government must act swiftly to remove test providers misleading customers from its site, while the CMA must be prepared to take tough action against any firms flouting the rules.' Major hospitals in Australia have become so over-run that they have been forced to set up emergency outdoor tents to help deal with a rise in Covid-19 patients. The makeshift units have been set up outside two hospitals in Sydney in response to an influx of patients as the city struggles to stamp out the fast-spreading Delta variant. The desperate move came as New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern defended her 'Covid zero' elimination strategy amid fears an outbreak of the highly transmissible Delta variant has rendered the policy ineffective. Both Australia and New Zealand are seeing record Covid-19 infections despite their draconian lockdown measures which have proved powerless to prevent the infectious variant from spreading. Australia's new daily cases of Covid-19 today surpassed 1,000 for the first time since the global pandemic began, while New Zealand recorded the largest cluster of cases the country has recorded throughout the entire pandemic with 277 cases. In Sydney, the rapid rise in Covid-19 patients has forced the major Westmead and Blacktown hospitals, which service the city's sprawling suburbs, to erect tents to screen and swab patients to help manage capacity. Pictured: NSW Ambulances park in the receiving bay for the Emergency Department at the Blacktown Hospital Both Australia and New Zealand are seeing record Covid-19 infections despite their draconian lockdown measures which has proved powerless to prevent the infectious variant It comes after Ardern decided to extend lockdown measures this week in response to rising cases as her zero Covid policy becomes undone day by day. Her decision to extend lockdown was branded 'absurd' and 'unfathomable' in an attempt to totally eradicate the virus when confronted with the Delta variant, coupled with a slow vaccination rollout. Scientists have warned 'zero Covid' is near impossible with the Delta strain, which is many times more infectious than the original virus that emerged in China. In Sydney, the rapid rise in Covid-19 patients has forced the major Westmead and Blacktown hospitals, which service the city's sprawling suburbs, to erect tents to screen and swab patients to help manage capacity. The makeshift unit in the emergency department for COVID-19 patients will help 'to offload delays', a Western Sydney Local Health District spokesperson. New South Wales (NSW) state, where Sydney is the capital, reported 1,029 new locally acquired cases, exceeding the previous record of 919 a day earlier. Of the new cases, 969 were detected in greater Sydney, up from 838. State Premier Gladys Berejiklian said authorities had quadrupled the number of the state's intensive care ventilators to 2,000 early last year. Although the system is 'under pressure', it can withstand the current crisis once vaccination rates rise, she said. 'It might be different to the help you got before because of the situation, but please know the system is kicking in,' Berejiklian said at a televised media conference Of 116 people in intensive care in NSW, 102 are not vaccinated. Three new deaths were reported, including a man in his 30s who died at home, taking deaths from the latest outbreak to 79, although the death rate has slowed since last year. In a video posted on Twitter Wednesday night, the Australian Paramedic Association said paramedics were given a choice to wait in their vehicles with infected people or 'wait outside in the freezing rain' due to the rise in patients. Meanwhile in New Zealand, Ardern said the strict nationwide lockdown enforced to stamp out COVID-19 was helping limit the spread of the Delta variant, despite the number of new cases rising on Thursday. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has defended her 'Covid zero' elimination strategy amid fears an outbreak of the highly transmissible Delta variant has rendered the policy ineffective A Delta case emerged in Auckland last week, ending a six-month run without local transmission in New Zealand, one of the world's last Covid-free zones. That infection has since ballooned into the largest cluster the country has recorded throughout the entire pandemic, with 277 cases. Ardern said she believed even the Delta strain could again be stamped out in the community and health experts were advising her to stick with the elimination approach. 'In their view, it's not only possible, it remains the best strategy and I totally agree,' she said Thursday after announcing 68 new community cases. Her Australian counterpart Scott Morrison this week said it was 'just absurd' to try to eliminate Delta, adding: 'New Zealand can't do that.' Australia pursued a Covid-zero policy for about 18 months, but runaway Delta outbreaks mean some authorities there are now talking more about containment than elimination. The New Zealand Herald this week asked if Ardern was 'chasing rainbows' trying to quash Delta and even her Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins conceded it raised 'big questions' about the policy's effectiveness. Ardern said she was 'not fussed' by such concerns, pointing to the success of a pandemic response in New Zealand which has resulted in just 26 deaths among a population of five million. 'We wanted to save people's lives, and we have; We wanted to try to have people's lives lived as normally as possible, and we've had some of the shortest periods of restrictions of any country,' she said. 'And we wanted to save jobs and the economy, with the economy running at pre-Covid levels, we've done that too.' Staff members perform a test at the Museum of New Zealand in Wellington amid harsh lockdown measures and rising Covid cases Ardern said Delta had forced tweaks to the elimination strategy - such as a faster national lockdown and more extensive testing - but it was still a valid goal. She said New Zealand could examine alternative policies when it improved vaccination rates, which are currently among the lowest in the developed world, with about 20 percent of the population fully inoculated. 'No one wants to use lockdowns forever and that is not our intention... but for now, while we vaccinate, elimination is the goal and we can do it,' she said. Meanwhile, the fast-moving Delta strain has taken the gloss off Australia's early success against the virus that kept its coronavirus numbers relatively low, with some 47,700 cases and 989 deaths. About 32 per cent of people above 16 have been fully vaccinated while just over 54 per cent have had at least one dose. Besides Sydney, the country's second-largest city, Melbourne, and capital, Canberra, are also in hard lockdowns, putting more than half of the country's 25 million population under strict stay-at-home orders. Cases in Victoria, home to Melbourne, surged to 80 on Thursday, up from 45 a day earlier. The federal government is pushing ahead with the country's reopening plans once vaccination rates reach 70%-80%, but some states have hinted they may delay given the rapid growth of cases in Sydney. Berejiklian said NSW may reach 70% fully vaccinated by mid-October, and airline Qantas said it was preparing for international travel to resume in December. Also on Thursday, grocer Woolworths Group reported a surge in annual profit as lockdowns sparked demand for household essentials. The NHS has drawn up plans to offer Covid vaccines to children as young as 12 when schools return, in a sign Britain is edging towards routinely jabbing youngsters. NHS England bosses yesterday told trusts to be ready to expand the roll out to 12 to 15-year-olds in just two weeks' time as scientists warned the virus will 'rip through schools' unless pupils are immunised before the new term. But some scientists have said it would be better in the long run for children to catch Covid naturally and build up immunity from an early age. Children would not need parental consent to get the vaccine under the new plans, health officials told The Telegraph. Figures show that, despite schools being out for summer, secondary-aged children are fuelling the third wave of infections along with older teens and young adults. There are fears there could be an explosion in cases when classrooms go back next week. Britain's medical regulator, the MHRA, has already said the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are safe and effective for the age group. But the Joint Committee on Vaccinations and Immunisations (JCVI) which advises No10 on jabs and is separate from the MHRA is yet to green light to the plans. It claims the small risk of side effects may still outweigh the benefit due to the fact young children are very unlikely to be badly ill with Covid. Leaked emails reveal NHS trusts in England have until 4pm on Friday to have plans in place for the rollout in children. All 16 and 17-year-olds are already being invited for the Pfizer vaccine and don't need permission from a parent or guardian to get one. But only under-16s who live with vulnerable people or who have immune weaknesses themselves are being invited at present. Some experts today called on No10's top scientists to approve vaccinations for teenagers warning that the Delta variant would 'fly through schools'. But others said they were 'right to be cautious' about vaccinating over-12s. Scientists pushing back against the move today argued it may be better for children to catch Covid and recover to develop natural immunity than to be reliant on protection from vaccines, which studies suggest wanes within months. The NHS is drawing up plans to vaccinate 12 to 15-year-olds in England, reports suggest. Latest Public Health England data showed Covid cases are rising fastest among 10 to 19-year-olds (green line). The second highest infection rate was in 20 to 29-year-olds (yellow line), but this had fallen compared to the previous week. Approving Covid vaccines for 12 to 15-year-olds will help curb the spread of the virus in the age group Latest estimates from a symptom-tracking app suggested under-18s had the second highest number of Covid cases in the country (blue line). Only 18 to 35-year-olds had a higher number of Covid cases (orange line). The data is from the ZOE Covid Symptom Study The JCVI is under pressure to approve Covid vaccines for 12 to 15-year-olds. Professor Devi Sridhar (left) today said they should approve the jab for teenagers because the Delta variant was 'flying through schools'. But SAGE scientist Professor Russell Viner (right) said they were 'right to be cautious' about jabbing the age group Britain's national roll out has already inoculated almost nine in ten adults in the country Scientists at war over jabbing children: Experts say youngsters may get 'better and longer immunity' if they catch Covid naturally Scientists were at war over vaccinating children against Covid today after it was revealed the NHS has put plans in place to jab secondary school pupils without their parent's consent. Health service bosses have told trusts to be ready to roll out jabs to all 12 to 15-year-olds in two weeks, in a sign the country is edging closer towards routinely jabbing youngsters. Experts pushing back against the move today argued it may be better for children to catch Covid and recover to develop natural immunity than to be reliant on protection from vaccines, which studies suggest wanes in months. Professor David Livermore, a medical microbiologist at the University of East Anglia, told MailOnline the world will need to live with Covid for years if not decades so having a generation of children with natural immunity would help prevent cases spiralling later down the line. He said natural infection could be a 'a better first step in the lifelong co-existence' with the virus than rolling out the jabs. But the move to jab healthy kids for Covid has been backed by several high profile experts who have warned the virus could 'rip through' the country again if children are allowed back into schools with no protection. Latest figures from Public Health England's (PHE) surveillance report showed secondary school children have the highest rate of infection in the country despite schools not even being back yet. And a survey today revealed almost two thirds of children would like to get a jab. Children have only a small risk of becoming seriously ill with Covid and a vanishingly small chance of death, while Pfizer and Moderna's vaccines are associated with rare cases of heart inflammation in young people. Professor Paul Hunter, an infectious disease expert at the University of East Anglia, said the risks of side effects currently outweighs the dangers posed by Covid itself for most children. And he added 'as much as half' of all teens would already have had the virus, referencing estimates from the Office for National Statistics, and therefore have natural immunity already and not need a jab. Professor Hunter also said that vaccinating children would be purely for the benefit of adults, which could be seen as ethically 'dubious'. Advertisement The Department of Health which has asked the JCVI for a recommendation on jabbing 12 to 15-year-olds said a decision is yet to be taken. Both Moderna and Pfizer's jabs have been linked to myocarditis, a rare heart problem believed to affect around one in 20,000 young people. The JCVI has claimed the risk of heart inflammation still outweighs the benefit of Covid jabs for healthy under-16s. It is closely monitoring data from America, France and Canada which have all decided to routinely jab under-12s already. Moderna's jab has been deemed safe and effective and is expected to be rolled out in younger age groups in a similar fashion to Pfizer's. The AstraZeneca vaccine is not being recommended for under-40s in Britain because it has been linked to very rare blood clots. NHS England's regional offices emailed trusts yesterday to tell them to draw up the plans, reports The Telegraph. They were told to have the plans ready by 4pm on Friday, and be able to roll out the first doses to the age group from September 6 when schools return. Emails revealed the aim is to inoculate three quarters of 12 to 15-year-olds by the date November 1. They also say children should be deemed 'Gillick competent to provide own consent' over jabs. This refers to a legal decision in 1985, which ruled that a teenage girl could obtain contraception without her parents' involvement. The JCVI has previously insisted there is not enough data to support a roll out in this group. But the newspaper reports further research on this is about to be published. The top committee has been showing signs that it could approve vaccines for secondary school children. In July, they said: 'The minimal health benefits of offering universal Covid vaccination to children do not outweigh the potential risks.' But just two weeks later deputy chief medical officer and committee member Professor Jonathan Van-Tam said it was 'more likely, rather than less likely' that jabs would be offered to 12 to 15-year-olds. A Department of Health spokeswoman said: 'No decisions have been made on vaccinating 12-15 year olds and it is inaccurate to suggest otherwise. 'Ministers have not yet received further advice from the JCVI on this cohort. We continue to plan for a range of scenarios to ensure we are prepared for all eventualities.' There are more than 2.6million children aged 12 to 15 in England, according to population estimates from the Office for National Statistics. Latest Department of Health data showed 15 to 19-year-olds in England had the highest Covid infection rate in the country at 929.7 cases per 100,000 people, or one in 107 being infected. Children aged 10 to 14 had the fifth highest infection rate at 354.2 per 100,000, or one in 282. The Department of Health has split the population into 19 different age groups to help monitor Covid infections. People aged 20 to 24, 25 to 29 and 30 to 34 had a higher infection rate than 10 to 14-year-olds. Separate estimates from Health data science company ZOE showed there are almost 16,000 Covid cases a day among under-18s, the second highest rate in Britain. Professor Tim Spector, a top epidemiologist who leads the app, said it was likely cases would continue to rise, especially when schools return. It is not clear whether NHS Trusts in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have also been asked to draw up plans to vaccinated secondary school children. But all four nations follow advice from the JCVI on which age groups should receive the Covid vaccine. It also not clear whether 12 to 15-year-olds could be offered two doses should the JCVI recommend they are vaccinated. Currently 16 to 17-year-olds are only being offered one jab. This chart shows the Covid infection rates by age groups in England over the last three months. A darker colour (purple and blue) means an age group has a higher infection rate, while a lighter colour (yellow and green) means it has a lower infection rate. Latest data reveals that 15 to 19-year-olds have the highest Covid infection rate in England at 929.7 cases per 100,000 people, or one in 107 being infected School pupils should be tested for Covid twice a week when term starts 'to avoid a new wave' Parents must make their children take Covid tests twice a week this coming term to stop another wave ripping through schools, say ministers. A new Government campaign stresses that all secondary schools must keep up regular testing or risk another winter of chaos. Pupils in Year 7 and over will have two lateral flow tests at school, three to five days apart, and afterwards should test at home twice weekly. But the system will rely largely on trust, with no feasible way for schools to check on each pupil every week. Ministers are today launching a major advertising drive aimed at parents and teenagers, urging them to do their duty. Fronting the campaign are Dr Ranj Singh, star of ITV's This Morning, and Olympian swimmer Matt Richards. Jenny Harries, head of the UK Health Security Agency, said: 'It is vital that we continue rapid testing in schools to help uncover hidden cases of the virus at the start of term. 'We encourage children to come into school to take their first tests in person and then to continue testing twice a week from home.' Health Secretary Sajid Javid added: 'I urge parents to encourage their children to take regular tests, to help break chains of transmission and stop the virus spreading.' There are fears the virus could take off again when schools go back over the next two weeks. Advertisement The JCVI is coming under pressure to approve Covid vaccines for over-12s from some scientists. Professor Devi Sridhar, a global public health expert at Edinburgh University, said 12 to 15-year-olds should be offered the vaccine 'urgently' with the Delta variant set to 'fly through schools'. She told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'I think right now, if we know the options with Delta, given how infectious it is, is that either you're going to be exposed to Covid without any protection or you can be exposed and have a vaccine. 'And we should be offering teens that vaccine so they have that protection before going back to schools.' She added that the JCVI were being 'very cautious', which was costing the country valuable time. 'They're waiting and watching and I guess the issue with a pandemic is that waiting and watching costs time,' she said. 'And time is the currency now that matters because it's not like we can wait and watch and in six months say 'OK, it's safe, let's vaccinate'. 'In those six months if a large percentage of 12 to 15-year-olds get infected, in some ways they've lost that window of time and so I think perhaps they don't feel the urgency that they should be feeling given it's an emergency situation and we have Delta, which is so infectious. I mean, it's just flying through schools as we know. 'But not just here, Germany, Denmark, even places like New Zealand and Australia are struggling with Delta compared to the original virus.' But SAGE scientist Professor Russell Viner backed the JCVI this morning, and said they were 'right to be cautious' about the decision to vaccinate over-12s. He told the Today programme: 'We would be vaccinating teenagers largely to protect adults, because the benefit to them is low, and if we're going to do that the safety bar needs to be exceptionally high.' Professor Viner said scientists needed to 'really bottom out the risk' posed by a rare heart inflammation that has been reported as a side effect of the Pfizer jab. 'My belief is that once we have more data and we have really bottomed out the risk from this rare heart inflammation, that in a few months we will undoubtedly be doing this but it is right to be cautious.' Professor Spector has also backed the JCVI's more cautious approach to inoculating the age group. He told MailOnline: 'We believe that the government and JCVI are proceeding with appropriate caution as this is a very new situation for everyone and the last thing we want to do is give people booster vaccines that don't need it. 'We hope there will be an announcement soon on the booster strategy.' Britain has been accused of being sluggish to roll out the Covid vaccine to other age groups, as its vaccination drive fell behind other countries. 9m children miss out on dentist Under one in four children saw an NHS dentist last year with nine million missing out on care due to the pandemic. The NHS delivered 3.3million courses of dental treatment to under-18s from April 2020 to March 2021 down 70 per cent on the previous year. Just 23 per cent had an appointment compared with 58.7 per cent before, according to figures from NHS Digital. Dentists warn many children have missed out on treatment which could avoid fillings or extractions. Dental practices were instructed to stop routine care from the end of March to early June last year. The British Dental Association said capacity remains low, with around half of NHS practices in England not meeting targets to hit 60 per cent of pre-Covid levels. Shawn Charlwood, of the BDA, said: 'Millions are still missing out on dental care and patients will be paying the price for years to come.' Advertisement US regulators approved Pfizer's jab for 12 to 15-year-olds in May, and has already got at least one dose to 40 per cent (7million) of the age group. The EU's regulator also gave the age group the green light to get the jab at the end of May, with many countries quick to start rolling it out. France began inoculating 12 to 15-year-olds in June, and more than 40 per cent (2million) have already received a first dose. Italy started rolling out jabs to the age group from July with the aim of inoclating them before schools return. The Netherlands also began rolling out the jabs to secondary school children in July. This is the comical moment a chimpanzee imitated the actions of a tourist doing push-ups at the zoo. Footage captured in the city of Chongqing in south-western China shows the 20-year-old male chimpanzee Yu Hui mimic the actions of a tourist as he presses his hands towards the glass and carries out a series of push-ups. The clever primate continues to mimic the exercise movements before standing on his feet and posing for the crowds. The 20-year-old male chimpanzee named Yu Hui mimics the actions of a tourist doing push-ups in Chongqing, south-western China The tourist presses his hands against the glass and lowers himself to the ground as crowds begin to watch During the clip, which was filmed on August 23, Yu Hui mimics the tourist behind the glass panel in front of him by positioning his hands in front of him and lowering himself to the floor. He then pushes himself back up and repeats the action as crowds gathered in front of him and applaud his skills. The chimpanzee then stands on his feet and appears to pose in front of the tourists. In 2019, Yu Hui was seen cleaning a white T-shirt with a brush and a bar of soap after watching his keeper carry out the chore. A spokesperson at the Lehe Ledu Theme Park in Chongqing said staff wanted to find out if the animal had learned how to do the laundry by observation and therefore placed a T-shirt, a brush and a bar of soap in his enclosure. As soon as Yu Hui and was let out of the building, he headed straight to the T-shirt and proceeded to dip the item of clothing in water before repeatedly rubbing the soap on it. The primate copies the tourist's actions and lowers himself to the floor before pushing himself back up The animal then looks up towards the crowds behind the glass panel and appears to pose for them He seemed to enjoy the process so much that his laundry session lasted for 30 minutes. In 2017, researchers in Sweden found chimpanzees like to imitate humans and often replicate gestures such as clapping, head-slapping and armpit-scratching. The study, which was reported in the journal Primates, observed a group of five chimpanzees and about 10,000 human visitors at Sweden's Furuvik Zoo and Lund University. The primate copied his keeper's actions and cleaned the T-shirt with a bar of soap Scientists found about 10 per cent of the actions produced by either humans or chimpanzee at the zoo was an imitation of the other species' interactions. Researcher Dr Gabriela-Alina Sauciuc said: 'Our study is the first to systematically observe and investigate if zoo-housed chimpanzees imitated visitors.' She added: 'We found a social and communicative side to chimpanzee imitation. They imitated familiar actions such as clapping, in an intentional manner, while looking towards the individual who produced those actions. 'In a few cases, they even put in an effort to come closer to the individual.' The former head of the British Army has accused Joe Biden of an 'abrogation of statesmanship' over his decision to pull US forces out of Afghanistan by August 31. Lord Richard Dannatt, who served as chief of the general staff from 2006 to 2009, said it 'makes little strategic sense' to exit the country now just to end the deployment before the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks. He suggested Mr Biden had taken the 'strategic decision merely to satisfy an election slogan' to end the so-called 'forever war'. Lord Dannatt also said calls for an inquiry into 'higher-level decision-making' during the Afghanistan conflict 'must not fall on deaf or politically embarrassed ears'. Lord Richard Dannatt, who served as chief of the general staff from 2006 to 2009, said it 'makes little strategic sense' to exit the country now just to end the deployment before the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks Lord Dannatt suggested Mr Biden had taken the 'strategic decision merely to satisfy an election slogan' to end the so-called 'forever war' Boris Johnson and other NATO allies had urged the US President to push the deadline back to provide more time for airlifts from Kabul airport. But Mr Biden has opted to stick to his exit date, amid fears in Washington that delaying the close of the mission could put US troops at greater risk of attack from the Taliban or Isis. Mr Biden declared earlier this year that 'it is time to end the forever war' in the country as he laid the groundwork for the withdrawal. Writing in The Telegraph, Lord Dannatt said: 'Until last month, the Afghan National Army, supported by a modest but highly effective international force, was successfully containing the Taliban while Afghan civil society continued to develop. 'In this context, the precipitate decision by Mr Biden to end the so-called forever war by the 20th anniversary of 9/11 makes little strategic sense. 'Indeed, to take a strategic decision merely to satisfy an election slogan is an abrogation of statesmanship.' Lord Dannatt said the decision to leave the country by August 31 is 'the latest in a series of errors that have characterised the Afghan campaign'. Backing demands for a probe into the handling of the conflict, he added: 'Recent calls for an inquiry into the higher-level decision-making in the Afghan campaign must not fall on deaf or politically embarrassed ears. 'Errors need to be exposed, lessons learnt and processes changed to ensure that the UK is better placed for the future.' Lord Dannatt warned the chaotic departure from Afghanistan will harm the reputation of NATO. He said that 'one wonders how impressed, or amused' China will be at the arrival of the UK Carrier Group in the South China Sea given that a 'near medieval group such as the Taliban can humble the world's only superpower, and by association ourselves'. A married father-of-two from Kansas has been identified as one of the two hikers who have died on the same Death Valley trail just days apart amid scorching temperatures in the area. On Saturday, Blake Chaplin, 52, from Leawood, Kansas, was found dead on the Golden Canyon Trail in Death Valley National Park, California. A search-and-rescue team recovered the body after it was reported by an early morning hiker. His cause of death has not been revealed. Blake Chaplin, 52, from Kansas, died while hiking in California's Death Valley on Saturday. His death came just three days after another hiker succumbed to heatstroke on the same trail The two hikers have died amid rocketing summer temperatures in the area (file image) Days earlier, on August 18, the body of Lawrence Stanback, 60, of San Francisco, was recovered by park officials on the same trail. He is suspected of succumbing to heatstroke according to Fox News, but the circumstances surrounding their deaths have not been reported. 'Although these temperatures may be cooler compared to the typical Death Valley Summer Day, precautions should still be taken while visiting in the heat,' the park said in a statement. According to social media posts, Chaplin is survived by his wife of nearly 20 years, Katie, and their two daughters. A graduate of Purdue University, Chaplin had worked for General Motors in Kansas for more than 23 years, rising to the position of a production group leader at the automaker's Kansas City plant, which produces Chevy Malibu and Cadillac XT4 models. Chaplin's wife is employed as a group leader at General Motors, according to her LinkedIn profile. Grieving loved ones have been leaving touching tributes on an online memorial page dedicated to Chaplin, describing him as a great husband, father and friend. 'Blake was my buddy, my friend, my confidant,' wrote Chaplin's co-worker Catherine Coughennower. 'He was a great listener, a great advisor and he ALWAYS looked on the bright side.' Blake lived in Leawood, Kansas, with wife Katie (pictured left) and the couple's two daughters. Chaplin is pictured with one of his girls, right Chaplin's cause of death has not been disclosed as of Thursday. He is pictured as a younger man with one of his daughters Another colleague, Thomas Ruiz, praised Chaplin as 'a true gentleman, honest , trustworthy and a big kid at heart.' On August 15, mercury in Death Valley hit 130 degrees, and may have been the hottest temperature on Earth ever recorded. The temperature was reached at 3.41pm Pacific time, according to the National Weather Service. If verified, the reading would break Death Valley's previous August record by three degrees, the Weather Service tweeted. On Saturday, Blake Chaplin, 52, from Kansas, was found dead on the Golden Canyon Trail in Death Valley National Park, California, where another body was found days earlier On August 18, the body of Lawrence Stanback, 60, of San Francisco, was recovered by park officials on the same trail. He is suspected of succumbing to heatstroke (file image) Death Valley currently holds the record for the hottest temperature ever recorded on Earth - a record set on July 10, 1913, of 134 degrees, and current temperatures are coming close. The roasting temperature came as a heat wave continues to grip much of the western United States. More than 80 million people were under heat alerts Friday from the Central and Southern Plains as well as for nearly the entire West Coast. A deadly 'heat dome' capped North America's hottest month of June on record, as wildfires continue to burn across the state. The 'heat dome lasted from June 26 to July 1, killing 116 people in Oregon and another 78 in Washington State as temperatures soared up to more than 95 degrees. It also caused some areas in the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia to hit as high as 115 degrees. This comes after a family were found dead in an area of the Sierra National Forest known as Devil's Gulch earlier this month. Signage warns of extreme heat danger inside Death Valley National Park in a file photo. The official temperature in the California national park hit 130 degrees in July Investigators are probing phones belonging to Jonathan Gerrish, 45, his wife, Ellen Chung, 31, in the hopes of finding a final recording that could solve the riddle of their deaths. Jeremy Briese, sheriff of Mariposa County, told The Times of London he was hoping the phones would reveal whether the couple made any phone calls or recorded any messages before their deaths. 'We've searched from the air and foot and all over looking for anything that may give us a clue to what occurred,' Briese said. 'Basically it's baffling and we've got to work through the different scenarios looking for answers.' Gerrish, Chung, their one-year-old daughter Miju, and their dog Oksi were found by search teams. Police are still awaiting the results of autopsy and toxicology reports following the deaths of Jonathan Gerrish, 45, his wife, Ellen Chung, 31, which are expected to take several weeks There were no signs of foul play and no traumatic injuries indicated at the scene, where Briese said, Miju was 'in a backpack carrier near the dad, but not on the dad,' and Chung was found about 30 yards away. Officials had been looking into whether poisonous algae killed the family but lifted the hazmat declaration on Wednesday. The bodies of the family were airlifted out of the area that afternoon. Police are still waiting on the results of post-mortem examinations. Further toxicology reports could take up to six weeks. Autopsies and toxicology tests are planned for Thursday in Stanislaus County. Samples from their water bottles have also been sent to toxicology labs, and a necropsy on their family dog has been planned. California State Water Resources Control Board and Mariposa County are now re-testing the river water for cyanobacterial toxins, which can form in algal blooms. Advertisement Police searching for missing Claudia Lawrence began uncovering the floor of a fishing lake today and combing woodland as her mother urged detectives to look at double murderer Christopher Halliwell again. North Yorkshire Police this morning began searching through the waters eight miles from her York home, using machinery to remove mould and rocks from beneath the surface. Meanwhile officers on land conducted fingertip searches through leafy woodland as the hunt intensified. Detective Superintendent Wayne Fox said: 'I thank the public for the positive responses and new information received in support of the current phase of the investigation. 'Our focus is on finding Claudia and bringing those responsible for her disappearance and suspected murder to justice.' It came as Claudia's mother Joan Lawrence said she feared the double killer could be connected to the case. Keen fisherman and cabbie Halliwell, 57, is behind bars for life for murdering Sian O'Callaghan, 22, and Becky Godden, 20, after snatching them from nightclubs. But many connected to his case believe he has further victims, including Ms Godden's mother who has previously said she knew of a witness who saw Halliwell talking to Claudia back in 2019 before she disappeared. Stephen Fulcher the detective superintendent who caught the killer has also gone on record to say there were 'clear indications' he had other victims, although did not go as far as name them. The date of the year Claudia disappeared is also the same date years later Halliwell abducted and killed Sian. It is thought the day is significant because he was dumped on that same day by an ex over a decade ago. Joan said today: 'Something always bothered me about Halliwell and leaves me feeling very uneasy. Police divers are pumping air into the bottom of the lake surface to remove silt and debris to search underneath The police operation is so large experts said it must have been prompted by a piece of specific intelligence on the lake The equipment is not big enough to drain the lake but will be used to displace the ground below to uncover clues. Police divers are searching a fishing lake for any clues as to what happened to Claudia after she vanished 12 years ago Police divers are currently searching the waters at a fishing lake at Sand Hutton in an effort to crack the 12-year-old case Halliwell, 57, is behind bars for life for murdering Sian O'Callaghan, 22, and Becky Godden, 20, in two brutal attacks Joan Lawrence said she feared killer Christopher Halliwell could be connected to the case after learning of lake development Police officers are back again at gravel pits in land at Sand Hutton to the east of York used by fisherman over the years 'The police may not have proved he had anything to do with my daughter's disappearance, but they haven't disproved it either,' she added to the Mirror. Miss Lawrence was reported missing after she failed to arrive for work at the University of York on March 18, 2009. The police's sudden interest in the area at Sand Hutton to the east of York could only have been sparked by new information, a friend told MailOnline yesterday. Specialist officers and staff, including underwater search teams, and forensic experts are expected to spend days at the site. Peter Faulding of Specialist Group International, a diving forensic team not involved in this search, told MailOnline it appeared as if they were trying to displace silt and debris on the lake floor. He said: 'I think what they are doing is using a suction dredge that will remove gravel and leaf mould from the pit by sucking it to the surface where is passes through a mesh to enable the forensic teams to look for any evidence. 'This suction dredge is controlled by a diver on the bottom in a specific grid pattern so nothing is missed. 'They will also be conducting fine fingertip searches over the same area and using underwater metal detectors for items of jewelry and other evidence. 'I would imagine they are searching with some very good intelligence.' Halliwell, 57, is currently serving two life sentences for murdering Sian (left) and Becky (right) Police search teams arrive on site as North Yorkshire Police investigate the disappearance The fishing spot near York, is being searched by police investigating the suspected murder North Yorkshire Police said its latest search at Sand Hutton gravel pits could take many days The force said it could not disclose what had led officers to the location eight miles from York Sian O'Callaghan and Halliwell's confession 2011 March 18: Sian O'Callaghan, 22, goes for a night out with friends in Swindon. She fails to return home and is reported missing the following day by her family. March 24: Halliwell is arrested. An 'urgent interview' is carried out by detectives. Halliwell starts journey to Gable Cross police station but is diverted to Barbury Castle where he meets Det Supt Fulcher. Halliwell shows detectives the location where he hid Miss O'Callaghan's body and later directs them to Eastleach, Gloucestershire, where years earlier he had buried missing sex worker Becky Godden-Edwards. March 26: Halliwell is charged with the murder of Miss O'Callaghan. May 23: Halliwell is charged with murder of Miss Godden-Edwards. 2012 January 30: A trial judge, Mrs Justice Cox, rules Halliwell's confessions to the murders of both women are inadmissible because of breaches of Pace. October 19: Halliwell pleads guilty to the murder of Miss O'Callaghan during a hearing at Bristol Crown Court and jailed for life with a minimum of 25 years. 2014 - May 15: Mr Fulcher resigns from the police force after he was found guilty of misconduct for not reading Halliwell his rights when he first confessed to killing Miss Godden-Edwards. 2015 February 18: Halliwell is arrested on suspicion of the murder of Miss Godden-Edwards. He tells Superintendent Sean Memory he will accept responsibility for Miss Godden-Edwards' murder provided the police do not ask further questions about other offences he may have committed. 2016 March 30: Halliwell is charged with Miss Godden-Edwards' murder. September 5: Halliwell goes on trial at Bristol Crown Court for Miss Godden-Edwards' murder. September 19: Halliwell is convicted of Miss Godden-Edwards' murder. September 23: Halliwell is sentenced to a whole life order by the judge, and will never be released. Advertisement Authors of a new book The New Millennium Serial Killer say he targeted petite women over a 20-year period. Former police intelligence officer Chris said: 'The pair were spotted by witnesses at the side of the road talking, perhaps arguing. 'We believe Claudia then left with Halliwell in his vehicle.' The sighting was also relayed to Joan by Ms Godden's mother Karen Edwards. Karen said in 2017: 'This witness said he saw Halliwell talking to Claudia through a taxi window. 'Claudia was asking if he had change so she could ring her dad from a call box.' Former detective Mr Fulcher also believes the killer has more victims yet to be discovered. He said earlier this year: 'It's a matter of justice that crimes attributable to Halliwell are thoroughly and vigorously pursued. 'There are clear indications there are other victims. 'For the next of kin of those victims, there are consequences of their daughter missing day after day, when there appears to be no effort to seek at least to resolve the matter 'For the next of kin of victims they don't cease to suffer as a consequence of missing their daughter. 'The cost of the crimes that Halliwell committed is incalculable. 'If you don't investigate homicide then there's really no reason to have a police force.' North Yorkshire Police has previously dismissed any link, saying: 'It can be confirmed on information provided by Wiltshire Police, that there are no known links between Halliwell and the Claudia Lawrence case.' It did not respond to MailOnline this morning when asked again if there was any connection. Yesterday Martin Dales, a friend of Miss Lawrence's late father Peter, told MailOnline: 'The police did everything they could at the time, searching the river, the waters at the university. 'You don't press the button on an operation like this unless there is a good reason for it. 'There must have been some kind of new information about this area. 'I can think of a lot of places as far away that have not been searched before. 'I don't know where the decision to search here has come from - nobody knew anything about it.' Workers in protective suits sprayed disinfectant through the streets in southern China after the coronavirus lockdown was lifted in the region. Clouds of disinfects blew through the streets of Zhangjiajie in the Hunan Province after workers were deployed to the area on August 25. Footage later showed hundreds of residents emerging from their homes with flags in their hands as they celebrated the easing of Covid-19 restrictions. The scenes come after some 1.5million residents were ordered to remain in their homes in the tourist destination of Zhangjiajie, near Zhuzhou, on July 29 following an outbreak of the fast-spreading Delta variant. Workers in protective suits spray clouds of disinfectant through the streets of Zhangjiajie in the Hunan Province, China, on August 25 The workers douse the streets with disinfectant after the region was placed into lockdown on July 29 During the clip, workers in protective clothing stand in a line as they walk through the streets and douse the area with disinfectant. Last month millions of people were placed back into lockdown in China as the country tried to contain the Delta variant as it reached over 20 cities and more than a dozen provinces. The latest surge, which state media labelled the 'most extensive outbreak of Covid since Wuhan', began when airport workers in Nanjing who had cleaned a plane that arrived from Russia later tested positive for the virus. Local governments in major cities including Beijing tested millions of residents, while cordoning off residential compounds and placing close contacts under quarantine. And the city of Zhangjiajie was also placed into lockdown after an outbreak spread among theatre patrons who then brought the virus back to their homes around the country. Officials said at the time they were urgently seeking people who had recently travelled from Nanjing or Zhangjiajie, and urged tourists not to travel to areas where cases had been found. The streets are sprayed with disinfectant after some 1.5million residents were ordered to remain in their homes in the tourist destination of Zhangjiajie last month Millions of people were placed back into lockdown in China last month as the country tried to contain the Delta variant The central city of Zhuzhou in Hunan province also ordered more than 1.2million residents to stay home under strict lockdown for three days as it rolled out a citywide testing and vaccination campaign, according to an official statement. Meanwhile, Beijing blocked tourists from entering the capital during the peak summer holiday travel season. The Delta variant, which first emerged in India and is much more transmissible than the original version of Covid, has proved particularly hard to control for many countries which until now had relied on border closures to keep cases low. Coupled with low vaccination rates, such countries - most of which are in Asia - are now seeing cases rise to record or near-record levels with leaders rushing to impose lockdowns. Cases are also at or near all-time highs in Japan and South Korea, though strict domestic lockdown measures there have slowed the kind of exponential growth that is being seen elsewhere. A Covid-positive man wanted by cops after allegedly refusing to isolate and evading police for nearly two weeks has been arrested in Sydney's west. Anthony Karam, 27, was arrested by Bankstown police just before 5.30pm on Thursday at an apartment in Wentworth Point. Mr Karam was previously known to police and tested positive for the disease on August 14, cops say, but allegedly refused to self-isolate at home. He allegedly refused to answer calls from health officials who then brought in police but when they tried to visit his home, they allegedly discovered the address he gave was fake. On August 23 police issued a public warning about him after they could not make contact in which officers dubbed him 'public health enemy No. 1'. Covid-positive Anthony Karam (pictured) was arrested by NSW Police after they say he reneged on a deal to turn himself in after he allegedly refused to self-isolate Karam allegedly went on the run while infected, potentially spreading the disease to thousands across the state. CCTV footage of Karam released by police shows him coughing while in an apartment block lift. Police allegedly previously made contact with him through a third party and thought they had negotiated a deal to bring him in off the streets, The Daily Telegraph reported. But they claim the deal fell through, which sparked a renewed manhunt for him. The situation was considered so serious that police used Section 62 of the Public Health Act for the first time to name and identify Karam to help in the search. Anthony Karam, 27, seen here in CCTV footage from a lift in an apartment block, has been branded Sydney's 'public health enemy number one' A doctor who had feelings for his flatmate created fake screenshots and sent him threatening messages in an attempt to sabotage his relationships, a court has heard. General practitioner Javed Saumtally went so far as to send himself abusive texts and invented a police officer as part of his web of deception, prosecutors say. He allegedly told the elaborate lies - complete with false reports to police - while living in Brighton, East Sussex, in 2018. The 28-year-old, who now lives in Ipswich, Suffolk, appeared at Hove Crown Court for trial on Wednesday afternoon after denying a charge of perverting the course of justice. Javed Saumtally, 28, (pictured) who had feelings for his flatmate created fake screenshots and sent him threatening messages in an attempt to sabotage his relationships, a court has heard Opening the case, prosecutor Jonathan Atkinson said the various lies were part of a 'concerted ploy by Mr Saumtally to deliberately undermine the relationships of his flatmate ... to (make him) feel under threat and harassed as a result, all the while pretending to act as an understanding friend and companion.' In his actions, Saumtally was 'motivated by his own feelings' for his male flatmate, the prosecutor added. Mr Atkinson said the defendant set about 'sending abusive and derogatory messages from unknown numbers' to his flatmate but also to himself, 'no doubt to make it look like he was also a victim and to deflect attention away from him'. He made use of fake messaging applications and websites in order to furnish his deception, the court heard. Dr Saumtally has denied perverting the course of justice and is on trial at Hove Crown Court One such fake message, the court heard, pretended to be to received by Saumtally from a man his flatmate knew and said: '...I am going to ruin his life'. When a man his flatmate had been seeing returned from a trip to Portugal, he was met with screenshots of WhatsApp messages he had supposedly sent, suggesting he had been seeing other people on the trip. These messages, the prosecution say, were 'faked'. The defendant denies the charge and the trial, which is expected to last about a week, continues. Advertisement Croatia could be moved to Britain's travel 'amber list' today while the Caribbean island of St Lucia may end up on the 'red list' as Ministers prepare to update the Government's traffic light rules. Morocco, Jamaica, Algeria, Nigeria and Ghana are also under threat of moving to the red list, as Transport Secretary Grant Shapps unveils the latest changes to the categories this afternoon. Extra countries being added to the toughest tier would require more returning travellers to stay in a quarantine hotel. Spain, France, Portugal and Greece are all expected to remain on the 'amber list', but Poland, Saudi Arabia, Czech Republic and Hungary are the main candidates to move to the 'green list'. Croatia could go from green to amber. Travel experts also expect Turkey and Pakistan to remain on the red list despite rumours they could be moved, although it is hoped that the Maldives could be at least one country that switches from red to amber. The update will be published by the UK Government as aviation bosses continue to call for politicians to scrap testing requirements for fully-vaccinated travellers returning from green and amber nations. Predictions from coronavirus data analyst Tim White, and Paul Charles, chief executive of travel consultancy The PC Agency There are growing fears the Caribbean island of St Lucia could be added to the travel 'red list' Spain, France and Greece are all expected to remain on the 'amber list'. Promenade des Anglais in Nice, France is pictured Paul Charles, chief executive of travel consultancy The PC Agency, said there is a 'strong' case for Turkey to be moved from red to amber because it has started supplying 'substantial data' to GISAID, a global database sharing figures on genetically sequenced coronavirus test samples. However, he is not expecting it to be moved. Mr Charles said he expected 'very few traffic light changes' to be made this afternoon because the Government 'simply doesn't have the bandwidth' to deal with the situation in Afghanistan, coronavirus and the travel rules at the same time. Countries which experts believe could move between lists today Countries which could go from amber to red St Lucia Jamaica Morocco Algeria Nigeria Ghana Countries which could go from amber to green Poland Saudi Arabia Czech Republic Hungary Countries which could go from green to amber Croatia Countries which could go from red to amber Maldives Advertisement He told MailOnline: 'There won't be too many changes tonight and certainly none affecting the major European markets of Spain, Portugal, Greece or France. I'm not expecting Turkey or Pakistan to come off the red list sadly. 'We may see Morocco, Jamaica and St Lucia added to the red list. Maldives may be moved to amber from red, which would be terrific news for future bookings for the winter period. 'Croatia may be moved to amber from green. 'We should also see a widening of the green list with Poland, Saudi Arabia, Czech Republic and Hungary the main candidates.' Mr Charles, who has been analysing the traffic light movements and travel corridors since the pandemic began, also told MailOnline: 'Consumers and the travel sector are tired of the traffic light system. 'It is lacking credibility as it's still a major barrier to the mass market booking future trips with confidence, due to the government changing countries from one colour to the next at short notice. 'It's time for an overhaul, and it should be replaced by a simple, stop-go system. Either a country is red or it is open. 'There is no need for frequent changes every two or three weeks and testing should be relied upon instead when re-entering the UK. Testing at cheaper cost.' Meanwhile coronavirus data analyst Tim White warned St Lucia is 'in real peril' of being put on the red list as 'the numbers keep getting worse'. He said 189 new daily coronavirus cases on the island have been reported, which is 83 per cent more than a week ago. Two additional deaths have been confirmed. Mr White said Morocco, Algeria, Nigeria and Ghana could also be put on the 'red list'. Holidaymakers wanting to return from Morocco before a change in status came into force could struggle to find flights due to a lack of spare capacity as a result of the upcoming August bank holiday weekend which is a major period for travel. Transport Secretary Grant Shapps is expected to unveil the latest changes to the categories this afternoon Experts fear St Lucia could be added to the 'red list' because of a spike in coronavirus cases on the island Experts also believe the countries of Morocco, Ghana and Nigeria could be added to the top tier But it is thought that the holiday hotspots of Greece, France and Spain will all remain on the 'amber list' It came as the boss of Gatwick Airport called for the Government to scrap the testing requirements for fully-vaccinated travellers arriving in the UK from green and amber locations. All arrivals from 'green list' locations must take a pre-departure test and another after they land. Those travelling from an amber country must take the same tests, plus a second post-arrival test. Chief executive Stewart Wingate said ending tests for double-jabbed passengers is vital to avoid the UK's aviation sector 'falling further behind' countries in Europe and North America. He explained: 'If our Government would to do that and follow the lead of other European nations then we believe the pent up demand will start to flow through and passenger volumes will start to recover. 'In the UK, we're at about 15-20 per cent of our pre-pandemic passenger volumes. France and Germany are at about 50-60 per cent of pre-pandemic passenger volumes. 'With that easing of travel restrictions, we should expect to see a very sharp recovery.' roblems kicked off in store when the man was apparently abusive to customers This is the moment a shoplifting suspect smashes up a display in a bid to make a high-speed mobility scooter escape from Waitrose with a bottle of booze as five security staff race to stop him. The disabled man also hurled his crutches at workers during the incident at the Waitrose Bloomsbury store in Camden, London, on August 10. Problems kicked off in the branch when the man was apparently abusive to customers. Staff then challenged him after he is believed to have taken a bottle of spirits. He began shouting at those attempting to detain him, sending goods flying as he tried to leave before five men jumped on his scooter. Police officers attended the store after being called to reports of shoplifting and no further action was taken, said the Met. Staff at the Waitrose Bloomsbury store in Camden, London, challenged the disabled man (pictured above) after he is believed to have taken a bottle of spirits from a nearby shelf Problems kicked off at the branch when the man was apparently abusive to customers. Police officers attended the store after being called to reports of shoplifting and no further action was taken, said the Met In a video, the man can be heard screaming: 'I've not done anything, get your hands off me!' One staff member appears to shout 'get out', to which he replies: 'I'm not getting out.' A worker takes away his crutches, with the man saying: 'Get out my f***ing way. What are you doing? You keep on assaulting me.' 'Get your f***ing hands off', he continues as other shoppers watch the scene unfold. The man then travels towards the double exit doors, knocking into a display before he is grabbed by the neck by one staff member. He repeats: 'Get your f***ing hands off me', while an employee says to call the police as a group of five of them try to stop the mobility scooter user from leaving. A worker takes away his crutches, with the man saying: 'Get out my f***ing way. What are you doing? You keep on assaulting me.' He then travels towards the double exit doors The man knocks into a display before he is grabbed by the neck by one staff member. A spokeswoman for Waitrose said: 'We're grateful to the police for their assistance and have cooperated fully with their investigations' Another crutch is filmed being thrown as one worker appears to remove a bottle of alcohol from the man's scooter. The group then try to drag him back into the store with one saying: 'You're not going anywhere', as the man shouts: 'Let go, let go'. A spokeswoman for the Met said they were called to the incident on August 10. She stated: 'Police were called at around 22:00hrs on Tuesday, 10 August, to reports of shoplifting at a shop on Handel Street, Bloomsbury. The man repeats: 'Get your f***ing hands off me', while an employee says to call the police as a group of them try to stop the mobility scooter user from leaving 'Officers attended and spoke to staff who alleged that a male had attempted to leave the shop without paying for items and when challenged caused criminal damage. 'He was detained by staff before police arrival. Officers spoke to all parties and no further action was taken.' A spokeswoman for Waitrose said: 'While we're unable to discuss individuals, our Partners and security team acted to protect the safety of our customers and Partners in the shop at the time. 'We're grateful to the police for their assistance and have cooperated fully with their investigations.' Advertisement Australia's ski resorts are blanketed in inches of fresh snow without a happy family in sight as they brace for their worst season yet, with locked down Victorians and New South Wales residents banned from hitting the slopes. While both states bunker down, snow has covered the slopes at Perisher valley in NSW, with heartbreaking images emerging of an eerily empty resort that was once bustling with tourism. As a wintry chill swept through the state's Snowy Mountains region on Wednesday, chair lifts no longer operated along the alpine slopes, snow mobiles sat idle and accommodation remained unoccupied. Pictured: Empty chair lifts are seen at Perisher Valley on Wednesday after a statewide lockdown forced the ski resort to cease operation with tourism operators concerned they'll see no activity its last month of ski season In cruel timing, Perisher recorded 8cm of snowfall in the last seven days amid the same period the ski resort was forced to shut after the announcement of a state-wide lockdown on August 14. Residents in regional areas could only leave their homes for essential work and study - that cannot be done at home, healthcare and exercise, with non-essential retail closing and hospitality venues operating as takeaway only. Prior to the state-wide health restrictions ski resorts scrambled with last minute cancellations from locked-down Sydneysiders as they relied on tourists from regional areas to fill the gap. The Alpine community faced yet another blow on Thursday after the NSW government said it was extending the state-wide stay at home orders until September 10, leaving just three weeks left of the ski season. Pictured: Snow blanketed the Perisher ski resort overnight, recording 8cm of snowfall in the last 7 days during the same period the resort announced its closure during the NSW statewide lockdown Pictured: Perisher snow mobiles sit idle as a statewide lockdown extension was announced until September 10 forcing thousands of residents to remain locked-down in their homes across the state 'The announcement of the regional lockdown extension is more difficult news for our Perisher community, guests and employees. It's a very uncertain time for the whole region and sadly our lifts will have to remain closed until at least 10 Sep,' said Pete Brulisauer, Chief Operating Officer Australian and Perisher. 'We encourage everyone to stay safe and do their bit, so we can all get out of lockdown as soon as possible.' Businesses and resorts in the Snowy region have already faced setbacks after it missed the crucial school holiday period in July missing out on much needed tourism dollars. Thredbo ski resort, located in the heart of Kosciuszko National Park, also remains closed amid lockdown restrictions, confirming it will pause its winter season until they are able to reopen again. Pictured: Tables and benches are left unoccupied by tourists at Charlotte Pass ski resort in the Kosciuszko National Park which is usually thriving with activity ski season 'While were incredibly disappointed to see the temporary closure of our resort, we are committed to playing our part in ensuring the health & safety of our guests, teams and our community,' the resort wrote on its website. 'We look forward to welcoming our guests back to the mountain soon.' Overnight Thredbo saw 15cm of snowfall blanket the empty alpine village as ski resort operators brace for their most challenging winter yet. Pictured: Chairlifts no longer operate along the snowfields at Charlotte Pass in the Kosciuszko National Park as Covid-19 restrictions for holiday-makers to cancel their ski trips Advertisement Britain's coronavirus outbreak continued to grow today as another 140 victims were recorded and infections and hospital admissions crept up again. Today's death toll marks a 24 per cent rise on last Thursday and means the country is now averaging 110 virus fatalities every day the highest in five months. There were also another 38,281 infections in the past 24 hours across Britain, an increase of nearly 5 per cent on the previous week, according to the Government's Covid dashboard. Latest hospital data shows there were 818 patients admitted with the virus on August 22 a small 1.7 per cent rise week-on-week. A raft of other datasets pointed to a steadily growing epidemic today. King's College London's symptom-tracking study found the number of Britons falling ill with Covid every day rose by a fifth last week - the first time it's risen in three weeks. Cases were highest in 18- to 35-year-olds, closely followed by under-18s, indicating that younger people are behind the uptick in infections. The fact secondary-aged children are fuelling the third wave of infections despite schools in England and Wales still being out for summer has raised serious concerns that there could be an explosion in cases when classes go back next week. Scotland's infection rate has doubled since schools went back there last week and officials north of the border have already admitted they will not hesitant to lockdown again if hospitalisations trend upwards. And the threat of cases spiralling out of control again has led to the NHS putting plans in place to jab secondary school pupils without their parent's consent in the next two weeks. Experts pushing back against the move today argued it may be better for children to catch Covid and recover to develop natural immunity than to be reliant on protection from vaccines, which studies suggest wanes within months. Latest figures from Public Health England's (PHE) surveillance report also showed secondary school children have the highest rate of infection in the country despite there still being a week before schools open for the Autumn term. People aged 10 to 19 in England and Wales had a case rate of 616.5 per 100,000 people in the seven days to August 22, up a third week-on-week from 472.5. The number of people falling ill with Covid in the UK has risen for the first time in three weeks, according to the ZOE symptom-tracking study Cases were highest in 18- to 35-year-olds (orange line) and under-18s (blue line), suggesting younger people are behind the recent uptick in infections Are England and Wales next? School Covid surge pushes Scotland to brink of lockdown... as scientists warn rest of UK 'certainly' next England and Wales have been told to brace for a Scotland-like surge in Covid cases in schools over the coming weeks after infections more than doubled north of the border. Daily cases in Scotland, where classrooms went back last Monday, shot up to 3,613 on Friday compared to 1,542 the previous week. Today there were 4,925 cases, up almost 50 per cent on the previous week. Nicola Sturgeon said yesterday she would not hesitant to put the country into another lockdown if hospital admissions start to trend upwards as a result. Professor Paul Hunter, an expert in medicine at the University of East Anglia, warned that England and Wales could 'certainly' expect a similar spike when classrooms return next week. Latest figures from Public Health England's (PHE) surveillance report showed secondary school children have the highest rate of infection in the country despite there still being a week before schools open for the Autumn term. People aged 10 to 19 in England and Wales had a case rate of 616.5 per 100,000 people in the seven days to August 22, up a third week-on-week from 472.5. There are now fears there could be an explosion in cases when schools return as it coincides with colder weather a known risk factor for Covid cases and there is the suggestion that vaccine immunity could wane in some people. Hospital admissions in Scotland are still stable, with 51 daily admissions on average on August 18. But there is a lag between cases and hospitalisations due to the time it takes to fall unwell. The risk of a fresh wave has renewed debate about whether to vaccinate all children aged 12 to 15, as is being done in several countries including the US, France, Canada and Italy. Advertisement It came as: Ministers prepared to update the Government's traffic light rules, with Croatia potentially to Britain's travel 'amber list' today and the Caribbean island of St Lucia tipped to end up on the 'red list'; Research suggested adults are at a greater risk of developing inflammation of the heart after catching Covid than from a vaccine; MPs have called for PCR travel tests to be scrapped for the fully vaccinated after official data showed just four in a thousand bring Covid back to the UK; Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh has branded KLM 'filthy scamming airline c***s' after they refused to let him on a flight because they did not accept his negative Covid test; A TV magician died from Covid after refusing to have the vaccine because his wife was 'super apprehensive' about getting jabbed . Some 15,309 of the cases (29 per cent) of the symptomatic cases last week were in fully vaccinated people, up from 13,604 the week before, prompting fears immunity from jabs earlier in the year may be waning. Professor Tim Spector, an epidemiologist and lead scientist on the study, said ditching social distancing and face masks on 'Freedom Day' last month has allowed Covid to find 'an opportunity to spread'. He warned that it was likely cases would continue to rise, especially with children returning to classrooms next week. Experts fear schools reopening will accelerate the current rise in cases, deaths and hospitalisations, prompting calls for children as young as 12 to be given vaccines. NHS England bosses yesterday told trusts to be ready to expand the roll out to 12 to 15-year-olds in just two weeks' time. The number of people falling ill with Covid in the UK has risen for the first time in three weeks, according to Britain's largest symptom-tracking study. Data from King's College London shows the number of daily symptomatic cases rose by about a fifth from 43,693 to 51,961 in the week ending August 21. It suggests one in 100 people are currently ill with the virus but many more are likely to be infected with no symptoms, with Office for National Statistics data suggesting one in 80 had the virus last week. Cases are highest in 18- to 35-year-olds, closely followed by under-18s, indicating that younger people are behind the uptick in infections. Data from the NHS Test and Trace today found there was a five per cent rise in infections in the week to August 18 in England. More than 200,000 tested positive for the virus during the week. The rise was in line with Department of Health figures that showed Britain's daily infections rose six per cent to 35,847, up from 33,904 the week before yesterday. Deaths also jumped by a third in a week to 149, up from the 111 recorded last Wednesday. Covid hospitalisations rose week-on-week for the twelfth day in a row after 859 admissions were recorded on August 21. There were 779 admissions seven days beforehand. Professor Spector said: 'Unfortunately, were back in a position where cases, hospitalisations and deaths are all going up and the UK has the highest rates of Covid in Europe, despite our superior vaccination rates. 'The main difference between the UK and Europe is our lack of restrictions. In many parts of Europe, people are still wearing face coverings and observing some social distancing. 'In the UK, where we eagerly declared freedom from Covid and did away with even the most basic social measures, Covid has found an opportunity to spread. 'As kids head back to the classrooms, theres a good chance cases will continue to rise from here.' The ZOE Covid Study incidence figures are based on reports from around one million weekly contributors and the proportion of newly symptomatic users who have received positive swab tests. Its latest survey figures were based on data from 25,876 recent swab tests done between August 7 and 21. The study found Covid in England was most prevalent in Yorkshire and the Humber, where one in 79 people fell ill with the virus. It was followed by London (one in 87), the North East (one in 89) and the North West (one in 94). The East Midlands had the lowest prevalence, with just one in 116 succumbing to the virus. Professor Spector said: 'Fully vaccinated people now make up nearly 30 per cent of positive cases and so its critical to be aware of the symptoms of Covid after vaccination. England and Wales have been told to brace for a Scotland-like surge in Covid cases in schools over the coming weeks after infections more than doubled north of the border. Daily cases in Scotland, where classrooms went back last Monday, shot up to 3,613 on Friday compared to 1,542 the previous week. Today there were 4,925 cases, up almost 50 per cent on the previous week Slide me Covid infections are rising in 74 out of England's 149 local authorities, official data showed today. They are surging fastest in Cornwall where they have doubled in a week following festivals and the summer holidays King's College London's symptom study found 15,309 of the cases last week (29.4 per cent)in the week ending August 21 are in fully vaccinated people (red line), up from 13,604 the week before Data from the NHS Test and Trace today found there was a five per cent rise in infections in the week to August 18 in England. Some 189,061 tested positive for the virus during the week Scientists at war over jabbing children: Experts say youngsters may get 'better and longer immunity' if they catch Covid naturally Scientists were at war over vaccinating children against Covid today after it was revealed the NHS put plans in place to jab secondary school pupils without their parent's consent. Health service bosses have told trusts to be ready to roll out jabs to all 12 to 15-year-olds in two weeks, in a sign the country is edging closer towards routinely jabbing teenagers. The move has been backed by several high profile experts who have warned the virus could 'rip through' the country again if children are allowed back into schools with no protection. Latest figures from Public Health England's (PHE) surveillance report showed secondary school children have the highest rate of infection in the country despite schools not even being back yet. And a survey today revealed almost two thirds of children would like to get a jab. But Professor David Livermore, a medical microbiologist at the University of East Anglia, said it is 'plausible' that it would be be better for children to catch Covid and recover to develop natural immunity than to be reliant on vaccines. Experts believe the virus will never fully disappear but it could become endemic in the future so having a generation of children with natural immunity would help prevent cases spiralling later down the line. Professor Livermore said natural infection could be a 'a better first step in the lifelong co-existence' with the virus than rolling out the jabs. Children have only a small risk of becoming seriously ill with Covid and a vanishingly small chance of death, while Pfizer and Moderna's vaccines are associated with ultrarare cases of heart inflammation in young people. Professor Paul Hunter, an infectious disease expert at the University of East Anglia, said the risks of side effects currently outweighs the dangers posed by Covid itself for most children. And he added 'as much as half' of all teens would already have had the virus and therefore have natural immunity and not need a jab. Professor Hunter also said that vaccinating children would be purely for the benefit of adults, which could be seen as ethically 'dubious'. Advertisement 'Our data shows post-vaccination infections are much more like a cold than the flu, with the top symptoms being runny nose, headache, sneezing, sore throat and loss of smell. 'Were again calling on the government to add these cold-like symptoms to their list to help educate the public and catch more cases.' Meanwhile, data from NHS Test and Trace today showed infections are continuing to rise in England, with more than 200,000 positive tests recorded last week. A total of 200,705 people tested positive for the virus in England at least once in the week to August 18, up five per cent on the previous week. This is the highest number of people testing positive since the week to July 21. Some 12.6 per cent of people around one in eight who were transferred to Test and Trace were not reached, meaning they were not able to provide details of recent close contacts. This is down slightly from 13 per cent in the previous week. Anybody in England who tests positive for Covid, either through a rapid (LFD) test or a PCR test processed in a laboratory, is transferred to Test and Trace so their contacts can be identified and alerted. The worrying figures come amid fears immunity from vaccines dished out earlier in the year may be on the wane. A study last night showed two doses of vaccine do not work as well in 40 per cent of those who are immunosuppressed. The Octave study showed more than 2,500 people in the UK signed up to the Octave research, with illnesses including rheumatoid arthritis, breast cancer, leukaemia and kidney disease. Preliminary findings from 600 participants found 40 per cent of the vulnerable produced fewer antibodies to fight off Covid than healthy people. The figure includes 11 per cent who produced no antibodies at all. A separate study by King's College London found two Covid vaccine doses become noticeably less effective at stopping infections within six months. Researchers warned Britons given the jabs first in winter including the elderly could see protection plummet to just 50 per cent by winter without boosters. The real-world study analysed PCR results from more than a million people who had been fully vaccinated to look for 'breakthrough' infections. It found that protection against infection after two shots of Pfizer decreased from 88 per cent at one month to 74 per cent at five to six months. For AstraZeneca, effectiveness dropped from 77 per cent to 67 per cent at four to five months. On the back of the findings, Professor Spector urged Britain to 'urgently' get its act together on booster vaccines. But Professor Finn told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'I think the Zoe study [King's College London] and actually, a couple of other studies we recently had, do show the beginnings of a drop off of protection against asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic disease. 'But other studies are showing maintenance of good protection against serious illness and hospitalisation. 'So that's encouraging actually that people who've had two doses are still very much well protected against serious illness, which is our main objective. 'But we do need to watch out very carefully to see if this waning begins to translate into occurrence of more severe cases because then boosters will be needed.' A beekeeper has spoken of his devastation after arsonists killed more than one million bees by dousing his hives in petrol and setting them alight. Mariusz Chudy, 52, from Sneinton, Nottingham, found three of his hives completely destroyed and three others partially burned when he arrived at his site at around 6pm on Saturday. He said he was heartbroken when he found the 'terrifying' scene on his site in Kinoulton, Rushcliffe, which he claims killed around one million bees, who he considers to be 'like family' to him. The father-of-three said he had not yet calculated how much money he had lost but estimated the value of each hive to be between 1,200 and 1,500, the BBC reported. Mr Chudy, who has kept bees for more than 30 years, told the publication: 'I do not understand these people. I am totally devastated. They have killed six colonies and all the equipment - and I don't know why.' Mariusz Chudy, 52, from Kinoulton, Rushcliffe, found three of his hives completely destroyed (pictured) and three partially burned when he arrived at his site at around 6pm on Saturday The beekeeper (pictured) said he was heartbroken when he found the 'terrifying' scene at one of his sites, which he claims killed around one million bees, who he considers to be 'like family' As well as his hives being set alight, his Nottinghamshire field had also been doused in petrol, according to the beekeeper, who had built the 20 beehives himself. He added: 'Petrol was poured all over the field. I am just heartbroken and completely devastated. 'I could not believe my eyes and cannot imagine who would do this. This is my life and someone has taken this away from me. It is a nightmare, just horrible.' Nottinghamshire Police, who are currently investigating the incident, described the 'malicious' attack as a 'deliberately cruel act' which has devastated the beekeeper. Mr Chudy, who has sold honey, bee bread and candle wax as head of the family-run business Goldendrops Bee Farm since 1994, said he is also worried about the harm to the local environment. He explained: 'Setting a fire at a farm is very dangerous and could have long-term impacts. 'It is not just about me and the bees, but for other farmers as well. The air has now been contaminated and it would be really difficult to go past that.' It's not clear whether the fire at Home Farm was an act of vandalism or had a more sinister motive to harm Mr Chudy's business. Mr Chudy said he had not calculated how much money he had lost but estimated the value of each hive to be between 1,200 and 1,500. Pictured: Damage done to the beehives by fire Mr Chudy's daughter Aleksandra said her father found a 'trail of petrol' at the site, which she believes showed that somebody 'really wanted to burn them all down'. She told the BBC: 'Dad is horrified and scared that it might not be a one-off event. 'As far as we know we have no enemies so we are unsure who would have done this. 'The farm is not one that we advertise either so not many people know the bees were there.' Mr Chudy is considering rebuilding his colonies in an alternative location following the 'devastating' blaze. David Rose, the owner of the land, reported the incident to Nottinghamshire Police and said the local community are all 'shocked' by the attack. The farmer said: 'I am in shock and we are all very concerned about this. 'We were planning to host an open day in September and show people how important bees are. 'I do not think that we will be able to do that anymore, and it is just upsetting.' A fundraising page set up by Steven Mayfield, 37, from Gedling, on Monday to help the beekeeper to rebuild his colony has already raised more than 800. The fundraiser had already exceeded its 500 goal within two days, with Mr Mayfield describing the arson as a 'despicable' thing to do. The teacher said: 'I was angry when I saw the ruined bee hives, it was a despicable thing to do. Nottinghamshire Police, who are currently investigating the incident, described the 'malicious' attack as a 'deliberately cruel act' which devastated Mr Chudy (pictured) 'Me and my partner have got a little baking business so we use a bit of his product and we already knew him.' He also told the BBC: 'We all need bees to pollinate our beautiful plants and when they produce such delicious honey why on Earth anyone would want to kill them all, I'll never know.' Mr Mayfield said he was thrilled that the local community had rallied together to help them reach their target so quickly. He added: 'The fact we're also small business holders and because we're decent humans we wanted to do something to help. 'That's his life and the moment someone told us we asked around to raise some money. We've had a really good response, it's only took two days to reach the target. 'We know he builds his own stuff but we wanted to pay for his time as he rebuilds everything and gets it up and running.' Mr Chudy said he plans to use the money from the fundraiser to rebuild his colony and buy new materials. He continued: 'I haven't really been able to think about anything else since the hives were burned. This fundraiser is a really good idea, I think it's amazing. 'Of course the money won't make up for all of my work that I put in by making everything for the bees myself by hand. 'I wasn't thinking about the cost because I used recycled materials so it was more the time and energy put in that made it so devastating, but the money will help me to rebuild quicker. 'Its amazing when people are helping me with the colony, because for me this bee colony was like my family - it was terrible. Mr Chudy's daughter Aleksandra said there was a 'trail of petrol' on the field that she believes showed that somebody 'really wanted to burn them all down'. Pictured: Damage done to hives Mr Chudy might rebuild his colonies in an alternative location following the 'devastating' blaze as he is concerned it is not a one-off event. Pictured: The hives before the fire 'I will use it for rebuilding the colony. I will be able to buy different material. 'I'm very happy that people are giving me a hand. It's nice to see people like what we do and it's very helpful after what happened.' Thomas Rawlings, based at West Bridgford police station, confirmed the force was investigating the incident after police were called to reports of the attack on Sunday. He said: 'This was a deliberate cruel act which has clearly left the owner devastated. 'This was wanton vandalism, a malicious attack which has resulted in the deaths of all these bees. 'I would urge anyone who has any information about the attack or who may have seen anything suspicious in the area to please come forward and help us with our enquiries. 'People can ring 101 quoting incident number 515 of 21 August 2021.' Two weeks ago, there were reports that honeypot thieves, who are suspected to be jealous rivals, are stealing beekeepers' hives. Stolen hives contain not just honey, which can then be sold, they also hold queen bees, which can fetch over 200 each, but can go for far less on the black market. Acquiring a new queen on the cheap means 'dodgy' beekeepers can start up a new colony, and increase their honey sales profits. The British Beekeepers Association (BBA) has urged members to get their hives micro-chipped so police can identify them if they are stolen. A fundraiser set up by Steven Mayfield, 37, from Gedling, on Monday to help the beekeeper to rebuild his colony has already raised more than 800. Pictured: Damage done to the beehives Other advice includes anchoring hives to the ground so they can't be lifted on to trucks, siting them in hidden places, such as behind hedges, and marking them with the postcode in 'permanent' ink. In one raid, thieves prepared to risk a severe stinging carried away a hive holding 10,000 bees and an estimated 600 worth of honey in Red Lane, Kenilworth, Warwickshire. A hive filled with honey can weigh as much as 25kg and to stop the hive from rocking and annoying the bees, it would normally need at least two strong men to carry it. There have been similar thefts across the UK, just as beekeepers are rubbing their hands in glee at the prospect of a bumper honey crop. Police and the BBA say it is a 'specialised' crime which would have to be done by people with knowledge of how to handle bees. In Norfolk, where there have been several raids, a police spokesman said: 'If you start moving a bee hive around and you don't know what you are doing, you are going to get stung... lots and lots of times.' The BBA said: 'It is currently estimated that there are 250,000 managed colonies owned by beekeepers in England and Wales. 'Only beekeepers are likely to have the contacts to sell on colonies, as these are not easily sold as one-offs to other than beekeepers.' A single mother who rescued three of her children but could not save her daughter from a caravan fire has been pictured. Natasha Broadley, 34, from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, lost Louisiana-Brook Broadley, two, in the blaze at Sealands Caravan Park in Ingoldmells, Lincolnshire. She and her three surviving children are being looking after back home with her mother Donna. It comes as wellwishers raised more than 12,000 for the shattered family, with a stream of tributes being paid online. Family friend Laurie Selfridge set up the GoFundMe page following the tragedy on Monday night. Natasha Broadley, 34, from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, lost Louisiana-Brook Broadley, two, in the blaze at Sealands Caravan Park in Ingoldmells, Lincolnshire Tragic Louisiana-Brook Broadley died following the horror at Sealands Caravan Park in Ingoldmells, near Skegness on Monday night, while mother Natasha and the other children managed to escape A woman and three of her children made it out safely but her fourth - the little girl - lost her life Miss Broadley shared a number of tributes to her late daughter on her Facebook page yesterday. Meanwhile her mother Donna paid tribute to Louisiana and revealed the family had rallied round and were staying together despite the fact their 'hearts were broken'. She posted photos of the little girl enjoying funfair rides on the family seaside holiday just days before she perished when the fire ripped through a static caravan. The 52-year-old wrote: 'Our hearts are broken as wee wee was our baby of our family. Tash gave her everything, she was her right leg. 'We as a family will be here for Tash and my grandchildren.' She posted pictures of the children 's 'last day having fun'. Ms Selfridge told the Newark Advertiser: 'Everyone knows her and her kids and it's had a massive impact on all of us. Newark has been knocked for six by this tragedy. 'Newark is their home and while they recently moved out Mansfield way, this is where they are loved. We need to do whatever we can to make their lives a little bit easier.' She added: 'I want them to know they'll be looked after and that we'll do whatever we can to give our little princess Louisiana-Brook the right send off after this absolute tragedy.' Miss Broadley, a full-time mother, recently moved from Newark to Clipstone Village, near Mansfield, where neighbours described her and the children as 'always smiling'. One said: 'Tasha had taken the kids away on a caravan holiday last week. As you can imagine as a young family they were really looking forward to going to the seaside. 'What happened is absolutely terrible. You can imagine the terror that mother and her children must have gone through.' She said the family only moved to the area a few months ago. Tributes have now flooded in for the toddler, who was originally from Newark, Nottinghamshire The child passed away at Sealands Caravan Park in Ingoldmells, near Skegness, following the blaze at 10.30pm The mother and three children received medical attention at hospital and have since been discharged Another neighbour near the family home in Newark added: 'What's happened is simply heart-breaking. The Broadleys are one big happy family. 'Locally, they are very well thought of. Everyone is so upset for them. Natasha is a lovely mum. 'She had been determined to give the kids a break by the seaside and that it should like this is just tragic.' Friends posted messages of condolence and support to Miss Broadley's Facebook page, with one saying 'We're all absolutely broken for you.' The fire at the Sealands Park site in Ingoldmells, Lincolnshire, destroyed the walls and roof of the caravan on Monday night. Police forensic officers are working alongside fire service investigators in a bid to establish the cause of the blaze, which was being treated as unexplained. Police are continuing to investigate the cause of the blaze, which killed the toddler (pictured) earlier this week Around 50 people from nearby caravans were evacuated and had to stay in emergency accommodation at the Laver Leisure site One holidaymaker, who was also staying in a caravan close to the fire, said: 'It was scary how quickly it went up' One resident on an adjacent site: 'We just saw flames. 'A neighbour knocked on our door saying we might have to move our car because of the gas bottles and everything. 'Then we just heard screaming. The flames were so big they lit up our living room. 'It is so sad.' Another holidaymaker heard a woman screaming and saw flames 'leaping several feet above the roof of the caravan'. Chief Supt Kieran English of Lincolnshire Police said forensic investigators were working to 'find the seat of the fire and give an indication as to how the fire started.' He added: 'Members of the public bravely assisted the family in escaping from the caravan. There were a lot of people in the area and people will have had mobile phones and other devices and may have taken pictures and recordings.' A model has been scarred for life after being attacked by a leopard during a photoshoot in Germany. Jessica Leidolph, 36, who also works as an animal rights activist, was airlifted to a specialist clinic by a helicopter after the incident on Tuesday at a compound in the town of Nebra in eastern Germany. The compound is used as a retirement home for show animals, and 16-year-old leopard Troja who lives there, attacked her during the photoshoot. According to local media, Jessica entered the leopards' enclosure at the 'Seniorenresidenz fur Showtiere' - which translates to 'retirement home for show animals' - when 16-year-old leopard Troja suddenly attacked her. Model Jessica Leidolph, 36, (pictured) has been scarred for life after being attacked by a leopard during a photoshoot in Germany Jessica was airlifted to a specialist clinic by a helicopter after a leopard named Troja (pictured) on Tuesday at the 'Seniorenresidenz fur Showtiere' in the town of Nebra in eastern Germany German police are now investigating the leopard attack, with a focus on the 48-year-old owner of the big cat, Birgit Stache, who is being investigated on suspicion of negligent bodily harm, the dpa news agency said. They are also investigating who else was present at the photoshoot and what safety precautions were taken. A public health officer visited the compound on Wednesday to check whether the animals were adequately kept and if the facility met regulatory standards. The animal handler has owned leopard involved in the attack, and one other, since 2019 and worked for 20 years as an animal trainer for circuses and amusement parks. Jessica, who was brought to the hospital with severely bleeding wounds and was immediately operated on, told Bild after the surgery: 'It repeatedly kept biting my cheek, ear and head' She also said that after she had lost consciousness the next thing she heard was the helicopter that airlifted her to the hospital Troja lives in an enclosure at the 'retirement home for show animals' with another leopard named Paris Troja and another leopard living in the enclosure named Paris, 18, had once featured in an advert for Panasonic, before they were moved to the 9,150 sq ft site in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. Jessica, who was brought to the hospital with severely bleeding wounds and was immediately operated on, told Bild after the surgery: 'It repeatedly kept biting my cheek, ear and head.' She also said that after she had lost consciousness the next thing she heard was the helicopter that airlifted her to the hospital. After local media incorrectly reported that the predator had escaped and was on the loose, Burgenland District spokesperson Steven Muller-Uhrig said: 'The animal never broke out. There is currently no danger to the population.' A Burgenlandkreis district spokesperson revealed that keeping leopards does not require a permit in Saxony-Anhalt and said: 'It is not legally limited by the state.' The authorities are considering taking away Stache's license for the retirement home for show animals. A British tourist has reportedly been stabbed by a Spanish waiter after he raised a complaint about the steak his wife was served. The middle-aged holidaymaker was rushed to hospital after allegedly being knifed in the stomach and leg during an argument at a restaurant on the Balearic island of Majorca. The incident happened around 7pm yesterday at a restaurant, named locally as Don Denis, in Can Picafort in the north east of the island. The waiter involved in the dispute is also understood to have been injured after being stabbed by the tourist - though their wounds have been described as less serious than those of the unnamed holidaymaker. A middle-aged British holidaymaker has reportedly been stabbed by a Spanish waiter in Majorca after he raised a complaint about the quality of his food and the size of his bill Emergency responders stabilised the tourist at the scene after he suffered a large loss of blood, according to Majorcan newspaper Diario de Mallorca. He was subsequently taken to Son Espases Hospital in Palma. The unnamed waiter is said to have treated in another hospital in the town of Muro, and police have launched an investigation. Jaime Soberats, manager of Don Denis, blamed the incident on a disagreement over the quality of the meat. Speaking after yesterday evening's assault, Mr Soberats said: 'I saw the meat before it was taken to the table and it looked very acceptable to me. Can Picafort is described as an ideal resort for families and couples and is a short drive from Puerto Alcudia which is popular with Brits 'I don't know whether it had anything to do with how well done the meat was which is the typical problem we face sometimes in keeping customers happy. 'I didn't witness the incident itself because I had to leave the restaurant to go to the supermarket and buy some extra supplies.' 'The witnesses and the two men involved are not at the restaurant today because they're giving statements but what I've been told is the tourist went beserk because he wasn't happy with the rib steak his partner had ordered. 'I don't know exactly what the problem was but he became very aggressive and went for my waiter without warning who is a peace-loving Bangladeshi man and has never given me any problems. 'The holidaymaker was definitely armed with a knife and in the struggle as they rolled around in bushes by the terrace both men were injured. The incident happened around 7pm yesterday at a restaurant, named locally as Don Denis, in Can Picafort in the north east of the island 'The tourist was hurt the worst and there was a lot of blood. My waiter assures me he didn't have a knife.' Mr Soberats, who described the tourist as a 'very big man' that his team hadn't seen before, said that his waiter is now at home after having given police a statement, and that the rest of his staff are in shock. Civil Guard officers on the island were unable to confirm whether the client had been arrested. Mr Soberats said he didn't expect his waiter to be detained. Neither man has yet been named. Can Picafort is described as an ideal resort for families and couples and is a short drive from Puerto Alcudia which is popular with Brits. Advertisement Britons hoping to travel to Australia face being no longer able to get a direct flight from London to Perth after Qantas said it was considering using Darwin as a hub for the route when it relaunches this December. Direct 17-hour flights between Heathrow and Perth began in March 2018 but were suspended just over two years later in June 2020 after only running as special Covid-19 repatriation flights for the final weeks. Now, Qantas has said Darwin Airport, which has been its main location for repatriation flights, could now be used as an alternative or in addition to its existing Perth hub given the very tight border policies in Western Australia. The airline expects London-Australia direct flights to resume in the final month of 2021 in time for the Christmas rush when it anticipates 80 per cent of Australians will be vaccinated and the international border will re-open. The switch to Darwin, which is slightly closer to London than Perth, comes after Western Australia Premier Mark McGowan said he intends to keep his state's border shut even when Australia reaches that jab coverage level. Australia has had some of the world's toughest border rules since March 2020 - and most Australians must request an exemption from a travel ban to leave the country, with foreigners refused entry in almost all circumstances. Australia has suffered less from the pandemic than many other developed countries with about 44,600 cases and 984 deaths - but a third wave from the Delta variant has put Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra into lockdown. Qantas flight QF10 takes off from London Heathrow en route to Perth in Australia on March 25, 2018. The Boeing 787 Dreamliner plane flew non-stop in about 17 hours in what was the first direct flight service from London to Australia Passengers from a Qantas flight are escorted to waiting buses by police after arriving at Perth Airport in October 2020 Darwin Airport could be the new arrival point for Qantas passengers arriving on direct flights from London in the future Qantas, which posted a 1.2billion pandemic-related loss today, said discussions are continuing on where it will fly - and it expects the non-stop route between Australia and Britain to be in 'even higher demand post-Covid'. Flights between Britain and Australia began in 1935 with the first Qantas route from Brisbane to London launching, but the trip took 12 days and was made up to 31 stopovers with a complicated series of connections. Passengers also had to transfer between different-sized aircraft, but the route was seen as a quick new option for travellers whose previous options for getting between the two countries included a six-week sea voyage. Shortly after the end of the Second World War in 1947, Qantas introduced its famous 'Kangaroo Route' on which meals were served and the travelling time from Sydney to London reduced to four days. By 1984 it was 20 hours. But it took until March 2018 for Australia and Britain to be connected by a non-stop journey when Qantas launched the London-Perth route which covered a 9,000-mile journey and took around 17 hours and 20 minutes. Australia has suffered less from the pandemic than many other developed countries with about 44,600 cases and 984 deaths Despite the low numbers in Australia, a third wave from the Delta variant has put Sydney and Melbourne into lockdown This graph from Qantas's financial results today shows how domestic demand in Australia has recovered to some extent Qantas used the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner for the route and hoped that more efficient aircraft giving longer ranges would soon bring in a non-stop flight from London to Sydney, which is more than four hours east of Perth. The 'Kangaroo Route' to present-day direct flights: Timeline of air travel between UK and Australia 1919 : The first flight from Britain to Australia sees brother Ross and Keith Smith take off from Hounslow Heath near the present-day London Heathrow Airport in a Vickers Vimy and land in Darwin 28 days later : The first flight from Britain to Australia sees brother Ross and Keith Smith take off from Hounslow Heath near the present-day London Heathrow Airport in a Vickers Vimy and land in Darwin 28 days later 1933 : Atalanta aircraft takes off from Croydon on May 29 on a month-long journey stopping at more than 30 locations before arriving at Brisbane on June 23 : Atalanta aircraft takes off from Croydon on May 29 on a month-long journey stopping at more than 30 locations before arriving at Brisbane on June 23 1935 : Qantas begins the open the 12,754 mile London to Brisbane route for passengers for a single fare of 195, in a weekly service which takes 12 days : Qantas begins the open the 12,754 mile London to Brisbane route for passengers for a single fare of 195, in a weekly service which takes 12 days 1938 : Qantas long-haul services move to Sydney : Qantas long-haul services move to Sydney 1947 : Qantas begins its 'Kangaroo Route' services on Lockheed Constellations, which take four days from London to Sydney, with stops in Rome, Tripoli, Cairo, Karachi, Calcutta, Singapore and Darwin : Qantas begins its 'Kangaroo Route' services on Lockheed Constellations, which take four days from London to Sydney, with stops in Rome, Tripoli, Cairo, Karachi, Calcutta, Singapore and Darwin 1959 : The journey time between London and Sydney is cut to under 30 hours with the Boeing 707 : The journey time between London and Sydney is cut to under 30 hours with the Boeing 707 1984 : British Airways begins the first one-stop flight to Australia, which is a 20-hour route with a refuelling stop in Mumbai (then Bombay) : British Airways begins the first one-stop flight to Australia, which is a 20-hour route with a refuelling stop in Mumbai (then Bombay) March 2018 : Qantas runs the first non-stop passenger flight from Britain to Australia, running from London Heathrow to Perth, which takes more than 17 hours : Qantas runs the first non-stop passenger flight from Britain to Australia, running from London Heathrow to Perth, which takes more than 17 hours May 2020 : Qantas suspends plans to press ahead with 19-and-a-half-hour direct flights from London to Sydney : Qantas suspends plans to press ahead with 19-and-a-half-hour direct flights from London to Sydney June 2020 : Direct flights from London to Perth are suspended due to the pandemic : Direct flights from London to Perth are suspended due to the pandemic December 2021 : Qantas forecasts flights from London to Australia could restart as international travel reopens, but may be moved to Darwin instead Advertisement Return economy flights on the route cost from 1,095 at its launch - but they were all stopped on June 8 last year after the Australian federal government stopped offering free repatriation flights for Australian citizens trapped abroad due to the pandemic. One month earlier in May 2020, Qantas said it had suspended plans to press ahead with launching 19-and-a-half-hour direct flights from London and New York to Sydney, which would have been the world's longest commercial services. They were due to use the Airbus A350-1000 as the most suitable aircraft for the routes, but eventually shelved plans to order up to 12 of the planes for the ultra-long-haul programme called Project Sunrise amid the collapse in demand for international travel. Qantas had run a non-stop test flight between New York and Sydney in October 2019 carrying 49 passengers and crew, before a second flight ran from London to Sydney in November that year with a similar number. Now, as Qantas looks at re-opening its London-Australia route, an airline spokesman said today: 'Qantas's ability to fly non-stop between Australia and London is expected to be in even higher demand post-Covid. 'The airline is investigating using Darwin as a transit point, which has been Qantas' main entry for repatriation flights, as an alternative (or in addition) to its existing Perth hub given conservative border policies in Western Australia. Discussions on this option are continuing.' Perth has an advantage over Darwin for business travellers because it has a separate business class lounge, dedicated international Qantas lounge and a 'transit lounge'. But Qantas Group chief executive Alan Joyce told Executive Traveller: 'We have teams looking at what we do on lounges, as an example, if (Darwin) was a long-term decision, which potentially it could be. 'In the short term, we'd operate there with what we have, to give people an option of staying in Australia to get to the UK directly, which we think there will be significant demand for. 'Given the conservative nature of Western Australia, we hope for the best, but we have to plan for the worst, so if the only option to operate London flights is through Darwin, we think we've very capable of doing that.' However the potential shift to Darwin was labelled 'outrageous' by Western Australia Premier Mark McGowan who said the state had spent 11million upgrading a terminal at Perth Airport to secure the flights. Passengers at Archerfield aerodrome in Brisbane in 1935. Flights between Britain and Australia began in 1935 with the first Qantas route from Brisbane to London launching, but the trip took 12 days and was made up to 31 stopovers Passengers had to transfer between different-sized aircraft when the route launched in 1935, but it was seen as a quick new option for travellers whose previous options for getting between the two countries included a six-week sea voyage Shortly after the end of the Second World War in 1947, Qantas introduced its famous 'Kangaroo Route' on which meals were served and the travelling time from Sydney to London reduced to four days. Flight crew are pictured in Brisbane that year According to WA Today, Mr McGowan said: 'All of the income we produce ... the revenue we produce for the Commonwealth government is keeping Australia alive, we shouldn't be punished for that. Gatwick still plans to bring emergency runway into routine use Gatwick is pressing ahead with its plan to bring its emergency runway into regular use despite the collapse in demand caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The UK's second busiest airport said the work could be completed by 2029 and will align with the Government's policy of "making best use of existing runways". It also claimed it will be delivered in a "sustainable way which helps to achieve the Government's overall goal of net-zero emissions by 2050". Gatwick Airport's chief executive Stewart Wingate stands on the Northern Runway yesterday, after discussing plans to use the airport's emergency runway for routine flights The West Sussex airport is launching a public consultation on the scheme on September 9, after first suggesting in October 2018 that the emergency runway could be brought into routine use. The emergency runway is currently used as a taxiway or when the main runway is closed due to maintenance or incidents. Under the plan, the emergency runway would be used for departures of smaller planes. Operating as a two-runway airport would enable Gatwick to boost its annual passenger capacity from 62 million to 75 million by 2038. Gatwick lost out to Heathrow in a bid to obtain Government approval to build an additional runway. The centre lines of Gatwick's main and emergency runways are separated by 650ft (198m). The plan involves increasing the gap by widening the emergency runway by 39ft (12m) to comply with safety regulations. Only around one million passengers travelled through Gatwick in the first seven months of this year. That total was reached after just 10 days in 2019. Gatwick expects pre-pandemic traffic levels will return by 2025 or 2026. Advertisement 'All I'd say to Qantas ... as a state, we funded the Perth-London flights. We put in place $15million (11million) worth of improvement at the terminal. (Qantas) need to show some understanding and perhaps some gratitude to what the state government has done.' A Perth Airport spokesman said that it had made significant financial outlays to establish the direct London route, adding: 'Thanks to those investments, Qantas has operated a route which proved to be one of the most profitable in Qantas's history. 'Everyone should be focused on getting to the vaccination rates needed to re-open our borders safely as quickly as possible.' Qantas's initial focus on international routes from December - pending Australian government acceptance - will be on countries with high vaccination rates, including the UK, Japan, Singapore, Canada and the US. Australia's government has drafted a plan to begin the gradual reopening of international borders once the country reaches a vaccination rate of 80 per cent, which looks likely to be achieved in December. Flights to countries with low vaccination rates are expected to be delayed until next April, including Indonesia, South Africa, Thailand and Vietnam. Mr Joyce said today: 'The prospect of flying overseas might feel a long way off, especially with New South Wales and Victoria in lockdown, but the current pace of the vaccine rollout means we should have a lot more freedom in a few months' time.' He added: 'I think it would be a terrible shame, if when we got to Christmas, from NSW (New South Wales) you could visit your relatives in London, but can't visit your relatives in Perth. 'Hopefully ... we can get some consistency (on borders) ... and for us not to be a 'hermit nation' going forward.' An airline spokesman added: 'One of the biggest unknowns is the quarantine requirements for fully vaccinated travelers entering Australia. Qantas said that if Australia keeps its requirement for vaccinated and unvaccinated travelers to spend 14 days in hotel quarantine, travel demand would be 'very low.' It added: 'A shorter period with additional testing and the option to isolate at home will see a lot more people travel.' The Qantas prediction for a resumption in international travel was based on an agreement reached by Australian government leaders in July that the country will begin to reopen when 80 per cent of the population aged 16 and older is fully vaccinated. Qantas expects Australia will have reached that target by December. According to the latest government figures released today, 32 per cent of the target population was fully vaccinated. Australia's largest airline has also suffered financial losses because of domestic travel restrictions. More than half the Australian population and the two biggest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, are currently locked down due to a delta variant outbreak that began in mid-June. ** Are you a British citizen stuck in Australia due to the pandemic? Please email: tips@dailymail.com ** Dozens of 'Red Wall' seats won by the Tories at the last election will be among the areas worst hit by Boris Johnson's decision to end a 20 a week uplift in the value of Universal Credit, a charity has said. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation found 413 parliamentary constituencies will see at least a third of working-age families with children hit by the reduction in benefits in October. Of those constituencies, some 191 are represented by Conservative MPs with 53 seats having only been won by the Tories at the 2019 general election. Senior Tories have repeatedly warned the Government not to go ahead with the planned 1,040 a year cut. But ministers have stressed the extra cash was only made available to help families during the worst of the coronavirus pandemic. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation found 413 parliamentary constituencies will see at least a third of working-age families with children hit by the reduction in benefits in October Of those constituencies, some 191 are represented by Conservative MPs with 53 seats having only been won by the Tories at the 2019 general election. Boris Johnson is under pressure to keep the 20 a week uplift in place The latest research published by the JRF, a charity which campaigns to end poverty, is likely to reignite calls for the Government to keep the support in place. However, making the increase permanent would cost the Government an additional 6billion a year, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies think tank. The JRF also revealed that in some Labour constituencies more than three-quarters of families with children will be affected by the cut. The reduction is expected to have the most severe impact in Yorkshire and the Humber, the North East, North West, and West Midlands. The charity said the cut will have 'deep and far-reaching consequences on families with children across Britain'. For example, in the Conservative constituency of Peterborough, 64 per cent of working-age families with children will be affected and in Labour-held Bradford West, 82 per cent of families with children will feel the pinch. Katie Schmuecker, deputy director of policy and partnerships at the JRF, said: 'We are just over a month away from the UK Government imposing the biggest overnight cut to the basic rate of social security since the Second World War. 'This latest analysis lays bare the deep and far-reaching impact that cutting Universal Credit will have on millions of low-income families across Britain. 'MPs from across the political spectrum are already expressing their deep concerns about this planned cut. Now is the time for all MPs to step up and oppose this cut to their constituents' living standards.' Labour has called for the 20 a week Universal Credit uplift to be kept in place. Shadow work and pensions secretary Jonathan Reynolds said: 'The Government's 1,000 a year cut will be a hammer blow to millions of families, hitting the lowest paid hardest and hurting our economic recovery.' A Government spokesman said: 'The temporary uplift to Universal Credit was designed to help claimants through the economic shock and financial disruption of the toughest stages of the pandemic, and it has done so. 'Universal Credit will continue to provide a vital safety net and with record vacancies available, alongside the successful vaccination rollout, it's right that we now focus on our Plan for Jobs, helping claimants to increase their earnings by boosting their skills and getting into work, progressing in work or increasing their hours.' Web users have today welcomed government plans to roll back on flagship EU data laws that will scrap online cookie requests in the first post-Brexit shakeup of the UK digital economy. The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport announced plans to reshape the UK's data legislation in an effort to boost growth and increase trade post-Brexit. Speaking to The Telegraph, Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden said the Government intends to peel away from key parts of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation, which came into force in 2018. Mr Dowden explained the UK wanted to shape data laws that were based on 'common sense, not box-ticking' as they forged their own legislation after leaving the bloc. He signalled that the reforms will cut down on 'pointless' cookie banners, which are used by organisations to secure consent for storing data when using their websites. Britons today hailed the 'common sense' move and took to Twitter to share their joy that the excessive red tape that hampered the online experience is set to be dismantled. Brexiteers have argued that GDPR which governs how data and peoples personal information is collected, is overly bureaucratic and should be reformed. Brits took to Twitter to share their joy at the news that the bureaucratic and excessive red tape caused by cookie pop-ups that hampered many an online experience is set to be dismantled In what is the first post-Brexit shake-up of the UK's digital economy, Oliver Dowden today outlined how Britons' data will be used more flexibly in future Lee Newell wrote: 'Nice to see common sense reversing the silly EU cookie law which has only made the web a more frustrating experience for all and scaring those that don't know how cookies work.' Others were quick to point to the finger at 'frustrating' and 'annoying' online pop-ups and revealed they were looking forward to the changes. Another said: 'Cookie permission pop ups are 50% of the reason why I voted to leave the EU.' The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has said it hopes the measures, which include new data partnerships with the US and other countries, will get around existing trade barriers associated with data rules. The Government hopes the changes can help facilitate more data transfers between the UK and other nations in areas such as GPS navigation, online banking and even law enforcement. The move would see the UK diverge from some parts of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which came into effect in the UK three years ago, with Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden saying the UK wanted to shape data laws that were based on 'common sense, not box-ticking'. Who is John Edwards, the man tipped to be UK's new Information Commissioner? John Edwards is an experienced lawyer who spent much of his career practicing in New Zealand's capital, Wellington. He has been tipped by Culture Secretary Mr Dowden to head-up Britain's new data law rollout. Mr Edwards will lead the UK regulator responsible for enforcing data protection, and will be enjoy newly awarded powers. The job will involve balancing privacy rights with the promotion of 'innovation and economic growth'. Speaking to the BBC, Mr Edwards said his appointment was a 'great honour'. He said: 'I look forward to the challenge of steering the organisation and the British economy into a position of international leadership in the safe and trusted use of data for the benefit of all' Mr Edwards is currently New Zealand's national Privacy Commissioner, a position he has held since 2014. Advertisement 'Now that we have left the EU, I'm determined to seize the opportunity by developing a world-leading data policy that will deliver a Brexit dividend for individuals and businesses across the UK,' Mr Dowden said. 'That means seeking exciting new international data partnerships with some of the world's fastest-growing economies, for the benefit of British firms and British customers alike. 'It means reforming our own data laws so that they're based on common sense, not box-ticking.' As part of the first package of measures announced, the Government said it was prioritising striking data adequacy partnerships with the US, Australia, South Korea, Singapore, the Dubai International Finance Centre and Colombia. Future partnerships with India, Brazil, Kenya and Indonesia are also to be prioritised. GDPR, which governs how people's personal information is collected, has been criticised for being too bureaucratic and overly prescriptive. Mr Dowden suggested the new reforms would also cut down on cookie banners, which are used by websites to secure users' consent for storing their data. At present under the GDPR rules, sites have to give users a genuine choice over whether to say 'yes' or 'no' to cookies which process and share their personal data. Ministers are also said to be planning to shake up Britain's data watchdog. The Government is set to appoint John Edwards, who is currently New Zealand's privacy commissioner, to head up the regulator. Mr Dowden described the reforms as a 'data dividend' of Brexit and said the new British framework would be 'more proportionate'. He added that it would help to cut costs for businesses and enable 'greater innovation' which will also 'drive growth and opportunities and jobs'. Plans to sweep away swathes of the EU's flagship data laws could spell the end of 'pointless' web cookie warnings and red tape, the Culture Secretary announced Mr Dowden said the Government intends to peel away from key parts of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation, which came into force in 2018 However, the EU continues to trumpet GDPR as having improved data privacy standards across the world, meaning the UK could trigger fresh tensions with the bloc by deviating from the rules. The plans will also likely be scrutinised by privacy campaigners who fear further online profiling of individuals and greater massing of personal data by big companies. Mr Dowden said the reforms would bring an end to 'pointless bureaucracy' and 'box ticking' but would still protect people's privacy. In response to the announcement, Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham said the UK's data watchdog would help support the Government's plans, but encouraged the pursuit of trust and transparency. 'Data-driven innovation stands to bring enormous benefits to the UK economy and to our society, but the digital opportunity before us today will only be realised where people continue to trust their data will be used fairly and transparently, both here in the UK and when shared overseas,' she said. 'My office has supported valuable innovation while encouraging public trust in data use, particularly during the pandemic. 'We stand ready to provide our expert advice and insight as part of any future Government consultation.' As part of the announcement, the DCMS also revealed it was naming New Zealand privacy commissioner John Edwards as its preferred candidate to be the UK's next information commissioner when Ms Denham leaves the post in October. Mr Dowden said Mr Edwards' 'vast experience makes him the ideal candidate to ensure data is used responsibly' to achieve the Government's goals. London mayor Sadiq Khan has announced plans to help the city's councils and housing associations support the arrival of Afghan refugees. Mr Khan says he will expand his new Right to Buy-back fund to help councils purchase homes which could be used to resettle families arriving from Afghanistan. Housing associations are also being encouraged to apply for funding for suitable homes that can be delivered quickly. London mayor Sadiq Khan (pictured) has announced plans to help the city's councils and housing associations support the arrival of Afghan refugees and families fleeing the country Mr Khan said in a statement he would invite London councils to submit bids to his Right to Buy-back fund, which allows them to buy former council homes back from the private sector, with the programme to have a particular focus on family-sized homes. Mr Khan announced the Right to Buy-back fund last month in a bid to help councils and council-owned housing companies acquire homes that would be let at social rent levels or used as accommodation for homeless families. 'It has been devastating to watch the crisis unfold in Afghanistan and I'm determined to do everything in my power to support those escaping the country,' Mr Khan said. 'London has a proud history of providing sanctuary to those in need and by working together we can help these refugees find a welcoming home in our city.' Several London boroughs have told the government they want to support those fleeing the brutal Taliban regime in Afghanistan and take in refugees. Richmond, Camden, Ealing, Hackney, Hammersmith & Fulham, Kingston, Lambeth, Islington and Lewisham are among the London boroughs to offer their support. Sadiq Khan said he is determined to do everything in his power to support those escaping Afghanistan. Pictured: People who want to flee the country wait around the airport in Kabul The government has confirmed plans to resettle 5,000 Afghan nationals who are 'at risk due to the current crisis' in its first year. However, according to the Evening Standard, London Councils told its local authorities 'details of the scheme are still to be confirmed' and there are several outstanding questions to be clarified. The newspaper reports that among the questions, it is seeking clarity on is whether arrivals will be granted permanent leave to remain and the right to work. Dr Nooralhaq Nasimi, director of the UK's Afghanistan and Central Asian Association, said: 'With the crisis unfolding in Afghanistan many Afghan refugees will be desperately looking for a safe place to call home. 'I am proud that the Mayor of London and London councils are leading the way in welcoming Afghan refugees and taking active steps to help accommodate them when they arrive and seek to build new lives in the city.' Earlier this week, it was reported councils are set to get grants from the government to rent or buy large homes for thousands of Afghan refugees. Councils who have agreed to help house Afghan refugees will be given grants to rent and buy large family homes to fill the demand. Pictured: Evacuation charter flight arrives from Kabul Although the details are unclear, the suggestion of grants to buy homes could spark resentment in local communities, with many Britons struggling to afford such properties. The Ministry of Defence says the UK has evacuated almost 7,000 Afghan individuals and their families out of Kabul. But the numbers seeking refuge under the scheme for Afghans who helped British forces could reach five times that level. Thousands more are expected to come to the UK under a separate longer-term resettlement scheme for those vulnerable to persecution by the Taliban. A Government source told the Times: 'The greatest challenge is that councils simply don't have enough vacant properties. 'We are looking at other options which could see councils renting properties of the right size or even purchasing them and adding them to their long-term housing stock.' Bodycam footage shows a black man being repeatedly struck with a flashlight by a Louisiana state trooper after he was stopped for a traffic violation. Aaron Larry Bowman, 46, was left with several broken bones and a gash to his head after Jacob Brown, 31, beat him 18 times with his flashlight near his home in Monroe. Footage allegedly shows the white trooper, who resigned from the department last March, unleashing the attack on the man after forcing him from his car and onto the ground. Bodycam footage shows a black man being repeatedly struck with a flashlight by a Louisiana state trooper after he was stopped for a traffic violation Bowman, who is a dialysis patient, can be heard screaming: 'I'm not resisting! I'm not resisting!' between blows, according to the New York Post. Brown is under federal investigation following the assault in May 2019, where he hits Bowman with an 8-inch aluminum flashlight reinforced with a pointed end to shatter car glass. Brown had tallied 23 use-of-force incidents dating to 2015 - 19 of them targeting black people, according to state police records. He was arrested in December 2020 for his role in Bowman's beating. He faces state charges of second-degree battery and malfeasance. Bowman (pictured) also faces a list of charges, including battery of a police officer, resisting an officer and the traffic violation for which he was initially stopped, improper lane usage He also faces state charges in two other violent arrests of Black motorists, including one he boasted about last year in a group chat with other troopers, saying the suspect is 'gonna be sore' and 'it warms my heart knowing we could educate that young man.' Robert Tew, District Attorney of Ouachita and Morehouse Parishes, declined to comment on Brown's case. He has also been hit with state charges over the beating and was found by state police to have 'engaged in excessive and unjustifiable actions.' The video shows trooper Jacob Brown (pictured) hit Bowman with an 8-inch aluminum flashlight In the video, the trooper shouts: 'Give me your f****** hands! I ain't messing with you.' Bowman tried to explain to the officer that he wasn't resisting and had done nothing wrong, and said: 'I'm not fighting you, you're fighting me.' In a statement, state police said Brown had failed to report the use of force to his supervisors and 'intentionally mislabeled' his body-camera video. After the encounter, Brown claimed Bowman had struck a deputy, but this is something Bowman denies and is not seen in the video being violent with officers. He is facing charges over the incident, including battery of a police officer, resisting an officer and the traffic violation for which he was initially stopped, improper lane usage. Investigators reviewed the video months after the incident and determined Brown's use of force was not reasonable or necessary. Louisiana state police did not launch an investigation into the attack on Bowman until 536 days after it occurred - and after Bowman brought a civil lawsuit. Footage allegedly shows the white trooper, who resigned from the department last March, unleashing the attack on the man after forcing him from his car and onto the ground They also claimed the trooper failed to report his use of force and mislabeled his footage as a 'citizen encounter' in what investigators called 'an intentional attempt to hide the video from any administrative review.' The attack on Bowman came less than three weeks after state troopers punched, stunned and dragged another black motorist, Ronald Greene, before he died in police custody. Federal prosecutors are examining both cases as part of a widening investigation into police brutality and potential cover-ups involving the department. The investigation into Bowman's attack comes as a secret internal panel launched a probe following the death of Ronald Greene, 49, in police custody in May 2019. Brown is under federal investigation following the assault in May 2019, where he hits Bowman with an 8-inch aluminum flashlight reinforced with a pointed end to shatter car glass In the video, the trooper shouts: 'Give me your f****** hands! I ain't messing with you.' Bowman tried to explain to the officer that he wasn't resisting and had done nothing wrong Greene was arrested after he eluded a stop for a traffic violation and led troopers on a chase at speeds topping 115 mph, officials said. Police initially told Greene's relatives that he died from a crash at the end of the chase. It took 474 days for state police to launch an internal inquiry. For more than two years, officials refused to release body camera video from the incident, which showed officers punching and dragging Greene, as well as using a Taser on him. The footage also showed Greene leading police on a high-speed chase, then crashing his car. An autopsy revealed that he had alcohol and cocaine in his system. He also suffered multiple injuries from the crash, as well as injuries from a physical struggle. No troopers have been charged in Greene's arrest. Advertisement An Australian dad-of-three beaten by the Taliban while scrambling to reach Kabul Airport has made a desperate plea to Scott Morrison to save his life, as his wife begs 'our kids need him'. Farid, who was born overseas but lives and works as a barber in Adelaide, travelled to Afghanistan in June to visit his sick mother before the war-torn nation fell to Islamic militants less than two weeks ago. Distressing video of the father-of-three emerged on Tuesday showing blood streaming from his face after being assaulted trying to make his way to Hamid Karzai Airport along with his cousins - thought to include three men and two women. Now in hiding and with grave fears it's 'only a matter of time' before Islamist militants hunt him down, Farid shared a heartbreaking video message pleading for help. Farid, an Australian citizen, was beaten bloody by Taliban guards at a checkpoint in Kabul on Wednesday, after the Taliban vowed to block any more people from going to the airport. He lives in Adelaide but had been visiting his sick mother in Afghanistan 'I am an Australian citizens. A father, a husband and a brother,' he said in a video broadcast by Nine News. 'Myself and my cousin and I were attacked by the Taliban yesterday. I injured my head. I plead for my country and for my Prime Minister Scott Morrison to urgently protect me. 'My life and my cousin's life are in danger. I ask my government to please step in and save my life.' Back home in Adelaide his wife Kolsoum shared her pain and anguish over the situation, revealing he had travelled to Afghanistan to see his sick mother. 'I just want him to come back. We love him. He is a father of three kids. Our kids need him,' she said. Relatives say he will continue to be targeted by the brutal regime because he belongs to the ethnic Hazara group - a Shia Muslim minority within Afghanistan. The Taliban are mostly made up of the Pashtun tribal group. Farid (pictured with wife Kolsoum and their children) was born overseas but lives and works as a barber in Adelaide. He travelled to Afghanistan in June to visit his sick mother before the war-torn nation fell to hard line Islamic extremists 'Our kids need him': Kolsoum said she desperately wants her husband (pictured, together) and father of their three children to return home So far about 3,000 desperate Australians have been rescued from the failed state since it fell on August 15. Overnight 1,200 people were evacuated from Afghanistan on four Australian and one New Zealand flight. The cohort included Afghan visa holders and people from allied nations escaping the chaos in the capital. Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Thursday said the number had far exceeded the government's expectations going into the mission. 'It is a highly dangerous situation, we have been very honest about the nature of these challenges and the likelihood of being able to achieve everything that we would hope to achieve,' he told reporters in Canberra. 'But we have to deal with the reality. The terrible, brutal and awful reality of the situation on the ground.'' Relatives say Farid will continue to be targeted by the brutal regime because he belongs to the ethnic Hazara group - a Shia Muslim minority within Afghanistan That harsh reality was confronting captured in the viral clip which showed Firad with blood running down his face and splattered across his polo shirt, crying out that he is an Australian citizen who was trying to reach the airport. 'I am an Australian citizen but they hit me,' the bloodied man says, the video cutting out with the sound of gunshots and screaming. The man's brother, who lives in Sydney, told Daily Mail Australia on Thursday that he has been repeatedly calling his sibling - but his phone is switched off. Kolsoum told the ABC she had briefly managed to get in touch with her husband after the incident, but several hours have passed since she heard from him. Desperate Afghans waded through a sewage ditch on the outskirts of Kabul airport on Wednesday while pleading with soldiers guarding the opposite bank to put them on a plane out of the country as time runs out to flee Taliban rule Troops force back a desperate Afghan man trying to enter the airport (left) while hundreds of others stand up to their knees in a filthy drainage ditch as the plead to be allowed to board flights out of the country Fears are growing that crowds could try to storm the airport once civilian mercy flights stop, or that opportunistic terrorists could attack the densely-packed crowd 'I was devastated. I was thinking, what should I do? What can I do?' she said. Relatives heard claims of Islamist militants going 'door to door' since. 'His life is in major danger and it's only a matter of time for the Taliban to find him,' his cousin told the Mail on Thursday. A source close to the family said that one of the women accompanying the Farid had a phone hidden under her headscarf. She has since messaged her Australian relatives to say the family has been split up and sent to different locations. Biden has committed the US to withdraw by August 31, a decision that western allies warn will mean thousands of Afghans who were promised sanctuary being left behind The Taliban has said it will now block all Afghan citizens from reaching the airport, meaning that those who are not already outside the gates face little prospect of being able to escape American troops and their allies have evacuated some 70,000 people from the airport since the Taliban took power on August 14, but the effort falls far short of the more-than 100,000 that western nations had promised to take It comes as Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade issued urged its citizens not to head to the airport as the situation deteriorates further in the Afghan capital. 'Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. If you're in the area of the airport, move to a safe location and await further advice,' the department said. 'The situation in Afghanistan remains highly volatile and dangerous.' Farid's assault took place despite Joe Biden demanding that the Taliban 'allow access to the airport for those who are transporting out and no disruptions to our operations', in return for withdrawing US troops by August 31. Keeping to that deadline means civilian mercy flights will have to stop in the coming hours so that planes can be diverted to evacuate troops. A US marine comforts a child at Kabul airport as the evacuation operation nears it end, with US allies saying flights could stop within the next 24 hours A US marine carries a child towards an evacuation aircraft at Kabul airport as the final mercy flights depart the country How Biden has backed himself and his allies into a corner and now has little choice but to follow the Taliban's lead Surrounded on all sides by the Taliban, babysitting a humanitarian crisis, and reliant on a single runway as an escape route - this is the situation faced by thousands of western troops at Kabul airport. Though Joe Biden likes to give off the impression that he is still calling the shots in Afghanistan - warning the Taliban yesterday that evacuation flights must be allowed to proceed unimpeded - in reality he has 6,000 men and women in harm's way, and he knows it. With all other US forces already out of the country, the troops at Hamid Karzai Airport are badly isolated and - as UK defence secretary Ben Wallace pointed out on Tuesday - all the Taliban need to do to cut them off further is to land a few mortars on the runway. Biden tacitly acknowledged the situation on Tuesday when he told Americans that 'the sooner we can finish [evacuating], the better,' adding that 'each day of operations brings added risk to our troops.' In short, western forces are woefully unprepared for any sort of confrontation with the Taliban - meaning Biden has little option but to sing to the Islamists' tune. Perhaps the starkest example of the new power dynamic was the Taliban's announcement last night that it will now block Afghans from reaching the airport - a statement that was issued at almost the same time Biden demanded that people be allowed through. It came as little surprise to learn that Taliban fighters were paying no attention to Biden today - beating one Australian man bloody as he headed to the airstrip while turning others back. The only way to stop them, as former head of the British armed forces General Sir Richard Barrons told the BBC, would be 'to leave the airport, and fight the Taliban to go and get these people.' 'I just don't see that as a credible proposition,' he added. As Ben Barry of the International Institute for Strategic Studies put it to The Telegraph: 'The UK and the US need to recognise that the country is under new management. 'The Taliban won They are the landlord and the last thing you want to do is upset the landlord.' Advertisement Some European nations have already ended their mercy missions. Poland has stopped flights, and both Hungarian and French jets are expected to take off for the final time within hours. That has sparked renewed desperation among crowds of refugees at the airport, with hundreds of Afghans wading into an open sewer underneath walls where western troops stand guard today - waving papers at them in the hopes of being picked up. Fears are now growing that civilians could rush the runway and trigger a deadly stampede in a repeat of the horror scenes from last week, or else opportunistic terror groups such as ISIS could attack packed crowds - fears that will only grow as troop numbers dwindle. British foreign secretary Dominic Raab admitted that the UK's mercy mission is now into its final hours with some 4,000 people - 1,250 western citizens and 2,500 Afghans - still left to rescue, though he did not say exactly when the final flight will leave or how many people may be left behind. Mr Raab was also forced to admit that the coming days will present 'maximum danger' for British troops, fearing both a 'Saigon' moment with crowds rushing planes and threats of a 'spectacular' terrorist attack. But, Mr Raab insisted, Britain will keep flying planes out of the country until the last possible moment in the hopes of getting as many people out as possible. One British soldier, speaking anonymously to the Daily Telegraph, said his 'biggest fear' is a stampede at the airport and that 'the civilians might try and get in any way they can and potentially put us all at risk.' 'Unfortunately the quantity of civilians arriving is something we cannot control, with the majority of them not being eligible to be evacuated,' he said, adding: 'I and many others have seen a few mentally disturbing scenes. I think there will be more of that.' Outlining rough plans for the British withdrawal, defence sources said the first move will be for troops to leave the Baron hotel where they have been processing paperwork of those wishing to leave the country. Next, soldiers will hand over control of Abbey gate - located on the south east side of the airport - to US forces. But exactly how and when they will leave the airport entirely is being kept a closely-guarded secret, amid fears that the news of a full exit could spark a rush of desperate people at the gates. Underlining the risks, one defence source told The Telegraph: 'It could be the airfield gets compromised by a massive incursion. It could be that the Taliban have an element that wants to put up a fight in the last days. It could be that ISIS wants to do a 'spectacular'.' Meanwhile Angela Merkel - who was first elected Chancellor in 2005, just four years into the war - gave a speech to the German parliament summing up the conflict as she prepares to leave power later this year. Admitting that leaving Afghanistan now leaves her with a 'bitter' feeling, she insisted the west's 20-year campaign had not been in vain and that trying to bring democracy and stability to the region was 'worth doing'. In a shot at Biden's decision to withdraw, she added: 'That the overall deployment literally stands and falls with the stance of the militarily strongest member of the alliance, the U.S., was always clear to us. 'We will continue the evacuation operation for as long as possible, in order also to make it possible for Afghans who worked with us for security, freedom, the rule of law and development to leave the country.' She did not give a date for when the last German evacuation flight would leave but said there are around 500 troops currently helping with the effort, some of whom are still in the country. Even after the effort ends, she said, Germany will work to see if it could continue to help people by 'among other things through civilian use of Kabul airport.' Biden also admitted to the danger facing troops on Tuesday as he announced his decision on the deadline, saying: 'The sooner we can finish, the better... each day of operations brings added risk to our troops.' The Pentagon said on Wednesday that US forces have 'been very clear' with the Taliban 'about what credentials we are willing to accept' for people trying to get to the airport. 'By and large, with caveats' people have been getting through checkpoints, spokesman John Kirby said, adding 'we also have other means to get people in.' 'When we have reports that someone credentialed is not being let in, we are making that clear to Taliban leaders they need to let them in,' Kirby said. The number of French women sunbathing topless has a hit a 40-year low amid fears they could be secretly photographed and their image posted on social media. A new poll found that only a fifth of women would go topless on the beach in France, with nearly 50 per cent pointing to a fear of being harassed or attacked by men as the reason why they would now wear a bikini top. Topless sunbathing has become less popular in recent years, with only 19 per cent of women saying they do, compared to 34 per cent in 2009 and 40 per cent in 1984. The survey by pollster Ifop showed that French women are becoming increasingly cautious of going topless due to health concerns, sexual harassment fears and safety reasons, reports Le Parisien. The poll, published to mark World Topless Day on Thursday, found that 46 per cent of French women said they did not go topless because they were worried about being covertly photographed and the photo then being posted on social media. The number of French women sunbathing topless has a hit a 40-year low amid fears they could be secretly photographed and their image posted on social media (file image) Another 48 per cent said they were worried about being harassed or attacked by men on the beaches if they sunbathed topless. Meanwhile, a larger 53 per cent of women said decided to wear a bikini top because of health reasons such as skin cancer or damage. Previous surveys have also shown that younger women are increasingly concerned about sexual harassment and body shaming on the beach. Less than 20 per cent of French women aged under 50 now sunbathe topless, compared with 28 per cent 10 years ago and 43 per cent in 1984, according to a 2020 survey by Ifop of over 5,000 Europeans including 1,000 French. This makes the French less willing to bathe topless than some other Europeans, with almost half of Spanish women saying they bathe topless and 34 per cent of Germans. Topless sunbathing has sparked a row in recent years in France, as two gendarmes in Sainte-Marie-la-Mer, 70 miles south of Montpellier, asked three female sunbathers to put their tops on in August 2020 after a holidaymaker complained. The move caused a public outcry, with politicians from the centre, left and right uniting in condemnation - with one branding it a 'threat to our culture'. France's Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin condemned the officers' actions and said: 'It was wrong that the women were warned about their clothing. 'Freedom is something precious. And it is normal that officials can admit their mistakes.' The local gendarmerie has since acknowledged their actions had been 'clumsy' but said the officers only wanted to calm the situation. Topless sunbathing in France is legally not considered to be sexual exhibitionism although it can be halted by local directives outlawing certain styles of dress. Images of Brigitte Bardot sunbathing topless on the Cote D'Azur the same decade helped to make the gesture fashionable, while denunciations by the Vatican and Spanish church only increased its appeal Topless sunbathing first gained a foothold in France in the 1960s, as second-wave feminism swept through Europe and women demanded the same right to tan their upper bodies as men. Images of Brigitte Bardot sunbathing topless on the Cote D'Azur the same decade helped to make the gesture fashionable, while denunciations by the Vatican and Spanish church only increased its appeal. But it was in the 1970s, after a conservative attempt to ban the practice was defeated, that it became a point of national pride. Today, the right of women to sunbathe topless on beaches is seen as a sign of equality between the two sexes, and a sign of France's progressive attitudes. Two daughters who are suing the Government over what they claim is a 'failure' to protect care home residents from Covid-19 have lost a bid for health authorities to provide further evidence. Dr Cathy Gardner and Faye Harris, whose fathers both died in care homes amid the pandemic, are suing the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC), NHS England and Public Health England (PHE). Dr Gardner accused the Government of breaching the human rights of thousands of vulnerable people, including her father Michael Gibson, 88, a retired registrar who died at the Cherwood House Care Centre in Oxfordshire on April 3, 2020. Ms Harris, 57, also joined the legal fight after her father Don, 89, an ex-Royal Marine, 'died of Covid' in May 2020 along with 24 residents at his Hampshire care home. A judicial review was given the go-ahead last November and the case appeared at London's High Court on Wednesday, with the women's lawyers arguing the Government 'failed to discharge their duty of candour in the proceedings'. Dr Cathy Gardner (right) is suing the Government after her father Michael Gibson (right), 88, died 'Covid probable' at the Cherwood House Care Centre in Oxfordshire on April 3, 2020 The lawyers said the court was not provided with 'essential documents evidencing the defendants' decisions' and asked for further disclosure of 132 further pieces of evidence. But Mrs Justice Eady rejected the request in a ruling on Thursday, saying it was not necessary for the court to decide the issues under challenge. The judge also refused the claimants' request to allow certain witnesses for the Government to be cross-examined during the full hearing, which is due to take place in October. She said the Government should provide a further statement detailing the steps it has taken to gather the evidence it is putting before the court for the full hearing. Dr Gardner's father, Michael Gibson, died in an Oxfordshire care home after it had re-admitted, without Covid testing, a former resident who had been in hospital. Her father's death certificate had said 'Covid probable' because he perished before widespread-testing was introduced in care homes. His bereft daughter was left devastated that she was forced to say goodbye to her octogenarian father through a care home window. Ms Harris joined the legal fight after her father Don, 89, 'died of Covid' in May along with 24 residents of Marlfield care home. The home had accepted hospital discharges of patients who may have been infected with the virus. Faye Harris, 57, also joined the legal fight after her father Don (pictured), 89, an ex-Royal Marine, 'died of Covid' in May 2020 along with 24 residents at his Hampshire care home Ms Harris had planned to treat Don to a sailing trip in Portsmouth Harbour for his 90th birthday and had found a boat adapted to carry people in wheelchairs, so he could see the harbour where he was stationed from the sea again. But just days later, Mr Harris died after an outbreak of coronavirus. Hampshire Court Council said later that a quarter of the 24 deaths there around this period were Covid-related but could have been higher. Ms Harris previously told The Times: 'Physically my dad was fit and he was well. He always had a smile on his face. When we left him he was mobile. He was strong and he was a fighter. 'He had Alzheimer's and had had care problems but he came through them all. He should not have died, he should have been on that birthday trip.' After the legal case was launched, Dr Gardner argued the lack of 'adequate' measures to protect residents was 'one of the most egregious and devastating policy failures of recent times'. The women have claimed key policies, such as an alleged policy of discharging patients from hospital into care homes without testing and suitable isolation arrangements, led to a 'shocking death toll' of care home residents. It is estimated that 20,000 people died in care homes between March and June. The women argue certain decisions and policies were a breach of duties under human rights - including the right to life and right to freedom from inhuman or degrading treatment - and equality legislation. Jason Coppel QC, for the two women, said in his written arguments: 'The Government's failure to protect vulnerable care home residents from the ravages of Covid, including its taking of positive steps which introduced Covid infection into care homes, represents one of the most egregious and devastating policy failures in the modern era. 'The House of Commons Public Accounts Committee has described the errors made by Government as 'reckless and negligent' and 'appalling'. 'An Amnesty International report found that Government decisions in relation to care homes were 'heedless at best' and 'inexplicable' and had 'directly violated the human rights of older residents of care homes in England - notably their right to life, their right to health, and their right to non-discrimination'.' This week, Sir James Eadie QC, for the Government, opposed the applications for further disclosure and cross examination, saying that a previous judge who refused to grant them was right to say they are 'excessive and disproportionate'. He told the court there were many decisions which had to be made 'very, very quickly, in the context of a pandemic which was breaking around everyone's ears'. The women's lawyers asked for further disclosure of 132 further pieces of evidence. But Mrs Justice Eady rejected the request on Thursday, saying it was not necessary (stock image) The case, which was filed at the High Court in June last year, accuses the Government of unlawfully exposing countless care home residents to substantial risk during the Covid pandemic. Dr Gardner, also chair of East Devon District Council, believes her father's death was part of a 'national disgrace'. The case will be for the benefit of every individual, including care home residents, staff and family members, affected by the government's course of action, she said. The government was met with staunch criticism of its handling of care homes during the health crisis, with particular policies allowing patients to be discharged from hospitals into care homes without being tested coming under fire. A letter sent to Matt Hancock in June last year said Dr Gardner believed the policies adopted by the Health Secretary, NHS England and Public Health England 'manifestly failed to protect the health, wellbeing and right to life of those residing and working in care homes'. The letter also claimed: 'Their failings have led to large numbers of unnecessary deaths and serious illnesses. 'In addition, the failings of Government have been aggravated by the making of wholly disingenuous, misleading and - in some cases - plainly false statements suggesting that everything necessary has been done to protect care homes during the pandemic.' The full hearing will be at the High Court in London from October 19 and is expected to last four days. MailOnline has contacted the Department of Health for comment. Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh has branded KLM 'filthy scamming airline c***s' after they refused to let him on a flight. The Scot was fuming when staff told him they could not accept his negative NHS Covid test and denied him boarding a flight to Belgrade, Serbia, yesterday. The 62-year-old hit out at the Dutch company on Twitter shortly after the incident and claimed he was refused the NHS test result as 'there's no money in it for them'. He revealed to his 360,000 followers he was now unable to attend an event in Serbia, which is on the amber list. The author, from Edinburgh, who lives in London, also raged festival organisers would have to refund tickets. The Scot (pictured) was fuming when staff told him they could not accept his negative NHS Covid test and denied him boarding a flight to Belgrade, Serbia, yesterday The 62-year-old hit out at the Dutch company (file photo) on Twitter shortly after the incident and claimed he was refused the NHS test result as 'there's no money in it for them' What are the rules for flying to Serbia? Those wanting to fly to Serbia have to have a negative PCR test taken 48 hours before they get to the airport - unless they are exempt. The government website says passengers will be refused if they do not have one and cannot take one at the airport. Serbian nationals and foreign nationals with temporary and permanent residence must either have a negative PCR test 48 hours before arrival or spend 10 days in self-isolation at home when they get to the Balkan country. For those choosing the latter option, they have to report to a healthcare centre within a day of arriving. Advertisement The government website explains passengers 'must use a private test provider for the test and not an NHS test'. It gives details of the specifications the test has to reach before it is used. And it adds that flyers have to take the test three days before heading to the airport. Despite this, Welsh blasted KLM in a series of tweets. He wrote: 'Turned away from airport heading to Belgrade as KLM do not accept the NHS Covid test as there's no money in it for them. 'Filthy scamming airline c***s. They are all turning this s*fest into the dystopia where the profiteering scammers and the bureaucratic w*****s meet.' When KLM asked for Welsh's booking code to try and help, he replied: 'You cannot assist me now. 'There is no way I can now attend the event which is sold out and for which the festival organisers will have to refund tickets. 'Save your regrets for them. Yes p****d off that I didn't get to see Belgrade for the first time. 'But even more p****d off that people looking forward to the event will be disappointed. 'But also that people have to meet those added costs and hassles to travel to see families and take holidays. 'I'm starting to think that the layers of s**t they already have and continue to impose upon us is not actually that much to do with them having our health interests at heart. He added: 'Anyway, ranting over. I still love everyone and I'm going back to my bed.' The airline responded to Welsh, tweeting: 'KLM will accept passengers who meet the governmental requirements of their transit or destination country. 'It is up to the authorities of the respective countries to determine which rules apply. 'These rules vary between countries, and include validity of tickets, passports and visa, as well as possible additional requirements regarding vaccinations, invitation letters and funds. 'These governmental requirements are stated in the IATA Travel Information Manual (TIM), and airlines have to accept or deny passengers accordingly. 'For remarks about governmental requirements, we kindly refer you to the respective local authorities.' Welsh replied: 'Get to f***.' Serbia is on the amber list, meaning visitors have to take a test three days before you travel. Passengers also have to sign a passenger locator form tracing where they have been and where they are going - whether they are vaccinated or not. Customers have been walking out of restaurants over gaps in the menu due to Britain's supply chain crisis, a Zizzi boss revealed today. Stefano Massetto, 49, assistant manager at Zizzi's on Chiswick High Street in west London, said his store had seen shortages of red wine, beer and Coca Cola. He told MailOnline: 'I've had some customers leave the table because of the shortages. We've tried to change some dishes with the material we have. 'One night we didn't have any cocktails and a big group came in wanting more drinks than food - they left.' Stefano Massetto, 49, assistant manager at Zizzi's on Chiswick High Street in west London, said his store had seen shortages of red wine, beer and Coca Cola A copy of the Zizzi menu with highlights over some of the items that were seeing shortages There were shortages of some items including wine and beer at the west London branch Mr Massetto said that delivery delays were a problem for businesses across the sector. 'Today we're missing wines and beers, because I don't think they've been delivered,' he said. 'Last we didn't even get Coca Cola. 'We've had days without any red wine at all. Fortunately our core business is not chicken like Nando's. 'The head office is being very helpful sending us information so we can forecast short term. They are trying to distribute the products so everyone gets some. 'I prefer to receive half of what I've ordered than nothing. They seem to be coming in smaller deliveries - twice a week instead of once. 'I think it's a combo between Brexit and the pingdemic. A lot of the drivers are either self-isolating or are not being allowed into the UK.' MailOnline has contacted Zizzi for comment. The British Retail Consortium, which represents major retailers, demanded business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng to push for the emergency measure to plug a shortfall of 90,000 lorry drivers It came as retailers called on the government to issue temporary visas for EU workers to plug a lorry driver shortage that threatens to disrupt Christmas - as gaps were seen on supermarket shelves and McDonald's ran out of milkshakes. The British Retail Consortium, which represents major retailers, demanded business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng to push for the emergency measure to plug a shortfall of 90,000 lorry drivers. Tesco chairman, John Allan, backed the idea, while Richard Walker, managing director of Iceland, said lorry drivers should be added to the government's essential and skilled workers list to allow those based abroad to apply for a 'skilled worker visa'. Why is there a supply-chain crisis? A lack of lorry drivers and food processors is being partly blamed on the new Brexit visa regime introduced on January 1, which penalises lower-skilled migrants in favour of those with qualifications. But global factors are relevant too, bosses say, including Chinese port closures and a lack of shipping containers. US Vice President Kamala Harris urged Americans to buy Christmas toys early due to a shortage there. Nick Allen, chief executive of the British Meat Processors Association, told MailOnline Britain has so far been unable to shake its dependency on EU workers who have been leaving due to the pandemic. The supply of new workers is also being held back by stricter visa rules introduced on January 1. The most common complaint among UK retailers and food producers is the shortage of lorry drivers, which the Road Haulage Association currently puts at 100,000. Thousands of prospective drivers are waiting for their HGV tests due to a backlog caused by lockdown, while many existing ones have left the UK after Brexit or to be back with their families during Covid. Importers are also suffering a financial hit, with dramatically rising transport costs caused by a global lack of shipping containers and a slowdown in freight movements resulting from port closures. Chinese authorities recently shut Ningbo-Zhoushan port, which is one of the world's largest container terminals, due to a Covid outbreak. Gary Grant, founder and executive chairman of toy chain the Entertainer, said the cost of shipping a container from Asia had increased from $1,700 to more than $13,000 (8,000) over the past year. Advertisement But ministers are said to be against relaxing visa requirements in light of 4.7% of the population remaining unemployed, according to the latest figure from the Office of National Statistics. 'They [retailers] know what the answer is, it's just expensive,' a Whitehall source told The Times. 'There are millions of people unemployed and 90,000 vacancies. They need to pay more and offer training. Government is not going to budge on that.' Coral Rose, Boss of Country Range group, a wholesaler that supplies catering products for schools, care homes and schools, said issues facing the food service sector were 'getting worse'. 'The shortage of drivers is the key issue,' she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. 'We're taking drastic action like buying smaller delivery vehicles because there is going to be increased pressure when schools reopen and people return to their offices. 'So the office is going to get worse. We would like the government to introduce a temporary visa scheme as a quick fix and then more training to increase the number of drivers in the longer term.' On Wednesday, it emerged that Greggs has been unable to restock popular products, including its chicken bake, the chargrill chicken oval bite, and several chicken-filled baguettes. It is the latest national chain, joining McDonald's, Nando's, KFC, Beefeater and Subway, to warn customers about shortages of key ingredients and products. Deliveries of bread, milk and fresh produce to supermarkets and convenience stores have been disrupted, while supplies of canned and bottled drinks are rationed in some areas. Haulage and retail industry leaders say the UK has a shortage of 90,000-100,000 drivers and they are calling on the government to take urgent action amid fears that crucial Christmas deliveries will be disrupted. They argue that HGV drivers should be added to a list of essential and skilled workers so people from the EU can be given visas and allowed into the country to keep food on plates. The managing director of Iceland, Richard Walker, said it is criminal that drivers are not eligible for these visas, yet they are available to visiting ballerinas and concert pianists. Pictures posted by Twitter users this week show how Greggs has been among those hit by supply chain issues He warned the delivery disruption is 'impacting the food supply chain on a daily basis'. Now ONLINE deliveries could be hit amid strike threat By Isabella Nikolic for MailOnline Online shopping deliveries from Asos, Argos and other major retailers could be hit after drivers for Yodel and DHL threatened strike action over pay. A consultative poll of 200 drivers working for DHL saw a 98 per cent vote for industrial action over the offer of a one per cent pay rise. It will now go to a full ballot of members by the Unite union who recently won a higher pay rise for beer delivery drivers after a threatened strike which was subsequently called off this week. A nationwide shortage of HGV drivers has put those in the trade in a stronger position when it comes to negotiating new pay deals. It comes as lorry drivers at delivery giant Yodel are being balloted on whether to take industrial action over pay and conditions. The GMB union said more than 250 of its members will vote in the coming weeks on whether to launch a campaign of action. Advertisement He said: 'Things like bread and other fast moving lines are being cancelled in about 100 stores per day, soft drinks are 50per cent less in terms of volume. So it is having an effect at shelf.' Mr Walker admitted that some stores are selling out of bread and then struggling to replenish' the shelves. 'We have a lot of goods to transport between now and Christmas and a strong supply chain is vital for everyone,' he said. 'The reason for sounding the alarm now is that we have already had one Christmas cancelled at the last minute, and I would hate this one to be problematic as well.' Industry experts say the shortage is the largely the result of a double-whammy of Brexit, which led to thousands of EU drivers going home, and coronavirus. Lockdown hit the training of new drivers and some 40,000 HGV driver tests were cancelled. Significantly, the average age of a British lorry driver is put at 56=57 and not enough young people have joined the industry against a background of long hours, poor conditions and pay. Mr Walker told the BBC's Today programme: 'I would not say it is not an inevitable consequence of Brexit. It is a self-inflicted wound caused by the government's failure to appreciate the importance of HGV drivers as skilled workers. 'On the skilled worker list are ballerinas and concert orchestra musicians, but not HGV lorry drivers - so let's add them to the list. It's 'criminal' that they are not on the list.' Tesco chairman, John Allan, backed the idea of giving EU drivers visas to help keep Britain moving. 'The best and most straightforward solution would be for the industry to bring in skilled drivers from elsewhere,' he said. The supply of popular Christmas products is likely to be hit by domestic labour shortages and issues with global shipping Tesco stores are currently suffering intermittent disruption, but Mr Allan said: 'There is absolutely no reason for customers of Tesco, or I suspect other chains, to panic buy.' Looking ahead to Christmas, he said: 'We are running very hard just to keep on top of existing demand and there isn't the capacity to build the stocks we would like to see. 'So in that sense I think there may be some shortages at Christmas. But again I wouldn't want to over-dramatise the extent to which that would be the case. I think it's very easy to make a drama out of a modest crisis.' Steve Murrells, chief executive of the Co-operative Group, said the ongoing food shortages 'are at a worse level than at any time I have seen'. He said the disruption has been driven by 'Brexit and issues caused by Covid', and the firm is retraining staff as lorry drivers to help fill vacant roles. They couple took evacuation flight to Birmingham on Monday and are honeymooning in a Westminster quarantine hotel As they tried to flee, Abdul was threatened with death by a Taliban fighter A British man who got married in Kabul a week before it fell to the Taliban has described the experience as a 'rollercoaster of emotions'. Abdul and Fatima, whose names have been changed, had their wedding at the start of the month and within days the Taliban had arrived outside the capital, which fell into their control on Sunday August 15. Since then the couple have been threatened with death by Taliban soldiers, fled the country and are now spending their 'honeymoon' in quarantine in a hotel in London. The 25-year-old medical student, who was born in Afghanistan, told the PA news agency: 'I got married in the first week of August, on the second week, I heard the Taliban were on the outskirts of Kabul. A British-Afghan couple who wed in Kabul at the start of the month were forced to flee after insurgent Taliban forces took over the country within days. Pictured: Taliban fighters patrol the streets of the capital 'You're happy you've just had your wedding, invited hundreds of people, then suddenly you hear the news. 'I've never been in such a situation before where you're very happy and then it hits the ground, and then it's hard to come back up.' Abdul grew up in the outskirts of Kabul before relocating to London as a teenager, and returned to his birthplace in early July after finishing his second-year exams at a UK medical school. He and his wife arrived into Birmingham airport on Monday night after an evacuation flight from Kabul, and are now quarantining in a hotel in Westminster. 'I told my wife, this is our honeymoon... so take advantage of it,' Abdul joked. 'Hopefully in the future we will try to have one, but for now this is our honeymoon - being safe, knowing the future will be bright and hopefully we can settle somewhere in the UK.' The couple have been threatened with death by Taliban soldiers, forcing them to flee to the UK on an evacuation flight. The couple are now spending their 'honeymoon' in quarantine in a hotel in London, having arrived safely on Monday night. Pictured: Passengers evacuating at Hamid Karzai International Airport Abdul said traditionally he would have been invited to various members of his wife's extended family in the weeks after the wedding, but they did not even get the opportunity to say goodbye to her parents before they had to flee. They are now concerned for the safety of those left behind. 'Right now, if I don't listen to the news I can gain peace of mind just for a while,' he said. 'But my wife, because she has family members in Afghanistan, she keeps watching TV. 'I think with people who are in Afghanistan at the moment, they have no hope... they are expected to be beaten up by the Taliban.' Abdul said a Taliban member threatened to kill him in front of his wife last week after he showed his British passport at a checkpoint in Kabul. He was trying to reach British soldiers beyond the position, which the Taliban member allowed, but only by pulling and leading him by the arm for '100 yards or so', leaving him bruised. Abdul said a Taliban member threatened to kill him in front of his wife last week after he showed his British passport at a checkpoint in Kabul. Pictured: Taliban fighters stand guard at a checkpoint 'They told me "if there wasn't international pressure on us, we would have shot you dead",' Abdul said. Abdul said his wife has faced anxiety since their journey, and he fears the NHS could face a mental health crisis helping refugees with PTSD when they return to the UK. 'I think over the past few days we have managed to give ourselves hope, you're in safety, I'll be able to go back to medical school in mid-September to pursue my dreams,' he said. 'I hope my wife can kind of start getting back a peace of mind as well.' He added that he does not know where he and his wife will live after they finish quarantine but he hopes the UK Government has plans to help refugees with accommodation. 'That's the uncertain part,' Abdul said. 'But... for now, I'm happy that we're in a safe place and grateful to everyone who contributed to the evacuation of myself, my wife and all (others).' *The couple's real names have been replaced with Abdul and Fatima to protect their identity. This Qing famille rose vase was expected to sell for 15,000 but actually sold for 550,000 as it was revealed it's an 18th century piece of Chinese artwork A Chinese vase a demolition worker received as payment for a job nearly 40 years ago has now sold for a whopping 550,000. The Qing famille rose vase had been given to the owner's late father, who ran a demolition company in south London in the 1980s. He kept it in his two-bed, semi-detached house until he passed away. The 12ins tall piece was inherited by his son who kept it stored away for the past 15 years. The 70-year-old is celebrating today after it sold at auction for 36 times the 15,000 it had been expected to be knocked down for. The vendor was said to be very emotional upon being told the result and also relieved that he won't have any financial worries through his retirement. The twin-handled falancai ruby glazed vase has the mark of the Qianlong Emperor on it, which would date it to between 1735 to 1796. Hannam's Auctioneers, of Selborne, Hants, said it was probably of that period and was possibly looted from the Imperial Palace in China during the Boxer rebellion in 1899-1901. The vase was in good condition with some minor flaking to the enamelling. The 12ins tall piece was inherited by the son of a demolition worker who kept it stored away for the past 15 years but then put it up for auction. Pictured: Hannam's auctioneer with the vase The Boxer Rebellion The Boxer Rebellion was an uprising against foreigners that occurred in 1900, begun by peasants but eventually supported by the government. It took place during the reign of the Qing dynasty - the last imperial dynasty to rule in China. A Chinese secret society known as the Boxers embarked on a violent campaign to drive all foreigners from China. The Boxers targeted foreigners first and foremost, Western missionaries in particular. It also targeted Chinese converts to Christianity, who drew ire for flouting traditional Chinese ceremonies and family relations. Several countries sent troops to halt the attacks. The troops captured Beijing in August 1900, and, after extensive discussions, the rebellion officially ended when the Boxer Protocol was signed on September 7, 1901 ending hostilities. Source: Britannica Advertisement The auction had seven phone bidders competing for the vase, which set a new house record of a hammer price of 520,000. With fees added on, the anonymous Chinese buyer paid 550,000 for it. Harry Hannam, from the auction house, said: 'The vase was given in lieu of a bad debt to the vendor's father who ran a demolition company in the 1980s. 'He took this vase along with a two-inch jade Buddha as payment, presumably to a client who couldn't pay their bill. 'The family were from a very moderate upbringing and were working class. They had a two-bed semi-detached home near Bromley. 'The man's wife inherited them upon his death and when she died in the early 2000s they went to their son. 'Since his mother died I believe the vase has been stored away and has not been on display anywhere. 'We sold the Buddha for the family when we first formed the company six or seven years ago for 5,500. 'He's going to be clearing the whole house soon and relocating to the south coast so decided to consign the vase for sale. 'He had absolutely no idea of its worth when it was initially consigned. The estimate was a great surprise to him and after I told him the selling price he was very emotional. 'What's lovely is that he will never have to worry again during his retirement. 'The vase is in generally good condition with minor flaking to the enamelling. Vase was given to the owner's late father in south London in the 1980s. Pictured: the vase had come from the Imperial Palace in China and was possibly looted during the Boxer rebellion 'Almost certainly the vase had come from the Imperial Palace in China and was possibly looted during the Boxer rebellion. 'In a market full of counterfeits, the vase was deemed by many to be 18th century and made for the Emperor some time between 1736 and 1795. 'Buyers of Chinese works of art are always keen to buy back important and historical pieces from their past and this vase represents a significant part of it.' A British Army Gurkha has been cleared after being accused of groping a female medic colleague while claiming he was trying to keep warm during a winter exercise. Prosecutors claimed Corporal Basanta Ale Magar, 32, 'manipulated' the woman when he said he was 'freezing' during the night and moved his camp bed next to hers. Worried that he was ill, she touched his back to see how cold he was. The married man was then accused of 'grabbing' her underwear and breast. However, the Corporal of the first Royal Gurkha Rifles denied sexual assault at Bulford Court Martial, Wilts, and has now been found not guilty. The Corporal of the first Royal Gurkha Rifles attempted to nuzzle into the woman's neck and after she pushed him away, he tried to kiss her but she forced him off again, the board was told. Corporal Basanta Ale Magar, 32, (pictured) was cleared of groping a female colleague during an army training exercise, a Bulford court martial hearing has ruled The court heard Cpl Ale Magar then asked the 'scared' officer whether she was 'frisky'. The woman reported the incident to her sergeant and the military police and the Gurkha was charged with sexual assault. The board was previously told Cpl Ale Magar dragged his cot camper bed across the 10m by 4m container next to hers. The woman said: 'He trapped me in a corner in the middle of the night. I didn't realise quite what was happening until he started to touch me. 'I thought he came over to me because he was poorly. It became quite clear what his intentions were. 'He was sitting right next to me, all I did was reach forward to touch him for reassurance and to see if he was cold - I was in patient mode. 'I was groggy and tired. I touched his back and it wasn't cold. Then he started to touch me inappropriately. The moment I started rubbing his back he started touching me. 'He reached down and touched the small of my back, he then rubbed his arm down and grabbed my underwear. Almost simultaneously, he grabbed my breast underneath my clothing for a couple of seconds. 'He tried to nuzzle into my neck at the same time and his lips touched my neck. 'I pushed him off me. I wanted him to get away from me because he had taken it far enough. He tried to grab me again and tried to pull my face towards his. 'It was really, really firm that time. He grabbed me for a kiss and I pushed him away even harder than I pushed him away the first time. 'I told him to get off me both times. He was just trying to manipulate me.' Bulford Military Court (above) cleared 'happily married' Cpr Ale Magar of the sexual assault charge But Cpl Ale Magar denied this and told the court their respective beds were already close together in the container and that the woman was 'making all of this up'. The 'model soldier', who appeared motionless dressed in full uniform, was cleared by the board who deliberated for an hour and a half. The court martial heard the alleged incident happened when the pair were sleeping alone in a container, commonly used for shipping, undertaking an exercise at an army training centre. Cpl Ale Magar denied intentionally touching the woman and told the board: 'I was shivering at the time. 'None of my body parts touched her and I am not aware of touching any part of her body. As far as I am aware we were close.' He told the court he was happily married. The Gurkha, who was described to the court as a 'consummate, dedicated and motivated' soldier by defence counsel Matthew Bolt, was cleared of the single charge. Adults are at a greater risk of developing inflammation of the heart after catching Covid than from a vaccine, research suggests. A real-world study of more than 2million Israelis found the risks of developing myocarditis following a Covid jab were outweighed by the risks from the virus itself. Researchers said the condition occurred among fewer than three per every 100,000 patients who got the vaccine and would not have otherwise developed it. That rate was much higher 11 per 100,000 among people infected with the virus, they said. People who caught the coronavirus were at a much higher risk of developing an irregular heart beat, kidney damage and blocked lung vessels compared to vaccinated participants. The study warned that the risk of heart inflammation risk was boosted slightly by vaccination, but the complications are still incredibly rare. The findings only apply to adults. Children on the other hand have been shown to be at a vanishingly small risk of getting sick with Covid in any way. This is why the UK's vaccine advisory group has ruled against routinely jabbing young people under 16. They say the tiny risk of side effects is still greater than the risk of Covid. Researchers in Israel spotted 2.7 extra cases of myocarditis per 100,000 people who were injected with the Pfizer vaccine, but this shot up to 11 additional cases for every 100,000 individuals who caught the virus The graph shows the number of extra cases of each adverse effect per 100,000 people after a Pfizer injection (grey bars) and a Covid infection (orange bars) The Covid vaccines went through extensive safety tests before being rolled out to the public, but because trials involve small groups, they often fail to detect extremely rare side effects. Tests did not pick up cases of myocarditis, but cases of the side effect was recorded in Israel, the US and UK after the countries began vaccinating their populations in the millions. Most myocarditis cases after Covid vaccines have been identified in young men, which seems to be supported by the study. Researchers at the Clalit Research Institute in Ramat Gan in Israel examined health records of 2.1million over-16s in Israel to gather data on the real-world cases of adverse effects after a vaccine or a Covid infection. The country exclusively used the Pfizer jab in its world-leading vaccination drive and was the first to reach 50 per cent uptake. The experts compared around 880,000 people who were double-jabbed by May 24 with the same number of unvaccinated individuals who had a similar age and health background. WHAT IS MYOCARDITIS? Myocarditis is an inflammation of the heart muscle. There are no specific causes of the condition but it is usually triggered by a virus. Some of the most common infections which cause myocarditis, are those called adenovirus and Coxsackie B. It can be caused by the common cold, hepatitis B and C, and herpes simplex virus. The most common symptoms of the condition include chest pain, a fever, a fast heartbeat, tiredness and shortness of breath. If the inflammation damages the heart muscle or the fibres that conduct electrical pulses to the heart, complications can develop. They can develop quickly, and include sudden loss of consciousness, an abnormally fast, slow or irregular heartbeat. In very severe cases the condition is fatal, causing heart failure or sudden death. The inflammation enlarges the heart and creates scar tissue, forcing it to work harder and therefore making it weaker. In most cases of viral myocarditis, the illness goes away and there are no complications. But in rare cases when inflammation is severe, there can be damage to the heart which needs monitoring and possibly a heart transplant. Myocarditis can reoccur, but there is no known way to prevent this. The risk of recurrence is low, around 10 to 15 per cent, according to Myocarditis Foundation. It is difficult to gauge the prevalence of myocarditis because there is no widely available test for it. In 2010, approximately 400,000 people died of heart muscle disease - cardiomyopathy that includes myocarditis - worldwide. Expert consensus opinion estimates that up to 40 per cent of dilated cardiomyopathy results from myocarditis, according to the National Organisation for Rare Disorders. Advertisement Their study, which was published yesterday in the New England Journal of Medicine, calculated how many cases of 25 different side effects there were in each group. They compared these findings to incidences of the adverse effects among 170,000 people who tested positive for Covid and a control group of the same size who did not have the virus. They spotted around three extra cases of myocarditis per 100,000 people 42 days after they received a second dose of Pfizer. But among those who tested positive for Covid, the risk shot up to 11 extra cases for every 100,000 individuals. Myocarditis is usually triggered by a virus and can be fatal in very severe cases, but most of those linked to Covid jabs have been mild. As of July 28, the UK recorded 256 cases of the condition after dishing out 46.7million jabs. It is unclear how many cases of the condition there are usually in the general population, because most cases are mild and not well investigated, according to Public Health England. But among the control group in the study, there was six cases of myocarditis, compared to 21 in those who received a Pfizer jab. The average age of those who developed the condition after a Pfizer injection was 25, while 91 per cent were male. The researchers concluded that the Pfizer jab was not associated with an elevated risk of most of the side effects they examined. There was a chance of developing myocarditis after a Pfizer jab, but this risk was much higher after a Covid infection, they said. Meanwhile, there was 11 more cases of pericarditis per 100,000 people after a Covid infection, while there was just one extra case per 100,000 people after the Pfizer jab. Dr Ben Reis, co-author of the study and head of predictive medicine at Boston Children's Hospital, told the New York Times: 'Coronavirus is very dangerous, and it's very dangerous to the human body in many ways. 'If the reason that someone so far has been hesitating to get the vaccine is fear of this very rare and usually not very serious adverse event called myocarditis, well, this study shows that that very same adverse event is actually associated with a higher risk if you're not vaccinated and you get infected.' The study also calcualted there to be 166 extra cases per 100,000 people of arrhythmia - an irregular heartbeat. Viral illnesses are a common cause of the condition, which can lead to strokes and cardiac arrest. Meanwhile, researchers spotted six less cases of this condition than they expected among people who got the Pfizer jab. People who caught the virus were also 125 times more at risk of developing kidney damage. Researchers also identified 62 more cases of a pulmonary embolism per 100,000 than expected after catching Covid, which is a blocked blood vessel in the lung. And there was 43 more cases of blood clots in the vein - called deep-vein thrombosis - per 100,000 after testing positive. Adverse effects linked with the Pfizer jab include 78 more cases than expected of swollen lymph nodes per 100,000 people, which is a common side effect from vaccines. It comes as the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), which advises the Government on the vaccine rollout, is determining whether the jabs should be rolled out to younger groups. Over-16s were invited to get a jab earlier this month, but the scientists are yet to decide whether any younger groups should be offered the vaccine. But NHS England have been told to prepare to rollout jabs to all over-12s in the coming weeks. Professor Lawrence Young, a virologist at the University of Warwick, told MailOnline: 'It's important to recognise that Covid is a very nasty disease that not only affects your breathing but also your body's blood clotting system. 'This can affect other organs such as your heart and kidneys which can lead to long-term damage. 'The risk associated with Covid infection far outweigh the rare myocarditis associated with the Pfizer vaccine. 'Most of the reported cases of myocarditis after infection are mild and individuals respond well to standard therapy.' Professor Robert Storey, an expert in infection, immunity and cardiovascular disease at the University of Sheffield, told MailOnline: 'Many decisions we make in life influence our health risks and gains. 'The best chance of a healthy life comes from making decisions that improve our chances of remaining healthy. 'Covid vaccines are a good example of this. 'There appear to be very small risks associated with these vaccines with less than roughly 1 in 30,000 risk of heart inflammation with the Pfizer vaccine or 1 in 100,000 risk of blood clots with the AstraZeneca vaccine. 'These risks of cardiovascular complications are tiny compared to the much higher risks of Covid infection and the rapid spread of the delta variant is clearly a huge danger to people who aren't vaccinated. 'Covid infection carries far greater risk and a much higher number of unpleasant complications, including much higher risks of heart inflammation or blood clots. 'Interestingly, the recent study showed a lower risk of brain haemorrhage amongst other things in people who received the vaccine. So it really emphasises the importance of vaccination in improving your chances of remaining healthy.' Joe Biden's withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan has been labelled a 'strategic disaster of very significant proportions' by MPs after evacuation efforts were rocked by a suspected terrorist attack this afternoon. Multiple people have been killed in at least two explosions near Kabul airport after UK ministers warned this morning that there was 'very credible reporting' of an 'imminent' attack in the area. At least 60 people have been killed 140 injured, a senior Afghan health official told the BBC. Earlier figures provided separately by the Russian foreign ministry and the Taliban put the death toll at 13. Twelve US servicemen are among those killed, according to the Pentagon. The deteriorating security situation in the Afghan capital has prompted calls for the UK to consider pulling out its remaining troops amid fears airlifts will have to stop. However, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has insisted that the 'despicable' attacks will not interrupt the UK's evacuation operation. One Tory MP criticised Mr Biden's handling of the withdrawal and his decision to stick to his August 31 exit date, telling MailOnline 'this is a strategic disaster of very significant proportions' and 'there is always going to be chaos when you're leaving somewhere on a forced deadline'. Joe Biden's withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan has been labelled a 'strategic disaster of very significant proportions' by MPs UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has insisted that the 'despicable' attacks will not interrupt the UK's evacuation operation They said: 'The question is, did it have to be a collapsing state? No, it didn't have to be but we chose to leave and we chose to abandon 20 years of work.' They added: 'If people cant get into the airport anymore and if it is thought that it is only a matter of time before our troops become the target, then obviously people are going to have be rethinking what is happening. A Labour MP said they were 'furious' with Mr Biden and claimed he had been 'too cowardly' to challenge Donald Trump's initial deal with the Taliban which committed US forces to leaving the country. Meanwhile, Tom Tugendhat, the Tory chairman of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, said: 'The attack on innocent people at Kabul airport simply trying to escape the horror of Taliban rule shows exactly who the group has brought with them. 'The pattern is well established from Nigeria and Mali to Syria and Iraq, whenever Islamist extremists take power, terror follows.' Downing Street said Mr Johnson had been updated on the situation at the airport and he would be chairing a meeting of the COBRA emergency committee. The Pentagon earlier confirmed two blasts occurred in a 'complex attack' outside Hamid Karzai International Airport and there were 'a number of US and civilian casualties'. The Ministry of Defence said there had been no UK military or Government casualties reported at an early stage. The Ministry of Defence did not confirm or deny whether ISIS-K was believed to be behind the explosions, after earlier warnings about the affiliate of the so-called Islamic State (IS) terror group in Afghanistan. But an anonymous US official said the blasts were 'definitely believed to be' carried out by IS. The blast took place near the Baron Hotel at the Abbey Gate of the airport where huge crowds had gathered in an attempt to enter the airport This afternoon's explosions came after Mr Johnson had warned that time was running out to rescue people from Afghanistan ahead of Mr Biden's exit date. The Prime Minister had said at lunchtime that the UK will continue with airlifts 'for as long as we can' and insisted 'we have got the overwhelming majority' of eligible people out. Armed Forces Minister James Heappey this morning delivered the stark admission that the UK will not be able to rescue everyone who is eligible. Mr Heappey said the 'window of opportunity to evacuate people is closing' and 'there will be people on your TV screens over the weekend that have been left behind'. The UK was due to run 11 evacuation flights today but Mr Heappey would not be drawn on whether there will be more tomorrow. Mr Biden rejected calls from Mr Johnson and other NATO allies to push back his withdrawal deadline to provide more time for the humanitarian airlifts. The UK is scrambling to get as many eligible people out of the country as possible amid fears those who worked for Britain could face reprisals under the new Taliban regime. The Prime Minister today visited the British Armed Forces Permanent Joint Headquarters, in Eastbury, northwest of London Speaking during a visit to Permanent Joint Headquarters in north London, where he met military personnel involved in the evacuation efforts, Mr Johnson said: 'We will keep going obviously for as long as we can and I think what people should also understand is what an incredible achievement this has been by the UK military just in the last 10 days or so.' He continued: 'We have got the overwhelming majority of those to whom we owe that debt out of Afghanistan as I stand and talk to you now. 'In the time we have left, which may be, as I am sure everybody can appreciate, quite short we will do everything we can to get everybody else. What is ISIS-K? ISIS-K is one of six or seven regional offshoots of the Islamic State - the K stands for the Khorasan region, which historically encompasses parts of modern day Iran, Central Asia, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. ISIS-K was begun in 2014, as a splinter group from the Pakistani Taliban, and its original leaders were from Pakistan. In 2015 it was recognized by ISIS's leaders in Iraq and Syria, and in January 2016 declared a terrorist organization by the State Department. Its strongholds are eastern Afghanistan, straddling the border with Pakistan in Nangarhar province, and the north of Afghanistan. In 2018 the group was weakened in the north of Afghanistan, and in 2019 severely beaten back in the east. But in 2020 they regrouped and launched a series of devastating terror attacks. Advertisement 'But I want to stress that this is just the first phase so even beyond the US deadline of the 31st of this month we hope to continue to be able to say to people well, you can come out and one of the key things that we are saying to the Taliban is to engage with the West, to unlock those funds, safe passage for those who want to come out is obviously the number one condition.' Mr Heappey had earlier warned there is 'very credible reporting' of an 'imminent' and 'severe' threat to Kabul airport. He called on those queuing outside Hamid Karzai International Airport to move to safety amid concerns over an affiliate of the so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan, known as Isis-K. He said the intelligence on a potential terrorist attack was now 'much firmer', telling BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'There is now very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack and hence why the Foreign Office advice was changed last night that people should not come to Kabul airport, they should move to a safe place and await further instructions.' America, Britain and Australia all issued instructions to their citizens in the early hours of this morning to immediately leave the area around the airport because of fears of a deadly attack. Many Afghans who have been told to stay away from the transport hub are now flocking to Pakistan and Iran in a bid to escape after the UK told them to head to the border. However, a Western diplomat in Kabul said areas outside the airport gates were still 'incredibly crowded' despite the warnings. Some countries have already announced they are ending their airlift operations from today. Mr Heappey conceded this morning that some people will be left behind as time runs out and the rescue flights stop. Praising the bravery of UK armed forces personnel, he told LBC Radio: 'They are heroes and we should all be really proud of them. They have brought out 12,279 people up to 6am this morning and they have done that in 11 days from a standing start. Planes are lined up at Kabul international airport today as the rescue mission to evacuate thousands is still ongoing ahead of the August 31 deadline The UK is scrambling to get as many eligible people out of the country as possible amid fears those who worked for NATO forces could face reprisals from the Taliban 'We won't get everybody out. There will be people on your TV screens over the weekend that have been left behind. 'But absolutely none of the paras, the pilots, anybody who has been involved in this mission should look at those TV pictures and see it as a personal reflection of their endeavours over the last few days. 'The reality is is that we have brought out 5,000 people, already more than we thought we needed to bring out when we started this mission. It is the most remarkable effort.' Ministers have not set out the deadline for the departure of British troops from Kabul but they are expected to have to pack up and leave ahead of the Americans. Mr Heappey would not be drawn on how much time is left for evacuations as he said: 'Eleven more flights today. I am afraid that what I am not going to be able to do today or any of my colleagues do in subsequent days until this operation is over and all British troops are out of the country is to discuss with you in any detail the timeline before the key events happen.' Of the 12,279 people who the UK has helped flee the Taliban since August 13 when the group was on its march back to power, some 1,988 were extracted yesterday. On Wednesday, it was estimated that nearly 2,000 people eligible under the Afghan relocations and assistance policy (Arap) remained on the ground. But Mr Heappey said the number outstanding has now dropped to 'potentially half' that. A South Korean Air Force KC-330 Cygnus multirole tanker-transport aircraft carrying Afghan evacuees is pictured today landing at Incheon airport, west of Seoul, as evacuation efforts continue Arap is designed to help those Afghans, such as interpreters, who helped the UK forces and who are therefore at a heightened risk of persecution by the Taliban. Embassy staff and British nationals are also being evacuated, as are some from allied countries. An unidentified number of 'special cases' may be eligible for evacuation, such as LGBTQ advocates, judges and human rights activists. The Taliban has said it is 'not in favour of allowing Afghans to leave' after the August 31 deadline amid reports the group has already launched a crackdown. Chicago police have said 'Hell, no' to Mayor Lori Lightfoot's plan to mandate vaccines for all city employees. The Democrat told a press conference on Monday that shots 'are absolutely going to be required' hours after the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine for over-16s - taking it beyond its emergency phase. The ruling prompted the Pentagon to order all 800,000 active service members to get the shot, while private firms including Delta Airlines and Goldman Sachs also told their staff to get the vaccine. Joe Biden has already signed an executive order requiring millions of federal staff to either get vaccinated or abide by a regular Covid testing scheme. But cop union boss John Catanzara told Fox: 'This vaccine has no studies for long-term side effects or consequences. None. 'To mandate anybody to get that vaccine, without that data as a baseline, amongst other issues, is a "Hell, no" for us. 'We are 100% against mandated vaccines for our members,' he added. Mayor Lori Lightfoot told a press conference on Monday that shots 'are absolutely going to be required' hours after the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine for over-16s - taking it beyond its emergency phase (file photo) Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7 President John Catanzara walks out of the Leighton Criminal Courthouse earlier this month Lightfoot's negotiations with several unions remain ongoing and there has not yet been an indication of when a requirement for the city's 33,000 employees will come into effect. At a press conference on Monday, she said: 'We're working through those discussions which have been ongoing now for a couple weeks with our colleagues in organized labor that represent city employees.' 'But we absolutely have to have a vaccine mandate,' she added. 'It's for the safety of all involved, particularly members of the public who are interacting with city employees on a daily basis. It's important for colleagues to also feel like they have a workplace that's safe. 'So a vaccine mandate from the city will come, and we'll make specific announcements in the coming days.' Catanzara has clashed with Lightfoot in the past, including after the January 6 riot at the Capitol when she labelled the cop 'delusional' for saying he sympathised with the MAGA mob. However, he is not alone in fighting her on the mask mandates. 'It ain't just our guys. It's the sergeants, lieutenants and captains. This is a united front. ... It's no longer John Catanzara's big mouth, like they like to spin it all the time,' Catanzara told the Chicago Sun Times on Wednesday. 'This has literally lit a bomb underneath the membership. ... And what are they gonna do when four or five thousand coppers say, "Screw you. I'm staying home. You're not making me get this f---ing vaccination. Don't pay me. That's fine. We'll see you in court." 'You're not gonna pay me. You're gonna make me stay home. But you're gonna have thousands of coppers willing to stay home, not getting paid to not get a vaccine and then, what are you gonna do for manpower on the streets?' he said. The uproar comes as the highly-infectious Delta variant continues to sweep across the United States, with more than 170,000 new cases and 1,470 new deaths recorded across the country on August 25. The Pfizer vaccine was granted final approval by the FDA on Monday after receiving Emergency Use Authorization in December. Moderna has also applied for full approval of its vaccine, and Johnson & Johnson has said it hopes to do so later this year. Dr. Anthony Fauci said Tuesday Americans can expect many more vaccine mandates now that a jab is fully authorized. 'You're gonna see a lot more [vaccine] mandates because there will be institutions and organizations which previously were reluctant to require vaccinations, which will now feel much more empowered to do that,' Fauci said on MSNBC's Morning Joe. 'That could be organizations, businesses, colleges, universities. We're even seeing it with the military already.' President Biden, in a speech on Monday, urged companies to now start requiring vaccines. 'As I mentioned before, I've imposed vaccination requirements that will reach millions of Americans,' he said. Biden signed an executive order requiring federal employees and contractors to either get vaccinated or adhere to a regular Covid testing scheme. 'Today I'm calling on more companies ... in the private sector to step up with vaccine requirements that will reach millions more people. 'If you're a business leader, a nonprofit leader, state or local leader, who has been waiting for FDA approval to require vaccinations, I call on you now to do that, require it.' An advanced Chinese weapon has taken down an unmanned aircraft with a powerful electromagnetic pulse in the first known field test of the Beijing technology. The electromagnetic pulse (EMP) weapon was fired at the aircraft while it was flying 1,500 metres (4,920ft) above sea level before crashing down. The experiment, conducted by Chinese defence contractor China Electronics Technology Group (CETC), is thought to be China's first openly reported field test of an electromagnetic pulse weapon in the race to catch up with the US. The EMP weapon used in the test operated within a narrow band, meaning the microwave beam it produced was designed to have a longer firing range. Chinese scientists have tested a powerful electromagnetic pulse (EMP) weapon in an experiment which saw a large aircraft brought down while flying at 4,920 feet (stock image) However, researchers found that the drone's flight control system had malfunctioned after the pulse weapon was fired. According to a paper in the Chinese journal Electronic Information Warfare Technology, in this experiment the drone did not drop immediately but veered unexpectedly from side to side. CETC engineer Wen Yunpeng and colleagues noted that a likely explanation for the drone's behaviour is that 'the flight control system malfunctioned, issuing an error control command.' The experiment is thought to be China's first openly reported field test of an electromagnetic pulse weapon in the race to catch up with the US (pictured, a US EMP weapon known as Boeing Champ) How EMP works EMP, or electromagnetic pulse weapons use missiles equipped with an electromagnetic pulse cannon. This uses a super-powerful microwave oven to generate a concentrated beam of energy. The energy causes voltage surges in electronic equipment, rendering them useless before surge protectors have the chance to react. The aim is to destroy an enemy's command, control, communication and computing, surveillance and intelligence capabilities without hurting people or infrastructure. Advertisement The paper did not give details about the date and location of the experiment, or of distance between the EMP weapon and the target. In 2019, the US demonstrated a prototype EMP weapon known as the Tactical High Power Microwave Operational Responder, or Thor, that brought down 50 drones with one shot, showing that it is capable of defending a military base. According to the researchers, the design of the Chinese EMP weapons are based on US ones, but with some cost-effective technical innovations. Although the Chinese experiment only involved one aircraft, researchers claimed the weapon would have 'a significant advantage against swarms of drones'. EMPs can range in size from narrowly targeted cannons that could disable an aircraft to massive atmospheric nuclear blasts that could wipe out the entire nation's electricity grid. An oncologist said he was forced to turn away cancer patient who needed emergency treatment because the hospital in Florida is full of Covid-19 patients. Dr. Nitesh Paryani, a radiation oncologist in Tampa, said he couldn't accept the patient from a nearby hospital because there was 'simply no room' to treat the patient. He told CNN on Wednesday that the patient was being sent to a location which had adequate treatment options, but the hospital had to turn them away. Dr. Nitesh Paryani, (pictured) a radiation oncologist in Tampa, said he couldn't accept the patient from a nearby hospital because there was 'simply no room' to treat the patient Paryani, the medical director of Tampa Oncology and Proton, said: 'Delta is just ripping through the hospitals in ways that we couldn't have imagined and the strain it's causing on the health care system is unimaginable.' The United States reported a record-high number of coronavirus last week, as Florida recorded more than 150,000 cases and the number of deaths surged 300 percent in a single day. The cancer patient was later admitted to another facility nearby, but hospitals in the area are beginning to hold off on procedures due to lack of beds. He added : 'The other day, our emergency room had a 12-hour wait. Almost every hospital in the city is on diversion, meaning they don't have room to take transfer patients.' The latest Covid-19 surge, due largely to the more transmissible Delta variant, is pushing emergency rooms to the brink (stock image) Paryani urged Americans to get vaccinated, calling it 'the best tool we have' to overcome the pandemic. 'We're seeing in the hospitals, greater than 90 percent of the people that are admitted in the ICUs are unvaccinated.' The latest Covid-19 surge, due largely to the more transmissible Delta variant, is pushing emergency rooms to the brink. According to figures compiled by the widely-respected Johns Hopkins University, the U.S. reported 319,456 new COVID cases, raising the overall count of nationwide cases to more than 37.7 million. Nearly half of those cases were reported in Florida, which is seeing a 19.8 percent positivity rate among tested individuals. The state, which only releases COVID data once a week, reported 150,118 cases. The U.S. reported 2,677 new deaths on Friday, after reporting only 908 deaths on Thursday. Florida accounted for 346 of those deaths. The spread of the Delta variant has sent COVID-19 cases among US children surging 84 percent in a week and has pushed hospitals in Florida, Texas and Missouri to 'breaking point'. The Biden administration has pushed back against DeSantis and offered federal financial support to Florida school districts who are defying the governor's ban The US is now averaging 100,000 new infections a day, returning to a milestone last seen during the winter surge as the more highly contagious variant is spreading through the country. Florida hospitals are suspending elective surgeries and putting beds in conference rooms, an auditorium and a cafeteria to try to make space for the influx of patients. This comes after Governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis urged Floridians to get vaccinated, and said people should continue to wear masks if they want to - but that no one should be forced to don the face coverings. More than half of Florida's students are enrolled in public schools that will implement mask mandates this coming school year. Speaking on Fox News' Hannity last Wednesday, DeSantis slammed Biden for being 'obsessed' with forcing kindergartners to wear masks all day at school The school districts' policies are in defiance of DeSantis' July 30th executive order to protect 'parents freedom to choose' whether or not their children had to wear masks in schools. DeSantis has threatened to withhold funds from school systems that mask up, though the Biden administration stepped in and allowed the schools to use funds from pandemic relief measures to replace the salaries of staff members. Biden has also threatened to sue the state over mask mandates, which DeSantis ripped him for last week. Speaking on Fox News' Hannity last Wednesday, DeSantis slammed Biden for being 'obsessed' with forcing kindergartners to wear masks all day at school. Vice President Kamala Harris declared that evacuating US citizens and allies out of Afghanistan is the Biden White House's 'highest priority' at a press conference in Vietnam on Thursday. Harris also told reporters that she spent 'almost [her] entire career' on 'the protection of women and children' after critics spent a week pointing out her delay in speaking out about the plight of Afghan women and girls under Taliban rule. It was the second of two stops on the vice president's Southeast Asia tour. Asked about American safety and evacuations in light of the growing threat from an Afghanistan ISIS affiliate, Harris echoed other senior Biden officials: 'Our highest priority right now is evacuating American citizens, evacuating Afghans who worked with us and Afghans who are at risk, with a priority around women and children.' 'It is a dangerous and difficult mission, but it must be seen through, and we intend to see it through as best as we can.' Harris's visit to Vietnam immediately after Kabul fell to the Taliban spurred comparisons to the fall of Saigon. Kamala Harris was asked about Afghanistan during a press conference in Vietnam on Thursday Biden is holding firm to his August 31 evacuation deadline despite pleas from lawmakers and US allies The Taliban's brutal and regressive treatment of women when it last held Afghanistan has concerned human rights advocates and lawmakers around the world that they will face the same treatment again. At the press conference Harris said 'there's no question that any of us who are paying attention' share the same fears. She noted her own background 'We have said before, and I will say again, that we are going to do what we are able to do in terms of the evacuation process, but in addition to that, what we are able to do politically and diplomatically to secure and to continue to work on the protection of women and children in that region, including working with our allies,' she said. But US allies have pressed President Joe Biden to extend his August 31 deadline to allow for all foreign nationals and vulnerable Afghans - including women and girls - to evacuate the country. He's held firm despite pleas from his fellow G7 leaders at a meeting on Tuesday. Approximately 95,700 people have been evacuated from Afghanistan since August 14. Over the last 24 hours, roughly 13,400 people were evacuated from Hamid Karzai International Airport on 17 US military jets and 74 coalition aircraft. Harris vowed the international community will do whatever they can to 'keep a focus on that issue' in Afghanistan, though no officials have publicly discussed any contingency plans should problems arise. She didn't mention whether the US had a plan for evacuating women or girls who need to escape after August 31. Afghan children at the airport in Kabul being evacuated. Harris said the Biden administration is prioritizing US citizens, Afghan allies and vulnerable Afghan civilians - specifically women and children A group of Afghan civilians being evacuated on a US Air Force jet. Since August 14 roughly 95,700 people have been evacuated Women and girls are not specifically named in any formal US visa categories. On her previous stop in Singapore, Harris also affirmed US support for evacuating citizens and allies, particularly mentioning women and children. A day later on Tuesday she wrote on Twitter, 'We are working around the clock to evacuate Americans and Afghan alliesincluding translators, interpreters, Afghan women leaders, and journalists.' State Secretary Antony Blinken said in a press conference on Wednesday that 45-46 percent of the people evacuated at that point were women and girls. He also said as many as 1,500 Americans - 500 actively in touch with the US government and 1,000 whose status needs to be ascertained - were still in Afghanistan. Fears of an ISIS-K terrorist attack forced the State Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs to send out a warning for people at three Kabul airport gates to 'leave immediately.' Those fears may have been realized when at Thursday afternoon local time, two explosions rocked Kabul and killed as many as 60 Afghans and 12 members of the US military. At least 13 deaths are confirmed. Four US Marines were killed, a CIA source told DailyMail.com ISIS-K is a sworn enemy of the Taliban, and intelligence officials reportedly believe they are actively planning multiple attacks in a bid to create mayhem at the airport. US soldiers stand inside the airport as hundreds of people gather near an evacuation control checkpoint on the perimeter of the Hamid Karzai International Airport. The State Department urged people to leave three checkpoints late Wednesday over a possible terrorist threat The United States, Britain and Australia told their citizens in the early hours of Thursday to clear the airport over fears of a deadly car bomb blast. The US said that citizens outside three gates in particular should 'leave immediately', while Britain and Australia told anyone near the airport to clear the area entirely. Among those still stranded are dozens of students from a San Diego school, who flew to Afghanistan with relatives to visit family and got stuck. They did not all travel together but went with their families in smaller groups. One of the groups has now returned to the US, leaving 19 still stuck in Kabul. The bomb threat on Wednesday was given amid fears extremist group ISIS-K, the Islamic State branch based in Afghanistan, was plotting an attack with multiple car bombs by deploying recently-freed prisoners. It comes as the number of evacuation flights are falling rapidly after Joe Biden held firm to the August 31 deadline, meaning that allied countries have started to shutdown their operations - or finished already. France said it will stop flying to Kabul on Friday, Poland has already left and Holland is expected to finish today. Meanwhile, Britain could stop flying by tonight because the U.S. is cutting short the evacuation operation three days before the deadline to ensure a safe exit. 'There have been reports that some ill-wishers want to disrupt the security situation there by attacking and harming people and the media. So don't go close to the airport to avoid being hurt,' they told CNN. 'It is hard to overstate the complexity and danger of this effort. We are operating in an hostile environment, in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban, with a very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack,' Blinken said Wednesday. Harris is due to depart Southeast Asia today. She was last at Joe Biden's side for his Afghanistan speech on August 20 amid pressure from feminist groups and others to speak out about the increased threat to Afghan women and girls. It was the first time she was seen at a public engagement with Biden since August 10, after the White House released a photo of her at his side in the situation room on August 18. Harris is the first female and minority vice president - just this fact has led to some criticism that Harris should be more vocal about helping women and children fleeing Afghanistan as the Taliban is historically bad for women's rights. 'Kamala's silence on protecting Afghan women and children is deafening,' Georgia Rep. Jody Hice wrote on Twitter last Wednesday. A Rhode Island congressional candidate similarly blasted her on the site, writing 'Vice President Harris, you will not be able to save the women and young girls who will brutalized by this regime.' Former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway said she 'Would love to hear from the "First Woman Vice President" on how her reckless, naive actions will cause most harm to Afghan women.' Earlier in her trip, Chinese officials exploited Harris' plane delay to Vietnam on Tuesday by sending a diplomat to offer the country two million COVID vaccines ahead of Harris's announcement that the US would donate a million shots. Harris met with civil society change makers who work on LGBT, transgender, disability rights and climate change in Hanoi Harris was set to announce a United States donation of 1 million Pfizer doses to the people of Vietnam on her trip, in an effort to build closer ties with the former enemy to draw back Chinese influence in the area, according to the Washington Post. But when Harris' team experienced a three-hour flight delay, after her office was made aware of an investigation into two possible cases of the so-called Havana Syndrome in Hanoi, Chinese officials took advantage. They sent their ambassador to the country, Xiong Bo, to met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and offer 2 million doses of its own Sinopharm COVID vaccine. Sinopharm's vaccine is less effective at preventing COVID than the Pfizer shot, and blocks around 79 per cent of infections - whereas Pfizer is believed to be around 94 per cent effective against the virus. In return, the Vietnamese prime minister thanked Bo and said his country 'does not ally with one country to fight against another,' state-run media reported. Vietnam is seeing a surge in COVID cases, mainly due to the highly virulent Delta variant, according to the Post, with Ho Chi Minh City - formerly known as Saigon - under strict lockdown, enforced by the military, which is delivering food to residents. China's vaccine donations would go to the Vietnamese military, while the United States' donation - which Harris announced on Wednesday - was intended for the general public. She said the doses would begin to arrive within the next 24 hours, as the United States opens a regional branch of the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Hanoi. In total, the Post reports, the United States has donated 6 million COVID vaccine doses to the country, while China sent 500,000 doses to the country in June. Advertisement Thousands of Afghans are fleeing to the border, but their bid to escape is being thwarted at Taliban-controlled crossings. Even those who make it out of Afghanistan have discovered there is no escape because neighbouring countries are sending them back to their home country. Their desperation to escape has only increased following today's ISIS bomb attack near Kabul airport that killed at least 13 people. Afghans were already fleeing on foot to neighbouring countries such as Iran in a bid to escape after the UK told them to head to the border. Many countries have ended their airlift operations. But for those who have made the exhausting journey to Afghanistan's borders, freedom is not guaranteed. Afghans are now fleeing on foot to neighbouring countries such as Iran in a bid to escape after the UK told them to head to the border, while many countries have announced they are ending their airlift operations. But for those who have made the exhausting journey to Afghanistan's borders, freedom is not guaranteed Taliban fighters stand guard on their side at a border crossing point between Pakistan and Afghanistan in Torkham The Taliban now control all of Afghanistan's main border crossing points with neighbouring countries and the Islamic militants have made clear they do not want Afghans to leave the country. Only traders or those with valid travel visas or documents are being allowed to cross the borders, reports suggest. For those who manage to cross the border into the neighbouring countries, many are being sent back to Afghanistan. Several hundred Afghans who reached Milak over the border in Iran last week were kept at the border by Iranian authorities and given food and drink to the refugees. But their renewed hope of safety was short-lived as they were sent back to Afghanistan. Iran has set up emergency tents for the refugees at their border with Afghanistan an Interior Ministry chief said that any Afghans who entered the country would, 'once conditions improve, be repatriated'. Meanwhile, Uzbekistan sent 150 Afghan refugees back to Afghanistan last week as per an agreement with the Taliban. Several hundred Afghans who reached Milak over the border in Iran last week were kept at the border by Iranian authorities and given food and drink to the refugees. But their renewed hope of safety was short-lived as they were sent back to Afghanistan Afghan refugees gathered at the Iran-Afghanistan border between Afghanistan and the southeastern Iranian Sistan and Baluchestan province on August 19 The refugees had been given security guarantees and all have reported they were able to return safely to their homes after the 'necessary formalities', the ministry said in a statement. It is unclear how many Afghans have crossed into the former Soviet republic as Taliban insurgents overran Afghanistan. The Tashkent government has denied that senior Afghan figures such as ethnic Uzbek leader Abdul Rashid Dustum were among them. Adam Rutland, the Executive Director at the Centre for Information Resilience, told MailOnline: 'Afghans have no good options right now. Even getting to potential exit points - the airport or land borders - is fraught with danger, particularly for those who have helped the UK and others. 'Carrying the official documents that might help them gain a new life outside Afghanistan, could be a death sentence within. 'We should also be deeply concerned that the more desperate will fall prey to human traffickers, with all the harm and misery that entails. Afghans wanting to leave are in an awful position. It's heart-breaking.' The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has urged the neighbouring countries to keep their borders open and let Afghans through. 'The vast majority of Afghans are not able to leave the country through regular channels,' a UNHCR spokesperson said last week. 'We continue to urge all countries neighbouring Afghanistan to maintain open borders, so that those seeking safety can find it.' Meanwhile, thousands have been seen flocking to Spin Boldak in eastern Afghanistan in an attempt to cross the border into Chaman, Pakistan. Others have been seen travelling to Torkham further south in an attempt to flee to Pakistan - but the Taliban controls the road from Kabul which makes the journey treacherous. Journalist Harald Doornbos tweeted: 'Kabul-Jalalabad-Torkham road (Pakistan border) is wholly owned by Taliban. Impossible to use for people wanted by the Taliban. If you're in Kabul, really the only way out is to fly.' Afghan people walk inside a fenced corridor as they enter Pakistan at the Pakistan-Afghanistan border crossing point in Chaman on Wednesday Troubling video showed thousands of Afghans attempting to flee the country via the Pakistan border. The footage shows a huge crowd of people at Spin Boldak, a southern village on the border with Pakistan, queuing up at the border gates But with the UK, U.S. and Australia urging their citizens and Afghans to stay away from Kabul airport amid an 'imminent' terrorist threat, the option to fly out of Afghanistan is no longer possible. Some desperate Afghans have turned to human traffickers to get them out of the country while others have managed to cross into Pakistan from Spin Boldak in Afghanistan in recent days, with the border crossing kept open only for those with valid documents. Pakistan has vowed to keep out refugees and has fenced off its border but many are illegally crossing on foot, with many being taken by human traffickers to countries such as Turkey. A people smuggler told The Guardian: It is impossible to fence the mountains and deserts,' he said. 'We have people at all entry points to receive the refugees and take them to the next destination.' James Rogers, Director of Research at the Council on Geostrategy, told MailOnline: 'Afghanistan is a landlocked country, so, logically, there should be many ways out. However, it is also a very rugged and inhospitable place, and difficult to move over especially for groups or families. 'The conditions at some of the border crossings are reportedly worse than at Kabul airport and many surrounding countries will not be keen to accept undocumented people even if the Taliban allows them to cross. There have already been clashes along the Afghan-Pakistani border.' He added: 'Consequently, it will also become harder for foreign citizens with documentation to get through given the numbers at the checkpoints. This makes it all the more important for countries like the United Kingdom to accelerate the evacuation effort from Kabul airport and do whatever is possible to buy time to get people out.' It comes as at least 13 people including children have been killed in two separate explosions near Kabul airport. The first blast was caused by a suicide bomber outside the Barons Hotel, which was followed by gunfire and mass panic before a second explosion from a car bomb ripped through a crowd of Afghans gathered at the Abbey gate of the Hamid Karzai airport. Images from the scene show scores of bodies piled up on the streets and bloodied people being carried away in wheelbarrows. An Afghan man queueing to enter the airport said the explosion hit the middle of a crowd of thousands, and he saw many injured and maimed people near where US troops were stationed. The devastation could spell the end of the airlifts before the August 31 deadline, with Germany already pulling out all its military planes in the wake of the blasts, potentially leaving thousands stranded under Taliban rule. Many had feared an attack could derail the evacuations, with the airport a likely target with crowds rushing to escape and many Western troops stationed at the transport hub. Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby said: 'We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US and civilian casualties. 'We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update.' A Number 10 spokesman said Boris Johnson has been updated on the situation and will chair a COBR meeting later this afternoon, while Joe Biden has also been briefed. Emmanuel Macron said he may struggle to evacuate 20 buses with French citizens on board at the airport gate and says he is in negotiation with the Taliban to secure their release. A suicide bomb has caused a huge explosion outside Kabul airport with 'unknown casualties' just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terrorist attack President Joe Biden has been briefed on the attack which took place at the Abbey gate of the Hamid Karzai where there were also reports of gunfire Images from the scene show scores of bloodied people being carried away from the bombsite with witnesses saying they saw 'so many hurt' The blast took place near the Baron Hotel at the Abbey Gate of the airport where huge crowds had gathered in an attempt to enter the airport Tory MP Nus Ghani said she was on the phone to somebody outside Kabul airport when the explosion happened, tweeting: 'Explosion at Kabul airport. I was on the phone to an Afghan outside the airport when he heard the explosion. 'Praying that he gets away safely and we get his family safe passage out of this nightmare.' Meanwhile Conservative MP Alicia Kearns, a member of the foreign affairs and national security strategy committees, said: 'A bomb or attack with gun fire at northern gate of Baron's hotel. Worried this will devastate evacuation - so many hurt. My heart is with all those injured and killed.' It comes as shots were fired at Kabul airport. Italian intelligence officials say the gunfire at the airport was not directed at their plane transporting 100 Afghan civilians to safety, after military sources said the C-130 plane had been fired at. A source from Italy's Defence Ministry had said shots were fired at transport plane minutes after take-off was but was not damaged. But intelligence reports now claim the gunfire was to disperse crowds gathered at the airport and was not directed at the departing plane amid the panic and heightened fears of an 'imminent' terror attack. Earlier, armed forces minister James Heappey said there is 'very credible reporting' of a 'severe' attack which could happen 'within hours' by ISIS-K, the sworn enemy of the Taliban who want to cause mayhem in the new regime. Heappey told the BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'There is now very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack. 'It's an extraordinarily challenging situation both on the ground and as a set of decisions to be taken here in Whitehall because people are desperate, people are fearing for their lives anyway. 'And so I think there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. I can only say the threat is severe.' He added: 'I can't stress the desperation of the situation enough, the threat is credible, it is imminent, it is lethal. 'And we wouldn't be saying this if we weren't genuinely concerned about offering Islamic State a target.' Meanwhile Colonel Richard Kemp, former head of British forces in Afghanistan, said a terror attack could be carried out by any of Al Qaeda, ISIS or the Taliban. He told BBC Breakfast: 'That threat of terrorist attack, whether it's from Taliban, the Islamic State, or Al Qaeda, it could equally be all three of those groups. 'The fact that people are talking about Islamic State doesn't make that the most likely threat. 'I think that threat has existed right the way from when this evacuation began, and I have no doubt that our forces are fully aware of the threat and already, for days now, have been taking measures to try and mitigate it, to prevent something like that happening. 'But, clearly, there could be a terrorist attack of some sort against the forces in the airport, maybe forces outside the airport, and of course the people trying to get in.' Founded in 2015, the ISIS splinter group's followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia Armed forces minister James Heappey said that there is 'very credible reporting' of a 'severe' attack A minister has warned that a 'very serious' terror threat at Kabul airport is 'imminent' as thousands desperately try to flee Afghanistan. Pictured: people waiting outside Hamid Karzai airport America, Britain and Australia all told their citizens in the early hours of Thursday to immediately leave the area over fears of a deadly blast from jihadists. But a Western diplomat in Kabul said areas outside the airport gates were 'incredibly crowded' again despite the warnings. What is ISIS-K? ISIS-K is one of six or seven regional offshoots of the Islamic State - the K stands for the Khorasan region, which historically encompasses parts of modern day Iran, Central Asia, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. ISIS-K was begun in 2014, as a splinter group from the Pakistani Taliban, and its original leaders were from Pakistan. In 2015 it was recognized by ISIS's leaders in Iraq and Syria, and in January 2016 declared a terrorist organization by the State Department. Its strongholds are eastern Afghanistan, straddling the border with Pakistan in Nangarhar province, and the north of Afghanistan. In 2018 the group was weakened in the north of Afghanistan, and in 2019 severely beaten back in the east. But in 2020 they regrouped and launched a series of devastating terror attacks. Advertisement US officials said last night there was a 'very real risk' of an attack by the terror group who are the Taliban's rivals. 'Due to threats outside the Kabul airport, US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates unless you receive instructions to do so,' the US State Department tweeted on Wednesday night. 'Those at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately.' The order to leave the gates was issued at 3.30am local time in Kabul on Thursday morning. Planes departing from the US have been departing every 39 minutes in the rush to evacuate as many citizens as possible before the August 31 deadline. In total, around 88,000 people have been airlifted from Kabul airport since evacuation efforts began, the Pentagon said on Wednesday, but up to 1,500 Americans and 400 Britons still remain on the ground. Already, military cargo planes leaving Kabul airport have launched flares to disrupt any potential surface-to-air missile fire as fleeing Afghan troops abandoned heavy weapons and equipment across the country in their collapse following America's withdrawal of troops. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson today stressed that August 31 would not mark the end of the UK's commitment to helping those who wish to flee Afghanistan. Johnson told broadcasters that although the 'lion's share' of eligible people had now been removed from the country, he recognised 'there will be people who still need help'. Asked whether this would be challenging amid reports of the Taliban blocking the roads, Mr Johnson said: 'What we're hoping, and this is the key point that the G7 agreed, is that the Taliban understand that if they want to engage with development aid, they want to unlock those billions of funds, they want to have a diplomatic, political relationship with the outside world, then the safe passage for those who want to come out is the key precondition.' Some countries have begun to even pull their soldiers and diplomats out, fearing potential attacks and likely signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told French radio RTL on that 'from tomorrow evening onwards, we are not able to evacuate people from the Kabul airport' due to the upcoming American withdrawal. A source close to the government added that the date had been imposed on France by the plan of the United States, which is providing security at the airport, to pull out by August 31. The source added that France would do everything to keep its operation in place for as many more hours as it can, saying that the evacuation of civilians would wind up several hours before the formal end of the mission when military and remaining embassy services would leave. The French foreign ministry has indicated that the final evacuations of civilians from Kabul by France would be late on Thursday or Friday morning. Meanwhile, Danish defense minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: 'It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul.' Denmark's last flight, carrying 90 people plus soldiers and diplomats, already had left Kabul. And the Dutch government said it would stop evacuation flights from Kabul today in what it acknowledged was a 'painful moment' that would leave some people behind. Already, Poland and Belgium have ended their evacuations from Afghanistan. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan grew out of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even-more extreme view of Islam, riding on a wave when the militants seized territory across Iraq and Syria. Naming themselves after Khorasan, a historic name for the greater region, the extremists embarked on a series of brutal attacks that included a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul that saw infants and women killed. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan. However, their advance across the country likely saw IS fighters freed alongside the Taliban's own. A woman who claimed she was struggling with lockdown sent indecent images of a two-year-old girl to a pervert who offered her 5,000. Abigail Kikke was supposed to be looking after the child but claimed the pandemic left her in a 'dark place' before she sent the pictures. Kikke, 27, abused the child and was also in contact with a convicted sex offender online. She was snared with a sick phone haul of 69 images at her mother's home in Condorrat, Cumbernauld, Scotland, in March 2020. The young girl appeared in 11 of them. Kikke pleaded guilty today at the High Court in Glasgow to sexually assaulting the girl and distributing images of her and other children. She also admitted taking or permitting to be taken indecent images of children and possession of indecent photographs. Abigail Kikke (pictured) was supposed to be looking after the child but claimed the pandemic left her in a 'dark place' before she sent the pictures The court heard police received intelligence Kikke had used social networking app 'Kik' to distribute indecent images of the girl. A video lasting one minute and 58 seconds involving the pair was recovered from her phone. Officers were able to trace Kikke through her internet address and her mother's home was raided. The house was searched and a variety of devices were seized. Kikke's mobile was found to contain 69 indecent still and moving images - 11 of which featured the girl. Some of the images had earlier been deleted by Kikke and were all created between 18 to 26 March, 2020. Kikke (pictured), 27, abused the child and was also in contact with a convicted sex offender online One of the videos seized was an extended version of the video that officers had previously found on Kik lasting five minutes. There were audible gasps and cries from the girl's father who was in court as the circumstances were read out. Prosecutor Shanti Maguire said: 'One of the images had been sent by the accused to an internet user known as 'Daddy'.' The other images contained on the phone showed children as young as three to four to 14-years-old. Kikke was also found to have chatted to another internet user known as 'Hollow' who asked her to perform sex acts on the girl. Miss Maguire added: 'She told 'Hollow' that she sent 'Daddy' images of her and the girl and that he was willing to pay her 4,000. 'Between March 22 and 23 she corresponded with a user she addressed as 'Daddy' at his request. 'During their conversation she told him she was in debt, self isolating and struggling with no human contact other than phone. 'He claimed he would send her 1,000 and in subsequent messages he claimed to be a successful stock trader who would take the woman and girl abroad on holiday.' Kikke followed up by sending pictures of the girl in a nappy and further indecent image. The hearing was told Kikke communicated with an internet user named 'gs1177 Mike D'. The pair chatted about children before Kikke was told the user was 'sexually aroused.' Kikke sent images of the girl to him while she received an image of a male and female children. Miss Maguire added: 'The user has been identified as 43-year-old man Gary Smith, who lived in Wigan. 'He has since been convicted at Bolton Crown Court of sexual offences including ones arising from his conversation with Kikke. 'He was sentenced to six months for distribution of images and attempting to arrange or facilitate the commission of a child sex offence which he received 32 months imprisonment.' Ronnie Renucci QC, defending, told the court Kikke appreciates that a custodial sentence is 'inevitable'. 'These offences took place at a black point in her life.' Sentence was deferred until October pending background reports by judge Lord Sandison. Kikke, from Clackmannanshire, showed no emotion as she was remanded in custody meantime. A federal judge sanctioned Sidney Powell, Lin Wood and nine other lawyers allied with former President Donald Trump on Wednesday for working on lawsuits related to overturning the 2020 election results. US District Judge Linda Parker, of the Eastern District of Michigan, said the group of lawyers 'engaged in litigation practices' that were 'abusive and, in turn, sanctionable.' Powell, Wood, and the rest of the MAGA lawyers filed a lawsuit in Parker's court last November claiming the 2020 presidential election results weren't legitimate and the vote was rigged to help Joe Biden win. Parker said the lawsuit was a sham intended to deceive the court and the public, just a few days after Biden's 154,000-vote victory in the state was certified, and was stuffed with 'speculation and conjecture' about the vote counting process. 'Despite the haze of confusion, commotion and chaos counsel intentionally attempted to create by filing this lawsuit, one thing is perfectly clear: Plaintiffs attorneys have scorned their oath, flouted the rules, and attempted to undermine the integrity of the judiciary along the way,' Parker wrote in her 110-page opinion issued on Wednesday. 'Sanctions are required to deter the filing of future frivolous lawsuits designed primarily to spread the narrative that our election processes are rigged and our democratic institutions cannot be trusted.' Parker's sanctions have now been referred to each of states where the lawyers are licensed for disciplinary action and they could face financial penalties or disbarment. They have also been ordered to take 12 hours of legal classes - including six hours in election law - before their potential punishments are determined. A federal judge sanctioned attorneys Sidney Powell, Lin Wood and nine others on Wednesday for working on lawsuits related to overturning the 2020 election results The lawsuit last fall was filed on behalf of six Republican voters who wanted Parker to decertify Michigans results and impound voting machines. The judge declined in December, calling the request 'stunning in its scope and breathtaking in its reach.' It was one of four legal actions by Powell collectively known as the 'Kraken' lawsuits, including allegations that George Soros, Venezuela and China among others tried to tamper with US voting machines. Parker ordered the attorneys to pay back the legal fees the city of Detroit and Michigan state officials spent while seeking sanctions. She accused them of attempts at 'deceiving a federal court and the American people' in a 'historic and profound abuse of the judicial process.' A lawyer for the city of Detroit said their lawsuit was meant to spread lies about the election and asked the Michigan federal court to sanction the lawyers. Michigan's Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer praised the judge's ruling on Wednesday. She said in a statement that it 'sends a clear message: those who seek to overturn an American election and poison the well of American democracy will face consequences.' Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer praised the ruling as a 'clear message' for people looking to overturn a US election 'I appreciate the unmistakable message she sends with this ruling - those who vow to uphold the Constitution must answer for abandoning that oath,' said Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, a Democrat. Multiple lawyers aligned with Trump have filed lawsuits claiming the election was rigged in multiple courts across the country, but none have succeeded. Trump allies have now turned to election audits in states including Arizona and Pennsylvania in a bid to prove there was ballot harvesting and other irregularities. During a July court hearing, Powell took 'full responsibility' for the lawsuit and compared the legal fight to the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decision that outlawed racial segregation in schools. 'It is the duty of lawyers and the highest tradition of the practice of law to raise difficult and even unpopular issues,' Powell told the judge, adding that efforts to impose sanctions would diminish the public's view of the court system. Woods name was on the lawsuit, but he insisted he had no role other than to tell Powell that he would be available if she needed a seasoned litigator. Wood and Powell are not the first attorneys to be punished over their 2020 lawsuits. Rudy Giuliani had his law license temporarily suspended in New York and Washington D.C. for his election fraud lawsuits. Wood (pictured with Trump in March 2020) and Powell are not the first attorneys to be punished over their 2020 lawsuits. Rudy Giuliani had his law license temporarily suspended in New York and Washington D.C. for his election fraud lawsuits Giuliani, Powell and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell are are being sued by Dominion Voting Systems for 2020 fraud claims centering around their equipment. Dominion is seeking $1.3 billion from each of them in separate lawsuits. Earlier this month all three Trump allies lost a bid to dismiss those suits in a US district court. 'But it is simply not the law that provably false statements cannot be actionable if made in the context of an election,' Judge Carl Nichols had written in a statement. He said the question of whether a juror could conclude Powell's statements were 'verifiable false' was 'not a close call.' Nichols referenced one of her claims that the Dominion founder said he could change votes if he wished. 'These statements are either true or not; either Powell has a video depicting the founder of Dominion saying he can 'change a million votes,' or she does not,' Nichols said. The company is also suing One America Network, Fox News and Newsmax claiming the news channels knowingly spread false information. Beachgoers desperately tried in vain to revive a surfer pulled unconscious from the sea at Byron Bay's popular Wategos Beach on Thursday. The 57-year-old local man was spotted lying lifeless in the water around 2.10pm when three other surfers tried to come to his rescue and dragged him to the shore. An off-duty paramedic and local police desperately joined the fight to save him and attempted to revive him with CPR until an ambulance arrived on the scene. Beachgoers desperately tried in vain to revive a surfer pulled unconscious from the sea at Byron Bay's popular Wategos Beach (pictured) on Thursday But the man did not regain consciousness and died on the beach. A NSW Police spokesman added: 'Officers from Tweed/Byron Police District attended and will prepare a report for the Coroner.' Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker is set to order all teachers from kindergarten to college to take vaccines as schools reopen amid surging cases of the Delta variant. Pritzker also plans to force all children over the age of two to wear masks in class, as well as mandate face coverings for university students and teachers. The Democrat's announcement is expected later on Thursday and comes after the FDA on Monday approved the Pfizer vaccine for over-16s - taking it beyond its emergency phase. The ruling prompted the Pentagon to order all 800,000 active service members to get the shot, while private firms including Delta Airlines and Goldman Sachs also told their staff to get the vaccine. Joe Biden has already signed an executive order requiring millions of federal staff to either get vaccinated or abide by a regular Covid testing scheme. Pritzker has faced backlash over vaccine mandates for other state employees, however the largest teachers' unions - the Illinois Education Association and the Illinois Federation of Teachers - are expected to embrace his order in a statement later today, according to the Chicago Tribune. Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker is set to order all teachers from kindergarten to college to take vaccines as schools reopen amid surging cases of the Delta variant (file photo) A teacher in a mask in California - where Pritzker's fellow Democrat, Gavin Newsom, has ordered teachers to get vaccines On Tuesday, the Governor said he would sanction any schools which defied his mask mandate. 'I realize that there are people who like to show up and shout at local school boards, at the local school board members. But the reality is that the vast majority of people in Illinois want to make sure that the children of Illinois, their parents, their communities are safe. And having a mask mandate operative in schools will help to do that,' he said. The following day he accused a conservative radio commentator of spreading misinformation after she questioned the efficacy of masks. 'We now need to protect our children, we need to protect the people in our communities, parents, grandparents, teachers,' Pritzker said. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot earlier this week announced that all 33,000 city employees 'are absolutely going to be required' to take the vaccine. She is at loggerheads with at least one police union which has said 'hell no' to the mandate. At a press conference on Monday, Lightfoot said: 'We're working through those discussions which have been ongoing now for a couple weeks with our colleagues in organized labor that represent city employees.' 'But we absolutely have to have a vaccine mandate,' she added. 'It's for the safety of all involved, particularly members of the public who are interacting with city employees on a daily basis. It's important for colleagues to also feel like they have a workplace that's safe. It comes as the highly-infectious Delta variant continues to sweep across the United States, with more than 170,000 new cases and 1,470 new deaths recorded across the country on August 25. The Pfizer vaccine was granted final approval by the FDA on Monday after receiving Emergency Use Authorization in December. Moderna has also applied for full approval of its vaccine, and Johnson & Johnson has said it hopes to do so later this year. Dr. Anthony Fauci said Tuesday Americans can expect many more vaccine mandates now that a jab is fully authorized. 'You're gonna see a lot more [vaccine] mandates because there will be institutions and organizations which previously were reluctant to require vaccinations, which will now feel much more empowered to do that,' Fauci said on MSNBC's Morning Joe. 'That could be organizations, businesses, colleges, universities. We're even seeing it with the military already.' President Biden, in a speech on Monday, urged companies to now start requiring vaccines. 'As I mentioned before, I've imposed vaccination requirements that will reach millions of Americans,' he said. Biden signed an executive order requiring federal employees and contractors to either get vaccinated or adhere to a regular Covid testing scheme. 'Today I'm calling on more companies ... in the private sector to step up with vaccine requirements that will reach millions more people. 'If you're a business leader, a nonprofit leader, state or local leader, who has been waiting for FDA approval to require vaccinations, I call on you now to do that, require it.' Long-suffering Victorians trapped in their sixth gruelling coronavirus lockdown were warned by Daniel Andrews that the harsh stay-at-home measures would remain in place if residents continue to 'break the rules'. His threat comes as revised Covid modelling being used to plan Australia's move out of the pandemic shows easing lockdown as part of the nationwide reopening plan with high case numbers will 'not lead to more deaths' once vaccination rates hit 70 and 80 per cent. But with the number of double-jabbed nowhere near that level yet, the Victorian premier scolded 'selfish' residents for visiting family, as well as young people he accused of putting off getting a Covid swab even after experiencing symptoms. He said in some cases people who later tested positive had been infectious in the community for over a week, spreading the disease to their loved ones. 'The longer people break the rules, the longer these rules will be on,' Mr Andrews warned. Victorians trapped in their sixth gruelling coronavirus lockdown were warned by Daniel Andrews (pictured on Thursday) that the harsh stay-at-home measures would remain in place if residents continue to 'break the rules' The Victorian leader claimed there was a high number of 'selfish' residents still visiting family and said young people were putting off getting a Covid swab even after experiencing symptoms (pictured, an anti-lockdown protester in Melbourne) Several state premiers have voiced their concern that ending Australia's zero-Covid strategy by doing away with lockdowns and crippling interstate border closures could see a surge in infections and deaths. But expert number-crunchers at the Doherty Institute have revised a report for National Cabinet's four-phase reopening plan, with their data finding it would be safe to end many onerous restrictions even with high cases numbers once 70 per cent vaccination coverage is reached. In recent weeks the Queensland, Western Australian and Victorian governments threatened to renege on the national plan as daily infection rates in New South Wales continued to surge - surpassing 1,000 cases for the first time on Thursday. The National Cabinet is scheduled to hold talks on Friday to discuss the new modelling, with many predicting fireworks at the sit-down after a war-of-words erupted during the week between Scott Morrison and rouge Premiers. Originally, the modelling had been based on lifting restrictions at around 30 daily cases, but this has since been revised to take in three possible scenarios - cases being in their tens, hundreds and thousands. Looking at the three scenarios over an 180-day period, there was found to be no major difference in fatality rates, according to The Australian. Australia's coronavirus cases have gone up dramatically in recent weeks, but that is unlikely to make a big difference to fatalities once the 70 per cent vaccination rate is reached, according to new modelling Residents living in households where all adults have been vaccinated in one of Sydney's 12 LGAs of concern will be allowed outside together for another hour on top of their existing one-hour exercise limit (pictured, shoppers in Sydney's Ashfield in the inner-west) The four-phase plan indicates Australia can move into phase two when 70 per cent of the adult population is fully-vaccinated. With only one third of people aged 16 and over now double-dosed, Australia is not likely to reach the target until the end of October if current vaccination rates are maintained. Based on that assumption, coverage of 80 per cent is expected to be completed in November - but overseas, including in the UK, US and Israel, vaccination rates have dropped significantly after the 60 per cent mark. Mr Andrews had previously voiced concerns about opening up with skyrocketed infection rates, but later maintained he's committed to the National Cabinet plan. Victoria recorded 80 new cases of Covid on Thursday, almost double the 45 it had on Wednesday in an escalation to its outbreak. Victoria recorded 80 new cases of Covid on Thursday, almost double the 45 it had on Wednesday in an escalation of its outbreak (pictured, a couple are seen walking in St Kilda, Melbourne) Only 39 in quarantine while infectious, while 13 mystery cases not yet linked to the outbreak, both of which the Victorian Government take as indicators that there will likely be many more cases not yet detected. Victoria beat its previous 2021 record of 71 set last week, and has not had this many new cases in a day since last September as its deadly second wave wound down. The Shepparton outbreak in regional Victoria has grown to 67 after 18 new cases were recorded in the last 24 hours. Health officials have ramped up support services in the town where 16,000 residents are currently isolating. The Premier at his daily Covid press briefing implored Victorians to stop making 'selfish' choices. 'One of the common sense practical things you can do, if you have symptoms today, get tested today. Don't, for heaven sake, wait eight days and literally infect everybody you go anywhere near in that eight period,' Mr Andrews said. 'Please, do not be visiting friends and family because the visitor no one knows about is the coronavirus. Victoria beat its previous 2021 record of 71 cases set last week, and has not had this many new cases in a day since last September as its deadly second wave wound down (pictured, people wait in line at a Covid019 vaccination centre in Melbourne on Thursday) The four-phase plan indicates Australian can move into phase two when 70 per cent of the adult population is fully vaccinated (pictured, a locked down Sydneysider braves the rain for her daily exercise) 'You are taking it with you to the people you love. You do not want them to get sick, so do not act in a selfish and irresponsible way.' Mr Andrews warned that if the rules are not followed the lockdown will not work. 'And that's why I'm appealing to everybody to make the best choices you possibly can,' he said. 'I don't know that there's too many more levers to pull.' Of the 600 active cases in Victoria, 240 are under the age 20. There are 36 cases being treated in hospital, 11 are in intensive care, including eight on a ventilator. NSW racked up a grim pandemic record of 1,029 cases overnight and three more deaths on Thursday (pictured, shoppers in Ashfield) Despite the surging Covid numbers Premier Gladys Berejiklian (pictured) announced new freedoms for those who have had both doses from September 13 Meanwhile, north of the Murry River, NSW racked up a grim pandemic record of 1,029 cases overnight and three more deaths, as Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced new freedoms for those who have had both vaccine doses from September 13. The embattled state leader said from that date, anyone who is fully vaccinated against Covid-19 and lives outside of an area of concern can gather in groups of up to five in their own LGA or within 5km of their home. Residents living in households where all adults have been vaccinated in one of Sydney's 12 LGAs of concern will be allowed outside together for another hour on top of their existing one-hour exercise limit. Sydneysiders in those areas though must still schedule the additional recreation time outside their strict 9pm-5am curfew. Anyone who is fully vaccinated and lives outside of an area of concern can gather in groups of up to five in their own LGA or within 5km of their home (pictured, Sydneysiders enjoying the sunshine in Bronte during lockdown) Ms Berejiklian said the new rules were the best compromise between meeting the state's mental health needs and preventing transmission of the virus. 'We know coming together is what people miss the most,' she said. 'From the various options we looked at, that was the option that met the mental health needs and wellbeing of our community, but also provided the lowest-risk setting.' Residents taking advantage of the new rules will need to carry proof on them they are fully-vaccinated at all times. The new freedoms come after NSW hit Ms Berejiklian's target of getting six million jabs in arms by the end of August a week early. She said the state is on track to fully vaccinate 70 per cent of its population by as early as mid-October - triggering further freedoms for the fully-vaccinated. HOW COVID RESTRICTIONS WILL BE EASED IN NSW FOR THE FULLY VACCINATED From 12.01am, Monday, 13 September: For those who live outside the LGAs of concern, outdoor gatherings of up to five people (including children, all adults must be vaccinated) will be allowed in a person's LGA or within 5km of home. For those who live in the LGAs of concern households with all adults vaccinated will be able to gather outdoors for recreation (including picnics) within the existing rules (for one hour only, outside curfew hours and within 5km of home). This is in addition to the one hour allowed for exercise. How to prove you are fully vaccinated: Download your Covid-19 digital certificate via the Express Plus Medicare mobile app or your Medicare online account through myGov. If you can't get proof online, your vaccination provider can print your immunisation history statement for you. If you're not eligible for Medicare you can call the Australian Immunisation Register and request your certificate be mailed to you. When the following targets are hit in NSW, freedoms will be as follows: 70 per cent full vaccination: a range of family, industry, community and economic restrictions to be lifted for those who are vaccinated. 80 per cent full vaccination: further easing of restrictions on industry, community and the economy. Advertisement But the minor relaxation of restrictions come as doomsday new modelling from the University of Sydney projected Australia is on track to see a staggering 40,000 Covid cases a day if the nation opens up once vaccination targets of 70 percent are reached. The data, in contrast with the Doherty Institute's report, paints a more alarming picture of the long-awaited countdown to freedom. USYD's Centre for Complex Systems data project infection rates will hit their peak at the beginning of October just before the vaccination targets are likely to be reached. 'In a sense the numbers are of the same order, for example if you look at the total cases the Doherty Institute estimated over 180 days, you do get in the hundreds of thousands of cases, maybe 300,000 to 500,000 cases over six months,' Professor Mikhail Prokopenko told the Sydney Morning Herald. Disturbing new modelling from the University Sydney projects Australia is on track to see a staggering 40,000 Covid cases a day if the nation opens up too quickly once vaccination targets of 70 percent are reached 'We say what you will experience is in the order of 500,000 in a month or a month-and-half, it's much steeper. 'Similarly if you look at the peak of daily cases, we say we could approach 40,000 a day by mid-December or end of the year. 'While Doherty say yes, you could approach up to 50,000 a day or 60,000 a day, but at later date maybe three months. So in that sense they are not unimaginable numbers, it's the steepness that worries me.' He said whether Australia is headed for 'soft landing or crash landing' will depend on how prepared the nation's healthcare system is to deal with the influx of Covid patients. The data, in contrast with the Doherty Institute, paints a more alarming picture of the long-awaited countdown to freedom A 26-year-old Connecticut woman faces a week in jail and more than $2,000 in fines after walking off-trail and onto thermal ground at Yellowstone National Park. While the sentence handed down to Madeline S. Casey of New Hartford may seem harsh, Acting US Attorney Bob Murray said, 'its better than spending time in a hospitals burn unit.' Casey and another hiker stepped off the boardwalk near the Norris Geyser Basin on July 22, according to the Wyoming U.S. Attorney's Office, and walked toward a thermal pool. 'It does suck, but I'm not going to comment now,' Casey said to MailOnline. She was sentenced August 18. 'For those who lack [the] ability to appreciate the dangerousness of... unstable ground, boiling water, and scalding mud, the National Park Service does a darn good job of warning them to stay on the boardwalk and trail in thermal areas, said Murray. 'Yet there will always be those like Ms. Casey who dont get it.' Madeline S. Casey of New Hartford (pictured), 26, faces a week in jail and more than $2,000 in fines after walking off-trail on thermal ground at Yellowstone National Park 'Yet there will always be those like Ms. Casey who dont get it,' said US Attorney Bob Murray in a press release. 'Although a criminal prosecution and jailtime may seem harsh, it's better than spending time in a hospital's burn unit.' Casey was caught traversing the unstable, off-limits thermal ground by other parkgoers, who showed cellphone footage to rangers Casey has until the end of January to serve her jail time and make the community service payment. She has until December 2022 to pay the fine, said Mark Trimble, spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Wyoming. The Norris Geyser Basin is one of the largest thermal areas in Yellowstone, according to the park service, as well as the hottest. Nearly all of the areas over 1,000 thermal features are above boiling point, which is 199 degrees at the site's elevation. Public Relations Contractor Lori Hogan with the Wyoming U.S. Attorney's office told MailOnline that other parkgoers captured Casey traversing the prohibited area near Cistern Spring their cellphones, then showed their footage to park rangers. The trio were detained at Yellowstone, she said; her two companions were not charged by police. Casey was charged with the class 6 misdemeanor of walking off-trail in a thermal area. According to Casey's citation, obtained from the Wyoming U.S. Attorney's office, she was accompanied by a man without shoes or a shirt when she tread on the prohibited area, and the third person was 'encouraging [Casey and the man] to trespass.' When police approached the group, the citation said, two of the three were drinking White Claws. 'It is unusual that, in this particular case, she was jailed for 7 days, said Hogan. [But] it is very dangerous to walk off-trail the ground is very fragile in thermal areas. 'It looks like solid ground, but sometimes its a very thin layer over scalding water. 'For those who lack [the] ability to appreciate the dangerousness of... unstable ground, boiling water, and scalding mud, the National Park Service does a darn good job of warning them to stay on the boardwalk and trail in thermal areas, said Murray. Madeline S. Casey of New Hartford (pictured), 26, faces a week in jail and more than $2,000 in fines after walking off-trail on thermal ground at Yellowstone National Park In 2016, the body of 23-year-old Colin Scott (pictured) dissolved in boiling, acidic waters at the Norris Geyser Basin after he and his sister diverted from the boardwalk and he slipped while checking the temperature of a hot spring he hoped to soak, or 'hot pot' in. 'Yet there will always be those like Ms. Casey who dont get it.' Casey, who formerly owned Main Stream Canoe and Kayak in New Hartford, has until the end of January to serve her jail time and make the community service payment. She has until December 2022 to pay her fines, said Mark Trimble, spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Wyoming. In 2016, the body of 23-year-old Colin Scott dissolved in boiling, acidic waters at the Norris Geyser Basin after he and his sister diverted from the boardwalk and he slipped while checking the temperature of a hot spring he hoped to soak in. A 3-year-old girl suffered second-degree burns in 2020 after running off the boardwalk and slipping into a small thermal feature, park officials reported. In May 2020, another woman was injured after she backed up and fell into a hot spring while taking a photo. In September, a man suffered severe burns after falling into thermal water near the cone of Old Faithful Geyser. In June 2017, a man was severely burned after falling into a hot spring in the Lower Geyser Basin. 'Boardwalks in geyser basins protect visitors and delicate thermal formations,' said park spokesperson Morgan Warthin. 'The ground is fragile and thin and scalding water just below the surface can cause severe or fatal burns. More than 20 people have died from burns suffered after they entered or fell into Yellowstones hot springs.' The Norris Geyser Basin is one of the largest thermal areas in Yellowstone, according to the park service, as well as the hottest. Nearly all of the areas over 1,000 thermal features are above boiling point, which is 199 degrees at the site's elevation. 'Hot springs have injured or killed more people in Yellowstone than any other natural feature,' the Yellowstone website says. A thousand dollars of Casey's fines will go toward the Yellowstone Forever Geological Resource Fund, Yellowstone's nonprofit partner, the Wyoming DOJ said. Harvard University has chosen a devout atheist and 'humanist chaplain' to lead the Ivy League school founded by Puritans to educate their clergy with the motto 'Truth for Christ and the Church.' Greg Epstein, 44, who was raised in a Reform Jewish household in Queens, New York, was named president of the chaplains for the religious community at the school after serving as Harvard's 'humanist chaplain' since 2005. He is a self-avowed devout atheist who wants to serve fellow nonreligious believers as well as agnostics and humanists at the Cambridge, Massachusetts, school. That's a far departure for a school founded by Puritans in 1636 and named for pastor John Harvard. The university did not even have a president who wasn't a clergyman for its first 70 years. Greg Epstein will become the head of representatives of the religious community at the Ivy League School And a Reform Jew shall lead them: Epstein's road from Queens to Harvard Epstein, 44, was raised in Flushing, Queens, as a self-described 'assimilated and disinterested Reform Jew' in the nation's most diverse borough. In 2005, Epstein received ordination as a Humanist Rabbi from the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism. He holds a B.A. (Religion and Chinese) and an M.A. (Judaic Studies) from the University of Michigan and a Masters of Theological Studies from the Harvard Divinity School He completed a year-long graduate fellowship at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Authored a book in 2010 called Good Without God: What A Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe He said that being a humanist rabbi means 'I combine Jewish culture with the belief that this world is all we have.' Epstein has raised over $1.7 million in gifts to the humanist chaplains since joining in 2005. He's written columns for CNN, Newsweek and The Washington Post and served as the 'ethicist' for the website TechCrunch in 2019. He was the National Chair for the organization 'Humanists for Biden/Harris' last year and served on Boston Mayor Marty Walsh's Interfaith Advisory Council. Advertisement But Epstein said his elevation to the position is meant to be inclusive of larger and larger numbers of Americans and especially progressive Harvard students who identify as spiritual but not religious. 'There is a rising group of people who no longer identify with any religious tradition but still experience a real need for conversation and support around what it means to be a good human and live an ethical life,' he told the New York Times. The Harvard Crimson did a survey of the school's class of 2019 and found that there are indeed increasing numbers of students without a designated faith. The survey showed 21% of the class as agnostic and 17% were atheists. This compared to 17% Catholics, 10% Jewish and 3% of Hindus and Muslims. This isn't just a trend at Harvard: a Pew Research Center poll found 20% of Americans identify as atheist, agnostic or non-religious. That same poll found two thirds of surveyed freshmen identified as 'somewhat or very liberal'; only 12% of the class said they were at least 'somewhat conservative.' Epstein himself served as the national chair of the organization 'Humanists for Biden/Harris' during the 2020 election. The university is known for often taken progressive views on social issues and outrage at more conservative faculty. Recently, a professor faced serious backlash for refusing to use the term 'pregnant people' and insisting on using the terms male and female. The university also removed Donald Trump-supporter US Rep Elise Stefanik from a panel for perpetuating claims of voter fraud Students have also filed a petition to ban Trump administration alums from speaking or teaching at the school. The position of chaplain is not necessarily tied to one particular religion, although it has origins in the Christian tradition. The Harvard Chaplains describe themselves as: 'a professional community of more than 30 chaplains, representing many of the world's religious, spiritual, and ethical traditions, who share a collective commitment to serving the spiritual needs of the students, faculty, and staff of Harvard University. These chaplains cover every mainstream faith that you can think of: everyone from Catholics, Jews and Muslims to Hindus, Buddhists, Zoroastrians, Mormons and Sikhs. Epstein has served as the 'humanist chaplain' at Harvard since 2005 and now also serves at MIT. Epstein was the unanimous choice as chief chaplain by a nominating committee that includes members who are Lutheran, Christian Scientist, evangelical Christian and Bahai. Margit Hammerstrom, the Christian Science chaplain at Harvard, said that Epstein's elevation displays how people of different faiths can communicate together and serve at a progressive university. 'Maybe in a more conservative university climate there might be a question like 'What the heck are they doing at Harvard, having a humanist be the president of the chaplains?' she said. 'But in this environment it works. Greg is known for wanting to keep lines of communication open between different faiths.' From Puritans to Atheists, who are the Harvard chaplains? Though it may be known as a bastion of the Ivy League elite today, Harvard University and it's chaplains have a distinctly Puritan origin. The Puritans who colonized New England in the 1630s wanted to be sure that their clergy were well-educated, which is what led to the founding of Harvard. The Cambridge school was initially founded to educate the ministry. Their original motto was 'Truth for Christ and the Church.' The school was named after the pastor John Harvard and did not have a president who was not a clergyman for over 70 years after its founding. Nearly four centuries later, Harvards organization of chaplains has elected as its next president an atheist named Greg Epstein, who takes on the job this week. Epstein has served the chaplains since 2005. The first 'humanist' chaplain, who served atheists and agnostics at Harvard, came to the school in 1974. Thomas Ferrick is believed to be America's first Atheist chaplain, according to Epstein. The Harvard Chaplains are a professional community of over 30 chaplains, who they say represent many of the worlds religious, spiritual, and ethical traditions, who share a collective commitment to serving the spiritual needs of the school's students, faculty, and staff. Advertisement 'Maybe in a more conservative university climate there might be a question like 'What the heck are they doing at Harvard, having a humanist be the president of the chaplains?' one chaplain said. 'But in this environment it works. Greg is known for wanting to keep lines of communication open between different faiths.' Epstein's biography describes himself as a 'professionally trained member of the clergy who supports the ethical and communal lives of nonreligious people.' Epstein previously held a congregation of humanists and atheists in the Boston area who met in Harvard Square for weekly services. He also serves as a chaplain at MIT. What does his work involve? According to the Times, he 'frequently meets individually with students who are struggling with issues both personal and theological, counseling them on managing anxiety about summer jobs, family feuds, the pressures of social media and the turbulence endemic to college life.' Harvard chaplains include (from left) Khalil Abdur-Rashid, a Muslims, the Rev. Dr. Kathleen Rice of the United Church of Christ, and Lama Migmar Tseten, who is Buddhist Epstein authored a book in 2010 called Good Without God: What A Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe Epstein has been a speaker and organizer for universities, community and state colleges, urban public and expensive private high schools, at the Democratic National Convention, the United States Congress and Senate, megachurches, synagogues and Islamic centers, hospitals and prisons, and interfaith and civic institutions of many other kinds. He also authored a book in 2010 called Good Without God: What A Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe. In 2005, Epstein received ordination as a Humanist Rabbi from the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism. He holds a B.A. (Religion and Chinese) and an M.A. (Judaic Studies) from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and a Masters of Theological Studies from the Harvard Divinity School, and he completed a year-long graduate fellowship at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. President Joe Biden canceled his first meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Thursday after a series of suicide attacks in Kabul, killing a dozen of U.S. service members. The White House announced Biden will now meet with Bennett on Friday. The meeting was originally delayed. Israeli press traveling with the prime minister were escorted from the White House and back to their hotel. Later it was rescheduled. At the sit down, each leader will press their case on major issues in the Middle East and try to reset relations between the two countries. The two leaders have divergent views on the Iran nuclear deal and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, both of which are expected to be major topics of conversation during their Oval Office sit down. Bennett and Biden will also look to form their own relationship after the American president had strained relations with Bennett's predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu. In their conversation, Bennett is expected to push Biden to give up his quest to revive the Iran nuclear deal. Ahead of his trip Bennett said he would tell Biden 'that now is the time to halt the Iranians, to stop this thing' and not to reenter 'a nuclear deal that has already expired and is not relevant, even to those who thought it was once relevant.' President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett will hold their first face-to-face meeting Thursday But Biden has expressed his support for reviving the 2015 landmark deal brought about by the Obama administration but scuttled in 2018 by Donald Trump. American indirect talks with Tehran have stalled, however, and Washington continues to keep sanctions on Iran. Meanwhile, White House has said it plans to bring up the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when the two leaders met. Bennett has said he will not allow a Palestinian state while he is in office. The Biden administration has expressed its support for a two-state solution that, by definition, includes an independent Palestinian state. Yet the White House has held off reopening the U.S. consulate for Palestinians in Jerusalem, a move that is seen as a show of support for Bennett. Bennett and Biden have never met - a rarity for the American president who knows most everyone thanks to his more than 40 years in politics. But they have spoken on the phone. Biden called Bennett two months ago shortly after he was sworn in as prime minister, replacing Netanyahu in office. Bennett's visit comes as Biden is dealing with the forthcoming August 31st deadline to remove U.S. troops from Afghanistan as the administration works to evacuate remaining Americans and their allies from that country. The visit gives Biden an opportunity to demonstrate business as usual with a key partner while contending with the complex situation in Afghanistan. Biden's biggest foreign policy crisis since taking office has not only hurt his approval ratings at home but raised questions about his credibility among both friends and foes. The Israeli PM met separately Wednesday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to discuss Iran and other issues. The visit is his first to the U.S. as prime minister. Secretary of State Antony Blinken (right) meets with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett at the Willard Hotel on Wednesday President Joe Biden had strained relations with Bennett's predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu - above the two men are seen together in 2016 when Biden was vice president Iran remains one of the thornier issues on the table ahead of the Oval Office meeting. Trump's decision to withdraw from Iran's nuclear deal led Tehran to abandon over time every limitation the accord imposed on its nuclear enrichment. The country now enriches a small amount of uranium up to 63%, a short step from weapons-grade levels, compared with 3.67% under the deal. It also spins far more advanced centrifuges and more of them than were allowed under the accord, worrying nuclear nonproliferation experts even though Tehran insists its program is peaceful. The Biden-Bennett sit-down comes weeks after Ebrahim Raisi was sworn in as Iran's new president. Raisi, 60, a conservative cleric with close ties to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has suggested he'll engage with the U.S. But he also has struck a hard-line stance, ruling out negotiations aimed at limiting Iranian missile development and support for regional militias - something the Biden administration wants to address in a new accord. Administration officials acknowledged that Iran's potential 'breakout' - the time needed to amass enough fissile material for a single nuclear weapon - is now down to a matter of months or less. Biden will tell Bennett that he shares Israel's concern that Iran has expanded its nuclear program but remains committed for now to diplomacy with Tehran, a senior administration official said. Briefing reporters ahead of the meeting, the official said: 'Since the last administration left the Iran nuclear deal, Irans nuclear program has just dramatically broken out of the box.' The official said that if the diplomatic path with Iran fails, 'there are other avenues to pursue,' but did not elaborate. Bennett is also looking to turn the page from his predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu. Bennett wants to move on from Netanyahu's combative public style and instead manage disagreements constructively behind closed doors between Washington and its closest Middle East ally. Netanyahu had a close relationship with Trump after frequently clashing with Barack Obama. Biden, who has met with every Israeli prime minister since Golda Meir, had his own tensions with Netanyahu over the years. During his latest White House campaign, Biden called Netanyahu 'counterproductive' and an 'extreme right' leader. Biden waited nearly a month after his election before making his first call to Netanyahu, raising concerns in Jerusalem and among some Netanyahu backers in Washington that the two would have a difficult relationship. The president called Bennett just hours after he was sworn in as prime minister in June to offer his congratulations. Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the liberal Jewish advocacy group J Street, said Bennett is intent on building a positive working relationship with the Biden administration. But Ben-Ami, whose group supports a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, noted that the two leaders are out of sync on several issues in addition to Iran. Bennett opposes the creation of a Palestinian state and supports expansion of settlements in the West Bank, which Biden opposes. Bennett, 49, the son of American immigrants to Israel, has been a vocal proponent of settlement building. JT McLean,45, (pictured in January this year) has been charged with two counts of first-degree murder by Boone County Sheriff's Office following the deaths of Allison Abitz, 43, and her daughter Jozee, 11 A manhunt is underway for a 45-year-old man after his long-time girlfriend, 43, and her 11-year-old daughter were found dead at their home in Columbia, Missouri. The Boone County Sheriff's Office in Missouri charged JT McLean with two counts of first-degree murder over the deaths of Allison Abitz, an elementary school teacher, and her daughter Jozee after finding their bodies on Sunday. He has a $1million cash-only bond, according to the Columbia Daily Tribune. McLean - who goes by many names, including John or Steven McLean or Steven Nagy - is currently on the run from police. It is not known how long he's been evading police, but the police have not had contact with him after finding the bodies, a representative from the Boone County Sheriff's Office said. He has connections in Missouri, Chicago, and Las Vegas, according to KY3. Police have not released how the mother and daughter were killed and McLean's alleged motive is unknown. Abitz (left) and her daughter (right) were found dead in their home in Columbia, Missouri on Sunday night after police were called to the home for a welfare check. The family claimed they hadn't heard from them in a few days Officers found the bodies when they performed a welfare check, after family members said they haven't heard from them in a few days. McLean was the last known person to have contact with them, according to the sheriff's office. McLean, whose last known address was in nearby Fulton, Missouri, worked as a over-the-road trucker. McLean is a 5-foot-9 man, who is approximately 210 pounds with green eyes and brown hair. He was last known to have grown his hair out, but has shaved his head bald. Ex-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo could be forced to return royalties he earned from his $5.1 million book deal - not just face a fine - if he violated New York law, officials said at a Wednesday ethics committee hearing in New York. Cuomo's book deal currently is the subject of an investigation from the New York attorney general's office and the New York State Assembly's judiciary committee to determine whether Cuomo violated ethics rules when government staffers worked on his book. Cuomo claims his aides offered their time voluntarily and denies the allegations. It's likely ex-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (pictured) could be forced to return royalties he earned from his $5.1 million book deal if he violated New York law, officials said at a Wednesday ethics committee hearing in New York Cuomo's book deal currently is the subject of an investigation from the New York attorney general's office and the New York State Assembly's judiciary committee Throughout Wednesday's state Senate Ethics Committee, State Sen. Dan Stec (R-Queensbury) questioned Joint Commission on Public Ethics (JCOPE) executive director Judge Sanford Berland on whether the panel was confident in retrieving profits gained from Cuomo's memoir, 'American Crisis: Leadership Lessons and the COVID-19 Pandemic.' 'If the financial gain is significantly more than any fines or penalties [that] can be invoked, there's an obvious encouragement for the behavior if I get a $5,000 fine for a $5 million book deal that's not much of a deterrent,' Stec mentioned. 'So I guess my question is, again, hypothetically, if financial gain is significant, is there a mechanism for JCOPE to claw back beyond just a standard fine or penalty, but the actual gain itself?' Berland responded that the statute provides 'for a penalty that includes recoupment of the compensation or benefits received by the individual.' But he argued the move to take back the royalties as a penalty would need to be voted on by a full panel of JCOPE commissioners and could face legal challenges. During Wednesday's state Senate Ethics Committee, State Sen. Dan Stec (right) probed Joint Commission on Public Ethics (JCOPE) executive director Judge Sanford Berland (left) on whether the panel was confident in retrieving profits gained from Cuomo's memoir, 'American Crisis: Leadership Lessons and the COVID-19 Pandemic' Gov. Andrew Cuomo talks on a mobile phone at the New York state Executive Mansion in Albany, N.Y. on Saturday Aug. 7, 2021 In addition, State Attorney General Letitia James' office is conducting an investigation into the matter, following a criminal referral by Comptroller Tom DiNapoli. Following its October 2020 release, the book immediately became a New York Times bestseller, during a time when Cuomo was still favorable among his constituents for guiding New York through the COVID-19 pandemic. The book was tied to the governor's daily COVID-19 briefings in 2020 during the height of the pandemic in New York. Crown Publishing offered the former governor more than $5 million for the manuscript - a risk considering Cuomo's previous memoir sold fewer than 4,000 hardcover copies. Tax records show Cuomo received the bulk of his advance, $3.12 million in 2020 and is expected to receive an additional $2 million in installments over the next two years. After sexual assault allegations against Cuomo surfaced in late February, Crown tried to distance itself from Cuomo, canceling plans for a paperback version in addition to halting promotion. Accusations: Cuomo was accused by several women of sexual misconduct, and an investigation concluded that the governor 'sexually harassed multiple women' New York's public officer's law requires vetting and approval from the ethics agency on matters relating to outside income and prohibits elected officials from engaging in situations benefiting themselves. The hearing also revealed that JCOPE staffers silently approved Cuomo's request to write the book without a full panel vote, resulting in tension among JCOPE commissioners. 'We promulgated a rule having to do with applications for outside activity meaning outside income. The rule requires a vote of the commission. But there was no vote on the book deal, in fact it was never presented to us. The staff took the position that no vote of the commission was necessary. I will move tomorrow to rescind the informal opinion,' said Commissioner Gary Lavine. During Thursday's public session of JCOPE's meeting, Lavine said he plans on making a motion to revoke approval for Cuomo's book deal. Cuomo would have 10 business days to reapply for approval if the measure is voted on and approved. After reviewing the application, the panel will then vote to deny or greenlight the request at a future meeting. The hearing came one day after Cuomo was stripped of the Emmy he won for his primetime pandemic briefings. On Tuesday, a day after Cuomo left the governor's mansion, the academy said it was taking back the award. 'The International Academy announced today that in light of the New York attorney generals report, and Andrew Cuomos subsequent resignation as governor, it is rescinding his special 2020 International Emmy Award,' the organization said in a statement to AFP. 'His name and any reference to his receiving the award will be eliminated from International Academy materials going forward.' The one-time Democratic Party heavyweight won global plaudits for his straight-talking television performances about the coronavirus as it raged though the United States in early 2020. His performances, which came as then-president Donald Trump sowed confusion with incoherent messages about the health crisis, earned him the International Emmy Founders Award. Past recipients of the award include Oprah Winfrey, Stephen Spielberg and Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes. Advertisement Scientists were at war over vaccinating children against Covid today after it was revealed the NHS has put plans in place to jab secondary school pupils without their parent's consent. Health service bosses have told trusts to be ready to roll out jabs to all 12 to 15-year-olds in two weeks, in a sign the country is edging closer towards routinely jabbing youngsters. Experts pushing back against the move today argued it may be better for children to catch Covid and recover to develop natural immunity than to be reliant on protection from vaccines, which studies suggest wanes in months. Professor David Livermore, a medical microbiologist at the University of East Anglia, said the world will need to live with Covid for years if not decades so having a generation of children with natural immunity would help prevent cases spiralling later down the line. He said natural infection could be a 'a better first step in the lifelong co-existence' with the virus than rolling out the jabs. But the move to jab healthy kids for Covid has been backed by several high profile experts who have warned the virus could 'rip through' the country again if children are allowed back into schools with no protection. Latest figures from Public Health England's (PHE) surveillance report showed secondary school children have the highest rate of infection in the country despite schools not even being back yet. And a survey today revealed almost two thirds of children would like to get a jab. Children have only a small risk of becoming seriously ill with Covid and a vanishingly small chance of death, while Pfizer and Moderna's vaccines are associated with rare cases of heart inflammation in young people. Professor Paul Hunter, an infectious disease expert at the University of East Anglia, said the risks of side effects currently outweighs the dangers posed by Covid itself for most children. And he added 'as much as half' of all teens would already have had the virus, referencing estimates from the Office for National Statistics, and therefore have natural immunity already and not need a jab. Professor Hunter also said that vaccinating children would be purely for the benefit of adults, which could be seen as ethically 'dubious'. Scientists were at war over vaccinating children against Covid today. Professor David Livermore (left) says it is 'plausible' that immunity from natural infection could last longer for children but Professor Devi Sridhar (right) says the virus could rip through the country again Latest Public Health England data showed Covid cases are rising fastest among 10 to 19-year-olds (grey line) and 20 to 29-year-olds (green line). Approving Covid vaccines for 12 to 15-year-olds will help curb the spread of the virus in the age group Latest estimates from a symptom-tracking app suggested under-18s had the second highest number of Covid cases in the country (blue line). Only 18 to 35-year-olds had a higher number of Covid cases (orange line). The data is from the ZOE Covid Symptom Study WHAT ARE THE PROS AND CONS OF VACCINATING CHILDREN? Pros Protecting adults The main argument in favour of vaccinating children is in order to prevent them keeping the virus in circulation long enough for it to transmit back to adults. Experts fear that unvaccinated children returning to classrooms in September could lead to a boom in cases among people in the age group, just as immunity from jabs dished out to older generations earlier in the year begins to wane. This could trigger another wave of the virus if left unchecked, with infection levels triggering more hospitalisations and deaths than seen during the summer. Avoiding long Covid in children While the risk of serious infection from Covid remains low in most children, scientists are still unsure of the long-term effects the virus may have on them. Concerns have been raised in particular about the incidence of long Covid the little understood condition when symptoms persist for many more weeks than normal in youngsters. A study released last night by King's College London showed fewer than two per cent of children who develop Covid symptoms continue to suffer with them for more than eight weeks. Just 25 of the 1,734 children studied 0.01 per cent suffered symptoms for longer than a year. Cons Health risks Extremely rare incidences of a rare heart condition have been linked to the Pfizer vaccine in youngsters. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Protection (CDC) in the US where 9million 12- to 17-year-olds have already been vaccinated shows there is around a one in 14,500 to 18,000 chance of boys in the age group developing myocarditis after having their second vaccine dose. This is vanishingly small. For comparison, the chance of finding a four-leaf clover is one in 10,000, and the chance of a woman having triplets is one in 4,478. The risk is higher than in 18- to 24-year-olds (one in 18,000 to 22,000), 25- to 29-year-olds (one in 56,000 to 67,000) and people aged 30 and above (one in 250,000 to 333,000). But, again, this is very low. Britain's drug regulator the MHRA lists the rare heart condition as a very rare side-effect of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. They said: 'There have been very rare reports of myocarditis and pericarditis (the medical term for the condition) occurring after vaccination. These are typically mild cases and individuals tend to recover within a short time following standard treatment and rest.' More than four times as many hospitalisations were prevented as there were cases of myocarditis caused by the vaccine in 12- to 17-year-olds, the health body's data show. Jabs should be given to other countries Experts have also claimed it would be better to donate jabs intended for teenagers in the UK to other countries where huge swathes of the vulnerable population remain unvaccinated. Not only would this be a moral move but it is in the UK's own interest because the virus will remain a threat to Britain as long as it is rampant anywhere in the world. Most countries across the globe are lagging significantly behind the UK in terms of their vaccine rollout, with countries in Africa, Southeast Asia and South America remaining particularly vulnerable. Jabs could be better used vaccinating older people in those countries, and thus preventing the virus from continuing to circulate globally and mutate further, than the marginal gains to transmission Britain would see if children are vaccinated, experts argue. Professor David Livermore, from the University of East Anglia, has said: 'Limited vaccine supplies would be far better used in countries and regions with large vulnerable elderly populations who presently remain unvaccinated Australia, much of South East Asia and Latin America, as well as Africa.' Advertisement And Professor Tim Spector, an epidemiologist at King's College London, told MailOnline vaccinating children would 'use up' Britain's supply of jabs designated for boosters for the clinically vulnerable this winter. But other experts are piling the pressure on the the JCVI to approve Covid vaccines for over-12s. Professor Devi Sridhar, a global public health expert at Edinburgh University, said 12 to 15-year-olds should be offered the vaccine 'urgently' with the Delta variant set to 'fly through schools'. Britain's medical regulator, the MHRA, has already said the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are safe and effective for the age group. But the Joint Committee on Vaccinations and Immunisations (JCVI) which advises No10 on jabs and is separate from the MHRA is yet to green light to the plans. It claims the small risk of side effects may still outweigh the benefit due to the fact young children are very unlikely to be badly ill with Covid. The JCVI said there was a risk of heart inflammation in about one in 20,000 after a dose of Pfizer's vaccine in guidance published last month. It ruled against recommending the vaccine to healthy children because the risk of dying from the virus for them is about one in a million. Professor Livermore told MailOnline: 'It is clear that the vaccine-mediated protection wanes significantly within four to six months. Even government advertising acknowledges this. 'On the other hand, reinfection remains rare among those infected in the first wave, over a year ago. 'Accordingly it is plausible - not proven - that natural infection will give children a better first step in the lifelong co-existence that we all are now going to "enjoy" with this now endemic virus.' He continued: 'There is no direct reason to vaccinate children and adolescents against Covid. They are extremely unlikely to suffer severe disease if infected. 'Rare but serious side effects have been associated with the vaccines, including blood clots and myocarditis. For older adults and the vulnerable, these are small hazards compared with those from Covid infection, and being vaccinated is obviously prudent. 'But for children the risk/benefit ratio is far less clear, and may reverse. The JCVI initially were against vaccinating children on this logic and have provided no clear reason for a change of view.' 'Taking these three points together I can see no good reason to vaccinate under-18s, let alone 12-year-olds.' Other experts agreed, arguing the balance of risk still appears to lean towards not giving children a vaccine. Professor Hunter told MailOnline: At the moment I think the balance of evidence is against vaccinating 12 to 15-year-olds against Covid but I would trust the JCVI decision and be supportive if they decided this group needs to be inoculated. 'I have heard a number of people whose opinion I value and trust argue against it including people who are on the JCVI and they will have spent a lot of time going through all the data.' He continued: 'The first issue is that young people in particular are at an increased risk of side effects from vaccines compared to older people. 'There are side effects - and it does appear to be the case - that myocarditis is a risk particularly in young boys who get the Pfizer vaccine. So in younger people vaccinating is not a risk-free option.' He said a report in the last week of July showed two-thirds of 17-year-olds are already immune to the virus from natural infection, and now now the figure is likely to be as high as three quarters. Around half of the 12- to 13-year-olds are likely to have antibodies already, he said, and the jab 'won't hae any real benefit' to them as a result. Professor Hunter said: If we are going to be vaccinating these children it has got to be in their interest, not in ours. It is one thing to say have a vaccine to protect your health, but quite another thing to persuade you to have a vaccine to protect my health. One is entirely ethical and the other is dubious.' And Professor Spector said while vaccinating would reduce cases 'in an ideal world', in the immediate term it could take up supply intended for booster shots to older, more vulnerable people who's own immunity from vaccines given earlier in the year may be on the wane. Professor Spector said: 'With vaccinating children you are going to reduce numbers of infections, but if you do that that means you use up your boosters and so you risk more deaths and hospitalisations at the other end of the spectrum. 'In the ideal world I would be in favour of doing both [booster shots for the elderly and vaccines for over-12s] but I definitely think we should be giving boosters to kids that have had natural infections.' Professor Paul Hunter, an infectious disease expert at the University of East Anglia, said the risks of side effects currently outweighs the dangers posed by Covid itself for most children (left). Professor Tim Spector (right), an epidemiologist at King's College London, told MailOnline vaccinating children would 'use up' Britain's supply of jabs designated for boosters for the clinically vulnerable this winter Covid cases in Scotland have spiked to new highs after schools returned last week. Today there were 4,925 cases, up almost 50 per cent on the previous week. There were 3,613 on Friday compared to 1,542 the previous week The number of people falling ill with Covid in the UK has risen for the first time in three weeks, according to the ZOE symptom-tracking study NHS England draws up plans to start vaccinating children as young as 12 in two weeks WITHOUT their parent's consent The NHS has drawn up plans to offer Covid vaccines to children as young as 12 when schools return, in a sign Britain is edging towards routinely jabbing youngsters. NHS England bosses yesterday told trusts to be ready to expand the roll out to 12 to 15-year-olds in just two weeks' time as scientists warned the virus will 'rip through schools' unless pupils are immunised before the new term. But some scientists have said it would be better in the long run for children to catch Covid naturally and build up immunity from an early age. Children would not need parental consent to get the vaccine under the new plans, health officials told The Telegraph. Figures show that, despite schools being out for summer, secondary-aged children are fuelling the third wave of infections along with older teens and young adults. There are fears there could be an explosion in cases when classrooms go back next week. Britain's medical regulator, the MHRA, has already said the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are safe and effective for the age group. But the Joint Committee on Vaccinations and Immunisations (JCVI) which advises No10 on jabs and is separate from the MHRA is yet to green light to the plans. It claims the small risk of side effects may still outweigh the benefit due to the fact young children are very unlikely to be badly ill with Covid. Leaked emails reveal NHS trusts in England have until 4pm on Friday to have plans in place for the rollout in children. All 16 and 17-year-olds are already being invited for the Pfizer vaccine and don't need permission from a parent or guardian to get one. But only under-16s who live with vulnerable people or who have immune weaknesses themselves are being invited at present. Advertisement Not all experts agree that the JCVI's previous position of not extending the rollout to children. Professor Sridhar told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'I think right now, if we know the options with Delta, given how infectious it is, is that either you're going to be exposed to Covid without any protection or you can be exposed and have a vaccine. 'And we should be offering teens that vaccine so they have that protection before going back to schools.' She added that the JCVI were being 'very cautious', which was costing the country valuable time. 'Theyre waiting and watching and I guess the issue with a pandemic is that waiting and watching costs time,' she said. 'And time is the currency now that matters because its not like we can wait and watch and in six months say "OK, its safe, lets vaccinate". 'In those six months if a large percentage of 12 to 15-year-olds get infected, in some ways theyve lost that window of time and so I think perhaps they dont feel the urgency that they should be feeling given its an emergency situation and we have Delta, which is so infectious. I mean, its just flying through schools as we know. 'But not just here, Germany, Denmark, even places like New Zealand and Australia are struggling with Delta compared to the original virus.' But SAGE scientist Professor Russell Viner backed the JCVI this morning, and said they were 'right to be cautious' about the decision to vaccinate over-12s. He told the Today programme: 'We would be vaccinating teenagers largely to protect adults, because the benefit to them is low, and if we're going to do that the safety bar needs to be exceptionally high.' Professor Viner said scientists needed to 'really bottom out the risk' posed by a rare heart inflammation that has been reported as a side effect of the Pfizer jab. 'My belief is that once we have more data and we have really bottomed out the risk from this rare heart inflammation, that in a few months we will undoubtedly be doing this but it is right to be cautious.' Britain has been accused of being sluggish to roll out the Covid vaccine to other age groups, as its vaccination drive fell behind other countries. US regulators approved Pfizer's jab for 12 to 15-year-olds in May, and has already got at least one dose to 40 per cent (7million) of the age group. The EU's regulator also gave the age group the green light to get the jab at the end of May, with many countries quick to start rolling it out. France began inoculating 12 to 15-year-olds in June, and more than 40 per cent (2million) have already received a first dose. Italy started rolling out jabs to the age group from July with the aim of inoculating them before schools return. The Netherlands also began rolling out the jabs to secondary school children in July. New Mexico, WA, Michigan, Maine are among states with a 4 percent or more decrease in enrollment between the 2019-2020 school year and 2020-2021 With a 2.94 percent dip, Nevada still does not have the largest decrease in enrollment in public schools Public school enrollment has plummeted nationwide since the COVID-19 pandemic began last year, amounting to 1.5 million fewer students in classrooms, the US Department of Education has revealed. While parents of many of the 1.5 million students have opted for remote learning or private schools, CBS News reports some have simply vanished from the school system. Schools opened earlier this month in Las Vegas, where masks were required for the more than 300,000 students and about 18,000 teachers returning to in-person classes at the fifth-largest district in the nation. However, classrooms were noticeably emptier this school year. One school, Tate Elementary in Las Vegas, began searching for students who had failed to show up to class weeks after the year began. George Gomez, 7, now in the second grade, has not been inside a classroom since kindergarten after his mother, Ivonne, decided on remote learning over the past year. However, she was convinced to re-enroll her son in public school after speaking with a doctor, who convinced her to do so following the family's vaccinations. Pictured: George Gomez, 7, now in the second grade, has not been inside a classroom since kindergarten after his mother, Ivonne, decided upon remote learning over the past year 'So we all got our shots,' George's mother said, while adding she feels safer having her son return to school now that her family has received their shots 'I kind of was, like, scared and concerned because none of us had a COVID shot at all,' Gomez's mother told the outlet. 'So we all got our shots,' she said, while adding she feels safer now that her family is vaccinated. The school's principal, Sarah Popek, told CBS News that George is one of many students at Tate who have yet to return to school due to parental concerns, adding that the area was hit particularly hard by the pandemic. Nurse Alisa Ellis-Balogun, from Sphere, tests 7-year-old Thomas Byrd (pictured) for coronavirus a day before returning to school in Louisville, Kentucky on August 10 Schools opened earlier this month in and around Las Vegas, where masks were required for the more than 300,000 students and about 18,000 teachers returning to in-person classes 'We do have some students who are not back because their parents are concerned,' she said. Meanwhile, at nearby Orr Middle School, classrooms once packed with more than of 1,200 students now have only 871. 'Basically 400 didn't show up for the first day of school,' the middle school's principal Anthony Nunez told the outlet. According to an October 2020 Bellwether Education Partners report, roughly three million public school students stopped attending in-person or online classes following the onset of the pandemic in March 2020. Percentage change in public school enrollment between school year 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 by state, showing a handful of states with a decrease of 4 percent or more Pictured: Growth of homeschooling in the US, showing a massive spike in 2020-2021 With a 2.94 percent dip, Nevada still does not have the largest decrease in enrollment in its public schools. New Mexico, Washington state, Mississippi, Michigan, Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire all saw a four percent or more decrease in enrollment between the 2019-2020 school year and 2020-2021, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Nunez added that the shrinking classroom sizes may have more than just an impact on students. With a reduced student body, the middle school principal says teachers could lose their jobs. 'It may cause a reduction in staffing.' Meanwhile, the amount of parents who opted to homeschool their children has spiked as public school enrollment numbers decline. CBS News reports that school administrators will ultimately be tracking down the missing students by literally going door-to-door to locate them From 2019 to the fall of 2020, the percent of homeschooled students increased from 3.4 percent to 9 percent. There were an estimated 4.5 to 5 million homeschooled students in grades K-12 in the United States during March of 2021, which is roughly 8 to 9 percent of school-age children. In spring 2019, there were about 2.5 million students being homeschooled, according to the National Home Education Research Institute. CBS News reports that school administrators will ultimately be tracking down the missing students by literally going door-to-door to locate them. A 17-year-old boy alleged to be the gunman at a Brooklyn Sweet 16 party last November that left a 20-year-old woman dead and six others wounded has been arrested. The suspect, along with three other purported gang members, opened fire in the Bedford-Stuyvesant building where the party was being held, cops said. He was arrested Wednesday on charges of murder and criminal possession of a weapon. No other arrests have been made. DailyMail.com did not receive a comment from the NYPD about why it took so long to track down the alleged shooter. A 17-year-old boy was arrested and charged on August 25 after he was involved in a seven-person shooting that wounded six victims and killed one at a Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment Daijyonna Long, 20, of Stafford, Virginia, was one of the seven young victims that was shot during the party. Long was pronounced dead at NYC Health and Hospitals in Woodhall. The other six victims survived the shooting and only sustained injuries. Betty Long, the girl's grandmother, called the college student and makeup artist 'my princess'. 'She was a good girl,' the grandmother told The Daily News. 'Nothing in that kind of nature ... She was studying to be something to take care of kids.' 20-year-old Virginia girl Daijyonna Long (above) was shot at the Sweet 16 after-party on Albany Avenue The shooting on November 22 started at the original location of the Sweet 16 party at Liberty Avenue. The party was broken up by police after a 17-year-old gang member was shot and injured. It was then moved to an apartment on Albany Avenue where four gang members retaliated in response to the shooting two hours earlier and opened fire. The shooting reportedly occurred at around 11.15pm throughout the building as four guns went off between the lobby and the third floor, according to police. A 16-year-old boy was one of the targets as he was shot a total of five times by two guns, according to The Daily News. The community was outraged by the lack of gun control and the involvement of children in violent crimes after the November shooting happened. 'Four of the people who were shot last night is four people I knew personally. And it's hard, it's hard, said Brooklyn community activist Sharronie Perry. How do you tell a mother and her daughter who got shot 'don't worry'? How do you tell a a 20-year-old's parents who came up here from Virginia for a joyous occasion and lost her life?' 'The mere fact that we don't call this event a mass shooting is stating that we normalize violence in our community and that is unacceptable,' Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams added. Shootings in New York have increased 7.1% in the last year as 1,010 shootings occurred in 2021 as compared to 943 shootings in 2020, according to NYPD. The number of shooting victims also increased by 4.4% with 1,208 victims in 2021 and 1,157 victims in 2020. Police reported that the event was a result of a previous incident that involved another brief shooting in which a 17-year-old gang member was shot Advertisement Priti Patel met with a group of Afghan refugees arriving at London Heathrow Airport today who were among the last to escape before two explosions struck near Kabul Airport only hours later. The Home Secretary visited Terminal 4 this morning to meet passengers on one of the final British planes out of Afghanistan, just hours before the blasts which could halt the remaining airlifts before the August 31 deadline. Some 369 Afghan refugees arrived on the flight this morning - before one explosion ripped through a crowd of Afghans gathered at the Abbey gate of the airport and another hit a hotel, followed by gunfire and mass panic. Ms Patel pledged to create safe routes of passage for Afghans to avoid them travelling on small boats across the English Channel - and said the UK was 'dedicated' to helping those who do not escape amid Britain's withdrawal. Before the evacuation effort - known as Operation Pitting - was placed under threat due to today's blasts, Ms Patel told reporters that Afghans crossing the Channel with people smugglers was 'exactly what we want to avoid'. It came only hours before the explosions, where scores of bloodied people were carried away in wheelbarrows after one of the bombers detonated in a sewage canal-way packed with people overlooked by US troops. The devastation - which killed at least 13 people - could spell the end of the airlifts before the August 31 deadline, with Germany already pulling out all its military planes, potentially leaving thousands stranded under Taliban rule. Meanwhile Ms Patel continues to face pressure to find a quick solution to the problem of migrants crossing over the Channel to Kent, with the total for the year so far now at more than 12,000 - compared with 8,410 in 2020. Home Secretary Priti Patel (second left) talks to Malalai Hussiny (wearing a green headscarf), a refugee from Afghanistan who arrived on a evacuation flight at London Heathrow Airport Terminal 4 this morning The Home Secretary met Afghans arriving at London Heathrow Airport today including Ms Hussiny, 20, and her family Ms Hussiny told Ms Patel about her family's journey to Kabul Airport, after she arrived at London Heathrow this morning Home Secretary Priti Patel said today that the Government wants to avoid Afghan refugees travelling to the UK unsafely The arrival came only hours before explosions in Kabul today, where bloodied people were carried away in wheelbarrows One of the attacks which took place at the Abbey gate of Kabul Airport today where there were also reports of gunfire A suicide bomb caused a huge explosion outside Kabul Airport today just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' attack Ms Patel said: 'We want to avoid that (Afghans crossing the Channel) because clearly it puts families in danger. The world has seen this in the Syria crisis. 'In 2015 we saw thousands of people dying in the Mediterranean, making the most perilous, treacherous journeys that puts them in the hands of people traffickers, people smugglers who just don't care about safety.' Shots are fired at Kabul evacuation plane: Italian transport plane comes under fire during take-off - but is not damaged - hours after warning ISIS attack was imminent Shots have been fired at an Italian military transport plane as it flew out of Kabul airport hours after a British minister warned an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS attack was expected in the Afghan capital. The C-130 plane was not damaged in the incident, a source from Italy's Defence Ministry added. An Italian journalist traveling on the flight told Sky 24 TG that the plane had been carrying almost 100 Afghan civilians when it came under fire minutes after take-off. Earlier, armed forces minister James Heappey said there is 'very credible reporting' of a 'severe' attack which could happen 'within hours' by ISIS-K, the sworn enemy of the Taliban who want to cause mayhem in the new regime. The US, Britain and Australia had already told their citizens to flee the airport over the terror threat with Western forces still stationed at the transport hub, with a multiple car-bomb attack feared by officials. The fears are heaping extra pressure on the operation to evacuate stranded foreigners, with Tuesday's deadline for foreign troops to leave fast approaching. Meanwhile Afghans who had been told to stay away from Kabul airport are instead flocking to Pakistan and Iran in a bid to escape after the UK told them to head to the border, while many countries have announced they are ending their airlift operations from today. Mr Heappey told BBC Radio 4 today: 'There is now very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack.' Advertisement Ms Patel also said the Government is 'absolutely dedicated and committed' to making sure people who do not escape Afghanistan ahead of the withdrawal are able to make safe journeys to resettle in the UK. She said: 'Those individuals who may not get out, there is huge work taking place right now, you saw it at the G7, the Prime Minister said that we will supply safe passage.' Heathrow has been used as a refugee processing centre since Tuesday, with between five and six flights a day carrying more than 1,000 refugee passengers between them arriving at Terminal 4. Other airports being used in the UK's evacuation effort include Birmingham and Brize Norton. Ms Patel said 'vigorous' checks are being carried out on all Afghans arriving in the UK to prevent security threats. Once processed by Border Force at Heathrow, the refugees are asked to quarantine for 10 days at a hotel as part of Covid health security measures, because Afghanistan is currently on the travel red list. The Home Secretary met Afghans arriving at Heathrow during her visit, including Malalai Hussiny, 20, and her family, who told Ms Patel about their journey to Kabul airport after being allowed to settle in the UK under the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (Arap). Ms Patel defended the UK's record on resettling Afghans after hearing of the difficulties refugees face travelling to Kabul airport. She added: 'The emergency has concentrated the need, with the Taliban coming in but also the securitisation of the airport with security partners around the world, America in particular. 'Our relocation programme has been ongoing but quite frankly with the security picture changing, the intelligence picture changing, the Taliban being on the move and coming right on to Kabul has had an intensified effect. 'It is the intensification of that effect that basically has led to the evacuation and we are seeing thousands of people coming in every single day.' Labour's shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds described Ms Patel's promises of safe passage after the evacuation from Kabul ends as 'like trying to close the stable door after the horse has bolted'. He added: 'The appalling mishandling of the collapse in Afghanistan by Conservative ministers has left huge numbers of lives at risk and a potential humanitarian crisis. The lack of planning to get people at risk out is unforgivable, given it has been 18 months since the Doha deal. 'We still don't know when these supposed safe routes will open or how people fearing for their lives will be able to access help once the airport closes, and the military has left. Priti Patel watches as a refugee has her fingerprints taken after arriving from Afghanistan on a flight at Heathrow today Home Secretary Priti Patel with Border Force regional director Tim Kingsbury at London Heathrow Airport this morning A Border Force worker processes refugees from Afghanistan who arrived on a evacuation flight at Heathrow Airport today Malalai Hussiny, a refugee from Afghanistan, poses for a photo at Heathrow today after arriving on a evacuation flight 'It is a dangerous mess, ministers should take responsibility and outline plans immediately.' Today, an explosion went off outside Kabul Airport, where thousands of people have gathered to try to flee the country on Western airlift since the Taliban seized power earlier this month. The Pentagon confirmed the blast, with no immediate word on casualties. Western nations had warned of a possible attack on Kabul's airport in the waning days of the massive evacuation efforts. Several countries urged people to avoid the airport, where an official said there was a threat of a suicide bombing. But just days - or even hours for some nations - before the evacuation effort ends, few appeared to heed the call. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. Hundreds of refugees from Afghanistan arrive on a evacuation flight at London Heathrow Airport this morning Refugees from Afghanistan wait to be processed after arriving on a evacuation flight at London Heathrow Airport today A member of Border Force staff assists a female evacuee as refugees arrive from Afghanistan at Heathrow Airport today Malalai Hussiny, a refugee from Afghanistan who arrived on a evacuation flight at London Heathrow Airport this morning The Taliban have so far honored a pledge not to attack Western forces during the evacuation, but insist the foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of August 31. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from Afghanistan's Islamic State group affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban's freeing of prisoners during their blitz across the country. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC today that there was 'very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack' at the airport, possibly within 'hours.' Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said his country had received information from the US and other countries about the 'threat of suicide attacks on the mass of people.' The acting US ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was 'clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling.' A member of Heathrow security staff gives a thumbs up to refugees arriving from Afghanistan at Heathrow Airport today Refugees from Afghanistan arrive on a evacuation flight at London Heathrow Airport this morning A refugee has his fingerprints taken after arriving from Afghanistan on a evacuation flight at Heathrow Airport today Refugees from Afghanistan arrive on a evacuation flight at London Heathrow Airport's Terminal 4 this morning But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details and did not say whether the threat remained. Shortly after, the blast was reported. Mr Wilson also said there remain 'safe ways' for Americans to reach the airport, but 'there undoubtedly will be' Afghans who had worked with or for the U.S. in Afghanistan who will not be able to get out before the evacuation ends. Sadiq Khan announces London homes plan for Afghan refugees as he offers cash to local authorities to buy back council houses that have been sold off London mayor Sadiq Khan has announced plans to help the city's councils and housing associations support the arrival of Afghan refugees. Mr Khan says he will expand his new Right to Buy-back fund to help councils purchase homes which could be used to resettle families arriving from Afghanistan. Housing associations are also being encouraged to apply for funding for suitable homes that can be delivered quickly. Mr Khan said in a statement he would invite London councils to submit bids to his Right to Buy-back fund, which allows them to buy former council homes back from the private sector, with the programme to have a particular focus on family-sized homes. Mr Khan announced the Right to Buy-back fund last month in a bid to help councils and council-owned housing companies acquire homes that would be let at social rent levels or used as accommodation for homeless families. 'It has been devastating to watch the crisis unfold in Afghanistan and I'm determined to do everything in my power to support those escaping the country,' Mr Khan said. 'London has a proud history of providing sanctuary to those in need and by working together we can help these refugees find a welcoming home in our city.' Several London boroughs have told the government they want to support those fleeing the brutal Taliban regime in Afghanistan and take in refugees. Richmond, Camden, Ealing, Hackney, Hammersmith & Fulham, Kingston, Lambeth, Islington and Lewisham are among the London boroughs to offer their support. Advertisement Late yesterday, the US Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens today not to go to the airport, with Australia's foreign minister saying there was a 'very high threat of a terrorist attack.' Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid earlier denied that any attack was imminent. Earlier today, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. While some fled, others just sat on the ground, covered their faces and waited in the noxious fumes. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her two-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. 'We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger,' Ms Sadat said. 'My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping.' Gunshots later echoed in the area as Ms Sadat waited. 'There is anarchy because of immense crowds,' she said, blaming the U.S. for the chaos. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. 'The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO,' he said. 'They are looking for them house-by-house at night.' Many Afghans share those fears. The hard-line Islamic group wrested back control of the country nearly 20 years after being ousted in a U.S.-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Senior US officials said yesterday's warning from the embassy was related to specific threats involving the Islamic State group and potential vehicle bombs. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss ongoing military operations. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan grew out of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even more extreme view of Islam. The Sunni extremists have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan. But ISIS fighters were likely freed from prisons along with other inmates during the Taliban's rapid advance. Extremists may have seized heavy weapons and equipment abandoned by Afghan troops. A young boy pulls a suitcase as refugees arrive from Afghanistan at Heathrow Airport in London this morning A Border Force worker processes refugees from Afghanistan who arrived on a evacuation flight at Heathrow Airport today Refugees from Afghanistan arrive on a evacuation flight at London Heathrow Airport this morning A young boy pulls a suitcase as refugees arrive from Afghanistan at Heathrow Airport in London this morning A member of Heathrow staff sets out cans of water on chairs before refugees from Afghanistan arrive on a flight today Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. 'The reality on the ground is the perimeter of the airport is closed. The Taliban have tightened the noose. It's very, very difficult for anybody to get through at this point,' said Canadian General Wayne Eyre, the country's acting Chief of Defense Staff. Lt Col Georges Eiden, Luxembourg's army representative in neighboring Pakistan, said that tomorrow would mark the official end for US allies. But two Biden administration officials denied that was the case. A third official said that the US worked with its allies to coordinate each country's departure, and some nations asked for more time and were granted it. 'Most depart later in the week,' he said, while adding that some were stopping operations today. All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the information publicly. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told RTL radio his country's efforts would stop tomorrow evening. Danish Defense Minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: 'It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul.' Denmark's last flight has already departed, and Poland and Belgium have also announced the end of their evacuations. The Dutch government said it had been told by the US to leave today. But Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said some planes would continue to fly. US soldiers stand inside the Kabul Airport wall today as hundreds of people gather near an evacuation control checkpoint Hundreds of people, some holding documents, gather near an evacuation control checkpoint at Kabul Airport today Afghan nationals line up and wait for security checks in Pakistan at a border crossing point in Chaman today US Air Force crews assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron load passengers at Kabul Airport this week 'Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission,' he said in a tweet. The Taliban have said they will allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. The Taliban have promised to return Afghanistan to security and pledged they won't seek revenge on those who opposed them or roll back progress on human rights. But many Afghans are skeptical. An Afghan journalist from private broadcaster Tolo News described being beaten by Taliban. Ziar Yad said the fighters also beat his colleague and confiscated their cameras, technical equipment and a mobile phone as they tried to report on poverty in Kabul. 'The issue has been shared with Taliban leaders; however, the perpetrators have not yet been arrested, which is a serious threat to freedom of expression,' Mr Yad wrote on Twitter. Bravery medals awards to disgraced media tycoon Robert Maxwell for his wartime service are going up for sale. The late newspaper baron, who died in 1991, was given a stash of awards for his heroics during the Second World War - including a Military Cross. He was handed the coveted title personally by legendary by Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery in 1945. But, almost 30 years after his death, a private collector is set to make around 8,000 out of the haul. The late newspaper baron (pictured with his daughter Ghislaine and wife Elisabeth in 1990), who died in 1991, was given a stash of awards for his heroics during the Second World War - including a Military Cross Maxwell's medals are pictured left to right: Military Cross, 1939-45 Star, France Star, Defence Medal, War Medal, Swedish Order of the Polar Star, Order of Stara Planina of Bulgaria, Order of the White Rose of Finland, Polish Order of Merit, Poland Cross of Valour, Czechoslovakia Medal of Merit and Czechoslovak Medal Abroad Almost 30 years after his death, a private collector is set to make around 8,000 out of the haul. Pictured: Order of the White Rose of Finland, Order of Stara Planina of Bulgaria and Polish Order of Merit Pictured: Israel 40th Anniversary Gold Medal Christopher Mellor-Hill, head of client liaison at Dix Noonan Webb auctioneers, said: 'We have been entrusted with the sale of Robert Maxwell's Military Cross for bravery in World War Two and his other awards. 'He was one of the most complex and colourful characters who became one of the most powerful press barons in the 1980s. 'Given an almost state-like funeral in Israel after his mysterious death at sea off his luxury yacht, he was soon infamous for being found to have looted the Daily Mirror's pension fund leading to the collapse of his business empire.' Decades before the fraudster stole millions of pounds from the pension fund of Mirror Group Newspapers and then drowned in mysterious circumstances, Maxwell was a decorated war hero with a tragic past. Born in Czechoslovakia to Jewish parents, his mother, father and four siblings were killed in the Holocaust. He survived by fleeing to France to join the Czech army in exile before being evacuated to England where he joined the British Army. Then a sergeant, Maxwell took part in the Normandy invasion and fought across Europe towards Germany. In April 1945 he was awarded the Military Cross for storming a German machine-gun post that had been pinning down British soldiers on the Holland/German border. He was decorated personally by Field Marshal Montgomery just 24 hours after learning his mother and sister had been killed by the Nazis. In April 1945 he was awarded the Military Cross for storming a German machine-gun post that had been pinning down British soldiers on the Holland/German border. He was decorated personally by Field Marshal Montgomery just 24 hours after learning his mother and sister had been killed by the Nazis (pictured) Maxwell, whose daughter Ghislaine Maxwell is currently in jail in the US awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges, became a press baron after the war. Pictured: British and Polish commemorative coins he was given Pictured is a note from Elisabeth Maxwell, Robert's wife, noting the medals he had received Maxwell, whose daughter Ghislaine Maxwell is currently in jail in the US awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges, became a press baron after the war. He died after suffering a heart attack and falling off his superyacht, the Lady Ghislaine, off the Canary Islands in 1991. His companies filed for bankruptcy in 1992 and his family sold the medals as part of the contents of his London home in the same year, with the proceeds going to the administrators. Maxwell was aged 16 when he fled his home in eastern Czechoslovakia in 1939 as the Nazi's occupied the country and persecuted Jewish people. In May 1940, following the Fall of France, he was evacuated to England and served in the Pioneer Corps before he was transferred to the North Staffordshire Regiment. In January 1945 in the town of Paarlo on the Holland/German border, 50 Germans attacked a row of houses containing Allied soldiers. Maxwell's commanding officer went to launched a counter-attack with his men but came under intense fire and withdrew. He then volunteered to lead two sections across the ground, again under fire, and reached the British soldiers who were holding out in some of the buildings. In January 1945 in the town of Paarlo on the Holland/German border, 50 Germans attacked a row of houses containing Allied soldiers. Maxwell's commanding officer went to launched a counter-attack with his men but came under intense fire and withdrew. Pictured: Together for Peace Foundation medal he was given Pictured: Israeli commemorative coins. The bravery medals awarded to the disgraced media tycoon will go on sale next month Maxwell achieved the rank of captain by the end of the war and afterwards, for two years, was a press censor for the Foreign Office in Berlin. Pictured: Israeli commemorative coins he was given He then led the men in clearing enemy soldiers out of neighbouring buildings, inflicting many casualties which prompted the rest to withdraw. The citation for his Military Cross read: 'For gallant and distinguished service in North West Europe. 'During the attack on Paarlo on January 29, 1945, Lieutenant Maxwell was leading his platoon when a heavy artillery concentration fell on and near the platoon killing and wounding several men. 'The attack was in danger of losing momentum but this officer, showing powers of leadership of the highest order, controlled his men with great skill and kept up the advance. 'During the night another platoon of the company was counter attacked and partially overrun. 'An attempt to restore the position with another platoon failed but Lieutenant Maxwell repeatedly asked to be allowed to lead another attempt; this request was eventually granted. 'By his marvellous example and offensive spirit this officer was responsible for the relief of the platoon and the restoration of the situation.' Maxwell achieved the rank of captain by the end of the war and afterwards, for two years, was a press censor for the Foreign Office in Berlin. He became a British citizen in 1946. His medals will be sold on September 15. Gladys Berejiklian has dropped a major hint that Sydney will be freed from lockdown on October 18 when NSW reaches a 70 per cent Covid-19 vaccination rate. The premier on Thursday said the state was seven weeks away from vaccinating 70 per cent of its eligible population - which would trigger a significant easing of the state's stay-at-home restrictions. The government is working towards October 18 as NSW's likely re-opening date once that target is reached, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. In the meantime, Ms Berejiklian is considering trialing industries where both customers and staff are vaccinated including salons and hairdressers to prepare for a larger reopening of the hospitality industry. Greater freedoms are on their way for vaccinated residents in NSW with the government earmarking a date of October 18 for the state's reopening (pictured, masked Sydneysiders in lockdown) Those small-scale 'trials' will be a litmus test for the wide-scale easing of hospitality capacity limits as long as they aren't linked to high levels of transmission. Ms Berejiklian has rallied industries, including pubs and restaurants, to prepare for the mid-October date. The premier on Thursday said she was already working with industry leaders to prepare plans to reopen at that time. 'We're calling upon industry and citizens to get ready for when we hit that 70 per cent double dose. We are already starting to work with industry stakeholders on how we can go back to safely open up,' she said on Thursday. 'Get fully vaccinated, you still have time to make sure that when you start opening up, you have those options to live a freer life.' The state leader is expected on Friday to unveil how school students in NSW will return to the classroom, starting with those in kindergarten to Year 2. HSC examinations will be pushed back until November, despite a vaccination blitz of 75,000 Year 12 students to inoculate them in time for the original October 19 start date. Greater freedoms for vaccinated Australians have already been granted for the coming weeks as the state plans its roadmap out of the relentless lockdown. Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant (pictured, right, with Gladys Berejiklian on Thursday) is working towards an October 18 reopening for the state Eight new venues of concern were identified including an Officeworks in Dubbo (pictured), with the town recording 25 infections on Thursday Outdoor gatherings of up to five immunised people living outside of LGAs of concern are permitted from September 13, including an extra hour of outdoor recreational activity for vaccinated residents in hotspots. While the government admitted a jump to 80 per cent vaccination rate was difficult, they were confident 70 per cent is a more realistic target. Ms Berejiklian said she was committed to giving people freedom despite sky-rocketing case numbers. 'We're a government that assesses the risk but also assesses our wish to live with this virus,' she said. 'We know that people coming together is what people miss the most.' 'From the various options we looked at, that was the option that met the mental health needs and wellbeing of our community, but also provided the lowest-risk setting.' Residents taking advantage of the new rules will need to carry proof they are fully-vaccinated at all times. A Dubbo Domino's takeaway shop is also listed as Covid-19 exposure site after being visited by a positive case NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian granted Sydneysiders some freedom from September 13 allowing outdoor gatherings of up to five people who are fully vaccinated (pictured, residents exercising during Sydney's lockdown) More than 80 per cent of Thursday's new cases were found in west and south-west Sydney (pictured, shoppers in Ashfield in the city's inner-west) The greater freedoms were announced on Thursday which included an extra hour of recreational activity for fully vaccinated residents in hotspot LGAs (pictured, locked-down residents enjoying takeaway coffee) LATEST NSW COVID EXPOSURE SITES Anyone who attended this venue is casual contact and must self-isolate until they receive a negative result. Windale: Windale Takeaway - Saturday August 21, 5:35pm to 5:45pm Wellington: Metro Petroleum - Sunday August 22, 10:30am to 10:40am Wellington: Coles - Sunday August 22, 9:20am to 10:15am Dubbo: Officeworks - Wednesday August 18, 4:45pm to 5pm Dubbo: Dominos Pizza - Wednesday August 18, 6:55pm to 7:10pm Berkeley: Coles - Saturday August 21, 11:10am to 11:25am Orange: 7-Eleven Molong Road - Saturday August 21, 2pm to 10pm, Friday August 20, 2pm to 10pm Orange: 7-Eleven Bathurst Road - Saturday August 21, 7am to 3:15pm Advertisement The new freedoms come after NSW hit Ms Berejiklian's target of getting six million jabs in arms by the end of August a week early. Health officials though are still concerned about the virus circulating in the community, with just 33 per cent of people fully-vaccinated and regional areas particularly at risk. Petrol stations, takeaways and supermarkets are the latest venues of concern after the state hit a record 1,029 locally acquired Covid-19 cases on Thursday - the first time an Australian state or territory has surpassed 1,000 daily cases. Eight new venues of concern in regional areas have been detected following the announcement of a lockdown extension for regional NSW until at least September 10. An Officeworks and a Domino's pizza store in Dubbo were on the list, after 25 cases of the virus were detected in the area on Thursday. More casual contact venues were also identified at a petrol station and a Coles in Wellington after a Woolworths in the central-western town issued nine Covid-19 alerts from August 15 to August 23. All shoppers who visited the exposure sites at the listed times must get tested and self-isolate until they receive a negative result. Residents taking advantage of the new rules will need to carry proof they are fully-vaccinated at all times (pictured, shoppers in Merrylands) NSW Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant said she was confident easing restrictions in the state was safe even when cases were still rising at record rates. More than 80 per cent of Thursday's new cases were found in west and south-west Sydney. There are now 698 Covid-19 patients across NSW with the virus - the vast majority of whom Dr Chant said were not vaccinated against the virus. 'What we're doing is incentivising vaccination because to avail yourself of this [lockdown] you have to be vaccinated,' she said. 'In the local areas of concern, we've taken the precaution that is just open to the household group. 'It's a thank you to the community and rewarding them in a way that is safe. These are baby steps.' NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian (pictured on Thursday) said she was committed to giving people freedom in the coming months English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson hired a private investigator to obtain personal details about a journalist whose home he went to unannounced, a court has heard. Robinson, 38, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was in court regarding an application for a stalking protection order after he went to the home of Independent home affairs correspondent Lizzie Dearden and her boyfriend, Samuel Partridge. Westminster Magistrates' Court heard that Robinson went to Ms Dearden's home on Sunday January 17 - two days after a request for comment through his solicitors about a story alleging that he misused money donated by his supporters. Robinson said he felt 'sick' and 'scared' and 'worried' when he saw the allegations being made, and said they were untrue, adding that they came from an unreliable source. Tommy Robinson, 38, hired a private investigator to obtain personal details about a journalist whose home he went to unannounced, a court has heard Giving evidence, Robinson said he attempted to contact a solicitor on the Saturday, adding that he 'panicked' as he had until the Monday to respond. 'I contacted a private investigator,' he said. 'And I asked, and said I'd pay, for information to find Lizzie Dearden.' Asked why he did this, Robinson responded: 'Because the email stated if I didn't respond by Monday morning they would run with the story.' Robinson told the court he also contacted his 'research group which involves many individuals', adding that he said 'find out what you can, everything you can'. He said the private investigator came back to him on the Sunday with 'lots of information' about Ms Dearden, including her address and information about who she lives with. EDL founder Robinson is facing Westminster Magistrates' Court (pictured) regarding an application for a stalking protection order after visiting the house of Independent home affairs correspondent Lizzie Dearden and her boyfriend, Samuel Partridge The court heard that Robinson, 38, went to Ms Dearden's home on January 17, some days after a request for comment was sent via his solicitors about a story alleging he had misused money donated by his supporters. Robinson said he is not allowed access to any social media, and so he films himself, and his plan was to film himself giving Ms Dearden 'all of the evidence'. He said his supporters could then share the footage to show there are 'two sides'. Video footage, filmed by Robinson, captures him saying: 'Lizzie, I will be back every day if I have to.' Robinson was subsequently arrested over the incident. Ryan Dowding, representing the Metropolitan Police, put it to Robinson that his intention was to 'intimidate' Ms Dearden and prevent her from publishing stories about him more generally. Robinson, who says Ms Dearden has written 220 articles about him since 2018, disagreed. Ms Dearden gave evidence remotely last week and was asked why she did not wish to go to speak to Robinson when he attended her home. She told the court: 'Because I didn't know what he was going to do, and, from what I could hear on the intercom and through the street, he sounded very angry and agitated. 'Basically, I was too frightened to go down.' Robinson speaks to a camera as he arrives at Westminster Magistrates Court in central London Mr Dowden has previously told the court that during Robinson's time outside Ms Dearden's home there was 'shouting about Mr Partridge, claiming he was a paedophile', adding: 'There were then threats to come back every day if he needed to.' On Thursday, Mr Dowding described the allegation about Mr Partridge as 'baseless' and 'nonsense', and put it to Robinson that he knew the allegation was 'completely unsubstantiated'. Robinson said the allegation came in a comment from someone in the 'research group' who he described as 'an unreliable source'. Deputy chief magistrate Tan Ikram agreed to impose an interim order in March ahead of the full application for a stalking protection order. At the time he said he was satisfied that the temporary order was 'necessary and proportionate' because the acts were 'capable of being associated with stalking' and there was an 'ongoing risk'. Mr Ikram said he will give his judgment on a future date to be fixed. The interim order will remain in place until October 13, unless it is revoked before that date. The case continues. Advertisement The Metropolitan Police today failed to stop Extinction Rebellion protesters from bringing chaos to the front door of the Queen's home in London as the eco-mob turned the Queen Victoria Memorial blood red just yards from Buckingham Palace. Hapless officers clumsily sloshed through the fountain to grab several young protesters from activist group Animal Rebellion before eventually carting them away. And their efforts did not stop other scruffy members of the rag-tag protest from waving 'royal blood bath' signs as they defaced the monument and dyed its water red. Social media users were left furious at the stunt, with one asking why the Met Police treat the activists 'like a public art exhibition'. Another fumed that he had had enough of the way officers treat the demonstrators 'all lovey dovey' when they take over the capital. Animal Rebellion, which campaigns for a 'plant-based food system', is affiliated to XR, whose two-week campaign of 'civil disobedience' is causing chaos in London as businesses begin to recover from the effects of lockdown. Spokesman Harley McDonald-Eckersall today claimed the Royal Family was guilty of eco-crimes for allowing hunting on its land. 'The Crown Estate is the biggest landowner in the UK and they choose to use this land for animal agriculture and hunting, which not only decimate our environment but cause the deaths of millions of lives every year,' she said. 'It's time for a new system based on justice and compassion and the royal family should be leading the way.' The Met tweeted: 'A number of activists have vandalised the Victoria Memorial water feature outside Buckingham Palace. We are on scene and arrests have been made. The suspects are being taken to custody.' Animal Rebellion protesters targeted the Queen Victoria Memorial today, holding placards reading 'A royal blood bath' in the fountain Police were seen sloshing through the fountain to grab several young protesters before carting them away Animal Rebellion, which campaigns for a 'plant-based food system', is affiliated to Extinction Rebellion, whose two-week campaign of 'civil disobedience' is currently causing chaos in central London Spokesman Harley McDonald-Eckersall today claimed the Royal Family was guilty of eco-crimes for allowing hunting on its land' Some may question the timing of the group's decision to target the Royals, which comes just days after Prince Charles made his most powerful intervention in the debate over climate change to date. Addressing business leaders, the heir to the throne urged them to help or the planet is 'done for'. Extinction Rebellion's last London demo left 120 TONS of rubbish on the streets that cost 50,000 to clean up, claims MP Extinction Rebellion, the environmental campaigning group, left 120 tonnes of rubbish on London's streets when they last took over the capital, an MP has warned. The mess cost taxpayers 50,000 to clean up after they shut down major roads and streets in London in October 2019 in a bid to encourage the Government to tackle climate change. Nickie Aiken, Conservative MP for Cities of London and Westminster, revealed the cost of the demonstration to her constituency as the activists target London's streets again. The former leader of City of Westminster Council told the Telegraph: 'The disruption to local people and businesses is immeasurable. I was told by the council that last time Extinction Rebellion were here for two weeks, they cleared 120 tons of rubbish left behind. That added 50,000 to their costs. This is local people's council tax.' Advertisement Drawing emotionally on his family connections to wildfire-racked Greece, the prince issued a robust challenge to big business to join his crusade for action 'before it's finally too late'. Writing in the Daily Mail, the heir to the throne said that humanity's 'only hope' was for business chiefs to join world leaders in an 'epic battle' to avert 'climate catastrophe'. The Prince of Wales declared that business 'with its trillions of dollars' has an 'absolutely critical' role to play. He said that unlocking this private sector investment could bring about a 'game-changing green transition'. The number of people arrested at Extinction Rebellion events in London in four days of protests has almost reached 200 as the environmental group also targeted the Oxford Circus area. The Metropolitan Police said as of 6pm yesterday, a further six had been arrested for a 'variety of offences'. It brings the total number of arrests made over the four days of protests to 196. However, dozens of people could be seen being dragged away by officers on Wednesday afternoon after a large group blocked off the surrounding roads near Oxford Circus with a partially-built pink sculpture - putting traffic at a standstill. The Met moved in after a van dropped off the sculpture and protesters formed a human chain to stop it being taken down, according to Extinction Rebellion (XR). Police officers remove protesters from the fountain at the Queen Victoria Memorial, which they covered in red paint An Animal Rebellion protester is taken away by police following today's protest, which comes as XR demonstrations continue in central London Three young protesters hold signs reading 'Animal agriculture, a royal blood bath'. Animal Rebellion campaigns against the meat industry Police pull a protester out of the fountain. Officers have been criticised on other occasions for not intervening to remove activists A spokesman for the group said: 'The van pulled up and everything was unloaded, including a partially-assembled pink structure. 'Some women then came and formed a ring to allow the structure to be built by holding hands and gluing their hands together. 'The police came charging in to try and stop it being built and rushed through the women to get to it, but the structure was already built by that point. Some people then began gluing themselves to the structure.' Police had warned XR protesters to leave the area or face being arrested. Using a loudspeaker, a police officer said: 'You must this area immediately or you may be arrested.' Topless women with climate messages written on their bodies were among the protesters in the area. Officers formed a cordon close to where they were and began carrying away dozens of them to police vans parked nearby. A barefoot protester makes her way along a narrow ledge in a bid to get away from police, who arrested several activists A protester with red paint on her face is removed from this afternoon's protest outside Buckingham Palace Members clapped and cheered as they were taken away while others played music and chanted. Pedestrians were urged to find another way around the area. The Met said in a statement on Twitter: 'Officers have intervened when protesters were building a structure at Oxford Circus. 'Some individuals have glued themselves to the structure, specialist officers are working to support their removal. There will be some disruption to traffic in the area as roads are currently blocked, which we are working to reduce.' Earlier in the day, activists from Money Rebellion, an offshoot of Extinction Rebellion, gathered at the Department for International Trade to hold a mock awards ceremony where a 'Charred Earth' award was given to the department. Animal Rebellion describes itself as 'a mass movement using nonviolent civil disobedience to call for a just, sustainable plant-based food system' There was a large police presence outside Buckingham Palace today as officers rushed to remove the protesters Other activists gathered at the Brazilian embassy to show solidarity with indigenous people in the Amazon Rainforest. XR began its Impossible Rebellion protests on Monday when demonstrators blocked roads in central London, including around Trafalgar Square. They are demanding the Government immediately end investment in fossil fuels that are driving climate change. The Met said a 'significant' operation would be in place for the protests over the bank holiday weekend but also acknowledged the activists' 'important cause'. Computer experts have warned the infuriating Flubot text messages scam could steal your bank account log in and force you to wipe your entire phone to get rid of it. Thousands of Australians have been inundated with the annoying, badly spelt text messages claiming you have a missed call or voicemail message. The messages, usually full of typing errors, tell users to click on an included link to retrieve the voicemail. But the link actually takes callers to an illicit app which installs malicious malware that can capture all your passwords and logins - as well as contact details of all your friends. Computer experts have warned the infuriating Flubot text messages scam could steal your bank account - and force you to wipe your entire phone to get rid of it. Now Delia Rickard, deputy chair of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, has warned Australians: 'Whatever you do, don't tap on the link!' The spyware software so far only affects phones running Google's Android operating system, such as Samsung phones, owned by an estimated 10.3 million Australians. The 8.3 million iPhone users in Australia have so far escaped the scam because of Apple's tighter security lockdowns on their phones. But for Android users, one click on those test messages could be a very expensive mistake. Thousands of Australians have been inundated with the annoying, badly spelt text messages (pictured) claiming you have a missed call, voicemail or notice from a service provider Dr David Lacey (pictured) from ID Care says his organisation has been receiving one complaint every hour from all across Australia by worried users hit by the scam HOW TO GET RID OF FLUBOT If you receive the message, don't click the link or call the number. If you have, there are three ways to get the malware off your phone because simply deleting it may not be enough, 1. Get an IT specialist to wipe your phone 2. Download an antivirus software program 3. Do a factory reset - but be warned this will also delete all your photos, files and apps. Advertisement 'It's particularly focused on harvesting your identity credentials and capturing your username and login for online banking,' Dr David Lacey of ID Care, a not-for-profit cyber support service, told Nine's A Current Affair. 'Get onto your bank straight away and change your passwords and look at other online accounts.' He said his organisation has been receiving one complaint every hour from all across Australia by worried users hit by the scam. The malware uses rootkit level coding to install surveillance software which can log every keystroke, such as passwords and logins, and send them back to fraudsters. It will also go through all your contacts and pass their details back too so they can be targeted next by the Flubot scam. Dr Lacey added: 'If you have clicked on the link the only remedy is basically doing a factory reset on your device.' A factory reset - or wipe - of a phone erases everything on it including all your contacts and photographs, and you can't then reinstall a back up because that will have been infected too. Melbourne tradie Les Kontos relies on his mobile phone for his business, including contact details of his former customers, but he's been bombarded by the scam texts over the past three weeks. 'One night at 10pm, then the next morning 7am, then one after lunch, it is constant,' he told the show. 'You're messing around with people's emotions, livelihood, the money that they've worked hard for... if I lose all that, then you start from scratch.' Tradie Les Kontos, from Melbourne, (pictured) relies on his mobile phone for his business so can't change the number - but has been inundated with the scam texts The ACCC says people have already contacted them after losing thousands in the scam but that could just be the tip of the iceberg. Scamwatch is now receiving up to 500 Flubot reports a day, after it first appeared on August 4. 'This is all done by organised crime. It is big business around the world,' added Ms Rickard. 'I cannot think of any time I've ever seen that many complaints on one scam in such a short period of time. 'It's a very sophisticated scam and potentially very dangerous. It can compromise people's bank accounts. 'Ignore them, hit delete and whatever you do, don't tap on the link.' FluBot text messages have already been detected across Europe including in in the UK, Spain, Germany, and Poland. The UK's National Cyber Security Centre has told users to factory reset their devices if they accidentally download the malicious apps as the software cannot survive the phone's data being cleared. In Australia, one user shared a message about the scams she received from Telstra, who told her the texts were being sent at random to Australian phone numbers. 'As they're coming from legit devices across the globe they're more difficult to block than some other scams,' the message from a Telstra representative read. 'They're hard to block as they're coming from legitimate handsets and devices all over the world. 'Most popular anti-virus apps for Android will clean it up.' Daily Mail Australia has contacted Telstra for further comment. Mark McGowan's hardline stance on Covid border restrictions could see the state lose its flagship Perth to the UK direct flight route, as former colleagues reveal his less-than-flattering nickname - Sneakers. Qantas said it is considering shifting its non-stop Australia-London flights to Darwin from the existing Perth hub because of 'conservative border policies in Western Australia'. The Western Australia Premier, who has kept borders shut with most other states to prevent virus cases leaking in, was left fuming at the announcement made by Qantas CEO Alan Joyce. Qantas has said flights between Australia and the UK could be moved to Darwin instead of Perth because of WA's strict Covid border closures WA has remain largely Covid-free in 2021 but has also been cut-off from the rest of the country (pictured, people walking in Perth in June during a four-day lockdown) 'As a state, we funded the Perth to London flights, we put in place $15million worth of improvements at the terminal,' Mr McGowan said. He added WA's economy - which boomed through 2020 despite the Covid pandemic courtesy of a strong mining industry - was helping to prop up the rest of the country including taxpayer funds which have kept the airline afloat. 'They need to show some understanding and perhaps some gratitude for what the state government has done.' Mr McGowan earlier this month recommitted to border closures and lockdowns even when 80 per cent of the population is vaccination - doubling down on the zero-Covid strategy which has fueled his popularity. Former Labor MPs said McGowan's demeanor had changed to be more confident in recent years (pictured in Perth this month) Famously parochial locals on the west coast have lapped up the premier's willingness to stand up to his counterparts on the east coast by imposing the strictest and lengthiest border closures in the country. A move which has made him a household name across the country in a way no previous west coast premiers have managed. He was voted back in by a landslide majority at the state's election in March this year. McGowan early in his political career (pictured with former PM Gough Whitlam) But the no-nonsense attitude and charisma of the last 18 months are a relatively new side to the 54-year-old former Navy lawyer. An old Labor colleague of two decades revealed to The Australian this week that Mr McGowan's early manner was worlds away from the authoritative persona he emits now. 'Before, he was a bit of a nervous Nellie, but he has changed his demeanour. He is confident, he is willing to take people on, he is not cue-carded like most of the party is,' former MP Mick Murray said. He was also regarded as a brown-noser and was so disliked within the Labor party early in his political career that he was given the nickname Mark 'sneakers' McGowan because that was the only part of him still visible, so the story goes. Mr McGowan (pictured) grew up and went to primary school in NSW before he relocated first to Queensland for university and then to WA to working for the Navy While Mr McGowan may be a hero at home - as long as locals have no desire to travel east or overseas - his Covid-free platform may inevitably crumble at some point unless he wants WA to remain isolated from the world. And with it so could his popularity, which in the world of politics can swiftly turn. Just ask NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian, who went from leading the 'gold-standard' example of how a state can remain open in the Covid pandemic to being held responsible for a crippling extended Sydney lockdown in a matter of weeks. 'What he does next that is the difficult thing,' Mr Murray explains. '[The Labor Party] haven't been exposed to any great degree, so if he makes a mistake, he is in the s**t.' Advertisement Incredible satellite images show the extent of raging Caldor wildfire as new blaze near Los Angeles gives rise to fears that Southern California faces same threat. The fire in San Bernardino County started on Wednesday afternoon and quickly burned several hundred acres, as well as damaging or destroying at least a dozen homes and outbuildings in the foothills northeast of LA, fire officials said. A color infrared satellite image of smoke billowing from the blaze shows the extent of the heat as an air tanker flies past, east of Sacramento. Incredible satellite images show the extent of raging Caldor wildfire as new blaze near Los Angeles gives rise to fears that Southern California faces same threat A color infrared satellite image of smoke billowing from the blaze shows the extent of the heat as an air tanker flies past, east of Sacramento Despite the firefighters getting the blaze under control, the southern region was expected to see a return of hot weather heading into the weekend Crews used shovels and bulldozers and mounted an air attack to keep the South Fire from the tiny communities of Lytle Creek and Scotland near the Cajon Pass. Some 600 homes and other buildings were threatened along with power transmission lines, and 1,000 residents were under evacuation orders. Firefighters appeared to have gained the upper hand and few flames were to be seen later that evening. But the blaze was worrying because Southern California's high fire season is typically later in the year when strong, dry Santa Ana winds blast out of the interior and flow toward the coast. After a few cooler days, the southern region was expected to see a return of hot weather heading into the weekend. In addition to dangerously dry conditions, the region is faced with firefighting staffing that is increasingly stretched thin, said Lyn Sieliet, spokeswoman for the San Bernardino National Forest. The fire in San Bernardino County started on Wednesday afternoon and quickly burned several hundred acres, as well as damaging or destroying at least a dozen homes and outbuildings in the foothills northeast of LA, fire officials said Crews used shovels and bulldozers and mounted an air attack to keep the South Fire from the tiny communities of Lytle Creek and Scotland near the Cajon Pass 'Some of our firefighters that we normally have on our forests are working on fires in Northern California, or Idaho and Washington,' she said. 'We don't have the full staff that we normally do.' The largest fires in the state and in the nation were in Northern California, where they have burned down small mountain towns and destroyed huge swaths of tinder-dry forest. The Caldor Fire destroyed some 500 homes since August 14 in the Sierra Nevada southwest of Lake Tahoe, including much of the tiny hamlet of Grizzly Flats. It was 12% contained and threatened more than 17,000 structures. Buck Minitch, a firefighter with the Pioneer Fire Protection District, was called to the fire lines last week while his wife fled their Grizzly Flats home with their two daughters, three dogs, a kitten and duffel bag of clothes. The blaze was worrying because Southern California's high fire season is typically later in the year when strong, dry Santa Ana winds blast out of the interior and flow toward the coast In addition to dangerously dry conditions, the region is faced with firefighting staffing that is increasingly stretched thin as they're tackling blazes elsewhere Hannah Minitch evacuated to her parents' property and the next morning received a text from her husband showing only a chimney where their house once stood. The two briefly wept together during a telephone call before he got back to work. 'We've got nothing left here,'' she recalled him saying. 'I've got to go protect what's left for other people.' The wind-driven fire was burning 1,000 acres of land per hour and on Wednesday it was less than two dozen miles from Lake Tahoe, an alpine vacation and tourist spot that straddles the California-Nevada state line. There weren't any evacuations in Tahoe but the fire continued to cast a yellow haze of smoke over the scenic region. South Lake Tahoe and Tahoe City on the west shore had the nation's worst air pollution at midmorning Wednesday, according to AirNow, a partnership of federal, state and local air agencies. Firefighters try to extinguish the flames at a burning house as the South Fire burns in Lytle creek in San Bernardino County on Wednesday The fire burns near power lines as the sky fills with smoke. The South Coast Air Quality Management District issued an advisory through Thursday morning for large portions of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties In Lytle creek, one house was destroyed by the fire and flames were still visible amongst the wreckage Meanwhile, California's Dixie Fire, the second-largest in state history at 1,160 square miles (3,004 square kilometers), was burning only about 65 miles (104 kilometers) to the north. It was 45% contained. Some 700 homes were among nearly 1,300 buildings that have been destroyed. In the southern Sierra Nevada, there was growing concern as the French Fire expanded near Lake Isabella, a popular fishing and boating destination. About 10 communities were under evacuation orders. The fire has blackened 32 square miles (83 square kilometers) since Aug. 18. Smoke from the fires had fouled air farther south. The South Coast Air Quality Management District issued an advisory through Thursday morning for large portions of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties. Nationally, 92 large fires were burning in 13 mainly Western states, according to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho. Climate change has made the West warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make the weather more extreme and wildfires more destructive, according to scientists. A man was given the shock of his life after he stumbled across a 14ft boa constrictor at a park near Glasgow. Jack Carson, 22, had been walking through a park towards Drumry train station in Clydebank, West Dunbartonshire, when he spotted the giant snake lying on the grass on August 25. The offshore worker, who initially thought the reptile was a tree branch, stayed at a safe distance but managed to capture the bizarre sighting on video. Jack Carson, 22, had been walking through a park towards Drumry train station in Clydebank, West Dunbartonshire, when he saw the 14ft boa constrictor During the clip, the snake remains motionless on the grass as Mr Carson says: 'I'm not tripping boys, that's a big snake. 'I'm in Drumry. Big massive snake mate.' Mr Carson said he later noticed a man, believed to be the snake's owner, laying on the grass enjoying a can of lager around 30-40ft away from the creature. He said: 'Me and my girlfriend were walking to Drumry train station and we seen the snake on the grass, thought I was obviously mistaken for a big branch or something but it was a huge snake. 'I went over but kept my distance and took a photo. There was a guy lying about 30-40ft away drinking a beer but no idea if he had anything to do with the snake. 'We didn't know for sure but I thought it was safe to assume at how casual the nearby man was it must have had something to do with him and nothing to be alarmed about. 'I was just assuming it had something to do with the casual guy sitting with a big can of beer since he was rather chilled out about the huge snake just cutting about.' The offshore worker is left stunned as he watches the reptile on the grass before saying: 'That's a big snake' Mr Carson, who has received more than 140,000 views after uploading the video, said he kept a safe distance away as he filmed the snake. Pictured: The park near Drumry train station where the snake was spotted He continued: 'In hindsight maybe we were a bit too casual. My girlfriend was terrified she wouldn't go any closer than the other side of the street from it. 'But I knew if I kept a bit of distance it was safe. We were a few minutes from getting our train so we had to leave pretty sharp!' Mr Carson has since received more than 140,000 views on social media from shocked viewers. One user wrote: 'Just going for a morning stroll.' While another person commented: 'When did you land in Australia mate?' Meanwhile another Twitter user joked: 'Nagini looking for Voldemort.' Italy could hold a referendum on legalising euthanasia as early as next year after a petition in favour received 750,000 signatures. In Italy, 500,000 signatures are required for any petition to force a referendum in the country. And with 250,000 more signatures than necessary, a vote could be held as early as next year on the campaign, which calls for changes to the country's assisted suicide law. In a statement from the Luca Coscioni Association on the petition, Roberto Saviano, a journalist and writer known for his investigations into the Neapolitan mafia, said: 'Today, without a law to regulate it, euthanasia isn't a right available to everyone. Italy could hold a referendum on legalising euthanasia as early as next year after a petition in favour received 750,000 signatures (stock image) 'I signed to give a free choice to those unable to travel to countries where euthanasia is legal.' Presently, anyone helping another person to kill themselves can be jailed for between five and 12 years under current Italian law. But the constitutional court added an exception in 2019 for 'patients kept alive by treatment... and affected by an incurable disease that causes physical and psychological suffering they find intolerable'. The patient must be 'fully capable of taking free and conscious decisions', the judges added. In Italy, 500,000 signatures are required for any petition to force a referendum in the country. And with 250,000 more signatures than necessary, a vote could be held as early as next year on the campaign. Pictured: The interior of the Italian Parliament People suffering from incurable diseases who do not fall into this category have no legal recourse to assisted suicide. Referendum backers say that if passed it will allow 'medical assistance to choose to die' for 'sick people who need help from someone else to end their own suffering'. However, challenging the petition, Mario Adinolfi, head of the small Christian political party Popolo della Famiglia (People of the Family) said the push was a 'marketing campaign' for a 'culture of death'. Sen. Ben Sasse didn't mince words in his criticism of the Biden administration's disjointed handling of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. 'Were gonna rely on the mercy and the good graces of these rapists?' the Nebraska Republican said on MSNBC's Morning Joe on Thursday. 'They're going to households and they're saying, "We have rights to every girl over 12. You ready to hand her over or do we have to fight you for her?"' Sasse continued. 'That's who these people are, and the administration says, "Trust us we have really good diplomatic relations."' 'The administration is filled with people right now who are just saying nonsense, thinking they'll be able to outlast the next 24 hours of a media cycle at home,' Sasse continued. 'They don't have a plan to say to our allies, the American troops on the ground and to say to the Americans who are trapped, many of them well beyond Kabul, to say to the Americans who are still in country, "You will not be left behind and the Taliban doesn't dictate any count down clock on your life or our moral obligation to keep our word."' Sasse spoke before a suicide bomb ripped through the swarms of people surrounding Hamid Karzai International Airport, killing at least 13, including children. There are reports of a second attack on the airport. ISIS-K is believed to be behind both attacks. 'Were gonna rely on the mercy and the good graces of these rapists?' the Nebraska Republican said on MSNBC's Morning Joe on Thursday 'The administration is filled with people right now who are just saying nonsense, thinking they'll be able to outlast the next 24 hours of a media cycle at home,' Sasse said of the Biden team The moderate senator tore into State Sec. Antony Blinken. 'Secretary Blinken says different things to different people. Repeatedly, his numbers don't add up and the only people he seems unwilling to blame is the Taliban.' The State Department was for days unwilling to say exactly how many Americans they had flown out of Afghanistan and how many were still waiting to be evacuated. On Wednesday, a State official said there were 4,100 Americans still awaiting rescue. Shortly after, an official said that the other official had 'misspoke.' Blinken then said the US had evacuated 4,500 Americans, was planning to evacuate another 500 and was trying to make contact with another 1,000 who may or may not want to leave. And just last week, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said there were 11,000 Americans who wanted to leave, while Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said there were between 5,000 and 10,000. 'Secretary Blinken says things that are partly good but they're undermined by things he says every day. He uses numbers that don't add up - are there 500 or 4,000 Americans left? Does it include passport holders only or green card holders also?' Sasse griped. Blinken said Wednesday his figure included US passport holders, not those with a green card. Tens of thousands of Afghans who assisted in the war effort have applied for special immigrant visas to come to the US, and while the US has promised not to leave them behind many have been blocked from getting to Kabul airport where the Taliban has formed a wall of checkpoints outside the perimeter. Afghans looking to flee have two options - head to the airport, where they have to risk being blown up as US officials warn an attack from ISIS-K could be imminent, and hope for a shot at an evacuation flight, or make a run for the Pakistan border which is now overrun with Afghans and nearly 200 miles away. Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport after a suicide bomber detonated an explosive outside the Baron Hotel, killing multiple people and injuring at least three US troops Scenes from the ground show injured Afghans being removed in wheelchairs. Left, a view of the explosion on Thursday Crowds of people wait outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Wednesday as the evacuation mission continues A US soldier places a 'gate closed' on one of the crowded entrances of Kabul airport as hundreds of desperate Afghans wait to board flights. The US is now working to evacuate everyone they can in the next 36 hours and will then withdraw - two days earlier than the Taliban's 31 deadline Overnight, 5,100 people were flown out of Kabul on US military planes. Another 8,300 were saved by coalition flights. The total - 13,400 - was drastically less than the 19,000 rescued in the previous 24 hours. After the Taliban announced 'consequences' for the US if it extended its troop presence beyond Aug. 31, Biden has said he will hold firm to that date. He said on Tuesday the US is on track to complete evacuations by then. 'What we really need is a commander-in-chief to declare to the Taliban there is no count down clock on American lives,' Sasse said. The senator also laid blame on President Trump, who signed a peace agreement with the Taliban promising the US withdrawal and the release of 5,000 prisoners. 'By the way, this bizarre view of the Taliban dates back to President Trump when they signed the deal in Doha February 2020, when he said he had a good call with the Taliban, they wanted to end the violence as much as he did.' A group representing dozens of House Republicans and Democrats issued a letter pleading with President Joe Biden to extend an August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops and allies from Afghanistan. The House Problem Solvers Causes made plain their concerns with the current trajectory in a letter to the president, which they issued before an explosion just outside the gates of the airport in Kabul. The group, which has 58 members, says the letter was backed by three-quarters of its members. 'As Democrats and Republicans, we stand united in our commitment to protecting U.S. citizens, diplomats, intelligence officers, and our foreign partners who are currently attempting to flee Afghanistan,' they wrote. Lawmakers from both parties are pushing President Joe Biden to extend a troop withdrawal deadline, as a reported 'suicide bomber' carried out an attack outside the airport in Kabul 'In this time of tremendous danger, politics must be put aside to advance our common goals,' they added. The letter said it was 'apparent' from the administration's latest briefing for lawmakers 'that the Administration's set date for departure from Afghanistan on August 31st does not provide enough time to evacuate all American citizens and our partners. We respectfully call on the Administration to reconsider its timeline and provide a clear plan to Congress that will result in the completion of our shared national objectives.,' they wrote. Reps. Anthony Gonzalez (R-Ohio) and Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) brought up the statement to a vote by the group. Members of the House Problem Solvers Caucus urged Biden to extend the August 31 deadline Two separate explosions have rocked Kabul with at least 13 casualties including children and three US soldiers among the wounded just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terror attack The administration had warned of the potential for terror attacks while Biden stands by the planned August 31 deadline. Americans have been warned to stay away from the airport The letter comes after another lawmakers, Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), a former high-level Pentagon official, said she raised concerns directly with President Biden. 'I raised my concerns with the August 31st deadline, the importance of ensuring that both Americans and Afghans who worked on our behalf be able to get through Taliban checkpoints up until the 31st, and my concerns about what happens in the days and months after we depart,' she tweeted after visiting the White House for a bill-signing Wednesday. 'We did not always agree, but the President clearly has Afghanistan at top of mind, and I appreciated the chance to express my thoughts on the way forward,' she wrote. The House Problem Solvers Caucus write Biden about the looming deadline A spokesman for Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-N.Y.) also said "frank conversation" with Biden. "The President and [Sherrill] had a frank conversation about their respective concerns on the issue and she appreciates the time he provided to listen to her views," said a spokesman for Sherrill, a former Navy helicopter pilot, Fox News reported. It was not immediately clear how the carnage outside the airport in Kabul after the explosion outside the airport would impact the push to extend the deadline. Biden and top administration officials cited the risk of a terror attack as a prime reason for sticking to the pullout deadline, despite the difficulty getting Americans and Afghanis applying for special visas out of the country. Former White House ethics chief Walter Shaub tore into Hunter Biden and his art deal which he said will 'tarnish' President Biden's legacy. 'I just think that's absolutely appalling,' Shaub said. The Obama-era ethics chief continued: 'If he were a patriotif he cared about this countryhe would not want to tarnish his father's reputation that way.' 'Now we can't fault him for not being a patriot. We can't fault him for not caring enough about his father's legacy to avoid this,' Shaub said on Law & Crime's 'Objections' podcast. 'Now we can't fault him for not being a patriot. We can't fault him for not caring enough about his father's legacy to avoid this,' he continued. 'That's a personal failing and he doesn't technically owe us anything because he's a citizen and not a government official, but then the White House crossed the line and they got involved in this deal and the art seller was theoretically always planning to keep the names secret, but the White House intervened to ask him to keep the names secret.' 'I just think that's absolutely appalling,' Walter Shaub, Obama-era ethics chief said The gallery's website praises Hunter's art as 'powerful and impactful' Hunter's New York exhibition will be at the Georges Berges Gallery in New York's trendy SoHo neighborhood Hunter's works will reportedly be sold at prices ranging from $75,000 to $500,000 for larger pieces. Ethics concerns over whether prospective buyers would pay half a million just to gain access to the White House have plagued the 51-year-old recovering drug addict's artistic debut. In response the White House has set guidelines that mandate Hunter and members of his father's administration will have no idea who is buying the works and for how much. 'There is simply no way an artist who has never even juried into a community center art fair is going to suddenly show up in New York selling art for half a million a pop,' Shaub said. 'Let's talk about the magnitude of this...That's $6.5 million going to the president's son for being the president's son, not for being an artist and I just think that's absolutely appalling.' Shaub said that Hunter Biden's 'career choices' have showed that he 'clearly endeavored to make money off his dad being a politician.' In fact, the younger Biden's career choices were at the heart of President Trump's first impeachment, when Hunter sat on the board of Ukrainian natural gas firm Burisma, where he was paid $50,000 a month for his expertise, though he had no experience in energy. Shaub said the president's recovering drug addict son is a 'sympathetic character' who 'we can feel bad for on many levels' but 'some of his problems are of his own making, in that he has always built his career around being Joe Biden's son.' George Berges Gallery plans to exhibit Hunter Bidens works in Los Angeles next month and New York City in October. Speaking to art podcast Nota Bene at the end of July, Hunter modestly said he would 'be amazed if my art had sold for $10.' Berges said Hunter's works have a 'profound energy' to justify the thousands of dollars he's looking to charge for them Shaub is an avid critic of the Trump children, too, for exploiting their surname, calling their violations under Trump's presidency far, far worse.' But he said the Biden family has done nothing to usher in an 'ethical Renaissance' in Washington. When people think Im blowing the Hunter Biden thing out of proportion, what theyre missing is that this is all part of a larger concern. And it isnt really about Hunter Biden. Its about the failure to understand that we need an ethical Renaissance in government, or were going to find ourselves in an even worse place than we did for the last four years, he said. Ghislaine Maxwell tried to 'barricade' herself in the video conference room in prison with a cart of legal documents, prosecutors have claimed. Jeffrey Epstein's alleged madam created a 'security threat' by blocking the door and preventing guards from accessing the room. Maxwell was banned from bringing the cart in and was forced to carry materials from her cell to the conference room. The row is the latest dispute over Maxwell's conditions in the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn, New York. The British socialite has been there since last July when she was arrested for allegedly recruiting children for Epstein to abuse. Prosecutors have claimed that Ghislaine Maxwell tried to 'barricade' herself in the video conference room in prison with a cart of legal documents They claim that Maxwell created a 'security threat' by blocking the door and preventing guards from accessing the room at the Metropolitan Detention Center, (MDC) in Brooklyn There have been disputes about her cell not being clean, allegations she doesn't flush her toilet and Maxwell filed a picture of herself with a black eye to suggest she had been beaten up. In a letter to federal court in New York, prosecutors said that Maxwell had been able in the past to bring a 'cart full of legal materials' into the video conference room, or VTC. The British socialite has been there since last July when she was arrested for allegedly recruiting children for late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein to abuse They wrote: 'However, the defendant used that cart to barricade the door to the VTC room, thereby preventing MDC staff from being able to access the room. 'Because of the security threat posed by the use of the cart to barricade the door to the VTC room, the defendant is no longer permitted to bring the cart into the room. 'Instead, the defendant may bring whatever materials she can carry into the room, and if she needs other materials during a particular meeting with counsel, she may leave the VTC room, retrieve those materials by hand, and then return to her meeting with counsel'. The letter was in response to complaints from Maxwell's lawyers that her access to video conferences had been disrupted. Her attorneys claimed that her screen went 'in and out, and her screen often turned green and became blurry'. During one call somebody other than Maxwell appeared on the screen, suggesting it was insecure. In response prosecutors said that after the incident the MDC switched to another form of video conferencing which was more secure. Maxwell lawyer Bobbi Sternheim said Maxwell 'never' tried to block her door with the cart and stop the guards getting in. She wrote in a letter that prosecutors 'cannot resist the opportunity to gratuitously cast Ghislaine Maxwell in a negative light while it defends the Metropolitan Detention Center at all costs'. In a letter to federal court in New York, prosecutors said that Maxwell had been able in the past to bring a 'cart full of legal materials' into the video conference room, or VTC. They wrote: 'However, the defendant used that cart to barricade the door to the VTC room, thereby preventing MDC staff from being able to access the room' In a ruling Judge Alison Nathan said that after hearing from both sides she 'remains confident that Ms. Maxwell is fully able to communicate with her defense counsel and to prepare for trial'. Ever since Maxwell was put in the MDC her lawyers have griped about almost every aspect of her confinement. They complained that she is being woken up every 15 minutes for searches and is forced to sleep with the lights on in her cell. Prosecutors said in their letter that the checks have to be done so regularly to ensure Maxwell's safety. Maxwell's lawyers filed a picture of her with a black eye which they said had no explanation even though she was under 24/7 camera surveillance. They claimed it could be 'related to the need for Ms. Maxwell to shield her eyes from the lights projected into her cell throughout the night' Maxwell's lawyers asked for an eye mask but were denied by Judge Nathan because eye masks are considered contraband items in the MDC. Another letter by prosecutors ticked off Maxwell for failing to flush her toilet after using it. Staff at the MDC said that Maxwell 'frequently did not flush her toilet after using it, which caused the cell to smell', prosecutors said. Maxwell's lawyer Bobbi Sternheim said Maxwell 'never' tried to block her door with the cart and stop the guards getting in. Sternheim said prosecutors 'cannot resist the opportunity to gratuitously cast Maxwell in a negative light while it defends the [prison] at all costs' Maxwell let her cell become 'very dirty' and guards told her to clean it and the toilet because it was insanitary, it was claimed, an allegation Maxwell disputed. Attorneys for Maxwell have also complained that the food she is given melts into the packaging when it is put in the microwave or stays frozen in the middle. Another problem has been that the water is 'odorous and non-palatable' and so 'clouded with heavy particulates' that it went brown. Sternheim said in one filing that Maxwell was 'withering to a shell of her former self' and losing weight because of the harsh treatment including being 'physically abused' by the guards during a pat down search. Judge Nathan has almost always universally dismissed Maxwell's claims and said she is satisfied that she is being treated like other inmates. Maxwell, 59, denies all charges and is due to go on trial in November. The risk of blood clots is 'much higher' in people who catch Covid compared to those who get a Covid jab, a major UK study has found. Britain, like several other countries in Europe, currently does not give the AstraZeneca vaccine to people under 40 after it was linked to clotting disorders in the spring. But the latest Oxford University study suggests the risk from clots is higher from the virus itself than the British-made vaccine. In the biggest study of its kind, researchers looked at the medical records of 29million people in England who had either tested positive or had a vaccine by April. Among those who caught Covid, 12,614 per 10million suffered blood clots in a vein who would not have otherwise developed the condition. Whereas the risk among those given the AstraZeneca vaccine was significantly lower at 66 per 10million. For Pfizer's vaccine which uses a different technology to AstraZeneca's jab the researchers did not spot any links between the jab and a clotting complication. The latest findings suggest that countries with scare resource that are still restricting use of AstraZeneca's vaccine should turn to the jab which has saved thousands of lives in the UK alone. Researchers at Oxford University found 68 cases of blood clots in the vein and 107 cases of low platelets per 10million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine that were dished out. But per 10million people who were infected with Covid, there was 934 cases of low platelet counts, 12,614 blood clots in the vein and 5,573 blood clots in the artery The risk of each side effect from varied depending on the number of days since a person was given a vaccine or caught Covid. But the side effects from Concerns about AstraZeneca's vaccine causing blood clots emerged in January and prompted EU nations to shun the jab. The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, the UK's medicines watchdog, subsequently recommended the jab should be only given to over-40s. The finding comes as a coroner concluded today that BBC radio presenter Lisa Shaw, 44, died in May just three weeks after her first jab from 'a rare and aggressive complication associated with the AstraZeneca vaccine'. In the latest study, which was published today in the British Medical Journal, researchers at the University of Oxford studied data from the 29.1million people in England who had received one dose of the AstraZeneca or Pfizer jab by April 24. Children aged 12 to 15 typically suffer mild to moderate side-effects from the Pfizer Covid jab and they clear up quickly, a study suggests Researchers from the Bristol Royal Hospital for Children asked parents to closely monitor the reaction to the vaccine among 27 kids. Adverse reactions were either mild or moderate, except in one recipient who had severe fatigue, discomfort and increased agitation. Currently, children aged 12 to 15 who are clinically vulnerable or live with adults who are at increased risk from the virus are eligible for a vaccine. There have been calls from some quarters to extend the rollout to all healthy 12 to 15-year-olds, especially as the return of schools is expected to lead to a rise in infections. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) has not advised ministers to widen the rollout to this age group. But the NHS in England is making preparations that will enable it to proceed if there is a decision to do so. All of the participants in the study were children with severe neurodisabilities who tend to get recurrent respiratory infections and spend time in residential care. One family reported a change in seizure type but this had been resolved a week after the vaccine. Effects in six of the children after a first dose included a mild rash, headache, diarrhoea, presumed sore throat, neck pain, difficulty sleeping and low blood sugars. But all of these had gone away within 72 hours, according to the study, which is due to be published in the Archives of Disease in Childhood. Five of the children had effects including diarrhoea, vomiting, armpit swelling and blisters around the mouth after the second dose. Fever was more common than in adult studies, with 13 per cent of the children having a temperature greater than 38C compared with 4 per cent in people aged between 16 and 55. Other recorded adverse events all resolved within a week, the study noted. The researchers said: Numbers were small but these data are especially important as they are representative of the children who are most likely to benefit from vaccination and parents and clinicians may have concerns regarding an increased risk of unexpected events. Other experts have previously warned of an increased risk of heart inflammation among younger people given the jab. Advertisement In the first four months of the rollout, some 19.6million people received the Oxford vaccine and 9.5million had Pfizer, while there were 1.7million confirmed Covid cases. The researchers who were not part of the team of Oxford researchers who developed the AstraZeneca jab looked hospital admissions and deaths due to low platelets, blood clots in the vein and blood clots in an artery within 28 days of having either vaccines. The team estimated that for every 10million people vaccinated with the first dose of AstraZeneca, there would be 107 additional cases of cases of low platelets in the eight to 14 days after being jabbed. But per 10million people who caught the coronavirus, there would by 934 cases of low platelets and the risk stayed high for the entire 28-day period the researchers examined. The experts found no links between low platelets and the Pfizer vaccine. Platelets are small and sticky blood cells that prevent bruising and stop bleeding after injury. But if a person does not have enough a condition that is called thrombocytopenia they can bruise easily and suffer from bleeding gums or internal bleeding. Professor Aziz Sheikh, one of those involved in the study, said the increased risk of thrombocytopenia seen in in relation to the AstraZeneca jab is similar to other commonly used vaccines in the UK, such as the flu jab. For blood clotting in a vein, the study estimated 66 excess events per 10million people vaccinated with AstraZeneca, compared with around 12,614 excess events per 10million in those with Covid. There were no associations with blood clots in an artery for either vaccine, but there were some 5,000 excess events per 10million people infected with Covid, they said. Additionally, the researchers found a increased risk of stroke among those who received a dose of Pfizer, with an estimate 143 cases of ischaemic stroke per 10million people who received that vaccine. But this risk was only present 15 to 21 days after vaccination. Meanwhile, the risk of a stroke was more than 10 times greater in those with the virus 1,699 cases per 10million people who had Covid and lasted for 28 days after the infection. The researchers saw no link between the AstraZeneca jab and higher risk of strokes. And there as an increased risk of cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST) among AstraZeneca recipient, with seven additional cases per 10million. But there were 20 more cases of stroke per 10million Covid infections. CVST is a clot in a major vessel behind the eye socket that carries blood away from the brain. Professor Julia Hippisley-Cox, an expert in clinical epidemiology and general practice at the University of Oxford and lead author of the paper, said the increased risks they detected were only for a short time after vaccines, compared to a longer period if infected with the virus. She said people should be aware of the increased risks after Covid vaccination and seek medical help if required. But they should be aware that the risks are 'considerably higher and over longer periods of time if they become infected with SARS-CoV-2', she said. Professor Hippisley-Cox added: 'There's always some unanticipated effects with any medicine and I think that this study design is the most robust way of looking at detecting these events and putting them in some context. Researchers found that a first dose of the AstraZeneca and Pfizer vaccines slightly increased the risk of developing blood clots or having a low platelet count. But catching the virus increased the risk significantly more 'This research is important as many other studies, while useful, have been limited by small numbers and potential biases. 'Electronic healthcare records, which contain detailed recording of vaccinations, infections, outcomes and confounders, have provided us with a rich source of data with which to perform a robust evaluation of these vaccines, and compare to risks associated with Covid infection.' Dr Peter English, a communicable disease expert, said it is well-known that Covid and other infections, such as influenza, can lead to clotting disorders and consequently heart attacks and strokes. 'This paper shows clearly that you are far more likely to suffer these adverse events (which are very rare following vaccination) if you get Covid,' he said. Covid infection rates in the UK are currently 'very high' and the dominant Delta variant is 'extremely infectious', so unvaccinated people are 'very likely' to catch the virus, Dr English said. The final calculation to be made is the different risks associated with each vaccine, he said. Dr English added: 'The rarity of these adverse events makes it difficult to quantify precisely their frequency after specific vaccines. 'As we accumulate more data, we will become more confident in our comparisons; and it may be that this will enable us to identify which vaccines if any are to be preferred in different categories such as age and sex of recipient with increased confidence.' pleaded not guilty to charges of scheming to defraud, grand larceny, criminal possession of a forged instrument, forgery and criminal simulation pleaded not guilty to charges of scheming to defraud, grand larceny, criminal possession of a forged instrument, forgery and criminal simulation the biggest seller of fake artifacts in the country Prosecutors say that, based on the number of years he ran his business, it's possible he may have been the biggest seller of fake artifacts in the country Prosecutors say that, based on the number of years he ran his business, it's possible he may have been the biggest seller of fake artifacts in the country Prosecutors say that, based on the number of years he ran his business, it's possible he may have been the biggest seller of fake artifacts in the country Investigators also found the tools that Sadigh used to age the phony antiques using varnish, sanders and spray paint Investigators also found the tools that Sadigh used to age the phony antiques using varnish, sanders and spray paint Investigators also found the tools that Sadigh used to age the phony antiques using varnish, sanders and spray paint After the sales, members of the DA's office and Homeland Security Investigations visited the gallery and found hundreds of fake artifacts displayed After the sales, members of the DA's office and Homeland Security Investigations visited the gallery and found hundreds of fake artifacts displayed After the sales, members of the DA's office and Homeland Security Investigations visited the gallery and found hundreds of fake artifacts displayed deral investigators a gold pendant depicting the death mask of Tutankhamun and a marble portrait head of an ancient Roman woman for $4,000 each two undercover fe deral investigators a gold pendant depicting the death mask of Tutankhamun and a marble portrait head of an ancient Roman woman for $4,000 each Sadigh sold two undercover fe deral investigators a gold pendant depicting the death mask of Tutankhamun and a marble portrait head of an ancient Roman woman for $4,000 each Prosecutors allege that for decades Sadigh passed off the fake artifacts as ancient relics to unsuspecting customers Prosecutors say Mehrdad Sadigh, a New York antiquities dealer who ran Sadigh Gallery created thousands of phony antiques in the back offices of his showroom Advertisement A New York City art dealer was busted, accused of forging thousands of antiquities and selling them in his Manhattan gallery for decades. Prosecutors say Mehrdad Sadigh, a New York antiquities dealer who ran Sadigh Gallery created phony antiques in the back offices of his Fifth Avenue showroom. Prosecutors allege that for decades Sadigh would then pass off the fake artifacts as ancient relics to unsuspecting customers who believed they were adding rare treasures to their collections. 'For many years, this fake antiquities mill based in midtown Manhattan promised customers rare treasures from the ancient world and instead sold them pieces manufactured on-site in cookie-cutter fashion,' Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance Jr., said in a statement. Prosecutors allege that for decades Sadigh passed off the fake artifacts as ancient relics to unsuspecting customers Prosecutors say Sadigh stored and manufactured fake items in rooms behind the gallery, which was located on an upper floor of a building on Fifth Avenue Prosecutors seized thousands of fake artifacts stored in the backroom on Sadigh's Manhattan gallery Prosecutors allege that for decades Sadigh passed off the fake artifacts as ancient relics to unsuspecting customers, who believed they were adding rare treasures to their collections Prosecutors said that, based on the number of years he ran his business, the quantity of items seized from his gallery and Sadigh's 'substantial financial gains', it's possible he may have been the biggest seller of fake artifacts in the U.S. Sadigh pleaded not guilty earlier this month. Prosecutors discovered Sadigh while investigating dealers selling stolen antiquities who asked why they were ignoring 'the guy selling all the fakes', Matthews Bogdanos, the head of the DA's Antiquities Trafficking Unit, told the New York Times. Sadigh sold two undercover federal investigators a gold pendant depicting the death mask of Tutankhamun and a marble portrait head of an ancient Roman woman for $4,000 each, leading to his arrest, prosecutors said. After the sales, members of the DA's office and Homeland Security Investigations visited the gallery, and found hundreds of fake items displayed on shelves and inside glass cases. Thousands more were discovered in rooms behind the gallery. Members of the DA's office and Homeland Security Investigations visited the gallery and found thousands more were discovered in rooms behind the gallery Prosecutors said they found thousands of objects in the back rooms of the gallery that were treated to make them seem ancient Investigators also found the tools Sadigh used to age the phony antiques using including varnish, sanders, spray paint and mud-like substances. Sadigh was arrested and pleaded not guilty August 6 to charges of scheming to defraud, grand larceny, criminal possession of a forged instrument, forgery and criminal simulation. He was released on his own recognizance and is due in court in October. The Times reported that in late 2020 and early 2021, his gallery's site listed a mummified falcon dated 305-30 BC for $9,000, an Egyptian sarcophagus mask carved from wood dated 663-525 BC for $5,000, and an iron and nickel fragment from a meteorite that landed in Mongolia for $1,500. The authenticity of Sadigh's artifacts was called into question prior to the investigation in 2019. The Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum in Iowa canceled a planned visiting exhibition after Bjorn Anderson, an art history professor at the University of Iowa, said 'the majority' of its items once sold by the Sadigh gallery appeared to be fakes, the Times reported. 'I don't know anything about this,' Sadigh told The West Branch Times in response to cancellation at the time. The US Ambassador to Afghanistan said getting to the airport in Kabul is 'safe' in a Thursday interview, barely two hours before two explosions reportedly killed at least 13 people and injured three members of the US military, likely among others. Among those killed are 11 US marines and a Navy medic. As many as 60 people were killed in the airport blast, and children were among those crowding the area. But around 8 a.m. Eastern on Thursday morning Ross Wilson, the chief diplomat in Kabul, told Good Morning America that it was still possible to get to Hamid Karzai International Airport safely. 'There are safe ways to get here, there are safe ways - relatively safe ways to access the airport, and we're doing everything we can to facilitate that,' Wilson said. Ross Wilson, who's headed the Kabul embassy since January 2020, said there are still 'safe' ways to get to the airport but Americans should avoid the crowds around checkpoints ICYMI: Ross Wilson, top diplomat in #Afghanistan, just told Good Morning America, "There are safe ways to get here. There are...relatively safe ways to access the airport." How does that square with State warning Americans not to come to the airport?? This is an absolute mess. pic.twitter.com/yk28AcOEdH John Cooper (@thejcoop) August 26, 2021 Before that he told CBS Evening News that 'people chose not to leave, that's their business.' 'Never in my 40 years of working at the State Department have I seen such strong language used. People chose not to leave. That's their business, that's their right,' he said. 'We regret now that many may find themselves in a position they would rather not be in and we are determined to try and help them.' But even before the blasts, the State Department sent a dire warning urging Americans at parts of the airport to leave immediately late Wednesday. The department asked other to avoid traveling to the airport 'unless you receive instructions to do so.' One of the cautioned areas was the Abbey Gate where the airport blast occurred. Kirby confirmed both blasts on Twitter. 'We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update,' Kirby wrote. Before the explosions Wilson said the statement was based on 'credible, imminent, compelling' threats. However Wilson added that there are Americans the government is working with on an 'individualized basis' to advise people 'exactly where to go' and how to do it safely. 'For American citizens in particular, we are working other ways on an individualized basis to assist in getting to the airport in a safe and secure manner. Being part of these huge crowds that remain around the gates and entrances to the airport is dangerous,' Wilson said. Smoke billows from the airport area after a blast outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport Scenes of chaos after two separate explosions rocked Kabul on Thursday Thousands of desperate Afghan civilians and foreign nationals have been crowding the airport for days to escape the Taliban before Joe Biden's August 31 withdrawal deadline Medical and hospital staff bring an injured man on a stretcher for treatment after two powerful explosions Thursday morning the State Department also confirmed 'reports of gunfire' at the airport and reiterated its warning for US citizens to leave immediately. Wilson was appointed to head the Kabul embassy by Donald Trump in January 2020, shortly after the former president negotiated a peace deal with the Taliban to drawdown all US troops by May 1. He has not released any statements following his ABC interview but retweeted the State Department's most recent warning. Biden had extended the deadline to August 31, despite pleas from fellow heads of state and lawmakers at home to scrap it. The Taliban also threatened retaliation if western allies didn't leave by that date. But the recent warnings have come amid concern over an ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan. The Taliban, whose fighters are guarding the perimeter outside the airport, are enemies of the Afghan affiliate of Islamic State, known as Islamic State Khorasan (ISIS-K), after an old name for the region. 'Our guards are also risking their lives at Kabul airport, they face a threat too from the Islamic State group,' said a Taliban official, who spoke on condition of anonymity and before the reports of the explosion. Before the explosion, dozens of Afghans are seen here trying to reach foreign forces behind the Taliban-controlled airport checkpoints Afghans hold documents as they struggle to reach the foreign forces to show their credentials to flee the country ISIS-K has claimed a series of suicide attacks in cities such as Kabul, where as well as government and civilian institutions, it particularly attacked targets associated with the Shi'ite religious minority. President Joe Biden has been briefed on the explosion, according to a White House official. Biden was in a meeting with security officials about the situation in Afghanistan when the explosion was first reported, according to a person familiar with the matter. Approximately 13,400 people were evacuated from Kabul within a 24-hour window ending August 26 at 3 a.m. Eastern. Since August 14, 95,700 people - mostly Afghans - were flown from the airport to intermediate staging areas before going on to the US. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 American citizens could still be in Afghanistan. South Dakota's attorney general will have to pay less than $5,000 in fines and was spared jail for running over and killing a pedestrian he says he thought was a deer, a judge ruled Thursday. Jason Ravnsborg pleaded no contest to two misdemeanor traffic charges of using a mobile phone while driving and failing to stay in his lane the night he killed Joseph Boever, 55, last September. The attorney general was not present during sentencing, frustrating Boever's family. 'Why, after having to wait nearly a year, do we not have the chance to face him?' Jane Boever, the victim's sister, told the judge. 'His cowardly behavior leaves us frustrated.' On top of his $500 fines, the attorney general must participate in an annual public service event for the next years around the anniversary of Boever's death The family of Joseph Boever, pictured with his wife Jenny, say the sentence handed down to the person who killed them makes them angry Stanley County Courthouse Judge John Brown ordered the first-term attorney general to pay $500 fines for each of the two charges and pay $3,742.38 in restitution. The maximum sentence for was up to 30 days in jail and a $500 fine on each charge. Prosecutors dropped a third careless driving charge as part of the plea deal. Jane Boever said that although her family waited a long time for justice, they never got it. 'As you can imagine this ordeal has been deeply upsetting for us,' she said in a statement released to Mailonline.com. '349 days ago, our brother and son Joe was struck and killed by Ravnsborg. We waited 349 days to face his killer. But Ravnsborg didnt have the courage to appear in court today. We waited 349 days for this nightmare to be over, to find closure. 'But Ravnsborg is walking away with a slap on the wrist, minimal fines, no jail time.' The Republican was also ordered to participate in an annual public service event around the anniversary of Boevers death for the next five years. However, the judge denied a request, made by the victims family, to have Ravnsborg pay for the victims funeral expenses. Brown said Boevers life insurance police would have covered those costs. Unfortunately, the outcome here was tragic, Brown told the court. It was unnecessary, and certainly not what anyone - including the defendant -would have wanted to happen. Ravnsborg claimed at the time that he thought he had struck a deer, and only the next morning realized he killed a man I understand the outcome here leaves a lot of questions unanswered. No resolve her is going to satisfy everyone, or perhaps anyone. Ravnsborg initially told authorities that he thought he had struck a deer or another large animal while he was driving home to Pierre from a Republican fundraiser on the evening of the crash. He claimed he had searched the unlit area with a cell phone flashlight and didnt realize he had killed a man until the next day when he returned to the scene on U.S. 14, near Highmore. He maintained this account even though investigators said the victims glasses flew into his car after the impact. Thursdays sentence sparked furor from the victims family, who said Ravnsborg has acted disgracefully throughout the entire process. 'It does make me angry,' Nick Nemec, Boever's cousin, told Mailonline.com 'Every step of the way, where (Ravnsborg) had the opportunity to act with honor, he chose to act with dishonor.' A person in a position of power in South Dakota dragged the victims family through a year of hell rather than step up and do the right thing, Nemec added. There is no justice. Well just have to go on with our lives. Hyde County Sheriff Mike Volek personally responded to Raynsborg's 911 call following the crash and told him car was too damaged to drive home After calling 911 to report the crash, Hyde County Sheriff Mike Volek personally responded to the scene to assess the damage and help search for what he hit. He said they searched the area around the vehicle with flashlights but neither of them spotted Boever lying in a ditch, according to previous report written by the attorney general. Since Ravnsborgs car was too damaged to drive and a tow truck would take more than an hour to arrive, Voltek offered to let the politician take his personal car back to Pierre. Nick Nemec the victim's cousin, says the sheriff who helped Raysnborg after the crash did not do his job properly I think he got preferential treatment from a lazy sheriff who didnt even bother to check the scene, Nemec said. There was no deer hair. That should have clued the sheriff if the sheriff in. If the sheriff had bothered to pull out a flashlight and check the scene of the crash, he would have seen a body. The morning after the crash, Ravnsborg and his chief of staff traveled to Highmore to return Voleks vehicle. The pair stopped at the crash site on the way, which was when they found Boevers body in the grass. In videos released by Gov. Kristi Noem this year, criminal investigators confronted Ravnsborg with gruesome details of the crash. His face was in your windshield, Jason, one investigator told him. Think about that.' Detectives told the attorney general that bone scrapings were found on the shoulders rumble strip, but Ravnsborg remained defiant. 'I never saw him, he told detectives. I never saw him. A toxicology report taken roughly 15 hours after the crash showed no alcohol in Ravnsborgs system, and people attending the fundraiser said he was not seen drinking alcohol. Ravnsborgs attorneys filed a motion last month alleging that Boever's alcoholism and prescription drug abuse led at least one family member, a cousin, to believe that a depressed Boever killed himself by jumping in front of Ravnsborgs car. Attorneys for Jenny Boever, the victim's widow, have said she plans to file a wrongful death lawsuit. Ravnsborg hasn't said whether he will seek a second term next year, but his predecessor, Marty Jackley, is running for his old job. Jackley served for 10 years in the post before losing the Republican primary for governor to Noem in 2018. The fatal crash has prompted some, including Noem, to call for the attorney generals impeachment. Gov. Kristi Noem, a fellow Republican, issued a statement in February, 'I believe the Attorney General should resign.' South Dakota House lawmakers began impeachment proceedings in February, but South Dakotas House of Representatives agreed in March to hold off on the proceedings until the court case reached its conclusion. A Nashville man, 28, has been charged with civil rights violations over a string of arson attacks on churches in 2019 after allegedly targeting the buildings because of 'religious character'. Alan Douglas Fox, 28, is facing up to 80 years in jail for the arsons, as well as a consecutive five-year sentence for carrying a firearm. Prosecutors say Fox admitted to setting fires at Crievewood United Methodist Church, Crievewood Baptist Church, Saint Ignatius of Antioch Catholic Church, and Priest Lake Community Baptist Church back in June 2019. He claimed to have intentionally set the fires due to the 'religious character of the churches,' according to the US Department of Justice. Alan Douglas Fox, 28, has been charged with civil rights violations for his alleged involvement in four 2019 church fires in Nashville. The FBI say he started the fires due to the 'religious character of the churches' The case was investigated by the FBI, Tennessee's Bureau of Investigations, the Metro Nashville Police Department, and the Nashville Fire Department. 'The Information alleges that Fox intentionally set the fires because of the religious character of the churches,' stated the DOJ. He allegedly broke in and started a fire in Crievewood United Methodist Church on June 17, 2019. Fox set four churches on fire over the course of a week. The big blaze left one of the churches with plenty of damages as fire climbed the wall near the backdoors of St. Ignatius Firefighters raced to stop the first at St. Ignatius of Antioch Catholic Church in Tennessee St. Ignatius of Antioch Catholic Church (pictured) was broken by someone throwing a rock a the glass doors just before midnight on June 25. Police suspected the fire started by Fox lighting the contents of a trashcan on fire A few days later, he allegedly broke into Crievewood Baptist Church by forcing open the back door around 9.30pm on June 25, 2019. Associate Pastor William Sensing told WZTV at the time that it appeared the arsonist had started a fire in one of the Sunday school rooms on the first floor. The Metro Nashville police reported at the time that Fox set fire to a cabinet full of paper in one of the classrooms located in the church. The fires started at Crievewood United Methodist Church on June 17 before Fox hit three churches over the course of one night between June 25 and 26. The Crievewood Baptist (pictured) fire started in one of their Sunday school rooms The religious community was left with plenty debris to clean up following the fire at the Baptist church after Fox lit a cabinet full of paper on fire A few hours later, the Metro Police received another call reporting someone had broken into St. Ignatius by throwing a rock at the glass doors. When police arrived, there was smoke in the building and they suspected he dragged a trash can in the gymnasium and set fire to its contents. Another fire was started at Priest Lake Community Baptist Church shortly after 1am on June 26. The Crievewood United Methodist Church (pictured) was the first church to be hit by Fox There was a small fire at Priest Lake Community Baptist Church (pictured) The door had been smashed in and Pastor Titus Augustine could see the man walking around the church through his home window. Cameras caught him stealing two flat-screen TVs and opening a locked door with a 'credit card' before he had started a small fire, according to the WKRN. Fox's public defender has been approached for comment. New images released Thursday capture two men approaching a crowd last month on a Queens street and firing about 40 shots, injuring 10 people before fleeing on mopeds, as New York City's violent summer of crime rages on. The shooters, who were in the North Corona neighborhood, targeted members of the Trinitarios gang, police said, but they opened fire near pedestrians outside a barbershop and at a birthday party in a restaurant. NYPD released new high-quality photos on Thursday showing two gunmen and their two accomplices on mopeds who are wanted by the police Eight men and two women, who range in age from 19 to 72, were all hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries from the Queens shooting July 31 The images show of a pair of gunmen and their two accomplices who helped them escape on mopeds the night of the shooting The gunmen were trailed by two men on mopeds, one of whom was wearing a charcoal-gray sweatshirt with an American flag emblazoned across the chest, as seen in the photos The other moped operator wore a red sweatshirt and covered his face with a black-and-white mask to shield his identity The victims ranged from ages 19 to 72, including a 72-year-old woman and a 70-year-old man, both of whom were shot in the leg, in addition to seven other men and another woman. All were hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries, according to police. Three of them were the intended targets, police said. The most seriously injured victim suffered a gunshot wound to the stomach, NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig said. 'The two males immediately extended their arms and began firing in the direction of a group in front of the barber shop down the street,' he said. 'This was, as I can most accurately describe it, a brazen, coordinated attack.' Three days after the July 31 shooting, the aunt of victim Sandra Lopez said her niece required surgery to remove the bullet lodged in her foot. 'She's very panicked, very shocked,' Lopez told the Daily News. 'She's diabetic, and her blood sugar went up ... She is very, very sick. Very difficult.' The shooting in her area has Lopez on edge. 'We were going to do something on Sunday but we couldn't after that. My little one goes to school right there. I'm scared sending a little autistic child now.' Police footage reveals the moment two men approached a crowd in a busy Queens neighborhood and opened fire, injuring 10 people The men were gang members targeting rivals from the Trinitarios gang during the shooting on a Saturday night in the borough's Corona neighborhood, police said Police and Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa are offering a combined $30,000 reward for information leading to an arrest Essig described what was caught in the surveillance footage as 'pretty disturbing.' 'There's just one common theme I want to get out there that's a recurring theme that keeps happening and it has to stop throughout the city. That's gang members, that's guns, multiple guns on the scene, scooters being used, masks and, lastly, unintended targets getting hit. This is unacceptable in our streets of NYC and it has to stop,' he said. Police said the two gunmen arrived at the scene on foot, but left by jumping on the backs of two mopeds driven by two other men. All four were wearing hooded sweatshirts and masks. It is unclear which gang was involved, if any, but police said they were clearly targeting three Trinitarios members on the street. Detectives suspect that the shooting was connected to a years-long feud between the Trinitarios and the Queens-based ABK (Always Banging Kings), according to the Daily News. It also may be linked to the July 18 murder of Aldair Melchor, 25, who was shot dead on 132nd St. and 32nd Ave. in Flushing by a gunman in a black car sources told the Daily News. Since then, two more shootings have been tied to the ongoing gang war, the sources said. Police say shots rang out in Corona near 99th Street and 37th Avenue around 11 pm The two unidentified gunmen opened fire while some bystanders were walking outside a barbershop and others gathered at a nearby restaurant for a birthday party NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig described the shooting as 'a brazen coordinated attack' Seven of the people shot were bystanders not affiliated with the feuding NYC gangs Silaw (pictured) looked at a vehicle that got hit by gunfire in Corona, Queens on Aug. 2 The Trinitarios gang formed on Ryker's Island jail in 1993 as a means of protecting Hispanic inmates from other gangs. Outside jail, the Trinitarios began in the Marcy Houses in Brooklyn before expanding throughout the city and Long Island. 'We need the community's help on this one,' said Chief of Patrol Juanita Holmes at the news conference. 'Someone's gonna see that video, they're gonna see those still photos, and they're gonna say, I know that clothing, or the video, I know their gait. I know so-and-so walks that way and that's why we're really appealing to the public. Our biggest asset is the public when it comes to solving crimes like this.' City Council Member Francisco Moya, who represents the district in which the shooting happened, said in a statement provided to CNN, 'The uptick in gun violence has been a reality of daily life in the outer boroughs and for communities of color. 'This is not just a Manhattan problem making headlines because we are concerned about scaring away tourists. We are trying to survive the COVID-19 pandemic and a gun violence pandemic.' The NYPD and Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa are offering a combined $30,000 reward for information leading to arrests. Police gave an update on the shooting at a news conference the following morning. Speaking above was Assistant Chief Galen Frierson, of the NYPD's Patrol Borough Queens North The most seriously injured victim suffered a gunshot wound to the stomach, NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig said NYPD have not made any arrest and are asking for the public's help gathering information New York City saw another violent night with seven additional shootings that left 18 people injured or killed in seven additional shootings the same night on July 31. Less than 30 minutes after the Corona shooting, three women were hit by crossfire when two groups exchanged gunshots in Inwood. The victims included a 78-year-old woman shot in the hand, a 58-year-old woman shot in the leg and a 42-year-old woman grazed in the left arm, the New York Daily News reported. Five other people were shot in separate incidents between 12am and 5am, two of whom died from their injuries. One was a 32-year-old man who was repeatedly shot in the torso while sitting in his car in Brooklyn at 4.30am. A second man, 26, was shot in the chest during an unrelated drive by shooting in Crown Heights and died at Kings County Hospital. As of that horrific night, 1,056 people were hit by gunfire in 898 incidents this year. That's a 12 percent jump from the 938 people shot in the same period last year, according to police data. The Gun Violence Archive noted the Queens mass shooting as one of five mass shootings that took place that night. Indiana, Illinois, Ohio and Kentucky also saw mass shootings where no deaths were reported, GVA reported the next day. NYPD's CompStat shows a slight increase in total crimes in July 2021 when compared to the same time period last year Robberies, grand larcenies and felony assaults are among the crimes that are spiking citywide A fake taxi driver lured an unsuspecting woman on a night out into his car then drove her around London before trying to sexually assault her, a court heard. Isaac Mabwa, 33 of Ealing, west London, kidnapped his 25-year-old victim as she was trying to get home in the capital in the early hours of the morning. Mabwa stopped his hired car and offered to give her a lift home as she walked along Euston Road in central London. She believed he was driving a genuine taxi or minicab, but shortly after getting in the woman realised it was not a genuine cab and Mabwa started driving her further away from her home in the opposite direction. During the journey of around an hour-and-a-half, the victim tried to get out of the car a series of times, but Mabwa stopped her from fleeing, Harrow Crown Court heard. Fake cab driver Isaac Mabwa, 33 of Ealing, west London, kidnapped his 25-year-old victim as she was trying to get home in the capital in the early hours of the morning She was able to text her boyfriend and a friend during the journey and sent a live location pin so they could keep track of her. Mabwa eventually pulled the car into an unlit car park and the woman began to scream. A member of the public heard the screams and called police as the victim struggled and managed to escape from the vehicle. Mabwa then left the car park and drove away before he was stopped by police not long after the attack. Although the attack took place in the early hours of May 8, 2017, detectives did not charge Mabwa until last April in what was described as a 'complex' investigation. Mabwa stopped his hired car and offered to give her a lift home as she walked along Euston Road (above) in central London. [File picture] At Harrow Crown Court on Tuesday, Mabwa was convicted of kidnap, false imprisonment and false imprisonment with intent to commit a sexual offence. He was found not guilty by a jury of sexual assault. Detective Chief Inspector Andy Brien, claimed: 'This case is an example of the tireless efforts made by our officers to bring offenders such as Isaac Mabwa, who commit violent offences against women and girls, to justice. At Harrow Crown Court, Mabwa was convicted of kidnap, false imprisonment and false imprisonment with intent to commit a sexual offence 'We encourage anyone who has been a victim of a sexual offence to come forward and speak to police. 'You will be supported by specially trained officers throughout the investigation and any subsequent legal proceedings.' Mabwa, from Ealing, west London, pleaded not guilty to all four charges at the beginning of his trial that started on August 16. After being convicted he was remanded in custody to appear for sentencing at a later date to be confirmed. A 'disturbed' criminal wanted over a double murder is fighting for his life in hospital after trying to take his own life when his barge hideaway was discovered. Lee Peacock, 49, was found after allegedly slicing his own throat' on a houseboat on the Grand Union Canal in Ealing, London, yesterday following a week-long manhunt. Peacock is wanted in connection with the murder of his girlfriend Sharon Pickles, 45, and 59-year-old Clinton Ashmore. Sex worker Ms Pickles and Mr Ashmore were found dead within hours of each other at separate flats in the Marylebone last Thursday night, having had their throats cut. Earlier this week, police released CCTV images of Peacock outside North Wembley tube station on the night of the murders in a bid to locate him. Peacock was found with serious 'self-inflicted injuries' last night around 10 miles from the murder scenes. A 'disturbed' criminal wanted over a double murder is fighting for his life in hospital after trying to take his own life when his barge hideaway (pictured) was discovered Lee Peacock (pictured), 49, was found after allegedly slicing his own throat' on a houseboat on the Grand Union Canal in Ealing, London, yesterday following a week-long manhunt Peacock is wanted in connection with the murder of his girlfriend Sharon Pickles (left), 45, and 59-year-old Clinton Ashmore (right) The houseboat where Peacock was found had been moored on the canal for weeks, despite being ordered to move on by the council, according to local residents. Peacock was taken to hospital and is thought to have cut his own throat before police arrived at around 5.55pm. He was transported to hospital where his condition is believed to be life threatening, according to Scotland Yard. Paramedics spent around half-an-hour working on him at the scene, according to residents who witnessed the aftermath. Jen Lock, 43, a community centre manager and founder of L.I.K.E - Lives Instead of Knives England - who lives around the corner from the scene, said: 'I saw the helicopter and so I walked over to the canal and saw it was absolute chaos. 'Then we walked down the canal and we saw police, paramedics, CID, everything. We got to the barge - it's like a white box boat - and they were working on someone. 'He was lying down on the grass next to the boat and they were pumping his chest for quite a long time. 'Eventually they put him on a stretcher and carried him away. We thought he was totally gone because of how long they had been working on him. 'The crazy thing is people were taking their kids over and showing them what had happened. 'Apparently he'd sliced his own throat - how do you do something like that to yourself?' Several police cars and an ambulance vehicle were spotted parked up on Kensington Road, Ealing, on Wednesday evening She added: 'To find out that he was here goes to show you never know what's happening on your doorstep. He is obviously a very disturbed person.' Selwyn Lee, 52, a bus driver who also lives nearby, added: 'We saw the helicopter circling and circling, so we went over to the canal. 'On the other side we saw around six officers around the white houseboat. They looked quite frantic and were turning back people coming along the footpath. 'Then I saw the paramedics arrive and the helicopter landed on the other side of the canal. 'Everyone was running, no one was walking, so you could tell they were trying to save someone's life.' Colin Mills, who lives in a house overlooking the canal, said: 'The boat was abandoned and I don't think it was liveable. 'It used to be moored outside my house, but that was a year-and-a-half ago now. 'I remember, the man who owned it was loading building materials onto it. It wasn't Peacock though, because he had a full head of hair.' Forensic investigators were seen gathering evidence near a houseboat where wanted man Lee Peacock was located last night Investigations teams worked through last night gathering information close to where Peacock was found A resident, who lives nearby and walks the canal path regularly, said: 'The curtains are always closed and it's not very nice. 'There was a sign on the window which isn't welcoming at all. 'It says something along the lines of people will be asked to move on. 'It's been there since the beginning of lockdown at least. I've never seen anyone there - it looked abandoned until the sign appeared. 'I've never seen a curtain move or any sign of life. ' Another resident, who did not wish to be named, added: 'It was around 6pm and there was a whole load of police officers running along the other side of the bank. 'Then I saw paramedics with a trolley - a stretcher on wheels - heading back towards the bridge. 'But it was empty. So either he was taken a different way or he must have gone in the helicopter. 'That houseboat has been there for ages - years. I know because I was talking to one of the canal officers about it.' They added: 'He told me it was houseboat, not a barge, and that it wasn't allowed on the canal.' The two deaths were previously reported to have been linked to a 120 drug deal between the three involved in the case. A woman called Sarah, who grew up in the area and had met Ms Pickles, said: 'I had spoken to her a couple of times and she was always nice and quiet - a skinny little thing. 'She took drugs, but she was trying to come off them, and she wasn't a bad woman. Some of my close friends used to go in that flat and knew Sharon well.' She added: 'Lee wanted to buy 120 of crack off Cliff. That's what happened. It's all about drugs.' Two people have been shot after gunman armed with semi-automatic handgun and large knife opened fire on group of people on Redondo Beach Pier before police shot him dead. The Redondo Beach Police Department said a teenage boy was shot in the lower torso and a man was shot in the upper torso during the attack in Los Angeles county, California, on Wednesday night. They were rushed to a local hospital where they are in a stable condition and are expected to survive. Two people have been shot after gunman armed with semi-automatic handgun and large knife opened fire on group of people on Redondo Beach Pier before police shot him dead (pictured, police arriving to the scene) The pier will remain closed through Thursday afternoon while authorities conduct the investigation. Police responded to multiple calls of shooter in the area at 8.15pm. Bystanders ran for cover and nearby businesses were told to shelter in place as shots were fired, according to Fox 11. According to police, as officers made their way to the pier, the suspect who was armed with a semi-automatic handgun and a large knife, ran toward a nearby rock embankment. The Redondo Beach Police Department said a teenage boy was shot in the lower torso and a man was shot in the upper torso during the attack in Los Angeles county, California (pictured, police cars line the pier) Police responded to multiple calls of shooter in the area at 8.15pm. Bystanders ran for cover and nearby businesses were told to shelter in place as shots were fired (file photo) As officers tried to take the suspect into custody, he was killed during an officer-involved shooting. The suspect's name has not been released but has been identified by a man in his mid-30s and the investigation is ongoing. Earlier this month, a Los Angeles shoe store employee was shot dead after he intervened during an argument between customers over a promotional raffle for a new pair of Nike sneakers. Jayren Bradford, 26, was killed outside the Shoe Palace on Melrose Avenue at around 12:20pm on August 11. The two victims were rushed to a local hospital where they are in a stable condition and are expected to survive (file photo) Jayren Bradford, 26, was shot and killed as he attempted to break up a dispute during a shoe raffle outside of the Shoe Palace store in Los Angeles on Wednesday afternoon Cellphone footage shows the employee intervening as a crowd of men and women argue outside the store. Suddenly an unidentified man draws a gun and fires a single shot, and Bradford is seen crumpling to the ground as others nearby flee for cover. The dispute appears to have been over a promotional raffle run by the store for a pair of Nike Dunk Lows in Black Multi Camo, according to ABC7. The sneakers are expected to be released on August 18, and they will retail for $110. But they are already being offered online for $150. Ofcom has fined a TV channel that counted Meghan Markle's friend among its presenters 200,000 over its UK broadcasts because it is controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. The media regulator said it had imposed the fine on Star China Media Limited, the licence holder for the China Global Television Network (CGTN), for breaches of its rules around fairness and privacy. CGTN, an international, English-language satellite news channel, had its licence to broadcast in the UK revoked in February this year. An Ofcom investigation had concluded it was controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, which is not permitted under UK broadcasting law. In total, CGTN has been issued with two 100,000 fines relating to two separate complaints about unfair treatment of individuals in programmes broadcast on CGTN - and CCTV as it was formerly known - between 2016 and 2019. Ofcom said it had imposed the fine on Star China Media Limited, the licence holder for the China Global Television Network (CGTN), which counted Meghan Markle's friend James Chau (both pictured above) among its presenters Both complaints related to how programming treated individuals and their alleged confessions to crimes. In both cases, Ofcom said it had found that CGTN had failed to take 'appropriate steps to satisfy itself that material facts had not been presented, disregarded or omitted in a way that was unfair' to the individuals involved. The watchdog previously launched an investigation into CGTN following broadcasts which showed British journalist Peter Humphrey appearing to confess to a criminal offence, and reported his conviction and an apology. Mr Humphrey, 64, was jailed for more than two years by a court in Shanghai in 2014 in connection with a corruption case involving pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline. The two reports from CCTV identified Mr Humphrey but his face was blurred. The 2013 footage was broadcast across Chinese media as well as in Britain. TV presenter James Chau, a Cambridge-educated journalist who considers the Duchess of Sussex as his friend, solemnly introduced the footage to viewers. The watchdog previously launched an investigation into CGTN following broadcasts which showed British journalist Peter Humphrey (pictured) appearing to confess to a criminal offence, and reported his conviction and an apology But according to Mr Humphrey, the entire broadcast was a lie. The investigator, who was arrested with his wife and business partner Yu Yingzeng while probing alleged corruption at pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, insisted that the footage masked the truth of his ordeal. Mr Humphrey claimed that he and his wife are innocent and the so-called 'confession' was a sham confected from doctored footage captured after he had been plied with sedatives. Speaking previously from his home in Surrey, Mr Humphrey told The Mail on Sunday: 'It was a travesty of my human rights. Mr Humphrey (pictured during a broadcast) claimed that he and his wife are innocent and the so-called 'confession' was a sham confected from doctored footage captured after he had been plied with sedatives 'I was stripped of my dignity, drugged, caged and had my words twisted to create the impression I confessed. But I never did and I never will. 'The grief and humiliation I suffered was overwhelming. During that forced confession and the two years I endured in prison, they set out to crush my spirit. I'm left with scars that are still healing.' After his release, Mr Humphrey complained to Ofcom, alleging unfair treatment and breach of privacy in two news reports on the case aired on CCTV, which has since been renamed CGTN. The penalty comes after Ofcom also fined the broadcaster 225,000 in March for breaching fairness, privacy and due impartiality rules. Advertisement These are the fortunate Afghan evacuees who landed in the United States on Thursday hours before two explosions rocked Kabul airport, killing at least 60 people, including children, and 12 US troops. The heartfelt and tear-filled moments where parents, children and couples are reunited were captured as the relieved refugees arrived at Dulles International Airport in Washington DC. Some individuals were seen smiling and embracing their loved ones, while others walked through the airport with solemn expressions on their faces. 'I feel safe here. I think it's a better place,' 23-year-old Kamran, who evacuated Kabul, told the New York Times upon his arrival at Dulles. Kamran, along with many other evacuees, remains fearful for relatives back in Afghanistan where the now Taliban-controlled nation faces chaos and violence. Refugees from Afghanistan exit Dulles International Airport after arriving from Afghanistan via evacuation flights on Thursday, August 26. A 'welcome home' balloon floats beside a boy hugging his mother upon her arrival from Afghanistan as they are reunite at Dulles airport on Aug. 26, 2021. A man and woman are seen holding hands on an escalator at Dulles airport on Aug. 26, 2021 Hamid Wahidi, who was a translator for Americans before moving to the US, greeted his brother, sister-in-law and their five children after waiting in the parking lot outside Dullles Expo Center for hours. 'I'm very happy for them to make it safely out of there,' Wahidi told the Wall Street Journal. 'Of course, it's going to be another struggle for them getting settled here, but at least they are in a safe place.' Scenes mimicking that of the Wahidi family were on display throughout the airport. A young boy held a 'welcome home' balloon and hugged his mother inside the airport upon her arrival. An Afghan man who reunited with his fiancee was seen holding her hand and presented her with flowers. 'We are safe,' one evacuee said when a reporter with the New York Post asked him how it felt to be in America. Many women were seen clutching young children, some only carrying purses or small bags with limited clothing and supplies. Other individuals fled Afghanistan completely empty-handed. A couple holds their twin babies on Thursday, Aug. 26, after arriving to Dulles from Afghanistan on evacuation flights A family of evacuees carries bedding-filled luggage through Dulles airport on Thursday, Aug. 26 as they prepare to head to military bases An Afghan man is reunited with his fiancee as she arrives at Dulles International Airport after arriving from Afghanistan via evacuation flights on Aug. 25, 2021 An apparent couple and their young child carry their luggage through the airport after exiting their evacuation flight to Dulles airport on Aug. 26 A man, bearing flowers, hugs a woman as they are reunited at Dulles airport A refugee who evacuated from Kabul is seen clutching a young boy and a portfolio filled with apparent documents as he walks through Dulles airport on Aug. 26, 2021 A woman is accompanied by her children on an escalator at Dulles airport after arriving to Virginia on an evacuation flight Outside the airport, lines of refugees boarded buses that would transport them to a nearby military base. An official directed people to the busses, offering words of encouragement and answering questions from evacuees. 'Go here?' a man, who was travelling with a child, is heard asking in video captured by DailyMail.com photographers. 'Yes,' the official replied, pointing to the bus. The man then thanked the official before boarding the vehicle with his family. Many evacuees say they don't know what to expect next. 'We are just waiting and seeing what will happen,' Kamran told the New York Times, noting that he believes it will be better than the situation in Afghanistan. Kamran said he left for the Kabul airport five days before his Wednesday arrival at Dulles. He shared that he had been beaten with batons by Taliban members and had to push his way to the American side of the airport. Once there, he stayed at the airport for two days enduring crowded, hot and chaotic conditions. The U.S. evacuated 13,400 people from Kabul in the last 24 hours, taking the evacuees to bases in Qatar, Bahrain or Germany before they return to the states. Overnight, 5,100 people were flown out of Kabul on US military planes. Another 8,300 were saved by coalition flights. The total - 13,400 - was drastically less than the 19,000 rescued in the previous 24 hours. Those who are cleared to travel are then flown to Dulles airport, located in the greater Washington DC area, processed and transported to military bases in New Jersey, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin, AXIOS reported. Additional bases are expected to be added. The tarmac at Dulles is filling up with flights transporting refugees. As of Thursday morning, people on seven different aircrafts waited at the airport as more flights were expected to come in, the Wall Street Journal reported. Evacuees who boarded flights with minimal belongings are waiting for up to ten hours to be processed by government officials before they can be transferred from the airport to temporary housing. A Department of Homeland Security told the newspaper that processing delays are stemming from a backup in the vetting of Afghans. 'Over the last several days, we have worked with urgency and with care to enhance screening and vetting operations such that we make these operations more efficient without compromising national security,' the official said. Once they are cleared from the planes, evacuees are either reunited with their loved ones or boarding busses that while take them to military bases. Families evacuated from Kabul walk through the terminal at Washington Dulles International Airport on Aug. 26, 2021 before boarding a bus taking them to a nearby military base Afghan refugees, who arrived at Dulles airport in Northern Virginia on Aug. 26, board a bus transporting them to military facilities for processing and temporary housing A family of refugees exits Dulles airport on Aug. 26 after arriving to the U.S. on evacuation flights. A young boy, who appears to be smiling under his face mask, holds a blanket bearing the Red Cross logo A group of evacuees exit Dulles airport on Aug. 26 after arriving from Afghanistan U.S. Army soldiers are assisting families as they depart a processing center for evacuees from Afghanistan at the Dulles Expo Center A woman carrying a sleeping child boards a bus at Dulles airport An Afghan evacuee was spotted outside at Dulles airport holding his phone and taking what appears to be a picture of himself A family with young, smiling children are outside Dulles airport after arriving from Afghanistan via evacuation flights An estimated 1,500 Americans still are trapped in Afghanistan following a rapid Taliban takeover of the country on the heels of the US pulling out after a 20-year occupation. Desperate Afghan men, women and children have swarmed the airport in a bid to escape and 10,000 evacuees are inside the gates waiting to get out, fearing further attacks from the Islamic State offshoot ISIS-K. The terrorist group is allegedly responsible for the two explosions at Kabul airport Thursday that killed at least 60 people, including children, and 12 U.S. troops. The first blast was caused by an ISIS suicide bomber in a vest, detonating outside The Baron Hotel, at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport, according to Fox News and Politico. Westerners were staying in the hotel before their evacuation flights. A second explosion was reported at the airport's Abbey Gate, where crowds have been gathering for more than a week in the hope of being put on one of the evacuation flights out. That explosion was caused by a car bomb, according to unconfirmed reports. Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby tweeted there were a 'number of US & civilian' casualties but it's unclear if he was referring to deaths or injuries. The blast was outside The Baron Hotel, at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport. Westerners were staying in the hotel before their evacuation flights A doctor in Florida has been fired for offering to sell medical letters to parents to exempt their children from school mask mandates. Dr Brian Warden, an ER doctor from Leon County, posted in a Facebook group titled Parents Against Masks telling people to send him a private message for the letters. The recent medical graduate was charging $50 to carry out interviews for the signed waivers, the Tallahassee Democrat reported. Leon County is one of 10 counties statewide which have defied Gov. Ron DeSantis' order banning mask mandates, with K-8 students still required to wear face coverings unless they have a medical exemption. Dr Brian Warden, an ER doctor from Leon County, posted in a Facebook group titled Parents Against Masks telling people to send him a private message for the letters. Students walk from iPrep Academy on the first day of school, Monday, in Miami, Florida. Leon County is one of 10 counties statewide which have defied Gov. Ron DeSantis' order banning mask mandates, with K-8 students still required to wear face coverings unless they have a medical exemption. The Capital Regional Medical Center was contacted about Warden's actions and said it had cut ties with the doctor. 'We act with absolute integrity in all that we do, and it is our expectation that providers behave in a way that is consistent with those values,' CRMC spokeswoman Rachel Stiles said. 'Immediately upon learning of this physician's actions, we began the process of removing him from providing services to our hospital patients,' she said. One of the posts said he was not carrying out the work affiliated with any hospital and would do the interviews under Dove Field Health, LLC, his own business. The company was incorporated on July 26, 2021, according to the Florida Secretary of State's website. Warden defended his action in a Facebook post, claiming he had a right to act independently as a licensed medical practitioner, the Democrat reported. When asked for comment, he told the paper by text: 'I'm sorry. I'm not supposed to say anything.' It was not clear if Warden had managed to make any money from the enterprise. Warden was issued his medical license on February 15, 2021, according to the Florida Department of Health's website. He graduated from Temple University in May 2018, DOH said. Over half of Florida's students are enrolled in public schools that will implement mask mandates this coming school year, despite attempts by Governor Ron DeSantis (pictured last week) to make them illegal As Florida's cases continue to soar, the state reported a seven-day rolling average of 21,706 new cases daily on Saturday More than half of Florida's students are enrolled in public schools that will implement mask mandates this coming school year - ignoring Gov. DeSantis' order to make the face coverings illegal. Indian River and Sarasota counties joined Miami-Dade, Broward, Hillsborough, Leon, Alachua, Palm Beach, Orange and Duval in mandating that students mask up for the coming school year. According to Florida Department of Education enrollment tallies for 2020-21, the 10 counties combine for about 52 percent of the total school population. There were 2,791,687 students enrolled last year, and the combined enrollment of those counties exceeds 1.45 million, according to The Associated Press. The Fort Lauderdale school's interim principal, Sean Curran, said the school's hands are tied and that the administration is just following the guidance of the Broward County school district. As Florida's cases continue to soar, the state reported a seven-day rolling average of 21,706 new cases a day last week. The state also recorded an additional 1,071 deaths, a daily average of 153, in the health department's weekly report. This brings the statewide total to 2,877,214 cases and 40,766 deaths. President Joe Biden huddled in the White House Situation Room on Thursday morning with his national security team and cancelled his meeting with Israeli prime minister after explosions rocked Kabul, killing a dozen of U.S. service members. It's the latest crisis for the president, who has stuck firm to the August 31st deadline to withdraw American troops from the country amid rising tensions as the Taliban solidifies its control. Secretary of State Tony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley were all seen arriving at the White House on Thursday morning. Blinken was scheduled to be there for the meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett but Austin had no events on his public schedule for Thursday. 'The President met with his national security team this morning, including Secretary Blinken, Secretary Austin, Chairman Milley, and commanders on the ground. He will continue to be briefed on updates on the evolving situation throughout the day,' a White House official said. Vice President Kamala Harris, returning from a trip to Asia, piped into the Situation Room for the briefing via Air Force Two, a White House official said. Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said a 'number of U.S. service members' were killed in the attack with more being treated for wounds. 'We also know that a number of Afghans fell victim to this heinous attack,' Kirby said in a statement. CENTCOM Commander GEN. Kenneth F. McKenzie said at a briefing that 12 U.S. service members were killed in the attack. The White House announced that the president's meeting with Bennett, scheduled to start at 11:30 a.m., would be delayed. No new time has been given and Israeli reporters at the White House for the event were sent back to their hotels. Later in the day it was rescheduled for Friday. Biden's 3 p.m. virtual meeting with some of the nation's governors was also cancelled. President Joe Biden meets with his national security team for a briefing on Afghanistan in the Situation Room on Sunday - Secretary of State Tony Blinken is on right, to Biden's left are National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley Biden was joined in the Situation Room by members of his national security team, including Secretary of State Tony Blinken (left) and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin (right) The first blast in Kabul was caused by an ISIS suicide bomber in a vest, detonating outside The Baron Hotel, where Westerners were staying before their evacuation flights. A second explosion was reported nearby a short time later at the airport's Abbey Gate, where crowds of Afghans have been gathering for more than a week in the hope of being put on one of the evacuation flights out. That explosion was caused by a car bomb, according to unconfirmed reports. As many as 1,500 Americans remain stranded in Afghanistan along with hundreds of Afghan allies. The administration has faced a storm of criticism from Democrats, Republicans and international allies about its handling of the evacuation. A group representing dozens of House Republicans and Democrats issued a letter pleading with Biden to extend the deadline. The House Problem Solvers Caucus, which has 58 members, says the letter was backed by three-quarters of its members. 'As Democrats and Republicans, we stand united in our commitment to protecting U.S. citizens, diplomats, intelligence officers, and our foreign partners who are currently attempting to flee Afghanistan,' they wrote. Biden said on Sunday that any attack at Kabul airport would be met with a 'swift and forceful response.' The president spoke about the situation in Afghanistan after getting briefed by his national security team in the Situation Room. 'Make no mistake: This evacuation mission is dangerous. It involves risks to our armed forces, and it is being conducted under difficult circumstances,' he said on Sunday. 'Weve made clear to the Taliban that any attack any attack on our forces or disruption of our operations at the airport will be met with a swift and forceful response.' He also noted officials were 'keeping a close watch on any potential terrorist threat at or around the airport, including from the ISIS affiliates in Afghanistan.' And he emphasized the ultimately responsibility rested with him: 'The buck stops with me,' he said. Biden and Bennett were to hold their first face-to-face meeting Thursday, each pressing their case on major issues in the Middle East and trying to reset relations between the two countries. The two leaders have divergent views on the Iran nuclear deal and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, both of which are expected to be major topics of conversation during their Oval Office sit down. Bennett and Biden will also look to form their own relationship after the American president had strained relations with Bennett's predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu. In their conversation, Bennett is expected to push Biden to give up his quest to revive the Iran nuclear deal. Ahead of his trip Bennett said he would tell Biden 'that now is the time to halt the Iranians, to stop this thing' and not to reenter 'a nuclear deal that has already expired and is not relevant, even to those who thought it was once relevant.' The blast was outside The Baron Hotel, at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport. Westerners were staying in the hotel before their evacuation flights The blast was outside The Baron Hotel, at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport. Westerners were staying in the hotel before their evacuation flights President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett will hold their first face-to-face meeting Thursday But Biden has expressed his support for reviving the 2015 landmark deal brought about by the Obama administration but scuttled in 2018 by Donald Trump. American indirect talks with Tehran have stalled, however, and Washington continues to keep sanctions on Iran. Meanwhile, White House has said it plans to bring up the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when the two leaders met. Bennett has said he will not allow a Palestinian state while he is in office. The Biden administration has expressed its support for a two-state solution that, by definition, includes an independent Palestinian state. Yet the White House has held off reopening the U.S. consulate for Palestinians in Jerusalem, a move that is seen as a show of support for Bennett. Bennett and Biden have never met - a rarity for the American president who knows most everyone thanks to his more than 40 years in politics. But they have spoken on the phone. Biden called Bennett two months ago shortly after he was sworn in as prime minister, replacing Netanyahu in office. Bennett's visit comes as Biden is dealing with the forthcoming August 31st deadline to remove U.S. troops from Afghanistan as the administration works to evacuate remaining Americans and their allies from that country. The visit gives Biden an opportunity to demonstrate business as usual with a key partner while contending with the complex situation in Afghanistan. Biden's biggest foreign policy crisis since taking office has not only hurt his approval ratings at home but raised questions about his credibility among both friends and foes. The Israeli PM met separately Wednesday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to discuss Iran and other issues. The visit is his first to the U.S. as prime minister. Secretary of State Antony Blinken (right) meets with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett at the Willard Hotel on Wednesday President Joe Biden had strained relations with Bennett's predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu - above the two men are seen together in 2016 when Biden was vice president Iran remains one of the thornier issues on the table ahead of the Oval Office meeting. Trump's decision to withdraw from Iran's nuclear deal led Tehran to abandon over time every limitation the accord imposed on its nuclear enrichment. The country now enriches a small amount of uranium up to 63%, a short step from weapons-grade levels, compared with 3.67% under the deal. It also spins far more advanced centrifuges and more of them than were allowed under the accord, worrying nuclear nonproliferation experts even though Tehran insists its program is peaceful. The Biden-Bennett sit-down comes weeks after Ebrahim Raisi was sworn in as Iran's new president. Raisi, 60, a conservative cleric with close ties to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has suggested he'll engage with the U.S. But he also has struck a hard-line stance, ruling out negotiations aimed at limiting Iranian missile development and support for regional militias - something the Biden administration wants to address in a new accord. Administration officials acknowledged that Iran's potential 'breakout' - the time needed to amass enough fissile material for a single nuclear weapon - is now down to a matter of months or less. Biden will tell Bennett that he shares Israel's concern that Iran has expanded its nuclear program but remains committed for now to diplomacy with Tehran, a senior administration official said. Briefing reporters ahead of the meeting, the official said: 'Since the last administration left the Iran nuclear deal, Irans nuclear program has just dramatically broken out of the box.' The official said that if the diplomatic path with Iran fails, 'there are other avenues to pursue,' but did not elaborate. Bennett is also looking to turn the page from his predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu. Bennett wants to move on from Netanyahu's combative public style and instead manage disagreements constructively behind closed doors between Washington and its closest Middle East ally. Netanyahu had a close relationship with Trump after frequently clashing with Barack Obama. Biden, who has met with every Israeli prime minister since Golda Meir, had his own tensions with Netanyahu over the years. During his latest White House campaign, Biden called Netanyahu 'counterproductive' and an 'extreme right' leader. Biden waited nearly a month after his election before making his first call to Netanyahu, raising concerns in Jerusalem and among some Netanyahu backers in Washington that the two would have a difficult relationship. The president called Bennett just hours after he was sworn in as prime minister in June to offer his congratulations. Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the liberal Jewish advocacy group J Street, said Bennett is intent on building a positive working relationship with the Biden administration. But Ben-Ami, whose group supports a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, noted that the two leaders are out of sync on several issues in addition to Iran. Bennett opposes the creation of a Palestinian state and supports expansion of settlements in the West Bank, which Biden opposes. Bennett, 49, the son of American immigrants to Israel, has been a vocal proponent of settlement building. It also pushed for Time's Up to cease 'all partnerships' with and return any donations from individuals and corporations with active sexual assault claims The organization is facing pressure from survivors and victims who sent an open letter demanding an independent, third-party investigation into the group At the time, Tchen said she didn't think a statement would be appropriate She's the second leader to resign from the anti-sexual harassment group for allegedly helping Cuomo, following chairwoman Roberta Kaplan's departure Tchen urged against releasing a statement in response to Cuomo asserting his innocence following Boylan's accusations Texts show that she told colleagues to 'stand down' in issuing a statement supporting Cuomo accuser Lindsey Boylan in December She said her position has become a 'painful and divisive focal point' Tina Tchen, the organization's CEO, made the announcement in a series of messages posted to Twitter Thursday afternoon The leader of anti-sexual harassment organization Time's Up has quit, admitting that her role in the group has become 'painful and divisive' after texts revealed she told staff to hold-off on publicly supporting former Gov. Andrew Cuomo's first accuser. 'Now is the time for TIME'S UP to evolve and move forward as there is so much more work to do for women,' Time's Up CEO Tina Tchen said in a series of messages posted on Twitter Thursday afternoon. 'It is clear that I am not the leader who can accomplish that in this moment.' Tchen is the second Time's Up leader to resign this month after being accused of helping Cuomo fight his sexual misconduct allegations. Tina Tchen, Time's Up CEO, has resigned after texts show she told colleagues to 'stand down' in issuing a statement supporting Gov. Andrew Cuomo accuser Lindsey Boylan in December Tchen made the announcement in a series of images posted to Twitter on Thursday afternoon Tchen touted her previous work with the Obama administration and other companies She admitted her position in the organization has become 'a painful and divisive focal point' Former chairwoman Roberta Kaplan stepped down earlier this month after it came out that she helped Cuomo draft a statement defending himself. In December, Tchen told colleagues to 'stand down' in supporting former governor's aide Lindsey Boylan after consulting with Cuomo's top aide, Melissa DeRosa, according to texts obtained by The Washington Post. Boylan, 36, was the first woman to accuse Cuomo of sexual harassment in a Medium post on February 24. She claimed the governor asked her to play strip poker and kissed her on the lips without her permission when she worked for him in 2017. In her resignation post, Tchen added: 'I am especially aware that my position at the helm of TIME'S UP has become a painful and divisive focal point where those very women and other activists who should be working together to fight for change are instead battling each other in harmful ways. 'Therefore, it is time for me to resign and continue to work for change in other ways, and to let TIME'S UP engage in the thoughtful and meaningful process I know will occur to move forward.' Lindsey Boylan, (pictured) a former state economic development adviser for Gov. Andrew Cuomo, was the first person to come forward with misconduct allegations against Cuomo Lindsey Boylan tweeted her reaction to learning that Tchen would resign as CEO During the December exchange among five of the organization's senior members, Tchen opposed releasing a statement in response to Cuomo asserting his innocence following Boylan's accusations. After learning of Tchen's resignation, Boylan tweeted her disappointment at TIMES Up, saying it's leadership mimicked the tactics of abusers who silence and gaslight their victims. 'If this is how I get treated, how do millions of survivors across America get treated,' Boylan wroted. 'They are destroyed for telling the truth.' The exchange was started after a FoxNews.com reporter asked about their reactions to the allegations. Tchen advised against releasing a statement, agreeing with board member Hilary Rosen, who was concerned about the negative impact of giving Fox 'a headline to run all day.' 'As a survivor I have always thought that serious allegations of sexual harassment should not be politicized and Fox News had a reputation for doing just that,' Rosen said in a statement. 'So part of this text chain is only responsive to the question about Fox. Context matters.' In addition to Tchen and Rosen, senior TU members Jennifer Klein, Rebecca Goldman and Amanda Harrington all texted to the chain, offering their opinions on issuing a statement that Harrington apparently had drafted. Accusations: Cuomo was accused by several women of sexual misconduct, and an investigation concluded that the governor 'sexually harassed multiple women' Secretary to Governor Melissa DeRosa (pictured) argued Boylan's allegations were vague and that she had credibility issues At the time, Tchen told her colleagues she didn't think issuing a statement would be appropriate. 'I agree wit [sic] hilary. The story is all over the place with this survivor,' she wrote in the exchange. In addition, Tchen also opposed specific portions of Harrington's statement. 'Just looked at statement and not sure I even like that on [sic] she deserves to be heard,' Tchen continued. 'She has been in the context she wants to be heard so no one is saying she shouldn't but the way she is speaking in not wanting to talk further doesn't mean she wants to be heard more. So I would say nothing right now.' In response, Goldman - who had left the organization weeks prior - disagreed with Tchen, referring to the organization's silence. 'I do think our silence looks bad and the first more generic statement Amanda wrote is what we should always say, every time, and compliments [sic] what he said himself,' Goldman wrote, referring to Cuomo. 'It is not good to have a headline that says TU is silent vs TU supports survivors. In my opinion. Everyone deserves to be heard.' From right to left, Tina Tchen, Wonya Lucas, Stephanie T. Rance and Juanita Slappy attend the Time's Up Luncheon in Edgartown, Massachusetts on August 11, 2021 Roberta Kaplan, (pictured) co-founder of Time's Up, later resigned following an investigation from the New York Attorney General later, who revealed Kaplan's law firm represents DeRosa Following Goldman's reply, Tchen decided to meet over Zoom. She rejoined the group chat following the meeting, asking colleagues to 'hold for an hour before deploying a statement to give Robbie [co-founder of Time's Up Roberta Kaplan] a chance to look at text.' After further deliberation, Tchen asked Rosen to reach out to Cuomo's office and see if she could examine their workplace culture. Rosen contacted former colleague Jennifer Cunningham, also a longtime informal Cuomo adviser, who reached out to Cuomo's office and raised concerns. 'I never talked to the Govs office directly,' Rosen said in a statement. 'I did try to encourage them, through a friend, to fully address this allegation and to take any problems in his office seriously, but I was shut down.' Rosen added that she was 'glad that Lindsey Boylan got her justice.' According to sources familiar with the matter, DeRosa told Cunningham she already ran the governor's response past Kaplan a day earlier, arguing Boylan's allegations were vague and that she had credibility issues. Following the news, Tchen reached out to colleagues and explained the organization would proceed in shifting direction. 'Robbie is talking directly to Melissa now. Let's stand down other efforts for now,' Tchen wrote. An investigation from New York Attorney General Letitia James later revealed Kaplan's law firm also represents DeRosa. Kaplan resigned following the report. Shortly after, the organization released a statement on Twitter, saying: 'We and she [Kaplan] agree that is the right and appropriate thing to do.' According to The New York Times, Kaplan wrote in her resignation letter: 'I therefore have reluctantly come to the conclusion that an active law practice is no longer compatible with serving on the board at Time's Up at this time and I hereby resign.' The organization is facing pressure from more than 100 survivors and victims who sent an open letter demanding an independent, third-party investigation. It also pushed for Time's Up to cease 'all partnerships' with and return any donations from individuals, and corporations with active sexual assault or harassment allegations. 'There is a consistent pattern of behavior where the decision-makers at Time's Up continue to align themselves with abusers at the expense of survivors,' the letter reads. 'Time's Up should be ashamed.' Alaina Hampton once received help from Time's Up with her lawsuit that pitted her against one of the highest offices in Illinois. Now she says the group has lost its way Tara Reade, who alleges that she was sexually assaulted by President Joe Biden in 1993, criticized Time's Up for being too closely tied to the Democratic Pary The group's leadership was also criticized for aligning itself with Cuomo and powerful Democrats. Alaina Hampton, who received help from Time's Up in 2018 with her lawsuit against an aide for former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, echoed this sentiment. 'They're just too tied to the Democratic Party and I don't think they're even really realizing the issues that it causes,' she told The Daily Beast. 'It just seems like everything that's happening is damage control and crisis management.' 'I believe it needs to be dismantled,' she added. Tara Reade, who alleged that she was sexually assaulted by President Joe Biden in 1993, also accused Time's Up of being too close to the Democratic Party. Reade has criticized the organization for declining to support her allegations against Biden on the grounds that they 'could not assist in a case against a candidate for federal office.' The organization also received backlash in June when they supposedly tried to strongarm a survivor of Russell Simmons, co-founder of Def jam Recordings, from appearing in the documentary, On the Record, detailing Simmons' alleged abuse. The anonymous survivor told The Daily Beast that she was contacted by Tchen to drop out of the documentary because the filmmakers were 'bad people.' Oprah Winfrey, a co-funder of Time's Up, had also pulled out as an executive producer from the documentary just weeks before its release. 'Tina Tchen said to me on the phone the night Oprah backed out of the film, 'The filmmakers are bad people' and when I disagreed with her she said, 'You have to trust me on this,' the survivor said. 'She implied that Time's Up would support me as a survivor, but only if I backed away from the film.' Tchen and Time's Up officials have repeatedly called the claims false. Oprah Winfrey, a co-funder of Time's Up, pulled out as an executive producer from the documentary detailing Russell Simmons alleged sexual abuses Former staffers of Time's Up also told The Daily Beast that the organization seemed to always take too long to accept internal ideas unless they were tied to powerful people. The staffers alleged that an expansion on sick leave for women during the pandemic was not immediately worked on because 'it might offend U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Nancy Pelosi.' And the 'We Have Her Back' program to help women running for public office was not launched until Biden was declared the 2020 Democratic nominee, the staffers claimed. One staffer said they were told not to tweet support for Democratic hopeful Elizabeth Warren after she attacked rival Michael Bloomberg. Another staff said that a banner on the organization's website featuring a promotion for Alessandra Biaggi, a New York State senator who championed anti-harassment legislation, was removed after the senator openly criticized Cuomo earlier this year. Time's Up officials denied all the allegations. One of the biggest blows to the organization's reputation came in March when Time's Up Healthcare - a spinoff group focusing on harassment in the medical field - suspended one of its members for allegedly brushing off sexual harassment reports at her own workplace. Esther Choo, the member in question, was defended by Time's Up former CEO Roberta Kaplan, and the organization released a statement defending Choo as an advocate for women's rights. 'Once we had that meeting and I saw the way that [Tchen] and [Kaplan] were saying, 'We have to protect this sisterhood,' I was like, I'm done here,' former member Dr. Kali Cyrus told The Daily Beast at the time. 'Because I'm not in the sisterhood. They're not going to protect me. They're protecting the people who are in their inner circle.' Republicans are demanding President Biden either resign or be impeached, claiming he has 'blood on his hands' for 'gross negligence in Afghanistan' after multiple explosions at the Kabul airport killed 13 US troops and as many as 60 Aghans. Lawmakers demanded a forceful response and called for 'resignations' out of the White House. Some warned the worst could be yet to come. Rep. Jody Hice, R-Ga., reupped a call for Biden to resign. 'Biden Admin views abandoned people in Afghanistan as a political nuisance. Maybe looking at them as real people instead of 'papers to push' would produce rescues rather than deaths. It's time for Biden to RESIGN NOW!!!' 'Should Biden step down or be removed for his handling of Afghanistan? Yes,' Nikki Haley, former ambassador to the United Nations, tweeted. 'But that would leave us with Kamala Harris which would be ten times worse. God help us.' 'My biggest fear is these attacks today are just the beginning of what we will continue to see as the Administration fails to get Americans and our Afghan allies out and to safety,' Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, wrote on Twitter. 'We dont need statements from the Administration right now - we need immediate resignations.' 'At what point does Afghanistan turn from "Biden's Saigon" to "Biden's Tehran Moment?"' questioned Rep. Ralph Norman, R-SC. The Iran hostage crisis from 1979-1981 was considered a major failure and contributor to President Jimmy Carter's loss in his reelection bid. 'President @JoeBiden- you had one job. That job continues and American lives & security depend on it. Act like it,' Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, wrote on Twitter. The first bomb was detonated in a suicide vest as the bomber was being searched by Marines. A second explosion was reported nearby a short time later at the airport's Abbey Gate, where crowds of Afghans have been gathering for more than a week in the hope of being put on one of the evacuation flights out. The State Department has warned Americans to evacuate the area immediately. 'Biden Admin views abandoned people in Afghanistan as a political nuisance. Maybe looking at them as real people instead of 'papers to push' would produce rescues rather than deaths. It's time for Biden to RESIGN NOW!!!' Rep. Jody Hice, R-Ga., above, wrote on Twitter An ISIS-K suicide bomber blew himself up amid the swarms of people outside the airport Thursday, killing 13 US service members, according to the Pentagon Smoke rises from a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday 'Joe Biden has blood on his hands,' Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-NY, declared. 'The buck stops with the President of the United States. This horrific national security and humanitarian disaster is solely the result of Joe Bidens weak and incompetent leadership. He is unfit to be Commander-in-Chief.' 'Terrible things happen when terrorists are allowed to operate freely,' Sen. Minority leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a statement. 'This murderous attack offers the clearest possible reminder that terrorists will not stop fighting the United States just because our politicians grow tired of fighting them.' 'If President Trump can be impeached over a phone call, then the time has come to IMPEACH Biden for gross negligence in Afghanistan. Americans deserve better. We deserve better than someone who willfully IGNORES the WORST crisis in decades,' Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, wrote on Twitter. 'Horrific,' Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., wrote on Twitter. 'Joe Biden needs to take responsibility and resign. We must keep our troops safe and our country protected.' 'A second explosion just went off in Kabul. Where is @POTUS?' questioned Rep. Roger Williams, R-Texas. 'I have no confidence that he is up to the task. Lives are on the line and time is not on our side.' 'In eight short months, it has become painfully clear that President Biden is incapable of fulfilling and faithfully executing the most important roles of the Commander in Chief...It's time for him to resign or be legally removed,' Williams said later on. 'I am deeply saddened by the bombing outside of the airport in Kabul and reports of other violence. My heart goes out to those there as we learn of American and Afghan casualties from the attacks. And I am grateful for the Americans putting their lives on the line to save others,' said Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, Ga. Meanwhile, Democrat Foreign Affairs Committee chair Sen. Bob Menendez, said: 'This is a full-fledged humanitarian crisis and US government personnel ... must secure the airport.' 'As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We can't trust the Taliban with Americans' security.' 'There was no reason that 12 American families needed to lose a son or daughter, husband or wife, dad or mom, or sibling today. But that is what President Bidens unmitigated failure in Afghanistan has caused the needless loss of American life,' Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., said in a statement. The deaths of these brave service members fall on President Biden who has yet to address the American people on this loss. His inexplicable lack of a strategic plan to successfully and safely evacuate Americans and our allies must be answered for. 'This is the nightmare we feared,' said GOP Sen. Ben Sasse, Neb. 'Mr. President, there is a clear choice before you know: either you rip up the August 31 deadline and defend evacuation routes - by expanding the perimeter around the Kabul airport or by retaking Bagram - or leave our people behind in your retreat.' 'Mr. President, fix the mess you created. Stop running from it. We are still at war. You didnt end the war, you just gave the enemy new advantage. Go on offense, establish superiority, and dont leave until all our citizens and allies are safe,' Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, tweeted in response to the violence. 'Earlier this week, I too called on the President of the United States to resign immediately following his haphazard withdrawal from Afghanistan. He has abdicated his responsibility and duties entrusted to him as POTUS, and he must RESIGN IMMEDIATELY,' said GOP Rep. Byron Donalds, Fla. 'Biden must immediately hold the Taliban accountable. The 8/31 deadline must be extended indefinitely, the enemy who perpetrated this attack must be crushed & we must make clear: Any impediment to our ops will be met with the full force of the U.S. We will leave no man behind,' Rep. Mark Green, R-Fla., wrote on Twitter. 'Todays horrific events in Afghanistan were a completely preventable disaster. Pres. Bidens aloof approach to this withdrawal has been disgraceful & the lives lost today fall squarely at his feet. After 4 years of military strength, we are seeing the consequences of elections...' said Kansas Republican Sen. Roger Marshall. 'When you allow terrorists and terror organizations to dictate your arbitrary deadline, the result is dangerous and disastrous for our brave military members and allies. The United States is better than this!' said Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn. Scenes from the ground show injured Afghans being removed in wheelchairs. Left, a view of the explosion on Thursday Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport after a suicide bomber detonated an explosive outside the Baron Hotel, killing multiple people and injuring at least three US troops Former President Trump also issued a statement - before Biden did - offering condolences for the fallen troops and Afghans which, curiously, didn't call his successor out by name. 'Melania and I send our deepest condolences to the families of our brilliant Service Members whose duty to the U.S.A. meant so much to them,' Trump said. 'Our thoughts are also with the families of the innocent civilians who died today in the savage Kabul attack.' 'This tragedy should have never been allowed to happen, which makes our grief even deeper and more difficult to understand,' Trump continued. Rep. Louie Gohmert called on the Pentagon to leave its weapons with resistance fighters in the north, who are made up of ex-Afghan security forces and villagers and have drove the Islamist militants out of three districts. 'On the 20th anniversary of 9-11, Biden will have disgracefully prevented our military from protecting Americans abroad, figuratively bowing to the very bloodthirsty organization that instigated 9-11,' Gohmert, R-Texas, said in a statement. 'Exit Afghanistan but leave US weapons with those militia who defeated the Taliban in the north in 2001-2002,' Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., demanded Biden find a 'new evacuation strategy' on Twitter. 'Coordination with the Taliban was a colossal mistake. We have Americans stranded, our forces under siege at the airport & even more sinister terror plots in the works,' the senator wrote. 'Must now implement a new evacuation strategy or more horror lies ahead.' 'Our irresponsible withdrawal from Afghanistan has tragically left the door open for chaos for those remaining and has left Americans vulnerable,' Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., wrote on Twitter. 'We must establish control, protect Americans and our allies, and be prepared to stay as long as needed.' 'Horrified but expected suicide bombing in Afghanistan. Officials informed Congress of likelihood of Isis K attack. Only so much you can do to stop suicide bomber,' wrote Rep. Steve Cohen. 'Sadly I expect more terrorist activity til last soldier leaves. As draw down ends less to little security for troops.' House GOP leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy called on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to bring back the House so that lawmakers can be briefed on the situation. 'Todays attacks are horrific. My prayers go out to those who were injured and the families of those who were killed. I also continue to pray for the safety of our troops, the stranded American citizens, our allies and Afghan partners who remain in the area. Our enemies have taken advantage of the chaotic nature of the withdrawal,' the California Republican said in a statement. 'It is time for Congress to act quickly to save lives. Speaker Pelosi must bring Congress back into session before August 31 so that we can be briefed thoroughly and comprehensively by the Biden Administration and pass Representative Gallaghers legislation prohibiting the withdrawal of our troops until every American is out of Afghanistan.' Sen. Lindsey Graham urged the administration to retake Bagram air base. 'It is not a capability problem, but a problem of will,' Lindsey Graham, above, said of retaking Bagram 'I have advocated for days that the Bagram Air Base should be reopened as the Kabul airport is very difficult to defend and has been the only evacuation outlet,' the South Carolina Republican wrote on Twitter. 'We have the capability to reestablish our presence at Bagram to continue to evacuate American citizens and our Afghan allies. The biggest mistake in this debacle is abandoning Bagram.' 'I urge the Biden Administration to reestablish our presence in Bagram as an alternative to the Kabul airport so that we do not leave our fellow citizens and thousands of Afghan allies behind. It is not a capability problem, but a problem of will,' Graham said. 'The retaking of Bagram would put our military at risk, but I think those involved in the operation would gladly accept that risk because it would restore our honor as a nation and save lives.' Other lawmakers submitted an outpouring of prayers for American troops on the ground and Afghans on Twitter as they, along with the rest of the world, watch and wait to see how a series of attacks on Hamid Karzai International Airport unfold. Lawmakers were briefed on the situation this week by Biden's national security team. Other lawmakers submitted an outpouring of prayers for American troops on the ground and Afghans on Twitter as they, along with the rest of the world, watch and wait to see how a series of attacks on Kabul airport unfold. Meanwhile, the House Problem Solvers Caucus, a conglomeration of Republicans and Democrats, wrote a letter Thursday to President Biden begging him to extend the Aug. 31 deadline. The letter said it was 'apparent' from the administration's latest briefing for lawmakers 'that the Administration's set date for departure from Afghanistan on August 31st does not provide enough time to evacuate all American citizens and our partners. We respectfully call on the Administration to reconsider its timeline and provide a clear plan to Congress that will result in the completion of our shared national objectives.,' they wrote. The hacker who claims responsibility for stealing more than 50 million customer records from T-Mobile has spoken out, calling the company's security 'awful'. John Binns, a 21-year-old American hacker living in Turkey, told the Wall Street Journal that he had used an unprotected router to access personal records of T-Mobile customers. Binns, who provided screenshots and evidence to back up his claim, said that the entry point allowed him to hack into the company's data center in Washington state, where stored credentials allowed him to access more than 100 servers. 'I was panicking because I had access to something big,' he told the newspaper. 'Their security is awful.' T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert is seen above. The hacker who claims responsibility for stealing more than 50 million customer records from T-Mobile says the company's security is 'awful' T-Mobile did not immediately respond to a request for comment from DailyMail.com on Thursday. The company said in a statement last week that it had 'located and immediately closed the access point that we believe was used to illegally gain entry to our servers.' Binns told the Journal that he was coming forward publicly in order to draw attention to his perceived persecution by the US government, claiming that he had been abducted in Germany and placed in a fake mental hospital. 'I have no reason to make up a fake kidnapping story and I'm hoping that someone within the FBI leaks information about that,' he explained. A relative in the US confirmed that Binns called on the telephone last year, claiming to be a computer expert and saying he had been taken to a hospital against his will. His abduction claims were detailed in lawsuits Binns filed against the Central Intelligence Agency, Federal Bureau of Investigation and other federal agencies. Binns brought the legal actions without the aid of an attorney. Binns alleged in a lawsuit that 'CIA contractors' wearing night-vision goggles had been spying on his home from nearby apartments in this neighborhood in Turkey In a lawsuit against the CIA, Binns provided this sketch of an alleged 'neurotoxic gas room' in a purported CIA black site disguised as a mental health facility in Germany In one lawsuit reviewed by DailyMail.com, he accused the CIA of attempting to get him 'extra-judicially killed' by Turkish authorities by falsely accusing him of being a member of ISIS. Binns alleged in the suit that 'CIA contractors' wearing night-vision goggles had been spying on his home from nearby apartments, and claimed that the spy agency had bribed his friend to inform on him by paying him with a pound of heroin. The suit further alleges that Binns had suffered harassment at the hands of the CIA including 'gangstalking,' 'microwave directed energy devices,' 'psychotronic weapons,' and 'neurotoxic gas rooms.' The lawsuit claimed that Binns had been abducted by 'fake Bavarian State Police officers' at the Munich Airport and taken to a 'fake mental hospital building' in July 2019. That suit was dismissed by a judge, while others are still pending. The agencies denied his allegations in court filings. Binns confirmed his identity to the Journal by answering personal questions, and provided details of the T-Mobile breach before they were made public. T-Mobile has confirmed that more than 50 million customer records were breached, including information such as social security numbers and drivers license information He grew up in northern Virginia with his Turkish mother and attended McLean High School. His father died in 2002 when Binns was two, contemporary news accounts show. Binns was estranged from his father's family and moved to Izmir, Turkey with his mother soon after his 18th birthday. Security researchers told the Journal that several online profiles tied to Binn are associated with groups of young gamers who use botnets of infected devices to knock other people or websites offline. His online aliases include the names IRDev and v0rtex. Binns said that the hack of T-Mobile was surprisingly easy. He said he found the unprotected router by scanning T-Mobile's known internet addresses for weak spots using a simple tool available to the public. Once inside, he said it took about a week to access the servers that contained personal data about the carrier's millions of current and former customers. The breach first came to light when hackers began offering the customer data for sale on the dark web. Binns declined to say whether he had sold any of the stolen data. T-Mobile has confirmed that more than 50 million customer records were breached, including information such as social security numbers, drivers license information, and IMEI device serial numbers. The breach has been a major black eye for the carrier, which became the second largest phone company in the country after last year's merger with Sprint. T-Mobile has already begun informing affected customers if their data was stolen, and suggests customers regularly reset PINs and passwords. However T-Mobile says it has no information indicating passwords, postpaid PIN numbers, or financial or payment information have been compromised. The company is offering two years of identity protection services with McAfee's ID Theft Protection Service and has recommended eligible T-Mobile customers sign up for 'scam-blocking protection' through Scam Shield. Some T-Mobile customers sued the company for damages last Thursday night in Seattle federal court, saying in a proposed class action that the cyberattack violated their privacy and exposed them to a higher risk of fraud and identity theft. The Seattle field office of the FBI is investigating the breach. A gunman who opened fire in a cemetery at the funeral of a Manchester gangster known as Mr Ibiza during lockdown has been jailed for six years. Mohammed Umar, 24, was sentenced at Manchester Crown Court for the possession of a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence at the funeral of criminal Clive Pinnock, 38, on April 23 last year. As well-wishers drank beer and blared music out of speakers near to the gravesite at Gorton Cemetery in Manchester, Umar sneaked in and shot at the crowd, which included young children. In a video taken at the scene someone can be heard shouting 'Who's shooting? Who's shooting?' as the crowd quickly disperses through the trees and armed police arrive. Mohammed Umar (pictured), 24, was sentenced at Manchester Crown Court for the possession of a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence at the funeral of criminal Clive Pinnock, 38, on April 23 last year Dozens of people who broke social distancing rules to attend the service of criminal 'Mr Ibiza' Clive Pinnock, 38, were forced to flee when a series of gunshots were fired within the crowd at Gorton cemetery, Manchester In the video, taken by a man attending with his friends, someone can be heard shouting 'Who's shooting? Who's shooting?' as the crowd quickly disperses through the trees and armed police arrive Greater Manchester Police said they allowed the large gathering of mourners at the funeral because they believed closing it down would endanger public safety and it was 'clear that the emotions of those at the gathering were high' 'It was terrifying. Everyone was playing their respects to Clive and having a drink and remembering old times while some music played,' an onlooker told the Sun. 'Then there was a popping sound and people started running. It took a few seconds to realise it was gunfire and then everyone started running and trying to find cover behind gravestones and in cars.' Nobody was hit and Umar fled, but was chased by some of the group as he continued to wield the weapon. The force spokesman said the group caught up with Umar and assaulted him before officers intervened. His injuries included black eyes and bruises and he was arrested following hospital treatment. Police said the gun was discovered in a park bin days later. Clive Pinnock (pictured left) was killed in a collision between a BMW and his motorbike on April 8. He was known as 'Mr Ibiza' by friends and family. Huge crowds gathered to pay their final respects to Mr Pinnock (right, a hearse drives through town) Mourners gather at Gorton Cemetery for Clive Pinnock while ignoring social distancing rules The mourners at Gorton Cemetery were pictured ignoring social-distancing rules as they packed around the grave on Thursday night Police taped off Gorton Cemetery after the incident involving the gunman at Mr Pinnock's funeral A group of police officers are seen around the graves in Gorton Cemetery after the shooting Police at the scene after the shooting at Gorton Cemetery Detective Constable Terry Macmillan said: 'This is a shocking act that took place in a location considered sacred to many, where people pay respects to their loved ones who have passed. 'Thankfully, no-one in the cemetery at the time of Umar's actions reported receiving any injuries, however Umar's own injuries as a result of the assault proved to be relatively serious. 'Umar opened fire in such a busy, open space, showing the disregard he has not only for the law, but the safety of the general public and innocent passers-by.' Pinnock, from Longsight, south Manchester, was killed after the Kawasaki motorbike he was riding was involved in a collision with a BMW in Manchester on April 8, 2020. In 2015, he was jailed for 11 years after stabbing two men following a row in a pub in the city. A woman who was issued 14 tickets has won her second appeal to the Sixth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals in a dispute over whether a Michigan city violated the U.S. Constitution by chalking her car tires without a search warrant. And the decision could see all similar tickets in the city since 2014 refunded, if officials do not launch another appeal. Allison Taylor, 40, has already paid the price for her 14 parking tickets, but she's been challenging the legality of the practice of chalking since 2017. She had been parking in a time-limited lot near her work in Saginaw when she received tickets from the same officer, Tabitha Hoskins. Parking attendants in states throughout the U.S. have chalked tires with large white lines for decades in zones without meters to enforce time limits and issue tickets. In a lawsuit that began in 2017, Taylor argued that marking tires with chalk constituted an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. The Fourth Amendment's ban against unreasonable searches was triggered when a Saginaw parking enforcer applied chalk marks and returned two hours later to see if the car was still there. Allison Taylor, 40, of Saginaw, Michigan, won her second appeal against the City of Saginaw in the Sixth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals. If the city does appeal, her class action suit will refund ticketed drivers from April 2014 to present The practice of chalking has been going on for decades to mark cars being walked by police for overstaying the time limit Her lawyers, Phillip Ellison (left) and Matthew Gronda (right) have been fighting the case for five years. They are arguing that chalking cars goes against the Fourth Amendment by illegally searching a car without a warrant Taylor and her two lawyers - Phillip Ellison and Matthew Gronda - are fighting to reverse the city's appeal. In a decision made on August 25, the Sixth Circuit agreed for the second time that it violated the Fourth Amendment. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a ruling in favor of Saginaw and sent the case back to U.S. District Judge Thomas Ludington for the next steps. It was Taylor's second trip to the appeals court. As long as the City of Saginaw doesn't appeal again, Taylor's class-action case will allow all those affected within the three-year statute of limitations Taylor is suing the City of Saginaw, as well as Saginaw police officer Tabitha Hoskins. Daily Mail approached the police department for a comment The statute of limitation in the state of Michigan is three years from the start of the proceedings - meaning all ticketed drivers from April 5, 2014 to present day would receive a refund. 'This would affect thousands of people,' Ellison said. 'It's not the end of the road, yet. We're close, we're getting closer to the end.' Judge Richard Griffin, who presided over the case, said in a 3-0 opinion on Wednesday: 'For nearly as long as automobiles have parked along city streets, municipalities have found ways to enforce parking regulations without implicating the Fourth Amendment,' Taylor parked her car in a timed lot near her job in Saginaw while she acquired the 14 tickets. She received the tickets from the same officer Tabitha Hoskins 'Thus, tire chalking is not necessary to meet the ordinary needs of law enforcement, let alone the extraordinary,' he said. The defendant, alongside the City of Saginaw, Tabitha Hoskins would take notes and sometimes chalk tires in areas where there was a time limit but no meters. The city said chalking was a signal to motorists that vehicles were being watched. 'The city has significant interests that are furthered by enforcing its parking ordinances through the use of chalk, and these interests greatly outweigh the minimal intrusion that a chalk mark creates,' Saginaw said in a court filing. If Taylor wins her case, it will only affect the City of Saginaw, but Ellison said 'others are waiting' for this case to close. Decisions by the 6th Circuit set legal precedent in Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee. Despite the weighty constitutional question, there were light moments when the court heard arguments on July 29. 'I haven't gotten many parking tickets,' said Judge Joan Larsen, a former Michigan Supreme Court justice. 'Only because I have a reserved parking spot.' Daily Mail approached the Saginaw Police for a comment. American children are among at least 33 California residents trapped in Kabul, a former Navy intelligence officer and advocate for Afghan interpreters told DailyMail.com. El Cajon school district, near San Diego, announced Tuesday that at least 24 students and 16 parents from Afghan families who moved to the US after assisting the military are now stranded in the country's capital. Mike Serban, director of family and community engagement for Cajon Valley school district, said six families from his district were stranded, but confirmed that one family with five children have since been able to make it back to California Wednesday. Remaining are about 19 students and 14 parents. Amanda Matti, who served six years in the Navy, deployed to Iraq, and now works for charities helping Afghan and Iraqi interpreters, told DailyMail.com that the Cajon Valley residents and other Afghan green card holders flew to Afghanistan this summer to visit their relatives, perhaps for the last time, before US troops pulled out and the Taliban took over. 'This all happened right in the middle of summer vacation so it was the prime time when there would be the highest number of US permanent residents in [Afghanista],' she said. 'They all thought they had until September to get out. Many of them were scheduled to fly out the week that all this blew up.' This comes as two blasts at the Kabul airport Thursday killed up to 60 people, including 10 American troops and multiple children. DailyMail.com confirmed that one family with five children from El Cajon, California, have since been able to make it back to California Wednesday. Remaining are about 19 students and 14 parents. Pictured are people evacuating Afghanistan El Cajon school district near San Diego announced Tuesday that at least 24 students and 16 parents from Afghan families are now stranded in Kabul Matti said she has been in contact with a family of six, including green card-holding parents from El Cajon, who have been desperately struggling to get to a gate at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul to show their passports and visas. Amanda Matti, who served six years in the Navy, deployed to Iraq, said some of those trapped children are American citizens, born in the US in the last five years to their green card-holding parents 'A lot of the green card families, the parents have green cards and they've been here for a few years, they've had younger children that were born here, so those younger children are citizens,' the southern California-based Navy veteran told DailyMail.com. 'I'm in touch with a family who tried today and they just messaged me that they didn't make it. 'They're just going back to relatives or wherever they can that is somewhat safe and sheltering in place for now. 'We try to keep limited contact just for their safety. It's just been a matter of us trying to pass information to them from senators' offices or congressmen and women who are helping, who are in direct contact with State Department. 'They are trying to pass along information like ''hey tell them right now that it doesn't seem like the wait time at such and such gate is so long, have them try this gate, have them take a picture of themselves so we know what they're wearing and somebody can identify them.''' 'But there's such confusion right now and there's really no organization. 'They come here mainly to the El Cajon area outside San Diego because there was already a huge Iraqi refugee population here that resettled during the first Gulf war,' she said. 'There was already a 'Little Baghdad' area so they were like let's put Afghans there too. 'These are actual green card holders. Most of them settled here in 2016, 17 and 18. The summer time is a big time they go back and visit family for funerals and weddings.' Mike Serban, director of family and community engagement for Cajon Valley school district, said six families from his district were stranded, but confirmed that one family with five children have since been able to make it back to California Wednesday Matti served six years in the United States Navy, including a 2005 deployment to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. At age 22, she fell in love with her Iraqi translator, helped secure his passage to America and married him. Pictured with her husband and child Matti said that although Taliban fighters were not yet going from door to door looking for Americans and Western allies, the danger and tension in the city is palpable. '[The Taliban] don't seem to be singling anybody out at this time but it does seem to be getting worse,' she said. 'Right now as far as we know it just seems like they're more taking control of the city and trying to lock down the city. They're closing streets, closing roads and making it more difficult for people to get to the airport.' Matti served six years in the United States Navy, including a 2005 deployment to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. At age 22, she fell in love with her Iraqi translator, helped secure his passage to America and married him. Her husband was 'an Iraqi college student recruited right off his neighborhood street to translate for U.S. forces throughout the course of the Iraq War,' Matti said. The former intelligence analyst wrote about her romance in a novel, A Foreign Affair. Fairdoon Hashemi and Mohammad Sarfarez, bilingual community liaisons for Cajon Valley district school board's Family and Children Engagement program, were first contacted by a family trapped in Afghanistan on August 16. The family contacted the liaisons 'to please hold their spot at their local school,' Howard Shen, the school district's media contact, told DailyMail.com. Mike Serban confirmed that some of the Southern California children stranded in Kabul are US citizens. 'There's definitely some US citizens in that situation who were either born here or became US citizens here,' he said. Thursday's blast took place near the Baron Hotel at the Abbey Gate of the airport where huge crowds had gathered in an attempt to enter the airport Wounded women arrive at a hospital for treatment after two blasts, which killed at least five and wounded a dozen, outside the airport in Kabul on Thursday A suicide bomb caused a huge explosion outside Kabul airport with 'unknown casualties' just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terrorist attack Mike Serban said: 'Several of our families over summer break independently decided to go home to Afghanistan and see their extended family.' 'A lot of the families, their nuclear families are here but all their grandparents and everybody are still in Afghanistan,' Serban said according to CBS8. 'They're still in Afghanistan trying to find their way to the airport or on an airplane.' A spokesman for US Rep. Darrel Issa of California's 49th congressional district which encompasses San Diego County said the lawmaker is working to get them home. 'Congressman Issa and his staff are working diligently to determine the facts on the ground, any bureaucratic barriers that can be removed, and the best ways to help those stranded leave Afghanistan and return home safely. We won't stop until we have answers and action,' said Issa's communications director, Jonathan Wilcox. Cajon Valley School Board President Tamara Otero said: 'The biggest concern is that the Taliban closed the airport. 'We are so worried about our students that are stuck there. We'll do the best we can to get them out.' A woman who refused to put her mask back on at a public board meeting in Texas was carried out of the building in her chair by police. The Tuesday incident, which spread quickly online, comes weeks after an executive order by Governor Greg Abbott forbidding mask and vaccination mandates was overturned. The woman was wearing her mask when she arrived at the Northside Independent School District Board of Trustees meeting, district spokesman Barry Perez told KSAT. But at some point she removed it and refused to put it back on when asked by district officials and then police. 'The individual refused [to place her face covering back on], and then when asked to leave, also refused,' Perez said. 'Northside ISD police officers did then lift her chair and carried it, with her still seated, outside of the room.' 'The individual refused [to place her face covering back on], and then when asked to leave, also refused,' said Northside Independent School District representative Barry Perez. 'Northside ISD police officers did then lift her chair and carried it, with her still seated, outside of the room,' said district spokesperson Barry Perez Perez told MailOnline on August 26 that, to his knowledge, no charges were filed in the incident. 'The individual is not a school board member. I understand she is a parent. I am unable to confirm her name,' he said. Neither the district's police department involved, nor the San Antonio Police Department could be reached for comment or further information. A mask mandate in the school di]strict went into effect Monday, the district's first day of school, after it was passed August 17 by the board of trustees, according to KSAT. Attendees at the Northside Independent School District Board of Trustees meeting (held at the building pictured) spent much of their 45 minutes of public comment shouting at board members regarding their new mask mandate, KSAT reported. Other meeting attendees can be heard shouting in protest as the woman, calm in her seat, is lifted and carried out of the building. 'This is ridiculous,' said one man. 'This is tyranny,' a woman can be heard yelling. 'Are you f*cking kidding me?' said another man. 'Someone stop them,' said a male attendee. One man attempted to stand between the two officers carrying the woman out of the room, but quickly moved. Attendees at the meeting spent much of the 45 minutes of public comment at the meeting decrying the mandate to trustees, KSAT reported. 'Forcing kids to wear masks against their will is child abuse,' said one parent. 'You are instilling fear in them. I won't do that to my kids.' 'We are teaching them to fear the air is toxic and we are teaching them to fear each other,' said another parent. 'Were using our kids to fight our political battles, and that is wrong.' One man attempted to stand between the two officers carrying the woman out of the room, but quickly folded. Governor Greg Abbott signed an executive order last month banning mask and COVID-19 vaccination mandates, declaring that it would promote 'individual rights and responsibility' in the Lone Star State. But Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo - whose role is more similar to a mayor that a court judge - announced Thursday that all students in schools and child care centers from pre-K to 12th grade must wear a mask in school. Harris County joins Dallas and Bexar counties as well as the city of San Antonio in defying Abbott's executive order that prohibits any school or government entities from mandating mask wearing. A judge issued a temporary restraining order to prevent enforcement of Abbott's executive order. He defended his executive order. 'The path forward relies on personal responsibility - not government mandates,' Abbott said. 'The State of Texas will continue to vigorously fight the temporary restraining order to protect the rights and freedoms of all Texans.' The conflicting orders are currently being resolved and, in the meantime, some Texas schools have taken advantage of the restraining order to institute mask requirements as the school year begins. A software glitch in a controversial data-mining program used by the FBI allowed four employees to access classified data without permission for more than a year, the federal government has admitted. The breach was quietly disclosed in an August 24 court filing by attorneys prosecuting programmer Virgil Griffith, who was charged in 2019 with conspiring to violate the international emergency economic powers act. Prosecutors said data from Griffiths Facebook and Twitter accounts that it legally obtained in 2019 was later uploaded by the FBI to Palantir, a data-mining program that has been accused of using unethical technology to aid Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids. At least four FBI employees who were not part of the New York City prosecution team accessed the information between May 2020 and August 2021, the court filing said. The unauthorized employees were conducting investigations into other matters, when they accessed Griffiths social media files, according to the document. Prosecutors trying programmer Virgil Griffith with conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers act say they obtained a search warrant to legally access Griffith's private social media data Griffith was charged in November 2019 with violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act by traveling to North Korea to offer advice on how to use cryptocurrency and blockchain technology to evade sanctions Prosecutors said they became aware of the breach August 12 when an FBI agent received an email from a colleague, indicating an FBI analyst had accessed the private data while conducting an unrelated investigation. Based on communications with FBI personnel and Palantir employees, the government understands that this outside access to the search warrant returns was made possible because, when data is loaded onto the [Palantir] platform, the default setting is to permit access to the data to other FBI personnel otherwise authorized to access the platform, the court filing said. When the search warrant returns here were loaded onto the platform, those default settings were not changed to restrict access to the search warrant returns to the FBI personnel actually engaged in reviewing the search warrant returns pursuant to the warrants. The revelation didnt sit well for those in the business of defending consumer rights. Palantir blamed the glitch on FBI misusing the program, Jamie Court, president of Consumer Watchdog, told Dailymail.com. But the company really should put better controls in place so that it is not a default that multiple people in an organization as big as the FBI could access data that was meant to be restricted to other employees. Prosecutors say FBI agents were able to access the data because it wasn't restricted to those working on Griffith's case Court cautioned the platform to take measures that would prevent such privacy violations from happening again. Palantir stores some very sensitive data and it needs to take precautions that users dont make errors that allow widespread access to data that is meant to be classified, Court added. Security by design is critical to securing classified information. Palantir needs to adjust its programming so that even user error doesnt allow sensitive information outside of the circles it is meant for. Griffiths social media data has since been deleted from the platform, prosecutors said. Palantir, cofounded by billionaire Peter Theil, has been criticized for aiding ICE agents According to the court filing, a now-retired FBI agent was the first to conduct an unauthorized search on the platform on May 4, 2020. The data was accessed again between August 6 and August 19 by an FBI analyst who viewed at least some of Griffiths data, the court filing said. The data later viewed by at least two other FBI employees, the prosecution said. Griffith was charged in November 2019 with violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act by traveling to North Korea to offer advice on how to use cryptocurrency and blockchain technology to evade sanctions, the Department of Justice said. Prosecutors say Griffith's social media data has since been deleted from the platform As alleged, Virgil Griffith provided highly technical information to North Korea, knowing that this information could be used to help North Korea launder money and evade sanctions, Geoffrey Berman, then-U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a statement following the arrest. In allegedly doing so, Griffith jeopardized the sanctions that both Congress and the president have enacted to place maximum pressure on North Koreas dangerous regime. While speaking at the Pyongyang conference in April 2019, he talked about how North Korea could use cryptocurrency to 'achieve independence from the global banking system,' according to a criminal complaint. The conference was attended by 100 people, prosecutors said, including several who appeared to work for the North Korean government. The criminal complaint Griffith planned to facilitate the exchange of cryptocurrency between North and South Korea and encouraged other US citizens to attend the same conference next year. Palantir, which was cofounded by billionaire Peter Theil, has been criticized for aiding ICE agents preparing to conduct raids of undocumented immigrants. Griffiths lawyer did not respond to a request for comment. More than 90 per cent of female doctors have reported experiencing sexism at work, but just a quarter of those who either went through it or witnessed it have raised the issue, a survey has suggested. The British Medical Association said the statistics are 'appalling' and that their report into the problem makes for 'shocking' reading. Their survey of more than 2,000 doctors found that 84 per cent of all respondents felt there was an issue of sexism in the medical profession and almost three-quarters believe sexism acts as a barrier to career progression. More than half (56 per cent) of female doctors said they had received unwanted verbal conduct relating to their gender and almost a third (31 per cent) experienced unwanted physical conduct in the workplace. The equivalent figures for men were 28 per cent and 23 per cent respectively. One female junior doctor told the BMA: 'I have been asked to massage consultants' shoulders during surgical multidisciplinary team working.' More than a quarter (28 per cent) of men who took part in the survey said they have or had more opportunities during training because of their gender, in comparison to just 1 per cent of women respondents. Dr Patricia Moultrie, the deputy chairwoman of BMA Scotland, said she hoped that 'shining a light' on sexist behaviour would lead to a 'cultural shift' in the health service. More than 90 per cent of female doctors have reported experiencing sexism at work, but just a quarter of those who either went through it or witnessed it have raised the issue, a survey has suggested While 9 per cent of women respondents said they had never experienced sexism at work over the past two years, the figure for men was 51 per cent. The survey found that 44 per cent of women and 34 per cent of men had experienced or witnessed an issue of sexism but did not raise it, while 26 per cent of women and 19 per cent of men had raised it. Some 61 per cent of women said they felt discouraged to work in a particular specialty because of their gender while 70 per cent felt their clinical ability had been doubted or undervalued because of their gender. The survey and report was prompted by the experiences of a junior doctor Chelcie Jewitt, who said she had been 'completely ignored' by a consultant in favour of a male colleague. She said: 'I felt humiliated and belittled by the way I was spoken to and even though I knew I was tired after a gruelling set of night shifts, I couldn't shake the feeling of upset and anger. 'Two weeks after a consultant completely ignored my contributions in favour of a male doctor while I was handing over after a busy shift, I knew I couldn't just let it lie.' Dr Latifa Patel, the acting chair of the BMA's representative body, said: 'It is appalling that we are seeing these statistics, hearing these stories and talking about these inequalities in 2021. 'The report makes for shocking reading and there is no place for sexism in society. 'If we want to eradicate it, we all have a part to play. It's going to take a concerted effort and it won't be quick to fix, but sexism must stop.' BMA Scotland's Dr Moultrie said: 'The Sexism in Medicine report has presented us with the stark reality of what many doctors are living with on a daily basis, gender-based discrimination has no place in our health service and the figures from this recent survey make for challenging and uncomfortable reading for everybody. 'The report goes some of the way to highlighting the detrimental impact that sexist behaviour is still having on the medical profession, preventing people from entering particular specialties, impacting on their health and wellbeing and discouraging them from living the work life balance they want and need. 'We can only hope that shining a light on these poor behaviours will allow for a cultural shift to a more equal, diverse and inclusive NHS.' In a joint statement, Dr Vishal Sharma, the union's consultants committee chair, and Dr Sarah Hallett, junior doctors committee chair, said: 'The results of this survey are deeply concerning and show how far we - as a society - have yet to go to stamp out sexism in the workplace once and for all.' The BMA said it will develop recommendations to address the issues raised in the report. Overall, 2,458 BMA members responded to the email survey in March. Of these, 82 per cent of respondents were female and 16 per cent were male while the rest were non-binary, preferred not to say or preferred to self-describe. Experts said the findings should reassure parents and doctors Only one child suffered from severe symptoms after the jabs A study of 27 at-risk children in the UK found side effects from Pfizer were mild Children with underlying health conditions only suffer mild or moderate side effects from the Pfizer Covid vaccine that disappear within a few days, a study has found. A small study of 27 at-risk 12 to 15-year-olds in the UK that were double-jabbed with Pfizer found only one experienced severe tiredness, discomfort and agitation, while the rest had mild symptoms. Covid itself is a mild illness for the vast majority of children and many show no symptoms at all. But youngsters with underlying health conditions are at greater risk of severe illness, so children aged 12 to 15 who are clinically vulnerable or live with adults who are have been invited to get a vaccine. Children with neurological conditions such as muscular dystrophy and cerebral palsy accounted for 11 per cent of children hospitalised with Covid and 26 per cent of those with severe and fatal disease. It comes amid a debate on whether Covid jabs should be rolled out to all over-12s, especially as the return of schools is expected to lead to a rise in infections. The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, the UK's medicines watchdog, has approved the Pfizer and Moderna jabs for all over-12s. And NHS England has been told to prepare to give the age group vaccines in the coming weeks. But the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), which advises the Government on the rollout, has only approved Covid jabs in over-16s. The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, the UK's medicines watchdog, has approved the Pfizer and Moderna jabs for all over-12s. In the study of 27 children in the UK, all were given the Pfizer vaccine Parents reported their children to suffer from a sore arm, general discomfort, a fever and tiredness after the first and second doses, but the majority of these side effects were mild To understand the side effects of the Pfizer jab in vulnerable children, researchers at the Bristol Royal Hospital for Children asked the parents of 27 youngsters to record any side effects their children experienced after being vaccinated. The participating youngsters all suffered from neurological conditions, such as muscular dystrophy and cerebral palsy, along with medical conditions including epilepsy and immune deficiency. Three of the participants were in hospital during the study, 16 were boys and 21 were white. What were the most common side-effects among vulnerable 12 to 15-year-olds? Among 27 children at-risk from Covid who were given two doses of the Pfizer vaccine, six parents reported side effects that fit into four categories. Reported side effects after a first dose of Pfizer Discomfort: 10 Fatigue: 4 Fever: 3 Redness: 1 Reported side effects after a second dose of Pfizer Fatigue: 6 Discomfort: 5 Fever: 3 Redness: 2 Advertisement Parents of six children reported side effects after the first dose that were 'mild to moderate' and went away within three days. These included a mild rash, a headache, diarrhoea, sore throat, neck pain, difficult sleeping and low blood sugar. There was an exception, with one child who experienced severe tiredness and discomfort, combined with increased agitation. One family reported a change in seizure type but this was resolved a week after the vaccine. Five of the children had effects including diarrhoea, vomiting, armpit swelling and blisters around the mouth after the second dose. Fever was more common than in adult studies, with 13 per cent of the children having a temperature greater than 38C compared with 4 per cent in people aged between 16 and 55. Other recorded adverse events all resolved within a week, the study noted. The researchers said: Numbers were small but these data are especially important as they are representative of the children who are most likely to benefit from vaccination and parents and clinicians may have concerns regarding an increased risk of unexpected events. Russell Viner, Professor of Adolescent Health at University College London, said: These data are generally reassuring that the Pfizer Covid vaccine produces few side-effects in a group with severe disability and very high medical needs, although one child had severe fatigue and discomfort and another had a brief change in seizure type. This should reassure parents and doctors that there are no special precautions or issues with this vaccine in this small group of children. However these data can tell us very little about rare side effects or about vaccinating healthy teenagers or those with common conditions such as asthma and diabetes. For that we must await further data in the order of millions of doses. There were no cases of myocarditis reported, however US reports suggest this occurs in around 1 in 15,000 second vaccine doses in young men, so these data on 27 cases cant be informative about myocarditis. Furthermore, nearly 40 per cent of the teenagers had cardiac impairment and this may have obscured any issues. Harrowing new details have emerged in connection with the deadly shooting that claimed the life of a young father in Miami Beach on Tuesday, including how the suspected killer pointed a gun at the victim's one-year-old son and said, 'It's time to die.' Tamarius Davis, 22, a UPS driver from Georgia, was arrested on a count of murder for allegedly gunning down Dustin Wakefield, 21, who was visiting Miami Beach with his family, including his wife and baby son. Wakefield's uncle, Michael Wakefield, told DailyMail.com on Thursday that the gunman, whom he slammed as a 'dirt bag,' approached his nephew and other relatives at random as they were having dinner at an outdoor Mexican restaurant on Ocean Drive. 'The suspect came up to Dustin and said its time to die,' Michael recounted in a Facebook Messenger exchange. 'The suspect pointed the gun at my nephew['s] son then Dustin replied back to him saying hes just a baby and then Dustin stood in front of hes [sic] son and then he was shot.' According to the uncle, who was not present during the attack but was told about it by Dustin's mother, his nephew sustained multiple gunshot wounds, including to the head. As it was previously reported by news outlets citing eyewitness accounts, Davis then allegedly celebrated by dancing over Dustin's body as he lay dying on the ground. 'You cant wrap your head around this type of evil,' the uncle said. Scroll down for video This image provided by the Miami-Dade Police Department shows Tamarius Davis Jr (left), police say who fatally shot a tourist, Dustin Wakefield, 21 (right), eating dinner with his family at a Miami Beach restaurant on Tuesday. Family said Wakefield died protecting his son Video showed Davis celebrating the killing by dancing, reportedly on top of Wakefield's body Michael added that he was not surprised that Dustin had put himself in harm's way to protect his son, saying that despite his young age, Dustin was an 'old soul with honor and pride' who always put his family first. 'Dustin was a true light in this world,' he added. After his arrest, Davis, of Norcross, Georgia, told investigators he shot Dustin because he 'was high on mushrooms, which made him feel empowered,' according to his arrest report. Michael Wakefield vehemently rejected Davis' explanation, arguing that being under the influence was no accuse for his purported actions. 'The moment he took the drugs It was a conscious decision on his part that changed his life and Dustins life forever in his own hands,' the uncle stated. 'We have to be accountable for our decisions that we make in life...' The victim's family are still grappling with many unanswered questions, including how Davis ended up at the restaurant on Tuesday? Where did he get the gun, and why did he choose to attack Dustin? When asked what would he like to tell Davis, if given the chance to address him, Michael Wakefield replied: 'I would say to him its too bad you didnt have five minutes to sit down and talk to Dustin you wouldve walked away after that conversation friend for life. 'You took away Dustins life. But Dustins Spirit and light will shine bright for the rest of time.' The uncle added: 'I hope Dustins face and spirit never leaves your mind and soul.' Davis allegedly told police he approached the patio area of the La Cerveceria restaurant just before 6.30pm and randomly decided to shoot Wakefield, who was on vacation from Castle Rock, Colorado with his young wife and their son. In a short video taken immediately after the shooting and obtained by WSVN-TV, the gunman can be seen dancing while people are heard screaming. The gunman then walks up some steps, the weapon in his hand. The incident took place at La Cerveceria restaurant in Miami Beach on Tuesday A photo of the Winter Haven hotel, where the gunman first opened on a passerby before allegedly killing Dustin Wakefield moments later A witness told CBS Miami that after the shooting, Davis celebrated by dancing over or on top of Wakefield. Wakefield was rushed to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where he died of his injuries. The victim's uncle said of his nephew, who worked in construction, 'He was the kindest kid. He loved his family. He loved being a dad.' Dustin's father and stepmother, Matt and Angela Wakefield, released a statement to Denver7, highlighting their son's 'love and generosity,' and praising his act of heroism that saved his baby's life. 'For us, his family, he was the best son/brother/uncle/cousin/nephew/grandson you could ask for,' the Wakefields stated. 'His heart always put others first, even from a young age. As a man, he was a faithful and loving husband. Karina is the love of his life, and she knows it. His love for her should inspire us. 'As a father he was full of love and pride. His son knows he is loved. As a friend, there is not a person alive who did not feel his kindness, acceptance and love always from him.' The statement continued: 'We take great pride and comfort in the fact that we were blessed with the man who stepped in front of the bullet to save others. He has always been and he will continue to be our hero.' Davis was arrested in an alley a short time later. He was said to have told cops he shot Wakefield at random because he 'was high on mushrooms, which made him feel empowered' Davis is pictured during his initial court appearance on Wednesday. Judge Mindy Glazer ordered him held without bond Davis fled the restaurant, police said, and was captured in a nearby alley. Cellphone video obtained by the Herald shows Davis lying spread-eagle on his back and smiling as three officers approach with their guns pointed towards him yelling commands, warning him that if he touches his gun he will be shot. Davis then rolled onto his side into a fetal position, before again rolling onto his back as officers approached. Davis screamed 'I did it, I did it, I did it' as officers flip him onto his stomach and handcuff him. The video shows a black handgun lying about 10 feet away. Tommy Davis, the suspects father, told The Associated Press that his son, who works as a UPS driver, had traveled to Miami Beach with some friends. He said his son has never been in trouble or had mental health issues. No arrest record for the younger Davis could be found. 'This is an unlikely thing,' the senior Davis said. We are trying to find out what happened. You can imagine we were shocked.' Wakefield was visiting Miami Beach with his wife and young son from their home in Castle Rock, Colorado According to family, Wakefield worked construction and loved being a dad He said he didnt know whether his son would ingest mushrooms or other drugs. 'You think you know your kid, but you dont,' he said. 'It is possible someone gave him something. That is something we need to find out.' Davis is charged with second-degree murder, and also for attempted murder for allegedly shooting at another man while chasing him moments before Wakefield's killing. Police said the man Davis was chasing escaped unharmed, reported Local 10. During his initial court appearance, Judge Mindy Glazer ordered Davis held in the Miami-Dade County Jail without bond, telling him: 'you shot and killed somebody in cold blood.' A GoFundMe campaign has been launched to support Wakefield's family, including his wife of two years and their son. The FBI paid a white supremacist leader who is connected to a neo-Nazi book publisher more than $140,000 to be a confidential informant in the takedown of a neo-Nazi organization, court documents show. Documents filed in federal court August 13 describe the informant as a 'convicted felon' who 'currently owns and operates a publishing company that distributes white supremacist writings.' The man began his 16-year-long career 'as a professional informant in exchange for consideration regarding his sentence on a federal conviction for possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number and an unregistered silencer.' He worked with the FBI on a case to crack down on the Texas-based terrorist neo-Nazi organization, the Atomwaffen Division and its leader Kaleb Cole. While Joseph Caleb Sutter, 40, is not named in the court documents filed this month, the connection is clear, as reported by VICE. The FBI paid a white supremacist leader who is connected to a neo-Nazi book publisher over $140,000 to be a confidential informant in the takedown of a neo-Nazi organization. the suspected CI is Joseph Caleb Sutter, 40, (pictured above) Sutter is assumed to be the CI due to the description of the informant in court documents Sutter, a former Aryan Nations white supremacist leader and leader of the Rural Peoples Party in his guise of Hindu priest, Shree Shree Kalki-Kalaratri at the Hindu New Bihar Mandir temple located on Sutters rural South Carolina property Sutter runs the Martinet Press which publishes books approved by extremist groups such as Liber 333 On The Temple of Blood Sutter was on the Southern Poverty Law Center's list of extremists alongside well-known terrorist such as David Duke. His father, David Sutter, is a fundamentalist Christian preacher and well-known South Carolina white supremacist leader. He has led several extremist groups including the Aryan Nations, the Rural People's Party (RPP), and the Church of the Sons of Yaweh. In February 2003, he was arrested for purchasing illegal automatic pistols with their serial numbers scraped off, and possession of silencers in a foiled plot to launch bomb attacks in a domestic terror campaign to overthrow the government. He served time in a Georgia federal prison but swiftly scheduled for release on November 2004. When he returned to his home state of South Carolina, married a woman named Jillian Hoy. Sutter and Hoy run the Martinet Press, a book publisher known to endorse and be endorsed by neo-Nazi groups. The Martinet Press 'a decidedly darker spiritual press', publishes literature focusing on extremist ideologies such as of esotericism, occultism, nihilism, and Satanism. Books published by Martinet Press such as Iron Gates and Liber 333 are known to be Atomwaffen Division-approved material. Sutter has lead several extremist terrorist groups including the Aryan Nations, the Rural People's Party (RPP), and the Church of the Sons of Yaweh Literature form the Rural People's Party (RPP) a pro-North Korea group which embraced both Kim Il Sungs Juche ideology and that of Jim Jones as its twin political mentors Sutter runs the Martinet Press with his wife Jillian Hoy (pictured above) whom he met after serving time in a Georgia federal prison The parallels between the description of the FBI informant and Sutter are strong enough to form a connection. The recent court documents state that the federal government employed the confidential informant and 'paid him handsomely.' 'Since 2003, he has been paid over $140,000 for this work. More importantly, the CI has been paid $78,133.20 plus an expense advance of $4,378.60 since February 7, 2018, which almost entirely coincides with his work on the investigation into Mr. Cole and Atomwaffen.' Sutter's potential involvement with the FBI has reportedly circulated through white supremacist groups since 2005. Sutter was essentially revealed as an FBI informant with Cole's recent motion to suppress all evidence seized during a search of his alleged residence. He claimed that the warrant used to search the premises 'failed to establish probable cause to search the home.' The defense also claims that the affidavit is insufficient because while it 'does not explicitly state that this information came from a CI, but defense counsel believes it does. Kaleb Cole (pictured above) has been identified as the leader of the Atomwaffen Division a terroristic neo-Nazi organization that formed out of Iron March, an influential fascist forum that went offline in fall 2017 He was charged last year for cyberstalking and sending Swastika-laden posters to journalists and an employee of the Anti-Defamation League. Pictured: Cole (right) posing in front of Auschwitz The information provided to the FBI by the CI appears to be the center of the federal charges brought against Cole. His defense team is arguing that information from the CI is not sufficient evidence to support his charges. Pictured: Cole (left) posing with a gun The use of informants is a controversial aspect of criminal law, but Sutter's intel appears to be the basis of the FBI's case against Cole. Cole has been identified as the leader of the Atomwaffen Division, which led a neo-Nazi campaign to threaten journalists and Jewish activists in three states. He and three other members of the terrorist group were charged last year for cyberstalking and sending Swastika-laden posters to journalists and an employee of the Anti-Defamation League. Enclosed notes said: 'You have been visited by your local Nazis,' 'Your Actions have Consequences,' and 'We are Watching.' Cole, has pleaded not guilty and is scheduled to face trial in September. Seattle police seized his guns in 2019 under an 'extreme risk protection order' that suggested he was planning a race war. He has been permanently banned from Canada after being identified as a 'member of an organization that might engage in terrorism,' according to court documents. The majority of Americans feel they cannot trust President Joe Biden and his administration when it comes to what they say about the situation in Afghanistan, according to a new poll released Thursday. Only 34 per cent of likely U.S. voters said they trust what Biden administration officials are saying regarding the chaotic scene in Kabul after the Taliban was able to take over the country in less than two weeks. In the Rasmussen Reports poll 54 per cent of respondents said they don't trust what administration officials are saying about the Afghanistan withdrawal and 11 per cent say they are unsure. The new survey was released as the administration continues to stonewall and deflect, and the president often refuses to take questions from the media on the matter. Unclear still is how many Americans are on the ground in Afghanistan and need evacuation before the impending August 31 deadline for a full U.S. troop withdrawal. The poll was taken August 24-25 among 1,000 likely U.S. voters. It was before two bombings at Kabul airport gates lead to 60 casualties, including four confirmed U.S. Marine deaths. The attacks also injured several other American service members and Afghans attempting to flee at the airport. 'We can confirm that a number of U.S. service members were killed in today's complex attack at Kabul airport,' Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby confirmed in a Thursday statement. 'A number of others are being treated for wounds.' 'We also know that a number of Afghans fell victim to this heinous attack.' Some reports indicate as many as 11 U.S. Marines and one Navy medic died in the bombings. Despite the chaotic scenes even before the Thursday attacks Biden rejected that there was violence at the airport and that Americans couldnt get there for evacuation. He also said in an interview last week that no one is being killed, even though there were already several deaths related to the disastrous airport evacuations last week. Only 34 per cent of likely U.S. voters feel they can 'trust' Joe Biden and his officials when it comes to information about the situation in Afghanistan The poll comes as Biden continues to deflect and refuse to speak with media about the chaotic scenes in Kabul BIDEN'S 'BALD-FACED LIES' OVER AFGHANISTAN WITHDRAWAL President Biden claimed in his interview on August 18 that chaos in Kabul was inevitable, but just six weeks ago at a White House briefing he said the Taliban takeover was 'NOT inevitable'. On the Taliban July 8: The likelihood there's going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely... it is not inevitable'. August 18: The idea that somehow, there's a way to have gotten out without chaos ensuing, I don't know how that happens. On the Afghan army July 8: I trust the capacity of the Afghan military, who more competent [than the Taliban] in terms of conducting war.' August 18: When you saw the significant collapse of the Afghan troops we had trained, that was -- you know I'm not -- that's what happened.' The Taliban swept to power in Afghanistan in less than two weeks after they took their first provincial capital. On the evacuation July 8: Our military mission in Afghanistan will conclude on August 31st. The drawdown is proceeding in a secure and orderly way' August 18: Americans should understand that we're going to try to get [the evacuation] done before August 31.' There are still around 15,000 Americans and allied citizens stranded in Afghanistan, with the Taliban deciding who can and can't reach the airport. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said: 'We don't have the capability to go out and collect up large numbers of people. On the Embassy July 8: Theres going to be no circumstance when youre going to see people being lifted off the roof of an embassy. Its not at all comparable [with Saigon].' The US embassy was closed on Sunday, August 15 with staff and the US flag hastily evacuated by chinook helicopter from the roof. On the Afghan government July 8: The Afghan leadership has the capacity to sustain the government in place.' August 18: 'You had the government of Afghanistan, the leader of that government, get in a plane and taking off and going to another country.' On Afghan translators July 8: 'We can guarantee their safety.' August 18: The Taliban control the area around Kabul airport and have shot and beaten crowds of people trying to get through for evacuation. Ex-US soldiers have said the lives of Afghans who helped the US are in grave danger and will likely be executed. Advertisement President Biden has still not weighed in on the attack or the confirmation that at least four U.S. Marines are dead because of it. The White House briefing by Press Secretary Jen Psaki was supposed to take place at 12:00 p.m. on Thursday but was postponed. A bilateral meeting between Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett was also put off. Biden canceled his virtual meeting with U.S. governors to discuss resettling Afghan refugees in their states and the State Department announced it was canceling its Thursday afternoon briefing. The White House COVID-19 briefing was also delayed indefinitely. The Pentagon will brief Americans on the situation in a 3:00 p.m. press conference. There are questions emerging over whether the U.S. will retaliate now that Americans were killed on the ground. Biden's National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan warned on Sunday that if there was any interference in evacuation efforts, there would be a 'forceful' response. 'If in the end Americans are blocked from getting to the airport, blocked from leaving the country, or our operations are disrupted or our evacuations are in some way interfered with, we have explained to them that there will be a swift and forceful response,' Sullivan told NBC News host Chuck Todd during an interview on Meet the Press on Sunday morning. Biden's original deal to get all troops out by August 31 had the caveat that the Taliban could not bring harm to U.S. service members on the ground or obstruct evacuation efforts. He has also doubled-down on his decision to remove troops and has reiterated as early as this week that he would keep to the August 31 deadline for troop withdrawal after the Taliban warned of 'consequences' if the 'red line' date was not met. As the president remains silent on the attack, Republicans are outraged and accuse Biden of having 'blood on his hands.' Senator Lindsey Graham urged the U.S. to take back control of Bagram airbase in the aftermath of two explosions at Hamid Karzai International Airport. 'I have advocated for days that the Bagram Air Base should be reopened as the Kabul airport is very difficult to defend and has been the only evacuation outlet,' the South Carolina Republican tweeted on Thursday. 'We have the capability to reestablish our presence at Bagram to continue to evacuate American citizens and our Afghan allies. The biggest mistake in this debacle is abandoning Bagram.' An ISIS-K suicide bomber blew himself up amid the swarms of people outside the airport Thursday. ISIS-K is also a sworn enemy of the Taliban. A second explosion was reported nearby a short time later at the airport's Abbey Gate, where crowds of Afghans have been gathering for more than a week in the hope of being put on one of the evacuation flights out of the country. The State Department has warned Americans to evacuate the area immediately. 'I urge the Biden Administration to reestablish our presence in Bagram as an alternative to the Kabul airport so that we do not leave our fellow citizens and thousands of Afghan allies behind. It is not a capability problem, but a problem of will,' Graham said. The poll was released before two bombings near the Kabul airport where reports say 11 Marines and one Navy medic were killed along with dozens of other Afghans trying to flee the country 'The retaking of Bagram would put our military at risk, but I think those involved in the operation would gladly accept that risk because it would restore our honor as a nation and save lives.' Lawmakers were briefed on the situation this week by Biden's national security team. Meanwhile, Democrat Foreign Affairs Committee chair Sen. Bob Menendez, said: 'This is a full-fledged humanitarian crisis and US government personnel ... must secure the airport.' 'As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We can't trust the Taliban with Americans' security.' House Republican leader Representative Kevin McCarthy called on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to bring back the lower chamber so that lawmakers can be briefed on the situation. 'Today's attacks are horrific. My prayers go out to those who were injured and the families of those who were killed. I also continue to pray for the safety of our troops, the stranded American citizens, our allies and Afghan partners who remain in the area. Our enemies have taken advantage of the chaotic nature of the withdrawal,' the California Republican said in a statement. 'It is time for Congress to act quickly to save lives. Speaker Pelosi must bring Congress back into session before August 31 so that we can be briefed thoroughly and comprehensively by the Biden Administration and pass Representative Gallagher's legislation prohibiting the withdrawal of our troops until every American is out of Afghanistan.' Other lawmakers submitted an outpouring of prayers for American troops on the ground and Afghans fleeing the country. Still nothing from the president. Sky News' Stuart Ramsay has recounted how his team was 'ejected' from Kabul, claiming the move was made 'on MoD or Whitehall orders' to prevent filming of the withdrawal from Afghanistan. The outlet's chief correspondent had been reporting on the desperate attempts of thousands to flee the country after the Taliban took control of the capital on August 15. In an article for Sky News, written before the evacuation area was hit by two explosions on Thursday, Ramsay recalled being 'kicked out' of a British evacuation base. 'The operational commanders wanted us to stay to the very end and leave with them, but the orders to remove us came from the MoD or from Whitehall, or both,' Ramsay wrote. 'We had fought to stay for days but ultimately we found ourselves on a military base and we were being ejected - there is nothing you can do. 'It was all conducted in a cordial manner, but we WERE kicked out. Ramsay, who has been reporting from Kabul airport, said: 'It was all conducted in a cordial manner, but we WERE kicked out' Sky News' Stuart Ramsay has recounted how his team was 'ejected' from Kabul, claiming the move was made 'on MoD or Whitehall orders' to prevent filming of the withdrawal from Afghanistan 'I suspect the prospect of the withdrawal being filmed in heart-breaking detail was a risk the government wasn't prepared to take, because this will end badly for thousands, I guarantee it,' the veteran reporter said. Ramsay was among the journalists documenting the scramble to evacuate foreign nationals and Afghans from Kabul before the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces from the country. Even before Thursday's deadly explosions, Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport had seen days of chaotic scenes as thousands tried desperately to secure safe passage out of the country. Stuart Ramsay was among the journalists documenting the international withdrawal from Afghanistan As the deadline draws closer, Western powers have expressed concerns about the ability to evacuate all foreign nationals, and worries are mounting over reports that the Taliban are preventing Afghan citizens, some of whom aided international efforts in the country - and are therefore at risk, from travelling to the airport area. In his article, Ramsay expressed guilt over the ease with which he was able to leave compared to those still struggling for safety. 'We felt guilty we were leaving - myself, my producer Dominique, Sky colleague Martin, and Toby. An easy exit for a group of journalists guaranteed safety by our soldiers and our governments.' But, he wrote, that the team's presence had ensured the desperation of the situation was broadcast to the world. 'No end of news conferences and ministerial interviews will hide the fact that any of the discussions about 31 August deadlines or extensions were hiding some basic truths: 'The Taliban are in control, the Western powers have little influence and the tens, even hundreds, of thousands, who had legitimate rights and expectations to be protected and removed by their former employers, are being abandoned,' he wrote' '...If we hadn't been there, nobody would have seen any of the scenes of horror and desperation that have engulfed this entire operation, none of the incredible work by the British military, and the Foreign and Home Office staff.' Ramsay described his team's journey to the airport, during which the convoy he was travelling in 'passed the hundreds knee-deep in sewage, pleading to have their cases heard with soldiers from across the world, looking down into the stinking water six feet below.' According to Pentagon figures, there are 10,000 people waiting inside the airport, but outside the numbers struggling to get in are far greater. 'Everywhere one looked, people were sleeping rough, sheltering beneath sheets, waiting for their turn,' Ramsay wrote. The Sky News team travelled aboard a U.S. plane full of Afghan refugees to Doha, Qatar. '[The other passengers] will go to countries, communities and cultures that are utterly alien. But they will survive,' Ramsay wrote. According to Pentagon figures, there are 10,000 people waiting inside the airport, but outside the numbers struggling to get in are far greater 'I can't get the faces of those left behind out of my mind, standing in sewage, pleading for help. I never will.' Ramsay wrote that he had spoken to an officer at the Kabul camp his team had been ejected from before sitting down to write his article. 'I asked him what it was like. He told me it was grim and that between 15 and 30 hardcore Taliban had taken over the entrance and were beating people. 'I asked if it was going to end badly. '100% Stuart. 100%.' On Thursday, twin bomb attacks rocked Kabul airport, in which the Taliban said at least 13 people were killed. The BBC later reported that at least 60 were dead and 140 others injured, citing a senior Afghan health official. The explosions hit outside the Abbey Gate, where US and British forces have been stationed, and at a nearby hotel. American servicemen are among the dead, according to the Pentagon and US media. The attack followed warnings that the large crowds of people gathering to evacuate could become a target for an attack by militants. A man from Liverpool who travelled to Afghanistan to rescue his family said he won't sleep due to the blood he saw as 'hundreds' of people were blown up in front of him in Kabul. Habib Rahman, 30, who has lived in Toxteth for almost 15 years, travelled to Afghanistan last week to bring his family back to the UK after the Taliban took control of the capital. After journeying more than 200 miles to reunite with his wife, children and step-brother, Habib returned to Kabul to fly back to the UK ahead of the August 31 deadline. While queueing at the airport, Habib was just a few yards away from the Abbey Gate of Kabul's airport, where one of the two suicide bomb blasts went off this afternoon. He told the Liverpool Echo: 'We were just a few yards away from where the incident happened. I have seen people run out and passing, each covered in blood. 'I saw hundreds of people blown up in front of me. I won't sleep because of the blood I have seen today.' Habib and his family suffered minor injuries in the explosion but said they were safe. The Rahman family are now desperately trying to get back to the UK and are worried about where they will sleep tonight. Habib said: 'I need to get back, I need to get to a safer place. I have kids and we are in extreme danger. 'We have nowhere to stay in Kabul and I'm not going back to our house as it is 100 miles away. 'We are so desperate, please help.' On Thursday, twin bomb attacks rocked Kabul airport, in which the Taliban said at least 13 people were killed. Private military contractor Erik Prince warned of further attacks on Kabul airport on Thursday as he condemned the decision to close Bagram air base in favor of a location surrounded by hills and four and half million people. He is the latest operations expert to say that the U.S. operation has been badly hampered by relying on an airport in the middle of a city controlled by the Taliban. The evacuation effort all but shut down after two suicide attacks killed dozens of people in Kabul. Prince, who founded Blackwater and was condemned this week for offering flights out of Kabul for $6500 per passenger, said he feared more attacks. 'I am very worried about attacks on any of the outgoing aircraft,' he told Steve Bannon's War Room podcast. 'Again, the individual in the US government who decided to give up Bagram, our largest airbase in the region - which is actually defendable - to say we're gonna do our final staging out of Kabul, a, an airport in the middle of a city of four and a half million surrounded on hills by three sides, where just ten guys, with a couple of motor tubes can shut the whole place down and destroy billions of dollars of US aircraft and kill 1000s of people on those aircraft, and that's what I'm afraid we're in store for over the next few days, a few hours.' Erik Prince, Blackwater founder, said the U.S. should have kept Bagram air base open and warned of more attacks against Kabul airport The blast happened as Afghans pressed forward seeking escape at Kabul airport Abandoning Bagram air base before withdrawing American civilians and Afghan allies was a major tactical mistake, according to senior national security experts, leaving U.S. forces reliant on a civilian airport, with a single runway in the heart of a city controlled by the Taliban Bagram was once the hub for the entire U.S. and NATO operation in Afghanistan. An hour's drive from the Afghan capital it was the epicenter of Operation Enduring Freedom He spoke after the Department of Defense confirmed that U.S. military personnel were among the dead in Kabul. The comments follow a string of other experts who have said Bagram, 25 miles to the north of the Afghan capital, would have provided a more secure evacuation hub. Last week, Bill Roggio, an army veteran and a former soldier and senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, demanded the resignation of the Centcom Commander U.S. Marine Corps Gen. Frank McKenzie for closing the base. 'You do not need to be a West Point and War College grad, or a grand strategist to know this was a recipe for disaster,' he said. '2nd lieutenants know this plan is a dumpster fire. Our general officer class as a whole is rotten to the core and must be held accountable.' But others disagree. A number of CIA veterans who have served at the base, told DailyMail.com it could be reached only by a single asphalt road, crossing two ridge lines and passing through built up areas outside Kabul, providing several ambush points. U.S. troops closed the hub of their Afghan military operations in early July. They slipped out of Bagram Air Base in the middle of the night, turning off the electricity without informing the Afghan commander who was due to take over. Last week Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said his orders were to secure the embassy and that he did not have sufficient troops to also keep Bagram open 'If we were to keep both Bagram and the embassy going that would be a significant number of military forces, that would have exceeded what we had,' he told reporters. 'We had to collapse one or the other.' U.S. troops slipped out of Bagram Air Base at night on July 2. Afghan forces surrendered to the Taliban on Sunday. Security experts said it should have been the last thing to close as U.S. forces headed home Prince's comments come after he was criticized for charging for his rescue efforts. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Wednesday that she found the business distasteful. 'I don't think any human being who has a heart and soul would support efforts to profit off of people's agony and pain if they're trying to depart a country and fearing for their lives,' she said. Prince, a staunch supporter of Donald Trump, whose sister Betsy DeVos served as Trump's education secretary, has long been a highly controversial figure. He first came under international scrutiny after his Blackwater contractors killing 17 Iraqi civilians in 2007. But military experts said private military contractors were part of any conflict, charging clients for security, advice and assistance. Prince's effort was no different, they said. Prince defended his actions, saying the criticism was a 'badge of honor. 'I'm certainly not in to make money.. But like I said before, I can't just will an owner of an aeroplane to fly their uninsured jet into a war zone to rescue people,' he said. 'I have to charge something.' House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy is urging House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call lawmakers in Congress's lower house back into session before President Joe Biden's August 31 deadline for a full withdrawal from Afghanistan. He made the statement Thursday after two suicide attacks in Kabul, likely performed by an Afghan ISIS affiliate, reportedly killed 60 people including 11 US Marines and a Navy medic. McCarthy is demanding the House pass a bill to get every American out of Afghanistan after Biden's decision to stick to the August 31 date drew outrage and despair from lawmakers, activists and international allies. Pelosi and other congressional leaders were briefed on the ongoing situation by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin Thursday, she stated in a letter to House colleagues. In his statement on Twitter McCarthy writes, 'Horrific. Our enemies have taken advantage of the chaotic nature of Biden's withdrawal,' seemingly referencing the deadly blasts. 'Speaker Pelosi must bring Congress back before Aug 31 so we can be briefed thoroughly by the Administration and prohibit the withdrawal of our troops until every American is safely out.' GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy took to Twitter demanding Speaker Nancy Pelosi call the House back into session before President Joe Biden's August 31 deadline for a full troop withdrawal McCarthy blasted Biden on Twitter and demanded Pelosi bring the House back, prompting a response from Pelosi's Deputy Chief of Staff Drew Hammill Pelosi's Deputy Chief of Staff hit back at McCarthy on Twitter, writing: 'Right now, American heroes are risking & giving their lives to execute an extraordinarily dangerous evacuation, & the Minority Leader wants to defund the mission & tie the Commander in Chiefs hands in the middle of the most dangerous days of the operation.' 'Whats not going to help evacuate American citizens is more empty stunts & distraction from the Minority Leader who sat idly by as Pres. Trump proudly negotiated with the Taliban. The Biden Administration has repeatedly briefed the Congress & providing frequent updates each day.' Congress is normally on summer recess for the month of August, when lawmakers are meant to spend time connecting with constituents in their home districts. Republican Rep. Dan Crenshaw, an Afghanistan veteran, supported McCarthy's demand The Democrat-controlled House returned briefly earlier this week and advanced Biden's $3.5 trillion infrastructure agenda and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. Both votes fell on party lines. But now McCarthy wants the House back in session to combat Biden's looming deadline. A full withdrawal on August 31 would likely strand thousands of Afghans and even some American citizens in the Taliban-controlled country. There were up to 1,500 Americans in Afghanistan looking to leave as of Wednesday. The Pentagon denied reports that the US was actually going to withdraw within 36 hours. The denial was issued before the two attacks, which occurred on Thursday afternoon local time in Kabul. One blast occurred near the Abbey Gate checkpoint at Hamid Karzai International Airport, where crowds of desperate people trying to flee were attempting to make their way past Taliban guards to foreign forces - many that claimed to have paperwork that would allow them safe passage. Horrific scenes emerged out of Kabul after two separate explosions rocked the city Volunteers and medical staff bring an injured man for treatment after the two powerful explosions Injured people were seen carried to a hospital amid reports that as many as 60 people were killed in the blasts But Taliban guards used violence to break up the mass of people, including a water cannon and reportedly even turned away citizens of Western nations, despite promising to let anyone but Afghan civilians through. In addition to US service members, the Taliban told Reuters that many of its fighters were killed in the blast. The second occurred near the Baron Hotel, where foreign nationals waiting to evacuate are staying. While her staffers played defense, Pelosi drew outrage for posting on Twitter and releasing a formal statement on Women's Equality Day after the two confirmed blasts were reported. One of her tweets also referenced Biden's massive infrastructure package. Pelosi is speaking an event in San Francisco today where she and Mayor London Breed 'commemorate Women's Equality Day.' She released a statement on Afghanistan Thursday afternoon after criticism over her silence. 'The United States House of Representatives strongly condemns the heinous terrorist attack outside Kabul airport. We mourn the loss of every innocent life taken, and we join every American in heartbreak over the deaths of the servicemembers killed,' Pelosi wrote. On the day of the explosions Pelosi is speaking at a Women's Equality Day event in San Francisco. She released a statement on Kabul on Thursday afternoon She added that she requested the White House 'continue to brief Members' and said 'Committees of Jurisdiction' will continue to hold briefings on the crisis in Afghanistan. But a slew of GOP lawmakers already balked at her silence before the statement. '@SpeakerPelosi has tweeted about Biden's "Build Back Better" plan, but not a word about the growing loss of American lives in Afghanistan,' Rep. Jim Banks wrote on Twitter. Rep. Dan Bishop wrote on the site: 'How is this read? There is an ongoing terrorist attack at the airport in Kabul. Marines and soldiers have died in service to our nation. Yet, Speaker Pelosi is tweeting about Biden's socialist wish list.' Rep. Dan Crenshaw, a military veteran who lost his eye in an IED explosion in Afghanistan, tweeted in support of McCarthy's demand to return the House to session. A Florida woman who battled COVID in a hospital returned home to find her husband dead of the virus in their bedroom after the couple opted out of getting vaccinated. Lisa Steadman, 58, is mourning the loss of her husband, Ron Steadman, 55, who she found dead after she battled COVID at Winter Haven Hospital for over a week. 'It was like walking into a horror film, and I wish I had never seen him like that because I can't get that picture out of my head,' Lisa Steadman tearfully told FOX 13. Lisa Steadman, 58, (right) is mourning the loss of her husband, Ron Steadman, 55, (left) who she found dead in their bedroom after struggling with COVIDat a local hospital for over a week Ron Steadman (left) tested positive for COVID-19 at a walk in clinic before Lisa (right) also tested positive for COVID Ron's doctor told Lisa her husband had died from COVID-related complications. Neither of the Steadmans were vaccinated. She said they were waiting to feel comfortable enough to take but after the harrowing experience she will take the vaccine as soon as she can. 'Both of us felt that it hadn't been tested enough yet,' Steadman told WFLA. 'Now after being in the hospital and talking with my doctor, when I am able to take it, I will in September.' Lisa's nightmare began when her husband tested positive for COVID-19 at a walk-in clinic before she got her own positive COVID results. Steadman said her husband was in good condition and all seemed well despite the positive test. 'They sent him home with medicine and stuff because he wasn't in distress or anything. It was just like he had a bad cold,' she said. But then Lisa also came down with COVID-19 and had to be rushed to the emergency room after passing out. She said at the hospital she began to feel the more serious symptoms of COVID. 'I thought I was going to die. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't stop throwing up,' she told FOX 13. She recalled how weak she felt at one point. 'It is like you don't have no bones in your body. You can't move. You're just that weak.' An emotional Steadman recalls the moment she walked in on her husband's dead body 'I wish I had never seen him like that because I can't get that picture out of my head,' she said through tears. Ron's doctor told Lisa her husband had died from COVID-related complications Neither of the Steadmans was vaccinated because they were waiting to feel comfortable enough to take the vaccine but now Lisa says she will take the vaccine as soon as she can Steadman spent over a week at the hospital and stayed in contact over the phone with her husband who was at home recovering. But a few days into her stay, Ron told Lisa his phone couldn't charge and after failing to get in contact with him she asked Winter Haven police to check on her husband. When officers performed a wellness check, all seemed to be alright with Ron but when Lisa was released from the hospital two days later on August 18 she made the grim discovery. In addition to finding Ron dead, the couple's dogs were near death from lack of food and water, WFLA.com reported. On top of losing her husband, Lisa has had to pay a cleaning crew $800 to clean the bedroom where her husband's body was discovered and replace bedroom furniture. 'They were in there all of 15 minutes. They cut the part of the mattress that had the waste on it,' Steadman said. She is raising money to help pay for the unexpected cost through a Facebook fundraiser that has garnered over $3,000. In an update on Wednesday Steadman said she was re-admitted to the E.R and is still struggling with COVID-19 symptoms 'Lord help me through this!' she last posted. A new sign posted at Norway's river border with Russia reminds tourists feeling nature's call that it's against the law to pee in the direction of Russia - on pain of a hefty fine. The sign posted on the banks of the Jakobselva river that separates Norway from Russia reads: 'No Peeing Towards Russia'. It is placed next to an official signpost informing people that the area is under video surveillance by Norwegian border guards. 'The sign was probably posted by well-intentioned people to warn passers-by against offensive behaviour,' The sign posted on the banks of the Jakobselva river that separates Norway from Russia reads: 'No Peeing Towards Russia' Norway's border commissioner Jens-Arne Hoilund told AFP, confirming a report on the internet site Barents Observer, which posted a picture of the new sign. Those caught face a fine of 3,000 kroner (290 euros, $340). The area is popular with tourists on the Norwegian side, where you can easily see Russia just a few metres away across the river. 'Urinating in nature is not necessarily offensive but it depends on your point of view. In this case it falls under the law banning offensive behaviour at the border,' Hoilund said. A Norwegian law prohibits 'offensive behaviour at the border intended for the neighbouring state or its authorities.' According to Hoilund, who is tasked with ensuring that agreements regulating neighbourly relations between Norway and Russia are respected, Russian authorities have never complained about urination incidents at the border. 'You may think that's severe, but we just apply the border rules as they are,' Hoilund said. Norway's 197.7-kilometre (123-mile) land border with Russia is NATO's northern border in the Arctic. Oslo and Moscow have traditionally enjoyed good relations, though tensions have risen since Russia's 2014 invasion of the Crimean peninsula. The EU's former chief negotiator on Brexit, Michel Barnier has announced he plans to stand as a right-wing candidate against centrist President Emmanuel Macron in next year's presidential elections. 'In these grave times, I have taken the decision and have the determination to stand... and be the president of a France that is reconciled, to respect the French and have France respected,' he told the evening news show of TF1 television in a live interview on Thursday. Barnier, who is entering an increasingly crowded field on the right, cited his long experience in politics as giving him an edge in the race including the 'extraordinary' negotiations to find a deal on Britain's exit from the European Union. He said during the years-long process he had to work 'with heads of state and government to preserve the unity of all the European countries'. Asked why he wanted to challenge Macron - with whom he had worked closely in the Brexit process - Barnier replied that he wanted to 'change the country'. Michel Barnier made the announcement on Thursday, saying he wants to 'be the president of a France that is reconciled, to respect the French and have France respected' Seeking to strike a more right-wing tone than the president, he spoke of needing to 'restore the authority of the state' as well as 'limit and have control over immigration', reaffirming a proposal for a moratorium on arrivals. He also told the Le Figaro daily in an interview published online Thursday that while France should offer asylum to Afghans who had helped French forces 'we cannot welcome everyone'. He said the moratorium was needed to 'review all procedures' and come to an agreement with the countries of origin 'so that they contribute to controlling migratory flows in return for French development assistance'. In February, Barnier set up a political faction under the 'Patriot and European' name, triggering rumours of a bid in next year's election. Less than a year before the April 10 first round of the presidential election, none of the former mainstream centre-left and centre-right parties, which were shut out by centrist Emmanuel Macron's victory in 2017, have chosen a candidate. Opinion polls show that French far-right politician Marine Le Pen is likely to face Macron again in the 2022 presidential final-round vote. Barnier, a 70-year-old former French foreign minister, is being closely watched by Macron's camp as he could attract support from the pro-European, centre-right electorate the president is targeting. The chances of the centre-right camp qualifying for the second round of the presidential election hinge on it unifying behind one candidate. Xavier Bertrand, who leads the northern region of Hauts de France, currently has the highest poll ratings among the mainstream centre-right candidates who have declared for the presidency. Emmanuel Macron has yet to officially declare his candidacy for a second term but it would be a sensation were he not to stand, despite occasional enigmatic pronouncements that nothing should be taken for granted But he has until now ruled out participation in any kind of primaries, which still have to be defined and may not even take place. France's main centre-right party, Les Republicains, said this summer it would wait until September 25 to decide on the way it will select its candidate for the presidential election. Valerie Pecresse, another former minister and current head of the wealthy Ile de France region, has vowed to take part in centre-right primaries as well as two other LR officials. Others, like Senator Bruno Retailleau and Laurent Wauquiez, another regional leader, might still enter the fray. Macron has yet to officially declare his candidacy for a second term but it would be a sensation were he not to stand, despite occasional enigmatic pronouncements that nothing should be taken for granted. A possible candidate on the left is the Socialist mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo who has yet to reveal her intentions but has hinted she is ready for a bid to be France's first female president. Keeping everyone guessing still is former prime minister Edouard Philippe, jettisoned by Macron last year after reportedly becoming too popular for his own good and who has issued no more than coded musings about his intentions. The threat of a car bomb attack on the airport in Kabul is 'high,' the Marine General who heads Central Command revealed Thursday even as the military continues to push through evacuations after a 'suicide' bomb attack. Marine Gen. Kennth McKenzie told reporters that a vehicle bomb is one of several threats confronting the airport in what is scheduled to be the final days of the U.S. evacuation. McKenzie, who called ISIS-K the likely perpetrator of the attack, said enemies are also interested in launching rocket attacks on the airport to try to disrupt the evacuation and kill Americans. 'We know that they would like to lob a rocket in there if they could,' he said, outlining three major potential threats. He also said terrorists are working to a 'suicide vehicle' of small to large size in proximity to the airport and the crowds. 'They're working all those options,' McKenzie said. Marine Gen. Kennth McKenzie warned that ISIS was seeking to carry out car bomb and other suicide attacks, while listing the threat posed by potential rocket attacks meant to target the U.S. evacuation in Kabul A third option is the one that appears to have succeeded: a person armed with a suicide vest. 'Weve just seen their ability to deliver a walk-in,' he said. The U.S. is adjusting to the new threats. To counter the rocket threat, there are and-rocket and mortar capabilities he called 'pretty effective.' He said there is a well-positioned boundary. He said the U.S. 'cut down the info we give the Taliban,' but also stressed the key role Taliban checkpoints provide in the security situation. 'We also use the Taliban as a tool to protect us as much as possible,' he said. He says the U.S. 'reached out to the Taliban' to get it to continue to push out the boundaries of security. He says the U.S. 'identified some roads that we would like for them to close.' The U.S. is taking new precautions at the crowded airport in Kabul Gen. McKenzie said the evacuation mission would continue McKenzie said ISIS-K was assessed to be behind the bomb attack A member of ther US military speaks with Afghan evacuees at the US Air Base Ramstein, Germany on August 26, 2021.'Theres no substitute for a young man or woman, a young U.S. man or woman conducting a search' at the airport, said McKenzie McKenzie said the U.S. had asked the Taliban to push back checkpoints, as he confirmed 12 U.S. service members had been kiilled A military aircraft takes off at the Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan, 26 August 2021 The military also has drones overhead providing surveillance and security, as well as manned aircraft. He specifically mentioned MQ-9 Reaper drones, which provide high-altitude armed surveillance. The military also AH-64 Apache attack helicopters, F-15 jets, and AC-130 gunships in the air. McKenzie said the gunship has a 'very highly capable targeting system.' He called it a 'very visible platform,' adding: 'We know from long experience that visual demonstrations of this kind of ISR tends to dissuade the attacker because they know that if we can see them and do it, we're going to strike them immediately.' 'We will be prepared to do that should it become necessary to defend the base,' he said. But McKenzie said checkpoints manned by U.S. troops to search people entering the airport for potential threats were vital, despite the risks of exposure. 'Theres no substitute for a young man or woman, a young U.S. man or woman conducting a search,' he said. McKenzie also pointed to the threat of outgoing aircraft which could result in a mass-casualty event. 'They have taken shots at our aircraft on occasion, without affect. We think thats going to continue,' he predicted. McKenzie confirmed 12 US soldiers have died and at least 15 have been injured in attacks. They include 11 US marines and a Navy medic. 'As you know, two suicide bombers, assessed to be ISIS fighters, detonated in the vicinity of the Abbey Gate at the airport and in the vicinity of the Baron Hotel. 'The attack on the Abbey Gate was followed by an attack by ISIS gunmen, who opened fire on civilian and US forces. 'At this time, we know that 12 US service members have been killed in the attack and another 15 have been injured. A number of Afghan civilians were also killed or injured.' 'We continue to focus on the protectsion of our forces and the evacuees,' he said in opening remarks. 'While we are saddened by the loss of life,' he said, 'we will continue to execute the mission.' McKenzie said he was not seeking additional troops, saying 'we have what we need to protect ourselves.' Advertisement Details have emerged of the ISIS-K attack that killed 13 US troops and scores of Afghan civilians after a suicide bomber slipped past a Taliban checkpoint to get close to an evacuee screening point at the Kabul airport. For days, a sewage canal at the airport had become a holding pen for Afghans who, knee-deep in effluent, waved passports and signs pleading for Western help in boarding evacuation flights out of Kabul. But the canal bank leading to Hamid Karzai International Airport became a scene of carnage, when the suicide bomber detonated explosives, killing at least 90 people. Amid the horror, wheelbarrows were used to cart off the wounded some missing limbs, others unconscious. Many survivors dropped vital documentation their only lifeline to escape a country descending into civil war in the stampede to flee that followed. Last night, Islamic State claimed responsibility, alleging one suicide bomber got within five meters of US troops before detonating a device. The two locations targeted in the bombings were the Abbey Gate of Hamid Karzai International Airport, where US troops were screening Afghans for evacuation, and the nearby Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Americans and Britons were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. The Pentagon first publicly confirmed the blasts shortly after 6pm Kabul time on Thursday, and later confirmed a staggering US military death toll that is the highest in one day in Afghanistan since 2011. General Frank McKenzie, commander of US Central Command, said that the attack on the Abbey Gate unfolded after at least one suicide bomber was able to get through initial Taliban screening points. General McKenzie said troops may have been searching the bomber when his device went off. Most chillingly, however, this was a tragedy foretold. The bomb at the Abbey Gate struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water Taliban fighters man a checkpoint outside Abbey Gate on Wednesday. A suicide bomber was able to slip past their checkpoint TERROR WARNINGS In the hours leading up to the suicide bombings, intelligence agencies from numerous countries had identified the imminent risk of a terror attack. State agencies had intercepted communications showing regional anti-Taliban IS fighters, under the banner Isis-K, were planning to hit the airport and kill US troops, civilians, and anyone else unfortunate enough to be in the area. US officials urged anyone attempting to board evacuation flights to leave immediately, telling those at the Abbey Gate, east gate, or north gate to find safety. Some did heed the advice, but thousands of Afghans knowing that their chances of getting out were diminishing in these final days of the evacuation mission remained at the airports Abbey Gate yesterday. Earlier, countries including Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Hungary all announced they were ending their evacuation programs. SHOTS FIRED At around 5.30pm local time, the nightmare began to unfold. Amid the forbidding atmosphere, an Italian military plane with 100 Afghans on board was said to have been targeted with gunfire. It was not damaged, and later reports claimed the shots came from Taliban militia simply firing warning shots into the air. That was a false alarm. But within the hour, the dam burst. SCENE OF CARNAGE The Taliban maintains an outer perimeter around the airport, and is supposed to screen Afghans before they reach US-manned checkpoints. General McKenzie speculated that the bomber may have slipped through due to incompetence among the Taliban militants. As Marines were conducting a pat-down at a secondary checkpoint, the apparent suicide bomb detonated, creating scenes of carnage that were shared on social video. The bomb at the Abbey Gate struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Reports say it was followed another around 200 yards away at the Baron Hotel, where troops and officials had recently been processing the documents of those hoping to board flights. One man who saw the explosion said up to 500 people had been caught up in the terror. The filthy canal was filled with bloodsoaked corpses, some being fished out and laid in heaps on the canal side while wailing civilians searched for loved ones. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Two separate explosions rocked Kabul with at least 12 US troops killed just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terror attack Smoke rises from explosion outside the airport in Kabul. The explosions went off outside Kabul's airport, where thousands of people have flocked as they try to flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan The attack on the Abbey Gate unfolded after at least one suicide bomber was able to get through initial Taliban checkpoint 'Men, women and children were screaming. I saw many injured people - men, women and children - being loaded into private vehicles and taken toward the hospitals,' Zubair, a 24 year-old civil engineer, told Reuters. He had been trying for a nearly week to get inside the airport with a cousin who had papers authorizing him to travel to the United States, said he was 50 meters away when he witnessed the blast at the Abbey Gate. After the explosions there was gunfire, Zubair said, but it was not immediately clear whether the shots were fired as part of the attack or the US response. 'We're still investigating the exact circumstances,' McKenzie said in a briefing. 'I don't know the size of the bomb.' McKenzie confirmed that the Abbey Gate attack occurred at the 'interface point' where US troops hand-screen Afghans, and said a suicide bomb hidden on the bomber's body was the 'working assumption' for the attack. Details of the blast at the Baron Hotel, which is nearby but outside the zone of US control, were even thinner. McKenzie was unable to confirm whether the blast at the hotel was caused by a suicide bomb or a car bomb. Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport on Thursday night after two explosions and gunfire ripped through crowds Afghans use a wheelbarrow to evacuate a wounded person from the scene of the blasts on Thursday Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport after a suicide bomber detonated an explosive outside the Baron Hotel, killing multiple people and injuring at least three US troops FANATIC SUSPECTS ISIS-K, the Islamic State's cell in Afghanistan and sworn enemies of the Taliban, has claimed responsibility for the attack. The K refers to the fact that the splinter cell is mostly based in the Khorasan province of eastern Afghanistan. Fighters claiming allegiance to Islamic State began appearing in eastern Afghanistan at the end of 2014 and have established a reputation for extreme brutality, disavowing the Taliban for not being strict enough. Its zealots have already carried out around 100 attacks on civilian targets. In May, it killed at least 68 Afghans and injured another 165 when they detonated three car bombs outside a school for girls in Kabul. Most of the victims were young students. The Taliban did not identify the attackers, but a spokesman described it as the work of 'evil circles' who would be suppressed once the foreign troops leave. Mujahid, the Taliban spokesman, said that his group 'strongly condemns the bombing of civilians' and blamed the US for the security lapse, saying the bombings 'took place in an area where US forces are responsible for security.' ISIS has claimed responsibility for Thursday's sequence of attacks. A fighter is shown in a grab from the group's Telegram account, where they are allowed to operate POLITICAL REACTION In Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was 'clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling.' But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Washington and its allies had been urging civilians to stay away from the airport on Thursday, citing the threat of an Islamic State suicide attack. McKenzie said that the evacuation will continue despite the bomb attack. He said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. Medical staff bring an injured man to a hospital in an ambulance after two powerful explosions, which killed at least six people, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021 In addition to the many Afghans, the State Department estimated there were as many as 1,000 Americans in Afghanistan who may want help getting out. But it remained unclear how the evacuation could move forward with reports suggesting the Kabul airport on lockdown. 'The doors at the airport are now closed and it is no longer possible to get people in,' Norwegian Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Soereide said on Thursday. 'We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone,' the acting chief of Canada's defense staff, General Wayne Eyre, told reporters. In the past 12 days, Western countries have evacuated nearly 100,000 people, mostly Afghans who helped them. But they say many thousands more will be left behind following President Joe Biden's order to pull out all troops by August 31. The last few days of the airlift will mostly be used to withdraw the remaining troops. Canada and some European countries have already announced the end of their airlifts, while publicly lamenting Biden's abrupt pullout. Biden has defended the decision to leave, saying U.S. forces could not stay indefinitely. But his critics say the U.S. force, which once numbered more than 100,000, had been reduced in recent years to just a few thousand troops, no longer involved in fighting on the ground and mainly confined to an air base. The U.S. troops killed on Thursday were the first to die in action in Afghanistan in 18 months. It marked the highest single-day death toll for US forces in the country since 2011. The two-decade war has cost 1,909 US military lives in combat. Full transcript of Joe Biden's statement of Kabul suicide bombing and answers he gave to reporters' questions By Melissa Koenig for DailyMail.com PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: Been a tough day. This evening in Kabul, as you all know, terrorists attacked - that weve been talking about and worried about, that the intelligence community has assessed [was] undertaken - an attack - by a group known as ISIS-K - took the lives of American service members standing guard at the airport, and wounded several others seriously. They also wounded a number of civilians, and civilians were killed as well. Ive been engaged all day, and in constant contact with the military commanders here in Washington, the Pentagon, as well as in Afghanistan and Doha. And my commanders here in Washington and in the field have been on this with great detail, and youve had a chance to speak to some, so far. The situation on the ground is still evolving, and Im constantly being updated. These American service members who gave their lives - its an overused word, but its totally appropriate - they were heroes. Heroes who have been engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others. They were part of an airlift, an evacuation effort unlike any seen in history, with more than 100,000 American citizens, American partners, Afghans who helped us, and others taken to safety in the last 11 days. Just in the last 12 hours or so, another 7,000 have gotten out. They were part of the bravest, most capable, and the most selfless military on the face of the Earth. And they were part of, simply, what I call the 'backbone of America.' Theyre the spine of America, the best the country has to offer. In a news conference on Thursday, President Joe Biden vowed to hunt down ISIS-K after American soldiers were killed in a bombing Jill and I - our hearts ache, like Im sure all of you do as well, for all those Afghan families who have lost loved ones, including small children, or been wounded in this vicious attack. And were outraged as well as heartbroken. Being the father of an Army major who served for a year in Iraq and, before that, was in Kosovo as a U.S. attorney for the better part of six months in the middle of a war - when he came home after a year in Iraq, he was diagnosed, like many, many coming home, with an aggressive and lethal cancer of the brain - who we lost. We have some sense, like many of you do, what the families of these brave heroes are feeling today. You get this feeling like youre being sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest; theres no way out. My heart aches for you. But I know this: We have a continuing obligation, a sacred obligation to all of you - the families of those heroes. That obligation is not temporary; it lasts forever. The lives we lost today were lives given in the service of liberty, the service of security, in the service of others, in the service of America. Like their fellow brothers and sisters in arms who died defending our vision and our values in the struggle against terrorism of - the fallen this day, theyre part of a great and noble company of American heroes. To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. I will defend our interests and our people with every measure at my command. Over the past few weeks - I know you're - many of you are probably tired of hearing me say it - weve been made aware by our intelligence community that the ISIS-K - an arch-enemy of the Taliban; people who were freed when both those prisons were opened - has been planning a complex set of attacks on the United States personnel and others. This is why, from the outset, I've repeatedly said this mission was extraordinarily dangerous and why I have been so determined to limit the duration of this mission. And as General McKenzie said, this is why our mission was designed -- this is the way it was designed to operate: operate under severe stress and attack. We've known that from the beginning. And as Ive been in constant contact with our senior military leaders - and I mean constant, around the clock - and our commanders on the ground and throughout the day, they made it clear that we can and we must complete this mission, and we will. And that's what I've ordered them to do. We will not be deterred by terrorists. We will not let them stop our mission. We will continue the evacuation. I've also ordered my commanders to develop operational plans to strike ISIS-K assets, leadership, and facilities. We will respond with force and precision at our time, at the place we choose, and the moment of our choosing. Here is what you need to know: These ISIS terrorists will not win. We will rescue the Americans who are there. We will get out our Afghan allies out, and our mission will go on. America will not be intimidated. I have the utmost confidence in our brave service members who continue to execute this mission with courage and honor to save lives and get Americans, our partners, our Afghan allies out of Afghanistan. Every day when I talk to our commanders, I ask them what they need - what more do they need, if anything, to get the job done. As they will tell you, I granted every request. I reiterated to them again today, on three occasions, that they should take the maximum steps necessary to protect our forces on the ground in Kabul. And I also want to thank the Secretary of Defense and the military leadership at the Pentagon, and all the commanders in the field. There has been complete unanimity from every commander on the objectives of this mission and the best way to achieve those objectives. Those who have served through the ages have drawn inspiration from the Book of Isaiah, when the Lord says, 'Whom shall I sendwho shall go for us?' And the American military has been answering for a long time: 'Here am I, Lord. Send me.' 'Here I am. Send me.' Each one of these women and men of our armed forces are the heirs of that tradition of sacrifice of volunteering to go into harms way, to risk everything - not for glory, not for profit, but to defend what we love and the people we love. And I ask that you join me now in a moment of silence for all those in uniform and out uniform - military and civilian, who have given the last full measure of devotion. (A moment of silence is taken.) BIDEN: Thank you. May God bless you all. And may God protect those troops and all those standing watch for America. We have so much to do. It's within our capacity to do it. We just have to remain steadfast. Steadfast. We will complete our mission. And we will continue, after our troops have withdrawn, to find means by which we defined any American who wishes to get out of Afghanistan. We will find them and we will get them out. Ladies and gentlemen, they gave me a list here. The first person I was instructed to call on was Kelly O'Donnell of NBC. QUESTION: Mr. President, you have said leaving Afghanistan is in the national interest of the United States. After today's attack, do you believe you will authorize additional forces to respond to that attack inside Afghanistan? And are you - are you prepared to add additional forces to protect those Americans who remain on the ground carrying out the evacuation operation? BIDEN: I've instructed the military, whatever they need - if they need additional force - I will grant it. But the military - from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Joint Chiefs, the commanders in the field - have all contacted me one way or another, usually by letter, saying they subscribe to the mission as designed to get as many people out as we can within the timeframe that is allotted. That is the best way, they believe, to get as many Americans out as possible, and others. And with regard to finding, tracking down the ISIS leaders who ordered this, we have some reason to believe we know who they are - not certain - and we will find ways of our choosing, without large military operations, to get them. O'DONNELL: Inside Afghanistan, Mr. President? BIDEN: Wherever they are. Trevor from Reuters. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. There has been some criticism, even from people in your party, about the dependence on the Taliban to secure the perimeter of the airport. Do you feel like there was a mistake made in that regard? BIDEN: No, I don't. Look, I think General McKenzie handled this question very well. The fact is that we're in a situation - we inherited a situation, particularly since, as we all know, that the Afghan military collapsed 11 days before - in 11 days - that it is in the interest of, as Mackenzie said, in the interest of the Taliban that, in fact, ISIS-K does not metastasize beyond what it is, number one. And number two, it's in their interest that we are able to leave on time, on target. As a consequence of that, the major things we've asked them - moving back the perimeter; give me more space between the wall; stopping vehicles from coming through, et cetera; searching people coming through - it is not what you'd call a tightly commanded, regimented operation like the U.S. is - the military is - but they're acting in their interest -- their interest. And so, by and large - and I've asked this same question to military on the ground, whether or not it's a useful exercise. No one trusts them; we're just counting on their self-interest to continue to generate their activities. And it's in their self-interest that we leave when we said and that we get as many people out as we can. And like I said, even in the midst of everything that happened today, over 7,000 people have gotten out; over 5,000 Americans overall. So, it's not a matter of trust, it's a matter of mutual self-interest. And - but there is no evidence thus far that I've been given, as a consequence by any of our commanders in the field, that there has been collusion between the Taliban and ISIS in carrying out what happened today both in front of the hotel and what is expected to continue for - beyond today. Aamer, Associated Press. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. You have spoken again powerfully about your own son and the weight of these decisions. With that in mind - and also what you've said: that the longer we stay, the more likelihood that there would be a major attack - how do you weigh staying even one more day, considering what's happened? BIDEN: Because I think what America says matters. What we say we're going to do and the context in which we say we're going to do it, that we do it - unless something exceptional changes. There are additional American citizens, there are additional green card holders, there are additional personnel of our allies, there are additional SIV card holders, there are additional Afghans that have helped us, and there are additional groups of individuals that have contacted us from women's groups, to NGOs, and others, who have expressly indicated they want to get out and have gathered in certain circumstances in groups, on buses and other means, that still presents the opportunity for the next several days, between now and the 31st, to be able to get them out. And our military - and, I believe, to the extent that we can do that knowing the threat, knowing that we may very well have another attack - the military has concluded that's what we should do. I think they're right. I think they're correct. And after that, we're going to be in a circumstance where there are - will be, I believe, numerous opportunities to continue to provide access for additional persons to get out of Afghanistan, either through means that we provide and/or are provided through cooperation with the Taliban. They're not good guys, the Taliban. I'm not suggesting that at all. But they have a keen interest. As many of you have been reporting, they very much would like to figure out how to keep the airport open. They dont have the capacity to do it. They very much are trying to figure out whether or not they can maintain what is the portion of an economy that has become not robust, but fundamentally different than it had been. And so there's a lot of reasons why they have reached out not just to us, but to others, as to why it would be continued in their interest to get more of the personnel we want to get out. We can locate them. Now, there's not many left that we can assess that are - want to come out. There's some Americans we've identified - weve contacted the vast majority of them, if not all of them - who dont want to leave because they have sig- -- they're dual nationals, they have extended families, et cetera. And there's others who are looking for the time. So, thats why we continue. I'll take a few more questions, and - but, you, sir. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. BIDEN: I didnt pick you, but thats okay. QUESTION: I wanted to ask you - you say that 'what America says matters.' What do you say to the Afghans who helped troops, who may not be able to get out by August 31st? What - BIDEN: I say - QUESTION: What do you say to them? BIDEN: - we're going to continue to try to get you out. It matters. Look, I know of no conflict, as a student of history - no conflict where, when a war was ending, one side was able to guarantee that everyone that wanted to be extracted from that country would get out. And think about it, folks. I think it's important for - I know the American people get this in their gut. There are, I would argue, millions of Afghani citizens who are not Taliban; who did not actively cooperate with us as SIVs; who, if given a chance, they'd be onboard a plane tomorrow. It sounds ridiculous, but the vast majority of people in communities like that want to come to America, given a choice. So, getting every single person out is - can't be guaranteed to anybody because there's a determination, all who wants to get out as well. At any rate, it's a process. I was really pointing to you, but - you, sir. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. There are reports that U.S. officials provided the Taliban with names of Americans and Afghan officials to evacuate. Were you aware of that? Did that happen? And then, sir, did you personally reject a recommendation to hold, or to recapture Bagram Air Force Base? BIDEN: Here's what I've done on the - ask this - Ill answer the last question, first. On the tactical questions of how to conduct an evacuation or a war, I gather up all the major military personnel that are in Afghanistan - the commanders, as well as the Pentagon. And I ask for their best military judgment: what would be the most efficient way to accomplish the mission. They concluded - the military - that Bagram was not much value added, that it was much wiser to focus on Kabul. And so, I followed that recommendation. With regard to-- there are certain circumstances where we've gotten information - and quite frankly, sometimes from some of you - saying, 'You know of such and such a group of people who are trying to get out and they're on a bus, they're moving' - from other people - 'and this is their location.' And there have been occasions when our military has contacted their military counterparts in the Taliban and said, 'This' -- for example, 'This bus is coming through with X number of people on it, made up of the following group of people. We want you to let that bus or that group through.' So, yes, there have been occasions like that. And to the best of my knowledge, in those cases, the bulk of that has occurred -- they've been let through. But I can't tell you with any certitude that there's actually been a list of names. I don't - there may have been, but I know of no circumstance. It doesn't mean it's not - it didn't exist, that, 'Here's the names of 12 people; they're coming. Let them through.' It could very well have happened. I'll take one more question. QUESTION: Mr. President, can I - QUESTION: Mr. President, right here. Mr. President - BIDEN: Whoa. Wait, wait, wait. Let me take the one question from the most interesting guy that I know in the press. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. Is that - is there -thank you. BIDEN: That's you. QUESTION: Mr. President, there had not been a U.S. service member killed in combat in Afghanistan since February of 2020. You set a deadline. You pulled troops out. You sent troops back in. And now 12 Marines are dead. You said the buck stops with you. Do you bear any responsibility for the way that things have unfolded in the last two weeks? BIDEN: I bear responsibility for, fundamentally, all that's happened of late. But here's the deal: You know - I wish you'd one day say these things - you know as well as I do that the former President made a deal with the Taliban that he would get all American forces out of Afghanistan by May 1. In return, the commitment was made - and that was a year before - in return, he was given a commitment that the Taliban would continue to attack others, but would not attack any American forces. Remember that? I'm being serious. QUESTION: Mr. President - BIDEN: No, I - I'm asking you a question. Be a - because before I - QUESTION: Donald Trump is not the President right now. BIDEN: No, no - now wait a minute. I'm asking you a question. Is that - is that accurate, to the best of your knowledge? QUESTION: I know what you're talking about. But, Mr. President, respectfully - BIDEN: What? QUESTION: Since -I don't think that the issue that -- do you think that people have an issue with pulling out of Afghanistan, or just the way that things have happened? BIDEN: I think they have an issue that people are likely to get hurt - some, as we've seen, have gotten killed - and that it is messy. The reason why - whether my friend will acknowledge it and was - reported it - the reason why there were no attacks on Americans, as you said, from the date until I came into office, was because the commitment was made by President Trump: 'I will be out by May 1st. In the meantime, you agree not to attack any Americans.' That was the deal. That's why no American was attacked. QUESTION: And you said that you still - a few days ago, you said you squarely stand by your decision to pull out. BIDEN: Yes, I do. Because look at it this way, folks - and I'm going to - I have another meeting, for real. But imagine where we'd be if I had indicated, on May the 1st, I was not going to renegotiate an evacuation date; we were going to stay there. I'd have only one alternative: Pour thousands of more troops back into Afghanistan to fight a war that we had already won, relative - is why the reason we went in the first place. I have never been of the view that we should be sacrificing American lives to try to establish a democratic government in Afghanistan - a country that has never once in its entire history been a united country, and is made up - and I don't mean this in a derogatory - made up of different tribes who have never, ever, ever gotten along with one another. And so, as I said before - and this is the last comment I'll make, but we'll have more chance to talk about this, unfortunately, beyond, because we're not out yet - if Osama bin Laden, as well as al Qaeda, had chosen to launch an attack - when they left Saudi Arabia - out of Yemen, would we have ever gone to Afghanistan? Even though the Taliban completely controlled Afghanistan at the time, would we have ever gone? I know it's not fair to ask you questions. It's rhetorical. But raise your hand if you think we should have gone and given up thousands of lives and tens of thousands of wounded. Our interest in going was to prevent al Qaeda from reemerging - first to get bin Laden, wipe out al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and prevent that from happening again. As I've said 100 times: Terrorism has metastasized around the world; we have greater threats coming out of other countries a heck of a lot closer to the United States. We don't have military encampments there; we don't keep people there. We have over-the-horizon capability to keep them from going after us. Ladies and gentlemen, it was time to end a 20-year war. Thank you so much. ISIS have claimed responsibility for the suicide bomb attacks on Kabul airport that killed 13 US solders and 60 Afghan civilians. The two explosions, one of which hit Kabul airport's Abbey Gate, the other the Baron Hotel, had been blamed on ISIS-K, a regional affiliate of the so-called Islamic State that operates in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The ISIS-K offshoot is a sworn enemy of the Taliban, who have been handed control of Afghanistan by Joe Biden's withdrawal of US troops. ISIS posted a statement claiming responsibility for the attack from their Telegram account on Thursday following the attacks earlier today. Abdul Rehman Al-Loghri of ISIS-K was the suicide bomber responsible for the blast at Abbey Gate, according to ISIS. Founded in 2015, ISIS-K followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia. ISIS posted a statement claiming responsibility from their Telegram account on Thursday, following the attacks earlier today Pictured: A statement from ISIS' official news channel claiming responsibility Prior to Thursday's attacks, the US had warned that the group would likely target the thousands of people gathering at Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport as they attempt to flee the country following the Taliban takeover on August 15 and before the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of US and NATO forces. The organisation has already carried out roughly 100 attacks against civilian targets and another 250 involving US, Afghan or Pakistani security services, most of them chronicled via mobile phone videos then broadcast online. In May, ISIS-K killed at least 68 Afghans and injured another 165 when they detonated three car bombs outside the Syed Al-Shahda school for girls in Kabul. The vast majority of the victims were young pupils the Islamist group regard as legitimate targets because they do not believe women and girls should be educated. The attack came after a period in which Western air strikes had killed thousands of the terror network's supporters and at least three of its leaders. The organisation's chosen first Emir, or leader, was a former Pakistani Taliban commander called Hafiz Saeed Khan, who was killed in 2016. His foot-soldiers were largely defectors from the Taliban as was his canny PR chief, Sheikh Maqbool, who was charged with ensuring that the group's attacks gained worldwide attention. The devastating twin attacks that struck Kabul killed at least 72 people and injured more than 100 They were appointed at the behest of ISIS's (then) top dog Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who was facing difficulties in his stomping grounds of Syria and Iraq, so began funnelling cash to Khan in order to establish a new stronghold in the East. Initially, their activities were limited to suicide bombings and small arms attacks targeting civilians, along with occasional kidnappings. Khan's successor Abdul Hasib was famed for both ordering fighters to behead local elders in front of their families, and to kidnap women and girls who were then forced to 'marry' his fighters, effectively becoming sex slaves. He perished in a special forces raid on his compound in which two US troops died in April 2017. Later that month, the US dropped the largest non-nuclear bomb in its arsenal a GBU-43 Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) also known as the 'Mother Of All Bombs' on a key ISIS-K cave and tunnel system in Afghanistan's Nangarhar province. Around 100 of their troops perished. A series of drone strikes then wiped out both of Hasib's successors, Abu Sayed and Abu Saad Orakzai, and roughly 80 per cent of the group's troops, reducing their estimated strength from between three and four thousand to under 800 followers by the end of 2018. Yet like many militant groups, they have since proved almost impossible to eliminate completely. A former Pakistani Taliban commander called Hafiz Saeed Khan (centre, standing) led ISIS-K until he was killed in 2016 Founded in 2015, ISIS-K followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia The deaths of successive leaders have ended up being largely symbolic, since they have been quickly replaced by experienced peers shipped in from other ISIS strongholds. New foot-soldiers have been recruited via slick propaganda videos outlining its global aspirations to create an Islamist caliphate across Asia, governed by Sharia law, before eventually '[raising] the banner of al-Uqab above Jerusalem and the White House'. The group's current leader is believed to be Shahab al-Muhajir, also known as Sanaullah. A United Nations report published in February said that he took over in June 2020. Sanaullah is currently thought to have little to no capacity for mounting terror attacks in the West. He is instead focusing on a mission to rid Afghanistan and other parts of its home territory of foreign 'crusaders' who 'proselytise Muslims' as well as 'apostates'. Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott scored a legal victory Thursday in his attempt to ban mask mandates in public schools. The Texas Supreme Court has blocked a mandate issued by San Antonio and Bexar County for their schools a blow to efforts by some cities, counties and school districts to go against Abbott's ban on such measures. The ruling came in a lawsuit by San Antonio and Bexar County, one of at least nine that have been filed by cities, counties and school districts against Abbott over his ban on mask mandates. The Texas Supreme Court has blocked a mask mandate issued by San Antonio and Bexar County for their public schools a blow to efforts by some cities, counties and school districts to go against Republican Gov. Greg Abbott's ban on such measures. Amid a surge in COVID-19 cases that have overwhelmed many hospitals across the state, at least 10 counties and cities, and 63 school districts or systems in Texas have imposed mask mandates in an attempt to slow the spread of COVID-19. Abbott has argued that a law known as the Texas Disaster Act gives him broad power in deciding how best to respond to emergency situations, including whether to ban mask mandates during a pandemic. In an emergency order issued last month, Abbott reaffirmed his ban on mask mandates by any state, county or local government entity. He also issued a ban on vaccine mandates Wednesday. Amid a surge in COVID-19 cases that have overwhelmed many hospitals across the state, at least 10 counties and cities and 63 school districts or systems in Texas have imposed mask mandates in an attempt to slow the spread of COVID-19 The counties, cities and school districts say Abbott has exceeded his authority. Dallas and Harris counties, two of the state's most populous counties, are among those that have imposed mask mandates. Last week, a judge granted Bexar County and San Antonio a temporary injunction that put Abbott's ban on hold pending trial in that lawsuit. The Texas Attorney General's Office asked the state high court to stay the injunction. The Texas Supreme Court had previously stayed temporary restraining orders issued in favor of Bexar County, San Antonio and Dallas County. The counties, cities and school districts say Abbott has exceeded his authority. Dallas and Harris counties, two of the state's most populous counties, are among those that have imposed mask mandates. In its order Thursday, the court said oversight of decisions on mask mandates has been up to the governor and 'that status quo' should remain in place while the courts examine the issue. 'This case, and others like it, are not about whether people should wear masks or whether the government should make them do it. Rather, these cases ask courts to determine which government officials have the legal authority to decide what the government's position on such questions will be,' the court said. The Texas Supreme Court had previously stayed temporary restraining orders issued in favor of Bexar County, San Antonio and Dallas County. The court has not yet made a final determination on the legal issues surrounding mask mandates. 'The Texas Supreme Court has sided with the law, and the decision to enforce mask mandates lies with the governor's legislatively-granted authority. Mask mandates across our state are illegal,' Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement. 'The Texas Supreme Court has sided with the law, and the decision to enforce mask mandates lies with the governor's legislatively-granted authority. Mask mandates across our state are illegal,' Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement. In a statement on Twitter, San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg said, 'We're not going to let an ongoing court battle distract us from the real fight against COVID-19. Get the vax. Wear a mask.' In a statement on Twitter, San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg said, 'We're not going to let an ongoing court battle distract us from the real fight against COVID-19. Get the vax. Wear a mask.' Judges handling the lawsuits against Abbott have granted various temporary restraining orders and temporary injunctions that have allowed these mask mandates to continue while the cases go through the courts. It was not immediately clear how those mandates would be impacted by the high court's Thursday ruling. The state recorded 13,633 new COVID-19 cases Thursday. While cases remain somewhat high, they're still down from the 21,000-plusa cases recorded Aug. 14, which hit a seven-month high in the state. Over 55,000 Texans have died from the virus. This comes one day after more than half of Florida public school students were put under mask mandates in defiance of Gov. Ron DeSantis. DeSantis' Press Secretary Christina Pushaw confirmed that any district found to be in violation of the state law would be subject to having funds withheld in an amount equal to the salaries of the superintendent and school board members. Possible enforcement actions beyond that are still under discussion. South Dakota is seeing Covid-19 cases skyrocket two weeks after about 700,000 people flooded Meade County for the 81st Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, a 10-day event that officials say was one of its biggest in years. The South Dakota Department of Health reported 657 cases on August 4 two days before the rally started and 3,655 cases on August 25, representing a 456% increase. Meade County, where the rally took place, is now reporting a 36% positivity rate, meaning that about one in every three COVID tests come back positive. The week leading up to the rally, July 30 to August 6, the state's weekly positivity rate was at about 10% and the week before that, July 23 to 30, the positivity rate was just 6%, the Department of Health data shows. Covid cases in South Dakota rose from 657 on August 4 to 3,655 cases on August 25 following the 10-day Sturgis Motorcycle Rally that began on August 6 Meade County is now reporting a 36 percent positivity rate, meaning that about one in every three Covid tests come back positive The event kicked off on August 6 with motorcycle enthusiasts packed shoulder-to-shoulder at bars with most not wearing masks. The event had no vaccine test requirements and no mask mandates. South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem rode into the rally on August 9 as part of the Sturgis Buffalo Chip Legends Ride. The Republican governor has staunchly voiced her opposition to coronavirus restrictions like vaccine passports and slammed Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, after he warned of the potential for the rally to cause a spike in cases. Of the rally, Fauci said, I mean, to me it's understandable that people want to do the kinds of things they want to do. They want their freedom to do that. But there comes a time when you're dealing with a public health crisis that could involve you, your family and everyone else, that something supersedes that need to do exactly what you want to do.' South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem rode into the rally on August 9 as part of the Sturgis Buffalo Chip Legends Ride Noem arrived at the Sturgis Buffalo Chip campground after riding in the Legends Ride Noem has staunchly voiced her opposition to coronavirus restrictions like vaccine passports and none were required at the rally In response, Noem accused Fauci of targeting the South Dakota event rather than other causes of infection spikes. She said, 'I was not surprised to see Dr. Fauci pick on Sturgis. He picked on it last year, this rally as well, and honestly, I wish he cared more about the Southern Border and what we have going on there with a lot of Covid virus cases coming across the border that are not being isolated and taken care of.' Noem has operated a hands-off policy during the pandemic stressing she prefers people make decisions for themselves. 'I don't believe that governors have the authority to tell people that they have to shut down their businesses and they have to shelter in place and to pass mandates on,' said Noem to KOTA. 'That should be used for personal responsibility and I've told the folks in South Dakota all the time that I will give them all the information that I have to protect their health.' Law enforcement officials said the first few days of this year's event were among the busiest they've seen. 'There are more people here than in the 31 years Ive been doing this,' Meade County Sheriff Ron Merwin told the Rapid City Journal on the second day of the event. The city held an opening ceremony for the 81st iteration of the event - something it skipped in 2020 in an attempt to tamp down the crowds. The event kicked off on August 6 with guests packed shoulder-to-shoulder at bars with most not wearing masks Bikers hung out at the Big Engine Bar at the Sturgis Buffalo Chip campground on near Sturgis, South Dakota Jody Perewitz, the rally's ceremonial grand marshal, said she was 'ecstatic' to see how many people came for the opening ceremony. Motorcycles stretched for blocks as crowds strolled Main Street, the heart of the rally. The biggest step city officials took this year to mitigate the risk of infections was allowing rallygoers to drink on public property, with the goal of spreading the crowds into the open air. The South Dakota Department of Tourism has estimated that the rally brings in about $800 million in revenue for the state, The New York Times reported. 'We're out in the wide open,' said Pam Williamson, a rallygoer from Kansas who also attended last year's gathering. 'If you want to wear a mask, that's your business. If you don't, that's your business.' Last year's rally was marked by defiance of coronavirus precautions, with T-shirts on sale that read, 'Screw COVID. I went to Sturgis.' This year, the pandemic appeared to hardly be an afterthought amid a crowd that embraces the risks and lifestyle of the open road. State health department data reveals that cases jumped by roughly 300 a day from the 1,355 cases reported on the day after the rally ended, August 16, to the 1,639 cases reported on August 17 and the 1,939 cases reported on August 18. There were 90 cases a day reported to the health department between August 1 and 7, the week leading up to the rally. This year, the pandemic appeared to hardly be an afterthought amid a crowd that embraces the risks and lifestyle of the open road Rallygoers are often seen walking with minimal clothing and body paint An analysis by the IZA Institute of Labor Economics last year found that the rally was a superspreader event that resulted in around $12.2 billion in public health costs, according to The Hill. Though significantly less people attended, researchers linked about 266,000 Covid-19 cases and at least one death to the event. About 61percent of the state's population over age 12 have been administered at least one dose of vaccine, and 55percent are fully vaccinated, the department's data shows. In Meade County, 7,984 of its 28,332 residents have been vaccinated, representing 28percent of the county's population. Dr. Shankar Kurra, the vice president of medical affairs at Monument Health, which operates a hospital in Sturgis, told NBC News that the rally was a replay of last year. In June, Monument Health had a pandemic low of three Covid patients and Kurra said he thought that number might drop to zero. Now, the number is up to 58 and he said almost 99.9percent are unvaccinated. Its not the highest it has ever been but is definitely at a number that puts us at a disadvantage, Kurra added. You have a strain on resources and a lot of stress on the health system to give timely care to non-Covid patients. However, Daniel Bucheli, a South Dakota Department of Health spokesperson, asserted that the spikes are not tied to the rally. In an email to NBC News on Tuesday, he said the rise in the states cases the state "are following a national trend being experienced in every state." "Regarding cases surrounding the Sturgis Rally, our Department has only been able to link 16 cases directly to this event," Bucheli said. "It is important to mention that Meade county currently has a lower vaccination rate than other counties in SD." President Joe Biden spent Thursday hunkered down with his national security team as he weighed one of the most difficult questions of his presidency: How to respond to the most deadly attack on American troops in Afghanistan in a decade. When he entered the East Room of the White House at a little after 5pm his mind was made up. He announced he would push on with plans to bring home all U.S. troops by the end of the month while hunting down the ISIS offshoot behind the killing of 13 service personnel. 'We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay,' he said in emotional remarks. His commanders had already been asked to draw up plans to strike at ISIS-K, he said, the Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan. But counterterrorism experts said the mission faced an obvious problem. 'When the president said we're going to hunt them down and make them pay my initial reaction was: Spot on,' said Nathan Sales, the former ambassador at large for counterterrorism under Trump. 'And my second reaction was: With which assets? 'Because the fact of the matter is, you can't effectively take terrorists off the battlefield in Afghanistan, unless you have intelligence collection capabilities and soldiers on the ground who are prepared to go out and accomplish the mission.' It means Biden will have to decide what assets must be moved into the region or whether he must strike immediately, while he still has special forces at Kabul airport. 'Were probably going to have to go back in to Afghanistan' to get the culprits, former defense secretary and CIA director Leon Panetta told CNN. 'We're going to have to go back in, to get ISIS. And we'll probably have to go back in to get Al Qaeda...' former defense secretary and CIA director Leon Panetta told CNN. 'We can leave the battlefield, but we can't leave the war on terrorism.' Biden promised to hunt down ISIS-K, the group believed to be behind the attacks, but will have to do so with few intelligence assets left within Afghanistan Two suicide bombings killed at least 60 people around Kabul airport on Thursday, as Afghans crowded around its gates seeking flights to safety ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks in Kabul that killed at least 6o people around the airport in Kabul on Thursday The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks. It said it targeted 'translators and collaborators with the American army.' At least two explosions ripped through crowds around the gates of Hamid Karzai International Airport killing dozens of Afghans desperate to leave the country since the Taliban seized power almost two weeks ago. The American death toll was the highest for a single incident in a decade. The result was the blackest day in Biden's presidency so far, and triggered immediate demands for air strikes and for U.S. troops to stay longer. Extending would likely bring blowback, said Richard Hoagland, a former deputy U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan and ambassador in southern and central Asia. He said: 'If Biden extends the date what does the Taliban do? 'And apparently this attack was by ISIS-Khorasan and that means that ISIS is in Afghanistan. 'To say that the Taliban will not allow them to stay: That's just wishful thinking.' Part of the terms of a deal made by the Taliban and Washington last year, required the militants to break ties with Al Qaeda and ensure Afghanistan could not be used to plot attacks against the U.S. Biden has justified the withdrawal of U.S. troops by saying Al Qaeda - the original target after the 9/11 attacks - no longer posed a threat. But U.S. intelligence officials suspect ISIS-K, whose fortunes waned in recent years, may have used Afghanistan's instability to rebuild. A propaganda photo released by ISIS-K in Afghanistan shows well-equipped fighters who have claimed responsibility for hundreds of attacks against Afghan and foreign targets The group is hostile to the Taliban, which cleared it out of its strongholds in Nangahar and Kunar provinces last year, but analysts said it would take any opportunity to attack foreigners and embarrass the new rulers of Afghanistan. Some counts suggest the group carried out roughly 100 attacks against civilian targets and another 250 involving US, Afghan or Pakistani security services since they were founded in 2015. They grew rapidly as a string of local commanders ditched their allegiance to the Taliban in favor of a group that was conquering territory in the Middle East, ensuring they could enjoy prestige and financial support. The fall of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria since then and the relative strength of the Taliban saw them fragment, now operating in small cells. 'I haven't heard of them having the capacity to launch an attack like this,' said a former intelligence official after the Kabul attacks. 'It makes you wonder if they had support.' By Thursday afternoon, the Pentagon said it had apache attack helicopters, MQ Reaper drones, AC 130 gunships in the air over Afghanistan. But without a functioning embassy and its CIA teams, and without allies of the Afghan armed forces stationed all around the country, the U.S. will lack intelligence streams to direct its air power. The blasts sent shockwaves around the world, buffeting Washington, where an already embattled spent the day Biden deciding his response. 'Biden has us in a no win situation,' said Mike Waltz, a former Green Beret turned Republican U.S. Representative.' 'We either keep the air bridge open and continue to get hit by terrorists attacks or leave Americans behind. 'We must go on offense against the perpetrators of this attack and let our Special Forces get Americans stuck behind terrorist lines.' Speaking before the president unveiled his answer, Lisa Curtis, for senior director for South and Central Asia on President Trump's National Security Council, said he would have been under pressure to speed up the withdrawal. 'We had growing indications that there were potential attacks being planned by ISIS-K so I don't think this has come as a surprise. 'This is why Biden has been so firm in sticking to the August 31 deadline.' In this frame grab from video, people attend to a wounded man near the site of a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021 Smoke rises over Kabul after two suicide attacks on Thursday, just as the U.S. was planning to wind up evacuation efforts from the city Biden kept his options open this week. In an address on Tuesday, he said every day spent in the country increased the risks. He referenced the danger of ISIS-K. 'The sooner we can finish, the better. Each day of operations brings added risk to our troops,' he said. But he added that completion by August 31, 'depends upon the Taliban continuing to cooperate and allow access to the airport for those who were transport- were transporting out and no disruptions to our operations. 'In addition, Ive asked the Pentagon and the State Department for contingency plans to adjust the timetable should that become necessary.' Sales, the former ambassador at large for counterterrorism under Trump, said the attack meant the Taliban had let down their side of the deal. That meant Biden was entitled to rip up his side. 'Evacuations should continue as long as it takes to extract every American who's in the country, and every Afghan, who is eligible to come to the United States because they provided support to our armed forces or served alongside our armed forces,' he said. To do it safely, he urged the administration to retake Bagram air base, which was vacated last month, and which would offer a more secure evacuation hub. He also said air strikes were the right response. 'You don't get to kill American sailors and Marines with impunity,' he said. 'The people who are responsible for this need to be found. And they need to be taken off the battlefield, not just to avenge our fallen, but because if they committed one attack, they're going to commit others.' Afghanistan's chilling new face of terror: 'ISIS-K' slaughter patients in their hospital beds, bomb girls schools... and see the Taliban as far too liberal by Guy Adams Dressed in white coats and carrying stethoscopes, three young men walked unchallenged into Kabul's 400-bed Sardar Mohammad Daud Khan hospital and made their way to the upper floors. Then, outside the building, situated opposite the heavily fortified US Embassy, there was a loud bang. The noise, from the detonating suicide vest of a comrade, acted as a signal for the trio to pull a selection of hand grenades and AK-47 assault rifles from beneath their medical clothing, before opening fire. By the time the chaos had died down, several hours later, more than 30 doctors and patients had been killed and roughly 50 more wounded. Further casualties included the three attackers, who were shot by Afghan special forces, plus the original suicide bomber, and a fifth member of the terror gang who had detonated a car bomb inside the hospital complex. A former Pakistani Taliban commander called Hafiz Saeed Khan (middle) led ISIS-K until he was killed by a drone strike in 2016 Their brazen and pitiless attack, which unfolded in broad daylight one afternoon in March 2017, was carried out in the name of ISIS-K, a local branch of the notorious global terror network. Founded in 2015, its followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia. The terror group is now such a threat that fear of an attack by Isis-K is being used to justify the US's refusal to delay its withdrawal from Kabul Airport after the August 31 deadline set by Joe Biden. In a statement released on Tuesday night, the US President claimed: 'Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians.' The White House seems to believe ISIS-K (who regard the Taliban as dangerous liberals) is about to organise a wave of attacks in an effort to destabilise its efforts to form a government. If so, then any foreign troops, including soldiers from Britain's 16 Air Assault Brigade currently guarding Kabul airport, would represent very high-profile targets indeed. The organisation has already carried out roughly 100 attacks against civilian targets and another 250 involving US, Afghan or Pakistani security services, most of them chronicled via macabre mobile phone videos then gleefully broadcast via the internet. One particularly vile film, circulated in June 2017, celebrated the work of a group of child recruits to ISIS-K known as the 'cubs of the caliphates'. Founded in 2015, its followers aim to establish an Islamic caliphate across Khorasan (hence the initial 'K') a historic region covering Pakistan and Afghanistan along with parts of Central Asia The film showed two of them both dressed in black and seemingly under 12 years of age forcing terrified captives to kneel on the ground. They proceeded to pull back the heads of the men (who were apparently accused of spying), rant at the camera and execute them via a single shot to the skull. More recently, in May this year, ISIS-K killed at least 68 Afghans and injured another 165 when they detonated three car bombs outside the Syed Al-Shahda school for girls in Kabul. The vast majority of the victims were young pupils the Islamist group regard as legitimate targets for the sin of being educated while being female. The attack, which came after a period in which Western air strikes had killed thousands of the terror network's supporters and at least three of its leaders, served as a bloody reminder of its ongoing ability to bring carnage to the streets of Afghanistan. ISIS-K published this photo in an effort to project unity and strength just days before hundreds of fighters admitted defeat and surrendered The very fact that a US President is admitting that his policy is being governed by a perceived threat from ISIS-K represents a major coup for a hitherto fairly low-profile organisation. It first made headlines in January 2016, when the Pentagon announced that the group had been designated as a Foreign Terrorist organisation. This made assisting them a criminal offence and allowed US troops on the ground to actively pursue members (under previous terms of engagement they usually had to wait until the group attacked them before responding). The organisation's chosen first Emir, or leader, was a former Pakistani Taliban commander called Hafiz Saeed Khan. Full transcript of Joe Biden's statement of Kabul suicide bombing and answers he gave to reporters' questions By Melissa Koenig for DailyMail.com PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: Been a tough day. This evening in Kabul, as you all know, terrorists attacked - that weve been talking about and worried about, that the intelligence community has assessed [was] undertaken - an attack - by a group known as ISIS-K - took the lives of American service members standing guard at the airport, and wounded several others seriously. They also wounded a number of civilians, and civilians were killed as well. Ive been engaged all day, and in constant contact with the military commanders here in Washington, the Pentagon, as well as in Afghanistan and Doha. And my commanders here in Washington and in the field have been on this with great detail, and youve had a chance to speak to some, so far. The situation on the ground is still evolving, and Im constantly being updated. These American service members who gave their lives - its an overused word, but its totally appropriate - they were heroes. Heroes who have been engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others. They were part of an airlift, an evacuation effort unlike any seen in history, with more than 100,000 American citizens, American partners, Afghans who helped us, and others taken to safety in the last 11 days. Just in the last 12 hours or so, another 7,000 have gotten out. They were part of the bravest, most capable, and the most selfless military on the face of the Earth. And they were part of, simply, what I call the 'backbone of America.' Theyre the spine of America, the best the country has to offer. In a news conference on Thursday, President Joe Biden vowed to hunt down ISIS-K after American soldiers were killed in a bombing Jill and I - our hearts ache, like Im sure all of you do as well, for all those Afghan families who have lost loved ones, including small children, or been wounded in this vicious attack. And were outraged as well as heartbroken. Being the father of an Army major who served for a year in Iraq and, before that, was in Kosovo as a U.S. attorney for the better part of six months in the middle of a war - when he came home after a year in Iraq, he was diagnosed, like many, many coming home, with an aggressive and lethal cancer of the brain - who we lost. We have some sense, like many of you do, what the families of these brave heroes are feeling today. You get this feeling like youre being sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest; theres no way out. My heart aches for you. But I know this: We have a continuing obligation, a sacred obligation to all of you - the families of those heroes. That obligation is not temporary; it lasts forever. The lives we lost today were lives given in the service of liberty, the service of security, in the service of others, in the service of America. Like their fellow brothers and sisters in arms who died defending our vision and our values in the struggle against terrorism of - the fallen this day, theyre part of a great and noble company of American heroes. To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. I will defend our interests and our people with every measure at my command. Over the past few weeks - I know you're - many of you are probably tired of hearing me say it - weve been made aware by our intelligence community that the ISIS-K - an arch-enemy of the Taliban; people who were freed when both those prisons were opened - has been planning a complex set of attacks on the United States personnel and others. This is why, from the outset, I've repeatedly said this mission was extraordinarily dangerous and why I have been so determined to limit the duration of this mission. And as General McKenzie said, this is why our mission was designed -- this is the way it was designed to operate: operate under severe stress and attack. We've known that from the beginning. And as Ive been in constant contact with our senior military leaders - and I mean constant, around the clock - and our commanders on the ground and throughout the day, they made it clear that we can and we must complete this mission, and we will. And that's what I've ordered them to do. We will not be deterred by terrorists. We will not let them stop our mission. We will continue the evacuation. I've also ordered my commanders to develop operational plans to strike ISIS-K assets, leadership, and facilities. We will respond with force and precision at our time, at the place we choose, and the moment of our choosing. Here is what you need to know: These ISIS terrorists will not win. We will rescue the Americans who are there. We will get out our Afghan allies out, and our mission will go on. America will not be intimidated. I have the utmost confidence in our brave service members who continue to execute this mission with courage and honor to save lives and get Americans, our partners, our Afghan allies out of Afghanistan. Every day when I talk to our commanders, I ask them what they need - what more do they need, if anything, to get the job done. As they will tell you, I granted every request. I reiterated to them again today, on three occasions, that they should take the maximum steps necessary to protect our forces on the ground in Kabul. And I also want to thank the Secretary of Defense and the military leadership at the Pentagon, and all the commanders in the field. There has been complete unanimity from every commander on the objectives of this mission and the best way to achieve those objectives. Those who have served through the ages have drawn inspiration from the Book of Isaiah, when the Lord says, 'Whom shall I sendwho shall go for us?' And the American military has been answering for a long time: 'Here am I, Lord. Send me.' 'Here I am. Send me.' Each one of these women and men of our armed forces are the heirs of that tradition of sacrifice of volunteering to go into harms way, to risk everything - not for glory, not for profit, but to defend what we love and the people we love. And I ask that you join me now in a moment of silence for all those in uniform and out uniform - military and civilian, who have given the last full measure of devotion. (A moment of silence is taken.) BIDEN: Thank you. May God bless you all. And may God protect those troops and all those standing watch for America. We have so much to do. It's within our capacity to do it. We just have to remain steadfast. Steadfast. We will complete our mission. And we will continue, after our troops have withdrawn, to find means by which we defined any American who wishes to get out of Afghanistan. We will find them and we will get them out. Ladies and gentlemen, they gave me a list here. The first person I was instructed to call on was Kelly O'Donnell of NBC. QUESTION: Mr. President, you have said leaving Afghanistan is in the national interest of the United States. After today's attack, do you believe you will authorize additional forces to respond to that attack inside Afghanistan? And are you - are you prepared to add additional forces to protect those Americans who remain on the ground carrying out the evacuation operation? BIDEN: I've instructed the military, whatever they need - if they need additional force - I will grant it. But the military - from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Joint Chiefs, the commanders in the field - have all contacted me one way or another, usually by letter, saying they subscribe to the mission as designed to get as many people out as we can within the timeframe that is allotted. That is the best way, they believe, to get as many Americans out as possible, and others. And with regard to finding, tracking down the ISIS leaders who ordered this, we have some reason to believe we know who they are - not certain - and we will find ways of our choosing, without large military operations, to get them. O'DONNELL: Inside Afghanistan, Mr. President? BIDEN: Wherever they are. Trevor from Reuters. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. There has been some criticism, even from people in your party, about the dependence on the Taliban to secure the perimeter of the airport. Do you feel like there was a mistake made in that regard? BIDEN: No, I don't. Look, I think General McKenzie handled this question very well. The fact is that we're in a situation - we inherited a situation, particularly since, as we all know, that the Afghan military collapsed 11 days before - in 11 days - that it is in the interest of, as Mackenzie said, in the interest of the Taliban that, in fact, ISIS-K does not metastasize beyond what it is, number one. And number two, it's in their interest that we are able to leave on time, on target. As a consequence of that, the major things we've asked them - moving back the perimeter; give me more space between the wall; stopping vehicles from coming through, et cetera; searching people coming through - it is not what you'd call a tightly commanded, regimented operation like the U.S. is - the military is - but they're acting in their interest -- their interest. And so, by and large - and I've asked this same question to military on the ground, whether or not it's a useful exercise. No one trusts them; we're just counting on their self-interest to continue to generate their activities. And it's in their self-interest that we leave when we said and that we get as many people out as we can. And like I said, even in the midst of everything that happened today, over 7,000 people have gotten out; over 5,000 Americans overall. So, it's not a matter of trust, it's a matter of mutual self-interest. And - but there is no evidence thus far that I've been given, as a consequence by any of our commanders in the field, that there has been collusion between the Taliban and ISIS in carrying out what happened today both in front of the hotel and what is expected to continue for - beyond today. Aamer, Associated Press. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. You have spoken again powerfully about your own son and the weight of these decisions. With that in mind - and also what you've said: that the longer we stay, the more likelihood that there would be a major attack - how do you weigh staying even one more day, considering what's happened? BIDEN: Because I think what America says matters. What we say we're going to do and the context in which we say we're going to do it, that we do it - unless something exceptional changes. There are additional American citizens, there are additional green card holders, there are additional personnel of our allies, there are additional SIV card holders, there are additional Afghans that have helped us, and there are additional groups of individuals that have contacted us from women's groups, to NGOs, and others, who have expressly indicated they want to get out and have gathered in certain circumstances in groups, on buses and other means, that still presents the opportunity for the next several days, between now and the 31st, to be able to get them out. And our military - and, I believe, to the extent that we can do that knowing the threat, knowing that we may very well have another attack - the military has concluded that's what we should do. I think they're right. I think they're correct. And after that, we're going to be in a circumstance where there are - will be, I believe, numerous opportunities to continue to provide access for additional persons to get out of Afghanistan, either through means that we provide and/or are provided through cooperation with the Taliban. They're not good guys, the Taliban. I'm not suggesting that at all. But they have a keen interest. As many of you have been reporting, they very much would like to figure out how to keep the airport open. They dont have the capacity to do it. They very much are trying to figure out whether or not they can maintain what is the portion of an economy that has become not robust, but fundamentally different than it had been. And so there's a lot of reasons why they have reached out not just to us, but to others, as to why it would be continued in their interest to get more of the personnel we want to get out. We can locate them. Now, there's not many left that we can assess that are - want to come out. There's some Americans we've identified - weve contacted the vast majority of them, if not all of them - who dont want to leave because they have sig- -- they're dual nationals, they have extended families, et cetera. And there's others who are looking for the time. So, thats why we continue. I'll take a few more questions, and - but, you, sir. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. BIDEN: I didnt pick you, but thats okay. QUESTION: I wanted to ask you - you say that 'what America says matters.' What do you say to the Afghans who helped troops, who may not be able to get out by August 31st? What - BIDEN: I say - QUESTION: What do you say to them? BIDEN: - we're going to continue to try to get you out. It matters. Look, I know of no conflict, as a student of history - no conflict where, when a war was ending, one side was able to guarantee that everyone that wanted to be extracted from that country would get out. And think about it, folks. I think it's important for - I know the American people get this in their gut. There are, I would argue, millions of Afghani citizens who are not Taliban; who did not actively cooperate with us as SIVs; who, if given a chance, they'd be onboard a plane tomorrow. It sounds ridiculous, but the vast majority of people in communities like that want to come to America, given a choice. So, getting every single person out is - can't be guaranteed to anybody because there's a determination, all who wants to get out as well. At any rate, it's a process. I was really pointing to you, but - you, sir. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. There are reports that U.S. officials provided the Taliban with names of Americans and Afghan officials to evacuate. Were you aware of that? Did that happen? And then, sir, did you personally reject a recommendation to hold, or to recapture Bagram Air Force Base? BIDEN: Here's what I've done on the - ask this - Ill answer the last question, first. On the tactical questions of how to conduct an evacuation or a war, I gather up all the major military personnel that are in Afghanistan - the commanders, as well as the Pentagon. And I ask for their best military judgment: what would be the most efficient way to accomplish the mission. They concluded - the military - that Bagram was not much value added, that it was much wiser to focus on Kabul. And so, I followed that recommendation. With regard to-- there are certain circumstances where we've gotten information - and quite frankly, sometimes from some of you - saying, 'You know of such and such a group of people who are trying to get out and they're on a bus, they're moving' - from other people - 'and this is their location.' And there have been occasions when our military has contacted their military counterparts in the Taliban and said, 'This' -- for example, 'This bus is coming through with X number of people on it, made up of the following group of people. We want you to let that bus or that group through.' So, yes, there have been occasions like that. And to the best of my knowledge, in those cases, the bulk of that has occurred -- they've been let through. But I can't tell you with any certitude that there's actually been a list of names. I don't - there may have been, but I know of no circumstance. It doesn't mean it's not - it didn't exist, that, 'Here's the names of 12 people; they're coming. Let them through.' It could very well have happened. I'll take one more question. QUESTION: Mr. President, can I - QUESTION: Mr. President, right here. Mr. President - BIDEN: Whoa. Wait, wait, wait. Let me take the one question from the most interesting guy that I know in the press. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. Is that - is there -thank you. BIDEN: That's you. QUESTION: Mr. President, there had not been a U.S. service member killed in combat in Afghanistan since February of 2020. You set a deadline. You pulled troops out. You sent troops back in. And now 12 Marines are dead. You said the buck stops with you. Do you bear any responsibility for the way that things have unfolded in the last two weeks? BIDEN: I bear responsibility for, fundamentally, all that's happened of late. But here's the deal: You know - I wish you'd one day say these things - you know as well as I do that the former President made a deal with the Taliban that he would get all American forces out of Afghanistan by May 1. In return, the commitment was made - and that was a year before - in return, he was given a commitment that the Taliban would continue to attack others, but would not attack any American forces. Remember that? I'm being serious. QUESTION: Mr. President - BIDEN: No, I - I'm asking you a question. Be a - because before I - QUESTION: Donald Trump is not the President right now. BIDEN: No, no - now wait a minute. I'm asking you a question. Is that - is that accurate, to the best of your knowledge? QUESTION: I know what you're talking about. But, Mr. President, respectfully - BIDEN: What? QUESTION: Since -I don't think that the issue that -- do you think that people have an issue with pulling out of Afghanistan, or just the way that things have happened? BIDEN: I think they have an issue that people are likely to get hurt - some, as we've seen, have gotten killed - and that it is messy. The reason why - whether my friend will acknowledge it and was - reported it - the reason why there were no attacks on Americans, as you said, from the date until I came into office, was because the commitment was made by President Trump: 'I will be out by May 1st. In the meantime, you agree not to attack any Americans.' That was the deal. That's why no American was attacked. QUESTION: And you said that you still - a few days ago, you said you squarely stand by your decision to pull out. BIDEN: Yes, I do. Because look at it this way, folks - and I'm going to - I have another meeting, for real. But imagine where we'd be if I had indicated, on May the 1st, I was not going to renegotiate an evacuation date; we were going to stay there. I'd have only one alternative: Pour thousands of more troops back into Afghanistan to fight a war that we had already won, relative - is why the reason we went in the first place. I have never been of the view that we should be sacrificing American lives to try to establish a democratic government in Afghanistan - a country that has never once in its entire history been a united country, and is made up - and I don't mean this in a derogatory - made up of different tribes who have never, ever, ever gotten along with one another. And so, as I said before - and this is the last comment I'll make, but we'll have more chance to talk about this, unfortunately, beyond, because we're not out yet - if Osama bin Laden, as well as al Qaeda, had chosen to launch an attack - when they left Saudi Arabia - out of Yemen, would we have ever gone to Afghanistan? Even though the Taliban completely controlled Afghanistan at the time, would we have ever gone? I know it's not fair to ask you questions. It's rhetorical. But raise your hand if you think we should have gone and given up thousands of lives and tens of thousands of wounded. Our interest in going was to prevent al Qaeda from reemerging - first to get bin Laden, wipe out al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and prevent that from happening again. As I've said 100 times: Terrorism has metastasized around the world; we have greater threats coming out of other countries a heck of a lot closer to the United States. We don't have military encampments there; we don't keep people there. We have over-the-horizon capability to keep them from going after us. Ladies and gentlemen, it was time to end a 20-year war. Thank you so much. Hairdressers in NSW are set to re-open for residents who are fully vaccinated against Covid-19 as part of a trial to prepare for wider restriction easing when 70 per cent of the state has had both doses. Premier Gladys Berejiklian did not announce the re-opening of hairdressers and salons as expected on Thursday - instead easing gathering limits for the fully vaccinated in relatively virus-free areas of the state from September 13. But she is also considering trialing industries where both customers and staff are vaccinated to prepare for a larger reopening of the hospitality industry in October. Those small-scale 'trials' are expected to be a litmus test for the wide-scale easing of hospitality capacity limits as long as they aren't linked to high levels of transmission. Hairdressers in NSW are set to re-open for residents who are fully vaccinated against Covid-19 as part of a trial to prepare for wider restriction easing. Pictured is a hair salon in Melbourne during the pandemic The trial will prepare NSW for wider restriction easing when 70 per cent of the state has had both doses of a Covid-19 vaccine. Pictured is a masked resident in the Campbelltown LGA on Thursday NSW reported 1,029 local cases of Covid-19 and three deaths from the virus on Thursday - a record spike in cases in any Australian state or territory in the pandemic. But the state leader flagged October 18 as the day when her state will reach a 70 per cent inoculation rate, triggering a further easing of lockdown measures. Ms Berejiklian has rallied industries, including pubs and restaurants, to prepare for the mid-October date, which is seven weeks away. In the meantime, health officials are still concerned about the virus circulating in the community, with just 33 per cent of people fully-vaccinated and regional areas particularly at risk. Petrol stations, takeaways and supermarkets are the latest venues of concern - with eight new exposure sites revealed in areas outside Sydney following the announcement of a lockdown extension for regional NSW until at least September 10. An Officeworks and a Domino's pizza store in Dubbo were among the list, after 25 cases of the virus were detected in the area on Thursday. Premier Gladys Berejiklian on Thursday announced an easing of gathering limits for the fully vaccinated in relatively virus-free areas of the state from September 13 Greater freedoms are on their way for vaccinated residents in NSW with the government earmarking a date of October 18 for the state's reopening (pictured, masked Sydneysiders in lockdown) A Woolworths in Wellington (pictured) was exposed to Covid nine times from August 15 to August 23 LATEST NSW COVID EXPOSURE SITES Anyone who attended this venue is casual contact and must self-isolate until they receive a negative result. Windale: Windale Takeaway - Saturday August 21, 5:35pm to 5:45pm Wellington: Metro Petroleum - Sunday August 22, 10:30am to 10:40am Wellington: Coles - Sunday August 22, 9:20am to 10:15am Dubbo: Officeworks - Wednesday August 18, 4:45pm to 5pm Dubbo: Dominos Pizza - Wednesday August 18, 6:55pm to 7:10pm Berkeley: Coles - Saturday August 21, 11:10am to 11:25am Orange: 7-Eleven Molong Road - Saturday August 21, 2pm to 10pm, Friday August 20, 2pm to 10pm Orange: 7-Eleven Bathurst Road - Saturday August 21, 7am to 3:15pm Advertisement More casual contact venues were also identified at a petrol station and a Coles in Wellington after a Woolworths in the central-western town issued nine Covid-19 alerts from August 15 to August 23. All shoppers who visited the exposure sites at the listed times must get tested and self-isolate until they receive a negative result. Health bosses are now only publicly listing exposure sites outside of Greater Sydney, as they claim they pose a 'greater risk' to the regional communities. Greater freedoms for vaccinated Australians will meanwhile be granted in the coming weeks as the state plans its roadmap out of the relentless lockdown. More than 80 per cent of Thursday's new cases were found in west and south-west Sydney (pictured, shoppers in Ashfield in the city's inner-west) Outdoor gatherings of up to five immunised people living outside of LGAs of concern are permitted from September 13, including an extra hour of outdoor recreational activity for vaccinated residents in hotspots. While the government admitted a jump to 80 per cent vaccination rate was difficult, they were confident 70 per cent is a more realistic target. Ms Berejiklian said she was committed to giving people freedom despite sky-rocketing case numbers. 'We're a government that assesses the risk but also assesses our wish to live with this virus,' she said. 'We know that people coming together is what people miss the most.' 'From the various options we looked at, that was the option that met the mental health needs and wellbeing of our community, but also provided the lowest-risk setting.' Last night Pen Farthing said his convoy of 200 shelter animals and 68 staff was targeted with gunfire after getting access to the airport. On their way to board a chartered plane, a gunman opened fire in an incident which saw the group's driver narrowly avoid being shot in the head and the convoy forced to turn back. Earlier yesterday the charity director pleaded with the Taliban on Twitter to 'facilitate safe passage'. Plans to board a privately-funded plane had been derailed due to security fears. Mr Farthing's supporter Dominic Dyer, an animal welfare activist, said a plane is waiting in a 'neighbouring country' but cannot land in Kabul until Mr Farthing is in the airport, which the group now hopes will happen today. Here Guy Adams looks at how the saga unfolded. The Defence Secretary, Ben Wallace, is a former Captain in the Scots Guards who now finds himself overseeing one of the most dangerous and challenging military evacuations since Vietnam. Yet at lunchtime yesterday, the 51-year-old minister found the time to break off from directing proceedings in Kabul to put out seven spectacularly angry tweets. They were designed to 'get some facts out there', as he put it, about his attitude towards Operation Ark, an attempt to evacuate roughly 200 cats and dogs from Afghanistan in the hold of a charter jet that will also carry the staff of a UK-run charity named Nowzad. In recent days Mr Wallace and his team have been accused of seeking to obstruct the daring animal rescue mission, firstly by failing to help secure permission for the plane to land and secondly by refusing to assist the evacuees (human, canine and feline) in their endeavours to reach the airport. Supporters of the charity, which is run by a former Royal Marine named Paul 'Pen' Farthing, have mounted a highly personal lobbying campaign via social media. This appears to have got under the Defence Secretary's skin. 'The bullying, falsehoods and threatening behaviour by some towards our MoD personnel and advisers is unacceptable and a shameful way to treat people trying to help the evacuation,' he wrote. Supporters of the charity, which is run by a former Royal Marine named Paul 'Pen' Farthing, have mounted a highly personal lobbying campaign via social media Elsewhere, Mr Wallace denied reports that he'd ever sought to 'block' a flight, claiming: 'This is a total myth and is being peddled around as if that is why the pet evacuation hasn't taken place.' He also stated, somewhat provocatively, that in the coming days his 'priority will be people not pets'. As the hostile tone of these remarks suggest, Operation Ark is now at the centre of an ugly and at times utterly surreal political dispute. While aspects of it might seem entirely frivolous the fate of 200 cats and dogs obviously pales in comparison to that of thousands of Afghans attempting to flee Kabul the row may also raise serious questions about the way in which Boris Johnson's Government conducts its business. For the campaign against Mr Wallace has been led by Dominic Dyer, an animal rights activist with close links to the Prime Minister's spouse Carrie. She even has a picture of him on her Twitter profile. Dyer has spent the last three days bombarding the Defence Secretary with no fewer than 53 hostile tweets, including one which read 'F*** this whole sh**** government and their unelected Spads and cronies,' and others which dubbed Wallace 'an arrogant, stupid fool of a man', and a 'total disgrace'. He has also attacked Mr Wallace's special adviser, Peter Quentin, accusing him of 'dirty tricks'. Yet while launching this attack on a Government minister, Mr Dyer also claims to have enlisted his friend Mrs Johnson to Operation Ark's cause. The campaign against Mr Wallace has been led by Dominic Dyer, an animal rights activist with close links to the Prime Minister's spouse Carrie, pictured In interviews, he has said that she 'most certainly' intervened to persuade the PM to order Mr Wallace to 'seek a slot' for the rescue flight. Although the PM yesterday claimed he 'had absolutely no influence' over policy towards the evacuation, it has been reported that Trudy Harrison, his parliamentary private secretary who is seen as a close ally of Mrs Johnson and shares her keen interest in animal rights, did intervene on Operation Ark's behalf to raise the issue with Defra officials. It is, all told, a curious affair. And to truly understand it all we must wind the clock back to the summer of 2006 when the aforementioned Royal Marine Pen Farthing arrived in Helmand province with the men of 42 Commando Royal Marines. During the peacekeeping tour, he was befriended by a horribly mutilated dog that had been used by Afghans in dog fights. Moved by its 'big, sad eyes' he took the animal back to the UK. It became the first of around 1,700 dogs that Mr Farthing rescued, setting up Nowzad named after the town he'd been stationed in to give them new lives, often in the West where many became companions of retired soldiers who had served in Afghanistan, helping address post-traumatic stress. The thoroughly inspiring charity won a string of humanitarian awards and made great strides in educating Afghans about animal welfare and eliminating rabies from Kabul, where the disease is a major public health risk. Staff at its rescue centre in the capital included some of the country's first female vets. Then came the Taliban's takeover, which threatened not only Mr Farthing's staff (deemed to be at risk of reprisals for having worked for a Western agency) but also his animals: in the 1990s the Taliban forbade the keeping of pets on the grounds that they are regarded as unclean under the organisation's extremist interpretation of Islam. Mr Farthing managed to evacuate his Norwegian wife, Kaisa Markhus, and a pregnant American friend. He then vowed to remain in Kabul to secure the safe evacuation of his staff members with their immediate families (who have been given visas to travel to the UK), plus the animals in Nowzad's care. In a few days, supporters raised roughly 200,000 to charter planes to take them first to Tashkent in Uzbekistan, roughly 45 minutes from Kabul, and then to Britain. At this stage, however, problems emerged: amid the chaos of the evacuation, Mr Farthing found himself unable to secure permission for the airplane to land at Kabul. By the start of this week, he and his staff were also still holed up at their HQ, several miles from the airport, which was by then difficult to access. There followed a dispute with UK authorities which played out via interviews and Twitter posts. It began on Tuesday, when Mr Farthing tweeted: 'Have been left to fend for myself in Kabul. Cut off from my MoD [Ministry of Defence] support line by the special adviser to Ben Wallace. 22-year marine left behind lines. Neither my staff nor animals will now get out. Cheers.' In a TV interview he added: 'We've got a privately-funded plane that can take 250 passengers out, 69 of them would be me and the staff, but we've got an empty cargo hold. I don't understand the problems here, I'm not asking the MoD to give me a plane I just need to have a call sign.' Hours later, Wallace responded on LBC Radio: 'I have some really desperate people in that queue who are really under threat of life and death, and if we don't get them out their future is very, very bleak. I simply have to prioritise those people over pets.' While aspects of it might seem entirely frivolous the fate of 200 cats and dogs obviously pales in comparison to that of thousands of Afghans attempting to flee Kabul the row may also raise serious questions about the way in which Boris Johnson's Government conducts its business In a second interview, Wallace criticised Mr Farthing's supporters, saying: 'Some of the campaigners have latched onto the fact they've chartered a plane as if this is somehow the magic wand. The magic wand is whether people can get through Kabul, through the checkpoint, and then through the 3,000-plus people waiting.' Repeating his provocative soundbite, he added: 'I am not prepared to prioritise pets over people.' The remarks met with huge anger from Mr Dyer and his allies, who include a TV vet named Mark Abraham, who helped Mrs Johnson source her pet dog Dilyn. Mr Dyer, a former campaigner against badger culls (an issue on which he has persuaded Mrs Johnson to lobby the PM on) uploaded furious messages to Twitter, urging supporters to 'get on to Ben Wallace's Twitter feed reflect your views'. Mr Dyer also called the Defence Secretary a 'bully boy incompetence [sic] fool who is playing politics with the lives of Pen Farthing, his team and animals in Kabul. This man is a total disgrace.' Replies by his supporters contained Mr Wallace's office telephone number, which was bombarded with angry calls. Fast forward a few hours, and Mr Wallace announced an effective U-turn. At 1.33am on Wednesday he uploaded a statement to Twitter saying: 'Pen Farthing's staff have been cleared to come forward I have authorised MoD to facilitate their processing alongside all other eligible personnel at (Kabul airport). In recent days Mr Wallace and his team have been accused of seeking to obstruct the daring animal rescue mission, firstly by failing to help secure permission for the plane to land and secondly by refusing to assist the evacuees (human, canine and feline) in their endeavours to reach the airport 'At that stage, if he arrives with his animals we will seek a slot for his plane. If he does not have his animals with him he and his staff can board an RAF flight.' Mr Dyer responded by posting gleeful videos to Twitter saying that Wallace had 'had his hands slapped' and 'his legs pulled from under him'. He then claimed the change of policy had been ordered by Mr Johnson, possibly at the behest of his wife. That in turn prompted the by now somewhat frazzled Defence Secretary to tell Tory MPs that his involvement in the ongoing battle over Operation Ark was affecting his ability to oversee the rest of the evacuation. 'What I can tell you, and it is a bit upsetting, is that I have soldiers on the ground who have been diverted from saving those people because of inaccurate stories, inaccurate lobbying that have diverted that resource,' he wrote to them at 4.30pm on Wednesday. 'And that is not something I would be proud of.' Whitehall insiders appear to agree. 'Wallace shouldn't really have got involved, but everyone is getting fractious and having to get by on very little sleep, and that's affecting their judgment,' one says. 'He's also been anxious, rightly, to protect his Spad Peter Quentin from abuse. But the way he's chosen to do it has at times been clumsy and tweeting in the middle of the night and whatnot is never going to be a good look.' As for Mr Farthing, his employees and their cats and dogs, yesterday morning they were in vehicles baking in the hot sun at Kabul airport. With the animals starting to struggle with thirst, he used Twitter to lobby another influential figure for help: Suhail Shaheen, the Taliban spokesman. 'Dear Sir, my team and my animals are stuck at airport circle. We have a flight waiting. Can you please facilitate safe passage into the airport for our convoy? We are an NGO who will come back to Afghanistan but right now I want to get everyone out safely,' he wrote. 'We have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage.' Around tea time, news came that they had secured access to the airport. However it was later reported that Mr Farthing had been forced to leave after their vehicle was targeted by a gunman. They intend to return today, so with a following wind, the Operation Ark evacuees get a happy ending. But however this plays out, the political fallout may take far longer to resolve. Laurence Fox says he could remove his children from school because of his opposition to the Governments Covid vaccination programme. Fox, 43, who played Sergeant Hathaway in ITV detective series Lewis, has two sons with his former wife, actress Billie Piper, 38. Fox says he will educate them at home rather than let them be vaccinated without his consent. Every parent who loves their children should resist this insanity, said the actor-turned-political campaigner. I will not be sending my kids back to school. I will educate my kids at home from now on. The rushed vaccination of children, for no reason whatsoever, shows how deeply morally corrupt this regime has become. I look forward to reading with them at home and staying the hell away from the authorities. Laurence Fox, 43, says he could remove his boys from school over fears they'll be vaccinated without his consent (pictured with ex-wife Billie Piper in 2015) Fox shares custody of his children with Miss Piper, whom he divorced in 2016, but she declines to comment on whether she would approve their removal from school. Fox was reacting to reports that the NHS had drawn up plans to start vaccinating 12-year-olds from the first week schools go back, with health officials quoted as saying that children would not need parental consent under the schools jabs programme. Vaccines are currently being offered to those aged 16 and 17. Yesterday a coroner concluded that BBC radio presenter Lisa Shaw, 44, died due to complications of the AstraZeneca vaccination. Speaking to the Daily Mail, Fox said: Following the tragic death of BBC journalist Lisa Shaw from vaccine-related complications, and the unending lies about the efficacy and safety of the vaccine, I will not be sending my children to school until I have received a cast-iron guarantee that my children will not be vaccinated without the consent of both parents for a disease that has negligible chance of serious illness to them. He added: We are in the middle of a mass delusion and it is time for people to wake up. Childrens lives are at risk. However, I fully support the provision of vaccination for children in vulnerable groups with fully informed parental consent. Earlier this year Fox complained about the cost of his offsprings education. I hate paying private school fees for my children, said the actor, who was expelled from 43,665-per-year boarding school Harrow. If it was my choice, I wouldnt be doing it, because I just think its a waste of money. Whats the point in spending money so you can teach them all to be posh and hang around with other elite parents? Boring. The actor, who shares two sons with former wife, actress Billie Piper, 38, says he will educate them at home instead. Pictured: The couple with one of their children as a baby in 2008 He was married to Secret Diary Of A Call Girl star Miss Piper for eight years. The actress, whose education at the Sylvia Young theatre school was cut short when she became a pop star aged 15, also has a child with her boyfriend, the musician Johnny Lloyd. Fox whose illustrious acting dynasty includes his father, James Fox, and cousin, Silent Witness star Emilia Fox was dropped by his agent last year after a string of social media comments that critics deemed racist. Two months earlier he had launched his own political party, Reclaim, which he set up in a bid to reclaim British values. A Department of Health spokesman said: No decisions have been made on vaccinating 12 to 15-year-olds and it is inaccurate to suggest otherwise. Ministers have not yet received further advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation on this cohort. U.S. energy companies began airlifting workers from offshore oil rigs and moving vessels in the Gulf of Mexico Thursday, preparing for Tropical Depression Nine, which could become Hurricane Ida before it makes landfall this weekend. The storm system brewing over the Caribbean Sea could bring hurricane-force winds, heavy rainfall and a life-threatening storm surge, said the National Hurricane Center. It would be the ninth named storm of the 2021 Atlantic season. The system could strike anywhere from the Florida Panhandle to the upper Texas coast on Sunday or Monday, according to computer models, after ripping through the Cayman Islands Thursday, and through Western Cuba Friday. The greatest risk for devastation, the agency said, is along the coast of Louisiana. Residents and businesses along the Texas coasts and the panhandles of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, along with fishing and oil operations, are being warned to monitor the storm's progress closely. Due to a confluence of conditions favorable for hurricanes, the storm could reach a Category 3 level, meaning it could bring winds over 100 mph, before it reaches the U.S., the NHC said. The National Hurricane Center warned that the storm could become a 'major hurricane,' defined by winds up to 111 miles per hour. The greatest risk for devastation, the agency said, is along the coast of Louisiana. Residents and businesses along the Texas coasts and the panhandles of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, along with fishing and oil operations, are being warned to monitor the storm's progress closely. The system could strike anywhere from the Florida Panhandle to the upper Texas coast on Sunday or Monday, according to computer models, after ripping through the Cayman Islands Thursday, and through Western Cuba Friday. In 2017, Hurricane Harvey made landfall on August 25, devastating Texas and Louisiana with winds, several feet of rain and flooding. More than 204,000 homes were destroyed, according to Lamar University in Texas. Preemptively, BHP, Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell and Equinor began evacuating their workers. Three of the companies have said that they will begin with their non-essential staff, while Equinor plans to move all of its workers. On Thursday, Chevron said its production remained at normal levels. Gulf of Mexico offshore wells account for 17 percent of U.S. crude oil production and 5 per cent of its dry natural gas production. More than 45 percent of total U.S. refining capacity lies along the Gulf Coast. 'This storm has the potential for rapid increases in intensity before it comes ashore because of extremely warm waters off Louisiana,' said Jim Foerster, chief meteorologist at DTN, which provides weather advice to oil and transportation companies. Water temperatures in the Gulf are at 85 degrees to 88 degrees, which Foerster said was 'three to five degrees higher than it normally would be.' The storm system's projected path over the warm waters will cause heavy rains and flooding as it nears the Gulf Coast. The weather system is south of Jamaica and is still forming, according to the NHC. As of Thursday afternoon, according to Accuweather, the depression was moving northwest at a speed of 13mph, with maximum sustained wind speeds of 35 miles per hour. It was 165 miles southeast of Grand Cayman Island, which it is expected to reach Thursday evening, and 95 miles south-southwest of Negril, Jamaica. Initially, the storm was expected to hit Mexico. The pace at which the system organizes and strengthens will determine its trajectory, Accuweather Senior Meteorologist Rob Miller said. 'The sooner the system strengthens, the more likely it is to take a northwesterly track into the central Gulf of Mexico, rather than a westward track across Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula and into the southwestern Gulf," he explained. A record 11 named storms struck the U.S. in 2020. Just this month, four tropical storms - Danny, Elsa, Fred and Henri - made landfall in the U.S. In 2020, Hurricane Harvey killed 68 people. Thousands in Texas fled their homes in kayaks and swam through watery streets, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency said that it would take years to repair the damage incurred. Advertisement It was already a heart-breaking scene of utter desperation. For days, a sewage canal at the airport became a holding pen for Afghans who, knee-deep in effluent, waved passports and signs pleading for Western help in boarding evacuation flights out of Kabul. But last night it became a scene of carnage, with dead bodies piled on top of one another and filthy sewage water running red with blood. On the canal bank leading to Hamid Karzai International Airport and potential escape from the country lay dozens more lifeless, bloodied figures. Amid the horror, wheelbarrows were used to cart off the wounded some missing limbs, others unconscious. Many survivors dropped vital documentation their only lifeline to escape a country descending into civil war in the stampede to flee that followed. This was the aftermath of bomb attacks at Kabuls airport, which left at least 60 dead, including 12 US troops, and more than 100 seriously injured. Their only crime? To long for a better life, away from a Taliban regime that destroyed the rights and lives of so many during its earlier iron-fisted rule. Last night, Islamic State claimed responsibility, alleging one suicide bomber got within five metres of US troops before detonating a device. US General Kenneth McKenzie said troops may have been searching the bomber when his device went off. Most chillingly, however, this was a tragedy foretold. Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport on Thursday night after two explosions and gunfire ripped through crowds As many as 12 US serviceman are thought to have died in two bomb attacks outside Kabul airport, while reports suggest a third explosion has been heard in the capital tonight. Pictured: Horrifying images (which have been muzzed) show the victims of one of the blasts outside Kabul airport today A person who was hit by the suicide bomb at Kabul airport is carried away from the blast in a wheelbarrow IT was already a heart-breaking scene of utter desperation. For days, a sewage canal at the airport became a holding pen for Afghans who, knee-deep in effluent, waved passports and signs pleading for Western help in boarding evacuation flights out of Kabul TERROR WARNINGS In the hours leading up to the suicide bombings, intelligence agencies from numerous countries had identified the imminent risk of a terror attack. State agencies had intercepted communications showing regional anti-Taliban IS fighters, under the banner Isis-K, were planning to hit the airport and kill US troops, civilians, and anyone else unfortunate enough to be in the area. Moments before the attack, a huge crowd of Afghan civilians and US soldiers are seen massing near the Abbey Gate where the second explosion struck US officials urged anyone attempting to board evacuation flights to leave immediately, telling those at the Abbey Gate, east gate, or north gate to find safety. Some did heed the advice, but thousands of Afghans knowing that their chances of getting out were diminishing in these final days of the evacuation mission remained at the airports Abbey Gate yesterday. Earlier, countries including Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Hungary all announced they were ending their evacuation programmes. But it was the words of Armed Forces minister James Heappey, as he conducted broadcast interviews yesterday, that were so prescient. After the Foreign Office told anyone in the vicinity of the airport to leave, Mr Heappey told LBCs Nick Ferrari there was a real lethality to the terror plans uncovered. Asked if an attack could happen in days, he replied: Hours. Such was the risk, he added, that he had been briefed that a terror attack was feared to take place while he was on air. Around six and a half hours later two explosions killed, maimed and injured scores. They were sitting ducks. SCENE OF CARNAGE In the days since Kabul was seized by the Taliban in a ruthless takeover, The Baron Hotel, close to the airport, had become a makeshift British embassy, where troops and officials process the documents of those hoping to come to the UK. The nearby Abbey Gate was manned by British and US troops, although Taliban militia also had a presence, leading to regular bouts of warning gunfire as crowds surged. The risks were high. On Tuesday, President Joe Biden said: Every day on the ground is another day we know that Isis-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians. At around 5.30pm local time, the nightmare began to unfold. Amid the forbidding atmosphere, an Italian military plane with 100 Afghans on board was said to have been targeted with gunfire. It was not damaged, and later reports claimed the shots came from Taliban militia simply firing warning shots into the air. A suicide bomb has caused a huge explosion outside Kabul airport with 'unknown casualties' just hours after warnings of an 'imminent' and 'lethal' ISIS terrorist attack Injured Afghans are removed from Kabul airport in the Baron Hotel, next to the airport in Kabul, after a suicide bomb attack on Thursday evening Afghan people who want to leave the country continue to wait around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 26, 2021 That was a false alarm. But within the hour, the dam burst. While the details remained confused last night, a blast rang out as a suicide bomb was detonated in or near the sewage canal by the Abbey Gate. Reports say it was followed another around 200 yards away. There was also a firefight involving alleged attackers, defending troops and Taliban militia. The Abbey Gate blast is feared to have inflicted the most casualties. Both areas were manned by American and UK troops. It was described by Pentagon spokesman John Kirby as a complex attack. One man who saw the explosion said up to 500 people had been caught up in the terror. He helped take some to hospital. I saw at least 400 or 500 people there, he added. The explosion was really powerful. Half were hurled into the water, others to the ground outside. We carried them on stretchers here and I am completely bloodied. Milad, who was also at the scene, said: Bodies, flesh and people were thrown into a canal. The blast was outside The Baron Hotel, at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport. Westerners were staying in the hotel before their evacuation flights Images from the scene show scores of bloodied people being carried away from the bombsite with witnesses saying they saw 'so many hurt' The large explosion at Kabul explosion filled the air with smoke (left), while those injured in the suicide bomb attack were carried away from the scene Another witness added: When people heard the explosion there was total panic. The Taliban then started firing in the air to disperse the crowd at the gate. I saw a man rushing with an injured baby in his hands. Footage showed maimed bodies stretched across the street. Mohammad Tanai, who has lived in Luton since 2009, was at the airport looking for an evacuation flight before he fled just 15 minutes prior to the attack after reading about the threat. He told the Mail: We were in traffic. I heard a terrible sound. We saw people running towards us, away from the airport. 'They were crying. I feel very lucky. I had just been there. I dont want to return to the airport now as this could happen again. FANATIC SUSPECTS Defence sources widely suspect Isis-K an offshoot of the Islamic State terror group. The K refers to the fact that the splinter cell is mostly based in the Khorasan province of eastern Afghanistan. Isis-K, which wants to create an Afghan caliphate, believes the Taliban is not strict enough. Abdul Rehman Al-Loghri of ISIS-K was allegedly the suicide bomber responsible for one of the blasts, according to a twitter post Its zealots have already carried out around 100 attacks on civilian targets. In May, it killed at least 68 Afghans and injured another 165 when they detonated three car bombs outside a school for girls in Kabul. Most of the victims were young pupils. Yesterday, a Taliban spokesman condemned the airport attacks, but pointed out that they took place in an area where US forces are responsible for security. EVACUATION BID Condemning the barbaric mass killing claimed by Isis-K, Boris Johnson said: Theyre despicable, but Im afraid theyre something weve had to prepare for. The Prime Minister insisted the atrocity would not interrupt our progress, were going to get on with this evacuation. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said: The UK and US remain resolute... to get as many people out as possible. It is testament to the remarkable courage of our personnel that they continue to do so while under fire. The night before he was indicted this week, a Long Island dentist accused of exchanging painkillers for sexual favors sent text messages suggesting he'd give a woman a Percocet prescription if she wanted to 'hang out' and 'party a bit,' federal prosecutors said Thursday. Barry Arnold, 70, of Williston Park, New York, was charged with 28 counts of distribution of controlled substances, accused of abusing his prescription privileges in a four-year scheme to supply women with oxycodone, Percocet and Xanax in exchange for sex acts. Arnold, indicted Tuesday and arrested Wednesday, was arraigned Thursday afternoon at the federal Eastern District Court of New York, in Central Islip. The defendant entered a plea of not guilty. Prosecutors said Arnold was uncooperative with authorities during his arrest on Long Island, New York, at his office. He refused to provide his thumbprint or unlock his iPhone despite a search warrant requiring him to provide data, federal prosecutors added. Arnold, first licensed to practice in New York in 1975, remained listed Thursday as a registered dentist in the state's licensing database. His name did not appear in records of misconduct proceedings. He graduated from New York University's school of medicine in 1974. Prosecutors said Arnold doled out prescriptions to at least six different women on numerous occasions from October 2016 to August 2020, often meeting them after hours at his offices in Lynbrook and Valley Stream. The women were not Arnolds dental patients and the prescriptions were not for legitimate medical purposes, prosecutors said. Long Island dentist is arrested for 'giving out prescription oxycodone and Xanax in exchange for sex' at his office (pictured) in Valley Stream, Long Island, during after hours Dentist Dr. Barry Arnold was arrested after prescribing over-the-counter drugs to at least six different women between October 2016 and August 2020 Arnold is accused of engaging in sex acts with women as payment for the drugs and on several occasions went with them to pharmacies to collect a kickback in the form of pills that he then handed out to women individually, prosecutors said. Arnold also bought and used crack cocaine with some of the women, prosecutors said. On Monday, Arnold exchanged text messages with someone he believed to be one of the women, asking if she wanted to 'hang out' and 'party a bit', and saying he 'might be able to give you a perc script,' prosecutors said. He further texted that she could bring a friend 'that likes to party,' prosecutors added. Acting U.S. Attorney Jacquelyn Kasulis said Arnold's alleged crimes are an abdication of his professional oath. 'As alleged, Dr. Arnold abused his position as a dentist and preyed upon vulnerable, drug-addicted women, trading prescriptions for sex acts,' stated Acting U.S. Attorney Kasulis. 'We are committed to vigorous prosecution of medical professionals who abdicate their Hippocratic Oath and contribute to the rise of drug abuse and addiction in our communities.' Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent-in-Charge Peter Fitzhugh said the dentist's behavior is 'really no different than a street dealer.' A message seeking comment was left with Arnolds lawyer, who remains unknown. Arnold is released on a $200,000 bond on home detention while wearing an electronic monitoring bracelet on his ankle. He also must surrender his DEA registration for writing controlled substance prescriptions. Arnold still will be able to practice as a dentist, but cannot perform oral surgery or administer nitrous oxide. He is allowed to administer Novocain to his patients, but he is ordered to stay away from witnesses and alleged victims. The next court date is October 29 at the same court in the U.S. Eastern District Court of New York. Footage has captured the moment armed police carrying shields and battering rams arrested a Covid-infected man who allegedly refused to isolate while on the run from authorities for nearly two weeks. Anthony Karam, 27, was arrested by Bankstown police just before 5.30pm on Thursday at an apartment in Wentworth Point in Sydney's west. The accused 'public health enemy number one' was previously known to police and tested positive for the disease on August 14, cops say, but allegedly refused to self-isolate at home. CCTV footage of Karam released by police had showed him coughing while in an apartment block lift. On Thursday evening, police were seen arriving to arrest the 27-year-old at the apartment building, before he was led out outside wearing a gown, mask and face visor to cheers from the public. Covid-positive Anthony Karam (pictured) was arrested by NSW Police after they say he reneged on a deal to turn himself in after he allegedly refused to self-isolate Video showed the 27-year-old being led outside to cheers from the public wearing a gown, mask and face visor When faced with cameras on the pavement outside, Karam insisted he had done nothing wrong. 'I've have proof I've been isolating the whole time - so you do what you like,' he told 7News. He has since been charged with 13 offences including being in public and not preventing the spread of a Category 2-5 condition, not complying with Covid-19 orders and two counts of failing to comply with a self-isolation direction. Karam was also charged with nine counts of not wearing a fitted face covering in the indoor area of a common property. He allegedly refused to answer calls from health officials who then brought in police but when they tried to visit his home, they allegedly discovered the address he gave was fake. On August 23 police issued a public warning about him after they could not make contact in which officers dubbed him 'public health enemy No. 1'. Karam is accused of going on the run while infected, potentially spreading the disease to thousands across the state. Anthony Karam, 27, seen here in CCTV footage from a lift in an apartment block, has been branded Sydney's 'public health enemy number one' Anthony Karam, 27, pictured, was previously known to police and tested positive for the disease on August 14 - but has allegedly refused to self-isolate Police alleged they made contact with him through a third party and thought they had negotiated a deal to bring him in off the streets, The Daily Telegraph reported. But they claim the deal fell through, which sparked a renewed manhunt for him. The situation was considered so serious that police used Section 62 of the Public Health Act for the first time to name and identify Karam to help in the search. An intelligence analyst with MSNBC was condemned by critics on Thursday after he tweeted '#dealwithit' in response to an Afghan suicide bombing that killed 13 Marines. Malcolm Nance, who has nearly a million followers on Twitter, had posted online about the suicide bombing outside of Kabul's airport. He previously served in the U.S. Navy and obtained the rank of Senior Chief Petty Officer. '20 YEARS- FYI there have been terrorist suicide bombers killing civilians nearly DAILY in Afghanistan. This ain't new. It's why we are leaving,' Nance tweeted. In the post, Nance included the hashtag '#DealWithIt' - sparking the controversy over his comments. He has since deleted the post and admitted his initial choice of words was 'callous.' Malcolm Nance, who has nearly a million followers on Twitter, had posted online about the suicide bombing outside of Kabul's airport He previously served in the U.S. Navy and obtained the rank of Senior Chief Petty Officer In the post, Nance included the hashtag '#DealWithIt' - sparking the controversy over his comments He has since deleted the post and explained why he deleted it in a new Twitter thread 'Today we lost 12 brave Americans & many Afghans. I deeply regret how callous it now sounds. I would never intentionally disrespect my brothers & sisters in arms. I also sincerely apologize to their families, and I pray for them,' he tweeted. He continued: 'As proud combat veteran whose family has served the U.S. military for 150 years, I spent almost all of my adult hood in defense of our country & its freedoms & guarded it w/my own life. Yes, I posted before there were any serious casualties reported. I should've waited.' 'Over 70,000 Afghan civilians, 40,000 Afghan soldiers, and 2,743 Americans have died in this conflict. I am heartsick about the lives we have already lost and those we lost today,' he added. 'Finally: My first Intel job was in Beirut, 1983. We lost 322 Marines/Sailors & civilians in just 2 suicide attacks. I was at the Pentagon 9/11 & survived Suicide Bombers in Iraq. My work is to keep you informed w/accurate assessments. I'll keep doing that with more empathy.' Images from social media purport to show scenes after the explosion at Kabul Airport A suicide bombing on Thursday killed U.S. troops in Afghanistan, including at least four Marines Afghans struggle to reach the foreign forces to show their credentials to flee the country outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan on Thursday But other Twitter users had already attacked Nance for appearing to tell his followers to 'deal' with the loss of American lives. 'Imagine not just thinking this, but feeling so beyond shame and perspective that you tweet it publicly,' Fourth Watch editor Steve Krakauer tweeted. Chuck Ross, a reporter with the conservative publication Washington Free Beacon, ripped Nance as 'MSNBC's finest.' 'Always genuinely disturbing to be reminded that these guys worked at the highest levels of the us government,' Ross' colleague Joe Simonson added. 'Can't think of anything witty to say here but maybe if your tweet about a suicide bombing includes 'hashtag dealwithit' it's not a good tweet,' Jack Crosbie wrote. People reacted to Nance's #dealwithit comments on Twitter As noted by Fox News, Nance has often been the subject of controversy and once claimed former President Donald Trump was compromised by Russia as early as 1977 and that ISIS should carry out a suicide attack on Trump Tower in Istanbul. The conservative website The Federalist noted that Nance had also deleted the tweet about Istanbul but did not apologize. Two other former UK military translators told the Mail they had narrow escapes after waiting hours at the airport gates A former British military interpreter and his family are feared to be among the casualties of the Islamic State atrocity at Kabul airport yesterday. Hussain, his wife, three children and three children of a relative were trapped with thousands of Afghans desperate for a mercy flight in an area between the Baron Hotel rendezvous point and the Abbey Gate at the time of the blast. The 48-year-old had told the Mail an hour before the double explosions believed to be set off by terrorists wearing suicide vests first at the gate then near the hotel that he had spent two days in the area trying to pass through British-manned checkpoints. He said he was aware of the bomb threat because UK forces had used loudspeakers to tell people to go home. But, with time running out, he worried that he would not be able to reach the front of the queue again. 'I know it is a risk but I have little choice if I am to escape,' said Hussain, who had worked with the UK military in Helmand. 'I know I am caught near the wrong gate but if I leave now I may not be able to make it through the Taliban checkpoints as they are turning people back.' A wounded man is carried away from the scene of one of Thursday's explosions in a wheelbarrow A wounded man leaves the scene of one of the explosions on Thursday, which killed dozens of people Hussain, a member of the minority Hazara community, had been stopped last week at a Taliban checkpoint when heading to the airport, a gun pressed to his chest and warned not to return. He and his family had permission to travel and had been called to the airport but he said yesterday that no one would help him through. Last night his telephone was ringing out and unusually he wasn't replying to messages. A friend in the house where he had been hiding said they had been checking the hospitals where victims of the attacks had been taken. Two other former UK military translators said they had narrow escapes after waiting hours at the airport gates. Aziz, his wife and four children had spent two nights in the crowds but less than 30 minutes before the blast returned home after reading a warning from British officials to leave. 'We were lucky', he said. 'We heard the massive explosion, felt the power and then the debris began to land. 'When it cleared we looked and it was close to where we had been. 'People were a mess, there must have been hundreds, maybe thousands of people, there was crying and shouting. Warnings had been issued that the huge crowds gathering near the airport to seek safety could become a target for an attack by militants People are seen on the ground near the Abbey Gate following the explosion on Thursday 'There were bodies and clothes had too much blood on. It was like a battlefield, but not like Helmand where you knew the enemy.' He added: 'People close to the bomber had been blown apart, it was horrible. Horrible... We are shocked, worried.' Aziz added: 'My brother is a surgeon and works at the emergency hospital. He said it was awful with many people killed and injured. 'Everyone was packed together so it was a very easy target with no escape.' Former UK special forces translator Obad, 34, was 800 yards from the first explosion and said his instinct was to fall to the ground to protect his four children. 'It was a very powerful explosion, there was silence and then cries,' he said. 'We could see many injured and some were dead. Bodies had been torn and there were many covered in blood. 'The people were rushing the injured to hospital past us, they looked in a mess. We were lucky not to be caught in it because if you were near when the explosion happened there was no chance of escape.' He added: 'We had been called to the airport and came from Kandahar. 'We are just waiting to hear from the British what to do. I hope the flight will still be flying but this could be the end.' The Daily Mail has been fighting for the safe relocation of Afghan translators since 2015 through the award-winning Betrayal of the Brave campaign. The BBC has angered staff after dumping much-loved presenters from their slots on its biggest local radio station, in a move blamed on the 'religion of diversity'. A 'schedule refresh' to be announced imminently for Radio London will see two of its most popular hosts replaced in their slots by more diverse talent. A source at the station said they fear there will be a backlash from audiences which could damage listening figures. Robert Elms, 62, has been a presenter on the station since 1994 and has a loyal audience. He will be lose his Monday-Friday mid-morning show But the BBC said that to suggest decisions were being taken based on anything other than ability was ridiculous. Robert Elms, 62, has been a presenter on the station since 1994 and has a loyal audience. He will be lose his Monday-Friday mid-morning show and present a programme on Friday, Saturday and Sunday mornings instead. Jo Good, 66, who has been at the station since 2003 and is on after lunch, is being moved to a 10pm-1am slot from Monday to Thursday. It is understood that Eddie Nestor, 57, who is black, will move from his 5pm show to replace Elms in broadly the same slot Monday to Thursday. Jeanette Kwakye, 38, who TV viewers will have seen doing track-side interviews during the BBC's Olympics coverage in Tokyo, will be given Miss Good's slot. Jo Good, 66, who has been at the station since 2003 and is on after lunch, is being moved to a 10pm-1am slot from Monday to Thursday Staff are said to have been told not to speak to anyone about the situation until it is announced. But some even fear that in removing popular presenters from top slots, bosses are 'deliberately crashing' the station so it can be moved online in the long-term. A Radio London source said: 'They have binned some really good people for the sake of diversity. It's like a religion of diversity at the BBC. 'It's every department. It's got to be diverse and a drive to go younger. We feel like you can't say anything or they think you're Jim Davidson if you start saying stuff.' They claimed staff were preparing for the switchboards to be 'jammed' with angry listeners once the new schedule is made public. A BBC spokesman said: 'No one is leaving the station and all our existing presenters will still host important shows. We make decisions based on a person's ability to do a job; to suggest otherwise is ridiculous.' The BBC has previously been accused of culling older white male presenters on Radio 5 Live in a bid to attract younger listeners. Harrowing footage has captured the moment desperate mothers handed their children to Australian soldiers in the hours before two blasts at Kabul Airport killed 60 people. Video showed families passing young children and their belongings over a barbed wire fence to Australian soldiers outside the airfield on Thursday. At 6pm local time, at least 60 Afghans and 12 US military personnel were killed when two suicide bombers attacked the crowds trying to flee the city after its fall to the Taliban 10 days ago. No Australians troops have been killed in the two deadly bomb blasts, with the ADF withdrawing their soldiers during a final airlift earlier in the day. Desperate mothers handed their children to Australian soldiers in the hours before two blasts at Kabul Airport killed 60 people An Australian soldier takes belongings from crowds at the airport. No Australians troops have been killed in the two deadly bomb blasts, following a final airlift earlier in the day The Afghan affiliate of Islamic State known as Islamic State Khorasan (ISIS-K) has claimed responsibility for the attacks. 'It's a horrible, horrible day,' Defence Minister Peter Dutton told the Today show on Friday. 'I just grieve, like every decent person would, at the loss of life and in particular for us, the loss of the American lives.' Australia has helped about 4,000 people escape Afghanistan, which has descended into chaos after the Taliban rapidly seized control following a US decision to withdraw from the country after 20 years. Mr Dutton said US troops provided security for thousands of Australian citizens and visa holders who escaped through the Abbey Gate and the Baron hotel where the blasts were detonated. 'Our troops will be devastated by the loss of their comrades. These are people they've worked alongside over the course of the last week,' he said. Wounded women arrive at a hospital for treatment after two blasts rocked Kabul on Thursday A man injured in the Kabul attacks on Thursday arrives at hospital to be treated. Among those killed in the two bomb attacks were 12 US troops, including 11 US Marines and one Navy medic ISIS has claimed responsibility for Thursday's sequence of attacks. A fighter is shown in a grab from the group's Telegram account, where they are allowed to operate 'It's remarkable how many people they have brought out, that they've saved, particularly women and children, but everybody is devastated by this.' As well as Australia, Norway, Poland, Holland and Canada have all stopped evacuating citizens. US General Kenneth F. McKenzie said the US would keep evacuating its citizens despite Thursday's attack and despite an 'imminent' threat of more attacks. US President Joe Biden has promised to hunt down and destroy the terrorists in the double suicide attack. He paid tribute to the 'selfless heroes' who died helping vulnerable people to safety, but delivered a stern warning to the people responsible. 'For those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive, we will not forget,' he said in an address at the White House. 'We will hunt you down and make you pay.' Biden has been under intense pressure to justify his decision to withdraw by August 31, after the way in which the Taliban raced across the country and captured the capital. That pressure reached fever pitch on Thursday as Republicans called for Biden's resignation or impeachment. Wounded Afghans lie on a bed at a hospital after a deadly explosions outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover Administration officials have been forced to negotiate with Kabul's new rulers in order to ensure Westerners and vulnerable Afghans could reach the airport. Warnings had grown in recent days that ISIS-K was planning a major attack. Biden said the US would continue with the operation to rescue another 1000 Americans believed to still be in Kabul. 'We will not be deterred by terrorists,' he said. 'We'll not let them stop our mission.' Advertisement Joe Biden crumbled when confronted by reporters with the deaths of 13 troops and 90 people who were slaughtered at Kabul airport on Thursday by two ISIS bomb attacks in the latest tragic episode of his disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. The 78-year-old President was lost for words at times and and frustrated in others, gripping his notebook and widening his eyes while reporters from a pre-approved list asked him questions for about 30 minutes. The press conference was at 5pm, nearly eight hours after the two blasts. Biden said nothing all day before the briefing. When pressed, accepted responsibility for the violence but still stood by his decision to withdraw troops hastily while thousands of Americans remained in the country. He then tried to blame it all on former President Donald Trump, who made the initial decision to withdraw. Trump has since claimed the attacks on Thursday would not have happened on his watch, because ISIS and the Taliban were too afraid of the force he would use in retaliation. He has also slammed Biden's team for giving the Taliban a list of Afghan allies they said should be evacuated, calling it a 'kill list' for a group of terrorists who may end up killing them in revenge for their cooperation with the US in the war. Biden has vowed to hunt down the killers responsible but in the meantime, he still has to get nearly 1,000 Americans out of the country before August 31 - a deadline the Taliban is insisting on. He didn't know about the kill list when asked at the press conference, but said it 'could exist'. As has become the norm for Biden, he was given a list of pre-approved journalists to call upon at the press briefing. Last week, a top cardiologist Dr. Aseem Malhotra, consultant and expert in evidence-based medicine, expressed concerns about Biden's age and mental and physical well being. Scroll down for video President Joe Biden bowed his head as he listened to a question from Peter Doocy of Fox News as he took questions after giving an update on the situation in Afghanistan and the deaths of 12 servicemembers The President was taking questions from a pre-approved list of reporters but he still widened his eyes and looked lost for words at times throughout the press conference that he had more than 7 hours to prepare for Biden - at 78 - is the oldest president and has previously suffered two brain aneurysms and a heart condition which makes the muscle beat too fast, causing dizziness and confusion. After working his way through a list of reporters, Biden called on Fox's Peter Doocy, who also followed Biden on the campaign trail, was one of the six members of the press the president called on 'There had not been a U.S. service member killed in combat since February of 2020. You set a deadline, you pulled troops out, you sent troops back in, and now 12 marines are dead,' he said, using the death toll that has since been updated to confirm an extra fatality. 'You said the buck stops with you. Do you bear any responsibility for the way things have unfolded the last two weeks?' Biden griped his notebook with both hands and was quick with his first answer. 'I bear responsibility for fundamentally all thats happened of late,' he responded. He then tried to blame it on Trump, saying Trump planned to be out by May 1 and that he delayed it. 'You know I wish one day you'd say these things. You know as well as I do that the former President made a deal with the Taliban that he would get all American forces out of Afghanistan by May 1. In return the deal was made - that was a year before. 'In return for the commitment, the Taliban would continue to attack others but would not attack any American forces. Remember that? I'm being serious. I'm asking you a question,' he said. Thursday's terror attack, which Biden attributed to ISIS-K, now poses a major political and military challenge Injured Afghans in hospital on Friday morning, the day after being struck by two ISIS suicide bombs at Kabul airport This is the bloody aftermath at Kabul airport on Friday. Blood-soaked clothes and discarded shoes are scattered across the ground in front of a lone Taliban fighter at one of the airport's gates TODAY and YESTERDAY: Crowds pack into the open sewer which runs around the airport perimeter (left) just hours after it was the scene of carnage when a suicide bomber blew himself up Afghans desperate to flee the country returned to the fetid canal which runs the perimeter of Kabul airport ISIS has claimed responsibility for Thursday's sequence of attacks. A fighter is shown in a grab from the group's Telegram account, where they are allowed to operate 'Is that accurate to the best of your knowledge, yes or no,' said Biden, trying to get Doocy to commit to an answer about the Doocy responded by saying, 'Do you think the people have an issue with the way things have happened?' Clearly frustrated, he put his head in his hands. Former President Donald Trump on Thursday night released this statement fuming over Biden's handling of the withdrawal after the first American lives were lost He lifted his head, took a breath to compose himself and answered. 'I think they have an issue that people are likely to get hurt. Some as we've seen have gotten killed, and that it is messy. 'The reason why, whether my friend will acknowledge it or has reported it, the reason why there were no attacks on Americans as you said from the day I came into office was because a commitment was made by President Trump: I will be out by May 1. 'In the meantime, you agree not to attack any Americans That was the deal. That's why no American was attacked.' Biden seemed content with his answer and braced for the follow up question. His eyes widened and his body tensed. His hands dropped to in front of his body. 'So you squarely stand by your decision to pull out,' Doocy asked. The president dug his heels in and demonstratively said, 'Yes, I do.' 'Because look at it this way folks, and I have another meeting for real. But imagine where we'd be if I had indicated on May the first that I was not going to renegotiate an evacuation date. We were going to stay there,' he said. 'I'd have only one alternative: to pour thousands of troops back into Afghanistan to fight a war that we had already won relative to the reason why we went in the first place. 'I have never been of the view that we should be sacrificing American lives to try to establish a democratic government in Afghanistan, a country that has never once in its entire history been a united country. 'And is made up of different tribes who have never ever ever got along with one another. So as I said before, and this is the last comment I'll make, we'll have a chance to talk about this unfortunately beyond because we are not out yet. Critics are now calling for Biden's resignation or for him to be impeached 'And so, as I said before -- and this is the last comment I'll make, but we'll have more chance to talk about this, unfortunately, beyond, because we're not out yet -- if Osama bin Laden, as well as al Qaeda, had chosen to launch an attack -- when they left Saudi Arabia -- out of Yemen, would we have ever gone to Afghanistan? Even though the Taliban completely controlled Afghanistan at the time, would we have ever gone? 'I know it's not fair to ask you questions. It's rhetorical. But raise your hand if you think we should have gone and given up thousands of lives and tens of thousands of wounded. 'Our interest in going was to prevent al Qaeda from reemerging -- first to get bin Laden, wipe out al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and prevent that from happening again. 'As I've said 100 times: Terrorism has metastasized around the world; we have greater threats coming out of other countries a heck of a lot closer to the United States. 'We don't have military encampments there; we don't keep people there. We have over-the-horizon capability to keep them from going after us. 'Ladies and gentlemen, it was time to end a 20-year war.' Biden's handling of the withdrawal has been almost universally condemned. 'We will make you pay': Biden vows to 'hunt down' ISIS-K for double suicide bomb attack that killed 13 US troops and 90 Afghans and tells Pentagon to draw up airstrike plans. Takes responsibility for carnage BUT stands by troop withdrawal President Joe Biden promised on Thursday to hunt down and destroy the ISIS-K terrorists who killed 13 American service personnel and dozens of Afghans in a double suicide attack on Kabul airport. He paid tribute to the 'selfless heroes' who died helping vulnerable people to safety, but delivered a stern warning to the Islamic state offshoot behind the blasts that killed 11 U.S. Marines, a Navy medic and another service member screening evacuees at the airport gates. The two locations targeted in the bombings were the Abbey Gate of Hamid Karzai International Airport, where US troops were screening Afghans for evacuation, and the nearby Baron Hotel, where thousands including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. The Pentagon warned there is still an imminent threat of attack at the airport and have now been told to draw up strike plans to hit ISIS-K assets and leadership. 'For those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive, we will not forget,' Biden said in an address at the White House. 'We will hunt you down and make you pay.' Biden spoke to the nation Thursday and took questions from the press after a day of consulting with his national security team and senior generals, while Republicans said he had 'blood on his hands' and demanded he resign or be impeached. He admitted that he must take responsibility for everything that has happened in Afghanistan since deciding to withdraw including the deaths of 13 service members - but stood by his decision to leave by August 31 and insisted the military timeline wouldn't change. 'Let me take the one question from the most interesting guy I know in the press,' Biden said, directing his final question of his briefing to Fox News' Peter Doocy. 'You set a deadline, you pulled troops out, you sent troops back in and now 12 Marines are dead,' Doocy said in a press conference before the latest confirmed service member death. 'You said the buck stops with you. Do you bear any responsibility for the way that things unfolded in the last two weeks?' he asked 'I bear responsibility for fundamentally all that's happened of late,' he said, before saying he had inherited a commitment to leave Afghanistan from the previous administration. 'Here's the deal, you know...as well as I do that the former president made a deal with the Taliban that he would get all American forces out of Afghanistan by May 1.' Biden revealed that he already asked his commanders for plans to strike back at the Afghan Islamic State offshoot that was responsible for the attack. 'I've also ordered my commanders to develop operational plans to strike ISIS-K assets, leadership and facilities,' he said. 'We will respond with force and precision at the place we choose and a moment of our choosing.' Wounded Afghans lie on a bed at a hospital after a deadly explosions outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover The blast was outside The Baron Hotel, at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport. Westerners were staying in the hotel before their evacuation flights The Pentagon first publicly confirmed the blasts shortly after 6pm Kabul time on Thursday, and later confirmed a staggering US military death toll that is the highest in one day in Afghanistan since 2011. General Frank McKenzie, commander of US Central Command, said that the attack on the Abbey Gate unfolded after at least one suicide bomber was able to get through initial Taliban screening points. The Taliban maintains an outer perimeter around the airport, and is supposed to screen Afghans before they reach US-manned checkpoints. McKenzie speculated that the bomber may have slipped through due to incompetence among the Taliban militants. As Marines were conducting a pat-down at a secondary checkpoint, the apparent suicide bomb detonated, creating scenes of carnage that were shared on social video. The bomb at the Abbey Gate struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. The filthy canal was filled with bloodsoaked corpses, some being fished out and laid in heaps on the canal side while wailing civilians searched for loved ones. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Biden has been under intense pressure to justify his decision to withdraw by August 31, after the way in which the Taliban raced across the country and captured the capital. That pressure reached fever pitch on Thursday as Republicans called for Biden's resignation or impeachment. Administration officials have been forced to negotiate with Kabul's new rulers in order to ensure Westerners and vulnerable Afghans could reach the airport. Warnings had grown in recent days that ISIS-K was planning a major attack. Other nations suspended their evacuation work and began flying their last remaining staff and military personnel out of the country. But Biden said the U.S. would continue with the operation to rescue another 1000 Americans believed to still be in Kabul. 'We will not be deterred by terrorists,' he said. 'We'll not let them stop our mission.' A bloodied patient was laying in the recovery unit at Wazir Akbar Khan Hospital after being injured in the deadly explosions A wounded man walked out of an emergency room in Kabul bloodied and with an IV bag in hand A man who was severely injured in the deadly attacks outside the airport in Kabul laid in a hospital bed on August 26, 2021 waiting for professional care Criticism of his handling of the crisis mounted throughout the day as Biden remained out of sight. The White House did not issue a statement and the Secretary State and Secretary of Defense also failed to appear. Biden began his speech with a tribute to the personnel who died, his voice cracking with emotion. 'These American service members who gave their lives - it's an overused word, but it's totally appropriate - were heroes ... heroes who have been engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others,' he said. 'They are part of an airlift, an evacuation effort unlike any seen in history.' The White House announced soon after that flags would be flown at half staff from federal buildings. At least 60 Afghans also died on Thursday when the two bombs went off amid the desperate clamour to escape Kabul. The first bomber was being searched by troops when he detonated a suicide vest. The second was a car bomb attack. It's unclear how the first bomber got through Taliban checkpoints and close enough to the Marines to kill them. The death toll is thought to be the highest in a single incident in Afghanistan since 30 died when a helicopter was shot down in 2011. In a statement, Islamic State claimed responsibility and said one of its suicide bombers had targeted 'translators and collaborators with the American army.' General Kenneth F. McKenzie, commander of CentCom, promised that the evacuation effort would continue despite the growing threat from ISIS and said he would 'go after' those responsible for the blasts. He said the US military had Apache attack helicopters, MQ-9 Reaper drones, F-15 fighters and AC-130 Gunships flying over Afghanistan and warned further attacks by the terrorists were imminent. 'We expect these attacks to continue,' General McKenzie said, saying he was particularly concerned about the risk of further car bomb attacks. Despite the danger, he said there was no alternative but to have troops continue to search people on the ground before they board flights, and that more than 100,000 had already been checked. One thousand Americans remain in Afghanistan but McKenzie said not all of them want to leave. He said his personnel would work to get those who do want to leave out, but that the operation was becoming increasingly difficult as the deadline approached. Republicans stepped up their attacks on Biden. Nikki Haley, former US ambassador to the UN, and others demanded he resign or be impeached for his handling of the the withdrawal. H.R McMaster, Trump's national security adviser, said Thursday's attack was 'just the beginning.' In this frame grab from video, people attend to a wounded man near the site of a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021 A man injured in the Kabul terrorists attacks on Thursday arrives at hospital to be treated. Among those killed in the two bomb attacks were 11 US Marines and one Navy medic Medical staff bring an injured man to a hospital in an ambulance after two powerful explosions, which killed at least six people, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021 Horrifying footage from Kabul airport shows dozens of Afghans lying in blood after two ISIS suicide bombers attacked crowds who were hoping to flee the Taliban Wounded women arrive at a hospital for treatment after two blasts, which killed at least five and wounded a dozen, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021 Medical and hospital staff bring an injured man on a stretcher for treatment after two powerful explosions, which killed at least six people, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021 In this frame grab from video, a medical worker attends to a person wounded in a deadly explosion at the Kabul airport, at a hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan 'We are going to see horrible image after horrible image. 'We're going to confront the steady drumbeat of horrors inflicted on the Afghan people. What are we going to do about it? 'Are we going to give a damn? Or is this going to be like Rwanda?' McMaster told Yahoo News, referring to the 1994 slaughter of 800,000 people in Rwanda. 'I would not be surprised at all if ISIS-K in fact, I'd be surprised if it wasn't the case is being used by the Haqqani network as a cutout to attack us and humiliate us on our way out,' he added. With the Taliban in charge of the city, there has not yet been any official death toll. Witnesses suggested as many as 60 Afghans had died. Norway, Poland, Holland and Canada have all stopped evacuating citizens. General McKenzie said the US would keep evacuating its citizens despite Thursday's attack and despite an 'imminent' threat of more attacks. The threat they are most concerned about is another car bomb, he said, but there is also intelligence to suggest ISIS wants to launch a rocket attack too. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, left, refused to take questions at a briefing on Thursday afternoon and instead let General Kenneth F. McKenzie, the commander on the ground, speak to reporters via Zoom Gen. McKenzie said the US would go after ISIS to retaliate if they can find the right groups. The threat of a suicide-born vehicle threat is 'very high.' He also said the US was working to determine how the suicide bomber got through, and that it may have been down to Taliban incompetence. He said there was no evidence the Taliban helped facilitate the attack. Among critics on Thursday as Trump's National Security Adviser, H.R McMaster, who said the attacks were 'just the beginning' 'Clearly, if they get up to the Marines, there was a failure here. The Taliban operate with varying degrees of competence - some of these guys are good and scrupulous, and some are not,' he said. General McKenzie is the only person from the government to speak to reporters about the fiasco. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken only tweeted about it. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement: 'On behalf of the men and women of the Department of Defense, I express my deepest condolences to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and wounded in Kabul today. 'Terrorists took their lives at the very moment these troops were trying to save the lives of others. We mourn their loss. We will treat their wounds. And we will support their families in what will most assuredly be devastating grief. 'But we will not be dissuaded from the task at hand. To do anything less - especially now - would dishonor the purpose and sacrifice these men and women have rendered our country and the people of Afghanistan.' Republicans, outraged about the terrorist attacks in Kabul that left US personnel dead, accused President Biden of having 'blood on his hands,' as Sen. Lindsey Graham urged the US to take back control of Bagram airbase after reports of two explosions at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul. 'I have advocated for days that the Bagram Air Base should be reopened as the Kabul airport is very difficult to defend and has been the only evacuation outlet,' the South Carolina Republican wrote on Twitter. 'We have the capability to reestablish our presence at Bagram to continue to evacuate American citizens and our Afghan allies. The biggest mistake in this debacle is abandoning Bagram.' 'I urge the Biden Administration to reestablish our presence in Bagram as an alternative to the Kabul airport so that we do not leave our fellow citizens and thousands of Afghan allies behind. It is not a capability problem, but a problem of will,' Graham said. 'The retaking of Bagram would put our military at risk, but I think those involved in the operation would gladly accept that risk because it would restore our honor as a nation and save lives.' Lawmakers were briefed on the situation this week by Biden's national security team. Meanwhile, Democrat Foreign Affairs Committee chair Sen. Bob Menendez, said: 'This is a full-fledged humanitarian crisis and US government personnel ... must secure the airport.' 'As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We can't trust the Taliban with Americans' security.' House GOP leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy called on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to bring back the House so that lawmakers can be briefed on the situation. 'Today's attacks are horrific. My prayers go out to those who were injured and the families of those who were killed. I also continue to pray for the safety of our troops, the stranded American citizens, our allies and Afghan partners who remain in the area. Our enemies have taken advantage of the chaotic nature of the withdrawal,' the California Republican said in a statement. 'It is time for Congress to act quickly to save lives. Speaker Pelosi must bring Congress back into session before August 31 so that we can be briefed thoroughly and comprehensively by the Biden Administration and pass Representative Gallagher's legislation prohibiting the withdrawal of our troops until every American is out of Afghanistan.' Other lawmakers submitted an outpouring of prayers for American troops on the ground and Afghans on Twitter as they, along with the rest of the world, watch and wait to see how a series of attacks on Kabul airport unfold. Still others demanded a forceful response and called for 'resignations' out of the White House. Some warned the worst could be yet to come. Rep. Jody Hice, R-Ga., reupped a call for Biden to resign. 'Biden Admin views abandoned people in Afghanistan as a political nuisance. Maybe looking at them as real people instead of 'papers to push' would produce rescues rather than deaths. It's time for Biden to RESIGN NOW!!!' 'Should Biden step down or be removed for his handling of Afghanistan? Yes,' Nikki Haley, former ambassador to the United Nations, tweeted. 'But that would leave us with Kamala Harris which would be ten times worse. God help us.' Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport after a suicide bomber detonated an explosive outside the Baron Hotel, killing multiple people and injuring at least three US troops Scenes from the ground show injured Afghans being removed in wheelchairs. Injured Afghans flee Kabul airport on Thursday night after two explosions and gunfire ripped through crowds Afghan people who want to leave the country continue to wait around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 26, 2021 'My biggest fear is these attacks today are just the beginning of what we will continue to see as the Administration fails to get Americans and our Afghan allies out and to safety,' Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, wrote on Twitter. 'We don't need statements from the Administration right now - we need immediate resignations.' 'At what point does Afghanistan turn from 'Biden's Saigon' to 'Biden's Tehran Moment?'' questioned Rep. Ralph Norman, R-SC. The Iran hostage crisis from 1979-1981 was considered a major failure and contributor to President Jimmy Carter's loss in his reelection bid. 'President @JoeBiden- you had one job. That job continues and American lives & security depend on it. Act like it,' Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, wrote on Twitter. Despite the escalating violence, the US's top diplomat made the astonishing claim on Thursday morning, before the explosion, that it was 'relatively safe' on the ground and people should still be able to make their way there. There is still no indication of when Biden may speak. A White House official told DailyMail.com on Thursday: 'The President met with his national security team this morning, including Secretary Blinken, Secretary Austin, Chairman Milley, and commanders on the ground. 'He will continue to be briefed on updates on the evolving situation throughout the day. 'There will be updates to the President's schedule, which we will share as they become available.' Earlier on Thursday, US troops on the ground closed gates at the airport and the State Department warned people not to congregate at the airport. Britain told its citizens to run for the Pakistan border instead. The Taliban claimed Kabul on August 14 and there has been a frantic scramble to get Western citizens and Afghan allies out of the region by August 31, the Taliban's ceasefire deadline. Full transcript of Joe Biden's statement of Kabul suicide bombing and answers he gave to reporters' questions By Melissa Koenig for DailyMail.com PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: Been a tough day. This evening in Kabul, as you all know, terrorists attacked - that weve been talking about and worried about, that the intelligence community has assessed [was] undertaken - an attack - by a group known as ISIS-K - took the lives of American service members standing guard at the airport, and wounded several others seriously. They also wounded a number of civilians, and civilians were killed as well. Ive been engaged all day, and in constant contact with the military commanders here in Washington, the Pentagon, as well as in Afghanistan and Doha. And my commanders here in Washington and in the field have been on this with great detail, and youve had a chance to speak to some, so far. The situation on the ground is still evolving, and Im constantly being updated. These American service members who gave their lives - its an overused word, but its totally appropriate - they were heroes. Heroes who have been engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others. They were part of an airlift, an evacuation effort unlike any seen in history, with more than 100,000 American citizens, American partners, Afghans who helped us, and others taken to safety in the last 11 days. Just in the last 12 hours or so, another 7,000 have gotten out. They were part of the bravest, most capable, and the most selfless military on the face of the Earth. And they were part of, simply, what I call the 'backbone of America.' Theyre the spine of America, the best the country has to offer. Jill and I - our hearts ache, like Im sure all of you do as well, for all those Afghan families who have lost loved ones, including small children, or been wounded in this vicious attack. And were outraged as well as heartbroken. Being the father of an Army major who served for a year in Iraq and, before that, was in Kosovo as a U.S. attorney for the better part of six months in the middle of a war - when he came home after a year in Iraq, he was diagnosed, like many, many coming home, with an aggressive and lethal cancer of the brain - who we lost. We have some sense, like many of you do, what the families of these brave heroes are feeling today. You get this feeling like youre being sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest; theres no way out. My heart aches for you. But I know this: We have a continuing obligation, a sacred obligation to all of you - the families of those heroes. That obligation is not temporary; it lasts forever. The lives we lost today were lives given in the service of liberty, the service of security, in the service of others, in the service of America. Like their fellow brothers and sisters in arms who died defending our vision and our values in the struggle against terrorism of - the fallen this day, theyre part of a great and noble company of American heroes. To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. I will defend our interests and our people with every measure at my command. Over the past few weeks - I know you're - many of you are probably tired of hearing me say it - weve been made aware by our intelligence community that the ISIS-K - an arch-enemy of the Taliban; people who were freed when both those prisons were opened - has been planning a complex set of attacks on the United States personnel and others. This is why, from the outset, I've repeatedly said this mission was extraordinarily dangerous and why I have been so determined to limit the duration of this mission. And as General McKenzie said, this is why our mission was designed -- this is the way it was designed to operate: operate under severe stress and attack. We've known that from the beginning. And as Ive been in constant contact with our senior military leaders - and I mean constant, around the clock - and our commanders on the ground and throughout the day, they made it clear that we can and we must complete this mission, and we will. And that's what I've ordered them to do. We will not be deterred by terrorists. We will not let them stop our mission. We will continue the evacuation. I've also ordered my commanders to develop operational plans to strike ISIS-K assets, leadership, and facilities. We will respond with force and precision at our time, at the place we choose, and the moment of our choosing. Here is what you need to know: These ISIS terrorists will not win. We will rescue the Americans who are there. We will get out our Afghan allies out, and our mission will go on. America will not be intimidated. I have the utmost confidence in our brave service members who continue to execute this mission with courage and honor to save lives and get Americans, our partners, our Afghan allies out of Afghanistan. Every day when I talk to our commanders, I ask them what they need - what more do they need, if anything, to get the job done. As they will tell you, I granted every request. I reiterated to them again today, on three occasions, that they should take the maximum steps necessary to protect our forces on the ground in Kabul. And I also want to thank the Secretary of Defense and the military leadership at the Pentagon, and all the commanders in the field. There has been complete unanimity from every commander on the objectives of this mission and the best way to achieve those objectives. Those who have served through the ages have drawn inspiration from the Book of Isaiah, when the Lord says, 'Whom shall I sendwho shall go for us?' And the American military has been answering for a long time: 'Here am I, Lord. Send me.' 'Here I am. Send me.' Each one of these women and men of our armed forces are the heirs of that tradition of sacrifice of volunteering to go into harms way, to risk everything - not for glory, not for profit, but to defend what we love and the people we love. And I ask that you join me now in a moment of silence for all those in uniform and out uniform - military and civilian, who have given the last full measure of devotion. (A moment of silence is taken.) BIDEN: Thank you. May God bless you all. And may God protect those troops and all those standing watch for America. We have so much to do. It's within our capacity to do it. We just have to remain steadfast. Steadfast. We will complete our mission. And we will continue, after our troops have withdrawn, to find means by which we defined any American who wishes to get out of Afghanistan. We will find them and we will get them out. Ladies and gentlemen, they gave me a list here. The first person I was instructed to call on was Kelly O'Donnell of NBC. QUESTION: Mr. President, you have said leaving Afghanistan is in the national interest of the United States. After today's attack, do you believe you will authorize additional forces to respond to that attack inside Afghanistan? And are you - are you prepared to add additional forces to protect those Americans who remain on the ground carrying out the evacuation operation? BIDEN: I've instructed the military, whatever they need - if they need additional force - I will grant it. But the military - from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Joint Chiefs, the commanders in the field - have all contacted me one way or another, usually by letter, saying they subscribe to the mission as designed to get as many people out as we can within the timeframe that is allotted. That is the best way, they believe, to get as many Americans out as possible, and others. And with regard to finding, tracking down the ISIS leaders who ordered this, we have some reason to believe we know who they are - not certain - and we will find ways of our choosing, without large military operations, to get them. O'DONNELL: Inside Afghanistan, Mr. President? BIDEN: Wherever they are. Trevor from Reuters. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. There has been some criticism, even from people in your party, about the dependence on the Taliban to secure the perimeter of the airport. Do you feel like there was a mistake made in that regard? BIDEN: No, I don't. Look, I think General McKenzie handled this question very well. The fact is that we're in a situation - we inherited a situation, particularly since, as we all know, that the Afghan military collapsed 11 days before - in 11 days - that it is in the interest of, as Mackenzie said, in the interest of the Taliban that, in fact, ISIS-K does not metastasize beyond what it is, number one. And number two, it's in their interest that we are able to leave on time, on target. As a consequence of that, the major things we've asked them - moving back the perimeter; give me more space between the wall; stopping vehicles from coming through, et cetera; searching people coming through - it is not what you'd call a tightly commanded, regimented operation like the U.S. is - the military is - but they're acting in their interest -- their interest. And so, by and large - and I've asked this same question to military on the ground, whether or not it's a useful exercise. No one trusts them; we're just counting on their self-interest to continue to generate their activities. And it's in their self-interest that we leave when we said and that we get as many people out as we can. And like I said, even in the midst of everything that happened today, over 7,000 people have gotten out; over 5,000 Americans overall. So, it's not a matter of trust, it's a matter of mutual self-interest. And - but there is no evidence thus far that I've been given, as a consequence by any of our commanders in the field, that there has been collusion between the Taliban and ISIS in carrying out what happened today both in front of the hotel and what is expected to continue for - beyond today. Aamer, Associated Press. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. You have spoken again powerfully about your own son and the weight of these decisions. With that in mind - and also what you've said: that the longer we stay, the more likelihood that there would be a major attack - how do you weigh staying even one more day, considering what's happened? BIDEN: Because I think what America says matters. What we say we're going to do and the context in which we say we're going to do it, that we do it - unless something exceptional changes. There are additional American citizens, there are additional green card holders, there are additional personnel of our allies, there are additional SIV card holders, there are additional Afghans that have helped us, and there are additional groups of individuals that have contacted us from women's groups, to NGOs, and others, who have expressly indicated they want to get out and have gathered in certain circumstances in groups, on buses and other means, that still presents the opportunity for the next several days, between now and the 31st, to be able to get them out. And our military - and, I believe, to the extent that we can do that knowing the threat, knowing that we may very well have another attack - the military has concluded that's what we should do. I think they're right. I think they're correct. And after that, we're going to be in a circumstance where there are - will be, I believe, numerous opportunities to continue to provide access for additional persons to get out of Afghanistan, either through means that we provide and/or are provided through cooperation with the Taliban. They're not good guys, the Taliban. I'm not suggesting that at all. But they have a keen interest. As many of you have been reporting, they very much would like to figure out how to keep the airport open. They dont have the capacity to do it. They very much are trying to figure out whether or not they can maintain what is the portion of an economy that has become not robust, but fundamentally different than it had been. And so there's a lot of reasons why they have reached out not just to us, but to others, as to why it would be continued in their interest to get more of the personnel we want to get out. We can locate them. Now, there's not many left that we can assess that are - want to come out. There's some Americans we've identified - weve contacted the vast majority of them, if not all of them - who dont want to leave because they have sig- -- they're dual nationals, they have extended families, et cetera. And there's others who are looking for the time. So, thats why we continue. I'll take a few more questions, and - but, you, sir. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. BIDEN: I didnt pick you, but thats okay. QUESTION: I wanted to ask you - you say that 'what America says matters.' What do you say to the Afghans who helped troops, who may not be able to get out by August 31st? What - BIDEN: I say - QUESTION: What do you say to them? BIDEN: - we're going to continue to try to get you out. It matters. Look, I know of no conflict, as a student of history - no conflict where, when a war was ending, one side was able to guarantee that everyone that wanted to be extracted from that country would get out. And think about it, folks. I think it's important for - I know the American people get this in their gut. There are, I would argue, millions of Afghani citizens who are not Taliban; who did not actively cooperate with us as SIVs; who, if given a chance, they'd be onboard a plane tomorrow. It sounds ridiculous, but the vast majority of people in communities like that want to come to America, given a choice. So, getting every single person out is - can't be guaranteed to anybody because there's a determination, all who wants to get out as well. At any rate, it's a process. I was really pointing to you, but - you, sir. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. There are reports that U.S. officials provided the Taliban with names of Americans and Afghan officials to evacuate. Were you aware of that? Did that happen? And then, sir, did you personally reject a recommendation to hold, or to recapture Bagram Air Force Base? BIDEN: Here's what I've done on the - ask this - Ill answer the last question, first. On the tactical questions of how to conduct an evacuation or a war, I gather up all the major military personnel that are in Afghanistan - the commanders, as well as the Pentagon. And I ask for their best military judgment: what would be the most efficient way to accomplish the mission. They concluded - the military - that Bagram was not much value added, that it was much wiser to focus on Kabul. And so, I followed that recommendation. With regard to-- there are certain circumstances where we've gotten information - and quite frankly, sometimes from some of you - saying, 'You know of such and such a group of people who are trying to get out and they're on a bus, they're moving' - from other people - 'and this is their location.' And there have been occasions when our military has contacted their military counterparts in the Taliban and said, 'This' -- for example, 'This bus is coming through with X number of people on it, made up of the following group of people. We want you to let that bus or that group through.' So, yes, there have been occasions like that. And to the best of my knowledge, in those cases, the bulk of that has occurred -- they've been let through. But I can't tell you with any certitude that there's actually been a list of names. I don't - there may have been, but I know of no circumstance. It doesn't mean it's not - it didn't exist, that, 'Here's the names of 12 people; they're coming. Let them through.' It could very well have happened. I'll take one more question. QUESTION: Mr. President, can I - QUESTION: Mr. President, right here. Mr. President - BIDEN: Whoa. Wait, wait, wait. Let me take the one question from the most interesting guy that I know in the press. QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. Is that - is there -thank you. BIDEN: That's you. QUESTION: Mr. President, there had not been a U.S. service member killed in combat in Afghanistan since February of 2020. You set a deadline. You pulled troops out. You sent troops back in. And now 12 Marines are dead. You said the buck stops with you. Do you bear any responsibility for the way that things have unfolded in the last two weeks? BIDEN: I bear responsibility for, fundamentally, all that's happened of late. But here's the deal: You know - I wish you'd one day say these things - you know as well as I do that the former President made a deal with the Taliban that he would get all American forces out of Afghanistan by May 1. In return, the commitment was made - and that was a year before - in return, he was given a commitment that the Taliban would continue to attack others, but would not attack any American forces. Remember that? I'm being serious. QUESTION: Mr. President - BIDEN: No, I - I'm asking you a question. Be a - because before I - QUESTION: Donald Trump is not the President right now. BIDEN: No, no - now wait a minute. I'm asking you a question. Is that - is that accurate, to the best of your knowledge? QUESTION: I know what you're talking about. But, Mr. President, respectfully - BIDEN: What? QUESTION: Since -I don't think that the issue that -- do you think that people have an issue with pulling out of Afghanistan, or just the way that things have happened? BIDEN: I think they have an issue that people are likely to get hurt - some, as we've seen, have gotten killed - and that it is messy. The reason why - whether my friend will acknowledge it and was - reported it - the reason why there were no attacks on Americans, as you said, from the date until I came into office, was because the commitment was made by President Trump: 'I will be out by May 1st. In the meantime, you agree not to attack any Americans.' That was the deal. That's why no American was attacked. QUESTION: And you said that you still - a few days ago, you said you squarely stand by your decision to pull out. BIDEN: Yes, I do. Because look at it this way, folks - and I'm going to - I have another meeting, for real. But imagine where we'd be if I had indicated, on May the 1st, I was not going to renegotiate an evacuation date; we were going to stay there. I'd have only one alternative: Pour thousands of more troops back into Afghanistan to fight a war that we had already won, relative - is why the reason we went in the first place. I have never been of the view that we should be sacrificing American lives to try to establish a democratic government in Afghanistan - a country that has never once in its entire history been a united country, and is made up - and I don't mean this in a derogatory - made up of different tribes who have never, ever, ever gotten along with one another. And so, as I said before - and this is the last comment I'll make, but we'll have more chance to talk about this, unfortunately, beyond, because we're not out yet - if Osama bin Laden, as well as al Qaeda, had chosen to launch an attack - when they left Saudi Arabia - out of Yemen, would we have ever gone to Afghanistan? Even though the Taliban completely controlled Afghanistan at the time, would we have ever gone? I know it's not fair to ask you questions. It's rhetorical. But raise your hand if you think we should have gone and given up thousands of lives and tens of thousands of wounded. Our interest in going was to prevent al Qaeda from reemerging - first to get bin Laden, wipe out al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and prevent that from happening again. As I've said 100 times: Terrorism has metastasized around the world; we have greater threats coming out of other countries a heck of a lot closer to the United States. We don't have military encampments there; we don't keep people there. We have over-the-horizon capability to keep them from going after us. Ladies and gentlemen, it was time to end a 20-year war. Thank you so much. Most peoples idea of a pre-party loosener is a glass of something chilled and fizzy. Not so for Lady Amanda Feilding who, back in the day, once drilled a hole in her head an hour before hitting the town. Then aged 27, she filmed herself using a dentists drill to sink through three layers of bone to her brain which she said was soft like a pudding in an attempt to increase blood flow in the area and supposedly create more energy and consciousness. Afterwards, she had a warm bath and a steak dinner. A picture taken later that evening in 1970 shows her swathed in technicolour robes and headscarf, her loyal pet pigeon Birdie perched on her shoulder, utterly cool and composed. Believe it or not, the ancient practice of skull-drilling or trepanning was considered by some at the time to be a legitimate medical procedure. Lady Amanda Feilding (pictured in 1970) once drilled a hole in her head an hour before hitting the town. Afterwards, she had a warm bath and a steak dinner. A picture taken later that evening in 1970 shows her swathed in technicolour robes and headscarf, her loyal pet pigeon Birdie perched on her shoulder, utterly cool and composed Feilding now the Countess of Wemyss and March had been introduced to it by an ex-lover and mentor, a Dutch scientist. She was campaigning for it to be made available as a mental health treatment on the NHS. It elicited no support from clinicians and didnt catch on. However, another of the aristocrats life-long pursuits to boost research into use of psychedelic drugs to manage mental illness has been rapidly gaining ground. And this month, her company, Beckley Psytech (its CEO and Director is her son, Cosmo Feilding Mellen), raised 58 m from venture capitalists to further fund its research commercialise future psychedelic medicines. The Oxford-based start-up is hoping to develop therapies for neurological conditions using synthetic versions of the active ingredients of psychedelic compounds in magic mushrooms and in a hallucinogen secreted by a toad found only in northern Mexico and the U.S. south-west. Increasingly, mainstream researchers believe tiny micro doses of these psychedelics not enough to cause the patient to feel high or hallucinate may be effective in treating depression and other conditions. A book by New York Times writer, Michael Pollan, How To Change Your Mind: The New Science Of Psychedelics, topped bestseller lists last year. Feilding (pictured in 2019) now the Countess of Wemyss and March had been introduced to the technique by an ex-lover and mentor, a Dutch scientist For Lady Feilding, being at the cutting edge of pharmacological research and winning substantial investment is, according to her friends, something of a vindication. Because as eccentric, bohemian aristocrats go, the Countess has long been in a class of her own, and in her own words, something of a pariah. Now 78, she may be feeling her moment has come and has been gathering a number of titles other than that bequeathed by her noble ancestry, including the Queen of Consciousness by New Scientist magazine while Wired Magazine said recently that if LSD is having its renaissance, Feilding is its Michelangelo. Amanda Feilding has also spent decades exploring mysticism and certainly such traits seem to be in her genes. Her father, Basil, the great-grandson of the 7th Earl of Denbigh and the Marquess of Bath, was an anti-Establishment hippie and unsuccessful artist, her mother, a devout Catholic who believed her daughter should live at home until she married. (In the event, after winning the science prize at her convent school and discovering pot, she headed off to the Middle East with 25 in her pocket and lived for a time with the Bedouin.) A start-up is hoping to develop therapies for neurological conditions using synthetic versions of the active ingredients of psychedelic compounds in magic mushrooms and in a hallucinogen secreted by a toad Her childhood was a bizarre mix of poverty and privilege. Money would run out, so wed have no heating, no hot water, no petrol, she has said. The surroundings in which she grew up were remarkably grand, however. Beckley Park is a moated stately home in Oxfordshire built during Henry VIIIs reign and where she returned to live and raise her children after her parents death. Creatives and visionaries who frequented Beckley Park include author Aldous Huxley, whose novel, The Doors Of Perception, explored the altered state of consciousness reached using the drug mescaline. Lady Feilding (who nicknamed the grand house Brainblood Hall) lived there with her first partner, Joe Mellen, the author of Bore Hole (about trepanning) from the 1960s onwards. She described the Old Etonian beatnik as anti making money and they spent their time exploring the brain and consciousness, and had two sons, Rocky and Cosmo. In our home there were no taboos, she has previously said. The children grew up knowing that you could smoke pot and work, and even enhance your cognitive function. She is remarkably close to her sons, and travels with them to the Burning Man festival a psychedelic-fuelled hedonists utopia in the Nevada desert, where no money is permitted and which features orgy domes and effigy burning. Lady Feilding and Mellen separated in the mid-1990s, and in 1995 she married James Charteris, 13th Earl of Wemyss and March (then known as Lord Neidpath), under the Bent Pyramid, an oddity among the ancient pyramids of Egypt thanks to its curved, misshapen appearance. Her own first encounter with hallucinogenic drugs was a traumatic one at 22, her coffee was spiked with LSD and she took months to recover. But her fascination with the experience meant Lady Feilding spent the next 50- plus years of her life personally experimenting with psychedelics and lobbying to extend research into their therapeutic use. Pictured: A Mexican magic mushroom, or psilocybe cubensis In doing so, she has attracted the attention of many respected scientists, including Oxford neuroscientist Professor Colin Blakemore and his counterpart at Cambridge, Professor Trevor Robbins. Through her Beckley Foundation, Lady Feilding has also worked with a number of prestigious institutions, including Imperial College London, UCL and Kings College London to further research into the potential of psychedelic drugs. And now it seems there was always method in this Ladys madness. Since the 1990s, a growing number of legitimate studies have shown that hallucinogenics can help treat depression and other mental illnesses. Clinical trials using tiny amounts of these drug compounds have helped some patients overcome past trauma and habitual negative thought patterns. Beckley Psytech is focusing on a synthetic version of psilocybin, commonly found in magic mushrooms, which can be used to treat a rare headache (known as short-lasting unilateral neuralgiform headache) that affects 45,000 people in the U.S. and Europe. More interestingly, Beckley Psytech will also study whether depression can be treated with small doses of synthetic 5-MeO-DMT, a compound produced in the glands of the Sonoran Desert toad, where it functions as a protective poison (secreted through the skin), but is also a source of mind-altering hallucinations. Toad venom users have described their trips as feeling like they are reborn, and a total fusion with God and claim to experience bright lights, euphoria and deep personal insights. Last year, conservationists concerned at the plummeting numbers of the toads, pleaded with people in California and Arizona to stop licking them yes really! in a bid to get high. A synthetic version of 5-MeO-DMT would not only leave toads in peace, as Lady Feildings son Cosmo puts it, but allow the production of a standardised, pharmaceutical-quality product. Its great that there is so much interest and so much investment going into this area after so many years in the dark, he has said. [My mother] has spent decades fighting against social stigma and regulatory hurdles to shine the light of science on to the medical potential of psychedelic compounds . . . These medicines cannot be ignored any longer. Lady Feilding might be forgiven for thinking I told you so . . ., finally recognised as a pioneer in the field of psychedelic bio-technology and now the City is following in her wake including investment from Jim Mellon, the British billionaire Master Investor who consistently ranks among the top 10 per cent in The Sunday Times Rich List. Currently believed to be on holiday in Jamaica, Lady Feilding is at last laughing all the way to the bank. The UKs asylum backlog has soared to record levels despite a fall in applicants, official figures have revealed. More than 70,000 are awaiting a decision on whether they can start a new life in the UK amid accusations that the Home Offices system is failing. The number left waiting for a decision on their future has increased by 73 per cent in the past two years. More than 70,000 are awaiting a decision on whether they can start a new life in the UK amid accusations that the Home Offices system is failing. Migrants are seen off Dover last month The Home Office data shows there are 56,617 cases relating to 70,905 people including 3,064 citizens of Afghanistan still to be resolved, over nine times the level a decade ago. The backlog comes despite a 4 per cent drop in the number claiming asylum here over the past year. Although there has been a surge in illegal immigration to the UK via the Channel, asylum cases have been falling since the European migration crisis in 2015 and 2016. Critics have described the Home Offices asylum system as not fit for purpose, while the High Court ruled earlier this year that asylum-seekers were being kept in poor conditions at an army barracks. The Home Office data shows there are 56,617 cases relating to 70,905 people including 3,064 citizens of Afghanistan still to be resolved, over nine times the level a decade ago Dr Peter William Walsh, of the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford, said: Some of the recent increases in the backlog took place during the pandemic, but actually this is a much longer-term trend. A key driver is that the share of people receiving a decision within six months has fallen dramatically over the past decade. Figures show that 511 Afghan nationals were offered protection in the UK in the 12 months to June 2021 through asylum, resettlement and other types of leave. This is down from 942 in the previous 12 months. The number of refugees and asylum seekers resettled in the UK also plummeted in the past year, with only 661 granted protection, down 81 per cent on the previous year. The resettlement system was shut down due to the pandemic but in the second quarter of this year only 308 refugees were resettled, compared with an average of more than 1,400 between 2016 and 2019. Meanwhile, an overhaul of immigration rules post-Brexit has led to a boom in the number of EU nationals seeking UK citizenship. More than a third of applications to obtain UK citizenship now come from nationals of the blocs 27 remaining member states. Applications from EU nationals rose by 83 per cent in the past year to 74,384. In the 12 months to June there were 200,177 applications for British citizenship, up 35 per cent compared to the previous year. Since March 2019, EU nationals in the UK, and their family, have been able to apply to the EU Settlement Scheme to continue living here. A fossil confiscated during a 2013 police raid in Brazil is from an 'exceptionally well-preserved' and 'almost complete' pterosaur, according to a newly published study. The fossil, which dates to the Early Cretaceous period and is more than 90 percent complete, is of a tapejarid, a toothless reptile that lived between 144 and 100 million years ago. The remains also include a 'remarkable preservation of soft tissues, which makes it the most complete tapejarid known thus far,' the authors wrote in the study. 'The Federal Police of Brazil was investigating a fossil trade operation and recovered, in 2013, over 3,000 specimens,' the study's lead author, Victor Beccari, told CNN. A fossil confiscated during a Brazil police raid is an 'almost complete' pterosaur, a new study says The fossilized pterosaur belongs to the Tupandactylus navigans species. 'The specimen was intercepted during a police raid at Santos Harbour, Sao Paulo State, Brazil, and confiscated together with several other exceptionally well-preserved fossils' in 2013, according to the study. It was eventually transferred to the Laboratorio de Paleontologia Sistematica of the Instituto de Geociencias at Universidade de Sao Paulo for further study. The fossil is more than 90% complete and is of a tapejarid, a toothless reptile. The remains include soft tissues, making it the most complete tapejarid known 'Fossils in Brazil are protected by law, as they are part of the geological heritage of the country,' Beccari continued. 'Therefore, collecting fossils requires permission, and the trade and private collections of fossils are illegal in Brazil.' In 1942, Brazil enacted a law that states fossils are state property because they are a part of Brazil's cultural heritage and can not be sold commercially, according to CNET. This particular tapejarid had an estimated wingspan of almost 9 feet (2.7m) and was nearly 3 feet (1m) tall, with the crest accounting for 40 percent of that Beccari studied the fossils using a CT-scan to look at the bones still under sediment, 'shedding new light on the anatomy of this pterodactyloid clade,' the authors wrote in the study. The tapejarid fossil was originally found in the Crato Formation in the Araripe basin in northeastern Brazil. The experts dated the creature, known for its long neck and giant crest on its head, to roughly 115 million years ago. The 115 million year-old fossil of the tapejarid (artist rendering) was snagged during a police raid at Santos Harbour, Sao Paulo State, Brazil in 2013. It was originally found in the Crato Formation in northeastern Brazil This particular tapejarid had an estimated wingspan of almost 9 feet (2.7m) and was nearly 3 feet (1m) tall, with the crest accounting for 40 percent of that. 'With such a tall head crest and a relatively long neck, this animal may have been restricted to short-distance flights.' Beccari told CNN. The study was published today the scientific journal PLOS One. Earlier this month, researchers uncovered another pterosaur, Thapunngaka shawi, which had a 23-foot wingspan and was the 'closest thing we have to a real life dragon.' In July, a study conducted by the universities of Portsmouth and Bristol found that newly-hatched pterosaurs may have been able to fly. Fossils of a previously unknown four-legged whale species that lived 43 million years ago have been unearthed in Egypt. The predatory creature is an ancestor of modern-day whales and highlights their transition from land to sea, which happened about 10 million years ago. The new whale, named Phiomicetus anubis, was about 10 feet long with a body mass around 1,300 pounds and was likely a top predator when it roamed the ancient seas. Paleontologists from the Mansoura University Vertebrate Paleontology Center (MUVP) discovered the fossilized remains from middle Eocene rocks in the Fayum Depression in Egypt's Western Desert an area once covered by sea that has provided a rich seam of discoveries showing the evolution of whales. Scroll down for video Fossils of a previously unknown four-legged whale species that lived 43 million years ago have been unearthed in Egypt 'Phiomicetus anubis is a key new whale species, and a critical discovery for Egyptian and African paleontology,' Abdullah Gohar of MUVP, lead author of a paper on the discovery published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, told Reuters. The whale's genus name honors the Fayum Depression and species name refers to Anubis, the ancient canine-headed Egyptian god associated with mummification and the afterlife. The new species differs from others in that it has an elongated temporal fossa, which is a shallow depression on the side of the skull. It also has muscles in the skull that produce movement of the jaw in a different place and longer parietals bones, which are two bones in the skull that form the sides and roof of the cranium. The new whale, named Phiomicetus anubis, was about 10 feet long with a body mass around 1,300 pounds and was likely a top predator when it roamed the ancient seas The whale's genus name honors the Fayum Depression and species name refers to Anubis, the ancient canine-headed Egyptian god associated with mummification and the afterlife 'Unique features of the skull and mandible suggest a capacity for more efficient oral mechanical processing than the typical protocetid condition, thereby allowing for a strong raptorial feeding style,' the study reads. It may be hard to believe that the massive whales we see in the ocean today are decedents of four-legged animals that once walked on land. However, this is exactly how they were 50 million years ago. In 2008, paleontologists discovered a 47-million-year-old fossil in Pakistan that featured a stocky, fox-sized animal with an elongated body and tail, Discovery Magazine reports The bones stuck in a layer of mud mirrored characteristics of modern-day whales - there was a similar bone over the middle-ear space and skull structure. Hans Thewissen, with Northeast Ohio Medical University and involved with the discovery, and his team determined the creature, dubbed Indohyus, waded in the water like a hippopotamus in search of food and as a means to avoid predators, which eventually led them to shift from land to a fully aquatic lifestyle. The new species differs from others in that it has an elongated temporal fossa, which is a shallow depression on the side of the skull. It also has muscles in the skull that produce movement of the jaw in a different place and longer parietals bones, which are two bones in the skull that form the sides and roof of the cranium The scientists described the skeleton as being 'a fox-sized mammal that looked something like a miniature deer.' Following a deeper analysis, researchers uncovered similarities between the skull and ears of both the Indohyus and whales. They determined that the bones of Indohyus had a thick outside layer, much thicker than in other mammals of this size. This characteristic is often seen in mammals that are slow aquatic waders, such as today's hippopotamus. In 2008, paleontologists discovered a 47-million-year-old fossil in Pakistan that featured a stocky, fox-sized animal with an elongated body and tail (pictured). This is one of the first four-legged whales discovered Another clue as to how Indohyus lived was found in its limb bones, which were thicker and heavy in the same way that a hippo's are. This suggests the animal was a wader, with heavy bones to help stop it from floating. Based on this evidence, Thewissen suggested that the ancestors of whales took to the water as a predator-avoidance mechanism and did not develop specific aquatic feeding behavior until much later. Paleontologist Jonathan Geisler, from Georgia Southern University in Statesboro, had previously identified a link between raoellids and whales, but his evidence was based only on small fragments of teeth. This new work solidifies the link, he said. 'What is really important about these fossils is that they seem to confirm the hypothesis that the ancestor of cetaceans became semi-aquatic before evolving teeth specialized for eating fish,' said Geisler The first ancestors of whales emerged 42 million to 48 million years ago, which Thewissen described as resembling sea lions. Then Baleen whales came next, about 41 million years ago, which included the ancestors of humpbacks and blue whales. These were followed by toothed whales about seven million years later, which are still swimming the oceans this day Many common names for species of plants, animals and insects, including the gypsy moth and Scott's oriole, have been dubbed 'racist' by scientists who want a change. In July the Entomological Society of America (ESA) removed the term 'gypsy' from the names of a moth and ant due to the fact it is seen as a slur for Romani people. The association have since launched a public call for alternative common names for the moth Lymantria dispar and ant Aphenogaster araneoides. Many species were named by early naturalists and explores for the things around them, people making a mark at the time and using terms acceptable to them. 'We can choose language that reflects our shared values,' Jessica Ware, president-elect of ESA told ScienceNews, speaking of the Better Common Names Project. It already prohibits new names that 'perpetuate negative stereotypes' and is asking for public input on which existing names should be changed in the future. The association have since launched a public call for alternative common names for the moth Lymantria dispar (pictured) and ant Aphenogaster araneoides NEW RULES FOR COMMON NAMES IN INSECTS These new rules were set out by the Entomological Society of America under their Better Common Names program. A common name should consist of three words or fewer, but four are permissible if justifiable. A proposal for a common name should document a stage or characteristic to which the proposed common name refers. Distinctive physical features that well differentiate the species are useful. Specific words used as modifiers (adjectives, adverbs) in a common name should be easily pronounced and generally understandable by a broad public audience. Common names with words that unnecessarily incite offense, fear or promote negative emotional reactions (e.g., epidemic, murder, invasive) are strongly discouraged. Descriptors of cultures, populations, ethnicity, race, and industries, occupations are generally not acceptable. The use of a geographic descriptor in a common names proposal is generally discouraged and will require additional justification. All words should be in lower case, except for proper nouns that are traditionally capitalised in English. Advertisement Birder and citizen of the Cherokee Nation, Stephen Hampton, told ScienceNews Scott's oriole, among others, should be renamed. This is due to the fact it is named after Winfield Scott, an 19th Century US military commander that drove Native Americans from their land in a march that led to thousands dying. So far over 80 'insensitive names' have been noted by the Better Common Names Project. Ware says the goal is to have 'everybody included' in the new naming system and remove offensive names from the list. In the case of the 'Gypsy moth', says it is encouraging people to refer to the insect by its Latin name, Lymantria dispar, until it can review the more than 100 proposals for a new moniker. Species have a given scientific name, stylised in Latin, but from the early 20th Century scientists started giving plants, insects and animals a common name. This was done to bridge the communications gap with people who don't study the species, to bring more attention to them. However, according to ESA 'not all common names accepted over the past 120 years align with the goal of better communication,' due to racist connections. Some of the names given to species have already been changed, like the jewfish, renamed to the Goliath grouper in 2001 after a petition citing its offensiveness. ESA says their library includes names that contain derogative terms, names for invasive species with inappropriate geographic references and names that 'inappropriately disregard what the insect might be called by native communities.' 'These problematic names perpetuate harm against people of various ethnicities and races,' a spokesperson for the association said. Birder and citizen of the Cherokee Nation, Stephen Hampton says Scott's oriole (pictured), should be renamed due to the fact it is named after Winfield Scott, an 19th Century US military commander that drove Native Americans from their land Adding that they 'create an entomological and cultural environment that is unwelcoming and non-inclusive, disrupt communication and outreach, and counteract the very purpose of common names.' For example, a number of scorpion, fish, birds and flowers have the label Hottentot, which is a term of abuse for the Khoikhoi people of southern Africa. Other names venerate people who, by modern standards wouldn't be considered viable candidates to give their name to a common species. Bachman's sparrow, endemic to the southeastern US, is named after Lutheran minister and naturalist John Bachman. One example of this change already happening is in the form of the McCown's longspur, named for Confederate general John P McCown originally, and now simply known as the thick-billed longspur, after its thick bill SOME SPECIES NAMES HAVE ALREADY BEEN CHANGED McCown's longspur - named for Confederate general John P McCown was changed to thick-billed longspur in 2021, named for its thick bill. The jewfish - was renamed in 2001 to the Goliath grouper after a petition drew attention to its offensiveness. Squawfish - was once the name given to four species that are now known as Pikeminnow, changed in 1998 as squaw is an offensive term given to Native American women. Advertisement However, despite ministering to slaves as a clergyman and declaring black and white people are the same species, he was a slave owner who defended the practice. 'Blacks and Native Americans would have always been opposed to these names,' Hampton told ScienceNews. In fact, bird names in general seem to be among the most problematic with a specific campaign called 'Bird Names for Birds' launching in 2020 to switch to more descriptive common names. 'It's not a be-all-end-all solution,' Robert Driver from East Carolina University told ScienceNews, but said that beyond removing difficult names, would be a useful 'consideration for everyone who's out there with binoculars.' The murder of George Floyd and subsequent protests, seems to have spurred change, with the American Ornithological Society now considering someone's role in 'reprehensible events' a valid reason to revise the name of a bird. One example of this change already happening is in the form of the McCown's longspur, named for Confederate general John P McCown originally, and now simply known as the thick-billed longspur, after its thick bill. Hampton says the Scott's oriole should be next, suggesting it should instead be known as the yucca oriole as they are the plants it is most associated with. But the process of changing bird names is on hold while the ornithological society considers a new name-changing process. Mike Webster, Cornell University ornithologist and president of the society said they were 'committed to changing these harmful and exclusionary names.' Ware says it is important to get it right, adding it 'uncomfortable now,' but doing it correctly ensures it 'only happens once' and names are built to last. Details about the Better Common Names project are available from the Entomological Society of America. NASA says despite a string of technical and budgetary setbacks, it is still on target to put the first woman and next man on the surface of the moon in 2024. Administrator Bill Nelson reaffirmed the agencies commitment to the lunar landing goal, telling the 36th annual Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colorado, that 'we can do hard things,' because 'we are a can-do people'. The Artemis program is the successor to Apollo, that saw Neil Armstrong and 11 other men step foot on the surface of our only natural satellite in the 1960s and 70s. The deadline of 2024 was already an ambitious one, but has been further brought into doubt due to legal challenges from Jeff Bezos over the lunar lander contract, issues with the spacesuits and budgetary constraints imposed by Congress. Nelson said the agency would be pushing full steam ahead, quoting President John F Kennedy's 1962 speech, saying: 'we choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.' NASA says despite a string of technical and budgetary setbacks, it is still on target to put the first woman and next man on the surface of the moon in 2024. Here Kristine Davis, a spacesuit engineer at NASAs Johnson Space Center is seen in the prototype spacesuit Administrator Bill Nelson reaffirmed the agencies commitment to the lunar landing goal, telling the 36th annual Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colorado, that 'we can do hard things,' because 'we are a can-do people' The Artemis program is the successor to Apollo, that saw Neil Armstrong and 11 other men step foot on the surface of our only natural satellite in the 1960s and 70s. And Administrator Bill Nelson said things are on track for 2024 If the timetable goes to plan the Artemis 3 crew will launch in the Orion spaceship on top of a Space Launch System rocket in September 2024. Up to four astronauts will leave the Earth, and two will take the SpaceX Human Lander System down to the surface, landing in the southern polar region of the moon and remaining for 6.5 days, performing four moonwalks in that time. The tight deadline was originally imposed by former president Donald Trump, and NASA have committed to sticking to his goal, which will require the first Artemis flight to take off early next year - sending an uncrewed Orion around the moon. The Space Launch System rocket has faced a number of delays, putting the launch window at risk, and more recently the entire mission has been beset with obstacles. Pictured: Billionaire Jeff Bezos, founder of Blue Origin.The space company has filed suit against NASA in the US Court of Federal Claims for awarding Elon Musk's SpaceX the sole contract for a lunar lander for the upcoming Artemis mission 'Our human landing system demo award has been held up by delays and by litigation,' Nelson said at the symposium. 'The spacesuits, which, for the first time, were built by our commercial partners, have been technically challenging. And COVID-19 has caused unprecedented disruptions in the supply chain,' he added. The last time people walked on the moon was in December 1972, when Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt spent 12.6 days on the lunar surface for Apollo 17. Like Apollo, the first crewed Artemis mission will travel around the moon but won't actually land on the surface - that is due to launch in 2023. However, with so many obstacles facing the launch, many suspect that NASA will fail to hit the 2024 landing. Like Apollo, the first crewed Artemis mission will travel around the moon but won't actually land on the surface - that is due to launch in 2023. The landing will be in 2024 (artist impression pictured) NASA's own Office of Inspector General (OIG) recently found that it won't be able to get the next-generation spacesuits, called the Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU) designed, tested and built in time for the December 2024 landing. 'NASA's current schedule is to produce the first two flight-ready xEMUs by November 2024, but the agency faces significant challenges in meeting this goal,' the audit warns. It adds that the delay in suit development, in part due to the multiple private sector firms building various aspects of the technology, make the 2024 landing unviable. As if that wasn't bad enough for the beleaguered moon mission, NASA has also voluntarily halted work on the lunar lander, being developed by SpaceX. In 2017, NASA decided to design, test and produce xEMU suits in-house, which resulted in six suits being built with parts from 27 different contractors and vendors. And another reason for the delay is that NASA is allowing these different contractors and vendors to propose their own ideas for the look of the moon mission suit NASA's own Office of Inspector General (OIG) recently found that it won't be able to get the next-generation spacesuits, called the Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU) designed, tested and built in time for the December 2024 landing This was after Jeff Bezos-owned Blue Origin took the agency to court over its decision to exclusively award the lander contract to Elon Musk's SpaceX. Bezos claims NASA broke convention, and moved the goalposts, by not picking two of the three candidates, out of SpaceX, Blue Origin and Dynetics, to build the vehicle that will put the first woman on the moon. These roadblocks have been made worse by Covid-19, which caused a wider range of delays, with many NASA employees working remotely for months at a time. Up to four astronauts will leave the Earth, and two will take the SpaceX Human Lander System down to the surface, landing in the southern polar region of the moon and remaining for 6.5 days, performing four moonwalks in that time Despite this, Nelson says he is optimistic NASA can achieve the 2024 date and its wider, ongoing lunar goals, including a station in orbit around the moon. 'We're presented with the opportunity to lead upon the challenges we face that, as a nation, as members of a global society,' Nelson said. 'For America to lead in space and, in turn, to continue to lead here on Earth, it will take all of us working together. Female hummingbirds make themselves look 'flashy' in a bid to avoid sexual harassment and 'aggressive sex' from males during mating season, a study shows. Flashy feathers deter male 'bullies' from pecking or 'body slamming' females during feeding, according to the team from the University of Washington in Seattle. By looking flashy in other words, having more of an colourful and iridescent display females appear more like males, which in turn quells attention from males. By watching white-necked jacobin hummingbirds (Florisuga mellivora) in Panama, researchers discovered that over a quarter of juvenile and adult females have the same flashy ornamentation as males, which is unusual among bird species. However, the physical mechanism that allows adult females to have male-like plumage is not known. Scroll down for video Much like in human society, female hummingbirds have taken it into their own hands to avoid harassment. This image shows a male-like female white-necked Jacobin hummingbird being released after capture and tagging WHAT IS IRIDESCENCE? Iridescence is the phenomenon of appearing to gradually change colour when viewed from different angles, like light off a soap bubble. Creating colours without the use of pigments comes about through tiny structures on the surface of beetle shells, butterfly wings, and bird feathers. Light waves are refracted and reflected from these surfaces, and the interference between the waves creates the colours that seem to shift as the viewing angle changes. It was discovered in 2009 that some flowers including hibiscus and tulip can be iridescent, and that bees can see that iridescence. Iridescence can help animals catch the eye of potential mates or warn predators that they may be poisonous. Advertisement Hummingbirds are famous for their intense iridescence meaning they appear to gradually change colour as they are viewed from different angles, like light off a soap bubble. Though plumage ornamentation in animals is usually attributed to attracting a mate, researchers found the opposite this species after their experiments. The study, published today in Current Biology, was led by Dr Jay Falk at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, New York. 'If females having male-like plumage is the result of sexual selection, then the males would have been drawn to the male-plumaged females,' he said. 'That didnt happen the male white-necked jacobins still showed a clear preference for the typically plumed adult females.' Male white-necked jacobin hummingbirds are known to have bright and flashy colours, with iridescent blue heads, bright white tails, and white bellies. Female jacobins, on the other hand, tend to be drabber in comparison, with a muted green, grey or black colors that allow them to blend into their environment. Interestingly, both males and females of this species initially have flashy colours when they are juveniles, but in most females, the colours fade by the time of adulthood and they become duller greens and greys. It is not clear whether this phenomenon is genetic, by the choice of the hummingbird, or due to environmental factors, according to the team. Both male and female white-necked jacobins fan their tails during courtship or aggressive interactions. Because this bird also has its wings partially raised it's likely an aggressive stance Pictured, a white-necked jacobin hummingbirds (Florisuga mellivora) of an unknown gender For the study, researchers captured, photographed and genetically sexed 401 of the species in Gamboa, Panama in total, 247 of which were male and 154 of which were female. When looking at all 154 females, both juvenile and adult, the percentage that had male-like plumage was 28.6 per cent. 'However, some of these are juveniles, which all look like males,' Dr Falk told MailOnline. 'So if we take those out and look just at adult females, around 20 per cent of the adult females looked like males.' Graphical abstract from the study. Both male and female white-necked jacobin hummingbirds have flashy plumage as juveniles. Generally the females lose this flashiness as adults. But researchers found 20 per cent of the adult females kept the flashy plumage The left and centre images show adult female and adult male plumages, respectively. Right image shows juvenile plumage Video from the experiments show a real male adult hummingbird making its way between a dummy 'drab female' on the left mount and a flashy 'male-like female' dummy on the right mount FEMALE OCTOPUSES THROW THINGS AT MALES THAT ARE HARASSING THEM Female octopuses throw things at males that are harassing them, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Sydney filmed the common Sydney octopus (Octopus tetricus) in Jervis Bay, south of the Australian city. Throwing abilities usually reserved for remains of meals or for excavating dens were used to launch shells and silt at other octopuses. New Scientist reports that one female octopus threw silt 10 times at a male that was attempting to mate with her and hit him on five occasions. Advertisement In another part of the study, Dr Falk and colleagues observed the reactions of male hummingbirds as they flew towards stuffed mounts of dummy hummingbirds placed on nectar feeders during breeding season. The mounts were stuffed specimens of adult white-necked jacobin males, typical adult females and female adults that looked like males. Researchers put radio frequency ID tags on birds and set up a circuit of 28 feeders wired to read the tags. By tracking the number and length of visits, they found that the typical, less colourful females were harassed much more than females with male-like plumage. 'Because the male-plumaged females experienced less aggression, they were able to feed more often a clear advantage,' said Dr Falk. The researchers found females that looked like males got to feed about 35 per cent longer at feeders filled with high-sugar nectar than the typical adult female. That can make a big difference because hummingbirds have the highest metabolic rate of any vertebrate and need to eat constantly in order to survive. It is still not clear whether male-like females behave just as aggressively as the males. Hummingbird tail showing its impressive iridescence, which is caused by differential refraction of light waves Researchers set up bird feeders in Panama to entice real hummingbirds using dummy models In future studies, Dr Falk and his team hope to use the results of the variation between female white-necked jacobins to understand how the variation between males and females in other species may evolve. 'Hummingbirds are such beloved animals by many people, but there are still mysteries that we haven't noticed or studied,' said Dr Falk, who is now a postdoc at the University of Washington. 'It's cool that you don't have to go to an obscure unknown bird to find interesting and revealing results. You can just look at a bird that everyone loves to watch in the first place.' Apple's latest flagship phone, the iPhone 12, and its latest smart watch, Apple Watch 6, can interfere with pacemakers, defibrillators and other lifesaving heart implants, a new study warns. Researchers at the US Food and Drug Administration conducted an investigation into Apple's devices, which were released in autumn last year. The experts found they emit powerful magnetic fields that can change how implanted devices work and could result in 'life-threatening' situations. People should keep any consumer electronic devices that may create magnetic interference, including cell phones and smart watches, at least six inches away from implanted medical devices, in particular pacemakers and cardiac defibrillators. The study follows Apple's own advice for users, first noticed in January, to keep the iPhone 12 at least six inches away from such implants. MailOnline contacted Apple for comment regarding this new study, which suggests the Apple's cutting-edge technology could come at a serious cost. Pictured, the iPhone 12, which can trigger 'magnet mode' in cardiac implanted electronic devices (CIEDs), including pacemakers An Apple spokesperson said it supports the FDA's guidance to keep consumer electronics a safe distance away from any implanted cardiac device, consistent with its guidance to customers. The investigation has been conducted by experts at the FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH) and published in the journal Heart Rhythm. 'Ensuring the safety of our nation's medical devices is a cornerstone of our consumer protection mission, especially as technology continues to advance,' said lead investigator Seth J. Seidman at CDRH. 'As part of this work, the agency reviewed recently published articles describing the possibility that certain newer cell phones, smartwatches, and other consumer electronics with high field strength magnets may temporarily affect the normal operation of implanted electronic medical devices, such as pacemakers and implantable defibrillators. 'Based on our review, we decided to conduct our own testing to confirm and help inform appropriate recommendations for patients and consumers.' New research findings verify FDA recommendation for patients with implanted medical devices to keep their smart phones and watches at least six inches away to avoid interference with implanted medical devices Cardiac implanted electronic devices (CIEDs) are intended to correct life-threatening cardiac arrhythmias, which can cause the heart to beat too fast, too slow or irregularly. CIEDs include pacemakers and implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs), as well as biventricular pacemakers and cardiac loop recorders. CARDIAC IMPLANTED ELECTRONIC DEVICES - Pacemakers - Implantable cardioverter defibrillator - Biventricular pacemakers - Cardiac loop recorders Advertisement Implantable pacemakers and ICDs include a 'magnet mode' designed to be used when a patient is undergoing a procedure where electromagnetic interference is possible, or when suspension of the device is necessary for medical treatment, such as an MRI scan. However, this feature can also be triggered accidentally from strong magnetic fields greater than 10G (a measure of magnetic flux density), which can change how the device works and could result in serious harm to the patient, including death. 'ICDs in magnet mode will not deliver lifesaving shocks or antitachycardia pacing therapy, which can be life-threatening to the patient if a dangerous abnormal heart rhythm were to occur,' the study says. The investigators tested the magnetic field output of all iPhone 12 and Apple Watch 6 models at varying distances from the CIEDs. They found that all the devices have static magnetic fields significantly greater than 10G in close proximity high enough to place implanted cardiac devices into magnet mode. However, when a separation distance of six inches or more is maintained, the phones and watches will not trigger magnet mode. Pictured, the Apple Watch 6 series, which was released by the tech giant last October. Both iPhone 12 and this series of smartwatches should be kept at least six inches away from CIEDs For years, magnets strong enough to trigger magnet mode were large and identifiable, such as stereo speakers or electronic motors in cordless tools. ADVICE FOR CONSUMERS The study authors offer the following advice for people with cardiac implanted electronic devices (CIEDs): - Keep the consumer electronics, such as certain cell phones and smart watches, 6 inches away from implanted medical devices. - Do not carry consumer electronics in a pocket over the medical device. - Check your device using your home monitoring system, if you have one. - Talk to your health care provider if you are experiencing any symptoms or have questions regarding magnets in consumer electronics and implanted medical devices. Advertisement 'Pacemaker patients were relatively unaffected from these magnets by maintaining some separation distance, since the static magnetic field decays exponentially with distance,' the authors point out. However, the advent of small but powerful rare-earth magnets (such as neodymium) means strong magnetic fields are now found in headphones, door locks and smartphone speakers. What makes matters worse is that the researchers expect the number of consumer electronics containing strong magnets in to increase over time. Seidman stresses the importance therefore of not carrying consumer electronics in a pocket over the medical device. 'Because of these results, we are taking steps to provide information for patients and healthcare providers to ensure they are aware of potential risks and can take simple proactive and preventive measures,' he said. 'We believe the risk to patients is low and the agency is not aware of any adverse events associated with this issue at this time. 'Therefore, we recommend people with implanted medical devices talk with their healthcare providers to ensure they understand this potential risk and the proper techniques for safe use. 'The FDA will continue to monitor the effects of consumer electronics on the safe operation of medical devices.' Powerful rare-earth magnets (such as neodymium, pictured, a magnetic ore used in the technology industry) means strong magnetic fields are now found in headphones, door locks and smartphones Back in January, Apple itself quietly confirmed that the iPhone 12 can interfere with pacemakers and other medical devices. iPHONE 13 MAY HAVE BIGGER WIRELESS MAGSAFE CHARGER THAT REFUELS AIRPODS Apple's upcoming iPhone could be compatible with a new 'reverse charger' that would let users charge their AirPods just by placing them on the phone while it charges. EverythingApplePro's Max Weinbach reported that the phone will have a stronger array of magnets in the back to support the bulked-up MagSafe charger, which is wireless. The rumored charger is also said to be better at keeping the phone from overheating, while allowing for a quicker recharge. EverythingApplePro's website also postulates the jumbo coil could be used for reverse wireless charging - which essentially uses the energy from the phone to wireless charge another device. iPhone 13, which is the unconfirmed name of Apple's next flagship iPhone, is expected to be released in September 2021. Advertisement The firm's latest devices feature a technology called MagSafe, which uses in-built magnets to firmly attach accessories like wireless chargers and wallets to the back of the phones. Apple says on its website: 'If you suspect that your Apple product is interfering with your medical device, stop using your Apple product and consult your physician and your medical-device manufacturer.' The MagSafe feature in the iPhone 12 series also uses a strong rare-earth magnet to align the phone for wireless charging, the FDA study authors point out. Prior to Apple's admission, another research paper, also published in Heart Rhythm, highlighted iPhone 12's ability to 'potentially inhibit lifesaving therapy in a patient' with an implanted medical device. The authors of this study, from Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, Michigan, had held an iPhone 12 near a patient's ICD. Once the iPhone was brought close to the ICD over the left chest area, the ICD immediately went into a 'suspended' state, they found. 'We hereby bring an important public health issue concerning the newer generation iPhone 12 which can potentially inhibit lifesaving therapy in a patient particularly while carrying the phone in upper pockets,' the study authors reported. 'Medical device manufacturers and implanting physicians should remain vigilant in making patients aware of this significant interaction of the iPhone 12 and other smart wearables with their cardiac implantable electronic devices.' MagSafe was initially introduced in 2006 for Mac laptops a handy little feature that ensured power connectors stayed attached. MagSafe connectors were discontinued across Apple's product lines between 2016 and 2019 and replaced with USB-C. All iPhone 12 (pictured) and Apple Watch 6 models tested have static magnetic fields significantly greater than 10G in close proximity, which can change how the device works and could result in serious harm to a person with a CIED However, the brand name was brought back for the iPhone 12 to allow rapid 15W wireless charging. Wireless charging as a concept has been around since Nikola Tesla, a Croatian inventor, first suggested in the 19th century that power could be transferred between two objects via an electromagnetic field. The charging pad contains a loop of coiled wires around a bar magnet, known as an inductor. When an electric current passes from the mains through the coiled wire, it creates an electromagnetic field around the magnet. This can then be used to transfer a voltage or charge to the smartphone. Apple's MagSafe charging method uses an array of magnets placed around the wireless charging coil that Apple says 'perfectly connects to iPhone every time'. Apple's next flagship phone, which will likely be called iPhone 13, is expected to be released in September 2021. Hidden for centuries under a layer of paint, an image of Cupid in the background of a famous Johannes Vermeer masterpiece has finally been fully exposed to view. The representation of the cherubic god was depicted hanging in the background of the Dutch painter's 165759 composition, 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window'. This lost portrait-within-a-portrait which was a common feature in Vermeer's interior scenes was first revealed in X-ray scans of the painting back in 1979. Experts at Dresden's Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister ('Old Masters Gallery') determined that the overpainting was not conducted by Vermeer's hand. Given this, it was decided to restore the work to its original state a process that has seen the paint covering the Cupid removed over the course of three years. This work was conducted painstakingly using a scalpel viewed under a microscope. The identity and time period of the artist who skilfully covered up the god of love and the exact reasons for such, however, remain uncertain. Scroll down for videos Hidden for centuries under a layer of paint, an image of Cupid in the background of a famous Johannes Vermeer masterpiece has finally been fully exposed to view (as pictured) This lost portrait-within-a-portrait which was a common feature in Vermeer's interior scenes was first revealed in X-ray scans of the painting back in 1979. Experts at Dresden's Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister ('Old Masters Gallery') determined that the overpainting (as seen left) was not conducted by Vermeer's hand. Given this, it was decided to restore the work to its original state a process that has seen the paint covering the Cupid removed over the course of three years (pictured, right, with only half of the figure exposed) CUPID'S SYMBOLISM In classical mythology, Cupid is the god of desire, erotic love and affection. He is typically portrayed as the young, son of the goddess of love, Venus and Mars, the god of war. His slender depiction in classical art gave way to more cherubic portrayals during the Hellenistic Period, at which point he became strongly associated with his magical bow and arrows. Vermeer used images of Cupid in four of his paintings including 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window' and 'The Milkmaid', in both of which the figure is believed to have been intended to symbolise love. Advertisement Until the Cupid was detected, the nature of the correspondence being read by the titular 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window' had been unclear. 'With the recovery of Cupid in the background, the actual intention of the Delft painter can be recognised,' Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister director Stephan Koja told the Telegraph. The inclusion of the god of love in the painting suggests, he explained, that the note being read was a love letter. This interpretation is bolstered by readings of the open window as being a signifier of the woman's desire to expand her domestic sphere beyond that of her home and the bowl of fruit as a symbol of extramarital relations. 'Beyond the ostensibly amorous context, it is about a fundamental statement about the nature of true love,' Dr Koja continued. 'Now we understand it as a key image in his oeuvre.' In fact, Cupid appears in the background of three other Vermeer pieces, including his 16571658 oil-on-canvas 'The Milkmaid', where the god is depicted on a Delft pottery wall tile in the background. In a similar fashion, Vermeer may have been implying that the maid was daydreaming about a man while she worked. While the exact reason why Cupid was edited out of 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window' may never be known, art historians speculate that the overpainting may have resulted from 'altered tastes', or an effort to make the work more profitable. By removing (the relatively obscure) Vermeer's Cupid motif from the work, an art dealer in the past may have been better positioned to pass off the work as having come from the hand of a more famous artist, such as the likes of Rembrandt. Certainly, the painting was misidentified as a Rembrandt when it was sold to the Elector of Saxony in 1742. After a spell being confused for a Pieter de Hooch, the work was finally correctly linked to Vermeer in 1880. It is considered to be one of only 34 Vermeer paintings that have survived to the present day. 'With the recovery of Cupid in the background, the actual intention of the Delft painter can be recognised,' Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister director Stephan Koja told the Telegraph. Pictured: the painting is subjected to X-ray fluorescence analysis Until the Cupid was detected, the nature of the correspondence being read by the titular 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window' had been unclear. Pictured: Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister director Stephan Koja (right) and colleagues pose with the half-restored painting back in 2019 In 1945, the painting was saved from destruction during the Allied bombing of Dresden and secreted away in a tunnel but it was subsequently seized by the Red Army and taken to Russia in act the Soviets presented as a 'rescue'. Following the death of Joseph Stalin, Russian authorities decided to return the hundreds of paintings they had removed from Dresden including 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window.' This was in spite of the suggestions by Soviet art historians and museum curators that Germany should donate the work along with Giorgione's 'Sleeping Venus' as a thank you for 'saving and rescuing' the Dresden paintings. Germany did not care to comply with this suggestion. Having completed its restoration which also replaced the aging, yellow-tinted varnish to reveal Vermeer's original colour palette the 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window' is going back on public display in the Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister. Cupid appears in the background of three other Vermeer pieces, including his 16571658 oil-on-canvas 'The Milkmaid' (left), where the god is depicted on a Delft pottery wall tile in the background (right). In a similar fashion to 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window', Vermeer may have been implying that the maid was daydreaming about a man while she worked Having completed its restoration which also which also replaced the aging, yellow-tinted varnish to reveal Vermeer's original colour palette the 'Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window' is going back on public display in the Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister Advertisement Blue Origin completed the 17th launch of its New Shepard Thursday, marking the first mission since founder Jeff Bezos took his own journey to the edge of space. The 60-foot-tall rocket came alive at 10:31am ET Thursday when it took off from the firm's West Texas facility while carrying 18 scientific payloads, 11 of which are from NASA, thousands of postcards made by children and an art installation on the capsule's exterior. New Shepard ignited Blue Engine 3, which emitted 110,000 pounds of thrust, and took off towards the sky where it will soar 62 miles above Earth's surface to the Karman line, an international definition of space. The art installation, called 'Suborbital Triptych, was created by Ghanaian artist Amoako Boafo who painted three portraits on the capsule's main chute covers one of which is of himself. 'A self-portrait looking up to the skies best explains what this project means to me,' Boafo said in a pre-launch statement. 'I grew up knowing the sky was the limit, and now I get to work on a project that goes beyond the sky as we know it.' The other two paintings depict Boafo's mother and fellow artist Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe, who is a childhood friend of Boafo's. Thursday's mission is another step for Blue Origin into the space tourism business, which Bezos proved will one day happen after he and three others soared 66 miles above Earth's surface on July 20. Scroll down for videos Blue Origin's New Shepard came alive at 10:31am ET Thursday when it took off from the firm's West Texas facility for the Jeff Bezos-owned rocket's 17th mission into space The rocket was slated to take off at 9:35am ET, but issues with loading the payloads kept it grounded for about an hour. When New Shepard finally took off, it soared at more than 1,700 miles per hour as it climbed toward space and conducted its main engine cut off once it hit 2,000 miles per hour. At this time, the rocket appeared as a glowing orbit in the darkness of space. The cameras on New Shepard shifted down toward Earth, showing a stunning birds eye view of the West Texas desert. The art installation, called 'Suborbital Triptych, was created by Ghanaian artist Amoako Boafo who painted three portraits on the capsule's main chute covers one of which is of himself The other two paintings depict Boafo's mother and the mother of fellow artist Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe, who is a childhood friend of Boafo's The 60-foot-tall rocket carried 18 scientific payloads, 11 of which are from NASA, thousands of postcards (pictured) made by children and an art installation on the capsule's exterior After the capsule separated, the booster headed back to Earth for what Blue Origin called a 'precise landing.' Roughly five minutes into launch, the booster was falling back to the launch pad and successfully deployed its parachute to help it slow down before touching down. A sonic boom was hear and seconds later, New Shepard touched down on the pad to complete it's eighth trip to space. 'Booster touch down, just as if she was landing on the moon,' the livestream commentator said. The comment echoes Bezos' fight with NASA over the lunar landing contract that was awarded to SpaceX instead of Blue Origin. Bezos filed a lawsuit against the American space agency on August 16 that 'challenges NASAs unlawful and improper evaluation of proposals.' The rocket was slated to take off at 9:35am ET, but issues with loading the payloads kept it grounded for about another hour The cameras on New Shepard shifted down toward Earth, showing a stunning birds eye view of the West Texas desert Blue Origin was originally in competition with SpaceX and a third firm, Dynetics, for what was expected to be two NASA contracts. After Congress trimmed the space agency's budget, NASA announced in April 2021 that SpaceX's Human Landing System (HLS) would be the sole contractor. However, the lawsuit does not seem to have tarnished Blue Origin and NASA's relationship - Thursday's mission took nearly a dozen NASA experiments to the edge of space. The capsule was fitted with NASA's Deorbit, Descent and Landing Sensor Demonstration experiment to collect data to reduce risk and increase confidence for successful missions to the moon. The Blue Origin capsule followed the booster back to Earth, releasing its three parachutes about eight minutes after launch. It carried the payloads and postcards made by children as part of Blue Origin's Club for the Future into orbit. About five minutes into launch, the booster was falling back to the launch pad and successfully deployed its parachute to help it slow down before touching down A sonic boom was hear and seconds later, New Shepard touched down on the pad to complete it's eighth trip to space. 'Booster touch down, just as if she was landing on the moon,' the livestream commentator said Club for the Future, founded in 2019, is a foundation that aims to inspire future generations to pursue a career in STEM. This is the fourth flight for the New Shepard program this year and the eighth flight for this particular vehicle, which is dedicated to flying scientific and research payloads to space and back. Bob Smith, CEO, Blue Origin, said in a statement following launch: 'After flying more than 100 payloads to space on New Shepard, today's 8th flight of this vehicle carried NASA-sponsored and commercial experiments, including the second flight of NASA's lunar landing technology that will one day allow us to further explore the Moon's surface. 'We are grateful to NASA for partnering with us once again on this experiment, and we are proud of the Blue Origin team for executing a great flight in support of all our customers.' New Shepard, which stands 60 feet tall, was specifically designed for Blue Origin's space tourism venture. The Blue Origin capsule followed the booster back to Earth, releasing its three parachutes about eight minutes after launch. The capsule seats six passengers and is equipped with reclining seats. Each of the seats has a window that are said to the 'the largest to fly into space.' Cameras line the interior, allowing travelers to share their memories that are truly out of this world. Thursday's flight comes less than a month from when Bezos took his first flight inside the capsule. He was joined by his brother Mark Bezos (right), Oliver Damen (left) and Wally Funk (second from right) The crew experienced weightlessness for about four minutes, before falling back to Earth to land in Texas Thursday's flight comes less than a month from when Bezos took his first flight inside the capsule. On July 20, the billionaire and his brother Mark traveled 66 miles above the surface. The pair were joined by 18-year-old Oliver Daemen - the word's first paying customer to buy his flight - and 82-year-old Wally Funk, who passed NASA's space program in the 1960s but never made it to space because the women's flight was canceled. The crew experienced weightlessness for about four minutes, before falling back to Earth to land in Texas. While the crew were enjoying their time in space, the booster returned to the landing pad for use on a future flight. Nearly twice as many British children aged 1015 are unhappy with their lives as they were a decade ago, a new report from The Children's Society has cautioned. A study conducted by Essex University researchers found that 6.7 per cent of 1015-year-olds reported being unhappy in 201819, up from 3.8 per cent in 200910. The latest figure the highest proportion recorded in a decade was recorded prior to COVID-19 and so does not factor in the negative impact of the pandemic. One in every 25 kids has struggled with the upheaval of the last year-and-a-half, and probably represent people who need mental health support, the report said. Areas of dissatisfaction expressed by children include problems around experiences at school, relationships with friends and concerns about their appearance. Nearly twice as many British children aged 1015 are unhappy with their lives as they were a decade ago, a new report from The Children's Society has cautioned (stock image) BODY IMAGE ISSUES According to the researcher from Essex University, nearly as many boys as girls are now unhappy about their how they look. Dissatisfaction in this area, in fact, has risen sharply among boys in the last decade, rising from 8 to 13 per cent of children interviewed. The corresponding figure for girls has also risen during the last decade from 15 up to 16 per cent. The findings, The Children's Society noted, suggest that boys are also 'increasingly feeling the pressures of looking good'. Body image issue can lead to detrimental impacts on well-being, they added. Advertisement 'Its deeply distressing to see that childrens wellbeing is on a 10-year downward trend,' The Children's Society's chief executive, Mark Russell, told the Guardian. 'On top of this a number of children have not coped well with the pandemic. 'Unhappiness at this stage can be a warning sign of potential issues in later teenage years,' he added. According to the report, children at the age of 14 who are unhappy with their lives are significantly more likely to display mental health issues by age 17. Given the findings, Mr Russell is urging the government to produce an action plan to improve the wellbeing of children, to better assess kid's happiness on a year-to-year basis and to improve access to appropriate mental health services. Alongside the Essex data from before COVID-10, the report also cited polling of 2,000 UK 1017-year-olds this year, which found that children rated their happiness with their family life at 8.1 out of ten. Health, meanwhile, received an average rating of 8.0 and friendships 7.8, while children felt less about their appearance (7.2), school (7.1) and future (6.9). While school received a relatively high average rating, more children rated their experiences with school as making them unhappy than any other area of life. These kids made up 12.2 per cent of those polled, versus just 9 per cent a decade ago. Other data sources for the report included University College London's Millennium Cohort Study, which is monitoring 18,000 people born in the period from 200002. 'It is shocking to see a further decline in children and young peoples level of happiness and that thousands are unhappy with their lives overall,' mental health charity Young Minds' director, Tom Madders, told the Guardian. 'The last year has been incredibly difficult for lots of young people with many struggling to cope with social isolation, loneliness and worries about the future.' 'Its clear that the pandemic is just one part of the picture, however, with young people facing multiple pressures that are impacting their overall wellbeing.' More kids rated their experiences with school as making them unhappy than any other area of life. These kids made up 12.2 per cent of those polled, versus just 9 per cent a decade ago 'This goes beyond the pandemic. The findings from the Good Childhood report show a worrying long-term trend,' NSPCC chief executive Peter Wanless told the Guardian. 'It is imperative that we listen and respond to what children and young people are telling us about their lives,' he added. The NSPCC has been attempting to combat body image issues among children. 'We know that children continue to struggle with feeling they need to look a certain way, and weve delivered nearly 5,000 counselling sessions about body image since last April,' Sir Peter concluded. The full findings of the report were published on The Children's Society's website. Scientists have found an 'almost perfectly preserved' skull of a previously unknown animal that lived some 230 million years ago and is the ancestor of most modern reptiles. Known as Taytalura alcoberi, this member of the Lepidosauromorpha, a group of reptiles that predates the dinosaurs, lived in what is now modern-day Argentina during the Late Triassic period. The fossilized skull of Taytalura is the first one from the lepidosaur group ever discovered and lets researchers understand its place on the evolutionary tree. 'I knew the age and locality of the fossil and could tell by examining some of its external features that it was closely related to lizards, but it looked more primitive than a true lizard and that is something quite special,' the study's co-author, Dr Tiago R. Simoes, from Harvard University said in a statement. Scientists found an 'almost perfectly preserved' skull of a previously unknown animal that is the ancestor of most modern reptiles Taytalura alcoberi was part of a group of reptiles, lepidosaurs, that predates the dinosaurs Lepidosaurs started to evolve between 260 and 150 million years ago, but most of the fossils found to date have provided scientists with little information on how they evolved. Lepidosauromorpha includes squamates (lizards and snakes) and sphenodontians (tuataras), but it predates when the two groups split. However, this fossil is roughly 11 million years younger than the oldest known lepidosauromorphs, which were found in Europe. The skull of T. alcoberi has similar features to modern-day tuataras, a reptile endemic to New Zealand. This suggests that many of the features which were believed to be exclusive to these reptiles, started early in their evolution. The Taytalura skull was discovered in Argentina, near the La Pena River 'The almost perfectly preserved Taytalura skull shows us details of how a very successful group of animals, including more than 10,000 species of snakes, lizards, and tuataras, originated,' said the study's lead author, Dr Ricardo N. Martinez. 'But it also highlights the paleontological importance of the paleontological site of Ischigualasto Formation, known for preserving some of the most primitive dinosaurs known in the world. The extraordinary quality of preservation of the fossils at this site allowed something as fragile and tiny as this specimen to be preserved for 231 million years.' Researchers performed a CT scan to create the mosaic, giving each bone a different color in order to better understand the anatomy of the fossilized reptile. 'This beautifully 3D preserved fossil is really an important finding. It is the most complete fossil representing the early stages of lepidosaur evolution that we have so far,' Dr Gabriela Sobral added. 'All other known fossils are too incomplete, which makes it difficult to classify them for sure, but the complete and articulated nature of makes its relationships much more certain.' Simoes agreed: 'Taytalura is a major point in the reptile tree of life that was previously missing. Because these fossils are so small they are very difficult to preserve in the fossil record. 'And what candidate fossils we do have are very fragmented and poorly preserved, so they don't provide as much useful data for analysis.' Researchers said this early lepidosaur had a skull that looked more like tuataras than squamates, while also containing different teeth than other lepidosaurs and the ability to migrate over vast areas The researchers concluded that this early lepidosaur had a skull that looked more like tuataras than squamates, while also containing different teeth than other lepidosaurs and the ability to migrate over vast areas. 'Contrary to almost all fossils of Triassic lepidosaurs found in Europe, this is the first early lepidosaur found in South America, suggesting lepidosaurs were able to migrate across vastly distant geographic regions early in their evolutionary history,' agreed Simoes. 'We are accustomed to accept that the Mesozoic Era was an age of gigantic reptiles, enormous proto-mammals, and huge trees, and thus we commonly look for fossils that are visible at human height, just walking,' said study co-author, Dr Sebastian Apesteguia. 'Taytalura teaches us that we were missing important information by looking not only for bigger animals, but for also thinking that the origin of lizards occurred only in the Northern Hemisphere as evidence seemed to support until now.' The study was published earlier this week in the scientific journal Nature. Climate change is causing the unprecedented warming and acidification of Earth's oceans and this may change up to 95 percent of surfaces by the end of the century, a new study suggests. The stark warning was revealed Thursday by a team of scientists led by Northwestern University, who fear hotter, more acidic surfaces will make the planet's oceans less hospitable for sea life. Using global ocean climate models, the team ran two emissions scenarios: one with a peak of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, but slow throughout the rest of the century; the other is a 'business as usual' approach, where emissions continue to rise throughout the next 80 years. The first scenario showed 36 percent of the current ocean surface conditions will stay throughout the 20th century, but disappear by 2100. However, the extreme scenario increase the surface amount to an alarming 95 percent. Using global ocean climate models, the team ran two emissions scenarios: one with a peak of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, but slow throughout the rest of the century; the other is a 'business as usual' approach, where emissions continue to rise throughout the next 80 years 'The rates of change in atmospheric CO2 over the past century are two-to-three orders of magnitude higher than most of the changes seen in the past 420,000 to 300 million years, suggesting that this challenge may be without precedent for many extant species,' the study's authors wrote in the study published in Nature. 'This rapid rate of environmental change means that by the end of the twenty-first century, large portions of the Earth's ocean could experience climates not found at present ('novel climates'), and some twentieth century climates may disappear.' Ocean surface climates refers to surface water temperature, acidity and the concentration of the mineral aragonite, which is a high pressure polymorph of calcium carbonate. Many marine animals use the mineral to form bones and shells and it supports the vast majority of sea life. The team created two scenarios, RCP 4.5 ('stabilization' emission response scenario where emissions peak in 2050, followed by slowed increase) and RCP 8.5 (worst case 'business as usual' scenario where emissions peak in 2100, followed by slowed increase), to better see the future of our oceans 'Species that are narrowly adapted to a climate that is disappearing will have to adapt to different conditions,' the study's lead author, Katie Lotterhos, from Northeastern University's Marine Science Center, told AFP, Phys.org reports. 'A climate in which the temperature and chemistry of the water is common today will be rare or absent in the future.' The team created two scenarios, RCP 4.5 ('stabilization' emission response scenario where emissions peak in 2050, followed by slowed increase) and RCP 8.5 (worst case 'business as usual' scenario where emissions peak in 2100, followed by slowed increase), to better see the future of our oceans. Between 2000 and 2100, these shifts are projected to become larger under RCP 4.5 and extreme under RCP 8.5. Marine life that lives closer to the surface is adapting to climate change by moving to different oceans in order to escape warming waters, but the study suggests that in the future their options may be limited due to near-uniform warming and acidification In the northern hemisphere, the present-day undersaturated and low pH conditions in the Arctic are projected to become more common at temperate latitudes by the end of the century. However, in the southern hemisphere under RCP 8.5 projections, there is almost no overlap between current and projected climate envelopes across all latitudes. Marine life that lives closer to the surface is adapting to climate change by moving to different oceans in order to escape warming waters, but the study suggests that in the future their options may be limited due to near-uniform warming and acidification. 'Already, many marine species have shifted their ranges in response to warmer waters,' said Lotterhos. Marine life that lives closer to the surface is adapting to climate change by moving to different oceans in order to escape warming waters, but the study suggests that in the future their options may be limited due to near-uniform warming and acidification 'The communities of species that are found in one area will continue to shift and change rapidly over the coming decades.' She said that governments needed to monitor future shifting habits in marine surface species. Ultimately, the world's oceans need the emissions driving their heating and acidification to cease. 'Without (emissions) mitigation, novel and disappearing climates in the sea surface will be widespread around the globe by 2100,' said Lotterhos. The summer transfer window is reaching its crescendo with clubs throughout Europe looking to finalise their squads before the ever-approaching deadline. Premier League clubs have until 11pm on August 31 to get their deals over the line, with the future of Tottenham talisman Harry Kane set to be the major talking point until the window's closure. The big bombshell so far has been Lionel Messi's switch to PSG after leaving Barcelona, which will certainly have a drastic impact of the market. Manchester City are closing-in on a sensational deal to poach Cristiano Ronaldo from Juventus Of course, Manchester United have been lively, signing both Jadon Sancho and Raphael Varane, while rivals Manchester City broke the British transfer record with the 100million acquisition of Jack Grealish. Chelsea - who spent big last summer - have done so once again, bringing Romelu Lukaku back to Stamford Bridge for a whopping 98m. Sportsmail will keep you up-to-date with the latest negotiations, rumours and done deals below. Manchester City are in talks with Cristiano Ronaldo's agent Jorge Mendes over a sensational return to the Premier League. City are open to taking the Portugal superstar on a free transfer if Juventus drop their 25million demand and Ronaldo accepts a cut to his 500,000-a-week salary. Thursday night's Champions League draw paired City with Paris Saint-Germain in Group A, setting up the mouth-watering prospect of Ronaldo clashing with his old rival Lionel Messi at the Etihad. Cristiano Ronaldo has agreed personal terms with Manchester City, according to reports Ronaldo's agent, Jorge Mendes (centre), held talks with Juventus as the player pushes to leave Juventus want to move Ronaldo off their wage bill, and the five-time Ballon d'Or winner is keen to leave Turin where he has 10 months left on his contract. City were offered the Manchester United legend last week, but the spectacular deal only became a possibility once they abandoned their pursuit of Tottenham's Harry Kane. They have not committed themselves to a move for Ronaldo, who will be 37 in February, and it is understood there is no agreement yet with either Juventus or the player. Portuguese outlets are suggesting he has also spoken with City boss Pep Guardiola (left) Manager Pep Guardiola is prepared for the transfer window to close with no additions to his current squad after the City boss broke the British record to sign Jack Grealish for 100m. Ronaldo's representative Mendes held talks with Juve and City on Thursday before it was reported that he had flown to Paris. Reports in the Portugal international's home country suggested Ronaldo has already spoken with Guardiola, he'd agreed personal terms with City and that the Italian side are now in talks with the Premier League champions about letting him leave three years after he joined. Wantaway superstar Ronaldo had asked Juventus to leave him on the bench against Udinese PSG could yet emerge as an option for Ronaldo playing alongside Messi and Neymar if the French club sell Kylian Mbappe, after he was the subject of an improved 155m bid from Real Madrid on Thursday. But Mendes is struggling to find any other European clubs able to afford his client, now the season has started and most squads are in place. United have been consistently linked with a move for Ronaldo since he left Old Trafford for Real in 2009. However, they have spent 116m on Jadon Sancho and Raphael Varane this summer and given Edinson Cavani a new contract. Ronaldo has just one more year left on his contract but Juventus want to collect a fee for him Ronaldo's former United team-mate Wayne Rooney cast doubt over the possibility of him tarnishing his legacy by signing for their neighbours. 'I can't see it happening with someone of Cristiano's stature,' Rooney said on Thursday. 'Cristiano has got a big legacy at Manchester United and I don't think he'll move somewhere for financial reasons. 'On the other hand, it's football. Anything can happen. It has happened before with legends from Manchester United. Peter Schmeichel went to City, Andy Cole went to City, Mark Hughes managed City.' City beat PSG in last season's Champions League semi-finals and they were paired together in Thursday night's draw in Istanbul. RB Leipzig and Club Bruges are also in a tough Group A. Ronaldo was also reportedly an option for PSG but City appear to be closing in on the deal The latest developments come despite Max Allegri insisting Ronaldo would stay at Juventus Ronaldo himself also looked to play down the speculation with a lengthy social media post Referring to PSG signing free agents Messi, Sergio Ramos, Georginio Wijnaldum and Gianluigi Donnarumma, City's director of football Txiki Begiristain said: 'Maybe they have taken advantage of something because they were free, but the quality of the signings they have made is unbelievable.' Liverpool landed Atletico Madrid who knocked them out of the competition last year old European adversaries AC Milan and FC Porto in Group B. 'I laughed pretty loud because it is a tough group,' said manager Jurgen Klopp.'But it's the Champions League and you have to play the best teams in Europe.' Chelsea are up against Juventus, Zenit St Petersburg and Malmo, but United appear to have the easiest route to the knockout stage. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's side have the opportunity to avenge last season's Europa League final defeat by Villarreal while Atalanta and Young Boys are their other opponents in Group F. Advertisement In an email to staff, British Airways today announced that it is to axe its short-haul operation at Gatwick and replace it with an entirely new operation by a subsidiary airline. And it partly blamed having to make the move on the Government's 'cautious approach' to the easing of global travel restrictions, complaining that it's stuck in a 'constant guessing game'. BA has a schedule of 47 short-haul routes and 1,881 flights from Gatwick, according to travel data and analytics firm Cirium, but its short-haul operations from the hub have been on hold since Spring 2020 due to the pandemic. In an email to staff, British Airways announced that it is to axe its short-haul operation at Gatwick and replace it with an entirely new operation by a subsidiary airline If BA pulls out of short-haul at the airport, four destinations will no longer have any service to it Algiers, Cologne/Bonn, Genoa and Manchester. The largest destination by flights is Jersey, followed by Malaga in Spain and Faro in Portugal, said Cirium. The travel journalist and broadcaster, Simon Calder, who began his career in aviation at Gatwick airport cleaning the offices of BA in the 1970s, told MailOnline the firm may be going back to a model of 'older planes and less well-paid staff' with its new subsidiary. He added that passengers using the new airline will not get the 'bottle of water and snack' in economy class, nor will flyers enjoy the 'world's most generous cabin baggage policy' any longer. BA's email said that the move would help it stay 'agile and competitive', but admitted that staff would need to wait for concrete plans to emerge. It read: 'We hoped that our industry would be back on its feet this year, and that the journey to pre-pandemic levels of flying would be well under way. But the cautious approach of Governments to the easing of global travel restrictions has undermined customer confidence, and recovery remains far behind where we need it to be. 'The pandemic is playing out differently, country by country. We're stuck in a constant guessing game, trying to predict all the possible variables around the world and designing operational plans to match what might happen. A map showing British Airways' routes - both long and short-haul - out of Gatwick. The map will look very different when the plans to axe its shorter routes come into force 'The UK Government's furlough scheme (CJRS), which ends on 30 September, has been a huge help. When it ends our pay costs will steeply increase, and any increase in costs is bad news. We know that our schedule and our operating costs for the rest of this year will not line up. We believe that this will be a temporary problem, but it's a serious one which we need to manage. Gatwick has always been second-best for British Airways and it appears that it is now looking to drive its costs down even further as it competes with easyJet, Ryanair and Wizz Air Rhys Jones of headforpoints.com 'This means we're going to have to be as flexible as possible when it comes to the way we work, to help mitigate the situation over the coming months. We are in discussions with your trade union representatives, who are as keen as we are to find a way through the winter season and into growth next year. 'As you know, we haven't been operating short-haul flights at Gatwick during the pandemic. This was previously a highly competitive market, but for us to run a sustainable airline in the current environment, we need a competitive operating model. Because of that, we are proposing a new operating subsidiary to run alongside our existing long-haul Gatwick operation, to serve short-haul routes to/from Gatwick from summer 2022. This will help us to be both agile and competitive, allowing us to build a sustainable short-haul presence at Gatwick over time. 'As of today, we don't have the answers, but we want to be upfront about the complexity we're dealing with, and working through with your trade union representatives. We will keep you posted as things develop.' Headforpoints.com explains that the replacement airline could be from the stable of BA's parent company IAG such as Vueling or Level, but suggests that's not likely. Vueling, it says, 'is not a particularly well-known brand outside of its Iberian footprint' and therefore 'there would [be] little benefit in introducing the brand to UK travellers versus creating a fresh new one'. Level, meanwhile, 'only operates from Barcelona', with IAG 'extremely reluctant, so far, to introduce the airline at its own hub-fortresses of Heathrow or Madrid'. From bi-planes to whipped cream, Maggie's handkerchief and a merger: BA's 92-year history explained August 25, 1919: BA's forerunner company, Aircraft Transport and Travel Limited (AT&T) launches first daily international air service between London and Paris, operating a single-engined de Havilland DH4A bi-plane from Hounslow Heath near current Heathrow. It carried a single passenger and cargo including newspapers, Devonshire cream and grouse on two-and-a half-hour cross-Channel journey to Le Bourget. 1924: Four fledgling airlines, including Daimler Airways (a successor to AT&T) merge to form Imperial Airways Limited operating from the new London airport at Croydon to all corners of the British Empire and the Continent. 1939: Imperial Airways nationalised at dawn of second world war and merged with another to form British overseas Airways Corporation BOAC. After the war BOAC continued to operate long-haul and transatlantic while a new company British European Airways (BEA) flew Continental and domestic routes. 1950s-60s: The passenger jet age dawned as BOAC flew the Comet to Johannesburg in 1952 in 23 hours with five stops, and began the first transatlantic jet service to New York on October 1958, days ahead of their American rivals. Beatles pop group, left to right, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison1960s: BOAC flies in from Miami Beach and is immortalised in a Beatles song 'Back in the USSR'. On another flight with BEA the Fab Four carry specially made flight-bags saying 'BEAtles'. 1974: BOAC and BEA are merged and nationalised to form British Airways. 1976: BA launches the world's first supersonic passenger service Concorde, with Air France. 1987: British Airways is privatised. 1997: British Airways ditches the Union Flag on its tail-fin, replacing it with a series of 'ethnic' designs from around the globe. It provokes immediate criticism with Baroness Thatcher famously draping her handkerchief over a model aircraft sporting one of the new tail designs at a Conservative party conference and calling it 'awful'. 1999: British Airways announces it is ditching the much-criticised 'ethnic' tailfin logos on half its fleet and replacing them with a red, white and blue Union Flag-based design. The remaining aircraft follow suit soon afterwards. British Airways Chief Executive Willie Walsh relaxes on the new business class flat bed2000: BA introduces the world's first fully flat bed in business class as modeled by British Airways Chief Executive Willie Walsh (pictured). 2001: September 11 attack on the USA causes immediate shut-down of transatlantic airspace and a decade of strife for airline industry and passengers. 2008: Terminal 5 is opened by the Queen and becomes BA's exclusive base. But the first day for passengers prioves a chaotic shambles as neither BA nor airport operator BAA are properly prepared. 2010: In the middle of a bitter 18-month dispute with striking BA cabin crew, the airline forms a joint business with America Airlines and Iberia. 2011: In January this year British Airways merges with Spanish airline Iberia to form the International Airlines Group (IAG). British Airways and Iberia become the first of an expected growing family of airlines to be accommodated within the umbrella of the IAG parent company. Advertisement The site believes the most likely solution for BA will be to launch a new subsidiary 'along the lines of its City Flyer operation at London City'. It adds: 'This would be operationally distinct, operated under a distinct brand with separate pilot and crew agreements.' Rhys Jones of headforpoints.com told MailOnline Travel: 'Gatwick has always been second-best for British Airways and it appears that it is now looking to drive its costs down even further as it competes with easyJet, Ryanair and Wizz Air, which are increasingly dominating the airport. 'By recruiting a separate crew on new poorer contracts, British Airways will be able to better compete with the low-cost carriers although it's not clear what effect this could have on service. It is also debatable whether a race to the bottom is one that BA can win. British Airways has recently re-introduced free snacks and water in economy on short-haul flights from Heathrow, but this could be at risk. 'It's not clear whether the new airline will fly under the British Airways brand - which risks damaging it - or if British Airways will introduce a new brand that the public won't recognise. The choice it makes will have an impact on what we can expect in price and service.' BA said in a statement: 'We are working with our unions on proposals for a short-haul operation at Gatwick. We are not prepared to comment further while this process continues.' Mr Calder said that when he was working for BA at Gatwick in the 1970s, the firm's operation at the airport was 'basically a "Gatwick subsidiary" called British Airtours, with older planes and less well-paid staff'. 'Today's news suggests they may be going back to that model,' he added. 'Over the decades I have watched a whole series of strategies to try to make BA's Gatwick operation profitable, including a short-lived and highly unsuccessful effort to make it "the hub without the hubbub". 'The new boss, Sean Doyle, is being much more radical. If he succeeds in cutting costs and reviving short-haul flying for BA at Gatwick [with the new subsidiary], travellers will benefit with real competition for the budget giant, easyJet.' However, he said the new subsidiary will be 'so different' from what BA currently offers, meaning 'you will not be getting the bottle of water and snack in economy, you will not have the world's most generous cabin baggage policy'. BA's plan with the new subsidiary is to use the same staff, aircraft and slots that it used at Gatwick in before it ceased its short-haul operations in March last year, Mr Calder added in the Independent. He said a likely new name for the venture is 'British Airways Express', like Iberia Express - the budget offshoot of BA's Spanish airline. BA has long-struggled to make its short-haul operations from Gatwick profitable. Its failed 'hub without the hubbub' operation at Gatwick North Terminal lasted only briefly and offered a connecting time that was as little as 26 minutes. In the 1980s, the firm took over British Caledonian and then Dan-Air, leaving it with duplicated and incoherent services. After the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001, easyJet embarked on a major move to Gatwick, which is now its main base. It meant that BA struggled to maintain profitability on its short-haul routes while competing with its budget rival. At the height of the coronavirus crisis in April last year, BA revealed that it could abandon Gatwick altogether as it battled to survive. The airline was crippled by the pandemic and was forced to cut thousands of pilot and cabin crew jobs. In a memo seen by the BBC at the time, it said: 'As you know, we suspended our Gatwick flying schedule at the start of April and there is no certainty as to when or if these services can or will return.' BA boss Mr Doyle, who took over in October last year after predecessor Alex Cruz stepped down following a troubled four-year tenure, has been fiercely critical of the Government over its handling of pandemic. Writing in the Daily Mail in July, he slammed ministers for 'shifting the goalposts' over plans to re-start international travel. 'No wonder were all so confused by the constant changes in the Governments approach. It feels like one set of rules apply in one area of life and another set of rules in another,' he wrote. 'The vaccination programme should have given us the confidence to get back in the air, but we remain largely in a holding pattern thanks to the lack of transparency in decision-making.' Shaughna Phillips has revealed that her family was almost made homelessness while her late father Eddie was dying from cancer. Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, the Love Island star, 27, reflected on the struggles she faced when her father, Eddie passed away almost five years ago. She is now urging people to host a Coffee Morning to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support, after the charity came to her family's rescue. Shocking: Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, Shaughna Phillips, 27, revealed that her family was almost made homelessness, while her late father Eddie was dying from cancer Shaugna explained: 'My dad was diagnosed with cancer in September 2015. He was a black cab driver in London. They're self-employed and work for themselves - most people don't realise that. 'So when he couldn't work anymore, he didn't get paid. There's no sick leave when you're self-employed. 'When people get cancer, all you think about is "god I hope they get through". You don't think about the impact on the whole family. We couldn't pay the rent. Macmillan came to the rescue. 'My mum as a lawyer contributed as much as she could, but it was quite a bit of shame for my dad, not being able to support the family financially. It had an impact on his mental state.' Grateful: The former Love Islander is urging people to host a Coffee Morning to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support, after the charity came to her family's rescue The Love Island star praised the charity for their financial support, and explained how three months after her father's diagnosis, they helped to secure them new accommodation. She said: 'MacMillan gave us these 2 grants, and that relief completely changed his whole mood. I'm still in such debt to them. They're the only reason we weren't homeless. 'We tried to get help from the government, but that didn't work. Macmillan also got in touch with out local MP on our behalf and managed to get us a house. 'We found out on Christmas Eve that we were able to move into a house that accepted pets, so we could take our dog. I can't explain how much we owe Macmillan.' Candid: 'When people get cancer, all you think about is "god I hope they get through". You don't think about the impact on the whole family. We couldn't pay the rent' (Pictured with her mum and brother Callu) Ass well as the assistance with finance and housing, Shaughna also touched on how much Macmillan's emotional support helped her father. She said: 'When we got in touch with Macmillan for help, it led onto bigger conversations that my dad felt like he couldn't have with my mum. 'Just seeing the difference on my dad after he had confidential chats with Macmillan, was huge.' And the debt she owes to the charity is not lost on the reality star, as she laughed while saying: 'My dad would be looking down on me right now like, "you better do this!"' Heartbreaking: Shaughna has been open about losing her father to cancer, after he passed away almost five years ago Shaughna admitted that there are times when she finds it hard to talk about losing her dad, and confessed that she's possibly 'buried some painful memories' but isn't interested in having therapy to resolve them. She said: 'You go through ebbs and flows. When I do things like this for Macmillan, I go on autopilot. 'It was only when I was being interviewed on camera for the Full Monty about details of what my dad went through, that I realised I'd never spoken about it. I've probably buried some painful memories that I haven't gone back to. 'When my dad did pass away, my aunt - my dad's sister - went to therapy straight away, and she still goes to therapy. 'For me, the only reason I wouldnt is because, I could discuss these painful memories but I'm still gonna be about my dad when I leave. There's nothing that can make that better. I'd go to therapy for other things though!' Heartbreakingly, Shaughna confessed that grief doesn't get easier to deal with, but talking about it helps you to accept the loss. The Love Islander said: 'You just get better at functioning with it [grief]. You learn to accept the ache in your heart that you just have continuously. I've never bottled it up and I've never denied myself crying. 'Even when my dad was ill - you don't accept it until the very end - but I didn't play it down to myself. I have no regrets. There's never enough time, but anything I wanted to say to him I did. I had that time.' Asked if she could say something to her dad now, Shaughna joked that she'd tell him: 'I can only apologise for Love Island.' She added, while laughing: 'My mum bumped into a friend the other week, who said "oh her dad would have been so proud of her on Love Island" and my mum said: "If her dad was still here, Shaughna wouldn't have been on Love Island." On the positive side, the reality stunner admitted: 'I am grateful for Love Island because now I have this platform and can work with Macmillan and Cancer Research UK and I've done Full Monty - I'll never turn down a job that's about raising awareness of cancer. Taking part: 'Now I have this platform and can work with Macmillan and Cancer Research UK and I've done Full Monty' said Shaughna (Pictured in promo shots for The Real Full Monty On Ice, which aired on ITV in December) Shaughna explained that she celebrates her dad's life by always talking about him and reminiscing about fond memories with her mum. She said: 'I talk about him all the time. Me and my mum will have jokes and remember when he did this. There's a poem I love which basically says "Don't shy away from saying my name. All is the same as it's ever been" - I do like to treat it like that. 'Even though it's painful, the idea of not talking about someone who was in my life every day, seems so strange to me. We were friends, we were close, so I have so many fond memories. I used to go to Arsenal with him all the time. That was our time. It's good to talk: Shaughna explained that she celebrates her dad's life by always talking about him and reminiscing about fond memories with her mum 'I can understand people's hesitancy to bring him up. When friends are talking about their dads, they might feel like it's better to not ask me - but ask me! I can tell you what he would have done and I'd rather be in the conversation. I had a dad. I have a dad!' Shaughna is urging people to host a Coffee Morning to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support and help the charity continue to deliver vital services for people with cancer. Sign up now at macmillan.org.uk/coffee to host a Coffee Morning on 24th September, or whenever suits you best. Married At First Sight Australia star Tamara Joy has broken up with her OnlyFans model boyfriend Thomas Powell. Tamara, 32, announced the split during an Instagram Q&A on Thursday, revealing the pair had parted ways after just three months. 'No, Thomas and I are not dating anymore,' she said when asked about her relationship status. It's over! Married At First Sight Australia star Tamara Joy (left) has broken up with her OnlyFans model boyfriend Thomas Powell (right). Pictured during a recent holiday in Greece She added: 'I was going to go on a bit of a tantrum and tell you all about it. But you know you know what? It's just not worth my energy or my breath.' 'If I'm honest, we are just two different people. We didn't work out. It's as simple as that really. Ladies, know your worth!' The brunette went on to say she was holding up okay following their break-up, and will continue living in the UK for the time being. Sad news! Tamara, 32, announced the split during an Instagram Q&A on Thursday, revealing the pair had parted ways after just three months Meanwhile, a source close to Tamara told Daily Mail Australia the couple decided to call it quits because they both wanted different things from their relationship. 'They were always fighting and arguing. It was just very toxic. Tamara felt like she was always walking on eggshells around him,' they claimed. According to the insider, Tamara would always 'match his energy and it was s**t'. Bad romance: A source close to Tamara told Daily Mail Australia the couple decided to call it quits because they both wanted different things from their relationship 'She hasn't been happy in a long time. It's like her happy, carefree personality was being dimmed just to keep the peace,' they added. Tamara's romance with the former Love Island star, 29, was only confirmed at the start of July. She has been living it up in Europe for the past few months, after fleeing Australia on a work permit before half the country was plunged into Covid lockdown. Unhappy: 'They were always fighting and arguing. It was just very toxic. Tamara felt like she was always walking on eggshells around him,' the insider claimed She has been spotted partying at several London hotspots and has even attended a few red carpet events. The Aussie stunner told The Sun recently she was planning to stay in Britain 'long-term' to carve out a media career. 'I have some work coming up, just little bits and pieces really,' she said. That was quick! Tamara's romance with the former Love Island star, 29, was only confirmed at the start of July. Pictured in London on June 24, 2021 Country musician Keith Urban has paid tribute to Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts after his death at the age of 80. The 53-year-old shared a heartfelt post on Instagram on Wednesday celebrating Watts and his contribution to popular music. He posted a photo of himself with the legendary percussionist when he met the Rolling Stones in Los Angeles in 2013. 'I thank you for all that you gave us': Country musician Keith Urban has paid tribute to Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts after his death at the age of 80. Pictured (left to right): Ronnie Wood, Charlie Watts, Keith Urban, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger in LA on May 3, 2013 'I'm shocked and truly saddened at just now hearing the news that we lost the "gentleman soul of rock and roll," the queen bee of the hive that is The Rolling Stones, the original, Charlie Watts,' he wrote in the caption. Keith described Watts as 'the heartbeat of one of the greatest bands of all time'. He said the English rocker was 'a truly one-of-a-kind musician whose influence is unquantifiable and will continue to be for as long as there are musicians who are working to shed all that is not needed, to get to the essence.' Rest in peace: 'I'm shocked and truly saddened at just now hearing the news that we lost the "gentleman soul of rock and roll," the queen bee of the hive that is The Rolling Stones, the original, Charlie Watts,' said Keith. Pictured: Watts performing in London in November 2012 'I didn't even properly know you, but I love you Charlie, and I thank you for all that you gave us,' he said. The Grammy winner added: 'I'm so grateful that through countless recordings we will always be not only hearing you, but feeling you!' Keith performed with the Rolling Stones at the Staples Center in Los Angeles in 2013. Collab: Keith performed with the Rolling Stones at the Staples Center in Los Angeles in 2013. Pictured: Watts and Keith Richards perform in Miami on August 30, 2019 'It's hard to describe that one. Surreal, obviously. I just wish it was a longer song, really,' he told Times Colonist of his experience on stage. 'The great thing was getting to rehearsals in the afternoon... and there's all the boys up there running through all the songs for the show.' Along with Mike Jagger and Keith Richards, Watts featured on every one of the Rolling Stones' studio albums. He was widely regarded as one of the greatest drummers of all time. Early years: Watts featured on every one of the Rolling Stones' studio albums and was widely regarded as one of the greatest drummers of all time. Pictured clockwise from left: Keith Richards, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts, Brian Jones and Mick Jagger Charlie was due to tour the U.S. with the band later this year, but it was announced earlier this month he would not feature due to recent emergency surgery. His London publicist, Bernard Doherty, said in a statement on Tuesday: 'It is with immense sadness that we announce the death of our beloved Charlie Watts. 'He passed away peacefully in a London hospital earlier today surrounded by his family. Declining health: Charlie was due to tour the U.S. with the band later this year, but it was announced earlier this month he would not feature due to recent emergency surgery 'Charlie was a cherished husband, father and grandfather and also as a member of The Rolling Stones one of the greatest drummers of his generation. 'We kindly request that the privacy of his family, band members and close friends is respected at this difficult time.' He leaves behind his wife Shirley (nee Shepherd), daughter Seraphina, born in 1968, and granddaughter Charlotte, born in 1996. Fans are used to seeing Tammy Hembrow dolled up and dressed to the nines for her glamorous Instagram photos. But the 27-year-old went makeup free for her latest YouTube vlog on Wednesday, showing off her natural complexion while eating breakfast. The video began with Tammy tucking into a bowl of cereal while tapping away on her laptop in the kitchen of her $2.88million Gold Coast home. Unmasked: Tammy Hembrow went makeup free for a YouTube vlog on Wednesday, showing off her natural complexion while eating breakfast (left). Right: Tammy in a recent Instagram photo The vlog documented an ordinary day in Tammy's life, and was titled: 'I regret buying Wolf this gift - follow me around VLOG.' 'When I'm eating breakfast, I always bring my laptop pretty much,' she said. 'Sorry if I'm talking too quiet; I don't want to wake anyone up.' The businesswoman then woke up her children, Wolf and Saskia, and applied her makeup before leaving for the office. Just like the rest of us! The video began with Tammy tucking into a bowl of cereal while tapping away on her laptop in the kitchen of her $2.88million Gold Coast home 'So I'm ready to go. My bed is not made, but I don't have time to make it right now so don't judge,' she said, putting on her Yeezy sneakers. She later arrived at her office and held meetings for her Saski Collection activewear business and Tammy Fit workout program. Tammy ended her day by heading to the gym, hanging out with her boyfriend Matt Poole and picking up her kids from school. Getting dressed: The businesswoman then woke up her children, Wolf and Saskia, and applied her makeup before leaving for the office Tips and tricks: Tammy has previously said she uses Rihanna's Fenty products and Nars cosmetics to achieve her sun-kissed glow Tammy has previously said she uses Rihanna's Fenty products and Nars cosmetics to achieve her sun-kissed glow. 'I love liquid blush and liquid highlighter, especially on days that I am not putting on proper makeup,' she said. 'You put on a tiny bit of liquid blush and a tiny bit of highlighter and it just boosts your natural beauty a little bit.' She also credits her complexion to collagen drinks. She recently returned from Italy where she celebrated her incredibly famous mothers birthday. But Lourdes Leon was back to modeling this week, when an image featuring the beauty surfaced on Wednesday for decorative glass and jewelry company Swarovski. The Vogue cover girl, 24, appeared in a light green bandeau-style halter top, which exposed her bare midriff and toned shoulders. Lourdes Leon was back to modeling this week: An image featuring the beauty surfaced on Wednesday for decorative glass and jewelry company Swarovski The model, who is the daughter of Madonna and Carlos Leon, hooked one thumb into her blue jeans, which were adorned with a belt. Lourdes, also known as Lola, sported a belly chain as well as a long necklace and various rings. Her dark hair was stick straight and parted at the middle. Having fun: Lola recently returned from Italy where she celebrated her incredibly famous mothers birthday The daughter of the Material Girl will serve as the face of Swarovskis new Collection II campaign, which the brand says is 'a platform for representation of people from all cultures and orientations. 'Model, actress, linguist, academic, activist, Lourdes personifies the spirit of Swarovski,' the statement concluded. Leon is no stranger to fashion and modeling campaigns, as she has previously appeared in photo shoots for Stella McCartney, Marc Jacobs and many others. Seen in a recent music video on YouTube: Leon is no stranger to fashion campaigns, as she has previously appeared in photo shoots for Stella McCartney, Marc Jacobs and many others Most recently, she was one of eight lucky supermodels to be featured on the coveted September issue cover of Vogue Magazine. Joining her, among others, were Bella Hadid, Kaia Gerber and Anok Yai. Lola also recently enjoyed a holiday to Italy, where she hung out with her brother Rocco Richie, 21, and younger siblings David Banda and Mercy James, 15, and twin girls Stella and Estere, nine, along with birthday girl mom Madonna, who turned 63 years young. Most recently: She was one of eight lucky supermodels to be featured on the coveted September issue cover of Vogue Magazine (seen far right) Mother and daughter: Lola also recently enjoyed a holiday to Italy, where she hung out birthday girl mom Madonna, who turned 63 years young Ashley Graham shared several snaps that showed off her growing baby bump to her Instagram Story. In many of the shots, the 33-year-old television presenter was seen spending quality time with her family during their recent Jamaican getaway and displaying her midsection for her fans. The model and her husband Justin Ervin currently share a son named Isaac Menelik Giovanni, aged one, and they are currently awaiting the arrival of their second child. Watching the sunset: On Wednesday, Ashley Graham shared several shots of her spending time with her son, Isaac, as they spent time in the ocean during their recent Jamaican getaway to her Story on Wednesday In Graham's shots from Tuesday, she was seen spending a bit of quality time with Ervin, who notably placed his hand on her stomach. The reality television figure sported a bright pink drawstring bikini and a matching bottom in the pictures. She also added a bit of shine to her clothing ensemble with a single gold chain necklace. The model was also spotted wearing the same outfit in a series of snaps that were shared to her Story on Wednesday. Happy couple: Graham's husband, Justin Ervin, was seen placing his hand on his wife's growing baby bump in a heartwarming snap that was shared to her Instagram account on Tuesday Interesting apparel: The television presenter was seen wearing a bright pink bikini top and a matching bottom in the snap Her gorgeous brunette locks were braided and fell onto her back as she spent time in the ocean with Isaac. The social media personality also shared a shot of herself smiling while spending time in what appeared to be a sizable patio area. She sported a neon green knitted dress above a floral-printed bikini top and a matching bottom in the sizzling shot. Her hair was notably tied into a lengthy braid, and she also wore the same gold necklace. Switching out: The model was also seen wearing a neon green knitted dress and a floral bikini top in another shot Graham and Ervin initially met in 2009 after they attended the same church service. The two moved quickly with their relationship and went on to tie the knot after just a year of dating. The couple waited nearly a decade to start a family and announced that they would be welcoming a child into their lives in 2019. The social media personality gave birth to Isaac Menelik last January. Staying together: Graham and Ervin tied the knot in 2010 and welcomed their son Isaac Menelik Giovanni a decade later Graham went on to announce that she was expecting another child with Ervin this past July. The big news was made public through a post made to her Instagram account, and she wrote a short message in the post's caption to express her excitement for the upcoming arrival of her second kid. The statement began with: 'the past year has been full of tiny surprises, big griefs, familiar beginnings and new stories.' She also wrote that she was 'just beginning to process and celebrate what this next chapter means for us.' She was recently in France with designer and Project Runway vet Christian Siriano. And Alicia Silverstone checked in on Instagram on Wednesday with a duo of sumptuous shots showing her in a partially sheer, magnificent black gown designed by Chrstian. The Clueless actress, 44, had her hands up near her waist as she stood on the marble floor in the shot, with her legs and part of her torso visible in the grandiose floor length gown constructed of sheer panels with what looked to be large black flower petals petals applied throughout. Exquisite: Alicia Silverstone checked in on Instagram on Wednesday with a duo of sumptuous shots showing her in a partially sheer, magnificent black gown Another image saw the beautiful mother of one in the statement garment outside, with one hand up in her wavy blonde hair that hung loose. The lush backdrop included greenery and the lavish manor, accented with aqua window shutters. Silverstone appeared to be wearing a bra and high waisted panties under the frock. Decadent: Another image saw the beautiful mother of one in the statement garment outside, with one hand up in her wavy blonde hair that hung loose In another picture uploaded on Tuesday, Alicia stood inside the chateau alongside designer Christian, who was seen sewing finishing touches into the chest area of the garment. In the caption, the actress shared a tremendous amount of gratitude for her 'dear sweet friend' Christian, who she said rented the chateau, planned their entire trip, and even organized the photoshoot for the dress which he designed. 'We had one day where we did a mini photoshoot,' Silverstone shared. 'Christian thrived using his artistic vision as he designed, produced, styled, and shot on his phone.' In another picture uploaded on Tuesday: Alicia stood inside the chateau alongside designer Christian Siriano, who was seen sewing finishing touches into the chest area of the garment In the caption: The actress shared gratitude for her 'dear sweet friend' Christian, who she said rented the chateau, planned their entire trip, and organized the photoshoot 'The trip was amazing with a really fun crew,' she also wrote. 'I can't explain how thankful I am that my brain got real rest. It was wonderful and I appreciate how thoughtful Christian was in all his planning for me and all of his friends on this unforgettable trip. Thank you Christian, my dear sweet friend. I love you '. And the stylish images were not the only souvenir Alicia shared from their French trip. Posing: The stylish images were not the only souvenir Alicia shared from their French trip Earlier this month, the Excess Baggage star shared an amusing video clip from the trip, in which she recreated a famous scene from her 1995 movie Clueless. The movie star was helped by Siriano, champion designer from season four of Project Runway, as the pair joked around in the clip. Silverstone looked exactly like her younger self in the snippet, which saw the pair of friends lying in a white hotel bed watching the famous old movie Spartacus recreating the iconic moment when Alicia's character Cher falls off the bed while trying to get closer to a character also named Christian. Married at First Sight star Tracey Jewel has hit back after being slammed by small Australian businesses for failing to deliver them thousands of followers in exchange for free products. In a lengthy statement posted to her Instagram page, Tracey adamantly 'denied any wrongdoing' and said that she did the giveaway to help Covid-affected businesses. 'I did this giveaway to support small businesses and offer an opportunity through my and others Instagrams to promote self care,' she wrote. Hitting back: Married at First Sight star Tracey Jewel has hit back after being slammed by small Australian businesses for failing to deliver them thousands of followers in exchange for free products 'Unfortunately, we didn't get the results we had hoped, for several factors beyond our control,' she continued. 'I fulfilled my role in promoting these businesses,' she added, before explaining that because the products were given as 'contra' and used in promotions, they were unable to be returned. 'It was not part of the agreement that products would be paid for or returned,' she added. Statement: In a lengthy statement posted to her Instagram page, Tracey adamantly 'denied any wrongdoing' and said that she did the giveaway to help Covid-affected businesses 'In advertising and marketing there are no guarantees and I wish these businesses all the best. 'I deny any wrongdoing and calling me a scammer or fraud is defamation and caution notices to these individuals may be issues.' Ebonnie Masini, the owner of Masini Sleepwear, claims 38-year-old Jewel contacted her on Instagram on June 30 with a business proposal. Defiant: 'I deny any wrongdoing and calling me a scammer or fraud is defamation and caution notices to these individuals may be issues' In messages seen by Daily Mail Australia, Jewel offered Ms Masini a spot in a mass giveaway, indicating she would gain anywhere between 5,000 and 10,000 followers if she were to participate. The catch was that she'd be required to 'gift' Jewel and 10 other influencers products from her line as well as pay a $299 'buy in' fee. Ms Masini refused, citing the pressures of a Covid downturn for being unable to afford the participation fee. Controversial: Tracey pictured wearing a Masini Sleepwear robe, surrounded by gifted products for the giveaway Ebonnie Masini (pictured), the owner of Masini Sleepwear, claims 38-year-old Jewel contacted her on Instagram on June 30 with a business proposal She claims Jewel then amended the conditions and accepted Masini Sleepwear into the competition without a fee, so long as she and three other influencers were gifted products. Ms Masini, along with other small business owners who agreed to participate, was under the impression that all 11 influencers would promote the brand both on their stories and on grid posts. The competition ran from August 15 to 21, and in the week since, Masini Sleepwear gained just 40 followers. Ms Masini said 40 followers was 'about the average' of what each of the female-led brands gained. Several other influencers have since claimed they were not made aware of the giveaway in advance and failed to receive the products Ms Masini, along with other small business owners who agreed to participate, was under the impression that all 11 influencers would promote the brand both on their stories and on grid posts While the businesswoman understands promoting products via Instagram influencers never guarantees sales, she feels the competition was poorly executed. 'We were lucky to have only gifted four items, however, these items all retail for $189 hence its not an insignificant amount for us as a small business,' she said. 'All brands involved have copped losses.' Ms Masini said she'd tried to contact Jewel to ask what went so wrong and point out that only three of the promised 11 influencers promoted her product, but she's been met with legal threats. 'This is harassment, bullying, defamation and cybercrime and my lawyers will be contacted on Monday morning if this does not stop. This is your first and final warning,' Jewel wrote in an email to all of the businesses involved. 'I understand a few of you are unhappy with the lack of results with this giveaway. I am too... Sometimes things just don't get the high return.' In messages seen by Daily Mail Australia, Jewel offered Ms Masini a spot in a mass giveaway, indicating she would gain anywhere between 5,000 and 10,000 followers if she were to participate Jewel has been at the centre of several controversies since appearing on Married At First Sight She has since been in touch with several other influencers listed on the promotion, some of whom claim they had no idea it even existed. Others say they were aware of the giveaway but either never received the products or received damaged goods with no instructions as to how or when to promote them. 'Many of them have since reached out embarrassed, apologetic and devastated that through no fault of their own their names have been tied to this,' Ms Masini said. Jewel told Daily Mail Australia she was simply involved in the giveaway but did not organise the details of the agreement. She later revealed that she had in fact created the giveaway and hoped to support small businesses. 'I fulfilled my role in promoting these businesses and in light of the giveaway results, the company I'm involved with decided in good faith to refund 33% of the fees they paid. 'We deny any wrongdoing... In advertising and marketing there are no guarantees and I wish these businesses all the best.' Just under a month after revealing his grandmother has passed away from COVID-19, actor Edgar Ramirez has offered another heartbreaking update that his aunt and uncle have now passed from the virus as well. The 44-year-old actor is a native of San Cristobal, Tachira, Venezuela, revealing that his Venezuelan family members and friends who have passed were not vaccinated, since they have no access to the vaccine in his home country. The Jungle Cruise star has also lost his Aunt Nidia's brother in law Rafael, who he called a 'dear friend,' and his Venezuelan agent and dear friend Laureano recently, as he begged his fans and followers to get vaccinated and protect the vulnerable. Heartbreaking: Just under a month after revealing his grandmother has passed away from COVID-19, actor Edgar Ramirez has offered another heartbreaking update that his aunt and uncle have now passed from the virus as well 'I beg you to please read this post carefully. It is the most painful and the most intimate thing I have had to publish in my life, but I think it is important to share it,' Ramirez began in the caption of his post. 'At times I feel like it is a nightmare from which I am going to wake up, but I know it is not. That this is as real as the air that at this moment it is difficult for me to breathe,' he said. The actor also posted a 10-minute interview with Dr. Anthony Fauci in which we discussed vital information on how to deal with COVID 19 and the urgent need to get vaccinated, especially those of us who are lucky enough to access to a vaccine.' Painful: 'I beg you to please read this post carefully. It is the most painful and the most intimate thing I have had to publish in my life, but I think it is important to share it,' Ramirez began in the caption of his post. 'No one who has access to a vaccine should die from COVID 19. Please read this information, watch the interview and please, please share it. Thank you very much, Edgar,' the actor concluded. The post itself was a passionate statement spread out over a number of images, which began, 'Unfortunately the miracle didn't happen. After gruesome agony, my Aunt Lucy died on Saturday. And after being stabilized for a few days and in only a matter of hours, my uncle Guillermo collapsed and died Sunday.' He added that COVID took both their lives in under 24 hours, and they hadn't even collected his aunt's ashes when they had to cremate his uncle. No miracle: The post itself was a passionate statement spread out over a number of images, which began, 'Unfortunately the miracle didn't happen. After gruesome agony, my Aunt Lucy died on Saturday. And after being stabilized for a few days and in only a matter of hours, my uncle Guillermo collapsed and died Sunday' Then just another day later, he learned that his Aunt Nidia's brother in law, Rafael, had passed on Monday, after months of battling COVID. The actor added they died a month and two days after his grandmother Bertha succumbed to the virus and four months after his Venezuelan agent and good friend Laureano died from COVID. 'My heart can't just take more pain. I am sad, I am frustrated, I am devastated. It's been weeks and weeks of my family being played, tortured and jerked around by this cruel, treacherous and violent disease which mercilessly ended up killing them all,' he added. Agent: The actor added they died a month and two days after his grandmother Bertha succumbed to the virus and four months after his Venezuelan agent and good friend Laureano died from COVID. No more pain: 'My heart can't just take more pain. I am sad, I am frustrated, I am devastated. It's been weeks and weeks of my family being played, tortured and jerked around by this cruel, treacherous and violent disease which mercilessly ended up killing them all,' he added He added that he refuses to let these, 'waves of hopelessness take root in my soul,' and that none of the deceased had been vaccinated, adding, 'None of them had access to a vaccine in Venezuela. 'Meanwhile, tens of thousands of vaccines are being thrown away in the United States because a large number of people don't want them,' Ramirez continued. He added that it, 'breaks my heart that so many people in this country are willing to snub the very vaccine my family would have taken in an instant.' No vaccine: He added that he refuses to let these, 'waves of hopelessness take root in my soul,' and that none of the deceased had been vaccinated, adding, 'None of them had access to a vaccine in Venezuela Snub: He added that it, 'breaks my heart that so many people in this country are willing to snub the very vaccine my family would have taken in an instant' He then issued an impassioned plea for anyone who is able to get vaccinated, to do so, if not for themselves, but to protect those who are vulnerable around them. 'Don't do it for yourself. Do it to protect those who are vulnerable, those with immune deficiencies, and all others who can get very sick if infected,' he said. Ramirez added that 'everyone agrees' that those who are not vaccinated, 'carry more of the lethal virus and can transmit it faster' than those who are vaccinated. Transmit: Ramirez added that 'everyone agrees' that those who are not vaccinated, 'carry more of the lethal virus and can transmit it faster' than those who are vaccinated He added that getting vaccinated is, 'an act of compassion,' before mentioning his interview with Dr. Anthony Fauci, which he posted on his Instagram page as well. The actor said he hoped the conversation with Fauci could serve as a 'starting point' with those who are hesitant about getting the vaccine. 'Lastly, I encourage you all to follow science and truthful information and please, please, PLEASE... If you can, get vaccinated, so you can help save those around you,' he concluded. Ramirez's Yes Day co-star Jennifer Garner also reposted his post on her Instagram story, adding, 'My dear friend @edgarramirez25's story is incredibly heartbreaking and too important not to share.' Starting point: The actor said he hoped the conversation with Fauci could serve as a 'starting point' with those who are hesitant about getting the vaccine Follow science: 'Lastly, I encourage you all to follow science and truthful information and please, please, PLEASE... If you can, get vaccinated, so you can help save those around you,' he concluded Christine McGuinness and Alison Hammond lead a host of famous faces supporting a campaign to raise money for a leading cancer charity. The celebrities are encouraging the public to host a coffee morning to raise funds for Macmillan Cancer Support following a drop in donations. Christine looked incredible as she posed for a photoshoot in a pink midi dress with a pair of white heels. Good cause: Christine McGuinness (pictured) and Alison Hammond lead a host of famous faces supporting a campaign to raise money for a leading cancer charity The Real Housewives of Cheshire star joined the campaign as her mother is currently going through cancer treatment. Joining Alison and Christine were other stars including actor Peter Capaldi, model Twiggy, Love Island star Shaughna Phillips and TV presenter Fearne Cotton. The cancer charity revealed that its flagship fundraiser is facing a 20 million drop in income for the second year running. This could put almost 200,000 cancer patients at risk of missing vital care from the charity's nurses. Macmillan has said that nearly 98 per cent of its funding comes from donations, but the number of people signing up to host a coffee morning has dropped by more than three-quarters below average for the second year. Charity: The celebrities are encouraging the public to host a coffee morning to raise funds for Macmillan Cancer Support (Alison pictured) Star: Joining Alison and Christine were other stars including actor and former Doctor Who star Peter Capaldi The coffee morning event raised 2.7 million in 2019, while estimates predict that this year's fundraiser will generate less than a third of that amount. Despite this lack of funding, the demand for its services is high due to Covid-19 causing disruptions to treatment. The 110-year-old charity said its free helpline has answered more than 250,000 telephone queries from people affected by cancer since the first national lockdown and received 22% more calls than this time last year. The charity has now collaborated with 12 celebrities who have been touched by cancer, and many who have experienced Macmillan's support, to raise awareness and funds. Family: Shaughna Phillips is also supporting the charity's campaign after her family was supported by a Macmillan grant when her father, who died of cancer in 2016, was no longer able to work during his treatment Drop: The cancer charity revealed that its flagship fundraiser is facing a 20 million drop in income for the second year running (Twiggy pictured) Care: This could put almost 200,000 cancer patients at risk of missing vital care from the charity's nurses (Fearne Cotton pictured) Fleabag actor Kadiff Kirwan, whose aunt had cancer received the support of a Macmillan nurse. Former Love Island contestant Shaughna is also supporting the charity's campaign after her family was supported by a Macmillan grant when her father, who died of cancer in 2016, was no longer able to work during his treatment. The other famous faces involved include, broadcaster Victoria Derbyshire, broadcaster and activist Samantha Renke, Strictly Come Dancing judge Shirley Ballas, Bridgerton actor Martins Imhangbe and Gavin & Stacey star Larry Lamb. Important: Strictly Come Dancing judge Shirley Ballas is encouraging people to get involved Funds: Macmillan has said that nearly 98 per cent of its funding comes from donations, but the number of people signing up to host a coffee morning has dropped by more than three-quarters (Samantha Renke pictured) Raised: The coffee morning event raised 2.7 million in 2019, while estimates predict that this year's fundraiser will generate less than a third of that amount (Martins Imhangbe pictured) Service: Despite this lack of funding, the demand for its services is high due to Covid-19 causing disruptions to treatment (Victoria Derbyshire pictured) Chief executive officer at Macmillan Cancer Support, Lynda Thomas, said: 'Macmillan is working tirelessly to do whatever it takes for people with cancer, many of whom are coping with the disruption caused by Covid-19, but without the support of the public we won't be able to keep up with the demand for our services. 'It's worrying for us to see Coffee Morning registrations are currently even lower than last year during Covid restrictions and we want to assure everyone that there are many safe and fun ways to get involved - whether it's a doorstep cuppa with a neighbour before work, or a family picnic in the park. 'Every penny raised will help fund vital support for people living with cancer, who need Macmillan now more than ever.' Sign up to host a coffee morning is on the Macmillan Cancer Support website. Support: Fleabag actor Kadiff Kirwan (pictured), whose aunt had cancer received the support of a Macmillan nurse. With just three episodes to go until Jimmy Nicholson chooses his winner on The Bachelor, the rejected bachelorettes are desperately trying to cash in on their 15 minutes of fame. One disgruntled contestant, who spoke to Daily Mail Australia on the condition of anonymity, said several of the women were 'fuming' because they still hadn't received 'blue tick' verification on Instagram. 'It's not fair! Channel 10 said they would apply to get us verified before they gave us control of our accounts back,' they said. 'Not fair!' A disgruntled Bachelor contestant says several of the women are 'fuming' because they still haven't received 'blue tick' verification on Instagram. Pictured: Jimmy Nicholson Only five participants have received the blue tick which was promised to them. 'They are fuming. Lily [Price] has hers and she was only out yesterday, but most of the girls that have been out for weeks still don't have theirs,' the ex-contestant said. Several of the women don't think it's fair that Holly Kingston is the only finalist to be awarded with a blue tick. Short-changed: Only five participants have received the blue tick which was promised to them 'Holly doesn't even have access to her account because she's still on the show, but 10 have gone and got her account verified,' they complained. 'Irena [Srbinovska, the winner from Locky Gilbert's season] and half the girls from last year didn't get theirs - yet Holly has hers already!' As of Thursday, the only Bachelor stars with verified accounts are: Holly, Belinda Robinson, Sierah Swepstone, Tahnee Leeson and Lily Price. No wonder she's smiling! Several of the women don't think it's fair that Holly Kingston (pictured) is the only finalist to be awarded with a blue tick Verified: As of Thursday, the only Bachelor stars with verified accounts are: Holly, Belinda Robinson, Sierah Swepstone, Tahnee Leeson and Lily Price Being verified on Instagram comes with a host of algorithmic benefits, as also makes an account more attractive to potential advertisers. While several 2021 cast members do have blue ticks, they won't be able to cash in with sponsored posts until their contract expires in October. The Bachelor continues Thursday at 7.30pm on Channel 10 Nicole Kidman has stripped down for a stunning pictorial in Marie Claire Australia's 25th birthday edition. The actress, 54, dared to bare in a variety of stylish ensembles that flattered her slender physique. One outfit sees the To Die For actress in a skimpy playsuit with a plunging neckline and black fishnet stockings. Confident: Nicole Kidman has stripped down for a stunning pictorial in Marie Claire Australia's 25th birthday edition She teams the ensemble, featuring a diamond-encrusted bow detail at the front, with fishnet stockings and pointed heels. Another look appears to be made of semi-sheer lace, leaving little to the imagination. The Australian star also puts on an elegant display in a black skirt and matching long-sleeved top with a turtleneck. Racy: Another look appears to be made of semi-sheer lace, leaving little to the imagination She's promoting her new TV drama Nine Perfect Strangers, which is based on the 2018 novel of the same name by Liane Moriarty. Nicole spoke about her family life in the accompanying interview. She admitted she 'would've loved 10 children' but was grateful for the 'miracle' of finding the love of her life, husband Keith Urban. Leggy: The 54-year-old confidently showed off her long legs and trim figure in a mini-dress Classy: The Australian star also puts on an elegant display in a black skirt and matching long-sleeved top with a turtleneck 'I wish I'd had more children but I wasn't given that choice,' she said. 'But that's okay. I get to mother other children. I have six nieces and nephews and I'm godmother to 12. I love mothering. I love kids and what they say.' 'They're quirky, funny, unfiltered. And then you get to see them grow and send them on their way.' Delicious! For another image, Nicole dined on a cake and devoured a red cherry Nicole and Keith share two daughters, Sunday, 13, and Faith, 10. She has two adopted children, Bella and Connor, from her marriage to Tom Cruise. Bella and Connor are now grown up and reportedly have limited contact with their mother due to their ties to the Church of Scientology. Advertisement Paris Hilton is enjoying a majorly loved up holiday with her husband-to-be. The Cooking With Paris star, 40, was snapped on a luxury yacht off the coast of Sardinia on Tuesday, smiling and kissing her fiance Carter Reum while wrapped in his arms. The pair could not keep their hands off of each other both in and out of the water, while embracing on the boat and also snuggling up together on a jet ski. Romance: Paris Hilton was snapped on a luxury yacht off the coast of Sardinia on Tuesday, smiling and kissing her fiance Carter Reum Fiance behavior: The pair could not keep their hands off of each other both in and out of the water, while embracing on the boat Carter, also 40, sported pink swim trunks and no shirt, save for a black scuba top when he jumped in the water and hopped on the jet ski. Paris, meanwhile, looked lovely in a skimpy red bikini top held together with a knot at the center of her chest. On the bottom, she wore a pair of tasteful high-waisted red and black floral bikini bottoms. Throes of passion: The lovebirds were definitely enjoying their majorly loved up holiday Vacay chic: Paris looked lovely in a skimpy red bikini top held together with a knot at the center of her chest Sweet moments: Carter, meanwhile, sported pink swim trunks Cute: They were even seen snuggling up together on a jet ski On the bottom: Hilton wore a pair of tasteful high-waisted red and black floral bikini bottoms When she got out of the water: Paris wrapped herself in a white beach towel Colorful: Hilton added a lovely striped multicolored robe-style cover up, which featured black piping and the words 'lift you higher' written in loud colors on the back Hilton added a lovely striped multicolored robe-style cover up, which featured black piping and the words 'lift you higher' written in loud colors on the back. She was briefly seen wearing a light blue sheer sarong wrapped around her waist. The Simple Life star also donned large celebrity-style black sunglasses, and a fabric headband which picked up the same pattern as her bikini bottoms. Jumping: Reum wore a black scuba top when he jumped in the water and hopped on the jet ski Enjoying: She sat in front of her man on the jet ski, managing the handlebars Two peas in a pod: The couple enjoyed being out on the water Luxury: Their boat featured a staircase descending to the ocean Having fun: Paris was seen laughing in the ocean water next to the boat, holding onto a rope Smiling ear to ear: She was having a fun and playful time in the water, egged on by Carter Balancing act: Carter also tried his hand at wake boarding, balancing on a small surfboard in the sea Canoodling: Reum found every opportunity to shower his bride-to-be with affection Paris tied her long blonde hair back into a sleek ponytail. In the water, she too wore scuba-style apparel, in the form of a black vest. She sat in front of her man on the jet ski, managing the handlebars. Kissing: The pair went in for a kiss fresh out of the ocean Bling: The hotel heiress had small white pearls in her ears, along with an assortment of other jewelry including one bracelet On the deck: She was also seen carrying a large throw or towel Fueling up: Carter took a snack break Phone time: Paris wasn't seen without her smartphone close by Another cuddle moment: The sweethearts took time for another vacation hug on the yacht Loved up: They even showered together When she got out of the water, Paris wrapped herself in a white beach towel. The hotel heiress had small white pearls in her ears, along with an assortment of other jewelry including one bracelet. She was seen laughing in the ocean water next to the boat, holding onto a rope. Carter also tried his hand at wake boarding, balancing on a small surfboard in the sea. Living it up: Paris proudly displayed her incredible physique in a revealing mismatched red bikini as she basked in the sunshine on her swanky boat in Sardinia Glamorous: She proudly displayed her svelte figure in the revealing red bikini top that accentuated her ample bust, teamed with high-waisted printed bottoms Perfection: The star finished her colourful outfit with a bold rainbow kimono and a matching printed headband as she battled the breeze on her way up to the yacht's top desk Glam: Later Paris donned a pair of tight blue trousers alongside her bikini top as she continued to pose for more stylish snaps Having fun? Paris has been enjoying her break in the mountainous Mediterranean island alongside fiance Carter, who was snapping away with his camera On Instagram, the reality star was seen enjoying the last days of summer as well. On Wednesday, Paris was pictured living her best life and she struck a series of poses while onboard a luxury catamaran in Corsica. The media personality shared the snaps herself to her 15.6million Instagram followers with the playful caption, 'Captain Paris in Paradise.' She tagged Sunreef Yachts in the post, described as being the world's leading designer and builder of luxury custom made catamarans and catamaran-superyachts. Paris has been enjoying her break in the mountainous Mediterranean island alongside fiance Carter Reum. Luxury: On Wednesday, the hotel heiress was pictured living her best life and she struck a series of poses while onboard a luxury yacht in Corsica Bride-to-be: Paris is set to marry her man soon and has hinted that it will be an opulent affair On a recent appearance on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, the former reality star admitted that she has some opulent plans for her upcoming wedding to Carter. Although she admitted the creative process for the big day has been 'very stressful' she also insisted that she is 'not a bridezilla at all.' She said: 'It's gonna be like a three-day affair. We have a lot happening.' In a previous post this week, Paris shared a loving snap with her husband-to-be as she captioned the picture, 'Lovers in Paradise.' Time to rest: Paris has admitted that the creative process for the big day has been 'very stressful' she also insisted that she is 'not a bridezilla at all' Looking out to sea: Paris appears to be enjoying the last days of summer Meanwhile, The Simple Life star has vowed to fans that she will record more new music 'soon'. Earlier this month, Paris celebrated the 15th anniversary of her debut album, Paris, that she said was 'so life-changing'. Alongside the album cover, she wrote on Instagram: "Happy 15th Anniversary to my debut studio album #Paris. Thank you to everyone who has supported these songs, and continue to listen to them today!' Good times: The Simple Life is on another vacation with her fiance, businessman Carter Reum 'Making this album was so life-changing and Im so proud of how these songs have transcended the years. Cant wait to continue to make more music for all of you soon! #Iconic #PopStarParis.' The socialite released her debut single Stars Are Blind - which helped launch her current DJ career - in 2006, and while fans have been waiting for her second album since the release of eponymously titled Paris that same year, she previously said that she's 'focused on singles'. Asked in 2018 if she was recording another album, Paris said: 'I'm mostly focused on just singles, I think that's just how it is nowadays with the music industry.' 'It's not really about albums. So yeah I've been working on my second album forever, but I'm also running a huge business and doing a million other things.' Nicole Kidman and castmates including Melissa McCarthy and Bobby Cannavale spent weeks filming their new series, Nine Perfect Strangers, in Byron Bay. Although the Hulu original, which airs on Amazon Prime in Australia, is set in California, locals of the NSW coastal town would recognise Soma anywhere. The boutique retreat is located in the idyllic back hills of Ewingsdale. An infinity pool, sweeping hinterland views to a yoga dome: Inside the stunning Byron Bay retreat where Nine Perfect Strangers is filmed. Pictured is Nicole Kidman as Masha in the hit show The property itself can be rented out to visitors and holidaymakers for approximately $8,580 per night, which is separate from the retreat. Retreats are also ran there, but prices vary. The property features a gorgeous infinity pool, sweeping hinterland views and its very own yoga dome. 'With the intention of creating a space to recharge your batteries, Soma has been mindfully designed with a modern yet warm aesthetic, allowing clarity externally for whatever space you need within,' it's official website reads. The ultra-modern space has also been used by Byron Bay local Chris Hemsworth, where he filmed videos for his fitness app. Luxurious: Called Soma, the boutique retreat is located in the idyllic back hills of Ewingsdale and can be rented out for approximately $8,580 per night. Pictured is the yoga dome Incredible: It features a gorgeous infinity pool, sweeping hinterland views and it's very own yoga dome Soma boasts ten bedrooms, eleven bathrooms and can accommodate eight cars. It has an abundance of light thanks to its floor-to-ceiling glass windows and presents a modern design via lots of concrete and wooden touches. The property sits on its own block overlooking a 22-acre forest. In Nine Perfect Strangers, the retreat is called the Tranquillum House and is based in California. Many of the exterior shots are from Big Sur. Lush: It has an abundance of light thanks to it's floor to ceiling glass windows and features a modern design using lots of concrete and wooden touches. The property sits on its own block with its own 22-acre forest Roomy: The pad boasts eleven bedrooms, 11 bathrooms and can accommodate eight cars The set: In Nine Perfect Strangers, the retreat is called the Tranquillum House Fancy that! The impressive ultra-modern space has also been used to film videos for Chris Hemsworth's fitness app called Centr The show is based on a book by Liane Moriarty and stars the likes of Nicole Kidman, Luke Evans, Samara Weaving, Melissa McCarthy and Bobby Cannavale. Nicole, 54, plays suspicious wellness resort director Masha. She insisted on staying in character for the five month shoot. Nicole recently said that she was 'bats*** crazy' on set and refused to answer to her own name in a bid to not make it seem she was 'doing a performance'. 'I'd only respond as Masha,' she explained during a TCA panel. 'I wanted a very calm healing energy to emanate all the time so I remember going over to people and sort of putting my hand on their heart, holding their hand, they would talk to me or use my name Nicole when I would completely ignore them.' Kyle Sandilands has savaged those falsely using Covid fears as an excuse to get out of work. The shock jock, 50, sympathised with a caller who claimed Australians were claiming they might have Covid symptoms and then calling in sick to their employers. 'It's so infuriating,' agreed Kyle during Thursday's show. Infuriated: Kyle Sandilands has savaged those falsely using Covid fears as an excuse to get out of work 'You can't do anything about it,' added the KIIS FM star, before adding that the practice may in fact not be legal. The Kyle and Jackie O Show newsreader Brooklyn added that 'if you want to be an a**ehole all you've got to do is get a [Covid] test, cause then you've got one or two days off.' When he said that people should be grateful to have jobs given the current economic climate, Kyle ranted, 'Some people will [be grateful] and some people will take advantage... it's horrible.' Gaming the system: The Kyle and Jackie O Show newsreader Brooklyn then added that 'if you want to be an a**ehole all you've got to do is get a [Covid] test' to get time off work The spray comes after Sunrise host David 'Kochie' Koch took a cheeky dig at Kyle when he appeared on The Kyle and Jackie O show earlier this week. Kochie, 65, told him he was a little upset that he wasn't invited to Kyle's 50th birthday bash back in June. 'Karl [Stefanovic] was there... I only saw the photos,' Kochie said, as Jackie O and his Sunrise co-host Natalie Barr laughed. Awkward! The spray comes after Sunrise host David 'Kochie' Koch took a cheeky dig at Kyle when he appeared on The Kyle and Jackie O show earlier this week He added: 'I had a present, I even went to the junk folder in my email [to look for an invite].' Kyle said he felt bad, but didn't have control of the guest list as the party was planned for him. 'I didn't know the guest list, I wasn't sure and there was plenty of people who were massively offended they weren't invited,' Kyle explained. Where was my invite? Kochie, 65, told the shock jock he was a little upset that he wasn't invited to Kyle's 50th birthday bash back in June He added with a laugh: 'How did Ben Fordham get invited, that's what I want to know!' Back in June, Kyle enjoyed a massive 50th birthday bash on a superyacht on the Sydney Harbour with a star-studded guest list. Guests included his co-host Jackie 'O' Henderson, Beau Ryan, Guy Sebastian and Samantha Jade. What a bash: Back in June, Kyle enjoyed a massive 50th birthday bash on a superyacht on the Sydney Harbour Star-studded: Guests included his co-host Jackie 'O' Henderson, Beau Ryan, Guy Sebastian and Samantha Jade Kyle even made a dramatic and epic entrance to the party, turning up alongside girlfriend Tegan Kynaston in a private speedboat and jumping on board. Also at the bash were the likes of Kyle and Jackie O newsreader Brooklyn and Kyle's manager and good friend, Bruno Bouchet. Kyle was presented with a lavish three-tiered 'King Kyle' cake as he joined guests onboard. Behind the cake was also an eye-catching gold balloon display and light numbers displaying the big '50'. KIIS FM radio star Lauren Phillips has been blasted on live on air by actor Matt Damon for being a 'bad neighbour'. Appearing on KIIS 101.1's Jase and Lauren in the Morning on Thursday, the Hollywood star took aim at the Weekend Today show weather girl after living next door to her and her aviation tycoon boyfriend, Paul O'Brien, earlier this year. The American actor stayed in Byron Bay for six months before heading back to the US in June with his family. Blasted: KIIS FM radio star Lauren Phillips has been blasted on live on air by actor Matt Damon for being a 'bad neighbour' 'Hey this is Matt Damon calling all the way from New York City,' he said on the line, before branding Lauren a 'terrible' neighbour. 'Here's how terrible Lauren is as a neighbour, she actually just said she doesn't even know her neighbours,' the Good Will Hunting favourite joked. An overjoyed Lauren then launched into a bit of friendly banter with The Bourne Identity star, calling him a 'far worse neighbour' than her. 'You used to just walk into our house willy-nilly and send your kids over and you'd never leave,' Lauren said to the Oscar winner. Appearing on KIIS 101.1's Jase and Lauren in the Morning on Thursday, the Hollywood star took aim at the Weekend Today show weather girl after living next door to her and her aviation tycoon boyfriend, Paul O'Brien, earlier this year Matt then revealed Lauren had an annoying habit of singing Whitney Houston songs after enjoying a few glasses of wine. 'She not afraid of [singing] Whitney,' he said. 'volume isn't the problem. Confidence isn't the problem either.' Lauren is no stranger to mingling with A-listers, having recently attended the exclusive Gold Dinner in Sydney alongside Chris Hemsworth and Elsa Pataky. Hitting back: An overjoyed Lauren then launched into a bit of friendly banter with The Bourne Identity star, calling him a 'far worse neighbour' than her The Weekend Today weather presenter, 34, looked glamorous in a black gown that hugged her figure as she posed at the event with the A-list couple, Liam Hemsworth and his girlfriend Gabriella Brooks, and Luciana. And while she seamlessly fitted into that famous social circle for the group photo at the charity event - it's quite a long way from her early days as the host of a children's show. In 2011, she was cast as the co-host of Channel Nine's now defunct program, Kids' WB Australia, alongside former Block star Andy Sunderland. BFFs: Lauren recently showed off her friendship with Matt Damon's wife, Luciana Barroso on Instagram Hanging with the Hemsworths: Lauren (second from left) looked glamorous in a black gown at the Gold Dinner in Sydney alongside Chris Hemsworth, Elsa Pataky (centre), Matt Damon's wife Luciana Barroso (left), Liam Hemsworth and Gabriella Brooks But the show was given the axe in November 2019 because Channel Nine's long-running deal with Warner Bros had expired. Lauren made headlines earlier in December 2018, when she announced her split from Lachlan Spark after just one year of marriage. At the time, her representative confirmed the marriage was over in a brief statement to The Daily Telegraph newspaper. Lauren is now believed to be dating multi-millionaire jet tycoon Paul O'Brien, who happens to be the ex-boyfriend of Sunrise host Sam Armytage. If the acting career doesn't pan out: The Thor star read her weather report live on air, and afterwards she joked the A-list star gave her a run for her money and take her job Paul runs high-end aviation business AVMIN, which boasts celebrity clients including Matt Damon and Chris Hemsworth. She has been enjoying getting to know Paul's many celebrity friends, including Hollywood superstar Hemsworth and his wife. Back in September, Lauren surprised Weekend Today hosts Richard Wilkins and Rebecca Maddern with a special appearance by Hemsworth in the New South Wales town of Scone. The Thor star read her weather report live on air, and afterwards she joked the A-list star gave her a run for her money and may take her job. In November, Lauren was among the small group of several women who got a tattoo with Elsa during Chris' mother Leonie's 60th birthday in Byron Bay. Tammy Hembrow has blasted false rumours she's an anti-vaxxer. The 26-year-old social media sensation hit back at a troll who claimed she's opposed to vaccination by revealing she's booked in for her Covid jab on Wednesday. 'What are your thoughts on Covid and the vaccine? Genuinely curious,' one person commented on Tammy's latest YouTube video. Hitting back: Tammy Hembrow (pictured) has blasted false rumours she's an anti-vaxxer as she revealed she's booked in for her Covid jab A troll wrote: 'Unfortunately she is anti-vaxxer. [She's besties with anti-vax influencer] Chloe Szepanowski and Mitchell Orval. That's why she has kept quiet when everyone else has spoken out.' Tammy hit back at the cruel comment, writing: 'I'm booked in to get it. Two weeks. I'm not nor have I ever been anti-vax.' Meanwhile, Tammy went makeup free in the YouTube vlog on Wednesday, showing off her natural complexion while eating breakfast. The video began with Tammy tucking into a bowl of cereal while tapping away on her laptop in the kitchen of her $2.88million Gold Coast home. Not true: The 26-year-old social media sensation hit back at a troll who claimed she's opposed to vaccination by revealing she's booked in for her Covid jab on Wednesday 'I'm booked in to get it. Two weeks. I'm not nor have I ever been anti-vax,' she responded The vlog documented an ordinary day in Tammy's life, and was titled: 'I regret buying Wolf this gift - follow me around VLOG.' 'When I'm eating breakfast, I always bring my laptop pretty much,' she said. 'Sorry if I'm talking too quiet; I don't want to wake anyone up.' The businesswoman then woke up her children, Wolf and Saskia, and applied her makeup before leaving for the office. Unmasked: Tammy also went makeup free in the YouTube vlog on Wednesday, showing off her natural complexion while eating breakfast (left). Right: Tammy in a recent Instagram photo 'So I'm ready to go. My bed is not made, but I don't have time to make it right now so don't judge,' she said, putting on her Yeezy sneakers. She later arrived at her office and held meetings for her Saski Collection activewear business and Tammy Fit workout program. Tammy ended her day by heading to the gym, hanging out with her boyfriend Matt Poole and picking up her kids from school. Anti-vax influencer Leila Stead has compared Queensland's new quarantine facilities to concentration camps. Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk announced the 1,000-bed facility will be built near Toowoomba, 130km west of Brisbane, for travellers entering the state. In a shocking Instagram post, the 35-year-old criticised the hub which is expected to be finished by the end of this year. Shocking: Controversial anti-vax influencer Leila Stead (pictured) compared Queensland's new quarantine facilities to concentration camps in shocking post 'What was that, we were crazy for saying concentration camps were on the horizon. Yeah tell me that again,' Leila wrote on Instagram. Queensland's new facility will be built in partnership with wealthy businessman John Wagner whose family own the adjacent Wellcamp Airport near Toowoomba. The facility is expected to have 500 beds available by the end of this year, expanding to 1,000 beds by the first quarter of next year. Criticism: In a shocking Instagram post, the 35-year-old criticised the hub which is expected to be finished by the end of this year Ms Palaszczuk said she hoped the facility would end the need for hotel quarantine in the Brisbane CBD. 'We need regional quarantine facilities, it's a no brainer,' she said. 'We don't need people in hotels, we need them in regional facilities.' 'What was that, we were crazy for saying concentration camps were on the horizon. Yeah tell me that again,' Leila wrote on in a post shared to Aussie Influencer Opinions Instagram page Ms Palaszczuk said the Queensland government had pushed for the facility at Wellcamp since January. 'It could have been built by now,' she said. The facility will be in addition to one being constructed by the Federal Government at the Damascus Barracks at Pinkenba, in Brisbane's inner east. Thomas Markle Jr. is making the most of his time in Australia after recently wrapping filming on the upcoming reality series, Big Brother VIP. The 55-year-old half-brother of Meghan Markle was spotted enjoying a stroll through Sydney on Wednesday. Thomas stepped out alone and wore a blue surgical face mask for his walk, with the embattled city having been in lockdown since June 26 after a COVID outbreak. Out and about: Thomas Markle Jr. is making the most of his time in Australia after recently wrapping filming on the upcoming reality series, Big Brother VIP He also wore a pair of grey cargo shorts, which he paired with a maroon T-shirt and camel-coloured thongs. The soon-to-be reality star appeared to have stopped to make a purchase during his outing, and was seen carrying a plastic bag with groceries, including a pack of chips. At one stage, he peered through the window of a Liquorland store, but the bottle shop was shut. Getting some fresh air: The 55-year-old half-brother of Meghan Markle was spotted enjoying a stroll through Sydney on Wednesday Flying solo: Thomas stepped out alone and wore a blue surgical face mask for his walk, with the embattled city having been in lockdown since June 26 after a COVID outbreak Snacks: The upcoming reality star appeared to have stopped to make a purchase during his outing, and was seen carrying a plastic bag with groceries, including a pack of chips Earlier this month, it was revealed that Thomas had officially signed with Australia's premiere talent agent, Max Markson. Markson, who is described as a 'black-belt master of the art of spin' announced the news via Instagram, uploading a promo shot for Big Brother VIP alongside a caption that confirmed Thomas was officially on his books. In a promo for Big Brother VIP, Thomas claimed he'd 'warned' Prince Harry, 36, about his sister before their marriage. Closed for business: At one stage, he peered through the window of a Liquorland liquor chain store, but the shop was shut Networking: Earlier this month, it was revealed that Thomas had officially signed with Australia's premiere talent agent, Max Markson Scandal: In a promo for Big Brother VIP, Thomas claimed he'd 'warned' Prince Harry, 36, about his sister before their marriage 'I'm Meghan Markle's brother, I'm the biggest brother of them all,' Thomas said while introducing himself in the video. He then added: 'I told Prince Harry, I think she's going to ruin your life. She's very shallow'. Thomas does not have a relationship with his famous younger sister, who is married to Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex. 'I told Prince Harry, I think she's going to ruin your life. She's very shallow,' Thomas said of his sister, Meghan Markle, in a promo video for Big Brother VIP Cut off: He was not invited to the Sussexes' wedding in May 2018, and at the time hadn't seen the Suits actress for about seven years Falling out: The window fitter has previously criticised his half-sister in the press, describing her as a 'phony' and a 'jaded, shallow, conceited woman' He was not invited to the Sussexes' wedding in May 2018, and at the time hadn't seen the Suits actress for about seven years. The window fitter has previously criticised his half-sister in the press, describing her as a 'phony' and a 'jaded, shallow, conceited woman'. He has also blasted Meghan, 40, for cutting off their father, Thomas Markle Sr., after he was caught collaborating with U.S. paparazzi. Replacement: Thomas was a late addition to Big Brother VIP, brought in to replace far-right British columnist Katie Hopkins Gone girl: After complaining about the strict quarantine system and boasting about flouting the rules, Katie was hauled back to the airport and put on a flight back to England Estranged: Thomas does not have a relationship with his famous younger sister, who is married to Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex. Pictured, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in London in November 2017 Thomas was a late addition to Big Brother VIP, brought in to replace far-right British columnist Katie Hopkins. Katie, 46, was deported from Australia last month while completing her mandatory hotel quarantine ahead of her scheduled appearance on the show. After complaining about the strict quarantine system and boasting about flouting the rules, Katie was hauled back to the airport and put on a flight back to England. Rachael Leigh Cook played the lead role of Laney Boggs, alongside Freddie Prinze Jr's Zack Siler in the teen romantic comedy, which turned out to be a sleeper hit in 1999, earning over $103 million on just a $7-10 million budget. Fast forward just over two decades and Cook, now 41, is back playing the mother of the female lead, played by Addison Rae, in the film's gender-swapped remake, He's All That. And on Wednesday the actress brought her real-life daughter, Charlotte Easton Gillies, to the Netflix premiere at NeueHouse in Los Angeles. Stylish: Rachael Leigh Cook attended the premiere of the Netflix teen romantic comedy He's All That, which is the gender-swapped remake of the 1999 sleeper hit film, She's All That Cook strutted in front of the cameras in a black and white polka dot dress that came complete with a one-shoulder design. She also donned a pair of open-toe heels and had her brown tresses styled long, with a part on the right. Her glowing smile stepped up a notch when her daughter joined on the red carpet looking adorable in in two-toned, champagne-colored dress and matching sandals. Charlotte also wore her brown locks long, only she went with a left part. Mother-daughter time: Cook, who plays the mother of the female lead, Addison Rae, in He's All That, brought her real-life daughter Charlotte Easton Gillies, 16, to the premiere Adorable: Charlotte held hands with her mother on the red carpet decked out in a two-tone champagne-colored dress and matching sandals Daughters in the spotlight: Cook and her daughter also posed alongside her She's All That co-star Matthew Lillard, who brought his daughter Macey Lillard, 16 Cook also shared the spotlight with her She's All That co-star Matthew Lillard, 51, who was also hand with his daughter, Macey Lillard, 16. The four proceeded to strike a number of poses together as the photographers clicked away. In the original teen rom-com, Cook's Laney was a lovable art nerd who gets a makeover, transforming her into a true beauty, compliments of Prinze Jr.s character, Zackary Siler and his sister. In the new remake, Rae's character Padgett Sawyer, which is inspired by Prinze Jr's Zack, is a popular high school student who dumps her hunky boyfriend after she catches him cheating. Cook also took a few moments to cozy up with Lillard, who played Brock Hudson in She's All That, which turned out to be a sleeper hit in 1999 Lovely: Cook strutted in front of the cameras in a black and white polka dot dress that came complete with a one-shoulder design She ends up accepting a challenge to turn the school's least popular boy (Tanner Buchanan) into Prom King, all while attempting to avenge her humiliating fallout with her beau, according to Deadline. Original producers Jennifer Gibgot and Andrew Panay and screenwriter R. Lee Fleming are all back for the updated iteration of the film. Mark Waters, best known for directing Freaky Friday (2003), Mean Girls (2004) and Ghosts Of Girlfriends Past (2009), helmed the film. Along with Cook, Rae and Buchanan, the cast for redo includes Madison Pettis, Peyton Meyer, Isabella Crovetti, Annie Jacob and Myra Molloy, Andrew Matarazzo and Dominic D. Goodman. In the original teen rom-com, Cook's Laney was a lovable art nerd who gets a makeover, transforming her into a true beauty Cook was just 19-years-old when shooting began for the teen comedy film She's All That, alongside Freddie Prinze Jr. and a slew of up-and-coming young stars She's All That ended up being Cook's most financially successful film of her career. It featured a number of young actors who went on to see more success in Hollywood, including: Kieran Culkin, Oscar winner Anna Paquin, musician Usher Raymond, Gabrielle Union, Paul Walker, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Kimberly 'Lil' Kim' Jones, Dule Hill, Jodi Lyn O'Keefe, along with Kevin Pollak and Lillard. Cook went on to appear in such films as Get Carter, Antitrust, Josie and the Pussycats, The Big Empty, and the Vineyard film franchise from Hallmark that began with Autumn in the Vineyard. Most recently the Minnesota native starred in the Netflix rom-com, Love, Guaranteed, with Damon Wayans Jr., that premiered in September 2020. She is known for showing off her impressive figure on her various social media accounts. And on Wednesday, Lori Harvey was seen showcasing her flawless physique as she stepped out on a solo shopping trip in West Hollywood's Melrose district. The 24-year-old model appeared to be enjoying her time in the shining California sun as she took a short stroll to her car after she finished her outing. Stepping out: Lori Harvey was seen showing off her flawless form during a solo shopping trip in West Hollywood on Wednesday afternoon Harvey wore a white sleeveless top that placed her washboard abs and sculpted arms on full display during her shopping trip. The social media personality also sported a pair of wide-legged Vetements blue jeans that obscured her curvy hips and toned legs. She also wore a pair of green fuzzy slippers and carried what appeared to be a matching sweater in case the late summertime weather suddenly dropped in temperature. The model accessorized with numerous articles of jewelry, as well as a pair of hoop earrings. Looking good! The model sported a white sleeveless top that showed off her toned abs and sculpted arms Dressed for success: The social media personality also sported a pair of wide-legged Vetements jeans. She also sported a pair of fuzzy green slippers and carried a matching sweater Harvey added a bit of darkness to her outfit with a set of stylish black sunglasses. Her gorgeous locks were tied back into a tight bun for the duration of her outing. The social media personality is currently prepping for the launch of her skincare company, SKN by LH. The entrepreneur made the news about her new venture public through a post that was made to her Instagram account this past July. Working hard: Harvey is currently prepping for the release of her cosmetics company, SKN by LH, which was announced to be in the works this past July Harvey also wrote a short message in the photo's caption where she noted that her new products would be 'coming soon.' The model has not made any official statements about her cosmetic lines since then, and its Instagram account mainly features photos of her using the items. However, the social media personality made references to her future endeavor in a video that was shared to Vogue's YouTube account this past May. Keeping it under wraps: The social media personality has launched an Instagram account for the company but has not provided many details about its products. She spoke about her makeup routine during a video that was shared to Vogue's YouTube account earlier this year In the clip, the social media personality expressed that she had enlisted the help of her partner, Michael B. Jordan while refining her skincare routine. 'I tested all my products, of course, on myself, but I also tested them on my boyfriend,' she remarked. Harvey pointed out that her tips and tricks have made the actor the subject of praise while he works on various projects. Getting help: During the clip, Harvey pointed out that she had tested several of her makeup products on her boyfriend, Michael B. Jordan 'He has become my live test model, so now he's very into his skin-care routine as well. He tells me all the time that when he's on set, the makeup artists compliment his skin now,' she said. The model also expressed that her skills were also made apparent to her father, who had previously been very negligent with regard to his self-care. 'I've pretty much gotten all of the men in my life on a skin-care regimen, my dad included, because he did nothing...so if you're wondering why his skin looks so good lately, it's because of me,' she noted. Americas Got Talent wrapped up the quarterfinals for Season 16 on Wednesday, sending seven more acts through to the next round of live shows. Ahead of all the high drama, Heidi Klum showed off her legendary fashionista style when she hit the red carpet for the pivotal episode that leads to the semifinal round. The longtime supermodel turned more than a few heads when she strutted her stuff in a purple velvet suit. Fashionista: Heidi Klum, 48, stunned in a purple velvet suit when she hit the red carpet for the quarterfinal round of America's Got Talent on Wednesday Opting for a flirty flare, Klum's suit included a double-breasted blazer that was worn without a top, which gave more than a hint of her ample cleavage. She donned matching pants that hugged her derriere but flared out, in a 1970s retro style, from the knees down. The German native rounded out her look with her blonde tresses styled long, with major bangs, and a part in the middle. For an added touch of style, Klum wore a necklace made of a red rose. Flirty: The longtime supermodel wore a double-breasted blazer without a top, which helped showcase her ample cleavage Classy: For an added touch of style, Klum wore a necklace made of a red rose To help drum up the drama, the AGT judge took to her social media platforms and shared some images of herself striking various poses on the red carpet. 'Excited to see who will make it to the Semifinals @agt,' she teased her 8.4 million fans and followers before the show, along with a closeup selfie video, which showed off her bold red lipstick. Not long later she shared a boomerang video of of herself popping open a couple of bottles of beer with fellow judge, Sofia Vergara. 'Celebrando a la Colombiana,' she wrote in the caption, which translates to 'Celebrating the Colombian.' Owning it: The German native rounded out her look with her blonde tresses styled long, with major bangs, and a part in the middle AGT veteran: Klum's time on America's Got Talent dares back to 2013 Drumming up the drama: The AGT judge took to her social media platforms and shared some images of herself striking various poses on the red carpet The two stars looked to be enjoy their bottles of suds in a dressing room area of the AGT studios. A couple hours later, Klum did a mock runway walk in another boomerang video she posted on Instagram, with the caption: 'Tonights look.' She proceeded to share the names of her gam team, including '@peter_dundas, @robzangardi @marielhaenn, @hairbylorenzomartin and @tombachik.' Only seven of the dozen acts advanced from Wednesday's quarterfinals episode to the semifinals. In the end those moving on were Lea Kyle, Michael Winslow (won Online Public Vote), Brooke Simpson, Rialcris, ChapKidz, World Taekwondo Demo, and Team and UniCircle Flow (won Judges Vote). Social media tease: 'Excited to see who will make it to the Semifinals @agt,' she teased her 8.4 million fans and followers before the show 'Celebrating the Colombian': Klum also shared a boomerang video of of herself popping open a couple of bottles of beer with fellow judge, Sofia Vergara She stars alongside Nicole Kidman in new horror series Nine Perfect Strangers. And before she landed her latest role, Samara Weaving recalls she auditioned for Fifty Shades Of Grey but failed to bag herself a part after an 'embarrassing' read through of a very explicit scene with her dad. The actress, 29, reveals in a new interview with Cosmopolitan UK that she had to film a self-tape for the audition, with no-one to help her read lines apart from her parents, as she discusses taking medication to help reduce her anxiety on set. Embarrassing: Samara Weaving recalls reading through very explicit scene with her dad for failed Fifty Shades of Grey audition in a new interview Re-living her failed audition for Fifty Shades - released in 2015, starring Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson - Samara explained that she was forced to film her self-tape from a remote town in Australia. She recalled: 'I had to do a self-tape of a very explicit scene where two women are talking about having sex with men. I was staying in a small town in Australia with my parents, so I had to ask them to read it with me. 'It was so embarrassing, and my mum couldnt do it. My dad was like, "Cmon, lets get into it" and was really acting and performing.' Mortified, Samara added: 'I had to be like, "No, just read the lines. Dont make eye contact with me. Lets just suffer through it." I didnt get the role.' Back on screen: The actress, 29, stars in new Hulu series Nine Perfect Strangers (pictured above (R) on series with Nicole Kidman) Red-faced: Speaking to Cosmopolitan, Samara said her dad got really into the read-through but she refused to make eye contact with him during the awkward self-tape While she didn't have much success with Fifty Shades, Samara has gone on to star in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Bill & Ted Face The Music and Netflix series Hollywood. Her latest role sees her star alongside Big Little Lies actress Nicole in new thriller series Nine Perfect Strangers. She plays social media influencer Jessica who is one of the nine strangers who attend a 10-day retreat at Tranquillum House hosted by Nicole's character Masha, but quickly realise everything is not what it seems. Samara reveals that starring in such thrillers helps to provide a 'good outlet' for her anxiety, as she admits she usually feels 'quite zen' after pretending to be scared all day in front of the rolling cameras. Familiar face: Fans will recognise Samara from starring in Netflix series Hollywood (above) Thriller: Samara also revealed working on thrillers such as Nine Perfect Strangers helps to provide a 'good outlet' for her anxiety, which she takes medication for (pictured above: Nicole Kidman as Marsha in Nine Perfect Strangers) To help keep her anxiety under control, Samara says she turns to 'therapy and grounding techniques' as well as meditation and exercise - and she steers clear of alcohol. She revealed that she also takes medication to keep her anxiety in check, adding: 'I take medication sometimes if thats what I need - I went to a doctor and we had a very thorough conversation about it.' Samara credited acting for helping her to 'stay present' and 'in the moment'. Nine Perfect Strangers sees her join a stellar cast, including Nicole, Melissa McCarthy, Luke Evans, Michael Shannon, The Good Place star Manny Jacinto and Regina Hall. The series, that has been adapted from Liane Moriarty's book of the same name, premiered on Hulu on 18 August. Molly-Mae Hague cut a pensive figure as she headed out for dinner in Mayfair on Wednesday, after sharing the news she had been referred for tests on a benign lump on her breast. The former Love Island star, 22, dressed up in a bold checked blazer dress with matching stone leather boots as she exited the Amazonico restaurant. Molly-Mae's outing came after she told fans on her YouTube channel she'd been referred for a biopsy after discovering a benign lump in her breast had grown, but reassured her followers that it's 'not serious.' Stylish: Molly-Mae Hague cut a glamorous figure as she headed out for dinner in Mayfair on Wednesday, after sharing the news she had been referred for tests on a benign lump Molly-Mae displayed a glum expression as she donned the stylish blazer dress with a brown checked print, which she accessorised with knee-high boots. The reality TV star carried her essentials in a classic white handbag with her blonde tresses pulled into a sleek high bun. Molly-Mae's outing comes as she prepares for the official launch of her latest range with PrettyLittleThing, which is set to feature a brand new range of stylish looks. Dressed to the nines: The former Love Island star put on a leggy display in a bold checked blazer dress with matching stone leather boots as she exited the Amazonico restaurant On Wednesday Molly-Mae uploaded her latest video to her YouTube channel, where she revealed her doctors had referred her for a biopsy after discovering a benign lump in her breast had grown. The star explained she previously had the lump checked by doctors, who reassured her that it was benign and non-harmful. She told her fans: 'I basically noticed a little lump in my boob, went to get it checked and it was completely fine, completely benign. 'It's a little thing called a fibroadenoma and it's a normal thing to get at this age, small lumps can happen all the time it doesn't mean they're sinister.' Struggles: On Wednesday Molly-Mae told fans that doctors had referred her for a biopsy after discovering a benign lump in her breast had grown Molly-Mae then told fans she'd begun to notice the lump was growing as it became more noticeable on her clothes. She continued: 'I went back today to get it checked and it had grown a little bit, again, it doesn't mean it's sinister, it doesn't mean it's dramatic, so the doctor recommended that we did a biopsy. 'It was not very nice actually considering I'm afraid of needles, but I thought there's not really a way around this. 'I promise it's nothing serious, I don't want it to be a massive thing. I think it's important that I share this with you guys. 'It's an important subject and we should all be checking our boobs and checking for lumps so we can do things like this.' Molly-Mae went onto tell her fans she would provide them with an update as soon as she gets the results. In November last year, Molly-Mae was given the devastating diagnosis that a mole of her leg was a malignant melanoma - a type of skin cancer. The influencer filmed herself being given the diagnosis for her YouTube channel. In the video, she opened up about what she's been going through following her 'shock' diagnosis, telling her fans: 'I was walking around with skin cancer on my leg.' Worrying: Molly-Mae then told fans she'd begun to notice the lump was growing as it became more noticeable on her clothes, and is awaiting the results of further tests Molly-Mae revealed that she learned her mole was a malignant melanoma during a work trip to Italy, when a doctor phoned her to deliver the diagnosis following a recent biopsy. The social media star initially got the mole on her leg checked out by two dermatologists but was told it was nothing to worry about. Molly-Mae eventually sought third professional opinion during a routine check-up because she 'felt something wasn't quite right'. Speaking on her YouTube video, after the phone call from her doctor played out, she told fans: 'I got the call today and he's told me it is malignant melanoma - which is skin cancer basically. Shock: In November last year, Molly-Mae was given the devastating diagnosis that a mole of her leg was a malignant melanoma - a type of skin cancer 'It's obviously petrifying, shocking and scary. I don't even know what to think or say. I cannot believe I was told by others doctors it was OK. I am so upset and angry. 'I just briefly asked this doctor when I was walking out. I was walking around with skin cancer on my leg!' 'If I hadn't have asked, I'd still have that mole on my leg now and I'd be none the wiser. It could be spreading through my body, you just never know.' Molly-Mae continued, explaining how she was trying to be strong, despite breaking down, so that her loved ones didn't freak out. She said: 'I've already shed tears about it. I've already cried down the phone to every family member.' Molly-Mae concluded the video by urging her fans to have their moles checked out. Gary Beadle's wife Emma McVey has shared a snap from her hospital bed and revealed she's been forced to remain another night after 'losing a lot of blood'. The beauty was recently taken to hospital and put on a drip after falling ill and on Wednesday night she admitted that she's 'missing' her family like 'crazy' amid her extended hospital stay. Writing in the caption, the mother-of-two added that her time away from home in hospital has been one of the 'hardest things' they've gone through, before praising her husband for holding the fort at home. Poorly: Gary Beadle's wife Emma McVey has shared a snap from her hospital bed and revealed she's been forced to remain another night after 'losing a lot of blood' Alongside a selfie of her wearing pink pyjamas in bed, Emma penned: 'Ive been wondering why Ive been looking like something from The Walking Dead recently, check out them black eyes, feeling a little bit better today, losing less blood but not allowed to leave yet. 'Missing my little family like crazy, one of the hardest things weve had to do but we are getting through it. Gary youre doing amazing, my dad and everyone whos helping out at home too thank you all for the lovely messages x.' Meanwhile, Geordie Shore star Gaz, 33, has kept his followers updated as he continued to look after son Chester, three, and 18-month-old Primrose. Holding the fort: The beauty was recently taken to hospital and put on a drip after falling ill and on Wednesday night she admitted that she's 'missing' her family like 'crazy' amid her extended hospital stay He shared snaps of the little ones sharing a snack on the sofa, as well as little Chester picking a flower for his mother. Meanwhile, sharing a snap from their wedding day last month, the realty star penned a heartfelt message to his wife. He penned: 'Through the good times and the bad times... we will get threw it we always do been hard for the kids not having Emma around as if u know her u will know how much of a hands on mum she is... Message: 'Missing my little family like crazy, one of the hardest things weve had to do but we are getting through it. Gary youre doing amazing' 'We are such a strong little family so you know we will be fine and u will be home before you know it... we miss u always fingers crossed your home Monday.' [sic]. It comes after Emma, who previously revealed she has a heart condition, was taken to hospital and put on a drip after losing blood, with the brunette admitting she and her husband were not prepared for the health scare. Taking to her Instagram Stories, she wrote: 'Emails/ work/ DMs, I will get back to everyone when I am out of hospital. Dad duties: Meanwhile, Geordie Shore star Gaz, 33, has kept his followers updated as he continued to look after son Chester, three, and 18-month-old Primrose How sweet: He shared snaps of the little ones sharing a snack on the sofa, as well as little Chester picking a flower for his mother Touching: Meanwhile, sharing a snap from their wedding day last month, the realty star penned a heartfelt message to his wife 'We weren't prepared for this as much as we've been panicking about preparing the kids for when I go into hospital.' Emma later updated her fans on her current situation after Gary was 'bombarded' with messages from people asking if she was OK. The mother-of-two explained she did not have heart surgery yet after previously revealing she would need the procedure at some point. She wrote: 'So sorry guys, poor Gary has just been bombarded. I'm not having my heart surgery yet. Health: It comes after Emma, who previously revealed she has a heart condition, was taken to hospital and put on a drip after losing blood Shock: Taking to her Instagram Stories, she wrote: 'We weren't prepared for this as much as we've been panicking about preparing the kids for when I go into hospital' 'I'm losing a lot of blood, nutrients, and weight unintentionally, which is making me really poorly. I just need to stay in hospital on a drip, have steroids, and get nutrients in me. 'Once my body starts responding I'll be allowed home with medications but probably not until next week so I'll most likely be quiet on here.' Gary shared Emma's post on his Instagram Stories and wrote: 'It's killing us we can't visit, me and the kids will miss you so much. 'You just get better and home to us as soon as possible. PS Don't worry about a thing at home, I got this.' Update: Emma later updated her fans on her current situation after Gary was 'bombarded' with messages from people asking if she was OK Apart: Gary shared Emma's post on his Instagram Stories and wrote: 'It's killing us we can't visit, me and the kids will miss you so much' Heartwarming: Emma also shared a snap of Gary cuddling their children Chester, three, and Primrose,18 months Back in June, Emma revealed she had three holes in her heart along with high blood pressure in her lungs. She wrote: 'I have three large holes in my heart and damaged tissue which is causing my blood to pass through the wrong direction, the right side of my heart is now enlarged and weak, along with high blood pressure in my lungs. 'This has all got a lot worse as they should of been closed when I was a child, unfortunately no one checked my heart even when I had seizures and diagnosed with epilepsy or fainted like it was a hobby.' Emma said doctors were surprised she survived Primrose's birth and the outcome could have been different if she didn't have a cesarean. Bliss N Eso, like many others, were deeply affected by the sudden passing of Mushroom Records founder Michael Gudinski in March this year. On Thursday, the hip hop trio told The Herald Sun he was like a father figure to them after his son Matt signed them to his Illusive Sounds label in 2006. 'It still doesn't feel real to me,' Bliss told the publication, referring to Gudinski's passing. 'He was a father to us': Hip hop trio Bliss N Eso reflected on the passing of music industry icon Michael Gudinski with The Herald Sun on Thursday 'We would talk a lot, and some mornings I wake up and think, "Damn, I can't just call him". 'He literally was a father to us in so many ways and that went beyond music.' Bliss N Eso were finishing off their seventh album, titled The Sun, when they received the news of Gudinski's sudden death. The award-winning trio have dedicated its release in his memory. Shock: 'It still doesn't feel real to me,' Bliss told the publication, referring to Gudinski's passing. 'We would talk a lot, and some mornings I wake up and think, "Damn, I can't just call him". Meanwhile, last week Ed Sheeran also announced his new single, titled Visiting Hours, is dedicated to Gudinski. 'I wish that heaven had visiting hours, And I would ask them if I could take you home,' he sings in the emotional song that was written while he was in quarantine Down Under. Michael died in his sleep on March 2 at the age of 68. Significant: Bliss N Eso were finishing off their seventh album, titled The Sun, when they received the news of his sudden death. The award-winning trio have dedicated the release to Gudinski's memory The music legend's state funeral was held at the end of March at Melbourne's Rod Laver Arena. It featured performances from Kylie Minogue, Jimmy Barnes and Ed Sheeran, who all had a close friendship with Michael. Tributes were also made by Elton John, Taylor Swift and Bruce Springsteen. She's been enjoying the luxuries of her lavish yacht with fiance Carter Reum. And Paris Hilton proudly displayed her incredible physique in a revealing mismatched red bikini as she basked in the sunshine on her swanky boat in Sardinia on Wednesday - three weeks after she denied she is expecting her first child. The heiress, 40, who had previously been seen packing on the PDA with her husband-to-be, slipped into knotted red bikini top and fun floral bottoms as she headed to her yacht's top deck for a spot of sunbathing. Living it up: Paris Hilton, 40, proudly displayed her incredible physique in a revealing mismatched red bikini as she basked in the sunshine on her swanky boat in Sardinia Paris proudly displayed her svelte figure in the revealing red bikini top that accentuated her ample bust, teamed with high-waisted printed bottoms. The star finished her colourful outfit with a bold rainbow kimono and a matching printed headband as she battled the breeze on her way up to the yacht's top desk. Adding a pair of towering studded heels Paris could be seen striking an array of poses for budding photographer Carter as she showed off her holiday looks. Revealing: The heiress who had previously been seen packing on the PDA with her husband-to-be, slipped into knotted red bikini top and fun floral bottoms Glamorous: Paris proudly displayed her svelte figure in the revealing red bikini top that accentuated her ample bust, teamed with high-waisted printed bottoms Perfection: The star finished her colourful outfit with a bold rainbow kimono and a matching printed headband as she battled the breeze on her way up to the yacht's top desk Showing off! While enjoying the luxuries of her yacht, Paris could be seen posing up a storm for Carter, proudly showing off her summer look Romance: Paris was also seen packing on the PDA with her fiance Carter Reum as they enjoyed their romantic getaway together Paris has been enjoying her break in the mountainous Mediterranean island alongside fiance Carter Reum. On a recent appearance on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, the former reality star admitted that she has some opulent plans for her upcoming wedding to Carter. Although she admitted the creative process for the big day has been 'very stressful' she also insisted that she is 'not a bridezilla at all.' Glam: Later Paris donned a pair of tight blue trousers alongside her bikini top as she continued to pose for more stylish snaps Having fun? Paris has been enjoying her break in the mountainous Mediterranean island alongside fiance Carter, who was snapping away with his camera Getting married! On a recent appearance on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, the former reality star admitted that she has some opulent plans for her upcoming wedding to Carter She said: 'It's gonna be like a three-day affair. We have a lot happening.' The Simple Life star said on her podcast This Is Paris in July that she is 'not pregnant, not yet' and does not want to start a family until after she gets married: 'Im waiting until after the wedding,' said the socialite. The DJ also went as far as to say that she does not want a child until 2022. 'My dress is being made right now so I want to make sure it looks gorgeous and fits perfectly,' said Paris. 'So definitely waiting for that part.' She added, 'I'm not yet... I will be after the wedding, I can't wait to have children in 2022. But like I said I am just preparing for the wedding right now.' Paris then reminded her fans that the 'rumor is definitely not true' as she noted her cell phone had been blowing up all morning with friends wanting answers. In a previous post this week, Paris shared a loving snap with her husband-to-be as she captioned the picture, 'Lovers in Paradise.' Meanwhile, The Simple Life star has vowed to fans that she will record more new music 'soon'. Earlier this month, Paris celebrated the 15th anniversary of her debut album, Paris, that she said was 'so life-changing'. Speaking out: Although she admitted the creative process for the big day has been 'very stressful' she also insisted that she is 'not a bridezilla at all' Splashing out: She said: 'It's gonna be like a three-day affair. We have a lot happening' In the works: Meanwhile, The Simple Life star has vowed to fans that she will record more new music 'soon' Iconic: Earlier this month, Paris celebrated the 15th anniversary of her debut album, Paris, that she said was 'so life-changing' Alongside the album cover, she wrote on Instagram: "Happy 15th Anniversary to my debut studio album #Paris. Thank you to everyone who has supported these songs, and continue to listen to them today!' 'Making this album was so life-changing and Im so proud of how these songs have transcended the years. Cant wait to continue to make more music for all of you soon! #Iconic #PopStarParis.' The socialite released her debut single Stars Are Blind - which helped launch her current DJ career - in 2006, and while fans have been waiting for her second album since the release of eponymously titled Paris that same year, she previously said that she's 'focused on singles'. Asked in 2018 if she was recording another album, Paris said: 'I'm mostly focused on just singles, I think that's just how it is nowadays with the music industry.' 'It's not really about albums. So yeah I've been working on my second album forever, but I'm also running a huge business and doing a million other things.' Luxury: On Wednesday, the hotel heiress was pictured living her best life and she struck a series of poses while onboard a luxury yacht in Corsica Bride-to-be: Paris is set to marry her man soon and has hinted that it will be an opulent affair Looking out to sea: Paris appears to be enjoying the last days of summer Advertisement Rupert Everett and Gina McKee were recently spotted filming the final dramatic scenes of future blockbuster My Policeman. The snaps, taken in East Sussex, hinted at a potentially tense unfolding, showing the film stars laying on the beach alongside a wheelchair, which Rupert was previously pictured sitting in. The upcoming LGBT romantic drama film focuses on husband-and-wife Marion and Tom, who fall in love on the Brighton coast in the 50s, before museum curator Patrick develops feelings for policeman Tom. Final scenes: Rupert Everett and Gina McKee - who play older versions of David Dawson and Emma Corrin in the movie, were pictured filming the final dramatic scenes of future blockbuster My Policeman in Sussex In pain: Rupert grimaced during one take as he lay down in the sand The story begins in the 1950s but the timeline of the plot spans to the 1990s, during which time the actors are swapped to portray the correct age of the characters. Gina, 57, takes on the role of Marion, which is played by Emma Corrin, 25, in the earlier scenes. Meanwhile, Rupert, 62, has the role of Patrick, taking over from David Dawson, 38. Not seen on set was Law and Order actor Linus Roache, who plays the older version of the policeman character, Tom. In his younger years he is portrayed by Dunkirk actor Harry Styles, 27. New man: Rupert plays an older version of David Dawson's character (right) who is entangled in a love triangle with Emma and Harry's characters Taking over: Gina, 57, stepped into the role of Marion after taking over from Emma Corrin, 25, (right) who portrayed the younger version of the character Older: Linus Roache (L) who was not filming on the day, has previously been seen transforming into policeman Tom Burgess, who Harry portrays in an earlier period of his life, (right) My Policeman is based on the book of the same name by Bethan Roberts. The 2012 novel explores the sexual mores of the 1950s and the criminalisation of homosexuality. Produced by Amazon Studios, it is unknown when the film will hit the big screen. London and Brighton were the filming hotspots, with the Sussex coastline boasting a scenic view from the latest on set snaps. On set: The snaps from filming, taken in East Sussex, hinted at a potentially tense unfolding Tense: The upcoming LGBT romantic drama film focuses on husband-and-wife Marion (Gina) and Tom, who fall in love on the Brighton coast in the 50s, before museum curator Patrick (Rupert) develops feelings for policeman Tom Filming prep: Gina, 57, (right) stepped into the role of Marion after taking over from Emma Corrin, 25, who portrayed the younger version of the character Beach set: In the scenes, the BAFTA award-winning actress was spotted in a dusty blue coat as she wheeled Rupert, 62, in a wheelchair Current project: Rupert has taken on the role of Patrick from David Dawson, 38 Getting in character: Rupert was wrapped up in warm garments for the final scenes - a thick brown coat, trousers and a blue scarf Amazon Studios production: The One Direction star's role was taken over by Law and Order actor Linus Roache, as the story progressed from the 50's to the 90's Film adaptation: My Policeman is based on the novel of the same name by Bethan Roberts Intense: The film is produced by Amazon Studios Crew: London and Brighton were the filming hotspots Beautiful: The Sussex coastline boasted a scenic view from the latest on set snaps Successful star: In an interview with Variety earlier this month, Rupert detailed how he felt about the project In an interview with Variety earlier this month, Rupert detailed how he felt about the project: 'It was lovely to make, its a great story from the book of the same name. I play someone who had a very bad stroke, a very different type of character. 'I had one scene with Harry Styles, he plays a younger version of another character and I was one of the old codgers. I really enjoyed it.' Rupert previously received a BAFTA nomination for his role in Another Country, 1984, as a gay pupil at an English public school in the 1930s. Gina's past projects include Notting Hill, In the Loop and Our Friends in the North, most recently starring in BBC's hit drama Bodyguard. Revealing all: Rupert said: 'It was lovely to make, its a great story from the book of the same name' On his role: 'I play someone who had a very bad stroke, a very different type of character', Rupert revealed And action! The successful actor described himself as 'one of the old codgers' and had one scene with Harry Styles Moving: In one capture from filming, Gina tenderly place her hand on Rupert's face Past endeavours: Rupert previously received a BAFTA nomination for his role in Another Country, 1984, as a gay pupil at an English public school in the 1930s Farmer Wants a Wife star Hayley Love is currently expecting her first child with her former co-star Will Dwyer. And while she's been relatively quiet on social media in recent weeks, the 25-year-old took to Instagram on Thursday to ask fans a question about her pregnancy. The excited mum-to-be shared a string of pictures from her 3D baby scan, before asking fans if they thought she was having a boy or a girl. 'I've never spoken on here before...' On Thursday, pregnant Farmer Wants A Wife star Hayley Love asked fans a question about her unborn baby via an Instagram poll 'So I havent actually spoken on here before, but I'm curious to know if you guys think I'm having a boy or girl,' she said. 'So Im going to post bubbas 3D scan on the next slide and... let me know.' Two hours after she posted the story, 65 per cent had voted the tot was a boy, while 35 per cent thought it was a girl. Last week, Hayley celebrated reaching 26 weeks of pregnancy by sharing photos of her bump to Instagram. '26 weeks of growing you,' she captioned the sweet images, in which she cradled her belly and smiled. The results are in: Two hours after she posted the story, 65 per cent had voted the tot was a boy, while 35 per cent thought it was a girl Mother-to-be: Last week, Hayley celebrated reaching 26 weeks of pregnancy by sharing photos of her bump to Instagram 'Starting life with you has been a difficult one but I do not regret it one bit at all. I will love you unconditionally and I know you will love me too. 'Thank you for choosing me little bean. 27/11,' she added, seemingly referring to her due date. Hayley revealed she was 22 weeks along in her pregnancy in a statement last month, but confirmed she and Will were no longer together. Sweet: '26 weeks of growing you,' she captioned the sweet images in which she cradled her belly and smiled. 'Starting life with you has been a difficult one but I do not regret it one bit at all. I will love you unconditionally and I know you will love me too' She was originally matched with farmer Matt Trewin on the Channel Seven show, but he broke up with her shortly before the finale. She went on to briefly date Will and became pregnant with his child, but they broke up after she told him she was expecting. Hayley and Will had a short-lived romance after the FWAW finale was filmed in December - and after he'd split from his winner, Jaimee. Exes: Hayley and Will (left) had a short-lived romance after the FWAW finale was filmed in December - and after he'd split from his winner, Jaimee (right) But they ended things around April. Will recently released a statement finally addressing Hayley's pregnancy news. In it, he vowed to be 'the best dad I can be... when the time comes'. The 39-year-old Longwood, Victoria farmer and his winner, paediatric nurse Jaimee, 32, alleged they were still together on the show's finale. Khloe Kardashian is in the best shape of her life as she has stuck to her rigorous daily workout routine for over a decade. And on Wednesday, the 37-year-old Revenge Body host put her figure to good use to plug her new Good American jeans. The looker, who is a single mother to daughter True Thompson, did not wear a top as she let her long hair cover her ample assets. Bare facts: Khloe Kardashian went topless for her latest shoot for her brand Good American 'Heeeyyyyy 178 million babes! Always fits denim. New colors and fits drop tomorrow,' she shared. The 178 million babes refers to her 178 million Instagram followers. The looker propped herself up on one hip as she wore her skintight jeans with pointy clear heels. Her hair was a warm honey color and worn stick straight over her chest as she added caramel colored makeup while staring blankly at the camera. Her skin was a deep bronzed tan color as she added a choker necklace and flashed long white nails. She was on the floor of a dark studio and lit to perfection. Haute stuff: The looker propped herself up on one hip as she wore her skintight jeans with pointy clear heels. Her hair was a warm honey color and worn stick straight over her chest as she added caramel colored makeup while staring blankly at the camera Another angle: The reality goddess appeared in this image on the Good American Insta account to hawk the jeans 'that adapt to you' Khloe had shared a Polaroid of the look earlier this week that got fans interested in her latest campaign. In a video filled with a series of photos of the reality star posted to her brand Good American's Instagram, she could be sporting just a pair of cropped jeans, a diamond choker and black clear stiletto heels. Other clips featured the mom-of-one in the same outfit with a nude bra, grey crop top and the same neon yellow manicure. Busty display: Her skin was a deep bronzed tan color as she added a choker necklace and flashed long white nails. She was on the floor of a dark studio and lit to perfection Glam: The Keeping Up With the Kardashians alum shared behind-the-photos from her latest photo shoot Later she changed into a cool camouflage jacket jacket, matching pants and a beige crop top, which highlighted her incredibly toned midriff. She completed the chic ensemble with a pair of brown booties. 'I'm so excited because today is the day that Shein X Design contest challenge airs,' Kardashian later teased on her Instagram Story. Now with a bra on: In this shot, the siren added a nude bra while in a makeup chair Her post comes just days after facing fierce backlash for teaming up with the fast-fashion brand as critics point out that the Chinese retailer has been accused of piracy and mass pollution. The beauty announced her collaboration with Shein on Instagram Wednesday, saying she will be a guest judge on the brand's upcoming Shein X 100K Challenge series. Posting a glamorous photo of herself, Kardashian wrote: 'I am so excited to have teamed up with @sheinofficial to judge the #SHEINx100Kchallenge. The SHEIN X Designer Incubator Program gives talented fashion designers the ability to design a collection for SHEIN that will be seen by fashionistas all around the world!' 'In order to fully support the SHEIN X designers, SHEIN produces, markets, and promotes the collections!' she added, urging fans to tune into the four-part series when it premieres on the Shein app. Kardashian also offered her followers a discount code to get 20 percent off Shein's entire site while promoting the partnership. Meanwhile: Khloe was rocking a very different look for sister Kourtney's Poosh, on Thursday on the Poosh account 'I'm so excited because today is the day that Shein X Design contest challenge airs,' Kardashian later teased on her Instagram Story The brand launched the competition in April as part of its Shein X incubator program, The Business of Fashion reported. The series will follow 30 budding designers as they compete to win $100,000 and a chance to have their designs sold on the company's website. The winner's looks will also be featured in Shein's upcoming Fall/Winter 2021 virtual fashion show. Kardashian is one of five celebrity judges, which include designer Christian Siriano, stylist Law Roach, and former J.Crew creative director Jenna Lyons. While the reality star is only serving as a judge on the show, critics lambasted her for promoting a company that has long been accused of copying other designers in its rush to release new products. 'Shein is one of the most unethical fast fashion brands,' one person commented, while another asked: 'Is this a joke???? After Shein knocks off small designers.' 'Lmaoooo Shein supporting designers?!' someone else wrote. 'All they do is rip off small independent designs to make fast fashion.' Shein which ships to 220 countries has had a pandemic-busting year that in June led to it toppling Amazon as the most downloaded shopping app on iOS and Android in the U.S. The brand targets social media-savvy Gen Zers with its never-ending rollout of trendy pieces sold for incredibly low prices. A halter top sells for as little as $6 on the site, while a summer dress goes for $15. Under fire: Kardashian has faced backlash for teaming up with the Chinese fast-fashion brand Shein Promotion: The reality star announced her partnership with Shein on Instagram Wednesday, saying she'll be a judge on the brand's upcoming Shein X 100K Challenge series The retailer has long been accused of copying other designers, but many of those who claim to be victims of piracy are small, independent labels without the resources to challenge an international giant. Last month, Nigerian brand Elexiay called out Shein on Instagram for copying its pink and green hand-crocheted sweater. The company shared a photo of its $330 design next to Shein's remarkably similar version, which was being sold for just $17. The sweater appears to have been taken down from Shein's site. Another gripe with Kardashian's critics is that Shein is contributing to mass pollution. Roughly 350,000 tons of clothing are dumped in landfills each year, and some claim fashion is the world's second-biggest polluting industry after fossil fuels. Many Shein items are made of polyester, a synthetic fabric usually derived from petroleum. When washed, they produce microfiber, which contributes to the huge volumes of plastic pollution in the seas. 'Fast fashion is bad for the environment not cute,' one person commented on Kardashian's post about her Shein collaboration. There were also unfounded criticisms about Shein's labor practices, which have been subject to speculation. Fashion crew: Kardashian is one of five celebrity judges, which include designer Christian Siriano, stylist Law Roach, and former J.Crew creative director Jenna Lyons While there isn't any evidence that the brand employs children or facilitates unsafe working conditions, some have found it suspect that the company hasn't disclosed its workers' wages or hours. Siriano, Roach, and Lyons have also faced criticism online after they promoted the show on their own social media pages. While Siriano announced that his team was deleting negative comments, Roach asked his fans to give the show a chance. Fast fashion: Shein targets social media-savvy Gen Zers with its never-ending rollout of trendy pieces sold for incredibly low prices 'My Tribe please just watch this when it airs and you will see why I choose to do this!!! I promise you will be proud of me,' he wrote. Lyons said she was also considering taking down negative comments out of respect for the young designers she met. 'The reason I participated if you are interested is because the ENTIRE PROCESS was designed to support young designers, and all of the contestants were incredibly talented, passionate, and deserving of a chance at winning 100k,' she explained. Advertisement She's six-months pregnant with her much longed for baby daughter. And Danielle Lloyd looked nothing short of sensational as she displayed her growing baby bump in a colourful bikini while soaking up the sun in Dubai on Thursday. The TV personality, 37, looked happy and relaxed as she strolled by the pool before relaxing on a sun lounger. Glowing: Danielle Lloyd looked nothing short of sensational as she displayed her growing baby bump in a colourful bikini while soaking up the sun in Dubai on Thursday Danielle happily showed off her bump in the striking zig-zag patterned two piece which featured a ruffled overlay top and matching high-waisted bottoms. The beauty accessorised her holiday look with a simple silver cross necklace and stylish over-sized sunglasses. While she shielded eyes from the sun with a straw sun hat, which she occasionally wore during her time by the pool. The former Celebrity Big Brother star later covered up in a white and blue Louis Vuitton playsuit, while her Christian Dior tote bag was on hand to store her other poolside essentials. Holiday: The TV personality, 37, looked happy and relaxed as she strolled by the pool before relaxing on a sun lounger Looking good: Danielle happily showed off her bump in the striking zig-zag patterned two piece which featured a ruffled overlay top and matching high-waisted bottoms Happy days: The beauty looked content as she strolled by the pool of her luxury resort Danielle appeared chilled as she enjoyed some downtime from her life busy life in the UK during the solo sunbathing session. The doting mother shares sons Archie, 10, Harry, nine, and George, seven, with ex-husband Jamie, and Ronnie, three, with husband Michael O'Neill. Earlier this month, Danielle hit back at a fan after it was alleged that she was seen 'smashing' cocktails while at the pub with her ex husband Jamie O'Hara. Danielle's plight began, when a follower wrote on Instagram: '@lavelsbylux was in the same pub as her, she was with her children and ex husband and she was smashed... Oh baby: The stunner looked down at her growing baby bump as she reclined on a lounger Fashionista: The beauty accessorised her holiday look with a simple silver cross necklace and stylish over-sized sunglasses Yummy mummy: Danielle tenderly cradled her baby bump, which she dressed in an eye-catching bikini Chill time: The doting mum gave a glimpse of her dazzling engagement ring as she gently stroked her stomach And relax! Danielle relaxed and closed her eyes during her alone time at the swimming pool 'Can assure you they wasn't cocktails. I didn't think it was her until someone told me it was and when I looked on Instagram saw she was pregnant.' They later penned: 'Bet you've got a hangover after your antics the other night'. Danielle responded by sharing screenshots on her stories and writing: 'Kids was with their dad at the weekend but I certainly wasn't! We don't even speak so think you got the wrong girl! Must of been another blonde!... 'Honest to god I don't even get people - you don't even follow me. Why do I have to wake up to messages like this, what is wrong with people?? Don't have to explain myself but haven't had a drink in eight months. Turning heads: Danielle was sure to catch the eye as she strolled past the pool in her colourful two-piece Catching the rays: The stunner showed off her bronzed tan as she soaked up the sun Style: The former Celebrity Big Brother star later covered up in a white and blue Louis Vuitton playsuit, while her Christian Dior tote bag was on hand to store her other poolside essentials Say cheese: The former Miss Great Britain ensured she documented her chilled out day in Dubai 'I was teetotal before I was pregnant! Seriously don't get why these idiots think I know I'll wake up at 6am and make some s**t up and post absolute c**p'. The family holiday comes after Danielle was rushed to hospital after collapsing at home and her sons called an ambulance for her. Danielle revealed to OK! that she fell ill at her house and began feeling pains in her stomach. The Liverpool-born star explained she went to the toilet and while she was in there she passed out, with her sons forced to knock on a neighbour's door for help to call out an ambulance. 'It was really traumatic,' Danielle told the publication about the July incident. 'I had really low blood pressure, I was so worried for the baby and it was obviously so terrifying for the boys, but I'm so proud of them.' Thankfully, after several tests, she was given the all clear to leave the hospital. Getting her best side: Danielle lifted her phone up high as she made sure to get the best angle of herself She's known for taking fashion risks. And Bella Hadid ensured she'd get people talking with her latest look, as she opted for a granny chic look in a cosy coat and scarf. The model, 24, was joined by her boyfriend Marc Kalman as they checked out of the Chiltern Firehouse hotel in London on Thursday. Second to nan! Bella Hadid opted for granny chic in a quilted coat and yellow neck scarf as she enjoyed checked out of the Chiltern Firehouse with beau Marc Kalman in London on Thursday Bella put her phenomenal figure under wraps as she donned a thigh length quilted navy coat layered over black flares. Adding a pop of colour, she donned a yellow patterned neck scarf and toted a fluffy leopard print handbag. Opting for comfort, she swapped her usual heels for a pair of navy trainers. Cute couple: The model, 24, was joined by beau Marc Kalman Layering up: Bella put her phenomenal figure under wraps as she donned a thigh length quilted navy coat layered over black flares Also keeping things casual was art director Marc, who donned a red jumper and jeans. The couple have been enjoying a romantic jaunt around Europe in recent weeks, heading from Ibiza to London. Bella went Instagram official with her older man last month when she shared a snap of them kissing in Cannes. Referring to her time with Marc and being at the Film Festival, she wrote in the caption of the post: 'Time of my life. Healthy, Working and Loved.' All about the accessories: Adding a pop of colour, she donned a yellow patterned neck scarf and toted a fluffy leopard print handbag Keeping it casual: Opting for comfort, she swapped her usual heels for a pair of navy trainers Low-key: Also keeping things casual was art director Marc, who donned a red jumper and jeans Speaking to E! about the new couple shortly after her snap, a source said: '[They] have been trying to keep it super low-key and private. 'Now that they have become more serious, she has been excited to be seen with him. She is truly so happy right now.' Prior to becoming romantically involved with Marc, Bella was in a long-term relationship with The Weeknd, which ended for good in 2019. The are hardly ever seen out together as a family. But on Wednesday Hollywood power couple Eva Mendes and Ryan Gosling were spotted with the their two children Esmeralda, six, and Amada, five, in Los Angeles. The stunning 47-year-old actress cut a chic figure in a red print summer dress while her 40-year-old partner kept it simple in a T-shirt and jeans with work boots. Good mommy: The are hardly ever seen out together as a family. But on Wednesday Hollywood power couple Eva Mendes and Ryan Gosling were spotted with the their two children Esmeralda, six, and Amada, five, in Los Angeles Eva stepped out holding her daughter's hand. The Hitch star was wearing a printed red button down dress that had no sleeves and showed off her black bra. She added white block heeled slides with her hair pulled into a high bun and wrapped with a black and white scarf. The movie star styled her tresses loose and in natural waves, opting to keep her makeup to a minimum. She also wore a black face mask. Daddy duty: The 40-year-old LaLa Land star kept it simple in a T-shirt and jeans with brown work boots A gold ring was seen on her wedding finger but it is not known if she is engaged or wed to Gosling. Ryan added a blue cap with designs on it to his Hollywood hipster vibe. Both little girls had on floral print dresses with hot pink sandals. The duo began dating September 2011 after working together on the film The Place Beyond The Pines. On the go: The stunning 47-year-old actress cut a chic figure in a red print summer dress while her child had on a black dress over leggings Ryan and Eva were friends for a 'long time' prior to their romantic relationship. At the time, a source told Us Weekly that there has 'always been this strong chemistry between them.. this was just a matter of time!' In early September 2011, the duo were spotted packing on the PDA during a date night to Disneyland in Anaheim. By the following September, the genetically blessed couple made their red carpet debut at the Toronto International Film Festival premiere of The Place Beyond The Pines. Soulmates: In April 2019, Eva revealed that she didn't want kids before meeting Ryan, revealing to Women's Health; seen together in 2017 at a Saturday Night Live afterparty in New York City In September 2014, Eva and Ryan welcomed their first child together, Esmeralda Amada, now six. They welcomed their second child, daughter Amada Lee, now five, in April 2016. In December 2015, Ryan was asked what he seeks in a woman, to which he sweetly answered: 'I know that I'm with the person I'm supposed to be with... that she's Eva Mendes. There's nothing else I'm looking for,' during an interview with Hello magazine. In character: The good looking duo began dating September 2011 after working together on the film The Place Beyond The Pines; seen in the film Making it official: At the Toronto International Film Festival premiere of The Place Beyond The Pines in 2012 In April 2019, Eva revealed that she didn't want kids before meeting Ryan, revealing to Women's Health: 'Ryan Gosling happened. I mean, falling in love with him. Then it made sense for me to have... not kids, but his kids. It was very specific to him.' The Hitch star further elaborated in October 2020 when speaking to radio station Nova 96.9's Fitzy & Wippa: 'I never wanted babies before until I fell in love with Ryan, and it kind of worked out to where I was 40 and having my first baby.' Adding: 'I think I was 42 for the second one, so it worked out in that way that I had a career and then I change my focus to my family.' Olivia Rodrigo thinks there is unfair 'pressure for young women in pop music' to instantly succeed. The drivers license songstress, 18, talked about society's unfair expectation for young artists during a conversation with SNL's Bowen Yang for V Magazine. 'Its like this thing where youre only successful if youre under 30,' she reasoned, adding: 'Ive always resented that because I think Im just going to get better with age. Pressure: Olivia Rodrigo talked about the pressure put on young women in pop music for V Magazine 'You know what I mean? Im just going to become a better songwriter and know what I want to say more [with time]. The High School Musical: The Musical: The Series star showed no shortage of star-power in the dramatic spread, which was photographed by Inez and Vinoodh and styled by Nicola Formichetti. In the interview, Olivia also talked about how important it is to her to represent her fellow Filipinos. 'I sometimes get DMs from little girls being like, "Ive never seen someone who looked like me in your position,"' she remembered. Glam: The star stunned in a shoot by Inez and Vinoodh and styled by Nicola Formichetti In conversation: The drivers license songstress, 18, talked with SNL's Bowen Yang Why? 'Its like this thing where youre only successful if youre under 30,' she reasoned, adding: 'Ive always resented that because I think Im just going to get better with age' 'And it makes me literally want to cry just thinking about it. I feel like I grew up never seeing that. Also it was always like, "Pop star," thats a white girl.' Olivia went on to talk about one of her own pop idols, Taylor Swift, and how she's influenced her own music. 'I've really just looked up to her since I was very young. I think her writing every single one of her songs was a big inspiration for me,' said Rodrigo. 'I take songwriting the most seriously out of any career that I have. It's just so important to me. And I think that's sort of the same with her. Represent: In the interview, Olivia also talked about how important it is to her to represent her fellow Filipinos, saying she's proud to break from the mold of pop stars being just 'white' Idol: Olivia went on to talk about one of her own pop idols, Taylor Swift, saying: 'I've really just looked up to her since I was very young Peer: 'She's just obviously brilliant at it. And it's just so cool to also be in a place in my career where people who I've looked up to for a really long time suddenly become my peers' 'She's just obviously brilliant at it. And it's just so cool to also be in a place in my career where people who I've looked up to for a really long time suddenly become my peers. 'That's such a crazy thing that I still haven't wrapped my head around. I'm like, the biggest fangirl. 'And so many artists, other than Taylor, I've had that experience with, too. It was so surreal. 'It's like, "What is my life?" Two days ago I was at the White House too. It's like, "What?" I don't get it. Advertisement She stars in the upcoming movie Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings - the first Marvel film to feature an Asian superhero as the lead character. And Awkwafina, 33, offered a lesson in red carpet dressing when she attended a screening of the blockbuster in London on Thursday alongside Sandra Oh, 50, who wowed in a sheer polka dot blouse. Stepping out in an immaculately tailored outfit, the star teamed a cropped blazer top with a pair of matching trousers. Wow: Awkwafina, 33, offered a lesson in red carpet dressing when she attended a screening of the blockbuster in London on Thursday alongside Sandra Oh, 50, who wowed in a sheer polka dot blouse Awkwafina wore her long, raven tresses loose and showed off a hint of her toned midriff. Making her look pop with a swipe of bold red lipstick, the actress otherwise opted for a minimal make-up look. She walked the carpet rocking an immaculate black and white manicure. Sandra teamed her sheer blouse with a pair of cream-hued trousers and and wore her glossy hair loose. Myleene Klass, 43, looked gorgeous in a show-stopping green frock and added height to her frame in brilliant gold heels. The mother-of-three was joined by her daughters Hero and Ava on the carpet. Immaculate: Stepping out in an immaculately tailored outfit, the star teamed a cropped blazer top with a pair of matching trousers Also stepping out towards the end of the week was Romanian actor Florian Munteanu, who plays Razor Fist in the film. Florian cut a dapper figure in a checked suit and draped the Romanian flag around his shoulders. Benedict Wong was also in attendance, who plays Wong. Wong was first featured in 2016's Doctor Strange, before returning in 2018's Avengers: Infinity War and 2019's Avengers: Endgame. Actress Fala Chen posed for photographs alongside the film's director Destin Daniel Cretton. Fala, who plays Jiang Li, looked sensational in a sleeveless white gown. Hair down: Sandra teamed her sheer blouse with a pair of cream-hued trousers and and wore her glossy hair loose Show-stopping: Myleene Klass, 43, looked gorgeous in a show-stopping green frock and added height to her frame in brilliant gold heels Sweet: The mother-of-three was joined by her daughters Hero and Ava on the carpet They were joined on the carpet by Simu Liu who plays the film's lead, Shang-Chi and Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon actress Michelle Yeoh, who plays Ying Nan in the Marvel flick. It comes after Awkwafina said she is 'so proud' to be a part of a movie that is making a difference to audience members from her community as she covered Cosmopolitan's September issue. Speaking about her new role as Katy in the new Marvel standalone, she said: 'These movies make me so proud, just as a watcher, because they contribute to visibility, which I do think has real-life effects.' Dapper: Also stepping out towards the end of the week was Romanian actor Florian Munteanu, who plays Razor Fist in the film In attendance: Benedict Wong was also in attendance. The actor plays Wong in the blockbuster and has also starred in Doctor Strange Posing: Actress Fala Chen posed for photographs alongside the film's director Destin Daniel Cretton Red lip: Fala was sporting a bold swipe of red lipstick Director: Director Destin posed for photographs with his hands tucked into his pockets and rocked a box-fresh pair of trainers Sensational: Fala, who plays Jiang Li, looked sensational in a sleeveless white gown teamed with chic black heels Star of the show: They were joined on the carpet by Simu Liu who plays the film's lead, Shang-Chi, and wore a crisp, maroon-hued suit Playful: Simu and Fala put on a playful display 'When the AAPI (Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders) community is seen as not ancillary characters, it's almost like, then people will know that we're here, you know?' Awkwafina, or Nora Lum as she was born, is excited to be in an action-packed film after featuring in the 2018 rom-com Crazy Rich Asians and 2019's drama The Farewell. 'Dangling off of things and flying, falling backwardit's really different from, say, an indie rom-com. It's really cool. It's so weird to switch from ''friend mode.'' Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings features an almost entirely Asian cast - a feat that would have been welcome when she was 'growing up'. Group photo: The Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings stars posed for a group photo Close: The cast and crew showcased their close bond for cameras Classic: Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon actress Michelle Yeoh cut a classic silhouette in a crisp white shirt Delighted: Michelle and Fala looked delighted while posing for snaps ahead of the screening Co-writers: Destin (right) directs from a script he co-wrote with Dave Callaham (The Expendables) and Andrew Lanham (Just Mercy) Having fun: The cast had fun together before settling down to watch their blockbuster flick Happy family: The cast and crew proved they are one big happy family All black: Actress Daniela Norman turned heads in a plunging black gown Night out: It's A Sin star Nathaniel Curtis also stepped out for the screening on Thursday 'When I was growing up, I knew how I was socioeconomically classified. I knew that my grandma was a working-class immigrant and my dad was a single dad. I knew that I would have to get through in my own way.' The star added: 'That taught me a lot of lessons, like you really have to humble yourself, doing waitress jobs and applying to really hip stores and not getting the job and feeling like, What is even out there? You have to really hit a kind of rock bottom to really want it, to fight for it.' However, the film is not out of the woods yet. Marvel has come under fire for attempting to use Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings to 'fix' its 'Asian problem'. The Guardian wrote: 'And now Marvel has 'fixed' its 'Asian problem' by announcing Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings' after a series of 'problematic' casting choices in their previous movies. Loved-up: Nicola Adams and her girlfriend Ella Baig put on a loved-up display when they walked the carpet In her element: Nicola was in her element as she enjoyed a night on the town Glamorous: Courtney Green arrived looking typically glamourous Cool-casual: Keith Lemon nailed cool casual Proud: Awkwafina has said she is 'so proud' to be a part of a movie that is making a difference to audience members from her community 'Keen to avoid a backlash when depicting the traditionally stereotyped Mandarin supervillain in Iron Man 3, the studio cleverly cast part-south Asian actor Ben Kingsley as a drunken English luvvie, Trevor Slattery, who was only ever playing the role of Tony Stark's evil nemesis. The only problem was that this was another role not going to an actor of east Asian extraction.' Ben Child added: 'Iron Fist fell into the problematic 'white saviour' trap by casting Finn Jones as kung-fu-kicking New York rich kid Danny Rand, a stereotypical white guy who beats the Asian martial arts experts at their own game.' The cast also includes Simu Liu as Shang-Chi, Michelle Yeoh as Ying Nan plus returning Marvel Cinematic Universe characters Wong (Benedict Wong) and Abomination (Tim Roth). She's a mother to four children, a billion dollar businesswoman and a reality television icon. And Kim Kardashian's quest for success was clearly written in the stars as she shared the ultimate Throwback Thursday clip singing with her sisters in a Star Search audition tape. The 40-year-old cosmetics queen shared a glimpse at her early days in the limelight as she belted out the '80s Tiffany bop with her family in the short clip posted on her Instagram account. Star power: Kim Kardashian's quest for success was clearly written in the stars as she shared the ultimate Throwback Thursday clip singing with her sisters in a Star Search audition tape Kim sported a massive gold bow in her hair as she held onto a microphone and sang I Think We're Alone Now with her siblings. 'Our Star Search audition,' she captioned the clip. 'Clearly we didnt get 4 startsbut Kris Jenner did for our outfits!!!!' Kourtney looked ever the professional confidently singing while Khloe rocked a pair of massive sunglasses. Girl group: The 40-year-old cosmetics queen shared a glimpse at her early days in the limelight as she belted out the '80s Tiffany bop with her family in the short clip posted on her Instagram account Tres amigas: Kourtney looked ever the professional confidently singing while Khloe rocked a pair of massive sunglasses The 37-year-old Good American founder was consumed with the cute content and wrote: 'A 5 year old vibe! I am a f***ing vibe!!!!!!!' Kim and her sisters have clearly come a long way from humbler days having just hung up their hats from filming their 20-season series, Keeping Up with the Kardashians. Their popular E! show ended this year after 14 years on air, but cemented their star status as Kim recently earned a position on the Forbes Billionaire list. 'Our Star Search audition,' she captioned the clip. 'Clearly we didnt get 4 startsbut Kris Jenner did for our outfits!!!!' A first: The 37-year-old Good American founder was consumed with the cute content and wrote: 'A 5 year old vibe! I am a f***ing vibe!!!!!!!' She has a $225million stake in SKIMS and in January last year, sold 20 percent of KKW Beauty to Coty for $200million while retaining 72 percent of the company a stake worth $500million. Kim also earns at least $10million a year through ad campaigns, social media posts and through her game app, Kim Kardashian: Hollywood. Her business portfolio includes KKW Beauty, KKW Fragrance, SKIMS, personalized emojis called Kimojis and a virtual reality game based on her life. Courtney Green pulled out all the stops on Thursday when she attended the star-studded screening of Marvel's Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings in London. Stepping onto the carpet in a cropped black halterneck layered beneath a chic white blazer, the TOWIE star, 25, offered crowds a flash of her toned midriff. The brunette bombshell teamed her tops with a thigh-skimming pair of black shorts and added height to her frame in wraparound heels. Wow: Courtney Green, 25, pulled out all the stops on Thursday when she attended the star-studded screening of Marvel's Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings in London Toting her belongings in a luxury black handbag tucked beneath her left arm, Chloe looked every inch the starlet as she worked her best angles for cameras. The star's glossy hair cascaded in loose curls past her shoulders and Chloe accessorised with gorgeous silver rings. Her immaculate white pedicure peeked out from her squared open-toe heels. Chloe joined the likes of Awkwafina, Sandra Oh and Myleene Klass at the event, which celebrated the release of the first Marvel film to feature an Asian superhero as the lead character. Chic: Stepping onto the carpet in a cropped black halterneck layered beneath a chic white blazer, the TOWIE star offered crowds a flash of her toned midriff Elsewhere, Chloe has been busy in both her professional and personal lives. Late last year, the TV star reunited with her businessman beau Callum Bushby during the first nationwide lockdown. Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, the former PA admitted it's unlikely she'd have reconciled with her boyfriend if it wasn't for COVID-19. Hair down: The star's glossy hair cascaded in loose curls past her shoulders and Chloe accessorised with gorgeous silver rings The couple split in December 2019 after 18 months together when he reportedly refused to commit to their relationship by moving in together. The brunette beauty explained that 'something happened' at the beginning of the pandemic which made her reach out to Callum, and it eventually led them to rekindling their romance. Courtney said: 'I did get back with my ex-boyfriend, something happened at the start of lockdown and we just started talking again. Me and Callum, obviously we're allowed out we've started dating each other and seeing a lot more. 'If lockdown hadn't happened I don't know if we would have got back together. I feel like because lockdown happened we feel like we had a lot of time to chat and we didn't have any distractions.' She turned heads when she entered the Love Island villa during the 2021 series. And Lucinda Strafford commanded attention once more on Thursday in a sizzling halterneck top as she joined tuxedo-clad model, Roxy Horner, and a host of stars at a Yungblud concert. The reality star, 21, sent temperatures soaring in her ab-flashing ensemble while Jack Whitehall's girlfriend Roxy, 30, looked trendy in a white jacket and faux leather leggings for the event at Samsung KX in London. Racy! Lucinda Strafford commanded attention on Thursday in a sizzling halterneck top as she joined tuxedo-clad model, Roxy Horner, and a host of stars at a Yungblud concert Lucinda teamed her tiny satin top with black shorts which skimmed her pert posterior. She draped a pink Louis Vuitton bag across her torso which complemented her rosy make-up look. The Love Islander's blonde locks were styled in glamorous loose curls and she rounded off the outfit with Dior trainers. Meanwhile Roxy flashed a preview of her black harness bra beneath her white blazer and boosted her lithe frame with strappy black heels. Wow! The reality star, 21, sent temperatures soaring in her ab-flashing ensemble while Roxy, 30, (pictured) looked trendy in a jacket and leggings for the event at Samsung KX in London Skimpy: Lucinda teamed her tiny satin top with black shorts which skimmed her pert posterior. and she draped a pink Louis Vuitton bag across her torso Steal the spotlight: The Love Islander's blonde locks were styled in glamorous loose curls and she rounded off the outfit with Dior trainers Sun-kissed: She was seen sporting a glowing tan, developed during her time in the Love Island villa in July The catwalk star curled her blonde tresses and enhanced her delicate features with a soft make-up look. Meanwhile Kimberley Wyatt injected a pop of colour with a lemon yellow suit. The former Pussycat Doll, 39, rocked a black lace bodysuit beneath her stylish two-piece as she worked her best angles in front of a Samsung promotional banner. Monochromatic: Meanwhile Roxy flashed a preview of her black harness bra beneath her white blazer and boosted her lithe frame with strappy black heels Stunning: The catwalk star curled her blonde tresses and enhanced her delicate features with a soft make-up look Mellow yellow: Meanwhile Kimberley Wyatt injected a pop of colour with a lemon yellow suit Silver lining: Kimberley elevated her look with a silver beaded necklace and unusual silver rimmed sunglasses Former Love Islander Eyal Booker attended the event alone in a burnt orange jacket and black tee. Fellow reality star Sharon Gaffka stood out from the crowd in a futuristic white dress with a belt cinched at the waist. Former McFly star Danny Jones opted for a corduroy shirt in a salmon pink hue over the top of a crisp white T-shirt. Model Jessica Anne Woodley showcased her style credentials in an oversized blazer and straight-leg jeans. Preened to perfection: She enhanced her youthful complexion with a peachy make-up finish as she clutched a timeless black handbag Hot couple alert: Kimberly was joined by her husband Max Rogers for the fun-filled night out Striking: Her partner highlighted his model silhouette in a navy jacket and straight-leg jeans which he teamed with spotless white trainers Meanwhile Olivia Newman-Young made a fashionable entrance in a faux leather jacket and black skirt which she teamed with a Mulberry handbag. Diver Chris Mears shrugged on a hip hoodie, peppered with black and neon green graffiti. Elsewhere Mel B's daughter Phoenix Brown flashed a look at her washboard stomach in a white cropped tee and distressed jeans. Model looks: Former Love Islander Eyal Booker attended the event alone in a burnt orange bomber jacket and black tee Footwear: The reality star, 26, slipped into understated black jeans which finished above his black and white trainers The live gig featured artist Yungblud performing alongside the London Community Gospel Choir and artist Aries Moross. The event celebrated the launch of Samsung Galaxy Z Fold3 and Z Flip3 devices which go on sale on Friday. Lucinda has been attending a host of glamorous events since she exited the villa in July. And earlier this month, the blonde beauty was reportedly caught in a bust up with her former Love Island beau Brad McClelland in a Brighton nightclub. Strike a pose: Fellow reality star Sharon Gaffka stood out from the crowd in a futuristic white dress with a belt cinched at the waist Stunning: The Love Island star's dress also featured buttoned cuffs and a drawstring hem Glam: Sharon wore her red locks down in a sleek and straight style and opted for glam make-up All eyes on her: Sharon stole the show as she made a stylish exit from the live concert Rise to fame: Sharon was in high spirits as she enjoyed her new found fame following her stint on the latest series of the ITV2 reality show Public outing: Former McFly star Danny Jones opted for a corduroy shirt in a salmon pink hue over the top of a crisp white T-shirt for the concert Effortless: Model Jessica Anne Woodley showcased her style credentials in an oversized blazer and straight-leg jeans The dumped reality stars were allegedly out when Lucinda is said to have been caught flirting with another man in front of Brad. Brad then confronted the guy in a heated exchange that got 'very ugly'. Brad and Lucinda coupled up on the recent series of Love Island but were forced to part ways when 26-year-old Brad decided he would sacrifice his place in the villa and leave Lucinda there to continue her experience. She wasted no time in coupling up with Aaron Francis, but the pair were dumped last week, with Lucinda already seen to have flitted back to Brad on the outside world. Urban twist: Diver Chris Mears shrugged on a hip hoodie, peppered with black and neon green graffiti It runs in the family: Elsewhere Mel B's daughter Phoenix Brown flashed a look at her washboard stomach in a white cropped tee and distressed jeans Centre stage: The live gig featured artist Yungblud (pictured) performing alongside the London Community Gospel Choir and artist Aries Moross Anarchy: The artist, 24, embraced punk fashion with a black denim jacket, padlock necklace and red tinted locks Yet she seems to be keeping all of her options open, going by the night's escapades earlier in August, as reported in The Sun. Sources say that the nightclub's security had to get involved, asking Brad to leave at 2:30AM. Brad was heard threatening the other man, yelling: 'Come on then, I'll knock you out! You're just a little boy!' The Northumberland hunk was visiting Brighton to see ex-air hostess Lucinda for their night out at Shoosh and apparently became riled when Lucinda 'secretly invited the other man to meet her in the VIP section' of the club. Leggy display! He revealed his toned legs in a daring mini skirt, complete with pleats and faux leather fabric, while sporting bright pink socks Back in black: The pop sensation was seen wearing a tee which referenced the punk band, The Cramps, which he paired with a gothic leather belt and mesh top Cheese! Yungblud delivered a dramatic expression and hand-horn gesture as he grabbed a selfie with the elated audience Instrument: He used a tambourine to enhance his electrifying performance Brad's pals claim this was the case, while Lucinda's friends told The Sun it was all a big misunderstanding. The publication shared photos of her chatting to both men, with Brad clocking her speaking to the second man and yelling at him, while Lucinda attempted to placate him. 'It got very ugly. Lucinda was playing with fire and has strong feelings for both lads. The men didn't fancy sharing and it got very heated,' a source said. 'Trouble flared again outside when Lucinda and her other enthusiast left at the same time.' A friend of Lucinda said: 'A man kept coming over and trying to talk to her in front of Brad. It got very annoying.' Team effort: The London Community Gospel Choir wore black outfits and pink socks for the performance, matching Yungblud's look Clash! Earlier this month, Lucinda was reportedly caught in a bust up with her former Love Island beau Brad McClelland (pictured) in a Brighton nightclub National Dog Day fell on Thursday this year, giving stars a great excuse to show off their four-legged friends on Instagram. Hollywood icon Demi Moore had one of the best posts as she was seen with all nine of her furry little friends. Others who had fun with their canines were Kate Hudson, Kyle Richards, Paris Hilton and John Travolta. Four paws up Demi: National Dog Day fell on Thursday this year, giving stars a great excuse to show off their four-legged friends on Instagram. Hollywood icon Demi Moore had one of the best posts as she was seen wit all nine of her furry little friends The paw pride was strong with GI Jane star Moore, who used to be wed to Bruce Willis and Ashton Kutcher. The brunette beauty was seen at home near a dog bed as all the little ones posed away like pros. 'Dinnertime with the crew,' said the Indecent Proposal star who has homes in Idaho and Los Angeles. She wore a white T-shirt and jeans with leopard print socks. Fur parent: Moore in May revealed she is a devoted fur parent as she is taking care of nine small dogs inside her Idaho mansion The glam days: She has stripped off the glitz during lockdown and after writing her memoir Inside Out; seen in 2006 Moore has three daughters - Rumer, 32, Scout, 29, and Tallulah, 27 - that have all grown up and left her nest. But that does not mean the A list actress, 58, is not busy playing mom at home. She is a devoted fur parent. In May she posed with nine pups. 'Tonight's dinner guests!' joked the author as she kneeled down in her dining room to feed the little pooches. Family time. In 2003 when she was with Ashton Kutcher, she was seen with ex Bruce Willis and their three kids: Rumer, 32, Scout, 29, and Tallulah, 27 It is not known if they are all hers. Some may belong to daughter Tallulah as she said in the comments box: 'Is that Winston far back??' Movie producer friend Allyn Stewart replied: 'Tallulah you are so cute. Yes that's Winston! He's joined the pack. Congratulations BTW!' She was congratulating Tallulah on her engagement to Dillon Buss. Idaho has the highest percentage of households in the US with dogs, according to a 2018 report from the American Veterinary Medical Association. Not a ruff life: Saturday Night Fever actor John Travolta also shared an image with his dog. The star was laying down as his little black friend cuddled his neck Kate the great: Kate Hudson looked like she was topless when she cuddled her dog in bed. She had her hair up and no makeup on. 'This is how to celebrate Dog Day,' said the Almost Famous actress who has three children with three different men Moore has been spending time in her home in Idaho in the past year. She purchased the property when she was wed to Willis because it felt like 'home,' she detailed in her memoir Inside Out which also described her painful childhood that included poverty, addiction and sex abuse. Saturday Night Fever actor John Travolta also shared an image with his dog. The star was laying down as his little black friend cuddled his neck. 'Some dogs are just so lovely,' said the former dancer. Sharon Stone shot back, 'U or him' with crying emojis. Followers said her remark was funny in the comment box. Stone's joke may have to do with his starring role in the 2009 film Old Dogs. The blues: Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin's daughter Amelia Hamlin held up her dog. The girlfriend of Scott Disick was in a blue outfit Shilling dog: 'He picks out her own outfits and for #nationaldogday I let her pick mine too @alo,' write the Vogue model Over a decade he face a fur tragedy when his two dogs were accidentally struck and killed on the tarmac when in Bangor, Maine. Bethenny Frankel also took part in the National Dog Day frenzy. The Real Housewives Of New York vet was seen with her fuzzy white dogs as she sat outside with a hat and glasses on. Real dogs of New York: Bethenny Frankel also took part in the National Dog Day frenzy. The Real Housewives Of New York vet was seen with her fuzzy white dogs as she sat outside with a hat and glasses on Small but sweet: Blanca Blanco held onto a small white dog as she wore her hair back while in a blue dress. The actress is currently starring on the Tubi series Tale Of Tails about a bar with topless dancers and a back room 'where anything goes for the right price' 'Dog days of summer #NationalDogDay #onedog @biggysmallz,' she said adding her glasses were Bethenny brand readers. Blanca Blanco held onto a small white dog as she wore her hair back while in a blue dress. The actress is currently starring on the Tubi series Tale Of Tails about a bar with topless dancers and a back room 'where anything goes for the right price.' Tinkerbell where are you? Paris Hilton shared a collage of herself with all her various purse dogs Dogs on the kitchen counter! Canine lover Hilton also shard this image with four dogs Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin's daughter Amelia Hamlin held up her dog. The girlfriend of Scott Disick was in a blue outfit. 'He picks out her own outfits and for #nationaldogday I let her pick mine too @alo,' write the Vogue model. Michael Douglas had his pup on his lap: 'Celebrating #NationalDogDay with the only & only Taylor Douglas!' Legends: Michael Douglas had his pup on his lap: 'Celebrating #NationalDogDay with the only & only Taylor Douglas!' Not furious: Jordana Brewster lay on the floor with her dog. 'No one cuddles as deliciously as Endi,' she said Service dog: GG Golnesa of Shahs Of Sunset had her arm around her four legged pal. 'I'm not sure when you became my owner but I enjoy being your pet! Thank you for being the best doggy everrrr!!!' she wrote Kate Hudson looked like she was topless when she cuddled her dog in bed. She had her hair up and no makeup on. 'This is how to celebrate Dog Day,' said the Almost Famous actress who has three children with three different men. Paris Hilton shared a collage of herself with all her various purse dogs. GG Golnesa of Shahs Of Sunset had her arm around her four legged pal. 'I'm not sure when you became my owner but I enjoy being your pet! Thank you for being the best doggy everrrr!!!' she wrote. And Kyle Richards of Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills fame was seen with her husband Mauricio Umansky as well as her daughters. Six dogs were seen in front of them as a Christmas tree was behind the family. Pregnant Sunrise newsreader Edwina Bartholomew received her first dose of the Pfizer vaccine earlier this week. And in her column for The Daily Telegraph on Thursday, the 38-year-old explained why she chose to get the jab during her pregnancy. 'After extensive research, I found that Pfizer is the jab recommended by Australian and International experts for pregnant and breastfeeding women,' she said. Getting the jab: Sunrise's Edwina Bartholomew revealed that after extensive research she decided that the Pfizer vaccine was right for her. Pictured is Edwina getting her jab this week 'I'm confident I have made the right decision for my body, my baby and my family,' she added. Edwina referred to data from the New England Journal of Medicine that found no safety concerns with Pfizer and that catching Covid would have an impact on the health of an expectant mother and her baby. The mum-of-one also touched on the impact of 'ill-informed influencers' spreading misinformation on social media. Safety first: 'I'm confident I have made the right decision for my body, my baby and my family,' she said in her column on Thursday. Pictured is Edwina with her daughter Molly She wrote: 'I'm very thankful that I don't get my advice from so-called experts who preach about "life, love and freedom" but are actually just spreading incorrect information to their many followers.' Edwina also thanked the nurses, doctors and midwives who shared comments of support on her vaccine Instagram post. On Wednesday, the TV presenter got her jab on live TV and urged other pregnant women to get the jab after discovering expecting women were more at risk of COVID complications. Doctor's office: On Wednesday, the TV presenter got her jab on live TV and urged other pregnant women to get the jab after discovering expecting women were more at risk of COVID complications She said: 'The very stark message from doctors is do it now or you and your baby could end up in hospital and very sick.' Edwina stood by her decision to get vaccinated on Instagram, despite attracting criticism from some of her followers and 'influencers' who 'fired right back'. 'For God's sake, don't take your health advice from Instagram influencers. Don't take it from me either. Checked out: After attracting criticism, she later said on Instagram that she was 'not going to waste any more time responding to anti-vaxxers today' 'Speak to your GP, speak to your midwife, your obstetrician, the health experts in your life who know the data, know the detail, and take advice from them.' In a post on Instagram on Wednesday, Edwina stated: 'This was my choice for my body, my baby and my family.' After attracting criticism, she later said on Instagram Stories that she was 'not going to waste any more time responding to anti-vaxxers today'. Plus one: Edwina announced she's expecting her second child with her husband of three years, Neil Varcoe, on Sunrise last week Baby on the way: 'And in some developing news, news that will be developing for the next six months, we are having another baby,' she said at the time Edwina announced she's expecting her second child with her husband Neil Varcoe, on Sunrise last week. 'And in some developing news, news that will be developing for the next six months, we are having another baby,' she said at the time on Sunrise. The couple, who have been married for three years, are already parents to a 20-month-old daughter, Molly. Hayley Hasselhoff looked to be in a great mood on Wednesday as she hit the beach in Malibu. The blonde beauty was seen with her boyfriend of over three years, Dominic Charles Farrell, as they walked arm-in-arm and then kissed while celebrating her 29th birthday. The plus-size model, who's the daughter of Baywatch star David Hasselhoff, 69, wore a plunging black jumpsuit with a long sheer robe as she carried a brown woven basket purse. Full of joy: Hayley Hasselhoff looked to be in a great mood on Wednesday as she hit the beach in Malibu. The blonde beauty was seen with her boyfriend of over three years, Dominic Farrell The looker wore her blonde hair down and had on pretty makeup as she smiled away while walking barefoot on the beach. Her partner had on a white shirt that was unbuttoned showing off his abs and gold necklace. The star added brown slacks that were rolled up at the hem, exposing a large tattoo, and he added black beaded bracelets as she held on to a pair of black Gucci loafers. Dominic is an actor who is best known for Eden Lodge (2015), Final Promises (2013) and Undercover Hooligan (2016). He also works as a photographer. In June she gushed over her man: 'You truly are everything in my life. I'm so beyond lucky to have you by my side today and everyday. through my emotional ups and downs you are patient, kind and the most beautiful supporter. I love you baby.' Her birthday present: The actor planted a kiss on his lady love during her 29th birthday; they have been together for over three years The two were apart for five months under lockdown - he was in the UK while Hayley was in Los Angeles. In May she said, 'It has been hard obviously because I can't see him but we're good with long distance just because when we first met each other I was travelling 10 times out of the month, we got very used to being in different time zones and making it work.' She added, 'But it's sad and I miss him so much he was supposed to come over here and funny enough it was a couple of days before the first major tier lockdown that I ended up leaving before Christmas time. Chic on the shore: The plus-size model, who's the daughter of The Hoff, 69, wore a plunging black jumpsuit with a long robe as she carried a brown woven basket purse 'The pandemic has definitely put things into perspective, it made me feel that I also want a permanent place in LA where I'm from and I can build a bigger life there.' They were reunited this summer. Before Farrell she dated Geordie Shore star Kyle Christie in 2017. This comes after she became landed the cover Playboy Germany in the spring. She told MailOnline her Baywatch-star dad believes in her and trusts the choices she makes for her career after she first started working aged 14. In an exclusive interview, Hayley, who competed on Celebrity X Factor in 2019, revealed she felt 'empowered' by being able to celebrate and showcase her body as she starred topless for the iconic magazine. They fell in love overseas: She has said when she met Dominic it was like a scene from Love Actually; seen in November 2019 in Austria Hayley, the youngest daughter of David and actress Pamela Bach, 57, told MailOnline: 'My dad is very supportive in the choices I make for my own career. My mum and my dad are always very supportive in everything that I have done. 'You have to remember I've been in this industry since I was 14 and I've been a curve model since I was 14. We all have different journeys in the curve industry but for me I started out as a curve model and I am still a curve model today. 'To see the progression of where I've gone, to where I am today, I think they're both very, very supportive and they believe in me and all the choices I make in my own career, just like I do for them.' Hayley shot the glamorous pictures in Paris during lockdown wearing her own lingerie after it became difficult for her team to source garments to fit her UK size 16-18 frame amid the pandemic. Making history: The curvaceous actress explained being the first plus-size woman to star on the front of Playboy Germany is significant because it plays into a 'bigger movement' of embracing all different body shapes and sizes The curvaceous actress explained being the first plus-size woman to star on the front of Playboy Germany is significant because it plays into a 'bigger movement' of embracing all different body shapes and sizes. She said: 'There are a few photos that are tastefully nude where I'm topless. 'At the beginning there were pieces of me like "oh Playboy" and then I had a think and I was like 'oh cool!' I get to make this movement for curve women during a global pandemic and let them know they have every right to celebrate their bodies. 'Looking at those images I have to say there were definitely moments on set where I was apprehensive because it was my first time ever shooting something like this. 'It was one of those moments where you have a thought bubble and that apprehensiveness but then that positive thought came back in and said "hold on a second that's the whole reason you're here today." She often models bikinis on her Instagram page. But model and social media influencer London Goheen, 23, had fans doing a double take on Thursday when she posed in a nude optical illusion swimsuit which made her appear as though she was posing completely naked. The itsy bitsy two-piece also barely covered her nipples. Naked ambition? Model London Goheen posed in nude optical illusion bikini on Thursday that made her appear completely naked The American beauty's impressive rock-hard abs were also on display after the brunette gave birth to her baby Stone in March. Earlier this month, London flaunted her trim post-baby body in a tiny black bikini while enjoying a romantic getaway with her husband Reece Hawkins in Mexico. She shared a series of sexy pictures on Instagram. Impressive: The American beauty's impressive rock-hard abs were also on display after the brunette gave birth to her baby Stone in March Hot: Earlier this month, London flaunted her trim post-baby body in a tiny black bikini while enjoying a romantic getaway with her husband Reece Hawkins in Mexico Followers praised the stunning influencer for her sizzling images. 'Hot mama,' wrote LA model Celeste Bright. Too Hot to Handle star Francesca Farago said, 'Oh my f**king god'. Much-needed holiday: London had been living it up in Mexico with Aussie influencer Reece after they welcomed their son in March 'So hot I die,' added another follower. London had been living it up in Mexico with Aussie influencer Reece after they welcomed their son in March. London gave birth to Stone on March 7 after a grueling 34-hour labour. 'We love you baby Stone and being your mama forever is going to be so much fun, I PROMISE,' she wrote in an Instagram caption. Her partner Reece is already father to two children with his influencer ex-fiance Tammy Hembrow. The former couple share son Wolf, five, and daughter Saskia, four. Her mom Lisa Rinna just slammed her daughter's dating choices. But Amelia Hamlin didn't look bothered by her mom's opinion on boyfriend Scott Disick, 38, while sunbathing with a friend on Thursday. The model, 20, glowed as she showed off her bikini body donning a yellow triangle top and matching bottoms with a floppy Prada cowboy hat while relaxing on a wooden pier. Mellow yellow: Amelia Hamlin showed off her stunning figure in a little yellow bikini on Thursday Not needing much makeup to look great, Amelia flaunted a fresh-faced glow and kept her brunette tresses down long and loose. The star's relaxing day comes after mom Lisa was heard expressing her disapproval for her daughter's much older boyfriend during this week's episode of Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills. While she said husband Harry Hamlin approved of older daughter Delilah's boyfriend Eyal Booker, Rinna sang a different tune regarding her youngest's significant other. Bikini body: The daughter of reality star Lisa Rinna sunned while sitting on a pier near a lake Howdy: Amelia teamed her yellow triangle top and matching bottoms with a floppy Prada cowboy hat 'I can't say the same for Amelia at this point now. Like, why can't it be Harry Styles? 'Why the f*** is it Scott Disick?,' she wondered. Scott and Amelia went public with their relationship last November. Harry earlier this season on the Bravo show was asked how he felt about Amelia, who was age 19 at the time of filming, dating much older Scott. ''My feelings about it, I must confess: The issue that's the most enduring is the age difference, which to me is odd,' Harry said. Going strong: Scott, 38, and Amelia, 20, shown together in June in Miami, went public with their relationship last November Approval rating: Delilah's boyfriend Eyal Booker was approved by Lisa and her husband Harry Hamlin 'But, then again, every time I think of that, I think of myself and Ursula Andress. I was 14 years younger than she when we had Dimitri, so I can't really complain, right?,' Harry added referencing his son Dimitri, 41. 'I was 29, she was 44,' Harry noted when they had Dimitri together. Lisa after learning of their relationship also admitted on the show that she was 'a lot nervous about it'. Why him? 'I can't say the same for Amelia at this point now. Like, why can't it be Harry Styles? 'Why the f*** is it Scott Disick?,' Lisa added in her confessional Amelia and Delilah tried on some of Lisa's old dresses and she gushed about how great they looked. 'Oh, my God. I still see my girls as little. Those kids were swinging on the swing set five minutes ago. And so to see them as women, it's mind-blowing. I mean, they grow up so fast, and I do feel like I'm losing my grip because as they leave the house, as they leave the nest, you lose control,' Lisa said in a confessional. She added that she adores her girls and called them 'the coolest people on the planet.' Later on: Amelia uploaded a joyous snippet to her Instagram Stories in which she was spinning and frolicking in a forest in front of a cabin She captioned the clip 'Happiest here' and showcased her curves in a brown minidress: Boyfriend Scott was most surely the one holding the camera FBI agents on Wednesday searched offices at Detroit City Hall and the homes of two City Council members, just a few weeks after another councilman was accused in a bribery scheme. On Wednesday, about 20 agents and state police officers were seen leaving City Hall with an array of boxes, and were at the homes of Janee Ayers, 39, and Scott Benson, 51, both of whom are running for reelection. Agents additionally searched the East English Village home of Benson's chief of staff, Carol Banks. On Wednesday, about 20 agents and state police officers were seen leaving City Hall with an array of boxes, and were at the homes of Janee Ayers, 39, (left) and Scott Benson, 51, (right) both of whom are running for reelection An FBI employee guards the entrance doors to the Detroit City Council on the 13th floor of the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center, Thursday, Aug. 25, 2021, in Detroit. The 11th floor of city hall, the location of Mayor Mike Duggan's office, was not searched, Duggan spokesman John Roach told Detroit Free Press. 'The mayor's office has no information on the search warrants,' Roach told the publication in a text message. The search came less than a month after Detroit Councilman Andre Spivey was charged in federal court with conspiracy to commit bribery and accused of accepting $1,000 from an undercover law enforcement agent in October 2018. Spivey's indictment also alleges that between 2016 and 2020, the councilman and 'public official A' accepted more than $35,000 in payments to influence votes 'concerning an industry under review by the council.' The search came less than a month after Detroit Councilman Andre Spivey (pictured) was charged in federal court with conspiracy to commit bribery and accused of accepting $1,000 from an undercover law enforcement agent in October 2018. On Wednesday, about 20 agents and state police were seen at the homes of Janee Ayers, 39, and Scott Benson, 51, (both of whom are running for reelection) in addition to leaving City Hall with an array of boxes 'The citizens of Detroit have a right to a city government that is free of corruption,' Tim Waters, head of the FBI in Detroit, told reporters outside City Hall Wednesday. 'No one is being charged today. Simply what we're doing today is collecting evidence.' Waters confirmed the surprise searches were a part of an ongoing public corruption investigation throughout Detroit. Ayers name emerged several years ago in a bribery investigation involving towing magnate Gasper Fiore, according to The Detroit News. She has not been charged in that investigation. In 2015, Ayers was appointed to the council following the resignation of former councilwoman Saunteel Jenkins. Ayers won a special election in 2016 and Detroit voters elected her to a full term in 2017. Before joining the City Council, Ayers was a union leader and an elected vice president of Metro Detroit AFL-CIO. She also worked as a tutor for children. Before taking office in 2014, Benson worked as a real estate developer and for Midtown Detroit Inc. as a small business director. In June, former Councilman Gabe Leland was sentenced in Wayne County Circuit Court to probation after pleading guilty to accepting an illegal $7,500 cash campaign contribution. Federal corruption charges were dismissed as part of Lelands plea deal. In 2018, Fiore, of Grosse Pointe Shores, was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison for his role in bribing a suburban official for a municipal towing contract. The government has said the money was funneled through an executive at a trash-hauling company, who also pleaded guilty to corruption. Former Detroit Deputy Police Chief Celia Washington also was sentenced that year to a year and a day in prison in a corruption case related to towing contracts. Washington was accused of accepting at least $3,000 from Fiore. Washington served as the Detroit Police Departments legal adviser, responsible for overseeing private towing companies that remove cars seized by police. Treading lightly on Tanna We go on a new ecotourism adventure tour in North Tanna Robbie Goodrich is director of arts information for the SFA College of Fine Arts. She is a former Sentinel staff writer and editor. Tropical Storm Henri didn't turn out to be as damaging to Connecticut as predicted. But it did create the perfect storm for social media users to disparage the forecast of Connecticut meteorologist Rachel Frank who said she got "venomous" comments about her coverage of the storm for Hartford-based FOX61 from viewers who insulted her appearance and intelligence. Frank's "challenging" week sounded familiar to fellow meteorologists and television journalists across Connecticut. When Ashley Baylor saw Frank's tweet, she said she contacted Frank to offer support. I reached out to Rachel right after her post, said Baylor, a meteorologist at New Haven's WTNH. I invited her out to lunch on Tuesday just to talk and get our minds off what happened...Many of us have been there we know how it feels to receive hate messages after a forecast didn't perfectly come to fruition. There are several forecasts available to public these days, Baylor said, which further complicates weather forecasting and its perceived accuracy by the public. Sadly, with computer models becoming easily available, all these armchair (social) MEDIAorologists have come on to the scene in recent years with their OWN public forecasts even though they don't have a degree or certification, she said in an email. Not only do they post their own forecasts, but often, I see them go with the worst-case scenarios to get the page views. It's beyond frustrating. I don't like having to talk people off a ledge because they're scared of something they saw on so-and-so's page. Brad Field, the former chief meteorologist for NBC Connecticut for 34 years and current chief meteorologist at New England Skywatch Weather, said its something hes encountered throughout the course of his time on TV making weather predictions. In my career, I experienced many doubters and critics, he wrote in a Facebook message. I largely ignored [them], but tried to see the grain of truth within the criticism and grow from that. So when he saw Franks tweet about the venomous comments she received, he offered words of encouragement to a fellow Connecticut meteorologist. As far as Rachel is concerned, we have MANY very good, very dedicated meteorologists in Connecticut, he said via Facebook. Rachel is among our best! Melissa Cole / Contributed Photo Meteorologist for WFSB in Rocky Hill Melissa Cole also shared support on social media for Frank. When it comes to Tropical Storm Henri or any storm Cole said that meteorologists have nothing to gain by hyping things up. At the end of the day, were doing the best job possible to provide the most accurate and at times life-saving information to the public, she said. On Saturday morning, things looked bad for Connecticut. Our forecasts evolved as the storm track evolved throughout the next 24 hours. Meteorologists are constant targets for criticism across the country, according to Baylor, and while she noted that shes been very lucky with the feedback shes received from viewers, shes no stranger to being on the receiving end of critical comments. I cant even tell you the number of times someone has said [or] written, Meteorologist the only job you get paid to be wrong, she said. After the Henri coverage, I had a lot of support, but sadly, its the troll comments that stick out. I had one guy write, Shouldve been a meteorologist. I love people who say this it has the underlying tone that we are paid to be wrong. Ashley Baylor / Contributed Photo Cole said she makes a point of supporting her fellow female meteorologists, especially now that many more of them are on TV. When I first started out at WFSB in 2003, I was the only female meteorologist in the market. Today, I love that there is at least one, if not two female meteorologists at every station, she said. I personally see it as less of competition, and more of a camaraderie women supporting women, especially in the STEM field. I love following them all on social media and often like or comment on their posts. Cole is also no stranger to receiving statements like the ones Frank got after Henri. In her first weekend on air in Connecticut, Cole said several people emailed her to say, No offense to you, but I just dont like it when a woman does the weather. Knowing that there hadnt been a female forecaster in the market for quite some time before her arrival, Cole said the comments were difficult to receive. I remember feeling crushed and even second guessed myself at times, but I just kept showing up and doing the best job I could, she said. About six months into the job, some of those emailers actually reached back out to apologize for their remarks. FOX61 news director Richard Washington said in a statement that Frank "provided life-saving information to our viewers during our coverage of Tropical Storm Henri. "While so many appreciated her dedication, as is typical with social media, she also received hurtful and hateful comments," he wrote. "FOX61/CW20 doesnt tolerate this type of online behavior and fully supports Rachel and all of the journalists who work to serve the greater good of our communities." While he said he and the station "won't be making any further comment" on the matter, state meteorologists offered additional words of support for their fellow forecaster and for those looking to get into the field. Cole said she tries to focus on the kind comments she gets. My skin has grown thicker over the years, despite the rise of social media and the easy ability to type a comment and click send, she said. But for every negative comment, there seems to be a hundred good ones, so I try and focus on that instead. Field said he advises up-and-coming forecasters to pause before answering any naysayers. Listen, but do not react immediately once you send, it's out there for eternity, he said. I always strived to win over my critics and in many cases, I did. Even though it's "not as easy or as glamorous as people think, Baylor said she and her fellow TV meteorologists love what they do, and she urged future meteorologists to not get caught up in criticism. You cant go after all of them, and often, theyre looking for a fight youll drive yourself insane, she said. True viewers and fans will be supportive and back you when someone gets out of line. Persevere, and stay excellent. RICHMOND, Va. (AP) Gov. Ralph Northam's administration received notification Wednesday that the Department of Defense had authorized the use of Marine Corps Base Quantico to house Afghan refugees, as well as a national guard installation in central Virginia. Fort Lee, an Army training site in Virginia, was already housing immigrants who recently fled Afghanistan. Over the coming weeks, capacity at Quantico and Fort Pickett in Nottoway County will build to support about 5,000 and 10,000 people, respectively, according to an email a senior Northam administration official received and shared with The Associated Press. We welcome these refugees, no matter how long or short they are here," said Billy Coleburn, the mayor of Blackstone, which neighbors Fort Pickett. An email seeking further comment from the Department of Defense wasn't immediately returned. U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger, whose district includes Fort Pickett, said her office was requesting additional information from Biden administration officials about the plans and how they will impact the area. Since the Taliban seized the Afghan capital on Aug. 14, about 82,000 people have been airlifted from Afghanistan. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may still be awaiting evacuation. And untold thousands of at-risk Afghans are struggling to get into the Kabul airport. As of Wednesday morning, more than 8,600 evacuees have arrived in the U.S. through Virginia's Washington Dulles International Airport, according to figures provided by Grant Neely, a communications advisor for Northam. U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said at a community event Wednesday that officials were looking for additional airports to serve as entry points because Dulles was getting overwhelmed," according to a transcript of his remarks provided by his office. At the airport Wednesday, a steady trickle of evacuees made their way from a holding area, where their papers were processed and they were tested for COVID-19. They were then put on waiting buses that would take them to the Dulles Expo Center or other temporary sites. Some said they had been waiting a day or more at the airport. In contrast with other international arrivals passing through customs with loads of luggage on carts, the evacuees often have had few or no belongings at all. Neely wrote in an email that military flights and buses were providing transportation to take evacuees who are not U.S. citizens or green card holders to military installations for further processing toward their final destination. U.S. citizens were passing through immigration and customs and being offered assistance for such things as temporary lodging and travel, he said. Virginia agencies and local governments were helping with the logistical efforts. The Virginia Department of Health was testing everyone arriving without documentation of a negative COVID test in the last 72 hours, Neely said. Of the more than 900 tests done Tuesday, 11 people tested positive, he said. Fairfax and Loudoun counties were providing isolation and quarantine space for U.S. citizens who test positive as needed, according to Neely. The state and defense departments were handling those accommodations for noncitizens. The evacuees were also being offered vaccines against the coronavirus and taking them at a higher rate than Virginians, Warner said. Northam said in an interview Wednesday that he was proud of the state's efforts. Northam and his wife, Pam, also described the conditions at Fort Lee, where they both recently visited but press access has not been allowed. They said the refugees were being provided adequate, culturally sensitive accommodations with access to medical care and space for recreation and worship. "As you might imagine, logistically, its a major challenge. But they're handling it well," Northam said of the efforts at Fort Lee. ____ Associated Press writer Matthew Barakat contributed to this report. FORT PIERRE, S.D. (AP) South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg pleaded no contest Thursday to a pair of misdemeanor traffic charges over a crash last year that killed a pedestrian, avoiding jail time despite bitter complaints from the victims family that he was being too lightly punished for actions they called inexcusable. Circuit Judge John Brown had little leeway to order jail time. Instead, he fined the state's top law enforcement official $500 for each count plus court costs of $3,742. Brown also ordered the Republican to do a significant public service event in each of the next five years near the date of Joseph Boevers death granting a request from the Boever family. But he put that on hold pending a final ruling after Ravnsborgs attorney objected that it was not allowed by statute. Ravnsborg said in a statement after the hearing that he plans to remain in office. The plea capped the criminal portion of a case that led Gov. Kristi Noem a fellow Republican and law enforcement groups around the state to call for his resignation. But he still faces a likely lawsuit from Boever's widow and a potential impeachment attempt. Ravnsborg's statement accused partisan opportunists of exploiting the situation and said they had manufactured rumors, conspiracy theories and made statements in direct contradiction to the evidence all sides agreed upon. Noem, in a statement afterward, pushed the Legislature to consider impeachment and said she ordered the House speaker be given a copy of the investigative file. Impeachment proceedings halted in February after the judge barred state officials from divulging details of the investigation. Lawmakers indicated then that they might resume after the criminal case ended. The attorney general was driving home to Pierre from a political fundraiser on Sept. 12 when he struck Boever, who was walking on the side of a highway. In a 911 call after the crash, Ravnsborg was initially unsure about what he hit and then told a dispatcher it might have been a deer. He said he didnt realize he struck a man until he returned to the crash scene the next day and discovered the body of Boever, 55. Ravnsborg pleaded no contest to making an illegal lane change and using a phone while driving, which each carried a maximum sentence of up to 30 days in jail and a $500 fine. Prosecutors dropped a careless driving charge. Ravnsborg didn't attend the hearing he didn't have to and was represented by his attorney, Tim Rensch. That angered Boever's family. Why, after having to wait nearly a year, do we not have the chance to face him? Boever's sister, Jane Boever, asked the court. She said his cowardly behavior leaves us frustrated. She said her brother was left behind carelessly the night he died. She accused Ravnsborg of running down her brother and then using his position and resources to string the case along. She said he has shown no remorse, and only arrogance toward the law. Jane Boever called the punishment a slap on the wrist. Our brother lay in the ditch for 12 hours, she said. This is inexcusable. Boever's widow, Jennifer Boever, said Ravnsborgs actions are incomprehensible and cannot be forgiven. Rensch pushed back hard on the familys criticism, calling the attorney general an honorable man. Rensch said Ravsnborg had been consistent from the beginning that he simply did not see Boever. And he noted that the case was not a homicide case, and its not a manslaughter case." Accidents happen, people die. It should not happen. No one wants anybody to die, he said. Rensch told reporters after the hearing that Ravnsborg had cooperated fully with investigators by sitting down for two interviews and allowing his phones to be analyzed. Basically just take your shirt off and say, Here I am, bring it on. Ill answer anything youve got, and thats what this guy did, Rensch said. Beadle County State's Attorney Michael Moore, one of the prosecutors, agreed that the attorney general had been cooperative. He was also satisfied with Ravnsborg's punishment and the crash investigation. Because of who it was and the high profile nature of the case, the investigation was a lot more thorough, he said. After a months-long probe led to prosecutors charging Ravnsborg with the three misdemeanors in February, Noem put maximum pressure on Ravnsborg to resign, releasing videos of investigators questioning him. They revealed gruesome details, including that detectives believed Boever's body had collided with Ravnsborg's windshield with such force that part of his eyeglasses were deposited in the backseat of Ravnsborg's car. Prosecutors said Ravnsborg was on his phone roughly one minute before the crash, but phone records showed it was locked at the moment of impact. Ravnsborg told investigators that the last thing he remembered before impact was turning off the radio and looking down at the speedometer. A toxicology test taken roughly 15 hours after the crash showed no alcohol in Ravnsborgs system, and people who attended the fundraiser said he was not seen drinking alcohol. Ravnsborg adamantly denied doing anything wrong. He insisted he had no idea he hit a man until returning to the crash site and that he is worthy of remaining the states top law enforcement officer. Joes death weighs heavily on me and always will, Ravnsborg said in his statement. Ive often wondered why the accident occurred and all the things that had to have happened to make our lives intersect. Ravnsborg's insistence on remaining in office has opened a divide among Republicans, with him retaining support among some GOP circles. The attorney general has been spotted working booths for local Republican groups at county fairs in recent weeks. But popular predecessor Marty Jackley is already running for his old job and has collected the support of most of the states county prosecutors. Political parties will select candidates for attorney general at statewide conventions next year. Ravnsborg built his political rise on personal connections in the party. It was his dutiful attendance at local GOP events like the one he was returning from when he struck Boever that propelled him from being a party outsider to winning the Republican nomination for attorney general in 2018. Boever's family said they hope Ravnsborg is driven from office one way or another. It is not too late for the state Legislature to resume impeachment proceedings, Jane Boever said. And if they fail us, then its left to the voters of South Dakota to remove him from the ballot box. Daytona Beach, FL (32114) Today Cloudy skies this evening followed by isolated thunderstorms overnight. Low 73F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%.. Tonight Cloudy skies this evening followed by isolated thunderstorms overnight. Low 73F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%. You are the owner of this article. Thank you for reading! Please purchase a subscription to read our premium content. If you have a subscription and are still unable to access our content, please link your digital account to your print subscription If you have a subscription, please log in or sign up for an account on our website to continue. Pune: Maruti chairman R.C. Bhargava and TVS Motor chairman Venu Srinivasan hit out at government decision-makers for levying high taxes on vehicles at the same level as luxury cars and not making them affordable to spur growth of the automobile industry, the third largest employer in the country. The demand for vehicles is unlikely to revive as buyers are finding it difficult to buy cars and two-wheelers due to the continuous increase in costs and no respite in taxes, Bhargava and Srinivasan, two of India's biggest names from the industry, said. "The rates of GST are more than double in India, compared to the EU, Japan or the US, and given the lower income levels in India, the question of affordability comes in," Bhargava, chairman at Maruti Suzuki. "GST is not the only thing. States have this one-time road tax, which takes the tax rate to 37-38 per cent on cars. Do we need the kind of high taxes we have? I don't think the automobile market is going to revive," he rued. He spoke at the 61st annual convention of the Society of Indian Automobile Manufactur-ers, or Siam. "The Centre and states must reconsider high taxes on automobiles. Green mobility will not take off unless we address the question of affordability. We haven't seen any action on the ground to reverse the decline of the auto industry. India is not looking at incomes, paying capacity and job creation while making mobility plans," Bhargava drove home the point. Automobile volumes in FY21 pushed the industry back by six years, according to Siam data. FY21 volumes for passenger vehicles were the lowest since FY16 and two-wheeler volumes the lowest since FY15. Sales of commercial vehicles in FY21 were the worst in 11 years, while for three-wheelers, they were the lowest in 19 years. "Is the automotive sector being recognised for what it has contributed to the environment, to revenues, and to foreign exchange earnings? And that is the question Mr Bhargava raised," Venu Srinivasan, CMD at TVS Motor Company, said. India's two-wheeler industry is the worlds largest. The vehicle is considered a family necessity than a luxury. But being taxed (GST) at the same level as luxury cars. "The price of the moped has gone up by 45-50 per cent. GST on two-wheelers is the same as a luxury-level product but is a basic mode of transportation. The switch to BS6, cost of ABS, Supreme Court ruling on mandatory purchase of three-year insurance, and a one-time tax have pushed prices of two-wheelers higher," Srinivasan added. Tarun Bajaj, taking note of the concerns, advised Siam to do an analysis on the reasons behind the downturn in the sector. "Siam should do a deeper analysis and come back with what changes you require, he said. New Delhi: Amid fall in state revenue and GST collection in view of COVID-19 crisis, Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj S Bommai on Thursday demanded the Centre to extend the GST compensation period to states beyond 2022, for three more years. After a meeting with Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Bommai said he also discussed the GST (Goods and Services Tax) dues to the tune of Rs 11,000 crore to be paid to Karnataka in installments. "The dues that were to be paid from July 2022 are being advanced through installment from this year. Along with this, I discussed extending the GST compensation to states beyond 2022," he told reporters after the meeting. In the meeting, the CM informed Sitharaman that the state GST collection has not yet stabilised in view of COVID-19 crisis, and it would be more helpful in this ongoing revenue crisis if the GST compensation to states is extended for three more years. Karnataka is one of the best performing states since the enactment of GST in 2017. "However, the COVID crisis since the last financial year has brought the state revenue collection down including the GST collections," he said in a representation made to the FM. Keeping in mind the revenue crisis in all states, the Centre had provided the GST compensation loan for the 2020-21 fiscal and it has also been extended for the current fiscal. "However, the compensation loan would support the states for only the current financial year, but the impact made by the COVID on revenue collection will be carried forward for next few years also. So, it will take time for GST revenue collection to reach the protected amount," he said. "I request you to kindly reconsider the state's request on extending the GST compensation," the CM stressed. In the meeting, Bommai -- who is also a member of the GST Council -- also flagged that the 15th Finance Commission in its final report for 2021-26 recommended reduction in Karnataka's share in tax devolution to 3.647 per cent, as compared to 4.71 per cent recommended by 14th Finance Commission. Since Karnataka has seen the steepest cut of 23 per cent because of the reduction in the devolution share, he requested the FM to reconsider the criteria of horizontal devolution for sharing of resources between the states. The CM also informed that the state government had submitted an additional memorandum to the Commission in this regard. But the Commission has not considered the state's request. "This has severely impacted Karnataka compared to other southern states," he noted. The CM also brought to the notice of the FM that the central government has not considered the 15th Finance Commission recommendation to award state specific grants of Rs 6,000 crore to Karnataka for holistic improvement of water bodies of Bengaluru and for Peripheral Ring Road. "... the government of India in its explanatory memorandum has not considered the Finance Commission's recommendation. This would be a set back to the state which is already strained due to severe cuts in tax devolution," he said. Bengaluru, the IT and start-up hub of the country, has a major contribution to the services sector of the national economy. And the city has further potential to attract more investments if the critical infrastructure is improved, he said. That apart, the NABARD assistance given to different groups including SC and ST women, Self Help Groups and for infrastructure purposes-- was also discussed in detail with the FM, he added. Bommai on the second day of his visit to Delhi is also scheduled to meet Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya and Commerce and Food Minister Piyush Goyal. Only 3.7 percent government school students got admission in fisheries, 4.89 percent in agriculture and less than 1 percent in the National Law University in Tiruchirappalli, he added. (PTI Photo) Chennai: The Tamil Nadu government on Thursday set apart 7.5 percent reservation on preferential basis to the state government school students for their admissions to engineering, agriculture, veterinary, law and other professional degree courses offered in government, aided and private institutions in the State. The quota bill, introduced in the assembly by Chief Minister M K Stalin, applies to the students who have studied in state run schools from sixth to 12th standard and gives effect to the recommendation of the commission under chief justice of High Court, Delhi, justice D Murugesan. Piloting the bill seeking to provide 7.5 percent reservation to government school students on preferential basis in admission to professional courses, similar to the 7.5 percent horizontal reservation for state government students in medical college admission brought out in the past, the CM said the government school students were unable to secure admission in professional courses, as they could not compete with their counterparts from private schools, owing to the socio-economic disparity. Over the years, fewer students from the state government schools got admitted to the professional courses. During 2020 21, a mere 0.83 percent government students were admitted to the Anna University, 6.31 percent in government institutions, 0.44 percent in aided engineering colleges while 3 percent got admission in Veterinary course, he said. Only 3.7 percent government school students got admission in fisheries, 4.89 percent in agriculture and less than 1 percent in the National Law University in Tiruchirappalli, he added. The opposition AIADMK had welcomed the Tamil Nadu Admission to Undergraduate Professional Courses on a preferential basis to students of Government Schools Act, 2021, at the introductory stage. The justice Murugesan commission, formed to assess and analyse reasons for less intake of government school students in engineering and other professional courses, in it findings said the students being in a disadvantageous position, require more facilities to pursue their school education and preferential treatment in joining various professional courses. Considering the socio-economic condition, disadvantage suffered and the past enrolment of government school students, the commission recommended that not less than 10 percent of seats in engineering, agriculture, veterinary, fisheries, law and other professional courses may be set apart to provide preference in admission to them, the commission had said. It is evident from the commission's report that there exists de facto inequalities between the government school students and the private school students. The government after careful examination of the recommendation of the commission has decided to take affirmative action so as to bring about real equality between the students who studied in government schools and in private schools, be setting apart certain percentage of seats on preferential basis, to the students who studied from sixth to twelfth standard in the state government schools in the admission to engineering and other professional degree courses, the statement of objects and reasons of the Bill, said. The bill was later unanimously passed by the House. MYSURU: A 21-year-old MBA student, belonging to Uttar Pradesh, was allegedly gangraped by four unidentified persons Tuesday evening at a newly developed and unoccupied residential layout near Lalithadripura village close to Chamundi Hills here. Her friend was attacked with stones leaving him injured. According to a media statement, the two were chatting in the layout when the boy was suddenly attacked by four persons. Although he resisted their attack, he was pelted with stones leaving him badly bruised and unable to rescue his friend. The four persons dragged the girl and raped her. Gathering energy, the victims went to a private hospital and alerted their friends. The four fled from the spot on two-wheelers. A complaint was lodged at Alanahalli police station on Wednesday morning. DCP Pradeep Gunti, ACP Shashidhar and others inspected the scene of crime and registered a case. Commissioner of police Chandragupta told presspersons that separate teams have been formed to nab the culprits. Minister for cooperation Somashekar said that he has asked police officials to initiate steps to prevent such incidents in the future. A senior DGCA official confirmed that the ban on 737 Max planes' commercial flight operations has been lifted on Thursday. (AFP Photo) New Delhi: India's aviation regulator DGCA on Thursday lifted the ban on Boeing 737 Max planes' commercial flight operations after almost two-and-half years. On March 13, 2019, all Boeing 737 Max planes were grounded in India by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) after the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max plane on March 10 near Addis Ababa which had left 157 people, including four Indians, dead. Currently, in India, only SpiceJet airline has Boeing 737 Max aircraft in its fleet. The budget carrier, in a statement on Thursday, said it expects to start operations of Max planes around the end of September, subject to regulatory approvals. Aircraft manufacturer Boeing has been modifying the 737 Max plane since March 2019 so that various countries' regulators, including the DGCA, permit its commercial flight operations again. The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) had in October last year declared the Max aircraft safe to fly. A month later, US aviation regulator FAA cleared Max aircraft to fly. In its order dated August 26, 2021, the DGCA said that since the orders issued by FAA and EASA in October and November last year, it "has been closely monitoring the global trend with regard to un-grounding" of 737 Max planes. Total 34 airlines across the world have operated 1.22 lakh flights using 345 Max aircraft -- since the plane was un-grounded in late last year -- without "untoward reporting", India's aviation regulator said. Therefore, the DGCA stated that the operation of Boeing 737 Max planes in India are permitted "only upon satisfaction of applicable requirements for return to service". A senior DGCA official confirmed that the ban on 737 Max planes' commercial flight operations has been lifted on Thursday. The March 10, 2019 accident near Addis Ababa was the second in a period of five months. On October 29, 2018, a 737 Max plane operated by Lion Air had crashed in Indonesia, killing 180 people. On March 13, 2019, SpiceJet had to ground 12 Max planes, forcing it to cancel a significant number of flights on that day as well as on the next day. Jet Airways also had five Max planes in its fleet but they were already grounded as on March 13, 2019 due to non-payment of dues to the lessors. A month later, the full-service carrier had shut down its operations due to lack of funds. In March 2019 itself, several countries grounded 737 Max planes. According to Boeing's statement in April 2019, the preliminary report of Ethiopian Accident Investigation Bureau contained flight data recorder information indicating that the Ethiopian Airlines' aircraft had an erroneous sensor that activated the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) function during the flight, just like what happened during the Lion Air 610 flight on October 29, 2018. MCAS was designed to automatically push the nose of the plane downward whenever it's activated. Hyderabad: Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao has decided that the state government would attend the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) meeting scheduled on September 1. The state government has been skipping the KRMB meetings since July after the hydel power generation row at irrigation projects on Krishna erupted between Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. The Chief Minister has directed the irrigation officials to put forth their strong arguments about the rightful share of Telangana in Krishna water. The Chief Minister also guided the officials on the strategy to be adapted on the matter. He held a review meeting with officials at Pragathi Bhavan here on Wednesday on the agenda of the KRMB meeting. Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar, irrigation special chief secretary Rajat Kumar, Chief Ministers secretaries Smita Sabharwal, Bhoopal Reddy, irrigation engineer-in-chief Muralidhar, Chief Ministers officer on special duty Sridhar Rao Deshpande, former advocate general Ramakrishna Reddy, senior advocate with Brajesh Kumar Tribunal Ravinder Rao and other officials were present. Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Minister reiterated that strong arguments should be put forth before the KRMB and other tribunals about the legal share of Krishna water of the state. He has directed the officials to put forth their arguments effectively with authoritative information. New Delhi: The government has forwarded nine names recommended by the Supreme Court collegium for appointment of judges in the top court to the President for final approval and a call is expected to be taken "shortly", sources in the government said on Thursday. With a sanctioned strength of 34 judges, the Supreme Court as of now has ten vacancies. In a first, the Supreme Court Collegium had last week recommended for appointment to the apex court three women judges, including Justice B V Nagarathna who will be in line to be the first woman Chief Justice of India (CJI) in September 2027 if she gets the final nod. Besides Justice Nagarathna, the third senior-most judge of the Karnataka High Court, the other women judges whose names have been recommended are Justice Hima Kohli, the Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court, and Justice Bela M Trivedi, the fifth senior-most judge of the Gujarat High Court. Justice Kohli retires on September 1. Asked what if her warrant of appointment could not be issued before that date, the sources said such a situation may not arise. While high court judges retire at the age of 62, the retirement age of Supreme Court judges is 65. They said a final call on the elevation of the nine names recommended would be taken "shortly". Once the names are cleared their warrants of appointment will be issued and the government will then issue a notification announcing the decision. Besides them, names of Justice C T Ravikumar of the Kerala High Court, and Justice M M Sundresh of the Madras High Court were recommended by the Collegium. Senior advocate and former Additional Solicitor General P S Narasimha, whose name if cleared, would became the sixth lawyer to be elevated to the apex court bench directly from the Bar. The chief justices of different high courts whose names have been recommended are Justices Abhay Shreeniwas Oka (Chief Justice of the Karnataka High Court), Vikram Nath (Chief Justice of the Gujarat High Court) and Jitendra Kumar Maheshwari (Chief Justice of the Sikkim High Court). deputy commissioner of police (traffic) L. S. Chauhan said that, depending on the response from visitors and commuters they will improve the plan. (DC Image) Hyderabad: A day after minister for municipal administration and urban development (MA&UD) K. T. Rama Rao responded to a twitter query regarding curbs on traffic movement on Tank Bund during Sunday, the Hyderabad traffic police came up with an action plan. The traffic police are experimenting to implement restrictions on Tank Bund route starting from Sunday (August 29) so that visitors can enjoy the beautiful view of Tank Bund. Briefing the media about traffic restrictions on Tank Bund, Hyderabad city police commissioner said, "Following the request from the minister for urban development, we are imposing traffic restrictions in the coming Sunday. Accordingly, we will ensure citizens enjoy the scenic view of Tank Bund." Explaining the traffic restrictions on Tank Bund, deputy commissioner of police (traffic) L. S. Chauhan said, "Coming Sunday, we will impose restrictions on the movement of vehicles and divert traffic from 5 am to 10 pm to either Lower Tank Bund or Necklace Road. After 10 pm, there won't be any restrictions." He further added, We will ensure there is 200 meters parking space on both the sides of Tank Bund. From Ambedkar statue, we will divert traffic to Lower Tank Bund and ensure 200 meters of parking space for visitors of Tank Bund. On the other side, we will divert the traffic at the sailing club and ensure a 200 meters parking area till the children's park. Depending on the response from visitors and commuters, we will improve the plan, said Chauhan. Amaravati: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy reached Shimla on Thursday, on a five-day trip with family, to celebrate the silver jubilee of his wedding. Jagan's wedding anniversary is on August 28. Though the initial plan was to visit London and Paris, it was dropped due to the prevailing Covid-19 situation and Reddy finally settled for Shimla, sources in the Chief Minister's Office said. He left by a special flight to Chandigarh, from where the family flew by a helicopter to Shimla. He will return to the state on August 30, the sources said. New Delhi: There is a national sentiment on Afghanistan and Indias long term interest is friendship for the Afghan people that will continue to guide it, external affairs minister S. Jaishankar told the 37 parliamentary floor leaders belonging to 31 political parties here Thursday, in an indication that New Delhi is digging in for the long haul following the takeover by the Pakistan-backed Taliban. It is banking on its goodwill among the Afghan people due to the massive development work done by India in that country over the past two decades. The minister said New Delhis immediate concern and task is evacuation and that India had undertaken evacuation operations in extremely difficult conditions, especially at Kabul airport. On Thursday, an Indian Air Force special flight evacuated 24 Indian nationals and 11 Nepalese from Kabul to New Delhi, taking the total number of people evacuated by India to 565, including Indians, Afghans and other nationalities like Nepalese. Sources said Mr Jaishankar told the MPs that evacuation challenges at Kabul airport included frequent firing incidents near the airport and inside Kabul, multiple checkpoints by various groups, landing permission delays, receiving overflight clearances by various countries, and the situation at Kabul airport itself. Sources said as per the latest evacuation data, the 565 persons evacuated by India included 175 Indian diplomats, 263 other Indian nationals, 112 Afghan nationals, including Afghan Hindus and Sikhs, and 15 foreign nationals such as Nepalese. Besides these, New Delhi has also facilitated evacuation of its nationals by friendly nations to destinations like Qatars capital Doha, from where they can fly back to India. The ministers comments at the briefing also indicate that New Delhi is making a distinction between the Afghan people, with whom India has strong ties, and the Taliban, who now rule over them. Sources said the MPs were informed that Indias priorities now also include assistance to Afghan nationals in distress, international humanitarian efforts and also New Delhis role at the UN in order to highlight the situation in the strife-torn nation. The briefing for the Parliamentary floor leaders was held after directions by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the external affairs ministry and was obviously aimed at evolving a national consensus and keeping the entire political spectrum, including the Opposition parties, in the loop after the Taliban takeover in the strife-torn nation. According to media reports, Mr Jaishankars briefing was attended by several key politicians, including Congress leaders Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Mallikarjun Kharge and Anand Sharma, NCP supremo Sharad Pawar, former PM and JD(S) supremo H.D. Deve Gowda and leaders from the DMK, TRS, TDP and other parties. Foreign secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla and Indias ambassador to Afghanistan Rudrendra Tandon, who was recently evacuated from there, were also present. After the meeting, Mr Jaishankar tweeted: Briefed the floor leaders of all political parties today on Afghanistan: 37 leaders from 31 parties attended. Thank them all. There is longstanding national sentiment on Afghanistan. Therefore, there is national concern now at developments. We are gathered with a national spirit. Our strong friendship with the people of Afghanistan is reflected in the more than 500 projects we have there. This friendship will continue to guide us. Indias footprint and activities naturally keep in mind the ongoing changes. The minister added: We have undertaken evacuation operations in extremely difficult conditions, especially at the airport. Our immediate concern and task is evacuation, and long-term interest is friendship for the Afghan people. MEA spokesman Arindam Bagchi tweeted: Op Devi Shakti in action! @IAF MCC flight with 24 Indian and 11 Nepalese evacuees from Kabul is on its way to Delhi. Sources said the MPs were informed by the MEA that the pre-emptive measures taken by India ahead of the Taliban takeover were the scaling down of the Indian embassy in Kabul in June, evacuation of diplomats from the southern Afghan city of Kandahar on July 10-11, evacuation of Indian diplomats from the Indian consulate in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif on August 10-11. It may be recalled India had ceased all diplomatic presence in Afghanistan and shut down its Kabul embassy soon after the Taliban takeover. As far back as April 2020, India-based personnel were temporarily withdrawn from the Indian consulates at both Herat and Jalalabad. The MPs were also told about the security advisories issued earlier by the government in the past two months advising Indian nationals to leave the strife-torn nation immediately. The sources also said the MPs were given details on the Special Afghan Cell established on August 16 to coordinate repatriation and other requests from Afghanistan in a streamlined manner. It was operational 24X7 for responding to requests over calls, emails and WhatsApp messages, and is being staffed by over 20 MEA officials. A total of 3,014 calls have been attended so far, 7,826 WhatsApp messages responded to, and 3,101 emails answered. New Delhi: A Supreme Court bench led by Chief Justice N.V. Ramana on Thursday decried a disturbing trend in India where police side with the ruling party. Police officers who want to be in the good books of the ruling party misuse power and harass political opponents, the CJI said. Holding police responsible for the trend, the SC asserted that police officers must stick to the rule of law. The SCs sharp message comes when there are wide-spread allegations of police targeting rivals and critics of the ruling party with politically-motivated probes, sedition and other charges. The observations came when the SC was hearing the plea of a Chhattisgarh cop who was suspended and charged with sedition. Gurjinder Pal Singh, a 1994 batch Indian Police Service (IPS) officer and former director-general of Chhattisgarh police, has requested the court to cancel FIRs charging him with corruption and conspiracy against the Chhattisgarh government. His allegation is that the states Congress government is hounding him as he was seen to be close to the BJP administration. Singh was initially booked in the disproportionate assets case following raids at his premises by states Anti-Corruption Bureau and Economic Offences Wing. Another case of sedition was invoked against him later on the grounds of his alleged involvement in promoting enmity and hatching a conspiracy against the government. Heading a bench also comprising Justice Surya Kant, CJI Ramana said, When cops are working and siding with the party in power then no sedition. But when the party is not in power, then the cops faces sedition charges. This is a very disturbing trend and the police department is also responsible for this. The top courts observations came as it protected Singh from arrest for four weeks in an alleged sedition case but asked him to co-operate with the investigation. Earlier, senior lawyer Mukul Rohatgi, representing the Chhattisgarh government, told the court that the former DGP was absconding and evading investigation. However, he was countered by senior counsel Fali Nariman, appearing for Singh, who said that once the charge-sheet has been filed where was the question of investigation. He said that on the contrary the charge-sheet has not been served on him. The court asked Chhattisgarh government to respond to both the petitions by the former director-general including one seeking transfer of the case to CBI. By Baiju Kalesh, Logistics & supply chain startup Delhivery, plans to file its draft prospectus as early as October for its Initial Public Offering (IPO) that could raise about $1 billion, people in the know said. The Delhi headquartered company, backed by SoftBank Vision Fund & Carlyle Group Inc., is targeting its D-Street debut before March next year, said the people, who asked not to be identified as the information is private. The offering could include both new & existing shares, one of the people said. Read | IPO bandwagon gets bigger; Aug sees 23 filings so far Delhivery was founded in 2011 & handles more than 1.5 million packages/day through its 43,000-strong team across India. It completed its Series H funding round in June led by Fidelity. It also counts Fosun International Ltd., Tiger Global and Times Internet Ltd. among its backers. Delhivery would add to a strong lineup of Indian startups that are ready to tap the IPO market in the coming months. Paytm, the countrys leader in digital payments, filed its preliminary offering documents last month and could raise as much as 166 billion ($2.2 billion). Flipkart, the Indian e-commerce giant controlled by Walmart Inc., and digital education startup Byju, are also preparing for their first-time share sales, Bloomberg News has reported. India's SpiceJet Ltd said on Thursday it has agreed to a settlement with Boeing Co's MAX aircraft lessor Avolon, paving the way for the 737 MAX jets to return to service. The airline said it expects to start operations of MAX aircraft around the end of September, subject to regulatory approvals. India's air safety regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation did not immediately respond to a request for comment. SpiceJet did not provide any further details on the settlement. "As India emerges from Covid-19 and air traffic picks up again, the MAX aircraft will play a major role in our future expansion," Ajay Singh, SpiceJet's chairman and managing director said. About 30 airlines and 175 countries have allowed the 737 MAX to return to service following a nearly two-year safety ban. The ban followed two crashes five months apart which killed 346 people, plunging Boeing into a financial crisis since compounded by the pandemic. Facebook has approached academics and policy experts about forming a commission to advise it on global election-related matters, said five people with knowledge of the discussions, a move that would allow the social network to shift some of its political decision-making to an advisory body. The proposed commission could decide on matters such as the viability of political ads and what to do about election-related misinformation, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the discussions were confidential. Facebook is expected to announce the commission this fall in preparation for the 2022 midterm elections, they said, though the effort is preliminary and could still fall apart. Outsourcing election matters to a panel of experts could help Facebook sidestep criticism of bias by political groups, two of the people said. The company has been blasted in recent years by conservatives, who have accused Facebook of suppressing their voices, as well as by civil rights groups and Democrats for allowing political misinformation to fester and spread online. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebooks chief executive, does not want to be seen as the sole decision-maker on political content, two of the people said. Facebook declined to comment. Read | Facebook unveils curbs for Taliban-seized Afghanistan If an election commission is formed, it would emulate the step Facebook took in 2018 when it created what it calls the Oversight Board, a collection of journalism, legal and policy experts who adjudicate whether the company was correct to remove certain posts from its platforms. Facebook has pushed some content decisions to the Oversight Board for review, allowing it to show that it does not make determinations on its own. Facebook has had a spotty track record on election-related issues, going back to Russian manipulation of the platforms advertising and posts in the 2016 presidential election. There are several elections in the coming year in countries such as Hungary, Germany, Brazil and the Philippines where Facebooks actions will be closely scrutinized. Voter fraud misinformation has already begun spreading ahead of German elections in September. In the Philippines, Facebook has removed networks of fake accounts that support President Rodrigo Duterte, who used the social network to gain power in 2016. There is already this perception that Facebook, an American social media company, is going in and tilting elections of other countries through its platform, said Nathaniel Persily, a law professor at Stanford University. Whatever decisions Facebook makes have global implications. The Taliban's unpredictable takeover of Afghanistan has ushered in a tumultuous second innings for the country, as the world watches the developments closely. Many countries have made key investments in Afghanistan, and China being a large stakeholder in the country is now actively evaluating its response as it seeks to protect its multi-billion dollar investments and infrastructure projects, including the Belt and Road initiative. Despite facing global condemnation of the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan, China was one of the first nations to quickly extend its support and acknowledgment of the new regime, which the Taliban has graciously welcomed. Also Read What happens to Afghanistans $1 trillion mineral resources? The fall of the Ashraf Ghani-led government in Afghanistan, backed by US military troops on Afghan soil since 2001, has revealed itself as an opportunity for China to step in America's shoes. What China fails to realise is that the US presence played an important role as a deterrent which protected the various investments made globally in Afghanistan, including that of China's. US President Joe Biden's decision to pull out US military troops spells chaos for Beijing too as China, over the years, has invested and raised huge infrastructure projects and has extended huge loans to Islamabad as part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), President Xi Jinping's star project in Asia, which seeks to rekindle the famed Silk road. Track latest updates from Afghanistan here The BRI is one of the most coveted projects of Jinping that requires active support of the South Asian countries, including Afghanistan. China's $282 billion investment as part of the BRI in Asia, Africa, Latin America and Europe is therefore now sitting at a precipice as the unhinged Taliban has once again taken over Afghanistan, which poses a major threat to the BRI project. Pakistan has been a major beneficiary of Chinese investments in Asia, but Beijing has started to raise concerns after the incident of bomb blast on a Chinese shuttle bus in northern Pakistan made news. The blast had killed nine Chinese engineers, who were working on the $4 billion Dasu hydroelectric dam. A month after the blast, Pakistan placed blame on the Taliban for the attack, claiming that Afghan soil was used for the incident. Such incidents serve as an example of what uncontrolled terror groups with enormous power can do in the disputed territories. lso Read 'Total failure': The war on terror, 20 years on The troubling aspect for China is the way the CCP and Jinping make key investment decisions in South Asia, which are mostly forward looking. Resultantly, China has shelled out large loans to countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan to secure its BRI dream. However, such a forward-looking strategy often falls on its head when regimes can change overnight in unstable territories, and China therefore willingly or unwillingly must extend its support to the Taliban, a group that by its very nature is highly erratic and poses a threat to all investments made in Afghanistan by countries globally. The Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) unplanned money shower in these disputed nations may possibly result in a blowback to the BRI, which further strains its own economy and its people as the nation is recovering from the devastating impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. Although the CCP has been quick to jump the gun and join hands with the Taliban by acknowledging their regime, the Taliban government 2.0 is an uncharted territory. China clearly undermined the importance of the 20-year-old US presence in Afghanistan. One superpower's exit may not necessarily be an opportunity for the supposed other. China now needs to carefully evaluate its support to the Taliban if it is to realise Jinping's ambitious Belt and Road Initiative. Sayed Sadaat used to be communications minister in the Afghan government before moving to Germany last December in the hope of a better future. Now he is a delivery man in the eastern city of Leipzig. He said some at home criticised him for taking such a job after having served in the government for two years, leaving office in 2018. But for him now, a job is a job. "I have nothing to feel guilty about," the 49-year-old said, standing in his orange uniform next to his bike. Read | Who will mentor the Taliban this time, Pakistan or Qatar? "I hope other politicians also follow the same path, working with the public rather than just hiding." His story has gained particular prominence with the chaos unfolding at home after the Taliban takeover. Family and friends of his also want to leave - hoping joining the thousands of others on evacuation flights or trying to find other routes out. With the withdrawal of US troops on the horizon, the number of Afghan asylum seekers in Germany has risen since the beginning of the year, jumping by more than 130 per cent, data from the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees showed. But even with his background, Sadaat struggled to find a job in Germany that matched his experience. With degrees in IT and telecom, Sadaat had hoped to find work in a related field. But with no German, his chances were slim. "The language is the most important part," said Sadaat, who also holds British citizenship. Every day he does four hours of German at a language school before starting a six-hour evening shift delivering meals for Lieferando, where he started this summer. "The first few days were exciting but difficult," he said, describing the challenge of learning to cycle in the city traffic. "The more you go out and the more you see people, the more you learn," he said. As the deadline for the US to evacuate troops inches closer, people in Afghanistan are scrambling to flee the country, fearing the rule of the Taliban. Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that over 82,000 people have been evacuated from the country. Twin suicide bombings struck outside Kabul's airport, where large crowds of people trying to flee Afghanistan have massed, killing at least 13 people. Stay tuned for live updates. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 US troops, Afghan and US officials said. The US general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen Frank McKenzie, head of US Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the US officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug 31. Read | Taliban condemn attack at Kabul airport The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, US President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the US out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the US military to develop plans to strike IS. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. US officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charity's manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. Read | At least 28 Taliban members among dead in Kabul airport blasts: Taliban official The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursday's attacks to happen. He said the US has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airport's perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britain's Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the group's rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. Even so, the airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people away.. From 3 am to 3 pm, Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban's freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting US ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the US Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. Check out DH's latest videos: The United States and allies urged people to move away from Kabul airport on Thursday due to the threat of an Islamic State terror attack as Western troops hurry to evacuate as many Afghans as possible before an Aug. 31 deadline. Pressure to complete the evacuations of thousands of foreigners and Afghans who helped Western countries during the 20-year war against the Taliban has intensified, with all US and allied troops due to leave the airport next week. In an alert issued on Wednesday evening, the US embassy in Kabul advised citizens to avoid travelling to the airport and said those already at the gates should leave immediately, citing unspecified "security threats". In a similar advisory, Britain told people in the airport area to "move away to a safe location". "There is an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack", the British Foreign Office said in its statement. Read | Who will mentor the Taliban this time, Pakistan or Qatar? Australia also urged its citizens and visa holders to leave the area, warning of a "very high threat of a terrorist attack" at the airport. The warnings came against a chaotic backdrop in the capital, Kabul, and its airport, where a massive airlift of foreign nationals and their families as well as some Afghans has been underway since the Taliban captured the city on Aug. 15. While Western troops in the airport worked feverishly to move the evacuation as fast as possible, Taliban fighters guarded the perimeter outside, thronged by thousands of people trying to flee rather than stay in a Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. Ahmedullah Rafiqzai, an Afghan civil aviation official working at the airport, said people continued to crowd around the gates despite the attack warnings. "It's very easy for a suicide bomber to attack the corridors filled with people and warnings have been issued repeatedly," he told Reuters. "But people don't want to move, it's their determination to leave this country that they are not scared to even die, everyone is risking their lives." A NATO country diplomat in the Afghan capital said that although the Taliban were responsible for security outside the airport, threats from Islamic State could not be ignored. "Western forces, under no circumstances, want to be in a position to launch an offensive or a defensive attack against anyone in Afghanistan," the diplomat added. "Our mandate is to ensure evacuations end on Aug. 31." Another Western official said flight operations had slowed on Wednesday but the pace of evacuations would hasten on Thursday. Taliban guards continue to protect civilians outside the airport, an official of the Islamist group said. Read | What is the Islamic State threat in Afghanistan? "Our guards are also risking their lives at Kabul airport, they face a threat too from the Islamic State group," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The White House said President Joe Biden was briefed on Wednesday about the threat from the ISIS-K militant group as well as contingency plans for the evacuation. Biden has ordered all troops out of Afghanistan by the end of the month, to comply with an agreement with the Taliban, despite European allies saying they needed more time to get people out. In the 11 days since the Taliban swept into Kabul, the United States and its allies have mounted one of the biggest air evacuations in history, bringing out more than 88,000 people, including 19,000 in the past 24 hours. The US military says planes are taking off the equivalent of every 39 minutes. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at least 4,500 American citizens and their families had been evacuated from Afghanistan since mid-August, and the State Department was reaching out to about 1,500 who remained there. Blinken told a news conference in Washington there was no deadline for the effort to help people who want to leave, both Americans and others, and that it would continue for "as long as it takes." The US military said it would shift its focus to evacuating its own troops in the final two days before the Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline. The Taliban have said foreign troops must be out by the end of the month. They have encouraged Afghans to stay, while saying those with permission to leave will still be allowed to do so once commercial flights resume after the foreign troops go. The militant group has asked NATO member Turkey to help keep the airport open after foreign troops leave. Turkey said technical experts might remain to help operate the airport. The United Nations is leaving some 3,000 Afghan staff at its mission. A U.N. security document reviewed by Reuters described dozens of incidents of threats, the looting of U.N. offices and physical abuse of staff since Aug. 10. The Taliban's 1996-2001 rule was marked by public executions and the curtailment of basic freedoms. Women were barred from school or work. The US-backed Afghan government collapsed swiftly after Biden withdrew the troops, two decades after US-back forces had ousted the Taliban in the weeks following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, planned from Afghan territory by al Qaeda. While the Taliban have said they will respect human rights and not allow terrorists to operate from the country, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told NBC News there was "no proof" that Osama Bin Laden, the late al Qaeda chief, was involved in the 9/11 terror attacks on New York and Washington. "There is no evidence even after 20 years of war, we have no proof he was involved ... There was no justification for this war," he said. President Joe Biden has favoured the Taliban against US' traditional friends and allies, a top Republican leader has alleged, slamming the government's Afghan policy. The president's misguided decisions run the risk of creating the largest international hostage situation we have ever faced as a nation, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy told reporters at a Capitol Hill press conference on Wednesday. Ripping apart the Afghan policy of the Biden administration, McCarthy said the president has ruined Americas reputation on the world stage, not for a week, but for decades to come. Our own allies are criticising us...asking us to extend the (August 31 withdrawal) deadline so they can get their own citizens home, not for any other reason, he said. The allies that we have fought for years together, he (Biden) said no, and yes to the Taliban. So, no, none of that would have happened under a different administration. And, yes, that was a failure, one of the biggest failures I watched from a foreign policy in my lifetime. It is going to do a lot of damage to us, not just in the short run, but a long run, McCarthy said. What does China believe now about Taiwan? What does Russia think about the Baltics or the Eastern Europe? And not only when you talk, Jake, about the base, think of the location of where it is. The president talks about looking over, having eyes ahead of time, that base proximity to Russia, to China, to Pakistan; the idea of terrorists coming again from Afghanistan, he said. A day earlier, McCarthy said, Biden made the decision not to shift the August 31 deadline to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan, even though some of America's strongest allies like France, Britain and Germany requested for it. Think for one moment, why is the UK and France, and Germany there? he asked. Because 20 years ago, America was attacked. They were there to help defend us and they requested us stay, to go longer so their own citizens could get removed. The president now made the announcement that he will not, allowing the Taliban to direct our foreign policy, McCarthy said. And now, with the very real prospect of thousands of Americans still stranded in Afghanistan on September 1, the Biden administration is willing to accept the fact that they'll be leaving Americans behind in a Taliban stronghold, he added. McCarthy said the US is less safe today than it was 20 years ago based upon the actions that have just taken place. Allowing Taliban to control our foreign policy, weaponising them, reports now that they have more Black Hawks than Australia. From the aircraft to the drones to weaponry. They have more support than they had before just from their own military buildup of the weapons that they've taken from America. Now, a border that is open and the fear of what the future holds, he said. Canada has ended evacuations from Kabul's airport, a Canadian general said on Thursday, as the clock ticks down on dramatic Western efforts to help people flee the Taliban takeover ahead of a full American withdrawal. General Wayne Eyre, the country's acting chief of Defence Staff, said all the other countries have to leave the airport before the Americans can wrap up their mission. Canadian military flights evacuated about 3,700 people. "We stayed in Afghanistan for as long as we could. We were amongst the last to cease evacuation operations. We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone who was so desperate to leave. That we could not is truly heartbreaking, but the circumstances on the ground rapidly deteriorated," Eyre said. Read more: 'Italian military plane fired at as it left Kabul airport' US President Joe Biden has said he is sticking to his August 31 deadline for completing the US pullout as the Taliban insisted he must, ramping up pressure on the already risky airlift from Kabul to get out as many people as possible in the coming days. Canada and European allies pressed for more time but lost the argument, and as a practical matter they may be forced to end their evacuations a couple of days before the last American troops leave. Several countries haven't said yet when they plan to end their operations, perhaps hoping to avoid yet another fatal crush at an airport that's one of the last ways out of the country. The Taliban wrested back control of Afghanistan nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a US-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks. Their return to power has pushed many Afghans to flee, fearing reprisals from the fighters or a return to the brutal rule they imposed when they last ran the country. Canada was one many countries taking part in the evacuation of people facing Taliban reprisals from Kabul's airport. Over 1,000 refugees are in Canada now. Canada has plans to resettle 20,000 Afghan refugees. The US has so far evacuated over 82,000 people from Kabul, with about 19,000 in the last 24 hours alone, in "one of the largest" airlifts in the world history, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said. Starting on August 14, the day when the Taliban toppled the US-backed Afghanistan government, there were 6,000 American citizens in the war-torn country who wanted to leave. Over the last 10 days, roughly 4,500 of these Americans have been safely evacuated along with their immediate family members, Blinken told reporters here on Wednesday. Since August 14th, more than 82,300 people have been safely flown out of Kabul. In the 24-hour period from Tuesday to Wednesday, approximately 19,000 people were evacuated on 90 US military and coalition flights. Only the US could organise and execute a mission of this scale and this complexity, he said. Blinken said, "This is one of the largest airlifts in history, a massive military, diplomatic, security, and humanitarian undertaking." Read | Taliban strengthened access and control around Kabul airport: Pentagon "Over the past 24 hours, weve been in direct contact with approximately 500 additional Americans and provided specific instructions on how to get to the airport safely," he said, adding that the US is aggressively reaching out to the remaining roughly 1,000 contacts. Noting that the US is operating in a hostile environment in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban, with the very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack, the secretary said the US is taking every precaution, but this is very high-risk. The US is "on track" to complete its mission by August 31 provided the Taliban continue to cooperate and there are no disruptions to this effort, Blinken said, adding that President Joe Biden has also asked for contingency plans "in case he determines that we must remain in the country past that date". But let me be crystal-clear about this: There is no deadline on our work to help any remaining American citizens who decide they want to leave to do so, along with the many Afghans who have stood by us over these many years and want to leave and have been unable to do so. That effort will continue every day past August 31," he asserted. Blinken said the Taliban have made public and private commitments to provide and permit safe passage for Americans, third-country nationals and Afghans at risk going forward past August 31. The US, our allies and partners, and more than half of the worlds countries 114 in all issued a statement making it clear to the Taliban that they have a responsibility to hold to that commitment and provide safe passage for anyone who wishes to leave the country not just for the duration of our evacuation and relocation mission, but for every day thereafter, he said. We are developing detailed plans for how we can continue to provide consular support and facilitate departures for those who wish to leave after August 31. Our expectation the expectation of the international community is that people who want to leave Afghanistan after the US military departs should be able to do so. Together we will do everything we can to see that that expectation is met, Blinken said. By Sudhi Ranjan Sen and Eltaf Najafizada, The Talibans military takeover of Afghanistan was swift and decisive. Forming an inclusive government to avoid another civil war is proving to be much harder. The militant group has been holding meetings in Kabul with Hamid Karzai, the first president after the US invasion, and Abdullah Abdullah, No. 2 in the ousted administration, after leader Ashraf Ghani fled the country earlier this month. The Talibans membership is drawn largely from the majority ethnic Pashtun population, which is most dominant in the southern part of the country. Read | 'Total failure': The war on terror, 20 years on Despite having the upper hand now, the Taliban realises any stable governing formation will need to include influential warlords and representatives from ethnic Uzbeks, Tajiks and Hazaras. Without that, the country risks falling into the same sort of internal conflict that erupted in the 1990s. Here are the leaders the Taliban needs to have on board: Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Former Prime Minister, 72 The former prime minister of Afghanistan and leader of the once powerful Hizb-e-Islami political party is a long-time survivor in Afghan politics. Once part of the Mujahideen fighters who were trained by the US during the Cold War era to fight the Soviet Union in the 1980s, Hekmatyar has been both an ally and an enemy of the Taliban over the last 25 years. He has been sanctioned by the US as a specially designated global terrorist. After US and NATO troops arrived in Afghanistan in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, he supported suicide attacks on coalition troops and had close links with Al Qaeda. In a recent interview he supported a dialogue and elections to decide the next Afghan government, and hes currently participating in discussions with Taliban leaders. Hekmatyars deep and well-established links with Pakistans intelligence agencies make him a crucial player. Hamid Karzai, Former President, 63 Hamid Karzai is now at the negotiating table with the same people who once wanted to kill him. As the world watched the country descend into chaos -- with the Taliban entering Kabul, and his successor Ghani fleeing -- Karzai posted a short video message announcing his resolve to stay in the country. Even though the message had little impact on the unfolding chaos in Kabul, it was especially powerful because he appeared with his young daughters. During his time as president, Karzai who has studied in India, fell out with the US over its use of drones and his refusal to sign a security pact that wouldve let US troops stay beyond 2014. Read | Hailing Taliban is condemnable Abdulllah Abdullah, Former CEO, 60 For the doctor-turned-politician, events in Afghanistan have come full circle. He was once an adviser to the leader of the Northern Alliance, Ahmad Shah Massoud, who fought the Russians and the Taliban. Now Abdullah, an ethnic Tajik, is negotiating a peaceful transfer of power with the Taliban. Striking peace deals in Afghanistan isnt easy and few know this better than Abdullah. He leads the High Council for National Reconciliation, which was expected to lead the now-dead intra-Afghan peace talks. Abdullah ran for president twice and came very close to victory in 2014. A dispute over the results prompted former Secretary of State John Kerry to fly in and broker a power-sharing deal between Ghani and Abdullah. Abdul Rashid Dostum, Warlord and Former Vice President, 67 The Uzbek warlord leader is another Afghan political veteran who has switched allegiances several times over four decades of fighting. He was a big part of the Northern Alliance, which fought the Taliban when they were last in power from 1996 to 2001. Dostum backed Ghanis government and was vice president for six years from 2013. He has been accused of war crimes, including mass killings and ordering the rape of a political rival, all of which he has denied. He spent several years in Turkey on health grounds, though rivals accused him of trying to escape facing justice in Afghanistan. Dostum flew back to Afghanistan just as the Taliban was making rapid territorial gains, and he was expected to defend the iconic northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif from the militants. But the city fell as swiftly as the rest of country, forcing Dostum to flee. Its unclear where he is currently. Amrullah Saleh, Former Spy Chief and Vice President, 48 The former vice president of Afghanistan declared himself the legitimate caretaker president when former president Ghani fled the country. Saleh, who joined Ghanis government in 2017 as interior minister and also led Afghanistans intelligence agency, has survived multiple assassination attempts by the Taliban, including one last September. Saleh is in the northern Panjshir valley, his stronghold. He appears to have teamed up with Tajik leader Ahmad Massoud, who has vowed to fight the Taliban. Ahmad Massoud, Rebel Leader, 32 The son of the slain Tajik Mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud could emerge as the face of the resistance against the Taliban. But that depends on whether he gets substantial help from overseas. In an op-ed in the Washington Post last week, the UK-educated Massoud wrote that his fighters were prepared to once again take on the Taliban. Still, he added that their stores of weapons and ammunitions would run out unless our friends in the West can find a way to supply us without delay. Massoud is currently in talks with the Taliban, which have sent fighters around his stronghold in Panjshir province north of Kabul. Ata Mohammad Noor, Provincial Leader, About 57 Ata Mohammad Noor, an ethnic Tajik leader, has been involved in wars in Afghanistan since the Soviet invasion and was among the Talibans fiercest enemies. He was governor of the northern Balkh province, the most prosperous in Afghanistan, until he was removed by Ghani in 2018. As the provincial capital of Mazar-e-Sharif fell to the Taliban, Noor fled along with his one-time rival Dostum. Earlier this year as the Taliban gained momentum, Noor was one of the first to call for new militias and a peoples uprising to fight the militants. On Twitter, Noor alleged the surrender of the Afghan forces was part of a larger organized and cowardly plot and he vowed to fight on. He is currently in Uzbekistan. Mohammad Karim Khalili, Hazara Leader, About 71 The former vice president is a prominent figure from the minority Hazara ethnic group. Khalili was part of the delegation of senior Afghan politicians who went to Pakistan after the Talibans Aug. 15 takeover of Kabul. In a Facebook post last week, he said he hoped the Talibans top leadership would form a stable political order. The future of Afghanistan depends on it, he said. With assistance from Archana Chaudhary. The Taliban stopped an Afghan United Nations staff member as he tried to reach Kabul airport on Sunday. They searched his vehicle and found his UN identification. Then they beat him. On Monday, three unknown men visited the home of another UN staff member who was at work at the time. They asked his son where his father was, and accused him of lying: "We know his location and what he does." The incidents are among dozens contained in an internal UN security document seen by Reuters that describes veiled threats, the looting of UN offices and physical abuse of staff since August 10, shortly before the Taliban swept to power. While the Islamist militant movement has sought to reassure Afghans and Western powers that they will respect people's rights, reports of reprisals have undermined confidence, not least among those associated with foreign organisations. The Taliban did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the UN incident list. Also read: 'Taliban a Pakistani project, not going to be a permanent phenomenon in Afghanistan' The group has said it would investigate reported abuses, and has also encouraged aid organisations to continue their work. It said this week that aid was welcome, as long as it was not used as a means of political influence over Afghanistan. The United Nations said it did not comment on leaked security documents. UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric added: "The authorities that are in charge in Kabul are responsible for the safety and security of UN staff and premises. We remain in touch with them in that regard." The United Nations has relocated about a third of the 300 foreign staff it had in Afghanistan to Kazakhstan. It has also stressed that it wanted to maintain a presence to help the Afghan people. There are around 3,000 Afghan UN staff still in the country. A UN spokesman has said the world body was in contact with other countries to urge them to provide visas or support temporary relocation of some of them. Also read: Pak project is to submerge Af in a larger radical Islamist identity Thousands of people have fled Afghanistan since the Taliban entered Kabul on August 15, boarding military and commercial flights from the capital where the airport has been the scene of deadly chaos. Some fear a return to the Taliban's brutal enforcement of strict Islamic law last time they ruled, when they banned women from work and girls from school. Others, including those who work in advocacy and human rights, believe they could be the target of reprisals after scores of people were killed in suspected targeted Taliban attacks in the last year. 'We are in danger' An Afghan woman, who has worked for the United Nations for several years, told Reuters she felt abandoned. "Every woman I know has the same fear as I do. What will now happen to our children if we are punished for our work? What will happen to our families? What will they do to us as women?" she said, speaking on condition of anonymity. In a video message to staff in Afghanistan on Tuesday, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was distressed by reports that some had experienced harassment and intimidation. "We are doing everything in our power, namely through the permanent engagement with all relevant actors, and will continue to do so to ensure your safety and well-being, and to find external solutions where they are needed," Guterres said. An August 21 UN risk assessment, reported by Reuters on Tuesday, said there was "no coherent command and control" within the Taliban. The speed of their military victory, which coincided with US-led foreign troops withdrawing after 20 years of war, has left a power vacuum, and the group is scrambling to form a government in Kabul and the provinces to run the country. Also read: Kolkata teacher surprised with Talibans 'polite' behaviour; doesnt want to return to Kabul An Afghan UN worker, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters he knew of at least 50 Afghan staff warned or threatened by the Taliban, adding: "UN national staff who are under serious direct threat of the Taliban must be evacuated." He said the threats were not all necessarily linked to people's status at the United Nations, but were a function of the Taliban's push to impose control over Kabul. A second Afghan woman who works at the United Nations has been moving houses with her husband and 3-year-old daughter in the past 10 days. Some of her neighbours knew she worked at the United Nations, and she worried they might inform on her. She has a visa for a neighbouring country, but is frustrated that the United Nations has not helped her evacuate. "We were expecting the entire UN system to help us. We were honestly expecting that," the woman said. "We are in danger. And if we cannot work, who is going to reach the people?" Twenty years ago, US president George W. Bush declared a "war on terror". Today, its failure is undeniable, with jihadist groups both more numerous and scattered more widely across the world. Bush launched the war on terror after the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York and Washington which were plotted from Afghanistan by Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who was sheltered by the Taliban regime of the time. The US-led invasion of Afghanistan toppled the Taliban and degraded the capabilities of Al-Qaeda, but it did nothing to eradicate the causes of violent Islamic extremism at its roots, analysts say. "They managed to kill Bin Laden," said Abdul Sayed, a researcher on jihadism based at Lund University in Sweden, referring to the killing of the Al-Qaeda chief by US special forces in Pakistan in 2011. "But if the goal was to end transnational jihadism, then it's a total failure," he said. Read | Hailing Taliban is condemnable Today, jihadist terrorism has transformed into a more global threat, posed by disparate groups and individuals around the world. Though the United States, and the broader Western world, has seen no attack on the scale of 9/11 in subsequent years, analysts say that should not be used to claim the "war on terror" has been a success. "The objectives that it set for itself were unachievable. Terrorism cannot be defeated. The threat is constantly evolving," said Assaf Moghadam, senior researcher at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Israel. The Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) estimated in 2018 that the number of active terror groups was 67, its highest level since 1980. The number of fighters varied between 100,000 and 230,000, a 270-percent increase over the 2001 estimates. A watershed event was the emergence of the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria which was hostile to Al-Qaeda and whose influence grew as that of the bin Laden network waned following his death. Read | 'Afghanistan mustn't become gathering place for terror' Given the vast resources devoted to it, the outcome of the war on terror has been disastrous, partly due to factors seen by some as major errors, notably the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq that ousted Saddam Hussein. "It did allow AQ (Al-Qaeda) to resurrect itself, which laid the ground for the Islamic State to emerge," said Seth Jones, director of the international security program at CSIS. Experts say the strategy relied on head-on confrontation without sufficiently taking into account the breeding grounds of jihadism -- war, chaos, bad governance, corruption. "Conflicts like the one in Syria can radicalise and mobilise thousands of militants in a short time period and there is little the outside world can do about it," said Tore Hamming, a fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation. "Arguably the biggest problem is not military," Hamming said. "One of the strongest mechanisms to prevent recruitment to Islamic militancy is providing people better alternatives. Weapons do not do that." The nature of the threat has transformed since 9/11 when jihadist terror essentially meant Al-Qaeda under the charismatic leadership of bin Laden. But then IS emerged and various branches pledging allegiance to IS or Al-Qaeda. The geographic spread of the jihadist threat has also changed. The groups were limited to the Middle East but they are now also common throughout Africa, most of the Arab world as well as in South and Southeast Asia. The links between these jihadist groups are loose, their relations with their leaderships often weak. And local grievances usually prevail over international ambitions. According to Moghadam, some terror figures have now "become serious political actors". "You're not just talking about a small number of people that we can put on the terrorism watchlist." "The threat has metastasised. You have a greater number of regimes in geographically dispersed places facing challenges of violent extremism." Africa has become the new battleground for jihadism in the Sahel region and Maghreb, Somalia and Libya, Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of Congo. "It is very clear it has moved from the Middle East to Africa and I don't think it was anticipated," said Brenda Githing'u, a Johannesburg-based counter-terrorism expert. "It's a failure in forecasting the emergence of a new battleground and in considering the potential Africa has in terms of a new jihad," she added. But times have changed for the West as well. While in 2001 it was clear that terrorism was enemy number one of the United States and its allies, tensions have since grown with Iran, Russia and above all China. "The US has shifted its priorities from countering terrorist groups overseas to dealing with the Chinese first, then the Russians and the Iranians," said Seth Jones. "There is a huge debate in the US intelligence community about whether there should continue to be a shift away from countering terrorism, both collecting intelligence and targeting strikes, against AQ and IS." Neither Al-Qaeda nor IS may have the means to stage attacks in the West in the near future like those against Paris on November 13, 2015 that were claimed by IS. But the police and intelligence services are faced with so-called "lone wolves" and other isolated militants, often from the country they strike, radicalised on the internet and who kill blindly, in the name of a jihadist group, with a knife, a gun or a vehicle. And the future threat may not always come from Islamist radicals drawing inspiration from the Middle East but from extreme right-wingers and white supremacists who look no further than the West. "Tackling right-wing extremism is likely going to be an even greater challenge for the United States because there are significant pockets of support," said Moghadam. "There is a certain degree of tolerance and sympathy in the West to the ideas." Britain's Foreign Office on Wednesday advised against all travel to Afghanistan, adding the security situation in the country remained volatile, with a "high threat of a terrorist attack". "The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) advise against all travel to Afghanistan. You should not travel to Afghanistan", the Foreign Office said in an advisory. "The security situation in Afghanistan remains volatile. There is an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack", the statement added. The advisory also urged not to travel to the Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. "If you are in the area of the airport, move away to a safe location and await further advice", it said. All non-essential operations at the British Embassy in Kabul in response to the deterioration in the security situation were suspended earlier and the embassy was relocated. Read | China eyes Afghanistans $1 trillion of minerals with risky bet on Taliban Foreign Minister Dominic Raab said that the deadline for evacuating people was up to the last minute of the month. The United Kingdom has already evacuated thousands of people from Afghanistan. The Taliban seized power in Afghanistan earlier this month from a US-backed government, sending thousands fleeing and potentially heralding a return to the militants' austere and autocratic rule of two decades ago. Western nations rushed to complete the evacuation of thousands of people from Afghanistan on Wednesday as the Aug. 31 deadline for the withdrawal of foreign troops drew closer with no sign that the country's new Taliban rulers might allow an extension. In one of the biggest such airlifts ever, the United States and its allies have evacuated more than 70,000 people, including their citizens, NATO personnel and Afghans at risk, since Aug. 14, the day before the Taliban swept into the capital Kabul to bring to an end a 20-year foreign military presence. The government has forwarded nine names recommended by the Supreme Court collegium for appointment of judges in the top court to the President for final approval and a call is expected to be taken "shortly", sources in the government said on Thursday. With a sanctioned strength of 34 judges, the Supreme Court as of now has ten vacancies. In a first, the Supreme Court Collegium had last week recommended for appointment to the apex court three women judges, including Justice B V Nagarathna who will be in line to be the first woman Chief Justice of India (CJI) in September 2027 if she gets the final nod. Besides Justice Nagarathna, the third senior-most judge of the Karnataka High Court, the other women judges whose names have been recommended are Justice Hima Kohli, the Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court, and Justice Bela M Trivedi, the fifth senior-most judge of the Gujarat High Court. Also Read Justice Nagarathna likely to be first woman CJI in 2027 Justice Kohli retires on September 1. Asked what if her warrant of appointment could not be issued before that date, the sources said such a situation may not arise. While high court judges retire at the age of 62, the retirement age of Supreme Court judges is 65. They said a final call on the elevation of the nine names recommended would be taken "shortly". Once the names are cleared their warrants of appointment will be issued and the government will then issue a notification announcing the decision. Besides them, names of Justice C T Ravikumar of the Kerala High Court, and Justice M M Sundresh of the Madras High Court were recommended by the Collegium. Senior advocate and former Additional Solicitor General P S Narasimha, whose name if cleared, would became the sixth lawyer to be elevated to the apex court bench directly from the Bar. The chief justices of different high courts whose names have been recommended are Justices Abhay Shreeniwas Oka (Chief Justice of the Karnataka High Court), Vikram Nath (Chief Justice of the Gujarat High Court) and Jitendra Kumar Maheshwari (Chief Justice of the Sikkim High Court). More than two years after grounding it, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Thursday lifted the ban on Boeing 737 Max planes' commercial flight operations. The ban was imposed on 13 March 2019 after the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max plane on March 10 near Addis Ababa killed 157 people, including four Indians and another crash involving Lion Air flight in October 2018, which killed 180 people. The DGCA said in its order that the operation of Boeing 737 Max planes are permitted "only upon satisfaction of applicable requirements for return to service". Boeing has been modifying the 737 Max plane since March 2019 so that various countries' regulators, including the DGCA, permit its passenger flight operations again. At present, only SpiceJet airline in India has Boeing 737 Max aircraft in its fleet. In March 2019, SpiceJet had to ground 12 Max planes. In a related development, SpiceJet announced that it has entered into a settlement with Avolon, a major lessor of MAX aircraft, paving the way for the airlines 737 MAX aircraft to start to return to service. The airline expects to start operations of MAX aircraft around the end of September 2021 subject to regulatory approvals, an airline statement said. Ajay Singh, Chairman and Managing Director, SpiceJet, said, "as India emerges from Covid and air traffic picks up again, the MAX aircraft will play a major role in our future expansion. With a better and a more efficient fleet back in operation we expect a significant reduction in our operating costs improving our bottom line." With Kerala witnessing a fresh spike in Covid-19 cases, Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla on Thursday asked the state government to impose night curfew in areas of high positivity and curb mass gatherings during the festive season. Bhalla reviewed the Covid-19 situation in Kerala and Maharashtra the two states that continue to report high numbers of Covid-19 cases at a time when the pandemic appeared to have ebbed in other parts of the country. The Home Secretary, during a virtual meeting with top officers from the two states, asked them to make more efforts to arrest the increase in infections. Of the 46,164 fresh coronavirus cases recorded in the country on Thursday morning, 31,445 were in Kerala and 5,031 in Maharashtra. Read | Centre considering reduction of gap between two doses of Covishield Bhalla suggested stepping up contact tracing, vaccination drives and Covid appropriate behavior in geographical areas having higher infection. He also suggested that the state governments should explore the possibility of placing night curfew in areas of high positivity. Bhalla assured the states that the Centre was ready to provide more vaccine doses to the states, if required. However, efforts must be made to consume the vaccine doses received. Also Read | Celebrate festivals with caution, second Covid-19 wave not yet over: Centre Bhalla advised that events with potential of having mass gatherings during the coming festive season must be avoided and testing must be ramped up in areas where positivity rates were on the higher side. Focus should also be placed over the next few months to suppress the levels of transmission of the virus so that the chain of transmission can be controlled more effectively, a Home Ministry spokesperson said. Besides Bhalla, V K Paul, Member (Health), NITI Aayog, Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan, Sujeet Singh, Director, National Centre for Communicable Disease and Chief Secretaries and Directors General of Police of Kerala and Maharashtra attended the meeting. Antarrashtriya Hindu Parishad chief Pravin Togadia on Thursday urged the central government not to give shelter to any Muslim national from Afghanistan, but said it should open the borders for the Hindu and Sikh refugees from that country. Speaking to reporters on his arrival at the airport here ahead of his three-day visit to Nagpur-Wardha region, he claimed that India is facing the biggest threat as it is a "centre of Taliban ideology", and asked the government to put restrictions on three Islamic organisations to prevent "Talibanisation" of the country's future. Read more: 'Kabul airport blast kills at least 13, including children' "India should not open its borders for the Muslim nationals from Afghanistan. India should give shelter to all Hindu and Sikhs from that country," he said. "Taliban is an ideology and the centre of this ideology is in India...The government should put restrictions on Darul Uloom Deoband, Tablighi Jamaat and Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind. These are the centres of Taliban ideology. India is now facing the danger of terrorism and the country should work together to tackle this. The government should restrict these three outfits to avoid Talibanisation of India's future," he added. To a query on Ram temple in Ayodhya, Togadia praised former Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) chief Ashok Singhal, Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray and former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Kalyan Singh, saying that these late leaders were "three heroes of independent India". India is expected to bring back around 180 people from Kabul in a military aircraft on Thursday amid a scramble by various countries to evacuate their citizens before the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of American troops from the war-ravaged country, people familiar with the developments said. Those being evacuated include Indians and a number of Afghan Sikhs and Hindus, they said. The aircraft carrying around 180 people is likely to reach Delhi on Thursday morning, said one of the people cited above. Under its mission 'Operation Devi Shakti', India has already evacuated over 800 people in view of the rapidly deteriorating security situation in Kabul after it was captured by the Taliban on August 15. Read | 'Taliban agree to let Afghans leave after August 31' Thousands of Afghans have been crowding around the Kabul airport for over a week, in a desperate attempt to flee the country fearing the Taliban's brutality. On Wednesday, several G-7 leaders requested US President Joe Biden to extend the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of American troops. However, Biden said the US is trying to stick to the timetable. "We are currently on a pace to finish by August the 31st. The sooner we can finish, the better. Each day of operations brings added risk to our troops," he said. In the last few days, India has stepped up efforts to evacuate its citizens as well as its Afghan partners from Kabul in view of the deteriorating security situation in the Afghan capital and other parts of the country. Read | How many people in Afghanistan need to be rescued? On Tuesday, 78 people, including 25 of its nationals and a number of Afghan Sikhs and Hindus, were airlifted to Delhi from Dushanbe, a day after they were evacuated from Kabul to the Tajik city. India evacuated 392 people including two Afghan lawmakers in three different flights on Sunday. The Taliban seized control of Kabul on August 15. Within two days, India evacuated 200 people, including the Indian envoy and other staffers of its embassy in the Afghan capital. The first evacuation flight brought back over 40 people, mostly staffers at the Indian embassy on August 16. The second aircraft evacuated around 150 people, including Indian diplomats, officials, security personnel and some stranded Indians, from Kabul on August 17. India has been carrying out evacuation missions in coordination with the US and several other friendly countries. Speaking at a think-tank, US Indo-Pacific Command Admiral John Aquilino said that there has been close cooperation between India and the US Central command in evacuating people from Afghanistan. He said the US is committed to ensuring the safe evacuation of all its citizens as well as those from its partner countries. Personnel from the US central command have been handling the security at the Hamid Karzai international airport in Kabul. Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Thursday claimed that Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray made his now-controversial comment about Yogi Adityanath because the latter garlanded a statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj while wearing footwear. Union minister Narayan Rane, who was arrested for a comment against Thackeray on Tuesday and later got bail, had alleged that Thackeray had said in the past that the Uttar Pradesh chief minister should be hit with a chappal (footwear). "The remarks were made a couple of years ago because Yogi Adityanath garlanded the warrior king (at a function) while wearing footwear. It is not in line with Maharashtra's culture," Raut told reporters here when asked about Rane's allegation. Also Read | Rane undermined Maharashtra's pride and prestige, his days in Union cabinet numbered: Shiv Sena "If the BJP feels it is okay to insult the legendary ruler....Is it okay?" he asked. "Was the BJP sleeping all these years? Don't they know how to respect people?" the Rajya Sabha member added. On Rane's statement that the BJP-led Union government will not allow Maharashtra to "become West Bengal," Raut asked who was Rane to say so. "A Union minister is not the Centre. If there is any communication to be had, we will have it with the PM," he said. BJP leader Rane was arrested on Tuesday from Maharashtra's Ratnagiri district following his remark that he would have slapped Thackeray for what he claimed as the latter's ignorance of the year of India's independence. His comments had set off protests by Shiv Sena workers. Subsequently, BJP leaders sought registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against chief minister Thackeray over his past remark about Adityanath. The Election Commission on Thursday unveiled a new initiative to reach out to new voters by sending them a personalised letter along with their voter identity card. Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar launched the initiative. The new voters will get a personalised letter from the Commission when they are sent their voter identity cards. The package would include a voter guide for new voters along with a congratulatory letter and a pledge for ethical voting, the Commission said in a statement. The initiative was launched during a two-day SVEEP (Systematic Voters Education and Electoral Participation) consultation workshop. The agenda of the workshop was to review state SVEEP plans and conduct extensive deliberations on the important aspects of SVEEP for a comprehensive strategy for the forthcoming assembly elections. Addressing the participants, Chandra observed that each voter interacts with the election machinery at two critical stages -- enrollment and polling day. He stressed that the field teams should ensure that the enrolment process is seamless and polling experience remains pleasant and hassle free for the voters. He said it is imperative that we evaluate our strategy and current interventions at regular intervals, identify critical gaps and address the challenges to devise deliverable action points. The CEC emphasised that implementation of the strategy at the ground level is important. Election Commissioner Kumar said the need for communication is self evident in today's world. He highlighted the role of social media and the new mediums of communication in outreach efforts. He felt partnering with district level local icons will help strengthen our messaging with our voters. Election Commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey, while interacting with the teams on the previous day, highlighted the importance of synergy between the use of social media and traditional forms of communication in the SVEEP strategy. Pandey said that the state teams should further conduct similar workshops and deliberations with district electoral officers and their teams in respective states. The two-day consultation workshop was attended by chief electoral officers and SVEEP nodal officers from Goa, Punjab, Manipur, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand which are ging to polls early next year. To broaden the idea and knowledge exchange, senior officers from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting were also invited for the workshop. Systematic Voters' Education and Electoral Participation programme is the flagship programme of the Election Commission for voter education and awareness, spreading voter awareness and promoting voter literacy in India. Uttar Pradesh minister Baldev Singh Aulakh has written to Union Home Minister Amit Shah urging him to resettle Hindus and Sikhs displaced from Afghanistan in Rampur district of the state. "Hindu and Sikh families displaced from Afghanistan are being brought to India by the government. I sincerely request you to settle them in Rampur there will be no inconvenience," Minister of State for Jal Shakti Aulakh said in his letter to Shah on Wednesday. Track latest updates from Afghanistan here "The residents of Bilaspur are ready to give land in Tehsil Bilaspur in Rampur district... Agricultural land will also be made available for the displaced Hindu and Sikh families," the minister, who is an MLA from Bilaspur, said. Hindus and Sikhs settled in Afghanistan have fled the country after its takeover by the Taliban. The government of India undertook a massive evacuation exercise to airlift Hindus, Sikhs and natives from the neighbouring country passing through a phase of volatile uncertainty for its people. Also Read All Afghans must travel to India only on e-visa: MHA India had on August 17 announced that it will issue an emergency e-visa to Afghan nationals who want to come to the country in view of the prevailing situation in Afghanistan. All Afghans, irrespective of their religion, can apply for the 'e-Emergency X-Misc Visa' online and the applications will be processed in New Delhi. Uttar Pradesh Minister Kapil Aggarwal, who is facing three criminal cases, on Thursday surrendered before a special court here and was granted bail. Aggarwal, the minister of state for vocational education and skill development, was booked in two cases of violation of prohibitory orders in New Mandi Police Station area and Kotwali Police Station area in 2016 and a case pertaining to disrupting rail services in 2012. However, charges were framed against the BJP MLA from Muzaffarnagar in one of the cases wherein he took out a roadshow in Kotwali Police Station area and violated prohibitory orders. Police had booked several BJP activists, including Aggarwal, under relevant sections of the law. Special judge Gopal Upadhyay granted bail to Aggarwal on furnishing two sureties of Rs 20,000 each and fixed September 8 as the next date for further hearing. Uttar Pradesh will drop legal proceedings against farmers accused of burning crop waste, a major source of pollution, as the Bharatiya Janata Party tries to placate growers ahead of elections next year to the state assembly. The action comes at a time when some states have stepped up punishments for crop residue burning to avert an expected spike in air pollution that brings smog every year during the low temperatures of winter. Uttar Pradesh is also considering waiving fines imposed on farmers, an influential voting bloc, for burning crop stubble. Read more: Farmers' national convention to mark 9 months of protest begins at Singhu border "The idea was not to punish farmers but to spread awareness about crop stubble burning and its effect on the environment," Navneet Sehgal, the top official in the state's information department, told Reuters. Shiv Kant Dixit, chief of the Bharatiya Kisan Sangh, or Indian Farmers' Federation affiliated to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's BJP, said it had urged the state to withdraw legal cases against farmers for crop residue burning. "About 10,000 farmers have been slapped with cases for stubble burning," Dixit said. The UP government is looking to mollify angry farmers ahead of the state assembly election, said Sudhir Panwar, the chief of a farmers' group, Kisan Jagriti Manch. For more than eight months, tens of thousands of farmers have camped on major highways to the capital, New Delhi to oppose new farm laws, in the longest-running growers' protest against Modi's government. The election in Uttar Pradesh, which sends 80 lawmakers, or more than any other state, to parliament in New Delhi, is often seen as a barometer of the popularity of the federal government. BJP is expected to pull out all the stops to hold on to the state. The Supreme Court on Thursday ordered immediate shifting of promoters of real estate company Unitech Sanjay Chandra and Ajay Chandra from Tihar jail to Arthur road jail and Taloja jail in Mumbai respectively, expressing serious displeasure over the charge that they are operating from the prison. A bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and M R Shah directed that both the accused would not be provided with any kind of additional facility in the Arthur road jail and Taloja jail. The court also pulled up the Tihar Jail authorities for "shamelessly" acting in connivance with Unitech Directors Sanjay Chandra and Ajay Chandra in engaging in illegal activities by flouting the jail manual, rules and statute, "dissipating proceedings, and derailing the investigation in the case". Also Read | Unitech founders operated 'secret underground office' from jail, ED tells Supreme Court The court also directed the Delhi Police Commissioner to start a detailed inquiry forthwith against the concerned Tihar jail officials, who connived with the two accused persons and sought a report within four weeks. The court passed its order after the Enforcement Directorate alleged two Unitech promoters were found allegedly operating from inside the Tihar jail and they were allegedly carrying out their work and various other transactions from there. The accused brothers were arrested by the Delhi Police's Economic Offices Wing (EOW) in March 2017 after receiving many complaints of cheating and duping homebuyers. The Patiala House Court had in 2015 passed the order of registering the FIR (First Information Report) against the Chandras. The FIR was registered after a complaint filed by a homebuyer in connection with the Anthea project in Gurugram. Several homebuyers approached the police after flats were not handed over to them within the stipulated deadline despite having paid money to the company. The Supreme Court on Thursday expressed its concern over a "disturbing trend" of police officials aligning with a political party in power, later getting targetted with criminal cases when another regime comes into office. "When a political party is in power, police officials side with it... then, when a new party comes into power, the government initiates action against those officials. This is a new trend, which needs to be stopped," a bench presided over by Chief Justice N V Ramana said. The bench, also comprising Justice Surya Kant, further pointed out that this was a very disturbing trend in the country and the police department was also responsible for it. The top court made these observations while granting protection from arrest to a suspended senior ADG rank-officer, Gurjinder Pal Singh, against whom two criminal cases -- sedition and amassing disproportionate assets -- have been filed by the Congress-led Chhattisgarh government. The top court directed the police not to arrest Singh in the cases for now. However, it directed Singh to cooperate with the agencies in the ongoing investigation. Senior advocate F S Nariman appeared for the suspended police officer and senior advocates Mukul Rohatgi and Rakesh Dwivedi appeared for the state government. The city police have registered a sedition case against Singh based on a written complaint filed by the anti-corruption bureau, which reportedly seized alleged documents from him, which indicated a conspiracy against the government. The top court directed the state government to file its reply to the two separate petitions within four weeks and asked the police not to arrest Singh in the meanwhile. Check out DH's latest videos: Delhi Universitys decision to remove works of two Dalit authors from Tamil Nadu from its syllabus kicked up a political storm in the state on Thursday with Chief Minister M K Stalin issuing a strong statement asking authorities not to view everything from the prism of politics of communalism. Stalin demanded that the University and the Union Government immediately restore the works in its curriculum. He also said the decision to remove the works of certain authors by the Oversight Committee (OC) despite objections from the Academic Council (AC). The works of Sukhartharini and Bama were removed. Sukhartharini, one of the writers whose work was removed along with renowned author Mahasweta Devis short story, said she was not surprised at the development. I am not surprised at all. I would only be surprised if my works continue to be part of the syllabus. I think this is what has been happening for a long time. I think caste has played a role in this decision, Sukhartharini said. She also said it was for the people for whose consumption writers pen their books to raise their voices against such actions. In a statement, Stalin said the habit of viewing works of people who speak for womens rights and fight for the emancipation of the downtrodden through the prism of politics of communalism. I request the management of the university and the Union Government to ensure that the removed works be added to the curriculum immediately, Stalin said. Lok Sabha MP and VCK chief Thol Thirumavalavan, a prominent Dalit leader, expressed shock at the development. Removing works of prominent writers from the syllabus of universities is shocking and more so when it involves writers from the Dalit community. I hope the order is withdrawn, Thirumavalavan said. Vilified by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party for its high Covid-19 cases, Kerala's apparent poor record may actually hold crucial lessons for the country in containing the outbreak as authorities brace for a possible third wave of infections. The opposition-ruled, densely populated state is currently reporting the most number of coronavirus cases in the country and accounts for the second-highest national tally - unflattering headline numbers that Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has seized upon as a reflection of bungled local leadership. However, a Reuters analysis of national and state data, and interviews with epidemiologists and Kerala health authorities paint a different picture. Also Read | Post-Onam, Kerala sees over 30,000 Covid-19 cases in a day It shows the state's containment measures have helped to catch infections early, allowing authorities to better manage the illness and dramatically lower the death rate - a stark contrast to people dying in carparks and outside hospitals for lack of oxygen and beds in big cities like Delhi at the height of the health crisis a few months earlier. "While the central government may have its views on rapid antigen tests, it is important to consider that the state's strategies have by and large succeeded in not just keeping mortality low but also in being able to detect one in six cases compared to one in 33 nationally," said Rajib Dasgupta, head of the Centre of Social Medicine & Community Health at New Delhis Jawaharlal Nehru University. The efficient detection rate and its population density at more than twice the national average explain the high number of cases in Kerala. All the same, at 0.5 per cent, Kerala still has the lowest fatality rate among all but one thinly populated state. The national figure is 1.4 per cent and it is 1.3 per cent for the country's Uttar Pradesh. The difference comes down to Kerala's reliance on rapid antigen tests to detect and strictly isolate infected people at home, an approach the federal health ministry has sharply criticised but which state officials argue has helped them to better allocate hospital beds and oxygen supplies for those who really need them. The government-recommended RT-PCR tests are more accurate but take longer to produce results, meaning by the time a positive Covid-19 case is confirmed the infected person is more likely to have developed severe symptoms and passed it on to others in a vicious cycle of more infections and deaths. Kerala's rapid test results allow for early treatment in home isolation which then narrows the virus' path to infections, state officials say. These factors, along with the strained medical resources across much of India, largely explain why the overall national death rate is much higher than in the Communist-run state. Kerala officials also say a state-run support service that includes phone consultation, provision of drugs and pulse oximeters that detect blood oxygen levels for people recovering at home provide a bulwark in the battle against the disease. Also Read | Kerala to study increasing breakthrough Covid-19 cases Delhi had a similar support structure but it collapsed when cases surged. "We do have a different model and our fatality rate shows our model is on the right track," Kerala Health Minister Veena George told Reuters. But Kerala officials acknowledge that the fast-evolving pandemic can undo even the best thought-out plans unless authorities remain nimble and flexible. A model to emulate? When Reuters recently visited Kerala's most populous Malappuram district, which is reporting the greatest number of infections in India, a quarter of the 344 Covid beds in its biggest hospital were vacant and oxygen supply was ample. The Indian Council of Medical Research has recommended lockdowns for districts where more than 10 per cent of the tests return positive results. The rate is about 15 per cent for Kerala and even higher in Malappuram, but shops and restaurants are open for business. Kerala officials argue that they are able to keep businesses open as the state has the best testing rate among Indian states - 86 tests per 100 people, compared with about 33 in Uttar Pradesh- meaning they are able to catch infections early and ensure timely treatment. The model, epidemiologists say, can be replicated in few other states with good health facilities, such as neighbouring Tamil Nadu. "Their surveillance is good, they detect cases early and their testing is very focused," MD Gupte, a retired director of the National Institute of Epidemiology who advises the central government on immunisations, said about Kerala. Also Read | Kerala's Covid surge pushes India's single-day coronavirus tally to 46,164, highest in nearly 2 months "Most people in Kerala are educated, so that helps." Indias daily demand for medical oxygen jumped more than eight times in May from pre-pandemic levels, but Kerala avoided major shortages of hospital beds and oxygen that crippled many states when nationwide infections saw an explosive surge. The federal health ministry did not respond to emails requesting comment. Vaccine Push State Health Minister George said the state was on course to administer at least one vaccine dose to all adults by next month, the fastest pace among all states. Currently, the state has covered more than 55 per cent of adults with at least one vaccine dose, compared with 48 per cent for the whole of India, which wants to vaccinate all its adults by December. Kerala, with 3.55 crore people, has so far reported 38 lakh infections, or 12 per cent of India's total of 3.25 crore. Its 19,757 deaths, however, account for only 4 per cent of the overall nationwide fatalities. The Indian government recommends 70 per cent of all Covid-19 tests be carried out by the RT-PCR method, while Kerala's rate is less than 50 per cent. "This is not the Kerala model, this is a model of mismanagement," BJP President Jagat Prakash Nadda, India's former health minister, said He said BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh had better managed the pandemic, though a government survey estimated in July that more than 70 per cent residents of both states had been exposed to the virus. The figure was 44 per cent for Kerala. Kerala's Covid-19 hospitalisation rate is only about 3 per cent, a state official said, compared with more than 5 per cent nationwide when cases peaked in May. TS Anish, a member of Kerala's Covid Expert Committee, said the state was now focused on vaccination. "If you are able to vaccinate large numbers, you will get infections but your health system will not be overwhelmed." Tamil Nadu government on Thursday announced setting up of a control room with a toll-free hotline and private email facility to receive complaints of sexual harassment and violence at schools, while an orientation module will be prepared to raise awareness about the POSCO Act among all stakeholders. The announcements were part of the policy note tabled by School Education Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi in the Assembly. The governments move comes months after teachers from several prestigious schools were accused of sexual misconduct with students during online classes and outside school hours. Poyyamozhi also said Child Abuse Prevention Week should be observed in all schools every year during November 15-22 and a Student Safety Advisory Committee will be set up in each school to monitor students safety and wellbeing. The control room will be set up at the Directorate of Public Instructions (DPI) campus in Chennai to receive complaints specifically pertaining to sexual harassment and violence at schools, from students, parents and others. An orientation module will be prepared for use by schools to raise awareness about POSCO Act among all stakeholders and to improve safety in schools, the minister said in the policy note. Among other measures is a self-audit module to be filled up by schools and the installation of safety boxes in school premises to enable students to lodge their complaints and feedback. The minister said 12 new primary schools will be opened and 22 schools will be upgraded in hilly and remote areas in the 2021-2022 academic year and added that an amount of Rs 20.76 crore is earmarked for establishing smart classrooms in 865 Government Higher Secondary Schools. Laying emphasis on inculcating reading habit among students, Poyyamozhi said dedicated library hours will be earmarked for every class and the same would be incorporated in the timetable of the respective class. Every student will be encouraged to borrow a book from the library every week. Activities like quiz, elocution, storytelling, essay writing, etc. will be introduced in the library hour, he added. On Kalvi TV, the minister said efforts are on to produce concept based videos instead of content-based videos, while much emphasis is being laid on enhancing the content telecast on the channel with the help of subject experts. In a significant development, an election petition filed by senior Congressman and former minority affairs minister Mohammed Arif Naseem Khan against now Shiv Sena MLA Dilip Lande would come up for hearing in the Bombay High Court on Friday. Khan is currently the working president of Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC). In the 2019 October Vidhan Sabha polls, Khan lost the Chandivali seat by a narrow margin of 409 votes against Lande. Khan, in his plea, has pointed out on 20 October, 2019, Shiv Sena president and now chief minister Uddhav Thackeray along with his close aide and now state transport minister Anil Parab and film actor Milind Gunaji had campaigned beyond the stipulated campaigning period. Polling in the state was held on 21 October, 2019. According to Khan's petition, a fake video was circulated showing him raising the slogan of Pakistan zindabad. The petition would be heard - for the first time - before a division bench headed by Justice SK Shinde. Khan had lodged a complaint against Lande, however, the Returning Officer did not take any action. The unlawful campaign during the prohibited 48 hours of elections by Thackeray with his large convoy and protection was against Election Commission norms. The aforesaid acts have resulted in an unlawful election process resulting in election of Lande by a margin of 409 votes, the petition states. Incidentally, the Shiv Sena and BJP contested the polls together. However, after the polls, the Shiv Sena forged an alliance with opposition NCP-Congress to keep BJP out of power and formed the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi government. Police have filed an extortion case against Mumbai Deputy Commissioner of Police Akbar Pathan and two other cops, one of them arrested for the killing of businessman Mansukh Hiran, on a complaint by a man who is an accused in a cheating case, an official said on Thursday. The complainant, Gurusharan Singh Chavan, faces a cheating case lodged at the Andheri MIDC police station in suburban Mumbai last year. He is one of the accused in a criminal case related to cheating people on the pretext of selling a "rice puller" metal device, claiming it had magical properties to pull rice out of grains, police said. The extortion FIR against Pathan and the two others was registered by the Amboli police on Wednesday on orders of the metropolitan magistrate's court in Andheri, the official said. The others named in the FIR are inspector Chimaji Adhav, who was earlier with the crime branch, and dismissed Assistant Police Inspector (API) Sunil Mane, arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in connection with the murder of Thane businessman Hiran, a case linked to the bomb scare near industrialist Mukesh Ambanis residence in February, he said. In his complaint, Chavan has claimed the trio took Rs 17 lakh from him via a police informer for not framing him in a cheating and forgery case, the official said. The three policemen allegedly asked for more money, but when he refused to pay, they filed a criminal case related to cheating and forgery against him at the MIDC police station. Pathan, who earlier served as DCP (Crime), is currently attached to the local arms division, while inspector Adhav is attached to the Byculla police station. This is the second FIR against Pathan. In July, real estate developer Shyamsunder Agarwal had lodged a complaint at the Marine Drive police station against two builders and six police officers, including Pathan, who were probing a case related to Agarwal's alleged nexus with the underworld. In his complaint, Agarwal had claimed Pathan demanded Rs 50 lakh and a flat in Bhayander on Mumbai's outskirts for not invoking the stringent Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) against him. Agarwal had also named former Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh in his complaint. The Congress will be battle-ready for the 2022 Goa assembly polls and the party will prop up "loyal" candidates who will not switch over to the BJP, former Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram said on Thursday while steering clear of media queries related to change in the party's state leadership and over the issue of patching up an alliance with like-minded parties. The veteran politician was in Goa on a two-day visit to the state as the All India Congress Committee's senior observer to oversee processes linked to the state assembly polls, which are scheduled to be held in early 2022. "My initial assessment is that the political atmosphere is extremely favourable to the Congress party. By all accounts, including accounts which I read in the media, there is an expectation that there will be a change in government and a new government led by the Congress will be formed after the elections," Chidambaram said. "If that is the expectation of the people of Goa, I want to assure the people of Goa that we will not disappoint you. We will get the party ready for elections and we will present to the people of Goa a set of candidates who will be loyal, faithful to the ideology hardworking and will serve the interests of the people of Goa," Chidambaram further said. When asked about the possibility of a change in leaders, as voiced by some senior state Congress leaders, including former Chief Minister Francisco Sardinha, Chidambaram said that replacing state leadership was not part of his mandate. When asked if the party was seeking to forge an alliance with other like-minded political outfits in the state to take on the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, the former Union Finance Minister said: "Again that is not the mandate now. Those are matters which will be discussed if necessary at the appropriate time. But at the moment it is to get the party battle-ready in all the 40 constituencies". Commenting on the disillusionment among the traditional Congress vote bank over the repeated saga of desertion of party MLAs to the ruling BJP, Chidambaram said: "... but (over) the last four and a half years he's (voter) even disappointed with the performance of the present government. He's even more disappointed with the failure of the present government". "...I'm assuring him now that we will present a set of candidates who are loyal, who are faithful to the ideologies of the party and who will serve the interest of the people of Goa," Chidambaram also said. 13 Congress MLAs have quit the party to join the BJP since 2017. Check out DH's latest videos: An adolescent girl with green eyes, wearing a torn red headscarf looking intensely at the camera was an iconic image taken by photojournalist Steve McCurry for the June 1985 cover of the National Geographic. That timeless image of an Afghan refugee girl with striking eyes inspired millions of people worldwide to recognise the anguish and plight of one of the initial waves of refugees from Afghanistan. Years of violence have profoundly shaken the whole society and pushed a third of Afghanistan's population into exile. Generations of Afghans have witnessed only conflict because of the 40-years-old situation, watching it metamorphose into various forms of violence, from actual war to the ferocity of minefields, destruction of livelihoods and human rights abuses. The recent Taliban takeover of the country has caused a humanitarian catastrophe in Afghanistan. It has triggered a mass exodus of a new wave of Afghan refugees desperate to flee the clutches of the Taliban. It is important to see them within a broader context of Afghanistan's long-standing displacement crisis. Waves of Afghan Refugees Although numbers have fluctuated over the years and various waves identified, the UNHCR (The UN Refugee Agency) estimates about 2.5 million registered refugees from Afghanistan, making it the largest protracted refugee population in Asia and the second-largest in the world. Track latest updates from Afghanistan here Four broad waves of Afghan refugees can be identified. The 1979 Soviet intervention of Afghanistan in the aftermath of the 1978 Saur Revolution triggered the first wave of Afghan refugees to seek refuge in neighbouring Iran and Pakistan. The second wave of refugees primarily comprised the Soviet sympathisers who fled Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal in 1989. The third and fourth waves of refugees from Afghanistan took place between the early 1990s and 2001. It was first due to the conflict and civil war intensifying when various Mujahideen factions were fighting each other to grab power. And when the Taliban unleashed a brutal and repressive regime over roughly three-quarters of Afghanistan they controlled. Afghanistan returned to the centre of global attention after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon by Al-Qaeda. Being the host of Osama bin Laden, the US launched a bombing campaign against the Taliban forces on October 7 in retaliation. The Taliban strongholds crumbled against the joint offensive launched by the coalition and Northern Alliance forces in the next few weeks. These developments generated a great sense of excitement and optimism among Afghans. Many wanted to seize the opportunity and possibilities that the new era was promising to offer. During the initial years after the US-led intervention, thousands of Afghan refugees and expatriates returned to Afghanistan. They took part in the country's nation-building initiatives and the international community, ushering in a pattern of reverse migration for the first time in Afghanistan's recent history. Also Read 'Total failure': The war on terror, 20 years on Many of these Afghans are fleeing today. The images of deadly chaos at the Kabul airport as security forces try to hold off thousands of Afghans desperate to escape the Taliban have regularly punctuated international headlines since the fall of Kabul on August 15, 2021. The Taliban's return to power has unleashed countless analyses, explanations and rushed post-mortem of the so-called "Global War on Terror" launched by the US twenty years ago. The discussions over the past two weeks have centred around the rationale and efficacy of a rushed withdrawal and the astonishing speed with which the Taliban managed to gain control over Afghanistan since May 2021. While the international media has been covering the mayhem at the Kabul airport and highlighting the desperation of Afghans to flee their country, the focus has been mainly on the refugee destinations. Primary triggers behind this exodus remain relatively unexplored. Triggers of flight Over the past 20 years, a generation of Afghans, particularly those from urban areas, have grown up amidst possibilities and opportunities; they are highly sceptical about their future under the Taliban. Today, Afghans are grappling with a sense of fear and despair and are acutely concerned about their shrinking hope of survival under the Taliban regime. Also Read US warns of threat at Kabul airport, tells citizens to 'leave immediately' Afghan women, in particular, fear that the Taliban will deprive them of their fundamental rights and all that they have worked so hard for will be snatched away once the global attention shifts from Afghanistan. Despite all its flaws, the previous political order could ensure that young Afghans have access to modern values, democracy, rights and liberties and international exposure - Afghans fear that access will be substantially curbed under the Taliban. Although the Taliban have declared "general amnesty" for government officials, Afghans are unconvinced about their intent. Many fear Afghanistan will become a graveyard of educated people, journalists and human rights activists once the world looks away. The recent overtures by the Taliban may signal a departure from its previous hardline approaches to some but based on the experience of the Taliban's last stint in power between 1996-2001 and being aware of what is happening in the provinces where international media is absent; Afghans refuse to trust the Taliban. They are convinced that this is the same draconian Taliban, dressed up in a new PR machine, and they will show their true colours once the international media leaves Afghanistan. The question of sheer survival is foremost in the minds of Afghans, especially those who were beneficiaries of the US-led era. Thousands of young Afghans trained or educated in foreign countries, including India, are highly cynical about their future and are desperate to flee Afghanistan. The current wave of Afghan refugees should also be seen within the context of the earlier waves who tried to escape conflict, persecution and violence in their country. Population movement out of Afghanistan has been a consistent phenomenon of its history over the past forty years. Yet, many fleeing today are the ones who returned to Afghanistan post-2001, having trusted the international community and its commitment towards Afghans and Afghanistan. They, unlike their predecessors, feel betrayed. (The writer is a Research Fellow at New Delhi-based Indian Council of World Affairs. She is the author of Identity and Marginality in India: Settlement Experience of Afghan Migrants, Routledge UK, 2019) In a justifiable display of annoyance over the delay in filling up vacancies in the various tribunals, the Supreme Court has in its order of August 16 given the government 10 days to fill up those vacancies. Chief Justice N V Ramana has sternly observed that the fact of pendency of writ petitions before the court shall not come in the way of the Union of India, and/or taking an excuse by them, for not processing/appointing members in various Tribunals. The Supreme Court had in an earlier order expressed unhappiness about the delay in filling up vacancies in the GST Tribunal and had gone on to make a larger point It seems that the bureaucracy does not want these tribunals. This was in the backdrop of the courts observation that there is a serious problem of vacancies in at least 15 tribunals ranging from the Debt Recovery Tribunal to the Central Administrative Tribunal. Thus, there were as many as 221 vacancies of judicial and technical members in the various tribunals as on August 5. It may be recalled that the Tribunals Reforms (Rationalisation and Conditions of Service) Ordinance, 2021, had abolished nine Appellate Bodies and transferred their functions to High Courts. The Appellate Bodies abolished were those as established under the Cinematograph Act, 1952; Trademarks Act, 1999; Copyright Act, 1957; Patent Act, 1970; Advance Rulings under the Customs Act, 1962; Airport Appellate Tribunal under the Airports Authority of India Act, 1994; Control of National Highways (Land and Traffic) Act, 2002; Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers' Rights Act, 2001; and the Geographical Indications of Goods (Registration and Protection) Act, 1999. This was a process that had commenced with the Finance Bill 2017, when the tribunal system was sought to be rationalised and the number of tribunals reduced from 26 to 19. The Law Commission of India, in its Report No 272 (Assessment of Statutory Frameworks of Tribunals in India), while discussing the reasons for the delay in justice administration, had emphasised the need for establishing tribunals. These reasons have not changed. The Constitution also provides for the establishment of tribunals. There were as many as 69,476 cases pending at various stages in the Supreme Court as on August 2. The position in the High Courts is more alarming -- as many as 58,68,271 cases (both civil and criminal) are pending as on date. Out of this, more than 1,50,000 cases are more than 20 years old. Thus, there is no doubt that the courts are straining under the burden of the heavy pendency. The reasons given while presenting the Tribunals Reforms (Rationalisation and Conditions of Service) Bill, 2021, (which later got implemented through the Ordinance) was that the tribunals do not contribute to a reduction in the workload for the courts, nor do they deliver faster justice, and that they come at the expense of the exchequer. This is a harsh and perhaps unfair indictment of the functioning of the tribunal system. But as Justice L Nageswara Rao observed in a Supreme Court decision, the existence of large number of vacancies of Members and Chairpersons and the inordinate delay caused in filling them up has resulted in emasculation of the tribunals. The latest decision arose out of the fourth time that the matter has come up before the apex court in the last three years. In 2019, the court had struck down the rules that were introduced by the government on the ground that they were in violation of the principles laid down by the apex court regarding the composition and security of tenure of the tribunals and the composition of the selection committee. New rules were notified in February 2020 which were again challenged and found to be vires of the apex courts directions. Some provisions of the Ordinance and the Rules notified afresh in June 2021 again met the same fate. The apex court struck down provisions relating to the four-year tenure and the minimum age requirement of 50 years for members of tribunals it has consistently held that the tenure should be five years and that the minimum age requirement of 50 would discourage younger talent. Despite the apex courts observations, the government went ahead with introducing the Tribunals Reforms Bill, 2021, in the Lok Sabha on August 2, and it was passed by the House the next day and by the Rajya Sabha on August 9. Predictably, there was no debate in Parliament on the Bill. This fact did not escape the attention of the apex court which, while passing its latest order, lamented the lack of quality debates in Parliament saying that it is a sorry state of affairs that has resulted in passage of laws with a lot of ambiguity in their provisions. The court has also expressed concern over the disturbing trend of the government not complying with its directions. While a rationalisation of the functioning of tribunals may be necessary, the solution perhaps lies in ensuring that the vacancies are filled up in the various surviving tribunals. They need to be given adequate infrastructure and support. And yes, it should be appreciated by all concerned that these posts are much more than sinecure jobs. Tribunals fulfil a very important role in the speedy disposal of litigation and discharge of justice. Shutting down tribunals, or worse not filling the vacancies in the existing tribunals, only increases the burden of the already overburdened courts. What the government should be doing is to ensure a rigorous selection process so that the right persons are selected for these important roles. The matter is now listed before the Supreme Court for August 31. It will be interesting to see the governments response. (The writer is a former chairman of the Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs) In her FY 2019-20 budget speech, the finance minister proposed establishing a Social Stock Exchange (SSE) in India. The stock exchange is intended to enable social enterprises with a clear social purpose to raise funds from multiple sources. These social enterprises can either be non-profit organisations or for-profit enterprises with a declared intent to create, measure and report social impact. According to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) 's Working Group and Technical Group reports released in June 2020 and May 2021, respectively, the SSE would offer multiple funding instruments and structures for social enterprises. These include, among others, equity and debt funds (individual or pooled) and pay-for-success structured products (such as Development Impact Bonds). The stock exchange is expected to attract impact investors (including international development finance institutions) who seek both commercial and social returns and philanthropies, foundations, CSR (corporate social responsibility) funds, retail and commercial investors. This is a welcome development as social enterprises struggle to raise funds, gain visibility and establish credibility with investors. Listing on SSE will enable social enterprises to gain access to new categories of investors, which they may not reach otherwise. However, there is one significant omission in SEBI reports, namely, of producer companies from the kinds of organisations considered for-profit social enterprises. The Government of India enabled registration of producer companies starting 2003, under the Producer Companies Act (under The Companies Act). The Companies Act defines producers companies as enterprises of producers engaged in agricultural and allied activities, handloom products and other handicraft industries. These companies engage in supporting production and enabling processing and marketing of their members' produce. They are expected to improve the livelihoods of small producers by providing a platform for collectivising small producers, aggregating their produce, enabling pooling of funds, and improving their bargaining power within markets. Over the past 6-7 years, the Centre has made a concerted effort to support these producer companies. In fact, in the same Union budget speech of FY 2019-20, the finance minister announced a scheme for "Formation and Promotion of 10,000 Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs)"; with an outlay of Rs 6,866 crore over nine years. While FPOs can be registered as cooperatives and societies, producer companies are the most popular form of registration. The NABARD (National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development), one of the nodal agencies for implementing the scheme, has promoted about 4000 producer companies. More than 85 per cent of shareholders are small and marginal producers. In addition, a large number of producer companies have been promoted by philanthropies and CSR organisations. As of March 2021, a study by the authors found approximately 16,000 producer companies registered with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs. However, most producer companies face severe capital and credit shortages, which prevent them from starting or growing their business operations. Their median paid-up capital is only about Rs 1 lakh which is substantially lower than the desired level of Rs 15-20 lakh in equity and debt needed by early-stage producer companies to start their operations (per a NABARD estimate). While the government has introduced several schemes to address the equity and debt needs of producer companies, very few producer companies are able to avail the benefits of these schemes due to their inability to meet eligibility requirements. Also, many commercial banks and financial institutions are hesitant to lend to producer companies due to risks inherent in agricultural businesses. As enterprises that can only have primary producers as shareholders (mostly small and marginal farmers), producer companies are excellent examples of for-profit enterprises driven by commercial objectives with a clear social commitment. Therefore, it would be imperative to include them explicitly as a category of social enterprises allowed to list on the upcoming SSE. Producer companies already meet the eligibility requirements specified in Section 2 of SEBI Technical Group Report, including "promoting livelihoods for rural and urban poor, including enhancing income of small and marginal farmers and workers in the non-farm sector". They also meet the criteria of having more than 67 per cent of their revenues, expenditures and beneficiaries aligning to the specific social purpose and measurable impact. However, since they are not specifically mentioned as examples of social enterprises, they are likely to get excluded from listing on SSE due to ambiguity in the rules. Listing on the Social Stock Exchange would allow these companies to access additional sources of funds, which will somewhat level the playing field for these companies of small producers as they compete in markets with large, well-financed corporations. Therefore, the SEBI should explicitly include producer companies in the definition of for-profit enterprises that are allowed to list on the Social Stock Exchange. The SEBI should also consider modifying some eligibility criteria for small producer companies (e.g. reducing the minimum turnover requirement from Rs. 50 lakh to Rs. 20 lakh) if all other criteria are met. In summary, producer companies are inherently for-profit enterprises with a social purpose, driven by both social and commercial imperatives. They are important vehicles for improving the incomes and livelihoods of small producers. Although the government has launched many schemes to support them, they continue to face capital and debt gaps. Allowing producer companies to list on the Social Stock Exchange will make it possible for them to raise funds from socially-minded investors and lenders and enable them to grow their business operations. (Annapurna Neti and Richa Govil are faculty members at Azim Premji University. This article is based on their ongoing study of producer companies in India) By Bobby Ghosh and Hussein Ibish, As the Taliban settle into their second stint as Afghanistans rulers, any hope of avoiding a reprise of their first period of rule may rest on a competition for influence in Kabul between Pakistan and Qatar. The outcome will determine what role the wider world, and especially the West, can play in the country after the withdrawal of American forces. Most Afghans as well as foreign governments, aid agencies, donors and investors will be rooting for Doha over Islamabad. Memories of how the previous Taliban administration performed under Pakistani tutelage allow for no optimism about how things will play out this time. The Qataris are a relatively unknown quantity in South Asia, but they could hardly do worse. Who wins will be determined in large part by another contest, within the Taliban. Although the group is headed by a supreme leader, Habitullah Akhundzada, it is not a monolith. Qatar is aligned with the political faction led by Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, while Pakistan is backing the military wing, marshalled by the likes of Mohammad Yaqoob, the son of former supreme leader, Mullah Omar, and Sirajuddin Haqqani, head of the dreaded Haqqani Network, designated a terrorist group by the US. Read | 'Total failure': The war on terror, 20 years on On the surface, things are looking good for the Qataris. Baradar, who has lived in Doha for the past three years, has arrived in Kabul and is expected to head the new government. The Biden administration seems to have determined that it can do business with him: Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns held secret talks with Baradar on Monday. This will alarm the Pakistanis, who are thought to be in bad odor with Baradar. They first gave him shelter after the US-led defeat of the Taliban, then arrested him in 2010. He was reportedly tortured in captivity. The Qataris, on the other hand, have been treating him as Afghanistans leader-in-waiting, and have built strong ties to others in his faction. But even if Baradar heads the government, the real power in the Taliban lies in Akhundzadas shura, or council, where Yaqoob and Haqqani wield considerable sway. From 1996 to 2001, when the Taliban last ruled, decisions made in Kabul were routinely overruled by the high council in Kandahar, the groups spiritual base and home of its supreme leader. If Pakistans proteges emerge as the dominant clique, Islamabad will likely be their principal go-between with the world. Weve seen that movie before, and it ends badly. The last time around, rather than encourage the Taliban to develop a modern, inclusive state, Pakistan indulged their obscurantist ideology, defended their reactionary worldview and excused their atavistic domestic agenda. Western governments, and especially the US, paid handsomely for Pakistans services as the designated Taliban-whisperer, but this only enriched and empowered the military and intelligence establishment in Islamabad, and did nothing to alleviate the plight of the Afghan people or abate the terrorist threat emanating from their country. Read | Hailing Taliban is condemnable After the fall of the Taliban in 2001, Pakistan provided the safe havens for them to regroup, rearm and return to the fray. Over the past 20 years, governments in Islamabad have made little effort to ameliorate the attitude of their guests. Now that theyre back in power, it is hard to imagine Pakistan will temper their tendencies. Can Qatar do better? Over the past decade, the tiny emirate has emerged as an effective interlocutor between the West and the Taliban. By brokering peace negotiations in Doha, the Qataris paved the way for the American withdrawal and the insurgents return to power. Their bid for influence in Kabul will depend on Baradar being grateful for services rendered and wanting still more. If the Taliban want international recognition for their government, the Qatari auspices will be more effective than that of Pakistan, which is itself regarded with suspicion by the West. And if they want money aid or investment Doha has much deeper pockets than Islamabad. This will be especially important in the first months of the new administration, when Western governments and donors will hold back funding while they take the measure of the new dispensation. Even if they remain suspicious of the Taliban, those inclined to keep assisting the Afghan population will feel more comfortable using Qatar as a conduit than relying on Pakistan. But dont rule out the Talibans old patrons just yet. For one thing, the Pakistanis have a major advantage in proximity. The two countries share a 1,650-mile land border, whereas Qatar and Afghanistan are separated by the landmass of Iran and the Persian Gulf. Pakistanis and Afghans also share ethnic and cultural ties that the Qataris cant hope to match. More important, the Pakistani state has a history with new rulers in Kabul that goes back to the Talibans birth, midwifed by Islamabads intelligence services, in the early 1990s. Some of those ties were frayed when the government of General Pervez Musharraf enabled the US-led 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, but the group could not have survived without continued, covert Pakistani backing. Baradar may have suffered at the hands of his jailors, but many in the military wing, leaders and fighters alike, will feel they owe their recent hosts a debt of gratitude. And finally, Pakistan also has much more at stake. For Doha, a friendly government in Kabul would be a very good outcome; for Islamabad, it is an existential imperative because Pakistani military doctrine has long held that Afghanistan provides the country with strategic depth in its rivalry with India. So, count on Pakistan to fight much harder than Qatar for influence in Afghanistan. This contest could yet get very dirty. People infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes Covid-19, are most contagious two days before, and three days after they develop symptoms, according to a study conducted in China. The research, published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine, also found that infected individuals were more likely to be asymptomatic if they contracted the virus from a primary case -- the first infected person in an outbreak -- who was also asymptomatic. "In previous studies, viral load has been used as an indirect measure of transmission," said Leonardo Martinez, an assistant professor at Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) in the US. "We wanted to see if results from these past studies, which show that those Covid cases are most transmissible a few days before and after symptom onset, could be confirmed by looking at secondary cases among close contacts," Martinez said. The researchers conducted contact tracing and studied Covid-19 transmission among approximately 9,000 close contacts of primary cases in the Zhejiang province of China from January 2020 to August 2020. "Close" contacts included household contacts -- defined as individuals who lived in the same household or who dined together -- co-workers, people in hospital settings, and riders in shared vehicles. Also Read | Kerala's Covid-19 lessons for India and the Modi government The researchers, including study co-lead Yang Ge from the University of Georgia College of Public Health, US, monitored infected individuals for at least 90 days after their initial positive Covid test results to distinguish between asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic cases. Of the individuals identified as primary cases, 89 per cent developed mild or moderate symptoms, and only 11 per cent were asymptomatic -- and no one developed severe symptoms. Household members of primary cases, as well as people who were exposed to primary cases multiple times or for longer durations of time, had higher infection rates than other close contacts. However, regardless of these risk factors, close contacts were more likely to contract Covid-19 from the primary infected individual if they were exposed shortly before or after the individual developed noticeable symptoms. "Our results suggest that the timing of exposure relative to primary-case symptoms is important for transmission, and this understanding provides further evidence that rapid testing and quarantine after someone is feeling sick is a critical step to control the epidemic," Martinez said. In comparison to mild and moderate symptomatic individuals, asymptomatic primary individuals were much less likely to transmit Covid to close contacts -- but if they did, the contacts were also less likely to experience noticeable symptoms, the researchers said. "This study further emphasises the need for vaccination, which reduces clinical severity among people that develop Covid," Martinez added. Check out DH's latest videos: A worldwide Covid-19 study led by UK experts and conducted at Indian hospitals among others around the world has been awarded the Guinness World Records title for the worlds largest scientific collaboration, involving over 140,000 patients in 116 countries. The record for Most authors on a single peer-reviewed academic paper is now held by the Universities of Birmingham and Edinburgh after 15,025 scientists around the globe contributed to the major research into the impact of Covid-19 on surgical patients. The co-lead author of the study, Indian-origin surgeon Aneel Bhangu from the University of Birmingham, said the study was aimed at improving our understanding of the deadly virus. Being awarded the Guinness World Records title for the worlds largest scientific collaboration highlights the scale of our global partnership, which aims to contribute to our understanding of Covid-19 and help to save as many lives as possible around the world, said Dr Bhangu. It marks the commitment and hard work of thousands of medical colleagues around the world to understand the changes that are needed in how surgery must be delivered if we are to beat the virus and reduce its impact on surgical patients, he said. Funded by the UK governments National Institute of Health Research (NIHR), the researchers concluded that patients waiting for elective surgery should be treated as a vulnerable group and access Covid-19 vaccines ahead of the general population potentially helping to avoid thousands of post-operative deaths linked to the virus. This was seen as particularly important for low and middle-income Countries (LMICs) where access to vaccination remains limited and mitigation measures such as nasal swab screening and Covid-free surgical pathways to reduce the risk of virus-related complications are not available for many patients. Overall, the scientists estimated that global prioritisation of pre-operative vaccination for elective patients could prevent an additional 58,687 Covid-19-related deaths in one year. The CovidSurg Collaborative international team of researchers published its findings in the British Journal of Surgery (BJS), Europes leading surgical journal, after studying data from 1,667 hospitals in countries including India, the UK, Australia, Brazil, China, the UAE and the US. In India, the study was conducted across 56 hospitals among the largest alongside Germany and Italy. Co-author James Glasbey, a surgical trainee from the University of Birmingham, commented: Over 15,000 surgeons and anaesthetists from across 116 countries came together to contribute to this study making it the largest ever scientific collaboration, surpassing even ground-breaking research from the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Switzerland. Every day we hear in the news that waiting lists are growing, and patients are unable to access the surgery that they need. This situation sadly is deteriorating in countries all over the world. Policymakers can use the data from this scientific collaboration to safely restart elective surgery. Launched in March 2020, the CovidSurg Collaborative has provided data needed to support changes to surgical delivery in the fastest time frame ever seen by a surgical research group, Birmingham University said. Research from this huge study group has also explored the timing of surgery after Covid infection, preoperative isolation, and risks of blood clots, all published in the field-leading journal 'Anaesthesia'. According to the experts, during the first wave of the pandemic, up to 70 per cent of elective surgeries were postponed, resulting in an estimated 28 million procedures being delayed or cancelled. Whilst surgery volumes have started to recover in many countries, ongoing disruption is likely to continue throughout 2021, particularly in the event of countries experiencing further waves of Covid-19. Vaccination is also likely to decrease post-operative pulmonary complications, reducing intensive care use and overall healthcare costs. Check out DH's latest videos: Karnataka Home Minister Araga Jnanendra landed in a controversy after saying that the "Congress was trying to rape" him over the Mysuru gang-rape incident. "The rape happened there. But Congress is trying to rape me, Congress is trying to rape the home minister. They are trying to reap political dividends," Jnanendra told reporters. It was in response to demands by the Opposition Congress that Jnanendra should resign by taking moral responsibility for the case. Jnanendra also came under fire for his remarks that the victims of the incident should not have visited the secluded spot in the evening. "She went there around 7-7.30 pm, which is a secluded spot. First of all, they shouldn't have gone there," he said. It is not possible to stop anyone from going to any place. "But, this place is secluded. Nobody goes there," Jnanendra said. The incident is inhumane. Opposition should demand that the culprits be nabbed at the earliest. "However, there are attempts to reap political mileage out of the incident," he said. Directions have been issued to all officials to ensure that such incidents do not repeat in the future. The National Commission for Women (NCW) on Thursday asked Karnataka Police to take immediate action against the culprits involved in the rape of a young woman in Mysuru. Taking cognizance of a media report, NCW Chairperson wrote to the Karnataka Director General of Police asking him to take immediate steps to arrest the group of men who sexually assaulted the girl in Chamundi Hills in Mysuru. The girl was with a male friend when a group of men attacked them and later raped her. Read more: College student allegedly gang-raped in Mysuru Sharma has also spoken about the "dreadful incident" with the Chairperson of the Karnataka State Commission for Women. The Commission has also sought to initiate a process to provide the adequate necessary compensation to the survivor as per the rules of the Victim Compensation Scheme enumerated under Section 357A of Criminal Procedure Code, 1972, an official statement said. The NCW has also asked that the survivor must be provided with medical and counselling support. It also directed the authorities to communicate the action taken in the case to the Commission at the earliest. The Mysuru Police has intensified its investigation into the alleged gang-rape of a college student reported on Tuesday. The police are trying to identify the culprits with the help of a mobile phone. They are checking the phone numbers that operated in the area at the time of the crime, an officer said. In addition, the police have also collected CCTV footage. An officer also informed that the police have received leads about the accused and the culprits will be arrested in a day or two. Read | Karnataka home minister bats for thorough probe into Mysuru gang-rape case Karnataka Congress on Thursday slammed the remarks made by Home Minister Araga Jnanendra in connection with the Mysuru gang-rape case, after the minister said that the Congress leaders were trying to rape him to reap political benefits over the case. His remarks that the victim and her friend should not have gone to the secluded spot also evoked angry reactions from the opposition party. Speaking to reporters, KPCC president D K Shivakumar condemned the remarks made by Jnanendra. I seek an answer from BJP leaders (over the comments made). If the Home Minister says that Congress is raping him, what does it reflect about administration in the state. A case should be filed under IPC Section 376 against any Congress leader who tried to rape the Home minister, he said. Shivakumar said that the Congress party was concerned about the image of Karnataka, and accused the Home minister of divulging the identity of the victim by disclosing the whereabouts of her parents and relatives. Also Read | Government has taken Mysuru gang-rape case seriously, perpetrators to be caught soon: CM Bommai We have no faith in government. They have not arrested even one person even after 24 hours into the incident, he said. If the minister asks why the victim had gone to the secluded spot, it is clear that there is no freedom for women in the state, he said. Meanwhile, Congress leaders V S Ugrappa demanded the resignation of Jnanendra for his insensitive remarks regarding the case. Committee constituted Shivakumar also announced a fact-finding committee under Ugrappa to visit the spot and submit a report regarding the case. The members of the committee are H M Revanna, Tanveer Sait, Roopa Shashidar, Manjula Manasa, Mallajamma and Manjula Naidu. Check out DH's latest videos: Karnataka Home Minister Araga Jnanendra on Thursday said that the government and the police department have taken the gang-rape incident in Mysuru "seriously" and all efforts are on to nab the culprits. The Minister said he will be travelling to Mysuru Thursday to take stock of the developments and the situation there. "The incident happened around 7:30-8 PM (on Tuesday), and the victim is admitted in the hospital, where good treatment is being provided. By 12 pm (on Wednesday) FIR was registered. As (the victim) is in shock, we are not able to record her statement completely. But, police have registered an FIR and all efforts are on to trace (the culprits)," Jnanendra said. Speaking to reporters, he said, We have sent our senior police officer ADGP Pratap Reddy from Bengaluru, and Mysuru police commissioner and senior officials have been asked to form teams, investigate seriously, nab the culprits and bring them to justice. Read | Karnataka home minister bats for thorough probe into Mysuru gang-rape case "There is no information on any arrests so far, once arrested, it will be made known," he said in response to a question. A college girl was allegedly gang-raped by five men near Chamundi Hill in Mysuru late on Tuesday and the incident came to light on Wednesday. The girl and her male friend, who was assaulted by the gang, are undergoing treatment in a private hospital. The Minister said Mysuru is a tourist place which thousands of people visit, this is incident is "unfortunate" and has made us to bow down our heads in shame. Responding to a question on complaints about lack of patrolling by the police might have led to such an incident, he said, he was going to Mysuru today and will hold a series of meetings with officials there on Friday as well, and try to rectify shortcomings if any. To a question on Congress' allegation that the law and order situation in the state has failed, Jnanendra said, it is unfortunate that they are trying to play politics over such an incident. "This is not an incident to politicise. We have to together see that such incidents don't repeat. Was everything great during Congress rule?" he said. Asked about the health of the victim, the Minister said according to his information, her health is fine, other than she is in a state of shock. "Police are alert, we have taken this incident seriously....her parents have come, according to my information she is from Maharashtra, it is not right to share further information about the victim," he said in response to a question. Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Thursday said the perpetrators in an alleged gang-rape incident that occured in Mysuru will be caught soon and brought to justice. "It is an unfortunate incident. My govt has taken it very seriously. The perpetrators will be caught soon & brought to justice," he told reporters here. He said he has directed DGP Praveen Sood to ensure that the culprits be arrested at the earliest. Read | College student allegedly gang-raped in Mysuru A college girl was allegedly raped by five men near Chamundi Hill in Mysuru late on Tuesday and the incident came to light on Wednesday. The girl and her male friend, who was assaulted by the gang, are undergoing treatment in a private hospital. (With PTI inputs) More horrific details have come out in the Mysuru gang-rape. The miscreants had made a video of their act of sexual assault of the college girl and demanded Rs 3 lakh for not making it 'viral' on social media, police sources said on Thursday. The crime had taken place on Tuesday late in the evening. A gang of six miscreants in an inebriated state had targeted the victim who had come to the isolated place with her male friend. They had attacked her male friend with a small boulder. Read more: Mysuru gang-rape survivor recovering slowly: Sources Sources say that the miscreants had raped the girl for nearly two hours. Since the place is isolated and people feared the movement of leopards, the miscreants were sure that their act would go unnoticed and no one would come to the girl's rescue. The miscreants had hit the victim's friend repeatedly with a small boulder, slapped and assaulted him. Both pleaded that they won't tell anyone about the incident. Even after that, the gang continued their attack and left them at the isolated place in an almost unconscious state. Somehow, the victim and her friend reached a hospital and told the authorities that they were attacked. They did not reveal what actually happened fearing the release of the video. But later the victim's male friend told the police about the rape. The police have recovered empty bottles and cans of beer from the area. The police sources said they are working on tracking calls from the tower location as they suspect the miscreants of spending more time there. Meanwhile, the National Commission for Women has taken suo motu notice of the gang rape case and registered a case. Rekha Sharma, the Chairperson, has stated that the commission would meet the victim on Thursday. Opposition leader Siddaramaiah has slammed the government that it has failed to maintain law and order in the state. Incidents of loot, attacks are on the rise, he said. The police are gathering information from the friend of the victim but no breakthrough has been made so far. The state government has appointed ADGP Pratap Reddy to head the investigation into the incident. The police are searching for clues as no CCTVs are installed in that area. As per preliminary information obtained from the girl and her friend, the rapists spoke in Kannada indicating they are locals. The police are waiting for the detailed statement of the victim and drawing up sketches of the miscreants based on the information given to them. Mask protests in Garnet Valley resulted in police being called to the August School Board meeting on Tuesday evening. A group of 30-40 parents protesting the districts mask plans for the fall appeared in person at the meeting which was held both in-person and on the meeting app Zoom. The in-person portion of the meeting never took place as people filled the room without wearing masks, which resulted in the board shifting to a fully virtual meeting and state police responding to clear the room of those who stayed. As of Aug. 16, the district required face covering of all individuals in district buildings. Before the start of the meeting Tuesday evening officials had asked that those in attendance put on masks, but most declined. One resident who was in attendance but didnt want his name used for fear of what he called cancel culture to his business told the Daily Times that the group of parents showed up not wearing masks and to voice their opinion that they want a choice for their children not to wear masks. When the board saw us walking in they requested we put masks on and we refused, said the Concord resident. The board closed the meeting and then proceeded to walk out so we could not voice our beliefs. As the board shifted to the virtual format. One resident, who identified herself as Leah Hoopes of Glen Mills, took the microphone in the boardroom and read her comments to the residents in the audience. Hoopes said what she called scientistism is being used when it fits the boards narrative and she questioned the changing recommendations about masking during the pandemic. She said families had done what they were asked to do over the past 18 months but the continued masking requirements are in her opinion not about safety, just liability and compliance. This has become psychological warfare on developing children, said Hoopes. Fact. masks dont work. My sons civil liberties, my parental discretion, are not suspended because of a virus. A number of residents also complained about the mask rule on the Zoom meeting. After a few minutes a school board official addressed the residents still in the building and said that officials are not health experts but they do consult Childrens Hospital Policy lab and University of Pennsylvania doctors and experts weekly for guidance. He said those experts have suggested a layered response including masking, distancing, hygiene, ventilation and disinfectants. It works and schools have shown it works, the official said. After about 20 minutes the people left the building. Superintendent Marc Bertrando wrote in an email Wednesday that the district will not allow individuals turbulent behaviors to disrupt board meetings to the extent that it prevents the board from conducting its business. While we appreciate the passion that our parents have in advocating for their children in these very difficult times, we will not allow the actions of some that refuse to follow the districts health and safety rules regarding mask requirements, Bertrando said. The district continues to stay laser-focused on its goal: Providing full-time in person learning for all students for the entirety of the school year. We believe that masking and other mitigation strategies will help us achieve this goal as efficiently and effectively as possible. The Districts Health and Safety plan was updated on Aug. 15 and states in part that the CDC and the state Department of Health guidance recommend masking for all individuals, regardless of vaccination status, in communities with substantial or high transmission rates. All students, staff, and visitors K-12 will be masked when our community is in substantial or high status for rate of transmission. We may revise this requirement should the community move to a low or moderate rate of transmission. Some of the protesters complained that masks were optional in neighboring districts including Penn-Delco; however Penn-Delco Superintendent Dr. George Steinhoff wrote in an email that his district will recommend masks. With respect to masks, the Penn-Delco plan indicates: The CDC and the state Department of Health (DOH) recommends universal indoor masking for all staff, students, and visitors to K-12 schools, regardless of vaccination status, Steinhoff wrote. Accordingly, the district will recommend universal masking of all persons in our schools. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia also has issued guidance requiring masks in Catholic schools when they open in September. We realize that this may be difficult for our school families, however we are committed to our students academic, faith, social, and emotional development. Please be assured that we are doing our best to meet the varied needs, Ken Gavin, chief communications officer for the archdiocese, said in a statement. We hope this requirement will be temporary. The decision will be revisited every two weeks and updated as needed, the archdiocese announcement said. The First Minister and Education Minister have praised ongoing good relations work in County Derry. First Minister Paul Givan and Education Minister Michelle McIlveen were speaking in Limavady during a visit to a T:BUC Camp being delivered by Roe Valley Residents Association. There they saw first-hand how the Executives Together: Building a United Community Strategy is actively bringing young people from different backgrounds and traditions together. First Minister Paul Givan said the work was helping to engender lasting societal change. The T:BUC Camps Programme is inspiring. It is a great example of the incredible good relations work that is helping to bring about positive change across so many communities here," he said. The Camps Programme is a key headline action of the T:BUC Strategy and reflects the Executives ongoing commitment to ending division and improving community relations. "The camps bring people of different backgrounds and traditions together for shared activities. This not only breaks down barriers in the present, but has a profound and lasting impact in creating a better future. This effort plays a key role in helping us continue the journey towards creating a more united and shared society. Deputy First Minister Michelle ONeill said the Executive was committed to the good relations journey. The amazing work being carried out through the T:BUC Camps programme and across the wider T:BUC Strategy is helping to bring people from different cultural traditions together and engender real and lasting societal change," she said. The Executive is committed to the good relations journey and to continuing to support projects working towards our goal of creating a truly equal and shared society where everyone can live together, free from intolerance, discrimination and prejudice. Education Minister Michelle McIlveen praised the T:BUC programme. The T:BUC Camps programme is an important initiative which demonstrates what can be achieved through a joined up approach involving The Executive Office, the Department of Education and the Education Authority, bringing together young people from different community backgrounds," she said. For some young people a T:BUC Camp can be the first opportunity to come together on a cross-community basis to meet people they may not otherwise do. It is an opportunity to take part in an exciting programme as well as making new friends. I hope there are some young people here today who will want to build on the experience gained in their involvement in the T:BUC camps programme and I would encourage that very much. Hit U.S. television series 'It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia' will be filming in Dublin this weekend and are in urgent need of a double for Danny DeVito, who plays Frank Reynolds on the show. According to the casting details on MovieExtras.ie, this position has yet to be filled and will be paid work. "Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia are coming to Ireland! And we need a Danny DeVito Double," according to the site. "Shooting is this Sunday, August 29 and the location is Dublin. If you know anyone that could work, please share, this is paid work." Casting co-ordinators are calling for male members of the public with a height of 4 foot, 5 inches, of large build and with a waist size of 41 inches preferably. For those not in-the-know, It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia is currently filming their fifteenth series. The show focuses on a group of dysfunctional and narcissistic friends that run an Irish pub (Paddy's) in Philadelphia. Show creator Rob McElhenney has strong Irish roots, as does Danny DeVito himself, and there's no doubt that they will make themselves at home here while they get filming! If you're interested in applying for the Danny DeVito double role, click here. The commital proceedings against a man charged with the attempted murder of a police officer outside Derry in 2015 could be delayed due to problems with face to face consultation, Derry Magistrates Court heard today. Ciaran Maguire, 33, of Kippure Park in Dublin, is charged with the attempted murder of a police officer at Eglinton on June 18 2015. He is also charged with possessing explosives with intent to endanger life on the same date. The commital proceedings are due to go ahead on September 14 but at today's hearing a defence solicitor, Michael Brentnall, said that there had been 'no movement' in response to requests for a face to face consultation with his client. The solicitor said it was 'absolutely crucial' that the defence have face to face consultation in this matter. Mr Brentnall said that he believed the Department of Justice was due to hold a meeting on this issue shortly. Deputy District Judge Sean O'Hare said he could see how the commital proceedings could be delayed if the defence could not get what they were seeking. A prosecution barrister told the court that there were four witnesses due to give evidence in the commital proceedings and they were all by Sightlink. The case was adjourned until September 9 for a review to see if the commital can go ahead. Maguire remains in custody. Actress Nusrat Jahan welcomes a baby boy, estranged husband Nikhil Jain & rumoured boyfriend Yash Dasgupta give statements Actor and Trinamool Congress MP Nusrat Jahan welcomed a baby boy on Thursday afternoon. She was admitted to a private hospital in Kolkata on Wednesday evening and gave birth to a boy around 12:20 PM. The Lok Sabha MP and her baby are both doing fine according to PTI sources. Actor Yash Dasgupta and Nushrat are rumoured to be dating now and according to a PTI report, he was present at the hospital at the time of the babys birth. According to a Hindustan Times report, Yash after Nusrats delivery has said, "For those who have been enquiring about Nusrat's health, the mother and child are healthy and doing well. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Nusrat (@nusratchirps) The actress has previously been in the headline for first marrying businessman Nikhil Jain in 2019 and then for their divorce. Despite their separation estranged husband Nikhil Jain sent good wishes to the mother and the baby, "There might be differences between us, but I am wishing the newborn and his mother all the best. I wish the baby boy has a bright future, he told PTI. Nusrat and Nikhil got separated in 2020. She claimed that their marriage was not valid in India since they tied the knot in Turkey while Nikhil had claimed that the MP refused to get the marriage registered Paparazzi make the classic 'Ranveer', 'Ranbir' goof up in front of Alia Bhatt, she reacts: "Ranveer Singh ho gaya hai ab?" Alia Bhatt was spotted at the Mumbai airport late on Wednesday evening. The actress was once again seen sporting boyfriend Ranbir Kapoors cap that read high as your expectations, as a part of her casual airport look. The fact didnt go unnoticed by the paparazzi that spotted her. Dressed in a black tracksuit, Alia topped off the look with Ranbirs cap and the photographers who followed her said that her airport looked like RKs. When she a confused Alia went huh? another pap slipped and said Ranveer Singh wala look. Alia jokingly pointed Ranveer Singh ho gaya ab? (So its Ranveer Singh now?). View this post on Instagram A post shared by Bollywood Pap (@bollywoodpap) At this point, other photographers pointed out they were referring to Ranbir while Alia said good night and added, So jao jake sab. Alia had earlier too made heads turn as she went around town wearing Ranbir Kapoors cap while he was away in Delhi shooting for his upcoming film. In a post shared on Instagram sporting the cap, Alia had written, when you miss him so you steal his belongings (& make sure you take many selfies). View this post on Instagram A post shared by Alia Bhatt (@aliaabhatt) On the work front, while Ranbir is busy shooting for Luv Ranjans next with Shraddha Kapoor, Alia is keeping busy with Karan Johars Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani with Ranveer Singh. Sohail Khan's son Nirvan turns assistant director with uncle Salman Khan's Tiger 3, hopes to join the industry soon Salman Khans nephew Nirvan Khan has accompanied the superstar to Russia where he is shooting for Tiger 3 with actress Katrina Kaif. Sohail Khan 21-year-old son, however, is not in Russia for the views and hues but according to reports, he is assisting director Maneesh Sharma on the project. A News 18 report claims that Virvan wants to follow in his uncles, father, and grandfathers footsteps and join the film industry someday. Nirvan apparently is inclined towards being a director is learning the tricks of the trade as an assistant director on Tiger 3. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Aryan Loves Salman (@salmanic_aryan) According to a source of the news portal, it was Salman Khans idea that Nirvan join him on the international schedule of Tiger 3 which started in Russia. The star hopes that a big scale film gives Nirvan the exposure he needs. The young star kid is apparently coordinating with all departments and cast members and also learning the technicalities of filmmaking and gaining experience in how to set up a scene. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Aryan Loves Salman (@salmanic_aryan) Salman and Katrina along with the rest of the cast and crew of Tiger 3 flew down to Russia last week. The film has been envisioned on a grand scale and YRF Chief Aditya Chopra is leaving no stone unturned in ensuring that the film turns out to be the best of the franchise. Chehre Movie Review: The Amitabh Bachchan & Emraan Hashmi starrer is not flawless, but definitely worth the watch Movie: Chehre Rated: 3.5/5.0 Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Emraan Hashmi, Annu Kapoor Director: Rumi Jaffery When it was reported that megastar Amitabh Bachchan and the very versatile Emraan Hashmi are coming together for Rumi Jafferys mystery thriller film, fans were quite excited to see how it turns out. Well, in the trailer we learned that their film Chehre follows the story of a retired prosecutor, who enjoys mock trials with his friends, and a business tycoon who falls for their game. The story as well as Rhea Chakrabortys blink and miss glimpse left us intrigued and we eagerly waited for the film to arrive in theatres. After watching Chehre, it is safe to say that it was worth the wait and definitely worth a watch. Sameer Mehra, played by Emraan, is a big shot at an ad agency. On his way back to Delhi from the mountains, he almost meets with an accident. The road is blocked and there is not a single soul in sight except for a sweet elderly man, who invites Sameer to his friends house to spend the night. It turns out that the man, played by Annu Kapoor, is a retired defense lawyer and his friends are all law veterans who enjoy mock trials on strangers who come their way. Lateef Zaidi, aka Big B, is a retired public prosecutor whereas Dhritiman Chatterjee is an ex judge and Raghubir Yadav-- well, well let you find that out for yourself when you watch the movie. Along with the nice and friendly elderly men, there is another face in the house that catches your attention-- Aana, played by Rhea, is like a caretaker to them who enjoys painting gruesome pictures featuring people getting punished. She has a cute yet weird laugh and behaves strangely. But it all makes sense towards the end. While in the trailer we found out that Sameer has been given the role of a criminal by the law veterans in this mock trial game, which slowly becomes pretty real, the unpredictable twists and turns in the film make it an incredibly intriguing watch. Sometime in the middle we are introduced to Krystle D'Souza, who has given a very convincing performance, but once again well let you find out what role she plays. While Amitabh and Emraans on-screen chemistry and hardcore performances are the true stars here, Raghubir Yadav and Annu Kapoors dialogue delivery and expressions have a big hand in making the thriller entertaining. Rhea, on the other hand, has wonderfully portrayed her character. Her behavior is quite odd in the beginning and will make you suspicious, but in the end there is a valid reason for it. Now you must be wondering why the title says not flawless. Well, there are a few loose ends here and there and some scenes in the film feel rather unnecessary, including Big Bs long monologue towards the end. His impactful voice and aura hit hard, as always, but the speech was not exactly needed. Then there are some extra characters, who dont get much to do and are just a part of the background. They could have been utilized! The soundtrack also could have been much better. The story, however, will not disappoint. It is interesting, unique and fresh-- all in all a good entertainer which is worth the watch. It all makes sense! Also, being back in a theatre will definitely make you want to add half a star to your own review. So go watch Chehre now and let us know what you thought of the film! Subscriber content preview Photo courtesy of Pierce College [enlarge] The proposed site is close to Brouillet Library/Science Building (in the rightmost foreground). Absher Construction and Integrus Architecture have been awarded a design-build contract from the Washington State Department of Enterprise Services for a new STEM building on Pierce College's Puyallup campus. . . . Subscriber content preview The airline said it also will stop extending pay protection to unvaccinated workers. By DAVID KOENIG AP Airlines Writer Delta Air Lines will charge employees on the company health plan $200 a month if they fail to get vaccinated against COVID-19, a policy the airline's top executive says is necessary because the average hospital stay for the virus costs the airline $50,000. CEO Ed Bastian said that all employees who have been hospitalized for the virus in recent weeks were not fully vaccinated. . . . Subscriber content preview By SARA CLINE Associated Press/Report for America PORTLAND People in Oregon, regardless of vaccination status, will once again be required to wear masks in most public outdoor settings including large outdoor events where physical distancing is not possible beginning Friday. The mandate, announced Tuesday by Gov. Kate Brown, is part of a growing list of statewide requirements implemented in Oregon in an attempt to slow the rapid spread of COVID-19. . . . ADA [ndash] Services for Joyce Evelyn Summers, 82, of Ada are 10 a.m. Friday at the Criswell Funeral Home Chapel, Rev. Harold Holt will officiate. Burial will follow at Rosedale Cemetery. The family will receive relatives and friends Thursday, from 5-7 p.m., at Criswell Funeral Home. Mrs. Su Duncan, OK (73533) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 73F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 73F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph. Claremont, NH (03743) Today Periods of rain. Low 56F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain. Low 56F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. North Andover, MA (01845) Today Periods of rain. Rain becoming heavy at times overnight. Low 59F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain. Rain becoming heavy at times overnight. Low 59F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. North Andover, MA (01845) Today Periods of rain. Rain may be heavy late. Low 59F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain. Rain may be heavy late. Low 59F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. THE Government has been urged to provide assurances that no workers will be laid off at Cork Airport when it closes temporarily next month. Solidarity TD Mick Barry has said that a number of workers at Cork Airport are still concerned about being temporarily laid off during the runway repairs. In July, Aer Lingus confirmed that it will not temporarily lay off its employees at the airport while the repairs are completed. The announcement came following reassurances from the Government regarding the continuation of the Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS). However, Mr Barry has claimed that workers with other airport employers have yet to receive similar guarantees. The Cork North Central TD said that the Government needs to make it clear in a public and unambiguous fashion that the employers will be able to avail of the EWSS for the duration of the period of the repairs. "Aer Lingus have decided to keep its workers on the company books for the duration of the shutdown. Other large airport employers must now do the same thing, he said. Solidarity TD Mick Barry has said that a number of workers at Cork Airport are still concerned about being temporarily laid off during the runway repairs. With less than a month to go to the shutdown large numbers of airport workers still have the threat of layoffs hanging over them. He said some workers at the airport have been in touch with him on the issue. The workers are in limbo and one month on, they have not been given the clarity that was provided to the Aer Lingus workers, and they need to be given that clarity now because the clock is ticking. Minister for Public Expenditure Michael McGrath TD said the government is providing financial support to the Airport and will assist in every way they can to rebuild traffic volumes at Cork Airport. "I was glad that, following engagement, Aer Lingus decided to keep its staff on the books during the temporary closure. It is a matter for every business affected by the closure to make a decision based on their specific circumstances, but I would point out that the wage subsidy scheme remains in place at the full rates for qualifying businesses. "I expect that many firms affected by the closure of the Airport qualify for the wage subsidy scheme and this will hopefully enable them to keep their staff in employment for what is a relatively short period. "I would certainly encourage the employers concerned to do everything possible to avoid layoffs during the closure." A CORK-based professor researching long Covid has said that people need to exercise their own best judgement when it comes to the return to school. Professor Liam OMahony, a principal investigator in the SFI Research Centre APC Microbiome Ireland, Department of Medicine and School of Microbiology at University College Cork (UCC) is leading a team that has been working on researching the effects of long Covid in people following Covid-19 infection. Speaking to The Echo, Prof OMahony said that while his research has focused solely on long Covid in adults, he added it does exist in children but with lower risk. It does exist but the risk is lower for children compared to adults and we just dont know yet how significant that risk is, he said. His comments come as concerns have been raised amongst medical professionals and members of the public about the return to school and the risk involved. My advice to parents is that I do know from the colleges point of view in UCC the amount of effort thats gone into making sure the space is going to be a safe place for students is phenomenal. The schools are the same. I have never seen such responsibility with teachers and people in the education sector. People are really trying to make sure people are safe and thats the message to reassure people that every effort has been made to make sure they are safe places, he said. NO JOKE AXA Research Chair of Applied Pathogen Ecology at UCC Gerry Killeen said that long Covid is not a joke in kids and that he is relieved that both his children have had their first vaccine. He said that large studies on long Covid are crystal clear and show that some of the epidemiological challenges with long Covid are very similar to chronic parasitic infections. He said that while such infections do not make people sick enough to go to hospital most of the time, that they make people sick enough to slow them down long term and reduce productivity. It takes very large studies but those large studies have been done now and its crystal clear, you can argue about exactly about what the numbers are, there are some studies showing long Covid rates of up to 50% in young adults but the middle of the dartboard is the UK ONS [Office for National Statistics] which is about 7 or 8% and even if you go with the Oxford study and go with the 4%, that is a lot. A 4% chance that your child will be really substantially debilitated for months and for some of them that will be years and for some may be life long so for me thats too much risk and if you look at the basic 101 rules of infectious disease transmission modelling, probably our primary schools are enough to sustain endemic transmission indefinitely. A spokesperson for the Department of Education said that the aim of all Covid-19 infection prevention and control measures that are in place is to support schools to operate safely and prevent the introduction of Covid-19 and the onward transmission of Covid-19 among the school community. TUESDAY last was August 24, St Bartholomews Day. One of the 12 Apostles, Bartholomew was also known as Nathaniel and was said to be free of guile an honest man. History tells us he was martyred in Armenia he was flayed and then beheaded. In paintings and depictions of the Saint, he is usually portrayed holding a butchers knife and is regarded as the Patron of Butchers. Though the Holy Well on our farm is dedicated to the saint, we can be fairly certain that Bartholomew was never in Bartlemy though the place is called after him. A bit like the close association we have with Napoleon Bonaparte, another character who probably never walked the roads or boreens around here, but his famous white steed Marengo was reputedly purchased at the Horse Fair here in the late 1700s. We had Mass at the Well on Tuesday night just over the ditch from where the Fair was held in olden times. You could say the links and stories that connect all these things is like a riddle wrapped in an enigma inside a mystery! Somethings we just know but cannot definitively prove. Well, anyhow, our Parish Priest celebrated the open air Mass on Tuesday before a nice gathering scattered along the bank of the river Knoppogue. It was a predecessor of our present pastor, Fr Edmond Barry, that engaged a mason, Garrett Heaphy, in the 1880s to build the stone enclosure around the Well. I think its great to keep up the old traditions alive, like doing the rounds at the Well, drinking the cold, cold water and washing ones eyes in the little stream that issues forth from the Well itself. Some unknown writer exiled far away from here penned a poem of nostalgia longing for home. One verse is as follows By the Brides verdant banks in my dreams am I straying Or bird nesting deep amid thicket and dell Mid the crowds in the deep glen at Pattern Im praying Neath the boughs bending low oer the old Blessed Well Those days I relive when with the pipes gaily chanting I dance until dark neath the spreading oak tree Ah brimful of memories sad, sacred and haunting Are those crossroads and dances of thine, Bartlemy. Thoughts like those are to the fore in my mind on special days like St Bartholomews Day. Because the Well is on our farm, I suppose its care has been handed down from generation to generation of our family. Were only in the place since the 1870s and the Well might be a place of worship for a thousand years! Was it a pagan well, Christianized by some of St Patricks pals all those years ago? No more than the mystery of the Saint and the French Emperor, well never know, but the traditions live on. Talking and reminiscing meant that the dark was well down on us before we crossed the bridge over the river on Tuesday night. Two of my second cousins were there and we ended up climbing and pruning our Family Tree! My mother had only one first cousin on the Twomey side (her fathers side) and both women were named Mai and were some women for talking. Now, Mams first cousin my Grand Aunt Lizzie died the year I was born but, by all accounts, she could trace for Ireland. When her daughter Mai and my mam got together, well, theres no doubt if there had been Olympic medals for conversation theyd have been Joint Winners of The Gold Medal! I recall about 30 years ago a man named Paul Cotter and his daughters came to Ireland from the USA. They were trying to trace their Cotter roots in this parish. We spent a night at mams first cousins home in Glenville trying to piece together the Cotter jigsaw. What a night it was! There were White, Black , Bun and Brown Cotter families in the area back in the 1800s when Pauls great grandfather had emigrated, after the Famine. Well, when the two Mais got into full flight that night, there were Cotters everywhere. Both women were big into degrees of consanguinity, they knew the difference between a second cousin twice removed and a third cousin once removed! Paul Cotters daughter had a tape recorder and many years later she sent me a transcript of the nights proceeding. What with Mai A said... and Mai F said..., it was a fairly complicated and convoluted piece of writing. In fairness, between them they sorted out the seed, breed and generation of the Cotters. Oft in the stilly night Ere slumbers chain has bound me, Fond memory brings the light Of other days around me; The smiles, the tears Of boyhoods years, The words of love then spoken; The eyes that shone Now dimmd and gone, The cheerful hearts now broken Thus in the stilly night Ere slumbers chain has bound me Sad memory brings the light Of other days around me. Ah yes, those evocative words of Thomas Moore do indeed recall the days of yore and as we lingered the other night by the old rustic bridge over the Knoppogue, we spoke of the future, the present and the past. Just a century ago, my great, grandfather (same relation of my two cousins) died. That was in the turbulent year of 1921, the year of the Truce. He had had a turbulent life himself. An advocate of tenant farmers rights, he got evicted from his farm in 1890 and spent a dozen years out of it. Ten years after he got his land back, he built a new house on the farm to replace the old thatched dwelling. Before the slate roof went on, he inserted a kind of time capsule under the wall-plate. That was in 1912 and just recently, 109 years, later, a sealed bottle was discovered during renovation work on the house. When opened, a most fascinating document was found. My great grandfather had traced his lineage back to his own grandfather. He gave a full account of the Eviction and how he had to fight hard to get his farm back. He outlined the problems he had to surmount its a really amazing legacy to have left. He even gave the name of the builder of the house in 1912 the very same man built the house I am living in! My two cousins were in rapture. We hope to mark the Centenary of our great, grandfathers death later this year. We parted by the historic Well on a historic day. Theres no going back for we cant change the past, Or turn back the pages of time, Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, And I know only this moment is mine. I am so aware that we cannot change the past, but isnt it just wonderful to be able to throw backward glances over our shoulder and see a glimpse of other times, different eras and the people who made us what we are? Stay up to date on COVID-19 Get Breaking News Sign up now to get our FREE breaking news coverage delivered right to your inbox. Sponsored By: St Anthony's Hospital Elkhart, IN (46516) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 52F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 52F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Digital COVID Pass goes live for Isle of Man residents From today, Island residents can obtain their vaccination status certificate in a secure and internationally recognised digital format, via web login to the NHS COVID Pass service. The Department of Health and Social Care has worked closely with UK partner organisations over a number of months to confirm all aspects of a uniquely complex legal and logistical project. Island residents can now login to the service to view their vaccination record on their home computer, laptop or mobile device, and opt to download a digital version or print a paper copy of their certificate. Users will first need to register with the UK NHS to create a secure login to access their health record online. Internet access, a mobile phone and an email address are required to register for the digital service, using this link: https://covid-status.service.nhsx.nhs.uk/. The web based document is valid for 30 days only but can be refreshed at any time. An alternative paper copy vaccination certificate is available for those who are unable to access a digital version of their vaccination certificate, via the NHS central customer service centre in the UK. From today, Isle of Man residents can call Freephone number 0808 1624 119 to request a paper copy of their vaccination certificate to be posted to them. In addition, a paper certificate can be applied for online without an NHS login, using this link: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/covid-pass/get-your-covid-pass-letter/ Matthew Gould, Chief Executive of NHSx, which has developed the NHS COVID Pass said: The NHS COVID Pass service is helping millions of people in England and Wales to demonstrate their vaccination status easily, securely and for free; and it is great news that we can now give residents of the Isle of Man access to the pass. This achievement is the result of successful joint working with the Isle of Man Government and we will continue to improve the service for the Island's residents. This includes working with the Isle of Man government so that residents can access the NHS COVID Pass using the NHS App in the future. Patient data has been securely shared by Manx Care with NHS Digital to enable residents to produce a COVID Pass online or request a paper certificate copy. Residents can opt out of having their records shared, noting that they will not be able to obtain the NHS COVID Pass vaccination certificate in any form. Those wishing to opt out from their data being transferred to NHS Digital should use this Vaccination Data Sharing Opt-Out form All travellers from the Isle of Man should check the requirements in force in their destination country when booking, to ensure they can be met. These may include evidence of pre-departure COVID-19 tests and further tests or quarantine on arrival. Residents planning travel should further note that while the digital COVID Pass can be downloaded at any time, paper certificates should be requested two weeks before departure, to allow for processing and delivery at busy periods. Residents who are unable to create a digital certificate will be automatically informed of the reason via email, letter or SMS message as per contacts on their GP record, and advised what to do next. For callers to the Freephone service, personal details must match those held on record. Where they differ - for instance, their current address is not the same as that held on their GP record - the patient record will need to be updated before the process can continue. Individuals will be given an error code and advised to contact the Manx Care COVID Pass Resolution Team for assistance. A dedicated phone line for queries will be open on weekdays (excluding bank holidays) from Thursday 26th August between 9 and 5pm. Residents should allow up to five days for the record to be refreshed before accessing or requesting a new pass. As with any new service there are likely to be teething problems and initial demand may be high - consequently only those who are travelling in the next month should use the service at this time. Access to vaccination certification via the NHS app for Isle of Man residents remains under development and is not yet available. However, residents are reminded that the NHS COVID Pass can be downloaded via the web or a paper copy requested. With NHS COVID Pass now available for Island residents in various formats, Manx Cares provision of vaccination certificates on request will end, having been an interim solution. Athens, AL (35611) Today Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%. We're not sure who or how many people use Microsoft Office on a Chromebook but if that's you, you're in for a downgraded experience. Microsoft will soon kill its Office app for Android on Chrome OS, the company confirmed Wednesday to About Chromebooks. The app will leave the Google Play Store on September 18th, at which point users will need to sign in through the web via Office.com or Outlook.com. As 9to5Google notes, the Office app will still be available on Android phones, even as it vanishes from Chrome OS. Though signing in via the web app should work in a pinch, it's clearly an inferior experience to what the Android app has offered until now, not to mention what Google's G Suite can do on its native Google-controlled platform. In particular, be warned that the web app offers almost no offline access, something users have enjoyed on the Google Play Store version. It's unclear why Microsoft is making this change, except that the company described the move in a statement to About Chromebooks as an "effort to provide the most optimized experience for Chrome OS/Chromebook customers." In a statement, a Google spokesperson said: "We're pleased to see Microsoft offer Chrome OS users a more optimized experience and embrace the open web. People love Chrome OS because it provides a speedy, secure, and simple computing experience and helps them stay connected while they work, study and stay entertained." Whatever Microsoft's intention, this is likely to give Chromebook users another reason to give the G Suite a try, if they haven't already. Or hey, perhaps they'll ditch their Chromebooks and download the Android app on Windows 11. Peter Thiel's AI company Palantir, whose clients have included the CIA and US immigration agency ICE, is back in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons. A new report claims a glitch in its secretive software program used by the FBI allowed unauthorized personnel to access private data for more than a year. According to The New York Post, the mishap was revealed in a letter by prosecutors in the Manhattan federal court case against accused hacker Virgil Griffith. Palantir denied the claims in a statement and said the fault was caused by the FBI's incorrect use of the software. Griffith was arrested in 2019 for allegedly providing North Korea with information on how cryptocurrency and blockchain tech could help it to evade US sanctions. The incident in question revolves around the alleged hacker's social media data, obtained through a federal search warrant in March 2020. According to the letter, the Twitter and Facebook information was uploaded to Palantir's program through the default settings, effectively allowing unauthorized FBI employees to access it. Between May 2020 to August 2021, the material was accessed four times by three analysts and an agent. The FBI case agent assigned to Griffith's case was alerted to the issue by a colleague earlier this month, according to the letter. Those who accessed the info reportedly told prosecutors that they did not recall using it in their investigations. An FBI analyst, in the course of conducting a separate investigation, had identified communications between the defendant and the subject of that other investigation by means of searches on the Platform that accessed the Search Warrant Returns, the letter noted. Palantir is trying to distance itself from the issue. "There was no glitch in the software," it told The New York Post in a statement, adding that the "customer" did not follow the "rigorous protocols established to protect search warrant returns." Amid increasing growth, the last thing Palantir needs is a major PR crisis involving flaws in its software. Since going public last fall, the company has seen its revenues surge, though it's operational losses are also increasing. Palantir's customers now span government agencies, tech stalwarts like IBM and even mining group Rio Tinto. Plus, it's working with commercial space companies to manage a meta-constellation of 237 satellites. This article contains mild spoilers for season two, episode three of 'Star Trek: Lower Decks.' This weeks episode of Lower Decks, Well Always Have Tom Paris, manages to squeeze two references into its title: a season one The Next Generation installment called Well Always Have Paris, and the name of a main cast member of Star Trek: Voyager, Lieutenant Tom Eugene Paris. But aside from that clever bit of wordplay, the title also carries a deeper meaning: That as much as wed like to forget about the more embarrassing moments of the Star Trek franchise, they still happened and they werent all bad. Even, and especially, Voyager. CBS Viewer reactions to Voyager have been rather polarized over the course of the 26 years since it premiered. Back in the 90s, many fans were excited to have a real Star Trek show again, one that took place on a ship that was constantly exploring, unlike the comparatively stationary political drama of Deep Space Nine. But clunky writing soured many peoples opinion on Voyager, and toward the end of its run the show was known more for Seven of Nines skintight outfits and its slate of guest stars of the week, including Jason Alexander and Dwayne The Rock Johnson. After the show went off the air, the franchise stopped moving forward in its timeline, choosing to explore Starfleets founding in Enterprise and rebooting the entire universe completely with the 2009 Star Trek movie. While fans were thrown a bone with a brief cameo by Admiral Kathryn Janeway in the last TNG-era film, Nemesis, Voyager would essentially disappear from the Star Trek canon until the appearance of Seven of Nine in episode four of Picard. Trae Patton For fans of The Next Generation, Picard had its upsides: We got to see Troi and Riker as a family, and Data got a better sendoff into the afterlife. But for fans of Voyager, it was anything but positive, with the death of a supporting character and a rather grim existence for fan-favorite Seven of Nine. Star Trek: Lower Decks rolls back the clock a little bit, as it takes place a year after the events of Nemesis, making it our first real view of the Star Trek universes immediate future after TNG, DS9 and Voyager. The Dominion War is over, Romulus is under a new regime and the crew of the USS Voyager are basically celebrities after seven years spent in the Delta Quadrant; Picard takes place nearly twenty years later, when the luster would have been gone. Matt Kennedy Here everything is just shiny and new and worthy of commemorative plates a bit of a weird thing to exist in a post-scarcity culture, but this is a comedy series, after all. And in this weeks B-plot, Brad Boimler is looking to get one of his plates signed by a special guest to the USS Cerritos: Tom Paris. Or, as Brad refers to the former Voyager crew member, Creator of Fairhaven, Captain Proton himself as well as the first human to break the transwarp barrier. Straight off, thats a reference to three of the goofiest, oddball and some say worst episodes of Star Trek: Voyager. And just in case you forgot what was so bad about the last one, Mariner asks is he still a salamander?, because that is a thing that happened in the episode Threshold. Undeterred (and perhaps even encouraged) by the weirdness, Boimler is all hyped to meet his hero. Even after the ships system doesnt recognize him and wont let him through any doors, he takes to the Jefferies tubes to make his way to the bridge to meet Lt. Paris. In a way, it feels like a metaphor for how the fandom feels about Star Trek: Voyager now. While everyone admits it had a lot of dumb moments, those actually made it more endearing. The famous line theres coffee in that nebula would inspire astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti to bring a replica uniform with her and wear it on a mission back in 2015: "There's coffee in that nebula"... ehm, I mean... in that #Dragon. pic.twitter.com/9MYrqIOXnI Samantha Cristoforetti (@AstroSamantha) April 17, 2015 And who can forget the infamous Tuvix episode, where crew members Tuvok and Neelix were merged into one being thanks to a transporter accident? Though the resulting individual was healthy and happy, the decision was made to force him to split back into his component persons, inspiring the recent internet rallying cry Janeway murdered Tuvix. Even Janeway actor Kate Mulgrew entered the debate, responding to a tweet from Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. When youve got politicians involved its not really a fandom in-joke anymore. Willing to hear the crews thoughts, as always. However, shouldnt Tuvok and Neelix should have the biggest say...oh wait, they couldnt! I stand by my decision to restore them to their lives. Rewatch and report back, AOC - and congrats on your win! Kate Mulgrew (@TheKateMulgrew) November 5, 2020 Maybe its time to give Voyager a bit more credit. Its not as good as TNG or DS9, but it still has its fair share of fans. I remember a time when it seemed like it was constantly running on Spike TV (now the Paramount Network), as opposed to Deep Space Nine, which is seldom rerun due to its serialized nature. Last year I sat down and rewatched the entire Star Trek franchise, including Voyager, and saw quite a few episodes I had missed the first time. I found myself enjoying some of it, cringing just as often, and eventually remembering why I had stopped watching the show for a while back when it aired. In general, I feel like the shows biggest problem was missed potential, like the way the conflict between the Starfleet and Maquis crew members was quickly smoothed over, how it underutilized many of its cast, and why on earth did Harry Kim never get promoted. CBS However, its not the job of Lower Decks to explain or redeem Voyager. Boimler and Tom Paris are only the B-plot here, with the main drive of the episode being Tendi and Mariners mission to pick up a package for Doctor TAna as well as Rutherfords quest to find out how a certain dead officer is alive again. The episode just asks us to consider what it would be like to be a Starfleet officer and hear about all of Voyagers adventures in the Delta Quadrant. Weird and goofy? Yes. But honestly, theyre also pretty cool. The Government Accountability Office has revealed in a new report that 10 federal agencies are planning to expand their use of facial recognition. In a survey involving 24 federal agencies on their use of facial recognition technology, the Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Homeland Security, Health and Human Services, Interior, Justice, State, Treasury and Veterans Affairs departments told GAO that they're planning to use facial recognition in more areas through fiscal year 2023. As The Washington Post notes, most agencies already use facial recognition to give their personnel access to their phones and computers. However, there's a growing number of agencies using it to investigate crime and to track people. The Department of Agriculture apparently wants to monitor the live feeds at its facilities and scan for individuals in the watch list. Another agency wants to use it to automate identity verification for travelers at airports. The agencies are planning this expansion despite the strengthening pushback against facial recognition systems. They're still far from being perfectly accurate, especially when identifying women and POCs, and have led to false arrests in the past. In Detroit, their use led to the wrongful arrest of two men last year, both of whom are Black. The states of Massachusetts, Maine and Virginia banned law enforcement from using facial recognition. At the same time, several cities across the US, including Portland, Oregon, had also restricted their use. GAO's report noted, however, that "recent advancements in facial recognition technology have increased its accuracy and its usage." Ten of GAO's respondents have also revealed they've been involved in the research and development of facial recognition tech. For instance, they're looking into the technology's ability to identify individuals wearing masks and to detect image manipulation. In addition, several agencies, including the Justice Department, the Air Force and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, admitted to using Clearview AI. Clearview has been under fire for scraping people's images from social networks over the past years without the companies' knowledge or consent to build its database. As of last year, the system, which can identify people in real time, was reportedly in use by 600 police departments across the US, including the FBI and DHS. The Services celebrating Lucky Andrike, 71, of Enid, will be held 10:00 A.M. Thursday, September 9, 2021, in the Marshallese First Assembly of God under the direction of Brown-Cummings Funeral Home. Condolences may be shared online at www.Brown-Cummings.com. The cast of "Black Panther 2, a.k.a. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever," has been hard at work and filming since the end of the June. One of the cast members who reprised her role for the Marvel Cinematic Universe sequel is Letitia Wright as Shuri. Reportedly, even though this is her fourth time that she's part of an MCU movie, this will be the first time that she would have a greater role. Unfortunately, hard work can sometimes be met with accidents and injuries. Letitia Wright Hospitalized for 'Black Panther 2' Injuries While COVID-19 measures must be in place, this does not mean all sorts of bad juju can be avoided in a superhero movie, which can be quite heavy on the stunts. She is said to have been hospitalized for some injuries incurred during the sequel shoot of this Black Panther movie. This incident is said to have taken place during an overnight shoot in Boston, Massachusetts. That said, while her injuries were enough to get her sent to the hospital, they turned out minor. The latest update that she is already released and that the film's schedule would not be affected. ALSO READ: Kylie Jenner, Travis Scott Slammed for Spoiling Daughter Stormi Again For 'Tone Deaf' Surprise Here's what a Marvel spokesperson told Deadline prior to the hospital release. "Letitia Wright sustained minor injuries today while filming a stunt for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. She is currently receiving care in a local hospital and is expected to be released soon." Even though majority of "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever's" main shoots have been happening in Atlanta, Georgia, the cast and crew went to Boston to film sequences at the Institute of Technology (MIT), and cameras rolled throughout the western part of the campus. While it's unclear how MIT fits Wakanda Forever's narrative, Kevin Feige, Chairman of Marvel Studios, recently stated that Riri Wiliams, a.k.a. Ironheart, was going to premiere Dominique Thorne in the movies leading her Disney+ series. Since Riri is an MIT comics student, it is definitely fair to presume that everything at Wakanda Forever university will include her. Will This Affect Her Role Shuri's Scenes? It can be remembered that It was earlier on reported that In future Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, Letitia Wright's Shuri will have a more significant role. This comes following the untlmely and sad death of Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman. Shuri is T'Challa's MCU sister and many expect her to take up Black Panther's mantle in the future of the franchise. The need to heal from some injuries, even if minor, can be quite a hassle. It remains to be seen if these would affect her role and scenes. The film has a July 8, 2022 release date. ALSO READ: Jimmy Hayes Cause of Death Shocking: Vaccine-Related, Cardiac Arrest, Or Drug Overdose? Absence doesn't always make the heart grow fonder - sometimes it just makes things calmer. In Meghan Markle's case, she reportedly did the royals a favor by not attending Prince Philip's funeral. According to a new report, the royal family members were "quietly pleased" that Meghan Markle did not bother flying from the US to Britain to accompany her husband Prince Harry to attend Prince Philip's funeral service. This allegation can be found on a chapter in the ex-royals' biography, "Finding Freedom, as the Independent reported it. According to the book, had Markle bothered, some of the royal members would have truly panicked. While not mentioned, it can be easily assumed that this includes Queen Elizabeth. These members were reportedly already quite worried that her attendance might make the solemn event a "circus" and she would cause an unwanted "spectacle." It can be remembered that at the time, her and husband Prince Harry's bombshell Oprah Winfrey interview just happened. She did not necessarily said the nicest things about the royals during the interview. If she were to go to the funeral, the media would have focused on how the royals were reacting to her interview and how Markle was composing herself in front of the people she lambasted, instead of the actual service. ALSO READ: Jimmy Hayes Cause of Death Shocking: Vaccine-Related, Cardiac Arrest, Or Drug Overdose? The said Oprah Winfrey tell-all, where Meghan Markle revealed she has had suicidal thoughts while still being in the palace and personally witnessed racist attitudes toward her son baby Archie, aired a month prior to Philip's passing. The Duke of Edinburgh died on April 9 at 99 years old and was laid to rest over a week later on April 17. Harry, 36, flew out for the ceremony. Him doing so also piqued the media interest, but not as much as it would if Meghan Markle went as well. Moreover, probably to avoid any more gossip and hype, he immediately returned home to Markle. The official reason though provided by Markle, 40 for her non-attendance was because she was heavily pregnant at the time, which sounds logical. It can be remembered that while Harry went, and survived the mini-reunion with his royal family after his quite damning Oprah tell-all alongside his wife he barely made it without anxiety. He said so that he went there with great worry. "I was worried about it, I was afraid," Harry told The Associated Press during a recent joint interview with Oprah Winfrey to promote a mental-health series they co-created and co-executive produced for Apple TV+. ALSO READ: Kylie Jenner, Travis Scott Slammed for Spoiling Daughter Stormi Again For 'Tone Deaf' Surprise Michael Nader, "Dynasty" actor died at the age of 76. His bereaved wife, Jodi Lister, revealed the sad news. The actor who is also known for his role in "All My Children," died at home in Northern California on Monday. His cause of death is reportedly cancer. " With heavy heart, I'm sharing the news of the passing of my beloved, Michael," Nader's wife Jodi Lister said in a statement obtained by MichaelFairmanTV.com. "We had 18 wonderful years together with the many dogs we fostered and adopted. Recently, Michael was so thrilled to reconnect with his friends from the cast of Dynasty during Emma Samms virtual event to help raise funds for Long-Covid research. He was a beautiful and fascinating man with many talents and skills. I will miss him forever," she added. Back in 2013, he talked about his shocking return to the soap "All My Children" after the show went off-air. His role Dimitri Marrick was quite a fan favorite. Back then, the show returned but for the streaming giant, Hulu. He was aseked what he thought about that and his response was quite amusing. ALSO READ: Jimmy Hayes Cause of Death: Autopsy Completed, But Truth Behind Untimely Passing Might Take Weeks - Why? "I was so unknowledgeable about any of this that the gentleman that handled my contract for me said, "Do you realize, Mike, that 70% of the new pilots in Los Angeles are going straight to the Internet," he shared. "I went, "Really?" He says, "Yes. The format of introducing and getting a new source of advertising dollars I guess is - they're moving that way very strongly," he added. Even though he was most known for "Dynasty" and "All My Children," his career is so much more than these two successful shows. The acting career of Michael lasted several decades. His first soap role was Kevin Thompson's in "As the World Turns" (1975-1978, and then his primetime soap, "Bare Essence" as Alexi Theopolous, before he landed as Alexis Colby's (Joan Collins') third husband, Dex, on the "Dynasty" later on the same year. Nader continued with the programme until 1989, when it was cancelled. His long TV and motion picture career also had him making appearances in hit shows such as "The Flash," "Law and Order: SVU," "Cold Case," among others. Michael is survived by his wife of 18-years, Jodi, stepmother Lillian, sister Stephanie, daughter Lindsay, ex-wife Robin, son-in-law Trevor, and granddaughter Juniper. There is said to be an impending Zoom memorial, the details of which are still being planned. ALSO READ: Kylie Jenner, Travis Scott Slammed for Spoiling Daughter Stormi Again For 'Tone Deaf' Surprise Lloyd Dobyns Jr., an award-winning NBC News correspondent, has died at the age of 85, his family confirmed. Dobyns' son, Ken Dobyns, confirmed the tragic news to Associated Press, saying that his father died on Sunday in North Carolina. According to Ken, the famous news anchor suffered from health complications after facing a series of strokes. His former "NBC News Overnight" partner, Linda Ellerbee, expressed her heartbreak upon learning the news. "He was a friend, teacher, trouble-maker, and a world-class journalist," she said, as quoted by New York Post. "I shall miss him more than I can say." Meanwhile, internet users who saw him perform his job through the years also shared their memories with the late anchor. Some also took their time to reveal how Dobyns inspired them in their lives. One Twitter user shared a screenshot of Ellerbee's Facebook post alongside a caption to honor the late personality. "Lloyd Dobyns has died. Linda Ellerbee posted this on Facebook. If you never had the privilege of watching him and hearing his writing, find his newscast videos," the user said. "As a young pup, I wanted to be Lloyd Dobyns when I grew up. I still do. There was none better, ever." Another wrote, "Lloyd Dobyns got me through a lot of sleepless nights back then. And Linda Ellerbee, too." Who is Lloyd Dobyns Jr.? From being a young Virginia native, he initially served his early days in the US Army before starting his broadcasting career at the WDBJ-TV in 1957. Three years later, he found fortune and became a news anchor of NBC affiliate, WAVY-TV. From there, he rose even more that he advanced to become a news director. Dobyns looked for further opportunities by leaving Virginia for New York. He immediately became the managing editor of WNEW-TV before joining the NBC News team. He worked as a foreign correspondent for NBC News in Europe, Middle East, Asia, and America. READ ALSO: Steph Curry's Parents Reveal Bitter Truth Behind Divorce: They Cheated On Each Other? After spending time abroad, he returned to grace the TV News magazine "Weekend." The position led him to earn a Peabody Award in 1975. When he left "NBC News Overnight," he appeared for a short time in "Monitor." He also famously led the documentary "If Japan Can, Why Can't We," which explored the Japanese's booming industry while American manufacturing hit rock bottom. Lloyd Dobyns Jr. officially retired in 1986. READ MORE: Serge Onik Dead: Cause of Death of 'So You Think You Can Dance' Contestant Raises Question Afghanistan is burning. Right now, as I write these words, Afghanistan is burning. The world has bubbled up a brouhaha over the international community being silent spectators to the inferno. The anguish is greater still since the United States (US) has chosen to look the other way. After withdrawing his troops from the war-ravaged country after a calculated 20 years, US President Joe Biden said he stands squarely behind his decision to retreat, adding that the fall of the capital, Kabul, was, in fact, inevitable. The response, though shocking, is not surprising. I, for one, have always been sceptical of the occidental modus operandi, particularly with respect to those it sees as the other. This piece is born out of that scepticism. It all started earlier this year, when I read the following words on CNNs website. I just want to hold her tight give her a hug ... hold her hand, hug her for a long time. Jami Webb and her mother, Xiaojie Tan, Chinese immigrants to the US, were really close. For her mothers 50th birthday, Webb wanted to celebrate all her achievementsimmigrating to the US, buying and running two spas, and providing for her family. But on 16 March, a day before the celebrations, an armed gunman shot and killed Tan and seven others in a shooting rampage. At Tans spa, Youngs Asian Massage, along with her, three others were fatally shot. Then, about an hour later, four more were killed at two different massage parlours in Atlanta, Georgia. Of the eight victims, six were Asian women. Reading the news, I inevitably placed myself in a similar scenario. What happened to Tan, and what Jami might be going through, still plagues my mind. What is all the more soul-crushing is that, according to USA Today, Tans mother, back in China, was not informed of her daughters grisly death as the family was afraid for her health. So her family cut a cake and celebrated Tans 50th birthday, while in the US, her daughter mourned her death. As the details of the shooting unravelled, Tan and Webb refused to leave my mind. When did stepping out of home become a game of Russian roulette? According to CNN, the suspect in the Atlanta eight case was 21-year-old Robert Aaron Long. Long told the police he believed he had a sex addiction and that he saw the spas as a temptation ... that he wanted to eliminate. While Long claimed his attacks were not racially motivated, the Atlanta police said it was too early to know the motive. In May, USA Today reported that Long was indicted on charges of domestic terror and murder. However, the Asian-American community, local residents and public health authorities wanted investigators and prosecutors to also seek charges of hate crimes against Long as Georgias laws consider a crime on the basis of sex and race a hate crime. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, North America has witnessed an increase in hate crimes against Asian-Americans. NPR observed that these racially motivated attacks, or COVID-19 hate crimes, were disproportionately targeted towards Asian women and Asian seniors. Speaking to NPR, Connie Chung Joe, CEO of Asian Americans Advancing Justice, said that there are far more people who have not reported incidents than those who have. The underreporting of anti-Asian hate crimes is troubling. NBC presented an analysis by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, which noted that while hate crimes in Americas 16 biggest cities dropped overall by 7% in 2020, those targeting Asians shot up by nearly 150%. Let me repeat that, hate crimes against Asians were up 150%. Further, according to the fact sheet, the numbers were collected only from preliminary police data. This means that the 150% increase is only for the reported anti-Asian hate crimes. In the same report, NBC spoke to Karthick Ramakrishnan, founder and director of demographic data and policy research non-profit AAPI Data, who said that while the increase in hate crimes could not entirely be attributed to former US President Donald Trumps racist coronavirus rhetoric, it did play a role in fostering hate. Trump often replaced the corona in the viruss name with China in his press conferences. Racist rhetoric aside, referring to the Atlanta Spa Shootings, another American problem becomes painfully clear. Guns A month after the Atlanta shooting, CNN reported that the US has had at least 50 mass shootings within a month. When the report was published (June 2021), more than 8,100 people in the US had already lost their lives to gunfire. The Washington Post, analysing data from the Gun Violence Archive, noted that 8,100 deaths within five months equals roughly 54 deaths per day to gun violence. Another worrying statistic is that while 2020 was considered the deadliest year for gun violence since 2000, experts now fear that 2021 may actually be worse. The first weekend of June alone saw more than 120 people lose their lives to mass shootings. Gun violence in the US has always been a moot point. By no means are the outrageous numbers mentioned above unique to 2021 and by no means did they come to the fore only after anti-Asian hate crimes shot up abruptly. To be clear, gun violence, particularly by White civilians, and law-enforcement authorities alike, against Black Americans has been, and still is, a shockingly unchallenged phenomenon. The egregious extent of this racial rancour is sickening. But I must admit, until it reached our own shores, the gravity of it all did not completely dawn on me. On 18 April 2021, eight people were killed in a mass shooting at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis. Four of the eight were Sikhs, including three women. Indian Express reported that about 90% of the workers at this facility were said to be Indian-Americans, mostly from the Sikh community. NPR reported that the gunman was 19-year-old Brandon Scott Hole, a former employee, who died by suicide after the mass shooting. NPR also noted that the two assault rifles used by Hole in the attack were purchased legally. The guns were purchased a year before, in 2020. Hole also used to own a shotgun, which was seized by the police when his mother reached out to law enforcement in March last year. Hole was further placed under mental health detention and interviewed by FBI agents, who, at that time, found no racially motivated violent extremism (RMVE) ideology or evidence of crime. However, according to CNN, one officer did find White supremacist websites on Holes computer. This is a major, major, cause for concern. In March 2020, Holes mother called the police when he purchased a shotgun because she feared for her life, he was assessed by the police and the FBI, with one officer reporting he browsed White supremacist websites, he was sent to a mental health facility and his family went on record saying they tried to get him the help he needed. Despite this, within six months, Hole was able to legally purchase an assault rifle. Three months later, he bought his second one. And the following year, he took eight lives. It is unsurprising that Reuters dubbed the US as the most heavily armed country in the world, with 121 firearms per 100 residents. The question worth asking, however, is, how could something like that happen? How did Holes history not raise any red flags? This brings us to yet another factor in the rise of anti-Asian hate crimeshow the US, especially its law enforcement and news mediaviews them. He was pretty much fed up and kind of at the end of his rope. Yesterday was a really bad day for him and this is what he did. This is how Cherokee County Sheriffs Office Capt Jay Baker described the 21-year-old man accused of the Atlanta spa shooting. The BBC broke down just what was wrong with Bakers choice of words. The language used by Baker came under scrutiny for downplaying the element of race in the killings, perpetuating racist and sexist stereotypes and framing the issue as one of White victimhood. Talking about the Atlanta shooting spree, Baker said the accused was lashing out because he had a bad day. Similarly, with news, Washington Post reporter Michelle Ye Hee Lee told CNN how, newsrooms were rushing to describe this shooting as not racially motivated. Lee further said that Asians were invisible and underrepresented in newsrooms. With little or no Asian representation in positions of power in news media, it is, again, not surprising that reports on hate crimes are slow and delayed. There is, however, an Asian currently in Office. Harris What does having a woman of colour as vice president mean for people of colour? In June, on her first international trip as vice president (VP), Kamala Harris travelled to Central America and Mexico to address the issue of immigration. The BBC reported that in a news conference in Guatemala, the VP warned would-be asylum seekers against entering the US illegally, raising concerns about the dangers of the route filled with traffickers and smugglers. While her intentions and concerns were valid, a poorly worded three-syllabic statement repeated twice, drew sharp criticism both home and abroad. Do not come. Do not come. Unfortunate as it is, this is not the first time Harris has faltered in the way she addressed the migrant crisis. Before the VP headed south to the border, her interview with NBC left even the Biden administration perplexed, as the New York Post noted. When the NBCs Lester Holt asked her about her plans of visiting the border, Harris responded that weve been to the border to which Holt pointed out that she, specifically, hadnt visited it yet. Harris laughed it off and said, And I havent been to Europe. The VP went on to say that she did not understand the point Holt was trying to make, which is highly unlikely, given the sensitive nature of the migrant crisis and the fact that she is vice president. Such frivolous remarks pertaining to people of colour by a woman of colour holding such a historically important position of power are nothing short of heartbreaking. A political gaffe of this degree just allows naysayers to reinforce their notions of tokenismthat Harriss nomination was merely a response to the racial justice protests of 2020. For instance, Slate wrote that in light of the murder of George Floyd, picking a woman of colour would have been more of a campaign strategy for winning the White House rather than governance. Besides, Harris rarely wears her Asian heritage, let alone her Indian heritage, on her sleeve. As the Washington Post covered, Harris seldom talks about her Indian background. But when it came to the rise of anti-Asian hate crimes, the article also noted that Harris shared the sense of urgency felt by many Asian-Americans. But five months after the 16 March shooting, attacks against Asians in America still continue. The New York Times noted that as of June, New York alone saw a 400% increase in hate crimes against Asian New Yorkers in 2021 as compared to the same time last year. Although cities have set up task forces to tackle hate crime, one wonders, given the history of US law enforcement officers and race-based crime, if they will make a legitimate difference. Reuters featured a report by the US Department of Justice, which stated that 82% of people suspected of hate crimes between 2004 and 2019 were not prosecuted. It must be remembered, the violence I have talked about so far is unfolding on American soil. Not 11,000 kilometres away in the Graveyard of Empires. With a borderline disregard for the safety of its own people, is it really surprising, then, that America has chosen to look the other way when it comes to Afghanistan? America, that dazzling democratic primate with lofty promises of upward mobility, that shining pinnacle reflecting the towering aspirations of millions around the world, is desperately failing its minorities. The conversation, for a greater part of the year, was about race-based hate crimes against the Asian community. This same time last year, the conversation was about the racially charged injustices towards the Black community. The deeper issue, however, is White supremacy. So long as young boys with bad days continue to be able to purchase assault rifles unquestioned, so long as mighty men behind powerful podiums continue to preach prejudice unimpeded, so long as an entire people continue to be indoctrinated by the belief that some imagined biological quirk makes their existence greater than someone elses and justifies their juvenile hostility, there will be hate, and it will lead to violence. Unless we consciously obliterate the root, the rot, of the system, we will continue to lose our Xiaojie Tans, Jaswinder Singhs and our George Floyds to hate. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that time was running out to evacuate those remaining in Afghanistan but the vast majority of those who were eligible to come to Britain had left. Guest Column: It was PG's smile, out-of-the-box ideas, and the ability to get the very best from everyone, writes Avinash Pandey, CEO, ABP Network Born to amuse, to inspire, to delight Here one day, Gone one night, Like a Sunset dying with the rising of the moon, Gone too soon, Gone too Soon Buz Kohan & Larry Grossman in Michael Jacksons Dangerous. I met Pradeep Guha for the first time in 2003. I was working with TV Today at the time and I realised none of us in the company had registered for AdAsia Jaipur. My then boss asked me to call Pradeep and request for registrations of 10 people. The festival was less than a week away and the news of it getting over-booked was already everywhere. I called, and to my surprise, he picked up. He said he will try but asked if my then boss can speak with him as well. A day later I called him again. He wanted the names and in order of priority. I sent 10 names to him. The first was obviously my boss, the second name was mine and the rest of the list were important names of company executives too but at that time, they appeared lesser mortals to me. PG cleared just the first two. I met him at Jaipur and thanked him. He was standing among a few Bollywood celebs in a crisp white shirt with the appearance of a person who knew he was in control. That was the beginning of our long friendship and association. This is what PG was the man always at the centre of conversations, and the core of power in our community. But seen as helping people, irrespective of their status. Those who knew PG (as he was called by his colleagues), will always remember him as a smiling, curious person. I never worked under him, but I worked with him on many occasions in the IAA, Ad Asia and IBF, and travelled with him almost all over the world. PGs biggest characteristic as a leader was that he never thought small, and never recommended what you already know. He thought, and executed, big. Ad Asia Jaipur, according to me, was Na Bhuto, Na Bhavishyati, it had never happened at this scale in the past, and neither could it be replicated like this in the future. Until he became the top boss at Zee, I am told Zee and Star never visited each other's offices. He partnered with the then-CEO of Star India and together drove the industry forward for rate hikes and the likes, driving incremental revenue. This one move was pivotal in setting up the importance of price discovery between ad agencies and broadcasters. He brought the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity to India. Today all of us that are part of the media, communication and advertising industry, owe it to him for placing India at the top at the Cannes Lions Festival. I frequently used to meet him at Cannes and often agreed for evening conversations. We never matched on lunch, as he loved seafood and I am a thorough vegetarian. We agreed on the Rose instead at the Gutter Bar and we discovered stories of the Indian media and advertising history, tales of Indian media owners and several other anecdotes that even served as lessons. It was during my Cannes visits that I realised how well connected he was internationally and how almost everyone from the Indian community wanted to share a drink or accompany him. He worked hard to bring India and Pakistan together through the IAA. He, in fact, took all the managing committee members of India to Lahore, where he was speaking along with Imran Khan and the other leaders of the sub-continent. He led a delegation of Indian company leaders to Silicon Valley to meet the Whos Who of the tech world for us to see what they were working on, meeting them in their offices and campuses. It was a trip that I was privileged to be part of and found him to be tremendously detailed in planning this one-week activity. Every day, he would be the first person to be there in the morning and the last to leave the bar at night, always happy, sharing anecdotes and learnings. I remember him taking the onus of hosting the IAA Global Conclave in India. He set up a very strong team and for some reason, he included me as well with the agenda to line up world-class speakers almost 18 months before the actual event. He said, first we will find a reason for these global leaders to come to India. And we all know how the Kochi IAA Summit was among the best in its chapters. PG was loved and supported by all that ever worked with him. It was his smile, his out-of-the-box ideas, and the ability to get the very best from everyone that made him lovable. With him gone, we truly say goodbye to an era. (This column was first published on BW Marketingworld) Read more news about (internet advertising India, internet advertising, advertising India, digital advertising India, media advertising India) GBP/EUR Exchange Rate Rangebound, German IFO Data Underwhelms The Pound to Euro exchange rate held steady today following the publication of Germanys latest IFO business climate and expectations reports for August, which both fell below forecasts. The pairing is currently trading around 1.16. Todays publication of Augusts German IFO expectations data fell below forecasts from Julys 101 to 97.5, while the latest business climate gauge also dipped from 100.7 to 99.4. As a result, the Euro has struggled as the Eurozones largest economy shows loss of momentum. Carsten Brzeski, the global head of macro at IFO, commented on the data: Germanys leading indicator joins the choir of recently released leading indicators pointing to a loss of momentum in the German economy. The Ifo index dropped for the second month in a row in August and came in at 99.4. Remember though that, apart from the last two months, this is still the highest level since April 2019. While the current assessment component improved to the highest level since June 2019, expectations saw their sharpest drop since the start of the pandemic. In short, improving current assessment and fading expectations still bode well for growth in the current third quarter but point to more difficult times thereafter. Owing to an uncertain outlook for the Eurozone economy, demand for the single currency has tapered in recent weeks, especially now that uncertainties are growing over the long-term efficacy of coronavirus vaccines against the virus. Pound (GBP) Exchange Rates Rangebound as UK Plunges Towards Supply Chain Crisis The Pound (GBP) held steady against the Euro (EUR) today as the UK plunges towards a possible supply chain crisis, with staff and transport disruption limiting confidence in the outlook for the nations economy. Andrew Sentance, a former member of the Bank of Englands monetary policy committee, explains: Its quite striking, I dont think we can dismiss this as a flash in the pan. Now that lockdown has been eased, were seeing a truer reflection of the impact of Brexit and issues building up before the pandemic. We could see this persisting for longer than people expect. Skills shortages could go on for a few years, the impact of Brexit on our ability to attract workers from the EU is not going to go away quickly and the process of training was quite significantly disrupted by the pandemic, when people were not working and furloughed. In the absence of any notable UK economic data today, however, Pound investors have become more concerned about the possible setbacks for the economy in the months ahead. Added to this, reports that Covid-19 is claiming 100 deaths-a-day in the UK has also sparked concerns about further cases going into autumn. Could rising daily Covid-19 rates weaken the GBP/EUR exchange rate later in todays session? GBP/EUR Exchange Rate Forecast: German Consumer Confidence in Focus Euro (EUR) traders will be looking ahead to tomorrows release of Septembers German GfK consumer confidence survey. Any improvement in the outlook for the Eurozones largest economy would drive-up the EUR/GBP exchange rate. Tomorrow will also see a speech from the European Central Banks (ECB) Isabel Schnable, who is a member of the banks executive board. Could dovish comments from the ECB drive-down the EUR/GBP exchange rate? Pound (GBP) traders will continue to eye Covid-19 developments. Ayn signs of rising daily infection rates and hospitalisations would be GBP-negative. The Pound US Dollar (GBP/USD) exchange rate has weakened throughout the day as the latest durable goods orders from the US fell less than forecast. The GBP/USD pairing are currently trading around the $1.3711 level as the Pound is unable to find any meaningful support today. Pound (GBP) Exchange Rates Struggle on Absence of Economic Data The Pound has found itself limited against the US Dollar throughout the day as an absence of economic data from the UK does little to add support to Sterling. It comes as investors continue to remain cautious surrounding the UKs economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic. Although daily coronavirus cases in the UK remain high, hospitalisations from the virus remain low thanks to the vaccine rollout across the country. However, supply chain issues remain a cause for concern as the Christmas period approaches. Richard Walker, Icelands managing director spoke to UK radio today to comment on the issues, saying: Weve got Christmas around the corner, and in retail we start to stock build really from September onwards, for what is a hugely important time of year. Weve got a lot of goods to transport between now and Christmas and a strong supply chain is vital for everyone. The reason for sounding the alarm now is that weve already had one Christmas cancelled at the last minute, and Id hate this one to be problematic as well. US Dollar (USD) Exchange Rates Supported The US Dollar has strengthened against many of its major rivals today as a more cautious market mood increases safe-haven demand, supporting the Greenback. The US Dollar has also found support from the latest US durable goods orders which although softened, beat market forecasts. US durable goods orders fell 0.1%, though demand remained strong despite supply-chain issues. The data published by the US census bureau read: Excluding transportation, new orders increased 0.7%. Excluding defense, new orders decreased 1.2%. Transportation equipment, also down following two consecutive monthly increases, drove the decrease, $1.7 billion or 2.2% to $75.3 billion. The US Dollar looks to find a resurgence on the global market mood in the remainder of todays European session. GBP/USD Exchange Rate Outlook: US Economic Data in Focus For US Dollar investors, tomorrows GDP growth rate reading from the US for Q2 could see the Greenback push higher against the Pound as the figure is expected to show the US economy expanded further during the second quarter of the year. The Greenback could also head higher on the back of the latest US initial jobless claims if the figure falls again. The GBP/USD exchange rate will continue to be driven by any further coronavirus developments in the coming days as investors keep an eye on the prevalence of the delta variant of the virus domestically and globally. The German Federal election will be held on September 26th. According to MUFG, the April-May 2022 French Presidential election is likely to have a greater market impact, but it notes that the focus on Germany will increase in the run-up to the election, especially given geo-political considerations. MUFG notes; who leads Germany is still of crucial importance. ING adds; One wild card is the result of the upcoming German elections. With the SPD nudging ahead in the polls could we see expectations of looser fiscal policy drive European yields and the euro higher? The outcome is also likely to have important implications for the Pound to Euro (GBP/EUR) exchange rate. The pair was little changed around 1.1685 on Wednesday. Merkel Era Draws to a Close, Fiscal Policy in Focus The element of uncertainty is magnified by the fact that Chancellor Merkel is not standing for re-election after being in office for close to 16 years. Market interest has been piqued by a latest Forsa opinion poll which put the SPD and ahead of CDU/CSU for the first time since 2006. According to MUFG; All polls point to a complicated coalition with a three-way alliance led either by the CDU/CSU or the SPD. The main discussion will be on fiscal policy and the possibility of increased spending if a coalition is led by the Greens or SPD. MUFG is doubtful that there will be a major short-term impact as the EU Recovery Fund has already been agreed and will be disbursed over the next three years. It adds; A political push for further fiscal spending on top of that seems unlikely. The bank notes; The reality for the financial markets is that firstly, it is the ECB that holds the most influence and power in terms of near-term policy expectations while secondly, the fiscal path in the euro-zone has already been set. There will, however, inevitably be an important element of uncertainty as the Merkel era comes to a close. MUFG notes; The main risk of the election having an influence on EUR would be from a very divided election result that increases concern over a period of political instability or a coalition and a leader that lacks authority. The New Zealand Dollar plunged lower last week as the RBNZ failed to raise rates as many expected it to do. The timing of the meeting was unfortunate, and as Assistant Governor Christian Hawkesby told Bloomberg on Tuesday, the bank delayed a rate hike as it would have been on the same day as a national lockdown. However, the bank still has plans to hike despite the lockdown and this helped the NZD recover strongly. Markets have quietened down on Wednesday ahead of the US open as traders eye the Jackson Hole symposium in the US that starts on Thursday. Stock markets are almost completely flat with only the FTSE making a move of note with gains of +0.33%. Currencies are also flat after several sessions of weakness in the USD which pushed it back down below the March high and back inside the large 2021 range. This was primarily driven by reduced expectations for anything hawkish out of the Fed in Jackson Hole. Weak PMIs on Monday and the spread of the Delta variant mean any announcement on taper is likely delayed again. G10 currencies have had mixed fortunes against a weak Dollar, with the New Zealand Dollar and Australian Dollar showing relative strength, and Sterling and the Euro uneventful. NZDUSD in particular has had a good few sessions and has almost recovered all of last weeks heavy losses that were inflicted when the RBNZ failed to raise rates as many expected. RBNZ Sets the Record Straight Last weeks RBNZ meeting was a real let down for NZD bulls. After rapidly ending its QE programme, the bank seemed to be heading straight into a rate hike as tightness in the labour market and a housing bubble pressured the bank to act. Yet, the RBNZ did no such thing and overly long NZD positioning was punished by a sharp move lower of around 3% versus the USD following the meeting. The reasons for the inaction were explained in more detail on Tuesday as Assistant Governor Christian Hawkesby talked to Bloomberg. We put out a document that would have easily supported putting up the official cash rate last week It was less about Covid stopping us doing it and it was more about the timing of communicating our policy move -- was the 18th of August the right day as the country went into lockdown, he said. Raising rates on the day of a national lockdown would have been hard to explain. However, the lockdown and the resurgence of Covid in New Zealand does not seem to be a long-term barrier to the banks plans. Our decisions around monetary policy arent going to be tightly linked to Covid and whether were in lockdown or not, or what level of mobility restrictions are in place, in part because one of the big lessons over the last 18 months is how Covids impacted both the demand and the supply side of the economy, Hawkesby told Bloomberg. This puts a rate hike in October firmly back on the table and explains the jump higher in the Kiwi. NZDUSUD is now +2.35% above last weeks low and doesnt look like slowing down. Another boost comes from Hawkesbys comments that a 50bps hike is possible rather than the standard 25bps. Tightness in the labour market is the main driver behind the banks urgency to hike and it will be hard to gauge how much the current lockdown will affect employment. If the lockdown drags on like it has in Australia, the bank may need to scale back hawkish plans and this could drop the Kiwi back down again. NZDUSD is currently trading just below 0.70 and is back above the important support level of 0.694 which held the March low. Technically, last weeks breakdown failed and this often leads to a move in the other direction, if only briefly. 0.71 is the next logical upside target at the 200dma. This week, the FDA gave format approval to the COVID-10 vaccine from Pfizer. This is big news because it means that individuals and organizations who were holding off on vaccinations (or on requiring them for their employees) now have official notice this is an approved drug. No sooner had this been made public than Pfizer announced the drug would now be marketed under its new name: Comirnity. Comirni-what? There is a logic to how this was put together. The word includes references to COVID, mRNA, immunity and community. OK, there's login to that, but it doesn't just roll off the tongue. It's not like Pfizer hasn't been able to come up with a catchy name before. This is the company that sells Viagra, after all. Supposedly, a branding company that calls itself the best in the industry advised Pfizer on this name. Hmm. The problem is any name that requires that much explanation is sort of defeating the purpose. We can easily remember made-up brand names, like Google, Lyft, Uber, YouTube...even Viagra. But Comirnity? Probably not. How easy is it for your customers to remember your brands? Are the names of your products and services memorable? Or, are they easily forgotten by busy prospects and customers? Are your competitors' product names more sticky than yours? Or, will your customers be saying, "We got that great vaccine. Can't remember the name though. Maybe it was Moderna?" Subscribe to this newsletter. Thirty more people have died of COVID-19 in Bexar County, the Metropolitan Health District reported Wednesday. That number, which brings Bexar Countys COVID death toll to 3,802, marks the most fatalities reported on a single day since 64 deaths were reported on Aug. 11, 2020. Since last year, no other days report has reached 30 deaths, and only a few have exceeded 20. The number of deaths reported each day that are confirmed to be caused by the coronavirus can include ones that occurred within the previous 14 days. Nevertheless, the 30 deaths cited Wednesday brings the total reported over the past two weeks to at least 103. As of Wednesday, San Antonio-area hospitals are treating 1,371 COVID-19-positive patients, including 25 children. Of those hospitalized, 391 are in intensive care units and 238 are relying on ventilators to breathe. About 85 percent of these hospitalized patients have not received the COVID-19 vaccine. According to Metro Healths July epidemiology report, only 1 percent of reported deaths since Jan. 1 have been among fully vaccinated people. Earlier this month, the Texas Department of State Health Services requested five refrigerated mortuary trailers from the Federal Emergency Management Agency following an increase in COVID-19 fatalities statewide, state spokesman Douglas Loveday said. They are stationed in San Antonio as a precaution and can be requested by other counties that need them. So far, the mortuary trailers have been sent to Bell and McLennan counties. Bexar County does not need one at this point, said Cleo Garcia, a public information officer with Metro Health. laura.garcia@express-news.net The Texas Supreme Court has temporarily blocked San Antonio and Bexar Countys mask mandate, marking the latest update in a flurry of court battles over mask requirements statewide. The decision comes after an appellate court earlier this month allowed the local mask mandate to stand, despite Gov. Greg Abbotts executive order barring public entities from instituting such requirements. The new ruling is a win for the governor and Attorney General Ken Paxton, who had asked the high court earlier this week to step in and stop local officials. The Texas Supreme Court has sided with the law, and the decision to enforce mask mandates lies with the governors legislatively granted authority, Paxton said in a release. Mask mandates across our state are illegal, and judges must abide by the law. Further noncompliance will result in more lawsuits. After suing Abbott, the county and city governments had issued their mandates earlier this month, requiring face coverings in local government buildings, and had applauded the Metropolitan Health District for ordering school districts to do the same. Both city and county officials have cited the recent surge of positive COVID tests and hospitalizations in advocating for the requirement. The Supreme Courts ruling came as San Antonio-area hospitals, as of Thursday, were treating 1,365 COVID-19-positive patients, which is more than triple what it was one month ago. That number includes 29 children. During a televised COVID-19 briefing by city of San Antonio and Bexar County officials, Mayor Ron Nirenberg and County Judge Nelson Wolff indicated that they werent surprised by the courts action. Wolff said he remains encouraged that some school districts continue to require masks. School districts are doing the right thing, and the mayor and I support them 100 percent. We are here principally to save our children, and its so distressing to see the governor of this state doing everything he can to stop us, Wolff said. San Antonio City Attorney Andy Segovia, who was also at the briefing, said the city was still evaluating what it would tell its employees in light of the Supreme Courts order. TEXAS TAKE: Get the latest news on Texas politics sent directly to your inbox every weekday The high court noted that its order does not consider whether people should wear masks or whether government officials should compel them to do so. Rather, the justices said, the case concerns which levels of government can make those decisions. The status quo, for many months, has been gubernatorial oversight of such decisions at both the state and local levels, the justices wrote. That status quo should remain in place while the court of appeals, and potentially this court, examine the parties merits arguments to determine whether plaintiffs have demonstrated a probable right to the relief sought. The court has yet to make a final decision on the lawsuit, which could take weeks or months. Several similar but separate lawsuits, including two in Dallas and Houston, are also currently being litigated. Its not yet clear how Thursdays ruling impacts an Aug. 19 decision by the high court to temporarily allow mask mandates in school districts across Texas, a policy that Abbott has also banned. Local officials have urged school districts to require masks but have said they would not enforce Metro Healths directive. A majority of public school districts in Bexar County have adopted mask mandates, sometimes after contentious public debate, and some indicated uncertainty in the immediate aftermath of Thursdays ruling over how it would affect them. Northside Independent School District officials consulted with the districts lawyers and will keep its mask mandate unchanged. It posted a notice on its website that said the district has an ethical obligation to our students and staff to keep them safe. We also believe that the universal use of face coverings prevents illness and quarantine that takes students and staff away from in-person instruction, the statement said. Northsides board this week voted to join the city and county in their lawsuit against Abbott in order to use every tool we can to continue to keep students, teachers, and staff safe during the pandemic, the districts superintendent, Brian Woods, said in a prepared statement emailed by a district spokesman. Joining this lawsuit is another step towards regaining local control to allow our elected school board to make decisions that are best for our district, Woods said. San Antonio ISD Superintendent Pedro Martinez sent a letter to parents saying the district still requires masks as a key step toward keeping schools open. "Please know, this is not about politics. This is a matter of public health and safety," he wrote. "Our attorneys can protect the district legally. Our focus will remain on protecting the health of those in our care and the stability of student learning." Bexar County District Attorney Joe Gonzales said he was personally disappointed in Thursdays decision. In a later statement, Gonzales said he would not prosecute any school district official for requiring masks in schools at this time because the latest guidance by the Texas Education Agency on Aug. 19 had noted that the governors ban on mask mandates was not being enforced as the result of ongoing litigation. I understand that this litigation has been confusing for public officials, administrators and, most importantly, the public, Gonzales said. Rest assured that we are working tirelessly to protect those who cannot protect themselves. I continue to urge those who are eligible for a COVID vaccine and/or a booster to get vaccinated and to continue to wear a mask to prevent the spread of this virus. cayla.harris@express-news.net, danya.perez@express-news.net, laura.garcia@express-news.net CONCORD, N.H. (AP) Six New Hampshire state troopers who discharged their guns, killing a man during a standoff in Claremont, were legally justified in their use of deadly force, the state attorney generals office said Wednesday. Jeffrey Ely, 40, who had barricaded himself in an automotive-type shop in Claremont where he had been living, died March 31 during an exchange of gunfire with police. Before the standoff, witnesses told police that Ely was driving recklessly outside the building and threatening to shoot everyone. He fired a gun in the direction of several people in the parking lot, hitting a truck. Ely also had spoken with local police and fired a gun several times inside the building, according to a report from the attorney general's office. A state police SWAT team had been called to the building and used a metal ram attached to an armored vehicle to push the building door open. Ely shot at the vehicle multiple times and declined repeated commands to drop his gun and leave the building, the report said. He put on a jacket, and still holding a gun, moved closer to the door as if he was about to leave," the report said. The troopers fired. An autopsy determined that Ely died of multiple gunshot wounds to the head, neck, arms, legs and torso. No law enforcement officers or other people were hurt. Toxicology testing revealed the presence of multiple drugs in Ely's blood, including methamphetamine, amphetamine, buprenorphine and norbuprenorphine. A report from the attorney general's office described the use of deadly force in two instances associated with Ely's death. In the first, the SWAT team members fired their guns in near unison over a period of approximately six seconds." In the second, it appeared that one of the troopers discharged his rifle three times about 16 seconds later. The attorney general's office investigates all instances when New Hampshire state troopers use deadly force. Now Playing: Two men were killed and another was injured Thursday morning in a shooting near the courthouse in the small northern Illinois city of Kankakee, authorities said. (Aug. 26) Video: Associated Press KANKAKEE, Ill. (AP) Two men were killed and another was injured on Thursday in shootings outside a northern Illinois courthouse stemming from a long-running internal gang dispute, authorities said. The shootings occurred after one of the victims, Victor Andrade, emerged from the Kankakee County Courthouse and was fatally shot by Antonio Hernandez, Kankakee Police Chief Robin Passwater said during a news conference. Ken Branca San Antonio police arrested two individuals after a suspected drunken driver crashed into another driver also suspected of driving drunk Thursday morning on the Northeast Side. Police said a 29-year-old man was driving a 2001 Nissan Altima the wrong way on Wurzbach Parkway at around 1:30 a.m. Thursday, when he crashed head-on into a 2021 GMC Terrain at the Buzzi Way intersection. A horrific 2019 San Antonio murder took center stage in the latest episode of "In Pursuit with John Walsh." Titled "Twisted Mysteries," the Investigation Discovery show aired Wednesday night and focused on Brian Ontivero's alleged shooting death of his ex-girlfriend, and mother of their young son. On June 8, 2019, Ontiveros shot Marissa Jernigan in her Northeast Side apartment, according to San Antonio police. Officers arrived after Ontiveros fled the scene. They found 20-year-old Jernigan unconscious and bleeding heavily. She died at the hospital shortly after. On ExpressNews.com: Fisherman finds dead infant in a shallow grave in Travis County Two years later, SAPD still has an active murder warrant for Ontiveros. John Walsh, the show's host and longtime criminal investigator, highlights cold cases in hopes of drawing out new information. Twenty-six fugitives featured during the the last two seasons of the show have been caught, according to a tweet by co-host Callahan Walsh. John Walsh shared a Twitter video an hour before the episode aired, asking his fans to help find the fugitive who he called a "weasel." "Over the past 35 years, I've been hunting dangerous fugitives who've fled to Mexico, and our fans down there have helped us put away the worse of the worst," Walsh said in the Twitter clip. During the episode, Walsh said U.S. Marshals Service believe Ontiveros is in Mexico. The federal law enforcement agency says it has video footage of him crossing the border with his brother two days after Jernigan's shooting death. Ontiveros is now 23 years old and is constantly changing his appearance with haircuts and distinctive tattoos, Walsh said during the episode. He urged anyone with information on Ontiveros' whereabouts to call 833-378-7783. Malak.Silmi@express-news.net The city wants to find four permanent locations that will be equipped to serve San Antonio residents in times of catastrophe. Pithily dubbed resiliency hubs, these stations would offer critical services in the event of a terrorist attack, natural disaster or another incident with the capacity to negatively affect the well-being and functionality of a significant portion of the city. Deputy City Manager Maria Villagomez proposed putting aside $1 million to develop resiliency hubs during a City Council budget workshop Wednesday. Defining city resiliency as the ability to survive and thrive no matter what kind of chronic stresses or acute shocks the community experiences, Villagomez hopes to collaborate with members of the public to identify promising venues for four such hubs throughout the city. She described them as neighborhood centers that are designed to provide a safe place for temporary shelter during events like a storm, for example, or a flood event. They would also be operational during man-made disasters such as infrastructure failures. On ExpressNews.com: 'Cascading disaster': Report details city and utilities' response, failings during February freeze Michelle Vigil, a city spokeswoman, emphasized the preliminary nature of the initiative. The city is just beginning to plan the hubs, she said, and more details will be provided after the budget is finalized. City officials are holding a series of workshops and community meetings to evaluate the proposed 2022 fiscal year budget totaling $3.1 billion. Public hearings will be held in September, and the budget is scheduled for approval Sept. 16. JERRY LARA / San Antonio Express-News Inspired by the recent cascade of tribulations the city faced during the February freeze and the ongoing pandemic, the resiliency hubs are part of a broader strategy to improve local emergency preparedness. In times of crisis, they will offer refuge, resources and services; in times of calm, they will host activities and programming intended to foster community engagement and awareness so that people get to know their neighbors (and) get to know the facilities in the event of a disaster, Villagomez said. One of the problems her department has encountered is poor attendance at emergency shelters, potentially because people dont know until the same day or the day before we open the facility, she said. The hubs would serve as permanent sites where the community knows they can go for help. On ExpressNews.com: Get the latest update on coronavirus and a tracking map of U.S. cases In addition to establishing resiliency hubs, the city plans to build resiliency by taking a number of other measures. In her presentation, Villagomez outlined plans to funnel $3 million of the $8.5-million proposed resiliency budget into purchasing emergency generators for select fire stations and police substations. However, District 1 Councilman Mario Bravo seemed to consider that amount excessive. When I think about critical infrastructure and putting generators there in case of severe weather events, or we lose power or anything like that, I think of $3 million in generators that are going to be not used probably 364 out of 365 days, he said. The proposal also includes funding for identifying vulnerable populations, providing community education, developing an overarching resiliency strategy and shoring up public infrastructure and safety facilities. caroline.tien@hearst.com When the last U.S. troops leave Kabul next week, Afghans whove resettled in San Antonio fear a bloodbath of retribution by their countrys victorious new rulers against supporters of the collapsed government including anyone who helped Americans or their allies during 20 years of war. In the nearly two weeks since the Taliban took the capital, the resettled Afghans have been flooding the Center for Refugee Services with desperate phone calls and lining up at its small office not far from the South Texas Medical Center, trying to arrange for the safe evacuation of trapped loved ones. With time running out, a handful of staff and volunteers have been collecting the names and circumstances of these friends and relatives to forward to the State Department through a local congressman. The center also is raising money and preparing to help provide food and household supplies to as many as 100 Afghans who might be sent for resettlement in San Antonio starting next week one family has already arrived, its director said. The newcomers would join 600-plus Afghans whove come to the Alamo City since 2015. One of them, who asked to be identified only as Honar, said his family had been told their papers were ready and that they could board a flight out of Kabuls airport. At the center Thursday, he said the Taliban have been limiting access to the airport and that one of their fighters had hit his brother in the back with the butt of an AK-47 rifle the day before. What are you doing? Why are you going in? Honar said the gunman asked his brother harshly. All the gates are crowded and chaos. How to help Visit the Center for Refugee Services at sarefugees.org and click on the "Take Action" link. The center uses monetary donations to buy hygiene and food supplies and kitchen utensils for its new arrivals. An application to volunteer is available. Interviewing and training for new volunteers is ongoing. RAICES is seeking apartments, clothing, food and household items and also needs volunteers. Information is on its website at www.raicestexas.org/take-action/volunteer See More Collapse The nonprofits executive director, Margaret Costantino, stood in a small courtyard outside her office and addressed a dozen Afghans waiting to fill out forms that might smooth passage for their families to America. Most were in T-shirts, slacks and tennis shoes. A few wore the shalwar kameez, the long tunic of Afghanistan and Pakistan. One man wanted to list 12 family members on the form, but that was five too many. Costantino gave him two forms. Express Briefing: Get the morning headlines in your inbox This is heartbreaking. This is heartbreaking (also) as a neighbor of people whom weve built relationships with over the last five or six years, knowing that their families are stuck, she said in an earlier interview. They are very grateful for what America has given them, Costantino said. Weve gotten a lot of friendship and kindness in return. Were here to help, and theyre here to be good neighbors, but its heartbreaking to see whats happening to their relatives and the fear on their faces. The single-page, handwritten forms make up slices of that heartbreak. Each starts with the San Antonio family members name, phone number and address and the person they are seeking to get out of Afghanistan. Above are my family members who are currently in Kabul in very bad situation, one San Antonio resident had written after listing a mother, a sister and several nephews and nieces. They are in danger of getting killed because I worked with U.S. armed forces and because I live here in USA. So, please help me evacuate them as soon as possible. They cannot stay on one location for too long, because the Taliban will find them. The center works to integrate legally resettled refugees into the community and has helped more than 1,000 clients a year who have come from more than 20 countries riven by violence, war and human rights abuses. The countries include Myanmar, Sudan, Iraq, Iran, Central African Republic, Eritrea and the Democratic Republic of Congo, as well as Afghanistan. Most of its Afghan clients live close to the centers modest office on Wurzbach, which has just two paid staff and about 30 volunteers who include multilingual refugees and graduate students working on degrees in public health and mental health. The center has given more than 150 college scholarships since 2010, and it helps refugees with everything from groceries to language and citizenship classes. The Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services, or RAICES, also has been busy, trying to locate apartments for an undetermined number of Afghan arrivals expected in the next several days, said Marisol Girela, who oversees its social programs. It receives new refugees year-round, but a process that usually gave her two weeks notice now might be moment to moment, with an email alerting her that evacuees need to be picked up at the airport or already have arrived, she said. Girela said RAICES is looking for apartments, furniture, clothes and food, all the basic living needs for a home. The group also will link up the new residents with potential employers and medical services and make sure their children can get enrolled in school. Our goal is for them to be well-connected, Girela said. There is significant urgency right now. We need the community to be aware. RAICES also needs volunteers. Girela said those interested in helping can go to its website. Most of the Afghans showing up this week at the Center for Refugee Services worked for U.S. military forces and obtained special immigrant visas, or SIVs, that allowed them to flee Afghanistan. One man, Mushtaq, 41, said he is trying to get four brothers and a sister to the U.S. I worked with the Special Forces, and we did a lot of missions, so thats why theyre targeting us, he said. They would never leave us alive. Another man, Ahmad, came to the U.S. under the SIV program with his wife and two children after working as an interpreter for the Army. On Thursday, he was translating for Mushtaq and another Afghan named Mohamad. Some in Ahmads family worked for nongovernmental organizations as drivers or security to support a wide variety of activities in Afghanistan, from health care to economic improvement. One was a village elder. They want to torture me, so theyre killing my family, said Ahmad, 35. Mohamad, also 35, said he has been in San Antonio for more than two years with his wife and five children. Whatever you want, you can get it here, he said. Theres a lot of opportunities for jobs, and children can go to school and every facilitys here. Thats the good things. But theres one thing they all appreciate: their safety. Im happy to live in the United States and San Antonio because Im feeling free, Ahmad. Im safe, I have freedom. Im feeling freedom, I can go to work. On the Monday after Kabul fell to the Taliban without a fight Aug. 15, Costantino and her assistant, Jean Sherrill, arrived at work to find a line running out the door, and a chilling thought crossed their minds. We said to each other, We have no idea how to help these people, Costantino said. On ExpressNews.com: For Texas veterans, Taliban triumph a gut punch She contacted U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, to act as a conduit to the State Department for names and other information their clients have provided. Castros office requested the forms and advised the center to get their clients to include their passport numbers. Nobody knows how to do this. This is all happening like, every day we were getting new information, Costantino said. Every day. Castros office warned them that some people would receive higher priority than others, she said. A critical element of the form is explaining why the person is at greater risk for attacks or death if left behind. Other members of Congress, both Republicans and Democrats, also are working to help bring refugees out of the country. Rep. Kevin Brady, R-The Woodlands, has acted on behalf of up to 20 Afghans trapped in the country. An Afghanistan War veteran, Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Houston, has taken up the cause as well, working on behalf of hundreds more. Brady said that like every other office, were receiving calls from all over the country with heartbreaking stories, and were doing everything we can to get that information to the State Department and help. Complicating matters, many Afghans coming to America have no identification especially women. The center has spun up a fundraising operation to help Afghans who are flown out of the country land on their feet in San Antonio. The Talibans really not going to wait to start clamping down once they know the Americans are gone. And thats what our people are telling us, that their family members, these people on this paper, Costantino said, holding the form, theyre getting knocks on the door right now and threats, and people are shooting at them. There is no kinder, gentler Taliban. Thats all baloney, she added. Its going to be horrible for whoevers left behind. Staff writer Elizabeth Zavala contributed to this report. sigc@express-news.net Former Bexar County District Attorney Nico LaHood is seriously considering a Republican primary run for state representative. The fiery former Democrat said he is giving prayerful consideration to launching a campaign in Texas House District 122, the seat currently held by maverick San Antonio Republican Lyle Larson. Public service is in my heart, obviously, LaHood said Thursday. Im in a season where Im focusing on my kids right now and my family and our (law) firm and our clients, and Im happy where God has me. But a state representative position gets me involved in bigger and broader discussions of ideas. This exploration of a Texas House campaign is an unexpected development for LaHood, whose only previously expressed interest in public office involved district attorney. In 2010, LaHood ran an energetic general election campaign against four-term Republican DA Susan Reed, ultimately losing by 7.7 percentage points. Four years later, he tried again and unseated Reed, with the help of more than $1 million in donations from superstar personal-injury attorney Thomas J. Henry. It was a major win for San Antonio Democrats in an otherwise bleak election cycle in which local Republicans gained one congressional seat and one Texas House seat and nearly swept Democrats out of the courthouse. LaHood never paid much heed to partisan politics, however, and over the course of his tenure as district attorney, his biggest critics tended to be his fellow Democrats. They were alarmed by the way he used his position to embrace the anti-vax movement, a stance rooted in his belief that a vaccine had contributed to his sons autism. LaHood, a devout Christian, also expressed the view that faithful adherence to the tenets of Islam would naturally lead someone to terrorism. In 2017, LaHood allegedly threatened to shut down the practices of two defense attorneys during a dispute in the lead-up to a murder trial. (The State Bar of Texas later ruled that LaHood committed professional misconduct and placed him on probation for one year.) One of the defense attorneys he allegedly threatened was Joe Gonzales, who decided to challenge LaHood in the 2018 Democratic primary for district attorney. Gonzales, with the help of a huge funding boost from progressive sugar daddy George Soros, beat LaHood by more than 18 percentage points. Eight months after his defeat, LaHood went on the Joe Pags radio show and announced that he no longer considered himself a Democrat. The party today has been hijacked by a leftist ideology, a neo-Marxist ideology, that is really fascist in nature, he said. LaHood said Thursday that he misses the days when people with differing party affiliations could have constructive philosophical debates without succumbing to name-calling. People need to be encouraged to critically think through things, he said. Weve lost this ability to talk. It used to be OK to disagree. And its missing. Ultimately, people have to understand that ideas have consequences. We need to get more in a discussion of ideas. We get caught up in politics, we get caught up in religion. Lets just talk about ideas and how those ideas affect people. LaHood, who has worked as a defense lawyer over the past 2 years, said he was approached by a number of people to make one more run for DA, but he concluded that the Texas House would be a better fit. The lingering question is whether Larson will even seek another term in the House. Larson has always been an independent voice in the Legislature. During this years legislative session, he has become a persistent critic of what he sees as shameless gamesmanship on the part of his fellow Republicans. Larson has blasted GOP lawmakers for pushing voting-restriction legislation and refusing to get behind Medicaid expansion. He also has lamented the lack of a strong GOP response to the two most pressing issues in the state: the COVID-19 pandemic and the shakiness of the Texas power grid. During a June 14 interview on the Express-Newss Puro Politics podcast, Larson referred to Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick as soulless and a jerk. Larson has done little to hide his growing distaste for the two-party system and has been talked about as a possible independent candidate for higher office. But he has yet to reveal any plans for 2022. LaHood indicated that his own plans wont be affected by Larsons. I reached out to him, and Im still waiting for my call back. So were supposed to sit down and talk, LaHood said. I believe in going to people. Im not trying to cheap-shot anybody. Lyle and I have had mutual respect for each other in the past, at least I felt that way. So I want to talk with him about it, to see what his intentions are and where hes at. But the consideration is still there regardless. ggarcia@express-news.net | Twitter: @gilgamesh470 During commemoration of Yom Kippur in biblical times, two goats were brought to the high priest. One was sacrificed to Jehovah. Upon the head of the other goat, the priest laid his hands and confessed the sins of the people. The goat, now burdened with the sins and crimes of a people, was called a scapegoat and released into the wilderness to pacify the demon Azazel. Scapegoats, innocents upon whom the wrongdoings of others are placed, are always needed for the ritual of finger-pointing and deflecting blame. Anyone, and any group of people, can be a scapegoat, at any given time for any given purpose. In the early days of COVID-19, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, Texas high priest of misinformation and culture wars, suggested senior citizens should be willing to sacrifice their lives to preserve the economy for their grandchildren. We are, now, in what wed hoped would be the final days of the pandemic but is instead a precarious moment with the rise of the delta variant. As COVID rages, particularly across the South, Patrick continues to sacrifice facts upon an altar of ideology while dismissing, into the wilderness, African Americans hes cast as scapegoats. On ExpressNews.com: Dan Patrick blames COVID surge on unvaccinated African Americans, prompting widespread backlash Last week, Patrick sat for an interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham, a woman who has advocated the use of Ivermectin, a horse dewormer, to treat COVID. The COVID is spreading, particularly most of the numbers are with the unvaccinated, and the Democrats like to blame Republicans on that, Patrick said. Well, the biggest group in most states are African Americans who have not been vaccinated. Last time I checked, over 90 percent of them vote for Democrats in their major cities and major counties, so its up to the Democrats to get as many people vaccinated. This is a lie. Either out of harmful ignorance or malicious intent well give him the benefit of the doubt that its the former Patrick is repeating a centuries-old racist trope of blaming the spread of disease on racial or ethnic groups. His co-trafficker in falsehoods, Gov. Greg Abbott, has wrongly blamed immigrants, another group historically the target of these smears. The Texas Department of State Health Services reports that while Black Texans have lower rates of vaccination, most of the estimated 8 million people unvaccinated in the state are white. Responding to the backlash over his comments, Patrick issued this statement. Not surprisingly, Democrat social media trolls were up late misstating the facts and fanning the flames of their lies. But it was Patrick misstating the facts, and injecting race and politics into the issue by singling out one group to blame and suggesting that only Democrats are responsible for encouraging African Americans or other Democrats to get vaccinated while Republicans are responsible for the unvaccinated who are white and Republican. COVID doesnt care about such man-made distinctions. It thrives among the unprotected and vulnerable, infecting people regardless of race, class or station in life. People like the children in Texas, many too young to be vaccinated, who are returning to school at a time when they are more likely, than a year ago, to be stricken with COVID. Yet their governor and lieutenant governor have refused to allow school districts to enforce mask mandates, which would better protect them. Instead of making scapegoats of others while lives are sacrificed, Patrick should think of what happens when the sins of the father threaten the health and lives of his sons and daughters. As President Joe Biden takes bipartisan criticism for his handling of Afghanistan, national Democrats are desperately trying to change the topic. On Wednesday that meant the Democratic National Committee rolling through Houstons East End on a bus tour promoting other accomplishments the White House desperately wants to put back at the top of the agenda as public polling shows his approval ratings beginning to slip. Specifically, the bus tour, which Republicans laughed off as an attempt at deflecting from a disastrous week for Biden, is aimed at touting the $1.9 trillion coronavirus recovery program and the $1.2 trillion infrastructure deal that Congress just approved. For nearly 30 minutes, Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner and other Democrats ticked off a list of accomplishments that they say have made the lives of Houstonians and Texans better because Biden took office seven months ago. Rental assistance programs, increasing COVID vaccinations, an improving economy and the promise of much-needed roads and bridges were all part of that focus. Afghanistan wasnt mentioned once until reporters pressed the issue as the event wrapped up. INFRASTRUCTURE: Cornyn, Cruz vote no as Senate passes $1.2 trillion bipartisan bill to fund roads, airports Turner said regardless of what is happening overseas, it doesnt change the fact that tens of thousands of households in Houston have received rent and utility bill assistance since Biden took office. The reality is, you still have to acknowledge the good things that have occurred and real families that have been positively impacted, Turner said while standing in front of a blue touring bus with the Biden slogan Build Back Better painted on the side. Turner, along with state Sen. Carol Alvarado, D-Houston, stressed the emergency rental assistance funding that has helped more than 45,000 households in Houston and Harris County. News of the bus tour brought audible chuckles from Republicans in the region like U.S. Rep Michael McCaul, whose 10th Congressional District stretches from Austin to parts of Harris County. He said Democrats clearly want to change the topic, but that wont be easy given how disastrous the withdrawal from Afghanistan has been. This isnt going away, said McCaul, the top-ranking Republican on the U.S. House Foreign Affairs committee. TEXAS TAKE: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox He said Biden is going to have to live with the ramifications of his poorly planned withdrawal, which McCaul said compares to the fall of Saigon in Vietnam or the loss of the U.S. Embassy in Iran during the Jimmy Carter administration. This will be a stain on this presidency, McCaul said. But Democrats pressed on Wednesday, armed with data that they said shows true progress since Biden won the White House. They touted 4 million jobs created since January, the 45,000 Harris County households that have received rental assistance help, and the 2 million Americans who have been able to sign up for the federal Affordable Care program. Today is a day to recognize the incredible progress we are seeing thanks to President Biden, said Carla Brailey, the vice-chair of the Texas Democratic Party. The campaign-style bus tour, which next goes to San Antonio tomorrow, underscores the messaging Democrats plan to use next year during the midterm elections when every member of the U.S. House will be up for reelection. While Republicans have made clear they will pound Democrats over the handling of the border and foreign affairs, Democrats are focusing on the pandemic recovery and the economy. Alvarado said in the closing months of the Trump administration, they were creating just 60,000 jobs a month. The Biden administration is helping create 60,000 every three days. Our economy is coming back, she said. The bus tour is hitting as Biden has seen his approval ratings dip from the early months of his presidency. The latest Politico/Morning Consult poll conducting between Friday and Monday showed Biden getting positive approval ratings from 51 percent of nearly 2,000 voters surveyed. In late April, a similar poll by Politico/Morning Consult had that approval rating over 60 percent. Midterm elections are historically perilous for the party of the president. In 2018, Republicans lost 40 seats in the U.S. House at the midpoint of President Donald Trumps term. During President Barack Obamas first term, Democrats lost 63 seats in the U.S. House. jeremy.wallace@chron.com A new survey from Rice University underscores the deepening partisan chasm over provisions in the controversial GOP priority elections bill. For example, 46 percent of Harris County Republicans polled who participated in the county's 2020 innovation of drive-thru voting said they supported the bills proposal to ban the method, despite 70 percent rating their experience as excellent. The poll confirms other research that has found that confidence in the 2020 presidential election was closely linked with a voters political party. The poll also shows that preference for provisions in the GOP elections bill scheduled to be debated in the Texas House today follows the same pattern, said Bob Stein, Rice University political science professor and a co-author of the poll. Its the persistence of partisan polarization, Stein said, adding that he was surprised that so many Republican drive-thru voters who said they would be interested in drive-thru voting again also said they would support outlawing it. The survey was taken online by 2,297 registered voters in Harris County who had previously participated in another survey by the university prior to the 2020 election. The margin of error was plus or minus 2.1 percent. BACKGROUND: After 6-week boycott, Texas Democrats return to the same voting bill Democrats have decried the legislation as a tool of voter suppression, while Republicans have said the measures are necessary to ensure election integrity The majority of Harris County voters who used drive-thru and 24-hour voting, 53 percent and 56 percent respectively, are Black, Hispanic or of Asian descent, county data shows. Democrats say banning the methods will discourage minority participation in future elections. Republicans, meanwhile, say the methods were never supposed to be allowed under Texas law and point to their lack of popularity. For example, while drive-thru voting was the highest-rated method of voting, according to the poll, it was also not an option used by many in the county. About eight percent of Harris County voters, or more than 127,000, voted from their cars. Still, political leanings influenced opinions, even among those who hadnt used drive-thru voting themselves: 95 percent of Democratic voters opposed a ban on drive-thru voting while 71 percent of Republican voters approved. Democrats and Republicans were also far apart on the issue of 24-hour driving, another target of the GOP elections bill. Ninety-two percent of Democrats did not want to see it banned, but 75 percent of Republicans did. Republicans were more aligned with Democrats on certain voting issues. The majority of Democrats 97 percent did not want to see a bill limit the number and location of polling places, a provision thats since been removed from the elections bills. A smaller majority of Republicans, 54 percent, also oppose such limitations. On expanding poll watcher access, in keeping with the partys stance, Democrats overwhelmingly opposed allowing the volunteers selected by political parties and candidates more area to roam in polling places. A slim majority of Republicans 52 percent supported it. READ MORE: Texas Democrats cheer as U.S. House passes federal voting rights bill The survey did not include additional questions about why voters supported or opposed the measure, Stein said, though he guessed that Republicans likely share some of the same concerns as Democrats in wanting to avoid opportunities for poll watcher intimidation. Another reason could be the ambiguity of the terms used in the bills. The bills guarantee watchers free movement within polling places and protects their ability to be near enough to see and hear the election officers conducting the observed activity. The poll asked voters whether watchers ought to have free access inside polling locations. taylor.goldenstein@chron.com A few blocks from the Pearl and St. Marys Strip, both pulsing with activity, a drab building in the shadow of Interstate 35 is one of the reminders of Tobin Hill as it used to be. The one-story, tan and green rectangle is empty. It sits at the corner of Elmira and St. Marys streets, flanked on both sides by modern, expensive townhomes. A trendy restaurant and yoga studio are across the street. High-end apartments and shops are a short walk away, and more projects are in the works in the near-downtown neighborhood. But its not all new development chasing new money. The boarded-up building also borders on modest older homes and low-slung offices and warehouses holdouts in a neighborhood thats attracting higher-income owners and renters as the Pearls growth ripples outward. And with values exploding, some property owners are receiving offers they wouldnt have dreamed of a few years ago. Thats what happened to Alternative Clubs Inc., or ACI, the former owner and occupant of that squat building. ACI ran one of San Antonios last remaining private mens clubs known in the community as a bathhouse on the edge of Tobin Hill for decades. Its parking lot was often full. ACI was a throwback to when a handful of such clubs offered gay men a safe place to socialize, before much of the dating scene moved online. With the internet being the place a lot of people go to meet and hook up, I dont think a bathhouse is the central place it used to be, said Melissa Gohlke, assistant archivist in special collections at the University of Texas at San Antonio who has studied the citys LGBTQ history. Last year, ACI moved out amid a dispute over unpaid rent and allegations that its landlord took advantage of the LGBTQ business, a charge his lawyer denies. Before that, ACI had changed hands and its assets were later sold to a limited liability company overseen by local attorney Justin Nichols, who also represented ACI in the eviction case. The sole member of the company is a trust, and Nichols is the trustee, he said. The company bought a former gym about three miles to the west, in the Woodlawn Lake area, and opened a private mens social club last year. ACIs former home is slated to be demolished. A Houston-based developer is under contract to buy the site and plans to build apartments. Someone was going to do it Robert Widule was part of a group that bought land next to ACI in 2016 and built a cluster of townhomes there. After watching a retail and office project go up across the street, he approached ACIs owner. The 10,400-square-foot building has good bones and parking, a rarity in the neighborhood, Widule said in an interview last year. With the Pearl, the San Antonio Museum of Art and the bars and restaurants along North St. Marys Street a short walk away, he thought it could be an attractive spot for a grocery store, restaurant or office building. If it wasnt me, someone was going to do it at some point make (the owner) an offer he couldnt refuse, Widule said. The owner, Baley Investments LLC, held out for a while, declining Widules offers. Then he finally hit on the right price. St. Marys Corner LLC, a company linked to Widule, bought the building and a parking lot across the street in 2017. He declined to say what he paid for the properties, but deed records show he borrowed $1 million for the purchase. The sale occurred with the understanding that ACI would move out and the property would be redeveloped, local attorney Joel Barber said last year. Widules company struck a temporary leaseback deal with ACI to give the business time to find a new home. The rent was $15,664.50 per month. ACI asked for more time and signed another lease that increased the rent to $30,500 in exchange for Widule delaying renovations, said Barber, who represented Widules company. And then ACIs ownership changed. The firm that acquired the business stopped paying what Nichols called astronomical rent for a dilapidated building after September 2019, according to court documents. After trying to resolve this matter amicably, St. Marys Corner LLC moved to evict the club in late 2019 after it failed to pay rent for several months, according to court documents. ACI fought back. Nichols and another attorney at his firm alleged in written responses to the landlord that the lease agreement was unconscionable and grossly one sided at the time (it) was made. The business owners had paid so much rent above any reasonable market rate that what they owed had been satisfied. They accused Widule and his company of crafting an unconscionable lease agreement based, in part, because of the nature of the business and its patrons (almost exclusively gay men). There is no doubt Mr. Widule lined his pockets with ridiculously high sums paid for on the backs of the LGBT community a community in which Mr. Widule lives and owns property but has not returned any of his profits to LGBT businesses, charities, or initiatives, they said in the court filings. The LGBT community is nary but a cash cow for your client, and it will stop now. They also threatened to alert the local LGBT news outlet and other media sources, court documents indicate. Last year, Barber dismissed the accusations against Widule, saying they were part of ACIs negotiation tactics intended to bully St. Marys into rent concessions. St. Marys Corner LLC did not promise any repairs because it intended to redevelop the property, and ACI assumed maintenance responsibilities, he added. ACI owed more than $91,000 in rent by late 2019. Judge Rogelio Lopez Jr. sided with the landlord. ACI appealed but later withdrew the appeal in part because the business moved out in early 2020. Bathhouses were an oasis Bathhouses and private mens clubs have long been seen as safe havens for gay men and are now largely a remnant of the past. These places ... offered a kind of an oasis for people to be themselves without being ridiculed or experiencing acts of violence, said Robert Salcido Jr., executive director of Pride Center San Antonio, a nonprofit that promotes and supports the LGBTQ community. Bathhouses were part of gay culture, with their national heyday in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, UTSAs Gohlke said. They created a sense of community. The businesses arrived in San Antonio by at least the early 70s. The Executive Health Club, which opened in 1973 on East Houston Street, was the first local gay bathhouse that Gohlke is aware of. The club offered a place where men could go to have anonymous sex, and that was and continued to be the main pull for bathhouses: men could go and hook up, and it was a safe space for them to do so for the most part, Gohlke said. Amid the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s, authorities shut down bathhouses in New York, San Francisco and other cities. Gohlke, however, is not aware of that happening in San Antonio. The Executive Health Club eventually relocated to Avenue B and later to Austin Street in the city center before closing in 2012. Those locations were close to gay businesses and in more secluded areas, allowing patrons a degree of anonymity. Just the fact that a health club existed for that many years really speaks to the importance of that institution in the community, Gohlke said. Its unclear when ACI opened but it was in business by 1996, when an Express-News article mentioned the all-male private club with a pool, weight room, television room and bedrooms. ACI had been the only private club for gay men in the area for years, Salcido said. Bathhouses are often perceived as run-down and unclean but in many cases its quite the opposite, he added. Club operators are usually well-versed in sexual health and partner with organizations to offer testing and distribute condoms. The popularity of bathhouses has declined with the advent of the internet and technology, as apps such as Grindr, Tinder and OkCupid are more common conduits for meeting people nowadays. The spaces are becoming more like a relic from the past, Gohlke said. Tobin Hill changing Historic neighborhoods in the city center such as Tobin Hill are seeing more development as people seek to live within walking distance of work, school, eateries, shops and bars. Warehouses and bungalows are being replaced with condominiums and townhomes, and abandoned properties torn down or renovated. Thats sparked tension between residents concerned about preserving the character of their neighborhoods and new arrivals hungry for denser housing like apartments and rows of townhomes, said Rick Lewis, assistant professor in practice in architecture at the University of Texas at San Antonio. Housing costs and taxes are rising. We are in a new era of rethinking urbanization from the standpoint of greater density and people living in closer proximity, he said. I dont think theres any going back. The Pearl is an example of that. Silver Ventures transformation of the decaying Pearl brewery into a gold- and brown-toned mix of apartments, restaurants and stores has set off a wave of development around it. Dilapidated houses are being fixed up and more restaurants are opening. And Paula Starnes, a Tobin Hill Community Association board member who has lived in the area for more than 30 years, credits the Pearl, which she describes as a lovely place. I used to make a joke with people who had stuff for sale and couldnt get enough money for it if you just said it was a mile from the Pearl, youd be able to sell it, she said. At the same time, property values and taxes are surging. The median value of single-family homes within two miles of the complex jumped from $83,050 in 2015 to $202,880 in 2020, according to the Bexar Appraisal District. Its a complicated issue at times, Starnes said. Proximity to the Pearl and the St. Marys Strip drew Urban Genesis to the area. The Houston-based developer builds single-family and multifamily rental housing and is under contract to buy the former ACI building, which it plans to demolish and replace with around 60 apartments. Rents are expected to range from about $1,300 to $1,600 per month. The $27 million complex wont have a pool, fitness center or gaming lounge. In exchange for not necessarily having all the bells and whistles of a typical apartment complex, we provide a really nice, safe, quality housing experience, said Urban Genesis founder Matt Shafiezadeh. We like the neighborhood to be the amenity. The company is also planning to build about 58 rental townhomes on a site between Locust and Grayson streets that was once occupied by Flasher Equipment. Projects near The Rim shopping center and in Stone Oak are also in the works. Were excited, Shafiezadeh said. We really like Tobin Hill, and we want to do more there. The razing of the former ACI building is imminent. After its demolition, Urban Genesis plans to break ground on the apartments early next year and finish construction in 13 to 15 months. madison.iszler@express-news.net SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. (AP) The decision to flee their home Thursday in the mountains above Lake Tahoe became clear when Johnny White and Lauren McCauley could see flames on the webcam at their local ski resort. Even as ash rained down under a cloud of heavy smoke, the couple wasnt panicked because they had an early warning to leave their home near Echo Summit, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) south of the lake, and wanted to avoid last-minute pandemonium if the wildfire continued its march toward the tourist destination on the California and Nevada border. You dont want everyone in the basin panicking and scrambling to try and leave at the same time, McCauley said. Firefighters were facing changing weather conditions that could push the fire closer to the Tahoe Basin, a home to thousands and recreational playground for millions of tourists who visit the alpine lake in summer, ski at the many resorts in winter and gamble at its casinos year-round. Winds and temperatures were expected to pick up in coming days while humidity drops, said Daniel Berlant, assistant deputy director of the state firefighting agency. Thats what's closing the window of opportunity weve had to make progress and really get hold of the fire, Berlant said. Echo Summit, a mountain pass where cliff-hanging U.S. Route 50 begins its descent toward Lake Tahoe, is where firefighters plan to make their stand if the Caldor Fire keeps burning through dense forest in the Sierra Nevada. Everythings holding real good along Highway 50," said Cal Fire Operations Section Chief Cody Bogan. "The fire has been backing down real slowly ... weve just been allowing it to do it on its own speed. Its working in our favor. The fire is one of nearly 90 large blazes in the U.S. There were more than a dozen big fires in California, including one that destroyed 18 homes in Southern California, which has so far escaped the scale of wildfires plaguing the north all summer. A new fire broke out Thursday in the Sierra foothills forcing evacuations near the historic Gold Rush town of Sonora, just dozens of miles from Yosemite National Park. Fires in California have destroyed around 2,000 structures and forced thousands to evacuate while also blanketing large swaths of the West in unhealthy smoke. Climate change has made the West warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make the weather more extreme and wildfires more destructive, according to scientists. The Caldor Fire has been the nation's top firefighting priority because of its proximity to Lake Tahoe, where its tourist economy should be in full swing this time of year. This is the week before Labor Day weekend a busy weekend, normally, South Lake Tahoe City Manager Joe Irvin said. That is not going to be the case this year. The Federal Emergency Management Agency noted in a report on the fire that social, political, and economic concerns will increase as the fire progresses toward the Lake Tahoe Basin. The agency did not immediately respond to a request to elaborate beyond that statement. Visitors are still crowding the highway that loops the massive lake and riding bikes and walking the beaches, but many are wearing masks. The lake, known for its water clarity and the granite peaks that surround it, has been shrouded in dense smoke that has reached hazardous levels. The Lake Tahoe Visitors Authority reversed its advice from earlier in the week and recommended tourists postpone their travel. Previously the group that promotes tourism on the south side of the lake advised letting visitors decide whether to cancel their trips amid smoke and approaching fire. Carol Chaplin, the president and CEO, said hotels and lodges were in lockstep with public safety officials. They understand that this is not the experience that their guests are used to or look forward to, she said. Irvin issued an emergency proclamation Thursday so the city that's home to Heavenly Ski Resort can be better prepared if evacuation orders come and be reimbursed for related expenses. The last time the city declared a wildfire emergency was during the 2007 Angora Fire, which destroyed nearly 250 homes in neighboring Meyers and was the last major fire in the basin. Not far from the neighborhood that was largely wiped out in that fire, residents hurried to clear pine cones and needles from their roofs and gutters to prepare for the possibility of fire. The Angora Fire, which was driven by strong winds and took residents by surprise, burned just 3,100 acres, fewer than 5 square miles. The Caldor Fire has burned over 139,000 acres or 218 square miles (565 square kilometers) and was only 12% contained Thursday. Retired fire district captain Joe McAvoy, who lost his own home in the fire, said wildfires larger than 100,000 acres were once-in-a-lifetime events in his career. Not anymore. Now it seems like theyre all 100,000 acres," McAvoy said. Its way more extreme. ... Now (fires) are 100,000 acres and its like, Oh, yeah, big deal. You know, its every fire. ___ Melley reported from Los Angeles. Associated Press reporters Christopher Weber and John Antczak contributed from Los Angeles. ___ Sam Metz 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. ISABELLA, Minn. (AP) Officials in the Superior National Forest said Thursday that the ongoing drought has created tinderbox conditions in northeastern Minnesota as firefighters continue to battle an uncontained wildfire, while rain that's expected to fall in coming days is unlikely to provide much help to crews who are growing tired. Crews have been working on fighting and suppressing wildfires since the spring, and Minnesota's wildfire season is not likely to end until snowfall. These are just tinderbox conditions, Superior National Forest Supervisor Connie Cummins said during a situation update for Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith and Gov. Tim Walz. The Greenwood Lake fire has already burned 25,991 acres (40.61 square miles) in Minnesota's Arrowhead region. Incident Commander Brian Pisarek said 12 seasonal homes or cabins are among the more than 50 structures that have been lost. Pisarek said about 300 people are currently evacuated. We got a little bit of rain today so we dont expect much fire growth today, he said Thursday, adding that firefighters are using the day to prepare for winds that are expected to come on Monday. So far, more than 400 firefighters are working to contain the fires, and more help has been requested. But Pisarek said rain that's expected to fall in the area over the next few days is not likely to help much with containment. One of our tactics is to remove the fuel in front of the fire on the east side, and this rain, of course, inhibits us from doing that, he said. Youd think rain would be the best thing we could get but timing of the timing of the rain is also critical to our operation." This firefight is dependent on the weather," he added. Meanwhile, one North Carolina family is questioning whether they did enough to mitigate fire risks on land they own, as the drought-stricken forest had been already weakened by an outbreak of spruce budworm, which decimated the areas balsam fir trees. Robert C. Hayes Jr., of Charlotte, North Carolina, whose extended family owns about 12,350 acres, or 20 square miles, at the Greenwood Lake fire site, told the Star Tribune: Im afraid to go up there because the pictures Ive seen. Its just scorched. A Star Tribune analysis of property records shows more than half of the Hayes' forest land appears to be inside the fire perimeter. Duluth photographer and writer Michael Furtman likened the situation to throwing a match on acres of dried-out Christmas trees. Furtman, who owns a cabin on Middle McDougal Lake, adjacent to the Hayes property, said he and his wife spent an estimated $2,000 to hire workers to cut down dead trees and remove potential tinder. The individual small landowners are doing everything they can, and can afford, Furtman said. Has the wealthy landowner done everything he can and can afford? Hayes called those questions reasonable. We are actively asking that of ourselves, he said. Hayes' family has owned the land for 30 years and wanted it to be a canvas for the moose and the wolf and the environment." The land is technically held by Lake County Land & Timber LLC, which is owned by a trust for the benefit of Hayes' father, Robert Cannon Robin Hayes, a former congressman and North Carolina Republican Party chairman who pleaded guilty in 2019 to lying to the FBI in relation to a bribery scheme. Former President Donald Trump pardoned him in January. Robert C. Hayes Jr., a trustee and head of the family office, said professional foresters help manage the trust's forest holdings, including one in South Carolina. He said the trust worked on fire management at the South Carolina forest, but not in Minnesota. He said the trust let the Minnesota property go natural so it could reach maturity. While the family was aware of problems with the spruce budworm, reducing the fire risk was not brought up. It was never discussed that it was fuel building up for forest fires, he said. I guarantee you it will be moving forward. Forest officials announced this week that they will keep the popular Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness closed until Sept. 3, dealing a blow to tourists who spent months planning their trips there and to the outfitters and other businesses serving the 1 million-acre wilderness. Cummins said Thursday that the area, or maybe parts of the Boundary Waters, would reopen once it is safe. Several fires caused by lightning have burned in the wilderness during this summers drought conditions, while the much bigger Greenwood Lake fire just to the south has forced the evacuation of about 280 homes and cabins since it was spotted Aug. 15 about 15 miles (24 kilometers) southwest of the town of Isabella. Fires burning just across the Canadian border, in Ontarios Quetico Provincial Park, led officials to close some parts of the Boundary Waters north of Ely earlier this summer. But when the John Ek fire took off late last week, forest officials decided to close the entire wilderness area as a precaution. They said that fire and the Greenwood Lake fire had stretched their resources too thin to ensure the safety of paddlers and campers. Cummins said the John Ek fire is kind of a time bomb" because if conditions are right, it could make a run toward the Gunflint Trail. John Lewis and Waitrose have launched a new initiative that aims to prevent wool from being wasted, by using it in a new sustainably-produced mattress range. The collaboration seeks to prevent unnecessary waste, support farmers and re-establish wool as a highly sought after and widely used commodity. John Lewis' new mattress range, which is now available, uses 100% traceable, sustainably sourced wool from sheep producers who supply Waitrose. Once a highly valued commodity, wool has been under-utilised for decades, with the price offered not even covering the cost of shearing, let alone transportation. This has led to hundreds of thousands of tonnes of high quality wool being wasted for decades, with farmers being forced to burn or bury it after shearing. This issue is not common knowledge among British shoppers, with two-thirds (66%) claiming to be unaware farmers were having to burn their wool. But over half (52%) said theyd be happy to pay more for products that use British wool, with 41% saying theyd be prepared to pay between 5-10% more and a third saying theyd pay as much as 20% more. By partnering with sheep farmers, Waitrose and John Lewis said that awareness of the issue will be raised, as well as drive a renewed demand for British wool. Patrick Loxdale, one of the farmers involved in the initiative said: "My hope is this initiative will kickstart a resurgence in interest in British wool. The wool market has been tough for a long time and now, with exports to China halted because of the pandemic, its even tougher." Jake Pickering, senior agriculture manager at Waitrose, added that the initiative aims to restore British wools status as the highly valued commodity it used to be. Wool used to sustain entire economies but it has declined in value so dramatically that British farmers are now in some cases having to dump it. "We saw an opportunity to make a difference to our farmers and the environment by ensuring the quality wool theyre producing is not wasted." The John Lewis Classic wool mattress range starts from 599 and the Hypnos Luxury Handmade Collection starts from 899. A new scheme by NFU Mutual provides small farming businesses with free access to social media expertise to boost their online following. The rural insurer is offering small business customers access to Maybe*s social media tools as part of a new support package. The scheme helps businesses connect with local shoppers through a free year-long subscription worth 1,140 giving access to social media tools, advice and insight. One business that has benefitted is Hayles Fruit Farm, which is located just outside the ancient market town of Winchcombe in the Cotswolds. The farm has been run by the by the Harrell family since 1950. Today, it has diversified and offers a tearoom and a farm shop, together with fishing and camping facilities. Since launching a transactional website, the farm has found social media a valuable tool to bring in more customers and now has an audience across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter of over 5,000. Instagram has proved to be a particularly effective tool for the business. Prior to 2020, the farm posted sporadically throughout the year. Since lockdown, the farm has needed to use social media even more as a way of connecting to local customers. It has now more than tripled the amount of social media content it produces and the engagement on that content. By being more active and more engaged on social media, Hayles is benefitting from the increasing level of support from the community as is it looked for more ways to support local firms. Through lockdown, the farm was well placed to serve local customers with grocery deliveries, making sure that it was communicating its 'Takeaway Tuesdays' initiative. The farm has continued to offer these services, as well as building on the Euros tournament and Olympics to offer customers a bundle of its own cider, which now has its very own newly-launched social media feeds. Joe Harrell, Hayles Fruit Farm, said the business was constantly learning and had plans to experiment more with Instagram Stories and with Reels. Instagram is relatively new for us but we are already seeing that we are engaging followers at a rate higher than accounts with thousands of followers more than us, so were really encouraged by the response. "Weve realised people engage more when we use social media to show behind the scenes, get to know us and the team, and understand how the land is farmed and how the cider is made. Small businesses, including retailers, cafes, offices, surgeries and farm shops insured with NFU Mutual, are being offered the free social media support. Eligible customers wanting to register for 12 free months of Maybe* membership can contact their local NFU Mutual Agent office for details. The future of Northern Irish farming will focus on delivering both food and environmental outcomes in a sustainable way, the agriculture minister has confirmed. In a new policy framework report, Edwin Poots said farmers were 'up for the challenge' to produce using environmentally-friendly farming practices. However, he said CAP payments had been of 'vital importance' in sustaining the industry in Northern Ireland. While this support must continue following Brexit, he said the industry had the opportunity to better target that support to meet local priorities. "The aim is to ensure that Northern Ireland takes full advantage of the opportunity to develop a sustainable agricultural industry," Mr Poots said in the report. "This will be underpinned by a set of bespoke measures that will ensure the delivery of productive, profitable, environmentally sustainable, resilient and supply chain focused outcomes tailored for NI." The Ulster Farmers' Union (UFU) said the publication of the report was a step in the right direction for Northern Ireland's farming industry. At the very least, we need to maintain the existing level of support for investment in farming," UFU president Victor Chestnutt said. "This is crucial to provide a sufficient delivery implementation transition giving individual farm businesses the necessary time to adapt to a new overarching domestic policy for agriculture. "Farmers also need flexibility to be granted by government to give them the best chance to adapt a common policy framework to the different regional needs of farming across NI." A public consultation on policy proposals will commence in autumn 2021. A group of seventeen farming businesses in the Yorkshire Wolds are collaborating as part of a major effort to improve soil and water quality in the area. The five-year Sustainable Landscapes Wolds Programme includes farms covering 10,000 hectares around Kilham, near Driffield, East Yorkshire. Funded by Yorkshire Water, it involves each farmer growing a minimum of 10 hectares of cover crops dubbed pop up rain forests each year between food crop rotations. Doing this, they aim to sequester atmospheric carbon, increase soil organic matter (SOM) and improve the lands capacity to hold water. This means crop inputs, particularly nitrogen, are held on the fields rather than leaching off into local aquifers and water courses before needing to be removed in costly treatments by Yorkshire Water. Andrew Walker, asset strategy manager at Yorkshire Water said: By embracing techniques that improve the biological functionality of soils, we can deliver more resilient, nutritious and sustainable food; improved biodiversity and pollinators; flood mitigation as well as improved water quality. "More recently we have been able to demonstrate that growing cover crops and ensuring there is always something growing in our fields, we can sequester significant volumes of carbon at the same time." The cover crops are made up of a diverse range of plant species chosen for their ability to capture CO2 from the atmosphere and, via their roots, nutrients from previous crops. Previous trials funded by Yorkshire Water show that growing them can increase above ground biomass by up to 40 tonnes per hectare and that just a 1% rise in SOM enables a hectare of land to absorb an extra 240 tonnes of water. As the trials achieved significantly more than this doubling SOM from 3% to 6% over five years the Sustainable Landscapes Wolds Programme could significantly improve local soil and water quality. The programme is being led by farming couple Liz Sellers and Jeremy Harrison who run Harrison Farms Ltd, a 4,000-acre arable enterprise spread across three farms in Kilham and nearby Sledmere. A small amount of their land is contract farmed, but the rest is managed by the Harrison family who grow malting barley, wheat, OSR, seed potatoes and vining peas. The couple have opted for a post-pea cover crop as this best suits their harvest schedule. Ms Sellers said: With basic payments tailing off and a drive to be more efficient, we need to reconsider everything soil health, water, the nutrients we apply, machinery use and how these fit into running a sustainable, profitable farming enterprise. The great thing about this trial is everything is measurable. We can measure the improvement in soil health and how that improves yield and Yorkshire Water can measure the improvement in the water. If we get this right, everyone wins. Liz added that Yorkshire Water had been flexible in how farmers participating in the trial could use the 10 hectares of cover crop seed provided, enabling them to sow where and when they wanted and encouraging research, collaboration, and group learning. For this to work, it needs to fit into our harvest schedule, and that is the same for all the farmers in the group, she said. For us, the best time to drill is post pea, but for others it will be different. The point is, we have to remain a profitable business and this needs to be a part of that. "Sustainability is about the environment, of course, but it is also about the long-term future of farming as well. That too, must be sustainable whilst maximising yield and enabling us to deliver great British food production." A solo BASE jumper flies through the air from the New River Gorge Bridge toward the New River during Bridge Day 2019. Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, Bridge Day 2020 was held virtually and dubbed The Bridge Day That Wasnt. The Bridge Day Commission, the organization established by the West Virginia Legislature to manage the states largest one-day festival, is moving ahead cautiously with plans for Bridge Day 2021, which is scheduled for Oct. 16, according to Becky Sullivan, chair of the commission and executive director of the Fayette County Chamber of Commerce. County health officials are especially concerned because of the quickly rising numbers of Covid cases in the state. We just think its very important and its our place to make sure people know (in the local community and people traveling in to visit) where we stand at that particular time, she said the next day. We just want to make sure folks know where we are with this virus before they choose to travel here for an event such as Bridge Day where everyones going to be together, Teri Harlan, administrator of the Fayette County Health Department, said last week following the commission meeting. The 4:30 News email is sent out on business days at 4:30 pm. Items include links to new stories, calendar events, occasional banner ads and weather. FH Times Breaking News Breaking News alerts from The Fountain Hills Times. These emails will be delivered only when there is breaking news deemed important enough to be sent out immediately on an as-needed basis. Category Select Category Apparel/Garments Textiles Fashion Technical Textiles Information Technology E-commerce Retail Corporate Association Press Release SubCategory Select Sub-Category Last week it was reported that Abhishek Bachchan has started work on his new project which is a remake of a South flick. The actor was shooting in Chennai for his work, however Jr AB had a freak accident on the set and injured himself. Late last night, Abhishek Bachchan shared a post on his social media where he shared the news about his freak accident and the aftermath of it. Abhishek shared a picture where we see his hand under a sling and even his palm bandaged. Explaining his plight with a pinch of humour he said, Had a freak accident in Chennai on the set of my new film last Wednesday. Fractured my right hand. Needed surgery to fix it! So a quick trip back home to Mumbai. Surgery done, all patched-up and casted. And now back in Chennai to resume work. The actor further in a witty note says, As they say... The show must go on! And as my father said.... Mard ko dard nahin hota! Ok, ok, ok it hurt a little. Thank you all for your wishes and get-well-soon messages. We really love the spirit and how he tries to make this moment light, but we hope that the actor gets well soon and takes care while he resumes work. As soon as he posted this several celebrities dropped comments on his post. His sister Shweta Bachchan said Best patient ever. Karan Johar, Zoya Akhtar, Manish Malhotra dropped several heart-emoticons. Vikrant Massey, Bobby Deol, Anand Ahuja and several other celebrities too commented on his post. Abhishek Bachchan will be next seen in Dasvi, which also stars Nimrat Kaur and Yami Gautam. The actor has been picking roles very selectively and were loving his choices. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Abhishek Bachchan (@bachchan) Read More - Abhishek Bachchan undergoes a surgery after an accident in Chennai Red Deer, Alberta--(Newsfile Corp. - August 25, 2021) - Rifco Inc. (TSXV: RFC) ("Rifco" or the "Company") is pleased to announce its consolidated first quarter results for the period ended June 30, 2021. First Quarter Highlights Rifco reported quarterly Adjusted Net Income before Taxes of $1.8M and $0.08 per share. This is 120% higher than the same quarter in the prior year. Adjusted Net Income before Taxes removes the effects of the non-cash change in provision for impairment and one-time strategic review expenses. Net income including these items and taxes, was $2.3M and $0.11 per share. The quarterly Credit Spread Rate improved 204 basis points over the comparable period from 11.28% to 13.32%. The Company believes that despite the impacts of COVID-19, the recent improvements in operations and current pricing model implemented alongside the custom credit model has contributed to improved Credit Spread. Originations in the quarter of $31.8M are a 322% increase over the same quarter last year. Originations also increased 24% from the $20.6M in the prior quarter. Originations are on track for a full recovery from those seen immediately following the pandemic outbreak. The Delinquency Rate (over 30 days) is at an exceptionally low level of 2.85%. Government support programs for those impacted by COVID-19 had an impact on the Company's Delinquency Rate. Loan modification and payment deferral programs implemented in response were mostly concluded by July 2020. While the Company is cautiously optimistic about recent and near-term results, the economic forecast in this COVID-19 environment is uncertain. Rifco Quarterly Comparative Results Statements of income Current Quarter 3 Months Ended June 30, 2021 Prior Quarter 3 Months Ended March 31, 2021 Comparable Quarter 3 Months Ended June 30, 2020 ($,000's, except per share, % of average loan receivables) Average loan receivables for the period 195,667 194,058 216,988 Financial revenue 8,450 17.27% 8,240 16.98% 9,047 16.68% Credit losses 1,929 3.95% 2,250 4.64% 2,934 5.40% Credit Spread 6,521 13.32% 5,990 12.34% 6,113 11.28% Financial expenses 2,201 4.50% 2,249 4.64% 2,660 4.90% Adjusted Net Financial Income before Operating Expenses 4,320 8.82% 3,741 7.70% 3,453 6.38% Adjusted Operating Expenses 2,497 5.10% 2,666 5.49% 2,626 4.84% Adjusted Net Income before Taxes 1,823 3.72% 1,075 2.21% 827 1.54% Strategic review process - 0.00% - 0.00% 482 0.89% Decrease (increase) in provision for impairment 1,138 2.33% (182 ) (0.38%) 1,344 2.48% Net income before taxes 2,961 6.05% 893 1.83% 2,653 4.91% Income tax expense (674 ) (1.38%) (193 ) (0.40%) (843 ) (1.55%) Net income 2,287 4.67% 700 1.43% 1,810 3.36% Weighted average number of outstanding shares at period end 21,750 21,750 21,597 Fully diluted basis 21,750 21,750 21,597 Adjusted Net Income before taxes per Common Share basic Diluted $0.084 $0.084 $0.049 $0.049 $0.038 $0.038 Net income (loss) per common share basic Diluted $0.105 $0.105 $0.032 $0.032 $0.084 $0.084 Rifco, today, filed its quarterly financial statements and management discussion and analysis for the period ended June 30, 2021. The previously released financial statements and the related management's discussion and analysis can be viewed at www.sedar.com or at www.rifco.net. Non-IFRS Measures Throughout this Press Release, management uses terms and ratios which do not have a standardized meaning under IFRS and are unlikely to be comparable to similar measures presented by other issuers. Specifically, management presents an Adjusted Net Income measure, along with related Adjusted sub-totals and ratios. These measures do not have any standardized meaning under IFRS and are therefore unlikely to be comparable to similar measures presented by other issuers. A full description of these measures can be found in the management discussion and analysis that accompany the financial statements for the period ended June 30, 2021. About Rifco Rifco National Auto Finance Corporation ("RNAF"), Rifco's sole, wholly owned, subsidiary operates with a purpose to help its clients obtain a safe and reliable vehicle by providing alternative finance solutions. RNAF currently distributes its alternative finance products indirectly through select automotive dealer partners. Rifco is built on a foundation of trust, respect, empowerment, accountability and passion which are exhibited by each and every member of the Rifco team, as we collaboratively pursue our collective vision and do so in a manner that is consistent with our purpose. The common shares of Rifco Inc. are traded on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol "RFC". There are 21.75 million shares (basic) outstanding and 22.70 million (fully diluted) shares. CONTACT: Rifco Inc. Warren Van Orman Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Telephone: 1-403-314-1288 Ext 7007 Fax: 1-403-314-1132 Email: vanorman@rifco.net Website: www.rifco.net Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94454 TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / August 25, 2021 / Aberdeen Asia-Pacific Income Investment Company Limited (TSX:FAP) (the 'Company'), a closed-end investment company trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange, announced today that the application in connection with the re-domiciliation of the Company from the laws of the Cook Islands to the laws of the Republic of Singapore (the 'Re-domiciliation') will be filed for approval by the Singapore Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority ('ACRA') on or about September 1, 2021. The Company anticipates the Re-domiciliation will be effective on or about November 1, 2021, subject to regulatory approvals. Upon the effective date of the Re-domiciliation, the Company will be re-named abrdn Asia-Pacific Income Fund VCC. The Company's total returns for various periods through July 31, 2021 are provided below. Period NAV Total Return (%)* Market Price Total Return (%)* 10-years 36.57 7.77 5-years 9.25 3.82 3-years 9.98 10.67 1-year 4.00 19.84 3-months 0.93 8.45 An annual redemption feature has been included in the Company's new variable capital company constitution filed for approval by ACRA. The first annual redemption may be exercised by shareholders starting in February 2022, if the parameters below are met. Optional Shareholder Redemption Subject to the VCC constitution and applicable law, if the volume weighted average trading price of the ordinary shares of the Company ('Shares') on the Toronto Stock Exchange during the 12 month period ending on the last business day of January (the 'Trading Discount Determination Date') of each year represents a discount greater than 12% of the average daily net asset value per Share during such period, up to 10% of the aggregate issued and outstanding Shares of the Company may be surrendered for redemption on the last business day of March of the calendar year following the Trading Discount Determination Date (the 'Redemption Date'). Information with respect to the annual redemption will be announced to shareholders annually in February. Redemption Price and Fee A shareholder whose Shares are redeemed on a Redemption Date shall be entitled to receive a cash redemption price per Share equal to the Average Net Asset Value per Share calculated on the Redemption Date less any expenses and charges incurred by the Company in order to fund such redemption payment (the 'Redemption Proceeds'). The 'Average Net Asset Value per Share' means the arithmetic average of the net asset values per Share calculated on the three trading days immediately preceding the relevant redemption date. Redemption Payment Payment of the Redemption Proceeds for such redeemed Shares shall be made to the shareholder by no later than the 15th business day following the Redemption Date. Important Information * Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Investment returns and principal will fluctuate and shares, when sold, may be worth more or less than the original cost. Current performance may be lower or higher than the performance data quoted. NAV returned data includes investment management fees, custodial charges, bank loan expenses and administrative fees (such as Director and legal fees) and assumes the reinvestment of all distributions. The Company is subject to investment risk, including the possible loss of principal. Total return based on net asset value reflects changes in the Company's net asset value during each period. Total return based on market price reflects changes in market value. Information in this press release that is not current or historical factual information may constitute forward-looking information within the meaning of securities laws. Such forward-looking information reflects the Investment Manager's beliefs, estimates and opinion regarding the Company's future financial performance, projects and opportunities and market conditions as at today's date. Implicit in this information, particularly in respect of future financial performance and condition of the Company, are factors and assumptions which, although considered reasonable by the Company at the time of preparation, may prove to be incorrect. Shareholders are cautioned that actual results are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, including general economic and market factors, including credit, currency, political and interest-rate risks and could differ materially from what is currently expected. The Company has no specific intention of updating any forward-looking information whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. Aberdeen Standard Investments ('ASI') is the marketing name in Canada for Aberdeen Standard Investments (Canada) Limited ('ASI Canada'), Aberdeen Standard Investments Luxembourg SA, Standard Life Investments Private Capital Ltd, SL Capital Partners LLP, Standard Life Investments Limited, Aberdeen Standard Alternative Funds Limited, and Aberdeen Capital Management LLC. ASI Canada is the administrator of the Company and is registered as an investment fund manager in Canada where required. ASI Canada is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Aberdeen Standard Investments Inc., the sub-administrator of the Company. Closed-end funds are traded on the secondary market through one of the stock exchanges. The Company's investment return and principal value will fluctuate so that an investor's shares may be worth more or less than the original cost. Shares of closed-end funds may trade above (a premium) or below (a discount) the net asset value (NAV) of the Company. There is no assurance that the Company will achieve its investment objective. Past performance does not guarantee future results. If you wish to receive this information electronically, please contact Investor.Relations@aberdeenstandard.com aberdeenfap.com FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE For More Information Contact: Aberdeen Standard Investments Inc. Investor Relations 800-992-6341 Investor.Relations@aberdeenstandard.com SOURCE: Aberdeen Asia-Pacific Income Investment Company Limited View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661434/Aberdeen-Asia-Pacific-Income-Investment-Company-Limited-Update-on-Re-Domiciliation-and-Annual-Redemption-Feature-Announced Headlines Reported NPAT $9.5M vs. ( $9.7M ) in PCP vs. ( ) in PCP Reported EBITDA* $25.5M , + $21.3M vs. June 2020 or +511% - Double-digit top and bottom-line growth in focus growth markets, China , and USA - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in Manuka product category - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in digital channels , + vs. or +511% - Double-digit top and bottom-line growth in focus growth markets, , and - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in Manuka product category - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in digital channels Gross profit +730 bps to 53.9% Marketing Investment +$8.7M or +56% Business transformation plan on track Net debt reduced by $10.9M to $4.6M , inventory reduction $11.7M , operating cash inflow $24.8M to , inventory reduction , operating cash inflow 9% reduction in total recordable injury frequency rate (TRIFR) Fully imputed dividend of 4 cps declared TAURANGA, New Zealand, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Comvita (NZX:CVT) today released its full year audited results for the year ending 30thJune 2021, reporting a full year EBITDA at the top end of its market guidance at $25.5M. This represents an increase of +511% versus the prior corresponding period (PCP) driven by strong performance in its focus growth markets, focus channels and categories, underpinned by $12.1M of benefits from its transformation programme over the last 18 months. Reported net profit after tax was $9.5M versus a loss of $9.7M in the PCP as work to both focus and simplify the organisation delivered results. Reported net debt was $4.6M vs $15.5M in PCP as Comvita continued to focus on good internal management of cashflows and working capital. Inventory reduced by $11.7M and SKU count by 30%. Comvita is pleased to announce resumption of dividend payments and have declared a fully imputed dividend of 4 cps representing a payout of 30% of NPAT. Revenue in constant currency increased by 1.5% as strong performance in its focus growth markets of China +31% and USA +23% offset material headwinds in its Australia, New Zealand (ANZ) and Hong Kong segments. Underlying revenue grew 5.4%*. It was encouraging to report that Q4 ANZ revenue increased by 17% versus PCP and 33% versus Q3. While the UK market was negatively impacted at revenue level (primarily due to Brexit and Covid impacts), it was encouraging to see the market breakeven at net contribution, proving the longer-term opportunity in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Comvita Chair Brett Hewlett commented, "As I shared at the Annual Shareholder Meeting in October 2020, FY21 was a crucial year for Comvita as we looked to prove the significant potential that exists to all stakeholders. We are pleased to report strong earnings growth at the top end of guidance, good management of cash and working capital and to be able to reward our shareholders with the resumption of dividends. In addition, we are particularly encouraged to publish our first Green House gas emissions report in this year's annual report as we embark on our journey to be carbon neutral by 2025 and carbon positive by 2030. We believe our unique business model, with significantly increased investment in our brand and supported by our environmental and social causes, will see Comvita recognised by the investment community as a sustainable premium FMCG brand with associated multiples." CEO David Banfield added, "I would like to thank the whole team at Comvita for their absolute focus on delivering the results we share today. The business has gone through significant change in order to arrive at this point, it hasn't always been easy, but we know that this is crucial to enable us to deliver the true potential of Comvita, captured in our 2025 plan. Our 60:15:20 plan sets out our aim to deliver a GP in excess of 60%, marketing to sales ratio of 15% and an EBITDA ratio of 20% by 2025. Today is an important step on that journey. We are genuinely excited by the growth opportunities that lay ahead of us." Strong performance in focus growth markets Comvita was particularly encouraged by its performance in its focus growth markets of China and North America. In local currency, China market sales (the world's biggest honey market), increased by 31% with strong performance delivered across all channels. Despite increasing marketing investment by 139% versus PCP, net contribution increased by 25% as top line growth translated to strong earnings improvement. Comvita remains the clear brand and market leader in China. In North America, total revenue in local currency increased by 23% and net contribution by 18%, despite increasing marketing investment by over 80%. Comvita is the fastest growing Manuka honey brand in North America.*** Comvita has a unique business model in the category. Its subsidiary model is designed to ensure that it is better connected to both customer and consumer needs in market and by being closer to customer, it can be more agile and responsive to changing customer needs around the world. Double digit top and bottom-line growth in both digital sales and Manuka honey Comvita continued its strong performance in both its focus Manuka honey category and in the digital channel with both recording double digit top and bottom-line growth. Constant currency digital sales grew 17% versus PCP to 35% of total group sales. Manuka honey sales increased 10% versus PCP as the continued focus delivered results. Comvita strategy on track - Building a Better Business - Stabilise results, transform the organisation and deliver long-term resilience and growth Stabilise results The results shared today show that we have come a long way to stabilise performance at Comvita. Not only have we returned to profitability with a reported NPAT of $9.5M versus a loss of $9.7M in the PCP, we have also significantly simplified the business to set up Comvita for long-term profitable growth. Despite significant headwinds in ANZ, we have been able to prove the underlying resilience of our model. In doing this, we have reduced our monthly revenue required to break even to $13.5M, despite a material increase in investment in our brand. It is encouraging that ANZ performance in Q4 was +17% versus PCP and +33% versus the previous quarter highlighting that we can now start to build revenue again in FY22. Comvita improved its GP by 730 BPS versus PCP in this period, in line with its aim to deliver a 60% GP by 2025. This was delivered through focus growth markets (China and North America), focus channels (digital) and focus categories (Manuka honey), along with productivity improvements. Inventory was reduced by $11.7M and SKU count by 30% as our focus on ensuring good management of working capital and SKU profitability continued. Operating cash inflow was $24.8M and net debt finished the period at $4.6M. Transformed organisation We have now completed our restructuring process. Our attention now fully focuses on optimisation and creating an aligned performance driven culture at Comvita. We have a clear view of the steps required to drive profitable growth across all segments and returns for all stakeholders. We have also proven that our new harvest model works, further increasing organisational resilience and reducing risk associated with variability of the weather. Our $25M ($15M +$10M) transformational plan remains on track to deliver by 2025. In the first 18 months, we have delivered over $12M of improvements, investing $1.2M to deliver this in FY21. In FY22 we will invest a further $2.5M in transformation projects. Long-term resilience and growth Our focus remains on setting Comvita up for long-term resilience and growth. We have a clear view and understanding of what it will take to win in our focus growth markets, our focus channels and our focus categories. Our new business model ensures that we have funds available to tell discerning consumers around the world 'why Comvita' and also share the founding story of Alan and Claude from 1974/5 that we know resonates with consumers today. We now focus on delivering our FY22 guidance, and further building trust with all our stakeholders on our journey to deliver our 2025 plan. David Banfield added, "A year ago, I shared that we were looking to deliver a rebound in performance in FY21. I am delighted that we have achieved that, but much remains to be done to deliver world class performance and experience for our consumers around the world. We know that we have an incredible opportunity to put in place the foundations that will enable Comvita and our bees to thrive for years to come and we remain absolutely committed to this cause. This starts by delivering our FY22 guidance and ensuring that we become recognised as a sustainable, premium FMCG brand. I look forward to sharing further progress at our Annual Shareholder Meeting in October." Brett Hewlett Chair, David Banfield CEO On behalf of the Board of Directors Note: *EBITDA earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation, constant currency revenue and underlying revenue are non-GAAP measures. We monitor these as key performance indicators and believe they assist investors in assessing the performance of the core operations of our business. Constant currency revenue and underlying revenue are both defined in our Investor Presentation. **Previous corresponding period. ***SPINS data Background information Comvita (NZX:CVT) was founded in 1974, with a purpose to heal and protect the world through the natural power of the hive. With a team of 500+ people globally, united with more than 1.6 billion bees, we are the global market leader in Manuka honey and bee consumer goods. Seeking to understand, but never to alter, we test and verify all our bee-product ingredients are of the highest quality in our own government-recognised and accredited laboratory. We are growing industry scientific knowledge on bee welfare, Manuka trees and the many benefits of Manuka honey and propolis. We have pledged to be carbon neutral by 2025 and carbon positive by 2030, and we are planting more than two million native trees every year. Comvita has operations in Australia, China, North America, South East Asia, and Europe - and of course, Aotearoa New Zealand, where our bees are thriving. Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1602240/CVT_Logo.jpg Tickets Now Available For Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror - Unprecedented Double Retrospective Debuts At The Whitney Museum And Philadelphia Museum Of Art On September 29 New York, New York--(Newsfile Corp. - August 25, 2021) - Tickets for Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror, the most ambitious retrospective to date of the work of Jasper Johns, are now available for advance purchase at whitney.org and philamuseum.org. Co-organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror is a single exhibition in two venues, filling almost 30,000 combined square feet. This unprecedented collaboration is the artist's first major museum retrospective on the East Coast in nearly a quarter century and will feature more than 500 works, including paintings, sculptures, drawings, and prints. Presented simultaneously at the Whitney and the Philadelphia of Museum of Art, Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror opens on September 29, 2021 and will be on view through February 13, 2022. Jasper Johns, Racing Thoughts, 1983. Encaustic and collage on canvas, 48 1/8 75 3/8 in. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York 2021 Jasper Johns / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/7987/94487_0b272fc7f473a824_001full.jpg Throughout the duration of the exhibition, visitors who attend the exhibition at the Whitney or the Philadelphia Museum of Art will enjoy 50% off admission at the other venue. Members of both institutions will also receive reciprocal admission privileges throughout Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror. Member Preview Days for Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror are Friday, September 24 through Monday, September 27, 2021. Complete ticketing details are available at whitney.org and philamuseum.org. About Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror Over the past sixty-five years, Jasper Johns (b. 1930) has produced a radical and varied body of work marked by constant reinvention. In an unprecedented collaboration, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Whitney will stage a retrospective of Johns's career simultaneously across the two museums from September 29, 2021 to February 13, 2022. Featuring paintings, sculptures, drawings, and prints, many shown publicly for the first time, Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror is inspired by the artist's long-standing fascination with mirroring and doubles. The two halves of the exhibition will act as reflections of one another, spotlighting themes, methods, and images that echo across the two venues. A visit to one museum or the other will provide a vivid chronological survey; a visit to both will offer an innovative and immersive exploration of the many phases, facets, and masterworks of Johns's still-evolving career. This exhibition is co-organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The organizing curators are Carlos Basualdo, Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Senior Curator of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Scott Rothkopf, Senior Deputy Director and Nancy and Steve Crown Family Chief Curator, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, with Sarah B. Vogelman, exhibition assistant, in Philadelphia, and Lauren Young, curatorial assistant, in New York. Hashtag JasperJohns Whitney Museum Hours and Admission The Whitney Museum of American Art is located at 99 Gansevoort Street between Washington and West Streets, New York City. Beginning September 29, 2021, public hours are: Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday, 10:30 am to 6 pm; Friday, 10:30 am to 10 pm; and Saturday and Sunday from 11 am to 6 pm. Closed Tuesday. Member-only hours are: Saturday and Sunday: 10:30 am-11 am. Visitors 18 years & under and Whitney members: FREE. Admission is pay-what-you-wish on Fridays, 7-10 pm. As of August 17, 2021, all visitors 12 years of age and older must be vaccinated against COVID-19 for admission to the Whitney, in accordance with New York City requirements. Face coverings are required, even if you are vaccinated.For complete visitor guidelines, visit whitney.org. For general information please call (212) 570-3600 or visit whitney.org. About the Whitney Museum The Whitney Museum of American Art, founded in 1930 by the artist and philanthropist Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875-1942), houses the foremost collection of American art from the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries. Mrs. Whitney, an early and ardent supporter of modern American art, nurtured groundbreaking artists at a time when audiences were still largely preoccupied with the Old Masters. From her vision arose the Whitney Museum of American Art, which has been championing the most innovative art of the United States for ninety years. The core of the Whitney's mission is to collect, preserve, interpret, and exhibit American art of our time and serve a wide variety of audiences in celebration of the complexity and diversity of art and culture in the United States. Through this mission and a steadfast commitment to artists themselves, the Whitney has long been a powerful force in support of modern and contemporary art and continues to help define what is innovative and influential in American art today. Media Contact Company Name: Whitney Museum of American Art Contact Person: Press Office Email: pressoffice@whitney.org City: New York State: NY Country: United States Website: whitney.org To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94487 Wellington, New Zealand--(Newsfile Corp. - August 25, 2021) - New Zealand Energy Corp. (TSXV: NZ) ("NZEC" or the "Company") announced today it has filed with Canadian regulatory authorities its Q2 2021 consolidated financial results and management discussion and analysis report, which documents are available on the Company's website at www.newzealandenergy.com and on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Commenting on the Company's second quarter 2021 results, Chairman James Willis said "The results saw a total comprehensive income of $117,125. (2020: loss of $391,152). There was a $734,764 decrease in cash held ($285,321 was held at the end of the quarter) with $1,525,000 expended during the quarter on the Tariki 3D seismic project. Cash provided in operating activities for the quarter was $1,142,557 (2020: used $989,081). The Company achieved average net daily production of ~101 boe/d (90% oil) through Q2." On the subject of current business, Mr Willis stated: "The Company completed acquisition of the 71 sq km Tariki 3D Seismic project on time and on budget and expects the processed data to be ready for interpretation in Q4, 2021. The Convertible Loan transaction announced on 20 July 2021 enabled the funding and execution of this project." The Company (with its Joint Venturer in the Tariki, Waihapa and Ngaere (TWN) properties) has concluded an agreement, effective from August 1st, 2021, cancelling all future obligations in respect of the Over-Riding Royalty held by Beach Energy Resources NZ (Tawn) Limited (formerly Origin etc etc). The Over Riding Royalty was granted to the former Grantee when the Company purchased the TWN licences in 2013. Mr Willis stated: "Cancellation of this Royalty has been a key objective and a necessary precursor to the Tariki work programme which lies ahead. It is great to have this one behind us." Projects focussing on increasing oil and associated gas production are well underway. Subject to there being no on-going operations restrictions from New Zealand's latest COVID-19 lockdown, the company should be able to return to continuous oil and gas production at the Waihapa-Ngaere Field by year end." The Company also advises that the Annual General and Special meeting of New Zealand Energy Corp. will be held at the offices of Straterra, 1st Floor 93 The Terrace, Wellington, New Zealand on 8 October 2021 at 10:00 a.m. (New Zealand Time). The close of business on 7 September 2021 is the record date for determining shareholders entitled to receive notice of, and to vote at, the Meeting. On behalf of the Board of Directors "James Willis" Chairman New Zealand Energy Corp. New Zealand Energy Contacts Email: info@newzealandenergy.com Website: www.newzealandenergy.com Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as such term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION AND CAUTIONARY NOTE REGARDING RESERVE ESTIMATES This document, the consolidated financial statements for the quarter ended 30 June 2021 and the Management's Discussion and Analysis contain certain forward-looking information, forward-looking statements ("forward-looking statements"). The reader's attention is specifically drawn to the qualifications, disclosure and cautionary statements in these documents regarding forward-looking statements and reserve and resource estimates. The Company notes that such forward-looking statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, some of which are beyond NZEC's control, the impact of general economic conditions, industry conditions, volatility of commodity prices, currency fluctuations, imprecision of reserve estimates, environmental risks, operational risks in exploration and development, competition from other industry participants, the lack of availability of qualified personnel or management, stock market volatility and the ability to access sufficient capital from internal and external sources. Although the Company believes that the expectations in its forward-looking statements are reasonable, they are based on factors and assumptions concerning future events which may prove to be inaccurate. Those factors and assumptions are based upon currently available information. Such statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that could influence actual results or events and cause actual results or events to differ materially from those stated, anticipated or implied in the forward-looking information. As such, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the forward-looking information, as no assurance can be provided as to future results, levels of activity or achievements. All forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this document or the date of the documents referenced above, except as required by applicable law, the Company does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or to revise any of the forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94490 ADELAIDE, AUS, Aug 26, 2021 - (ACN Newswire) - Agilex Biolabs, the Australian specialist bioanalytical and toxicology laboratory facilities for clinical trials is partnering with Endpoints News to share the latest on "Non-clinical and clinical pathways for rapid vaccine development in Australia", in a webinar hosted by Endpoints News Editor Arsalan Arif.Agilex Biolabs' Director, Immunoassay, Kurt J. Sales (B.Sc; B.Sc (MED) Hons; M.Sc, Ph.D, PGCM) said:"The COVID-19 pandemic has seen the rapid development of a series of novel vaccines targeting SARS-CoV-2. Development of multiple COVID-19 vaccine candidates has been facilitated within Australia by the availability of high-quality contract research organizations such as Agilex Biolabs, and a favorable regulatory environment. This webinar will cover the pathways that biotech companies can take for rapid vaccine development, and why Australia is the ideal location. I am joined by my toxicology expert colleagues Dr Peter Tapley and Dr Drew Brockman for this detailed vaccine development webinar."In this webinar Dr Sales and specialists from Agilex Biolabs' toxicology firm, TetraQ Toxicology will provide an overview of strategies to conduct vaccine development within Australia.It will cover Australian research, and regulatory and clinical infrastructure, which provides a favorable environment for rapid vaccine development. It will also include discussion of a case study for rapid vaccine development based on non-clinical research conducted with a novel COVID-19 protein subunit vaccine.This case study will review key aspects of non-clinical design required to facilitate approval for first-in-human studies.Register Here: https://webinars.endpts.com/non-clinical-and-clinical-pathways-for-rapid-vaccine-development-in-australia/September 7, 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm EDTSpeakers:Dr Kurt Sales: Director, Immunoassay, Agilex BiolabsDr Peter Tapley: Director, TetraQ, an Agilex Biolabs companyDr Drew Brockman: Head of Toxicology, TetraQ, an Agilex Biolabs company.https://webinars.endpts.com/non-clinical-and-clinical-pathways-for-rapid-vaccine-development-in-australia/Agilex Biolabs' world-class laboratories feature state-of-the-art equipment including Gyrolab Xplore, MSD Quickplex 120, Luminex Magpix, BD FACSymphony A3 flow cytometer and soon to be released, digital droplet quantitative real-time RT-PCR.Latest News - new Immunobiology Lab - watch launch video. https://www.agilexbiolabs.com/launch-of-immunobiology-laboratory/Agilex Biolabs CEO Jason Valentine said the new laboratory focusses on new and emerging areas of therapeutic interest, including RNA vaccines, siRNA/miRNA clinical targets and gene therapy studies."This new facility adds digital droplet quantitative RT-PCR analysis for RNA, siRNA and miRNA clinical trials, including vaccines and gene therapy trials," he said."We are also installing an EliSPOT/FluoroSPOT multi-spot reader for vaccine studies to enable extrapolation of recall immune responses, which coupled with our state-of-the-art BD FACSymphony 5 laser, 20 colour flow cytometer, offers unparalleled sensitivity for immunology and vaccine trials."The company offers services for both small molecules and biologics for PK, immunogenicity (PD) and biomarker bioanalysis utilising the two platforms of LC-MS/MS and Immunoassay.Australian clinical trials have remained open for business and Agilex Biolabs is a designated essential service so clients can be assured of study continuity.Agilex Biolabs has more than 130 staff which includes 85 dedicated laboratory staff, and supports client pharma and biotech companies from US, Europe and APAC.Book a confidential briefing with our scientists before you start your next clinical trial. https://calendly.com/agilexbiolabs/30minAbout Agilex Biolabs https://www.agilexbiolabs.com/Agilex Biolabs, the Australian specialist bioanalytical and toxicology laboratory facilities for clinical trials, has more than 24 years' experience in performing regulated bioanalysis, including quality method development, method validation and sample analysis services. It has successfully supported hundreds of preclinical and clinical trials from around the world where customers choose Australia for the streamlined regulatory process and access to the world's most attractive R&D rebate of more than 40% on clinical trial work conducted in Australia.Agilex Biolabs also offers toxicology services through its company TetraQ, an established GLP toxicology facility in Australia.Agilex Biolabs has the leading certifications including OECD GLP Recognition with NATA (Australian Government OECD GLP Compliance monitoring authority) and ISO 17025 Accreditation for global recognition.The company has recently expanded its main labs by more than 30% to accommodate biotech demand from APAC and the USA. In addition it has launched a new Immunobiology lab - watch the video here. https://www.agilexbiolabs.com/launch-of-immunobiology-laboratory/Agilex Biolabs specialises in bioanalysis of small molecules and biologics for PK, immunogenicity, biomarkers and immunological pharmacodynamics assessments utilising LC-MS/MS, immunoassay (Mesoscale, Gyrolab, Luminex) and flow cytometry (BD FACSymphony A3, 20 colour cell analyser).Agilex offers pharmacodynamics services that include immunobiology services using the latest state-of-the-art technology to support immunology, cell biology and mode of action assays, including:- Immunophenotyping- Receptor occupancy- Cytokine release assays (whole blood or PBMC stimulation assays) and cytokine/biomarker profiling- PBMC assays and cellular mechanism of action assaysAgilex Biolabs Media Contact:Kate NewtonMedia@AgilexBiolabs.comSource: Agilex BiolabsCopyright 2021 ACN Newswire . All rights reserved. Caverion Corporation Investor News 26 August 2021 at 8:00 a.m. EEST HELSINKI, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Caverion has been awarded the electrical and HVAC contracts for the Sulkavuori Central Wastewater Treatment Plant. The total value of the agreements signed with Tampere Region Wastewater Treatment is EUR 41 million. The total value of the construction work following the central treatment plant's excavation is EUR 161 million. Sulkavuori Central Wastewater Treatment Plant will be built inside rock. Caverion's responsibilities include electrical and HVAC work as well as the installation of building automation and water mist systems. "The wastewater treatment plant to be built in Sulkavuori is the most significant part of our project, which also includes two large wastewater pumping stations and wastewater transfer pipelines from the existing wastewater treatment plants in Tampere. The electrical and HVAC work included within the scope of Caverion's agreement is highly demanding and absolutely key to the future operation of the plant. We are pleased that these contracts will be carried out by an experienced contractor," says Timo Heinonen, Managing Director of Tampere Region Wastewater Treatment. "We are delighted with the trust the customer places in us and the opportunity to participate in this significant environmental investment in the Tampere region. We want to enable sustainable, safe and smart solutions for growing urban areas. Good cooperation between the project participants provides an excellent starting point for collective success," says Ville Tamminen, Head of Division Finland at Caverion. Wastewater treatment for the next 100 years Underground construction and the large construction site present special challenges for the installation of technical solutions. The ventilation of underground spaces is subject to strict requirements due to the build-up of various gases, which requires a high level of treatment performance from the systems. In addition to Caverion, the other implementation partners include the main contractor consortium consisting of Kreate Oy and Aki Hyrkkonen Oy as well as Skanska Infra Oy and Valmet Automation Oy. The work will start at the beginning of 2022 in Sulkavuori and finish at the end of 2025. The large project will centralise the wastewater treatment of six Tampere region municipalities in the Sulkavuori treatment plant. The state-of-the-art central wastewater treatment plant represents a significant environmental investment. Its wastewater treatment performance will be so high that even while the population of the Tampere region and the amount of wastewater increase, the environmental load on Lake Pyhajarvi and its downstream waterways will decrease and their recreational value will increase. The central wastewater treatment plant will ensure the effective regional treatment of wastewater for a long time to come and satisfies increasingly strict permit conditions. Wastewater can be treated in the Sulkavuori plant for the next 100 years. For more information, please contact: Kirsi Hemmila, Communications Manager, Caverion Finland, tel. +358 50?390 0941, kirsi.hemmila@caverion.com Timo Heinonen, Managing Director, Tampere Region Wastewater Treatment Ltd, tel. +358 40 820 2695, timo.heinonen@keskuspuhdistamo.fi This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com https://news.cision.com/caverion/r/caverion-wins-a-eur-41-million-technical-solutions-project-in-tampere-region--finland---centralised-,c3403377 The following files are available for download: AMSTERDAM (dpa-AFX) - Dutch design, engineering and consultancy company Arcadis NV (ARCAY.PK) said that it has renewed its three-year contract for global environmental and resiliency solutions with AkzoNobel, a Dutch multinational company which produces paints and performance coatings. Under the new contract, work will be executed in Europe, North and South America, and Asia. Over the past years, Arcadis has worked in 40 countries for AkzoNobel on an extensive number of projects. As per the new contract, Arcadis will assist AkzoNobel with work that includes activities related to the closure, remediation, and transfer of company locations. The new contract also includes the potential to provide services in the areas of environmental management, and for energy savings, sustainability, water treatment and use, as well as water savings consulting. 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. OSLO, Norway, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Aker ASA ("Aker") announced today that it has entered a strategic partnership with SalMar ASA ("SalMar") to establish a global offshore aquaculture company. The new joint company, SalMar Aker Ocean AS ("SalMar Aker Ocean"), will operate within offshore fish farming, including offshore and semi-offshore, combining Aker and SalMar's industry experience, leading competence in salmon production, software, and cleantech to create the world's most reliable and intelligent offshore farming operations with the highest requirements for fish welfare and a zero-emissions value chain ambition. "The aquaculture industry is at the cusp of a new, more sustainable era, opening up for a new resource base and with green production," said yvind Eriksen, President and CEO of Aker. "The new company combines Aker's leading industrial track record within offshore operations with SalMar's history as one of the world's largest and most efficient producers of farmed salmon. We also share a vision for the potential of software, data, and analytics, and we believe we can join forces to make the next step to develop ocean farming, including using technology and joint industrial capabilities to protect ocean health, fish welfare and promote sustainable growth." SalMar and Aker through its wholly owned subsidiary Aker Capital AS, will eventually own 66.6 per cent and 33.4 per cent, respectively, of the joint company, SalMar Aker Ocean, which will comprise SalMar's interests in its semi-offshore and offshore farming operations. Aker will contribute up to NOK 1.65 billion cash in three tranches. The company will continue the ongoing work within testing, learning, researching, and developing offshore farming operations, including through the world's first operating offshore fish farm, Ocean Farm 1; and the technology of the innovative Smart Fish Farms to be positioned in offshore Norwegian waters, and eventually internationally. Norway is currently at the forefront in developing this technology and industry world-wide. Ocean Farm 1 and Smart Fish Farm have both been developed with a unique interdisciplinary partnership between SalMar - building on more than 30 years of experience - and world-leading players in Norway within aquaculture, offshore and R&D. Olav Andreas Ervik will head the company as CEO and the board will consist of six members, including Gustav Witze, Atle Eide, Kjell Inge Rkke and yvind Eriksen. The new offshore technology opens vast new areas for fish farming with optimal biological conditions for the salmon. SalMar Aker Ocean will continue to develop the offshore technology to ensure production on the salmon's terms, meet the highest requirements in respect of fish welfare and minimize the environmental footprint. "SalMar's focus on the open ocean marked the start of a new era in the seafood industry. We are very pleased to be partnering with a strong industry partner like Aker. Together, we will be at the forefront of ensuring sustainable growth on the salmon's terms, utilizing the potential of the ocean to produce healthier food, deploying digital technologies, cleantech, and using superior supplier industry capabilities at a critical time for ensuring sustainable food production in the long-term. Together, we can take the next technological leap for offshore farming, with a global ambition" said Gustav Witze, CEO of SalMar. Over two production cycles, 10,000 tonnes of salmon have been produced at Ocean Farm 1, a full-scale pilot facility based on world-class Norwegian aquaculture and offshore technology. The two production cycles have shown strong biological results and has given valuable insights in respect of future development. The construction and operation of the pilot, combined with Aker's leading engineering, offshore operation, and fabrication capabilities, gives SalMar Aker Ocean an unparalleled position in the next phase of developing offshore fish farming on a global scale. To further accelerate growth, the parties will immediately initiate a project to develop a next-generation semi offshore unit, with an aim at reaching an investment decision for a new production unit as soon as possible. Based on the experience from Ocean Farm 1, SalMar Ocean has developed the Smart Fish Farm technology, with an ambition to build a series of units for offshore production. SalMar Aker Ocean will continue this work to streamline and digitalize construction and operation processes and will jointly seek approval for locations and licenses offshore, initially within the Norwegian Economic Zone. SalMar Aker Ocean has an ambition to develop a world leading company with global presence. The company will initially focus on establishment of offshore fish farming in Norwegian waters, which will require establishment of a regulatory framework for offshore fish farming. SalMar Aker Ocean will collaborate with Norwegian regulators, the aquaculture industry and other interested parties for the establishment of such framework. In the longer term, SalMar Aker Ocean will target growth in international markets building on experience and know-how from Norway. The establishment of the joint company is subject to customary closing conditions, and closing is expected in Q1 2022. The parties aim for listing of SalMar Aker Ocean on a relevant stock exchange within one to two years' time. SalMar presents results for the second quarter 2021 on Thursday 26 August 2021 at 12:00 CEST in the auditorium at Sparebank 1 SMN offices in Sndre Gate 4 in Trondheim. Representatives for both companies - Gustav Witze, Leif Inge Nordhammer, Olav Andreas Ervik, Kjell Inge Rkke and yvind Eriksen - will, immediately following the results presentation, jointly hold a presentation outlining the new collaboration, and will be available for answering questions. This will be done in Norwegian. Given current disease prevention measures due to Covid-19, it will be limited number of seats available. For registration, please contact corporateaccess@sb1markets.no For more information, please contact: Atle Kigen, Head of Media Relations and Public Affairs, Aker ASA Tel: +47 90784878 Email: atle.kigen@akerasa.com This information is considered to be inside information pursuant to the EU Market Abuse Regulation and is subject to the disclosure requirements pursuant to Section 5-12 the Norwegian Securities Trading Act. This stock exchange announcement was published by Laila Hop, Paralegal, Aker ASA, on August 26, 2021 at 08:00 CEST. This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com https://news.cision.com/aker-asa/r/aker-asa--enters-partnership-with-salmar-to-create-world-leading-offshore-farming-operations,c3403381 The following files are available for download: LONDON (dpa-AFX) - CRH PLC (CRH, CRH.L) said it recorded a positive first-half performance with sales up 15% from prior year. EBITDA improved 25% with continued margin expansion in all divisions. Based on this, the Group expects second-half Group EBITDA to be ahead of a record prior year. First-half profit before tax increased to $1.05 billion from $518 million, last year. Earnings per share, in cents, was 99.5 compared to 51.0. EBITDA was $2.0 billion, up 25%. Revenue increased to $14.04 billion from $12.21 billion. The Board has decided to increase the interim dividend to 23.0 cents per share, an increase of 4.5% on prior year. 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. Empower welcomes BC Pharmacy Association President and respected educator Annette Robinson VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / EMPOWER CLINICS INC. (CSE:CBDT)(FRA:8EC)(OTCQB:EPWCF) ("Empower" or the "Company") an integrated healthcare company - serving patients through medical centers, telemedicine platforms and a high complexity medical diagnostics laboratory processing thousands of COVID-19 specimens - is pleased to announce the appointment of Annette Robinson to its inaugural global advisory board, designed to advance the Company's strategic goals through expert advice and guidance. "We are assembling a diverse board of high-caliber experts and leaders to further Empower's growth agenda," said Steven McAuley, Chairman and CEO of Empower Clinics. "Annette's credentials, skills and network are unmatched, and I'm thrilled to welcome her to our growing team." A pharmacist by trade, Annette was elected to the BC Pharmacy Association (BCPhA) Board in September 2017 and currently serves as the BCPhA President and is the board representative for the Canadian Pharmacists Association. Additionally, she has served on the College of Pharmacists of BC Discipline Committee. Annette has worked as a Certified Diabetes Educator (C.D.E) as well as an Insulin Pump and Device trainer. A BC native, Annette graduated from the University of British Columbia with a BSc in Pharmacy. She is a thirty-seven-year veteran of the industry, with experience working as the staff pharmacist for small independent pharmacies, to pharmacy management for the biggest brands in Canada, such as Pharmasave and Rexall. "I am looking forward to partnering with an innovative and integrated healthcare brand like Empower," said Annette Robinson. "In my roles in both leading pharmacies and its main lobbying association, I can confirm that Empower has a vision that is very timely and relevant to pharmacies across Canada, and likely beyond. Pharmacies need a partner like Empower to offer more diagnostic products and both digital and in-person healthcare services solutions to their clients." Annette will begin advising Empower Clinics immediately, with further advisory board members to be announced in the fall. This press release is available on the Empower Clinics Verified Forum on AGORACOM for shareholder discussion, questions and engagement with management https://agoracom.com/ir/EmpowerClinics ABOUT EMPOWER: Empower is an integrated healthcare company that provides body and mind wellness for patients through its clinics, with digital and telemedicine care, and world-class medical diagnostics laboratories. Supported by an experienced leadership team, Empower is aggressively growing its clinical and digital presence across North America. Our Health & Wellness and Diagnostics & Technology business units are positioned to positively impact the integrated health of our patients, while simultaneously providing long term value for our shareholders. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS: Steven McAuley Chief Executive Officer CONTACTS: Investors: Steven McAuley CEO s.mcauley@empowerclinics.com 604-789-2146 Investors: Tamara Mason Business Development & Communications t.mason@empowerclinics.com 416-671-5617 DISCLAIMER FOR FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS This news release contains certain "forward-looking statements" or "forward-looking information" (collectively "forward looking statements") within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities laws. 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. Forward-looking statements can frequently be identified by words such as "plans", "continues", "expects", "projects", "intends", "believes", "anticipates", "estimates", "may", "will", "potential", "proposed" and other similar words, or information that certain events or conditions "may" or "will" occur. Forward-looking statements in this news release include, but are not limited to, statements regarding: the expected benefits to the Company and its shareholders as a result of the acquisition of Kai Medical Laboratory; the transaction terms; the expected number of clinics and patients following the closing; the future potential success of Kai Medical Laboratory, Sun Valley's franchise model; launch of new healthcare centers and the occurrence thereof; that the Company can bring healthcare to millions of Canadians; that new healthcare services can be added and that the Company will be positioned to be a market- leading service provider for complex patient requirements in 2020 and beyond. Such statements are only projections, are based on assumptions known to management at this time, and are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results, performance or developments to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements, including: that Kai Medical Laboratory will successfully win any US Government RFP; that the MedX Health pilot program will be successful; that Empower will place the MedX Health teledermatology product in health centers in North America; that the Company's products may not work as expected; that the Company may not be able to expand COVID-19 testing; that legislative changes may have an adverse effect on the Company's business and product development; that the Company may not be able to obtain adequate financing to pursue its business plan; that the Company will be able to commence and/or complete build-outs and tenants improvements for Canadian clinics or Kai Medical Laboratory expansion inn 2Q 2021; that general business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties; failure to obtain any necessary approvals in connection with the proposed transaction; and other factors beyond the Company's control. No assurance can be given that any of the events anticipated by the forward-looking statements will occur or, if they do occur, what benefits the Company will obtain from them. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements in this release, which are qualified in their entirety by these cautionary statements. The Company is under no obligation, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation, to update or revise any forward-looking statements in this release, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as expressly required by applicable laws. SOURCE: Empower Clinics Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661424/Empower-Clinics-Announces-First-Member-of-New-Expert-Led-Advisory-Board Hyundai Motor Group (the Group) to host the forward-thinking 'Hydrogen Wave' global forum online on September 7 Three short videos teased ahead of the forum now available on the Group's YouTube channel: [Hydrogen Wave 1 LINK, Hydrogen Wave 2 LINK, Hydrogen Wave 3 LINK] The Group will showcase its outlook and blueprints for a future hydrogen society, including breakthrough hydrogen mobility ideas and technologies Worldwide broadcast of the Hydrogen Wave will go live on Sep. 7 on the Group's YouTube channel [LINK] Next-generation hydrogen fuel-cell systems and applications to debut at the forum, delivering the technology into new industries beyond the automotive space SEOUL, South Korea, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Hyundai Motor Group (the Group) today announced to host 'Hydrogen Wave', a global virtual forum which represents the Group's plans for a new 'wave' of hydrogen-based products and technologies. The forum will also provide a revealing insight into the Group's future vision of a sustainable hydrogen society. The forward-thinking forum, which is exclusively online, starts on September 7, 15:00 KST (06:00 UTC), and will be live streamed via the Group's YouTube channel [LINK]. Investigating and exploring the concept of a future sustainable hydrogen society, Hydrogen Wave is open for participation to industry, media and the wider public. Ahead of the online forum, the Group has released three short teaser videos on its YouTube channel [Hydrogen Wave 1 LINK, Hydrogen Wave 2 LINK, Hydrogen Wave 3 LINK]. It has also launched a microsite (https://www.hydrogen-wave.com/) that provides a glimpse of future hydrogen products and technologies that will be unveiled at Hydrogen Wave. Following the online forum, the program jumps from the virtual world of Hydrogen Wave into the real-world of a physical exhibition taking place in the city of Goyang, South Korea, from September 8 to 11. Falling on the 'International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies', an annual September 7 event that was proposed by South Korea and ratified by the United Nations, Hydrogen Wave will demonstrate the future vision for hydrogen energy and a global hydrogen society based on the Group's decades-long rich expertise and experience in hydrogen technology development. The Group will present its vision of a future hydrogen society by unveiling its exciting plans and business strategies for new hydrogen mobility technology, next-generation fuel cell systems and applications to diverse industries beyond automotive. State-of-the-art future fuel cell electric vehicles - as well as other innovative applications - will be unveiled during the forum. Cutting-edge hydrogen application systems and products from the Group's affiliates will also be presented at the exhibition, further showcasing and detailing how a hydrogen society can be formed and realized. Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1602367/Photo__1.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1602365/Photo__2.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1602366/Photo__3.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1602368/Photo__4.jpg CANBERA (dpa-AFX) - The Australian and NZ dollars fell against their major counterparts in the Asian session on Thursday, as most Asian stocks fell, led by a decline in Chinese shares on persistent fears over Beijing's crackdown on the private sector. Traders await Jackson Hole symposium for more insights about the Fed's plan to scale back bond purchase program. Fed Chair Jerome Powell will deliver a speech on Friday, which will be parsed over whether the delta threat may forbid an imminent tightening of policy. A resurgence in Delta variant virus cases in several parts of the region clouded near term outlook. Oil prices fell as coronavirus restrictions due to the spike in infections raised demand worries. The aussie dropped to 79.78 against the yen, 1.6218 against the euro and 0.7252 against the greenback, off its early highs of 80.09 and 1.6168, and a session's high of 0.7280, respectively. The aussie may find support around 77.5 against the yen, 1.65 against the euro and 0.70 against the greenback. The aussie pulled back to 1.0423 against the kiwi, following a high of 1.0444 hit at 8.15 pm ET. On the downside, 1.02 is possibly seen as its next support level. The aussie reached as low as 0.9147 against the loonie at 5:30 pm ET and was steady thereafter. The pair had closed Wednesday's deals at 0.9157. The kiwi depreciated to 0.6951 against the greenback, 76.50 against the yen and 1.6921 against the euro, after rising to 0.6975, 76.73 and 1.6858, respectively in early deals. The kiwi is seen challenging support around 0.68 against the greenback, 74.5 against the yen and 1.71 against the euro. Looking ahead, the European Central Bank publishes the account of the monetary policy meeting of the Governing Council held on July 21-22 at 7:30 am ET. U.S. GDP data for second quarter and weekly jobless claims for the week ended August 21 will be released in the New York session. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX Kostenloser Wertpapierhandel auf Smartbroker.de ZUG, Switzerland, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Participating in an IDO can be lucrative most times for an investor, but at certain times it can be quite tricky searching for the new x100 crypto gem. If you want to know what an IDO is, and its pros and cons - read our article at VRM Research. IDO's are not always profitable. Unfortunately, pre-sale & IDO investors are sometimes left holding worthless tokens. As examples of the cases with such situations, look at Crypto Puzzles IDO results with -92,8% ROI: And Algo Painter with -82,8%: It happened for different reasons, such as a developer failed to provide liquidity or initially providing the liquidity only to later remove it (this is called "rug pulling"). Rug Pull A rug pull is a situation when crypto developers abandon a project and run away with investors' funds. Rug pulls sometimes happen in the DeFi ecosystem, especially on DEXs, where malicious individuals create a token and list it on a DEX, pair it with a leading cryptocurrency like Ethereum. But once a significant number of investors swap their ETH for the listed token, the creators then withdraw everything from the liquidity pool, driving the coin's price to zero. Ensuring that you don't fall victim to a rug pull Decentralized exchanges such as Uniswap algorithmically determine the prices of tokens in a pool depending on the available balances. Check the project's liquidity in a pool before you invest, and check if there is a lock on the token's pool for a certain period. But it's not possible all the time, because not every project adds liquidity to the pool before an IDO. Even if the project looks reliable and worthy, even if it has well-known investors and companies, it doesn't guarantee positive results. The coin's creators may even create a temporary hype around Telegram, Twitter, and other social media platforms and initially inject a substantial amount of liquidity into their pool to cultivate investor confidence and to drive FOMO that leads more people to invest in the token. FLy protects customers and investors from the risks of an IDO Driven by the principles of complete transparency and understanding investors' needs, the FLy team has developed a Launchpad platform that provides its users with a high degree of risk protection within the volatile space of DeFi investing. The FLy ecosystem, powered by its utility token Franklin (FLy), serve as the fuel that power the platform. FLy is a utility token with an actual purpose: hold FLy Tokens to get access to the Launchpad and risk-free IDO which is a distinguishing feature amidst other launchpad platforms. FLy token holders also get access to such solutions as trading signals for manual and API trading produced by quantitative trading algorithms, FLyDEX for traders and DeFi solutions for FLy token, such as staking and farming , a network bridge , escrow and more to come. Risk-free IDO on the FLy platform. Case study As we had mentioned previously, an IDO can be risky for investors. That's why it's extremely important to participate in such an investment type using the right platform, that ensures maximum benefits for its community of investors and protects its customers. As an example, on August 5th 2021, a project called CFL365.Finance had an IDO for its token on the FLy Launchpad platform . The IDO was fully deposited within 30 minutes of starting and closed with a gained deposited amount double of what was necessary. But unfortunately, the $CFL365 token performance didn't suit the risk management profile. FLy cares about the community and to keep the community in profit, it stopped token distribution. To ensure the FLy community from losses, all USDT tokens that were participated in the IDO were unlocked. Moreover, FLy Launchpad participators got an airdrop in $CFL365 tokens for free according to the FLy tokens amount in their wallet. The FLy launchpad is risk-free, so the team doesn't leave their community without refunds in case of bad project performance. All information about the IDO process is sent to the community through the FLy and BO Newsletter and official Telegram Global community channel. You can check all the transactions of this case here: https://bscscan.com/tx/0x5db49501c87a784fc0f695c82885b3304834c882539e3b135888285655beea14 Tokens airdrop: https://bscscan.com/tx/0x52bbc9f61c410c88eda92315e592055bf7d7f54a42ff0f6917b0726e2289d16f https://bscscan.com/tx/0xc9196878ff84737edf23af8fe606955ec7e345ffe9bc67f4ed6d5272ba7066e8 USDT return: https://bscscan.com/tx/0xba0296e351cfca0191035218cc3ae1cd71f633933d182d56016942e8576861c9 https://bscscan.com/tx/0x8f298d46ccf5ee8eac2ca7488a3bb466095f217e008707557a61423e6cd4b0b0 About Fly Launchpad FLy Launchpad helps and advises project teams on how to best attract communities and increase the number of investors for a successful launch of their token. The launchpad provides a full fundraising service, starting from advisory to post-listing, marketing and market-making support. The FLy team is looking for strong projects with a unique and innovative vision in the crypto space. The FLy community enjoys the opportunity to invest in high-quality projects with good conditions, which are similar to pre-seed and seed institutional rounds. FLy Launchpad offer completely risk-free IDOs and create a win-win situation for both projects and investors. Fly Launchpad benefits for investors and projects Large community and relevant expertise for projects, pre- and post-IDO support with marketing, price management and advisory. The FLy community could be backers of high-quality projects for investing. Risk - protection for FLy token holders, in the case when an IDO token performs bad or a team behaves unfairly, the token holders get back their investment without any losses. Participating in an IDO on the FLy Platform Participant has to have more than 100 FLy tokens (BSC/ETH network) in his/her web wallet (Metamask as an example) (BSC/ETH network) in his/her web wallet (Metamask as an example) Participant must have the appropriate amount of funds to his/her investment request Fly token holder has to select a project to invest in Has to link his/her appropriate wallet to launchpad.bo.market Has to decide an investment amount and approve the request to invest Win in a lottery Complete an investment Receive tokens from a token sale Current price of the FLy token The FLy token price rose on +170% last weekend, while trading volume for FLy token set the record with more than $10M. Fly is expected to continue to increase on the back of new partnerships and services coming to market, definitely one to watch for the future. Add FLy token to your CoinMarketCap watch list. If you're looking to diversify your portfolio, now could be the ideal time to consider adding FLy. Fly has a lot more upcoming solutions and there will be many more exciting announcements about the latest updates. Stay tuned! Website: https://tokenfly.co/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/FrankLinYield Telegram: Telegram Global community channel Telegram Announcements: https://t.me/TokenFLyBlackOcean Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1601715/1.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1601716/2.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1601717/3.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1601718/4.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1601719/5.jpg TEL AVIV, Israel, Aug. 26, 2021/PRNewswire/ -- Attenti, an established leader in the electronic monitoring industry, will be presenting their Domestic Violence Deterrence Solution at The Emergency Services Show. Taking place at Birmingham's National Exhibition Centre on the 7th and 8th of September, The Emergency Services Show is the UK's largest event for the emergency services. Comments Roni Weinberg, Vice President of Sales & Marketing at Attenti, "Domestic abuse is the world's hidden pandemic. We're excited to be presenting our solution to law enforcement officials at the Emergency Services Show and demonstrate our Domestic Violence Deterrence Solution's effectiveness as a vital tool in tackling the scourge of family and domestic abuse in the United Kingdom." Domestic Abuse: The World's Hidden Pandemic The alarming statistics of domestic abuse and their negative effects on the individuals and families involved are a global phenomenon. The Covid-19 pandemic further caused a dramatic increase in domestic violence - not just in the UK, but around the world, becoming what the UN described, a "shadow pandemic". The Crime Survey for England and Wales showed that 1.6 million women and 757,000 men had experienced domestic abuse between March 2019 and March 2020, with a 7% growth in police recorded domestic abuse crimes. Because domestic abuse is a vastly under-reported crime, the true picture is likely to be far worse than the official statistics show. It is very common for released domestic abuse offenders to return and attack their victims. Protection orders alone are often not enough to prevent an offender from re-attacking a victim. Attenti's Electronic Monitoring Deterrence Solution is an effective solution to enforce restraining orders. It can be harnessed to increase the sense of security of victims at home and on the move, while providing improved supervision over both the victim and the aggressor, in order to avoid potential encounters and ensure compliance with court orders. Bolstering Law Enforcement The majority of the domestic violence victims who have used Attenti's device reported feeling much safer, and most of the aggressors believe the solution helped them meet legal obligations imposed by the restraining order. "Our solution provides a greater level of oversight, meaning that domestic violence victims have far greater protections in place than they ever have. This provides law enforcement officials with an opportunity to rapidly respond to dangerous situations and in-so-doing, prevent repeated violence and potentially save the life and health of a victim." Attenti's successful cooperation with local criminal justice agencies and other government stakeholders has led to the development of domestic violence deterrence programs in Europe and South America. Further, it has the most installations worldwide of domestic violence deterrence solutions, with thousands of individuals monitored and protected daily. About Attenti For over two decades, Attenti has been committed to keeping our clients, partners and the people who trust in them on safe ground. Our innovative monitoring solutions make a tangible difference to people's lives. To law enforcement officers out in the field. To communities tasked with reintegrating participants back into civilian life. To public authorities entrusted with making efficient use of taxpayer money. Wherever we operate, our extensive knowledge, veteran team of experts, and innovative electronic monitoring systems are trusted the world over to make society safer, more secure, and advanced for everyone. For any questions or additional information, contact Marketing Director Tal Stein Email: tstein@attentigroup.com or Tel: +97237671700 NASHVILLE, Tenn., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- eWeek is expanding its global web presence with the launch of a new digital publication eWeek UK . The website is now live and will cover the UK's B2B technology scene. Antony Peyton will take the reins as eWeek UK Editor-In-Chief. James Maguire will remain as Editor-in-Chief of the US-based eWeek. Peyton's career spans over 17 years of business and technology sector journalism and has carried him across Europe, China and Japan. He most recently served as the Deputy Editor of FinTech Futures in London. Peyton says, "The eWeek brand has thrived since the early 1980s, providing news, insights and analysis for IT professionals and technology buyers around the world. The ambition of eWeek UK is to bring the same level of expertise and scrutiny for which we are known to the four countries that make up this kingdom." "We'll be covering a wide range of subjects such as cybersecurity, big data and analytics, cloud, mobile, networking, artificial intelligence and innovation. The B2B tech scene in the UK is energetic and constantly enterprising, and it deserves a digital publication that solely focuses on its activities. I know there will be no shortage of companies to cover, people to meet and themes to explore." The eWeek brand is owned by Nashville-based technology media company, TechnologyAdvice. Twitter: eWeekUK Web: eWeekUK.com Media Contact: Caroline Weishaar media@technologyadvice.com August 26, 2021 Company's innovative, integrated imaging systems, devices, software, informatics and services support greater efficiency, enabling high-quality care for a growing volume of complex cardiac patients Early detection, accurate diagnosis, precise treatment and easy follow-up are enabled by data-driven, streamlined workflows Amsterdam, the Netherlands - Royal Philips during the virtual European Society of Cardiology (ESC) 2021 Congress, taking place August 27-30, during which it will showcase its latest suite of solutions to help improve outcomes for patients with cardiovascular disease by enabling quick, confident diagnoses, and efficient, effective treatments. During the congress, Philips will demonstrate its continued leadership in cardiology across its integrated portfolio of solutions throughout the entire cardiac care journey, from early detection, diagnosis and treatment, to long-term follow-up. Cardiovascular disease has become the number one healthcare challenge globally and is one of the leading causes of death worldwide [1]. The costs associated with cardiovascular diseases are rising significantly, with an expected growth in cost of 101% by 2035 [2]. The demands on cardiology departments are higher than ever before, forcing clinicians to balance the delivery of high-quality care for a growing volume of complex patients, while dealing with the pressures to improve departmental efficiency at the same time. Definitive diagnostics, innovative procedures and personalized patient management are essential to help address these most challenging demands. "From emergency care to diagnosis and treatment, to care into the home, cardiac care teams need the right information and support available at their fingertips across the entire cardiac patient journey," said Bert van Meurs , Chief Business Leader of Image Guided Therapy at Philips. "Philips is uniquely positioned to integrate imaging, devices, software, informatics and services at each point in a cardiac patient's journey to help deliver results now, while positioning for future success. At this year's ESC virtual congress, we continue our longstanding leadership in cardiology, as we demonstrate the latest smart solutions to help improve the precision diagnosis and effective treatment for patients in cardiac care, driving better outcomes and lower cost while improving the patient and staff experience." Philips cardiology experience at the Virtual ESC 2021 Congress Visitors to the Philips virtual experience during ESC will see how Philips' solutions help strengthen clinical confidence with robust data and advanced technologies to give insight to provide the right care at the right time, improving outcomes for even the most complex patients. Building efficiency throughout the care pathway, Philips is streamlining communication between devices and systems to identify and address operational improvements to optimize resources and help reduce costs. By improving cardiac care experiences with user-friendly tools and streamlined workflows, Philips is helping relieve pain points for staff and enhancing comfort for patients. Technology highlights in diagnostic and treatment solutions at this year's virtual ESC congress include: Philips Spectral CT 7500 for advanced cardiac imaging. The new Philips Spectral CT 7500 (https://www.usa.philips.com/a-w/about/news/archive/standard/news/press/2021/20210519-philips-introduces-the-new-spectral-computed-tomography-7500-system-providing-spectral-information-for-every-patient-and-every-scan.html), designed to support diagnosis, builds on Philips's strong reputation in cardiac imaging by delivering fast cardiac scans with excellent coronary vessel visualization, and now layers of spectral information for every exam. The spectral detector allows the Spectral CT 7500 to be the only system that will acquire spectral cardiac data in the same time and place for all patients, from pediatrics to bariatrics. This latest intelligent system has demonstrated a 34% reduction in time to diagnosis [3], a 25% reduction in repeat scans and a 30% reduction in follow-up scans [4] compared to conventional CT. The time-saving spectral workflow is fully integrated, enabling spectral chest scans. Intelligent workflows of Philips IntelliSpace Portal (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/product/HC881101/intellispace-portal-12) simplify advanced vessel analysis, comprehensive cardiac assessment, lung nodule assessment, and transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) to expand cardiac and ED trauma capabilities. The new (https://www.usa.philips.com/a-w/about/news/archive/standard/news/press/2021/20210519-philips-introduces-the-new-spectral-computed-tomography-7500-system-providing-spectral-information-for-every-patient-and-every-scan.html), designed to support diagnosis, builds on Philips's strong reputation in cardiac imaging by delivering fast cardiac scans with excellent coronary vessel visualization, and now layers of spectral information for every exam. The spectral detector allows the Spectral CT 7500 to be the only system that will acquire spectral cardiac data in the same time and place for all patients, from pediatrics to bariatrics. This latest intelligent system has demonstrated a 34% reduction in time to diagnosis [3], a 25% reduction in repeat scans and a 30% reduction in follow-up scans [4] compared to conventional CT. The time-saving spectral workflow is fully integrated, enabling spectral chest scans. Intelligent workflows of (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/product/HC881101/intellispace-portal-12) simplify advanced vessel analysis, comprehensive cardiac assessment, lung nodule assessment, and transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) to expand cardiac and ED trauma capabilities. New innovations in ultrasound enhance clinical efficiency and diagnostic confidence. Philips' new echo imaging, quantification, and tele-health technologies help improve clinical confidence, automate repetitive tasks, and remotely and securely connect clinicians and patients. Philips brings together the EPIQ CVx (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/product/HC795231/epiq-cvx-premium-cardiology-ultrasound-system) and Affiniti CVx (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/resources/landing/affiniti-cvx) ultrasound platforms, TOMTEC advanced analysis, Collaboration Live (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/resources/landing/collaboration-live) remote decision support and Philips multi-modality image and information management solutions ( IntelliSpace Cardiovascular (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/product/HCNOCTN198/intellispace-cardiovascular)) in an end-to-end workflow, for a fully integrated experience in echocardiography. Philips' new echo imaging, quantification, and tele-health technologies help improve clinical confidence, automate repetitive tasks, and remotely and securely connect clinicians and patients. Philips brings together the (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/product/HC795231/epiq-cvx-premium-cardiology-ultrasound-system) and (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/resources/landing/affiniti-cvx) ultrasound platforms, TOMTEC advanced analysis, (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/resources/landing/collaboration-live) remote decision support and Philips multi-modality image and information management solutions ( (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/product/HCNOCTN198/intellispace-cardiovascular)) in an end-to-end workflow, for a fully integrated experience in echocardiography. Improved workflow and patient focus in image guided procedures. Philips will demonstrate the integration of its Interventional Hemodynamic System (https://www.philips.com.au/healthcare/product/HC722463/hemo-with-intellivue-x3)and market-leading portable Patient Monitor IntelliVue X3 (https://www.philips.com.au/healthcare/product/HC867030/intellivue-x3-patient-monitor), providing advanced hemodynamic (blood flow) measurements at the tableside in the cath lab and continuous monitoring of key vital signs throughout the patient journey [5]. The integration provides the opportunity for monitoring during image-guided procedures on the Philips Image Guided Therapy System - Azurion, (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/resources/landing/azurion?npagination=1) improving workflow with comprehensive patient records that support timely clinical decision-making during interventional cardiology procedures and beyond. Philips will demonstrate the integration of its (https://www.philips.com.au/healthcare/product/HC722463/hemo-with-intellivue-x3)and market-leading portable (https://www.philips.com.au/healthcare/product/HC867030/intellivue-x3-patient-monitor), providing advanced hemodynamic (blood flow) measurements at the tableside in the cath lab and continuous monitoring of key vital signs throughout the patient journey [5]. The integration provides the opportunity for monitoring during image-guided procedures on the Philips Image Guided Therapy System - (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/resources/landing/azurion?npagination=1) improving workflow with comprehensive patient records that support timely clinical decision-making during interventional cardiology procedures and beyond. Cardiology informatics solutions drive actionable insights to enhance cardiology care. Philips Cardiovascular Informatics solution (https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/solutions/diagnostic-informatics/cardiology-informatics-cvis) provides a consistent end-to-end intuitive workflow for easy access to a patient's cardiovascular pathway. By connecting and integrating disparate clinical systems across the enterprise, the cardiology care team can make fast clinical decisions based on the data when and where it is needed. Philips cardiology informatics solutions, smart intelligent algorithms and predictive analytics work seamlessly to help optimize patient throughput. Advanced cardiac monitoring from the hospital into the home Philips cardiac care solutions and BioTelemetry's leading remote cardiac patient monitoring have transformed the cardiac care pathway. Now, individuals with complex co-morbidities can emerge from a cardiac event or procedure to live independently with the confidence of 24/7 clinical oversight with advanced cardiac monitoring including monitoring of wearables and implantable devices for a complete end-to-end solution across acute and non-acute settings, from the hospital into the home. Philips hosted webinars and symposia sessions during ESC 2021 ESC delegates can join Dr. Roberto Lang of the University of Chicago Medicine, along with Dr. Pepe Zamorano of the University Hospital Ramon y Cajal, Madrid, Spain and Dr. Eric Saloux with Coen University Hospital, France during an Ultrasound Satellite Symposia session on August 28 at 8:00AM CET, as they present results on new imaging technologies under investigation. ESC attendees can also join Dr. Tim Leiner, Professor of Radiology at Utrecht University Medical Center in the Netherlands, who will share the latest results and advantages of cardiovascular imaging with the next generation Spectral CT 7500. On August 27 at 10:00AM CET, Dr. Borja Ibanez, Director of Clinical Research of the National Center Cardiovascular Research. Visit the Philips ESC Engagement Hub for the full list of Philips hosted webinars throughout the event. For more information, join the Philips virtual experience at ESC 2021. Visit www.philips.com/cardiology and the Philips Press Backgrounderfor more information on Philips full suite of integrated imaging, devices, software, informatics and services enhancing precision heart care. And join @PhilipsLiveFrom to follow Philips for updates throughout the event. [1] European Cardiovascular Disease Statistics 2017. [2] RTI International for the American Heart Association. Projections of Cardiovascular Disease Prevalence and Costs: 2015-2035. [3] Andersen, MB, Ebbesen, D, Thygesen, J, et al. impact of spectral body imaging in patients suspected for occult cancer: a prospective study of 503 patients. Eur Radiol. [4] Analysis by CARTI Cancer Center in Little Rock Arkansas and University Hospitals of Cleveland. Results from case studies are not predictive of results in other cases. Results in other cases may vary. [5] Philips Interventional Hemodynamic System with Patient Monitor IntelliVue X3 is available in the majority of markets worldwide. Philips' continuous patient monitoring solution is available for sale in markets across Europe, Middle East and APAC, with further expansion planned later this year. It is not available for sale in the U.S. For further information, please contact: Mark Groves Philips Global Press Office Tel.: +31 631 639 916 E-mail: mark.groves@philips.com About Royal Philips Royal Philips. Attachments VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Mawson Gold Limited ("Mawson") or (the "Company") (TSX:MAW) (Frankfurt:MXR) (OTC PINK:MWSNF) is pleased to announce an independently verified update of the third constrained Inferred Mineral Resource estimate at its 100% owned Rajapalot project in Finland. The estimate was completed by Qualified Persons from AFRY Finland Oy , a European leader in engineering, design, and advisory services. Mineral Resources are calculated using a long-term gold price of US$1,590/oz and a cobalt price of US$23.07/lb and using 0.3 g/t gold equivalent "AuEq" open pit cut-off and 1.1 g/t AuEq underground cut-off (Table 1). AuEq values were calculated using the following formula: AuEq g/t = Au g/t + (Co ppm/1005). Key Points: Base case Mineral Resource estimate 10.91 Mt @ 3.0 g/t gold equivalent ("AuEq"), 2.5 g/t gold ("Au"), 443 ppm cobalt ("Co") for 887 koz Au, 4.8 kt Co equating to 1.04 Moz AuEq in the inferred category; for Compared to the previous Rajapalot resource estimation published on September 14, 2020 (Figure 4): Gold grade increased by 19% (AuEq grade by 12%); Contained gold ounces increased by 47% (contained gold equivalent ounces by 35%); Gold camp now comprises 8 distinct prospects, doubling the 4 previously contained in the 2020 Rajapalot Inferred Mineral Resource estimate (Figures 5 and 6); in the 2020 Rajapalot Inferred Mineral Resource estimate (Figures 5 and 6); Substantial increases in existing resources demonstrate continuity within the deposits and expansion potential at depth and along strike (Figure 7): All resource areas remain open to depth and the Company has developed a strong geological and exploration model to target mineralization; demonstrate continuity within the deposits and expansion potential at depth and along strike (Figure 7): Growth potential remains strong: Drilling covers only 20% of the mineralization-host package at Rajapalot (Figure 8); Rajapalot camp represents only 5% of 100 square kilometre Rompas-Rajapalot Finnish project area owned 100% by Mawson. Mr. Hudson, Chairman and CEO, states, "Following a significant drilling effort, we are delighted to hit a milestone of 1.04 Moz AuEq, while delivering a year-on-year gold grade increase of 19% with contained gold up 47% from our last resource upgrade in 2020. Rarely does substantial resource growth come together with grade increases, and the robustness of Rajapalot at different cut-offs and constraining models is impressive. This year we doubled the number of prospects within the resource area, and our annual winter campaigns have been adding 300-400 koz AuEq resource growth in a predominant 10-week drilling window. We have developed a strong geological and exploration model to target high-grades, and excitingly it remains early days at Rajapalot with 80% of the target untested, which is just 5% of Mawson's larger 100 square kilometre Finnish project - all from a project that is one of the few in Finland that enjoys majority local support." Table 1: Total Inferred Mineral Resources estimate as of August 26, 2021, at the listed cut-offs for constrained open pit and underground resources at Rajapalot. Zone Cut-off (AuEq) Tonnes (kt) Au (g/t) Co (ppm) AuEq (g/t) Au (oz) Co (tonnes) AuEq (oz) Palokas Pit 0.3 1,228 2.2 382 2.5 85,513 469 100,511 Palokas UG 1.1 4,878 2.7 501 3.2 427,797 2,443 505,941 Palokas total 6,106 2.6 477 3.1 513,310 2,911 606,451 Raja Pit 0.3 485 1.3 289 1.6 19,722 140 24,206 Raja UG 1.1 2,492 3.2 401 3.6 254,600 999 286,574 Raja total 2,977 2.9 383 3.2 274,322 1,140 310,780 East Joki (no pit) East Joki UG 1.1 299 4.5 363 4.9 43,378 109 46,859 East Joki total 299 4.5 363 4.9 43,378 109 46,859 Hut Pit 0.3 61 0.1 874 1.0 214 54 1,928 Hut UG 1.1 816 1.4 411 1.8 35,943 336 46,682 Hut total 877 1.3 444 1.7 36,157 389 48,610 Rumajarvi Pit 0.3 401 0.6 496 1.1 8,107 199 14,467 Rumajarvi UG 1.1 246 1.5 356 1.9 12,009 88 14,813 Rumajarvi total 647 1.0 443 1.4 20,116 286 29,279 Total Pit 0.3 2,175 1.6 396 2.0 113,556 861 141,112 Total UG 1.1 8,732 2.7 455 3.2 773,728 3,974 900,868 Total 10,907 2.5 443 3.0 887,284 4,836 1,041,980 CIM Definition Standards (2014) were used for Mineral Resource classifications. AuEq=Au+Co/1,005 based on assumed prices of Co US$23.07/lb and Au US$1,590/oz. Rounding of grades and tonnes may introduce apparent errors in averages and contained metals. Drilling results to 20 June 2021. These are Mineral Resources that are not Mineral Reserves and do not have demonstrated economic viability. Resource Methodology Mineral Resource estimation reporting follows the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum ("CIM") definitions standards (2014) for mineral resources and reserves and have been completed in accordance with the Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects as defined by National Instrument 43-101; Reported tonnage and grade figures have been rounded from raw estimates to reflect the relative accuracy of the estimate. Minor variations may occur during the addition of rounded numbers; Constrained Resources are presented undiluted and in-situ and are considered to have reasonable prospects for eventual economic extraction. The Qualified Person considers that the reported Mineral Resource has reasonable prospects for eventual economic extraction by the open pit and underground mining method at the specified cut-off grades. An assessment of whether the project as a whole is economically viable has not been made under this analysis. Mineral Resources that are not Mineral Reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability. Whittle software (version 4.7.3) was used in the optimization on Palokas, South Palokas, Raja, Hut, Rumajarvi, Uusisaari, Terry's Hammer and Joki prospect wireframes to define the mineralization falling within the confines of an open pit (demonstrating reasonable prospects for eventual economic extraction, "RPEEE"). Five block models were created covering the eight prospects. Mineralization falling outside the pits above the cut-off grade of 1.1 g/t AuEq was then defined as underground resources with RPEEE. Optimized open pit constrained resources are reported at a cut-off grade of 0.3 g/t AuEq. Underground resources are reported at a cut-off grade of 1.1 g/t AuEq (Figures 1-3). The cut-off grades used for reporting were based on up to date third party metal price research, forecasting of long-term gold and cobalt prices, and a cost structure from benching marking Finnish mining, metallurgical and G&A operational costs. Costs include mining, processing and general and administration ("G&A"). Net Smelter Return ("NSR") includes metallurgical recoveries and selling costs inclusive government royalties. Gold equivalent "AuEq" = Au+(Co/1005) based on assumed prices of cobalt US$23.07/lb and gold US$1,590/oz. The optimization process was conducted considering three scenarios: The first using Whittle optimization for a pit of Revenue Factor 1 (Rev-F-1); The second optimization utilised the changeover from open cut (OC) to underground (UG) based on the estimated differential operating expenses of OC and UG (model termed OC-UG or "base case"); The third was an underground scenario where a depth of 20 metres below the top of solid rock was regarded as the near-surface limit of potential mining (UG only). These three scenarios were developed to allow consideration of reasonable prospects for eventual economic extraction (RPEEE). Without further consideration of economic viability, the second optimization (OC-UG) is regarded as the most reasonable. The Pit Optimization section provides details of the three scenarios considered. Table 2: Grade/tonnage relationships for alternate constraining models for Rajapalot Model Tonnes (kt) Au (g/t) Co (ppm) AuEq (g/t) AuEq (oz) RF= 1 Whittle 13,395 2.1 423 2.5 1,094,125 Base Case 10,907 2.5 443 3.0 1,041,980 All UG 9,780 2.8 441 3.2 1,004,732 A gold top cut of 50 g/t Au was used for the gold domains. A cobalt top cut was not applied. Bulk density values were calculated for each block within the wireframes based on 3,345 density measurements (linear relationship of iron oxide to density was used to make an Ordinary Kriged estimate of density for each wireframe). Wireframe models were generated using gold and cobalt shells separately. Forty-eight separate gold and cobalt wireframes were constructed in Leapfrog Geo and grade distributions independently estimated using Ordinary Kriging in Leapfrog Edge. Sub-block triggers in each case were created using the gold and cobalt wireframes, the base of till and lidar surface wireframes were also used to control the density model for "air" and till blocks (till density is set to 2 t/m 3 . Parent blocks were used in all cases for grade estimation. A range of parent block sizes was tested with an optimal 12 m x 12 m x 4 m size determined (>20% of the drill hole spacing) as suitable. Sub-blocking down to 4 m x 4 m x 0.5 m was optimal for geologic control on volumes, thinner and moderately dipping wireframes (testing of options up to the parent block size showed less than 5% overall variation in the Mineral Resource estimate). For creation of the SMU model for pit optimization, the sub-block model was copied and controlled to regular 5 m x 5 m x 2.5 m blocks. There was less than 0.5% difference in the total Mineral Resource estimate created during the change to regularized blocks. AFRY created the Rajapalot Mineral Resource estimate using the drill results available to 20June 2021. Additional metals were estimated using ordinary kriging in the resource base case. The average contents of these metals were arsenic (234 ppm), copper (198 ppm), iron oxide (11.0%), nickel (108 ppm), sulphur (2.2%), uranium (31 ppm) and tungsten (100 ppm). From a resource efficiency point of view, it appears that only gold (2.5 g/t) and cobalt (443 ppm) have the potential to be extracted economically, considering the low background values of the other metals. Certain environmental opportunities potentially exist to extract and capture some of the other metals to produce a cleaner tailings product. A National Instrument 43-101 Technical Report will be filed on SEDAR shortly. About the Rajapalot Project Diamond Drilling Mawson completed 76 holes for 19,422 metres during the 2020/21 winter drill season. At the completion of the 2020/21 winter drill program a total of 544 drillholes for 84,507 metres had been drilled at the Rajapalot project with an average depth of 155 metres. Key results from the program are outlined below. The 100% owned gold-cobalt Rajapalot discovery hosts numerous hydrothermal gold-cobalt prospects drilled between 2013 and April 2020 within a 3 by 4-kilometre area. A total of 76,155 drilling metres (90% of total) has been completed since 2017. A total of 330 holes for 72.8 kilometres and an average depth of 250 metres were used in the upgraded August 2021 resource estimation. In comparison, a total of 257 holes for 53.8 km and an average depth of 209 metres were used the upgraded September 2020 resource estimation and a total of 178 holes for 24.0 km with an average depth of 135 metres were used within the December 2018 maiden resource estimation. Geology The host sequence comprises a polydeformed, isoclinally folded package of amphibolite facies metamorphosed Paleoproterozoic supracrustal rocks of the Perapohja belt. The Paleoproterozoic of northern Finland is highly prospective for gold and cobalt, and include the Europe's largest gold mine, Kittila, operated by Agnico Eagle Finland Oy. Stratabound gold-cobalt mineralization occurs near the boundary of the Kivalo and Paakkola groups with two contrasting host rocks, either iron-magnesium or potassic-iron types. Multi-stage development of the mineralization is evident, with early-formed cobalt and a post-tectonic hydrothermal gold event. Prospects with high-grade gold and cobalt at Rajapalot occur across 3 km (east-west) by 2 km (north-south) area within the larger Rajapalot project exploration area measuring 4 km by 4 km with multiple mineralized boulders, base-of-till (BOT) and rare outcrops. High-grade Au-Co mineralization at Rajapalot has been drilled to 540 metres deep at Raja and South Palokas prospects, but is not closed out at depth in any prospect. The only surface exposure of mineralization is at Palokas, however except for East Joki, all mineralization comes to the top of the bedrock below the till, less than 6 metres below the surface. East Joki is 110 metres from the surface at its shallowest, but is not drilled yet in the up-dip direction. Mawson's primary target type across the whole Rajapalot-Rompas area is the disseminated Au-Co style, with Mawson's geological team in Finland devoted to uncovering more prospects based on their increased understanding of the host sequence. Two distinct styles of gold mineralization dominate the Rajapalot area. The first, is a variably sulphidic magnesian-iron host, previously referred to internally as "Palokas" style. The magnesian-iron host is most likely an ultramafic volcanic (komatiitic) and occurs within approximately 100 vertical metres of the inferred Kivalo-Paakkola boundary (that is, near the incoming of pelites, calc-pelites and quartz muscovite rocks). A largely retrograde mineral alteration assemblage includes chlorite, Fe-Mg amphiboles (anthophyllite and cummingtonite series), tourmaline and pyrrhotite commonly associated with quartz-veining. Subordinate almandine garnet, magnetite and pyrite occur with bismuth tellurides, scheelite, ilmenite and gold, cobalt pentlandite and cobaltite. Metallurgical testing at Palokas reveals the gold to be non-refractory and 95% pure (with minor Ag and Cu) with excellent recoveries by gravitational circuit with conventional cyanidation and/or flotation. QEMSCAN studies also show that the gold occurs as native grains, found both on grain boundaries and within minerals. Detailed work by Jukka Pekka Ranta of the University of Oulu (plus co-workers) on fluid inclusions and the host rocks to the Fe-Mg mineralization at Palokas indicates weakly saline, methane-bearing fluids at depths as shallow as 5 km and temperatures of approximately 250 degrees were responsible for deposition of the gold. The second style of gold-cobalt mineralization at Rajapalot, a potassic-iron (K-Fe) style (formerly referred to internally as "Rumajarvi" type) is characteristically associated with muscovite and / or biotite and chlorite in a diverse range of fabrics. Gold grades of more than 1 g/t Au are associated with pyrrhotite and contained within muscovite-biotite schists, muscovite and biotite-bearing albitic granofels and brecciated, variably micaceous albitic rocks. Magnetite is a common mineral, but not a necessity for anomalous gold grades. The host rocks are grey to white owing to their reduced nature and may be enclosed by light pink to red calcsilicate-bearing albitites. To date, the K-Fe gold-cobalt mineralization style has been intersected near the muscovite-bearing quartzite at Raja and Rumajarvi, but as other rock types are also mineralized and the clear strong structural control on grade, stratigraphic constraints may locally not be relevant. Exploration for Palokas and Rumajarvi style gold prospects is not restricted to the Rajapalot area. Recognition of the host stratigraphic package (near the boundary of the Kivalo-Paakkola Group boundary) enclosing the 6 km long vein-hosted Rompas Au-U system increases the search space for the pyrrhotite-Au-Co systems to cover Mawson's full permit area. The geochemical characteristics of the ultramafic volcanics and related intrusives are not only present in the southern drill section at South Rompas but have more than 50 km of strike length in Rompas-Rajapalot. It is the interaction of this reactive rock package with late gold-bearing hydrothermal systems driven by ca. 1.8 Ga granitoids, that now form the most highly prospective targets away from the Rajapalot area. The cobalt component of the system is largely stratabound and formed much earlier, most likely from oxidized saline basinal fluids interacting with reduced strata. Metallurgy Preliminary metallurgical testing on drill core from the Rajapalot prospect demonstrate excellent gold extraction results of between 95% and 99% (average 97%) by a combination of gravity separation and conventional cyanidation and or/flotation. Metallurgical test work indicates gold recovery and processing are potentially amenable to conventional industry standards with a viable flowsheet which could include crushing and grinding, gravity recovery, and cyanide leaching with gold recovery via a carbon-in-pulp circuit for production of onsite gold dore. Further metallurgical test work is currently underway, with Mawson a participant of Finland's BATCircle consortium, a program designed to value-add to the Finnish battery metals circular economy. Initial indications suggest the cobalt minerals present (cobaltite and linnaeite) can float or be separated by magnetic separation methods. Strategic Cobalt Rajapalot is a significant and strategic gold-cobalt resource and one of Finland's largest gold resources by grade and contained ounces and one of a small group of cobalt resources prepared in accordance with NI 43-101 policy within Europe. Finland refines half the world's cobalt outside China. The world's largest cobalt refinery is located 400 kilometres south of Rajapalot, where CRU estimates annual refining of 22,734 tonnes of cobalt (approximately 18% of world refined cobalt production), 90% of which was sourced from Chinese-owned mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Finland mines only 650 tonnes or 0.5% of the world's cobalt per year. The Rajapalot resource has the potential to support Finland's desire to source ethical and sustainable cobalt. ESG Mawson acknowledges that Environmental, Social and Governance ("ESG") forms a comprehensive framework for our Company to successfully navigate and balance the benefits of our projects to the planet, people and profit. Mawson has had an active ESG program operating for many years, and we are constantly developing and adding to it as our projects grow and develop. Mawson appreciates the overwhelmingly strong support it receives from local stakeholders in Finland. The Ylitornio municipality, which hosts the Rajapalot project, is a sparsely populated area with a decreasing population. The Rajapalot project could create many opportunities for both the current population and those in the future who settle within the area. During late 2020, Mawson Oy, Mawson's 100%-owned subsidiary in Finland, requested the Lapland Centre for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment ("ELY") to arrange a preliminary consultation in accordance with section 8 of the Environmental Impact Assessment ("EIA") Procedure Act. The EIA procedure identifies, assesses, and describes the significant environmental effects of a project and subsequently allows Mawson to consult with the authorities and those whose conditions or interests may be affected by the project. The EIA procedure is not a permit procedure, but provides information on the environmental effects of a project that will subsequently be taken into account by official authorities during mine permitting. Mawson has also proposed to the regional municipality of Ylitornio and the city of Rovaniemi that these bodies request the Regional Lapland Council ("Lapin Liitto") to initiate regional land use planning for the Rajapalot project. In combination with the EIA, the two municipal areas where the Rajapalot gold-cobalt project is located, the City of Rovaniemi and Municipality of Ylitornio, at the request of Mawson, have formally decided to start the sub-area Local Master land use planning processes. Both municipalities have made decisions to propose to the Regional Council of Lapland (" Lapin Liitto ") to start the phased provincial land use plan for the Rajapalot gold-cobalt project. Technical Background Qualified Persons - Mineral Resources: The Mineral Resources disclosed in this press release have been estimated by Eemeli Rantala, AFRY - P.Geo, Ville-Matti Seppa, AFRY - EurGeol of Finland and the metallurgical sections by Craig Brown, Mining Associates P/L - FAusIMM of Australia . All authors are independent "qualified persons" as defined by NI 43-101. The NI 43-101 technical report is entitled "Mineral Resource Estimate NI 43-101 Technical Report - Rajapalot Property". By virtue of their education and relevant experience, all authors are "Qualified Persons" for the purpose of National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Resources have been classified in accordance with CIM Definition Standards for Mineral Resources and Mineral Reserves (May, 2014). All authors have read and approved the contents of this news release as it pertains to the disclosed Mineral Resource estimates. The Qualified Person, Dr Nick Cook, Mawson's Chief Geologist, and a Fellow of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, has reviewed and verified the technical contents of this release. About Mawson Gold Limited (TSX:MAW, FRANKFURT:MXR, PINKSHEETS:MWSNF) Mawson Gold Limited is a gold exploration and development company and has distinguished itself as a leading exploration company with a focus on the flagship Rajapalot gold-cobalt project in Finland and its Victorian gold properties in Australia. On behalf of the Board, "Michael Hudson" Michael Hudson, Chairman & CEO Further Information www.mawsongold.com 1305 - 1090 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6E 3V7 Mariana Bermudez (Canada), Corporate Secretary, +1 (604) 685 9316, info@mawsongold.com Forward-Looking Statement This news release contains forward-looking statements or forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities laws (collectively, "forward-looking statements"). All statements herein, other than statements of historical fact, are forward-looking statements and are based upon various estimates and assumptions including, without limitation, the expectations and beliefs of management, including that the Company can access financing, appropriate equipment and sufficient labor. Forward-looking statements are typically identified by words such as: believe, expect, anticipate, intend, estimate, postulate, and similar expressions, or are those, which, by their nature, refer to future events. Mawson cautions investors that any forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future results or performance, and that actual results may differ materially from those in forward-looking statements as a result of various factors, including, but not limited to: capital and other costs varying significantly from estimates; changes in world metal markets; changes in equity markets; ability to achieve goals; that the political environment in which the Company operates will continue to support the development and operation of mining projects; the threat associated with outbreaks of viruses and infectious diseases, including the novel COVID-19 virus; risks related to negative publicity with respect to the Company or the mining industry in general; reliance on a single asset; planned drill programs and results varying from expectations; unexpected geological conditions; local community relations; dealings with non-governmental organizations; delays in operations due to permit grants; environmental and safety risks; and other risks and uncertainties disclosed under the heading "Risk Factors" in Mawson's most recent Annual Information Form filed on www.sedar.com. While these factors and assumptions are considered reasonable by Mawson, in light of management's experience and perception of current conditions and expected developments, Mawson can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. Any forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date on which it is made and, except as may be required by applicable securities laws, Mawson disclaims any intent or obligation to update any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or results or otherwise. Figure 1: Grade/tonnage relationships at different AuEq g/t cut-off grades for the combined open pit portion of the Rajapalot constrained base case ("OC-UG") inferred resource Figure 2: Grade/tonnage relationships at different AuEq g/t cut-off grades for the combined underground portion of the Rajapalot constrained base case ("OC-UG") inferred resource Figure 3: Grade/tonnage relationships at different AuEq g/t cut-off grades for the Rajapalot underground only ("All Underground") inferred constrained resource. This is not the base case. Figure 4: Resource growth at Rajapalot, highlighting August 2021 grade increase Figure 5: Plan view of resource wireframes and EM geophysical plates with drill intersections coloured by grade times width with key drill results. Note a strong correlation of the resource block model wireframe and electromagnetic conductors that extend each target area to at least 800-1,000 metres down-plunge and provide a large upside footprint for increasing the resources in future drill campaigns. Figure 6: Plan view of resource wireframes and EM geophysical plates with drill intersections coloured by grade times width with summarized resource number by prospect area. Note a strong correlation of the resource block model wireframe and electromagnetic conductors that extend each target area to at least 800-1,000 metres down-plunge and provide a large upside footprint for increasing the resources in future drill campaigns. Figure 7: Oblique view towards northeast of Rajapalot project with the OC-UG model pits in light blue along with the semi-transparent Lidar surface, drill traces, and mineralized intersections and wireframes. All resource areas remain open to depth and the Company has developed a strong geological and exploration model to target mineralization. Figure 8: Plan view showing growth potential remains strong in the Rajapalot gold camp. Approximately 80% of the Rajapalot area, or 20 kilometres of mineralization-host package remains untested by drilling. Rajapalot forms a smaller part of Mawson's larger 100 square kilometre Rompas-Rajapalot Finnish permit area owned 100% by Mawson. SOURCE: Mawson Gold Limited View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661460/Mawson-Announces-Over-1-Million-Ounces-Gold-Equivalent-at-Rajapalot-Finland-Gold-Ounces-Up-47-Gold-Grade-Up-19 LAS VEGAS, NV / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / MJ Harvest, Inc. ("MJHI") (OTCQB:MJHI) announced today that MJHI and its portfolio company PPK Investment Group, Inc. ("PPK") completed the acquisition of certain assets of Oklahoma-based AOK Ventures, Inc. ("AOK"). AOK manufactures and sells the Sublime brand of cannabis products in Oklahoma. In exchange for funding a portion of the acquisition price, MJ Harvest acquired 15% of PPK, increasing MJHI's ownership stake in PPK to 25%. The assets acquired through the acquisition of AOK will be held by PPK. The acquisition price was $2,500,000 for the equipment, trademark license agreement and cannabis licenses, subject to adjustment based on a final inventory of the equipment on hand at the closing date. The acquisition price was funded with shares of MJHI common stock plus a note payable, subject to adjustment after completion of the physical audit of all assets. The shares were priced at $0.36 per share representing the 20-day volume weighted average price prior to closing. AOK may also receive additional shares of MJHI stock if revenues from the business exceed projections for the 12 months immediately following the close of the acquisition. The earnout consideration will be calculated at 15% of the revenue amount over projections with the additional shares valued at the 20-day volume weighted average price at the calculation date. As part of the acquisition, AOK has agreed to transfer to PPK, subject to regulatory approval, the license granted by the Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority to produce, manufacture and sell marijuana products in the state of Oklahoma. The assets comprise an industrial kitchen and leased facility in Tulsa, Oklahoma, a lease on a processing, storage and distribution facility in Oklahoma City, and equipment necessary to operate the kitchen and vans for delivery. The Tulsa kitchen produces over 90 different cannabis products. The kitchen assets include approximately 50 pieces of commercial food quality manufacturing equipment. The kitchen is completely equipped and will allow PPK to immediately begin manufacturing the Sublime products plus additional products marketed under the Country Cannabis and Chronic brands in Oklahoma, with plans for immediate expansion to add other cannabis products. Central to the acquisition of AOK was the trademarks for the Sublime brand established by Consensus, IP LLC, an affiliated company of AOK. Prior to the acquisition, AOK manufactured, marketed and sold the Sublime brand of cannabis products through a licensing agreement with Consensus. With the completion of the acquisition, PPK is now the sole and exclusive licensee of the Sublime brand in Oklahoma. Pursuant to the license agreement, PPK will pay Consensus a royalty on all gross sales of all Sublime products sold by PPK in Oklahoma. MJHI now owns 25% of PPK with options to acquire up to 100% of PPK at any time prior to March 31, 2023, provided any increase can then be accomplished in accordance with Oklahoma law. Patrick Bilton, Chief Executive Officer of MJ Harvest, Inc., commented: "We are pleased to deliver to our shareholders this great news. Sublime is a recognized and respected cannabis brand that has nationwide appeal. By acquiring rights to manufacture and distribute the Sublime brand through PPK's existing distribution channels, we add another recognized product line for dispensaries to carry and we expand the reach of the Sublime brand to PPK's 1000+ customers in Oklahoma. Our goal is to make all the brands we associate with some of the most widely recognized cannabis brands in Oklahoma and then to expand to other states." PPK is currently operating in Oklahoma, is in the process of expanding into Arizona and South Dakota and is exploring several other expansion opportunities in various other markets, including California. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements and information. Although the forward-looking statements in this release reflect the good faith judgment of management, forward-looking statements are inherently subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to be materially different from those discussed in these forward-looking statements. Readers are urged not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this release. No assurances are, or can be given, that the results of operations of the AOK brands acquired by PPK will be profitable or generate historic revenue levels. The Company assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statement to reflect any event or circumstance that may arise after the date of this release. CONTACT: MJ Harvest, Inc. 9205 West Russell Rd., Ste. 240 Las Vegas, NV 89148 Telephone: 954.519.3115 Tcktsllc@earthlink.net @HARVESTMJ SOURCE: MJ Harvest, Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661451/MJ-Harvest-Inc-and-PPK-Investment-Group-Inc-Complete-Acquisition-of-Oklahoma-Based-Cannabis-Related-Assets-of-AOK-Ventures-Inc Calgary, Alberta--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - LEUCROTTA EXPLORATION INC. (TSXV: LXE) ("Leucrotta" or the "Company") is pleased to announce its financial and operating results for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021. All dollar figures are Canadian dollars unless otherwise noted. HIGHLIGHTS Increased adjusted funds flow (1) by 209% to $0.9 million in Q2 2021 from negative $0.8 million in Q2 2020. Closed the sale of certain natural gas assets located in Doe, BC for gross proceeds of $30.0 million (recognized as assets held for sale at March 31, 2021). June 30, 2021 adjusted working capital (1) balance of $57.0 million. FINANCIAL RESULTS Three Months Ended June 30 Six Months Ended June 30 ($000s, except per share amounts) 2021 2020 % Change 2021 2020 % Change Oil and natural gas sales 6,426 5,439 18 16,900 11,230 50 Cash flow from (used in) operating activities (744) (798) (7) 4,175 607 588 Per share - basic and diluted (-) (-) - 0.02 - 100 Adjusted funds flow (used) (1) 866 (798) (209) 4,656 (38) (12,353) Per share - basic and diluted - (-) - 0.02 (-) (100) Net loss (1,592) (2,189) (27) (425) (91,633) (100) Per share - basic and diluted (0.01) (0.01) - (-) (0.46) (100) Capital expenditures 3,745 662 466 4,234 12,674 (67) Proceeds on sale of properties and equipment 30,000 8,206 266 30,000 8,206 266 Adjusted working capital (deficiency) (1) 57,029 (4,309) (1,423) Common shares outstanding (000s) Weighted average - basic 245,899 200,525 23 223,588 200,525 12 Weighted average - diluted 245,899 200,525 23 223,588 200,525 12 End of period - basic 247,641 200,525 23 End of period - fully diluted 289,711 226,392 28 (1) See "Non-GAAP Measures" section. OPERATING RESULTS (1) Three Months Ended June 30 Six Months Ended June 30 2021 2020 % Change 2021 2020 % Change Daily production Oil and NGLs (bbls/d) 431 1,128 (62) 475 995 (52) Natural gas (mcf/d) 10,559 16,019 (34) 11,799 14,186 (17) Oil equivalent (boe/d) 2,191 3,797 (42) 2,441 3,359 (27) Revenue Oil and NGLs ($/bbl) 70.66 21.75 225 66.41 29.24 127 Natural gas ($/mcf) 3.80 2.20 73 5.24 2.30 128 Oil equivalent ($/boe) 32.23 15.74 105 38.25 18.37 108 Royalties Oil and NGLs ($/bbl) 3.94 1.64 140 8.12 1.31 520 Natural gas ($/mcf) 0.17 0.07 143 0.37 0.04 825 Oil equivalent ($/boe) 1.60 0.77 108 3.36 0.57 489 Net operating expenses (2) Oil and NGLs ($/bbl) 9.18 9.58 (4) 9.29 9.74 (5) Natural gas ($/mcf) 0.87 1.04 (16) 0.88 0.97 (9) Oil equivalent ($/boe) 6.00 7.24 (17) 6.04 6.96 (13) Transportation and marketing expenses Oil and NGLs ($/bbl) 0.98 0.74 32 0.81 1.05 (23) Natural gas ($/mcf) 1.59 1.49 7 1.46 1.62 (10) Oil equivalent ($/boe) 7.87 6.49 21 7.21 7.14 1 Operating netback (2) Oil and NGLs ($/bbl) 56.56 9.79 478 48.19 17.14 181 Natural gas ($/mcf) 1.17 (0.40) (393) 2.53 (0.33) (867) Oil equivalent ($/boe) 16.76 1.24 1,252 21.64 3.70 485 Depletion and depreciation ($/boe) (7.45) (8.11) (8) (8.04) (8.24) (2) Asset impairment ($/boe) - - - - (143.74) (100) General and administrative expenses ($/boe) (7.89) (3.47) 127 (7.02) (3.69) 90 Share based compensation ($/boe) (4.12) (0.17) 2,324 (2.72) (0.16) 1,600 Gain on sale of equipment ($/boe) - 4.36 (100) - 2.47 (100) Finance expense ($/boe) (0.37) (0.18) 106 (0.55) (0.22) 150 Finance income ($/boe) 0.56 - 100 0.25 - 100 Realized loss on risk management contracts ($/boe) (2.62) - 100 (1.83) - 100 Unrealized loss on risk management contracts ($/boe) (2.86) - 100 (2.71) - 100 Net loss ($/boe) (7.99) (6.33) 26 (0.98) (149.88) (99) (1) See "Frequently Recurring Terms" section. (2) See "Non-GAAP Measures" section. Selected financial and operational information outlined in this news release should be read in conjunction with Leucrotta's unaudited condensed interim financial statements and related Management's Discussion and Analysis ("MD&A") for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021, which are available for review under the Company's profile on The System for Electronic Document Analysis and Retrieval ("SEDAR") at www.sedar.com . UPDATE Operations In Q2 2021, Leucrotta successfully completed and tested its first Basal Montney well at Mica. The results (previously released June 15, 2021) were favourable and Leucrotta has now incorporated a Basal Montney well into its first pad. Drilling of the four wells on the Mica pad commenced in late July with the wells expected to be completed and on-stream by mid Q4 2021. The Mica pad wells will be drilled with approximately 2,400 metre horizontal laterals and completed with approximately 130 frac stages per well. This compares to 1,500 metre horizontal lengths and 28-41 frac stages utilized during the delineation phase. Map outlining the four-well test pad in the Mica Development Area and related infrastructure is included below. Engineering for the facility expansion to accommodate Leucrotta's growth plans into 2022 and 2023 is well underway with initial design plans and cost estimates to be completed in Q4 2021. Leucrotta will also perform an extended test of the Upper Montney at Mica in the next couple months to further prove out the large Montney resource in place by adding additional productive benches in the Montney. Financial Leucrotta ended Q2 2021 with $57.0 million of adjusted working capital and no debt. It has commenced the four-well pad at Mica as noted above and will proceed through its plans to produce >30,000 boe/d within its five-year time horizon. In Q4 2021 we anticipate releasing a full financial plan to achieve our goals in conjunction with finalizing initial cost estimates and confirming pad well results. To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4150/94437_220d9b6474bb3823_004full.jpg FREQUENTLY RECURRING TERMS The Company uses the following frequently recurring industry terms in this news release: "bbls" refers to barrels, "mcf" refers to thousand cubic feet, and "boe" refers to barrel of oil equivalent. Disclosure provided herein in respect of a boe may be misleading, particularly if used in isolation. A boe conversion rate of six thousand cubic feet of natural gas to one barrel of oil equivalent has been used for the calculation of boe amounts in this news release. This boe conversion rate is based on an energy equivalency conversion method primarily applicable at the burner tip and does not represent a value equivalency at the wellhead. NON-GAAP MEASURES This news release refers to certain financial measures that are not determined in accordance with IFRS (or "GAAP"). This news release contains the terms "adjusted funds flow (used)", "adjusted funds flow (used) per share", "adjusted working capital (deficiency), "operating netback" and "net operating expenses" which do not have any standardized meaning prescribed by GAAP and therefore may not be comparable to similar measures used by other companies. The Company uses these measures to help evaluate its performance. Please refer to the MD&A for additional information relating to Non-GAAP Measures. Management uses adjusted funds flow (used) to analyze performance and considers it a key measure as it demonstrates the Company's ability to generate the cash necessary to fund future capital investments and abandonment obligations and to repay debt, if any. Adjusted funds flow (used) is a non-GAAP measure and has been defined by the Company as cash flow from (used in) operating activities excluding the change in non-cash working capital related to operating activities, expenditures on decommissioning obligations, and transaction costs on property dispositions. The Company also presents adjusted funds flow (used) per share whereby amounts per share are calculated using weighted average shares outstanding, consistent with the calculation of net loss per share. Adjusted funds flow (used) is reconciled from cash flow from (used in) operating activities under the heading "Cash Flow From (Used In) Operations and Adjusted Funds Flow (Used)". Management uses adjusted working capital (deficiency) as a measure to assess the Company's financial position. Adjusted working capital (deficiency) includes current assets less current liabilities excluding the effects of any current portion of risk management contracts. Management considers operating netback an important measure as it demonstrates its profitability relative to current commodity prices. Operating netback, which is calculated as average unit sales price less royalties, net operating expenses, and transportation and marketing expenses, represents the cash margin for every barrel of oil equivalent sold. Operating netback per boe is reconciled to net loss per boe under the heading "Operating Netback". Net operating expenses is calculated as operating expenses less processing revenues. Management uses net operating expenses to determine the current periods' cash cost of operating expenses less processing revenue and net operating expenses per boe is used to measure operating efficiency on a comparative basis. The measure approximates the Company's operating expenses relative to its produced volumes by excluding third party operating costs. FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION This news release contains forward-looking statements and forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws. The use of any of the words "expect", "anticipate", "continue", "estimate", "may", "will", "should", "believe", "intends", "forecast", "plans", "guidance" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements or information. More particularly and without limitation, this news release contains forward-looking statements and information relating to the Company's risk management program, oil, NGLs, and natural gas production, capital programs, and debt. The forward-looking statements and information are based on certain key expectations and assumptions made by the Company, including expectations and assumptions relating to prevailing commodity prices and exchange rates, applicable royalty rates and tax laws, future well production rates, the performance of existing wells, the success of drilling new wells, the availability of capital to undertake planned activities, and the availability and cost of labour and services. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements and information are reasonable, it can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. Since forward-looking statements and information address future events and conditions, by their very nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated due to a number of factors and risks. These include, but are not limited to, the risks associated with the oil and gas industry in general such as operational risks in development, exploration and production, delays or changes in plans with respect to exploration or development projects or capital expenditures, the uncertainty of estimates and projections relating to production rates, costs, and expenses, commodity price and exchange rate fluctuations, marketing and transportation, environmental risks, competition, the ability to access sufficient capital from internal and external sources and changes in tax, royalty, and environmental legislation. The forward-looking statements and information contained in this document are made as of the date hereof for the purpose of providing the readers with the Company's expectations for the coming year. The forward-looking statements and information may not be appropriate for other purposes. The Company undertakes no obligation to update publicly or revise any forward-looking statements or information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, unless so required by applicable securities laws. Leucrotta is an oil and natural gas company, actively engaged in the acquisition, development, exploration, and production of oil and natural gas reserves in northeastern British Columbia, Canada. Further Information For additional information, please contact: Leucrotta Exploration Inc. Suite 700, 639 - 5th Avenue SW Calgary, Alberta T2P 0M9 Phone: (403) 705-4525 www.leucrotta.ca Mr. Robert J. Zakresky President and Chief Executive Officer Mr. Nolan Chicoine Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94437 OTTAWA (dpa-AFX) - Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CM.TO, CM) said the company targets to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. The company also announced a significant increase in its commitment to mobilizing sustainable finance to a target of $300 billion by 2030. CIBC said it will be setting interim targets for financed emission reduction, with reporting on key sectors beginning in fiscal 2022. The company will achieve carbon neutrality in its operations as 2024-end. This target includes sourcing 100% of electricity for operations from renewable sources. 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. Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Cabral Gold Inc. (TSXV: CBR) (OTC Pink: CBGZF) ("Cabral" or the "Company") is pleased to provide assay results from ten additional reconnaissance RC holes at the Pau de Merenda ("PDM") target, and to provide a drilling update at the Cuiu Cuiu gold district in northern Brazil. Highlights are as follows: Results from an additional ten reconnaissance RC drill holes at the Pau de Merenda target, located 2.5km NW of the Central gold deposit, have expanded the recently identified gold-in-oxide blanket to 800 x 300m in size. The blanket remains open in three of four directions Assay results are pending on six follow-up RC holes completed within the Machichie SW vein array where a series of NE-trending vein structures have been mapped and previously returned high-grade drill results including 3.4m @ 36.9 g/t gold and 3m @ 13.2 g/t gold At the MG gold deposit, assay results are currently pending from 8 diamond drill holes and 38 RC drill holes. Assay results are also pending on a number of holes at the Mira Boa target Alan Carter, Cabral's President and CEO commented, "The additional drill results received from the PDM target suggest the presence of a much larger gold-in-oxide blanket than we previously envisaged, and it is still open in several directions. The surface extent of this blanket now exceeds the size of the nearby gold-in-oxide blanket which overlies the nearby primary gold deposit at MG, and obviously begs the question as to where all of the gold in the blanket is being eroded from. Further drilling to define the limits of this blanket is currently in progress, and diamond drilling is planned in order to test for the presence of a primary gold deposit beneath the gold-in-oxide blanket." PDM Reconnaissance RC Drilling The PDM target is located approximately 2.5km NW of the Central gold deposit at Cuiu Cuiu (Figure 1) and comprises a significant gold-in-soil anomaly. Limited historic diamond drilling (nine holes totaling 2,593m) at this target previously returned encouraging drill results within the underlying bedrock including 30m @ 1.1 g/t gold in CC-19, 47.1m @ 1.8 g/t gold in CC-20 and 8.5m @ 5.1 g/t gold in CC-22. Figure 1: Map showing the location of the PDM target, the two known gold deposits at Central and MG and other key targets within the Cuiu Cuiu district To view an enhanced version of Figure 1, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/3900/94499_589e74055412db45_002full.jpg A total of 21 initial reconnaissance RC holes have now been completed at PDM to test for the presence of a gold-in-oxide blanket akin to the recently identified gold-in-oxide blanket above the primary MG gold deposit. Assay results from the initial 11 holes, which were drilled vertically at 100m spacings, were encouraging and included 40m @ 2.2 g/t gold from surface, which ended in weathered material averaging 9.4 g/t gold over 7m (see press release dated August 10, 2021). These results from the initial eleven holes indicated the presence of a blanket up to 40m in thickness with minimum dimensions of 400 x 200m, and open in all directions. The assay results from the most recent ten additional holes have extended the gold-in-oxide blanket to both the east and south-east outlining an area of approximately 800m (NW-SE) x 300m (Figure 2). Results include 10m @ 0.5 g/t gold from 1m depth and 11m @ 0.6 g/t gold from 21m depth from hole RC-115 (Table 1). The blanket remains open in three of four directions, west, east and north. Additional follow-up drilling (ten RC holes) is in progress aimed at outlining the surface extent of the gold-in-oxide blanket at PDM. Diamond drilling is also planned to test the possibility of an underlying hard-rock primary source. Figure 2: Map showing the PDM target with previously reported and recently completed vertical RC drill holes (labelled in yellow) and the current estimated limits of the gold-in-oxide blanket To view an enhanced version of Figure 2, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/3900/94499_589e74055412db45_003full.jpg Drill Hole Weathering Mineralized Zone From to Width Grade # m m m g/t gold RC114 Oxide/Saprolite Blanket 0 16.0 16.0 0.3 EOH 25.0 RC115 Oxide/Saprolite Blanket 1.0 11.0 10.0 0.5 21.0 32.0 11.0 0.6 36.0 43.0 7.0 0.1 EOH 49.0 RC116 Oxide/Saprolite Blanket 14.0 21.0 7.0 0.6 EOH 35.0 RC117 Oxide/Saprolite 0.0 0.0 0.0 NSV EOH 38.0 RC118 Oxide/Saprolite 0.0 0.0 0.0 NSV EOH 42.0 RC119 Oxide/Saprolite 0.0 0.0 0.0 NSV EOH 51.0 RC120 Oxide/Saprolite Blanket 5.0 9.0 4.0 0.4 EOH 60.0 RC121 Oxide/Saprolite Blanket 1.0 13.0 12.0 0.4 47.0 57.0 10.0 0.4 EOH 57.0 RC122 Oxide/Saprolite Blanket 3.0 9.0 6.0 0.1 16.0 22.0 6.0 0.2 65.0 69.0 4.0 1.5 EOH 69.0 RC123 Oxide/Saprolite Blanket 0.0 8.0 8.0 0.2 EOH 47.0 Table 1: Table of drill results for reconnaissance RC drill holes at PDM RC-114 to RC-123 Drilling Update MG Drilling Diamond drilling aimed at defining the high-grade zones within the MG gold deposit is continuing with assay results pending on eight diamond-drill holes. In addition, RC drilling of the recently identified gold-in-oxide blanket which overlies the primary MG gold deposit is also in progress and assay results are pending on 38 RC holes. This brings the total number of RC holes completed to date at MG to 52 from a planned total of 74 holes, with 22 still left to drill. Machichie SW Follow-up RC Drilling Six additional follow-up RC holes were recently completed in the Machichie SW vein array where six NE-trending high-grade veins have been identified 300m north of the MG gold deposit. Limited previous drilling from this area has returned high-grade drill results including 3.4m @ 36.9 g/t gold and 3m @ 13.2 g/t gold. Assay results are pending for all six holes. Mira Boa Reconnaissance RC Drilling A total of 33 short RC holes have now been completed at the Mira Boa target which is located 3km south-west of the Central gold deposit and is the site of extensive historic placer gold workings. The source of this gold is currently unexplained. Soil sampling has identified an extensive gold-in-soil anomaly extending over at least 2km N-S which has never been previously tested by drilling, and may represent a concealed gold-in-oxide blanket. Assay results are pending for all 33 holes. About Cabral Gold Inc. The Company is a junior resource company engaged in the identification, exploration and development of mineral properties, with a primary focus on gold properties located in Brazil. The Company has a 100% interest in the Cuiu Cuiu gold district located in the Tapajos Region, within the state of Para in northern Brazil. Two gold deposits have so far been defined at Cuiu Cuiu and contain 43-101 compliant Indicated resources of 5.9Mt @ 0.90g/t (200,000 oz) and Inferred resources of 19.5Mt @ 1.24g/t (800,000 oz). The Tapajos Gold Province is the site of the largest gold rush in Brazil's history producing an estimated 30 to 50 million ounces of placer gold between 1978 and 1995. Cuiu Cuiu was the largest area of placer workings in the Tapajos and produced an estimated 2Moz of placer gold historically. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT: "Alan Carter" President and Chief Executive Officer Cabral Gold Inc. Tel: 604.676.5660 Guillermo Hughes, MAusIMM and FAIG., a consultant to the Company as well as a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101, supervised the preparation of the technical information in this news release. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as such term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-looking Statements This news release contains certain forward-looking information and forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities legislation (collectively "forward-looking statements"). The use of the words "will", "expected" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. These statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results or events to differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements should not be unduly relied upon. This news release contains forward-looking statements and assumptions pertaining to the following: strategic plans and future operations, and results of exploration. Actual results achieved may vary from the information provided herein as a result of numerous known and unknown risks and uncertainties and other factors. The Company believes the expectations reflected in those forward-looking statements are reasonable, but no assurance can be given that these expectations will prove to be correct. Notes Gold analysis has been conducted by SGS method FAA505 (fire assay of 50g charge), with higher grade samples checked by FAA525. Analytical quality is monitored by certified references and blanks. Until dispatch, samples are stored under the supervision the Company's exploration office. The samples are couriered to the assay laboratory using a commercial contractor. Pulps are returned to the Company and archived. Drill holes results are quoted as down-hole length weighted intersections. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94499 JAKARTA (dpa-AFX) - Iceland's jobless rate declined in July, figures from Statistics Iceland showed on Thursday. The jobless rate rose to a seasonally adjusted 5.2 percent in July from 5.6 percent in June. In the same month last year, unemployment rate was 7.7 percent. The number of unemployed persons decreased to 10,800 in July from 11,700 in the preceding month. The number of employed persons rose to 197,500 in July from 196,000 in the prior month. On an unadjusted basis, the unemployment rate was 4.1 percent in July. 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. MOUNTAIN VIEW (dpa-AFX) - Tech majors Google and Microsoft announced billions of dollars in investment with a view to tackling cybersecurity threats in the United States. In a meeting between the U.S. President Joe Biden and private sector and education leaders to discuss the efforts needed to address the growing cybersecurity issues, Microsoft announced an investment of $20 billion and Google $10 billion over the next 5 years. Under the new initiatives, the National Institute of Standards and Technology or NIST agreed to collaborate with industry and other partners to develop a new framework to improve the security and integrity of the technology supply chain. It will provide a guideline to public and private entities on how to build secure technology and assess the security of technology, including open source software. Apart from Microsoft and Google, IBM, Travelers, Coalition, and many others have agreed to participate in the NIST-led initiative. As per a Government release, cybersecurity is a national security and economic security imperative for the Biden Administration. It was noted that both U.S. public and private sector entities increasingly face malicious cyber activity, and the threats and incidents affect businesses of all sizes, small towns and cities. Amid the growing issues, nearly half a million public and private cybersecurity jobs remain unfilled. As part of the initiatives to prioritize cybersecurity to maintain business continuity, Microsoft will speed up efforts to integrate cyber security by design and deliver advanced security solutions. The company will immediately make available $150 million in technical services to help federal, state, and local governments with upgrading security protection., Google will expand zero-trust programs, help secure the software supply chain, and enhance open-source security. Google also will help 100,000 Americans earn industry-recognized digital skills certificates that provide the knowledge that can lead to secure high-paying, high-growth jobs. Further, Apple will establish a new program to drive continuous security improvements throughout the technology supply chain, and IBM will train 150,000 people in cybersecurity skills over the next three years. Amazon will make available to the public the security awareness training it offers to employees at no charge. For all Amazon Web Services account holders, a multi-factor authentication device will be available at no additional cost to protect against cybersecurity threats like phishing and password theft. As part of the cybersecurity initiatives, the President in May had issued an Executive Order that modernizes Federal Government defenses and improves the security of technology. In the critical infrastructure, a 100-day initiative was launched this fall to improve cybersecurity across the electric sector with others to follow. On July 28, the National Security Memorandum was issued by Biden establishing voluntary cybersecurity goals that clearly outline the country's expectations for owners and operators of critical infrastructure. Internationally, the Biden Administration has rallied G7 countries to hold accountable nations who harbor ransomware criminals and to update NATO cyber policy for the first time in seven years. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX ALPHABET-Aktie komplett kostenlos handeln - auf Smartbroker.de HELSINKI (dpa-AFX) - Colas SA, a unit of French telecom, media, and construction company Bouygues SA (BOUYY.PK), announced Thursday its agreement to acquire Destia Oy, a player in the road, rail and energy infrastructure in Finland. The transaction is expected to close by the end of 2021 and is subject to the approval of the competition authorities. The company said the acquisition is in line with its strategy to pursue international growth in targeted regions, such as Northern Europe, United States, Germany. Destia, which currently belongs to the family-owned Ahlstrom Capital Group., has a workforce of more than 1,600 people, and generated revenue totaling 564 million euros in 2020 Francis Grass, Managing Director Colas EMEA, said, 'We are very impressed by Destia's skills and expertise, particularly in terms of digitalization of construction sites and maintenance services in harsh weather conditions. We see the opportunity to further develop business lines such as rail and earth & rock services and Colas will bring onboard its expertise in complex projects management.' 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. Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Neptune Digital Assets Corp. (TSXV: NDA) (OTC Pink: NPPTF) (FSE: 1NW) ("Neptune" or the "Company"), a cryptocurrency leader in Canada, is pleased to inform shareholders that the Company's recent purchase of two hundred new Antminer S19 Pro next-generation bitcoin ASIC mining machines announced July 7, 2021 have arrived in the United States and are securely warehoused awaiting distribution to the Company's Bitcoin mining facility. "We are quite pleased with our timing on this most recent purchase as rig prices have moved up a significant amount since we placed this order. This will add another 22,000 TH/s of capacity to our existing 12,000 TH/s and we look forward to working with Luxor and our US partners to get these new bitcoin mining machines operational as soon as possible. We continue to source the best machines at competitive pricing as we scale our bitcoin mining operations cautiously and strategically with market forces in mind," stated Cale Moodie, Neptune CEO. "As we have mentioned before, the COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact logistics and the supply of miners and we are working closely with our partners to maximize speed and decrease cost." At the time of this release and under prevailing cryptocurrency prices, Neptune Digital has total assets of approximately $54M and monthly revenues of $505,000 per month. The Company has no debt and no material liabilities at this time. About Neptune Digital Assets Corp. Neptune Digital Assets (TSXV: NDA) is one of the first publicly-traded blockchain companies in Canada and is a cryptocurrency leader with diversified assets and cryptocurrency operations across the digital asset ecosystem including bitcoin mining, tokens, proof-of-stake cryptocurrencies, decentralized finance (DeFi) and associated blockchain technologies. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD Cale Moodie, President and CEO Neptune Digital Assets Corp. 1-800-545-0941 www.neptunedigitalassets.com Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-Looking Statements This release contains certain "forward looking statements" and certain "forward-looking information" as defined under applicable Canadian securities laws. Forward-looking statements and information can generally be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "may", "will", "expect", "intend", "estimate", "anticipate", "believe", "continue", "plans", "proposes" or similar terminology. Forward-looking statements and information include, but are not limited to, the future rate of production from the Company's bitcoin mining machines and the anticipated timing thereof; the anticipated timing of the Company's new bitcoin mining machines becoming operational; the Company's future ability to source the best bitcoin mining machines at competitive pricing; the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on logistics and the supply of miners; the Company's ability to work with its partners to maximize speed and decrease cost of delivery of bitcoin mining machines; the revenues from the Company's mining and staking operations; the future scaling of the Company's bitcoin mining operations; and the future outlook of the crypto currency market generally. Forward-looking statements and information are based on forecasts of future results, estimates of amounts not yet determinable and assumptions that, while believed by management to be reasonable, are inherently subject to significant business, economic and competitive uncertainties, and contingencies. Forward-looking statements and information are subject to various known and unknown risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the ability of the Company to control or predict, that may cause the Company's actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from those expressed or implied thereby, and are developed based on assumptions about such risks, uncertainties and other factors set out herein, including but not limited to: the inherent risks involved in the cryptocurrency and general securities markets; the Company's ability to successfully mine digital currency; revenue of the Company may not increase as currently anticipated, or at all; the Company may not be able to profitably liquidate its current digital currency inventory, or at all; a decline in digital currency prices may have a significant negative impact on the Company's operations; the volatility of digital currency prices; uncertainties relating to the availability and costs of financing needed in the future; the inherent uncertainty of production and cost estimates and the potential for unexpected costs and expenses, currency fluctuations; regulatory restrictions, liability, competition, loss of key employees and other related risks and uncertainties. The Company does not undertake any obligation to update forward-looking information except as required by applicable law. Such forward-looking information represents management's best judgment based on information currently available. No forward-looking statement can be guaranteed and actual future results may vary materially. Accordingly, readers are advised not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements or information. (All dollar amounts are in Canadian dollars unless otherwise indicated) To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94497 NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Nordic floor paints market is estimated to progress at a CAGR of 2.7% and reach a value of 104 Mn by 2031. Consumption of floor paints in the Nordic region is projected to be driven by rising construction spending in order to extend and expedite infrastructural development as a result of expanding urban habitats and industrialization. Furthermore, consumer demand for greater floor finishing, chemical resistance, and other key properties of floor paints is expected to boost demand for floor paints in the region. Industrial demand for floor paints is being driven by sectors such as food, chemicals, automotive, and others. Further, growing demand for marking paints from warehouses, garages, and parking lots is also expected to benefit the consumption rate of floor paints across Nordic. Floor paints see high demand in both, residential and commercial applications due to their several advantages such as long-term durability in harsh environments as well as abrasion resistance and strong adhesive properties. Remodeling and repainting businesses are witnessing continuous growth in demand for floor paints. Marketing of floor paints and associated services through smartphone apps and websites is also something that market players can look to focus on. Request for sample PDF of report: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/32698 Key Takeaways from Market Study Epoxies account for a prominent share in the market and are a highly preferred resin type in floor paints. Sweden is anticipated to account for a key share of 35% in the Nordic market for floor paints. is anticipated to account for a key share of 35% in the Nordic market for floor paints. Growing population coupled with rising industrialization are expected to drive the sales outlook of floor paints over the coming years. Demand for floor paints for cement and mortar purposes is anticipated to expand at a CAGR of 2.7% over the next ten years. Growing food, chemical processing, and manufacturing industries are propelling demand for floor paints in the industrial segment. "Key market players are focusing on acquisition and expansion to increase their presence in the Nordic region," says a Persistence Market Research analyst. Competitive Landscape The Nordic market for floor paints has been identified as a moderately consolidated space due to the dominance of some key market participants. Some of the leading players included in the report, such as PPG Industries, Sherwin Williams, Sika AG, Tikkurila Oyj, RPM International Inc., Jotun Group, AkzoNobel N.V., Hempel A/S, TEKNOS, Hagmans Nordic AB, Axalta Coating systems, Rust-Oleum, Nor-Maali, Fosroc Inc., and Technima Group, are anticipated to create tough a competitive environment in across Nordic countries. Ask an expert for any other query: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/ask-an-expert/32698 Conclusion Over the forecast period, rapid industrialization as well as expansion of infrastructure and manufacturing sectors fueled by private and public sector investments are expected to have a favorable influence on the industry of floor paints. The need for floor paints is driven by rise in demand to preserve concrete floors in industrial and commercial buildings. Furthermore, increasingly stringent environmental regulations have pushed the adoption of eco-friendly paint solutions and water-borne coatings that are less toxic, and at the same time offer excellent surface properties and also make excellent primers. Several key players are further investing a significant portion of their revenue in research and development to develop new products and solutions for long-term sustainability. Get full access of report: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/checkout/32698 More Valuable Insights Persistence Market Research, a research and consulting firm, has published a new market research report on the Nordic floor paints market that contains industry analysis of 2016-2020 and opportunity assessment for 2021-2031 The report provides in-depth analysis of the market through different segments, namely, resin, product type, floor type, end use, and country. The report also provides supply and demand trends along with an overview of the parent market. Related Reports: Floor Paints Market Cellulose Paints Market Specialty Paints Coatings Market Paints and Coatings Market Luminous Paints Market Insulation Paints And Coatings Market About Persistence Market Research: Persistence Market Research (PMR), as a 3rd-party research organization, does operate through an exclusive amalgamation of market research and data analytics for helping businesses ride high, irrespective of the turbulence faced on the account of financial/natural crunches. Overview: Persistence Market Research is always way ahead of its time. In other words, it tables market solutions by stepping into the companies'/clients' shoes much before they themselves have a sneak pick into the market. The pro-active approach followed by experts at Persistence Market Research helps companies/clients lay their hands on techno-commercial insights beforehand, so that the subsequent course of action could be simplified on their part. Contact Rajendra Singh Persistence Market Research U.S. Sales Office: 305 Broadway, 7th Floor New York City, NY 10007 +1-646-568-7751 United States USA - Canada Toll-Free: 800-961-0353 Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com Visit Our Website: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/661339/Persistence_Market_Research_Logo.jpg ZUG, Switzerland, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Bitcoin Association, the Switzerland-based global industry organisation that works to advance business with the Bitcoin SV (BSV) blockchain and digital currency, today announces that it has appointed Francesco Morello as Bitcoin Association Ambassador for the Italian community as part of its global ambassador programme. Bitcoin Association Ambassadors are experienced professionals from the BSV ecosystem who work to raise awareness and improve understanding of the BSV blockchain and digital currency, as well as the power of the original Bitcoin protocol to support a massively scaled distributed data network for both peer-to-peer electronic cash payments and enterprise-grade blockchain applications. With the addition of Morello, there are now 25 Bitcoin Association Ambassadors representing 26 different countries, territories and communities. Morello is best known in the blockchain space as the creator of BullishArt - a curated platform for artists to create non-fungible tokens (NFTs) based upon their contemporary art. A Sicily, Italy native, Morello relocated to Seoul, South Korea in 2006, where he has been an active member of both the Italian and blockchain communities. A long-time supporter of Bitcoin SV, Morello helped to organise and run South Korea's first BSV meetup - held before the CoinGeek Seoul conference in October 2019. He has also worked to roll out an increasingly diverse set of Italian-language BSV education and learning materials. The BSV Blockchain is the world's largest public blockchain by all major utility metrics; data storage and daily transaction volume, scaling ability and average block size. To find out more about Bitcoin Association and its global ambassador programme, visit bitcoinassociation.net Commenting on today's announcement, Bitcoin Association Founding President Jimmy Nguyen, said: "As global interest and demand in BSV continues to grow, so too must our global ambassador programme to support more languages and communities. The great work that Francesco Morello has been doing to generate interest in BSV-based NFTs with his BullishArt platform, in addition to his efforts to grow the Italian-language BSV community make him an ideal candidate to become a Bitcoin Association Ambassador. I look forward to working with him on our ever-increasing agenda of international outreach and community development centred around the BSV blockchain." Speaking on his appointment as Bitcoin Association Ambassador for the Italian community, Francesco Morello said: "It is an honour to be appointed a Bitcoin Association Ambassador to the Italian community. The Italian community is underrepresented in the digital asset space, part of which can be attributed to a general reluctance around new technologies - a factor not helped by a distinct lack of Italian-language content and representatives. In my new role, I look forward to opening the eyes of people in the Italian community about the power of Bitcoin; there are so many brilliant minds who, once they understand the potential and opportunities apparent with BSV, will join us on our journey to change the world by learning, building and working with the BSV blockchain." About Bitcoin Association Bitcoin Association is the Switzerland-based global industry organisation that works to advance business on the Bitcoin SV blockchain. It brings together essential components of the Bitcoin SV ecosystem - enterprises, start-up ventures, developers, merchants, exchanges, service providers, blockchain transaction processors (miners), and others - working alongside them, as well as in a representative capacity, to drive further use of the Bitcoin SV blockchain and uptake of the BSV digital currency. The Association works to build a regulation-friendly ecosystem that fosters lawful conduct while facilitating innovation using all aspects of Bitcoin technology. More than a digital currency and blockchain, Bitcoin is also a network protocol; just like Internet protocol, it is the foundational rule set for an entire data network. The Association supports use of the original Bitcoin protocol to operate the world's single blockchain on Bitcoin SV. NEW YORK CITY (dpa-AFX) - Pfizer Inc. (PFE) and BioNTech SE (BNTX) announced Thursday that they have signed a letter of intent with Eurofarma Laboratrios SA, a Brazilian biopharmaceutical company, to manufacture their Covid -19 vaccine COMIRNATY for distribution within Latin America. Eurofarma will perform manufacturing activities within Pfizer's and BioNTech's global COVID-19 vaccine supply chain and manufacturing network, which will now span four continents and include more than 20 manufacturing facilities. The companies noted that technical transfer, on-site development, and equipment installation activities will begin immediately. Under the deal, Eurofarma will obtain drug product from facilities in the U.S., and manufacturing of finished doses will commence in 2022. At full operational capacity, the annual production is expected to exceed 100 million finished doses annually. All doses will exclusively be distributed within Latin America. To date, Pfizer and BioNTech have shipped more than 1.3 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses to more than 120 countries and territories. The companies aim to provide 2 billion doses to low and middle income countries in 2021 and 2022 - 1 billion each year. COMIRNATY, which is based on BioNTech's proprietary mRNA technology, was developed by both BioNTech and Pfizer. 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. BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - Following the release of the European Central Bank's accounts of the monetary policy meeting of the governing council held on July 21 and 22 at 7.30 am ET Thursday, the euro changed little against its major rivals. The euro was trading at 129.64 against the yen, 1.0787 against the franc, 0.8567 against the pound and 1.1773 against the greenback around 7:33 am ET. 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. Revenue of $11.3 million in Q2 2021, a 147% increase over Q2 2020 Strong brand performance, with approximately 897,395 Branded Units sold in Q2 2021 (an 82% increase over Q2 2020) Well-positioned for growth in the second half of 2021, following an accretive acquisition which expands our Core Markets to include Vermont Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - SLANG Worldwide Inc. (CSE: SLNG) (OTCQB: SLGWF) ("SLANG" or the "Company"), a leading global cannabis consumer packaged goods (CPG) company with a diversified portfolio of popular brands, today released financial results for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021. All figures in this press release are stated in Canadian dollars unless otherwise noted. Financial Highlights: Revenue for Q2 2021 was $11.3 million, compared with $4.6 million in Q2 2020 and $9.9 million in Q1 2021. The primary driver of year over year growth was a rebound in demand in the Company's Core Markets of Colorado and Oregon as well as the consolidation of wholesale revenue. Strength in the Company's Emerging Markets also contributed to sequential growth, as did the successful launch of new products, including Lunchbox Alchemy CBD. Adjusted EBITDA was ($0.95 million) in Q2 2021, compared with ($1.8 million) in Q2 2020 and an improvement of approximately $10,000 over Q1 2021. The reduction of the Adjusted EBITDA loss is primarily attributable to an increase in revenue and a reduction in operating expenses. EBITDA of ($3.2 million) in Q2 2021, compared with ($4.2 million) in Q2 2020 and ($4.6 million) in Q1 2021. The improvement in EBITDA from the prior-year and prior-quarter represents a 24% and 31% improvement, respectively. The Company remains committed to prudently managing its operating expense on its mission to further improve efficiency. Chris Driessen, CEO of SLANG, said, "This was our fourth consecutive quarter of growth, with quarterly revenues reaching a record $11.3 million, an impressive 147% increase from the prior year period and a 14% increase from Q1 2021. Our record revenue during the quarter, together with improved operational efficiency, also led to an improvement in profit when compared with the prior year and prior quarter results. These improved topline and bottom-line results, both year over year and sequentially, were primarily driven by modifications in the operations in our Core Markets of Colorado and Oregon as we benefited from our consolidated supply chain. Our Colorado Core Market was the primary growth driver during the quarter, incurring the bulk of the increased demand. Of note, we also closed the acquisition of Allied Concessions Group, Inc. ("ACG") in the quarter, although we have been consolidating its economics since December 31, 2020. We further strengthened our position in the Company's Emerging Markets, as we successfully launched brand extensions and new products." "Looking ahead, SLANG is well positioned to leverage its cumulative operational experience from its Core Markets of Colorado and Oregon and is looking to rapidly expand in Vermont following our recent acquisition of HI-FI, the largest medical cannabis company in the state. Adding Vermont, including its four retail locations in the state, to our Core Market cohort, enables SLANG to begin recognizing revenue at the retail level in late Q3 2021. By offering SLANG's existing line of products in Vermont, we create additional brand visibility, and anticipate top and bottom-line growth in the near-term as these direct customer sales are expected to generate higher margin. Overall, we are pleased with this quarter's progress, as we continued to reduce operating expenses, while supporting the Company's expanded capabilities, demonstrating once again the effectiveness of cost cutting initiatives taken by management over the past year." Operational Highlights and Growth Drivers: SLANG continued to grow in its core markets of Colorado and Oregon, as well as executing on its Emerging Markets strategy where it employs an asset-light business model by forming strategic partnerships to establish a market presence in other U.S. states. Subsequent to quarter end, SLANG created its third Core Market in Vermont, with the closing of the acquisition of High Fidelity, Inc. ("HI-FI") the largest medical cannabis company in the state which services approximately 70 percent of registered patients. The acquisition expands SLANG's operational footprint in Vermont to now include a 28,000-square-foot cultivation, production, lab, and retail distribution facility, with a planned 50,000-square-foot expansion expected to be completed in 2022. It also adds two of the five medical cannabis licenses in Vermont with four fully operational dispensaries, including in the Burlington area, with the ability to add two new retail dispensaries upon receipt of licenses. The acquisition of HI-FI is expected to be accretive to SLANG's earnings in calendar 2021 and onward. Retail sales in Vermont for adult-use cannabis products are expected to begin in the fall of 2022, with sales expected to reach up to US$230 million in 2023. In the second quarter, revenue growth in Colorado, the Company's largest market, was driven by its Colorado-based distribution business, which enabled the Company to recognize wholesale revenue by distributing all SLANG branded products through sales directly to dispensaries. In June, the Company closed its previously announced acquisition of ACG, a manufacturing and distribution business based in Colorado. While the Company has been consolidating the economics of ACG since December 31, 2020, the integration of ACG into SLANG's platform will allow the Company to control its supply chain from seed to wholesale of the entire portfolio of SLANG brands by consolidating and streamlining operations in Colorado. In Oregon, the Company entered into an agreement to acquire NS Holdings, Inc. ("NSH"), to further bolster its manufacturing assets in the state. NSH is the parent company of GNT Oregon, LLC ("GNT"), the operating asset that produces O.pen, Bakked and District Edibles branded cannabis products at its licensed CO2 extraction and manufacturing facility in Portland, Oregon. The proposed acquisition of NSH follows SLANG's acquisition of licensed manufacturer and distributor, Lunchbox Alchemy in Oregon. The Company's expansion strategy in its Emerging Markets continued to contribute to its revenue growth in the second quarter 2021 as it strives to consistently bring new and unique product SKUs to market through the launch of additional brands in new product verticals and the expansion of existing product lines. Subsequent to quarter end, the Company re-entered California, its largest Emerging Market and the largest cannabis market in the world, with the re-launch of its District Edibles product line (the previous best-selling gummy brand in CA) through its strategic partnership with Natura Life + Science ("Natura"). The Company expects to launch more SLANG-branded products to increase its market penetration in California. In Washington state, the Company launched one of its best-selling brands, O.pen, through a strategic partnership with Snowcrest LLC ("Snowcrest"), a cultivator and processor in Vancouver, WA, subsequent to the quarter end. As part of the partnership, Snowcrest manufactures the SLANG branded products, and SLANG's sales and marketing teams work to place these products in dispensaries across the state. Key Performance Indicators The Company showed meaningful growth with 897,395 Branded Units sold in the second quarter of 2021, an increase of 82% compared to 493,662 Branded Units sold in Q2 2020; and 72.7 million Branded Servings were sold in Q2 2021, an increase of 64% compared to 44.3 million Branded Servings sold in Q2 2020. In addition to sequential sales improvements in the Core Markets of Colorado and Oregon, sales in certain Emerging Markets were notable contributors to the increase. Q2 2021 Branded Units and Servings included sales from the Emerging Market of California, marking the Company's re-entry into the state through its Strategic Partner, Natura. Brand Leadership SLANG's brands continued to earn market-leading positions in its Core Markets in the second quarter of 2021. Highlights include: O.pen VAPE ranked as the #1 vape cartridge in Colorado; Firefly Mini was the #5 and O.pen was the #4 disposable vaporizer in Colorado; Bakked was the #5 dabbable distillate in Colorado (Source: BDSA). During Q2 2021, SLANG's Gross Merchandise Value ("GMV"), representing the total retail dollar value of SLANG branded products sold through all existing SLANG sales channels, whether directly by SLANG or by one of SLANG's strategic partners, totaled $40,578,968. SLANG's Q2 product and licensing revenue of $11,268,202, as reported in its Q2 2021 financial statements, represents 27.8% of GMV. GMV is calculated by multiplying SLANG's number of branded products sold in a period by the MSRP of those products sold. Furthermore, the total percentage of GMV captured by SLANG is an important metric in assessing brand performance as it determines SLANG's proportion of total retail revenue captured. As a newly reported metric, the Company will continue to focus on GMV going forward and initiatives that will help increase SLANG's percentage of GMV. Management expects the acquisition of HI-FI and a continued focus on ecommerce channels will have a meaningful impact on SLANG's percentage of GMV in the remainder of 2021. HI-FI's four retail locations in Vermont and direct to consumer sales via ecommerce will allow SLANG to recognize 100% of GMV on products sold via those channels. Appointment of Director The Company is pleased to announce that effective today, Mr. Shayne Lynn, former President of HI-FI, has been appointed to the Board of Directors. Mr. Lynn is the tenth director to be added to SLANG's majority independent Board. Second Quarter 2021 Financial Review The consolidated financial statements were prepared in accordance with IFRS. The following is selected presentation of the Income Statement for the quarter end June 30, 2021 3 months ended 30-Jun-21 3 months ended 30-Jun-20 (In thousands except per share data and percentages) CDN CDN Net Operating Revenue $11,288 $4,570 Cost of Goods Sold 7,532 1,729 Gross Profit Before Gain on Fair Value of Biological Assets 3,756 2,841 Unrealized gain on fair value of biological assets 343 - Gross Profit 4,099 2,841 Gross Profit Margin 36% 62% Operating expenses 9,172 8,678 Operating Loss (5,073) (5,837) Other items (Impairment, FV adjustment, FX, gains/losses, taxes, etc.) (413) (8,549) Total Comprehensive Income / (Loss) (4,660) 2,712 Earnings Per Share Basic ($0.01) $0.01 Diluted ($0.01) $0.01 The Company reported $9.7 million of cash and cash equivalents at June 30, 2021, compared to $6.5 million at December 31, 2020. Non-IFRS Measures EBITDA, Adjusted EBITDA, Adjusted Gross Profit, Adjusted Gross Profit Margin, Gross Merchandise Value, Branded Unit volume and Branded Servings volume are non-IFRS financial measures that the Company uses to assess its operating performance. EBITDA is defined as net earnings (loss) before net finance costs, income tax expense (benefit) and depreciation and amortization expense. Management defines Adjusted EBITDA as EBITDA adjusted for other non-cash items such as the impact of unrealized fair values, share based compensation expense, impairments, one-time gains and losses, and one-time revenues and expenses. Management defines Adjusted Gross Profit and Adjusted Gross Margin as gross profit and gross margin adjusted for inventory fair value adjustments and fair value changes of biological assets. Gross Merchandise Value is defined as the total retail dollar value of SLANG branded products sold through all existing SLANG sales channels, whether directly by SLANG or by one of SLANG's strategic partners. See the heading "Key Performance Indicators" in the Company's management's discussion and analysis for the three months ended June 30, 2021 (the "Q2 2021 MD&A") for a description of how each of Branded Unit volume and Branded Servings volume is calculated. This data is furnished to provide additional information and are non-IFRS measures and do not have any standardized meaning prescribed by IFRS. The Company uses these non-IFRS measures to provide shareholders and others with supplemental measures of its operating performance. The Company also believes that securities analysts, investors and other interested parties, frequently use these non-IFRS measures in the evaluation of companies, many of which present similar metrics when reporting their results. As other companies may calculate these non-IFRS measures differently than the Company, these metrics may not be comparable to similarly titled measures reported by other companies. We caution readers that Adjusted EBITDA should not be substituted for determining net loss as an indicator of operating results, or as a substitute for cash flows from operating and investing activities. 3 months ended 30-Jun-21 3 months ended 30-Jun-20 (In thousands except per share data and percentages) CDN CDN Total Comprehensive Income (Loss) ($4,660) $2,712 EBITDA (3,202) (4,239) Adjusted EBITDA (946) (1,772) See the Q2 2021 MD&A for a detailed reconciliation of EBITDA and Adjusted EBITDA to Operating Income / (Loss). SLANG's financial statements and the Q2 2021 MD&A are available on SEDAR at www.sedar.com, and on the Company's Investor Relations website at www.slangww.com. Conference Call Details Management plans to host an investor conference call today, August 26, 2021, at 10:00 am EDT to discuss the results. Timing: Thursday, August 26, 2021 at 10:00 am EDT Dial-in: +1.833-529-0214 (US toll free) or +1.236-389-2114 (International) or +1.647-689-6824 (International) Conference ID: 8484189 Webcast: A live webcast can be accessed from the Investors section of Company's website at www.slangww.com or at this link. A replay of the webcast will be archived on the Company's website for one year. Share Issuance The Company also announces that it has issued 3,666,673 common shares (611,074 common shares at a deemed price of $0.255 and 3,055,599 common shares at a deemed price of $0.209) in consideration of the provision of past services to the Company by a former director and executive officer. The issuance of the common shares is subject to Canadian Securities Exchange approval and a hold period expiring 4 months and 1 day from the date of issuance, unless waived by the Canadian Securities Exchange. About SLANG Worldwide Inc. SLANG Worldwide Inc. is a global leader in the cannabis CPG sector with a diversified portfolio of popular brands distributed across the United States. The Company specializes in acquiring and developing market-proven regional brands as well as launching innovative new brands to seize global market opportunities. For more information, please visit www.slangww.com. To be added to SLANG's email distribution list, please email SLNG@kcsa.com with "SLNG" in the subject. Forward-Looking Statements This news release contains statements that constitute "forward-looking statements." Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, performance or achievements, or developments in the industry to differ materially from the anticipated results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts and are generally, but not always, identified by the words "expects," "plans", "anticipates", "believes", "intends", "estimates", "projects", "potential" and similar expressions, or that events or conditions "will", "would", "may", "could" or "should" occur. Forward-looking statements included in this news release include, but are not limited to, statements in respect of the manufacture and distribution of SLANG branded products in Vermont and the expansion of SLANG's facility in Vermont. Forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by management of SLANG at this time, are inherently subject to significant business, economic and competitive risks, uncertainties and contingencies that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in such statements. Investors are cautioned not to put undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Applicable risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to regulatory risks, risks related to the COVID-19 global pandemic, changes in laws, resolutions and guidelines, market risks, concentration risks, operating history, competition, the risks associated with international and foreign operations and the other risks identified under the headings "Risk Factors" in SLANG's annual information form dated April 29, 2021 and other disclosure documents available on the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. SLANG is not under any obligation, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation, to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as expressly required by applicable law. Third Party Information This press release includes market and industry data that has been obtained from third party sources, including industry publications. The Company believes that the industry data is accurate and that its estimates and assumptions are reasonable, but there is no assurance as to the accuracy or completeness of this data. Third party sources generally state that the information contained therein has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, but there is no assurance as to the accuracy or completeness of included information. Although the data is believed to be reliable, the Company has not independently verified any of the data from third party sources referred to in this press release or ascertained the underlying economic assumptions relied upon by such sources. Media and Investor Inquiries Investors@SLANGww.com KCSA Strategic Communications Phil Carlson / Elizabeth Barker SLANG@kcsa.com To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94498 The platform aims to re-define communication on the Internet LONDON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- NYOUM LTD, a London-based technology company, announced today the launch of its flagship communication platform,LOVE, a brand new way to communicate face-to-face with those closest to you. At its core, the product is a new take on video and audio messaging, video calling, and more. "LOVE is the culmination of working with the most extraordinary artists, technologists and designers to re-define how we communicate on the internet," said Christopher Schlaeffer, NYOUM's Founder and Executive Chairman, "Communication is about visual expression, speech and human connection. With those closest to you. And our technology caters for exactly that." LOVE puts video at the heart of how people communicate, innovates on visual expression supported by the world's leading artists, replaces the keyboard as a human-machine interface by multi-modality, transcribes speech and translates into 50+ languages on the recipient's end. "It is clear that the first promises of the internet have fallen short. Communication should have been enhanced by moving online. And yet, it hasn't. Messengers are still very much like SMS, just free and faster, video calls are far from enjoyable, and social media have made communication impersonal, or even unsafe," said the Company's Co-Founder and CEO, Samantha Radocchia ('Sam Rad'), "We are on a bold mission with LOVE: a mission to restore connections and transcend boundaries, a mission to create a magical space for those closest to you, a mission to build a better internet. No ads, no likes, just a place where you can be unapologetically you." LOVE is completely ad-free, built from the ground up to protect privacy and enact the right to forget, and, in a first-of-its-kind initiative, is committed to democratizing the platform by transferring ownership to its users within five years. LOVE's technology stack is based on transformative AI in the domains of voice and face recognition, natural language processing, privacy and encryption, contextual analytics, and translation algorithms in order to make user interaction extremely simple. "Many of the technologies we are incorporating into LOVE didn't exist 2 years ago," said Jim Reeves, NYOUM's Co-Founder and CTO, "It is one of the most exciting challenges as a technologist to be building with and innovating on the cutting edge of what's possible." While the technologies that power LOVE are complex, simplicity is the core pillar of LOVE's design philosophy. The messaging interface is built to resemble a high-tech, multimodal walkie-talkie. All a person needs to do to communicate is hit "start," record a message, and hit "stop." They then select a friend and hit send. The message is transcribed in real time, so the recipient can watch, listen, or read the message. Video calling is just as magical, incorporating a physics engine to power a playful yet elegant calling experience with one or many. "Our goal is to make communication as simple--and human--as possible, liberating LOVE's users from the confines of the keyboard, and creating an environment where a person can convey not only the content but also the essence of a conversation," said Timm Kekeritz, the Company's Co-Founder and Chief Design Officer. Hans-Ulrich Obrist, curator and artistic director at the Serpentine Galleries, London, said, "LOVE is the future. I am excited that international artists like Ed Fornieles have engaged to shape this new democratic platform." LOVE is currently available foriOS in the US. The Company plans to expand to many more countries and Android soon. About NYOUM NYOUM is a communication technology company based in London, New York, and Berlin. The Company's flagship platform, LOVE, is a brand new way to communicate face-to-face with those closest to you. For more information on LOVE, visit: http://seeyouonlove.com. Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1578276/LOVE_Platform.jpg Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1577887/LOVE_Logo.jpg CONTACT: ?pr@seeyouonlove.com, +1 (415) 580-2863 VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Lucky Minerals Inc. (TSXV:LKY)(OTC PINK:LKMNF)(FRA:LKY) ('Lucky' or the 'Company') is pleased to announce a non-brokered private placement (the 'Private Placement' or 'Offering') consisting of 43,750,000 units of the Company (the 'Units') at a price of CDN$0.08 per Unit for gross proceeds of CDN $3.5 Million. Each Unit consists of one common share ('Common Share') of the Company and one common share purchase warrant ('Warrant'). Each Warrant will be exercisable to acquire one Common Share of the Company at a price of CDN $0.15 per Common Share for a period of 24 months from the date of issuance. All of the Common Shares and Warrants issued in connection to the Offering are subject to a statutory hold period expiring four months and one day from the date of issuance. The Company has already obtained commitments exceeding CDN $2.5 million and expects to close a first tranche by September 3, 2021. The second and final tranche is expected to close in the following weeks. The Company wishes to thank its US corporate advisor, EAS Advisors, LLC, acting through Odeon Capital Group LLC, member of FINRA/SIPC/MSRB/NFA, for its assistance with the Private Placement. The Company may pay finder's fees on a portion of the Private Placement in accordance with applicable securities laws and the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange. This Offering is subject to TSX Venture Exchange Approval. The net proceeds of the Offering will be used to complete the very first drill program on the Company's Fortuna Project in Ecuador and for general working capital. The drill program is expected to be approximately 3,000 meters and is a follow up to the recent discoveries made during the surface exploration work over the past 18 months. These include Wayka's trench T6 which sampled 17.63 g/t gold over 3.0 meters (Please click here to read July 30, 2021 News Release). About Lucky Lucky is an exploration and development company targeting large-scale mineral systems in proven districts with the potential to host world class deposits. Lucky owns a 100% interest in the Fortuna Property. The Company's Fortuna Project is comprised of twelve contiguous, 550 km2 (55,000 Hectares, or 136,000 Acres) exploration concessions. Fortuna is located in a highly prospective, yet underexplored, gold belt in southern Ecuador. Covid-19 Safety Protocols Lucky Minerals has strict rules in place for all workers arriving to and from field sites. All personnel are tested upon arriving and leaving and are tested every two weeks. All personnel are housed in separate and private accommodations and are isolated from the community. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD 'Francois Perron' Chief Executive Officer Further information on Lucky can be found on the Company's website at www.luckyminerals.com and at www.sedar.com, or by contacting Francois Perron, President and CEO, by email at investors@luckyminerals.com or by telephone at (866) 924 6484. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Cautionary Statement Regarding Adjacent Properties and Forward-Looking Information This news release contains forward-looking statements relating to the future operations of the Company and other statements that are not historical facts. Forward-looking statements are often identified by terms such as 'will', 'may', 'should', 'anticipate', 'expects' and similar expressions. All statements other than statements of historical fact, included in this release, including, without limitation, statements regarding the future plans and objectives of the Company are forward-looking statements that involve 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. Such factors include, but are not limited to: uncertainties related to exploration and development; the ability to raise sufficient capital to fund exploration and development; changes in economic conditions or financial markets; increases in input costs; litigation, legislative, environmental and other judicial, regulatory, political and competitive developments; technological or operational difficulties or inability to obtain permits encountered in connection with exploration activities; and labor relations matters. This list is not exhaustive of the factors that may affect the Company's forward-looking information. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the Company's expectations also include risks detailed from time to time in the filings made by the Company with securities regulators. The reader is cautioned that assumptions used in the preparation of any forward-looking information may prove to be incorrect. Events or circumstances may cause actual results to differ materially from those predicted, as a result of numerous known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors, many of which are beyond the control of the Company. The reader is cautioned not to place undue reliance on any forward-looking information. Such information, although considered reasonable by management at the time of preparation, may prove to be incorrect and actual results may differ materially from those anticipated. Forward-looking statements contained in this news release are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release are made as of the date of this news release and the Company undertakes no obligation to update or revise publicly any of the included forward-looking statements except as expressly required by Canadian securities law. SOURCE: Lucky Minerals Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661449/Lucky-Secures-Over-25-Million-of-Commitments-Towards-a-35-Million-Non-Brokered-Private-Placement "Want More, Give More, Get It Done" Values Helped the Company Shift To Remote Operations and Land Its Sixth "Best Places to Work" Recognition BLUE BELL, PA / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / CoreDial, LLC, a leading provider of cloud communications, video collaboration, and contact center solutions, announced that it has once again been named a "Best Place to Work" by the Philadelphia Business Journal. CoreDial was chosen based on its strong company culture, its ability to seamlessly weather the transition to remote operations, and its growing team of highly-skilled and motivated employees. This marks the sixth time CoreDial has received this recognition. The "Best Places to Work" program recognizes "the top companies to work for in greater Philadelphia as voted by the people who know them best: their employees," according to the publication. Companies were ranked based on a series of surveys submitted by employees regarding workplace policies, shared goals, benefits, work/life balance, team building activities, and community initiatives. CoreDial was one of only 25 companies to be recognized on the 2021 list. Based in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania, CoreDial provides high quality, reliable, and margin-rich cloud communications solutions to its network of more than 850 channel partners. The company distinguishes its workplace by emphasizing and nurturing a culture of "Want More, Give More, Get It Done." This philosophy focuses on maintaining an enriching, positive environment that encourages innovation, collaboration, and execution among all levels of staff. These values proved essential in helping CoreDial's employees make a seamless transition to remote work in 2020, all while remaining highly productive, engaged, and focused on their mission of being the best at enabling the IT channel to succeed with cloud communications. To support the adoption, strength, and ongoing embodiment of this culture, the company offers programs and facilities (both onsite and virtual) that address health, wellness, relaxation, and recreation. Community service is integral to CoreDial's culture as well; the company engages in and encourages community service activities that provide much-needed assistance to local philanthropic organizations and fosters camaraderie across the team. "We have always believed that our people are our most important asset. They're integral to CoreDial's success and to our partners' success," said Alan Rihm, CoreDial's chief executive officer. "Now more than ever, with employees working from home or preparing for a hybrid schedule, building a culture that's welcoming, invigorating, innovative, and collaborative is crucial. We're extremely grateful that our team members have stayed true to our 'Want More, Give More, Get It Done' values and remained positive and engaged throughout the past 18 months. From recruiting to interviewing to onboarding to logging-on every morning, work doesn't look the same as it did two years ago. But we're as committed as ever to maintaining a culture that enables our team members to achieve the highest levels of success, and this award validates that commitment." About CoreDial CoreDial is a leading provider of high-quality and scalable cloud communications, contact center, and video collaboration to more than 32,000 businesses. The company's solutions are quickly and easily auto-provisioned through its CoreNexa platform, which seamlessly integrates with other essential business applications. For small- to medium-size businesses and larger enterprises, CoreDial offers comprehensive, cost-effective, and future-proof communications solutions customers demand. Backed by an industry-leading 99.999% SLA and supported locally by 850+ trained partners, CoreNexa is uniquely positioned to help businesses unleash the power of the modern workforce. www.coredial.com CoreDial PR Contact: Suzanne Mattaboni Parallel Communications Group, Inc. 610-737-2140 smattaboni@parallelpr.com SOURCE: CoreDial View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661454/CoreDial-Wins-a-2021-Best-Places-to-Work-Award-from-the-Philadelphia-Business-Journal Financing Success Exceeded Expectation, Positioned Aurwest for Additional Property Acquisition, Expansion and Acceleration of Exploration Programs Calgary, Alberta--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Aurwest Resources Corporation (CSE: AWR) ("Aurwest" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that the Company has filed its June 30, 2021 second quarter financial statements ("Financial Statements"), management's discussion and analysis ("MD&A"), and quarterly certifications for the three and six-month period ended June 30, 2021. The Financial Statements have been prepared in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards as issued by the International Accounting Standards Board and interpretations of the International Financial Reporting Interpretations Committee. In accordance with the change of year end from May 31 to December 31 on January 14, 2021, the Financial Statements and MD&A provide a comparison of the financial performance of the Company for the six-month period ended June 30, 2021 to the six-month period ended May 31, 2020. SECOND QUARTER 2021 HIGHLIGHTS As at June 30, 2021, Aurwest had cash of $5,755,015 and working capital of $5,635,893 due to the overwhelming support of its non-brokered flow-through and non-flow through financing completed on June 16, 2021. The financing brought gross proceeds of $5,310,184 of which $2,000,000 were subscribed by Mr. Eric Sprott and his affiliated company resulting in Mr. Sprott controlling 12.7% (basic) of the shares in Aurwest. In early June 2021 the Company had commenced its planned Phase 1 exploration program for its Paradise Lake/Miguels Lake gold projects. The Company is currently planning its Phase 2 exploration program consisting of approximately 138 line kms of IP (induced polarization) survey, estimated at $615,000. Exploration on the Stony Caldera gold property started in early July 2021. Total operating expenses, not including share-based compensation, for the three and six months, were $137,457 and $251,823 (May 31, 2020 - $120,963 and $230,711). Share-based compensation for the three and six months was $300,447 and $653,527 (May 31, 2020 - $Nil and $Nil) reflecting the fair value of the 2,800,000 stock options granted, 12,760,589 warrants issued for flow-through private placements and 2,064,966 agent warrants for the six-month period. The Company capitalizes its exploration and evaluation expenditures totaling $309,508 for the six-month period of which $161,452 was for property acquisition and $148,056 for exploration. Colin Christensen, President and Chief Executive Office of the Company stated, "Aurwest is one of the largest landholders in the new evolving gold district in central Newfoundland. With the success of our financing in June, the Company is in a strong financial position, and is poised to build shareholder value through expansion and acceleration of its exploration program and property acquisition." All amounts presented herein are in Canadian dollars, unless stated otherwise. On Behalf Of Aurwest Resources Corporation Colin Christensen President and Chief Executive Officer For additional information please contact: Colin Christensen Telephone: (403) 483-8363 Email: cchristensen@aurwestresources.com Website: www.aurwestresources.com About Aurwest Resources Corporation Aurwest is a Canadian-based junior resource company focused on the acquisition, exploration and development of gold, silver and other precious and base metal properties in North America. The Company currently holds on option on the Paradise Lake and Stony Caldera gold projects in Central Newfoundland, that covers approximately 45 kms of the regional scale mineralized structure that hosts the Valentine Lake gold deposit located to the southwest and the Moosehead gold discovery located northeast of the property. Aurwest also currently holds a 100% interest in the 22,255 hectare Stellar copper/gold project, located approximately 25 kilometres southwest of Houston, British Columbia. Forward-Looking Information Statements included in this announcement, including statements concerning our plans, intentions and expectations, which are not historical in nature are intended to be, and are hereby identified as "forward-looking statements". Forward looking statements may be identified by words including "anticipates", "believes", "intends", "estimates", "expects" and similar expressions. The Company cautions readers that forward-looking statements, including without limitation those relating to the Company's future operations and business prospects, are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated in the forward-looking statements. Readers are advised to rely on their own evaluation of such risks and uncertainties and should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Any forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this news release, and the Company assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking statements, except in accordance with the applicable laws. The Canadian Securities Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94483 Raises $3.2 Million in Capital; Executed Amended and Restated Credit Facility WESTMINSTER, MA / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / TechPrecision Corporation (OTCQB:TPCS) ("TechPrecision" or the "Company"), an industry-leading manufacturer of precision, large-scale fabricated and machined metal components and tested systems with customers in the defense and precision industrial sectors, today reported that it completed its acquisition of Stadco, located in Los Angeles, a key supplier of large flight-critical components for several high-profile commercial and military programs, including military helicopters, and closed on a private placement financing and new loans from its current bank, Berkshire Bank, the proceeds of which were used to settle Stadco's debt and acquire the outstanding shares of Stadco. The purchase of Stadco is based on the Company's opinion that it is a prime turnaround prospect. We believe we can end the cycle of what we believe were badly negotiated contracts by Stadco's pre-November 2014 management and financial shortages and economic woes that have crippled Stadco since it was last acquired in November 2014. With working cash no longer an issue and the new cycle of defense contracts being negotiated on more favorable terms, we believe we have found an opportunity with a company that not only fits our primary defense focus but could complement both Stadco and Ranor's businesses as they are very similar in what they do but at the same time do work that the other does not or cannot do. We did NOT buy Stadco based on its past financial performance, we bought it for its future. Key Terms of the Stadco Acquisition The Company issued approximately 1.5 million shares of its common stock to satisfy Stadco's indebtedness to its shareholders and certain other debt holders and acquire all outstanding shares of Stadco. The Company paid to Stadco's landlord approximately $750,000 in past due rent, which included a forgiveness of an equal amount of past due rent, to bring rent current and included waiver of all penalties, interest and other reimbursements. We also negotiated a reduced rental amount going forward. The Company purchased Stadco's loan from Sunflower Bank, for a total amount of approximately $7.9 million in cash, which included a reduction of its loan indebtedness by $1.4 million. The Company reached an agreement with Five Crowns Credit Partners, LLC, which held a substantial number of Stadco debt and equity securities. In exchange for all such securities, the Company issued to Five Crowns (1) 600,000 shares of TPCS common stock; and (2) warrants to purchase 100,000 shares of TPCS Stock at $1.43 with a three-year exercise time limit. Private Placement Financing Simultaneously with the Stadco closing, we closed on a private placement financing, structured as a private investment in public equity (PIPE) transaction. We sold 3,202,727 shares at $1.10 per share to a limited number of institutional and other accredited investors, providing net proceeds to us of approximately $3.2 million. Source of Funds Financing for the transaction came from the proceeds of the private placement financing and new loans from our current bank, Berkshire Bank. Concurrent with our closing of the Stadco acquisition, we entered into an amended and restated loan agreement with Berkshire Bank. Under the amended facility, our term loan in the original principal amount of $2.85 million, of which approximately $2.4 million remains outstanding, will remain, and we will have access to a revolving line of credit of up to $5 million. Berkshire also loaned us an additional $4 million. Repayment obligations under all of the loans are secured by a first lien on all personal and real property of Ranor and Stadco. On April 3, 2021, an independent Machinery and Equipment Appraisal Report estimated that the orderly liquidation value of Stadco was approximately $8,638,300. STADCO History Stadco, whose name was derived from Standard Tool and Die Co., was founded in 1941 by Nat Handel, who expanded the business over the next few decades, ultimately selling to the Nazarian family in 1981. The Nazarians sold Stadco to a private equity firm in 2010 for $27 million. Doug Paletz, who had spent eight years with Stadco, and Bob Parsi, who had spent 12 years with Stadco, left within two years of the sale. Stadco's financial condition and results of operations deteriorated under new ownership over the next several years. In November 2014, an investment group led by Doug Paletz (CEO, Pres.) and Bob Parsi (COO) acquired Stadco. Upon taking possession, the new management soon realized that the company was not in as good of a condition as expected and facing significant liabilities. Stadco was not only financially strapped but locked into production contracts that resulted in significant losses over the next several years, as well as financially responsible for damages for a previously defaulted contract. The remaining few loss pieces due under the various contracts are ending this year or in the beginning of calendar year 2022. From the closing of its acquisition by the recent sellers, Stadco was in serious need of cash, resulting in several financially necessary but punitive transactions. Because of this, Stadco's management had been continually distracted from its core purpose in order to constantly find funds to make payroll and keep suppliers at bay. Stadco Business Stadco is a key supplier of large flight-critical components on several high-profile commercial and military aircraft programs, including military helicopters. It has been a critical supplier to a blue-chip customer base that includes some of the largest OEMs and prime contractors in the defense and aerospace industries. Stadco also provides tooling, customized molds, fixtures, jigs and dies used in the production of aircraft components. Some of Stadco's largest orders run on multi-year-based cycles and it is presently finalizing the latest in string of recurring long-term production contracts that will last through several years and provide a sound economic base upon which we believe we can grow the company. For some of these contracts, it is the most significant supplier, if not the actual or virtual sole supplier. Stadco has a long history of making critical high precision parts for the defense and civil aviation industry, national laboratories, various weapons programs, and space flight. It continues to do so. It has been a prime supplier of parts for the Sikorsky CH-53 helicopter for over 45 years and continues to be a supplier of critical parts for the current CH-53E model and the new CH-53K King Stallion heavy lift helicopter. Sikorsky, on October 20, 2020, announced that it will build six additional production CH-53K King Stallion helicopters under a new contract for the U.S. Navy. The aircraft will further support the U.S. Marine Corps in its mission to conduct expeditionary heavy-lift assault transport of armored vehicles, equipment and personnel to support distributed operations deep inland from a sea-based center of operations. The six helicopters are part of 200 aircraft Program of Record for the U.S. Marine Corps, and their addition makes a total of 24 CH-53K production aircraft now under contract. Under the terms of this most recent contract - known as Low-Rate Initial Production (LRIP) Lot 4 - Sikorsky will begin delivery of the six aircraft in January 2024. This 200 aircraft order does not include an expected order from Israel to replace 20-25 of its aging helicopters with the CH-53K as well as a possible order from Germany for up to 70 of the CH-53Ks. Production at Sikorsky is expected to increase to as many as 24 CH-53K helicopters per year over the next several years. On June 25, 2021, the U.S. Navy awarded Sikorsky a contract to build nine more CH-53K King Stallion helicopters. According to a Naval Air Systems Command statement, the Lot 5 contract includes nine helicopters for a value of $878.7 million, and an option for a Lot 6 contract worth $852.5 million for nine more helicopters. The Lot 5 low-rate initial production contract increases the number of CH-53Ks on contract to 33. The Lot 5 aircraft are to be delivered in 2024. Stadco is also a supplier of critical parts for the new Boeing F-15EX Eagle II. In July 2020, Boeing announced that the USAF awarded Boeing an Indefinite Delivery, Indefinite Quantity contract for up to 200 F-15EXs. Stadco has one of the largest electron beam welding machines set up in the United States, allowing it to seamlessly weld thick pieces of titanium and other metals. Using this capability, it has produced the largest structural part for the F-22 fighter plane, as well as space shuttle and launch vehicle components for NASA. Stadco presents as a world leader in metal tools to lay up aerospace composites and it has provided these tools to major US Prime contractors as well as internationally. Stadco also make parts for other fighter planes, as well as weapon systems. Other major customers include Lockheed Martin, Spirit Aerosystems, Raytheon Missile Systems, Raytheon Defense Northrop ATK. Doug Paletz and Bob Parsi will remain in day-to-day charge of the operations under the oversight of TechPrecision's Alex Shen (CEO) and Tom Sammons (CFO). Financial Statements of Stadco In accordance with SEC rules, we are working to file two years of Stadco's audited statements and the required proforma financial statements within 75 days of closing. Conference Call We will schedule a conference call to discuss the acquisition as soon as practicable. About TechPrecision Corporation TechPrecision Corporation, through its wholly owned subsidiary, Ranor, Inc., manufactures large-scale, metal fabricated and machined precision components and equipment. These products are used in a variety of markets including: defense, aerospace, nuclear, industrial, and medical. TechPrecision's goal is to be an end-to-end service provider to its customers by furnishing customized solutions for completed products requiring custom fabrication and machining, assembly, inspection and testing. To learn more about the Company, please visit the corporate website at http://www.techprecision.com. Information on the Company's website or any other website does not constitute a part of this press release. Safe Harbor Statement This release contains certain "forward-looking statements" relating to the business of the Company and its subsidiary companies. All statements other than statements of current or historical fact contained in this press release, including statements that express our intentions, plans, objectives, beliefs, expectations, strategies, predictions or any other statements relating to our future activities or other future events or conditions are forward-looking statements. The words "anticipate," "believe," "continue," "could," "estimate," "expect," "intend," "may," "plan," "predict," "project," "will," "should," "would" and similar expressions, as they relate to us, are intended to identify forward-looking statements. These statements are based on current expectations, estimates and projections made by management about our business, our industry and other conditions affecting our financial condition, results of operations or business prospects. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Therefore, actual outcomes and results may differ materially from what is expressed or forecasted in, or implied by, the forward-looking statements due to numerous risks and uncertainties. Factors that could cause such outcomes and results to differ include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties arising from: our reliance on individual purchase orders, rather than long-term contracts, to generate revenue; our ability to change the composition of our revenues and effectively control operating expenses; external factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, that may be outside of our control; the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and government-imposed lockdowns in response thereto; the availability of appropriate financing facilities impacting our operations, financial condition and/or liquidity; our ability to receive contract awards through competitive bidding processes; our ability to maintain standards to enable us to manufacture products to exacting specifications; our ability to enter new markets for our services; our reliance on a small number of customers for a significant percentage of our business; competitive pressures in the markets we serve; changes in the availability or cost of raw materials and energy for our production facilities; operating in a single geographic location; restrictions in our ability to operate our business due to our outstanding indebtedness; government regulations and requirements; pricing and business development difficulties; changes in government spending on national defense; our ability to make acquisitions and successfully integrate those acquisitions with our business; general industry and market conditions and growth rates; general economic conditions; the effect of the Stadco acquisition on the Company's business relationships, operating results and business generally; risks related to diverting management's attention from the Company's ongoing business operations; unexpected costs, charges or expenses resulting from the acquisition of Stadco; and other risks discussed in the Company's periodic reports that are filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and available on its website (www.sec.gov). Any forward-looking statements speak only as of the date on which they are made, and we undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date of this press release, except as required by applicable law. Investors should evaluate any statements made by us in light of these important factors. Company Contact: Investor Relations Contact: Mr. Thomas Sammons Hayden IR Chief Financial Officer Brett Maas TechPrecision Corporation Phone: 646-536-7331 Phone: 978-883-5109 Email: brett@haydenir.com Email: sammonst@ranor.com Website: www.haydenir.com Website: www.techprecision.com SOURCE: TechPrecision Corporation View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661470/TechPrecision-Announces-Closing-of-Strategic-Acquisition VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Silver Elephant Mining Corp. ("Silver Elephant" or "the Company") (TSX:ELEF, OTCQX:SILEF, Frankfurt:1P2N) announces that it has executed a plan of arrangement under the Business Corporations Act (British Columbia) pursuant to which, it shall (the "Arrangement"): (i) as disclosed in a Company press release dated August 26, 2021, transfer certain royalties presently held by the Company in certain projects of the Company to Battery Metals Royalties Corp. ("Battery Metals Royalties"), a wholly owned subsidiary of the Company; and (ii) spin-out its Manitoba based Minago Nickel project ("Minago"), its Nevada based Gibellini Vanadium project ("Gibellini"), and Battery Metals Royalties each into its own entity (each a "SpinCo"). In connection with the Arrangement, the Company shall distribute shares of each SpinCo to the Company's shareholders ("Shareholders"). Pursuant to the Arrangement, it is currently expected that each Shareholder will receive one share of the Minago SpinCo, one share of the Gibellini SpinCo, and two Battery Metals Royalties SpinCo shares for every share of Silver Elephant held by such Shareholder on the record date for the Arrangement (the "Record Date"). Subject to receipt of required Shareholder, court, regulatory, Toronto Stock Exchange and other approvals and satisfaction of other closing conditions, the Arrangement is expected to close in December, 2021. The share distribution offers Shareholder direct participation in the growth and upside in each of the four companies' businesses (silver mining, vanadium mining, nickel mining, and royalty investments). Following completion of the Arrangement, each SpinCo is expected to aim to list on a Canadian securities exchange to enhance their respective share trading liquidity, price discovery and facilitate equity financings to support future business expansion. The Company cautions there can be no assurance that the Arrangement will be completed on the terms described herein or that the proposed public listings of the SpinCos will be completed. Further Details on the Plan of Arrangement Subject to adjustment, it is presently expected that following completion of the Arrangement, Silver Elephant securityholders (common share, option, and warrant) on the Record Date shall, assuming exercise of all convertible securities (warrants and options) of Silver Elephant in accordance with their terms, collectively hold approximately 55% of the shares of the Minago SpinCo, 55% of the shares of the Gibellini SpinCo, and 70% of the shares of the Battery Metals Royalties SpinCo. Upon completion of the Arrangement, subject to adjustment, it is expected that Silver Elephant convertible securityholders will receive, in addition to each share of Silver Elephant to be received upon exercise of their convertible security in accordance with their terms, one share of Minago SpinCo, one share of Gibellini SpinCo and two shares of Battery Metals Royalties SpinCo. Such shares of the SpinCos to be issued to the convertible securityholders of Silver Elephant shall be held in escrow for such convertible securityholders by Silver Elephant to be issued upon exercise. The remaining non-escrowed Minago SpinCo shares (approximately 45%), and Gibellini SpinCo (approximately 45%) held by Silver Elephant will be transferred to Battery Metals Royalties in connection with the completion of the Arrangement. All amounts referenced herein are estimates and may be subject to adjustment for changes to the capitalization of Silver Elephant securities prior to the Record Date. As of August 25, 2021, Silver Elephant has 209,477,539 shares and 26,300,250 warrants and options issued and outstanding. The Company expects to apply for an interim order from the Supreme Court of British Columbia, authorizing the Company to call a shareholder meeting ("Meeting") to be held on or before December 10, 2021, or such other date as may be determined by the Company, to approve the Arrangement, which requires a special resolution of the Shareholders passed by at least two-thirds of the votes cast by Shareholders present in person or represented by proxy at the Meeting. Shareholders are entitled to one vote for each Silver Elephant share held. Further details regarding the Arrangement will be contained in an information circular of the Company to be mailed to Shareholders in connection with the Meeting (the "Circular"). After careful consideration, the Board of Directors has unanimously determined that the Arrangement is in the best interest of the Company. A description of the various factors in arriving at this determination will be provided in the Circular. Business Description Upon completion of the Arrangement, it is presently expected that: Silver Elephant will hold the Pulacayo silver and El Triunfo gold-silver projects in Bolivia, and approximately 30% of the issued and outstanding Battery Metals Royalty shares as a long-term investment. Gibellini SpinCo will hold the Gibellini vanadium project in Nevada. Minago SpinCo will hold the Minago nickel project at Thompson nickel belt in Manitoba. Battery Metals Royalties will hold 2% royalties of all the assets referenced above and, subject to adjustment, approximately 45% of outstanding Gibellini SpinCo and Minago SpinCo shares as long-term investments. Please refer to the Company's press release dated August 26, 2021, regarding the details of the Battery Metals Royalties 2% royalties. Silver Elephant Following completion of the Arrangement, it is presently expected that Silver Elephant will be managed by Joaquin Merino P.Geo as VP Exploration, Robert Van Drunen as Interim COO, and John Lee as CEO. Mr Lee maintains a strong focus on silver and has spent the majority of his time in Bolivia since 2015 managing all aspects of the Company's Pulacayo project. On October 13, 2020, Silver Elephant announced the Mineral Resource Estimate prepared by Mercator Geological Services of its 100% controlled Pulacayo project which includes an Indicated Mineral Resource of 106.7 million oz of silver, 1,384.7 million pounds of zinc, and 693.9 million pounds of lead, and an Inferred Mineral Resource of 13.1 million oz of silver, 122.8 million pounds of zinc and 61.9 million pounds of lead. The Indicated Resource is 48 million tonnes grading 69g/t silver, 1.3% zinc, 0.7% lead based on over 100,000 meters of drilling. Silver Elephant's wholly owned Bolivian subsidiary has invested over US$30 million at the Pulacayo Project on exploration, technical studies, mine development, and environmental permitting since 2006. Pulacayo Project Resource Estimate Oct 13, 2020 Deposit Category k Tonnes Ag M oz Zn M lbs Pb M lbs Pulacayo Indicated 26,350 70.2 903.7 386.0 Inferred 1,670 7.2 71.8 18.4 Paca Indicated 21,690 37.0 485.8 304.2 Inferred 3,395 6.0 51.1 43.7 Total Indicated 48,040 106.7 1,384.7 690.2 Inferred 5,065 13.1 122.8 61.9 The Pulacayo Project consists of the Pulacayo Deposit and Paca Deposit (7km north of Pulacayo deposit). Pulacayo is within driving distance from Sumitomo Corporation's San Cristobal silver mine, New Pacific's Silver Sands discovery, and Pan American Silver Corp.'s San Vicente silver mine. The Pulacayo and Paca Deposits are interpreted to be low-to-intermediate sulphidation epithermal deposits. The Pulacayo Deposit occurs within the Tertiary age Pulacayo volcanic dome complex that consists of older sedimentary rocks of the Silurian Quenhua Formation and the intruding andesitic volcanic rocks of the Rothchild and Megacristal units. Mineralization hosted by volcanic rocks can be tens of meters in thickness and typically consists of discrete veins plus stockworks of narrow veins and veinlets that occur within argillic alteration host rock envelopes. Veins are commonly banded in texture and can contain semi-massive to massive sulphides. The primary minerals of economic importance at Pulacayo are tetrahedrite, galena and sphalerite. There are also silver sulfosalts and native silver which contribute to deposit silver grades. Mineralization is controlled by an east-west oriented normal fault system which links two northeast trending, steeply dipping, regional strike slip faults. Pulacayo Drill Hole Highlights Pulacayo from (m) int (m) Ag (g/t) Pb(%) Zn % PUD005 96.2 - 108.0 11.9 689 1.9 1.4 PUD007 70.0 - 96.8 26.8 517 2.3 4.2 PUD057 374.0 - 378.0 4.0 1,184 0.8 2.3 PUD069 281.0 - 294.0 13.0 624 2.1 4.2 PUD109 293.6 - 298.4 4.8 3,607 3.8 4.1 PUD118 174.0 - 184.0 10.0 1,248 1.7 2.6 PUD134 128.2 - 151.5 23.3 514 1.3 1.9 PUD150 290.0 - 302.0 11.2 882 0.4 0.6 PUD159 343.0 - 354.0 11.0 790 0.6 0.6 PUD170 237.0 - 239.0 2.0 3,163 0.1 0.9 Reported widths are core-interval widths and not true widths. True widths have not determined. Historic Pulacayo mine production was predominantly from the Tajo vein system (TVS) which extends over a strike length of more than 2.5 km and down dip 1,000 meters. Resource drilling spans 1.4 km mineralized strike and extends down dip 400 meters from the surface. It covered an area that's approximately 30% of TVS. There is the potential of discovering additional resources by drilling along the strike and at depth. Silver Elephant is currently carrying out a 2,000 meter drill program at Pulacayo to test several IP anomalies with assay results expected in September 2021. On July 13, 2020, the Company acquired the El Triunfo Gold-Silver-Lead-Zinc Project in La Paz District, Bolivia ("Triunfo Project"). The Triunfo Project area covers approximately 256 hectares which is located 75km to the east of the city of La Paz, Bolivia. On August 19, 2020, Silver Elephant received the assay results from the Company's first diamond drill program where TR007 intercepted 48.9 meters of mineralization grading 0.42 g/t gold, 35.5 g/t silver, 1.17% zinc, and 0.83% lead within 98.9 meters of mineralization grading 0.37 g/t Au, 22.7 g/t Ag, 0.74% zinc, and 0.58% lead starting 13.0 meters downhole. The company is currently conducting geological mapping and induced polarization surveys (IP). Triunfo drilling is tentatively scheduled for Q4 of 2021. Minago SpinCo Following completion of the Arrangement, it is presently expected that Minago SpinCo will be managed by Danniel Oosterman P.Geo as interim CEO, and Robert Van Drunen as COO. Mr. Van Drunen was the senior project manager at Vale's Thompson operation. The board of directors of Minago SpinCo will consist of Mark Scott, John Lee, and Ron Espell. Mr. Scott was former head of Vale's Manitoba Operations. The Company announced the results of a new mineral resource estimate ("MRE") by Mercator Geotechnical Services and AGP Mining Consultants for its 100% owned flagship Minago Nickel Project ("Minago Project") in Manitoba's Thompson Nickel Belt ("TNB") in Canada on July 6, 2021 The MRE includes a Measured and Indicated mineral resource of 722 million lbs of contained nickel and an Inferred mineral resource of 319 million lbs of contained nickel grading 0.74% nickel based on over 70,000 meters of drilling. Minago Project Mineral Resource Estimate July 2, 2021 Type Category k Tonnes Ni % Ni M lbs Open Pit Measured Indicated 23,940 0.71 374.3 Inferred 2,070 0.57 26.0 Underground Measured Indicated 20,290 0.77 345.0 Inferred 17,480 0.76 292.9 Combined Measured Indicated 44,230 0.74 721.6 Inferred 19,550 0.74 318.9 All resources occur within a mineral lease that is surrounded by 94 mineral claims plus a second mineral lease held by the Company, comprising a total area of 197 km2 The Minago Project has been historically the subject of over $40 million in exploration, feasibility study and environmental permitting expenditures by various previous interests since early 2000, the most recent of these being by Victory Nickel Inc. Minago Drill Hole Highlights Hole No From (m) To (m) Int (m) Ni% V-10-11 161.5 353.2 191.7 0.51 V-10-16 176.0 320.3 144.3 0.85 V-08-06 537.7 676.7 139.0 0.73 V-08-06 132.2 265.3 133.1 0.62 V-10-15 109.5 228.0 118.5 0.82 V-08-04B 361.7 471.0 109.2 0.76 N-05-01 143.7 251.0 107.3 0.80 MXB-71-94 177.4 282.2 104.9 0.73 V-10-26 269.2 358.8 89.5 0.86 NM-06-02 293.3 364.2 70.9 1.21 N-05-01 325.3 391.2 65.9 1.08 V-10-18 351.0 409.1 58.1 1.67 B-12A-89 322.2 372.5 50.3 1.23 V-08-01 452.2 490.6 38.4 1.51 Reported widths are core-interval widths and not true widths. True widths have not determined. In August 2011, the Minago Project achieved a major milestone when the Environment Act License ("EAL") was issued by the Province of Manitoba. The prior operator of the project subsequently filed a Notice of Alteration ("NOA") to the EAL in December 2013, related to relocation of the tailings management area to address First Nation concerns. Silver Elephant has re-engaged the Manitoba Government regarding the NOA status for the 10,000 tonne-per-day open-pit mining operation at Minago. The Agriculture and Resource Development Department ("ARDD") has confirmed that the NOA can still be completed and the Company is currently working with ARDD to finalize the NOA approval, leading to issuance of an updated Environment Act License, which is expected by the end of 2021. A socioeconomic assessment was conducted and the prior operator signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with First Nation groups in 2008. The Company is re-engaging the First Nations with traditional territories that include the project site to work toward renewal of the MOUs in 2021. Several initiatives are being considered or taken to minimize the carbon footprint of potential future mining operation at Minago. For mining, the Company will examine the use of a fully electric mine fleet. For ore and waste processing, the crushing, milling and flotation processes would be powered by renewable hydroelectricity, which accounts for 97% of all electricity generation in Manitoba. The Agriculture and Resource Development Department ("ARDD") has expressed support for the Minago Project, which would supply much needed Class 1 high-purity nickel to make nickel-lithium batteries used in electric vehicles. Gibellini SpinCo Following completion of the Arrangement, it is presently expected that Gibellini SpinCo will be managed by Ron Espell as CEO. Mr. Espell was the corporate environmental director of McEwen Mining Inc. where he led his team to obtain the Gold Bar project's EIS approval from the United States Bureau of Land Management ("BLM"). Mr. Espell was former regional environmental director Australia Pacific with Barrick Gold Corp., where he spent 17 years of his career. Silver Elephant's 100% owned Gibellini Project is located in Nevada, USA, with a preliminary economic assessment study (PEA) by Wood Plc announced on May 29, 2018 which demonstrates an after-tax Internal Rate of Return of 36%, and after-tax cumulative cash flow of $333 million, assuming an average vanadium pentoxide price (V2O5) of $10.18 per pound (V2O5 price is currently $9.6/lb according to AsianMetals.com). The Gibellini Mineral Resource Estimate includes a Measured and Indicated mineral resource of 131.3 million lbs of contained V2O5 and an Inferred mineral resource of 93.8 million lbs of contained V2O5. Gibellini has received over $40million in investments since early 2000. The Gibellini project is designed to be an open pit, heap leach operation in Nevada's Battle Mountain region (25km south of Eureka) with initial capital cost of $117 million, average annual production is 9.65 million pounds of V2O5 , at Cash Operating Cost of $4.77 per pound with strip ratio of 0.17 to 1. Gibellini Project Mineral Resource Estimate May 29, 2018 Deposit Category k Tons V205 % V205 M lb Gibellini Measured Indicated 22,950 0.29 131.3 Inferred 14,970 0.18 52.3 Louie Hill Inferred 7,520 0.28 41.5 Gibellini Drill Hole Highlights HoleID From (m) To (m) Meters %V2O5 T-38 3.05 45.72 42.7 0.755 NG-47 28.96 39.62 10.7 1.005 NG-12 24.38 45.72 21.3 0.857 Reported widths are core-interval widths and not true widths. True widths have not determined. Highlights of 2018 PEA (after tax) Average annual production 9.65 million lbs V2O5 Operating cash cost $4.77 per lb V2O5 Capex including 25% contingency $116.76 million Strip ratio 0.17 waste to leach material Mining operating rate 10,000 tpd V2O5 heap leach recovery rate 62% Life of mine 13.5 years V2O5 $/lb After-tax IRR After-tax NPV @7% After-tax cashflow $12.73 51% $338M $600.4M $10.18 36% $183M $333M $8.91 26% $103M $197M A Notice of Intent ("NOI") to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement ("EIS") for the Gibellini Project was published on July 14, 2020 in the Federal Register. The NOI commences the 12-month timeline according to Instructional Memorandum 2021- 022 based on Secretarial Order 3355, to complete the National Environmental Policy Act ("NEPA") review by the BLM. There was a delay due to transition to new administration and incorporating an additional alternative to the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). The project conforms to the current US administrations green energy initiatives and the EIS Record Of Decision (ROD) is expected in early 2022. Operating permits from the State of Nevada are on track to be received on the same timeline as the ROD. The renewable energy alternative in the EIS includes 6MW of solar panels and a 10MW vanadium flow battery to provide 100% of the projects electrical power demand. If selected by the BLM, Gibellini would be the first mine in the US completely powered by renewable energy. The Gibellini mine would also be the first primary vanadium mine in the U.S. Vanadium was designated a critical material by the U.S. government in 2018 due to its importance to the defense and energy storage sectors and there being no domestic production with all supply through imports, mostly from Russia, China, and South Africa. Vanadium alloy steel is 30% lighter with double the tensile strength of non-alloyed steel. It's used extensively in the aerospace and defense sectors, as well as skyscraper construction. A structural vanadium deficit is expected to occur by 2025 with the rising popularity of the Vanadium Redox Flow Battery which is a mature technology featuring up to an 8 hour duration discharge and is scalable to hundreds of megawatt hours. Battery life is a minimum of 20 years with no degradation of the vanadium or the charge density. Opportunity exists to upgrade the Gibellini, Louie Hill inferred resource to higher confidence level by drilling. Further, the acquisition of the Bisoni McKay property in September of 2020 significantly expanded the Company's land position from 7km of strike to 21km covering Woodruff Formation that is the host of vanadium mineralization. Numerous vanadium-bearing surface rocks have been sampled by the Company in areas along the strike in its 2019 reconnaissance program which may develop into future drill targets upon further investigation (see Company's press release dated May 26, 2019). Battery Metals Royalties SpinCo Following completion of the Arrangement, it is presently expected that Battery Metals Royalties SpinCo will be managed by John Lee, CFA. Mr. Lee brings over 20 years of experience in metals and mining. With valuations anchored by its holdings in royalties and shares of each of Gibellini SpinCo and Minago SpinCo, Battery Metals Royalties will focus on further mining investments in nickel, vanadium, silver, copper, and gold leveraging Mr. Lee's extensive network with the aim of locating opportunities before they become mainstream. In the past decade, Mr. Lee visited well over 50 mining projects around the world and led Silver Elephant acquiring over 15 mining properties in Canada, US, Bolivia, and Asia. Mr. Lee has helped raised over $120 million in equity financings for Silver Elephant, a skill which he will apply to grow Battery Metal Royalties. Additional management and directors will be appointed in each SpinCo as may be prudent in connection with the Arrangement. While it is currently expected that each SpinCo will aim to list on a Canadian securities exchange following completion of the Arrangement, there is no guarantee that any such SpinCo will be able to meet initial listing requirements or that listing will be in the economic best interests of such SpinCo immediately following the Arrangement. Listing is subject to the applicable rules and policies of the respective exchange. Qualified Persons The technical contents of this news release have been prepared under the supervision of Danniel Oosterman, VP Exploration for Silver Elephant. Mr. Oosterman is a "qualified person" as defined by National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects ("NI 43-101") and is not independent of the Company as this term is defined under NI 43-101. About Silver Elephant Silver Elephant Mining Corp. is a premier mining and exploration company in silver, nickel, and vanadium. Further information on Silver Elephant can be found at www.silverelef.com. SILVER ELEPHANT MINING CORP. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD "John Lee" Executive Chairman For more information about Silver Elephant, please contact Investor Relations: +1.604.569.3661 ext. 101 ir@silverelef.com www.silverelef.com Neither the Toronto Stock Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Toronto Stock Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements Certain statements contained in this news release, including statements which may contain words such as "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "plans", "believes", "estimates", or similar expressions, and statements related to matters which are not historical facts are forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws. These forward-looking statements, may involve, but are not limited to, statements with respect to future events or future performance, the completion and structure of the Arrangement, anticipated shareholder, court and regulatory approvals, the realization of the anticipated benefits deriving by any entity from the Arrangement or from the Company's or any SpinCo's assets or investments, the general performance of the assets of the Company and any SpinCo, and the results of exploration, development and production activities as well as expansions projects relating to the properties of the Company and/or any SpinCo and/or in which the Company and/or any SpinCo will hold a royalty, stream or other interest. Such forward-looking statements, which reflect management's expectations regarding the Company's future growth, results of operations, performance, and business prospects and opportunities, are based on certain factors and assumptions, including, without limitation, management's perceptions of historical trends; current conditions; expected future developments; the ongoing operation of the properties of the Company and/or any SpinCo and/or in which the Company and/or any SpinCo will hold a royalty, stream or other interest by the operators of such properties in a manner consistent with past practice; the accuracy of public statements and disclosures made by the operators of such underlying properties; no material adverse change in the market price of the commodities that underlie the asset portfolio; no adverse development in respect of any significant property of the Company and/or any SpinCo and/or in which the Company and/or any SpinCo will hold a royalty, stream or other interest; the accuracy of expectations for the development of underlying properties that are not yet in production; and the absence of any other factors that could cause actions, events or results to differ from those anticipated, estimated or intended, and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties which may cause the actual results, performance, or achievements to be materially different from future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of performance. These factors should be considered carefully, and readers should not place undue reliance on the Company's forward-looking statements. The Company believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements contained in this news release and the documents incorporated by reference herein are reasonable, but no assurance can be given that these expectations will prove to be correct. In addition, although the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual actions, events, or results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause actions, events, or results not to be as anticipated, estimated, or intended. For additional information with respect to these and other factors and assumptions underlying the forward-looking statements made in this press release, see the section entitled "Risk Factors" in the most recent Annual Information Form of the Company which is filed with the Canadian securities commissions and available electronically under the Company's issuer profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com and the Company's Form 20-F annual report for the year ended December 31, 2020 filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and available electronically under the Company's issuer profile on EDGAR at www.sec.gov. The forward-looking statements set forth herein reflect the Company's expectations as at the date of this press release and are subject to change after such date. The Company undertakes no obligation to publicly release any future revisions to forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this news or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as expressly required by law. None of the securities to be issued pursuant to the Arrangement have been or will be registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act"), or any state securities laws, and any securities issuable in the transaction are anticipated to be issued in reliance upon available exemptions from such registration requirements pursuant to Section 3(a)(10) of the U.S. Securities Act and applicable exemptions under state securities laws. This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities. SOURCE: Silver Elephant Mining Corp. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661474/Silver-Elephant-Announces-Execution-of-Plan-of-Arrangement-and-Spin-Out-of-Nickel-and-Vanadium-Assets ?TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Toronto based CO2 GRO Inc. ("GROW") (TSXV:GROW, OTCQB:BLONF, Frankfurt:4021) is pleased to announce that it has been selected to participate in a virtual trade mission to Mexico presented by the Ontario Ministry of Economic Development, Job Create and Trade ('MEDJCT') in collaboration with the Toronto Regional Board of Trade. The selection was based on GROW's CO2 Delivery Solutions application as a clean technology. The virtual clean tech mission is to be held September 20th to 23rd. The objective is to attain a targeted 6 pre-screened high impact B-2-B meetings coordinated by Global BMT Consulting. Global BMT is a market intelligence company focused on international business, marketing, and trade consultancy that has been retained by the MEDJCT to introduce Ontario based clean technology companies entering the Mexico market to targeted potential customers and distributors. According to Aaron Archibald, VP Sales & Strategic Alliances, "We are delighted to be chosen by our Ontario Ministry of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade, and the Toronto Regional Board of Trade to their clean tech trade mission to Mexico. Participation will augment our initial Mexico introductions screened by our Canadian Federal Trade Commissioners earlier in 2021 as well as our penetration of Mexico's protected Ag market by us and our Mexico marketing partner Rancho Nexo. This is the fourth time our Canadian Governments have selected CO2 GRO as a promising Canadian Ag tech company to help promote us in international markets. We are currently also in competition for other Canadian Trade Commissioner Ag Tech support programs for 2022 in the EU and the Middle East. The support we have received from Canadian Trade Commissioners in international markets is greatly appreciated and gives us confidence our CO2 Delivery Solutions technology will gain widespread adoption as we continue to penetrate domestic and international markets." Visit www.co2delivery.ca ?for more information on CO2 Delivery Solutions or ? watch this video .? To see a CO2 Delivery Solutions VCO2 system installation, ? watch this video . About CO2 GRO Inc. (CO2 GRO Inc.) GROW's proprietary CO2 Delivery Solutions technology is revolutionizing the global 600 billion square foot protected agriculture industry (Cuesta Roble 2019). We create a saturated CO2 solution that when misted onto plants provides growers that cannot gas with CO2 the opportunity to increase plant yields by up to 30% and profits by up to 100%. Applying saturated CO2 also suppressed the development of pathogens such as E.coli and powdery mildew, helping to reduce crop losses. GROW's CO2 Delivery Solutions is protected by a suite of patents and patents pending. The worldwide market for GROW's disruptive CO2 Delivery Solutions technology is the 50 billion square feet of greenhouses and 550 billion square feet of protected agriculture facilities (Cuesta Roble 2019). Growers can maximize revenue and profits with our systems' low fixed and variable costs and ease of systems installation. GROW's management is rapidly expanding its international marketing partner relationships into the EU, the UK, South Africa, the Middle East, South East Asia and Latin America as well as in its North American base. GROW is committed to good Environment, Social and Governance (ES&G) policy and practices. We are an equal opportunity employer of choice and opportunity. Our mission is to accelerate the growth of all value plants safely, economically, naturally and sustainably using our patented advanced CO2 Delivery Solutions while accreting value to our customers, stakeholders and shareholders. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains statements which constitute "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable securities laws, including statements regarding the plans, intentions, beliefs and current expectations of the Company with respect to future business activities. Forward- looking information is often identified by the words "may," "would," "could," "should," "will," "intend," "plan," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "expect" or similar expressions and include information regarding: statements regarding the future direction of the Company; the ability of the Company to successfully achieve its business and financial objectives; plans for expansion and the ability of the Company to obtain, develop and foster its business relationships; and expectations for other economic, business, and/or competitive factors. Investors are cautioned that forward-looking information is not based on historical facts but instead reflect the Company's management's expectations, estimates or projections concerning the business of the Company's future results or events based on the opinions, assumptions and estimates that management considered reasonable at the date the statements are made. Such assumptions include but are not limited to: general business and economic conditions; the Company's ability to successfully execute its plans and intentions; the availability of financing on reasonable terms; the Company's ability to attract and retain skilled staff; market competition; the products and technology offered by the Company's competitors; and that good relationships with business partners will be maintained. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking information are reasonable, such information involves risks and uncertainties, and undue reliance should not be placed on such information, as unknown or unpredictable factors could have material adverse effects on future results, performance or achievements. Among the key factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking information are the following: changes in general economic, business and political conditions, including changes in the financial markets; in particular, in the ability of the Company to raise debt and equity capital in the amounts and at the costs that it expects; adverse changes in applicable laws or adverse changes in the application or enforcement of current laws; the biotechnology industry and the greenhouse growers market are highly competitive, and technical advances in the industry will impact the success of the Company, and other risks described in the Company's filings that are available at www.sedar.com . Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking information prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as intended, planned, anticipated, believed, estimated or expected. Although the Company has attempted to identify important risks, uncertainties and factors which could cause actual results to differ materially, there may be others that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. The Company does not intend, and does not assume any obligation, to update this forward-looking information except as otherwise required by applicable law. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. For more information, please visit www.co2gro.ca or contact Michael O'Connor, Manager, Investor Relations at 604-317-6197 or michael.oconnor@co2gro.ca SOURCE: CO2 Gro Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661455/CO2-GRO-Inc-Selected-to-Participate-in-a-Virtual-Trade-Mission-to-Mexico-Presented-by-the-Ontario-MEDJCT-and-Toronto-Regional-Board-of-Trade-from-September-20th-to-23rd-2021 Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - iMining Technologies Inc. (TSXV: IMIN) (the "Company" or "iMining") announced today the appointment of Carlton Griffith to the Company's Board of Directors. Further to the Company's July 13, 2021 press release, this appointment fulfills one of the conditions attached to the acquisition of BitBit Financial Inc. ("BitBit") whereby BitBit was extended the right to appoint a director to the Board of iMining. Mr. Griffith has over 30 years' experience in real estate management, having worked for some of Canada's most prestigious property management firms including Grubb & Ellis (for Microsoft Canada), Mintz & Partners, and Chrysler Pension Fund. In addition to his real estate expertise, Mr. Griffith also brings significant experience in the non-profit sector and serves on several non-profit executive boards. Mr. Griffith is committed to helping organizations create efficient and sustainable practices that are suitable to their respective needs. "I am excited to welcome Carlton to iMining," said Khurram Shroff, President and CEO. "Carlton's expertise in operations and real estate management brings a diverse perspective, which will serve us well as we continue to implement our growth strategy with the diverse businesses currently under the iMining umbrella and future acquisitions." Carlton Griffith's appointment follows the resignation of Mr. Robert Eadie as a director of the Company. The Company wishes to express its gratitude to Mr. Eadie for his years of service to the Board and commitment to shareholders. Mr. Eadie will continue to serve as an Advisor to iMining's Board of Directors. About iMining Technologies Inc. iMining Technologies Inc. is a growth oriented, TSXV listed company, focused on linking traditional capital markets with blockchain investment opportunities. Through its wholly owned subsidiaries, the company provides retail and institutional investors a safe and secure way to stake, mine and exchange digital assets using proprietary and secure solutions. We are driven by our core values to operate with transparency, efficiency, and sustainability as we work toward building long-term shareholder value. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD Signed "Saleem Moosa" Saleem Moosa, Director FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, please contact: iMining Corporate Offices: Robert Eadie, Advisor to the Board Email: investor@imining.com Telephone: 1-604-602-4935 Facsimile: 1-604-602-4936 Toll Free: 1-866-602-4935 Evan Eadie, Corporate Development Email: eeadie@imining.com Telephone: (604) 602-4935 ext. 203 Toll Free: 1-866-602-4935 Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-Looking Statements This news release contains certain forward-looking statements, which relate to future events or future performance, and reflect management's current expectations and assumptions, and are based on assumptions made by and information currently available to the Company. Readers are cautioned that these forward-looking statements are neither promises nor guarantees, and are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause future results to differ materially from those expected including, but not limited to, market conditions, availability of financing, actual results of activities, future cryptocurrency prices, operating risks, and other risks in the cryptocurrency industry. All the forward-looking statements made in this news release are qualified by these cautionary statements and those in our continuous disclosure filings available on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date hereof and the Company does not assume any obligation to update or revise them to reflect new events or circumstances save as required by applicable law. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94451 HIGHLIGHTS Regional exploration summer work confirms numerous mineral occurrences across Benz tenement package typical from Archean greenstone belts Outcropping lithium (spodumene) bearing pegmatite at Ruby Hill West with historic rock chips samples assay results from a 60m x 25m outcrop including: 4.72%Li 2 O, 1720 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) 2.15% Li 2 O, 990 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) 1.97% Li 2 O, 3660 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) 1.10% Li 2 O, 710 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) Outcropping copper-gold mineralization in the Placer Lake Area coincident with newly defined FLEM conductors with historical values of 2.7% Cu and 8.2 g/t Au Multiple occurrences coincident with VTEM anomalies at both Ruby Hill West and East 30km of untested VTEM conductors on ultramafic contact at Ruby Hill West and East Third drill rig due at site imminently with assays for 15,000m currently outstanding Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Benz Mining Corp. (TSXV: BZ) (ASX: BNZ) (the Company or Benz) is pleased to update the market on its summer regional exploration campaign, led in parallel with its 50,000m diamond drilling campaign at Eastmain. Multiple documented mineral occurrences were visited to confirm historical data, collect additional surface samples and prepare for further exploration activities. The successful campaign confirmed the strong mineral endowment potential of the upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt of which Benz controls 220km2 or approximately 30%. A large part of the belt's geology lies under a thin layer of cover, a situation that Benz has successfully overcome at Eastmain with the discovery of three new mineralized zones under glacial till cover using the appropriate geophysical methods. CEO, Xavier Braud, commented: "Archean Greenstone Belts worldwide have been a source of mineral wealth thanks to their amazing endowment, not only in gold but in base metals from copper rich VMS deposits to ultramafic hosted nickel deposits. If one wanted to compare the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt with an Australian example, the Agnew to Wiluna Greenstone Belt would come to mind. The significant difference is that the Agnew to Wiluna belt has been accessible to prospectors and explorers for over 100 years while the road to the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt is only 5 years old. Now that Benz has year-round, all-weather access to the region and the only fully operational winterised exploration camp in the belt, we will be able to realise the full potential it has to offer. Exploring the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt in 2021 is a bit like having a virgin version of the Agnew to Wiluna belt to explore with 21st century technology in a world craving minerals. Our team has close to 100 years of cumulative nickel-copper-PGE exploration experience with WMC, BHP, IGO and Falconbridge. We are excited to draw on this experience in the Upper Eastmain Greenstone belt." Figure 1: Agnew to Wiluna Greenstone Belt; >100years of access and exploration activities, multi-million ounce gold endowment, globally significant nickel production area and verified lithium endowment. To view an enhanced version of Figure 1, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_001full.jpg Figure 2: Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt at the same scale; 5 years of year-round all-weather access, 1 gold deposit confirmed and growing and multiple unfollowed metallic occurrences. To view an enhanced version of Figure 2, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_002full.jpg Figures 1 and 2 place in parallel the Agnew to Wiluna Greenstone Belt in Western Australia and the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt in Quebec. In the Western Australian belt, the first gold was discovered at the Lawlers gold field in 1895 and continuous mining and exploration activities since then have seen the discovery of multiple multi-million ounce deposits. Gold was first discovered in the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt in 1969 and it is only in 2016 that the Route 167 Nord unlocked this untapped greenstone belt. Benz has a considerable first mover advantage with the only permitted camp in the belt. Multiple mineral occurrences coincident with VTEM The 2005 Variable Time Domain Electro Magnetic (VTEM) survey, helped identify tens of kilometres of conductive zones, associated with mafic and ultramafic units but also with iron formations and sediments. All these environments are prospective for a range of commodities and the presence of documented mineral occurrences near the VTEM anomalies augurs well for future exploration success. Figure 3: Ruby Hill East and Eastmain Geology with documented mineral occurrences and known deposits. To view an enhanced version of Figure 3, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_003full.jpg Figure 4: Ruby Hill East and Eastmain 2005 regional VTEM showing +10km of unexplored VTEM conductors. To view an enhanced version of Figure 4, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_004full.jpg Figure 5: Ruby Hill West and Eastmain Geology with documented mineral occurrences and known deposits. To view an enhanced version of Figure 5, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_005full.jpg Figure 6: Ruby Hill West and Eastmain 2005 regional VTEM showing +30km of unexplored VTEM conductors. To view an enhanced version of Figure 6, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_006full.jpg Exploration opportunities Benz recently completed a test survey over its newly discovered D zone with a new version of airborne high powered VTEM. The newer VTEM systems are designed to be far superior to the equipment used in the original 2005 survey flown by Eastmain Resources over Benz's projects. Results of this test are currently being interpreted and, following the results, Benz will be able to decide whether VTEM will be used to explore its extensive tenement package. Gold Potential Extension of the Mine horizon to the NW Several days were spent following up high gold values identified by Eastmain Resources in trenches and understanding the structure and alterations. This work enabled Benz to extend the mineralized zones previously reported, including the Suzanna and Michel zones where rock chips taken at surface assayed up to 125gpt gold. Grids G and H These areas were covered with ground Crone Deep Electromagnetic (EM) surveys last winter and several EM conductors were prospected by our geologists. Mineralized quartz veins and garnet biotite alteration zones were identified in the field corresponding closely to the EM conductors and in the same stratigraphic position as the Eastmain Mine trend. These EM conductors will be tested in upcoming drill programs. Grid F / Loop F This grid covers the Lac Erasme, Lac Placer and the Meg Au-Cu occurrences. Several ground EM conductors were identified, some of which correspond to the historical mineral occurrences. The Lac Erasme occurrence was discovered in 1983 and yielded values up to 2.72% Cu, 8.25 g/t Au in grab samples. This area contains several gossanous outcrops, where the contact between felsic pyroclastic and basalt is mineralized in pyrite and pyrrhotite. The rocks are strongly altered as well. Figure 7: Mineralized contact between basalts and altered felsic pyroclastic, Lac Erasme occurrence looking North west, the felsic tuffs are to the right of the photo. Samples taken from this outcrop have assayed 8.3g/t gold and 2.7% copper. To view an enhanced version of Figure 7, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_007full.jpg Figure 8: FLEM Loop F with the location of the 8.3g/t gold rock chip sample at the Lac Erasme occurrence. To view an enhanced version of Figure 8, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_008full.jpg In the Ruby Hill East property, a mineral occurrence called the Lac Rene Sud showing corresponds to strongly deformed sulphide bearing silicate and magnetite iron formations with associated conglomerates. There are multiple quartz veins present in this unit. Only one outcrop was sampled in the past and yielded values of up to 1.65 g/t Au (Quebec government report). This mineralized zone was found to extend for at least 1.4km to the NW on the same magnetic trend and represents an excellent exploration target that will require further work. The main mineralized occurrences within the Ruby Hill West property were visited as well. Nickel potential Geological mapping and interpretation from geophysics by Quebec's MERN shows the presence of multiple ultramafic flows within the tenement package. In the rare areas where they outcrop, those ultramafics are komatiitic in composition and as such could be prospective hosts for nickel sulphide mineralization. In addition to the komatiitic flows, several zoned mafic and ultramafic intrusions are present in the south-west part of the Ruby Hill East property. MaxMin surveys and later airborne EM surveys showed numerous anomalies within the greenstone belt. The most recent VTEM survey has identified multiple conductors coincident on the contact of these ultramafics and mafic rocks over 30km at Ruby Hill West and over 10km at Ruby Hill East. However, to our knowledge no exploration for nickel sulphide mineralization associated with the mafic and ultramafic rocks has been conducted. Outside of the Upper Eastmain River greenstone belt, the Lac Lessard nickel prospect has nickel-copper-PGE disseminated sulphide mineralization associated with a younger mafic / ultramafic zoned intrusion. This intrusion is part of an intrusive trend, called the Dominique suite, interpreted as Paleoprotezoic. Copper- Zinc potential Multiple surface occurrences of polymetallic mineralization have been identified since the early 1980's. Most occurrences recorded show sulphide mineralization usually associated with lithological transitions between felsic and mafic units, typical of Volcanogenic Massive Sulphides environment. Lithium potential The lithium potential of Archean Greenstone Belts comes from late pegmatite intrusions commonly bearing lithium rich minerals including spodumene. Production of spodumene concentrates from greenstone hosted LCT (lithium, cesium, tantalum) pegmatites is an integral part of the currently growing and undersupplied global lithium market. A prime example of such a deposit is Western Australia's Pilgangoora deposit currently in production by Pilbara Minerals. Keeping the comparison between the Agnew to Wiluna and the Upper Eastmain Greenstone belts, the Kathleen Valley Lithium deposit owned by Liontown Resources show the belts potential for the critical battery element. In the James Bay area of the Province of Quebec, several lithium bearing pegmatites are in an advanced production stage (Nemaska Lithium, Rose) in addition to several other Li bearing pegmatites at a prospect stage. In the Ruby Hill West project area, a lithium (spodumene) bearing pegmatite outcrops over an area of 25m x 60m. Rock chips samples, collected in 2016, returned assay results of: 4.72%Li 2 O, 1720 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) O, 1720 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) 2.15% Li 2 O, 990 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) O, 990 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) 1.97% Li 2 O, 3660 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) O, 3660 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) 1.10% Li 2 O, 710 ppm Rb (>100ppm Ta, >500ppm Cs) The limited size of the outcrop is mostly due to the presence of thin cover over the area masking potential extensions to the outcrop. Figure 9: Photograph taken of the spodumene bearing pegmatites in the Ruby Hill West property. To view an enhanced version of Figure 9, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/1818/94485_13f98cde34a19864_009full.jpg Regional VTEM In 2005, Eastmain Resources flew a VTEM survey over Ruby Hill West, Ruby Hill East and Eastmain projects. The technology available at the time did not allow for precise modelisation of EM conductors nor for precise location and shape of the conductive zones but still showed vast tracts of land with coincident VTEM conductors and prospective lithologies. When adding those VTEM anomalies to the map of recorded mineral occurrences in outcrop and in drilling, the whole area is strongly prospective for the discovery of additional sulphide bearing mineralisation. To help with the targeting, an extensive soil survey was conducted this summer to cover prospective areas with overburden in areas not previously covered. Several till samples were also collected in selected areas. Eastmain Gold Deposit The Eastmain Gold Project, situated on the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt in Quebec, Canada, currently hosts a NI 43-101 and JORC (2012) compliant resource of 376,000oz at 7.9gpt gold (Indicated: 236,500oz at 8.2gtp gold, Inferred: 139,300oz at 7.5gtp gold). The existing gold mineralization is associated with 15-20% semi-massive to massive pyrrhotite, pyrite and chalcopyrite in highly deformed and altered rocks making it amenable to detection using electromagnetic techniques. Multiple gold occurrences have been identified by previous explorers over a 10km long zone along strike from the Eastmain Mine with very limited but highly encouraging testing outside the existing resource area. This press release was prepared under supervision and approved by Dr. Danielle Giovenazzo, P.Geo, acting as Benz's qualified person under National Instrument 43-101. Analytical samples were taken from grab samples and sent to Actlabs in Ste Germaine de Boule, Qc for preparation and gold analysis then to Ancaster, Ont for multielement analysis. All core assays reported were obtained by standard 30 or 50-gram fire-assaying-AA finish (codes 1A2B30 /1A2B50) and gravimetric finish (code 1A3-50) for samples with > 10gr/t Au. Samples are also analyzed for multi-elements, using a four-acid digestion -ICPMS method (code UT-4M). Because of the presence of visible gold, BENZ is using a 1000gr metal sieve (code1A4-1000) for mineralised samples. Quality Assurance/Quality Control ("QA/QC") and interpretation of results is performed by qualified persons. A QA/QC program consistent with NI 43-101 and industry best practice has been implemented with internal certified OREAS standards and blanks inserted at every 20 samples by the corporation. About Benz Mining Corp. Benz Mining Corp. brings together an experienced team of geoscientists and finance professionals with a focused strategy to acquire and develop mineral projects with an emphasis on safe, low risk jurisdictions favourable to mining development. Benz is earning a 100% interest in the former producing high grade Eastmain gold mine, Ruby Hill West and Ruby Hill East projects in Quebec. The Eastmain Gold Project is situated within the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt in Quebec, Canada and currently hosts a NI 43-101 and JORC (2012) compliant resource of 376,000oz at 7.9gpt gold. The existing gold mineralization is associated with 15-20% semi-massive to massive pyrrhotite, pyrite and chalcopyrite making it amenable to detection by electromagnetics. Several gold mineralization occurrences have been identified by previous explorers over a 10km long zone along strike from the Eastmain Mine with very limited testing outside the existing resource area. On behalf of the Board of Directors of Benz Mining Corp. Xavier Braud, CEO For more information please contact: Paul Fowler Head of Corporate Development (Canada) Benz Mining Corp. Telephone: +1 416 356 8165 Email: info@benzmining.com Xavier Braud CEO, Head of Corporate Development (Aus) Benz Mining Corp. Telephone +61 423 237 659 Email: info@benzmining.com Forward-Looking Information: Certain statements contained in this news release may constitute "forward-looking information" as such term is used in applicable Canadian securities laws. Forward-looking information is based on plans, expectations and estimates of management at the date the information is provided and is subject to certain factors and assumptions, including, that the Company's financial condition and development plans do not change as a result of unforeseen events and that the Company obtains regulatory approval. Forward-looking information is subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties and other factors that could cause plans, estimates and actual results to vary materially from those projected in such forward-looking information. Factors that could cause the forward-looking information in this news release to change or to be inaccurate include, but are not limited to, the risk that any of the assumptions referred to prove not to be valid or reliable, that occurrences such as those referred to above are realized and result in delays, or cessation in planned work, that the Company's financial condition and development plans change, and delays in regulatory approval, as well as the other risks and uncertainties applicable to the Company as set forth in the Company's continuous disclosure filings filed under the Company's profile at www.sedar.com. The Company undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements, other than as required by applicable law. NEITHER THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN THE POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ACCURACY OR ADEQUACY OF THIS RELEASE. Competent Person's Statements: The information in this report that relates to Exploration Results is based on and fairly represents information and supporting information compiled by Mr Xavier Braud, who is a member of the Australian Institute of Geoscientists (AIG membership ID:6963). Mr Braud is a consultant to the Company and has sufficient experience in the style of mineralization and type of deposits under consideration and qualifies as a Competent Person as defined in the 2012 edition of the "Australasian Code for Reporting of Exploration Results, Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves". Mr Braud holds securities in Benz Mining Corp and consents to the inclusion of all technical statements based on his information in the form and context in which they appear. The information in this announcement that relates to the Inferred Mineral Resource was first reported under the JORC Code by the Company in its prospectus released to the ASX on 21 December 2020. The Company confirms that it is not aware of any new information or data that materially affects the information included in the original market announcement and confirms that all material assumptions and technical parameters underpinning the estimate continue to apply and have not materially changed. The Company confirms that the form and context in which the Competent Person's findings are presented have not been materially modified from the original market announcement. Appendix 1: JORC Tables Section 1 Sampling Techniques and Data (Criteria in this section apply to all succeeding sections.) Criteria JORC Code explanation Commentary Sampling techniques Nature and quality of sampling (eg cut channels, random chips, or specific specialised industry standard measurement tools appropriate to the minerals under investigation, such as down hole gamma sondes, or handheld XRF instruments, etc). These examples should not be taken as limiting the broad meaning of sampling. Include reference to measures taken to ensure sample representivity and the appropriate calibration of any measurement tools or systems used. Aspects of the determination of mineralisation that are Material to the Public Report. In cases where 'industry standard' work has been done this would be relatively simple (eg 'reverse circulation drilling was used to obtain 1 m samples from which 3 kg was pulverised to produce a 30 g charge for fire assay'). In other cases more explanation may be required, such as where there is coarse gold that has inherent sampling problems. Unusual commodities or mineralisation types (eg submarine nodules) may warrant disclosure of detailed information. Historical surface sampling data. Samples were collected by geologists in the field and may only represent a small fraction of the local geology Samples were collected following visual criteria and mineralized samples were more likely to have been sampled Historical reports all indicate that for all the various types of samples collected, industry best practice of the time was followed and analysis were conducted at reputable laboratories with QA/QC systems in place. Drilling techniques Drill type (eg core, reverse circulation, open-hole hammer, rotary air blast, auger, Bangka, sonic, etc) and details (eg core diameter, triple or standard tube, depth of diamond tails, face-sampling bit or other type, whether core is oriented and if so, by what method, etc). No drill results reported in this release Drill sample recovery Method of recording and assessing core and chip sample recoveries and results assessed. Measures taken to maximise sample recovery and ensure representative nature of the samples. Whether a relationship exists between sample recovery and grade and whether sample bias may have occurred due to preferential loss/gain of fine/coarse material. No drill results reported in this release Logging Whether core and chip samples have been geologically and geotechnically logged to a level of detail to support appropriate Mineral Resource estimation, mining studies and metallurgical studies. Whether logging is qualitative or quantitative in nature. Core (or costean, channel, etc) photography. The total length and percentage of the relevant intersections logged. Rock chips samples have been extensively described and the description recorded on the SIGEOM (Systeme d'information geominiere du Quebec) database. Sub-sampling techniques and sample preparation If core, whether cut or sawn and whether quarter, half or all core taken. If non-core, whether riffled, tube sampled, rotary split, etc and whether sampled wet or dry. For all sample types, the nature, quality and appropriateness of the sample preparation technique. Quality control procedures adopted for all sub-sampling stages to maximise representivity of samples. Measures taken to ensure that the sampling is representative of the in situ material collected, including for instance results for field duplicate/second-half sampling. Whether sample sizes are appropriate to the grain size of the material being sampled. Rock chips samples submitted for chemical analysis. Various types of samples collected at various points in time All reports show that industry best practice at the time was followed Quality of assay data and laboratory tests The nature, quality and appropriateness of the assaying and laboratory procedures used and whether the technique is considered partial or total. For geophysical tools, spectrometers, handheld XRF instruments, etc, the parameters used in determining the analysis including instrument make and model, reading times, calibrations factors applied and their derivation, etc. Nature of quality control procedures adopted (eg standards, blanks, duplicates, external laboratory checks) and whether acceptable levels of accuracy (ie lack of bias) and precision have been established. All of the reported assays are laboratory assays and are considered total. Verification of sampling and assaying The verification of significant intersections by either independent or alternative company personnel. The use of twinned holes. Documentation of primary data, data entry procedures, data verification, data storage (physical and electronic) protocols. Discuss any adjustment to assay data. No verification of sampling has occurred yet. Benz Mining teams have visited the outcrops sampled historically and have collected multiple samples from each outcrop. Those new samples have been submitted for analysis and results have not yet been received Location of data points Accuracy and quality of surveys used to locate drill holes (collar and down-hole surveys), trenches, mine workings and other locations used in Mineral Resource estimation. Specification of the grid system used. Quality and adequacy of topographic control. Surface samples location for samples collected before 2000 were approximate and based on positioning of sampling locations against topographical maps Post 2000 GPS location of samples was more accurate. Benz field teams reported that approximate locations coincided with outcrops in the field and the approximate locations were deemed accurate enough for the purpose of detecting anomalies. Data spacing and distribution Data spacing for reporting of Exploration Results. Whether the data spacing and distribution is sufficient to establish the degree of geological and grade continuity appropriate for the Mineral Resource and Ore Reserve estimation procedure(s) and classifications applied. Whether sample compositing has been applied. Not applicable. Data is not yet to be used in a resource estimation. Orientation of data in relation to geological structure Whether the orientation of sampling achieves unbiased sampling of possible structures and the extent to which this is known, considering the deposit type. If the relationship between the drilling orientation and the orientation of key mineralised structures is considered to have introduced a sampling bias, this should be assessed and reported if material. Surface sampling has inherent bias as geologists tend to select material showing signs of mineralization preferentially. Sample security The measures taken to ensure sample security. No record of samples security have been found however, descriptions of the protocol followed by reporting companies show that samples were in custody of the companies until transfer to the assay laboratories Audits or reviews The results of any audits or reviews of sampling techniques and data. The Company is constantly reviewing its sampling and assaying policies. No external audit has been conducted at this stage. Section 2 Reporting of Exploration Results (Criteria listed in the preceding section also apply to this section.) Criteria JORC Code explanation Commentary Mineral tenement and land tenure status Type, reference name/number, location and ownership including agreements or material issues with third parties such as joint ventures, partnerships, overriding royalties, native title interests, historical sites, wilderness or national park and environmental settings. The security of the tenure held at the time of reporting along with any known impediments to obtaining a licence to operate in the area. The Eastmain Mine Project comprises 152 contiguous mining claims each with an area of approximately 52.7 ha covering a total of 8,014.36 ha plus one industrial lease permit that are owned by Eastmain Mines Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Fury Gold Mines. The claims are numbered 1133433 to 1133583 consecutively plus claim 104458 (Figure 4.2). All of the claims are located within NTS sheet 33A 08. The former Mine Lease BM 817 was issued on January 10, 1995 and expired in 2015 after a 20-year term. This former Mine Lease was converted to Industrial Lease 00184710000 on September 1, 2015 and contains all normal surface rights. The former mineral rights for BM 817 are now included in the expanded Claims 1133523, 1133524, 1133525, 1133505, 1133506 and 1133507. The claims are 100% held by Fury Gold Mines subject to certain net smelter royalties ("NSR"). On August 9, 2019, Benz Mining Corp. announced that it has entered into an option agreement with Eastmain Resources Inc. (now Fury Gold Mines) to acquire a 100% interest in the former producing Eastmain Gold Project located in James Bay District, Quebec, for CAD $5,000,000. Eastmain Resources would retain a 2% Net Smelter Return royalty in respect of the Project. Benz may, at any time, purchase one half of the NSR Royalty, thereby reducing the NSR Royalty to a 1% net smelter returns royalty, for $1,500,000. The Eastmain Mine, as defined by the perimeter of a historic mining lease, is subject to a production royalty net smelter return ("NSR") of 2.3% through production of the next 250,000 oz produced and 2% thereafter. A package of claims surrounding the mine precinct is subject to a production royalty (NSR) of 2% in favor of Goldcorp as a result of their succession to Placer Dome in an agreement dated December 30, 1988 between Placer Dome, MSV Resources Inc. and Northgate Exploration Limited. The 152 claims that form the Eastmain Mine Property are all in good standing with an active status. Exploration done by other parties Acknowledgment and appraisal of exploration by other parties. 1930s & 1940s - Prospecting of gossans 1950s & 1960s - Riocanex - Exploration of the Upper Eastmain Greenstone Belt Mid 1960s - Fort George - Diamond drilling of a gossan zone 1696 - Canex Aerial Exploration Ltd & Placer Development Ltd - Airborne magnetic and EM surveys with ground geophysics follow up. 1970 - Placer Development Ltd - Seven holes testing an EM anomaly. Discovery of A Zone with 1.5m @ 13.71g/t Au 1974 - Nordore - Aerodat airborne AEM survey and Ground geophysics. 3 holes returned anomalous gold values adjacent to B Zone 1974 - Inco Uranerz - Airborne geophysical survey over the whole greenstone belt. 1981 & 1982 - Placer - Airborne and ground EM, ground magnetics. Drilling of EM anomalies discovered B zone and C zone. 1983 to 1985 - Placer - Airborne and ground EM, downhole PEM, 91 holes over A B and C zones. 1986 - Placer - 25 holes into A B and C zones 1987 &1988 - Placer Dome / MSV JV - Drilling of A, B and C zones 1988 to 1994 - MSV Resources - Drilling, surface sampling, trenching, regional exploration, Seismic refraction over ABC Zones, 1994 & 1995 - MSV Resources - Mining of 118,356t at 10.58g/t Au and 0.3%Cu, processed at Copper Rand plant in Chibougamau, 40,000oz recovered 1997 - MSV Resources- Exploration, mapping, prospecting, trenching. 2004 - Campbell Resources - M&I resource calculation for Eastmain Mine. 2005-2007 - Eastmain Resources - Purchase of the project from Campbell Resources, VTEM, Prospecting, regional exploration. 2007-2019 - Eastmain Resources - Sporadic drilling, regional exploration, mapping, sampling, trenching. Surface geochemistry (soils) Geology Deposit type, geological setting and style of mineralisation. In the Eastmain Gold Deposit, gold mineralization occurs in quartz veins with associated massive to semi-massive sulphide lenses/ veins and silicified zones associated with a deformation corridor. The mineralized zones are 3 m to 10 m thick and contained in a strongly deformed and altered assemblage (Mine series) consisting of felsic, mafic and ultramafic rocks. Mineralized quartz veins and lenses show a variable thickness between 10 cm and 13 m, and sulphide contents average 15% to 20% in the mineralized quartz veins and sulphide lenses. In order of decreasing abundance, sulphides consist of pyrrhotite, pyrite, and chalcopyrite, with minor sphalerite, magnetite and molybdenite. Visible gold occurs in the mineralized quartz veins as small (<1 mm) grains associated with quartz and (or) sulphides in the A, B and C Zones. Regionally, Benz Mining tenure covers Archean geology and predominantly greenstone sequences, composed of ultramafic, mafic and felsic volcanic, sub volcanic and plutonic rocks. Worldwide, Archean Greenstone Belts are know to host orogenic gold deposits, intrusion related gold deposits, polymetallic volcanogenic massive sulphide deposits, nickel sulphide deposits (Komatiite flow or ultramafic intrusive related), pegmatite hosted Lithium Tantalum Tin Cesium mineralization. Drill hole Information A summary of all information material to the understanding of the exploration results including a tabulation of the following information for all Material drill holes: easting and northing of the drill hole collar elevation or RL (Reduced Level - elevation above sea level in metres) of the drill hole collar dip and azimuth of the hole down hole length and interception depth hole length. If the exclusion of this information is justified on the basis that the information is not Material and this exclusion does not detract from the understanding of the report, the Competent Person should clearly explain why this is the case. No drilling reported in this release Data aggregation methods In reporting Exploration Results, weighting averaging techniques, maximum and/or minimum grade truncations (eg cutting of high grades) and cut-off grades are usually Material and should be stated. Where aggregate intercepts incorporate short lengths of high grade results and longer lengths of low grade results, the procedure used for such aggregation should be stated and some typical examples of such aggregations should be shown in detail. The assumptions used for any reporting of metal equivalent values should be clearly stated. No drilling reported in this release Relationship between mineralisation widths and intercept lengths These relationships are particularly important in the reporting of Exploration Results. If the geometry of the mineralisation with respect to the drill hole angle is known, its nature should be reported. If it is not known and only the down hole lengths are reported, there should be a clear statement to this effect (eg 'down hole length, true width not known'). All sampling reported in this release is historical surface sampling which provides single point data Diagrams Appropriate maps and sections (with scales) and tabulations of intercepts should be included for any significant discovery being reported These should include, but not be limited to a plan view of drill hole collar locations and appropriate sectional views. See figures in the body of text Balanced reporting Where comprehensive reporting of all Exploration Results is not practicable, representative reporting of both low and high grades and/or widths should be practiced to avoid misleading reporting of Exploration Results. All assays results available to the company have been released. Other substantive exploration data Other exploration data, if meaningful and material, should be reported including (but not limited to): geological observations; geophysical survey results; geochemical survey results; bulk samples - size and method of treatment; metallurgical test results; bulk density, groundwater, geotechnical and rock characteristics; potential deleterious or contaminating substances. Benz conducted systematic BHEM of each hole drilled as well as BHEM surveying of historical holes. BHEM identified over 150 in-hole and off-hole conductors coincident or not with drilled mineralization. Further work The nature and scale of planned further work (eg tests for lateral extensions or depth extensions or large-scale step-out drilling). Diagrams clearly highlighting the areas of possible extensions, including the main geological interpretations and future drilling areas, provided this information is not commercially sensitive. Benz Mining is currently conducting a 50,000m drilling campaign which started in January 2021 This drilling is conducted alongside regional FLEM surveys (TMC Geophysics) All new holes will be surveyed by BHEM as well as a selection of historical holes. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94485 Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Kodiak Copper Corp. (TSXV: KDK) (OTCQB: KDKCF) (FSE: 5DD1) (the "Company" or "Kodiak") is pleased to announce that the Company is remobilizing staff to the MPD copper-gold porphyry project in Southern British Columbia to restart its drill program. With improved conditions, wildfire risk to our operations has been reduced, allowing the Company to resume work. The Company will continue to monitor the situation closely and act accordingly throughout the remainder of the summer fire season. Claudia Tornquist, President and CEO of Kodiak said, "Special thanks to all fire fighters and first responders who work tirelessly to contain the wildfires. Kodiak is now able to resume work at our MPD drill program after only a short interruption which will not have a material impact on the large exploration program we are undertaking at MPD this year. We are looking forward to many drill results throughout the autumn and winter and expect to update the market about our progress in the near future." On behalf of the Board of Directors Kodiak Copper Corp. Claudia Tornquist President & CEO For further information contact: Nancy Curry, Corporate Development ncurry@kodiakcoppercorp.com +1 (604) 646-8362 About Kodiak Copper Corp. Kodiak is focused on its 100% owned copper porphyry projects in Canada and the USA. The Company's most advanced asset is the MPD copper-gold porphyry project in the prolific Quesnel Trough in south-central British Columbia, Canada, where the Company made a discovery of high-grade mineralization within a wide mineralized envelope in 2020. Kodiak also holds the Mohave copper-molybdenum-silver porphyry project in Arizona, USA, near the world-class Bagdad mine. Kodiak's porphyry projects have both been historically drilled and present known mineral discoveries with the potential to hold large-scale deposits. Kodiak's founder and Chairman is Chris Taylor who is well-known for his gold discovery success with Great Bear Resources. Kodiak is also part of Discovery Group led by John Robins, one of the most successful mining entrepreneurs in Canada. Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-Looking Statement (Safe Harbor Statement): This press release contains forward looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities laws. The use of any of the words "anticipate", "plan", "continue", "expect", "estimate", "objective", "may", "will", "project", "should", "predict", "potential" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward looking statements. In particular, this press release contains forward looking statements concerning the Company's exploration plans. Although the Company believes that the expectations and assumptions on which the forward looking statements are based are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on the forward looking statements because the Company cannot give any assurance that they will prove correct. Since forward looking statements address future events and conditions, they involve inherent assumptions, risks and uncertainties. Actual results could differ materially from those currently anticipated due to a number of assumptions, factors and risks. These assumptions and risks include, but are not limited to, assumptions and risks associated with conditions in the equity financing markets, and assumptions and risks regarding receipt of regulatory and shareholder approvals. Management has provided the above summary of risks and assumptions related to forward looking statements in this press release in order to provide readers with a more comprehensive perspective on the Company's future operations. The Company's actual results, performance or achievement could differ materially from those expressed in, or implied by, these forward looking statements and, accordingly, no assurance can be given that any of the events anticipated by the forward looking statements will transpire or occur, or if any of them do so, what benefits the Company will derive from them. These forward looking statements are made as of the date of this press release, and, other than as required by applicable securities laws, the Company disclaims any intent or obligation to update publicly any forward looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or results or otherwise. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94505 FORT LAUDERDALE, FL / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / American Leisure Holdings Inc. (OTC:AMLH), is pleased to announce that earlier today August 26th, the company submitted all the required and necessary documentations to OTC Markets to become 'OTC Current' in its reporting requirements . Over the course of the last month the company has taken several actions to bring the company into good standing. On August 2nd the company was reinstated in the state of Nevada and with plans to be OTC Current well before the Sept 28th SEC imposed deadline. Immediately thereafter, the company paid OTC markets to gain access to the otciq service(the back end of otcmarkets). In a recent interview, CEO Adrian Patasar discussed the strategic road map of American Leisure Holdings. He emphasised on several upcoming reporting timelines and discussed potential mergers or joint ventures which the company has identified. CEO Adrian Patasar, said the following. ' Over the course of the last month I have worked very aggressively to position the company to be in good standings with all parties that oversee otc companies. We have also recently established a solid relationship with a very talented, young, smart and successful group, (who will be in our upcoming 2021 Q3 Filing). More importantly, any financing provided, will be at fixed prices, avoiding the traditional toxic financing means of yesteryear. Aside from some back pay to the CEO, (which can always be settled out for equity), the company will be virtually debt free and ready to grow and build value for shareholders' Below is the list of items the company uploaded to get apply to get 'OTC Current' Annual Report 2019 Annual Report 2020 Q1 &Q2 2021 Filings. Attorneys Letter in regards to Two past Fiscal Years Obviously, OTC Markets may have their comments or questions and the company will stand by, ready to answer any queries. About American Leisure Holding Inc. American Leisure Holdings Inc. ($AMLH) is a holding company that is in the process of getting current with the SEC and OTC Markets. The company plans to bring accretive shareholder value and grow by participating in cash flowing, revenue generating projects and acquiring cutting edge technologies. Contact: Adrian M. Patasar American Leisure Holding Inc. 561-654-5722 info@amlh.net ($AMLH) FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. All statements other than statements of historical fact included in this presentation are forward-looking statements. These statements relate to analyses and other information, which are based on forecasts of future results and estimates of amounts not yet determinable. These statements also relate to our future prospects, developments, and business strategies. These forward-looking statements may be identified by the use of terms and phrases such as 'anticipate,' 'believe,' 'could,' 'estimate,' 'expect,' 'intend,' 'may,' 'plan,' 'predict,' 'project,' 'target,' 'will' and similar terms and phrases, including references to assumptions. However, these words are not the exclusive means of identifying such statements. Although we believe that our plans, intentions, and expectations reflected in or suggested by such forward-looking statements are reasonable, we cannot assure you that we will achieve those plans, intentions, or expectations. All forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those that we expected or may prove unachievable. The Company's business and prospects must be considered in light of the risks, expenses, and difficulties frequently encountered by companies working with new and rapidly evolving technologies such as blockchain. These risks include, but are not limited to, an inability to create a viable product and risks related to the issuance of tokens. Furthermore, the Company's business contemplates participation in a highly regulated space of consumer finance and associated customer data and therefore may face regulatory and execution challenges, particularly in light of the novelty of the concept. The Company cannot assure you that it will succeed in addressing these risks, and our failure to do so could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects. There can be no assurance as to whether or when (if ever) the Company will achieve profitability or liquidity. The forward-looking statements included in this press release are made only as of the date hereof. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, except as otherwise. SOURCE: American Leisure Holdings, Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661475/American-Leisure-Holdings-Inc-Submits-Attorney-Letter-to-OTC-Markets Former Qualtrics leader to head strategic initiatives to accelerate Quantum Metric's continued market growth and industry innovation COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Quantum Metric, the pioneer in Continuous Product Design (CPD), a methodology that helps organizations build better digital products faster, today announced that Bryce Winkelman will serve as its Chief Business and Strategy Officer. With his experience over the last 14 years growing Qualtrics from start-up to public company, Bryce will advance Quantum Metric's market reach and identify strategic ways to grow with the evolving digital landscape. "My experience has shown me that people, not technology, sit at the heart of any successful business," said Winkelman. "Through the partnership with Qualtrics, I've had the opportunity to see the unique, people-centric value Quantum Metric brings to the brands they work with, their customers and its own employees. I'm thrilled to join Quantum Metric and have the opportunity to contribute to the next chapter of company growth and innovation." At Qualtrics, Winkelman held roles including Global Head of Solution Strategy for Employee Experience and Global Head of Digital CX. He established and ran teams in the U.S., Europe, Asia Pacific and Latin America, providing solutions spanning employee and customer experience across all verticals. Winkelman is based in Salt Lake City and will report directly to Quantum Metric CEO and founder, Mario Ciabarra. "Bryce has had a front row seat to the digital customer evolution and brings a distinct perspective to Quantum Metric that will allow us to remain on the forefront of industry innovation," said Ciabarra. "It's an exciting time at Quantum Metric, as we continue to attract new team members, like Bryce, that not only are experts in their craft, but continue to uphold our commitments to passion, persistence and integrity. This has been our recipe for success in the past and will continue to guide our rapid growth in the marketplace." Winkelman is the latest of a number of industry experts who have joined Quantum Metric over the past few months. In August, Quantum Metric also welcomed Elissa Quinby as Senior Director of Retail Marketing. Having spent seven years with Amazon Retail, Quinby brings unique retail expertise that will enable Quantum Metric to build better partnerships with customers and boost their success. In addition, Ben Child joined Quantum Metric as Vice President of Brand in June, bringing his extensive experience in leading creative teams at Domo, Workfront and Adobe. Quantum Metric kicked off 2021 by becoming one of the year's first tech unicorns, with a valuation above $1 billion and a $200 million Series B funding round led by Insight Partners. The company has seen continued phenomenal success, with a 100-percent customer retention for the first half of the year. For information on Quantum Metric and its leadership team visit: www.Quantummetric.com About Quantum Metric Quantum Metric helps organizations build better digital products faster. Our Continuous Product Design platform gives business and technical teams a single version of truth that's automatically quantified and based on what matters most - your customer's perspective. The result: Teams are aligned, learn faster, and release with confidence. In January of 2021, Quantum Metric secured its place as the first tech unicorn of the year with an above $1 billion valuation and a $200 million Series B funding round. In 2020, Quantum Metric was ranked 124 in the Inc 5000, a list of America's fastest-growing private companies. For more information about Quantum Metric, visit www.quantummetric.com Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1559642/Quantum_Metric_Logo.jpg BANGALORE, India, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Global Electronic Health Records Market is Segmented by Type (Client Server Based, Web Based, Software as Services), by Application (Ambulatory surgery centers, Hospital, Physician Office): Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2021 - 2027. This report is published on Valuates Reports under Health Category. The Global Electronic Health Records market size is projected to reach USD 47.25 Billion by 2027, from USD 29.16 Billion in 2020, at a CAGR of 7.14% during 2021-2027. EHRs are patient-centered, real-time records that make information available to authorized users promptly and securely. While an EHR system does contain a patient's medical and treatment history, it is designed to go beyond traditional clinical data collected in a provider's office and can encompass a broader view of a patient's care. Major factors driving the growth of the Electronic Health Records market are: EHR can reduce the incidence of medical errors by improving the accuracy and clarity of medical records. EHRs give more full patient information, allowing doctors to make well-informed care decisions more rapidly, improving treatment, and reducing safety concerns. These factors are expected to increase EHR adoption. The electronic health record (EHR) streamlines the clinician's workflow by automating access to information. Other care-related activities, such as evidence-based decision support, quality monitoring, and outcomes reporting, can be supported directly or indirectly by the EHR through various interfaces. Such advantages are expected to further boost the EHR market forward. Furthermore, the need for easy accessibility to patients' records by the physicians is expected to fuel the EHR market. View Full Report: https://reports.valuates.com/market-reports/QYRE-Auto-2E1900/global-electronic-health-records TRENDS INFLUENCING THE ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS MARKET: As the number of patients seeking treatment for chronic diseases in specialist clinics grows, more effective data management systems will be required. This in turn is expected to drive the growth of the electronic health record market. The rising incidence of chronic and severe health disorders, such as cancer, diabetes, skin infections, and orthopedic conditions, has resulted in an increase in the number of patients visiting specialized facilities. Healthcare professionals are increasingly relying on digital technologies to provide ongoing care and improve the treatment process. EHR software's acceptability in specialty centers will continue to grow in the future since it provides an efficient means of managing patient health data. EHR can enable improved efficiencies and lower health care costs by promoting preventive medicine and improved coordination of health care services, as well as by reducing waste and redundant tests. Furthermore, they can provide better clinical decision-making by integrating patient information from multiple sources. These advantages are expected to fuel the electronic health record market. COVID-19 IMPACT ON ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS MARKET COVID-19 has a moderately beneficial impact on healthcare systems' acceptance of EHR. The electronic health record is also utilized to help clinical research activities by allowing researchers to share and access precise clinical data that has aided them in COVID-19 trend analysis and drug development. This has also aided in the management of large patient databases in hospitals with integrated EHR systems. Furthermore, industry sources are assisting the government with pandemic preparedness. Government support for integration of EHR software in the healthcare ecosystem to develop sustainable infrastructure especially in the European region will influence the EHR market. Get Free Sample: https://reports.valuates.com/request/sample/QYRE-Auto-2E1900/Global_Electronic_Health_Records_Market EHR MARKET SHARE The web-based segment is expected to be the most lucrative. The popularity of web-based EHRs among physicians and healthcare providers who operate on a smaller scale can be ascribed to the fact that these systems can be set up without the need for in-house servers and can also enable considerable changes and improvements, as needed. Europe and North America are expected to be the most lucrative regions during the forecast period. Both Europe and North America are technologically more advanced and the acceptance of EHR is much easier than in developing countries. Furthermore, favorable government policies and rising digitalization in the healthcare sector are propelling the EHR market in these regions. Inquire for Regional Data: https://reports.valuates.com/request/regional/QYRE-Auto-2E1900/Global_Electronic_Health_Records_Market ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORD MARKET SEGMENTATION By product type Web Based Client Server Based Software as Services. By end users/application Hospital Physician Office Ambulatory surgery centers Others. Key Manufacturers PA SUN IBM PCCW Solution PKU Healthcare IT CO., Ltd Kingdee Duchang IT GoodWill Wining Neusoft Allscripts Healthcare Solutions, Inc. Athenahealth, Inc. Cerner Corporation CPSI Epic Systems EClinicalWorks. Buy Now for Single User: https://reports.valuates.com/api/directpaytoken?rcode=QYRE-Auto-2E1900&lic=single-user Buy Now for Enterprise User: https://reports.valuates.com/api/directpaytoken?rcode=QYRE-Auto-2E1900&lic=enterprise-user SUBSCRIPTION We have introduced a tailor-made subscription for our customers. Please leave a note in the Comment Section to know about our subscription plans. SIMILAR REPORTS - Ambulatory EHR & EMR Systems Market is segmented by Type, Cloud based, On premise, by Application, Hospitals, Clinics and by various regions. - The Clinical EHR Market is segmented by Type Hardware, Software, Services & Consulting, by Application Hospitals, Clinics, Pharmacies and by various regions. - Hospital EMR Systems market size is projected to reach USD 15260 Million by 2027, from USD 9913.4 Million in 2020, at a CAGR of 5.9% during 2021-2027. - Healthcare API market size is projected to reach US$ 184.8 million by 2027, from US$ 156.5 million in 2020, at a CAGR of 2.4% during 2021-2027. - Digital Healthcare market size is projected to reach USD 95430 Million by 2026, from USD 77240 Million in 2020, at a CAGR of 22.4% during 2021-2026. - The eHealth market was valued at USD 74,476 Million in 2019, and is projected to reach USD 230,640 Million by 2027 at a CAGR of 14.5% from 2020 to 2027. - Electronic Health Record (EHR) Software Solutions Market - The smart hospitals market was valued at USD 16,925 Million in 2017 and is expected to reach USD 58,777 Million by 2025 with a CAGR of 17.3% during the forecast period. - Acute Care Electronic Health Recorder (EHR) Market - EMR Systems Market - Urology EMR (Electronic Medical Record) Software Market - Health Care Information System Market Click here to see related reports on Electronic Health Records Market ABOUT US Valuates offers in-depth market insights into various industries. Our extensive report repository is constantly updated to meet your changing industry analysis needs. Our team of market analysts can help you select the best report covering your industry. We understand your niche region-specific requirements and that's why we offer customization of reports. With our customization in place, you can request for any particular information from a report that meets your market analysis needs. To achieve a consistent view of the market, data is gathered from various primary and secondary sources, at each step, data triangulation methodologies are applied to reduce deviance and find a consistent view of the market. Each sample we share contains detail research methodology employed to generate the report, Please also reach to our sales team to get the complete list of our data sources CONTACT US Valuates Reports sales@valuates.com For U.S. Toll-Free Call +1-(315)-215-3225 For IST Call +91-8040957137 WhatsApp: +91 9945648335 Website: https://reports.valuates.com Follow on Twitter - https://twitter.com/valuatesreports Follow on Linkedin - https://in.linkedin.com/company/valuatesreports Follow on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/valuatesreports Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1082232/Valuates_Reports_Logo.jpg Brown Honored by The Software Report for His Role Leading the Top Ranked Company LONDON and NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021, a leading technology company focused on helping businesses engage in more meaningful customer conversations, today announced that its Chief Executive Officer, James Brown, has been recognized as one of the "Top 50 SaaS CEOs of 2021" by The Software Report. Brown joins this distinguished list of cloud software executives honored for their business leadership and deep expertise. Each year, The Software Report showcases exceptional CEOs based on effective leadership style, company performance, customer satisfaction, workplace culture, product strength and strategic decision-making, among other areas. James Brown is a seasoned executive with over 25 years of experience leading high growth SaaS companies and ensuring success among enterprise-level customers. Since joining Smart Communications as CEO in 2018, Brown has helped the company achieve Leader status in its industry as recognized by analyst firms such as IDC, Aspire, Novarica, and Aragon. These firms, and now more than 650 customers, have been impressed by the company's ability to help enterprises take full advantage of the cloud to efficiently engage their customers in smarter conversations that are two-way, personalized and delivered via multiple channels and devices based on preferences. The increased adoption of its cloud-based solution has resulted in the strongest second quarter performance in company history; propelling exceptional growth for the first half of 2021. Additionally, during his tenure Brown has overseen two strategic acquisitions, including Intelledox in 2019 and Assentis earlier this year. As a result, Smart Communications has evolved its Conversation Cloud platform to include forms transformation capabilities and had deepened its expertise in Financial Services and expanded its reach throughout continental Europe. "It's an honor to be included by The Software Report on this list alongside other SaaS CEOs who are making a tremendous impact on their companies and industries," said James Brown, CEO of Smart Communications. "Helping enterprises realize the benefits that cloud technology can have on their business and with their customers has never been more important than over the past 18 months as digital transformation efforts became an imperative. I have been so impressed with the commitment my colleagues at Smart Communications have made to help companies along this digital-first journey and it has been my pleasure to lead this team." The Software Report is a comprehensive source for market research and insights, business news, investment activity and corporate actions related to the software sector. Based in New York City, the firm is run by a seasoned team of editors, writers, and media professionals highly knowledgeable on software and the various companies, executives and investors that make up the sector. http://www.thesoftwarereport.com About Smart Communications Smart Communications is a leading technology company focused on helping businesses engage in more meaningful customer conversations. Its Conversation Cloudplatform uniquely delivers personalized, omnichannel conversations across the entire customer experience, empowering companies to succeed in today's digital-focused, customer-driven world while also simplifying processes and operating more efficiently. Smart Communications is headquartered in the UK and serves more than 650 customers from offices located across North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific. Smart Communications' Conversation Cloud platform includes the enterprise-scale customer communications managementTM, forms transformation capabilities made possible by SmartIQTMand the trade documentation expertise of SmartDXTM. In 2021, the company acquired Assentis, a leading European software solutions provider specializing in customer communications management. Contact: Robert Patterson Smart Communications rpatterson@smartcommunications.com Edmonton, Alberta--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Altiplano Metals Inc. (TSXV: APN) (WKN: A2JNFG) ("Altiplano" or the "Company") is pleased to report on the July 2021 results from the Farellon Copper-Gold (Cu-Au) mine located near La Serena, Chile. During July 2021, Farellon extracted approximately 4,020 tonnes of mineralized Cu/Au material at an approximate grade of 1.52% copper with shipments for processing totaling 2,831 tonnes. These figures represent a 11.5% improvement from June in tonnes extracted and a 2% increase in the copper grade. Revenue generated in July was approximately US$243,900 (after processing costs). Waste removal increased in July, reflecting the ongoing development work of the Hugo decline extension and preparation work for bench mining practices. At July month end, an additional 1,280 tonnes were stockpiled at site and will be shipped in August for processing. CEO Alastair McIntyre commented, "I am pleased to see that our positive July results highlight our focus on continuation of the upward trend in improved grade and increasing output while working in tandem with the ongoing development of our decline extension and sustainability work, such as the ventilation improvements." Figure 1. Comparative 2021 Monthly Review of Farellon Output To view an enhanced version of Figure 1, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4303/94388_ce1e495804c5e80f_001full.jpg Figure 2. Monthly Processed Material, Income and Mining Cost at Farellon To view an enhanced version of Figure 2, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4303/94388_ce1e495804c5e80f_002full.jpg Figure 3. Comparative 2021 Income, Copper Contained and Grade Month 2021 USD Income* Copper Pounds Cu grade % January $218,695 104,741 1.77% February $137,990 68,806 1.38% March $184,028 83,974 1.43% April $230,655 88,053 1.64% May $99,614 39,330 1.23% June $269,442 93,277 1.49% July $243,853 90,654 1.52% *After processing costs Figure 4. Illustration of Underground Operations at Farellon To view an enhanced version of Figure 4, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4303/94388_ce1e495804c5e80f_003full.jpg The decision to re-commence production on the Farellon deposit is not based on a feasibility study of mineral reserves demonstrating economic and technical viability and there is increased uncertainty and economic and technical risks of failure associated with the production decision. During July, extraction of Cu/Au mineralized material focused on advancing the 376 SW and the 368 NE levels. Bench mining continued on the ceiling of level 389 SW and preparation for benching has begun on the 382 SW ceiling (Figure 4). Development work on the Hugo Decline continues with the advance to the next access point at the 360 m level where to date, 70.5 m of the total 90 m required to reach the 360 m level have been completed. The decline advance is expected to be completed at the end of August where an additional advance of 22 m will be required to reach to the vein intersection. This additional work is expected be completed in September. The civil works for the new ventilation plan started with the closure of selected areas of the Almendro Tunnel to support the improved airflow through the Hugo Decline. In addition, the 125 HP fan platform has been installed with test phase preparation underway. About Altiplano Altiplano Metals Inc. (TSXV: APN) is a Canadian mining company focused on developing and acquiring near term cash flowing assets and exploring for projects of significant scale. Altiplano's goal is to grow into a mid-tier mining company through developing a portfolio of near-term production projects, cash flowing assets, and exploration projects focusing on copper, gold and silver. Management has a substantial record of success in capitalizing on opportunity, overcoming challenges and building shareholder value. John Williamson, B.Sc., P.Geol., a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101, has reviewed and approved the technical contents of this document. Altiplano is part of the Metals Group portfolio of companies. Metals Group is an award-winning team of professionals who stand for technical excellence, painstaking project selection, uncompromising corporate governance and a unique ability to pan through the rubble to discover and develop golden opportunities. www.metalsgroup.com ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD /s/ "John Williamson" Chairman For further information, please contact: Alastair McIntyre, CEO alastairm@apnmetals.com Tel: (416) 434 3799 Jeremy Yaseniuk, Director jeremyy@apnmetals.com Tel: (604) 773-1467 Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the (TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This release includes certain statements that may be deemed "forward-looking statements". All statements in this release, other than statements of historical facts, that address exploration drilling, exploitation activities and events or developments that the Company expects are forward-looking statements. A qualified person has not done sufficient work to classify any historical estimates as current mineral resources or mineral reserves and the issuer is not treating the historical estimates as current mineral resources or mineral reserves. The Farellon mine was previously in production dating back to the 1970's with a reported historical production (to a depth of 70 m) yielding approximately 300,000 tonnes at an average grade of 2.5% copper and 0.5g/t gold. This material was processed locally and sold to ENAMI. Altiplano is relying upon past production records, underground sampling and related activities and current diamond drilling to estimate grade and widths of the mineralization to reactivate production. The decision to commence production on the Farellon deposit is not based on a feasibility study of mineral reserves demonstrating economic and technical viability and there is increased uncertainty and economic and technical risks of failure associated with any production decision. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements include market prices, exploitation and exploration successes, continuity of mineralization, uncertainties related to the ability to obtain necessary permits, licenses and title and delays due to third party opposition, changes in government policies regarding mining and natural resource exploration and exploitation, and continued availability of capital and financing, and general economic, market or business conditions. Investors are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. For more information on the Company, investors should review the Company's continuous disclosure filings that are available at www.sedar.com. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94388 WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Dollar Tree, Inc. (DLTR) reported a year-over-year increase of 11.8% in its second quarter earnings per share. However, the company reduced its fiscal 2021 earnings guidance due to additional freight costs since the previous guidance. Dollar General Corp. (DG) recorded a year-on-year decline of 13.8% in its second quarter earnings per share. Same-store sales were down 4.7%, for the quarter. The company updated its fiscal 2021 financial guidance despite an expected increase in transportation and distribution costs for the remainder of fiscal 2021. Dollar Tree reported that its second-quarter earnings per share increased 11.8% to $1.23, from $1.10, last year. On average, 23 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to report profit per share of $1.01, for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items. Net income increased to $282.4 million from $261.5 million, last year. Dollar Tree reported that consolidated net sales increased 1.0% to $6.34 billion from $6.28 billion. Analysts expected revenue of $6.44 billion, for the quarter. Enterprise same-store sales decreased 1.2% on a constant currency basis, or 1.1% when adjusted to include the impact of Canadian currency fluctuations. For fiscal 2021, Dollar Tree now expects consolidated net sales to range from $26.19 billion to $26.44 billion, based on a low single-digit increase in same-store sales and 3.4% square footage growth. The company now estimates earnings per share will range from $5.40 to $5.60. Previously, the company projected fiscal 2021 earnings per share in a range of $5.80 and $6.05. Analysts expect the company to report profit per share of $5.99 on revenue of $26.40 billion. Freight costs for fiscal 2021 are now expected to be $1.50 to $1.60 per share higher than fiscal 2020. The updated outlook includes $0.60 to $0.65 per share, of additional freight costs since the prior guidance. The company's previous freight outlook assumed that its regular ocean carriers would fulfill only 85% of their contractual commitments and also assumed higher spot market rates. However, Dollar Tree now projects that its regular carriers will fulfill only 60-65% of their commitments. Also, the spot market rates for ocean freight from China have increased more than 20%. For the third quarter, Dollar Tree estimates consolidated net sales will range from $6.40 billion to $6.52 billion, based on a low single-digit increase in same-store sales for the combined enterprise. Earnings per share are estimated to be in the range of $0.88 to $0.98. Analysts expect the company to report profit per share of $1.26 on revenue of $6.43 billion. Shares of Dollar Tree were down 7% in pre-market trade on Thursday. Dollar General Corp. reported that its second-quarter earnings per share decreased 13.8% to $2.69 from $3.12, last year. On average, 22 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to report profit per share of $2.57, for the quarter. Net income was $637.0 million, a decrease of 19.1%. Net sales decreased 0.4% to $8.65 billion. Analysts expected revenue of $8.59 billion, for the quarter. For fiscal 2021, Dollar General now expects earnings per share in the range of $9.60 to $10.20, compared to previous expectation in the range of $9.50 to $10.20. Analysts expect the company to report profit per share of $10.22. Net sales growth is projected in a range of 0.5% to 1.5%; compared to prior expectation of a 1% decline to an increase of 1%. The company now targets same-store sales decline of 3.5% to 2.5%, compared to its prior expectation of a decline of 5% to 3%. Share repurchases are projected to be approximately $2.4 billion; compared to prior guidance of approximately $2.2 billion. Shares of Dollar General were down 5% in pre-market trade on Thursday. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX DOLLAR TREE-Aktie komplett kostenlos handeln - auf Smartbroker.de Led by C5 Capital, the investment validates Oomnitza's differentiated approach to managing the new enterprise hybrid IT environment Oomnitza, the pioneer in SaaS-based Enterprise Technology Management (ETM) solutions, announced it has completed a $20 million growth funding round led by C5 Capital, and includes Aspenwood Ventures (also known as Hummer Winblad Venture Partners) and Gula Tech Adventures, along with existing investors Riverside Acceleration Capital and Shasta Ventures. In total, Oomnitza has raised $35 million to fulfill its mission of improving the way enterprises manage and secure their technology assets. Oomnitza's customers include many technology unicorns as well as Fortune 500 organizations across retail, hospitality, automotive, and financial services sectors. These companies, representing more than $3 trillion of market capitalization, have adopted Oomnitza's solution to become their system of record to manage their technology assets. "Our customers have been telling us that the traditional approach of managing technology in siloed tools was not working, and that for the first time with Oomnitza, they have a single source of truth for all their technology portfolios," said Arthur Lozinski, CEO and Co-Founder of Oomnitza. "With our new capital partners' deep experience in technology and security, we are boosting product innovation, market reach and are innovating on new ways to address this fast growing and dynamic market." Oomnitza's Enterprise Technology Management product enables organizations to integrate and manage their diverse technology portfolio, including endpoint devices, applications, cloud infrastructure, networking, and accessories. "Oomnitza has created a new category-defining solution that provides immediate impact for organizations seeking to scale and maximize their technology ROI as evidenced by their rapid growth and enthusiastically positive customer feedback," said William Kilmer, Managing Partner at C5 Capital. "We believe that Oomnitza will be the solution of choice for organizations seeking to effectively manage their technology because customers who use their solution see strong, consistent, and rapid results." To date, more than 150 companies have adopted Oomnitza to bridge traditional technology silos and scale their assets while managing rapidly changing requirements in security, compliance, procurement, and improving employee experience. "Cybersecurity needs to rely on a clear inventory and management of all technology assets, and this has been lacking until now. With Oomnitza's Enterprise Technology Management solution, organizations finally have the foundation for effective cybersecurity," said Steve Kishi, Managing Director at Aspenwood Ventures. The move to a hybrid IT ecosystem requires an aggressive and revolutionary way of thinking about security, compliance, and the overall employee experience. "We are excited to join Oomnitza during this critical inflection point as the team continues to expand its enterprise offering and customer base," said Ron Gula, President of Gula Tech Adventures. "Oomnitza is the right technology at this time, focusing on the immediate global challenges of digital transformation, moving to the cloud, explosion of endpoints and devices, and the dynamism of working from anywhere. All IT teams deserve a solution that keeps them secure in the constantly evolving technology landscape." Riverside Acceleration Capital and Shasta Ventures also supported Oomnitza's previous round of funding, completed in August 2020. "We've been privileged to have a front-row seat to the growth of Oomnitza's team and to the continued expansion and maturation of the Oomnitza platform," said Jonathan Drillings, Partner at Riverside Acceleration Capital. "With the capability to manage all IT assets, and with intuitive automation frameworks, Oomnitza gives enterprises the ability to holistically manage their IT ecosystem and better control IT costs and security on- and off-premises." "Oomnitza's approach to managing IT technology is critical in today's massive and abrupt shift to a work-from-anywhere environment and accelerated move to the cloud," said Nitin Chopra, Managing Director at Shasta Ventures and Board Member at Oomnitza. "The legacy data center approach is going away, and Oomnitza is perfectly positioned with the right technology to manage and secure the new IT infrastructure." About Oomnitza Oomnitza is the first Enterprise Technology Management solution that provides a single source of truth for endpoints, applications, cloud, networking, and accessories. Our customers can orchestrate lifecycle processes, from purchase to end-of-life, across all IT assets, ensuring their technology is secure, compliant, and optimized, enabling their employees. Oomnitza is headquartered in San Francisco, CA. For more information, visit www.oomnitza.com. About C5 Capital Limited C5 Capital Limited (C5) is a global specialist investment firm that exclusively invests in the secure data ecosystem and in the transformation of critical infrastructure, including cyber security, cloud, AI, energy, and space. The firm is dedicated to nurturing a secure digital future with an investment strategy that is based on building long-term relationships with innovative companies that share in our mission. For more information, visit: www.c5capital.com. About Aspenwood Ventures Hummer Winblad Venture Partners Aspenwood Ventures (www.aspenwoodvc.com) is a San Francisco-based venture capital firm that leads pre-seed to Series A investments in enterprise software companies. Lars Leckie and Steve Kishi are the firm's managing directors, who spent 15 years each at Hummer Winblad Venture Partners prior to founding Aspenwood Ventures, where past early-stage investments include Mulesoft, Sonatype, Five9, Hopin, and Neuvector. About Gula Tech Adventures Gula Tech Adventures is a cybersecurity and technology-focused venture capital firm. At Gula Tech Adventures, we seek to increase the pervasiveness of cybersecurity in critical infrastructure and industries, improve awareness of cybersecurity risks, and provide opportunities for recruitment and training of the cybersecurity workforce. For more information about Gula Tech Adventures, please visit https://Gula.Tech. About Riverside Acceleration Capital Riverside Acceleration Capital (RAC) provides flexible growth capital to expansion-stage B2B software and technology companies, through an investment structure that maximizes alignment while minimizing dilution. RAC is part of The Riverside Company, a global private equity firm focused on investing in growing businesses valued at up to $400 million. Since its founding in 1988, Riverside has made more than 800 investments. The firm's international private equity and structured capital portfolios include more than 130 companies. For more information, visit https://www.riverside.ac. About Shasta Ventures Shasta Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm with a 15-year track record of investing in groundbreaking startups like Anaplan, Zuora, Nextdoor, SendBird, Lattice, Glint, Highspot, and hundreds more. Shasta now invests in innovative early-stage enterprises. By focusing just on these sectors, we can dive deeper to produce better outcomes. Our investment in Shasta Elevate gives enterprise founders the playbook, tools, and support they need to scale faster. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005519/en/ Contacts: Media Contact: Regina Parundik e: regina@cobblecreative.com CHICAGO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- According to the new market research report "Speech and Voice Recognition Market with COVID-19 Impact Analysis by Delivery Method, Deployment Mode (On Cloud, On-Premises/Embedded), Technology (Speech Recognition, Voice Recognition), Vertical and Geography - Global Forecast to 2026", published by MarketsandMarkets, the Speech And Voice Recognition Market is expected to grow from USD 8.3 billion in 2021 to USD 22.0 billion by 2026; it is expected to grow at a CAGR of 21.6% during the forecast period. The major driving factors for the growth of the speech and voice recognition market include increase in use of smart appliance and use of artificial intelligence technology to boost accuracy of speech and voice recognition system. The COVID-19 outbreak resulted in a decline in the growth rate of the speech and voice recognition market, especially in 2020 and 2021. The COVID-19 pandemic affected the speech and voice recognition market both positively and negatively. The demand for smart appliances and devices has increased with most of the population working from home. This has also created an opportunity for the speech and voice recognition market as this technology is being used in various smart devices. However, many people are also focusing on basic amenities during the pandemic, putting off other purchases for the time being. The COVID-19 pandemic has also resulted in halted production, thus affecting the manufacturing capabilities of all regions; the supply of products from manufacturers to end users has declined drastically as a result. Ask for PDF Brochure: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownloadNew.asp?id=202401714 Speech Recognition technology shows significant increase in speech and voice recognition market during the forecast period. Growing demand for speech-enabled consumer electronics devices including smart home devices, mobile devices, and wearable devices is expected to result in rapid growth of the speech recognition market during the forecast period. The automatic speech recognition (ASR) segment is expected to record the highest CAGR in the forecast period. The growing accuracy of ASR technology offered by Chinese vendors, such as Baidu (China) and iFLYTEK (China) is expected to benefit the entire value chain for the automatic speech recognition market in Asia Pacific during the forecast period. The growing need for local language-based speech recognition software in South Asian countries is expected to provide ample growth opportunities for the ASR market in APAC during the forecast period. On-premises/embedded deployment mode to grow significantly during the forecast period The demand for on-premises/embedded infrastructure is expected to increase in the forecast period. Americas will lead the market for the on-premises/embedded segment as a result of more companies demanding on-premises/embedded deployment. The increasing demand for on-premises/embedded infrastructure is also leading to an increase in the number of providers in the Americas, thereby improving the overall market growth. Browse in-depth TOC on "Speech and Voice Recognition Market" 167 - Tables 72 - Figures 227 - Pages Inquiry Before Buying: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Enquiry_Before_BuyingNew.asp?id=202401714 Consumer vertical to have the largest market share during the forecast period In 2020, the consumer vertical accounted for the largest size of the speech and voice recognition market and is expected to hold a dominant position throughout the forecast period. The introduction of voice based smart devices in the consumer sector has led to the launch of many innovative products in the market. The continuous decline in the cost of voice and speech devices, software developments, and relevant content developments are also driving the market for speech and voice recognition. The increasing demand for intelligent virtual assistant smart speakers with voice capabilities is expected to be a prominent driver for the speech and voice recognition market for the consumer vertical during the forecast period. APAC to grow with highest CAGR for speech and voice recognition market during the forecast period The market in APAC is expected to grow during the forecast period. The growing focus on artificial intelligence (AI) in industries and enterprises is also expected to contribute toward the growth of the voice recognition market in Asia Pacific during the forecast period. Increasing digitalization and government policies favoring digitalization and technological innovations are also expected to drive the growth of market in APAC region. Key Market Players: Apple (US), Microsoft (US), IBM (US), Alphabet (US), Amazon (US), Sensory (US), CANTAB Research (UK), Baidu (China), iFLYTEK (China) and SESTEK (Turkey) are among the key players operating in the speech and voice recognition market. Related Reports: Text-to-Speech Market with COVID-19 Impact By Offering (Software, Services), Vertical (Enterprise, Consumer Electronics, Education, Retail), Deployment, Language, Organization Size, Voice Type, and Geography-Forecast 2026 About MarketsandMarkets: MarketsandMarkets provides quantified B2B research on 30,000 high growth niche opportunities/threats which will impact 70% to 80% of worldwide companies' revenues. Currently servicing 7500 customers worldwide including 80% of global Fortune 1000 companies as clients. Almost 75,000 top officers across eight industries worldwide approach MarketsandMarkets for their painpoints around revenues decisions. Our 850 fulltime analyst and SMEs at MarketsandMarkets are tracking global high growth markets following the "Growth Engagement Model - GEM". The GEM aims at proactive collaboration with the clients to identify new opportunities, identify most important customers, write "Attack, avoid and defend" strategies, identify sources of incremental revenues for both the company and its competitors. MarketsandMarkets now coming up with 1,500 MicroQuadrants (Positioning top players across leaders, emerging companies, innovators, strategic players) annually in high growth emerging segments. MarketsandMarkets is determined to benefit more than 10,000 companies this year for their revenue planning and help them take their innovations/disruptions early to the market by providing them research ahead of the curve. MarketsandMarkets's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "Knowledge Store" connects over 200,000 markets and entire value chains for deeper understanding of the unmet insights along with market sizing and forecasts of niche markets. Contact: Mr. Aashish Mehra MarketsandMarkets INC. 630 Dundee Road Suite 430 Northbrook, IL 60062 USA: +1-888-600-6441 Email: sales@marketsandmarkets.com Research Insight: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/ResearchInsight/speech-voice-recognition-market.asp Visit Our Web Site: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com Content Source: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/PressReleases/speech-voice-recognition.asp Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/660509/MarketsandMarkets_Logo.jpg Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - North American Nickel Inc. (TSXV: NAN) (OTCBB: WSCRF) (CUSIP: 65704T 108) (the "Company" or "NAN") announces that it has participated for its pro-rata share in a recent private placement financing of Premium Nickel Resources ("PNR"), to maintain its 10% equity ownership. The PNR private placement is being held in escrow and is conditional on the anticipated signing of the Asset Purchase Agreement for the assets in liquidation of the former BCL Limited, Botswana. NAN is a founding shareholder in PNR, a private Canadian company that provides direct exposure to nickel-copper-cobalt ("Ni-Cu-Co") opportunities in the southern African region. PNR submitted an Indicative Offer ("IO") to the BCL Liquidator in June 2020 to acquire the former producing BCL Selebi-Phikwe Mining Complex and the Tati Nickel Mining Corporation ("TNMC") Operations as well as regional exploration joint ventures on highly prospective Ni-Cu-Co projects located in north-eastern Botswana. NAN currently owns 10% of common shares of PNR and has a 5-year Warrant to purchase an additional 15% undiluted equity interest in PNR for USD$10M. NAN is providing the corporate management and technical expertise to PNR on a contractual basis. NAN CEO, Keith Morrison commented "NAN is working with PNR during the current exclusivity period to finalize the assets for purchase. The use of this private placement will enable a smooth transition to the ownership of the assets and prepare for the activities required to advance the purchased assets to a compliant Pre-Feasibility level. The PNR business model is based on a modern redevelopment of a combination of the BCL and TNMC deposits to produce Ni-Cu-Co and water in a manner which will benefit all stakeholders and that is inclusive of modern environmental, social and corporate governance responsibilities. PNR's goal is to significantly reduce the environmental and carbon footprint with the adaption of best practices including safety, sustainability and the application of new technologies." PNR was selected as the preferred bidder to acquire the assets formerly owned by BCL Limited and TNMC on February 10, 2021. On March 24, 2021, PNR completed the Exclusivity Memorandum of Understanding ("MOU") with the Liquidator for the ongoing six-month exclusivity period to complete additional work and related Asset Purchase Agreements (See News Release Dated March 24, 2021). Negotiations are ongoing to finalize terms on the prioritized assets that will be included in the Asset Purchase Agreement. The BCL operations at Selebi-Phikwe are comprised of a mining complex, a concentrator and a processing facility, as well as other supplementary assets and infrastructure such as rail line, tailings facilities, and employee housing. Shaft sinking and plant construction started in 1970 and open pit mining commenced at Phikwe in 1972. Throughout the mine's life the various deposits, over a 14 km strike length, have been mined by open pit and various underground mining methods. Mining concluded in October 2016 when the operations were placed on care and maintenance due to a failure in the smelter. PNR's redevelopment plan is based on a re-characterization of the remaining resources and the ability to produce two separate commercial concentrates (a Cu concentrate and a separate Ni-Co concentrate). Underground Selebi-Phikwe Remaining reserves and resources at 31 December, 2016 Proven & Probable Mineral Reserves 49 Mt @ 0.61% Ni, 0.68% Cu; Indicated & Inferred Mineral Resources 35 Mt @ 0.82% Ni, 0.92% Cu (The historical statements of resources and reserves noted above are sourced from the following report Wood Mackenzie - Selebi Phikwe Closed Nickel Operation Asset Report, December, 2018. The report was reviewed by Sharon Taylor on behalf of NAN, who has concluded that the stated reserves and resources are non NI 43-101 compliant. However, the historical reserves and resources are considered to be relevant and reliable as a basis for understanding the potential resources at the property. To the best of NAN's knowledge, information and belief, there is no new material, scientific or technical information that would make the disclosure of the mineral resources inaccurate or misleading. NAN has not done sufficient work to classify the historic estimate as current mineral resources or mineral reserves and is not treating the historical estimate as current mineral resources or mineral reserves. The Company understands that PNR, upon successful acquisition of the assets, intends to commence a program to update the resource model to support an NI 43-101 compliant resource estimate). The TNMC Operations are comprised of two mines and a processing plant situated 65 km south-east of town of Francistown, and 75 km north of the BCL Operations at Selebi-Phikwe. Underground production at Selkirk of high-grade massive sulphides between 1989 to 2002 produced 1 million tonnes @ 2.6% Ni and 1.5% Cu that was direct shipped to the BCL Smelter. A large volume of disseminated Ni-Cu mineralization surrounds the higher-grade Selkirk mineralization is being evaluated as a potential open pit development. The Phoenix open pit mine and processing plant began operations in 1995. The operations were put on care and maintenance in early 2016. Open Pit TNMC Remaining reserves and resources at 31 December, 2016 Proven & Probable Mineral Reserves 17.8 Mt @ 0.19% Ni, 0.13% Cu; Indicated & Inferred Mineral Resources 234 Mt @ 0.22% Ni, 0.23% Cu (The historical statements of resources and reserves noted above are sourced from the following report Wood Mackenzie - Tati Closed Nickel Operation Asset Report, December, 2018. The report was reviewed by Sharon Taylor on behalf of NAN, who has concluded that the stated reserves and resources are non NI 43-101 compliant. NAN has not done sufficient work to classify the historic estimate as current mineral resources or mineral reserves and is not treating the historical estimate as current mineral resources or mineral reserves. To the best of NAN's knowledge, information and belief, the reported resource is understated because it does not report grades for Cobalt, Platinum or Palladium. These elements are known to add value based on historical annual reports by previous operator Nornickel. The Company understands that PNR, upon successful acquisition of the assets, intends to commence a program to update the resource model to support an NI 43-101 compliant resource estimate). There can be no assurance that PNR will move from exclusivity to successful completion of the proposed acquisition. About North American Nickel North American Nickel is a mineral exploration company with 100% owned properties in Maniitsoq, Greenland and Ontario, Canada. In 2019 the Company became a founding shareholder in Premium Nickel Resources ("PNR") a private Canadian company, to provide direct exposure to Ni-Cu-Co opportunities in the southern African region. PNR completed a Memorandum of Understanding to acquire the assets, in liquidation, formerly operated by BCL Limited in Botswana. In addition, the Company is expanding its area of exploration interest into Morocco and building a relationship with the Office National des Hydrocarbures et des Mines ("ONHYM"), the leading resource crown corporation and the single largest permit holder in Morocco. The Maniitsoq property in Greenland is a Camp scale permitted exploration project comprising 3,048 square km covering numerous high-grade nickel-copper + cobalt sulphide occurrences associated with norite and other mafic-ultramafic intrusions of the Greenland Norite Belt (GNB). The >75km-long belt is situated along, and near, the southwest coast of Greenland and is accessible from the existing Seqi deep water port with an all-year-round shipping season and hydroelectric power potential from a quantified watershed. The Post Creek/Halcyon property in Sudbury is strategically located adjacent to the past producing Podolsky copper-nickel-precious metal sulphide deposit of KGHM International Ltd. The property lies along the extension of the Whistle Offset dyke structure. Such geological structures host major Ni-Cu-PGM deposits and producing mines within the Sudbury Camp. The Company acquired 100% ownership of property near the southern extent of the Lingman Lake Greenstone Belt in northwest Ontario known as Lingman Nickel and in the Quetico region near Thunder Bay Ontario. The acquisition of these properties is part of the Company's strategy to develop a pipeline of new nickel projects. The Company is evaluating direct and indirect nickel asset acquisition opportunities globally. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS Keith Morrison Chief Executive Officer North American Nickel Inc. For more information contact: North American Nickel Inc. Jaclyn Ruptash Corporate Communications +1 (604) 770-4334 Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. CAUTIONARY STATEMENT REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION: This news release includes certain "forward-looking statements" and "forward-looking information" under applicable Canadian securities legislation concerning the business, operations and financial performance and condition of the Company. Forward-looking statements and forward-looking information include, but is not limited to, statements about the future prospects of any assets or properties of the Company, the ability of the Company to successfully complete due diligence, the ability of the Company to access capital, any spending commitments, the success of exploration activities, the future economics of minerals including nickel and copper, the benefits of the development potential of the properties of the Company, the benefits of drilling and advancement of projects. Forward-looking information is 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 information. There can be no assurance that such information will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such information. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information. All forward-looking information contained in this press release is given as of the date hereof and is based upon the opinions and estimates of management and information available to management as at the date hereof. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. Although the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual actions, events or results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause actions, events or results not to be anticipated, estimated or intended. Statements concerning mineral reserve and resource estimates may also be deemed to constitute forward-looking statements to the extent they involve estimates of the mineralization that will be encountered if the property is developed. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94510 THIS NEWS RELEASE IS NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO U.S. NEWSWIRE SERVICES OR FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / LINK GLOBAL TECHNOLOGIES INC. (CSE:LNK)(FRA:LGT)(OTC PINK:LGLOF) ("LINK", "Link Global" or the "Company"), an innovative power and infrastructure solutions provider for Bitcoin mining, and data hosting operations, provides an update on business operations and recent developments in Alberta. On August 19, 2021, after working with the Alberta Utilities Commission ("AUC" or the "Commission") Staff in a joint submission to the Commission for the past six months and scrutinizing the Company's operations in Alberta, a decision was made by the AUC to require the Company to seek additional approvals for two of the Company's smaller operating facilities and halt these operations until such approvals are obtained. Link currently operates the following sites in Alberta: 3.75MW at Kirkwall, 5MW at Campbell, and 10MW at Westlock. The larger 10MW site continues to operate within the AUC regulatory framework. Based on the feedback from AUC, Kirkwall site will be safely shut down effective August 26, 2021 until such approvals are obtained. The Company is the process of working with the AUC for such review. The operations at the Campbell site will also be shut down on August 26th, will be moved to another location and subject to review and approval by the Commission. In February of 2021, the Company was contacted by the AUC due to a noise complaint made by a homeowner with a property that is approximately 850 meters east of the Campbell site. Link Global took immediate actions to provide the AUC with the documentation requested in response to the complaint and provided remedies for noise reduction. Link Global has worked cooperatively with the AUC at every step of the way through a " joint submission process". The complaint resulted in a full and detailed review by the AUC of all of the Company's operational sites. "The high level of scrutiny on all of Link Global's operations by the Alberta Utilities Commission that resulted from this process has given us confidence that we can achieve compliance on our existing sites, but also new sites moving forward." said Link Global CEO, Stephen Jenkins. "In consideration of the neighbour's concerns, at the Sturgeon County site we are moving forward with plans to move this plant to a new location even though we currently meet all noise compliance standards for the Campbell site. We do recognize it is important to listen to the local community and in particular one neighbour's concerns with respect to the facility. The agility of our units allows us to be flexible and respond when the need for mobility becomes obvious." In order to correct some information inaccurately represented in a recent media article and to keep our shareholders fully informed about the facts related to the situation, Link Global submits the following timeline and facts: Link Global was contacted by the Alberta Utilities Commission on February 11, 2021, with a request to conduct a second detailed noise survey of its operations in both the daytime and nighttime at our Campbell site. Link Global completed the requested survey on February 26, 2021, with the outcome being extremely close to compliant. Further mitigation work was undertaken to ensure LINK met the requirements. Sound barriers were then installed. A follow-up survey was completed showing full compliance for both daytime and nighttime operational standards. Between March and June 2021, Link Global and the Alberta Utilities Commission worked collaboratively on a joint submission to the AUC board for consideration, - this submission was completed together in a spirit of cooperation. The joint submission was provided to the board of the AUC on June 18, 2021. Link Global followed up with the AUC on numerous occasions since June 18, 2021 inquiring about the timeline and any additional measures that the company could take to address any items. Unfortunately, the AUC did not respond regarding our outreach requests. Link Global was informed of the AUC board's decision on August 19 th , 61 days after submission. , 61 days after submission. Despite meeting noise standards, Link Global understands that neighbours in this area have a high sensitivity to the operation and the Company is taking action to relocate the plant from the Campbell site as soon as operationally possible to a new site fully operational within a 4-5 week timeframe. The Campbell site is only one of several Link Global sites. The Company continues to operate successfully on other sites in Alberta. "Link Global is breaking ground in this relatively new industry. Inevitably, unknown challenges will have to be tackled along the way," added Jenkins. "We worked closely and transparently with the Alberta Utilities Commission, even providing a "joint submission" to the board due to the unknown nature of many factors. We have grown as a company due to this experience and we are now focussing on expanding other sites for our industry in Alberta." Link Global currently operates other sites in Alberta, which have been reviewed by AUC and any items that have been requested to bring the sites to the exempt status are being implemented expeditiously. These other sites collectively make up the majority of the Company's generation capacity and meet or exceed all regulatory standards. About Link Global Technologies Inc. Link is engaged in providing infrastructure and operating expertise for digital mining and data hosting operations. Link's objectives include locating and securing, for lease and option to purchase, properties with access to low-cost, reliable power, and deploying this low-cost power to conduct digital mining and supply clean energy and infrastructure for other data-hosting services. To learn more about Link's activities, visit us at https://linkglobal.io/ On behalf of Link Global Technologies Inc. Stephen Jenkins Chief Executive Officer & Director For more information, visit http://linkglobal.io/ or contact: Steve Jenkins stephen@linkglobal.io +1-877-770-6545 For investor information, please contact: Omar Diaz Investor Relations Manager omar@linkglobal.io 604-551-2950 The CSE has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. CAUTIONARY STATEMENT REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION. This news release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking statements consist of statements that are not purely historical and include any statements regarding beliefs, plans, expectations or intentions regarding the future. Often, but not always, forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of words such as "plans", "expects", "is expected", "forecast", "budget", "scheduled", "estimates", "forecasts", "intends", "anticipates", or "believes", or variations (including negative variations) of such words and phrases, or statements that certain actions, events or results "may", "would", "could", "should" or "might" occur. Forward-looking statements made in this news release include, but are not limited, to: statements with respect to the shut down and relocation of the Company's smaller sites and the timing thereof; that the Company can achieve compliance on its existing sites, and also new sites moving forward; and other business plans of the Company. All such forward-looking statements are based on factors or assumptions that were applied in drawing a conclusion or making a forecast or projection, including assumptions based on historical trends, current conditions and expected future developments. Since forward-looking statements relate to future events and conditions, by their very nature they require making assumptions and involve inherent risks and uncertainties. The Company cautions that although it is believed that the assumptions are reasonable in the circumstances, these risks and uncertainties give rise to the possibility that actual results may differ materially from the expectations set out in the forward-looking statements. In the case of the Company, these risks, uncertainties, assumptions and other factors include, without limitation: those set out in the Company's most recent MD&A, fluctuations in the price of electricity, fluctuations in the price of digital currencies/Bitcoin, the future potential halving of Bitcoin, increases in the network difficulty rate and price of digital currencies/Bitcoin, negative changes in the level of digital currency/Bitcoin rewards per block, the securing of economic rates for the purchase of power, the opportunities for acquiring digital currency mining hardware, unanticipated changes in laws, regulations or other industry standards affecting the business of the Company, reliance on key management personnel, the Company's ability to implement its business plan, litigation risk, stock price volatility, the effects of general economic and other factors beyond the control of the Company, and other matters that may occur in the future. Given these risks, undue reliance should not be placed on these forward-looking statements, which apply only as of the date hereof. Other than as specifically required by law, the Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements to reflect new information, subsequent or otherwise. SOURCE: Link Global Technologies Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661494/Link-Global-Technologies-Provides-an-Operational-Update HAMBURG (dpa-AFX) - Aurubis (AIAGY.PK, AIAGF.PK) and Nussir have decided to terminate the previously signed memorandum of understanding related to future concentrate supply. While making the announcement, Aurubis stated that sustainable conduct and business activities in the entire supply chain are integral components of the company's corporate strategy. On August 11, 2020, Aurubis signed MoU with the Norwegian mine partner Nussir ASA, under which Nussir had plans to operate the world's first fully electrified mine with zero CO2 emissions. Michael Hellemann, Senior Vice President Commercial at Aurubis AG, said: 'As much as we acknowledge and welcome the mine's approach of zero CO2 emissions, for us, all sustainability criteria have to be fulfilled.' Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann. BERLIN (dpa-AFX) - German media holding company Axel Springer SE (AXELF.PK) said that it signed an agreement to acquire Washington, D.C.-based publisher Politico, including the remaining 50 percent share of its current joint venture Politico Europe, as well as the tech news website Protocol from Robert Allbritton. Both parties have agreed not to disclose the deal terms. Axel Springer and Politico in the U.S. have been joint venture partners since 2014, when they launched Politico Europe. Robert Allbritton, Founder and Publisher of POLITICO and Protocol, will continue as publisher of POLITICO and Protocol. The editorial and management leadership teams of POLITICO in the U.S., POLITICO Europe and Protocol will remain in place, and will continue to operate their publications separately from Axel Springer's other brands headquartered in the U.S. Closing of the transaction is expected in the fourth-quarter 2021. 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. GURUGRAM, India, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- UAE News Etihad Cargo has outlined its plans to focus on COVID-19 focused services, setting up a dedicated COVID-19 distribution team in anticipation of a vaccine for the virus. Its new specialized pharma and healthcare product PharmaLife, will focus on key gateways including Abu Dhabi , Barcelona , Chicago , Paris , Dubai , Frankfurt , Hyderabad , London , Milan , Melbourne , Mumbai , Shanghai , Singapore , and Sydney . has outlined its plans to focus on COVID-19 focused services, setting up a dedicated COVID-19 distribution team in anticipation of a vaccine for the virus. Its new specialized pharma and healthcare product PharmaLife, will focus on key gateways including , , , , , , , , , , , , , and . Amazon.ae announced that it has launched International Shopping Experience, delivering items from the UAE to Bahrain , Kuwait and Oman . The delivery includes import fees along with customs clearance managed by Amazon's couriers. The move acts as a strong fillip to the growth of e-commerce across the Middle Eastern region. , and . The delivery includes import fees along with customs clearance managed by Amazon's couriers. The move acts as a strong fillip to the growth of e-commerce across the Middle Eastern region. In a historic step for global trade, the UAE and Israel agreed to normalize relations in mid-August 2020 and signed a normalization agreement in September. In October, a ship carrying cargo from the UAE, docked at an Israel's Haifa Port. The ship will bring cargo from the UAE to Israel on a weekly basis. Impact of COVID-19: The COVID-19 pandemic impacted overall supply chain operations in the UAE, with road freight due to sealing of borders and air freight due to flight cancellation being the major sufferers. Moreover, companies have been struggling with employee infections and have been forced to move to a remote working setup, at least for the non-operational staff. The industry is gradually recovering from the transport restrictions. Going forward, pharmaceutical logistics will play an important part in distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine, once it is ready and is hence expected to lead vertical market growth in the future. The demand for essentials and daily usage consumer products went up during the lockdown period, and is expected to continue to grow, as the retail segment looks to be the highest contributing vertical to logistics in the UAE. Freight Forwarding is expected to be Lead Contributor: While the UAE Logistics industry is composed of different service segments such as Freight Forwarding, Warehousing, Express Delivery and Value Added Services, it is the Freight Forwarding Segment that is expected to continue being the leading segment in the future. Express market segment is identified to grow at the fastest pace, due to growth in e-commerce deliveries and companies. Technological Advancement to Drive Growth: Government Initiatives such as Dubai IoT Strategy, Dubai Block Chain Strategy, Introductions of drones for last-mile delivery, UAE National AI Program, Smart Dubai 2021, Dubai 3D printing Strategy, Dubai Data Initiatives and National Innovation Strategy will revolutionize the logistics and warehousing market of UAE. Analysts at Ken Research in their latest publication "Competition Benchmarking of Top Logistics Players in UAE in Transportation, Warehousing, 3PL, International Express, Domestic Express, Automotive, Pharma, Oil and Gas and Retail Logistics" observe that the UAE Logistics Market is expected to grow at a decent pace, backed by upcoming new businesses in the country along with the favorable position of the country as a logistics and trans-shipment hub globally. The Logistics Market in UAE is expected to grow at a CAGR of 3.9% from 2019 to 2025, in terms of revenues. The rescheduled Expo 2020 would also play a part in growth of the industry during the early period. Key Target Audience: - 3PL Logistics Companies Integrated Logistics Companies E-Commerce Companies Oil & Gas Companies Retail Companies Pharmaceutical Companies Logistics/Supply Chain Industry Associations Time Period Captured in the Report:- Historical: 2015 to 2019 Future: 2019 to 2025 Companies Mentioned:- Kuehne + Nagel Agility Emirates Post Al-Futtaim Logistics DB Schenker DHL FedEx Express UPS Allied Transport Freightworks Zajel Courier Services Time Express Bollore Logistics Danzas AEI Mohebi Logistics Hellmann Worldwide Logistics Tristar Gulf Agency Company CEVA Logistics ATS Skynet Sky Express Avalon General Land Transport GSL (Global Shipping and Logistics) RSA Global Roadlink Transport Al Mujarad Transport Key Topics Covered in the Report:- UAE Logistics Industry Overview UAE Logistics Industry Market Size by Sub-Service, 2015-2025 UAE Logistics Industry Market Size by Vertical, 2015-2025 UAE Logistics Sub-Service Market Segmentation by End User Verticals, 2019-2025 UAE Warehousing Market Segmentation by Type of Warehouses, 2019 Competitive Landscape including Major Players in each Service Segment, 2019 Competitive Landscape including Major Players in each Vertical Segment, 2019 Cross-Comparison of Major Freight Forwarding and Express Players, 2019 Company Profiles of Major Players in each Segment Major Trade Lanes for Land Freight, Sea Freight, Air Freight and International Express, 2019 Pricing Analysis for Major Players by Service Mix, 2019 UAE Logistics Industry UAE Freight Forwarding Industry UAE Warehousing Industry UAE Express Delivery Industry UAE Land Freight Market Size UAE Sea Freight Market Size UAE Air Freight Market Size UAE Domestic Express Market Size UAE International Express Market Size Express Delivery Players UAE E-Commerce Logistics UAE Freight Forwarding Players UAE Warehousing Players UAE Air Freight Trade Lanes UAE Cold Chain Market UAE Retail Logistics Market UAE Oil & Gas Logistics Market UAE Pharmaceutical Logistics Market UAE UAE Logistics Market Future Outlook Warehousing Space UAE Major Companies UAE Retail Logistics Major Companies UAE Pharma Logistics Major Companies UAE Oil & Gas Logistics Major Companies UAE E-Commerce Logistics Major Companies Land Freight UAE Major Companies Sea Freight UAE Major Companies Air Freight UAE Major Companies Warehousing UAE Major Companies Domestic Express UAE Major Companies International Express UAE For More Information on the research report, refer to below link:- UAE Logistics Market Related Reports:- Saudi Arabia Dry Logistics And Warehousing Market Outlook To 2025 - Warehousing Automation And Investment Within Transport Infrastructure To Drive Market Revenue) The market showcased a volatile growth trajectory. Dry logistics revenue declined at a CAGR of single digit CAGR during 2015-2019 due to oil price shock further leading to an economic slowdown during 2016-2017 periods. Saudi Arabia is located at the crossroads of significant international trade route that connects Asia, Europe and Africa. This strategic location provides the Kingdom with a unique advantage over other nations thus, enabling it to become a leading regional logistics hub. In April of 2016, Saudi Arabia announced its Vision 2030 which includes transforming the Kingdom into a preferred logistics hub. It is making continuous efforts to make imports and exports processes more streamlined. Additionally, government is restructuring the regulations and structures logistics sector government and opening the way for market liberalization and private sector participation. Expansion of industrial cities continues to offer opportunities for foreign investors towards developing the non-oil manufacturing base, warehousing & logistics segments. For instance, Pfizer opened a manufacturing facility in the King Abdullah Economic City in the year 2017. Non-oil manufacturing growth is facilitated by launch of National Industrial Development and Logistics Program (NIDLP) in Jan 2019 by KSA government. Various companies are investing in Special bulk trucks and heavy lift movements to diversify their Revenue streams and Operations. For instance, Bahri launched new dry-bulk carrier 'Sara' & increased their total fleet of dry-bulk carriers to 6 ships in KSA. Philippines Logistics Market Outlook to 2024- By Sea, Land, and Air Freight Forwarding; By Warehousing (Industrial/ Retail, ICD/CFS, Cold Storage, Agriculture), By End Users; By Cold chain market (Cold transportation and Cold storages) Philippines Logistics Market has witnessed an average CAGR during 2014-19 due to favorable laws from CTAP, Investments in Bridges to promote Inter-island transportation through RORO, and development of ports both by the government and with Public-Private Partnerships. The Current logistics cost comprise 27.16 % of sales in the Philippines which is very high in comparison to other SEA countries. The influx of foreign players, increasing consolidation, Green freight policies by the Government, and investing in innovative technologies has stimulated the growth in the market. India Logistics Market Outlook to FY24-Driven by Government Infrastructure Push, New Age Logistics Startups, and Technology Innovation India has been ranked at 4th position in the world in railway freight traffic after China, the US, and Russia. Under the land freight corridors, 65% of domestic freight volume carried through the road; high compared to ~50% in developed countries. India Logistics Market has witnessed an average CAGR during FY14-FY19 due to favorable policy reforms from the government, continued investment in infrastructure by both the government and the private sector; the influx of foreign players in the market in recent years, increasing consolidation, and investing in innovative technologies has stimulated the growth in the market. China Logistics and Warehousing Market Outlook to 2025 - Led by Growth in Road Freight Services, Improving Infrastructure and Rising Digital Innovations The Chinese Logistics Market was observed to be in growth stage during the period of 2015-2020 owing to the expanding manufacturing & retail sector, increasing disposable income, growing number of investments and increasing value of exports and imports in the country. The China Logistics Industry has grown at a CAGR of 5.4% on the basis of revenue. The market is booming owing to increasing infrastructure investment, rising digital innovations and growing logistic demand in China. The freight forwarding sector is the leading segment towards the revenues of the logistics industry, followed by courier & parcel activities and warehousing. Value Added services also contribute a significant proportion to the overall logistics market in China. More Logistics Research Reports: - https://www.kenresearch.com/automotive-transportation-and-warehousing/logistics-and-shipping/SC-100-45.html Follow Our Social Media Pages:- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kenresearch Twitter: https://twitter.com/KenResearch LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ken-research/ About Ken Research Ken Research is a research based management consulting company. We provide strategic consultancy to aid clients on critical business perspective: strategy, marketing, organization, operations and technology transformation, advanced analytics, corporate finance, mergers & acquisitions and sustainability across all industries and geographies. We provide business intelligence and operational advisory across 300+ verticals underscoring disruptive technologies, emerging business models with precedent analysis and success case studies. Some of top consulting companies and Market leaders seek our intelligence to identify new revenue streams, customer/ vendor paradigm and pain points and due diligence on competition. Contact Us:- Ken Research Ankur Gupta, Head Marketing & Communications Support@kenresearch.com +91-9015378249 Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/661352/Ken_Research_Logo.jpg RAIPUR, India, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Stratview Research announces the launch of a new research report on Small Satellites Market by Type (Minisatellite, Microsatellite, Nanosatellite, and Picosatellite), by Application Type (Earth Observation, Technology Development, Communications, and Scientific), by Operator Type (Commercial, Government, Civil, and Military), and by Region (North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and Rest of the World), and by Region (North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and Rest of the World), Trend, Forecast, Competitive Analysis, and Growth Opportunity: 2021-2026. This strategic assessment report, from Stratview Research, provides a comprehensive analysis that reflects today's small satellites market realities and future market possibilities for the forecast period of 2021 to 2026. After a continuous interest in our space electronics market report from the industry stakeholders, we have come up with another comprehensive research report on the small satellite market which is one of the most-talked topics in the industry currently. The report segments and analyzes the market in the most detailed manner to provide a panoramic view of the market. The vital data/information provided in the report can play a crucial role for the market participants as well as investors in the identification of low-hanging fruits available in the market as well as formulate growth strategies. Small Satellites Market: Highlights Miniaturized satellites having a wet mass of under 500 KG are considered under the small satellites category. The weight of small satellites varies as per the components and sensors installed in them. These satellites have a shorter development team and cycles; thus, can be developed and launched at a lower cost in comparison to traditional large satellites. Development in computational technology and data analytics drove the miniaturization of satellite systems. The number of small satellites launched in the past few years has surged substantially owing to its low cost, easier launch vehicle integration, and technological developments. SpaceX's robust plan of launching about 12,000 satellites in the Starlink constellation, of which half of them are targeted to be launched by end of 2024, is signaling a highly optimistic near-term outlook for the industry, especially of small satellite ones. The small satellites market plunged in 2016 mainly due to launch failures. It further dropped slightly in 2018 when compared to 2017, owing to the decline in the number of small satellite launches. However, the market witnessed a robust pace in 2020 especially due to the launch of the Starlink internet satellite by SpaceX. The COVID-19 outbreak had a negligible impact on the small satellites market due to the longer project timelines for launching and establishing services. However, the temporary halt of satellite production lines, postponement of launches, and limited availability of funding led to some turbulence amid the pandemic. Click Here to Run Through the Detailed TOC of the Report: https://www.stratviewresearch.com/toc/1920/small-satellites-market.html Based on the type, the small satellites market is segmented as minisatellite, microsatellite, nanosatellite, and picosatellite. Minisatellite is expected to remain the largest and the fastest-growing segment of the market during the forecast period. Minisatellites are satellites weighing between 201-500 kg. These satellites are simpler and use similar technologies as larger satellites. SpaceX is the leading player in the minisatellite sector and is primarily employing these satellites for communication and broadband internet services. Based on the application type, the market is segmented as earth observation, technology development, communications, and scientific. Communication is expected to remain the largest segment of the market during the forecast period. Rising demand for high-speed internet services coupled with growing digitalization across various verticals is augmenting the demand for smallsats, especially for communication purposes. In terms of regions, North America is projected to remain the largest market for small satellites in the foreseen future. The USA is the pioneer in the smallsats market. In the year 2020, small satellite launches in the USA grew six-fold from that of 2019-level, mainly driven by SpaceX's Starlink constellation. Leading players, such as Planet Labs and SpaceX, are vertically integrated, having a stronghold from raw material procurement to the provision of internet services. Asia-Pacific is likely to recoup at an impressive rate during the forecast period. The strong growth of the region is mainly attributable to the growing emphasis on the production and launch of smallsats to cater to the need for broadband connectivity solutions, military support, and weather forecasting. China is the leading contributor in the APAC region in the wake of strong expenditure in space exploration and defense activities. Register Here for a Free Sample of the Report: https://www.stratviewresearch.com/Request-Sample/1920/small-satellites-market.htmlform The market for small satellites is highly consolidated with the strong presence of key players such as SpaceX, Planet Labs, and OneWeb Satellites. These major players are focusing on production as well as launch of smallsats to cater to the need for remote sensing and communication applications. SpaceX offers ride-share missions to other smallsat manufacturers, which further strengthens its position in the industry. The supply chain of this market comprises several nodes including raw material suppliers, component manufacturers, system integrators, satellite manufacturers, ground station operators, and end-users. Following are the key players in the small satellites market. SpaceX OneWeb Satellites Planet Labs Inc. Chang Guang Satellite Technology Co., Ltd. Kepler Communications Inc. Satellogic Spire Global Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL) Swarm Technologies, Inc. Development of smallsats for communication, long-term agreements among the key players, and funding provided by VCs & government entities to smallsat start-up companies are the key trends shaping the market as well as competitive dynamics. Report Features This report provides market intelligence in the most comprehensive way. The report structure has been kept such that it offers maximum business value. It provides critical insights on the market dynamics and will enable strategic decision making for the existing market players as well as those willing to enter the market. The following are the key features of the report: Market structure: Overview, industry life cycle analysis, supply chain analysis. Market environment analysis: Growth drivers and constraints, Porter's five forces analysis, SWOT analysis. Market trend and forecast analysis. Market segment trend and forecast. Competitive landscape and dynamics: Market share, product portfolio, product launches, etc. Attractive market segments and associated growth opportunities. Emerging trends. Strategic growth opportunities for the existing and new players. Key success factors. This report studies the small satellites market and has segmented the market in four ways, keeping in mind the interest of all the stakeholders across the value chain. Following are the four ways in which the market is segmented: Small Satellites Market, by Type Minisatellite (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Microsatellite (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Nanosatellite (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Picosatellite (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Small Satellites Market, by Application Earth observation (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Technology Development (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Communications (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Scientific (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Others (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Small Satellites Market, by Operator Type Commercial (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Government (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Civil (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Military (Regional Analysis: North America , Europe , Asia-Pacific , and RoW) Small Satellites Market, by Region North America (Country Analysis: The USA , Canada ) Europe (Country Analysis: Germany , the UK, Russia , and Rest of Europe ) Asia-Pacific (Country Analysis: Japan , China , India , and Rest of Asia-Pacific ) Rest of the World (Country Analysis: Argentina and Others) Stratview Research has several high value market reports in the aerospace and defense industry. Please refer to the following link to browse through our reports: https://www.stratviewresearch.com/market-reports/Aerospace-Defense.html About Stratview Research Stratview Research is a global market intelligence firm providing wide range of services including syndicated market reports, custom research and sourcing intelligence across industries, such as Advanced Materials, Aerospace & Defense, Automotive & Mass Transportation, Consumer Goods, Construction & Equipment, Electronics and Semiconductors, Energy & Utility, Healthcare & Life Sciences, and Oil & Gas. We have a strong team of industry veterans and analysts with an extensive experience in executing custom research projects for mid-sized to Fortune 500 companies, in the areas of Market Assessment, Opportunity Screening, Competitive Intelligence, Due Diligence, Target Screening, Market Entry Strategy, Go to Market Strategy, and Voice of Customer studies. Stratview Research is a trusted brand globally, providing high quality research and strategic insights that help companies worldwide in effective decision making. For enquiries, Contact: Stratview Research E-mail: sales@stratviewresearch.com Direct: +1-313-307-4176 Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/660595/Stratview_Research_Logo.jpg Population-based cohort study from Canada is first to describe patterns of mortality, both cancer-related and otherwise, for people with different types of NETs. PLYMOUTH MEETING, Pa., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Among all patients with neuroendocrine tumors (NETs), the risk of dying of cancer was higher than that of dying of other causes, but mortality varies by primary tumor site, according to a new study published in the August 2021 issue of JNCCN-Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network. It is the first population-based cohort study to describe factors associated with cancer-specific death after a NET diagnosis. "Neuroendocrine tumors are very unique in that they are often slow growing indolent cancers. They have very heterogenous behaviors. While some metastatic tumors can threaten patients' survival, other localized tumors do not. Therefore, it was important to understand cause of death and the exact burden of cancer on mortality in different sub-groups of patients with NETs," said lead author Julie Hallet, MD, MSc, University of Toronto. "Our results show that some patients with non-metastatic NETs are more likely to die of other causes than NET. This is crucial to inform patients and make decisions regarding treatment. It is important to make sure that treatment does not present a higher risk than the NET itself. For example, small pancreas, stomach or rectal NETs can be safely monitored." The retrospective study of 8,607 patients whose health data were stored at ICES, the not-for-profit research institute in Toronto, Canada, found that the highest risks of cancer-specific death occurred in patients with bronchopulmonary and pancreatic NETs. For non-metastatic gastric, small intestine, colonic, and rectal NETs, the risk of non-cancer death exceeded that of cancer-specific deaths. Advancing age, higher material deprivation, and metastases were associated with higher hazard ratios of cancer-specific mortality; while being female and having a higher comorbidity burden were associated with a higher proportion of cancer-unrelated death, according to the researchers. "This article sheds an important light on the complex issue of predicting long term survival and the factors associated with it in NETs," said Whitney S. Goldner, MD, Professor in the Division of Diabetes, Endocrinology, and Metabolism at the Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center; and Vice-Chair of the NCCN Guidelines Panel for Neuroendocrine Tumors. "NETs are a very heterogeneous group of malignancies, so they require individualized treatment recommendations for each primary tumor site. It is insightful to learn about the different patterns of both cancer and non-cancer specific mortality specific to primary tumor site as well as other contributing factors. This article will be helpful to inform future guidelines regarding monitoring and treatment of different NETs and enable providers to provide NET site-specific counseling." Researchers also noted that examination of factors associated with cancer-specific and non cancer-related death showed that efforts to address cancer-specific death in NETs "should include special considerations for older adults and socioeconomically deprived patients to ensure they can access and receive care during their cancer journey." The study appears in the August issue of JNCCN. This issue of the journal also includes the announcement of a new impact factor of 11.908 for the past year. That figure has grown steadily since 2017, when it was at 6.471. The impact factor of an academic journal is a scientometric index calculated by Clarivate that reflects the yearly average number of citations of articles published in the journal during the previous two years. With the current impact factor, JNCCN ranks 23rd of 331 oncology journals, putting it in the top 7%. To read the entire study, visit JNCCN.org. Complimentary access to "Risk of Cancer-Specific Death for Patients Diagnosed with Neuroendocrine Tumors: A Population -Based Analysis" is available until November 10, 2021. About JNCCN-Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network More than 25,000 oncologists and other cancer care professionals across the United States read JNCCN-Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network. This peer-reviewed, indexed medical journal provides the latest information about innovation in translational medicine, and scientific studies related to oncology health services research, including quality care and value, bioethics, comparative and cost effectiveness, public policy, and interventional research on supportive care and survivorship. JNCCN features updates on the NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology (NCCN Guidelines), review articles elaborating on guidelines recommendations, health services research, and case reports highlighting molecular insights in patient care. JNCCN is published by Harborside. Visit JNCCN.org. To inquire if you are eligible for a FREE subscription to JNCCN, visit NCCN.org/jnccn/subscribe. Follow JNCCN on Twitter @JNCCN. About the National Comprehensive Cancer Network The National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) is a not-for-profit alliance of leading cancer centers devoted to patient care, research, and education. NCCN is dedicated to improving and facilitating quality, effective, efficient, and accessible cancer care so patients can live better lives. The NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology (NCCN Guidelines) provide transparent, evidence-based, expert consensus recommendations for cancer treatment, prevention, and supportive services; they are the recognized standard for clinical direction and policy in cancer management and the most thorough and frequently-updated clinical practice guidelines available in any area of medicine. The NCCN Guidelines for Patients provide expert cancer treatment information to inform and empower patients and caregivers, through support from the NCCN Foundation. NCCN also advances continuing education, global initiatives, policy, and researchcollaboration and publication in oncology. Visit NCCN.org for more information and follow NCCN on Facebook @NCCNorg, Instagram @NCCNorg, and Twitter @NCCN. Media Contact: Rachel Darwin 267-622-6624 darwin@nccn.org Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/441768/NCCN_Logo.jpg Singapore, Singapore--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - AAEX GLOBAL, the AAEX BLOCKCHAIN exchange of Singapore, AA Blockchain Technology Innovation Co., Ltd., held a published Online ceremony in Singapore. Yang Bin, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Singapore AA Blockchain Technology Innovation Co., Ltd., Lu Huangbin, CEO, C.H. Poh, General Manager of AA megamall, Honorary Director Liu Taiying, as well as directors and working partners and distinguished guests from various countries participated in the event in the form of a webcast meeting. Figure 1 To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/7987/94512_fb451d6c54a40b0b_001full.jpg Singapore AAEX BLOCKCHAIN exchange is a subsidiary of Singapore AA blockchain Technology Innovation Co., Ltd. and it provides services to service global crypto lovers outside Singapore through AAEX global mobile phone application. During the Published Online ceremony, Singapore AAEX blockchain exchange signed a cooperation framework agreement with DS Solutions Pte Ltd. DS Solutions Pte Ltd has a "special exemption license for payment services" issued by the monetary authority of Singapore, MAS. HQ established in SIngapore, AAEX BLOCKCHAIN exchange will provide a full range of compliant blockchain related services to the world through cooperation with DS solutions. Figure 2 To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/7987/94512_fb451d6c54a40b0b_002full.jpg During the event, Mr. Liu Taiying, Honorary Chairman of the company, Mr. Ken Chen, Chairman of SUN MOON LAKE Fuli group, Mr. Duan Kaixiong, Chairman of Myanmar Mars network finance company, Mr. Rex Watson, AA BLOCKCHAIN representative from Down Under Australia and DR. Jo of Singapore congratulated Chairman Yang Bin on effectively promoting the development of mercury Blockchain and the Published Online ceremony through virtual event & live streamed on Online Media platform. After the first phase of AAEX BLOCKCHAIN exchange goes online, it will first provide (USDT / ASDT / AAC / AAA) mutual trading pairing between these four digital currencies, and also to provide trading for most popular Crypto Currency in the later stage to serve the global digital currency believers. According to Dr. Wang, Chief Technology Officer of AAEX Global exchange, AAEX Blockchain exchange adopts the current most advanced exchange procedures, which are also fully self-dependent, promised friendly operation ease But Super highest security guarantee. AA chain mercury public chain is a decentralized, efficient and energy-saving public chain initiated by Yang Bin, Chief Executive of Sinuiju, North Korea, basing on the "consensus trust" mechanism and encryption algorithm based on the blockchain. Every transaction in the customer scenario is recorded on the blockchain, and it do not need to rely on third-party intermediaries, it also promises to be completely open, transparent and traceable, Further-more it establishes a global trust system, and realized efficient consensus, multi application scenario, scalability, high performance, high security, high-speed access and efficient operation. AA Mercury Blockchain supports the construction of various applications on the chain, including anonymous network communication, computing power sharing, storage space sharing, bandwidth sharing, credit guarantee, etc., provides open interfaces for third parties to develop DAPP, and cooperates with with various service providers and application to provide practical application to combining various scenarios. It is built to support even commercial organizations and government agencies to build a public chain, alliance chain and even private chain application systems, according to their own business characteristics and needs, so as to apply AA chain mercury chain to various practical required scenarios. Singapore AA Block Chain Technology Innovation Limited has since attracted attention from all over the world. It has also attracted the influential partner in Australia, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and China, which contributed in the total worth of the AA company to exceed $4 billion in value. The launch of AAEX GLOBAL exchange is an important application to complete the eco-cycle of AA mercury chain. It is an important embodiment of AA chain value interconnection and value transmission system and a strong support for AA blockchain megamall. Through AAEX exchange, AA megamall will slowly evolve to a realised a multi-national, ecological, borderless, business nature. AAEX exchange will also to allow linkage AA mercury chain with national legal currencies through the implementation of transaction pairing including the introduction of ASDT and USDT, and forming an effective channel for global encrypted crypto exchange for ASDT, so as to meet the rapid and fast growing global Crypto believers in AA blockchain MEGAMALL. The infinite influence under by AA mercury chain will one day become the leader of node economic development in the digital world in the near future. Figure 3 To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/7987/94512_fb451d6c54a40b0b_003full.jpg Mr. Yang Bin, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Singapore AA Blockchain Technology Innovation Co., Ltd., was born in Nanjing. He went to the Netherlands to study at the age of 25 in 1987 and obtained Dutch nationality in 1993. From the late 1980s to the early 1990s, seizing the business opportunities of appearing in Eastern Europe, he devoted himself to international trade between China and Poland and earned his first pot of gold. In 1990, he founded Euroasia International Trade Co., Ltd. in the Netherlands. At the end of 1992, he started his second business and invested in agriculture. He then returned to China in 1995, engaged in agricultural development in Shenyang, and established a Holland-look alike development project. In the same year, he was ranked No. 2 China richest top listing by Forbes magazine . He was later appointed as the Chief Executive of "Sinuiju", Special Administrative Region by the government of North Korean, and achieved great success in development. This Year, Yang Bin went to Singapore to establish "Singapore AA Blockchain Technology Innovation Co., Ltd." as the Chairman of the Board of Directors. He also actively participated in Singapore charities and social causes and recently donated S $100,000 to Singapore's "New Hope Community Services", "New Hope Community Services" (hereinafter referred to as "new hope NHCS") to support the group's shelter for the needy in Singapore. Media Contact Company Name: A&A BLOCKCHAIN TECHNOLOGY lNNOVATION PTE LTD. Contact Person: HUANG WlND Email: Windwin6666@gmail.com Website: http://aaexsg.com/en/ To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94512 First closing of dedicated Canadian fund provides investing capacity of more than CAD$550 million for investments in senior living, student housing, medical office, life sciences, storage, and digital assets CHICAGO and TORONTO, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Harrison Street, one of the leading investment management firms exclusively focused on alternative real assets, today announced it is bringing its significant expertise investing in demographic-driven alternative assets to the Canadian market and will pursue investments in senior living, student housing, medical office, life sciences, storage, and digital assets throughout Canada. Harrison Street Canada Alternative Real Estate Fund recently completed its first closing and, based on committed capital and targeted leverage, anticipates initial capacity to invest over CAD$550 million in stabilized, cash-flow producing assets with up to 35% invested in value-add strategies. The Fund has received capital commitments from accredited investors, including a variety of institutional investors and prominent Canadian family offices, such as the Hennick Family and senior executives of the firm. Christopher Merrill, Co-Founder, Chairman and CEO at Harrison Street, said, "For more than 15 years, Harrison Street has been a first mover in highly differentiated, demographic driven real estate, first in the United States and then Europe. Now, we are thrilled to bring our deep expertise and track record to the Canadian market. Demographic characteristics in Canada are like those we see in the United States, however, alternative real estate remains underdeveloped compared to the U.S. market. Our expansion into the Canadian market is a natural evolution to our platform and we look forward to identifying attractive investment opportunities for our global investors and partners in the alternative real asset space in Canada." Jonathan Turnbull, Managing Director and Head of Canadian Transactions for Harrison Street, added, "Similar to how Harrison Street has built its business in the U.S. and Europe, relationships with best-in-class developers and operators on a local and national level is a critical component to our successful execution in Canada. Accordingly, we have a robust and actionable pipeline of off-market opportunities with multiple partners across our sectors of focus and several investments, closing in the near term, are in partnership with operators who are new to the Harrison Street platform. Additionally, our strategic alignment with Colliers, one of the top global players in commercial real estate will further amplify our reach into the market." About Harrison Street Harrison Street is one of the leading investment management firms exclusively focused on alternative real assets. Since inception in 2005, the firm has created a series of differentiated investment solutions focused on demographic-driven, needs-based assets. The firm has invested across senior housing, student housing, healthcare delivery, life sciences and storage real estate as well as social and utility infrastructure. Headquartered in Chicago with offices in London and Toronto, the firm has more than 195-employees and approximately $36 billion in assets under management and is owned by its senior leadership team in partnership with Colliers International Group Inc, one of the top global players in commercial real estate, creating long-term stability and strong alignment with investors. Clients of the firm include a global institutional investor base domiciled in North America, Europe, Middle East, Asia and Latin America. Harrison Street has been awarded Best Places to Work by Pensions & Investments for the last seven consecutive years and was named 2020 Global Alternatives Investor of the Year by PERE. For more information, please visit www.harrisonst.com. About Colliers Colliers, Twitter @Colliersor LinkedIn. Media contacts: Nathaniel Garnick/Grace Cartwright Gasthalter & Co. (212) 257-4170 Andrea Cheung Global Manager, Communications Colliers andrea.cheung@colliers.com 416-324-6402 This information is not intended to be an offer or solicitation to buy or sell securities. Any such offer or solicitation will be made only by means of the Confidential Offering Memorandum relating to the Fund. Access to information about the Fund is limited to investors who qualify as "accredited investors" in the applicable Canadian jurisdiction, pursuant to other prospectus exemptions, or internationally, pursuant to local laws. Forward-Looking Statements In addition to historical information, this press release contains financial projections and other forward-looking statements that involve risk and uncertainty. These statements are based on current expectations, estimates, projections and assumptions made by management. Sentences or phrases that use words such as "expects", "believes", "anticipates", "hopes", "plans", "may", "can", "will", "projects," and others, are often used to indicate forward-looking statements, but their absence does not mean a statement is not forward-looking. By their very nature, such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. Many of these uncertainties and risks are difficult to predict and beyond Harrison Street's control. Forward-looking statements are not a guarantee of future performance, results or events. Harrison Street assumes no obligation to update or supplement forward-looking statements that become untrue because of subsequent events. Watch here for our VP Exploration's discussion on the McKinnon Gold Zone. TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / E2Gold Inc. (TSXV:ETU) (the "Company" or "E2Gold") has ramped up drilling activities on its Hawkins Gold Project above and beyond the originally planned Phase 2 shallow step-out target. After a very successful July financing that exceeded expectations, the Company is putting those extra funds directly back into the ground to test two new additional targets: a deep-drilling campaign focused below the current McKinnon Resource (at roughly 500 meters (m) below surface); and a series of off-trend exploration holes outside of the Resource to test newly interpreted geophysical anomalies. The Phase 2 drilling program will be expanded to 10,000 m from 5,000 m. To accommodate this added work, the Company will bring on a second drill rig. Ellie Owens, Vice President of E2Gold, comments, "Our shareholders have given us a mandate to accelerate our drilling. We're excited to see what the McKinnon Resource has to offer at depth, and are pleased that we will be able to obtain more assay results sooner by front-loading drilling. It's important to accomplish as much as we can before the weather starts to change at the end of October, giving our geologists more time to review results and refine the winter 2022 exploration plans." Phase 2 began in July, with 4 holes (5th in progress) totalling 1,668 m completed to-date. The program to confirm drill targets within and outside of the McKinnon Zone: several new drill targets located off-trend of the McKinnon Zone were identified by reinterpretation of the fall 2020 airborne magnetic survey; an 8-person field crew started mapping in May and will continue into October; prospectors have moved quickly to strip 15 outcrops, poised for channel sampling; downhole IP surveys are being conducted on Phase 1 drill holes; a soil sampling program is being planned. Natalie Pietrzak-Renaud, VP Exploration, comments, "Because drilling is the most expensive part of exploration, we need to use all of the data available to tease out as much information as possible to ensure efficient testing of drill targets." Ms. Pietrzak-Renaud continued, "to that end, we will be conducting an IP geophysical survey over portions of the central Hawkins Gold Project and a large airborne magnetic survey over the western claim block, amongst other activities." For more information on our activities, please follow up with E2Gold management at Precious Metals Summit (Beaver Creek, Colorado), New Orleans Investor Conference (New Orleans, Louisiana), 121 Mining (London, UK), or on any of the number of webinars planned for this year. Qualified Persons: Eric Owens, Ph.D., P.Geo. and Natalie Pietrzak-Renaud, Ph.D., P.Geo. act as the Qualified Persons for E2Gold, and have reviewed the content of this press release. ABOUT E2GOLD INC. E2Gold Inc. is a Canadian gold exploration company which completed an Initial Public Offering on December 30, 2020, and began trading on the TSX Venture Exchange on January 4, 2021. Its large 60-km long flagship property, the Hawkins Gold Project, covers seven townships in north-central Ontario, about 140 km east of the Hemlo Gold Mine. The Company is currently focused on the central 15 km-long portion of the project, around the McKinnon Zone Inferred Resource, which hosts 6,280,000 tonnes grading 1.65 g/t gold for 328,800 ounces of gold1 in an effort to expand the size of the resource. Note 1: Historic results and Inferred Mineral Resource estimate comes from National Instrument 43-101 Technical Report and Updated Mineral Resource Estimate on Hawkins Gold Project, Ontario by P&E Mining Consultants Inc. with lead author Eugene Puritch et al., effective date September 10, 2020 filed with the Preliminary Prospectus on November 11, 2020. For further information please contact: Eric Owens President & Chief Executive Officer Tel. (416) 509-5385 Email: eric.owens@e2gold.ca Ellie Owens Vice President Tel. 647-575-2888 Email: ellie.owens@e2gold.ca SOURCE: E2Gold Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661506/E2Gold-Update-2nd-Drill-Rig-to-Arrive-on-Hawkins-Project-as-Company-Continues-to-Expand-Its-Exploration-Program TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Nuinsco Resources Limited ("Nuinsco" or the "Company") (CSE:NWI) today announced two additional substantial intersections of 122.3m and 125.7m of Critical Elements and phosphate mineralization from the continuing drill-core sampling program at its 100%-owned Prairie Lake project near Terrace Bay, Ontario. The mineralization in the Prairie Lake intrusion occurs at surface and extends to unknown depth below the deepest drilling conducted to date (circa 500m). Prairie Lake represents a very large domain of rock mineralized with a number of elements and compounds of economic interest including those identified as Critical Elements defined under the Canadian Minerals and Metals Plan ("CMMP") for which demand is projected to substantially increase and for which secure supply chains are sought. "This brings to six the number of drill holes for which analytical results have been obtained to date from the sampling program. As the number of drill holes with 100+m intersections of Critical Elements continues to expand so too does the potential scope of the mineralized domain at Prairie Lake," said Paul Jones, Nuinsco's CEO. "The continuous intersections of sought-after Critical Elements mineralization derived from the current sampling program are all 100m or more, with the maximum intersection being 347m. With demand for these Critical Elements forecast to increase dramatically through initiatives to electrify the global vehicle fleet and expand the capacity of renewable electric-power generation worldwide, the potential value of the Prairie Lake project is becoming increasingly apparent." Sampling of diamond drill core from holes NP0804 and NP0805 has produced continuous mineralized intersections of 123.2m (NP0804: 1.8-125m) and 125.7m (NP0805: 5.3-131m) of niobium (Nb), tantalum (Ta), phosphate (P2O5), and rare earth elements (REE) including lanthanum (La), cerium (Ce), samarium (Sm), neodymium (Nd) and yttrium (Y) - analytical results are tabulated below. Eighteen drill-holes have been sampled to date, focussing on drill-holes collared to intercept the Southwest (SW) Area (see map below) - this domain measures 1km in length and is between 150m and 750m wide at surface. The SW Area alone hosts an Exploration Target ("ET") of 435-530 million tonnes with grades as tabulated in the "Prairie Lake ET" table below. The sampling will provide information to support the Company's goal of establishing a mineral resource at Prairie Lake. Hole ID From (m) To (m) Width (m) Rock Type* P2O5 (%) Nb2O5 (%) Ta2O5 (%) Y (g/t) La (g/t) Ce (g/t) Nd (g/t) Sm (g/t) REE (g/t) New intersections: NP0804 1.8 18.5 16.7 PYX 1.89 0.147 0.0027 39 175 418 197 34 863 38.95 91.23 52.28 CRBT/PYX 2.84 0.121 0.0024 58 259 573 267 44 1202 101 125 24 CRBT/PYX 1.93 0.116 0.0024 47 228 501 227 38 1040 NP0805 22.5 53 30.5 CRBT/PYX 2.29 0.139 0.0020 62 228 530 258 45 1124 87.5 97.2 9.7 CRBT/PYX 2.40 0.152 0.0017 52 194 468 228 39 981 116 126.94 10.94 CRBT 4.64 0.087 0.0053 106 403 964 489 84 2046 Combined extended intersection: NP0804 1.8 125 123.2 2.65 0.140 0.0024 56 245 557 244 42 1145 NP0805 5.3 131 125.7 3.34 0.172 0.0027 77 279 682 299 56 1394 Principal rock type: CRBT=carbonatite; IJ-PYX BX = breccia with crbt matrix & ijolite or pyroxenite clasts; MEL-IJ = melano-ijolite. REE = Sum of Y, La, Ce, Nd, Sm; Y - yttrium, La - lanthanum, Ce - cerium, Nd - neodymium, Sm - samarium. P2O5 - phosphate, Nb2O5 - niobium oxide, Ta2O5 - tantalum oxide, 1g/t = 1 ppm The Prairie Lake project consists of 46 mineral claims covering an area of ~630 ha. Logistically Prairie Lake is superbly located, with ready access to power, road, rail and shipping infrastructure; it is easily accessed by an all-weather road from the TransCanada Highway 28 kilometres to the south. The mineralization identified is entirely contained within the Prairie Lake carbonatite complex; the ET of 515-630 million tonnes is defined by 59 diamond drill holes with grades as tabulated below. All samples were analysed by Activation Laboratories (ActLabs) in Ancaster, Ontario. Samples were analysed for a whole rock and trace element ICP analytical package as well as for niobium, tantalum, and zirconium oxides using a fusion XRF method. An internal Quality Control Quality Assurance (QAQC) program was implemented with four QAQC samples (blanks and reference standards) added into the sampling stream. Prairie Lake Drilling & Trenching by Target Area1: SW Jim's Showing East NE Other Areas Total Historic Drill Holes (1969-1983) Drill Holes 16 11 1 0 17 45 Metres 1351.7 938.4 34.1 0 1528.5 3852.7 Drill Holes (2007-2010) Drill Holes 21 10 0 0 1 32 Metres 6632 1692.4 0 0 101 8425.4 Trenches (2010) Trenching 1 0 2 2 0 5 Metres 377.7 0 433.0 754.55 0 1562.2 1 Trench lengths are calculated as cumulative length of samples along trench. Prairie Lake ET2: SW Jim's Showing East NE Total REEs La (ppm) Lanthanum 275 - 340 295 - 360 305 - 370 200 - 250 280 - 340 Ce (ppm) Cerium 650 - 790 670 - 820 670 - 820 450 - 550 650 - 790 Sm (ppm) Samarium 55 - 70 55 - 70 55 - 70 50 - 60 55 - 70 Nd (ppm) Neodymium 295 - 360 290 - 360 320 - 390 235 - 290 300 - 360 Y (ppm) Yttrium 85 - 100 90 - 110 80 - 100 135 - 170 85 - 100 La+Ce+Sm+Nd+Y (ppm) 1360 - 1660 1400 - 1720 1430 - 1750 1070 - 1320 1370 - 1660 Additional Elements (as oxides) P2O5 (%) Phosphate 3.0 - 4.0 3.5 - 4.5 2.5 - 3.0 2.5 - 3.5 3.0 - 4.0 Nb2O5 (%) Niobium 0.095 - 0.115 0.100 - 0.120 0.040 - 0.050 0.085 - 0.105 0.090 - 0.110 Ta2O5 (ppm) Tantalum 18 - 25 25 - 30 5 - 7 10 - 12 18 - 21 Volume - m3 (million) 140 - 175 12 - 14 13 - 16 2 - 3 170 - 210 Tonnes (million) 435 - 530 35 - 45 40 - 50 7 - 8 515 - 630 2 The potential quantity and grade of the ET is conceptual in nature and there has been insufficient exploration to define a mineral resource. It is uncertain if further exploration will result in the discovery of a mineral resource. There is no National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects preliminary economic assessment in respect of the Prairie Lake ET. The potential quantity and grade of the ET is conceptual in nature and there has been insufficient exploration to define a mineral resource. It is uncertain if further exploration will result in the discovery of a mineral resource. There is no National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects preliminary economic assessment in respect of the Prairie Lake ET. Laura Giroux, P.Geo, Chief Geologist, acts as Nuinsco's Qualified Person under National Instrument 43-101. Ms. Giroux has reviewed and approved the technical contents of this news release. About Nuinsco Resources Limited Nuinsco Resources has over 50 years of exploration success and is a growth-oriented, multi-commodity mineral exploration and development company focused on prospective opportunities in Canada and internationally. Currently the Company has four properties in Ontario - the high-grade Sunbeam gold property near Atikokan, the Dash Lake gold property near Terrace Bay, the large multi-commodity (rare-earths, niobium, tantalum, phosphate) Prairie Lake project near Terrace Bay, and the Zig Zag Lake property (lithium, tantalum) near Armstrong. In addition, Nuinsco has an agreement for gold exploitation at the El Sid project in the Eastern Desert of Egypt. Forward-Looking Statements This news release contains certain "forward-looking statements." All statements, other than statements of historic fact, that address activities, events or developments that Nuinsco believes, expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are often, but not always, identified by the use of words such as "seek," "anticipate," "believe," "plan," "estimate, "expect," and "intend" and statements that an event or result "may," "will," "can," "should," "could," or "might" occur or be achieved and other similar expressions. These forward-looking statements reflect the current expectations or beliefs of Nuinsco based on information currently available to Nuinsco. Forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that may cause the actual results of Nuinsco to differ materially from those discussed in the forward-looking statements, and even if such actual results are realized or substantially realized, there can be no assurance that they will have the expected consequences to, or effects on Nuinsco. Factors that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from current expectations include, among other things, failure to successfully complete financings, capital and other costs varying significantly from estimates, production rates varying from estimates, changes in world copper and/or gold markets, changes in equity markets, uncertainties relating to the availability and costs of financing needed in the future, equipment failure, unexpected geological conditions, imprecision in resource estimates, success of future development initiatives, competition, operating performance of facilities, environmental and safety risks, delays in obtaining or failure to obtain tenure to properties and/or necessary permits and approvals, and other development and operating risks. Any forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date on which it is made and, except as may be required by applicable securities laws, Nuinsco disclaims any intent or obligation to update any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or results or otherwise. Although Nuinsco believes that the assumptions inherent in the forward-looking statements are reasonable, forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and accordingly undue reliance should not be put on such statements due to the inherent uncertainty therein. To learn more, please visit www.nuinsco.ca or contact: Paul Jones, CEO paul.jones@nuinsco.ca Sean Stokes, Executive VP sean.stokes@nuinsco.ca Cathy Hume, Consultant cathy@chfir.com Instagram: @nuinscoresources Twitter: @NWIResources SOURCE: Nuinsco Resources Limited View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661521/Nuinsco-Announces-Further-Significant-Intersections-at-Prairie-Lake-1223m-and-1257m-of-Continuous-Critical-Elements-Phosphate-Mineralization ORLANDO, FL / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Clarion Events Food & Beverage Group has made the decision to postpone the 2021 Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show and Healthy Food Expo Florida that were scheduled for September 19-20 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, FL. This decision was made following conversations with exhibitors, operators, sponsors, and speakers who recommended moving the next in person live event to 2022 as a result of health and safety conditions related to the pandemic in Orlando. Dates and venue will be announced shortly. "Our events are here to support the industry as a partner, and although disappointed that we will not be able to gather this September, we know this is the right decision," said Rita Ugianskis, Vice President for the Clarion Events Food & Beverage Group. "The most basic value proposition of this Show is to connect in person with peers, vendors and speakers - in a safe environment free from health risks. After speaking with many of our attendees, vendors and partners over the past weeks, we understand and share our industry's concern for their own safety, as well as that of their colleagues and loved ones. We are grateful for the feedback from those here in Florida, as well as those who would be traveling to Florida for the Show." She added, "We will use this time to refocus the 2022 event to meet the ever changing needs of this evolving industry with an emphasis on event experience and value. We look forward to sharing exciting updates with you, including new ways to make personal and professional connections; learning from unique and exciting content to enhance your business and your career; and discovering the products to enhance your menu, deliver operational efficiency and improve your guest's experience. We value our role in supporting you, and our commitment to that remains strong and unwavering." The Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show is sponsored by The Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association (FRLA), Florida's premier non-profit hospitality industry trade association. Founded in 1946 as the Florida Restaurant Association, FRLA merged with the Florida Hotel and Motel Association in 2006. FRLA's more than 10,000 members include independent hoteliers and restaurateurs, household name franchises, theme parks and suppliers. The association's mission is to protect, educate and promote Florida's $111.7 billion hospitality industry which represents 1.5 million employees. Dedicated to safeguarding the needs of the membership, FRLA provides legislative advocacy to ensure the voices of its members are heard and their interests are protected. The association offers regulatory compliance and food safety training through SafeStaff and FRLA's subsidiary, RCS Training. The FRLA Educational Foundation provides industry-developed, career-building high school programs throughout the state. Clarion Events (us.clarionevents.com ) produces 37 events across 13 sectors of both trade and consumer events. The Clarion Events Food & Beverage Group include the Western Foodservice & Hospitality Expo, Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show, International Restaurant & Foodservice Show of New York, Healthy Food Expo, Coffee Fest and The NGA Show. Clarion Events acquired PennWell in early 2018, bringing 4 Tradeshow 200 events into the U.S. portfolio and super-charging the already rapid growth. Clarion Events has offices in Trumbull, CT; Kennesaw, GA; Boca Raton, FL; Tacoma, WA, and Fairlawn, NJ. For Further Information, Contact: Amy Riemer, Media Relations Representative 978-475-4441 (office) or 978-502-4895 (cell) amy@riemercommunications.com SOURCE: Restaurant & Foodservice Show View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661516/The-2021-Florida-Restaurant-Lodging-Show-Postponed--Will-Move-Next-In-Person-Event-to-2022 WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - President Joe Biden has appointed crisis management expert Elizabeth M. Allen as Assistant Secretary of State for Global Public Affairs at the U.S. Department of State. The appointment, announced on Wednesday, comes amid the Afghanistan crisis. The United States is carrying out the biggest evacuation process in its history from Afghanistan, as the August 31 deadline set by the Taliban for US forces to leave the country is very near. US troops control Kabul airport from where tens of thousands of people, including American citizens and Afghans working for foreign forces, have been evacuated. Thousands of people are stranded outside the airport to flee the country fearing reprisals from the Taliban militants now in power. Liz Allen is currently a partner at strategic communications and public affairs firm Finsbury Glover Hering (FGH), where she specializes in message and campaign strategy, crisis management, and leadership communications. Prior to FGH, Allen has served in the Obama Administration for eight years, most recently as White House Deputy Communications Director and Deputy Assistant to President Barack Obama. She also served as White House Director of Message Planning and Deputy Director of Communications to the then Vice President Joe Biden. In that capacity, she traveled extensively to more than 30 countries with the Vice President, including trips to some of the most volatile parts of the world such as Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. In 2020, Allen took a leave of absence from FGH to serve as Vice President Kamala Harris's Communications Director on the presidential campaign. Allen previously served at the U.S. Department of State as Director of Strategic Communications and Public Affairs for the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, focusing on U.S. public diplomacy efforts, and in positions in the State Department's Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement and Office of Global Women's Issues. A native of Buffalo, New York, she is a graduate in Political Science from the State University of New York (SUNY) College at Geneseo. Wednesday, Biden announced two nominations to U.S. foreign policy and aid. Thomas Barrett was named Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. Carla Koppell was nominated as Assistant Administrator for Development, Democracy, and Innovation, United States Agency for International Development (USAID). Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX Kostenloser Wertpapierhandel auf Smartbroker.de Dieppe, New Brunswick--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Colibri Resource Corporation (TSXV: CBI) ("Colibri" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that its earn-in partner Silver Spruce Resources (SSE-TSXV) has reported the results of a Phase 2 ground exploration program on the 1,130-hectare Jackie Gold & Silver Property which began June 11th, 2021. Today's News Release By Silver Spruce follows: August 26, 2021 - Bedford, NS - (TSXV: SSE) - Silver Spruce Resources Inc. ("Silver Spruce" or the "Company") is pleased to announce promising gold and multi-element assay results of its Phase 2 ground exploration program on the 1,130-hectare Jackie Au-Ag property ("Jackie" or the "Property"). The program was focused around a pristine exploration target with encouraging Au-Ag assays from our Phase 1 prospecting and rock sampling (see Figures 1, 2 and 3). The work was performed on a 100-hectare section of the Property with grid-controlled detailed geological mapping and rock sampling focused on a 25-hectare central block covering the core of the gold and silver discovery area with additional wider spaced grid mapping of the surrounding area. Figure 1. Jackie and Diamante 2 Concession Location Map. Access from Tepoca south on Highway #117 and local road to La Quema. Discovery area 3km north of La Quema is indicated by the white arrow. To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4269/94521_cceb6ff7842a080c_001full.jpg "We are excited about the potential for Jackie given the positive results and an original discovery with our early exploration campaigns. The intense silicate and oxide alteration with high-grade precious metal values ranging up to 9.65 g/t Au and 515 g/t Ag during Phase 1, and up to 4.15 g/t Au and 100 g/t Ag in separate samples during Phase 2, verified and extended the target area anomaly," said Greg Davison, Silver Spruce VP Exploration. "Our Hermosillo-based geological team completed tightly-spaced 25-50 metre grid sampling and mapping which successfully increased the target to 200m x 400m. A distinct northwesterly trend of anomalous precious metal and typical heavy metal pathfinder elements runs parallel to several local and regional lineaments which provide new untested targets for follow-up sampling." Assay results for 10 Phase 2 samples and 3 Phase 1 samples sorted by Au content are presented in Table 1. A total of 310 rock samples were collected to date in two programs. Table 1. Select assay results sorted by Au g/t from Phase 1 and Phase 2 rock sampling - n=310 samples To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4269/94521_table1.png Figure 2. Ridge located 50 metres above the valley floor, showing intense oxidation and argillic alteration peripheral to and within large polymetallic anomaly as indicated in Figure 1. To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4269/94521_cceb6ff7842a080c_003full.jpg The Company, with a six-person team (two senior geologists, two junior geologist and two field assistants) and all necessary logistical support undertook a Phase 2 exploration program, including rock sampling and geological mapping of known areas exhibiting significant alteration or mineralization (see Figures 2 and 3), collection of structural data and alteration zoning to assist with vectoring toward potential Phase 3 drilling targets. The investigation of several known hyperspectral alteration targets identified from satellite imagery was deferred due to rainy season access limitations. All aspects of the exploration program were conducted with strict adherence to COVID-19 protocols for personal safety. Figure 3. Outcrop sampling north of exposed ridge with high grade Au 9.56 g/t and Ag 515 g/t - sample 221009 showing intense zeolite, clay and jarosite alteration of andesite To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4269/94521_cceb6ff7842a080c_006full.jpg Figure 4 illustrates the Phase 1 geochemistry, based on 75th, 90th, 95th and 98th percentiles using proportional symbols, for gold with the inset map for Au, Ag, Pb, Zn and Cd. Figure 5 illustrates the Phase 1 results for Au with an inset map for Phase 2 Au distribution. Figure 6 illustrates the Phase 1 and 2 results for Cu. The data clearly show a strong multi-element cluster effect (Au, Ag, Bi, Sb, Cd, Zn and Hg) and strong silicate alteration focused over the principal 200m x 400m target area extending for the pathfinder elements on a general northwesterly trend and open along strike. The preliminary prospecting program identified a distinctive andesite ridge with intense oxidation, silicification and argillic alteration, and a notable paucity of vegetation located 35-50 metres vertical above the valley floor. Similar alteration, verified by preliminary aiSIRIS results of hyperspectral analysis, from the northern area of the ridge which was covered by thick vegetation, where exposed displayed intense replacement by zeolite, kaolinite, alunite, montmorillonite, opaline silica and muscovite and contained the bulk of the anomalous gold and silver values. Geochemical analyses clearly identified a strong Au-Ag anomaly, commonly though not exclusively, associated with elevated Hg, Pb, Zn, Cd, As, Sb and Cu with spatial distribution and trends similar to the multi-element data recorded for the nearby El Mezquite property. Figure 4. Phase 2 grid sampling areas on Phase 1 geochemistry (Au ppm only), Jackie property. Inset map with 50 metre grid location map and multi-element anomaly Au (ppm), Ag (ppm), Pb (ppm), Zn (ppm) and Cd (ppm). To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4269/94521_cceb6ff7842a080c_007full.jpg Figure 5. Phase 2 grid sampling area (inset) on Phase 1 geochemistry (Au ppm), Jackie property. Inset map with cluster of anomalous Au and Ag assays up to 4.15 g/t Au and 100 g/t Ag in separate samples. To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4269/94521_cceb6ff7842a080c_008full.jpg Figure 6. Phase 2 grid sampling area (inset) on Phase 1 geochemistry (Cu ppm), Jackie property. Inset map with cluster of anomalous Cu analyses with distinct northwesterly trend parallel to several local and regional lineaments. To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4269/94521_cceb6ff7842a080c_009full.jpg Planning for the Phase 3 exploration program is underway with a view to additional ground work in Q4 2021, including preparation of the environmental report required for a drilling permit and targeting for Q1 2022 reverse circulation drilling. Interpretation of the geological, geochemical, hyperspectral, and property-wide ASTER, LANDSAT 8 and LiDAR imagery is ongoing. The additional geochemistry and geological maps and images from the field program will be provided on the Silver Spruce website (www.silverspruceresources.com) in due course. Project Background The Company recently signed a Definitive Agreement (Press release November 30, 2020) with Colibri Resource Corp. to acquire 50% interest in Jackie, an early-stage precious metal project located 175 km east of Hermosillo, Sonora, Mexico. The large grassroots property is located in a very productive region only one to two kilometres south from our El Mezquite and Diamante properties and adjacent to the west of Minera Alamos' Santana project, and approximately six kilometres northwest of their Nicho deposit currently under development. The Jackie Project is located within the western portion of the Sierra Madre Occidental Volcanic Complex within the prominent northwest-trending "Sonora Gold Belt" of northern Mexico and parallel to the precious metals-rich Mojave-Sonora Megashear. Other nearby large operating mines include Alamos Gold's Los Mulatos gold mine and Agnico Eagle's La India gold mine located 50-60 km to the northeast, Agnico Eagle's Pinos Altos Mine, 95 km southeast and Argonaut's La Colorada Mine, 100 km to the west. Exploration is very active with adjacent and nearby properties reported to be held by Minera Alamos, Newmont, Garibaldi, Evrim, Kootenay Silver and Penoles. The 1,130-hectare Property is easily accessible from Hermosillo to the Tepoca area and heading south from Mexican Highway #16 or west from Highway #117, or from Ciudad Obregon travelling northeast on Hwy. #117 and west to the pueblo of La Quema with vehicles and then pack teams along dry river beds, dirt roads and trails. High voltage power lines are located on Highway #16. Geochemical Analysis, Quality Assurance and Quality Control Rock samples were delivered to the ALS sample preparation facility in Hermosillo, Sonora, Mexico. ALS Global in North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, is a facility certified as ISO 9001:2008 and accredited to ISO/IEC 17025:2005 from the Standards Council of Canada. Pulps (50gram split) were submitted for Au analysis by Fire Assay with Atomic Absorption finish (Au-AA24) and Four Acid Digestion with Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectrometry (ICP-AES) multi-element analyses (ME-ICP61m). Splits of crushed rejects were sent to ALS in Reno, NV for hyperspectral analysis (HYP-PKG) using the Terraspec 4 and aiSIRIS identification of the principal silicate, sulphate, carbonate and hydrous oxide species, namely the alteration minerals and their relative intensity. In-house quality control samples (blanks, standards, duplicates, preparation duplicates) were inserted into the sample set. ALS Global conducts its own internal QA/QC program of blanks, standards and duplicates, and the results were provided with the Company sample certificates. The results of the ALS control samples were reviewed by the Company's QP and evaluated for acceptable tolerances. All sample and pulp rejects are stored at ALS Global pending full review of the analytical data, and future selection of pulps for independent third-party check analyses, as requisite. All of the metal values disclosed herein by Silver Spruce are reported from grab and channel samples which may not be representative of the metal grades. There is no record of historical sampling from previous exploration efforts on the Property. Qualified Person Greg Davison, PGeo, Silver Spruce VP Exploration and Director, is the Company's internal Qualified Person for the Jackie Project and is responsible for approval of the technical content of this press release within the meaning of National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects ("NI 43-101"), under TSX guidelines. ABOUT COLIBRI RESOURCE CORPORATION: Colibri is a Canadian-based mineral exploration company listed on the TSX-V (CBI) and is focused on acquiring and exploring prospective gold & silver properties in Mexico. The Company has six exploration projects of which five currently have exploration programs being executed or planned for 2021. The flagship Evelyn Gold Project is 100% owned and explored by Colibri. The Company has four additional projects, Pilar Gold & Silver Project (optioned to Tocvan Ventures- CSE:TOC), El Mezquite Gold & Silver Project , Jackie Gold & Silver Project, and the Diamante Gold & Silver Project (50% earn-in agreements with Silver Spruce Resources - TSX.V-SSE) are also currently being actively advanced. For more information about all Company projects please visit: www.colibriresource.com. Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Notice Regarding Forward-Looking Statements: This news release contains "forward-looking statements". Statements in this press release which are not purely historical are forward-looking statements and include any statements regarding beliefs, plans, expectations or intentions regarding the future. Actual results could differ from those projected in any forward-looking statements due to numerous factors. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this news release, and the Company assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking statements, or to update the reasons why actual results could differ from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes that the plans, expectations and intentions contained in this press release are reasonable, there can be no assurance that they will prove to be accurate. For further information: Ronald J. Goguen, President, Chairperson and Director, Tel: (506) 383-4274, rongoguen@colibriresource.com To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94521 Immediate Positions Available SAN DIEGO, CA / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Sea Crest Facility Services LLC (SCFS) has seen increased demand for their services because of Covid with businesses, schools, building facilities and the like having to step up their sanitizing and cleaning. And now SCFS is on a major hiring campaign throughout all of Southern California. Like many industries, the janitorial and landscaping industry has a shortage of people to meet the huge demand for services now that things are opening up fully. But the problem they are having is hiring employees to meet the need. SCFS is looking to fill hundreds of positions in San Diego, Los Angeles, Orange County and Riverside / Inland Empire. There is no experience required as they offer on the job training, the starting pay ranges from $14 to $22 per hour, they offer medical and dental insurance and room for growth . If that isn't enough, they are also offering a $400 hiring bonus all in a fun and energetic environment. For more information on Sea Crest Facility Services and for more details on job requirements, please visit https://SeaCrestservicesca.com/ About Sea Crest Facility Services LLC Sea Crest Services Facility Services LLC, provides the expertise that comes with 40 years' experience in transforming commercial properties. Their integrated facilities services include janitorial and landscaping - a broad range of support for busy property and facility managers. The primary mission at SCFS is to build successful long-term relationships with their clients by ensuring open communication, optimal service, trust, integrity, and understanding. They are Southern California's #1 choice in facilities services, delivering exceptional cleaning services for offices, cleanrooms, medical buildings, education institutes, homeowners associations, retail centers, gyms, and more for Orange County, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Riverside counties. Media Contact: Joice Truban Curry c3 Communications, Inc. 858-794-6974 / joice@c3publicrelations.com SOURCE: SeaCrest Facility Services View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661443/Sea-Crest-Facility-Services-LLC-on-MAJOR-Hiring-Campaign-Due-to-Huge-Demand Clinical trial sponsored and conducted by the French oncology cooperative group ARCAGY-GINECO and supported by Merck Sharp Dohme Corp. (MSD), a subsidiary of Merck Co., Inc., Kenilworth, NJ, USA, known as MSD outside of the US and Canada, and OSEImmunotherapeutics. Innovative approach in ovarian cancer, an oncology indication with high unmet medical need. First Results expected beginning of 2025. Regulatory News: This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005345/en/ OSE Immunotherapeutics (Paris:OSE) (ISIN: FR0012127173) and the French cooperative group ARCAGY-GINECO announced today that the first patient has been randomized in the Phase 2 clinical trial evaluating Tedopi alone and in combination with MSD's Keytruda (pembrolizumab) as maintenance treatment in patients with recurrent ovarian cancer after chemotherapy (the TEDOVA trial). The three arm TEDOVA study aims at evaluating the neo-epitope-based vaccine Tedopi as a maintenance treatment, alone or in combination with anti-PD-1 immune checkpoint inhibitor Keytruda, versus best supportive care in patients with first or second platinum-sensitive recurrent ovarian cancer with controlled disease after platinum-based chemotherapy and who have already received both bevacizumab and a PARP (Poly ADP-Ribose Polymerase) inhibitor. Dr Alexandra Leary, Chief Investigator of TEDOVA study from Gustave Roussy cancer center, comments: "We are very pleased to announce enrolment of the first patient in TEDOVA, the first trial evaluating an innovative maintenance strategy for patients in first or second platinum sensitive relapse post-PARP inhibitor and bevacizumab. We look forward to evaluating this therapeutic option for women with ovarian cancer and a strong unmet medical need Patients with ovarian cancer do not respond to checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) alone because these tumors are 'immune cold'. The objective of TEDOVA is to turn ovarian cancer into an 'immune hot' tumor using a combination of tumor associated neo-epitopes that have been optimized to break immunological self-tolerance. This Phase 2 trial, sponsored by the "Association de Recherche sur les CAncers dont GYnecologiques (ARCAGY-GINECO)" on behalf of GINECO, is designed to enroll 180 patients and will be conducted at approximately 30 sites in France and around 12 sites in Germany and Belgium. Alexis Peyroles, Chief Executive Officer of OSE Immunotherapeutics, adds: "Having the first patient enrolled by our oncology group partner marks a significant milestone in Tedopi's development by exploring its impact in an additional oncology indication. We are expecting first results on the potential of such an innovative PD-1 targeted checkpoint combination strategy at the beginning of 2025". ABOUT OVARIAN CANCER Worldwide, ovarian cancer is the seventh most common cancer and the eighth leading cause of cancer death in women. The five-year survival rate for ovarian cancer worldwide is 30-40%. In 2018, there were nearly 300,000 new cases diagnosed. Once the first relapse has occurred, ovarian cancer is managed as a chronic disease, requiring iterative lines of platinum-based chemotherapy. After 6 cycles, chemotherapy is stopped and one of the major priorities is to extend "chemotherapy-free" intervals for the patients by proposing maintenance strategies with targeted therapies (PARP inhibitors or bevacizumab). By the time patients with ovarian cancer present with first or second relapse, they will have received BOTH a PARP inhibitor and bevacizumab, thus patients progressing post-PARP inhibitors and bevacizumab represent an area of unmet medical need, they are offered chemotherapy alone with no maintenance strategy. The TEDOVA trial focuses on these women. ABOUT GINECO GINECO (Groupe d'Investigateurs National pour l'Etude des Cancers de l'Ovaire et du sein) is the French Cooperative Group in Oncology labelled by INCa (Institut National du Cancer or French NCI) developing and conducting gynecological and metastatic breast cancer clinical trials at the national and international level. The GINECO group was founded in 1993 and is member of international consortia such as ENGOT and GCIG (Gynecologic Cancer InterGroup). ABOUT ENGOT ENGOT (European Network for Gynecological Oncological Trial groups) is a research network of the European Society of Gynecological Oncology (ESGO) and was founded in 2007. ENGOT is a platform that guarantees that the European spirit and culture is incorporated into the medical progress in gynaecological oncology, and that all European patients and countries can participate in an active way in clinical research and progress. The ultimate goal is to bring the best treatment to gynecological cancer patients through the best science and enabling every patient in every European country to access a clinical trial. Currently, ENGOT includes 21 cooperative groups from 25 European countries. ABOUT MSD Established in France since 1961, MSD France, a research-based pharmaceutical company, is a subsidiary of the American company Merck Co., Inc., Kenilworth, NJ, USA. MSD France aims to deliver patients and healthcare professionals with a global innovative health offer including prescription medicines (mainly in four major therapeutic areas: cardio-metabolism, oncology, infectious diseases, vaccines), solutions and services, especially in the digital field. For more information, visit www.msd.com. ABOUT OSE Immunotherapeutics OSE Immunotherapeutics is an integrated biotechnology company focused on developing and partnering therapies to control the immune system for immuno-oncology and autoimmune diseases. The company's immunology research and development platform is focused on three areas: T-cell-based vaccination, Immuno-Oncology (focus on myeloid targets), Auto-immunity Inflammation. Its balanced first-in-class clinical and preclinical portfolio has a diversified risk profile: Vaccine platform Tedopi (innovative combination of neoepitopes): the company's most advanced product; positive results for Step-1 of the Phase 3 trial (Atalante 1) in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer post checkpoint inhibitor failure. In Phase 2 in pancreatic cancer (TEDOPaM), sponsor GERCOR. In Phase 2 in ovary cancer, in combination with pembrolizumab (TEDOVA), sponsor ARCAGY-GINECO. In Phase 2 in non-small cell lung cancer in combination with nivolumab, sponsor Italian foundation FoRT. CoVepiT: a prophylactic second-generation vaccine against COVID-19, developed using SARS-CoV-2 optimized epitopes against multi variants. Positive preclinical and human ex vivo results. Voluntary and temporary Phase 1 enrollment suspension on-going (July 2021). Immuno-oncology platform BI 765063 (OSE-172, anti-SIRPa mAb on SIRPa/CD47 pathway): developed in partnership with Boehringer Ingelheim in advanced solid tumors; positive Phase 1 results in monotherapy and BI 765063 dose escalation study ongoing in combination with Ezabenlimab (PD-1 antagonist). CLEC-1 (novel myeloid checkpoint target): identification of mAb antagonists of CLEC-1 blocking the "Don't Eat Me" signal that increase both tumor cell phagocytosis by macrophages and antigen capture by dendritic cells. BiCKI: bispecific fusion protein platform built on the key backbone component anti-PD-1 (OSE-279) combined with new immunotherapy targets; 2nd generation of PD-(L)1 inhibitors to increase antitumor efficacity. Auto-immunity and inflammation platform FR104 (anti-CD28 monoclonal antibody): Licensing partnership agreement with Veloxis in the organ transplant market; ongoing Phase 1/2 in renal transplant (sponsored by the Nantes University Hospital); Phase 2-ready asset in an autoimmune disease indication. OSE-127/S95011 (humanized monoclonal antibody targeting IL-7 receptor): developed in partnership with Servier; positive Phase 1 results; in Phase 2 in ulcerative colitis (OSE sponsor) and an independent Phase 2a planned in Sjogren's syndrome (Servier sponsor). OSE-230 (ChemR23 agonist mAb): first-in-class therapeutic agent with the potential to resolve chronic inflammation by driving affected tissues to tissue integrity. For more information: https://ose-immuno.com/en/ Click and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn Forward-looking statements This press release contains express or implied information and statements that might be deemed forward-looking information and statements in respect of OSE Immunotherapeutics. They do not constitute historical facts. These information and statements include financial projections that are based upon certain assumptions and assessments made by OSE Immunotherapeutics' management in light of its experience and its perception of historical trends, current economic and industry conditions, expected future developments and other factors they believe to be appropriate. These forward-looking statements include statements typically using conditional and containing verbs such as "expect", "anticipate", "believe", "target", "plan", or "estimate", their declensions and conjugations and words of similar import. Although the OSE Immunotherapeutics management believes that the forward-looking statements and information are reasonable, the OSE Immunotherapeutics' shareholders and other investors are cautioned that the completion of such expectations is by nature subject to various risks, known or not, and uncertainties which are difficult to predict and generally beyond the control of OSE Immunotherapeutics. These risks could cause actual results and developments to differ materially from those expressed in or implied or projected by the forward-looking statements. These risks include those discussed or identified in the public filings made by OSE Immunotherapeutics with the AMF. Such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance. This press release includes only summary information and should be read with the OSE Immunotherapeutics Universal Registration Document filed with the AMF on 15 April 2021, including the annual financial report for the fiscal year 2020, available on the OSE Immunotherapeutics' website. Other than as required by applicable law, OSE Immunotherapeutics issues this press release at the date hereof and does not undertake any obligation to update or revise the forward-looking information or statements. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005345/en/ Contacts: OSE Immunotherapeutics Sylvie Detry sylvie.detry@ose-immuno.com +33 153 198 757 Investor Relations Thomas Guillot thomas.guillot@ose-immuno.com +33 607 380 431 Media U.S. Media: LifeSci Communications Darren Opland, Ph.D. darren@lifescicomms.com +1 646 627 8387 French Media: FP2COM Florence Portejoie fportejoie@fp2com.fr +33 607 768 283 Guillaume van Renterghem LifeSci Advisors gvanrenterghem@lifesciadvisors.com +41 76 735 01 31 ARCAGY-GINECO www.arcagy.org www.twitter.com/ArcagyGineco Benedicte Votan bvotan@arcagy.org PRESS RELEASE Half-year financial results Credit Mutuel Arkea continues its growth trajectory and confirms the efficiency of its development model in serving its customers and partners Brest, August 26th, 2021 - The Board of Directors of Credit Mutuel Arkea today approved the financial statements for the first half of 2021. In a general context still marked by the health crisis, Credit Mutuel Arkea benefits from the rebound of economic activity and shows very good commercial dynamics, which illustrate the confidence of its members and customers. With the presentation of very good financial indicators, Credit Mutuel Arkea confirms the relevance of its strategic choices and the resilience of its original development model, which supports customers and territories in their environmental and social transition. Very good commercial dynamics Credit Mutuel Arkea has been resolutely mobilised in its territories alongside its members and customers throughout the health crisis, and its activity indicators are at a very good level. The strong momentum observed in all business lines reflects the quality of the range of products and services and the support provided by the group's employees. With a customer portfolio up by 1.8%, i.e. 85,000 new individual and professional customers in the first half of the year, Credit Mutuel Arkea now has nearly 5 million members and customers. This growth, mainly driven by retail banking activities (Fortuneo and Keytrade online banks, and the Credit Mutuel de Bretagne and Credit Mutuel du Sud-Ouest networks in particular) and by the insurance activities, testifies to the success of the diversification strategy pursued by the group. Gross outstanding loans amount to 70.1 billion (+3.6%), driven by an increase in housing, corporate, institutional and consumer loans compared to the end of 2020. Loan production in the first half of 2021 amounted to 7.7 billion. Excluding State-guaranteed loans (PGE), it rose by 8.6% compared to the first half of 2020. In particular, the Group is stepping up production of the "PACT" loans offered since 2020 by Arkea Banque Entreprise et Institutionnels to SMEs, ETIs, institutions and real estate players. These impact loans provide for significant savings (up to 20%) on financial expenses, correlated with the borrower's improvement of its ESG performance. Total outstandings savings also rose by 7% in the first half, to 147.3 billion, with net inflows of 4.6 billion, compared with 2 billion in the first half of 2020. Net life insurance inflows benefited from the Group's long-standing commitment to diversifying savings into unit-linked products. Unit-linked policies accounted for 61% of gross life insurance inflows and 37% of total assets under management. Financial savings, driven by Arkea Investment Services, also posted a very good level of inflows, reflecting the product innovation strategy implemented to offer attractive asset classes in the low-rate environment. At the end of June 2021, assets under management by the Group's multi-boutique asset management subsidiary amounted to 66 billion, compared with 60 billion at the end of 2020. In property, life and health insurance, compared with the first half of 2020, earned premiums on existing policies rose by 2.8% to 224 million, and new business premiums increased by 22.6% to 32 million. External networks accounted for 56% of new business premiums and 34% of earned premiums on existing policies. Results that confirm the relevance of the strategy Group revenues*, at 1,224 million, were up 11.6% compared with the first half of 2020, and 9.7% compared with the first half of 2019. They reflect Credit Mutuel Arkea's very good commercial momentum in all its activities, and the relevance of the strategy to diversify its revenue* sources. The net interest margin increased, in line with the decrease in funding costs. Fees and commissions increased, driven by the contribution of the lending business and white label banking services. The BtoB and specialised services division thus contributed 16% of the Group's first-half revenues*, or 192 million. The good performance of the life insurance market and the financial markets benefited the net income of the insurance business. As for the group's private equity business, after being heavily impacted in 2020 by the effects of the health crisis, it recorded a significant rebound in the first half of the year, with asset valuations benefiting from a more favorable economic environment. * Net banking and insurance income and gains on disposal or dilution of companies accounted for by the equity method Net income group share, at its highest level ever at 277 million, was up 11.1% compared with net income for the first half of 2020, which benefited in particular from non-recurring impacts. It is also 13.4% higher than in the first half of 2019. The cost of risk fell by 37.6% compared with the same period last year, to 53 million, representing an annual level of 15 basis points in relation to outstanding customer commitments. This change in the cost of risk in the context of the health crisis reflects the good quality of the loan portfolio, as well as a still very limited exposure to sectors considered vulnerable. A solid financial structure Total assets increased by 3.3% compared to December 31, 2020, to 174.9bn, with a gross loan?to?deposit ratio of 98.5%. Group shareholders' equity increased by 4.5% to 8.1 billion. They include 2.5bn of member shares, up 4.5% compared to December 2020, illustrating the confidence that members have in Credit Mutuel Arkea. The Common Equity Tier One (CET1) solvency ratio of 17.1%, up from December 31, 2020, and the total capital ratio of 21.6% as at June 30, 2021, are well above regulatory requirements and reflect an extremely solid financial structure. SIMPLIFIED INCOME STATEMENT M 30/06/2021 30/06/2021 Variation % Net banking and insurance income including gains on disposal or dilution of companies accounted for by the equity method 1224 1096 + 128 11.6% Operating expenses 807 667 + 139 20.9% Cost/income ratio 65.9% 60.9% + 5 points Gross operating income 417 429 - 12 - 2.7% Cost of risk 53 84 - 32 - 37.6% Operating income 365 345 + 20 5.8% Net income - group share 277 249 + 28 11.1% Credit Mutuel Arkea's performance in the first half of the year, to which all business lines contributed, testifies to the group's attractiveness and the relevance of its development model. Against the backdrop of a strong rebound in the French economy, we are taking full advantage of the flexibility and agility provided by our intermediate size. Our diversified business model and solid financial structure will enable us to continue our development, serving our members, our customers and the local economy. The group's employees and directors are mobilised to support each of our members in the realisation of their projects, by providing real added value in terms of expertise and quality of service. We are working towards a successful and sustainable recovery, based on the convictions of our strategic plan Transitions 2024, unveiled at the beginning of the year. Aligned with our Raison d'etre, it expresses our collective ambition to strengthen our positive impact and support all our stakeholders in their environmental and societal transition. - Julien Carmona, Chairman of Credit Mutuel Arkea - With results at an all-time high and indicators at a very good level, Credit Mutuel Arkea is on a fine growth trajectory. Fundamentals are solid and commercial performance testifies to the company's commitment to its members and customers and to the quality of its product and service offering. The group confirms the effectiveness and relevance of its development model, and has the essential assets to ensure the success of its Transitions 2024 strategic plan, which places environmental and societal considerations at its heart, for the responsible achievement of all. Our dynamic HR policy, which has already resulted in more than 450 new hires since the beginning of the year, underscores our uniqueness and also reflects our objective of striving for overall performance in our businesses. - Helene Bernicot, Chief Executive Officer of Credit Mutuel Arkea - About Credit Mutuel Arkea Credit Mutuel Arkea is made up of two regional federations representing two main French geographic zones (Brittany in the West and the South West) and their member local savings banks. Credit Mutuel Arkea also has a presence across Europe thanks to its corporate and online subsidiaries (Fortuneo, Monext, Financo, Arkea Investment Services, Suravenir, CFCAL). Credit Mutuel Arkea is entirely owned by its customer shareholders. Credit Mutuel Arkea employs more than 11,000 people, counts 2,800 directors and has a total of nearly 5 million customers. The bank has 174,9 billion euro in total assets. Credit Mutuel Arkea ranks among the leading banks with headquarters in the regions. A detailed presentation for the first half of 2020 is available on the group's website at the following address: https://www.cm-arkea.com/banque/assurance/credit/mutuel/ecb_5037/en/investor?presentations Press contact: Ariane Le Berre-Lemahieu - 02 98 00 22 99 - ariane.le-berre-lemahieu@arkea.com Follow Credit Mutuel Arkea news on social networks c m - a r k e a . c o m ------------------------ This publication embed "Actusnews SECURITY MASTER ". - SECURITY MASTER Key: ym1rY5maZpiVxp1ulZptbpaYaJplw2aYmGGYmWNwa5yUaJ9imW5mZ8WeZnBhnGpo - Check this key: https://www.security-master-key.com. ------------------------ Copyright Actusnews Wire Receive by email the next press releases of the company by registering on www.actusnews.com, it's free Full and original release in PDF format:https://www.actusnews.com/documents_communiques/ACTUS-0-70752-credit-mutuel-arkea-results-for-the-first-half-of-2021.pdf Vantage Group Holdings Ltd. (Vantage) continues the build-out of its insurance platform introducing new product offerings in Financial Lines and Professional Liability insurance. Vantage was established in late 2020 and began writing reinsurance risk on January 1, 2021, through its Bermuda Class 4 company, Vantage Risk Ltd. The Bermuda carrier has since expanded its offering to include select insurance products. In the US, Vantage launched a US surplus lines carrier, Vantage Risk Specialty Insurance Company, enabling certain US risks to be written on A- (Excellent)/Financial Size Category XII AM Best rated paper. Commenting on the progress to date, CEO Greg Hendrick said, "We are very pleased with the quality of the insurance businesses launched in the second and third quarters of 2021. I am excited to highlight some of the insurance leaders at Vantage who lend a great depth of experience, long-standing industry relationships and bold commitment to Vantage's ambition to build a specialty re/insurance business that sees risk differently." Bermuda Professional and Financial Lines Leona Lik joined Vantage in April 2021 and heads the Financial and Professional Lines business in Bermuda. Leona brings over 20 years of insurance, brokerage and consulting experience. Most recently she progressed through senior-level roles in Aon's Financial Services Group across Bermuda, New York and London platforms, culminating as Broking and Strategy Leader. Leona earned a Bachelor of Science degree in International Business and Marketing with a minor in Sociology from New York University's Stern School of Business. At Vantage, she has recruited an experienced Bermuda underwriting team to grow the Bermuda book of Financial and Professional Lines business, focusing on writing all industry classes across Management Liability, Financial Institutions and Professional Services. Product lines will include D&O, Side-A DIC, EPL, Wage Hour, E&O, Blended, Fiduciary, GPL, and Professional Indemnity, all providing excess capacity. US Financial Institutions Bhuma Patel also joined Vantage in April 2021 to head the Financial Institutions business in the United States. Bhuma brings almost 20 years of Financial Institutions Professional Liability Underwriting experience, most recently at CAN, where she led the Eastern region of the Financial Institutions team. Bhuma earned both a Bachelor of Arts in Finance and a Master's in Business Administration from New York University. At Vantage, Bhuma has assembled a team of proven leaders with decades of direct Financial Lines underwriting experience, including Cara Sweeney, Nick Steiner and Rima Pattanam. Her team is focused on Asset Managers (including advisors, hedge funds and private equity firms), Banks and Insurance Companies, providing capacity for excess attachments. They work with National wholesale and retail partners. D&O, E&O, blended policies, GPL, EPL, Fiduciary, Side-A and related lines are all products considered by the Financial Institutions team through tailored solutions and a streamlined excess policy form. US Management Liability In July 2021, the Vantage team welcomed Richard Wall as head of its US Management Liabilitybusiness. Rich brings almost 25 years of D&O and Professional Liability underwriting experience, most recently at AXA XL, where he was Regional Head of Professional Liability underwriting, leading the West region and spearheading the group's national life sciences D&O underwriting strategy. Rich earned a Bachelor of Arts in Finance with a minor in Management Information/Decision Support Systems from the University of Delaware. While all classes of business will be considered, Rich is initially focused on writing excess publicly traded D&O risks (ABC and Side-A DIC) while actively recruiting a team of highly experienced client/broker-facing underwriters. Primary D&O and Lead Side-A DIC product releases on admitted paper are expected in 2022. Commenting on these businesses, Greg Hendrick added, "The performance of these teams since their launch has been impressive, and the heads of these businesses add considerable value to our Insurance Leadership Team. With up to $15 million of excess capacity we are excited to see their business plans fully implemented in the months ahead. We look forward to their unique risk management insights making a difference for Vantage clients." About Vantage: Vantage Group Holdings Ltd. (Vantage) is a re/insurance partner designed for the future. Driven by relentless curiosity, our team of trusted experts provides a fresh perspective on our clients' risks. We add creativity to tech-enabled efficiency and robust analytics to address risks others avoid. The Carlyle Group and Hellman Friedman, global investment firms with successful track records and experience in the re/insurance industry, are lead investors. Disclaimer: The information contained herein is not an offer to sell, or a solicitation to buy, any particular insurance product. No insurance product is offered or will be sold in any state or jurisdiction in which such offer or solicitation would be unlawful under the laws of such state or jurisdiction. Vantage Risk Specialty Insurance Company is not licensed in all states, and products are not available other than through a licensed surplus lines broker. Vantage Risk Ltd. is not licensed, or otherwise authorized, to conduct business in the United States and does not engage in or transact any business in the United States. Business is written in Vantage Risk Ltd. through Bermuda brokers only. Insurance policies issued by these entities are not protected or guaranteed by state insurance guaranty associations or insolvency funds. For more information, please visit www.vantagerisk.com/ View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005653/en/ Contacts: Meridith Bridge, Vested vantage@fullyvested.com 917-545-4118 VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / CMC Metals Ltd. (TSXV:CMB)(FRA:ZM5N)(OTC PINK:CMCZF); (the "Company") announces that initial positive soil geochemical results demonstrate validation of airborne geophysical targets at its flagship Silver Hart project in Yukon. CMC has significantly extended previous soil geochemical surveys at Silver Hart as a part of validating targets identified by its property wide airborne SkyTEM geophysical survey completed earlier this year. The airborne survey identified eight new targets areas on the property (T1 to T8, see Figure 1) and initial results of soil geochemical surveys over T1 and T4 are highly encouraging. Results in the remainder of these target areas and the six other target areas are pending. Existing mineralization in known mineralized veins in the Main Zone occur along northeasterly structures in an area characterized with low magnetic features, moderate conductivity, and in close proximity to the geological contact between volcanics of the Cassiar Batholith with overlying meta-sedimentary sequences including limestones and schists. These polymetallic veins are known to have strike extent up to 1.35 kilometers with above average grades of silver, lead, zinc with minor copper and gold. T1 was a target located within the KW zone in the northwestern portion of the property. Previous surveys had indicated geochemical anomalies in the northwestern corner of this zone. Current results (see figure 2) have identified a stronger anomalous area extending further to the northeast over an area of possible strike length of 400-750 meters with a width of over 200 meters depicting northeasterly trends. The silver soil anomaly is also coincident with lead and zinc soil anomalies. The anomaly remains open in all northerly directions and is associated with key setting features including low magnetism, moderate conductivity, and in close proximity to the Cassiar Batholith-sedimentary contact. T4 was a target located within the northernmost portion of the South Zone. This zone now comprises of a significant anomalous area (see Figure 3) extending over 2.5 kilometers in possible strike length with concentrated anomalies in both the southernmost portion and now defined in the northeastern area. The recent results show a strong anomaly of silver in soils coincident with lead and zinc soil anomalies. Like T1, the anomalies in the T4 area, and within the South Zone, are now known to be associated with low magnetism, moderate conductivity and in close proximity to the Cassiar Batholith-sedimentary contact. The current anomaly remains open to the east, north and west and is northeasterly trending. Kevin Brewer, P.Geo. President and CEO notes, "The SkyTEM airborne geophysical survey identified several attractive drill targets new areas for us at Silver Hart and Blue Heaven in areas that prior to this field season had never been explored. Subsequently, we have completed geochemical surveys, mapping and prospecting over these areas to help further delineate the potential of these zones. With the current validation we will then evaluate those areas which merit drilling in 2022 and beyond. We are now more confident in the two targets (T1 and T4) where we have now received geochemical results as they serve to verify the validity of our property wide 3D modelling and our geophysical analysis. T1 and T4 are very prominent targets with large spatial areas that if mineralized could significantly increase the current resources of high-grade silver, lead and zinc at Silver Hart. In addition, if you compare the extent of known polymetallic veins in the Main Zone (see Figure 1) to the areas of prospectivity it is evident that there is a lot of exploration upside potential on this project and we still feel we have not yet identified all areas with potential for high grade polymetallic veins and possibly carbonate replacement style deposits." John Bossio, Chairman notes, "We are very pleased with these preliminary results from our 2021 program. Since 2019 our overall strategy has been to implement a systematic property wide exploration effort to undertake an evaluation of the true exploration potential of Silver Hart which has never been undertaken in its 35-year history. What is giving us confidence in this project is that every survey and work effort has added value to the project and contributed significantly to our understanding of the high-grade polymetallic vein system. We feel this will aid us in identifying future drill targets outside of the identified structures in the Main Zone. We also understand that our shareholders and others are interested in receiving news on our current drilling program focussed on expanding our resources in the Main Zone. To date we have completed 13 holes and we are on target to complete Phase 1 of our planned drill efforts which will continue into 2022. We expect results soon." The Company is continuing its efforts to seek a partner for our Bridal Veil and Terra Nova Projects in Newfoundland. As previously noted the Company is planning to undertake further exploration of these properties in October. Bridal Veil is known to host high grade copper-lead-silver +/- gold mineralization in veins and a unexplained geophysical anomaly. Only a small portion of the property to date has been explored. Bridal Veil is located in central Newfoundland in the Gander Zone, approximately 20 kilometers east of the Newfound Gold Queensway Gold discovery, 10 kilometers east of Gander and is transected by the Trans Canada Highway and the Trans Canada trail system. Terra Nova is also located in Central Newfoundland near the community of Terra Nova. At this property high grades of silver-copper-gold and tungsten have been identified in several showings in an alteration area of 12 square kilometers. Kevin Brewer, President and CEO notes, "I am personally looking forward to finally getting to examine these promising properties in Newfoundland in October so that we can develop an exploration strategy for 2022. These two properties comprise a total of 197 claims and include several high-grade mineral occurrences. They are polymetallic in nature with both good base and precious metal content from outcrop samples over large areas of alteration. Bridal Veil is of possible orogenic origin and Terra Nova is thought to have the potential to host mesothermal gold -polymetallic deposits. We are glad to have a solid position in one of the best jurisdictions to be operating in the world - Newfoundland - and on a personal note as a Newfoundlander I am looking forward to doing work in my home province." Qualified Person Kevin Brewer, a registered professional geoscientist in BC, Yukon and Newfoundland, is the Company's President and CEO, and Qualified Person (as defined by National Instrument 43-101). He has approved the technical information reported herein. The Company is committed to meeting the highest standards of integrity, transparency and consistency in reporting technical content, including geological reporting, geophysical investigations, environmental and baseline studies, engineering studies, metallurgical testing, assaying and all other technical data. About CMC Metals Ltd. CMC Metals Ltd. is a growth stage exploration company focused on opportunities for silver in Yukon and British Columbia and polymetallic deposits in Yukon and Newfoundland. Our silver-lead-zinc prospects include the Silver Hart Deposit and Blue Heaven claims (the "Silver Hart Project") and the recently acquired Rancheria South, Amy and Silverknife claims (the "Rancheria South Project"). Our polymetallic projects with potential for copper-silver-gold and other metals include Logjam (Yukon), Bridal Veil and Terra Nova (both in Newfoundland). On behalf of the Board: "John Bossio" John Bossio, Chairman CMC METALS LTD. For further information concerning the CMC Metals Ltd., or its exploration projects, please contact: Investor Inquiries: Kevin Brewer, P. Geo., MBA, B.Sc Hons, Dip. Eng President, CEO and Director Tel: (604) 670 0019 kbrewer80@hotmail.com Office: Suite 110-175 Victory Ship Way North Vancouver, BC V7L 0B2 To be added to CMC's news distribution list, please send an email to info@cmcmetals.ca or contact Mr. Kevin Brewer. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. "This news release may contain certain statements that constitute "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable securities law, including without limitation, statements that address the timing and content of upcoming work programs, geological interpretations, receipt of property titles and exploitation activities and developments. In this release disclosure regarding the potential to undertake future exploration work comprise forward looking statements. Forward-looking statements address future events and conditions and are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions. While such estimates and assumptions are considered reasonable by the management of the Company, they are inherently subject to significant business, economic, competitive and regulatory uncertainties and risks, including the ability of the Company to raise the funds necessary to fund its projects, to carry out the work and, accordingly, may not occur as described herein or at all. Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward looking statements include market prices, exploitation and exploration successes, the timing and receipt of government and regulatory approvals, the impact of the constantly evolving COVID-19 pandemic crisis and continued availability of capital and financing and general economic, market or business conditions. Readers are referred to the Company's filings with the Canadian securities regulators for information on these and other risk factors, available at www.sedar.com. Investors are cautioned that forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance or events and, accordingly are cautioned not to put undue reliance on forward-looking statements due to the inherent uncertainty of such statements. The forward-looking statements included in this news release are made as of the date hereof and the Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as expressly required by applicable securities legislation." SOURCE: CMC Metals Ltd. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661550/CORRECTION-CMCs-Positive-Geochemical-Survey-Results-Further-Validate-Airborne-Geophysical-Targets-At-Silver-Hart-Project-Yukon Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Euro Asia Pay Holdings Inc. (CSE: EAP) ("EAP" or the "Company"), a leading fintech solutions provider in the North American education industry, announces that the Company has granted a total of 1,535,000 incentive stock options to various directors, officers and employees of the Company. Each option vests immediately, is exercisable into one common share of the Company at a price of $0.26 per share for a period of five years, and is governed by the terms of EAP's stock option plan. Of the foregoing options, 1,035,000 or 67% were granted to employees who are neither directors nor officers of the Company. Following the grants, EAP has 5,405,000 outstanding incentive stock options, representing 7.9% of the Company's issued and outstanding common shares. In addition, EAP announces that the Company has entered into a letter agreement with Darren Cudmore regarding the provision of market stabilization and liquidity services (the "Letter Agreement"). Pursuant to the Letter Agreement, the Company will pay Mr. Cudmore a fee of $5,000 per month in exchange for Mr. Cudmore maintaining a reasonable market for the Company's common shares and generally improving their liquidity. The engagement is ongoing on a month-to-month basis, may be terminated by either party upon 15 days' written notice, and is not intended to constitute a formal market making agreement. There are no performance requirements contained in the Letter Agreement and Mr. Cudmore will not receive any securities from the Company as compensation for his services. Finally, EAP announces that Charles Newton Price has stepped down as the Chief Growth Officer of the Company in order to pursue other opportunities. The Company would like to thank Mr. Newton Price for his contributions and wishes him success in his future endeavours. About Euro Asia Pay Holdings Inc. Euro Asia Pay Holdings Inc. is a developer of innovative financial solutions for the next generation of consumers. Its first product, SideKick, enables parents to transfer, control and monitor payments to their children in a simple, intuitive manner. The product includes a student-facing mobile application, a prepaid student payment card and a parent portal, among other features. To learn more about EAP's products and services, visit www.euroasiapay.com. On Behalf of the Board of Directors Peter MacKay Chief Executive Officer & Director For further information, please contact: Peter MacKay Chief Executive Officer & Director (800) 508-8813 ir@euroasiapay.com For all media queries, please contact: Swati Mehta PR Associates (403) 804-0768 smehta@prassociates.com The CSE has not reviewed, approved or disapproved the content of this news release. NOT FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES OR FOR DISTRIBUTION TO UNITED STATES NEWS WIRE SERVICES. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94542 With their goal of Disrupting Tobacco, GGII exhibits at the White Label Show, with a new CBD and Hemp track, with an effort to attract new white label joint venture partners that will use GGII's intellectual property and manufacturing to create Hemp CBD Cigarettes and other Herb Smokables Why is the new Hemp and CBD white label track important? It's focused on existing companies that want to start selling Hemp and CBD companies that want to start selling Hemp and CBD The white label show attracts new entrepreneurs that are just starting in Hemp and CBD entrepreneurs that are just starting in Hemp and CBD Jorge Olson is a Keynote Speaker on the Keynote Speaker 1 stage, on opening day, educating potential customers and buyers to the company's existing Hemp CBD Cigarette brands, and partner potential for joint ventures on the Keynote Speaker 1 stage, on opening day, educating potential customers and buyers to the company's existing Hemp CBD Cigarette brands, and partner potential for joint ventures GGII will showcase their Hemp CBD Vending Machines The Real Stuff Hemp CBD Cigarettes will offer distribution opportunities to white label companies, as well as affiliate programs for influencers will offer distribution opportunities to white label companies, as well as affiliate programs for influencers Sandro Piancone, CEO of GGII, has existing appointments with partners and investors in one place San Diego, California--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Green Globe International Inc. (OTC Pink: GGII) ("GGII") is exhibiting at the White Label Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, booth 2007, where Jorge Olson, co-founder of Hempacco, a subsidiary of GGII, is a keynote speaker, on September first and second of 2021. GGII attends the show to attract new Hemp CBD Cigarette brand partners, and The Real Stuff Hemp Cigarette customers, furthering their mission of Disrupting Tobacco. Jorge Olson Keynote Speaker To view an enhanced version of this image, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/7978/94541_jorge%20olsen%20keynote%20speaker.jpg. Green Globe International, Inc. will attend the White Label show in Las Vegas, Nevada, on September 1, 2, 2021, exhibiting at booth 2007, to attract customers and partners for their Hemp CBD Vending Machines, Hemp CBD Cigarettes, and white label joint venture partners. Jorge Olson is one of the Keynote Speakers, speaking September 1, at 4:15 PM, speaking on Wholesale Distribution into Convenience Stores. "The White Label Show now has a new track dedicated exclusively for Hemp and CBD," says Sandro Piancone, CEO and Chairman of Green Globe International, Inc., "this is one of the big reasons why we're exhibiting. With this new track we'll planning on onboarding new customers for wholesale distribution as well as partners for our Hemp CBD white label program and new customers and partners for our six hundred CBD Vending Machines through our wholly owned subsidiary Hempbox Vending, Inc," concluded Sandro Piancone. Green Globe International, Inc. will exhibit at the White Label Show with Hempacco, Co. Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary. Hempacco's mission is Disrupting Tobacco with alternatives to tobacco cigarettes, including Hemp, Herbs, CBG, and CBG Cigarettes. To book an appointment with a Hempacco salesperson during the show, call (775) 473-1201. "I'm a keynote speaker at the white label show," said Jorge Olson, Co-Founder of Hempacco, "My keynote speech is: How to sell to 100,000 retailers with wholesale distribution strategies. In this keynote speech I'll show potential partners how Sandro and I have grown brands with wholesale distributors, selling into supermarkets and convenience stores. I've created over 1,000 Fast Moving Consumer Goods and sold them using these same strategies," concluded Jorge Olson. You can get a free ticket for the show and to see Jorge Olson speak here: https://www.whitelabelexpo.com/speakers/jorge-olson/. Forward-Looking and Cautionary Statements This news release may include forward-looking statements including opinions, assumptions, estimates, the Company's assessment of future plans and operations, including but not limited to information concerning a potential combination with Hempacco and the timing thereof. When used in this document, the words "will," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "expect," "intent," "may," "project," "should," and similar expressions are intended to be among the statements that identify forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements are founded based on expectations and assumptions made by the Company. Forward-looking statements are subject to a wide range of risks and uncertainties. Although the Company believes that the expectations represented by such forward-looking statements are reasonable, there can be no assurance that such expectations will be realized. Any number of important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements including, but not limited to regulatory and third party approvals not being obtained in the manner or timing anticipated; the ability to implement corporate strategies; the state of domestic capital markets; the ability to obtain financing; changes in general market conditions; industry conditions and events; and other factors more fully described from time to time in the reports and filings made by the Company with OTC Markets Group, Inc. or the securities regulatory authorities. Except as required by applicable laws, the Company does not undertake any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements publicly. We intend that all forward-looking statements be subject to the safe-harbor provisions of relevant securities laws and considered forward-looking information within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended. About Green Globe International Inc. (GGII) : Green Globe International, "GGII" is Disrupting Tobacco's nearly $1 Trillion industry with herb and hemp-based alternatives to nicotine cigarettes by manufacturing and marketing consumer goods, including CBG and CBD Hemp cigarettes. The Company owns and licenses intellectual property, has conducted extensive research and development, and is engaged in manufacturing and sales of smokable Hemp brands, including The Real Stuff Hemp Smokables. Hempacco Co., Inc.'s operating segments include joint-venture private label agreements and sales, Intellectual Property licensing, and the development and sales of inhouse brands using patented counter displays as well as six hundred Kiosk vending machines called HempBoxes. Add Your Name to The Hempacco Investor Email List To be added to GGII investor email list to be kept apprised of all upcoming IR activities, please subscribe using this link: https://newsroom.newsfilecorp.com/lists/8020/490, or for additional information, please call Investor Relations Partners at 323-380-4500. You can purchase The Real Stuff Hemp Cigarettes by clicking here or copy-paste https://www.realstuffsmokables.com to your browser and get free samples of our Hemp Blunts. Wholesale distributors and retailers get wholesale pricing by calling (775) 473-1201. Company Contact: Founder Sandro Piancone or Investor Relations IR@hempaccopackaging.com Here are other Press Release headlines from GGII - Hempacco: List the latest PR's or the ones we want to highlight. Green Globe Intl. - Hempacco Licenses Hemp Cigarette Manufacturing Technology to CBD Cigarette Company Green Globe Intl. Chairman, Dr. Stuart Titus, to Serve as Panelist at 7th CBD Outlook Conference Green Globe Intl. Signs LOI to Acquire Patent to Make Marijuana Paper Green Globe Intl. - HempBox Vending Partners with Industry Giant SUZOHAPP to Rollout HempBoxes Across Its Network Green Globe Intl. - Hempacco Partners with the Pelican Group to Rollout HempBoxesTM Nationwide Green Globe Intl. - Hempacco Appoints Industry Veteran Dr. Stuart Titus as Chairman of The Board of Directors GGII Announces 20 Billion Share Reduction in Issued and Outstanding Common Stock GGII Green Globe - Hempacco to Be Featured in New Hemp and Cannabis Documentary Debuting at Sonoma Film Festival GGII Green Globe - Hempacco Announces New Initiative to License Their Technology to Manufacture Cannabis Cigarettes GGII Green Globe - Hempacco Receives Purchase Order for 250,000 packs of CBD Hemp Cigarettes from Ace & Axle, The Largest in Company History GGII Green Globe - Hempacco launches CalivibesDelta8.com & Signs Joint Venture Agreement to launch Calivibes Delta8 Hemp Cigarettes with a 50% Ownership Stake GGII Green Globe - Hempacco to Produce a Portfolio of Flavored Hemp Paper Wraps or Hemp Blunts, with the First Order of $230,000 GGII Green Globe - Hempacco Files Patent Application for Cigarette Filter Infusion Technology for Cannabis, Tobacco, Herb, and Hemp Cigarettes, Furthering Their Mission of Disrupting Tobacco Green Globe - GGII Licenses Patent for Terpene Spraying Technology from Open Book Extracts, Furthering their Mission of Disrupting Tobacco To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94541. TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Victory Nickel Inc. ("Victory Nickel" or the "Company") (CSE:NI)(www.victorynickel.ca) is pleased to provide a corporate update. As announced on March 31, 2021, Victory Nickel engaged Grant Thornton as financial advisor to assess alternatives in the next phase of restructuring the Company's unsecured debt. A successful restructuring (defined as eliminating the working capital deficit resulting in a clean balance sheet) of the unsecured debt is the critical next step to moving the Company forward in a more streamlined and viable manner. In late 2020 Victory Nickel supported the Minago sales process initiated by the then secured lender as it was the sole basis in which the Company could foresee generating residual value for the remaining stakeholders, the unsecured creditors and shareholders. The Company remains committed to this objective. Furthermore, the Company is committed to treating unsecured creditors with legally enforceable claims as a single class of creditors who will be offered the same restructuring opportunity, with no priority given to any one creditor in the class. On this basis the Company has crafted a proposal to restructure its unsecured debt. This proposal has been circulated to an initial group of creditors representing the majority of the class to solicit feedback. These discussions are ongoing and there can be no assurance a restructuring will be successfully completed. The Company will provide updates on the process as appropriate. Victory Nickel continues to work diligently to safeguard the liquidity created through the sale of Minago with a minimalist Management team and Board. This is not sustainable and as such the urgency of completing the next phase of debt restructuring is the Company's number one priority. The Board continues to believe that all stakeholders will be in a better position by having Management direct the crystallization of our liquidity rather than allowing a bankruptcy and insolvency or restructuring ("CCAA") scenario to occur. On the operations front, the domestic frac sand market appears to be showing signs of recovery, customers are reporting 20-50% increase in volume of sand pumped during the second quarter of 2021 compared to the second quarter of 2020. The Company continues to review the business plan for the development of its Short Grass property. There is value in the Company's nickel assets as well as with the nickel price showing an overall improving trend in 2021. As always, we appreciate the continued support of our shareholders, lenders and suppliers, progress is being made. There are no assurances that the Company will be able to restructure its remaining unsecured debt and there is no certainty as to what further steps, if any, the debtors, or the Company, will take. About Victory Nickel Victory Nickel Inc. is a Canadian company with significant NI 43-101 sulphide nickel resources in Manitoba and Quebec, containing significant NI 43-101-compliant nickel resources. Additionally, through a wholly-owned subsidiary, Victory Silica Ltd., Victory Nickel has established itself as a producer and marketer of industrial sands in the western Canadian marketplace from its 7P Plant in Medicine Hat, Alberta. Contact: Victory Nickel Inc. Lesley Duncan, Administrator 647.988.7798 Email: admin@victorynickel.ca www.victorynickel.ca Forward-Looking Information: This news release contains certain forward-looking information. All information, other than information regarding historic fact that addresses activities, events or developments that the Company believes, expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future is forward-looking information. The forward-looking information contained in this news release, including information related to the completion and outcome of any debt restructuring activities reflects the current expectations, assumptions and/or beliefs of the Company based on information currently available to the Company. The forward-looking information contained in this news release is subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results or events to differ materially from current expectations. Any forward-looking information speaks only as of the date on which it is made and, except as may be required by applicable law, the Company disclaims any obligation to update or modify such forward-looking information, either because of new information, future events or for any other reason. Although the Company believes that the assumptions inherent in the forward-looking information are reasonable, forward-looking information is not a guarantee of future performance and accordingly undue reliance should not be put on such information due to the inherent uncertainty therein. SOURCE: Victory Nickel Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661577/Victory-Nickel-Provides-Corporate-Update Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - August 26, 2021) - Relay Medical Corp. (CSE: RELA) (OTCQB: RYMDF) (FSE: EIY2) ("Relay" or the "Company") is pleased to host the second episode about the "State of Cybersecurity Industry: Roots of SBOM"1 featuring key panelists Kate Stewart, Steve Springett, Chris Blask and moderated by Evgeniy Kharam. As leaders in SBOMs, these panelists will discuss how crucial they are for protecting technology globally. The event will be hosted live on the Cybeats YouTube2 channel on September 9th at 1pm EDT. Relay's Cybeats will host the panel which will feature many industry leaders including Kate Stewart, Vice President of Dependable Embedded Systems at The Linux Foundation; she is a world-class innovator and leader in system software and application tools as well as one of the original founders of SPDX. Steve Springett is the Chair of CycloneDX SBOM Standard, Core Working Group and World class leader in Defensive Design, Programming and Automation. Chris Blask, vice president strategy at Relay, is a respected thought leader in SBOMs and is known for creating the Digital Bill of Materials (DBOM) and one of the first commercial firewall products. The panel will be moderated by co-host of the Security Architecture Podcaster, Evgeniy Kharam. Live Webinar Attendees and Date To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/952/94534_fd5482d9c4c01aed_001full.jpg Register for the 'Root of SBOM' Free Webinar using the link below: https://stateofcybersecurityindustryep.splashthat.com/ As the open-source world continues to grow, panelists will discuss the increasing demand for SBOMs and the greater importance of the longevity and credibility of software ultimately showcasing how it offers a vital solution. 'Economic of Security Adoption' by Chris Blask, recently appointed VP of Strategy at Relay: "At the moment there is a great deal of focus on supply chain security. The mandate to produce or consume Software Bill of Materials (SBOM)3 in the U.S. for critical infrastructure is providing fuel to cybersecurity efforts. Transparency is being built into the supply chain to allow those security needs to be addressed. What many in the security community will miss during this period is that the underlying driver for all these changes is not security, it is economics. Organizations that adopt these structures before their competitors will find more than improved security. They will find that they have improved logistics, more effective customer relationships, lower costs, and greater profitability. Those who move first in this area will end up out-competing their peers, and that's what history will take note of." Transparency and licensing have become increasingly important in the expansion of open source software, thus the need for SBOMs. Now more than ever, it is imperative to think about the sustainability and durability of software. Join us, as we discuss how SBOMs are essential to maintaining the global security of our technology in episode two of the State of Cybersecurity: The Roots of SBOM webinar with these leaders in the industry. "Due to the overwhelmingly positive response for the first Cybeats seminar 'The State of Cybersecurity,' we felt the need to continue the discussion regarding cybersecurity to highlight the importance of SBOMs for global cybersecurity," said Yoav Raiter, CEO of Relay Medical. "SBOMs are the basis of cybersecurity and are of critical importance as the number of connected devices continues to exponentially grow. With cyber-attacks becoming more prevalent, protecting the ever-increasing number of high-value connected devices is now a priority for government regulators, and both large and small organizations which rely on connected technology. We have brought in another leading panel of SBOM experts, and I look forward to a lively discussion with Kate, Steve, and Chris. Please join us for this riveting webinar on September 9 at 1pm ET." A recent report from Gartner4 noted that due to the recent increase in cybercrime attacks on information and communication technology (ITC), there must be significant importance placed on operational technology of connected devices. Furthermore, the report indicates that the management of these new cyber risks are either absent or fragmented within most organizations, leaving them exposed. Examples of recent cybercrimes include the Iowa-based Peoples Community Health Clinic (PCHC), who notified patients about a recent cyberattack which may have impacted patients' private information,5 and New Jersey-based Bridgeway Senior Healthcare faced a ransomware cybersecurity attack that affected large amounts of patient data.6 U.S. Regulators have also taken notice. In May 2021, the U.S. Food & Drug Administration outlined recommendations for cybersecurity standards and guidelines to enhance software supply chain security. The FDA states that increasingly common ransomware attacks on healthcare "highlight the ungraceful failure of perimeter-based firewalls and the safety consequences of not separating operational technology from information technology by design."7 On July 12, 2021, U.S Regulators stated new software minimum requirements that apply to software on IoT devices.8 This news follows the Executive Order (EO) on Improving the Nation's Cybersecurity,9 as President Biden identified the prevention, detection, assessment and remediation of cyber incidents as a top priority of his Administration. The Commerce Department and National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) were directed by the EO to publish the minimum elements for a Software Bill of Materials (SBOM), a key tool to help create a transparent and secure software supply chain.10 RECENT NEWS: Relay recently announced an engagement with Canada's largest medical technology developer, StarFish Medical to provide the Cybeats platform for high-valued connected medical devices. The engagement includes the SBOM software to monitor security of the products being developed and can be licensed by StarFish clients for continued protection. The complete release can be found here: https://bit.ly/2Wn2bV3 SUBSCRIBE: For more information on Relay or to subscribe to the Company's mailing list visit: https://www.relaymedical.com/news About Cybeats Cybeats is an integrated security platform designed to secure and protect high-valued connected devices. Cybeats' unique approach eliminates device downtime due to cyber-attacks and allows device manufacturers to develop and maintain secure and protected devices in a timely and cost-efficient manner. Cybeats' SBOM Studio product allows for the monitoring and analysis of cybersecurity on all components during the design and manufacturing stage, ensuring connected devices have been developed with secure software components. Cybeats' capabilities span across detecting and mitigating attacks on devices while they are operational, enabling device makers to identify and fix security flaws during the product's design phase and empowering end users with fleet management tools such as secure firmware updates. Website: www.cybeats.com About Relay Medical Corp. Relay Medical is a technology innovator headquartered in Toronto, Canada focused on the development of novel solutions in the diagnostics, AI data science and IoT security sectors. Website: www.relaymedical.com Contact: Destine Lee Media & Communications Relay Medical Corp. Office. 647-872-9982 TF. 1-844-247-6633 Media Inquiries: media@relaymedical.com Investor Relations: investor.relations@relaymedical.com Forward-looking Information Cautionary Statement Except for statements of historic fact, this news release contains certain "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable securities law. Forward-looking information is frequently characterized by words such as "plan", "expect", "project", "intend", "believe", "anticipate", "estimate" and other similar words, or statements that certain events or conditions "may" or "will" occur. Forward-looking statements are based on the opinions and estimates at the date the statements are made, and are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual events or results to differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements including, but not limited to delays or uncertainties with regulatory approvals, including that of the CSE. There are uncertainties inherent in forward-looking information, including factors beyond the Company's control. There are no assurances that the commercialization plans for the technology described in this news release will come into effect on the terms or time frame described herein. The Company undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking information if circumstances or management's estimates or opinions should change except as required by law. The reader is cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Additional information identifying risks and uncertainties that could affect financial results is contained in the Company's filings with Canadian securities regulators, which filings are available at www.sedar.com. [1] https://www.linkedin.com/events/6834623376489779200/ [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlWPPNuCZTQ [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_bill_of_materials [4] Gartner, "ICT Supply Chain Risk Management Is Mission Critical, but Best Practices Are Just Emerging," Katell Thielemann, 7 July 2021 [5] https://healthitsecurity.com/news/patient-info-exposed-in-health-clinic-cyberattackdata-breach [6] https://healthitsecurity.com/news/ransomware-extortion-threat-actors-post-data-from-4-healthcare-entities [7] https://www.fda.gov/media/149954/download [8] https://www.ntia.gov/blog/2021/ntia-releases-minimum-elements-software-bill-materials [9] https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/05/12/executive-order-on-improving-the-nations-cybersecurity/ [10] https://www.ntia.gov/blog/2021/ntia-releases-minimum-elements-software-bill-materials To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/94534 VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Legend Power Systems Inc. (TSXV:LPS)(OTCQB:LPSIF) ("Legend Power" or the "Company"), a global leader in commercial electrical system solutions, today reported its Q3 2021 financial results for the three and nine months ended June 30, 2021. The Company has also scheduled a conference call to provide a business update and discuss its Q3 2021 financial results for Thursday, August 26, 2021 at 5:00 PM ET (2:00 PM PT). The call will be hosted by Randy Buchamer, President & Chief Executive Officer and Steve Vanry, Chief Financial Officer (details below). A complete set of Financial Statements and Management's Discussion & Analysis has been filed at www.sedar.com. All dollar figures are quoted in Canadian dollars. Financial Highlights for the quarter ending June 30, 2021 (Q3 2021) Sales bookings of $896,000 1 compared with $nil in Q3 2020 compared with $nil in Q3 2020 Revenue of $1.27 million versus $1.5k in Q3 2020 Gross profit of $345k versus $1.5k in Q3 2020 Adjusted EBITDA loss of $706k versus a $856k loss in Q3 2020 Net loss of $947k versus a $1.02 million loss in Q3 2020 Cash of $10.38 million, no debt, and $11.32 million in working capital at June 30, 2021. Q3 Fiscal 2021 Growth Highlights: Added five new channel sales partners Achieved largest sales booking in Company history Entered demonstration agreement with City of New York Exceeded Q3 fiscal 2021 goal of 90 SmartGATE Insights engagements Exceeding goal of 50% conversion rate from SmartGATE Insights to full SmartGATE Platform sales bookings with 100% conversion from some customers "Much like the trend established in Q2 2021, the Company's growth trajectory in Q3 2021 was driven by our new "Insights-led" sales model, which continues to be the key driver of new customer and channel partner engagements," said Randy Buchamer, CEO of Legend Power Systems. "This is evidenced by our ability to exceed the SmartGATE Insights engagement and conversion goals we established in our last quarter, as well as achieving the Company's largest sales booking ever, with a follow-on order for 10 SmartGATE platforms from a multi-family residential property owner. Our ESCO sales partners continue to promote our solutions and generate leads, increasing our confidence in achieving significant sales growth." Legend's SmartGATE Insights and Power Impact Report are valuable tools that provide building owners a better understanding of the financial impact the power grid is having on their buildings and how SmartGATE solutions can solve these challenges for them. The Power Impact Report details these excessive costs across each building in a property portfolio and demonstrates how SmartGATE solutions can reduce these costs. Financial summary for the three and six months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 Three months ended June 30, Nine months ended June 30, (Cdn$, unless noted otherwise) 2021 2020 Change 2021 2020 Change Revenue 1,272,192 1,548 - 2,520,562 1,681,236 50% Cost of sales 926,609 - - 1,884,413 1,326,031 42% Gross margin1 345,583 1,548 - 636,149 355,205 79% Gross margin %1 27% - - 25% 21% 4% Operating expenses 1,285,769 983,658 31% 3,431,307 4,340,180 (21)% Adjusted EBITDA2 (706,011) (856,386) (18)% (2,091,643) (3,658,701) (43)% Net loss (946,616) (1,015,242) (7)% (2,803,237) (4,014,067) (30)% 1 Gross margin is based on a blend of both equipment and installation revenue. 2 Adjusted EBITDA is a non-IFRS financial measure. See EBDITA Reconciliation for details. Revenue for the third quarter of 2021 was $1,272,192, up significantly from $1,548 in the same quarter of fiscal 2020, which was adversely impacted by COVID related lock downs. Revenue for the nine months ended June 30, 2021 was $2,520,562, up 50% from $1,681,236 in the same period of fiscal 2020. Revenue for the three months ended June 30, 2021 primarily realized in relation to installations completed pursuant to a large sale booked in Q1 of fiscal 2021 and, to a lesser extent, 5 units purchased by a reseller in Q1. Revenue for the nine months ended June 30, 2021 was up over the same period in fiscal 2020 due to stronger sales bookings and improved flexibility in customer install completion scheduling. Inventory supply chain delays continue to be a timing constraint on revenue recognition but is expected to improve in fiscal 2022. Gross margin in the third quarter of fiscal 2021 was 27%, compared with nil% in same quarter of fiscal 2020. Gross margin for the nine months ended June 30, 2021 was 25%, compared with 21% in the same period of fiscal 2020 due in most part to economies of scale achieved through higher production throughput and comparatively very low gross margin in Q1 of fiscal 2020. Management believes that in the short-term, margins may continue to be impacted by widespread supply chain cost increases, COVID-19 supplier surcharges, and component raw material (metal) costs, but as the Company scales through fiscal 2022 and supply chains return to normal, and sales bookings convert to revenue, margins should improve and be closer to long-term average results. The Company's operating expenses for the third quarter of fiscal 2021 were $1,285,769, up 31% from $983,658 in the same quarter of fiscal 2020. Operating expenses for the nine months ended June 30, 2021 were $3,431,307, down from $4,340,180 in the same period of fiscal 2020. The primary cause for the increase in operating costs during Q3 2021 was the Company's decision to end certain cost cutting measures implemented during the onset of COVID-19, higher share-based compensation and product development costs. The decrease in the nine-month comparative fiscal periods is the result of COVID-19 cost cutting measures still in effect during Q1 and Q2 of fiscal 2021. Adjusted EBITDA for the third quarter of fiscal 2021 was negative $706,011, compared with negative $856,386 in same quarter of fiscal 2020. Adjusted EBITDA for the nine months ended June 30, 2021 was negative $2,091,643, compared with negative $3,658,701 in the same period of fiscal 2020. Net loss for the third quarter of fiscal 2021 was $946,616, compared with a net loss of $1,015,242 in the same quarter of fiscal 2020. Net loss for the nine months ended June 30, 2021 was $2,803,237, compared with $4,014,067 in the same period of fiscal 2020. The reduced net loss in the third quarter comparative periods was due to a gross margin of $345,583 realized in Q3 of 2021 vs $nil in Q3 of 2020, which was offset slightly by higher operating costs in Q3 2021. Significantly reduced operating costs and a gross margin increase of 79% were the largest contributing factors to the significantly lower net loss in in the year over year comparative nine-month periods. 1$374k of which in a deferred purchase order CONFERENCE CALL DETAILS: DATE: Thursday, August 26, 2021 TIME: 5:00 PM ET (2:00 PM PT) DIAL-IN NUMBERS: North America Toll Free Dial-in Number (877) 201-0168 International Dial-in Number - (647) 788-4901 ONLINE LISTENING https://onlinexperiences.com/scripts/Server.nxp?LASCmd=AI:4;F:QS!10100&ShowUUID=66A6CE01-2BB4-4023-86C8-0A4734EFF150 CONFERENCE ID: 9467428 REPLAY: Available at: www.legendpower.com About Legend Power Systems Inc. Legend Power Systems Inc. (www.legendpower.com) provides an intelligent energy management platform that analyzes and improves building energy challenges, significantly impacting asset management and corporate performance. Legend Power's proven solutions support proactive executive decision-making in a complex and volatile business and energy environment. The proprietary and patented system reduces total energy consumption and power costs, while also maximizing the life of electrical equipment. Legend Power's unique solution is also a key contributor to both corporate sustainability efforts and the meeting of utility energy efficiency targets. For further information, please contact: Steve Vanry, CFO +1 (604) 671-9522 svanry@legendpower.com Sean Peasgood, Investor Relations +1 (647) 503-1054 sean@sophiccapital.com Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-Looking Statements This Press Release may contain statements which constitute "forward-looking information", including statements regarding the plans, intentions, beliefs and current expectations of the Company, its directors, or its officers with respect to the future business activities and operating performance of the Company. The words "may," "would," "could," "will," "intend," "plan," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "expect" and similar expressions, as they relate to the Company, or its management, are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. Investors are cautioned that any such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future business activities or performance and involve risks and uncertainties, and that the Company's future business activities may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements as a result of various factors. Such risks, uncertainties and factors are described in the periodic filings with the Canadian securities regulatory authorities, including the Company's quarterly and annual Management's Discussion & Analysis, which may be viewed on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking statements prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as intended, planned, anticipated, believed, estimated or expected. Although the Company has attempted to identify important risks, uncertainties and factors which could cause actual results to differ materially, there may be others that cause results to not be as anticipated, estimated or intended. The Company does not intend, and does not assume any obligation, to update these forward-looking statements other than as may be required by applicable law. SOURCE: Legend Power Systems Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661591/Legend-PowerR-Reports-Q3-2021-Financial-Results THUNDER BAY, ON / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / ZEN Graphene Solutions Ltd. ("ZEN" or the "Company") (TSXV:ZEN)(OTC PINK:ZENYF), a Canadian, nanotechnology company focused on next-gen healthcare solutions, is pleased to announce the 2021 Shareholder Meeting will be held on Monday, September 27th at 4pm at the Delta Hotel in Guelph, Ontario. Due to COVID-19, capacity will be limited to the first 50 shareholders who register by email at info@zengraphene.com. Attendees will need to show proof of full vaccination before being granted access. The shareholder meeting will be live streamed for those who cannot attend in person with details to be provided at a later date. Dr. Francis Dube, ZEN Executive Chairman commented: "We look forward to meeting our shareholders to discuss the direction of the company and to vote on important matters that will allow the board and management team to best move the company forward. ZEN is focused on next-gen healthcare solutions in the areas of prevention, detection, and treatment - and we are asking shareholders to support this by voting on several matters, including the listing of shares of the Corporation on other Canadian or United States exchanges. We strongly believe that with support on these votes, we will be able to position the company to optimize our healthcare platform and shareholder value." The Management Information Circular will be mailed shortly to shareholders of record on Friday August 13th. Shareholders will be asked to vote on the following items: to receive and consider the financial statements of the Corporation for the year ended March 31, 2021 and the report of the auditors thereon; to appoint McGovern Hurley, LLP, Chartered Accountants as the auditors of the Corporation for the ensuing year and to authorize the directors to fix their remuneration; to elect the directors of the Corporation for the ensuing year; to consider and, if deemed advisable, to pass an ordinary resolution approving the adoption of the Corporation's omnibus long-term incentive plan; to consider and, if deemed advisable, to pass, with or without variation, a special resolution to amend the articles of the Corporation to change the name of the Corporation to such name as the directors of the Corporation, in their sole discretion, may determine and as may be acceptable to the Director appointed under the Business Corporations Act (Ontario), as more fully described in the accompanying management information circular; to consider and, if deemed advisable, to pass an ordinary resolution to approve a change of business pursuant to the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange such that the Corporation will cease to be classified as a "Mining Issuer" and will instead be classified by the TSX Venture Exchange as an "Industrial, Technology, or Life Sciences Issuer"; to consider and, if deemed advisable, to pass, with or without variation, an ordinary resolution of the shareholders of the Corporation authorizing the Corporation to make an application to voluntarily delist the common shares of the Corporation from the TSX Venture Exchange and to apply to list the Corporation's common shares on one or more alternative stock exchanges in Canada or the United States, as more fully described in the accompanying management information circular; to consider and, if deemed advisable, to pass, with or without variation, an ordinary resolution to approve, for the ensuing year, the Corporation's incentive stock option plan that was adopted on August 1, 2010; and to transact such other business as may properly come before the Meeting or any adjournments or postponements thereof. The nature of the business to be transacted at the meeting is described in further detail in the management information circular of the Corporation under the section entitled Matters to be Acted Upon. About ZEN Graphene Solutions Ltd. ZEN is a nanotechnology company developing and commercializing next-gen healthcare solutions in the areas of prevention, detection and treatment. ZEN is currently focused on commercializing ZENGuardTM, a patent-pending coating with 99% antimicrobial activity, including against COVID-19, and the potential to use similar compounds as pharmaceutical products against infectious diseases. The company also has an exclusive agreement to be the global commercializing partner for a newly developed, highly scalable, aptamer-based rapid pathogen detection technology. For further information: Francis Dube, Executive Chairman Tel: +1 (289) 821-2820 Email: drfdube@zengraphene.com Forward-Looking Statements This news release contains forward-looking statements. Since forward-looking statements address future events and conditions, by their very nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Although ZEN believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing the forward-looking information in this news release are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information, which only applies as of the date of this news release, and no assurance can be given that such events will occur in the disclosed time frames or at all. ZEN disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, other than as required by law. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. SOURCE: ZEN Graphene Solutions Ltd. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661589/ZEN-Graphene-Solutions-Announces-Shareholder-Meeting-Monday-September-27th-2021-at-the-Delta-Hotel-in-Guelph-Ontario TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / August 26, 2021 / Galway Metals Inc. (TSXV:GWM)(OTCQB:GAYMF) ("Galway Metals" or the 'Company'), is pleased to announce that Rafael Solis has agreed to join its Board of Directors (the "Board") and will serve as the Vice President of Finance. Mr. Solis brings to the Company extensive equity capital markets experience accumulated over 20 years in the financial industry. The Company is also pleased to announce it has begun trading on the OTCQB Venture Market ("OTCQB"), a U.S. trading platform operated by the OTC Markets Group in New York, under the ticker symbol GAYMF. Mr. Solis has worked in the equity capital markets business for over twenty years, primarily in the role of institutional equity distribution. The vast majority of Mr. Solis' career was spent in financial services in New York at Morgan Stanley and Banco Santander where he participated in placing primary and secondary equity transactions ranging in size from multibillion deals to small private placements in the US, Europe and Latin America. In recent years, Mr. Solis embarked on a venture focused identifying and marketing alternative investment opportunities for high-net-worth individuals and family offices. Over the span of his career, Mr. Solis has developed a vast global network of contacts among institutional asset managers, high net worth investors and family offices. Mr. Solis earned his MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and a BA in International Relations from University of California, Davis. "We are extremely pleased to have Rafael join the Galway team, given his complimentary skillset. Rafael was a seed investor in the predecessor company, Galway Resources, and over the years has been very supportive of our efforts and in the process has accumulated a material share position in the company," cites Robert Hinchcliffe, President and CEO, "The Company is also excited to be trading on the OTCQB as it will provide additional liquidity and increase its visibility in the U.S. capital markets." The Company would also like to announce the resignation of Rob White from the Board. The Board and management would like to thank Mr. White for his contribution to the Company. His experience and advice have been very important to the advancement of Galway Metals and we wish him the very best. Insider Purchases Robert Hinchcliffe, President, Chief Executive Officer and Director of the Company has acquired, through a series of transactions conducted through the facilities of the TSX Venture Exchange, a total of 412,500 common shares of the Company in 2021, including 182,500 just in Q3. As a result, Mr. Hinchcliffe now owns a total of 14,712,019 common shares of Galway, representing approximately 8.8% of the issued and outstanding shares of the Company. Overall, since Galway's shares began trading in 2013, following its spin out to shareholders as a result of the $340 million sale of Galway Resources, Mr. Hinchcliffe has purchased 7.5 million shares in the open market, 4.7 million shares via private placements and 1.3 million shares acquired through the exercise of warrants and options. Total equity purchases since the Company began trading back in 2013 has been 13.5 million shares. Joe Cartafalsa, a director of Galway Metals, has acquired, through a series of transactions conducted through the facilities of the TSX Venture Exchange, a total of 25,400 common shares of the Company this quarter and currently owns a total of 2,020,288 shares. The securities held by Mr. Hinchcliffe and Mr. Cartafalsa are for investment purposes and they may vary their holdings of securities as investment conditions warrant. Listing on The OTCQB Exchange The Company will continue to trade on the TSX Venture Exchange under its symbol "GWM". The OTCQB listing is part of the Company's strategy to enhance its position in the public markets and increase its visibility to a wider range of investors. The OTCQB is the premiere marketplace for developing and entrepreneurial U.S. and international companies. Companies must be current in their financial reporting and undergo an annual verification and management certification process, including meeting a minimum bid price and other financial conditions. The OTCQB quality standard provides a strong baseline of transparency as well as technology and regulation to improve the information and trading experience for investors. With heightened compliance and quality standard, the OTCQB provides investors improved visibility to enhance trading decisions. Investors can find real-time quote and market information for the Company at https://www.otcmarkets.com. About Galway Metals Inc. Galway Metals is well capitalized with two projects in Canada, Clarence Stream, an emerging gold district in New Brunswick, and Estrades, the former producing, high-grade precious metals rich polymetallic VMS mine in Quebec. The Company began trading on January 4, 2013, after the successful spinout to existing shareholders from Galway Resources following the completion of the US$340 million sale of that company. With substantially the same management team and Board of Directors, Galway Metals is keenly intent on creating similar value as it had with Galway Resources. Should you have any questions and for further information, please contact (toll free): Galway Metals Inc. Robert Hinchcliffe President & Chief Executive Officer 1-800-771-0680 Website: www.galwaymetalsinc.com Email: info@galwaymetalsinc.com Look us up on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn Cautionary Statement Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Toronto Stock Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news release. No stock exchange, securities commission or other regulatory authority has approved or disapproved the information contained herein. This News Release includes certain 'forward-looking statements' which are not comprised of historical facts. Forward-looking statements include estimates and statements that describe the Company's future plans, objectives or goals, including words to the effect that the Company or management expects a stated condition or result to occur. Forward-looking statements may be identified by such terms as "believes", "anticipates", "expects", "estimates", "may", "could", "would", "will", or "plan". Since forward-looking statements are based on assumptions and address future events and conditions, by their very nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Although these statements are based on information currently available to the Company, the Company provides no assurance that actual results will meet management's expectations. Risks, uncertainties and other factors involved with forward-looking information could cause actual events, results, performance, prospects and opportunities to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information. Forward looking information in this news release includes, but is not limited to, the Company's objectives, goals or future plans, information with respect to the OTCQB listing, DTC eligibility, and broadening U.S. institutional and retail investors. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from such forward-looking information include, but are not limited to changes in economic conditions or financial markets, political and competitive developments, operation or exploration difficulties, changes in equity markets, changes in exchange rates, fluctuations in commodity prices capital, operating and reclamation costs varying significantly from estimates and the other risks involved in the mineral exploration and development industry, an inability to predict and counteract the effects of COVID-19 on the business of the Company, including but not limited to the effects of COVID-19 on the price of commodities, capital market conditions, restrictions on labour and international travel and supply chains, and those risks set out in the Company's public documents filed on SEDAR. Although the Company believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing the forward-looking information in this news release are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information, which only applies as of the date of this news release, and no assurance can be given that such events will occur in the disclosed time frames or at all. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, other than as required by law. SOURCE: Galway Metals Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/661592/Galway-Metals-Announces-Appointment-of-New-Director-Update-to-Insider-Purchases-and-Listing-on-The-OTCQB-Exchange NEW YORK CITY (dpa-AFX) - Employees of Goldman Sachs Group (GS) have to complete their vaccinations to enter their office in the United States, according to an internal memo sent to the workers on Tuesday, seen by Reuters. The memo also said that the employees, regardless of their vaccination status, will have to wear masks in the bank from Wednesday onwards and the company will also arrange for weekly covid tests from September 7. The mandate does not spare any medical or religious reasons. Those who have not been inoculated yet will have to work from home as of now. Employees in the branches that are in 'high-risk' zones, marked by the CDC, will have to wear their masks at all times, except while eating and drinking. Earlier this week, the Pfizer vaccine got full approval from the FDA. According to the regulators, the vaccine is safe and secure. This announcement has helped to convince the people about the safety of the vaccine and the government expects that it will increase the rate of vaccination. With more than 171,000 people testing positive on Wednesday alone, the vaccination needs to be stepped up rapidly to avoid a more calamitous situation. Talking about the remote-working situation, the CEO of the company, David Solomon said in February, 'I do think for a business like ours which is an innovative, collaborative apprenticeship culture, this is not ideal for us and it's not a new normal. It's an aberration that we're going to correct as quickly as possible.' Goldman Sachs, like many other companies, dropped the mask mandates back in June when the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention had said that it is safe for fully vaccinated individuals to stop wearing masks. But as the Delta variant keeps on ravaging the country, CDC advised reintroducing the mask mandates. Goldman Sachs will also allow a half-day paid leave for the employees to get jabbed. Apart from Goldman Sachs, Citigroup Inc (C) and Morgan Stanley (MS) have also reintroduced the mask mandates. Major names yet to make it mandatory for the employees to vaccinate include JP Morgan Chase & Co (JPM), Bank of America Corporation (BAC), and Wells Fargo and Co (WFC). Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX GOLDMAN SACHS-Aktie komplett kostenlos handeln - auf Smartbroker.de Aumni, a Salt Lake City UT-based investment analytics platform, raised $50M in Series B funding. The round was led by J.P. Morgan with participation from Pelion Venture Partners, WndrCo, Citadel Securities, Invesco Private Capital, Vanderbilt University and Kera Capital, which joined existing investors SVB Financial Group, DLA Piper, Next Frontier Capital, Kickstart Fund, First Trust Capital Partners and Prelude, a Mercato Partners fund. The company intends to use the funds to deepen its presence with investors in the private capital markets and expand its offering to limited partners, law firms and company founders. Founded by former BigLaw corporate attorneys, Tony Lewis and Kelsey Chase, Aumni is an investment analytics platform for private capital markets that includes venture funds, family offices, university endowments, and corporate venture firms. By combining A.I. and human expertise, the system extracts and analyzes critical deal data in dense legal agreements and provides comprehensive insights regarding every investments financial and legal position. Since the launch of its flagship product in 2018, the company has analyzed more than 100,000 investment transactions. FinSMEs 25/08/2021 Ozkan Akkilic and Tolga Onal elopage, a Berlin, Germany-based SaaS platform and payment provider for digital entrepreneurs, creators, SMEs and enterprise businesses, closed a USD 38m (EUR 32m) initial funding round. The round was led by Target Global, Partech Ventures and Avid Ventures. The company intends to use the funds to grow its team from 70 to 190 by the end of the year, expand across Europe, and invest further in its proprietary end-to-end platform. Founded in 2015 by Ozkan Akkilic and Tolga Onal, elopage delivers a payment provider and content delivery service to digital entrepreneurs ranging from solopreneurs and creators to international media platforms with annual sales from 5k EUR to 40m EUR. Via its microservices, users can develop and host a tailored website and sales funnels, collect payments, and take care of their tax payments. elopage is used by more than 40,000 digital businesses. FinSMEs 26/08/2021 pawaPay, a London, United Kingdom-based payments company focused on Africa, raised $9m in seed funding. The round was co-led by MSA and UK-based investment fund 88mph, with participation from Vunani Capital, Kepple Ventures and Zagadat Capital. The company intends to use the funds to scale its operational presence, find more talent to join the team, and expand into new markets on the continent. Founded in 2020 by Nikolai Barnwell, CEO, pawaPay is focused on the mobile money infrastructure provided by telecommunications companies (telco) in Africa. Through its API, merchants can access more than 300 million customers in more than ten markets and enjoy payments. With a single API, pawaPays customers can access all telco mobile money systems and thus receive and send payments to hundreds of millions of people. Customers are large Pan-Africa/global merchants and companies needing to make payments to African consumers accounts. FinSMEs 26/08/2021 Quantum Brilliance, a Canberra, Australia- and Stuttgard, Germany-based full-stack quantum accelerator startup, closed a USD$9.7m seed funding. The round was co-led by the QxBranch founders and Main Sequence investment consortium with participation from CP Ventures, Investible, Jelix Ventures, MA Financial (formerly Moelis Australia) Growth Ventures Fund, R3I Ventures, and Ultratech Capital Partners. The company intends to use the funds to actively hire for 20 roles including VP of Engineering and scientists, physicists, software engineers and control engineers to support the research, development, engineering and production of its quantum computing technology. Spun out in 2019 from The Australian National Universitys research group in diamond quantum science by CEO Andrew Horsley, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer Marcus Doherty, Ph.D., and COO Mark Luo., Quantum Brilliance harnesses synthetic diamonds to build quantum accelerators that do not require near absolute zero temperature or complex laser systems to operate like mainframe quantum computers. The companys projected roadmap to provide quantum accelerators the size of a lunchbox with over 50 qubits by 2025 will accelerate the adoption of useful quantum applications across a variety of sectors. Quantum accelerators can be deployed wherever classical computers are used such as satellites, vehicles, hospitals and robotic systems. FinSMEs 25/08/2021 Trove, a Brisbane, CA-based branded recommerce company, raised $77.5M in Series D funding. The round, which brought Troves total funding to date to $122.5m, was led by G2 Venture Partners with participation from Bank of Montreal, Capital One Ventures, Commerce Ventures and Wellington Management. The company intends to use the funds to expand its roster of brand partners, strengthen its technology and logistics infrastructure, enter the luxury vertical, and service a new customer audience in Europe. Led by Andy Ruben, CEO, Trove provides white-label technology and end-to-end operations platform for premium brands to take back items from customers closets while maintaining control of their brand equity and owning their customer experience, data and relationships. The company currently serves brands such as lululemon, Patagonia, REI, Nordstrom, Levis, Eileen Fisher and Arcteryx. Trove recently joined the Ellen MacArthur Foundation network, which supports businesses that promote a circular economy across three sustainability principles, designing out waste and pollution, keeping products and materials in use, and regenerating natural systems. FinSMEs 25/08/2021 PIKEVILLE After nearly dying from COVID-19 and being hospitalized for more than 100 days, Lora Adkins, 39, of Robinson Creek, is sharing her harrowing experience to warn others about the risks that can come from the virus if people do not get vaccinated. Before the COVID-19 pandemic started, Lora was already considered immunosuppressed. Due to her Multiple Sclerosis, she took a medication that severely impacted her immune system, which made her immunosuppressed and high-risk for potentially suffering poorer effects from COVID-19. As cases surged in Pike County last winter, she, her husband Duran Adkins and their two children maintained a smaller circle of contacts in order to limit any exposure to the virus. Once their daughter, then 8 years old, became exposed to the virus and tested positive three days later, it did not take long for Lora, her husband and their other child to test positive as well. At the time, Lora and her husband were unvaccinated because they were not eligible for vaccinations yet. With an 8 year-old, if shes not feeling well, youre not going to tell her to get away from you, Lora said. Mommas gonna cuddle her. About three days after our daughter tested positive, my husband, my son and I all tested positive. Lora tested positive for COVID-19 on Jan. 25, but she said she continued to work from home while she was in quarantine. However, on Feb. 7 12 days after she tested positive Lora was admitted into Pikeville Medical Center. She spent a total of 116 days in the hospital between Feb. 7 and June 25, while being on a ventilator for 73 of those days, as she suffered from COVID-19 complications. Lonely and fearful time in hospitalization Lora said it is difficult for her to remember some of her hospitalization, due to her being sedated for most of that time. However, she said she remembers how lonely and fearful she felt while being hospitalized because her family could not come visit her for several months. I dont really remember the worst parts of it, and when youre sedated like that, your brain tries to fill in gaps, Lora said. I would wake up, I would have been having a dream and I would think I was somewhere else. It was scary, especially when people you knew couldnt come visit so youre surrounded by strangers, and theres nobody really there to talk you down from you not knowing whats going on. While on the ventilator, Lora received a breathing tube through her neck, blood transfusions, CRRT dialysis and ECMO, or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, which pumps and oxygenates a patients blood outside the body. By the time she was on ECMO, she said, her odds of survival were slim. One of my best friends is the chief hospitalist at PMC, Lora said. She told me that when I was put on ECMO I was on ECMO for 13 days because I asked her, At that point, what were the options? She said, At that point, you either went on ECMO, or it was comfort care and you died. And I was 38. Lora and her husband Duran have been together since 1997, and he said that she has always kept him on a straight and narrow path. However, when she was hospitalized, he said it was difficult and scary for him to watch her go through that. Through all of this, for me, it was rough because I didnt have that person I went to with my problems or that person, who I went to talk about anything, really, he said. I was brokenhearted in a lot of ways from this because I didnt have her and I had to do this on my own. Duran got to see her through the glass of her ICU unit on March 6, and he came inside to visit her temporarily on March 11 while she was sedated. Difficult decisions Duran said that he had to make difficult decisions in order to protect Lora throughout her hospitalization. One of those decisions came in early March when Lora was on ECMO and he was asked by the doctors if he wanted to visit her while she was in ECMO for a short period of time. Duran said he told the doctors that he did not want her to have any visitors at that time, including himself, in order to limit any risk of potential infection. While Lora was in the hospital, Duran said that he educated himself on the treatments she was receiving and the ones she could potentially receive so that he could make an informed decision for her. He also hardly slept because he wanted to be awake in the event that there were any developments with her treatments and her condition. Through it all, though, he said that he tried to stay faithful to God and stay positive for his friends, his family and his children. You become a hollow person, just knowing that youve got to stay faithful to God and stay positive to keep peoples hopes up, keep peoples spirits up, stay there for her and stay strong for your kids, Duran said. Thats what youve got to do. When the doctors planned to wake Lora up from anesthesia on the morning of April 23, they called Duran in order for him to be in the room to calm her down. As she woke up, he held her hand and he said that moment was indescribable. When I walked in the room that morning, when I got to see her and touch her for the first time after that long period of time of not actually being able to touch her, it was awesome, Duran said. Theres no word to describe it. Theres no word to describe not seeing your wife, knowing the situation, knowing the problem she was having, knowing all the stuff that was going on, all of that, and not being able to be by her side. Ventilation required multiple times Lora needed to be placed on a ventilator three times Feb. 22-April 23, May 2-10 and June 17-21 and she was finally discharged from the hospital on June 25. However, the long period of time she was on a ventilator left her body in a frail state. She said she needed help sitting up in her hospital bed, as well as standing and walking on her own. She needed to use a walker and do physical therapy for several months after being hospitalized, and she said she still suffers from some permanent damage to her muscles and her lungs after suffering from COVID-19 complications and COVID pneumonia. I actually just stopped doing physical therapy a week ago, Lora said. I still have to wear a foot brace. I have foot drop because the tendon in my leg, where it wasnt being moved for so long, it doesnt work so I cant lift my right foot up. The pulmonologist said that my lungs will probably never be at 100 percent. I get out of breath really easily. I just stopped walking on a walker a couple weeks ago. While being hospitalized, Lora missed several family moments, including her childrens birthdays, her own birthday and her 17th wedding anniversary, as well as Valentines Day and Easter. She said that realization was difficult for her. Its very hard to know that youre missing milestones and, even beyond those milestones, to know that youre just missing the day-to-day, its heart-wrenching, Lora said. When she was finally able to reunite with her children and her mother for the first time in months, Lora said it was emotional. That was amazing the hugs, the tears and the smiles, Lora said. My daughter had made little Welcome Home signs, Mom had baked a cake and they had put a banner up. It was great. COVID hospitalizations surging Unfortunately, hospitalizations have surged across Kentucky and across the country with mostly unvaccinated people being admitted for COVID-related illness. Per the Kentucky Department for Public Health, 4,230 patients were hospitalized in Kentucky from COVID-related illness between March 1 and Aug. 18, 2021. Of those total patients, 3,819 patients (about 90.3 percent) were unvaccinated and only 411 patients (9.7 percent) were fully vaccinated. Vaccinations are the publics best defense against poorer outcomes of COVID-19. Per the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, vaccines provide 80-90 percent effectiveness in protection against the virus, which has been proven to prevent severe illness and poorer outcomes. People who have previously had COVID-19 are also still highly encouraged and recommended to get vaccinated because, per a recent CDC study, unvaccinated individuals who were previously infected with COVID-19 were twice as likely to be reinfected with the virus than people who were fully vaccinated after initially contracting the virus. Although a very small percentage of fully vaccinated people can still get sick, be hospitalized or die from COVID-19, there is a significantly greater chance that unvaccinated people will get sick, be admitted to the hospital and possibly die from the virus, per the CDC. Lora and her husband Duran, who are now fully vaccinated, expressed to the public why its crucial for everyone to get vaccinated. This vaccine is necessary, Lora said. People should want to get it to protect themselves and their families. People like me are dependent on herd immunity because, even though Im vaccinated, my body doesnt produce the antibodies because Im immunocompromised. Duran said that he knows how COVID-19 can impact a person and leave lasting effects on their health, after what his wife experienced this year. He urged the public to grow up and stop taking health advice from people who are not qualified to give advice on the vaccine. He said that people should listen to healthcare professionals about the effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccines, not their local handyman. Grow up, and have compassion for your fellow man, Duran said. Stop listening to Joe Blow, who fixes cars. Why dont you listen to Dr. Fadi (Al Akhrass)? Why dont you listen to actual people who have medical degrees who actually know what theyre talking about? Quit listening to your plumber or your contractor. Start listening to doctors. Everyone who is 12 years old and older can receive a COVID-19 vaccine. No vaccines have been approved for children between 5 and 12 years old in the U.S. yet. Contact your local healthcare provider for more information about vaccines and contact your preferred pharmacy regarding available vaccines. Unlimited website access 24/7 Unlimited e-Edition access 24/7 The best local, regional and national news in sports, politics, business and more! With a Digital Only subscription, you'll receive unlimited access to our website and e-edition. Our digital products are available 24/7 and are accessible anywhere, anytime. After the vivo X70 and X70 Pro renders, now the CAD-based renders of the vivo X70 Pro+, the top-end model in the series has surfaced, thanks to @OnLeaks. This reveals a 6.7-inch curved punch-hole screen, which is expected to be an AMOLED display with 120Hz refresh rate. It also shows quad rear cameras with ZEISS optics and triple LED flash along with laser autofocus. Camera specs are not available yet, but it could include a periscope camera. It also shows that the USB Type-C port, speaker grille, microphone and SIM card slot are located at the bottom. The phone is said to measure 164.8 x 75.5 x 9~11.3mm. Based on earlier Google Play console listing, the model V2145A is said to be the vivo X70 Pro+ that is said to be powered by Snapdragon 888 SoC with 8GB of RAM, and it should run Funtouch OS 11.1 based on Android 11. It is also expected to come in 12GB RAM version. Both the X70 and X70 Pro are said to be powered by Dimensity 1200 SoC. Earlier rumours said that the phone with come with 50MP Sony IMX766 main camera, and is rumoured to support 66W charging. The vivo X70 series is expected to be announced sometime in September. Source PANAMA CITY BEACH, Fla (WALA) -- Tropical Storm Fred made its presence known on the Gulf Coast on Monday, bringing with it relentless rain and wind. It would be a great day for a kite, said Ritch Campbell. The winds were very interesting, just watching what they were doing. Fred making landfall around 2:15 Monday afternoon near Cape San Blas, a roughly 60-mile drive from Panama City Beach. 65 mile per hour winds pounded the coast. Rough surf and rip currents kept the Gulf waters closed. It looks pretty rough, not too crazy yet, but well see what happens, said Alannah Yager. Conditions got worse throughout the day in Northwest Florida. On Panama City Beach, businesses closed early leaving many vacationers stuck inside. Its one of those things, it doesnt matter if its called the glass half empty or half full same amount of liquid in there, Campbell said. Weve been making the best of it man, its just something different. As Fred marches north, the rain totals continue to climb. While the Gulf Coast is no stranger to tropical trouble. Last years record season has many people here on high alert. I live in a condo on the beach so its always something you kind of pay attention too, Yager said. You follow the news channel and youre being proactive to it not reactive. Yes! Ive really missed regular library visits during the pandemic. Im excited, but I dont think Im ready to make a full return to the library just yet. Ive shifted to using the libraries virtual and curbside services, and itll probably stay that way. I dont use the local library. Vote View Results Wednesday August 18, 2021 Samantha Renee Nissen passed away at the age of 52. Samantha was born in Gainesville, Texas on January 14,1969. She married Chris Nissen in Gainesville on February 16th, 1990. She most enjoyed being a Grandsam. Samantha is survived by her husband Chris Nissen, Daugh Galveston, TX (77553) Today Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 83F. Winds S at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 83F. Winds S at 10 to 15 mph. [This unedited press release is made available courtesy of Gamasutra and its partnership with notable game PR-related resource Games Press.] SAN DIEGO Aug 26, 2021 | Developer TripleCh3rry and Publisher Proponent Games have released its epic fantasy metroidvania action-adventure game Betrayer: Curse of the Spine in early access on Steam! Through exploration, crafting, and strategic combat, players will maneuver throughout the land to uncover the truth behind its dark history and strike down its gods. PC gamers can now purchase the early access title Spine for $9.99 on Steam and embark upon the cursed realm of Karaka! Betrayer: Curse of the Spine is a metroidvania action-adventure game where players take the role of a lone warrior as they rage throughout the vast world of Karaka in vengeance of the gods that have imprisoned them. Featuring intricate storytelling, a robust crafting system, weapon customization and multiple endings to experience, this highly atmospheric game is filled with drama, mystery and dread. Check out all the mayhem in the Betrayer: Curse of the Spine trailer here: https://youtu.be/5fbDoeEmI3s Betrayer: Curse of the Spine will feature: An Engaging Narrative Death is meaningless in the Spine of the Cursed. Everything that dies comes back to existence, eventually. Players must navigate this ancient realm of danger in search of answers and powers that will enable them to uncover the dark truth behind this veiled land and the dark truths behind your own past. As The Betrayer, they embark on a story rich action adventure game that combines quick platforming action with an engaging world, crafting, characters, combat, and abilities. Crafting at the Core Part of overcoming the challenges in this world is learning to use all the tools you have at your disposal. One of the most valuable pieces of your toolkit is your ability to craft. Make potions to restore your health or to increase your strength. Make weapons to brutalize your enemies and armor to protect your tender bits. Deadly Platforming and Skilled Combat Not only will your wits be put to the test but your reflexes will as well. It's not all just stabby-stab. Run and jump your way to victory - and likely die trying, many times, before you succeed. Assets Pack: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1WuN-LiOjipWHTuNYhPXPIT97-5Y9sir_?usp=sharing # # # About Proponent Games Proponent Games is a video game publishing company focused on supporting independent game developers and showcases their dedication to gaming by building a community around their games and giving them the opportunity to grow in new and exciting creative directions. Committed to the ethos of passion, community, and opportunity, Proponent Games looks for game developers who carry the same passion for gaming and provides support by nurturing that passion with the resources needed to take that drive to create and design and transforming it into a finished creative product. Proponent Games is headquartered in San Diego. For more information, please visit: https://proponentgames.com MEDIA CONTACT Zac Gunnell (on behalf of Proponent Games) [email protected] Justice Brett Kavanaugh was trying to be a nice guy. In an act of judicial gallantry, he chose to give the losing side a break. The Alabama Association of Realtors had sued to halt the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's eviction moratorium on the grounds that bureaucracies don't have the authority to write laws. Four Supreme Court justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett sided with the realtors. For his part, Kavanaugh wrote on June 29, he agreed that the CDC had exceeded its authority in issuing a national eviction moratorium, but since the moratorium was scheduled to end on July 31, he decided to let the situation ride. "Because the CDC plans to end the moratorium in only a few weeks, on July 31, and because those few weeks will allow for additional and more orderly distribution of the congressionally appropriated rental assistance funds," Kavanaugh explained, he voted to allow the program to continue through July 31, for what was supposed to be the final extension. Let's just say Kavanaugh is unlikely to make the same mistake again. On Aug. 3, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky signed an order extending the moratorium until Oct. 3. Gettysburg, PA (17325) Today Becoming partly cloudy after some evening rain. Low 58F. Winds N at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Becoming partly cloudy after some evening rain. Low 58F. Winds N at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Localized flooding is expected. Gettysburg, PA (17325) Today Becoming partly cloudy after some evening rain. Potential for flooding rains. Low 58F. Winds NNW at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Becoming partly cloudy after some evening rain. Potential for flooding rains. Low 58F. Winds NNW at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Remembering September 11 We pledged on Sept. 11, 2001, that we would never forget. As if we could. The tragedy and loss we felt 20 years ago is forever imbedded in our memories. We remember where we were, what we felt. We remember the loss of innocence. What do you remember about 9/11? Please share your memories with us that we can include in a special edition on Sept. 11. Send emails to aturner@gillettenewsrecord.net. VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Aug. 25, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- AZINCOURT ENERGY CORP. (Azincourt or the Company) (TSX.V: AAZ, OTC: AZURF), is pleased to announce it has appointed C. Trevor Perkins as Vice President, Exploration. Mr. Perkins is a Professional Geologist with wide-ranging experience in planning and executing mineral exploration programs and managing exploration teams. He brings a proven track record of discovery and results from a successful 26-year career in mineral exploration in some of the worlds most prolific mining regions. Mr. Perkins has been Exploration Manager at Azincourt since October of 2020. Hes been responsible for leading exploration efforts at the Companys East Preston uranium project, located in the Western Athabasca Basin, Saskatchewan. Prior to joining Azincourt, Mr. Perkins held the title of Exploration Manager for UEX Corporation, responsible for overseeing exploration in the Athabasca Basin, Saskatchewan. As a Qualified Person for UEXs uranium and cobalt projects, he was responsible for several 43-101 technical reports and resource estimates for both the Christie Lake and West Bear Projects. In addition, he managed the team that made the Orora Uranium Deposit discovery 2017. Mr. Perkins was also Senior Geoscientist with Rio Tinto and spent a decade with Cameco Corporation. At Cameco he served as Vice President, Exploration for Cameco Mongolia, District Geologist for Europe and Asia, Senior Project Geologist for Arnhem Land in Australia, and a Project Geologist for Camecos Athabasca projects. As Project Geologist for the McArthur River project, he led the team that discovered the McArthur River North Extension zones (110Mlb U3O8) and as Senior Project Geologist based in Darwin, Australia, he led the team that discovered the Angulari Uranium Deposit (20Mlb U3O8). Were very pleased to elevate Trevors role with the Company, which is now more reflective of his growing role and increased responsibilities, said CEO, Alex Klenman. Since coming on board last year he has brought both a high degree of professionalism and a real hunger and enthusiasm for discovery. He has been directly involved in several significant uranium discoveries in the past and has the proven ability to direct large scale exploration programs. Its a great fit and were happy to bring him on as VP of Exploration, continued Mr. Klenman. I am very excited to move into this new role and take on the added responsibility that comes with it, commented Trevor Perkins, Vice President, Exploration. This is an exciting time in the Uranium space, as it looks like we are poised for positive movement. I am eager to move forward with larger programs to evaluate our East Preston Project and look for opportunities to expand our exploration portfolio, continued Mr. Perkins. About Azincourt Energy Corp. Azincourt Energy is a Canadian-based resource company specializing in the strategic acquisition, exploration, and development of alternative energy/fuel projects, including uranium, lithium, and other critical clean energy elements. The Company is currently active at its joint venture East Preston uranium project in the Athabasca Basin, Saskatchewan, Canada, and the Escalera Group uranium-lithium project located on the Picotani Plateau in southeastern Peru. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF AZINCOURT ENERGY CORP. Alex Klenman Alex Klenman, President & CEO Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its regulation services provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This press release includes forward-looking statements, including forecasts, estimates, expectations and objectives for future operations that are subject to a number of assumptions, risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the control of Azincourt. Investors are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and that actual results or developments may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking information represents managements best judgment based on information currently available. No forward-looking statement can be guaranteed, and actual future results may vary materially. For further information please contact: Alex Klenman, President & CEO Tel: 604-638-8063 info@azincourtenergy.com Azincourt Energy Corp. 1430 800 West Pender Street Vancouver, BC V6C 2V6 www.azincourtenergy.com Palo Alto, CA, Aug. 25, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Kehillah Jewish High Schools ethos is based on longstanding Jewish values such as respect, responsibility, and belonging, so the recent addition to the Senior Leadership Team of Rabbi Dennis Eisner, formerly Rabbi of Peninsula Temple Beth El, and Dr. Joshua Krug, recently from Moishe House and New York University, lends special gravitas to our deeply held Jewish commitments and programmatic planning. Kehillah welcomes and celebrates the return of in- person education focusing on the universal ideals these scholars will explore with students and with the larger community. We warmly welcome them to our kehillah and look forward to learning a great deal from their lives and their work with us. Dennis Eisner: New Director of Institutional Advancement Rabbi Eisner, ordained at Hebrew Union College in New York, will work alongside Director of Development, Eric Weller, to lead strategic fundraising and support the deepening of Kehillah's philanthropic culture. Together, they are responsible for the overall leadership and management of fundraising efforts while also cultivating and stewarding relationships with a wide range of donors, grant funders, and volunteers.. Rabbi Eisner's vast experience with young people in Jewish communal life has taught him to understand how to harness the energy of our students by highlighting their positive attributes as they pursue, and actually create, a better world. He remarks it is an honor and a blessing to be part of this team as we all pursue this vital goal. Joshua Krug: New Director of Jewish Life and Learning Dr. Krug earned his Ph.D in Education and Jewish Studies and will provide ongoing, pastoral care for students including an overarching focus on adolescent development, with the goal of cultivating a healthy community for all constituents. Supporting the development of positive relationships within the student, faculty, and parent communities is a core component of his new role using the integration of Jewish values, wisdom, and practice into school climate, student life, and student learning. Dr. Krug recently said I am intrigued by the school leaderships focus on and approach to the sacred practice of learning. Kehillah feels like a laboratory for contemporary Jewish education and culture. I am excited about serving its diverse population of students and families. I feel the challenge at the root of all education is how to present contested facts accurately and how to ask the right questions so that learners can wrestle with them for themselves. Kehillah is grateful for and inspired by these and many other incoming faculty, as it begins a very special year. Attachments VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Major Precious Metals Corp. (Major Precious Metals or the Company) (CSE:SIZE | OTC:SIZYF | FRANKFURT:3EZ) is pleased to provide an update on its Phase I diamond drilling program at its Skaergaard Project (Skaergaard) in eastern Greenland. Drilling commenced in July and has prioritized the northern part of the Skaergaard deposit including several areas being drilled to determine the open-cut potential at Skaergaard. Historically, these priority areas were never drilled at Skaergaard due to the focus being on defining a resource in the southern part of the deposit. Successful completion of these drill holes within these key priority areas by this September has the potential to both upgrade and significantly expand the existing mineral resource estimate (MRE) for Skaergaard. The current MRE includes Indicated Mineral Resources of 81.6 million tonnes at 2.10 g/t PdEq resulting in 5.51 Moz contained PdEq ounces and Inferred Mineral Resources of 217.3 million tonnes at 2.05 g/t PdEq resulting in 14.4 Moz contained PdEq ounces at a cutoff grade of 1.43 g/t PdEq. The current MRE is supported by a National Instrument 43-101 (NI 43-101) technical report (the Report) with an effective date of April 15, 2021. The Report was prepared by SLR Consulting (Canada) Ltd. (SLR) and was filed on SEDAR on May 25, 2021. Tony Williams, Chairman and CEO of Major Precious Metals commented, The Report confirms that Skaergaard already contains a very large Palladium and Gold Resource with known mineralization open in all directions and we are excited to highlight some of the key target areas and priorities for our current drilling program. Skaergaard Drilling Priorities The Company is prioritizing the following key target areas (Zone 1 to 4) at Skaergaard for its current drilling program to both upgrade the existing mineral resource categories and significantly increase the size of the mineral resource (Figure 1): Several NW-SE trending drill fences in the northern part of the deposit with drill holes spaced approximately 300 m apart (Zone 1). Completion of these drill holes will allow the Company to not only upgrade the resource classification in this large area, but possibly expand the mineral resources further to the north from the existing geological model; Several drill holes in the northeast to determine the open-cut potential of the near surface mineralization in this area (Zone 2); Several drill holes immediately north of the glacier to determine the open-cut potential of the near-surface mineralization in this area (Zone 3); and Several drill holes southwest of the glacier to extend and upgrade the near-surface resource in this area (Zone 4). Figure 1 is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/92f96322-0984-49ce-b78c-2409ca0dff96 At the Companys request, SLR has sent Consulting Geologist Phil Geusebroek, P.Geo. and Senior Mining Engineer Murray Dunn, P.Eng. to Skaergaard to complete an independent site visit and personal inspection of active drilling and coring operations. Both individuals are Qualified Persons under NI 43-101 and are visiting Skaergaard the week of August 23rd to: Review the Companys active diamond drilling operations; Inspect the Companys core logging and sampling facilities, and ensure the Companys geological consultants are adhering to strict QAQC procedures and following CIM exploration best practices; Verify the current drilling plan will be fully effective in developing a robust updated MRE for Skaergaard with the main priorities being to upgrade and expand the existing resource. SLR geologist Phil Geusebroek completed the Companys MRE for Skaergaard and also assisted the Company in designing its current drilling and sampling program, and will therefore audit the current drill plan and sampling protocols on site; Assess locations for future mining infrastructure and investigating open-cut and underground mining options for the Skaergaard Project as part of its upcoming Preliminary Economic Assessment ( PEA ). This task will be completed by SLR mining engineer Murray Dunn; and ). This task will be completed by SLR mining engineer Murray Dunn; and Time and weather permitting both SLR consultants will fly into the Companys newest mineral exploration licence (MEL 2021-10) to determine this areas potential for exploration work and future mining infrastructure requirements. Tony Williams commented further, We will report again as the detailed results from these key target areas outlined above begin to emerge in the coming weeks. We also plan to report these results and engage with shareholders and other potential investors via a number of upcoming webinars and international precious metal conferences. Full details of these will be provided in due course. As previously stated the resampling and geological remodelling of the historical exploration data have already demonstrated a Palladium and Gold resource of global significance at Skaergaard. As more results are reported we believe we will be able to clearly show that we are adding significant value for all stakeholders as we move forward along the Mine Development Cycle. This includes the planned PEA, which will outline the next steps needed for potential extraction of the substantial precious metals mineralization at Skaergaard. Qualified Person Statement All scientific and technical information contained in this news release was prepared and approved by Paul Teniere, P.Geo., President of Major Precious Metals Corp, who is a Qualified Person as defined in NI 43-101. On behalf of the Board of Directors MAJOR PRECIOUS METALS CORP. Tony Williams Chairman and CEO Suite 810 - 789 West Pender Street Vancouver, BC V6C 1H2 Ph: 1-877-475-0963 info@majorprecious.com About Major Precious Metals Corp. Major Precious Metals is a Canadian junior mining company listed on the Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE) and its common shares trade under the ticker symbol SIZE. The Companys flagship project is the Skaergaard Project in Greenland containing one of the largest palladium and gold deposits outside the major PGM producing areas of Russia and South Africa. The Company is focused on accelerating the progress of the Skaergaard Project along the Mine Development Cycle and has recently initiated a further major work program of drilling and economic evaluation. Additional information relating to Major Precious Metals is available at www.majorprecious.com and SEDAR at www.sedar.com . The Canadian Securities Exchange has neither approved nor disapproved the contents of this news release. Forward-looking Information Statement This news release may contain certain forward-looking statements and forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable Canadian and United States securities laws. When used in this news release, the words anticipate, believe, estimate, expect, target, plan, forecast, may, schedule and other similar words or expressions identify forward-looking statements or information. These forward-looking statements or information may relate to the development of a mineral resource estimate for the Skaergaard Project, and other factors or information. Such statements represent the Companys current views with respect to future events and are necessarily based upon a number of assumptions and estimates that, while considered reasonable by the Company, are inherently subject to significant business, economic, competitive, political and social risks, contingencies and uncertainties. Many factors, both known and unknown, could cause results, performance or achievements to be materially different from the results, performance or achievements that are or may be expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend, and does not assume any obligation, to update these forward-looking statements or information to reflect changes in assumptions or changes in circumstances or any other events affections such statements and information other than as required by applicable laws, rules and regulations. Boerne, TX, United States, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The award-winning digital marketing agency specializes in web design and search engine optimization (SEO.) Experts in their field, the company is helping local roofers compete with larger companies by offering complementary assessments of current online performances to create strategies that achieve top search engine rankings and drive sales. More information can be found at https://www.cinchlocal.com/roofing-seo As pandemic restrictions are lifted throughout the US, roofing contractors are doing what they can to increase exposure among target audiences and recoup revenues. To help roofers become the go-to experts in their cities, the company is updating services by introducing business owners and contractors to Googles ranking criteria, so they can create strategies todays algorithms reward. Search engine optimization (SEO) is a process that results in ranking-compatible websites designed to attract more quality traffic. The right SEO strategy helps roofers capture local homeowners who are actively searching for their services. By emulating keyword searches and building these strings into their clients websites, the experts at CinchLocal can direct in-market audiences to their clients businesses. There are three types of rankings Google results pages (the SERPs) deliver: top paid ad positioning, featured Google Maps listings, and organic search results. Paid ads are pay-per-click promotions; an area most online users skip. Roofers that rank within the top five organic listings can increase business by close to 70 percent. Those who land in the Google Maps section (also known as the 3-Pack), can double their business. Ranking in the Google 3-Pack is dependent upon on-page SEO, which means website content that incorporates the keywords those looking for roofing services would use to conduct their online search. Off-page SEO, known as backlinks and citations in business directories, helps with overall Google recognition and indexing. CinchLocal specializes in securing top search engine listings and highlights that engage homeowner interest and trust with customized on-page and off-page SEO solutions. The team provide affordable plans that cover all search engine ranking factors. With the launch of their complimentary SEO audit and strategizing sessions, the company is helping hard-working contractors outperform the conglomerates, so they can meet their goals and continue to grow their businesses. Visit https://www.cinchlocal.com/roofing-seo to find out more. Website: https://www.cinchlocal.com/ Wilmington, NC, United States, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Health Insurance by LaRose today reflected on its release of its North Carolina Health Insurance offerings several years ago. The main aim was always to provide affordable and customized health insurance plans to meet clients needs, however Insurance by LaRose strived to be different by offering transparency during the plan selection process. By sharing his screen with prospective clients when filtering plans, clients ensure they are getting the best rate and coverage for their needs and over the last several years, the businesss consultative approach did so, with a difference. Interested parties can learn more by visiting: https://links.insurancebylarose.com/prcp Kyle LaRose, Owner at Health Insurance by LaRose, says: We wanted to try something new with North Carolina health insurance services. Anyone familiar with the health insurance market will probably have noticed how everyone else always seemed to gather information from prospective clients and make a firm recommendation based on their analysis. We felt this was a problem because while this approach isnt wrong, it lacks a certain level of transparency and often results in less choices for the customer. Insurance by LaRose offers a more consultative approach where we partner with clients to review their options, make recommendations, but go an additional step further to screen share our available offerings with our clients to prevent any lack of transparency or deceptive behavior. So as a welcome breath of fresh air, Health Insurance by LaRose provides free consultations to anyone who wants an honest review of their options. By engaging in non aggressive sales tactics and working with a consultative approach, Health Insurance by LaRose is able to operate on a needs based analysis and does not oversell their clients on health insurance products. The company chose to make this move as, oftentimes, people avoid insurance products due to the reputation the sales people have in the field. More often than not, once clients obtain health insurance from Insurance by LaRose, they express feelings of gratitude and state they should have completed this sooner, however were avoiding it as they heard too many negative things about brokers. Kyle understands the importance of a solid health insurance plan and the peace of mind it can bring individuals and business owners. By operating his business with a consultative, non aggressive, relaxing approach, Kyle provides a service based model in a very sales oriented business. Health Insurance by LaRose has been in business since 2018. Since Day 1 it has always aimed to provide practical, transparent, and complete health insurance products to new and existing customers. For further information about Health Insurance by LaRose and to book a free consultation interested parties can visit: https://links.insurancebylarose.com/prcp Website: https://links.insurancebylarose.com/prcp SSG BidCo A/S (SSG or the Company) is delighted to announce that the company has entered exclusive discussions and has signed a letter of intent for the acquisition of a Swedish damage control company, which generated ca. SEK 6 million in EBITDA in 2020. As announced on August 20, 2021, proceeds from subsequent bonds of EUR 2.1 million may be used to partially finance the acquisition, should it materialise. For further information, please contact: CEO Carsten Fensholt, e-mail Carsten.Fensholt@ssg.dk, or Group CFO Pernille Damm Nielsen, e-mail Pernille.d.Nielsen@ssg.dk. This is information that SSG BidCo A/S is obliged to make public pursuant to the EU Market Abuse Regulation. The information was submitted for publication, through the agency of the contact persons set out above, at 9:00 CET, on 26 August 2021. August 26, 2021 Companys innovative, integrated imaging systems, devices, software, informatics and services support greater efficiency, enabling high-quality care for a growing volume of complex cardiac patients Early detection, accurate diagnosis, precise treatment and easy follow-up are enabled by data-driven, streamlined workflows Amsterdam, the Netherlands Royal Philips (NYSE: PHG, AEX: PHIA), a global leader in health technology, today announced the launch of its digital experience during the virtual European Society of Cardiology (ESC) 2021 Congress, taking place August 27-30, during which it will showcase its latest suite of solutions to help improve outcomes for patients with cardiovascular disease by enabling quick, confident diagnoses, and efficient, effective treatments. During the congress, Philips will demonstrate its continued leadership in cardiology across its integrated portfolio of solutions throughout the entire cardiac care journey, from early detection, diagnosis and treatment, to long-term follow-up. Cardiovascular disease has become the number one healthcare challenge globally and is one of the leading causes of death worldwide [1]. The costs associated with cardiovascular diseases are rising significantly, with an expected growth in cost of 101% by 2035 [2]. The demands on cardiology departments are higher than ever before, forcing clinicians to balance the delivery of high-quality care for a growing volume of complex patients, while dealing with the pressures to improve departmental efficiency at the same time. Definitive diagnostics, innovative procedures and personalized patient management are essential to help address these most challenging demands. From emergency care to diagnosis and treatment, to care into the home, cardiac care teams need the right information and support available at their fingertips across the entire cardiac patient journey, said Bert van Meurs , Chief Business Leader of Image Guided Therapy at Philips. Philips is uniquely positioned to integrate imaging, devices, software, informatics and services at each point in a cardiac patients journey to help deliver results now, while positioning for future success. At this years ESC virtual congress, we continue our longstanding leadership in cardiology, as we demonstrate the latest smart solutions to help improve the precision diagnosis and effective treatment for patients in cardiac care, driving better outcomes and lower cost while improving the patient and staff experience. Philips cardiology experience at the Virtual ESC 2021 Congress Visitors to the Philips virtual experience during ESC will see how Philips solutions help strengthen clinical confidence with robust data and advanced technologies to give insight to provide the right care at the right time, improving outcomes for even the most complex patients. Building efficiency throughout the care pathway, Philips is streamlining communication between devices and systems to identify and address operational improvements to optimize resources and help reduce costs. By improving cardiac care experiences with user-friendly tools and streamlined workflows, Philips is helping relieve pain points for staff and enhancing comfort for patients. Technology highlights in diagnostic and treatment solutions at this years virtual ESC congress include: Philips Spectral CT 7500 for advanced cardiac imaging. The new Philips Spectral CT 7500 , designed to support diagnosis, builds on Philipss strong reputation in cardiac imaging by delivering fast cardiac scans with excellent coronary vessel visualization, and now layers of spectral information for every exam. The spectral detector allows the Spectral CT 7500 to be the only system that will acquire spectral cardiac data in the same time and place for all patients, from pediatrics to bariatrics. This latest intelligent system has demonstrated a 34% reduction in time to diagnosis [3], a 25% reduction in repeat scans and a 30% reduction in follow-up scans [4] compared to conventional CT. The time-saving spectral workflow is fully integrated, enabling spectral chest scans. Intelligent workflows of Philips IntelliSpace Portal simplify advanced vessel analysis, comprehensive cardiac assessment, lung nodule assessment, and transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) to expand cardiac and ED trauma capabilities. The new , designed to support diagnosis, builds on Philipss strong reputation in cardiac imaging by delivering fast cardiac scans with excellent coronary vessel visualization, and now layers of spectral information for every exam. The spectral detector allows the Spectral CT 7500 to be the only system that will acquire spectral cardiac data in the same time and place for all patients, from pediatrics to bariatrics. This latest intelligent system has demonstrated a 34% reduction in time to diagnosis [3], a 25% reduction in repeat scans and a 30% reduction in follow-up scans [4] compared to conventional CT. The time-saving spectral workflow is fully integrated, enabling spectral chest scans. Intelligent workflows of simplify advanced vessel analysis, comprehensive cardiac assessment, lung nodule assessment, and transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) to expand cardiac and ED trauma capabilities. New innovations in ultrasound enhance clinical efficiency and diagnostic confidence. Philips new echo imaging, quantification, and tele-health technologies help improve clinical confidence, automate repetitive tasks, and remotely and securely connect clinicians and patients. Philips brings together the EPIQ CVx and Affiniti CVx ultrasound platforms, TOMTEC advanced analysis, Collaboration Live remote decision support and Philips multi-modality image and information management solutions ( IntelliSpace Cardiovascular ) in an end-to-end workflow, for a fully integrated experience in echocardiography. Philips new echo imaging, quantification, and tele-health technologies help improve clinical confidence, automate repetitive tasks, and remotely and securely connect clinicians and patients. Philips brings together the and ultrasound platforms, TOMTEC advanced analysis, remote decision support and Philips multi-modality image and information management solutions ( ) in an end-to-end workflow, for a fully integrated experience in echocardiography. Improved workflow and patient focus in image guided procedures. Philips will demonstrate the integration of its Interventional Hemodynamic System and market-leading portable Patient Monitor IntelliVue X3 , providing advanced hemodynamic (blood flow) measurements at the tableside in the cath lab and continuous monitoring of key vital signs throughout the patient journey [5]. The integration provides the opportunity for monitoring during image-guided procedures on the Philips Image Guided Therapy System Azurion, improving workflow with comprehensive patient records that support timely clinical decision-making during interventional cardiology procedures and beyond. Philips will demonstrate the integration of its and market-leading portable , providing advanced hemodynamic (blood flow) measurements at the tableside in the cath lab and continuous monitoring of key vital signs throughout the patient journey [5]. The integration provides the opportunity for monitoring during image-guided procedures on the Philips Image Guided Therapy System improving workflow with comprehensive patient records that support timely clinical decision-making during interventional cardiology procedures and beyond. Cardiology informatics solutions drive actionable insights to enhance cardiology care. Philips Cardiovascular Informatics solution provides a consistent end-to-end intuitive workflow for easy access to a patients cardiovascular pathway. By connecting and integrating disparate clinical systems across the enterprise, the cardiology care team can make fast clinical decisions based on the data when and where it is needed. Philips cardiology informatics solutions, smart intelligent algorithms and predictive analytics work seamlessly to help optimize patient throughput. Advanced cardiac monitoring from the hospital into the home Philips cardiac care solutions and BioTelemetrys leading remote cardiac patient monitoring have transformed the cardiac care pathway. Now, individuals with complex co-morbidities can emerge from a cardiac event or procedure to live independently with the confidence of 24/7 clinical oversight with advanced cardiac monitoring including monitoring of wearables and implantable devices for a complete end-to-end solution across acute and non-acute settings, from the hospital into the home. Philips hosted webinars and symposia sessions during ESC 2021 ESC delegates can join Dr. Roberto Lang of the University of Chicago Medicine, along with Dr. Pepe Zamorano of the University Hospital Ramon y Cajal, Madrid, Spain and Dr. Eric Saloux with Coen University Hospital, France during an Ultrasound Satellite Symposia session on August 28 at 8:00AM CET, as they present results on new imaging technologies under investigation. ESC attendees can also join Dr. Tim Leiner, Professor of Radiology at Utrecht University Medical Center in the Netherlands, who will share the latest results and advantages of cardiovascular imaging with the next generation Spectral CT 7500. On August 27 at 10:00AM CET, Dr. Borja Ibanez, Director of Clinical Research of the National Center Cardiovascular Research (CNIC) in Spain will also be presenting results from ultra-fast cardiac MR scanning, reducing MRI evaluation of the heart to a few minutes . Visit the Philips ESC Engagement Hub for the full list of Philips hosted webinars throughout the event. For more information, join the Philips virtual experience at ESC 2021. Visit www.philips.com/cardiology and the Philips Press Backgrounder for more information on Philips full suite of integrated imaging, devices, software, informatics and services enhancing precision heart care. And join @PhilipsLiveFrom to follow Philips for updates throughout the event. [1] European Cardiovascular Disease Statistics 2017. [2] RTI International for the American Heart Association. Projections of Cardiovascular Disease Prevalence and Costs: 20152035. [3] Andersen, MB, Ebbesen, D, Thygesen, J, et al. impact of spectral body imaging in patients suspected for occult cancer: a prospective study of 503 patients. Eur Radiol (2020). Results from case studies are not predictive of results in other cases. Results in other cases may vary. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00330-020-06878-7 . [4] Analysis by CARTI Cancer Center in Little Rock Arkansas and University Hospitals of Cleveland. Results from case studies are not predictive of results in other cases. Results in other cases may vary. [5] Philips Interventional Hemodynamic System with Patient Monitor IntelliVue X3 is available in the majority of markets worldwide. Philips continuous patient monitoring solution is available for sale in markets across Europe, Middle East and APAC, with further expansion planned later this year. It is not available for sale in the U.S. For further information, please contact: Mark Groves Philips Global Press Office Tel.: +31 631 639 916 E-mail: mark.groves@philips.com About Royal Philips Royal Philips (NYSE: PHG, AEX: PHIA) is a leading health technology company focused on improving people's health and well-being, and enabling better outcomes across the health continuum from healthy living and prevention, to diagnosis, treatment and home care. Philips leverages advanced technology and deep clinical and consumer insights to deliver integrated solutions. Headquartered in the Netherlands, the company is a leader in diagnostic imaging, image-guided therapy, patient monitoring and health informatics, as well as in consumer health and home care. Philips generated 2020 sales of EUR 17.3 billion and employs approximately 77,000 employees with sales and services in more than 100 countries. News about Philips can be found at www.philips.com/newscenter . Attachments Dublin, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Lip Cold Sore Treatment Market in China, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Southeast Asia -Revenue Estimation and Forecast by 2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market size is set to increase to $85,265.1 thousand in 2030 from $45,262.1 thousand in 2020, at a 6.7% CAGR between 2021 and 2030. In China and Southeast Asia (SEA), the prevalence of herpes simplex virus type-1 (HSV-1) infection is increasing. Mostly transmitted via mouth-mouth contact, the infection often presents with no symptoms, which makes infected people a potential carrier without their knowledge. HSV-1 infection most commonly presents on and around the lips as blisters. The most-prominent symptoms of this infection are painful gums, headache, fever, swollen lymph nodes, muscle ache, and sore throat. Apart from being in contact with infected people, fatigue, abnormal hormone levels, physical trauma, physiological and psychological stress, and immunosuppression greatly elevate the risk of HSV-1. Thus, the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market is growing with the rising demand for products that can offer symptomatic relief and speed up the healing of the sores. The containment measures taken in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic have led to the shutting down of factories and reduced trade of an array of products. As a result, the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market was negatively affected due to the curtailed manufacturing activities and people staying home. Moreover, the widespread financial distress has forced people to spend only on essential stuff, such as important medication and ration. The fastest growth in the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market in the coming years will be seen in the cream category, on the basis of product type. Creams not only relieve itching, pain, tingling, and burning sensations but also inhibit the growth of the virus. Throughout this decade, the clinics category is projected to hold the largest share in the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market, based on end user. An increasing number of people suffering from this condition are visiting clinics due to the rising awareness on this disease. The pharmacies category dominated the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market in the past, under segmentation by distribution channel. In most cases, a dermatologist prescribes the treatment for this condition, which is why the products are bought predominantly from pharmacies. The SEA lip cold sore treatment market has been the most productive in China till now, and this country is also set to witness the highest CAGR in the years to come. With the increasing prevalence of HSV-1 infection in rural China and the increasing awareness on this disease, the demand for the related treatment products is rising in the country. Key Findings of China and SEA Lip Cold Sore Treatment Market Increasing HSV-1 infection incidence strongest market growth driver Demand for patches for lip cold sore treatment burgeoning Highest consumption of lip cold sore treatment products seen in clinics Pharmacies continue being preferred sales point Market fragmented in nature Players engaging in mergers and acquisitions for larger market share The most-significant players in the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market include Perrigo Company plc Church & Dwight Co. Inc. Kyungdong Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. Quantum Health Carma Labs Inc. Integria Healthcare (Australia) Pty Ltd Blistex Inc. Alliance Pharma plc Li & Fung Limited Viatris Inc. GlaxoSmithKline plc URGO Group Laboratoire HRA Pharma SAS Key Topics Covered: Chapter 1. Research Background Chapter 2. Research Methodology Chapter 3. Executive Summary Chapter 4. Introduction 4.1 Definition of Market Segments 4.1.1 By Product Type 4.1.1.1 Cream 4.1.1.2 Patch 4.1.1.3 Gel 4.1.1.4 Others 4.1.2 By End User 4.1.2.1 Clinics 4.1.2.2 Hospitals 4.1.2.3 Homecare settings 4.1.3 By Distribution Channel 4.1.3.1 Pharmacies 4.1.3.2 E-commerce 4.1.3.3 Direct sales 4.1.3.4 Grocery stores 4.2 Market Dynamics 4.2.1 Trends 4.2.1.1 Increasing demand for patches 4.2.2 Drivers 4.2.2.1 Proliferating modes of transmission of herpes simplex virus 4.2.2.2 Increasing prevalence of cold sores 4.2.2.3 Advancements in treatment with rising number of product launches 4.2.2.4 High lip core sore incidence among children 4.2.2.5 Impact analysis of drivers on market forecast 4.2.3 Restraints 4.2.3.1 Side-effects of lip cold sore treatment products 4.2.3.2 Lack of awareness on lip cold sores and HSV-1 infection 4.2.3.3 Impact analysis of restraints on market forecast 4.2.4 Opportunities 4.2.4.1 Growing disposable personal income 4.3 COVID-19 Impact 4.4 Porter's Five Forces Analysis 4.4.1 Bargaining Power of Buyers 4.4.2 Bargaining Power of Suppliers 4.4.3 Intensity of Rivalry 4.4.4 Threat of New Entrants 4.4.5 Threat of Substitutes Chapter 5. China, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and SEA Market Size and Forecast 5.1 Overview 5.2 Market Revenue, by Product Type (2015-2030) 5.3 Market Revenue, by End User (2015-2030) 5.4 Market Revenue, by Distribution Channel (2015-2030) 5.5 Market Revenue, by Country (2015-2030) Chapter 6. China Market Size and Forecast Chapter 7. Indonesia Market Size and Forecast Chapter 8. Philippines Market Size and Forecast Chapter 9. Vietnam Market Size and Forecast Chapter 10. Thailand Market Size and Forecast Chapter 11. South Korea Market Size and Forecast Chapter 12. Malaysia Market Size and Forecast Chapter 13. Taiwan Market Size and Forecast Chapter 14. Hong Kong Market Size and Forecast Chapter 15. Competitive Landscape Chapter 16. Company Profiles 16.1 Business Overview 16.2 Product and Service Offerings 16.3 Key Financial Summary For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/njvx9e Pune, India, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The global womens health devices market size was USD 34.23 billion in 2020. The market is projected to grow from USD 35.63 billion in 2021 to USD 62.61 billion in 2028 at a CAGR of 8.4% in the 2021-2028 period. This information is provided by Fortune Business Insights in its report titled, Womens Health Devices Market, 2021-2028. According to our researchers, the upsurge in the spending towards womens health is mainly owing to the mounting consciousness of female health concerns, coupled with the constant rise in the disposable incomes of women across the globe. As per a piece issued in Forbes magazine in 2020, the female technology market segment gained nearly USD 800.0 million in terms of capital. For example, Willow, which is a start-up firm involved in the enlargement of a fresh, wearable breast pump for females, was proclaimed handsome funding of USD 55.0 million for its ideas to magnify its product series towards fresh mothers. This is expected to bolster the womens health devices market growth during the forecast period. Significant Industry Developments of the Womens Health Devices Market Include: October 2020: F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. and BabyScripts bonded into a profitable alliance for next-generation of combined womens health resolution. F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd.'s capitalization in BabyScripts is estimated to develop a maternal care section involving NIPT. Request a Sample Copy of the Research Report: https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/enquiry/request-sample-pdf/women-s-health-devices-market-105732 Restricted Hospitals Appointments amid COVID-19 to Adversely Influence Market Growth The COVID-19 pandemic has reflected poorly on the universal market owing to the lockdowns enforced across the globe by the governments of various regions. These stringent rules restricted medical tourism and put a limitation on prioritizing emergency cases on the healthcare professionals. Several key companies in the market reported a loss in revenue in the first half of the pandemic and later made affirmative income collection in the second half. For example, Cooper Surgical Inc. observed a noticeable adverse impact as the global returns deteriorated by 4.0% under the fertility section of the company in Q4 2020 on account of the pandemic. Nonetheless, in Q1 2021, the corporation perceived optimistic performance in the same section with an upsurge of 12.0% over Q1 2020. Click here to get the short-term and long-term impact of COVID-19 on this market. Please visit: https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/women-s-health-devices-market-105732 Increased Awareness of Women's Health Issues to Strongly Drive Market Growth Considering modern demographics, the women population across the globe has undergone substantial escalations in terms of percentage. Moreover, the general healthcare infrastructure globally, particularly in developing nations, is projected to experience noteworthy enhancement. Therefore, these developments in shape global healthcare limits have also considerably amplified the consciousness and compassion towards womens health concerns. The demand for clinical equipment for the analysis & treatment of women's health illnesses, such as an extensive series of female cancers, has enlarged extremely over the last several decades because of the significant growth in the female patient populace. For example, the office on Women's Health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in U.S. establishes numerous cognizance initiatives associated with womens diseases such as breast cancer, hypertension, human papillomavirus (HPV), and mental health wellbeing. Speak to Industry Analyst: https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/enquiry/speak-to-analyst/women-s-health-devices-market-105732 North America to Lead Backed by Rising Healthcare Spending by Companies North America held the largest womens health devices market share and was worth USD 15.40 billion in 2020 and is probable to be measured as the biggest market in the forthcoming years. Hefty healthcare spending for womens health in the region, united with the reasonably higher demand for technologically innovative gadgets in the region, are a few of the features that are liable for the domination of this region. Europe generated the second-largest share in 2020 in the market, which is credited to the sturdy female healthcare expenditure in crucial European nations, coupled with the existence of a considerable female populace in Europe. Asia Pacific region is projected to observe the highest CAGR during the forecast period of 2021-2028. The enhancement in healthcare substructure in Asian countries, increasing incidence of womens diseases, and the escalating consciousness regarding technologically progressive womens health devices are navigating the market growth in the region. List of Manufacturers in the Womens Health Devices Market include: Coloplast A/S Hologic Inc. Boston Scientific Corporation ALLERGAN BD Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd CooperSurgical Inc. Caldera Medical Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC Have Any Query? Ask Our Experts: https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/enquiry/queries/women-s-health-devices-market-105732 Global Womens Health Devices Market Segmentation: Introduction Research Scope Market Segmentation Research Methodology Definitions and Assumptions Executive Summary Market Dynamics Market Drivers Market Restraints Market Opportunities Market Trends Key Insights Prevalence of Key Disease Indications, Key Countries/ Regions, 2020 Overview: Start-ups and Innovations in the Womens Health Devices Market Key Industry Developments Mergers, Acquisitions, and Partnerships Impact of COVID-19 on the Womens Health Devices Market Global Womens Health Devices Market Analysis, Insights and Forecast, 2017-2028 Key Findings / Summary Market Analysis, Insights and Forecast By Application General Health & Wellness Cancers & Other Chronic Diseases Reproductive Health Pregnancy & Nursing Care Pelvic & Uterine Healthcare Others Market Analysis, Insights and Forecast By End User Hospitals & Clinics Home Healthcare Others Market Analysis, Insights and Forecast By Region North America Europe Asia Pacific Rest of the World Get your Customized Research Report: https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/enquiry/customization/women-s-health-devices-market-105732 SECONDARY RESEARCH IS CONDUCTED TO DERIVE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION: Details such as revenues, market share, strategies, growth rate, product & their pricing by region/country for all major companies Details in relation to prevalence, incidence, patient numbers, distribution of patients, average price of treatment, etc. Number of end user facilities by region/country and average annual spending or procurement of devices by type of end user facility Number of procedures and average price of procedures Replacement rate and pricing of capital equipment Market dynamics in relation to the market under focus Drivers, restraints, trends, and opportunities Market & technological trends, new product developments, product pipeline. About Us: Fortune Business Insights offers expert corporate analysis and accurate data, helping organizations of all sizes make timely decisions. We tailor innovative solutions for our clients, assisting them to address challenges distinct to their businesses. Our goal is to empower our clients with holistic market intelligence, giving a granular overview of the market they are operating in. Our reports contain a unique mix of tangible insights and qualitative analysis to help companies achieve sustainable growth. Our team of experienced analysts and consultants use industry-leading research tools and techniques to compile comprehensive market studies, interspersed with relevant data. At Fortune Business Insights we aim at highlighting the most lucrative growth opportunities for our clients. We, therefore, offer recommendations, making it easier for them to navigate through technological and market-related changes. Our consulting services are designed to help organizations identify hidden opportunities and understand prevailing competitive challenges. Contact Us: Fortune Business Insights Pvt. Ltd. 308, Supreme Headquarters, Survey No. 36, Baner, Pune-Bangalore Highway, Pune - 411045, Maharashtra, India. Phone: US :+1 424 253 0390 UK : +44 2071 939123 APAC : +91 744 740 1245 Email: sales@fortunebusinessinsights.com Fortune Business Insights TORONTO, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Discovery Silver Corp. (TSX-V: DSV, OTCQX: DSVSF) (Discovery or the Company) is pleased to announce its financial results for the three months ended June 30, 2021 (Q2 2021), and to provide a summary of key events for the quarter and subsequent to quarter-end. All amounts are presented in Canadian dollars (C$) unless otherwise stated. Discoverys flagship project is our 100%-owned Cordero project (Cordero or the Project) located in Chihuahua State, Mexico. We are aggressively advancing the Project through a 66,000 metre (m) drill program in 2021 focused on delineating a high-margin silver project with size and scaleability. HIGHLIGHTS FROM Q2 2021 & SUBSEQUENT EVENTS: Financial: As at June 30, 2021, we had a cash and cash equivalents and short term investment balance of $88.0 million. The Companys cash position as of the date of this release is approximately $83.6 million. Exploration: At Cordero, we have now received all assays that will be used to support the bulk-tonnage resource update scheduled for release later this quarter. This new drill data, totaling 91,000 m (223 holes), will supplement the historical drilling completed on the property. The preliminary economic assessment (PEA) remains on schedule for delivery in 4Q 2021. The four drill rigs on site continued uninterrupted with Phase 2 drilling. Phase 2 drilling will be focused on reserve definition, resource expansion and high-grade vein delineation. PEA update We announced during the quarter the PEA will be led by Ausenco, an industry leader in cost-effective process design and construction, with input from specialists across all key mining disciplines. The overarching objective is to deliver a technically robust study that outlines one of the largest producing primary silver operations in the industry with manageable upfront development capex and operating costs in the bottom half of the industry cost curve. Support work for the study is progressing well. A comprehensive metallurgical testwork program is now complete with results expected to be received later this quarter. Process design work as well as development of capex and operating cost inputs for processing and mining continues to be advanced. Knight Piesold and Co. (USA) are close to completing their assessment of pit wall stability based on two dedicated geotechnical drill holes in the North Corridor and a review of drill core in the South Corridor. Knight Piesold have also completed preliminary work on the overall site layout including the potential location of the tailings storage facility. Bulk-tonnage drilling Our recent drilling has expanded the higher-grade bulk-tonnage domain by more than 250 m northeast, along strike in the South Corridor. This domain has now been defined over a strike length of approximately 1.4 km and drilled to a depth of 500 m and remains open below this. Higher-grade zones of mineralization are typically flanked by medium and lower-grade mineralization pointing to the scaleability of the mineralized system at Cordero. Select drill highlights during Q2 2021 and subsequent to quarter-end from our bulk-tonnage targets include: 217.3 m averaging 194 g/t AgEq 1 from 39.3 m (75 g/t Ag, 0.45 g/t Au, 1.1% Pb and 1.0% Zn) in hole C21-481 including 81.9 m averaging 254 g/t AgEq 1 (99 g/t Ag, 0.54 g/t Au, 1.5% Pb and 1.4% Zn) from 39.3 m (75 g/t Ag, 0.45 g/t Au, 1.1% Pb and 1.0% Zn) in hole C21-481 including (99 g/t Ag, 0.54 g/t Au, 1.5% Pb and 1.4% Zn) 132.6 m averaging 260 g/t AgEq 1 from 204.7 m (78 g/t Ag, 0.11 g/t Au, 1.7% Pb and 2.8% Zn) in hole C21-479 including 46.3 m averaging 448 g/t AgEq 1 (110 g/t Ag, 0.10 g/t Au, 2.4% Pb and 5.9% Zn) and 21.5 m averaging 748 g/t AgEq 1 (194 g/t Ag, 0.12 g/t Au, 4.2% Pb and 9.6% Zn) from 204.7 m (78 g/t Ag, 0.11 g/t Au, 1.7% Pb and 2.8% Zn) in hole C21-479 including (110 g/t Ag, 0.10 g/t Au, 2.4% Pb and 5.9% Zn) and (194 g/t Ag, 0.12 g/t Au, 4.2% Pb and 9.6% Zn) 86.2 m averaging 192 g/t AgEq 1 from 312.5 m (51 g/t Ag, 0.09 g/t Au, 1.2% Pb and 2.2% Zn) in hole C21-476 including 36.5 m averaging 372 g/t AgEq 1 (97 g/t Ag, 0.16 g/t Au, 2.3% Pb and 4.3% Zn) from 312.5 m (51 g/t Ag, 0.09 g/t Au, 1.2% Pb and 2.2% Zn) in hole C21-476 including (97 g/t Ag, 0.16 g/t Au, 2.3% Pb and 4.3% Zn) 65.9 m averaging 258 g/t AgEq 1 from 309.4 m (69 g/t Ag, 0.11 g/t Au, 0.7% Pb and 3.7% Zn) in hole C21-417 128.2 m averaging 165 g/t AgEq from 312.4 m (65 g/t Ag, 0.05 g/t Au, 1.2% Pb and 1.3% Zn) including 26.1 m averaging 263 g/t AgEq 1 (109 g/t Ag, 0.06 g/t Au, 2.0% Pb, 1.9% Zn) in hole C20-405 from 309.4 m (69 g/t Ag, 0.11 g/t Au, 0.7% Pb and 3.7% Zn) in hole C21-417 High-grade vein drilling We continue to demonstrate the excellent potential of the high-grade vein systems that transect the deposit. At Josefina we have consistently intercepted bonanza grades along 1.5 km of strike extent. At the 1.5 km Todos Santos vein trend we continue to expand the drill-confirmed strike extent with recent step out holes 250 m to the southwest and 250 m to the northeast from our previous drilling intercepting high-grade vein mineralization. Select drill highlights from these veins during Q2 2021 and subsequent to quarter end include: Josefina Vein Trend 4.1 m averaging 1,043 g/t AgEq 1 from 304.5 m (520 g/t Ag, 0.11 g/t Au, 3.0% Pb and 9.8% Zn) in hole C21-421 from 304.5 m (520 g/t Ag, 0.11 g/t Au, 3.0% Pb and 9.8% Zn) in hole C21-421 1.1 m averaging 3,934 g/t AgEq 1 from 404.8 m (1,570 g/t Ag, 16.25 g/t Au, 7.0% Pb and 19.0% Zn) in hole C21-457 from 404.8 m (1,570 g/t Ag, 16.25 g/t Au, 7.0% Pb and 19.0% Zn) in hole C21-457 1.1 m averaging 3,424 g/t AgEq1 from 92.2 m (1,960 g/t Ag, 0.32 g/t Au, 15.4% Pb and 21.6% Zn) within 28.5 m averaging 245 g/t AgEq1 (122 g/t Ag, 0.06 g/t Au, 1.1% Pb and 1.9% Zn) in hole C21-435 Todos Santos Vein Trend 2.2 m averaging 403 g/t AgEq 1 from 157.5 m (163 g/t Ag, 0.17 g/t Au, 2.8% Pb and 3.1% Zn) in hole C20-404 from 157.5 m (163 g/t Ag, 0.17 g/t Au, 2.8% Pb and 3.1% Zn) in hole C20-404 1.0 m averaging 589 g/t AgEq 1 from 258.1 m (160 g/t Ag, 0.39 g/t Au, 3.8% Pb and 6.4% Zn) in hole C21-409 from 258.1 m (160 g/t Ag, 0.39 g/t Au, 3.8% Pb and 6.4% Zn) in hole C21-409 2.1 m averaging 558 g/t AgEq1 from 73.3 m (160 g/t Ag, 0.27 g/t Au, 3.3% Pb and 6.3% Zn) in hole C21-418 For drill results noted above, refer to news releases dated April 20, May 26, June 22, July 13, August 5 and August 25, 2021, for further details. COVID-19: Despite the increased risk that the Delta variant poses to future exploration at the Project, all the drilling required to complete the updated resource has now been completed and the Company remains on-track to deliver it by the end of Q3 and an updated PEA in Q4. To-date, health and safety protocols and the efforts of employees and contractors to manage COVID-19 have been effective and the Company continues drilling with four diamond core rigs. LOOKING AHEAD: We are looking forward to releasing our updated resource estimate later this quarter. The resource will be supported by updated geological and structural models and data from approximately 200,000 metres of drilling from more than 500 drill holes. The resource update will be followed by a revamped PEA in 4Q 2021. The PEA will consider staged expansions to reduce upfront capex and an elevated cut-off grade strategy and effective use of stockpiling to accelerate the payback period. The study will be vetted by industry leading consultants and supported by a comprehensive dataset including three rounds of metallurgical testwork. We are already planning for next year with our ongoing Phase 2 drill program focused on reserve definition for an expected pre-feasibility study on the project for 2022. Alongside this infill drilling we will remain focused on potential resource expansion of bulk-tonnage mineralization as well as ongoing testing of the grade and continuity of the high-grade veins that transect the deposit. Our property wide mapping and sampling program also continues to progress well with targets expected to be finalized through the remainder of the year ahead of initial drill testing early next year. We are also close to completing the Companys inaugural ESG report which we expect will be published in 4Q 2021. The report will provide a framework of our ESG pillars and principles and is reflective of our commitment to operate in a safe and responsible manner and to have a positive impact on local communities as we diligently advance Cordero toward a construction decision over the coming years. SELECTED FINANCIAL DATA: The following selected financial data is summarized from the Companys condensed interim consolidated financial statements and related notes thereto (the Financial Statements) for the three months ended June 30, 2021. A copy of the Financial Statements and MD&A is available at www.discoverysilver.com or on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Net loss Q2 2021 Q2 2020 (a) Total $ (8,709,519) $ (1,747,677) (b) basic and diluted per share $ (0.03) $ (0.01) Net loss & total comprehensive loss $ (8,736,684) $ (1,936,075) Total weighted average shares outstanding 324,892,666 226,123,323 June 30, 2021 December 31, 2020 Cash, cash equivalents & short-term investments $ 87,955,295 $ 82,547,897 Total assets $ 116,923,661 $ 111,564,881 Total current liabilities $ 1,825,301 $ 982,260 Total liabilities $ 1,842,299 $ 1,023,349 Working capital $ 86,871,096 $ 82,435,046 Total Shareholders equity $ 115,081,362 $ 110,541,532 About Discovery Discoverys flagship project is its 100%-owned Cordero project, one of the few silver projects globally that offers margin, size and scaleability. Cordero is located close to infrastructure in a prolific mining belt in Chihuahua State, Mexico, and is supported by an industry leading balance sheet with approximately C$84 million available for aggressive exploration, resource expansion and future development. Discovery was a recipient of the 2020 TSX Venture 50 award and the 2021 OTCQX Best 50 award. On Behalf of the Board of Directors, Taj Singh, M.Eng, P.Eng, CPA, President, Chief Executive Officer and Director For further information contact: Forbes Gemmell, CFA VP Corporate Development & Investor Relations Phone: 416-613-9410 Email: forbes.gemmell@discoverysilver.com Website: www.discoverysilver.com TECHNICAL NOTES & REFERENCES: 1All results in this news release are rounded. Assays are uncut and undiluted. Widths are drilled widths, not true widths, as a full interpretation of the actual orientation of mineralization is not complete. Intervals were chosen based on a 20 g/t AgEq cutoff with no more than 10 m of dilution. AgEq calculations are used as the basis for total metal content calculations given Ag is the dominant metal constituent as a percentage of AgEq value in approximately 70% of the Companys mineralized intercepts. AgEq calculations for reported drill results are based on USD $16.50/oz Ag, $1,350/oz Au, $0.85/lb Pb, $1.00/lb Zn. The calculations assume 100% metallurgical recovery and are indicative of gross in-situ metal value at the indicated metal prices. Refer to notes below for metallurgical recoveries assumed in the 2018 PEA completed on Cordero. The most recent technical report for the Cordero Project is the 2018 Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA) authored by M3 Engineering and Technology Corp and includes the most recent resource estimate, completed by Independent Mining Consultants, Inc. It is available on Discoverys website and on SEDAR under Levon Resources Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Discovery. The PEA assumes metallurgical recoveries of 89% for Ag, 84% for Pb, 72% for Zn and 40% for Au. Sample analysis and QA/QC Program: True widths of reported drill intercepts have not been determined. Assays are uncut except where indicated. All core assays are from HQ drill core unless stated otherwise. Drill core is logged and sampled in a secure core storage facility located at the project site 40km north of the city of Parral. Core samples from the program are cut in half, using a diamond cutting saw, and are sent to ALS Geochemistry-Mexico for preparation in Chihuahua City, Mexico, and subsequently pulps are sent to ALS Vancouver, Canada, which is an accredited mineral analysis laboratory, for analysis. All samples are prepared using a method whereby the entire sample is crushed to 70% passing -2mm, a split of 250g is taken and pulverized to better than 85% passing 75 microns. Samples are analyzed for gold using standard Fire Assay-AAS techniques (Au-AA24) from a 50g pulp. Over limits are analyzed by fire assay and gravimetric finish. Samples are also analyzed using thirty three-element inductively coupled plasma method (ME-ICP61). Over limit sample values are re-assayed for: (1) values of zinc > 1%; (2) values of lead > 1%; and (3) values of silver > 100 g/t. Samples are re-assayed using the ME-OG62 (high-grade material ICP-AES) analytical package. For values of silver greater than 1,500 g/t, samples are re-assayed using the Ag-CON01 analytical method, a standard 30 g fire assay with gravimetric finish. Certified standards and blanks are routinely inserted into all sample shipments to ensure integrity of the assay process. Selected samples are chosen for duplicate assay from the coarse reject and pulps of the original sample. No QAQC issues were noted with the results reported herein. Qualified Person: Gernot Wober, P.Geo, VP Exploration, Discovery Silver Corp., is the Company's designated Qualified Person for this news release within the meaning of National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects (NI 43-101) and has reviewed and validated that the information contained in this news release is accurate. Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This news release is not for distribution to United States newswire services or for dissemination in the United States. This news release does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy nor shall there be any sale of any of the securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful, including any of the securities in the United States of America. The securities have not been and will not be registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the 1933 Act) or any state securities laws and may not be offered or sold within the United States or to, or for account or benefit of, U.S. Persons (as defined in Regulation S under the 1933 Act) unless registered under the 1933 Act and applicable state securities laws, or an exemption from such registration requirements is available. Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements This news release may include forward-looking statements that are subject to inherent risks and uncertainties. All statements within this news release, other than statements of historical fact, are to be considered forward looking. Although Discovery believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements. Such statements include but are not limited to: the timeline for the execution and completion of the Phase 2 drill program including the impacts and benefits; the timeline and anticipated results to be included in the Resource update including the impact and benefits; the timeline and anticipated results to be included in the Preliminary Economic Assessmen including the impact and benefits; Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements include fluctuations in market prices, including metal prices, continued availability of capital and financing, and general economic, market or business conditions. There can be no assurances that such statements will prove accurate and, therefore, readers are advised to rely on their own evaluation of such uncertainties. Discovery does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required under applicable laws. For a detailed discussion on the risks faced by the Company, refer to the documents incorporated by reference herein, the Companys MD&A for the year ended December 31, 2020 and the Companys 2019 Annual Information Form available on the Companys website at www.discoverysilver.com or under Discoverys profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Parallel Structure to Prolific Bodie-Aurora-Borealis Mines High-Grade Surface Rock Samples of Over 8 g/T Gold WATCH VIDEO SUMMARY OF THE PRESS RELEASE WINNEMUCCA, Nev., Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. (NYSE American: PZG) (Paramount) announced today that it has entered into an agreement with Nevada Select Royalty (Nevada Select) to purchase a 100% interest in the Bald Peak Project (Bald Peak) located in Mineral County, Nevada. Nevada Select is a wholly owned subsidiary of Ely Gold Royalties Inc., which was recently acquired by Gold Royalty Corp. (NYSE American: GROY). Paramount President and COO, Glen Van Treek, commented: We are thrilled to expand our portfolio of assets in a cost-effective manner to fuel future growth. This project has excellent gold values at surface but has never been drilled and is in one of the worlds best mining jurisdictions. Bald Peak fits our strategy of applying our teams technical expertise to de-risk and advance US precious metals assets through the mine development cycle. Bald Peak is a large gold and silver epithermal system with several miles of prospective ground in the prolific, Bodie-Aurora-Borealis district which has produced over 3 million ounces of gold from open pit mines. Gold and silver mineralization is associated with strongly silicified rock in a well-defined 4-mile-long structural system. Surface outcropping has returned rock samples grading over 8 g/T gold. The gold-bearing silicified material exhibits a strong, easy-to-follow resistivity signature (see table below). During due diligence, the Paramount technical team identified an alteration system stretching beyond the Bald Peak property and has staked additional claims extending towards Hecla Minings Aurora Mine. Paramounts plan is to initiate surface sampling, geological reconnaissance, and a subsequent geophysical survey to map silicification at depth to identify drill targets. A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/e546d92c-710e-455d-8066-899aed9410b5 Paramount has the right to acquire a 100% interest in the Bald Peak Project for total consideration of $300,000 payable to Nevada Select as follows: $20,000 on closing of the transaction (paid); $30,000 upon the receipt of a drilling permit (the Permit Date); $50,000 one year following the Permit Date; $50,000 due on each of the second and third years following the Permit Date; and A final payment of $100,000 four years following the Permit Date. Nevada Select, upon option exercise, will retain a 3% Net Smelter Royalty (NSR), on the Nevada Select Claims Paramount has the right to reduce the NSR to 2% for a payment of $1 million. The following rock samples identify some of multiples the high-grade gold and silver potential at Bald Peak. Geological Description Au g/T Ag g/T Quartz bladed oxidized float with Manganese (Mn) staining plus oxidation. Sugary/drusy quartz 8.12 24.2 Bladed quartz float rock sample with significant oxidation and dark brown Mn-staining hosted within the lithic breccia 6.33 18.45 Quartz vein with oxidation and boxwork within altered trachyandesite 5.79 4.5 10-18cm quartz vein boulder 5.74 21.7 Southern end of the resistant quartz vein outcrop 5.36 3.9 Photos accompanying this announcement are available at: https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/296311bf-a02a-45c6-b81d-ae5495dc5946 https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/a4cee8f9-7710-459e-908f-0f60aa56f290 https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/b5c521bb-1256-4e6f-8e3a-a44b637acdb5 To stay informed of future press releases, subscribe to our E-Alerts Program and to learn more about our projects visit the projects section of our website. About Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. is a U.S. based precious metals exploration and development company. Paramounts strategy is to create shareholder value through exploring and developing its mineral properties and to realize this value for its shareholders in three ways: by selling its assets to established producers; entering joint ventures with producers for construction and operation; or constructing and operating mines for its own account. Paramount owns 100% of the Grassy Mountain Gold Project which consists of approximately 8,200 acres located on private and BLM land in Malheur County, Oregon. The Grassy Mountain Gold Project contains a gold-silver deposit (100% located on private land) for which results of a positive Feasibility Study have been released and key permitting milestones accomplished. Frost is comprised of 84 unpatented lode claims covering approximately 1,730 acres located 12 miles southwest of the Companys proposed high-grade, underground Grassy Mountain gold mine in Malheur County, Oregon (Grassy). Paramount owns a 100% interest in the Sleeper Gold Project located in Northern Nevada, the worlds premier mining jurisdiction. The Sleeper Gold Project, which includes the former producing Sleeper mine, totals 2,322 unpatented mining claims (approximately 60 square miles or 15,500 hectares). The Sleeper gold project is host to a large gold deposit (over 4 million ounces of mineralized material) and the Company has completed and released a positive Preliminary Economic Assessment. With higher gold prices, Paramount has begun work to update and improve the economics of the Sleeper project. Safe Harbor for Forward-Looking Statements This release and related documents may include "forward-looking statements" and forward-looking information (collectively, forward-looking statements) pursuant to applicable United States and Canadian securities laws. Paramounts future expectations, beliefs, goals, plans or prospects constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and other applicable securities laws. Words such as "believes," "plans," "anticipates," "expects," "estimates" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements, although these words may not be present in all forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements included in this news release include, without limitation, statements with respect to the use of proceeds from the Offerings. Forward-looking statements are based on the reasonable assumptions, estimates, analyses and opinions of management made in light of its experience and its perception of trends, current conditions and expected developments, as well as other factors that management believes to be relevant and reasonable in the circumstances at the date that such statements are made, but which may prove to be incorrect. Management believes that the assumptions and expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are reasonable. Assumptions have been made regarding, among other things: the conclusions made in the feasibility study for the Grassy Mountain Gold Project (the FS); the quantity and grade of resources included in resource estimates; the accuracy and achievability of projections included in the FS; Paramounts ability to carry on exploration and development activities, including construction; the timely receipt of required approvals and permits; the price of silver, gold and other metals; prices for key mining supplies, including labor costs and consumables, remaining consistent with current expectations; work meeting expectations and being consistent with estimates and plant, equipment and processes operating as anticipated. There are a number of important factors that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to: uncertainties involving interpretation of drilling results; environmental matters; the ability to obtain required permitting; equipment breakdown or disruptions; additional financing requirements; the completion of a definitive feasibility study for the Grassy Mountain Gold Project; discrepancies between actual and estimated mineral reserves and mineral resources, between actual and estimated development and operating costs and between estimated and actual production; the global epidemics, pandemics, or other public health crises, including the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) global health pandemic, and the spread of other viruses or pathogens and the other factors described in Paramounts disclosures as filed with the SEC and the Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta Securities Commissions. Except as required by applicable law, Paramount disclaims any intention or obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of developments occurring after the date of this document. Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. Rachel Goldman, Chief Executive Officer Christos Theodossiou, Director of Corporate Communications 866-481-2233 Twitter: @ParamountNV TORONTO, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Copper Lake Resources Ltd. (TSX-V: CPL, Frankfurt: W0I, OTC: WTCZF) ("Copper Lake" or the "Company") is pleased to announce it has been issued mineral exploration permits by the Ontario Ministry of Energy, Northern Development and Mines (MNDM) for its Marshall Lake copper-zinc-silver-gold property. The permits cover the Main Billiton Zone and the Deeds Island and Marshall Creek Zone and have been issued for an initial three-year term. As part of the permit approval process, Copper Lake consults with the respective First Nations communities when exploration takes place on their lands. On the Marshall Lake property, the Company is working with Aroland First Nation and Animibiigoo Zaagiigan Anishinaabek (AZA) First Nation. Copper Lake CEO, Terry MacDonald stated: We extend our appreciation to Chief Dorothy Towedo and the Council of Aroland and to Chief Theresa Nelson and the Council of AZA for their ongoing assistance and cooperation with our exploration efforts, and in particular in facilitating the recent site visit to the Marshall Lake property with representatives of AZA. We look forward to working with both Aroland and AZA in our upcoming drill program. Billiton Zone MT/DCIP Survey The Company completed an integrated Magnetotelluric (MT)/Deep IP survey over the Billiton deposit locale in mid-July. The goal of the surveys is to assist in mapping the configuration of the Marshall Mineralized Band, containing the Billiton Zn-Cu-Ag massive sulphide deposit (historic resource of 2.2 MT at 1.3% copper, 4.2% zinc & 2.5 opt Ag1), as well as several other base-metal occurrences contained within it (Map 1). The MT/DCIP survey measures resistivity, an important parameter givens its sensitivity to massive sulphides and hydrothermal alteration. MT technology generates models of the subsurface resistivity in 2D & 3D at shallow depth and to depths of up to 1 km. Preliminary results of the survey are anticipated shortly; the Company is confident that the survey will generate several VMS drill targets on surface and at depth, in the Billiton deposit locale and within the Marshall Mineralized Band. Deeds Island Target The Deeds Island target, located 6 km to the east of the Billiton deposit, comprises an 800-metre long zinc anomaly containing zinc values of up to 1000 ppm. The geochemical anomaly is coincident with a large zone of intense garnet-actinolite alteration within felsic volcanic rocks, an alteration assemblage associated with sulphide mineralization at the Billiton deposit. Two airborne VTEM conductors as well as a number of historic EM conductors are closely associated with the target, adding further attraction to the area (Map 2). The Deeds Island target has not been tested by previous diamond drilling. Status of 2021 Drill Program The Company intends to commence the drill program in early October, with an initial plan for 3,000 metres of drilling. The drilling will be primarily focused on the Billiton deposit locale in addition to drilling select land- based targets on the highly prospective Deeds Island and Marshall Creek Zone. 2021 Precious Metals Summit The Company has been invited to attend the 2021 Precious Metals Summit in Beaver Creek, Colorado from September 8 11, 2021. The Summit is a premier event that brings together the community of institutional investors, sell-side representatives and corporate executives from senior and junior precious metals companies to meet and network with some of the most prospective producers, explorers and developers from around the globe. Granting of Options The Company has granted an aggregate of 3,050,000 Options to certain officers, directors and consultants of the Company in accordance with the Companys current Stock Option Plan. Each Option is exercisable into one common share (a Share) of the Company at a price of $0.05 per Share for a period of five years from the date of grant, being today. The options will vest immediately. 1The resources described above are considered historic under NI-43-101 guidelines and have not been verified by an Independent Qualified Person and therefore should not be relied upon. The Company is not treating the historic resource as a current Mineral Resource Qualified Person The technical content of this news release has been reviewed and approved by Donald Hoy, M.Sc., P.Geo, as the qualified person. About Copper Lake Resources Copper Lake Resources Ltd. is a publicly traded Canadian company currently focused on advancing its Marshall Lake and Norton Lake properties located in Ontario, Canada. Marshall Lake Property The Marshall Lake high-grade VMS copper, zinc, silver and gold property, comprises an area of approximately 195 square km located 120 km north of Geraldton, Ontario and is accessible by all- season road from the Trans-Canada Highway and just 22 km north of the main CNR rail line. Copper Lake has an option to increase its interest to 87.5% from its current 75% interest. The property also includes 148 claim cells staked in 2018 and 2020 that are 100% owned and not subject to any royalties, and which add approximately 30 square km to the property. In addition to the original Marshall Lake property above, Marshall Lake also includes the Sollas Lake and Summit Lake properties, which are 100% owned by the Company and are not subject to any royalties. The Sollas Lake property consists of 20 claim cells comprising an area of 4 square km on the east side of the Marshal`l Lake property where historical EM airborne geophysical surveys have outlined strong conductors on the property hosted within the same favorable felsic volcanic units. The Summit Lake property currently consists of 100 claim cells comprising an area of 20.5 square km, is accessible year round, and is located immediately west of the original Marshall Lake property. Norton Lake Property Copper Lake has a 71.41% interest in the Norton Lake nickel, copper, cobalt, and palladium PGM property, located in the southern Ring of Fire area, is approximately 100 km north of the Marshall Lake Property. The Norton Lake property has a NI 43-101 compliant Measured and Indicated resource of 2.26 million tonnes @ 0.67% Ni, 0.61% Cu, 0.03% Co and 0.46 g/t Pd. On behalf of the Board of Directors, Copper Lake Resources Ltd. Terry MacDonald, CEO (416) 561-3626 tmacdonald@copperlakeresources.com www.copperlakeresources.com Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Graphics accompanying this announcement are available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/4e1d2419-c917-49cb-9e2e-f7c552ffe4eb https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/3ad47279-b1d8-468f-ab9d-20208011f32e TORONTO, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Galane Gold Ltd. (Galane Gold or the Company) (TSX-V: GG; OTCQB: GGGOF) is pleased to announce the release of its financial results for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021. A copy of the unaudited condensed consolidated interim financial statements for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021 prepared in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards and the corresponding Managements Discussion and Analysis are available under the Companys profile on www.sedar.com. All references to $ in this press release refer to United States dollars. Second Quarter 2021 Highlights Produced 5,851 ounces of gold at Mupane and sold its gold at an average sales price of $1,787 per ounce. Earnings from mining operations for the period of $1,484,410. Capitalised $2,464,922 of concentrate sales produced by Galaxy. Positive cash flows from operating activities of $544,675. $2,309,975 of debt repaid. Galane Gold CEO, Nick Brodie commented: We continue to make good progress at Galaxy by exceeding our production targets plus commencing stoping in the Galaxy ore body. In addition, based on the excellent condition of the Summit Mine and the Banner Mill, we have decided to advance a plan with a shorter path to production(1). As stated in our press release of August 9, 2021, Mupane production was not at the level we had hoped for in the second quarter due to problems experienced at its main jaw crusher, employee absence due to COVID-19, issues with its main incoming transformer and production complications at Tau due to poor performance by its mining contractor. Despite this, we have continued to make considerable progress in the reduction of debt on our balance sheet. We are also currently seeing on-plan performance from our mining contractor and we will continue to work with them to maintain that for the remainder of this year(1). About Galane Gold Galane Gold is an un-hedged gold producer and explorer with mining operations and exploration tenements in Botswana, South Africa and New Mexico. Galane Gold is a public company and its shares are quoted on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol GG and the OTCQB under the symbol GGGOF. Galane Golds management team is comprised of senior mining professionals with extensive experience in managing mining and processing operations and large-scale exploration programmes. Galane Gold is committed to operating at world-class standards and is focused on the safety of its employees, respecting the environment, and contributing to the communities in which it operates. Note: (1) This is forward-looking information and is based on a number of assumptions. See Cautionary Notes. Cautionary Notes Certain statements contained in this press release constitute forward-looking statements. All statements other than statements of historical fact contained in this press release, including, without limitation, those regarding Companys plan to advance a plan with a shorter path to production at the Summit Mine, the performance of the Companys mining contractor, and the Companys future financial position and results of operations, strategy, proposed acquisitions, plans, objectives, goals and targets, and any statements preceded by, followed by or that include the words believe, expect, aim, intend, plan, continue, will, may, would, anticipate, estimate, forecast, predict, project, seek, should or similar expressions or the negative thereof, are forward-looking statements. These statements are not historical facts but instead represent only the Companys expectations, estimates and projections regarding future events. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve assumptions, risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict. Therefore, actual results may differ materially from what is expressed, implied or forecasted in such forward-looking statements. Additional factors that could cause actual results, performance or achievements to differ materially include, but are not limited to the risk factors discussed in the Companys annual information form for the year ended December 31, 2020. Management provides forward-looking statements because it believes they provide useful information to investors when considering their investment objectives and cautions investors not to place undue reliance on forward-looking information. Consequently, all of the forward-looking statements made in this press release are qualified by these cautionary statements and other cautionary statements or factors contained herein, and there can be no assurance that the actual results or developments will be realized or, even if substantially realized, that they will have the expected consequences to, or effects on, the Company. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this press release and the Company assumes no obligation to update or revise them to reflect subsequent information, events or circumstances or otherwise, except as required by law. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its regulation services provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. For further information please contact: Nick Brodie CEO, Galane Gold Ltd. + 44 7905 089878 Nick.Brodie@GalaneGold.com www.GalaneGold.com Jasper Health will integrate the BioIntelliSense FDA-cleared BioSticker and medical grade BioButton wearable devices as part of its remote member engagement and guidance platform wearable devices as part of its remote member engagement and guidance platform Jasper Health and BioIntelliSense will also offer COVID-19 monitoring services to Jasper Healths thousands of members as a new joint oncology care offering YELLOW PINE, Idaho and DENVER, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Jasper Health, an emerging leader of digital engagement for people diagnosed with cancer, today announced it has formed a strategic collaboration with BioIntelliSense, a continuous health monitoring and clinical intelligence company, to integrate its medical grade multi-parameter wearables and data services into Jasper Healths remote member guidance platform. This unique combination provides a first-of-its-kind remote care offering for cancer patients and their caregivers in managing and supporting complex care needs for those newly diagnosed, currently in treatment and throughout recovery. Jasper Health has attracted thousands of registered members to its specialized platform who are engaging in daily symptom tracking, medication management, and psychosocial services orchestration. This new offering will enable Jasper Health members to leverage the FDA-cleared BioSticker and medical grade BioButton multi-parameter devices to manage continuous vital signs during treatment and to more effectively engage with healthcare professionals remotely for personalized monitoring and guidance throughout a members health journey. Unlike traditional remote patient monitoring (RPM), Jasper Healths category-defining remote member guidance (RMG) solution, recognizes that cancer doesn't define a person and that Jaspers members need personalized guidance and support, not just distance treatment and management, in living with such a complex condition. Jasper Health is proud of its rapid growth in serving thousands of our members with the industrys first remote member engagement and guidance oncology care experience. The addition of BioIntelliSenses leading medical grade wearable devices, along with Jaspers scalable psychosocial triage solution, creates a first-of-its-kind offering and remote care capability for payers and health systems, says Adam Pellegrini, CEO and Co-Founder of Jasper Health. Jasper Healths ability to marry unprecedented oncology member engagement with clinically proven care management and guidance capabilities is a game changer. We are making digital oncology care transformation a reality. A Remote Guidance and Monitoring Solution for COVID-19 and Beyond The healthcare industry has seen a significant rate of adoption in remote monitoring and telemedicine during the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic. Newly diagnosed cancer patients along with those undergoing treatment, are immunocompromised and have been identified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as high-risk for COVID-19 and the current Delta variant. This reality underscores the need for continuous monitoring of elevated temperature and adverse vital sign trends, along with personalized remote care guidance, to address oncology patient populations at scale, commented James Mault, MD, CEO and Co-Founder of BioIntelliSense. The ability to monitor complex oncology care patients for fevers and neutropenic febrile episodes for earlier detection of signs and symptoms associated with an infectious process is a key benefit of our medical-grade biosensors and analytics. We are excited about the collaboration with Jasper Health to advance oncology care. Jasper Health also enables human care guidance digitally within the platform via asynchronous messaging and live video consultations to help support patients and caregivers through each phase of their care journey. The platform also allows for healthcare professional and care team engagement and collaboration to create a true circle of care around the Jasper Health member. Jasper Health has experienced impressive growth with nearly 10,000 members to date, over 50 non-profit partners, and an accomplished digital health team. The ability to integrate with the BioIntelliSense multi-parameter wearable devices that combine an effortless user experience with medical grade clinical accuracy is a strong addition to the Jasper Health platform offering for provider and payor organizations nationally. Wireless, Secure Continuous Vital Sign Data and Analytics The BioSticker is an FDA-cleared 510k Class II medical wearable device for continuous passive monitoring of high frequency data across a broad set of vital signs, physiological biometrics and symptomatic events (skin temperature, heart rate at rest, respiratory rate at rest, body position, activity levels, cough frequency) for thirty (30) days of monitoring on a single-use device. With the BioSticker and recently released BioButton medical grade devices, vital sign patient trending of temperature and respiratory rate for COVID-19 remote symptom monitoring can be rapidly deployed for those patients with a confirmed diagnosis or during quarantine periods. In addition, the BioSticker and BioButton wearable devices qualify for CMS Remote Patient Monitoring reimbursement (CPT code 99454) for medical grade monitoring at home. Media Contacts Jasper Health Press Office Kati Chevaux kati.chevaux@hellojasper.com BioIntelliSense, Inc. Carolyn Walsh Chief Commercial Officer cwalsh@BioIntelliSense.com About Jasper Health Jasper is a digital planning, navigation and engagement experience that improves the lives of members and caregivers, while also helping the healthcare system best support members. Our team includes a clinical social worker and digital health experts along with industry leading medical advisers. We believe that powerful technology and passionate people can relieve some of the stress of organizing care. To learn more, visit hellojasper.com . About BioIntelliSense BioIntelliSense is ushering in a new era of continuous health monitoring and clinical intelligence for Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM). Its medical-grade Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) platform seamlessly captures minute-to-minute vital signs, physiological biometrics and symptomatic events through an effortless patient experience. For more information on how BioIntelliSense is redefining remote patient monitoring through medical-grade and cost- effective data services, please visit our website at www.BioIntelliSense.com. A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/e8345dc2-bd5d-459e-8e35-2fa1a62a86e7 HARRISONBURG, Va., Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Farmer Focus, the only 100% organic and humane-certified chicken company with a mission to protect and promote generational family farms, has hired Sean McLendon to lead Research and Development. McLendon brings over 25 years of experience in product research and development, innovation, quality control, and operations in protein, across fresh and fully cooked food manufacturers. He also has extensive knowledge of marinated proteins and flavor trends honed during his tenure at Lumina Foods, JBS USA, and CraftWorks Restaurants and Breweries. A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, McLendon began his culinary career as a chef and restaurateur, receiving a James Beard nomination as chef/owner of Seans American Bistro in 2009. As a chef, I have always had the deepest respect for farmers, so working for a company that is committed to the preservation and promotion of generational family farms is incredibly meaningful to me, said McLendon. One of the best ways I can honor our farmers and the birds they so carefully raise is to develop products and flavors that bring out the best in each part of the bird. This approach also enables us to reduce waste and further our corporate commitment to sustainability. Drawing on his deep understanding of culinary and global flavor trends, McLendon led the development of Farmer Focus inaugural organic pre-seasoned product line, which includes Peruvian Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts, Chophouse Boneless Skinless Chicken Thighs, Red Curry Bone-in Skin-on Chicken Thighs, Toasted Lager Half Chicken, and Lemon and Cracked Pepper Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast. Two of the pre-seasoned items have already been recognized as NEXTY Award finalists. Toasted Lager Organic Half Chicken is a finalist for two categories: Mission-Based Product and Meat, Dairy, or Animal-Based Product. Red Curry Organic Bone-in Skin-on Chicken Thighs is a finalist for best Organic Food. The NEXTY Awards recognize excellence in the natural products industry, with a focus on elevating impactful brands and products that inspire a healthy, sustainable future. In addition to his passion for the Farmer Focus mission, Sean brings an abundance of talent and experience to this critical role, said Corwin Heatwole, Farmer Focus Founding Farmer and CEO. Our new line of pre-seasoned chicken is unbelievably delicious and makes it easier than ever for our customers to create memorable meals that support our growing family of farmers. Farmer Focus currently partners with over 73 independent farmers who continuously improve the standards on raising chickens organically and humanely. With the use of Farm I.D., every package of Farmer Focus chicken is 100% traceable to the farm where it was raised. Farmer Focus products are available in 2,500 stores throughout the East Coast and Midwest. The new pre-seasoned line will be available at major retailers like Fresh Direct, Kroger Mid-Atlantic Region, Fresh Thyme, Giant Eagle, and online retailers starting Fall 2021. ABOUT FARMER FOCUS Founded by sixth-generation chicken farmer Corwin Heatwole in 2014, Farmer Focus is the only 100% organic and humane-certified chicken company with a mission to protect and promote generational family farms. By shifting farm-level decision-making and chicken ownership back to farmers and empowering them to farm the way they know is best, Farmer Focus significantly improves the financial viability of the farm and farmer profit. Available in 2,500 stores throughout the East Coast and Midwest, including major retailers like Kroger Mid-Atlantic, Giant Eagle, Harris Teeter, Meijer, Fresh Direct, and more, Farmer Focus is committed to consistently providing exceedingly delicious, 100% organic and humanely raised chicken that is better for people, the planet, and animals. Photos accompanying this announcement are available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/652ed65f-5011-4f1a-a44b-a12265e676b4 https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/3b4d4bb3-bf09-4f13-9326-47516de4919e https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/3326b3b5-434c-4856-9fb3-32acc5b501bd https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/2b5cc245-ae2f-4afb-9452-70a37edeeee1 https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/a79df3d4-3ecd-4206-8259-ae2e88b0377c https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/6042a05f-a82f-46d6-a8ec-73a39ba0560f https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/e19ac051-37aa-41ff-8e83-c7c7269f805f English French Global aircraft, with their high-altitude performance and long endurance, are the chosen platform for Swedish defense suppliers GlobalEye Airborne Early Warning and Control solution Bombardier Specialized Aircraft provides an array of flexible, trusted solutions to integrators, governments and agencies around the world MONTREAL, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Bombardier is proud to announce the recent arrival of a fifth Global business jet at Swedish defense supplier Saabs Linkoping, Sweden, location, ready for conversion into Saabs Airborne Early Warning and Control solution known as GlobalEye. The aircraft was delivered to Saab from Bombardiers Toronto manufacturing site and underwent interior completions work at Flying Colours Corp. in Peterborough, Ontario, prior to arriving in Sweden. Bombardier Global aircraft are ideally suited for conversion into specialized assets, and we are recognized around the world for our collaborative, flexible approach and unparalleled expertise, said Steve Patrick, Vice President, Specialized Aircraft, Bombardier. Our Global 6000 aircraft and increasingly its successor, our Global 6500 aircraft, are known as the go-to platforms for high-altitude, long-endurance missions that require significant payload capability with ample available power, hosted on a reliable platform featuring advanced avionics and systems technology. Bombardiers signature smooth flight technology provides a comfortable environment for operators and highly stable platform for sensors. Saab partners with industry leaders, which is why we chose Bombardiers Global 6000 aircraft as the platform for our advanced Airborne Early Warning and Control solution. We are looking forward to continuing our collaboration with Bombardier and Canadian industry, says Carl-Johan Bergholm, Senior Vice President and head of Saab business area Surveillance. Saab is a leading global defence and security company and has been a trusted partner of the Canadian military for more than 30 years. The companys GlobalEye aircraft completed its maiden flight in early 2018 and three have been delivered from Saab to the customer. Bombardier Global business jets are a shining example of Canadian aerospace innovation, with ultra-long range, spacious cabins and class-leading maintenance intervals and reliability. Global aircraft are ideally suited to a range of specialized missions, from securing airspace, borders and infrastructure to head-of-state transport and humanitarian assistance including long-range medical evacuations. Fellow Canadian company Flying Colours Corp. supports Saab through the introduction of a practical, functional interior for the mission system operators. Designing a special mission interior necessitates an intelligent approach, ingenuity and imagination, said Sean Gillespie, Executive VP for Flying Colours Corp. Our work with Saab showcases the high levels of technical expertise delivered by our experience, knowledge and the exceptional talent within our team. Bombardier Specialized Aircraft offers flexible solutions for customers around the world, with conversion options ranging from turnkey packages comprising the complete design, building, testing and certification activity, through to specialized engineering support and technical oversight of customer-specific projects, including modifications to external shapes such as antennae, sensors and radars. Bombardier has designated its Wichita, Kansas, facility as the Centre of Excellence for Specialized Aircraft, with the experience and expertise to carry out complex modifications on site. More than 550 Bombardier Global, Challenger and Learjet business aircraft are currently performing specialized missions worldwide. About Bombardier Bombardier is a global leader in aviation, creating innovative and game-changing planes. Our products and services provide world-class experiences that set new standards in passenger comfort, energy efficiency, reliability and safety. Headquartered in Montreal, Canada, Bombardier is present in more than 12 countries including its production/engineering sites and its customer support network. The Corporation supports a worldwide fleet of more than 4,900 aircraft in service with a wide variety of multinational corporations, charter and fractional ownership providers, governments and private individuals. News and information is available at bombardier.com or follow us on Twitter @Bombardier. Bombardier, Global, Global 6000 and Global 6500 are unregistered or registered trademarks of Bombardier Inc. or its subsidiaries. For Information Louise Solomita Bombardier 514-855-5001, ext. 25148 Louise.Solomita@aero.bombardier.com A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/608ec0a4-0631-45d4-848e-228dd5589c1c Please find enclosed the presentation of Frontline Ltd.s second quarter 2021 results to be held on the webcast / conference call 26 August, 2021 at 15:00 CET. This information is subject to the disclosure requirements pursuant to section 5 -12 of the Norwegian Securities Trading Act. Attachment WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The National Human Services Assembly (National Assembly) welcomed over 50 national leaders in the health and human service sector to its virtual 2021 Annual Meeting on Monday, August 23, 2021. The event, featuring guest remarks from U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, was hosted by National Assembly Board Chair Jeff Fleischer and new Executive Director Victor Valentine. Among the other featured guests were Darlyne Bailey (Social Justice Initiative at Bryn Mawr College), Monisha Kapila (ProInspire), John Maki (Alliance for Safety and Justice) and Ruth Sigei (PurchasingPoint). In his remarks, Secretary Becerra thanked the National Assembly and other sector leaders while addressing gaps in community-level services the pandemic has exposed. The Secretary called upon human service organizations to lead as both experts and nimble responders in positively influencing communities. In his comments, Secretary Becerra said, We obviously are not done We saw through COVID where we need to go. The gaps in our system were fully exposed... In the richest, most dynamic country in the world, we still were not reaching everyone in America. That we still were leaving people behind. Other speakers provided remarks to outline National Assemblys ongoing commitment to addressing these service gaps specifically by promoting racial-equity among human service leaders, best practices for youth justice and strengthening the sector via public policy and resource development. Watch the full livestreamed meeting on YouTube. About the National Human Services Assembly National Human Services Assembly is a collection of national leaders in the health and human services sector that seeks to leverage its collective voice to promote sector-wide and systems-level strategies positively impacting the health and well-being of American communities. MEDIA CONTACT: Michelle Stewart 202-347-2080, ext. 23 mstewart@nassembly.org VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Unbounce , the global leader in landing page and conversion intelligence software, today announced the appointment of Greg Dos Santos as Chief Financial Officer. Dos Santos comes to Unbounce with over 20 years of financial leadership experience in the technology industry for growing Software as a Service (SaaS) and professional services companies. Greg is a modern CFO, said Felicia Bochicchio, President of Unbounce. His decades of experience leading global financial teams, mergers and acquisitions, and partnering with Operations and People and Culture teams paired with his strong leadership and project management skills make Greg a rare breed as a CFO. His deep experience working in the ad-tech space will help continue to guide Unbounces market leadership and growth trajectory. Previously Dos Santos served as Cardinal Paths Chief Financial Officer where he led the successful sale to Dentsu Inc, one of the largest advertising agencies in the world. Dos Santos also developed a scalable corporate infrastructure and a four year strategic financial plan including operational KPIs and line of business reporting which drove the company towards exponential growth in both licensing and professional services revenue. Prior to Cardinal Path, Dos Santos was the VP of Finance at Blast Radius and the Director of Finance at Maximizer Software. I look forward to helping Unbounce bring small businesses into the new era of marketing. Giving small businesses access to AI-backed insights traditionally available only to large companies levels the playing field in the post-pandemic era, and ultimately helps these businesses grow smarter and faster, said Dos Santos. This is a very exciting time to join the Unbounce team and I look forward to working with the Unbounce team to create strategic growth initiatives and put conversion intelligence in the hands of small business owners. Dos Santos appointment comes on the heels of Unbounces highly anticipated Smart Builder announcement a landing page builder leveraging AI-backed insights to help small business owners save time and increase their conversions. About Unbounce Unbounce is the global leader in landing page and conversion intelligence software empowering marketers to build and test high-performing landing pages without a web developer. As part of the companys purpose to help the world grow smarter, Unbounce is helping small business owners save time and accelerate business growth. Founded in Vancouver, B.C., Unbounce is a people-first business, one of Canadas most admired corporate cultures and has powered over one billion conversions worldwide. Connect with our growing community of marketers at Unbounce.com and @Unbounce . Media Contact: Sarah Gooding sarah.gooding@unbounce.com A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/69befc73-70c7-4a36-9c57-3694077d7889 Palm Beach, Florida, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Ahead of its planned expansion and entry into a new business sector, JZZ Technologies Inc. (OTC Pink: JZZI) is relocating its corporate headquarters from New York state to West Palm Beach, Florida, effective immediately. Management has been contemplating a change of its corporate headquarters for some time, and after careful consideration, selected West Palm Beach, Florida, for the many opportunities and advantages the location will provide the company. We see our move to West Palm Beach, Florida as a strategic step forward for the Company and its shareholders., says Deirdrea Renwick, CFO of JZZ Technologies, Inc. It is critical for our success to operate in a region that not only accommodates our growth but also creates opportunities for our new business ventures. We are confident that West Palm Beach, Florida, is that place. Florida has a robust infrastructure, pro-business climate, competitive cost of doing business, and a streamlined regulatory environment that makes it one of the best places for corporate headquarters in the United States. It also offers a diverse talent pool supported by zero state income taxes, a reasonable cost of living, and excellent economic opportunities. According to data firm Statista, Florida represented the fourth-largest economy in the U.S. in 2019, prior to the impact of the global pandemic. It seems little wonder that a host of major international and domestic organizations from nearly every industry from finance to food markets and aerospace and healthcare have located their headquarters in the state. Many companies have migrated or are moving their corporate headquarters to Florida for the economic, corporate, and social benefits that are quickly being eroded in other regions. Some of the high profile corporations that have recently located in the state of Florida include: Blackstone Financial CrossBorder Solutions Thomas Bravo Windstar Cruises Starwood Property Trust of Starwood Capital Cyber-security firm OPSWAT JetBlue Airways Icahn Enterprises Colony CapitalTeal Zumper Goldman Sachs Renwick adds, As we enter the health, bioscience, and biotechnology sector, we need to be at the epicenter of these industries. Innovators like KRS Biotechnology, based in Boca Raton, make up the more than 260 companies in the biotech industry. There are more than 4,500 researchers that support some 220 pharmaceutical labs, and over 726,000 people work within the healthcare system in the state. Not surprisingly, Florida is ranked second in the U.S for creating FDA-approved medical devices. The management of JZZ Technologies, Inc. also singled out Florida since it is extremely well suited to the Companys focus on aging and an active senior population. Seniorliving.org reports that there are 8.6 million Florida residents 50 and older, the second largest such population in the U.S. behind California. About JZZ Technologies, Inc. JZZ Technologies, Inc. is a diversified technology company rolling up projects and partnerships in two distinct business sectors that operate cohesively; its digital media business includes online media and apps ( activelifestylemedia.com ), content creation, digital marketing, streaming video content, publishing, and free over-the-air television ( EyeOnTV ) targeted at active adults 55+. The Companys other business is focused on strategic biotechnology and bioscience acquisitions related to Human Life Extension and Human Longevity that can be immediately leveraged to support improved quality of life for aging populations. DISCLAIMER and FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS Certain statements contained herein are forward-looking statements (as such term is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995). Because such statements include risks and uncertainties, actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. This press release may contain certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and such Forward-Looking Statements are intended to be covered by the safe harbors created thereby. Investors are cautioned that all forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties. All statements other than statements of historical fact in this announcement are forward-looking statements, including but not limited to the viability of the companys business plans, the effect of acquisitions on our profitability, the effectiveness, profitability, and the marketability of the Companys products; the Companys ability to protect its proprietary information; general economic and business conditions; the volatility of the companys operating results and financial condition; and other risks detailed in the Companys filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties and are based on current expectations, assumptions, estimates, and projections about the company and the industry. The Company undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent occurring events or circumstances or to changes in its expectations, except as may be required by law. Although the company believes that the expectations expressed in these forward-looking statements are reasonable, management cannot assure the public that their expectations will turn out to be correct. Investors are cautioned that actual results may differ materially from the anticipated results. Contact: JZZ Technologies, Inc. Charles Cardona, CEO Email: ccardona@jzztechnologies.com Website: https://www.jzztechnologies.com/ Attachment Minneapolis, MN and Aurora, IL, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Provation, the premier software and SaaS provider of procedure documentation and clinical decision support solutions today announced its partnership with ACL Laboratories, for pathology integration with Provation MD and cloud-based Provation Apex procedure documentation solutions. Provation pathology integration helps providers keep more accurate, up-to-date patient medical records, which is required by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), and streamlines communication between clinicians and pathology labs, such as ACL Laboratories. This new partnership adds to a growing list of major pathology vendors that have invested in integration with Provation solutions. Provation is thrilled to have ACL Laboratories as an official pathology partner, said Brandon Hoheisel, Director of Strategic Partnerships at Provation. Together, ACL and Provation can enhance and automate the digital exchange of patient data for our mutual customers, while empowering clinicians with the information needed to make vital diagnostic decisions and care plans. The COVID-19 pandemic has drastically accelerated the demand for telemedicine and real-time data transfers, including the digital exchange and immediate processing of pathology test results, explains Kevin Anders, Director of Sales at ACL Laboratories. While this pathology integration focuses on colon and esophageal cancer detection and not COVID-19, this partnership came at an unprecedented time in healthcare that will help ACL meet the growing need for secure electronic pathology communication. About Provation Provation is a leading provider of healthcare software and SaaS solutions for clinical productivity, care coordination, quality reporting, and billing. Our purpose is to empower providers to deliver quality healthcare for all. Provations comprehensive portfolio spans the entire patient encounter, from pre-procedure through post-procedure, with solutions for physician and nursing documentation (Provation MD, Provation Apex, MD-Reports and Provation MultiCaregiver), #1 Best in KLAS anesthesia documentation (Provation iProcedures), patient engagement, surgical care coordination, quality reporting, and billing capture (Provation SurgicalValet), order set and care plan management (Provation Order Set Advisor and Provation Care Plans), and EHR-embedded clinical documentation (Provation Clinic Note). Provation has a loyal customer base, serving more than 5,000 hospitals, surgery centers, and medical offices, and 700 physician groups. Provation is headquartered in Minneapolis, MN and backed by Clearlake Capital Group, L.P. For more information about our solutions, visit provationmedical.com and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Provation is headquartered in Minneapolis, MN and backed by Clearlake Capital Group, L.P. For more information about our solutions, visit provationmedical.com and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. About ACL Laboratories ACL Laboratories has one of the nations largest networks of dedicated pathologists who provide a full range of anatomic and clinical pathology services throughout Illinois, Wisconsin and Northern Indiana. With over 90 pathologists board certified by the American Board of Pathology in Anatomic Pathology, Clinical Pathology or both, Great Lakes Pathologists, S.C. and Midwest Diagnostic Pathology, S.C. deliver unsurpassed pathology services. Our pathologists examine more than 500,000 cases annually, including tissue biopsies, gynecologic and non-gynecologic cytology specimens, bone marrow samples, flow cytometry cases and cytogenetics samples. In addition, many of our pathologists have completed fellowships and have additional subspecialty board certification. Our consultative approach to pathology has enabled us to build strong relationships with physicians proving that interactive diagnostic collaboration is at the heart of excellent healthcare. ACL Laboratories is uniquely positioned to provide superior service on a wide range of clinical, anatomic pathology, and analytical testing, including molecular diagnostics and more. ACL staff includes board-certified pathologists, PhD chemists and microbiologists, registered medical technologists/technicians, cytotechnologists, histotechnicians and specialists in information technology, allowing them to offer 24-hour turnaround on most routine lab tests, including specialty tests. ACL is accredited by the College of American Pathologists and is certified in accordance with the Clinical Laboratories Improvement Act (CLIA). Visit www.acllaboratories.com for more information. Attachment VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Green Light Solutions ("GLS" or "the Company"), an innovation firm committed to driving excellence in the Cannabis industry, is pleased to announce the official launch of its CBD dominant brand, LoFi. The flagship product, LoFi CBD Oil 1500, initially exclusively available in the B.C. market, delivers quality and potency for the value-minded CBD consumer. The LoFi product line offers potent, CBD forward formulations using highly concentrated CBD and premium ingredients. The newly released LoFi CBD Oil 1500 is a full-spectrum CBD oil containing hemp-derived CBD extract, made in B.C., and sustainably sourced MCT oil. All LoFi products feature the inLite supply chain traceability technology, providing customers unparalleled visibility into ingredient source and batch-specific lab results. "This new product line arrives just in time to satisfy a growing demand for CBD products that are high-quality and affordable," says Walker Patton, Corporate Development at GLS. "LoFi is proof that good CBD does not need to be expensive. We intend to delight both new and experienced users with great CBD products at accessible prices." Following its successful soft launch in the B.C. market, selling out in just 48 hours, LoFi CBD Oil 1500 will be available again shortly in B.C. licensed retailers in a 30ml format. A 50ml format will be available later this year. "Strong initial sales support our thesis of a market need for high-potency, price accessible CBD products," Patton added. "By extracting our CBD from premium hemp, we can pass the savings along to the consumer while elevating product quality." LoFi continues to advance discussions with other provincial wholesalers regarding future supply agreements. An expanded suite of LoFi CBD products will be available in late 2021. About LoFi LoFi is a BC-based independent cannabis brand passionate about three simple things: quality, consistency, and value. We are committed to upholding the highest quality standards through our inclusive CBD products that are market competitive in potency and price. About Green Light Solutions Green Light Solutions (GLS) is an innovation firm committed to driving excellence in the Cannabis industry. GLS delivers value across multiple cannabis verticals through an agile, tech-forward business model, following Cannabis and Hemp specific strategies in its subsidiary business units. The Company's leadership team combines extensive experience in the cannabis industry with strong manufacturing and technology development expertise and a robust I.P. portfolio. www.grnlight.ca www.loficannabis.ca https://www.instagram.com/lofi.cannabis/ A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/ab9cf323-1f8f-4a55-9776-53e3e6a6b34d New York, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Green Building Materials Global Market Report 2021: COVID-19 Growth And Change" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06130537/?utm_source=GNW , Owens Corning, RedBuilt LLC, Andersen Corporation, Armstrong World Industries Inc., Cemex, Chengdu Onekin Green building materials Co. Ltd., Ecostar LLC, Firestone Building Products Company LLC, Fletcher Insulation Pty Limited, Johns Manville Corporation, Knauf Insulation Ltd., LIXIL Group Corporation, and Marvin Windows and Doors Inc. The global green building materials market is expected to grow from $216.99 billion in 2020 to $238.91 billion in 2021 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.1%. The growth is mainly due to the growing awareness about environmental sustainability which is driving the demand for green building materials. The market is expected to reach $383.85 billion in 2025 at a CAGR of 12.6%. The green building materials market consists of sales of green building materials by entities (organizations, sole traders, or partnerships) manufacture eco-friendly, durable, and renewable green building materials.Green building materials are defined as those materials which are both locally sourced and renewable. Green building materials use less water and are easier to maintain than traditional building materials, and they improve the sustainability and efficiency of a building because of a lower carbon footprint. The main types of green building materials are structural, exterior, interior, and others. It is used in framing, insulation, roofing, exterior siding, interior finishing, others and is implemented in various sectors such as residential buildings, non-residential buildings. North America was the largest region in the green building materials market in 2020.Asia Pacific was expected to be the fastest region in the forecast period. The regions covered in this report are Asia-Pacific, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Middle East, and Africa. The introduction to environment-friendly products is gaining significant popularity in the green building materials market.Major participants in the green building materials industry are concentrating on launching new product lines that minimize the global warming potential (GWP) without compromising product quality. For instance, in August 2020, Owens Corning, a US-based building and industrial materials company introduced a new product line FOAMULAR NGX (Next Generation Extruded) in the USA and Canada. This innovative range of extruded polystyrene (XPS) foam products in the new product line uses a patented blowing agent that reduces the global warming potential (GWP) by 90% without affecting product quality. In December 2020, Armstrong World Industries, a US-based designer, acquired Arktura for an undisclosed amount.Through this acquisition, Armstrong World Industries further strengthens its robust portfolio of architectural specialty solutions, as well as its design capabilities across its entire enterprise. Arktura is a US-based manufacturer of architectural systems and custom solutions with a strong emphasis on green practices and sustainability. The increasing demand for green buildings is expected to drive the growth of the green building materials market in the coming years.Green building is the discipline of designing structures and employing procedures from site selection to design, construction, operation, service, remodeling, and deconstruction that are ecologically responsible and resource-efficient. As green building materials are utilized to produce green buildings, the demand for green building materials is also expanding.For instance, according to a 2019 global survey conducted by World Green Building Trends Smart Market Study, nearly half of all respondents intend to construct more than 60% of their buildings as green buildings by 2021. According to the same survey, green building is also gaining popularity among building owners, with 57% expecting to make the bulk of their constructions green by 2021. The countries covered in the green building materials market report are Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, South Korea, UK, and USA. Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06130537/?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. __________________________ Sales for 1H 2021: 208.3m, up 15% from 1H 2020 Net margin for 1H 2021: 18.7m, up 2.8m from 1H 2020 Normalised profit before tax in 1H 2021: 4.8m, up 2.2m from 1H 2020 Net profit for 1H 2021: 3.4m compared to 1.3m in 1H 2020 Basic earnings per share (EPS) for 1H 2021 were 0.1287 cents per thousand shares compared to 0.0509 cents per thousand shares for 1H 2020 Strong sales growth in S-Europe from March, following easing of Covid19 restrictions UK merger process and integration has proven to be more complex and costly than anticipated, impacted by Brexit and Covid19, the long-term prospects remain positive Total assets of 249.1m at end of June, reduced by 12.3m from end of March. Equity ratio of 31.7% at end of June Operation in the USA simplified, and risk reduced following an agreement with Villa Seafood Normalised PBT Outlook range narrowed to 12.0-16.0m for 2021, assuming Covid19 restrictions in key markets will not be tightened in 2H 2021 Group results for 1H 2021, showing good recovery from same time last year. After slow start in the first two months of the year, sales have picked up strongly from March onwards driven by good demand in key markets. Group sales in 1H 2021 of 208.3m were 15% higher than same time last year. Normalised PBT in the period of 4.8m were 2.2m higher than 1H 2020, driven by strong results of VA S-Europe division. Total assets of 249.1m at end of June were 7.7m higher than year-end 2020 but reduced by 12.3m from end of March. Sales growth in S-Europe was driven by strong demand in Spain and Italy from March onwards, after easing of Covid19 restrictions. Total divisional sales during 1H 2021 of 77.8m were 24.1% up on same period last year. Demand in HORECA sector is recovering but activity is still significantly below pre Covid19 levels. At the same time retail sales are increasing, with new retail agreement kicking in during Q2. Sales team in retail were strengthened with recruitment of experienced sales manager in the period. The proposed acquisition of Ahumados Dominguez will strengthen and broaden Iceland Seafoods retail position in Spain and opens new opportunities selling high quality salted cod products in Spanish retail. The Irish operation continued to perform well, showing significant sales growth from previous year. The Irish entities were well prepared for Brexit and in better position to service local retail customers than suppliers outside Ireland. Lockdown measures helped sales in the period as restrictions on restaurant dining increased demand in retail. We continue to expand our product offering with the addition of breaded products produced by IS UK, and sales of Argentinean shrimp from Achernar continues to grow. The merger and integration of the UK operation continued to be challenging during Q2, the process has been more complex and costly than anticipated, not helped by external factors such as Brexit, Covid and disruptions in transportation and logistics especially from Asia. Foodservice sales have improved following easing of restrictions in May and June, but activity is still well below pre-Covid levels. Actions were taken in Q2 to improve efficiency in the new factory and progress made on new sales agreements with both existing and new customers. With Iceland Seafoods strong customer base and the new state of the art Grimsby factory the outlook and potential for the UK business remains strong, whilst this year results will be severely impacted by the situation. The performance of the Sales & Distribution division was good in the period. Similarly, to S-Europe, sales increased from March onwards after slow start of the year. Sales of all product categories out of Iceland have been good, fresh markets on Continental Europe and the frozen at sea market in UK remained strong. The supply chain disruptions to and from Asia have positively impacted sales of Icelandic products in the period. With signing of an agreement with Villa Seafood Ltd in Boston, the operation in the USA will be simplified. The sales office of Iceland Seafood will stop operating from October 1st and Villa Seafood will take over sales and distribution of Icelandic landfrozen products under the Iceland Gold brand in North America. Iceland Seafood will continue to sell fresh and seafrozen products from Iceland directly to customers in the USA. This decision is in line with the Groups strategy of focusing mainly on value added activities in Europe, it simplifies Iceland Seafoods operation in the USA and reduce risk. At the same time this will not have significant impact on neither sales nor profit generation of the Group. The level of uncertainty for 2H of the year remains high, both due to Covid19 development and other external factors such as quota decrease and price development. Disruptions in supply chains continues to impact transportation and logistics costs. The integration in UK has been more complex and costly than anticipated, it took us longer time to reach necessary efficiency and utilisation levels in the factory. At the same time demand in key markets is good and vaccination has progressed well. Over 70% of population fully vaccinated in Spain, which is important for the important HORECA sector. Assuming Covid19 restrictions in key markets will not be tightened, the outlook range for 2021 Normalised PBT is narrowed to 12.0 16.0m, i.e. higher end of the range is reduced by 1m from previous outlook. Bjarni Armannsson, Group CEO: Q2 is generally a relatively quiet quarter for Iceland Seafood, but same trends were at work during the quarter as in Q1. We continue to benefit from strong fundamentals in S-Europe and Ireland, the Sales & Distribution division also showed increased activity and reduced cost which generated good profits. Our UK operations had negative results, the reason being a combination of ramping up a renovated factory, dealing with challenging logistics from South-East Asia and merging two factories in a period of Covid19 issues and Brexit. These factors shape the financial outcome in Q2. Overall, in the first half we are where we had planned to be when we announced the profit outlook for 2021 in late February. Realising now that our assumption going forward, i.e. that things would have normalized by mid-year is not what is happening, we are narrowing down the outlook range to 12-16m in normalized profit before tax for the full year from 12-17m previously communicated. Having said that, in general we are reaching our strategic goals of: Better balance between retail and foodservice A stronger foundation in Salmon products Better cross selling of products between operating entities within the Group With increased activities in Ireland, the importance of retail is growing. Same applies to our activities in UK. We have strengthened our organization in Spain to better address the retail market, with the addition of Ahumados Dominiguez, this position will further be strengthened. As we said when reporting on Q1, we are ready to take part in the ongoing consolidation of the seafood sector in Spain. The pace of consolidation in the industry is increasing to a large degree driven by increased interest of private equity capital. Iceland Seafood sees interesting opportunities in this trend and is well positioned to be pro-active when comes to improving the efficiency of the Spanish seafood industry. With the LOI signed with the founding family of Ahumados Dominiguez we have entered a process to acquire 80% of the share capital in the company. The company owns a premium consumer brand which has a strong foothold in the Spanish retail, primarily within the product category of smoked salmon. We plan to conclude the acquisition before end of Q3. We believe that going forward, the Spanish companies can together gain a stronger market presence overall, both in whitefish as well as in salmon. The acquisition will in particular strengthen the Group as a quality smoked salmon producer. Finally, with vaccinations progressing well in our key markets in Europe, we will see further lifting of restrictions in our markets in coming months. However, this is going to be a gradual process and hopefully not with too many setbacks. We are also reaping the benefits of increased cross-selling within the Group. Something we want to nurture going forward. We highlight this in our investor presentation with the Q2 figures. With structural changes in our operations in the USA, we are further focusing our management efforts on Europe. We see clearly that Brexit will bring us opportunities long term. There is a need for automated efficient processing facilities, close to the consumer base in UK, the same applies to Europe in general. The reliance on China as a production hub for the world is fading. The ongoing megatrend is bringing processing closer to the consumer that is a trend we will benefit from. Finally let me express my gratitude to our employees and management for hard work and relentless strive to improve our activities. We have managed to stay course in turbulent waters. We now have to be smart about taking advantage of volatility in our environment and our strong position in our markets. Electronic investor meeting Today at 4.15pm GMT, Iceland Seafood will host an electronic meeting for investors and market participants, where management will present and discuss the 1H 2021 results. The meeting will be webcasted live in Icelandic on https://vimeo.com/event/1225836/embed/0c99e2f33d and recording will be available after the meeting on www.icelandseafood.com/investors Participants to the meeting can send questions in writing prior and during the meeting to the email investors@icelandseafood.com. Disclaimer This announcement is furnished and intended for European market participants and should be viewed in that light. Any potential forward looking statements contained in this announcement reflect the management's current views on future events and performance, whilst those views are based on positions that management believes are reasonable, there is no assurances that the stated events and views will be realized. Forward looking views naturally involve uncertainties and risks and consequently actual results may differ from the statements or views expressed. For more information: Iceland Seafood International hf. http://www.icelandseafood.com/Investors Bjarni Armannsson, bjarni.armannsson@icelandseafood.com Attachments VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Affinor Growers Inc. (Affinor or the Company) (CSE: AFI OTCQB: RSSFF), a vertical farming technology company and commercial production facility licensor and operator, is pleased to announce that it has been issued Patent No. 38806 by the Superintendencia de Industria y Comercio, Republica de Colombia for vertical growing towers for automated horticulture and agriculture. Affinors vertical farming towers can be used to sustainably grow fruits, vegetables and cannabis in greenhouses and indoor facilities. The hot dipped, galvanized steel construction is a durable and long-lasting design capable of operating in all climates. The towers are part of a complete turnkey vertical farming technology solution encompassing automation, water conservation, soil remediation and alternative energy. It offers ease of plant maintenance, increased yield, lower production cost, higher quality, minimized water usage, optimized air flow and mechanical pollination. The company plans to offer their technology for licensing in 2022, wherever patent protection has been achieved. Affinor expects to showcase its patented commercial towers this year, in its 15,000 square foot greenhouse in Abbotsford BC, growing strawberries for local markets. The Company plans to aggressively continue to build its patent portfolio of mechanical and process designs that address sustainability and climate change issues affecting the global agriculture sector. Affinor is also pursuing opportunities in other sectors, such as decorative flowers, reforestation, biotech, pharmaceutical and nutraceuticals. Nick Brusatore CEO: The United States Patent and Trademark Office issued the first patent for our towers in November 2020. I expect Affinor to be issued additional patents in the coming year from several other countries. Affinors simplistic, yet intricate ecological approach will define the future of vertical farming. I look forward to unveiling the next automated lines for herbs and high-demand leafy greens like kale, spinach and romaine lettuce. Our technology not only combats climate change and sustainability issues, but also assists countries to become more self sufficient in high-quality food production. About Affinor Affinor is a publicly traded company listed on the CSE under the symbol AFI and on the OTCQB under the symbol RSSFF. Affinor is focused on developing vertical farming technologies and using those technologies to grow fruits, vegetables, and cannabis in a sustainable manner. To learn more about Affinor, visit: www.affinorgrowers.com Renmark Financial Communications Inc. Joshua Lavers: jlavers@renmarkfinancial.com Tel: (416) 644-2020 or (212) 812-7680 www.renmarkfinancial.com Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor its Market Regulator (as that term is defined in the policies of the Canadian Securities Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. CAUTION REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION This news release includes certain statements that may be deemed "forward-looking statements". All statements in this new release, other than statements of historical facts, that address events or developments that the Company expects to occur, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts and are generally, but not always, identified by the words "expects", "plans", "anticipates", "believes", "intends", "estimates", "projects", "potential" and similar expressions, or that events or conditions "will", "would", "may", "could" or "should" occur. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause the actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements include market prices, continued availability of capital and financing, and general economic, market or business conditions. Investors are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on the beliefs, estimates and opinions of the Company's management on the date the statements are made. Except as required by applicable securities laws, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements in the event that management's beliefs, estimates or opinions, or other factors, should change. WAWA, Pa., Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Wawa, Inc. is thrilled to announce today a month-long Cheers to the Classrooms celebration from September 1 September 30, across its entire chain of PA, NJ, DE, MD, VA, FL and Washington, D.C. stores that will recognize teachers and school administration who educate, guide and inspire children across our region with the following support: Free Coffee or Fountain Beverage for Teachers & School Administration All day, every day from September 1 30, any size coffee or fountain beverage is free for all teachers and school administrators. All day, every day from September 1 30, any size coffee or fountain beverage is free for all teachers and school administrators. Classroom Fund and Cheers Tour Through a partnership with Donors Choose, an online resource for teachers to submit funding requests for school supplies/support, Wawa has designated a $25,000 fund to support schools throughout its operating area serving K-12 at-risk youth returning to school. From September 1 September 10, Wawa has scheduled a Cheers Tour, with its Wawa Community Care Truck visiting select schools that have been selected to receive funding to formally present checks and brighten days with freshly brewed coffee and donuts! Store to School Visits All 940+ Wawa stores selected a local school of their choice to receive 50 free Sizzli coupons, 2 boxes of coffee and 50 free specialty, heart-shaped, apple-filled donuts and fun props during special visits the weeks of September 13 September 24. Thats 47,000 Sizzlis and 47,000 donated donuts chainwide! As teachers and school administration return back to school following one of the most challenging years, Wawa is making a special effort to bring cheer to classrooms across our chain with free coffee, financial support and special visits as our small way of expressing gratitude to those championing for our children, said Chris Gheysens, President and CEO, Wawa. It gives us great pride to celebrate our teachers and school administration who represent everyday heroes in our community. About Wawa, Inc. Wawa, Inc., a privately held company, began in 1803 as an iron foundry in New Jersey. Toward the end of the 19th Century, owner George Wood took an interest in dairy farming and the family began a small processing plant in Wawa, PA in 1902. The milk business was a huge success, due to its quality, cleanliness and certified process. As home delivery of milk declined in the early 1960s, Grahame Wood, Georges grandson, opened the first Wawa Food Market in 1964 as an outlet for dairy products. Today, Wawa is your all day, every day stop for freshly prepared foods, beverages, coffee, fuel services and surcharge-free ATMs. Wawa stores are located in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Florida and Washington, D.C. The stores offer a large fresh foodservice selection, including Wawa brands such as custom prepared hoagies, freshly-brewed coffee, hot breakfast sandwiches, specialty beverages and an assortment of soups, sides and snacks. Forbes.com Ranks Wawa as #23 of Americas Largest Private Companies in 2020. For more information, visit us on www.wawa.com or follow us on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram at @wawa. CONTACT: public.relations@wawa.com A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/ef3b9e33-331d-44d5-b18d-20ad347b2a69 RADNOR, Pa., Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The law firm of Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP announces that a securities fraud class action lawsuit has been filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama against Churchill Capital Corp IV (NYSE: CCIV) (CCIV) on behalf of those who purchased or acquired CCIV securities between January 11, 2021 and February 22, 2021, inclusive (the Class Period). Investor Deadline Reminder: Investors who purchased or acquired CCIV securities during the Class Period may, no later than August 30, 2021 , seek to be appointed as a lead plaintiff representative of the class. For additional information or to learn how to participate in this litigation please contact Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP: James Maro, Esq. (484) 270-1453 or Adrienne Bell, Esq. (484) 270-1435; toll free at (844) 887-9500; via e-mail at info@ktmc.com; or click https://www.ktmc.com/churchill-capital-class-action-lawsuit?utm_source=PR&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=churchill CCIV is a blank check company, also known as a special purpose acquisition company. Atieva, Inc., d/b/a Lucid Motors (Lucid) is an American automotive company specializing in electric cars. As of 2020, Lucids first car, Lucid Air, is in development. The Class Period commences on January 11, 2021, when Bloomberg News reported that Lucid is in talks to go public through a merger with one of Michael Kleins special purpose acquisition companies, according to people familiar with the matter. Michael Klein launched CCIV in April 2020 and raised $2,070,000,000 in CCIVs initial public offering. It was rumored that Lucid was merging with CCIV. On February 16, 2021, Lucids Chief Executive Officer, Peter Rawlinson, appeared on Fox Business News with Neil Cavuto touting that Lucid was aiming for a spring delivery of its first vehicles. On Monday, February 22, 2021, the long anticipated merger agreement between CCIV and Lucid was announced. CCIV and Lucids transaction equity value was estimated at $11.75 billion. However, at 6:22 p.m. that same night, Ed Ludlow of Bloomberg News reported that Mr. Rawlinson announced that production of its debut car will be delayed until at least the second half of 2021, with no definite date set for delivery of an actual vehicle. Following this news, CCIVs stock price fell from a close of $57.37 per share on February 22, 2021, to a close of $35.21 per share on February 23, 2021. The complaint alleges that throughout the Class Period, the defendants failed to disclose a true and accurate picture of CCIVs business, operations and financial condition. CCIV investors may, no later than August 30, 2021 , seek to be appointed as a lead plaintiff representative of the class through Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP or other counsel, or may choose to do nothing and remain an absent class member. A lead plaintiff is a representative party who acts on behalf of all class members in directing the litigation. In order to be appointed as a lead plaintiff, the Court must determine that the class members claim is typical of the claims of other class members, and that the class member will adequately represent the class. Your ability to share in any recovery is not affected by the decision of whether or not to serve as a lead plaintiff. Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP prosecutes class actions in state and federal courts throughout the country involving securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duties and other violations of state and federal law. Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP is a driving force behind corporate governance reform, and has recovered billions of dollars on behalf of institutional and individual investors from the United States and around the world. The firm represents investors, consumers and whistleblowers (private citizens who report fraudulent practices against the government and share in the recovery of government dollars). The complaint in this action was not filed by Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP. For more information about Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP please visit www.ktmc.com. CONTACT: Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP James Maro, Jr., Esq. Adrienne Bell, Esq. 280 King of Prussia Road Radnor, PA 19087 (844) 887-9500 (toll free) info@ktmc.com New York, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Intracranial Stents Global Market Report 2021: COVID-19 Growth And Change" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06130524/?utm_source=GNW The global intracranial stents market is expected to grow from $328.57 million in 2020 to $368.18 million in 2021 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.1%. The growth is mainly due to the increasing incidence of a brain aneurysm and strokes, increase in preference for intracranial stents for the treatment of intracranial stenosis and management of stroke, increasing Demand for Minimally Invasive Intracranial Surgeries, increase in the adoption of technologically advanced intracranial stents, growing prevalence of high blood pressure, and rapid rise in the geriatric population. The market is expected to reach $700.90 million in 2025 at a CAGR of 17.5%. The intracranial stents market consists of sales of intracranial stents by entities (organizations, sole traders, and partnerships) that manufacture intracranial stents.Intracranial stents are the tubular device that is placed inside the blood vessel, canal, or duct. They are used for intracranial stenosis and brain aneurysms to open the blocked arteries. The main types of intracranial stents are self-expanding stents, balloon expanding stents, and stent-assisted coil embolization.A self-expanding stent expands on its own after being inserted into the lumen it is meant to occupy, such as a blood vessel, tube, or organ. Balloon expanding stents also known as balloon-expandable stents have higher radial stiffness and more accurate placement and are designed to treat restenosis in the iliac artery by opening clogged arteries and restoring blood flow.Stent-assisted coil embolization helps stabilize the coils within the aneurysm and provide a buttress that allows for coil deposition while preventing coil haerniation into the parent vessel lumen. The various indications of diseases include brain aneurysm, intracranial stenosis and are implemented in various sectors such as hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, others. North America was the largest region in the intracranial stents market in 2020.Asia Pacific is expected to be the fastest region in the intracranial stents market during the forecast period. The regions covered in this report are Asia-Pacific, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Middle East, and Africa. The introduction of flow diversion technology to the field of neurointervention has revolutionized the treatment of intracranial aneurysms which is a key trend gaining popularity in the intracranial stents market.Flow diversion is an endovascular procedure in which a device is inserted in the parent blood vessel to move blood flow away from the aneurysm rather than around the aneurysm sac. For instance, in March 2020, Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology (SCTIMST) developed an innovative intracranial flow diverter stent for brain aneurysms treatment.Intracranial flow diverters have the benefit of becoming adaptable and flexible to the vessels shape and direction and also helps the vessel wall recover by relieving it of the continuous burden of blood flow. It is entitled as Chitra flow diverter, the device is ready for transfer and further testing in animals to be followed by human trials. In January 2021, Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology (SCTIMST), an autonomous institute of the Department of Science & Technology (DST), Govt of India, under the Technical Research Centre (TRC), announced that it has entered into Technology Transfer Agreements with Biorad Medisys, for two biomedical implant devices namely an Atrial Septal Defect Occluder and an Intracranial Flow Diverter Stents developed by the institute in collaboration with National Aerospace Laboratories, Bangalore (CSIR-NAL)using superelastic NiTiNOL alloys. Biorad Medisys is a India based company that manufacturer various implants and surgical devices The increasing incidence of a brain aneurysm is expected to propel the growth of the intracranial stents market in the coming years.A brain aneurysm is the development of a bulge in the blood vessels of the brain. This bulge may rupture or burst and can cause brain hemorrhage, which may lead to the death of the patient.Intracranial vessel stenting (IVS) is a minimally invasive treatment for treating serious cerebral artery stenosis. The weakening of the arteries that deliver blood to the brain is known as cerebral artery stenosis. According to the brain aneurysm foundation, 2020, an expected 6.5 million people in the USA are suffering from an unruptured brain aneurysm, accounting for about one in every 50 people. Additionally, a brain aneurysm causes around 500,000 deaths globally every year and is more common among women. Thus, the increasing incidence of a brain aneurysm will drive the intracranial stents market growth. The countries covered in the intracranial stents market report are Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, South Korea, UK, and USA. Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06130524/?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. __________________________ ATLANTA, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- CoxReps, a Cox Media Group (CMG) business and the top broadcast television advertising rep firm in the country, today announced the appointment of Ann Hailer to the role of President, effective immediately. Since 2019, Hailer has served as the Chief Operating Officer and in her new role as President, she will build on the positive momentum she is spearheading within the organization to strengthen operations and strategically evolve the business. Ann exemplifies the leadership, collaboration and resilience that are the hallmarks of our culture at CoxReps, said Steve Pruett, Executive Chairman, CMG. She is a respected, passionate and committed leader who is laser focused on bring the best out of her people to deliver exemplary customer service and outperform the competition. Over the years, Ann has played a critical role in positioning CoxReps for success by embracing disruption and championing innovation. I am excited to see how the future unfolds under her leadership. A proven leader and media-industry veteran, Hailer has spent most of her career with CMG, serving in various sales, management, and key leadership roles with increasing responsibility throughout her tenure. In her most recent role as CoxReps Chief Operating Officer, she leveraged her 25 years of media experience to effectively steer operations and procedures across sales, analytics, technology, and business development. Prior to serving as COO, she was senior vice president and director of sales. Hailers longevity with CoxReps is bolstered by her belief that no matter the role, there is always an opportunity to be a both a mentor and pupil. As such, Hailer served as the Chair of CMGs Diversity & Inclusion advisory council from 2016 to 2019 and is an active member of CMGs Executive Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Council. She also sits on TVBs Executive Board of Directors and has been a member of the Detroit AdCraft group since 1993. My journey at CoxReps continues to evolve and this is the exciting beginning of a new chapter, said Hailer. The media industry is more diverse and competitive than ever and Im incredibly honored to take on this role and lead the amazing CoxReps team during such an extraordinary time. I look forward to further strengthening our business, driving success for our premiere station group clients, and providing the most advanced solutions to agencies and advertisers in the local media space. About CoxReps As the nations leading national TV representative company, CoxReps delivers smart, local media solutions on a national scale; helping agencies tap into a diverse roster of 350+ local, best-in-class broadcast television stations across the country. CoxReps strives to maximize revenue for client stations and provide value to agency partners. The company is made up of two powerhouse rep firms: TeleRep and HRP. With the most creative and relentless sales force in the industry, each firm embodies the Smart Service experience that stations and clients across the country have come to expect from CoxReps. Through cutting-edge research and data, a steadfast commitment to our clients, and the immeasurable value of its people, CoxReps delivers smart-media solutions that reach audiences on every screen. For more information about CoxReps, visit www.coxreps.com. About Cox Media Group Cox Media Group, Inc. (CMG) is an industry-leading media company with dominant brands, award-winning content, and exceptional people. CMG provides valuable local content to viewers in the communities in which it serves. The company's operations primarily include 33 high-quality, market-leading television stations in 20 markets, 65 radio stations delivering all genres of content in 11 markets, and numerous streaming and digital platforms. CMG's portfolio includes primary affiliates of ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, and MyNetworkTV, as well as several valuable news and independent stations. Additionally, the company also offers a full suite of national, regional, local and digital advertising services with CMG Local Solutions, CoxReps and Gamut. For more information about CMG, visit www.coxmediagroup.com. Media Inquiries: CMGMediaRelations@cmg.com A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/a263a477-e202-44ea-aa7e-b195148d3e34 Pleasanton, CA, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- SavvyMoney, the leading provider of a fully integrated credit score solution that provides credit scores, reports, and actionable insights directly from a financial institutions online and mobile banking platform, today announced the launch of its 500th financial institution partner. By partnering with both digital banking platforms and financial institutions, this fast-growing fintech is leveraging its strengths in the credit score and technology sectors to bring financial education to consumers via their trusted financial institution across the United States. More than 35 digital banking platforms have selected SavvyMoney to seamlessly integrate into digital banking, adding additional value and functionality to end-users. Financial institutions are then able to deliver SavvyMoneys solution to their end-users via their digital banking platform. The industry-wide adoption of SavvyMoneys engaging platform highlights the power of the solution. SavvyMoneys partners share a common goal of elevating their personalized digital banking experience. Each financial institution partner is committed to providing next-level, personal financial wellness. We are excited that so many financial institutions have trusted SavvyMoney to be their credit score, personalized loan offer, and analytics marketing solution, said JB Orecchia, CEO and President of SavvyMoney. Knowing these partners depend on SavvyMoney to push the needle from a technology, credit, and financial wellness perspective fuels us to keep innovating. The strong adoption of SavvyMoneys agile platform highlights the confidence financial institutions have in their solution, said Jonathan Price, EVP Emerging Businesses, Corporate & Business Development at Q2. Leveraging Q2s Innovation Studio, the implementation between our platform and SavvyMoney was quick and easy. Were proud to offer SavvyMoney to our financial institutions and are excited for their continued growth. Founders Federal Credit Union, the 500th financial institution partner to go live with the SavvyMoney solution, is a Q2 customer that implemented SavvyMoney via the integration. Founders Federal Credit Union is honored to be the 500th partner, says Nicki Nash, Chief Marketing Officer at Founders. We take pride in offering this cutting-edge technology and look forward to discovering new insights as we examine the data. We plan to launch a digital loan recapture campaign in the coming months and really leverage SavvyMoney analytics for maximum return on our investment. Further enhancements and exponential growth are expected as SavvyMoney continues to partner with financial institutions to drive deeper relationships and engagement in digital banking through financial wellness. ### About SavvyMoney SavvyMoney is an award-winning fintech company who works with over 675 financial institutions. SavvyMoney provides an integrated credit report and score solution right into financial institutions online and mobile banking. Consumers get actionable advice about their credit score, report, and saving opportunities from pre-qualified loan offers. SavvyMoneys analytics platform provides the financial institution with full visibility to users credit scores trends, wallet share analysis, and targeted lending campaigns. www.savvymoney.com @SavvyMoneyTip About Q2 Q2 is a financial experience company dedicated to providing digital banking and lending solutions to banks, credit unions, alternative finance, and fintech companies in the U.S. and internationally. With comprehensive end-to-end solution sets, Q2 enables its partners to provide cohesive, secure, data-driven experiences to every account holder from consumer to small business and corporate. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Q2 has offices worldwide and is publicly traded on the NYSE under the stock symbol QTWO. To learn more, please visit Q2.com. About Founders Federal Credit Union Founders Federal Credit Union is one of the largest and most innovative in the nation. Founded in 1950 in Fort Mill, South Carolina to provide financial services to the employees of Springs Industries, Inc, Founders now serves over 221,000 members and has more than 30 locations across two states. The credit union has over $3 billion in assets. New York, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- PHI Group, Inc. ( www.phiglobal.com , PHIL ), a company currently focused on implementing PHILUX Global Funds, a group of Luxembourg bank funds organized as Reserved Alternative Investment Fund (RAIF), and developing the Asia Diamond Exchange (ADE) in Vietnam, is pleased to announce that PHIL management has substantially increased their stock ownership in the Company. On August 25, 2021 Henry Fahman, Chief Executive Officer of the Company, converted $550,000 of accrued and unpaid salaries from 9/30/2004 to 3/31/2009 into 114,672,922 shares of restricted Common Stock of the Company pursuant to the corporate resolutions of the Board of Directors of PHI Group, Inc. dated March 12, 2012, November 02, 2012 and March 12, 2021. Similarly, on August 25, 2021, Tina Phan, Corporate Secretary and Treasurer of PHIL, converted $217,500 of accrued and unpaid salaries from 9/30/2004 to 3/31/2009 into 45,347,928 shares of restricted Common Stock of the Company. Form 4s regarding these acquisitions of shares by the Companys management are filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on August 26, 2021: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0000704172/000149315221021304/xslF345X03/ownership.xml https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0000704172/000149315221021310/xslF345X03/ownership.xml Mr. Fahman stated, "Our commitment to PHI Group and to PHIL shareholders has never been stronger; we strongly believe in future success for our company and stand firm by our long-term shareholders. After years of laying the groundwork, PHI Group is ready to capitalize on those efforts with many exciting and cutting-edge ventures, including the Luxembourg bank funds, the first-ever Asia Diamond Exchange, and other initiatives which will potentially bring significant benefits to our shareholders as well as all other stakeholders around the world." About PHI Group, Inc. PHI Group ( www.phiglobal.com , PHIL ) primarily focuses on advancing PHILUX Global Funds, a group of Luxembourg bank funds organized as Reserved Alternative Investment Fund (RAIF) ( www.philux.eu ), and building the Asia Diamond Exchange (ADE) in Vietnam. The Company also engages in mergers and acquisitions and invests in select industries and special situations that may substantially enhance shareholder value. Safe Harbor Act and Forward-looking Statements This news release contains forward-looking statements pursuant to the safe-harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements describe future expectations, plans, results, or strategies and are generally preceded by words such as may, future, plan or planned, will or should, expected, anticipates, draft, eventually or projected, which are subject to a multitude of risks and uncertainties that could cause future circumstances, events, or results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements as a result of various factors. Contact: Dallas, Texas, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Dickeys Barbecue Pit is continuing to grow at a rapid pace as the worlds largest barbecue franchise embarks on a huge development push in the Northeast. Dickeys announced today that the company has signed a multi-unit area development agreement with Chaac Foods, LLC. CEO and President Luis Ibarguengoytia led the negotiants for Chaac Foods and signed the agreement this week to develop 48 Dickeys locations in five years. Ibarguengoytia, a veteran restaurant operator, has teamed with Gauge Capital to form Chaac Foods, which currently develops and operates Pizza Hut and Bojangles restaurants. We look forward to entering the barbecue category by joining forces with the worlds fastest growing barbecue franchise, said Ibarguengoytia. We were drawn to Dickeys Barbecue Pit because of the flexibility offered with various operational formats, including traditional stand-alone stores, virtual locations and food trucks. We plan on opening several variations of Dickeys, particularly in the higher rent districts. The flexibility makes this deal an attractive opportunity when seeking to develop multiple locations during a dynamic time in the restaurant industry. Chaac Foods considers its relationship with Dickeys as an integral part of its plans for expansion. We see a lot of potential in the barbecue space and love the turn-key business model; it fits neatly in our business growth plans, Ibarguengoytia said. Were glad to have Chaac Foods join our family of brands, said Roland Dickey Jr., CEO of Dickey's Capital Group. The immediate goal is to expand in the Northeast and introduce more fans to Dickeys Legit. Texas. Barbecue. Luis is an incredibly talented and experienced restaurant operator, so were proud to welcome him into the Dickeys Franchise family as he introduces our slow-smoked meats and savory sides to barbecue lovers nationwide. About Chaac Foods Based in Irving, Texas, Chaac Foods is named for the Mayan God of Rain. Since acquiring 32 restaurants in December 2019, the company has grown rapidly to include 160 stores operating in 10 states and the District of Columbia. Chaac Foods has a passion for developing and operating nationally and regionally recognized restaurants and building a quality workforce that focuses on making the customer experience first-rate. The Chaac Foods leadership team has over 100 years combined experience in the restaurant industry managing 20 brands and thousands of employees working in hundreds of locations. CEO and President Luis Ibarguengoytia leads the way using the knowledge he has gained in nearly a quarter century of working in the industry. About Gauge Capital Gauge Capital is a leading middle market, private equity firm based in Southlake, Texas. Gauge invests in four key sectors, including: healthcare services, tech-enabled business services, government & industrial services, and food & consumer. The firm manages approximately $2 billion in assets, and in 2020, Inc. Magazine named Gauge one of the top 50 private equity firms for founders. For more information, please contact Managing Director of Business Development Andrew Peix at apeix@gaugecapital.com. About Dickeys Barbecue Restaurants, Inc. Dickeys Barbecue Pit is celebrating 80 years and has over 550 locations across the United States and six other countries. Dickeys Barbecue Pit is the fastest growing barbecue chain and is on track to have over 600 locations by the end of the year. To learn more, follow Dickeys Barbecue Pit on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Download the Dickeys Barbecue Pit app from the Apple App Store or Google Play. Dickey's Barbecue Restaurants, Inc., the worlds largest barbecue concept, was founded in 1941 by Travis Dickey. For the past 80 years, Dickeys Barbecue Pit has served millions of guests Legit. Texas. Barbecue. At Dickeys, all our barbecued meats are smoked onsite in a hickory wood burning pit. Dickeys proudly believes theres no shortcut to true barbecue and its why they never say bbq. The Dallas-based, family-run barbecue franchise offers several slow-smoked meats and wholesome sides with 'No B.S. (Bad Stuff)' included. The fast-casual concept has expanded worldwide with international locations in the UAE and Japan. Dickeys Restaurant brands have over 550 locations nationwide. In 2016, Dickeys won first place on Fast Casuals Top 100 Movers and Shakers list, was named a Top 500 Franchise by Entrepreneur in 2018 and was named to Hospitality Technology Industry Heroes in 2021. Led by CEO Laura Rea Dickey, who was named among the countrys 50 most influential women in foodservice in 2020 by Nations Restaurant News and was recognized as one of the top 25 industry leaders on Fast Casuals 2020 Top 100 Movers and Shakers list, Dickey's Barbecue Pit has also been recognized by Fox News, Forbes Magazine, Franchise Times, The Wall Street Journal and QSR Magazine. For more information, visit www.dickeys.com. Attachment Winston-Salem, NC, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Inmar Intelligence, a data-driven, technology-enabled services company, today announced that it has been recognized as a leader among sell-side retail media solutions in The Forrester Wave: Sell-Side Retail Media Solutions, Q3 2021. As the Forrester report explains, Inmars longstanding loyalty and in-store media solutions paved the way for its modern sell-side retail media solution that aims to enhance retailers digital transformation, loyalty, and profitability goals. The report notes that Inmar is exceptional at balancing retailers and brands needs when innovating and Inmar's advanced reporting and measurement capabilities are also a strength. As one client interviewed for the report told Forrester, Their reporting on campaigns simplifies complexities for our advertisers. Inmar Intelligence also received the top score in the report in the strategy category. As Forrester describes, The companys best-in-class roadmap features enhancements such as the extension of retail media to digital out-of-home, an integrated self-serve portal for omnichannel optimization, and advanced relevancy controls. Retail Media Networks have become a critical piece of retailers marketing strategy, as well as their overall revenue profiles. Inmar Intelligence's innovative approach takes this concept a step further by helping retailers build what the company calls Retail Marketing Platforms which are more effective at addressing marketing, merchandising and monetization objectives to achieve best outcomes. Inmars solution features their unique CDP, ShopperSyncTM, at its core and a robust, but modular media portfolio that provides retailers a level of customization while still delivering an integrated solution. With this approach, marketing, targeting and attribution are unified across all channels to address the entire consumer journey and drive greater loyalty, revenue and profitability. We are thrilled that Forrester is focusing on the booming Retail Media sector within the media industry, and are proud to be listed as a leader among sell-side retail media solutions, said Aaron Kechley, General Manager, Media & Data at Inmar Intelligence. The category is transforming quickly which is why weve evolved our vision to focus beyond only retail media to focusing on retail marketing, merging mass advertising channels with one-to-one marketing and commerce channels. With Retail Marketing Platforms, retailers can help brands address the entire consumer journey from awareness to personalization to retention and loyalty. For decades, Inmar Intelligence has played a critical role in helping retailers make business decisions. Inmar Intelligences Retail Cloud is built to support retailers development and execution of an omnichannel, personalized shopping experience with a technology infrastructure designed to provide the flexibility, security, control and scalability needed to complement retailers technology roadmap. While the pandemic accelerated the evolution of consumer buying behavior and trends, leaving some businesses flat-footed, Inmar Intelligences platform is able to meet these changing demands. With a technology infrastructure designed to execute machine learning and artificial intelligence at scale, Inmar Intelligence generates actionable insights to better inform planning decisions. For more information about Inmar Intelligences Retail Media Network solution, please visit our Retail Media Network solutions page. About Inmar Intelligence Commerce Accelerated. Inmar Intelligence is a leading data platform company. $120 billion dollars of commerce runs through our market-driven platforms which are propelling digital transformation through unified data, workflows and fund flows to help companies drive innovation and achieve digital transformation. Our integrated workflows create insights through Analytics, AI, Machine Learning and to drive faster actions and outcomes. Throughout our 41-year history, we have served retailers, manufacturers, pharmacies, health systems, government and employers as their trusted intermediary in helping them redefine success. For more information about Inmar, please follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook, or call (866) 440-6917. WEST CHESTER, Pa., Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Key Financial, Inc. of West Chester, PA has just announced that their CEO Patti Brennan, CFP has been named by Forbes in their rankings for Americas Top 250 Wealth Advisors for 2021. Brennan has also been noted by Forbes as the #18 Top Women Wealth Advisor in America and was also named the #2 Top Women Wealth Advisor in Pennsylvania for 2021. Forbes rankings, developed by SHOOK Research are the only advisor rankings with a focus on quality, not just assets under management. The ranking of Americas Top 250 Wealth Advisors in America started with over 33,000 nominations received for both male and female advisors. The process is based on an algorithm of qualitative and quantitative data, rating thousands of wealth advisors with a minimum of seven years of experience and weighing factors like revenue trends, assets under management, compliance records, industry experience and best practices learned through telephone and in-person interviews, explained RJ Shook, President of SHOOK Research. Shook added, Unlike other advisor rankings, SHOOK is not a robo-ranker. His goal is to create rankings of role models-advisors that are leading the way in offering best practices and providing a high-quality experience for clients. Through a culture rooted in the tenets of wisdom, perspective and commitment, the Key Financial team provides each client with a personalized financial plan with multiple scenarios, stress tests and what ifs. This approach to concierge service has resulted in a new standard for the client experience. This paired with Pattis unique ability to communicate complex financial concepts through understandable terms, has garnered recognition by Forbes, The Financial Times and Barrons as one of the Top Advisors in America year after year for almost two decades. With the goal in mind to elevate the client experience, Brennan has created a culture that boasts a client retention rate of 99.5% and is the envy of the industry. I think our client retention rate, more than anything, recognizes the excellence in the efforts made by every member of my team, on behalf of our clients and the families they love. I am humbled by the confidence our clients put in us every day and promise to do everything we can to warrant their trust. A graduate of Georgetown University, Brennan and her team have been providing wealth management with wisdom and care to their client families, both locally and nationally, for over 30 years. Brennan maintains a close connection in her community by serving on the Boards of the YMCA of Greater Brandywine, University of Pennsylvania Chester County Hospital, Cuddle My Kids and is a former Board member of the Chester County Economic Development Council (CCEDC) and the National Advisory Board. Patti is a Registered Representative of Royal Alliance Associates, Inc., one of the nations leading wealth management firms, and is mission-driven to support the strategic role that financial professionals can play in the lives of their clients. Patti is invited to speak at conferences throughout America, as well as being the only American advisor invited to present at the 2019 Barrons Economic Summit in London and the 2020 Barrons Economic Summit in Australia. As a former board member of the Chester County Economic Development Council (CCEDC), Brennan has been the Keynote speaker for their Annual Economic Review in January each year for the past fourteen years. Patti has guided standing room only audiences with her wisdom, perspective and practical advice through some of the most challenging times in our country. Brennan is also the host of The Patti Brennan Show, a podcast dedicated to helping improve the listeners net worth. It can be found on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher and Spotify. The show is biweekly and covers timely financial topics as well as economic forecasts and market discussions. With assets under management as of date just under $2 billion, Key Financial Inc. provides comprehensive financial planning and wealth management services and is located at 1045 Andrew Drive Suite A West Chester, PA. For information about the firms planning services or to speak with Patti Brennan, call (610)429-9050 or visit www.keyfinancialinc.com. Securities offered through Royal Alliance Associates, Inc. (RAA), member FINRA/SIPC. Investment advisory services offered through Key Financial, Inc. RAA is separately owned and other entities and/or marketing names, products or services referenced here are independent of RAA. The Forbes ranking of Americas Top Wealth advisors, is based on an algorithm of qualitative and quantitative data, rating thousands of wealth advisors with a minimum of seven years of experience and weighing factors like revenue trends, assets under management, compliance records, industry experience and best practices learned through telephone and in-person interviews. There is no fee in exchange for rankings. The Barrons Winners Circle Top 100 is a select group of individuals who are screened on a number of different criteria. Among factors the survey takes into consideration are the overall size and success of practices, the quality of service provided to clients, adherence to high standards of industry regulatory compliance, and leadership in best practices of wealth management. Portfolio performance is not a factor. Please see www.barrons.com for more information. The Financial Times 300 Top Registered Investment Advisers is an independent listing produced annually by the Financial Times (June 2019). The FT 300 is based on data gathered from RIA firms, regulatory disclosures, and the FTs research. The listing reflected each practices performance in six primary areas: assets under management, asset growth, compliance record, years in existence, credentials and online accessibility. This award does not evaluate the quality of services provided to clients and is not indicative of the practices future performance. Neither the RIA firms nor their employees pay a fee to The Financial Times in exchange for inclusion in the FT 300. A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/824ab2d8-f700-4694-bf4f-327598e00eae New York, Aug. 27, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors Market: Key Insights According to our new research study on Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors Market Forecast to 2028 COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis by Product, Application, and Geography, The global Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors Market is expected to grow from US$ 14,547.86 million in 2021 to US$ 24,752.20 million by 2028; it is estimated to grow at a CAGR of 7.9% from 2021 to 2028. Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors Market: Competitive Landscape and Key Developments APC International, LTD.; Johnson Electric Holdings Limited; Microfine Materials Technologies PTE LTD; Piezo Electric Technology CO., LTD.; TDK Corporation; PI (PHYSIK INSTRUMENTE) L.P.; and PIEZOMOTOR UPPSALA AB are a few key players profiled in the study of the piezoelectric sensors and motors market. The companies mentioned above are collectively holding a significant share in the market. In March 2021, PI (Physik Instrumente), the technology leader for piezo applications and high precision positioning technology has acquired the Japanese company PGW Precision Granite W Co. Ltd. The acquisition was completed on February 25th, 2021. Get Exclusive Sample Pages of Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors Market - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis with Strategic Insights at https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPRE00014704/ The rising application of piezoelectric actuators and motors in automotive systems is fostering market growth globally. Piezoelectric actuators convert an electrical signal into mechanical movement; hence, they are widely used for adjusting mirrors, lenses, and other automotive parts. Also, piezoelectric technology is being widely used in fuel injectors. With the help of this technology, the fuel injection accuracy has increased, and the injector leakage has reduced significantly, compared to the conventional technologies. This has resulted in increased fuel efficiency of commercial and passenger vehicles, with less carbon emission. Further, the additional application of piezoelectric has been witnessed in fuel pumps, high-speed valves, keyless door entry, seat belt buzzers airbag sensors, airflow sensors, and tire pressure sensors, among others. Also, piezoelectric actuators have been largely used by automobile companies, specifically in the suspension system and seat adjustment controls of vehicles. Moreover, piezoelectric actuators are finding applications in the braking systems of electric vehicles. Thus, the increasing adaptability of piezoelectric actuators and motors in the automotive sector is driving the piezoelectric actuators and motors market across the globe. The global piezoelectric actuators and motors market is segmented into five major regionsNorth America, Europe, Asia Pacific (APAC), the Middle East & Africa (MEA), and South and Central America. In 2020, Asia Pacific held the largest revenue share of the market owing to the rapid industrialization taking place in the region. The market growth in Europe is attributed to the significant use of piezoelectric actuators and motors in the automobile industry. North America is substantially contributing to the piezoelectric actuators and motors market owing to the presence of various established industries in the region. Also, the MEA and South and Central America are contributing significantly to the market growth. Further, the rise in the production of vehicles integrated with comfort features is expected to drive the market growth during the forecast period. Download Sample PDF Brochure of Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors Market Growth Research Report at https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPRE00014704/ The growth of the piezoelectric actuators and motors market in APAC can be attributed to the rising industrialization and growing automotive sector. In addition, countries in the region, such as China, India, and Japan, comprise major automotive manufacturers. Honda, Hyundai Motors, Tata Motors, Mitsubishi, and Kia are a few major end users of piezoelectric actuators in the region. Further, China is expected to hold the largest share in the Asia Pacific market due to the high production of automobiles. With the integration of piezoelectric actuators with haptic technology, the applications of piezo actuators have been increased in electronics and semiconductors devices. Haptic technology involves enabling an electronic device to stimulate the human sense of touch by allowing humans to feel motion, vibration, or movement. At present, there are three mainstream technologies in haptic eccentric rotating mass (ERM) motor, linear resonant actuator (LRA), and piezoelectric. Among the mentioned technologies, piezoelectric technology holds the edge over the rest, owing to its mechanical advantages such as faster response time, greater acceleration, and smaller size. In addition, piezo actuators are more power efficient and provides haptic solutions with less power consumption than ERM and LRA technology. Which means that piezoelectric is the most efficient technology for high-definition haptic solutions and offers lucrative opportunities for the market growth. Hence, the aforementioned factors are expected to boost the demand for piezoelectric actuators and motors during the forecast period. Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors market: Product Overview Piezoelectric actuators and motors are among important components for machineries used in industrial and manufacturing sector. They are expected to witness significant demand in the coming years. Piezoelectric motors are used in digital cameras for zooming, autofocus, and stabilization of optical images. Hence, the increasing sale of consumer electronics in Asian countries is propelling the market growth. In addition, increasing adoption of piezo motors in haptic technology used in consumer electronics is expected to boost the market growth in coming years. Order a Copy of Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors Market Shares, Strategies and Forecasts 2021-2028 Research Report at https://www.theinsightpartners.com/buy/TIPRE00014704/ Piezoelectric Actuators and Motors market: Application Overview Many applications, such as micro-positioning stages, fiber-optic positioning, and medical catheter placement, require motors of extremely high resolution with low power consumption. Piezoelectric motor meets these requirements. When compared to a conventional motor and its associated power train, a piezoelectric motor offers various advantages, such as faster response times, far higher precision, inherent brake capability with no backlash, higher power-to-weight ratio, and smaller size. The operation of this motor is based on the use of piezoelectric materials where a material is capable of being deformed by the application of a voltage. Browse Related Reports: Piezoceramics Market Forecast to 2028 - Covid-19 Impact and Global Analysis - by Material (Piezo Crystals, Piezo-Ceramics, Piezo Polymer, Piezo Composites); Product (Sensors, Actuators, Transducers, Generators, Motors); Application (Industrial, Automotive, Medical Devices, Electronics and Telecommunication, Others) and Geography - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/piezoceramics-market Piezoresistive Pressure Sensors Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Type (Diffuse Silicon Piezoresistive, Ceramic Piezoresistive, Strain Gage Piezoresistive); Application (Biomedical Applications, Automotive Industry, Household Appliances) and Geography - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/piezoresistive-pressure-sensors-market Valves Actuators and Positioners Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Valve Type (Control Valves); Actuator Type (Hydraulic, Pneumatic, Manual, Electric); Positioner Type (Pneumatic, Electro-Pneumatic); Application (Aerospace, Automotive, Electronics , Others) and Geography - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/valves-actuators-and-positioners-market Hydraulic Actuators Market Forecast to 2028 - Covid-19 Impact and Global Analysis - by Type (Linear Actuator, Rotary Actuator); End-user (Automotive, Oil and Gas, Construction, Agriculture, Aviation, Others) and Geography - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/hydraulic-actuators-market Robotics and Automation Actuators Market Forecast to 2028 - Covid-19 Impact and Global Analysis - by Type (Linear, Rotary); Actuation (Electric, Hydraulic, Pneumatic, Others); Application (Robotics, Process Automation, Service Robots); Industry Vertical (Automotive, Electronics, Aerospace and Defense, Chemicals and Materials, Engineering and Construction, Energy and Utilities, Food and Beverages, Others) and Geography - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/robotics-and-automation-actuators-market Pneumatic Actuators Market Forecast to 2028 - Covid-19 Impact and Global Analysis - by Type (Quarter-Turn Actuator, Multi-Turn Actuator, and Linear-Turn Actuator); and Vertical (Oil & gas, Power Generation, Mining, Healthcare, Food & Beverage, and Others) - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/pneumatic-actuators-market Optogenetic Actuators And Sensors Market Forecast to 2028 - Covid-19 Impact and Global Analysis - by Actuators ( Channelrhodopsin, Halorhodopsin, Archaerhodopsin ); Sensors ( Genetically encoded calcium indicators, Voltage-sensitive fluorescent proteins, pH Sensors ); Disease Type ( Retinal Disorders, Parkinson's Disease, Schizophrenia, Autism, Depression And Anxiety ) and Geography - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/optogenetic-actuators-and-sensors-market About Us: The Insight Partners is a one stop industry research provider of actionable intelligence. We help our clients in getting solutions to their research requirements through our syndicated and consulting research services. We specialize in industries such as Semiconductor and Electronics, Aerospace and Defense, Automotive and Transportation, Biotechnology, Healthcare IT, Manufacturing and Construction, Medical Device, Technology, Media and Telecommunications, Chemicals and Materials. Contact Us: If you have any queries about this report or if you would like further information, please contact us: Contact Person: Sameer Joshi E-mail: sales@theinsightpartners.com Phone: +1-646-491-9876 Press Release - https://www.theinsightpartners.com/pr/piezoelectric-actuators-and-motors-market Connect With Us on: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/7591674/admin/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/tipmarkettrends Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theinsightpartners/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheInsightPartners RSS/Feeds: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/feed/ | https://www.biospace.com/employer/2309254/tip-knowledge-services-pvt-ltd-/ NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO U.S. NEWSWIRE SERVICES OR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES TORONTO, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Water Ways Technologies Inc. (TSXV: WWT) (FSE: 977) ("Water Ways" or the "Company"), a global provider of Israeli-based agriculture technology, providing water irrigation solutions to agricultural producers, is pleased to announce the appointment of Mr. Dor Sneh as the Companys new Chief Financial Officer ("CFO"), effective August 28, 2021. Mr. Sneh will oversee all accounting and finance functions, while providing strategic recommendations that ensure all financial solutions, support Water Ways' evolving growth strategy, vision and mission. Mr. Sneh, who holds a B.A. in Economics and Accounting from Haifa University, has been with the Company since 2019 and served as its Group Controller. Mr. Sneh began his career, in 2016, in public accounting at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC Israel). Mr. Sneh will replace Mr. Nathanzon as CFO of the Company who had to leave the company unexpectedly for personal reasons. Mr. Haber and the Board of Directors would like to thank Mr. Nathanzon for his hard work and significant contributions to Water Ways. "We are thrilled to welcome Dor to Water Ways' senior management team," stated Ohad Haber, Water Way's CEO and Chairman of the Board. "Dor has been working for the Company for the last two and a half years and has done an amazing job in assisting our performances and returning to profitability. His promotion to CFO will assist our growth strategy." In addition, the Company plans to announce its second quarter financial results on Monday, August 30, 2021, in a release that will be issued at approximately 4:00 pm (ET). The press release will also be available on the company's website. Additionally, the company will hold an Investor Webinar to discuss the results and future outlook of the company on September 14, 2021. The Webinar will be open to all and a press release will follow shortly with the registration sign-up link. At the live webinar, CEO Ohad Haber take audience questions on the Companys Q2/21 results as well as discuss: Results of Q2 and H1 2021; Latest projects including the Companys Vietnam Project; Latest Financing and Strategic Direction of the company; Agro-Tech as critical to food production and global water conservation; and Future outlook for Investors. Water Ways Technologies is capitalizing on the opportunities presented by micro and intelligent irrigation. It also makes a positive and enduring impact on society by making these technologies more widely available, especially in developing markets such as Africa and Latin America and developed markets such as China and Canada. About Water Ways Technologies Water Ways Technologies Inc., through its subsidiaries, is a global provider of Israeli-based agriculture technology, providing water irrigation solutions to agricultural producers. Water Ways Technologies competes in the global irrigation water systems market with a focus on developing solutions with commercial applications in the micro and precision irrigation segments of the overall market. At present, Water Ways Technologies' main revenue streams are derived from the following business units: (i) Projects Business Unit; and (ii) Component and Equipment Sales Unit. Water Ways Technologies is capitalizing on the opportunities presented by micro and smart irrigation, while also making a positive mark on society by making these technologies more widely available, especially in developing markets such as Africa and Latin America and developed markets such as China and Canada. Water Ways Technologies irrigation projects include vineyards, Cotton fields, Apple and Orange orchards, Blueberries, Medical Cannabis, fresh produce cooling rooms and more, in over 15 countries. For more information, please contact Ronnie Jaegermann Dor Sneh Director CFO T: +972-54-4202054 T: +972-54-6512500 E: ronnie@waterwt.com E: dor@irri-altal.com https://www.water-ways-technologies.com/ Twitter: @WaterWaysTechn1 Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-Looking Statements Certain statements contained in this press release constitute "forward-looking information" as such term is defined in applicable Canadian securities legislation. The words "may", "would", "could", "should", "potential", "will", "seek", "intend", "plan", "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect" and similar expressions as they relate to Water Ways. All statements other than statements of historical fact may be forward-looking information. Such statements reflect Water Ways' current views and intentions with respect to future events, and current information available to Water Ways, and are subject to certain risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Material factors or assumptions were applied in providing forward-looking information. Many factors could cause the actual results, performance or achievements that may be expressed or implied by such forward-looking information to vary from those described herein should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize. Should any factor affect Water Ways in an unexpected manner, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking information prove incorrect, the actual results or events may differ materially from the results or events predicted. Any such forward-looking information is expressly qualified in its entirety by this cautionary statement. Moreover, Water Ways does not assume responsibility for the accuracy or completeness of such forward-looking information. The forward-looking information included in this press release is made as of the date of this press release and Water Ways undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking information, other than as required by applicable law. Water Ways' results and forward-looking information and calculations may be affected by fluctuations in exchange rates. All figures are in Canadian dollars unless otherwise indicated. Ottawa, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The automotive interior materials market size was valued at US$ 27.60 billion in 2020. Interior material plays a significant role in the design of an automobile are utilized as inside cabin materials in a vehicle such as plastics, composites, metals, and many others. As the demand for high performance is increasing in a vehicle, the demand for improved ergonomics and appealing aesthetics is also rising at the same rate for the automotive interior. Advanced lighting and higher-level of comfort are the common features demanded by the consumers in almost every new automobile. Doors, console, seats, dashboards, floor carpet, steering wheels, and various other interior parts of a vehicle are the common application areas for an automotive interior material. Growth Factors Increasing demand for light weight vehicle and hence its body parts and other materials used in the manufacturing process is one of the significant factors that drives the market for automotive interior materials in the coming years. Cabin section of an automobile is very critical for the overall weight of a vehicle and making light weight automotive interior materials are imperative for conserving the emission level. Superior functions and attributes of cabin components have significantly increased the number of interior automotive components. Get the Sample Pages of Report for More Understanding@ https://www.precedenceresearch.com/sample/1265 Further, rising demand for low-emission materials particularly from the emerging nations along with stringent fuel economy standards have propelled the market growth for automotive interior materials. For instance, in 2018, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) in China issued new guidelines for the passenger vehicles sold in the country. Under the guideline, new vehicle should meet the average fuel economy of 5.8 liters per 100 kilometers. In the last decade, the average fuel efficiency of new cars in China is better compared to USA, Europe, Japan, Australia, and other parts of the world. However, rising prices for natural leather anticipated to hinder the market growth and likely to propel the demand for synthetic leathers. This is mainly attributed to the demand-supply gap along with increasing regulations for the use of synthetic leathers. As synthetic leathers are not bio-degradable, hence governments of various regions have issued stringent regulations on the application of synthetic leathers as well as to promote the application of natural leathers in various industries. The aforementioned factors are expected to prosper the market growth of automotive interior materials in the near future. Regional Snapshots By geography, the Asia Pacific is the front-runner in the global automotive interior materials market and estimated to continue the same trend in the upcoming period. The region estimated to hold nearly 50% of the revenue share by the analysis period. This is mainly because of rising sale of automobiles in the region. Rising urbanization, robust economic development, and rising purchasing power of middle-class people in the region are other significant factors that propel the growth of automotive interior materials market. Apart from this, proliferating demand of passenger cars along with supportive government measures like to accelerate the demand for automotive interior materials in the region. Get Customization on this Research Report@ https://www.precedenceresearch.com/customization/1265 Report Highlights The Asia Pacific leads the global automotive interior materials market owing to prominent growth of automotive industry in the region North America and Europe are the significant markets in the global automotive interior materials owing to stringent regulations and amendments in the automotive applications By material, plastics captured majority of revenue share in the year 2020 because of its favorable capabilities to make a vehicle lighter and more appealing in terms of aesthetics In terms of application, seats dominated the global automotive interior materials market and hold nearly 30% in the year 2020 owing to an important segment for driver and passenger comfort Based on vehicle, passenger car leads the global automotive interior materials market in the year 2020 and projected to maintain the same trend over the forecast period due to high sales rate compared to other vehicle types On the basis of end-users, aftermarket captured considerable revenue share and register a fast growth during the forecast period because of increasing demand for parts change in vehicles Browse more Related Reports@ https://www.precedenceresearch.com/industry/automotive Key Players & Strategies The prominent players operating in the global automotive interior materials market anticipated to experience intense competition during the upcoming years mainly because of rising focus on research & development and aggressive strategies adopted by the market players to maintain their competitive edge on the global scale. Further, industry players also adopt inorganic growth strategies such as product development, merger & acquisition, partnership, collaboration, and other strategies. For instance, in May 2018, SABIC introduced its new PP compounds portfolio, particularly for automotive interior applications that strengthens its market position on the global range. Some of the key players in the global automotive interior materials market are Evonik Industries AG, UFP Technologies, Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC), Arkema, BASF SE, Stahl Holdings B.V., Hexcel Corporation, Continental AG, Toray Industries Inc., Huntsman International, Sumitomo Chemical Company, Dow Chemical Company, Trinseo S.A., Borealis AG, and Covestro AG among others. Market Segmentation By Material Outlook Composites Plastics Leather Fabrics Others By Vehicle Outlook Passenger Cars Light Commercial Vehicle (LCV) Heavy Commercial Vehicle (HCV) By Application Outlook Doors Consoles & Dashboards Seats Floor Carpet Steering Wheels Others By End-users Outlook OEMs Aftermarket By Regional Outlook North America U.S. Canada Europe U.K. Germany France Asia Pacific China India Japan South Korea Rest of the World Buy this Premium Research Report@ https://www.precedenceresearch.com/checkout/1265 You can place an order or ask any questions, please feel free to contact at sales@precedenceresearch.com | +1 9197 992 333 About Us Precedence Research is a worldwide market research and consulting organization. We give unmatched nature of offering to our customers present all around the globe across industry verticals. Precedence Research has expertise in giving deep-dive market insight along with market intelligence to our customers spread crosswise over various undertakings. We are obliged to serve our different client base present over the enterprises of medicinal services, healthcare, innovation, next-gen technologies, semi-conductors, chemicals, automotive, and aerospace & defense, among different ventures present globally. For Latest Update Follow Us: https://www.linkedin.com/company/precedence-research/ https://www.facebook.com/precedenceresearch/ https://twitter.com/Precedence_R Gloucester, MA (01930) Today Windy with rain, heavy at times. Low 62F. Winds NE at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Windy with rain, heavy at times. Low 62F. Winds NE at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Gloucester, MA (01930) Today Periods of rain and becoming windy. Rain may be heavy. Low 61F. Winds NE at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain and becoming windy. Rain may be heavy. Low 61F. Winds NE at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Gloucester, MA (01930) Today Periods of rain and windy at times. Rain becoming heavy at times overnight. Low 61F. Winds NE at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain and windy at times. Rain becoming heavy at times overnight. Low 61F. Winds NE at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. TOPEKA [mdash] Ervin H. Fry, 82, Topeka, died at 12:10 p.m., Monday, Aug. 30, at his residence after a courageous battle with cancer. He was born on April 2, 1939, in Yoder, Kansas, to Harvey and Elizabeth (Miller) Fry. On Dec. 13, 1962, in Topeka, he married Barbara Ellen Frey. She survives Governor Northam and Dominion Energy Announce Agreement to Propel Offshore Wind Industry in Virginia Clean energy, carbon reduction, new Virginia Clean Economy Act position Virginia to lead new American offshore wind industry RICHMONDGovernor Northam announced that the Port of Virginia has reached an agreement to lease a portion of the Portsmouth Marine Terminal to Dominion Energydramatically accelerating the largest commercial clean energy offshore wind development in the United States and creating a place in Virginia for a new American industry to emerge. Under the agreement, Dominion Energy will use 72 acres of the deep-water, multi-use marine cargo Portsmouth Marine Terminal as a staging and pre-assembly area for the foundations and turbines that will be installed 27 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach. The Virginia wind project will produce more than 2,600 megawatts of clean, renewable energyenough to power up to 660,000 homes. This announcement is yet another milestone toward making Virginia the national leader in offshore wind power, said Governor Ralph Northam. The Commonwealth and Dominion Energy are standing together to promote clean energy, reduce carbon emissions, create jobs, and build a new American industry on the East Coast of the United States. This location at the Port of Virginia is second to none, said chair, president and CEO of Dominion Energy Robert M. Blue. It has deep water access, no overhead restrictions, a strong, experienced maritime workforce and sufficient space for these large wind infrastructure components. It is perfectly situated to serve the Virginia offshore wind project and grow the domestic supply chain needed to complete other offshore wind projects in the United States. Northam and Blue spoke at the Business Network for Offshore Winds International Partnering Forum, a three-day global conference being held at the Greater Richmond Convention Center. It is the largest offshore wind conference in the Western Hemisphere. More than 1,300 people are participating in person, and another 1,000 online. The lease term is 10 yearsvalued at nearly $4.4 million annuallyand includes an option for two five-year renewals. The lease agreement includes significant upgrades to ensure the terminal can handle the weight of the large components that will be deployed to build the offshore wind turbines. Once the components are loaded onto ships, the vessels will travel to the construction site 27 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach. The agreement comes just 18 months after Governor Northam signed into law the Virginia Clean Economy Act, cementing Virginias commitment to clean and renewable energy. The law sets a target of 2034 for producing at least 5,200 megawatts of energy through offshore wind, and a target of 2045 for achieving 100 percent carbon-free energy production. Negotiations accelerated in July, when the Virginia Port Authority Board of Commissioners directed Stephen A. Edwards, CEO and executive director of the VPA, to finalize the lease negotiation. For the last several years it has been known that The Port of Virginia, and specifically the Portsmouth Marine Terminal, is positioned to be the leading Mid-Atlantic logistics hub for the offshore wind industry, said Port of Virginia CEO Stephen Edwards. This agreement capitalizes on PMTs potential and solidifies Virginias place as the leader in this growing and competitive field. This port is ready to support Dominion Energy and all of the businesses and jobs that will ensure the success of offshore wind in Virginia. Virginias agreement with Dominion Energy accelerates the Commonwealths transition to clean, renewable energy, creates good-paying jobs, and expands Virginias economy, said Secretary of Transportation Shannon Valentine. This partnership also positions the Port of Virginia as the hub of this emerging industry, and Virginia as the forerunner in offshore wind. Our coastal assets speak for themselves when it comes to business opportunities for offshore wind, said Secretary of Commerce and Trade Brian Ball. Virginia has been recognized as the countrys best state to do business since 2019, and we welcome companies eager to expand here in the United States. There is no better state than Virginia to host this years International Offshore Wind Partnering Forum, said Business Network for Offshore Wind CEO and President Liz Burdock. Under Governor Northams leadership, Virginia continues to show a strong commitment to offshore wind power and the many benefits it offersjob creation, green energy, new technology, and more. We are proud to partner with the Commonwealth to host this important conference. Offshore wind is a growing industry in the United States, backed by the Biden Administrations target of 30 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity by 2030. Dominion Energys Virginia project is a vital part of the companys clean energy strategy to meet standards outlined in the Virginia Clean Economy Act and to achieve the companys net zero carbon dioxide and methane emissions commitment across its 16 state footprint by 2050. Presently, Dominion Energys two-turbine pilot project is operating off of the coast of Virginia Beach. Last month, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management issued a Notice of Intent for the full commercial project. The Notice of Intent triggers a federal review of the project and preparation of an Environmental Impact Statement, which will take about two years. # # # Amy Holt enjoys adventure and the outdoors. She has a passion for hiking, camping, and backpacking. Support local journalism We are making critical coverage of the coronavirus available for free. Please consider subscribing so we can continue to bring you the latest news and information on this developing story. / GPD GREENWICH The newest member of the Greenwich Police Department is a town native who previously served in the Bridgeport Police Department. Officer Steve Caldwell graduated from Greenwich High School in 2003 and attended Johnson & Wales University, where he graduated in 2005 with his associates of degree in criminal justice. Phone records, ride-share company documents and video surveillance footage have established a rough timeline of when a Greenwich native was last seen outside a New York apartment to when her remains were found a week later in New Jersey, according to an arrest warrant for the man charged with helping to dispose her body. The body of Nicole Flanagan, a mother of three, was found naked in a 55-gallon plastic drum Aug. 13 in Ridgefield Park, N.J., a Bergen County town near the George Washington Bridge. The Bergen County Prosecutors Office announced Tuesday the arrest of Aquellio Parker, 29, in connection with the Greenwich natives death. Parkers arrest warrant, obtained Wednesday by Hearst Connecticut Media, sheds new light on the case and raises questions about a second suspect who apparently still remains at-large. The arrest warrant describes Flanagan, 42, meeting up with Parker at an upscale apartment building in Manhattans Financial District around 1:45 a.m. Aug. 6. Flanagan, who received a text message from Parker before she arrived, was last seen getting into an elevator with him and heading up to an apartment, the warrant stated. The warrant does not provide any information about what police believe may have happened over the next few days, but indicates Flanagan may have remained in the Wall Street apartment until Aug. 12. Using ride-share records obtained for Parker, police said he returned to the apartment at 95 Wall St. around 11:30 a.m. Aug. 11, according to the complaint. Surveillance footage captured Parker carrying a large drum, which appears to match the one found in New Jersey with Flanagans remains, the warrant said. The next night, Parker and another individual are seen on surveillance video arriving at the Wall Street apartment in a white commercial van around 9:30 p.m. Aug. 12, the warrant said. The two are seen grabbing a luggage cart from the lobby and bringing it to the buildings freight elevator around 9:45 p.m., the warrant said. Several minutes later, Parker and the other individual are seen exiting 95 Wall Street with a drum matching the description of the one recovered in Ridgefield Park, the warrant states. Law enforcement databases registered the van traveling across the George Washington Bridge a little after 10:30 p.m. that night, the warrant states. Ridgefield Park video surveillance near Teaneck Road and Hobart Street where Flanagans body was found shows the van circling the area, according to the warrant. The van is then seen stopped for several minutes around 10:45 p.m. in the area where the body was found, the warrant stated. The van was later registered traveling back across the Alexander Hamilton Bridge, which spans between the Bronx and Manhattan, a little before 11:30 p.m. that night, the warrant stated. The rental company reported the van had been rented in July, but was never returned. Two days later, Ridgefield Park police discovered Flanagans remains after receiving a complaint about the suspicious drum that was left on the street in front of a residence, the warrant stated. The New York Police Department identified Parker from video surveillance, according to the warrant. Parker, of Queens, N.Y., turned himself in Sunday on charges of being an accomplice to disturbing, moving and/or concealing human remains; being an accomplice to desecrating, damaging and/or destroying human remains; and conspiring with a co-defendant to disturb, move, conceal and/or desecrate a deceased body. He is being held pending extradition to New Jersey. Parker is scheduled to appear in New York Criminal Court on Sept. 7 at 9 a.m. Flanagans cause of death is still pending further testing from the Bergen County medical examiners office. Flanagans family said the mother of three was born in Greenwich and attended the towns high school in the mid-90s. She loved her kids a good mother to them. She was loved by a lot of people, a lot of people care about her, her brother said. The family has launched a GoFundMe fundraising campaign, which has gathered more than $9,000 as of Wednesday for funeral arrangements. Flanagans wake is planned for Thursday and the funeral is scheduled for Friday in Greenwich. SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) A California judge said Wednesday that she anticipates a two-week hearing early next year before she decides if Scott Peterson deserves a new trial in the 2002 death of his pregnant wife. That's more than a year after the California Supreme Court ordered Superior Court Judge Anne-Christine Massullo to consider if juror misconduct was so significant that it denied him a fair trial. Massullo is expected to hear testimony from juror Richelle Nice, who is at the center of the dispute and has denied that she was influenced by her own background of domestic abuse. Nice is identified in court papers as Juror 7. But she co-authored a book about the case with six other jurors. That hearing would get to the meat and potatoes of what the jurors information is, Deputy Stanislaus County District Attorney Dave Harris said. Laci Peterson, 27, was eight months pregnant with their unborn son, Connor, when she was killed. Massullo must decide if Nice committed prejudicial misconduct by failing to disclose that she had sought a restraining order in 2000 for fear that her boyfriends ex-girlfriend could harm Nice's own unborn child. Petersons attorneys revealed in a June court filing that Nice also failed to disclose that her boyfriend beat her in 2001 while she was pregnant with another child. As a perspective juror, Nice had answered no when she was asked if she had ever been involved in a lawsuit or been a crime victim. Nice said in a court filing that she didnt think the restraining order was a lawsuit, nor did she feel victimized the way the law might define that term. Massullo said she had wanted to schedule the evidentiary hearing for October, and she might still try to do it in early November. But she said delays in gathering evidence and sworn witness testimony, partly because of the coronavirus pandemic, make it more likely she will schedule the hearing for two weeks in late January or early February, after the winter holidays. She expects to set the dates during a Sept. 22 hearing after considering several legal filings in the meantime. Peterson, 48, participated in Wednesday's hearing through a telephone link from San Quentin State Prison, home of California's death row. The state Supreme Court separately overturned Petersons death sentence last year over unrelated faulty juror selection, and prosecutors said they wont again seek to have him executed. If Peterson gets a new trial, his attorney has said he will present new evidence bolstering the defense theory that Laci Peterson was killed when she stumbled upon a nearby burglary. Investigators said that on Christmas Eve 2002, Peterson dumped the bodies from his fishing boat into San Francisco Bay, where they surfaced months later. The states high court last year said that there was considerable circumstantial evidence incriminating Peterson in the slayings. WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) A former Delaware political candidate who unsuccessfully sought the Republican nominations for governor and U.S. Senate has pleaded guilty to federal charges of mailing threats to a lawyer who represented his wife in a divorce case. Michael Protack pleaded guilty on Wednesday to two counts of mailing a threatening communication. Protack, 63, faces a maximum sentence of five years on each count at his Dec. 6 sentencing but will likely receive a lesser sentence. Prosecutors have agreed not to oppose a reduction in the offense level used in sentencing calculations based on his acceptance of responsibility. Prosecutors say Protack, who now lives in Seal Beach, California, mailed two death threats to Delaware lawyer Patrick Boyer earlier this year. An unsigned January letter was addressed to Boyer. Little Boy, with a return address of the Viper Association at a Wilmington post office box, according to investigators. The VIPERS are coming for you. We all have military experience and have no fear of the outcome, the letter states. You are a coward who will regret his actions. Count on being dead by June 2021. You wont know when, where or how but your end has been written. Take the time and put your affairs in order because they will not find your body for weeks. Authorities said Protack followed up a few weeks later with a letter containing a graphic image of a mutilated body. Protack unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for governor in 2004 and 2008 and narrowly lost the GOP primary for U.S. Senate in 2006. According to an FBI affidavit, Boyer began representing Mary Ann Protack in divorce proceedings in 2018 and helped her obtain protection from abuse, or PFA, orders against Protack. I could shoot you in the head and spend the rest of my life in jail happy about it, Protack allegedly told his wife at one point. The affidavit added he also allegedly once told her, Someone is going to die today. The divorce proceedings appear to have started around the same time that Protack, a former airline pilot who served in the Marine Corps, was notified that Delta Air Lines intended to terminate him. In a federal lawsuit filed in January 2018, Protack claimed that Delta had harassed and bullied him for years over his union activity and repeatedly questioned his physical and mental fitness after he was injured in a hit-and-run incident in 2012. The lawsuit also claims Delta unfairly portrayed Protack as obstructionist for refusing to submit to a psychiatric examination. The case was dismissed early last year after being transferred from California to Georgia. Protack filed a similar lawsuit, without an attorney, earlier this year. That case was dismissed in late June because of Protacks failure to properly serve the defendants. ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) The Maryland State Board of Education voted Thursday for an emergency regulation to require children and adults to wear masks in K-12 schools statewide to help stop the spread of COVID-19. While most of Maryland's 24 jurisdictions already have mandated masks in schools, five counties have not - Carroll, Cecil, Dorchester, Somerset and Worcester counties. The 14-member board's vote was 11-1 for the regulation, with two board members absent. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended universal mask-wearing for teachers and students inside school buildings this fall, citing the rapid spread of the delta variant. Most states allow school districts to set their own mask policies. Maryland would join California, Illinois and Louisiana in deciding to require masks for students and teachers statewide, if a state legislative committee gives final approval. Susan Getty, a board member, noted that about half of the state's students are not even eligible for a vaccine at this time because of their age. People 12 and over are eligible to be vaccinated. Getty said mandating mask-wearing is an additional strategy to protect students, especially against the highly contagious delta variant. The CDC, as of today, has designated all counties in Maryland as high- or substantially-high risk. No one is in the low category," Getty said. "Because of this and the 80,000 cases of COVID already with children under age 19, I fully support this mask mandate at this time. The mandate still will require the approval of the Maryland General Assembly's Joint Committee on Administrative, Executive, and Legislative Review. The regulation could take effect 10 days after it is received by the committee. It would be effective for 180 days to meet exigent circumstances. On Wednesday, a coalition of 32 of Maryland's 47 state senators sent a letter to the board's leadership, urging them to approve emergency masking in schools. Senate President Bill Ferguson, a Baltimore Democrat, commended the board's vote. He said the joint legislative committee will work expeditiously to approve this emergency regulation. Ferguson also thanked State Superintendent of Schools Mohammed Choudhury for his leadership. His voice was a critical component in todays decision to do what is in the best interest of students, families, teachers, and staff, Ferguson said in a statement. House Speaker Adrienne Jones described the board's action as a common sense vote to protect our children. The AELR Committee will vote to approve this regulation, Jones, a Baltimore County Democrat, said in a statement. Jones also urged Gov. Larry Hogan to use his authority to put the mandate in place right away to avoid the 10-day wait period. Our children can't wait, she said. Hogan, a Republican, has said he's leaving the decision up to local boards. While the governor has been very clear that he believes local decision makers are best qualified to make these decisions, this policy is in line with current state and federal health guidance and the board has the legal authority to take this action, said Kata Hall, a spokeswoman for Hogan. "The governors top priority is getting our children back into classrooms for in-person instruction. The vote comes as Maryland has seen a rise in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations. The state reported an increase of 1,244 confirmed cases over a 24-hour period on Thursday. Also on Thursday, hospitalizations reached 720, after having dipped below 100 on July 2. GREENWICH First Selectman Fred Camillo is pushing back against criticism of his new mask and vaccine mandates issued in response to the rise in COVID-19 cases in town. On Friday, Camillo announced a mandate starting Monday to require masks in common areas inside town-owned buildings and private businesses, including offices, stores and restaurants. Im getting some emails and text messages from people citing studies that say masks are no good and theyre not working, Camillo said Wednesday during his weekly update on COVID-19. The American Journal of Medicine, the New England Journal of Medicine, the annals of internal medicine, the CDC, the local health department, the state health department, doctors and Greenwich Hospital all cant be wrong on this, he said as he warned residents to avoid misinformation on the internet. And when it comes to those who say that masks infringe on freedom, Camillo said he cant buy it. I could attack that argument all day long, but ... Ive found with certain people youre never going to convince them of the dangers of COVID-19, he said. I always tell people, if you dont care about your own health, care about your neighbor or your family member (then dont wear a mask). And if you dont care about them, that says an awful lot. Ultimately, Camillo said the overwhelming majority of people are doing the right thing, and were very proud of them. The complaints, he said, are coming from a minority of people who just dont want any restrictions. As of Wednesday, 81 new cases of COVID-19 had been diagnosed in town since Aug. 18, bringing the total up to 5,478 since March 2020, he said. Of those cases, the town Department of Health considers 69 to be active, which is down nine cases since last week. And for the first time in months, a resident diagnosed with the virus died, bringing the local death toll to 90, Camillo said. Mask measures The first selectman said the mask requirement may be for a short time just until the number of COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations drops. We can get to the other side of this quicker by just having a minor inconvenience for however long, Camillo said. I dont think its even going to be that long, but we need to do it. Otherwise it will be long, and you will have event cancellations and capacity limits will be imposed on us by the state. Were trying to stay ahead of that. Many of the complaints have come from gyms, which say the mask rule is costing them business, he said. The intent here is not to hurt businesses, said Camillo, who said he uses a mask while at the gym to send that message. But he said he knew some gyms had been allowing patrons to take off their masks before the delta variant hit. We want to send the message that were taking this seriously, Camillo said. When youre in a common area, put it on. He further explained where masks should be worn. If youre at a table or at a desk, you dont have to wear one. Youre far away from people, he said. If youre in line at a store, youre in a common area. If youre walking around in a busy hallway thats a common area. Camillo said he expected to meet with Gov. Ned Lamont on Thursday to discuss several issues, including the response to COVID-19 and the delta variant. The town will release more guidance on the policy by the end of the week, Camillo said. Rules on vaccines In his mandate last Friday, Camillo also required all town employees to become fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or undergo weekly testing for the virus. The deadline is Sept. 27 the same date set by the state for all state employees as well as employees in nursing homes and public schools to meet the same requirement. There has been no pushback from town employees, Camillo said. The number of fully vaccinated residents, among the 52,000 who are eligible, is up to 77.62 percent, he said. And the number who have gotten at least one shot is more than 84 percent. We are doing well there and hopefully these measures that we put in place will get us through this period where people are coming back to town and unfortunately are bringing the virus with them from other locations, Camillo said. He and Greenwich Hospital President Diane Kelly said they hope more residents get vaccinated now that the federal Food and Drug Administration has given full approval for Pfizers vaccine. The lack of approval was the No. 1 reason weve heard people say theyre not getting it, Kelly said. If this was a barrier to people, Im very hopeful that they will take that to heart and then theyll move forward and take the vaccine. As of Wednesday, Greenwich Hospital was treating 11 patients diagnosed with COVID-19, with two in the intensive care unit with one on a ventilator, she said. Of the 11 hospitalized patients in town, 10 had not been vaccinated, Kelly said. Overall at the Yale New Haven Health System, of which Greenwich Hospital is a part, there are 136 COVID-19 patients, an increase of 19 since last week. Kelly said that 100 of those patients had not been vaccinated. The important message here is, please, its not too late to get your vaccine, she said. Greenwich Hospital has resumed administering vaccinations for immunocompromised residents who need a third booster shot through its location at 500 W. Putnam Ave. Kelly said eligibility for boosters could expand in the coming weeks based on guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Vaccines are also available for free at local pharmacies, including at CVS or Walgreens. kborsuk@greenwichtime.com HARTFORD Newly elected state Sen. Ryan Fazio was sworn in as the newest GOP member of the legislature before a vocal crowd of supporters in the Senate Chamber at the state Capitol on Thursday morning. Surrounded by friends, family and fellow Republicans, Fazio took the oath of office from Secretary of the State Denise Merrill and spoke briefly as he officially began representing the 36th District, which covers all of Greenwich as well as portions of Stamford and New Canaan. I know and love our community and our state, Fazio said after he was sworn in. And while our state faces immense challenges, I know with a positive change in our state government that Connecticut can succeed like never before. There is always hope. Fazio was elected last week in a special election to fill the remainder of the term of Alex Kasser, a Democrat who resigned unexpectedly in June. She was who was elected last November to her second term, which runs through the end of 2022. Fazio lost in a match-up against Kasser in 2020, but last week he defeated Democratic candidate Alexis Gevanter and petition candidate John Blankley in the special election. In his remarks at the Capitol, Fazio thanked the voters for placing their trust in me and became emotional when speaking about his grandmother, Anne Gadaleta, who passed away Wednesday. He said she was the person most on my mind as he took the oath. No one did more to support and encourage my love of country and interest in government from the time I was very young than she did, Fazio said. She was the last surviving of 21 children in her Irish-Catholic family, which sounds like Im making it up. But Im not. Its true. She was born in the Great Depression, and her family didnt have two nickels together. But she told me that she always felt rich because she had faith in God and family and friends, he said. I know I am a rich man today because I have faith and family and friends. And I promise you I will always show the same faith and devotion to doing what is right as your state senator that my grandmother showed her whole life. At the swearing-in ceremony, Fazio led the crowd, which included his parents, stepmother, sister and a brother, in the Pledge of Allegiance. Now that he has taken office, Fazio will soon be assigned to committees by the Republican Senate leadership. Those assignments are still under discussion, Fazio said Thursday. In addition to his family, several prominent Greenwich political figures were on hand for the swearing in, including First Selectman Fred Camillo, who is a former state representative, as well as Selectwoman Lauren Rabin and former state Sen. L. Scott Frantz, who previously held the seat. Fazio was also welcomed to the state Senate and the GOP caucus by Sen. Kevin Kelly, the Republican Senate minority leader. However, Democrats retain a 23 to 13 seat majority in the state Senate after this seat changed party control. In the first few minutes I met Ryan Fazio, it was immediately clear to me that he cares about the people he represents, Kelly said while serving as an unofficial master of ceremonies at the event. He cares about our state. He cares about making a difference. He embodies the next generation of Connecticut leadership. kborsuk@greenwichtime.com Guam Boonie Stompers Inc. will be offering public hiking adventures that include swimming and rock sliding on Saturdays in September. Hikers should provide their own transportation, and children must be accompanied by a responsible adult. Note that weather conditions can make the hikes more difficult than described. No reservations are required. To join, meet at 9 a.m. behind the center court of Chamorro Village in Hagatna. The cost is $5 for hikers over 17. If you complete 10 hikes, you get a free Boonie Stomp T-shirt. For more information, go to facebook.com/GuamBoonieStompersInc or call (671) 787-4238. Sept. 4: Mt. Finansanta, very difficult, 7 hours for 5 miles The Sept. 4 trek combines three difficult hikes together. Enjoy the fantastic views of two mountains, a jungle river and a narrow gorge with swimming, jumping and rock sliding. Bring: 4 quarts of water, wet shoes, gloves, sunscreen, insect repellent, lunch and camera. Special conditions: Sword grass, long steep slopes, walking in water and slippery rocks. Sept. 11: Alutom Falls with Upper Sigua Option, medium/difficult, 3 hours for 2 miles Starting from the top of Mount Alutom, hike down to a hidden green waterfall with jumping and swimming. Then continue to the steep drop to Upper Sigua Falls for waterfall fun before climbing back out. Bring: 2 liters of water, hiking shoes, gloves, swimsuit, sun screen, insect repellent, lunch and camera. Special conditions: Steep slopes, rocky trail and mud. Sept. 18: Aguada Falls, very difficult, 5 hours for 5 miles Trek to experience a large and beautiful waterfall in western Guam. Travel to a waterfall the group has not visited yet as youll be going across a long steep and grassy ridge to the waterfall. There are smaller falls and swimming spots along the way. Bring: 3 liters of water, hiking shoes, gloves, sun screen, insect repellent, lunch and a camera. Special conditions: Sword grass, river walking, steep slopes and little shade. Sept. 25: Madofan Falls and Agaga River, medium/difficult, 4 hours for 2 miles Hike down the southwestern savannah and experience a series of three large waterfalls on the Madofan River. Then walk on the beach headed to Agaga River and head upstream on a narrow jungle river to find more waterfalls. Those wanting an easier exit can walk to Sella Bay. Bring: 3 quarts of water, wet shoes, gloves, swim suit, sunscreen, insect repellant and lunch. Special conditions: Sword grass, steep hills and walking in water. Twenty-eight years ago, two astronauts made the decision to open a huge space dumpster on the moon. They released an evil witch named Rita Repulsa and her four minions, leading to another alien trapped in a tube on Earth to find five teenagers with attitude. No, this isnt a Space X story, but the pilot to the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. If you were lucky to be a child in the 90s, you were blessed with Fox Kids waking you up every Saturday morning. The lineup consisted of the animated X-Men, Spider-Man and Batman series, and of course the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers aired Aug. 28, 1993 the date fans the world over celebrate National Power Rangers Day. Created by Haim Saban, the series was inspired by the original Japanese series, Super Sentai. It had some of Super Sentais footage spliced with what Saban had shot with American characters. Was it devastating for me to know the truth years later? No, not really. I got the power Saying I was a fan is an understatement. Before being obsessed with a galaxy far far away, my 3-year-old self had an obsession with Jason (Austin St. John), Billy (David Yost), Zach (Walter Emanuel Jones), Trini (Thuy Trang) and Kimberly (Amy Jo Johnson), and with Tommy (Jason David Frank) later. It didnt help that my older brother would feed that obsession by recording the episodes for me. That way, I could watch it as much as I wanted! It was Saturday morning for me every day! I was so happy. The obsession grew and I had to collect all the action figures from Ban Dai (sorry mom and dad), watch the 1995 and 1997 films, play the video game for the Sega Genesis, see them at Guam Reef, and even dress up as the Pink Ranger for Halloween. My parents were just lucky that I didnt adopt kicking furniture around. My love for the Power Rangers went past Mighty Morphin. It transitioned through Power Rangers Zeo and Power Rangers: Turbo. If you must ask, yes, I also had those action figures, and I did believe that short kid can grow into adulthood when he became the Blue Ranger. I remember getting as far as when they passed the atmosphere with Power Rangers in Space. Goodbye, my friends Unfortunately, like Ginger Spice leaving the Spice Girls, 1998 was when I parted with the rangers. I wasnt sure why I stopped following the series. Probably school, childhood friends or possibly that new craze where I gotta catch em all to be the very best, that no one ever was. Either way, it was difficult watching my Power Rangers collection go to a cousin who probably tore them to pieces like Sid from Toy Story. I didnt want to know the truth as to what happened to my Power Rangers toys then, and I dont think I ever want to know. 2017 Twenty-four years after the shows initial debut, 22 years after its first movie, Power Rangers got the reboot treatment as a feature film. Despite the franchise then being on its 18th iteration, Power Rangers Ninja Steel, Haim Saban decided to see if there was still nostalgic love left for his successful franchise. The movie centered around the main cast of characters from the original show, learning in a short span of time on how to become the Power Rangers, stop Rita Repulsa (Elizabeth Banks) and still be teenagers with attitude for Zordon (Bryan Cranston). I honestly was worried about this remake at first. Even if I thought the original first movie was awesome and action packed as a kid, I understand that it didnt age as well with all its 90s cheesiness. Once I got the chance to see it, I was pleasantly surprised. Saban understood that as cheesy and nostalgic as the Power Rangers were, the remake had to have some relevancy. Each ranger had their own teenage struggles that didnt come across whiney or trivial. It was as if you took the issues the kids from The Breakfast Club had, but you made them superheroes that have Iron Man-like armor. I enjoyed their dynamic so much that I didnt even mind Bill Hader as Alpha 5! Granted, the film had Krispy Kreme shoehorned, but I could understand that Saban had to get their movie made somehow. If heavy product placement was going to fund the movie, I was all for it. Was it cheesy? Yes, but that was what Mighty Morphin Power Rangers were all about! Future It was also reported in October 2020 that Hasbro is looking to reboot the franchise again after it obtained the rights to the franchise. Reports say that Producer and Director Jonathan Entwistle will be connecting Power Rangers through TV and soon feature films. Think of him like Kevin Feige from Marvel and how hes connecting all the Marvel properties. As it stands, the Power Rangers are now on their 20th TV iteration with Power Ranger Dino Fury. I have yet to catch an episode due to ... adulting. As a former diehard fan, Im both hopeful for where the franchise is going. Knowing that it survived two decades of network changes, company buyouts and changing cast members, I have the upmost hope that this franchise will be able to create new fans while catering to us nostalgic fans. I give Hasbro my blessings and say, Its morphing time. After earning high praise from Simon Cowell for their quarterfinals performance, Guams Xiamara Starr and her dance group Chapkidz are now setting their sights on the semifinals of Americas Got Talent. After their rousing performance, which was broadcast on Aug. 24, Cowell called Chapkidz the best act of the night. This stage can make you or break you. Tonight, it made you, Cowell said, prompting the troupe to jump up and down in excitement. It was sensational, absolutely sensational. By far, the best act by a mile. The results of the third quarterfinals for the shows 16th season were broadcast on Aug. 25. The first of two semifinal performances will be broadcast on Aug. 31 with the second semifinals show on Sept. 7. The final performances will be shown on Sept. 14 and results will be broadcast on Sept. 15. Other acts that were given the nod include ANICA, Brooke Simpson, Keith Apicary, Klek Entos, Lea Kyle, Michael Winslow, Rialcris, The Curtis Family C-Notes, UniCircle Flow, World Taekwando Demonstration Team and Storm Large. For their quarterfinals performance, Chapkidz traded their striking red skirts and black shiny tops for yellow gloves, white button-down shirts and black shorts to perform Problema by Daddy Yankee. Their high energy hip-hop moves and super synchronized sets ending dramatically with all but one of the 35 dancers flat on the stage brought all four judges to their feet. Its crazy. The energy you guys give is incredible, and there are so many of you, and I look at all of your feet and everyone literally is doing exactly the same thing. It is incredible, Heidi Klum said. I also love how you use the entire stage, I love that you dont just think forward you do an AGT sign, you do a heart that you capture from above so you think 360, youre not just what we see right here very well done, good for you guys! I mean, its incredible because its no joke to have so many people on a stage and you guys are like, 37 or something like that, and to be so synchronized, its unbelievable, its beautiful, Sofia Vergara said. Dancing is my favorite part of AGT no one has ever (won) the competition being a dancer, so maybe, maybe this year The dance group is based out of Fairfield, California, and led by Greg Chapkis. His Chapkis Dance Studio had another dance group, Chapkis Dance Family, performed on the show in Season 10. Following the performance and judges responses, Chapkis Dance posted a message of appreciation on their Instagram account earlier on Aug. 25: Thank you to all the judges for their encouraging words and for thinking so highly of us! We definitely worked for that critique but we didnt expect it. We hope you felt the same America!! Were excited to see if we advance to the next round. In a later post after results were broadcast, Chapkis Dance Studio said on their Instagram, Thank you all for the love, support and most importantly your vote! We couldnt have done this without you! Back to work we go!! Well see you soon America!! Tourists, visiting Guam from Taiwan, take some time to explore and capture a few images while at the Plaza de Espana in Hagatna July 13. GVB said there are opportunities for Guam to get tourists from South Korea, Japan and Indonesia. Joseph Bo Roman II will serve no additional time in prison after he was sentenced to credit for time served for his role in the drug conspiracy with Mark Mayo. In 2018, Roman, Mayo and co-actor Daniel Pangelinan were arrested in connection to picking up a package containing a little less than a pound of methamphetamine from the Barrigada Post Office under the orders of drug dealer Lovelia Mendoza, according to court documents. Roman pleaded guilty shortly after his arrest and testified against co-defendant Mark Mayo in the trial. Roman initially faced a sentence ranging from 30 to 37 months in prison for the charge of conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine hydrochloride, but Chief Judge Tydingco-Gatewood said his progress in receiving treatment for his drug addiction at Lighthouse Recovery Center was a key factor in granting a variance to the sentence. The defendant has worked hard, in this case, to try and improve himself and his motivation is to try to develop a relationship with his children, which by the way he should do that because his children dont need a dad who is not with the program. They need a dad who is sober, Tydingco-Gatewood said. The variance of the sentence to give Roman credit for time served was not only argued for by his attorney, Jay Arriola, but Laura Sambataro from the United States Attorneys Office. The agreement was made because it is significant to the government that Roman received treatment. Roman completed a six-month intensive program at Lighthouse Recovery earlier this week on Aug 23. Arriola also indicated Roman has not touched drugs since he was first arrested in 2019. He has since been employed and attending the GCA Trades Academy to pursue a vocation in air conditioning services. Tydingco-Gatewood remarked the program Roman completed is tough and is one of the few defendants she knows who was able to do it. Community members suggested ways to improve mental health and substance abuse care on island with grant money for which the Guam Behavioral Health and Wellness Center is applying. The center is hoping to get $466,446 from the federal Mental Health Block Grant. The grant would support community-based programs on the island that serve children with serious emotional disturbances, adults with serious mental illness and people with substance abuse issues. An application requirement is to have a public comment session, which was held on Wednesday, to hear how the funds will most effectively respond to the needs of those requiring the centers services. Lawyer Daniel Somerfleck voiced his concern about people with substance abuse issues who need services and are exposed to law enforcement. Guam Behavioral Health and Wellness clinical administrator Reina Sanchez said when the centers mobile crisis unit responds to a scene, they are accompanied by first responders who are not bound by confidentiality. Somerflecks worry is this could lead to an arrest, or discourage those in need from seeking help. How many people are open, willing and want to cooperate with the Guam Police Department? said Somerfleck, who emphasized the need for a system of peer-based responders independent of law enforcement who are trained in crisis management. He agrees with the centers goal to train police officers on how to better handle situations of those experiencing mental illness or substance abuse issues. Another area discussed during the session was segregating students with serious mental health issues from school peers by putting them in resource classrooms. They are already in need of special education, and then on top of that you are taking them needlessly from their friends, said Lourdes Bascon Mendiola. She said a goal should be to help the students eventually rejoin regular classes and not be stuck in resource learning. Its very hard to get in, but its also very hard to get out. It can be a revolving door to nowhere said Tyrone Bryan, a psychiatric social services administrator for Guam Behavioral Health and Wellness Center. Bryan wants an assessment of how many students went into resource learning, how long they stayed in those classrooms, and if it had a helpful, long-lasting impact. The application was about 85% completed by the time of the session, but could not be finished until feedback was given from the public, said Sanchez. The Mental Health Block Grant is a non-competitive grant mandated by Congress under the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, a branch of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Guam residents can expect thunderstorms and wind gusts of up to 35 mph Thursday evening, according to theNational Weather Service Guam Forecast Office. The office issued a special weather statement for for the island until 7:30 p.m., as a line of showers is moving across Guam, bringing heavy rainfall and winds gusting up to 35 mph. Thunderstorms are possible, especially over central Guam. Up to 1 inch of rain has fallen over central and northern Guam. Earlier in the evening, forecasters issued a thunderstorm advisory. Thunderstorms are possible or occurring within 20 nautical miles of the airport. The Offices of Guam Homeland Security and Civil Defense advise that if lightning is seen or thunder is heard, remain indoors. The Offices of Guam Homeland Security and Civil Defense reminded the community to practice caution while traveling on wet roads, driving below the speed limit and allowing enough braking distance between vehicles. William Topasna Mantanona was sentenced to six months in prison for his role in influencing a juror for a drug trial involving his brother, John Boom Mantanona. William Mantanona appeared before Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood at the District Court of Guam with his attorney, William Gavras, who argued Mantanona was pressured by his brother to influence a juror of reaching a not guilty verdict for the drug trial, United States vs. Raymond John Martinez and Juanita Moser. John Boom Mantanona served as an investigator for defendants Martinez and Moser in that trial. Gavras said aside from meeting with a juror, Greg Tyquiengco, at a funeral to discuss the not guilty verdict, William Mantanona had a small role in the jury tampering. In response, Rosetta San Nicholas from the United States Attorneys Office presented a timeline of events that showed William Mantanona made several calls to his brother and Tyquiengco showing he was more involved than Gavras had claimed. The timeline included a call history showing multiple calls were made between the three involved in the jury tampering while trial was on going. Before being sentenced, William Mantanona addressed Tydingco-Gatewood apologizing for his actions. I hope you will find it in your heart to forgive me, William Mantanona said. Thank you for hearing my case. Although Tydingco-Gatewood believed William Mantanonas apology, she felt he was culpable for influencing Tyquiengco as the trial was eventually thrown out. It appears to me Mr. Mantanona, you were very involved and front and center with your brother in this case, Tydingco-Gatewood said after getting a clear perspective from San Nicholass presentation. William Mantanona will serve his six months of incarceration at the Department of Corrections on Guam and will have two years of supervised release after for the charge of making a false statement. William Mantanona was indicted on charges of obstructing justice by endeavoring to influence a juror and false statement in 2018. The charge of obstructing justice by endeavoring to influence a juror was dismissed when William Mantanona entered a plea of guilty in January 2020. California judge sentences two Guam drug dealers to prison Two drug dealers, Raymond Martinez and Juanita Moser Martinez, were sentenced by a Californi I am one of the many who are dismayed with the governors latest executive order, restricting the movement of unvaccinated family members, fri Haiti - Politic : Prime Minister Henry launches the Emergency Alert Program Wednesday, August 25, 2021, as part of the major earthquake of 7.2 on the Richter scale which hit the southern peninsula of Haiti hard, Prime Minister ai Ariel Henry launched the "Emergency Alert" Program at the General Directorate of Civil Protection (DGPC) Designed within the framework of Haiti's National Development and Recovery Plan (PDNA), in partnership with the UN, the World Bank, the European Union and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the "Emergency Alert" Program aims to provide vital multisectoral assistance to people affected by the August 14 earthquake. It also aims to support livelihoods and basic services in the areas affected by the earthquake. The Prime Minister recalled that by launching this Program, the Government wants to emphasize the importance of making a good bridge between emergency and development, between the short term and the long term. Ariel Henry believes that this mobilization of resources is all the more crucial since it concerns all the strategic needs such as : drinking water infrastructure, deeply damaged, thus exposing the population not only to water scarcity, but also to the risks of infections (cholera, malaria) and without forgetting the fight against food and nutritional insecurity affecting nearly 40% of the overall Haitian population. In addition, the Prime Minister reaffirmed on his Twitter account the determination of his Government to support parents, teachers and students in the great South. Question of facilitating the resumption of school activities, as quickly as possible and under better conditions "The return to school is one of the main priorities of the government. Therefore, we are committed to clearing the sites of collapsed schools. We will also support the parents of students and teachers decapitalized, following the earthquake that devastated the southern peninsula." This launch took place in the presence of Minister Dieuseul Simon Desras (Planning), Jean Emmanuel Jacquet (Culture), Mrs. Helene La Lime Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations, Humanitarian Coordinator Bruno Lemarquis and Deputy Relief Coordinator of emergency, Ramesh Rajasingham. Read also about the earthquake : https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34586-haiti-earthquake-550-churches-and-more-than-400-catholic-and-protestant-schools-destroyed.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34559-haiti-flash-the-death-toll-rises-to-2-207-dead-and-12-268-injured.html https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-34554-icihaiti-earthquake-the-army-to-protect-humanitarian-convoys.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34551-haiti-earthquakethe-ccrif-will-pay-nearly-$40m-compensation-to-haiti.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34545-haiti-earthquake-the-private-sector-is-mobilizing-to-come-to-the-aid-of-the-victims.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34543-haiti-flash-at-least-266-national-schools-damaged-or-destroyed.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34540-haiti-earthquake-the-international-community-continues-to-mobilize.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34538-haiti-flash-at-least-3-aftershocks-between-47-and-51-in-48-hours.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34537-haiti-earthquake-more-than-half-of-churches-are-destroyed.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34525-haiti-flash-the-toll-is-growing-nearly-15-000-victims-partial-assessment.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34522-haiti-humanitarian-update-on-international-aid.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34520-haiti-unicef-nearly-540-000-children-in-haiti-were-affected-by-the-earthquake.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34516-haiti-flash-nearly-2-000-dead-and-10-000-injured-partial-assessment.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34512-haiti-earthquake-rain-of-messages-of-sympathy-part-2.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34509-haiti-earthquake-mexico-chile-taiwan-japan-venezuela-international-aid-is-coming.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34507-haiti-flash-1-417-dead-6-975-injured-84-225-houses-destroyed-or-damaged-partial-assessment.html https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-34501-icihaiti-earthquake-food-for-the-poor-in-action.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34500-haiti-usa-american-aid-arrives-in-haiti.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34498-haiti-flash-the-partial-death-toll-increases-nearly-1-300-dead-and-5-700-injured.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34496-haiti-flash-the-toll-is-increasing-724-dead-international-aid-is-arriving.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34493-haiti-earthquake-rain-of-messages-of-sympathy-part-1.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34492-haiti-earthquake-the-international-community-has-started-to-show-its-solidarity.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34488-haiti-flash-more-than-300-dead-nearly-2-000-injured-very-significant-material-damage-provisional-assessment.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34487-haiti-flash-the-human-toll-promises-to-be-heavy-already-227-dead-and-hundreds-injured.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34486-haiti-flash-7-new-aftershocks-in-the-southern-peninsula.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34480-haiti-flash-second-earthquake-in-haiti-magnitude-52.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34479-haiti-flash-magnitude-72-earthquake-in-the-nippes-updated-10am.html HL/ HaitiLibre Haiti - News : Zapping... Hinche : Police dismantle a gang Earlier this week, the Hinche police arrested the named Santo, John, Sainfete Laurent, Simeon Nestor, Jean Michel, Cene Vanel, Prevision Roland aka "Sonson" and Leon Odile, all part of an armed gang and dangerous involved in kidnappings, armed robberies, assassinations, destruction of property, theft of land... They usually operated in Fort Rozolie. Diaspora and reconstruction of the Great South Wednesday, August 25, Ms. Judith Nazareth Auguste the Minister of Haitians Living Abroad (MHAVE) met with Ms. Marina Gourgue and Jessie Pierre, two officials of the "Haitian Diaspora Resources" (HDR) about a possible agreement partnership between the Ministry and the HDR for the reconstruction of the Great South. Donation of 30,000 gallons of fuel from Senator Delva Tuesday, August 24, Senator Delva (AAA) donated 30,000 Gallons of fuel to organizations involved in the response and care of earthquake victims in the 3 affected departments, calling on his colleagues to follow his example and support the victims. The new Miragoane power plant soon in operation The transformers of the transformer station of the new Miragoane power plant have arrived on the site. Very soon, 5.4 MW will be available to supply Miragoane, Paillant and Petite Riviere de Nippes. 200,000 barrels of gasoline have arrived Fils Aime Ignace Saint Fleur, Director General of the Office for the Monetization of Development Assistance Programs (BMPAD) confirmed that a boat loaded with 200,000 barrels of gasoline and 45,000 barrels of kerosene docked at Thor terminal (Carrefour). Grand'Anse : 16 churches destroyed, 20 damaged In the Grand'Anse 16 churches were destroyed, 20 were damaged according to Father Loudger Mazile Spokesperson for the Episcopal Conference of Haiti (CEH) H / HaitiLibre Published on 2021/08/25 | Source New stills added for the Korean movie "Hostage: Missing Celebrity" (2021) Advertisement Directed by Pil Kam-sung With Hwang Jung-min, Kim Jae-bum, Lee Yoo-mi, Ryu Kyung-soo, Jung Jae-won, Lee Gyu-won,... Synopsis After a VIP movie premiere, Korean top movie star Hwang Jung-min gets kidnapped by strangers. Jeong-min first thinks that someone is playing pranks, but the kidnappers' cruelty helps Jeong-min realize that the abduction is no joke. Jeong-min tries to find his way out, while the kidnappers demand him a huge amount of ransom within 24 hours. Jeong-min encounters a real brutality that is way different and more extreme than the ones he has seen in the movies. Release date in Korea : 2021/08/18 Winnsboro, LA (71295) Today A few clouds with an isolated thunderstorm possible after midnight. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 30%.. Tonight A few clouds with an isolated thunderstorm possible after midnight. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 30%. Videos Sorry, there are no recent results for popular videos. Finding Humanism listed among the 26 religions represented on the Board of Ministry at Harvard may seem curious, but Humanist chaplain Thomas Ferrick relishes that as one of many anomalies about his job. Humanism, as defined by the American Humanist Association, is a progressive philosophy of life that, without supernaturalism, affirms our ability and responsibility to lead ethical livesyet Ferrick spends his days in Memorial Church, the symbolic center of Harvards religious life. He inhabits a tiny basement office within the headquarters of the United Ministry, the umbrella organization for Harvards religious representatives, a number of whom owe their inclusion, in part, to his vigorous lobbying on their behalf. Thomas Ferrick Photograph by Stu Rosner The Jesuit-trained Ferrick cheerfully admits that he and the other board members dont always manage a united viewpoint. He points out, The wonderful thing is that when the United Ministry meets and begins to debate different thingssay, gay rightswe always use the logic and the rationality of naturalism. When any chaplains point of view fails to reach consensus, he or she has to withdraw that issue, and settle for gains in other places. And what an experience it is to test the limits of tolerance and to learn respect for other points of view, he adds. Its a living example of what is possible. Dreading to leave an illiterate Ministry to the Churches was the reason a 1643 prospectus gave for the founding of Harvard College, but in post-Enlightenment days, Harvards ethos has been more informed by the rationalism of William James and George Santayana. So when Ferrick, armed with endorsements from the American Ethical Union, the Fellowship of Religious Humanists, and the American Humanist Association, proposed his services in 1974, many saw it as a case of bringing coals to Newcastle. Ferrick, however, was (and is) quick to point out that even though the Emersonian ideal of personal self-sufficiency has been dominant in Harvard culture, there is a distinction between secular pragmatism and secular humanism with its emphasis on ethical behavior. In any event, the president of the United Ministry that year invited Ferrick to make a formal application to join its ranks, and he was accepted. Its likely, Ferrick speculates, that the United Ministry decided it would be wise to provide ethical guidance for students lacking a strong religious identification. Im not here as a watchdog, but I try to get students to transcend their goals of personal success, to choose a social responsibility inherent in the Harvard experience. Ferrick brought to his pastoral role at Harvard his eight years experience as a Catholic chaplain (first at Dartmouth College and then within the University of Massachusetts system) before he left the priesthood in 1969, propelled by his disillusionment with the churchs authoritarianism and his evolving ideas about the nature of human existence. In his childhood, the Massachusetts native says, the Catholic Church seemed to offer the certainties life had denied him. Both his parents succumbed to tuberculosis before he was eight, and his early years in foster care were confusing and lonely. Educated in a Catholic environment, he drew consolation from the notion of the Christian God. In retrospect it was knowledge that was the engine of my life, he says. I believed I had proof. The rational steps that I could take brought me right to God. Only many years later did I realize that those were not automatic steps up a staircase to God; they were great flights of hope and faith. In 1971, the ex-priest was invited to become the leader of the Boston Ethical Society (a position he held until 1974, when the society could no longer afford it). There he became acquainted with the American Humanist Association and its science-based philosophy. The laws of cause and effect, the laws of randomness, these were so clear, so profound and definite, he explains, that I was able to step away from all theological meanderings and philosophical perusals and go toward Humanism. Ferrick admits to a slight regret for the absence in organized Humanism of rituals like singing together or listening to readings of passages from Humanist texts, though adherents do have naming ceremonies, weddings, burial and memorial services, and their own feast days: Charles Darwins birth date (February 12), the summer and winter solstices, and the anniversary of the founding of the United Nations (October 24). Certainly we all need a little ritual, he explains. Despite his commitment to naturalism, and its conviction that nature is all that exists, Ferrick is proud of having prodded the United Ministry to add the Hindu, Muslim, and Buddhist religions to their roster. If there was a sizable group of students who believed in this, that, or the other thing, he says, I was all in favor of their religion being included [on the Board] as long as they fully accepted the obligation of mutual respect. After three decades at Harvard, Ferrick plans to retire in June, and this past year, for the first time, hired an assistant chaplain, Greg Epstein, with a view to grooming him as his successor. Epstein, who is training for the rabbinate at the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism, believes, like Ferrick, that Humanism is the natural outcome of religion that has kept pace with science, and sees no contradiction in embracing the cultural roots of religions and building on them. Ferrick likes to tell a story that sums up his convictions about the harmonizing virtues of Humanism while acting as his modest yardstick for success. It concerns two Harvard graduates, class of 1924friends once, who grew apart. John Loeb amassed a fortune in banking and over time donated more than $70 million to the University. Social and political activist Corliss Lamont was a founding member in 1941 of the American Humanist Association and one of Ferricks earliest supporters at Harvard. In 1993, when John Loeb read an article the Harvard Gazette ran about Ferrick and the small remittance he survived on, he was moved to endow the chaplaincy, telling a New York Times reporter, The humanistic approach to deeds, not creeds, appeals to me. Lamont caught the Times piece and picked up the phone and called his old adversary. A year later, the two met at their seventieth reunion. I was present when those two elderly gentlemen met and embraced under the good offices of Humanism, Ferrick says with satisfaction. Bertrand Russell said, In the end, kindness is the foremost virtue. Its a survival technique, this kindness. Our civilization depends on it. ~Lauren Byrne Lauren Byrne is a freelance writer living in the Cambridge area. Written By Reporter Sophia Voight is a reporter for the Hastings Star Gazette. She is from Oshkosh, WI and graduated from the UW Oshkosh with a bachelor's degree in Multimedia Journalism in 2021. She can be reached with any news tips at svoight@orourkemediagroup.com | Editor: So we all agree we needed to start getting out of Afghanistan. We have bee No sooner had the Taliban taken control of Kabul than the establishment demanded t Gov. Greg Gianforte and Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., thanked firefighters and first responders for their work battling wildfires at a press conference held at Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation's Southwestern Land Office Helibase in Missoula Wednesday. Gianforte said the facility has launched countless critical missions during one of the state's most dangerous fire seasons, and everyone involved from volunteer firefighters to the Montana National Guard should be praised for their efforts. "The sacrifices of these brave men and women cannot be calculated in dollars or in acres burned," he said. He said as he speaks thousands are putting their lives on the line to keep the state's people and natural resources safe with the 50 fires now burning. Among those honored was smokejumper Tim Hart of West Yellowstone, who was killed in June fighting a fire in New Mexico. He said Hart's loss is a reminder that firefighting is dangerous and noble work, and while prayers have been answered in Montana in recent days with some rain that has helped these men and women, there is still a long way to go. Gianforte said wildfires hurt people, the communities they live in, as well as the economies of those communities, and implored that everyone remember to secure their trailer chains, maintain their equipment and prepare their properties. He said everyone should have an evacuation plan in the event of a fire, not just for their own safety, but so firefighters can focus on aggressively controlling the blaze. Gianforte voiced his support for increased forrest management including the Resilient Federal Forrest Act, a bill that aims to improve forest management by streamlining the environmental review process and eliminating what he called frivolous lawsuits against timber projects, a bill he has asked President Biden to support. Gianforte said millions of acres of forrest are at risk due to a lack of management and he's committed to improving management efforts by investing in new and existing projects. He said Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., has been a champion of forrest management in the senate and supports his efforts. Daines said Montana's Forrest Service has told him they need to improve fire management acreage, but the Biden Administration has moved to decrease that acreage, a move he criticized. He also said timber harvest projects are being blocked by environmental organizations which he described as extremists, and the Resilient Federal Forrest Act, which has gained bipartisan support, would free up the millions of acres tided up in lawsuits. Daines also expressed his thanks to firefighters, first responders and the Montana National Guard troops supporting them. He said he especially wanted to thank everyone across so many different agencies and departments for their exceptional cooperation and coordination with each other. He said he was speaking with Fort Belknap Indian Community Council President Andy Werk Jr. about the Pine Grove Fire recently and Werk said it was amazing to see so many counties helping them with the fire and working together flawlessly. The fire burned thousands of acres and resulted in the evacuation of Pine Grove and Zortman but Daines said the blaze is now under control and no lives were lost. Greg Gianforte DNRC Director Amanda Kaster said it has been a challenging fire season for the U.S. and while there are many weeks of it left her department is prepared to keep working with other agencies to effectively and aggressively fight fires. She also said she was proud of everyone involved working collectively, but wanted to call special attention to volunteer firefighters of Montana who she said are often overlooked despite the vital role they play protecting their communities. "They are the untold heroes of success during initial attack this fire season," she said. She also thanked the National Guard Montana for providing a great deal of support in the form of personnel and equipment as well as the out-of-state support they've received. Kaster said the difference these people made cannot be overstated. Havre Police Department Meea Lee Healy of Havre, 19, was arrested on two Justice or City court warrants and Jared Sage Tincher of Havre, 27, was arrested on three Justice or City court warrants after a caller asked Wednesday at 2:49 p.m. for assistance removing some people from a First Street Northeast building. -- John Alan Horseman of Fort Belknap, 50, was arrested on a disorderly conduct charge after caller reported that a man was passed out on a Ninth Avenue lawn Wednesday at 11:51 p.m. Hill County Sheriff's Office Deputies investigated a Wednesday 5:51 p.m. report of a shoplifter at a U.S. Highway 2 West business. -- Kade S. Lanier of Havre, 25, was arrested on two Justice of City court warrants and a 15-year-old was issued a summons on a charge of driving without a valid driver's license in response to a complaint called in from Wildhorse Road Wednesday at 8:46 p.m. Havre Fire Department Emergency medical personnel responded to two calls Wednesday. Havre Animal Shelter The shelter this morning held three 9-week-old kittens, two 15-week-old kittens, a 6-month-old kitten and one 12-week-old kitten all of unknown gender, three female cats, three male 19-week-old kittens and two male cats. A male 16-week-old kitten and a male 17-week-old kitten were being held separately but are also available for adoption. -- The shelter also held one female and one male 11-week-old puppies, a female Doberman pinscher dog, a male Labrador retriever dog, a female pit bull terrier dog, a male catahoula leopard dog, a female 15-week-old puppy, a female Australian shepherd dog, a male husky dog and a female shar pei dog. Births A boy was born Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, to Lena Main and Quacey WhiteGrass of Fort Belknap. Hill County health director says county failed to provide disaster relief funding Editors note: This version corrects attribution on a quote from an audience member. It corrects misreporting on CDC recommendations for people who are fully vaccinated and exposed to the virus. The Hill County Health Department, between a lack of funds and having it's authority curtailed by Montana House Bill 702, is having trouble keeping up with the pandemic amid a nationwide surge driven by the delta variant. During a special meeting of the board Wednesday about changes that need to be made to quarantine policy in the wake of HB 702, Hill County Health Department Public Health Director Kim Berg, also the Hill County health officer, said the department, for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, doesn't have the resources to get in touch with every close contact of a COVID-19 case, even as some staff are dropping all other duties to work exclusively on the pandemic. After the meeting she said the department has already had to let two staff members go because they don't have the money to pay them and they may lose more in the coming months. She said the department does have a disease intervention specialist coming in the next few weeks and she still has two part-time contact tracers on staff until November, but the situation is very concerning. In the meeting, Berg said last year the department had access to CARES Act funds that allowed it to deal with pandemic and the massively increased workload that came with it, but that money is gone and no additional funds were obtained to keep the department sustainable during this time of massively increase work. She said the department received no funds from the American Rescue Plan Act, which she said could have been used to bolster her department and keep it sustainable had the Hill County Commission allocated and asked for it. Hill County Commissioner Diane McLean said Berg should have told the commission what the department needed, and Berg said while she didn't make specific asks she reached out multiple times by email ask for funds to keep the department sustainable. After the meeting Berg said she sent the commissioners an email months ago asking about their plans for how to use ARPA funds along with suggestions about holding public meetings on the subject, but received no reply. When she saw in the Havre Daily News that the commission was talking about how to use the money, she said, she reached out again to ask why no funds were being allocated to public health given the fact that the pandemic was still ongoing but received no answer beyond that the commission's primary use for the funds was the Milk River Levee project. This morning, Hill County Commissioner Mark Peterson said he hasn't had a chance to go back through his emails and look for what Berg sent him, and the commission was unaware that ARPA funds could be used for that purpose. He said the commission has since looked into the issue and possible solutions to it and he hopes to set up a meeting with Berg to alleviate the problem. The lack of resources factored into Berg's recommendation that the department cease issuing quarantine orders entirely now that Montana House Bill 702 prevents them from making recommendations based on a person's vaccination status, she said. Berg said Montana House Bill 702 prevents public and private entities from discriminating against the unvaccinated, so the department has been effectively barred from following guidelines set forth by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. CDC recommends vaccinated people get tested 3-5 days after the date of being exposed to COVID-19 and wear a mask in public indoor settings for 14 days after exposure or until a negative test result comes back, but they dont need to quarantine. It recommends vaccinated people who test positive or are experiencing COVID-19 symptoms isolate. CDC recommends unvaccinated people who are exposed to the virus quarantine and that they isolate if they are infected with the virus. Hill County Attorney Karen Alley said even if someone volunteers that information to the department, it can no longer provide recommendations based on it due to the law. Berg said the law's primary effect is on COVID-19 for now, but ultimately it affects all communicable diseases for which there is a vaccine, which will affect the work of public health long after the pandemic is over. Given these circumstances, she said, her department has worked with Alley to create two plans for how to handle quarantine orders from now on. The first option was to quarantine everyone and their close contacts regardless of vaccination status. Berg said, from a public health standpoint, this option will provide the most protection to the people of Hill County, but, on a practical level, will be very difficult for the department due to the workload it would create for and an already strained workforce that no longer has access to extra funds to deal with the pandemic. She said it would also disrupt schools and workplaces, many of which don't have policies in place for extended sick leave that would be needed by so many people. Option two would be to cease issuing quarantine orders altogether and ask that people follow CDC guidelines when making the personal decision whether to quarantine, trusting them to make the right decision. Berg said this option does pose a risk by people who choose not to follow CDC recommendations and may lead to greater community spread, but, under the circumstances, it may be the best the department can do, at least for now. She said the decision between the two options can be evaluated and changed later, but these are the best options they have at this point. Health Board member Erica McKeon-Hanson said she understands where Berg is coming from, but she can't in good conscience support a measure like Option 2 that will put the public in greater danger. She said the board has a duty to protect the public from communicable disease and if the department doesn't have the resources to do that, those resources need to be provided by those that have the power to do so. She also expressed a general frustration that this is a choice that even has to be made when public health experts know what needs to be done and vaccine status is a relevant factor to take into account when making recommendations. Berg said she understands McKeon-Hanson's concerns, but it needs to be acknowledged that quarantining people who are vaccinated is unfair to them. This was echoed by Hill County Commissioner Diane McLean, who said the whole reason she got vaccinated was so she wouldn't need to do things like quarantine. Of the four public attendees three voiced opposition to option two. Havre Public School Board Chair Curtis Smeby said public health experts know how to keep people safe and the Legislature's efforts to interfere with them is unacceptable. He said the inconvenience caused to the vaccinated by being quarantined is unfortunate, but given the nature of COVID-19 as a serious and ongoing public health crisis, that inconvenience is absolutely justifiable. However, Smeby said, he would prefer to see Hill County follow suit with others and take the third option, following CDC guidelines in defiance of the state, and if need be see the state in court. "We have laws in this country, let's use them, but let's challenge them when they are inappropriate, and this is clearly in appropriate," he said. This sentiment was echoed by another attendee Cal Long, whose wife, Pamela, also expressed concern with the prospect of the board implementing option two. Long said people in the community are at risk, including children who are returning to school who are in danger, especially with the U.S. medical system strained. "Why not err on the side of caution?" she asked. She said the county has public health experts they should listen to. "We also have freedom," audience member Charlotte Faust said. Exactly, Long said, she has the freedom to not get exposed to COVID-19. The board voted 3-2 to recommend option 2 with all three commissioners voting yes and McKeon-Hanson and board member Kristi Kline voting no. The recommendation will be discussed and voted on at next week's Hill County Commission business meeting, at which point it would be implemented. McKeon-Hanson thanked the department and all of its employees for all of their hard work over the course of an extremely difficult 18 months likely with more hardship to come. Chuck Bartlebaugh of the Be Bear Aware Campaign talks Saturday about bear spray and being safe around bears to people attending the Second Annual Milk River Gobblers Youth Fun Day. The Milk River Gobblers Second Annual Youth Fun Day at Havre Trap Club was a success, organizers said, with more than 55 people braving the cool, windy weather to participate in the fun and educational activities. The Youth Fun Day is organized to help the Milk River Gobblers get youth interested in hunting, the outdoors and wildlife, group spokesman Jeff Dibblee said, and to help give area youth the knowledge and resources to be successful hunters. The Gobblers members came together because of a shared interest in preservation and enhancement of the wild turkey in the area, as well as promoting turkey hunting, along with hunting in general, Dibblee said, to encourage people, especially youth, to get outdoors. To that end, all youth accompanied by a parent or guardian were invited to the Youth Fun Day, which included games, informational tables on animal track and bird identification and hunting, turkey and duck call demonstrations, camouflage face painting, a clay pigeon shoot, an archery demonstration and presentations on predator control. Many different volunteers and vendors helped make the day possible, Dibblee said. Montana Trappers Association had a display about the importance of predator control. Animals like skunks, raccoon and weasels go after the eggs and hatchlings and larger predators like coyote and fox will kill the young birds, Dibblee said, hurting not just turkey populations, but other game birds as well. Different traps were on display and informational pamphlets available to take home. Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks was on hand with plaster of paris animal footprint displays and pelts to help teach people how to identify wild animals. Chuck Bartlebaugh with the Be Bear Aware Campaign program in Missoula came for the weekend, giving a presentation on bear safety Friday at Pepin Park and again Saturday at the fun day. The program is part of a national non-profit organization that has volunteers who travel to communities and provide educational and common sense information and literature on bear awareness. With the increase in grizzly and black bear sightings in the area, the Gobblers thought it would be a good idea to help inform the community about safety measures that should be taken, Dibblee said, for the safety of public as well as the bears. The Be Bear Aware Campaign website says its mission is to decrease the number of human-wildlife conflicts. The campaign emphasizes the importance of not trying to approach, follow, interact with or feed or touch wildlife. It also emphasizes the importance of safety precautions, bear spray and the use of optics such as binoculars, spotting scopes and telephoto lenses. Milk River Archery representatives provided information about bow hunting, he said. And Matt Sasaki and Jim Bachini, members of Havre Trap Club, taught attendees about the safe handling of firearms and proper shooting stance, then many youth and some adult attendees took the opportunity to shoot clay pigeons. Dibblee said they had originally planned to let participants shoot balloons with the shotguns using the trap club facility, but the windy conditions were hard on the balloons, so everyone big enough who wanted to shoot got to try to prove themselves shooting clay pigeons. "The kids had a ball with the clay pigeons. ... A lot of the little kids that I thought would never be able to hit one, they actually shot some pigeons, they did well," Dibblee said. Two of the youth eligible for the drawing won Mossberg pump action shotguns. Maci Wood won the girls' teal camouflage shotgun, and Daniel Conrad won the blue camouflage shotgun in the boys' raffle. Milk River Gobblers used to be affiliated with the National Wild Turkey Foundation but the local group went out on their own a few years ago, Dibblee said, because they wanted to direct the funds they raised more to local objectives. And local youth are the biggest beneficiaries of this move. "We found that we could work better with the budget that we were making on our own local event such as the banquet, raffle drawings, etc. That money could be put right back into the community with events like this Fun Day and scholarships to local youth," Dibblee said. The group gives out at least two $1,000 college scholarships to youth in their region that extends from Malta to Shelby and south to Big Sandy. Last year's scholarships also included two $250 scholarships, he added. "We try to turn it right around and put it back into the community," he added. That effort isn't just monetary. Dibblee said that they work with Fish, Wildlife and Parks to locate areas that would benefit from introduction of wild turkeys and advocate transplanting of the birds. Wild turkeys are scattered throughout the group's area, but right now the Bear Paw Mountains have the largest flocks in the area, Dibblee said, though the Missouri River and into the Breaks has a growing population. Montana has the Merriam's wild turkey subspecies, and the birds harvested in the Bear Paws, especially, he said, taste just like turkeys grown commercially. Dibblee added that he is also campaigning FWP to have the eastern wild turkey subspecies introduced to the area because the birds grow a little bigger than the Merriam's. Courtesy photo Jim Bachini of the Havre Trap Club instructs 9-year-old Tyler Rowe of Havre on safe gun handling while shooting clay pigeons Saturday during the Milk River Gobblers Second Annual Youth Fun Day. Fish, Wildlife and Parks is very helpful with pointing people who want to start hunting turkeys in the right direction for finding local flocks, he said. Members also make themselves available to people who want an introduction to turkey hunting or hunting in general, with what they call sharing the hunt and spreading the heritage. "Those who have hunted a lot, like myself," Dibblee said, "we want to spread our knowledge of what we have found over the past years of hunting and enjoying this great outdoors to the young kids." It's an informal assistance effort right now, but they are negotiating the legal side of starting a formal hunter-mentorship program. "I'm pretty confident that it won't be too long and we'll have something on the order of a hunter-mentor program," he said. But in the meantime, anyone wanting some advice on wild turkeys in the area or information on the the Milk River Gobblers can contact Dibblee at 406-945-1632 or [email protected] Other sources of funding available The St. Mary Rehabilitation Working Groups Sept. 21 meeting was canceled in the wake of the news that all four applications for American Rescue Plan Act funds were unsuccessful, at least for now. Milk River Joint Board of Control Program Manager Jen Patrick said this is a disappointing development, but not an overly surprising one. Patrick said ARPA guidelines said dams and reservoir projects are not being funded at this time, so the applications were a long shot. Its not a shock, she said. Despite this set back, she said, all hope is not lost on the ARPA front as rules could change when the second round of funding comes. She said the project also has other possible sources of revenue including the infrastructure bill recently passed by the U.S. Senate which includes $100 million, which would likely be used for the diversions dam, as well as the St. Mary Reinvestment Act which would invest an additional $52 million. The working group was formed in 2003 after users of the Milk River warned that catastrophic failure was likely unless major repairs much more than the irrigators could afford were made. That happened last spring when the last concrete drop structure on the 29-mile system of dams, dikes, canals, giant metal siphons and drop structures failed and had to be replaced. The diversion was shut down over last summer until collaborative work got it re-opened in October. Members warn if the system requires updates and repairs or such failures will happen again. A drone belonging to the Turkish occupation targeted the car of the leader, Deeb Al-Aswad, during his visit to the War-wounded House in Qamishlo, which led to his injury and two civilians of its administrators. In this regard, our agency held a meeting with the leader of the Deir ez-Zour Military Council, Shekwar Zarek, nicknamed "Deeb al-Aswad", who, at the beginning of his speech, mentioned his joining the Syrian Democratic Forces. He said, "I joined to the SDF early 2011 to stand against the fascist authoritarianism of the Turkish occupation. My sister and I joined the People's Protection Units (YPG) and the Women's Protection Units (YPJ)." He added, "Since 2011, we both have been resisting in all military campaigns against the authoritarian fascist mentality of the mercenaries of the Turkish occupation, the Free Army, Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS mercenaries. We participated in the military campaigns from the outskirts of Kobani and Manbij with the Women and People Protection Units within the Syrian Democratic Forces." The commander pointed out that the sons of all components and peoples joined the forces and participated in the battles to liberate Manbij, Tabqa, Raqqa and Deir Ezzor from the occupation and all mercenaries. He indicated that he and his sister were injured during the military campaigns in which they participated, but the sister's injury was more serious, as a result of which she was forced to stay in Qamishlo in the Jazira region, while he is now a leader in the Deir ez-Zor Military Council. The attack details On a visit to his sister, "and those with her who lost members of their bodies as a result of the attacks of mercenary groups and the Turkish state, which openly sponsors mercenaries," an occupation drone targeted the leader's car in front of the War-wounded House in Qamishlo. The leader's words were not enough to describe the attack he underwent, as he commented on the matter by saying: "There is no description of the brutal and immoral method of shelling by the occupation drone, which contradicts all international and regional standards." Attacking the war-wounded against ISIS is evidence of an assault on the peace of peoples Al-Aswad stressed that the attack on the place of treatment for the injured only indicates "the barbarism, hatred that Turkey harbors for our people in north and east Syria, and the attack on the symbols of resistance against mercenaries and groups supported by the Turkish occupation is clear evidence of the aggressive encroachment on the peace and security of peoples." Pointing out that it is also an "attack on the holy places and the dignity of peoples without respect for customs, traditions or international laws," and pointed out that this illustrates the aggressive and authoritarian mentality of the Turkish occupation and its mercenaries. Al-Aswad also noted the continuous attacks of the Turkish occupation state on the people of Tel Tamr, Ain Issa and Kobani, describing them as "greedy against innocent people who are struggling for their livelihood, as mercenaries steal their money, livestock and homes, while the people struggle with life and offer martyrs and the Turkish occupation and its mercenaries attack women." The brutal and aggressive killing of children demonstrates their hatred against our people. SDF defends all components without discrimination At the conclusion of his speech, the leader Al-Aswad, sent a message to the peoples of the region, saying: We, the Syrian Democratic Forces, defend all components of our people without any discrimination, and we will protect you and preserve you and the brotherhood of peoples and free democratic coexistence. We assure the mothers of the martyrs and their families that we will continue to fight the occupation aggressive mentality until the last drop of our blood, so that our people may live in peace, freedom and dignity. It is worth noting that the Turkish occupation state has recently escalated the attacks on the regions of north and east Syria and Sengal, as it attacked Sengal on the 16th and 17th of August and on the 19th of the same month, it launched an air raid on the headquarters of the relations of the Tal Tamr Military Council and targeting the car of the leader Renas Roj on Ali Faro Road between Qamishlo and Al-Hasakah on the same day. On the 22nd of August, a Turkish occupation drone targeted the car of the leader, Deeb Al-Aswad, and bombed it almost daily on the villages of Tal Tamr, Zarkan, Manbij, Al-Shahba canton and Shera and Sherawa districts in occupied Afrin. (A( ANHA Henderson, NC (27536) Today Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%. Today Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 61F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Tonight Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 61F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Tomorrow Sunny skies. Less humid. High 82F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Free access for current print subscribers As a home delivery subscriber, you get free unlimited digital access to premium content on HenryHerald.com, including local news, local sports, obituaries, legal notices, local features, and the e-edition. All you need is your print subscription account number and your last name. Don't know your subscription number? Email access@henryherald.com with your delivery address. Activate your account now. Elbert Coffee, Jr., 83, of Dallas, passed away Aug. 29, 2021. Visitation will be noon to 6 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 2, at Cozine & Tarver Funeral Home in Greenville, Texas. His funeral service will be at 11 a.m. Friday, Sept. 3, at New Hope Baptist Church in Greenville, and burial will be in Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. At least 60 Afghans and 12 U.S. troops were killed, Afghan and U.S. officials said. Anderson, IN (46016) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. We're always interested in hearing about news in our community. Let us know what's going on! Submit (JNS) - American Jews are often criticized these days for distancing from Israel as a result of political considerations. To counteract that trend, the "Israel trip" has become a central way to positively interact with the Jewish state and all it has to offer. But due to the coronavirus pandemic and the inability of traveling there this High Holiday season, Israel-loving foodies say it's more vital than ever to find new ways to connect. Bringing Israeli cuisine to the Rosh Hashanah or Sukkot table, they say, is a wonderful way to honor the roots of Jewish culinary traditions, as well as bring us closer to the Jewish state. "We don't argue about a great brisket and challah like we do religion and politics," maintains Chanie Nayman, editor of Kosher.com, who lived in Israel for more than five years. "Food is a uniting force. Who doesn't relate to food?" Nayman said Israel is leading the kosher community past falafel and shawarma sandwiches to "multicultural, creative, delicate and fine cuisine with bold flavors," which she says come naturally to a nation "forced through different situations that have made us adapt, change things up in a moment's notice." For those looking to break out of the same-old recipes, incorporating herbs like cilantro and citrus, bold spices like cumin, za'atar, silan and sumac, in addition to ingredients like tehina, toasted pine nuts and sesame seeds, figs, dates, olives and pomegranate, are a great way to bring Israeli influences into one's home, Nayman tells JNS. At holiday time and year-round, she urges: "Slowly break out of the potato kugel, arrive at Israeli cuisine and embrace it." American Israeli cookbook author Danielle Renov adds that it not only "makes sense" to incorporate Israeli flavors into one's holiday menu, but "we are literally intended to incorporate them" as "the Jewish people, Israel and the holidays are intertwined." "The foods we eat on Rosh Hashanah - the simanim ['signs' of the High Holidays] like dates and pomegranate - are indigenous to the land of Israel during this holiday season, so by embracing those flavors, we are paying homage to the land itself," she tells JNS. Renov's recently released cookbook Peas Love & Carrots was influenced by the flavors of her Moroccan Sephardi home the United States, where farmers markets were "few and far between, and 'seasonal' wasn't even a word in my vocabulary," as well as her newer home in Israel, which she moved to from New York 10 years ago. 'Kosher has become a buzzword' Following Israeli seasonality, says Renov, has tremendously guided her cooking style. Shopping local and using foods timed to the months of the year boost flavor and ingredient accessibility. Sukkot, she notes, offers an opportunity for themed meals, suggesting lots of salads, pita chips, and main dishes like arais (a pita stuffed with spiced beef, Moroccan-style) and flatbread with hummus and meat. Fall ingredients and spices with warming notes, such as tahini, cumin and turmeric, work well for the cooler harvest season, adds Renov. "Kosher has become a buzzword associated with current food trends such as Mediterranean and healthy cooking, and its ability to be allergen and dairy-free has made it more current," said the author. Tahini and Tamarind Glazed Salmon with Kadaif topping. Renov's Tahini and Tamarind Glazed Salmon with Kadaif Topping, for example, is a family-friendly entree for non-meat eaters and a wonderful alternative to the classic gefilte fish appetizer. Apples and Honey Mustard Chicken, also from the Peas, Love & Carrots cookbook, captures the essence of Rosh Hashanah on a platter, while the Pomegranate Braised Beef puts a sweet-tart spin on a holiday classic. For dessert, Apple Bourekas with Silan-Sesame Drizzle by Naomi Nachman calls for frozen puff-pastry squares and apple-pie filling. With food as an "equalizer," encourages Renov, Jewish holidays and Israeli culture can be celebrated by coming to the table - this year, with not too many faces - and spending quality time with family and community. L'Shana Tova! What a year it has been. Each year, Rosh Hashanah gives our students an opportunity to renew our commitment to our heritage. We, at Jewish Academy of Orlando, are so grateful to be back safely and in person with all of our students and our Jewish community. "We engage as a united family, providing a safe environment to celebrate our shared heritage and Jewish identity through Mitzvot (good deeds), Tzedakah (acts of righteousness), and Gemilut Chasadim (acts of loving kindness), as well as instill a love for and commitment to Israel and Klal Yisrael (Jewish people everywhere)." This is the text of Caring Community, one of JAO's five core values and never has it been more relevant. Being together reaffirms our sense of identity, and strengthens our ties to our traditions and our connections to one another. Our students are looking forward to joining the congregations at Temple Israel for Sukkot and Congregation Ohev Shalom for Simchat Torah. The students, faculty and staff of JAO, pride ourselves by living, learning and teaching by our Core Values. From preparing holiday cards for residents of Savannah Court, giving tzedakah each Shabbat and raising money for relief efforts around the world, JAO students understand the importance of giving back and leave our school knowing that with the support of their community, they can go out and change the world. While this is something we celebrate every day, Rosh Hashanah reminds us why we choose to live an honorable, Jewish life, reaffirms our faith and sense of community. Amy Polacek, principal The year 2020 was filled with a lot of heartbreak in the film community and it ended delivering one final blow. On Dec. 31, one of the most important independent filmmakers of the last 50 years lost her battle with dementia. Joan Micklin Silver passed away at the age of 85, leaving behind quite the legacy. With 18 films under her belt, her most notable film, "Hester Street," released in 1975 and starring Carol Kane and Steven Keats, has stood the test of time and is still considered one of the most important works centering around the Jewish immigration experience in the late 1800s/early 1900s on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. The film is based on the 1896 novel, "Yekl: A Tale of the New York Ghetto" and it is set during the year of its novel's publication. The story begins by following the young immigrant Yekle (played by Steven Keats, the son of immigrants himself) as he begins his affair with a beautiful dancer, Mamie (played by Dorrie Kavanaugh). Yekle fully embraces his new life in America, shaving off his beard and divorcing himself from his old name. He calls himself Jake now. When his wife, Gitl (played by Canadian actress Carol Kane, earning an Oscar nomination for her performance) arrives in America with their son from their Russian homeland, the film redirects its focus to her struggle to retain her identity from a man pushing her to change completely. This film thrives in its subtlety, acknowledging the big picture without losing focus of its self-contained story. In the beginning of the film, we see the 'boss' of the sewing factory Jake works at, putting down the young scholar, Mr. Bernstein (played wonderfully by Mel Howard who was initially just going to be a crew member). A big difference between this new world and their old communities is pointed out, with the boss, a former peddler, telling him that in America the peddler can be the boss, and the scholar can make just six dollars a week. Mr. Bernstein is put down throughout the film by characters like Jake who want to expel their past to such extreme measures that certain concepts take over their values. In one scene, when Gitl is complimenting Mr. Bernstein, Jake corrects her, saying that he makes eighteen dollars more than him at the company. It is of little surprise that Silver chose her first film to center around the immigrant experience. The daughter of immigrants herself, she recalled growing up and hearing about their experiences in Omaha. "My father loved to tell stories about his experiences, about his becoming a peddler and selling in the streets." Silver wanted to evoke the feeling of looking at those old sepia photographs, deciding to shoot the film in classic black and white, and it was no discussion that the Yiddish language would play a vital role in the film. Getting the film rights for the book was the easy part for Silver, but convincing figures in the film community to fund a story as Jewish as this one by a female director on top of it was more than a little difficult in the 1970s. She quoted an unnamed Hollywood producer as telling her, "Feature films are expensive to make and expensive to market and women directors are one more problem we don't need." Even having several short films under her belt, one already dealing with immigration, meant nothing to a male-dominated industry intimidated by change. Luckily, with the help of her husband who was in real estate, they were able to raise enough funds to produce the film themselves. The shoot went smooth, filming the exterior shots on Morton Street instead of the titular Hester Street to keep the film on budget. The entire production wrapped after a slim 34 days, and it is quite remarkable what she was able to accomplish in such a short time frame. And if finding the money to make the film wasn't hard enough, finding a distributor was even harder. It was considered too ethnic, too Jewish, too specific to distribute. All was not lost, however, as they were able to find help with distribution through several people who had helped market some of John Cassavetes' films. As a result, they were able to send it to several festivals and even have the honor of showing it at Cannes. This helped get the buzz going and, when it opened in New York several months later, they were greeted by lines wrapped around the block. "Hester Street," at first glance, is an incredibly simple film about a woman paving her own path. However, this film was way ahead of its time in the way it tackles themes of ethnic identity and assimilation in ways never brought to screens before it. Gitl's struggle is that of many immigrants, the pursuit of this 'American dream' with the hopes of not losing their roots. Silver's choice of refocusing the novel's attention from Jake onto Gitl makes this film so much more than it would have been. In a scene earlier in the film, Jake sits at a table with Mamie and their friends when a new immigrant comes over and sits next to them. Jake and his friends have shaved their beards, changed their clothes and, next to this man, look like they are from completely different backgrounds. They make fun of his hat, his prayers, his mannerisms, as if this man was not them at one point. In another scene, Gitl asks her husband, "Where in America is the gentiles, huh? I go with Miss Kavowski to Rivington Street, everywhere, Jews. The gentiles keep in another place, huh?" This is an important scene because Gitl is reminding Jake that he is playing dress up in a town no different from himself. He is trying to 'fit in' amongst his own people. Jake: "Look at me. Give a look at me. Am I a Jew or a gentile? Forget that you know me. Just by what you see. What do you say?" Mr. Bernstein: "A Jew is a Jew." Zachary Aborizk is an independent filmmaker and writer based out of Orlando, FL. His work has appeared in such publications as Adelaide Magazine in New York as well as the Tampa Bay Underground Film Festival. One of the more wonderful parts of being Jewish is living in "Jewish time." It's having Rosh Hashanah in September, instead of waiting four months to define the end of a hard year by bringing in the sweet promise of goodness and redemption. As 5781 rolls over to 5782, we will all be looking to repeat some of the wishes that we had this time last year. The wish for Covid-19 to stay put and not join us as a most unwelcome guest in the coming year. The wish for loved ones, friends and colleagues to be able to get through this hardship with both our physical and mental health intact. The wish for our livelihoods to be safe and that as our rabbis taught us, "may we all be blessed to give thanks to G-d that in the exchange of hands, ours was the one giving this past year and not receiving." We also prayed for the peace of Israel and all her inhabitants, and this too feels as far away as our hope for civility to return to our society. There were, and indeed are, so many prayers and wishes left over for us to ask for again this year. For many there were more blessings that we can count if we would just see them. In this past year, in a world filled with challenges, we endured. For the residents of Kinneret, this past year has been about all the above challenges plus the fears and anxieties that surround those in our community for whom financial security has been consistently elusive. The difficulties of facing financial struggles as well as the horrific decisions of choices of "food vs. medicines" are compounded by the inability to leave one's apartment or connect with other humans for months on end. When I talk with our residents who are now free to socialize in a much more communal manner, they are almost universally filled with gratitude and joy. They are excited about the future and while there will no doubt be challenges in the road ahead for us all, our seniors have taught me that in life, it just doesn't pay to sweat the "small stuff." The things we consider to be "HUGE" today will be tomorrow's "small stuff" that we look back nostalgically upon. Because we will one day look back fondly at this period, why not start now? On behalf of our Board, staff, and our wonderful residents, we wish you and your families a most Healthy, Happy and Sweet New Year! May we all be worthy of a good inscription in the Book of Life in the coming year. May the continued merits or our good deeds sustain us all in 5782! Sharon Weil, executive director Ali Polejes, KCOA president Kinneret Council on Aging Rhonda Pearlman, president Kinneret Apartments Photos in Special Issues Section September 2020 The country was still under COVID-19 mandates and Jewish organizations were getting creative in how to continue some programs. One such program was the Jewish Academy of Orlandos performance of Alice in Wonderland. Originally planned for May, then rescheduled for October, became a video production. The video was filmed in the fall and released later in the year. A few members of the Jewish community ran for offices: Lynn Moira Dictor ran for Seminole County Tax Collector, Tracey Kagan ran for State House Representative in District 29 (Seminole County) and Patricia Sigman ran for State Senate. Politics caused a great divide all across the United States, but here at The Heritage two employees devout Democrat Gil Dombrosky and devout Republican Johnny Johnson didnt let politics interfere with their friendship and each one took the others political jabs in stride. October 2020 The Holocaust Memorial Resource & Education Center of Florida partnered with USC Shoah Foundation the Institute for Visual History and Education. This marks the first time USC Shoah Foundation has teamed with a Holocaust Museum to design, develop and implement a ground-up and permanent museum-wide exhibition. November 2020 For the first time, attendees of the Central Florida Jewish Film Festival watched the movies from the comfort of their own couches. Two of the films, Resemblance and The Shabbos Goy were written and produced by locals. Mysterious Resemblance was written, directed and produced by Kevin J. ONeill and Bethanne Weiss was the executive producer. The hilarious The Shabbos Goy was written and directed by Talia Osteen. Alan Rusonik, Jewish Academy of Orlando head of school, announced he would bid farewell at the end of the school year. The ZOA Gala honored Staci and Dr. Daniel Layish as Zionists in the Spotlight. December 2020 The Holocaust Memorial Resource & Education Center hosted an exhibit titled Uprooting Prejudice: Faces of Change, an exhibit of 45 photos taken by photographer John Noltner in the aftermath of George Floyds death in police custody. Even though there was no mention of Floyd in the exhibit, many were deeply offended. January 2021 Rachel Rosenberg OBrien was selected as executive director of Congregation Ohev Shalom. The Jewish Federation of Greater Orlando started a community survey, conducted by the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis University. February 2021 The 2021 Kinneret Council on Aging 8 Over 80 honorees were Louis Feinberg, Harvey Kobrin, Marc Katzen, Barry Rubenstein, Renee Roberts, Susan Bierman, Roz Weinstein and Ruth Darvin. Gilis Food Truck began serving customers in southwest Orlando. Rabbi Yanky Majesky asked if they could come to Longwood and residents in and around Longwood could also enjoy kosher food brought to them by Gilis. Community member Pearl Halikman had her memoir published and released this month. Local writer Pam Ruben sat with Halikman over a period of a couple years to put together A Pearl and her King. March 2021 Dr. Moshe Pelli was awarded professor emeritus status for his distinguished performance, outstanding contributions and exceptional service to the UCF community. Amy Polacek was selected as the new principal of the Jewish Academy of Orlando. April 2021 The Massey family James Farrell and Andrea Massy-Farrel, Jann and Tony Massey, Harvey and Carol Massey, and Angela and Shane Riganese received the Tess Wise White Rose award. Bruce Gould produced a film about the life of Menachem Begin, Upheavel: The Journey of Menachem Begin, which was shown virtually at the Miami Jewish Film Festival. Plans are underway to stream it on HBO or Cinemax, NetFlix and Prime. Rabbi Joshua Neely and Dr. Bernie Kahn were recognized for their efforts in reopening Temple Israel safely for in-person services. The Kinneret Board of Directors approved a plan to sell the Kinneret Apartments located in downtown Orlando to a qualified buyer. May 2021 Congregation Ohev Shalom hired an interim rabbi, Rabbi Murray Ezring, who will assume his duties in August. Rabbi David Kay announced in November that he would leave at the completion of his contract with COS, July 3, 2021. An antisemitic group called the Goyim Defense League protested at The Roth Family JCC against the Holocaust Memorial Resource & Education Center. A community-wide event was held to educate the community about the dangers of drugs in our own back yard. As Hamas and Hezbollah pelted Israel with rockets, rallies were held across the U.S. to show support for Israel. The local Israeli-American Council participated in a coast-to-coast rally supporting Israel. Two weeks later, Jews and Christians showed their support for Israel in a rally also held at Lake Eola. June 2021 JFS Orlando was chosen as the June beneficiary of the Winn-Dixie Community Bag program. JFS received $1 donation every time the $2.50 reusable bag was purchased during June. Whisper, whisper, what happened at Trader Joes? An employee at a local Trader Joes refused to service a Jewish customer. The woman contacted Israeli-American Council Director Idit Lotringer. Both JFGO CEO Keith Dvorchik and Lotringer took action to bring this matter to the attention of the CEO of Trader Joes. Dvorchik also contacted Florida Representatives Randy Fine and Michael Gottlieb. I dont think it would have had the outcome it did without the Federations involvement and being able to get bi-partisan support from the Florida legislators, said Dvorchik. An in-person and zoom meeting to address the growing antisemitism throughout the country was held with Keith Dvorchik and Aaron Weil, CEO of Central Florida Hillel. More than 80 people zoomed in. Congregation Beth Am hired Rabbi David Barnett as interim rabbi. July 2021 Mel Pearlman, Heritage columnist, won an American Jewish Press Association award Hunter Gold took over the helm as Central Florida Hillel CEO as Aaron Weil leaves to return to Israel with his family. The mayor of Maitland, John Lowndes, decreed that July 31, 2021, would be Rabbi David Kay Day. August 2021 Bruce Gould was the 34th recipient of the Heritage Human Service Award. As 5781 comes to a close, the Central Florida Jewish community says goodbye to Aaron and Sharon Weil, Rabbi David Kay, and JAO Head of School Alan Rusonik. (JTA) - Amid the Taliban's total takeover of Afghanistan this week, some had specific concerns about one person: that country's last remaining Jew, 62-year-old Zebulon Simantov. Simantov, who has in recent years lived in Kabul's only synagogue, said earlier this year that he would leave before the Taliban arrived, possibly for Israel. He has also said that the Taliban jailed him during the fundamentalist Muslim group's last hold on power in Afghanistan, and that they tried to convert him and regard him as an infidel. Days after the Taliban takeover, Simantov's whereabouts remain unclear. Meanwhile, Israeli media has revealed new information about the family situation of the carpet dealer and former restaurant owner who grew up in the city of Herat, including that for decades he has refused to grant his wife a divorce. Here's what we know right now. Many people are trying to help Simantov - but it's unclear if he wants them to. Several Jewish organizations have expressed willingness to help Simantov if he wishes to leave. And Mendy Chitrik, chair of the Alliance of Rabbis in Islamic States, said he has been in contact with authorities in Turkey, where he lives, about Simantov. But an employee of a Jewish group told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that a journalist in Kabul contacted Simantov Sunday, and that Simantov told the journalist he would not leave. Moti Kahana, an Israeli-American businessman, said people interested in getting Simantov out of Afghanistan have reached him after the takeover but that he declined, demanding "personal funding." It wasn't the first time Simantov had tried to extort someone seeking to contact him. "I don't go under 200 dollars," one journalist from a German news organization reported him as saying in 2015. Another account from last year has Simantov demanding $500 from an Israeli journalist for an interview, finally settling on $100. Amie Ferris-Rotman, a British-Jewish journalist who used to work in Afghanistan, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, "He really liked alcohol, and used to insist journalists who wanted to interview him bring some." It's unclear whether Simantov has spoken publicly since the Taliban seized Kabul. An Indian news channel, WION, on Tuesday quoted him as saying that he would not leave Afghanistan, but the report featured archive footage only. His refusal to divorce his wife has spurred international diplomacy in the past. Reports about Simantov in the past have noted that his wife and daughters moved to Israel in 1998. On Wednesday, reports emerged in Israeli media that he has refused for more than 20 years to divorce his wife under Jewish law. (Yedioth Acharonoth in 2010 already reported about the attempts of Simantov's wife, who lives in Holon near Tel Aviv and has not been named in the Israeli media, to divorce him.) Under Jewish law, a "get," or rabbinic bill of divorce, is required for women to be able to remarry. Women whose husbands refuse to give a get are known as "agunot," or chained women, and their plight is seen as a major point of gender inequality in Orthodox Judaism. In recent years, Orthodox rabbis have invested effort to address the issue. That was the case a decade ago, when Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, the president of the Conference of European Rabbis, offered in 2011 to fly to Kabul to obtain a get for Simantov's wife. Ferris-Rotman heard about the woman's attempts to obtain a Jewish divorce certificate from Israeli colleagues. "I knew Zebulon and I knew Rabbi Goldschmidt, so I tried to see how we can solve the situation," Ferris-Rotman, who now lives in London, told JTA. She said others had discussed pressuring Simantov in the past. But Simantov refused to meet Goldschmidt, despite being offered a hard-to-obtain commodity to sweeten the deal. "Even after Amie offered a case of single malt scotch, the man refused," Goldschmidt tweeted on Wednesday. In Israel, men determined to be "recalcitrant spouses" can face jail time, and Israeli media said that Simantov is staying in Afghanistan to avoid dealing with his divorce and rabbinic authorities. But a spokesman for the Israeli Chief Rabbinate told JTA he was unfamiliar with a ruling or edict from a rabbinical judge denouncing Simantov as a recalcitrant spouse, or "sarvan." Ferris-Rotman said she had asked Simantov why he wouldn't grant his wife a divorce. "He would say, 'Oh, her, I'm done with her,'" she said. He's had problems getting along with others before. "He's something of a disgruntled old man," said Ferris-Rotman, who communicated with Simantov in Russian, which he does not speak very well. Simantov, whose main language is Dari, the Afghan dialect of Persian, also speaks broken Hebrew. Simantov had a famously bad relationship with Kabul's other remaining Jew, Ishaq Levin, until Levin died in 2005. Speaking about Levin to The Guardian, Simantov said: "The old man was crazy," screwing a finger against his temple to illustrate the point. The two lived at opposite ends of the synagogue, the report said, and would only exchange curses. According to stories Simantov has told journalists over time, each man went to the Taliban to accuse the other of criminal behavior. He said the two argued so much in prison that the Taliban released them both - though the group kept a Torah that Levin and Simantov had tried to recover. One report Wednesday suggested that Daniel Kurtzer, U.S. ambassador to Israel from 2001 to 2005, might also have been involved in Simantov's divorce diplomacy. But Kurtzer's recollection suggests that he was likely working on the issue for Simantov's housemate, Ishaq. "What I did was arrange for a Jewish chaplain in the U.S. Army to go to the synagogue in Kabul where this man was living, and to try to persuade him to give a get. The chaplain did get back to me to say that the man was unwilling to do so," Kurtzer recalled. The next year, the chaplain was back in Kabul and sought to try again. But he learned that the husband had died, so the woman in Israel was informed that she was no longer an agunah, but an almana, or widow. His fate under the Taliban is unclear. Simantov has been a well-known local personality. Journalists came to him regularly and some taxi drivers already knew where he lives in Kabul, where many of the streets have no names. That means the Taliban knows just what he thinks. Unlike Ishaq, who said he had no quarrel with the Taliban, only with Simantov, Simantov has been outspoken about his disdain for the Taliban. Ferris-Rotman said that was the case when she lived in Afghanistan, and it was still the case this spring when Simantov conducted an on-air interview. For now, the Taliban says Simantov should have no reason to fear. On Tuesday, an Israeli journalist from the Kan broadcaster asked Suhail Shaheen, a Taliban spokesperson in Doha, Qatar, whether Simantov would be safe under Taliban. Shaheen, who said he was not aware that he was speaking to an Israeli publication, said: "We don't harm minorities. There are Sikhs and Hindus in the country, and they have their religious freedom." (JNS) As Israel observes the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban, its difficult to forget the capitulation of the Iraqi army to ISIS in 2014 or the EUBAM observers who fled as Hamas seized power in the Gaza Strip in 2007, not to mention visions of the United States fleeing Saigon in the spring of 1975 as part of the collapse of the Vietnam War. Noting the coincidental, yet equal number of years separating each of the Middle Eastern incidents in which Islamic fundamentalists defeated their adversaries, Eran Lerman, vice president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, half-jokingly called it the seven-year-itch. What worries me, he says, is a much broader symbolic message that Islamist radicalism is once again on the march, the Americans have no staying power, and the West is in decline. Lerman suggests that Israel learn lessons from the past, saying it should band together with other countries to hold against the tide. Referring to Israels own concerns of Islamic fundamentalists taking over Palestinian areas besides Gaza, which Hamas already controls, Lerman says I hope we never again hear lectures from the Americans on how you can trust Palestinian security forces to run their country and keep us safe once we leave. Israel has long argued that a future Palestinian state left to its own devices and without Israeli oversight would easily collapse if confronted by a terrorist organization like the Islamic State (ISIS), the Taliban or Hamas. The fall of Afghanistan only strengthens Israels argument and, as Lerman argues, its leaders must learn the lessons here. Having finally extricated itself from the mire that is Afghanistana goal shared by the previous two U.S. administrations, one Democrat- and one Republican-ledAmerica has simultaneously sent a dark and ominous signal suggesting to its allies that it is no longer reliable, especially since it grossly underestimated the speed at which the Taliban took control. A state of war or Islamic rule? The United States has now left a vacuum in Central Asia, and powerful actors such as Iran, Turkey, Russia and China are already scheming on how to take advantage of the vacuum. This puts Israel in a dangerous position. Experts agree that the Jewish state must plan accordingly if it wants to survive what could become an Islamic fundamentalist onslaught from the east in the coming years. Taliban mullah Khairullah Khairkhwa earlier this year promised he would not launch a military offensive if U.S. President Joe Biden committed to removing all remaining American troops. Khairkhwa is a former Guantanamo Bay prison detainee who former President Barack Obama released in a prisoner exchange in 2014 against the advice of the Pentagon, which classified him as too dangerous to release. The Obama-Biden administration allegedly ignored disturbing intelligence reports that he and his men were forming a terror network from their base in Qatar. Now, he is the mastermind of the regime change in Afghanistan and has his heart set on establishing an Islamic fundamentalist government, much like that which exists in Iran and Gaza. Iran has also supported the creation of a Shiite militant organization in Afghanistan, causing diplomatic tensions between Tehran and Kabul in the past. According to Silvia Boltuc at ASRIE Analytica, after dozens of Afghan districts surrendered to the Taliban, the Shiite militant group Hashd al-Shia (Shiite Mobilisation) emerged in Afghanistan. Among the fighters, there are members of the Fatemiyoun Division, an Afghan Shiite group believed to have been trained by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps for the fighting in Syria. The world is now witnessing the creation in Afghanistan of a scenario similar to Syria, Yemen, Iraq and Lebanon, where Iranian Shiite militias are operating and promoting Tehrans dangerous foreign policy, which focuses on regional and then international domination. Islamic fundamentalism beliefs held by Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Taliban, Al-Qaeda and others maintain that the world can only exist in two states: a state of war (Dar al-Harb) or under Islamic rule (Dar al-Islam). An ally facing serious security challenges and concerns Jonathan Spyer, also of JISS and director of the Middle East Center for Reporting and Analysis, tells JNS the retreat from Afghanistan reflects a broader desire of the U.S. to withdraw from commitments in the Middle East and its surrounding area. In terms of implications this has for Israel, Spyer says he believes that the nature and form of the withdrawal reflects a broader confusion in U.S. foreign-policy goals and practice, which is reflected by deep internal confusions and divisions. All of this is of great interest to Israel as a key U.S. ally and an ally facing serious security challenges and concerns, he says. Michael Barak, a senior researcher at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism and a lecturer at the IDC Herzliya, told JNS the Taliban victory increases the morale of other terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Al-Qaeda. Notably, senior Hamas official Moussa Abu Marzouk praised the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. One of the important implications for Israel is that it must track the increasing ties between the Taliban and Hamas, warns Barak. Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh recently met with Taliban leaders in Qatar to discuss cooperation. The Taliban representatives congratulated Hamas on its victory in Operation Guardian of the Walls, the 11-day conflict between Israel and Hamas in which the terrorist organization claimed it came out the winner. In return, Haniyeh congratulated the Taliban on the end of the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan in a phone call with Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar. Barak says the implications for Israel are worrying since the image of the United States has become weakened and has an adverse effect on Israels allies in the Gulf. U.S. troops are actively withdrawing from the region and these Arab allies may draw closer to Iran if they feel vulnerable. Iran perceives that the United States is not willing to defend its allies, and the Islamic regime will work to take advantage of the void America is leaving, though it has challengers who share the same ambition. Turkey, Russia and China are all important actors in the region; each wants a piece of the pie, if not the entire pie and more. What lessons can be learned from American foreign policy and its waning willingness to be involved in problems far from home? Spyer says the most important one for Israel is the need to strengthen relations with other partners, particularly on a regional level. He notes that the lighter American footprint in the region in the period ahead makes local alliances and connections of paramount importance, adding relations with the Gulf countries, Egypt, India and other partners thus acquire greater importance and centrality in light of the withdrawal and from a focus away from the Middle East and its environs. Grief is a noun that means deep sorrow especially caused by someones death. Are you coping with the loss of a spouse, parent, child or loved one? Join a free grief support group run by Rabbi Maurice Kaprow who serves on the Board of Directors for the Jewish Pavilion. Be part of an encouraging, supportive network. When you are ready, the Jewish Pavilion can help you with a six-week on-going program to help you cope with grief. Rabbi Kaprow recommends that people wait six months after a death to participate, because the grief is too raw prior to that time. The program helps participants deal with their grief through a Jewish Lens and members participate in all six sessions. Joining a grief support group can seem like a big step. Grief brings on a lot of intense feelings at times, and you may wonder if opening yourself up to those feelings and focusing on them is something you want or can manage. It may also feel risky to expose your vulnerable self to participants in a group. These concerns are a normal part of the group experience and everything shared in the group is strictly confidential. The Jewish Pavilion has offered Grief Support with Rabbi Kaplan for six years in the fall and spring. Many previous participants have found that the group can be a rewarding and transformative one. The Jewish Pavilion Grief Support Group meets Oct 13 - November 10. Sessions are from 10:30-11:30 a.m. and held outdoors at Cascade Heights 160 Islander Court. To register contact Nancy Ludin NancyLudin@jewishPavilion.org or 407-678-9363. Forty-five years ago on Aug. 27, 1976 the lead story in the first issue of the Heritage Central Florida Jewish News was about the land optioned for Kinneret II that the Central Florida Jewish Community Council had secured. The Council accepted a loan for $2,225,000 from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Also covered on the front page was that Janet and Ezra Almog, two of the Entebbe hostages, would speak at Congregation Ohev Shalom about their experience being held hostage in the Uganda airport. The paper was 12 pages long, in black and white. Gene Starn was the founder of the Heritage and had this to say from The Editors Desk: Heritage is a newspaper youll be seeing every other week on Fridays. It is published independently of any outside agency and depends solely on subscribers and advertisers for support. It came into being because we felt Central Florida Jewry desperately needed to know what was going on in the Jewish world, both here at home and worldwide. When we [Gene and his wife, Elaine] first came to Orlando, we saw that it was difficult to learn about Jewish activities, what organizations existed and what they did, what the Center did, if there were any cultural events that had a Jewish tam. And unless you subscribed to the Jewish paper from back home you could never get more than a cursory item or two about things of a Jewish nature from the local press or television. Starn had several goals for the paper, which included: To be a community bulletin board; chronicle births, deaths, marriages, bar/bat mitvahs. And other simchas. He hoped the Heritage would be an educator and a promoter, and to guard the Jewish peoples interests by keeping its readers informed of injustices throughout the world and the need for a united front to help Jewish people all over the world. Our editorial pages will be open to all comments and views, and we especially want our readers to make suggestions and participate in any dialogue on any issues. We feel that communication, printed or otherwise, brings about understanding, Starn stated. Starn sold the independent paper to Jeff Gaesar 6 years later in 1982 and Starn became editor emeritus. After 45 years, Heritage is still an independent newspaper and continues to maintains these goals. Although the Internet has greatly supplemented awareness of events happening within the community, Heritage still continues to be a source of information for our readers. For the sixth straight year, on average, students at Jewish Academy of Orlando are performing at least two grade levels ahead of their peers nationwide. The test scores, from April 2021, were taken using the nationally recognized Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) commonly known as the "Iowa Assessments." The Iowa Assessment is a nationally standardized achievement test for K-12 students, allowing schools to compare their students' scores to national norms in Reading, Language Arts, Mathematics, Social Studies and Science. The Iowa Assessments rank the students' scores by grade level equivalents. As a general guide, a score of 8.4 for a 5th grader means the student is testing on an achievement continuum at a level equivalent to an 8th grader in their fourth month, or also reads they are 3 years and 4 months ahead of their current grade level. "We are always grateful to see our students' scores," said Amy Polacek, principal. "We are proud that Jewish Academy of Orlando is a top-ranking school, not only in Orlando but in the nation." The test is used by a large number of private schools and various states to measure grade-level performance. It is often paired with an IQ instrument such as WISC-IV or the CogAT for entrance into gifted and talented programs and National Honor Society. "We try to challenge every student to the best of their ability. Differentiated learning," Polacek explained, "provides students with instruction, which adjusts learning, projects, homework, and classwork to meet the needs of each individual student. Through differentiated learning, it's not just about the speed at which a student covers the material; more often it is about the depth of their study. This could include opportunities for instruction beyond their current grade level to more challenging material." Teaching to the test is not the practice of the Jewish Academy of Orlando. "We use this test for a variety of reasons. One is to get a glimpse of how our student body is performing against national norms. It is one of many indicators teachers use to gauge how well students have mastered benchmarks at each grade level," says Polacek. "These tests also allow us to understand where we need to refine and review our curriculum to stay competitive. Our scores prove that we have been able to combine our teaching techniques, philosophies, and instruction to ensure our students reach their full potential." In addition to JAO's strong academics, the school provides a multi-faceted whole-child development program. Emily Watson, curriculum coordinator stated, "Jewish Academy of Orlando truly believes in educating the whole child, and we have a dual-focus as educators. We foster both academic excellence and social-emotional growth, cultivating values of kindness, self-awareness, mindfulness, and character." To further this thought, Polacek added, "We are extremely proud of our students' academic achievements; we are focused on graduating children that are happy, confident, love to learn, and know how to get along with their peers; students that are ready for the world!" Jewish Academy of Orlando serves Central Florida students of all faiths from kindergarten through fifth grade. The school delivers a whole-child education fostering academic excellence and character education rooted in Jewish values. Jewish Academy of Orlando is accredited by the Florida Council of Independent Schools. To learn more about Jewish Academy of Orlando, please visit: jewishacademyorlando.org or follow the school on Facebook https://facebook.com/JewishAcademyOrlando. JFS Orlando is pleased to announce it has been awarded a $50,000 grant from the Heart of Florida United Way. This grant will support JFS Orlandos FAMILY of services, including their Counseling services, RIDE (Reliable Independent Drivers for the Elderly) Program, Pearlman Emergency Food Pantry, Family Stabilization Program, and Chaplaincy services. In 2020, JFS served an average of 10,000 individuals, provided more than 188,000 meals, and provided more than 4,800 counseling sessions. This past year has been especially challenging for our clients and Central Florida overall, said JFS Executive Director Philip Flynn. We are so grateful to continue providing our relief services in partnership with Heart of Florida United Way. For more information on JFS Orlando and its other programs, visit http://www.JFSorlando.org or follow them on social media @JFSorlando. (JTA) Dozens of progressive Jewish leaders have signed a letter condemning the Israel lobby AIPAC for social media ads targeting Reps. Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other members of the group of progressive Congress members known as the Squad. J Street, a liberal Israel lobby and rival of AIPAC, spearheaded the letter. In its ad about Omar, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee said the Minnesota Democrat sees no difference between America and the Taliban, between Israel and Hamas, between democracies and terrorists. The ad references a tweet by Omar in June that mentioned unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban. Omar later clarified that she was discussing cases before the International Criminal Court and wrote that she was in no way equating terrorist organizations with democratic countries with well-established judicial systems. The ad about Ocasio-Cortez said that by opposing an arms sale to Israel, the New York Democrat was reward[ing] Hamas, the militant group that governs Gaza defined as a terror group by the U.S. and others. Hamas and Israel recently fought an 11-day conflict, the fourth since 2008. AIPAC seems to be declaring war on progressive Democrats with incendiary ads falsely accusing Congresswomen of color of supporting terror & hate, J Street tweeted about the ads. This isnt bipartisan. It doesnt help Israel. It doesnt speak for American Jews. The letter spearheaded by J Street regarding the ads said they are dangerously misleading and risk inciting bigotry, harassment and violence against these lawmakers. The letter, which was first reported by Haaretz, called on AIPAC to discontinue the ads. Among its 45 signatories were progressive organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union, the New Israel Fund, IfNotNow, Americans for Peace Now, BTselem USA, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, Indivisible and MoveOn. Other signatories are Rabbi Sharon Brous of the Los Angeles congregation IKAR; Peter Beinart, the Jewish writer who supports establishing one state for Israelis and Palestinians; and Rabbi Alissa Wise, a former leader of Jewish Voice for Peace, an anti-Zionist group. Omars spokesperson, Jeremy Slevin, tweeted that the AIPAC ad about Omar contains accusations that are virtually identical to the language used in death threats she gets and said the ads are putting [her] life at risk. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, another member of the Squad and an outspoken opponent of Israel, tweeted in response, I am so sick of this sh*t. AIPAC then responded by tweeting, So are we, Congresswoman. Inciting hate by demonizing Israel and spreading vicious, dangerous lies about our democratic ally Israel doesnt advance the prospects for peace. (JNS) - Newly installed Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi celebrated the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan and the failure of the United States to leave smoothly after 20 years entrenched in the country, marking the beginning of what's likely to be a more aggressive stance there and on other fronts in the Middle East. American leaders have accused Iran of backing the Taliban in the fight against its military forces in Afghanistan. While a withdrawal was announced by the Biden administration earlier this year, what has happened over the course of the past few days was certainly not what they had in mind. "America's military defeat and its withdrawal must become an opportunity to restore life, security and durable peace in Afghanistan," Raisi pronounced on Monday, according to Iran's state TV, reported Reuters. Iran has had a complicated relationship with Afghanistan and the Taliban. The Shi'ite Muslim country shares a 560-mile border with mainly Sunni Muslim Afghanistan and hosts some 3.5 million Afghan refugees. In the late 1990s, Iran almost went to war with the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan after several Iranian diplomats were killed, and the Islamic Republic had cooperated with the United States early on in the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 with intelligence support before relations deteriorated during the Bush administration. Nevertheless, the embarrassment of the U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan and the swift Taliban victory over the Western-backed government represents an opportunity for Iran to take a more defiant posture against an America on the retreat from the Middle East. "The Islamic Republic of Iran believes that the reign of the will of the wronged people of Afghanistan has always created security and stability," said Raisi. "While consciously monitoring developments in the country, Iran is committed to neighborly relations." Allies Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah have all come out praising the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. They see it as a model for defeating the United States and Israel in the Middle East. Raisi presented a cabinet of hardliners last week, including Gen. Ahmad Vahidi as interior minister. He is a former defense minister wanted by Interpol for his alleged role in the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish cultural center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 and injured hundreds. Meir Javedanfar, a lecturer on Iranian politics at IDC Herzliya in Israel, told JNS that the new Iranian government and its composition is a message to the international community that Iran will not be so forthcoming and as during the previous term of President Hassan Rouhani. "The latter was at least more accommodating rhetorically. But those days are over," he said. Javedanfar sees Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as being the impetus behind the new government. In terms of what actions can be expected from the new government, Javedanfar predicted that "you could almost call it the Khamenei government; the people now in charge can be assumed to have been appointed directly from the leader himself." As per the ongoing negotiations to revive the 2015 nuclear deal, he said it's too soon to speculate if this new government signals the end of the talks. "I do think the composition of the new government means Iran is sending a tougher message to the U.S. negotiators, but an agreement might still be possible," said Javedenfar. The International Atomic Energy Agency stated in a report presented to members states on Monday and seen by Reuters that Iran is advancing its work with uranium metal. "On 14 August 2021, the Agency verified ... that Iran had used 257 g[rams] of uranium enriched up to 20 percent U-235 in the form of UF4 (uranium tetrafluoride) to produce 200 g[rams] of uranium metal enriched up to 20 percent U-235," said the U.N. nuclear watchdog. Such work is not going to help advance talks that are already at an impasse. Iran's aggressive policies 'likely to continue' Ali Alfoneh, a senior fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, told JNS that "the Iranian president does not necessarily represent a belligerent line, but lessons learned by the Iranian state in the past decade are likely to lead to a more confrontational approach." He wrote in a recent article that this aggressive approach is likely to continue due to four main lessons learned by officials in Tehran. First, proxy wars secured military victories in Syria and Yemen. Second, Iran survived the Trump administration's nearly four-year "maximum pressure" campaign. Third, no military retaliation came for attacks against Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. And fourth, the coronavirus pandemic has led to more government control of the country, rather than less. Add Afghanistan to this list of countries where Iran is likely to push to increase its influence drastically after the U.S. military withdrawal. The collapse of the Afghan military could serve as further motivation for Iran to aggressively target American-allied Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, as well countries like Jordan. WASHINGTON (JTA) While most of the foreign policy world is focused on President Joe Bidens moves in Afghanistan in the wake of the stunning turn of events there, the first anniversary of another important Middle East development quietly took place last week. The first part of the Abraham Accords, the historic cooperation agreements between Israel and several of its Arab neighbors, brokered in large part by the United States, turned one year old on Friday. The United Arab Emirates signed a treaty to normalize its relations with Israel for the first time on Aug. 13, 2020, opening up collaboration on tourism, trade, technology sharing and more. Bahrain would soon follow suit, followed by Sudan and Morocco all of whom never had formal relations with Israel. The Biden administration did not exactly call attention to the anniversary in fact, the administrations spokesmen still wont even use the term Abraham Accords. Thats likely in part because the agreements were a foreign policy win for Donald Trumps team, and because Biden is prioritizing other initiatives at the moment, such as combating the latest COVID-19 case surge and addressing the fallout in Afghanistan. We welcome and support the normalization agreements between Israel and countries in the Arab and Muslim world, a State Department official said last week, responding to a JTA query about the status of the accords. The United States will continue to encourage other countries to normalize relations with Israel, and we will look for other opportunities to expand cooperation among countries in the region. The degree to which the normalization agreements are thriving varies from country to country, and for the moment it doesnt look like there are any imminent new members of the club. But the forecast by experts and peace-brokers is that the deals are here to stay. And Biden deserves some credit for that, a Trump administration official told JTA. The country is in a difficult moment in time and pretending that Republicans and Democrats are ideologically aligned right now on much of anything would be foolhardy, said the Trump official, who asked not to be further identified in order to speak candidly. And yet, here we stand with peace agreements, all with very intricate, complicated components to them, and they have really thrived in this last year and its important to say this administration deserves credit. Still, not everyone is happy about the trajectory. Jonathan Schanzer, senior vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a group that is critical of Bidens Middle East policies, said the apparent failure to commemorate the deal is sending the wrong signal. Its not a deal-breaker, but it certainly does not seem terribly encouraging for the countries involved, Schanzer said. Almost all of the individual agreements came with key incentives, or compromises, from the side of Israel and the U.S. Heres a rundown of how those incentives are holding up, and a look at each countrys relations with Israel, one year later. The incentives are in place for now The Trump administration negotiated incentives for three of the four countries that normalized relations with Israel: -The U.S. agreed to sell the UAE state of the art F-35 stealth fighter jets, which some including (for a time) former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believed could weaken Israels qualitative military edge in the region. -The U.S. agreed to recognize Moroccos claim to rule over disputed territory in the Western Sahara. -The U.S. removed Sudan from listings identifying the country as a terrorism sponsor. Sudan had landed on the list after harboring the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, Osama bin Laden. -Bahrain, the headquarters of the U.S. Navys 5th Fleet and its Central Command, already had a close relationship with the United States and required no apparent incentives. The human rights community immediately targeted all three of those incentives, lobbying to reverse them. Some supporters of the accords at first worried Biden a champion for decades of a human-rights-oriented foreign policy might accede to their demands. There were compelling arguments to reconsider the incentives: -The UAE has acted as a sometimes malign interventionist actor in the region, most recently joining Saudi Arabia in backing the Yemen government in a devastating war against Houthi rebels who are backed by Iran. -Recognizing Moroccos claim to an area it has claimed by force was seen as undercutting efforts to counter other expansionist bids, for instance, Russias effective annexation of Crimea. -While the government of Sudan rejects everything its predecessors stood for, families of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks are still pressing for compensation. Biden has so far kept all of these intact. At first, he froze the UAE F-35s deal, but then recommitted to it, in part because the pro-Israel community, which had joined the opposition to the deal, dropped its objections. (A number of Democrats in the Senate still hope to slow the deal down.) The Biden administration has said that reversing the Western Sahara recognition is off the table for now. And Secretary of State Antony Blinken has accepted the terms of the Sudan deal, accepting payment for victims of some acts of terrorism Sudan facilitated in the 1990s and preserving the right of victims of the 9/11 attacks to continue their quest for compensation. The United Arab Emirates The UAE deal is the biggest success of the four, and Israel and the UAE have already exchanged official ambassadors. This is not in any sense a low-profile bromance: The UAE has rolled out the red carpet for top Israeli officials, including Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid. Commercial ties are also thriving. A massive UAE investment in Israels offshore natural gas extraction is going ahead. Tens of thousands of Israelis visited the UAE in the months after the signing. A kosher food industry is blossoming in Dubai. The Trump peace broker said that the Emirates high-profile embrace of normalization is paying off with the dividend that the Trump administration sought: A street-level embrace of Israel as a natural neighbor. When the Emiratis team has a rugby match in Israel, it gets covered by the UAE papers and the UAE papers are seen in Saudi Arabia and in Tunisia and in Egypt and in Oman and Bahrain and even in Iran, the official said. These things are changing people. There is still one important point of tension: Israels military actions against the Palestinians. Before the latest round of fighting between Israel and Hamas in May, the UAE criticized Israels crackdown on Palestinians protesting evictions in eastern Jerusalem. Schanzer predicted that the issue will require some time to smooth over. There is discomfort, every time theres a Gaza conflict, or whatever the issue is, some flare-up in Jerusalem or the West Bank, it makes it more difficult I think for the UAE to engage with the IDF. Thats going to be the final frontier, he said. Bahrain Bahrain, which houses a Jewish community thats more than a century old and which has had quiet relations with Israel and the pro-Israel community since the 2000s at least, did not need a lot of convincing to buy into the accords. Two months after the signing, Bahrains commerce minister was in Jerusalem formalizing already existing commercial ties. Bahrain has named an ambassador to Israel, but unlike the UAE has not yet established an embassy in Israel. Houda Nonoo, who in the 2000s made history as the first Jewish ambassador from an Arab country to Washington, said she expected the relationship with Israel to flourish. As we embark on a new era in the BahrainIsrael relationship, it is important to remember that at the core of this agreement is the desire to create a new Middle East, one built on peace and prosperity for all, Nonoo, who is still working for the Bahraini foreign ministry and who attended last years signing, said in a message to JTA. I believe that the growing partnerships between Bahrain and Israel will lead to sustainable peace in the region. Morocco Morocco was always seen as the easiest get: Theres a huge Moroccan Jewish community in Israel that has since the 1990s traveled back to the country on pilgrimages. And of the four countries in the accords, it has the largest remnant Jewish community. A number of Moroccan Jews are advisers to King Mohammed VI. Morocco and Israel have existing commercial and, reportedly, security ties. The countries have so far exchanged envoys and have launched for the first time ever direct commercial flights. But there have been some hiccups a consequence, in part, of uncertainty for a period about how Biden would treat the recognition of the Western Sahara. While the ideal situation for Moroccan decision-makers would be a public statement of recognition [from Biden], the lack of a reversal in itself is a win, said Yasmina Abouzzohour, a visiting fellow at the Brooking Center in Qatar who is an expert on Morocco. Another factor impeding a full-fledged mutual embrace has been the countrys elected government, which is more Islamist than the royal court. Abouzzohour said the pluses the media has played up are the economic ties, the concomitant strengthening of ties with the United States and the potential for Morocco to have a bigger role in helping bring about a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But she said the average Moroccan citizen on the street was not thrilled about the relationship. The Moroccan population is overwhelmingly pro-Palestine, she said. It will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for this to change. Israeli violence in Jerusalem and Gaza in May 2021 did not help the matter and led to numerous protests across the country. Israels foreign minister Yair Lapid landed in Rabat on Wednesday and met with his counterpart. He made it clear Israel wants the deal to advance. What did we achieve from all these years, during which the relations between our two ancient and proud nations were severed? he said. Nothing. What did our citizens gain? Nothing. Today, we are changing this. Today, we are changing this for the benefit of tourism and the economy, for trade and cultural exchange, for friendship and cooperation. Sudan Sudan is another country that has long had sub rosa ties with Israel; it played a critical role in the 1980s in the wave of Ethiopian Jewish immigration. Right now, its deal with Israel is stuck, as the two sides hash out details not because any of the parties are having second thoughts. Sudans government is contending with internal tensions as it transitions to democracy that have frustrated its overall efforts to engage with the international community. There have been a few delegations from Israel to Sudan, not the other way around, thats been postponed and postponed and postponed, said David Pollock, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who tracks public opinion in the Middle East. Theres a lot of potential in Sudan, for technical cooperation in many different areas water, agriculture, energy. But it continues to be of course a country that has many internal divisions, and a very fragile, kind of government. Although, its muddling through pretty well considering. Whos next? The big domino that could lead to a cascade of mutual recognition in the Arab and Muslim worlds is Saudi Arabia. But thats not likely to happen soon: Lawmakers in Congress, mostly Democrats but a number of Republicans as well, see the country as toxic because of its human rights abuses, including its murder of a U.S.-based journalist in 2018, and because of its Yemen war interventions. Biden, even if he were inclined to deliver the incentives Saudi Arabia would demand to hop in, would face resistance domestically. That said, there are a number of countries that already have informal ties with Israel that could easily transition to full-blown ties, among them Oman, Mauritania, Indonesia and Qatar. Iran and Hamas on Monday effusively welcomed the final capitulation of the Afghan government to Taliban insurgents over the weekend, praising the hardline Islamist organization for its brave leadership in defeating the American occupation. As reports poured in from around the country of Taliban fighters seizing unmarried girls to serve as sex slaves and carrying out executions of members of the Afghan military, Irans President Ebrahim Raisi gushed over the defeat of the U.S., claiming that the Talibans violent seizure of power reflected the reign of the will of the wronged people of Afghanistan. The theological and political divide between Shia Iran and the ultraconservative Sunni Islam of the Taliban has not prevented cooperation between the two in the past. During this year alone, at least two delegations of Taliban leaders have visited Tehran for talks with the leaders of the Islamic Republic. In July, as Taliban fighters reported significant advances on the ground, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif told a visiting delegation of Taliban chieftains that his regime stood ready to support negotiations involving Afghanistans armed factions. At a press conference that followed the private discussions, Zarif a key architect of the ill-fated U.S.-led 2015 agreement on Irans nuclear program hailed the Talibans defeat of U.S. troops after 20 years of war. We are proud to have stood alongside our noble Afghan brothers and sisters during the jihad against the foreign occupiers, Zarif declared at the time. Separately, the presence of a Taliban delegation in Tehran in January was depicted as an exercise in real politik by a regime spokesperson. The Taliban is part of todays reality in Afghanistan, Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh stated, insisting at the same time that Iran had not forgotten its martyrs in Mazar-e-Sharif a reference to the execution by the Taliban of a group of Iranian diplomats in the northern Afghan city in 1998. Meanwhile, Irans ally in Gaza, the Hamas terrorist organization, similarly cheered the Talibans takeover of the Afghan capital Kabul in a statement published on social media by one of its main spokesmen. Today the Taliban is victorious after it used to be accused of backwardness and terrorism, said Musa Abu Marzouk, a member of the Hamas political bureau. Now, the Taliban is more clever and more realistic. It has faced America and its agents, refusing half-solutions with them. The Taliban was not deceived by the slogans of democracy and elections and fake promises. Abu Marzouk continued: This is a lesson for all oppressed peoples. Will they learn the moral of this story? Taliban leaders have also held cordial meetings with their Hamas counterparts. On Monday, several social media feeds ran photographs of an encounter that took place in Doha, the capital of Qatar, shortly after the hostilities between Israel and Hamas ended in May. The Hamas delegation was led by Ismail Haniyeh, the Qatar-based head of the Hamas political bureau, with Mullah Abdul Ghani Barader slated to be the next President of Afghanistan leading the Taliban envoys. At the meeting, Barader offered Hamas congratulations for its victory over the IDF during the fighting in May. In a column for Canadas National Post on Monday, Terry Glavin a journalist who has traveled frequently to Afghanistan observed that Baradar was sprung from a Pakistani prison at the request of the Trump administration three years ago. Glavin said that Baradar was a co-founder of the Taliban and a senior figure in the Pakistan-sponsored Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan that enslaved Afghan women and ransacked Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. He noted that it was Baradar who happily signed the February 2020 peace agreement with the Trump administration. Ben Cohen writes a weekly column for JNS.org on Jewish affairs and Middle Eastern politics. His writings have been published in Commentary, the New York Post, Haaretz, The Wall Street Journal and many other publications. (Jewish Journal via JNS) If youve been following the ethnic studies controversy in California over the past few years and came away thinking the Jewish community had emerged relatively unscathed, think again. The Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum was unanimously adopted in March of this year by the California Board of Education. Some members of the Jewish community pushed for the inclusion of Jews in that curriculum, and once satisfied with various modifications, ultimately supported it. Others had grave concerns about the curriculums underlying ideology, which presents the world in binary terms of oppressed versus oppressor largely along racial lines. This framing should have raised red flags, especially for Jews. Now, with the ESMC ideological underpinnings in place, the very people who authored and promoted earlier versions of the ESMC versions so explicitly anti-Semitic they were unable to passare now pushing a Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum that contains even more extreme prescriptions than the original. The goal, they explain on their website, is for teachers to be part of a larger movement. Rather than giving voice to marginalized people, as the authors claim, the curriculum seeks to indoctrinate Californias K-12 students into what Elina Kaplan, co-founder of the Alliance for Constructive Ethnic Studies describes as a narrow ideological agenda that misappropriates the focus on local ethnic groups real obstacles and accomplishments and shoehorns a one-sided advocacy message. Their website promotes a curriculum toolkit that refers to The Anti-Defamation League, the Jewish Community Resource [sic] Council (meaning JCRC), and Simon Wiesenthals Museum of Tolerance as Zionist organizations whose primary goal is to stunt the development of authentic anti-racist curriculum. The curriculum authors, who define Zionism as a nationalist, colonial ideology, claim that there is a current apartheid in Israel and that Israels settler colonialism has pedagogical importance and therefore must be included in Californias ethnic studies curriculum. They intend to teach children that Zionism calls for the expansion of Israel as a Jewish state in what they refer to as historic Palestine and by any means necessary. And they want to convince the children of California that Zionist organizations try to silence discussion of Palestine/Israel. What makes Israel an appropriate subject for a curriculum that is supposed to be about ethnic groups in the United States? The authors want Californias young minds to subscribe to the conspiracy theory that there are clear connections between the struggle for Palestinian rights and the struggles of Indigenous, Black and brown communities, and other marginalized groups impacted by U.S. policies, both within and outside of U.S. borders. They want teachers to integrate Palestine into their curriculum by making a connection between Native American history, gentrification and forced relocation, criminalization of youth, and hip-hop as resistance, to settler colonialism in Palestine. Heres the kicker: California is about to pass a bill mandating ethnic studies as a graduation requirement, and school districts are not required to use the approved version. In fact, 14 school districts have already passed resolutions endorsing this anti-Semitic version. That any California school district would permit children to be taught anti-Semitic falsehoods about Jewish organizations, Zionism and the history of Israel is shocking, but no longer surprising. We have been warning the Jewish community that this illiberal ideology will continue to give rise to anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism. Several mainstream Jewish groups continue to publicly support these kinds of curricula. The strategy of working within the progressive world in order to influence discourse about Jews made sense in the past, but it has become increasingly clear that this is a failed strategy. Sooner or later, well-meaning Jews must come to realize that to go along with this ideology is to countenance its inevitable anti-Semitic manifestations. Until the underlying ideology is rejected, the Jewish community will be playing an endless game of whack-a-mole with anti-Semitic curricula, programs and incidents. David Bernstein is the founder of the Jewish Institute for Liberal Values (JILV.org). Follow him on Twitter @DavidLBernstein. Pamela Paresky is Board Chair of JILV, Visiting Senior Research Associate at the University of Chicagos Stevanovich Institute on the Formation of Knowledge (SIFK), and Senior Scholar at the Network Contagion Research Institute. Follow her on Twitter @PamelaParesky. This article was first published by the Jewish Journal. (JNS) The diplomatic crisis unfolding between Jerusalem and Warsaw is unfortunate. Eastern European countries have been staunch supporters of the United States and Israel in a way that their counterparts in the Western continent have long ceased to be. As a result, conservative columnist Amnon Lord is among those stressing that Israel needs to be smart, not just right, when it comes to its relations with Poland. Despite its nationalism, he recently wrote, Poland is a type of ally. The cooperation with it in terms of military aviation is a cornerstone of our national security. The Poles also buy weapons and other systems from us. Poland is also an important potential partner for Israel, together with the member countries of the Visegrad Group (the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia), with regard to Israels effort to crack the anti-Israel Western-European bloc. Its more than a valid point. But lets not kid ourselves. Polands hysterical reiteration that it played no part in the Holocaust other than being victimized by the occupation of the country first by Hitler and then by Stalin is problematic. Though technically true, both in relation to Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, the reality where the former is concerned is more complicated. For decades, any mention of the death camps in Poland has been pounced upon by Polish politicians and intellectuals as a lie, or at least, as misleading. German-occupied Poland did, however, house 457 Nazi camp complexes. The most notable of these, Auschwitz-Birkenau, is the site of the annual March of the Living, which attracts participants from all over the world, including Israel. Warsaws stubborn refusal to acknowledge any role in or cooperation with the genocide of the Jews let alone pursue and prosecute individual Polish collaborators culminated in actual legislation. According to a law passed by the Polish parliament and then signed in February 2018 by President Andrzej Duda, Whoever accuses, publicly and against the facts, the Polish nation, or the Polish state, of being responsible or complicit in the Nazi crimes committed by the Third German Reich shall be subject to a fine or a penalty of imprisonment of up to three years. The outcry that ensued in Europe, the United States, and, of course, Israel, caused Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki to amend the law, which he argued had merely been intended to defend Polands good name. He stated that the correction would be to switch violations from criminal offenses to civil ones. This didnt stop him from taking a dig at Israel for its vocal objections to the law, even after it was modified. Asked about it during a press conference at the 2018 Munich Security Conference, he told reporters: Its extremely important to first understand that, of course, it is not going to be punishable, not going to be seen as criminal, to say that there were Polish perpetratorsas there were Jewish perpetrators, as there were Russian perpetrators, as there were Ukrainian not only German perpetrators. Then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the remarks outrageous, saying that they showed an inability to understand history. This brings us to todays brouhaha, occurring with a new Israeli government but with the same cast of Polish characters going at it again. The current flap surrounds Dudas recent approval of yet another piece of legislation this one establishing a 30-year limit for restitution claims on property stolen by the Nazis and then confiscated by the post-war Communist regime. Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid blasted the law, going as far as to accuse Poland of having become an anti-democratic, non-liberal country that does not honor the greatest tragedy in human history. He also recalled the charge daffaires from the Israeli embassy in Warsaw and put a hold on dispatching the newly appointed ambassador there. Referring to the move as groundless and irresponsible, Morawiecki posted on Facebook: No one who knows the truth about the Holocaust and the suffering of Poland during World War II can agree to such a way of conducting politics. To make matters worse, the countrys deputy foreign minister, Pawel Jablonski, said in an interview with the Polish Internet radio station, Kresy, that Warsaw is considering canceling Israeli school trips to Poland, where they visit Auschwitz-Birkenau as part of their Holocaust-studies curriculum. He asserted that the trips do not take place in a proper manner; they sometimes instill hatred for Poland in the heads of young Israelis. He went on, We are dealing with anti-Polish sentiment in Israel, and one of the reasons for this is the way in which Israeli youth are educated and raised. This propaganda, based on hatred of Poland, seeps into the heads of young people from an early age in school. Talk about chutzpah or projection not to mention delusion. As it happens, Israeli kids are not fed anti-Polish propaganda, certainly not in school. If any hear of horror stories about Polish anti-Semitism, they do so from their grandparents or other aging relatives, who experienced it firsthand. No, Jablonskis accusation was of a retaliatory nature. He was getting back at the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamirand his disciple, former Transportation Minister Yisrael Katzfor saying that Polish children imbibe anti-Semitism from their mothers milk. Tit for tat, so to speak. The difference, as the late anti-Semitism scholar Manfred Gerstenfeld wrote in 2019, is that there actually was massive participation of Poles in the murders of Jews during the Holocaust, as well as persistent anti-Semitism [in Poland] both before and after the war. He, like Lord, urged that Israel exercise caution in the complex relationship with Poland, as the countries have many shared interests. Its excellent advice in the realm of pragmatic diplomacy. Too bad Poland isnt following it. Warsaw needs friends in the international community just as much as Jerusalem does, after all. Enacting anti-Semitic laws is not the way to keep the Jewish state in its corner. Ruthie Blum is an Israel-based journalist and author of To Hell in a Handbasket: Carter, Obama, and the Arab Spring. (JNS) For those old enough to remember the images of the last days of South Vietnam, recent events in Afghanistan are shockingly familiar. In each case, a flawed American ally facing a determined foe quickly collapsed once both sides to the conflict realized that the United States wouldnt lift a finger to help its friends. Afghanistan was Americas longest war, and sadly, it must go down in history, like Vietnam, as one in which a superpower was defeated by a much weaker enemy. In both instances, there are good reasons to argue that defeat might have been inevitable despite the skill and bravery of the U.S. forces, and that of our allies, who fought there. And in both cases, its entirely likely that most Americans will not care all that much. Our lives will go on undisturbed, even if troubling memories about Taliban rule will pop up on the 9/11 anniversary or when the oppression of women or other Islamist atrocities that will commence in Afghanistan are publicized. That wont be the case for other American allies, including those like Israelis, who, thankfully, dont depend on the presence of U.S. troops to defend them against enemies. The United States may still be a country whose national defense is a function of oceans and continents. But smaller countries that live in dangerous neighborhoods inhabited by those, like Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon, where the victory of Islamists like the Taliban will indeed be celebrated, are, however, forced to draw harsh conclusions about their alliances with the United States and whether its government can be relied upon to keep its word when the chips are down. The Vietnam analogy cannot be ignored. By the time an armored offensive by the North Vietnamese Army (and not, as myth would have it, successful guerrilla fighters) swept into Saigon, the overwhelming majority of Americans were heartily sick of the Vietnam War. When a Democratic Congress overruled a Republican administrations desire to resupply the South Vietnamese, most shrugged and said, not unreasonably, that they had given enough in a war that didnt make them any safer. They continued shrugging when the Communist victors put roughly a million of the losers in re-education camps and when hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese who hadnt been able to get on the last helicopters out of Saigon fled their homes in unsafe small boats hoping for a chance to get to freedom. It will probably go even harder for the people of Afghanistan. But a broad, bipartisan consensus in favor of ending the forever war in that country will cause most Americans to avert their eyes without too much trouble. After all, Americans have poured vast amounts of blood and treasure into Afghanistan, even if, thankfully, the casualty count was a fraction of what it was in Vietnam. They have every right to think that after 20 years they have sacrificed enough. The denouement happened on President Joe Bidens watch as his feckless predictions that another Saigon wouldnt happen proved false, and the sense that the government that had lost control of events and, even worse, didnt really care, pervaded even sympathetic coverage of his folly in the mainstream media. But the blame for this debacle is bipartisan. It starts with the George W. Bush administration. The United States had every right to invade in the fall of 2001. Yet Bush discounted the long history of catastrophes for foreign armies in Afghanistan dating back to Alexander the Great, and included the British and Soviet empires when he ordered U.S. troops to attack in retaliation for the Talibans hosting of the Al-Qaeda terrorists that attacked America on 9/11. The initial American success in routing the Taliban from power was heartening, but rather than leave the Afghanis to sort out their fate, U.S. and NATO forces felt impelled to stay and to begin a futile effort at nation-building. Despite the positive impact that had on so many there, this was doomed to failure in a nation where many of the people had little interest in either democracy or the benefits of life in the 21st century, as opposed to the medieval Islam practiced by the Taliban. President Barack Obama inherited a stable conflict in which the West arguably still had the upper hand. Democrats had campaigned in 2006 and 2008 on the idea that Afghanistan was the good war as opposed to the bad one being fought by Bush in Iraq. Still, his 2011 declaration that the United States intended to leave signaled to the Taliban that all they had to do was to wait it out until the Americans had enough and were gone. That mistake was compounded by President Donald Trump, who engaged in pointless and humiliating negotiations with the Taliban in order to try to make good on his promise to end a war in which the other side was determined to keep fighting until victory. Trump set in motion a plan for withdrawal that also encouraged the Taliban and helped guide their final offensives. Nevertheless, he had contradicted his America First neo-isolationist beliefs by vigorously pursuing a victorious campaign against ISIS terrorists in Iraq and Syria that Obama had flubbed, coupled with a tough stance against Iran. That at least held open the possibility that he might not ignore a situation in which American allies in Kabul were endangered or overwhelmed. Not so with Biden, who, given his supposedly superior command of foreign policy, could still have overturned Trumps Afghanistan plans, as he did his predecessors policies on Iran and other issues. His administration was unprepared for the crisis and failed to respond effectively, even to the point where Americans and those who had served our cause were left behind in the final rush to flee Kabul. The imagery of a president and his spokesperson on vacation and unavailable for comment as an ally fell to a sworn foe of America and the West will linger in the worlds memory of these events. Whats more, the problem isnt merely a question of the failures of Biden and the three presidents who came before him. As was the case after Vietnam, there needs to be a reckoning within the military and intelligence establishment in Washington. As much as their political masters, they were the architects of this disaster and need to be held accountable with respect to the strategies they pursued and their inability to properly evaluate events right up until the final disaster. That is something that, sooner or later, Americans will attend to, as theyve done before after other failures. Israelis, on the other hand, must reckon with the immediate consequences for the Middle East. American allies must rightly wonder how they can possibly rely on a government like the one led by Biden as threats from other Islamists like the regime in Iran, and its allies and auxiliaries continue to grow stronger. The administration will point out that Israel and even the Gulf states and other Arab nations, which have good reason to feel slighted by Biden, are in a very different position than Afghanistan. Thats true, but as the president continues to engage in an effort to renew Obamas appeasement of Iran, how can he possibly ask any of Americas allies to trust him to take their security into account when negotiating with the theocrats of Tehran? While there is still time to reverse course, at the moment, Washington is giving every indication that it is a declining world power drifting into an incoherent and ineffective stance against Irans terrorist threats and nuclear ambitions, as it has done in Afghanistan. That leaves Israel and its Arab allies more dependent on each other than ever. And it must force them to think of the necessity of both acting on their own without the United States, as well as to consider reaching out to other powers like Russia and China even though their intentions are far from benevolent and cannot be trusted. This creates a formula for a far more dangerous world than it would be if the United States were led by people who understood the dangers and were focused on protecting U.S. interests, rather than pursuing illusory goals rooted in ideology. A willingness to take responsibility for this failure something that Biden clearly refuses to do would be a start. Some believed that starting in January, the adults were back in power and that as a result, the world would be safer. If only that were true. Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNS Jewish News Syndicate. Follow him on Twitter at: @jonathans_tobin. (JNS) Just as things were returning to normal, and rabbis across America were eagerly anticipating a full reopening for the High Holy Days, the Delta variant showed up. Oh no, not again. Need I remind you that nearly every synagogue and Jewish center in America pretty much shut down during last years High Holidays because of COVID-19? That the great American Jewish ritual of scoring High Holiday tickets succumbed to a deadly, global virus? That rabbis had to scramble for alternatives, from Zoom services to backyard and porch minyans? Those days of physical isolation were supposed t... More than half of Lifeways employees plan to join new county mental health provider Anchor/Multimedia Journalist Hello! I am the weekend anchor as well as a reporter for Your News Now! You can reach me with news tips (or just to say hello!) at khonigford@wlio.com. Renovation 26 August 2021 Ahead of this year's International Hotel Investment Conference (IHIF), Hilton (NYSE: HLT) has signed a franchise agreement to open Hilton Heidelberg, a 244-room upscale hotel in Heidelberg's city centre. The property will undergo a major refurbishment before welcoming guests in Summer 2022. The hotel is owned by Invesco Real Estate, the global real estate investment manager which acquired the property in 2017. Heidelberg is a thriving university town, steeped in history and famed for its distinctive gothic architecture. Numerous large corporates are headquartered in the town and Heidelberg has a reputation as one of Europe's leading scientific hubs as well as being home to the European Molecular Biology Laboratory. Guests to the hotel will be a short walk from Heidelberg's baroque old town and the historic Heidelberg Castle. Heidelberg University, founded in the fourteenth century and the oldest university in Germany, is three kilometres away. Once refurbished, the hotel will offer 244 stylish guest rooms and suites, as well as a restaurant, bar and executive lounge. Guests will also benefit from access to the hotel's gym. Meetings and events will be held in the hotel's seven conference rooms, which will provide more than 550 square metres of modern meeting space. Hilton Heidelberg is part of Invesco Real Estate's exposure to the European hotel sector, the firm's allocation represents now 1.3bn assets under management in the European hotel sector, consisting of 24 hotel investments across six countries in Europe. The hotel will be located at Kurfuersten-Anlage 1, Heidelberg, 69115, Germany. Appointment 26 August 2021 Red Roofnames George Limbert as President of the company effective immediately. Limbert has been interim president since October of 2020. Limbert served as Red Roof's General Counsel for the previous eight years. He has been on the core leadership team that has guided the company throughout the pandemic. Red Roof has overcome these challenges as a well-positioned leader in the industry, seeing consistent increases in all performance metrics. Earlier this month, the company announced a new prototype for HomeTowne Studios, its extended stay offering. HomeTowne Studios will rapidly become the leader in the economy extended stay segment. The new prototype was launched to great acclaim at the annual meeting of the Asian American Hotel Owners Association in Dallas. Limbert is an Ohio native. He received a degree in business from The Ohio State University and earned his law degree at the University of Dayton. Limbert is also an adjunct professor teaching Franchise Law at The Ohio State University, Moritz College of Law. He lives in Columbus, Ohio with his wife and their daughter. WASHINGTON Jim Walzel doesnt fit the profile of what most people would think of as a climate denier a term he rejects. A chemical engineer who made his money as a pipeline executive, Walzel lives in West University, a Houston enclave populated with academics from nearby Rice University. He points to his COVID-19 vaccination card as proof he trusts in science, and says he has little doubt that fossil fuels are warming the planet. But hes not convinced that climate change will result in the cataclysmic future predicted by forecasters. I wouldnt call myself a denier, but I am skeptical about the gravity of the thing, he said. Im trying to look at the facts and say whats the deal here. And from what Im seeing the consensus of scientists is not as pervasive as you describe. Walzels views open a window on how and why climate skepticism persists, despite mounting evidence that global warming not only poses a serious threat to the planet but is already doing damage. In Houston, long the unofficial capital of the worlds oil and gas industry, such strains of thought are particularly persistent, often grounded in the work of a small cadre of scientists who fixate on legitimate uncertainties within climate science. They do not question the fundamental notion that greenhouse gas emissions are raising global temperatures but rather that it will all end in catastrophe. Dismissed as kooks or contrarians, these scientists continue to find followings among those like Walzel who believe if the world is going to shift from fossil fuels in just a matter of decades, we better be certain on the science. Go to NASAs website, and it states 97 percent of published climate scientists agree that manmade carbon emissions have caused the planet to warm over the past century. But once you get past the consensus that the planet is warming faster than it would naturally, agreement fractures over how fast polar ice caps are melting or whether climate change will cause more hurricanes and heat waves hugely complex questions that require looking decades or centuries into the future. Climate skeptics, or realists as they prefer to be called, fixate on the details under debate, even though the overwhelming the majority of climate scientists agree that global warming will go very badly unless mankind takes immediate action. For instance, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently released another terrifying report calling climate change a code red for humanity. But in the nearly 4,000-page study, skeptics note, the term low confidence jargon for findings where there is conflicting evidence occurs almost 1,400 times. The term likely which could mean a degree of certainty as low as 66 percent appears thousands of times, including as to whether major hurricanes have increased in frequency since the 1980s. When you add up that uncertainty, it amounts to a field of science that has a long way to go, said Steve Koonin, a physicist who worked at Caltech and MIT and served as undersecretary of science at the Department of Energy during the Obama administration. Now the director of the Center for Urban Science and Progress at New York University, Koonin published a book earlier this year entitled, Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn't, and Why It Matters, prompting a wave of criticism from other scientists, accusing him of cherry picking data to suit his thesis. We should be making societal decisions in a fully informed way, and there are things in the (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) reports that contradict the narrative and nobody ever talks about them, Koonin said. Some of it is there are some scientists who really think theyre going to save the world. There's others and its peer pressure. Ive had scientists say to me, Youre right, but I wouldnt dare say it. Marie D. De Jesus, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer Code of silence Climate scientists acknowledge the uncertainties, but stress there is plenty of well documented evidence showing that climate change and its dire consequences are not only real, but already happening, as wildfires and extreme flooding became regular events. You dont need to agree with all the details to recognize there is a profound need to change the way we emit greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, said Chris Field, director of Stanford Universitys Woods Institute for the Environment . But in Koonins mind, there are simply too many open questions to express that level of confidence, and scientists have entered into a dangerous code of silence. Among them: the rate of ice melt in the Arctic. While polar ice is melting faster than it did in the 1990s, historical data indicates its occurring at the same pace as during the 1940s. Another unsettled question is whether climate change is causing more intense hurricanes a phenomenon commonly cited by politicians. The latest United Nations report said category 3 or higher storms have only likely increased in intensity since 1980. In those and other cases, the uncertainty comes from the relatively short period in which climate data has been collected. Satellites werent put into orbit until the 1960s, leaving scientists who track climate over the centuries to rely on murky historical records from say, a ship captain who spotted a hurricane at sea or a scientist observing in person the loss of ice in the Arctic. The motivation for downplaying these uncertainties, Koonin says, comes from belief that talking freely about the unknown would fuel public skepticism when the world needs political agreement to act on climate change. What sounds like a conspiracy theory stems in part from a 1989 magazine interview with Stephen Schneider, the late Stanford University professor and pioneer in climate science. Schneider described a double ethical bind that required scientists to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have to attract public attention. As scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but, he said. On the other hand, we are not just scientists, but human beings, as well. And like most people we'd like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climatic change. That comment followed an infamous 1988 appearance before Congress by the climate scientist James Hansen, who traveled to Washington during a historic heat wave. Wiping the sweat from his forehead, he proclaimed, The greenhouse effect has been detected, and it is changing our climate now. Climate modeling, however, wasnt nearly as developed as now, and other scientists took issue with what they viewed as a clever piece of stagecraft exaggerating their findings, said Deborah Coen, a science historian at Yale University. They believed he had compromised his integrity and their integrity, she said. This is less common now, but if you go back to the earlier days, there were credentialed scientists who were skeptical of the models. At that point, it wasnt clear how bad the consequences were, and how much political opposition the science would face. The year after Hansens appearance, oil companies, including Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips and Chevron, formed the Global Climate Coalition to challenge findings that human activity caused global warming and campaign against regulation of greenhouse gas emissions. The oil companies lobbied Congress and blanketed the media with claims that greenhouse gas limits would wreck the economy. They even distributed a video claiming increased carbon dioxide was positive because it would likely increase crop yields since plants need carbon dioxide for photosynthesis. They were not alone. A number of prominent scientists, including physicist Frederick Seitz, the former president of the National Academy of Sciences, and Freeman Dyson, the groundbreaking theoretical physicist from Princeton University, questioned whether global warming was the emergency that climate scientists portrayed. The skeptics kind of forced a lot of climate scientists to back off, Coen said. Toe the line on facts (not computer simulations) or be labeled alarmists. Changing tenor Eventually, mounting evidence that climate change was not only real but already happening made outright denial unfeasible. To question the finer points of climate theory was no longer just scientific method but also a political statement. Disputing any aspect of accepted views of global warming risked scorn, ridicule and isolation. Walzel, the retired president of the former pipeline company Houston Natural Gas, knows the feeling. While not a household name, the 84-year-old Walzel is prominent in Houston business and philanthropic circles. He has given so much money to Southwestern University that the school put his and his wife Pats name on a building. As a young graduate of Rice Universitys chemical engineering program, he advanced through Houston Natural Gas, working under the late Ken Lay before leaving the company in 1985 as it merged with Omaha-based Internorth to eventually form Enron. I narrowly escaped being an Enron guy, Walzel quipped. Today, he serves on the boards of charities, and, in his spare time, reads frequently about climate change his current stack is nine books tall. Earlier this summer, he wrote to this reporter, recommending Koonins book. If enough people read it, he wrote, it might raise the level of discussion on climate to what it deserves. But climate change is not a subject Walzel discusses with friends and neighbors. He is reluctant to raise the issue outside a small circle of like-minded friends even his wife disagrees with him because it would inevitably lead to an argument. There would be nothing to be gained from it, he said. That sort of quiet division has emerged within science as well. Interview requests for this story were routinely declined or met with no response. Matthew Hersch, a science history professor at Harvard University, took umbrage with this reporters description of scientists like Koonin as seemingly well-reasoned skeptics. Generally speaking, I would not call a person inclined to ignore known, catastrophic dangers because they are decades away to be well-reasoned, especially if those dangers are already manifest, he said in an email. That seems to be a simple case of wishing for something not to be true that is, or a kind of self-interested shortsightedness. Jon Shapley, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer High stakes Differing viewpoints are common in science. But unlike say, biochemistry or theoretical physics, climate change is not just about whos right, but also the future of the planet. The differences over climate science often correlate to the particular field in which scientists work. Physicists, like Koonin, are particularly well represented among skeptics, said Matthew Stanley, a philosophy of science professor at NYU. Much of physics relies on precise measurements of the natural world. But climate science is too complex for such an approach. Instead it relies on computer models, which assimilate countless variables to project how the earth might respond to increases in temperature. In the early days, those models struggled, but over the past three decades, computer simulations have evolved to the point where scientists can quantify to which degree increases in flooding or wildfires were caused by climate change. Particle physics is the classic exact science, Stanley said. You expect an exact answer down to 30 decimal places, and if you dont get that you failed. If thats your perspective, the models are incredibly messy. Losing faith Koonin came to the climate debate in 2014 when the American Physical Society asked him to lead an effort to review its statement on climate change, after a number of physicists objected to the description of the evidence of global warming as incontrovertible. Until then, he said, he accepted climate science as dogma. But when he assembled a group of six climate scientists in Brooklyn, he realized they could agree that man was causing the planet to warm, but not much else. Is it going to be catastrophic? Thats where the discussion broke down, he said. I had a committee member say we cant write about uncertainty because it will give ammunition to the deniers. Koonin ended up resigning from the American Physical Society and writing an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal claiming climate science was not settled, making him a pariah within the scientific community. Former energy secretary Ernest Moniz, with whom Koonin worked at MIT and described as a good friend and colleague for 30 years, declined through a spokesman to comment about Koonins work. Asked about Koonins claims on ice melt and hurricanes, Field, the Stanford climate scientist, did not directly contradict him. On the question of why ice sheets are melting around the same rate as the 1940s, Field said it was incredibly complicated and diverse interpretations remain about how fast polar ice will melt and cause sea levels to rise. But he expressed exasperation with those who suggest that uncertainty on ice caps or other details undermines the overall theory that climate change would be catastrophic. You dont get featured in The New York Times for saying I agree with that guy, Field said. Thats not the culture of science. Science is based on finding flaws and new interpretations. 'Global cooling' Sciences inclination to debate and reconsider itself has, in part, driven modern climate skepticism. Walzel, the philanthropist and former executive, vividly recounts media coverage of a group of scientists warning in the 1970s that the world was headed for another ice age due to a perceived trend of global cooling, as well as forecasts of imminent global famines caused by overpopulation predictions that didnt come to pass. Those theories never came close to achieving the consensus among scientists that climate change has amassed, or accumulating the empirical evidence that expanded the climate consensus over the years. But Walzel remains skeptical of anyone claiming the world is coming to an end. People like a crisis. he said. Its human nature. james.osborne@chron.com Houston Chronicle Publisher John McKeon said Thursday that he will be retiring, capping a more than 40-year career in the newspaper business. McKeon, who has been the Chronicles publisher since 2015, will stay on with the company while a national search is conducted for his successor. The search is expected to take several months. After over 40 years in the newspaper business, I have much to be thankful for, he said in a letter sent to staff Thursday. Most notably the sacrifices of my wife Deb and our family in service to my career. It is now my turn to try and make up to her for what she has done for me. A task I fear that I will not be the equal of, but I will try my best. McKeon, 64, came to the Chronicle nearly six years ago from the San Antonio Express-News, where he had served as president and publisher since 2012. He previously held various executive positions at Newsday, the Los Angeles Times and the Dallas Morning News. The New York native grew up fetching the early edition of the New York Daily News, the New York Post and the New York Times for his parents, who were voracious consumers of news. While attending the City University of New York City College, McKeon worked in the mailroom of a newspaper advertising firm owned by the Boston Globe and the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. After graduating from college, McKeon took a job with the firm. McKeon led the Chronicle as Houston experienced several oil crashes, a major hurricane and a global pandemic. During his tenure, the newspaper was named a Pulitzer Prize finalist for its coverage of Hurricane Harvey and an investigative series on special education. In recent years, the Chronicle has been honored with a prestigious George Polk award and was named the top newsroom in the state for three consecutive years by the Texas Associated Press Managing Editors. HoustonChronicle.com, the papers premium subscriber website, has nearly tripled its digital-only subscriptions over the past three years. Jeff Johnson, president of New York-based Hearst Newspapers, lauded McKeons leadership of the Chronicle. During his time at Hearst, he has been a strong champion of investment in our content and the evolution of our business model, Johnson wrote in a note to staff. John displayed incredible leadership during Hurricane Harvey, as we sustained our operation under extremely difficult circumstances, and he has led the Chronicle through many challenges and supported one of the leading newsrooms in our industry. John will also leave the legacy of a very talented and diverse leadership team at the Houston Chronicle. McKeon, who plans to stay in Houston after he retires, said he expects the Chronicle will continue to serve Houstonians with quality local journalism that will help create a fairer, more equal and just society. He said he is confident the team he has built at the Chronicle will be able to navigate journalisms digital future, transitioning to a subscriber-based business model that is less dependent on advertising. Every business has to know where it creates value, McKeon said. We create value in the content we create and the journalism that we execute on. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is one of a handful of GOP governors trying to block school districts from requiring masks in the classroom. Under DeSantis direction, the state health department adopted a rule that gives families the ability to opt out of locally ordered school mask mandates. The state board of education approved another rule that allows parents to secure vouchers for their children to attend a different school if they encounter pushback on their refusal to use masks. The DeSantis administration threatened to penalize school officials financially if they bucked the rules. Much of DeSantis argument was based on his belief that parents have a right to determine whats best for their child, as well as his doubts about whether mask mandates are effective at curbing the virus in a school setting. (When we looked into the latter argument, multiple experts pointed to research showing that mask-wearing is effective in protecting children from COVID-19 and preventing COVID transmission in schools.) But DeSantis also cited some specific negatives for mask wearers health. In an executive order, DeSantis wrote that "masking children may lead to negative health and societal ramifications" and that "forcing children to wear masks could inhibit breathing, lead to the collection of dangerous impurities including bacteria parasites, fungi, and other contaminants, and adversely affect communications in the classroom and student performance." DeSantis press secretary, Christina Pushaw, told PolitiFact that "there are potential downsides to masking children for eight hours per day, from a developmental, emotional, academic, and medical perspective. These potential downsides are largely unexplored." She cited concerns raised in an op-ed by Marty Makary, a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and Cody Meissner, the chief of pediatric infectious diseases at Tufts Childrens Hospital, that said "masks can lead to increased levels of carbon dioxide in the blood" and that they "can be vectors for pathogens if they become moist or are used for too long." Makary and Meissner also warned of impacts on verbal and nonverbal communication. Other people aligned with DeSantis view have put the harm of kids wearing masks in even starker terms. During a panel discussion convened by DeSantis, clinical psychiatrist Mark McDonald said, "My position is simple: Masking children is child abuse," according to the Miami Herald. (Meissner was also on the panel.) Rep. Madison Cawthorn, R-N.C., spoke out against a proposed school mask mandate by the Buncombe County Schools Board of Education, saying a mandate is "nothing short of psychological child abuse." And on the July 27 edition of his Fox News show, Tucker Carlson asserted that its a "scientifically established fact that masks pose a far greater threat to children than COVID does. So, strictly speaking as a scientific matter, this is lunacy." What does science say about whether masks can cause harm for the wearer? Generally, we found that concerns about significant negative impacts on breathing arent well supported. Worries about masks interfering with communication and serving as a barrier to social connection in the classroom may be more reasonable, experts say. Wilfredo Lee/AP Breathing concerns The first thing to note is that masks arent recommended for everyone. The American Lung Association, for instance, cautions people with preexisting lung disease to consult their doctor before wearing a mask regularly. In addition, the CDC does not recommend that children under 2 years old wear masks. Masks are also generally not recommended during heavy exercise. But what about people who do not fall into these categories? Could they be hurt by wearing a mask? Some of the most common concerns raised involve a lack of oxygen, or a buildup in carbon dioxide. We have previously found such concerns to be oversold, as have other fact-checkers. The issue "has been convincingly debunked," said Babak Javid, a professor of medicine at the University of California-San Francisco. We should note that studies specific to children have been rare, so most of the scientific literature has involved research on adults. Two studies on children used N95 masks, which are more sophisticated than the masks most school children will use, but even these found no significant impacts on breathing. Other peer-reviewed studies of adults have produced similar results. A mask "will add some resistance to the breathing process, meaning it may feel like it takes a bit more work to take a breath, but it won't materially change the makeup of air that comes through the mask," said Benjamin Neuman, a biology professor at Texas A&M University and chief viologist of the universitys Global Health Research Complex. One paper published in February 2021 looked at 10 previous studies of adults or children that addressed questions of breathing while wearing a mask. The authors expressed disappointment at how few studies looked specifically at the impacts on children, and they urged that more research is needed on that specific question. However, the paper found little reason for worry. "The eight adult studies, including four prompted by the pandemic and one on surgeons, reported that face masks commonly used during the pandemic did not impair gas exchange during rest or mild exercise," the authors wrote. A June 2021 study that seemed to indicate breathing challenges for masked children was retracted by the journal JAMA Pediatrics 16 days after its publication, due to methodological shortcomings and other concerns. David G. Hill, a physician and American Lung Association board member, has written that masks "absolutely" do not cause low oxygen levels. "We wear masks all day long in the hospital," Hill wrote. "The masks are designed to be breathed through and there is no evidence that low oxygen levels occur." Another reason medical experts arent too worried is that "the world has engaged in a massive study observational, but literally billions of people on mass mask wearing, and people are not dropping dead left, right and center," Javid said. Other possible impacts A few other complaints about masks sometimes surface, such as fear that they could concentrate toxins or harm the immune system. But these arent well supported either, experts say. As long as masks are regularly replaced or laundered, "theres no reason to worry about toxins, said Columbia University virologist Angela Rasmussen. And theres "no evidence that masks have any effect on the immune system or immune function," she said. Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, told PolitiFact that swabbing a students backpack would probably generate as many or more pathogens as swabbing their mask. And Nicole Gatto, an associate professor of public health at Claremont Graduate University, said that pathogens on masks may be evidence that theyre being kept "out of the mouths and noses of those who wore them, preventing people from potentially getting ill." While the scientific evidence for specific ills such as low oxygen or high carbon dioxide is weak, experts say its more plausible that the annoyances of masking could distract from in-class lessons and make it harder to hear other students or the teacher. In a September 2020 paper in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, the authors wrote that "while there are minimal physiological impacts on wearing a mask ... there may be consequential psychological impacts of mask wearing on the basic psychological needs of competence, autonomy, and relatedness." Such downsides may be especially acute for students who are English language learners, or those who are deaf or hard of hearing. "Masks interfere with lip-reading, which has a major impact on communication," Javid said. The reality is that "there is minimal evidence" on how severe these sorts of impacts could be for most children. "This is the first time in most of our lifetimes we have faced the prospect of continued isolation and masking, so it is not surprising we have insufficient evidence to guide us," said Amy Price, a senior research scientist at Stanford University. Still, there is evidence that children are adaptable. In a December 2020 study of childrens ability to read facial expressions of masked people, researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that "while there may be some challenges for children incurred by others wearing masks, in combination with other contextual cues, masks are unlikely to dramatically impair childrens social interactions in their everyday lives." And child-development experts caution against assuming that any deficits from masks will linger over the long term. Most children "don't like wearing pants or shoes at first, but they adjust, like they do for all the other things we require of them," said A. E. Learmonth, professor with the cognition, memory and development lab at William Paterson University. "In many ways, a mask is just another article of clothing. In the beginning it could be distracting and uncomfortable, but like shoes, they will get used to it." Meanwhile, polling suggests that parents are open to masks in schools. A Kaiser Family Foundation survey taken in July and August found that 63% of parents wanted masks required in schools for people who are unvaccinated. Gabrielle Settles and Jason Asenso contributed to this article. Joanne King Herrings phone started buzzing nonstop on Aug. 15, when Afghanistans government collapsed some 20 years after the U.S. invaded following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Text messages and email poured in from around the world. The Taliban regime that U.S. troops pushed out in 2001 is back in power. Herring, now 93, became connected to Afghanistan in the publics mind when Julia Roberts portrayed her in the 2007 film Charlie Wilsons War, a loosely biographical comedy-drama about three people who helped fuel a semi-secret war in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The unlikely trio Roberts as Herring, Tom Hanks as former U.S. Rep. Charlie Wilson and Philip Seymour Hoffman as CIA operative Gust Avrakotos led to the formation of Operation Cyclone, a program designed to help support and organize the Afghan mujahideen during the Soviet-Afghan War. Their efforts may have ultimately changed the course of history by bringing down the Soviet Union and ending the Cold War. People want to keep quoting that movie, Herring said. And thats a very good movie, but its not history. The reality is, it wasnt director Mike Nichols and screenwriter Aaron Sorkins job to write a story about what to do in Afghanistan, she pointed out. Solving cultural conflict is more complex than that. Its so dreadfully sad. And people dont know what the real situation is, Herring said. My heart is just breaking from what I see. All these people are weeping over Afghanistan, but theyre not doing anything to help them. Shes quick to say that theres no quick fix or easy solution. If you dont understand the country youre dealing with and trying to help, you hurt more than you help, she said. Its like a physician treating a patient without examining him. She said her philosophy is more aligned with the Chinese axiom: If you give a hungry man a fish, you feed him for a day, but if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime. After she married her second husband, oilman Robert Herring, the couple made dozens of trips overseas for oil and gas deals. During the long flights, her husband discussed the Afghan situation, giving her facts, figures and persuasive arguments, she said. By the late 70s, Herring held three volunteer positions: She was honorary consul to Pakistan and to Morocco, and she also helped Pakistani villagers redesign their handmade crafts everything from rugs and fabric to copper and silver goods to appeal to Western consumers. Along the way, she enlisted influential friends in the fashion industry to design dresses using Pakistani materials. Herring is perhaps best known for her political relationship with former President of Pakistan Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, a lasting friendship that spanned from the early 1970s through the 1980s. He once held a dinner in honor of the Herrings in Islamabad, the capital city. In Charlie Wilsons War, Herring is credited with introducing Wilson and Zia, a union that led to funding Pakistans anti-communist policies. She was also said to have been a most trusted American adviser in Zias administration on the big screen. Zia appointed Herring his honorary consul at Houstons Consulate General of Pakistan, a move that reportedly broke protocol and ruffled feathers with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He also awarded Herring with Pakistans highest civilian honor, the Tamgha-e-Quaid-e-Azam. Her association with Pakistan was not without detractors. In his book Magnificent Delusions, former ambassador and adviser to three Pakistani prime ministers Husain Haqqani described Herring as being known more for glamour than for political wisdom and knowing little about the country. She pushed back against the criticism. What Charlie and I did there didnt involve one American soldier. All we did was help the Afghans help themselves, she said. We gave them the tools; they did the rest through free enterprise. She said thats what breaks her heart the most a man from a village she watched grow from a population of 1,800 to more than 47,000 recently wrote her a gut-wrenching letter: You think that because some of us cant read and write, we dont know the millions (of dollars) youve poured into our country. But none of that got to us. Though the current conflict is vastly different from the Soviet-Afghan War, she said her position remains the same. You cant fix 30 years of war by just sending money, she said. Thats the reason she founded Marshall Plan Charities in 2009, she said. The nonprofits mission was to complement the ongoing U.S. military effort in Afghanistan by rapidly and effectively redeveloping normal, healthy civilian life village by village. The charity prioritized the distribution of clean water, food, health care, schools and jobs over direct financial or military support. You cant learn to fight if youre hungry or dying of dysentery, she said. No war starts with one shot. They break down communities, then they break down the government, then the morale, then separate the people, and suddenly everyone is vulnerable. amber.elliott@chron.com Interfaith Ministries of Greater Houston is preparing for an influx of refugees from Afghanistan. Starting on Sept. 1, chief programs officer Ali Al Sudani estimates that between 1,500 and 2,500 individuals will arrive in the city, over a period of about nine months. And Interfaith already has the infrastructure in place to respond, Sudani said. For the past 40 years, the nonprofits Refugee Services division has offered comprehensive programs from picking up individuals at the airport to securing housing, employment and opportunities for education. This time around, however, the pace will be accelerated: Interfaith receives notice about 24 to 36 hours in advance for Afghani refugees. We would usually get this information about two weeks in advance, but because of the circumstances, we have a quick turn-around time, Al Sudani said. He has a number of concerns regarding the swift processing requirements, including hang-ups caused by COVID. Interfaith, on its own, cannot do it, Al Sudani said. MORE BELIEF: How Interfaith's work with refugees creates new futures He asked for the faith communitys help, as well as the support of other nonprofits and the business community. On a Aug. 25, Al Sudani convened with Houstons faith leaders on Zoom - along with Interfaith president and CEO Martin B. Cominsky, vice president Jodi Bernstein, director of Interfaith relations and education the Rev. Gregory Han and program director Kim Mabry. Houston and the faith community have a history of responding in a crisis, Al Sudani said. We are blessed as a city to have a strong faith community that is connected, organized and willing to help. NEWSLETTERS Join the conversation with HouWeAre We want to foster conversation and highlight the intersection of race, identity and culture in one of America's most diverse cities. Sign up for the HouWeAre newsletter here. Rabbi Oren Hayon at Houstons Congregation Emanu El, chair of Refugee Services at Interfaith Ministries, explained that faith leaders must find the most effective ways to help refugees, as quickly as possible. Theyre going to start arriving very soon, he said. Its a call to action to welcome these folks and help them get settled. Its not unlike a natural disaster, he added. Its not something you plan for, but when it happens, you marshal all of your resources to help people get out of danger. Hayon said that in the Jewish tradition, welcoming the stranger is key. Our scripture tells us again and again to remember the stranger and to remember our own experience of being displaced and homeless, he said. Stories of Afghan refugees current situations remind Al Sudani of his own flight from Iraq before settling in Houston as a refugee in 2009. More Information To volunteer or donate, visit Interfaith's website at www.imgh.org. To learn more, contact Kamil Khan, Refugee Services community outreach coordinator, at kkhan@imgh.org. See More Collapse Its a matter of making a decision in a second, what you need to take and what you will leave behind, Al Sudani said. Usually, you leave behind everything, just trying to save your life. You cant understand unless you live it, he added. Many refugees from Afghanistan are given a Special Immigrant Visa (SIV), granted to Iraqi and Afghani citizens for their service to the U.S. government. The program will provide assistance with resettlement, Al Sudani explained. Others will come to the U.S. on humanitarian parole, a program allowing Afghans to enter the country without their official refugee status. Al Sudani explained that parolees will not be eligible for food stamps, Medicare or monetary assistance until their status is amended. MORE BELIEF: Interfaith's new service program could change the game in Houston Even families that have an SIV or are approved for refugee status, there can be delays in receiving food or health care benefits because of the pandemic. A family could wait as long as a month to receive food stamps, and would need meals in the meantime. We are operating under COVID. Lets not forget that, he said. Already, Interfaith has helped 50 Afghan SIV holders and expects 75 more in the next couple of weeks. Al Sudani said that the State Department currently expects about 50,000 refugees in total to come to the U.S. Some Afghani residents have already fled to neighboring countries like Pakistan and Turkmenistan, he added. Most of the families who come to Houston are young between the ages of 25 and 36 Al Sudani said. There are typically four members in each family, with at least one who speaks English. They are worried about the family members they left behind, Al Sudani said. But they are optimistic. They are optimistic that the faith community in Houston will be able to provide them support. Interfaith will seek the support of area churches, mosques, temples and synagogues to provide volunteers and make financial contributions. The initial top priority will be to provide emergency assistance and housing for refugees when they arrive. Al Sudani estimates 150 apartments will be needed in September alone. The faith community can also help with services in the future, volunteering with Interfaiths womens empowerment groups and teen mentorships for example. A good welcoming word can make a huge impact, he added. Along with Interfaiths national resettlement partners, the U.S. State Department and Episcopal Migration Ministries, the organization will work with other local faith leaders to coordinate efforts. For Hayon, the refugee services chair, this moment is a personal call to help. Just about every American Jew has a story about being in peril and needing to find a safe home, he said. And many of us have stories of gratitude or disappointment, when different nations would or would not open their doors for assistance. The needs of refugees now resonates and requires empathy and hospitality, he added. The Rev. Kim Mabry, program manager at Interfaith, is reminded of Matthew 25:35. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, she quoted. We can welcome these, our newest neighbors to our city, she said. Lindsay Peyton is a Houston-based freelance writer. The former Lone Star College-CyFair president is now serving as the CEO of the community college systems new online program, LSC-Online. The new CEO, Seelpa Keshvala is also now the college systems executive vice chancellor, two positions she accepted after being asked to by the chancellor of the Lone Star College System, Stephen Head. She has previous executive experience with Ivy Tech Community College in Warsaw, Indiana, where she served as president, and has also been active with the Cy-Fair Educational Foundation and the Cy-Fair Houston Chamber of Commerce. Cy-Fair school notebook: Lone Star College nursing students recruited to help hospitals during COVID-19 surge Weve been talking about restructuring our online for a few years now, but the pandemic just sort of exacerbated the need and acceleration of it, Keshvala said. For me, its a new leadership opportunity. Im grateful for the opportunity to serve in a new way. Lone Star College offers online courses already, she said, but the instructors of online courses are located at various other colleges around the Houston area. With a school now dedicated to online, they will have their own faculty and will be able to offer more classes to fit students schedules. Spring, Klein school notebook: Lone Star College-North Harris math professor given national award By just reorganizing a little bit, it will make it even better for the students and their experience, she said. The online school is already offering classes, she said, with more than 30 degree programs available. The school will soon begin taking on internal transfers and she anticipates about 40 faculty members will be transferred from within the Lone Star College System this fall to have everything complete by next fall. Even though everything will be online, Keshvala said the school will still have a physical space at Lone Star College-University Park, where faculty and support staff can come and collaborate and students can go to meet with teachers in person. We still want that part of it where theres still space to come in and collaborate, she said. Lone Star College learned over the years that students want multiple options, she said, such as fully face-to-face learning, fully online learning, or a combination of the two. With this online school, they will be able to cater not just to students in the area who want fully online learning, but students out of state as well, and members of the military. Its just another strategy weve been thinking about for quite some time to grab more enrollments and we can be a national leader in the online space, she said. In some ways, she said, COVID provided the school with opportunities to look at things differently and see what other ways they can offer education to students. Through reorganizing this college, students will be able to complete their degree program within two years time. A search is underway for a permanent replacement to Keshvala as Lone Star College-CyFair President, LSC Spokesperson Bill Van Rysdam said. Vice Chancellor Gerald Napoles will serve as interim president until the search is completed. paul.wedding@hcnonline.com Chronicle file After much work, the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution went into effect on this day in 1920. Though the news that women could now vote was certainly momentous, it didn't come with much fanfare at the time. In fact, a Chronicle headline on the front page notes that "women leaders" were disappointed. Jay Jordan A 28-year-old Crosby man was shot and killed Tuesday morning at his home after an altercation with his ex-girlfriend and an unidentified male, according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office. The incident occurred at approximately 7:20 a.m. when the victim, Rigoberto Hernandez, got into a fight at his home at 519 Sundown Meadow St. with a man accompanying the victim's ex-girlfriend to pick up her belongings, according to authorities. Virologist Ben Neuman was one of the worlds top experts on coronaviruses long before most of us had ever heard of them. Hes now chief virologist at Texas A&Ms Global Health Research Complex, and regularly updates us on coronavirus science. Youre at Texas A&M. What are you seeing on campus? Texas A&M is somewhere near the middle of what American universities are doing. Youve got some, out on the East Coast in particular, that are testing students once a week, mandatory, and faculty once or twice a week, mandatory. Thats a really good way to figure out where the virus is and keep very close tabs on it. A&M is in the midst of a great big testing push. Were doing one big test at the beginning of term, and then there may be additional tests throughout term. So there are a lot of people to go through. Ive been helping to run some of these samples through. Its a lot of saliva, and Ive got to say, saliva is very unpleasant. How reliable are those tests? As reliable as the nasal swab the poke-your-brain kind of PCR. According to published studies, theyre a lot more sensitive than the antigen detection tests like the BinaxNOW card. It takes physically a lot more virus particles to generate a positive on an antigen-capture test, as opposed to a PCR test, because with the antigen-capture test, you can only work with however many particles you have right there on the card. But a PCR test amplifies. You start out with a few particles and you build it up until you have enough that you can see it. So if Im taking a test, Id rather spit than have a swab poked way up my nasal passages. But if Im the one processing the test... Yeah! As far as results go, the spit test and the poke-your-brain test are equivalent. But saliva is disgusting to process. You want to not be the guy running the de-capper. When those samples have been sitting out in the Texas sun for an hour or two, and then you open that [Shudders.] Its like popping garbage bags at the dump. How optimistic are you that this delta wave will peak soon that the rate of spread will stop growing and then drop back off? Im not at all optimistic about that. But I am optimistic that we can control delta as well as anything else. Heres why, and I think its the key to all of this. Look at all of the Greek-letter-named variants the variants of concern, the variants of interest plus two other variants that are seeming to spread that dont have names yet. A very small set of mutations that is shared between them. By my count, only six mutations are popping up in the receptor-binding domain of the spikes. Thats the part of the spike that makes contact with the cell. So that is the part where you want antibodies to bind, because an antibody will interfere with that contact. When we see these new variants with new names, it seems like theyve got a completely different receptor-binding things. But all of those come from the same set of mutations those same six mutations are just popping up on different genetic backgrounds. Different branches of the family tree have come to exactly the same conclusion. COVID HELP DESK: What is Ivermectin, and why does the FDA warn against treating humans with it? Its kind of like Twitter, where a person has this amazing thought that everybody else has had but still puts it out there anyway. [Laughs.] Twitter for viruses, thats what were dealing with. A nice paper maybe two weeks ago looked at whats going on not just with the spike, but also the nucleoprotein inside of the virus. The spike is the outside of the virus, the nucleoprotein is inside, and theres a protein in the middle that isnt changing much, so well pretend its not there. It turns out that in the variants, the changes on the outside of the virus seem to be making the protein a little bit creepier, a little bit better at grabbing onto cells. And in the process, theyre changing some of the parts that, if youve been vaccinated, your immune response recognizes. So the virus wins and wins. But it also loses. Thats the important part here. The mutant versions of the spike that you find in alpha, beta, gamma, delta, are all much less efficiently loaded onto virus particles. So the virus runs into a logistics problem and cannot deliver enough of the stuff to the place at the time. The change that that they discovered in this paper is that the nucleoprotein is changing in a way that dramatically increases efficiency. You might say, All right, this is why we have problems. This is why we have delta. But its actually reasonably good news. The way I look at it, based on the current data, there are only so many ways you can change a spike and still be a competitive virus, a good-enough virus. Any additional oomph has to come from other parts of the virus essentially, by improving various infrastructure parts that just hold the thing together, or that roll more units off the assembly line. We do see those changes. But the vaccine is based only on the spike. In terms of how well a vaccine is going to work, it doesnt matter whether theres been a change to any other part of the virus as long as the spike is somewhat constrained. And now, it looks like the spike is splashing around in a very shallow gene pool. This makes me very happy. We have a chance to get out of this thing. So this means the vaccines will hold up against new variants? Its good news for the vaccines holding up. Of course, they dont work very well in the bottle. They have to be in somebodys arm. Thats the difficulty. People are asking, Even though Ive been vaccinated, are we back to Square One? Is it like 2020? Should we be hermits again? So could we run through some scenarios, and youll rate them for risk: red, yellow or green? Yeah! Come on, give me some. Eating outdoors at a restaurant: How risky is that? Red, yellow or green? Green. Theres some risk. But not enough to make me shy away from it. Visiting friends who are fully vaccinated? Outdoors thats green to yellow. Indoors thats yellow to red. We are seeing quite a number of cases in vaccinated people where the virus does seem to get through a little bit. So we want to stay on the safe side? Eating indoors at a restaurant? I dont like that at all. I mean, I love restaurants, and I love food. But taking your mask off in order to put things into your food hole really exposes the body to other things that come in through that food hole. MORE Q&A WITH LISA GRAY: Texas Medical Center president says 18% of new COVID cases are kids Sending vaccinated kids to school? Twelve- through 18-year-olds, I guess, since theyre eligible for the vaccine? The problem there is that most kids are not vaccinated. So for the vaccinated kids its fine. But for the others you have whatever is the opposite of herd immunity herd susceptibility, perhaps particularly in the younger age groups. So the vaccine is going to help, but there is still a lot of room for exposure in a school setting, and something needs to be done there. So that is yellow to red even though youve done everything right, its still a problem. Sending unvaccinated kids to school? Oh, my gosh, why would you do that to people? And to yourself? Just invite COVID into your house. Invite COVID over for a drink! The problem is some kids cant even get vaccinated: Lots are under 12, and some have medical issues. With the little ones, you can send them with a mask to school, but are they going to wear it? I hope so. For all our sakes, it would be much better if they did. Going to a sporting event? The Texans have their first preseason game soon. If you get to sit in that cushy owners box or something like that, where its just you, and the front is open: That could be okay. You should definitely push for that. [Laughs.] But if youre in the stands? Thats one of those situations that people are going to think is low risk. But because there are going to be so many people there, its probably going to be much higher risk than you would think. And I dont know that Ive been to any kind of sporting game where I did not end up putting some kind of hotdog or beverage into my mouth. So I dont know that masking would be an option. And, frankly, under the hot Texas sun, I dont think masking would be a pleasant option. So Im gonna have to stay home watch on TV. Going to a wedding or a funeral? Those have both been super-spreader events in the past. When people are dealing with extreme grief and extreme joy, they are not going to be thinking about the CDCs guidelines. So its risky. But humans need to interact at these important moments. I guess Id be outside, like in that scene in The Graduate. That would be me on the outside of the wedding, banging on the window but Id be cheering them on. The Chronicles Features editor has this question: We postponed the Best Dressed luncheon, which draws 800 people. It was supposed to be Sept. 22, but we rescheduled it for November. Will we need to reschedule it again? What do you think? Eight hundred people eating indoors by November? The optimist in me wants to see a way to do this. The realist in me does not think theres any way that this is going to happen safely. And thats a shame. But by November, you wouldnt necessarily be as dependent on the air conditioner as we are at this particular time of year. So there may be a way to do it outdoors. Maybe out on the beach! [Laughs.] Sand goes really well with fancy clothes and heels. What do we know about vaccines effectiveness waning? The last set of papers that I saw the one-year-on studies showed that theres a very sharp drop in the amount of antibodies and reactive white blood cells, and then it sort of levels out. That news is more positive than I expected. Like so many others, when I first saw that initial drop, I just completed that little dotted line right down to zero and said, Well, yeah, things are gonna be bad in six months to a year, and probably for a lot of people. But it turns out that the immunity may be a little more durable. Since you and I talked last, weve been hearing that people will need a booster shot eight months after being fully vaccinated. The effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccines is roughly on par with the polio vaccine. It takes four polio vaccine doses to get a person up to what turns into lifelong durable immunity. The first dose gets you about 40 percent immunity, which is about what the first dose of a COVID vaccine gets you. The second one will get you close to 90 percent, which is where the mRNA vaccines are with two doses. The third dose of polio vaccine gets you to 99 percent. And the fourth one gets you to immune-for-life. With the COVID vaccines, the initial studies looked at only two doses, because that was the simplest protocol to write up and put into effect. They didnt know if they would need more doses at the time, and it would have taken longer to get anything approved if they waited until they had tried out two, three, four, five or six doses at various intervals. And people were dying. They wanted to be able to vaccinate medical workers and the elderly. Yeah, there was more at stake than intellectual satisfaction. So right now, with the boosters they are trying to figure out how many doses were going to need. I look at it not as a booster, but as completing a set of vaccinations that was probably always going to be more than two. Something like four may be reasonable for coronavirus. But theres still a lot of work that needs to be done to see exactly how durable that is, to see whether all the components of immunity stay strong for a long time afterward. Is the durability different for people of different ages? The studies show that on average, the older you are, the lower the antibody levels start, and the faster they drop off but thats not uniform at all. With the younger age groups, you get a much narrower spread: Everybody gets pretty darn good immunity and it lasts pretty long. With older groups, you get a few people who look like theyre a young person young at heart, young immune system and you get other people whose response drops off, boom!, straight off the edge of a cliff. That spread means that you wouldnt be able to tell whether someone is protected based solely on the amount of time since their last vaccine or the number of vaccines taken. So eventually, were going to have to move to some kind of system where we look at a marker of immunity. Antibodies are probably the easiest and cheapest way to do that. Then we would say, When you drop below this antibody level, then its time to time to go fill up the gas tank. On HoustonChronicle.com: Hotez says COVID booster shot was 'predictable' as White House plans to encourage third dose Some people are saying that cruise ships where everyone has been vaccinated, are potentially safer than our public schools. What do you think of that I mean, besides that its a silly comparison, like whether Batman could beat up Spider-Man? Interesting.I like that everybody is vaccinated on the cruise ship. We have been seeing people pop up in the news with fake vaccine cards. So that would be a non-zero risk. The other thing is that a lot of cruises would go places; nobody likes to be on the boat all the time. And when you get to the place, the question would be: Whats the vaccination rate there? That will vary considerably, depending on where your cruise goes. Unfortunately, they dont make many cruises to Vermont. But school is fairly dangerous in terms of infection. Schools have so many unvaccinated people, either by choice or just by not even being allowed to get a vaccine. So yeah, if its either/or, I guess I have to go with the cruise ship. Theyre both red lights? Both red lights. Oh, but wait: I have one more concern with cruise ships. On the most recent cruise ship that I was on thankfully, somebody else was paying most of the staff were from South Asia. The vaccines that are available in the areas where these people originated are among the ones that do not work as well. You cant be sure because a person comes from a place which vaccine they got, but the Chinese vaccines and one of the Indian vaccines do not seem to give the same level of protection as you get from some of the others. So you may also have people who think they are protected because they have done the right thing, but would still be somewhat more vulnerable or possibly even carrying the virus. Some people are arguing that the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine too quickly. What do you think? They say theres been too much progress?! I dont see that. It was approved faster than vaccines had been before, but this particular approval has a lot more data behind it, and a lot more careful analysis of things like side effects. VAERS the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, the thing that everybody reports their side effects through is new. That was not in place when the measles vaccine came out, for example, or for the polio vaccine. Personal computers were still way off into the future. You really cant hold a modern vaccine to old vaccine standards. The process that weve seen for this one is more rigorous. Based on the data, I have got to say, the FDA could have made the call on this one a month ago or or more. They were being cautious. That is their job. Theyre here to certify that a thing is safe. But no, I dont think they were too fast. If anything, I would argue that they were a little on the slow side. Whats new in coronavirus science? Ive been looking back through some of the strains that are out there. Changes are popping up that are very far away from the proteins we would normally associate with pathogenicity, the process of getting disease. One of these is a thing called nonstructural protein 4, which is a great name. Its one of your favorite proteins? Im actually a bigger fan of nonstructural protein 3. Four is a little its hard to work with, like certain Hollywood stars. So what is nonstructural protein 4 up to? It holds onto another nonstructural protein 4. To which you probably say, Uh, okay. But this protein is mostly embedded in the human cells membrane. You can be embedded in the membrane by going through the membrane; nonstructural protein four goes through the membrane four times. It gets together with nonstructural proteins 4, 3 and 6. These things all go through the membrane, and a four hooks onto the four. And so now you have two membranes hooked together. And these are what are called paired membranes. Coronaviruses do all of their copying work on paired membranes. So these proteins are basically the factory floor that gets laid down, and then the rest of the factory gets built on top of it. We got a really nice paper about a month ago thats actually solving the structure of the rest of the factory. I think there might have been eight proteins in there. We sort of knew what they did. But now that we can see the complex, sure enough, theyre kind of arranged in the order that we expect now. Youve got the starting point in the center. Youve got two nonstructural protein 4s together. Then the RNA is going to work its way toward the outside, and its going to start by adding a little nucleotide to a protein. Thats how we begin! MORE FROM LISA GRAY: Baylor College of Medicine student orientation turns into COVID cluster Then were going to make that nucleotide into a little chain. Well take that chain and attach it to another chain that we want to copy. Thats all happening pretty close to the center. Then as we build out that chain, we start modifying the tip of the chain. Thats the next set of enzymes. Theyre going to chop away a nucleotide at the end, add on another one backwards, add on two methyl groups with two separate enzymes to this. This all for stealth. Every human messenger RNA has something called a cap structure, and its got a particular decoration. This is like your armys camouflage, and our cells are real good at recognizing it. So the virus is going out there in full camouflage, looking just like a human messenger RNA. I think the only purpose would be to hide to avoid provoking an undesirable response. But anyway, now we can see all these things! Theyre arranged in a row as a great big, beautiful complex. When I was starting out [laughs] when I was a lad When you were but a wee coronavirus scientist. We didnt have structures for any of these things! We barely had names. We knew what the polymerase was its the main copying part but most of the other enzymes, we had not yet discovered why they were there. We just knew that this thing always occurs third after the polymerase, and this one is always fourth after. Now all this has been filled in! And not just conceptually, but in three dimensions, with a layer of function on top. The whole thing looks like a big baked potato. [Laughs.] Im not gonna lie: Its kind of like one of those long, skinny baked potatoes. But to me, its beautiful. Do we know this much about other viruses? Or is it just that so many people are studying this one now? Yes and no. In terms of modern molecular biology, I think SARS-CoV-2 has pulled ahead of HIV. In terms of old-school molecular biology, HIV is still miles ahead because it has so many hands and minds working for so many years. With SARS-CoV-2 there are still wrinkles to be discovered. Theres just not the same sort of depth in the field as with HIV. But the high end studies! Everybodys working on corona. And oh! I found out why. Its because a lot of universities said that only essential workers could come into their labs, and you can be an essential worker if youre working on COVID. So even if you never worked on coronaviruses before, maybe you decided to do it now. So now everybodys a COVID biologist, and thats producing amazing dividends for the field. Its very neat to see. Pre-COVID, how many people were studying coronaviruses? If youre talking group leaders at the meetings in the U.S., there might have been 40, but some of those would be arterivirus people. Arteriviruses are not quite coronaviruses, but theyre important, and there were a couple of pig viruses in particular that that worried people. So with the agriculture people and the immunology people and the molecular biology people all rolled together, yeah, there were maybe 40 group leaders in the U.S., and they each had one or two postdocs with them, and one or two Ph.D students. It was maybe the same in Europe, and there were tiny little communities in Asia, but really not much before the original SARS coronavirus outbreak. After the original SARS, China came in in a big way. All of a sudden all these brand new Chinese researchers were doing really good work. The original SARS was a stimulus a selective pressure, if you like. Honestly, the science thats been coming out of China since then is at least world-quality. I dont know that anyone else would have the sort of number of people, the national coordination and availability of resources to do some of this research anywhere else. It has been dramatic. There are still large parts of the world where there isnt a whole lot of coronavirus research. Theres not as much in South America, although theres some here and there, and not much in Africa at all. But labs have popped up all over Australia and New Zealand, and it is very nice. Surprisingly, at the coronavirus meeting this spring, there werent many new faces. Maybe thats now this dusty old meeting with fossils sitting around discussing the old days, but it feels like the community has grown. And a lot of parts of the community dont necessarily know that theyre in the community. Itd be nice to open up the circle. Anything else we should all be thinking about? The new dumb thing going around is no one has ever isolated the coronavirus. How many have you isolated? Weve only been running BSL-3 for three weeks now. Biological Safety Level 3 is the level of lab security required to work with SARS-CoV-2. And we just got our first one: G HRC1. We havent got a sequence on it yet, but it is kicking the heck out of the cells we have it on. And Ive got another 30 incubating right now. Well see if any of those pop up. lisa.gray@chron.com twitter.com/LisaGray_HouTX While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration this week announced the full approval of Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine, some people are still turning to an anti-parasite drug that is not proven to treat the virus and could cause severe health problems. The Houston Chronicles COVID-19 Help Desk is here to clear up any confusion about existing treatments for COVID, which is continuing to send people to the hospital in record numbers. Every week, a Chronicle reporter answers readers questions about how the virus works, what to expect with the vaccine updates and other concerns on Houstonians minds. What is Ivermectin, and why are officials saying not to use it to treat COVID-19? Ivermectin is a medication used to treat certain parasitic infections. It is approved by the FDA to treat people with intestinal strongyloidiasis and onchocerciasis, two conditions caused by parasitic worms. It can also be used to treat head lice and skin conditions such as rosacea. The over-the-counter version for animals is designed to prevent heartworm disease and certain internal and external parasites, according to the FDA. In the early days of the pandemic, the drug showed some activity against the virus that causes COVID-19 in lab tests, said Dr. Luis Ostrosky, chief of infectious diseases with McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston. But there was a key problem with that finding. This activity only occurs when you add concentrations of it that are extremely toxic to humans, said Ostrosky. To this day, further testing has not shown any meaningful benefits from use of the drug at any stage of COVID-19, experts say. Taking the drug for any unapproved use can be dangerous. People can overdose, which may cause cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, hypotension, allergic reactions, dizziness, ataxia, seizures, coma and even death, according to the FDA. The version of the drug designed for animals can also be harmful to humans. Animal drugs are often highly concentrated because they are intended for large animals like horses and cows. Additionally, many inactive ingredients found in animal products arent evaluated for use in people, according to the FDA. People who take the animal product are ending up in emergency rooms, said Ostrosky. The drug has also triggered an uptick in calls to poison control departments in both Texas and Mississippi, according to media reports. What does the FDAs full approval of the Pfizer vaccine mean? The FDA on Monday announced the full approval of the Pfizer vaccine for those 16 and older. That means the vaccine has now undergone extensive review over a substantial period of time more than six months to ensure long-term safety, said Dr. Prathit Kulkarni, an assistant professor of medicine in infectious diseases a Baylor College of Medicine. A fully approved vaccine can continue to be used after the public health emergency of COVID-19 is declared to be over. It also makes it easier for certain entities, such as the military, to require vaccines. Ostrosky hopes the approval will help the public trust the process and trust the science and recognize that this vaccine has met the burden of proof of efficacy and safety. Is the vaccine booster shot the same as the first doses? Yes. The booster shot is a third dose of whichever vaccine the person had received before. In rare instances, when the same vaccine is not available, the other mRNA vaccine can be safely administered instead, Kulkarni said. Right now, a third dose is only recommended for certain immunocompromised people who had previously received either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine. Houston-area hospitals began administering the boosters last week. Starting the week of Sept. 20, all Americans will be eligible for a booster if they are eight months post-second dose, according to the CDC. Those who were fully vaccinated first will likely be eligible in September for their booster. A booster dose is not specifically recommended for people who received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. That might change going forward. What are monoclonal antibodies, and why are they important? Monoclonal antibody therapy is a type of treatment that prevents the spread of COVID before it progress to a full infection. The antibodies, which are engineered in a lab, can be delivered either intravenously or by injection under the skin. The therapy has been shown to have substantial benefits for people who have had a close, unprotected exposure to someone with active COVID-19 and are either not fully vaccinated or are immunocompromised, according to Kulkarni. It also benefits patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 who are at higher risk to progressing to severe COVID-19 because of their age or other underlying medical conditions. Houston-area hospitals are administering the treatment, and more antibody infusion centers are opening across the state. Have a question for the Chronicles COVID-19 Help Desk? Ask it here. julian.gill@chron.com Since school started earlier this month, Texas Childrens Hospital emergency centers and urgent care clinics have been filled with parents seeking COVID-19 tests for their children. But emergency rooms dont have the capacity to test all of them, especially if they are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms, said Dr. Brent Kaziny, medical director of Emergency Management at Texas Childrens Hospital. In addition to handling COVID-positive patients, the pediatric hospital is in the middle of a busier-than-usual respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) season and is handling patients who come in for the normal things, like accidents, falls and other injuries that come with the start of school. COVID HELP DESK: Is the vaccine booster shot the same as the first doses? A number of Houston and Galveston-area schools do on-site COVID testing, but theres not a blanket testing policy from the Texas Education Agency. On Aug. 19, the agency changed its guidance to require schools to inform parents if their child is exposed to the virus at school. If an individual who has been in a school tests positive, the school is required to notify the local health department and Texas Department of State Health Services. Schools must notify all teachers, staff and families of all students in a classroom, extracurricular activity or after-school program if a test-confirmed case is identified among students or staff who participated in those activities or classrooms, according to the new guidance. Kaziny said parents are faced with difficult decisions when they receive emails from school about their child being exposed. While its common for school-aged children to come down with sniffles or a fever, that doesnt mean they should be brought to an emergency room for a COVID test, he added. If the child is experiencing mild symptoms, Kaziny recommends finding a pharmacy or public testing site and making an appointment. Obviously when the child is sick, its a challenge for the parent who is in a different mindset than they were pre-COVID, (when) they felt comfortable taking care of their kid at home if they had minor symptoms, he said. Now theyre jumping in the car and seeking that out in the emergency center for maybe not medical concerns, but solely testing. Q&A WITH LISA GRAY: There's a new reason to think vaccines can beat variants People should not be tested until three to five days after potential COVID exposure, which will cut down on the possibility of false negative tests, he said. Most hospitals, including Texas Childrens, use a PCR molecular COVID test, which has a turnaround time of 48 to 72 hours. Kaziny says parents should bring their child to the emergency room if the child has a fever that does not improve with , first treat with Tylenol or Ibuprofen. If the child has worsening breathing issues, like labored breathing and an elevated heart rate, take them to the hospital. If the fever recurs but other symptoms have subsided, Kaziny recommends making an appointment with the pediatrician. julie.garcia@chron.com Twitter.com/reporterjulie The Camp Logan Mutiny of 1917 was more than unrest, scholars say. But thats how a short-lived tweet from the Houston Police Department painted the violent night, while saluting the five officers killed as more than 150 Black soldiers sought retribution for weeks of torment by white civilians and local law enforcement. The social media post, part of the departments frequent End of Watch series for officers killed in the line of duty, went live at 8 a.m. Monday and stated that officers Rufus Daniels, Ira Raney, Daniel Patton, Horace Moody and Edward Meinecke were shot and killed in 1917 after unrest sparked by the arrest of several soldiers. Missing from the tweet was context about what preceded their deaths or what happened after. Nineteen of the soldiers were executed. One of the officers, Daniels, was responsible for beating a corporal who inquired about a jailed soldier. Hours later, Chief Troy Finner had the tweet deleted, officials said. Houston Chronicle Police spokeswoman Jodi Silva said several community members contacted Finner about the social media post and that he then asked for it to be removed. He wants to respect fallen officers but this is also a dark and painful moment in history, she said. When asked about decision Wednesday, Finner said, We do have to be more sensitive. He declined to identify who reached out to him about the post. The tweet garnered some attention online before its removal. Misdemeanor judge Franklin Bynum did not reach out to Finner but expressed outrage that the department would publicly commemorate one of the most notorious, racist episodes in the departments history. NEWSLETTERS Join the conversation with HouWeAre We want to foster conversation and highlight the intersection of race, identity and culture in one of America's most diverse cities. Sign up for the HouWeAre newsletter here. Imagine if the Tulsa Police Department honored police officers who died carrying out the Tulsa Massacre of 1921 by posting an officer down meme, Bynum said in a statement to the Chronicle. One history expert argues that reducing the mutiny to unrest simplifies a complicated situation. The clash stemmed from Black soldiers with the Third Battalion, of the 24th Infantry Regiment, reaching a boiling point following the arrests of their own. At the time, the United States had just entered World War I and officials dispatched the Battalion to Houston to guard construction of Camp Logan, about where Memorial Park now stands. Jim Crow laws in Houston made the city a hostile environment for the soldiers, said Ronald Goodwin, associate professor of history with Prairie View A&M University. The story goes that a particular soldier saw HPD roughing up a Black female and he intervened, Goodwin said. As a result, he got the beat down and was taken to jail. Another soldier witnessed the arrest and hurried back to base and told the others what he saw. A corporal who confronted the police about the arrest was shot at, beaten and arrested. Rumors started flying that the officers had killed him and a white mob was headed for them. Soldiers at the base said, We had enough of this, Goodwin said. The soldiers disobeyed orders to remain at the camp and instead broke into a supply tent for rifles. The group marched down what is now Allen Parkway, Goodwin said, and fired into the night. About 15 white civilians and the five police officers were killed. The largest murder trial and court martial in U.S. history then followed. What happened next is as follows: 13 soldiers were hanged in San Antonio that December, 63 were handed life sentences, and six more were executed in 1918. Researchers at Prairie View have since found no conclusive evidence or reliable witness testimony that any of the first group of executed men had participated in the riots. Goodwin called the trial a sham. Houston history tried to whitewash this because they didnt want it to be known. Historians found it. Every now and then it comes up, he continued. Descendants of the executed soldiers expressed hope in 2017 for a posthumous presidential pardon. Angela Holder, history professor at Houston Community College, is the great-niece of Jesse Brown, one of the soldiers hanged in the first round. She has researched the Camp Logan Mutiny for more than 20 years, even as most immediate family members have since died. She continues to seek a pardon for the soldiers. The hourglass is ticking away on getting something done, Holder said. On the 100-year anniversary of the rampage, she called the executions a knee-jerk reaction. Theyre long gone, but theyre definitely not forgotten, she continued. nicole.hensley@chron.com When I called Dean Kyne, director of UT Rio Grande Valleys Disaster Studies Program, for tips on preparing for my first hurricane season, his thoughts on how people were getting ready for continual storms were pretty glum. What were seeing recently is more and more people now numb to natural disasters, Kyne told me. It is really alarming that disaster preparedness is really low. LATEST: Tropical depression could become major hurricane as it nears Gulf Coast The to-do list he gave me scrambling together both a go-bag and shelter-in-place kit, setting up out-of-town emergency contacts, finding a safe place to travel inland felt overwhelming, more so because coronavirus had already exacerbated my anxiety. Preparing for a hurricane is no joke, which is why I made a list of what to put together before it starts storming. Now Playing: Get the latest local weather news from the Houston Chronicle and ABC13 Houston. Video: Houston Chronicle / ABC13 Houston Hurricane season, which officially began June 1 and ends Nov. 30, is no joke in Houston. And just a few days into the wettest part of the year, Tropical Storm Cristobal has already formed in the southern Gulf of Mexico. More Information What is this? I'm Gwendolyn Wu, and I'm writing "Houston How To," a series on how to navigate the city and its complexities. Humans have an innate drive to improve themselves, and we're always striving to live better, smarter and more efficiently by throwing countless dollars and hours at our problems. The Houston Chronicle wants to simplify that for you. As a reporter, I usually ask the questions, but I can't be the only one wondering how something works. What are things you need to know how to do, Houston? You can find me on Twitter at @gwendolynawu or by email at gwendolyn.wu@chron.com. See More Collapse Heres what you need to know about getting ready to shelter in place, and preparing to evacuate in a major natural disaster. Whats in a kit? Before you make a pricey big-box retailer run, know that youre preparing for two different scenarios: hurricanes that do more damage with rain and those whose main threat is high wind. With the former, flooded neighborhoods can bring gross critters and chemicals into your home, and if you know thats likely, you should evacuate if you live in the southern reaches of the Greater Houston region. (Think Harvey.) But folks living in solid, stable structures should prepare to ride out storms with more powerful winds than torrential rains, such as Hurricane Ike. If you live in a mobile home, or another structure with shoddy construction, you should consider evacuating. Buy your supplies early, and make sure that you have the essentials to survive two weeks sheltering in place, said Jackie Drake, an American Red Cross spokeswoman for the Texas Gulf Coast region. Like the pandemic preparation of weeks past, youll want to have in your home: Food (non-perishable, shelf-stable, can be eaten without heating up) Water (a gallon per person, per day you plan to stay there) A first aid kit (bandaids, rubbing alcohol, gauze) Personal hygiene items (towels, soap, pads, tampons) Battery-powered radio and batteries (in case theres no electricity source) MORE HOW TO: Houstons restaurants need cash. Heres how to help. Should the National Weather Service forecast heavy rains and flooding, prepare to evacuate. Drake recommends three days worth of food, water, medicine and personal hygiene supplies in addition to: Cleaning supplies (disinfectant and paper towels) Chargers (phone and laptop) Cash (if power is out, credit systems are down) Important documents (copies of your birth certificate, Social Security card and passport) Clothes (dont forget clean underwear and socks) Evacuation prep should include food, water or necessary supplies for any babies or pets. You dont want to be stuck without formula, or be without a dog leash, if disaster strikes. Put these supplies into a plastic tote that is waterproof and airtight. If flood water batters the exterior, you want the things inside to be safe. Each person in the family should have their own go bag, Drake said. These are things you can pick up any time you go to a grocery or big-box store you dont have to wait and purchase them just before a storm is scheduled to hit. Plan on top of packing Register your phone number with the Houston Office of Emergency Management to get alerts for any warnings and advisories in the area. You can sign up at houstonemergency.org/alerts/. If you dont get information, you will be out of luck, Kyne said. Experts say the most prepared households are the ones who also coordinate a plan for communication and meet-ups if the power goes out. Some communities have a hurricane evacuation route; contact your homeowners association, if you belong to one, for details on yours. Coastal communities and ZIP codes at higher risk of flooding can consult the Houston-Galveston Area Councils evacuation map to see which highways to take out of disaster areas. In case cell phone towers are swamped after a disaster, plot a meeting point that is easy to get to in case your family is separated. And create a contact card with everyones cell phone numbers in case your phone dies, Drake said. One of the numbers should be for a point person who lives outside the hurricane zone so they can coordinate connections if youre unable to get hold of your family. Put that in a plastic bag, or if possible, find a way to laminate it so that it repels water. You should know if your plan is to go to a hotel or a shelter, Drake said. Whatever your hurricane evacuation plan is, do not drive into floodwaters. You dont know how deep it gets. If you plan to shelter in place, make sure youre outside the evacuation zone. Take refuge during bad windstorms in an interior room without windows to avoid breaking glass. (The lower to the ground the better.) Ensure that you have an escape route and access to your go-bag if you need to leave. Reach out to friends and family members nearby to set up an evacuation plan in case you, or someone else in your household, require help getting out. Preparing in a pandemic Yes, on top of a global coronavirus outbreak, you have to deal with getting ready for bad storms. (But at least youve had some preparation to shelter in place.) While COVID-19 might be the last thing on your brain if youre forced to leave your home or protect your family, youll want to make plans that can keep you and your loved ones safe. Hospitals could get flooded, so you want to avoid any situations that would leave you in urgent care. If you need to escape, look for private accommodations. Aid organizations like American Red Cross will be setting evacuees up in hotels and dorms, rather than shelters in large communal spaces, and you should do the same to avoid being in close proximity with others. Avoid going out and crowding stores in the days just before a storm hits. Now is the time to pack the canned food and toilet paper youve squirreled away during the pandemic. Use a delivery app to get food and water if you havent already prepared your kits. And dont count on big aid organizations if you need to seek help from one to have masks and gloves. If you do have to evacuate, make sure if that if you go to a hotel or shelter, that you bring all of your own protective equipment, Drake said. It may take longer to restore power and other services due to the pandemic. It may be worth your time and money to buy a generator (which you should not try to run in your house or in an enclosed garage to prevent carbon monoxide poisoning). Secure your home and property Kyne recommends collecting insurance documents, such as property insurance policies and health insurance cards, and scanning them to a cloud-based service like Google Drive or iCloud. If you lose the physical copies, or need to upload any for disaster applications and insurance claims, collecting them in internet form will smooth the process. Not only will government offices be closed in the days after a major storm, many already are due to public health stay-at-home orders. TROPICAL STORM CRISTOBAL: Storm most likely to reach coast by Sunday, forecasters say Long before storms make landfall, take a look at things around your house and see what could be picked up by hurricane-force gales or could damage your walls, said Mike Gulla, director of underwriting at Hippo Insurance, a property insurance company based in Palo Alto, Calif., which insures more than two dozen states, including Texas. Gasoline may be hard to come by, as Ike veterans will tell you, so make sure your vehicles tanks are full in advance. And speaking of filling - fill your bathtubs with water in advance for flushing and rinsing purposes. Its a lot more difficult for people to get contractors out there with pandemic public health guidelines, as many contractors have either reduced staff or are taking stricter precautions about entering homes, Gulla said. Prepare for long wait times to get someone to replace your glass panes with impact resistant windows, seal structural cracks or get rid of large debris that could become a hazard if the wind picks up. I always tell people to think about the things that your insurance policy really isnt meant to cover, Gulla said. That means putting family heirlooms and important mementos on the highest shelves in your home in case of a flood. If you plan to buy a flood insurance policy for your home, note that it can take a few weeks for the policy to go into effect. Any homeowners looking to get their property covered should buy a plan as soon as possible to get through most of Houstons hurricane season. gwendolyn.wu@chron.com twitter.com/gwendolynawu It isnt often that a pop star releases a music video that aligns so well with my academic research. But thats exactly what Lizzo did in her new song, Rumors. In it, she and Cardi B dress in Grecian goddess-inspired dresses, dance in front of classically inspired statuary, wear headdresses that evoke caryatids and transform into Grecian vases. Theyre adding their own twist to whats called the classical tradition, a style rooted in the aesthetics of ancient Greece and Rome, and theyre only the most recent Black women artists to do so. The classical tradition has been hugely influential in American society. You see it in the branding of Venus razors, named after the Roman goddess of beauty, and Nike sportswear, named for the ancient Greek goddess of victory; in the names of cities like Olympia, Washington, and Rome, Georgia; in the neoclassical architecture found in the nations capital; and in debates over democracy, republicanism and citizenship. However, in the 19th century, the classical tradition started being wielded against Black people in a specific way. In particular, pro-slavery lobbyists and slavery apologists argued that the presence of slavery in ancient Greece and Rome was what allowed the two empires to become pinnacles of civilization. Even though ancient Greece and Rome traded with, fought against and learned from ancient African civilizations such as Egypt, Nubia and Meroe, the presence and influence of these societies have tended to be downplayed or ignored. Instead, ancient Greek and Roman aesthetics were held up as paragons of beauty and artistic sensibility. Classical statues such as the Venus de Milo and the Apollo Belvedere are often considered the apex of human perfection. And because marble statues from antiquity have, over time, lost their painted colors, its influenced the widespread belief that all the deities were imagined as white. For these reasons, Black women have rarely appeared in classical depictions and reproductions. When they did and especially in Western neoclassical art it was usually in the form of mischaracterization or mockery. For example, in Thomas Stothards 1801 engraving Voyage of the Sable Venus from Angola to the West Indies, he depicts a Black woman in the style of Botticellis Birth of Venus romanticizing the harrowing trauma of the slave trades Middle Passage. In the mid-19th century, Sarah Baartman, a Black South African woman, was paraded around Europe and put on display due to her large buttocks. She was derisively dubbed the Hottentot Venus. At the turn of the 20th century, however, Black women started reclaiming classical deities of beauty, such as Venus. Pauline Hopkins, a writer working in Boston for The Colored American Magazine, played a pivotal role. A 1903 issue of the magazine published an editorial with no byline, though theres scholarly consensus that Hopkins penned the piece. The editorial controversially argued that the models for two paragons of classical beauty had actually been enslaved Ethiopians. Authorities in the art world demonstrated that the most famous examples of classic beauty in sculpture - the Venus de Milo and the Apollo Belvedere - were chiselled from Ethiopian slave models, Hopkins wrote. Although it is difficult to know for sure, her editorial proposes an exciting set of possibilities around how African people and civilizations influenced classical beauty standards. During her time with the magazine, Hopkins also wrote several serialized novels, including Of One Blood , which was published over the course of 1902 and 1903. In it, the protagonist discovers a hidden African civilization called Telassar that has retreated from the world and so was able to escape the ravages of colonialism and the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The protagonist discovers that he is the heir to Telassar and should join forces with Queen Candace to bring the country out of hiding and take its place in the world. Hopkins frequently describes the great beauty of all the women in the novel in terms of their likeness to the classical deity Venus. In both the editorial and the novel, Hopkins questions the very idea that the classical tradition can be deemed white or European. She calls on her readers to consider if these aesthetics and beauty ideals were, in fact, rooted in African traditions, only to be corrupted and co-opted by white supremacists. Other artists have followed Hopkins lead. Toni Morrisons fiction has reworked stories from the classical tradition, including Euripedes Medea and Ovids Metamorphoses. In Morrisons novel Tar Baby, the protagonist is a model whos depicted as the Copper Venus in a magazine spread. More recently, Beyonce announced the birth of her twins, Rumi and Sir, by adapting Botticellis 1480 painting Birth of Venus. Meanwhile, artist 3rdeyechakra has inserted Black female artists, such as Beyonce, Megan Thee Stallion and Lizzo, into paintings of classical deities like Venus and Aphrodite. Which takes me to Lizzos joyful and gleeful reclamation of the classical tradition in her new music video with Cardi B. In a song that focuses heavily on female empowerment and body positivity, Lizzo and Cardi B deploy the visual imagery, fashion, art and architecture of the classical era, while also populating it with people and bodies that have so long been excluded. Lizzo and her dancers perform their choreography atop classical columns, positioning themselves as the muses an allusion, perhaps, to the Black muses in Disneys animated film Hercules. The bodies of the statues in Lizzos video are not the chiseled physiques youre accustomed to seeing in museums, while the various Grecian-style vases are painted with images of women in bondage gear, performing on poles and twerking. Lizzo and Cardi B also perform in front of statues that are deliberately centered on the buttocks. Its an allusion not just to classical statues like the Venus Callipyge which translates to Venus of the beautiful buttocks but also a playful dig at a culture that historically has hypersexualized the bodies of Black women. Id never suggest reading the comments section of any YouTube video. But with Rumors you dont have to scroll for very long before coming across a heated debate around cultural appropriation in the music video. Some say that its Greek and Roman art thats being pilfered and sullied. But to me, its just another example of Black women trying to stake their own claim to the beauty, joy and power of this tradition. When Lizzo and Cardi B touch their acrylics in a gesture reminiscent of Michaelangelos famous Creation of Adam painting on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, theyre transfigured into a Grecian vase in a flash of lightning. Just like that, the centrality of Black women to the classical tradition is no longer just a rumor. Its true. McGowan is a PhD Candidate in American Studies, Boston University. This piece was first published by the Conversation. Gov. Greg Abbott is seeking $1 billion to fund the early stages of constructing a barrier that could cover over 700 miles of the Texas-Mexico border, part of a broader spending plan that would more than triple the states border security budget if approved by lawmakers. The plan, which is advancing through the Republican-controlled Legislature, would carve $1.8 billion out of the state budget to fund a surge in troopers to the border, outfit state detention centers to house the growing number of migrants jailed under Abbotts border initiative, and pay for at least part of the border wall envisioned by the governor. If approved by lawmakers, the spending package would boost Texas border security budget to nearly $3 billion over the next two years, with more than $1 billion already earmarked in the spring. The most recent two-year budget contained about $800 million for border security operations. Abbott, with the support of Republican legislators and some Democratic sheriffs in border counties, says the ramp-up in spending is necessary to handle the increased number of migrants crossing the border. U.S. Customs and Border Patrol reported more than 212,000 encounters along the southern border in July, the highest total for that month in 21 years. TEXAS TAKE: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox The governor, who is being portrayed by his primary foes as insufficiently tough on border issues, has largely blamed the surge on President Joe Bidens policies while accusing Bidens White House of doing nothing to address the issue. The failure of the federal government to maintain a lawful process has opened the door for evil actors like cartels and dangerous gangs. Its enticed vulnerable individuals and families to embark on a dangerous path, putting innocent lives at risk, Sarah Hicks, Abbotts policy and budget director, told the House Appropriations Committee earlier this week as she explained the need for the funding. Its clear that the current state of affairs is unsustainable, which has led to this request. Framing the situation as a crisis, Abbott has focused much of his ire on Bidens decision to end a Trump-era policy requiring asylum seekers to wait in Mexico while their cases are adjudicated. The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the White House to reinstate the policy Tuesday, which Abbott said will reduce the record number of migrants entering our country illegally. Democrats criticized several parts of the proposed spending during the committee hearing earlier this week, arguing the barrier along with Abbotts overall plan to enforce stiffer criminal penalties on migrants by charging them with trespassing and other state charges would do little to accomplish Abbotts stated goal of deterring migrants from crossing the border. They also accused Abbott of proposing the new spending to court the support of primary voters who were disappointed that former President Donald Trump largely failed to construct his promised border wall along the Texas border. State Rep. Alex Dominguez, D-Brownsville, also criticized Abbotts office for approving a $250 million down payment to begin construction on the barrier in June without approval from the Legislature. Hicks noted that the top budget writers in both chambers signed off on the plan, though it did not go through the full body. Im sorry, did the Texas House or the Texas Senate approve either of these spending measures during the 87th regular session? Dominguez said. Still, the governor and Republicans in the Legislature are pushing ahead with the new spending plan. DPS: 700 miles of Texas border needs barrier Of the $1.8 billion, $750 million would go toward the construction of a barrier along the Texas-Mexico border, which spans more than 1,200 miles. Hicks said the Department of Public Safety has identified up to 733 miles of border where some kind of barrier may be necessary. Another $250 million would pay the Texas Department of Criminal Justice back for the funds Abbott and other top Republicans essentially borrowed from the agency in June to start working on the border barrier. Hicks acknowledged the costs of the project would likely grow. I dont think $1 billion takes care of the entire border, but I think thats what, at this time, we think is a reasonable place to start, she said. For now, officials are planning to construct a patchwork barrier of temporary fencing as they wait for the permanent border barrier to go up, Hicks said. The governors spending request would fund the deployment of an additional 1,800 National Guard troopers on top of the 700 troopers already funded by the budget approved during the spring to oversee construction of the temporary fencing. The Department of Transportation, which is already building what Hicks described as a semi-permanent barrier covering a heavily trafficked 2-mile stretch in Maverick County, is leasing machinery and equipment for the temporary fence construction. The proposed border wall spending, first reported by the Dallas Morning News, would cover parts of eight border counties starting around the Rio Grande Valley and running all the way to Hudspeth County near El Paso. The spending plan would otherwise carve out funds to hire new judges, legal counsel for migrants and interpreters to speed up a backlog in the courts, while also providing a pot of money to train county prosecutors to handle border security-related charges. It would also devote $170 million to establish and staff three new processing and intake centers near the border, and, amid growing concerns about capacity issues, set aside additional funds to convert existing state detention centers so they can house detained migrants. The state is currently sending migrants to a detention facility in Frio County with a capacity of about 1,400. There were 488 inmates at the center Wednesday, according to a TDCJ spokesman. jasper.scherer@chron.com WASHINGTON The U.S. Supreme Court this week struck another major blow to President Joe Bidens efforts to build what he calls a more humane immigration system, courtesy of Texas Republicans who have been fighting Bidens border policies since he took office. The court on Tuesday night ordered the Biden administration to reinstate a Trump-era policy requiring asylum seekers to wait in Mexico while their cases are adjudicated, which Biden scrapped soon after taking office. While the White House has vowed to vigorously challenge the ruling, immigration advocates see it as the latest sign that the conservative Supreme Court majority may be prepared to block much of Bidens immigration agenda. The ruling was at least the second time this month that the courts have sided with Texas as the GOP-led state challenges Bidens immigration policies. A federal court in Texas earlier this month blocked the presidents efforts to narrow his administrations targets for deportation. Texas continues to be the leader of the opposition, said Muzaffar Chishti, a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute. I think Texas larger-than-life role in the political dimension in this has to be understood. This is becoming the new battleground for federalism in our country. Its also a big win for the states Republican leaders, including Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton, who have sought to keep the border front and center as U.S. Customs and Border Protection continues to report record numbers of encounters with migrants. ABBOTTS LATEST ORDER: Abbott again bans vaccine mandates, adds issue to special session agenda Abbott has sought to position himself on the frontline, ordering state troopers to arrest migrants for trespassing and rolling out plans to strip state licenses from shelters housing migrant children. He touted the Supreme Court ruling as a major victory in a statement on Wednesday. Texas will continue to fight back against President Bidens disastrous open-border policies while working to secure the border and keep our communities safe, Abbott said. While the immediate effects of Tuesdays Supreme Court ruling are still unclear, a key component of Bidens immigration plan is very much in question. The administration earlier this month proposed an overhaul of the nations asylum system intended to speed it up, in part by hiring hundreds of new asylum officers who could decide cases quickly, bypassing deeply backlogged immigration courts. That is part of a broader effort to expand legal immigration options and followed a 21-point plan the White House released this summer it said would create an orderly, secure, and well-managed border while treating people fairly and humanely. The administration has also added facilities to house unaccompanied children crossing the southern border and worked to more swiftly find permanent sponsors for them. And it has expanded visas and reinstated a program that allows children in some Central American nations to apply for asylum there, instead of traveling to the U.S. The Biden administration said earlier this year it would allow some 25,000 migrants waiting in Mexico under the program to enter the U.S. It had let in more than 12,500 of them by last month. The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement it would comply with the Supreme Courts order, which it is appealing. The Biden administration could try again to end the remain in Mexico policy in a way that would meet the high courts approval, which advocates say they expect will happen. Immigration experts, meanwhile, say the remain in Mexico program had essentially been dormant since former President Donald Trump issued a public health order at the beginning of the pandemic under which most migrants are immediately expelled from the U.S. Texas Take: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox Biden has left that order in place and is still expelling most migrants at the border, though the administration has allowed unaccompanied children and a growing number of families into the country. The policy never applied to children and its unclear to what extent the administration will begin to require families to wait in Mexico that it was otherwise allowing into the U.S. Its also unclear whether Mexico will be willing to let the U.S. keep asylum seekers south of the border again. The Trump administration had threatened tariffs to pressure the Mexican government into going along with the plan. DHS said it has begun to engage with the Government of Mexico in diplomatic discussions surrounding the Migrant Protection Protocols. At some point the court will likely have to grapple with an argument about Mexico and its at that point the rubber is really going to hit the road, said Leon Fresco, a D.C.-based immigration attorney. If the Biden administration says its because Mexico isnt taking back these third-country families who arent Mexican, is the court going to throw Joe Biden in jail? Is the court going to throw Mayorkas in jail? Whats it going to do to enforce this? Still, advocates say the repeated rulings against Biden are a bad sign for his agenda moving forward. It should raise alarms for all of us beyond the reinstatement of this egregious policy, said Marielena Hincapie, executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, an immigrants rights group. This really puts at risk Bidens entire progressive agenda. ben.wermund@chron.com Texas Attorney General Ken Paxtons office refuses to release the names of the authors or the taxpayer cost of the internal report published Tuesday that concluded that whistleblowers accusations that Paxton broke the law were unfounded. Yet the body of the report indicates that a key author was Paxtons top deputy, First Assistant Attorney General Brent Webster, who was hired on Oct. 5 the same day the internal investigation was initiated and just days after seven senior officials at the agency had notified Paxton that they had reported him to law enforcement. Webster, whose annual salary was $265,000 as of July, was hired to replace Jeff Mateer, one of the whistleblowers, who resigned Oct. 2. Webster did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday. The FBI is investigating the whistleblowers claims that Paxton accepted bribes, abused his office and committed other crimes to help his friend and campaign donor, Nate Paul. The Austin-based real estate investor donated $25,000 to Paxtons re-election campaign in 2018. Paxton has denied all wrongdoing. According to court documents, Paul also gave a woman a job at his company at Paxtons recommendation and helped Paxton remodel his home. The internal investigation did not address either of those allegations. Instead the report, which was left unsigned, concludes that Paxton could not have been bribed by Paul because the campaign contribution came before an FBI raid of Pauls house that led Paul to seek Paxtons help and before Paxton allegedly abused his office by advocating for Paul. The findings were released as Paxton, a Republican seeking his third term, braces himself for his toughest primary race yet. Land Commissioner George P. Bush, one of his primary challengers, was quick to slam Paxton for what he characterized as a publicity stunt. Conservatives should be absolutely outraged that their elected official has taken corruption to an entirely new level by treating the states legal team as his own personal lawyers, and at taxpayer expense, Bush said in a statement Wednesday. BACKGROUND: Embattled Texas AG Ken Paxton releases anonymous internal investigation clearing himself An AG spokesman, Alejandro Garcia, said Tuesday that the report was written by a group of lawyers who were not involved in the underlying matters that were the subject of the report. He did not respond to questions about why the office was declining to provide their names. In response to an open records request by Hearst Newspapers, the attorney generals office said it cannot calculate the cost to taxpayers of the 10-month internal investigation because the authors belong to the executive administration and do not keep timesheets. Lauren Downey, the agencys public information coordinator, would not name the authors, saying the office did not have a list. 2022 RACE: Texas AG Ken Paxtons donors are defecting to his challengers and taking big money with them Under the General Appropriations Act, the states biennial budget, the office is required to continue an accounting and billing system by which the costs of legal services provided to each agency may be determined. The internal report contains multiple references to Webster, including one instance in which Webster told the Travis County District Attorneys office attorneys that he was conducting an investigation in an Oct. 8 email. General Paxton recently appointed me to be his First Assistant Attorney General, he wrote. One of my tasks is to collect our agency documents and other evidence to determine what has transpired internally with our agency If you have any documents or email communications you are willing to release to me that would assist me in understanding what has transpired, I would appreciate it. Websters name also appears in annotations on various documents included in the report, and he is described at least five times in the report as someone asking questions of others at the agency or collecting information about whistleblower-related issues. In a separate case, Paxton is awaiting a trial for a 2015 indictment on three felony securities fraud charges. He has pleaded not guilty to accusations that he encouraged investors to back a technology startup without disclosing that he was being paid by the firm and failed to register as securities agent. taylor.goldenstein@chron.com Mandatory vaccination against the coronavirus for active-duty U.S. service members who have not already gotten shots will begin now, though no hard deadline has been set to complete it, the secretary of Defense said in a memo. Lloyd J. Austin III directed the secretaries of the military departments to immediately begin full vaccination of all members of the armed forces under DoD authority on active duty or in the Ready Reserve, including the National Guard, who are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19. The memo, dated Tuesday, said that only vaccines that have been federally approved will be used. It said the leaders of each branch of the military should impose ambitious timelines for implementation and report back regularly on progress, using established systems for mandatory vaccine reporting. John F. Kirby, a spokesman for the Pentagon, said at a news conference on Wednesday that 68% of active-duty troops were already fully vaccinated, including the National Guard and Reserves. He said the Navy was the most-vaccinated branch, with 73% of sailors fully inoculated, while the Army was the least, with just 40% of soldiers fully vaccinated. The secretary has made clear his expectation to the military departments that he wants them to move with some alacrity here, and get the force fully vaccinated as fast as possible, Kirby said. Federal approval for Pfizer-BioNTechs vaccine for people 16 and older on Monday allowed the military to begin requiring COVID vaccinations. The other two vaccines now in use in the United States made by Moderna and Johnson & Johnson only have emergency use authorizations from the Food and Drug Administration. Mandatory vaccinations are familiar to all Service members, and mission critical inoculation is almost as old as the U.S. military itself, Austin said. Our administration of safe, effective COVID-19 vaccines has produced admirable results to date, and I know the Department of Defense will come together to finish the job, with urgency, professionalism and compassion. Over the months when vaccination was voluntary for the 1.4 million active-duty members of the military, a current of resistance developed among younger members. Now that it will be mandatory, Kirby said, service members who refuse vaccination and lack a valid medical or religious exemption will be offered a chance to discuss the vaccine with a physician and with their commander, which would ideally address the service members concerns, before facing discipline. Its a lawful order, and its our expectation that troops will obey lawful orders, Kirby said. And we also expect that commanders will have plenty of other tools available to them to get their vaccination rates up, and to get these individuals to make the right decision, short of having to use disciplinary action. This article originally appeared in The New York Times. Subscribing to our services is a three step process. First you have to create an account and then you have to pick if you want to subscribe to digital and or print. Some people only want to be a digital subscriber to get access online and others want to also receive the print edition. If you are already a print subscriber and want online access, it is free, you simply have to create an online account and then attach your print subscription account number to the online account you create. Local officials and cultural leaders gathered at the Lichtenstein Center for the final public hearing on ARPA funds. Director of Community Development Deanna Ruffer with a word cloud gathered from a phone survey on the pandemic's impact. State Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier says the ARPA funds offer an opportunity for cultural venues and organizations. PreviousNext At Final ARPA Hearing, Cultural Organizations Ask for Monetary, Tech Assistance Priorities for spending ARPA funds are identified. PITTSFIELD, Mass. Workers and supporters of cultural organizations hope that the sector crippled by COVID-19 can find some refuge with the use of Pittsfield's nearly $33 million allocation of American Rescue Plan Act funds. At the last of the four American Rescue Plan Act hearings this time at the Lichtenstein Center for the Arts cultural industry attendees voted the provision of monetary and technical assistance as the most urgent use of the funds. When asked over a phone survey how the pandemic impacted their organization or workplace, a majority of people said they were "shutdown." "Financially devastating" and "emphasized disparities" were other phrases used to describe the pandemic's effects over the last 18 months. Some feel there is a bright side to the situation, submitting phrases such as "creativity unleashed," "re-evaluate community," and "growth and change." State Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier offered the word "opportunity." "If you had asked me last year at this time how COVID-19 is impacted cultural institutions, it would be a very different response than this year, because when I think of COVID-19, I think of all of it, and we wouldn't have ARPA funds without COVID-19," she said. "And so I put 'opportunity,' I think right now, particularly cultural institutions have an unbelievable opportunity and that's why [Director of Community Development Deanna Ruffer], [Mayor Linda Tyer], and the whole put this on specifically because we have a chance to really change what we do here, and improve what we do here, and be more sustainable with what we do here in Berkshire County." The $1.9 trillion American Rescue Act was passed by Congress and signed into law in March with the goal of stabilizing local government operations, households, small businesses, and other sectors affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Pittsfield is receiving $32.4 million that is being allocated in two parts. The first deposit of $16.2 million happened about a month ago and the second will happen next year at this time. Obligations for the spending must be made by the end of 2024 and the funds must be spent by 2026. The city is also receiving a county allocation of $8.4 million in two phases. The funds are being distributed to communities on a per-capita basis because Berkshire County no longer has a county administrative structure. Eligible types of assistance for cultural organizations include implementation of COVID-19 mitigation and infection prevention measures, support for those operating prior to the pandemic who has to close, and support of safe reopenings, expansion, or upgrades. The group identified other priority areas for funding such as paid internships for locals, tourism campaigns, mental health assistance, and addressing systemic racism. Berkshire Theatre Group Executive Director Nick Paleologos revealed that three years ago, the theater committed to a long-term sustainability plan that wound up getting sidelined by efforts to stay alive during the pandemic. "Three years ago we engaged in a long-term sustainability plan and committed to it, and part of the things that were in that plan was to make our whole infrastructure more energy efficient, just to give you an example, we spend a lot of money every year on heating, electricity, air conditioning, and, ideally, you know, part of our plan was to make our buildings greener," he explained. "All of that went out the window and both the money that we had set aside and also the money that we had expected to go to donors has been so busy these last couple years just keeping us alive and breathing, that we haven't been on track to what ultimately will be one of the key elements of our long term sustainability." Paleologos shared that about 15 years ago, he was invited to Pittsfield by former Mayor James Ruberto and was ultimately sold on the city, which is why he relocated to it three years ago. "I might as well say for the record I totally want to disassociate myself from the impression that was left in the in the in The Berkshire Eagle article, which is not my impression as one of the culturals on the main street here in Pittsfield," he said about the newspaper article published last week that channeled a negative connotation about North Street and highlighted businesses struggles. "We have made amazing progress even in the three years I've been living here, and I know some of it was contained very deep in there but the overall impression of that piece is totally different than the experience that I have had." When asked what type of assistance the attendees received during the pandemic, a majority indicated that they utilized Payroll Protection Program loans. Berkshire Museum Executive Director Jeff Rodgers speculated that a lot of organizations were able to make it in the last year and a half because of PPP loans. He expressed concern for the institutions that want to operate with full staff or even expand while still recovering from the lost revenue of the pandemic. "How do we support those organizations that want to keep full staff, want to keep their employees, to bring in new employees, or create internship programs for local populations while we see the decrease in revenue is happening?" he added. Berkshire Anthaneum Director Alex Reczkowski expressed the need for involving the community in opportunities that local cultural organizations offer. "I look at some of the cultural organizations represented here and jobs or internships with these organizations can be really transformative for a career in the arts, but I don't see us making space for our local communities to be parts of those as much as maybe as possible," he said. "And that's not a criticism, it's just a reality. If ARPA can be a way to change that so that our local community feels like there is space for us and this is an opportunity there, I would love to see local people thriving from that just as well as the people applying from around the country." Group members also spoke about the importance of using the funds to address systemic racism, which requires additional support and staff time as well as consultants and training. "We have an opportunity with almost $41 million addressing all these COVID impacts and we know that COVID has disproportionately affected people of color, their frontline workers, they're the most vulnerable and I and they have, we have been the most impacted," Ward 1 Councilor Helen Moon said. "And so as we're rolling out even in our ideas of how to address cultural institutions and relief for cultural institutions with the ARPA funding, I think you have to build into the funding and build into the process, a way to dismantle the systemic racism that's impacting people of color." The first ARPA hearing on public health and human services can be found here. The second hearing on economic recovery can be found here. And the third hearing on housing and neighborhoods can be found here. Dr. Devan Bartels, right, participates in her first in-person meeting since her appointment to the Board of Health with Dr. Erwin Stuebner. Williamstown Board of Health Advises Face-Coverings Indoors WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. The Board of Health on Tuesday expressed its support for indoor face-covering and "recommended highly" that all residents eligible for the COVID-19 vaccination get vaccinated. Meeting in person for the first time in more than a year, the board acknowledged that vaccination rates are high in Berkshire County and that infection rates are low in Williamstown itself. It nonetheless encouraged continued vigilance in the Village Beautiful to help prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus, particularly given the emergence of the virus' Delta variant in recent weeks. The four members at Tuesday morning's meeting unanimously passed a resolution saying the Board of Health "supports indoor masking for people who are vaccinated and unvaccinated, supports any establishment that chooses to mandate it for their establishment, supports masking for school children and at-risk populations and recommends highly that anyone eligible be vaccinated." "In Williamstown, we do have a high rate of vaccination, but we have a lot of international and domestic tourists," Dr. Devan Bartels said. "All the college kids are returning in the fall, very shortly. It's a dynamic situation. I'm glad we had this timely meeting. "We probably should readdress this as numbers evolve in the fall. Hopefully, we can be less conservative in the future, but it's definitely a moving target. Things looked totally different in May and June than they do now." Town Health Agent Jeff Kennedy told the board that the town currently has four cases of COVID-19, according to an official epidemiological database, but three of those cases are beyond the 14-day isolation period for the disease, meaning the town may actually have just one active case. "Our positivity rate is 1 percent, which is good," Kennedy said. "The two hotspots in the county are North Adams and Pittsfield. As far as the county as a whole, it's trending downward. "In conversations with my colleagues, if we're seeing unvaccinated people infecting vaccinated people, it's usually in a close family setting. It's not casual contact. And for vaccinated people, when they acquire COVID, it's very mild. "It's the lack of vaccination that is driving COVID right now. Vaccination appears to be the key." Kennedy said that while the overall number of cases in Berkshire County is up, the percent of positive tests is down countywide due to increased testing based on data as of Aug. 19. Bartels shared that while she is vaccinated, she is concerned about "waxing immunity" as she nears the eight-month mark since she received the vaccine as a front-line health care worker. "I mask because I want to make sure if I come in contact with someone I don't also get it given the potential for waxing immunity," Bartels said. The board noted that it was encouraged to see the steps taken by the local school district and, on Tuesday morning, by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education in Boston, and it is happy from reports it has received from Williams College as the school gets ready to welcome back students for the fall semester. "Of the students returning to campus, and they're expecting a full complement of about 2,000, only 13 requested an exemption [from vaccination]," Dr. Win Stuebner said. "I don't know how many they granted, but they were pretty strict." Ruth Harrison added that she believed the college limited the exemptions to its mandatory vaccination policy to students with religious or medical reasons for not vaccinating. The Board of Health members said they will continue to strongly encourage anyone eligible to get vaccinated but agreed the body has no jurisdiction to mandate vaccines. "It's been politicized," Bartels said. "There is a lot of misinformation out there. But we can state the facts and tell people clearly that except for the exceptionally rare case of an allergic reaction all the side effects [of the vaccine] are symptoms of COVID but to a lesser extent. "We have now almost nine months of experience of rolling out vaccines internationally, and we can see how people tolerate it. It's been exceptionally well tolerated." Stuebner agreed. "A lot of people were concerned about how quickly the vaccine came out, but it needs to be stressed that this is different from other vaccines," he said. "It works on messenger RNA, which has been used in other instances for a decade. Now, it's used for vaccines. It's well proven. It's much faster to produce the vaccine with messenger RNA." In non-COVID business Tuesday, Bartels asked Kennedy when the town plans to stop testing for bacteria in the swimming hole at Margaret Lindley Park. Kennedy explained that the town tests the water weekly starting the week before Memorial Day, and he will conduct the final test next week, before the official date for the end of swimming at the park, Labor Day. Kennedy said bacterial rates have been excellent this year and they usually are, and he acknowledged it is possible people will continue to swim after the posted end date to the swimming season, Sept. 6, this year. "We've had a stretch in the past where we had to close it to swimming, not because of bacteria but because of turbidity in the water, and I'm sure there were people swimming there despite the signs," Kennedy said. Bartels asked Kennedy to consider extending the tests into September, and he said he would see whether there was room in the budget to do so. The Story behind the Wrightsman 18th Century French Collections at the Met LENOX, Mass. Historian and author Francis Morrone via Zoom to the Ventfort Hall Mansion and Gilded Age Museum to tell "The Story Behind the Wrightsman 18th Century French Collections at the Met." Morrone will give his visual presentation on Aug. 31 at 4:00 pm as part of the museum's Tuesday Talks. Charles Wrightsman was an Oklahoma-born oil tycoon and polo player and Jayne Wrightsman was a Michigan-born beauty who for 40 years traveled the world acquiring French antiques and decorative arts for their 18-room apartment in New York, a home in London and a famed mansion in Palm Beach. They eventually gave hundreds of works to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, including porcelain, gilt bronzes, antique furniture, boiseries, paintings and sculpture. Leading experts, even from beyond the Met, were approached to advise on the socially prominent couple's museum-quality acquisitions. Their collections, a major lasting legacy, are exhibited in a series of recreated rooms and galleries. After her husband's death in 1986, Jayne continued to be interested in the collections, even to the point of new textiles, reupholstering and lighting for the rooms, each presented as if it were a different time of day. Morrone is also the author of eleven books, including architectural guide books. His writings have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the New Criterion, City Journal and the New York Sun, where he was an art and architecture critic. He teaches architectural and urban history at New York University, and is the recipient of the university's Excellence in Teaching Award. Travel + Leisure magazine named him as one of the 13 best tour guides in the world. He has also received an Arthur Ross Award in the category of History/Writing/Publishing from the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art. Brand new townhouses at 330 Cole Ave. in Williamstown will be open for public view during Thursday's ribbon-cutting event. Ribbon Cutting Thursday at Williamstown's 330 Cole Ave. Project WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. -- As early as next week, families will begin filling homes built on the site of an abandoned factory near the Hoosic River. On Thursday at 11 a.m., Berkshire Housing Development Corporation will host a ribbon cutting for its 330 Cole Ave. apartment complex, an affordable housing development that has been in the works for nearly a decade. Cathy Yamamoto was in the middle of a lot of that work. So much time, money, public input, planning and work have gone into transforming this formerly blighted site, Yamamoto said this week. It's wonderful to see how many homes have been added and fitting that the ribbon cutting should take place as we approach the 10th anniversary of Tropical Storm Irene's devastation. Let's never forget the trauma experienced by those who lost their homes that day. Every town is challenged by housing issues, and Williamstown continues to meet those challenges in admirable ways. In 2013, Yamamoto was chair of the towns Affordable Housing Committee when it developed a request for proposals to build subsidized housing on the former mill site, which was abandoned by the Photech Corporation in 1989. The town ultimately selected the proposal submitted by the Boston-based Womens Institute for Housing and Economic Development and Pittsfields Berkshire Housing, which last summer broke ground on a 41-unit complex that includes brand new townhouses and a renovated four-story mill building. Eileen Peltier, who this spring took over for longtime BHDC President Elton Ogden, said that the first residents will move into the townhouses by the end of the month with another group of townhouses to be filled in September. The former mill building, known locally as the cube, will be filled by mid-October, Peltier said. Peltier said that a national shortage of building materials has not caused noticeable slippage in the projects timeline. Im sure Allegrone [Construction] would say they have had many challenges, but as far as affecting the timeline, it hasnt been that bad, Peltier said. Just a couple of months. Allegrone did a great job managing the project and getting it done with just a little bit of a delay. An old version of the timeline was we would have been opening late June, so a couple of months behind, but that can happen in normal circumstances. We were pretty lucky having a good partner in Allegrone who was working and on top of it. Peltier said Berkshire Housing has had plenty of applicants for homes in the development. But we always encourage people to apply, she said. Its a little hard to anticipate who will qualify and who wont. Thursdays ribbon cutting ceremony will include an opportunity for attendees to see the insides of the townhouse units as well as remarks from local officials and members of the development team. Its always my favorite part of my work, this moment when you get to cut the ribbon, Peltier said. Its often five, six, seven years of work leading up to that moment. Its an example of the kind of work that groups like Berkshire Housing can do. No one else would be interested in that kind of project on a very challenging site. Its a great example of Eltons legacy, a transformational change for a community like Williamstown, taking a site that was pretty much an eyesore and a mess and making it beautiful and giving the opportunity for families to live in Williamstown and take advantage of everything it has to offer. Its my favorite part of the job. People interested in applying for a lease in the income-eligible units can contact Berkshire Housings Linda Pensivy at 413-499-1630, Ext. 100, or email her at lpensivy@berkshirehousing.com. North Adams Community Dog Park Clean Up Day NORTH ADAMS, Mass. Volunteers are invited to a community cleanup day Sunday at the dog park. A clean up day is scheduled for Sunday, Aug. 29 from 9 A.M. to 12 P.M. Clean up will take place in and around the park. Work will include trimming back trees and bushes as well as picking up trash and raking. Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts Students will be on hand to assist with the clean up. The dog park is located on River Street. All 42 units in the 330 Cole Ave. complex will be accessible to families earning 60 percent or less of the area median income. Massachusetts Affordable Housing Trust Fund Director Michelle Vinciguerra speaks at Thursday's event. Berkshire Housing President and CEO Eileen Peltier talks about the work of her predecessor, Elton Ogden. A kitchen in one of the townhouses at 330 Cole Ave. The view of the Hoosic River out the window of one of the second floor bedrooms in a townhouse at 330 Cole Ave. Thursday's event included a peek inside one of the townhouses at the complex. The living room of that unit is seen here. PreviousNext Williamstown Celebrates Opening of Affordable Housing Development The project's completion also marks the retirement of Berkshire Housing President and CEO Elton Ogden, who served as the master of ceremonies on Thursday morning. WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. Much of the focus of Thursday morning's ceremony at 330 Cole Ave. centered on endings. The end of an era for an abandoned mill complex that blighted the town's north end, the end of a long and complicated effort to rehabilitate the site and build 42 affordable housing units, the end of tenure of Berkshire Housing Development Corp. President and CEO Elton Ogden, whose retirement becomes official upon the project's completion. But the director of the commonwealth's Affordable Housing Trust Fund turned the focus to the beginnings that Thursday represented. "The other day I saw a quote on a bottle of red wine vinegar," Michelle Vinciguerra said. "I didn't know there were quotes on vinegar bottles, and I probably paid more for that. But it was by Robert Louis Stevenson, who said, 'Judge each day, not by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant.' "I think it's a perfect analogy for this day. The completion of this development is planting seeds for a community to blossom and for people to grow into whatever their next phase of life is." Starting next week, dozens of families will begin new lives in a series of brand-new townhouses that flank the four-story former mill building that has been converted to apartments. Officials hope to move people into the "cube," the converted mill, in September and October. All units in the complex are for families earning up to 60 percent of the area median income with some units reserved for families making lower percentages of the AMI. Vinciguerra was one of several local and state officials whose agencies partnered with Berkshire Housing and who were on hand Thursday morning to celebrate the end of construction and beginning of new life on the property. Each of the dignitaries, from Williamstown Select Board Chair Andrew Hogeland to state Rep. John Barrett III, D-North Adams, to Eileen Peltier, Ogden's successor at the helm of Berkshire Housing, took the opportunity to recognize Ogden for his years of service to the non-profit and to the region. "He has created more affordable housing, more quality affordable housing, than perhaps anyone else," Barrett said. "Whoever follows him is going to have a tough job. "That's you," Barrett added with a look to Peltier, drawing chuckles from the crowd gathered in the complex's parking lot. "The cooperation that came from the Selectmen, the housing authority, the general population in this community, you reached out to the community," Barrett continued. "Everybody knew what was going on, and the limited opposition you had here was amazing in itself. "Even though it's taken 32 years to get this site cleaned up and get something beneficial that's here today, like a fine wine, it's gotten better with age. This got better with time. This is a product we can all be proud of in the Northern Berkshire area." Ogden was quick to note that there are a lot of people who can be proud of what they accomplished on the site. "I just want to deflect anything that's coming to me," he said. "Everything we do is about teamwork, and, yes, I'm often the one out in the front doing the talking. But I'm not able to do this without an incredible team." Ogden credited Mollye Wollahan-Lockwood, formerly of the Women's Institute for Housing and Economic Development, with helping to convince him to take on the Cole Avenue site. She returned to town on Thursday to recognize his efforts. "Elton, I can't believe you're actually retiring," Wollahan said. "I don't believe any of us really thought it would happen. But this project is a perfect example of what you have brought to all of your work. The respect all of the industry has for you, your calm tenacity, your amazing skill at solving complex and really challenging problems, your leadership. This project needed all of those skills to make it happen and your talent to get it done." Peltier echoed that. "In our work, we wish for a flat, clean piece of land to develop," she said. "As you know, this site was not so much that. Elton and his team said, 'Yes' anyway." Hogeland, who occupies the Select Board seat on the board of Williamstown's Affordable Housing Trust, called on the town to keep saying yes to projects like 330 Cole Ave. "I've got three really simple messages for you," Hogeland said. "First, is to the incoming residents of the town, welcome to our town. To all those who made this possible, thank you very much for the work you did over the course of, depending on how you count, 10 or 20 or 30 years to get us to where we are today. "And the third message is: We're not done. We're going to celebrate this today, but the needs of Williamstown housing are not finished. So we need to commit ourselves to do more." Viewed of Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. Danish defense minister warns that 'it is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul' after his country's last flight left Canada has ended its evacuations from Afghanistan as the clock ticks down on dramatic Western efforts to help people flee the Taliban takeover ahead of a full American withdrawal Keerthi Ratnayake, a journalist affiliated with Lanka e News, was arrested on August 14 by Sri Lankas government and accused of providing intelligence information to the Indian embassy in Sri Lanka. He was charged under the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). The International Federation of journalists (IFJ) and its Sri Lankan affiliates, the Free Media Movement (FMM), the Federation of Media Employees Trade Union (FMETU) and the Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association (SLWJA) urge the authorities to immediately release Ratnayake. Police from the Colombo Crime Division (CCD) handcuffed Keerthi Ratnayake on August 14. Following his arrest, Ratnayake was asked to lead police to his home. The CCD team then raided his home, seized his personal laptop, mobile phone and other devices. He was not allowed to talk with family members or consult with lawyers. Ratnayake was then taken to the CCD headquarters in Dematagoda, where he was kept until August 19 and handed over to the Colombo Criminal Investigation Department (CID) for investigation, extending his detention order to 90 days. Further, the CID police is reported to have raided the house of a friend of Ratnayake and their some of their computers. Keerthi Ratnayake, who had predicted the assassination of drug kingpin Makandure Madush just few days before he was killed, informed authorities that the Indian Embassy in Colombo was at risk of attack from Taliban extremists working with the Chinese government in Sri Lanka. Similarly, in similar incident of attack on journalists, Tamil journalist, Punniyamoorthy Sasikaran, was interrogated on August 23 by the Batticaloa police. Police also summoned the journalist, Punniyamoorthy Sasikaran, on terrorism charges July 4, 2021 and raided the house of social media activist Thushara Wanniarachchi. The Media Organizations Collective, which includes the IFJs three affiliate unions in Sri Lanka, the Free Media Movement (FMM), the Federation of Media Employees Trade Union (FMETU) and the Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association (SLWJA) strongly condemn the incident and urged the government to guarantee law and order during detention while ensuring the safety of journalists in custody. In a letter written to the Inspector General of Police, Chandana D. Wickramaratne, the Media Organizations Collective said, We urge that the investigations be done under the proper regulations, as his editors have informed us that the Police are currently questioning him about unrelated details those about the news website. We would like to remind that journalists have a responsibility to not reveal their sources, and only reveal what is necessary for legal proceedings. The IFJ said:The IFJ notes that the Sri Lankan government is employing different means to harass journalists, invoking dubious terrorism charges under the problematic PTA. We urge the Sri Lankan government to stop using the PTA as a means to silence the voice of journalists and ensure that those taken into custody are released safely. Keerthi Ratnayake must be released immediately. Grab Philippines today announced new initiatives for small businesses in the food and beverage industry in the Philippines. This includes product solutions to expand merchants online presence; a partnership with the International Finance Corporation to improve financial literacy among small businesses; and the launch of Grabs first Food Trend Report to guide local merchants as they continue to adapt to changing consumer behaviors and preferences. These initiatives were announced at Grab Philippines second annual merchant conference for its food and beverage merchant-partners. The new initiatives, which will roll out in phases this year, are part of Grab Philippines ongoing efforts to support the digital transformation of local businesses who are the bedrock of the Philippine economy. By providing businesses with powerful platform tools, relevant insights, and upskilling opportunities, Grab Philippines aims to be the most-preferred platform of choice for merchants and businesses in the Philippines. As more Filipinos turned to food delivery during this age of working from home and distance learning, it is vital that food and beverage business owners have actionable market insights and trends to help them better tailor their business offerings, seize untapped market opportunities, and resiliently grow their businesses. Grab has commissioned the global research firm Nielsen IQ on its first F&B Trends Report consisting of insights and trends based on the responses of 1,000 respondents, in-depth interviews, and consumer focus groups. The report highlighted how Filipinos F&B consumption behaviors have shifted since the pandemic, and how COVID further accelerated the adoption of food delivery platforms given the restricted mobility caused by quarantine measures. Many F&B businesses relied on food delivery platforms to help sustain their operations and grow their businesses - with 92% of the respondents saying that food delivery plays a critical role to their businesses, while 39% suggested that they depend on food deliveries for the survival of their business. The increasing number of consumers ordering meals online is creating opportunities for merchant-partners and they are now looking for ways to expand their online presence both within and beyond the Grab app. As a market leader in food delivery, Grab is extending its tech expertise and capabilities to help its merchant-partners grow by introducing Grab Online Shop, an e-commerce solution tailored for food and beverage businesses. Grab Online Shop gives merchants the opportunity to set up and manage their own customizable online ordering website, with comprehensive technical and customer support from Grab. The benefits include: Increased flexibility: Merchants can set their preferred delivery radius, maximum delivery fees and minimum order amount, and have the choice of delivering orders using their own fleet or Grabs delivery fleet. This added flexibility will enable merchants to further grow their online sales while optimizing their costs. Merchants can set their preferred delivery radius, maximum delivery fees and minimum order amount, and have the choice of delivering orders using their own fleet or Grabs delivery fleet. This added flexibility will enable merchants to further grow their online sales while optimizing their costs. Easy management: Merchants can manage their website orders using the GrabMerchant app, which is the same app they currently use to manage their GrabFood orders. The GrabMerchant app and portal also give merchants access to analytics and marketing tools to understand how their business is performing and create promotions to attract more customers to their website. Merchants can manage their website orders using the GrabMerchant app, which is the same app they currently use to manage their GrabFood orders. The GrabMerchant app and portal also give merchants access to analytics and marketing tools to understand how their business is performing and create promotions to attract more customers to their website. Fuss-free set up: The Grab team will help merchants set up their branded websites according to their preferred configurations. The website also comes integrated with Grabs user login, cashless payment and last-mile delivery solutions, giving merchants everything they need to start operating their own online ordering website. These integrations also improve the consumer experience by allowing users to place an order within 5 taps. Grab users can log-in with their Grab account to have their delivery details auto-populated before proceeding with an order. Grab is also launching Campaign Packages, a Marketing solution housed within the GrabMerchant app. With Campaign Packages, GrabFood merchants can opt-in to their preferred Grab-curated marketing packages, which combine relevant advertising and promotional solutions, to enable merchants to more effectively meet their goals. For merchants who like the flexibility of designing their own campaigns, they can continue to leverage Grabs self-serve advertising and promotional solutions within the GrabMerchant app. Grab and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) are collaborating to improve financial literacy among small businesses. Grab's merchant-partners will have access to IFC's world-class training materials for free via GrabAcademy on the GrabMerchant app. When I became Country Head last October, I made it my commitment to use our tech and platform to help our kababayans overcome the many challenges brought by the pandemic. These are challenging times for many businesses, but through regular engagements with our merchant-partners and constantly keeping our ears to the ground, we gain a holistic and deeper understanding of their needs and continuously support them with features, solutions, and programs to help them become more resilient amidst these market conditions. We are grateful for the trust and confidence of our merchant-partners, and we will continue to reinforce our commitment to supporting their growth and long-term success, said Grace Vera Cruz, Grab Philippines Country Head. Continuous Support for Merchant-partners Grab has actively played a key role in supporting MSMEs, especially during the pandemic, by providing tools, education, and solutions. Since the lockdown, Grab has focused on providing safe and quality service to Filipino consumers while supporting its merchant-partners. With the continued mobility restriction, this prompted Grab to introduce Long Distance Delivery and GrabKitchen and allow merchant-partners to improve their livelihood and increase their revenues as they are able to reach a wider and larger customer base. Consumers are also able to provide consumer feedback on food safety and quality through the Merchant Quality Scorecard which will be shared directly with merchant-partners in-app. The GrabMerchant app gives merchant-partners access to analytics and marketing tools that help them understand how their business registered to the platform are performing. It guides businesses as well on how to craft promotions to attract more customers . Beyond managing daily operations, merchant-partners can also plot their growth through an enterprise-grade analytics dashboard. Apart from this, Grab aided many local businesses in their digitalization journey through the Small Business Booster Program wherein necessary tools and solutions are provided so that they can better serve their consumers online. Grab launched as well the Madiskarteng Boss Club, a program that helps the social sellers by equipping them with learnings and skills that they need to grow their businesses through Grab, together with multiple benefits exclusive to the members. In the past year, the Philippines saw various enterprises and industries struggle with new challenges. Some businesses managed to alleviate the situation by providing alternative and additional services with the help of digital solutions, however other enterprises were not so fortunate. How Modern Applications will lead the country into a future-ready nation With numerous businesses shutting down, the pandemic has shone a light on the need to adopt cloud technologies. A report from the World Bank and the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) said that digital technologies such as digital payments, e-commerce, telemedicine, and online education are rising in the Philippines. Digital Transformation helped businesses and the government cope with social distancing measures, ensure business continuity, and deliver public services during the pandemic. The World Bank also said that increasing digital adoption is critical to help the Philippines adapt to the post-COVID-19 world and achieve its vision of becoming poverty-free by 2040. A Glimpse of the Future One of the best ways enterprises can prevent this obstacle is through modern applications. It will allow them to quickly scale to potentially millions of users, have global availability, manage petabytes to exabytes of data, and respond in milliseconds. According to Stratpoint Technologies, a born-in-the-cloud digital transformation enabler delivering enterprise-grade solutions, modern applications are built with a combination of modular architecture patterns, serverless operational models, and agile development processes. It allows organizations to innovate faster while reducing risk, time to market, and total cost of ownership. Take it from Solaire Resort & Casino Manila, whose website serves as the first touchpoint for its clientele. Their growing number of online visitors had placed stress on its infrastructure reliant on a single server, making it inefficient and ineffective. A slow website with a single point of failure risks an awful experience for Solaire's customers. To solve this predicament, Stratpoint's cloud team provided the expertise to re-architect and migrate Solaire's website from its previous cloud provider to the IT provider's Amazon Web Services (AWS) Landing Zone. This website migration answers their need to shift to a more efficient cloud solution. Solaire's core business is to provide a luxurious experience to its guests in every aspect of the customer journey, even on online platforms like their website. Migrating their website infrastructure to a robust cloud location such as AWS keeps it 99.99% operational, focused on creating delightful guest experiences. Take the Step to the Next Level AWS is a comprehensive, evolving cloud computing platform provided by Amazon that includes a mixture of infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and packaged software as a service (SaaS) offering. It offers organizations tools such as compute power, database storage, and content delivery services. Businesses can modernize their applications on AWS, giving them the ability to scale to potentially millions of users quickly, have a broad reach, manage extensive data, and respond to customer needs fast. Solaire, for instance, now reaps these benefits. In a month, the premier luxury hospitality institution had a fully functioning website in the cloud, better suited for their world-class business. Stratpoint also started delivering a fully managed cloud service, maintaining the infrastructures security, elasticity, and high availability. This time, the good news is small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) that need this solution to cope with todays challenges can get an added benefit with Stratpoint's AWS Migration Promo. Any company interested in availing of this offering will receive three months' worth of AWS credits, allowing them to save up to $20,000 of costs to jumpstart their AWS migration. "We now live in an age where human interactions are brought online to platforms that provide a new experience to people. At Startpoint, we are prepared to help enterprises and agencies, big or small, future-proof their services whether it's building a new, customized cloud-native application or modernizing a complex, single-server legacy system," said Mary Rose Dela Cruz, Stratpoint Chief Executive Officer. For Sonny Carlos, Stratpoint Head of Cloud Business, each companys path to the cloud is unique and can be overwhelming to a lean IT team. There is also the added pressure to deliver apps and solutions to gain a more significant market share while trying to catch up with technology that will help businesses cope with a global economic disruption. We understand how daunting cloud migration can be for businesses. And this is where we can help. Our experienced team of AWS-certified professionals has successfully taken companies to the cloud before and during the pandemic, Carlos added. Stratpoint builds modern applications for enterprises that elevate customer experiences and promote business growth in the digital economy today and in the future. The company leverages its expertise and experience with Filipino enterprises and Silicon Valley startups to design, develop, and manage software, cloud, data, and AI solutions, enabling companies to become agile, scalable, and competitive in the global market. If you want to find out if your company qualifies for the AWS Migration Promo (and save up to $20,000 or Php1,000,000), send Stratpoint a message at hello@stratpoint.com. Whatever your feelings about the science of vaccines, from an accounting standpoint the data are clear: Vaccinations pay off. Many U.S. states, particularly in the South, are experiencing high levels of transmission fueled by the spread of the highly-contagious Delta variant. Unvaccinated people, by far, make up the majority of those cases. As of August 25, 2021, nearly 200 million people in the United States have received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, which leaves nearly a third of the population unprotected, according to the Centers for Disease and Prevention (CDC). If they are your employees, they not only risk their health, they are also potentially costly to the business. Here's why: If an employee is hospitalized, it could cost tens of thousands. When employees sick with Covid-19 end up in the hospital and you supply their health insurance, you can expect higher coverage costs. Depending on how much of the bill you're footing -- the employer share of health insurance coverage will vary -- companies can pay out tens of thousands of dollars if an employee winds up in the hospital. On August 25, Delta Airlines announced that an average hospital stay for an employee with Covid-19 costs the company $50,000 per person. To account for the higher coverage costs and the cost of treating employees with severe breakthrough infections, the company says that beginning November 1, unvaccinated employees enrolled in Delta's account-based health care plan will be subject to a $200 monthly surcharge. "Protecting yourself, your colleagues, your loved ones, and your community is fundamental to the shared values that have driven our success for nearly a century," said Delta Airlines CEO Ed Bastian in a statement about the new policies. "Vaccinations are the safest, most effective, and most powerful tool we have to achieve our goals, live up to our values, and move forward." Additionally, employees themselves may be on the hook for Covid hospitalization costs. If an employee is infected with Covid-19 at the workplace, commercial health plans can delay and even deny reimbursement for hospitalizations and defer them to workers compensation, especially high-dollar inpatient stays, according to the National Law Review. And if workers comp doesn't kick in, employees must pay. Covid-19 testing isn't always covered by insurance. If employees refuse to get vaccinated, another option is to ask them to adhere to regular testing and screenings, especially if they wish to go into the office. However, while some private insurers waive co-payments and deductibles for Covid testing, many will not if the tests are deemed to not be medically necessary, such as if an employee wants a test simply to work in the office, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to health policy in the U.S. Additionally, out-of-network providers aren't limited in what they can charge patients and are allowed to bill patients directly for the entire cost of testing and related services. Claims then need to be filed separately. If employers agree to pay for testing, they should get ready to shell out. A rapid Covid test costs $75 and the more accurate PCR test costs $150. That's per person, per test, and employees will need to get tested 72 hours before entering the office, each time they wish to enter, so the costs will add up. Free testing is available at certain Covid testing sites, but it may be inconvenient for employees depending on their location, and some employees may wish to be reimbursed for travel expenses. Compare this to the cost of the vaccines themselves. The shots are free, and the U.S. Department of Health also covers the administration fees. You have to include the cost of replacing an employee. While an employee is out sick, there's often a cost to replacing that person. Currently the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, a piece of legislation extended in March, reimburses companies whose employees need to go on leave as a result of contracting Covid-19. But that aid program is only in force until September 30, 2021. Business leaders -- and their employees -- are tired. That's one of the conclusions from the Adobe Document Cloud "The Future of Time" survey, released Thursday. The survey comprised 2,100 small- and midsize business leaders, as well as 3,400 employees of large companies, in the U.S., the U.K., France, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan. "Burnout has gotten worse in the past year," wrote Todd Gerber, vice president of product marketing for Adobe Document Cloud, in a company blog post about the survey. Fifty-six percent of SMB leaders said they are working longer hours than they would like. Among that group, 65 percent say they've been working more since the coronavirus pandemic began. A majority of leaders also reported feeling like they always have to be reachable (61 percent) and that they are always stretched for time at work (57 percent). For some groups of business leaders surveyed, the struggles appear to have sapped the joy from owning a business: 55 percent of minority business owners, for example, say they no longer feel a connection to the reason they started their company. Meanwhile, 49 percent of essential businesses -- defined as those that provided consumers with crucial products or services during the pandemic -- say that they would sell their business tomorrow because it no longer brings happiness. Things don't look much better for workers, according to the survey. Companies should be aware: More than a third of employees said they plan to switch jobs in the next year. And among enterprise workers who say they are working longer hours than they would like to, 39 percent blame company culture. To help retain your employees and attract new ones, be sure to check out Inc.'s advice on boosting compensation, increasing salary transparency in job listings, and more. CEO Ed Bastian wrote in a public memo that unvaccinated Delta employees on the company's health care plan will be charged $200 extra a month starting November 1. Unvaccinated employees also will start getting tested weekly on September 12 for as long as local transmission rates remain high and must wear masks while on the job, effective immediately. "Over the past few weeks, the fight has changed with the rise of the B.1.617.2 [Delta] variant -- a very aggressive form of the virus," Bastian wrote. As a result, he added, the company is taking "robust" measures to encourage employees to get the shot. The Delta variant has driven an uptick in cases and overwhelmed the country's hospitals. As of late August, over 77 percent of the ICU beds in the U.S. are being used due to a rise in Covid-19 patients, according to Axios. Most of those patients are not vaccinated. Three-quarters of Delta employees are vaccinated, the CEO said. But the cost of coronavirus hospitalizations contributed to the airline's decision. "The average hospital stay for Covid-19 has cost Delta $50,000 per person. This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company," Bastion stated. The CEO added that in the last couple of weeks, most of the Delta employees who have been hospitalized due to coronavirus were not fully vaccinated. Employees who choose not to get the shot will not receive "Covid protection pay" if they get sick. FDA approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is expected to encourage more employers to mandate vaccines. But there are many factors to consider before you decide whether to do so. As Inc. has reported, if you require a vaccine and an employee has a serious, adverse health reaction, the employee could get worker's comp. Employees also are allowed to refuse to take the vaccine for religious or medical reasons. If you do not accommodate that objection, you could open yourself up to legal issues. And a mandate could dampen your recruiting efforts in a challenging labor market, though that effect could subside if more companies require vaccines. A Kern County firefighter at the site of the French Fire in the Sequoia National Forest on August 25, 2021. Getty Images After years of hesitance, investors are finally warming up to wildfire tech. Questions around monetization have generally been the reason financiers have avoided startups making technology to help combat wildfires. According to Ahmad Wani, co-founder and CEO of disaster preparedness company One Concern, VCs tend to disregard business models that depend on governments as primary customers. "As soon as you go to a venture capitalist and say the words 'disaster' or 'government,' they say, 'You are a disaster. There's the door,' " says Wani. In the past two weeks, however, a handful of fire-tech companies have announced funding rounds. On Thursday, San Francisco-based Firemaps announced a $5.5 seed round led by Andreessen Horowitz, according to TechCrunch. The company helps homeowners defend their houses against wildfires by creating 3-D models of their structures, developing fireproofing plans, and reaching out to contractors who can perform the work. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi also invested in the round. In June, Israel-based BreezoMeter, which makes the air quality tool used by iPhone and Apple Watch's Weather app, closed a $30 million funding round led by Fortissimo Capital. The app locates air pollutants, including pollen and wildfire smoke, and also allows users to track wildfires on a map in real time. In April, Berkeley, California-based wildfire evacuation platform Perimeter raised a $1 million pre-seed round. VCs aren't the only ones showing interest in the space. This spring, San Francisco-based evacuation management platform Zonehaven sold to publicly traded alert company Genasys for $24.2 million. Earlier this year, Zonehaven was the subject of an Inc. feature highlighting the difficulties founders face in the wildfire-tech space. For Zonehaven, as with others, creating technology that helps combat fires and their destruction hasn't been nearly as challenging as securing customers and capital. Dir: Michael Caton-Jones. Starring: Tallulah Greive, Abigail Lawrie, Rona Morison, Sally Messham, Marli Siu, Eve Austin. 15, 105 mins. Our story is older than the glens and hills, teenage girl Orla (Tallulah Greive) recites in the opening moments of Our Ladies. Shes dressed in fair-maiden white, her bare feet delicately balanced across the pebbles of a Highland loch a pale, wraith-like figure, but with a look in her eyes thats both sharp and mischievous. Shes flanked by four other girls, all dressed the same: Finnoula (Abigail Lawrie), Chell (Rona Morison), Manda (Sally Messham) and Kylah (Marli Siu). But they are not, as it might seem, awaiting the return of their betrothed from battle, or simply withering away, their chastity held close to them like a pearl in its shell. The story they tell is not one of love, loyalty, or sacrifice its one of desire. Or, to phrase it more on their terms, unquenchable horniness. Michael Caton-Joness comedy, based on Alan Warners novel The Sopranos (unrelated to a certain mob show), is endearing in the way it frames youthful sexual discovery as an age-old tradition. Its a riot of a film, relatable both to those who may share in the experience of growing up in rural Scotland and to those who just remember fondly what its like to feel such wild abandon. These teenage girls, all students at a Catholic school in the Scottish coastal town of Fort William in 1996, have a near-myopic focus on sex. Every conversation drifts into innuendo. Every man is sized up as a potential conquest. And when theyre shuttled off to Edinburgh by their teacher, Sister Condron (a brilliantly funny Kate Dickie), for a choir competition, they use their precious few hours of freedom to run riot. The characters here feel truthful largely because the cast are so willing to channel the ecstatic social dynamics of teen girls who still view the adult world as something new and exotic though that unrestrained giddiness might read like a human tornado to outside observers. Its a state amplified by the relative naivete they all possess as teens living during a time before mobile phones and social media changed everything forever. Itd be all too easy for a film like Our Ladies, especially one written and directed by men (Caton-Jones collaborated with Alan Sharp on its script) to chastise its characters for rushing into potentially dangerous situations the girls think nothing, for example, of accepting an invitation back to the flat of two explicitly creepy men. Or even if the film were too smart for victim-blaming, it might have twisted those scenes into tragic invocations of the dangers women face on a daily basis. But the pleasure of Our Ladies lies in the fantasy. Its purpose is not to reflect harsh reality but to see things purely through the eyes of its protagonists, who are all young enough to still view themselves as undefeatable and indestructible. The characters here feel truthful largely because the cast are so willing to channel the ecstatic social dynamics of teen girls who still view the adult world as something new and exotic (Sony Pictures) And Caton-Jones certainly doesnt mistake that wilfulness for pure naivety. The girls of Our Ladies still recognise the limits of their own youthful opportunity that as working-class women living in rural Scotland, theyll spend a lifetime being underestimated and undervalued by those around them. They hold a simmering resentment towards Kay (Eve Austin), the doctors daughter whose path leads straight to university. And theres a telling way that Orla, whos in remission from leukaemia, shrugs off all suggestion that her miracle trip to Lourdes has made her some kind of favoured soul. But whats ultimately so joyous about Our Ladies is all the small ways they rebel against their circumstances while the world wants them to focus on the destination of their lives, theyve chosen to revel in the journey. As a music critic, Ive long been fascinated by peoples first favorite songs. Not songs made for children, or the kinds of songs we self-consciously broadcast our allegiance to after weve developed the filters of taste, personal identity and critical perspective. Im talking about those early formative encounters with the vast world of popular culture the initial, primeval jolt that this song is somehow more special than the rest. Where does that feeling come from? Does something about our first favourite songs chord progression or production style predict what sort of music we grow up to like best? Are we all eternally doomed to be haunted by our original favourite song, forever chasing the unrepeatable rush of hearing it for the first time? I have perhaps felt a need to intellectualise all of this to avoid coming to terms with an embarrassing truth, which is that my first favourite song yes, me, a person who grew up to be a professional music critic is a song hated so vehemently by some people that its own Apple Music catalogue description admits that it regularly shows up on worst song lists. It certainly seems to be one of the most parodied songs in pop music history. Even its composer has an ambivalent-at-best relationship to its existence and has repeatedly compared its monotonous melody to a dentists drill and a droning mosquito. I am talking about Billy Joel and his notorious, wildly mystifying 1989 US-history-lesson-on-Adderall We Didnt Start the Fire, which as a four-year-old I believed to be the greatest song ever recorded. What kind of four-year-old loves this song? My vocabulary was still a work in progress, so I couldnt have understood most, if any, of its hundred-plus cultural references: Josef Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser and Prokofiev/ Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc. And yet I lived for the thrill of the songs rousing introduction coming on the car radio as it did often. Fire hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 around the time I turned three. I loved its weird intensity: I didnt know what Joel was saying but it all sounded so important. So deep was my love of We Didnt Start the Fire that there is a camcorder video of me singing it into a Playskool karaoke machine, ad-libbing lyrics about my own personal cultural luminaries of the time, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. But that was then. How long has it been since youve sat down and really listened to that song? (I had to do it to write this article, so you have to do it to read it Im sorry, but those are the rules.) More than three decades later, it provokes several different variations on the philosophical question, How did this get made? Also: Is Billy Joel rapping? Did he just rhyme Malcolm X with British politician sex? Does he always pronounce Berlin with an accent on the first syllable, or is he just stretching it to fit the syntax of the song? Whats up with the urgent, unbridled passion he summons to growl Trouble in the Sueezzzz? Buddy Holly, Ben-Hur, space monkey, Mafia is not the most poetic line that the Piano Man has ever penned I can at least offer an answer for the how did this get made? part. Joel wrote it during a transitional moment in his life: It was around the time of his 40th birthday, and he was feeling a little ruminative. One day, when he was working on what would become his 1989 album Storm Front, a young Sean Lennon stopped by the studio with another friend his age. They were bemoaning what a strange and overwhelming time they were growing up in: foreign debts, homeless vets, Aids, crack, Bernie Goetz. Joel suggested that he had also come of age during an exhausting moment in history: birth control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon back again. But, in Joels telling, Lennons friend countered: You were a kid in the 1950s. And everybody knows that nothing happened in the 1950s. Didnt you hear of the Korean War or the Suez Canal crisis? Joel protested. (Again with the Suez.) As soon as these youngsters left, he began writing down bite-sized headlines from his youth, if only to prove his point. Eventually he realised he was writing a song. The chain of news events and personalities came easily mostly they just spilled out of my memory as fast as I could scribble them down, Joel told his biographer Fred Schruers. (He also told Billboard magazine in 2009 that he was pretty sure it was the first and last time in his career that he wrote a songs lyrics before its melody: I think it shows, because its terrible musically.) Enjoy unlimited access to 70 million ad-free songs and podcasts with Amazon Music Sign up now for a 30-day free trial Sign up (Getty Images) And yet, for a song so indelibly time-stamped and frozen in the year of its completion, We Didnt Start the Fire has had a remarkably long afterlife. In the almost 32 years since its release, it has spawned countless parodies, from the niche (a friend recently told me that her former colleagues once performed a company-specific rendition they had written for an office party) to the mainstream (a 2019 Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon bit in which the stars of Avengers: Endgame attempted to summarise the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe). The Office and Parks and Recreation both featured Fire riffs. And this year, a history-based podcast named after the song debuted; hosts Katie Puckrik and Tom Fordyce devote an entire episode to each of the topics Joel mentions in the song. (Suffice to say, theyre going to be at it for a while.) There have also been the pandemic-era memes. Today was like if we didnt start the fire was a day, TV writer Matt Warburton tweeted on 12 March 2020. Shortly afterwards, a therapist named Brittany Barkholtz went viral when she took him up on this challenge: Schools close, Tom Hanks, trouble in the big banks, no vaccine, quarantine, no more toilet paper seen. Plenty of sequels followed, tailored to the most surreal headlines of the day. When I listen to the song now, I cant say I believe it to be objectively good but there is something enjoyable about the over-the-top absurdity of it. (It is certainly one of my go-to karaoke standards.) More than anything, though, I am amazed that all the way back in 1989 Joel somehow managed to predict the precise, decontextualised mania that I feel when Ive spent too long on the internet. At any given moment, I can log onto Twitter and experience a sequence of flat, oddly juxtaposed phrases being shouted at me with the intensity of a man growling Trouble in the Sueezzzz. But I also find the prescience of this three-decades-old song a little comforting. It can be easy to feel that we are currently living through the nadir of human history and hey, maybe we are! But Joel also wrote this song to capture a certain kind of generational deja vu that has existed since the dawn of civilisation. As he reflected to his biographer: Oh man, we all thought that too, when we were young: My God, what kind of world have we inherited? Maybe Buddy Holly, Ben-Hur, space monkey, Mafia is not the most poetic line that the Piano Man has ever penned. But its often hard for songwriters to predict just which of their creations will strike an enduring chord, let alone understand why. In a similar sense, you dont necessarily get to choose which songs you fall in love with, especially when youre young and impressionable, which is why pop music is one of the great cultural equalisers. I now spend most of my days trying to put into words exactly why I like certain songs, so We Didnt Start the Fire makes me nostalgic for a simpler time when I enjoyed things in a way that defied further explanation. I heard the song and was blown away. What else do I have to say? This article originally appeared in The New York Times. Terror group Isis has claimed responsibility for an attack on Kabul airport which claimed dozens of lives. Members of the group shared photos on the Telegram network of the martyr posing in front of the Isis flag while holding a gun and wearing a suicide vest. The attack earlier on Thursday saw two suicide bombers and gunmen attack crowds of Afghans as they flocked to Kabuls airport. Dozens were killed, including 11 Marines, a Navy medic and another military member, according to two US officials. They said another 12 service members were wounded and warned the toll could grow. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal. According to a statement posted by its Amaq propaganda agency in Arabic, the terror group claimed more than 150 people including civilians, US forces and Taliban fighters were killed or wounded in the suicide bombing. An image allegedly showing the Isis fighter who carried out a bombing at Kabul airport on Thursday (Grab) Isis claimed the attacker came within five metres of American troops who were overseeing the collection of documents of those seeking to leave Afghanistan on evacuation flights before detonating the device. A US official earlier said the attack was believed to have been carried out by Isis. The groups affiliate in Afghanistan, known as Isis-K, is considered to be far more radical than the Taliban. The name given to him by the group suggested he was an Afghan national from Logar province, south of the capital. Isiss last claim for an attack on the Taliban was on 14 August, the day before it took Kabul, according to The Independents security correspondent. There were six the previous month. People tend to a wounded man near the site of a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul (AP) Western officials had warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport, but that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the US officially ends its 20-year presence on 31 August. The US general overseeing the evacuation from Afghanistan has said the US will go after the perpetrators of the attacks if they can be found. We expect these attacks to continue, said Gen Frank McKenzie, adding that Taliban commanders have been asked to take additional security measures to prevent another suicide bombing on the airports perimeter. He said he had seen no indication that the Taliban allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. A 12-year-old girl fell to her death from the ninth-floor balcony of her house in the northern Indian city of Ghaziabad on Wednesday while attempting to rescue her puppy. The girl, identified in media reports by her first name Jyotsana, was reportedly playing with her five-month-old puppy who ran to the balcony and got stuck in the iron grill covering it, in Uttar Pradesh state, according to a local report. The seventh standard student decided to help her pet but the puppys head kept getting stuck in the grill in the balcony which was covered with a nylon net to keep birds out. In her attempt to pull the puppy out from the other end, the girl allegedly climbed on to the balcony railing, a family member told The Times of India. She held on to the nylon net with one hand and used the other to pull the puppy out. According to local reports, she slipped but clung on to the net for support. Upon hearing her cries for help, the girls mother rushed to the balcony and tried to save her, but the net gave way and the girl and the puppy fell down nine floors. While the dog died on the spot, the girl was rushed to a private hospital by her family and declared dead on arrival. The girls father was not at home at the time of the incident. Police officials reached the spot soon after and are probing the incident. Preliminary investigation seems to suggest that it was an accident, according to reports. The Talibans advent to power has insinuated a sense of fear among Afghans, especially the religious and ethnic minorities who have repeatedly been at the target point of the hardline Islamist group and have faced widespread persecutions. The Hazaras of Afghanistan, the third largest ethnic group belonging to the Shia community, have faced some of the most violent assaults at the hands of the Taliban. The Hazaras follow Shia Islam while the Taliban and majority ethnic groups of Pashtuns practice Sunni Islam, an ideological crossroads that leads only to conflict. With the takeover of Kabul, the fall of the democratic government and the withdrawal of US-led foreign troops, the minority Shia Muslim group fears the Taliban will again target them just as it did during its last regime in the 1990s and the majority Pashtun community will also turn on them. The last period of extended Taliban rule saw widespread persecutions of Hazaras along with targeted bombings of schools and hospitals in the region. This time, however, the Taliban has claimed all religious and ethnic minorities can live peacefully under their rule and no one will be persecuted. But recent reports suggest otherwise. A 2018 United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan report says most attacks by Taliban on civilians are directed towards the minority population, most of whom are ethnic Hazaras. However, the conflict between the minority Hazaras and majority Pashtuns in Afghanistan goes back centuries. Who are the Hazaras? The Hazaras are the third largest ethnic group of Afghanistan and a religious minority in Afghanistan. There are about 4 million Hazaras estimated to be living in Afghanistan, forming around 10 per cent of the total population of the conflict-ridden nation. They are believed to be of Mongolian and central Asian descent and the descendants of Genghis Khan (known as Changez Khan in south Asia). They look slightly different from the Pashtun majority, resembling the Mongol features a little, speak a different dialect of Dari, one of Afghanistans two major languages, and most of them follow a different sect of Islam the Shia Islam. The two largest ethnic groups, the Pashtuns and Tajiks, follow Sunni Islam, while the Taliban as well as the Islamic State are hardliner Sunni groups. The two sects have been largely in conflict with each other, with sectarian violence erupting in other countries like Pakistan as well. The alienation of Hazaras and migration to the rugged mountainous central areas, known as Hazaristan, is also the result of decades of persecution, especially at the hands of the Taliban. The Islamist group in the 1990s denounced the community as kafirs (non-Muslims) and ordered their massacre. Attacks against Hazaras The recent persecution of Hazaras was not instigated by the Taliban but had existed for centuries when Afghanistan was under monarchs and the majority Pashtun community dominated the minority Hazaras. In the late 19th century, thousands of Hazaras are believed to have been killed under Pashtun King, however, the exact number is debatable. The children of the Hazaras were later enslaved and their lands were taken away. Under the Taliban rule of the 1990s, thousands of Hazaras were believed to have been slaughtered by the militants. Even after the Talibans defeat, the community has repeatedly been at the receiving end of violence and suicide bombings targeting their mosques, schools and assemblies. An elderly mother mourns at the grave of her Hazara son after he was killed in the 23 July twin suicide attack in Kabul in 2016 (Getty) However, the situation changed for the better in recent years when more efforts were put in to include the community in the mainstream, including getting the children to schools and Hazaras moving into positions of power. What has the Taliban promised? The Taliban is yet to spell out the finer details of how the new regime would function, but the militant group also announced its laws will be based on the religious rules of sharia law. It has also made tall claims of peace and equality, promising no persecutions based on religious or ethnic ideology. Under the new constitution Afghanistan adopted in 2003 after the US-led forces drove out the Taliban from power in 2001, the Hazaras were given equality with other communities in the country. However, right after taking control of the Ghazni province in eastern Afghanistan last month, Taliban militants are believed to have massacred nine ethnic Hazara men, a report by Amnesty International said last week. Some pictures emerging on social media also showed that the statue of a prominent Hazara leader in Bamiyan where the famed Buddhas were also destroyed two decades ago had been decapitated within days of Taliban taking control. The Taliban also assured freedom of movement for women, but it has been announcing orders for women to stay at home for their own safety. Despite the diplomatic language of the leaders this time around, the minorities may also be looking at a bleak future in Afghanistan. The Talibans swift takeover of Afghanistan is already facing resistance from armed forces that aim to fight back against a return to the hardline Islamist organisations authoritarian rule of the country, last seen about two decades ago. In northeastern Afghanistan, the Panjshir Valley has once again become a centre for resistance, having previously been the home for battles against Soviet forces in the 1980s. The National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF), founded by Ahmad Massoud, claims to have thousands of fighters ready to take on the Taliban - although it says it wants to enter into peace talks before pursuing conflict. We prefer to pursue peace and negotiations before any sort of war and conflict, Ali Nazary, head of foreign relations for the NRF, told the BBC, before adding that the group would not accept any sort of aggression from the Taliban. Who is Ahmad Massoud? Ahmad Massoud is the son of Afghan mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, who was known for successfully leading resistance groups from the Panjshir region against the Soviet Union and the Taliban. Ahmad Shah Massoud led forces as the main opposition against the Talibans rule of Afghanistan, from 1996 to 2001, until his assassination in September 2001. Ahmad Massoud has vowed to continue his fathers work by challenging the Taliban following the withdrawal of western troops from the country this month. I write from the Panjshir Valley today, ready to follow in my father's footsteps, with mujahideen fighters who are prepared to once again take on the Taliban, he wrote in a piece published in the Washington Post. We have stores of ammunition and arms that we have patiently collected since my father's time, because we knew this day might come. What does he want? Ahmad Massoud has said that he wants to hold peace talks with the Taliban and does not want to see a civil war in Afghanistan. However, he also warns that his forces are prepared to fight if necessary to oppose the Islamist group. [My forces] want to defend, they want to fight, they want to resist against any totalitarian regime, Mr Massoud told Reuters on Sunday. Ultimately, the NRF says it wants to move towards a decentralised form of governance in Afghanistan, with an inclusive system of power-sharing that represents all of the countrys different ethnic groups. The NRF believes that for lasting peace we have to address the underlying problems in Afghanistan, Mr Nazary told BBC Radio 4s Today show. Afghanistan is a country made up of ethnic minorities, no one is a majority. It's a multicultural state, so it needs power sharing - a power-sharing deal where everyone sees themselves in power. How likely is the NRF to succeed? The Panjshir region has been notoriously difficult to conquer in the past, with the Soviet Union and the Taliban both failing to capture the area in the 1980s and 1990s. The Red Army, with its might, was unable to defeat us Mr Nazary told the BBC. I don't think any force right now in Afghanistan has the might of the Red Army. And the Taliban also 25 years ago... they tried to take over the valley and they failed, they faced a crushing defeat. However, the NRF, which reportedly has around 6,000 troops, will likely need international support to hold off the Taliban for an extended period. Mr Massoud has called on France (where his father is known as a notable freedom fighter), the US and other parts of Europe and the Arab world to support the resistance. Dozens of people, including children, are feared to have been killed and more wounded in two explosions at Kabul airport, where thousands of people had gathered to try to flee the country. Isis admitted carrying out the attacks, which killed at least 12 US service members, including 11 Marines and one Navy medic, according to two US officials. A number of US military troops were wounded. At least 60 Afghans were also killed, according to local officials, and video images uploaded by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies of people killed in tightly packed crowds outside the airport. The US general overseeing the evacuation from Afghanistan said the United States would go after the perpetrators if they could be found. Gen Frank McKenzie said the attacks were believed to have been carried out by fighters linked with the Islamic State groups Afghanistan affiliate. And Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer said that those responsible will be sought and brought to justice. There were no UK military or government casualties, the Ministry of Defence said, and Boris Johnson, who chaired an emergency Cobr meeting with ministers, insisted the evacuation effort in Kabul would continue despite the barbaric terrorist attack. The prime minister said the overwhelming majority of eligible people had already been helped to flee the Taliban by the RAF and the UK would keep going up until the last moment as the deadline rapidly approached. The head of the US militarys central command said two suicide bombers were involved. The blasts followed warnings that a terror attack could be launched in the final phase of the evacuation effort before the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan is complete on Tuesday. The Taliban condemned the attack, saying it occurred in an area controlled by US forces. Spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said his group strongly condemned it, and was paying close attention to security. The militant group, which has been trying to control the mass of people at the airport gates, has pledged not to attack Western forces during the evacuation, but insists the foreign troops must be out by Americas self-imposed deadline of Tuesday. An emergency hospital in Kabul counted at least 60 wounded people, and the US military was reported to be bracing itself for more attacks. US Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the first explosion was at Abbey Gate, and the second was at the Baron hotel, where the UK has been processing Britons and Afghans eligible for evacuation after the Taliban seized control of the country. The US embassy in Kabul warned anyone at the Abbey Gate, East Gate or North Gate to leave immediately. Adam Khan, an Afghan waiting outside the airport, said the first blast went off in a crowd of people waiting to enter the airport. Khan, who was about 30 yards away, said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who lost body parts. A former interpreter with UK forces who was with his wife, and two young children waiting for an evacuation flight reportedly said: It was like doomsday, injured people everywhere. Another witness said the first blast was followed by gunfire. Emergency, a volunteer group that runs war surgery hospitals and first aid posts across Afghanistan, said some people were dead on arrival. We have activated all mass casualty protocols, it said. Thousands of Afghans have been gathered at the airport for days trying to escape from the country since the Taliban takeover earlier this month. Western nations had warned of a possible attack. A UK government source said final evacuees who have been approved for travel to the UK, along with a few still undergoing security checks at the Baron hotel, were expected to be flown out of Afghanistan by the end of Friday, with the withdrawal of British officials, diplomats and troops expected to be completed by the end of the weekend. A senior British source said it was now highly unlikely that any more people would be admitted into the airport to seek evacuation on RAF flights. Mr Johnson was briefed at the Cobr meeting on whether the withdrawal should be accelerated in response to the attack, but concluded that this was not necessary as the mission was already close to its end and was being terminated as quickly as possible. Tom Tugendhat, chair of the foreign affairs select committee, tweeted: The attack on innocent people at Kabul airport simply trying to escape the horror of Taliban rule shows exactly who the group has brought with them. The pattern is well established - from Nigeria and Mali to Syria and Iraq, whenever Islamist extremists take power, terror follows. Tory MP Nus Ghani said she was on the phone to somebody outside Kabul airport when the explosion happened. The Wealden MP tweeted: Explosion at Kabul airport. I was on the phone to an Afghan outside the airport when he heard the explosion. Praying that he gets away safely and we get his family safe passage out of this nightmare. Another Tory MP, Alicia Kearns, tweeted: A bomb or attack with gun fire at northern gate of Barons hotel. Worried this will devastate evacuation - so many hurt. My heart is with all those injured and killed. Several countries urged people to avoid the airport earlier in the day, with one saying there was a threat of a suicide bombing. But just days or even hours for some nations before the evacuation effort ends, few appeared to heed the call. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from Afghanistans Islamic State group affiliate, whose ranks are thought to have been boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners across the country. British Armed Forces minister James Heappey told the BBC early on Thursday there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport, possibly within hours. The Ministry of Defence said it was working urgently to establish what happened in Kabul and its effect on the evacuation effort. Our primary concern remains the safety of our personnel, British citizens and the citizens of Afghanistan, a statement added. The faction of Isis that is active in Afghanistan is called Wilayah Khorasan by Isis (Isis-K by others), meaning Khorasan State. Its wilayat are regional factions in different parts of the world. It covers Afghanistan, Pakistan and other parts of south Asia. They have fought the Taliban now and again, as well as Afghan forces, and have launched significant terror attacks. They have not claimed any attacks on the Taliban since 14 August but previously did every few days. Britain and the United States have issued a new alert to their citizens - warning them to stay away from Kabul airport due to an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack. Amid mounting concern that people either at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, or else trying to make their way there, could be targeted by Isis extremists, urgent warnings were made by both capitals. Hundreds are still awaiting airlift by Britains RAF, but they are now being told to head for the border with Pakistan or Iran instead. The security situation in Afghanistan remains volatile, Britains foreign office said in an update late on Wednesday. Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. If you are in the area of the airport, move away to a safe location and await further advice. Meanwhile, the US also warned its citizens to stay away from certain gates at the airport, a degree of specificity that suggested the apparent threat contained precise information. The US Embassy in Kabul advised US citizens at a number of gates at the airport to leave immediately, noting security threats outside the gates. Earlier, CNN reported of very specific threat stream from Isis-K against crowds. Isis-K, a militant group linked to the fighters who seized a huge stretch of territory in Iraq and Syria until its defeat in 2019, has been gaining ground in Afghanistan in recent months, even though it is a sworn enemy of both the US and the Taliban. Crowds have flocked to the airport over the last 12 days, since evacuation efforts began, in order to flee Afghanistan. Chaotic scenes have been reported as troops attempted to remove as many eligible people as possible before an August 31 deadline by which military personnel must leave the country. In Washington DC on Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, said around 82,000 people had been flown out of Kabul since August 15 when the Taliban seized power. He said an estimated 1,500 Americans remained. Ex-CIA chief criticizes congressmen for taking 'Instagram trip' to Afghanistan Over the past 24 hours we have been in direct contact with approximately 500 additional Americans and provided specific instructions on how to get to the airport safely, he said at a press conference. For the remaining roughly 1,000 contacts we had, who may be Americans seeking to leave Afghanistan, we are aggressively reaching out to them multiple times a day, through multiple channels of communication phone, email, text message to determine whether they still want to leave and to get the most up to date information and instructions to them for how to do so. In London, the FCDOs updated advice said there had been allegations of people being mistreated on their way to Kabul International Airport. And it warned that travelling by road was extremely dangerous. It comes as it was reported that Defence Secretary Ben Wallace told MPs in a call on Wednesday that Afghans wanting to flee the country would be better off heading for the border and trying to make their way to a third country rather than travel to Kabul airport. Nearly 2,000 Afghan interpreters and other staff who worked for Britain still need to be evacuated from Afghanistan. They have been assessed as eligible under the Afghan relocations and assistance policy (Arap) and have passed security checks but remain on the ground, the PA news agency understands. Latest figures from the Ministry of Defence (MoD) showed that 11,474 people had been able to leave the country since the evacuation mission Operation Pitting began on August 13. This includes embassy staff, British nationals, those eligible under the Afghan relocation and assistance policy (Arap) programme, as well as some evacuees from allied countries. On Tuesday, Joe Biden spoke of the terrorist threat to the airport, even as he stood by his decision not to extend the evacuation deadline beyond August 31. Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that Isis-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians, he said. Who are the two groups? The Taliban and Isis are both Sunni Islamist extremist groups seeking to form authoritarian states under strict Sharia law and prepared to use violence to achieve their aim. The two forces are actually enemies, however, who have fought bitterly since 2015 when Isis formed the Islamic State-Khorasan Province (ISKP) in Afghanistan at a time when it was first seeking to extend its geographical reach beyond Iraq and Syria. The Taliban first came to prominence in 1994 during the Afghan Civil War, its ranks composed largely of students - from which the group derives its name in Pashto - many of whom had been mujahideen resistance fighters who had battled occupation by the Soviet Union in the 1980s. A Deobandi fundamentalist Islamist movement originating in the Pashtun areas of eastern and southern Afghanistan and in northern Pakistan, the Taliban was led by Mullah Mohammed Omar and conquered first the province of Herat and then the whole country by September 1996, overthrowing the Burhanuddin Rabbani regime, establishing the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and making Kandahar the capital. Follow Afghanistan news live: Latest updates Its tyrannical rule, marked by the massacre of opponents, the denial of UN food supplies to starving citizens and the oppression of women, was brought to an abrupt end by US-led coalition forces in December 2001 in retaliation for Osama Bin Ladens devastating al-Qaeda terror strike on the World Trade Center in New York City, which killed 2,996 people and left 25,000 injured. Since then, Taliban fighters have regrouped as an insurgency and continued to battle to retake Afghanistan from US peacekeeping forces ever since. Isis meanwhile was first formed by Jordanian jihadist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in 1999 before rising to global prominence when it drove Iraqi forces out of key cities in the west of the country in 2014 - having declared itself a worldwide caliphate - and later conquered swathes of eastern Syria before ultimately surrendering Mosul and Raqqa in 2017 when international forces intervened. It established the ISKP in the Nangarhar Province of eastern Afghanistan in January 2015, actively recruiting defectors from the Taliban, in particular those who were discontented with their own leaderships lack of success on the battlefield. How have their respective factions interacted? The formation of ISKP prompted Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour to write a letter to his Isis counterpart, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, calling on him to abandon his recruitment drive of the disaffected and arguing that any war for their comparable cause in Afghanistan should be carried out under Taliban leadership. Fighting duly broke out between the two sides that June 2015 and between two separate factions of the Taliban in the Zabul Province that November over whether or not to join forces with Isis. More battles erupted in April 2017 when ISKP captured three drug dealers selling opium to raise funds for the Taliban in the northern Afghan province of Jowzjan and again in May 2017 when 22 militants were killed in clashes between the two sides along the Iranian border. The Taliban launched an offensive to clear Isis out of Jowzjan the following summer, with the the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan joining in on the latters side, as up to 7,000 people were displaced from their homes. That Julys conflict ended in a significant defeat for ISKP, who suffered further setbacks in skirmishes the following year before being almost entirely eradicated by the US and the Afghan military in late 2019, although the Council for Foreign Relations estimates that there are still 2,200 members of ISKP still active in Afghanistan. In February 2020, the Donald Trump administration signed its dubious peace accord with the Taliban in Doha, Qatar, which saw the latter group pledge to keep other Islamist extremists, including Isis, out of the country. Why are we asking this now? Afghanistan is again in a state of turmoil after the Taliban recaptured the capital city of Kabul on Sunday, declaring the country an Islamic Emirate once more after president Ashraf Ghani abandoned the presidential palace and fled to Tajikistan. The operation followed swiftly on from the withdrawal of American troops from the country last month at the order of US president Joe Biden, their exit coming almost 20 years after the US military drove the same faction out of Kabul at the outset of George W Bushs War on Terror in response to 9/11. Biden expressed his determination not to hand the responsibility for policing Afghanistan on to a fifth commander-in-chief following the completion of his own tenure in the White House and trusted in the Afghan military, in whom the US had invested almost $1trn over two decades, to keep the Taliban at bay. The fact of the matter is weve seen that that force has been unable to defend the country... and that has happened more quickly than we anticipated, US secretary of state Anthony Blinken lamented on Sunday. Amid the chaotic scenes in Kabul as people fled for the airports was the alarming sight of 5,000 escaped prisoners walking free from the Pul-e-Charki prison on Bagram air base, occupied by the Americans until recently, with alleged Isis and al-Qaeda fighters present among their number. Speaking on NPRs All Things Considered last week, former US defence secretary Leon Panetta gave this blunt assessment of the disaster unfolding: The Taliban are terrorists, and theyre going to support terrorists. If they take control of Afghanistan, there is no question in my mind that they will provide a safe haven for al-Qaeda, for Isis and for terrorism in general. And that constitutes, frankly, a national security threat to the United States. During pitched battles in which the Taliban fought against Afghan government forces and their American patrons in Nangarhar province, both sides occasionally put aside their differences and focused their firepower on a mutual enemy: Isis, which had gathered fighters from across the world and hidden itself within the forbidding mountains along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. That was several years ago, and beating the threat posed by the local branch of Isis to all of south Asia became a major impetus for the deal eventually struck between Washington and the Taliban. Follow Afghanistan news live: Latest updates Isis-K has now claimed responsibility for the terrorist bombing outside Kabuls Hamid Karzai airport, which left at least 60 people dead, including children, and added to the chaos and despair in Afghanistan on the eve of the final withdrawal of international forces from the country after nearly 20 years of failed efforts at stabilisation and state-building. The main thing that signals is that, even now that the Taliban spokesman has been saying the war is over, this really shows that terrorism is still very much prevalent in Afghanistan and will continue to be so under this Taliban regime, said Viraj Solanki, a south Asia researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. Afghan civilian lives will continue to be under threat. Declared in 2015, and formally called the Islamic State in Khorasan Province, Isiss south Asia branch is believed to have been responsible for some of the most horrific attacks in Afghanistan, including bombings of Shia mosques and institutions, which have worsened sectarian mistrust in the country. It has also struck inside Pakistan, targeting government forces as well as members of the countrys Sufi minority. Isis affiliates were responsible for the worst ever terrorist attack in Sri Lanka, when eight suicide bombers carried out a series of coordinated attacks that killed over 250 people in April 2019. Experts have described Isiss Khorasan branch as an umbrella group for at least a dozen or so militant factions occasionally cooperating with each other across borders. Various similarities and distinctions in the nature and timing of ISKs attacks in both countries indicate that ISKs activity is coordinated across the AfPak region to a substantial degree, said a 2018 report written by Amira Jadoon for West Points Combatting Terrorism Centre. The group has between 2,000 and 5,000 fighters, with half hailing from outside south Asia, drawn to the region by the allure of violent jihad. It is led by a former Taliban commander named Shahab al-Muhajer, a former member of the Talibans al-Qaeda-linked Haqqani network, which is now, ironically, partially in charge of Kabuls security. The original Isis formed as an offshoot of al-Qaeda that eventually overpowered its predecessor in Iraq and Syria, establishing a self-declared caliphate that spanned a huge swathe of territory across the Levant. But south Asia, which contains more Muslims than the Middle East and north Africa combined, was always in the sights of the group. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the late jihadi who founded the caliphate, identified Afghanistan, Pakistan and India as targets of the groups ambitions. His words and the caliphates early successes inspired franchise movements across the globe, including the south Asia branch, which has proven itself enormously effective despite losses suffered by the Isis core leadership in Iraq and Syria. This is a group that maintains branches from north Africa all the way to southeast Asia, but Afghanistan happens to be the most potent, said Colin Clarke, director of policy and research at the Soufan Group, a Washington-based security consultancy. From the time of its formation, Isiss south Asia affiliate has been building up strength as the lethality of its attacks has grown, despite persistent US airstrikes and engagements with the Afghan forces as well as attacks from the Taliban. While other jihadi groups worldwide cheered the Talibans victory over the Kabul government and praised it for seemingly defeating a US-led Nato force, Isis cursed Afghanistans new masters as Washington dupes. Taliban is merely a political movement using the cloak of Islam, one Isis supporter wrote on the Telegram messaging platform. Even with the US announcing a withdrawal from Afghanistan, it continued to claim low-key attacks against Taliban strongholds. But suddenly the attacks stopped about 10 or 11 days ago, said Mr Clarke. His worry was that the group was planning something big. Pulling off a complex attack like this takes time, planning and training, he said. This wasnt just a run-of-the-mill attack. There were multiple suicide bombs and gunmen involved. The attack on Kabuls airport could set the tone for Afghanistans future the way the 2003 bombing of the United Nations compound in Baghdad darkened Iraqs prospects. Since taking de facto control of the country, the Taliban has reached out to China, Turkey, Iran, and Russia in efforts to draw investment and technical expertise and gain international legitimacy. But Isis persistence in Afghanistan could undermine those efforts. The attack could also attract fresh Isis recruits, helping the group grow, and thereby drain any nascent efforts at creating a sustainable government in Afghanistan. Its going to be a shot in the arm for Isis-K, said Mr Clarke. Success is sexy. When you have an attack like this it draws attention and new fighters. The political and psychological impact is tremendous. I cant think of an attack that is going to have as big an impact. The personal belongings of notorious mobster Al Capone are being auctioned off by his family, partly because of the threat of possible wildfires destroying them. Capone's three granddaughters are selling 174 personal items belonging to the prohibition-era gangster who died at his Florida estate in 1947. Diane Capone, one of the granddaughters who is now 77 years old, said the decision of the granddaughters to auction his belongings was made partly because of her desire to distribute the processions while they are still alive. But Ms Capone and her sisters have also been worried that a wildfire, like the ones currently burning in the US, would threaten their North California homes where the possessions are stored. The granddaughters have been looking after Capones belongings which were once housed at his estate in Miami Beach. The sisters will be putting the items on sale with the help of Sacramento-based Witherells auction house. It was a tremendous relief for the memorabilia of my grandparents to be removed because theres no way we could save it from a wildfire. We would lose it all, Diane Capone told The Washington Post. The climate crisis has led to a rise in the global temperature which in turn has caused a spike in extreme weather events, including wildfires in the drier parts of California, where the granddaughters currently live. A Colt .45 pistol, considered Capone's favourite gun, a Patek Phillipe pocket watch monogrammed with 90 diamonds, and bedroom furniture from his Palm Island home at Miami beach are among the belongings up for sale. The combined inventory value of the 174 items that will be auctioned on 8 October is said to be pegged at $715,000, according to The Guardian. Earlier in 2017, a diamond watch from Capones personal collection was auctioned for $84,375. Another engraved 1932 silver-plated cocktail shaker was sold for $68,500 in 2014. Capone was part of the Chicago Outfit, an Italian-American organised crime syndicate that was founded in the US in the early 20th century. Capone headed the outfit for seven years until his imprisonment in 1933. He gained notoriety for ordering a hit at a garage where rival gang members were bootlegging liquor. Mobsters disguised as policemen barged into the garage and killed seven men after forcing them to line up against the wall and then firing at least 70 shots at them. The hit was known as the St Valentines Day Massacre. Ms Capone, speaking to The Washington Post, said she has not been able to reconcile the reputation of her grandfather as a dreaded mobster and her perception of him as a loving family man. How is it possible that a man who was so loving and so generous and so devoted could have been capable of some of these things that were alleged? she questioned. I dont know how to reconcile it, but I suppose Ill have to wait until I get to heaven, and I can find out then, she added. Animal rights activists have been arrested after dyeing the iconic Buckingham Palace fountains blood red in a protest against use of crown land for hunting and animal agriculture. Animal Rebellion is protesting the revelations in a recent news story that found that the Queens lawyers secretly lobbied Scottish ministers to change a draft law to exempt her private land from an initiative to cut carbon emissions. A Met Police statement said: A number of activists have vandalised the Victoria Memorial water feature outside Buckingham Palace. We are on the scene and arrests have been made. The suspects are being taken to custody. Harley McDonald-Eckersall, a spokesperson for Animal Rebellion said: The crown estate is the biggest landowner in the UK and they choose to use this land for animal agriculture and hunting, which not only decimates our environment but causes the deaths of millions of lives every year. Its time for a new system based on justice and compassion and the royal family should be leading the way. Animal Rebellion is a separate yet sister organisation to Extinction Rebellion, which is undertaking a massive fortnight-long protest against the global climate crisis in London. The fountains outside the palace are a major draw for tourists (Animal Rebellion) Animal Rebellion and other animal rights groups have targeted the royals in the past because of their support of hunting, racing and the fur trade. Crown land should be used to grow healthy, nutritious food for all and to provide homes for the animals we share this country with, McDonald-Eckersall added. We are demanding that the Queen end the use of crown land for industries which are contributing to the climate and ecological emergency and the death of animals. Met Police confirmed arrestes were made (Animal Rebellion/Nik Gupta) In July seven Animal Rebellion activists were arrested after protesters barricaded a McDonalds factory. Protesters were at the site in Scunthorpe for more than 48 hours, preventing products leaving the factory in a bid to get the fast-food giant to move to an entirely plant-based food menu by 2025. Dozens of activists set up a blockade using trucks, tents and bamboo structures and locked onto one another to stop the facility from distributing burgers. Amid a busy wildfire season, officials say the Caldor fire is knocking on the door of Lake Tahoe, a popular tourist destination in Northern California. Having burnt nearly 123,000 acres and only 11 per cent contained, the number one priority in the nation for fires to get additional and new resources that are coming available, Chief Thom Porter, Cal Fire director, said at a news conference. It is that important. Starting on 14 August, the Caldor fire swept through Grizzly Flats days later, decimating homes, churches and businesses. The fire destroyed over 600 buildings, the majority of which were homes. Its also closed major highways and nine national forests. The small town is located east of Sacramento, California, in El Dorado County and has forced over 24,000 people to evacuate from the area. With the Caldor fire creeping east, the fires smoke has already turned Lake Tahoes blue skies into an orange glow and has polluted the cities air quality. Reaching hazardous levels, IQAir, a company that monitors air quality, recommends avoiding outdoor exercise. Even though the fires smoke has already affected Lake Tahoe, Tim Ernst, operations sections chief for the Cal Fire incident management team, said theyre trying to contain the fire from spreading to the area. Lake Tahoe officials said visitors are cancelling vacations because of the air quality and potential fire risk. So far, there are no evacuation orders for Lake Tahoe residents. On Monday, Governor Gavin Newsom requested that the president declare a major disaster for eight counties in California 43,000 Californians are on evacuation orders because of wildfires. The Caldor fire is one of 14 active blazes in California, according to Cal Fire. On Monday, a Cal Fire spokesman said in this year alone, wildfires have burned 1.5 million acres, which is up 42 per cent from last year. The climate crisis is causing hotter temperatures and droughts in California, which make fire seasons longer and more severe. As leaders of the G7 prepared for their virtual summit this week, Boris Johnson made a very public plea for the US to extend its presence in Afghanistan beyond the agreed 31 August deadline. This always seemed very unwise. There were simply too many reasons why an extension, however modest, was not going to happen. All countries engaged in the evacuation from Kabul have been living on borrowed time, with the tragic results of the twin explosions at the airport highlighting the danger involved in the operations. Their operations depend not just on the security provided by US forces, but also humiliating though it is on the cooperation of the Taliban victors. The US had agreed the August deadline. For president Joe Biden even to hint at a change could be seen as disrespectful by a movement, now a de facto government, acutely sensitive to honour; he would have been tempting fate in a wholly irresponsible way. Elementary diplomacy advises that you should never ask in public for something you are unlikely to get. But this is not the main criticism of Johnson following his abortive request. It is rather that he was too optimistic about the UK-US relations, sparking a new bout of soul-searching about the state of the supposed special relationship. Does it really exist? (Only in the eyes of some, mostly on this side of the Atlantic). What use is it, if it cant be invoked successfully in an emergency? (Not much and not at all if the US sees its own national security under threat.) Does the UK have more clout in Washington than other allies? (Less and less.) Has Brexit altered the balance of the relationship, making the UK at once more needy and less useful to the US as a bridge to Brussels? (Probably) A police officer is going viral for his uncanny resemblance to Dwayne Johnson, otherwise known as The Rock. The comparisons between the 49-year-old Jumanji star and Morgan County Patrol Lieutenant Eric Fields from Alabama first began earlier this month after the official Morgan County Sheriffs Office Facebook page uploaded a photo of the officer. In the photo, Fields, who is also bald like the Hollywood star, can be seen smiling as he leans against a police van. The picture, which has since been liked more than 1,800 times, prompted hundreds of comments from Facebook users shocked by the resemblance between the two men. Why is The Rock in this photo? Just wondering, one person asked the sheriffs office, while another said: Umm is that The Rock? The doppelganger also prompted someone else to joke: Dwayne The Cop Johnson. The police officers similarities to Johnson then made their way to TikTok, where one user, a woman named Chandler who goes by the username @chandlerelyse_, urged people to look at the photo. I really dont think yall are ready for this because this is insane. Look at him. You can not tell me that is not Mr Dwayne, Chandler joked as she showed the photo of Fields in the video, which has been viewed more than 1.6m times. Dwayne The Rock Johnson. Its him. On 26 August, Morgan County Sheriffs Office acknowledged the similarities in another Facebook post, where the department revealed that one of its officers had run into a Walmart employee who asked to take a photo with the actors lookalike. This gentleman recently ran into Sgt Mason and informed him he wanted to meet our Deputy that people say looks like The Rock, the sheriffs office wrote. Sgt Mason passed that along and Lieutenant Fields was happy to swing by the Hartselle Walmart to see him. Tyler is one of their many hard workers and it was great to meet him and some of his coworkers! In the photo, Fields, who appears nearly identical to the actor, poses next to a smiling Walmart employee, with the second photo again prompting shocked reactions in the comments. As for Fields response to his viral fame, he toldWVTM13 reporter Rick Karle that hes been having fun with it. However, the 37-year-old, who has been with the department for 17 years, also acknowledged that there are a few key differences between himself and the actor, continuing: Im a bit of a cross between The Rock and Vin Diesel. Remember, The Rock is 6ft 4in and 260lbs, and Im only 6ft 2in and 230lbs. There is a big difference between the two of us. During a pandemic that upended life as we knew it, brought constant bouts of worry, and forced us into social isolation, our pets have been a lifeline. Touch-starved and lonely during three national lockdowns and a year of social restrictions, more than three million households in the UK adopted a new pet, boosting the number of family dogs to 12 million. One study, led by researchers at the University of York and the University College London, found a positive link between pet ownership and a reduction in the deterioration of mental health as well as a smaller increase in loneliness during lockdown. In addition, 74 per cent of new pet owners surveyed by the Pet Food Manufacturers Association in March said their new pet had helped their mental health through the pandemic. One new puppy owner told the organisation that cuddling their Schnoodle, Minnie, put a smile on their face during times of loneliness. Another owner, Marie Da Silva, said she had always wanted a dog but previously did not have enough time in her schedule to bring one into her life. Working from home for two months last year was the perfect opportunity to train a puppy. There is no way I could have adjusted to life with a puppy had there not been a pandemic, she said. While mans best friend has clearly helped many of us cope with the negative effects of the past year, experts fear that our pups may find it difficult to adjust as life returns to normal. It has now been a little over a month since UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson lifted the remainder of social restrictions in England, including the guidance on working from home. The latest data collected by the Centre for Cities High Street Recovery Tracker suggests that so far, 18 per cent of workers have returned to the office in Britains 31 largest cities. With this figure set to increase, RSPCA pet welfare expert Dr Samantha Gaines has cautioned that it could prove a difficult transition for old family dogs who are now used to having us around all the time, and new dogs who have never known any different. We have real concerns that life post-lockdown, both in terms of a new routine and spending time alone, could be really difficult for them to adjust, Gaines said. Woman during pandemic walk with her dog (Getty Images) Another added factor is that many people who adopted new pets during lockdown are first-time dog owners. While a puppy who has never been left alone coupled with an inexperienced owner may sound like a recipe for disaster, Graeme Hall, dog behaviour expert and author of All Dogs Great and Small says we still have time to help our pups adjust to a change in routine, but cautions that this should be done slowly, and in small steps. Start sooner rather than later The sooner you start, the better. You want to get your dog used to the notion of the people leave, the people come back, Hall says, explaining that this is a gradual process that will take a few weeks. In short, its about instilling confidence in your pup that even when you do leave them, you will surely return. To begin, he recommends leaving them alone for a minute. Simply put on your shoes and grab your keys as you would when normally leaving the house and go outside. After 60 seconds, come back inside and say a quick hello to your dog. Minimal fuss The trick, Hall adds, is to do this with minimal fuss. Your demeanour has to be calm and very normal. If youre worried that your dog will be upset, its going to be written all over your face. Dogs read our faces, so if your dog sees that as youre leaving, this will in turn make them anxious. Its the same when you come back. Even if your dog is clambering against the door, dont give them too much attention. Say hello but walk in and make a cup of tea and do normal stuff, he adds. From here onwards, he recommends repeating this process plenty of times, each day working upwards on the amount of time you are absent until your dog feels comfortable. Look out for signs of separation anxiety For some owners, it may be difficult to know whether your dog is experiencing separation anxiety. While Hall emphasis that dogs are as individual as people, there are some common warning signs. For those who have an in-home camera, you might see your dog aimlessly pacing up and down after you leave or scrabbling at the carpet near a door. Its almost like an attempt to burrow out. Whats peculiar about separation anxiety is that in the dogs mind, they want to go and find mum or dad, and see where they went, Hall explains. For those without a camera, a sign to look for is damage to the door or to the wall around it, which also suggests your dog was trying to leave. On the other hand, a dog that is adjusting well will display much calmer behaviour and likely sleep through much of the day. Dogs will sleep all night, and a happy dog will sleep half the day as well. If a dog is on their own and pretty much never napping, then there is something wrong, Hall adds. Lots of dogs are fine and if you do have a problem, there are lots of professionals around that you can ask for a bit of help. Be positive: its not an answer to everything, but its a damn good start. Graeme Hall Of course, an obvious sign of a distressed dog is if your neighbours hear a lot of barking throughout the day. But as per Halls earlier advice that not all dogs are the same there is a chance your dog may not be experiencing separation anxiety. For example, some dogs bark at passersby because they think they are guarding the house, so they react to sounds, he says. Heading: Leave the radio on and toys available After 18 months of having its owners at home, your dog might be finding it difficult to adjust to a quiet house, making outdoor sounds harder to cope with. To counteract this, Hall suggests leaving the radio or television on throughout the day, as it will help block sounds from outside. Another old chestnut is to leave your dog with a toy they can safely chew and play with, Hall suggests. But there is a caveat; avoid a toy that rules your dog up and makes them excited. Instead, try a toy that will soothe your dog, and help calm them down. Consider a dog walker or daycare (if you can afford it) While social contact was limited during the three national lockdowns of the past 18 months, people in the UK were permitted to exercise outdoors once a day, including taking their dog for a walk. This advice was later updated in January 2021, allowing dog owners to take their pets outside more than once in a 24-hour period. While owners werent encouraging their dogs to interact with other dogs as they usually might have pre-pandemic, they were still out and about and seeing other animals. This social interaction could mean that your dog would fare well in the hands of a dog daycare or dog walker on your return to the office if an affordable option. Most dogwalker and daycare establishments, they are really savvy. If you talk to them about your dog and be really honest with them, they will take it from there, Hall says. His experience has also shown that often, dogs behave better with strangers than they do with their owners. Youre worried about the dog, and actually the report that comes back is that your dog has been absolutely fine, he says. Have faith and stay positive While the prospect of returning to the office and leaving your pup alone for an entire workday seems understandably daunting, some of the best help we could give to our dog is just by having a little more faith. Emphasising his earlier advice, Hall says that your dog is bound to be startled by your worry, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. Hall says: Lots of dogs are fine and if you do have a problem, there are lots of professionals around that you can ask for a bit of help. Be positive: its not an answer to everything, but its a damn good start. Carrying on Princess Dianas legacy is an absolute priority for both Prince William and Prince Harry regardless of hurt feelings between them, biography Finding Freedom has claimed. The biography, written by royal commentators Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand, consults a number of unnamed sources as it charts the last 12 months of Prince Harry and Meghan Markles lives. But the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have said that the authors do not speak for them, and that they did not authorise the book. A friend of Prince Harry told Finding Freedoms authors that the brothers put the reported rift between them aside for the unveiling of a statue in memory of their late mother last month. On 1 July, Harry and William reunited at Kensington Palace to mark what would have been Princess Dianas 60th birthday. Diana died at the age of 36 in August 1997 in Paris. Harrys friend, who was not named, told Scobie and Durand that both brothers are deeply devoted to carrying on their mothers legacy and no amount of hurt feelings would ever get in the way of that. It is an absolute priority and even amidst this other stuff, they simply wouldnt proceed without one another together, they added. In a joint statement at the time, Harry and William said they hope the statue will be seen forever as a symbol of [Dianas] life and her legacy. Today, on what would have been our mothers 60th birthday, we remember her love, strength and character - qualities that made her a force for good around the world, changing countless lives for the better, they said. The statues unveiling was the first time the brothers were seen together in public since Prince Philips funeral in April, just over a month after Harry alluded to a rift between them during an interview with Oprah Winfrey. In March, he told Winfrey the relationship is space at the moment. As Ive said before, I love William to bits, he said. Hes my brother. Weve been through hell together. We have a shared experience, but we were on different paths. In Finding Freedom, the authors write that although William was understood to be furious that private family matters were being discussed in the public domain following the controversial interview, Harry has made progress in mending his relationship with the royal family. One anonymous source told the authors that Harrys visit to the UK for his grandfathers funeral had broken the ice, while another said there had been efforts on all sides. A woman has sued Starbucks after she reportedly sustained burns from spilling a coffee that was not the one she ordered. Mary Simms filed the lawsuit on 19 August after the injury occurred on 14 April at a Starbucks drive-thru in Tomball, Texas, according to USAToday. In the court documents, Simms alleged that she sustained the injury after she was informed by a Starbucks employee that she had been given the wrong coffee, at which point she stopped her car to hand it back. According to the lawsuit, while Simms was handing the hot coffee back, the lid came off and the liquid spilled onto her lap, which reportedly left her with first- and second-degree burns. As a result of the spill, [Simms] sustained first and second-degree burns causing severe personal injuries and damages, the suit said, according to the New York Post. The lawsuit goes on to claim that the injury was due to Starbucks negligence, as Simms alleged that she should have been warned of the unreasonably dangerous condition that was created by the failing lid, hot water and/or liquid of the coffee. Defendant knew or should have known of the unreasonably dangerous condition created by the failing lid, hot water and/or liquid of the coffee, and Defendant neither corrected nor warned Plaintiff of the same, the lawsuit said. Simms is seeking up to $75,000 to cover her medical bills and lost wages, as well as past and future loss of enjoyment of life, Business Insider reported. In a statement to Business Insider, a spokesperson for Starbucks said the company was aware of the lawsuit and was investigating, and that the coffee chain takes its responsibility to provide a safe environment seriously. We take our responsibility to provide a safe environment seriously, and our partners [employees] take great pride in ensuring our beverages are crafted with care and delivered to customers safely, the spokesperson said. This is not the first time that an individual has sued a chain restaurant over burns sustained from spilled coffee, as Stella Liebeck previously sued McDonalds after she suffered third-degree burns from a hot beverage. Starbucks has also been sued for burns sustained from its coffee, as a woman from Florida sued the coffee chain in 2017 and was awarded $100,000 for her injuries after she was left severely burned when her coffee cups lid came off. The Independent has contacted Starbucks for comment. At least six families from a San Diego suburb with a large refugee population are among those stuck in Afghanistan after going back to the country over summer break to visit grandparents and other relatives. The families, from El Cajon, were asking for the U.S. government's help after being unable to board their flights back to California. They have been blocked by the throngs of Afghans at the Kabul airport desperately trying to escape following their government's rapid collapse and the withdrawal of U.S. troops. The El Cajon Valley Union School District became aware of the problem after one of the family's relatives reached out to say their child would be late starting the school year, which began Aug. 17. The district said it had identified 24 students from various schools and 16 parents who are with them. The children range from preschoolers to high school students. Some have witnessed shootings and other violence in and around the Kabul airport in recent days, said Fraidoon Hassemi, an Afghan who works as the district's community liaison and has been talking to the families Nobody is doing well, he said. They are trying their best to get to the airport, get to their gates and get on an airplane. The situation is very horrible. The families had each traveled on their own on different dates and were not part of an organized trip. They now find themselves plunged into a harrowing experience, Hassemi said. Many of the families arrived in Afghanistan in early May and June, months before the crisis unfolded and the country's president fled as the Taliban seized power. What happened in Afghanistan was unexpected for everybody, Hassemi said. Everyone was shocked that in one week, everything changed. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan. It was unclear if that included all the El Cajon families. Some are U.S. citizens; others have U.S. residency. Despite travel warnings from the U.S. government, many felt an urgency to go to the country after not being able to see their extended families because of travel bans from the coronavirus pandemic, Hassemi said. Most of the El Cajon families came to the United States on a special immigrant visa after having worked for the U.S. government or U.S. military in Afghanistan, officials said. The visa allows in only the person and their spouse and children. Hassemi, who came to the United States on a special visa in 2015 and is now a U.S. citizen, said he normally would have also gone back to Afghanistan for summer vacation so his four children could visit their grandma. But they didnt go this year because his sons passport had expired during the pandemic. He feels fortunate now for having been inconvenienced. Superintendent David Miyashiro said the families are particularly scared because of the upcoming Aug. 31 deadline for the United States to end its withdrawal. Just like you and I, they had used the summer to go back to see their relatives," Superintendent David Miyashiro said. No one felt that were going to be unsafe or unable to return. Miyashiro said he could not provide more details since the children and their parents could be in danger. The district is working with Republican Rep. Darrell Issa's office to try to help get them out safely. His office said they were working with the State Department and the Pentagon on confirming visas, passports and other paperwork of those trapped in Afghanistan. Congressman Issa and staff are aware of several American citizens who reside in our district and are as of this hour trapped in Afghanistan," Jonathan Wilcox of Issas office said in an email. We have also been in direct and consistent contact with them, they are scared and stranded, and theyve been unable to reach the airport." Hassemi said the students will likely need a lot of support when they return. Im sure they are going to be affected emotionally," he said, adding: Their teachers miss them. We all miss them. We hope to see them all back to school." Cajon Valley school board president Tamara Otero said it's been stressful too for those waiting for their return. Its killing us right now," Otero told the newspaper. We are so worried about our students that are stuck there. Well do the best we can to get them out. Brexit and other factors have led to shortages of both food supplies and workers in recent weeks, with supermarkets now warning of potential disruption to Christmas supplies. Britains EU exit has contributed to a massive fall in the number of lorry drivers available to move goods, as have rising wages in their home countries, according to the boss of Tesco. Reports suggest coronavirus self-isolation requirements have also been a factor, while McDonalds and others have been hit by a shortfall in manufacturing workers. You can follow live updates on Brexit here. Here we look at which chains have been affected, and what they have had to say about the crisis. Greggs The national pastry chain was reported to have suffered a shortage of poultry affecting its popular chicken bake and other items. However, that particular favourite is still on the menu. There are no current supply issues with our chicken bakes and our customers can continue to enjoy these as they usually would, a spokesperson said. Unfortunately, like others, were seeing temporary interruptions in supply for some ingredients which occasionally results in shops not being able to maintain full availability on all lines. However, we have a wide range of choices in our menu for customers happy to buy an alternative. Costa A number of menu items at the coffee chain have been affected by supply shortages, according to its Twitter account. These have included paninis and decaffeinated coffee beans. McDonalds The American fast-food franchise, which has some 1,250 shops in the UK, ran out of milkshake ingredients and bottled drinks this week. A spokesperson said the shortages were only affecting England, Scotland and Wales, however notably, not Northern Ireland. We apologise for any inconvenience, and thank our customers for their continued patience. We are working hard to return these items to the menu as soon as possible, they added. Nandos and KFC Nandos blamed its widely publicised difficulties in sourcing chicken for its peri-peri restaurants on the coronavirus ping-demic. It has not publicly acknowledged the impact of Brexit but did admit that shortages were not affecting restaurants in Northern Ireland or the Republic. One of Britains largest poultry producers, Avaro Foods, dismissed claims the crisis had been caused by coronavirus isolation rules. Our concern is recruitment and filling vacancies when the UK workforce has been severely depleted as a result of Brexit, a spokesperson said, adding: This is causing stress on UK supply chains. Nick Allen, chief executive at the British Meat Processors Association, told The Independent: The supply problems are coming from the underlying labour problems happening since Brexit Its certainly Brexit-related, but its also the immigration decisions our politicians are making since Brexit. Co Op Shortages of food have reached historic levels, the head of the Co-Operative Group has suggested. Steve Murrells, the retailers chief executive, said it had significantly reduced its range of some products to help serve customers. He told The Times: The shortages are at a worse level than at any time I have seen. He blamed Brexit and Covid-19, and said the company was retraining staff to work as lorry drivers. Iceland Icelands boss grabbed the headlines this week when he suggested that food shortages driven by Brexit could affect Christmas. Richard Walker Radio 4s Today programme: The reason for sounding the alarm now is that weve already had one Christmas cancelled at the last minute and Id hate this one to be problematic as well. Recommended Final UK troops pulled out of Kabul The supermarket giant is suffering daily shortages of food and drink products because of a chronic lack of lorry drivers, he added. Iceland is currently short of 100 full-time drivers and Mr Walker warned that this was impacting the food supply chain on a daily basis. More than a quarter of food and hospitality businesses have been impacted by stock shortages in recent weeks while shoppers have been warned to expect higher prices as the UKs supply chain crisis deepens. A survey by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) found that 27 per cent of food services and accommodation companies have experienced low stock levels, with problems also spreading to other sectors. A quarter of retail and wholesalers also reported problems, as did 23 per cent of manufacturers. A host of factors have caused mounting disruption to supply chains, resulting in empty shelves in supermarkets and forcing some restaurant chains to close their doors. McDonalds this week ran out of milkshakes as major dairy suppliers struggled with a severe shortage of lorry drivers, while meat processors and fruit farms have also been hit by a long-running labour shortage that has been deepened by both the pandemic and Brexit. Haulage industry bosses, meanwhile, have warned shoppers to brace themselves for higher prices, while retailers have boosted wages for lorry drivers. The Road Haulage Association told the PA news agency the substantial pay rises on offer could force supermarkets to pass the costs on to customers. Certainly, drivers pay is increasing, often by quite substantial amounts, said RHA managing director Rod Mckenzie. This, in turn, is a cost that will need to be passed on, and given the tight profit margins of most haulage operators, that means their rates to customers will have to go up. In turn, this may mean more of us paying higher prices for goods, services and shopping including food prices going forward. The RHA added that the situation is not getting better and warned that the long period of time needed to train new drivers means Government action is needed. Problems are not restricted to food supplies. UK car makers reported their worst production figures for 65 years thanks to a global shortage of microchips and workers self-isolating. Car factories produced just 53,438 vehicles last month, a drop of 37.6 per cent on the same month a year earlier, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) reported. SMMT boss Mike Hawes said the chip shortage shows little sign of abating. Covid has caused disruption to supplies of manufactured goods, and shipping rates have surged this year as economies have reopened, causing demand to rocket. Suppliers of many goods now in high demand have struggled to keep pace. Plumbers, who enjoyed a boom as people carried out home improvements during the pandemic, have been forced to delay work because vital parts are out of stock, with long lead times. Kevin Wellman, CEO of the Chartered Institute of Plumbing and Heating Engineering, said the industry had been experiencing growing disruption for 18 months, with problems now deepened by additional red tape after Brexit. Manufacturers are doing all they can but they cant just increase supplies overnight. Its just been one thing after another for the poor, unsuspecting tradesperson who has just been trying to get things up and running. He warned people they might face delays and urged them to trust their plumber. Builders have also been dealing with shortages of raw materials and skilled workers. More than one in seven construction firms report that they have not been able to get the materials they need in recent weeks. Fraser Stewart, architectural director at HOKO Design, said Brexit had been a massive factor. The UKs departure from the EU has caused longer lead times for materials imported from mainland Europe, such as windows, doors, cement, timber, plasterboard, steel and cladding metals, Mr Stewart said. He added that demand for building materials looked set to remain high, meaning supply issues are likely to persist. Just over half of manufacturers have said they were able to get hold of the materials and goods they needed, but nearly one in five have had to change suppliers or find alternative ways to get materials, goods or services. Some industries where manufacturing has remained in the UK have reported fewer issues. Rob Harding, chief executive of wholesaler Greendale Carpets and Flooring, said British carpet makers had been coping really well, despite social distancing in factories and significantly increased demand. There are still a large number of UK manufacturers making carpets its one of the few industries that is still dominated by British companies. Carpets not made in the UK are often imported from Turkey, a supply chain that Mr Harding said has held up reasonably well, while some niche products from further afield have been delayed. However, the industry is still being affected by increased pay rates for lorry drivers and rising costs of man-made fibres. It is feeding through to increased prices that we are having to pass on to our members, and they are having to pass on to the public. Ubers UK boss is to meet with the head of the GMB union to hold groundbreaking talks about the ride-hailing companys treatment of workers. Jamie Heywood, Ubers UK chief, and GMBs Gary Smith said the exploitation of drivers by companies such as Bolt and Addison Lee must stop. In a joint statement, GMB and Uber said an estimated 230,000 drivers were not being granted their legal rights. The talks come after Uber lost a Supreme Court case earlier this year over workers rights. Judges dismissed the companys appeal, ruling that lower courts were right to find that Uber drivers must be legally classified as workers and paid the minimum wage, a pension and holiday pay. For years, Uber had argued drivers were independent contractors. Now the company is calling on competitors to fall in line with the Supreme Courts verdict. Uber recognised GMB as a union for its 70,000 taxi drivers in May. Gary Smith, GMB General Secretary, said the deal was a first step towards a fairer working life for drivers. It showed that when companies and trade unions work together, standards can be raised across these industries, he said. Earlier this year the Supreme Court set a precedent for all ride-hailing apps to provide drivers with worker rights such as holiday pay and a pension. Uber has done this for its 70,000 drivers, but there are more than 200,000 more working for other operators still denied these basic legal rights. GMB and Uber today take the next step in our commitment to ending the exploitation of hundreds of thousands of ride-hailing app drivers. Addison Lee boss Liam Griffin hit back at Ubers statement, saying: We guarantee the drivers that work with us get the London living wage level of earnings, as opposed to only the national minimum wage paid by Uber. Drivers working with Addison Lee also get access to a pension and holiday pay. Addison Lee has been involved in its own court battle with workers. Thousands of drivers could be in line for compensation averaging 10,000 each after the Court of Appeal found in April that workers were entitled to holiday pay and the national minimum wage. A Louisiana child under the age of one has died of Covid-19 this week, according to a statement released by the Louisiana Department of Health. The officials said the death was attributed to the more contagious Delta variant and low vaccination rates in the state. Since the beginning of the pandemic, there have been 12,226 covid-19 deaths in Louisiana. Kids and babies infected with Covid-19 typically are not hospitalised or die from the disease. But that does not mean all kids infections arent severe, especially with the new variant. Governor John Bel Edwards said in the states fourth surge, younger people are getting hospitalised, with 63 kids requiring hospitalisation last week. 31 per cent of new Covid-19 cases are in people 18 and younger. Other hospitals in the south and midwest are also seeing more kids with severe cases of Covid-19. For those eligible to get vaccinated people 12 and older a shot can prevent an infection from becoming severe. Yet, only 40 per cent of the population is fully vaccinated, making Louisiana a state with one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country, too. Each Covid-19 death in Louisiana has been heart wrenching, but the loss of such a young child, who could not be vaccinated yet, is tragic and a stark reminder of the difficult circumstance we are in throughout Louisiana, Mr Edwards said in the statement. So far, 11 children in Louisiana have died from Covid-19. Dr Joseph Kanter, a state health officer, said while kids under 12 cant get vaccinated, those eligible can protect this population from covid-19. The best way we can protect ourselves, our loved ones and young children who are not eligible to get the vaccine is to get vaccinated ourselves and wear a mask. Its really that simple, Mr Kanter said in the statement. Dubai International Airport, the world's busiest airport for international travel, handled some 40% less passenger traffic in the first half of 2021, compared to the same period last year, its chief executive said Wednesday. The decline came as more contagious coronavirus variants cut off the hub's biggest source markets and continued to clobber the global aviation industry. However, CEO Paul Griffiths remains optimistic for the crucial east-west transit point as authorities gradually re-open Dubai's key routes to the Indian subcontinent and Britain The 10.6 million passengers that passed through the airport over the past six months is still very positive," Griffiths told The Associated Press. I think coupled with the restrictions easing that were now seeing, (it) will bode very well for a satisfactory end to the year. The airport, which saw 86.4 million people squeeze through before the pandemic hit in 2019, has held the title of the worlds busiest since it beat out London's Heathrow seven years ago. It even kept the crown as the virus turned the worlds biggest airports into massive voids. But the once-teeming terminals still have a long way to go before seeing pre-pandemic passenger levels. The hopes stoked by the United Arab Emirates' speedy vaccination campaign took a hit as the delta variant emerged, prompting familiar border closures and capacity cuts, and hurting the mammoth airport, hub of long-haul carrier Emirates. Dubai World Central, the Gulf citys second airport that went out of use for commercial flights during the pandemic, appears to be a parking lot for Emirates iconic fleet of double-decker Airbus A380s. Although the UAE recently lifted an entry ban on India, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka, which are home to most of the vast foreign workforce in the federation, stringent vaccination requirements still bar many from boarding flights to the country. All of those South Asian markets are incredibly important to Dubai, theyre a very important transit opportunity, of course, as people go to all parts of northern Europe," said Griffiths. Its very important we get those traffic flows back. There are reasons to expect a rebound, Griffiths added. One of the airport's two main terminals, mothballed amid the pandemic, returned to use last month to prepare for an influx of holiday-makers escaping wintry weather and attending the World Expo in October. And after months of frustration and confusion, the U.K. last week removed the UAE from its red list that ordered all travelers to quarantine for 10 days in costly, government-approved hotels. The upgrade to amber elicited a strong sigh of relief throughout the federation of seven sheikhdoms, home to some 120,000 British expats. London was ranked as the top destination city for Dubais airport in 2020, with 1.15 million customers. Griffiths declined to put a number on the financial hit, but said the loss of traffic (to the U.K.) has had a very, very significant impact on the economy of both countries. So thrilled was Emirates about the flight resumption that the airline plopped a woman on the pinnacle of the tallest tower on the planet, Burj Khalifa, and filmed her raising placards that implored Brits to fly Emirates. The stakes are indeed high for Dubai, where the economy thrives not on oil, like in other Gulf Arab sheikhdoms, but on travel and tourism. Emirates remains the linchpin of the wider empire known as Dubai Inc., an interlocking series of businesses owned by the city-state. There are signs of looming uncertainty, with the airport yet to to hire back any of the 5,000 employees it furloughed during the devastation of the pandemic last year. But when asked whether Dubai Airport would hold onto its title one of many prized superlatives in the extravagant emirate home to the world's tallest building and biggest mall Griffiths didnt miss a beat. I have no doubt in my mind, he said. Were gearing up to expect a huge surge in volume." An anti-masker man who had been trying to bring his mask-less daughter back to school in Florida's Broward was arrested on Wednesday for physically assaulting her classmate. In a video that was widely circulated on social media, 50-year-old Dan Bauman was seen shoving his daughter's classmate while protesting against the Broward country public school's mask mandate. Mr Bauman has been recording his multiple attempts to get his 10th-grade daughter into the Fort Lauderdale high school sans a mask. Calling the school's mandate "illegal," Mr Bauman can be seen in one of the videos saying his daughter has "the right to go in." "First of all, its illegal for them to mandate it. Its against the law, its against the Parents Bill of Rights. Our belief is it doesnt stop the spread of the virus. It doesnt control it, it does more harm than good," he told CBS Miami. A masked student reportedly approached Mr Bauman and said "I have had enough for four days" and tried to wrest the phone from him. He then immediately shoved the student and "grabbed her hand and twisted her arm in an aggressive manner," the arrest report read. He was taken into custody and has been charged with aggravated child abuse. The schools interim principal Sean Curran said that the administration is following the guidance of the Broward County school district. In the past, the school had met with Mr Bauman's family to detail exceptions that were available, he added. "Every single one of them is wearing it and are supportive of what the measures are to keep everyone safe," Mr Curran said. The Florida state board of education has sent an order to Broward and Alachua county schools stating that they have two days to comply with the state's orders to allow an opt-out option for masks, otherwise the state will begin withholding funds. However, the Broward school organisation on Tuesday stood their ground against the state's efforts to force schools to reverse the mask mandate, arguing that the Florida law allows the district authority to impose "dress-related requirements, including masks, to protect the safety of students and staff." At least eight school districts with more than one million students were defying the governors order, AP reported. Florida has been recording the highest numbers of deaths related to Covid-19 since the onset of the pandemic due to the rapid spread of the Delta variant of the coronavirus. Despite the spike in cases, Governor Ron DeSantis has been firm on banning the mask mandate. A school board in Virginia has agreed to pay $1.3 million in legal costs to the American Civil Liberties Union after the nonprofit spent six years representing a student who sued over the board's transgender bathroom ban. Gavin Grimm s suit against the Gloucester County School Board ended in June after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the boards appeal to reinstate its bathroom policy. Lower courts ruled that the board's policy was unconstitutional and discriminated against Grimm because he was required to use restrooms that corresponded with his biological sex female or private bathrooms. He was barred from the boy's facilities in high school. The board agreed to the pay the ACLU s legal costs in a filing made in a U.S. District Court in Norfolk on Thursday. Josh Block, senior staff attorney with the ACLU LGBTQ & HIV Project, said in a statement that it should not have taken over six years of expensive litigation to get to this point. Grimm, who is now 22, said in a statement that he hopes "this outcome sends a strong message to other school systems that discrimination is an expensive, losing battle. David Corrigan, an attorney for the Gloucester County school board, released a board statement that said its insurance provider has addressed the ACLU's request to cover legal costs. The board declined to comment further. It's unclear what the board's own legal costs have been over the years. The Associated Press filed a request in 2018 with the school board's insurance carrier under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act seeking that information. Steve Craig, managing director of the Virginia Risk Sharing Association, responded at the time that such information is exempt because the matter was still pending. Craig declined to comment on Thursday, stating in an email that we cant be of assistance and cant offer any information or comment on the case. School systems that are insured are unlikely to suffer any long-standing financial repercussions from one lawsuit, said Francisco M. Negron, Jr., chief legal officer for the National School Board Association. They may see a rise in premiums just like any other insured would experience, he said, speaking generally and not about Gloucester. Grimm began transitioning from female to male while he was a student at his high school, located in a mostly rural area about 60 miles (95 kilometers) east of Richmond. He had chest reconstruction surgery and hormone therapy. Grimms case began after his mother notified school administrators that he had transitioned to a boy as a result of his medical treatment for gender dysphoria. That was at the start of his sophomore year at Gloucester High School. Grimm was initially allowed to use the boys restroom. But after some parents complained, students were told their use of restrooms and locker rooms shall be limited to the corresponding biological genders or a private restroom. Grimm filed his lawsuit in 2015 and argued that he suffered from urinary tract infections from avoiding school bathrooms as well as suicidal thoughts that led to hospitalization. The case then pinballed through the federal courts. It became a federal test case when it was supported by the administration of then-President Barack Obama It was scheduled to go before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2017. But the high court hearing was canceled after President Donald Trump rescinded an Obama-era directive that students can choose bathrooms corresponding with their gender identity. Grimm's case was heard again in U.S. District Court in Norfolk in 2019 and by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2020. Both ruled in his favor. All non-urgent community blood testing by GPs and other health services has been stopped by NHS England today as the nationwide shortage of blood collection tubes became critical. In a new alert to the health service on Thursday, NHS England also told hospitals they needed to reduce the amount of blood test requests by doctors by 25 per cent. NHS trusts have been warned they need to put plans in place to help each other out if some organisations come close to running out of tubes. NHS England said the shortage of blood collection tubes was likely to get worse before it gets better. The new changes are designed to stretch out existing supplies and will come into effect immediately and last until at least 17 September. It comes as staff in one major hospital have been told the shortages have reached critical levels and staff need to take urgent action. In an alert to the service NHS Englands medical director Steve Powis said: The supply position remains constrained and is forecasted to become even more constrained over the coming weeks. While it is anticipated that the position will improve from the middle of September, overall supply is likely to remain challenging for a significant period. The following measures should be applied across the NHS in England, all commissioned services and by independent providers of NHS services in England, regardless of which blood tube products they use. He added: All primary care and community testing must be halted until 17 September 2021, except for clinically urgent testing. Acute and mental health trusts must reduce their demand by a minimum of 25 per cent for the three-week period up to 17 September 2021 Organisations are asked to ensure that they are prepared, to provide mutual aid across local and regional systems for those sites experiencing acute shortages. NHS England said plans were in place to start using alternative products but this will take time for the tubes to imported and delivered to trusts. It added: It is important and urgent that demand is reduced as much as possible and that this letter is acted upon immediately. A message to staff at Leeds Teaching Hospitals Trust, seen by The Independent, warned staff they must not order blood tests unless it was absolutely clinically urgent. The message warned: The on-going shortage of blood collection tubes is now critical. Your urgent attention is needed to help control our testing and supply. Only request a blood test if absolutely clinically urgent. There must be senior clinical oversight around the ordering of tests. The trust said it was taking all possible actions to reduce the impact of the shortage urging staff to do their bit it said: We must avoid compromising patient care. Elsewhere the Royal United Hospitals Bath Foundation Trust has told GPs in the area they must cut the number of blood tests they are requesting by more than 50 per cent, the Health Service Journal reported. In a letter seen by the HSJ, the trust said: We have seen a 6 per cent reduction in the volume of GP tests but we are now having to ask that all non-essential bloods are not requested. We are aiming for more than a 50 per cent reduction. This meant stopping tests for all health checks and preventative medicine and monitoring as the trust focuses in urgent patient needs. NHS England and NHS Supply Chain, which handles equipment ordering for the NHS at a national level, has been trying to control stock levels since the start of the crisis but there is growing concern the shortage could get worse before it improves. The British Medical Association has said the shortage is a significant concern. Responding to the latest alert from NHS England, Dr David Wrigley, deputy council chair of the British Medical Association said: We are still no closer to understanding how this situation was able to develop; why there wasnt a contingency plan; and what happens if - despite NHS Englands efforts to avoid this - GP surgeries and hospitals do run out of blood tubes before 17 September. Its not unreasonable to question that there must have been a time when NHS England and the government knew that blood tube supplies were running low, and therefore, to now ask, Why has nothing been done to mitigate that? He added: In the meantime, patients who need a range of blood tests may now face cancellations, or at best a delay with those tests and this is a huge concern. Blood tests are a fundamental part of patient care, giving us essential insights into different conditions, warning signs, and overall health. If they cant be done or are delayed, then the quality of patient care is under threat. Patients need to have clear information about the scale of the problem, the impact it may have on them and whats being done to keep them safe. That needs to come from NHS England and very soon. Manufacturer Becton Dickinson alerted the NHS to problems in July and said the increased global demand as well as UK border challenges were to blame as well as a shortage of raw materials. A BD spokesperson said the company was maximising supply of the products and expanding its manufacturing capacity. A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: Patient safety is a top priority and we are working closely with NHS England, the devolved administrations, and NHS Supply Chain to minimise any impact on patient care. The health and care system continues to work flat out with the supplier and stakeholders to put mitigations in place, and restore normal supply, and there continues to be stock in place. Katie Price has reportedly said she cannot face a court hearing after she was allegedly assaulted in her home. The Sun newspaper reported on Wednesday the 43-year-old reality star believes she is not mentally strong enough to appear as a witness. The comments, which reportedly came from an unnamed friend of Price, said: This is a nightmare situation for Katie. She absolutely stands by her account of events of that night given to police, but upon reflection isnt sure shes mentally strong enough to go through yet another court appearance. She doesnt want to be dragged through the mill, and her private life scrutinised by all and sundry. Katie doesnt see any other way out. Speaking out yesterday, the mum-of-five told The Sun of how she ran away after allegedly being punched in her own home. Photographs shared by the newspaper showed bruising and cuts on her face. A source close to the star told The Sun that her 50,000 engagement ring given to her by fiance Carl Woods was targeted in the attack. Essex Police said officers were called to the scene by the ambulance service and a 32-year-old man was arrested a short time later on suspicion of assault, theft and coercive and controlling behaviour. He has since been released on bail until 20 September. Price told The Sun: Im still all dazed. Im devastated. I ran away after being punched I ran to Harveys house nearby and have now done damage to my feet, which I previously injured. A police spokesperson told The Independent they were still investigating the alleged attack. They said: We have a duty of care to gather all evidence relating to this case and our enquiries continue. Price is a former model and one of Britains best-known reality stars. She started her modelling career at 17, under the pseudonym Jordan, and rose to fame during the late 1990s. She later starred in a number of TV documentaries and reality shows, as well as releasing numerous books, perfumes, clothes and other products. She has been involved in a number of court cases in recent years relating to driving, bankruptcy and libel. The government should ban on new intensive poultry farms in an effort to save rare animal species from being wiped out, experts say. Ministers must declare peak poultry within a year, phasing out industrial chicken from school and hospital menus, because the meat is damaging biodiversity and fuelling the climate crisis, its claimed. Chicken are reared on vast quantities of soya, grown in South America, where swathes of forests are cleared to produce feed for industrially farmed animals. Campaigners from the Soil Association say species being put at risk of extinction because their habitats are being lost include jaguar, northern tiger cats, giant anteaters, giant armadillos and three types of monkey. The damage has shot up because the UKs consumption of poultry has risen significantly in recent years as consumers have switched away from red meat on health and environmental grounds. UK consumers eat nearly a billion chickens a year, reared in at least 1,000 intensive poultry units nationwide, an increase of more than 30 per cent in a decade, research has shown. The Soil Association is calling on the government to ensure UK consumption and production of poultry peaks within 12 months, then falls. The organisations chiefs want ministers to: Phase out industrial chicken meat from schools and hospitals Immediately ban new intensive poultry units And support producers to switch to nature-friendly and higher-welfare production systems The government says it is introducing world-leading legislation banning products grown in illegally deforested areas and is forcing businesses to examine their supply chains. Rob Percival, Soil Association head of food policy, said: Were gobbling our way through some of the planets most precious ecosystems, sacrificing iconic wildlife for the sake of soya and an ultra-processed chicken nugget. Just as the climate crisis demands we rapidly reach peak oil and transition to renewable sources of energy, the nature crisis demands we reach peak poultry and transition to more nature-friendly, sustainable farming systems. An Ipsos Mori poll this month found six in 10 UK adults wanted a ban on imports linked to deforestation, and a Soil Association survey found strong support for a ban on industrial livestock units. Research from Greenpeace among others has repeatedly highlighted the destruction caused by soya production on rainforests, savannah and wetland ecosystems - vital wildlife habitats - in Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay. Mr Percival called it devastating. There simply isnt enough land to go around Rob Percival Dr Flavia Miranda, professor at the University of Santa Cruz-UESC and an IUCN-affiliated wildlife veterinary expert, said: Soyabeans have been destroying our country due to the loss of critical wildlife habitats. In just a few decades, nearly half of Brazils landscapes have been transformed into pastures and agricultural land, leaving only about 22 per cent of the biome. The UKs overseas soya footprint covers an area approaching the size of Wales, according to the Soil Association. Mr Percival added: We need roughly a tennis court of soya per person to fulfil our demand for grain-fed meat. With UK poultry consumption roughly double the global average, and demand for grain-fed meat rising globally, there simply isnt enough land to go around. Our diets need to change. Last year international scientists suggested introducing taxes on meat consumption and production to tackle the biodiversity and climate crises. And the UK Climate Change Committee called for a 20 per cent drop in meat and dairy consumption by 2030. If the UK is to be a credible host for the Cop26 climate talks, Mr Percival said, it was vital to address our contribution to deforestation and wildlife loss abroad and get our industrial poultry problem under control. A government spokesperson said: The UK has a long and proud history of supporting action to combat deforestation and promote sustainable land use. Our new due diligence measure in the Environment Bill will clean up our supply chains by making it illegal for UK businesses to use key commodities produced on illegally deforested land. This is just one piece of a much larger package of measures we are putting in place to tackle deforestation, and we are working internationally to tackle the drivers of deforestation and protect the worlds vital intact forests. As part of our presidency of Cop26, we are building a global alliance of countries committed to working together to tackle this important issue, and this new dialogue will be instrumental in making this happen. The mother of Richard Okorogheye, the 19-year-old student who was reported missing in March and whose body was found two weeks later in Epping Forest, is backing a new blood donation campaign in his memory entitled Bonded by Blood: A Mothers Story. Prior to being reported missing, Richard had been isolating at home due to the coronavirus pandemic, only leaving to go to hospital to receive blood transfusions for the sickle cell disorder he was living with. Bonded by Blood: A Mothers Story, which is backed by Richards mother, Evidence Joel, will share 17 individual stories through a short film on how blood donation has positively impacted the lives of individuals who have received transfusions to treat illnesses such as sickle cell and blood cancer, as well as during childbirth and for a range of other medical conditions. These stories will be told through the lens of the mothers who have supported their children on their blood transfusion journey, whilst encouraging more blood donors from Black communities to donate during either World Sickle Cell Awareness month in September, or Black History Month in October, at one of the 10 sessions taking place nationwide, Speaking to The Independent, Ms Joel said: We want people to know how important it is to donate blood and save lives. We want people to know that anybody can benefit from it; my son did. When he was going through crisis (and received blood transfusions), it greatly improved his quality of life. Blood donation campaigns like Bonded by Blood are incredibly important to encourage existing blood donors to donate regularly and new blood donors to consider donating, particularly within the Black community to help the lives of sickle cell patients and others who require blood transfusions and exchanges to maintain and save their life. Richard Okorogheye (Supplied) There are cultural barriers and lack of knowledge around the importance of donating blood. If we get rid of these barriers and the taboo around this then I think that it will positively affect change. At the time of her sons disappearance, Ms Joel told The Independent that the police treated her as nuisance - a matter thats currently being assessed by the Metropolitan Police Service - and further questioned how much officers understood about Richards health condition after they tried to reassure her he would find his way to the hospital if needed. The grieving mother believes that more needs to be done to raise awareness about sickle cell disease across wider society. People need to know that the disease is real and many are suffering from it, she said. Lives are at stake; when you speak to people and they ask what is sickle cell?, its scary because its something that everyone should be aware of. Ms Joel, who works as a community nurse, added: Even when I trained it wasnt addressed throughout my studies. We never talked about such things until we started working in hospitals. Coming to terms with Richards death - the cause of which remains unknown - has been difficult. I take each day as it comes; I do have my ups and downs - one minute Im okay and the next minute Im not, Ms Joel said. I feel completely empty and still sometimes think hes going to walk through the door but, of course, thats not going to happen. Richard was very principled and caring; he prioritised other peoples happiness and would go miles to make sure you had a smile on your face. I was privileged to have him and very lucky to be his mum. I am grateful for the Bonded by Blood organisations coming together to do something positive in the name of my son Richard. He had a bright future ahead of him. It is my hope his legacy will be that of his name, encouraging people from the Black community to support each other by doing something so amazing such as giving blood. We want people to know how important it is to donate blood and save lives. (PA) Every month NHS Blood and Transplant need 1,300 new Black donors to provide not only essential treatment for 15,000 patients living with sickle cell, but also to provide life-saving blood for use in emergencies, childbirth, during surgery, treatment of cancer and for a range of medical conditions. Whilst people of Black heritage are 10 times more likely to have the same rare blood subtype, the shortage of Black donors makes it harder to find the best ethnically matched blood for Black patients. The special blood donation events will take place over three consecutive weekends between 25 September and 10 October, at venues across London, Bristol, Birmingham and Manchester. To register to donate blood and attend the Bonded by Blood: A Mothers Story blood donation sessions, individuals should call the priority booking line on 0300 303 2805. Alternatively, people can click here to complete the pre-booking form. The campaign has been formed by a group of Black health charities including ACLT (African Caribbean Leukaemia Trust), SickleKan and Unsickle My Cells, supported by NHS Blood and Transplant. Beverley De-Gale OBE, ACLT co-founder and director of operations, said: The number of Black blood donors has increased in recent years but there is still a long way to go. By asking the Black community to step up and donate during World Sickle Cell Awareness Month or Black History Month, we hope it will contribute to the much-needed blood stocks now and in years to come. Additionally, the rare Ro blood subtype is more commonly found in Black people and thats why Black donors are so important to ensure that patients get this lifesaving treatment. The overwhelming majority of people eligible for evacuation by the RAF from Kabul airport around 15,000 people have now left Afghanistan, Boris Johnson has said. Mr Johnson said that there was now little time left before the UKs 1,000-strong military presence at the airport itself needs to withdraw, but said that they would do everything we can to get everybody elsein the time remaining. The prime minister was speaking against the backdrop of an increasingly chaotic situation in Kabul, with UK government ministers warning of the danger of imminent terror attacks by groups such as the Islamic State off-shoot Isis-Khorasan. Speaking to broadcasters on a visit to the Permanent Joint Headquarters in north London, where he met military personnel co-ordinating the evacuation effort, Boris Johnson said around 15,000 people had already been evacuated by British troops. In the time we have left, which may be as Im sure everybody can appreciate quite short, well do everything we can to get everybody else, he said. Mr Johnsons claim that the bulk of eligible people had been evacuated was met with incredulity from opposition MPs. Labours Chris Bryant said: From conversations with Labour colleagues and from my own experience with my constituents, I find it very difficult to believe the PM when he says that we have already evacuated the vast majority of Afghans who stood by us, let alone the many thousands of extremely vulnerable. And Hammersmith MP Andy Slaughter said: From our caseload of over 100 families, I can say that the vast majority of eligible Afghans have not been evacuated. So this is just a bare-faced and sickeningly cynical lie. Asked about the terror threat to UK troops and civilians, Mr Johnson said: I think we have to be transparent about the risks, that we have to be realistic about whats going on, and youll appreciate that there are Islamic State Khorasan province (Isis-K) terrorists out there. I cant go into the details, clearly. But we have to be mindful of the security of our personnel, but also of the Afghan people who are trying to get out. Earlier on Thursday armed forces minister James Heappey warned that a possible terror attack at the airport could come within hours calling the threat credible and imminent. Mr Johnson stressed that 31 August deadline for evacuation would not mark the end of the UKs efforts to help those who wish to flee Afghanistan. The prime minister said that although the lions share of eligible people had now been removed from the country, he recognised there will be people who still need help. Asked about reports of the Taliban stopping people who wish to leave by blocking roads, Mr Johnson said he hoped the Taliban understand that if they want to engage with development aid, they want to unlock those billions of funds ... then the safe passage for those who want to come out is the key precondition. Mr Johnson has come under pressure to step up preparations for what MPs and charities warn could be a humanitarian catastrophe after the closure of the airport. The prime minister said the next challenge would be to help Afghan refugees integrate into our society. He added: The real job now is to make sure they have the housing, they have the skills, they have the opportunities to integrate into our society. As you know, our labour market ... it currently offers many opportunities, but we must make sure that theyre ready, and thats another whole job. The UK and the US have issued a warning to any remaining citizens in Afghanistan to stay away from Kabul airport due to an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack. A possible terror attack at the airport could come within hours, Britains armed forces minister James Heappey warned on Thursday morning calling the threat credible and imminent. The defence minister described the terror threat to people outside Kabul airport as lethal amid concerns over an attack by an affiliate of the so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan, Isis-K. Follow Afghanistan news LIVE: Latest updates as suspected suicide bombing outside Kabul airport I cant stress the desperation of the situation enough the threat is credible, it is imminent, it is lethal, Mr Heappey told BBC Breakfast. We wouldnt be saying this if we werent genuinely concerned about offering Islamic State a target. The minister told LBC: I was given lines today for what might happen if the attack happened while I was doing this media round. He added: Daesh, or Islamic State, are guilty of all sorts of evil. The opportunism of wanting to target a major international humanitarian mission is just utterly deplorable, but sadly true to form for an organisation as barbarous as Daesh. Mr Heappey said British intelligence about the imminence and credibility of an attack by the so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan had grown significantly this week. There is real lethality to the plans were aware of, he added. It is not yet clear how the terror warning might disrupt evacuation plans. Britain was set to make one last push to bring nearly 2,000 Afghan interpreters and staff out of Kabul on Thursday, in what was expected to be the final day of the RAFs airlift operation. Officials in London insisted that the timing of the last UK evacuation flight has not yet been decided, but defence secretary Ben Wallace made clear in a conference call with MPs on Wednesday evening that time was running very short. Mr Wallace was reported to have told MPs that Afghans hoping to seek asylum in the UK would be better off now heading for the border and trying to make their way to a third country such as Pakistan or Iran. Mr Heappey said there will be 11 more flights out of Kabul on Thursday, but declined to say whether there will be more on Friday, citing the security of troops. We will do our best to protect those who are there. There is every chance that as further reporting comes in we may be able to change the advice again and process people anew but theres now guarantee of that, he told BBC Radio 4s Today programme. The window of opportunity to evacuate people is closing. Its not as simply a case of we can pause, deal with the [terrorist] threat and pick up where we left off. The Foreign Office issued an alert on Wednesday evening stating: Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. If you are in the area of the airport, move away to a safe location and await further advice. The US Embassy in Kabul advised US citizens at a number of gates at the airport to leave immediately, noting security threats outside the gates. The Pentagon said on Wednesday that more than 10,000 people remained at Kabul airport waiting to be evacuated. EU nations have offered stark warnings about the waning days of a massive airlift to bring people out of Afghanistan after the Taliban seized control of the country. France said it would halt its evacuations on Friday while Denmark said its last flight had already left Kabuls airport. Danish defence minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul. Eight RAF flights managed to lift 1,988 people from Kabul within the past 24 hours, Mr Heappey said, taking the total since the Taliban began its march to power to just over 12,200. Close Related video: Nandos temporarily closes stores across UK due to supply issues The UK and the European Union can still find sensible solutions to issues over Northern Irelands post-Brexit trading arrangements with the right political will, Irish Prime Minister Micheal Martin has said. A positive and constructive future partnership is in everyones interests but it will only be delivered if there is a relationship of trust and a willingness to deliver on commitments entered into, Mr Martin said after a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron. The EU had demonstrated commitment, patience and creativity in its work to implement the withdrawal agreement and the protocol, he added. It comes as supermarkets and hauliers have issued a warning to shoppers that supply struggles could mean they face long-term higher food prices. A shortfall of around 100,000 drivers, which has been driven by thousands of European drivers leaving during the pandemic and not returning, as well as high numbers of workers retiring, is being blamed for the trouble, hauliers told PA. Close Trump asks who shot 'innocent, wonderful, incredible woman' Ashli Babbitt The officer who who fatally shot Trump supporter Ashli Babbitt during the riot inside the halls of Congress on 6 January revealed his identity in an interview aired on NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt on Thursday. I know that day I saved countless lives, Lt. Michael Byrd said, speaking publicly about the shooting for the first time, after authorities previously declined to identify him. I know members of Congress, as well as my fellow officers and staff, were in jeopardy and in serious danger. And thats my job. Ms Babbitt has emerged as a far-right martyr whose name and the phrase who killed Ashli Babbitt? has been invoked by GOP lawmakers and former president Donald Trump, who has eulogised her in public remarks and on Fox News, in an apparent effort to deflect from scrutiny into the causes and narrative behind the attack and Republican liability supporting an effort to undermine democracy. All that made it so when Lt Byrds named leaked online, the officer, who is Black, faced a torrent of threats and racist abuse. The revelation of his identity comes amid renewed scrutiny of the 6 January riot from all sides. Hours before the interview, a lawyer for Ms Babbitts family revealed Lt Byrds name and denounced her killing as A group of seven Capitol Police officers also filed a lawsuit on Thursday accusing former president Trump, far-right extremist groups and Trump allies of plotting to disrupt the certification of millions of Americans votes and subvert the outcome of the presidential election. The lawsuit follows recent testimony of several officers to the House Select Committee to probe how the Trump-era White House and federal law enforcement planned its response to the attack, and how the administration fed into the movement that propelled it. The family of Ms Babbitt an Air Force veteran who amplified QAnon- and election-related conspiracy theories on social media before she travelled to Washington DC to participate in the riot has also threatened a $10m wrongful death lawsuit and demanded records related to the attack, including the identity of the officer who killed her. Follow for updates Close Biden vows to hunt down US enemies after suicide bombers kill US servicemen in Kabul Following a suicide bombing at Kabul airport that left 13 American service members dead and 18 wounded, among dozens of others killed, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett extended condolences and deep sadness for the loss of American lives during a meeting with US President Joe Biden at the White House on Friday. After pledging to hunt down those responsible for the attack, the president was briefed by military officials on Friday on the likelihood of another terror attack and the maximum force protection measures underway at Hamid Karzai International Airport. Military officials also updated the president and vice president on plans to develop Isis-K targets, according to statement from White House press secretary Jen Psaki. The next few days of this mission will be the most dangerous period to date, the statement said. Injured US service members have been transported to the US Armys Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. Isis-K, a sworn enemy of the Taliban, has claimed responsibility for the attack. Ms Psaki told reporters on Friday that the president has made clear that he does not want them to live on earth anymore. A number of Republican lawmakers have called on the president to resign over the ongoing crisis. GOP House leader Kevin McCarthy said there will be day of reckoning. Ms Psaki dismissed calls from GOP lawmakers, adding that the backdrop of their calls is the men and women of the US military deployed on the ground are bravely continuing to implement a mission to save lives on the ground. Yesterday they lost 13 of their own and the president made absolutely clear that were going to hunt down, go after and kill the terrorists who are responsible, she said. Everyone should be supportive of that. US military officials have stressed that the attack has not stopped evacuations, which will continue until the end of the month as planned. US forces have evacuated roughly 12,500 people over a 24-hour period into early Friday morning, according to the White House. Since the end of July, the US has relocated approximately 110,600 people, the White House said on Friday. Follow live updates as they happenened A Catholic cardinal who expressed Covid-19 vaccine-skeptic views is currently on a ventilator with the virus in Wisconsin, according to his social media. Cardinal Raymond Burke announced that he had tested positive for Covid last week while on a visit to his home state from Rome. He asked his followers to pray for him as he battled the virus. He tweeted, Praised be Jesus Christ! I wish to inform you that I have recently tested positive for the COVID-19 virus. Thanks be to God, I am resting comfortably and receiving excellent medical care. Please pray for me as I begin my recovery. Let us trust in Divine Providence. God bless you. However, the 73 year-olds condition has since worsened, leading him to be placed on a ventilator in a hospital. The update was provided by a spokesperson on his Twitter account. Cardinal Burke has been admitted to the hospital with COVID-19 and is being assisted by a ventilator. Doctors are encouraged by his progress. H.E. faithfully prayed the Rosary for those suffering from the virus. On this Vigil of the Assumption, let us now pray the Rosary for him, the tweet read. Cardinal Burke has been seen frequently not wearing a mask. It is not known whether he is vaccinated against Covid-19 but has made public statements outlining anti-vaccine sentiment. In May 2020, he said, vaccination itself cannot be imposed, in a totalitarian manner, on citizens. During the same virtual address, Cardinal Burke went on to echo conspiracy theories, such as the drive to inject microchips that permit people to be controlled by the State regarding health and about other matters which we can only imagine. In December 2020, he referred to the coronavirus as the mysterious Wuhan virus, a derogatory term famously used by former President Donald Trump. He also said that people were using the pandemic to advance their evil agenda. In a statement, the Vatican said all available Covid vaccines were morally acceptable. Both Pope emeritus Benedict XVI and Pope Francis have gotten two doses of the Pfizer vaccine. From 1995 to 2004, Cardinal Burke was the bishop of the diocese of La Crosse in Wisconsin. Between 2004 and 2008, he served as the Archbishop of St Louis. Following this, he became the Vaticans Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura. Pope Francis relieved him from this post in 2014. Cardinal Burke has been a vocal critic of Pope Francis, opposing his views on divorced people taking Communion, abortion and LGBT+ issues. This article was amended on 26 August 2021 to remove an incorrect assertion that Cardinal Burke said Covid vaccination involved the insertion of microchips. His reference to people being controlled by the state via injected microchips did not relate to the Covid vaccine. The mother of a 14-year-old boy accused of murdering a fellow student has been arrested for allegedly tampering with evidence. Crystal Smith, the 35-year-old mother of Aiden Fucci, was arrested in Florida on Saturday in connection with the murdering of 13-year-old Tristyn Bailey on 9 May. She handed herself into deputies and was charged for tampering with evidence, according to the St Johns County Sheriffs Office, It follows a warrant for her arrest which alleged that Ms Smith tried to wash blood off Aidens jeans in a bathroom sink, as captured in surveillance footage. Both the jeans and the sink afterwards tested positive for blood, according to an arrest warrant for Ms Smith. She was charged on Saturday with tampering with evidence in the murdering of Tristyn, who police say was stabbed more than a 100 times by Aiden, a fellow student. Surveillance footage allegedly shows the pair walking together on a street, only for Aiden to return alone, wearing jeans. Tristyn was reported missing by her family that same day, before investigators found her body hours after, on Mothers Day. Aiden will be tried as and adult, and faces charges of a first degree murder, which could result in life imprisonment, but because of his age, will not face a death penalty. He has so far pleaded not guilty. Following the arrest of Ms Smith, Johns County sheriff Robert A Hardwick said in a statement: "Our goal in any investigation is to ensure proper accountability across the board for successful prosecution," "Crystal Smith will be held responsible for her role in this case and justice will be served for Tristyn Bailey and her family." Florida state attorney RJ Larizza added: "Tampering with evidence is tampering with justice and cannot be excused or tolerated. Two people are dead and another is injured after an early-morning shooting outside the county courthouse in Kankakee, Illinois. Local police have several suspects in custody, and Kankakee mayor Christopher Curtis called the attack a targeted incident. The scene of the shooting is now secure, according to the Kankakee County Sheriffs Office. We are asking everyone to avoid the area as the investigation continues, the sheriffs office wrote on Facebook on Thursday. No officers were injured in the shooting, and none fired their weapons. Kankakee, a city of about 25,000 people 60 miles south of Chicago, has closed city buildings and schools are on lockdown as a precaution. Aerial news footage of the site showed a cluster of police officers in the area, as well as what appears to a large blood stain on the pavement. From our sixth floor window, you could see people scattering and moving away from the Kankakee County Courthouse, Michael Taylor, who owns a newspaper in the area, told ABC 7 Chicago. This is something in my 30 years of journalism, and living in Kankakee County, that Ive never even seen or even heard of anything like this in the area. State and local police were reported on the scene as part of an ongoing investigation into the shooting, which occurred about 100 yards from the courthouse, on its south side, near the facilitys jail. A witness working on the roof of a nearby building told the Kankakee Daily Journal that he saw someone with an AK-47-type gun argue with another individual, armed with what appeared to be a pistol, in the middle of the road near the courthouse, before shooting them multiple times. Another witness said she took pictures of a shooter with a long-barrel-style gun. A press briefing was scheduled for later on Thursday. The Independent has reached out to Kankakee police for more information. There have been at least 452 mass shootings in the US in 2021, according to the Gun Violence Archive, part of more than 26,685 total injures from gun violence across the country. If trends continue, this could be the worst period for school shootings in decades. A frat house at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln was shut down after hundreds of students gathered outside for a protest following reports of a sexual assault taking place there. The students gathered at Phi Gamma Delta, also called FIJI, in the Nebraska state capital of Lincoln around 10pm on Tuesday night, chanting What do we want? Justice and If we dont get it, what do we do? Shut it down! KOLN reported. Campus crime logs show that a sexual assault was reported at the fraternity between 11.30pm and 12am on Monday night. Students at the protests said that all fraternity and sorority activities planned for Tuesday night had been cancelled. UNL Police and Lincoln Police were present at the scene during the protest. Phi Gamma Delta issued a statement saying that they were working closely with the UNL Police to investigate recent allegations of sexual assault that involve one of the student members of the fraternity. We take these allegations very seriously as they absolutely do not meet our fraternity Code of Conduct. To our knowledge, no charges have been filed with the UNL Police or other local authorities. We are assisting local authorities and are providing any information and assistance they need. As the investigation continues, we are prepared to take immediate, appropriate action to ensure the safety and security of all who are part of or visit Phi Gamma Delta, the fraternity added. University Chancellor Ronnie Green said in a statement on Wednesday that UNL police began investigating this incident as soon as the report came in. That investigation remains open and is ongoing. The Phi Gamma Delta (Fiji) fraternity at UNL is currently under probation for previous violations of university policy. We are closing the fraternity house and suspending operations of the Fiji chapter while this investigation is ongoing, due to potential violations of that probation. This is the responsible action to take for everyone involved. UNL Senior Carissa Caraway told KMTV: Its a shot to my chest, it kind of makes you feel like, how come my safety isnt prioritised, how come women as a whole, how come our safety isnt prioritised? Its really frustrating, its just like, we knew there was a problem in the past, theyre reinstated and not even the first day of school is completed and we have another issue, she added. She said she has avoided walking past the house. I knew like a week coming here their reputation at that house and it wasnt a good one, she said. Even the day I walked in as a freshman, people told me to stay away from the fraternity house, senior Jennifer Barrett told the local TV station. The fact that they have this prolonged reputation and they are still allowed to be here, I think they should definitely be kicked off campus. Enough is enough and how many more girls are we going to sacrifice and their safety so theyre able to organise, Ms Caraway said. Its a bad place to be and I want to feel safe on campus and I want everyone around me to feel safe on campus as well, so its just, I want the admin to do something about it and take some actions that show that these actions that they have done, are not okay, Ms Barrett added. Phi Gamma Delta, also called Phi Gam, was founded in 1848 at Jefferson College in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania. Its website says it aspires to be an active, vital force of men who courageously live our values and make a positive impact on college and community. The fraternity chapter in Lincoln was suspended from March 2017 until May 2020 after an investigation by the university found a pattern of behaviour and a series of instances within the fraternity in violation of the Student Code of Conduct, according to the then-vice chancellor for student affairs Juan Franco. The university said at the time that the behaviour included reckless alcohol use, hazing, and inappropriate sexually based behaviour, including a pattern of sexually harassing conduct. The conduct occurred in multiple incidents at various points in time over the course of recent academic terms. While not the focal point of the suspension, comments made by Fiji members January 21 outside the fraternity house during a womens march were consistent with the pattern of sexually harassing conduct evident in multiple other incidents, the university said. The suspension led the school to no longer recognise Phi Gamma Delta, also known as Fiji, as a Greek organisation at Nebraska. In 2019, the fraternity petitioned to be reinstated but this was contingent upon the fraternity taking steps toward lasting reform, including a review of membership, increased oversight, education and other requirements, Mr Franco said. A doctor in Tampa, Florida has revealed that he was forced to turn a cancer patient away from a hospital because all of the beds were taken up due to the recent influx of coronavirus patients. Dr Nitesh Paryani told CNN about the incident. He said a nearby hospital needed to transfer a cancer patient to a location with adequate treatment options. Generally Dr Paryani would take in such a patient, but he was forced to turn them away. "We just didn't have a bed. There was simply no room in the hospital to treat the patient," he told CNN's Chris Cuomo on Wednesday. Doctors across the country have warned that the latest wave of the coronavirus, driven by the highly contagious Delta variant, has pushed health care workers and hospital occupancy to the brink. Many doctors are reporting burnout and exhaustion, all exacerbated by a worsening staffing shortage in hospitals. "Delta is just ripping through the hospitals in ways that we couldn't have imagined and the strain it's causing on the health care system is unimaginable," the doctor said. Florida has been ravaged by the Delta variant, and the state is representative of 17 per cent of the nation's Covid-19 hospitalisations despite only making up 6.5 per cent of the nation's population. It is the second most infected place on the planet, and Covid-19 cases there are higher now than at any point during the pandemic. Dr Paryani said that Florida hospitals have been inundated with patients in recent weeks. "What we are seeing is just a tremendous amount of patients coming in. The other day, our emergency room had a 12-hour wait. Almost every hospital in the city is on diversion, meaning they don't have room to take transfer patients," he said. "Patients who need complex care simply can't access it. This kind of strain is something we've never seen before." The doctor encouraged Americans to take the coronavirus vaccines, calling them the "best tool we have" to beat the pandemic. He noted that more than 90 per cent of people admitted to ICUs and put on ventilators are unvaccinated. There is no question that the vaccine is the best option we have. It is also the cheapest option we have. It is the most effective, and there's really no reason that people should be avoiding the vaccine," he said. "There's not a single patient that we've had to intubate because of a complication from the vaccine. The people we're intubating, the people that are on life support, the people that are dying are the ones that are not vaccinated." A judge in Orange County, California, has approved a request to drop almost all counts against a surgeon and his girlfriend who have been accused of drugging and raping multiple women. After the request was granted, only the charges stemming from two alleged victims are still intact. CBS Los Angeles reported that Grant Robicheaux, who was once the subject of a Bravo reality show for his dating escapades, was originally accused by seven women of rape and sexual assault. According to prosecutors, Mr Robicheaux and his girlfriend, Cerissa Riley, lured women into their lives, drugged them and raped them. Both had denied any wrong doing. Originally Mr Robicheaux faced 16 felony charges from the victims, and Ms Riley faced five charges. A judge in Orange County heard arguments from attorneys for the couple and for the alleged victims and prosecutors last week, after which one alleged victim said they were "exhausted" by the thought the case could take years to prosecute. Over the past three years of the case, the lawsuit has been subject to political infighting between the former and current district attorney. According to the state attorney general's office, at least three victims said they no longer wanted to partake in the case because they were "dragged through the mud" but the Orange County district attorney's office. Charges relating to two of the women were dropped in July at request of the alleged victims, according to BuzzFeed News. After the charges were dropped, Orange County Superior Court Judge Steven Bromberg recused himself from the case. At one point the California Attorney General's Office took over the case from the Orange County District Attorney's Office after it determined that District Attorney Todd Spitzer and Tony Rackauckas, a political rival and his predecessor, used the case to further their own political ambitions. When Mr Rackauckas was overseeing the case, he incorrectly predicted that there could be as many as 1,000 victims. Mr Spitzer, who was campaigning against Mr Rackauckas at the time, accused the district attorney of delaying the couple's arrest to drum up media coverage, which he alleged would help his opponent's campaign. The then-district attorney admitted that media attention would help his re-election but denied making any decisions based on his political aspirations. Last February, after Mr Spitzer ousted Mr Rackauckas, he announced his intention to drop the charges against the couple and compelled prosecutors to apologise to the couple and question the claims of the victims. Another judge at the time said he would refuse to drop the charges, calling Mr Spitzer's decision "ludicrous" and questioning the district attorney's possible motives for the move. The double-strike attack at Kabul airport that killed up 60 people including a dozen American troops is believed to represent the deadliest single day for the US military in 10 years. As Isis claimed responsibility for the attack, involving two explosions at the airport where crowds were thronging to try and leave the country, the US military said it would not be deterred by the assault. We believe it is their desire to continue these attacks and we expect those attacks to continue and we're doing everything we can to be prepared for those attacks, General Kenneth McKenzie, head of US Central Command, told reporters in a briefing, saying the threat from Islamic State existed alongside other active threat streams. He said its evacuation mission would proceed. I think we can continue to conduct our mission, even while we are receiving attacks like this, he said. The fatalities represent one of the deadliest single days for the US military in its two-decade engagement in the so-called war on terror. ISIS-K attacks 'expected to continue' US military commander confirms Indeed, it is believed the deaths are the highest number since August 6 2011, when a CH-47 Chinook helicopter ferrying Navy SEALs was shot down by a rocket-propelled grenade over eastern Afghanistan. A total of 30 Americans, including 22 Navy SEALs, were killed in the crash. The Department of Defence website shows that a total of 2,372 active duty US soldiers have lost their lives since 2001, when the US and allies including the UK invaded Afghanistan in a mission called Operation Enduring Freedom. At least 457 British troops have been killed. Countless thousands of Afghan troops and civilians have been killed by the fighting and many more driven from their homes. ABC News reported that the toll from Wednesdays attack, an incident about which the US and UK had issued a warning, and urged people to keep away from the airport, was the bloodiest since the downing of the chopper a decade earlier that killed 30 Americans. In June 2005, 19 Special Operations troops were killed during Operation Red Wings, when three service members were killed in an ambush and 16 others died when their helicopter went down in an effort to help fight off the ambush. Meanwhile, on July 13 2008, a total of nine Americans and 27 others were wounded in an attack on an American observation post that became known as the Battle of Wanat. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed from the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Pentagon later confirmed the August 6 2011 was the deadliest incident in Afghanistan to date. A spokesperson said the most recent fatality was in Feb 2020, when two soldiers were killed in combat in Nangarhar Province. Additional reporting by agencies The governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem, has slammed conservative podcast host Matt Walsh for horrible misogyny. Instead of engaging in a debate about the proper role of government and how it isnt conservative to tell people how to do business, @MattWalshBlog stooped to horrible misogyny. Eyes up here, Matt, tweeted Ms Noem following comments on the Daily Wire host show on Wednesday, in which he said: Kristi Noem is a very attractive woman, so shes got that going for her. As far as I can tell, thats the only reason why she was ever looked at as some sort of 2024 potential frontrunner. The hype and everything that shes gotten from conservative media is entirely based on the fact that shes an extremely attractive woman, which she is. He added: But you know, you put 50 pounds on her and another 20 years, I dont think she gets any of the hype. Because outside of that, shes just a, just your standard corporatist establishment Republican whos not interested in doing anything. Mr Walsh has disagreed on Gov Noems stance on business vaccine mandates and her not banning businesses from introducing Covid-19 vaccine mandates, if they choose to do so. One of the states largest employers, Sanford Health, has announced that all employees should get vaccinated by 1 November. This is the right thing to do for our patients and residents, people and communities, said Bill Gassen, president and CEO of Sanford Health, in a statement. As more contagious Covid-19 variants continue to spread and threaten our communities, we must do everything we can to protect each other and our loved ones. Dakota House of Representatives speaker Spencer Gosch wants to pass a bill to make Covid-19 vaccination status strictly confidential medical information. Gov Noem has resisted taking action on such a bill. A prominent Trump loyalist, Gov Noem has been talked up as a potential Republican presidential candidate in the future. Republican members of Congress slammed President Joe Biden after an explosion attack at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul killed 11 and one Navy medic US Marines and killed multiple civilians. Texas Rep Tony Gonzales, a Navy veteran, called for resignations from the Biden administration. My biggest fear is these attacks today are just the beginning of what we will continue to see as the Administration fails to get Americans and our Afghan allies out and to safety, the freshman rep tweeted. We dont need statements from the Administration right now - we need immediate resignations. Sen Josh Hawley of Missouri went one step further and said Mr Biden must resign. Joe Biden has now overseen the deadliest day for US troops in Afghanistan in over a decade, and the crisis grows worse by the hour, he said. We must reject the falsehood peddled by a feckless president that this was the only option for withdrawal. Rep Jim Banks of Indiana, who served in Afghanistan, blamed Mr Biden for the attack. The responsibility for this tragedy rests squarely on the shoulders of Joe Biden, Mr Banks. His incompetence means American blood has been shed. This was avoidable and is unforgivable! House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy called on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call Congress back into session so members could be briefed and vote on Rep Mike Gallagher of Wisconsins legislation to keep troops in Afghanistan until every American is out of the nation. In the meantime, President Biden must take decisive action to protect our troops, our citizens, and our allies without regard for an arbitrary deadline, Mr McCarthy said in a statement. Texas Rep Dan Crenshaw, who lost an eye in Afghanistan, said Mr Biden needed to fix the problems that he said the president created. We are still at war. You didnt end the war, you just gave the enemy new advantage, he tweeted. Go on offense, establish superiority, and dont leave until all our citizens and allies are safe. Michigan Rep Peter Meijer, who earlier this week traveled to Afghanistan with Democratic Rep Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, called the attack was the worst possible outcome. Heartbreaking and awful news- a nightmare scenario we had been fearing, he said. Senator Lindsey Graham called for Bagram Air Base to reopen after a suicide bomber attack Kabuls Hamid Karzai International Airport injured as many as three US Marines and killed multiple civilians. I have advocated for days that the Bagram Air Base should be reopened as the Kabul airport is very difficult to defend and has been the only evacuation outlet, the South Carolina Republican Senator tweeted on Thursday. Mr Graham said that the United States had the capability to establish a presence at Bagram to continue moving Americans and allies. The biggest mistake in this debacle is abandoning Bagram, Mr Graham said. The retaking of Bagram would put our military at risk, but I think those involved in the operation would gladly accept that risk because it would restore our honor as a nation and save lives, Mr Graham tweeted. Mr Grahams words come as news broke out of Kabul of a the explosion at the airport. We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update. President Joe Biden pledged to avenge the 13 American service members killed in suicide bomb attacks in Kabul on Thursday. To those who carried out this attack as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: we will not forgive, we will not forget, we will hunt you down and make you pay, the president said. The Pentagon confirmed in a briefing earlier in the day that 11 US Marines, one Navy medic and one other who were providing support for evacuations of Americans and allies leaving Afghanistan from Hamid Karzai international airport were killed in an explosion. US officials believe the attack was carried out by members of Isis-k, a branch of the Islamic State in Afghanistan. The president hailed the service of those killed and called them part of a great and noble company of American heroes. The presidents words echoed those of US Central Command leader General Kenneth McKenzie, who pledged to find the people who killed Americans. Weve been clear all along that were going to retain the right to operate against Isis in Afghanistan and were working very hard to determine attribution, to determine who is associated with this cowardly attack and were prepared to take action against them, Gen McKenzie said. The president also invoked the death of his son Beau Biden, who served in Iraq before dying of brain cancer, as he offered his condolences to the loved ones of those who perished. You get this feeling like youre being sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest and theres no way out, he said, promising to fulfil the United States obligations to the families. We have a continuing obligation, a sacred obligation to all of you. That obligation is not temporary, we lost forever, he said. The president said the mission in Afghanistan would continue the mission to evacuate. After the remarks, NBC Newss Kelly ODonnell asked whether additional military forces would be sent to Afghanistan. But Mr Biden said almost every military leader supported the idea of getting as many people out of the country as possible. With regard to finding, tracking down, the Isis leaders who ordered this, we have some reason to believe we know who they are, its not certain, and we will find ways of our choosing without large military operations to get them, he said, before adding after a question, wherever they are. But the president also had a sharp exchange with Fox Newss Peter Doocy, who asserted he was solely responsible for the unraveling situation in Afghanistan, wherein Mr Biden pointed to his predecessor Donald Trumps deal with the Taliban. I bear responsibility for fundamentally all this happened of late. But here's the deal: you know, I wish you one day say these things, you know as well as I do that the former president made a deal with the Taliban, he said, which led to Mr Biden putting his head in his hands. President Biden rest his head in his hands in apparent frustration during an exchange with Fox News reporter Peter Doocy (AP) Republicans sharply criticised the president, with Rep Jim Banks of Indiana, chairman of the Republican Study Committee, saying Mr Biden had blood on his hands, while House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy called on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to bring Congress back to brief members and pass legislation to that would keep troops in Afghanistan until every American left. The explosion and the ensuing death threw the presidents schedule into disarray. He had previously planned to meet with newly minted Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet and speak with governors about Afghanistan. The killings in Afghanistan canceled the meeting with governors and the presidents meeting with Mr Bennett will happen on Friday instead. At the same time, despite the nature of the attack, the president did say that he did not regret putting an end to the US military mission in Afghanistan. I have never been of the view that we should be sacrificing American lives to try to establish a democratic government in Afghanistan, a country that has never once in its entire history been a united country, he said. It was time to end a 20-year war. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was challenged by a reporter over the US-employed Afghan staff who feel completely betrayed at being left stranded in the country. Andrea Mitchell of NBC News said that many local staff employed by the US Embassy in Kabul have been prevented from reaching the citys international airport because of Taliban checkpoints. We evacuated our embassy and there have been cables back that I know you must be familiar with, or your teams are, of people who feel completely betrayed, she said And these are thousands of people that we rely on in embassies around the world. The message is going forward that we will not be loyal. They were not told about the evacuation. They were not put on those choppers with our American staff. Mitchell also asked Americas top diplomat to defend a withdrawal that has left behind all the millions of Afghan women who have told their daughters and been raised under this promise of a future, which the Taliban are already are denied. Mr Blinken said that there were 1,500 Americans who had not yet been evacuated from Afghanistan. And there are also tens of thousands of Afghans who qualify for special immigration visas waiting to be put on flights out of the country. First, of the 82,000 plus people who so far have been evacuated, about 45-46 percent have been women and children and weve been intensely focused, particularly on making sure that we can get women at risk out of harms way, he replied. Second, with regard to women and other Afghans at risk going forward, we will use, I will use every diplomatic, economic, political and assistance tool at my disposal working closely with allies and partners that feel the same way to do everything possible to uphold their basic rights. And thats going to be a relentless focus of our actions going forward. And he insisted the US was relentlessly focussed on getting the locally-employed staff out of Afghanistan, out of harms way. Nothing is more important to me as secretary of state than to do right by the people who have been working side-by-side with American diplomats in our embassy, he said. Seven Capitol Police officers are suing Donald Trump and almost 20 members of right-wing extremist groups and political organisations, accusing them of plotting to disrupt the 2020 election through the 6 January Capitol riot. The groups named in the suit include violent right-wing gangs like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, as well as Trump allies and associates like conservative advisor Roger Stone. Mr Trump is facing similar lawsuits, though this is the first to claim that he directly worked with the other groups and organisations named in the defence. Five of the seven Capitol officers behind the suit are Black, and included in the filing are descriptions of the abuse which often included racial slurs they received on the day of the attack. The officers accounts include stories of being beaten, maced, pelted with batteries and being temporarily blinded. According to The New York Times, the lawsuit argues that Mr Trump and his co-defendants violated the 1871 Ku Klux Klan Act, which prohibits people from carrying out violent action in an attempt to interfere with the democratic process. The plaintiffs also accuse the defence of committing bias-motivated acts of terrorism. The FBI recently said there was little evidence to suggest the Capitol riot was a coordinated attack. However, that assessment applies to the individual rioters, and not necessarily to Mr Trump and other White House officials. On Wednesday, the House select committee investigating the Capitol riot filed an expansive records request on Mr Trump and many of his allies in an effort to understand exactly where they were and what they were doing leading up to and during the attack. Mr Trump's response to the last two cases aimed at tying him to the attacks on 6 January one filed by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the other by Democratic congressman Eric Swalwell has been to seek dismissal of the charges. He justifies his requests by claiming immunity from civil litigation since he was serving as president on 6 January. The new lawsuit will attempt to expand the conspiracy charge beyond 6 January by tying the start of Mr Trumps false election fraud narrative around May 2020 to the riot that would come months later. The filing also hopes to tie Mr Trump to the Proud Boys extremist gang, which he told to stand back and stand by during a presidential debate in September. US health regulators could approve a third Covid-19 shot for adults beginning at least six months after full vaccination, instead of the previously announced eight-month gap, the Wall Street Journal reported on 25 August. Approval of boosters for three COVID-19 shots being administered in the United States those manufactured by Pfizer Inc and partner BioNTech SE, Moderna Inc and Johnson & Johnson s expected in mid-September, the report said, citing a person familiar with the plans. Pfizer and BioNTech have already started the application process for the approval of its booster shot in people 16 and older, saying it spurs a more than three-fold increase in antibodies against the coronavirus. Earlier this week, U.S. regulators granted full approval to Pfizers two-dose vaccine. Moderna said on Wednesday it has completed the real-time review needed for a full approval for its jab in people 18 and above. White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in her daily briefing that any such development would be under the purview of the Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention. The CDC said the governments plan to administer booster shot depends on pending action from the Food and Drug Administration and recommendation to it from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. The FDA, however, reiterated its joint statement from last week that said the government was gearing up to roll out the third shot from mid-September to Americans who had their initial course of two-dose vaccines made by Moderna and Pfizer more than eight months ago. The rollout would start if the FDA and the CDC decide that boosters are needed, U.S. officials had said. Republican Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida is holding strong to his claim that masks do not make a difference in mitigating the spread of the coronavirus, going so far as to claim that members of the press "love having kids in masks." The governor made the statement during a press conference on Wednesday in which he accused the media of taking an "editorial position" on mask usage, after which he claimed to have read a "3,000 word" New York Times article that suggested mask use was ineffective. More people are sick with Covid-19 in Florida now than at any other time during the pandemic. An average of 227 people die each day from Covid-19, with a seven day average of 22,000 cases. For comparison, the seven day average in New York once the epicentre of the virus is 1,800. Florida is the most infected state in the country, making it one of the most Covid-infected places on Earth. Since the pandemic began, Mr DeSantis has made it clear he would push back on virtually any mitigation effort or restriction if it interfered with commerce. While he has been supportive of the vaccine and has encouraged his residents to take the shot, he has also used his executive powers to strike down emergency restrictions and mask mandates passed by local governments. More recently, Mr DeSantis used his powers to prohibit school districts from enforcing mask mandates for students. He threatened to punish anyone who violated his orders by withholding funding, but his threats were largely ignored by Florida's public school officials, who have required masks regardless. During the same press conference where Mr DeSantis suggested masking was ineffective, he also alluded to the schools that have defied him, noting that there would be "additional consequences" for those who did not fall in line. When pressed, Mr DeSantis did not provide further details. Currently more than half of the state's 2.8 million students are in schools where mask usage is required. Mr DeSantis' executive order is facing court challenges from parents and at least one school district. Attorneys on both sides of the lawsuit brought by the group of parents will give closing arguments today. The lawsuits claim that Mr DeSantis' order is an unconstitutional act of executive overreach. The governor's order is facing pushback outside of court as well. The US Department of Education has sent a letter to Mr DeSantis and Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who also issued a similar order, expressing its support of school districts who are refusing to comply with the directives. "The Department recognizes that several school districts in your State have already moved to adopt such policies in line with guidance from the CDC for the reopening and operation of school facilities despite the State level prohibitions. The Department stands with these dedicated educators who are working to safely reopen schools and maintain safe in-person instruction," Education Secretary Miguel Cardona wrote in the letter. French President Emmanuel Macron held talks with top Irish officials in Dublin Thursday, focusing on a major overhaul of taxes on the worlds biggest multinational companies. During the one-day state visit his first to Ireland Macron met with President Michael Higgins and Taoiseach Michael Martin Ireland is not among the approximately 130 countries that backed an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) deal which would see minimum corporation tax set at 15% worldwide. Ireland's rate is currently 12.5%. The proposal, supported by all Group of Seven nations, seeks to deter complex avoidance schemes that have cost governments billions in revenue. Macron said while he believed a common framework made sense for a post-COVID-19 world, it was not for France to put pressure on Dublin to sign up to the agreement. Martin said significant challenges remained before his government could accept the deal, but maintained that Ireland was engaging constructively in the discussions. The taoiseach hailed France as Irelands now nearest neighbor within the European Union, following the U.K.s departure from the trading bloc. The leaders joint news conference was delayed following reports of the explosion at Kabuls airport amid the evacuation operation by the United States and NATO following the Taliban takeover. The French president said the security situation at the airport had seriously deteriorated, but work to move out foreign nationals and eligible Afghans would continue for as long as possible towards August 31, when U.S. forces complete their withdrawal from the country. Rep Ilhan Omar has called on President Joe Biden to pardon Daniel Hale , the former Air Force analyst who leaked secret data about US drone strikes. The legal question of Mr Hales guilt is settled, but the moral question remains open, Ms Omar wrote in a letter to the president on Thursday. I strongly believe that a full pardon, or at least a commutation of his sentence, is warranted. Hale, 33, pleaded guilty earlier this year to leaking classified documents about civilian deaths from the drone program, which he said were much higher than Americans knew. He was convicted of violating one count of the Espionage Act, and sentenced to 45 months in prison. At his sentencing, Hale said he was compelled to break the law by his own conscience. With drone warfare, sometimes nine out of 10 people killed are innocent, Hale told the judge . Please, your honour, forgive me for taking papers instead of human lives. In light of that ethical reasoning, Ms Omar believes Hale deserves some leniency. His motivation, as outlined in his deeply moving letter to the judge in his case, was profoundly moral, the congresswoman wrote. Acknowledging where weve gone wrong, and telling the truth about our shortcomings, is not only the right thing to do, but also an act of profound patriotism. Ms Omar also questioned the timing of Hales indictment. Although the leaks were discovered during the Obama administration, the Justice Department did not prosecute him until Donald Trump was president. We are all well aware of the severe consequences of the Trump Administrations chilling crackdown on whistleblowers and other public servants who they deemed insufficiently loyal, the US representative wrote. I believe that the decision to prosecute Mr. Hale was motivated, at least in part, as a threat to other would-be whistleblowers. In addition, Ms Omar argued that Hales disclosures hurt no one, and in fact greatly helped Americans to understand the harms of a program that had largely remained in the shadows. It is for precisely these cases, where the letter of the law does not capture the complex human judgments in difficult situations, that your pardon authority is at its most useful, she implored the president. The Biden administration has not yet responded to the request. Details are still emerging. But some things are already very clear. A double-strike terror attack at Kabuls airport, apparently by Isis, has reportedly killed at least 60 people, including as many as 12 US troops and inuring up to 140, including some American soldiers. Once again a US president is scrambled to the White House situation room, trying to get a grip on the chaos unfolding, even as the Pentagon admits it is bracing for further attacks. And Joe Biden, adamant no more US lives be lost in Afghanistan during his watch, must be watching on in horror as fresh American blood is spilled. There is an old adage in the military that no plan survives first contact with the enemy, meaning that no matter the amount of planning and preparation one does, it cannot anticipate the impact of real-time events. The adage applies to politics too. Joe Biden campaigned for the US presidency vowing to withdraw troops from Afghanistan and end Americas longest war. Wounded rushed to hospital in taxis after double explosion in Kabul The deal signed with the Taliban in February 2020 was brokered by the administration of Donald Trump. But Biden had voiced his desire to get US troops out of there since at least 2009, and he went along with Trumps deal, and agreed to stick more or less to the timetable set for the last 2,400 troops to come home. It was a policy that the majority of Americans, perhaps as many as 70 per cent, supported. The only voices arguing for the continuation of a US military presence in Afghanistan after 20 years were senior military commanders and the foreign policy establishment in DC. Biden argued, probably correctly, that another year or even five years of Americas de-facto control of Afghanistans security would not turn the tide in a struggle with the Taliban, in truth a civil war that has played out for decades. Yet, when Biden confirmed his plan to press ahead to withdraw those troops, he said it would be a dignified and measured departure. We will not conduct a hasty rush to the exit. Well do it well do it responsibly, deliberately, and safely. And we will do it in full coordination with our allies and partners, who now have more forces in Afghanistan than we do, he said, speaking in the Treaty Room of the White House in April. And the Taliban should know that if they attack us as we draw down, we will defend ourselves and our partners with all the tools at our disposal. It is fair to say Americas departure from Afghanistan has been anything but responsible, deliberate or safe. Rather, since the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan on 15 August, having faced very little opposition from an Afghan army on which the US spent $80bn to train and equip, the world has watched a rush to flee the country, with thousands of foreigners and Afghan nationals pouring towards Hamid Karzai International Airport. Suddenly, Bidens approval rating over his handing of this has fallen to as little as 25 per cent, even as he insists there have been no mistakes and that his administration was not caught flat-footed. Real and important questions are being asked about the level of planning and preparation. Even to his supporters, Bidens answers must appear far from convincing. One piece of intelligence the US and UK did get right was the threat posed by a hitherto little-known extremist outfit, Isis-K, a regional franchise of the notorious Islamist terror group that seized large swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq in an attempt to create a caliphate before they were uprooted by the efforts of the Kurdish and American military. Hence the warning issued late on Wednesday to stay away from the airport. Isis also hates the Taliban, and so in the latest twist of realpolitik surreality, US commanders in Kabul are cooperating with the Taliban to counter the threat from Isis-K. It is another example of my enemys enemy being my friend, even in the short-term. The US Air Force load passengers onto a C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 24, 2021 (via REUTERS) All lives are equally valuable, each casualty of these attacks similarly tragic, but it is also true that the American public, and hence American leaders, care far more about American lives and casualties, especially when they are US soldiers killed overseas. It is those casualties, rather than those of people in nations the US has occupied, that tends to shift policy. When people search for historical markers to draw comparisons to what is happening now, there are many they could turn to not just the 1975 retreat from Saigon that marked the end of the Vietnam war, but also Ronald Reagans decision to pull out US troops from Lebanon after the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing that killed 241 Americans and 58 French military personnel. Similarly, they could examine the 1993 Black Hawk Down raid that killed 18 American marines in Somalia, that led Bill Clinton to withdraw US forces from that east African nation the following year. It also probably persuaded the US to sit back, rather than trying to prevent the Rwandan genocide of 1994. Biden and his aides will also be thinking about the failed 1980 effort by US commandos dispatched by Jimmy Carter to rescue hostages held by Iranian militants. The failed raid only added to the woes of Carter, who was roundly defeated by Reagan in that years election. And Democrats know all too well about the attacks and political point-scoring that can happen following events such as the 2012 killing of US Ambassador Chris Stevens in Benghazi, Libya. Then-secretary of state Hillary Clinton sat through hours of Republican-led questioning over what was deemed an intelligence failure, and Trump and his supporters used it to attack her during the 2016 election campaign. Congress has already said it plans to investigate what has steadily turned into a tragedy in Kabul. Secretary of state Antony Blinken might point proudly to the 82,000 people evacuated since the Taliban seized power. But those are not the things people remember. Rather, they remember images of chaos and panic, of Afghans tumbling from the wheels of US aircraft, and smoke billowing in the aftermath of a terror attack at an airport. Joe Bidens plan for ending Americas involvement with Afghanistan has not survived first contact. There will be pressure now to extend his deadline for evacuations beyond 31 August. There may also be calls for him to send extra US troops, something that might make sense when viewed from Washington DC, but a move that is likely to antagonise the Taliban. So, can Biden now step forward, admit he was wrong, acknowledge things didnt go as planned, and make sure he fixes them? If so, the time for him to act is now. US officials have confirmed the deaths of 13 US service members after two ISIS-K suicide bomb attacks on Kabul airport. A series of blasts in the countrys capital also injured 18 US troops providing support for the evacuations of US personnel and Afghan citizens from Hamid Karzai International Airport. Officials say that 60 Afghans waiting to be evacuated were also killed and more than 140 were injured. Earlier on Thursday the Pentagon said that 11 Marines and a Navy medic were among the dead, but US Central Command has not confirmed the service of the latest fatality. Gen Kenneth McKenzie of US Central Command said that his working assumption was that the blast occurred as a suicide bomber was attempting to pass through a security checkpoint at the airport gates. The situation on the ground is still evolving, and Im constantly being updated, added President Joe Biden during a national address. Were outraged, as well as heartbroken, the president continued. The lives we lost today were lives given in the service of liberty, in the service of security, in the service of others. Directing a message at the perpetrators of Thursdays attack: Mr Biden said: We will not forgive, we will not forget. An official with the Taliban said that some of the groups militants, who have been acting as a de facto security force in the areas surrounding the airport as a result of their takeover of Kabul, were also killed in the explosion. US officials believe the attack was carried out by members of Isis-k, the Islamic States branch in Afghanistan, according to a Pentagon news briefing. [T]he Islamic Emirate strongly condemns the bombing of civilians at Kabul airport, a spokesperson for the Taliban said, adding the Islamic Emirate is paying close attention to the security and protection of its people, and evil circles will be strictly stopped. Gen McKenzie added at the news briefing that the US would retaliate against the perpetrators of the attack if it could locate them. Yes, if we can find who is associated with this, we will go after them, he said. Ultimately, Americans have got to be in danger in order for Afghans seeking evacuation to receive proper security checks, he noted, while stressing that US forces would work to improve their security procedures. Isis-k claimed responsibility for the attack through its Amaq News Agency. Adam Khan, an Afghan waiting outside the airport, said the first blast went off in a crowd of people waiting to enter the airport. Khan, who was about 30 yards away, said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who lost body parts. A former interpreter with UK forces who was with his wife, and two young children waiting for an evacuation flight reportedly said: It was like doomsday, injured people everywhere. Emergency, a volunteer group that runs war surgery hospitals and first aid posts across Afghanistan, said some people were dead on arrival. We have activated all mass casualty protocols, it said. Another witness to the explosion described the horrific scene in an interview with Fox News. Inside the crowd, a lot of people got hurt, said the man, who was identified by the network as a Afghan national and special immigrant visa (SIV) applicant who had previously worked with US forces in the country. I had a baby girl-- she was 5 years old. She died right in my hand, he continued explaining that the child belonged to another couple. I tried to help her. Thousands of Afghans have been gathered at the airport for days trying to escape from the country since the Taliban takeover earlier this month. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson was first to confirm the news of the deaths around noon eastern US time on Thursday after initial reports of the blasts came in. Mr Johnson told reporters that he could confirm that theres been a barbaric terrorist attack in Kabul, adding that members of the US military have, very sadly, lost their lives. The prime minister added that the UK would continue evacuations, while a report from the Military Times indicated that US forces were welding some gates shut at the airport to prevent entry. The US is continuing evacuations as well, according to US Central Command and the Pentagon. Despite this attack, we are continuing the mission, said Gen McKenzie. Today is a hard day...the thing I come back to is the remarkable professionalism on the ground, he added. One of the blasts occurred in an active wastewater canal where Afghans were lined up in waist-deep water to enter the airport, according to the Military Times. Another occurred near the Baron hotel where UK forces are conducting security checks on civilians seeking evacuation, though a senior British official told The Independent no UK service members were injured. The final evacuees who have been approved for travel to the UK, along with a few still undergoing security checks at the Baron hotel, are expected to be flown out of Afghanistan by the end of Friday, with the withdrawal of British officials, diplomats and troops expected to be completed by the end of the weekend. None of those being processed at the Baron under the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (ARAP) were injured by the bombs, one of which detonated close to the hotel. And there were no casualties or injuries among UK troops or officials. A senior British source said it was now highly unlikely that any more people would be admitted into the airport to seek evacuation on RAF flights. In this evenings Cobr meeting, Mr Johnson was briefed on whether the withdrawal should be accelerated in response to the attack, but concluded that this was not necessary as the mission was already close to its end and being terminated as quickly and efficiently as was possible. Mr Biden, who was scheduled to meet on Thursday with Israels new prime minister, Naftali Bennett, cleared his agenda in the wake of the attack and huddled with his team in the Situation Room. US lawmakers reacted to the news of the blast with shock. Some Republicans used the issue to amplify criticism of the Biden administration that had been growing for days as the evacuations unfolded. This is the nightmare we feared and its why for weeks, military, intelligence, and congressional leaders from both parties have begged the President to stand up to the Taliban and push out the airport perimeter, said Sen Ben Sasse, a moderate Republican. He went on to say that Mr Biden now faced a clear choice: the extension of the August 31 deadline for withdrawing US troops, or leav[ing] our people behind in your retreat. This is devastating and incredibly sad to see. Our marines were bravely performing the critical mission of evacuating Americans. While the effort is worthwhile, [Mr Biden] must ensure everything is being done to protect and support those evacuating and helping them. So far, I have been very disappointed with the actions of this administration, added West Virginias Sen Shelley Moore Capito. Rep Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, added that he was devastated to hear about the attack but stopped short from calling for a withdrawal deadline extension A plane thats believed to have been carrying US lawmakers was denied permission to land in Kabul. The jet could be seen on open-source air traffic websites as it flew over Turkmenistan, but the planes final destination and route were unclear, CNN reported. Flying from Athens, Greece, the plane was last seen over Baku, Azerbaijan. Which members of Congress were part of the delegation is still unclear. Democratic Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts and Republican Peter Meijer of Michigan visited the Kabul airfield on Tuesday to conduct oversight on the mission to evacuate Americans and our allies. The trip was criticised by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who said: We dont want anyone to think this was a good idea. Theres a real concern about members being in the region. Thousands of people are still trying to get out of Afghanistan as two explosions occurred in Kabul on Thursday one directly outside the airport, resulting in both Afghan and US casualties, and another at a nearby hotel which has served as a base for the British. After first arguing that the US should extend its 31 August deadline for troop withdrawal, the trip changed the minds of Mr Moulton and Mr Meijer, who are both veterans of the Iraq War and have been criticizing President Joe Biden for the sped-up withdrawal. Almost every veteran in Congress wants to extend the August 31 deadline, including us, and our opinion on that was changed on the ground because we started the evacuations so late, Mr Moulton told The New York Times. Theres no way we can get everyone out, even by September 11. So we need to have a working relationship with the Taliban after our departure. And the only way to achieve that is to leave by August 31. It is utterly bizarre and baffling that were in this position. To go from having the Taliban as an adversary were seeking to kill, to relying upon them for security, coordinating to make sure things run smoothly, Mr Meijer told the paper. Its a complicated situation thats impossible to understand if youre not on the ground and yet critical to saving the lives of tens of thousands. There are tireless diplomatic officials there who have been working around the clock to clear backlogs, to work on the permissions needed to land in order to make sure all of this goes smoothly, he added. Mr Moulton said that one of the critical things we learned from our visit is that the task force prioritizing all the [special immigrant visa] applicants is overwhelmed by requests from members of Congress. Thats never been communicated to us, but that is something that we are now communicating to our colleagues. A father in Texas stripped down to his underwear during a school board meeting to argue for the institution of a mask mandate. James Akers, the father of a high school student in the Dripping Springs Independent School District west of the state capital of Austin, used his 90 seconds to speak at the 23 August meeting to urge the district to institute mask protocols in schools, despite the inconvenient nature of wearing masks. I do not like the government or any other entity, just ask my wife, telling me what to do, Mr Akers said as he took off his shirt and jacket. But, sometimes, Ive got to push the envelope a little bit, and Ive just decided that Im going to not just talk about it, but Im going to walk the walk. At work, they make me wear this jacket. I hate it. They make me wear this shirt and tie. I hate it, he said. On the way over here, I ran three stop signs and four red lights, he added. I almost killed somebody out there, but by God, theyre my roads, too. So I have every right to drive as fast as I want to, make the turns that I want to. I got over here to the school today, and the parking lot was full, and I decided I was going to park wherever the hell I wanted to, which, in this case, happened to be a handicap spot, he said and removed his pants, garnering cheers and boos from the surrounding crowd. Its simple protocol, people. We follow certain rules for a very good reason, Mr Akers told the school board wearing just his underwear. Masks are currently optional in the district and Mr Akers was urging the school board to institute a mask mandate. He said he has had three children go through their schooling in the district, where he has lived for 15 years. Board president Barbara Stroud used her gavel to restore order amid the noise in the room. Mr Akers I understand I believe youre a swimmer but if you wouldnt mind putting your pants back on for a comment, that would be appreciated, Ms Stroud said. Two police officers approached Mr Akers, who simply gathered his clothes and walked back to his seat, fist-bumping one of the officers as he went. The school districts health protocol said as of 6 August that masks are optional in schools, although the board said on 16 August that it would be recommending mask-wearing on campus but choosing not to go so far as to make it a mandate. Mr Akers later told KXAN that he stripped in front of the whole board to prove a point about social norms and what we do every day, with each other. There are too many voices out there that I think are digging in for political reasons, and absolutely just not thinking about the common-sense decisions we make every day to comply with everything from driving down the road and being safe and courteous to other drivers to not parking in handicapped spots, Mr Akers added. All these rules that were given every day we follow because they make sense. According to The New York Times Covid tracker, 49 per cent of people are fully vaccinated in Hays County, Texas, which includes Dripping Springs. Hospitalisations have jumped 36 per cent in the last two weeks, with 21 people dying in the county during that time. A total of 27,244 cases have been reported since the start of the pandemic one in eight residents have been infected. August has been the month with the highest average of new cases in the county. The test positivity rate is high in the county, meaning the number of reported cases could represent an undercount. The CDC recommends that vaccinated people also wear masks in the district because of the high spread of the virus in the area. Terrorism and intelligence media pundit Malcolm Nance has been criticised after writing on Twitter that there have been terrorist suicide bombers killing civilians nearly DAILY in Afghanistan for 20 years. This aint new. Its why we are leaving he wrote, adding the hashtag: Deal with it. Imagine not just thinking this, but feeling so beyond shame and perspective that you tweet it publicly, the editor of Fourth Watch and producer of The Megyn Kelly Show podcast, Steve Krakauer, tweeted in response. A reporter at the conservative Washington Free Beacon, Joe Gabriel Simonson, wrote that it was always genuinely disturbing to be reminded that these guys worked at the highest levels of the US government. Journalist Jack Crosbie tweeted that he cant think of anything witty to say here but maybe if your tweet about a suicide bombing includes hashtag dealwithit its not a good tweet. Rick Dickson added: I cannot believe the callousness in this tweet when I think of all the people Ive known, and heard stories about, whove died in the past 20 years. Imagine telling a grieving family, partner force or US It happens. Deal with it. Mr Nance, who served in the Navy, later added in a follow-up tweet that the loss of US service members is terrible. One Twitter user responded to his initial tweet: Thank you sir. Finally someone giving context to this situation. [The Mainstream Media] just want the sound bites - no context, no meaning, just whataboutism; denigration and division. No more for me though - no more. There were a million different ways you could have made your point, and yet you chose the one that makes you an asshole, lawyer Ari Cohn tweeted. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport on Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. At least 60 Afghans and 12 US troops were killed, Afghan and US officials said. US officials said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. They said another 12 service members were wounded and warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the dirty water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. A US official said the complex attack was believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz and condemned the attack. Associated Press contributed to this report General Kenneth McKenzie, the leader of US Central Command, said that the US is looking for the people behind the attack in Kabul that killed 12 US servicemembers but also pledged to continue its evacuations from Kabul. Mr McKenzie added that 15 service members were also injured and said the military would respond to ISIS-K. Weve been clear all along that were going to retain the right to operate against ISIS in Afghanistan and were working very hard to determine attribution, to determine who is associated with this cowardly attack and were prepared to take action against them. 24/7, were looking for them, Mr McKenzie said. The general said that the military assessed that ISIS-K was behind the attack and said they can find who was associated with it toward the end of the month. At the same time, Mr McKenzie said the military was committed to continuing evacuations. ISIS will not deter us from accomplishing our mission, he said. Mr McKenzie said that while the military is still investigating the circumstances, the attack occurred at a gate where people have to be checked before they arrive at an airfield. We have to ensure theyre not carrying a bomb, or any other kind of weapon that could ultimately make its way onto an aircraft, he said, which requires physical screening. Shots fired at Kabul airport were not aimed at an Italian military plane as previously reported, according to a government source in Rome. Earlier, an Italian defence source said that a plane carrying out evacuations had come under fire minutes after takeoff. But the shots were fired into the air by Afghan forces to disperse crowds near the airport, the government source said, quoting intelligence reports. Follow Afghanistan news LIVE: Latest updates as suspected suicide bombing outside Kabul airport The plane, which was carrying almost 100 Afghan citizens from the country, was not damaged and no injuries related to the incident have been reported. Evacuations from Afghanistan have been ongoing since the Taliban took control of Kabul. International powers are attempting to pull their citizens from the country before Tuesday, the date by which US President Joe Biden has confirmed troops will leave Afghanistan. Experts say this will make future evacuations more difficult, particularly as the Taliban has forbidden Afghan citizens from leaving the country after the end of the month. Some foreign nations have already ended their evacuation efforts. Among them are Poland, Belgium and Canada. This article was updated to reflect new information from the Italian government source. The former leader of Samoa has accused Jacinda Ardern of instigating his countrys recent political crisis, claiming she had sought to install a female prime minister. I am starting to get suspicious maybe New Zealand is behind all of this, said Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi in an interview with Samoan channel TV1. Tuilaepa had been prime minister of the Pacific nation for more than 22 years, making him the second-longest serving in the world, before he was ousted in a shock election upset earlier this year. He was beaten by his former deputy leader, Fiame Naomi Mataafa, who became the countrys first female prime minister at the end of July after she defected from the Human Rights Protection party (HRPP), which had ruled Samoa for 39 years. It took several months before Tuilaepa would accept Fiames victory in the April election. During this time, he questioned courts decisions and accused Fiame and her MPs of treason. Fiame and other MPs from her party were also locked out of the parliament building when they were due to be sworn in to parliament. The victory has been ruled both legal and constitutional by Samoas courts and recognised as legitimate by leaders around the world. The interview is the most recent example of the former prime minister attempting to cast doubts over his successors victory. The government [of New Zealand] has been heavily involved, he alleged, reported a translation of the interview by the Samoa Observer. He added: It looks like the New Zealand prime minister wanted Samoa to have a female prime minister, which has blinded [Ms Ardern] from seeing if its something that is in line with our constitution. But like that English proverb says: the end justifies the means. At the end of July, following several months of political turmoil, the Samoan court of appeal ruled Faatuatua ile Atua Samoa ua Tasi (FAST) party was the official winner of the national election. This meant Fiame became the countrys prime minister. New Zealand is Samoas closest ally and Ms Arden was one of the first world leaders to offer Fiame her congratulations. This was seen as a key moment in the international community accepting her victory as Samoas prime minister. Tuilaepa suggested Ms Ardens prompt congratulations were proof that the New Zealand government had planned this all along. The proof is, as soon as the [court] decision was handed down, the prime minister of New Zealand immediately sent her congratulatory message, he said. The fact that she quickly sent Fiame her well wishes makes me think that they had planned all of this. A spokerperson from Ms Arderns office told The Independent that they rejected the allegations and that they are unfounded. The Pacific has the lowest rate of female political representation anywhere in the world and Fiame is only the second woman to lead a country in the Pacific Islands. The first was Hilda Heine, former president of the Marshall Islands. Alexei Navalny, the Kremlin critic currently in prison in Pokrov, has compared his Russian prison to a Chinese labour camp in his first interview from jail. Speaking to The New York Times, Mr Navalny explained that he was being forced to watch eight hours of Russian state television each day, saying that, although the days of heavy labour in Soviet prisons are over, they have been replaced by what he called psychological violence. Mr Navalny, who built a political career exposing corruption in Russia, said that being forced to watch Russian propaganda was part of an awareness-raising programme for political prisoners. Reading, writing or doing anything else is prohibited, Mr Navalny disclosed. You have to sit in a chair and watch TV, he said, adding that if a prisoner falls asleep the guards shout: Dont sleep, watch! You might imagine tattooed muscle-men with steel teeth carrying on with knife fights to take the best cot by the window, Mr Navalny was quoted as saying. Recommended Final UK troops pulled out of Kabul You need to imagine something like a Chinese labour camp, where everybody marches in a line and where video cameras are hung everywhere. There is constant control and a culture of snitching, he added. Mr Navalny explained that there are five daily sessions of television-watching for inmates, the first of which begins straight after breakfast. Then, after some free time, theres a two-hour spell in front of the screen, lunch, then more TV, dinner, and then more screen time in the evening. Apparently, during one afternoon session, inmates may play chess or backgammon as an acceptable alternative. Explaining what sort of things the prisoners are made to watch, Mr Navalny said: We watch films about the great patriotic war, or how one day, 40 years ago, our athletes defeated the Americans or Canadians. He said that, during the TV viewing time, I most clearly understand the essence of the ideology of the Putin regime: the present and the future are being substituted with the past the truly heroic past, or embellished past, or completely fictional past. All sorts of past must constantly be in the spotlight to displace thoughts about the future and questions about the present. He went on to say he had not been attacked by any fellow prisoners, even describing having fun creating snacks with them. The 45-year-old Kremlin critic, who is being held 100km north of Moscow, remained positive about the future in respect of Vladimir Putins regime, insisting that one day it would come to an end. Sooner or later, this mistake will be fixed, and Russia will move on to a democratic, European path of development simply because that is what the people want, he said in the interview. He went on to repeat criticisms of the US and European governments for their use of sanctions against Russia, saying that these harmed Russian people instead of those in power. Mr Navalny has remained intermittently active on social media since his jailing in March and has even released a letter from prison. Western intelligence agencies have said they have high confidence that Mr Navalny was poisoned with the nerve agent novichok last year by FSB officers, something that the Kremlin denies. He was first flown to Germany for treatment but later returned to Russia in January, where he was arrested and sent to a penal colony. According to the charges brought against him, Mr Navalny violated parole requirements during his stay in Germany. The sentence has been criticised internationally as being politically motivated. Most recently, he was charged with a fresh set of crimes that could extend his jail time by three years. If he is found guilty of these crimes, he would be released after 2024, the year in which Russia intends to hold a presidential election. Police in Germany are investigating after a leopard reportedly attacked a model during a photo shoot, causing the female victim to suffer severe head injuries. The 36-year-old model, whose identity has not been made public, was airlifted to hospital following the incident on Tuesday in the eastern German town of Nebra. News agency dpa said the focus of the police probe was on the 48-year-old owner of the leopard. She is said to have been keeping two leopards along with other animals at a compound in the town and is being investigated on suspicion of negligent bodily harm. A public health officer visited the womans compound on Wednesday to check whether the animals were adequately kept and if the facility met regulatory standards, dpa said. The animal handler is reported to have owned the leopards since 2019 and worked for 20 years as an animal trainer for circuses and amusement parks. Her name and that of the victim were not released in line with German privacy rules. Additional reporting by agencies A mass grave has been discovered in Ukraine revealing the bones of around 5,000 to 8,000 people. The bones are thought by historians to belong to victims of Stalins Great Terror from 1937 to 1939. They were likely executed by Stalins NKVD secret police unit, though their crimes and identities remain unknown. Sergiy Gutsalyuk, the head of the regional branch of the National Memory Institute told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency that the number of victims may increase as the excavations continue. The remains were discovered after exploratory works started as part of plans to expand the airports territory. Mass graves have been discovered in the area in previous years. A famous mass grave discovered in the country is the National Historic Memorial site of the Bykivnia graves on the outskirts of Kyiv. The site was discovered in the 1990s and there is estimated to be between dozens and hundreds of thousands of bodies buried there. Historians estimate that between 950,000 and 1.2 million people died as a result of the Great Terror. It is estimated that hundreds of thousands died in Ukraine. Millions of Ukrainians were also killed during the Holodomor, or Terror Famine, which ran from 1932 to 1933 and is regarded as a genocide orchestrated by Stalin. Mr Gutsalyuk said it would be impossible to identify the victims as documents of that era are classified and kept in Moscow. These documents will never be handed over to us under the current government in Russia, he said. The two former-Soviet nations are currently engaged in the Russo-Ukrainian War which started in 2014 following the Russian annexation of Crimea from Ukraine and the Russian backing of armed separatists in eastern Ukraine. Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this week vowed to do all he can to bring back the peninsula of Crimea and urged international allies to support the effort. Speaking at the Crimean Platform summit, he said Ukraine will use all possible political, legal and first and foremost diplomatic means, to make Crimea part of Europe. Top officials from 46 countries and blocs took part in the summit, including from the United States, the European Union and Turkey. Poland has become the first country in Europe to end its evacuations from Afghanistan, making it one of the first Western countries to put an end to operations helping people leave the country following the Taliban takeover. Marcin Przydacz, a Polish deputy foreign minister, said that Poland had evacuated its last group, reasoning that the lives of Polish soldiers and diplomats could not continue to be risked. He explained: We cannot risk the lives of our diplomats and of our soldiers any longer. Mr Przydacz has said that a number of Polish troops will remain in Afghanistan for a short time to wrap up operations. During its evacuation programme, Poland used over a dozen planes to carry hundreds of evacuees to Warsaw, some of whom later travelled on to other countries. US president Joe Biden declared on Tuesday that the US would stick to their original plan to withdraw troops from Afghanistan by 31 August, with the Taliban suggesting that they would not let Afghans be evacuated from the country past next Tuesday. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, told a news conference in Kabul that the US must stick to the 31 August deadline, adding after that we wont let Afghans be taken out on evacuation flights. Meanwhile, Mr Biden has warned of the imminent threat of a terrorist attack on Kabul airport. He said: Every day were on the ground is another day that we know Isis-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both us and allied forces and innocent civilians. The US president added that although the Taliban is currently cooperating, we run a serious risk of it breaking down as time goes on. Late on Wednesday the US Embassy warned US citizens who were at three airport gates in Kabul that they should leave immediately because of a threat to security. Meanwhile, Australia, Britain and New Zealand all told their citizens on Thursday morning not to go to Kabul airport, due to a very high threat of a terrorist attack. European allies have pressed for an extension to the 31 August deadline, for practical purposes, but will have to end their evacuation efforts prior to when US troops leave early next week. Several countries have given no indication of when they might end their evacuation operations, although some have said they fear they will not be able to get the many thousands of Afghans who helped their forces out in time. Germanys Chancellor Angela Merkel, however, said on Wednesday that Germany will continue to evacuate people from Afghanistan for as long as it is responsible to do so. She went on to suggest that this may continue after the deadline expires. At least 13 people are feared to have been killed and at least 15 injured by suicide bombers in Afghanistan, according to reports. The two attacks took place just outside of Kabuls Hamid Karzai International Airport and at the nearby Baron hotel. Before the attacks happened, the US and allied countries had urged people to avoid the area around the airport due to the acute threat of attacks by affiliates of the so-called Islamic State (Isis) or al-Qaeda. Follow Afghanistan news LIVE: Latest updates as suspected suicide bombing outside Kabul airport It comes amid thousands of people desperately trying to leave the country before the 31 August deadline, to flee the Talibans rise to power. What is the significance of the area that were targeted in the attacks? One suicide bombing happened close to the Abbey Gate entrance to the airports airfield and another is reported to have occurred near the Baron hotel less than one mile away from the airport. The hotel was being used as a centre for processing Afghan people that are hoping to be evacuated from the country to flee the Taliban, and was mainly used by British officials. The 160-room hotel is also near to Camp Sullivan, which is a self-contained facility for the local guard force that provides protection to all official US facilities in the capital city. The hotels website says the accommodation is one of the most prestigious secured lodging projects in Kabul as its security is provided by a private company from the US, is surrounded by a four-metre-high perimeter wall, and has five guard towers. It add that it is next to International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) meaning it benefits from being within the buffer zone of security for both of these landmarks. Abbey Gate, where the second blast happened, is an entrance to the airport that is controlled by the British but is only accessible via Taliban checkpoints. Loading.... Before the blasts, UK armed forces minister James Heappey had said that Afghans aiming to be evacuated to the UK should avoid the airport as there had been very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack. He added that the worsening security situation in Kabul means British forces will probably get out fewer people than had been hoped before Tuesdays evacuation deadline. Mr Heappey said the threat is specifically from an Isis affiliate known as Isis-K, a branch of the terror group in the Khorasan Province. The US state department had urged those at Abbey Gate, east gate or north gate should leave immediately. It had cited unspecified security threats and advised people to approach only if you receive individual instructions from a US government representative to do so. Astronomers have discovered a new class of habitable ocean-covered mini-Neptune planets outside our solar system, an advance that could accelerate the search for alien life forms. In the quest for finding life outside our Solar System, while scientists have mostly looked for planets of similar size, mass, temperature and atmospheric composition to Earth, astronomers from the University of Cambridge believe the newly discovered habitable Hycean planets offer better chances of finding alien life as they are more numerous and observable. According to the study, published Wednesday in The Astrophysical Journal, the Hycean planets are hot, ocean-covered planets with hydrogen-rich atmospheres, that could increase the chances of finding signs of life outside our Solar System within the next two or three years. Hycean planets open a whole new avenue in our search for life elsewhere, Nikku Madhusudhan from Cambridges Institute of Astronomy, who led the research, said in a statement. These planets, the researchers say, are often referred to as super-Earths, or mini Neptunes, and are about 2.6 times larger than Earth and have atmospheric temperatures up to nearly 200 degrees Celsius. While earlier studies noted that the temperature beneath the hydrogen-rich atmospheres of mini-Neptunes would be too high to host life, a recent research by Dr Madhusudhan and his team on one such planet K2-18b found that in certain conditions these could be habitable. They say a subset of these are tidally locked dark Hycean worlds in which the same side of the planet is in light, and may have habitable conditions on their permanent night sides. These Cold Hycean planets, the astronomers say, receive little radiation from their stars with their oceanic conditions could similar to those conducive for microbial life in Earths oceans. In this scenario, the only energy source affecting the atmospheric temperature profile is internal heat ... we find that Cold Hycean planets can be readily conducive to ocean life, the scientists wrote in the study. Its exciting that habitable conditions could exist on planets so different from Earth, study co-author Anjali Piette, also from Cambridge, said in a statement. The scientists say such exoplanets are likely quite common, but add that while looking for them, size alone would not be enough to confirm whether a planet is Hycean. Other aspects such as mass, temperature and atmospheric properties are required for confirmation, they added. Hycean planets, the study noted, lie in the habitable zone, or Goldilocks zone of its star. To determine if they have life, astronomers also look for molecular signs to infer the planets atmospheric and internal structure that govern its surface conditions, presence of oceans, and potential for life. They also need to look for the presence of certain signatures molecules such as oxygen, ozone, methane and nitrous oxide, which are present on Earth, and could indicate the existence of life, as well as markers like methyl chloride and dimethyl sulphide, that may offer hints of life on planets with hydrogen-rich atmospheres. Essentially, when weve been looking for these various molecular signatures, we have been focusing on planets similar to Earth, which is a reasonable place to start. But we think Hycean planets offer a better chance of finding several trace biosignatures, Dr Madhusudhan said. Due to the larger sizes, higher temperatures, and hydrogen-rich atmospheres of Hycean planets the scientists say the atmospheric signatures of these planets are much more detectable than those of Earth-like exoplanets. The Cambridge researchers say they have identified a sizeable sample of potential Hycean worlds that could be studied with next-generation telescopes like the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), which is scheduled for launch later in the year. A biosignature detection would transform our understanding of life in the universe. We need to be open about where we expect to find life and what form that life could take, as nature continues to surprise us in often unimaginable ways, Dr Madhusudhan added. Manchester City and Juventus are negotiating over a fee for Cristiano Ronaldo, but that is the only remaining barrier in what would be a sensational signing for the English champions. The Portuguese has already spoken to Pep Guardiola about his role in the team, and it is understood personal terms have been agreed in principle. Ronaldo will be paid over 250,000 a week should the deal be completed. His agent Jorge Mendes flew into Turin on Wednesday night to try and negotiate his exit, and Juventus are in principle open to a sale as they want Ronaldo off the wage bill in order to rebuild. There is still a significant distance way to go, though, as City do not want to pay a fee but Juventus are adamant he does not go for free. That may yet scupper the deal, but the principal personal terms have been agreed. Mendes investigated Paris Saint-Germain as another possible destination and Ronaldo was interested in what would have been an incredible partnership with Lionel Messi, but the French club were unwilling to go forward. The prospective signing would no doubt complicate Ronaldos legacy at neighbours Manchester United, but he is intent on moving to a club that gives him the chance of winning another Champions League and the Ballon DOr. City's priority signing this summer outside of Jack Grealish was Harry Kane with boss Guardiola a huge admirer of the England captain. But with Tottenham and chairman Daniel Levy unwilling to come to the negotiation table, Kane announced on Wednesday he would be staying in London. That has seen the club quickly turn to Ronaldo with striker a key area of need following the exit of Sergio Aguero at the end of last season. British Airways is to set up a separate low-cost subsidiary for European and domestic flights at Gatwick allowing it to compete with budget airlines. A BA Lite operation has been repeatedly considered by British Airways bosses seeking to make the Sussex airport profitable. Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, BAs Gatwick short-haul network has been dormant, though some long-haul flights are continuing. With the ending of the governments furlough scheme next month, the new British Airways chief executive, Sean Doyle, has decided to press ahead with plans to cut costs and make BA more competitive with easyJet. The airline has launched consultations with trades unions telling them that change is essential if British Airways is to return to the Sussex airport at scale. BA has consistently criticised the UK governments travel restrictions and subsequent undermining of passenger confidence. The plan is to use the same staff, aircraft and slots as existed in March 2020, but as part of a new, separate airline. Informally, some people have dubbed the venture BA Lite. A likely name is British Airways Express, mirroring Iberia Express the lower-cost offshoot of BAs Spanish sister airline. The carrier is likely to begin operations at the start of the next summer season in late March 2022 in time for the Easter school holidays. For decades, BA has struggled with making its domestic and European operations from Gatwick profitable. After taking over British Caledonian and then Dan-Air, British Airways was left with an incoherent portfolio of routes from the Sussex airport. Many were to Mediterranean destinations, and some duplicated services from BAs much bigger hub, Heathrow. British Airways briefly established a hub-and-spoke operation at Gatwick North Terminal, calling it The hub without the hubbub and offering a connecting time as short as 26 minutes. Separately, BA set up a low-cost subsidiary, Go, which was based at Stansted. It was sold to senior management backed by private equity in 2001, and a year later bought by easyJet which merged Go into its operations. After the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the immediate downturn in air travel in late 2001, easyJet moved at scale into Gatwick which is now the budget airlines biggest base. Subsequently easyJet took over GB Airways, which previously operated services to destinations such as Spain, Morocco and Egypt on behalf of BA. While British Airways had a busy long-haul leisure operation at Gatwick until the coronavirus pandemic, maintaining profitability on short-haul while competing head-to-head with easyJet was always a challenge. According to the data specialist Cirium, in the peak summer month of July 2022 BA is currently scheduled to be the second-largest airline at Gatwick, behind easyJet. British Airways has 1,881 short-haul flights scheduled from Gatwick, with Jersey, Malaga and Faro in Portugal the top destinations. Ryanair is increasing operations to and from Gatwick, including a link on the key route to Malaga in southern Spain, and Wizz Air is also known to be interested in establishing a foothold there. According to the most recent traffic report from the air-traffic provider Eurocontrol, Gatwick has been harder hit by the decline in passengers than any other leading European airport. Canada, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and the Azores have all been added to the green list in the governments latest update to the traffic light system for international travel. The move will mean that all arrivals from these destinations can avoid quarantine on entry to the UK, regardless of vaccination status. Instead, they must take one Covid PCR test within two days of arriving, in addition to presenting a negative lateral flow prior to departure to the UK. The changes will come into effect at 4am on 30 August. It remains to be confirmed whether the same changes will be adopted by Wales and Northern Ireland, but Scotland has already announced it will mirror Englands changes. All classification changes have been decided by ministers, informed by the latest data and analysis by the Joint Biosecurity Centre (JBC) and wider public health considerations, to help the public understand the risks to UK public health from incoming travel from different destinations, according to a statement released by the Department for Transport (DfT). While there is relief that key destinations, including some Caribbean islands and Morocco, have escaped the red list, airlines and holiday companies are dismayed that restrictions have not been eased more widely. Within minutes, travel industry leaders attacked the limited easing of rules. Sean Doyle, chairman and chief executive of British Airways, said: Despite our world-leading vaccination programme the UKs economic recovery remains far behind our more pragmatic European neighbours, which are already reaping the rewards of a rapid recovery. We have a much more costly, prohibitive and restrictive testing regime than everyone else. We also need to urgently end the uncertainty caused by the constant threat of changes to countries traffic light status. Our green list is much smaller than that of the US and EU, despite no new variants being transported into the UK. Travel industry bosses have reacted angrily to the latest round of traffic light changes confirmed by the UK transport secretary. Grant Shapps tweeted: Weve updated our travel lists further cautiously easing international travel, but gave no further details beyond a link to gov.uk. While there is relief that key destinations, including some Caribbean islands and Morocco, have escaped the red list, airlines and holiday companies are dismayed that restrictions have not been eased more widely. Canada, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Switzerland and Liechtenstein have been moved to the quarantine-free green list along with Portugals Atlantic archipelago, the Azores. None is a mass-market travel destination. The leading omission from changes is Turkey which remains on the red list. The government in Ankara, as well as the travel industry in the UK, had lobbied intensively for the country to be taken off the high-risk register and moved to the amber list meaning travellers fully vaccinated in the UK or EU need not self-isolate on return. There were also hopes that the Maldives and Pakistan would be moved from the red list. Within minutes, travel industry leaders attacked the limited easing of rules. Sean Doyle, chairman and chief executive of British Airways, said: Despite our world-leading vaccination programme the UKs economic recovery remains far behind our more pragmatic European neighbours, which are already reaping the rewards of a rapid recovery. We have a much more costly, prohibitive and restrictive testing regime than everyone else. We also need to urgently end the uncertainty caused by the constant threat of changes to countries traffic light status. Our green list is much smaller than that of the US and EU, despite no new variants being transported into the UK. Julia Lo Bue-Said, chief executive of the Advantage Travel Partnership, said: Another three-week review ending in disappointment with Turkey being left off the list and kept on red. Whilst we welcome some countries added onto the green list there really is no rationale based on the public data that is available for Turkey to remain in red. The traffic light review system is destroying public confidence and making it impossible for the travel industry to trade its way through to recovery, let alone the British public to make plans to travel, do business or be reunited with loved ones. There would appear to be a wholehearted attempt by government to completely sabotage public confidence because there really is now no other logical rationale, as the data certainly doesnt point to protecting public health given how broken the whole testing system is too. The CEO also deplored the manner in which the changes were announced. What an utterly appalling way to make an announcement. The stress and anxiety being caused is beyond repair, she said. Airlines UK, the industry body representing UK-registered carriers, said: Too many families are having to look over their shoulders for rule changes, and pay through the nose for tests with no sign from government that this will change. A Department for Transport statement read: All classification changes have been decided by ministers, informed by the latest data and analysis by the Joint Biosecurity Centre and wider public health considerations, to help the public understand the risks to UK public health from incoming travel from different destinations. Continuing with our phased approach to restarting international travel while protecting public health, we are engaging with governments around the world, offering technical expertise and support to help them make any improvements needed for a change in traffic light rating. Thailand and Montenegro have been assigned to the high-risk red list, requiring hotel quarantine for arrivals to the UK. There are very few British tourists in Thailand, but several thousand UK holidaymakers are believed to be in Montenegro. The former Yugoslav republic has seen infection rates rising sharply, with an increase of 40 per cent plus in a week. The changes take effect at 4am on Monday morning, 30 August. Paul Charles, chief executive of The PC Agency, said: Yet again, a lack of transparency undermines the decision making behind these changes. There are many other countries that should be changing colour according to the data. Sadly I dont think these changes really create meaningful recovery for the travel sector. Many holidaymakers in the Caribbean will be relieved that they do not need to rush home to beat a red list deadline. Rising infection rates in Jamaica and St Lucia had led to fears they might be downgraded from amber list status. Morocco has also escaped the red list, unlike many other African nations including Egypt, Kenya and South Africa which remain in the highest risk category. Three weeks after the last update, the government announced the latest changes to the traffic light travel system today, 26 August, at 5.30pm. Transport Secret Grant Shapps tweeted the additions and movements on the list this afternoon. The Department for Transport (DfT) decides which countries are safe enough from the risk of arrivals reimporting coronavirus infections to join its hallowed green list, from where travellers need not quarantine when entering the UK, regardless of vaccination status. Follow green list news live: Green list update expected today The green list, previously at 36 destinations, saw seven additions but no removals in this weeks announcement. Meanwhile, Thailand and Montenegro were both moved to the red list, necessitating 11 nights of hotel quarantine for travellers who visit from 30 August. Which countries are currently on the green list? There are now 43 places on the green list: Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, Austria, Barbados, Bermuda, British Antarctic Territory, British Indian Ocean Territory, Brunei, Bulgaria, Canada, Cayman Islands, Croatia, Denmark, Dominica, Falkland Islands, Faroe Islands, Finland, Germany, Gibraltar, Grenada, Hong Kong, Iceland, Israel and Jerusalem, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Madeira, Malta, Montserrat, New Zealand, Norway, Pitcairn Islands, Romania, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, Singapore, Slovenia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Taiwan and Turks and Caicos Islands. What time were the lists announced? The additions and movements on the list were announced by Grant Shapps on Twitter around 5.30pm. How can I find out the latest updates? The Independents travel team will be live blogging all updates as soon as theyre revealed throughout the day. Check out our rolling news coverage here for all the latest additions to the traffic light lists. The US is being urged to accept the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine if travel from the UK to the US is ever to reopen. The countrys government currently doesnt officially recognise the Oxford-made vaccine, which is one of the three types currently being administered in the UK, alongside Moderna and Pfizer. The USs Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) formally approved the Pfizer vaccine earlier this week. Continued failure to recognise AstraZeneca will seriously depress consumer demand and prevent the much-needed revival of transatlantic travel, the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) has said. Leisure travel from the UK to the US for non-American residents has been banned since March 2020, regardless of travellers vaccination status. The UK loosened its restrictions for fully vaccinated visitors from the States earlier in August, allowing them to swerve quarantine and simply present a pre-departure and post-arrival Covid test. Unvaccinated travellers are still permitted to enter the UK but must quarantine at home or the place theyre staying for 10 days and take an additional PCR test on day eight of self-isolation. The USs travel rules are far more draconian after a series of Presidential proclamations. Even if it were to offer a reciprocal agreement allowing double-jabbed Brits to enter the country, until the CDC formally recognises AstraZeneca, approximately 23.9 million people from the UK would be discriminated against. Its crucial the US authorities step forward to formally approve the AstraZeneca vaccine as a matter of urgency, to enable cross-border mobility and the return of transatlantic travel between the UK and US, said Virginia Messina, senior vice president of the WTTC. Unless they give it the green light, the US will effectively remain closed to the vast majority of UK visitors and the many millions around the world who are double-jabbed with the AstraZeneca vaccine. This will leave airlines, cruise lines, tour operators, hotels and the entire travel and tourism infrastructure, which depends upon transatlantic travel, in significant trouble for the foreseeable future. Neither the US nor the UK economy can afford this vaccine vacuum to continue a day longer, and every day which passes, and transatlantic travel remains off limits, it leaves the Travel & Tourism sector sinking deeper into the red. Since 1963, The Independent has helped create a great community! Since our founding in September of 1963, The Independent has been dedicated to giving Livermore, Pleasanton, Dublin, and Sunol readers the news they need to be in-the-know about what's going on in the Tri-Valley region. remaining of Thank you for Reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. Actor-politician Nusrat Jahan has been blessed with a baby boy today. Confirming the news, actor-assembly poll candidate Yash Dasgupta, who is rumoured to be her boyfriend, said, "For those who have been enquiring about Nusrat's health, the mother and child are healthy and doing well." Nusrat got embroiled in a controversy after she claimed that her marriage with Nikhil Jain in Turkey was not legal under Indian laws. Nikhil, on the other hand, claimed that Nusrat avoided his requests to register their marriage. Reacting to the news, Nikhil told Aaj Tak Bangla, "My differences with her would not stop me from wishing well for the newborn. I wish her well. May the baby be super healthy and have a prosperous future". BCCL When Nusrat revealed earlier this year that her marriage with Nikhil Jain is illegal, she also stated that her jewelry and other valuable assets have been "illegally held back". Nusrat Jahan and Nikhil Jain had tied the knot on June 19, 2019. BCCL Also Read: Another Muslim Cleric Slams Nusrat Jahan, Says Her Marriage Is Not Valid Under Islam & Jainism Kerala has reported more than 30,000 fresh cases on Wednesday, which the state government tagged as "Onam spike". The state recorded 31,445 fresh infections and 215 deaths. It now has 1.7 lakh active cases and the test positivity rate is at 19 per cent. Reuters Ernakulam district recorded the highest number with 4,048 cases, followed by Thrissur (3,865), Kozhikode (3,680), Malappuram (3,502), Palakkad (2,562), Kollam (2,479), Kottayam (2,050), Kannur (1,930) Alappuzha (1,874), Thiruvananthapuram (1,700), Idukki (1,166) Pathanamthitta (1,008) and Wayanad (962), a government release said. Kerala celebrated Onam on August 21. India reports 46,164 new #COVID19 cases, 34,159 recoveries and 607 deaths in the last 24 hrs, as per Health Ministry. Total cases: 3,25,58,530 Total recoveries: 3,17,88,440 Active cases: 3,33,725 Death toll: 436365 Total vaccinated: 60,38,46,475 (80,40,407) in last 24 hrs pic.twitter.com/sWNTEna5mu ANI (@ANI) August 26, 2021 Since July 27, after Bakrid celebrations, during which restrictions were relaxed for a few days, Kerala has been reporting more than or close to 20,000 cases almost every day. BCCL India reports over 46,000 cases India reported 46,164 new Covid-19 cases on Thursday, taking the total tally of cases 32,558,530. The country recorded a spike of over 20,000 infections in the last two days. In the last 24 hours, 607 deaths were also recorded, the death toll now stands at 436,365. The Taliban barred at least 140 Afghan Sikh pilgrims from boarding flights from Kabul on Wednesday night, as they attempted to arrive in Delhi for celebrations marking the 400th birth anniversary of Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur. Barred from travelling for celebrations "A kirtan darbar is scheduled to be held on Sunday. Community members from various parts of the world are arriving here. Unfortunately, the Taliban denied the 140 pilgrims access to the Kabul airport," said Partap Singh (Afghan origin), the president of the Sri Guru Arjan Dev Ji Gurdwara in New Mahavir Nagar. SGPC There will be a grand celebration marking the 400th birth anniversary of Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur, the ninth Sikh Guru. Meanwhile, Afghan-origin Guljeet Singh, the president of the Guru Nanak Sahib Ji Gurudwara in Vikaspuri, said: "We had requested the Indian government to facilitate their attendance at the mega celebrations. Regret to note that last night, these law-abiding pilgrims were turned back by Taliban security forces from the airport after waiting for more than 15 hours in their convoys." AP Three swaroops were brought from Kabul Earlier this week, Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas and Minister for Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep S Puri received and carried one of three swaroops of the Sri Guru Granth Sahib that were brought from Kabul amid the chaos in Afghanistan. On August 24, three copies of Guru Granth Sahib and 77 civilians, including Afghan Hindus and Sikhs, arrived at the Indira Gandhi International airport in New Delhi. Union ministers Hardeep Singh Puri and V Muraleedharan received copies of the Guru Granth Sahib and 44 Afghan Sikhs, who landed in Delhi from Kabul on a special Air India flight. ANI "Blessed to receive & pay obeisance to three holy Swaroop of Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji from Kabul to Delhi a short while ago," tweeted Hardeep Singh Puri. He also expressed his gratitude to Prime Minister Modi for conducting rescue operations in Afghanistan and said the government was in contact with those living there. AP Western nations warned their citizens Thursday to immediately leave the surroundings of Kabul airport over a terrorist threat, as thousands of people try to reach a dwindling number of evacuation flights. Read more Here's more top news of the day: 1) Sexual Intercourse By Husband Against Wife's Wishes Is Not Rape: Chhattisgarh HC Representational Image In what is seen as legitimising marital rape, the Chhattisgarh high court has discharged a man of the offence of marital rape after observing that sexual intercourse or any sexual act by a husband with his legally wedded wife is not rape even if it was by force or against her wishes. Read more 2) Mexico Welcomes Afghanistan's All-girl Robotics Team & Journalists Fleeing Taliban Clutches UNICEF Mexico has welcomed 124 media workers and their family members from Afghanistan, including New York Times journalists, as thousands of people continue to flee after the Taliban militant group's takeover. Read more 3) India Evacuates 4-Month-Old Baby Without Passport From Kabul; Two More Infants To Land Soon #WATCH | An infant was among the 168 people evacuated from Afghanistan's Kabul to Ghaziabad on an Indian Air Force's C-17 aircraft pic.twitter.com/DoR6ppHi4h ANI (@ANI) August 22, 2021 In one of its evacuation operations from Afghanistan, India evacuated an infant without a passport who also boarded the C-17 transport aircraft of the Indian Air Force. Read more 4) Taliban Reportedly Issue Death Warrant Against Woman Who Divorced Talib Husband & Came To India Representational Image Despite promises of women's safety after taking over Afghanistan, the Taliban have now issued a public death decree for an Afghan woman, who had left the worn-torn country four years ago and is now settled in India. Read more 5) Vaccinate All First, Boosters Can Wait, Says AIIMS Chief To Meet December Deadline Representational Image As Brazil, US and several other countries have announced third vaccine shots, AIIMS chief Randeep Guleria has said that the idea of booster doses can wait" and India should at the moment focus on vaccinating as many people as possible to curb the spread of Covid-19. Read more As Brazil, US and several other countries have announced third vaccine shots, AIIMS chief Randeep Guleria has said that the idea of booster doses can wait" and India should at the moment focus on vaccinating as many people as possible to curb the spread of Covid-19. AIIMS chief's statement I think we should focus on vaccinating those who have not been vaccinated till now, especially the high-risk group. Still many healthcare workers, many elderly and those with comorbidities have not been vaccinated, and they are the ones who have a chance of having more severe disease and dying because of Covid-19," Guleria was quoted as saying by ANI. BCCL Further, the AIIMS chief said that instead of exploring the idea of booster doses, if the focus is on giving vaccines to those who will benefit from it, "we may be able to save lives." "So I think the issue should be to vaccinate as many individuals as possible, rather than going in for three shots, four shots and trying different things, I think, let's stick to what we know right now, and focus on vaccinating as many people as we can," Guleria said. The AIIMS chief also said that enough data was not yet available to show the need for booster dose right now in the country. "I don't think we have enough data to show that there is a need for booster right now, remember antibodies is not the only way of giving protection," he said. BCCL WHO's stand on boosters The top doctors suggestion comes days after WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called on countries to delay giving out booster shots. The World Health Organization previously argued against giving out follow-up doses while some countries continue to struggle vaccinating their population in the first place. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other top leaders of the country have repeatedly urged people to get vaccinated as soon as possible, as Centre has been pushing to meet its December deadline of jabbing all adults. Representational Image/Reuters 1 cr doses per day to meet deadline According to a report in Times of India, the country needs to average almost one crore doses per day till the end of the year to reach the target. To do this, it will have to nearly double the daily average it achieved in the best week so far just under 59 lakh per day from June 19 to 25, the report stated. It further said that the burden will be heavier on states such as West Bengal, Bihar, UP, Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra, where the average needed for the rest of the year is about double what was achieved in the best week or even more. Worryingly, thats a list that includes the four most populous states in the country. AP Guleria also said that if vaccinations continue in good strength according to the results of the Sero Survey, the country may not have as many cases in the likely third wave of COVID-19. "My feeling is that if we are able to continue to have good vaccination and looking at the serosurvey data, chances are that we may not have that many cases in the third wave," he said. Western nations warned their citizens Thursday to immediately leave the surroundings of Kabul airport over a terrorist threat, as thousands of people try to reach a dwindling number of evacuation flights. Nearly 90,000 Afghans and foreigners have fled Afghanistan via the US-led airlift since the hardline Islamist Taliban movement took control of the country on August 15. Twitter Desperate crowds of people are flogging to the airport as some foreign nations cease flights ahead of Tuesday's deadline by President Joe Biden to end the evacuations and withdraw the US troops overseeing it. One reason for the hard deadline cited by Biden and his aides this week was an "acute" terrorist threat from the regional chapter of the Islamic State group. The US government and its allies raised the alarm further on Thursday with a series of coordinated and specific advisory warnings for their citizens to avoid the airport. AP "Those at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," said the US State Department, citing unspecified "security threats". Australia's department of foreign affairs said there was an "ongoing and very high threat of terrorist attack". "Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. If you're in the area of the airport, move to a safe location and await further advice." London issued a similar warning, adding "if you can leave Afghanistan safely by other means, you should do so immediately". After the Taliban took control over Afghanistan, fear has been looming large across the country. While the most affected are the women and children of the country, people from the creative industries have also been under a lot of pressure. Recently, an Afghan film director and current general director of Afghan Film, Sahraa Karimi issued a letter to all the film communities across the world to help the film community in Afghanistan and the women and children who are in deep danger. She said, Its a humanitarian crisis, and yet the world is silentThey will ban all art. I and other filmmakers could be next on their hit list. To All the #Film_Communities in The World and Who Loves Film and Cinema! I write to you with a broken heart and a deep hope that you can join me in protecting my beautiful people, especially filmmakers from the Taliban. #Share it please, don't be #silent. pic.twitter.com/4FjW6deKUi Sahraa Karimi/ (@sahraakarimi) August 13, 2021 Taliban is set to impose barbarian rules that have nothing to do with art and culture. In fact, the militant group looks down upon the same and may target people who have accomplished in the field of art in the past twenty years. Based on this, Omaid Sharifi shared on Twitter how artists across the country are destroying their art. He wrote, "My heart shatters to see and talk to Afghan artists who have started destroying their own art out of fear. #Afghanistan is becoming black and white again. Its losing its beauty, diversity and colours. I am afraid the world will let this happen again!" My heart shatters to see and talk to Afghan artists who have started destroying their own art out of fear. #Afghanistan is becoming black and white again. Its losing its beauty, diversity and colors. I am afraid the world will let this happen again! pic.twitter.com/XSKA0To7BJ Omaid H. Sharifi- (@OmaidSharifi) August 26, 2021 People on the internet were saddened to see this vision. When you are forced to live your life with the decision and thought of others The simplest right of yours that you cannot do for fear of others Abdulrahim Mohammed (@RahimMUN) August 26, 2021 Our hearts break with you too. Art is so important to a viable society. Beyond sorry this is happening to you all there. True grief. M (@IndiaLove88) August 26, 2021 William Gourlay (@GourlayWill) August 26, 2021 Afghan designer Shamayel Pawthkhameh Shalizi told DW that her musician friends in Afghanistan told her that the Taliban are now breaking down their studios and hiding everything. But she has also been in touch with other artists who continue their art as a form of resistance, doing music or graffiti in Kabul as the Taliban take over the city, "as a swan song," the last thing they do before going underground. Artists depicting the Taliban regime negatively are under extra heightened threat, Shalizi said, but art, in general, is perceived as a threat by the Taliban. Even though the Taliban has implied that they will change this time around, let's hope that history doesn't repeat itself. Copenhagen city capital of Denmark has secured the top position in the "safest city in the world" study conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU). Japan's Tokyo city and Singapore have been knocked off first and second spots respectively in a ranking of the world's safest cities by Copenhagen and Toronto after environmental security was added as a criterion in the ranking. Meanwhile, the coronavirus pandemic forced everyone to rethink what it means for a city to be safe. Both Denmark's capital city Copenhagen took the top spot from Tokyo, and Toronto pushed Singapore from second to third position, performed significantly better on environmental security dealing with sustainability and climate adaptation measures than either Tokyo or Singapore. The fourth edition of the Safe Cities Index 2021 was released from The Economist Intelligence Unit, sponsored by NEC Corporation. The report is based on the fourth iteration of the index, which ranks 60 cities across 76 indicators covering digital, health, infrastructure, personal and environmental security. The fourth edition of the EIU's Safest City Index 2021 also included names of two Indian cities that secured their place among the top 50. Take a look at the world's safest cities in 2021: A newly married bride from Bihar, India, alleged she was kept as a virtual slave, and tortured and raped by her husband in the U.S. This is the dirty secret of our community: women who are completely at the mercy of their abusive husbands, and have little or no support to leave him, Puneet Ahluwalia, Indian American executive director of the South Asia Minorities Alliance Foundation, told India-West. (photo courtesy of Narika) This photo taken on Oct. 20, 2020 shows the U.S. Department of Justice building in Washington, D.C. A tech executive in Washington state, Mukund Mohan, was sentenced to two years for fraudulently getting $1.8 million in PPP loans. And Manish Lachwani, Indian American co-founder of Silicon Valley tech firm Headspin, has been charged with securities fraud. (Xinhua/Ting Shen via Getty Images) Woodbridge, VA (22192) Today Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 61F. Winds NW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 80%.. Tonight Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 61F. Winds NW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 80%. The Parent Teacher Student Association at the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology appears safe from being disbanded at least for now. Just last month, the TJ PTSA was on the verge of having its charter revoked by the Virginia PTA for hostile behavior and political conflict. If that happened, the TJ PTSA would have been disbanded and its assets, including $80,000 meant to fund student events, would have been seized. Since then, though, according to treasurer Himanshu Verma, the TJ PTSA has seen a dramatic turn of events. After months of allegations hurled from both sides, members of the executive committee held a meet-and-greet with the state PTA on July 21. Although nothing of substance was discussed, Verma says the meeting considerably improved relations between the two sides. After that meeting everything changed. It was a wonderful meeting, Verma said. We realized we're all human beings after all and everyone wants the same thing. It did not look like there was any contention between the VA PTA and us at that point. The PTSA dispute was the latest challenge at the magnet school, which draws students from across Northern Virginia. The school also has been involved in controversy around its change to admission policies last year. The July 21 meeting with the state group included once-removed PTSA president Bonnie Qin. Members of the TJ PTSA executive committee voted 3-1 on July 9 to remove Qin from her post for allegedly blocking access to communication channels. In response, the state PTA placed the organization on probation and ordered that they reinstate Qin by July 31. At the time, Harry Jackson who took over as president after Qins removal told InsideNoVa that the demands were unreasonable and that he was exploring ways to contest them. However, the TJ PTSA executive committee was eventually forced to give in. Any decisions that we took in the July 9 meeting are no longer valid, Verma said. In general, people agree that the decision to vote her out in that meeting was probably wrong, because it was not a special meeting. In order to vote out the president, you have to call a special meeting, and that requires a five-day notice. Qins return to her role as president didnt last long, though; she resigned July 28. Qin contended that other members of the executive committee refused to work with the state PTA unless she was no longer on the committee. Verna denies that allegation. Since a number of the current TJPTSA Executive Board Officers seemed to make removing [me] their condition for cooperating with the VA PTA Support Team, it is my sincere hope that my resignation will convince them to finally prioritize the communitys best interest over their own personal and political agendas, Qin wrote in an announcement to the general membership. After Qins resignation, Jackson ascended back into the role of PTSA president. In order to avoid being disbanded, the executive committee also invited vice presidents Li Yang and Jun Wang back onto the committee before the July 31 deadline. Yang and Wang previously resigned in early July due to internal conflict. The TJ PTSA will continue working with the state PTA as it awaits an end to its probation period. So far, the process has not been without bumps. On Aug. 8, Jackson sent an email to the general membership and the school principal in which he disapproved of a student orientation held by the TJ Alumni Action group, which consists of alumni in favor of recent changes to the admissions process. The state PTA reprimanded Jackson and the executive committee for the email. We will discuss this failure to adhere to terms of the probation letter regarding the call for meetings and the critical need to focus on mission-based activities as defined in the TJ PTSA bylaws with the Executive Committee during the next TJ PTSA EC meeting, the Virginia PTA wrote in an email on Aug. 10. Aside from raising concerns about student orientations, the TJ PTSA has restructured its committee system and appointed new chairs. Parent Elaine Maag said many of the events a TJ PTSA would normally organize at the start of a school year have not occurred. It's not clear to me what direction the PTSA is going, Maag said. I would have thought that wed be at the point where we would be learning about what the PTSA plans to do. Anuj Khemka is a senior at TJ and a member of the editorial board of tjTODAY. Two former top officials at a Massachusetts veterans home where nearly 80 residents died in one of the countrys deadliest COVID-19 outbreaks in a long-term care facility appeared in court Tuesday in an effort to have their criminal charges dismissed. Lawyers for former Holyoke Soldiers Home Superintendent Bennett Walsh and former Medical Director Dr. David Clinton argued on a number of motions to dismiss the case in Hampden Superior Court in Springfield. They maintained the state had not met its burden of proof for charging their clients with 10 counts each, including abuse, neglect, or mistreatment of an elderly or disabled person. We dont think anyone here should be blamed criminally for anything, Michael Jennings, a lawyer for Walsh, argued. The blame here belongs to the virus, not with anyone who worked in that nursing home. Prosecutors argued that the decision by Walsh, Clinton and other facility leaders to cram residents who were positive for the coronavirus into the same unit as those with no symptoms was negligent. The judge didnt immediately make a ruling, and another court date was set for the end of October. Walsh and Clinton have complained theyre being scapegoated by state officials. One of Walshs lawyers also suggested Tuesday that his clients effort to alert state officials relatively early in the crisis helped save lives by allowing the state to mobilize the National Guard. But an independent report commissioned by the state concluded that utterly baffling decisions made by facility administrators allowed the virus to spread unchecked last March as the pandemic took hold in the U.S. At least 76 veterans died from the virus over 11 weeks, and many more residents and staff were sickened. Earlier this month, veterans home workers filed a class-action suit against several members of the facilitys former leadership team, including Walsh and Clinton. The workers allege they were forced to care for sick and dying veterans, sometimes after testing positive themselves, in inhumane conditions. The workers argued in the lawsuit filed in federal court that Holyoke Soldiers Home administrators initially ignored guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for containing the virus and lied to state officials about measures they were taking to protect residents and staff once the first veteran tested positive in March 2020. Walsh, who resigned in October, declined to comment. Clinton strongly denied the allegations. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics COVID-19 Massachusetts Fire crews battled a blaze at the site of a former refinery in south Philadelphia that was the scene of a huge blaze two years ago. Police said fire crews were called just after 12:30 p.m. Monday to the former Philadelphia Energy Solutions site, which is now owned by a redevelopment firm. Two hours later, more units were summoned to the scene, police said. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that the blaze started inside an unused fuel storage tank being dismantled by welders. No injuries were reported and no evacuation or shelter-in-place orders were issued. More than 100 firefighters were reported at the scene before the blaze was declared under control at about 4:30 p.m. Monday. Philadelphia Energy Solutions shut down following a June 2019 fire and explosion, which injured five people, and declared bankruptcy shortly afterward. The refinery was the largest oil-processing facility on the East Coast and had been in operation for 150 years. In January of last year, Hilco Redevelopment Partners won an auction with a $240 million bid to acquire the 1,300-acre refinery. City officials said they had an aggressive timeline to clean up and redevelop the site into a mixed-use industrial facility. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Training Development More Canadian businesses will introduce COVID-19 vaccine mandates for their employees to safely return to the office amidst a growing fourth wave, the minister in charge of procuring inoculations said in an interview. Canadas five biggest banks last week said they would require employees working from their offices to be fully inoculated and some large Canadian businesses, including Shopify Inc and Sun Life Financial, have done the same. Though hospitals, some universities and even the Toronto police force are introducing mandates, many other companies have so far held off, or are not planning on requiring vaccinations, citing concerns over legal challenges. Anita Anand, who Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau calls his minister of vaccines, predicts more mandates are coming and said, in the end, the courts will rule that the pandemic was a justifiable reason for imposing them. This is just the beginning of what we are going to see going forward with large and small companies who want to get back to business as usual, Anand said in an interview after accompanying Trudeau to a rally in Newfoundland late Monday. We are going to see public organizations and companies, private companies, pension funds and other organizations, including nonprofits, going forward with some sort of mandatory vaccination policy. Despite 74% of Canadian residents getting at least one dose of a vaccine, cases have surged over the past three weeks due to the highly contagious Delta variant, according to a Reuters tally. Two days before calling a snap Sept. 20 vote, Trudeau mandated vaccinations for federal employees and domestic air and train travelers, thrusting the issue to the forefront of his election bid. There has been pushback. The largest union representing federal workers said the move should not be punitive and that accommodations like regular testing should be made, and Conservative Party leader Erin OToole has advocated for a similar compromise. The Toronto Police Association, a union representing 8,000 uniformed and civilian members of the police service, said it disagreed with the mandate. But more than 80% of Canadians said they supported Trudeaus vaccine mandates and would back them for healthcare workers and teachers as well, according to an Ipsos poll published on Aug. 19. Some 72% support vaccine passports for restaurants, gyms and other indoor spaces, a policy adopted in Quebec. Blue Jays, Pension Funds On Wednesday, the Toronto Blue Jays said they would require fans to be fully vaccinated or have a recent negative test to attend games at the ballpark from Sept. 13. Also on Wednesday, Air Canada said all employees and not just those already subject to the travel mandate must be vaccinated by Oct. 30 or their jobs could be terminated. Several pension funds contacted by Reuters said they were still mulling what measures to take to bring people back to their offices, including the Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP), Alberta Investment Management Corporation, British Columbia Investment Management Corporation, and OPTrust. But Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec (CDPQ), the countrys second biggest pension fund, ruled out a mandate. We strongly and openly encourage our employees to get vaccinated, but we cant force them, legally, to do so or even ask them for that matter, whether they will get vaccinated or if they are, said a spokesman for Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec (CDPQ). Anand, who was a professor of corporate and securities law at the University of Toronto for 25 years before entering politics, said the safety of the workforce would ultimately outweigh concerns over individual privacy rights. This is one sort of instance where the safety of the collectivity, and the society at large, is so important courts are going to see this as being a justifiable reason to collect data. (Reporting by Steve Scherer, additional reporting by Maiya Keidan; editing by Lisa Shumaker) Topics Canada Police and fire investigators say a fire at a northeast Missouri law firms office is being investigated as an arson. The fire was reported early Sunday at the Frick and Cundiff law office in Kirksville. Legal Assistant Paula Bradshaw said those responsible for the fire pried open a side door and set the fire near the firms computers, KTVO reported. The fire damage was contained to that area but smoke and fire damage was found throughout the building, Bradshaw said. The computer hard drives appeared to be salvageable and some legal documents were saved, she said. Fire Investigator Ray Jagger said the investigation is continuing, with assistance from the Missouri State Fire Marshals Office. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Law Enforcement Missouri Arson Four insurance firms Travelers, Coalition, Resilience Cyber Solutions and Vantage Group were among the participants in the White House summit on cybersecurity along with giant technology firms and Biden Administration officials. The federal government cant meet this challenge alone, President Joe Biden told the executives. You have the power, the capacity and the responsibility, I believe, to raise the bar on cybersecurity. White House, Big Tech, Insurers Vow to Raise the Bar on Cybersecurity Heres what the insurance firms said after the meeting about the role of the insurance industry and their own companys commitment to cybersecurity: Alan Schnitzer, chairman and chief executive officer, The Travelers Companies: Cybersecurity is one of the most pressing issues of our time, and we applaud President Biden for bringing experts and industry leaders together to address this growing threat. We are proud to join this critical discussion alongside our partners in government, technology, financial services and education, among others. According to the Travelers Risk Index, which surveys U.S. business leaders, cyber risk is the number one concern across companies of all sizes. At Travelers, we see firsthand the devastating effects that a breach can have on a business, and we understand that even small changes can have a big impact on data security. For instance, research suggests that implementing affordable mitigation controls, such as multifactor authentication, could prevent the vast majority of ransomware attacks. Adopting best practices for cyber hygiene will make our businesses and our country safer. At the White House, I highlighted the critical role that the insurance industry plays in strengthening Americas cybersecurity. Insurers help organizations manage cyber risk efficiently and effectively, including by conducting cyber risk assessments, advising on hardening cyber defenses and providing ongoing monitoring of cyber vulnerability. After a breach has occurred, insurers provide technical expertise and financial support to facilitate recovery. Working together, the industry can also identify and share trends in the cyber risk environment and promote the adoption of cybersecurity best practices. I also announced Travelers participation in the National Institute of Standards and Technologys initiative to develop a new framework for public and private entities to improve the security and integrity of the technology supply chain. Its an important step in enhancing the nations overall cybersecurity. Ultimately, the victims of cybercrime are people employees, customers and owners of businesses small and large, in every corner of the nation. Protecting their interests must be a priority, and I look forward to continuing to partner with the Administration and my colleagues who gathered today to do just that. From preparation and prevention to mitigation and recovery, Travelers is committed to helping individuals and businesses safely navigate the rapidly evolving cyber landscape. Joshua Motta, CEO and co-founder of Coalition, cyber insurance and security provider: Coalition discussed how cyber insurance can help solve the nations cybersecurity challenges by incentivizing the controls that reduce the likelihood or success of a cyber attack and providing a lifeline to those organizations that have had to file a claim. Motta said: Were honored to work with President Biden, the government, and other private sector leaders to tackle our nations cybersecurity challenges head on. As the threats from ransomware and other cyber crimes accelerate, small and midsize businesses cant be left to fend for themselves. It takes a broad combination of accessible technology and aligned incentives to keep these companies safe. Coalition also made a public commitment to offer its policyholder risk management platform, Coalition Control, to any business at no cost, effective immediately. The platform includes continuous attack surface monitoring, recommendations on how to close security vulnerabilities, and a downloadable risk assessment to help organizations control their cyber risk exposure. Coalition is making this risk management platform available at: coalitioninc.com/securityforall Vishaal Hariprasad, CEO, Resilience Cyber Insurance Solutions and Resilience: I share the goal of driving security standards up, but I also worry about withdrawing protection for victims who would otherwise externalize their crisis to the public, their employees, and their customers. When insurance is at its best, it is doing two things: it is paying covered claims, whether it is health, auto, or cyber insurance; and, it is pointing the way to those actions or steps that make bad things less likely to happen whether that be quitting smoking, wearing a seat belt, or deploying MFA. Our obligation is to do both. Resilience offered four key areas where industry and government can work together: Prioritize cyber hygiene Use the bully pulpit to encourage industry collaboration in raising awareness of its importance for general safety. Encourage more information sharing Both from industry to government and back from government to industry. Collaborate with the insurance industry To set minimum cybersecurity standards for critical infrastructure companies. Empower our industry with legal resources To go after cyber attackers. The insurance industry has historically been able to put incentives in place to change human behavior for the better. We saw this with fire, auto, and healthcare insurance. This is the role cyber insurance should play in security, Hariprasad said. Resilience made the following commitment in the federal governments mission to mitigate cyberthreats: Resilience, a cyber insurance provider, will require policyholders to meet a threshold of cybersecurity best practice as a condition of receiving coverage. The insurance industry is uniquely positioned to have a mutual stake in the fight against ransomware. We want our companies to be stronger, more cyber resilient, when partnered with us. If our clients get hit, the insurance pays that loss. Our clients cyber risk is our cyber risk. Simply put, Resilience believes that placing capital at risk without requiring action on behalf of the insured is a kind of moral hazard. Greg Hendrick, CEO, Vantage Group Holdings Ltd., a re/insurance firm: By tackling current issues that disrupt businesses and place assets at increased risk, leaders can better understand the potential impact of those risks. There is opportunity in proactively understanding and identifying ways to mitigate the outcomes of threats such as cyber security breaches. By broadly sharing data about those efforts in a consistent, organized way, we can gain valuable insights to help mitigate and avoid these risks. The team at Vantage approaches complex issues such as this with relentless curiosity and creativity. We are pleased to share perspectives through private/public partnerships like this that can accelerate improvements and achieve broad national impact. The insurance industry can play a vital role by bringing a more risk-based approach to providing coverage and pricing of cyber insurance. We need to be prepared and mitigate what has yet to be seen; a true catastrophic scenario where an attack is able to impact thousands of companies. While the federal government is prioritizing and elevating cybersecurity like never before, the private sector should be taking the same approach. Turning all the stones over and working together to help solve this complex, growing international threat is undoubtedly the best way forward. Topics Cyber The billionaire owners of OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma LP and lumber giant Georgia-Pacific are in high-stakes legal battles to shed billions of dollars of liabilities in bankruptcy the first over their companys alleged role in Americas opioid crisis and the second for 64,000 asbestos claims. If they are successful, it threatens to reduce the bargaining power of alleged victims of corporate abuse for years to come. The outcome could also benefit, Johnson & Johnson, which is fighting tens of thousands of health-related lawsuits. In New York, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain could rule as early as Thursday on whether to grant the Sackler family broad immunity to all current and future lawsuits related to the addictive painkiller. Meanwhile, in North Carolina, Georgia-Pacific is trying to use a strategy nicknamed the Texas Two-Step to rid itself of lawsuits related to asbestos, an industrial product that causes lung cancer, by siphoning them off to a unit. The two cases could tip bankruptcy rules in favor of companies and away from people trying to sue, Adam J. Levitin, a research professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said in an interview. They are trying to get the benefits of bankruptcy on the cheap, he said. Read more: Opioid Billionaires Face Final Test of Deal to Avoid Liability Companies have been using bankruptcy courts to consolidate their liabilities since the 1980s, applying the restructuring process to wipe out tens of thousands of lawsuits for less than the cost of litigating the claims individually in court. The recent cases threaten to set a precedent that other company owners could use as a legal hammer against victims during negotiations. The company is going to say, Here is the offer were going to give you. If you dont play nice we are going to use the bankruptcy process to, at the very least, drag this on for years. Now we all know how that will go. Its going to mean lower recoveries for tort victims, Levitin said. Purdue is asking a federal court to approve a landmark settlement that would hand all of its assets along with more than $4 billion from the Sacklers to cities, states and counties fighting the U.S. opioid crisis. To get the family on board, the court must agree to permanently insulate the owners from opioid lawsuits. In a written declaration to the court, David Sackler made clear that his family wont support the plan or pay the settlement amount unless all civil claims against us for Purdues Opioid-Related Activities are fully, finally and permanently released. Even after Purdue narrowed the legal releases sought by the Sacklers this week, the U.S. Trustee, a federal watchdog for corporate bankruptcies, continued to oppose the legal immunity, arguing it remains is too broad and vague. Representatives for members of the Sackler family either declined to comment or didnt reply to requests for comment. The family has previously denied wrongdoing. Texas Two-Step In asbestos cases, a strategy popped up a few years ago that came to be known as the Texas Two-Step. In step one, Georgia-Pacific, which is owned by Koch Industries Inc., incorporated in Texas, according to court documents. There, a business-friendly law lets a company conduct a so-called divisive merger to break itself into two parts. In one entity, Georgia-Pacific kept its most valuable assets, including its operating businesses. The other part was saddled with 64,000 asbestos claims and assets worth about $177 million, and then put into bankruptcy, according to court records. The restructuring left the new, smaller company, Bestwall LLC, a hollow shell, with no employees, no operations, no ongoing business, creditors who have attacked the maneuver said in a filing. The $177 million is a nearly inconsequential asset value when compared with what old GP would owe. Georgia-Pacific disputed the idea that its strategy would make it harder for asbestos victims to hold corporations accountable. Bestwall filed for bankruptcy to fairly and permanently resolve current and future asbestos claims, Georgia-Pacific representative Greg Guest said in an email. Bestwall has been working and will continue to work with representatives of current and future claimants who are appointed by the court to reach agreement on a global resolution that will pay legitimate asbestos claims in full. The case is months away from resolution as lawyers for asbestos victims and the company battle over arcane points of law. Read more: Judge to Consider Blocking J&J from Giving Talc Claims to Unit Meanwhile, asbestos victims who blame the talc in baby powder made by J&J were so concerned about the Texas Two-Step that they preemptively asked a federal judge to block the consumer products giant from doing it. J&J faces potentially billions in lawsuits from people claiming they developed ovarian cancer from baby powder tainted with asbestos. J&J shouldnt be blocked from using any legal strategy it believes will benefit it, company attorney Theodore E. Tsekerides said during a court hearing on Tuesday. Victim lawyers are wrongly assuming J&J will somehow hurt them with whatever tactics it chooses to employ in the future. They are prejudging their fight, Tsekerides told a judge in Wilmington, Delaware on Tuesday. They are saying whatever we do is harm. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Laurie Selber Silverstein said she would decide in the coming days whether to temporarily bar J&J from using the strategy. Johnson & Johnson hasnt really denied that this is a possibility, Silverstein said in court. There has been no denying that a Texas Two-Stepis within the realm of possibility. The company has won more than a half a dozen such cases at trial outside of bankruptcy court in recent years, but its also lost some, including a $2.1 billion award in 2018 to 20 women who sued in St. Louis. Cramdown Provisions When David Sackler took the stand in Purdues bankruptcy trial last week, he testified that his family could only free itself of all its legal woes related to the OxyContin maker if they get sweeping immunity as part of the case. I dont know of any other forum that would allow this kind of global solution, he said in court. Indeed, the linchpin of trying to win relief from future lawsuits in bankruptcy often comes down to so-called third-party releases, which raises the stakes for precedent-setting cases that risk tilting the scales against victims. These releases carry the ability to force a settlement onto holdouts. Once 75% of creditors who participate in a vote agree to back a deal, everyone else can be dragged along if the judge greenlights it. Outside of bankruptcy, theres no way to force someone to settle a case if they demand to go to trial. Its the only forum that can compel future demand holders to accept the payments, said former bankruptcy judge Judith K. Fitzgerald, who oversaw the reorganization of specialty chemical maker W.R. Grace & Co., one of the longest running asbestos-related bankruptcy case in history. Copyright 2021 Bloomberg. An explosion rocked an Alabama convention center, heavily damaging the building but causing no injuries, authorities said. The cause of the Monday night blast at Selmas convention center _ which was unoccupied at the time was not immediately known, Al.com reported. However, the preliminary investigation is pointing to a gas leak as the cause, Interim Selma Fire Chief Gabriel Sharpe told The Selma Times-Journal. It caused significant damage to the Carl C. Morgan Convention Center, Dallas County District Attorney Michael Jackson said. There is smoke and fire damage inside the building, Sharpe said. It also caused structural damage in the kitchen area in one corner of the building, he said. The force of the blast also shook the nearby Selma City Hall, Jackson told the Selma newspaper. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Alabama Crews with chainsaws and heavy equipment cleared their way through trees densely matted with vegetation, garbage and building debris Tuesday as searchers scoured a normally shallow creek for more flooding victims in rural Tennessee. Even cars and sheds were woven into the tangle of debris lining Trace Creek in Humphreys County, where the town of Waverly saw the most death and destruction from Saturdays flooding that killed 18 people. Three people remained unaccounted for Tuesday. At one bridge, an excavator crawled into the creek to dig through a debris plug that included large trees, huge spools of cable, panels of wooden fencing and chunks of concrete. Officers watched from above and downstream in case a body was uncovered. Other crews were working with chainsaws along the banks, clearing smaller objects. Several miles downstream, officers had deployed drones to help with the search. Its difficult to know how far the bodies might have been carried, but one car was found about a half-mile from where it had been parked, Humphreys County Chief Deputy Rob Edwards said. Sheriffs deputies and police were aided by crews from agencies all over the state, he said. The teams have cadaver dogs at the ready if they suspect a body might be nearby. With the heat in the mid-80s and rising, it was not difficult to detect the odor of decay, Edwards said, although crews also were finding animals. As the search for the missing continues, officials have started to comprehend the scope of devastation in the community. The Humphreys County Emergency Management Agency said in a news release that more than 270 homes had been destroyed and 160 have major damage. Some are just gone _ off the foundation _ twisted, turned, Humphreys County Sheriff Chris Davis said at the news conference. They would probably have to be totally destroyed before they could be built back. The sheer devastation that we saw in that helicopter ride yesterday has made me realize that we have got an extremely long road to go in all of this, he said. Authorities revised the confirmed death toll to 18 people Tuesday, a drop from as high as 22. Waverly police Chief Grant Gillespie said that one person in the emergency room who died of natural causes was mistakenly added to the count and John and Jane Doe victims were not crossed off the list once they were identified. Gillespie said authorities had detectives follow up on each case and confirm the numbers, which now line up with the state tally. Just an honest mistake, and I hope everybody understands that, Gillespie said. Its still a tremendous loss of life. I hope that number doesnt grow. Three people are still on the list of those missing who witnesses said they saw in the water, he said. The flooding took out roads, cellphone towers and telephone lines in the county of about 18,000 people, leaving some uncertain about whether family and friends survived the unprecedented deluge, with rainfall that more than tripled forecasts and shattered the states one-day record. It also left large swaths of the community about 60 miles (96 kilometers) west of Nashville suddenly displaced, leaving many to sort through difficult decisions about what comes next. GoFundMe pages sought help for funeral expenses for the dead, including 7-month-old twins swept from their fathers arms as they tried to escape. Matthew Rigney and Danielle Hall described to WTVF-TV how the water began to rage through their apartment as he held onto their twins and two other young children. The water, when it hit us it just pulled us under, all of us and we were trapped underneath a bed, Rigney told the station, his voice trembling behind tears. The other two children survived. I was trying to find all of them, and Leah came up like a big girl. You swam like a big girl, and Im so proud of you, Rigney said to 5-year-old Maleah, who sat with her family during the interview. A neighbor helped Rigney and the two children up to the roof. Hall was ultimately rescued from a tree by boat. School was canceled for the week, according to the sheriffs office. Waverly Elementary and Waverly Junior High had extensive damage, according to Kristi Brown, coordinated health and safety supervisor with Humphreys County Schools. About 750 customers were without power Tuesday, down from 2,000 the night before, utility officials said. Meanwhile, the state received approval from President Joe Biden for a major disaster declaration, which frees up federal aid to help with recovery efforts in Humphreys County, the White House said in a statement Tuesday. Sheriff Davis told reporters Tuesday, Youve seen us get a little emotional. You have to remember, these are people we know, peoples families, people we grew up with _ just the people of our small town. Its just very close to us. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Flood Tennessee A federal jury has denied a damage award to the family of a Livingston, Mont., man who was shot and killed by police in January 2016. The estate of Sean Patrick OBrien filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the City of Livingston and the officers involved in 2018. The family argued police were negligent, used excessive force and violated department policies. The family said OBrien was trying to run away when he was shot. But the city argued OBrien charged at officers with a knife in his hand. The jury placed 49% of the blame on the city and 51% on OBrien in a trial that concluded on Aug. 18. If the jury had assigned 50% of the blame to Livingston, OBriens family would have been allowed to recover some damages, The Billings Gazette reported. The shooting happened when officers responded to a Livingston store following reports of a man threatening employees. One officers used his stun gun on OBrien but it had no effect. Authorities say two officers opened fire on OBrien after he ignored repeated commands to stop moving, get on the ground and drop his weapon before running at officers with a knife. A coroners jury in 2016 determined the shooting was justified. Nate Wagner, who represented OBriens estate, said that while the jury found there was blame on both sides, officers could have acted to save OBriens life. At the same time, we believe the jurys determination that the officers were 49% responsible for Seans death sends a powerful message to law enforcement agencies in Montana, Wagner said. The City of Livingston avoided financial liability by the slimmest possible margin, and we hope this outcome will serve as a deterrent to the unnecessary use of deadly force by law enforcement officers against the citizens of Montana. The wrongful death lawsuit first went to trial in June. Jurors hearing the case in June were unable to reach a decision on the allocation of blame, resulting in a mistrial. A juror from that trial called Livingston officials and said there was one juror who insisted on assigning blame to the city, which led to the mistrial, City Attorney Courtney Lawellin said. Lawellin said she felt the decision in the second trial was actually a compromise to avoid another mistrial. However, there is no way to know that because Magistrate Judge Timothy Cavan ordered the jurors not to contact the parties in the case. We may never know what happened, in deliberations, Lawellin said. And I think that is certainly something that the public should know. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Lawsuits Montana New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas has retained California legal counsel on behalf of the state and filed for leave to submit an amicus curiae brief in the conservation proceedings over California Insurance Co. CIC continues to battle the imposition of a conservatorship by the California Department of Insurance to halt the redomestication, characterizing the CDIs move as misuse of a conservatorship, typically imposed on distressed carriers in danger of insolvency. Balderas, who successfully petitioned to file amicus briefs earlier on behalf of CIC in related federal cases, is now seeking to act in light of the problems caused for New Mexicos regulators in the redomestication process. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is expected to hear CICs appeal in its related federal cases on an expedited basis over the CDIs objections following an earlier ruling on procedural grounds. In 2019 CIC, as part of its buyout from Berkshire Hathaway, sought the CDIs permission to move to New Mexico, while New Mexico held a hearing to approve the change of domicile. Approval was unanimous, including that of CDI officials. CIC had begun to plan its move to New Mexico, when in November California regulators acted to block the move with the imposition of a conservatorship. A California federal court in April declined to get involved with a lawsuit that Applied Underwriters and the California Insurance Co. filed against the California Department of Insurance. California Insurance Company of New Mexico filed suit in federal court in January to enjoin the CDI from continuing to take what the suit asserts are illegal, actions to block the approved redomestication of CIC and to undermine a financially sound insurer by instituting a conservatorship to gain control of CIC. The suit came after the Office of the Superintendent of Insurance in New Mexico ordered CIC either to comply immediately with all regulations required under its approved redomestication to New Mexico or face financial penalties and possible revocation of the Companys Certificate of Authority. CDI got approval last year to place CIC in conservatorship and in January CDI filed a follow-up rehabilitation plan that would force CIC to sell its California business to another insurer. As A-rated CIC has attempted to complete its redomestication to New Mexico, the CDI has used every means, illegal and otherwise, to block the move, even as recently as its objection to the expedited hearing in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to further delay a hearing on the merits, CICs Executive Vice President and General Counsel Jeffrey Silver stated. We seek, after all of these processes, finally to discuss the actual merits before the court despite the CDIs efforts to the contrary. We were subject to the conservatorship with no hearing or procedural opening to state our case. Together with the appeals in federal court, the actions of Attorney General Balderas reflect the sentiment and opinion of many observers, including the media, that CDI appears to be exercising a vendetta against CIC, since New Mexico approved the move, as did the CDI, Iowa, Texas and other states. According to the documents filed by Balderas, the CDI has answered only that it sought the conservation order because CIC, attempted to merge its business with a New Mexico-based insurer without first securing the departments prior approval. CIC has argued that CDI officials were present at the administrative hearing in October 2019 in New Mexico and when given the opportunity did not object to the proposed merger. The carrier has also claimed that the CDIs proposed rehabilitation plan should be considered arbitrary and punitive. In his filing, Balderas observed that the conservation plan has effectively forestalled the merger, and has forced New Mexico officials to threaten regulatory action against the carrier, starting with a show-cause action against CIC, compelling the carrier to finalize its merger and prove it is legally allowed to do business in the state. That action prompted CIC to sue the CDI. The matter is now proceeding forward in three court actions, two federal, one state. The CDI issued the following statement on Thursday in response to the Balderas announcement: The Department took this conservation action under California law to protect California policyholders and we cannot comment on other states regulatory actions. Related: Topics California Mexico Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney will officially open Irelands embassy in Ukraine during a visit to the country. The minister said the move was part of the Governments strategy to double Irelands footprint on the world stage. Mr Coveney said: I am delighted to officially open the Embassy of Ireland in Kyiv. This marks a new stage in our bilateral relationship with Ukraine, through which we can deepen and widen our bilateral co-operation. I am glad also to be part of the international community which has convened to co-ordinate efforts to resolve the long-standing issue of the illegal annexation of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol. Mr Coveney will also meet his Ukrainian counterpart, foreign minister Dr Dmytro Kuleba, during his visit to Ukraine. The ministers will discuss a range of issues, including Covid-19 and the current situation in Crimea. Mr Coveney will also represent Ireland at the inaugural summit of the International Crimean Platform (ICP). The ICP has been established to further develop a co-ordinated approach by those in the international community who want to resolve the issue of the occupation of Crimea. While in Kyiv, Mr Coveney will take the opportunity to meet with representatives of the Irish community in the country. Concern has grown over the affiliate of the so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan, Isis-K, amid fears it could be planning a terrorist attack on Kabul airport. Who are Isis-K? Founded in 2015, Isis-K is the branch of the so-called Islamic State in the Khorasan region, which historically covers parts of Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan. It was formed initially by militants from Pakistan along with disaffected Taliban members and operates mainly in the north and east of Afghanistan, close to Kabul. A recent UN Security Council report suggested there were between 1,000 and 2,200 Isis-K fighters, down from a peak of between 5,000 and 6,000 in 2016, but their ranks may have been swelled in recent weeks as the Talibans advance saw prisoners freed across the country. A Taliban fighter stands guard at a checkpoint in Kabul, Afghanistan (Khwaja Tawfiq Sediqi/AP) What is Isis-Ks relationship with the Taliban and al Qaeda? Isis-K is hostile towards the Taliban due to its more extreme version of Islam and the two groups have previously fought over control of territory in Afghanistan. After the Talibans takeover of the country last week, the group reportedly executed a senior Isis-K commander who had been imprisoned in Kabul. The conflict between the two groups means that Isis-K is less likely to be bound by the Talibans agreement with Western forces to allow evacuations to continue from Kabul airport. Similarly, the relationship between Isis-K and al Qaeda is unlikely to be one of straightforward co-operation despite their similar beliefs, reflecting broader conflict between al Qaeda and IS globally. British nationals and Afghan evacuees depart a flight from Afghanistan at RAF Brize Norton (Jacob King/PA) What is the threat from Isis-K? Isis-K has carried out a number of high-profile attacks in recent years, despite reports its numbers had fallen thanks to military action by the US, Afghan forces and the Taliban. The group is thought to have carried out a devastating attack on a maternity hospital in Kabul in May 2020, killing 24 people including newborn babies and mothers. It has also claimed responsibility for several other attacks in Kabul, including an assault on the citys university last November and rocket attacks in the same month. Isis-K also claimed responsibility for an attack on Jalalabad prison last August. The group is clearly able to carry out deadly, complex attacks in the area and US secretary of state Antony Blinken described the threat of an Isis-K attack as a very real possibility. United States secretary of state Antony Blinken has said an attack by Isis-K is a very real possibility (Yui Mok/PA) But the former head of British forces in the country has said it might not be the main threat. Colonel Richard Kemp told BBC Breakfast on Thursday morning: That threat of terrorist attack, whether its from Taliban, the Islamic State, or al Qaeda, it could equally be all three of those groups. The fact that people are talking about Islamic State doesnt make that the most likely threat. President Joe Biden has vowed to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite a deadly suicide bomb attack at Kabul airport. He also promised to avenge the deaths, declaring to the extremists responsible: We will hunt you down and make you pay. Speaking with emotion from the White House, Mr Biden said the Islamic State groups Afghanistan affiliate was to blame for the attacks that killed 12 American service members and many more Afghan civilians. He said there was no evidence they colluded with the Taliban, who now control the country. (PA Graphics) We have some reason to believe we know who they are, he said of the bombers and gunmen involved. Not certain. As many as 1,000 Americans and many more Afghans are still struggling to get out of Kabul. Mr Biden was briefed on the attacks, which also killed dozens of Afghans and came 12 days into the rushed evacuation and five days before its scheduled completion. Some Republicans argued to extend the evacuation beyond next Tuesdays deadline. The US general overseeing the evacuation, Gen Frank McKenzie, said after the attacks: If we can find who is associated with this, we will go after them. He said it would be a mistake for the United States to call an early end to the evacuation, despite the risks. The administration has been widely blamed for a chaotic and deadly evacuation that began in earnest only after the collapse of the US-backed Afghan government and the Talibans takeover of the country. More than 100,000 people have been evacuated so far. Thursdays attacks were sure to intensify political pressure from all sides on Mr Biden, who already was under heavy criticism for not beginning the pullout earlier. He had announced in April that he was ending the US war and would have all forces out by September. House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy called for Speaker Nancy Pelosi to bring the chamber back into session to consider legislation that would prohibit the US withdrawal until all Americans are out. That is highly unlikely, and Ms Pelosis office dismissed such suggestions as empty stunts. At the Pentagon, Gen McKenzie said the military believes the attacks on the airports perimeter were carried out by fighters affiliated with the Islamic State groups Afghanistan arm. He said more attempted attacks were expected. After the suicide bombers attack at the airports Abbey Gate, a number of Isis gunmen opened fire on civilians and military forces, he said. There also was an attack at or near the Baron Hotel near that gate, he said. Mr Biden had pledged to get out of Afghanistan every American who wished to leave. As of Thursday, the State Department estimated there were as many as 1,000 Americans in Afghanistan who may want help getting out. Burma Civilians Used As Human Shield by Myanmar Junta Still Detained: Right Groups Regime troops in Kayah State. / FBR Fifteen civilians remain in military detention after at least 30 people were detained by Myanmars regime to use as human shields in fighting with resistance fighters in Kayah State earlier this month. Divisions 66 and 55 detained 30 civilians between August 13 and 18 from Demoso, Hpruso and Bawlakhe in Kayah State and Pekon townships in southern Shan State amid heightened military tensions with resistance fighters. The regime has released 15 detainees 10 from Pekon, three from Demoso and two from Hpruso but 15 others are still being held by the regime troops. I heard six taken from Demoso and eastern Hpruso are now in Loikaw after being used as human shields in different places. The regime is interrogating them in Loikaw, which may take four to five days. We will know only after interrogation if they will be released, said Ko Banyar, a spokesman for the Karenni Human Rights Group. The six were detained on August 14 as they returned to their villages to fetch food after fleeing their homes amid clashes. Two of the six were badly beaten as they were captured by junta troops and one of the six is a 15-year-old with health problems, according to the group. They were taken to the frontline for more than a week before being sent to Loikaw. The regime also detained a civilian from Demoso around the same time and his whereabouts are still unknown. A woman and seven men are reportedly being held by Light Infantry Battalion 531 based in Hpruso. They have been badly tortured, said the rights group, quoting witness accounts. Passers-by were seized by troops. They were tied in pairs and used as cover when soldiers entered villages. They were not fed properly. It is the terrible crime of kidnapping, using as human shields and slavery. It is a war crime under the Geneva Convention, said Ko Banyar. When asked by The Irrawaddy about the detained civilians, regime spokesman Major General Zaw Min Tun said: We dont arrest people for no reason. The only reason they were arrested is because they are linked to terrorist groups. When asked about the teenage detainee, he said: The 15-year-old might be involved with illegal groups and will face justice. Karenni civil society organizations have accused the regime of forcing civilians to serve as guides for regime troops and using civilians as human shields in fighting with resistance fighters since May. Among those forced to serve as guides were children as young as 15 and women, said the organizations. The Geneva Convention, which Myanmar has ratified, outlaws destroying civilian property, taking civilians hostages and compelling civilians to do work for military operations. You may also like these stories: Myanmar Seizes Around 150 Civilians in 10 Days Myanmar Ex-Dictator, Wife Leave Hospital After COVID-19 Diagnosis Karen Rebel Army Braced for Myanmar Juntas Major Offensive Burma Myanmar Junta Enacts Genocide Law A heavily-armed Myanmar army patrol in Maungdaw Township, Rakhine State near the border with Bangladesh on October 16, 2016. Myanmars military regime has added a genocide law to the countrys colonial-era Penal Code, a move being seen by legal experts as an attempt to ease international pressure on the regime as it faces a genocide charge at a United Nations court for its soldiers atrocities against the Rohingya. The new provisions published in junta-controlled newspapers threaten the death sentence for murders committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group. The provisions were signed by coup leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing on Tuesday. The addition to the Penal Code also carries a life sentence for other crimes committed with genocidal purpose. They include causing grievous hurt or serious mental harm to members of a group, deliberately inflicting on a group conditions of life calculated to bring its physical destruction in whole or in part, imposing measures, not in accordance with any existing laws, intended to prevent births within a group, and forcibly transferring children of a group to another group. The promulgation of the new genocide law coincided with an online campaign to mark the fourth anniversary of atrocities against the Rohingya, the stateless Muslim people in Rakhine State, in 2017. A Rohingya Genocide Remembrance Day was organized online on Wednesday, with many activists expressing their apologies to the Rohingya for failing to speak out while they were being persecuted by the Myanmar military. Over 700,000 Rohingya fled to neighboring Bangladesh after the military carried out clearance operations in Rakhine in response to the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Armys attacks on security outposts in August 2017. The Gambia, representing the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, filed a genocide case against Myanmar at the United Nations International Court of Justice (ICJ) in late 2019. However, both the then National League for Democracy government and the military denied the accusations of genocide. In January 2020, the ICJ ordered Myanmar to comply with four provisional measures as requested by The Gambia. The measures require that Myanmar take steps to prevent genocide from occurring in the future, as well as ensuring that the military and its affiliates do not commit further acts of genocide, in particular killing, causing serious bodily or mental harm, and preventing births. Myanmar is also required to preserve all evidence of genocide, and provide regular updates on its progress on these measures. One legal expert, who asked for anonymity, said that the military regime has enacted the genocide law to ease international pressure on it as it faces the genocide charge at the ICJ, but the move will not give the regime any protection from crimes it has previously committed. The law will not have an effect on things that happened before its enactment. This law should be accepted as it presents the opportunity for citizens, ethnic groups and religious organizations to open cases regarding genocidal crimes in the future, he added. The junta said it had enacted the genocide law because it was liable to do so after Myanmar ratified the Genocide Convention on December 30, 1949 and then became a member of the Convention in March 1956. As we are a member country, we have a responsibility to enact a law. So we have enacted a law to prevent and punish genocide, said the regime spokesperson, Major General Zaw Min Tun. The junta has also changed the Code of Criminal Procedures, which allows authorities to arrest genocide suspects without a warrant. People accused of genocide can no longer be bailed. They just want to show the international community that they are against genocide and are taking action to prevent it, said another legal expert. Meanwhile, the parallel National Unity Government (NUG) is also working to prosecute Myanmars military at the International Criminal Court (ICC). Myanmar is not an ICC member, but Acting President Duwa Lashi La of the NUG lodged a declaration with the ICC registrar last week, accepting the ICCs jurisdiction with respect to international crimes committed in Myanmar since July 1, 2002, the earliest date permitted by the Rome Statute that established the ICC. To mark Rohingya Genocide Remembrance Day, the NUG Deputy Minister for Women, Youths and Children Affairs, Daw Ei Thinzar Maung, called on Myanmar people to show sympathy for the traumatic experiences Rohingya women and children and other ethnic minorities have suffered. She also urged them to protect the vulnerable and to speak out for them to prevent genocidal acts from occurring in the future. You may also like these stories: Civilians Used As Human Shield by Myanmar Junta Still Detained: Right Groups Myanmar Seizes Around 150 Civilians in 10 Days Myanmar Ex-Dictator, Wife Leave Hospital After COVID-19 Diagnosis Burma Myanmars Ties With Russia Deepening Since Coup: Military A Russian military delegation with Myanmars Defence Minister General Mya Tun Oo (left) during Myanmars Armed Forces Day parade in March in Naypyitaw. Myanmars bilateral relations with Russia have reached a new level since the February coup, said the regimes spokesman Major General Zaw Min Tun. The two countries maintained good relations under the National League for Democracy government but relations with Russia are deeper now. Russia plays the central part in Myanmars air defense systems, followed by China. And the cooperation between the air forces is expanding, said the spokesman. Maj-Gen Zaw Min Tun praised Russia for its advanced weapons technology. The junta wants a world-class Russian air defense system, he added. A military delegation from Myanmar, led by General Maung Maung Aye, chief of the general staff, was in Moscow to attend the International Military Technical Forum Army 2021 and participate in the International Army Games. The general met Russian deputy defense minister Alexander Fomin on Monday. The two sides discussed military and technical cooperation and ways to deepen military relations, according to the Russian media. The deputy minister called Myanmar a reliable ally and strategic regional partner. Gen. Maung Maung Aye, one of the militarys rising stars, will reportedly inspect Sukhoi Su-30 fighters which Russia is yet to deliver to Myanmar, Orlan-10 drones and the Pantsir-S1 air-defense missile-gun system. Myanmar ordered six Sukhoi Su-30SM fighter jets in a contract worth about US$204 million in 2018. During his two-day visit to Naypyitaw in January, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu pledged to sell air defense weaponry to Myanmar. Some of the weapons have already reportedly arrived in Myanmar and training has begun for military personnel for the equipment. Since the coup, Fomin visited Myanmar in March and coup leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing attended the international security conference in Moscow and visited several places, including arms factories, in Russia. Other high-level military delegations from Myanmar have visited Russia. Gen. Maung Maung Kyaw, the air force chief, also visited Moscow. The regime is reportedly planning to send civilians for scholarships in Russia, besides its military trainees. Political analyst Dr. Khin Zaw Win said Myanmar had moved back into the influence of Russia and China since the coup, and away from western countries. Myanmar will become a pariah again, like under former military dictator Senior General Than Shwe, he said. The military regime can only rely on China and Russia now. The regime also gets help from India and Thailand as secondary sources. Russia has become the main country that helps the junta. It recognizes the regime, continues to help and sell it weapons, Dr. Khin Zaw Win said. Russia will grab the market from China. The Russian navy wants access to the Indian Ocean. Russia has a big navy but struggles to reach it. China and the US already have forces in the ocean, he added. While the international community has been cautious in engaging the military regime, Russia has been publicly cooperating with the junta. Analysts say Russia primarily wants a market for its weapons. You may also like these stories: Myanmar Junta Enacts Genocide Law Civilians Used As Human Shield by Myanmar Junta Still Detained: Right Groups Myanmar Seizes Around 150 Civilians in 10 Days Guest Column Afghanistan, Myanmar Crises Test Indias Neighborhood First Policy Myanmar military chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing (left) and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi meet in New Delhi in 2019. / Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaings website Two of Indias key neighborsMyanmar to the southeast and Afghanistan to the northwestare in turmoil. The biggest South Asian power and the worlds largest democracy, India has over the years engaged with these two nations to varying degrees to aid in their democratic transitions. But coincidentally, history is repeating itself and democracy is in disarray in both countriesthe military has seized power in Myanmar by overthrowing a democratically elected government and the Taliban insurgents have taken over in Afghanistan. The question that is being discussed in foreign policy circles is whether New Delhi could have played some proactive role to stop the upheavals in the two countries, and if it can still prevent them from turning into pariah states. There is no easy answer to those questions, but one thing is clear: The crises in Afghanistan and Myanmar have put the Narendra Modi governments much-publicized Neighborhood First policy to the test. And Indias lack of engagement with the interim regimes in both Kabul and Naypyitaw could allow China to increase its influence over them. Indias experiments in Afghanistan The swift and sudden takeover of Kabul by the Taliban has taken the entire world by surprise. Seen as an intelligence failure of epic proportions, countries have squarely blamed the US for its hasty exit from the war-torn country, thereby leaving the common Afghans to the mercy of trigger-happy Afghan warlords. There was no way India could have predicted such an event given that New Delhi has always opted to play what is called soft diplomacy in the South Asian nation, focusing more on people-centric relations, rather than hardcore military and intelligence-sharing cooperation. Buoyed by Americas war on terror in Afghanistan, launched in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, New Delhi invested more than US$3 billion in rebuilding the war-ravaged nation. It has completed various infrastructure development projects, including the Salma Dam, a hydropower project in Herat province; the Zaranj-Delaram highway close to the Iran border; and the Afghan Parliament building, besides hospitals and schools. Its worth mentioning that India was the first country to resume its diplomatic mission in Afghanistan in November 2001. And ironically, it is one of the first countries to have begun the process of shutting down consular services. For instance, India operated four consulates in Afghanistan, of which twothe ones in Jalalabad and Heratwere closed last year, purportedly due to the COVID-19 pandemic and not because of any direct threat from the Taliban. The Kandahar and Mazar-e-Sharif consulates were shut in the past one month or so. New Delhi finally evacuated all personnel from its Kabul embassy after the Taliban captured the capital city. India-Afghan ties Historically, the two countries have maintained warm and friendly ties. Afghanistan has been in turmoil for almost four decades due to a mix of internal and external factors, but this has not deterred India from engaging with successive governments barring the last Taliban regime, prior to 2001. The ousted president Ashraf Ghani maintained close relations with New Delhi as he realized that Pakistan and China were not interested in solving Afghanistans problems. However, China has been quick to fill the void created after the US exit from the South Asian country. Days before the fall of Kabul, Beijing hosted a Taliban delegation in the Chinese city of Tianjin. It is believed China is keen on investing in mineral-rich Afghanistan in a big way. For this, the communist country has sought assurances from the Taliban that it will ensure security and stability in the region and curb the activities of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, a UN-designated terrorist outfit that seeks to establish a Uygur state in Chinas western province of Xinjiang. India too has some old contacts in the Taliban. Taliban spokesperson Sohail Shaheen was seen on Indian television on various occasions and Sher Abbas Shanikzai, head of the Talibans Doha office, has referred to his training at the Indian Military Academy several times. It seems India could easily leverage these old contacts. Earlier this year, Qatar allowed the Taliban to set up an office in the capital city Doha to facilitate peace talks with the US and countries seeking to contact the Taliban. In June, Indias External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar visited Doha as New Delhi was seeking Qatari assistance to create a ground for India-Taliban relations. Challenges before India Coming back to the question of whether India can still do some diplomatic maneuvers with respect to Myanmar and Afghanistan, one can only be hopeful that all is not lost yet. New Delhi just needs to play its cards carefully. On civil war-hit Myanmar, Indias position continues to be ambiguousit has not officially condemned the Feb. 1 military coup, although New Delhi has called for an end to the ongoing violence and bloodbath. On Aug. 17, India chaired a closed UN Security Council meeting on Myanmar and welcomed the ASEAN five-point consensus, even as dissenting voices started to emerge from within the bloc. According to New Delhi-based foreign policy analyst Prakash Nanda, there has not been any major shift in Indias foreign policy vis-a-vis Myanmar and Afghanistan for decades. The Modi government has continued the same foreign policy as was envisaged by the previous United Progressive Alliance government. In a nutshell, India continues to play soft diplomacy, when it comes to countries like Myanmar and Afghanistan, Nanda, who has authored several books on Indias foreign policy, told this writer. Explaining further, Nanda said India does not want to disturb its military ties with Myanmar, a reason why New Delhi has so far desisted from openly criticizing the junta. India needs Myanmars cooperation to rein in the northeastern rebel groups operating from that country. Besides, India has invested in infrastructure projects in the neighboring country and hence, it is walking a diplomatic tightrope. However, the China factor will haunt New Delhi if the Myanmar crisis persists for a longer period. After all, communist China could wield far greater influence over the military rulers in Naypyitaw in the long run than a democratic India can. Jayanta Kalita is a senior journalist and author based in New Delhi. He writes on issues relating to Indias northeast and its immediate neighborhood. The views expressed are his own. You may also like these stories: Need to Counter China Will Make It Hard for Asian Powers to Shun Myanmar Junta US Vice Presidents Visit to SE Asia Sends Signals to ASEAN Public Facing an Unprecedented Threefold Tragedy: Myanmars Shadow Govt Must Work With Ethnic Civil Groups Yangon, Myanmars business hub, has been hit hard by the third wave of COVID-19 infections. In July, 6,000 people died, making it the deadliest month since the coronavirus outbreak was first reported in Myanmar in late March last year. Amid the surge in cases, volunteers from charity services in the city have endured unprecedented conditions. They are being called round the clock by COVID-19 patients desperate family members seeking to get their sick relatives to a hospital, find emergency supplies of medical oxygen for them, or to transport their bodies to cemeteries for cremations or burial services. On some days, crematoriums are jammed with bodies, mostly of people who died of COVID-19. Sometimes, the volunteers even keep night vigils for elderly patients who live alone. They called us for urgently needed oxygen. After we dispatched the tanks, the old couple begged us not to leave them as they had no one else in case of an emergency. So we had to sleep right in front of the house, a volunteer recalled. Given their constant physical proximity with COVID-19 patients, volunteers admit they have to disinfect their hazmats and reuse them due to a shortage of personal protective equipment. They no longer return to their homes, but stay in lodgings at their office lest they spread the virus to their family members. As the infection and death rates have abated somewhat for the moment, volunteers in Yangon are less busy than during the peak period, but still have to respond to people reaching out to them. They offer a hand helping to refill oxygen tanks at plants and getting them delivered to homes on request. They also transport people to COVID centers and of course bodies to cemeteries. But the number is relatively low now. As of Wednesday, Myanmar had reported a total of 309,032 COVID-19 cases and 14,737 deaths. Huntsville, TX (77320) Today Scattered thunderstorms early, then becoming clear after midnight. Low 76F. Winds S at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms early, then becoming clear after midnight. Low 76F. Winds S at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%. GUEST INTERVIEW: Logitech has launched secure new enterprise-class wireless technology to protect the transmissions between Logitech's new range of MX Master Series and Ergo Ergonomic Series keyboards and mice with the enterprise-level security offered by Logi Bolt. Like a bolt from the blue, lightning has struck the innovators at Logitech, whose new, high-performance, secure wireless Logi Bolt technology provides cross-platform compatibility to power a new product suite that will revolutionise enterprise IT. Through its secure wireless connection and robust signal, we're told Logi Bolt not only addresses productivity, but also "endpoint vulnerability challenges that continue to burden Australian enterprises." Logitech explains its technology "enables device connection using Logi Bolt USB receivers, or through Bluetooth Low Energy wireless installed on the host computer, both of which offer Mode 1, Level 4 grade secure connections. "In addition to offering a secure connection, Logi Bolt powered USB receivers provide strong, drop-off free connection up to 10 meters, even in congested wireless environments. It also boasts on average up to eight times lower latency than others deployed in noisy enterprises." Logitech Australia's B2B & Education Partner Manager, Ross Hewitt, joined us to explain the new technology in a video interview embedded immediately below, after which you'll find commentary from General Manager of B2B for Creativity and Productivity at Logitech, Joseph Mingori, followed by a summary of the topics I spoke about with Ross, and Logitech's FAQ on the technology: General Manager of B2B for Creativity and Productivity at Logitech, Joseph Mingori said at its core, "Logi Bolt will not only support enterprises with addressing integration and security challenges, but it will also enhance overall employee experience." Mingori added: For decades, consumers have trusted Logitech to deliver products that help them create, communicate, work and learn at home and on-the-go. Now we look to expand that expertise to employers and offer a stellar employee experience as they evolve their requirements in a rapidly changing landscape. We have redefined our enterprise offering to support individual work setup solutions on a global scale while launching our new, wireless technology solution - Logi Bolt - enabling secure and robust connections to meet todays evolving business needs. These offerings prioritise the needs of enterprise IT to keep their diverse workforces productive, collaborative and secure no matter where they work." There's plenty more information below, but first, here's a summary of the topics I spoke about with Ross Hewitt: I started by introducing Ross, welcoming him to the program, and asking him to explain the new Logi Bolt technology. I then asked Ross about the MouseJack vulnerabilities discovered in 2016 for a range of wireless keyboard and mouse vendors, and the 2019 vulnerability discoveries, which Logitech has supplied patches for here - and which everyone using Logitech wireless keyboards and mice purchased in the past should check for, although current products on sale have already all been patched with firmware updates. You can get Logitech firmware updates here. We discussed Bluetooth security and the security Logi Bolt uses, as well as Logi Bolt's ability to overcome traditional wireless congestion. Ross then explained what new devices were on offer and when they'll be on sale, followed by a a range of stats on productivity with mice compared to trackpads, and other findings around working from home, ergonomics and more. We discussed the improved cross platform compatibility, the types of USB connectors in use, whether computer manufacturers might ever build Logi Bolt technology in, and what the chances were that Logitech might seek to do some marketing deals with Usain Bolt or Andrew Bolt. Ross then answered my questions about his first computer, memories of his first wireless keyboard and mouse, his own history in the world of tech, his thoughts on the future, great advice received in life, and his final message to iTWire viewers and readers, as well as Logitech's current and future customers and partners. Naturally, to coincide with the launch of Logi Bolt, the company has introduced a suite of five new devices that leverage the technologys cross-platform compatibility. Among the new devices is the MX Keys for Business keyboard and the ergonomic K860 Split Keyboard for Business. {loadposition alex08} Logi Bolt works with operating systems and platforms, including but not limited to: Windows, macOS, iOS, iPadOS, Linux, Chrome OS and Android. Logitech says that "by providing reliable connections it allows IT managers to efficiently source, purchase and distribute without fearing compatibility or connectivity issues." Logitech devices featuring Logi Bolt technology are coming soon and will be available to purchase through Logitech resellers across Australia, with more on Logitech for Business here. The new devices are as follows, with RRP pricing yet to be released but which will be available soon. Master Series MX Keys Combo for Business Master Series MX Keys for Business Master Series MX Master 3 for Business Master Series MX Anywhere 3 for Business Ergonomic Series ERGO K860 Split Keyboard for Business Ergonomic Series ERGO M575 for Business Logitech's Logi Bolt FAQ: Logi Bolt is Logitechs next generation wireless technology that enables secure, wireless device connection and powers a new, high-performance product suite featuring cross-platform compatibility. How does Logi Bolt enable enterprise security? Logi Bolt was designed to address growing security concerns resulting from an increasingly mobile workforce working from home being an obvious example. The Logi Bolt wireless connectivity technology offers secure and robust device connections to meet todays evolving business needs. In a world where remote and working is encouraged, theres a rising risk in cyber security. Secure wireless mice and keyboards are essential to enable effective enterprise security safeguards. Logitechs mice and keyboards featuring Logi Bolt connectivity offer robust and reliable wireless performance, next-level compatibility and Security Mode 1, Level 4 when connected via a tiny Logi Bolt USB receiver. How does Logi Bolt enable high performance and productivity? The right work set up can make a world of difference to ergonomic comfort, productivity and performance. But, with employee needs varying by job, role, work location and personal preference, finding an enterprise solution that sets everyone up for success can be a minefield. With Logitechs diverse line-up of mice and keyboards for business, organisations can cater to diverse workforces with one secure, globally available and cross-platform-compatible standard. Highly-specialised workers such as coders, creators, and analysts need highly-specialised work setups. Mice and keyboards in Logitechs Master Series for Business are backed by decades of research and development to deliver an extra level of focus, precision and accuracy. Further, logitech conducted an Ergonomic Lab Study with 23 participants in October 2019 and found that people are: 50% more productive with a mouse compared to a trackpad, and 30% faster with a mouse compared to a trackpad. What are the key features IT managers need to know about? Logi Bolt is LogitechR proprietary wireless technology based on BluetoothR Low Energy 5.0. Logi Bolt wireless mice and keyboards are ideal for environments where corporate policy does not permit use of BluetoothR connections. Though Logi Bolt is based on Bluetooth, it is an end-to-end closed system where a Logi Bolt receiver is emitting an encrypted signal that only connects with Logi Bolt products. So the Logi Bolt USB receiver cant be paired with any non-Logi Bolt device. And because Logi Bolt works with most enterprise operating systems and is securely paired right of the box, it makes procurement and set up that much easier. Logi Bolt features a secure connections only mode Logi Bolt wireless devices actively use the security services introduced in Bluetooth Low Energy Core Specification 4.2 combined with additional Logitech features designed to reduce vulnerability when devices are paired to a Logi Bolt USB receiver. When paired with a Logi Bolt receiver, Logi Bolt wireless products use Bluetooth security mode 1, level 4 (also known as Secure Connections Only mode), which is U.S. Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) compliant. Logi Bolt overcomes wireless congestion Logi Bolt USB receivers provide a strong, reliable, drop off free connection up to 10 meters (33 feet)1 even in congested wireless environmentswith a lower average latency than other commonly deployed wireless protocols for enterprise. What is employee demand for an ergonomic keyboard and mouse? Logitech conducted a proprietary, quantitative research project with decision makers and end users in 2019 and found that 9 out of 10 people who switch to an ergonomic keyboard or mouse never switch back to traditional models. Further, in 2020 Logitech conducted another research project to gain insights into working from home practices. Key findings indicated that: 33% of people who work from home feel pain/discomfort in their shoulders, 38% feel pain/discomfort in their necks, and 41% feel pain/discomfort in their backs. Notably, those who are new to working from home are 30% more likely to report pain/discomfort in their necks than those who worked from home prior to COVID-19. This insight led to the development of the new Ergonomic Series with ERGO K860 Split Keyboard for Business and ERGO M575 for Business, both of which have been released with Logi Bolt. Where can IT managers purchase Logi Bolt products from in Australia? Logi Bolt products can be purchased from your preferred Logitech reseller in Australia. The Australian Securities Exchange (ASX), a market operator and payments system facilitator for buyers and sellers, has consolidated its data architecture and modernised its core systems to achieve resiliency. Maintaining the ASXs leadership and keeping its financial system under one roof was challenging. Thus, it required a modernised infrastructure that its legacy systems could not provide. "We are replacing and modernising every layer of technology, and we see that as fundamental to the way that we'll deliver services now and, in the future," explains ASX chief information officer Dan Chesterman. Building a modernised global financial exchange: Project Hubble The company underwent end-to-end transformation using microservices, containers, and Apache Kafka messaging support from software company TIBCO. ASX has also commissioned TIBCO's Project Hubble, which is creating a shared data processing foundation, one central platform with a robust and future-proof technology core. "We are in the midst of a quite significant renewal of our technology platforms. We've replaced a lot of underlying infrastructures, implemented a new secondary data centre that we use for fast recovery, and implemented a new virtual platform, Chesterman explains. ASX says the new implementations will keep the company at the forefront of the financial services industry for years to come. While ASX has used TIBCO's products for several years to integrate its systems, its visual analytics platform helped inform complex business decisions. ASX launched its new DataSphere product that helps customers make more informed decisions. DataSphere: Securities data-as-a-service With its new core data infrastructure, ASX examined how it could derive more value from the huge volumes of data flowing through its systems. ASX then deployed data-as-service solution DataSphere, which unites a community of data providers, experts, and insight seekers in a platform fuelled by data science and visual analytics. DataSphere will provide a new revenue source for ASX, a range of financial insight products that can be purchased on a web store. Customers can buy ASX data to see a company's performance in the context of the entire market. In one platform, it combines datasets, analytics tools, data governance, and commercial opportunities. Users can gain immediate insights, customise their models, and commercialise their data through the ASX platform. DataSphere has built-in measures to ensure that data is used as intended, which aligns with the company's mission to provide superior ethical governance. As stated in ASXs 2020 annual report: Managing and protecting our data, and that of our customers, is critical to maintaining trust and confidence in Australia's financial markets and strengthening the resilience of our operations." Increasing operating resilience and reliability According to ASX, it has made significant improvements to its operational resilience via its Building Stronger Foundations program in recent years. The program has seen customer-facing incidents fall approximately 78% from 2016 levels, and outages across its five main market systems are at their lowest levels since 2006. The market operator continues to progress its multi-year technology investment program, which will reduce the average age of its equity technology stack from 11 years in 2019 to four years by 2023. Service is trending up ASX processes more than 100 million messages a day since its partnership with TIBCO. Chesterman says that the expectations for operational resilience are ever increasing. "The consequence of a failure is higher now, and regulations are more stringent, which I don't think is inappropriate. Over the last three years, we've increased the number and the velocity of changes by about 30% per month, and at the same time, weve decreased the number of customer-impacting security and regulatory incidents by about 30%, Chesterman explains. While technology issues cannot be completely eliminated, ASX has done much in recent times to reduce the risk of their occurrence, and the company is committed to improving and enhancing its platforms and processes. We're making constant improvements and having fewer operational incidents that affect the customer," Chesterman adds. Intelligent solutions to build tomorrow's economy Modern infrastructure and new data offerings have helped ASX achieve its goal of running important services faster and more securely. This removes the friction in the exchange process, enabling commerce to run less expensively with less risk. "We fundamentally believe that organisations can succeed in the new digitised economy by addressing the hard task of modernising an infrastructure's core to make it more flexible and resilientwhich is central to future success," concludes Chesterman. ASX built a modern data infrastructure to meet its business design and profitability goals. It improved performance, stability, integrity, and resilience, leading in the region and infusing confidence into financial markets and made possible by TIBCO. The Victorian Government is putting $73 million into the Victorian NBN State Program Fund to help finance new network infrastructure in certain parts of the state. The money, to be held on trust by NBN Co, will be used to support selected area switch technology change programs. In return, NBN Co will co-fund projects that deliver positive outcomes to Victorian communities and a threshold commercial return to the company. The first project is to create eleven new NBN Business Fibre Zones in Benalla, Colac, Cranbourne South, Dromana, Hamilton, Lara, Pakenham North, Pakenham South, Portland, Warragul and Wonthaggi-Inverloch. This makes a total of 295 zones around Australia, covering more than 860,000 business premises. The new zones will allow RSPs to offer business-grade fibre connections to approximately 10,000 Victorian businesses in these areas at no upfront build cost from NBN Co, and no upfront connection cost if the RSP signs up for a three-year Enterprise Ethernet plan. Enterprise Ethernet combines the highest wholesale upload speed tiers with dedicated onshore support for providers via the Business NBN Operations Centre. Options include prioritised data, high capacity symmetrical wholesale download and upload speed tiers from 10Mbps to close to 1Gbps. The initiative will reduce the price variation for business broadband services in regional and rural areas compared to CBD zones. Eligible Enterprise Ethernet customers within NBN Business Fibre Zones will see prices based on the same wholesale charge applicable to customers in CBD Zones. "We are delighted to work with the Victorian Government to identify opportunities to co-invest in the development and delivery of new NBN network infrastructure to support the Connecting Victoria Program," said NBN Co CEO Stephen Rue. "Small and medium businesses are the backbone of our great nation. And ongoing network investment to enhance digital infrastructure in Victoria will create jobs both in the medium term during the design and construction process, and over the long-term by stimulating greater productivity and the proliferation of a stronger, more vibrant digital economy in Victoria." He added "When we made a substantial commitment to network upgrades towards the end of last year, we also announced that this would include significant funding to be made available for co-investment opportunities with state and territory governments and local councils. "The Victorian Government has been the first to seize this opportunity, and the program we have announced today fits perfectly with the Victorian Government's overall $550 million Connecting Victoria Program." The Minister for Communications, Urban Infrastructure, Cities and the Arts Paul Fletcher said "Network investment in digital infrastructure in Victoria will create jobs both in the medium term, during the design and construction process, and over the long-term, by stimulating new businesses and greater productivity." This Week in Review A weekly review of the best and most popular stories published in the Imperial Valley Press. Also, featured upcoming events, new movies at local theaters, the week in photos and much more. We plan to travel and stay overnight. We are planning a day trip. We plan to entertain family and friends at home. We are going to stay home with those in our household, for safety. We're planning a streaming binge all weekend. We have plans to do something not listed here. We don't have any plans... yet. Vote View Results Services for Robert Kesinger, 67, of Alto Will be Thursday August 26th at 10am at the O.T. Allen and Son Chapel. Visitation will be one hour prior to services at the funeral home. Interment will follow services at Old Palestine Cemetery in Alto. Robert Kesinger was born May 18th, 1954 in Rus Donate Now As a public service during this pandemic, the Jewish News is providing free, unlimited access to all articles. Jewish News is a nonprofit publication that is owned by the community and relies on community support. Alexander has reported on courts and crime since June 2021. A fan of all things outdoors, he came to Teton County after studying journalism at Northwestern University. Evan Robinson-Johnson covers issues residents face on a daily basis, from smoky skies to housing insecurity. Originally from New England, he has settled in east Jackson and avoids crowds by rollerblading through the alleyways. President Joe Biden says the United States will complete its evacuation of Americans and others from Kabul, despite the attack that killed at least 13 U.S. service members and many Afghan civilians During session, Eric can be found at the Capitol in Hartford, reporting the information that readers want and need to know. For insights and updates on legislation, politicians, committees, and commissions that affect the entire state of Connecticut, follow Eric on Twitter: @BednerEric. The death of the Lion of Chad has rekindled the burning question of reparations for his victims. Hissene Habres 2015 trial of before the Extraordinary African Chambers (EAC) in Dakar, where he had gone into exile, was seen as a model of justice and a relief for Chadians. Justice was done by an African court conducted by Africans in Africa. And in a rare event, a former head of state was sentenced to life imprisonment outside his country for serious violations perpetrated against his own population, after a trial in which victims voices were central. But their satisfaction was soon tinged with bitterness, as there was no sign of the substantial financial compensation that the EAC granted them. The special court in Dakar ordered Habre to pay no less than 82,290 billion CFA francs (124 million euros) to 7,396 civil parties. Aware that Habres assets would not be enough, the judges delegated the implementation of the reparations to a Victims Compensation Fund to be managed by the African Union the institution that set up the EAC after a 2012 agreement with Senegal. Habres villa seized but not sold More than four years after the reparations decision, the fund exists only on paper. The court ruling confirmed that two bank accounts and a villa in Dakar belonging to the former president had already been confiscated during the investigation of his case. Surprisingly, this property (a land title of 1,336 m2, according to the judgment) has still not been put up for sale. Even more surprisingly, the civil parties did not request the execution of this part of the EACs judgment. The High Court in Dakar was designated by the EAC to hear any matters arising after the EACs dissolution. A Senegalese magistrate who wished not to be named said he was surprised by the lawyers inaction: I dont understand. Legally, there was nothing to prevent action. It was possible to request the sale of the property and place the money in escrow if still waiting for the activation of the Fund. No request has been filed in the Senegalese courts, Yare Fall, former Senegalese lawyer for two Chadian victims organizations before the EAC confirmed to Justice Info. His colleague Assane Dioma Ndiaye, who represented a third Chadian organization in Senegal, also confirmed this. He said that the issue was raised during an informal discussion between civil parties. Ndiaye cites strained relations between the Chadian organizations as a reason for the inaction, but Fall doesnt think the approach is relevant. The value of his house in Cite Africa and his few frozen bank accounts is derisory and would be of no use to the victims, he says, given the amount of compensation ordered. I hope Habres death will draw attention Reed Brody, former legal advisor to Human Rights Watch during the trial, disagrees. The villa, located in the chic Dakar neighborhood of Ouakam, has been valued, he said: The value of the building was estimated at the time at about 445,400,000 million CFA francs (680,000 euros), and then there are the two bank accounts, the amount of which was not specified. For Brody, there is no doubt this money could be a good start for the Fund. The American lawyer does not explain why no action has been taken. Brody says he learned of Habres death just as he was holding a conference call with victims lawyers on how to speed up the reparations process. Habres death wont change anything, he says, except that I hope it will draw attention to the plight of the victims. It was through their actions that two historic things were done. A dictator was tried. And this is the first time in history that victims mobilized to get a dictator tried in a country other than their own. You could say they did the work of international justice. 300 victims dead since end of trial Clement Abaifouta, a victim who was arrested by Habres political police in 1985 and forced to work as a gravedigger during his detention, recalls a visit to Dakar by Jacqueline Moudeina, the Chadian lawyer for the civil parties, after the verdict, to meet with the judicial authorities. Nothing concrete came of it, he says. Several demonstrations were organized in NDjamena to demand the establishment of the Fund. Abaifouta, who is also president of the Association of Victims of the Crimes of the Habre Regime, went to Addis Abeba himself with Brody to raise awareness of the AU heads of State. But nothing concrete came out of it. The AU is dragging its feet and the victims are slowly dying, laments the survivor. He says his organization has recorded the deaths of more than 300 victims since the end of the trial. There is a real lack of will on the part of the Senegalese judicial authorities, the Chadian political authorities and the AU, he concludes. Habre was a former head of state, and the African heads of state club is casting its shadow over us. Clement Abaifouta, former prisoner of Habres political police and president of the Association of Victims of Hissene Habres crimes. Seyllou / AFP Donor conference? Moudeina also thinks the AUs inaction stems from this. We had problems for more than 20 years in trying to get Habres trial, she says. These people [heads of state] did not want to try Habre, and their stonewalling continues for reparations. For me, this inaction is support for Habre and for impunity. Moudeina believes that the Fund should be set up and a conference organized to raise funds and make an appeal so donors can contribute. Habres death, she adds, caught them by surprise as they were doing strategic planning. We will wait a couple of weeks and come back with an action plan, she says. Abaifouta, who fought for two decades for the Habre trial to take place, is not one to be discouraged. I say to myself, where has our joy gone? When we knew that Africa was judging an African dictator, everyone rejoicedand then everyone forgot about that. Now I think that Habres death should be a catalyst, and should speed things up. Its not an end, its a beginning. Two Syrians received lengthy jail sentences in Germany on Thursday for their role in an execution by an Islamist terrorist group linked to Al-Qaeda, a court said. Named only as Khedr A.K., 43, and Sami A.S., 36, the two men were found guilty for complicity in the deadly shooting of a lieutenant colonel with the Syrian army on July 10, 2012, the court in Duesseldorf said. Khedr A.K. was handed a life sentence for war crimes, murder and membership of a terrorist organisation, while Sami A.S. received nine years for aiding and abetting a war crime and supporting a terrorist organisation. Khedr A.K. joined the Ghurabaa Muhassan group in Syria, part of the Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist organisation, some time before July 2012, prosecutors said on the mens arrest in July 2020. At that time, Jabhat al-Nusra was Al-Qaedas sister organisation in Syria. Khedr A.K. is accused of guarding the prisoner with a rapid-fire rifle as he was transferred to his place of execution and as he was killed on the banks of the Euphrates river in Syria. Sami A.S. filmed the shooting of the victim and commented on the video in a glorifying manner for propaganda purposes, prosecutors said. Syrias civil war, which started with the brutal repression of anti-government protests, has killed more than 380,000 people and displaced nearly half the countrys pre-conflict population. Germany has taken in more than 700,000 Syrian refugees since the start of the conflict. In February, a German court convicted a former Syrian intelligence service agent for complicity in crimes against humanity in the first court case worldwide over state-sponsored torture by Syrian President Bashar al-Assads government. Former Chadian president Hissene Habre was buried Thursday in Senegals capital Dakar, AFP journalists saw, where he had been serving a life sentence for crimes against humanity. The former leader was jailed in Dakar in 2016 after an African Union-backed trial over abuses committed during years of iron-fisted rule in Chad. On Tuesday, he succumbed aged 79 to Covid-19 in a private clinic in West African city. About two hundred relatives, supporters and Senegalese dignitaries prayed before his body before an uncompleted Dakar mosque on Thursday as part of a simple ceremony. There were no women present, according to tradition. Habres body, which was shrouded in cloth, was then buried at a nearby cemetery. The ex-dictators son Hamid Hissene Habre described his father as loving and called his conviction an injustice. His commitment to a free, dignified, united and proud Africa was deeply rooted in him and our duty today is to rehabilitate him and do him justice, he said. Habre seized power in Chad in 1982, ruling until he fled to Senegal in 1990 after being overthrown. His rule was marked by brutal crackdowns on dissent, including alleged torture and executions of opponents. Some 40,000 people are estimated to have been killed, earning Habre the nickname of Africas Pinochet. In exile, the former leader lived quietly in an upmarket Dakar neighbourhood, but he was eventually arrested in 2013 and tried by a special tribunal set up by the African Union (AU) under a deal with Senegal. The court handed a life term to Habre in May 2016 for war crimes, crimes against humanity and torture. The sentence was upheld the following year. Chads government said on Tuesday that it would allow Habres body to be repatriated but stressed that it would hold no official commemoration out of respect for his victims. However, one of Habres wives later stated that her husband would be buried in Senegal, where his body would remain there until his reputation is rehabilitated in Chad. Cire Cledor Ly, one of Habres Senegalese lawyers who was present at the funeral, said that his former client had been the victim of the greatest judicial fraud that humanity has ever seen. History will restore him to his rightful place, he said. Sign up for myFT Daily Digest and be the first to learn about global economic news. Good morning.This article is our live version First FT communication.Register our Asia, Europe/Africa or America Version so that it will be sent directly to your inbox every working day morning.You can contact us in the following ways [email protected] this Risk of terrorist attack The NATO official warned that the Kabul airport is increasing every day because he described the dilemma that countries face when deciding when to end foreign military efforts to airlift personnel out of Afghanistan. One day after U.S. President Joe Biden chose to stick to his plan to withdraw U.S. troops before the end of the month despite European opposition, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg stated that the terrorist threat facing the airport is not theoretical, but It is real danger. On the one hand, we want to have as much time as possible for as many people as possible to leave, Stoltenberg said in an interview. At the same time if we go beyond [the] August 31 [deadline], Especially if we dont get at least some kind of talibans acquiescence, the danger will increase [of] attack. On Wednesday night, the British government updated its travel advice for British nationals still in Afghanistan, advising them not to go to Kabul Airport because of the threat of terrorist attacks. Turkey started Withdraw its troops The big turn from Kabul Airport shows that the security situation in Afghanistan is rapidly deteriorating. Russia has also expressed increasing concern about the security situation in Afghanistan. Began to evacuate its citizens yesterday.Follow the latest reports in Afghanistan Fortis. (Financial Times, New York Times) More about Afghanistan: How the exile changed the Taliban: Decades of exile made the leaders of militant groups More secular, But they may have difficulty controlling their infantry. Escape from Kabul: Shaqaiq Birashk, an adviser to the U.S.-funded Afghan government project, reveals how special forces act Cause her to escape From the capital of Afghanistan. Thank you for reading FirstFT Asia.You can share your feedback with me [email protected] -Emily There are five more stories in the news 1. Japan and Taiwan hold talks to counter Chinese aggression The two ruling parties will hold First bilateral security meeting On Friday, they sought to strengthen their relationship against an increasingly belligerent China. 2. OnlyFans revokes controversial porn ban Only fans have Changed the decision After founder Tim Stokelys criticism of unfair banks sparked a new dialogue with financial institutions, pornography was banned. The company announced yesterday that it has received the guarantees needed to support our diverse creator community. 3. Pinduoduo shares rose 22% after pledged to donate profits Pinduoduo shares Rose more than one-fifth The Chinese e-commerce group announced on Tuesday that it will donate US$1.5 billion of future earnings to charity after announcing its first quarterly profit since its initial public offering three years ago. 4. The British FCA is incapable to supervise Binance The Financial Conduct Authority, one of the worlds leading financial regulators, stated that Incapable of proper supervision Although the products of the cryptocurrency exchange posed significant risks and allowed consumers to place excessive bets, Binance still did. 5. Angela Merkels successor loses lead in opinion polls Angela Merkels center-right Christian Democratic candidate Armin Laschet is now Under pressure to strengthen the campaign And prevent what could be the worst election result for his party in 70 years. Coronavirus Digest Thank you for voting in our poll. 76% of respondents said they support the Covid-19 vaccine regulations issued by their employers. the day before income British recruitment company Hayes today announced its full-year earnings. With the Covid-19 recession, the rebound in employment in the UK is a source of hope not only for this group but also for the economy as a whole. Air New Zealand, Dell Technologies and TCS Group are also among the companies reported today. View our complete list here. Joe Biden hosts Naftali Bennett During his tenure as Prime Minister of Israel First visit to the White House Today, he is expected to push the President of the United States to take a tough stance against Iran. (Reuters) U.S. revised growth data The growth data for the second quarter is May be revised higher After a series of stronger-than-expected data reflecting the reopening of the economy, it was released today. However, the increase in Covid-19 infection caused by the Delta variant may pose a risk. (Reuters) What are we still reading The supply chain is in a mess. So how does trade flourish? Confusingly, while economists from the manufacturing giants warned that the difficulty in parts procurement is affecting GDP data, we foreshadow a boom in exports. Alphaville found the clue As for why this is in the new OECD data. If movie theaters cannot solve their survival crisis, why do we all fail How to pay for actors, screenwriters and other creatives in the streaming era May have just begunBox office analysts worry that the streaming habit we developed during the pandemic will continue, leading to a long-term decline in movie theater attendance. Currently, cryptocurrency exchanges are booming The popularity of Bitcoin has turned the former small platform into a powerful platform, generating millions of dollars in revenue every day. How long can wealth last, Ask Eva Sale. Focus on ESG in Asia The Bank of America reported that as of June, ESG equity funds in developed Asian countries had inflows of US$3.6 billion, an increase of 187% over the same period last year. At the same time, the Hong Kong Stock Exchanges board of directors diversification measures have come under fire, and Chinas carbon market has started to be unstable.More in our Asian version of ethical money. Subscribe to the newsletter here. Marijuana Banking U.S. federal law still classifies cannabis as an illegal substance. This is why the largest bank in the United States chose not to provide services to cannabis companies.But the relief is mainly due to A small group of financial services companies It has sprouted to cater to the weed industry. books As the worlds largest democracy, India is undergoing fundamental changes, raising peoples questions about whether it should be called a democracy. These two new books Emphasizing the speed of this transformation gives a subtle but equally pessimistic description of the countrys development trajectory. On a small piece of land in the Visayan region of the Philippines, farmer Totong Edgar is growing abaca. This tall, pointed-leaf plant takes two years to grow, and will be transformed into hemp fiber similar to Rapunzels blonde hair during the harvest. Later, it will be hand-woven by local craftsmen into a basket bag of the London brand Uri. Uri is owned by Edgars cousin, Filipino-Dutch designer Charlie Jacobs. Jacobs is part of the grassroots movement, which believes that luxury brands avoid intricate supply chains and instead support their own farm-to-fashion ecosystem. The Indian brand Oshadi was founded by Nishanth Chopra in 2015 and was creatively at the helm of Irish designer Richard Malone. It grows, weaves, cuts and makes all womens clothing in its own enclosure in Erode, southern India. British designer Patrick Grant is currently planting His practical brand of hemp, Community Clothing. At the same time, raising sheep may just be the next big trend in fashion. The Italian brand Zegna owns 10,000 Australian ewes and they graze freely on 6,300 acres of land-their fluffy merino wool is made into luxurious sweaters that sell for up to 600; Gabriela Hearst and Joshua Millard use them separately They used sheep herding techniques and rolling pastures on family farms in Uruguay and Dorset, England; and Alexander Stutterheim, a raincoat brand of the same name, bought a flock of sheep on an island in Sweden and created his knitting brand John Sterner. This is an honest manufacturing method, Stutterheim said. I built a farm myself to understand all this. Textile and clothing production is usually complex and sometimes ambiguous, and may involve multiple factories in different geographical locations. For example, wool needs to be sheared, washed, carded (combed), spinning, woven and dyed before it can be knitted into a sweater; a cardigan can accumulate a lot of flying miles before it reaches the brand warehouse and is ready for sale. For Jacobs, owning a family farm means you can minimize waste and maximize the quality of the fiber produced. A manufacturer uses abaca to make baskets for Uri in the Philippines A completed Uri basket There is more and more market for ecological certificates; Chopra believes that fashion farms can reduce the phenomenon of green drifting. We dont have to rely on [external] Certification, these documents usually do not reflect the actual work done on the ground, he said, referring to specifications such as organic cotton. Traceability helps reduce the carbon footprint. forward [you] Start to build something on the other side of the world, you can [you] Built somewhere nearby? Statheim asked. Most of the time the answer is yes. Millard did, of course; he introduced a specific Teesewater breed to his flock because its wool is closer to the body. The meat is used for food, while the sheep skin and leather are used to make oversized coats, and The spun wool is then made into fabrics for custom tailoring. Once the main source of trade in England in the Middle Ages, the value of sheared wool is so low today that farmers often burn them. Joshua Millards flock in Dorset The implementation cost of this infrastructure is very high, especially for emerging brands. Millard, Chopra, and Jacobs have all invested heavily in their supply chains. They hope it will eventually pay off: in 2019, when Chopra established his farm, his cotton was 50% more expensive than ordinary cloth. Now it has only increased by 30%. As the farm reaches full production, his operating costs have also been reduced by 30%. Jacobs said that in the long run, it is cheaper to grow your own crops than to pay suppliers. Some of Millards farms to fashionable clothing The farm is already influencing the way Jacobs handles design. It has shifted from abstract creativity to a deeper understanding of process and long-term strategy. Her cousin Edgar has already started planting pandan, rattan and bamboo for Jacobs to use in future series-the latter two will take about seven years to mature before harvest. I swear I can only design [pieces] Around the fiber that can grow sustainably, no more than 10 kilometers away from our manufacturer, she said. Agriculture also enables brands to better control the supply chain. Stutterheim says he has learned to reduce middlemen. As the industry gradually moves towards transparency, his efforts will prove beneficial. Even the most certified [fabric] When it comes to the location of the manufacturer, the supplier is often protected. .. These middlemen make a living by keeping them away from competitors, Jacobs said. But in my entire supply chain, there is no one I dont know the name. John Sterner sweater Elisabeth Toll This stability is beneficial during a pandemic, which has caused factory closures and the collapse of global supply chains. The farm has provided incredible support for our business, said Chopra, who grows all Oshadis cotton and natural dyes on site.At the beginning of the pandemic, cotton supply was very limited. But we have a large stock of fiber from farms, so we can continue to produce [clothes]. In fact, Oshadi has grown up. The farm has expanded from 50 acres to 100 acres and now employs 50 farmers and 70 artisans, increasing from 40 to 40. Many of them are multi-generational family members, and Oshadi is committed to paying a fair living wage.Uris Jacobs is also determined to help solve the problem: Many Filipino women choose to work abroad to find enough money to raise their children. [by sending cash home]. This is the model I want to break. .. By enhancing the image of marginalized manufacturers, she said. Alexander Stutterheim is on his Swedish farm. When you manage your resources, you learn to respect them more, he said Whether its the environment or society, responsibility is at the core of this type of agenda: Chopra describes agriculture as a humble experience. Seeing so many small organisms and processes playing such an important role, in turn teaches the way to treat everyone with equal importance, he said. Stutterheim agrees: He likes to hug his sheep and says that he even likes their smell. Sheep are highly sensitive and self-protective, but they are also strong and social I have learned a lot from them, he said. This is a holistic approach. When you manage your resources, you learn to respect them more. British supermarkets are in trouble for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic Keep their shelves replenished. Fast food chain Nandos had to Close 45 restaurants Because of the chicken shortage; McDonalds is Less milkshake. Supermarket owner Already warned A possible shortage at Christmas. Supply chain bottlenecks are partly due to labor shortages-especially truck drivers. Some reasons are short-term. But the long-term transformation that is at work may have a profound impact-shifting the balance of bargaining power from capital to labor. The shortage of workers is not just a problem in Britain. According to reports, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Scandinavia and similar industries are also experiencing squeeze: hotel, distribution, construction, health and social care. Compared with some EU neighbors, the United Kingdom has indeed suffered an earlier and greater surge in Delta variant infections. The plague in which workers were forced to self-isolate after contact with infected persons coincided with school holidays, resulting in an abnormally high rate of absenteeism. However, many of the factors contributing to the employment contraction are the same as those in the EU and the United States. After a long period of lockdown, multiple departments are reopening and re-hiring at the same time. Fast replenishment puts additional pressure on distribution. During the lockdown, some expanding industries, such as online retailing and grocery trade, sucked workers out of the hotel industry. The pandemic has caused some workers to reconsider their priorities and withdraw from difficult, low-paying jobs. As economic growth and wage growth have attracted some people to return home, the migration of migrant workers from Central and Eastern Europe to the richer West has begun to reverse the situation before Covid.However, although exact data are scarce, it is estimated that the pandemic has prompted There are hundreds of thousands to return To Poland, Lithuania and other places.National Bureau of Statistics estimated Compared with the same period last year, the number of EU nationals working in the UK decreased by 364,000 in the third quarter of 2020; some estimates are Much higher. However, for the UK, Brexit has exacerbated the impact of capital outflows. EU nationals applying for residential status can return if they wish. But now that the transition period after Brexit is over, the end of free movement means that others cannot return without a work visa. Remains believe that this is a negative result of Brexit. Many Brexit supporters may be more relaxed; in 2016, it was believed that too many jobs flowed to overseas workers, which depressed wages and expanded the Brexit vote. To ease the shortage, the Boris Johnson government is under pressure from industry leaders to issue more visas to EU drivers and farm workers.But its political promise Low immigration Limits its leeway-and with a large number of job vacancies across the EU, it is not clear how many Bulgarians or Romanians are prepared to cope with the additional bureaucracy that comes with coming to the UK. When there are shortages in other sectors, the government needs answers-for example, in social care in winter. In the long run, if there is no large-scale special visa program or a broad labor mobility agreement with the EU, filling vacancies will mean that British workers must be provided with better pay and conditions. Where technology cannot be replaced, training must be expanded to provide the required skills, from pipelines to transportation. Over time, this may push the governments upgrade agenda. But this may also mean that consumers need to pay higher shopping expenses and need to devote more resources to education. Soon, these are the trade-offs that the government needs to explain to voters. Sign up for myFT Daily Digest and become the first person to learn about British agricultural news. British pig producers have warned that they are still weeks away from phasing out healthy animals after a shortage of labor at the slaughterhouse caused a backlog of 70,000 surplus animals on the farm. The National Swine Association is the latest organization to warn about the impact on its members, as a lack of workers has affected food production and transportation, which has had a knock-on effect on many UK supply chains. The associations chief executive Zoe Davies stated that some slaughterhouses have a quarter of their capacity below normal, and about 15,000 pigs are trapped on the farm every week. If they dont act quickly, we will have to destroy completely healthy pigs, she said. Excess pigs will incur additional feed costs and fines imposed by processors on overweight animals. This has increased the pressure on pig farmers, many of whom have been at a loss since the winter, as the problems caused by Britains withdrawal from the European Union have put them in trouble. Remaining Davis said the number of animals at the beginning of the year. She said: This is devastating for many farmers who have just been freed from the last time. We expect a large outflow from the pig industry next year. Nick Allen, chief executive of the British Meat Processors Association, said that meat processors also had to reduce the scope of available cuts and had difficulty fulfilling orders due to staff shortages. Davis said that pork products such as tuna are now under enormous pressure and that customers will have to rely on imports to fill the supply gap. The points-based immigration system after Brexit focuses on highly skilled workers and highly paid workers. The government has rejected calls to add butchers to the list of occupations facing shortages, a move that will make it easier for people applying for specific jobs to obtain visas. According to data from the Food and Beverage Federation, Brexit and the pandemic have also prompted a large number of EU workers to return to their homes. It is estimated that the number of exodus exceeds 1 million. Respected Its chief executive, Ian Wright, said: If you dont take quick action [labour shortages], The impact we have seen will worsen-including supply chain disruptions, shelf shortages and the possible closure of the hotel industry. This becomes even more important in the context of the autumn being the critical time for suppliers to ensure availability before Christmas demand. According to data from the Agriculture and Horticultural Development Commission, the slaughter volume of pigs in the week ending August 21 was 16% lower than last year, or 30,000, and the price of pigs was also falling. In total, there are about 5 million pigs in the UK. Allen said that with the end of the vacation plan at the end of September, the broader labor market may ease, although he believes that there are no skilled butchers among those on vacation. He said that the government has told companies to pay more and improve working conditions, and then you will get British workers, but he warned that this will lead to higher food costs. He said that wages have increased, and the annual salary for entry-level meat processing jobs was 18,000 pounds a year ago, and now offers 22,000 pounds. This must be reflected in the price of food Christmas items can be very expensive, he added. BATON ROUGE, LA A state court has permanently barred a Metairie woman from working as a tax preparer in Louisiana. Judge Shayna Beevers Morvant, of the 24th Judicial District Court in Jefferson Parish, signed the order barring Brischea Bowman Johnson from preparing, filing, or assisting with the preparation or filing of any Louisiana state tax returns but her own. Johnson was arrested in 2020 after a joint investigation between the Louisiana Department of Revenue Criminal Investigations Division and the state Attorney Generals office determined that she had submitted false tax returns for several of her clients, including fraudulent claims for deductions for charitable contributions and business expenses. After Johnson pled guilty to filing false public records, litigators with the Department of Revenue brought a civil case against her to bar her from working as a tax preparer in Louisiana. Johnson is the seventh person barred from working as a tax preparer in the state since Act 526 of the 2018 Regular Session of the Louisiana Legislature authorized the Department of Revenue to file lawsuits against preparers who commit fraud. Lafayette,LA -The University of Louisiana at Lafayette has been urging students to get vaccinated against COVID-19 in anticipation of full FDA approval. Now that the Pfizer vaccine is approveD, many students are experiencing mixed emotions. The University of Louisiana at Lafayette students are back on campus to start the fall semester and many like Brittany Ray are excited to get back to in person learning. "Its easier to maintain your time and to get things done rather than procrastinating and you get to meet new people every day. Photo courtesy of Pfizer via AP Photo courtesy of Pfizer via AP Kathleen Bedre says though she is happy to be back on campus, there are already talks of going back to virtual if there's another outbreak. "I am a little nervous for that because I am not great at learning when it comes to online, but I think that I can push through it." Some like Caroline henning see the vaccine as a way to get back in the classroom now that the pfizer dose fda approved. "I'm fine with it especially if it means that campus is going to be more opened in the future and then we possible won't have to wear mask I think it's great." First-year freshmen caleb viator says he took two years off because he wanted in-person learning, but he feels mandating a vaccine is not the way to go. "I think it should be greatly encouraged but not mandated because I don't think the government should mandate anything for your body." NEWS15 received a statement from the university that they will require students to get vaccinated now that the FDA has approved the Pfizer vaccine. They plan to release more information about the steps in the coming days. Audrey Coleman, left, and Heath Hardage Lee, right, speak at the Dole Institute of Politics on Oct. 22, 2019. Two years later, the Institute will have a new director, Erica Terry, who will begin her position on Oct. 4, 2021. Upcoming action fantasy series "Moving" starring Jo In Sung, Han Hyo Joo, Cha Tae Hyun, and more is on its full swing with a jaw-dropping production budget. After confirming the cast lineup, the JTBC drama reportedly began its filming session on August 23 and is in talks to produce 20 episodes together with Disney+. K-Drama 'Moving' has a Production Budget Worth Millions of Dollars In addition, the action-fantasy K-drama is expected to set the bar high with a hefty amount of budget allocated for the production. According to Spotify News, Jo In Sung's new drama would cost 42 Million USD or 50 billion KRW and will be produced by Studio & New, who is behind the success of "Train To Busan" and "Peninsula." Apart from this, "Moving" is helmed by Park In Je, the genius behind the Blockbuster K-zombie film "Kingdom Season 2." Interestingly, the upcoming drama will be penned by the webtoon author itself, Kang Full. 'Moving' Cast and What We Know So Far The soon-to-be-released JTBC series focuses on a high school student and his family who have been keeping a mysterious past from the people around them. Apart from the trio, "Moving" cast includes an intriguing mix of veteran and rookie actors. Cast members include Kim Sung Kyun, Kim Hee Won, "Kingdom" star Ryu Seung Ryong and Kwak Sun Young from "Hospital Playlist." Joining them are some of the industry's fresh faces starting with Lee Jung Ha, who appeared in "Nevertheless" and "Run On" as well as the "Law School" actress Go Jo Yoon Jung. Jo In Sung, Han Hyo Joo, and Cha Tae Hyun's Current and Upcoming K-Drama Appearance The upcoming K-drama "Moving" is Jo In Sung's return to the small screen after starring in the 2014 series "It's Okay, That's Love." In 2016, he appeared in tvN's melodrama "Dear My Friends," where he played Go Hyun Jung's long-distance boyfriend. Now, he has a new movie, "Escape from Mogadishu" which is set to hit the 2 million mark in blockbusters. Not only that, Jo In Sung is booked and busy in the coming year after being courted to appear in a star-studded movie "Smugglers" with Yeom Jung Ah, Go Min Si, and "Signal" star Kim Hye Soo. Just like the award-winning actor, Han Hyo Joo will also be making a comeback in K-drama with two series under JTBC and tvN. Apart from "Moving," she is also set to lead the cast of action fantasy drama "Happiness" directed by "Stranger," "Record of Youth," and "Memories of the Alhambra" PD Ahn Gil Ho. To recall, the "Spring Waltz" star's last series is the 2016 mega-hit rom-com with Lee Jong Suk. As for Cha Tae Hyun, he is currently starring in "Police University" with SNSD's Krystal and B1A4's Jinyoung. In the rom-com drama, he plays the former detective turned National Police University campus professor, Dong Man. IN CASE YOU MISSED: Jo In Sung and Cha Tae Hyun to Work Together in tvN's Upcoming Variety Show KDramastars owns this article. Written by Geca Wills Kim Go Eun flaunts her playful side as she shares a glimpse of her recent shoot with W Korea. The Hallyu star updated her 4.3 million followers on her social media by showing the never-before-seen photos for the magazine's September issue in collaboration with luxury brand Chanel. To recall, the French fashion house named the "Goblin" star as their newest muse in 2019. Since then, the 30-year-old South Korean beauty has been gracing various covers as she teams up with the top-tier brand. Kim Go Eun's Rocks Head to Toe Chanel for W Korea Kim Go Eun's Instagram featured a series of photos sporting head-to-toe ensembles from the French fashion house. During the shoot, she dons Chanel's iconic tweed two-piece set while her glam team makes sure that she's all set for the project. On the other hand, other snaps illustrate that she's having fun on the set, donning wacky poses on cam. Other than her fans, the comment section was filled with her fellow celebrities like Choi Hee Seo and "Hospital Playlist" actress Shin Hyun Bin, lauding her latest campaign shoot. According to W Korea, this is for her first video with the brand. "Here is the first video of Chanel and Kim Go Eun's Real Rendezvous trilogy. Please look forward to the next episode. Moreover, the publication also posted a short clip, showing off her simple yet sophisticated aura. Kim Go Eun's New Drama' Yumi's Cells' with Ahn Bo Hyun Her latest shoot comes ahead of her much-awaited comeback in K-drama alongside Ahn Bo Hyun in "Yumi's Cells." The webtoon-based series from the same name is helmed by PD Lee Sang Yeob, who also directed several notable dramas like "Shopping King Louie" and "A Piece of Your Mind." In the tvN series, the Hallyu star will take on the titular role of Kim Yumi, who is controlled by a series of complex networks of cells in her body. It came after Yumi fell into a coma after experiencing a painful breakup. Although she managed to overcome this, she had difficulty processing her thoughts, emotions, and feelings. Fortunately, she is surrounded by her "special friends" known as her cells, who helped her in her day-to-day activities, including preparing for a date. In the first teaser, the clip showed Yumi figuring out what to wear on her first date. Luckily her little friends helped her pick outfits for her special day. In the drama, Ahn Bo Hyun's character Goo Woong will wake up her love cells and unexpectedly sparking Yumi's interest in love while stimulating the viewer's curiosity regarding their budding romance. Aside from the two lead stars, "Yumi's Cells" stellar cast members includes Lee Yoo Bi as Ruby, Park Ji Hyun who will take on the role of Yumi's rival, Seo Sae Yi, and GOT7's Jinyoung as Yoo Babi. "Yumi's cells" release date is scheduled on September 17, airing every Friday and Saturday, and will be available on tvN and Viki. KDramastars owns this article. Written by Geca Wills ROSEBURG, Ore. Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin posted a letter on Wednesday pledging that his agency would not be enforcing any of Governor Kate Brown's COVID-19 mandates, while vocally criticizing the use of statewide requirements that ignore "the abilities of our local leadership." The position that local law enforcement in Oregon will not enforce the Governor's COVID-19 executive orders has been relatively standard since the beginning of the pandemic, and enforcement has largely fallen to state regulatory agencies like Oregon OSHA. However, Hanlin's letter primarily focuses on his personal opinions about the merits of mandates in rural Oregon. "Personally, I am tired of Governor Brown's style of leadership that ignores the abilities of our local leadership, and her support of ideals that contradict the values most of us in rural Oregon hold dearly," Hanlin wrote. "The Governor's good for one, good for all form of leadership is not working here. "Governor Brown has once again initiated what many consider to be an unconstitutional mandate by requiring our children and citizens to wear masks and by requiring COVID-19 vaccinations for state employees, healthcare workers and teaching staff. This mandate is potentially more reckless than doing nothing to stop the spread of COVID. I am aware of many state employees including police, fire & EMS service, healthcare, and education staff that intend to walk off the job if coerced into getting vaccinated." Hanlin concluded that while health, safety and livelihoods "are important needs for us all," they cannot be accomplished through requirements and mandates, only through honest communication. By Ivana Kottasova, Barbara Starr, Kylie Atwood, Nick Paton Walsh, Sam Kiley and Zachary Cohen, CNN (CNN) -- Twelve US service members and dozens of Afghans have been killed in two bombing attacks outside Kabul's airport, according to the Pentagon and Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health. We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update. John Kirby (@PentagonPresSec) August 26, 2021 The deadly blasts came as the United States and other Western countries raced to complete a massive evacuation of their citizens and Afghan allies following the Taliban takeover of the country. An official with Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health told CNN on Thursday that more than 60 people were dead and 140 wounded. Fifteen US service members were injured in addition to the 12 dead, said Gen. Frank McKenzie, Commander of US Central Command. US officials have been warning over the past week that a threat of a terror attack at the airport was becoming more acute. Earlier on Thursday local time, US diplomats in Kabul warned American citizens to "immediately" leave several gates into the airport, citing security threats. A US defense official had also told CNN that officials were concerned by a "very specific threat stream" involving the ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan. US officials believe the group, ISIS-K, was likely behind today's attack but are still working to confirm its involvement, according to a senior US official and another source briefed on initial assessments. The second source told CNN it may take a few hours before US officials are able to identify the specific individuals who carried out the apparent suicide bombing. Thousands of Afghans have been gathering at the airport's gates in recent days, trying to be evacuated. Footage posted to social media on Thursday showed chaotic scenes of crowds of people trying to help the wounded amid bodies on the ground. Photos showed apparently injured people being transported away from the scene in wheelbarrows. Kirby said earlier that one of the explosions happened "at the airport's Abbey Gate" and "at least one other explosion happened at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate." Abbey Gate has become the main entry point to the airport and primary security there has been provided by US Marines. The area around that gate had been used for holding refugees after they passed through the Taliban check points outside the airport, and before they were allowed to go to the airport. Baron Hotel was used by British soldiers and other allies as an evacuation handling center to process evacuees, before moving them up to the Abbey Gate. It is unclear whether international forces were still in the area when the explosion happened. The US Embassy in Kabul said US citizens who were at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate of the airport "should leave immediately" in the wake of the blast. "There has been a large explosion at the airport, and there are reports of gunfire," the security alert said. "US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates at this time," it added. Immediately after the explosions, gunmen opened fire on service members and civilians, McKenzie said. US President Joe Biden has been briefed on the attacks, a White House official said. In previous days, he had cited the risk of a terror attack among the reasons for getting US troops out of the country by August 31. He had also promised a swift and forceful response to any disruption to the operation. Evacuations slowing down Tens of thousands of people have so far been evacuated by the US military and NATO allies from the airport in the past two weeks. These evacuations are set to start winding down in the next few days, ahead of US' August 31 deadline for the final exit from a 20-year war in Afghanistan. Over 95,700 people have been evacuated since August 14 and over 101,300 since the end of July. McKenzie said that the evacuations will continue despite the attack. "Our mission is to evacuate US citizens, third country nationals, special immigrant visa holders, US embassy staff, and Afghans at risk. Despite this attack, we are continuing the mission, the evacuation at best speed," he said. "But right now our focus really, we have other active threat streams, extremely active threat streams against the airfield, we want to make sure we are taking the steps to protect ourselves there. Our focus is on that," he added. He said the threats from ISIS were "imminent," raging from rocket attacks to "vehicle-borne" suicide attacks in addition to "walk-in" suicide attackers like the attack today. McKenzie also said the US is sharing some intel with the Taliban for security purposes. "They don't get the full range of information we have. But we give them enough to act in time and space to try to prevent these attacks," said McKenzie. He added that the US is using attack helicopters and other manned and unmanned aircraft to defend the airport in Kabul. Several European countries, including Belgium, the Netherlands and Poland, announced their evacuation missions would end on Thursday. Denmark said its last flight left Afghanistan on Wednesday evening. Canada's efforts have also come to an end, General Wayne Eyre, Canada's acting chief of defense staff, said in a virtual briefing Thursday. In the wake of the blast, French President Emmanuel Macron warned the situation around the airport had seriously deteriorated. "As we speak, we have 20 buses of dual citizens and Afghans that we would like to be able to repatriate," he said. "I cannot guarantee that we will be successful because the security situation is beyond our control." UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the UK will continue its evacuation operation from Kabul despite the "barbaric" attack. "I think [these attacks] are despicable, but I'm afraid that this is something we have had to prepare for. It isn't going to interrupt our progress, we are going to get on with our evacuation," he later added, speaking to British media in London. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Thursday that those who have not yet been able to access evacuation flights from Kabul will not be forgotten, adding that the German Foreign Ministry is still in negotiations with the Taliban. "We know that the window of opportunity is closing. Tens of thousands of people have been rescued but I want to say again today: we will not forget those people who could not be rescued by the air bridge. Rather we will do everything we can to enable their evacuation," Merkel said. Germany is in talks with Afghanistan's neighboring countries to secure safe border crossing for further evacuations to take place, according to Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. Abdullah Abdullah, the chairman of Afghanistan's Reconciliation Committee under the previous government condemned the attacks on Thursday. "I strongly condemn the terrorist attack at Kabul Airport which killed and wounded a large number of the civilians," he said in a tweet. Early on Thursday CNN reported the Taliban has taken away security from former Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah. MEDFORD, Ore. Friends, family, and fellow firefighters are in mourning on Wednesday as they confront a life without 56-year-old Frumencio Ruiz Carapia a local wildland firefighter, husband, and father who lost his life in an accident on the Gales Fire in Lane County on Monday. According to the Lane County Sheriff's Office, Carapia was hit when a tree suddenly snapped and came crashing to the ground along the eastern flank of the fire. Despite the efforts of his crew, the 20-year firefighting veteran succumbed to his injuries at the scene. He was due to return home to his family in Medford the next day. Those who knew Carapia say that he was kind, loving, a care-free soul, and one great father. Armando Tovar has been a firefighter for 11 years, and this is his sixth season leading a 19-person crew. Carapia was part of the crew when Tovar took on his role as crew boss, and they worked together for years on forestry projects above and beyond firefighting. "I remember that he was . . . after a regular worker, he was a friend a good friend to me," Tovar told NewsWatch 12. "He was a guy who liked to make jokes, and he was never sad. Every time you were with him, he knew just what to say. If you were sad, he would always be there for you, or if you made a mistake on a fire, he'd say 'hey, don't worry about it, we are human.'" Monday, the day of Carapia's death, was Tovar's 30th birthday. For both of those reasons, he says that the day will stick with him forever. "We talked about the day that was going to happen, and he gave me a hug and said 'happy birthday,'" Tovar recalls of that morning. Tovar said that the accident happened around 3 p.m. Monday afternoon, but he remembers almost nothing from beyond that moment except that it was a bad day for himself and the rest of the crew. There are now two GoFundMe pages established to supported Ruiz Carapia's wife and children: one from a friend and neighbor and another set up by family members. Arnold Sicairos says that his family was greeted by Carapia when they moved into the neighborhood just over a year ago. He describes Carapia as an "honest, humble gentleman" who cared for the people around him. Sicairos set up one of the GoFundMe fundraisers, and he hopes to surprise Carapia's family with the money they raise. "We might not know you on a personal level we've only met as acquaintances but know that we have a lot a love for you," Sicairos said. "We're here for you, and it's sad what happened . . . but you know God has a plan and just know we're literally a door knock away for you." Carapia's employer, Esteban Gonzalez at GE Forestry, put out a statement on Tuesday addressing his death: "We're heartbroken for the family and friends of our firefighter, Frumencio Ruiz. It's devastating to lose any member of our team. Frumencio has been with our company from day one and was indeed like part of the family. He was kind and hardworking. "Frumencio had more than 25 years of firefighting experience. He was a squad boss on a National Type 2-IA crew on the Gales Fire in the Willamette National Forest. "We make the safety of our firefighters our top priority, and every firefighter completes all the required training. Frumencio's training exceeded the requirements, and he was the most experienced firefighter on his crew. He drew from his extensive fire experience to keep his crew safe. "This year, Frumencio had already been on several fires including Mezcal and Patagonia fires in Arizona, Tenant Fire in California, and two two-week assignments on the Bootleg Fire in Oregon. He lived in southern Oregon with his family and was originally from Mexico. We are with his family and by their side to support them through this time." SALEM, Ore. With Oregon economists continuing to track a relatively rapid economic rebound after pandemic shutdowns, tax-payers should see rebates next year through the state's unique "kicker" rule. State economists delivered their quarterly Economic & Revenue Forecast to lawmakers on Wednesday, outlining a recovery from pandemic shutdowns and job losses that they expect to continue at a relatively rapid pace, though not without growing pains. "The economic outlook remains bright. Strong household incomes, boosted considerably by federal aid during the pandemic, are the underlying driver. Consumers have no shortage of firepower if they want to and feel safe enough to spend," the Office of Economic Analysis wrote in its executive summary. The report predicted that Oregon's labor market will regain all of its lost jobs by next summer, one quarter sooner than estimated in the last forecast. "While these dynamics remain intact, the risks are weighted toward the downside," the economists continued. "Growth in a supply constrained economy is challenging. Firms are struggling with supply chains and a tight labor market. Wages are rising quickly to attract and retain workers. Prices are increasing as demand continues to outstrip supply. On top of this the current Delta wave of the pandemic complicates the immediate term outlook." Unsurprisingly, the Office said that the biggest threat to economic recovery would be the return of COVID-19 shutdowns on sectors of the economy. Though Oregon's tax collection deadline was delayed this year by the pandemic, the economists said that the 2021 tax season "turned out to be a very big one," with collections surging from personal income taxes, corporate income taxes, lottery sales, and the new Corporate Activity Tax. As a result of the strong tax revenues, Oregon tax-payers are expected to receive a $1.9 billion personal income tax kicker credit for the 2021 tax year. The median taxpayer will receive a credit of about $420, and the average payment is estimated at $850. Governor Kate Brown and a number of Oregon's state lawmakers released statements reacting to the revenue forecast on Wednesday, with most of them highlighting the state's apparently stable and recovering economy, looking ahead to investments in communities that are still struggling the most. Todays revenue forecast is another sign that Oregons economy is healthy, strong, and on the path for a rapid recovery," Governor Brown said in a statement. "This is welcome news at a time that Oregonians continue to face immense challenges: from wildfire recovery to extreme drought to our worst surge of cases and hospitalizations during the COVID-19 pandemic." Senate Republican Leader Fred Girod narrowed in on the kicker, an additional $850 million heading to K-12 schools, and a state budget with an ending balance of $699 million. Its clear that Democrats raided $15 million from the Kicker for no good reason," Girod said. "Unprecedented deficit stimulus spending by the federal government and Oregonians stepping up to support businesses during the Governors shutdowns has given the state excess money. The legislature now has money to invest in COVID and wildfire response and recovery and preparing for upcoming unknown expenses in the next biennium. Most importantly, our kids need to be in school full-time to get caught up after a year of learning loss. This money can help our kids recover. MEDFORD, Ore. -- On Wednesday, August 25 protesters gathered outside of Asante Rogue Regional Medical Center in Medford to take a stand against vaccine requirements for medical professionals, mandated by Oregon Governor Kate Brown earlier this month. The organizer of the protest, Ryan Mallory told Newswatch 12 the crowds were estimated to be somewhere between 1,600 to 3,000 people. Several mask-less people carried signs, some reading, "My body, my choice", "stop medical tyranny", and "I am not your lab experiment." The protest received support from passers by in the form of honks and cheers, and from what Newswatch 12 could see and hear in the moment, no one was vocal about opposing the message of the protest, though all opinons regarding the vaccine mandate were sought out. Newswatch 12 was later told many health care workers at Asante were advised to leave the hospital taking alternate routes away from the main areas of the protest. Some of those in support of the protest did work in the medical field, while a vast majority did not work in health care but were against the Covid-19 vaccine mandate. Katherine Green was one woman who was present for the portest and spoke to Newswatch 12 saying, "I really, personally, don't believe that governors or politicians should be making anyone's medical decisions, much less doctor's and nurses' medical decisions. That's absurd." In addition, she told Newswatch 12 that she hopes that those who are vaccinated continue to live healthy lives, but wants people to be aware of the risks of the Covid vaccine as well as the benefits. A 60-home project on Campbell Road in West Kelowna, just above Okanagan Lake, was moved Tuesday by West Kelowna city council to a public hearing. But councillors were critical of the developer's plan to also include a 242-slip marina. Barbara Violo, pharmacist and owner of The Junction Chemist Pharmacy, draws up a dose behind vials of both Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines on the counter, in Toronto, Friday, June 18, 2021. A group of major Canadian long-term care operators will require COVID-19 vaccination for all staff this fall. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette The Quebec government's new vaccine passport smartphone application called VaxiCode is shown on a phone in Montreal, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, as the COVID-19 pandemic continues in Canada and around the world. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes FILE - Attorney Lin Wood, a member of President Donald Trump's legal team, gestures while speaking during a rally on Dec. 2, 2020, in Alpharetta, Ga. Nine lawyers, including Wood, allied with former President Donald Trump face financial penalties and other sanctions after a judge Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, said they had abused the court system with a lawsuit that challenged Michigan's election results that certified Joe Biden as the winner.(AP Photo/Ben Margot, File) Hopkinsville, KY (42240) Today Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low around 60F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low around 60F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. 99 Shares Share Despite the bright pink walls of its exterior, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility stands inconspicuously, set back along a stretch of a frequently traveled road. We had come to meet Carla (identifying information changed), a detainee seeking asylum whose lawyer had requested a medical evaluation from our medical student-run human rights clinic. The immigration officer peered closely at our letter granting entrance and balked at the medical equipment and cell phone we needed to conduct our exam and document any injuries. An hour after a call to the Department of Homeland Security, we finally brought in our equipment and passed through the metal detectors. Our cell phone, typically used to document injury, was confiscated, and we were told that it would be provided when needed. Asylum seekers are noncitizens who have come to or crossed U.S. borders and are applying for protection from persecution. The Refugee Act of 1980 requires that the United States provide protection to those who qualify as resettled refugees or asylum seekers. There are two paths to apply for asylum: affirmative and defensive. Asylum seekers who enter lawfully (e.g., with a tourist visa) or are under the age of 18, file affirmative applications with the asylum office of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Their asylum claims are adjudicated by an asylum officer in an interview setting. Noncitizens in deportation proceedings file a defensive application with an immigration judge at the Executive Office for Immigration Review within the Department of Justice. This is an adversarial process that resembles a trial, with evidence, examination, and oral testimony. There is no appointed counsel and the asylum seeker (with or without the assistance of an attorney) must present a case of a credible fear of future persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion should they be removed from the U.S. and returned to their home country. If they are granted asylum, they are eligible to become permanent residents. Inside the facility, we saw young men and women with orange and gray prison-style jumpsuits and unlaced shoes. Several attorneys and a judge were on-site, holding asylum court. Carla was brought into a room with a large window and faced our team: a medical student, an attending physician, and an interpreter, all assembled through our student-run human rights clinic. She gave us a nervous smile as we introduced ourselves and explained our roles as impartial medical evaluators for her asylum application. We asked about her childhood, her home, her siblings, her education, and her aspirations in her native country. We heard stories full of love, support, and comfort. In time, she met a man and became a mother. The story changed to one of control, confinement, and verbal and physical abuse. She feared for her life, and her childrens safety, enduring years of emotional trauma, physical violence, and repeated hospitalizations. When the police were called after episodes of abuse, they were of no help. They photographed broken glass and furniture, but not her physical injuries, claiming that the damaged property was what was of value. The culminating event that led Carla to flee to the United States was the night in which she endured rape and the attempted murder of her and her children. She was intercepted off the Florida coast and had been in this ICE facility for several months. She had mostly kept to herself as she awaited her trial. Every screening tool we administered indicated severe depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress, clearly linked to uncertainty about her fate, the fate of her children, and a fear of being returned to a land that promised no justice or safety for her. Our interpreter, herself a survivor of intimate partner violence, rested her hand on Carlas back as she sobbed. In the spartan setting of the Detainment Center, our examination was limited to assessing vital signs, documenting her injuries, and noting the diaphoresis that erupted when she spoke of her husband. After hearing her story and documenting her symptoms, we completed the evaluation and wished her the best. Carla is one of approximately 120,000 men and women who have applied for asylum in the United States, each of whom carries the burden of proving, and thereby reliving, in a court of law the persecution or abuse they are escaping. Evidence is often scarce, especially when fleeing under duress. In Carlas case, her husband had taken her phone and deleted items on social media that contained proof of threatening messages. Her body was her last piece of evidence and we carefully documented the cuts and scars that marked it. As our team exited the ICE facility, we each reflected: the traumatic aspects of Carlas story, the fact that she was detained despite having committed no crime as an asylum seeker, and the nature of being in a situation in which we had no access to her medical record, could provide no further follow up care, and could not refer her for mental health care. We were left with knowing only that we had listened carefully, allowed her the space to tell her story, and that we could provide this impartial service. A few months later, we were informed that Carla had been denied asylum and would be deported. Carlas story is a glimpse of our current system for those who have not had the opportunity to work with detainees who are survivors of torture, domestic abuse, trafficking, and religious and other forms of persecution. They face overcrowded facilities, limited access to health care, unsanitary living conditions, and the constant threat of being returned to even worse circumstances. Physicians can provide an important service to detainees by performing medical affidavits, bearing witness to center conditions, and ensuring the promotion of fundamental human rights. Carlas story is not one of justice served, but one which illuminates the need for physician advocacy of this highly vulnerable population. Madeline Cohen is an obstetrics-gynecology resident. Gauri G. Agarwal is an internal medicine physician. Image credit: Shutterstock.com When US Vice President Kamala Harris stepped aboard the littoral combat ship USS Tulsa in Singapore on Monday, it put a fresh spotlight on arguably one of the most divisive vessels in the US Navy's fleet. Depending on who you talk to, littoral combat ships (LCS) are either a naval threat capable of "blowing up every Chinese operation in the South China Sea," or a floating symbol of all the US Navy's most pernicious problems. And while US naval leaders tout the LCS' speed and agility in shallower coastal areas, critics point to its limited armaments and history of mechanical breakdowns. "The reason we are here is important," Harris told the crew of the Tulsa on Monday night. "Our presence in the Indo-Pacific has a long, long history, including now, of helping to guarantee peace and security, freedom of trade and commerce, freedom of navigation ... and open waterways, and the rules-based international order that has brought so much safety and prosperity to so many." US Navy leaders say the LCS, which is comparable in size to the more standard corvette class of ships, has an integral role in making that happen. And they expect the LCS to play an even bigger part as the US faces a more robust Chinese presence in the South China Sea, emphasized by its growing fleet and fortified military installations built by Beijing on manmade islands. "Beijing continues to coerce, to intimidate, and to make claims to the vast majority of the South China Sea," Harris said in Singapore on Tuesday. She called China's action's "unlawful." 'Distributed lethality tactics' China claims almost all of the 1.3 million square mile South China Sea as its sovereign territory and says the presence of US warships there are the cause of tensions and instability. That has not stopped the US Navy from asserting itself in the waterway, where it regularly sends its ships for exercises and so-called Freedom of Navigation operations, which challenge Beijing's claims to disputed islands. Vice Adm. Bill Merz, who commanded the US Navy's 7th Fleet until June, told an online defense conference earlier this year the Navy has plans to deploy up to eight LCS in the Western Pacific by the end of 2022, including having four operating out of a base in Singapore -- where two are based now -- by the end of this year. Merz's comments, first reported by US Naval Institute News (USNI), came after one LCS, the USS Gabrielle Giffords, "pretty much owned the southern South China Sea" during operations last year, he said. "She kept out there pounding away, blowing up every Chinese operation in the South China Sea. It was pretty impressive work," Merz said. A 7th Fleet spokesperson later clarified the Giffords' effectiveness in the South China Sea, telling CNN in an email that "nothing was actually 'blown up.'" "It is a trade term for influence," Cmdr. Reann Mommsen said. "Without going into specifics, USS Gabrielle Giffords presence influenced operations throughout the South China Sea." Navy officials say the LCS is an ideal fit for the South China Sea environment. Described by the US Navy as "perfect" for coastal threats, the small surface combatants can move quickly among islands features in the waterway, take cover from threats among those features and enter smaller ports than the 7th Fleet's guided-missile destroyers, enabling easier cooperation with partner states in the region. The ships, which cost around $360 million apiece, come in two variants -- Freedom, 387.6 feet (118.1 meters) long, and Independence, 421.5 feet (128.5 meters). Both variants can achieve speeds of 40+ knots. "When you put it in the archipelago with its low signature, high speed, it turns out it is very hard to target, very hard to kill," Merz told the virtual Mine Warfare Association International Mine Technology Symposium in May. To make the LCS more formidable, the Navy has upgraded the Pacific-based ships' firepower, arming them with up to eight Naval Strike Missiles, sea-skimming cruise missiles that are difficult to spot on radar, and can maneuver to avoid enemy defenses. Merz said that new firepower with the original designs of the LCS makes them ideal for the Pacific. That upgrade has been noticed by the Chinese military, according to a 2020 Chinese government research paper reviewed by US Naval Institute News. The LCS' "cheap price, high speed, and other characteristics enable it to become a powerful tool in future distributed lethality tactics," read the paper from the Marine Design & Research Institute of China (MARIC), USNI reported. "Distributed lethality" means dispersing firepower among many scattered units, rather than employing it in one location, like an aircraft carrier strike group. But analysts question what the LCS could do in any conflict with the People's Liberation Army (PLA) Navy, which in the past year has surpassed the US Navy as the world's largest fleet, while rapidly modernizing to where it has become arguably a near equal in ability to the US Navy. The LCS "won't last long if they come against a PLA Navy unit in a combat situation. That is an environment for which they were not built for, and speed doesn't help you when missiles are flying," said Carl Schuster, a former US Navy captain now an instructor at Hawaii Pacific University. Blake Herzinger, a nonresident fellow at the Pacific Forum in Singapore, wondered if Merz was overstating the LCS' effectiveness against China. "The world's largest navy is terrified of a littoral combat ship that has eight missiles on it? I don't know about that," said Herzinger, who is also a US Naval Reserve officer. He said the LCS' checkered mechanical record -- the class has suffered a series of high-profile breakdowns since its introduction in 2008 -- made it a poor choice for operations where it could come in close contact to the PLA Navy, like near contested islands in the South China Sea, much of which Beijing claims as its sovereign territory and has vowed to defend as such. "I would lean away from putting it in positions where self defense becomes an issue," Herzinger said. "You cruise one of those through the (contested) Spratlys and it breaks down, that becomes a big problem." 'A placeholder' in the Pacific In contrast to the analysts' doubts, the US Navy is showing faith in the LCS, of which it has 34 in the fleet or in various stages of production. The LCS comes in monohull and trimaran variants and it is the latter that are based in the Pacific. During a conference call with reporters earlier this summer, US Navy Capt. Tom Ogden, who commands the Destroyer Squadron 7, which oversees littoral combat ship operations in the region, noted that in 2019 and 2020, LCS performed three freedom of navigation operations -- where the US Navy challenges what it calls excessive maritime claims of foreign nations -- in the Spratly chain. Ogden also praised the Giffords' 2020 deployment in the South China Sea. "They were sometimes in the right place at the right time, and it worked out with what 7th Fleet assigned the ship to do," Ogden said. Herzinger, the Singapore-based analyst, said mechanical problems have limited the ability of the LCS to be where it's needed when it's needed. "The reputation of the LCS ... has taken a big beating in Southeast Asia," he said, with interactions with allies and partners scrapped. "They had maintenance issues, they've had canceled exercises because the LCS couldn't get there because it was broken," he said. But if it is reliable, it could be effective in showing the US flag and freeing up more capable platforms like destroyers and cruisers for more vital missions, Herzinger and other analysts said. "The vessel could provide symbolic support and a localized military presence in disputed waters and thus free up higher end assets to be more dynamically employed or held at high readiness for warfighting scenarios," said Sidharth Kaushal, research fellow for sea power at the Royal United Services Institute in London. "It's an effective use of a less-than-ideal asset," said Herzinger. Kaushal called the LCS "a placeholder" in the Pacific, filling a gap until new frigates, the first of which the Navy ordered in 2020, begin coming online in five years. The Constellation-class frigates, of which a fleet of 20 are planned, will be equipped to conduct air defense, surface defense, anti-submarine and electromagnetic warfare operations in both littoral and open-ocean environments, according to government documents. But with only two of the billion-dollar warships on order and their actual deployment being years away, the LCS-frigate situation shows just how stretched Navy resources are in the Pacific, Herzinger said. He noted the Navy's proposed budget for the next fiscal year has only four surface combat ships in it, and only one frigate. "That's not even enough to stay the same. That's a Navy that's shrinking," he said. And in the short term at least, it leaves the Navy with no place to turn but the LCS. "It's better than having them tied up to the pier in San Diego," Herzinger said. "It's not the ship we needed, but it's the ship we've got." The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Coronavirus infections continue to surge among children across the United States, and older teens, ages 16 and 17, are facing the highest rate of weekly cases, according to a new CNN analysis of the latest data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As of Saturday, these teens appear to have the highest rate of infections among not only children, but all age groups, based on the CDC's count of weekly Covid-19 cases per 100,000 people. There are several factors that help explain why teens have higher Covid-19 case rates: the Delta variant is highly transmissible and they are more likely to interact with others, especially throughout the summer, Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, told CNN on Wednesday. Among eligible groups, teens are also the least likely to be vaccinated. "The simple answer is -- you have a virus that's highly infectious. It's going to spread to the people who are most vulnerable, and that's going to be the people who are least likely to be vaccinated," Benjamin said. "And it's still true that the younger people are still least likely to be vaccinated." Earlier on in the pandemic, the original strain of the coronavirus infected older adults and essential workers at high rates, Benjamin said, but now, most of the people in those groups are fully vaccinated. "As this goes on, who gets exposed changes. Everybody else is vaccinated, they don't get infected, so now we're seeing, at least statistically, the people who are getting infected changing," Benjamin said. "Add to the fact that we have this new virus, and this new virus is going to do a couple of things. One, it's clearly much more infectious than the other viruses, and it's going to hit the ones who are most vulnerable," Benjamin said, referring to the Delta variant of the coronavirus. "Who are the most vulnerable? It's the people that aren't vaccinated and the people who are out and about." 'The sad reality is that we have a solution' There could be some biological mechanisms behind why older teens appear to have Covid-19 case rates higher than other children -- but that's not really clear, said Dr. Sean O'Leary, professor of pediatrics and infectious diseases at University of Colorado's School of Medicine. "My suspicion is it probably has more to do with behavior than biology, in terms of, what are those kids doing? They're able to drive on their own, they're hanging out after school, getting together with other kids their age, likely often without the mitigation measures that would be in place in school," O'Leary said. And children overall are now even more vulnerable as they head back to school this month. "The sad reality is that we have a solution that adequately protects adolescents over sixteen years old. We have the Pfizer vaccine approved for that age group. So, we really shouldn't be seeing high case rates in that age group if we're successful with vaccinating late teens who are eligible," Lori Tremmel Freeman, chief executive officer of the National Association of County and City Health Officials, said. "I am more worried about what we'll see in the next three weeks if trending follows to younger ages under 16. Without a vaccine solution yet for younger children, we're going to see more of what we're starting to hear now -- schools having to make decisions about pausing in-person learning for a week or so," Freeman said. "There might be those kinds of temporary measures that allow schools to get back on their feet if in-person learning begins to impact transmission in the younger ages with school reopenings." More kids are catching Covid-19 In the past month, adults ages 18 to 29 consistently have had the highest weekly Covid-19 case rates of all. But as of Saturday, older children ages 16 and 17 took that position with 160.3 weekly Covid-19 cases per 100,000 people, according to CDC data. Of course, as more cases are reported to the CDC, the case rates are likely to rise and the data may change. In comparison, adolescents ages 12 to 15 had a weekly Covid-19 case rate of 152.7, children ages 5 to 11 saw a weekly rate of 137 and kids younger than 5 had a rate of 79.4, the data showed. Among adults, as of Saturday, people ages 18 to 29 saw a weekly case rate of 151.9, ages 30 to 39 had a rate of 152.9, ages 40 to 49 were at 129.6, ages 50 to 64 saw 95.9, ages 65 to 74 had 71.2 and adults 75 and older were at 63.5. In the past month, older teens ages 16 and 17 have had the highest weekly Covid-19 case rate among all children, climbing from a rate of about 48 per 100.000 on July 10 to about 200 per 100,000 on August 14, before declining last week. The CDC notes that there may be up to a two-week delay in case reporting. Overall, a total of nearly 800,000 Covid-19 cases so far have been among teens ages 16 and 17, representing about 2.6% of all cases nationwide. This age group makes up 2.5% of the US population. Their older peers, ages 18 to 29, make up the largest share of Covid-19 cases nationwide with around 6.7 million infections so far -- representing 22.7% of all cases, even though this age group makes up 16.4% of the US population. As more young people become fully vaccinated against Covid-19, that should drive down case rates among teenagers -- and the hope is to keep more teens out of the hospital and intensive care units. "That older age group, particularly when they have risk factors, tend to be a little bit higher risk for hospitalization. It's the under one and then the older teens, in the pediatric age group, who tend to be the higher risk groups for hospitalization, said O'Leary at the University of Colorado. About 8 million or 32% of all adolescents ages 12 to 17 are fully vaccinated against Covid-19 so far and "nationally, roughly half of 16- to 17-year-olds have gotten a first dose, and so that's a lot of unvaccinated in that age group," O'Leary said. As more teens receive the vaccine, it will still take a while to see the effects. "What we saw from the clinical trials going way back, and I don't think we have anything to suggest that things are different now, is you start to see an effect roughly after two weeks after the first dose and then, the biggest effect starting roughly one to two weeks after the second dose," O'Leary said, adding that one dose of vaccine appears to be less effective against the Delta variant. "But also remember that vaccination is rolling -- it's not like all of a sudden everyone is going to get it today and so five weeks from now we'll see a big impact," he said. "It's that there will be more people getting it today and tomorrow and the next day, and so it's really a rolling impact. But the sooner the better!" The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Here is a look at the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Facts Nineteen men hijacked four fuel-loaded US commercial airplanes bound for west coast destinations. A total of 2,977 people were killed in New York City, Washington, DC and outside of Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The attack was orchestrated by al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The Victims At the World Trade Center (WTC) site in Lower Manhattan, 2,753 people were killed when hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175 were intentionally crashed into the north and south towers, or as a result of the crashes. Of those who perished during the initial attacks and the subsequent collapses of the towers, 343 were New York City firefighters, 23 were New York City police officers and 37 were officers at the Port Authority. The victims ranged in age from two to 85 years. Approximately 75-80% of the victims were men. At the Pentagon in Washington, 184 people were killed when hijacked American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the building. Near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, 40 passengers and crew members aboard United Airlines Flight 93 died when the plane crashed into a field. It is believed that the hijackers crashed the plane in that location, rather than their unknown target, after the passengers and crew attempted to retake control of the flight deck. As of October 2019, 1,645 (60%) of 2,753 WTC victims' remains have been positively identified, according to the medical examiner's office. Timeline September 11, 2001 - 8:46 a.m. ET - American Airlines Flight 11 (traveling from Boston to Los Angeles) strikes the north tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. - 9:03 a.m. ET - United Airlines Flight 175 (traveling from Boston to Los Angeles) strikes the south tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. - 9:37 a.m. ET - American Airlines Flight 77 (traveling from Dulles, Virginia, to Los Angeles) strikes the Pentagon Building in Washington. - 9:59 a.m. ET - South tower of WTC collapses in approximately 10 seconds. - 10:03 a.m. ET - United Airlines Flight 93 (traveling from Newark, New Jersey, to San Francisco) crashes in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. - 10:28 a.m. ET - North tower of WTC collapses. The time between the first attack and the collapse of both World Trade Center towers is 102 minutes. December 13, 2001 - The US government releases a tape in which Osama bin Laden takes responsibility for the attacks. December 18, 2001 - Congress approves a measure to allow the president to designate September 11 as "Patriot Day" on each anniversary of the attacks. December 2001-June 15, 2004 - The original Victims Compensation Fund processes death and injury claims from families and relatives of September 11 victims. Families of those killed had until December 22, 2003, to apply for compensation. The fund reopens in 2011. May 24, 2007 - The Chief Medical Examiner of New York City, Dr. Charles S. Hirsch, rules that the death of Felicia Dunn-Jones in 2002, from dust exposure, is directly linked to the 9/11 attack and therefore a homicide. July 19, 2007 - The New York Medical Examiner's Office announces that the remains of three more people are positively identified. 1,133 victims, 41% of the total, remain unidentified. January 2009 - The medical examiner's office rules that Leon Heyward, who died the previous year of lymphoma and lung disease, is a homicide victim because he was caught in the toxic dust cloud just after the towers collapsed. January 2, 2011 - President Barack Obama signs James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act of 2010, reopening and expanding the scope of the Victim Compensation Fund. June 17, 2011 - The New York medical examiner rules that Jerry Borg's death on December 15, 2010, is a result of inhaling toxic substances from the dust cloud generated by the collapsing twin towers. May 10, 2014 - The unidentified remains of those killed in the attacks are returned to the World Trade Center site where they will be kept in a repository under the jurisdiction of the Office of Chief Medical Examiner of the City of New York. August 7, 2017 - The New York City medical examiner's office announces that the remains of a man killed at the World Trade Center are positively identified due to more sophisticated DNA testing being available. 2019 - The remains of three victims are identified by the New York City medical examiner's office through DNA testing. September 11th Victim Compensation Fund The original fund operated from December 2001 to June 2004. The initial Victim Compensation Fund received 7,408 applications for both death claims and personal injury claims. The fund made awards in 5,560 of those cases. The reopened and expanded fund has operated since January 2, 2011. Information on total awards is updated regularly and posted here. Families who agreed to get compensation from the federal fund agreed not to sue the airlines. Economic Impact $500,000 - Estimated amount of money it cost to plan and execute the 9/11 attacks. $123 billion - Estimated economic loss during the first 2-4 weeks after the World Trade Center towers collapsed in New York City, as well as decline in airline travel over the next few years. $60 billion - Estimated cost of the WTC site damage, including damage to surrounding buildings, infrastructure and subway facilities. $40 billion - Value of the emergency anti-terrorism package approved by the US Congress on September 14, 2001. $15 billion - Aid package passed by Congress to bail out the airlines. $9.3 billion - Insurance claims arising from the 9/11 attacks. Cleanup at Ground Zero May 30, 2002 - Cleanup at Ground Zero officially ends. It took 3.1 million hours of labor to clean up 1.8 million tons of debris. The total cost of cleanup was $750 million. Homeland Security The Department of Homeland Security was created in response to September 11. It merged 22 governmental agencies into one, including the Customs Service, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the US Coast Guard and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Through the Container Security Initiative, over 80% of imported maritime containerized cargo is prescreened before entering the US. March 12, 2002 - The Homeland Security Advisory System is introduced. April 20, 2011 - The National Terrorism Advisory System (NTAS) replaces the color-coded Homeland Security Advisory System (HSAS). The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. DOUGLAS COUNTY, Ore. - Two people have been arrested in connection to the murder of a missing Douglas County man. On Monday, August 16, 2021, Douglas County Sheriff's Office Detectives began investigating a missing person report. 41-year-old James Leroy Hood of Camas Valley was reported missing by family members who last heard from him on March 11, 2021. During interviews, detectives learned Hood had been murdered in a barn on Raleigh Drive and his body remained on the property. This information led investigators to apply for a search warrant for a property located in the 500-block of Raleigh Drive near Winston. On August 17, 2021, members of the Douglas County Major Crimes Team served the search warrant and a body believed to be Hood was located. Additional evidence was collected at the crime scene to further support the initial information provided during interviews. A second search warrant was served in the 500-block of Newton Creek Road as detectives continued their investigation. On August 19, 2021, the Oregon State Medical Examiners Office conducted an autopsy and concluded the deceased person was the victim of foul play and died of homicidal violence. On Wednesday, August 25, 2021, 35-year-old Ashley Tyshanne Reynolds of Roseburg and 33-year-old William Levi McClure of Winston were arrested in connection to the homicide. Both had previously been arrested by detectives on unrelated charges and remained in custody at the Douglas County Jail. Reynolds was lodged for First Degree Murder and McClure was lodged for Second Degree Murder. The Major Crimes Team is continuing the investigation. The team consists of detectives from the Douglas County Sheriff's Office, Roseburg Police Department, Oregon State Police, and members of the Douglas County District Attorney's Office. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Douglas County Sheriffs Office Investigations Division at (541) 440-4458 or email dcso.pio@co.douglas.or.us ROSEBURG, Ore. Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin released an online statement Wednesday saying he will not enforce Gov. Kate Brown's statewide mask mandate. The announcement comes as Douglas County sees more new COVID-19 cases than Lane County, with about a third of the population. At 50%, Douglas County also has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the state. The Douglas County Sheriffs Office will not be enforcing Governor Browns mandates period, Hanlins two-page statement said. He added that it is up to individuals to stay informed and make their own responsible decisions about their health. He said he is tired of Browns leadership, which he says ignores the abilities of local leadership and contradicts the values held by those in rural Oregon. Brown has initiated what many consider to be an unconstitutional mandate by requiring citizens to wear masks and state employees, healthcare workers and teaching staff to get vaccinations, Hanlin said. The citizens of Douglas County can choose to wear a mask or choose not to wear a mask," he said. We can choose to get vaccinated or choose not to get vaccinated. And we can choose to stay home or we can choose to travel freely. These are choices we as informed individuals shall make ourselves, not have made for us by the government. Hanlin said he takes his duties as sheriff seriously, and it is his responsibility to provide for the peace and safety of people in Douglas County. He added that it is in the best interest of Douglas County and other counties to retain local control over decisions affecting public health and safety. We reached out to Brown's office for a response to Hanlin's comments and will update this story when we hear back. LANE COUNTY, Ore.- Doctors in Lane County say an unprecedented COVID-19 crisis is gripping area hospitals, and it's mostly driven by people who refuse to get vaccinated. Right now, there are around 100 COVID-19 patients in the hospital at RiverBend in Springfield. And 37 of them are in the Intensive Care Unit. Doctors were able to extend their COVID-19 care unit into the area where they normally treat patients after surgery. But even with this expansion, doctors said there are still major strains on staff and on resources. Karthik Mahadevan, M.D., the Medical Director for the RiverBend Emergency Department, said this problem will only continue to get worse in the coming weeks. "We expect that the next several weeks will continue to have a significant demand for ICU and hospital beds, that puts other patients at a disadvantage and getting their care delivered," said Dr. Mahadevan. PeaceHealth is also offering a new, one-time drug treatment therapy for those at extreme risk for hospitalization for COVID-19. It's a monoclonal antibody therapy normally used in cancer patients. But with an emergency use authorization from the FDA, COVID-19 patients at extreme risk can use the therapy to relieve symptoms. This treatment will not take place at the hospital but at the PeaceHealth Urgent Care at Valley River. Brenda Ormesher, M.D. said patients who've done the treatment see symptom improvement around 48 hours later. "The monoclonal antibody is a lab-produced antibody that is infused into your body to help your body recognize, in this case, the COVID particle and then boost that attacking to the virus and clear it," said Dr. Ormesher. Patients who are interested in the treatment must have a referral from their primary care provider. Ormesher also said unless you are having an emergency, you should contact your health care provider about this treatment option. Doctors like Mahadevan and Ormesher are still encouraging the community to get vaccinated. And to push the community to get vaccinated, Lane County Public Health is bringing back mass vaccination clinics. This morning Lane County Public Health officials reported that about 5,200 individuals have been vaccinated in the first two weeks of August. That's nearly double from July. But officials said we are still far from our goal. This is why they're bringing back a mass vaccination clinic at the Lane Events Center in Eugene. This clinic will primarily cater to people getting their third dose of the vaccine, but it will also be a place where people can receive their first and second shots. Lane County Public Health spokesperson Jason Davis said this plan is still in its final stages of planning, but it will help accommodate more people again. "In anticipation for that, we are setting up mass vax clinics again. It will be a somewhat different look and feel to them but we will be able to process and run through a number of more individuals than we are right now at our smaller pop-up clinics," said Davis. Davis also said Lane County Public health is still waiting for the 3rd dose to be approved for general use by the Oregon Health Authority and other groups. Thank you for reading! Please log in, or sign up for a new account to continue reading. To subscribe, click here. Already a subscriber? Click here. Improving the energy efficiency of Co. Kilkenny homes through retrofitting and installation heat pump systems could cost in excess of 1.3bn. Thats according to a new report published today (Thursday) by Liquid Gas Ireland (LGI) on The role of LPG and BioLPG in a Just Transition for Co. Kilkenny. The report sets how 1.1bn can be saved if the 22,685 homes in the county currently using high carbon fossil-based fuels such as oil, coal, and turf for home heating and as an energy source switch to a lower carbon alternative such as LPG or BioLPG instead of retrofitting for installation of heat pump systems. The savings were based on an average cost of 56,000 for a full scale retrofit including heat pump installation and an industry estimate of 5,000 for switching to a gas boiler with standard system upgrades. Mixed technology approach to decarbonisation required for Co. Kilkenny Commenting on the report, Chair of LGI Brian Derham said: If the Government is serious about achieving Irelands climate targets, it is critical that people living in both urban and rural communities are brought on the decarbonisation journey. Rural communities should be engaged by ensuring they are given the technology choices that meet their unique needs through secure, clean, and efficient lower-carbon fuels like LPG and BioLPG. The Governments revised Climate Action Plan must therefore provide for the delivery of a mixed technology approach to decarbonisation which works for rural Ireland, particularly for those living in or operating off-grid rural homes and businesses. At the core of the Climate Action Plan is a commitment to install 600,000 heat pumps and retrofit 500,000 homes for improved energy efficiency. However, we continue to express our concern that this one size fits all approach to decarbonisation is putting significant pressure on those living in rural communities. It simply does not consider the unique economic and infrastructural challenges these areas face in achieving a just transition, where over two-thirds of homes currently rely on oil boilers for heating and fuel. Many of these homes are classified as hard-to-treat houses meaning the cost of a retrofit would be 80 per cent more expensive. This prohibitive expense is proved by the continued low uptake of retrofitting grants outside urban centres. The report, which was conducted using CSO census data, names Kilkenny No.1 Urban, Pilltown, Castlecomer, Kilkenny Rural and Thomastown as the five electoral areas within Co. Kilkenny most reliant on high carbon fossil-based fuels for home heating and energy. Of the 10,851 dwellings in these areas, 43% (4,675) use oil, coal and turf while by contrast only 4% (479) have transitioned to heat pump technology. With no connection to the national gas grid and a proposed ban on gas boilers, households in these five rural areas alone will face a combined estimated cost of 261,800,000 to transition to heat pump technology, if this is the only lower carbon heating solution available to them. The role LPG and BioLPG can play in Kilkennys decarbonisation journey Mr Derham added: A mixed technology approach to decarbonisation, which includes lower-carbon fuels such as LPG and BioLPG could save about 1.9 million tonnes of CO2 emissions per year if 500,000 rural homes currently using oil-fired central heating switched to BioLPG by 2040. We are therefore calling on the Government to reverse its proposed ban on gas boilers so as not to restrict a seamless transition from lower carbon LPG to renewable BioLPG down the line. LPG boilers offer a long-term, cost-effective pathway to decarbonisation through the gradual introduction of BioLPG meaning that over time, carbon emissions will increasingly reduce. In addition, we want to see a reversal on the proposed removal of the eligibility of LPG and BioLPG heating systems under the revised Energy Efficiency Obligation Scheme (EEOS). Transitioning from oil to LPG and BioLPG allows off-grid homes and businesses to significantly reduce their carbon footprint without expensive retrofitting or major change to heating systems. It is our belief that rural communities should be given the option to adopt the carbon savings available through LPG and BioLPG, in addition to hybrid heating systems. This could be incentivised through the extension of Government energy efficiency schemes to encourage rural consumers to make a switch from oil boilers to an affordable LPG / BioLPG alternative. Renewable Energy Ireland recently launched its 40by30 Renewable Heat Plan which sets out a roadmap where 40 per cent of Irelands heat can come from renewables by 2030 in line with Government CO2 targets. The plan outlines how there is no single solution to decarbonising heating systems and acknowledged the important role renewable gas like BioLPG should play, alongside other renewable heat technologies. For further information on Liquid Gas Ireland, visit: www.lgi.ie. Last week, the number of Covid-19 cases in children in the US reached levels not seen since the winter surge. And with the return to schools, the Delta variant on the rise and this winter approaching, health officials are concerned it could get worse. After a decline in early summer, child cases have increased exponentially -- with more than a four-fold increase in the past month, according to the latest report from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children's Hospital Association. From about 38,000 cases a week near the end of July, the week ending August 19 saw more than 180,000 cases in children, the report said. "The virus is raging in all these children who are unvaccinated, which is why in schools mask mandates are so important," CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner told Jake Tapper, pointing out that people younger than 12 are not eligible to be vaccinated and inoculation rates are low among adolescents who are eligible. "They have no other protection. They're literally sitting ducks." The rise has come while 48.3% of the population is not fully vaccinated, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention -- and as the daily average of newly reported cases has climbed to more than 151,000. Health experts have been particularly concerned about cases among children as students return to school, many without mask mandates and without access to vaccines. Pfizer/BioNTech's vaccine was fully approved by the US Food and Drug Administration on Monday for Americans 16 and older, which National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis Collins told CNN was a "ray of sunshine in the midst of all these dark Covid clouds." The two companies said Wednesday they have begun to submit data, including that from a trial with 306 people, to the US Food and Drug Administration for approval of a booster dose of their Covid-19 vaccine. Moderna announced it has completed its submission to the FDA for full approval of its Covid-19 vaccine for people 18 and older. Moderna said it has requested priority review from the agency. Moderna's vaccine is currently available under emergency use authorization for people age 18 and older. The company began submitting data for approval to the FDA in June. Still, children younger than 16 aren't fully approved for a vaccine, and the emergency use authorizations in place only cover adolescents 12 and older. Children ages 5 to 11 are the next group in line to become eligible to receive the Covid-19 vaccine, and an updated emergency use authorization from the FDA would make at least 28 million additional children -- representing about 9% of the US population -- eligible to receive the vaccine, according to a CNN analysis of federal data. You asked, we're answering: Your top questions about Covid-19 and vaccines But the process of authorizing a vaccine for that age group may not be completed until the end of the year, US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy told CNN's Brianna Keilar. The timing is a problem, Dr. Paul Offit, a member of the FDA's vaccines advisory committee, told CNN, because the more transmissible Delta variant is spreading and the cold dry weather of the winter months makes it easier for the virus to spread -- all while children are sitting together in classrooms. "You are going to have a group of fully susceptible people all in one place," he told Jake Tapper. "That's not a good recipe." And though it would be good to have vaccines for children before then, it is important for health officials to take their time in making sure the vaccines are tested heavily -- and deemed safe. "We're moving as quickly as we can, it's just not easy to move that quickly when you talk about doing big vaccine trials," said Offit. Hospitalizations surpass the six-figure mark More than 100,000 people are hospitalized with Covid-19 in the US, the first time the country has surpassed that mark since January, according to data from the US Department of Health and Human Services. Covid-19 hospitalizations have been on the rise in the US since early July. They've nearly tripled in the past month, and have grown by 10% in the past week alone. Current hospitalizations are about 71% of the peak from January 14, according to HHS data. Florida and Texas account for nearly a third (31%) of current Covid-19 hospitalizations. Florida has the worst per capita hospitalization rate in the country -- about 80 hospitalizations per 100,000 people -- followed by Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia and Louisiana, each with more than 55 hospitalizations per 100,000 people. Covid-19 hospitalization rates are still highest among seniors, but the gap is smaller than it was during the winter surge. In fact, Covid-19 hospitalization rates among children and adults under 50 are the highest they've ever been, CDC data shows. An ensemble forecast published Wednesday by the CDC projects that new Covid-19 hospitalizations are likely to remain stable or have an uncertain trend over the next four weeks. It's the first time since mid-July the forecast did not project an increasing level of hospitalizations. Wednesday's forecast predicts there will be 7,800 to 27,000 new confirmed Covid-19 hospital admissions likely reported on September 20. Since July 14, the forecasts had projected that hospitalizations would increase each week. The forecast also predicts that new Covid-19 deaths will likely increase over the next four weeks, projecting a total of 651,000 to 680,000 deaths reported by September 18. The previous forecast, published August 18, predicted up to 664,000 Covid-19 deaths by September 11. As with previous weeks, the agency says that its Covid-19 cases forecast should be interpreted with caution because actual numbers have fallen outside the range of previous predictions. Schools take different approaches to rising cases As cases rise among children, some school leaders are pressing for precautions while others are banning mask mandates. Throughout Florida's 15 largest school districts, at least 11,851 students and 2,610 employees have tested positive for Covid-19, amounting to more than 14,461 confirmed cases since the school districts started keeping track of cases for the 2021-22 school year, according to a CNN analysis. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has issued an executive order banning schools from instituting mask mandates, but eight counties have defied the order as cases have grown. South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster also issued a ban on mask mandates, prompting a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union, according to a complaint filed Tuesday. "This is a disability rights issue," said Susan Mizner, ACLU disability rights program director. "Students with health conditions or disabilities that make them vulnerable to COVID have a right to attend school without endangering their health or safety. Schools who have children with these conditions have legal obligations under federal disability rights laws," Mizner said in an ACLU statement. McMaster's spokesperson Brian Symmes declined to specifically comment on the lawsuit, but said, "The only truly inclusive option is to allow every parent to decide whether their child will wear a mask in school." On the other hand, the Los Angeles Unified School District has implemented strong mitigation measures and appears to have kept infection rates under 1% during the first week of classes. The school district, the second-largest in the country, enacted the measures throughout its more than 1,000 schools. Teachers and employees are required to be fully vaccinated by October 15. Masks are required for all students, staff and visitors. The district also has a "cohort" model in place, which aims to keep as many students in the same classroom and with the same group of students as often as possible. A rigorous and costly testing initiative has also been put into place. Every student and employee must undergo free weekly testing regardless of vaccination status in order to be able to enter a school. The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has implemented a mask mandate in all public K-12 schools, effective immediately. It applies to students 5 and older, teachers and staff, according to a news release from the education department. The mandate is in full effect through October 1. After that date, middle and high school officials can lift the mandate for vaccinated students and staff, provided 80% of students and staff in a school building are vaccinated, the release says. The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Beatrice de Lavalette was 17 years old when she was at Brussels' Zaventem Airport, heading back to the US for spring break. The next thing she remembers is darkness, and the feeling of being lifted off the ground. By chance De Lavalette had been standing next to a suicide bomber and was one of the 300 people who were left injured after Zaventem Airport was struck by twin blasts on March 22, 2016 -- an attack where 32 people were killed and which ISIS would later claim responsibility for. "I was just on my phone talking to my brother and listening to music, really not paying attention to what was going on around me [...] I think the next thing I see is that everything's going really dark," de Lavalette tells CNN Sport's Amanda Davies. "It was right after I came to from being knocked out from the initial impact of the bomb, I remember looking around and knowing exactly what had just happened and I remember thinking, 'I cannot believe this just happened,'" she adds. She also remembers "a lot of chaos, a lot of smoke and fire and darkness." "I could start hearing other people screaming for help [...] I remember thinking that I should probably be doing the same thing," she says. Eventually, de Lavalette caught the eye of one of the first responders, who immediately sprayed her with a fire extinguisher to douse the flames that had enveloped her body. She was left with life-changing injuries including second- to third-degree burns, a spinal cord injury and the loss of her lower legs -- both of which were amputated. Six years on from that horrific day, the 22-year-old dressage rider is looking forward to brighter horizons and representing Team USA at her first Paralympic Games in Tokyo. No end in sight About a month after coming out of a coma, de Lavalette says she cried every day. She spent in ICU and wondered what life held in store for her. "Thank God I had my family there to support me," de Lavalette recalls. "Just knowing that my life wasn't over and that I was going to be able to continue living my life in a positive way helped me a lot when I was in the hospital." It was a few months later when the American ambassador to Belgium came to visit her in hospital, and they began talking about the Rio 2016 Olympics. "We were just talking and joking around. And she mentioned that the Olympics were going on in Rio at that point and how cool it would be for me to be in Tokyo for the next one," she says. "But I didn't really think too much into it." Until that point, de Lavalette had no intention of becoming a para-athlete -- let alone competing at a Paralympic Games -- but she did want to resume her passion of horse riding. "I wanted to get back to my [...] regular life, and for me, regular life was riding every day, so not being able to do that was really hard." The road to recovery De Lavalette spent months learning how to ride again, which was "really uncomfortable." "I had no muscle, I was just skin and bones, so being back on the saddle with no sense of balance was really uncomfortable. But with time, I was able to build up the muscle and work on my balance, and it got easier with time," she says. "My body was so different than prior to the accident. So for me, it was just readjusting what I had learned my whole life," de Lavalette adds. Riders often use their legs to guide their horse, shifting their weight to change the movement of their mount, but de Lavalette uses a whip to guide her horse, touching it from side to side to tell it where to go. 'I am very appreciative' From riding in the south of France as a youngster to returning to the saddle with her horse Delegada X -- who she affectionately calls DeeDee -- de Lavalette says her connection with horses has always proved stronger than the obstacles she's faced on her path to her first Games. When de Lavalette was recovering from the 2016 accident, her mother found a way to bring DeeDee to the hospital parking lot, where she was reunited with her beloved companion. "That moment made me decide that I wasn't going to give up on life," she told daytime talk show "The Doctors." "The basis of how I work with my horses is trust," de Lavalette tells CNN. "It's the feeling, the connection that you have with the horse, just that bond that you create over the [...] course of the training, I think, for me is probably my favorite," she adds. De Lavalette went back to school in September 2016 and finished her first para-equestrian show in April 2017. She made her first appearance for the US Para Dressage Team in January 2020 -- where she contributed to the team competition victory. Recently, she's been getting used to training with her new horse, a 14-year-old Dutch Warmblood named Clarc, who de Lavalette says is "awesome." "I've had [him] for nine months," she adds. "He's such a great horse. He is in some sense very supportive. He's a hard worker. He likes what he does and he doesn't toss me off [...] so I am very appreciative of that." 'It was really surreal' In July, de Lavalette shared the news that she had been picked to represent Team USA at the Paralympic Games. "It was really surreal," she says, "I kind of knew it was going to happen just because I had worked so hard, and I had done the results that I needed to make the team. But hearing it and making it official was really an incredible moment." Of course, de Lavalette's achievement is the culmination of years of hard work and sacrifice, but she says the dream of making a Paralympic podium is what has kept her going. "It'll probably make me cry, but it's going to mean everything. It's just such a special moment just to be able to represent the country and then do well enough to make the podium. It's going to be incredible," de Lavalette says. "It's going to be very happy tears." De Lavalette admits that she wouldn't have been able to get through the past several years without the support of her friends and family. "They have been there since day one and have never stopped supporting me, and I know that if I'm having a bad day, I can always call my parents or call my friends and they'll always help me get back to being my regular happy self." "I was born into a family [...] where everybody rode, so for me to continue the legacy was kind of a given," she adds. De Lavalette still thinks about that fateful day in 2016. "I think that I wouldn't be the person that I am today without the events that happened on that day," she says. "I watched it with my parents about a year after the accident. And for me, it was really important to see it because I didn't know or realize just how close I actually was to the bomber. "So for me to see myself literally stepping right next to the guy and then moments later the bomb going off was a bit of a realization of how lucky I really am. "It's a blessing in disguise, as well as kind of a nightmare." The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Today, women being able to vote is a given. A no-brainer. A natural, non-negotiable insurance of a Constitution designed to provide equality for all people. But before the 19th Amendment was ratified in 1920, ensuring all women the right to vote*, people invented all sorts of reasons why they didn't belong at the polls. (*Assuming you weren't Black or disabled.) Women were seen as somehow too fragile and too powerful at the same time, liable to burst into hysterics or upend the entire family unit just by casting a ballot. Here are a few examples of these arguments, from the absurd to the downright depressing. Argument : Eve ate the apple which made women unequal to men and, sorry, voting won't change that Some of the most common arguments against a woman's right to vote centered on religion, which tied into ideas about the family unit, relationships between men and women and, as Justin D. Fulton, a pastor of the Union Temple Baptist Church in Boston, Massachusetts put it, "nature and common sense." His 1869 pamphlet, "Woman as God Made Her," not only incorporates traditional arguments from scripture, but also features this bold take: "If we give to woman the ballot, shall the equality which woman lost, when she ate of the forbidden fruit, be restored, and shall she be made again the equal of man?" Unsurprisingly, his conclusion is ... no. Argument : Women don't actually want to vote, they just think it would be fun to try Sadly, men weren't the only ones to rail against women's suffrage. There were plenty of women who insisted they didn't want the right to vote, and occasionally, the push for voting rights was dismissed by some as a fashionable cause du jour that women would simply pick up and later abandon, like a fancy hat. That viewpoint is on display in this cartoon, published by the New York Press, in which fairly common arguments for women's equality are cast as some questionable fashion choice -- as a passerby asks, "I wonder if it's really becoming?" Argument : Women could cancel out their husbands' votes Some anti-suffrage material mixed in political arguments with household tips to, as the Jewish Women's Archive writes, "convince ordinary women that the right to vote was unnecessary." In fact, to them it wasn't just unnecessary. It could actually blot out the power of men! This pamphlet, published by the National Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage encourages women to vote (lol) "no" on women's suffrage because, among other things, married women can "only double or annul their husband's votes." And if that wasn't bad enough, "in some states more voting women than voting men will place the Government under petticoat rule." That term is, of course, a derogatory reference to a government dominated by women. Argument : Voting won't help women cook and clean, so what's the point? More household tips! Another pamphlet from the National Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage makes the household tip-to-anti-suffrage connection even more obvious. Observe these helpful hints, any of which would make a beautiful cross-stitch sampler: "You do not need a ballot to clean out your sink spout. A handful of potash and some boiling water is quicker and cheaper." "Why vote for pure food laws, when your husband does that, while you can purify your ice-box with saleratus water?" "Butter on a fresh burn takes out the sting. But what removes the sting of political defeat?" Checkmate, suffragists. Argument : Voting will lead women away from love and children and toward loneliness and anxiety Enough of the "slippery slope" argument. What about the "stairs of doom" argument? This cartoon drawn by Laura E. Foster around 1912 features a roller coaster of highs and lows for a woman pursuing the vote. At the bottom is love, marriage, children and home, which are all fine. But then things get dark, and the children are left behind as she ascends to ambition, social achievement, admiration, and then, suddenly, flattery and disappointment on her way to suffrage. But alas, the fated journey has not yet ended. Once the vote is secured, she keeps ascending to strife, anxiety and loneliness, pausing to tear her gaze away from the laurels of fame toward the precious children she left behind about a dozen steps before. Argument : Women can get whatever they want anyway This excerpt features some rebuttals from suffragists against a paper titled "Woman's Arguments Against Woman Suffrage." The anti-suffragists call a woman's vote a "grave social experiment," and argue, basically, that women can already get whatever they want without the vote. "It is exactly because the suffragist has found it easy to get whatever she wants from men outside of the lawmaking body, that she comes so confidently to you to-day," it reads. In fact, to these anti-suffragists, it's not enough that women don't need the vote to get what they want -- voting could actually take away a woman's power! "We believe that woman's non-partisan attitude gives her the opportunity for influence in the community which the suffrage would divert and curtail," the arguments go on. Argument : Pregnant women could get too excited when they vote, and that will turn their babies into ugly idiots Pregnant women and others in a delicate way, please look away lest you injure yourselves in rage. This book, written by Benjamin Vestal Hubbard around 1915 comes out swinging from the title: "Socialism, feminism, and suffragism : the Terrible Triplets." In a section titled "Physiological Conditions Make Woman Suffrage Impractical," Hubbard (a lawyer and writer by trade), delves into the mercurial mystery of a woman's body and how ill-suited it is for the strenuous task of voting. "Many women, at the time of holding primary elections, will be in a delicate condition, and to expose herself to excitement will jeopardize the physical and mental well-being of the child that is to be," he writes. "Better to let the government go to smash than bear a physically imperfect or idiot child." Hubbard goes on to apply the same argument to such blasphemies as women jurors and politicians, who he claims couldn't do their jobs because they wouldn't know where to put their babies. Finally, another cross-stitch sampler from his screed: "If you know the physical life of a woman, you know until she is 50 she has moods and tenses." What happens after 50? Who knows, but it apparently doesn't have to do with voting. Argument : Women will abandon their husbands, cruelly leaving them alone with their own children, in order to vote It's clear a lot of anti-suffrage arguments used a woman's role as mother to both dissuade them from voting and convince everyone else that women's suffrage would lead to a total breakdown in the family structure and destroy the next generation of Americans. For instance, this cartoon suggests that women may actually need to leave the house to vote, which would leave her defenseless and fragile husband alone with the two small, loud strangers also known as his children. A ballot on the lower right corner reveals the members of the "Hen Party:" Mrs. Henry Peck (get it? Henpeck) for president and Mrs. Wm. Nagg for vice president. Argument : Women are sweet, weak and gentle and voting will make them hard and harsh like men Many, many notable politicians were firmly on the anti-suffrage side, including Elihu Root, who served as the Secretary of State under President Theodore Roosevelt. This 1909 column from the Geneva Daily Times details Root's arguments against women's suffrage at a Capitol hearing and features text from an argument against suffrage that he made in 1894, when he was practicing as a lawyer. "Woman rules today by the sweet and noble influence of her character. Put woman into the arena of conflict and she abandons these great weapons which control the world and she takes into her hands, feeble and nerveless for strife, weapons with which she is unfamiliar and which she is unable to wield," he writes. "Woman in strife becomes hard, harsh, unlovable, repulsive ..." For the record, Root won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1912 for his advancement of international relations. Argument : Women will vote to punish the men who have done nothing but give them everything they want There are innumerable examples of ridiculous arguments made against women's suffrage, but how many of them are immortalized in four-part harmony? The title of this little ditty by Frank Howard, published around 1869, is the first clue that it's a satire of the suffrage movement: "We'll vote against these terrible men." The verses feature women lamenting their hard, luxurious lives bereft of suffrage. "My husband gives me but once a week, a hundred dollar bil to spend. Of such cruelty I'll no farther speak, but won't stand it long, depend ..." one verse goes. In another verse, a woman "leads a wretched life, she seems sad all the while; It's true she rides in her carriage fine, and buys six dresses every week ... But of trifles we'll not speak. " Then, of course, the chorus, in which these silly pampered suffragists vow to "Fix these 'dreadful men'" who have given them money, status and children but not their constitutionally enshrined right to a say in what happens in their government. All together now! The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. ROCHESTER, Minn. A former Mayo Clinic surgeon is pleading not guilty to invading patient privacy. Ahmad Maher Abdel-Munim Alsughayer, 28 of Saginaw, Michigan, was charged in April with unauthorized computer access, a gross misdemeanor. Investigators say Alsughayer accessed medical records, including nude images of a patient, without authorization or medical need. No trial date has been set. Alsughayer and Mayo Clinic are also being sued by three former patients over Alsughayer accessing their medical records, including nude images. A breast cancer patient and two dermatology patients say Mayo could have stopped Alsughayers behavior but failed to do so. One civil trial is scheduled to start in August 2022. No trial date has been set for a second lawsuit. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen have targeted crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport, in the waning days of a massive airlift that has drawn thousands of people seeking to flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. Russian officials said at least 13 people were killed. U.S. officials said 12 U.S. service members were killed, including 11 Marines and a Navy medic. A number of other American military were among dozens wounded. A U.S. official said the complex attack was believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby confirmed the blasts, saying one was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. I know our Minnesota National Guard members overseas will continue to demonstrate strength and courage as they execute their mission and make our state and nation proud. I ask all Minnesotans to keep our soldiers and airmen in their thoughts. Governor Tim Walz (@GovTimWalz) August 26, 2021 Praying for the Americans and our Afghan allies at the airport in Kabul. This is a sad day for our country and the future of Afghanistan. Gov. Kim Reynolds (@IAGovernor) August 26, 2021 This is a heartbreaking day for our country. We must do everything to get every American out and protect our men and women in uniform there as we evacuate. President Biden must not take orders from terrorists. Congressman Jim Hagedorn (@RepHagedorn) August 26, 2021 My prayers are with the families and loved ones of our military and others who lost their lives or were wounded during the terror attack in Kabul. Our service members are the best of us, our countrys bravest. My office continues to be in touch with State and Defense Depts. https://t.co/Uymc9kvXXM Amy Klobuchar (@amyklobuchar) August 26, 2021 My heart breaks at the news that American service members have been killed in the horrific attack in Kabul today. My thoughts are with their loved ones, and with all those who had loved ones killed and injured. Senator Tina Smith (@SenTinaSmith) August 26, 2021 Im monitoring situation at Kabul airport My prayers are w our servicemembers +American citizens + allies on the ground in Afghanistan ChuckGrassley (@ChuckGrassley) August 26, 2021 Im absolutely heartbroken & so angry about Afghansitan. I am thinking of the brave U.S. service members who lost their lives today & am praying for their families. President Biden needs to be accountable for this catastrophic failure of leadership. God bless our troops. Ashley Hinson (@hinsonashley) August 26, 2021 ROCHESTER, Minn. A man arrested for stabbing his wife at St. Marys Hospital is pleading guilty. Augustino Soro Nasona, 59 of Rochester, entered a guilty plea Thursday morning to one count of first-degree assault. Authorities say he stabbed his wife four times in the St. Marys employee cafeteria on May 29, 2019. Police say Nasona slashed at someone who tried to stop his attack and Nasona was eventually subdued by a Mayo Clinic security officer and another man in the cafeteria. Nasona had pleaded not guilty in July 2019 and was originally set to stand trial in February 2020, but that was put on hold when the COVID-19 pandemic hit. A sentencing hearing is now scheduled for October 4. MINNEAPOLIS (AP) A southern Minnesota man has pleaded guilty to illegally possessing a firearm after he bragged about his illegal shotgun and plans to kill a police officer at a Donald Trump rally at the state Capitol. 22-year-old Dayton Sauke of Owatonna entered his plea in federal court in Minneapolis on Wednesday. According to court records, the man posted antigovernment sentiments and photos of him holding guns on social media before the January rally. He also expressed a desire to kill a police officer at the rally, made numerous posts about building and selling guns without a license and posted photos of a sawed-off shotgun. MASON CITY, Iowa Police have released more information on gunfire Monday in Mason City. It happened around 2:10 pm near the intersection of 4th Street SE and Illinois Avenue. Witnesses reported someone in a vehicle shooting at another vehicle and then driving away. Police say a bullet went through the rear drivers door, through a back door, and then hit another vehicle that had two people inside. No injuries have been reported. Officers located the vehicle the gunfire had come from at a local residence and after securing the area, police say they were able to get Jacob Patterson, 21 of Mason City, to surrender without incident. The Mason City Police Department says the parties involved in this shooting were known to each other and there is no ongoing threat to the larger community at this time. While a shot fired in this incident went in a southerly direction, investigators say it did not impact anywhere near Mason City High School or Jefferson Elementary School. Patterson has been charged with intimidation with a weapon, a class C felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison. This incident remains under investigation and anyone with information about this incident is asked to contact the Mason City Police Department at 641-421-3636. Austin Utilities held an open house on Wednesday from 3:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. to celebrate the newly restored Ellis Well House number six facility. The project took Austin Utilities roughly three years to complete, with a price tag of $1.3 million that was funded by the company's customers. The historic Ellis water tower site was built in 1955, with 2021's renovation being the first time any changes were made to the well house in 66 years. Inside the facility resides the site's well, which is roughly 1,080 feet deep. New additions to the facility include a drive-up refill station for contractors, with the ability to access the water site by entering a code on the outside of the building. Austin Utilities Operations Director Alex Bumgardner said the company had a difficult time gathering materials for the new facility. "We definitely had some hand full of struggles just with obtaining materials and getting the right material that we wanted for the facility," Bumgardner said. The Ellis site only uses two chemicals for water treatment, according to Engineering Supervisor Keven Maxa. Maxa said chlorine is used for disinfecting, while polyphosphate prevents corrosion. ROCHESTER, Minn. Olmsted County residents are being encouraged to mask up when outdoors where other people may be present. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) recently updated their masking guidance to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and Olmsted County health officials are following suit. Olmsted County Public Health Services (OCPHS) has consistently followed the CDC and MDH guidance on COVID-19. We encourage all residents in the county to use masks in crowded outdoor settings whether youre vaccinated or not, says OCPHS Director Graham Briggs. Mask wearing is recommended: - In substantial and high transmission rate areas, CDC and MDH recommend wearing a mask: - If you are not fully vaccinated and aged two or older in indoor public places. - In crowded outdoor settings and for activities with close contact with others who have not gotten fully vaccinated. - If you have a condition or are taking medications that weaken your immune system. Individuals should continue to take all precautions recommended for unvaccinated people, including wearing a well-fitted mask unless their healthcare provider advises otherwise. - If you are fully vaccinated to maximize protection from the Delta variant and prevent spreading it to others. The CDC and MDH guidance offer event holders, businesses, and organizations with the proper steps to take to protect their patrons from COVID-19 while transmission in our community is high, says Briggs. The CDC says Olmsted County continues to have high rates of COVID-19 transmission, meaning the county has had either 100 total new cases per 100,000 people over the last seven days or a 10 percent positive test rate over the past seven days. Jasper, TX (75951) Today Thunderstorms early, then becoming clear after midnight. Low 72F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.. Tonight Thunderstorms early, then becoming clear after midnight. Low 72F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%. Two Easy Ways To Subscribe! The Kodiak Daily Mirror offers full-service, five-day a week subscriptions with home delivery in addition to unlimited access to our online services (including our e-Edition). Online-access-only subscriptions include unlimited access to the Mirror's online services without delivery of the printed newspaper. (Note: New users: You must register and login before purchasing a subscription. Kokomo, IN (46901) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. hospital workers nursing home workers teachers all or most of the above let employers decide the vaccine should not be mandated anywhere Vote View Results PORTLAND, OR (KPTV) COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths are continuing to spike in Oregon, especially in smaller counties and rural areas. Some funeral homes in these places have reached their limit and are now asking for help from the state to help store bodies. Both Tillamook and Joseph PORTLAND, OR (KPTV) - Community leaders held a rally at Pioneer Courthouse Square in downtown Portland Thursday to call for an end to the violence in the city. Portland Police: Suspect in Old Town murder turns himself in PORTLAND, OR (KPTV) - A suspect in a deadly shooting at an Old Town bar early Sunday morning has turned himself in, according to the Portland Pastor Corey Pritchett is one of the organizers of the "Stop the Violence' rally. He says after five people were shot while attending a vigil for another person killed in Old Town on Sunday he felt called to push for change in the city. The Portland Police Bureau has responded to 800 shootings so far this year, with over 250 gunfire-related injuries. This comes after a record-breaking year in 2020 with a total of 891 shootings. The rally Thursday is part of the community's Social Services Fair, which is being host by Better Portland and Worldwide Deliverance Church. Pritchett believes mental health is a contributing factor to the rise in violence happening amid the COVID-19 pandemic. He believes the campaign - specifically - can combat those issues through consistent outreach within the community. "One of the big differences is our Better Portland campaign is a one-year campaign. This is not a one and done, we're not here just to do a rally and go home," Pritchett said. "We are partnering with different nonprofits and different community organizations, and we're going to be having outreach. We're planning on coming back in October and December. It encourages a lot of fear in our community, we want people to know that if we stand together, we can make a change." Portland-area hospitals plead with public to get vaccinated amid surge in COVID cases PORTLAND, OR (KPTV) - All four major hospital systems pleaded with the public Wednesday to get their COVID-19 vaccine because most of their pa In addition to calling for a stop to the violence in Portland, organizers also called for community members to get vaccinated as Oregon reaches record highs in COVID-19 case number and hospitalizations. POCATELLO, Idaho (KPVI) - "As we saw the last four years, we had low gas prices, a stable Afghanistan and other things," said Bannock County Commissioner Terrel Tovey, who believes the new presidency has gone off the path. Read more Running from room to room, emergency room director Mark Kellar, right, barely puts one foot down as he hurries between patients at Our Lady of Angels Hospital in Bogalusa on Monday, August 9, 2021. (Photo by Chris Granger | The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate) MISSOULA, Mont. - As Montana continues to deal with nearly 50 active fires in the state, Governor Greg Gianforte held a news conference to give an update on the response to this prolonged fire season. The governor repeatedly thanked the countless organizations that collaborated and shared resources to fight fires in communities across the state. According to Gov. Gianforte, more than 800,000 acres have burned in Montana and 50 homes were lost this year. He believes a more proactive approach to land management will improve future fire seasons. Last year, the Department of Natural Resources and Conservation treated 11,000 acres, but the governor has challenged them to double that amount. "We've also invested in 14 different cross boundary projects throughout Montana. These 14 active management projects throughout our state will create more resilient forests, improve wildlife habitat, increase recreational opportunities and support our local economies with good-paying jobs in the forestry products industry," he said. Senator Steve Daines also spoke at the event saying he has introduced a bill, aiming to fix the cottonwood decision according to Dains Office, looking to combat any lawsuits that seek to prevent momentum with future land management efforts. BERLIN & WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 26, 2021-- The publishing group Axel Springer signed an agreement to acquire POLITICO, including the remaining 50 percent share of its current joint venture POLITICO Europe, as well as the tech news website Protocol from Robert Allbritton. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005451/en/ POLITICO will complement and strengthen Axel Springers portfolio with an authoritative voice offering inside perspective and analysis of politics and policy in Washington D.C., across the U.S., and around the globe. Together with INSIDER and Morning Brew, which are already part of the companys portfolio, Axel Springers U.S.-headquartered news brands will have a significant reach. Over its 15-year history, POLITICO has emerged as one of the worlds most-influential news sources, and one of the preeminent models of successful media innovation in the 21 st Century. Today, more than 500 journalists at POLITICO and its sibling publication Protocol, launched in 2020, help set the agenda on the most urgent issues dominating the global public policy landscape. With significant revenue derived from high-value business-to-business subscriptions and advertising, the publishing model has produced steady growth and healthy profits, and has a proven strategy for further robust expansion moving forward. Axel Springer and POLITICO in the U.S. have been joint venture partners since 2014 when they launched POLITICO Europe. The Brussels-based publication has since become an indispensable source of information in the EU and has continuously grown both its newsroom and its revenues and has been profitable since 2019. Mathias Dopfner, CEO Axel Springer, commented: POLITICOs outstanding team has disrupted digital political journalism and set new standards. A true North Star. It will be a privilege and a special responsibility to help shape the future of this outstanding media company. Objective quality journalism is more important than ever, and we mutually believe in the necessity of editorial independence and nonpartisan reporting. This is crucial for our future success and accelerated growth. Robert L. Allbritton, Founder and Publisher of POLITICO and Protocol: My 15-year adventure with POLITICO has been the ride of a lifetime. I reach this milestone with a sense of satisfaction that I hope is shared by every POLITICO. Together we have built what is without a doubt the most impressive and most enduring of the many experiments in new publications over the past generation. Particularly in recent years, we have put the emphasis on doing rather than boasting, and what multiple competitors have aspired toa consistently profitable publication that supports true journalistic excellencewe have achieved. Above all, I have always known that ownership is about responsibility. As POLITICO has prospered in recent years, accompanied by the successful launch of Protocol, it became steadily more clear that the responsibility to grow the business on a global scale, to better serve the audience and create more opportunities for our employees, might be better advanced by a larger company with a significant global footprint and ambitions than it could be by me as owner of a family business. As I have often said, I would only welcome a new investor that reflected my values and POLITICOs distinctive company values. Axel Springer and Mathias Dopfner and his team meet that test better than any other company in media today. I look forward to working with them as publisher of POLITICO and Protocol as we reach even greater heights. Robert Allbritton will continue as publisher of POLITICO and Protocol. The editorial and management leadership teams of POLITICO in the U.S., POLITICO Europe and Protocol will remain in place, and will continue to operate their publications separately from Axel Springers other brands headquartered in the U.S. Both parties have agreed not to disclose the deal terms. Subject to regulatory approval, closing of the transaction is expected in Q4 2021. About Axel Springer Axel Springer is a media and technology company and active in more than 40 countries. By providing information across its diverse media brands (amongst others BILD, WELT, INSIDER, POLITICO Europe) and classified portals (StepStone Group and AVIV Group), Axel Springer SE empowers people to make free decisions for their lives. Today, the transformation from a traditional print media company to Europes leading digital publisher has been successfully accomplished. The next goal has been set: Axel Springer aims to become global market leader in digital content and digital classifieds through accelerated growth. The company is headquartered in Berlin and employs more than 16,000 people worldwide. About POLITICO POLITICO is the global authority on the intersection of politics, policy, and power. It is the most robust news operation and information service in the world specializing in politics and policy, which informs the most influential audience in the world insight, edge, and authority. Founded in 2007, POLITICO has grown to a team of 700 working across North America, more than half of whom are editorial staff. POLITICO Europe, its seven-year-old European edition has grown to nearly 200 employees. Early this year it acquired E&E News, the renowned news organization focused solely on energy and the environment. About Protocol Protocol is a leading digital media company focused on the people, power and politics of tech. Technology is no longer just an industry; its a global power center with the sweep and impact of any nations capital. At Protocol, we cover it with no agenda and just one goal: to arm the most senior decision-makers in tech, business and public policy with the unbiased news and analysis they need to navigate a world undergoing rapid change. Launched in 2020, Protocol covers U.S. and China big tech in addition to areas such as enterprise technology, fintech and the evolving tech workplace. Protocols team includes reporters in San Francisco, New York, Washington, D.C. and London. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005451/en/ CONTACT: For Axel Springer Finsbury Glover Hering Andrew Johnson / Sophia Templin 914-497-5138 / 917-596-8172 andrew.johnson@fgh.com/sophia.templin@fgh.comFor POLITICO Brad Dayspring 202-550-4458 bdayspring@politico.com KEYWORD: GERMANY EUROPE UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY OTHER COMMUNICATIONS PUBLISHING PUBLIC RELATIONS/INVESTOR RELATIONS MARKETING ADVERTISING COMMUNICATIONS SOCIAL MEDIA SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING INTERNET SOURCE: Axel Springer Copyright Business Wire 2021. PUB: 08/26/2021 08:30 AM/DISC: 08/26/2021 08:32 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005451/en NASHVILLE, Tenn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 26, 2021-- LBMC Employment Partners, a leading professional employer organization based in Nashville, TN, is pleased to announce the addition of the Cigna national plan to its PEO. The Cigna addition expands LBMC Employment Partners Professional Employer Organization (PEO) to provide a full suite of benefit offerings to businesses headquartered outside the state of Tennessee and complements the companys established BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee plan offered to employers based in Tennessee. The key strategic expansion allows LBMC Employment Partners, a Certified PEO and member of NAPEO, to offer competitive health insurance to companies headquartered across the U.S. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005093/en/ Cigna Addition Expands LBMC Employment Partners National Presence; Allows Firm to Offer Outsourced HR Solutions to Companies Across the U.S.; Further Establishes Firm as Leading PEO (Graphic: Business Wire) The addition of the Cigna national plan to our suite of service offerings has been one of our key strategic initiatives for LBMC Employment Partners and our clients, said Sharon Powlus, President/CEO, LBMC Employment Partners. For several years, we have worked to secure a national health plan to complement our current BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee plan. We are excited to announce we finalized that plan through Cigna and are now able to sell our PEO service anywhere in the U.S. Through the Cigna national plan, LBMC Employment Partners will provide four medical offerings on Cignas largest network, along with dental and vision plans. Our expanded national PEO will bring enhanced peace of mind to employers and employees alike. Employers can offer more competitive benefits packages, which in turn allows them to retain talent and stand out to potential recruits, and employees will have the advantage of a large network regardless of where they are located. With the hybrid workforce here to stay, offering a national plan will add even more value to the services we provide our clients, said Powlus. About LBMC Employment Partners LBMC Employment Partners, LLC, a member of the LBMC Family of Companies, is a world-class professional services firm. LBMC Employment Partners provides a comprehensive suite of human resource-related services to businesses, including Professional Employer Organization (PEO) services, HR Outsourcing (HRO), Payroll, Payroll Tax Outsourcing, Human Resource Consulting, Employee Benefits, and ACA Compliance Consulting. LBMC Employment Partners is also the only Tennessee-based PEO to receive the Certified Professional Employment Organization (CPEO) designation in the first round of IRS certifications. For more information visit www.lbmcep.com. About LBMC LBMC is a Forbes Top Recommended Firm, one of the Southeasts largest accounting and business consulting firms and a top 50 firm in the nation serving approximately 10,000 clients with diverse needs across a spectrum of industries. The LBMC Family of Companies has more than 700 employees, with offices in Chattanooga, Nashville (Brentwood), and Knoxville, TN, and Charlotte, NC. Founded in 1984 as a traditional accounting firm, LBMC has expanded its focus to meet a broad range of advisory and business consulting needs for its diverse client base. Today, we've become industry leaders in financial, human resources, technology, information security, and wealth advisory services for businesses and individuals. For more information, visit www.lbmc.com. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005093/en/ Lisa Namm,lnamm@lbmc.com, 615-309-2356 KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA TENNESSEE INDUSTRY KEYWORD: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES OTHER PROFESSIONAL SERVICES INSURANCE HUMAN RESOURCES CONSULTING ACCOUNTING SOURCE: LBMC Employment Partners, LLC Copyright Business Wire 2021. PUB: 08/26/2021 08:34 AM/DISC: 08/26/2021 08:34 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005093/en KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike IS. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. U.S. officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airports perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. Faiez reported from Istanbul, Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike IS. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. U.S. officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airports perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. Even so, the airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people away.. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. Faiez reported from Istanbul, Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. MISSOULA, Mont. - The debate over masks in the classroom is heating up as some parents filed a lawsuit against one Montana school district. The lawsuit is over a Missoula County Public Schools policy to require masks for the first six weeks of the school year. Missoula Attorney Quentin Rhoades says the constitution states there has to be a "compelling government interest' to force people to make health care choices that they don't want to make. He said the courts state there's a very narrow set of circumstances in which they can do that. His clients argue there's no scientific evidence that proves non-sterile masks in a non-sterile environment prevents the spread of COVID-19. A parent of a student in the Missoula County Public School District, Erick Prather, said there was no choice but to file a lawsuit because the school board wasn't listening to concerns from the community. "I think this is a gross violation of our Civil Rights under the color of authority. These folks are elected, they have no business prescribing a medical device to our students," Prather said. A group of parents in Missoula who are against the mask mandate started a GoFundMe page to help cover legal fees. As of Wednesday, they raised over $9,000. The school board's attorneys said they "certainly disagree with the plaintiff's allegations and will be responding to those allegations in court filings." The Superintendent's Office for the Missoula County Public School District had no comment. BOZEMAN, Mont. - Montana State University is hosting its Move-In Weekend from Saturday, Aug. 21, through Tuesday, Aug. 24. MSU is expecting more than 3,500 students to move into residence halls across campus this school year. Students and their families are appointed two-hour time slots between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. to move in. There is a group of volunteers from the MSU and the Bozeman community that will be helping students unload vehicles and get items to their rooms. For many parents dropping off their kids at college is a very emotional time. MSU Parent, Perrin Grubbs said, "We are hoping that this year goes as well as it can all things considered and we have worked hard to get here and we are excited to start. To help students get adjusted to moving away from home and meeting new colleagues, MSU is hosting events all week long. A list of MSU welcome back events can be found here. MSU students in-person and online classes start on Wednesday. More information on MSU Move-In Weekend can be found here. TURIN, AUG 26 - A puppy has been found amid the rubble of a Turin building 30 hours after it collapsed due to a gas explosion killing a four-year-old boy and leaving three adults seriously injured. The puppy, Ettore, had been adopted by one of the families struck by the disaster. One of the injured people is the mother of the dead boy. The Italian fire brigade's Urban Search and Rescue team pulled Ettore out of the rubble on Wednesday afternoon. The animal, which appeared to be in a reasonable condition, was given to vets for treatement. (ANSA). ROME, AUG 26 - Italy thinks it is crucial to invite Russia to tackle regional and global crises like the one in Afghanistan, Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio told TASS Thursday. Speaking ahead of a Rome meeting with Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov Friday, Di Maio said "Italy recognizes the importance and he need for Russia's active involvement in addressing global challenges and crises: our proposal to call an emergency G20 meeting on Afghanistan is aimed precisely at attracting the main powers to seek a global solution that satisfies all the parties". (ANSA). VENICE, AUG 26 - A 70-year-old German tourist died of his injuries in hospital Thursday after a campsite fight near Venice on Saturday night, local sources said. The man was said to have started bothering other campers after drinking too much and one of them reacted by pushing him so that he fell to the ground and banged his head hard, knocking him unconscious, the sources said. The incident happened at the "Portobello" camping site at Ca' Savio, a district of Cavallino-Treporti near Venice. Prosecutors are set to decide whether to prosecute the man who pushed the tourist for involuntary manslaughter, judicial sources said. (ANSA). ROME, AUG 26 - The G20 must do all it can to help Afghan women maintain their rights and freedoms even under the Taliban, Premier Mario Draghi told the G20 Conference on Women's Empowerment at Santa Margherita Ligure near Genoa on Thursday - a few hours before a suicide bomber killed at least 13 Afghans including some children at Kabul Airport. "The G20 must do everything possible to guarantee that Afghan women keep their freedoms and rights," he said in opening the forum, which Italy chairs as G20 duty president. "We must not deceive ourselves, Afghan girls and women are set to lose their freedom and dignity, to return to the sad condition in which they found themselves 20 years ago," Draghi went on. "They risk becoming second-class citizens once more, victims of systematic violence and discrimination, for the sole fact of being women. "We must defend women's rights everywhere in the world, above all where they are threatened. "The G20 must do all possible," the Italian premier insisted, "to ensure that Afghan women keep their fundamental freedoms and rights, in particular the right to education. "The conquests achieved in the last 20 years must be preserved". Speaking after Draghi, Equal Opportunities Minister Elena Bonetti said that there must be an "acceleration" in women's empowerment and that she had called a meeting of G20 colleagues later Thursday to discuss the situation in Afghanistan. The Taliban is trying to present a more moderate face but there are already reports of women and girls being forced to stay at home. The Islamist militants swept back into power as US and other western forces started leaving the Asian country 20 years after invading it to drive out al-Qaeda. The US has set a deadline of August 31 for pulling out its troops and ending the western airlift of Afghans at risk of Taliban reprisals. On Thursday it told US citizens not to go to Kabul airport. But NATO sources said some evacuation efforts may proceed beyond that date. London said Thursday that there was an "imminent" threat of an ISIS car or truck bomb attack on the airport in the Afghan capital. European Economic Affairs Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni, a former Italian premier, said Thursday that the US decision to pull out of Afghanistan had been disastrous but "the debacle may spell Europe's hour" in terms of a new role to try to preserve some of the rights which the Taliban return has threatened. Amid chaos at the airport, it was initially reported that an Italian C-130 transport carrying Afghan former NATO workers out of Kabul was fired on as it left the ground - but Italian intelligence clarified that the Taliban had fired shots into the air to disperse a crowd and had not aimed at the plane. Moscow said Thursday some 50 people have died at Kabul airport in the last few days. The Taliban said Thursday that music would once more be banned in the country. A suspected suicide bomber blew himself up in the 'channel' where British troops examine thousands of papers at Kabul airport, killing at least 13 people including some children and wounding many more, Taliban sources said, adding that some militants were among the wounded. Some US marines were hurt, US media including Fox News reported. (ANSA). ROME, AUG 26 - The Italian defence ministry said Thursday that no Italians have been involved in a suicide bomb attack, believed to have been by ISIS, that reportedly killed at least 13 people including some children and wounded many others at a Kabul Airport entrance gate. The explioion took place in an area far from where Italian soldiers are conducting the final stages of Operation Aquila for the evacuation of Afghan citizens, the ministry said. A suspected suicide bomber blew himself up in the 'channel' where British troops examine thousands of papers at Kabul airport, killing at least 13 people including some children and wounding many more, Taliban sources said, adding that some militants were among the wounded. Some US marines were hurt, US media including Fox News reported. Three US marines and several British soldiers were hurt, Bild said. At least one of the Americans was seriously wounded, US sources said. The Pentagon said there had been a second bomb at the Baron Hotel, not far from the scene of the first bomb, the Abbey Gates. (ANSA). It's the Lake of the Ozarks boating event of the year. The Shootout is something everyone who lives or vacations here ought to experience at least once. In addition to the thrilling sights and sounds of fast boats, the air show is always a hit, and many people attend simply because it's a perfect reason to tie up and enjoy a long day of doing not much at all, on a float, next to the boat on a sunny August weekend. Whether you're watching from water or land, here are LakeExpo's "insider" tips on getting the best angle on the racing action. 1. By water: arrive early for a good spot The best view of the Shootout is from the spectator flotilla, which begins lining up more than an hour before the races begin. And since the Non-professional classes begin their runs at 10 a.m., it means an early morning if you want prime Shootout flotilla real estate. The early-arrivers get the best spots, but as long as you're on the front row (typically two or more rows form), in the span of the actual 3/4-mile race course, you'll be positioned for a great view. The beginning of the race course is marked by a big start boat and buoy, like this: And the end of the race course is marked by two buoys, like this one: Make sure you follow the directions of the Anchor Management folks: they're Shootout volunteers who idle up and down the crowd flotilla and make sure everyone keeps a safe distance from the actual racing action. Pro Tip: Bring a pair of binoculars or long-lens camera if you want a really cool, up-close look at these incredible boats and racers on the course. 2. No boat? Hop aboard with a friend Theres nothing quite like experiencing the Shootout from the water. So if you live or vacation at Lake of the Ozarks, scroll through that Facebook friend list and look for somebody whose profile photo shows them on a boat. If you offer to bring the beverages, maybe theyll let you join in the fun. But maybe you dont have any friends with a boat (or none of them want you aboard), or you just dont want to get out on the water. You can still enjoy the Shootout, by land. Reminder: No drones are allowed above the Shootout race course! Aerial photos are cool, we agree, but unless you have explicit permission from Shootout organizers, leave the drone at home. 3. Watch by land If you're one of the lucky ones who has a friend (or friend-of-a-friend...) with a house or condo on the land-side of the race, you'd be crazy not to accept an invite to watch from there. However, for most Shootout landlubbers, Captain Ron's Bar & Grill nestled in the cove behind the flotilla can be a great place to experience a different kind of Shootout action. Many fans come every year to mingle with racers on the docks, watch mechanics swapping props or fiddling around in the engine compartment, and enjoy the frequent roars of huge engines coming to life. Be aware, you cant really see the Shootout racing from Captain Rons. If you stand at the end of a dock and look out of the cove, you can see the massive flotilla of boats extending along the channel. You can see racers coming off the course, idling over to the docks at Rons, and racers idling away from the docks toward the start line. But you can watch the Shootout from Captain Rons: on the beach! The video feed (managed this year by Benne Media) will be playing on their digital sign truck set up next to the silent auction tent on Captain Ron's beach as well as on multiple additional monitors in the tent. So grab a seat and watch fast boats to your hearts delight. Plenty of fans stand around the area, talking and watching; sometimes the friends or family of a specific racer will gather to watch their boat on the screen. Most folks dont just sit and watch the Shootout on a screen all day, though. The fast boats are cool, but much of the fun of Shootout is the experience. Stroll through the vendor village, go mingle with racers on the docks and take a peek inside the boats. Bring your kid (or borrow one), and a racer might even offer to let you climb inside the cockpit! Grab a drink inside or (more likely) at the outside tiki bar, and go for a swim in the protected swimming area complete with sandy beach. You can even see the high-flying acrobatics of the air show. Plenty of people enjoy the Shootout by land at Captain Rons every year, and in fact, seem to prefer it! 4. Tune in, from home The Shootout will be broadcast over radio, TV, and the Internet. So if youd rather avoid the water and avoid the crowds, and just casually watch or listen to the races and accompanying commentary, heres how: Shootout Online LakeExpo.com -- a live-stream player will be embedded on our homepage and our Shootout page. Lake TV Webstream Lake TV Facebook Live Stream Shootout On The Radio KQUL Cool 102.7 FM KQUL Cool 102.7 Classic Hits Facebook page / KLOZ Mix 92.7 Todays Best Hits Facebook page Shootout On Lake TV Platforms Co-Mo Connect Channel 90 Charter Spectrum 197 Lake TV Roku channel Search Lake TV in Channel Store Fire TV Lake TV Search Lake TV under Apps Shootout On TV Jim Giamarese has a lot of hungry mouths to feed with the 120 acres of fruits and vegetables he raises on his central New Jersey farm. Before Mr. President, Since this is the first time my delegation takes the floor during your presidency, allow me at the outset to congratulate you on the assumption of the presidency. You can count on our full support. We thank the distinguished panelists for their valuable `insights into this timely discussion on Women and International Security. Mr. President, We repeat among ourselves at each session that the CD is the sole multilateral disarmament negotiating forum. Yet, regrettably, we have not been successful in reaching consensus on a Programme of Work, let alone the negotiations.. Irrespective of the CDs lack of progress, the world outside keeps moving and the already fragile international security situation is taking a turn for the worse. Trust in multilateralism is challenged and there are concerns on the return of strategic competition among military powers. It is in these worrying circumstances that we welcome this session on Womens participation and role in International Security, a discussion that will shed light on an important link on the chain of disarmament and non-proliferation that is often over looked. Sri Lanka in 1960 produced the worlds first elected female Prime Minister who mooted the proposal for the Indian Ocean to be made a Zone of Peace at the United Nations General Assembly in 1971. , Sri Lanka has over the years seen women leaders rising up to important government positions including the office of the President, Cabinet Ministers, Chief Justice, and the Attorney General. In the recent past two Sri Lanka female career diplomats have held senior positions at the IAEA and at the OPCW contributing to disarmament and non-proliferation efforts. We consider active female participation is essential in the disarmament and non-proliferation discussions and negotiations due to several reasons. Firstly, women consist of nearly half of the world population. Women are the true strength of a nation and are inseparably linked to the human life chain. They therefore form a crucial part in shaping the world we live in and more importantly on its security. No meaningful and sustainable peace can be achieved without the effective participation of women in the process. Women have been involved in informal peace processes over the years. While participation of women in indigenous peace processes are important and proved to be effective, their role should not be limited only for such local processes. The voice of women in formal peace negotiations has been less heard and their participation is less prominent. It is important to ensure that formal conflict resolution processes are inclusive enabling effective participation of women. Secondly, conflicts affect men, women, girls and boys differently. Women and girls constitute the largest number of victims of gender based violence. It is this very situation of being direct victims of security, economic, political and humanitarian crisis that require women to be at the forefront of the international security discourse to ensure that their concerns are heard and incorporated into peacebuilding and reconciliation efforts. Issues concerning women and girls right to education and employment are also important factors for consideration and would be best explained by women themselves emerging from such communities and directly participating in negotiations. Thirdly, it is important that we approach the discourse on women and security going beyond the victim centric perspective of presenting women and girls exclusively as targets. This will not only undermine ability of women to face challenging circumstances but also impede opportunities for equal participation. According to the Inter Parliamentary Union, at the current rate, it will take another 50 years before gender parity is achieved in parliaments worldwide. There is a greater possibility for multilateral disarmament efforts to reflect gender sensitivity in their outcomes if there are women in representative bodies. Furthermore, women bring in different perspectives to the negotiation table from more diverse experiences fostering creativity and change, which are essential elements of sustainable peace and stability. Effective female representative should be ensured through out the process and not as an after thought. Fourthly womens equitable participation in post conflict reconstruction and rehabilitation is crucial. In post conflict environments, womens role either as civilians, ex combatants or as victims is seen reduced to the minimum. While the inclusion of women in post conflict rebuilding efforts may be considered a moral imperative, there are compelling economic and security reasons that are even more convincing for their inclusivity in such processes. There is a clear linkage between development and female participation. Gender equality and womens empowerment remains an integral principle of each of the 17 SDG goals. In Sri Lanka female deminers play a remarkable role in the national mine action program and many of whom are rehabilitated ex-LTTE combatants. Lastly, female participation in international security related negotiations require their empowerment with technical expertise and negotiation skills. As a beneficiary of the UN Disarmament Fellowship programme and more recently from the UN Women in Cyber (WIC) Fellowship, I would personally highlight the importance of encouraging women to get more engaged in and contribute to the disarmament and non-proliferation discourse and decision making. This in turn would contribute to increase the confidence among female representatives to be more influential and meaningful in their engagement. We appreciate the efforts by UNODA to enhance the role of women in international peace and security, particularly the publication of Notes on Gender Perspectives on Disarmament and the implementation of their Gender Mainstreaming Action Plan (2016). Mr. President, in conclusion allow me to point out one more important consideration. Last 21 years have passed since the adoption of the UN Security Council resolution 1325 and 26 since the launch of the Beijing Platform for Action, two important milestones in the women, peace and security agenda. There is enough acknowledgment of the importance of the issue. What is lacking is for these commitments to be reflected in actions on the ground. Genuine political will beyond commitments enshrined in paper therefore is essential. Sri Lanka stands ready to play its role in this process. (ends) View PDF The largest-ever infrastructure project in the Maldives, funded under the Indian Grant and Line of Credit, will commence soon. A contract between AFCONS (Mumbai-based company) & Government of Maldives to be signed today for construction of Greater Male Connectivity Project(GMCP) pic.twitter.com/Bteg8W1rZ7 ANI (@ANI) August 26, 2021 (SocialLY brings you all the latest breaking news, viral trends and information from social media world, including Twitter, Instagram and Youtube. The above post is embeded directly from the user's social media account and LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body. The views and facts appearing in the social media post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY, also LatestLY does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.) The White House has reportedly cut off President Joe Biden's microphone when asked what he will do if Americans are still in Afghanistan after the deadline. According to political strategist Josh Holmes, the move was "pretty remarkable," The Daily Wire reported. Joe Biden was delivering his remarks on Wednesday regarding a cybersecurity event when NBC News White House correspondent Peter Alexander asked him the question. Alexander later tweeted the exchange and said the president told him that "you'll be the first person I call." The NBC News White House correspondent also said that Joe Biden took no questions. READ NEXT: Taliban Got Hold of a U.S.-Made Super-Surveillance System Americans Still in Afghanistan U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday said more than 1,500 Americans are still in Afghanistan, while the U.S. still relies on the Taliban to allow safe passage to Kabul airport only six days before the August 31 deadline. Among those trapped are 24 students from California Cajon Valley Union School District, with 16 parents who visited the warzone on a summer trip. The students and parents went to Afghanistan to visit extended family, but they have not been able to leave since then, Daily Mail reported. Blinken blamed the Americans still in Afghanistan for not leaving fast enough after being warned earlier this year to leave the country as soon as possible. The secretary of state said the U.S. has been in "direct contact" with around 500 confirmed U.S. citizens and provided detailed instructions on how to get to the airport safely. Blinken said some might no longer be in the country, while some may have claimed to be Americans, but turned out not. He said they will continue to try and identify the status and plans of the people stuck in Afghanistan in the coming days. Taliban Blocking Access The Taliban on Tuesday said they would be hindering Afghans from trying to leave the country. They also said that they would reject any plans to extend the deadline for the U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the chaos at the airport remained a dangerous problem. Mujahid noted that it was being closed to Afghan citizens to prevent people from joining the crowds, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported. Mujahid said that foreigners could go pass through, but Afghans will not be allowed to go there. The Taliban was also reportedly seeking out Afghans who worked with U.S. and NATO forces. The spokesman urged the U.S. not to encourage Afghan people to leave their country as they need their doctors, engineers, and those who are educated. On Monday, the Taliban warned that there would be consequences if the U.S. extends its presence longer in the country. Meanwhile, Joe Biden did not want to extend the August 31 deadline. Many Afghans, particularly women, stay inside their homes, scared to face the Taliban's wrath at checkpoints. READ MORE: U.S. Military Launches Airstrikes Against Iran and Syria, Targets Militia Groups Behind Drone Attacks on U.S. Personnel This article is owned by Latin Post Written by: Mary Webber WATCH: Thousands of Americans Still Stranded in Afghanistan - From NBC News The U.S. Embassy in Kabul has issued a security alert Wednesday evening advising Americans to avoid traveling to the airport in Afghanistan's capital city. The said security alert issued by the embassy encouraged Americans at the airport gates - Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate - to "leave immediately" due to the security threats outside Kabul airport. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul advised Americans to be aware of their surroundings at all times, especially in large crowds, and follow the instructions of local authorities. The embassy also advised Americans to have contingency plans in case of emergencies, monitor local media, enroll in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP) to receive alerts, and follow the State Department on social media. It was still unclear what prompted the advisory. READ NEXT: Fox News Host, Rachel Campos-Duffy Slams Jill Biden for Letting 'Mentally Frail' Husband Joe Biden, Run as President U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken: Up to 1,500 Americans Still in Afghanistan On Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said there could be up to 1,500 Americans who are still in Afghanistan and attempting to evacuate. Blinken blamed the Americans still in the South Asian country for not leaving fast enough after being warned earlier this year to leave the country as soon as possible. According to Blinken, the U.S. has been in "direct contact" with around 500 confirmed U.S. citizens and was provided detailed instructions on how to get to the airport safely. The secretary of state noted that some Americans might no longer be in Afghanistan, while some claimed to be Americans but turned out not. He said they will continue to identify the status and plans of the people stuck in Afghanistan in the coming days. White House Says Joe Biden's Evacuation Efforts in Afghanistan - A 'Success' On Tuesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki lauded the evacuation efforts of President Joe Biden in Afghanistan. Psaki said the evacuation efforts were "anything but a success." She called the ongoing evacuation in Afghanistan to be the "biggest airlift in U.S. history." Psaki said that American citizens, as well as Afghan partners, were pulled out from the country. To date, more than 70,000 people have been removed from Afghanistan. Joe Biden on Tuesday said the U.S. has already evacuated at least 75,900 people from Afghanistan. Meanwhile, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby noted that "several thousand" Americans have already been evacuated, but he failed to give a more specific figure. On Tuesday, Joe Biden told other G7 leaders that the U.S. is on pace to complete the pullout from Afghanistan by August 31. But Psaki said the president already asked the Pentagon and the State Department "for contingency plans" to adjust the timeline if it becomes necessary. The Taliban earlier warned the U.S. that there would be consequences if the evacuation and withdrawal of troops in Afghanistan would go beyond the August 31 deadline. Taliban spokesperson Dr. Suhail Shaheen has called the withdrawal deadline "red line." Shaheen noted that if the U.S. extends it, "that means they are extending occupation while there is no need for that." "It will create mistrust between us. If they are intent on continuing the occupation, it will provoke a reaction," Shaheen said. READ MORE: Angelina Jolie Joins Instagram, Posts Heartfelt Letter Sent to Her by an Afghan Girl This article is owned by Latin Post Written By: Joshua Summers WATCH: Security Concerns at Kabul Airport as Americans and Afghans try to Evacuate - From Good Morning America Prince Harry and Meghan Markle had considered identifying the "royal racist" who they said commented on their son Archie's skin color, according to an updated edition of their biography. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex said they weighed up sharing the said information during their interview with Oprah Winfrey, Daily Mail reported. However, Meghan decided not to reveal the individual's identity because she believed it would be very damaging to them. In an updated edition of the biography "Finding Freedom," authors Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand claimed that the couple considered sharing the details during their TV interview. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle had repeatedly said that Finding Freedom was unauthorized and that they had not offered any cooperation. However, Scobie and Durand are seen as being close to the couple. The updated version of the epilogue will be published next week. READ NEXT: Queen Elizabeth II Warns British Media to Stay Away From Balmoral - And Her Son Prince Andrew Leaked Details of The Epilogue The updated edition alleged that members of the Royal Family were quietly pleased that Meghan Markle had missed Prince Philip's funeral back in April for fears that she would "create a spectacle" if she attends, Page Six reported. The chapter also said that the Royal Family is still sensitive over the Oprah interview. The source said that there has to be some acknowledgment of understanding about what the Sussexes went through for there to progress. Prince William was earlier asked if the Royal Family is a racist family. He answered that they are not a racist family. William was reported to be "furious" about private family members being talked about in public, Independent reported. Meanwhile, a royal family source said there is actually progress with efforts coming from both sides. A friend of Prince Harry noted that there's still so much work to be done, but Harry's visit to the U.K has broken the ice and pushed a closed-door slightly ajar. Harry's friend said that communication between William and Harry has been easier as they continue to plan another tribute to their mother. Friends of Harry and Meghan claimed that the couple thinks the Queen did not take "full ownership" of the allegations they made in their Oprah Winfrey interview. In a chapter of the biography, a friend of Meghan said that months later, little accountability has been taken regarding the issue, The Daily Beast reported. Queen Elizabeth II said, at the time, some recollections may vary and that they are taken very seriously and will be addressed by the family privately. The book was also reported to cover the couple's "heartbreak" over Prince Philip's death and Meghan's journey from losing a child to the birth of their daughter, Lilibet. Royal commentator Robert Jobson said many think the Royal Family is racist, adding that he believes it will be difficult for members of the Royal Family to go over to America, Daily Express reported. READ MORE: Prince Charles Won't Allow Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's Kids to Receive Royal Titles When He Becomes King This article is owned by Latin Post Written by: Mary Webber WATCH: Royals 'Pleased' Meghan Didn't Attend Prince Philip's Funeral - From Sky News Australia A Georgia man has been arrested in Miami Beach, Florida after he "randomly" shot and killed a tourist and danced over the body of the victim who tried to protect his one-year-old baby from the gunman. According to New York Post, Tamarius Blair Davis of Norcross, Georgia was allegedly high on psychedelic mushrooms when he opened fire on Dustin Wakefield at close range before he proceeded to dance on top of the victim's dead body. The Miami police said the horrifying scene was witnessed by onlookers dining outdoors at La Cerveceria de Barrio in Ocean Drive, Miami Beach on Tuesday night. Dustin Wakefield, a 21-year-old Colorado resident, was on a vacation in Miami Beach with his wife and one-year-old son. Georgia Man Killed the Victim Who Tried to Protect His One-Year-Old Son A witness, who did not want to be identified, told CBS Miami that after the 22-year-old gunman shot the Colorado man multiple times, he danced on top of the victim. The victim's family said Wakefield attempted to protect his one-year-old son before he was shot. The victim's uncle, Mike Wakefield, told the Miami Herald that the shooter came in at the restaurant waving a gun and said, "It's time to die." According to Mike, the Georgia man then pointed the gun at Wakefield's son, and the victim said that "he's only a boy." Mike said Dustin Wakefield was shot after he stood up between the gunman and the baby. Tamarius Blair Davis is now facing charges of second-degree murder with a weapon and attempted murder. He's being held without bond at the Miami-Dade County Jail. READ NEXT: Florida Mom Kills Toddler, Stabs Husband and Daughter After 'Vision' Tells Her COVID Vaccine Takers Will Go to Hell Georgia Man Celebrates After Shooting the Colorado Man The alleged shooter was seen in a video dancing. Screams could also be heard from inside the restaurant. A witness said the gunman appeared to be smiling and laughing throughout the disturbing attack. Another footage showed Tamarius Blair David celebrating in an alleyway next to the scene, yelling, "I did it. I did it." Based on the arrest report, the suspect told police that he was high on "mushrooms," which made him feel "empowered." Police said the gunfire also struck another customer, who suffered non-life-threatening injuries. Authorities have not released the identity of the second victim. Police said the Georgia man confessed to the random attacks. Responding to 911 calls about the shooting, police found Tamarius Blair Davis trying to open a locked door while holding a firearm. Officers ordered him to drop the weapon, and he quickly complied. The suspect was then taken into custody. Meanwhile, Davis' father, Tommy Davis, told The Associated Press that his son did not have any past criminal or mental health issues or troubled history. Tommy noted that he thought he already knew his son. He said there's a possibility that someone gave him something that prompted him to shoot someone randomly. Davis' father asked authorities to find out what caused his son to do this horrible act. READ MORE: Hundreds of California Recall Ballots, Drugs, Loaded Gun Discovered in Felon's Car: Police This article is owned by Latin Post Written by: Jess Smith WATCH: Police: Man on Mushrooms Shoots Miami Tourist Who Shielded Child From Gunfire - From Fox 13 Tampa Bay Delta Air Lines announced on Wednesday that unvaccinated employees would have to pay $200 more every month for their company-sponsored health insurance. New York Post reported that the added charge to health insurance contributions is the latest strategy of the company to encourage more employees to get vaccinated. Among the companies that have mandated vaccines for their employees include United Airlines in efforts to protect their operations from the Delta variant. Delta Air Lines Chief Executive Ed Bastian said that the monthly surcharge would be imposed effectively on November 1. According to its spokesperson, the company had estimated $40,000 per person for the average hospital stay for COVID. The spokesperson added that the surcharge would be applied to the whole workforce, and proof or documentation of vaccination will be needed to avoid it. Bastian noted that 75 percent of Delta Air's staff had been vaccinated. However, he said all employees who have been hospitalized with COVID in recent weeks were not fully vaccinated. Other major U.S. airlines such as American and Southwest are also encouraging employees to get vaccinated. However, they have not required it yet. READ NEXT: New CDC Study Shows COVID Vaccines Are Less Effective Against Delta Variant U.S. Companies Vaccine Mandates Chevron Corp. and drugstore chain CVS had also announced that they would require particular workers to get vaccinated. According to NPR, the announcement of the companies' vaccine mandates came after the full approval of Pfizer. Dr. Robert Murphy, the executive director of the Institute for Global Health at Feinberg School of Medicine, said full approval would be a much bigger deal than people think. Murphy said the only thing that is really going to work is mandates, which should be coming from individual companies and hospitals as the government has limited impact. Leading the Global Health Group for C&M International, Nicholas Diamon noted that full approval adds a level of comfort, USA Today reported. The railroad service Amtrak has also announced its plan of requiring all its employees to be fully vaccinated by November 1. Airlines Vaccine Mandate Alaska Airlines announced earlier this month that it was considering requiring employees to be vaccinated against COVID. However, it would only do so if one of the vaccines received full approval. Meanwhile, Frontier Airlines said that employees have to be vaccinated or tested regularly for COVID, according to CNBC. Delta Air Lines has said that it informed the Air Line Pilots Association of the changes in the airline company. Air Line Pilots Association is their aviators' labor union. The union said it had received dozens of comments from pilots opposing the surcharge. However, others had applauded the measure. The union's statement noted that it has consistently advocated maintaining each individual's right to consult with his or her medical provider about the vaccines. It added that the union respects Delta's effort to reduce the impact of infections in its operations, but the company needs to "bargain with the Delta MEC over any employer-mandated vaccination for pilots." READ MORE: Moderna Booster Shots Work Well Against Variants: Early Data This article is owned by Latin Post Written by: Mary Webber WATCH: Delta Airlines: Unvaccinated Employees Will face $200 monthly Surcharge on Health Insurance - From CNBC Television Actor Edgar Ramirez is pushing for more people to get vaccinated for COVID-19 after losing five loved ones to COVID-19 this year. On Wednesday, the "Jungle Cruise" star posted an emotional message on Instagram encouraging others to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and follow the "science and "truthful information" to fight the notorious disease. READ NEXT: Rising Indie-Rock Band WILD LOVE To Debut New Single 'I Hate That I Need You'-Bringing Back Attitude To Pop Music! Edgar Ramirez Narrates Heartbreaking Loss of 5 Loved Ones to COVID-19 Edgar Ramirez shared his devastating experience on his Instagram post, where he revealed that five of his loved ones, including his uncle and auntie, succumbed to COVID-19. "I beg you to please read this post carefully. It is the most painful and most intimate thing I have had to publish in my life," Ramirez captioned in his Instagram post. The open letter narrates the straw of the tragic death of the actor's loved ones. The first family member that the actor mentioned was his aunt, Lucy, who died on Saturday. The actor's uncle, Guillermo, died on Sunday after being stabilized for a few days. Ramirez said that his uncle collapsed and then died. The 44-year-old Venezuelan actor noted that in less than 24 hours, COVID had taken the lives of his uncle and auntie. Ramirez also said that his aunt's brother-in-law died on Monday after battling COVID-19, which was just over a month after his grandmother, Bertha, died from it and four months after the notorious disease took the life of Edgar's agent, Laureano. "At times I feel like it is a nightmare from which I am going to take wake up but I know it is not," Ramirez said in his caption. The actor also said that he was sad, frustrated, and devastated by what happened. "It's been weeks and weeks of my family being played, tortured and jerked around by this cruel, treacherous and violent disease which mercilessly ended up killing them all," Ramirez noted. "I can't stand this void in my chest, this metallic taste in my mouth, this crippling headache that doesn't seem to soothe," he added. Edgar Ramirez Urges People to Get Vaccines Edgar Ramirez said none of his five Venezuelan-based loved ones had access to the vaccine. The actor noted that people should get a COVID-19 vaccine to protect not only themselves but also "those who are vulnerable." Ramirez said his heart breaks that so many people in the U.S. are snubbing the vaccines that resulted in tens of thousands of doses being thrown away. Edgar Ramirez also posted a conversation between him and Dr. Anthony Fauci, where the nation's top infectious disease expert laid out vital information amid the pandemic. The actor said he hopes his interview with Dr. Fauci will serve as a "starting point" for a conversation about people getting vaccinated. READ MORE: Nirvana, Kurt Cobain's Estate Sued by Naked Baby on 'Nevermind' Cover Over Child Sexual Exploitation This article is owned by Latin Post Written By: Joshua Summers WATCH: Edgar Ramirez Says COVID Has Been Challenging For His Family - From ET Canada California stimulus checks are set to be distributed as early as next week, with payments of up to $1,100 for eligible recipients. According to the updated information on the California Franchise Tax Board's website, direct payments are set to be issued on September 1. KTLA reported that most direct payments would be sent to bank accounts between September 1 and October 15, provided that the Californians recipients had already completed and filed their 2020 tax returns. Individuals who will be receiving payments through direct deposit are those who have already opted for that choice to receive a refund on their tax return. For people who did not choose the direct deposit option, their checks will be mailed out in early October and will be continued to be sent out through the end of the year. Taxpayers should see a delay of up to two months if their return has not been processed to their ZIP code's scheduled payment date. READ NEXT: Pres. Joe Biden to End Enhanced Weekly $300 Unemployment Benefits for 7.5 Million Americans How Much Will You Receive in The Second Round of California Stimulus Checks? If you are an eligible recipient of the first Golden State stimulus payment and claimed a credit of one or more dependents, you are likely to receive $500. On the other hand, if you did not qualify for that stimulus payment and did not claim a credit of one or more dependents, you will receive $600, SF Gate reported. But if you did not qualify but claimed one or more dependents, you could receive $1,100. The Tax Board has set up a tool on its website that can help you determine the amount. On July 12, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill with a $12 billion relief for families hit hardest by the pandemic. Newsom noted that the state is taking on the inequities brought by the pandemic through expanding the support for Californians. The state will start distributing payments by the end of the month and will continue to do so on a two-week basis. Meanwhile, enhanced unemployment benefits are set to end by September 4, with President Joe Biden earlier announcing that it will not be extending the program. Enhanced Unemployment Benefits A study authored by economists and researchers at Colombia University, Harvard University, the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and the University of Toronto suggests that unemployment benefits are not playing a huge role in hiring challenges. States that ended federal benefits have seen an uptick in job gains among the unemployed, with the unemployment jumping 4.4 percentage points to jobless individuals, CNBC reported. University of Massachusetts Amherst economics professor Arindrajit Dube said there was an increase in employment. The Biden administration is urging states with high unemployment rates to use federal funds given through the American Rescue Plan to keep the benefits distributed past September 6. University of Toronto assistant professor Michael Stepner noted that there is a gap in the labor market. Stepner said there are lots of open jobs with below-average labor force participation. However, these jobs are not being filled. Economics blame the continuing COVID health concerns as it poses a challenge to caregiving responsibilities and other factors. READ MORE: Pres. Biden Agrees To Limit Eligibility for $1,400 Stimulus Checks This article is owned by Latin Post Written by: Mary Webber WATCH: Most Californians to Receive Another Stimulus Check - From ABC7 A 23-year-old man from Colombia was found in a Florida Park a month after he vanished from Miami International Airport. Miguel Angel Roldan was found on Tuesday by a couple who recognized the Colombia man from the photos shared on the news. READ NEXT: Southwest Airlines Flight Attendant Tells Mom to Glue Mask to Her Toddler's Face After Kid Refused to Keep It On Felicia Bautista and her husband spotted Roldan while they were on their way to a church in Hollywood, Florida. The couple reportedly stopped to talk to the man from Colombia while they waited for the police to arrive. Authorities took Roldan to Memorial Regional Hospital, where he was treated for dehydration. Roldan's mother, Alejandra Cordoba, rushed to be at his side after police alerted her. Authorities said the man from Colombia might have spent several days walking from downtown Miami to reach Hollywood. At one point, Roldan reportedly spent eight days outside a restaurant in Miami begging for food. Roldan and her mother were expected to return to their home in Medellin in Colombia in the coming days. Colombia Man Vanished in Miami Airport Miguel Angel Roldan's journey started when American Airlines refused to allow him on a flight home because he did not have proof of a negative COVID test. NBC Miami reported that the man traveled to the U.S. to receive his COVID vaccine and visited a friend from Los Angeles, California. Roldan suddenly vanished when he was on his way back home trying to catch a connecting flight from Miami. The young man was reportedly turned away at the gate for not having a negative COVID test. Public Information Officer from the Miami-Dade police, Alvaro Zabaleta, said Roldan went "directly from the front of the gate to door 2, that exits the airport." Reports also revealed that Roldan lost all his valuables four days before leaving California, except his passport and $40 cash. Meanwhile, Roldan's mother said it took nearly a week before American Airlines responded to her inquiry about his missing son. A local group that helps Colombian in the U.S. called "Zone 33" helped in finding the 23-year-old man. The group's spokesman Mauricio Arcilla said they filed a report on the family's behalf, and they went to morgues and hospitals, but no one matched with Roldan's description. Between August 5 and 8, Zone 33 Director Beatriz Sierra noted that Roldan went to a hospital due to foot pain, but he left. Airport Travel Guidance On January 26, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) imposed that traveling internationally would require an individual to take a viral test not more than three days before the flight. Travelers are also required to show documentation that would certify negative test results or proof of recovery from COVID-19. CDC said that international travel poses additional risks, and even fully vaccinated travelers are at increased risk for getting and possibly spreading new COVID-19 variants. READ MORE: White House Weighing Vaccine Mandates for Domestic Air Travelers, Nursing-Home Workers as COVID Delta Variant Spreads This article is owned by Latin Post Written By: Joshua Summers WATCH: CDC Updates Guidelines for International Travel - From 11Alive The House committee probing the Capitol riot has shown interest in former President Donald Trump's mental health and whether he has considered enacting martial law. According to The Hill, the House panel is currently seeking documents or records on family members of Donald Trump and a long list of former aides as part of its probe. The House committee is also asking the White House and federal agencies to relay conversations about whether Trump planned to use the military to remain in power and if there were any plans to remove the former president from office. Federal agencies were also asked to relay all documents and communications related to the mental stability" of Trump or "his fitness for office" after the January 6 Capitol attack by a mob of Trump supporters. The House committee is also seeking information about efforts within the administration of Trump to push the former president's baseless claims of election fraud and any attempt to overturn the November election's results or to hinder "the peaceful transfer of power." If provided, the documents could offer new insight into whether former Vice President Pence and Trump's Cabinet members were considering taking action following reports that administration officials were eyeing to invoke the 25th Amendment during Trump's last weeks in office. READ NEXT: Pres. Joe Biden Says Capitol Riot a 'Violent Attempt' by 'Extremists' and 'Terrorists' to Hold Power at All Costs House Committee Requesting Documents Requesting documents is normally the starting point for investigations as the committee builds a public record detailing the Capitol riot. These requests were made for White House records from the National Archives, along with documents from the departments of Justice, Defense, Homeland Security, and Interior and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the FBI. The House committee members are also eyeing to ask telecommunications companies to preserve phone records of certain people, including members of Congress, Los Angeles Times reported. The phone records would help the panel determine who knew about the Capitol riot and when did they know it. Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson is leading the House committee investigating the Capitol riot. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appointed Thompson. Thompson did not give the names of lawmakers whose records would be asked. But he said officials would be contacting communication companies, social media platforms, and other big tech firms. Thompson said the agencies have to comply with the requests to turn over documents by September 9. He said they would look at everything that will give them information on what happened on January 6, The New York Times report. So far, the 13-person committee has only heard from police officers, who were at the Capitol last January 6. Donald Trump Accuses the House Committee of Trying to 'Distract' According to another The Hill report, Donald Trump has accused the House committee of trying to "distract" with its latest request of the trove of documents and communications. The former president dubbed the House panel as the "Leftist 'select committee." Donald Trump said the committee was trying to distract Americans from "historic and global catastrophes brought on by the failures of (President) Joe Biden and the Democrats." The former president noted that executive privilege would be defended. "Not just on behalf of my administration and the Patriots who worked beside me, but on behalf of the Office of the President of the United States and the future of our nation," he added. Donald Trump said the Democrats have one trick - political theater - and the latest request only proves "that pathetic reality." House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy described the committee's investigation as "so political." McCarthy was asked if he would turn over his phone records from January 6, which he answered that he already told the American public who he was speaking to that day. The lawmaker was referring to his television news appearance on that day. Meanwhile, Rep. Jim Banks said turning over phone records to investigate lawmakers was an "abuse of power." Republican Rep. Liz Cheney earlier noted that the public should know what happened "every minute of that day" inside the White House. READ MORE: Pres. Joe Biden Says He Does Not Care if People Think He's 'Satan Reincarnate' After Expressing Support On Bipartisan Probe of Capitol Riot This article is owned by Latin Post Written by: Mary Webber WATCH: 'Grabbed, Beaten, Tased': Police Testify in US Capitol Riot Probe - From Al Jazeera English Scott Peterson's sister-in-law claimed that new evidence showed that his brother-in-law did not murder his pregnant wife in 2002. Janey Peterson, who is married to Peterson's older brother, told the TODAY show on Wednesday that the commonly accepted timeline of the Laci Peterson murder case is wrong. Scott Peterson Murder Case: Incorrect Timeline The 49-year-old suspect is currently serving a life sentence after being convicted in 2004 of killing his wife and unborn child. Scott Peterson was sentenced to death in 2005. He remained on death row until last year when his death was overturned. That means he would face a new penalty phase trial. Based on the California Supreme Court ruling in October, the lower court should take a second look at the murder case to determine whether Peterson's guilty verdict should be overturned and whether he should face a new trial, People reported. According to Janey, Laci was not killed on 2002 Christmas Eve but was killed later. Janey noted that there was evidence completely ignored and that showed that Laci was alive after Scott Peterson "left for the day." She added that there was also "no evidence that he (Scott) had anything to do with what happened to Laci." According to Janey's theory, Laci had a confrontation with men who were robbing the house across the street on the day she went missing. This theory was part of Peterson's appeal but was earlier rejected by the court. Janey believed that these burglars killed Laci and framed Scott Peterson by disposing of her body in an area where his brother-in-law happened to be fishing at the time. Peterson's legal team reportedly plans to make this argument. A police investigation has cleared the burglars after they denied any involvement in the murder case. Laci Peterson was eight months pregnant with their son when she was reported missing on Dec. 24, 2002. Four months after she went missing, locals found two decomposed bodies washed ashore in the San Francisco Bay. Scott Peterson was arrested on Apr. 18, 2003. It was the same day that the two decomposed bodies were identified as Laci Peterson and their son, Conner. RELATED ARTICLE: Scott Peterson Wants a New Trial in His Murder Case Scott Peterson Returns to Court Scott Peterson appeared in court in California on Wednesday as a judge evaluates the allegations of juror misconduct and, in the end, determines whether to grant a new trial, Fox News reported. Due to the threat of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Scott Peterson participated in the hearing virtually from San Quentin State Prison, while prosecutors and defense attorneys appeared in person at San Mateo County Superior Court. Peterson's defense team has argued in a habeas corpus petition that given the pre-trial publicity, a juror failed to disclose that she had sought a restraining order against her boyfriend's ex-girlfriend in 2000 to get on the jury to convict Peterson. The hearing was brief as the Stanislaus County District Attorney's Office and Peterson's legal team weighed in on the timeline for several motions to be considered by the court. During the hearing, San Francisco County Superior Court Judge Anne-Christine Massullo did not announce any decision on evaluations into juror misconduct but scheduled the next hearing for September 22. Massullo said she would set a date for the evidentiary hearing that would be crucial in determining whether there would be a new trial. The sentencing hearing of Scott Peterson would also be postponed until next month. Scott Peterson's Dark Secrets According to Scott Peterson, Laci was killed by an unknown assailant when she walked their dog after he left to go on a solo fishing trip on Christmas Eve morning. However, as the case moved forward, jurors heard about his dark secrets. The court has discovered the months-long affair of Peterson with a woman named Amber Frey. The woman was not aware that Peterson was married when she started dating him. Amber Frey later worked with prosecutors, taping damning phone calls with Scott Peterson. During the trial, Frey testified for several days regarding her relationship with Peterson. She cited her realization that the suspect was still married and that Laci Peterson went missing. Frey, a massage therapist, came forward and admitted to police that she started dating Peterson two months earlier before Laci had vanished. But during Wednesday's interview, Janey said that being an adulterer does not mean that her brother-in-law is a killer. "I don't think you can take that leap," Janey noted. READ MORE: Scott Peterson May Be Called in Kristin Smart Murder Trial as Defense Team Wants Convicted Killer to Testify This article is owned by Latin Post Written by: Jess Smith WATCH: Scott Peterson Faces Judge to Request New Trial - From Good Morning America Covid-19 featured UW-EC students, profs test classroom ventilation before semester starts Staff photos by Dan Reiland UW-Eau Claire freshman Emily Fountas places dry ice in front of a fan inside a classroom at Schneider Hall Wednesday. Fountas was one of several students and two professors working on testing classroom ventilation on campus this week. The student researchers and professors are tracking how well-ventilated some classrooms are using dry ice, fans and carbon dioxide monitors. Staff photo by Dan Reiland Jim Boulter, professor of chemistry in the Public Health and Environmental Studies Program at UW-Eau Claire, speaks Wednesday while conducting a ventilation test inside a Schneider Hall classroom with students. Boulter EAU CLAIRE A group of UW-Eau Claire researchers have begun conducting tests to measure classroom ventilation with a goal of helping the university's effort to control transmission of COVID-19 this fall. Two UW-Eau Claire professors and several public health and environmental studies students hauled industrial fans and a container of dry ice into a handful of Schneider Hall classrooms on Wednesday on the university campus. After closing the doors and turning on the fans, Jim Boulter, Crispin Pierce and three of their students tracked carbon dioxide levels in the room. Special sensors started to beep as the dry ice the solid form of CO2 turned into the gaseous state of carbon dioxide, which was dissipated through the room by the fans. (Researchers held the rooms at about 1,000 parts per million of CO2 during the testing, Boulter said far below a level thats harmful to humans.) The experiment allows the students and professors to simulate a classroom full of people exhaling carbon dioxide as they breathe, Boulter explained. The research team is interested in how quickly the heightened CO2 levels decline, which tells them how quickly air exchanges in each room. And that can vary from room to room. The more air builds up, the higher the concentration of aerosol particles and (potential) virus particles we get, said Boulter, a professor of chemistry in UW-Eau Claires Public Health and Environmental Studies program. What were doing here is explicitly measuring the rate at which the air is turned over. COVID-19 spreads when an infected person exhales droplets and much smaller particles that contain the virus. The droplets or particles can be breathed in, or land on other people after a cough or sneeze, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. While people within six feet of an infected person are the most likely to be infected, the much smaller aerosol particles also pose a danger. The smaller particles carry virus and can transmit infection, and are small enough to stay suspended in the air for minutes to hours, the CDC stated. But the virus is much less transmissible outdoors and in well-ventilated spaces. Thats what Boulter, Pierce and their students are aiming for: By tracking which classrooms and other rooms on campus have the slowest and fastest air exchange rates, they hope to recommend which classrooms need air purifying units and other strategies. This is going to be a semester-long program, but our goal for these first two days is to make recommendations now, said Pierce, a professor in UW-ECs Public Health and Environmental Studies program. Where do we put the air purifiers? Where do we suggest the professors keep the doors open? Can we open windows inside the building? Fall semester classes begin in a week at UW-Eau Claire, but the researchers and some students involved in other activities have already arrived on campus. The bulk of students living in the universities dormitories this semester will move in this weekend. Hands-on research for students The CO2 research project began with biochemistry and molecular biology students Danielle Zahn and Sydney Dame. Inspired by similar ventilation research from Harvards School of Public Health and other universities during the pandemic, Zahn and Dame wrote a proposal to purchase CO2 air monitors to conduct testing. It kind of grew from there, Zahn said Wednesday while she monitored CO2 levels in a Schneider Hall classroom on her laptop. Zahn and Dame presented their research at a UW-Eau Claire event, and the project took second place in the science category of a UW System competition in April called Quick Pitch. During the spring semester, the two students began by testing a handful of rooms in the McIntyre Library on campus. This summer we pitched this to university administration and said, We really want to roll this out across campus, Boulter said. Several months later, university facilities staff identified a handful of rooms on campus with lesser-than-average ventilation, Boulter said. The group plans to test a fraction of those rooms as an audit before the fall semester begins. The sense is that over time, were going to add different classrooms, Boulter said. Rehearsal rooms, the weight room, where people are respiring more heavily and producing more aerosols. Wed love to extend this to different kinds of rooms over the semester. University administrators are working with the researchers as they conduct testing, said Michael Knuth, UW-Eau Claire associate director of marketing and communications: Campus leaders are supportive of the great work being done by faculty, staff and students to help all Blugolds stay healthy this academic year. Zahn didnt expect her work to be implemented on a larger basis. It was kind of a lofty dream, she said Wednesday. Its definitely very cool to look back and see the work that we did Ideally, we wanted it to get (done) here. But did I think wed get here this soon? No. This is definitely surreal. The students and professors plan to continue their testing this week, focusing on rooms with a high student-per-square-foot ratio, Pierce said. You can see it in the students. Theyre really excited, he said. This is hands-on environmental public health It's just thrilling to be able to do this kind of work. Portland, TN (37148) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 59F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 59F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. The Covid-19 Delta variant surge in Laois has sustained through August with Portlaoise the new county hotspot for the disease where the incidence is higher than the national average. The latest Local Electoral Area (LEA) figures, published on August 26 on the Covid-19 Ireland data hub, covers the period from August 10 to August 23. These figures show that there were 180 new cases in the Portlaoise LEA over the two weeks. This delivers an incidence of 566.1 per 100,000 population in contrast to the 526.4 per 100 k nationally. The Portlaoise figures represent a sharp rise on the first two weeks in August when 119 cases gave an incidence was 374.3 per 100 k. It also represents worsening of the situation in July when there was a high prevalence levels of the disease in Laois. The 14 day population incidence in the two weeks to August 2 in Portlaoise was 481.2 per 100 k. The population of the Portlaoise LEA is 31,794 people with more than 20,000 living in the county town environs. It includes Abbeyleix, Ballyroan and Ballinakill. It borders Kilkenny. The latest figures from the Portarlington Graiguecullen LEA show a slight steadying of spread. There were 96 new cases in the north, east and southeast of Laois in the 14 days to August 23. This translates into an incidence of 341.7 per 100k. This contrasts with the 109 cases between August 3 and 16 which delivered an incidence of 388 cases per 100 k. There were 164 new cases in the district in the fortnight to August 2. This produced an incidence of 583.7 per 100 k. The population in this LEA is 28,096. Apart from the two big towns, it includes Stradbally, the home of the Electric Picnic which has been refused a licence due to Covid-19. Other communites in the district include Timahoe, Ballylinan, Ballyadams, Killeshin, Crettyard, Killenard, Ballybrittas. It borders Kildare, Carlow, Kilkenny and Offaly. The situation has worsened in the Mountmellick / Borris-in-Ossory LEA which is the least densely populated part of Laois. A total of 91 new cases presented in the LEA in the fortnight to August 23 giving a rate per 100k of 366.8. This contrasts with the two weeks to August 16 when it had 84 new cases giving a rate of 334.6 per 100 k. Evidence of the sustained spread of the Delta variant in Laois is best illustrated in this LEA. In the second two weeks of June there were less than five new cases confirmed and the incidence was less than 5 per 100 k. With 24,807 people it includes Rathdowney, Mountrath, Durrow, Castletown, Camross, Errill, Clonaslee and Rosenallis. It borders Tipperary, Offaly and Kilkenny. The Health Protection Surveillance Centre tracks the spread of the disease for NPHET. Figures up to start of August revealed that while the incidence was high, the situation in Laois was improving. At one point in July Laois had the second highest level of the disease out of the 26 counties. Latest figures published by the HPSC to midnight August 24 show that there were 360 new cases previous two weeks. Of these, just over half or 192 new cases, were detected in the last seven days. The seven day incidence is 226.7 per 100 k while the 14 day incidence is 425 per 100 k. An average of 23 new cases are being identified each day over a five day average. While Laois now as the seventh best containment of Covid-19 out of the 26 counties the indicators are once again going in the wrong direction. HPSC figures up to August 3 show that there were 372 cases in Laois in the previous 14 days, giving a two week incidence rate of 439.2 per 100k. However, nearly 40%, or 143 of these were spotted in the previous seven days, which included the August Bank Holiday weekend. The seven day incidence to August 3 had fallen to 168.8 per 100 k. No new dates have been set for when the next Electric Picnic will take place and there is uncertainty about its location. Part of the reason for the lack of clarity is that that Managing Director of Festival Republic is busy organising two festivals in the UK which will be attended up to 180,000 people. A spokesperson for the Electric Picnic said there is no official comment on Laois County Council's announcement that the refusal of a licence for the event could not be reversed. The council also insists that the public health advice which led to the refusal has not changed. The Picnic said ticket refunds are available to anyone who cant make the new dates. She added that 2020 ticket can be used for the next edition of the festival which has been held in Cosby Hall, Stradbally since its inception in 2004. The Leinster Express asked Festival Republic be reviewing the location of the Electric Picnic in the Laois town in the wake of the council's latest stated position. A spokesperson said she was not in a position to answer this as Festival Republic MD is attending the Reading and Leeds festivals over the coming days and has not been in a position to respond to queries due to the scale of both events. The spokesperson added that 90,000 people are due to attend each festival which take place in Britain from August 27 to 29. Festival Republic took a majority stake in the Electric Picnic in 2007. A rolling contract is understood to be in place with the Cosby family which owns the venue. Heretofore, the Electric Picnic would normally have taken place in the weekend after these events. Festival Republic had rescheduled the 2021 holding of the Electric Picnic to the end of September in the hope that public health restrictions in Ireland would allow it to happen later than usual. Laois County Council refused to grant a licence for the event at the start of August. The application was originally made in April and revised in June with the new dates. Mr Benn asked the local authority to review its decision after Ireland's Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan, who also leads that National Public Health Emergency Team, said the Electric Picnic could happen if all atttending were vaccinated. Up to 70,000 people were due to attend the Electric Picnic in Stradbally this year if the licence was granted. It has been estimated previously that the event is a huge money spinner for Co Laois and Stradbally bringing millions into the midland county. Local charities and initiatives in Stradbally have also benefited from donations made by the Picnic's organisers. The refusal to grant a licence to allow 70,000 people attend the Electric Picnic is "regressive" according to the owner of the Laois site which hosts the event who also believes Irish people are 'running around like sheep' rather than getting on with living life with the virus. Tom Cosby is a member of the Cosby family which owns the estate in Stradbally that has hosted the festival since it was first staged in 2004. Speaking to the Leinster Express he was clearly annoyed at the local authority in Laois for halting the festival this year by refusing to grant a licence for the event at Cosby Hall. He is also frustrated by the national approach to managing the virus which he believes has not helped. "The decision by Laois County Council is unhelpful and that would be the kindest way of putting it," he said. As to whether this meant he was disappointed he was forthright in is opinion. "It's a very regressive decision. It shows absolutely no foresight whatsoever. I cannot see why they could not have given a conditional licence based on Government policy (on Covid-19) at the time of the event. It would have made far more sense," he said. He was critical of decision to abide by the letter of licencing laws designed for normal times. He insisted that compromise must be reached in the middle of pandemic. He accused the decision makers of "hiding behind" the event legislation rather than finding a middle ground. "There has to be flexibility. Everything has been inflexible in the last 18 months and we have to do things differently," he said. Mr Cosby said there would have been huge benefits to be gained from allowing it to proceed. "Locally, nationally, internationally - there is a huge downstream effect. It is not just a monetary value such as people working on it but also a social value of people enjoying themselves," he said. He said work had commenced on preparing the site for 2021 in the same way as Festival Republic and other big event organisers are holding events around the world as countries emerge from the pandemic. "They are putting these events on with very strict conditions. It is work in England, Europe and America. There is no reason at all why it can't work here," he said. Instead he said Irish authorities have been giving out 'mixed signals'. He said the Minister For Arts Cathryn Martyn had been trying to make some progress but had been 'blackballed' out of the decision making on big events. "I don't know what's going on. Early in the pandemic people (in power) were making decisions. Now everyone is terrified of their shadows of making decisions...There is a massive lack of coherence," he said. He said it is 'patently obvious' that everyone will have to live with the virus after everyone is vaccinated. He added that Dr Holohan's comments that the event could go ahead if everyone is vaccinated was the equivalent of giving a view 'after the horse has bolted'. He said he would like to see the correspondence received by Laois County Council from health authorities including NPHET about the basis for reaching a decision. Asked about local resistance in Stradbally to the event, Mr Cosby believe it was minimal. "There were one or two voices against it. People are going to have concerns," he said. He added that he had met English people on holiday whose views showed him how out of step the position of Ireland is in the management of the virus. "We are running around like sheep whereas every other country is being much more progressive in realising that we can get on with life if we are just sensible such as wearing masks indoors. They (other nationalities) are not be complacement - they are just being sensible. We instead seem terrified to take the next move," he said. Mr Cosby said the event would not happen this year. "Blame can be assigned all around but it is just incredibly disappointing that nobody can make decision that takes into account a changing situation," he said. As to the future and 2022, Mr Cosby said a rolling contract in place with Festival Republic to stage the event in Laois. While he did not believe the handling of the licence application will not sour the relationship with Laois that could lead to a move elsewhere, he said what has gone on 'does not help'. "By this time next year hopefully things will have calmed down," he concluded. Electric Picnic was postponed in 2020 due to the pandemic. Plans drawn up for 2021 would have seen the biggest edition of the festival taking place to date with 70,000 scheduled to attend from September 24 to 26. A Laois farmer is auctioning off a bullock to help raise money for a 'field of dreams' training centre for the Laois branch of Down Syndrome Ireland. Paul Ryan from Camross, will see his bullock auctioned off shortly in the mart in Roscrea. He is hoping that bidders will be generous for the good cause. "It's a very good cause. I have a third cousin who has Down Syndrome and it's nice to give something back, it's something I wanted to do for a long time," he told the Leinster Express. His bullock is a Limousin, weighing about 480kg. The Laois branch of Down Syndrome Ireland is planning to build an Adult Employment Training Centre of Excellence in Abbeyleix. They have secured a four acre site donated by Laois County Council near the fire station, and are now working on development plans, and trying to raise money to build the centre. The centre would include a training hub and an allotment area for growing fruit and veg, with hopes to eventually create independent living quarters at the property for people with intellectual disabilities. There are similar Fields of Dreams in other counties, all part of Down Syndrome Ireland's aim to give members meaningful working paid lives, ensuring they are as independent as possible, fulfilled and integrated into their communities 'from cradle to grave'. The Laois branch have thanked Paul for his generous donation. "This is a novel way to fundraise for our Branch project, which is so imperative to the future welfare and well-being of our family members. A huge thank you to Paul Ryan for this kind gesture, and all the work he is putting in on behalf of our vulnerable family members," Chairperson Michael Gorman said. Paul is looking for sponsorship for this fundraiser from any businesses or individuals around the county and beyond. "If there are any other farmers out there, who would like to fundraise in this way for our members, Paul Ryan would be happy to give any advice necessary. Several individuals and businesses have already donated to this fundraiser, and we thank them all for their generous support," he said. To contact the branch directly, ring Michael on 086 0491633 at any time. The has set a 100,000 fundraising target with almost 5,000 raised so far. Donate via their Gofundme page here. Students in Laois schools are invited to turn their creative ideas into project entries for the 2022 BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition (BTYSTE). Renowned nationally and internationally as a brilliant platform for young people to showcase their STEM ideas, the exhibition is open for project entries until September 27, 2021. Entries can be made in any one of four categories: technology; social and behavioural science; biological and ecological science; and chemical, physical and mathematical science. An individual or group must submit a simple, one-page proposal outlining their project idea. Very Interesting Info @BTinIreland is committed to further education in the areas of STEM & senior category winners of #BTYSTE receive a bursary for entry into one of seven 3rd-level institutions in the Rep of Ireland in partnership with the Irish Universities Association WOW! pic.twitter.com/XeOhianTvr August 25, 2021 BT Ireland, organiser of the BTYSTE, has waived the project entry fees for the second year running, with the exhibition being delivered in a virtual format in 2022 due to Covid-19. This builds on the success of the 2021 virtual exhibition, which attracted over 105,000 visitors from 77 countries. The exhibition, now in its 58th year, opens up huge opportunities with many young people who take part going on to have successful careers in STEM. In addition to over 200 prizes, worth more than 35,000 in total, up for grabs, the BTYSTE offers young minds a fun and exciting way to share their ideas with an international audience, with the winner going on to represent Ireland at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists. BT Ireland is committed to further education in the areas of STEM and senior category winners of the BTYSTE receive a bursary for entry into one of seven third-level institutions in the Republic of Ireland in partnership with the Irish Universities Association. Additionally, each year more than 30 students are chosen to take part in the BT Young Scientist Business Bootcamp, a commercialisation course that can help convert ideas into enterprise. Speaking on his BTYSTE experience, Abdul Abubakar, former participant and overall winner in 2007 said: "Entering the BTYSTE was a once in a lifetime opportunity and a proud moment for me, my school and my local community. Presenting my project to the judges and then being chosen as the winner was a really exciting time. Entering the exhibition solidified my passion and interest in STEM, which lead me to pursue a career within STEM." Abdul went on to represent Ireland and won top prize at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists following his win at the BTYSTE and has since forged a successful career in software engineering. Abdul said: "Representing Ireland at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists made my whole BTYSTE experience even more special. The opportunities are endless when you take part in an event like this." Head of the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition, Mari Cahalane, BT Ireland said: Every young person has an idea. Were providing them with a brilliant way of sharing those ideas with a huge audience, of being part of a community which is passionate about STEM, and of securing some of the amazing awards and prizes available. The exhibition can be life-changing. We want students to seize that opportunity. Interested students can visit www.BTyoungscientist.com for more information on how to enter. Qualifying students will have the opportunity to present their projects to the judges remotely during the virtual exhibition between January 12 14, 2022. A unique event is set to take place in Clane next week. A Drive In Ceili is taking place at Clane GAA in aid of the Little Way Cancer Support Centre on Sunday September 5 at 3pm. Members of the Shamrock Star Ceili Band are making a much anticipated return to the stage. "The idea for the fundraiser emerged after three family members Margaret Brereton, Darren Brereton and Declan Aungier came together and released the Shamrock Star Ceili Band CD," said a Little Way Cancer Centre spokesperson. "Due to the phenomenal success of the CD and with the assistance of Clane GAA they will host Kildares first Drive in Ceili. The afternoon will see a host of traditional musicians playing some well-known Irish ceili tunes. The afternoon will be a trip down memory lane for those in attendance as members of the original Shamrock Star will be on stage reliving some of those lively ceili sessions of the past." Musicians playing on the day will include three of the original Shamrock Star band members - Peter Gordon on guitar, and Ducks Moran and Dinny Moran on accordion. Other musicians on the day will include Declan Aungier on accordion, Zak Moran on drums and Alan and Darren Brereton. All proceeds from the event will be donated to the Little Way Cancer Support Centre in Clane. "The centre has been in operation for the last 18 years in Kildare providing emotional and practical support to clients and their families who may be affected by cancer. Its through the generosity of the public and fundraising initiatives such as the Drive-In-Ceili that we can offer our services free of charge to those affected by cancer," said the spokesperson. "All funds raised go directly into the delivery of our services to our clients. The last eighteen months has been a difficult time for charities and we were delighted to be able to reopen our doors in June of this year. We sadly lost our co-founder Evelyn McKee in March of this year to cancer and having left such a wonderful legacy for the people of Kildare. "As we look to the future we are committed to ensuring that these services will continue and as we emerge out of the pandemic that we will build on the solid foundations laid by Evelyn McKee and continue to provide cancer support services based on our client needs and their wellbeing. "We are thankful to Clane GAA who have kindly offered their club facilities however there will be a limited number of car spaces so to avoid disappointment arrive early. Gates will open at 2pm with the musicians going on stage at around 3pm for an afternoon filled with music and memories." The entrance fee will be 10 per person per car with admittance free for children. "If the sun shines please bring a travel chair so you can sit beside your car and listen to the music. We are so thankful to the people of Kildare for always supporting us as without them we would not be able to do what we do. The Little Way are also so grateful to the musicians and their family for coming together and fundraise for us by putting on a wonderful afternoon of live traditional music that will surely have us all tapping our feet," she added. For enquiries about the event please contact Dearbhail Maloney, Little Way Cancer Support, Unit 2/3 Village Centre, Clane Email: clane@little-way.org Contact: 045902966 The Streetscape Enhancement Scheme 2021 initiative, which will provide grants of up to 8,000 to property owners to improve street facades (either residential or commercial) and shopfronts, has been announced by Kildare Co Council. This 320,000 of activity is funded by the Department of Rural & Community Development as part of Our Rural Future, the Governments five-year strategy to revitalise rural Ireland. The Scheme applies to the following towns/villages in County Kildare: Sallins, Castledermot and Ballitore, Kilcock, Monasterevin and Rathangan The types of projects that could be supported include: Strategic collaboration between property owners to paint buildings or shopfronts Commissioning of murals in towns and villages Upgrade or restoration of old shopfronts Green enhancement of entrances/terraces with planting Illumination and lighting of architectural features Installation of street furniture Decluttering of shopfronts with removal of unnecessary signs / wires. Cathaoirleach of Kildare County Council Cllr Naoise O Cearuil, said I welcome this project and the support from the Minister for the roll out of this essential support for the communities in Sallins, Castledermot and Ballitore, Kilcock, Monasterevin and Rathangan The aim of the Scheme is to improve the visual appearance of our urbanstreetscapes which increases pride and confidence in our towns and villages, making them more attractive places to live. We in Kildare County Council look forward to working with communities, and owners of business and residential premises in these locations. Speaking about the scheme, Chief Executive of Kildare County Council, Peter Carey said Kildare County Council is delighted to roll out this scheme and work in partnership with the Department to support regeneration in rural locations of County Kildare. Its great to see Kildare taking every opportunity to support towns and businesses moving forward. Enhancing our streetscapes will create a positive energy in our urban centres which in turn will attract higher footfall and help our local businesses to flourish at this most challenging of times for them. Explaining the application process, Jacqui Mc Nabb, Head of Economic Development & Enterprise said, grants of up to 100% or 8,000 per premises can be provided under this scheme and now is the time to avail of this opportunity and we will support communities in whatever way we can to ensure that each town gets a good level of projects supported under the scheme. McNabb concluded by saying, over the coming weeks we will make ourselves available to assist with applications, which can be submitted online at https://submit.link/oR up to 2pm on Tuesday 7th September 2021. If you require further information log on to https://www.localenterprise. ie/Kildare/Enterprise- Development/Colour-Kildare- Town-Village-Renewal-Scheme/ or have any enquiries please contact: Local Enterprise Office, Kildare County Council; Tel: 045 980 838 or by emailing: localenterprise@ kildarecoco.ie Additional Information: This measure is targeted at towns or villages with a population of up to 15,000 people. Commercial, residential or unoccupied buildings in town/village centre locations, as defined by the local authority, will be considered eligible. Projects must be completed by 31st Oct 2021. Please allow ads as they help fund our trusted local news content. Kindly add us to your ad blocker whitelist. If you want further access to Ireland's best local journalism, consider subscribing to our ePaper and/or free daily Newsletter . Support our mission and join our community now. A dad of three, who spent six weeks in a coma after a serious motorbike accident, was saved by a St John's Ambulance volunteer, and now he wants to highlight the amazing work they do. To show his appreciation, Martin Cross has organised a bike run to raise funds for this valuable service this Saturday. Setting out from Mondello Park at 12.30pm, the bike convoy will make its way through Sallins, Clane, Kilcock, Summerhill, Trim, Ballivor, Kinnegad and finish up at the Kinnegad Plaza. The Blackwood native suffered major injuries after he was involved in a motorbike accident outside Mondello Park on August 27 2019. He is still not back at work, but is nearing a full recovery. "Laura, a volunteer from St John's Ambulance service was traveling from her parent's home back to Dublin when she came across the accident. The road was blocked so she walked up to see what had happened. Luckily she stopped people from moving me and saved my life. The people there were only trying to help, but that would have been the worst thing to do," said Martin, who had shattered his pelvis in two. "She stayed with me for half an hour until the ambulance came. She was brilliant. She is a volunteer and she works in IT but she has trained up to paramedic level and also trains other volunteers." Motorbikes involved in the run can make a voluntary donation and collection buckets will be positioned at Summerhill and the Kinnegad Plaza station during the stops. A question and answer session on how to handle similar emergency situations will be run by the St John's Ambulance volunteers at both locations. All money raised will go to the Dundrum St John's Ambulance service to help pay for equipment and training. "It's important not to move someone after an accident like that unless their life is in immediate danger, and the volunteers will be able to explain what to do and what not to do in similar situations," said Martin. Newbridge residents are furious with the condition their estate has been left in months after sewerage works have been completed there. Chairperson of Pairc Mhuire Residents Association, Theresa Collins said they take great pride in their area and won best estate in the Council's Tidy Town's competition the last time it was held. "This year we didn't even enter. into it. Why would you with the condition of the green and the bar alley (a walkway)?" she said. She explained how Irish Water, Kildare County Council and the contractors had a meeting with the householders prior to the sewerage works being undertaken. "They promised us our estate would be put back to the condition it was in. This hasn't happened." Theresa, along with local residents Frank Durney, Kit O'Sullivan and Kathleen Murphy showed how one of the green areas has been cordoned off with temporary fencing and cones. "They just dumped in top soil, which was not suitable at all. They didn't plant any grass and the weeds began to grow. That's like that since May," said Kathleen. She said Irish Water promised they would come back and finish it but that hasn't happened. The residents are also annoyed the way the contractors treated the bar alley - a short cut between the estate and the main road which emerges out across the road from Dunnes Stores. Frank explained how they replaced one side of the walkway with a wall and the other side with a wire fence. He showed where people have been dumping their litter and rubbish in behind the fence and the residents can't access the rubbish to clear it out. "Irish Water have created this problem, they put up that fence which has created the problem and they are about to cause a rodent problem," added Frank. "The residents who live down this end used to clear out the rubbish because they could access it with the old fence. They weeded it and took great pride it in and it was well looked after. Now they can't. We want the new fence replaced with a wall. That would be the best thing to do," stressed Theresa. They also said that when heavy rains come, the pathway at the bar alley becomes flooded. Theresa acknowledges the support of the council through a grant received every year through the residents association. She pointed out that this covers half the cost of the maintenance of the estate. "But you can't go around asking people for money and doing collections when they are looking out at the state of that green. We have a great community here. All we want is to be treated with a little bit of respect," said Theresa. Kit added;"It disgraceful. It's not fair on the people who live here." When contacted, Kildare County Council said; "any queries relating to water issues must be directed to Irish Water". Irish Water said "temporary reinstatement was carried out in Pairc Mhuire in May 2021". "Permanent reinstatement works in the area are due to commence in early September. Fencing was erected to enclose the works area and to ensure the health and safety of the project team and residents. This fencing will be removed once all permanent reinstatement works have been completed in the coming weeks. Irish Waters project team have been engaging with the local residents association and have agreed to remove the lower part of the fence to facilitate the removal of rubbish," it added. Rubbish thrown in behind the fence at the bar alley Rubbish is building up behind the fence at the bar alley at Pairc Mhuire in Newbridge and weeds line the base of the new wall. Female entrepreneurs from County Leitrim are being encouraged to join the latest cycle of ACORNS - a highly-successful development initiative to support early-stage female entrepreneurs living in rural Ireland. The call for applications for the latest cycle of the programme ACORNS 7 has been launched by Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue ACORNS is funded under the Departments Rural Innovation and Development Fund. Programme organisers are looking for female entrepreneurs living in rural Ireland, who wish to start and develop new businesses or who have recently started a venture. A total of 50 new entrepreneurs will be selected and the free initiative will run over six months from October 2021 to April 2022 with the deadline for applications midnight on September 10, 2021. Among the 50 new businesses that took part in the last cycle of ACORNS during the Covid-19 pandemic, many changed their career direction completely to establish their businesses. A desire to make lifestyle changes was a common thread among the participants. Resilience and flexibility especially during the challenging economic circumstances was particularly evident. There was great variety and diversity in the new businesses. Based on a belief that entrepreneurs learn best from each other, ACORNS is centred on interactive round table sessions facilitated by successful female entrepreneurs who have started and grown businesses in rural Ireland. These are known as ACORNS Lead Entrepreneurs, and they give their time free of charge to encourage and support the new business owners. There is no charge for those participating in ACORNS, thanks to the continuing support of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine and the voluntary contribution of time by the Lead Entrepreneurs. This years voluntary Lead Entrepreneurs are Anne Reilly, PaycheckPlus; Caroline Reidy, The HR Suite; Eimer Hannon, Hannon Travel; Larissa Feeney, Accountant Online; Mary B Walsh, Ire Wel Pallets; Norma Dinneen, Bo Rua Farm and Triona MacGiolla Ri, Aro Digital Strategies. In addition, Monica Flood, formerly Olas IT and a Going for Growth Lead Entrepreneur, will facilitate an ACORNS Plus round table for selected previous participants who are committed to driving forward the growth of their businesses. Fitzsimons Consulting, specialising in entrepreneurship and growth, developed the initiative. Founder Paula Fitzsimons says: What the ACORNS participants achieved during the last cycle in challenging circumstances was remarkable new sales, additional employees, and new exporters. We are delighted that, through the support of the Minister and his Department, we are in a position through ACORNS to continue to support entrepreneurial women in rural Ireland, as they start and develop their businesses. Any woman with a new business based in Co Leitrim or a well-developed idea for a new venture they want to get off the ground can get more information and register to receive an application form at www.acorns.ie. There is no charge for participation. ACORNS 7 will run from October 2021 to April 2022 and will include a launch event, six roundtable sessions, an understanding the financials workshop, a briefing by the various development agencies and an end of cycle celebration. Instagram is celebrating International Dog Day by unveiling the most popular dog breeds on its platform. Retrievers, Cocker Spaniels, Labradors, Collies and Huskies are the most paw-pular dog breeds in Ireland, according to the image-sharing app. With over 97,000 people in Ireland posting more than a quarter of a million times about dogs on Instagram since May, its clear that Ireland is a nation of dog lovers. People in Ireland are also barking mad for the dog and dog face emojis, which have been used by more than 56,000 people, 114,000 times on Instagram since May, alongside popular hashtags including #dogsofinstagram. With the rise in dogs being surrendered by owners since the easing of Covid-19 restrictions, animal welfare organisations have been working hard to rehome dogs and raise awareness of the pandemic puppy. In the last 3 months, theres been over 12,000 posts and comments about rehoming dogs by 9,500 people in Ireland across Facebook and Instagram. There has also been a surge in the use of hashtags such as #adoptdontshop, #rescuedog, #rescuedogsofinstagram and #rescuedismyfavoritebreed as people across Ireland support these organisations in rehoming rescue dogs. Wicklow Animal Welfare is one of many organisations that relies on Instagram to connect potential owners with dogs in need of a new home. Miriam Peters, who helps run the charitys Instagram profile said: This year, we have rescued and rehomed hundreds of dogs through Instagram. Alongside the dogs we rescue on a normal basis, we are now inundated with what we term Covid surrenders. Its heartbreaking for the dogs who have been let down by people. As a voluntary organisation, founded by Fiona Gammell, we rely entirely on the goodwill of our supporters. With 14,000 followers and growing, Instagram plays a huge role in helping us communicate with our community, encouraging them to support and donate to help cover costs associated with rescuing dogs. On Facebook, over 300,000 people in Ireland are part of 27,000 active Groups about dogs. More than 57,000 of these people are part of Groups dedicated to rehoming dogs such as My Dog and Dog Trust Ireland Lost & Found Dogs. Melanie Kevelighan, who runs the Dogs Trust Ireland Lost & Found Dogs Group which has more than 14,900 members, said: We will be spoiling the dogs in our care and celebrating those lucky pooches who are enjoying the day in their forever homes. Unfortunately, weve recently been experiencing a huge increase in the volume of people contacting us to surrender their dog as Covid-19 restrictions ease. While most of us humans are delighted with the easing of restrictions and the return to normal life, not everybody feels the same, especially many of our furry friends. "We have lots of tips and tricks to help prepare your dog for spending more time in their own company, and to teach them vital skills that they can apply in any situation. To receive your free interactive Life After Lockdown - Bark to Basics pack, please sign up via our website: DogsTrust.ie/BarkToBasics Without a doubt, people across Ireland love celebrating dogs both online and offline. Round of appaws for some of Ireland's most loved dogs this International Dog Day; Misneach and Brod who are President Michael D. Higgins Bernese Mountain dogs; Stephen Byrnes' new rescue pup from Wicklow Animal Welfare; Roz Purcells two rescue dogs Wilko and Myla; Bobby Dassler the mini dog with a big personality and Cockalier Bertie The Blogger. Colorado-based author Wendi Silvano read from her latest book "Turkey Goes to School" at the Wandering Jellyfish Bookshop on Aug. 21. The persistent turkey at the center of Wendi Silvano's Turkey Trouble series is crushed when he learns that farm animals don't go to school. But with some help from his barnyard friends, Turkey uses his knack for coming up with clever disguises to get them all into a local classroom...almost. That's the story behind "Turkey Goes to School," the latest installment in Silvano's popular series and one of the featured titles at The Wandering Jellyfish Bookshop in Niwot. On Aug. 21, the Grand Junction-based author stopped by the store and entertained a youthful crowd with a reading and Turkey-inspired activities. "The turnout was much better than we expected, especially considering we didn't have much time to prepare between this and the grand opening," Carissa Mina, co-owner of Wandering Jellyfish, said. The store held a ribbon cutting and celebration on Aug. 13. "But everyone had a great time, and Wendi was really fantastic with the kids." "Turkey Goes to School" is the fifth book in the Turkey Trouble series, which chronicles the adventures of an excitable farm turkey as he uses clever costumes to get himself in and out of trouble. Silvano said that the character was inspired by a real turkey she met while living in Peru. "Whenever we would finish eating, we'd go scrape our leftovers into this trough, and the dogs would come running, and this turkey would just come running. And I didn't think turkeys have personality, but he really did. He was quite a comedian. He would follow us around and tease us." Her turkey friend came to mind years later when she started writing children's books. "I thought he would be good in a Thanksgiving story, and there isn't a lot of Thanksgiving stuff out there," Silvano said. Turkey made his debut in 2009's "Turkey Trouble," where he disguises himself as different animals to avoid becoming the main course at Farmer Jake's Thanksgiving dinner. The character proved so popular that in 2012 she published a sequel, "Turkey Claws," which sends Turkey to the North Pole in order to escape the dinner table. Since then, Silvano has published "Turkey Trick or Treat," and "Turkey's Eggcellent Easter," each featuring Turkey coming up with some outrageous costumes. "His disguise is never the same," Silvano said. "It's been interesting to see what Lee Harper, the illustrator, figures out how to disguise him because he's had to come up with some pretty strange things." Jocelyn Rowley Author Wendi Silvano appeared at Wandering Jellyfish to promote "Turkey Goes to School," the fifth installment in the Turkey Trouble series. The sixth book in the series is due out in December, and will have a Valentine's Day theme. Silvano isn't sure where the series will go after that, and she also has some other characters in development, including a ballet dancing tiger. In the meantime, Silvano wants to get books into the hands of as many children as possible. "Reading for kids is about the best thing you can do to get ready for school," she said. "I was a teacher for many, many years and have a bunch of kids and grandkids too. So I've seen the power of reading and books, and my goal is to make books that kids will love to hear over and over." The Wandering Jellyfish Bookshop (198 2nd Ave., Niwot) is open Tues. - Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday, 10 a.m.- 6 p.m., and Sunday by appointment. For more information, visit their website at twjbookshop.com or on Facebook (@twjbookshop). A Limerick based online charity shop, Second Time Lucky, is hosting a fundraiser in aid of Womens Aid, to gather much-needed funds for victims of domestic violence in Ireland. The overall aim of the charity competition is to help refine and maintain essential services dealing with the intervention and prevention of domestic violence. The number of people who contacted Women's Aid in Ireland increased by 43% last year compared to 2019. On Monday August 30, Second Time Lucky will be raffling off prizes from various small Irish businesses, such as Pressed Flowers By Nell, Solas Cinealta, Fika Coffee Bar, Bittersweet Tattoos, and many more local talents. So far, Second Time Luckys small but mighty community has collectively raised 800 of the overall goal of 1000. Founded in May of 2021 on Instagram, the shop aims to create a safe and enjoyable space for anyone to enjoy and benefit from, through sharing helpful resources and uplifting messages This shop has provided me personally with countless beautiful experiences, without a doubt it is changing my life in the most wonderful of ways, says Megan Quinn, who runs the shop. We regularly receive messages from a vast number of courageous women, recounting their own personal success stories with thanks to the Womens Aid charity. I will never forget one woman in particular stating that without Womens Aid, I would definitely not be here today. This is why we do what we do, to support incredible and selfless individuals in improving the quality of life for countless women across the country. To enter this raffle, just make a donation on GoFundMe, and youll be entered into the competition. All details available on Instagram @2nd.time.lucky Teachers unions have said they are concerned for school staff in early pregnancy and certain cohorts of immune-compromised members who are not currently eligible for vaccination. In a joint statement from the ASTI, TUI and INTO, they said: "With increasing concern in respect of very high rates of community infection and growing unease about the transmissibility of the delta variant being central to regular public health messages from NPHET, we are alarmed that this small cohort of the school workforce is being sent back to school settings prematurely, prior to getting the opportunity to achieve significant vaccine protection. "Three months ago, public health advisers assured education unions that all of our members would be offered vaccines before the next school year began. While we acknowledge that the vast majority of our members have received vaccines in advance of schools reopening, we find it incredible that government expects vulnerable members in the early stages of their pregnancy to return to school buildings without vaccine protection. "Over the last number of weeks, we have called on the Department of Education to engage with these workers directly and to provide short term relief, enabling them to work from home for a short period of time until they have the same opportunity as all other education workers to build up immunity against Covid-19. "For the entirety of the last academic term, all pregnant teachers were permitted to work from home, and not a single child was unable to attend their school on foot of that sensible precaution. Pregnant workers in the early stages of their pregnancy represent a small cohort of all pregnant staff and so any impact on the delivery of education would be lower still as they would continue to work remotely. "We condemn the failure of the Minister for Education and the Department of Education to provide alternative time-bound working arrangements for teachers who have been ineligible to receive vaccines. To cause a group of pregnant workers to endure weeks of anxiety and fear is unconscionable. We reiterate today our call for swift action to be taken to permit these workers to work from home and support pupils remotely, until such time as they achieve significant vaccine protection." LIMERICKs win in the All-Ireland final saw publicans across the city and county bounce back after a turbulent 18 months. Some publicans were reporting that their takings had rebounded to up to 80% of 2018 levels, when the hurlers beat Galway for a first title in 45 years. Three years later, the world has changed, with pubs only allowed to serve customers at tables, and strict limits on how many are allowed on the premises. Like tickets for Croke Park, spots in pubs across Limerick were at a premium. And a mix of sunny weather and superb hurling sparked celebrations. Jason Kelly, who manages the Still House in Thomas Street, said his takings would be between 70% and 80% of 2018, adding: What saved me is the fact we have an outside area. The reason it would have been 80 was it was dry. It was a case, he said, of going out with a bang, as he finishes up on Friday after 20 years with the pub, and will instead take up a nine to five position. This has come about as a result of the uncertainty in the sector during the Covid-19 pandemic. In Newcastle West, Joe Lee, who runs Lees Bar in The Square said Mondays takings were at 80% compared to the day after the All-Ireland final in 2018, while on Sunday, theyd have been at 50%. Its great, we are seeing people come in and be in such great form. Its amazing what this can do for people. I turn 55 this year, and I never thought Id see Limerick win an All-Ireland. I never thought Id see a team of this quality playing for Limerick, they are such a joy to watch, he said. Its a sentiment shared by his customers, with many of his patrons happy to see such a quality team wearing a Limerick jersey. Chamber president Donnacha Hurley said: I think the win like the one we had creates a positive mental attitude. It creates a great atmosphere for people to meet and commerce to flourish. It creates a lovely atmosphere for the city. PLANS to develop a tourist office for nature will be discussed at an event in Limerick this Friday night. Local campaigner Sinead Jackson will on Friday night host a meeting in the hope of progressing plans for a Shannon Interpretation Centre which she hopes to open in the city. She has already held talks with a local businessman and won support for the plan from Green party councillor Sean Hartigan. Sinead said: I hope to raise awareness of climate related issues and bring nature alive in the centre. To show nature for what it is. Bring the mythology and beauty of Limerick into poetry. She pointed out there are several important nature lands in Limerick, including the Corbally baths, the Westfields Wetlands and the Baggot Estate. An interpretive centre could act as a signpost to these, she explained. Sinead hopes that other environmental organisations across the city and county join in. And shes already identified a number of urban locations where she feels an interpretive centre could be built. The meeting begins at 6pm this Friday, August 27. It will take place virtually via the Zoom platform. For more information, you can telephone Sinead at 085-2623312. Alternatively, email sineadjirl@gmail.com A mysterious illness dubbed "Havana Syndrome" has brought severe headaches, nausea, and possible brain damage to US diplomats. Moreover, yesterday, US Vice President Kamala Harris delayed for several hours a trip to Vietnam after the US embassy in Hanoi reported a possible case involving "acoustic incidents" there, raising concern she could be a target. It was the most recent of dozens of such cases reported by US diplomats and intelligence officers since 2016, first in Cuba, then in China, Germany, Australia, Taiwan, and in Washington itself. Havana Syndrome symptoms US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the State Department employees working at the American embassy in the Cuban capital in late 2016 were the first to describe the symptoms of the unexplained illness. They described hearing harsh mechanical sounds and/or experiencing uncomfortable pressure, as the sensation of driving fast in a car with one window partially down. Some sufferers have said that when the symptoms first emerged, it felt like they were being hit with a beam of energy. Other problems like vision-related, hearing-related, and poor concentration have also been reported. In some cases, the diplomats faced pain and issues just in one location, like, feeling nauseous in a hotel room but nowhere else. What could be the cause of Havana syndrome? The cause of Havana syndrome remains unknown but experts believe it could be caused by either accidental or deliberate exposure to a toxic chemical or other agents. The most likely cause of Havana syndrome is assumed to be some type of mechanical device that emits ultrasonic or microwave energy. How is Havana syndrome treated? It can be treated by doing meditation, breathing exercises, or acupunctures. What the US has to say about Havana Syndrome CIA Director William Burns has called the syndrome an intentional act". "I'm certainly persuaded that what our officers and some family members, as well as other US government employees, have experienced is real, and it's serious," the CIA director said. Meanwhile, the US is investigating possible new cases of Havana syndrome. A task force was also formulated to investigate Havana syndrome. Subscribe to Mint Newsletters * Enter a valid email * Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter. LONDON : A worldwide COVID-19 study led by UK experts and conducted at Indian hospitals among others around the world has been awarded the Guinness World Records title for the worlds largest scientific collaboration, involving over 140,000 patients in 116 countries. The record for Most authors on a single peer-reviewed academic paper is now held by the Universities of Birmingham and Edinburgh after 15,025 scientists around the globe contributed to the major research into the impact of COVID-19 on surgical patients. The co-lead author of the study, Indian-origin surgeon Aneel Bhangu from the University of Birmingham, said the study was aimed at improving our understanding of the deadly virus. Being awarded the Guinness World Records title for the worlds largest scientific collaboration highlights the scale of our global partnership, which aims to contribute to our understanding of COVID-19 and help to save as many lives as possible around the world," said Dr Bhangu. It marks the commitment and hard work of thousands of medical colleagues around the world to understand the changes that are needed in how surgery must be delivered if we are to beat the virus and reduce its impact on surgical patients," he said. Funded by the UK governments National Institute of Health Research (NIHR), the researchers concluded that patients waiting for elective surgery should be treated as a vulnerable group and access COVID-19 vaccines ahead of the general population potentially helping to avoid thousands of post-operative deaths linked to the virus. This was seen as particularly important for low and middle income Countries (LMICs) where access to vaccination remains limited and mitigation measures such as nasal swab screening and COVID-free surgical pathways to reduce the risk of virus-related complications are not available for many patients. Overall, the scientists estimated that global prioritisation of pre-operative vaccination for elective patients could prevent an additional 58,687 COVID-19-related deaths in one year. The COVIDSurg Collaborative international team of researchers published its findings in the British Journal of Surgery (BJS), Europes leading surgical journal, after studying data from 1,667 hospitals in countries including India, the UK, Australia, Brazil, China, the UAE and the US. In India, the study was conducted across 56 hospitals among the largest alongside Germany and Italy. Co-author James Glasbey, a surgical trainee from the University of Birmingham, commented: Over 15,000 surgeons and anaesthetists from across 116 countries came together to contribute to this study making it the largest ever scientific collaboration, surpassing even ground-breaking research from the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Switzerland. Every day we hear in the news that waiting lists are growing, and patients are unable to access the surgery that they need. This situation sadly is deteriorating in countries all over the world. Policy makers can use the data from this scientific collaboration to safely restart elective surgery." Launched in March 2020, the COVIDSurg Collaborative has provided data needed to support changes to surgical delivery in the fastest time frame ever seen by a surgical research group, Birmingham University said. Research from this huge study group has also explored the timing of surgery after COVID infection, preoperative isolation, and risks of blood clots, all published in the field-leading journal 'Anaesthesia'. According to the experts, during the first wave of the pandemic, up to 70 per cent of elective surgeries were postponed, resulting in an estimated 28 million procedures being delayed or cancelled. Whilst surgery volumes have started to recover in many countries, ongoing disruption is likely to continue throughout 2021, particularly in the event of countries experiencing further waves of COVID-19. Vaccination is also likely to decrease post-operative pulmonary complications, reducing intensive care use and overall healthcare costs. Subscribe to Mint Newsletters * Enter a valid email * Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter. Technologically-savvy aliens could be powering their society using a hypothetical megastructure called a Dyson sphere to harvest energy from a black hole . And the sphere might radiate in peculiar ways, allowing telescopes on Earth to discover the existence of intelligent beings elsewhere in the universe, a new study suggests. A Dyson sphere is a speculative structure that would encircle a star with a tight formation of orbiting platforms in order to capture starlight and produce power, according to Live Science's sister site Space.com . First proposed by theoretical physicist Freeman Dyson in 1960, the idea might be realized by a spacefaring extraterrestrial species who had spread out across their star system and therefore required ever-increasing amounts of energy. Related: Extraterrestrial evidence: 10 incredible findings about aliens During a coffee break, astronomer Tiger Yu-Yang Hsiao of National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan and his colleagues read a paper about Dyson spheres and began wondering if it were possible to build one around a black hole instead of a star. "Black holes are one of the brightest objects in the sky," Hsiao told Live Science. While we normally think of them as being dark and all-consuming, black holes can radiate incredible amounts of energy, he added. Material often forms a disk as it falls into a black hole's maw, much like water circling a drain. As the gas and dust in this disk spin and bump against each other, they heat up through friction , sometimes to millions of degrees, producing light in the X-ray portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, Hsiao said. Colossal beams of energy can also shoot from a black hole's poles. Because black holes smoosh a gargantuan mass into a tiny area of space, they are smaller than stars and therefore potentially easier to encircle. A species that chooses to "build a Dyson sphere around a black hole can save a lot of material," Hsiao said. Aliens could place a large satellite in a stable orbit around a black hole and then collect X-ray energy using something akin to solar panels, study coauthor Tomotsugu Goto, also of National Tsing Hua University, told Live Science. They might also build a ring-like structure around the black hole or totally surround it with platforms, much like in Freeman Dyson's original proposal, Goto added, though each of these would be increasingly complex and challenging to construct. In either case, a black hole could radiate up to 100,000 times more energy than a star like the sun, meaning that a celestial species would have a lot of power to work with, the researchers wrote in a paper published July 1 in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society . After being absorbed and used, the energy from a cosmic object would have to be reradiated or else it would build up and eventually melt the Dyson sphere, as Dyson noted in his 1960 paper . This energy would be shifted to longer wavelengths, so a Dyson sphere around a black hole might give off an unexplainable energy signature in the ultraviolet or infrared, the researchers said. Several instruments, including NASA's space-based Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) and the Pan-STARRS telescope in Hawaii, have cataloged billions of objects during their detailed surveys of the night sky, Goto said. Should Dyson spheres around black holes actually exist, it's possible that their telltale signs have already been recorded by such detectors, he added. The team is now developing algorithms that can search through these databases and hunt for peculiar entities that might indicate Dyson spheres. "If it can really be found, I would feel ecstatic," Hsiao said. Such a search might be useful no matter what it uncovers, Macy Huston, a doctoral candidate in astronomy at The Pennsylvania State University who was not involved in the work, told Live Science. "Even if you're not finding Dyson spheres, you're probably going to find something interesting along the way," they said. Yet black holes provide distinct challenges to alien mega-engineers. The gravitational monsters tend to be less stable than stars in terms of their energy production, Huston said. Whereas sunshine glows continuously, black holes often have bursts of activity followed by periods of quiet as they consume larger and smaller amounts of matter in their disks. An alien species might have to watch out for particularly large bursts that could destroy orbiting structures, Huston said. But "if a species is looking for something more powerful than a star, this could be it," they said. Originally published in Live Science. A rare "virgin birth" of a smoothhound shark (Mustelus mustelus) in an Italian aquarium may be a scientific first for the species. (Image credit: Shutterstock) A shark's rare "virgin birth" in an Italian aquarium may be the first of its kind, scientists say. The female baby smoothhound shark (Mustelus mustelus) known as Ispera, or "hope" in Maltese was recently born at the Cala Gonone Aquarium in Sardinia to a mother that has spent the past decade sharing a tank with one other female and no males, Newsweek reported . This rare phenomenon, known as parthenogenesis, is the result of females' ability to self-fertilize their own eggs in extreme scenarios. Parthenogenesis has been observed in more than 80 vertebrate species including sharks, fish and reptiles but this may be the first documented occurrence in a smoothhound shark, according to Newsweek. Related: Hail Mary! 9 amazing tales of virgin births in the animal kingdom "It has been documented in quite a few species of sharks and rays now," Demian Chapman, director of the sharks and rays conservation program at Mote Marine Laboratory & Aquarium in Florida, told Live Science. "But it is difficult to detect in the wild, so we really only know about it from captive animals," said Chapman, who has led several studies on shark parthenogenesis. Virgin birth Parthenogenesis may occur infrequently, but it happens in many types of sharks. "About 15 species of sharks and rays are known to do this," Chapman said. But it is likely that most species can probably do it, he added. Scientists notice parthenogenesis occurring most often in carpet sharks, particularly white-spotted bamboo sharks (Chiloscyllium plagiosum) and zebra sharks (Stegostoma tigrinum), because they are common aquarium species. However, parthenogenesis occurs in both oviparous (egg-laying) sharks, like carpet sharks, and viviparous (live-birthing) sharks, like smoothhound sharks, Chapman said. Zebra sharks (Stegostoma tigrinum) are commonly observed giving birth via parthenogenesis. (Image credit: Shutterstock) In the wild, parthenogenesis may be a last resort for females that cannot find a mate, either because they have been separated from others in their species or because human impacts, such as climate change and overfishing, or natural selection pressures, such as predation and disease, have wiped out all the available males. In aquariums, separation from males or long periods of isolation can trigger this natural response in females, Chapman said. Some individual sharks have been observed repeatedly giving birth via parthenogenesis over a period of years, and others may switch between parthenogenesis and sexual reproduction when introduced to a mate, Chapman said. Imperfect cloning There are two types of parthenogenesis: apomixis, a form of cloning common among plants, and automixis, a form of self-fertilization that more closely resembles sexual reproduction, according to National Geographic . "Rather than combining with a sperm cell to make an embryo, [the egg cell] combines with a polar body, which is essentially another cell that is produced at the same time that the egg cell is produced and has the complementary DNA ," Christine Dudgeon, a biosciences researcher at the University of Queensland in Australia who has studied shark parthenogenesis, told Live Science. In this scenario, the polar body acts as a pseudo-sperm cell with a single strand of DNA. The resulting offspring get 100% of their their DNA from their mother but are not exact clones of them, Dudgeon said. This is because sex cells, also known as gametes, have a unique combination of genes that are randomly selected from each parent as they are created so each shark egg (or polar body) has a different genetic makeup. When the polar body and egg combine, they produce a baby shark that is genetically different from the mother. But because they are only made from one gamete , not two, parthenogenetic offspring are more closely related to their mother than normal babies are, Dudgeon said. Because parthenogenesis in sharks happens only in females and females cannot pass on a Y chromosome , it also means the resulting offspring are always female. "The mother is XX, and so she will only pass on X chromosomes to the offspring," Dudgeon said. Health issues "Parthenogenesis is essentially a form of inbreeding, as the genetic diversity of the offspring is greatly reduced," Dudgeon said. As such, offspring produced by parthenogenesis may have a reduced chance of survival, Dudgeon added. "There is a high rate of embryonic failure among parthenogenetic offspring," Chapman said. "But when they do survive, many have normal lives, and some can even reproduce." However, it is hard to pin down exactly why baby sharks die, whether they are parthenogenetic or not. "Mortality in young sharks in aquaria, and the wild, is common, so it's hard to say what is causing it," Dudgeon said. "The [normal] offspring that are born have already won the lottery," she added. Baby Ispera appears to be in good health and is expected to live a relatively normal life in captivity, according to Newsweek. Originally published on Live Science. Bezos shows the aviation glasses that once belonged to Amelia Earhart, which he took with him during the flight, at the post-flight press conference. These days, it feels as though billionaire-backed space companies are launching off Earth all the time. So why does Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin seem to be in the hot seat? Despite a summer of success, recent competition and some controversial tweets including some misleading infographics have left many who follow the space industry feeling less than supportive of Jeff Bezos and his space company. Over the past few months, commercial spaceflight has launched into overdrive as companies like Axiom planned crewed missions to the International Space Station, SpaceX won NASA's Human Landing System (HLS) contract to build a moon lander and Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic successfully completed crewed suborbital flights with the companies' respective billionaire founders on board. However, amidst a booming space sector, one company has drawn a majority of the ire Blue Origin. Related: Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin sues NASA over denied moon lander contract Since Bezos founded the company in 2000, Blue Origin and its hardworking engineers and employees have been making progress with the company's many space technologies, including its New Shepard vehicle that lofted a crew of four passengers to space and back this July, and its upcoming New Glenn orbital vehicle. Blue Origin's latest launch, which carried Bezos along with his brother Mark, 18-year-old Dutch student Oliver Daemen and pioneering aviator Wally Funk to and from suborbital space aboard New Shepard, was a turning point for the company. It was its first trip to space with passengers, a milestone that signified a step toward a future with regular launches of crews of paying customers, including space tourists. But this milestone, which put Blue Origin into the spotlight, also seems to have been a turning point for how the public views Bezos' company. The July flight certainly didn't mark the first time that Blue Origin got major media attention. But the fact that it was a crewed launch (with a crew that included Bezos himself), and its temporal proximity to Virgin Galactic's crewed suborbital launch with its founder Richard Branson just over a week beforehand, shone a brighter light on the company. All the wrong attention "There is also a fair amount of backlash to the flights, and the industry more broadly, about the enormous costs of these flights," Christian Davenport, author of "The Space Barons" and space reporter for The Washington Post, told Space.com. "While these entrepreneurs are starting to take private citizens [to space], the passengers so far have been, by and large, extremely wealthy. That's raised questions about who ultimately is benefiting." (Bezos bought The Washington Post in 2013.) Leading up to these suborbital flights and afterward, the public discourse on social media and even in traditional media and broadcast news networks has leaned heavily into discussing whether it is positive progress to see billionaires ride to space in the rockets their companies have built. "Bezos has received some serious backlash in the last month, both because he is the richest person in the world, and his first real public spaceflight act was to get on a ship and rocket into space for his own gratification," author and senior space editor at Ars Technica Eric Berger told Space.com. "This underscores the criticism of commercial space as 'rich boys and their toys.'" (Berger's book "Liftoff: Elon Musk and the Desperate Early Days That Launched SpaceX" was published in March.) Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who ran for president in 2020, publicly criticized Bezos "Jeff Bezos can take a joy ride to space while he and other billionaires have gamed the system so they pay almost zero in taxes," Warren tweeted Aug. 18. Jeff Bezos can take a joy ride to space while he and other billionaires have gamed the system so they pay almost zero in taxes. The best option to stop that is my two-cent #WealthTaxAugust 18, 2021 See more Though fellow billionaire Branson also took a suborbital trip courtesy of his own company in recent months, a lot of the negative discourse circles around just Bezos. Aside from their space ventures, Bezos and other billionaire founders like Branson and SpaceX's Elon Musk have storied careers and histories that have garnered a wide variety of public opinions. However, recently, ongoing behavior by Bezos and competitive infographics put out by Blue Origin have prompted criticism of the company. Jeff Bezos celebrates his first spaceflight with a bottle of Champagne. (Image credit: Blue Origin) Sketchy infographics Ahead of Blue Origin's crewed suborbital flight, the company published the first of several infographics that could be labeled "competitive" in the most polite of terms. This first infographic, which Blue Origin tweeted July 9, displayed a side-by-side comparison showing the differences between Virgin Galactic's suborbital ride, called SpaceShipTwo, and Blue Origin's New Shepard. The infographic was posted just two days before Virgin Galactic's crewed suborbital flight on July 11. From the beginning, New Shepard was designed to fly above the Karman line so none of our astronauts have an asterisk next to their name. For 96% of the worlds population, space begins 100 km up at the internationally recognized Karman line. pic.twitter.com/QRoufBIrUJJuly 9, 2021 See more Among the many attributes Blue Origin listed in the infographic, it specifically pointed to the fact that Blue Origin's flight would reach above the Karman line, an internationally recognized boundary of space 62 miles (100 kilometers) above Earth, while Virgin Galactic's flight would only reach above 50 miles (80 km), an altitude that merits astronaut wings by U.S. government agencies. Related: Blue Origin throws shade at Virgin Galactic ahead of Richard Branson's launch A Blue Origin infographics throws shade at SpaceX's Starship. (Click the top right corner to expand) (Image credit: Blue Origin) This infographic was followed by additional infographics that have poked at other space companies. For example, the latest one, which the company published on its website, called SpaceX's Starship deep-space vehicle "immensely complex" and "high risk." "His [Bezos'] public relations tactic of employing infographics critical of SpaceX seems ham-fisted and tone deaf," Berger said. HLS tug of war The infographic depicting SpaceX's Starship points to another major point of contention sparked by Bezos and his company. In April, NASA named SpaceX the sole winner of its Human Landing System (HLS) contract that will see the company build NASA's next moon lander, which will bring astronauts to the lunar surface as part of the agency's Artemis program. SpaceX, which will use Starship for the job, beat out Dynetics and the Blue Origin-led "National Team" for the contract. NASA had previously stated that it would like to award more than one HLS contract so the Artemis program could benefit from competition and redundancy. But that wasn't a viable option given the relatively low levels of funding Congress has allocated for the HLS work, agency officials said in the wake of the contract announcement. Instead of accepting NASA's decision, Blue Origin and Dynetics both filed protests with the U.S. Government Accountability Office. (Those protests were denied earlier this month.) And in July, Bezos penned an open letter to NASA Administrator Bill Nelson stating why Blue Origin should have won an HLS contract and suggesting that the selection wasn't conducted properly. Related: NASA picks SpaceX's Starship to land Artemis astronauts on the moon Jeff Bezos poses for a photo with Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket. (Image credit: Blue Origin) Bezos "has been criticized in the space community for his dogged protest of NASA's award of the Human Landing System contract" to SpaceX, Berger said. In addition to the growing discourse over social media, publications including Popular Science are beginning to document this criticism. "I dont know if the public is paying attention to this, but the space community sure is and the space community is reacting very negatively," Laura Forczyk, who owns the aerospace consulting firm Astralytical, told Popular Science. "Its seen as pettiness as throwing a tantrum." And the HLS saga has continued, with Blue Origin most recently deciding to file a lawsuit in the Court of Federal Claims against NASA over the selection, citing what the company describes as "NASA's unlawful and improper evaluation of proposals submitted under the HLS Option A BAA [broad agency announcement]," according to SpaceNews. This lawsuit has actually halted work on the Artemis moon lander, with NASA volunteering to temporarily pause its HLS work with SpaceX because of the lawsuit, a NASA representative told SpaceNews. And, amidst all of the trouble with the HLS contract, a Blue Origin engineer, Nitin Arora, who formerly worked for NASA, actually jumped ship to join SpaceX, he announced on LinkedIn. "Bezos seems to have really strayed from the founding principles of Blue Origin," Berger said. "The public, and many in Congress, look at Blue Origin and Bezos and wonder why someone who is worth $200 billion is protesting and suing NASA for money to build a lunar lander." "If it is that important to build a highway to space, then start building it," Berger added. "Government contracts will eventually follow if what you build serves a useful purpose." The cherry on top While Blue Origin as a company has fielded quite a bit of criticism with its infographics and multiple actions taken in response to NASA's HLS selection, the company's founder himself has also been in the crosshairs. In addition to Bezos' public letter, the multiple actions taken by Blue Origin after losing the HLS contract and the company's controversial infographics, Bezos added yet another contentious item to the list on the day of his suborbital flight. After landing back on Earth following the brief mission, Bezos and the rest of the New Shepard crew gathered for a livestreamed press conference. During the conference, Bezos, still clad in the large cowboy hat he wore to space, took just three questions from reporters before launching into discussing the flight. One post-flight comment from Bezos caught many peoples' ear: "I also want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer, because you guys paid for all this," Bezos, who also founded Amazon, said to the crowd and livestream audience. Even aside from Bezos' comment, the juxtaposition of Bezos' ride aboard the spaceflight and the continuing complaints about worker treatment at Amazon has raised questions and concerns. "Tomorrow, Jeff Bezos will ride around on a rocketship for a little over 10 minutes. Amazon warehouse workers on 'megacycle' shifts will be on their feet for 10 hours. Im fighting for an economy that values the dignity of their work, not the multiplication of his wealth," Congressman Andy Levin (D-Mich.) tweeted July 19, one day ahead of Bezos' launch. Tomorrow, Jeff Bezos will ride around on a rocketship for a little over 10 minutes.Amazon warehouse workers on megacycle shifts will be on their feet for 10 hours.Im fighting for an economy that values the dignity of their work, not the multiplication of his wealth.July 19, 2021 See more While criticism of billionaire space company founders isn't limited to just Bezos, "the main difference between Bezos and others, such as Musk and Branson," Berger said, "is that he has largely ignored the public and the media." "Musk appears fairly regularly at news conferences or on teleconferences and interacts with people on Twitter all the time. Branson is fairly approachable in that he seems down to Earth. Bezos, by contrast, is standoffish," Berger added. "He rarely tweets and his Instagram account is clearly highly curated to reflect a certain image. This is not someone serious about engaging with the space community in a meaningful way." But is "engaging with the space community" really necessary for a space company to succeed? Is public image that important? Certainly, the founder of a company doesn't need to be the most-liked person for the company to be successful. However, the aforementioned behavior by Bezos and Blue Origin could potentially jeopardize the company's future success. While many companies have been lofting satellites into orbit for quite some time, "there aren't that many companies that are involved in that latter, human spaceflight piece," Michael Lopez-Alegria, a former NASA astronaut and current vice president of business development at Axiom, told Space.com. "And so each of them, I think particularly between the two suborbital companies they have to figure out how to differentiate themselves. And part of it's obvious because they're very different experiences," he said, referring to Virgin Galactic's space plane and Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket and capsule. "But I think beyond that their branding and their approach to media is how they want to portray themselves." "I think there's a huge market in suborbital space tourism, so as long as New Shepard can execute with safe and regular flights, I think that business will be profitable," Berger said. However, now that Blue Origin "is starting to more aggressively go after government contracts, and as it starts flying private citizens, it will need to more effectively engage with the public," Davenport added. "The founders of the companies may claim that they don't pay close attention to public opinion, but members of Congress will. And since Congress oversees federal spending, they could have a huge role to play in the companies' futures." Blue Origin has its next launch, an uncrewed flight of New Shepard called NS-17, coming up. This mission will lift off Aug. 26 for suborbital space before returning to Earth. Email Chelsea Gohd at cgohd@space.com or follow her on Twitter @chelsea_gohd. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook. Unemployment rises to 9.8% Employers added fewer jobs than forecast in November and the unemployment rate rose to 9.8 percent, pointing to economic weakness that's likely to keep the Federal Reserve pumping money into the financial system. Payrolls increased 39,000, less than the most pessimistic projection of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, after a revised 172,000 increase the prior month, Labor Department figures showed Friday in Washington. The jobless rate rose to a seven-month high, while hours worked and earnings stagnated. ECB buys bonds to calm investors Jean-Claude Trichet is keeping the onus on governments to fix the debt crisis as the European Central Bank buys bonds to give politicians time to cut deficits. Warning European Union leaders that they can't rely on "benign neglect" to quell market turmoil, Trichet, the ECB's president, is deploying a two-pronged strategy to ease roiled markets. The bank snapped up Portuguese and Irish bonds again Friday after Trichet Thursday assured investors that policymakers will delay the withdrawal of emergency liquidity. Google said to buy NYC building Google Inc., owner of the world's most popular search engine, signed a contract to buy its New York office building at 111 Eighth Ave. for about $1.8 billion, according to a person with knowledge of the agreement. The sale probably will close by the end of the year, said the person, who asked not to be named because the deal hasn't been made public. Google, based in Mountain View, Calif., will expand beyond the 550,000 square feet it currently occupies in the building, the person said. Former Kaplan dean alleges fraud A former dean of Washington Post Co.'s Kaplan higher education unit alleged the company engaged in fraudulent activities to get U.S. student aid as he defended himself against criminal cyber-harassment charges in a federal jury trial under way in Chicago. U.S. prosecutors charge Bennie Wilcox, a former dean of law and legal studies at Kaplan University, with six counts of sending threatening e-mails and online postings, according to court filings. Kaplan turned over evidence to authorities that led to the 2008 indictment, said Ron Iori, a Kaplan spokesman. The fraud allegations against Kaplan are untrue and the company "vigorously" denies them, Iori said. Wilcox witnessed Kaplan executives commit "multiple schemes" to defraud the U.S. government and taxpayers out of $1 billion, he said Thursday in his first day of testimony in U.S. District Court. He said Kaplan is retaliating for his attempt to expose fraud at the company in a pending whistleblower lawsuit in Florida filed in 2007. Lee family tightens grip at Samsung Samsung Electronics Co., the world's largest maker of televisions and flat screens, promoted the chairman's son to president as the founding family tightens its grip on South Korea's biggest industrial group. Lee Jae Yong, 42, will report to Chief Executive Officer Choi Gee Sung. His sister, Lee Boojin, 40, was named president of Samsung Everland Inc., chief executive officer of affiliate Hotel Shilla Co. and adviser to Samsung C&T Corp. The promotions pave the way for Lee and his sister to prove their ability to lead a group of nearly 70 companies generating annual sales of about $200 billion. Sherwood picked to lead ABC News Walt Disney Co. named Ben Sherwood president of ABC News to replace David Westin, who announced in September he would step down at the end of the year. Sherwood, 46, will oversee editorial, programming and digital operations at ABC's global news business, including broadcast TV, radio and the Internet, Disney said Friday in a statement. He will report to Anne Sweeney, president of the Disney/ABC Television Group. SEC proposes Dodd-Frank swap dealer, participant definitions The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission proposed definitions to determine which firms will face higher capital and margin requirements under new rules for the $583 trillion over-the-counter swaps market. SEC commissioners voted 5-0 today to seek comment on proposals designed to match those endorsed by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in a 3-2 vote on Dec. 1. The two Washington-based agencies are charged with revamping oversight of derivatives markets under the Dodd-Frank law. AstraZeneca raided By European antitrust officials AstraZeneca Plc, the U.K.'s second-biggest drugmaker, and Nycomed A/S were raided by European Union antitrust officials as part of a probe into whether companies colluded to keep cheaper copies of medicines off the market. The European Commission said it raided the premises of "a limited number of" pharmaceutical companies that may have slowed the sale of generic medicines. AstraZeneca said inspections at its premises concerned the ulcer drug Nexium. U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., reaffirmed a call on Monday he made last week for an extension of the Bush tax cuts implemented in 2001 and 2003. "I know that many people, including the president, have argued that the tax cuts should not be continued for people making more than $200,000 a year, but to me these are the people we need to be using their income to spend and invest to spur growth and job creation," he said to about 250 members of the Stamford Chamber of Commerce at its 23rd annual meeting at the Hilton Stamford Hotel & Executive Meeting Center. "The fact is that the top 3 percent of American income earners account for 25 percent of the consumption in our economy." The Stamford native in his fourth Senate term said he has had "promising discussions" with Democrats and Republicans concerning a permanent extension of the middle-class tax cuts and temporary extension on tax cuts for the highest-income brackets, to ensure no one's taxes go up while the economy struggles to recover. "The government cannot ultimately get the economy back to robust growth," he said. "The private sector must do it, and raising taxes now will, I fear, make that impossible." The "surest way" to prevent a double-dip recession is for Congress to grant the extension, Lieberman said. Lieberman hailed the recently passed Small Business Jobs Bill, which provides $12 billion in tax cuts for small businesses to access capital, eliminating capital-gains taxes on the sale of qualifying small business stock. This will help job growth by encouraging investment in such entities, said Lieberman. The bill also will strengthen the real estate and construction markets by letting builders expense as much as $250,000 of leasehold improvements for qualifying restaurant and retail properties rather than depreciating those costs over time, he said. Furthermore, the bill will increase businesses' abilities to get capital by raising limits on U.S. Small Business Administration loans, eliminating loan fees and creating a $30 billion small business lending fund, he said. Nonetheless, Congress needs to focus on export growth to create more jobs, particularly in Connecticut, Lieberman said. "Just about the best news that we have had about our state's economy recently is that exports from Connecticut increased by more than 16 percent during the first half of 2010, compared to 2009 levels," he said. Free trade agreements negotiated with Colombia and Panama, and the Obama administration's deadline to finalize the Korea Free Trade Agreement by the G-20 Summit in Seoul by November, will help Connecticut companies, especially its aerospace industry, Lieberman said. "After the United States entered into a free trade agreement with Singapore that went into effect in 2004, Connecticut's exports to Singapore increased 71 percent between 2004 and 2008," he said. Lieberman's remarks on the U.S. need to grow exports bode well for the state's economy, said Joslyn Gadwah, branch manager of the Stamford office of Milwaukee-based staffing firm Manpower. "I think we still have the volume to bolster our economy in that way," she said. Lieberman presented himself as a representative of all people by acknowledging the high unemployment rate and the need to extend tax cuts to everyone, including the wealthy, said Dean Jackson, general manager of ServiceMaster of Stamford and lower Westchester County, N.Y. "He sees both sides and tries to represent both sides as best as he can," he said. "We need more of that." DEAR ABBY: My husband and I are newlyweds and share an apartment with another couple because we ran into financial difficulties, and this was our only option. The problem is the other couple has two dogs they expect us to take care of while they're at work. My husband and I get home two hours earlier than they do in the evening, and they have become accustomed to our generosity in occasionally taking the dogs out and walking them. They now expect us to do it every day, and get angry and nasty if we don't. Please help. -- IN THE DOGHOUSE IN GEORGIA DEAR IN THE DOGHOUSE: You and your roommates appear to have a communication problem. Speak up. Tell them you dislike their palming off the responsibility for walking their animals and you won't be doing it anymore. Then remind them that while you were willing to do an occasional favor, you do not appreciate their attitude of entitlement. You are not their built-in dog walkers. You only have to occupy the "doghouse" if you allow yourself to be put in one. DEAR ABBY: I have never told anyone about this. I was molested by my pastor when I was 8, and again when I was 14. I see a doctor because of depression and PTSD. My doctor doesn't know, and I don't want my family to know. I don't even know if the pastor is still alive. Should I tell my doctor or just let it go? I have heard about priests doing this, but I was going to a Pentecostal church. -- MALE READER IN KENTUCKY DEAR MALE READER: It is very important for your mental health that you tell your doctor everything you have disclosed to me, because what happened to you is likely the cause of your depression and PTSD. Do this, not only for yourself, but also because it may help other young people who belong to that church and who also may have been molested by that predator. DEAR ABBY: Is it appropriate to use dental floss in public? When my mom eats out, she uses dental floss while she is still at the table or while walking out of the restaurant. She thinks she's being discreet, but what she's doing is obvious. When I ask her to stop, she says she can't stand having food in her teeth. I tell her to go into the restroom or do it outside, but she does neither and continues to floss. I'm hoping she'll listen to you and that you will back me up. -- ELLEN IN THE USA DEAR ELLEN: I agree that flossing one's teeth in public is unsightly and something that should be done in private. If it becomes necessary, it should be done in the restroom. (Need I add that if there is mouth-rinsing, the sink should be cleaned afterward and any detritus stuck to the mirror removed?) Reader claims many obituaries missing key information DEAR ABBY: This may seem inconsequential, but there seems to be a growing trend of omitting a woman's maiden name in obituaries. As someone in my 70s, I read the obits more often, but I know I have missed opportunities to send condolences and offer childhood stories to family members of former playmates because I didn't know their married names. Often, parents are just mentioned as "deceased." It's as though the woman's life did not begin until she got married. I have sent cards to many of the families of male classmates, but only to a handful of the females'. I realize that column space in newspapers is expensive but, surely, a name and perhaps even the mention of a high school wouldn't be a problem. -- MISSED CONDOLENCES DEAR MISSED: If this is a "trend," it hasn't hit my local newspaper. The contents of obituaries are provided by the deceased's family unless the person is a celebrity -- in which case the article is written in advance by a reporter. If the maiden names of the women who died are missing, it is probably because they weren't mentioned by the grieving relatives. DEAR ABBY: I'm a private duty nurse in my 50s and have two grown children. It's hard work. I have one big problem, which is very embarrassing. I used to work in a hospital and, because of the hectic work schedule, I had to eat fast. Our lunch break was only 30 minutes, and I had to stand in line to get my food. I never broke the habit. I was eating at a restaurant recently and some people sitting across from me commented about it. The man said, "She eats like she's starving!" Now I feel insecure about going out to eat. Can you make a suggestion? I don't like takeout. -- FAST EATER IN TEXAS DEAR FAST EATER: I do have one. When you take a bite of food, make a conscious effort to chew it 10 times. It will slow you down and it's better for your digestion. However, if you are unable to do that, then I suggest you stop listening to rude comments aimed in your direction by strangers. P.S. Having a small snack an hour before mealtime may help you to eat more slowly because you won't be quite as hungry. DEAR ABBY: Recently, family members have started texting to inform me about personal, private matters. When they do, I text back, which sometimes leads to lengthy paragraphs. I wish they'd just call me! I'm beginning to wonder if that's what they are avoiding. I should add that I am not feuding with my family. Am I wrong? -- PERPLEXED IN CONNECTICUT DEAR PERPLEXED: No, you are not wrong. People have become so enamored of their electronic devices they seem to have forgotten that sometimes it's more efficient to just TALK to the other party. I know from personal experience that emailing and texting can take far more time than a spoken conversation. Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Buren, also known as Jeanne Phillips, and was founded by her mother, Pauline Phillips. Contact Dear Abby at www.DearAbby.com or P.O. Box 69440, Los Angeles, CA 90069. Click here to read the full article. A cavalcade of creatures from Japanese folklore come alive in The Great Yokai War: Guardian, a hugely enjoyable fantasy-adventure directed by the famously prolific and supremely versatile Takashi Miike (Audition, 13 Assassins). Starring amazingly talented child actors Kokoro Terada and Rei Inomata as brothers summonsed by peace-loving spirits to stop an angry demon from engaging in the time-honored Japanese monster movie tradition of destroying Tokyo, this smashing piece of young-adult entertainment should be a big hit in Japan, where its sure to get plenty of love from older adults as well. With its standout visuals and uplifting messages about trust, friendship and acceptance, Guardians should attract the interest of specialized overseas distributors following its international premiere as the closing-night attraction of Fantasia 2021. Miike is most closely associated with extremely violent crime stories such as Audition and blood-soaked costume action-thrillers like Blade of the Immortal. Less well known outside Japan are his family-friendly hits such as Ninja Kids!!! and The Great Yokai War (2006). No knowledge of the first Yokai War film is required to enjoy this second chapter, which is directed with infectious exuberance by Miike. Anyone could be forgiven for thinking Guardians is the work of a talented and super-enthusiastic newcomer rather than a veteran whos notched 111 directing credits since 1991. Roughly translated as strange apparition, Yokai is the collective name for Japanese supernatural entities. Sometimes hostile to humans and sometimes friendly, these creatures are staples of comics, video games and movies (notably Studio Ghibli films), and have a strong presence in many other areas of Japanese culture and society. Before unveiling the wondrous world where the Yokai dwell, Miike and scriptwriter Yusuke Watanabe (Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods) establish the films simple and powerful emotional terrain. Kei Watanabe (12-year-old Kokoro Terada, Grandma Is All Good) is a typical fifth-grader who wants to be accepted by his peers and fights with little brother Dai (Rei Inomata). Theyre adored by widowed mother Reika (Nanako Matsushima) and remember their late father as a loving man who taught the importance of kindness and co-operation. The film zooms into high gear and barely looks back from the moment Kei and Dai are whisked into a magical land inhabited by stunningly designed and costumed creatures whose carnival midway-like meeting place looks like the best theme park ever built. The boys are told by friendly, bubble-headed Yokai leader Nurarihyon (Nao Ohmori, who played the lead role in Miikes Ichi the Killer) that destiny has brought them here. As the last descendants of legendary demon hunter Watanabe no Tsuna (Kazuki Kitamura), Kei and Dai have been nominated by peace-loving Yokai as their only hope of defeating Yokaiju, a mighty sea demon currently on a collision course with Tokyo. Its not just Tokyo in the firing line. In a gorgeously filmed and wittily scripted flashback, we witness a meeting of the World Yokai Summit in Beijing, with creatures including Yeti, Medusa and Frankensteins monster in attendance. A serious rift has occurred between pacifist Yokai and a rebel faction led by Inugami Gyobu (Takao Osawa), a big, hairy, demon biker dude who rides a flame-throwing motorcycle. He and tough sidekick Ibarakidoji (Sumire), a warrior with coiffure and wardrobe in the style of 1980s glam metal bands, want Yokaiju to stomp all over Tokyo, and much more besides. Ongoing discussions between pro-peace and pro-war Yokai are written with sharp satirical humor that pokes fun at the conduct of real world politicians and institutions. Such debates about human-Yokai relations add another satisfying layer to a captivating story that finds Dai becoming separated from his brother and placed in mortal danger alongside supposed protector Amanojaku (Eiji Akaso), a horned beastie with a flip phone and a flip-flop attitude toward telling the truth. Right on cue, Kei finds a magic sword and instantly becomes one of the most adept and inspiring young warriors youve ever seen. Keis action-packed mission to save his brother and restore harmony between spirit and human worlds is beautifully imagined and emotionally rewarding. The smile and determination on Keis face as he rides a magic dragon and undertakes the adventure of a lifetime is simply irresistible. Its almost impossible not to be affected by the lads sincere appeals for everyone to settle differences and respect each other. Theres a lovely connection to the boys exalted lineage in the fetching form of Ms. Fox (Hana Sugisaki), a clever cookie who shared a special moment with Watanabe no Tsuna many centuries ago. En route to the awe-inspiring conclusion, audiences will be delighted and entranced by Yokai such as slinky, ice-breathing dame Yukionna (Yuko Oshima), Hell Boy-like tough guy Shojo (Koji Okura) and Ubume (Sakura Ando), a long-haired lady with a baby who looks like she just emerged from the well in the Ring movies. Although some effects work is wobbly and the pace slackens just a tad in the middle, Guardians wins through with the type of energy, imagination and pure storytelling joy thats often lacking in highly sanitized and cautiously constructed childrens and young-adult adventure films made elsewhere. Huge credit goes to Miikes direction of the extraordinarily talented youngsters, both of whom perform like seasoned pros of character-driven action-thrillers. The entire cast appears to be having a ball, and the technical contributions of DP Hideo Yamamoto (Hana-bi), production designer Yuji Hayashida (Tokyo Tribe) and composer Koji Endo (Blade of the Immortal) are imbued with the same kind of lets put on a great show feeling. Reviewed online in Sydney, Aug. 24, 2021. (In Fantasia Film Festival closer.) Running time: 116 MIN. (Original title: Yokai daisenso gadianzu) Running Time: Running time: 116 MIN. Production (Japan) A Toho, Kadokawa release of an OLM Inc. production. (World sales: Kadokawa, Tokyo.) Producers: Misako Saka, Yoshikazu Tsubaki. Executive producers: Hiroshi Aramata, Tsuguhiko Kadokawa. Co-producer: Shigeji Maeda. Music By Koji Endo Crew Director: Takashi Miike. Screenplay: Yusuke Watanabe. Camera: Hideo Yamamoto. Editor: Naoichiro Sagara. Music: Koji Endo. With Kokoro Terada, Rei Inomata, Hana Sugisaki Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Click here to read the full article. Though famously ambivalent about film adaptations of his work to the degree of never watching some Alan Moore has written a screen original in The Show, perhaps attracted to a more hands-on approach to the medium now that hes officially retired from comics. This playfully wayward mystery set in his native Northampton turns that burg into a kind of midlands Gotham, where not-quite-superheroic intrigue unfolds as convolutedly as possible. Fun if perhaps a little too tongue-in-cheek for its own good, the results will no doubt appeal most to Moore fans wholl revel in his Byzantine plotting, noirish tropes and other signature elements. Fathom Events is providing them one-night U.S. theatrical access this Thursday, Aug. 26; release in other formats is as yet unannounced. The Show is directed by Mitch Jenkins, a photographer whos collaborated with the Watchmen scribe for 12 years, including on several shorts that introduced some of its characters and ideas. (Three were previously packaged as the little-seen 2014 omnibus feature Show Pieces.) Though meant to be self-contained, the film does give off a sly in-joke air that may feel too insular for some, as if its primary world-building had already happened somewhere else. On the other hand, its hardly as if theres a lack of viewers wholl grasp exactly what Moore is up to here, in general if not always in playfully cryptic narrative specifics. Fletcher Dennis (Tom Burke, last seen by audiences as Orson Welles in Mank) is a floppy-haired loner traveling incognito on the behest of a London client who wants back a stolen family heirloom. But upon tracing his suspect to Northampton, the hitman/private dick currently going as Steve discovers that Jim Mitchum (Darrell DSilva) died in an apparent nightclub mishap the night before. Still being paid to find the missing golden cross, he checks into a B&B and chases various leads. Those in turn acquaint him with a roll call of oddballs including a librarian with an apparent secret masked identity (Richard Dillane), a band frontman who styles himself after Hitler (Eric Lampaert), an imperious drug queenpin (Sheila Atim), a hostile yet hyper-observant witness (Antonia Campbell-Hughes) and so forth. But then everyone hereabouts is a trifle odd, not excluding our protagonists parapsychology-studying hostess (Ellie Bamber), or the local detective agency he discovers is run by children in fedoras, speaking hardboiled 1940s pulp prose. As if these encounters arent dislocating enough, there are frequent abrupt sidesteps into flashbacks, dream sequences and hallucinations. The blurriness of reality is underlined by what a cabbie tells Fletcher the deceased thief told him: That everyone is living in a series of linked games a simulation inside a simulation inside a simulation. Adding his own two cents, the cabbie quotes an old adage, God made the country, but he didnt make the town. Moore himself (made up like a crescent moon) appears as a figure who might be classified as Gods traditional nemesis, though the most conspicuously evil personality here turns out to be our heros own employer (Christopher Fairbank as Mr. Bleaker). Fletchers only real ally is Faith (Siobhan Hewlett), a journalist who was present when Mitchum died, and who amidst that nights very confusedly-recalled events nearly died herself. More than a bit Twin Peaks-y in its surreal flourishes, labyrinthine structure and droll-to-broad humor, albeit with a lighter heart of darkness, The Show throws everything from the occasional song or TV spoof to a Fellini-esque farcical court trial. Despite a few big chunks of explicative monologue, theres not much getting-to-the-bottom-of-all-this or sense that if you could sort it out, it would matter much. This enterprise runs more on idiosyncrasy than action or plot, though it never feels static in editor Colin Goudies sleek pacing. Its all diverting, with the actors striking assertive notes on a continuum from bemused earnestness to vaudevillian caricature. While the films overall look is familiar comic-book noir, DP Simon Tindall, production designer Helen Watson, Hilary Hughes costumes and other design personnels contributions provide attractive splashes of splashes of vivid color. The Show ultimately seems just to be toying with its major fixations, from Northampton itself to underworlds both criminal and occult. It hesitates to really say anything about them, or indeed go anywhere very concrete at allbut it will entertain those for whom watching Alan Moore play around with such themes is inherently rewarding enough. Reviewed online, San Francisco, Aug. 24, 2021. Running time: 115 MIN. Running Time: Running time: 115 MIN. Production (U.K.) A Shout! Studios (in North America) release of a BFI, Lipsynch presentation of a Lex Films, Emu Films production, in association with Orphans of the Storm. Producers: Tom Brown, Mike Elliott, Jim Mooney. Executive producers: Mary Burke, Norman Merry, Peter Hampton, Siobhan Hewlett, Walli Ullah. Crew Director: Mitch Jenkins. Screenplay: Alan Moore. Camera: Simon Tindall. Editor: Colin Goudie. Music: Andrew Broder. With Tom Burke, Siobhan Hewlett, Ellie Bamber, Sheila Atim, Babou Ceesay, Antonia Campbell-Hughes, Julian Bleach, Darrell DSilva, Roger Ashton-Griffiths, Eric Lampaert, Dominic Coleman, Christopher Fairbank, Richard Dillane, Alan Moore. Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Click here to read the full article. Tina Tchen, the former chief of staff for Michelle Obama who became president and CEO of Times Up Now and the Times Up Foundation, has stepped down from the womens advocacy group. Tchens resignation comes amid a time of crisis for the organization, which was founded in January 2018 by Hollywood A-listers and Washington power players on the promise of supporting women against sexual harassment. But in recent months, Times Up committed a series of unforced errors, which culminated in a public reckoning about its own purpose. Tchen and other Times Up staffers became involved in the handling of the sexual harassment allegations against former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, and after their connections with Cuomo and others in his administration were uncovered, the controversy raised questions about whether a group thats meant to protect victims had been compromised by its access to power. And those questions have led Tchen to step down. In a statement, Tchen said she has spent her career fighting for positive change for women and never stopped. She stated that leading Times Up has been a hugely rewarding experience and she is proud of the organization for advocating for women across the country. Now is the time for Times Up to evolve and move forward as there is so much more work to do for women. It is clear that I am not the leader who can accomplish that in this moment, Tchens statement said. I am especially aware that my position at the helm of Times Up has become a painful and divisive focal point, where those very women and other activists who should be working together to fight for change are instead battling each other in harmful ways. Therefore, it is time for me to resign and continue to work for change in other ways, and to let Times Up engage in the thoughtful and meaningful process I know will occur to move forward. Earlier this summer, Times Up was implicated in a bombshell report by the New York Attorney General that found that Cuomo had sexually harassed 11 women. The Attorney Generals investigation revealed that the law firm of a Times Up founder, Roberta Kaplan, represents Melissa DeRosa, a former Cuomo aide who helped draft a letter smearing the first Cuomo accuser, Lindsey Boylan. The AG found that Kaplan had spoken with DeRosa about a draft letter that would respond to Boylans accusations, which she read to Tchen at the time. The investigation described the letter as part of an unlawful retaliation against Boylan. Following the report, Kaplan resigned amid outcry from sexual assault survivors. Since Kaplan resigned, Tchen has said she does not recall the details of her conversation with Kaplan and was unaware that the letter was meant to be disparaging against any women. But the New York Times and the Washington Post separately published damning reports about Times Up, providing more details of Tchens possible involvement in deciding not to publicly support Cuomos accuser. In an attempt to right the ship, Tchen apologized to the Times Up board, acknowledged that she had made some missteps, but said she never was in direct communication with the former governor. She told members of the organization that she believes in the Times Up mission and solely intends to help women, survivors and victims of sexual assault. During a recent internal meeting, Tchen had the support of the board, and a spokesperson for Times Up told Variety that she had no plans to resign. After that meeting, sources told Variety that Times Up would be bringing on an outside consulting firm to conduct an internal assessment, and provide guidance for accountability and necessary culture-shift strategies needed for the organization to move forward and help work through its problems. Times Up co-founder Nina Shaw stepped in to replace Kaplan as interim board chair, and is said to be taking on more responsibility within the organization, including working directly with the yet-to-be-named consultant on mapping out next steps for the organization. Quickly following this weeks meeting, more claims about Tchen came out, including the Washington Post report that provided alleged text messages in which Tchen instructed her staff to stand down from releasing a press statement in support of Boylan. (In December 2020, when Boylan first accused Cuomo, the then-governor had been heralded as a hero during the pandemic, and became a Hollywood darling with frequent TV appearances and even an Emmy award, which has since been rescinded.) Many survivors had stood behind Tchen, noting her lifetime work of advocacy. But others had been calling for her resignation, stating the she and the organization have lost their way. Following the attorney generals investigation of Cuomo, a group of survivors penned an open letter to the Times Up Board of Directors, stating that the organization has failed them. Times Up and Times Up Legal Defense Fund were built to advocate for those who make the bold decision to hold our abusers accountable. But it seems that vision was lost and leadership drifted from who mattered most: survivors and victims, the open letter stated. In a statement released by Times Up immediately after Tchens resignation on Thursday, the board pleasantly bids her farewell, while pledging to hold themselves accountable. Tina Tchen has dedicated her life to making workplaces fair and equitable for workers and safer for women. That is why we asked her to lead Times Up in the first place and why she has accomplished enormous changes in the two years she has served as our president, the boards statement says. Tina has made a difference in the lives of so many and we are grateful for her hard work and impact. Accepting her resignation today is a demonstration of accountability and will allow our organization to move forward. As of today, the organization has not announced the hire of an outside consulting firm. With Tchens resignation, the future of Times Up, and its priorities survivors versus access to power is in question. Tchen was recruited to run Times Up in October 2019. She is not the first leader of the organization to face controversy: Lisa Borders, the inaugural CEO of Times Up, stepped down in February 2019, after her son was accused of sexual abuse. Times Up was founded in January 2018, after investigations into Harvey Weinstein in The New York Times and The New Yorker caused a sea change in Hollywood around sexual assault and harassment, which extended into exposing predators in a number of industries. Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Click here to read the full article. The higher the intensity of a trailer, the slower the song that accompanies it. This may seem fairly recent as a reliable rule, but its not a completely new phenomenon. What goes back at least to the 2001 trailer for the first iteration of Xbox 360s apocalyptic warfare video game Gears of War with Gary Jules delivering a heart-ripping cover of Tears for Fears Mad World is an visual-aural contrast thats now common practice. More recent examples of the trend include FJRAs echoey take on the 4 Non Blondes perennial Whats Up? in the terrifying trailer for 2020s Welcome to the Blumhouse; Lana Del Reys creepy version of Once Upon a Dream, from the classic Disney animated film Sleeping Beauty, in the trailer for 2014s Maleficent; and ConfidentialMX featuring Becky Hansons operatic interpretation of the Bee Gees I Started a Joke in the dark trailer for 2016s Suicide Squad. All have shown that the formula keeps viewers buying movie tickets and streaming services ticking. Its what I call the old-comfortable-shoe phenomenon, says Jonathan McHugh, a music supervisor, director and founding member of the Guild of Music Supervisors. You give people something familiar, like Destiny Childs Say My Name in the new Candyman, and all of a sudden theyre more engaged in the content and predisposed to enjoy what theyre watching because they love the song. Says Brian Monaco, president and global chief marketing officer at Sony Music Publishing: Its called trailerizing a song. That means changing every aspect of the song but leaving the lyrics. People know the lyrics. The goal is to catch peoples attention. Maybe theyre not paying as much attention to the trailer, and they start to hear the chorus of the song, and they go, Wait, I know this song. They start paying attention, and now theyre watching the trailer. At Sony and in his four-times-a-year writing camps, Monaco has teams of writers working on reimagined versions of legendary artists catalogs. He has entirely reworked ELOs discography, has redone a large portion of the Beatles songs and now is tackling Paul Simons newly acquired hefty songbook. The writing exercise, as Monaco calls it, is beneficial for everyone involved. Newer artists performing the covers are getting paid (and at a fraction of what the original masters would command, providing they were cleared at all, but still a good payday for their level). At the same time, these artists gain visibility on high-profile trailers for mass-appeal films. The writers, many of whom are or were performing musicians, are also getting paid without having to be concerned about appealing to or alienating their fan base. The heritage artists whose songs are being rerecorded are seeing an uptick in their streaming numbers. And, of course, the publishing company is reaping the rewards from all of the above. In a two-minute trailer, people are assessing whether or not they want to see the film, says McHugh. Its all about manipulating the emotions of the viewer with music that is provocative while still showing the action and getting the message across. Audiences familiar with a song will remember it, and the younger people will say, I discovered this. Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. MIAMI (AP) Joel Steckler was eager for his first cruise in more than a year and a half, and he chose the ship that just two months ago became the first to accept passengers again after a long pandemic shutdown. Steckler was fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and that was enough to resume cruising, under initial guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Now, the 63-year-old from Long Island, New York, is going to postpone the trip he had planned for Saturday amid new, tighter guidelines prompted by the delta-variant-fueled surge in cases and breakthrough infections. You just have to make a personal decision, said Steckler, who takes medication that suppresses his immune system and changed his plans after consulting his doctor. You dont want to be in a position where you are sick on a cruise and you have to fly home or somehow get home. Cruise lines have detected infections among vaccinated crew members and passengers, including in an elderly traveler who recently died. Last Friday, the CDC began advising travelers who are at a higher risk for severe COVID-19 illness to avoid cruises. It is also recommending that passengers show both a recent negative COVID test and proof they've been immunized. In addition to the surging delta virus, the CDC changed its cruise guidelines for high-risk groups because of the close proximity of ship passengers, the limited options for care on board and the challenges of medically evacuating travelers at sea, Centers spokeswoman Kristen Nordlund said Tuesday. Some cruise lines and cruise destinations are also revising their own guidelines. Starting Sept. 3, the Bahamas a favored stop for cruises is requiring all passengers 12 and older to be vaccinated against COVID-19 as a condition for ships to dock. That has prompted companies including Disney Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean and Carnival to announce this week that they are adopting the same requirement. The companies will ask for a government vaccination card or a record from a health care provider. They've been able to do so in Florida after a federal judge this month temporarily blocked a state law banning cruise lines from requiring passengers to prove they're vaccinated. The companies are also once again requiring masks in indoor areas of the ships and other places where people gather. "Unfortunately, no venue on land or at sea is COVID-free right now," Carnival Corp. said in a written statement. Carnival commented on the case of a vaccinated 77-year-old woman who later came down with the virus. The company said the woman almost certainly did not contract COVID on our ship, suggesting she was already infected when she embarked. Neither cruise lines nor the federal government are reporting how many cases they have had on their ships. They have only acknowledged that there have been infections. Officials in Belize, however, recently reported that 26 crew members and one passenger of a Carnival cruise ship all of whom had been vaccinated tested positive for COVID-19. They said all of them had mild or no symptoms, and were in isolation. Jaime Katz, an analyst who covers the cruise industry for the Morningstar financial services company, said while many high-risk travelers might postpone their trips, others will continue to book for the future, betting that the current wave of cases will subside by the time their ship sails. Flexible booking and cancellation policies have made cruising more palatable for nervous travelers, he said. Companies are offering full refunds if people test positive for COVID-19 or decide to cancel after a cruise line shortens the length of a planned trip. Royal Caribbean International is also offering to fly people home if they or anyone in their party test positive during the cruise. Chris Woronka, a Deutsche Bank analyst who follows the leisure industry, said cruisers, including those over 65, are an avid bunch so eager to get back on the water that they wont easily be dissuaded by the current COVID surge and more stringent travel requirements. I dont think this is permanent unless were dealing with delta 2.0 or whatever the next one is, Woronka said. ___ Koenig reported from Dallas. Coming off the worst local report for COVID results in months on Monday, officials from the City of Laredo and Webb County reported an additional 346 positive cases and one related death from the past two days as hospitalizations are becoming a more considerable concern. The additions bring Laredo to 49,454 positives and 894 deaths historically dating back to the beginning of the pandemic locally in March of 2020 as the area simultaneously closes in on the 50,000-positive and 900-death milestones. The nearly 350 new cases keeps the positive figure elevated after it dipped to end last week. That included 172 positives on Wednesday and 237 Friday two of the three lowest figures announced from the previous 10 reports. But Mondays 439 positives were the most ever in a non-daily report and the highest figure in any overall report since Jan. 26 had 471. And combined with the seven deaths announced, it was overall the worst day for COVID metrics since Jan. 22 announced 607 positives and 11 deaths from a single day. Combined with Mondays positives, the city now has 785 positives so far this week eclipsing the 784 from last week, which itself was the third-most in a report of the past 27 weeks dating back to the middle of February. The 1,081 positives from Aug. 7-13 is the most positives recorded in a week recently since the week of Jan. 30 to Feb. 5 had 1,218, and this week is now on pace to break that recent high. Fortunately, deaths were not as high as the last report which featured seven all coming from recent days. The latest death was a man in his 20s who died Tuesday. Laredos rolling seven-day positivity rate is currently 12.5%. Texas rolling positivity rate is 20.4% while the United States is at 11.1%. Active cases have continued to climb with the increase, jumping to 856. Thats the third-highest recent total, behind the 906 from Aug. 13 and the 886 from Aug. 16. The former was the highest recorded in a day since Feb. 6 had 1,016. COVID-19 Metrics in Laredo Positives: 49,454 Deaths: 894 Hospitalizations: 86 ICU: 37 Fully Vaccinated: 81.1% Recoveries: 47,704 Total Tested: 393,461 7-Day Positive Rate: 12.5% Source: City of Laredo Health Department See More Collapse The city stated that of just the currently investigated active cases, 53.9%, or 247 people, are non-vaccinated individuals. This number is lower than it has been in the past typically sitting around 75-85% detailing that many more at least partially-vaccinated individuals in the heavily-vaccinated area of Laredo are still getting sick. However, the numbers still indicate that the serious cases overwhelmingly belong to the unvaccinated population, as only 51 fully-vaccinated persons this year have been hospitalized with a breakthrough case. Hospitalizations are becoming more and more of a concern as the figure hit another recent high Wednesday. The area reported 86 hospitalized with COVID a big jump up from the 74 from Monday. It was the highest recorded figure since 97 were hospitalized on Feb. 18. ICU cases have also risen despite the heavy number of recent deaths up to 37, three higher than Monday. Due to these increases, Laredos COVID-19 hospitalization rate has also shot up a bit. According to the Texas Department of State Health Services most recent data for Tuesday, the rate now sits at 22.5% up from 20% two days ago and 18.5% to end last week. Thats the highest recorded rate for the area since the 30.4% from Feb. 16. As an indicator of the current struggles of the state with COVID, Laredos hospitalization rate still ranks only 12th out of the 22 hospital regions in Texas listed by the DSHS. There are now five regions above 30% including Corpus Christi (37.4%), Lufkin (33.5%), Galveston (32.6%), Waco (32.5%) and Victoria (30.4%). However, the DSHS reports that Laredo has only eight hospital beds available the lowest in the state with only four others below 100, as Waco is the next closest with 68 beds. Laredo also has no ICU beds available for the 23rd straight day. As Laredo is medically underserved and with facilities understaffed, its hospital capacity has been diminished despite being nowhere near its previous high in hospitalizations of 249 in January when it was receiving help from the state, something that has been denied this time around. This is why local experts continue to tout being vaccinated as vital, even despite the areas success in that regard, as its current lack of resources has curtailed that success. The City of Laredo reported on Wednesday that it now has 100.02% of its eligible population above 12 years of age partially vaccinated, or 215,970 people, although it did not elaborate how that figure has broke 100%. Of the eligible population, a reported 81.1% are now fully vaccinated totaling 215,970 individuals. However, around a third of Laredos total population is below the age of 18. That means that a significant segment of the citys actual population may not be vaccinated, as those under 12 are unable to do so. As for its elderly, the city reports that 96% of those age 65 and up have been at least partially vaccinated. Over the course of the pandemic, 393,461 tests have been administered. An estimated 47,704 people have recovered from a previous infection. zdavis@lmtonline.com A Mexican citizen has been found guilty of smuggling more than $1 million in meth following a two-day-trial in Laredo, according to court documents. The jury deliberated for about three hours before convicting Juan Victor Larraga-Solano, 32, of conspiracy to import and importation of meth. U.S. District Judge Marina Garcia Marmolejo presided over the trial and set sentencing for Nov. 30. Larraga-Solano faces up to life in federal prison and a possible $10 million maximum fine. He will remain in custody pending the sentencing. Homeland Security Investigations led the investigation with the assistance of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Drug Enforcement Administration and Border Patrol. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Adam E. Harper and Brandon S. Bowling are prosecuting the case. The case dates back to March 8, when Larraga-Solano and a passenger arrived at the Juarez-Lincoln International Bridge driving a gray 2019 Volkswagen Jetta bearing Mexican registration. Larraga-Solano stated that the Jetta was a rental and that they were on their way to San Marcos for two days. CBP officers referred Larraga-Solano and the vehicle to secondary inspection. (CBP officers) examined Larraga-Solanos Jetta. (CBP officers) discovered grape juice boxes, beer bottles and three coolers concealing crystal and liquid methamphetamine, states the arrest affidavit filed on March 10, 2020. The U.S. Attorneys Office added, Law enforcement inspected the items and noticed that, when shaken, the juice boxes sounded as if they contained rocks. Further, the alleged beer did not have any bubbles. A follow up X-ray examination also revealed anomalies in the walls of the coolers. In a post-arrest interview, Larraga-Solano provided conflicting statements to HSI special agents. He then added that on March 7, 2020, a man identified as David instructed him to meet two individuals near the airport in San Luis Potosi, Mexico, where they loaded the coolers and merchandise into Larraga-Solanos Jetta. In total, authorities seized 56 packages of meth and 12 beer bottles containing liquid meth. The contraband weighed 98.23 pounds and had an estimated street value of $1.1 million. Testimony also revealed that Mexican cartels have increased the price of meth to raise demand for less expensive drugs like cocaine and marijuana, the U.S. Attorneys Office said. Local officials devoted a large portion of Wednesdays COVID-19 media briefing to children and the expected wave of cases originating at schools after students returned to campuses. Laredo Health Authority Dr. Victor Trevino said that during a health professional meeting, a short-term plan to bring a pediatric care team to Laredo has been discussed. In local clinics, pediatric patient numbers have increased due to COVID, and while early pandemic data may have pointed to children faring better than adults, the delta variant has changed the circumstances. The delta variant is giving us more data points, and we are seeing that more children are getting infected and sicker, Trevino said. Now there are opinions from some that the percentage of child deaths is still very low, and my answer to that is what does that say about us if we are willing to risk preventable deaths of children because it is a small percentage? I do not agree with that, especially when we know the data from Hispanic children are eight times more likely to be hospitalized and we dont have a pediatric intensive care unit. Both LISD and UISD were tasked with creating and presenting a mitigation plan to Trevino in an effort to minimize the chances of infection in mass gathering situations at school, such as lunch in cafeterias. Both districts have turned in their respective plans, which will be covered and amended as needed by Trevino. Laredo Health Director Richard Chamberlain said that as of Monday, 144 COVID positive cases were reported from both UISD, LISD and private schools combined. This included children below the age of 18. Trevino added that combining both staff and student cases, there have been over 200 cases from Laredo schools since opening last week. In 2021, a total of five children have been transported out of the city due to needing hospitalization outside of Laredo. In the citys public update, 86 individuals were hospitalized Trevino said that number was as high as 87 Wednesday, up from 74 on Monday. And the COVID-19 hospitalization rate reached 22.5% as of the Texas Department of State Health Services most recent data for Tuesday the highest recorded rate for the area since the 30.4% from Feb. 16. With Laredos COVID metrics rising, health officials continue to encourage masks and vaccines. Hospitals are over 90 admissions with patients waiting also in the ER overflow, Trevino said. With high numbers of patients in the hospital overflow, patients normally sent for observations at hospitals are now treated in local clinics, which has an impact of treatment of other illnesses in the community. This will be especially true for the unvaccinated population. When individuals get sick from a preventable disease, it does put stress on our medical resources. cocampo@lmtonline.com A new study the largest of its kind says that women who are diagnosed with the most common type of early-stage breast cancer most likely dont need chemotherapy after theyve had endocrine (hormone) therapy. The news could lay to rest some anguished conversations between doctors and patients. When a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer, all medical muscle goes toward eliminating the cancer and reducing the possibility of a recurrence. But for many women, chemotherapy can have disastrous results. This study says that if the additional treatment isnt necessaryor has little measurable positive effectmany women can skip it. The study is not groundbreaking, but its a little bit of additional clarification for patients, said Dr. Lajos Pusztai, Yale Cancer Center professor of medical oncology and director of breast cancer translational research as well as co-director of Yale Cancer Center Genetics, Genomics, and Epigenetics Program. Given the thousands of women cancer affectsbreast cancer is second only to skin cancers as the most common cancer among U.S. womenthe study is important, Pusztai said. According to the American Cancer Society, in 2018 some 266,120 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed in women, and about 40,920 women will die from the disease. The study, called the Trial Assigning Individualized Options for Treatment, or TAILORx, is considered a precision medicine trial. Precision medicine looks at individuals down to their genetic makeup and lifestyles when administering health care. The study was partially funded by the National Cancer Institute with proceeds from the U.S. Postal Services breast cancer stamp, which has raised some $86 million for breast cancer research since it was issued in the late 90s. The study was launched in 2006, and, after looking at 10,273 women with breast cancer, it concluded that some 70 percent of them, or roughly 85,000 women a year, can skip chemo with its often-debilitating side effects that can include nausea, and weight, hair, and memory loss, or worse. For this population, endocrine therapy alone appeared to be every bit as effective as endocrine therapy combined with chemotherapy. As Pusztai says, women who are at low risk for a recurrencethose who score between zero and 10 based on a test where doctors read a sample of the patients tumor tissuegenerally would not be considered candidates for chemotherapy. Women who score in the high-risk 26 to 100 range generally do submit to the additional treatment. But the bulk of women who are diagnosed with this kind of breast cancer hormone-driven, without the protein HER2 fall mid-range on the risk scale, 11-to-25. For them, the decision to go through chemo is fraught with anguish. In the past, after a breast cancer diagnosis, the decision to enroll a patient in chemotherapy was mostly based, Pusztai said, on patient preference, doctors bias, and gut feeling. The study confirms what astute and experienced breast cancer specialists already know, he said, that chemo for a mid-risk patient doesnt have the desired effect, and may place a woman at risk for serious health issues, such as leukemia or heart disease, that can come after chemo. (The study said that women younger than 50 who score in the middle range may benefit at least somewhat from chemotherapy, so doctors may take the patients age into consideration.) The study reflects the general decline of the use of chemotherapy among early-stage breast cancer patients. According to a December report in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, chemo among early-stage patients dropped from 26.6 percent in 2013 to 14.1 percent just two years later. Its a very exciting finding, said Yonni Wattenmaker, executive director of the Greenwich-based Breast Cancer Alliance, which provides funding for breast cancer research and training, including early-stage research. But we fund the training of breast surgery fellowshipsthis may affect how hospitals treat patients, but it will likely not impact how they train the specialists overall, she said. Susan Campbell is a distinguished lecturer at the University of New Haven. She can be reached at slcampbell417@gmail.com. This column was reported under a partnership with the Connecticut Health I-Team (www.c-hit.org). Amy Schneider, 31, of Stratford, came to Hartford Saturday toting a colorful sign she made that said Fight Like a Girl. At Bushnell Park, she joined some 10,000 people at the second annual Womens March to chant, mingle, and remind themselves that the fight isnt over. In fact, its just begun. The day after Donald J. Trump took office in January 2017, millions of women and men headed to D.C., New York, and places like Hartford to protest. This year all around the country women and men gathered again to march, and to mark a years worth of unprecedented political action, with hundreds of women whod never considered entering political office running and winning, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. In Connecticut last summer, Yales Womens Campaign School had 500 applicants for 80 slots in its five-day summer session. Thats a record. In Hartford on Saturday, West Hartfords deputy mayor, Elizabeth Kerrigan, stepped to the podium and the crowd roared when she announced her title. In New York, the mayors office estimated some 200,000 people marched. At Trumps Mar-a-Lago, hundreds of women dressed in The Handmaids Tale red cloaks and white hats marched. Tens of thousands of marchers flooded the streets around Los Angeles City Hall. People gathered as well in Raleigh, Charleston, and Oklahoma Cityroughly 250 cities in all. In addition to marking a new activism, the marchers protested the farces that emanate daily from Washington. Though in Hartford, Trumps name was only occasionally mentioned because it isnt just Trump. Its Congress. Its the GOP, nationally and locally, whose members continue to pretend that their president is defensible. Accordingly, its been a year of erosion of the rights of some of the countrys most vulnerable populations, including immigrants, Muslims, the elderly, children not blessed to be born wealthy, poor women, as well as women who give birth in the ninth month. (OK. That last one was a line he flubbed at a recent March for Life rally, and yes, it was a head-scratcher.) At that anti-abortion march, Vice President Mike Pence introduced Trump as the most pro-life president in American history, which would be yet another laughable piece of hyperbole save for the presence of Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch on the Supreme Court. Something as basic as a womans right to choose could be on the chopping block. But it wont be an easy fight. At every march around the country, volunteers ran booths and handed out literature that encouraged political action and involvement. In Hartford, those organizations included Planned Parenthood and PoliticaCT, a nonprofit that advocates for progressive candidates. Trump and his minions have managed to wake the beast. How awesome are the times were living in? On the day of the march, Trump himself tweeted his support (while touting his fake-news about his fake-successes) and immediately was buried under tweeted responses that suggested he butt out. America! Like so many other marchers in Hartford, last year Schneider made the trek to the mother march in D.C., and that was the impetus of her political awakening. She came home and got involved in local politics. She had volunteered a little in high school, and worked some on LGBT issues, she said, but this feels different. This feels serious, and shes ready. Not too far down the road, Schneider just might run for office. And yes: Shell fight like a girl. WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden vowed Thursday to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite the day's deadly suicide bomb attack at the Kabul airport. He promised to avenge the deaths of 13 U.S. service members killed in the attack, declaring to the extremists responsible: We will hunt you down and make you pay. Speaking with emotion from the White House, Biden said the Islamic State group's Afghanistan affiliate was to blame for the attacks that killed the Americans and many more Afghan civilians. He said there was no evidence they colluded with the Taliban, who now control the country. He asked for a moment of silence to honor the service members, bowing his head, and ordered U.S. flags to half-staff across the country. As for the bombers and gunmen involved, he said, "We have some reason to believe we know who they are ... not certain. He said he had instructed military commanders to develop plans to strike IS assets, leadership and facilities. Gen. Frank McKenzie, the U.S. Central Command chief, said more attempted attacks were expected. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan has carried out many attacks on civilian targets in the country in recent years. It is far more radical than the Taliban, who seized power less than two weeks ago. The most heralded American attack on the group came in April 2017 when the U.S. dropped the largest conventional bomb in its arsenal on an IS cave and tunnel complex. The group more recently is believed to have concentrated in urban areas, which could complicate U.S. efforts to target them without harming civilians. We will respond with force and precision at our time, at the place of our choosing, Biden said. These ISIS terrorists will not win. We will rescue the Americans; we will get our Afghan allies out, and our mission will go on. America will not be intimidated. Biden said U.S. military commanders in Afghanistan had told him it is important to complete the evacuation mission. And we will, he said. We will not be deterred by terrorists. Indeed, Gen. McKenzie, who is overseeing the evacuation operation from his Florida headquarters, told a Pentagon news conference shortly before Biden spoke, Let me be clear, while we are saddened by the loss of life, both U.S. and Afghan, we are continuing to execute the mission,. He said there were about 5,000 evacuees on the airfield Thursday awaiting flights. As many as 1,000 Americans and many more Afghans are still struggling to get out of Kabul. McKenzie said 12 U.S. service members had been killed and 15 were wounded. Later, his spokesman, Capt. William Urban, said the toll had risen to 13 dead and 18 wounded. Urban said the wounded were being evacuated from Afghanistan aboard Air Force C-17 transport planes equipped with surgical units. The Marine Corps said 10 Marines were among those killed. Central Command did not identify the dead by service. It was the deadliest day for U.S. forces in Afghanistan since August 2011, when a helicopter was shot down by an insurgent armed with a rocket-propelled grenade, killing 30 American troops and eight Afghans. In somber, sometimes halting remarks, Biden praised U.S. forces and asked for the moment of silence. Asked later about further actions, press secretary Jen Psaki said that personal calls to families would wait for notification of next of kin and that Biden might travel to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware when the remains of the fallen service members are returned. They were the first U.S. service members killed in Afghanistan since February 2020, the month the Trump administration struck an agreement with the Taliban that called for the militant group to halt attacks on Americans in exchange for a U.S. agreement to remove all American troops and contractors by May 2021. Biden announced in April that he would have all forces out by September. Thursday's attacks, came 12 days into the rushed evacuation and five days before its scheduled completion. Some Republicans and others are arguing to extend the evacuation beyond next Tuesday's deadline. The administration has been widely blamed for a chaotic and deadly evacuation that began in earnest only after the collapse of the U.S.-backed Afghan government and the Talibans takeover of the country. More than 100,000 people have been evacuated so far, Afghans, Americans and others. Thursdays attack was sure to intensify political pressure from all sides on Biden, who already was under heavy criticism for not beginning the pullout earlier. He had announced in April that he was ending the U.S. war and would have all forces out by September. House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California called for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to bring the chamber back into session to consider legislation that would prohibit the U.S. withdrawal until all Americans are out. Pelosis office dismissed such suggestions as empty stunts. After the suicide bombers attack at the airports Abbey Gate, a number of ISIS gunmen opened fire on civilians and military forces, he said. There also was an attack at or near the Baron Hotel near that gate, he said. We thought this would happen sooner or later, McKenzie said, adding that U.S. military commanders were working with Taliban commanders to prevent further attacks. As details of the day's attack emerged, the White House rescheduled Bidens first in-person meeting with Israels new prime minister on Thursday and canceled a video conference with governors about resettling Afghan refugees arriving in the United States. A number of U.S. allies said they were ending their evacuation efforts in Kabul, at least in part to give the U.S. the time it needs to wrap up its evacuation operations before getting 5,000 of its troops out by Tuesday. Despite intense pressure to extend the deadline, Biden has repeatedly cited the threat of terrorist attacks against civilians and U.S. service members as a reason to keep to his plan. In an interview with ABC News, Ross Wilson, the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, said, There are safe ways to get to the airport for those Americans who still want to leave. He added that there undoubtedly will be some at-risk Afghans who will not get out before Bidens deadline. The airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people from the airport and as other countries began shutting down their efforts. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. ___ Associated Press writers Aamer Madhani, Lolita C. Baldor and Ellen Knickmeyer in Washington and James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida, contributed to this report. The incidence of suicide in nearly all age groups has increased by 24 percent since 1999 and by 200 percent among girls between ages of 10 and 14. Theories behind such astounding unprecedented increases, reported recently by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, vary. Some research says that among older Americans, the recent recession may have played a part, though the correlation is not a simple one. As for why so many more young girls are killing themselves, the answers there, too, are complicated. Girls between ages 10 and 14 showed the greatest rise in suicide of any age group since 1999, from 0.5 per 100,000 to 1.5 per 100,000 in 2014, according to last months CDC report. Its easy to get lost in the numbers, and its important to remember that adolescent suicide is still relatively rare, said Kimberly M. Nelson, a licensed clinical social worker, and senior vice president for services at Wheeler Clinic. The clinic provides behavioral and medical health care services around the state. Nelson said suicides among young girls may be increasing for a variety or combination of reasons, including that age groups use of social media, the relatively early onset of puberty, and mental health professionals reluctance to aggressively treat attendant symptoms (depression and the like) among the group. Social media has increased teens and tweens ability to reach out and sometimes bully. Most of social networking, said Nelson, is unmonitored, and younger teens and tweens may not have appropriate impulse control to use the tools properly. Most suicides occur in the youths home, after school hours, Nelson said. Thats when youth are using social media. All afternoon and all evening, all sorts of stuff is going on in social media that contribute to isolation, and that really allow for bullying, and all those things nobody sees. Suicide remains one of the leading causes of death in this country, after heart disease, and cancer. For adolescents, leading causes of deaths include suicide, road accidents and homicide. Most suicides among young teens occur in the home, says Kimberly Nelson of the Wheeler Clinic. Connecticut has one of the countrys lowest suicide rates, at 44th of 50 or roughly one person a day. State health care officials have been proactive to stop this largely preventable epidemic, starting in 1989 with a legislative-mandate youth suicide advisory board. In 2014, the state Department of Children and Families, and the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services released a strategic plan to help prevent suicide in the state. The plan uses a collaborative approach among departments and agencies. In the last few years, Connecticut legislators have passed a flurry of anti-bullying laws. Suicide is openly discussed in places such as the First United Methodist Church in Mystic, where the Emerson Theater Collaborative recently staged Always Picked Last, an anti-bullying play. Still, Nelson said clinicians are seeing younger and younger children enter puberty, a notoriously difficult time. The vast majority 90 percent of early onset puberty in girls comes from unknown causes. Puberty at the beginning of last century generally started around age 16-17. That has dropped to age 12 or so and sometimes even earlier. Some studies point to exposure to certain chemicals that hasten menarche, or the beginning of menstrual periods. Whatever the cause, mental health professionals, said Nelson, need to be aware. What we know is puberty brings with it the beginning of psychological distress, Nelson said. We see in line with puberty psychiatric disorders, depression, anxiety, social stressors, and thats happening earlier and earlier. Thats something we need to think about. Nelson said the study is a wake-up call for mental health professionals. This clearly tells us we need to be paying closer attention to prevention and awareness of the younger female, she said. This column was reported under a partnership with the Connecticut Health I-Team (c-hit.org). Susan Campbell is a distinguished lecturer at the University of New Haven. She can be reached at slcampbell417@gmail.com. Beth D. Ramage, formerly of Lockport, NY, passed away August 21, 2021 in Deerfield Beach, Florida. Beth was born May 17, 1931, daughter of Howard H. Dobbins and Almeda T. Dobbins. Beth was a graduate of Lockport High School and Queens College in Charlotte, NC. Predeceased by her husband of 6 The beginning of the school year when you got to show off your new duds, new cars, new looks! Sports! Playing, cheering, watching high school athletics. The arts: Dramatic arts, musical groups and shows, graphic arts groups, debate, etc. The prom! No dancing the night away or punch bowl antics. The daily interactions. Just being with the group, hanging with friends and classmates. Access to college recruiters and advisors its harder to line up higher education. Walking onstage to get a diploma while all the family is watching with everyone elses family. Vote View Results Mayo beating Dublin in the All-Ireland Semi-Finals was the talk of the entire country last week and what better way to celebrate than with a signed Mayo Jersey? Longford Cystic Fibrosis campaigner, Jillian McNulty is holding a draw to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis and the jersey, signed by all the Mayo players, including man of the match, Padraig OHora, is the prize. The draw will take place on September 4 - just one week before the All-Ireland Final - via Facebook live. Even Bill Murray is on board, joining Jillian - or Jingles as he calls her - in a video to promote the draw. Im in for a fiver, he said. Entries cost 5 each and you can enter as many times as you like. The final entry closes at 6pm on Friday, September 3. Enter via Revolut (@gilliaepzy), PayPal (cystic5roses@hotmail.com) or Bank Transfer (message the Signed Mayo Jersey Facebook page for details) or cash. Please ensure you include your name, address and contact number. Donations can also be made via GoFundMe. Students from across the county are invited to turn their creative ideas into project entries for the 2022 BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition (BTYSTE). Renowned nationally and internationally as a brilliant platform for young people to showcase their STEM ideas, the exhibition is open for project entries until September 27, 2021. Entries can be made in any one of four categories: technology; social and behavioural science; biological and ecological science; and chemical, physical and mathematical science. An individual or group must submit a simple, one-page proposal outlining their project idea. Very Interesting Info @BTinIreland is committed to further education in the areas of STEM & senior category winners of #BTYSTE receive a bursary for entry into one of seven 3rd-level institutions in the Rep of Ireland in partnership with the Irish Universities Association WOW! pic.twitter.com/XeOhianTvr August 25, 2021 BT Ireland, organiser of the BTYSTE, has waived the project entry fees for the second year running, with the exhibition being delivered in a virtual format in 2022 due to Covid-19. This builds on the success of the 2021 virtual exhibition, which attracted over 105,000 visitors from 77 countries. The exhibition, now in its 58th year, opens up huge opportunities with many young people who take part going on to have successful careers in STEM. In addition to over 200 prizes, worth more than 35,000 in total, up for grabs, the BTYSTE offers young minds a fun and exciting way to share their ideas with an international audience, with the winner going on to represent Ireland at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists. BT Ireland is committed to further education in the areas of STEM and senior category winners of the BTYSTE receive a bursary for entry into one of seven third-level institutions in the Republic of Ireland in partnership with the Irish Universities Association. Additionally, each year more than 30 students are chosen to take part in the BT Young Scientist Business Bootcamp, a commercialisation course that can help convert ideas into enterprise. Speaking on his BTYSTE experience, Abdul Abubakar, former participant and overall winner in 2007 said: "Entering the BTYSTE was a once in a lifetime opportunity and a proud moment for me, my school and my local community. Presenting my project to the judges and then being chosen as the winner was a really exciting time. Entering the exhibition solidified my passion and interest in STEM, which lead me to pursue a career within STEM." Abdul went on to represent Ireland and won top prize at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists following his win at the BTYSTE and has since forged a successful career in software engineering. Abdul said: "Representing Ireland at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists made my whole BTYSTE experience even more special. The opportunities are endless when you take part in an event like this." Head of the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition, Mari Cahalane, BT Ireland said: Every young person has an idea. Were providing them with a brilliant way of sharing those ideas with a huge audience, of being part of a community which is passionate about STEM, and of securing some of the amazing awards and prizes available. The exhibition can be life-changing. We want students to seize that opportunity. Interested students can visit www.BTyoungscientist.com for more information on how to enter. Qualifying students will have the opportunity to present their projects to the judges remotely during the virtual exhibition between January 12 14, 2022. Ensure you get a print copy of the Loudoun Times-Mirror delivered weekly to your home or business! Complete online access is included with all print subscriptions purchased online. Plus, up to four other members of your household can share online access through this subscription with their own, individual linked accounts at no additional charge. (Are you a current advertiser? Ask your sales rep for our special advertiser rate code!) LA County Fire Department (LACoFD) personnel finish mopping up a fire in a homeless encampment located beneath Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu on Sunday, July 18. The fire, reported burning beneath an underpass at Pacific Coast Highway and Cross Creek Road, was the sixth or seventh to occur under an overpass in Malibu this summer, LACoFD reported. Manchester Center, VT (05254) Today Periods of rain. Low 52F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible.. Tonight Periods of rain. Low 52F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible. Manchester Center, VT (05254) Today Cloudy with periods of rain. Low 54F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall possibly over one inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible.. Tonight Cloudy with periods of rain. Low 54F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall possibly over one inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible. MANISTEE The Manistee Area Public Schools work study session was a little more well attended than usual Wednesday evening as numerous parents came to participate in the public communications portion of the meeting to voice their displeasure over the district's universal masking policy. "I was just about to send my child to school finally. I've been working hard on getting her potty-trained," said Amy Eckholm. "I've been thinking this over for years as far as her schooling, and I finally made the decision. Then I found out that she would be required to wear a mask. Now we have to make a different decision: figure out how to pay for her to go to a different school, or hold her back another year and hope that magically next year it won't be an issue. ... Now we have to redo our finances, because I will not have my child wear a mask." Over a dozen concerned parents and citizens came to the meeting, with nine partaking in the public communications portion. Many of the parents thanked the school board for their service and efforts in creating the best learning environment possible for their children, but said they took umbrage with mandatory masking. "It's pretty cut and dry: mandating masks is actually breaking Michigan law," said Tim Tabaczka. ... "The revised school code, Act 451 of 1971, says the state policy under 1307h shall include a statement that all of the following practices are prohibited for all school personnel and public schools of this state under all circumstances including emergency situations. There's a whole list, but the one I'm going to point out is any restraint that negatively impacts breathing is prohibited under all circumstances even emergency circumstances. "So literally, putting that mask over a kid's face and the school requiring it is against Michigan law," he continued. "All I'm asking for is that you give parents a choice and let them be in charge of their children." Board president Jim Thompson pointed out to parents that, as it was a work study session, the board would not be voting on any action items that night and would not be able to respond to comments. He still welcomed the parents to share their perspective and said the board would take everything said into consideration. "The mask thing is supposed to be a public health concern for our kids, right? Everybody's worried about their safety, their health and being able to live life normally," said Jessica Meshraky. "I feel like if we were more concerned about their safety and their health, there probably wouldn't be the vending machines full of pop and juice and junk. I believe in America one in three kids has an issue with obesity and over 350,000 Americans die each year because of obesity. That seems a little more pressing than the one in 15 million kids dying from COVID exposure." The MAPS school board voted 6-1 in favor of requiring masks for staff and students, regardless of vaccination status, during a board meeting on Aug. 11. The board said it would be ready to revisit its policy if cases in the county and region become more favorable. Some in attendance said the option to decide what was in the best interest of the children was being taken out of parents' hands. "I find it disturbing that you don't deem us residents capable of evaluating risks and acting accordingly," said Crystal Fraly. Before the public communications portion began, Thompson pointed out that masks were required during school board meetings and asked the numerous people without masks to put one on unless medically exempt from doing so, stating there were masks available in the back of the auditorium. All but a few said they were medically exempt and the meeting proceeded. SEE ALSO: Why Manistee Area Public Schools will require masks to start school year Mankato, MN (56001) Today Clear this evening then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low 57F. Winds ESE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Clear this evening then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low 57F. Winds ESE at 5 to 10 mph. Real Madrid's drive to tie down their most important players is all part of a protectionist strategy against Paris Saint-Germain. Central to all this is the protracted transfer saga surrounding Kylian Mbappe. Real Madrid are concerned that if they are to prise the 22-year-old away from the French capital, then there may be reprisals from PSG in the form of their own transfer raids. As such, over the last three months the likes of Luka Modric (until 2022), Lucas Vazquez (2024), Nacho Fernandez (2023), Dani Carvajal (2025), Thibaut Courtois (2026), Karim Benzema (2023) and Fede Valverde (2027) have all seen their deals renewed. And that's just as well, given the aggressive rhetoric emanating from PSG sporting director Leonardo. "Madrid's behaviour has been disrespectful, incorrect, illegal and unacceptable," he told MARCA on Wednesday. Getting the futures of Courtois and Valverde secured seems to have been Real Madrid's priority in this scenario, with the pair's contracts now as watertight as can be. All of which is well timed for Real Madrid's final assault for Mbappe. As things stand, Los Merengues only have four players who are out of contract next year. Three of those - Isco, Marcelo and Gareth Bale - aren't considered part of the club's future, with the other - Luka Modric - is of an age, 36, where his evolution is discussed year-on-year anyway. All of the other squad members are under the club's control, not only in contractual terms but also in relation to their prohibitive release clauses, nearly all of which stand at over 700 million euros. Jose A. Garcia The Barcelona precedent Florentino Perez and the Real Madrid hierarchy have set about these measures having seen what has happened to great rivals Barcelona in recent years. They wanted Marco Verratti but ended up losing Neymar. And then even worse, they saw Lionel Messi depart, having also missed out on Georginio Wijnaldum. Support Local Journalism Now, more than ever, residents need trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by purchasing a digital subscription. Your subscription will allow you unlimited access to important local news stories. Our mission is to keep our community informed and we appreciate your support. YMM EQUITY ALERT: Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP Announces that a Securities Fraud Class Action Lawsuit was filed on Behalf of Investors of Full Truck Alliance Co. Ltd. It was time to leave; we should have stayed. It was in vain; it was a success. Local veterans who have served in Afghanistan have a range of o Marietta, GA (30060) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low near 65F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low near 65F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Marietta, GA (30060) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low near 65F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low near 65F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Bollywood cant do horror. It just can't. Their idea of a good scare is people dressed in weird clothes, horrible makeup and even weirder sound effects. However, it does one hell of a job at making people fear for their lives with their crime movies and sadistic characters who are psychopath killers. Phantom Films Bollywood movies based on ruthless murderers and serial killers have scarred us more than those desi aatmas and chudails ever could. There are some terrifying killers shown in movies who can give nightmares to the even bravest of souls. Vishesh Films Here are the 6 most khatarnak psychopaths and serial killers from Bollywood movies that scare the sh*t out of us even today: 1. Rakesh Mahadkar (Ek Villain) Balaji Motion Pictures Rakesh appears to be a normal guy who has an unappreciative wife who always taunts him. However, you soon stop feeling sorry for him and are terrorised to see him mercilessly killing every woman who is rude to him. He murders women as a way to let out his frustration with his unhappy wife who he loves. 2. Dheeraj Pandey (Murder 2) Vishesh Films He is one of the most terrifying psychopath killers in cinema believed to be inspired by a South Korean serial killer and sex offender. He calls hookers over and kills them and has a history of torturing women. Think it doesnt get more disturbing than this. Oh, it does! He castrates himself to become a eunuch and worships the devil. 3. Lajja Shankar Pandey (Sangharsh) Vishesh Films This religious fanatic abducted innocent children and sacrificed them at the shrine of the goddess for immortality. Every 90s kid was (and is still) traumatised seeing Ashutosh Rana in that red saree ululating in the middle of the street. Chills! 4. Maam (Kaun?) Kshitij Production Combines Major spoiler alert! Urmila Matondkar is shown as the scared, timid young woman whose name isnt revealed in the movie but is referred to as Maam. It keeps us on the edge of our seats thinking she is about to get murdered by the serial killer on the loose (probably Manoj Bajpayee). However, SHE is revealed to be the psychotic killer. It was the scariest thing ever! 5. Gokul Pandit (Dushman) Vishesh Films Another sadistic character played by Ashutosh Rana, Gokul Pandit in Dushman, is a psychopath killer who rapes and kills women. He brutally murders Sonia Sehgal (Kajol) which remains to be the most disturbing scene till date. 6. Ramanna (Raman Raghav 2.0) Phantom Films Inspired by real-life serial killer Raman Raghav who was on a killing spree for three years in Mumbai during the 1950s, Ramanna, in the movie, also kills people with a sharp object like a hammer or tyre iron. The fact that it is based on a real killer makes him even scarier. Actor Swara Bhasker recently shared pictures from the griha pravesh ceremony at her new house. Her house underwent a makeover. Swara revealed that she didnt stay at this house since 2019. Swara tweeted on Thursday, "The Gods have approved!" She also added the hashtags 'Griha Pravesh' and 'New Old House' and 'New Beginnings'. She also posted eight pictures from the puja where she sat next to the pandit. Check out the post here- The picture showed Swara with a goofy expression on her face and in the next picture, she looked more serious. Earlier, she had written in a post saying, "Moving back into my new old house after 2.5 years! 1st night in my own house after Feb 2019 feels gratifying & blessed! The world, all our lives, my life have changed with the pandemic & loss.. & yet there is so much to be grateful for & cherish! Goodnight peeps. Finally! Swara also kept on sharing pictures when the house was under renovation and now that she has moved in the new house, she also revealed her favourite spot in the house. In an interview with HT last year, Swara said, "No society in Mumbai was ready to rent a house to two single girls, one of whom was trying to get into the film industry. They asked us, Will you be meeting boys? We said yes. I even got into fights with a few landlords who were being very kattar (staunch). I started explaining to them our fundamental rights Article 19 of the Indian Constitution. Our broker said, Madam, if you want to do all this, go find a house somewhere else, I cant help you. We eventually found a house in a building that wasnt a part of society. It was new construction and there were not a lot of occupants. Thats how I got my first house," she mentioned narrating the story. Ideally, this Bollywood blockbuster featuring the cream cast of Priyanka Chopra, Abhishek Bachchan and John Abraham had to be a gateway into the likes of the LGBTQ+ community, making people get acquainted and a tad bit more comfortable with the idea of them. But what it ended up doing instead, was feed further into the stereotypes and make a mockery out of the queer community by literally getting everything wrong. Dharma Productions And this happened despite the movie being produced by none other than Karan Johar, who himself is gay. Talk about doing a terrible disservice to your own community. Safe to say, the movie did not help the LGBT+ community in ANY way, but only helped our dear KJo in minting money. Dharma Productions Getting to the synopsis of this problematic drama, Kunal aka John Abraham is a fashion photographer and Sameer is a male nurse. The two are house-hunting (separately) when their paths cross as they find a dream apartment in Miami that is near to perfect. Dharma Productions The only problem is that it's being rented out by an Indian woman who only wants only females as tenants because the third roommate is going to be her own niece Neha. Dharma Productions Unwittingly, Sam and Kunal decide to pretend to be gay to not let the apartment get out of their hands. But things go south when they find out that the niece who was being referred to all along, was a very hot and single Priyanka Chopra. Dharma Productions What follows is a series of problematic and unfunny portrayal of gays by two straight men who are also homophobic. Because that is exactly what we wanted, to further desensitise the community to LGBTQ+ people who are already misunderstood and quite often, made fun of. Dharma Productions Each time the two characters pretend to be gay, they are shown either adopting women-like gestures, talking about fashion or in compromising sexual positions. Because apparently, that is all that queer people care about. Dharma Productions Sam and Kunal try hard to keep up the gay-couple facade and are even offered as bait to Nehas gay boss who is depicted as poorly as the plot of the film. Somehow, by now, it has been established in the film that every gay person out there is simply lusting after each man in their sight, which explains Boman Iranis OTT feminine acting. Dharma Productions Not that there's anything wrong in a gay or even a straight man being feminine, but to reduce them to just that without balancing it out? Thats just a misappropriation of facts. Dharma Productions In fact, there is an entire scene in the movie where when they are surprised by an officer from the Immigrations office, Sams advice to fare through the night is by thinking like a girl. Because by Bollywood logic, gay = girly. I mean Dharma Productions And to add a touch of bureaucracy in the movie here, we see M (Boman Irani) deny Neha the promotion she so deserved after he is unable to prey on either Sam or Kunal at Nehas party. He then hands over her promotion to Abhimanyu Singh aka Bobby Deol who is as quickly resented by Neha as Bobby was by the Indian audience. Dharma Productions All this while, the two guys are also busy trying to woo Neha off her feet forgetting one crucial detail - theyve told her they are gay. But because men are men and only seldom do they ever give up, the toxic pursuit of Neha keeps going on. Up until Sams mother aka Kirron Kher enters... Dharma Productions She plays the role of a regressive homophobic typical Indian mother to the T. Unaccepting of the fact that her son could be gay despite sending him to the best schools (because Indian society logic correlates education with sexual identity), Kirron Kher spends major screen time in sheer denial. Dharma Productions In fact, KJo rips out a song out of the situation that goes like Maa da laadla bigad gaya, and to be honest, it drops the movies standards as low as John Abrahams swimsuit in the opening credits. Dharma Productions However, towards the end, we see even someone as staunch and orthodox as Kirron Khers character come around to the idea of love being gender-less and accepting her son and his boyfriend with open arms. But Sam and Kunal, on the other hand, are still cringing on the inside, making the scene physically uncomfortable for all of us to watch anymore. Dharma Productions Neha, on the other hand, has a breakthrough with her boss Abhimanyu Singh who realises that she has too much potential to be put on the sidelines. Also, they fall in love and start dating which OBVIOUSLY doesnt sit right with the two brooding male protagonists who try to sabotage their budding relationship. Dharma Productions From giving unsound advice to creating doubts and fears in the couples heads, Sam and Kunal try every trick in the book to break them apart. Dharma Productions When nothing works, they manipulate little Veer (Abhimanyus son from his first marriage) into disliking Neha and Abhimanyu breaks their relationship off. Dharma Productions Sam and Kunal come clean to Neha about not being gay, and Neha evicts them out of the house as she should have done way back. The two try to win Nehas forgiveness back but nothing works. At a fashion show, when the two tell Neha and Abhi that they were the reason why Veer was against the idea of marriage, it further angers the now-broken up couple. Dharma Productions This pushes Kunal and Sam to make a public apology to Neha who is still pretty upset about being lied to. She, however, decides to forgive the two only if they kiss each other. Again, as unnecessary as Bobby Deol in the movie. Dharma Productions Kunal takes up the opportunity and kisses a rather reluctant Sam on the lips and Neha forgives them, as she realises the lengths they were willing to go to for her friendship. Dharma Productions Sam and Kunal propose Abhi on Nehas behalf, he agrees and two months later, Neha asks Sam and Kunal if they ever fell for each other for real. The two deny, while still reminiscing about their kiss. The End. Meridian, MS (39302) Today Thunderstorms, some strong during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. Gusty winds and small hail are possible. Low near 70F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%.. Tonight Thunderstorms, some strong during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. Gusty winds and small hail are possible. Low near 70F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%. Click here to log in and see all of our other subscription options for the Mesabi Tribune, including online only & auto-renewal subscriptions. In summer 2020, The New York Times coordinated a nationwide project to document the lives of Americans out of work because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study involved collaborating with 11 other local newsrooms around the U.S. The Messenger-Inquirer was the only newspaper from Kentucky in the collaboration. The resulting collection of stories was published Oct. 23, 2020, in the New York Times print edition and at nytimes.com/outofwork. The following list is the Messenger-Inquirer's local unemployment coverage from that time period; read more by clicking the "New York Times Project" header. Click on "Out Of Work In America" to go to the full Gov. Whitmer, SOS Benson, AG Nessel Share What's Next Following Sanctions Victory Against 'Kraken' Attorneys Gov. Whitmer, SOS Benson, AG Nessel Share What's Next Following Sanctions Victory Against 'Kraken' Attorneys Attorney General Media contact: Lynsey Mukomel 517-599-2746 Public inquiries: 517-335-7622 August 26, 2021 LANSING - Wednesday's ruling from United States District Court Judge Linda Parker granting sanctions against attorneys who participated in a baseless election lawsuit made clear the "lawsuit represents a historic and profound abuse of the judicial process." Michigan's top elected officials reaffirmed today that the accountability secured in the case does not end here. "After the 2020 election where Americans voted in record numbers, the outgoing president, his allies, and his enablers pushed the Big Lie-that the election was stolen, that our system didn't work, that American democracy was fraudulent," Governor Gretchen Whitmer said. "While the mob on January 6th physically assaulted our democracy, Sidney Powell and other lawyers continued to do so in our courts. They launched dozens of lawsuits, exploiting the legal system to undermine a free and fair election. The courts rejected all of them. This ruling sends a clear message: those who seek to overturn an American election and poison the well of American democracy will face consequences." "As Judge Parker rightly noted, this case was about seeking consequences for those who 'debased the judicial process' in a misguided, deceitful effort to undermine the public's faith in our democracy," Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said. "I am grateful for the court's definitive recognition that those who misuse their positions of authority and power to intentionally deceive voters about their rights and the truth of the 2020 election - or any election - will be held accountable." "These attorneys abused our judiciary for the sole purpose of undermining our system of free and fair elections," Attorney General Dana Nessel said. "There is a direct correlation between their filings and the distrust now felt by millions of Americans. I'm proud of the work done by my office to secure these sanctions and I recognize the work that lies ahead for all of us to repair the damage done to our democracy." The sanctioned attorneys are listed below, followed by the jurisdiction in which they are admitted to practice: Sidney Powell - Texas; L. Lin Wood - Georgia; Emily Newman - Virginia; Julia Z. Haller - the District of Columbia, Maryland, New York and New Jersey; Brandon Johnson - the District of Columbia, New York, and Nevada; Scott Hagerstrom - Michigan; Howard Kleinhendler - New York and New Jersey; Gregory Rohl - Michigan; and Stefanie Lynn Junttila - Michigan. Judge Parker's 110-page opinion also ordered the sanctioned attorneys to pay the fees and costs incurred by state defendants and the City of Detroit, as well as: ordering the plaintiffs' attorneys to complete at least 12 hours of continuing legal education, taught by non-partisan organizations, in the subjects of pleading standards and election law within six months; and the judge's decision will be referred to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission and the appropriate disciplinary authority where each attorney is licensed for investigation and possible suspension or disbarment. The Department of Attorney General previously asked for further disciplinary action before the Attorney Grievance Commission of the State of Michigan and the State Bar of Texas. Thus far, Texas' Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel has granted an investigatory hearing related to Powell's bar license, set for November 4. There is no update related to the Michigan licenses at this time. Judge Parker's ruling will mean disciplinary boards in other states will also review the attorneys' conduct. Earlier this month sanctions were granted in favor of Michigan and other parties by United States Magistrate Judge N. Reid Neureiter in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado against attorneys who took part in a previously-dismissed election lawsuit filed in that court. The sanctioned attorneys in the Colorado case are Gary D. Fielder and Ernest J. Walker. They've been ordered to pay defendants' fees related to the suit. MI AG, DIFS Investigation Results in Felony Charges Against Medical Supplier MI AG, DIFS Investigation Results in Felony Charges Against Medical Supplier Attorney General Media contact: Lynsey Mukomel 517-599-2746 Public inquiries: 517-335-7622 August 26, 2021 LANSING - Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has charged a Florida medical supplier with several crimes, including insurance fraud, for allegedly operating in Michigan without proper licensing. David Winter, 51, of Boca Raton, owner and operator of GTV Networks (GTV), is accused of illegally dispensing durable medical equipment and billing Michigan auto insurers for equipment that was not actually dispensed. The case is the result of collaboration between the Michigan Department of Attorney General (MI AG) and the Department of Insurance and Financial Services (DIFS) Fraud Investigation Unit. Winter is charged with: five counts of insurance fraud, four-year felonies; and five counts of unlawful conduct for operating a pharmacy without a license, four-year felonies. Under Michigan's Public Health Code, dispensing certain durable medical equipment falls within the scope of a pharmacy and requires a license. Last July, DIFS notified MI AG that GTV was operating in Michigan without proper authority. On Aug. 4, 2020, MI AG sent GTV a letter informing Winter of the violation of operating in Michigan without a certificate of authority, seeking documentation of the certificate of authority within 30 days if GTV claimed to be authorized to operate in Michigan. Neither Winter nor a representative from GTV responded. According to National Insurance Crime Bureau, between June 29, 2018 and April 17, 2020, GTV billed $2,245,806 related to 717 patients in Michigan, Florida, and Ohio. "Our laws are set up to protect patients and ensure that medical suppliers are operating under ethical standards," Nessel said. "Those who ignore our laws will be held accountable. I appreciate the coordination between my office and DIFS to secure charges in this case." "Insurance fraud, including the type of conduct Mr. Winter is accused of, adds millions of dollars in costs to Michigan's auto insurance system," DIFS Director Anita Fox said. "The DIFS Fraud Investigation Unit was established to help combat this insurance fraud in all its forms, and we are proud to work with the Attorney General's office to help bring those who violate our laws to justice." Winter was arraigned in the 36th District Court in Detroit Wednesday and given a $100,000 personal recognizance bond. A probable cause conference is scheduled for Sept. 7 and a preliminary exam is set for Sept. 14 at 8:45 a.m. before Judge Roberta Archer. The DIFS Fraud Investigation Unit investigates criminal and fraudulent activity related to the insurance and financial markets and works with the Attorney General and law enforcement to prosecute these crimes. Suspected insurance fraud can be reported to DIFS safely, easily and, in most cases, anonymously by calling 877-999-6442 or online by visiting the department's website. ### Whitmer, Benson, Nessel share what's next following sanctions victory against 'Kraken' attorneys Whitmer, Benson, Nessel share what's next following sanctions victory against 'Kraken' attorneys LANSING - Wednesday's ruling from United States District Court Judge Linda Parker granting sanctions against attorneys who participated in a baseless election lawsuit made clear the "lawsuit represents a historic and profound abuse of the judicial process." Michigan's top elected officials reaffirmed today that the accountability secured in the case does not end here. "As Judge Parker rightly noted, this case was about seeking consequences for those who 'debased the judicial process' in a misguided, deceitful effort to undermine the public's faith in our democracy," Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said. "I am grateful for the court's definitive recognition that those who misuse their positions of authority and power to intentionally deceive voters about their rights and the truth of the 2020 election - or any election - will be held accountable." "After the 2020 election where Americans voted in record numbers, the outgoing president, his allies, and his enablers pushed the Big Lie-that the election was stolen, that our system didn't work, that American democracy was fraudulent," Governor Gretchen Whitmer said. "While the mob on January 6th physically assaulted our democracy, Sidney Powell and other lawyers continued to do so in our courts. They launched dozens of lawsuits, exploiting the legal system to undermine a free and fair election. The courts rejected all of them. This ruling sends a clear message: those who seek to overturn an American election and poison the well of American democracy will face consequences." "These attorneys abused our judiciary for the sole purpose of undermining our system of free and fair elections," Attorney General Dana Nessel said. "There is a direct correlation between their filings and the distrust now felt by millions of Americans. I'm proud of the work done by my office to secure these sanctions and I recognize the work that lies ahead for all of us to repair the damage done to our democracy." The sanctioned attorneys are listed below, followed by the jurisdiction in which they are admitted to practice: Sidney Powell - Texas; L. Lin Wood - Georgia; Emily Newman - Virginia; Julia Z. Haller - the District of Columbia, Maryland, New York and New Jersey; Brandon Johnson - the District of Columbia, New York, and Nevada; Scott Hagerstrom - Michigan; Howard Kleinhendler - New York and New Jersey; Gregory Rohl - Michigan; Stefanie Lynn Junttila - Michigan Judge Parker's 110-page opinion also ordered the sanctioned attorneys to pay the fees and costs incurred by state defendants and the City of Detroit, as well as: ordering the plaintiffs' attorneys to complete at least 12 hours of continuing legal education, taught by non-partisan organizations, in the subjects of pleading standards and election law within six months; and referring the decision to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission and the appropriate disciplinary authority where each attorney is licensed for investigation and possible suspension or disbarment. The Department of Attorney General previously asked for further disciplinary action before the Attorney Grievance Commission of the State of Michigan and the State Bar of Texas. Thus far, Texas' Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel has granted an investigatory hearing related to Powell's bar license, set for November 4. There is no update related to the Michigan licenses at this time. Judge Parker's ruling will mean disciplinary boards in other states will also review the attorneys' conduct. Earlier this month sanctions were granted in favor of Michigan and other parties by United States Magistrate Judge N. Reid Neureiter in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado against attorneys who took part in a previously-dismissed election lawsuit filed in that court. The sanctioned attorneys in the Colorado case are Gary D. Fielder and Ernest J. Walker. They've been ordered to pay defendants' fees related to the suit. The full order granting sanctions against Fielder and Walker is online. Judge Parker's opinion is also on the Department of Attorney General's website. # # # For media questions, contact Tracy Wimmer at 517-281-1876. We welcome questions and comments at the Contact the Secretary of State page. Customers may call the Department of State Information Center to speak to a customer-service representative at 888-SOS-MICH (767-6424). BIG RAPIDS A group of Michigans sheriffs have a message for human traffickers: We are united, and were coming for you. On Wednesday, Genesee County Sheriff Christopher R. Swanson led a news conference at the Big Rapids Department of Public Safety regarding human trafficking in the state of Michigan and details on a recent sting. To his sides were sheriffs from Mecosta, Osceola, Isabella, Montcalm, and Newaygo counties, as well as authorities from Big Rapids and Ferris State police departments. Human trafficking is the movement of humans for the sex slave industry, Swanson said. Anybody who comes to have sex with an underaged boy or girl is engaging in human trafficking. Swanson and the Genesee Human Oppression Strike Team, GHOST, use a number of undercover officers online pretending to be underaged children in order to catch predators. Swanson said GHOST has offered its knowledge to better assist other sheriffs departments in Michigan. Together, Swanson and Mecosta County Sheriff Brian Miller worked together to perform a sting operation in the area last month. Through that operation that we did we arrested three individuals through this sting, Miller said. The three suspects arrested July 15 are: Quinn Lee Rasmussen, 46, of Big Rapids; Sonage Azard, 30, of Grand Rapids; and Joshua Webb, 37, of Lakeview. All three men came to the Mecosta County area looking to have sex with a 14- to 15-year-old girl, Miller said. Its sad that this goes on, but we are all looking to make that difference here, he said. Millers team also provided assistance to a nearby law enforcement agency with a similar operation. Newaygo County Sheriff Bob Mendham said his team performed a sting operation Tuesday, Aug. 24, which lead to the arrest of three individuals. However, because the suspects are currently awaiting arraignment, no further details could be released. At one point, I was told there were 18 people all working together in one hotel room, Mendham said of the sting. No one got hurt, and three bad guys went to jail. In relations to the sting in Mecosta County, all three suspects were arraigned in Mecosta Countys 77th District Court on July 16. Rasmussen, Azard, and Webb were each charged with single counts of accosting children for immoral purposes, and using a computer to commit a crime. Azard was also charged with one count of delivery of marijuana. Rasmussen, who remains lodged in the Mecosta County Jail, was bound over to Mecosta Countys 49th Circuit Court and is scheduled to appear for a pretrial hearing Aug. 30. Future court dates for Azard and Webb have not been set. Both men remain free on bond. Watch the full video of the press conference below: REED CITY Although a bakery, machine shop/plastics manufacturer and the military may be in different employment sectors, they do have one thing in common in todays economy they all are looking for qualified talent to join their respective workforces. A small group of young adults were able to tour these employers facilities, ask questions and see up close what it is they do for a living. Through Michigan Works! West Centrals Talent Tour program, four young adults were able to recently tour Reed City Group, White Stone Bakery and visit with the Michigan National Guard to get a better picture of the different industry sectors. Talent Tours introduce young adults, parents and educators to available career paths in the region by offering behind-the-scenes looks at in-demand businesses and industries. They also provide up-to-date information regarding employer, education and training requirements necessary to find employment in those fields. Meeting the people at the employers that youd be working with was the best part, said Clara Maddox, a 22-year-old Reed City resident who participated in the recent Talent Tours. Getting to know how they feel about their kind of work and what it takes to do it was interesting. There were interesting things at all three employers. At Reed City Group, those on the tour got a chance to look at the machining process up close, as well as their existing plastics manufacturing department and burgeoning Life Science and Medical division in former NABCO building across the street from their main facility. I already knew what an CNC machine is and how it works, but Ive never seen a commercial one up close, Maddox said. It was pretty cool to see it in action. The second stop of the day was to the new White Stone Bakery in downtown Reed City, where owner/baker Michelle Sines shared the story of how she got into culinary arts and eventually owning her own business. Growing up, I didnt want anything to do with the kitchen, Sines said with a laugh. My first baking job was at a restaurant down the road from where I lived. That was 25 years ago, but it was very natural for me to be a baker. If you love what you do, it doesnt feel like a job, and I love what I do. Baking is my therapy. Those on the tour were able to take a hands-on approach to learning about baking, as Sines set them up to frost cupcakes in her commercial baking space. Sines, whos workday starts as early as 4:30 a.m. some days, also was able to provide her guests an idea of what it takes to own and operate their own business, and what shes looking for in employees. I look for people with a positive attitude, a willingness to work and those who feel comfortable to be themselves, Sines said. The final tour of the day was with the Michigan National Guard. Although their recruiting center is located in Big Rapids, two guardsmen traveled to the Michigan Works! West Central service center in Reed City to give a presentation to the young adults on the tour. They also brought a Humvee that participants could look at up close and sit in. The Talent Tours were a great success, said Vanessa Wolgamott, a talent specialist with Michigan Works! West Central. Talking with the clients who participated afterward, they said they found value in the tours. A couple even filled out applications at the bakery. Mark and Pat Baringer are celebrating their 50th anniversary. Mark married the former Pat Thornton on Aug. 26, 1971, at Sanford United Methodist Church. They have two children, Mark (Tammy) Baringer and Kurt (Janice) Baringer. They also have four grandchildren. How they met: What started as a prank to get her attention led to a years-long romance for Mark and Pat Baringer. From their first prom and subsequent wedding, to traveling through most of the U.S. and Canada and the countless adventures theyve had, theyve been together through it all. Their two kids and four grandchildren are appreciative of how Mark and Pat have shown them how to be caring and compassionate, humorous and hopeful, committed to family, and to love unconditionally. RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) North Carolina Senate Republicans on Thursday passed a bill to limit how teachers can discuss certain racial concepts inside the classroom. The proposal seeks to bar educators from compelling students to personally adopt any ideas from a list of 13 beliefs, including the views that one particular race or sex is inherently superior and that students should feel guilty because of their race or sex. The measure that passed along party lines by a 25-17 vote is now one step away from clearing the General Assembly and would make its way to the governor if the GOP-controlled House signs off on the latest version. While Republicans say the bill is designed to, at a minimum, shed light on how teachers operate and call out questionable classroom activities, it does not appear to prevent any of the alleged cases of indoctrination that were included in an 831-page task force report GOP Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson released earlier this week. The purpose of this bill is to put in place guardrails against the most extreme forms of indoctrination, Republican Senate leader Phil Berger said during a floor debate. Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper is likely to veto the bill if it reaches his desk, as he has previously criticized the measure. It could also get stalled in budget negotiations between Berger, Cooper and House Speaker Tim Moore. Democrats argue Republicans crafted the bill to placate unfounded concerns among staunch conservatives ahead of the 2022 and 2024 elections. They also say the bill would stymie conversations by dissuading teachers from discussing America's history of racism and lingering effects of slavery. Indoctrination is fake news, said Sen. Gladys Robinson, a Guilford County Democrat. "As a matter of fact, it's more than that. Its a bold-faced lie. There is no indoctrination. What we need to do is step in our lane and let them (educators) go into theirs. The latest action in North Carolina follows a national trend of Republican-controlled legislatures looking to combat certain ideas they associate with critical race theory, a complex framework legal scholars developed in the 1970s and 1980s that centers on the idea that racism is systemic in the nations institutions and serves to maintain the dominance of whites in society. But Republicans have used critical race theory and "indoctrination" as catchall phrases to describe racial concepts they find objectionable, such as white privilege, systemic inequality and inherent bias. The movement against the theory gained traction last year when former President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring federal contractors from conducting racial sensitivity trainings after a conservative activist appeared on Fox News urging the former president to do so. As of Thursday, 27 states have considered legislation or other steps to limit how racism and sexism can be taught, according to an Education Week analysis, with several states adopting language from Trumps now-defunct executive order. Berger associates indoctrination with the promotion of any of 13 views the bill outlines, while other Republicans like the state's lieutenant governor have a more expansive view of the term. Regardless, both point to examples of educators accused of giving preferential treatment to pupils who agree with their racial views and districts hosting questionable trainings and workshops for staff as evidence of systemic problems within the state's public education system. It cant possibly be true that critical race theory isnt in our schools and that this bill doesnt go far enough in addressing critical race theory in our schools, Berger said. "Which is it? Which argument do the bill opponents want to adopt? Sen. Mike Woodard, a Durham County Democrat, believes decisions about how teachers should discuss race ought to be left to state and local education officials in consultation with parents. Families and educators dont want politicians in Raleigh deciding how history will be taught in their schools," he said. ___ Follow Anderson on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BryanRAnderson. ___ Anderson is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. The focus of most of the last Owendale Village Council meeting was on repairs that are needed in a variety of areas. Repairs noted under buildings and grounds included the replacement of a power line. The overhead power line running from the well house to the pole across Mill Street, which is village owned, needs to be replaced, explained village Clerk Randy Howard. DPW Superintendent Robert Coryell gave the council a quote on the cost to install the wire underground instead of overhead. The cost to do that is about $3,370, which the council approved. The next repair item under water, sewer, and drains that was discussed was the repair to the lagoon. The expected cost of the repair is approximately $70,000," Howard reported. The council approved having Townley Engineering solicit bids for the project. Also, there is a dip in the sidewalk on Hartman Street, which appears to be from the collapse of a small culvert. Coryell was directed to check out the issue. In other matters, property owners need to keep their lawns mowed or face stiff fines. A rate of $100 per hour was set for the DPW to step in and mow lawns that are in violation of the village ordinance. Also, the council decided the DPW will no longer routinely mow the lawn at the former apartment building on Beech Street, or a piece of property on Main Street. Nutrien Ag Solutions was thanked for its donation to fund new lights in the park pavilion, and Trustee Elaine Thies was also thanked for her efforts to get the project done. In other business, the village received the deed for the former Schember property from the Huron County Land Bank. Also, Bartnick Service of Cass City will be contacted about scrapping the villages street sweeper that is no longer operational. WARSAW, Poland (AP) Poland and Belgium ended their evacuations from Afghanistan, but other European nations vowed Wednesday to press on for as long as possible, as the clock ticks down on a dramatic airlift of people fleeing Taliban rule ahead of a full American withdrawal. President Joe Biden said he will stick to his Aug. 31 deadline for completing the U.S. pullout, as the Taliban insisted he must, ramping up pressure on the already risky operation to fly people out of Kabul. European allies pressed for more time but, as a practical matter, will need to end their evacuations before the last American troops leave. Several countries have not said when they plan to end their operations, perhaps hoping to avoid yet another fatal crush at an airport, one of the last ways out of the country. The Taliban wrested back control of Afghanistan nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Their return to power has pushed many Afghans to flee, fearing reprisals and a possible return to their brutal rule. It's not clear if the thousands of people still thought to be trying to leave will succeed. But any decision by Biden to stay longer could reignite fighting between the Taliban and Western troops running the airlift. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned U.S. citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday morning not to go to the airport, where there was a very high threat of a terrorist attack. Australia has helped evacuate around 4,000 people, and Prime Minister Scott Morrison noted the increasingly dangerous situation. That danger and those risks have been increasing each and every day as we always knew they would, and thats why weve been moving with the haste that we have, he added. The Taliban said they would allow normal commercial air traffic to resume when they assume control of the airport after Aug. 31, but its unclear whether airlines would be willing to fly into an airport controlled by the militants. With the deadline looming, Marcin Przydacz, a Polish deputy foreign minister, said Poland had evacuated its last group. We cannot risk the lives of our diplomats and of our soldiers any longer," Przydacz said. A number of troops will remain briefly to wrap up operations, Przydacz said. Poland has used over a dozen planes to bring hundreds of evacuees to Warsaw. Some later traveled on to other countries. Hours later, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said his country ended its evacuation flights carrying people from Kabul to Pakistan. Belgium will continue to repatriate to our country those people evacuated in the days ahead, De Croo said. More than 1,100 people have been flown to Belgium. The Czech Republic declared its own evacuation mission complete last week, and Hungary said it plans to end its operations soon. Due to extreme tension on the ground ... and the scheduled departure of American forces, these evacuations are a true race against time, French government spokesman Gabriel Attal said Wednesday. He said that his countrys evacuation would likely end a few hours, maybe a few days ahead of the American departure. The White House said Wednesday around 19,000 people were evacuated from Kabul over the last 24 hours. It said the U.S. has evacuated or facilitated the evacuation of around 82,300 people since the Taliban takeover in mid-August. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation, a figure that suggests that part of the U.S.-led airlift could be completed before the Tuesday deadline. The State Department estimated about 6,000 Americans had wanted to leave when the airlift began Aug. 14. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the military will continue to evacuate needed populations all the way to the end." But he added that in the final days and hours there will have to be a balance as the 5,400 troops in Kabul and critical systems also need to be withdrawn. In Kabul itself, life has been slow to return to normal, but many people especially women are staying inside, fearful of the Taliban or the general instability. Kabul Mayor Dawood Sultanzoy said many city workers have yet to return to work, with the absence of experienced staff hindering normal operations. But he said the city has begun to remove the blast walls that became ubiquitous in recent years as the Taliban and other armed groups carried out bombings and other attacks against the Western-backed government. The Taliban say the decades of war are over and there will be no revenge attacks on people who opposed them. But there have been reports of summary executions and other abuses, and many Afghans fear a return to the Taliban's hard-line Islamic rule of the 1990s, when women were largely confined to their homes. Chaos at the Kabul airport has transfixed the world after the Taliban captured most of Afghanistan in a matter of days this month. Afghans poured onto the tarmac last week, and some clung to a U.S. military transport plane as it took off, later plunging to their deaths. At least seven people died that day, and another seven died Sunday in a panicked stampede. Thousands have thronged the airport in the days since, and the U.S. and its allies have worked to speed the evacuation, sometimes flying people out before their paperwork is fully processed and bringing them to transit points. On Wednesday, 51 people landed in Uganda, the first African nation to serve as a transit point. For now, the U.S. military coordinates all air traffic in and out of the Kabul airport. Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen tweeted that people with legal documents will be able to fly out of Kabul airport via commercial flights after the August deadline. On Wednesday, a stream of military planes took off from the airfield as evacuees lined up on the tarmac. The desperate remained outside, some standing knee-deep in sewage and waving identity documents at Western soldiers in hopes of being allowed to go beyond the barbed wire fencing and onto a flight out. While the final withdrawal date just under a week away, analyst Patricia Lewis said the practical deadline for the evacuations to stop was the next couple of days. Theres a huge amount of stuff that has to be done, including getting all the people out who are doing the job and all the equipment," said Lewis, who is the director of the international security program at Chatham House, an international think tank. All of the allies are highly dependent on the U.S. for military cover, particularly air cover," Lewis said. "They cant put their own people at risk, so it really depends on when the U.S. starts packing up. ___ Associated Press writers Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Tameem Akhgar in Istanbul, Jill Lawless in London, Karel Janicek in Prague, Geir Moulson in Berlin, Sylvie Corbet in Paris, Joseph Krauss in Jerusalem and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington contributed to this report. ___ More AP coverage of Afghanistan: https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan Robert Wadlow was 22 years old when he died in 1940, standing at a height of 8 feet, 11.1 inches tall, the tallest a person has ever grown (with proof), according to Guinness World Records. Wadlow, a citizen of Alton, Ill., died in Manistee, Mich. of a septic blister on his right ankle, caused by an ill-fitting brace. Wadlow, born Feb. 18, 1922, was a cherished member of the Alton community, and during his life was a boy scout, member of the YMCA, was part of the Main Street Methodist Church in Alton and a member of the Franklin Masonic Lodge. He also spent his time visiting hospitals and orphanages, as well as military camps and charitable organizations. "He was one of a kind in this area," Carol Frisse, an archival research assistant at the Madison County Archival Library in Edwardsville, Ill. said. "He was part of Madison County history, he is pretty well known throughout the country. I was in California several years ago for a trade show and as I was waiting to get in, somebody saw a notation about him and said 'nobody ever grows that tall', and I said yes they do. They were surprised. He truly was one of a kind." Recently, the tallest man in America, Igor Vovkovinskiy, who resided in Minnesota, passed away. He stood at 7 feet, 8.33 inches tall as of the latest measurement. The tallest living man is Sultan Kosen of Turkey, who stands at 8 feet, 2.8 inches tall. Nobody has come close to Wadlow's height. Wadlow stood 6 feet, 2 inches tall at just eight years old. His astounding growth was attributed to an over-active pituitary gland, which produced much higher than normal levels of growth hormone. Today, medicine helps account for such problems, but in the 1920s and 30s, when Wadlow lived, there was no therapy available. Wadlow was the world's tallest boy scout when he joined at 13, standing 7 feet, 4 inches tall. He later became a member of DeMolay, a youth organization based in Kansas City, and worked for the International Shoe Company, who provided Wadlow his size 37 shoes for free as part of his compensation package. Wadlow worked as a goodwill ambassador for the shoe company, touring the country including a trip west to California. Wadlow had trouble with sensation in his feet, and did not feel chaffing in his shoes or braces until blisters formed, which allowed for the fatal blister to form in Manistee. Wadlow died on July 15, 1940 in his sleep and was returned to Alton, where his funeral was held and over 40,000 people signed the guest register. In 1984, a citizens committee organized efforts to honor Wadlow, and in 1985 a bronze statue was erected on the campus of Southern Illinois University School of Dental Medicine. "He liked children and being around children, he would bring back gifts for his brothers and sisters from his trips around the country," Frisse said. "That's why he got the name Gentle Giant, he was not like the average person. People read stories or hear stories about him and they don't believe he's real. He was very much so and like all the other kids attended schools and participated in all kinds of things as he grew older." Wadlow is buried in Oakwood Cemetary in Alton with a headstone that reads "At Rest". SPRINGVILLE, Tenn. (AP) She was folding a red sweater when she heard a car door slam, went to the window and realized that a moment she always imagined would kill her was about to be made real: three Marines and a Navy chaplain were walking toward her door, and that could only mean one thing. She put her hand on the blue stars shed stuck next to the front door, a symbol meant to protect her son, Marine Lance Cpl. Alec Catherwood, who had left three weeks before for the battlefields of Afghanistan. And then, as she recalls it, she lost her mind. She ran wildly through the house. She opened the door and told the men they couldnt come inside. She picked up a flower basket and hurled it at them. She screamed so loud and for so long the next day she could not speak. I just wanted them not to say anything, said Gretchen Catherwood, because if they said it, it would be true. And, of course, it was. Her 19-year-old son was dead, killed fighting the Taliban on Oct. 14, 2010. As she watched the news over the last two weeks, it felt like that day happened 10 minutes ago. The American military pulled out of Afghanistan, and all they had fought so hard to build seemed to collapse in an instant. The Afghan military put down its weapons, the president fled and the Taliban took over. Then suicide bombers killed several U.S. military members, including at least 11 Marines, in attacks Thursday at the Kabul airport, where thousands have been trying desperately to escape. Gretchen Catherwood felt like she could feel in her hands the red sweater shed been folding the moment she learned her son was dead. Her phone buzzed with messages from the family shes assembled since that horrible day: the officer whod dodged the flowerpot; the parents of others killed in battle or by suicide since; her sons fellow fighters in the storied 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, nicknamed the Darkhorse Battalion, that endured the highest rate of causalities in Afghanistan. Many of them call her Ma. Outside of this circle, shed seen someone declare what a waste of life and potential on Facebook. Friends told her how horrible theyd felt that her son had died in vain. As she exchanged messages with the others whod paid the price of war, she worried its end was forcing them to question whether all they had seen and all they had suffered had mattered at all. There are three things I need you to know, she said to some. You did not fight for nothing. Alec did not lose his life for nothing. I will be here for you no matter what, until the day I die. Those are the things I need you to remember. In the woods behind her house, the Darkhorse Lodge is under construction. She and her husband are building a retreat for combat veterans, a place where they can gather and grapple together with the horrors of war. There are 25 rooms, each named after one of the men killed from her sons battalion. The ones who made it home have become their surrogate sons, she said. And she knows of more than a half-dozen who have died from suicide. I am fearful of what this might do to them psychologically. Theyre so strong and so brave and so courageous. But they also have really, really big hearts. And I feel that they might internalize a lot and blame themselves, she said. And oh God, I hope they dont blame themselves. ___ The 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment deployed in the fall of 2010 from Camp Pendleton, California, sending 1,000 U.S. Marines on what would become one of the bloodiest tours for American service members in Afghanistan. The Darkhorse Battalion spent six months battling Taliban fighters in the Sangin district of Helmand province. An area of green fields and mud compounds, Sangin remained almost entirely in the Talibans control nearly a decade into the U.S.-led war. Fields of lush poppies used in narcotics gave the militants valued income they were determined to hold. When the Marines arrived, white Taliban flags flew from most buildings. Loudspeakers installed to broadcast prayers were used to taunt U.S. forces. Schools had closed. The Marines came under fire as soon as a helicopter dropped them outside their patrol base. When the bird landed, we were already getting shot at, recalled former Sgt. George Barba of Menifee, California. We run, we get inside and I remember our gunnery sergeant telling us: `Welcome to Sangin. You just got your combat action ribbon. Snipers lurked in the trees. Fighters armed with rifles hid behind mud walls. Homemade bombs turned roads and canals into deathtraps. Sangin was Alec Catherwood's first combat deployment. He had enlisted in the Marines while still in high school, went to boot camp shortly after graduation, then was assigned to a 13-man squad led by former Sgt. Sean Johnson. Johnson was impressed by Catherwoods professionalism physically fit, mentally tough and always on time. He was only 19, so that was extra special, Johnson said. Some are still just trying to figure out how to tie their boots and not get yelled at. Catherwood also made them laugh. He carried around a small, stuffed animal he used as a prop for jokes. Barba recalled Catherwoods first helicopter ride during training, and how he was smiling ear-to-ear and hes swinging his feet like hes a little kid on a highchair. Former Cpl. William Sutton of Yorkville, Illinois, swore Catherwood would crack jokes even during a firefight. Alec, he was a shining light in that darkness, said Sutton, who was shot multiple times fighting in Afghanistan. And then they took it from us. On Oct. 14, 2010, after a late night standing watch outside their patrol base, Catherwoods squad headed out to assist fellow Marines under attack, who were running low on ammunition. They crossed open fields, using irrigation canals for cover. After sending half his squad safely ahead, Johnson tapped Catherwood on the helmet and said: Lets go. After running just three steps, he said, gunfire from ambushing Taliban fighters sounded behind them. Johnson looked down and saw a bullet hole in his pants where he had been shot in the leg. Then came a deafening explosion one of the Marines had stepped on a hidden bomb. Johnson blacked out momentarily, waking up in the water. Another explosion followed. Looking to his left, Johnson saw Catherwood floating facedown. It was obvious, he said, that the young Marine was dead. Explosions during the ambush killed another Marine, Lance Cpl. Joseph Lopez of Rosamond, California, and badly wounded another. Back in the United States, Staff Sergeant Steve Bancroft began an excruciating two-hour drive toward Catherwood's parents' house in northern Illinois. Hed served seven months in Iraq before he became a casualty assistance officer, tasked with notifying families of a death on the battlefield. Id never wish that on anybody, I cant express that enough: I do not wish looking a mom and dad in the face and telling them their only son is gone, said Bancroft, who is now retired. He was stoic when he had to be, as he escorted families to Dover, Delaware, to watch coffins be rolled out of a plane. But when he was alone, he cried. And he still weeps when he thinks about the moment he arrived at the home of Gretchen and Kirk Catherwood. They laugh now about the hurled flowerpot. He still regularly talks to them and other sets of parents he notified. Though he never met Alec, he feels like he knows him. Their son was such a hero, its hard to explain, but he sacrificed more than 99% of the people in this world would ever think of doing, he said. Was it worth it? We lost so many people. Its hard to think about how many weve lost. he said. ___ Gretchen Catherwood keeps the cross her son was wearing on a chain around her bedpost with his dog tags. Alongside it hangs a glass bead, blown with the ashes of another young Marine: Cpl. Paul Wedgewood, who made it home. The Darkhorse Battalion returned to California in April 2011. After months of intense fighting, they'd largely seized Sangin from the Talibans grip. Leaders of the provincial government could move about safely. Children, including girls, returned to school. It came at a heavy price. In addition to the 25 who perished, more than 200 returned home wounded, many with lost limbs, others with scars harder to see. Wedgewood had trouble sleeping when he finished his four-year enlistment and left the Marine Corps in 2013. As he slept less, he drank more. A tattoo on his upper arm showed a sheet of scroll paper bearing the names of four Marines who died in Sangin. Wedgewood considered reenlisting, but told his mother: If I stay, I think itll kill me. Instead, Wedgewood enrolled in college back home in Colorado, but soon lost interest. A welding program at a community college proved a better fit. Wedgewood had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. He was taking medication, participating in therapy. He was very engaged in working on his mental health, said the Marines mother, Helen Wedgewood. He was not a neglected veteran. Still, he struggled. On the Fourth of July, Wedgewood would take his dog camping in the woods to avoid fireworks. He quit a job he liked after a backfiring machine caused him to dive to the floor. Five years after Sangin, things appeared to be looking up. Wedgewood was preparing for a new job that would take him back to Afghanistan as a private security contractor. He seemed to be in a good place. After a night of drinking with his roommates, Wedgewood didnt show up for work on Aug. 23, 2016. A roommate later found him dead in his bedroom. He had shot himself. He was 25 years old. He left a short note. He basically said that he loved us, but he was tired, Helen Wedgewood said. She considers her son and others who took their own lives to be casualties of war every bit as much as those killed in action. When the Taliban swept back into control of Afghanistan just before the fifth anniversary of her sons death, she felt relief that a war that left more than 2,400 Americans dead and more than 20,700 wounded had finally come to an end. But there was also sadness that gains made by the Afghan people especially women and children may be temporary. As a mom, this kind of stabs you, because would he still be around, would any of these young men still be around if this whole war hadnt happened? she said. But I try to gently correct people when they say this was a waste or this was all for nothing. Because thats not true. We dont know what impacts its had on the safety of our country, on the safety of the Afghan people. ___ Some who served with the Darkhorse Battalion are having a hard time seeing it any way other than that their efforts, their blood and the lives of their fallen friends were all for nothing. Im starting to feel like how the Vietnam vets felt. There was no purpose to it whatsoever, said Sutton, 32, who now works in the veterans services office of a county outside Chicago, helping military vets get care. We were able to hold our head up high and say we went to the last Taliban stronghold and we gave them hell, Sutton said, only for it all to be taken away. In the blink of an eye. Barba, 34, works as a private security guard near Los Angeles. He and his wife are expecting their first child. He said hes had trouble sorting his feelings about the bleak news from Afghanistan. His wife recently woke to Barba screaming in his sleep. I think your nightmares are back, she told him. It really is weird, Barba said. Ive seen my guys get mad. Ive seen my guys get frustrated. But not like this. This is like somebody spit in their face. Johnson, 34, works as a commercial diver in Florida. He said the U.S. should have acknowledged years ago that the Afghan security forces Americans trained and equipped would never be able to defend the country on their own. My personal opinion, yeah, we probably should have pulled out years and years ago, Johnson said. If youre not going to win the damn thing, what are you doing there? ___ A few months ago, Gretchen Catherwood was painting the cabins that will become the Darkhorse Lodge. It was dark, still without electricity and no cell service, so it was quiet. She felt suddenly like she could feel her son and his 24 fallen comrades. She could almost see their faces. Its a place where I can feel like theyre together, she said, and that they are still caring for their brothers. The Catherwoods moved out of their home in Illinois. Every time she walked to the front door, Gretchen remembered those four men arriving with the news. She couldnt bear it anymore. The gold star pins she wore everyday on her chest kept breaking. Shed always disliked tattoos and hassled her son when he got one as a Marine. But then she found herself at a tattoo parlor. She had his name inked on her arm, and the shape of a gold star pin put permanently on her chest, just above her heart, so shed never take it off again. She could no longer care for her son, she said, but she could for those who made it home. She and her husband moved to the woods in Tennessee and got to work on the Darkhorse Lodge. They fashioned their logo after the battalions mascot, a fierce-looking horse, facing left, its mane sharp like a serrated knife and its eyes squinted for battle. The artist who drew theirs softened its edges and turned it to the right, facing toward a future after war. They raised a million dollars, mostly in small donations. One woman sends a check for $2 every month. Bancroft, the officer who notified her of her sons death, donates every year. The obituary for one soldier who died by suicide asked for donations to the Darkhorse Lodge in his memory, and checks flooded the Catherwoods mailbox. They hope to open next summer and offer free stays for any combat veteran from any war or branch of the military who might benefit from time in the woods, where the only conflict is among the dozens of hummingbirds fighting over the feeders on her front porch. She is hopeful that the American withdrawal from Afghanistan means no one else will die on a battlefield there. But she also worries that it might rattle the vets who made it home, and who might already be struggling to make sense of what happened there and why. Thats a constant fear, its been my fear since they got back but now its even worse, she said. They experienced things that 99% of the country never will. Ive never watched a friend die. Ive never fought to the death. We are losing these people at a frightening, frightening rate to suicides, and we cant afford to lose one more. She and her husband dont believe that the chaotic end honors their sons service, and are particularly troubled that some of the Afghan interpreters and others who helped the military for years might not make it out alive. But they also cant imagine how it might have ended any other way, had the United States stayed in Afghanistan another year or five or 20. Part of Alec Catherwood remains there, and for a while that bothered his mother. When he was alive, she loved to touch his face. He had baby soft skin and when she put her hands on his cheeks, this big tough Marine felt like her little boy. The military did an honorable job making him look whole, she said. But when she touched his cheek as he laid in the casket, she touched a part that had been reconstructed - it wasnt really him. That used to be much harder than it is now, she said. Now, its like, damn straight, hes still there. Hes always going to have a presence there, flipping off the Taliban. Good things will grow where he is, she likes to think. Hes part of their dirt, their soil, hes part of the Earth there, he is forever there. ___ Bynum reported from Savannah, Georgia. MIDDLETOWN The municipal pool, a source of outdoor recreation and joy for generations of Middletown families, was retired Thursday with a ceremonial demolition, soon to be replaced by a $2 million aquatics complex. Faith Jackson, Middletowns director of equal opportunity and diversity management, stopped by Veterans Memorial Pool on Walnut Grove Road to witness the smash party, which signaled the end of her childhood stomping ground. Jackson, who used to ride her bike to the 63-year-old structure, recalled my mother loved it, because we were out of her hair for a while. As everyone donned safety glasses and grabbed a mallet on a humid, 93-degree day, the sound of smashing concrete filled the air. I dont know if I have good form, Mayor Ben Florsheim said, as Recreation and Community Services Director Cathy Lechowicz cheered him on, encouraging him and others to let out their frustration: Cmon! she said. One joked: Its not moving, councilman, watching Common Council Majority Leader Gene Noceras efforts. Youve got to go for the points of weakness, Lechowicz yelled. I just want to say thank you to this pool, she said at the start of the event, as everyone chuckled. It has served our community well. It is with a lot of love, perhaps duct tape, ingenuity that it has gotten us this far. After climbing down the rickety ladders, officials took hammers to the concrete. It will be demolished starting the day after Labor Day, and is expected to be ready by the 2022 summer season. This day has been a pretty long time coming, Florsheim said. The work is being paid for with a portion of the $33.5 million parks bond voters passed in 2015. In-house services will save a great deal of money, Public Works Department Director William Russo said. This parks bond project by project by project is transforming Middletown, Florsheim said. There are a lot of memories and a lot of history at this site. The pool, which will increase in size and be orientated toward the formal entrance to Veterans Park off Fisher Road, will include a six-lane lap swim area, a section for community swim, zero-entry ramp, stairs, and resistance walking wall for non-impact exercise, Lechowicz said. Im so excited to better meet a community need and have this awesome amenity for the community, she said, adding that her children learned to swim there. There also will be a shallow portion for the littles to play, and, down a hill, closer to the road, a splash pad free for the community, she said. There also will be a focus on pedestrian accessibility. The pool house will be gutted, Lechowicz said, and new lockers will be installed, along with a family/gender-neutral restroom/changing area. Russo reminisced about the entrance fee being only 10 cents when they were young, a memory that prompted many longtime residents at the event to laugh aloud. The concrete from the pool will be crushed and used for fill under roads and sidewalks, the public works director said. The complex ties into the citys growing multiuse trail so children and others living in the North End can access it easily by foot. A bridge will be built on Jackson Street over the Coginchaug River so people can avoid crossing busy Newfield Street/Route 3, Russo said. Families and children flourish when theyre having fun, Nocera said, quoting Dr. Martin Seligman. This is what the parks do for our community. 3 1 of 3 Contributed Photo / Middletown Police Department / Contributed Photo Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Middletown Police Department / Contributed Photo Show More Show Less 3 of 3 MIDDLETOWN Police have made more arrests in connection with a May shooting that left 25-year-old Tylon Hardy dead. Middletown Police arrested the girlfriend of the alleged shooter Thursday. Alexandra Vazquez, 21, was was charged with interfering with the investigation and was initially held on $100,000 bond, according to the Middletown Police Department. BRIDGEPORT Paul Frosolone isnt a fan of vaccines. Until Wednesday, the 54-year-old West Haven man hadnt considered getting vaccinated against COVID-19. I dont like the idea that were getting told to take it, he said, adding he doesnt usually get a flu shot. But, while driving Wednesday morning, Frosolone heard an ad for a vaccine clinic at the new Hartford HealthCare Amphitheater that was taking place that day. Almost on a whim, he decided to drive out to Bridgeport and get his shot. I do landscaping and Im around a lot of of elderly people, he said, adding he was concerned about unintentionally infecting a vulnerable person. Im more worried about their health than mine. Frosolone was one of many people who showed up at the clinic, during which professionals from Hartford HealthCare which includes St. Vincents Medical Center in Bridgeport doled out shots of Pfizer-BioNTech and Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Less than an hour after the clinic opened, a line of people was outside waiting to be vaccinated. Its great, Dr. Corina Marcu, associate vice president of medical affairs for HHCs Fairfield region, said of the turnout. She said part of it was likely due to Mondays announcement that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration had given final approval to the Pfizer vaccine. Of the doses given Wednesday morning, about 60 percent were Pfizer, Marcu said. Bill Hoey, vice president of mission integration for HHCs Fairfield Region, said the FDA approval could drive more people to clinics like the one at the amphitheater. I think some of the vaccine hesitancy was because of the emergency use approval, and people thinking it was experimental, he said. We hope the formal approval of the Pfizer will alleviate some of those concerns. However, some like Frosolone were still getting Johnson & Johnson. He said that vaccine appealed to him because there was only one dose, unlike the Pfizer vaccine, which requires a second shot 21 days after the first dose. Otto Wendland, 67, of Ansonia, got the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, due to the convenience of the single shot. He said he had delayed the the vaccine because he had contracted COVID-19 earlier and hoped the antibodies from his infection were enough to protect him. However, research, including from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has shown that vaccines are more effective at protecting against COVID than antibodies from a previous infection. Wendland ultimately decided to get the vaccine, after seeing some organizations and businesses putting vaccine mandates into place. Its getting to the point where you cant go anywhere if you dont have it, he said. Marcu said the rise of the delta variant of COVID-19 might have driven some of the traffic at the clinic. I think theres fear, when youre seeing the numbers go up and people being hospitalized, she said. Connecticut has yet to dole out about $171 million in emergency federal rental relief intended to help tens of thousands of renters struggling to make payments with a looming deadline that puts unspent funding in jeopardy. The figure represents nearly three quarters of the aid federal officials allocated to the state in January. A Sept. 30 federal deadline to spend 65% comes just a handful of days ahead of a scheduled end to a national ban on most evictions for nonpayment of rent. The bans future is uncertain, as it faces court challenges from real estate groups. The U.S. Supreme Court is set to determine its fate over the next few days. Nationwide, many states and local government agencies who collectively received $46.5 billion of federal rental relief funding have struggled to get money into the hands of renters. The aid was approved over two acts, the first round of which was for about $25 billion. States are supposed to spend the money by the end of September or, federal officials have warned, they risk losing it. The money has been really, really slow to go out, said Sarah White, a staff attorney with the Connecticut Fair Housing Center. I think thats true in a lot of places. National housing experts have cited burdensome documentation requirements, lack of sufficient staffing to run programs and landlords who are unwilling to participate in the program as some of the reasons money has been slow to trickle out to tenants in need. Connecticuts program, UniteCT, has spent just over $65 million on emergency rental assistance, or about 27% of its $235.9 million allocation, and a substantial uptick from last months spending, but still well below the goal of 65%, according to recently released data. The state has assisted about 8,270 tenants and 3,453 landlords, according to its website. As of the end of July, Connecticut had spent $22 million, or about 9% of its allocation. Nationally, about 89% of total funds remained unspent as of the end of July. More than 70 states and municipalities have expended more than half of their funds, while others struggle to get money out quickly, according to the U.S. Department of the Treasury. Too many grantees have yet to demonstrate sufficient progress in getting assistance to struggling tenants and landlords, a Treasury news release said Wednesday, referencing national numbers. After September, programs that are unwilling or unable to deliver assistance quickly will be at risk of having their rental assistance funding reallocated to effective programs in other high-need areas. UniteCT is managed by the state Department of Housing and provides up to $15,000 in rental assistance as well as $1,500 in electricity payments for households that earn up to 80% of the area median income and who were financially impacted by the pandemic, according to its website. A spokesman for UniteCT did not respond to a request for comment immediately Wednesday. Connecticut has made some adjustments since the programs launch to make documentation requirements easier on tenants, White said. Still, an online-only application that requires an email address has caused some roadblocks for tenants, White said. Some landlords in the state wont accept the money, she added. The federal treasury this week also announced a set of updated guidance that aims to get money to tenants and landlords faster. The guidance includes allowing more self-attestation to prove eligibility, allowing partnerships with nonprofits to deliver funds to tenants facing eviction while their applications are pending, and to allow coverage of debts associated with past addresses, among other measures. Fund distribution nationally improved slightly in July, according to a Wednesday news release from Treasury. The Emergency Rental Assistance program was funded partially through the federal Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021 in an effort to prevent mass evictions following economic losses caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention ban on most evictions for nonpayment of rent is set to expire Oct. 3. The order, first enacted in September 2020, has been extended several times and was designed to prevent further spread of COVID-19 by keeping people from having to move into homeless shelters or with friends and family. Nearly 8 million tenants nationwide are behind on rent. In Connecticut, 63,450 households reported that they were behind on rent, according to a U.S. Census Bureau Pulse Household Survey for July 21 to Aug. 2. Over the past year, the United Way of Connecticuts 211 line has received 293,321 requests for service regarding housing and shelter. About a quarter of those calls were about rental assistance, according to publicly available United Way data. Many of the 211 calls come from a group termed ALICE, or Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed, research and community engagement director Annie Scully said. That group consists of households that have jobs and dont qualify for many government aid programs, but are still struggling. Often, theyre hourly wage workers and hold jobs such as restaurant workers, teaching assistants, bus drivers and cashiers, Scully said. Many of them lost work during the pandemic, she added. These are families that work two or three jobs, Scully said. But theyre barely scraping by, theyre barely making ends meet. PARIS (AP) An Afghan evacuee under surveillance in France for possible indirect links to the Taliban was convicted and given a suspended sentence Wednesday for leaving the hotel where he was restricted and traveling to Paris. The man, identified only as Ahmat M., was among five evacuees suspected of direct or indirect links with the Taliban, but not the principle suspect. He was arrested Monday in Paris after leaving the hotel east of the capital where all five men were confined along with family members. Ahmat M. was given a 10-month suspended prison sentence at the urgent court hearing Wednesday, just days after his arrival in France. The prosecutor had sought a 12-month sentence with six months suspended for failing to respect an administrative surveillance order. The maximum possible sentence was three years in prison and a 45,000-euro ($52,875) fine if convicted, the prosecutor's office said. During the hearing, the 30-year-old, who arrived in France last weekend, claimed he had been a prosecutor in Afghanistan and went to Paris on Monday with another person to buy medication for headaches, according to French media. The other man said the defendant wanted to buy a telephone card. This isn't the file of a Taliban on his own in France, his lawyer, Alice Ouaknine, was quoted as saying. It's the file of a man who fled his country with his wife and 3-month-old daughter. Four of the five placed under surveillance after arriving in France were close to a man suspected of links to the Taliban, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin has said. That man, who has remained in the restricted zone, admitted belonging to the Taliban. He bore arms at a blockade in Kabul, the interior minister said this week, but also helped in the evacuation of the French Embassy, assisting the French army, citizens and journalists. French intelligence agents were tracking the five via geopositioning and saw on Monday that one of them had left his restricted zone, Darmanin said on Tuesday. He arrived in Paris last weekend and was immediately placed under watch, along with the four others, at the hotel east of Paris, and ordered not to leave. The interior minister, who ordered the special surveillance for the five, insisted in an interview Tuesday with France Info that there were no slip-ups in checking evacuees. The main suspect slipped through the cracks in the chaotic evacuation last weekend, but Darmanin said he was identified during a thorough identity check at the French air base in Abu Dhabi, used by France as a transit point for evacuees. By Wednesday night, France had evacuated more than 2,000 Afghans and more than 100 French, authorities said. COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) South Carolina students will again be required to wear masks on school buses starting Monday as COVID-19 cases among children and students are rising rapidly and health care workers are increasingly struggling to deal with the crush of unvaccinated patients of all ages. The state Education Department told schools in July they did not have to make students on buses wear masks. But the agency changed its mind in a letter Thursday, bringing it into line with federal health rules about masks on buses. Education Superintendent Molly Spearman said the delta variant of COVID-19 appears to be spreading quickly in children and more must be done to keep students safe and schools open. Districts who need masks will get them by the end of the weekend to pass out to students who board buses without a face covering. Drivers can't kick a student off a bus for not wearing a mask. Spearman's letter does not change the ban on mask mandates in schools and classrooms passed in the state budget by the General Assembly. Nearly 30% of new COVID-19 cases in South Carolina in the past two weeks have been in people age 20 and under. During the same time in 2020, about 17% of cases were in that age group, according to data from the state Department of Health and Environmental Control. Currently, only people age 12 or over can be vaccinated against COVID-19. People ages 12 to 20 make up a little over 10% of the state population, but just 7% of the people who have gotten at least one shot. Prisma Health, which provides health care for about half the state, said it is running out of beds and workers to take care of the youngest patients. The danger with children is especially frustrating since many of them can't be vaccinated, said Dr. Wendell James, chief clinical officer for Prisma Health in the Upstate. They depend on us and the community around them to protect them from harm. And we need to, as adults, take that responsibility on, Davis said, Health officials Thursday reported 56 COVID-19 deaths, the highest numbers of deaths in a day since mid-March, when the worst peak of the pandemic so far was winding down. South Carolina is now averaging more than 4,200 new COVID-19 cases a day. The only time the state was reporting more new cases was for three weeks at the height of the pandemic in January. While children are one of the biggest worries currently with the pandemic, hospitals across the state continue to warn they are nearing capacity with all patients. Lexington Medical Center on Wednesday had 192 COVID-19 patients more than any other time during the pandemic. Officials warned the surge of patients mean other medical emergencies like heart attacks or injuries in accident may have to wait longer than normal for care. Were going to do everything we can, but our waits are much longer than we would want them to be, much longer than you or I would want them to be. Were trying our best, but it is incredibly difficult, Lexington Medical Center President and CEO Tod Augsburger told WIS-TV. Prisma Health's hospitals in the Midlands and Upstate had 12 COVID-19 patients on July 2. They have 436 now and 94% of them didn't get the COVID-19 vaccine, officials said. No matter the age, the people who end up in the hospital end up with a long and arduous recovery and a high possibility of chronic problems, said Dr. Christopher Lombardozzi, chief medical officer for quality for Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System. This is not spending a day or two in the hospital with us, getting better and going home, Lombardozzi said. Doctors and nurses are being pushed to the brink, especially frustrated since getting shots are a simple way to stop the worst COVID-19 cases, he said. "Last winter we dealt with the worst pandemic we thought we would ever have to deal with. Its worse now," Lombardozzi said. ___ This story has been corrected to show that state lawmakers passed a ban on mask mandates, not a ban on masks. ___ Follow Jeffrey Collins on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JSCollinsAP. ___ Follow APs coverage of the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic. TOKYO (AP) Japan suspended use of about 1.63 million doses of Moderna vaccine Thursday after contamination was found in unused vials, raising concern of a supply shortage as the country tries to accelerate vaccinations amid a COVID-19 surge. The health ministry said contamination was reported from multiple vaccination sites. Some doses might have been administered, but no adverse health effects have been reported so far, officials said. Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., a Japanese drugmaker in charge of sales and distribution of the vaccine in Japan, said it decided to suspend use of doses manufactured in the same production line as a safety precaution. It asked Moderna to conduct an emergency investigation and told medical institutions and organizers to stop using the vaccine produced in Spain and shared the production numbers that may be affected. The Spanish manufacturer, Rovi, said it is conducting an investigation into the matter and is also cooperating with authorities. The detection of this particulate matter refers to certain vials of one product lot distributed exclusively in Japan, the company said in a statement from Madrid. The origin of this manufacturing incident may be in one of ROVIs manufacturing lines, the statement noted. It said that as a precaution, the batch in question and two adjacent lots have been put on hold. Neither the companies nor authorities gave details on the possible type of contamination. The Moderna vaccine problem came just as Japan struggles with surging infections, with daily new cases hitting new highs in many parts of the country and severely straining the health care system. Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato told reporters the government and Takeda are discussing ways to minimize the impact on Japans vaccination progress. We will do utmost in order to avoid any impact on vaccination progress, especially at worksites and large-scale centers, Kato said. Japan relies entirely on foreign-developed vaccines by Moderna, as well as Pfizer Inc. and AstraZeneca. Moderna has been since mid-June at large-scale centers and workplace inoculations and has helped speed up Japans rollout. About 43% of the Japanese population have been fully vaccinated, with daily doses of about 1 million. ___ Barry Hatton contributed to this report from Lisbon, Portugal. WASHINGTON A world away from the evacuation violence in Afghanistan, President Joe Biden was meeting Thursday with a bipartisan group of governors from across the U.S. who have said they want to help resettle Afghans fleeing their now Taliban-ruled country. The White House meeting was taking place days before a Tuesday deadline for the U.S. to halt evacuations of Americans and vulnerable Afghans from the airport in Kabul, and to withdraw from the country entirely after 20 years of engagement. Some governors have said they want to help temporarily house or resettle Afghans in their communities because many aided the U.S. war effort and now fear retribution from the Taliban for that assistance. Officials say the U.S. must keep its word to help these Afghans. But some conservatives have been sounding alarms about a new influx of refugees to the U.S., coming on top of large groups of Central American migrants and unaccompanied children trying to enter the U.S. through the border with Mexico. There are also concerns that some refugees coming from Afghanistan might actually be terrorists, though the administration says all are being screened. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican, is among those who say assisting Afghan refugees is paramount, even as he has criticized Biden's handling of the U.S. pullout from Afghanistan,. We made a commitment. We can't let them down, Hogan said this week on CBS This Morning. What kind of message does it send to our allies across the world if our word is no good. Separately Thursday, an explosion went off outside the airport in Kabul, the capital, where thousands of people have flocked as they try to flee Afghanistan. Officials offered no casualty count, but a witness said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded. The explosion detonated as the U.S. works to get remaining Americans out of the country. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation amid growing warnings of terrorist threats targeting the airport. Asked during an interview with ABC News about reports the evacuation could end on Friday, Ross Wilson, the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, declined to comment. He said there are safe ways to get to the airport for those Americans who still want to leave. He added that there undoubtedly will be some at-risk Afghans who will not get out before Biden's deadline. The airlift continued Thursday despite warnings of vehicle-borne bomb threats near the airport. The White House said 13,400 people had been evacuated in the 24 hours that ended early Thursday morning Washington time. Those included 5,100 people aboard U.S. military planes and 8,300 on coalition and partner aircraft. That was a substantial drop from the 19,000 airlifted by all means the day before. Several of the Americans working phones and trying to get out former Afghan colleagues, women's advocates, journalists and other vulnerable Afghans said they were still waiting for U.S. action. Its 100% up to the Afghans to take these risks and try to fight their way out, said Sunil Varghese, policy director with the International Refugee Assistance Project. Blinken emphasized at a State Department briefing on Wednesday that evacuating Americans is our top priority. He added: Were also committed to getting out as many Afghans at-risk as we can before the 31st," when Biden plans to pull out the last of thousands of American troops. As more nations began shutting down own evacuation flights and pulling out before the U.S. withdrawal, there were new European warnings about the threats. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC that there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport, possibly within hours. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul, the capital, issued a security alert Wednesday warning American citizens away from three specific airport gates. Senior U.S. officials said the warning was related to ongoing and specific threats involving the Islamic State and potential vehicle bombs. Blinken said the State Department estimates there were about 6,000 Americans wanting to leave Afghanistan when the airlift began Aug. 14, as the Taliban took the capital after a stunning military conquest. About 4,500 Americans have been evacuated so far, Blinken said, and among the rest some are understandably very scared. The 6,000 figure is the first firm estimate by the State Department of how many Americans were seeking to get out. U.S. officials early in the evacuation estimated as many as 15,000, including dual citizens, lived in Afghanistan. The figure does not include U.S. Green Card holders. About 500 Americans have been contacted with instructions on when and how to get to the chaotic Kabul airport to catch evacuation flights. In addition, 1,000 or perhaps fewer are being contacted to determine whether they still want to leave. Blinken said some of these may already have left the country, some may want to remain and some may not actually be American citizens. Associated Press writers Darlene Superville and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida, contributed to this report. NIAMEY, Niger Hundreds of Islamic militants attacked a military outpost in southeastern Niger overnight, killing 16 soldiers and wounding at least nine others, the country's defense ministry said Wednesday. Extremists from the Boko Haram group targeted the soldiers near the village of Baroua, not far from the border with Chad. "The terrorists, numbering several hundred, had come from Lake Chad and were pushed back by the military, according to a statement from Niger's national defense ministry that said 50 militants were killed in the fighting. The military outpost was set up near the village of Baroua after residents who had fled violence in the area were repatriated to their village last July after five years. Boko Haram and its breakaway faction known as the Islamic State in West Africa Province have launched scores of attacks in Niger since the extremists started their insurgency in neighboring Nigeria in 2009. Niger also faces mounting extremist violence along its borders with Mali and Burkina Faso in the west. Hundreds of civilians have been killed this year alone in a series of massacres in the troubled region. Associated Press writer Chinedu Asadu in Lagos, Nigeria contributed. Editor's Note: Thursday evening the Pentagon provided an updated tally of fatalities tied to the bombings at Hamid Karzai International Airport, bringing the total to 13 U.S. service members. This story has been updated accordingly. The Pentagon is expecting more attacks after a bombing Thursday at Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport killed 13 U.S. service members and scores of Afghan civilians in one of the deadliest days of the 20-year war. A further 18 American troops were wounded. With less than a week remaining before the Aug. 31 deadline to complete the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, defense officials say they're developing plans to strike back against those responsible for the attack, which included two suicide bombers and gunfire. "We are working very hard right now to determine attribution, to determine who is associated with this cowardly attack, and we're prepared to take action against them," Marine Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, told reporters Thursday afternoon. Read Next: Afghanistan: The War That Made War Normal An Islamic State affiliate, ISIS-Khorasan or ISIS-K, is largely seen as the most likely culprit, given prior intelligence warnings about planned attacks against the airport. The situation on the ground is incredibly fragile, as the U.S. has an effective alliance with the Taliban for the time being and is sharing redacted intelligence to prevent attacks from ISIS-K. McKenzie said that the U.S. military is "reaching out to the Taliban" as they provide security on the outskirts of the airport, outside of the American-controlled area. "Despite this attack, we're continuing the mission. The threat from ISIS is extremely real," McKenzie said. "We believe it is their desire to continue the attacks, and we expect the attacks to continue. We're doing everything we can to prepare for those attacks." The Taliban, which has fought against the U.S. for two decades, recently conquered Afghanistan. But the group is also in a war with ISIS-K, a longtime rival. McKenzie said the Taliban are eager to see U.S. forces leave and are motivated to make the withdrawal go smoothly. He added there is so far no evidence the Taliban purposefully let the suicide bombers slip through searches. "We share a common purpose," McKenzie said. "They've been useful to work with." Just weeks ago, the U.S. and Taliban were staunch enemies who had spent decades killing one another. The U.S. initially invaded Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban government, but the group reclaimed that role with little resistance in recent weeks. Now, U.S. officials find themselves negotiating with their former foe to try to evacuate Americans and American allies safely. McKenzie said the Pentagon asked the Taliban to broaden the security perimeter outside the airport and close down a series of roads after the attack. The U.S. also is flying attack aircraft around Kabul to deter would-be attackers, hoping planes and attack helicopters could quickly identify and strike anyone who attacks the airfield. Thursday's attack consisted of two suicide bombers. One bomb was detonated near an airport gate in a packed crowd of Afghans desperately trying to flee the country, many of whom fear retribution from the Taliban for working with the U.S. or the now-collapsed Afghanistan government. The second bomb was set off at a hotel across the street from the airport. Gunfire followed the explosions, but it is unclear whether U.S. troops were able to return fire. "We mourn their loss. We will treat their wounds. And we will support their families in what will most assuredly be devastating grief. But we will not be dissuaded from the task at hand," Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement. "To do anything less -- especially now -- would dishonor the purpose and sacrifice these men and women have rendered our country and the people of Afghanistan." -- Steve Beynon can be reached at Steve.Beynon@military.com. Follow him on Twitter @StevenBeynon. Related: Roughly 1,500 Americans May Still Be in Afghanistan Less Than a Week Before Troops Are Due to Leave Updated 10:30 p.m. Eastern Editor's Note: Thursday evening the Pentagon provided an updated tally of fatalities tied to the bombings at Hamid Karzai International Airport, bringing the total to 13 U.S. service members. This story and headline have been updated accordingly. Pentagon officials confirmed that at least two bombs were set off outside of Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on Thursday, causing chaos and killing multiple U.S. service members and civilians as evacuations out of Afghanistan continue. Thus far, officials have confirmed few details about the attacks and the casualties. Chief Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said via Twitter that one explosion at the airport's Abbey Gate, which has served as one of the main entry points to the facility for Afghans fleeing Taliban rule, "was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties." "We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate," he added. Read Next: 'Was It Worth It?' A Fallen Marine and a War's Crushing End Hours later, Kirby said that "a number of U.S. service members were killed" and "a number of others are being treated for their wounds." Late Thursday, U.S. Central Command Spokesman Capt. Bill Urban issued a statement that 13 U.S. service members had died as a result of the attack, with 18 further service members injured all of whom were evacuated from Afghanistan. Earlier today, former Vice President Mike Pence tweeted that he was "praying for the three U.S. Marines and innocent civilians injured in the terrorist attacks near Kabul Airport today." Satellite image shows Kabul International Airport and the location of an explosion near the Abbey Gate. (Associated Press) Satellite image shows Kabul International Airport and the location of an explosion near the Abbey Gate. (Associated Press) The Pentagon did not immediately answer questions about whether the attacks have halted evacuation flights out of the airport. The Biden administration had set an Aug. 31 deadline to remove U.S. troops from Afghanistan. With less than a week before that deadline, it is possible that the attack could lead to the last U.S. service member fatalities of the war. Before Thursday, 2,448 members of the military had died in the 20 years of war in the country. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid condemned the attack in a tweet hours after the bombings. An international humanitarian organization, Emergency, said in a tweet that "around 60 patients wounded in airport attack have arrived at our Kabul Surgical Centre so far." Earlier, the group said that six patients were "dead on arrival" at its facility. The news comes after days of warnings from Western nations about threats to the airport and the crowds waiting outside, as well as specific concerns about attacks at the gates. "Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport to attack both U.S. and allied forces and innocent civilians," President Joe Biden said Tuesday. An Islamic State affiliate, ISIS-Khorasan or ISIS-K, is seen as a threat by U.S. officials but is an enemy of the Taliban as well. Experts have theorized that an attack on the airport by ISIS-K could serve a dual purpose of hurting Americans and embarrassing the Taliban as the group attempts to establish credibility that it can effectively secure Afghanistan. U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said in a statement on the attacks that while it is too early to draw any conclusions, ISIS-K had a clear motivation to disrupt our efforts." "The sooner we can finish, the better," Biden said. "Each day of operations brings added risk to our troops." Shortly after reports of the first explosion, the U.S. Embassy in Kabul told American citizens to "avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates at this time." "There has been a large explosion at the airport, and there are reports of gunfire," the embassy said. It urged any U.S. citizens at the Abbey Gate, East Gate or North Gate to "leave immediately." The United Kingdom, one of the key U.S. allies on the ground in Kabul, said in a statement given to Military.com that "there have been no reported UK military or UK Government casualties following the explosions in Kabul" but that officials are "working urgently to establish what has happened and its impact on the ongoing evacuation effort." "We are in close contact with our US and other NATO allies at an operational level on the immediate response to this incident," the statement added. -- Konstantin Toropin can be reached at konstantin.toropin@military.com. Follow him on Twitter @ktoropin. Related: Roughly 1,500 Americans May Still Be in Afghanistan Less Than a Week Before Troops Are Due to Leave The HMS Queen Elizabeth recently traded F-35B Lightning II stealth fighters with a U.S. amphibious assault ship at sea, another first for the U.K. aircraft carrier on its first operational deployment, according to the U.S. Marine Corps. The USS America and the Queen Elizabeth held a cross-deck training exercise Friday near the Hawaiian Islands, the first time the two flagships and their groups have worked together. The America, homeported at Sasebo Naval Base, Japan, its amphibious ready group and elements of the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit have been at sea since June, according to the Navy. The Queen Elizabeth, carrying 18 F-35Bs -- 10 of which are from a U.S. Marine Corps squadron -- is making its way to Japan for scheduled port calls in September. Its first patrol is expected to cover 26,000 nautical miles over 7 months and 40 nations. As part of the Navy's Large-Scale Exercise 2021, the Queen Elizabeth launched F-35Bs, built for short take-offs and vertical landings, that the America recovered, reloaded, refueled and relaunched, according to a Marine Corps press release Tuesday. The operation highlighted a change in modern warfare, said Marine Corps Col. Simon Doran, U.S. senior national representative to the U.K. strike group. "The [exercise] underscored our continued effort to shift away from static, built-up airfields towards distributed maritime operations," he said in the news release. The two groups trained through several other scenarios, including large-formation maneuvers, anti-submarine and surface warfare and aviation drills, according to a Sunday news release from the U.S. Navy's 7th Fleet. "These events allow us to work with an unmatched network of partners and allies in a complex environment, supporting the common goal of a free and open Indo-Pacific," Rear Adm. Chris Engdahl, commander of Expeditionary Strike Group 7, said in the release. The blended air wing aboard the Queen Elizabeth includes F-35Bs from Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 211 and the Royal Air Force's No. 617 Squadron. "The U.K. Carrier Strike Group offers the largest fifth generation air wing afloat today and working with our close allies to develop operating procedures and capabilities while concurrently showcasing the agility of land and carrier-based aviation in the Indo-Pacific demonstrates our commitment to the region," said Commodore Steve Moorhouse, the strike group commander, said in the Sunday news release. During a Tuesday night news conference, Moorhouse said Indo-Pacific exercises differ from those in the North Atlantic or Mediterranean because they focus primarily on multiple-threat scenarios. That presents a chance to learn to balance traditional surface and underwater threats with space and cyber elements. The ability of the two nations' F-35Bs to communicate seamlessly highlighted the advantage of allied forces integrating their technology and communications, Moorhouse said. Failure to do so would be like "fighting with one hand behind your back," he said. The Queen Elizabeth in the Indo-Pacific marks the U.K.'s first military presence in the region in 25 years. The ship has completed several firsts since its departure from the U.K. in May, including an exercise with the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan in July. Corie Weathers is a licensed professional counselor specializing in military families and first responders. If I drew out our family story line, 2009 is where our path takes a dramatic turn, with a pinpoint that says "Afghanistan." My husband wasn't injured during his two deployments, but his soul was. Like thousands of other service members, he was exposed to the darkness of a war-torn country. As a chaplain, he tended to injured, abused or burned children and villagers in the operating room and aid station of his forward operating base. After just five months, he called me as he was preparing to deliver a Red Cross message to one of his troops. I could hear the emptiness in his voice when he confessed that he felt as though he were walking hand-in-hand with death. How do you welcome home a soul ravaged by loss and hurt? I didn't do a great job. I was exhausted myself from such an arduous deployment. For the next five years, we followed that new trajectory, doing whatever we could to bring meaning to the innocence that was lost in those rugged mountains of Afghanistan. At times, it was a slugfest for our mental health and marriage. Matt struggled to sleep at night, and our experiences of the deployment were drastically different from each other. He wanted to live life to the fullest, while I desperately wrestled life into submission with two toddlers. Before Afghanistan, we felt unified; now, we just felt disconnected. Yet the only answer we had was to bring meaning to the experience of Afghanistan in our life. I spent only one day in Afghanistan. I was there courtesy of the Pentagon to see deployment conditions as a military spouse and somehow convey what I saw to families at home. I had already seen Turkey and Iraq, but Afghanistan made me anxious -- not because I felt unsafe, but because I saw it as a third entity in our marriage. It had invaded our story and hovered in the background of our life like white noise. When I had the opportunity to see those mountains, smell the air and walk on that dirt, my heart was overwhelmed with what I wanted to say to that country. What I wasn't prepared for was feeling the weight of the burden our military community carried. I already was feeling the guilt of why I was given this experience and not the thousands of other family members who rightfully needed to be there. All of us had something to say to those mountains. I felt the grieving widow, the mother who lost a child, the spouse whose own trajectory unexpectedly pivoted to "caregiver," and so many more. How was I to fulfill my own mission to Afghanistan to describe a country that had taken so much from so many? Would it even help? I wanted to scream, but instead I barely made it from the C-130 to a small room at Forward Operating Base Fenty before I burst into tears. Civilians around me stared in confusion, and I realized what service members meant when they said they felt "broken." There was no way those strangers could understand, and I was strangely glad they didn't have to. Later that day, as we flew out of the country, I intentionally chose to leave behind my resentment toward the war and what it introduced there in the mountains of Afghanistan. I left it for my own sake but also for the thousands of souls who also needed to let something go there. And, yet, here we are, 20 years after the war started, having to re-experience that pain, and let it go all over again. Perhaps you pushed it down and never processed it. You "drove on," never tending to the wounds. Or maybe, like us, this withdrawal ripped open scar tissue you thought you would not have to revisit. With the intense tempo of new missions, we all occasionally reflected on our own conclusions of why our presence was still needed in Afghanistan. Now, we watch as others debate whether it was even worth it and feel the deep pangs of soul injury all over again, possibly worse. While I can't speak for everyone, I believe I know the deeper questions you are asking, whether you served in Afghanistan or are a family member whose life was shaped by it. Was it worth it? It was not in vain. Your service, your time away from those you love, and the mission you gave your blood, sweat and tears to were worth it. The Air Force released a photo of 640 Afghans crammed into the belly of a C-17. Their faces reveal the "why" that so many of us struggled to put into words and the stories that it feels were ignored for the last 20 years. A mother holding her son who will have a new future and a new perspective on women like her. The father embracing his daughter, who is not covering her ponytail. The elder who has a lifetime of stories to tell of pain but also rescue. The women who learned to read, write and now will dream of endless possibilities. It is heart-wrenching to watch news stories of those who are left behind, desperate to escape the country. Yet because of souls like yours, there are Afghan people who know their worth and want more. The crew of Reach 871, who successfully evacuated those 640 people, represent the best of our service members and remind me of those I met in Turkey, Iraq and Afghanistan. You volunteered because you believe in a way of life that is just and good. You consistently go above and beyond for those on your right or left, whether it is a battle buddy, a family member, a child or a civilian who still doesn't understand. You willingly would give your own life to save another. Many of you have tried. And the scars that remind you of the ones you couldn't rescue feel freshly opened now. It is doubly excruciating because we exist to fight and win our nation's wars. Nothing about this feels like a win. Yet even in the midst of this outcome, we have to choose to believe that this war, your service, held off evil long enough that an entire generation can believe in a different future. This week did not negate your sacrifice. If anything, it reveals how the strength, commitment, talent and unity of our military created stability for a country for 20 years. Many Afghan lives were changed for the better, and this is not the end of their story. The American and Afghan narrative is far from over, but we are entering into an unfamiliar new phase in our community. Our warfighters and family members, including an entire generation that has never known rest, are experiencing the anxiety, loss and restlessness of slowing down. We have begged for it, for years. But when it suddenly coincides with a swift, systematic sweep of an enemy reclaiming territory we once protected, it is a jagged pill to swallow. It brings all the past pain into the present, shattering us when we've been trying to find a place and space to pause and recuperate. We must find a way to rest and heal. It is time to let go but not forget. Time to remind your body and soul that you must slow down and not remain occupied with the next mission. Your experience of Afghanistan is worth it when you bring it meaning. My husband is a more tender father and husband because of his time there, and I believe I am a better wife, mother and clinician. What the last two decades have given us is priceless, even though it cost us greatly. It is up to each of us to decide how it fits into who we have become as individuals and families, but know that you deserve the support of your loved ones and professionals to help you process what a soul was never meant to carry. Come home, weary traveler, and rest. "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free ..." -- "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, as etched on the pedestal of Lady Liberty. -- The opinions expressed in this op-ed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Military.com. If you would like to submit your own commentary, please send your article to opinions@military.com for consideration. I got an email this week from a college student studying neurobiology who is engaged to a Navy guy. After researching possible locations where they might be stationed, the student said she was really struggling. Her question for me was whether she should change her major in order to accommodate their upcoming moves. I keep thinking that her question ought to have been: Should I marry him at all? That is a shocker for me to think, much less to say. I am all about the ability of military families to adapt and overcome. Yet I cannot say with conviction that love can permanently overcome the drive for meaningful work. I cannot say that because someone loves you that they will leave the military when you want them to and that they will be happy about it. I cannot say that because you love someone in uniform that you can make a job as a neurobiologist magically appear in Kuwait or Guam or Pensacola. I wish I could. But that would not be true. If the first ladys recent focus on spouse employment has shown anything, it has crystalized the fact that finding work when you move every 2.5 years is no not easy. Military spouses, who tend to be better educated than the average U.S. population, have a 26 percent employment rate. Husbands of servicemembers earn about 70 percent of their matched civilian counterparts. Military wives earn about 50 percent of what matched civilian wives earn. Those figures are depressing and discouraging -- especially when you are in love. Both military finances and military members alike need to look at those numbers hard. Love is not a rational decision. Marriage is. So I wish this student and her fiance would consider these ideas from our Spouse Summit 2012 audience: One person cannot provide another persons complete happiness According to neurobiologists, the cocaine-like brain response of true love lasts from 3 months to four years. So even if we assume that your particular love addiction will keep you going for the full four years, it will eventually stop. It is not right to ask anyone -- including that fabulous young military member -- to be the sole source of your happiness. Admit your true level of career commitment. Expect it to change. Servicemembers are notoriously unable to predict/admit whether they will stay in for the full 20. Twenty years is a really, really long time. A lot can happen. Bosses that spit at you. Sexual harassment can wear away at you. You have children. Your particular rate or MOS can become obsolete. If you think there is as much as a 50/50 chance you will make the military your career, or if you are a spouse who knows that your career demands that you stay in the same location, that MUST be factored into the decision to marry because the military is not a job you can easily quit. The educational attainment of a spouse is a mixed blessing. The research shows that spouses who have completed their bachelors degree are more likely to be employed -- whether that is because they have student loans to pay or that they are more employable is not clear -- but they are more likely to find employment. Yet, the research also shows that the higher the spouses level of education, the more likely he or she is to perceive a negative impact from moving. You will move and your moves will be unpredictable. Unless the entire military is BRACed down to a single base, unpredictable moves at every level of a career are the norm. Military marriage is a choice. When I married my Navy guy, my future career was not anywhere near as important as being with him every possible minute. It is now. Over the years, my husband and I have made a lot of compromises to get meaningful work for us both. We choose the military every day. We choose each other. And that is a powerful place to be. Jacey Eckhart is a military life consultant in Washington, DC. Her newest CD I Married a Spartan: The Care and Feeding of Your Military Marriage is available on iTunes and Amazon Reach Jacey on www.SpouseBuzz.com, on Facebook or through her website at www.jaceyeckhart.com. Vice President Kamala Harris addresses the crew of the Independence-variant littoral combat ship USS Tulsa (LCS 16) during an all-hands call, Aug. 23, 2021. How to use the mindat.org media viewer Click/touch this help panel to close it. Welcome to the mindat.org media viewer. Here is a quick guide to some of the options available to you. 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Summary of all keyboard shortcuts The Marlins signed reliever Cody Carroll to a minor league contract this week, according to the MLB.com transactions tracker. He has been assigned to their Florida Complex League affiliate but figures to report to Triple-A Jacksonville some time soon. Carroll was released by the Orioles a few weeks ago. A well-regarded bullpen prospect coming up in the Yankees system, Carroll was part of the group New York sent to Baltimore in the 2018 Zack Britton deal. He made his major league debut that August and made fifteen appearances down the stretch. He missed almost the entire 2019 campaign recovering from back surgery and was bombed in three appearances last season before being outrighted off the 40-man roster. Carroll owns a dismal 13.74 ERA over 19 career big league frames. Before his release, he spent the 2021 campaign with the Orioles top affiliate in Norfolk. The 28-year-old posted a 5.57 ERA in that hitter-friendly environment. While Carroll struck out a solid 25.6% of batters faced, he also issued walks at an elevated 12.2% clip and served up five home runs in 21 innings a continuation of trouble with the long ball that has plagued him in the majors as well. Carrolls time in Baltimore obviously didnt go as hed intended, but he posted great numbers up through Double-A in the New York organization. Theres no risk for Miami in taking a look to see if he can recapture some of the form he showed at the lower levels and work his way back to the big leagues down the stretch. Reds reliever Tejay Antone announced (on Twitter) that he will undergo Tommy John surgery tomorrow. Itll be the second time of the right-handers career, as Antone previously underwent the procedure in 2017. Its a disappointing, if not especially surprising, development. Antone spent most of the past few months on the injured list with forearm troubles. He was activated from the IL on Tuesday but pulled himself from that nights game just five pitches amidst obvious discomfort. Cincinnati placed him back on the IL yesterday with what the team termed a forearm strain. While no timetable has been announced, it seems likely Antone will miss the entire 2022 season. Tommy John procedures often require fourteen-plus months of recovery time, and it wouldnt be surprising if the team is particularly cautious with Antones rehab given that hes already undergone the procedure once before. Its a notable blow for the Reds, as Antone has been the clubs best reliever. The 27-year-old worked 33 2/3 innings across 23 appearances as a high-leverage weapon, pitching to a 2.14 ERA. Antone punched out hitters at a massive 32.8% clip on the back of an above-average 12.9% swinging strike rate. Its the second consecutive high-end season to begin Antones MLB career, as he broke into the big leagues with 35 1/3 frames of 2.80 ERA ball in 2020. Despite Antones contributions, the bullpen has been a problem for the Reds for much of the year. Cincinnati relievers have a 5.27 ERA that ranks 28th in the league, while theyre closer to middle-of-the-pack in SIERA (4.07) and strikeout/walk rate differential (14.3 percentage points). Theyve been marginally better since remaking their bullpen the week of the trade deadline when they acquired Luis Cessa, Justin Wilson and Mychal Givens but Reds relievers still have an even 5.00 ERA over the past thirty days. Antone has been on the injured list for almost all of that time already, but holding late leads will be all the more difficult with no possibility of him making it back at this point. At 69-59, the Reds hold a one-game advantage over the Padres in the NL Wild Card race. Antone will likely be placed on the 60-day injured list whenever the Reds need a spot on the 40-man roster. Hell need to return to the 40-man over the offseason but can go back on the 60-day IL for the entirety of next season. Antone will continue to accrue service time on the IL and is scheduled to reach arbitration eligibility for the first time after the 2022 campaign. [August 26, 2021] ASEAN luminaries call for inclusive digital trade ecosystem: NIKKEI-ISEAS forum SHENZHEN, China, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Co-organized by NIKKEI Group and ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute (ISEAS), the "Nikkei-ISEAS Forum on Digitalizing Trade in South East Asia and ASEAN" brought together luminaries from the region including the Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs, Indonesia, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), ISEAS, Honey Consulting Ltd. and Huawei to explore initiatives to unlock the potential of digital trade in the region. The need for a connected, inclusive and multilateral digital trade ecosystem was emphasized during the discussion. The COVID-19 crisis has accelerated the adoption of digital technology. ASEAN predicts the digital economy will contribute one trillion US dollars to regional GDP. Third-party data shows 132% of SEA population has a mobile connection, 463 million people are internet users.[1] There are many different trade agreements connecting the region. The importance of collaboration on building the digital trade ecosystem was echoed by participants in the forum. Mr. Choi Shing Kwok, Director and CEO, ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute, thanked NIKKEI and Huawei for supporting this meeting of minds, saying, "Digital trade is a promising driver of ASEAN's trade that came to the fore during the COVID-19 pandemic and we expect it to prevail post-pandemic. By reducing trade costs and increasing productivity, digital technologies such as the Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, and 3D printing can increase the growth rate of trade in developing countries, including those in the ASEAN region, by 2.5 percentage points per annum or 22.5 percentage points from 2021 to 2030." As a policy-maker, Dr. Rudy Salahuddin, Deputy Minister for Digital Economy, Manpower, and SMEs at Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia, highlighted the crucial role of digital trade in boosting digital economy at large, especially in realizing a resilient economic recovery. He also mentioned the ASEAN faces challenges in ICT infrastructure gap and uneven rate of ICT adoption, to which ICT partners including Huawei can contribute. "Digital Trade offers golden opportunities for collaboration to support common goals such as regional economic recovery and tackling the climate crisis," said Craig Burchell, Senior Vice President of Global Trade Affairs, Huawei, who also supported collaboration to unlock the potential of digital trade to benefit SEA and ASEAN. He referred to the Economist Report on the "Costs of Deglobalizing World Trade" as a warning signal on decoupling, and called for greater collaboration and advocated "Technology for All" policy to optimize digital services, such as 5G, Cloud and AI, to enable new trading opportunities for all. Further developments on the statistical front will be required to develop a meaningful measure of digital trade, said Annabelle Mourougane, Head of the Trade and Productivity Division at OECD, "This will support evidence-based analysis and inform firms' investment choices and policymaking. All actors, including ICT and technology providers, need to be involved to advance the reflection in a fast-changing environment. Huawei's Digital Trade White Paper is in this regard a useful contribution to the debate." Stephanie Honey, Principal of Honey Consulting Ltd, noted that while SEA enjoys a vibrant digital business community and consumer market, fragmented trade rules within the region and beyond meant that businesses were not able to realise the full potential of the digital economy. It would be essential to have collaboration, flexibility and multi-stakeholder participation in developing new digital trade rules, and to integrate approaches across as many economies as possible. There were a number of innovative regional agreements that could be used as models, including the Digital Economy Partnership among Singapore, New Zealand and Chile. During the forum, the idea of further nourishing open, inclusive digital trade policies gained recognition from speakers. Dr. Rudy Salahuddin, suggested policy-makers across the region should focus on cross-cutting regulations to enable the digital economy and to ensure fair sharing of the benefits of digital trade, with policies including trade facilitation, data governance, privacy, logistics, and cyber security. Given the differences in approach between the world's largest trading blocs on some digital topics, Craig Burchell emphasized, "There is a need for greater collaboration on new rules and better governance of the global digital ecosystem, and this work would benefit from an inclusive approach aimed at pursuing co-existence and interoperability rather than convergence." A follow-up webinar themed "Facilitating Digital Trade in the Region" will take place on Sept. 14th. After the event, ISEAS will publish a policy brief on digital trade. Huawei Digital Trade White Paper: https://www.huawei.com/en/public-policy/innovations-in-digital-trade-unlock-the-future-today [1] WeAreSocial, Digital 2021 Report. About Huawei Founded in 1987, Huawei is a leading global provider of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and smart devices. We have more than 197,000 employees, and we operate in more than 170 countries and regions, serving more than three billion people around the world. Our vision and mission is to bring digital to every person, home and organization for a fully connected, intelligent world. To this end, we will drive ubiquitous connectivity and promote equal access to networks; bring cloud and artificial intelligence to all four corners of the earth to provide superior computing power where you need it, when you need it; build digital platforms to help all industries and organizations become more agile, efficient, and dynamic; redefine user experience with AI, making it more personalized for people in all aspects of their life, whether they're at home, in the office, or on the go. For more information, please visit Huawei online at www.huawei.com or follow us on: http://www.linkedin.com/company/Huawei http://www.twitter.com/Huawei http://www.facebook.com/Huawei http://www.google.com/+Huawei http://www.youtube.com/Huawei SOURCE Huawei [ Back To www.mobilitytechzone.com\LTE's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] NIH Backs Synchron Brain Computer Interface with $10M Grant to Launch First U.S. Clinical Trial Synchron, a brain data transfer company, today announced that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded a $10M grant for the initiation of the COMMAND U.S. clinical trial of the Synchron motor neuroprosthesis to Carnegie Mellon University, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), Mount Sinai Health System and Synchron collectively. The FDA granted approval in July to begin this breakthrough trial, paving the way for Synchron's StentrodeTM to become first commercially available implantable brain computer interface. The Stentrode is the only brain computer interface (BCI) implanted without the need for open brain surgery. "This significant investment by NIH reflects the mature stage of Synchron's technology. We are excited to be collaborating with three world-leading U.S. institutions to deliver on the long promise of brain computer interface technology." said Synchron CEO Thomas Oxley, MD, PhD. "We have overcome technical problems that have previously restricted clinical translation of BCI: it is wireless, mobile, fully implantable, and does not require open brain surgery or robots." Carnegie Mellon University will take the lead in management of the grant. UPMC and Mount Sinai Health System will collectively recruit eligible patients, perform the minimally-invasive neurointervention procedures and monitor the subjects' clinical status. This new study, the COMMAND trial, will evaluate the safety and efficacy of the Stentrode in six severely paralyzed patients in the U.S. for regaining digital communication and functional independence. Synchron is also continuing to evaluate this device in the SWITCH human clinical trial in Australia, where four patients have been implanted with Synchron's Stentrode to control digital devices through thought. "This technology has the potential to revolutionize our abiliy to care for patients by solving health challenges that have previously been insurmountable including communication with patients with certain types of paralysis," said David Putrino, PT, PhD, director of Rehabilitation Innovation for the Mount Sinai Health System, and associate professor of Rehabilitation Medicine at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Synchron's technology is designed to facilitate better communication between the patient and their caregivers and medical professionals, ultimately improving patient care. It has allowed patients implanted with the device to perform daily tasks, including texting, emailing, online shopping and banking, enabling functional independence. The Stentrode converts the thoughts associated with attempted movement into cursor and keyboard commands, a function typically performed by part of the body known as 'motor neurons'. The Stentrode device is small and flexible enough to safely pass through curving blood vessels, and is implanted using neurointerventional techniques commonly used to treat strokes. A publication in the Journal of NeuroInterventional Surgery (JNIS) in October 2020 demonstrated that the first two patients implanted with the Stentrode were each able to learn to control texting and typing through direct thought. Following implantation, and a short period of machine learning-assisted training they were able to use the system unsupervised in their homes to send text messages, do online shopping and manage their finances. Future applications may include the potential to diagnose and treat conditions of the nervous system, including Parkinson's disease, epilepsy, depression, and hypertension, as well as non-medical solutions. The project is funded by the NIH BRAIN Initiative (NS120191-01). About the StentrodeTM Synchron's flagship technology, the Stentrode is a minimally invasive brain implant designed to enable patients to wirelessly control digital devices through thought and improve functional independence. This motor neuroprosthesis (MNP), Synchron's foundational technology, is implanted via the jugular vein using neurointerventional techniques commonly used to treat stroke. It does not require drilling into the skull or open brain surgery. The system is designed to be user friendly and dependable for, as well as operated autonomously by, patients suffering from paralysis as a result of a broad range of conditions. The Stentrode has been granted Breakthrough Device Designation from the U.S. FDA. About Synchron, Inc. Synchron, a brain interface platform company, is a leader in the field of implantable neural interface technology. The company is already in the clinical stage with a commercially-viable neuroprosthesis for the treatment of paralysis and is developing the first endovascular implantable neuromodulation therapy. Future applications may include the potential to diagnose and treat conditions of the nervous system, including Parkinson's disease, epilepsy, depression, and hypertension, as well as non-medical solutions. Headquartered in New York City, Synchron has offices in Silicon Valley, California and R&D facilities in Melbourne, Australia. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005433/en/ [ Back To www.mobilitytechzone.com\LTE's Homepage ] The families of deceased bank employees will receive up to 30 per cent of the last drawn salary of the employee under the National Pension Scheme (NPS). Contribution made by PSBs for employee pensions under the National Pension Scheme has been hiked to 14 per cent from the earlier 10 per cent. So far, the pension under the scheme was capped at Rs 9,284. Speaking at a media briefing in Mumbai on Wednesday, the Secretary for the Department of Financial Services, Debasish Panda said that post raising of the banks' contribution family pensions of bank employees can go up to Rs 35,000. "Proposal for enhancement of family pension and employer's contribution under the NPS is approved by FM. The benefits would now accrue to family pensioners," Panda said. "Cap on pay is removed and uniform slab of 30 per cent will be in force. Pension can go as high as Rs 35000," he added. Addressing the media, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that during her interaction with the chiefs of Public Sector Banks, she directed them to interact with export promotion agencies as well as with bodies of industry and commerce so the requirements of exporters can be well addressed in time. She also noted that with changed times, industries have the option of raising funds even from outside the banking sector. "Banks themselves are raising funds through various avenues. These new aspects need to be studied to target credit where it is needed," she said. Disclaimer: Information, facts or opinions expressed in this news article are presented as sourced from IANS and do not reflect views of Moneylife and hence Moneylife is not responsible or liable for the same. As a source and news provider, IANS is responsible for accuracy, completeness, suitability and validity of any information in this article. The Minerals and Metals Trading Corporation (MMTC) Ltd, India's largest public sector trading body, says a court has ordered attachment of its three properties located in Delhi in the Anglo Coal case. Earlier, after failing to pay the decretal amount, MMTC had deposited original title deeds of 36 immoveable properties to secure interests of Anglo-American Metallurgical Coal Pty Ltd. In a regulatory filing, MMTC, which is one of the two highest earners of foreign exchange for India, says, "...vide order dated 23 August 2021, the execution court attached three properties located in Delhi. MMTC is exploring further legal remedies available." Earlier this month, the Supreme Court disposed a special leave petition (SLP) in favour of the Australian company. The bench of justice RF Nariman and justice KM Joseph had set aside a decision of the division bench of Delhi High Court, while restoring the majority award issued on 12 May 2014. The apex court also upheld the single judges judgement on 10 July 2015 while dismissing MMTC's application filed under Section 34 of the Arbitration Act. The execution petition filed by Anglo Coal was revived on 23 December 2020, and accordingly vide the order dated 3 March 2021 the execution court directed MMTC to deposit Rs586 crore, the principal of the decretal amount within two months from the date of the order. However, MMTC failed to deposit the money citing financial crisis. The decision on the review petition came on 29 July 2021. Accordingly, Anglo Coal, the decree holder filed execution petition for Rs1,047 crore and MMTC has filed for Rs902 crore as liability on account of principal and interest as on 31 July 2021. In 2007, Anglo Coal and MMTC entered into a long-term agreement for supply of a certain quantity of freshly mined and washed coking coal to the Indian company for three delivery periods between 1 July 2004 to 30 June 2007. Both the companies agreed to extend the agreement for two more delivery periods. By consensus, Anglo Coal and MMTC decided to extend the fifth delivery period till 30 September 2009. It was agreed that Anglo Coal would supply 466,000 metric tonnes (MT) of coal to MMTC at $300 per MT for the fifth delivery period. However, due to the global crisis of 2008, MMTC requested Anglo Coal to reduce the price of coal for quantities to be supplied during the fifth delivery period. While MMTC alleged that Anglo Coal failed to supply 454,034MT of coking coal, the Australian company contended that the Indian company failed to buy the coal in breach of their agreement. The matter then reached arbitration. On 12 May 2014, a panel of four arbitrators sat in New Delhi and delivered their international arbitral award in favour of Anglo Coal. The majority award held that the Australian company was able to supply the contracted quantity of coal for the fifth delivery period, at the contractual price, and that it was MMTC, who was unwilling to lift the coal, owing to a slump in the market. MMTC challenged the award under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act before the Delhi High Court. In its judgement on 10 July 2015, the single judge bench upheld the majority award issued by the arbitration panel. In March last year, a division bench of Delhi HC set aside the single judge order and allowed MMTC's appeal. Later, the Supreme Court set aside the Delhi HC judgement dismissing the application made under Section 34 of the Arbitration Act by MMTC. We had mentioned in Wednesdays closing report that Nifty, Sensex may move sideways. On Thursday, the indices opened higher but ended flat. On the NSE, there were 1,005 advances, 989 declines and 5 unchanged. The trend of the major indices on Thursdays trading are given in the table below: Procter & Gamble Hygiene and Health Care reported net profit of Rs 48.98 crore for the quarter ended 30 June 2021, down 29% from 69.21 crore in the corresponding period of the previous financial year (YoY). Revenue grew 24% to Rs 787 crore from Rs 635 crore YoY. Future Retail announced the appointment of Sadashive Nayak as the CEO the company with immediate effect. Kaveri Seed Company board approved a proposal to buy back equity shares worth up to Rs 120 crore at a maximum price of Rs 850 each. Affle India board approved stock split of 1 equity share of the face value of Rs 10 each into five shares of Rs 2 each. Thermax subsidiaries Thermax Babcock and Wilcox Energy Solutions have bagged Rs 293 crore order for a refinery and petrochemical complex in western India. Belstar Microfinance Limited, a subsidiary of Muthoot Finance, plans to raise primary equity of Rs. 350 crore from new investor Affirma Capital and existing investors Muthoot Finance and Maj Invest. Intellect Design Arenas transaction banking specialist Intellect Global Transaction Banking announced a deal win with a leading Islamic bank in APAC to digitise and streamline its cash and trade transaction banking technology offerings. Marksans Pharma received USFDA approval for its ANDA for Acetaminophen Extended-Release Tablets USP, 650 mg (OTC). Carborundum Universal will make a strategic investment in PLUSS Advanced Technologies by acquiring the equity shares of its shareholders as well as subscribing to additional equity capital. Control Print will acquire majority stake of 80% in Innovative Codes India Private Limited. Sonal Adhesives board has approved to dispose off the companys land property in Dheku village in Khopoli to Mr. Hitesh Bhanwarlal Sanghvi. The top gainers and top losers of the major indices are given in the table below: The closing values of the major Asian indices are given in the table below: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has imposed a monetary penalty of Rs27.5 lakh on Thrissur-headquartered Dhanlaxmi Bank for non-compliance with specific provisions issued by the central bank on crediting eligible amounts to the Depositor Education and Awareness Fund (DEA Fund). In a separate release, the RBI announced that it had imposed a penalty of Rs20 lakh on Gorakhpur-based NE & EC Railway Employees Multi-State Primary Cooperative Bank. RBI justified its punitive action saying Dhanlaxmi Bank was being penalised for violating norms related to the Depositor Education and Awareness Scheme, while the action against NE & EC Cooperative Bank was due to deficiencies in its regulatory compliance. The RBI issued two separate statements, one for each bank, informing of its decision. The statutory inspection for supervisory evaluation (ISE) of the bank was conducted concerning its financial position as of 31 March 2020. An examination of the risk assessment report, as well as an inspection report, revealed, inter-alia, contravention of the provisions of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949, read with the Depositor Scheme, the RBI says on Dhanlaxmi Bank, adding that a show-cause notice was issued to the latter seeking explanation on why it should not be penalised for the infringement. After considering the reply, as well as oral submissions made during personal hearings, it was concluded that the charge of contravention was substantiated and called for a financial penalty to be levied on the bank, the central bank further says. On NE & EC Cooperative Bank, it said the action was based on an inspection report of the bank, which, RBI says, revealed non-adherence to specific instructions under the Supervisory Action Framework (SAF). The report was based on the bank's financial position as of 31 March 2019, it added. However, the banking regulator clarified that the fines imposed on the two banks were purely due to deficiencies in regulatory compliance and should not be seen as a comment on the validity of any transaction or agreement that these may have with their respective customers. In its regulatory filing, Dhanlaxmi Bank said that RBI has mentioned that this action is based on the deficiencies in regulatory compliance and is not intended to pronounce upon the validity of any transaction or agreement entered into by the Bank with the customers. Get Laughs or Cry Trying with Ken Rudnick is official selection at Battle of the Sketches SUPPORT THIS INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM The article youre about to read is from our reporters doing their important work investigating, researching, and writing their stories. We want to provide informative and inspirational stories that connect you to the people, issues and opportunities within our community. Journalism takes a lot of resources. Today, our business model has been interrupted by the pandemic; the vast majority of our advertisers businesses have been impacted. Thats why the Weekly is now turning to you for financial support. Learn more about our new Insiders program here. Thank you. JOIN NOW For the past 17 months, its been my great honor to serve on the local Covid Task Force. Local leaders from all walks of life health care, business, government, non-profits, churches, first responders, and more work together so that we can better respond to the real world effects of the Oak Hill, WV (25901) Today A few showers this evening with mostly cloudy conditions overnight. Low around 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 30%.. Tonight A few showers this evening with mostly cloudy conditions overnight. Low around 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 30%. August 26, 2021 Further U.S. Hostility Against The Taliban Is Not In Its Best Interest The chaotic evacuation of international 'assets' and economic migrants from Kabul airport just got more complicate. An hour ago a suicide bomber blew himself up amidst a crowd which was waiting to get access to the airport. Additionally gunfire was heard. At least 13 people got killed. There are pictures and video of dozens of killed and wounded Afghans. Hours ago the U.S. and UK had warned of an imminent ISIS attack on the airport and had asked their citizens to stay away from the airport. The evacuation flights for civilians were supposed to end today. That was to leave time for the several thousand military on the ground to wrap up their mission before the August 31 end date. The Taliban have insisted on that final date. Whoever has sent in the suicide bomber wanted to interrupt that process. Your guess who that was is as good as mine. The whole evacuation panic was and is, in my view, totally unnecessary. The Taliban have no interest in taking hostages or in taking systematic revenge on Afghan personnel that had worked with foreign governments. They publicly issued a complete amnesty. They also need money, international recognition and support. The U.S. has blocked the Afghan central bank accounts with the Fed and ordered the IMF and the World Bank to not provide money to Afghanistan. That is huge leverage. The U.S. could have used that leverage in a positive sense to organize, if necessary at all, a very smooth and orderly evacuation of people by normal civil flights over several weeks or months. But for some reason the Pentagon friendly media in Washington created an artificial panic and set off a monstrous military emergency show. The U.S. should by the way lift its block on that Afghan money. It is in its best interest to have good relations with the Taliban. The German chancellor Merkel recognized that. She announced that Germany will continue to support Afghanistan even under Taliban rule. It is the right thing to do because Afghanistan is still a dirt poor country, because there are people in need and because it is in 'western' interest to keep Afghanistan peaceful and united. An unruly Afghanistan under financial pressure is way more likely to create trouble abroad - be it as shelter for global militants or as a source of huge refugee streams. Withholding money does not create long term leverage. Leverage is to use money to reward good behavior. The Taliban have so far behaved very well. They protected the airport from again being overrun. All of Kabul except for the airport is living a normal life. People are back at work, the banks have reopened. President Joe Biden has taken on political risk by ordering the complete retreat from Afghanistan. Should he consider further hostility against the country, by financial means or by igniting a new civil war as some Republican demands, he will not gain the political profit from it. Posted by b on August 26, 2021 at 15:21 UTC | Permalink Comments next page Moultrie, GA (31768) Today Scattered thunderstorms, some strong early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Low 72F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms, some strong early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Low 72F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%. LOS ANGELES (AP) A 30-year-old man who appeared nude at 4 months old in 1991 on the cover of Nirvanas Nevermind album is suing the band and others, alleging the image is child pornography they have profited from. The lawsuit, filed by Spencer Elden on Tuesday in federal court in California, alleges that Nirvana and the record labels behind Nevermind intentionally commercially marketed Spencers child pornography and leveraged the shocking nature of his image to promote themselves and their music at his expense. The lawsuit says Elden has suffered lifelong damages" from the ubiquitous image of him naked underwater appearing to swim after a dollar bill on a fish hook. It seeks at least $150,000 from each of more than a dozen defendants, including the Kurt Cobain estate, surviving Nirvana members Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl and Geffen Records. Emails seeking comment from representatives for the defendants were not immediately returned. Elden is filing the lawsuit now because he "finally has the courage to hold these actors accountable, one of his attorneys, Maggie Mabie, told The Associated Press Wednesday. Mabie said despite the photo being 30 years old, the lawsuit is within the statute of limitations of federal child pornography law for several reasons, including the fact that the image is still in circulation and earning money. Elden also wants any new versions of the album altered. If there is a 30th anniversary re-release, he wants for the entire world not to see his genitals, Mabie said. When the cover was shot, Nirvana was a little-known grunge band with no sense they were making a generation-defining album in Nevermind," their first major label release, whose songs included Smells Like Teen Spirit, Come as You Are and Lithium. Elden's father was a friend of the photographer, Kirk Weddle, who took pictures of several swimming babies in several scenarios at the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center in Pasadena, California. Cobain chose the image depicting Spencer like a sex worker grabbing for a dollar bill that is positioned dangling from a fishhook in front of his nude body with his penis explicitly displayed, the lawsuit says. Elden has recreated the image several times, always with clothes or swim trunks on, for anniversaries of the album's release, and he has expressed mixed feelings about it in interviews that have grown increasingly negative through the years. He told the New York Post in 2015 that it was cool but weird to be part of something so important that I dont even remember. He added, Itd be nice to have a quarter for every person that has seen my baby penis." The Associated Press does not typically name people who say they have been victims of sexual abuse, but may when they have repeatedly come forward publicly, as Elden has. ___ This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Novoselic. ___ Follow AP Entertainment Writer Andrew Dalton on Twitter: https://twitter.com/andyjamesdalton GRAND ISLAND, Neb. (AP) The former finance director of the Nebraska State Fair has pleaded no contest to three counts of felony theft of money from the fair. Patrick Kopke, 30, pleaded Tuesday and faces up to 20 years in prison on each charge when he is sentenced in October, The Lincoln Journal-World reported. ST. LOUIS (AP) A judge has removed the city of St. Louis from a lawsuit filed after the accidental shooting death of a police officer who was playing a variation of Russian roulette with another officer. The mother of officer Katlyn Alix sued the city after her daughter was shot to death by officer Nathaniel Hendren in January 2019. Todays terrorist attacks in Afghanistan are abhorrent and I condemn them in the strongest possible terms. Our troops in Afghanistan are heroes, to whom we owe an immeasurable debt. We are all praying for the casualties of these attacks, for the wounded to recover swiftly, and for the safety of all Americans still trapped in Afghanistan. -- As a veteran, it is shameful to see the chaos President Biden has caused in Afghanistan. President Biden, Americans demand to know your plan to protect lives and prevent further casualties. You must establish dominance by any and all means necessary to ensure the safety of every American life. There will be a time for accountability, but right now, I implore my fellow Americans to come together and show our troops that we support them. Their efforts are not in vain. Congressman August Pfluger, R-San Angelo -- Heartbreaking attacks outside Kabul airport. Please join me in praying for the injured U.S. military members, all of our troops, our allies, & the innocent lives lost. Gov. Greg Abbott -- Jan and I are devastated to hear the news of the deaths and injuries sustained by several U.S. service members in the attack at the Kabul airport today. Please join us in prayer for the soldiers, their loved ones, and for our armed forces. We will not forget the soldiers who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick Note: All reactions were taken from their respective Facebook pages or taken from press statements. Years after its official breakthrough in 2017, the Aperol Spritz has cemented itself as a go-to cocktail in the US, appearing on more and and more bar menus (and Instagram posts) each year. Part of it is undoubtedly how easy it is to make: It has just three ingredients: Aperol, Prosecco, and soda water. Luckily, none of these are terribly expensive if youre looking for a drink to prepare for a group. But while it might only have recently started gracing cocktail lists in the U.S., its been an aperitif of choice in Europe for around 120 years, with roots that go even further back. The spritz was born in the 1800s, when Austrian soldiers in northern Italys Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia regions (under Austrian rule at the time), were getting tipsy a little too quickly. Aperol Aperotivo Liqueur Aperol Aperitivo Liqueur wine.com $19.99 Shop Now The Austrian soldiers were not used to drinking wines and found them too strong, says Corinthia London bar operations manager Alena Cagnato. Thats why they requested some water to be poured into the wine to make it more drinkable. Spritzen is a German verb [to splash], and thats where the name spritz has its origin. Like all recipes, the spritz evolved: Still water was swapped for sparkling, and other liqueurs were added to the combo for a little something extra. In the 1900s new bitters like Aperol came on the scene, says Cagnato, and the resulting union was perfection: Prosecco is the most known and consumed wine in Veneto and Aperol was born in Padua [a city in Veneto] The marriage between the two was just inevitable I think we can say it has been one of the longest and most successful marriages ever! These days, there are a few ways to go about making one: According to Aperols website, the International Bartenders Association-approved recipe for an Aperol Spritz is three parts Prosecco, two parts Aperol, and one part soda, and an orange slice (of course). If you want more Aperol flavor, Daniel Warrilow, the Italian Portfolio Ambassador for Campari Group (which produces Aperol), suggests equal parts Aperol and Prosecco, plus a splash of soda water and orange. The best Prosecco to use come with the Designation of Controlled Origin (DOC) label, a distinction of excellence that kind of sets out the rules for a proper Prosecco: in this case, its produced from grapes grown in the Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia regions of northeast Italy, says Michelle Erland, certified sommelier. It should also use a minimum of 85% Glera grapes and be produced through a specific method that uses secondary fermentation. If you want to level up, though its not necessary by any means, theres also Prosecco Designation of Controlled Origin and Guaranteed (DOCG), which is made in accordance with the Italian government and adheres to rules even more stringent than DOC. But there are a ton of different kinds of prosecco, which range from something a little sweeter to extra-extra dry, and they have more impact on the flavor of an Aperol Spritz than you might think. Although some proseccos might drink perfectly on their own, once paired with Aperol, they can completely bury the spirits flavor or taste flat against it. And one things for sure: Be sure to avoid any wines that are off-dry or sweet, says Warrilow. The beauty of Prosecco is that its perfectly balanced to complement the herbaceous and floral notes of Aperol as to not have an overly sweet cocktail. All said and done, the best Proseccos for pairing with an Aperol Spritz make the Aperol sing without making the drink too sweet or too dry. But which ones are those? In the interest of saving you from disappointing Aperol Spritzes, this writer once again assembled a crew of seven dedicated, regular-people tasters to give a few proseccos a go and see how they measured up in an Aperol Spritz. One clear winner emerged, but in the name of variety, we spoke with a few other experts (including an Italian bartender and a sommelier) to see which prosecco theyd pair with the Aperol. The Group Favorite Mionetto Prosecco Brut DOC $14.99, Wine.com Mionetto Prosecco Brut 750ml wine.com $14.99 Shop Now During an evening of tastings (five proseccos in all), the Mionetto stood out as the obvious favorite among the seven of us, each bringing our own fair share of Aperol Spritz-swilling history to the tasting table. It was juicy and vibrant in the glass without being overwhelmingly sweet, and the fizz balanced the soda waters carbonation perfectly. I love the Mionetto, said taster Carlos Alvarado. It didnt taste too sweet there was a nice bubbly feeling on the tongue. It tasted like a classic Aperol Spritz. Cindy Brzostowski, also on the tasting committee, echoed Alvarado: Its a classic, signature Aperol, she said. Theres not a lot of sweetness, but its also not too bitter. But it was perhaps volunteer Adam Hurly who summed it up best: Its great that a cocktail I made tastes exactly like one I would pay good money for at the bar. The Sommeliers Picks Valdo Marca Oro Prosecco DOC $14.99, Wine.com Valdo Prosecco Valdo wine.com $14.99 Shop Now Made from 100% Glera grapes, this Prosecco is one of Erlands top picks for an Aperol Spritz. Using high-quality ingredients for your Aperol Spritz like Valdo Marca Oro Prosecco DOC will certainly elevate the classic cocktail with this bottles versatility, fine perlage, and crisp, fruity palate, she says. Perlage, by the way, refers to the bubbles, or pearls, that keep rising up from the bottom of the glass if its a Prosecco where there arent bubbles rising up for long, thatll result in an Aperol Spritz that goes flat fast. La Gioiosa Prosecco DOC Treviso $16.99, Wine.com La Gioiosa Prosecco wine.com $16.99 Shop Now Also a favorite of this writer and the Italian in the tasting committee, this prosecco comes sommelier-recommended for an Aperol Spritz. While its on the pricier side, its a great pick not just for drinking alone, but for balancing out the flavors of the Aperol: La Gioiosas Prosecco DOC Treviso serves an Aperol Spritz well with its dry, fresh and flavorsome sensation on the palate and fine, persistent perlage, says Erland. Like the Valdo Marco Oro above, its made from 100% Glera grapes. The Bartenders Pick Nino Franco Rustico Prosecco Superiore $19.99, Wine.com Nino Franco Prosecco Rustico 750ml wine.com $19.99 Shop Now This DOCG (fancy fancy) Prosecco is at the top of the list for Cagnato. It boasts a very fine perlage and its quite creamy and with character, she says. It comes from Valdobbiadene DOCG, in the heart of the Prosecco hills, and it contains all the typical aromas and notes: green apple, pear, a flower bouquet and some freshness which balances perfectly to complement Aperol. Analytics Recruiter Harnham Launches Graduate Business London-based data and analytics recruitment agency Harnham Group has launched a new business called Rockborne, to train and place the 'next generation' of graduates. Established in 2006, Harnham now has more than 130 consultants, covering permanent and contract vacancies across the UK, Europe, and USA, and it provides access to its annual salary and diversity guides. The company recently moved into larger offices in San Francisco and Berlin, and opened a new office in Arizona. Its new business will take on graduates and put them through an intensive sixteen-week training program, designed to ensure that they not only have the most up-to-date technical skills, but also the business acumen and softer skills required. They will then be given two-year placements as Consultants in data teams across the country, after which, their current employer will have the choice whether or not to keep them on permanently. The consultants will also have the opportunity to undertake three weeks of training prior to their placement, tailored to the business they are entering. Rockborne will be led by CEO Neil Berry (pictured), who previously served as a Partner at both KPMG and IBM. He will work alongside former dunnhumby exec Gareth Mitchell-Jones who joins as Chief Revenue Officer; Waseem Ali, formerly of Virgin Care, as Chief Data Officer; and former Barclays exec Amy Foster, who will serve as Rockborne's Chief Talent Officer. Harnham Executive Chairman Simon Clarke comments: 'Rockborne is set to continue the mission already pursued by our other Harnham Group companies; to help the world of data and analytics innovate and flourish, to provide opportunities for those who work in the industry to thrive, and to create a more diverse and inclusive workforce.' Web sites: www.harnham.com and www.rockborne.com . Tidelands Health volunteers get the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine in Murrells Inlet in December. There are about 975 doses for the hospital front-line workers given on a voluntary basis. While the staff is optimistic about the vaccine, they say they will remain vigilant by continuing to wear masks and practice social distancing until the vaccine is widely available to limit the spread of COVID-19. Photo by Janet Morgan/janet.morgan@myhorrynews.com LONDON (AP) For months, Gabrielle Walker had been looking for a part-time job. She applied to restaurant chains and retailers like Nandos and Primark, and she scoured the job search site Indeed. Nothing. Then one day, Walker, a 19-year-old student at University College London, was scrolling through TikTok and stumbled on a video about an app called Stint. A face on the screen explained that Stint could help students earn money by working brief temporary stints at places like restaurants and bars that require little training or experience. Walker downloaded the app, took a 15-minute intro course and days later snagged a job polishing cutlery at a Michelin-star restaurant in London for one day. Between May and June, she took on several other gigs, squeezing them into her class schedule where she could. Everyone could do it, Walker said. Stint, in use across the U.K., has grown in popularity, alongside similar apps in the United States like Instawork and Gigpro, as one response to the peculiar ways in which economies have been rebounding from the pandemic recession. Uncertainty about the durability of the recoveries and the tentative re-openings of businesses still threatened by the coronavirus have made flexibility a top priority for workers and employees alike. As the hospitality industry, in particular, confronts worker shortages, these apps are helping form an ultra-short-term worker-employee relationship, something that hasn't widely existed in recent decades. Walker noted that even students with no relevant experience could sign up with one of these apps and likely find paid work as brief as a couple of hours that fits their schedule from week to week. In contrast to Stint, Instawork and Gigpro are suited more for skilled or experienced workers who want or need short-term shifts. Collectively, the newer apps represent a variation on the many gig apps that sprang up in recent years from Uber and DoorDash to TaskRabbit and Thumbtack that typically serve households in need of a one-time service. What distinguishes the latest apps is that they link workers with employers that have a steady need for labor but don't necessarily want to commit to permanent hires given the uncertainties from the pandemic. Its no surprise that during COVID, when everything became virtual that these ... marketplaces might have exploded, said Fiona Greig, co-president of the JPMorgan Chase Institute, a global financial thinktank, whose research expertise includes the online platform economy. The newer gig apps could potentially help ease the labor shortage in England, where nearly all pandemic restrictions were lifted last month. Most recently, its pingdemic by which the National Health Service alerted people to self-isolate if they had been in close proximity to someone who had tested positive for the virus disrupted businesses. Many workers had to isolate themselves, and some stores had to shut down temporarily for lack of labor. Gig economy workers can help plug the gap, said Mariano Mamertino, a senior economist at LinkedIn. While Mamertino holds out hope that pandemic-related shortages will ease as Englands economy reopens and vaccine rollouts continue, one question mark that remains for the UK," he said, is whether firms will have to permanently adapt to a new post-Brexit status quo. Not everyone is celebrating the trend. UKHospitality, the leading trade association for Britains hospitality sector, suggested that while businesses are used to innovating, the economic forces that have created staff shortages in the industry could pose enduring problems. The association, along with the British Beer and Pub Association and the British Institute of Innkeeping, asserted that the road to recovery requires that the government put in place the right trading environment," including an expansion of business tax cuts. UKHospitality has also urged an overhaul of post-Brexit visa rules to make it easier for foreigners to work in the industry. Sol Schlagman, who co-founded Stint along with his brother, Sam, drew from his own experience as a college student in creating it. Its the student that needs to have money to pay their rent," he said, "but its also the student that wants to buy a pair of shoes they wouldnt necessarily buy otherwise. The restaurant chain Chipotle uses Stint to recruit workers at short notice to cover peak times in our restaurants," said Jacob Sumner, its director of European operations. Chilango, another food chain, said its stores use the app when they need extra pairs of hands during busy times. The use of apps to connect businesses and workers for short-term gig work appears to be a growing trend in the United States as well. The biggest change we see is this desire for flexible staffing on both sides, said Sumir Meghani, CEO and co-founder of Instawork, which connects businesses with temporary or short-term hourly workers. During the pandemic, Meghani said, businesses discovered that the rise and fall of viral cases and the resulting disruptions to their operations sometimes require them to scale up or down at any given notice. Greater flexibility in the worker-employer relationship during the pandemic period is also what Gigpro's founder, Ben Ellsworth, has observed. His app, which operates in three Southern U.S. states, is expanding, to try to address staffing shortages exacerbated by the pandemic. Ellsworth, who spent years in the restaurant industry, said that with eateries in particular, workers have been plagued with low wages, lack of incentive, no real focus on flexibility or quality of life. Stuck at home after being laid off, many of these workers either turned to other industries, Ellsworth suggested, or came to recognize gig work as an opportunity to tailor their work hours to their own needs. That realization arrived just as businesses, too, sought workers to fill part-time hourly slots at least temporarily as business restrictions eased. Now that restrictions have been lifted and businesses are starting to boom again," Ellsworth said, "theyre getting stretched. While the flexibility provided by these apps serves a need now, some critics foresee a threat to workers over the long run. If gig workers replace jobs formerly filled by permanent restaurant or retail employees, they could diminish job security, along with sick pay and other benefits. The flexibility of the gig economy may be welcome when crises take out regular staff, but this comes at a potential cost to society," said Ann Light, a professor of design and creative technology at the University of Sussex. Still, Greig acknowledged that the apps can lower barriers to entry for people who need cash quickly, a category that includes many young workers with limited work experience. The role of gig workers, for employment purposes, can vary widely with these apps. Student users of Stint are employed as workers, guaranteed a set wage and accrued holiday pay. On the other hand, those who use Instawork are considered independent workers who can choose to be either contractors or employees. Gigpro users are independent contractors. Platforms also take their cue from an international perspective, Light suggested, even as they battle local jurisdictions. This year, Uber drivers in Britain won rights as workers. Similarly, last week, a judge struck down a California measure that exempted app-based ride and delivery services like Uber from a state law requiring that drivers be classified as employees eligible for benefits. In the meantime, the worker apps appear to be filling a niche. For Monty Jackson, a student at the University of Plymouth in England, the work gigs he's obtained through Stint have helped fund his swimming hobby. He had been working part time at restaurants and bars. But the work shifts he received had interfered with his studies. Now, he plugs in only the hours when hes available and picks up a work slot sometimes the same day he looks for one. The flexibility attracted me," Jackson said. ___ This story was first published on August 24, 2021. It was updated on August 26, 2021 to correct the name of the Instawork app. Nearly nine months after South Jacksonville trustees approved its creation, a separate bank account is being established to comply with requirements for drug-seized funds. Other problems linger, though, that are keeping the villages police chief from accessing available law enforcement tools. Although trustees approved creating the forfeiture fund in December, it took until this week to get the necessary documents needed for the bank to set it up. Police Chief Eric Hansell said he received the papers Monday and the bank created the account Tuesday. Asset forfeiture is a common practice among local, state and federal law enforcement agencies when they suspect the money was made through drugs. Money, vehicles and other assets can be seized and eventually used for law enforcement equipment and training. In Illinois, about 90% of what is confiscated is returned to the arresting agency, according to a 2020 study by the Institute for Justice. Money collected through the process has to be kept separate from other funds. I dont want that sitting at the vault in the station, Hansell said. I have to have somewhere to put that money. When assets are seized, its up to a judge to determine if they should go be returned or be held until a hearing. Should it be determined the assets were acquired through the sale of drugs, Hansell said it would then be turned over to the state, which determines how it is allocated. I [wanted] it done so were compliant, he said. I just want to make sure were doing everything by the book. Now, the police chief is hoping to resolve an issue involving certification requirements and access to official email. Hansell was fired earlier this month by Mayor Tyson Manker, but reinstated by trustees within days. Since his return, however, my access to email was essentially killed. Between the time he was first hired in 2020 and the time of his reinstatement this month, the village changed its website domain from southjacksonville.org to southjacksonville-il.gov. While that might seem like a minor change, law enforcement programs like Criminal Justice Information Services, a division of the FBI that provides tools to police and national security and intelligence community partners, require any that anyone who is an administrator of a government website complete training because of the sensitive nature of some of the materials. The new domain will not be recognized by the service until then. Hansell has told trustees he is unsure whether Manker who is on a leave of absence has taken coursework. It would be required because Manker is an administrator of the villages website and server. Illinois State Police is being asked to investigate whether the release of audio from a closed-door meeting which South Jacksonville Mayor Tyson Manker said shows efforts to retaliate against him violated state law. Manker posted an edited version of an audio file on his Facebook page that reportedly was made during an executive session portion of a village trustee meeting Aug. 17. Government officials can conduct such sessions outside of a public setting when certain criteria are met. Manker, who said Aug. 9 that he was taking a leave of absence from the office he has held since May, was not in the closed-door meeting. South Jacksonville Police Chief Eric Hansell initiated a review Tuesday of whether the posting violates state law. Although state law does not prevent officials from speaking about matters discussed in a closed session, documents and recordings are not permitted to be publicly distributed without a vote by the board during an open session. Hansell said he was requesting an independent investigation by state police. He and Manker have had a tumultuous relationship after Manker fired the chief this month before that move was overturned and Hansell was reinstated. Manker said in the social media post that Hansell, as well as Trustee Paula Belobrajdic-Stewart, are retaliating against him. Why is village Trustee Paula Belobrajdic-Stewart conspiring with the recently reinstated police chief to retaliate against me by suspending my access to Village Hall and having state police conduct an adult threat assessment to determine if I, the mayor, [pose] a threat of shooting up Village Hall? Is this real life? It is truly unbelievable the lows these officials are willing to stoop [to]. This is what I deal with, he wrote. Belobrajdic-Stewart was unavailable for comment Wednesday. Village Attorney Rob Cross declined to comment. In another post, Manker said he has felt harassed since taking office. The job that I was elected to do is no longer enjoyable due to constant harassment and vicious, disgusting personal attacks from my political opponents. These are not reasonable working conditions, as an elected official. After just over 100 days in office, my desire to serve has evaporated like a fog at high noon, and the hope that I once had for South Jacksonville has all but disappeared. Hansell can be heard in the audio suggesting restricting Mankers access to Village Hall until an assessment is done after comments by Manker through email and in person raised concerns. In an email from Manker to Hansell that was obtained by the Journal-Courier through the Freedom of Information Act, Manker expressed worries for his safety after a confrontation with former Trustee Jason Hill. I now feel I need to carry a weapon in my office, because I simply do not safe [sic]. Maybe you can also advise me about how I could make that happen, Manker wrote. Although the newspaper was not provided with a copy of the response to the email, Hansell said Wednesday that he told Manker only law enforcement officers were permitted to carry weapons on village property, regardless of whether the person had a concealed carry permit. Hansell said in the recording that Mankers desire to carry a gun, as well as other statements including a comment Manker reportedly made that if this were Iraq, you know what I would do raised what Hansell considered a need to assess the situation for everyones safety. Im not saying that that was his intention, Hansell said in the recording. Im just saying that when I look at [Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder], everything that he is exhibiting is pointing to that right there. Manker received a other-than-honorable discharge from the Marine Corps following his 2003 deployment to Iraq, according to the publication Stars and Stripes. He told the New York Times in 2018 that it was because he was caught smoking marijuana one time to try to calm his nerves. Hansell said in the recording that the village has requested assessments in the past for employees who have taken leaves of absence because of mental health issues or have made statements that could be considered threatening. Such assessments are used to determine if there is a credible threat and what actions should be taken. The police chief said because of his termination and subsequent reinstatement, an outside agency needed to look into any allegations. After everything that has happened with me in the last two to three weeks, I believe someone independent needs to handle these investigations, Hansell said. It is a conflict of interest and, this way, if an arrest is made, it cannot be alleged that I was doing it to retaliate. The new four-bedroom house in Charlotte, North Carolina, was Crystal Marie and Eskias McDaniels personal American dream, the reason they had moved to this Southern town from pricey Los Angeles a few years ago. A lush, long lawn, 2,700 square feet of living space, a neighborhood pool and playground for their son, Nazret. All for $375,000. Prequalifying for the mortgage was a breeze. They said they had saved much more than they would need for the down payment, had very good credit scores of 805 and 725 and earned roughly six figures each, she in marketing at a utility company and Eskias representing a pharmaceutical company. The monthly mortgage payment was less than theyd paid for rent in Los Angeles for years. They were scheduled to sign the mortgage documents on Aug. 23, 2019 a Friday and were so excited to move in they booked movers for the same day. The Wednesday before the big day, the loan officer called Crystal Marie, and everything changed, she said: The deal wasnt going to close. The loan officer told the couple he had submitted the application internally to the underwriting department for approval a dozen, 15, maybe 17 times, getting a no" each time. The couple had spent $6,000 in fees and deposits all nonrefundable. It seemed like it was getting rejected by an algorithm, she said, and then there was a person who could step in and decide to override that or not. She was told she didnt qualify because she was a contractor, not a full-time employee even though her boss told the lender she was not at risk of losing her job. Her co-workers were contractors, too, and they had mortgages. Crystal Maries co-workers are white. She and Eskias are Black. I think it would be really naive for someone like myself to not consider that race played a role in the process, she said. An investigation by The Markup has found that lenders in 2019 were more likely to deny home loans to people of color than to white people with similar financial characteristics even when we controlled for newly available financial factors the mortgage industry for years has said would explain racial disparities in lending. This story was reported by The Markup, and the story and data were distributed by The Associated Press. Holding 17 different factors steady in a complex statistical analysis of more than 2 million conventional mortgage applications for home purchases, we found that lenders were 40% more likely to turn down Latino applicants for loans, 50% more likely to deny Asian/Pacific Islander applicants, and 70% more likely to deny Native American applicants than similar white applicants. Lenders were 80% more likely to reject Black applicants than similar white applicants. These are national rates. In every case, the prospective borrowers of color looked almost exactly the same on paper as the white applicants, except for their race. The industry had criticized previous similar analyses for not including financial factors they said would explain disparities in lending rates but were not public at the time: debts as a percentage of income, how much of the propertys assessed worth the person is asking to borrow, and the applicants credit score. The first two are now public in the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data. Including these financial data points in our analysis not only failed to eliminate racial disparities in loan denials, it highlighted new, devastating ones. We found that lenders gave fewer loans to Black applicants than white applicants even when their incomes were high $100,000 a year or more and had the same debt ratios. In fact, high-earning Black applicants with less debt were rejected more often than high-earning white applicants who have more debt. Lenders used to tell us, Its because you dont have the lending profiles; the ethno-racial differences would go away if you had them, said Jose Loya, assistant professor of urban planning at UCLA who has studied public mortgage data extensively and reviewed our methodology. Your work shows thats not true. We sent our complete analysis to industry representatives: The American Bankers Association, The Mortgage Bankers Association, The Community Home Lenders Association, and The Credit Union National Association. They all criticized it generally, saying the public data is not complete enough to draw conclusions, but did not point to any flaws in our computations. Blair Bernstein, director of public relations for the ABA, acknowledged that our analysis showed disparities but that given the limitations in the public data we used, the numbers are not sufficient on their own to explain why those disparities exist. In written statements, the ABA and MBA criticized The Markups analysis for not including credit scores and for focusing on conventional loans only and not including government loans, such as those guaranteed by the Federal Housing Administration and Department of Veterans Affairs. Isolating conventional loans from government loans is common in mortgage research because they are different products, with different thresholds for approval and loan terms. Government loans bring people who wouldnt otherwise qualify into the market but tend to be more expensive for the borrower. Even the Federal Reserve and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the agency that releases mortgage data, separate conventional and FHA loans in their research on lending disparities. Authors of one academic study out of Northeastern and George Washington universities said they focus on conventional loans only because FHA loans have long been implemented in a manner that promotes segregation. As for credit scores, it was impossible for us to include them in our analysis because the CFPB strips them from public view from HMDA data in part due to the mortgage industrys lobbying to remove them, citing borrower privacy. When the CFPB first proposed expanding mortgage data collection to include the very data that industry trade groups have told us is vital for doing this type of analysis credit scores, debt-to-income ratio, and loan-to-value ratio those same groups objected. They didnt want the government to even collect the data, let alone make it public. They cited the risk of a cyberattack, which could reveal borrowers private information. These new (data) fields include confidential financial data, several large trade groups wrote in a letter to the CFPB, including the ABA and MBA. Consequently, if this (sic) data are inadvertently or knowingly released to the public, the harm associated with re-identification would be even greater. Government regulators do have access to credit scores. The CFPB analyzed 2019 HMDA data and found that accounting for credit scores does not eliminate lending disparities for people of color. In addition to finding disparities in loan denials nationally, we examined cities and towns across the country individually and found disparities in 89 metropolitan areas spanning every region of the country. In Charlotte, where Crystal Marie and her family searched for a home, lenders were 50% more likely to deny loans to Black applicants than white ones with similar financial profiles. In other places, the gap was even larger. Black applicants in Chicago were 150% more likely to be denied by financial institutions than similar white applicants there. Lenders were more than 200% more likely to reject Latino applicants than white applicants in Waco, Texas, and to reject Asian and Pacific Islander applicants than white ones in Port St. Lucie, Florida. And Native American applicants in Minneapolis were 100% more likely to be denied by financial institutions than similar white applicants there. Its something that we have a very painful history with, said Alderman Matt Martin, who represents Chicagos 47th Ward. Redlining, the now-outlawed practice of branding certain Black and immigrant neighborhoods too risky for financial investments that began in the 1930s, can be traced back to Chicago. Chicago activists exposed that banks were still redlining in the 1970s, leading to the establishment of the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, the law mandating the collection of data used for this story. When you see that maybe the tactics are different now, but the outcomes are substantially similar, Martin added, its just not something we can continue to tolerate. Who makes these loan decisions? Officially, lending officers at each institution. In reality, software, most of it mandated by a pair of quasi-governmental agencies. Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were founded by the federal government to spur homeownership and now buy about half of all mortgages in America. If they dont approve a loan, the lenders are on their own if the borrower skips out. And that power means Fannie and Freddie essentially set the rules for the industry, starting from the very beginning of the mortgage-approval process. Fannie and Freddie require lenders to use a particular credit scoring algorithm, Classic FICO, to determine whether an applicant meets the minimum threshold necessary to even be considered for a conventional mortgage, currently a score of 620. This algorithm was developed from data from the 1990s and is more than 15 years old. Its widely considered detrimental to people of color because it rewards traditional credit, to which white Americans have more access. It does not consider, among other things, on-time payments for rent, utilities, and cellphone bills but will lower peoples scores if they get behind on them and are sent to debt collectors. Unlike more recent models, it penalizes people for past medical debt even if its since been paid. This is how structural racism works, said Chi Chi Wu, a staff attorney at the National Consumer Law Center. This is how racism gets embedded into institutions and policies and practices with absolutely no animus at all. Potentially fairer credit models have existed for years. A recent study by Vantage Score a credit model developed by the Big Three credit bureaus to compete with FICO estimated that its model would provide credit to 37 million Americans who have no scores under FICO models. Almost a third of them would be Black or Latino. Yet Fannie and Freddie have resisted a steady stream of plaintive requests since 2014 from advocates, the mortgage and housing industries, and Congress to update to a newer model. Even the company that created Classic FICO has lobbied for the agencies to adopt a newer version, which it said expands credit to more people. A lot of things that minorities and underserved borrowers are doing, responsible financial behaviors, are going under the radar, said Scott Olson, executive director of CHLA, a trade group representing small and midsized independent mortgage lenders. Fannies and Freddies regulator and conservator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, continues to allow the companies to stick with Classic FICO, more than five years after ordering them to study the effects of switching to something newer. The FHFA has also expressed concern about the cost and operational implications if they would have to continually test new credit scoring models. Neither of the companies would answer questions from The Markup about why they still require Classic FICO. Theyve been testing alternate scores for years, and I dont know why the process is taking so long, said Lisa Rice, president and CEO of the National Fair Housing Alliance, a consortium of hundreds of fair housing organizations. Well-deserving consumers are being left behind. Fannies and Freddies approval process also involves other mysterious algorithms: automated underwriting software programs that they first launched in 1995 to much fanfare about their speed, ease and, most important, fairness. Using a data base as opposed to human judgment can avoid influences by other forces, such as discrimination against minority individuals and red-lining, Peter Maselli, then a vice president of Freddie Mac, told The New York Times when it launched its software, now called Loan Product Advisor. A bank executive told Congress that year the new systems were explicitly and implicitly color blind, since they did not consider a persons race at all in their evaluations. But, like similar promises that algorithms would make colorblind decisions in criminal risk assessment and health care, research shows that some of the factors Fannie and Freddie say their software programs consider affect people differently depending on their race or ethnicity. These include, in addition to credit histories, the prospective borrowers assets, employment status, debts, and the size of the loan relative to the value of the property theyre hoping to buy. The quality of the data that youre putting into the underwriting algorithm is crucial, said Aracely Panameno, director of Latino affairs for the Center for Responsible Lending. If the data that youre putting in is based on historical discrimination, then youre basically cementing the discrimination at the other end. Research has shown that payday loan sellers usually place branches in neighborhoods populated mainly by people of color, where bank branches are less common. As a result, residents are more likely to use these predatory services to borrow money. This creates lopsided, incomplete credit histories because banks report both good and bad financial behavior to credit bureaus, while payday loan services only report missed payments. Gig workers who are people of color are more likely to report that those jobs are their primary source of income rather than a side hustle theyre using for extra cash than white gig workers. Having multiple sources of income or unconventional employment can complicate the verification process for a mortgage, as Crystal Marie and Eskias McDaniels learned. Considering an applicants assets beyond the down payment, which lenders call reserves, can cause particular problems for people of color. People with fatter bank accounts present a lower risk because they can more easily weather a setback that would leave others unable to pay the mortgage. But, largely due to intergenerational wealth and past racist policies, the typical white family in America today has eight times the wealth of a typical Black family and five times the wealth of a Latino family. People of color are more likely to have smaller savings accounts and smaller (or nonexistent) stock portfolios than white people. This is a relatively new world of automated underwriting engines that by intent may not discriminate but by effect likely do, said David Stevens, a former president and CEO of the Mortgage Bankers Association, now an independent financial consultant. Not even home valuations are free from controversy. The president of the trade group representing real estate appraisers, who determine property values for loans, recently acknowledged that racial bias is prevalent in the industry and launched new programs to combat it. Any type of data that you look at from the financial services space has a high tendency to be highly correlated to race, said Rice, of the National Fair Housing Alliance. In written statements, Fannie said its software analyzes applications without regard to race, and both Fannie and Freddie said their algorithms are routinely evaluated for compliance with fair lending laws, internally and by the FHFA and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. HUD said in an email to The Markup that it has asked the pair to make changes in underwriting criteria as a result of those reviews but would not disclose the details. This analysis includes a review to ensure that model inputs are not serving as proxies for race or other protected classes, Chad Wandler, Freddies director of public relations, said in a written statement. He declined to elaborate on what the review entails or how often its done. No one outside Fannie and Freddie knows exactly how the factors in their underwriting software are used or weighted; the formulas are closely held secrets. Not even the companies regulator, the FHFA, appears to know, beyond broad strokes, exactly how the software scores applicants, according to Stevens, who served as Federal Housing commissioner and assistant secretary for housing at HUD during the Obama administration. The Markups analysis does not include decisions made by Fannies and Freddies underwriting algorithms because, while lenders are required to report those decisions to the government, the CFPB scrubs them from public mortgage data, arguing that including them would likely disclose information about the applicant or borrower that is not otherwise public and may be harmful or sensitive. Lenders ultimate mortgage decisions are public, however. Borrowers names are not reported to the government and addresses are not in the public data. Fannie and Freddie declined to answer our questions about why their algorithms decisions are excluded from the public data but said in a 2014 letter to the CFPB that the revelation could allow their decision-making algorithms to be reverse-engineered. Loan officers say the softwares decisions are mysterious even to them. When you run so many deals through the automated system, youll look at one deal that didnt get an approval, and you just know that thats a better client than someone else that mightve gotten approved, said Ashley Thomas III, a broker and owner of LA Top Broker, Inc., a minority-owned real estate agency and brokerage in South Los Angeles. That lack of transparency in the technology is very concerning. The Community Home Lenders Association sent a letter to Fannie and Freddie in April complaining about unannounced changes to both of their underwriting software programs that members discovered when applicants who had previously been approved suddenly were denied. Scott Olson, executive director of CHLA, said theres no good reason to keep lenders in the dark: The more transparent, the more clear the guidance is, the easier it is for borrowers to know what they need to do to be in a position to qualify. Earlier this month and weeks after we began asking about its algorithms Fannie announced in a news release that it would start incorporating on-time rent payments in its loan approval software starting in mid-September. When we asked about the timing of that change, spokesperson Katie Penote emailed The Markup a statement saying the company wanted prospective borrowers to have this option as soon as possible but was silent about what prompted it. In addition to using Fannies or Freddies software, many large lenders also run applicants through their institutions own underwriting software, which may be more stringent. How those programs work is even more of a mystery; they are also proprietary. When we examined the reasons lenders listed for denying mortgages in 2019, the most common reason across races and ethnicities, with the exception of Native Americans, was that applicants had too much debt relative to their incomes. When lenders did list credit history as the reason for denial, it was cited more often for Black applicants than white ones in 2019: 33% versus 21%. When we examined the decisions by individual lenders, many denied people of color more than white applicants. An additional statistical analysis showed that several were at least 100% more likely to deny people of color than similar white borrowers. Among them: the mortgage companies owned by nations three largest home builders. The two principal laws forbidding housing and lending discrimination are the 1968 Fair Housing Act and the 1974 Equal Credit Opportunity Act. An alphabet soup of federal agencies can refer evidence of violations of these laws to HUD or the Justice Department for investigation, but referrals have dropped precipitously over the past decade. Marcia Fudge, who took over HUD leadership earlier this year, told Axios in June that part of the reason Black ownership rates are so low in America is that we have never totally enforced the Fair Housing Act. In an email, HUD press secretary Meaghan Lynch told The Markup that Fudge intends to tackle systemic discrimination in the housing and credit markets that is at the heart of the racial homeownership gap. We do have laws that explicitly protect against discrimination, and yet you still see these disparities that youre finding, so that suggests that we need better enforcement of existing laws, and more investigations, said Kevin Stein, deputy director of the California Reinvestment Coalition. Agencies need to do a better job of ferreting out discrimination and taking serious action once they find it. Another key housing law, the federal Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1977, allows the federal government to penalize lenders who fail to invest in low-income or blighted neighborhoods but makes no requirements regarding borrowers race. Steins group has lobbied for the law to be reformed. Lenders who violate fair lending rules can be punished with fines in the millions of dollars. Rep. Al Green, a Texas Democrat, has sponsored legislation wending its way through Congress that would make it a crime to engage in lending discrimination. Banks already have laws that punish people who commit fraud, he said. You can be imprisoned for I hope you have your seatbelt on 30 years. Why not have some similar law that deals with banks who are invidiously discriminating against people who are trying to borrow money? And some fair lending advocates have begun to ask whether the value system in mortgage lending should be tweaked. As an industry, we need to think about, what are the less discriminatory alternatives, even if they are a valid predictor of risk, said David Sanchez, a former Federal Housing Finance Agency policy analyst who currently directs research and development at the nonprofit National Community Stabilization Trust. Because if we let risk alone govern all of our decisions, we are going to end up in the exact same place we are now when it comes to racial equity in this country. Crystal Marie McDaniels said whatever effect race may have had on her denial, it wasnt overt. Im not sure you ever really know, because theres no klansmen in our yard or anything but its definitely something we always think about, she said. Its just something that we always understand might be a possibility. The lender, loanDepot, denied race had anything to do with the decision. The companys vice president of communications, Lori Wildrick, said in an email that the company follows the law and expects fair and equitable treatment for every applicant. We take the issues raised by Ms. (McDaniels) very seriously and are conducting a thorough review of her concerns. Crystal Marie said buying a house was crucial for her because she wants to pass on wealth to her son someday, giving him an advantage she never had. So when the loan officer told her the deal wasnt going to happen, she refused to give up. With the help of their real estate agent, and multiple emails from her employer on her behalf, she and her husband Eskias pushed back against the denial. Around 8 p.m. on the night before the original closing date, Crystal Marie got an email from the lender: Youre cleared to close. She still doesnt understand how the lender went from a no to a yes, but she was relieved and elated. It means so much to me, as a Black person, to own property in a place where not that many generations ago you were property, said Crystal Marie, who said she is descended from slaves in neighboring South Carolina. She said her family has always had a fraught relationship with money. Some relatives were so mistrustful of banks that theyd insisted on dealing only in cash, she said, making it impossible to build up credit or wealth for future generations. Its meant so much, she said, that we were able to go through this process and finally, eventually, be successful. ___ This story was reported by The Markup and the story and data were distributed by The Associated Press. Watertown, SD (57201) Today Cloudy this evening with showers after midnight. Low around 60F. Winds SE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%.. Tonight Cloudy this evening with showers after midnight. Low around 60F. Winds SE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%. Q&A: For McAvoy, Horgan Together is an actors dream View Photo James McAvoy and Sharon Horgan didnt know one another before this year. But the two actors got very familiar very quickly thanks to the new film Together, a cutting examination of a failing relationship during the pandemic only held together by their 10-year-old son. Armed with acerbic dialogue and honest monologues written by Tony Award-winner Dennis Kelly, an Oscar-nominated director in Stephen Daldry and a freedom to break the fourth wall and address the audience directly, McAvoy and Horgan got to flex their skills as actors while diving into the collective trauma of the past 18 months. The film opens in North American theaters Friday. McAvoy and Horgan spoke to The Associated Press recently about the intense process and not holding anything back. Remarks have been edited for clarity and brevity. - AP: This was an insanely quick 10-day shoot. Were you at least able to rehearse beforehand? HORGAN: Oh yes. There was an awful lot to work out because we were going to be in this one house and mainly utilizing two rooms and so in order for them to be in any way interesting visually to look at, we needed to sort of get it up on its feet and get moving with it. Stephen just kept us moving constantly. Then this funny thing happened, well it wasnt funny at the time, but it kept happening we would rehearse something and work it all out in movement and choreograph it and then no one could remember what we did but in actual fact, you would usually end up in a place that worked better. AP: This isnt quite as mean as say, Whos Afraid of Virginia Woolf, but these characters are pretty cruel to one another. Was that exciting to perform? HORGAN: It was really exciting. Every day you just didnt know where youd get to and it felt really unusual to get to do that Im quite shy as a person. Im a bit like, Dont look at me and James is so immediately in it and doing it. It was like, Oh were doing this? You had to lose your inhibitions. You had to be willing to try anything. MCAVOY: Theres a little bit of film acting where its like, Save it for the camera, save it for the take People dont even care sometimes if youre saying the lines in the script as long as something truthful got captured on camera, something vital and alive and full of energy But this is so detailed and so dense you couldnt just save it for the camera. You couldnt just save it for the day and hope a better truth would come out because maybe a truth comes out in the first five seconds and then you realize you have 20 minutes of this and you need to make every minute work. If one minute doesnt work the audience will check out. It felt like we were getting to use our craft rather than just being little vehicles for honesty and truth. AP: James, is doing a project like this about the emotional toll of the pandemic coming from the same place as your impulse to raise money for PPE? MCAVOY: No, absolutely not. Its just completely selfish and personal Sometimes its just as simple as, My God, the writing is compelling enough that all I need to do is look into the camera and talk to you for 10 minutes and its enough. Theres something so pure about that. Its like when youre in the pub or your pals telling you a story or youre having a conversation with a mate or your missus or your son or whoever. When the conversation is that compelling and that exciting, hours go by, days go by, weeks go by. If we can do that in writing and filming and acting, then that is really, really special because thats real connection. This felt like it had the potential to be that. AP: Sharon, you excel in awkward relationship truths in works like this and Catastrophe. Why are you drawn to that? HORGAN: Its what I find interesting to write and its what I find interesting to perform. When youre writing about relationships, the things that are easiest to write are the ones that are dysfunctional because its funny or interesting. I dont have a huge amount of interest in just having sweet stories. MCAVOY: Generally when were happy, we kind of understand why were happy. We dont really understand why were a mess, thats why we do years and years and years and years of therapy. Thats what drama is for, thats what comedy is for, thats what any kind of art is for to help us look at ourselves and understand why were such a (expletive) mess. AP: Did you find yourselves turning to art over the past year for comfort or catharsis? HORGAN: I watched an awful lot of true crime. Thats it really When bad things are happening you kind of turn to see something worse happening to someone else. MCAVOY: I actually started playing online video games with four of my pals. A bunch of 40-something males and here we are playing computer games. HORGAN: Violent? MCAVOY: Mainly the violence happens to us though Itll be like kids from far-flung countries just kicking the (expletive) out of us. Every second or third night were chatting about life, love and everything in a way that weve never done and more regularly than weve ever done. HORGAN: Whilst holding guns? MCAVOY: Whilst holding control pads, pretending to be good at games whilst getting our (expletive) handed to us by foreign children. - Follow AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ldbahr By LINDSEY BAHR AP Film Writer Tigray forces in Ethiopia support negotiated end to war View Photo NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) The leader of Tigray forces in Ethiopia has expressed the commitment to a negotiated end to the nine-month war that has killed thousands and left nearly half a million people facing famine, while the United Nations secretary-general on Thursday warned there is no military solution. In a letter to U.N. chief Antonio Guterres, seen by The Associated Press ahead of Thursdays U.N. Security Council meeting on the crisis, Debretsion Gebremichael said the Tigray side requires an impartial mediator, among other conditions. But he warned that the African Union, whose headquarters are in Ethiopia, cannot provide any solution to the war that the continental body endorsed early in the fighting. That complicates the AU initiative announced Thursday to appoint former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo as its special representative to the Horn of Africa. The prospect for talks between Ethiopias government and the Tigray leadership, who dominated the national government for 27 years before Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took office, remains deeply challenging. Ethiopias government earlier this year declared the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front a terrorist group, and the United States told Thursdays meeting that the government has not responded positively to calls for talks. Meanwhile, the conflict has spread in recent weeks into Ethiopias Amhara and Afar regions, displacing hundreds of thousands of people, while Abiys government has called all able citizens to war, urging them to stop the Tigray forces once and for all. The heated rhetoric on both sides has led to growing international calls for an immediate cease-fire. The further the resurgent Tigray forces advance outside the Tigray region, the greater the harm to the ethnic Tigrayans for whom they act, Kenyan Ambassador Martin Kimani told the Security Council meeting, while urging Ethiopia to be prepared to lift the terror designation. He also encouraged the African Union to step up. What began as a political falling-out now threatens to destabilize Africas second most populous country, while abuses have been committed by all sides in the mix of armed groups that include those from neighboring Eritrea. The worlds worst hunger crisis in a decade continues to worsen. Guterres at Thursdays meeting criticized the de facto humanitarian blockade of the Tigray region of 6 million people, with food warehouses there now empty, and the United States warned that if these impediments continue, large numbers of people will starve to death. With sadness and disbelief, we are once again discussing the possibility of a manmade famine in Tigray, Norways Deputy Ambassador Trine Heimerback said, referring to Ethiopias catastrophic starvation crisis in the 1980s. The aim is to exterminate Tigrayans by starving them to death, Debretsions letter asserted. Ethiopian Ambassador Taye Atske Selassie told the meeting that his country is improving the process for the delivery of aid. Ethiopias government has accused Tigray forces of looting and impeding the delivery of aid. The TPLF is standing between Ethiopia and peace, he said, accusing it of being bent on destabilizing the country of 110 million people. We are open to working with all well-intentioned partners, he added. The war that began in November has affected all Ethiopians and has already drained over a billion dollars from the countrys coffers, Guterres said. But the Security Council appears largely powerless to take significant action on the crisis, as permanent member China expressed its opposition to external interference in Ethiopias affairs. Both China and Russia warned that sanctions by individual countries, as the U.S. imposed this week against the chief of staff of Eritreas defense forces, would only worsen the conflict. By CARA ANNA Associated Press The Latest: New Zealand unable to get everyone out it wanted The Latest: New Zealand unable to get everyone out it wanted View Photo WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealand says it was not able to get everybody it wanted out of Afghanistan in time before the deadly attacks near Kabuls airport brought its rescue mission to an end. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Friday she is not yet sure how many people were left behind or whether they were New Zealand citizens, residents or visa holders. She said the New Zealand military had gone to great lengths to try and find people in recent days and had been able to fly several hundred people to safety. We went to extraordinary efforts to bring home as many as we could who were either New Zealanders or who had supported New Zealand. But the devastating thing is that we werent able to bring everyone, Ardern said. And now, we need to look to see what we can do for those who remain. Both Ardern and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison strongly condemned the attacks that took place Thursday. Morrison described them as evil and inhuman. ___ MORE ON AFGHANISTAN: Kabul airport attack kills 60 Afghans, 12 US troops Explainer: How dangerous is Afghanistans Islamic State? Was it worth it? A fallen Marine and a wars crushing end Biden left with difficult choices after deadly Kabul attacks Female Afghan robotics team hopes to work for country UK animal charity staff caught up in deadly Kabul blast Afghanistans top high school graduate fears for her future Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan ___ HERES WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING: TIRANA, Albania The Albanian government said that a first group of Afghans evacuated from their country arrived early Friday. A government spokesman confirmed the arrival without giving more details. A civilian airplane of the Egyptian Almasria Universal Airlines was seen landing at the Tirana international airport with men and women, children and old people leaving it. A government spokesman, speaking anonymously due to security reasons of the operation, said before the planes arrival that 171 Afghans were expected. The Afghans were first taken to military tents, where they had a rapid virus test, other medical and psychological assistance, registration before being moved to hotels. The government has said the Afghans may stay at least a year while proceeding with applications for special visas for final settlement in the U.S. Prime Minister Edi Rama has said that the tiny Western Balkan country may house up to 4,000 Afghans. Albania was among the first to offer temporary shelter to the Afghans leaving their country after all western military left and the Taliban took power. ___ SEOUL, South Korea South Korea says it strongly condemns the Kabul airport attack, saying terrorism cannot be justified for whatever reason. South Koreas Foreign Ministry said Friday it will join international efforts to root out terrorism and conveyed deep sympathy to those killed during the attack and their family members. South Korea had already evacuated 391 Afghans to Islamabad before Thursdays attack occurred. The ministry said 378 of them came to South Korea on Thursday and the other 13 are to arrive later Friday. They had worked for South Korean-run facilities in Afghanistan or were their family members. ___ WASHINGTON House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has ordered the flags at the U.S. Capitol to be flown at half-staff in honor of the U.S. service members and others killed in the attack in Afghanistan. The speakers office said she had ordered the flags lowered Thursday after the bombings outside the Kabul airport in Afghanistan. The toll of service members who died has risen rose to 13, according to Capt. Bill Urban, spokesman at Central Command. The latest number of injured is now 18, all of whom were in the process of being evacuated from Afghanistan on specially equipped C-17s with surgical units. At least 60 Afghans also died. ___ WASHINGTON President Joe Biden presided over a moment of silence for U.S. service members on Thursday following attacks at the Kabul airport that killed at least 60 Afghans and 12 Americans. Biden held his moment of silence for those in uniform during somber remarks at the White House. Suicide bombings and gunfire killed 11 Marines and one Navy medic attacks the U.S. is blaming on the local affiliate of the Islamic State. The American service members had been carrying out screenings at the gates of the airport, where thousands of Afghans have crowded in for nearly two weeks in hopes of an evacuation. These American service members who gave their lives its an overused word, but its totally appropriate here were heroes, Biden said. ___ WASHINGTON President Joe Biden says the U.S. servicemembers who were killed in attacks outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, were heroes. Addressing the nation from the White House, Biden says they were engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others. At least a dozen U.S. servicemembers were killed in Thursdays attacks, along with scores of Afghans. Biden addressed those responsible for the attack, telling them, We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attacks. ___ DUBAI, United Arab Emirates The Islamic State groups affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attack outside the Kabul airport. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport on Thursday, killing at least 60 Afghans and 12 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The IS branch, known as The Islamic State-Khorasan Province after a name for the region from antiquity, said in its claim of responsibility that it targeted American troops and their Afghan allies. The statement carried a photo of what the militant group said was the bomber who carried out the attack. The image shows the alleged attacker standing with the explosive belt in front of the black IS flag with a black cloth covering his face, only his eyes showing. The statement made no mention of a second suicide bomber or gunmen. The claim could not be independently verified. IS also said the bomber managed to get past Taliban security checkpoints to come within 5 meters (yards) of a gathering of U.S. soldiers, translators and collaborators before detonating his explosives. It said Taliban were also among the casualties. The extremist IS group has battled the Taliban, which it views as traitorous for agreeing to a peace deal with the United States. The statement also said the bomber got around U.S. security measures and that the camp that was targeted was where U.S. forces were gathering paperwork for those whove worked with the military. ___ WASHINGTON President Joe Biden is set to speak following the deadly explosions outside the airport in Kabul that killed 12 U.S. service members and scores of Afghans. The White House says Biden will address the nation from the White House at 5 p.m. on Thursday. Two suicide bombers and gunmen struck crowds of Afghans waiting in Kabul to flee life under the Taliban on departing flights. A U.S. operation airlifting American citizens and vulnerable Afghans to other countries is set to end Tuesday, a deadline set by Biden. The Islamic State groups affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attack. Biden has been under intense pressure to extend the evacuations beyond Tuesday, but repeatedly has cited the threat of attack for sticking to his deadline. ___ WASHINGTON The State Department says it is tracking roughly 1,000 American citizens who it believes may still be in Afghanistan, as evacuation efforts proceed despite deadly suicide attacks outside the Kabul airport. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had said Wednesday that some 1,500 U.S. citizens were still thought to be in the country but the department said Thursday that it confirmed about 500 of them had been evacuated. In the meantime, it said another 500 people claiming to be Americans wanting to leave had gotten in touch with the U.S. Embassy but that it expected the majority of them would turn out not to be U.S. citizens. Of the 1,000 Americans the department believes to be in Afghanistan, it said about 75% were making preparations to leave. ___ WASHINGTON The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation from Afghanistan says the United States will go after the perpetrators of the Kabul airport attacks if they can be found. Gen. Frank McKenzie said the attacks on Thursday were believed to have been carried out by fighters associated with the Islamic State groups Afghanistan affiliate. He said the attacks, which killed 12 U.S. service members, would not stop the United States from continuing its evacuation of Americans and others. McKenzie warned there are still extremely active security threats at the airport in the Afghan capital. We expect these attacks to continue, he said, adding that Taliban commanders have been asked to take additional security measures to prevent another suicide bombing on the airports perimeter. He said he sees no indication that the Taliban allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. Also Thursday, Defense Secretary LLoyd Austin suggested the evacuation will go on and expressed his deepest condolences to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and wounded in Kabul today. Terrorists took their lives at the very moment these troops were trying to save the lives of others, he said. We mourn their loss. We will treat their wounds. And we will support their families in what will most assuredly be devastating grief. But we will not be dissuaded from the task at hand. To do anything less especially now would dishonor the purpose and sacrifice these men and women have rendered our country and the people of Afghanistan, the statement also said. ___ DUBAI Saudi Arabia says it strongly condemns the Kabul airport attack and reaffirms that such criminal acts contradict religious principles and human values. The kingdom said on Thursday that it extends its deepest condolences to all those killed and wounded. The Saudi Foreign Ministry statement added that Saudi Arabia stands with the people of Afghanistan at this time. Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron also condemned in the stronger terms the attacks at Kabul airport. Macron expressed in a statement Frances condolences to the families of victims and praised the heroism of those on the ground who are carrying out the evacuation operations. Also later Thursday, Albanias foreign minister strongly condemned the attacks at the Kabul airport. In a tweet, Olta Xhacka condemned the horrific terrorist attack, adding that our hearts and our prayers go out to all those who lost their loved ones. Albania, a NATO member country since 2009 and aspiring to join the European Union soon, will be one of the transit hubs for the Afghans evacuated from their country. Prime Minister Edi Rama said the country could house up to 4,000 Afghans. The first group may arrive early Friday. We remain committed to guarantee the lives and security of all our Afghan allies, said Xhacka. ___ WASHINGTON U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was briefed by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in a phone call after the attacks in Kabul on Thursday that also killed at least 12 U.S. service members, including 11 Marines and one Navy medic. Pelosis office dismissed the House Republican leaderships calls to bring Congress back into session as empty stunts amid the extraordinary evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan. Right now, American heroes are risking & giving their lives to execute an extraordinarily dangerous evacuation, Pelosis spokesman Drew Hammill said on Twitter. Whats not going to help evacuate American citizens is more empty stunts & distraction. ___ WASHINGTON U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that those responsible for the attack in Kabul on Thursday will be sought and brought to justice. The New York Democrat said in a statement that he had just spoken to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin about the heinous attacks on U.S. personnel and the Afghan partners. I strongly condemn this act of terrorism and it must be clear to the world that the terrorists who perpetrated this will be sought and brought to justice, he said. Meanwhile, the U.S. House Republican leader called on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call the Congress back into session so lawmakers can consider legislation would prohibit the Aug. 31 withdrawal until all Americans are out of Afghanistan. Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California said, It is time for Congress to act quickly to save lives. A return to session before the deadline is highly unlikely. The Democrats aligned with President Joe Biden hold majority control and are not expected to consider such legislation to alter the withdrawal date. Republicans have been highly critical of Bidens handling of the situation in Kabul. ___ BERLIN The German defense minister says her country has ended its evacuation mission in Afghanistan. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said the last of the German military aircraft and troops arrived in Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Thursday evening. She said that, in all, Germany evacuated 5,347 people from at least 45 nations, including more than 4,000 Afghans. Germany hadnt publicly specified ahead of time when exactly its flights would end but other European nations also have been wrapping up their evacuation efforts ahead of an Aug. 31 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops. Kramp-Karrenbauer said the last flights had been loading at the time of Thursdays attacks just outside the airport and the German commander then set in motion plans for an emergency departure. She added that the attacks we saw this afternoon have made clear that an extension of the operation in Kabul was not possible. The security situation on the ground, and also the Talibans decision not to tolerate an extension beyond Aug. 31, made it impossible. The minister said Germany offered a medevac plane that was overhead at the time to bring out wounded from other nations but according to my information, that wasnt the case so far. She said the plane, which flew on to Tashkent, will be provided if needed. ___ ISLAMABAD Pakistans prime minister say the international community should help the Afghan Taliban to restore peace after their takeover of Afghanistan. Imran Khan spoke at a gathering of his ruling party on Thursday; the speech was televised. The remarks are the most openly supportive by Khan of the Taliban since they swept into Kabul on Aug. 15 and practically took over the entire country. Khan says the Taliban are talking about peace and the world community should help them. He added that the Taliban have stated that they want to form an inclusive government, respect human rights and not allow anyone to use the Afghan soil to stage attacks. The prime minister a famous former cricket player who turned to politics and became a conservative Islamist said the Afghan people need peace. Khans speech came shortly before twin suicide bombings and gunmen outside the Kabul airport killed at least 13 people and wounded 15 wounded. Several Marines were killed and a number of other American military were wounded. Pakistans foreign ministry said children were among those killed and added that Pakistan condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. ___ LONDON British Prime Minister Boris Johnson says the barbaric bomb attack at Kabul airport has caused many casualties, but that the U.K. evacuation operation in Afghanistan will continue for a bit longer. The U.S. says several Marines were among those killed when two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans outside the airport on Thursday. Johnson offered condolences to the U.S. and Afghanistan, saying Americans very sadly have lost their lives, and there were also many Afghan casualties. He said Britain would continue with the evacuation operation, though were now coming towards the end of it. He said that what this attack shows is the importance of continuing that work in as fast and as efficient manner as possible in the hours that remain to us. Johnson did not say when the British effort would end. U.S. forces are due to leave the airport by Aug. 31, and other countries missions will have to wrap up before then. Several countries have already announced the end of their airlifts. ___ TEHRAN, Iran Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said Afghanistans neighbors should support the formation a broad-based government in Kabul. Raisi spoke on Thursday during a meeting with visiting Pakistani foreign minister to Tehran, saying other nations should only play the role of a facilitator for establishing a broad-based and inclusive government with presence of all people and groups. The remarks were posted on Raisis website. He said Iran has hosted some 4 million Afghan refugees in the past four decades and it has supported the people of Afghanistan. The presence of Western nations in the region would not be conducive to its security, he alleged. Iran has seen the presence of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq as a threat on its doorstep. It has welcomed the U.S. evacuation even as it cautiously looks to the next moves by the Taliban. Unlike in 1998, when Iran came to the bring of war with the Taliban over the killings of several Iranian diplomats in Afghanistan after the Taliban came to power, Iranian state media have in recent weeks claimed that the Taliban have changed and pose no threat to Iran. Critics, however, warn that the Taliban will return to their anti-Iranian stance as soon as they shore up their full control of Afghanistan. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands The foreign minister of the Netherlands says the last Dutch diplomats and troops have flown out of Kabul as the international airlift winds down and that her thoughts are now with the people left stranded in the Afghan capital. Foreign Affairs Minister Sigrid Kaag said in a tweet on Thursday: Its terrible to have to leave Afghanistan this way after 20 years. She says her thoughts are with people left stranded in Afghanistan after the international flights out of the country end. Kaag also said the Netherlands and its allies remain committed to helping all those entitled to return or evacuate and to continue to support the Afghan people. The Netherlands has in recent days flown more than 20 flights out of Kabul to airports in the region. More than 1,700 people have been flown back to the Netherlands, including over 1,000 Afghans who worked with Dutch forces and diplomats. ___ TBILISI, Georgia The government of Georgia says about 2,000 people have been evacuated from Afghanistan to Tbilisi, the countrys capital. A government statement on Thursday said NATO cargo planes are making daily flights from Tbilisi to Kabul and that evacuations are also conducted by charter flights. The former Soviet republic is not a NATO member but in recent years has cooperated closely with the alliance. The statement said Georgia is cooperating with international institutions including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to evacuate their personnel from Afghanistan. ___ WASHINGTON Sen. Robert Menendez, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, in a statement called the situation unfolding in Kabul a full-fledged humanitarian crisis. He said that U.S. government personnel, already working under extreme circumstances, must secure the airport and complete the massive evacuation of Americans citizens and vulnerable Afghans desperately trying to leave the country. I understand that American personnel were among the casualties and my prayers are with the victims of this cowardly attack and their families, Menendez said. As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We cant trust the Taliban with Americans security. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands NATO chief has condemned the twin suicide bombings at the Kabul airport as a horrific terrorist attack that targeted desperate Afghans trying to leave the country and the alliances efforts to evacuate them from Afghanistan. Jens Stoltenberg said on Twitter after the explosions on Thursday: I strongly condemn the horrific terrorist attack outside #Kabul airport. My thoughts are with all those affected and their loved ones. Our priority remains to evacuate as many people to safety as quickly as possible. The bombings struck outside Kabuls airport, where large crowds of people trying to flee Afghanistan have massed, killing at least 13 people and wounding 15, according to Russian officials. Western nations had warned earlier in the day of a possible attack at the airport in the waning days of a massive airlift. ___ LONDON A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the explosion near the Kabul airport. Paul Pen Farthing said the group was outside the airport when the blast occurred on Thursday. Were fine but everything is chaos here at the moment, he told Britains Press Association news agency. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47. Weve been in the airport, and back out of the airport; the whole things a mess, he added. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. They have been stuck outside Kabuls airport as they try to get a flight out. He spoke as reports emerged of two suicide bombings outside the airport that killed at least 13 people and wounded another 15. U.S. officials meanwhile have said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. ___ DUBLIN French President Emmanuel Macron said the situation has seriously deteriorated near the Kabul airport after several explosions happened in the last hours. Speaking in a news conference during a visit to Dublin, Ireland, Macron said we are facing an extremely tense situation that makes us coordinate obviously with our American allies and call for the utmost caution in a context we dont control. He added France will seek to protect and evacuate French nationals, people from allied countries and Afghans as long as the conditions will be met at the airport. Macron said he did not have more details about the circumstances of the explosions. The Russian Foreign Ministry has said there were two suicide bombings outside Kabul airport that killed at least 13 people on Thursday and wounded another 15. U.S. officials meanwhile have said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. ___ MOSCOW The Russian ambassador in Afghanistan says 360 Russian citizens have been flown home from Kabul. Ambassador Dmitry Zhirnov said in televised remarks Thursday that all those Russians who wanted to leave Afghanistan were taken home the previous day aboard four Russian Defense Ministry planes. He said that along with 360 Russians, the planes also evacuated 38 nationals of other ex-Soviet nations. Zhirnov said that the embassy was now trying to help a few Russians who were unable to leave for logistical reasons. He noted that about 100 Russians who remain in Afghanistan havent expressed a desire to leave. The Russian Foreign Ministry says the flights were organized with the assistance of the Taliban and the United States, which controls Afghanistans airspace. The ambassador said that Russian diplomats in Kabul are also working to help about 400 Afghan students who have enrolled Russian universities travel to Russia for studies. He said the embassy maintains close contacts with the Taliban. ___ WASHINGTON The acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, says the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News on Thursday, he would not give details and did not say whether the threat remained. Wilson also said there remain safe ways for Americans to reach the airport for evacuation. He said there undoubtedly will be Afghans who had worked with or for the U.S. in Afghanistan who will not be able to get out before the U.S.-led evacuation ends. ___ TORONTO Canada has ended evacuations from Kabuls airport, a Canadian general said Thursday, as the clock ticks down on dramatic Western efforts to help people flee the Taliban takeover ahead of a full American withdrawal. General Wayne Eyre, the countrys acting chief of Defense Staff, said all the other countries have to leave the airport before the Americans can wrap up their mission. Canadian military flights evacuated about 3,700 people. We stayed in Afghanistan for as long as we could. We were amongst the last to cease evacuation operations. We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone who was so desperate to leave. That we could not is truly heartbreaking, but the circumstances on the ground rapidly deteriorated, Eyre said. U.S. President Joe Biden has said he is sticking to his Aug. 31 deadline for completing the U.S. pullout as the Taliban insisted he must, ramping up pressure on the already risky airlift from Kabul to get out as many people as possible in the coming days. Canada and European allies pressed for more time but lost the argument. Canada is one many countries taking part in the evacuation of people facing Taliban reprisals from Kabuls airport. Over 1,000 refugees are in Canada now. Canada has plans to resettle 20,000 Afghan refugees. ___ BERLIN Germanys defense minister says terror threats in Kabul have become significantly more concrete as the international evacuation effort from the airport in the Afghan capital is nearing its end. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said on Thursday that the effort is now in what is certainly the most hectic, dangerous and sensitive phase. We know that the terror threats have intensified massively and that they have become significantly more concrete. She said Germanys foreign ministry told people in Kabul overnight that they should not try to get to the airport on their own, in line with warnings by the U.S. and others. The German military was still flying between Kabul and Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Thursday. It wasnt immediately clear when exactly the German evacuation effort would end. Germanys top military commander, Gen. Eberhard Zorn, said that as of Thursday afternoon German flights had evacuated some 5,200 people from 45 nations, including about 4,200 Afghans. Zorn said two small German helicopters that were flown into Kabul a few days ago, intended to help get individuals to the airport, were flown out to Tashkent overnight. ___ WARSAW, Poland A deputy foreign minister in Poland said on Thursday that his country is looking for the family of 13-year-old Afghan boy, Fawad, who got separated from his parents in the crowd pressing on the Kabul airport. Fawad has been brought to safety in Poland but his parents whereabouts were not immediately known. Marcin Przydacz said that Fawads parents could have been evacuated on another flight to a Western country, such as the United States or Britain, but have not yet been localized. The first appeal for help in finding Fawads family, with the boys photo was made on Twitter by Polands government official, Michal Dworczyk, on Tuesday. ___ LONDON Britains prime minster says the overwhelming majority of people eligible to come to Britain have been evacuated from Afghanistan, but time is running out on the airlift. Boris Johnson said about 15,000 people have left Kabul airport on Royal Air Force flights. He said that in the time we have left, which may be as Im sure everybody can appreciate quite short, well do everything we can to get everybody else. U.S. forces are due to leave the airport by Aug. 31, and other countries missions will have to wrap up before then. Visiting a military base in London where the British evacuation effort is being coordinated, Johnson said Britain hoped to continue evacuations after the end of the month, and urged the Taliban to facilitate it. Johnson said the safe passage for those who want to come out is the key precondition for development aid and access to international funding for Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. ___ BRUSSELS The European Union still has a skeleton staff in Kabul working to evacuate people as the end of airlifts from the chaotic airport looms. A number of European nations have said that they are ending their evacuation efforts ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. European Commission foreign affairs spokesman Peter Stano said Thursday that a small EU team will be on the ground as long as necessary in order to complete the evacuation operations. He declined to give more details, saying he didnt want to share more details because they are operating in an environment which is not exactly friendly. Stano says that more than 400 Afghans who worked for the EU in Afghanistan, along with their families, have already been evacuated. He adds that there are still some people who we need and want to get out but would not give more detail, citing operational reasons. Commission spokesman Eric Mamer says that the 400 Afghan EU workers and their families are in the process of being transferred to member states who offered places. He called discussions about their relocation a very intense process but adds that members of the 27-nation bloc are very clear that they are they are willing to help accommodate the EUs Afghan staff. ___ MOSCOW The Kremin says that Russia will closely follow the developments in Afghanistan before making a decision on whether to recognize the Talibans rule. Russian President Vladimir Putins spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Moscow will watch the Talibans future steps to ensure order and security of the countrys citizens and provide security for the Russian diplomats. Peskov emphasized that Russia wants to see peace and stability in Afghanistan and hopes that efforts will be taken to stem the flow of drugs coming from the country. Moscow, which fought a 10-year war in Afghanistan that ended with the Soviet troops withdrawal in 1989, has made a diplomatic comeback as a mediator over the past few years, reaching out to feuding Afghan factions including the Taliban even though the group was added to the Russian list of terrorist organizations in 2003. ___ BUCHAREST, Romania Romanias Supreme Council of National Defense says Romania will contribute a maximum of 200 troops to NATO missions to evacuate and relocate Afghan citizens. The NATO operation will, in principle, consist of taking Afghan citizens from temporary bases in Kuwait and Qatar and relocating them to temporary stationed bases on the territory of allied states, the supreme council said in a statement after a meeting Wednesday. The council said that Romanian troops would contribute for a maximum of six months and that operations would start in August. The security council also said that during the meeting it decided further steps would be taken to bring Afghan citizens, such as journalists, human rights activists, magistrates, and students to safety in Romania. It did not provide further details on how or when this would happen. Romanian authorities have earmarked a number of Afghans for evacuation to Romania, but none could make it safely to Kabul airport last week when Romania carried out three evacuation flights, officials said. The security council also said in the meeting that Afghanistans swift takeover by the Taliban may have security consequences for Romania, due to the dangers posed by extremism, terrorism, the export of instability in the region, drug and arms trafficking, (and) illegal migration. ___ LONDON A former Royal Marine who runs an animal charity in Afghanistan says he, his Afghan staff and dozens of dogs and cats are stuck outside Kabuls airport as they try to get a flight out of the country. Paul Pen Farthing appealed to the Taliban to allow the group safe passage into the airport. He tweeted to Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen that we have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage. Truly would like to go home now. Farthing has been pressing for days to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. Dominic Dyer, a British animal campaigner who is assisting Farthing, said a plane had been chartered and was due to leave the U.K. later Thursday for Kabul. Farthings supporters have clashed with Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, who refused to airlift the animals on a Royal Air Force plane. saying I have to prioritize people at the moment over pets. The U.K. defense ministry later said it would help Farthing, his group and the animals leave on the privately funded chartered jet. Armed Forces Minister James Heappey said Thursday that U.K. forces at the airport would facilitate the flight. He told ITV that the difficulty is getting Pen into the airfield. ___ HELSINKI Finland said Thursday it had evacuated 51 people from Kabul to the Nordic country, adding that its total number of evacuees has risen to close to 340 people. The Finnish Foreign Ministry wrote on Twitter that Finland too had assisted four people on their way to other countries Wednesday when the people were evacuated. Cooperation is power, the ministry wrote, adding that Finland in total had assisted 30 persons from our partner countries. ___ MILAN The Afghan director of a school for girls dedicated to an Italian newspaper correspondent killed in Afghanistan is trying desperately to gain access to the Kabul airport for evacuation, with anxiety growing as the end of flights nears. Shir Ahmad Mohammadi has sent messages to contacts in Italy as well as Italian officials in Kabul, saying that the Taliban are not allowing him and his family near the airport, Corriere della Sera reported on Thursday. Help me, I cant go on. The Taliban are not allowing us to pass. They are asking for U.S. documents that we dont have, Mohammadi wrote. He is the director of a school in Herat province named for Maria Grazia Cutuli, a Corriere correspondent killed in 2001. He traveled by bus with his wife and two daughters, finding himself in the capital controlled by the Taliban and with foreign troops by now closed off in the airport. I served female students in Afghanistan, giving them the chance to study in the name of your country. Now it is time that I think of my daughters, and try to get them to safety, he wrote. I have my two daughters with me, what should I do, I cannot leave them to be treated in this way. I have to take care of their security and their dignity. That is why I made this trip. He said his wife and daughters are under increasing strain. I dont know how long we can keep going in these conditions, Mohammadi wrote. ___ WARSAW, Poland Poland says the reason it has halted its evacuation flights was so that the United States could meet its Aug. 31 deadline to quit Kabul. That is the date when the last U.S. soldier is to leave Kabul airport, Deputy Foreign Minister Marcin Przydacz said Thursday, but to make that possible all others must leave first. Przydacz said that some countries have not yet evacuated all their citizens and associates and for this reason they were continuing their evacuation missions. Poland however has met its evacuation goals and ended its mission. Przydacz said that no matter how long the mission would have taken and how many people would have been evacuated, if a Polish diplomat or a soldier got hurt, the mission would not have been a success. Przydacz said it was a difficult decision to wrap up the evacuation but that today, with such high level of terrorist threat, amid the growing instability, we see no possibility of putting the lives of our people at risk any longer. They have really done an immense job. He mentioned the consuls at the spot, finding people in the crowd, diplomats in various countries securing instant permission for Polish planes to fly over their territory, and officials in Warsaw who worked round the clock to bring people to safety. Poland has evacuated some 1,300 people in 14 flights, through Uzbekistan. Some 200 of the evacuees were rescued at the request of other countries, and of the IMF. The last group arrived Thursday morning. Przydacz said that Poland will be ready to air lift more people if commercial flights from Afghanistan are restored. ___ ISTANBUL The first Turkish troops evacuated from Afghanistan arrived back in Turkey on Thursday. TV footage showed a Turkish Airlines flight carrying 345 soldiers land at Ankaras Esenboga Airport, having departed Kabul on Wednesday evening. Some 600 Turkish troops were based in Afghanistan. We aim to complete the transfer as soon as possible, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said in a statement. ___ COPENHAGEN, Denmark The foundation created by toymaker Lego and its parent company say they will donate 100 million kroner ($16 million) to support vulnerable children in Haiti and Afghanistan. The humanitarian crises that are happening in Haiti and Afghanistan are unimaginable and only intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic, said Thomas Kirk Kristiansen, chairman of the LEGO Foundation. Since May 2021, more than 500,000 people have been displaced in Afghanistan. As for Haiti, the Aug. 14 violent earthquake that was followed by a tropical storm has left half-a-million Haitian children with limited or no access to shelter, safe water, health care, and nutrition. With COVID-19 still (being) an imminent threat to the health and safety of Haitis population, the loss and damage associated with these most recent natural disasters only further compounds the dire situation so many children and families are experiencing, they said in a joint statement. Based in Denmark, the Lego Foundation and parent company KIRKBI A/S said that they had partnered up with, among others, two U.N. agencies UNICEF and UNHCR as well as Education Cannot Wait, a global fund to transform the delivery of education in emergencies. ___ DUBAI, United Arab Emirates Qatar says it has helped the evacuation of more than 40,000 people from Kabul airport. The small nation on the Arabian Peninsula says most will transit through Qatar after staying in temporary accommodations. Qatar says that the evacuation efforts will continue in the coming days in consultation with international partners. Qatar also hosts an office of the Taliban and was the site of negotiations between America, the toppled Afghan government and the insurgents. ___ NEW DELHI India says it has evacuated most of its nationals from Afghanistan and is doing everything to bring them back home. Indias External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told a meeting of political leaders on Thursday that India has operated six flights so far from Kabul after a stunning takeover by the Taliban. A few of them (Indians) are still there. He didnt give the exact number of Indians and Afghans evacuated so far from Kabul but the Indian media put their numbers around 800. He declined to say how India is going to deal with the Taliban government in Afghanistan. The situation in Afghanistan is yet to settle down. I will talk about it later, Jaishankar told reporters. New Delhi had stayed away from the Taliban except for back-channel contacts in recent months. It didnt recognize the Taliban government that ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001. ___ ISLAMABAD Pakistans prime minister has called on the international community to continue engagement with Afghanistan, saying it was a way forward to avert any humanitarian crisis and secure peace and stability. Imran Khan made his comment during a meeting with David Beasley, executive director of the United Nations World Food Program who met with him in Islamabad. Khan also called for the formation of an inclusive government to ensure peace and avoid an humanitarian crisis, after the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan. The latest development comes as dozens of Afghans continue to enter Pakistan via its land borders. But the number of Afghan people entering Pakistan through land routes has been steadily decreasing since earlier this week. ___ BUDAPEST, Hungary Hungary says its army has evacuated all Hungarian citizens from Afghanistan of which the defense ministry is aware. Defense Minister Tibor Benko told a press conference on Thursday that 540 people, among them 57 Afghan families including 180 children, had been evacuated to Hungary from Kabul. Of the Afghan citizens who assisted Hungarian forces in Afghanistan since 2003, the army has evacuated 87%, he said, adding that Hungarian, Afghan, Austrian and U.S. citizens were evacuated during the operation. All of the nearly 100 Hungarian soldiers that participated in the evacuation operation have returned to Hungary, Benko said. No injuries occurred during the evacuation operations, though there were Afghan citizens who sustained injuries prior to their evacuation, he said. Seven Hungarian soldiers were killed during military operations in Afghanistan since 2003, Benko said. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands The Dutch government says it is pulling its troops and diplomats out of the Kabul airport over the security situation. In a letter to parliament Thursday, the foreign and defense ministers say that the Netherlands has been told by the United States to leave today and will most likely carry out its last flight later today. They add that in light of the extremely quickly deteriorating situation in and around the airport, evacuees can no longer be assisted by the Netherlands to get access to the airport. ___ LONDON The British, French and Danish militaries have given stark warnings about the security situation at the Kabul airport, where Afghan civilians are scrambling to evacuate ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for foreign troops to leave Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC on Thursday there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport. Other warnings emerged about a possible threat from Afghanistans Islamic State affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country. Heappey conceded that people are desperate to leave and there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told French radio RTL on Thursday that from tomorrow evening onwards, we are not able to evacuate people from the Kabul airport due to the Aug. 31 American withdrawal. Meanwhile, Danish defense minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul. Denmarks last flight, carrying 90 people plus soldiers and diplomats, already had left Kabul. Poland and Belgium have already ended their evacuations from Afghanistan. By The Associated Press Brazils Indigenous march to pressure court on land ruling View Photo BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) Thousands of Indigenous people marched toward Brazils Supreme Court on Wednesday to pressure justices expected to issue a ruling with far-reaching implications for land rights. Wearing feather headdresses and with their bodies painted, they sang and danced along their 5-kilometer (3-mile) route. The group, which has been camping all week in the capital behind the National Theater, is comprised of some 6,000 people from 173 ethnic groups across the country, according to Association of Brazils Indigenous Peoples, a rights group and one of the organizers. Justices will be evaluating a lower courts ruling that invalidated a claim by some Indigenous people in Santa Catarina state to what they say is their ancestral territory. The lower court based its decision on allegations the group wasnt occupying the land in October 1988, when Brazils constitution was signed after the nations return to democracy, which the group denies. The Indigenous people were frustrated that the court didnt start discussing the case Wednesday. The majority of justices have yet to vote on another contentious debate, regarding the constitutionality of the Brazilian central banks autonomy. Protest organizers say the courts decision could be the ruling of the century, because negating the 1988 benchmark would force judges across the country to impose that understanding on similar pending cases, and also affect the fate of a related, controversial bill advancing in Congress. President Jair Bolsonaro suggested Wednesday that overturning the lower courts ruling would prompt new requests to officially recognize hundreds of Indigenous territories. His attorney general filed a request to the countrys top court seeking to stop the Indigenous people from gathering, citing pandemic protocols that the president himself has repeatedly ignored. Justice Luis Roberto Barroso denied the request, saying he believed demonstrators were taking precautions. Farming groups argue the 1988 cutoff date provides certainty regarding property law, but rights defenders say it ignores the fact many Indigenous people had been forcibly expelled from their lands, particularly during the military dictatorship, or may not have formal means to prove possession. The criteria isnt functional for determining whether or not a territory was traditionally occupied because there are diverse contexts, diverse groups that for many reasons werent on their territories in 1988, said Samara Pataxo, a lawyer for the association. Pi Surui, from the 7 de Setembro village in the Amazon rainforest state of Rondonia, said he had come to the capital to make clear that Indigenous territory is more than just land. It is sacred, our history, our life, Surui, 23, said at the encampment. We have the right to grow our crops and sell our livestock, our fish, live sustainably. We are also adapting to the new times, balancing our needs and advances as human beings, but without losing our culture. The Santa Catarina state government says the Indigenous people involved in the current court case invaded the land in 2009. The Xokleng people say the original extent of their territory was progressively diminished by encroaching agribusiness and that they never left the area. Bolsonaro has repeatedly said Indigenous people control far too much land relative to their population their territories cover 14% of Brazil, most in the Amazon and has been outspoken about his desire to promote rural development. Together with farm interests, he has argued that the 1988 cutoff had already been established by an earlier court ruling. Changing it now would create chaos, he said in a television interview on Wednesday. If that happens, we will immediately have in front of us hundreds of new (Indigenous) areas to be demarcated, he told farming-focused station Canal Rural. In addition to the losses for the rural producer many have family occupying that land for more than 100 years those lands that today are productive could cease to be productive. Some of the people marching on Wednesday held banners that read Bolsonaro Out and Indigenous territory is life. Jose Miguel Vivanco, executive secretary of Human Rights Watch for the Americas, took to Twitter to oppose the cutoff date, which he said large landholders and Bolsonaro allies are supporting in order to expel Indigenous people. Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen, who often advocates for Indigenous and environmental causes, also spoke out against it on social media. Separately, the lower house of Congresss Constitution and Justice Committee in June approved a bill that would officially establish Oct. 1988 as the reference date for Indigenous people seeking full protection of their territories to have been occupying the land. There are more than 200 such pending requests, mostly for small territories located outside the Amazon rainforest. The bill is awaiting a floor vote. A court ruling upholding the 1988 date would add legal backing to that bill in Congress, said Pataxo, the lawyer. If the court strikes down the prior ruling, that would weaken the bills momentum by providing justification to challenge its constitutionality in the future. Brazil has 421 officially recognized Indigenous territories that are home to 466,000 people, according to the nonprofit Socioenvironmental Institute. At a Tuesday night vigil ahead of Wednesdays march, Indigenous people held lights and carried banners, one of which read: Our history doesnt begin in 1988. We have resisted for more than 12,000 years. ___ Associated Press writer Debora Alvares reported this story in Brasilia and AP writer David Biller reported from Rio de Janeiro. By DEBORA ALVARES and DAVID BILLER Associated Press Mexico: President foe who fled allegedly got $500,000 bribe View Photo MEXICO CITY (AP) Federal prosecutors in Mexico said Wednesday that an opposition politician who fled the country over the weekend allegedly took a $525,000 bribe. The Attorney Generals Office outlined the accusation that led it to try to obtain an arrest warrant fort former presidential candidate Ricardo Anaya. Anaya ran for the conservative National Action Party in the 2018 presidential election, which was won by Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, and he has been contemplating a second bid. Anaya says he is the victim of political persecution. Prosecutors said evidence indicates the former head of the state-owned oil company, Emilio Lozoya, had received bribe money from the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht. Lozoya has told prosecutors he gave $525,000 to Anaya, then a legislator, in 2014 to vote in favor of an energy reform bill that opened the industry to the private sector. Anaya said in a video posted on social media over the weekend that he was leaving Mexico. He did not say where he was going, but said he feared being jailed for 30 years on the charges. In the era of autocrats like Lopez Obrador, exile is the only alternative to continue fighting, Anaya said. Allowing yourself to be jailed by an autocrat often means losing the battle. Anaya had been criticized in the past for his long sojourns in the United States. He had recently been touring Mexico in an apparent bid to ignite another run for the presidency in 2024. Lopez Obrador denied Monday that the government is persecuting Anaya, but has never liked him much. The two sparred angrily in debates for the 2018 election, with Lopez Obrador dubbing Anaya with a nickname that means little rich kid. The president said accusations that the charges are a political vendetta are a lie, a falsehood. However, many Mexicans have expressed concern that Lozoya, the ex-official who has accused Anaya and others of accepting bribes, has himself been allowed to stay out of prison for alleged corruption because he agreed to cooperate with prosecutors. Some fear Lozoya, the former head of Petroleos Mexicanos, may avoid prosecution in exchange for smearing the presidents opponents. Lozoya has acknowledged bribery, but said he was ordered to commit the offenses during the 2012-2018 administration of President Enrique Pena Nieto. On Wednesday, Anaya posted another video, claiming that Lopez Obrador is using Lozoya to attack him. The accusations against me are your invention, put in the mouth of Lozoya, Anaya said, referring to the president. Calaveras County Sheriff's Office logo View Photo Vallecito, CA Law enforcement arrested a man who snuck into the Airola Fire evacuation zone last night. The Calaveras County Sheriffs Office reports that 32-year-old Richard Serva allegedly approached a CHP Officer on Parrotts Ferry Road and started yelling obscenities because he couldnt get through the road closure. Serva became increasingly agitated, but eventually he walked away from the roadblock. About 10 minutes later, shortly before midnight, Serva was spotted by a deputy inside the closure area. He had walked through the woods to circumvent the closure. He was still uncooperative and reportedly told deputies to take him to jail. He was placed under arrested on charges of public intoxication, unauthorized entry into an emergency area and delaying a peace officer who was performing duties. Lt. Greg Stark says, During evacuations, the Calaveras County Sheriffs Office coordinates mutual aid with local and state law enforcement agencies to provide extra patrol for the affected areas. During these extra patrols deputies vigorously patrol to ensure the security of the evacuated areas. Adding, Persons entering or trespassing in an area subject to mandatory evacuations will be arrested. Looting and or trespassing during evacuations will not be tolerated. Persons entering evacuation areas will slow and at times stop firefighting progress and the flow of other emergency equipment and personnel from entering to stop or slow the fire. Evacuations are put into place to save lives and protect property. If you are caught interfering with those efforts in Calaveras County you will go directly to jail. The sheriffs office was assisted yesterday with the evacuation efforts by the Angels Camp PD and the California State Parks. Lebanon judge issues subpoena for outgoing PM in port blast View Photo BEIRUT (AP) A Lebanese judge leading the investigation into last years massive explosion at Beiruts port issued a subpoena for the countrys caretaker prime minister after he failed show up for questioning on Thursday, the state-run National News Agency reported. Last month, judge Tarek Bitar confirmed charges filed by his predecessor against outgoing Prime Minister Hassan Diab and three former ministers. Dian was summoned for questioning on accusations of intentional killings and negligence. Bitar also summoned former and current generals. Hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive material used in fertilizers that had been improperly stored in the port for years, exploded on Aug. 4, 2020, killing 214 people, injuring more than 6,000 and devastating nearby neighborhoods. The blast was one of the largest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded and was the most destructive single incident in Lebanons troubled history. Bitar set a new date for questioning Diab, Sept. 20. The prime minister had also declined to be interrogated last year by Bitars predecessor, Fadi Sawwan. Bitar was named to lead the investigation in February after Sawwan was removed following legal challenges by senior officials he had accused of negligence that led to the blast. Diab, who resigned following the explosion, said in an interview last year with The Associated Press that he was being singled out and charged while others knew more. On Wednesday, Bitar supervised a simulation of the welding that took place at the port shortly before last years explosion, according to the news agencys report. Its aim was to determine whether the welding could have been the main cause of the fire that preceded the explosion. The simulation was attended by a group of lawyers and security officers. Spain judge nixes backup site for disputed Hawaii telescope View Photo MADRID (AP) A Spanish judge in a decision cheered by environmentalists has put a halt to backup plans for the construction of a giant telescope in the Canary Islands eliminating at least for now the primary alternative location to the preferred spot in Hawaii, where there have been protests against the telescope. Construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope, or TMT, on Hawaiis tallest mountain, Mauna Kea, has been stalled by opponents who say the project will desecrate land held sacred to some Native Hawaiians. Telescope officials had selected the alternate location near an existing scientific research facility on the highest mountain of La Palma, one of the Spanish islands off the western African coast, in the Atlantic Ocean. But an administrative court in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the capital of the Spanish archipelago, ruled last month that the 2017 concession by local authorities of public land for the tentative project was invalid. The ruling was dated on July 29, but only became public this week after local media reported about the decision. In the ruling obtained by The Associated Press, Judge Roi Lopez Encinas wrote that the telescope land allocation was subject to an agreement between the Canary Astrophysics Institute, or IAC, and the telescopes promoter, the TMT International Observatory (TIO) consortium. But the judge ruled that the agreement was not valid because TIO had not expressed an intention to build on the La Palma site instead of at the Hawaii site. The judge also sided with the plaintiff, the environmental group Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Accion, in rejecting arguments by TIOs legal team and the islands government that the land concession was covered by an international treaty on scientific research. An official for the Canary Islands High Court said questions about the ruling could not be answered because other court officials in a position to answer the questions were on vacation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to be named in media reports. The islands local elected government chief, Mariano Zapata, said it was sad that advocacy groups are so occupied by administrative matters instead of environmental issues. I wish we were all in the same boat with the intent of creating jobs in the La Palma island so it can keep being an international reference on scientific research, Zapata said. His government estimated last year that the telescope would generate 500 permanent jobs and at least 400 million euros ($470 million) in investment. Scott Ishikawa, a spokesperson for the consortium hoping to build the telescope, said that the consortium plans to appeal the ruling. While we respect the courts ruling in La Palma, we will pursue the legal process to retain La Palma as our alternative site. Hawaii remains our preferred location for TMT, and we have renewed our efforts to better connect with the Hawaii community in a meaningful and appropriate way, he said in an email to The Associated Press. Pablo Batista, a spokesman of the Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Accion group, hailed the decision as a big setback for what he called a fraudulent project that he said made fake promises of new jobs for the island. The whole idea of offering the island as a back-up was nothing else but as a strategy to put pressure on the Hawaii plans, Batista said. In a statement, the group also said that the five years that the TIO consortium has lost on La Palma should make it reflect on the arrogant and disrespectful strategy that they have carried out both in Hawaii and in the Canary Islands, emboldened by institutional support and despising the arguments of the opposition to the TMT. The groups concerns echo some of the concerns expressed by those fighting the telescope in Hawaii, said Kealoha Pisciotta, one of the leaders seeking to keep the project off Mauna Kea. Im glad that they challenged it, because like here, the challenge helps bring awareness to TMTs not only lack of following the process, but caring for the environment and Hawaiians sacred site, she said. ___ Associated Press writers Audrey McAvoy and Jennifer Sinco Kelleher contributed to this report from Honolulu. By ARITZ PARRA Associated Press The Latest: New Zealand extends virus lockdown View Photo WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealands government has extended a strict nationwide lockdown through Tuesday as it tries to quash its first outbreak of the coronavirus in six months. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Friday the government expects to keep Auckland, where most of the cases have been found, in full lockdown for at least two more weeks. But she expects most other parts of the country can ease restrictions slightly from Wednesday. The announcement came as health authorities reported 70 new daily cases, the most yet in the outbreak, which has grown to nearly 350 cases in total. Ardern said there was evidence the lockdown was working and new case numbers were beginning to level off. She said she remained committed to the strategy of eliminating the virus entirely. ___ MORE ON THE PANDEMIC: U.S. may reach 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths by Dec. 1. AP-NORC poll: Half of US workers favor vaccine, mask mandate in workplaces Illinois Gov. Pritzker requires educators, health workers to get vaccine U.S. virus surge breaks hospital records amid rising toll on kids ___ Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine ___ HERES WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING: LAS VEGAS A man from the Las Vegas area won the $1 million grand prize Thursday to cap an eight-week coronavirus vaccination jackpot program. Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak created the program to boost enthusiasm for COVID-19 shots. The prize winners were introduced by their first name and last initial at a live event hosted by the governor at the Las Vegas Convention Center and aides at the Sierra Arts Foundations Riverside Gallery in Reno. The program called Vax Nevada Days launched June 17 with $5 million in federal coronavirus relief funds. State health data showed the percentage of vaccinated state residents increased about 10% between the time the prize pool was announced in mid-June and when it ended Thursday. ___ FRANKFORT, Ky. Kentuckys governor said Thursday that the latest wave of grim COVID-19 statistics would have triggered a statewide mask mandate indoors if he still wielded the authority to take such action. But the Kentucky Supreme Court recently shifted pandemic-related decisions on masking and other issues to the Republican-dominated legislature, Gov. Andy Beshear said. So the Democratic governor used his bully pulpit to continue urging people to mask up when indoors, away from home. The Bluegrass State has reached uncharted territory with the prolonged escalation of virus infections, hospitalizations and patients in intensive care, he said at a news conference. On Wednesday, Kentucky reported 65 virus-related deaths. It also notched its third-highest daily number of new COVID-19 cases as the highly contagious delta variant overwhelms many hospitals. On Thursday, Beshear reported new record highs in Kentucky, with 2,115 virus patients hospitalized, including 590 in intensive care and 345 on ventilators. The state suffered 27 more virus-related deaths and had 5,401 new COVID-19 cases, its second-highest daily total of the pandemic. The escalation caused more than 10,000 COVID-19 infections reported statewide in the past two days, and 4,600 children tested positive for the virus in the last three days, he said. ___ LINCOLN, Neb. Nebraskas hospitals are even more crowded now than they were at the height of the coronavirus pandemic in November, Gov. Pete Ricketts said Thursday as he announced a staffing emergency to try to address a severe shortage of health care workers. The states hospitals were treating a 3,162 patients as of Wednesday, up from 3,074 on Nov. 20, when the number of known cases was at its all-time high. Most of the recent hospitalizations arent virus-related, however, and Ricketts said the increase was driven by patients seeking treatment for other medical problems. According to state data, hospitals are currently treating 337 virus patients about 11% of total hospitalizations. In November, the hospitals counted 987 virus patients, accounting for 32% of hospitalizations. Ricketts said he declared the emergency after consulting with the states hospital administrators. But he stopped short of calling it a COVID-19 emergency, which would allow the state to once again disclose daily case information. ___ MEMPHIS, Tenn. The president of CEO of the Memphis-based St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital said in a letter Thursday that parents should protect their children by insisting that they wear masks in the classroom. In his letter, Dr. James Downing mentioned Tennessee Gov. Bill Lees recent executive order allowing parents to opt out of mask mandates issued by school districts. Many school systems are complying with the Republican governors order, but Shelby County Schools in Memphis and the school district in Nashville are defying it and still requiring students and staff to wear masks in school buildings. Some parents have protested mask mandates outside schools and at board meetings, arguing that mask-wearing by their children should be their choice. Downing wrote that masks are safe to wear and they help prevent the spread of COVID-19. Protesting mask mandates puts an agenda before childrens health, Downing wrote. This stance is not rational. Stop the arguments and the protests. Stand up as a community and do what is right to protect children. ___ BUENOS AIRES, Argentina A federal prosecutor is accusing Argentine President Alberto Fernandez of apparently violating his own pandemic restrictions decree by joining a dozen other people at his wifes birthday party. The action by prosecutor Ramiro Gonzalez means Fernandez could face a criminal investigation. The party was held last year at the presidential residence at a time when the government had banned social gatherings to impede the spread of COVID-19. Investigators began looking into the case when a photo circulated this month showing Fernandez together with his wife Fabiola Yanez and other unmasked people standing around a table with with remnants of a party. The government acknowledged that the photograph was taken on July 14, 2020, at a moment when restrictions were in place. The president publicly apologized. While the president is in no risk of going to prison for such an offense, it has dented his image ahead of Novembers legislative elections. ___ MONTGOMERY, Ala. Alabama is seeing a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases in school-age children, with more than 5,000 cases reported last week an increase officials say is likely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant and is causing some schools to temporarily switch to remote learning. The Alabama Department of Public Health said last week, 5,571 children ages 5 to 17 were reported to have COVID-19. That compares to 702 cases in school-aged children during the same week last year, a time when more than half of students were studying remotely and a less contagious variant was circulating. State Health Officer Scott Harris pointed to delta variant as the most likely explanation. The numbers are staggering, Harris said of the increase We want to remind people that everyone needs to be vaccinated who is eligible, that is everyone 12 and up. We strongly recommend universal masking in schools. Hospitalizations and deaths in children remain relatively rare, according to state numbers. Of the nearly 2,900 patients in state hospitals with COVID-19 on Thursday, fewer than 50 were children, according to the Alabama Hospital Association. ___ OFALLON, Mo. Missouri is opening antibody treatment centers in several counties in the hopes that theyll keep some high-risk patients with COVID-19 from dying or becoming critically ill. Monoclonal antibody infusion treatment will be available for 30 days at sites in Jackson, Pettis, Scott, Butler and Jefferson counties. Two more sites will be added later in the St. Louis area. The state is spending $15 million on the centers and believes they could treat up to 4,000 people over the next month. The initial site was set up last month in southwestern Missouri, a region hit hard by the delta variant surge. Health officials said 588 people have been treated at an infusion center in Springfield. Katie Towns, the health director for Springfield and Greene County, said in a news release that the treatment has undoubtedly saved lives in our community. The drugs are lab-made versions of virus-blocking antibodies that help fight off infections. Antibody treatments are among the few therapies that can lessen the effects of COVID-19, and they are seen as an option for those with mild-to-moderate cases who arent yet in hospitals. On Thursday, the states COVID-19 dashboard showed that hospitalizations rose by 84, to 2,352. The state cited 2,161 newly confirmed cases, bringing its pandemic total to 622,081. The state also has reported 10,409 COVID-19 deaths since the onset of the pandemic. ___ DETROIT The head of the 397,000-member United Auto Workers union says its against requiring members to be vaccinated against the virus that causes COVID-19. New President Ray Curry says if any of the 700 companies that employ union members wants to impose such a requirement, it would be subject to bargaining with union officials. Curry told reporters Thursday that the union encourages members to get vaccinations and consider boosters when they are available. But the union respects members wishes if they dont want to be vaccinated for religious, medical or personal reasons, he said. The UAW would be against mandates even if infected workers could endanger fellow employees, Curry said. We also believe that the employers and the employees that we represent in those locations still have a voice, and we will have to take those things under consideration, he said. No employers have contacted the union about requiring vaccines or imposing additional health care costs on employees who arent vaccinated, Curry said. ___ MOSCOW Russia reported a one-day record of 820 coronavirus deaths. The national coronavirus taskforce says the number of new daily infections reached 19,630. That follows a consistent ebb since the beginning of the month when 22,800 cases were reported. The previous record for deaths was 819 on Aug. 14. Russia has reported more than 6.8 million confirmed cases and 179,243 confirmed deaths. ___ NEW ORLEANS A Louisiana teenager has died of COVID-19. The coroner in East Baton Rouge Parish on Thursday confirmed the death of 14-year-old Patrick Sanders III from the city of Baker. Baton Rouge media report that Sanders, who died Wednesday, was a football player at Baker High School. Sanders death came days after the state reported the death of an infant. Children under 18 made up about 30% of cases reported Thursday in Louisiana. The state reported more than 5,100 new probable and confirmed coronavirus cases Thursday and 72 confirmed deaths. Hospitalizations statewide stand at 2,729, down from more than 3,000 earlier this month. Vaccinations in Louisiana are increasing, with nearly 60,000 doses administered since Monday. First shots have been given to about 49% of the states population. ___ FRANKFORT, Ky. Kentucky and Texas have joined a growing list of states that have surpassed their record for hospitalized coronavirus patients. The two states on Wednesday reported the most COVID-19 patients in their hospitals since the start of the pandemic. At least six other states Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi and Oregon have already surpassed their records amid a national surge in the virus. The latest spike is fueled by the highly contagious delta variant of the virus among those who are unvaccinated. In areas with low vaccination rates, doctors have pleaded with their communities to get inoculated to spare overburdened hospitals. They have also sounded the alarm about the growing toll of the delta strain on children and young adults. Nationwide, COVID-19 deaths are averaging more than 1,100 a day, the highest level since mid-March. New cases per day are averaging over 152,000, turning the clock back to the end of January. As of this week, the number of people in the hospital with the coronavirus was around 85,000, a level not seen since early February. ___ NEW YORK The U.S. is projected to reach nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths by Dec. 1. Thats the prediction from the nations most closely watched forecasting model. But health experts say that toll could be cut in half if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. Some behavior changes already may be flattening the curve in a few places in the South where the coronavirus has raged this summer. An Associated Press analysis shows the rate of new cases is slowing in Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas. The projection from models at the University of Washington indicates deaths will rise to nearly 1,400 a day by mid-September, then decline slowly. Deaths are currently averaging 1,100 a day in the U.S., turning the clock back to mid-March. The projection is an additional 98,000 Americans will die by the start of December, for an overall U.S. death toll of nearly 730,000. By The Associated Press Half of US workers favor employee shot mandate: AP-NORC poll View Photo NEW YORK (AP) Half of American workers are in favor of vaccine requirements at their workplaces, according to a new poll, at a time when such mandates gain traction following the federal governments full approval of Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine. The poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that about 59% of remote workers favor vaccine requirements in their own workplaces, compared with 47% of those who are currently working in person. About one-quarter of workers in person and remote are opposed. The sentiment is similar for workplace mask mandates, with 50% of Americans working in person favoring them and 29% opposed, while 59% of remote workers are in favor. About 6 in 10 college graduates, who are more likely to have jobs that can be done remotely, support both mask and vaccine mandates at their workplaces, compared with about 4 in 10 workers without college degrees. Christopher Messick, an electrical engineer who is mostly working from home in Brunswick, Maryland, said he wrote to his companys human resources department to ask that employees be required to get vaccinated before they are recalled to the office. Messick, who is vaccinated, said he doesnt just worry about his own health. He said he also doesnt want to worry about getting a breakthrough infection that could land an unvaccinated co-worker in the hospital. I dont want sit an office for eight hours a day with someone who is not vaccinated, said Messick, 41. The people who are anti-vax, I see them as selfish. So far, many vaccine requirements are coming from private companies with employees who have mostly been able to work from home during the pandemic. The companies, including major tech companies and investment banks, have workforces that are already largely vaccinated and consider the requirement a key step toward eventually reopening offices. Goldman Sachs joined that trend Tuesday, telling employees in a memo that anyone who enters its U.S. offices must be fully vaccinated starting Sept. 7. In contrast, few companies that rely on hourly service workers have imposed vaccine mandates because the companies are concerned about losing staff at a time of acute labor shortages and turnover. Exceptions include food processing giant Tyson Foods and Walt Disney World, which reached a deal this week with its unions to require all workers at its theme park in Orlando, Florida, to be vaccinated. The AP-NORC poll was conducted before the FDA granted full approval of Pfizers vaccine, which some experts and employers are hoping will persuade more people to get the shot and support mandates. Drugstore chain CVS said this week that pharmacists, nurses and other workers who have contact with patients will have to be inoculated, but the company stopped short of requiring the vaccine for other employees such as cashiers. The AP-NORC poll showed high support for vaccine mandates among those who say they work in person in a health care setting, with 70% approving of vaccine requirements at their workplace. The poll also showed divisions along racial lines. Seventy-three percent of Black workers and 59% of Hispanic workers who are more likely than white workers to work in front-line jobs support mask mandates at their workplaces, compared with 42% of white workers. In addition, 53% of Black and Hispanic workers support vaccine mandates at their workplaces, as do 44% of white workers. Despite mixed support for mandates among in-person employees, 71% of those workers said they themselves are vaccinated. Mike Rodriguez, a maintenance worker at an auto dealership in Florida, said he got the vaccine in the spring after a diabetes diagnosis gave him a sense of urgency. But he said he leans against supporting a vaccine mandate at his job and does not mind that masks are not required. I dont like being told what to do. Never have, said Rodriguez, 54. Im going to wear mine no matter what. Just like whenever I go into a store. Thats my choice. Many large retailers, grocery store chains, food manufacturers and other companies have aggressively encouraged vaccinations with bonuses, time off, information campaigns and on-site vaccination access. Janet Haynes of Topeka, Kansas, an education consultant who works part time as a package handler at a warehouse, said she struggled in March to get an appointment, putting herself on various waiting lists before she finally got a call. Now that vaccines are widely available, Haynes said she is frustrated with people who are reluctant to get them and she would support a requirement at her warehouse, where she dodges co-workers who flout a mask rule. We get so hung up on democracy and freedom, but the reality is that your freedom cant exist at the expense of someone elses loss, said Haynes, adding that she recently had a breakthrough case of COVID-19 and credits the vaccine for her swift recovery. We are not going to be free until we get vaccinated. ____ The AP-NORC poll of 1,729 adults was conducted Aug. 12-16 using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 3.2 percentage points. By ALEXANDRA OLSON and HANNAH FINGERHUT Associated Press Officials in Detroit are looking at making continued changes to city towing rules after several federal corruption probes. Mayor Mike Duggan told reporters Thursday that hes asked the citys police chief for a plan in two weeks to eliminate a decade-long practice of rotating towing duties to a list of preferred companies. On Wednesday, search warrants were executed at offices in City Hall. Agents and state police also were seen at the homes of Councilman Scott Benson and Councilwoman Janee Ayers. It was not immediately known if the ongoing probes are related to Detroits towing practices. The FBI did not provide details Wednesday about the search warrants. Ayers name emerged several years ago in a bribery investigation involving towing magnate Gasper Fiore, according to The Detroit News. She has not been charged in that investigation. A former high-ranking Detroit police official and about a half-dozen ex-police officers have been indicted in recent years for bribery in connection with towing contracts. A decision was made in 2011-12 to not competitively bid towing contracts. A permit system was created and involved a rotation among a preferential group of companies, Duggan said. Owners of stolen or impounded vehicles have to pay towing costs and storage fees before their vehicles are returned. It is a system fraught with potential for abuse, Duggan said. The amounts of money that are involved are just breeding potential for abuse. Since 2017, the city has terminated contracts with some companies and changed the practice where a company could find a stolen vehicle and then claim the tow work, Duggan said. We had evidence that it appears some of the towers were in cahoots with the car thieves, he said. After we stopped that practice, the car theft rate dropped significantly. Duggan said he will withhold judgment until he sees what develops from Wednesdays searches, but added that no one has been charged. Its never good when the Feds are delivering search warrants, he said, adding that the FBI has not shared any details of their investigation with him. In 2018, Fiore, of Grosse Pointe Shores, was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison for his role in the bribing of a suburban official for help with a municipal towing contract. Former Detroit Deputy Police Chief Celia Washington was sentenced that year to a year and a day in prison in a corruption case related to towing contracts. Washington was accused of accepting at least $3,000 from Fiore. Last month, Detroit Councilman Andre Spivey was charged in federal court with conspiracy to commit bribery and accused of accepting $1,000 from an undercover law enforcement agent in October 2018. The indictment also alleges that between 2016 and 2020, Spivey and public official A accepted more than $35,000 in payments to influence votes concerning an industry under review by the council. In June, former Councilman Gabe Leland was sentenced in Wayne County Circuit Court to probation after pleading guilty to accepting an illegal $7,500 cash campaign contribution. Federal corruption charges were to be dismissed as part of Lelands plea deal. ___ Williams reported from West Bloomfield, Michigan. By COREY WILLIAMS Associated Press ONTARIO, Calif. (AP) The pilot escaped with minor injuries after a small plane made an emergency landing in a Southern California field on Wednesday, authorities said. TV news footage from the scene showed the single-engine Cessna stopped with its left wing in the grass near a main road in Ontario, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) east of downtown Los Angeles. The pilot is alert and being treated on scene. No bystanders were hurt and no homes were damaged, the Ontario Police Department said on Twitter. The pilot was the only person on board, the Federal Aviation Administration said. The FAA and National Transportation Safety Board will investigate. SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) A California judge said Wednesday that she anticipates a two-week hearing early next year before she decides if Scott Peterson deserves a new trial in the 2002 death of his pregnant wife. Thats more than a year after the California Supreme Court ordered Superior Court Judge Anne-Christine Massullo to consider if juror misconduct was so significant that it denied him a fair trial. Massullo is expected to hear testimony from juror Richelle Nice, who is at the center of the dispute and has denied that she was influenced by her own background of domestic abuse. Nice is identified in court papers as Juror 7. But she co-authored a book about the case with six other jurors. That hearing would get to the meat and potatoes of what the jurors information is, Deputy Stanislaus County District Attorney Dave Harris said. Laci Peterson, 27, was eight months pregnant with their unborn son, Connor, when she was killed. Massullo must decide if Nice committed prejudicial misconduct by failing to disclose that she had sought a restraining order in 2000 for fear that her boyfriends ex-girlfriend could harm Nices own unborn child. Petersons attorneys revealed in a June court filing that Nice also failed to disclose that her boyfriend beat her in 2001 while she was pregnant with another child. As a perspective juror, Nice had answered no when she was asked if she had ever been involved in a lawsuit or been a crime victim. Nice said in a court filing that she didnt think the restraining order was a lawsuit, nor did she feel victimized the way the law might define that term. Massullo said she had wanted to schedule the evidentiary hearing for October, and she might still try to do it in early November. But she said delays in gathering evidence and sworn witness testimony, partly because of the coronavirus pandemic, make it more likely she will schedule the hearing for two weeks in late January or early February, after the winter holidays. She expects to set the dates during a Sept. 22 hearing after considering several legal filings in the meantime. Peterson, 48, participated in Wednesdays hearing through a telephone link from San Quentin State Prison, home of Californias death row. The state Supreme Court separately overturned Petersons death sentence last year over unrelated faulty juror selection, and prosecutors said they wont again seek to have him executed. If Peterson gets a new trial, his attorney has said he will present new evidence bolstering the defense theory that Laci Peterson was killed when she stumbled upon a nearby burglary. Investigators said that on Christmas Eve 2002, Peterson dumped the bodies from his fishing boat into San Francisco Bay, where they surfaced months later. The states high court last year said that there was considerable circumstantial evidence incriminating Peterson in the slayings. By DON THOMPSON Associated Press OAKLEY, Calif. (AP) A 12-year-old boy died Wednesday after a freight train collided with multiple vehicles, officials with the San Francisco Bay Area city of Oakley said. East Contra Costa Fire Protection District fire fighters responded to the crash at a railroad crossing shortly before 1 p.m. Wednesday, the East Bay Times reported. The boy, a passenger, was pronounced dead at the scene and the driver, a 19-year-old female, was flown to a nearby medical center. She is listed in critical condition. Their identities were not released. Authorities did not release details of the crash, including cause or sequence of events. The Oakley Police Department will conduct an investigation. Last week, the fire protection district responded to a crash involving a semi-truck and an Amtrak train headed to Stockton. The driver of the truck had minor injuries and there were no reported injuries from people on the train. CHICAGO (AP) A man wanted on a murder warrant in California was fatally shot during an exchange of gunfire with Amtrak police when officers tried to take him into custody on the platform of Chicagos Union Station, authorities said. Amtrak spokesman Marc Migliari said the shooting took place at about 5 p.m. on Tuesday. He said when the man spotted uniformed officers on the platform he ran away. But he saw that he was running toward other officers and began shooting at them. Chicago Police said an Amtrak police officer returned fire, striking the man in the chest. They said the man was rushed to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead on Tuesday evening. Police also said a gun was recovered at the scene. The man was identified as Jamar Jason Taylor, 33, of San Leandro, California. The Cook County Medical Examiners office had not identified the man as of Wednesday morning pending the notification of next of kin. Three others were taken to area hospitals. One man was being treated for lacerations to his face and was listed in good condition, police said. Two others were taken to a hospital, but their conditions were not immediately known. Calling all aspiring lonesome cowboys, agave sippers and true Texans. Here's your chance to enjoy some local libations and catch the premiere of a new documentary all about two lifelong cowboys in the San Antonio area. Austin-based company, Desert Door Texas Sotol and Octotillo Films are investing in cowboy history with this "yeehaw" showcase on Sunday, September 12, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. The Texan alcohol purveyors will be hosting a screening of the film "Eastenos: True Cowboys of the Wild Horse Desert" along with the organization. Courtesy of Desert Door The showing will take place in Hotel Emma's Elephant Cellar. The story explores the 45-year legacy of brothers Timo and Miguel Rodriguez, cowboys at the East Foundation for more than 45 years. The East Foundation is an organization that promotes land stewardship through ranching, science and education. It also manages over 217,000 acres of native South Texas rangeland and operates six separate ranches. The short film is set at the historic San Antonio Viejo Ranch during their annual spring cattle round-up. "I do believe theyre literally rooted into this place. Theyre a part of it. When you put this much sweat, and blood, and literal tears into a place, you get connected to it," said Zane Herrin, Cattle Operations Manager at East Foundation on Timo & Miguel Rodriguez, in a statement. After the film screening, attendees will have an opportunity to participate in a Q & A with the film collaborators and the cowboys in question, the Rodriguez brothers. Tickets are on sale starting at $75, and include two Desert Door cocktails and appetizers upon arrival. Slackers, a local arcade-themed bar, is gearing up to move its St. Mary's Street location into the building once home to a live music staple the Strip. More for you Eat & Drink Five video games that take over 100 hours to beat A sign hanging on the front of the old Limelight building that reads "Slackers Coming Soon" confirms that the arcade bar will move in. When that will happen is not known. Frank Garza, a spokesperson with Slackers, declined to comment on the planned move. Slackers' first location on the Strip is just down the street from Limelight at 2809 N St. Mary's Street. The Strip location opened in 2017, making it the third location for the local chain. The planned migration also means that Limelight has closed. Casey Lange, who owns the former Limelight property, says the bar closed sometime in July. Attempts to reach representatives for Limelight went unanswered. Limelight's last post about on Facebook was on July 27, 2020, lamenting what would have been open mic night, but the club's doors were closed. Gov. Greg Abbott had ordered bars to close in response to the pandemic just a month before that post. A broad education effort about cardiac arrest seemed to improve care and save lives, a study has found. But even as the response to cardiac arrest improved in important ways, survival rates rose only in white people. "What this makes us want to do is make sure we have efforts in place to recognize and respond to cardiac arrest in Black communities in a rapid way," said the study's senior author Dr. Christopher Granger, a professor of medicine at Duke University School of Medicine in Durham, North Carolina. The study, published Wednesday in the Journal of the American Heart Association, looked at data from 2010 to 2014 in 16 North Carolina counties. More than 7,000 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests were examined. About 37% were Black adults; the rest were white adults. In 2010, North Carolina began a statewide effort called HeartRescue. It included training for hospital workers and first responders about cardiac arrest as well as community education on how to perform CPR and use automated external defibrillators, or AEDs, which are found in many public places. In the program's wake, researchers found, bystander CPR rates improved for both groups from 37% to 46% for Black people, and from 39% to 52% for white people. First responders such as firefighters and police officers became more likely to use a defibrillator on white people before paramedics arrived. Defibrillator use by first responders also increased for Black people, but the finding did not reach statistical significance. Survival until hospital discharge improved significantly only for white people, increasing from 8% in 2010 to 11.4% in 2014. Survival for Black people remained unchanged at about 9%. Digging into the data, researchers found Black people were less likely to have had a "shockable" heart rhythm when first responders arrived. "The results indicate that the lower frequency of shockable rhythm among Black patients could be an important contributor" to their survival rates, said lead author Dr. Sidsel Mller of Herlev and Gentofte Hospital in Hellerup, Denmark. The study found other differences between Black and white cardiac arrest patients. Black people were more likely to have a cardiac arrest, and those who did were younger and more often women. And they were more likely to be alone when they had one. That can be a problem, Granger said, "because if the arrest isn't witnessed, then of course the response is going to be delayed." Cardiac arrest is a sudden disruption of the heart's electrical function. For a few minutes, a normal rhythm can be restored by shocking the patient with a defibrillator. But the longer it takes for help to arrive, the lower the likelihood someone will respond to treatment. Of the more than 350,000 cardiac arrests that occur outside the hospital each year in the U.S., only about 1 in 10 survive to hospital discharge, according to American Heart Association statistics. In the study, the average response time for emergency medical services was eight minutes, the same for both Black and white patients. Response time for first responders was not measured, Granger said. Dr. Marina Del Rios, an associate professor in the department of emergency medicine at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Chicago, said the study was important because it used real-life data to confirm what had been seen in narrower types of studies. Del Rios, who was not involved in the new research, said the findings raise questions about what hospitals are doing that could cause survival rates to differ. She noted, for example, previous research indicates women and Black and Latino people who've had a cardiac arrest are less likely than their respective male and white counterparts to receive post-cardiac arrest interventions. Such differences, she said, exist within the context of broader structural problems, including racial bias and unequal access to health care. "We still have a lot of work to do to understand why some patients are at higher risk of having a cardiac arrest and why the type of cardiac arrest that they have is different," she said. Mller said the overall findings indicate that intervention programs such as HeartRescue seem to work irrespective of the patients' race. And Granger said the work pointed to several possible steps that could help improve cardiac arrest survival in Black communities, starting with ensuring first responders are positioned to arrive rapidly and dispatchers are fully trained in how to best serve Black callers. The study, he said, also shows the importance of widespread education about cardiac arrest. "It's especially important for the Black community to get trained in bystander CPR," and to know when to call 911. He agreed more work lies ahead. "Care did improve, community response improved, but survival did not. So, the implications of the study are, 'OK, now we need to find out why that might be the case.'" If you have questions or comments about this story, please email editor@heart.org. Copyright is owned or held by the American Heart Association, Inc., and all rights are reserved. Permission is granted, at no cost and without need for further request, for individuals, media outlets, and non-commercial education and awareness efforts to link to, quote, excerpt or reprint from these stories in any medium as long as no text is altered and proper attribution is made to American Heart Association News. Other uses, including educational products or services sold for profit, must comply with the American Heart Associations Copyright Permission Guidelines. See full terms of use. These stories may not be used to promote or endorse a commercial product or service. HEALTH CARE DISCLAIMER: This site and its services do not constitute the practice of medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always talk to your health care provider for diagnosis and treatment, including your specific medical needs. If you have or suspect that you have a medical problem or condition, please contact a qualified health care professional immediately. If you are in the United States and experiencing a medical emergency, call 911 or call for emergency medical help immediately. Texas attorney Jim Adler, also known as "The Texas Hammer," thinks he nailed an Alabama lawyer using his steez. One might say he's getting "angrier than a junkyard dog." He's so upset, he filed a lawsuit. According to AL.com, a website for Alabama news, Adler, who has offices in San Antonio, Houston, Dallas and Channelview, is suing Mike Slocumb, known as "The Alabama Hammer," for copyright infringement. Adler accuses his Alabama counterpart of copyright and trademark infringement, unfair competition, and wants compensation and an end to the ads, AL.com reports. Are the Alabama ads similar to what San Antonio has been seeing for years (and making memes of)? There's certainly a lot of aggressive hammer mentions. Houston Chronicle contributor In the documents obtained by AL.com, Adler says he's spent more than $100 million on ads solidifying himself as the "Texas Hammer," a slogan he's been using since the 1990s. Slocumb denies he's ripping anything off. The battle was featured on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, where the host called them "glorious maniacs" and compared two ads. Turns out Texans aren't the only ones seeing a "tough," hammer-wielding lawyer going head-to-head with an 18-wheeler you know the commercial. Slocumb has an add that mirrors Adler's. Oliver pointed out that it proves the younger Hammer is ripping off the Lone Star State lawyer. While Slocumb seems to be paying close attention to our Hammer's ad work, it's unclear if he's dabbled in Spanish like Adler has. No one comes close to EL MARTILLO TEJANO. Our judgement? Slocumb's original content is pretty wild in itself. One ad shows him running after an ambulance, presumably an "ambulance chaser" joke, then being hit by another emergency vehicle. Another shows a child version of himself punching a hallway bully before morphing into his adult form. At one point, he was able to tap legendary actor William Shatner to be on a commercial. Stick to what you know, Slocumb. Texas Democrats aren't holding back their comments after Gov. Greg Abbott announced his latest executive order on Wednesday, August 25. Abbott's order bans COVID-19 mandates regardless of a vaccine's approval status with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Additionally, Abbott says the subject of vaccine mandates will be added to the state legislature's special session agenda. "Vaccine requirements and exemptions have historically been determined by the legislature, and their involvement is particularly important to avoid a patchwork of vaccine mandates across Texas," Abbott said in a statement. Shortly after the news, many took to Twitter to call out Abbott's latest action. Former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro tweeted the order isn't about Texans' freedom. He says, "This is about Abbott playing political games with a deadly virus to placate his extreme right-wing base." San Antonio Independent School District also told reporter Joshua Fechter of the Texas Tribune that it will continue to move forward with its vaccine mandate for its employees. "We strongly believe that the safest path forward as a school district is for all staff to become vaccinated against COVID-19," SAISD wrote in its statement. "We are moving forward with our request to have all vaccinated by Oct. 15, unless they have a medical or religious exemption." Scroll below to see reactions from other Texas leaders, as well as The Daily Show with Trevor Noah. An all Republican Texas Supreme Court has sided with Gov. Greg Abbott in the ongoing legal battle of mask mandates, potentially putting Bexar County back to square one. The Supreme Court granted Abbott emergency relief on Thursday, August 26, to enforce his ban on mask mandates, turning over the temporary injunction for the public and private schools mask mandate created by Bexar County. "While I am personally disappointed in the order handed down today by the Texas Supreme Court, I will continue to do all that I can to fight for the health, safety and welfare of the citizens of Bexar County," says District Attorney Joe Gonzales. "We are continuing to work with the city of San Antonio to determine the next steps in light of the order issued today." Bexar County District Judge Antonia Arteaga had previously granted a temporary injunction against Abbott's executive order banning mask mandates on August 16, allowing the county to enforce its mandate for public and private schools. Today's motion from the Texas Supreme Court comes after an unsuccessful appeal attempt in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on August 20. "I support continuing the mask requirement for city employees and facilities. I also hope and expect school districts will stay the course and continue with their mask requirements," Mayor Ron Nirenberg says in a statement. "Confusion is the enemy of emergency response, and the governor is excelling at it. Mask up. Get vaccinated. Protect yourself and those around you. Its as simple as that. Since Bexar County's temporary injunction, several school districts approved temporary mask mandates, including Northside ISD, Northeast ISD, and Alamo Heights ISD. San Antonio ISD, which is currently being sued by Attorney General Ken Paxton, implemented a mask mandate for students and staff, and a vaccine mandate for staff. Abbott also pushed another executive order Wednesday, August 25, banning vaccine mandates, despite Pfizer's full approval this week from the FDA. He also added the issue to the special legislative session agenda. MySA reached out to Abbott's office for comment on the Texas Supreme Court motion, but did not immediately receive comment. Mayor Ron Nirenberg, however, did issue a tweet. Tim Zurowski/Getty Images/All Canada Photos Travis County Sheriff's Office launched a suspicious death investigation after the body of a newborn infant was recently discovered by a fisherman off of Old San Antonio Road in Buda. According to a news release from the office, deputies responded to a report of a deceased person around 8:30 a.m. on Tuesday, August 24. MCALLEN On a late July afternoon, a director and an officer with the Texas Department of Public Safety met with Sister Norma Pimentel and Rev. Mario Alberto Aviles of the Brownsville Diocese to tell them that Gov. Greg Abbotts new executive order meant that Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley could no longer transport migrants. The DPS officials told Pimentel that once Abbotts order went into effect, troopers would constantly watch Catholic Charities shelter in McAllen, the largest in the area for migrants seeking asylum in the U.S., according to a brief the shelter filed in court as part of a federal lawsuit against the governor. If troopers saw shelter employees and volunteers transporting migrants, they would pull over and impound the vehicle, the director told Aviles and Pimentel, the shelters executive director. In the court documents, Pimentel said if the shelter couldnt transport migrants to the nearby airport or a hotel, the shelter would become overcrowded and increase the risk of COVID-19 if staff could not transport infected migrants to a hotel to be isolated. We would have to turn away mothers and babies who are seeking temporary shelter, food, and medical assistance, she said. If we cannot provide humanitarian aid, it is my understanding that these families would likely be left to their own devices on the street, without access to food, shelter and medical care. As immigration issues continue to roil President Joe Bidens administration and spark debates across the country, Abbott has issued a disaster declaration for many border counties a move usually reserved for natural disasters and pressed a series of Texas-based initiatives to combat what he has described as a crisis caused by the presidents lax immigration policies. Abbotts office is collecting donations to continue building barriers at the Texas-Mexico border. He has sent roughly 1,000 state troopers and Texas Rangers to arrest migrants on state charges, dispatched National Guard to help Border Patrol agents and turned a state prison into an immigrant-only detention center. His order to intercept civilian vehicles transporting migrants was temporarily suspended by a federal judge in El Paso until Aug. 27. Immigrant advocates and some elected officials in the Rio Grande Valley say the governors rhetoric about needing a massive law enforcement response to address an out-of-control border doesnt match the realities border residents face. Valley officials say they need more COVID-19 test kits and shelter space rather than more state troopers. If he would come and spend one day with us, just sit down at the table and eat with these people or come to church and pray with these people, hell see, these are not despicable people. These are not vermin. They're not dangerous. They're not nefarious, they're sweet, said Father Roy Snipes, whose Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Mission serves as an overflow shelter. In rural West Texas, meanwhile, local officials say theyd appreciate more of the law enforcement resources that are going to other parts of the border, to help detain immigrants damaging private property and deter what some locals suspect are drug smugglers. Joanna Mackenzie, the emergency management coordinator for Hudspeth County, a massive county east of El Paso with a population of about 4,400 people, said migrants have become brazen, stealing weapons from a house and breaking windows and doors to steal food and water. We carry our guns all the time now because we dont know who were going to run into, Mackenzie said. U.S. Customs and Border Protection data shows that migrants are attempting to enter the country through the Texas-Mexico border in ever-growing numbers. With just over a month left in the fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, Border Patrol agents already have had the most encounters with migrants in 21 years. CBP has recorded 1.3 million encounters with migrants on the U.S.-Mexico border, led by the Rio Grande Valley sector with more than 412,000 of them. The agency said it encountered 845,300 unique individuals between October and July. Many migrants attempt to cross the border multiple times, and the number of repeat crossers has jumped from 5% of those apprehended in 2019 to 40% this year, according to the American Immigration Council, a Washington, D.C., a group that advocates for immigrants. Part of the reason repeat crossings have exploded, immigration experts say, is President Donald Trumps policy continued under Biden of immediately expelling migrants after theyre apprehended. Since the policy was enacted in March 2020 in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, Border Patrol agents have expelled more than 840,000 migrants. Renae Eze, an Abbott spokesperson, said Bidens policies have created a magnet for migrants that Texas now has to address. President Bidens reckless open border policies not only endanger Texans and their communities it endangers the lives of migrants making the dangerous journey, she said. Marian Roblero, a 27-year-old mother of a 7-month-old baby, said she left Guatemala a month ago because she couldnt find a job. She said she studied physical therapy at a university but without money, she couldnt finish her studies. Holding back tears at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church, Roblero said people who demonize immigrants are wrong about us. Maybe because they havent had to live through what weve experienced. Maybe theyve never been hungry or cold. Migrants seeking refuge On a recent Monday morning outside of Catholic Charities in McAllen, many of the migrants dropped off were families wearing surgical masks. Some also wore ankle monitors and most of them carried manila folders with immigration paperwork proving theyve been allowed to enter the country pending the outcome of their legal cases. Outside the shelter, taxis awaited migrants heading to the airport or a hotel. Relatives and friends looked for loved ones they hadnt seen in years to take them to homes in Dallas and Louisiana. Among them was Edin Galeano, a 37-year-old from Honduras who has lived in Dallas for the past five years and currently works as an Uber driver. He made the nearly eight-hour drive to McAllen after receiving a call days earlier from his wife: She had arrived in the U.S. and would be dropped off at the shelter. Pacing in blue jeans, a black T-shirt and a black face mask, Galeano anxiously waited to catch sight of his wife and two children, whom he left behind when he emigrated alone. Galeano, like his wife, said he left Honduras because of the lack of job opportunities. Its disheartening that Abbotts policies arent more welcoming, he said. I ask that people put themselves in the shoes of an immigrant and live in the conditions that our country is currently in, Galeano said, constantly checking his iPhone for a call or message from his wife. I think family is the biggest love anybody can have, and anyone is willing to do anything for their family. Nearby, Jose Alfredo Ledezma, 35, waited outside the shelter with his wife and 1-year-old daughter for a taxi to give them a ride to a nearby hotel. Border Patrol allowed the family, who came from Honduras, to enter the country the night before asking for asylum, after they had spent three days under the Anzalduas International Bridge south of McAllen, where Border Patrol agents have set up an outdoor processing center. There, Idxi Martinez, Ledezmas wife, said they slept on trash bags on the ground, fighting off mosquitoes. Getting to the Texas-Mexico border, however, was the most dangerous part, the couple said. Somewhere in Mexico, they said a group of armed men kidnapped them and demanded a $4,500 ransom. Even after they paid the ransom with money family members sent to them, they said the men didnt let them go. One night they snuck out of the house when the kidnappers left them unattended, they said. They hope to start a new life in the U.S., where their daughter can get a good education. Were confident in God because we came here with a purpose, to fight for a successful life in this country, Ledezma said. Hidalgo County Judge Richard Cortez, who has criticized both the Biden administration and Abbott for how theyve handled immigration, said the governors approach gives a false portrayal that the problem is illegal immigration, when in reality, the problem is not having resources to help asylum-seeking migrants who are following a legal immigration process. Cortez said a wall or more state troopers on the border wouldnt stop migrants from seeking asylum. The Valley needs resources to help asylum-seekers be processed in a more humane and practical way, he said, rather than packing them into overcrowded shelters and the processing center at the Anzalduas Bridge. Im not saying there is no problem, he said. Jesus Gasca, a parishioner and volunteer at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church who immigrated to Texas from Mexico years ago, said the politics around immigration are detached from what were actually doing here. The people coming through here are hungry, theyre escaping violence, he said. I think what we need instead is to have a little bit of humanity, and be a bit more sensible with people. Feeling ignored The rugged terrain of the Eagle Mountains, located just 30 miles north of Mexico in Hudspeth County, could be a national park because of the green vistas and serene atmosphere, some residents here say. Along rocky paths that crisscross the mountains, the ground is littered with discarded sleeping bags, T-shirts, water bottles and plastic bags once filled with food, left behind by migrants who have crossed through here to sneak across the border. According to CBP data, there have been 155,882 migrant encounters in the El Paso sector, which includes Hudspeth County, so far in fiscal 2021. Thats a 290% increase from the same period last fiscal year. Cattle ranchers and officials here say migrants cut through private property, sometimes breaking into homes to escape the blistering sun or cutting water lines to rehydrate. Some residents have described seeing men carrying big packs and wearing combat boots and camouflage clothing. They suspect theyre smuggling drugs. On occasion, migrants have started fires in the mountains to be rescued after injuring themselves or being left behind by their smugglers, known as coyotes. Other times, ranchers find the bodies of migrants who died attempting to cross. A 66-year-old rancher who requested anonymity out of fear of being targeted by migrants she suspects have connections to drug cartels said she fears who she may run into when she rides through the 100,000-acre property. She will routinely check on the furnished but vacant houses on her ranch to find that migrants have broken in and left the water running in a bathtub, ripped window screens and broken bedroom door locks, she said. You just feel very violated, she said as she drove on her four-wheel Polaris Ranger through her property, picking up items migrants left behind. It wasnt always like this, residents say. In years past, ranchers would accept the migrants as part of border-town culture. Regardless of ethnicity, many in this Hispanic-majority county grew up bilingual and would help migrants who would ask for food or water as they passed through the area. We grew up letting them go by because we know they are trying to better their life, said Mackenzie, the county emergency management coordinator. Hudspeth County Judge Thomas Neely, 93, said that in recent years dealing with the effects of migration has been more costly for the county. He said the sheriffs office and emergency responders have received an increasing number of search-and-rescue calls to help find migrants or their bodies. Ive never seen anything this serious, thats caused this much disruption, Neely said. A CBP official testified to Congress in July that the agency has recorded more than 300 migrant deaths so far in fiscal year 2021 at the U.S.-Mexico border, compared to 250 deaths for all of fiscal year 2020. Hudspeth County has just 17 deputies and three staffed ambulances to cover 4,570 square miles an area nearly the size of Connecticut. When they need help, county officials turn to Texas Rescue Patrol, a nonprofit organization made up of search-and-rescue volunteers. The sheriffs office has recovered nearly 20 bodies this year, a small number compared to other areas of the border, but a significant jump compared to years past when the county tallied single digits. By comparison, the county has recorded just four COVID-19-related deaths this year. Mackenzie said that she wishes the National Guard would help Border Patrol agents patrol the area. She said that if there was a bigger law enforcement presence, it would help ranchers feel safer and would help deter migrants from destroying property. We just want an acknowledgement that theres a problem here, she said. The Texas Tribune is a nonpartisan, nonprofit media organization that informs Texans and engages with them about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues. The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are bold as a lion. Proverbs 28.1 Yesterday, we published a partly-redacted version of a CalPERS board closed session transcript that its attorney Durie Tangri had mistakenly made public.1 This meeting took place shortly after we exposed that Chief Investment Officer Ben Meng had approved a $1 billion commitment to a Blackstone fund when he also held Blackstone shares, which was a violation of Californias conflict of interest laws. Meng resigned with immediate effect three days after we published our post. Our discussion today will focus on how the CalPERS board has swallowed a completely false story, that Meng resigned due to dirty laundry that should have been secret nevertheless getting out. In fact, all of the damaging information that got Meng so upset that he quit was public, and it all came directly from or was generated by Meng. Yet the CalPERS board acts as if its the victim of internal saboteurs. As the transcript shows, CEO Marcie Frost and her key allies on the board, Board President Henry Jones and board member Rob Feckner repeatedly and falsely present Meng as a victim of secrets having been tossed over the transom to the press. Not only was everything that embarrassed Meng out in the open for competent reporters to write up, but in at least one and arguably two cases, Mengs defensiveness made his situation much worse. As well show, Frost used the bogus idea that CalPERS is full of traitors as an excuse for continuing to keep the board in the dark about crucial matters like Meng being investigated for his financial conflict of interest. Frost and Feckner also claim that Meng believed that his bad press was due to saboteurs. That suggests that Frost and other senior staffers stoked Mengs paranoia and helped precipitate his departure. In fact, a careful reading of the transcript against CalPERS statements to the press suggests that what bent Meng out of shape was that Frost, general counsel Matt Jacobs, and the inner circle of the board had cooked up a deal with Meng: hed confess to his conflict of interest sins privately, at a September board meeting, take a modest sanction, and the public would be none the wiser. As we pointed out yesterday, the publication of most of this secret board transcript is due to a remarkable error. Former board member JJ Jelincic sued CalPERS to disclose this very document after the giant fund refused. Jelincic alleged that the closed session was improper and hence the transcript had to be published. CalPERS law firm, due to a mistake in accessing the court website, made a filing meant for the judges eyes only available to the world. We explained yesterday how the partial transcript proves that Jelincic was correct: the conversation was entirely about policy and process matters that are required to be discussed in open board meetings. It also exemplified the funds stunning arrogance. CalPERS gave a big raised middle finger to Judge Michael Markman by redacting large sections of the transcript, when the point of an in camera review is for the judge to determine if a request to keep material secret is legitimate. Judge Markman cant make that call when CalPERS withholds key parts. Today well go into more detail about how the board has been sold a boatload of bunk as to why Meng resigned and why that matters. Ben Mengs Inability to Take the Heat of Office, Compounded by Self-Inflicted Wounds The CalPERS Chief Investment Officer position is the best paid at CalPERS and the best paid in the US, with the first year package a potential $1.7 million. The big bucks reflect the importance and difficulty of the position, including being accountable when things dont work out well. Andrew Silton, the former Chief Investment Officer of the much smaller North Carolina state public pension fund, remarked that getting roughed up when performance was less than stellar, and having to address other problems was part of the job. Of Mengs three major controversies, one was entirely predictable and he was well positioned to ride it out. The other two were self-generated. Meng made his bad situation much worse by getting defensive. And in all three cases, everything that went down that worked against Meng was out in the open. The first was when Republican legislators attacked Meng for having come to CalPERS after working for the Chinese government overseeing the investment of some of its foreign exchange reserves. As Bloomberg explained last August: Earlier this year, he was accused by Republican Congressman Jim Banks of being a tool for the Chinese government, funneling American money into Chinese hands due to his role at SAFE. Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton and Wyoming representative Liz Cheney, both Republicans, expressed support for Bankss inquiry into Calperss and Mengs ties to the Chinese government. Its hard to fathom how Meng didnt see this coming when he joined CalPERS. Trump was in office going full bore after China, using the blunt instruments he has as President. Even without Trumps China-bashing, there are plenty of pension opponents who would grasp at any opportunity to generate a negative story. Linking Commies, China, and perceived to be too-fat funds would get some traction for a news cycle or two. But with nothing more than that, the noise was destined to die out quickly, as it did. Indeed, Meng seemed to lack the perspective that as unpleasant as the bad headlines might seem, they garnered sympathy where it mattered: in Democratic-run California, with a large Chinese community, and among investment professionals. Yet the transcript presents Meng as unable to handle this obviously partisan roughing-up: BOARD MEMBER FECKNER: If you were to actually ask him point blank, sit down and have a conversation with him, he will tell you its because of the outlandish press information to the outside. The press that hes getting from one, two, sometimes three Board members is what drove him to this point. He could not, in his own good conscience, continue to stay here, and go through this, and put his family through this turmoil again. We almost lost him six, eight months ago when the whole China issue came up. This in a nutshell is the garbage barge the staff cronies on the board, Jones, Feckner, and board Vice President Theresa Taylor are trying to sell to the rest of the board: that Meng left because bad board members roughed him up. Yet Feckner immediately demonstrates that this claim is an utter fabrication. Feckner presents Mengs sensitivity to being beaten up by Republicans seen as combo plates of whack jobs and investment ignoramuses, when no CalPERS board member whatsoever piled on . So how is this the boards fault? And if Meng actually believed that board members were stoking the Chinese Commie hysteria, thats unhinged. The second big blowup on Mengs watch was when he cancelled two tail risk hedging programs, and the giant fund exited both just before March 2020, missing a $1 billion payday in the Covid-induced market swan dive. This was a change in the portfolio composition that should have been reviewed and approved by the board. It wasnt. As a result, Margaret Brown, seeking to give Meng something positive to talk about at the March board meeting, asked how the tail hedges were doing. Meng lied. From an April 2020 post: BOARD MEMBER MARGARET BROWN: Ben, can you tell me how our left-tail investments are performing? Are they performing the way we thought they would in this economic downturn? CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER MENG: Good morning, Ms. Brown. Yes, for any left-tail risk hedging strategy youre referring to, they should perform well in this kind of a down market, as they were exactly designed to do. And from what we know are most of these strategies are performing as anticipated. Had Meng syndicated the decision by getting it approved by the board, he could not have been blamed when it went sour. But irate staff members leaked the story to Bloomberg and fingered Meng for ignoring CalPERS consultant Wilshire. From the same post: The damning Bloomberg report by Erik Schatzker is almost certainly the result of leaks by unhappy insiders. It states both staffers and even CalPERS outside expert Wilshire opposed the move but Meng overruled them. From the article: Calpers had been warned about the perils of shifting strategy. At an August 2019 meeting of its investment committee, Andrew Junkin, then one of the pension plans consultants at Wilshire Associates, reviewed the $200 million of tail-risk investments. Remember what those are there for, Junkin told Calpers executives and board members, according to a transcript. In normal markets, or in markets that are slightly up or slightly down, or even massively up, those strategies arent going to do well. But there could be a day when the market is down significantly, and we come in and we report that the risk-mitigation strategies are up 1,000%. Institutions like CalPERS hire advisers like Wilshire not just for their acumen but also as a liability shield. This bad call sits entirely on Mengs shoulders. Note that Junkin recommended keeping the hedges on when its estimate of the payoff was over 3 times lower than what the one Meng killed would have generated. Now this is the one case where even though Meng was the creator of his own mess, he could say staff members running to the media got him in hot water. But they did so because he had violated well-established processes for making investments. And thats because Meng was arrogant to think he was smarter than both his staff and Wilshire. Had Meng tried to get approval cancelling the hedges to the board, Wilshire would have politely opposed it. Andrew Junkin was so trusted by the board that that would have been a very hard sell. And.drumrolldespite this being one of the few cases where the meanie leakers charge has merit, the board again, contra Feckner and other uniformed board members, had absolutely nothing to do with these stories. They learned about the cancellation of the tail hedges from the press! Another key fact that is lost in the poor Ben version of the story is that the de facto staff revolt by going to the press was a symptom of much deeper problems. First, Meng had exceeded his authority in exiting the program, yet the staff had no outlet for alerting the board save by going outside. Second, these leaks were a sign of lack of confidence in his leadership. Wed pointed out how Meng had driven out two highly respected investment professionals, Ron Legnado and Paul Mouchakka. That would also have rattled the more capable members of the investment team. The loss of day-to-day confidence of his team likely weighed on Meng more than the bad press clips. Knowing that some, perhaps many, of your nominal subordinates dont think much of you is psychologically draining.2 Despite giving up $1 billion, investors do make bad calls from time to time. Meng could have ridden this one out had he not called more attention to his mistake. The very short version is Meng tried to justify his bad bet, rather than shutting up about it, by saying the tail hedge products were too pricey relative to their potential payoff. That got him in a press war with Universa, the manager of the bigger hedge that CalPERS had invested in. Universa manages its tail hedges at much lower cost that its competitors, so Mengs defense amounted to a smear on them. Nassim Nicholas Taleb is an adviser to Universa. Taleb has a much bigger microphone than Meng does. And he does not suffer fools. Universas PR firm also piled on, since the dustup provided an opportunity for Universa to publicize their spectacular returns in the coronoacrash. Institutional Investor and later the Wall Street Journal wrote follow on stories that almost certainly would never have appeared had Meng laid low. The third fiasco, the one that led to Mengs sudden resignation, was yet another act of self-sabotage. And the board and loose-lipped insiders had nothing to do with it. It only took three bits of information, and all were public. The sorry part of the last chapter of Mengs short career at CalPERS is that it makes clear that top to bottom, board members are utterly ignorant of the information CalPERS cranks out for board meetings and posts periodically. If they dont pay attention to what staff serves up to them, they cant begin to do a proper job of supervising the fund. I had obtained Ben Mengs Form 700 financial disclosure forms for as of when he started office, in January 2, 2019, and year-end 2019. CalPERS had managed to call attention to Meng by initially not posting his form as had been CalPERS long established practice for its CIO.3 The form for year-end 2019 showed, remarkably, that Meng still owned shares in Blackstone, Carlyle, and an Ares credit fund, as he had when he joined CalPERS. That was shocking because Meng was guaranteed at some point to wind up approving investments in Blackstone and Carlyle funds, which would put him in violation of Californias political conflict of interest laws. It didnt take much digging to find CalPERS recent private equity investments and in particular, the first quarter 2020 $1 billion commitment to a Blackstone fund. The post also documented at considerable length a point that the press chose to ignore: that Mengs later Form 700 was felonious, since signed it under penalty of perjury, yet failed to disclose the timing and extent of stock sales and purchases. You could see he had to have made them by comparing the two forms, assuming the disclosure of what he owned at both points in time was accurate. We showed our work in our August 2 post. It was all from public sources. Yet the board has been conned into believing that nefarious insiders somehow fed it to us. The only basis Meng might have for thinking insiders were out to get him was that the day after our post appeared, the Fair Political Practices Commission received two anonymous complaints about Meng. The fact that two complaints came on the heels of each other does not prove that they came from insiders. If anyone had bothered to look at what it takes to file a Fair Political Practices Commission compliant, it would be trivial to generate one based on the detail in our post. But Meng and some CalPERS board members still assumed the anonymous complaints came from staffers, say members of the compliance team unhappy that CalPERS had attempted to cover up Mengs malfeasance (more on that in a future post). Frankly, it would be far more logical to assume that we had filed one of the complaints. And it only takes one complaint to get the FPCC to saddle up. CalPERS Quislings Everywhere Paranoid Delusions Contrast the record of what actually happened with the CalPERS funhouse mirror version you find in the meeting transcript. The discussion was almost entirely about Mengs resignation and the trigger, the unexpected exposure of his financial conflict of interest. The word leak appears in some form appears 25 times, along with other complaints about media coverage, like gotcha stories. But the fantasies are piled high and deep. Board President Jones is the self-appointed fabulist-in-chief. For instance: PRESIDENT JONES: Late April, whenever it was late April, early May, somewhere in there, Ms. Frost called me and said that they may have a problem with the Form 700 from Mr. Meng. And I said, well, what are your what steps are you taking? And she said, well, were going to start the investigation So that was the how I knew about the occurrence. And so what happened, as all of you know, somehow the information was leaked aboutthis investigation. Jones harps on this idea later in the meeting: PRESIDENT JONES [On the boards reaction to the conflict of interest stories breaking]: Then what happened is that the leak occurred. And of a sudden all this information was out there.. It is remarkable to see that either Jones relishes the role of fronting for Marcie Frosts spin, or he really is to thick to realize that the press stories had absolutely nothing to do with the investigation and came entirely from CalPERS own public records? Mind you, there is one way CalPERS could have gotten the idea that their investigation had leaked, and its the result of their paranoia. The day the two Fair Political Practices Commission complaints were filed, a Pensions & Investments reported contacted a very well networked Californian who has never been a CalPERS staff or board member. The journalist was looking for someone who could comment on how the Fair Political Practices Commission investigations worked. The source referred the reporter to Lance Olson, who is the top lawyer in California on the FPPC. Lance Olson was handling the Meng investigation for CalPERS. Olson almost certainly would have told someone at CalPERS that hed gotten a call from a reporter and had not taken it. Thus the only explanation (aside from the staff fabricating that the investigation had been leaked to try to gain the upper hand with the board) was that a CalPERS employee heard about the call to Olson and jumped to the erroneous conclusion that the reporter had been tipped off about Olson working on the investigation.4 Matt Jacobs tries to have it both ways (at least in the parts we can see) acting as if leaks were a fact, but depicting it as Mengs opinion that they came from CalPERS sources: GENERAL COUNSEL JACOBS: He is very concerned about the leaks that he thinks have come out of CalPERS and/or the Board. When State Controller Betty Yee complained, as other board members did, of not having been told about the investigation, Frost revealed the reason for harping on the canard that the board couldnt be trusted (as if thats her call to make!): its her justification for giving the board the mushroom treatment: CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER FROST: Yeah, and I you know, thank you. And I would really, you know, like to have a conversation with this full Board. And, you know, at some point, you know, I can excuse the team and we can walk through this. But, you know, we do have an investigation around confidential information leaking. You know, I would love to have a conversation about how do we how do how do we work on that as an organization? That, you know, the Board has an extremely important role, management has an extremely important role, but all of it is about protecting CalPERS. As we have stressed CalPERS as in the nearly 3000 person organization, has no standing under the law. The notion isnt mentioned once in the law that governs the giant fund, the Public Employees Retirement Law. The organization exists only as an instrumentality of the board. For Frost to act as if she the CEO can tell the board what to do and withhold information is rank insubordination. The CalPERS board of the 1990s would have publicly excoriated any CEO who tried pulling a stunt like that once, and would have showed them the door if they tried it a second time. To their credit, some board members with spine objected. Stacie Olivares called out Matt Jacobs when he suggested the staff could withhold information about personnel matters because staff had the nerve to sit in judgement on their trustworthiness: BOARD MEMBER OLIVARES: I never have understood the employees having any right to have their the issue not discussed in closed session with the Board. Now, obviously, if a Board member leaks that information, thats going to put the Board and that individual in danger of some action against them by Mr. Meng or someone else, and thats certainly problematic. But the fundamental question of whether the Board can hear about personnel matters, if that is not a possibility, I think we need to understand that more clearly, because I had certainly always felt that we could hear those matters in detail. Board member Margaret Brown pointed out that a Bloomberg You were there type story on August 8, which smacked of being planted by CalPERS by virtue of including details of a private meeting between Frost and Meng and being very Meng-friendly, also mentioned his fragile mental state. Brown asked how was that disclosure consistent with the professed concern about Mengs privacy rights. Frost deflected the question by trying to pretend CalPERS didnt pitch the story to Bloomberg. Olivares also challenged that the (bogus) notion that the board was talking to the press: BOARD MEMBER OLIVARES: You know, the leaking of the information about the investigation is no~ the problem. The problem is the Board members who were then asked about it didnt know anything about it. So the leaking is sort of secondary to what I think is the fundamental problem is that we didnt know that this was happening. The most forceful skeptic was Jason Perez: BOARD MEMBER PEREZ: My disappointing is not even a strong enough word. Im angry over this whole process. Im angry that we werent notified. Im angry because ultimately the court and U.S. or the California Constitution we, Board members, are responsible for the actions of everyone in that building at CalPERS. We absolutely should have been notified sooner. We it seems like staff or team members are or even some Board members are always referring to the leak, the leak, the leak, the leak. Well, obviously, in this case, that leak didnt come from the Board. So I dont know that we continue to use a leaky Board where information is being sent out, we need that information. Disappointingly, the considerable upset of some members of the board about being denied information has gone nowhere. But the die was cast when the board refused to fire Frost for her misrepresentation of her education, an offense that would have gotten her shown the door in a functioning organization. This board would rather go down with Frost and Jacobs rather than show enough steel to get them to shape up or leave. _____ 1 Supporting our view that making the document public was a big mistake, as opposed to a clever stratagem, this e-mail is time stamped less than two and a half hours after we posted it. Keep in mind it had already been up for over five days and was still up as of end of day Pacific time yesterday: Sent: Wednesday, August 25, 2021 1:10 PM To: Dept16@alameda.courts.ca.gov Cc: SERVICE-JELINCIC ; michael@risherlaw.com; acisneros@capublicrecordslaw.com Subject: Jelincic v. CalPERS Case No. RG21090970 In Camera Document Filed Publicly Importance: High Dear Clerk of Court, Regarding the above-captioned case, it appears that Defendants Closed Session Transcript, lodged on August 18, 2021, has been filed on the public docket. As this was lodged with the Court for in camera review, Defendant respectfully requests that the filing be promptly sealed. Thank you, Joyce Li Joyce Li (she/her) | Attorney | Durie Tangri LLP | jli@durietangri.com | 415-376-6482 2 Before you think this is an exaggeration, I received multiple e-mails from investment office insiders, currently and recently ex CalPERS, with specific complaints of how he managed staff and his investment decisions. 3 Specifically, I had put in a Public Records Act request with CalPERS for Mengs and other Forms 700 in June 2020. Even though I could have gotten the same records from the Fair Political Practices Commission in mere days, the point of going to CalPERS was to put them on notice that they really needed to put them on the CalPERS website as before. CalPERS dragged its feet, which I originally took as personal, since they slow-walk my PRAs as a matter of course. But I now wonder if was a sign that they feared I had or would connect the dots with the March 2020 $1 billion Blackstone commitment. 4 Only someone very unsophisticated could have jumped to this conclusion. If a reporter had been told that Olson was representing CalPERS with respect to Meng, the journalist would have known a call to him would go unanswered. (Natural News) Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccines are causing people to suffer from a condition known as an Antibody Dependent Auto-Attack (ADAA), for which Big Pharma is already in the process of creating a new pharmaceutical to treat it. A pre-print study appearing on the bioRxiv website explains that the anti-spike antibodies induced by Chinese Virus injections can have a pathogenic effect through binding to sick lung epithelium cells and misleading immune responses to attack self-cells. Thus, researchers are working on a new drug candidate to both prevent and treat this potentially deadly phenomenon. The drug candidate is a formulation comprising N-acetylneuraminic acid methyl ester (NANA-Me), an analog of N-acetylneuraminic acid, the paper explains. ANA-Me acts through a unique mechanism of action (MOA) which is repairment of the missing sialic acid on sick lung epithelium cells. By blocking the antibodies from binding to sick cells, the drug candidate could, researchers say, reduce the rate of sickness and death among those who take Fauci Flu shots in accordance with government recommendations. the formulation has potential to prevent and treat the adverse reactions of COVID-19 vaccines because the vaccines can induce similar antibodies, including pathogenic antibodies, the paper goes on to explain. The formulation will be helpful in increasing the safety of the vaccines without reducing the vaccines efficacy. Compared to existing antiviral drugs, the formulation has a unique MOA of targeting receptors, broad spectrum of indications, excellent safety profile, resistance to mutations, and can be easily produced. Pharmaceutical company shareholders wrote paper pushing drug cure for covid vaccine injuries The paper was authored by numerous drug company shareholders who have a financial stake in the drug candidate being promoted as the cure for covid vaccine-induced ADAA. One of them, Huiru Wang, holds shares in Huirui Biopharma, while Xiaoling Liu and Yuxing Chen, two other authors, hold shares in HuaAn McAb Biotechnology. There are patent applications pending related to this work, the paper explains at the bottom in its Competing Interest Statement. The fact that Big Pharma is already pushing new Chinese Virus drugs to treat the damage caused by existing Chinese Virus drugs, all for massive profits, is hardly a surprise. After all, Moderna, which produces one of the deadly mRNA injection vaccines being pushed as part of Operation Warp Speed, is nothing but a massive pump and dump operation. The entire Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) plandemic is all about money and depopulation, it turns out. Almost nothing being proposed as a solution to the virus has anything to do with helping people. It is all about padding the pockets of the rich while taking advantage of the poor. And what else would people expect from the same folks that have been pushing drug scams for decades? The Big Pharma machine is all about money, which is the golden calf of the industry. Nature, meanwhile, always takes a back seat to the latest witches brews to come from drug companies. Since we know that Wuhan Flu shots are destroying peoples immune systems over time, the expectation is that many new drugs will be coming down the pipeline to treat the damage. Such drugs include new booster shots and other novel therapies that will drive up drug company stock prices, making investors filthy rich at the expense of public health. It certainly helps when you have the likes of Fauci promoting overpriced therapeutics and dangerous and unproven vaccines, while natural remedies and inexpensive pharmaceuticals are already doing a great job of healing even the most sick, wrote one Natural News commenter. To keep up with the latest news about Fauci Flu shot injuries and deaths, visit ChemicalViolence.com. Sources for this article include: BioRxiv.org NaturalNews.com (Natural News) National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Anthony Fauci told CNN that the time has come for a nationwide vaccine mandate as Pfizers coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine got full approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). I know I respect peoples freedom, but when youre talking about a public health crisis that weve been going through for well over a year and a half, the time has come. Enough is enough. Weve just got to get people vaccinated, Fauci said. If we keep lingering without getting those people vaccinated that should be vaccinated, this thing could linger on, leading to the development of another variant which could complicate things. It was just one of Faucis customary flip-flops during this pandemic. Just last week, Fauci said he does not foresee a COVID-19 vaccine mandate in the United States. I dont think youll ever see a mandating of vaccine, particularly for the general public, he said during a Healthline.com town hall on Aug. 17. Fauci said at the time that everyone has the right to refuse a vaccine. If someone refuses the vaccine in the general public, then theres nothing you can do about that. You cannot force someone to take a vaccine, he said. FDA grants Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine full approval On Monday, Aug. 23, the FDA gave full approval to Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine for people 16 and older potentially boosting public confidence in the companys COVID-19 vaccine and instantly opening the way for more universities, companies and local governments to make vaccinations mandatory. The widely anticipated decision replaces the emergency use authorization granted to Pfizer last December. (Related: Pfizers vaccine studies are based on FRAUD and put lives in danger, warns former Pfizer vice president.) While this and other vaccines have met the FDAs rigorous, scientific standards for emergency use authorization, as the first FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccine, the public can be very confident that this vaccine meets the high standards for safety, effectiveness and manufacturing quality the FDA requires of an approved product, acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock said in a statement. As part of the approval process, the vaccine also got a brand name: Comirnaty. Its pronounced co-MER-na-tee according to Scott Piergrossi, head of creativity for the Brand Institute, which crafted the name. It represents a combination of the terms COVID-19, mRNA, community and immunity. Pfizer vaccines waning effectiveness The FDA apparently ignored preliminary vaccine data published by Israel in July, which found that Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine was just 40.5 percent effective on average at preventing symptomatic disease. The analysis, which was carried out as the delta variant became the dominant strain in Israel, appeared to show a waning effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine. The vaccine was only 16 percent effective against symptomatic infection for those who had two doses back in January. For people that had received two doses by April, the efficacy rate against symptomatic infection stood at 79 percent. Myocarditis and pericarditis Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine has also been linked to cases of myocarditis and pericarditis in teenagers and young adults. Myocarditis is a condition that involves inflammation of the heart muscle. Symptoms can include fever and fatigue, as well as shortness of breath and a very specific type of chest pain. Patients tend to say their chest hurts more when they lean forward. The pain tends to subside when they lean back. Pericarditis, on the other hand, is the swelling and irritation of the thin, sac-like tissue surrounding the heart. A study published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on July 30 found that 397 children between the ages of 12 and 17 were diagnosed with heart inflammation after receiving Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine. In June, Israels Ministry of Health also identified over 200 cases of heart inflammation in men between 16 and 30 years old, a vast majority of those happening at the younger end of that range. Government expects more people to receive COVID-19 vaccine President Joe Biden used the announcement to press for more people to get vaccinated as soon as possible. Let me say this loudly and clearly: If youre one of the millions of Americans who said that they will not get the shot until it has full and final approval of the FDA, it has now happened, he said. The moment youve been waiting for is here. Its time for you to go get your vaccination. Get it today. Fauci said the FDAs full approval of a COVID-19 vaccine could be a game-changer. There was some poll that showed about 30 percent of people who are not anti-vaccine, they were just waiting to get what they felt was the real final stamp of approval, which we just got today with the Pfizer product, Fauci said. And those 30 percent are saying when that occurs, they will feel very, very comfortable about getting vaccinated. So right away, youre talking about 30 percent. I hope they come through with what the survey said. More vaccine mandates on the way Fauci, also the White Houses chief medical adviser, said that a lot of institutions, organizations and places of employment are going to say if you want to work for us in person, youve got to be there and get vaccinated. (Related: NYC restaurants REFUSE to enforce vaccine passport mandate and become vaccination police.) The Pentagon announced it will go ahead with its plan to force members of the military to get vaccinated against the virus following the announcement that Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine was granted full approval by the FDA. The full approval of Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine also set off a chain reaction among colleges and universities. On the same day the FDA decision came down, New York City announced that all public school teachers and other staffers will have to get vaccinated. One of the first to implement the requirement was the State University of New York (SUNY) system, which has nearly 400,000 students and more than 85,000 faculty members spread across its 64 campuses. With the FDAs full approval of the Pfizer COVID vaccine today, the state mandated directive for all students to be vaccinated is now in place for all SUNY campuses, said Holly Liapis, SUNY spokesperson. Pursuant to SUNY policy, there is an up to 35-day grace period to allow students to provide proof of vaccination or submit a request for a medical or religious exemption for campus review. Several other prominent institutions such as the University of Minnesota, the University of Memphis, Louisiana State University, Washington State University and Colorado State University are all expected to impose vaccine mandates after consultation with their Boards of Trustees and state officials. Follow Immunization.news for more news and information related to vaccine mandates and coronavirus vaccines. Sources include: InfoWars.com APNews.com CNBC.com DailyMail.co.uk NPR.org (Natural News) The FBI has warned that employees of Big Tech firms in Silicon Valley are being coerced by countries like China and Russia into stealing information about their employers or sharing their login credentials. The threat of intellectual property theft and economic espionage is a real one that experts like FBI Special Agent Nick Shenkin have become all too aware of in recent years. In one of Shenkins cases, agents of the Chinese government actually threatened to deny dialysis to the mother of an employee of a large hardware and software company at her home in China if he did not steal proprietary information from his employer. Speaking to Protocol, Shenkin explained how he has been warning startups, tech industry groups, academics and venture firms that could be of interest to foreign actors about the subtle ways that these countries are getting their hands on intellectual property. The FBI has even developed framework known as the Delta Protocol to distribute to startups with advice on protecting themselves. With these hackings now hitting the headlines regularly, more and more companies are becoming aware that the threat is real and are showing an interest in taking steps to avoid this problem. According to the U.S. government, the losses from Chinese intellectual property theft are hundreds of billions of dollars per year, and FBI Director Christopher Wray said that Chinas economic espionage and counterintelligence were the greatest long-term threat to our nations information and intellectual property, and to our economic vitality in a speech last year. Shenkin says that it is not the right approach to have HR departments try to screen spies out during their hiring processes. Instead, he wants tech companies to know how they can identify vulnerabilities in their employees and protect those who are vulnerable and the company itself from allowing these weaknesses to be taken advantage of by places like China and Russia. Family vulnerabilities often exploited They have identified four main vulnerabilities in the FBI briefings. These are being a citizen of an autocracy, having assets in an autocracy, having family members or employees who live or work in the autocracy, and doing business with an autocracy. According to Shenkin, the family vulnerability is the one that tends to be exploited the most. Many people do not have any desire to steal intellectual property, he says, but they are being threatened and are fearful of what could happen to their loved ones if they do not comply. And while this has led many to think that Chinese Americans may be the most vulnerable given Chinas propensity for spying and the family connections that many Chinese American employees might have there, that is a narrow view that overlooks other potential vulnerabilities, such as employees who have gambling problems and may be desperate to sell inside information for money. Some Big Tech companies already have staff who are tasked with assessing insider threats and countering them, but startups are considered to be especially vulnerable because of their size as well as the work they do on cutting-edge technologies. The FBIs Delta Protocol recommends practices such as logging who has access to sensitive IPs and installing physical security such as self-locking doors and alarms. It also explains how companies can identify characteristics of insider threats, covering everything from employees who could be coerced via high-risk activities they engage in to employees who simply lack loyalty and would be likely to sell information, perhaps due to unhappiness in the workplace. This type of espionage is a quotidian problem that needs to be taken very seriously, according to Shenkin, who added: This is a massive fundamental activity that bolsters and is one of the mainstays of many autocratic countries and their governments. Sources for this article include: Protocol.com FBI.gov (Natural News) The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine for general delivery to adults in the United States a step up from the experimental designation it had held for the months it already has been given to people. (Article by Bob Unruh republished from WNDNewsCenter.org) But that doesnt mean its safe, according to a detailed report from Liberty Counsel, a legal team that specializes in religious and human rights cases. The organization cited the national VAERS data, a compilation of cases involving negative results and reactions from medications, and those show 595,620 adverse events, including 13,608 deaths as of August 13, 2021, from the COVID injections. The deaths in this data include approximately 3,079 deaths after receiving the Pfizer shot. Regulators also said they determined there are increased risks of myocarditis and pericarditis, or heart inflammation, following administration of the shot, particularly within the seven days following the second dose of the two-dose regimen, the organization, which is active in fighting corporate demands that workers and others accept the unusual shots, said. It noted the warnings included on the Pfizer injection state: The observed risk is higher among males under 40 years of age compared to females and older males. The observed risk is highest in males 12 through 17 years of age. Available data from short-term follow-up suggest that most individuals have had resolution of symptoms. However, some individuals required intensive care support. Information is not yet available about potential long-term health outcomes. Among the reactions are fatigue, headache, muscle pain, chills, joint pain, fever and injection site swelling. The report noted the history of the Pfizer brand, which in 2009 was involved in a case, with its subsidiary Pharmacia & Upjohn Company Inc., in paying $2.3 billion in the largest health care fraud settlement in history against a pharmaceutical company, Liberty Counsel explained. Back then, Pfizer pled guilty to a felony violation of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act for illegally promoting the uses of four of its drugs, including the anti-inflammatory drug Bextra; Geodon, an antipsychotic; Zyvox, an antibiotic; and Lyrica, an anti-epileptic drug. Earlier, 2004, Pfizer also agreed to pay $430 million to federal and state governments and pled guilty to criminal charges of illegally marketing the epilepsy drug Neurontin for migraine headaches, pain and bipolar disorder, the report said. Liberty Counsel also provided a list of other drugs that have been approved by the FDA, but still caused problems. For example, Seldane was approved in 1985 but was recalled because of life-threatening heart problems when taken in combination with other drugs. And Ranitidine was sold under the familiar name Zantac (among other names) which is a medication that was used to treat stomach acid. It was found to break down into N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) which is known to be highly hepatotoxic (chemical driven liver cancer) and is a known carcinogen in laboratory animals. Also, A popular opioid pain reliever Darvon & Darvocet (Propoxyphene) was put on the market in 1955 and continued to be on the market for 55 years (2010) until it was found that it was causing serious toxicity to the heart. Accutane had been on the market for 27 years before being pulled in 2009 for being linked to an increase risk of birth defects, the report said. Expediting an experimental injection in months without years of clinical studies and testing is irresponsible and deadly. The FDA has a terrible track record approving drugs that had to [be] recalled and removed from the market. I fear this unsound rush to approve the Pfizer two-shot dosage will be added to the FDA long list of failed and harmful drugs. Notwithstanding this FDA approval, people may still claim medical and religious exemptions, explained Mat Staver, Liberty Counsels chief. Read more at: WNDNewsCenter.org and Vaccines.news. (Natural News) Government officials in the City of Angels are fuming mad about a video that Los Angeles Fire Department Captain Christian Granucci posted to social media opposing to the citys Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccine mandate. In the video be sure to watch it below Granucci rails against city officials in L.A. who are attempting to force all public employees to get injected for the Wuhan Flu or else face punishment. This is tyranny, Granucci emphatically states in the video. This is about freedom of choice. The department has said we can seek medical exemption that is a pie in the sky. We can even seek religious exemptions, but they know they have end-runs around those. The vaccinations will come. And then after that, it will be a booster, and another booster and another booster. When will this end? When will this tyranny stop? The 31-year vet of the department is refusing to obey a city ordinance requiring all city employees to show proof of injection or a weekly negative covid test in order to remain employed. Non-exempt employees have until September 7 to get their first dose of either Pfizer or Moderna, and until October 5 to get their second dose. City employees who opt for the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) single-dose injection have until October 5 to get injected. Granucci says he plans to put a stop to the tyranny Not only is Granucci not planning to get the shot, but he has also vowed to fight the ruling on behalf of other city employees who do not want to get jabbed. He also blasted the fire department and union representing firefighters for going along with the tyranny. You decided to play politics with us, Granucci said of the firefighters union. Granucci and his supporters are further planning to seek legal counsel, he says, against the City of Los Angeles for attempting to violate the rights of city employees. We will take this fight to you, the City of Los Angeles, Granucci proclaimed, calling the unnamed attorney involved with the fight a shark. The latest data shows that many of the people being admitted to Los Angeles-area hospitals with covid are patients who were recently injected. Despite this, the local city council has decided that forcing the jabs on everyone, including the unwilling, is the best way to flatten the curve. LAFD Firefighters and Paramedics have been at the forefront of the fight against coronavirus for almost 18 months providing vaccinations, testing, and emergency medical care for hundreds of thousands of Angelenos, said Freddy Escobar, president of the United Firefighters of L.A. City, in a statement. When the City shut down, it was our first responders who continued to show up to care for our residents in the face of uncertainty. Rather than allow city employees to make their own health decisions, Escobar and others believe that forcibly penetrating peoples bodies with mystery chemicals is the best way to save lives and end the plandemic. My friend at church, a retired L.A. County Fire Captain, says the poor guy is getting raked over the coals because he posted on duty and in uniform, wrote one commenter at Citizen Free Press about Granucci. We hope his fellow firemen support him! Thanks for the inspiration, wrote another. My company gave me till the 31st of August to comply or face the same fate. Well, it took 4 nurses to hold me down when I was 2 years old for a shot I havent changed much. Not taking the jab Chinese Virus injections are injuring and killing thousands of people. To keep up with the latest, visit ChemicalViolence.com. Sources for this article include: CitizenFreePress.com NaturalNews.com (Natural News) A 42-year-old rapper, MMA/UFC fan, and youth mentor is dead in yet another post-injection heart attack while exercising. (Article republished from TheCOVIDBlog.com) Mr. Todd Williams, aka Louie Knuxx, received his second dose of experimental Pfizer mRNA on July 15, according to his Twitter page. He reported sore arms the following morning, but no other adverse effects. He also said he was ready to party. Mr. Knuxxs vitriolic rhetoric and attitudes towards anti-lockdown protesters in Australia had been ongoing since at least May. He referred to thousands of protesters in Melbourne as whiney fucking babies. He posted a similar tweet on July 23 not only referring to Melbourne protesters as fucking stupid, but also threatened violence. He said [he]wants to punch one of these cunts in the jaw. That same day, he attacked the non-vaxxed. Four days later, he continued mocking the non-vaxxed. About two weeks after the second injection, he attempted [reassuring] himself by saying hes still had no adverse reactions. A hint of irony sneaked through one of this final Twitter posts. A woman correctly stated that heart disease kills thousands of people per year, but government does not force anyone to exercise. Mr. Knuxx responded with more mockery. Mr. Knuxx woke up on August 13 and got on his treadmill, as was apparently a regular routine. But he suffered a heart attack while running on the treadmill, meaning blood flow was blocked (blood clots) to parts of the heart. He was pronounced dead shortly thereafter. Who is Louie Knuxx? Mr. Knuxx moved from Auckland to Melbourne in 2018. He was the director of the Chin-Up Project that helped at-risk youth in Melbourne. Prior to that, Mr. Knuxx worked as a mentor in a youth facility in his hometown of Taranaki, New Zealand. He lived in that same youth facility himself as a teen when he got in trouble with the law. His rap career started in New Plymouth, New Zealand with a group called Dirtbag District. His debut album Wasted Youth was released in 2006. His second album, Progressive Gangsta Thug/Gentleman Romance Rap (PGT/GRR) was released in 2014. Mr. Knuxxs final album, Tiny Warm Hearts, was released in 2016. He was also part of a collective called Young, Gifted and Broke. Several New Zealand and Australian rappers paid tribute to him after he died. An online fundraiser to cover his funeral costs has garnered over $50,000 as of publishing. Another death after mockery From all accounts, Louie Knuxx was a decent human being. Unfortunately he is now part of a dubious group of individuals on this blog who died after needlessly mocking those who do not agree with him. Mr. Jordan Hayes called the non-vaxxed idiots and morons before succumbing to a heart attack 14 weeks after his second injection. Mr. Ronald Babb made a similar turning into robots comment that Mr. Knuxx implied. Babb died seven days after the Johnson & Johnson injection. Jason Maurer, Dr. Thomas Flanigan, Dr. Witold Rogiewiczagain, its all so unnecessary. But Mr. Knuxx is also part of another group. There is a very disturbing trend of people dying while exercising after theyve received one of the experimental injections. That sadly includes many teenagers who died while playing sports. The U.K. government even advises against exercising for at least 48 hours after the injections. There will be more of these stories in 2021 and beyond. And well keep covering as many as we can. Stay vigilant and protect your friends and loved ones. Read more at: TheCOVIDBlog.com and VaccineDeaths.com. (Natural News) For months, the federal health establishment has been pushing Americans to get vaccinated for COVID-19 because that is the only way they could guarantee that we as a country could get back to normal. This push was coming despite the fact that several studies have shown that the tens of millions of Americans who have gotten the virus, the vast majority of which have recovered well (which these people never talk about), have good immunity from COVID-19 because of the antibodies created. The push to get everyone vaccinated also came as a new variant has emerged Delta which is now leading the same morons to claim we all will need COVID boosters if we ever hope to survive the viral onslaught. In the meantime, few other experts who are not career functionaries and federal bureaucrats like Dr. Anthony Fauci have remained fairly silent while the country was repeatedly lied to about these vaccines (and now booster jabs) as more breakthrough infections began to occur because of the mutation into the Delta (and other) variants (because thats what viruses do when they face resistance). But that is changing. Believe it or not, mainstream media newswire Reuters actually published a report late last week containing quotes from leading epidemiologists who are not at all convinced that adding a COVID booster to the regimen of existing ineffective vaccines is a good idea at all. Thus far, much of the data is showing that the breakthrough infections are mostly occurring in older Americans, which isnt surprising given that the demographic was most vulnerable to the original strain. We dont know if that translates into a problem with the vaccine doing what is most important, which is protect against hospitalization, death, and serious disease. On that, the jury is still out, Dr. Jesse Goodman, an infectious disease expert at Georgetown University in Washington and a former chief scientist at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, told Reuters, which added: Some experts questioned the focus on booster shots when around 30% of eligible Americans have yet to get even a first vaccine dose, despite new COVID-19 cases and deaths surging across the country. Furthermore, scientists warned, we could end up in a situation where we start chasing our tails, and continuously offering more and more shots to people, while the virus either adapts, or more harmful variants arise in areas where vaccines are more scarce. The more important thing, I think, at this point than boosters is making sure we get the vaccine in any arm that hasnt had one as fast as we can, Dr. Dan McQuillen, an infectious disease specialist in Burlington, Mass., and the incoming president of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, also told the newswire. You could end up in situation where you are chasing your tail, giving more and more boosters in the U.S. and Western Europe, while more dangerous variants are coming from other places, added Dr. Isaac Weisfuse, epidemiologist and adjunct professor at Cornell University Public Health. This, despite the fact that researchers (including some within the federal government, believe it or not) are learning that at least one vaccine, from Moderna, is causing heart problems in many younger people, from their early to late teens. There might be a 2.5 times higher incidence of myocarditis in those who get the Moderna vaccine compared with Pfizers vaccine, according to Reuters in a separate report. This info comes late, of course, since some 142 million Moderna vaccines have already been administered. Americans along with everyone else in the world have been lied to early and often about this virus by the powerbrokering elite who own and run everything. The only way back from the abyss is to kick them all out and start over. Sources include: Reuters.com NaturalNews.com (Natural News) The University of Oxfords Clinical Research Group conducted a study recently which found that people who get vaccinated for the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) carry in their nostrils 251 times the viral load of the Chinese Virus compared to unvaccinated people. The preprint paper, which is set to be published in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet, is groundbreaking in that it confirms the threat of vaccinated people who are shedding the virus and who even knows what else on others when they venture out in public. Even if the jabbed are not showing symptoms, researchers found that they carry with them extremely high viral loads that transform them into what Dr. Peter A. McCullough, M.D., Ph.D., calls presymptomatic superspreaders. This phenomenon may be the source of the shocking post-vaccination surges in heavily vaccinated populations globally, McCullough wrote in a piece for The Defender, a newsletter of Childrens Health Defense (CHD). The papers authors, Chau et al, demonstrated widespread vaccine failure and transmission under tightly controlled circumstances in a hospital lockdown in Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam. Confirmed: Covid vaccines are spreading the delta variant Scientists took a closer look at healthcare workers at the hospital who were injected for the Fauci Flu and had to remain confined there for two weeks. Several months later, all of these individuals were determined to have acquired, carried and transmitted the dreaded delta variant to others, including their vaccinated colleagues. In other words, the so-called vaccines did absolutely nothing to prevent either infection or spread, even to other vaccinated people who, according to Fauci, should have been protected. These same vaccinated healthcare workers also presumably transmitted the delta variant to their patients, contributing to the latest surge in new cases of the disease that governments around the world and their mainstream media lapdogs are blaming on the unvaccinated. This is consistent with the observations in the U.S. from Farinholt and colleagues, and congruent with comments by the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention conceding COVID-19 vaccines have failed to stop transmission of SARS-CoV-2, McCullough says. On Feb. 11, the World Health Organization indicated the AZD1222 vaccine efficacy of 63.09% against the development of symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection. The conclusions of the Chau paper support the warnings by leading medical experts that the partial, non-sterilizing immunity from the three notoriously leaky COVID-19 vaccines allow carriage of 251 times the viral load of SARS-CoV-2 as compared to samples from the pre-vaccination era in 2020. In case you missed it, we also covered the phenomenon of leaky vaccines, revealing how Chinese Virus injections are more than likely the primary contributor to the latest wave of disease. Were it not for the presence of vaccinated people throughout society, we probably would not even have delta or any other variant at all. The pandemic would have long been over by now and everything would have been back to normal, if only Operation Warp Speed had never been brought into existence. Thus, we have a key piece to the puzzle explaining why the Delta outbreak is so formidable fully vaccinated are participating as COVID-19 patients and acting as powerful Typhoid Mary-style super-spreaders of the infection, McCullough says. Vaccinated individuals are blasting out concentrated viral explosions into their communities and fueling new COVID surges. Vaccinated healthcare workers are almost certainly infecting their coworkers and patients, causing horrendous collateral damage. Though the Pandoras box has already been opened, we might be able to get a handle on this thing if the vaccination campaign is immediately stopped, including all mandates that aim to inject everyone with these deadly poisons. The latest news stories about how vaccinated people are actively spreading Delta and other Chinese Virus variants can be found at ChemicalViolence.com. Sources for this article include: ChildrensHealthDefense.org NaturalNews.com (Natural News) Vietnam has deployed soldiers to enforce the countrys extreme Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown in Ho Chi Minh City, its largest urban area and the epicenter of its current outbreak. The socialist nations authorities announced Ho Chi Minh Citys repressive lockdown restrictions on Friday, Aug. 20, as a response to the still-surging COVID-19 outbreak. Earlier lockdown restrictions implemented in July have not stopped the new COVID-19 cases. The announcement prompted a rash of panic buying, as the nine million people in the city all surged into supermarkets and other stores all over the city to stock up on essential supplies. Its looking chaotic, said one person living in the eastern part of Ho Chi Minh City. Too many people are rushing out to buy food and essential stuff for their hard days ahead. I have managed to buy some food, as I dont want to die from hunger before dying from coronavirus. More supermarket rush, more panic buying before the imminent lockdown. Hundreds of people are queuing for hours to get supplies for the next two weeks #Saigon #Vietnam pic.twitter.com/nUuKLnrkcu Nga Pham (@ngahpham) August 21, 2021 Under the new lockdown regulations, almost every single person in Ho Chi Minh City is barred from leaving his or her home. This rule even prohibits people from going out to the supermarket to purchase food and other essential supplies. (Related: Zero covid nations with strict tyranny and heavy-handed vaccine compliance seeing biggest explosion of new cases.) We are asking people to stay where you are, not to go outside. Each home, company, factory should be an antivirus fort, said Pham Duc Hai, deputy head of Ho Chi Minh Citys coronavirus authority. People must absolutely stay put, isolate from each other, from house to house, from community to community, said Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh. Since the beginning of the pandemic last year, Ho Chi Minh City has recorded over 180,000 infections and 7,000 deaths. The city alone makes up over half the countrys infections and around 80 percent of its fatalities. On Sunday, the Ministry of Health reported the countrys largest single-day tally of deaths at 737. Most of these deaths were from Ho Chi Minh City. The countrys coronavirus outbreak has also strained its healthcare system. Over 14,600 additional doctors and nurses have been called up to Ho Chi Minh City and its neighboring provinces to support its hospitals and other healthcare facilities. Patients with mild or no symptoms have even been told to just quarantine at home rather than head to a hospital. The lockdown in Ho Chi Minh City began in early July. This earlier lockdown alone was already very repressive. Public gatherings of more than two people were banned and people were only allowed to leave their homes for essential reasons such as purchasing food. Vietnamese military takes control of Ho Chi Minh City The socialist authorities of Vietnam are increasingly portraying the countrys fight against COVID-19 as a military campaign. Statements from politicians and public health authorities regularly contain wartime analogies. Police and military units are increasingly being mobilized to enforce lockdown restrictions. This is the case in Ho Chi Minh City. The city authorities said the military, with the assistance of volunteers, labor unions and veterans, will be delivering food to city residents. Witnesses in Ho Chi Minh City told mainstream news outlet Reuters that soldiers and volunteers have been delivering food to city residents. State-owned media outlets have also broadcast images showing armed soldiers manning checkpoints and checking the documents of people leaving their homes. Sources from the Phu Nhuan and Go Vap districts in the central part of Ho Chi Minh City also told Reuters that they had received packages of rice, meat, vegetables and fish from the military. The central government in the northern city of Hanoi also announced that it would send 130,000 tons of rice from state stockpiles to Ho Chi Minh City and 23 other cities and provinces to prevent lockdown-induced starvation. The extreme lockdown restrictions will remain in place until at least Sept. 15. This will probably be extended if the countrys health authorities keep discovering new COVID-19 cases. Learn more about the extreme COVID-19 lockdowns being implemented in Vietnam and the rest of the world by reading the latest articles at Pandemic.news. Sources include: News.Trust.org ABC.net.au Reuters.com TheDiplomat.com (Natural News) Australian truckers appear to be banding together to shut down their countrys economy in protest of authoritarianism and tyranny over COVID-19 lockdowns and other pointless mandates given that the continent isnt suffering many infections at all. One of the truckers, an unidentified man, posted a short video to social media making the announcement while advising his fellow citizens to get busy and stock up before the end of the month when the strike is set to begin. Caution: Strong language Good morning, Australia, the man begins, hand-brushing back his white hair. I just f**cking woke up. Weve been telling everyone around the world everyone and everyone around Australia, its on. The truckers are doing it, he continued. We need you and everyone elses support to watch this video, hand it up, and let everyone in Australia know the truckies are gonna shut down the country, the man continued. What that means is you need to go shopping now, get what you can for the next week or two, load your fridge, freezers. The truckies are comin and theyre gonna pull this country down, and were all gonna do it together and remove the sh*t government, the man went on. The vets are in, the truckies are in, Im in. Im willing to go to jail to save my country and my children. If you wanna do this, you gotta do it together as one, he added. The men went on to talk about the poison that is the COVID virus and specifically that China developed it with U.S. funding and that most governments were aware of it. In addition, truckers are also upset about wages and have other differences with Toll, a multi-billion dollar transport company, after talks broke down with the Transport Workers Union (TWU). Business Insider Australia reports: Australia will need to brace for major disruptions from Friday as it experiences its first road transport strike in more than a decade. Thousands of truck drivers will go on strike on Friday after negotiations broke down between multi-billion dollar logistics company Toll and the Transport Workers Union (TWU). The industrial action, supported by 94% of the workforce, will see workers pack it in for a full 24 hours, grinding deliveries to a halt, and creating a wave of backlogs and delays. It is an abomination that billionaire retailers like Amazon are smashing profit records while ripping off transport supply chains and crushing the jobs of the truck drivers whove risked the health of their families to deliver parcels and keep shelves stocked, TWU national secretary Michael Kaine told the outlet. Toll workers need guarantees that they wont be sliced and diced Qantas-style and replaced by a cut-price, underemployed workforce. They dont want to go on strike, especially during a pandemic, but they must because they have everything to lose, he continued. Tolls behavior is reprehensible. The transport giant is responsible for two crises at the same time: a cruel attack on good, safe transport jobs, and mass disruption to food and fuel supplies, Kaine added. Both of these disasters would have been fixed today if Toll had taken a reasonable approach and backed down on plans to trash jobs and drag down standards in Australias deadliest industry. Another report said that deliveries of food and other high-demand, high-value commodities are going be in short supply as well. The decision to strike also comes as Australian authorities have begun cracking down on their own citizens over COVID violations like trying to rescue a dog or sneezing, unmasked, in an elevator. This is a power move by a population fed up with police violence and government despotism and one can only hope nothing untoward will happen and the government indeed stands down and leaves the halls of power so the people of Australia can rise in freedom once again; a breakthrough for the rest of the world as well, Our Greater Destiny noted. Sources include: OurGreaterDestiny.com MSM.com NaturalNews.com (Natural News) The Biden regime desperately wants to put the unvaccinated on a no fly list permanently segregating tens of millions of innocent Americans from air travel. The tyranny doesnt end there. Once Americans are placed on a no fly list and labeled domestic terrorists, they can be put on a no gun list leading to firearm confiscation and forever depriving Americans of their right to keep and bear arms. This is all being done intentionally, step-by-step, and in a clandestine way, because it is so much easier to round up dissenting Americans and put them in internment camps when they are unarmed and stereotyped as a subhuman class of citizens. Democrats propose putting the unvaccinated on a No-fly, No gun list The Department of Homeland Security has already claimed that anyone who opposes vaccines, masks, social distancing or lockdowns poses a potential terror threat to society. Their latest memo labels Americans as extremists if they do not go along with travel restrictions and bodily mandates. The memo states, These extremists may seek to exploit the emergence of COVID-19 variants by viewing the potential re-establishment of public health restrictions across the United States as a rationale to conduct attacks. Pandemic-related stressors have contributed to increased societal strains and tensions, driving several plots by domestic violent extremists, and they may contribute to more violence this year. The Democrats have already introduced HR 4980, directing the Secretary of Homeland Security to ensure that any individual traveling on a flight that departs from or arrives to an airport inside the United States or a territory of the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, and for other purposes. The Atlantic and other controlled media outlets parroted the Orwellian proposal. If this escalates, then tens of millions of Americans will be classified as domestic terrorists banned from travel, and then stripped of their firearms. First, they put you on the no-fly list, then they can automatically put you on a no-gun-buy list, as the Democrats have proposed for years. The No Fly, No Buy, Gun Control law has bipartisan support. Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Donald Trump have all supported a national security system that places Americans on a no fly list if there is reasonable suspicion to believe they pose a threat to public safety. These politicians all agree that Americans who are placed on this no fly list should also be put on a no gun buy list that would block them from purchasing firearms from a federally licensed dealer. Targeting and disarming unvaccinated Americans makes it easier to put them in internment camps With tens of millions of Americans disarmed and wrongfully classified as domestic terrorists, the government can then round these people up and put them in the CDC internment camps. The CDC has proposed a shielding approach to future public health initiatives, establishing a group of shelters such as schools, community buildings within a camp/sector (max 50 high-risk individuals per single green zone) where high-risk individuals (the unvaccinated) are physically isolated together. Once their firearms are taken and they are put on a list, unvaccinated people will be easier to confront, door-to-door, as the Biden regime initially planned. It will be much easier to physically overpower and take the unvaccinated to these CDC internment camps, where they can easily be reeducated, abused, forcibly inoculated, exterminated or forced into slave labor (like communist China). Governments have already developed armies of contact tracers to track people down, monitor their whereabouts and confine them in their homes. Now, the National Guard is currently hiring people to work as internment resettlement specialists and correctional officer, internment resettlement specialists. The job description for these includes: supervision of confinement and detention operations; external security of facilities; providing counseling/guidance to individual prisoners within a rehabilitative program; and maintaining records of prisoners/internees and their programs. Make no mistake about it: If these communist criminals can defraud, intimidate,and coerce millions of Americans to give up their body autonomy and inject a deadly bioweapon, then they are certainly capable of targeting those who dont comply, stripping Americans of their self defense rights, and relocating them to internment camps that are already being approved through emergency order on American soil. Sources include: Ammoland.com DHS.gov Congress.gov Archive.is Time.com CDC.gov NaturalNews.com Indeed.com NaturalNews.com (Natural News) The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is listing people who die from the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) as unvaccinated if they die within 14 days of getting the second vaccine dose. Mainstream media outlets have published multiple articles that supposedly prove that unvaccinated Americans make up the vast majority of recent COVID-19 cases. One article from Yahoo Finance even claims that the unvaccinated population of Los Angeles is 29 times more likely to be hospitalized for COVID-19. (Related: Unvaccinated people have already achieved herd immunity, while the VACCINATED are now getting sick as their vaccines fail.) This report cites the CDCs Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, published on Tuesday, Aug. 24. The report provides people with the CDCs definitions for fully vaccinated, partially vaccinated and unvaccinated. According to the chart, a person is only considered fully vaccinated if 14 days have passed since that persons second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. This means if someone was hospitalized, admitted to ICU, required mechanical ventilation or died within two weeks of getting the jab they are being counted as unvaccinated,' wrote Kelen McBreen for InfoWars. Additionally, this means that the number of supposedly unvaccinated people who have died from COVID-19 is most likely very inflated. But unfortunately, the CDCs data is not specific enough to help analysts distinguish how many fully vaccinated people were hospitalized or died of COVID-19 but were mislabeled as unvaccinated. The entire report can basically be tossed into the trash thanks to the inclusion of the recently vaccinated in the unvaccinated category, wrote McBreen. This intentionally misleading data is now being used to infringe on the rights of the people of California and across the entire United States as vaccine mandates and passports are being rolled out nationwide. More vaccine mandates coming to California The Food and Drug Administrations (FDA) recent granting of full approval for the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine spells disaster for California. Experts in California believe that the FDAs approval paves the way for more vaccine mandates in different sectors of society. San Francisco was the first major metropolitan area in California to mandate vaccines. The citys mandate prevents unvaccinated individuals and people who are unable to prove their vaccination status from entering certain businesses like bars, restaurants and gyms. Following the FDAs announcement regarding the Pfizer vaccine, the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce said that businesses not included in the mandate have also voluntarily signed up to mandate vaccines in their establishments. Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease physician for the University of California, San Francisco, warned that the FDAs full approval has allowed state authorities to implement more vaccine mandates. I think given the federal stamp of approval it will give confidence to put this on a wider scale, to scale it up so to speak. Beyond a county requirement, said Chin-Hong. A similar situation can be seen in Californias colleges. Some, like the University of California and the California State University did not bother to wait for FDA approval and went ahead with forcing their students and staff to be vaccinated for the fall semester. Some of the states 115 campus-based community colleges also did not bother waiting for FDA approval. But most have not yet implemented mandates to coerce students and staff to get the experimental and side effect-riddled COVID-19 vaccines. Rafael Chavez, a spokesman for the office of the state chancellor overseeing Californias community colleges, expects more colleges to adopt vaccine mandates following the FDAs announcement. One of the first community college districts expected to mandate vaccines is the Los Angeles Community College District. This is by far the largest district in the state, encompassing nine colleges and over 230,000 students. If more of California falls under vaccine mandates, the number of COVID-19 deaths in the state will likely increase. Many of these will no doubt be labeled as unvaccinated even if they have received two COVID-19 doses. Sources include: InfoWars.com CDC.gov [PDF] ABC7News.com EdSource.org (Natural News) No matter what the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) says about Pfizers fully approved Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccine, the experimental drug is still injuring and killing people all around the world. A detailed report from Liberty Counsel, a legal team that specializes in human rights and religious cases, explains that just because the FDA has given a rubber stamp to the Pfizer jab does not mean that it is in any way safe. The group cited national data collected in the governments Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS), which shows that nearly 600,000 people have incurred adverse events after getting injected with the Pfizer needle. Another 13,608 people and counting have died from the jab. The deaths in this data includes approximately 3,079 deaths after receiving the Pfizer shot, Liberty Counsel wrote in its report, explaining that it is actively fighting against covid vaccine mandates at the corporate level. Regulators also said they determined there are increased risks of myocarditis and pericarditis, or heart inflammation, following administration of the shot, particularly within the seven days following the second dose of the two-dose regimen. Pfizer admits covid injections are spreading disease In its own literature, Pfizer admits that people who take its Fauci Flu shots have a greatly increased risk of suffering adverse effects compared to those who trust their own natural immunity against the virus. The observed risk is higher among males under 40 years of age compared to females and older males, Pfizers warning label states. The observed risk is highest in males 12 through 17 years of age. Available data from short-term follow-up suggest that most individuals have had resolution of symptoms. However, some individuals required intensive care support. Information is not yet available about potential long-term health outcomes. Among the noted acute reactions from the shots are things like fatigue, muscle pain, chills, headaches, joint pain, fever and injection site swelling. Ironically, many of these symptoms are what the average person might suffer after contracting a bad case of covid, while most people who test positive never suffer any symptoms at all. People should be leery of anything coming from Pfizer to begin with, as the company has been embroiled in numerous multi-billion-dollar legal cases involving dangerous drugs it has peddled on sick people over the years. Back in 2009, Pfizer subsidiary Pharmacia & Upjohn Company Inc. shelled out a whopping $2.3 billion in what became the largest health care fraud settlement in history against a pharmaceutical company. At the time, Pfizer pleaded guilty to a felony violation of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act for illegally marketing four drugs, including the anti-inflammatory drug Bextra, an antipsychotic drug called Geodon, an antipsychotic called Zyvox, and an anti-epileptic drug called Lyrica. Earlier, in 2004, Pfizer agreed to pay out $430 million to both federal and state governments for illegally marketing an epilepsy drug called Neurontin, which is prescribed for migraine headaches, chronic pain and bipolar disorder. Is a company like this trustworthy when it comes to the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19)? Hardly. In fact, people who agree to take the Pfizer jabs are playing Russian roulette with their lives, and the Liberty Counsel report proves that. If you read Dr. Jane Rubys review, she agrees that Pfizer only got emergency authorization while the other Pfizer vax got official approval but is months from beginning production, a Natural News commenter wrote. No approval for the current poison shot. The FDA document actually says it is interchangeable with Pfizers jabs with a few differences, wrote another. It does not specify what those few differences are. The devil is in the hidden details. To keep up with the latest news about injuries and deaths caused by Chinese Virus injections, visit ChemicalViolence.com. Sources for this article include: WNDNewsCenter.org NaturalNews.com (Natural News) By approving Pfizers Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccine (there is some confusion surrounding that approval), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has forever destroyed any remaining semblance of credibility. A dangerous and ineffective jab like the Pfizer mRNA injection has not even completed the clinical trial process. It is also causing countless injuries and deaths, with more mounting daily, and yet the FDA has declared that the experimental gene therapy is perfectly suited to flatten the curve and eventually end the plandemic. Not only that, but the FDA has broken the law with its decision, thus nullifying its perceived authority and eliminating any reason for anyone to ever do anything based on them ever again, to quote Karl Denninger from The Market Ticker. Under black letter law an EUA (emergency use authorization) is illegal if there is an alternative that is considered safe, effective and available, Denninger adds. This was the reason the FDA did not (for 18 months!) run the studies and evaluate them on other early-intervention drugs for Covid-19. We all know what they are. Im living proof they work too, as are millions of others worldwide. The early-intervention drugs of which Denninger speaks include hydroxychloroquine, an ionophore drug that helps to deliver more covid-fighting nutrients like zinc into the cells. The FDA violated the law and nullified its authority a long time ago when it issued EUA to all of the currently available injections for the Chinese Virus since the agency ignored and rejected hydroxychloroquine as well as ivermectin, another early treatment for the Wuhan Flu. The entire American medical system is committing fraud by administering Moderna, J&J injections As for the FDAs recent full approval of the Pfizer injection, this decision instantly made it illegal for anyone to continue injecting people with Modernas mRNA shots as well as those offered by Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and AstraZeneca. What the mainstream media is failing to tell their followers is that it is now illegal for any doctor or medical professional to inject people with these other shots because the FDAs full approval for Pfizer has effectively voided the EUA for these other drugs. The makers can apply for full authorization, of course, but the EUAs are void as of this morning and under black letter law cannot be administered to anyone in the United States as they are now unlicensed and unlawful products in human beings until and unless they are given full approval themselves, Denninger explains. No medical provider can offer or administer any other than the Pfizer Covid-19 shot in the United States as of the moment of that approval. As to be expected, the law will continue to be ignored by the professionals. This was seen in the soaring stock prices of both of the companies that produce mRNA injections, which should have instantly been cut in half, Denninger says. The FDAs issuance of an approval at all also broke the law, which requires a full hearing to evaluate all of the data from the full set of clinical trials. Since said clinical trials are still ongoing, the FDA cannot lawfully approve any of the injections they are calling vaccines until at least 2022. This is a black letter violation of the law as well, but nobody cares, Denninger laments. Any business or government mandating any of these shots is, of course, also breaking the law. Keep this in mind if you happen to work for any of them and be sure to challenge their illegal attempts at medically raping you. The latest news about the criminality of the FDA and the American medical system can be found at Corruption.news. Sources for this article include: NaturalNews.com Market-Ticker.org NaturalNews.com (Natural News) A major health crisis is sweeping Israel, thanks to Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccines. New cases of the Chinese Virus are soaring and the culprit, experts now admit, is the jabs. Despite overwhelming compliance with the governments vaccine push, vaccinated Israelis are still getting sick and spreading that sickness to others, including those who took the jabs. With roughly 80 percent of the country now fully vaccinated, Israel was supposed to be a shining example of how to end a pandemic. Instead, it has become the elephant in the room illustrating the total failure of Operation Warp Speed. After Israel achieved what the government claimed as herd immunity following mass vaccination, most of Israel returned back to normal, only to then see a surge in sickness just weeks later. The country is now far worse off than it was before the vaccines were introduced, and the vaccines are to blame. The plandemic would have ended many months ago had the experts let the first round of the virus run its course. Israel reported 9,831 new diagnosed cases on Tuesday, a hairbreadth away from the worst daily figure ever recorded in the country 10,000 at the peak of the third wave, reported The Daily Beast. More than 350 people have died of the disease in the first three weeks of August. Israeli hospitals are full to capacity with sick, vaccinated patients In a recent press conference, the directors of seven public hospitals across Israel soberly announced that they can no longer admit any more Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) patients because they are full to capacity. The effect of most of the country getting injected is that another wave of sickness and death is sweeping the land, driving the nation to the brink of a major public health disaster. I dont want to frighten you, announced Israeli coronavirus czar Dr. Salman Zarka to the countrys parliament. But this is the data. Unfortunately, the numbers dont lie. The self-proclaimed experts have been reluctant to blame the injections, of course, instead choosing to blame all the vectors, whatever that is supposed to mean. Anyone who is paying attention, though, can clearly see that the vaccines have not only failed but made things exponentially worse. We are still in the midst of a pandemic, and there is no silver bullet, stated Hagai Levine, a Hebrew University of Jerusalem professor epidemiology, to The Daily Beast. Speaking of The Daily Beast, this far-left news outlet has chosen to blame Israelis returning from foreign vacations during the weeks in which Israel dropped all restrictive measures for the latest surge in new cases. It also mentions a worrisome decrease in vaccine efficacy after about six months as another drive. This six-month efficacy narrative seems to be the new media talking point, which is setting things up for the next phase of booster shots coming to a town near you. In the end, the goal of the medical fascists is to jab everyone semi-annually for Chinese Germs for the rest of their lives. Doing this will of course destroy vaccinated peoples natural immunity, making them lifelong customers for Big Pharma. In turn, lots of new cash will be generated for the pharmaceutical barons at the expense of public health. This is the approach that Israel and nearly every other country that went along with last years plandemic script is taking to help stop the spread. No mention is ever made about healthy living or prevention, of course, which would actually put a stop to all the madness without the need for any more injections. To keep up with the latest news about Chinese Virus injections, check out ChemicalViolence.com. Sources for this article include: Archive.is NaturalNews.com (Natural News) Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has deployed more than 100 National Guardsmen to hospitals across the state to deal with the rising number of fully vaccinated individuals contracting the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19). The troops from the Georgia National Guard were deployed to hospitals to assist hard-pressed healthcare workers as their emergency rooms reach capacity because of fully vaccinated COVID-19 cases. These guardsmen will assist our frontline healthcare workers as they provide quality medical care during the current increase in cases and hospitalizations, and I greatly appreciate General [Thomas] Carden and his team for their willingness to answer the call again in our fight against COVID-19, said Kemp. Major General Thomas Carden is the current commander of the National Guard. In total, 105 members of the guard have been deployed to 20 different hospitals around the state. (Related: Shocking executive order signed by Tennessees GOP governor authorizes quarantines, involuntary internment for COVID enforced by National Guard.) This Georgia National Guard mission is in addition to the 2,800 state-supported staff and 450 new beds brought online I announced last week, at a total state investment of $625 million through December of this year, said Kemp. The governor added that the National Guard is coordinating with the Georgia Emergency Management Agency and the Georgia Department of Community Health to figure out where the 105 troops are needed the most. Carden said during an interview with a local news outlet that the 105 National Guard members will come from both the Army National Guard and the Air National Guard. When asked about how long the National Guards deployment will be, Carden answered: As long as it needs to be. The first groups we are sending out are medics, some are doctors, he added. The National Guard troops began deploying on Tuesday, Aug. 24. They are currently stationed in 10 hospitals across the state, mostly within the Atlanta and Macon metropolitan areas or around Savannah and the Georgian coast. There are currently plans in place to spread these National Guard troops out to 10 more hospitals soon. National Guard to head to hospitals with most COVID-19 cases Kemps move to deploy the National Guard is Georgias latest attempt to bolster its healthcare system which has been trained in recent weeks due to the rise of the post-vaccine delta variant of COVID-19. Earlier this month, Kemp announced that the state was spending an additional $125 million to employ an additional 1,500 healthcare workers in hospitals in the state. The $125 million is on top of $500 million the state has previously allocated to employing an additional 1,300 healthcare workers at 68 hospitals across the state. Public health authorities have blamed the current surge in COVID-19 cases on unvaccinated individuals. From our standpoint, the biggest contributor is the spread of the virus in the unvaccinated population in the community, said Dr. John Delzell of the Northeast Georgia Hospital System. But it should be noted that more than half of Georgias adult population is already fully vaccinated. Healthcare providers at some of Georgias largest hospitals have talked about the increasing toll the latest post-vaccine surge has on younger, healthy individuals. The unfortunate thing is we dont have the luxury of saying, Were full, and were closed,' said Robert Jansen, chief medical officer at Grady Health System in Atlanta. Were not a hotel, so people will continue to come and our staff will continue to cope and well continue to find places to take care of these patients. But it is going to be difficult and its not going to be easy and it wont make people happy, he added. Janet said his hospitals emergency room is facing a tsunami of new COVID-19 patients. This has forced staff to divert ambulances to other hospitals that are not dealing with as many coronavirus cases. As of Tuesday, 86 percent of inpatient beds and 88.6 percent of intensive care unit beds in Georgia were filled. If the post-vaccine outbreak isnt dealt with quickly, Georgias current outbreak could go further than the heights of capacity seen earlier this year. Sources include: WSBTV.com Fox5Atlanta.com APNews.com NYTimes.com (Natural News) Impeachment proceedings should have begun already against Joe Biden over his aiding and abetting of an invasion of illegal aliens into our country after reversing nearly all of President Donald Trumps border enforcement policies. They should also have begun after he recently ignored a Supreme Court ruling stating that the Executive Branch has no constitutional authority to impose or extend a rent and eviction moratorium. But now, not only should Biden be impeached, but he literally should be charged with treason a strong allegation, yes, but imminently accurate. Unlike President Donald Trump, whose allegation of treason and sedition was based on the lie that he incited the January 6 breach at the Capitol Building which we know was really a false flag attack planned by the FBI Biden leaving American citizens to rot in Taliban cells if they even survive is unforgivable and cannot be allowed to stand. Earlier this week when asked if the administration will be able to get all Americans out of the country before the hard-and-fast Aug. 31 deadline, White House press secretary Jen Psaki indicated that the answer is no. According to Conservative Brief, Psaki didnt even bat an eye when she made the admission: During the press briefing, Psaki not only called Joe Bidens Afghanistan crisis a success, she appeared to admit that not all Americans will be evacuated from the Taliban-controlled country. Psaki said the mission to evacuate U.S. citizens depended on continued coordination with the Taliban, adding that Biden has requested contingency plans from the Pentagon. Doocy: "You said yesterday it's irresponsible to say that Americans are stranded in Afghanistan right now. What do you say to the American citizens in Kabul that fox spoke to this morning" who says she's been "stranded." Psaki responds with a banquet kitchen-sized word salad. pic.twitter.com/PpDC8SEYTD Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) August 24, 2021 It didnt have to be this way. In fact, it shouldnt have been this way. Never mind that the United States has literally been in Afghanistan now for two decades; and never mind that a deal was cut with the Taliban, at a cost of releasing some 5,000 Taliban prisoners held by the then-Afghan government, in February 2020, giving the U.S. plenty of time to start getting people out. And in fact, the Trump administration began the process; U.S. troops and supporting American contractors were gradually reduced over the next several months. But then Trumps reelection was stolen from him and Biden came in and ignored the terms of the pullout as he ignored and overturned everything else Trump did and accomplished. Whats taking place in Kabul, Afghanistan, right now with the chaotic debacle unfolding before a mass American hostage situation evolves is actually a lot worse than what happened in what was then Saigon, South Vietnam, in April 1975, when Americans hurriedly evacuated that city on our way out of the Vietnam War so says a former Chicago Tribune correspondent who was on the ground there at the time. Ron Yates told a forum this week that he recalls U.S. troops worked for weeks to get South Vietnamese personnel who helped them throughout the conflict out of the country. They managed to get a lot of people out, Yates recalled on The Epoch Times American Thought Leaders on Aug. 20. But at the same time, the Biden regime failed to do the same for Afghanis who worked for and with the U.S. for decades. Its an unmitigated disaster, Yates said. They had months to do this. Why couldnt they have begun this process three or four months ago, slowly taking out these Afghans who were going to be, probably targeted by the Taliban after they took over? Its not as if the regime doesnt know whats going to happen. Infowars notes that the State Department this week issued a statement saying that any Americans left behind in Afghanistan will be without assistance before officially retracting it. These seasoned diplomats and deep state functionaries knew what was going to happen and they let it happen anyway. Thats treason, straight up. And if the American people let these functionaries and the Biden regime get away with it, we deserve the tyranny that will follow. Sources include: Infowars.com TheEpochTimes.com NewsTarget.com (Natural News) Mississippi State Health Officer Thomas Dobbs, on Friday, Aug. 20, issued a state order requiring anyone who has tested positive for coronavirus (COVID-19) to quarantine for 10 days at home or another appropriate residential location. Failure to comply is a misdemeanor that carries a fine of $500 and/or six months of jail time, according to the order. If a life-threatening disease is involved, disobeying the order of a health officer is a felony, carrying a $5,000 fine and/or five years of jail time. All persons residing in Mississippi must immediately home-isolate on first knowledge of infection with COVID-19, Dobbs wrote. He also stated in the order that infected people undergoing isolation at home should avoid contact with other household members or wear a mask if it is unavoidable. While a negative COVID-19 test is not required to end home isolation after 10 days, people must be fever-free for at least 24 hours. Number of new cases expected to rise as more people get vaccinated The order comes as Mississippi faces a surge in infections with hospitalizations and ICU bed occupancy at or near pandemic highs. Interestingly, the rise in number of new cases coincided with a productive stretch in the states vaccination campaign. Mississippi health officials have reported 7,249 new infections and 56 COVID-related deaths from Aug. 20 to 22. A single-day record of 5,048 new cases was reported on Friday. The previous highest one-day total was a week prior, on Aug. 13, with 5,023 cases. From Aug. 13 to 19, the state reported over 25,000 new COVID-19 cases. Hospitalizations for COVID-19 in Mississippi were close to their pandemic peak on Sunday, with 1,563 patients in hospital, 465 in ICU and 329 on ventilators. Only about 37 percent of Mississippians are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Mississippi State Department of Health. But the number of people who are getting vaccinated against the coronavirus has been increasing. (Related: Fauci admits covid vaccines are spreading disease.) Over a hundred thousand have received a COVID-19 vaccine dose in the last two weeks, including a seven-day period in which over 70,000 Mississippians got vaccinated the most in a week since April, according to state department of health data. Vaccinations dont stop COVID-19 transmission Whats happening in Mississippi is consistent with the assessment made by scientists from other countries that mass vaccinations are not going to eradicate SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Those scientists are now recommending that the virus be allowed to circulate throughout the population. We dont have anything that will stop transmission, so I think we are in a situation where herd immunity is not a possibility and I suspect the virus will throw up a new variant that is even better at infecting vaccinated individuals, Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, told a parliamentary panel earlier this month. Pollard argued that if mass testing was not stopped, the UK could be in a situation of continually vaccinating the population. He said that only those with symptoms should be tested while others should go about their daily lives. Infectious disease expert Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, told the same panel that vaccination would not bring about herd immunity. He said it was time to stop concentrating on supposed cases rather than actual infections. We need to start moving away from just reporting infections or just reporting positive cases admitted to hospital, to actually start reporting the number of people who are ill because of COVID, said Hunter, who also advises the World Health Organization (WHO) on the virus. Otherwise we are going to be frightening ourselves with very high numbers that actually dont translate into disease burden. According to recent reports, vaccinated and unvaccinated people have a similar viral load when they catch the virus and likely have the same odds of transmitting it to others. Icelands state epidemiologist arrived at the same conclusion as a record number of people in Iceland have been infected in recent weeks despite the fact that the majority of the population has been vaccinated. We really cannot do anything else but allow the virus to take its course in order for the population to achieve herd immunity, said Porolfur Gudnason, chief epidemiologist of Icelands Directorate of Health. We need to try to vaccinate and better protect those who are vulnerable, but let us tolerate the infection. It is not a priority now to vaccinate everyone with the third dose. Vaccinations fuel spread of new dangerous COVID-19 variants In March, vaccine expert Dr. Geert Vanden Bossche urged governments to stop vaccination drives. He said in an open letter that vaccinations will fuel the spread of new dangerous variants of the virus. Vanden Bosschek, a seasoned vaccine developer who coordinated the Ebola vaccine program at the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI), said that the ongoing mass vaccination drives are likely to further enhance adaptive immune escape as none of the current vaccines will prevent replication or transmission of viral variants. Immune escape is a term used to describe when the host can no longer recognize and counter a pathogen such as a relevant variant or mutant of SARS-CoV-2. The more we use these vaccines for immunizing people in the midst of a pandemic, the more infectious the virus will become, Vanden Bossche wrote. With increasing infectiousness comes an increased likelihood of viral resistance to the vaccines. (Related: Science: Fully vaccinated bodies are breeding grounds for new coronavirus variants.) Meanwhile, refining or improving the vaccines will increase the selection pressure. Selection pressure is a term used to describe the process that helps an organism or pathogen to evolve in ways that make it better adapted to its changing environment. An antibiotic resistance, which is caused by the overuse of antibiotic drugs, is a good example of selection pressure. The virus will effectively outsmart the highly specific antigen-based vaccines that are being used and tweaked. Follow Immunization.news for more news related to vaccination drives and coronavirus vaccines. Sources include: TheEpochTimes.com ClarionLedger.com TheNewAmerican.com Dryburgh.com (Natural News) A 49-year-old woman from New York was on the verge of dying from an immune-mediate skin disorder that rapidly took over her body after she was vaccinated for the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) with the Pfizer injection. In a peer-reviewed case study published just last week, researchers from Prince Mohammed Bin Abdulaziz Hospital in Riyadh revealed that the unnamed woman was rushed to the emergency room after receiving her first dose of Pfizers experimental mRNA injection, which the mainstream media now says is fully approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The patient started to develop fever, fatigue, and headache followed by skin lesions affecting her trunk and starting to spread to her face and upper limbs with oral ulceration, the study explains, noting that the patient was given paracetamol with no noticeable improvements. The patient had no history of taking any new medication or any cosmetic treatment in the past two months before the development of the skin lesions. Upon examination, the patient was vitally stable, anxious, and in severe pain. She had numerous purpuric and dusky red macules involving the chest. If you are interested in seeing photos of the womans skin (WARNING: GRAPHIC), you can do so at this link. Pfizer covid vaccine caused woman to develop skin lesions in her genitalia The womans entire body basically became covered in lesions, including on her abdomen, upper limbs, face, upper thighs, and genitalia. The paper explains that she showed coalescence of lesions with flaccid bullae and areas of epidermal detachment with positive Nikolskys sign. The mucosa was involved in her condition, the paper goes on to reveal, where she had extensive oral ulceration and hemorrhagic crusting over the lips. Said crusting is so disturbing that this writer just about gagged at the sight of it. And to think, this was all done to supposedly avoid a few sniffles caused by the Fort Detrick Virus paid for by Tony Fauci with American taxpayer dollars. Roughly 30 percent of the womans body is now said to be covered with these lesions, thanks to the Pfizer shot. She was given two 60 ng/ml doses of etanercept subcutaneously, the first one on the day of her hospital admission and the second two days later. Two days after receiving the first dose of this emergency drug, the woman stopped forming lesions on her body. She is said to have had a complete healing 22 days after that. The woman was reportedly diagnosed with Stevens-Johnson syndrome, as well as toxic epidermal necrolysis spectrum (SJS / TEN). In a nutshell, the Pfizer shot caused her skin to rot, and it would have continued rotting, eventually killing her, were it not for the emergency intervention. TEN is considered a medical emergency and requires immediate discontinuation of the offending agent,' The Covid Blog reported, noting that vaccines and other pharmaceutical drugs are the primary causes of these conditions. Researchers concluded that there were no other identifiable causes for the TEN in the subject woman other than the Pfizer injection. Similarly, a man by the name of Richard Terrell, located in the United States, developed a full-body rash and swelling for four days after receiving the experimental covid injection from Johnson & Johnson (J&J). Another person, Leigh King from Scotland, developed the same thing after taking the AstraZeneca injection. The instant case is the first severe/life-threatening skin reaction weve covered as a result of the mRNA injections, The Covid Blog adds. There are 66 cases of SJS and TEN recorded in the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) as of August 13. The latest news about the death and destruction being caused by Fauci Flu shots can be found at ChemicalViolence.com. Sources for this article include: TheCovidBlog.com NaturalNews.com (Natural News) Researchers from the Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences in Iran assessed whether royal jelly can help relieve physical and emotional discomfort brought about by menopause. Their findings were published in the journal Complementary Therapies in Clinical Practice. For their study, the researchers looked at the effects of royal jelly in treating menopausal symptoms. They noted that menopause is linked to physical and emotional discomfort in women and can adversely affect their quality of life. A total of 200 women from Bandar Abbas, Iran were enrolled for the double-blind, randomized clinical trial, which ran from June to November 2018. Participants were postmenopausal (i.e., 4560 years old) and were given either 1,000 mg of royal jelly capsules or a placebo daily for eight weeks. The researchers instructed the participants to take the capsules daily for eight weeks. At baseline, the menopausal score between the control and experimental groups did not differ. However, the participants who were treated with royal jelly reported significant reductions in their menopausal score after the intervention. In sum, the daily consumption of royal jelly for eight weeks effectively alleviated menopausal symptoms in the participants. Learn more about natural postmenopausal treatments at WomensHealth.news. Journal Reference: Sharif SN, Darsareh F. EFFECT OF ROYAL JELLY ON MENOPAUSAL SYMPTOMS: A RANDOMIZED PLACEBO-CONTROLLED CLINICAL TRIAL. Complementary Therapies in Clinical Practice. 2019 Aug 22; 37: 47-50. DOI: 10.1016/j.ctcp.2019.08.006 (Natural News) A recent study published in the Journal of Experimental Biology found that wild brown trout can become addicted to methamphetamine a stimulant with a growing number of users worldwide. Researchers in the Czech Republic examined whether concentrations of methamphetamine and one of its byproducts, amphetamine, could be detected in the brains of brown trout. The trout were exposed to the drug in large tanks over eight weeks and then put into withdrawal in drug-free tanks for ten days. During that time, the researchers tested the fishs preference for fresh water or water containing methamphetamine and compared this with the responses of fish that had never been exposed to the drug. Those exposed to methamphetamine preferred the water containing the drug, while no such preference was shown for the untreated fish. The researchers also found that during their withdrawal period, the methamphetamine-exposed trout moved less. The researchers interpreted this as a sign of anxiety or stress typical signs of drug withdrawal in humans. Several changes in brain chemicals that correspond to what is seen in cases of human addiction were also detected in the brain chemistry of the exposed fish. These markers in the brain remained even after the behavioral effects had waned after the withdrawal period. Meaning, the methamphetamine exposure could have long-lasting effects similar to what is seen in people. Fish exposed to drug behave like humans suffering from addiction Many studies on different fish species have shown that fish can behave similarly to what is seen in humans suffering from addiction. One of the hallmarks of drug addiction is a loss of interest in other activities. Its possible that the fish might start to change their natural behavior, causing problems with their feeding, breeding and their survival. They may be less likely to evade predators. Exposure to drugs may also affect their offspring. In fish, addiction can be inherited over several generations. In 2019, scientists in the UK reported cocaine in freshwater shrimp in all 15 rivers they sampled. Interestingly, they detected illicit drugs more often than some common pharmaceuticals. While the wider effects of those drugs remain largely unknown, there have been comprehensive studies on the impact of pharmaceuticals in rivers. Medicines do not fully break down in our bodies, arriving at wastewater treatment plants in feces and urine. With around 269 million people around the world using drugs each year, sewers are flooded with drugs that are excreted from the human body along with the broken down chemical components that have similar effects to the drugs themselves. Sewage treatment plants dont filter those things out because they were never designed for it. Sewage also often finds its way into rivers and coastal waters untreated. Once in the environment, drugs and their byproducts can affect wildlife. For example, exposure to hormone-disrupting chemicals found in contraceptive pills can turn fish from male to female within a few weeks. Canadian biologists found that minuscule amounts of estrogen in wastewater discharges can decimate wild fish populations living downstream. Male fish exposed to estrogen become feminized, producing egg protein normally synthesized by females. In female fish, estrogen often impedes normal sexual maturation, including egg production. Recent studies have also shown that antidepressants can cause a wide range of behavioral changes in aquatic organisms. Diana Aga, director of the Research and Education in Energy, Environment and Water (RENEW) Institute at the University at Buffalo, said antidepressants are a real downer for wildlife health. (Related: Antidepressant use is posing a very real threat to the environment, experts warn.) Because [these chemicals] are persistent, they also tend to accumulate in fish, she said. A study she co-authored in 2017 examined fish from the Niagara River and found the highest bioaccumulation of antidepressants occurred in the brains followed by livers, muscles and gonads of fish. Contaminants affect other aquatic species A new study published in June by the Ecological Society of America Journals found that the same contaminants can influence the behavior of other aquatic species. For example, spiny-cheek crayfish became bolder after being exposed to the common antidepressant citalopram. Bold isnt a great trait when youre low on the food chain. The accumulation of pharmaceuticals in aquatic invertebrates poses a range of potential impacts to the invertebrates themselves and their predators, including altered growth, reproduction and behavior, the researchers wrote. Crayfish and other invertebrates play important roles in their ecosystems, so anything affecting them can cascade throughout a habitat. Plants can also take up chemicals. A study from False Bay, in Cape Town, South Africa, found the anti-inflammatory drug diclofenac in edible seaweed called sea lettuce. The researchers also found traces of the drug, albeit in lower quantities, in marine invertebrates like starfish, mussels and sea urchins. Despite the two decades of research that has identified more than 600 pharmaceutical residues in rivers and streams, theres still a lot of unknowns about how these compounds affect biodiversity. Part of the problem is that many studies have been done in the lab where animals are usually exposed to a single drug. There are a lot more variables outside the lab. A lot of these pharmaceuticals may have either synergistic or addictive or maybe even antagonistic effects when combined, Aga said. Its very difficult to predict what happens in the wild when theyre exposed to hundreds of these pharmaceutical residues at once. (Related: If you use pharmaceuticals, you are polluting the water.) We may also need to change our behavior to really confront this issue. There have been discussions about pharmaceuticals in water for a long time, but the response has been slow, said Aga. When I started looking at this awhile back, Id hear people say that pharmaceuticals cant be toxic or that bad because we take them. But we need to broaden our minds its not just the people we should be thinking about, we should think about biodiversity. Follow Poison.news for more news related to toxins in the water. Sources include: TheConversation.com ScienceDaily.com EcoWatch.com (Natural News) Dr. Vivek Murthy, the US Surgeon General, criticized social media platforms for not doing enough to stop the spread of misinformation online. (Article by Christina Maas republished from ReclaimTheNet.org) The speed, scale and sophistication with which it is spreading and impacting our health is really unprecedented, Murthy said during an interview on CNNs State of the Union. And its happening largely, in part, aided and abetted by social-media platforms. The Surgeon General did acknowledge that these platforms were already working to censor but said what they are doing is not nearly enough. There are people who are super-spreaders of misinformation, he said. And there are algorithms, still, which continue to serve up more and more misinformation to people who encounter it the first time. These are things that companies can and must change. And I think they have a moral responsibility to do so quickly and transparently. Murthys remarks came shortly after Facebook released its content transparency report, revealing the most viewed content. Facebook decided not to release a similar report for the first quarter of 2021 as it would have resulted in bad PR. The most-viewed content in the first quarter was a link to a story about a CDC investigation into the death of a doctor who died shortly after receiving a COVID-19 vaccine. Read more at: ReclaimTheNet.org and Censorship.news (Natural News) A woman from Ridgeway, Virginia, is the latest to file a lawsuit against the makers of heartburn medication Zantac, claiming that the drug gave her esophageal cancer. Deborah Haskins said that she began using Zantac in 2005, taking at least one 75mg tablet a day. She was later diagnosed with esophageal cancer, apparently due to the drug. Following this, Haskins has decided to sue the drugs makers for battery due to the failure of warning consumers of the risks. Zantacs active ingredient breaks down into a carcinogen In the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, Haskins alleged that Zantacs active ingredient, ranitidine, formed unsafe levels of a known human carcinogen in her body. She also said that ranitidines chemical structure is unstable and can break down during digestion to produce the cancer-causing agent, N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA). Previous studies conducted on animals showed that NDMA has been linked to several cancers, such as colon and rectum, kindeys, liver and stomach. The lawsuit named Sanofi, Zantacs current manufacturer in the U.S. as a defendant. It also included previous makers, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals and GlaxoSmithKline. While research has not explicitly linked Zantac to cancer, the esophagus is acted upon by the drug. Symptoms of esophageal cancer include trouble swallowing, chest pains, indigestion, heartburn and unexplainable weight loss. Treatment can range from immunotherapy to radiation, to chemotherapy. If at an advanced stage, surgery may also be necessary to remove some or most of the esophagus. The National Cancer Institute noted that an estimated 17,650 new cases of esophageal cancer were diagnosed in 2019, while 16,080 patients died from the disease. In the lawsuit, Haskins also noted that if she had known about the unsafe levels of NDMA in Zantac, she never would have purchased the medication. She is also seeking an undisclosed amount for damages, such as medical expenses, lost wages, and loss of enjoyment of life. Zantac is part of a class of drugs known as histamine-2 blockers. It lowers the amount of acid that the stomach produces, and has been in the market since 1986. It was named the worlds best-selling drug, but in September 2019, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it found traces of NDMA in tests of Zantac that were higher than what is deemed safe for human exposure. The FDAs recommended daily intake limit is just 96 nanograms, but an independent pharmacy reported that it detected NDMA in excess of 3 million ng per tablet. After unsafe levels were found in the generic versions of the drug (ranitidine), several companies began recalling their products. Meanwhile, pharmacies also announced they would be suspending sales of Zantac due to the troubling findings. This is a big blow to the company. Zantac, the fourth-leading atacid tablet in the U.S. was worth an estimated $129 million in 2018. (Related: Popular heartburn drug may have given millions of people cancer, found contaminated with cancer chemical.) The status of other Zantac lawsuits Most lawsuits against Zantac and Sanofi are currently in their initial stages. Federal Zantac lawsuits have been consolidated in multidistrict litigation in Florida, where lawsuits from across the country have been moved to one court to share resources and streamline the process. In July this year, Judge Robin L. Rosenberg dismissed cases against generic drugmakers as federal law prevents them from being sued. However, there are still 670 lawsuits pending in multidistrict litigationas of July 15, 2021. Because the plaintiffs in the Zantac litigation alleged that they have cancer, Rosenberg provided rules to take the testimonies of plaintiffs in deteriorating health, and parties can choose to expedite depositions who may not survive beyond the year, or may not be capable of testifying competently within the next six months. There are several proposed Zantac class actions filed by attorneys, and anyone who bought Zantac or generic ranitidine can join the class action; they do not have to have a cancer diagnosis they only have to prove that they bought the drug without being warned about the cancer risks. There have been no Zantac jury verdicts or settlements as of August 10, 2021; however, lawyers speculate that lawsuit payouts could be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Find more updates at Medicine.news. Sources include: DailyMail.co.uk DrugWatch.com Officials in Indonesia have announced that the country's first-ever trial of dog meat merchants under animal health rules will go forward, in what animal activists believe would be a critical turning point in the horrific trade's downfall. In May of this year, the group was apprehended by Kulon Progo District Police while unlawfully carrying 78 dogs tied and gagged in the back of a vehicle. The canines were on their way to Central Java to be slaughtered for human food. The interception was the first of its kind in Indonesia, and it came after negotiations with the Dog Meat Free Indonesia group, which is campaigning for a countrywide ban on the barbaric trade. Animal Welfare in Indonesia Every year, millions of dogs and cats are taken from their families and homes around the country, stuffed into metal cages and bags, and shipped to slaughterhouses and markets across the country. Their anguish is unbearable. The trek usually takes several days, and many people die along the route from injuries, a lack of food and water, or stress. Apart from the obvious animal welfare concerns, disease testing has revealed that many dogs are rabies-infected, putting both visitors and the general public in danger. Related Article: South Korea Recognizes Animals as 'Sentient Beings,' Govt Grants Them Legal Rights Dog Meat Trade Although the selling of dog meat for human consumption is officially prohibited in Indonesia, many tourists would not be able to tell if they were going through one of the country's numerous busy marketplaces. Butchers have no qualms about exhibiting animals for sale after bludgeoning and charring their bodies to remove their fur. Crackdown Against Dog Meat On May 6, authorities in Indonesia's Kulon Progo Regency halted a vehicle carrying 78 scared and ill dogs kidnapped from homes or taken from the streets to be tied and brought for slaughter. This was the first time authorities stopped a dog meat truck, seizing the dogs on board and changing their fate. This was a direct outcome of activist pressure, which prompted authorities to step up their efforts to combat the trade. Thanks to Dog Meat Free Indonesia, a combination of activists and animal welfare organizations, 63 surviving canines are now safe and healing at the Ron Ron Dog Treatment Jogja shelter, where they have received vaccines and veterinary care (Humane Society International is a founding member). Unfortunately, several puppies did not survive the harrowing 10-hour voyage, packed and tied up on the dog sellers' truck, as is typically the case. The 63 rescued dogs, on the other hand, are receiving the love and care that all canines need. A Brighter Future for Indonesian Dogs This is the latest in a series of official crackdowns on the dog meat trade due to the Dog Meat Free Indonesia coalition's relentless advocacy. Local governments are taking matters into their own hands after years of national inactivity and lack of legal enforcement, enacting new legislation expressly outlawing the trade in their areas on public health and animal welfare grounds. These are extremely promising indicators of progress, demonstrating how policy can be translated into life-saving action and cementing the societal consensus that patrons must stop the dog meat trade. However, the events in Karanganyar, Sukoharjo, Salatiga, and Bali show that tackling animal abuse and public health problems requires real leadership. The most recent rescue emphasizes the need for provinces to work together to halt the supply and demand for dogs and guarantee that existing regulations are enforced and strengthened. More action is needed in some of the most troublesome locations. Also Read: Pigs Cut While Still Alive: Hidden Cam Showed Extreme Animal Cruelty in Slaughterhouse For more animal news, don't forget to follow Nature World News! After his twin babies perished in the terrible flooding in Tennessee, a devastated father has claimed he feels like he "failed" his family. On Saturday, record-breaking rains and floodwater caused significant damage to houses, businesses, highways, and power lines as it swept across the southern portion of the US state, killing at least 22 people and leaving scores more missing. The Twin's Unfortunate Death The parents of 7-month-old twins murdered in Tennessee flash floods claim they had little time to respond to the catastrophic rush of rain that washed away two of their children. According to the National Weather Service, the twins, Ryan and Riliegh, were ripped from their father's grip inside their apartment Saturday in Waverly, near McEwen, where 17.02 inches of rain poured, surpassing the state's 24-hour record by nearly 4 inches. Matthew Rigney and Danielle Hall, their distraught parents, have recalled how the water began to flow into their flat, where they were sheltering with their four children. The family, who had only moved into their apartment 20 feet from Trace Creek two weeks earlier, relocated their four children to a rear bedroom, including 19-month-old Brayla and 5-year-old Maleah, but the downpour inside rapidly intensified, leading the children's mother, Danielle Hall, to crawl out a window. Mr. Rigney told local news station WTVF-TV, "We woke up, and water was flooding our flat. The glass on our front entrance cracked, and water poured in into our house." He told the TV station, "I had the twins in my arms, I had (19-month-old) Brayla on my hip, and I had (five-year-old) Maleah wrapped around my neck." Rushing Rapids Kenny Miller told AccuWeather, "That water came up so quickly." When Miller attempted to relocate his car on Saturday, he said he was nearly carried away by powerful floodwaters. As the water surged around him and almost drew him into its hold, he held onto a shrub. As he hung on, debris was pelting him and going over his head. He assessed the depth of the water to be 7 feet. Finally, he was able to break away and make his way to his house, where his daughter and her mother were waiting. "It was already... we couldn't open the door to let him in by the time he came back," Sadie Vaughn recalled of her father, Kenny. "He had to go in via the window." Deaths in Waverly, Tennessee Thousands of people in Waverly, Tennessee, survived the devastating flood over the weekend, including Vaughn and Miller. But, unfortunately, every single one of them is sure to have a similarly horrific story to tell. The floods, which happened after 17 inches of rain fell in less than 24 hours, had a "big impact" on "this little community," according to public safety head Grant Gillespie of Waverly, the small town where the majority of the deaths occurred. Also Read: Storm Anxiety: How to Handle Extreme Weather Phobias During Hurricane Season For more climate and weather updates, don't forget to follow Nature World News! This year's wildfires burning across the planet have emitted a record amount of carbon dioxide. CO2 is a primary ingredient in the greenhouse gasses that adds to the change in climate. As per the data which a senior scientist at the European Union's Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) whose name is Mark Parrington compiled, fires have released 4.3 gigatonnes (4.7 gigatons) of carbon dioxide as of the 16th of August. As per the International Energy Agency policy center, European Union's 27 member nations produced a relatively minimal 2.7 gigatons in comparison. It could worsen: Northern California's wildfire season doesn't usually end until October, as per the California Department for Forestry and Fire Protection, and has extended into December in recent years. This 2021's soaring CO2 levels, though, are in great part because of the over 190 forest fires that have consumed parts of Siberia. As of the beginning of August, NASA made a report that 505 megatons of carbon dioxide have been discharged skywards above the distant Sakha Republic in northeastern Siberia - more than the 450 megatons emitted last year, with some more weeks of wildfire season to go. Also Read: WATCH: Stunning 3-D View of How Carbon Dioxide Moves Around the Earth Climate Change The thick, extensive, acrid fumes emanating from hundreds of forest fires unfolded 2,000 miles from the eastern region to the western region and from 2,500 miles from north to south. The smoke geo to the North Pole which is over 1,800 miles away from where?, in what NASA is convinced to be a first, and also extends across some portion of Mongolia, a distance of 1,200 miles. Previously, Parrington revealed that in just July, the raging flames released some 350 megatons of CO2, the primary ingredient in greenhouse gasses triggering climate change. That became the highest monthly amount since satellites began the analysis of CO2 levels 20 years ago. Also, it's a fifth higher than the month's past record, set in 2014, as per CAMS. Record heat waves and extended droughts triggered much of that and were driven by climate change themselves, said Parrington. Wildfire He told New Scientist: "We've seen big areas of fires before, but for two months at a time, that's not something we've seen so much of in the data." It's not only the US and Russia that were affected. However, Southern Europe has experienced shocking fires in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Montenegro, Greece, and Turkey. In the Middle East, the fires badly damaged Lebano, Algeria, and Tunisia. So far, there have been about 267 major fires that have raged in 2021 in the Amazon rainforest, engulfing 60,000 acres or a region approximately the size of Los Angeles, as per the environmentalist site Monga Bay. Different from the fires in the US, Amazon's fires don't usually start naturally. Monga Bay reported that they're set intentionally "to clear felled trees and plants to make way for agriculture or renew existing pasture." Related Article: Wildfires Are a Real but Undisclosed Risk for Millions of Areas and Homes For more news, updates about wildfires and similar topics don't forget to follow Nature World News! Beavers will be reintroduced into the wild, this will be done under the proposals of the government to encourage a "cautious" return of the semi-aquatic rodents to English rivers. Rewilding beavers The indigenous animals will be legally protected in England, so deliberately capturing, killing, disturbing, injuring, or even damaging their breeding sites or resting places is an offence. This is included in efforts to boost their recovery. As plans are being put out for dialogue, certain criteria will be needed in requests for licences to free beavers into the wild, which includes local buy-in and making sure landowners are supported and river users is in place. Beavers are considered as natural engineers that bring back wetland habitats through felling trees and dam-building, lowering, preserving and filtering water in their natural environment, which brings other wildlife and decreases flooding downstream. In Britain, beavers were hunted for their fur, meat, and glands till they went extinct in the 16th century. Also Read: Beavers Engineered Special Exmoor Dam: A First in 400 Years Reintroduction of Beavers They have partially returned to England and are found wild on Devon's River Otter which is the location of a fortunate official trial reintroduction, and also on other rivers because of unauthorized releases or escapes. They have also been brought into enclosed areas in several English counties to assist in the management of floods and make habitat for other wildlife. Conservationists support the reintroduction of beavers to bring back wetland habitats, increase the number of other wildlife, control climate impacts including severe flooding, and back eco-tourism - though landowners have brought up concerns pertaining to the impact locally. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is beginning consultation lasting for a 12-week on more reintroductions into the wild and management of other wild populations in England, which George Eustice, the environment secretary, said would take a careful strategy. Licences for Reintroduction Eustice said: "We are committed to providing opportunities to reintroduce formerly native species, such as beavers, where the benefits for the environment, people and the economy are clear. But we also understand that there are implications for landowners, so we are taking a cautious approach to ensure that all potential impacts are carefully considered." The dialogue seeks views on possible future reintroduction into the wild, current and potential releases into enclosed regions, and controlling of beaver activity or effects in the wild, including on the River Otter and location other beavers living freely have made their habitat. It suggests that authorization for reintroductions into the wild would need to meet requirements like showing helpful stakeholder engagement and local buy-in, and evidence that a complete assessment has been handling impacts on surrounding land, infrastructure, habitats, waterways, and species. Projects must also make sure that assistance for river users and landowners is included in the proposals. Related Article: Due to Illegal Rewilding, Wild Beavers Across Scotland Suddenly Increased to 1,000 For more news, updates about beavers and similar topics don't forget to follow Nature World News! As it left Townsville, Australia, in March, the converted ferry boat had a mobile scientific laboratory and a big fan on its deck in place of its usual load of automobiles and vans. The researchers anchored in a coral lagoon 100 kilometers offshore and then turned on the cone-shaped turbine, which blasted saltwater over the rear of the boat in a mist. What occurred next was a pleasant surprise: the plume rose into the sky after momentarily floating over the ocean's surface. Brightening the Clouds This mist machine, which resembles a jet engine, is at the heart of an experiment that, if successful, may help decide the Great Barrier Reef's destiny. Three hundred and twenty nozzles sprayed a cloud of nano-sized particles designed to brighten clouds and block sunlight, offering some relief for the coral colonies below. Sensors on the ferry, drones, and a second boat were deployed to track the plume as it moved upward. Small Scale Experiment The experiment was too small to have a major impact on the clouds. But, according to Daniel Harrison, an oceanographer, and engineer at Southern Cross University in Coffs Harbour, Australia, who is leading the research, preliminary results from field tests - which were shared exclusively with Nature - suggest that the technology may perform even better than computer models predicted. Harrison says, "We are now quite sure that we can get the particles up into the clouds." "However, we must still figure out how the clouds will react." Harrison's experiment is the first field test of marine cloud brightening, one of several controversial geoengineering methods that scientists have investigated for decades in the lab. The research is motivated by the worry that humans will be compelled to influence the Earth's climate and weather systems to mitigate the worst effects of global warming in the future. Related Article: UN Wants to Spray Chemicals in Atmosphere to 'Reduce Global Temperatures': Will it Work? Coral Bleaching in Australia For many Australians, that day came in 2017, when major coral bleaching and mortality occurred throughout most of the 2,300-kilometer Great Barrier Reef due to a marine heat wave. That disaster occurred just a year after another coral bleaching incident on the reef, home to over 600 kinds of coral and supporting an estimated 64,000 jobs in tourism and fishing. Warming seas, tropical storms, and predatory starfish have caused the reef to lose more than half of its coral between 1995 and 2017. Some scientists in other countries are concerned about the research, partly because the Australian group hasn't published much about its findings. Last year, when news of the first experiment surfaced, environmentalists worldwide protested to the idea, and the details of the 2021 trial may draw similar criticism. Local Adaptation to Climate Change Because its use would be limited in geography and time, Harrison emphasizes that the cloud-brightening initiative is about local adaptation to climate change, not global geoengineering. It's also part of Australia's broader Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program (RRAP), which began last year with a budget of Aus$300 million (US$220 million) to research and develop strategies and technology to restore the country's reefs. Many suggestions, ranging from cloud brightening to the breeding of heat-tolerant corals, would be firsts for humans in the natural reef system. According to ecological modeling, a large-scale intervention incorporating several techniques, including a fleet of mist machines, may extend the reef's life as governments strive to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But, according to Cedric Robillot, executive director of the RRAP, today's objective is to figure out what is feasible in the actual world. Also Read: UNESCO: Great Barrier Reef Should Be Classified as "In Danger" Due to Degradation For more news update about Environmental Action, don't forget to follow Nature World News! Two systems has a reasonable probability of developing, and a tropical depression is anticipated to emerge later this week or over the weekend. Developing Tropical Wave A tropical wave now situated over northern Colombia and the south-central Caribbean Sea is likely to produce a broad region of low pressure over the southwestern Caribbean Sea during the next day or so. As a result, environmental conditions are expected to be favorable for development, and a tropical depression is expected to form late this week or over the weekend over the northern Caribbean Sea as the system travels west-northwestward to northwestward. On Saturday, the disturbance is forecast to pass close or through Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, then move into the western Gulf of Mexico by Sunday, where conditions may be suitable for further development. Over the next five days, there is an 80% likelihood of development. Related Article: Storm Anxiety: How to Handle Extreme Weather Phobias During Hurricane Season Second Chance A wide trough of low pressure in the central tropical Atlantic, roughly 800 miles southeast of Bermuda, is producing disorganized showers and thunderstorms. However, due to unfavorable upper-level winds, only a sluggish development of this system is predicted during the next day or so. Following that, environmental conditions are expected to improve, and a tropical depression is expected to form late this week or this weekend as the storm moves eastward over the middle Atlantic. Over the following five days, the likelihood of development stays high at 80 percent. Finally, a tropical wave creates a chaotic region of showers and thunderstorms several hundred miles southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands in the far eastern tropical Atlantic. While moving west-northwestward at 10 to 15 mph across the eastern tropical Atlantic, some development of this system is possible over the following several days. By this weekend, upper-level winds are expected to become less favorable to development. The possibilities of this system developing are still modest, at 30%. Tropical Storms Tropical storms, also known as hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons, leave a damaged path in their wake. Hurricanes frequently occur over tropical oceans in warm climates. How they Form Heat and moisture are transferred from the sea surface to the atmosphere by the winds. The system may be strengthened if local atmospheric conditions enable deep convection and minimal vertical wind shear. As the air heated near the surface rises, intensification occurs. The air movement away from the trough axis causes the surface pressure to drop, resulting in stronger winds and increased heat transfer at the surface. In addition, the Coriolis force, which is caused by the rotation of the Earth, causes the winds to revolve around the center, resulting in a closed and symmetric circulation pattern. Tropical storms are more common since they are precursors to more powerful tropical cyclones. Also Read: Millions of Properties in California May Be Underwater by 2050; Lawmakers Suggest Solutions For more climate and weather updates, don't forget to follow Nature World News! Police in Brazil confiscated a fossil from smugglers and it has appeared to be one of the remarkable preservations of a flying reptile that existed more than 100 million years ago. Pterosaur's Fossil The flying reptile called pterosaur was captured just in time, because the fossil had been divided apart and was close to being transported out of the country. Now, eight years after, paleontologists finally got the chance to give it a better look and they were excited. Tupandactylus navigans is the creature the fossil belongs to. T. navigans is a species of pterosaur from the early Cretaceous, the starting of the end of the dinosaur age. They were first identified in 2003 and are tapejarid, a pterosaur of medium size specifically recognizable for the big soft tissue crests. A larger animal named Tupandactylus imperator whose sail dwarfs that of Tupandactylus navigans is another instance. The T. navigans that were rescued features a good-looking sail-shaped crest shooting out from its head and even a tinier crest dropping from the point of its jaw, like the sharpest chin you' have ever spotted. Also Read: New Texas Pterosaur Is Remarkably Similar To English Cousins, Say Researchers [VIDEO] Illicit Trafficking of Fossils In the fossil record, Tapejarids have been incomplete so the fossil that was described recently overhauls the understandings of paleontologists of how a complete creature would be. The sample was discovered in a police raid at Sao Paolo's Santos Harbor, one of three attacks in 2013 that discovered 3,000 fossil specimens that were about to be sneaked out of the country. Sadly, illicit trafficking of fossils out of Brazil is the country's frequent problem; the thousands of fossils the police retrieved in 2013 reveal a well-established problem that doesn't have any definitive solution yet. Brazilian police seized the 3,000 fossils and at some point, it was distributed to two Brazilian museums. Currently, a group of Brazilian researchers released their analysis of the notably well-preserved T. navigans fossil discovered in the attack. Morphology of the Early Cretaceous Pterosaur The fossil had been divided into six portions but still provided a special look into the morphology of the ancient Cretaceous pterosaur. Their outcomes were released in the journal PLOS One. In a video call, a paleontologist at the University of Sao Paolo and also a lead author of the paper whose name is Victor Beccari said: "Now we have this specimen that has not only the complete skull, so the best-preserved skull of all the Tupandactylus that we have, but also the post-cranial almost fully articulated. We think this fossil is at least 95% complete, which for paleontologists is already a lot, but for a pterosaur is even crazier. Not only the bones but the soft tissue-the crest and the beak." Related Article: 'Real-Life Dragon'- Fossils of Australia's Largest Flying Reptile Discovered! For more news, updates about pterosaurs and similar topics don't forget to follow Nature World News! Sign up to get breaking news, weather forecasts, and more in your email inbox. Sign Up Now FINLEY, WA - Friend and fellow disc golfer of Bo Zlatich, one of the victims of the Tri-Cities crime spree last week, organized an disc golf e The Rizos gave up on gardening at their home on White Oak Shade Road in years past because of the plethora of small animals, rabbits and squirrels included, that have laid waste to their crops. But, this year, Soula Rizo said she has not been seeing those small animals. When she saw a large animal, thought to be a cougar, in her backyard recently, she thought she may have an answer as to why. So, I dont know if it is prowling at night, Rizo speculated on Wednesday. Animal Control Officer Allyson Halm said that the rarity of small animals could be due to other predators. The animal the Rizos saw looked very strong, and like a huge cat, she told Hearst on Wednesday. Further descriptions included having a flat face, a beige and grayish color and strutted with a long tail curled up. She said that she sees coyotes and fox often, but not an animal like this. The large tan cat also known as a mountain lion, puma or panther is native to the Americas, according to the National Wildlife Federation Website. The large cat is not considered native to the state of Connecticut. Soula said her husband John saw the animal first and asked: What is that? What is that? As they looked out the backyard, they saw a large animal wandering around the side of the house, go into the back yard, and through the bushes onto a neighbors property, she said. She called the New Canaan Police Department and was told to call Animal Control. The Rizos have no small pets, but alerted their neighbors who do. Rizos reported their sighting a few days before other sightings were recorded, including a large cat that was seen on Hoyt Farm Road not far from Route 123 near the Norwalk and New Canaan border. Halm said she is getting a crash course on cougars. I would associate the drop in population of small mammals with the increased population of all our predators fox, coyote and bobcat. Small mammals are their staple, Halm said. Mountain lions are transient, she said, adding that the big cats thrive on deer. Cougars eat almost anything that they can catch, including deer, rabbits, rodents and even insects, according to the Audubon Nature Institute. Instead, I believe they would drag their kill off into the woods, gorge, then partially bury the remains, Halm said. They may hang around until the kill is consumed. The large cats vary in body size depending on geographic location, but generally, males weigh between 115 and 220 pounds and females weigh between 64 and 141 pounds, according to the Wildlife Federation Website. With increased sightings of bear and now mountain lions, it's certainly plausible that these animals are becoming part of the ecosystem and its food web, Land Trust Executive Director Aaron Lefland said Tuesday. But it is important to remember that their population are fairly small, whereas other predators are much more abundant. SEOUL, South Korea (AP) South Koreas vice defense minister on Thursday called for North Korea to resume cooperation under a 2018 military agreement on reducing tensions, which the North has threatened to abandon over U.S.-South Korean military exercises. The agreement, which created buffer zones along land and sea boundaries and no-fly zones above the border to prevent clashes, has been crucial in maintaining stability between the Koreas as their relations worsened in recent months, Vice Defense Minister Park Jae-min said in an interview with The Associated Press. While there havent been major skirmishes, North Korea has held back from some critical parts of the agreement, including forming a joint military committee to maintain communication and avoid crisis situations and jointly searching for remains from the 1950-53 Korean War. Since the collapse of its nuclear diplomacy with the Trump administration in 2019, North Korea has suspended all cooperation with South Korea and threatened to scrap the inter-Korean military agreement while expressing anger over the Souths joint military exercises with the United States, which it insists are invasion rehearsals. The allies describe the drills as defensive in nature but have downsized them in the past few years to provide space for diplomacy and because of COVID-19. While it will be up to leaders and diplomats to persuade North Korea to go in a different direction, South Koreas military is thoroughly prepared to push forward with inter-Korean military cooperation whenever diplomacy creates room for it, Park said. "We are very hopeful that the North would respond to our calls to form the joint military committee, Park said. He said such a committee would allow both sides to move forward with an agenda agreed to in 2018 and also "explore other agendas to strengthen trust between the militaries. The inter-Korean military agreement is one of the few tangible remnants from South Korean President Moon Jae-ins ambitious diplomacy with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Moon's efforts helped set up Kims first summit with former U.S. President Donald Trump in June 2018. The Korean leaders met three times that year, exchanging vague vows about a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula and expressing ambitions to reboot inter-Korean engagement when possible, voicing optimism that international sanctions on North Korea could end and allow such projects. But such hopes were crushed following the collapse of the second meeting between Kim and Trump in 2019, when the Americans rejected North Korean demands for major sanctions relief in exchange for a partial reduction of its nuclear capabilities. Critics say North Korea has already damaged the spirit of the inter-Korean military agreement with a series of belligerent acts in 2020. It blew up an empty inter-Korean liaison office in the North Korean border town of Kaesong in June and its troops shot and killed a South Korean government official who was found drifting near their sea boundary in September. While North Korea has suspended its testing of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles that could hit the United States since 2018, it has tested various new short-range missile systems that experts say potentially expand its ability to deliver nuclear strikes at targets in South Korea, including U.S. military bases. Park and other South Korean military officials plan to discuss the North Korean nuclear issue and other security matters with global counterparts during next months annual Seoul Defense Dialogue forum. The Sept. 8-10 event in Seoul will involve military officials and experts from around 60 countries participating either in person or by video. Park said theres greater need for dialogue between military officials as the world faces an unprecedented security crisis in which traditional threats such as tensions on the Korean Peninsula, the heated competition between Washington and Beijing, and the turmoil in Afghanistan are coinciding with non-traditional threats such as COVID-19. South Koreas military has played a central role in its pandemic response, deploying thousands of medical personnel and troops to assist with tests, contact tracing and quarantine enforcement and providing hospitals and shelters to treat virus carriers. Park said South Korean defense officials will share details of their experiences at the Seoul forum, where participants will explore the possible roles militaries could serve in fighting the virus and expanding international cooperation. South Korean officials are also hoping to use the forum to pursue stronger military ties with European nations, including Britain. Officials are expecting a high-level British official, possibly Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, to attend the forum in person and participate in discussions to facilitate exchanges between the countries militaries and defense industries. The Seoul Defense Dialogue will begin days after the British aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth and its strike group are to participate in planned training with the South Korean navy in waters near the country. South Korea earlier this year confirmed its plans to build and deploy its first aircraft carrier by 2033 and some experts say the country may seek to tap into British experience in operating carriers. Regarding the aircraft carrier strike group, meetings are planned between people of both countries involved in related technologies and defense industries, Park said. New Castle, PA (16103) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 52F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 52F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Climate justice pilgrims walk across Norfolk Climate justice pilgrims walk across Norfolk A nine-day relay focusing on climate justice heading from Great Yarmouth to King's Lynn is underway organised by local Christians and Quakers. This multi-faith pilgrimage is a local expression of the larger national Young Christian Climate Network pilgrimage from Truro to Glasgow, where the COP26 climate summit will take place in November. It aims to unite local voices to express their urgent concern that COP26 produces realistic commitments to the radical changes needed to save the planet from ecological disaster. The Rt Revd Graham Usher, Bishop of Norwich, who is himself an ecologist and was appointed lead bishop on the environment by the Archbishop of Canterbury in June 2021 has encouraged the relay and particularly advocates the engagement of young people saying: It is incredible that young people have been inspired to organise a relay from the G7 meeting in Cornwall to Novembers COP26 in Glasgow. We need to hear their prophetic voices and enable them to convert the Church and society as a whole to engage much more with climate change. This tributary of the main Youth Climate Change Network pilgrimage offers a great opportunity for young Christians from across Norfolk and Waveney to call for the crucial action needed to act on climate change. God bless them on their journey to bring change. The relay started from Great Yarmouth on Saturday 21 August and following the Cross-Norfolk Trail, and yesterday (Tuesday August 24) passed through Norwich, before arriving in Kings Lynn on Sunday 29 August. With coastal erosion, rising sea levels and sea pollution posing some of the greatest climate and ecological threats to Norfolk, a discarded bottle filled with sea water at Great Yarmouth will be carried as a symbolic baton across the county and, after meandering its way through churches and rest places along the entire Norfolk route, will be passed on at Kings Lynn to another relay group in the next county. Peter Belton, Quaker representative on the organising team, explains what the pilgrimage relay hopes to achieve: With this years UN climate talks being hosted by our government, this is a key moment for people across the UK to come together and call for the radical action needed to prevent ecological disaster and mass suffering. We hope that this pilgrimage will demonstrate the strength of feeling in our communities and pressure the UK and other governments to make realistic commitments at COP26. Participation by individuals, faith groups, accompanied young people, and families is actively encouraged; taking part in as much or little of the pilgrimage as they like. All are welcome to be involved by: Supporting pilgrims as they gather at 9.30am to depart from Great Yarmouths Britannia Pier at 10.00am on Saturday 21 August, from outside St Peter Mancroft opposite the Forum in Norwich at 10am on Tuesday 24 August or at the conclusion at Kings Staithe at 3pm on Sunday 29 August; as they gather at 9.30am to depart from Great Yarmouths Britannia Pier at 10.00am on Saturday 21 August, from outside St Peter Mancroft opposite the Forum in Norwich at 10am on Tuesday 24 August or at the conclusion at Kings Staithe at 3pm on Sunday 29 August; walking part or all the route with the group; part or all the route with the group; writing a prayer and leaving it at one of the waystation churches or Quaker meeting houses to be carried by the pilgrims to Kings Lynn; and leaving it at one of the waystation churches or Quaker meeting houses to be carried by the pilgrims to Kings Lynn; writing and posting a letter to the Prime Minister and other MPs or leaving it at one of the waystations, to be posted together with others from Kings Lynn. Revd David Longe, Rector of the Matlaske Benefice and Chair of the Diocesan Environmental Working Group says: Our hope is that through participating in this pilgrimage (whether through walking it, writing letters, or praying) that we are all led to care for God's creation. Engaging in this route will, I pray, deepen people's awareness that we are not isolated from creation but through our ignorance threaten our beautiful single island planet that God formed. This we must now urgently respond to. To get involved, or find out more, visit www.multifaithpilgrimage.org or contact COP26relay@gmail.com. Pictured above: The #COP26 pilgrims set off from Norwich on Tuesday morning, with a blessing from the Archdeacon outside St Peter Mancroft and The Forum, Norwich on the next leg of the relay. Helen Baldry, 26/08/2021 Latest job opportunities Use this website to help find the best person to fill your role. This is a paid-for service aiming at advertising jobs which are of interest to the Norwich and Norfolk Christian community and its many churches, groups and organisations. To advertise a vacancy, simply e-mail the details such as job and person specifications, approx salary, contact details and a closing date to us here . For full details of the service, and our cost-effective fee, please click here. Word of thanks Stewart Barber, Eckling Grange Care We had a great advert on Network Norwich for many weeks with great layout, unlimited words, colour logo and a direct link from the weekly newsletter! We also found our new manager through the website. Tom Howell, Halls of Residence Thank you for all your help with our recruiting process during 2019. We have some great new staff at the Matthew Project as a result. God bless."We had a good response to our advert on Network Norwich for a Project Worker. We were able to short-list some very possible applicants and have now made an appointment of a lady whom we expect to fit well into our existing team and who brings to us some useful past experience.Thank you for your help, what a useful medium this is.""We see the Network Norfolk website as a good place to advertise the organisation and Im very pleased to say that the recent advert for an account assistant led to an appointment." Newburyport, MA (01950) Today Periods of rain and becoming windy. Rain may be heavy late. Low around 60F. NE winds at 10 to 15 mph, increasing to 20 to 30 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain and becoming windy. Rain may be heavy late. Low around 60F. NE winds at 10 to 15 mph, increasing to 20 to 30 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Newburyport, MA (01950) Today Periods of rain and becoming windy. Rain may be heavy. Low around 60F. NE winds at 10 to 15 mph, increasing to 20 to 30 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain and becoming windy. Rain may be heavy. Low around 60F. NE winds at 10 to 15 mph, increasing to 20 to 30 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Help support your local hometown newspaper/website. Independent local news reporting matters. Please log in, or sign up for a new account and purchase a subscription, for as little as $3, so we can continue to provide independent local reporting on our communities. Whippany, NJ (07981) Today Showers and thundershowers early, then overcast overnight with occasional rain. A few storms may be severe. Low near 60F. Winds NNE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected.. Tonight Showers and thundershowers early, then overcast overnight with occasional rain. A few storms may be severe. Low near 60F. Winds NNE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. A decades-old fight to expand and protect voting rights will intensify this weekend, when multiracial coalitions of civil, human and labor rights leaders hold rallies in Washington and across the nation to urge passage of federal voter protections eroded since the Voting Rights Act of 1965. It's a united front that rights advocates say hasnt been seen in two generations, back when the landmark federal legislation removed barriers keeping voters of color from easily accessing the ballot box. Some progress was made this week, when the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives passed legislation Tuesday that would restore sections of historic voting legislation that allowed legal challenges to state voting laws. The Voting Rights Act also required states with a history of voter discrimination to get federal preclearance before changing laws. True victory now hinges on the Senate, where Republicans have promised to block voting rights legislation and where Democrats dont have enough votes to overcome a filibuster rule that requires some GOP support for passage. And with midterm elections approaching next year, some fear the window of opportunity is closing to do away with the filibuster and beat back state-level voter suppression. I think this has given us a sense of urgency, said the Rev. Al Sharpton, whose March On for Voting Rights event with the families of Martin Luther King Jr. and the late Rep. John Lewis on Saturday will move from Washingtons McPherson Square to the National Mall, with the U.S. Capitol as a rally backdrop. The Senate is now the battleground, Sharpton said. And clearly the timing of this couldnt be better. Everything that were concerned about whether its health care, whether its student loans, whether its educational equality, whether its economic relief none of it can happen if our votes are lessened. The list of speakers, first shared with The Associated Press, includes Reps. Joyce Beatty, Terri Sewell, Sheila Jackson Lee and Mondaire Jones, along with civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump, the family of George Floyd, and American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten. Sharptons march and those in dozens of other cities, including Atlanta, Houston, Miami and Phoenix, cap a week of actions against a wave of proposals in conservative-leaning states to curb access to early voting, mail-in vote casting and ballot drop boxes used in pandemic-era elections. Advocates say its a reaction to shifting racial demographics, made clear in recently released 2020 census data, and a corresponding shift in the balance of power between the white majority and Black and Latino people, as well as rapidly growing Asian communities. Prominent Republicans, who have criticized the Democratic proposals as a power grab, say they arent opposed to election laws that expand voter access. And many of them support proposals to build trust among Americans who believe, albeit falsely, that the last presidential election was stolen from former President Donald Trump and other GOP candidates due to widespread voter fraud. The Democratic proposals include the John Lewis Voter Advancement Act, which would restore and strengthen the weakened 1965 law and add protections against suppression tactics affecting Indigenous communities. The separate For the People Act would create a national standard for voter registration, mail-in balloting and early voting, as well as curb racial gerrymandering and institute campaign finance reforms. Meanwhile, a wave of Republican-backed state initiatives could disproportionately disenfranchise voters of color at a time when they have turned out at the polls at historically high levels in states like Georgia and Missouri, said Carmen Perez, president and CEO of The Gathering for Justice, a nonprofit founded by legendary musician and activist Harry Belafonte. Its important that we create entry points for all people to get involved, especially when were looking at voting rights being taken away from Black and brown communities, as well as Indigenous communities, said Perez, an organizer of the Make Good Trouble Rally" in tribute to Lewis at the Lincoln Memorial Saturday. The late civil rights icon was brutally beaten by a state trooper during the 1965 march from Montgomery to Selma, Alabama, that preceded passage of the Voting Rights Act that year. Perezs rally is in the same location as last years commemorative March on Washington, where the families of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Jacob Blake urged support for federal policing reforms and voting rights legislation. Tamika Mallory, co-founder of the social justice group Until Freedom, said voting rights are essential to electing leaders who support police reform. One reason we do not have the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act passed at this moment is because of the lack of support ... on both the Democratic side and the Republican party, Mallory said. That means we have to elect new folks to office, she said. And we have to have the ability to go to the polls and not be suppressed. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, which tracks laws restricting voter access, between January and mid-July at least 18 states enacted 30 suppressive laws. More than 400 bills with rules that reduce mail-in voting access, ballot drop boxes and other restrictions were introduced in 49 states this year. The bills followed the election of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, the nation's first Black and South Asian vice president, along with a diverse group of progressive candidates to the House and Senate. On the same day as the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Georgia declared the winners of its runoff elections Democrats Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, the state's first Black and Jewish senators. An August poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that 43% of Americans think the U.S. government is doing a good job protecting the right to vote, while nearly as many 37% say its doing a poor job. By comparison, in December of 2015, 70% said it was doing a good job compared with 15% who said a poor job. The drop came across party lines and across racial and ethnic groups. An AP-NORC poll in April found about half of Americans supported expanding access to early and mail-in voting, while about 3 in 10 were opposed and the rest had no opinion. Automatic voter registration was the most popular Democratic proposal in the survey, endorsed by 60% of Americans. The Biden administration, which said it supports the voting rights legislation passed by the House, hasnt made getting it through the Senate a priority, critics and advocates say. Many see the biggest Senate hurdle as two Democratic senators, Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona and Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who have said they oppose eliminating the filibuster to take up the voting rights legislation. Thats why the Rev. William Barber II, co-chair of the Poor Peoples Campaign, planned to confront Manchin with a mass motorcade from the Boone County Courthouse in Madison, West Virginia, to the statehouse in Charleston to call out the senator's obstruction on the filibuster. Democrats need to step up, because they ran on all this stuff, Barber said of the U.S. Senate. Everybody said, if we get them the majority, they are going to do it. Theyre willing to pass infrastructure with 51 (Democratic) votes in the Senate. Why cant they pass voting rights laws with 51 votes? The Senate is set to recess ahead of the Labor Day holiday next month, making the prospects of action on the legislation unclear. The urgency of the moment dictates that we act now, said NAACP President Derrick Johnson, whose civil rights organization has partnered with several national labor unions in support of federal voting rights legislation. In this moment, for the Senate to go home for recess without addressing the issue is a problem, Johnson said. ___ Polling editor Emily Swanson in Washington contributed. ___ Morrison is a member of the APs Race & Ethnicity team. Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/aaronlmorrison. Michael Nader, the actor best known for playing Farnsworth "Dex" Dexter on the hit soap "Dynasty," has died age 76. The Missouri-born star's manager, Richard Schwartz, confirmed to USA Today that he died in his California home on Monday after a short battle with cancer. A statement from Nader's wife, Jodi Lister, to Michaelfairmantv.com, read: "With heavy heart, I'm sharing the news of the passing of my beloved, Michael. We had 18 wonderful years together with the many dogs we fostered and adopted." Nader's acting career spanned several decades after he landed his first acting gig in William Asher's 1963 comedy "Beach Party." In 1978, he secured his first soap job as Kevin Thompson on "As the World Turns." He rose to prominence in 1983 when he joined the cast of "Dynasty" as the love interest of Alexis Carrington, played by Joan Collins. Collins paid tribute to her onscreen husband Thursday, posting a photo of the pair on Instagram. The "Dynasty" star said she was "very sad to hear" of Nader's death, adding: "I loved working with him and his character was a wonderful mixture of tough and tender." Collins said her character was "crazy to keep on rejecting him." Nader was also known for portraying Dimitri Marick, the on-again-off-again romantic partner of Susan Lucci's character Erica Kane in ABC daytime series "All My Children" from 1991 to 2001. He reprized his role in 2013. Lister said her husband had been "so thrilled to reconnect with his friends from the cast of Dynasty during Emma Samms virtual event to help raise funds for Long-Covid research." She ended the tribute by describing him as a "beautiful and fascinating man with many talents and skills," adding: "I will miss him forever." Nader's acting credits include "The Flash," "Law and Order: Special Victims Unit," "Beach Blanket Bingo," "The Great Escape II: The Untold Story" and "Lucky Chances." The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent a health advisory Thursday warning doctors and the public about the "rapid increase" in prescriptions for the anti-parasitic drug ivermectin. The CDC also cautions about an increase in reports of severe illness caused by the drug to poison centers. Ivermectin is used to treat parasites such as worms and lice in humans and it is also used by veterinarians to de-worm large animals. For months, conservative media -- including Fox News hosts Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham -- have talked about how it could be used to treat Covid-19. It's a popular topic on Twitter. Ivermectin has been called a "miracle drug" in congressional hearings. Even Wisconsin Republican Sen. Ron Johnson has been touting its benefit to treat Covid-19 cure. Normally, about 3,600 prescriptions are written for ivermectin in a week, the CDC said. This rose more than tenfold by the week of January 8, when 39,000 prescriptions were written. "Since early July 2021, outpatient ivermectin dispensing has again begun to rapidly increase, reaching more than 88,000 prescriptions in the week ending August 13, 2021. This represents a 24-fold increase from the pre-pandemic baseline," the CDC said. GoodRx a company that tracks drug prices has seen a similar sharp increase in prescriptions filled for ivemectin. From the company's data for August, so far they've seen 20 times the average level of fills in 2019. The US Food and Drug Administration has cautioned people against using ivermectin to treat Covid-19. Last Saturday the FDA tweeted: "You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y'all. Stop it." Calls to poison control centers have increased three-fold, compared to the number of calls about the drug before the pandemic, the CDC said. Some examples of these calls included an adult who wanted to prevent Covid-19 and had to be hospitalized for nine days after drinking a cattle formula. Another person who bought pills online to treat their Covid-19 infection was hospitalized after taking five tablets a day for five days. The CDC reminded doctors that ivermectin is not authorized or approved for use in Covid-19 patients. Doctors did investigate the possibility, but clinical trials of the drug "yielded insufficient evidence" to treat Covid-19. Scientists would need to perform more clinical trials to see if it actually worked to treat the disease. Overdoses of the drug can cause stomach problems, nerve damage, seizures, disorientation, coma and death. The CDC advisory reminded the public that vaccination rather than treatment "is the safest and most effective way to prevent getting sick and protect against severe disease and death" from Covid-19. The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that there are approximately 1,500 people who may be Americans left in Afghanistan as the United States' presence on the ground nears its end. The State Department has made contact with 500 people and is "aggressively" attempting to reach the other thousand as it continues evacuations from the now-Taliban controlled capital of Kabul. More than 82,000 people have flown out since evacuation efforts began on August 14, including "at least 4,500 American citizens and likely more," Blinken told reporters at the State Department on Wednesday. "More than 500 of those Americans were evacuated in just the last day alone," he said, adding that when evacuation operations began, "there was a population of as many as 6,000 American citizens in the country who wanted to leave." "Over the past 24 hours we've been in direct contact with approximately 500 additional Americans and provided specific instructions on how to get to the airport safely," he said "For the remaining roughly 1,000 contacts that we had who may be Americans seeking to leave Afghanistan, we're aggressively reaching out to them multiple times a day through multiple channels of communication," he added. A senior State Department official described those efforts as incessant, but told reporters that "in many cases, we have not heard back from them." "That could mean any number of things," the official said. "It could mean that that is the person on the end of the line isn't in fact, a passport holder. There was some error in the data. It could mean that they've already left, and we certainly expect that applies to a number of Americans," the official said, noting the department had warned US citizens for months to leave Afghanistan. "We are not going to leave anything to chance. That is why we are calling and re-calling, emailing and re-emailing this universe of individuals we believe may be American citizens who're still in Afghanistan," they said. Many of the Americans remaining in the country are dual citizens, one senior State Department official told CNN, saying that "most of the Americans who are in Afghanistan right now are there because they do not want to leave extended family and they are making the choice not to go to the United States." "We as the US government can't tell somebody that they need to come home," the official said. "Obviously these are hard decisions but they're making them according to their own family needs and consciousness at this point." Precise count difficult The State Department has noted that it is difficult to get a precise count of the number of Americans in a country at any given time, as US citizens are not required to register with the department or inform it when they depart. It has led to a fluid and, at least publicly, opaque process -- one that has played a role in the reluctance of US officials to provide exact numbers of Americans inside the country. But behind the scenes, the effort to get into direct contact with US citizens in the country and bring them inside the airport's perimeter has been a logistical undertaking that senior State Department officials describe as unprecedented. That push launched in earnest on August 13 -- less than two days before the Taliban took Kabul -- and over the last 10 days it has expanded to include hundreds of consular officials and State Department volunteers across the world driving what has become an intensive 24-7 operation, officials said. Officials say they have meticulously tailored their list of potential US citizens in the country in real time and there have been thousands of messages and calls that continue until individual citizens are confirmed as evacuated through cross-checks on military flight manifests. "While evacuating Americans is our top priority, we're also committed to getting out as many Afghans at risk as we can before the 31st," Blinken said, outlining the riskiness of evacuation operations on the ground. Biden administration officials have repeatedly voiced concern about security around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul. The US believes ISIS-K, which is a sworn enemy of the Taliban, wants to create mayhem at the airport and has intelligence streams suggesting it is capable and planning to carry out multiple attacks, a US defense official told CNN. On Tuesday, as he confirmed his decision not to extend the evacuation deadline beyond August 31, President Joe Biden acknowledged the growing threat that the group poses to the airport. "Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians," the President said. The security threats have created daunting challenges for officials attempting to navigate US citizens through Taliban-controlled checkpoints surrounding the airport, the senior State Department officials said. While officials have declined to outline details for security reasons, one official told CNN that citizens are now being directed to congregate in groups in predetermined safe locations. They are then brought into the perimeter through alternative routes, with embassy officials and their military counterparts constantly providing guidance on safe options. In some instances, the US military has used helicopters to take people in Kabul to the airport for evacuation. The third such extraction operation took place Tuesday evening, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby and Gen. Hank Taylor, Joint Staff deputy director for regional operations, told reporters during a briefing on Wednesday. "It's hard to overstate the complexity and the danger of this effort," the top US diplomat said. "We're operating in a hostile environment in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban with the very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack. We're taking every precaution but this is very high-risk. As the President said yesterday, we're on track to complete our mission by August 31 provided the Taliban continue to cooperate and there is no disruption to this effort," he said. While Blinken has said that the US is committed to getting not only Americans, but also "the many Afghans who have stood by us over these many years and want to leave and have been unable to do so," out of Kabul after August 31, it is unclear how these efforts will continue once the US is no longer a presence on the ground. There are "very active efforts underway on the part of regional countries to see whether they can play a role in keeping the airport open once our military mission leaves or if necessary reopening it if it closes for some period of time," Blinken said Wednesday, but no agreement has been made on the operation of the airport once US troops leave. Blinken could not commit to a continuing diplomatic presence The top US diplomat also did not commit to a US diplomatic presence staying in Afghanistan following the US military withdrawal, saying in a news conference, "with regard to our own potential presence going forward after the 31st, we're looking at a number of options." A senior State Department official said the future of the airport and the future of the US diplomatic presence are "very much related," noting that "you'd be hard pressed to find a country that would feel comfortable operating diplomatically in a country where there is not ready access to an airport or a seaport." "An airport is going to be important to not only a country like the United States but also our allies and partners," they told reporters Wednesday. The official also declined to say whether the US would keep a diplomatic presence in Afghanistan after August 31, saying: "Right now we're focused on the evacuation operation." "These questions have a number of sub-questions attached to them, including the airport, including the type of government that may come together in the coming days, the willingness of any such government to uphold its commitments, the ability of any such government to uphold its commitments, so it's premature for us to go beyond that at this point, but it's something we're thinking about now," they said. They also noted that the number one priority is the "safety and security our people." Even as the United States and other countries fly tens of thousands of people out of the country, many Afghans who assisted the war effort are still awaiting their turn to leave. The dangerous and chaotic scenes outside the airport have made it virtually impossible for Afghans -- even those with green cards, specific instructions from the US embassy, or ailing children -- to make it onto the airport grounds. White House press secretary Jen Psaki told CNN's Phil Mattingly later Wednesday at a White House briefing that the US does not have a cap on the number of Special Immigrant Visa applicants they hope to get out of Afghanistan by the end of the month. "We are continuing to work every day to get as many people evacuated as we can," Psaki said. Following the US withdrawal and evacuation effort, Blinken said the US would "judge our engagement with any Taliban-led government in Afghanistan based on one simple proposition: our interests and does it help us advance them or not." "If engagement with the government can advance the enduring interest we will have in counterterrorism, the enduring interest we will have in trying to help the Afghan people who need humanitarian assistance, the enduring interest we have in seeing that the rights of all Afghans, especially women and girls, are upheld, then we'll do it," he said. "But fundamentally, the nature of that engagement and the nature of any relationship, depends entirely on the actions and conduct of the Taliban." This story has been updated with additional reporting Wednesday. The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. COLLEGE PARK A Clayton County Sheriffs Office deputy was involved in a shooting Tuesday, Aug., 23 that left a suspect dead. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation has been called in to investigate the incident. According to the GBI, at about 9:45 a.m. Tuesday members of the Clayton County Sheriffs Office Fugitive Unit were attempting to execute an arrest warrant on Tory Brown, 22, of Atlanta at an apartment on Godby Road. Brown was wanted on a probation violation. The GBI said deputies gave verbal commands for several minutes for the occupants of the apartment to leave. Some did leave, but Brown was not among them. When deputies entered the apartment, Brown quickly advanced towards deputies, according to the GBI. A Clayton deputy shot Brown, and he died at the scene as a result of his injuries. No officers were injured. The GBI will continue its independent investigation, and once complete will send the case file to the Fulton County District Attorneys Office for review. This is the 65th officer involved shooting the GBI has been requested to investigate in 2021. Vice President Kamala Harris' departure for Vietnam was delayed by several hours Tuesday afternoon after her office was informed by the US embassy in Hanoi, Vietnam, of a "report of a recent possible anomalous health incident." That term is the way that the government usually refers to the mysterious Havana syndrome that has sickened hundreds of US officials over the past few years. "Earlier this evening, the Vice President's traveling delegation was delayed from departing Singapore because the Vice President's office was made aware of a report of a recent possible anomalous health incident in Hanoi, Vietnam. After careful assessment, the decision was made to continue with the Vice President's trip," said Rachael Chen, spokeswoman for the US embassy in Hanoi, in a statement. Aboard Air Force Two, Harris' chief spokeswoman Symone Sanders told traveling reporters that Harris is "well, all is fine and looking forward to meetings in Hanoi tomorrow." Later she said of the delay: "This has nothing to do with the vice president's health," according to a pool report. Harris eventually took off from Singapore's Paya Lebar Air Base at 7:32 p.m. local time, after a more than three-hour delay. During the White House press briefing Tuesday afternoon, White House press secretary Jen Psaki attempted to assure reporters of the vice president's safety in Vietnam, saying Harris "wouldn't travel further to a country if there wasn't confidence in her security on the ground." When asked if Harris or her staff were the target of a possible attack, Psaki said no additional assessments have been made. She also declined to elaborate on any additional security details, such as how the administration will keep the vice president safe. "This is not a confirmed case at this point in time. We take any reported incident, which was recent and was reported publicly, I will note, quite seriously. As a result, there was an assessment done of the safety of the vice president, and there was a decision made that she could continue travel along with her staff," Psaki said. Psaki confirmed that those affected were not traveling with Harris but declined to say how many individuals fell ill. Harris was not medically evaluated because she was not on the ground at the time the incident was reported. The intelligence community still doesn't have an official explanation for Havana syndrome, which is a perplexing mix of sensory experiences and physical symptoms that have now sickened hundreds of US diplomats, spies and troops around the globe -- some severely enough to force their retirement. CNN has not reported any cases of Havana syndrome in Vietnam. Incidents of Havana syndrome began in late 2016 in Cuba and a Senate committee said earlier this year that the number of suspected cases appeared to be on the rise. Victims of Havana syndrome have reported a varying set of symptoms and physical sensations, including sudden vertigo, nausea, headaches and head pressure, sometimes accompanied by a "piercing directional noise." Some have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries and continue to suffer from debilitating headaches and other health issues years later. US federal investigators have struggled to determine what or who is causing the mysterious symptoms. There have been cases reported in Russia, China and other countries across the globe. Last month, Austrian authorities said they were investigating reports that US diplomats in Vienna had experienced symptoms of Havana syndrome. Earlier this year, CNN reported on two separate incidents that occurred near the White House late last year affecting National Security Council staffers. Two defense officials said in May that the Pentagon was drafting a memo to the entire US military and civilian workforce asking personnel to report any so-called anomalous health symptoms that might indicate they have been victims of Havana syndrome. CNN reported earlier this month that frustration is rising among rank-and-file staffers in the State Department and diplomats over what multiple officials say has been a tepid response by department leadership, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The reported incident comes in the middle of Harris' trip to Singapore and Vietnam, as the vice president looks to convey to the Southeast Asian nations that the US is sincere in its long-term commitment to the region. White House officials say Harris' overarching mission of the trip is to shore up relationships with regional partners. She is expected to focus on regional security issues amid concerns over China's territorial claims in the South China Sea; economic priorities, including supply chain issues like global chip production; climate change; and the Covid-19 pandemic. It's her second trip abroad as vice president. Earlier this year, she traveled to Central America -- a trip that also saw travel issues as Harris had to switch planes moments before leaving for Guatemala due to a technical glitch. This story has been updated with additional information. The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Thirteen US service members and at least 60 Afghans have been killed in two bombing attacks outside Kabul's airport, according to the Pentagon and Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health. The deadly blasts came as the United States and other Western countries raced to complete a massive evacuation of their citizens and Afghan allies following the Taliban takeover of the country. An official with Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health told CNN on Thursday that more than 60 Afghan people were dead and 140 wounded. Eighteen US service members were injured in addition to the 13 dead, said Capt. Bill Urban of US Central Command (Centcom). US President Joe Biden, speaking from the White House, called the troops "heroes" and said he was "outraged as well as heartbroken." "We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay," he warned the perpetrators of the attack. ISIS in Khorasan, known as ISIS-K, has claimed that an ISIS militant carried out the suicide attack, but provided no evidence to support the claim. US officials have said the group was likely behind the attack, and Biden on Thursday announced that he had ordered US military commanders "to develop operational plans to strike ISIS-K assets, leadership and facilities." In previous days, the President had cited the risk of a terror attack among the reasons for getting US troops out of the country by August 31. He had also promised a swift and forceful response to any disruption to the operation. US officials have been warning over the past week that a threat of a terror attack at the airport was becoming more acute. Earlier on Thursday local time, US diplomats in Kabul warned American citizens to "immediately" leave several gates into the airport, citing security threats. The risk of potential suicide attacks by ISIS-K had already led the US to establish alternative routes to Kabul airport, earlier on in the evacuation operation. Biden said he didn't feel that it had been a mistake to rely on the Taliban to provide security outside the airport. The President said that while he does not trust the Taliban, it was in the best interests of both the United States and the Taliban to try and prevent an attack from ISIS. Two explosions Thousands of Afghans have been gathering at the airport's gates in recent days in hopes of being evacuated. Footage posted to social media on Thursday after the explosions showed chaotic scenes of crowds of people trying to help the wounded amid bodies on the ground. Photos showed apparently injured people being transported away from the scene in wheelbarrows. Ten Marines were among the troops killed and several more were wounded, Marine spokesman Maj. Jim Stenger said. The identities and units of those killed won't be announced until Friday after relatives are notified, he added. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said earlier that one of the explosions happened "at the airport's Abbey Gate" and "at least one other explosion happened at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate." Abbey Gate has become the main entry point to the airport and primary security there has been provided by US Marines. The area around that gate had been used for holding refugees after they passed through the Taliban check points outside the airport, and before they were allowed to go to the airport. Baron Hotel was used by British soldiers and other allies as an evacuation handling center to process evacuees, before moving them up to the Abbey Gate. It is unclear whether international forces were still in the area when the explosion happened. The US Embassy in Kabul said US citizens who were at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate of the airport "should leave immediately" in the wake of the blast. "There has been a large explosion at the airport, and there are reports of gunfire," the security alert said. "US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates at this time," it added. Immediately after the explosions, gunmen opened fire on service members and civilians, said Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, Centcom Commander. Hours after the attacks, coalition forces also conducted a series of scheduled and controlled explosions within Hamid Karzai International Airport, US Central Command spokesman Maj. John Rigsbee told CNN. Evacuations to continue, but winding down Tens of thousands of people have so far been evacuated by the US military and NATO allies from the airport in the past two weeks. These evacuations are set to start winding down in the next few days, ahead of US' August 31 deadline for the final exit from a 20-year war in Afghanistan. Over 95,700 people have been evacuated since August 14 and over 101,300 since the end of July. Even after the attack, scores of people continued to gather at the airport. McKenzie said that the evacuations will continue despite the attack. "Our mission is to evacuate US citizens, third country nationals, special immigrant visa holders, US embassy staff, and Afghans at risk. Despite this attack, we are continuing the mission, the evacuation at best speed," he said. "But right now our focus really, we have other active threat streams, extremely active threat streams against the airfield, we want to make sure we are taking the steps to protect ourselves there. Our focus is on that," he added. He said the threats from ISIS were "imminent," raging from rocket attacks to "vehicle-borne" suicide attacks in addition to "walk-in" suicide attackers like the attack today. McKenzie also said the US is sharing some intel with the Taliban for security purposes. "They don't get the full range of information we have. But we give them enough to act in time and space to try to prevent these attacks," said McKenzie. He added that the US is using attack helicopters and other manned and unmanned aircraft to defend the airport in Kabul. Biden said he would authorize whatever military leaders need, including more troops. "These ISIS terrorists will not win. We will rescue the Americans. We will get our Afghan allies out. And our mission will go on," the US President said. "America will not be intimidated." Several European countries, including Belgium, the Netherlands and Poland, have said their evacuation missions would end on Thursday. Denmark's last flight left Afghanistan on Wednesday evening, and New Zealand's on Thursday. Canada's efforts have also come to an end, Gen. Wayne Eyre, Canada's acting chief of defense staff, said in a virtual briefing Thursday. In the wake of the blast, French President Emmanuel Macron warned the situation around the airport had seriously deteriorated. "As we speak, we have 20 buses of dual citizens and Afghans that we would like to be able to repatriate," he said. "I cannot guarantee that we will be successful because the security situation is beyond our control." UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the UK will continue its evacuation operation from Kabul despite the "barbaric" attack. "I think [these attacks] are despicable, but I'm afraid that this is something we have had to prepare for. It isn't going to interrupt our progress, we are going to get on with our evacuation," he later added, speaking to British media in London. The UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said 13,146 people -- including embassy staff, British nationals, those eligible under the Afghan Relocation and Assistance Policy program and a number of nationals from partner nations -- have been evacuated from Afghanistan. German Chancellor Angela Merkel also said Thursday that those who have not yet been able to access evacuation flights from Kabul will not be forgotten, adding that the German Foreign Ministry is still in negotiations with the Taliban. "We know that the window of opportunity is closing. Tens of thousands of people have been rescued but I want to say again today: we will not forget those people who could not be rescued by the air bridge. Rather we will do everything we can to enable their evacuation," Merkel said. Germany is in talks with Afghanistan's neighboring countries to secure safe border crossing for further evacuations to take place, according to Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, speaking to reporters outside the Security Council chambers, condemned the attack in "the strongest possible way" and sent his condolences to the families of the victims. Abdullah Abdullah, the chairman of Afghanistan's Reconciliation Committee under the previous government condemned the attacks on Thursday. "I strongly condemn the terrorist attack at Kabul Airport which killed and wounded a large number of the civilians," he said in a tweet. Early on Thursday CNN reported the Taliban has taken away security from former Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah. The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Members of Veterans of Foreign Wars groups from across Kentuckys 5th Congressional District, including Pikevilles Post, met on Aug. 18 with U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers and talked on several topics of interest to veterans. Reporter Mary Schenk is a reporter covering police, courts and breaking news at The News-Gazette. Her email is mschenk@news-gazette.com, and you can follow her on Twitter (@schenk). "As a Floridian that just so happened to interview here in the month of February, I was enchanted by the snow. So, my host took my wife and I on a brief nighttime walk through the Quad during a light snow. The scene was quite remarkable for this Florida boy." A new study from Linkoping University has shown that the tumor-inhibiting gene TET2 is silenced in a large fraction of cases of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) in children. The scientists show that the gene can be reactivated by treatment with an existing drug, 5-azacytidine. The results, published in the scientific journal PNAS, suggest that 5-azacytidine may function as targeted therapy for ALL in children. "T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL) is a devastating disease for the affected children and their families. One of five children affected do not survive the disease. The ultimate goal of my research is to ensure that all children can be cured. Our discovery may pave the way for clinical studies of 5-azacytidine as a new therapy for this poorly understood disease. The more treatment options we have for T-ALL the more chance we have of beating this aggressive cancer", says Colm Nestor, senior lecturer in the Department of Biomedical and Clinical Sciences at Linkoping University, who has led the study. One of the characteristics of cancer cells is that they lose their cellular identity. It's as if they have forgotten that they should be, for example, a liver cell, brain cell, or cell of the immune system. One of the reasons for this loss of identity is that genes that should be active in a certain type of cell have been switched off (silenced), while other genes have been erroneously activated. The activation and deactivation of genes is controlled by a process known as epigenetic modification, in which small chemical groups are attached to and removed from DNA. One such epigenetic modification is DNA methylation. It has long been known that the pattern of DNA-methylation is often altered in cancer cells, and for this reason, drugs that change DNA-methylation are interesting as potential treatments for cancer. In the recently published study, the researchers were interested in an enzyme, TET2, that removes methyl groups from DNA. The gene that codes for TET2 is often affected by mutations in adult leukemias. In contrast, harmful mutations in TET2 are very rare in T-ALL in children. This led the researchers to speculate whether the function of TET2 is affected in a different manner in child leukemias. They analyzed the gene expression patterns in cancer cells from more than 300 patients with T-ALL, and found that the TET2 gene was silenced in a large fraction of cases. It turned out that the TET2 gene was often silenced through methylation. The scientists therefore decided to treat tumor cells in culture with a drug, 5-azacytidine, that removes methyl groups from DNA. This drug is used to treat certain leukemias in adults. We found that one type of T-ALL cell, whose DNA seems to be highly methylated, is more sensitive to azacytidine than other cells that are not highly methylated. The drug actually turns silenced TET2 back on by demethylating it, so this might be a targeted therapy for a subset of cases. We suggest that azacytidine may have a doubled effect in these cells, since both the drug itself and TET2 kill cancer cells by demethylating the genome." Colm Nestor, Senior Lecturer, Department of Biomedical and Clinical Sciences, Linkoping University Since 5-azacytidine has already been approved as a drug, the researchers hope that the path from preclinical results in the laboratory to actually treating children with T-ALL will be much shorter than is required when developing a novel drug. "Chemotherapy agents have a broad effect and can be used for many patients, but they kill also healthy cells and can give rise to serious undesired effects. Targeted treatment, on the other hand, only works for a small fraction of patients, but is extremely specific. We need an arsenal of drugs to use for patients who experience relapses, and for those whose cancer does not respond to chemotherapy", says Colm Nestor. The research is at an early stage. The LiU researchers will now continue with experiments to determine the effects of activating TET2 in these cancer cells. Another question is whether 5-azacytidine can function as targeted therapy in other types of cancer. The research group hopes that their discovery will inspire other researchers to test the therapy in clinical studies. "The fact that we can target the loss of TET2 using the drug 5-azacytidine makes me hopeful that this treatment can help T-ALL patients in the future", says Maike Bensberg, PhD student at Linkoping University and one of the researchers behind the study. The largest analysis aimed at more accurately predicting the risk of sudden cardiac death after myocardial infarction is presented in late breaking results from the PROFID consortium at ESC Congress 2021. Sudden cardiac death is responsible for approximately one in five fatalities and is usually a result of myocardial infarction. A prophylactic implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) is recommended for patients with a left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) of 35% or lower, but most sudden cardiac deaths occur in those with a LVEF above 35%. In addition, due to improved medical and interventional treatment of myocardial infarction, only a minority of patients eligible for an ICD will ever require it yet may have unintended shocks or complications from the device. PROFID aims to personalize prevention of sudden cardiac death after myocardial infarction. The first phase of the project, presented today, was to develop a model to predict the risk of sudden cardiac death in individual post-infarction patients. In the second phase, two randomized trials will compare a personalized strategy for ICD eligibility (based on individual risk according to the model) with current clinical practice. The researchers analyzed 19 datasets from Europe, Israel and the US for a total of approximately 225,000 patients. Participants had 1) previous myocardial infarction regardless of LVEF and/or 2) ischemic cardiomyopathy with LVEF below 50%. Patients with and without a prophylactic ICD were included. All datasets contained information on demographics, clinical parameters, medication, ECG, biomarkers, echocardiography, and outcomes (sudden cardiac death, appropriate ICD therapy, death from other causes). Six datasets also held information on cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) imaging. The primary outcome, analyzed at 12 months, was sudden cardiac death in patients without an ICD or appropriate ICD therapy. Four models were developed using traditional analytical methods or artificial intelligence techniques (Weibull model, flexible parametric survival model, random forest, deep neural network). Eighty-five variables were entered into the models including demographics, clinical information (15), biomarkers (12), imaging (echocardiography and CMR; 9), ECG (10), medical history (11), lifestyle (2), and medication (12). The four models were then tested for their ability to predict the primary outcome. As a comparison, the researchers also assessed the ability of LVEF to predict the primary outcome. In the first step, the models were developed without CMR variables. The second step consists of a model update with inclusion of CMR variables. In the analysis of the first step (not including CMR variables), the researchers found that none of the four models substantially improved the predictive performance of LVEF. The area under the curve for the four experimental models ranged from 0.600 for the random forest method to 0.622 for the neural network. The corresponding value for LVEF was 0.601. In addition, no clinical variable improved the predictive performance of LVEF. The authors are now updating the four models with inclusion of the CMR data. Preliminary results indicate that this modification may improve their predictive ability. This was the largest dataset ever analyzed to improve the understanding of sudden cardiac death risk prediction after myocardial infarction. The finding that using the 85 selected variables did not improve the predictive value of LVEF significantly is of huge importance and will advance the future design of SCD prevention trials, potentially emphasizing the role of CMR." Professor Gerhard Hindricks, Principal Investigator Dr. Nikolaos Dagres, principal investigator, said: "These results contribute substantially to our approach to sudden cardiac death prediction. For the first time it has become obvious that relying on clinical variables alone, we will not be able to achieve a significant improvement. This can be one of the explanations for the substantial limitations that have been faced so far in this challenging field. We are now optimistic and waiting for the results of the CMR analysis." Researchers in the UK have looked at the impact of the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic on the population birth outcomes in 2020, detailing the experiences of the expectant mothers from immunization rates for babies to self-reported levels of stress and anxiety in the mothers, compared to pre-COVID years. A pre-print version of the research paper is available on the medRxiv* server. Hope Jones and colleagues observe that while implemented public health and non-pharmaceutical interventions (i.e., social distancing, lockdowns, self-isolation) were effective in controlling the virus spread, these measures also imposed significant changes in primary and secondary care services, such as the care provided to pregnant women and young mothers. In the current study, the research team from University Medical School, Wales, Public Health Wales, Cardiff, and Cardiff University, in the United Kingdom, investigated the different impacts on the population-level birth outcomes due to the COVID-19, assessing the expectant women's experiences of pregnancy during this period. They found that while the expectant women had a negative impact, this experience did not translate to adverse birth outcomes during the pandemic. "This study aims to examine the impact of changes in maternity care due to COVID on (a) population birth outcomes including stillbirths, mortality, prematurity, birth weight, rates of Caesarean sections (C-sections) and vaccination rates before and during the pandemic and b) women's experience of pregnancy during the coronavirus pandemic." The Study The researchers used data from SAIL Databank and performed a comparative study. The SAIL (Secure Anonymised Information Linkage) databank is a privacy-protecting trusted research environment (TRE), consisting of routinely collected population and health data (~5 million) - providing anonymized person-based data for research and analysis. The researchers inform that the data used for this study included: National Community Child Health (NCCH), Annual District Death Extract (ADDE) from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) mortality register, Patient Episode Dataset for Wales (PEDW), Welsh Demographic Service Dataset (WDSD), Welsh Longitudinal General Practice (WLGP), and COVID-19 Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing data (PATD). They assessed the population-level birth outcomes in Wales, such as stillbirths, prematurity, birth weight, and Cesarean section births - during 2016-2019, the pre-pandemic period, and during 2020. The study comprised two parts: analysis of data from SAIL on pregnancy and birth outcomes in Wales, before and during the pandemic, and an online survey on the expectant mothers' experiences. To address the stress questions, the researchers used the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS), Patients Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) and the General Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7). The researchers also compared the first primary immunizations of the baby during these periods. They surveyed self-reports from 215 expectant mothers (aged 16+) on their experiences of pregnancy during the pandemic in Wales. They analyzed the qualitative survey data using codebook thematic analysis, generating themes from an open-ended question. The findings There were a number of significant findings in this study, including the incidence of stillbirths, preterm births, Cesarean sections, primary immunization rates, and responses to the mental health questionnaire. Preterm mortality rates by year 2020 saw fewer births than the previous average, with no significant difference between annual outcomes including gestation and birth weight, stillbirth, rates of Cesarean sections for infants born in 2020 compared to previous years. During the first lockdown, the researchers observed late-term births (>42 weeks gestation). During the second lockdown, they found a decrease in moderate to late preterm births (32-36 weeks gestation). Thus, a small increase in preterm mortality may be a temporal increase year on year with no association with the pandemic. All babies received their immunizations - except a few were delayed in timing the shots (administered within 28-days of due date) at 8 weeks and 16 weeks. At 12 weeks, the babies received their shots on time. Seventy-one percent (71%) of the mothers experienced anxiety, stress, and loneliness. Because of the pandemic-related restrictions, these mothers expected a negative impact - attending scans without their partners, giving birth alone, or minimal contact with the midwives. Most of the stressed mothers reported feeling nervous, anxious, or on edge. Conclusions Anxiety, pregnancy-related anxiety, and psychosocial stress among pregnant women are common. This is also associated with adverse birth outcomes, such as premature birth, low birth weight, and associated clinical complications. However, despite maternal stress and anxiety, it did not translate into adverse birth outcomes during the COVID-19. Across the UK and Europe, studies report regional variations and impacts in this perspective. While a similar study assessing women's pregnancy experience during the pandemic conducted in Wales was lacking, the researchers also write that combining the results of such a study with national data on objective measures of neonatal and obstetric outcomes was also not examined so far. This throws an important light on the need for safe face-to-face maternity care and familial support, emphasizing the changes to maternity and neonatal care, as well as the direct impact of COVID-19 in Wales. *Important Notice medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information. As a result of the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, schools throughout the world have closed for extended periods of time. The reopening of schools is being challenged continuously due to the emergence of new variants of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Study: Self-testing and vaccination against COVID-19 to minimize school closure. Image Credit: Halfpoint / Shutterstock.com SARS-CoV-2 in school Outbreaks in schools are difficult to document, as most children infected with SARS-CoV-2 are either asymptomatic or have mild non-specific symptoms. Additionally, despite the lower susceptibility of children to SARS-CoV-2 as compared to adults, viral circulation can occur in the school environment. Taken together, the opening of schools requires the implementation of safety protocols such as the use of masks, social distancing measures, hand hygiene protocols, and regular testing for COVID-19. Although vaccination has been extended to children who are 12 years of age and older in several countries around the world, it is unlikely that the majority of students will be vaccinated by the time school begins this fall. An additional threat to the safety of classrooms in the fall is the highly contagious Delta variant, which has infected an increasing number of younger individuals. A new study published on the pre-print server medRxiv* discusses an agent-based transmission model that considers empirical contact data, as well as field data to determine age-specific differences in susceptibility of infection, contact patterns, and contagiousness to COVID-19. About the study The current study involved a collection of empirical contact data on both primary and secondary schools prior to the pandemic, as well as field data on adherence to screening in schools in France between March 8 and June 7, 2021. All data were collected by having students wear radio-frequency identification (RFID) sensors. Whereas the primary school dataset consisted of 232 students and 10 teachers in October 2009, the secondary school data set consisted of 325 students from 9 different classes in December 2013. Comparatively, field data was acquired from a total of 209,564 students and 18,019 personnel from 94 pre-schools, 427 primary schools, 158 middle schools, and 4 high schools. Next, an agent-based stochastic model was developed that involved age-specific parameters to determine transmissibility, susceptibility, probability of developing symptoms, and the probability of detecting a case based on the symptoms. In their model, children were considered to have a relative susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 of 50%, whereas adolescents had a relative susceptibility of 75% as compared to adults. Subsequently, symptom-based testing and case isolation (ST) were implemented in all protocols. The protocols involved included reactive quarantine of the class (ST+Qc), reactive quarantine of the class level or specialization (ST+Ql), regular testing with adherence (ST+RT%), regular testing with adherence, and reactive quarantine of the class (ST+RT%+Qc). Study findings In the first portion of their study, the researchers assessed how students and teachers interact with each other in both primary and secondary schools. While both types of schools appear to have a strong sense of community in the classrooms, their patterns of interactions vary greatly. As compared to adolescents, children have a larger average number of distinct contacts throughout the day and interact with almost their entire class. In fact, approximately 50% more contacts occur between classes as compared to within classes in primary school, whereas adolescents experience 75% fewer links. However, students in both settings were found to interact more within the class than with individuals from outside the class. The results also showed that regular testing can be an efficient preventive measure when 50% of teachers are vaccinated. Notably, testing in schools during the third wave resulted in heterogeneous participation. In their work, the researchers found testing adherence to be highest in lower-level schools as compared to secondary schools. Furthermore, only about 50% of non-vaccinated individuals were willing to participate in these screening programs. (a) Number of schools participating in the screening initiative during the third wave in France, according to school level (pre-school, primary school, middle school, and high school). (b) Predicted percentage of reduction in the number of cases achieved by each intervention protocol with respect to the basic strategy of the symptom-based testing (ST) in the primary school. Intervention protocols are: symptom-based testing and case isolation, with reactive quarantine of the class (ST+Qc); symptom-based testing and case isolation, with reactive quarantine of the class level (ST+Ql); symptom-based testing and case isolation, coupled with regular testing with a percentage of adherence (ST+RT%), with =10%, 50%, and 75%. For regular testing, different frequencies are shown: one test every two weeks, a weekly test, two tests per week. Error bars correspond to 95% confidence intervals. The empty marker corresponds to the adherence estimated from empirical data recorded in schools of that level (from panel d). (c) As in panel b, for the secondary school. (d) Estimated adherence to screening recorded in the different school levels participating to the screening initiative in the third wave in France. Error bars correspond to 95% confidence intervals. (e) Probability distribution of the simulated final epidemic size in the primary school for selected protocols at the end of the trimester. Regular testing is done with weekly frequency. (f) As in panel e, for the secondary school. The case reduction would rise to about 30% and 70% in the two schools, respectively, by either increasing adherence to 75%, or by keeping the same participation (50%) but increasing the frequency of tests (twice a week). Regular testing also helps in reducing the number of days that students are absent from school by 30 to 50 times more as compared to symptom-based testing. An increase in vaccination among adolescents also acts as a strong protective factor against outbreaks in school. Moreover, preliminary data indicates an imperfect effectiveness of the vaccine in preventing infection and transmission due to the Delta variant [28], reinforcing the relevance of regular screening. (a) Predicted percentage of reduction in the number of cases achieved by selected protocols as a function of the vaccination coverage in teachers in the secondary school. The case reduction is computed relative to the basic strategy (symptom-based testing, ST). (b) Predicted percentage of reduction in the number of cases achieved by intervention protocols as a function of the median epidemic size in the secondary school. The case reduction is computed relative to the basic strategy (symptom-based testing, ST). Dots of the same protocol for different vaccination coverage are clustered together. (c) Predicted increase in student-days lost for selected protocols as a function of the vaccination coverage in teachers in the secondary school. The increase in days lost is computed relative to the basic strategy (symptom-based testing, ST). (d) Predicted percentage of reduction in the number of cases achieved by selected protocols as a function of the vaccination coverage in adolescents in the secondary school. The case reduction is computed relative to the basic strategy (symptom-based testing, ST). (e) Predicted total epidemic size at the end of the trimester vs. the vaccination coverage in adolescents in the secondary school in selected protocols. (f) Predicted increase in student-days lost for selected protocols as a function of the vaccination coverage in adolescents in the secondary school. The increase in days lost is computed relative to the basic strategy (symptom-based testing, ST). The 50% and 70% data points are not shown as the median student-days lost for ST is equal to zero (the likelihood of generating a clinical infection among the pupils - recognizable on the basis of the symptoms - becomes low with increasing vaccination coverage). In all panels, the empty markers and bars correspond to the adherence estimated from empirical data recorded in schools of that level. Study limitations Although the current study is quite effective in establishing the importance of regular testing in various school environments, it has certain limitations. First, this study focuses on contact data of two school settings, but contacts in other schools might be different. Second contacts only inside the school premises during the school hours were considered, whereas socializing activities outside the school premises were not considered. Third, the study only focuses on the school outbreaks and does not consider the impact the strategies would have on the community. *Important notice medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information. John Nolan served in the U.S. Army and Marines and later worked in law enforcement and as a correctional officer. A career spent dealing with traumatic events led to post-traumatic stress disorder and insomnia. He felt like his life was spinning out of control. Nolan was greatly helped by telepsychiatry services in his town, 125 miles from Little Rock, Ark. He was invited to chair the community advisory board for the largest trial of telepsychiatry to date. The five-year study, published Aug. 25 in JAMA Psychiatry, found that telepsychiatry in rural, federally qualified health centers was a resounding success for patients who had screened positive for bipolar disorder and/or PTSD. The trial was called The Study to Promote Innovation in Rural Integrated Telepsychiatry (SPIRIT). It was designed to identify the best approach to delivering tele-mental health services to rural primary-care clinics. The results of our trial showed that if you give access to high-quality care for patients who are underserved, they improve their quality of life." Dr. John Fortney, lead researcher, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine The 1,004 participants were enrolled from 24 federally qualified health centers in Washington, Arkansas and Michigan. Without telepsychiatry, most of these patients would likely not receive help from a mental health specialist for these complex psychiatric disorders, the researchers said. In fact, only one-third of individuals with bipolar disorder and PTSD receive specialty mental health care in a year, the researchers wrote. They said in primary care settings, only 10% of patients with these disorders receive adequate care. Nolan had originally enrolled in the study that led to this trial called Telemedicine for Outreach for PTSD at the Department of Veterans Affairs in Little Rock, also overseen by Fortney. "It made a huge difference in my life," he said. As the SPIRIT trial wound down, Nolan said he could hear the hope and relief in the voices of participants who shared their stories in a video documentary. SPIRIT trial The trial compared two interactive video approaches to integrate remote specialty mental health services in participating clinics. Tele-referral services involved one-on-one visits with a psychiatrist or licensed clinical psychologist. Tele-collaborative services involved a telepsychiatrist and care manager supporting visits with a primary care provider. This collaborative model, pioneered at the UW School of Medicine, allows a psychiatrist to manage more patients than the traditional referral model. After patients completed the baseline survey, they were randomized to either get tele-referral care or tele-collaborative care. The clinics partnered with the state medical schools to provide the telepsychiatry and telepsychology services. While many federally qualified health centers provide mental health care, only about 10% of staff are psychiatrists or licensed clinical psychologists, Fortney said. By providing care from the states' medical schools, they minimized patients' travel burdens. And the potential stigma of a mental health care visit was averted by having the medical school providers credentialed to practice at the health center, giving the appearance of a regular healthcare visit. Results of trial Patients in both groups reported substantially and statistically significant improvements in perceived access to care, decreases in their mental health symptoms and medication side effects, and improvements in their quality of life. There was no difference between the groups, and there were no differences in outcomes regarding age, gender, race or ethnicity. "One of the major contributions of this study is what we knew to be effective for depression and anxiety we now know also achieves good outcomes for patients with PTSD and bipolar disorder," said Dr. Paul Pfeiffer, associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Michigan Medical School. Pfeiffer led the Michigan-based study activities. The trial results come as the COVID-19 pandemic has enabled providers and patients alike to experience virtual care and to see the benefits for themselves, paving the way for wider adoption of telepsychiatry. Dr. Jurgen Unutzer, chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Washington School of Medicine, said both the timing and impact of this trial are really important. "We're at a time now where almost everybody has sort of come to realize what a huge burden untreated mental illness and addiction problems have been," he said. While there is still a critical workforce shortage of psychiatrists, psychologists, clinical social workers and counselors, Unutzer said, this trial shows how to distribute the available workforce a little bit more effectively. This trial was funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, which was launched as a part of the Affordable Care Act to compare two real-world treatments regarding outcomes that matter most to patients. Wake Forest School of Medicine and the American Federation for Aging Research (AFAR) have received a renewal award for up to $5 million over five years from the National Institute on Aging (NIA), National Institutes of Health, to continue their management of the Research Centers Collaborative Network (RCCN). The RCCN brings together scientists from six NIA center programs focused on addressing a wide range of issues affecting older adults. Established in 2018 through a $2.5 million award over three years from NIA, the RCCN aims to spur multidisciplinary efforts in aging research across the NIA centers through five complementary strategies: conferences, pilot programs, early career faculty education, web-based resource identification tools, and fundraising/proposal development. The six NIA centers under the Research Centers Collaborative Network are: Alzheimer's Disease Research Centers Centers on the Demography and Economics of Aging Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Centers Nathan Shock Centers of Excellence in the Basic Biology of Aging Resource Centers for Minority Aging Research Roybal Centers for Translational Research on Aging These six Centers encompass and engage more than 90 individual centers throughout the United States. The RCCN is led by Wake Forest School of Medicine and AFAR. Stephen B. Kritchevsky, PhD, co-director of the Sticht Center for Healthy Aging and Alzheimer's Prevention at the Wake Forest School of Medicine and principal investigator of the Wake Forest Older Americans Independence Center, will continue to serve as multiple-principal investigator together with Stephanie Lederman EdM,AFAR's Executive Director. AFAR manages two other NIA-funded initiatives, the Clinician-Scientist Transdisciplinary Aging Research (Clin-STAR) Coordinating Center and Nathan Shock Centers of Excellence Coordinating Center. We are ideally positioned to continue to provide strong support for the RCCN mission through this renewal award and are excited to continue our collaboration with the NIA and Wake Forest to support the RCCN." Stephanie Lederman, AFAR Executive Director Wake Forest is primarily responsible for the network's scientific endeavors and outreach to the aging research community, while AFAR is primarily responsible for the administrative functioning of the network, including communications, planning workshops and webinarsand grants. "In its first three years, the RCCN has encouraged in-depth conversations and interconnected collaborations in aging research, and has funded 7 projects to advance science at the intersection between disciplines" notes Stephen B. Kritchevsky, Co-PI of the RCCN Coordinating Center. "Through this renewal award, the RCCN is poised to help expand discussions across disciplines and further engage the leadership of the NIA Centers." With the renewal award, the RCCN will expand the scope of the workshops and pilot award programs, enhance its early career programs and will develop a new RCCN scholars program to provide on-going support for early career investigators. In addition, the RCCN will initiate a new process to build tools and support the development of standards and guidelines to promote cross-disciplinary research and expand its collaboration with the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) program to develop, promote and evaluate a strategy to increase the recruitment of older adults into clinical research. "Improvements in healthspan and healthcare for older adults can come from interdisciplinary research, and the RCCN exemplifies the power of cross-disciplinary exchange," notes Basil Eldadah, MD, PhD, Supervisory Medical Officer of the Division of Geriatrics and Clinical Gerontology (DGCG) at the NIA. "NIA looks forward to the continued and expanded work of the Research Centers Collaborative Network in support of our mission, which is to conduct genetic, biological, clinical, behavioral, social, and economic research on aging; foster the development of research and clinician scientists in aging; provide research resources, and disseminate information about aging and advances in research to the public, health care professionals, and the scientific community, among a variety of audiences. Children across the nation are heading back to school, a time of year that can bring a variety of emotions from excitement to anxiety. However, this school year has an extra layer of uncertainty amid the continuing COVID-19 pandemic, so it's important to take precautions to fight the spread of the disease in the classroom particularly as the highly contagious delta variant is circulating. Johns Hopkins Children's Center (JHCC) experts recommend the following: Children 12 years and older should get a COVID-19 vaccine. Students should wear a mask with at least two layers of tightly woven fabric. Masks should fit well, covering the nose and mouth. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend masking for all students in grades K-12, even those who are fully vaccinated. Getting the COVID-19 vaccine and wearing a face mask are the two most important strategies to decrease the spread of COVID-19 in schools and to keep children safely learning in person. Mask-wearing also can prevent the spread of other viruses that might cause them to miss school." Kate Connor, M.D., M.S.P.H., JHCC pediatrician, assistant professor of pediatrics, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Connor recommends that p arents check with their child's school as to its mandatory COVID-19 safety precautions. However, she strongly encourages parents to send their children to school masked, even if it's not required. Along with ensuring children are physically protected against COVID-19, parents may have to deal with some pandemic-related stress and not just the usual back-to-school jitters. JHCC experts suggest calmly talking with children about what to expect when they return and pointing out the precautions that will be in place to keep them safe. The experts also recommend parents monitor how their children are doing emotionally by asking simple questions such as "How are you feeling about going back to school?" "Like most big changes in routine, going back to school in person could take some adjustment time for children," says JHCC child psychologist Andrea Young, Ph.D. , assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. "So, if the kids seem a little overwhelmed or more reserved than usual, check in with them about their thoughts and feelings." Young adds that if parents notice any worsening or persistent irritability, anxiety or sadness, they should consult their child's pediatrician or a mental health expert. "It's also important for parents to be aware of their own anxiety about the return to school, so they don't transfer it to their children," she says. To ease the transition into the school year, Connor and Young recommend gradually shifting children's bedtimes back 10 minutes earlier each night in the week before school starts. In this way, they will be well rested and able to rise earlier. Finally, the JHCC experts say parents should check with their child's pediatrician to ensure routine vaccinations including those required to attend class are up to date and annual checkups have been completed before school starts. "The past 1-1/2 years of the pandemic have brought a wave of emotions for parents and children alike," Connor says. "Returning to in-person schooling is much needed for the health, education and overall well-being of students, so we have to prepare them as much as possible to have a safe return to the classroom." Scientists believe the most important tool to contain the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is rapid vaccination. The pandemic has been caused by the rapid transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Numerous studies have been conducted to assess the effectiveness of existing COVID-19 vaccines in the general population. Some of these studies have reported the high effectiveness of the BNT162b2 vaccine developed by Pfizer-BioNTech and the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccine by Oxford-AstraZeneca, against the Alpha (B.1.1.7) and preceding variants. Owing to mutations, there has been a continuous emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants, which have threatened the effectiveness of the vaccines. In vitro studies have indicated a reduced neutralization activity of vaccine-induced antibodies against some of the SARS-CoV-2 variants, e.g., Delta variant (B.1.617.2). This variant has caused a surge in the number of COVID-19 cases in many countries across the world, including those with high vaccination coverage, such as the UK. Due to the high infectiousness of the Delta variant, it has been classified as a Variant of Concern (VoC). Vaccine Effectiveness and the Delta Variant Scientists have pointed out the scarcity of real-time evidence on the effectiveness of the available vaccines against the Delta variant. A recent study that used data from the English symptomatic testing program revealed that the efficacy of a single dose of BNT162b2 or ChAdOx1 vaccine was much lower against symptomatic infection with the Delta variant than the Alpha variant. However, both the vaccines were found to be effective against the Delta variant, with a minor reduction in efficacy, after completion of the two-dose regime. Another study conducted in Scotland indicated reduced effectiveness of vaccines against the Delta variant, even after administering two doses of the vaccines. This study also showed the high efficacy of the vaccines against the Alpha variant. The impact of vaccination on hospital admission was not reported. A New Study Now, a new study published on the medRxiv* preprint server focused on determining the effectiveness of the BNT162b2, ChAdOx1, and mRNA-1273 vaccines by conducting SARS-CoV-2 PCR-positive tests. This study used an extensive community-based survey (Office for National Statistics COVID-19 Infection Survey) of individuals living in randomly selected private households across the UK. Irrespective of symptoms, vaccination, and prior infections, RT-PCR tests were conducted in these households on a pre-determined schedule. Researchers determined the effectiveness of the vaccines based on overall RT-PCR positivity, self-reported symptoms, and the cycle threshold (Ct) value that indicated the viral load. This study was conducted in two phases, and the first phase was between 1 December 2020 (commencement of vaccination program) and 16 May 2021, during which period the Alpha variant was dominant. The second phase was from 17 May 2021 to 1 August 2021, when the Delta variant was dominant. Researchers also determined the variation in vaccine effectiveness by long-term health conditions among two age groups, i.e., 18-34 years and 35-65 years. Also, vaccine efficacy was assessed based on the interval between first and second vaccination and prior infection. Finally, the viral burden, using Ct values, was assessed among newly infected individuals who became PCR-positive after 14 days of receiving the second vaccine dose. Main Findings This study reported that the effectiveness of the BNT162b2 and ChAd0x1 vaccines against the Delta variant was reduced compared to other SARS-CoV-2 variants, such as the Alpha strain. Researchers found that a single dose of the mRNA-1273 vaccine had similar or better effectiveness than a single dose of the BNT162b2 or ChAdOx1 vaccine. The effectiveness of two doses was comparable to the immune protection triggered after natural SARS-CoV-2 infection. The degree of immune responses induced by the BNT162b2 and ChAdOx1 vaccines differed significantly. Both the vaccines were found to be highly effective against the new PCR positives, but a decline in protection was observed when the viral load was high, especially, in the case of the BNT162b2 vaccine. (A) Protection against all new PCR-positive episodes, those with Ct<30, or with self-reported symptoms in those 18-64 years in the Delta-dominant period (B) Protection against all new PCR-positive episodes in those 18+ years in both the Alpha- and Delta-dominant period. In the context of vaccine effectiveness with varied dose intervals, researchers found no significant variation in vaccine effectiveness. However, COVID-19 convalescent individuals who were vaccinated were found to possess greater immune protection compared to vaccinated individuals without a history of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Surprisingly, individuals who completed the two doses of vaccine regime and were infected with the Delta variant exhibited a viral load comparable to those who were not vaccinated and were infected with this strain. Conclusion The main strength of this study is its sample size and design. Additionally, researchers accounted for the risk factors that influence vaccination. Some of the factors considered in this study are commonly documented in electronic health records, e.g., the long-term health conditions of a patient. However, most of the studies solely rely on the data available in the electronic databases, which may miss small intrinsic details. The current study incorporated data beyond what is available in these databases. One of the limitations of this study is that even though it has included numerous potential confounders, it might have excluded unknown confounders or misclassified a prior infection status. This might bring about a biased result. The authors of this study stated that even though SARS-CoV-2 vaccination reduces new infections, the effectiveness in lowering the viral load against the Delta strain was found to be reduced. *Important Notice medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information. As classes get underway this week and next, Montana school and county health officials are grappling with how a new state law that bans vaccine discrimination should apply to quarantine orders for students and staffers exposed to covid-19. It's the latest fallout from the law that says businesses and governmental entities can't treat people differently based on vaccination status. The law makes Montana the only state that prohibits both public and private employers including hospitals from requiring workers to get vaccinated against covid. Some state and county officials also interpret the law to mean that unvaccinated people can't be ordered to quarantine over a covid exposure unless vaccinated people are, too. That interpretation goes against the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's recommendations for only unvaccinated people to quarantine in the event of a covid exposure. The state law worries school officials who had planned to lean on the CDC guidelines to keep closures and disruptions to a minimum this fall after last school year's fluctuating in-person, remote and hybrid classes. Micah Hill, superintendent of Kalispell Public Schools, said he received guidance from Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte's office that confirmed the law means quarantine protocols must be the same for the vaccinated and unvaccinated alike. Hill described that interpretation as a "game changer" for schools as the highly transmissible delta variant of the virus races through the state. Kalispell's Flathead County has among the highest number of active covid cases with just 41% of the eligible population fully vaccinated. Only 1 in 4 children eligible for a covid vaccine are vaccinated, according to county health officials. Hill estimates about two-thirds of his staff are vaccinated. "If everybody is getting quarantined with a more contagious variant, you could see a lot of people out of school, staff and students, and [that] really threatens the ability of schools to stay open," Hill said. As a result of the law, some Montana county health and school officials have decided to drop quarantine orders. Instead, they are making quarantining an option for exposed students. But at least one county has decided to defy the law. The Missoula City-County Board of Health unanimously voted this week for a policy requiring the unvaccinated to quarantine, but not the vaccinated. The board held the vote after being advised by a representative from the county attorney's office that the policy could lead to a lawsuit. The stance by Missoula health officials is the latest in a string of defiant acts by schools and local governments against state laws and policies that ban covid-prevention measures. In Florida, for example, a handful of counties have said they will require students to wear masks despite Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis' ban on mask mandates. In Texas, some school districts have defied a similar executive order by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, while one county has sued the governor to overturn the order. Anna Conley, Missoula's chief civil deputy county attorney, said that although she can't promise the county will be successful in court, the county might have a good argument to overturn the state law if it winds up being litigated. The law may conflict with other state health laws that require health boards and health officers to prevent the spread of infectious diseases, she said. Montana legislators passed House Bill 702 this spring amid a backlash against covid-prevention protocols such as a mask mandate under former Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock, and after a Great Falls hospital announced plans to require its employees to get vaccinated against covid. "Your health care decisions are private; they are protected by the constitution of the state of Montana," said bill sponsor state Rep. Jennifer Carlson (R-Manhattan) during the legislative session. "Your privacy is protected, and your religious rights are protected." Brooke Stroyke, a spokesperson for Gianforte, said it's up to county officials to interpret how HB 702 affects quarantine orders in schools. However, an adviser in the governor's office has instructed districts that the law presents an all-or-none option for county health departments when it comes to quarantine orders. "HB 702 would allow for quarantine protocols as long as they are applied to everyone equally and are not based on COVID vaccination status," Gianforte education and workforce policy adviser Dylan Klapmeier wrote in an email. Lance Melton, CEO of the Montana School Boards Association, said that interpretation erases the advantage vaccines could provide in schools, where vaccinated teachers and students 12 and older would not have to quarantine following an exposure under CDC guidance. Aside from Missoula, many county health departments are still deciding what to do. Gallatin and Lewis and Clark counties both say they will drop quarantine orders, making it optional for people to follow CDC guidance. Flathead County is leaning toward the same approach. Flathead County Health Officer Joe Russell said that would allow vaccinated students, teachers and county residents to return to school and work as long as they aren't showing covid symptoms. Russell said the county can still order covid-positive people to isolate. "I don't think it's fair to punish someone that's fully vaccinated and tell them that they have to stay home for eight to 10 days. How fair is that?" Russell said. That means relying on unvaccinated people to do the right thing and stay home after they've been identified as a close contact. The prospect terrifies Rebecca Miller, who has two children in the Bigfork School District in Flathead County, where masks won't be required in schools. Miller doesn't think parents who are desperate to keep their kids in school so they can keep working will follow the Flathead City-County Health Department's advice. "Yeah, I think they're going to send them to school," she said. This story is part of a partnership that includes Montana Public Radio, NPR and KHN. It is well known that dementia is associated with increased mortality. New scientific research shows how in recent years more deaths are being registered with dementia as the underlying cause of death. The growth in the rate of dementia related deaths may be connected to an increased awareness about dementia as a fatal disease. Over the past 20 years an increasing number of deaths have been registered with dementia as the underlying cause of death. That is the main conclusion of a new study published in Journal of Alzheimer's Disease from Danish Dementia Research Centre (DDRC), who investigated how the causes of death has changed over time in people with diagnosed dementia as compared to the general elderly population. It calls for more attention to the fact, that dementia in its essence is a life-threatening disease, says chair of DDRC professor Gunhild Waldemar. "We believe that this increase in the registration of dementia as a cause of death may reflect a positive change in diagnostic rates and in perceiving dementia not only as a disease that contributes to mortality but as a disease that is actually fatal". She adds that even though there is an increase in registration, dementia is probably still underreported as a cause of death in people with a dementia disorder. Dementia as leading cause of death The new population-based study is the first to investigate time trends of causes of death in people diagnosed with dementia. Data were based from the national registry data from the entire Danish population aged 65 years and above who died within the years 2002-2015. During the study period 621826 people died of whom 103785 were diagnosed with dementia prior to death, and dementia became the most leading cause of death in people diagnosed with dementia. During the latter part of the period dementia appeared more frequently as the "underlying cause" rather than the "contributing cause" on the death certificates. Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has been documented in several mammalian species besides humans, including cats, dogs, and mink. A form of the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) receptor that is responsible for interaction with the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein prior to host-cell entry is present in a wide variety of animals, and it is the affinity between the spike protein and this receptor that determines the risk of infection upon viral challenge. For example, mice are inefficiently infected with human SARS-CoV-2 unless firstly humanized and made to express the human ACE2 receptor, or alternatively, SARS-CoV-2 is made to adapt to murine ACE2 by serial passage. The COVID-19 outbreak reported amongst farmed minks in the Netherlands and several other counties during 2020 was seen to be a result of human to mink transmission, and once adapted to the population, mink-SARS-CoV-2 was noted to bear several mutations that enhance affinity towards the mink ACE2 receptor, namely Y453F or N501T to the spike protein. Subsequently, farmworkers and those living in the local community were reported to be infected with SARS-CoV-2 bearing the Y453F mutation, raising concerns related to the development of novel variants of concern that may escape immunity induced by vaccination or past exposure. In a paper recently uploaded to the preprint server bioRxiv* by the cause of SARS-CoV-2 mutations observed in mink and ferrets is investigated, and the danger posed by such mutations to humans assessed. Ferrets are closely related to mink and have been extensively utilized in SARS-CoV-2 experiments regarding infection and transmission owing to their susceptibility and similarity to humans. Several studies have reported the same Y453F or N501T mutations to the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein as seen in infected mink. The mink and ferret ACE2 receptors are almost identical, potentially explaining why these mutations to the virus are common, though interestingly, these mutations have also been associated with an enhanced affinity towards the human ACE2 receptor. The very similar N501Y mutation to the spike protein known to have developed in human SARS-CoV-2 during the pandemic also enhances affinity towards ACE2. Thus these mutations may instead non-specifically increase affinity towards a wide variety of mammalian ACE2 receptors. Consistent spike mutations in ferrets The group firstly demonstrated that the Y453F or N501T mutations develop in ferrets by inoculation with wildtype SARS-CoV-2, where N501T with Y453F is a minor variant were seen to appear just two days post-infection, with both mutations becoming equal in number by day 5. In initially uninfected ferrets that came into contact with the infected, transmitted virus population included a mixture of Y453F with a smaller proportion bearing the N501T mutation, also evening out after several days. Viral load in Y453F ferrets was found to be higher than in those infected with wildtype SARS-CoV-2 two days post-infection. However, titers between the groups were equal by day five as the initially wildtype virus had since adopted these mutations. The Y453F mutation was maintained amongst those ferrets inoculated with this strain throughout the course of the experiment. The group noted the development of several other mutations, including D614N to the spike protein, again very similar to the D614G mutation seen to have occurred in humans that is thought to enhance transmission by encouraging the adoption of a more frequently open spike protein state. Ferret SARS-CoV-2 affinity towards ACE2 A library of mutated spike proteins was generated by the group to create lentivirus-based pseudovirus constructs, allowing the ability of the particles to gain cell entry using human, ferret, or rat ACE2 to be assessed. The group found that Y453F, N501T or F486L mutations enhanced the affinity of the spike protein towards both ferret and human ACE2, but not rat ACE2. Upon closely examining the structure of the spike protein receptor-binding domain and ACE2 interface, the group note that these mutations are mainly located around regions of the ACE2 receptor that differ between humans and ferrets. Primary human bronchial cells were then infected with either wildtype or SARS-CoV-2 bearing the Y453F mutation. In this case, the group note that wildtype virus significantly outcompeted the mutated version, with less than 5% of virus 48 hours post-infection still bearing the mutation. Incorporation of other mutations such as D614G, both of which are present in the mink-to-human SARS-CoV-2 strain recorded in the Netherlands in 2020, also did not induce greater viral loads in human cells, again being outcompeted by wildtype in mixed inoculation. Ferret SARS-CoV-2 escape mutants To investigate whether mutations adopted in mink hosts better facilitate escape from neutralizing antibodies induced by past infection in humans convalescent sera collected from individuals infected with wildtype SARS-CoV-2 was collected and applied to the virus bearing the Y453F mutation. The group found that the Y453F virus was, in fact, more easily neutralized than wildtype, only requiring around 60% as much sera for the same 50% rate of neutralization. Against sera collected from individuals having received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, the difference was less notable, however, with 7 of the 10 sera collected being slightly better at neutralizing the Y453F virus than wildtype. Finally, the group demonstrated that mutations present in many of the currently circulating variants of concern could also enhance affinity to ferret ACE2, as well as human ACE2. Variants of concern investigated include alpha (B.1.1.7), iota (B.1.525), and beta (B.1.351), which each bear mutations such as L452R, E484K and N501Y. Each of these strains showed significantly greater affinity towards ferret ACE2 than wildtype SARS-CoV-2 pseudovirus, as observed towards human ACE2, while the gamma (P.1) variant, which instead bears the K417N/T mutation, showed a reduction in affinity towards ferret ACE2 compared to human ACE2. In conclusion, this study has demonstrated that ferrets may be a poor model for representing COVID-19 in humans. The ferret ACE2 receptor is not well utilized by human SARS-CoV-2 without mutations that enhance affinity. Therefore, any adaptations that enhance transmissibility in either species may not apply to the other. However, mutations that alter regions other than the receptor-binding domain (RBD), which interacts with ACE2, may still be applicable. *Important notice bioRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information. New insights into how the human body develops from one cell into trillions, and the genetic mutations that cells pick up along the way, have been generated by two studies from scientists at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, the University of Cambridge and their collaborators. The studies, published today (25 August 2021) in Nature, are the first to analyze somatic mutation in normal tissues across multiple organs within and between individuals. Researchers were able to retrace human development, including in a 78-year old individual, all the way back to the first cell division, as well as confirm that the mutation rate in the germline cells is much lower than in the other tissues of the body. This fundamental knowledge will help to establish baselines for human development and how we acquire mutations throughout life, in both the cells of our body and the genetic code that is passed on to the next generation. Knowing what normal development and ageing looks like will in turn help to better understand the onset of disease. In recent years, technological and experimental advances have allowed researchers to study somatic mutation in healthy tissue. This has been achieved by taking micro-biopsies of just a few hundred cells, which are then genome sequenced to an incredibly high degree of accuracy. From the very first cell division, an individuals cells experience damage to their genome. Most of this damage is repaired by the cell, but some changes to the letters of DNA, known as somatic mutations, persist. Through cell division, these mutations are then passed on to the next generation of cells by progenitor cells. When two cells share the same mutations, this implies a shared ancestry and these markers can be used to trace development back through time. The genetic code that is passed on via sperm and egg cells during reproduction, known as the germline, has long been thought to be protected from the mutational processes that occur in the rest of the body as we age. This helps to ensure that individuals start life with a genome that is intact, or free from the mutations acquired by the parents during their lives. For these studies, samples of normal tissue from three adult individuals were supplied by researchers at the MRC Cancer Unit, University of Cambridge and a commercial provider. Researchers at the Wellcome Sanger Institute used laser microdissection to cut out tiny biopsies of just a few hundred cells, covering a wide range of tissues from each donor. These biopsies were then whole genome sequenced so that somatic mutations within and between individuals could be compared. In one study, researchers created a family tree of cell lineages for each individual stretching all the way back to the fertilized egg of each person. By analyzing genomes from the different tissues they could use mutations shared by cells to trace how the tissues of the body had formed from a single cell. This analysis revealed significant variation between individuals in which cells went on to form particular tissues. For example, the two progenitor cells created by the division of the fertilized egg cell contributed relatively equally to the body of one individual, but in another donor 93 per cent of their cells were descended from just one of the original progenitors. Dr Tim Coorens, a first author of the studies from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, said: By examining the history of each cell, weve been able to retrace the development of a 78-year-old person all the way back to the first cell division. It was surprising to find how much variation there was in human development between individuals, and especially between tissues in the same person. Its not as straightforward as the same set of cells contributing to the heart or kidneys, say, in every person. What our study makes clear is that human embryology is not set in stone. In the other study, scientists analyzed the genomic data to compare the mutational landscape in 29 different tissues. Researchers at Newcastle University supplied samples from a further 11 men, from which a further 162 micro-biopsies were taken to explore germline mutation in greater detail. Such analysis is able to detect patterns of mutation, known as mutational signatures, that can be attributed to particular biological processes or substances the body is exposed to that alter the genome, such as alcohol or tobacco. The team found ubiquitous mutational signatures across all of the tissues studied, including two that result from the normal functioning of human cells, called SBS1 and SBS5. Other signatures were specific to certain tissues, such as SBS18, which may be indicative of oxidative damage. There was substantial variability in the mutational landscape between tissues in the same individual. Notably, the mutation rate for spermatogonia immature sperm cells derived from stem cells in the testes was found to be much lower than for other cells in the body. Dr Raheleh Rahbari, a senior author of the studies from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, said: This study advances our understanding of the diversity of mutation rates and processes within the human body. It has long been suspected that the germline acquires fewer mutations than other cells, in order to preserve the genome that will be passed on to the next generation. Here we reveal for the first time that low germline mutation rate is not the result of selection of sperm with fewer mutations during conception or development, but is a global feature of the male germline compared to other cells. But what is not clear is how spermatogonia, which must divide to create vast numbers of sperm cells, maintain such a low mutation rate. The studies will help to establish baselines of normal development and how we acquire mutations throughout life. Exploring the human body via the mutations cells acquire as we age is as close as we can get to studying human biology in vivo. Our life history can be found in the history of our cells, but these studies show that this history is more complex than we might have assumed. Dr Luiza Moore, First Study Author, Wellcome Sanger Institute Professor Sir Mike Stratton, a senior author of the studies and Director of the Wellcome Sanger Institute, said: These studies explore the landscape of mutations that normally occur during the course of life in every cell of the human body, providing new insights into human development and important differences between cell types. Early in the tumultuous 2020-21 school year, Missouri officials made a big gamble: set aside roughly 1 million rapid covid tests for the state's K-12 schools in hopes of quickly identifying sick students or staff members. The Trump administration had spent $760 million to procure 150 million rapid-response antigen tests from Abbott Laboratories, including 1.75 million allotted for Missouri, telling states to use them as they saw fit. Nearly 400 Missouri charter, private and public school districts applied. Given supply constraints, each was offered one test per person, according to interviews with school officials and documents KHN obtained in response to a public records request. What began as an ambitious plan landed with a thud. Few of the tests were used; according to state data updated in early June, schools reported using just 32,300. Missouri's effort provides a window into the complexities of covid testing at K-12 schools, even before the highly transmissible delta variant surged through. Delta's spread has mired communities in emotional fights about how to safely send children who are mostly unvaccinated back to classrooms, particularly in states like Missouri, bedeviled by a high aversion to mask mandates and low vaccination rates. As classes begin, once again schools must weigh testing and other strategies to limit covid's spread potentially without a deep supply of test kits available. Missouri educators described the testing that began last October as a blessing, for rooting out infected people and giving teachers peace of mind. But its logistical challenges quickly became clear, according to interviews and documents obtained by KHN. Dozens of schools or districts that applied for rapid tests listed just one health care professional to administer them. The rapid tests initially were set to expire after six months, so officials were reluctant to order too many. And some worried the tests would deliver inaccurate results or that on-site testing of someone with covid symptoms might spread infection. "We were nervous" about sick kids being on campus, said Kelly Garrett, executive director of KIPP St. Louis, a charter school with 2,800 students and 300 staffers. Elementary students returned in November. It reserved its 120 tests for "emergency" situations. "Schools that don't have a nurse on-site or any kind of medical staff on-site, it's just not as simple," said Robert Milner, principal of Hope Leadership Academy, a charter school in Kansas City that shipped dozens of tests back to the state. Milner said his school was able to mitigate covid with measures like temperature checks, a mask requirement, physical distancing and even getting rid of air dryers in bathrooms. Plus, "I have other options that I can send my families to" in the community for testing. "We have no plans, nor is it our job, to administer this test to everyone," Lyndel Whittle, a public school superintendent, wrote in one district's application for tests. The district, Iberia R-V, requested 100 rapid tests in its October application, enough to provide one to each staff member. "Were a school, not a healthcare provider," Whittle wrote. 'We weren't shutting down' As the limits of remote learning became clear last year, officials pressed for a return to school. Gov. Mike Parson at one point said children would inevitably contract the virus at school, but "they're going to get over it." Now, even as childhood covid cases rise because of the delta variant, districts nationwide are increasingly under pressure to return to full-time classroom instruction. Testing in K-12 schools generally has been limited, according to experts, despite the huge investment in rapid antigen tests. More recently, the Biden administration distributed $10 billion through the American Rescue Plan Act to increase routine covid screening in schools, including $185 million for Missouri. Missouri is establishing a program for K-12 schools to regularly test people without symptoms, relying on a contract with Ginkgo Bioworks, in which the biotech company provides testing materials, training and staffing. As of mid-August, only 19 institutions had expressed interest, said Lisa Cox, state Department of Health and Senior Services spokesperson. Unlike covid tests that use a polymerase chain reaction technique, which could take days to deliver results, rapid antigen tests return results within minutes. The trade-off: Studies have shown they are less accurate. Still, for Halley Russell, president of the Missouri State Teachers Association and a high school teacher in Jackson, Missouri, it was a relief to have rapid tests and she wished they'd had them sooner. Her district, Jackson R-2, applied in December and began using them in January, months after schools reopened. "The timeline was just hard: We couldn't rapid-test students we thought could have [covid]," she said. "Some of them just quarantined." "Ultimately, I think, there was a level of anxiety the entire time because we were face-to-face, we weren't shutting down," said Russell, whose classroom required masks. "Testing just gives you some control over things you can't control." Allison Dolak, principal of Immanuel Lutheran Church & School in Wentzville, Missouri, said her small parochial school had the means to use rapid covid tests for students and staffers but it took ingenuity. Dolak said applying for tests was a "no-brainer" to help keep their doors open. "There would have been so many kids that had to online-learn had we not had those tests," she said. At times, the suburban St. Louis school had to call on parents who were nurses to administer them. Dolak even performed a few herself in the parking lot. State data as of early June shows the school received 200 tests and used 132. It did not require masking. Many schools indicated they intended to test only staff members, applications obtained by KHN show. Missouri directed schools at first to use Abbott's rapid tests on symptomatic people, which further limited testing. Arguably, some of the reasons limited testing occurred aren't bad in interviews, educators said they curbed infections by screening for symptoms and requiring masks. Currently, Missouri authorizes testing on symptomatic and asymptomatic people. "In the K-12 space, there really has not been that much testing," said Dr. Tina Tan, a professor of pediatrics at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine. "It really has been more that kids have symptoms screened before they've gone to school, and if they become symptomatic then they're tested." At least 64 schools and districts that received tests hadn't administered a single one, according to state dashboard data that schools self-report, as of early June. Others that applied didn't follow through on their orders or decided against administering tests, according to interviews and documents obtained by KHN. One was the Maplewood Richmond Heights district in St. Louis County, which directed people away from schools for testing. "While the antigen test is decent, there were some false negatives," Vince Estrada, director of student services, said by email. "For example, if a student had been exposed to someone with COVID-19, and tested negative with the antigen test at school, we would still require them to get a PCR test." Space for testing and nurse availability were also issues, he added. "Many of our school districts don't have capacity to store the tests, to manage the testing," said Molly Ticknor, executive director of the Show-Me School-Based Health Alliance of Missouri, which focuses on access to health services at school. 'A lot' of tests returned unused Sherry Weldon, administrator of the Livingston County Health Center in northwestern Missouri, said the public health agency ran tests for personnel in county schools, both public and private. "None of the schools want to take that on themselves," she said. "They just were like, oh, God, no." When the school year was over, Weldon, a registered nurse, said she shipped back "a lot" of unused tests, although she has since reordered to offer rapid testing to the public. Cox, the DHSS spokesperson, said as of mid-August the state had recouped 139,000 unused tests from K-12 schools. Recouped tests would be redistributed the shelf life of Abbott's rapid antigen test has been extended to one year but officials aren't tracking how many have been, Cox said. Schools are not required to report expired antigen test quantities to the state. Mallory McGowin, spokesperson for Missouri's Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, said "absolutely there have been tests that have expired." Health officials also sent rapid tests to long-term care facilities, hospitals and jails, among other locations. As of mid-August, the state had distributed 1.5 million of the 1.75 million antigen tests it received from the federal government. After accounting for tests K-12 schools didn't use, the state had shipped them 131,800 tests as of Aug. 17. "It quickly became clear," Cox said, "the tests we had pushed out were not being fully utilized." When asked whether schools were equipped to handle testing, McGowin said having such resources was a "real opportunity" but also "a real challenge." But "at the local level, there's only so many people," she said, "to help with covid protocols." School covid testing could "make a big difference," said Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, chief of Stanford University's pediatric infectious diseases division. However, the more important strategies to limit spread are masking, increased ventilation and getting more people vaccinated. "Testing is more icing on the cake," she said. Abbey Road on the River begins tomorrow. Do you plan to attend? Daniel Suddeath is the editor of the News and Tribune. He can be reached at 812-206-2130, or by email at daniel.suddeath@newsandtribune.com. Goldsboro, NC (27530) Today Cloudy early with some clearing expected late. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 67F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Cloudy early with some clearing expected late. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 67F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. (The Center Square) Approximately 24 students from Cajon Valley Union School District in East County, Californian, are stuck in Kabul, Afghanistan, where an explosion at the airport has been reported. An explosion ripped through a crowd of Afghans trying to enter Kabul airport, where the U.S. military is attempting to evacuate thousands of Americans and Afghans, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday morning. At least three U.S. troops were injured, and an eyewitness says the explosion occurred in the middle of thousands of people. Many were maimed, and an untold number were killed, witnesses said. Western governments have repeatedly warned of an imminent attack by Islamic State and urged their citizens not to approach the airport, the Journal notes. The blast came after several of Americas allies said they were halting evacuation flights from Afghanistan, leaving behind citizens and thousands of Afghans who had been cleared for entry. The children from California stranded in Kabul range in age from preschoolers to high school students. They are with approximately 16 parents. The Taliban has taken Afghanistan, confiscating U.S. weapons and machinery, after the Biden administration withdrew troops. The Californians are "scared" and "trapped, a spokesman for Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said. He and his staff are aware of their location and have been in direct contact with them. Rep. Issa tweeted, At least 24 students from El Cajon are stranded in Afghanistan. Im working diligently to determine the best ways to help those trapped return home safely. I wont stop until we have answers and action. Students and their parents traveled to Afghanistan to see extended family prior to Biden withdrawing troops and the country imploding. A district spokesperson says, the families involved are on special visas for U.S. military service and that the Department of Defense considers them allies. A spokesperson for the Cajon Valley Union School District said when they found themselves stranded, they contacted district officials asking to hold their spots in their schools, prompting the district to make a list of all students known to be in Afghanistan. A district spokesperson said Issas office has been incredibly supportive in the attempt to bring these families home. A Pentagon spokesperson told reporters on Wednesday that it has no information about the California students and parents. Secretary of State Antony Blinken also said on Wednesday that roughly 1,500 Americans are left in Afghanistan. Since Aug. 14, 82,300 people have been evacuated but only 4,500 hold U.S. passports, The Hill reports. Of the U.S. evacuation efforts, Rep. Issa said, If you take the presidents words and add Adam Schiffs, what you get is they planned for every contingency including the one where they leave a lot of Americans behind in Afghanistan. Goldsboro, NC (27530) Today Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 67F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 67F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. What's Included With a Digital Only subscription, you'll receive unlimited access to our website and e-edition. Our digital products are available 24/7 and are accessible anywhere, anytime. If you have any questions or need further assistance, please call our customer service team at 574-583-5121 or email cgrace@thehj.com. (Newser) Like workers in the US, much of China's labor force is reconsidering its options, leaving factories across the country with openings. There are parallels to the situation in the US, with many workers shifting to higher-paying jobs, often in the service industry, and many migrants deciding to just stay home, the Wall Street Journal reports. But China has a unique wrinkle: Part of the cause is the one-child policy, which was in effect until five years ago. The demographics have not turned employers' way; the labor pool is shrinking. "China has long exhausted its demographic dividend," said an economist in Hong Kong. Working against the employers are: story continues below Labor pool demographics . Over the next five years, the government estimates, the workforce is expected to decline by about 35 million. The pool is aging, too. One factory owner said the age of his average employee was about 28 a decade ago and is now at least 35. Overall, the percentage of China's migrant workers 30 or younger has been dropping consistently. . Over the next five years, the government estimates, the workforce is expected to decline by about 35 million. The pool is aging, too. One factory owner said the age of his average employee was about 28 a decade ago and is now at least 35. Overall, the percentage of China's migrant workers 30 or younger has been dropping consistently. The pandemic . Many workers who quit going to factories during the pandemic are still at home, in some cases looking for work close to home because they worry especially about catching the coronavirus in big cities. . Many workers who quit going to factories during the pandemic are still at home, in some cases looking for work close to home because they worry especially about catching the coronavirus in big cities. Changing attitudes . "Young people are no longer willing to take up just any type of hard jobs," the Hong Kong economist said. "They have much higher expectations for what a job can bring, and they can afford to wait longer." A factor owner sees it similarly: "Unlike our generation, young peoples attitudes towards work have changed. They can fall back on their parents and dont have much pressure to make ends meet." . "Young people are no longer willing to take up just any type of hard jobs," the Hong Kong economist said. "They have much higher expectations for what a job can bring, and they can afford to wait longer." A factor owner sees it similarly: "Unlike our generation, young peoples attitudes towards work have changed. They can fall back on their parents and dont have much pressure to make ends meet." Increased demand. Orders have increased for some factories as the delta variant's spread sends more business to China, making the labor shortage felt more acutely. Looking for solutions, factories are investing in technology more, which helps in a couple of ways, per CNBC. It can open up the age range for hiring. "If an older employee can learn, a job in the auto industry today is no longer one that requires a lot of physical strength," an executive said. Women are being hired more often for jobs in construction, transportation, and other heavy-labor fields, per the Journal. "They work hard and have few complaints," a construction boss said. Li Juyuan worked in a factory in another city before returning home and taking a construction job, which pays better. "Far away from home, without much education and skills, I had always felt being looked down upon," she said. (Read more China stories.) (Newser) Among the 1,500 US citizens still in Afghanistan are at least 20 students and as many as 16 parents from a southern California school district. Six families from El Cajon, a San Diego suburb with a large immigrant and refugee population, had taken separate summer trips to Afghanistan to visit grandparents and other relatives, the AP reports. They were all planning to be back for the school year that began August 17, but could not get to the airport after the abrupt Taliban takeover of the country, the Los Angeles Times reports. The kids range in age from preschool to high school, KTLA reports. "Nobody is doing well," says a community liaison for the El Cajon Valley Union School District who has spoken to the families and says children have witnessed violence including shootings at the Kabul airport. "The situation is very horrible." story continues below Originally, 24 students were reported to be stuck, but CNN reports one family has since been able to get back to the US safely. The rest "are scared, stranded and trapped in the Kabul area," says a spokesperson for Rep. Darrell Issa, who is working with the State Department and the Pentagon to help the families. "So far, they've been unable to reach the airport. I know the President and his Press Secretary have previously said this isn't happening, but that's dead wrong. ... We have reason to believe that other California residents are very much in the same situation. This is real." Asked about the situation during a press briefing Wednesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki seemed confused and said she had no information on the incident. Similar stories can be found about other US families, like this one from Philadelphia. Meanwhile: Terror threat: The US embassy in Afghanistan issued what Fox News calls a "startling statement" early Thursday. "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising US citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a US government representative to do so," it reads. "US citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately." The US embassy in Afghanistan issued what Fox News calls a "startling statement" early Thursday. "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising US citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a US government representative to do so," it reads. "US citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately." Australia agrees: Australia also warned its citizens late Wednesday that the threat of a terrorist attack at the Kabul airport is high, Reuters reports. Australia also warned its citizens late Wednesday that the threat of a terrorist attack at the Kabul airport is high, Reuters reports. Who's behind it: CNN explains that a branch of ISIS known as ISIS-Khorasan or ISIS-K, a sworn enemy of the Taliban, is believed to want to create havoc at the airport and has planned attacks on groups waiting for flights out. CNN explains that a branch of ISIS known as ISIS-Khorasan or ISIS-K, a sworn enemy of the Taliban, is believed to want to create havoc at the airport and has planned attacks on groups waiting for flights out. Biden quote of the day: Controversy erupted after President Biden was asked during a Wednesday meeting what would happen if Americans remained in Afghanistan following the August 31 troop withdrawal deadline. The White House cut off Biden's audio feed before he responded, but the reporter confirmed the president told him, "You'll be the first person I call," Fox News reports. Many were outraged at the apparent snark. A Fox News reporter later grilled Psaki about the exchange, and all she said was, "I think what he conveyed is that he has notwell, what I can convey from here, I should say, is that, as he stated yesterday and as the secretary of state just stated, we're on track to complete our mission by August 31st." (Read more Afghanistan stories.) (Newser) The only defendant to admit plotting to kidnap Michigan's governor last year was sentenced to prison on Wednesday. Ty Garbin, 25, was given a prison term of six years, three months in federal court in Grand Rapids, the New York Times reports. Prosecutors said Garbin was driven by anger at the Democratic governor's coronavirus restrictions and cuts to his pay. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer wasn't in the courtroom, but Garbin apologized to her anyway. "I cannot even begin to imagine the amount of stress and fear her family felt because of my actions," he said. "And for that I am truly sorry." Whitmer had filed a victim impact statement in which she said that she still receives threats and that "things will never be the same." story continues below "I have looked out my windows and seen large groups of heavily armed people within 30 yards of my home," the governor said, per the AP. "I have seen myself hung in effigy." Garbin cooperated with investigators, and prosecutors asked the judge to keep that in mind. One of them said Garbin "didn't hold back," adding, "He would come out and say, 'We planned to do this and I was knowingly a part of it.' He sat for hours answering all of our questions." Based on his testimony, federal charges were added to the cases against three other men. Sentencing guidelines called for 14 to 17 years in prison, prosecutors recommended nine, and Garbin's lawyers asked for six, per the Detroit News. In all, there are 14 other defendants, many of them members of a Michigan antigovernment paramilitary group, the Wolverine Watchmen. Six of them will stand trial together in October, while eight who are charged with helping them will be tried in two state courts. Garbin's attorney told the judge that his client "is going to be a star witness" in the other trials. Garbin, an airplane mechanic, had no criminal record before this. He said in his plea agreement that the six defendants had trained for the kidnapping on his property near Luther, Michigan. They built a "shoot house" designed to resemble Whitmer's vacation home and practiced "assaulting it with firearms," Garbin said. (Read more Gretchen Whitmer stories.) (Newser) Insiders say ABC News staffers have been shaken by allegations that a former top producer on Good Morning America sexually assaulted two other producers. In a lawsuit filed in New York on Wednesday, Kirstyn Crawford, a producer for Good Morning America co-host George Stephanopoulos, accuses Michael Corn of assaulting her during a trip to Los Angeles to cover the Academy Awards in 2015, the Guardian reports. She alleges that an intoxicated Corn forcibly touched her during an Uber ride back to their hotel, saying he wanted to help her with her career, and later her grabbed her when she brought Advil to his room as requested. story continues below The lawsuit also alleges that Corn assaulted former ABC News producer Jill McClain on two occasions around a decade ago, including a 2011 incident in London where he allegedly pulled her clothes down and groped her after forcing his way into her hotel room, reports the Wall Street Journal. McClain is not a plaintiff but she is supporting the case. According to the suit, both women filed formal complaints in February this year, triggering an internal investigation. Corn abruptly left the network in April and joined Nexstar Media Group the following month. The lawsuit also names ABC as a defendant, saying officials learned of the allegations in 2017 but did not investigate them at the time. Sources tell CNN that the lawsuit has jolted staffers at all levels of ABC News. "There is a lot of anger and confusion and people wanting to understand what happened," one insider says. Corn issued a statement saying the allegations from both women are fabrications and he will be defending himself "vigorously," the Journal reports. ABC News says it "disputes the claims made against it and will address this matter in court." (Read more Good Morning America stories.) (Newser) Executive producer Mike Richards resigned as permanent host of Jeopardy! last week, after only a day of filming, over newly resurfaced comments about women and Jews, leaving Mayim Bialik, selected as permanent host for prime-time specials, in the role of interim host. But as EJ Dickson writes at Rolling Stone, Bialik "has a few scandals of her own," having "spent the past decade espousing toxic, false, and, in many cases, highly dangerous views about gender, sexuality, health, and science." Some are even calling for her resignation, per Kotaku. story continues below On C-sections: "There are those among us who believe that if the baby can't survive a home labor, it is OK for it to pass peacefully," Bialik said in a 2010 interview with SELF. "I do not subscribe to this, but I know that some feel that if a baby cannot make it through birth, it is not favored evolutionarily." "There are those among us who believe that if the baby can't survive a home labor, it is OK for it to pass peacefully," Bialik said in a 2010 interview with SELF. "I do not subscribe to this, but I know that some feel that if a baby cannot make it through birth, it is not favored evolutionarily." On avoiding sexual assault: Bialik wrote that she avoided assaults by predators like Harvey Weinstein because she dressed modestly and did not "act flirtatiously with men," in a 2017 New York Times op-ed. "Nothingabsolutely nothingexcuses men for assaulting or abusing women. But we can't be naive about the culture we live in," she added. She later apologized, saying "you are never responsible for being assaulted." Bialik wrote that she avoided assaults by predators like Harvey Weinstein because she dressed modestly and did not "act flirtatiously with men," in a 2017 New York Times op-ed. "Nothingabsolutely nothingexcuses men for assaulting or abusing women. But we can't be naive about the culture we live in," she added. She later apologized, saying "you are never responsible for being assaulted." On hormonal birth control: In March, Bialik suggested hormonal birth control was linked to mental illness. "Many women experience staggering depression, emotional-ability, and something I'm concerned about is the stereotyping of women and their moods and even about PMS may actually be reflecting the hormonal manipulation of our systems," she said, per Rolling Stone. On brain supplements: "Neuriva Plus is backed by strong scienceyes, I checked it myselfand it combines two clinically tested ingredients that help support six key indicators of brain health," Bialik says in an ad for the product touted as a brain-boosting supplement, which is also backed by Alex Jones. A 2020 Psychology Today article describes it as "snake oil." "Neuriva Plus is backed by strong scienceyes, I checked it myselfand it combines two clinically tested ingredients that help support six key indicators of brain health," Bialik says in an ad for the product touted as a brain-boosting supplement, which is also backed by Alex Jones. A 2020 Psychology Today article describes it as "snake oil." On co-sleeping: In a 2011 op-ed in Today, Bialik advocated for sharing a bed with children. It's "actually really safe," she wrote, noting "rolling onto a baby is an exaggerated fear that is not based on any research." The American Academy of Pediatrics said babies who share a bed with their parents were almost three times as likely to die of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome than infants who don't, per Slate. In a 2011 op-ed in Today, Bialik advocated for sharing a bed with children. It's "actually really safe," she wrote, noting "rolling onto a baby is an exaggerated fear that is not based on any research." The American Academy of Pediatrics said babies who share a bed with their parents were almost three times as likely to die of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome than infants who don't, per Slate. On not giving her children medications: "Neither of our sons has ever been on antibiotics, nor do we give them Tylenol, Motrin, antihistamines or cough syrup," Bialik wrote in her 2012 book Beyond the Sling. She'd previously described her family as "non-vaccinating," though she's changed her tune recently. "As of today, my children may not have had every one of the vaccinations that your children have, but my children are vaccinated," she said in October. Still, "we give way too many vaccines in this country." Bialik was reportedly the top choice over Richards to take the permanent hosting gig but is committed to her Fox sitcom Call Me Kat, per the Hollywood Reporter. A source tells Yahoo that she's hoping to adjust her schedule to make the hosting gig work beyond the 15 episodes she's scheduled for now. However, most sources CNN's Brian Stelter talked to told him former Jeopardy! champ Ken Jennings "is now the hands-down favorite." (Read more Mayim Bialik stories.) (Newser) European nations offered stark warnings Thursday about the waning days of a massive airlift to bring people out of Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, with a British official saying an "imminent attack" could target Kabul's international airport. As President Biden says he'll stick with his deadline of Aug. 31 to totally withdraw troops, some countries have begun to pull even their soldiers and diplomats out, likely signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. New warnings emerged overnight from Western capitals about a possible threat from Afghanistan's Islamic State affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country, the AP reports. Military cargo planes leaving Kabul airport have launched flares to disrupt any potential surface-to-air missile fire. story continues below British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC on Thursday there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport, possibly within "hours." Heappey conceded that people are desperate to leave and there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. On Wednesday, the US Embassy in Kabul issued a security alert warning American citizens away from three specific airport gates, but gave no further explanation. Senior US officials said the warning was related to ongoing and specific threats involving the Islamic State and potential vehicle bombs. (Read more Afghanistan stories.) (Newser) In lockdown in Guyra, New South Wales, Australian sheep farmer Ben Jackson couldn't travel the 250 miles to Brisbane to attend the funeral of his aunt, who died recently following a two-year battle with cancer. "I felt hopeless, helplessI didn't really know what to do," he tells the BBC. So he made a small adjustment to his chores. "Because I was doing a bit of feeding already, I just decided to do a massive heart in the ground, which in all earnest, pales in comparison to hers," says Jackson, who likes to create "art" with his sheep in the form of words and logos. story continues below A drone video captured his flock finding the grain laid out in a heart shape, slowly forming the outline from bottom to top. Played at Monday's funeral and shared Tuesday on Instagram, it's set to Simon and Garfunkel's "Bridge Over Troubled Water," one of Debbie Cowdery's favorite songs. "When I saw it like that, I'll be the first to admit that it was like I had chopped a ton of onions. It was pretty emotional," Jackson tells the BBC. "I just hope that when I did it, Debbie took one eye off from having a yarn with her loved ones up there and looked down and saw my heart for her," he adds, per the Sydney Morning Herald. The video has hit home for many around the world, who've had to say goodbye to loved ones from afar during the coronavirus pandemic. "I was completely and utterly unprepared for how it's affected me, the family and others. Of course there are so many people who are doing it tough in Australia and the world," Jackson tells the Herald. But Cowdery "would be proud as punch to see so many people smiling and enjoying the heart I've made for her," Jackson adds, per the BBC. "It's just love." And "love's sensational." (Read more uplifting news stories.) (Newser) Two lawmakers who made an unannounced and unauthorized trip to Afghanistan to see the US evacuation effort for themselves have been strongly criticizedbut they say the insights they gained were worth it. In an interview with the New York Times, Republican Rep. Pete Meijer and Democratic Rep. Seth Moulton say they took a commercial flight to the United Arab Emirates followed by a military flight to Kabul because they believed the Biden administration was not giving lawmakers the full story. Both men are Iraq veterans who have strongly criticized the administration's withdrawal plan. They say they tried to keep disruption to a minimum. From the interview: Why they went. Meijer says they realized much of what they were hearing from the administration was "outdated, inaccurate, or otherwise irrelevant." He says he spoke to Moulton and they decided to "try to get there to understand and help communicate, especially to many of our colleagues who are struggling to get American citizens or special visa applicants out." story continues below Their minds were changed . Moulton says he had supported calls to extend the withdrawal date past Aug. 31, but he changed his mind after witnessing conditions on the ground. "Theres no way we can get everyone out, even by Sept. 11," he says. "So we need to have a working relationship with the Taliban after our departure. And the only way to achieve that is to leave by Aug. 31." Meijer adds that it is "utterly bizarre and baffling that were in this position." . Moulton says he had supported calls to extend the withdrawal date past Aug. 31, but he changed his mind after witnessing conditions on the ground. "Theres no way we can get everyone out, even by Sept. 11," he says. "So we need to have a working relationship with the Taliban after our departure. And the only way to achieve that is to leave by Aug. 31." Meijer adds that it is "utterly bizarre and baffling that were in this position." What they saw. Meijer says he witnessed "incredibly heartbreaking" scenes of desperation at the airport gate. "Something I think people need to know is that there is no scenario that trains a soldier or Marine to take somebody in a wheelchair, and have to push them back out because they dont meet the paperwork criteria," he says. Praise for the troops. Meijer and Moulton praised the troops in Kabul for turning the situation from "utter chaos" to an evacuation as orderly as could be hoped for in the circumstances. "Its the most extraordinary thing Ive ever seen in my life," Moulton says. "I've never been more proud to be an American than after witnessing the soldiers and Marines." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned other lawmakers against traveling to the region Wednesday, citing safety concerns and the need to concentrate resources on the airlift effort, the Detroit Free Press reports. "We dont want anybody to think this is a good idea and try to follow suit," she said. "It was not, in my view, a good idea." Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the visit "certainly took time away from what we had been planning to do that day" and the military is "obviously not" encouraging visits to a "very tense, dangerous, and dynamic situation." (Read more Afghanistan stories.) (Newser) There's been renewed media focus on Florida as it grapples with COVID, with record-breaking numbers of infections, hospitalizations, and deaths. When it comes to hospitalizations, the country as a whole has taken a similar step back. The Washington Post reports that more than 100,000 people are now hospitalized with the virus, reaching a level not seen since the end of January, which the paper notes was before vaccinations began in full force. Hospitalization rates are highest in the South. Reports of new infections are also similar to January's, with an average number of 150,000 daily cases reported on Wednesday. The silver lining: Deaths aren't coming close to the numbers seen in early 2021, with a daily average of 1,100 on Wednesday, compared to 3,100 in late January. More on the state of COVID in the US, a year and a half into the pandemic: story continues below Pediatric hospitalizations: The number of COVID patients in pediatric hospitals are also experiencing a record-breaking surge, with new admissions for kids reaching its highest number since the US started tracking this demographic about a year ago, reports CNBC. CDC data show an average of 303 new admissions per day for the week ending Aug. 22, and doctors feel a combo of the delta variant and school reopenings will only make things worse. The number of COVID patients in pediatric hospitals are also experiencing a record-breaking surge, with new admissions for kids reaching its highest number since the US started tracking this demographic about a year ago, reports CNBC. CDC data show an average of 303 new admissions per day for the week ending Aug. 22, and doctors feel a combo of the delta variant and school reopenings will only make things worse. A country divided: A Washington Post analysis reports on how polarizing and political COVID has become, especially regarding vaccines and masking, noting "it's worth taking stock of how unusual this internal feuding is over an issue of such national import." Per a recent Pew Research Center survey, the split in the US over COVID restrictions is larger than in any of the 10 other nations polled. A Washington Post analysis reports on how polarizing and political COVID has become, especially regarding vaccines and masking, noting "it's worth taking stock of how unusual this internal feuding is over an issue of such national import." Per a recent Pew Research Center survey, the split in the US over COVID restrictions is larger than in any of the 10 other nations polled. A difference in leadership: CNN notes a similar divide among officials across the nation, with some mayors, governors, and local leaders once more pulling out mitigation tools against the virus, while others throw caution to the wind. "This is not rocket science, everyone," Maui Mayor Michael Victorino said Tuesday after asking residents and tourists to avoid unnecessary activities for the next three weeks. "We've got to step it up again." On the flip side are Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. CNN notes a similar divide among officials across the nation, with some mayors, governors, and local leaders once more pulling out mitigation tools against the virus, while others throw caution to the wind. "This is not rocket science, everyone," Maui Mayor Michael Victorino said Tuesday after asking residents and tourists to avoid unnecessary activities for the next three weeks. "We've got to step it up again." On the flip side are Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. Vax numbers: According to the CDC, about 73% of Americans have received at least one vaccine dose. NBC News offers a map showing the number and percentage of unvaccinated adults in each state and US territory. A 'significant twist': Until now, the first recorded COVID death in the US was said to have taken place on Feb. 6, 2020, in San Jose, Calif. Now, updated stats show there was such a fatality recorded in Kansas on Jan. 9, 2020, per the Kansas News Service. Indeed, an updated listing from the National Center for Health Statistics shows one death involving COVID for the week ending Jan. 11, 2020as well as six other COVID-related deaths in January and early February. The Mercury News reports on this "significant twist," noting these early deaths took place not only in California and Kansas, but also in Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma, and Wisconsin. Until now, the first recorded COVID death in the US was said to have taken place on Feb. 6, 2020, in San Jose, Calif. Now, updated stats show there was such a fatality recorded in Kansas on Jan. 9, 2020, per the Kansas News Service. Indeed, an updated listing from the National Center for Health Statistics shows one death involving COVID for the week ending Jan. 11, 2020as well as six other COVID-related deaths in January and early February. The Mercury News reports on this "significant twist," noting these early deaths took place not only in California and Kansas, but also in Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma, and Wisconsin. Official count: Per the numbers tracked by Johns Hopkins University, as of Thursday morning, the US has had more than 38 million COVID cases over the course of the pandemic, with 632,283 deaths in total. (Read more COVID-19 stories.) (Newser) A kitesurfer hoping to enjoy the waves in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., died Wednesday when a gust of wind lifted him off the beach, carried him 400 feet, then slammed him into the side of a home, WESH reports. An orange kite was seen protruding from a second-floor balcony of the beachfront home as authorities arrived on the scene around 10am. A witness had called 911, describing a man "unconscious on the floor" and "bleeding." "The wind picked up and threw him against the building, and he went down," the caller added, per WSVN. story continues below The man had attempted to launch from the beach "just two doors down, when strong winds came into the area unexpectedly," Fire Rescue Battalion Chief Stephen Gollan told the outlet. "We went from relatively calm conditions to extremely dangerous conditions in a short period of time ... and he was not able to release from the kite in a timely manner." Surveillance video showed the man attempting to control the kite before he was dragged along the sand, then lifted, per WSVN. The victim was taken to a hospital in critical condition, but he died of his injuries shortly after 1pm, fire department officials said. Friends identified him as 61-year-old Fred Salter, per Fox News. One friend told WPLG that Salter had just survived a battle with cancer. "I keep thinking I should've been there this morning, but I can't think that because Freddy was a very intelligent waterman," Mike Bradley said of the longtime kitesurfer. It shows "just how fast something can happen on the water. It's just crazy." (Read more Florida stories.) (Newser) The horrific crimes of Dylann Roof "qualify him for the harshest penalty that a just society can impose," a federal appeals court said Wednesday, firmly rejecting an appeal from the first person sentenced to death for a federal hate crime. Lawyers for Roof, a white supremacist who massacred nine Black people in a Charleston, SC, church in 2015, had argued that he shouldn't have been found competent to stand trial or allowed to represent himself during the penalty phase. The lawyers said Roof believed fellow white nationalists would rescue him from prison, but only if he kept his "mental impairments," including depression and autism, out of the public record. A three-judge panel on the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the death sentence and called the 27-year-old's argument "strained," NBC News reports. story continues below The judges said no "cold record or careful parsing of statutes and precedents" could capture the "full horror" of his actions. "Dylann Roof murdered African Americans at their church, during their Bible-study and worship. They had welcomed him. He slaughtered them," the judges wrote, per Law & Crime. They noted that Roof, then 21, "wanted the widest possible publicity for his atrocities, and, to that end, he purposefully left one person alive in the church 'to tell the story.'" They praised the trial judge for handling the "difficult case with skill and compassion for all concerned, including Roof himself." Roof, who also received nine consecutive life sentences in state court, is on death row at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind., but he's unlikely to be executed in the near future, the AP reports. Attorney General Merrick Garland ordered a temporary moratorium on federal executions last month while a review of policies and procedures is carried out. (Read more Dylann Roof stories.) (Newser) The horrors of the first half of the 20th century left plenty of mass graves scattered across Ukraineand historians believe they have uncovered one of the largest yet. Researchers say between 5,000 and 8,000 bodies are in 29 graves at a site detected during work to expand an airport in Odessa, the BBC reports. Ukraine's Institute of National Memory says the victims were most likely killed by Soviet secret police in the late 1930s, during Josef Stalin's rule, but it will be impossible to identify them because the records are all in Russia. "These documents will never be handed over to us under the current government in Russia," Sergiy Gutsalyuk, head of the institute's regional branch, tells the AFP. story continues below In a Facebook post, the institute said the number of victims in the mass graves hasn't been determined yet but it appears to be one of the largest such sites in the country. The institute says there are also believed to be mass graves in a military site adjacent to the airport site. The graves were detected with the help of a local historian who found information about mass executions in the area in Romanian archives, reports Radio Free Europe. Records show Soviet secret police ordered 8,600 death sentences in Odessa between 1938 and 1941. (Read more Ukraine stories.) (Newser) A man pardoned by Kentucky's former governor for a 2014 drug robbery killing has been convicted for the same slaying in federal court after a two-week trial. Federal prosecutors brought charges against Patrick Baker after he was released from prison when former Gov. Matt Bevin pardoned him on his way out of office in 2019. Baker's family had political connections to Bevin, including hosting a fundraiser for the one-term Republican governor. A federal jury in eastern Kentucky convicted Baker Wednesday on a charge of murder committed during a drug trafficking crime, the AP reports. Prosecutors said Baker killed Donald Mills, a drug dealer in Knox County, in 2014 while trying to rob Mills of cash and pain pills. Baker posed as a US Marshal during the crime. story continues below US District Judge Claria Horn Boom will sentence Baker, 43, on Dec. 21. Prosecutors declined to seek the death penalty, but Baker could serve life in prison on the conviction. Baker was convicted of reckless homicide in state court in 2017. He was sentenced to 19 years in prison, but Bevin's pardon released him and erased the conviction. Federal prosecutors said Baker was prosecuted the second time under the dual sovereignty doctrine, which allows state and federal officials to prosecute the same defendant for the same actions without infringing on double jeopardy protections. Bakers lawyer, Louisville attorney Steve Romines, said he would appeal. (Read more Kentucky stories.) (Newser) South Dakota's attorney general was convicted of two misdemeanors Thursday in the death of a man struck by a vehicle while walking along a rural highway one night last fall. Jason Ravnsborg also was fined $1K on Thursday under the terms of his plea deal, the Argus Leader reports. Ravnsborg, a Republican, pleaded no contest to driving outside his lane and driving while using an electronic device. The family of Joseph Boever, 55, was not pleased. "We are not satisfied with the outcome," Jane Boever, the victim's sister, told the Fort Pierre court. "I am against the fact that he is not to get jail time at all," said Jenny Boever, the victim's wife. "I understand that, maam," Judge John Brown replied. story continues below "It isn't a homicide case," the attorney general's lawyer said. "That's what the mix-up here is with the family. They think it's a homicide case." It was just an accident, he said, adding, "What happened out there that night could have happened to anybody." The attorney general told investigators he thought he'd hit a deer, per the Hill, though Boever's eyeglasses were later found in Ravnsborg's car. At the family's request, the judge ordered the defendant to perform a "significant public service event" for the next five years around the anniversary of Boever's death. The victim's wife described her despair to the court. "We were building our lives together," she said, "and now we will never have that." (Investigators had said Ravnsborg was distracted while at the wheel.) (Newser) Former President Trump just got with another lawsuit over the Capitol riot, this time by officers who were injured by his supporters. The lawsuit also implicates several Trump allies, including Roger Stone and members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers. Main claim: The lawsuit filed in federal court in DC accuses Trump of intentionally setting a mob upon the Capitol as part of his bid to remain in office. Trump worked with white supremacists, violent extremist groups, and campaign supporters to violate the Ku Klux Klan Act, and commit acts of domestic terrorism in an unlawful effort to stay in power," says the suit, per the AP. That 1871 statute is aimed at violence meant to disrupt the actions of Congress. The lawsuit filed in federal court in DC accuses Trump of intentionally setting a mob upon the Capitol as part of his bid to remain in office. Trump worked with white supremacists, violent extremist groups, and campaign supporters to violate the Ku Klux Klan Act, and commit acts of domestic terrorism in an unlawful effort to stay in power," says the suit, per the AP. That 1871 statute is aimed at violence meant to disrupt the actions of Congress. Accusers: Seven Capitol Police officers filed the suit, reports the New York Times. This is probably the most comprehensive account of Jan. 6 in terms of civil cases, says Edward Caspar of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, which filed the suit on behalf of the officers. It spans from the former president to militants around him to his campaign supporters. story continues below Details: The suit includes first-hand accounts from the officers, including Governor Latson, who describes how rioters beat him and hurled racial slurs at him. Latson, who is Black, also was injured by exposure to noxious pepper spray, bear spray, fire extinguishers and other pollutants sprayed by the attackers," says the suit, per the Washington Post. The suit includes first-hand accounts from the officers, including Governor Latson, who describes how rioters beat him and hurled racial slurs at him. Latson, who is Black, also was injured by exposure to noxious pepper spray, bear spray, fire extinguishers and other pollutants sprayed by the attackers," says the suit, per the Washington Post. Details, II: Another officer, Jason DeRoche, describes being hit with batteries and doused with mace and bear spray while on the steps of the Capitol. Officer Michael Fortune says it was like a war zone, with chemical fog in the air, tables flipped, statues defaced, feces on the walls, blood and broken glass on the floors. Another officer, Jason DeRoche, describes being hit with batteries and doused with mace and bear spray while on the steps of the Capitol. Officer Michael Fortune says it was like a war zone, with chemical fog in the air, tables flipped, statues defaced, feces on the walls, blood and broken glass on the floors. Other suits: This lawsuit makes similar allegations to those made by individual members of Congress in previous litigation. While Trump has not responded yet to the officers' lawsuit, he has sought to dismiss the earlier ones by saying he was acting in his official capacity as president and thus is immune from civil suits. A special House panel also is investigating the events of Jan. 6. (Read more Capitol riot stories.) (Newser) In addressing the nation on Thursday, President Biden expressed his resolve to not let the airport attack in Afghanistan stop evacuations even as US troops track down and punish the forces responsible. "To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive. We will not forget," Biden said. "We will hunt you down and make you pay." The explosions in Kabul killed 13 US troops and at least 60 Afghans, Defense Department officials said. The president also said he might send more troops, USA Today reports, though the Pentagon has not asked for that. story continues below "I've instructed the military, whatever they needif they need additional forceI will grant it," Biden said from the White House. For now, he suggested, military officials want to concentrate on the mission of removing Americans and others from Afghanistan. Other aspects the president addressed include: The attack response. Biden said he's asked the military to plan a counterattack on ISIS-K, which claimed it's responsible for the airport explosions, per the New York Times. The terrorist group had been planning an operation for weeks, he said. "We will respond with force of precision at our time, place, we choose in a moment of our choosing," Biden said, adding, "America will not be intimidated." The casualties . "These American service members who gave their lives they were heroes," Biden said, per the Washington Post, undertaking a mission to save others. The US will honor its "sacred obligation" to the families of the US troops killed, he said. Referring to his wife, Biden said, "Jill and I, our hearts ache, like I'm sure yours do as well." . "These American service members who gave their lives they were heroes," Biden said, per the Washington Post, undertaking a mission to save others. The US will honor its "sacred obligation" to the families of the US troops killed, he said. Referring to his wife, Biden said, "Jill and I, our hearts ache, like I'm sure yours do as well." The Taliban's role . Biden defended counting on the Taliban to provide security outside the Kabul airport, per NPR. "It's in their self-interest that we leave when we said and that we get as many people out as we can," he said. Biden said he's not been shown any evidence that the Taliban colluded with ISIS on the attack. . Biden defended counting on the Taliban to provide security outside the Kabul airport, per NPR. "It's in their self-interest that we leave when we said and that we get as many people out as we can," he said. Biden said he's not been shown any evidence that the Taliban colluded with ISIS on the attack. Presidential responsibility. "The former president made a deal with the Taliban," Biden said when asked about whether he bears responsibility for the worsening situation in Afghanistan. Former President Trump had agreed with the Taliban that US forces would be out by May. But Biden also conceded, "I bear responsibility for, fundamentally, all that's happened of late." (Read more Afghanistan stories.) Shamokin, PA (17872) Today Becoming partly cloudy after some evening rain. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Becoming partly cloudy after some evening rain. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected. Shamokin, PA (17872) Today Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming partly cloudy. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming partly cloudy. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch. Localized flooding is expected. Let us know what you're seeing and hearing around the community. Submit here Hundreds of people from all political persuasions visited Fairbanks Pioneer Park on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2019, the first day of a campaign to recall Gov. Mike Dunleavy from office, to sign the official Recall Dunleavy petition. The Daily News-Miner encourages residents to make themselves heard through the Opinion pages. Readers' letters and columns also appear online at newsminer.com. Contact the editor with questions at letters@newsminer.com or call 459-7574. Community Perspective Send Community Perspective submissions by mail (P.O. Box 70710, Fairbanks AK 99707) or via email (letters@newsminer.com). Submissions must be 500 to 750 words. Columns are welcome on a wide range of issues and should be well-written and well-researched with attribution of sources. Include a full name, email address, daytime telephone number and headshot photograph suitable for publication (email jpg or tiff files at 150 dpi.) You may also schedule a photo to be taken at the News-Miner office. The News-Miner reserves the right to edit submissions or to reject those of poor quality or taste without consulting the writer. Letters to the editor Send letters to the editor by mail (P.O. Box 70710, Fairbanks AK 99707), by fax (907-452-7917) or via email (letters@newsminer.com). Writers are limited to one letter every two weeks (14 days.) All letters must contain no more than 350 words and include a full name (no abbreviation), daytime and evening phone numbers and physical address. (If no phone, then provide a mailing address or email address.) The Daily News-Miner reserves the right to edit or reject letters without consulting the writer. TDT | Manama The Daily Tribune www.newsofbahrain.com Bahrain health officials have strongly recommended COVID-19 booster shots for fully vaccinated citizens and residents as a very strong protection against severe infection and death. The National Medical Taskforce for Combatting the Coronavirus (COVID-19 yesterday stressed the importance of taking a booster shot within a maximum of six months after completing the second dose of the Sinopharm, Pfizer-BioNtech, Sputnik V, or AstraZeneca (Covieshield) vaccines. Data from a global study showed a decrease in the effectiveness of Pfizer-BioNTech in the month following the second dose, from 88% to 74%. The effectiveness of AstraZeneca decreased from 77% to 67% after four to five months following the second dose. The study was based on data from more than one million individuals who received these vaccines. The study by Britains ZOECOVID also showed that the protection provided by vaccines for the elderly and healthcare workers may drop to less than 50% by winter. In line with medical research, the taskforce noted that a booster dose can increase efficacy levels and enhance the bodys immunity against COVID-19 and its variants, as well as reducing severity of symptoms and mortality rates in case of infection. Those who meet the required criteria are encouraged to register for a booster dose by visiting the Ministry of Healths website, healthalert.gov.bh, or via the BeAware application. Thank you for trusting us for your local news coverage. You have reached the maximum number of free articles per month. Subscribe today for unlimited access to News-Press NOW. It's a fast and easy way to support local journalism. It was always going to end this way DANBURY A new initiative seeks to help local immigrants and low-income workers find employment. DanburyWORKS has received a $20,000 grant from Fairfield Countys Community Foundation for the effort, which will include various partnerships and a career navigator who works directly with this community. Danbury is a thriving city, in large part because of our immigrants and residents of color, Michelle James, executive director Community Action Agency of Western Connecticut, said in a statement. The goal of DanburyWORKS is to help these residents gain meaningful and well-compensated employment so their families can prosper. The success of our city depends on their success and a promising future for their children. We thank Fairfield Countys Community Foundation for their support of this work. DanburyWORKS is a community collaborative of more than 17 Danbury-based organizations working to reduce poverty in the city by 5 percent within the next 10 years. Community Action Agency of Western Connecticut has assumed the role of backbone organization for DanburyWORKS as of July 2021, as it transitions into the workforce development phase of its plan. Research from United Way of Western Connecticut has shown half of Danbury residents struggle to meet basic needs. This work is meant to address that. The career navigator will provide services to job-seekers to make it easier for them to find employment, while building relationships with entry-level employers and engaging with the local Manufacturer Roundtable to assess the skills needed to fill job openings. A Spanish-speaking community liaison will work with the navigator to bridge the cultural and language gap. The liaison will help the navigator to recruit job placement clients and training participants. Hispanic and Latino residents make up 33 percent of Danburys population, according to the 2020 U.S. Census Bureau data. DanburyWORKS will also partner with The Bridge to Independence and Career Opportunity, or TIBCO, to improve the soft skills of job seekers, through TBICOs World of Work training program. Grant money will go toward providing professional development to licensed child care providers in Danbury, too. Providers in United Way of Western Connecticuts Coras Kids program, which aims to improve the affordability and quality of child care in Danbury, will participate in this program. EdAdvance will also connect with center-based child care providers to offer the sessions to its staff. DANBURY The public schools new superintendent is a familiar face. Kevin Walston, the assistant superintendent who has been serving as interim school chief since Sal Pascarella retired at the end of June, was approved by the school board on Wednesday evening to take over the about 12,000-student district. Im looking forward to the challenge, Walston said after the board approved his appointment 10-1. I know the district has been stabilized by Dr. Sals presence for over a decade and I recognize Im stepping into big shoes. The board approved Walstons term to run until June 2024 and authorized the board chair to sign his contract. But some board members said they were disappointed in the search process. I must convey my concern over the injustice in how the protocol was handled throughout the process due to the lack of leadership and the outside services that were provided, said Republican Kathryn Hodgdon, the only board member to vote against Walstons appointment. However, I do wish Mr. Walston the best of luck. Republican Rachel Chaleski said she, too, was dissatisfied with the process. I believe we as a board are due for our own professional development on roles and responsibilities, she said. I think we should look to incorporate how to strengthen the process to ensure proper protocols are followed in the future. She added she has enjoyed working with Walston and supports his appointment. Loren Daly, a Republican, agreed. I do have concerns about how this process was, how we went through this process, she said. I look forward to some professional development for the board. Gladys Cooper, board chairwoman and Democrat, said she relied on the boards attorney or someone who knew a little bit more than we do for advice about the process. Do we need professional development? Yes we do, she said. You know, the process, it might not have been the way we wanted. It was not done the way it was done 15 yeas ago when we hired Dr. Sal, but it was a different group, so we all can learn from that. Democrat Joe DaSilva said he did not have problems with the search process and backed Walstons appointment. He is the right choice for our district, he said. I am encouraged by this. The school board enlisted a consultant firm, Ray and Associates, to assist with the search. The firm helped the board find candidates and narrowed down the top contenders for the board to interview. In the spring, the board and firm held sessions with parents and others to see what the community wanted in a new superintendent. Community members had said they wanted someone who understood what it was like to work in a large, diverse school district, among other attributes. Walston has been Danburys assistant superintendent for three years, having served in that role in South Orange and Maplewood, N.J. A former teacher, he was the principal of Warren Harding High School in Bridgeport and the director of instructional leadership for the Waterbury schools. He has a bachelor of arts degree from City University of New York, Lehman College. He also has a masters degree in school administration and supervision and a professional diploma in school district administration from The College of New Rochelle. As superintendent, hell face challenges, including the districts tight budget, returning to school full-time during COVID-19 and rising enrollment, which demographers have found hard to predict. Two projects are ongoing to address the overcrowding in the schools. Construction will continue this school year to add seven classrooms to Ellsworth Avenue Elementary School, while the school and city plan to build a career academy for middle and high school students. The academy is expected to open in the fall of 2024, but staff is working this year to prepare the curriculum. We have a lot of educational things that we need to take care of this district, Cooper said. I want to work with everyone and I hope everyone wants to work with each other, so we can make this the best district. The plans for hiring a new assistant superintendent were unclear Wednesday evening, but Walston said he is looking forward to fill out the remaining members of the team to serve this district well. LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) Inmates at a northwest Arkansas jail have been prescribed ivermectin to combat COVID-19, despite warnings from federal health officials that the antiparasitic drug should not be used to treat the coronavirus. Washington County's sheriff confirmed Tuesday night that the jail's health provider had been prescribing the drug. Sheriff Tim Helder didn't say how many inmates at the 710-bed facility had been given ivermectin and defended the health provider the jail uses that has been prescribing the medication. Whatever a doctor prescribes, that is not in my bailiwick," Helder told members of the Washington County quorum court, the county's governing body. Helder did not immediately respond to a call from The Associated Press, and a spokesperson for the sheriff's office referred questions to Karas Correctional Health, the jail's health provider. It's not clear what information inmates who were prescribed the drug have been given about it, including warnings that it isn't approved to treat COVID-19. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved ivermectin in both people and animals for some parasitic worms and for head lice and skin conditions. The FDA has not approved its use in treating or preventing COVID-19 in humans. Using any treatment for COVID-19 thats not approved or authorized by the FDA, unless part of a clinical trial, can cause serious harm," the FDA said in a warning about the drug. Health officials in Arkansas and Mississippi this week warned people to not take the veterinary formulation of the drug after seeing an uptick in calls to their poison control centers. The drug has been touted by some Republican lawmakers in Arkansas as a potential treatment for COVID-19. Eva Madison, a member of the quorum court, called the use of the drug on inmates disturbing, noting that they're not in a position to seek a second opinion from physicians about its use. Are we allowing him to effectively experiment on our detainees at our jail with no oversight?" Madison said. Karas Correctional did not immediately return a message left Wednesday morning. Helder said Karas informed him of the drug's use in July, the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported. In a video posted on his Facebook page, Dr. Rob Karas said ivermectin is one of nine medications he's prescribed for COVID-19 to inmates at the jail and has been administering there since October. Karas said no inmates are forced to take the medication and they can refuse it. Karas said the jail has had 531 virus cases and zero deaths and only one inmate hospitalized. In a Facebook post, Karas said 67% of the jail's inmates have been vaccinated against the virus. Karas, who said he has had COVID-19 twice and has taken ivermectin, defended administering it to patients. Do you want us to try and fight like we're at the beaches of Normandy or do you want me to tell what a lot of people do, which is go home and ride it out and go to the ER when your lips turn blue?" Karas said. The American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas criticized the drug being prescribed to inmates, citing the FDA's warnings about the drug. The group said it was seeking additional records about the drug's use from the sheriff's office and from the health provider. They need to stop this practice immediately," ACLU of Arkansas Executive Director Holly Dickson said. None of the jail's inmates administered ivermectin were state prisoners being held by the facility, the state Department of Corrections said. The department and its medical services provider are not providing ivermectin to any of its inmates, spokeswoman Cindy Murphy said. BENSON, Ariz. (AP) The Mescal Movie Set once made Benson one of the most recognizable western cinematic towns on the big screen. The set was built in 1969 for a movie called Monte Walsh. Some 80 films followed and six television series also were shot on location. SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) Democrat Kevin Paffrath shook up the recall debate stage Wednesday in his first appearance alongside three Republican rivals, accusing them of lacking bold plans and pitching himself as the best option to lead California should voters remove Gov. Gavin Newsom from office. A vote for any Republican, including the ones who are not here, is a wasted vote, the 29-year-old YouTube creator said. He was the only Democrat on stage alongside former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, state Assemblyman Kevin Kiley and businessman John Cox, all Republicans who had debated each other three times before. Save for one sharp exchange with Faulconer, the three largely avoided engaging with Paffrath including his ending request for them to drop out of the race and endorse him and kept their messaging trained on Newsom's failures. Its not the time for the on-the-job-training, for YouTube, somebody that's never actually had to get legislation across," Faulconer quipped after Paffrath brought up botched real estate deals in San Diego during Faulconer's time as mayor. The debate was also notable for who wasn't on stage: Talk radio host Larry Elder, who is widely considered the frontrunner to replace Newsom among Republicans. Both Paffrath and Faulconer underscored his status atop the field by directly urging voters not to support him. Elder has declined to debate his rivals, saying he'll only go toe-to-toe with Newsom. We have a big threat, and that threat isn't here to defend himself: It's Larry Elder," Paffrath said, accusing Elder of sharing disinformation in appearances on Fox News. He didn't provide specific examples. Faulconer again slammed Elder for his past comments about women in the workplace. Elder recently denied allegations he displayed a gun in front of an ex-fiancee, and the allegations haven't seemed to noticeably dampen his standing in the race. News station KCRA and the San Francisco Chronicle hosted the televised debate. It came less than three weeks before the last day to vote, Sept. 14. All registered California voters more than 22 million people received ballots in the mail and more than 1.5 million people have already voted, according to ballot tracking data from Political Data Inc. Voters are asked two questions: Should Newsom be recalled and, if so, who should replace him? There are 46 replacement candidates, though Republican Doug Ose dropped out after ballots were printed and endorsed Kiley. Newsom and his Democratic party allies kept another well-known, elected Democrat from running on the second question in an effort to keep the party unified behind the governor. They are urging Democrats to vote no on the recall and forgo the choice for a replacement option. But Paffrath's presence on the debate stage could complicate that message. With his nearly 1.7 million YouTube subscribers, to whom he gives financial advice, he's the best known among the nine Democrats running. If a majority of voters choose to remove Newsom, the replacement candidate with the most votes will become governor, even if they fall far short of a majority. Paffrath's lack of political experience flashed briefly when he referred to the state Legislature as Congress." He was arguing that he's best poised to make progress in Sacramento because Democrats hold a supermajority in both chambers of the Legislature. He also shared some unique and far-fetched ideas, including a proposal for California to construct a pipeline to carry water from the Mississippi to the Colorado River to boost California's water supply. On the coronavirus, he agreed with his Republican rivals that the state shouldn't mandate vaccines. But he was the only candidate to give a clear answer when asked what he would do to stop the spread of the virus; he proposed installing better air filtration systems in schools and public buildings and said the state would provide N95 face masks to anyone who can't afford one. What weve just heard from the other three candidates on the stage and what you hear from the other candidates who are too afraid to be here tonight to stand in front of California people is nothing about ventilation and new ideas. Its more of the same, and thats why were failing with COVID," he said. The Republicans largely stuck to their familiar talking points, blasting Newsom for overreaching on the coronavirus and pledging to build more water storage, better manage the state's forests and cut taxes. Kiley at one point said Paffrath's presence on stage disproved Newsom's characterization of the recall as a Republican effort. I want to thank (Paffrath) for underlining something that is abundantly clear to everyone except Gavin Newsom, which is that this is not a partisan recall," Kiley said. This has been bipartisan and multipartisan from the beginning, its about the failures of our government to do the most basic things." The Democratic governor has painted the recall as a movement driven by GOP extremists and supporters of former President Donald Trump. Republican activists led the drive to place the recall on the ballot, but it is not solely supported by Republicans. On wildfires, all four candidates said they would not restrict housing construction in areas at high-risk for fire. All four spoke out against the defund the police" movement and none committed to signing legislation in the works to create a statewide process to strip law enforcement who break the law of their badges. California is one of a few states without a process. DANBURY An apparent fight at a carnival in June sparked this months gunfire that wounded a 15-year-old girl at the mall, an arrest warrant revealed Wednesday. Police said Derek Sotelo, 18, was charged this week with criminal attempt to commit second-degree assault, first-degree reckless endangerment, inciting a riot, inciting injury to a person, risk of injury to a minor and breach of peace. Officials said they believe he was carrying a hammer at the time of the incident. A 14-year-old boy, believed to be the shooter who wounded a 15-year-old girl, was recently charged with first-degree assault. Sotelos arrest warrant, obtained by Hearst Connecticut Media, provides a timeline of events that led to the shooting at the Danbury Fair mall on Aug. 11 and what police say happened in the days that followed: June 5: Dereck Sotelo, 18, was jumped by a group of juveniles at a carnival held in the Danbury Fair mall, according to his arrest warrant. Sotelo suffered minor injuries, according to investigators. Officers said they believe one of the suspected juveniles who attacked Sotelo is also the suspect in the Danbury mall shooting. Aug. 11: Sotelo, a 15-year-old girl later identified as the shooting victim, and a witness were at the Danbury Fair mall. The witness told officers they heard a group yelling and clapping at them, according to the arrest warrant. Sotelo recognized the group as those who jumped him at the carnival and ran out of the mall, a witness told officers. According to the warrant, they called other friends to come to the mall. Sotelo allegedly grabbed a hammer from a car and the group of seven went back into the mall, the arrest warrant said. Aug. 11 at 6:53 p.m.: A group of several people, who a witness identified as the Ridge Kids, can be seen in security footage around the clothing racks in the Macys mens section, the warrant said. A 14-year-old boy from Danbury appears to be securing something black in his waistband, according to the arrest warrant. Aug. 11 at 6:54 p.m.: The 14-year-old boy leaves his group, according to surveillance footage. Aug. 11 at 6:57 p.m.: Surveillance footage from Macys shows Sotelos group three males and four females entering the store. The 14-year-old boy who left his group is seen sitting down on a chair outside of Macys, according to the warrant. Sotelo sits down at the couch next to the chair, according to surveillance footage obtained by the Danbury Police Department. Aug. 11 at 6:58 p.m.: Most of the first group take the escalator down to the second floor of the store and head toward the exit into the mall, the arrest warrant said. Both groups are in front of Macys when surveillance footage indicates things were getting heated, the arrest warrant said. A witness later said someone asked the Ridge Kids if they had a problem with her friends, investigators wrote in the warrant. The video footage showed the 14-year-old boy got up from his chair and started to back pedal toward Jennys Spa, the warrant said. He pulled a black gun from his waistband and fired at least one shot, hitting the 15-year-old girl, investigators wrote in the warrant. Sotelo allegedly lunged toward the shooter with a hammer in his right hand, the arrest warrant stated. The shooting suspect ran away in the opposite direction of Macys, the warrant said Sotelo came out of the spa and ran back into Macys and out of the exit before he discarded the hammer in the parking lot, according to his arrest warrant. The shooting victim late told officers that she remembered ducking when she heard the gunshot, the warrant said. The victim said she felt pain and ran out of the mall with her friends, only realizing she was shot after she saw blood, according to the warrant. Aug. 11 at 7 p.m.: Five of the seven members of Sotelos group were seen in surveillance footage rapidly exiting the store, along with several other patrons, according to the warrant. Sotelo ran out of Macys carrying an object that officers believe is a hammer in his right hand, the warrant said. Aug. 11 at 7:01 p.m.: Danbury police responded to the mall for a report of shots fired. The mall was locked down immediately after the shooting. Danbury detectives spoke with the shooting victim who appeared to have a gunshot wound on the left side of her throat, according to the arrest warrant. She was taken to Danbury Hospital and later transported to Connecticut Childrens Medical Center in Hartford for further treatment. Her injuries were not life-threatening. Hospital staff later told police the girl suffered a fractured vertebrae, the arrest warrant said. Aug. 11 at 8:30 p.m.: People inside the mall were slowly permitted to leave as police cleared each of the stores, police previously said. Aug. 11 at 10 p.m.: The final mall shoppers and employees were being released. Aug. 13: A judge granted a warrant for the arrest of the 14-year-old boy, according to police. Aug. 16: The 14-year-old boy turned himself in to police. He was charged with first-degree assault, first-degree reckless endangerment, unlawful discharge of a firearm, carrying a pistol without a permit, risk of injury to a minor and breach of peace, according to Danbury police, who said they recovered the gun used in the shooting. Aug. 24: A judge granted a warrant to charge Sotelo and detectives took him into custody, police said. Sotelo was charged with criminal attempt to commit second-degree assault, first-degree reckless endangerment, inciting a riot, inciting injury to a person, risk of injury to a minor and breach of peace, according to his arrest warrant. His bond was set at $100,000. LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) COVID-19 vaccinations in Africa tripled over the past week, though protecting even 10% of the continent by the end of September remains a very daunting task," the Africa director of the World Health Organization said Thursday. Meanwhile, the continent saw 248,000 new confirmed cases over the past week, with at least 24 countries seeing a surge in infections driven by the delta variant. "This is a preventable tragedy if African countries can get fair access to the vaccines, Matshidiso Moeti told reporters. The WHO Africa director said 13 million doses were administered in the past week, three times more than the number of shots given in the previous week as donations of doses increased from developed countries. But that remains a drop in an ocean on the continent home to 1.3 billion people, where the Africa CDC says only 2.4% are currently vaccinated. Africa's brutal resurgence driven by the delta variant is further stretching already strained health systems across the continent. As African countries struggle, the United States and other high-income countries are talking about booster shots. WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus recently said it was unconscionable that some countries are now offering booster shots while so many people remain unprotected. I think it is very difficult for us to talk about booster doses in Africa, Moeti said Thursday. We have not covered even 5% of the population yet with the initial vaccinations that are needed to slow down the spread of the virus and most importantly, stop what we think might be a fourth wave which is coming. Africa will receive 117 million doses in coming months but an additional 34 million will be needed to reach the 10% vaccination target, the WHO Africa director added. Beyond that, though, Moeti urged African countries to ramp up their readiness to utilize vaccines when they arrive. No precious dose should be wasted, she said. ___ This story has been corrected to show that 24 countries in Africa are experiencing a surge linked to the delta variant, not 28. The World Food Programme (WFP) on Wednesday reported that one in three Afghans, or 14 million people, "are hungry today and two million malnourished children urgently need treatment". A crisis of incredible proportions is unfolding in Afghanistan as conflict, combined with drought and COVID-19, is pushing Afghans into a humanitarian catastrophe, said the UN food relief agency on Wednesday. The World Food Programme (WFP) on Wednesday reported that one in three Afghans, or 14 million people, are hungry today and two million malnourished children urgently need treatment. WFP Regional Director John Aylieff pointed out on Wednesday that 14 million people in Afghanistan are struggling to put food on the table, UN News reported. The price of wheat has gone up by 25 per cent in the last months and, therefore, with the economic situationand with the turmoil in which the country has been thrown, it is very difficult now to see the future for this populationa future which is food securewithout malnourished children, he said. Meanwhile, since the beginning of the year, conflict and insecurity have driven more than 550,000 Afghans from their homes as some 70,000 displaced people have converged from across the country into the capital, Kabul. There are no crops, no raining, no water and people are living in misery, said Delawar, a 52-year-old Afghan, adding that WFPs assistance is a great mercy from God that really helps poor and needy people. However, as the UN agency is due to run out of wheat flour as early as October, it requires immediate funds upfront to support the millions depending on it to deliver food. This is Afghanistans hour of greatest need and we need the international community to step up and support them, the WFP underscored. As thousands of people try to leave the Kabul airport, WFP reported that relatively few have sought refuge in neighbouring countries. We have plans in place to assist if they do cross land borders, the UN agency said, noting that if donors want to avoid large refugee outflows, it is imperative that WFPs food operations inside the country are not interrupted. The UN agency described funding existing needs in Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan and Tajikistan as most urgent, saying that it needs USD 200 million for Afghanistan and USD 22 million for the neighbouring countries. Connecticut Childrens, a network of pediatric care providers, announced Wednesday it is expanding its services into the network of health care centers run by Nuvance Health. The organization runs seven hospitals in western Connecticut and nearby New York, including Danbury, Norwalk, New Milford and Sharon hospitals. Im pleased to announce today that Nuvance Health has expanded its collaboration with Connecticut Childrens to make it easier for parents to get the care they need for their children in both western Connecticut and throughout New Yorks Hudson Valley, Nuvance President and CEO John Murphy said during a Wednesday news conference. Through this new pediatric alliance, Childrens experts will provide care to infants and children of all ages across the entirety of Nuvance Healths system, he said. The news conference was held over Zoom and simultaneously livecast to Nuvance Healths Facebook page. Murphy said Nuvance has worked side-by-side with Connecticut Childrens in Danbury and Norwalk, a partnership he described as fruitful and productive. Jim Shmerling, president and CEO of the Hartford-based Connecticut Childrens Medical Center, said he was excited about the expansion, and said it would give families greatest access to our pediatric expertise. It means that families will hopefully find it easier than ever to make appointments, find physicians or go into an intensive care unit if they need it he said. The two organizations highlighted the case of Tanya Madrigal, who received care through the partnership after her son arrived in June three months early. Madrigal said she received an emergency cesarean section after doctors told her it was necessary to save her life and the life of her son. All the doctors and nurses from Connecticut news conference. The first day she saw her son, he was connected to machines by wires. I was so scared, Madrigal said. The first thing that came to my mind was he was not going to make it. After blood transfusions, brain ultrasounds and a hernia removal, her son was able to come home Wednesday, Madrigal said. Hes an amazing baby, she said. Every single day hes smiling he has a smile for mommy every day. ANSONIA When school opens in Ansonia Thursday morning, Assistant Superintendent Steve Bergin will be running the system. Joe DiBacco, Ansonias superintendent of schools, confirmed he is stepping away temporarily due to ongoing complications from a routine medical procedure. I have no idea when Im going to be back, but right now, (according to) my doctors notes, its October 1, DiBacco said. DiBacco has been superintendent of schools for Ansonia since 2019, and was previously the assistant superintendent. He led the district through the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic and then presided over a switch to remote learning. He then oversaw the reopening of the school district, which happened as isolated virus outbreaks led to temporary school closures. Ansonia school officials did not immediately return calls seeking comment. DiBacco said he was in good spirits, and was touched by the amount of well wishes hes received. He credited the communitys caring with helping his recovery. Theres a lot of power in prayer. My wife is from Trinidad. I had people in Trinidad, I had people in Canada, I had people in my old school district in Hamden, everyones sending prayers my way, he said. DiBacco has had limited access to work emails since undergoing his procedure in July. He said his absence will not impact the school reopening. During his recovery, he said daily tasks have proved to be tiring. I shaved the other day. And I fell asleep for two hours after. Thats how tired Ive been, he said. The ongoing complications have not only impacted DiBaccos health, but also put a stop to a summer teaching class he was preparing for earlier this summer. I was going to be teaching an online school finance class for Quinnipiac (University), he said. Because, hey, what am I going to do for the month? Derby Superintendent Matthew Conway said he was aware of DiBaccos absence but that the regionalization study involving Ansonia and Derby would continue. The two districts have previously explored the possibility of combining resources to save money. The committee is still ongoing and meeting. Their next meeting is September 1, Conway said. WASHINGTON (AP) A former Bureau of Prisons officer who was serving time behind bars for an inappropriate sexual relationship with an inmate and a plot to kill his wife, as well as a separate plot to kill a federal agent who was investigating him, has been beaten to death at a federal prison in Indiana, two people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press. Michael Rudkin died Tuesday, a day after he was beaten in an altercation with another inmate at USP Terre Haute, a high-security penitentiary in Indiana, the people said. His death is being investigated as a potential homicide. The people were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. USP Terre Haute is also home to the federal death row and was the prison where 13 executions were carried out in the waning months of the Trump presidency. Rudkin, however, was not a death-row inmate and was serving a 90-year prison sentence. The Bureau of Prisons said Rudkin was found unresponsive at the prison around 6:30 p.m. on Monday and staff members began administering medical attention and called for emergency medical crews. He was taken to a local hospital with life-threatening injuries and died on Tuesday. His death is the latest in a rash of incidents for the federal Bureau of Prisons. In the last two years the AP has exposed one crisis after another, including rampant spread of coronavirus inside prisons and a failed response to the pandemic, escapes, deaths and critically low staffing levels that have hampered responses to emergencies, as well as serious misconduct. Rudkin worked for the Bureau of Prisons as a correctional officer at a federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut, and was convicted in 2009 after he was involved in a sexual relationship with a female inmate and plotted with her to kill his wife. He had been in the sexual relationship with the woman from October 2007 to January 2008 and promised to pay her $5,000 to arrange for his wifes murder, according to prosecutors. His plan included making periodic payments to her commissary account to pay off the debt. While he was serving his sentence in that case, Rudkin solicited help from other inmates to find someone outside of the prison to kill a federal agent with the Justice Departments inspector generals office, his ex-wife and others. Prosecutors said he had made an initial payment of $500 as part of that murder-for-hire plot and had promised more money would be coming. He had been held at Terre Haute, which houses more than 1,100 male inmates, since July 2017. Michael Sears/AP MADISON, Wis. (AP) President Joe Biden has nominated Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett to serve as the next U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg. The White House announced the appointment Wednesday. Barrett still needs Senate confirmation to serve, but the White House issued a statement with Barrett, a Democrat, saying hes proud to be nominated and looks forward to serving. Until then, he said, he will remain as mayor. The Trinity Spiritual Center is hosting Hindu writer, speaker and social activist Sadhvi Bhagawati Saraswati at a free event on Sept. 9. The event will be at 7 p.m. and will be both in-person and livestreamed. It is open to all people with advance registration. Saraswati will discuss the concept of the word grace, and how it unexpectedly entered, and changed her life. Saraswati will also explore the unusual series of events that led her out of her upper middle class American life, and into her spiritual awakening on the banks of the Ganga of India. Copies of Saraswatis memoir book, Hollywood to the Himalayas, will be available for a suggested donation of $30 or more to the Divine Shakti Foundation. An author signing will follow the event. Call the church at 203-255-0454 with questions. Register at Sadhvi_at_TSC_eventbrite.com. The center is located at 651 Pequot Ave. in Southport. Sailing organization host Scout Troop 88 Community Sailing of Fairfield recently hosted Fairfield Scout Troop 88 to an open sail on Aug. 16, with volunteer skippers taking 24 scouts out for demonstration sailing trips in club boats. The goal of the four-hour program was to have fun and introduce safe boating basics. Community Sailing of Fairfield is a 25-year-old nonprofit organization of sailing and kayaking enthusiasts based in Southports Ye Yacht Yard marina. Visit https://www.communitysailingfairfield.com/ for more information about the organization. Fairfield U. offering health care method acting workshop Fairfield Universitys Marion Peckham Egan School of Nursing and Health Studies is launching a free, three-day immersive acting workshop titled, Patients and Performance: Healthcare Method Acting. The workshop is open to the public and runs Sept. 17 through Sept. 19. Attendees will use the schools simulation center, and be trained to play roles of standardized patients, which is a key component of the Egan Schools curricula at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Actors will learn to portray patients with health care needs, and to interact with students in order to help them develop their skills as health care providers. Register by contacting Fairfield Universitys Administrative Assistant for Simulation and Health Studies Laura Strang at lstrang@fairfield.edu. Michael Cicirelli, an advanced practice registered nurse, and Tom Schwans, an adjunct professor in the schools Visual and Performing Arts Department, are teaching the workshop. In exchange for completing the workshop, participants are asked to commit to 10 unpaid hours of standardized patient acting. Upon fulfilling the 10-hour commitment, the participants are eligible to earn $18 an hour. Each day of the workshop, participants will layer acting methods in improvisation with empathy building experiences to allow them to immerse themselves in the role of a patient. Participants will need to attend all three sessions. The simulation center is accredited in teaching, and education through the Society for Simulation in Healthcare. Pride, wellness fair happening The Triangle Community Center is hosting a free Pride and Wellness Fair from noon to 3 p.m. on Aug. 29, at the Wakeman Boys and Girls Club in Southport. The event will feature vendors, who specialize in services including sexual, and reproductive health, personal trainers, mental health, massage, primary care, advocacy and more. The event is mask mandated amid the coronavirus pandemic, and wheelchair accessible. The Boys and Girls Club is located at 385 Center St. in Southport. The center is located at 650 West Ave. in Norwalk. Foundation announcer of Tree of Hope recognition The Pediatric Hydrocephalus Foundation is Augusts Tree of Hope on Sherman Green. The nonprofit works against hydrocephalus, the buildup of fluid in the brain. The tree has been lit up in hydrocephalus blue along with an informational lawn sign about the foundation, and the brain condition to raise awareness. Cindy and Tim Shanely, of Fairfield, are the foundations Connecticut chapter directors, as well as the parents of 8-year-old Reagan, who has the condition. Research projects about the condition are being conducted in several hospitals across Fairfield County, including the Yale School of Medicine, which has hosted local fundraising events on behalf of the foundation since 2015. The family has also created the Reagan Sloane Shanely Scholarship for applicants, who are interested in the neuroscience, or engineering fields, and who have an understanding, and, or current interest in the condition, cerebral spinal fluid, and the brain. ATHENS, Greece (AP) Workers at public hospitals in Greece held a five-hour work stoppage Thursday to protest a government decision making vaccination against COVID-19 mandatory for all health care workers in the public and private sector. About 300 hospital workers rallied outside the health ministry in Athens to protest the measure, which goes into effect on Sept. 1. The government has made clear that no extension will be granted. Those working in the public and private health care sector and those working in care homes who haven't received at least one dose of the vaccine by that date, or who dont have a certificate of recent recovery, will be suspended from work. The public hospital workers union said that while it supports the vaccines, it opposes making them mandatory. We will not leave defenseless the health care and social care workers who have a personal right to vaccination, the union said. Patients are not at risk of catching the coronavirus from health care workers. Hospitals are filling up again with patients suffering from the coronavirus which they caught in the community. Health Minister Vassilis Kikilias said those who were protesting against the measure were small minorities who frequently protest about an assortment of issues related to the national health system. They are in the opposite direction of the majority of Greek society, which wants to protect public health," he said. Speaking on Skai TV, Kikilias announced the start of a pilot program to have mobile vaccination units administering shots in town squares outside churches. The program would start this Sunday on the island of Crete, the minister said, and would expand to the country's main cities. Greece has been seeking to boost its vaccination drive with a series of incentives. It has been seeing a steady increase in confirmed coronavirus cases and deaths, as well as hospitalizations and intubations, over the past several weeks. ICU beds for COVID-19 patients are more than 69% full, while regular COVID-19 wards are 45% full, health ministry figures show. On Tuesday, Kikilias said that significantly more than 90% of patients who are in COVID ICUs are unvaccinated," without specifying whether some of them had received one vaccine dose and weren't yet fully vaccinated. More than 11 million vaccine doses have been administered, with 5.6 million people now fully vaccinated in this country of about 11 million people. COVID-19 vaccines are freely available in Greece to anyone over the age of 12. Vaccination is not mandatory except for those in the health care sector, but on Tuesday the government announced new testing requirements and restrictions on access to various venues for people who are unvaccinated. The measures, which will be in effect from Sept. 13 until March 31, include mandatory weekly or twice-weekly testing for unvaccinated public and private sector workers, and indoor access to venues such as restaurants, bars, cafes and entertainment venues allowed only for those with a certificate of vaccination or recent recovery. ___ Follow APs pandemic coverage at: https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak EDDYVILLE, Iowa (AP) An industrial acid leak at an animal feed supplement plant outside the southeastern Iowa town of Eddyville led to a shelter-in-place order and delayed local school openings, officials said. The leak of hydrochloric acid at the Ajinomoto was reported Wednesday night, and Eddyville residents were told to stay indoors for their safety. The shelter-in-place order was lifted around 1 a.m. Thursday, according to the Wapello County Sheriffs Office. NEW HAVEN Tweed New Haven Regional Airports immediate plan to renovate the existing terminal and the airports older administration building into departure and arrival terminals, and add 271 parking spaces on what used to be the airports second runway, gained an important step. The City Plan Commission unanimously approved the airports site plan and coastal site plan, as well as a flood plain permit and special permit for the additional parking following a 31/2-hour special meeting Wednesday night, during which it heard mostly from neighbors opposed to the plan. While several members sympathized with concerns about traffic, noise and climate change and acknowledged that, with regard to the latter, some of the citys rules may be out of date they said that based on the rules in place, the application merited approval. They also were sympathetic to the airport teams argument that the plan would better serve Tweed and was only a temporary solution until it puts forth a more comprehensive and controversial plan to extend the existing runway by 1,035 feet and build a new, larger terminal on the East Haven side of the airport as part of a $100 million expansion plan. Members Adam Marchand, Ernest Pagan, Vice Chairman Ed Mattison, Chairwoman Leslie Radcliff and newly-appointed alternate Carl Goldfield all voted in favor. Ive used that airport and I feel that the changes that are being proposed will help it function better, even without the large-scale enhancements that are being proposed, said Alder Marchand, D-25, who is the Board of Alders representative on the City Plan Commission. Nevertheless, there are things Im concerned about, Marchand said. But unless we are proposing to shut the airport, then we should help it to function better. Marchand acknowledged that in the age of global climate change, we need to be examining the citys standards and zoning codes. The issue, for me, is that ... our rules are somewhat out of date, said Mattison. Nevertheless, I will vote to support it because it does meet our current requirements ... but I dont think our requirements make sense. I think they should be much more focused on resilience. Goldfield said that within the constraints of what we were presented with, I feel that letting this go forward is the right thing to do. Radcliffe said that as commission members, we have a very narrow lane that were being asked to stay in. Does it meet the requirements and is it in alignment with our comprehensive plan? As a commissioner, the application is approvable, she said just prior to the vote. Tweed Executive Director Sean Scanlon said afterward that when we first announced this project in May, we made clear that there were many steps necessary to make it a reality. Tonight was one of those critical steps, and I want to thank the City Plan Commission for their thoughtful comments and support. We were grateful for the opportunity to collaborate with commission staff on these important issues and look forward to continued work with other city officials in the coming weeks, including the Board of Alders, he said. Through this process, we have and will continue to ensure this project is undertaken in a responsible and transparent manner. Commission approval of the interim plan comes as the longer-term plan, including a proposed 43-year lease and long-term management contract for Avports LLC, Tweeds contract operator, is about to come before the Board of Alders. Under the proposed arrangement, Avports would fund up to $100 million in improvements including a new terminal, runway extension and moving the airports entrance to the East Haven side off Proto Drive eliminating the need for the $1.8 million in state and local subsidies Tweed receives each year. In total, the commission received 12 letters in favor of the application and 21 in opposition. Of the dozen or so residents who spoke Wednesday, all but one were opposed. Carl Testa, vice chairman of the citys Quinnipiac East Community Management Team, submitted a motion unanimously recommending that that the commission and the Board of Alders postpone voting on Tweed until additional information can be delivered. Lighthouse Road resident Rachel Hareema, organizer of the 10,000 Hawks opposition group, told members, My big question for the commission is, What about our health? Hareema said that asthma is very prevalent in New Haven and air pollution from more planes is huge and a triggering factor in asthma. Resident Gretl Gallicchio told the commission, I am vehemently opposed to the ... expansion. ... It seems to me that proceeding with any construction, any preliminary steps is highly irresponsible at a time when we do not have completed environmental impact studies. Gallicchio pointed out that just this last weekend we had lots of flooding on the runways down here. ... I think the consideration of a plan like this in the age of climate change ... is extremely irresponsible. Julia McFadden of Townsend Avenue said she was concerned about traffic along Townsend Avenue. This needs more study, McFadden said. The one resident who spoke in favor of Tweeds application was William Villano, a Townsend Avenue resident who also is director of the Workforce Alliance, which is working with Tweed and its new airline, Avelo Airlines, to train people for about 100 jobs being offered locally. Avelo last week announced plans to being flying from Tweed to four Florida cities Orlando, Fort Laudedale, Tampa and Fort Myers on Nov. 3. I support the increase in service at Tweed, Villano said, who said it will create new pathways to jobs for New Haven residents ... I live only a few blocks from the airport and takeoff noise levels is minimal. Lisa Bassani of Nelson Street in Morris Cove, said that FEMA projects this airport to be under water by 2050 and the neighborhood and adjacent neighborhoods face ongoing flooding issues. Gabriela Campos Matteson of Stewart Street said what Tweed is looking to do is an imposition of a giant airport. Bradley is not in a residential neighborhood, she said of the states much larger Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks. We live on marshes. The roads have sinkholes, she said. She said of the airport, This is city property. This should be for the benefit of the residents. Not one resident who Ive spoken to is in favor of it. East Haven resident Lorena Venegas said the commission had to deny the permit because the applicant had sought a waiver not to use required reflective heat coatings. Tweeds development team, led by attorney Joseph Williams, urged the commission to approve the application. Josh Wilson, a senior ecologist and professional wetlands scientist for Fuss & ONeill, pointed out that there would be no addition of impervious area on the site and sum total of the project actually would be to decrease the amount of paved area, as well as improved stormwater management, with no adverse impacts to coastal resources. Airport consultant Andrew Vasey said there would be a net reduction of 1,300 square feet of pavement as a result of the project. The new parking would be on what already are paved surfaces from the former crosswind runway, he said. We were careful not to pave a new parking lot, he said. Mattison at one point said he thought the commisions ought to hire somebody who is an independent professional to give us advice. City Plan Director Aicha Woods told the commission, however, that there have been about nine internal technical review meetings on this, and this has certainly been looked at by our own experts in the Building Department, City Plan and the Engineering Department. She pointed out that as an architect, Ive worked as a consultant designing airports. She said Mattisons suggestion would be a very good one for the more permanent plans at Tweed. She and Williams both pointed out that the plan before the commission Wednesday was for a temporary solution that would last about three years. mark.zaretsky@hearstmediact.com WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) Federal prosecutors have reached consent judgments with a company accused of fraud while providing mental health and substance abuse treatment services at community clinics throughout Delaware, authorities said Thursday. Connections Community Support Programs, which also is the former medical and behavioral health care contractor for the Department of Correction, has agreed to the entry of consent judgments totaling more than $15.3 million, U.S. Attorney David Weiss said in a news release. The judgments resolve two lawsuits brought by the federal government alleging health care fraud under the federal False Claims Act and violations of the Controlled Substances Act. The company, which sought bankruptcy protection in April shortly after the lawsuits were filed, agreed to the entry of a judgment for $13.7 million, plus interest, to resolve claims that it violated the False Claims Act. Those claims involved allegations that providers working for the company billed Medicare or Medicaid for mental health services even though the providers didn't qualify professionally to do so. Connections was also accused of billing Medicaid for mental health services using incorrect procedure codes for the person performing the service, resulting in higher payments than were permitted. The company also has agreed to the entry of a judgment for $1.6 million, plus interest, to resolve claims that it violated the federal Controlled Substances Act. Those claims allege that Connections negligently failed to keep proper records of its use of controlled substances, including methadone and buprenorphine, in its treatment of patients with substance use disorders, and that it transferred controlled substances between locations without proper documentation. The company completed a bankruptcy sale of its assets and operations in June to Conexio Care, Inc. and Coras Wellness and Behavioral Health. The settlement agreements and consent judgments between Connections and the United States must be approved by the bankruptcy court, and the final amount of any recovery will be limited by the availability of funds in the bankruptcy estate. The False Claims Act settlement partially resolves a whistleblower lawsuit filed by two former Connections employees, who are continuing to pursue additional claims against the company and former CEO Catherine Devaney McKay. Federal authorities are also continuing to pursue claims for violations of the Controlled Substances Act against McKay and two other Connections executives, William Northey and Steven Davis. Davis has denied the allegations against him and sought to have them dismissed. A judge has yet to rule a motion by McKay arguing that some of the allegations are barred by the passage of time, and that the government should be forced to provide a more definite statement providing specific details regarding the basis for other allegations. Prosecutors filed a motion last week seeking a default judgment against Northey for failing to respond to the complaint. Delaware Department of Correction officials announced abruptly in March 2020 that they were ending their contracts with Connections, three months before their scheduled expiration. Connections has been the DOCs medical care provider since 2014 and its behavioral health services provider since 2012. An independent review of Delawares prison health care system in 2019 found that it was plagued by poor communications, little accountability and a lack of data collection and analysis, and that organizational changes were needed. That same year, Delaware lawmakers unanimously approved a bill to reform a committee charged with monitoring prison health care. The bill was introduced after the attorney generals office confirmed it was investigating allegations that Connections had ordered staffers to forge documents to falsely state inmates were getting mental health treatment they never received. In January 2020, Bayhealth Medical Center in Dover filed a lawsuit claiming that it was owed more than $6 million by Connections for medical care the hospital had provided to prison inmates. BOWLING GREEN, Mo. (AP) A woman died and a man was seriously injured when the stolen vehicle they were riding in crashed along a Pike County highway, authorities said. Officials said the unknown driver of the stolen vehicle fled on foot from the wreckage, and authorities were searching for that person. New York State Senator Brian Benjamin, right, and State Senator John Liu, second from left, attend the "Voting is Justice Rally," on June 20, 2021, in New York. Gov. Kathy Hochul has chosen Benjamin, a Democrat from Harlem, to be her lieutenant governor. (AP Photo/Brittainy Newman, File) The National Broadcasting Commission has queried Channels Television over the inciting, divisive and unfair comments made by Benue State... The National Broadcasting Commission has queried Channels Television over the inciting, divisive and unfair comments made by Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom, on the TVs Sunrise Daily breakfast programme on Tuesday. NBC made this known in a letter to the television station titled, Notice of Infraction. The regulators letter was dated August 24, 2021 and signed by its Director-General, Balarabe Ilelah. NBC said, The programme which had as guest the Executive Governor of Benue State, Governor Samuel Ortom, was observed to contain inciting, divisive and unfair comments which were not thoroughly interrogated by the anchors. It said the actions negated Sections 1.10.4, 3.1.1, 3.3.1(b), 3.3.1(e), 3.11.1(a), and 3.12.2 of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code. Consequently, Channels Television is required to explain why appropriate sanctions should not be applied for these infractions of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code. Your response should reach the Commission within 24 hours of the receipt of this letter. Ortom, who was a guest on the TV programme on Tuesday morning, had said, Mr President is pushing me to think that what they say about him, that he has a hidden agenda in this country is true because it is very clear that he wants to fulanise but he is not the first Fulani president. Shagari was a Fulani President, Yar Adua was a Fulani President and they were the best in the history. But President Buhari is the worst President when it comes to issues of security and keeping his promises. Go back to 2015, what did he say, human rights issues, he talked about press freedom, about the economy, corruption, security, tell me one that Mr President has achieved. He has achieved some level of development in other sectors but these prominent things that are concerns to Nigerians and we are all worried about.. tell me when Mr President has come out to address them. Is it corruption, we are worse in the history of this country. The outspoken fiery governor had also flayed the President, Major General Muhammadu Buharis stance on open grazing. Buhari had approved recommendations of a committee to review 368 grazing sites, across 25 states in the country, to determine the levels of encroachment. Reacting, Ortom had said, If Mr President respects the law, the Land Use Act gives governors the power to preside over land administration on behalf of the people that they govern. So it is amazing and I am surprised to hear this coming from Mr President as if he doesnt have an Attorney General, or Lawyers around him to advise him. I think Mr President was misquoted or he did it out of error. He should come out to apologise to Nigerians. The Presidency subsequently came hard on the governor on Wednesday and accused him of using sectarian language similar to that of the Rwandan Genocide of 1994, while reacting to the security challenges in his state. Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, in a statement had said, In an attempt to boost his sinking political fortunes, Ortom takes the cheapest and lowest route possible by playing on ethnic themes and in doing so knowingly causes deaths of innocent Nigerians by inciting farmers against herders, and Christians against Muslims. Garba had added that the good, and fair-minded people of Benue State deserve more than this, and we look forward to the next election when they have an opportunity to restore its greatness. Manchester City are ready to offer Cristiano Ronaldo between 14m-15m a year in wages to join them from Juventus, according to Italian trans... Manchester City are ready to offer Cristiano Ronaldo between 14m-15m a year in wages to join them from Juventus, according to Italian transfer expert, Gianluca Di Marzio. The Premier League champions want to sign Ronaldo on a two-year deal. The 36-year-old is into the last 11 months of his current contract with Juve and wants to leave Serie A. City are now keen on the former Manchester United forward, after Harry Kane announced he is staying at Tottenham Hotspur this season. Pep Guardiola needs a striker in his squad following the departure of Sergio Aguero to Barcelona. City have until the transfer deadline on Tuesday to secure a striker. Ferran Torres, predominantly a winger, started as the central striker against Norwich on Saturday, with Gabriel Jesus deployed as a right winger. Jesus is the only recognised senior striker at the club, while academy forward Liam Delap, 18, is set to stay rather than leaving on loan. Jefferson and St. Bernard parish school officials appear content to let the COVID-19 Delta variant largely run its course by implementing only modest mitigation measures and even rolling back some safeguards put in place last year to control the significantly less deadly version of the virus. Considering 11 children in Louisiana have died as a result of Covid and infection rates among school-aged children are skyrocketing, it's an approach to public health policy that one expert says has turned kids, who are largely unvaccinated, into sitting ducks. It doesn't make sense to me, Tulane epidemiologist Dr. Susan Hassig told Gambit. We were offering remote back then but we're not offering remote now when we've got even more transmission and more people hospitalized. Ted Beasley, a spokesperson for Jefferson Parish schools, acknowledged the district was expecting positive cases during the school year because of the virus' prevalence in the state. As long as the virus is present in our community, we are prepared for cases among students, employees and families, he said in a statement to Gambit. When school districts initially began planning for the 2021-2022 school year, new Covid cases were declining, live music and other events were returning and scheduled for the fall, and officials were easing restrictions across the state. But then in July, Delta began rapidly spreading in the area and cases started to surge. Rather than account for the new variant, officials in St. Bernard and Jefferson Parish opted to stick to the loosened rules and since then, teachers say the implementation of those standards hasnt been smooth. The biggest change from last year is that Jefferson and St. Bernard parishes are no longer offering a virtual option to all students nor are they implementing a hybrid model where students learn from school some days and from home others. That means a lot more students and staff are on school campuses. Neither district is checking the temperature of staff and students, though Hassig says that may have been more pandemic theater anyway. Field trips, which were discontinued altogether last year, are now allowed in a limited capacity. And before Gov. John Bel Edwards reinstated the statewide indoor mask mandate on Aug. 2, both districts only recommended masks rather than requiring them. Additionally, there are no longer set maximum group sizes in either parish, which last year ranged from 10-50 people in a room depending on which phase of restrictions the state was in. Buses no longer have capacity limits either, though Jefferson Parishs pandemic Start Strong Plan does note that Families are encouraged to drive their children to school if possible. They planned for one virus and now we've got another one, Hassig said. They set their plans back when transmission was low and they haven't changed it now that transmission is high. Through Aug. 22, 6,111 students and 837 employees have tested positive for Covid in K-12 schools, according to data compiled by the Louisiana Department of Health and released Wednesday. That means likely tens of thousands have already quarantined in the state. In Jefferson Parish, between Aug. 15-21, 3,014 students, teachers and other staff were quarantined from public schools, including 54 employees. Of those, 412 people, including 45 employees, tested positive for the virus, according to the district. During the same period, St. Bernard Parish reported 107 positive cases, including five employees, resulting in an additional 387 individuals being quarantined. John Ehret High School teacher Brian Williams said last year his school used to send individual emails for each new positive case at the school, but now theyre sending notifications with a total count of new cases instead. Jeremy Williams (no relation to Brian Williams) had two children who were among those quarantined in Jefferson Parish last week. It was the first time theyd been back to school in person since the pandemic started, as they opted for Jefferson Parishs virtual option last year. His second grader at Airline Park Elementary was sent home the fourth day of school through Monday, Aug. 23. In fact, the entire second and third grade had to quarantine. Then, his high schooler at Haynes Academy for Advanced Studies was notified the weekend after school started that hed have to stay home until Tuesday, Aug. 24 because of a potential exposure on the bus. While his kids were out, they were given Google Classroom assignments they needed to complete at home rather than live virtual instruction. He said though his children had learned to navigate virtual learning last year, they still had questions about what needed to be submitted online and had trouble getting clear answers from some of the teachers and the schools about what they needed to do. They're kind of left to their own devices, Williams said. There was no support network. If we called with simple questions, the school might answer them. But there was nothing beyond that. So literally the kid on their own with their parent if the parent can help. One Jefferson Parish elementary school teacher, whose identity Gambit is preserving because she fears reprisal from the district, said shes been posting assignments online for her quarantined students, but that she doesnt believe her students know theyre supposed to be turning them in online. I don't even think they know they have to do that because this happened so suddenly in the school year, she said. They're still rolling all of that stuff out yet they're supposed to utilize it all immediately. We just haven't even set all that up yet. Overall, its been frustrating. Theres a lack of communication. Theres a lack of responsiveness, Williams said. While we were going into last year with more unknowns about the pandemic, we were better prepared for a situation where the case counts werent as high, it wasnt affecting kids [to this extent]. This year Im sure youve seen the memes the school board plans are like, Step 1: Open schools. Step 2: Freak out. Both districts say they are working with the state health department and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to determine their ongoing Covid policies. "Just like last school year, our Start Strong Jefferson plan aligns with recommendations from the Louisiana Department of Health and the CDC," Beasley said. "In fact, the CDC continues to recommend that children return to full-time in-person learning given new evidence on the Delta variant. We will continue to follow the guidance of medical professionals." At the moment, schools have only close contacts of infected staff or students quarantine. The CDC currently defines a close contact as someone who was within six feet of a person who tests positive for a total of 15 minutes or more within two days prior to illness onset. But that determination was made with less transmissible versions of Covid, and its unclear if its still sufficient guidance with Delta. For schools, the latest CDC guidance only recommends students maintain at least three feet of physical distance between students within classrooms. A St. Bernard teacher and parent told Gambit that when a student tests positive, a person comes into the classroom and measures the perimeter around that students desk to determine close contacts. But little else is done to determine who may have come in contact with the student. I have been asked if we have done any group work but not much more than that, she said. That approach leaves an enormous number of opportunities for school spread uninvestigated. For example, it does not necessarily take into account possible transmission between students while in hallways. In other areas like buses, some of which are being quarantined, schools are at best uneven in how they enforce the rules. The Jefferson Parish elementary school teacher said last week that two buses at her school had been quarantined but that shes seen several students who rode the bus back in school anyway. She said in these instances, teachers only noticed at the end of the day once the students bus didnt show up to pick them up. We had a whole bus that had to be quarantined, yet those kids got dropped off to school in the morning by their parents, the teacher said. And during dismissal, they're just sitting there because all the buses have already been called, and we're like, 'Well why are you still here?' It's like, 'Oh my lord, like how did you slip through the cracks all day long while you're supposed to be quarantined?' There's been at least two or three of those in our hall every single day, she added. Between the two quarantined buses, one grade quarantined the first week and two others quarantined the next week at her school, it's been an interesting two weeks so far, we'll put it that way, she said. Because the virus is more transmissible, more children are getting infected as a whole. On Monday, the Louisiana Department of Health reported that kids ages 5 through 17 made up the highest rate of new cases per 100,000 people of any age group in Louisiana over the last week. That was the first time that's ever happened, which is really quite daunting to think about, said Hassig, the epidemiologist. According to Fox 8, doctors at Childrens Hospital in New Orleans said recently there have been about 18 children hospitalized with Covid there daily and about half of them are less than two years old. Additionally, children in K-12 schools are largely unvaccinated. Only children ages 12 and older are eligible for the Pfizer vaccine, and vaccination rates remain low among that age group. Anyone unvaccinated is at high risk of exposure and infection with Delta circulating the way it is right now, Hassig said. So unfortunately, the young ages are unable to be vaccinated or are vaccinated at relatively low levels at this moment in time, so they're kind of sitting ducks. Despite these numbers coinciding with the start of the school year, its hard to tell if the return to school is contributing to the spread among children or just a product of the Delta variants prevalence in Louisiana, according to Hassig. But she said a lack of mitigation protocols and adherence to them could make in-person learning an issue. I think that especially if schools aren't being rigorous with their mitigation protocols, with masking and distancing to the degree possible and keeping kids from spending much time at all, if any, unmasked in the presence of other kids ... that there is a real possibility that school itself could be a problem, Hassig said. Meanwhile, Brian Williams, the John Ehret teacher, said because of the Delta variant this school year has been much more stressful than last year, especially because his school has significant Latino and Black populations, two groups that have been hit particularly hard by Covid. He says one of his classes has more than 30 students, which would be a lot even if there wasnt a global pandemic. It really just feels like Covid is in the classroom with you, he said. And it's just kind of terrifying the amount of responsibility that myself and other teachers feel trying to keep kids safe in a situation that ... I feel is not safe. Despite ongoing pandemic, school boards in suburban parishes eliminate quarantine days for teachers By the second week of August, 80 Jefferson Parish public school employees were out quarantining due to potential exposure to COVID-19. But onc KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) A suicide attack outside Kabul's airport Thursday killed at least 2 people and wounded 15, Russian officials said. Large crowds of people have massed outside the airport as they try to flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. UPDATE: At least 12 U.S. service members killed in 2 suicide attacks outside Kabul airport Western nations had warned earlier in the day of a possible attack at the airport in the waning days of a massive airlift. Suspicion for any attack targeting the crowds would likely fall on the Islamic State group and not the Taliban, who have been deployed at the airport's gates trying to control the mass of people. The Pentagon confirmed the blast, and Russian Foreign Ministry gave the official casualty count. The explosion went off in a crowd of people waiting to enter the airport, according to Adam Khan, an Afghan waiting nearby. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who lost body parts. Several countries urged people to avoid the airport earlier in the day, with one saying there was a threat of a suicide bombing. But just days or even hours for some nations before the evacuation effort ends, few appeared to heed the call. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have pledged not to attack Western forces during the evacuation, but insist the foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from Afghanistan's Islamic State group affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban's freeing of prisoners during their blitz across the country. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC early Thursday there was "very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack" at the airport, possibly within "hours." Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said his country had received information from the U.S. and other countries about the "threat of suicide attacks on the mass of people." The acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was "clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling." But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details and did not say whether the threat remained. A while later, the blast was reported. U.S. President Joe Biden has been briefed on the explosion, the White House says. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport, with Australia's foreign minister saying there was a "very high threat of a terrorist attack." Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent in the wake of those warnings. Earlier Thursday, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. "We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger," Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping." Gunshots later echoed in the area as Sadat waited. "There is anarchy because of immense crowds," she said, blaming the U.S. for the chaos. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. "The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. "They are looking for them house-by-house at night." Many Afghans share those fears. The hard-line Islamic group wrested back control of the country nearly 20 years after being ousted in a U.S.-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Senior U.S. officials said Wednesday's warning from the embassy was related to specific threats involving the Islamic State group and potential vehicle bombs. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss ongoing military operations. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan grew out of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even more extreme view of Islam. The Sunni extremists have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan. But IS fighters were likely freed from prisons along with other inmates during the Taliban's rapid advance. Extremists may have seized heavy weapons and equipment abandoned by Afghan troops. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. "The reality on the ground is the perimeter of the airport is closed. The Taliban have tightened the noose. It's very, very difficult for anybody to get through at this point," said Canadian General Wayne Eyre, the country's acting Chief of Defense Staff. Lt. Col. Georges Eiden, Luxembourg's army representative in neighboring Pakistan, said that Friday would mark the official end for U.S. allies. But two Biden administration officials denied that was the case. A third official said that the U.S. worked with its allies to coordinate each country's departure, and some nations asked for more time and were granted it. "Most depart later in the week," he said, while adding that some were stopping operations Thursday. All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the information publicly. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told RTL radio his country's efforts would stop Friday evening. Danish Defense Minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: "It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul." Denmark's last flight has already departed, and Poland and Belgium have also announced the end of their evacuations. The Dutch government said it had been told by the U.S. to leave Thursday. But Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said some planes would continue to fly. "Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission," he said in a tweet. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. The Taliban have promised to return Afghanistan to security and pledged they won't seek revenge on those who opposed them or roll back progress on human rights. But many Afghans are skeptical. Ziar Yad, an Afghan journalist from private broadcaster Tolo News, said Taliban fighters beat him and his colleague and confiscated their cameras, technical equipment and a mobile phone as they tried to report on poverty in Kabul. "The issue has been shared with Taliban leaders; however, the perpetrators have not yet been arrested, which is a serious threat to freedom of expression," Yad wrote on Twitter. ___ Lawless reported from London and Gambrell from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press writers Joseph Krauss in Jerusalem; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. A Slidell area man has been arrested and accused of sexually abusing animals, the St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's Office said Wednesday. Kenneth Ord Starling, 52, was booked with 32 counts of sexual abuse of animals, the Sheriff's Office said in a news release. The Sheriff's Office said Starling admitted having sexual intercourse with two of his dogs. The Sheriff's Office said it had received a complaint about possible inappropriate behavior with animals. Detectives searched Starling's residence on Victoria Way and found "numerous images and videos of animals being sexually abused," the news release said. Starling was booked into the St. Tammany Parish Jail in Covington. His bond had not yet been set Wednesday afternoon. St. Tammany Parish Animal Control took the two dogs that were at Starling's home. As a dog owner myself I find this behavior unthinkable and very disturbing, Sheriff Randy Smith said in the news release. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. At least 13 people were killed and dozens wounded, Russian officials and aid workers said. At least 12 U.S. service members were among the dead, including 11 Marines and one Navy medic, according to two U.S. officials. Officials say a number of US military troops were wounded and warned the toll could grow. It was not clear if they were included in the Russian toll. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. A second U.S. official said the complex attack was believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz and condemned the attack. Western officials had warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport, but that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. President Biden to keep to Aug. 31 deadline for Afghanistan evacuations, drawing criticism U.S. President Joe Biden is sticking to his Aug. 31 deadline for completing a frantic airlift of Americans, at-risk Afghans and others seeking Russias Foreign Ministry gave the first official casualty count, but the numbers continued to grow. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby also confirmed the blasts and said there were casualties, including among members of the military, but gave no figure. He said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. One official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing military operations, said several Marines were killed. It wasnt clear if other U.S. military troops were among the dead. American officials have said that information is still coming in and they are trying to determine exact numbers of casualties. Even as the area was hit, evacuation flights continued to take off from Kabul airport. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. US official says CIA director met Taliban leader in Kabul The director of the CIA met with the Taliban's top political leader in Kabul amid the ongoing effort to evacuate people fleeing their takeover All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. In Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Top stories in New Orleans in your inbox Twice daily we'll send you the day's biggest headlines. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The reality on the ground is the perimeter of the airport is closed. The Taliban have tightened the noose. Its very, very difficult for anybody to get through at this point, Canadian General Wayne Eyre, the countrys acting Chief of Defense Staff, said ahead of the attack. Lt. Col. Georges Eiden, Luxembourgs army representative in neighboring Pakistan, said that Friday would mark the official end for U.S. allies. But two Biden administration officials denied that was the case. A third official said that the U.S. worked with its allies to coordinate each countrys departure, and some nations asked for more time and were granted it. Most depart later in the week, he said, while adding that some were stopping operations Thursday. All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the information publicly. Danish Defense Minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned earlier: It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul. Islamic State threat forces US changes to evacuations at Kabul airport KABUL, Afghanistan Potential Islamic State threats against Americans in Afghanistan are forcing the U.S. military to develop new ways to get Denmark's last flight has already departed, and Poland and Belgium have also announced the end of their evacuations. The Dutch government said it had been told by the U.S. to leave Thursday. But Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, said some planes would continue to fly. Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission, he said in a tweet. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. ___ Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.tr A Metairie woman is barred from working as a tax preparer in Louisiana after a 2020 investigation found her guilty of submitting false returns for several clients. Brischea Bowman Johnson has been barred from preparing, filing or assisting with any state tax returns other than her own, according to a news release from the Louisiana Department of Revenue. Johnson was arrested in 2020 after a joint investigation between the LDR Criminal Investigations Division and the state Attorney General's office found she submitted false tax returns for several clients, including fraudulent claims for deductions for charitable contributions and business expenses, state officials said. After Johnson pled guilty, the Department of Revenue filed a civil case against her to bar her from working as a tax preparer in the state. Johnson is the seventh person barred from working as a tax preparer in Louisiana since 2018. The number of COVID patients in Louisiana's hospitals continued to drop on Wednesday after more than a week of steady decline, according to a Thursday afternoon update from the Louisiana Department of Health. There were 2,729 patients with COVID-19 in Louisiana's hospitals as of Wednesday, the latest day for which data is available, a decrease of 115 patients from the day before. Hospitalizations during this latest and worst surge in Louisiana peaked on Aug. 17 with record-setting 3,022 patients. Since then, that number has steadily dipped, though there remains far more COVID patients in the hospital now than during either of the previous three waves. The state reported 59 new confirmed deaths and 13 more that are suspected to have been caused by the coronavirus. Confirmed infections increased by 3,684. Another 1,447 cases were listed as "probable" by the Louisiana Department of Health, for a total of 5,131 new cases. There were 480 patients on ventilators on Wednesday, eight more than the day before. Vaccine news in your inbox Once a week we'll update you on the progress of COVID-19 vaccinations. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine booster shot increases antibodies, researchers say Johnson & Johnson says a booster shot of its COVID-19 vaccine appears to produce a rapid and robust increase in antibodies needed to fig Note: The Advocate and The Times-Picayune staff calculates daily case count and confirmed death increases based on the difference between today's total and yesterday's total of confirmed coronavirus cases and deaths. The Louisiana Department of Health releases a daily case count on its dashboard that includes probable cases as indicated by a positive antigen test. That case count can be different than the one listed here. Here are the parishes with the highest number of new cases: Jefferson: 425 Orleans: 278 St. Tammany: 254 East Baton Rouge: 212 Lafayette: 197 Caddo: 191 Ouachita: 184 Terrebonne: 125 Livingston: 108 St. Landry: 103 Here are the parishes with the highest number of new deaths: One man was shot dead and two people were injured Wednesday evening in the New Orleans Central Business District. The violence was reported at 6:27 p.m. at Loyola Avenue and Julia Street. The 25-year-old victim, Kendrick Hollerman, died there, on the sidewalk adjacent to a surface parking lot on the lake side of Loyola between Union Passenger Terminal and the post office parking garage. Emergency Medical Services took the other two, a man shot in the leg and a man who suffered scrapes, to a hospital. It was one of two shootings Wednesday evening in New Orleans. At about 10:30 p.m., a 23-year-old man was shot in the 4300 block of Maple Leaf Drive and taken to a hospital in a private vehicle. Police did not release more details. Top stories in New Orleans in your inbox Twice daily we'll send you the day's biggest headlines. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up Anyone with information on the crimes was asked to call police at (504) 658-6010 or Crimestoppers Inc. at (504) 822-1111. CORRECTION: Based on Police Department information, earlier versions of this story said the CBD victim who suffered scrapes was a juvenile. The Police Department later said the victim was an adult male. Editor's note: This story has been updated with new information from authorities. A man accused of a deadly Aug. 14 shooting in Treme was jailed Wednesday, the New Orleans Police Department said. Bernard Nwubah, 39, was booked with second-degree murder in the killing of 48-year-old Isaac Johnson. Johnson was kneeling and facing a building in the 2600 block of Dumaine Street when another man walked up and shot him in the head, said police, citing surveillance video. Johnson died later at a hospital. Nwubah fell under scrutiny when officers linked him to a white Mercedes-Benz C class car captured on video near the scene of the killing, police wrote in a sworn statement filed in criminal court. Officers also searched his home and in his bedroom found a distinctive headwrap that matched one worn on surveillance video by Johnson's killer, detectives said in the court documents. Top stories in New Orleans in your inbox Twice daily we'll send you the day's biggest headlines. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up When questioned by investigators, Nwubah said he was at the New Orleans East home where he lives by himself at the time Johnson was slain, according to investigators. Police nonetheless booked Nwubah on Wednesday. The court filings accusing Nwubah of murder don't specify a possible motive for Johnson's slaying. Nwubah's bail wasnt immediately set. If convicted as charged, he would receive mandatory life imprisonment. The most recent leader of the Louisiana Housing Corp. to be forced from office while facing sexual harassment allegations is now accusing board members of dirty dealing, after a law firm hired to investigate said it couldnt corroborate the female subordinates claims. Keith Cunningham was suspended in April from his $200,000 job as executive director of the housing corporation, a state agency, pending an investigation into the harassment claims, which he denies. The state Senate didnt bother to wait for the outcome, however, refusing to confirm Cunningham in a closed-door vote on the last day of the legislative session in June. The Kullman Firm issued its report to the agency a month later, saying its investigation could not conclusively establish that Keith Cunningham engaged in conduct that constitutes a violation of LHCs sexual harassment policy. Cunningham views the 13-page report as belated vindication. Now hes threatening to sue the agency, claiming his exit was orchestrated by board members irked over his refusal to hire a Ville Platte housing developer, Charles Tate, to a high-paying agency post. Cunningham had signed a three-year contract extension last year. In a recent settlement demand letter, his attorney, John Smith, cited a November phone call in which he said Cunningham sought to discuss a raise with the board's then-chairman, Lloyd Buddy Spillers, and vice-chairwoman, Jennifer Vidrine. Vidrine, the mayor of Ville Platte and a longtime friend of Tate's, wasn't hearing it. Im not talking about anything else until we get this Charles Tate thing resolved, she demanded. Board member Willie Rack was also on the call. Cunningham claims that after he balked, board members weaponized murky allegations of sexual harassment to force him out. Vidrine did not return calls seeking comment. Spillers, who resigned from the board in February, acknowledged the rift over the question of hiring Tate. But he denied playing a role in Cunninghams ouster. I think the #metoo movement caught his butt. And the LSU debacle, and the attorney general, Spillers said, referring to a pair of sexual harassment scandals that roiled the state Capitol last spring. It was all blasting down in Louisiana at the same time. Cunninghams accuser filed a formal complaint in March, followed by a lawsuit, alleging that Cunningham propositioned her for sex on a monthly basis starting soon after she was hired in 2016. She alleges that Cunningham ogled her and tried to touch her breasts, pestered her over why she wasn't attracted to dark-skinned brothers, and retaliated against her after she rejected his advances. The Kullman Firm interviewed a dozen witnesses in late April and early May, reviewed emails and found that none of the witnesses were able to corroborate (her) allegations of inappropriate conduct by Cunningham. Cunningham conceded that hed made comments like Black dont crack and called the woman by the nickname Hollywood. The report found that he has, on occasion, used language in the workplace that may not be appropriate. But the only allegations that have been corroborated are a handful of sporadic comments over a four-year period and only one was based on (her) gender," the report said. The womans attorney, Jill Craft, downplayed the report, calling it unsurprising considering the law firm was hired by the state and the alleged harassment came in one-on-one situations where only Cunningham and his accuser were present. She says it happened, and he says it didnt. So the litigation is pending and we look forward to getting this matter before a jury, Craft said. The housing corporation was created a decade ago to merge the functions of several other agencies that administered state and federal funding to help build homes for low- and moderate-income people. Of the agencys 11 board members, six were appointed by the governor and two each by the Senate president and House speaker. The state treasurer also sits on the board. Vidrine is an appointee of Senate President Page Cortez, R-Lafayette. Spillers and Rack were appointed by Gov. John Bel Edwards. Top stories in New Orleans in your inbox Twice daily we'll send you the day's biggest headlines. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up +2 'These people are struggling': Huge spigot of rental aid begins to open up across Louisiana Julie Winn had done about all she could to keep up with the rent on her Central City shotgun, despite a steep loss in income from a cancelled Scandal isn't new to the agency. The last executive director before Cunningham, Frederick Tombar III, resigned after he was accused of promising to protect an employees job in exchange for sex in a Baton Rouge hotel room booked on the agencys dime. Even so, the Kullman Firm's investigation found that the agency still maintained an outdated sexual harassment policy that was silent as to what individuals should do if they are informed by a co-worker that sexual harassment is occurring. The agencys human resources department did not seem to have a system for documenting or logging employee complaints and how they were resolved, the report added. The law firm's report also raised questions about how witnesses, including Spillers, responded to comments the woman had made last year about Cunningham. At some point, she suggested to Spillers that Cunningham was coming on to her and told a security guard that he'd asked her out, but those comments didnt get forwarded, the report said. Spillers did approach Cunningham about the woman last fall, though it was unclear what he revealed about the woman's harassment or discrimination claims. The report says that Cunningham, "to his credit," asked the agencys counsel to investigate anything." But when agency lawyers talked to Spillers, he did not disclose that (the woman) had made any complaints of harassment or discrimination. Consequently, no investigation was initiated at that time," the report said. Spillers said the woman "dropped little things like, 'There's more going on than you know.' In the same breath, she said something (like) she didn't want any publicity about this." Spillers said he determined she wasn't, in fact, making a complaint to him. The current board chairman, A.P. Marullo, an Edwards appointee, declined to comment on the mess, citing pending litigation. Spillers denied strong-arming Cunningham in the phone call and dismissed his allegation that the dispute was connected to his firing, though he acknowledged that hiring Tate was a longstanding goal for he and other board members. Tate, who had worked as an aide to former Gov. Kathleen Blanco, had been the boards first choice to replace Tombar in 2016. But the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development balked at potential conflicts involving money Tate was owed through LHC grant funds for past work with an Opelousas nonprofit he ran, Community Directions Inc., and with his for-profit firm, Jasmine Consulting LLC. Tate, a former Ville Platte city attorney, said he ultimately withdrew from the running, then received support from board members for another job with the agency. There was early talk of hiring Tate as an executive officer, but Tate said the pay was too low, and as a classified position the job needed to be posted. Spillers said Cunningham dragged his feet over the hire. We felt that (Tate) kind of got the tail end of the deal. We had a sympathetic ear to his situation. We asked Keith to find someplace where we could talk about him being employed in a non-classified position, Spillers said. We got gaslighted and delayed and delayed. When we confronted Keith, it was just, Lets get this done, its been going on long enough. Nobody twisted his arm. But Smith, Cunningham's lawyer, argued that the board members placed his client in an untenable position in the phone call. The agenda on that day was him talking about his compensation package, Smith said. A condition of them discussing his compensation is him taking care of Charles Tate. Smith said he couldn't specify how Spillers, Vidrine or others might have influenced Cunningham's fate in the Senate. He pointed to the timing of the report's release after Cunningham was axed as cause to suspect an intentional delay. The report's authors dated the last of the witness interviews to May 4. One state ethics expert, who listened to the recorded call at a reporter's request, said its not clear just what ultimatum the board members were giving Cunningham, or what they expected him to do outside of normal hiring rules to bring on Tate. Still, Robert Travis Scott, president of the Public Affairs Research Council of Louisiana, said the latest controversy may warrant an outside review of the trouble-plagued agency. This is something that, under these circumstances, you might expect the legislative auditor to do a performance audit on the agency, Scott said. He added that an investigation by state Inspector General Stephen Streets office might also be warranted. It doesnt necessarily imply anything illegal has happened, Scott said, but an investigation could take place so they could determine if anything inappropriate happened. Earl Smith, 83, former resident of Moore, OK passed away peacefully at his home in Longmont, CO. Earl was born in Depew, OK to John and Ethel Smith. He retired in 2000 from Rose State University as an accounting Professor. Graveside service will be held at Oakdale Cemetery, Depew, OK on Sept Womens Equality Day honors the passage of the 19th amendment -- the day when women gained the constitutional right to vote. Every year on August 26, this right is commemorated by celebrating National Womens Equality Day. How it started The movement germinated in 1840, when several women were denied access to the World Anti-Slavery Convention floor in London. Eight years later, five women--Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Staton, Martha Wright, Mary Ann McClintock, and Jane Hunt--began to plan the first womans rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York. Held at Wesleyan Chapel on July 19-20, 1848, the conference drew 200 women on the first day. The convention opened to men on the second day, and some reportedly did attend. During the womens rights convention, leaders presented 12 resolutions which outlined that women should be equal to men socially, economically, legally, and representatively. Pull Quote Resolved, that it is the duty of the women of this country to secure to themselves their sacred right to the elective franchise. ~ 9th Resolution of the Seneca Falls Convention 1848 Of the 12 resolutions, all but one were approved unanimously. The one that didnt: the right to vote. Many women felt that pursuing that resolution would lead to withdrawal of overall support. With the help of abolitionist Frederick Douglass, the 9th resolution also passed. The 19th amendment, the constitutional right to vote, came 34 years after the initial effort to advocate for womens suffrage on the Congress floor in 1886, a bill which failed to pass. It took another 34 years before a new amendment made it to Congress. History repeats itself The recognition of Womens Equality Day also required repeated attempts. While the day was proposed in 1971, it was not until 1973 that Congress approved the bill. Women's Equality FAQ from National Day Calendar Q. When was the League of Women Voters established? A. On February 14, 1920, Carrie Chapman Catt founded the League of Women Voters. Q. What does patriarchy mean? A. A patriarchal society places men at the highest roles family, communities, businesses, spiritual organizations. The patriarch of a family is usually the father or the eldest male member of the family. Q. When did the United States pass the Equal Rights Amendment passed? A. The U.S. Senate passed the Equal Rights Amendment on March 22, 1972. The amendment was then sent to the states for ratification. Since then, it has only been ratified by 35 states (short of the 3/4 majority required). Since 1982, Congress has reintroduced the Equal Rights Amendment every session. The repetition of these efforts is not unique to a Congressional process; it persists in the everyday lives of women all around the world. Women continue to fight for both basic human rights and equality. Today in Afghanistan, for example, women currently suffer threats to their human rights under law, a fact which highlights the critical role of a legal system. Women in workplaces also suffer threats to their legal rights. U.S. Small Business Administration support It was a community of women leaders who first promoted womens suffrage. Communities are no less important today. In this light, organizations like the U.S. Small Business Administration are gathering to celebrate women entrepreneurs on this historic day. The U.S. Small Business Administration is hosting a virtual fireside chat to discuss what the SBA is doing to empower and support women entrepreneurs. The event will be held today at 2 p.m. Join Economic Equality for Women Entrepreneurs: A Conversation in Celebration of Womens Equality Day 2021, hosted by Isabella Casillas Guzman, Administrator, U.S. Small Business Administration, and Natalie Madeira Cofield, Assistant Administrator, SBA Office of Womens Business Ownership. All women entrepreneurs are invited to attend. Registration is required and open until the program begins. The Office of Womens Business Ownerships (OWBO), established in response to an Executive Order in 1979, exists to enable and empower women entrepreneurs through advocacy, outreach, education, and support. The OWBO has provided women with training, counseling, technical assistance, access to credit and capital, as well as marketing opportunities. Today, think back to the efforts of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone, Carrie Chapman Catt, Alice Paul, and others. Share your #WomensEqualityDay story! Williamsport, Pa. Woodlands Bank is proud to announce and welcome Deb Bingaman to their Hughesville Office team. She joins the organization as an Assistant Community Office Manager. Woodlands Bank, headquartered in Williamsport, offers consumer and commercial banking and trust services in both Lycoming and Clinton Counties. Bingaman brings more than 16 years of financial service experience to her new role. She began her banking journey as a teller and has held various positions since then. Excited about taking on her new position, Bingaman worked previously for Jersey Shore State Bank as a Customer Service Representative. Her favorite part about banking is working with customers, according to Bingaman. She enjoys meeting new people and building long lasting relationships. Helping customers reach their financial goals is what she looks forward to doing as Assistant Community Office Manager. We are excited to have Deb working with us at the Hughesville Office. Her in-depth knowledge of banking and the pride she takes in providing customers with outstanding service makes her not only a great asset to our team but also to our customers, Denise Cardillo, Community Office Manager at the Hughesville Office. Bingaman will be developing and managing relationships throughout the Hughesville market. Bingaman will be working closely with the Hughesville team to provide excellent customer service, said Cardillo. Muncy, Pa. One of Lycoming Countys most passionate animal lovers has died. Bonnie J. Lynn Snyder, owner of the nonprofit Bellabons Pet Recovery Services, died early Wednesday morning, Aug. 25. Snyder, 64, of Muncy, had been battling cancer since March 2020. Her sister, Cindy Poust, notified her followers of her passing on her nonprofits Facebook page: It is with great sadness that we let you know Bonnie passed away early this morning. She was a daughter, sister, aunt, cousin, friend, and most importantly to her the best damn pet recoverer on this planet. She fought extremely hard to fight this horrible ~ nasty disease never giving up no matter what her body went through. As the doctors verbally told us for the past year she miraculously beat all odds. "She is no longer suffering with pain him (sic) and is at peace with family members and friends who have gone on before her. She was so looking forward to seeing her Boo and Petey, who passed over the rainbow bridge years ago. It will be a celebration of life for Bonnie at a later date ~ Well make sure you were all made aware when details are finalized. Thank (sic) I love you for your thoughts, prayers, love, support, and generosity. Snyder, who had three dogs of her own, had been running her animal rescue service since 2012. The nonprofit ran solely on donations. Snyder led a simple life, dedicating much of her time and energy to animals until cancer slowed her down earlier this year. Even while she was sick, she would still try to answer messages or phone calls from her bedside if she was able. "She considered pet recovery her greatest mission and her greatest accomplishment in life, and would work tirelessly around the clock (without pay) to find beloved animals and bring them home. She was the best friend that lost dogs ever had," according to her obituary published on Thursday. One of Snyder's more recent rescues was in March when she helped locate a dog in Williamsport who escaped from his fenced in yard. Owner Kristina Kurelja Pavlick said she called Snyder about her dog Hank, and was told she was not able to come out at that time. Snyder then proceeded to ask Pavlick detailed questions about the situation, the dog, last points of contact, etc. Snyder made recommendations to Pavlick and stayed on the phone with her as she continued to search for Hank, "providing guidance at every turn." "Sure enough, within 20 minutes of being on the phone with her I caught sight of my dog Hank and together we cried tears of joy," Pavlick said. "Once my dog and I were both safe in the car, Bonnie proceeded to share with me that she just received bad news about her battle with cancer. My phone call had interrupted her own grief about the news, and called her back to her commitment to helping people and their pets. I was so grateful to her, and her selflessness in that moment," Pavlick said. "She asked for me to send that picture, just so she could see our faces and smiles," Pavlick said. She is truly an angel, and I was saddened to see her loss." Snyder also assisted many pet owners from outside of northcentral Pennsylvania who lost their pets when traveling through the area. Todd Sailer, who lives outside of Philadelphia, was in Waterville early in 2018 training for a 100-mile race when he lost Bode, his Australian Shepherd dog. The dog often ran with him, Sailer said. One morning, Bode took off while Sailer's girlfriend at the time was letting him outside to go to the bathroom. Sailer was not able to locate Bode before he had to get back home to work. Desperate to get his dog back, Sailer found Bellabon's through Facebook and contacted Snyder. "I called Bonnie and she was just a blessing," Sailer said. Snyder got to work posting flyers and tracking Bode's movement. Several days later, she called Sailer very excited that Bode had been spotted at a campsite. Sailer got into his car and began driving back to Waterville. As he was approaching Bloomsburg, Snyder called back with more exciting news: Bode had been captured after being gone for 11 days. "She was as happy as I was to get him back," Sailer said. He described Snyder as a person who "wore her heart on her sleeve," and noted that she did not take any pay for the work she did. She had told him that there were dogs she was tracking that had been lost for close to a year. "She was never going to give up," Sailer said. One of Snyder's most widely publicized rescue missions occurred in June 2019 when she was called to assist with rescuing cats from a condemned and dangerous apartment building in Jersey Shore. A back wall of the structure at the 400 block of Main Street had fallen apart, and tenants only had a short time to immediately vacate the building with their belongings. Unfortunately, some cats were left behind. A fence went up around the structure while the property owners waited for a demolition company to raze it. Snyder and her team stayed outside the fence and tracked the cats' movements using cameras. She and her team also set food stations outside the fence to help lure cats out of the building. At the time, Snyder was recovering from a broken sternum and fractured leg as a result of a car accident. "My main goal is to help the cats," Snyder said in an interview at the time. Related Reading: Pet recovering service attempting to save cats in partially collapsed building Though it took her some time, Snyder was eventually able to save some of the cats from the structure. "Bonnie fought a long, hard, determined battle with cancer and asks people to 'hug their family members and pets, as well as enjoy each day, not taking one day for granted,'" her obituary read. A celebration of life will be set for a later date at Indian Park in Montoursville. "We chose this place so her family, friends and 'Bellabon' pet followers can bring their dogs as well, which is what Bonnie wanted," according to the obituary. The Bellabon's nonprofit closed at the time of Snyder's passing. Her family is asking donations be made in Snyder's memory to Rehome Animal Rescue, Inc., 504 River Street, Buchanan, MI 49107 or via PayPal at GorgeousAdoptions@gmail.com. Williamsport, Pa. While writing a paper for class about diversity in business, Abigail Traxler 23 happened upon a program that promotes just that women in finance. I instantly knew that I wanted to apply, said Traxler. Not only would this program bring me on-the-job experience and a network of other women, but I would learn finance and investment concepts to further expand on what I have learned in the classroom at Lycoming. Girls Who Invest (GWI) is a ten-week, competitive summer program designed to instruct, mentor, and support women in colleges and universities by providing educational courses and paid internships. According to the website, Investment firms say they do not see enough resumes from women, so [GWI] is creating a pipeline of talented and motivated young women who are prepared to succeed in the industry. Related reading: "Celebrate Women's Equality Day: From suffrage to entrepreneurship" With support from Lycoming faculty and with help in the application process from Anne Landon, associate director for career advising at Lycoming, Traxler was accepted into the program. Along with accepted students from other institutions, she spent the first four weeks remote, taking rigorous classes taught by leading investment professionals and professors from the University of Pennsylvania and UCLA. Topics covered accounting, valuation, financial modeling, asset allocation, and presentation and business etiquette. The future can be daunting to anyone, especially a college student, Traxler said. On the first day of the program, Seema Hingorani, the founder of GWI, advised us that what matters most is the steps you took to get where you are today. When able, Traxler attended coffee chats and community events in order to make connections with other scholars in the program. To finish off the educational portion of the program, students looked at Etsy, an online marketplace, and put together a stock pitch that involved their opinion on whether or not they would buy stock in the company. A panel of three industry professionals listened to the pitch, asked questions, and gave feedback. For the final six weeks of the program, Traxler interned at Wellington Management Company as an Early Career Investor. She began each day reviewing market activity and tuning into Wellingtons company-wide morning meeting. When not with her team of mentors, analysts, and speakers, Traxler spent time researching an industry to present at the end of the internship. The findings will be key to the firm in making investment decisions. I begin and end every day feeling grateful for this opportunity, said Traxler. The program has inspired me to use my passion for helping others by encouraging other women to explore careers in finance. When asked what the program has done for her, Traxler replied that it has equipped her to enter the workforce as a capable, prepared, and knowledgeable professional. After graduation, she aims to take as many steps as necessary to lead an organization as a CEO. She takes inspiration from Jean Hynes, Wellington Managements first female CEO. She demonstrates that women really can do anything, said Traxler. Not only are women underrepresented in finance, but women are underrepresented at the CEO level of top companies. Meanwhile, GWI seeks to have 30 percent of the worlds investable capital managed by women by the year 2030. This program has really changed my life, said Traxler. In addition to a potentially life-changing internship opportunity, Traxler recently won the Miss Pennsylvania Collegiate America Pageant competition, and will advance to the national competition in Little Rock, Ark. The Miss Pennsylvania Elementary, Jr. High, High School, and Collegiate America Pageant competitions exist for the purpose of providing personal and professional opportunities for Elementary, Jr High, High School, and College-Aged women who excel in academics and community service involvement. During the next year, Traxler will promote the national anti-bullying platform, B.R.A.V.E. - Building Respect and Values for Everyone, with a state-wide women-in-business empowerment initiative. Spotlight PA is an independent, nonpartisan newsroom powered by The Philadelphia Inquirer in partnership with PennLive/The Patriot-News, TribLIVE/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, and WITF Public Media. Sign up for our free newsletters. Harrisburg, Pa. The Wolf administration has unexpectedly canceled a controversial plan to overhaul a crucial safety net program for tens of thousands of low-income children and parents in Pennsylvania. The state Department of Health surprised advocates and lawmakers earlier this year when it announced that it would terminate several long-standing providers contracts to administer WIC a nutrition program for pregnant and breastfeeding people as well as infants and young children that serves about 169,000 Pennsylvanians each month. The decision came after a bidding process that advocates and lawmakers said lacked transparency. But in letters sent Tuesday to groups that applied for WIC contracts, the department said it would cancel the transition to new providers. Organizations that expected to take over programs, as well as existing WIC providers, received little information about what will happen next. The letters obtained by Spotlight PA dont explain why the transition was canceled, but the plan received pushback from some local, state, and national WIC experts who raised concerns that the change would create too much confusion and lead to a drop in enrollment. A Department of Health spokesperson confirmed the cancelation and said it will have no impact on the continuity of WIC services for the women and children who need them. While a competitive application process for all WIC local agencies remains a critical step toward further program enhancements, the department will continue working to improve the WIC program for all beneficiaries at both the state and local level, the spokesperson said. They did not offer an explanation for the cancelation and said it is too early to determine if there will be costs associated with the change. Our interpretation of that is that everything will remain the same, said Kellie McKevitt, CEO at Southwestern Pennsylvania Human Services, Inc., which includes Mon Valley Community Health Services, the organization currently administering the WIC program in Westmoreland County. Though the organization was surprised by the news, McKevitt said it is happy to continue providing the services. Known as WIC, the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children is overseen by the state health department and funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Local WIC offices in each county provide nutrition education, as well as food and breastfeeding support, to pregnant and postpartum people, infants, and children under age 5. Two current providers that were set to lose contracts the Allegheny County Health Department and Family Health Council of Central Pennsylvania, Inc. had appealed the departments selection process and transition. The appeals were pending as of Tuesday. Im glad to hear that they canceled the process, said State Rep. Austin Davis (D., Allegheny), who was one of several state lawmakers to sign a letter calling on the Wolf administration to rethink the plan. Davis said he had a number of concerns about how the state handled the application process from start to finish, including questions about why the state chose a Washington County-based organization to take over the program in Allegheny County. Its my understanding that there will be a new process, Davis said, adding that he did not have details about a new timeline. A spokesperson for Blueprints, the organization set to take over the contract in Allegheny County, confirmed that it received a letter from the health department but directed other questions to the state. Under the now-canceled plan, providers would have changed in at least five counties: Allegheny, Cumberland, Erie, Philadelphia, and Westmoreland. Those transitions were scheduled to start in October and be completed by Oct. 1, 2022, according to an announcement from the state health department in April. That transition timeline was shortened in July, The Inquirer reported. Kathy Fisher, policy director for the Greater Philadelphia Coalition Against Hunger, said many WIC advocates and partner agencies werent taking sides on the contract awards. But she raised concerns about further disrupting established relationships, given the coronavirus pandemic, and the departments timeline for the transition. Without time to recover and stabilize, we fear that the WIC program risks a further decline in enrollment and fewer families getting the support they desperately need, Fisher said in an email. Alfred Lubrano of The Inquirer contributed. WHILE YOURE HERE... If you learned something from this story, pay it forward and become a member of Spotlight PA so someone else can in the future at spotlightpa.org/donate. Spotlight PA is funded by foundations and readers like you who are committed to accountability journalism that gets results. Spotlight PA is an independent, nonpartisan newsroom powered by The Philadelphia Inquirer in partnership with PennLive/The Patriot-News, TribLIVE/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, and WITF Public Media. Sign up for our free newsletters. Harrisburg, Pa. Gov. Tom Wolf is calling on the Republican-led legislature to return to the Capitol immediately to pass legislation mandating the use of masks in K-12 classrooms and child-care centers throughout Pennsylvania. In a letter to legislative leaders in both chambers, the Democratic governor struck a note of urgency, noting that many public schools have already returned to the classroom most without mask requirements and that parents, teachers, pediatricians, and others who have contacted his administration overwhelmingly support a statewide mandate. Related reading: CDC: All Pa. county transmission rates considered either substantial or high; schools considering health & safety plan reviews Just 59 school districts out of the 474 that submitted health and safety plans to the Department of Education had implemented mandatory masking policies as of the end of July, Wolf said in the letter to Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman (R., Centre) and House Speaker Bryan Cutler (R., Lancaster). For most of the past 18 months, the legislature has asked for my administration to defer to local governments and local organizations when making mitigation decisions, Wolf wrote. It is clear that action is needed to ensure children are safe as they return to the classroom. He added: With school having already started in many areas of the state, the time to act is now. Wolf could not be reached for comment, but it is unlikely the legislature will heed his call. Jason Gottesman, spokesperson for House Republicans, said in an interview that the chamber has no plans to return before its scheduled to in September, and reiterated the belief that masking decisions should be made at the local level. Weve been for local decision-making since the beginning of the pandemic, said Gottesman, who also noted that Pennsylvanians earlier this year voted to curtail Wolfs emergency powers, which was framed at the time as a referendum on the governors handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Senate Republicans, who are also scheduled to return to Harrisburg in September, did not respond to requests for comment. The Wolf administration, without the legislature, implemented a mask mandate for schools with limited exemptions last year. And despite the referendum that limited Wolfs emergency powers and led to the end of the states disaster declaration, officials have been adamant they still have the power to issue public health orders including a mask mandate. But as recently as three weeks ago, Wolf told reporters his administration would not do so, despite a recommendation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that all students and staff wear masks regardless of vaccination status. Pull Quote It is clear that action is needed to ensure children are safe as they return to the classroom. -- Gov. Tom Wolf I think the school districts in Pennsylvania have to decide what they want to do, Wolf said at a news conference in Philadelphia. I think the CDC guidelines strongly recommend that schools do that. Theyre not mandating it and neither am I. The president of the states largest teachers union on Wednesday backed Wolfs call to state legislators. In the meantime, we continue to urge school district leaders to follow CDC guidance and adopt universal masking policies as students return to school, said Rich Askey, a Harrisburg music teacher and president of the Pennsylvania State Education Association. But without a statewide order or new legislation, theres concern among some local districts that they do not have the authority to implement mask mandates. Our school district solicitor has advised us of his belief that there is no enabling legislation for the school board or for me to order mandatory masking without an order from the Pennsylvania secretary of health or legislation enacted by the Pennsylvania legislature and governor, Superintendent Brian White, of the Butler Area School District, told families in an Aug. 17 letter. The law firm serving as the districts solicitor did not respond to a request for comment. Sen. Scott Martin (R., Lancaster), chair of the chambers Education Committee, also recently questioned how local mandates are enforceable without constitutional or statutorial clarity. Quite frankly are they opening themselves up to potential litigation? he asked administration officials during a hearing. Its possible parents and organizations opposed to mandatory masking could bring potentially costly lawsuits, as some have already threatened to. But legal experts who spoke to Spotlight PA agreed that school districts are empowered to implement their own mandates. What they may be saying is that they dont have the political authority to do it, that the pushback from the powers that be in the community or in Harrisburg makes them feel that they cant get away with it, Scott Burris, director of the Center for Public Health Law Research at Temple Law, said of school districts. But they have the legal authority to do it for sure. Thats also the position of Education Secretary Noe Ortega, who said Monday that a mask mandate is no different than what school boards have done historically to keep the schools healthy and safe. York Suburban School District in central Pennsylvania is forging ahead with a mask mandate, despite being put on notice that we should expect legal challenges. We know that this decision was met with both dismay and gratitude, but it was made lawfully, the district wrote in an Aug. 16 letter to families, citing a section of state law that gives school boards the authority to set rules and regulations that apply to students. The district plans to enforce masking the same way a dress code violation would be handled, said Nicholas Staab, a district spokesperson. It kind of trivializes the mask requirement, because nobody is going to get sick and die because they have a tank top on, and school dress codes are kind of easy to make fun of, Burris of Temple University said. But it ultimately is kind of the same thing. WHILE YOURE HERE... If you learned something from this story, pay it forward and become a member of Spotlight PA so someone else can in the future at spotlightpa.org/donate. Spotlight PA is funded by foundations and readers like you who are committed to accountability journalism that gets results. Tillamook, OR (97141) Today Clear. Windy this evening. Low 44F. N winds at 20 to 30 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph.. Tonight Clear. Windy this evening. Low 44F. N winds at 20 to 30 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph. Local Floyd County Schools prepare for the potential of virtual classes next week as COVID-19 cases rise The Floyd County school system is preparing for the possibility that several schools may move to virtual learning as COVID-19 cases in students continue to rise. A report published Friday showed that four schools had over 3% of the student population infected with COVID-19 Model Middle, Cave Spring Elementary, Armuchee Middle and Armuchee High. Those schools, as well as Coosa Middle and Glenwood Primary, have already moved to mandatory face coverings. Superintendent Glenn White said theyre preparing for the possibility that several schools may exceed the 5% threshold of infections in the next report, which would shift the school to virtual learning. What you see we have (in Floyd County), we have that in the schools, White said, citing the increasing number of COVID-19 cases since mid-July. Glenn White Parents at those schools, like Model Middle, were given notice that there was a potential that their children would be taking classes virtually next week. They received a form to see if their child would need a Chromebook to participate in virtual learning. The number of new cases daily is difficult to track from outside the school system. White, who receives hourly updates, decided not to publish a daily infection report despite agreeing to do so at a called Floyd County Board of Education meeting on Friday. We dont want to scare parents, White said, when asked about the decision. He said because the school system is making decisions on a weekly instead of daily basis, he decided not to update the report daily. The school board voted unanimously in its Friday meeting to accept Whites recommendation to create a threshold to determine when individual schools should begin to take precautions to curtail the spread of the highly infectious COVID-19 Delta variant. At a 2% infection rate the school would invoke mandatory face coverings and take other measures, at a 5% infection rate the school would go to virtual learning. Both measures would be determined each Friday and would be in effect for the next five school days. Four elementary schools in the Rome school system remain under a mandatory face covering and additional COVID-19 prevention measure plan West End, West Central, Main and East Central. While Rome High School is close to reaching the city school systems 1% margin to move to COVID-19 prevention measures, as of the Tuesday report it is at 17 infections in students and staff. The margin for Rome High is at 22 to move to mandatory masking. The community spread of the virus in Floyd County, and most of Northwest Georgia, is as high or higher than any other time since March 2020 when the first novel coronavirus case was reported in the region. In the past two weeks there have been over 1,200 new cases reported locally and hospitals have reported being overwhelmed with unvaccinated COVID-19 patients since serous cases began spiking in late July. Support Local Journalism Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by subscribing. WASHINGTON The chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan may haunt President Joe Biden, but it could also hang over some of the Republicans who will seek to replace him in 2024. While Biden has to contend with harrowing images of Afghans trying to flee after the Taliban takeover, former President Donald Trump orchestrated the withdrawal agreement and another potential 2024 GOP contender was ... Rome, GA (30161) Today Mostly clear. Low around 65F. Winds light and variable.. Tonight Mostly clear. Low around 65F. Winds light and variable. Vinny Olsziewski has a 40-year career as a disability rights advocate, working with local, state and national organizations and encouraging participation by people with disabilities in the political process. News featured COVID-19 cases continue to rise as school year starts With the school year underway in the county and COVID-19 cases continuing to rise, local health officials are continuing to emphasize vaccinations and face masks as ways to prevent illness and quarantine. As of Tuesday, there have been 97 COVID-19 cases in the county in August, an increase of 37 cases in one week (there were 60 as of Aug. 17). Also as of Tuesday, there were 14 hospitalizations so far in August. Of those 97 cases, 20 are for those 0-19 years old; 13 are those 20-29 years old; 12 are those 30-39 years old; 16 are those 40-49 years old; 15 are those 50-59 years old; 10 are those 60-69 years old; five are those 70-79 years old; and six are those 80 years and older. COVID is here. Its affecting our youth, said Henry County Health Commissioner Joy Ermie. The county is considered a high transmission county per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and as of Tuesday, had 155.52 cases per 100,000 in population and an 8.84% positivity rate. The health department continues to recommend individuals who are 12 years and older be vaccinated, everyone 2 years and older wear a face mask regardless of vaccination status, maintaining physical distancing, staying home when sick, avoiding large crowds and washing hands frequently to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The increase of COVID-19 cases, which mainly started toward the end of July in Henry County, has continued into August, leading into the beginning of the school year. It was confirmed last week that Henry County does have the Delta variant. Just as our kids are back to school, the new Delta variant is sweeping across Ohio, Leah Budke, public information officer/health educator for the Henry County Health Department, said, adding the variant causes more infections and spreads faster than earlier forms of COVID. The Delta variant is highly contagious, nearly twice as contagious as previous variants. The Henry County Health Department is recommending all students and staff wear face masks and continue with other protocols used in the schools last year increased handwashing, social distancing and cleaning. Our goals are to keep students and staff in school, Ermie said. We proved that what you did last school year worked, and theres no reason to change now. The Ohio Department of Education has issued guidelines for quarantine after COVID-19 exposure in a classroom setting for this school year, which includes different guidelines for schools which are mandating masks and at least three feet of physical distance as compared to those who are not. The school districts in Henry County have not mandated face masks, except on school buses as required by the federal government, leaving it up to families to decide whether students wear masks while attending school. For districts without those measures in place, unmasked, unvaccinated students who come into close contact of a student who is positive for COVID-19 in a classroom setting will need to quarantine. They can only return to normal classroom and extracurricular activities after seven days if they have received a negative COVID-19 test that was performed at least five days after exposure. If they test positive, they should isolate for at least 10 days from the date of the positive test. However, Ermie explained that masked, unvaccinated students who come into close contact of a student who is positive for COVID-19 in the classroom setting will not need to quarantine. Because masks are not mandated in any of the schools, our only way to keep our children in school due to quarantine, is to wear a mask, Ermie said. If you wear a mask, you go to school. We understand that this is not a popular idea, but quarantine isnt a popular idea either. While both are difficult decisions for some families, we need to choose our difficult. Are we choosing to send our kids to school with masks or are we choosing to find daycare or take the chance of missing up to 14 days of work ourselves to be home? Quarantines from extra-curricular activities are decided on a case-by-case basis and a variety of factors such as ventilation and close contacts outside of the practice or game. The purpose of this is not to harm a child. The purpose of this is to help a child to not get sick, Ermie said. If we can wear masks when were around people that are outside of our house, we have a better chance of not getting sick. If you dont get sick, you can still go to school, you can still play sports, you can still do extra-curricular activities. If a person is identified as a close contact to a positive case and they are fully vaccinated, quarantine is not necessary as long as they wear a mask indoors either for 14 days or until a test performed three to five days after exposure has come back as negative and monitor for symptoms. As of Wednesday afternoon, Ermie said the health department has seen COVID-19 cases in children, but no quarantines related to school exposure have been done yet. However, most schools only started this week. Because no one is masked, its going to lead to more quarantines than we saw last year, Ermie said. That is going to hinder the childrens ability to learn. I feel like our kids have been through enough since March 2020, they deserve a normal school year. The best we can offer them right now is to wear masks so they can go to school. Ermie added its also important that children not go to school if they are sick and to be tested for COVID-19. It looks different than it did at the beginning of the school year last year. We are seeing more cases entering the school year now than we did last August. Now, more than ever, we have to protect our children, Ermie said. The best way to protect our children is to keep them in an environment where theyre safe. Keeping them in school, masked, washing their hands and staying home when theyre sick, is going to help them have the best year possible. Though masking might not be popular, not only is it going to help protect them from being infected with COVID, its also going to help them stay in school because just by virtue of being masked, they will not have to be quarantined in the classroom setting, she continued. The health departments goal ... is to keep (students) and staff in the schools healthy and in school. Ermie said they have received comments that no masks should be required and quarantines in schools shouldnt be done either. Ermie cited Ohio Revised Code 3707.16 that says, No person isolated or quarantined for a communicable disease declared by the board of health ... shall attend any public, private or parochial school or college, Sunday school, church or any other public gathering, until released from isolation or quarantine by the board (of health). Ermie said Senate Bill 22, which became law in Ohio this summer, means she as county health commissioner cannot make decisions such as mask mandates. Ive lost the ability to make decisions based on Henry County data for Henry County, Ermie said. For the same reason I cant mandate masks is the exact same reason I cant get rid of quarantine. Cleveland-Cliffs attained a 75% vaccination rate among employees nationwide after offering the "most generous vaccination program in the world." The Indiana Harbor steel mill in East Chicago, Cleveland-Cliff's largest, reached a vaccination rate of 78%, as compared to a vaccination rate of just 43% in Lake County. That qualified vaccinated employees there for the company's full $3,000 vaccination bonus. The Cleveland-based steelmaker launched an incentive program in July in conjunction with unions like the United Steelworkers, the United Autoworkers, and the International Association of Machinists. It originally offered $200 to anyone who got the vaccine, $1,500 to the vaccinated if the site's vaccination rate was over 75% and $3,000 if the rate was over 85%. In the last week of the incentive, CEO and Chairman Lourenco Goncalves bumped it up to $1,500 to get vaccinated and $3,000 if 75% of the worksite got vaccinated, believing many steelworkers had gotten the shot but didn't have enough of a financial reward to bother to come forward to report it to their human resources department. About 19,000 of Cleveland-Cliffs' 25,000 employees in North America ended up getting vaccinated against COVID-19, or about 75% Its been a couple of weeks since K-12 students throughout the Region returned to the classroom, and while new COVID-19 cases were bound to happen, some districts already have hundreds of students in quarantine. Over 3,500 new positive cases among students were reported to the Indiana Department of Health as of Monday. Those cases were reported to the state since the last weekly update. There were an additional 172 cases among teachers and 218 among staff reported to the state. Schools across the Region, both those with optional and required mask policies, have emphasized staying in-person all year. One thing that could force a school to close would be high numbers of students and staff in quarantine, but masking could help combat that since the state's definition of a close contact in a school setting is reduced to being within 3 feet when masks are worn. The Crown Point Community School Corp. Board of Trustees discussed masking as a way to keep quarantine numbers down to ensure schools can stay open. The district started the year with optional masks and saw almost 275 students quarantined just in the second week of school, over 40% of which were high schoolers. "I know for Councilwoman (Katrina) Alexander, it means a lot, too, as she is the first black woman to serve on the city council. ... This is the first time we've had two African Americans serve on the council together," Tyler said. "I think it's a great time to continue to celebrate the history of firsts that we have, even with our first black police chief in the city of Hammond, too." Councilwoman Katrina Alexander, D-at large, told The Times renaming the street was a "no-brainer." "When Rev. Parrish won that election, it was a stepping stone in the city," Alexander said. "That was monumental for any African American to serve in a political role, and now we get to actually honor him for his time and his sacrifice and his effort." People like Parrish paved the way for Alexander, she told The Times. "I'm standing on Rev. Parrish's shoulders as the first African American woman to the council, and then to be the first African American council at large because many have tried, and I'm standing on so many people's shoulder," Alexander said. "We have to give honor where honor is due. ... A lot of times people say it's not always about race, but we know that it's taken a lot for African Americans to be in leadership roles." Later that day, residents of the mobile home park saw Richardson on the ground and called 911. She was taken to the hospital by ambulance, he said. Police learned Monday that Richardson had been admitted to the hospital, and investigators returned to the mobile home park to search for more evidence, Hamady said. About 1:15 p.m. Tuesday, officers went to the mobile home park to search for a person of interest, who was identified as 30-year-old Orlando Burgos, of Gary. Burgos has a warrant out of Illinois for a parole violation, Hamady said. He remained at large Thursday. While at the park, police were able to confirm Burgos' identity, but he retreated into a mobile home. Police followed him, but found a dog that needed to be secured before they could continue inside. Meanwhile, the man fled out of the back of the home, police said. A SWAT team and K-9s were called to the area. Members of the Northwest Regional SWAT team helped Gary police establish a perimeter, police said. During the investigation, a woman approached police and said her child was inside the home with the possible barricaded subject, Hamady said. VALPARAISO Bond was set Thursday at $2,500 cash for a 37-year-old Valparaiso man accused of sending various images and discussing sex with children with a woman he met on a dating app, according to the court. Patrick Hofmann made an initial appearance before Porter Circuit Court Judge Mary DeBoer on two counts of possessing child pornography. If he bonds out, Hofmann will be required to wear a GPS monitor and is prohibited from gaining access to the internet, according to the court order. He will be placed on pretrial supervision. He had been ordered to be held without bond until Thursday's initial hearing, according to the court. Valparaiso police said they were contacted in July 2020 by a woman who told them she had met Hofmann on a dating app and they began exchanging sexual messages. Hofmann then began sending various sexual images involving children, police said. "Hofmann continued to discuss his interest in girls 8 to 12 years old," according to a charging document. The woman provided police with the images allegedly sent by Hofmann and the messages they shared, police said. Police said they searched Hofmann's home in November and seized his cellphone. VALPARAISO A 12-year-old girl claiming she was molested last fall by a Valparaiso man revealed the same man sexually assaulted her twice before when she was about 5 years old, according to court documents. Pleas of not guilty were entered Thursday morning during an initial hearing for Luis Hernandez-Flores, 39, of Mexico, who is charged with three counts of child molesting. The most serious count carries a potential prison sentence of 20 to 50 years. +2 Valpo man arrested in child neglect case; bond set for him and child's mother Porter Superior Court Judge Mike Fish told Jack Graeber if he bonds out of jail, he will be on supervised release and prohibited from having any further contact with the alleged victim while his case proceeds. The girl told police she was at a party away from home on Sept. 5 in Valparaiso when Hernandez-Flores, who she knew, walked in on her in a bathroom and proceeded to kiss and molest her, according to a charging document. "Would you do anything for me?" he reportedly asked while carrying out the acts. The girl said Hernandez-Flores would not let her leave the bathroom and repeatedly asked her to keep his actions a secret, police said. The girl's mother said she knocked on the bathroom door and it was opened by Hernandez-Flores with the girl inside crying, according to police. No criminal charges have been filed after a man was shot in South Haven by a police officer in May. The Porter County prosecutor's office declined to file charges after police killed 30-year-old Alexander Tuzinski. Tuzinski suffered single a gunshot wound and later died at Northwest Health-Porter hospital, according to the Porter County coroner's office. The Porter County coroner's office ruled the death a homicide. The Porter County Sheriff's Office asked the Indiana State Police to investigate the shooting. "I have reviewed with the Indiana State Police all of their reports and all of the body camera footage from all of the officers," Prosecutor Gary Germann said. "I have determined the shooting death of Mr. Tuzinski was justified as tragic as it was." A Porter County Sheriff's Office deputy was placed on paid leave after the fatal encounter, as is customary because of police department protocols while an investigation takes place. The officer has since returned to duty. The shooting took place on May 1 in the 700 block of Long Run Road in South Haven in unincorporated Porter County. Mrvan had hoped to attend the breakfast meeting but couldnt get a flight home from Washington, D.C., until Wednesday morning after voting for the infrastructure bill Tuesday night, Lopez said. While Mrvan voted to allow debate to continue on the $3.5 trillion spending plan for human infrastructure, the congressman cant decide whether to support the bill until he sees whats in it, Lopez said. The legislation is still being hammered out in committees. Among other provisions, the legislation would extend public education beyond K-12 to include a two-year certification program, figuring thats what it takes to support a family today. The bill would also extend child tax credits and support for child care as well as add dental, vision and hearing benefits to Medicare, he said. Lopez was also asked about the situation in Afghanistan. He isnt aware of any troops from Indiana there, but typically the military will share information about units stationed there, not individuals, he said. The focus now is to protect Americans and Afghans who helped them and continue to extract them. There will be time going forward to look back and see where mistakes were made, Lopez said. McCoy, who said he worked at the building before moving in five years ago, was dismayed that officials never came back after promising a new building several years earlier, but that he loved the Nicosia nonetheless. I said I like this building, I want to move there and live there the rest of my life, he said. And then one day you gotta go. A new building is still coming, Vincent said, although like with countless other projects, the COVID-19 pandemic sidetracked those plans. Still, Vincent says when the new public housing is available, the residents of Nicosia will have first dibs. But that day is likely years away. Both Vincent and Hill said the project to repair Nicosia will take years, not months, with Hill estimating a timeline of two to three years before residents can come back, if they can come back at all. Vincent said wed like to save the building but that a final investigation from engineers would determine its fate. To begin their investigation, engineers ripped into the walls of several unoccupied units to reveal the support columns and inspect sometimes large cracks that had developed in the concrete. Others chipped away the buildings exterior to reveal even more visible damage. NEW YORK (AP) The U.S. government said Thursday it is shutting down a federal jail in New York City after a slew of problems that came to light following disgraced financier Jeffrey Epsteins suicide there two years ago. The federal Bureau of Prisons said the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan will be closed at least temporarily to address issues that have long plagued the facility, including lax security and crumbling infrastructure. The facility, which has held inmates such as Mexican drug lord Joaquin El Chapo Guzman and Mafia boss John Gotti, currently has 233 inmates, down from a normal population of 600 or more. Most are expected to be transferred to a federal jail in Brooklyn. The decision to close the MCC billed as one of the most secure jails in America comes weeks after Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco toured it and saw the conditions firsthand. Until recently, the facility had been recruiting new staff. Now, employees are being sent letters notifying them of a force reduction. If we're going to tackle this virus and also protect our children, it's going to take a two-pronged effort by adults. Our state needs more adults to step up and get the vaccine. And school boards need to institute measures that protect students particularly those who have no current ability to be vaccinated. This may not be politically appetizing to school board members who might be worried about backlash from their constituents, but it's the right thing to do. A piecemeal system of optional masks, no vaccine mandates and draconian measures when a child gets sick or comes in contact with someone who's sick isn't the way to go in the midst of a global pandemic that is again picking up steam. Thousands of children have gotten sick. More and more kids are landing in the hospital because of the delta variant. Whether it be from political fear or hubris, we are failing children via inaction in many cases. Right now, the only option is to act on the local level to protect children. In less than two weeks, Lt. Gov. Kathy Hochul will become the next governor of New York, amid a period of exceptional tumult and uncertainty. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who held office for more than a decade and kept tight control over the states Democratic Party, is resigning after a report by New Yorks attorney general found he had sexually harassed nearly a dozen women. At the same time, the coronavirus pandemic is surging anew, raising thorny questions about public health, school safety and how best to manage New Yorks precarious path toward economic recovery. On Thursday, Ms. Hochul confirmed that she would seek a full term as governor in November 2022, so she will be tackling the states pressing issues while running a campaign in what could be a hotly contested election. FRONT PAGE An article on Monday about flooding in Tennessee misspelled the name of a 15-year-old girl missing since the flood. She is Lilly Bryant, not Lily. INTERNATIONAL An article on Tuesday about Jews praying at the Temple Mount misspelled the name of the president of the board of the Temple Institute, which supports the construction of a new Jewish temple at the site. He is Rabbi Yisrael Ariel, not Israel Arieli. NATIONAL An article on Tuesday about sentences that were commuted by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York on his last day in office misidentified one of the left-wing radical groups involved in the 1981 robbery of a Brinks truck. It was the May 19th Communist Organization, not its predecessor, the Weather Underground. An article on Wednesday about Donald H. Rumsfelds funeral misstated how David Hume Kennerly came to work in the White House. President Gerald R. Ford brought him on to his staff, not Mr. Rumsfeld. At least 1,500 American citizens and tens of thousands of Afghans who fear retribution from the Taliban remain in the country, and the Kabul airport has been a scene of chaos and violence with crowds of desperate people trying to escape as the U.S. militarys Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline closes in. Those who have made it out said they were relieved to arrive in the United States, although many still feared for family members stuck in Kabul. Kamran, 23, arrived at Dulles at 4 a.m. on Wednesday with his sister and three cousins. After evacuating from Kabul and stopping in Bahrain, he said he felt good about landing in America. I feel safe here, he said before boarding one of the buses. I think its a better place. Kamran left for the Kabul airport five days ago, bringing only a small backpack with two shirts, two pairs of jeans, a pair of sneakers and his phone charger. While pushing his way through to get to the American side of the airport, Taliban members beat his head and shoulders with batons. He eventually made it through and spent two days at the airport, which he said were excruciating because the sun was burning hot and there was not enough water for everyone. Along with a group of other Afghans arriving in Virginia, Kamran took a bus to the Expo Center, where refugees were given food, drinks and a place to rest. Some manufacturers are falling behind. Novavax has had production problems. Johnson & Johnson, which initially planned for one billion doses this year, has made slightly more than 103 million, Mr. Krellenstein said, citing data from the scientific intelligence firm Airfinity. That is in part because its contract manufacturer, Emergent BioSolutions, ruined up to 15 million doses, prompting the Food and Drug Administration to shutter its Baltimore plant for three months. If 12 billion doses were indeed produced and equitably distributed by years end, the worlds needs could be met. But, the Duke institute wrote, those are both big ifs. Several other countries as well as the United States are already recommending booster shots, which will cut into the supply. And the virus changes shape so rapidly the highly infectious Delta variant is now dominant around the globe that the vaccines developed last year may soon be outdated, said Dr. Richard Hatchett, the chief executive of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, which helps lead the international vaccine effort known as Covax. In the short term, poor nations need doses, and Mr. Biden is correct when he says the United States has donated more than any other country. The United States has already donated 115 million surplus doses from the nations own supply, and has purchased 500 million doses from Pfizer and BioNTech to be distributed through Covax. With the United States planning for booster shots, one official said, there is no surplus right now. Their financial contributions are huge no other country has pledged as much as the U.S., Dr. Hatchett said. But, he added, its not to say that they cant and shouldnt do more. Dr. Hatchett said he would like to see a more nuanced discussion of the logistics of not only making vaccines for poor and middle-income nations, but also administering them. The New York Times recently reported that Covax was having trouble getting those shots into peoples arms. Unused doses are sitting idle on airport tarmacs in poor nations that lack the money and capacity to buy fuel to transport doses to clinics, to train people to give the shots and to persuade people to take them. Mr. Biden took his first steps to address the vaccine shortage in March, when the White House announced the Merck deal as well as a partnership with Japan, India and Australia aimed at expanding manufacturing capacity. That included a pledge to help Biological E, an Indian manufacturer, produce one billion doses by the end of 2022. Days after the crash, Mr. Ravnsborg said in a statement that he had personally found the body of Mr. Boever the morning after the accident. And in the two videos that were briefly released by the state, Mr. Ravnsborg told the story of what he said had happened on the night of the crash. In the first video, from Sept. 14, Mr. Ravnsborg told investigators that he had been driving home alone from a Republican Party dinner on the night of Sept. 12 and that after passing through the town of Highmore, he had accelerated to about 67 miles per hour on U.S. Highway 14. And then, quite frankly, wham, he said. I hit, the incident happened. I never saw anything until the impact. He said he had jumped out of the car and called 911. He then hung up, used his phones flashlight and looked around the highway and the ditch. I am thinking it is a deer at this point, but I did not see anything, he told two investigators during the interview, adding that he did not see blood or fur from the impact, just debris from his car. After the sheriff arrived, he made arrangements for a tow truck and lent Mr. Ravnsborg a vehicle so he could drive home. The next morning, on his way to return the vehicle, Mr. Ravnsborg and a staff member stopped at the scene of the accident, where Mr. Ravnsborg said he found a body in a ditch. The body was later identified as Mr. Boever, a resident of Highmore. When told by investigators in the first interview that they had found a broken pair of eyeglasses in his car, Mr. Ravnsborg could not say whether they belonged to him, even though he said he did not wear glasses. He signaled that such an arrangement could be reached with a mix of economic and diplomatic pressure, and the lure of international aid, but he would not discuss his level of confidence in the Taliban to keep their word beyond vaguely citing what he called their public and private commitments to allow people to leave. Let me be crystal clear about this: There is no deadline on our work to help any remaining American citizens who decide they want to leave to do so, along with the many Afghans who have stood by us over these many years, and want to leave, and have been unable to do so, Mr. Blinken said. That effort will continue every day past Aug. 31. A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said on Wednesday that Afghans with valid travel documents would not be prevented from entering the airport if they were allowed in by American and Afghan forces there. In his first sit-down interview with a Western media organization since the Talibans arrival in Kabul, Mr. Mujahid disputed reports that the group would begin to keep Afghans away from the airport, which had been based on his statements during a news conference a day earlier. We said that people who dont have proper documents arent allowed to go, he said. They need passports and visas for the countries theyre going to, and then they can leave by air. If their documents are valid, then were not going to ask what they were doing before. He also insisted that the Taliban would forgive those who fought against them, and that women would be allowed to attend school and work, within what he described as Islamic principles. Human rights officials have dismissed such assurances as disingenuous, and many Afghans have hidden in their homes, fearing harassment and violence. Mr. Mujahid acknowledged that women would need a male guardian on journeys of three days or longer. He said that rumors that the Taliban would force women to stay in their homes or cover their faces were baseless, but he confirmed that music would not be allowed in public. The U.S. Embassy warned Americans to stay away from the Kabul airport and told anyone outside the perimeter to leave immediately, citing unnamed security threats. The British and Australian governments issued similar warnings, with Australian officials describing an ongoing and very high threat of terrorist attack. The warnings came as the last of the estimated 1,500 Americans and countless other foreigners still in Afghanistan try to make it to the airport to leave before the U.S. withdrawal on Aug. 31. Thousands of Afghan nationals are camped outside the perimeter of the airport in desperate attempts to escape on the last flights out, some with documents allowing them to leave. A senior U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity about confidential assessments, confirmed that the United States was tracking a specific and credible threat at the airport from the Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan, which has carried out dozens of attacks in recent years, many targeting ethnic minorities and other civilians. Florida Sees Worst of Pandemic So Far The state hit records for deaths, hospitalizations and new cases, as doctors urge vaccinations. Pfizer, BioNTech and Johnson & Johnson press ahead on booster shots. J. & J. finds that a second dose of its vaccine provides a strong boost. In a trial participants were given a booster shot at six months, and their antibodies against the coronavirus jumped nine times higher than after the first dose. Credit... Robyn Beck/Agence France-Presse Getty Images A booster shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine dramatically raises the levels of antibodies against the coronavirus, the company reported on Wednesday. Johnson & Johnson will submit the data to the Food and Drug Administration, which is evaluating similar studies from Pfizer and Moderna. If authorized by the agency, the Biden administration wants to provide booster shots eight months after vaccination. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine was absent from the governments initial booster plan, announced last week. But with the new data, the company hopes to be part of the initial distribution of additional shots, which could happen as early as September. We look forward to discussing with public health officials a potential strategy for our Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine, boosting eight months or longer after the primary single-dose vaccination, Dr. Mathai Mammen, the global head of Janssen Research & Development at Johnson & Johnson, said in a statement. In February, the F.D.A. gave emergency authorization to Johnson & Johnson for its one-shot vaccine. A clinical trial carried out last fall and winter showed that a single shot had a 72 percent efficacy in preventing symptomatic Covid-19 among U.S. participants. In the trial, none of the vaccinated volunteers were hospitalized or died. Johnson & Johnson carried out its clinical trial before the Delta variant became widespread, leaving open the question of how well the vaccine worked against the highly contagious form of the virus. But in a study released earlier this month, South African researchers found that a single shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was up to 95 percent effective against death from the Delta variant, and reduced the risk of hospitalization by 71 percent. In its new study, Johnson & Johnson tracked 17 volunteers from last years clinical trial. Six months after vaccination, their level of antibodies had changed little. Thats different than the pattern seen with the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines. Those shots initially produce higher levels of antibodies, but their levels then drop over several months. When volunteers in the Johnson & Johnson trial were given a booster shot at six months, their antibodies against the coronavirus jumped nine times as high as after the first dose. Studies on the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines found a comparable jump in antibody levels. Because the three vaccines were not tested in a head-to-head comparison, its not possible to determine which one provides the biggest boost. Johnson & Johnson said that it had submitted a manuscript describing the research to the website Medrxiv. It has not been posted there yet. Noah Weiland contributed reporting. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Pfizer and BioNTech say a third shot boosts antibodies against the virus. A patient receives their booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine in Southfield, Mich., on Monday. Credit... Emily Elconin/Getty Images Pfizer and BioNTech said on Wednesday they were now applying to the Food and Drug Administration for supplemental approval of a coronavirus vaccine booster shot for those aged 16 and up, and will submit all their supporting data by the end of this week. The move came as the companies said that a third shot of the vaccine sharply increased the levels of antibodies against the virus. The companies conducted a study of 306 volunteers who received a booster shot about five to eight months after their second shot. Researchers found that the level of antibodies that block the coronavirus jumped more than three times higher than the level after the second dose. The side effects of a third injection were about the same as after the initial two doses, the companies said. The underlying data was not included in the news release, nor were the dates or location of the study specified. The companies said they were preparing a scientific publication describing the research. The news of Pfizer and BioNTechs booster application came two days after the F.D.A. fully approved their two-dose vaccine for those 16 and older, making it the first to move beyond emergency use status. Over the past few weeks, federal regulators have been racing to collect and evaluate data on booster shots. If the F.D.A. decides additional shots are safe and effective, the Biden administration has said it wants adults to get a third injection eight months after their second shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, starting the week of Sept. 20. Federal health officials said last week that they believe that the potency of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines wanes over time, raising the risk of infection from the highly contagious Delta variant. While data indicate that the vaccines continue to offer robust protection against hospitalization and severe disease, the officials said they fear that the situation could change without booster shots. Some public health experts have challenged the plan as premature, saying the available data shows that the vaccines are holding up well against severe disease and hospitalization, including against the Delta variant. Extra shots would be warranted only if the vaccines failed to meet that standard, some have said. Pfizer executives presented an early look at their booster data on July 23, during their second-quarter earnings call. In a smaller study, they found that antibody levels dropped markedly in the months following a second dose. But those levels jumped back up after a third dose. When researchers expanded their focus to a larger group of subjects, they continued to find a strong effect from the boosters. Antibodies that can neutralize the coronavirus are only one kind of defense our immune systems use to fight it. The new study did not include details about other defenses provoked by the vaccine, such as immune cells trained to kill infected cells. The participants in the new booster study were between the ages of 18 and 55. It was not immediately clear why the study did not include older people. Volunteers were followed for a median period of 2.6 months. Pfizer and BioNTech said that in addition to the F.D.A., they plan to submit their data to regulatory authorities in Europe and other countries. The administrations booster plan does not as yet include recipients of Johnson & Johnsons one-shot vaccine. Johnson & Johnson announced earlier on Wednesday that unlike the studies of Modernas and Pfizers vaccines, a study of 17 volunteers showed little change in their antibody levels over the course of six months. But the study also showed that when the volunteers were given a second shot six months after their first, their antibodies against the coronavirus jumped nine times higher than the level after the first dose. Company officials said they are looking forward to discussing a potential booster strategy for their vaccine with federal health officials. While Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was fully approved as a two-shot regimen for those 16 and older, adolescents aged 12 to 15 can continue to be vaccinated under the vaccines emergency use authorization. Regulators have only authorized a third shot for some people with weakened immune systems. Sharon LaFraniere and The W.H.O. will address inequities by making vaccines in Latin America. Newly vaccinated patients waiting to be released after the mandatory post-vaccine observation period in Le Lamentin, Martinique, earlier this month. Credit... Lionel Chamoiseau/Agence France-Presse Getty Images To help address unequal access to Covid-19 vaccines around the world an issue that remains the Achilles heel of the pandemic fight the World Health Organization is starting a program to manufacture vaccines in Latin America and the Caribbean, Dr. Carissa Etienne, the director of the Pan American Health Organization, said Wednesday. Much of todays vaccine supply remains in the hands of wealthy nations around the world, she said. We must expand regional pharmaceutical production so we can be in the drivers seat. She said her organization, which is part of the W.H.O., was analyzing about 30 proposals to manufacture messenger RNA vaccines the same type as the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna shots and expects to decide next month which ones to implement. The most feasible proposals, including those that already have guaranteed investment backing, will get priority in an effort to expedite the project, according to Dr. Jarbas Barbosa, the pan-American agencys assistant director. The mRNA vaccines are some of the most effective vaccines against Covid-19, and the technology is highly adaptable, so it has enormous potential to be used against other viruses, Dr. Etienne said. Vaccines produced by the program are to be distributed to countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, a region where an average of only 23 percent of the population has been fully vaccinated so far. In many countries coverage is much lower, Dr. Etienne said. Just over 3 percent of people have been vaccinated in Guatemala, and a little over 4 percent in Jamaica. Many islands in the Caribbean, including Jamaica, are reporting steep surges in new cases and Haitis health system is struggling to care for survivors of the devastating Aug. 14 earthquake that killed more than 2,200 people. Logistics and security challenges continue to limit the delivery of supplies, the deployment of personnel to affected areas and the transfer of patients to other hospitals, Dr. Etienne said. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Maines Episcopal diocese orders staff and clergy to be vaccinated. The Cathedral Church of St. Luke, the Episcopal cathedral in Portland, Maine. The bishop of Maine is requiring all staff members of the diocese to be vaccinated against the coronavirus. Credit... Farragutful The Episcopal Diocese of Maine will mandate coronavirus vaccines for all clergy and staff members, becoming one of the first religious authorities in the country to require inoculations. We needed to join the public health leaders in giving a religious voice to what is a very pressing moral issue right now, said Bishop Thomas J. Brown on Wednesday. To lead in the public square, and to join other organizations, corporations and institutions with similar mandates is to say that we are all about loving God and loving our neighbors. Bishop Brown issued the directive on Monday and said it will apply to about 240 clergy and 14 employees, who will have until Sept. 30th to get fully vaccinated, unless they have a medical exemption from a physician. So far, all 170 religious who have responded have told him they are already inoculated. If any of the remaining 70 decline to get shots, he said the consequences would depend on their role. The bishop said he issued the directive in an effort to safeguard the public well beyond the reach of the diocese, which includes more than 10,000 parishioners. What it ultimately means is, we can say to people in Maine who are not in our churches that we stand on the side of public health. Some faith leaders in the United States have sought to tread carefully on issues like vaccines and masks, creating a patchwork of policies as they seek to reopen houses of worship after more than a year of restrictions. A smaller group of religious denominations and leaders have opposed public health rules and questioned inoculations. The Episcopal Church, though, has been supportive of vaccinations long before this pandemic, Bishop Brown said. In 2019, the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church issued a resolution stating: The proper and responsible use of vaccines is a duty not only to our own selves and families but to our communities. Choosing to not vaccinate, when it is medically safe, threatens the lives of others. Maine has fared relatively well amid the nations recent surge in cases and deaths driven by the Delta variant, with a seven-day average of 161 new cases per day and two deaths reported on Tuesday, according to a New York Times database. More than 70 percent of Maine residents have received at least one dose of the vaccines and 65 percent are fully vaccinated. Advertisement Continue reading the main story A study finds that myocarditis is more common after Covid than after vaccination. Administering a dose of the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine at a mobile clinic near Moshav Dalton in northern Israel in February. Credit... Jalaa Marey/Agence France-Presse Getty Images The Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine is associated with an increased risk of myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle, a large new study from Israel confirms. But the side effect remains rare, and Covid-19 is more likely to cause myocarditis than the vaccine is, scientists reported on Wednesday. The research, which is based on the electronic health records of about two million people who are 16 or older, provides a comprehensive look at the real-world incidence of various adverse events after both vaccination and infection with the coronavirus. In addition to myocarditis, the Pfizer vaccine was also associated with an increased risk of swollen lymph nodes, appendicitis and shingles, although all three side effects remained uncommon in the study. Coronavirus infection was not associated with these side effects, but it did increase the odds of several potentially serious cardiovascular problems, including heart attacks and blood clots. Coronavirus is very dangerous, and its very dangerous to the human body in many ways, said Ben Reis, a co-author of the new study and the director of the predictive medicine group at the Boston Childrens Hospital Computational Health Informatics Program. He added, If the reason that someone so far has been hesitating to get the vaccine is fear of this very rare and usually not very serious adverse event called myocarditis, well, this study shows that that very same adverse event is actually associated with a higher risk if youre not vaccinated and you get infected. The data arrived in the middle of an intense discussion among federal regulators about the risks of myocarditis and pericarditis, which is inflammation of the lining around the heart, in younger recipients of both the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines. Emily Anthes and Nebraska is recruiting unvaccinated nurses to plug a staffing shortage. Medical professionals sanitizing at a coronavirus testing site in Omaha, Neb., last year. Credit... Calla Kessler for The New York Times Health officials in Nebraska are so desperate for staff that they are recruiting unvaccinated nurses, an unconventional attempt to plug the shortage of nurses as the state battles a surge in coronavirus cases. The advertisements for unvaccinated nurses are popping up on postcards, on Facebook and on state job postings: $5,000 sign-on bonus! and No mandated Covid-19 vaccinations, the notices say. The ads are for positions in veterans homes, psychiatric treatment facilities and other locations. State Senator Carol Blood first heard about the advertisements on Monday, she said, when she was inundated with messages from constituents criticizing the outreach. Our health care professionals were calling my office in tears, she said. Its a slap in the face to them. On Thursday, Gov. Pete Ricketts of Nebraska declared a staffing emergency for the states hospitals. New cases in Nebraska have jumped, with hospitalizations rising to the highest level since January, according to a New York Times database. The governor said he would issue an executive order that will make it easier for hospitals to hire nurses. The order will waive licensing requirements for hospitals in order to authorize credentials for retired or inactive nurses, defer some continuing education requirements and suspend statutes concerning new health care providers who are seeking a license to practice. Nebraskas nurses, like health care workers across the country, are a year and a half into a relentless battle to care for Covid patients. The latest and most severe cases, across the country, are among those who have yet to be vaccinated. Nebraska Covid-19 Hospitalizations 500 1,000 hospitalized Mar. 2020 Apr. May Jun. Jul. Aug. Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec. Jan. Feb. Mar. 2021 Apr. May Jun. Jul. Aug. 7day average 347 About this data Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The seven-day average is the average of a day and the previous six days of data. Currently hospitalized is the most recent number of patients with Covid-19 reported by hospitals in the state for the four days prior. Dips and spikes could be due to inconsistent reporting by hospitals. Hospitalization numbers early in the pandemic are undercounts due to incomplete reporting by hospitals to the federal government. As the highly contagious Delta variant pummels the United States, nurses are reporting that they feel depleted and traumatized, their ranks thinned by early retirements or career shifts that traded the emergency room for less stressful jobs. Gov. Ricketts, a Republican, directed the state authorities to recruit unvaccinated nurses, said Taylor Gage, a spokesman for the governor. The state responded with this campaign so nurses throughout Nebraska know that state government is an alternative career choice, Mr. Gage said in a statement. The decision came after eight state hospitals mandated vaccines for their employees, KETV reported. Ms. Blood, a Democrat, wrote a letter to the governor on Monday criticizing the recruitment scheme, saying the states decision was of grave concern to myself and countless people in my district. I do understand that we have a serious shortage of staff, she wrote. With that said, putting those who live in these facilities at risk because we need to find bodies to hire is not acceptable. Ms. Blood said on Wednesday night that she had not received a reply from the governors office. The surge is being driven by the highly contagious Delta variant and low vaccination rates, health experts said. The authorities in Nebraska are struggling to vaccinate its citizens, with only 57 percent of people at least partially vaccinated. The national rate is 61 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Gov. Ricketts also announced Thursday a directed health measure to limit elective surgeries that will take effect on Monday. The statewide limitations comes days after Nebraska Medicine, Methodist Health, and Bryan Health announced that they would suspend elective surgeries to preserve hospital capacity. Nebraska Medicine cited the nursing shortage as a factor in its decision. The governor said on Thursday that he is still against mask mandates, vaccine requirements and the use of vaccine passports but he urged all Nebraskans to get vaccinated. Alyssa Lukpat and Advertisement Continue reading the main story Chicago will require city workers to be vaccinated, the mayor says. Peter Cooper Public School teacher Lizbeth Osuna, left, receives a Moderna COVID-19 vaccine in Chicago in Feb. Credit... Shafkat Anowar/Associated Press Mayor Lori Lightfoot of Chicago said on Wednesday that all city employees will have to be fully vaccinated against the coronavirus by Oct. 15. The action by the city, the second-largest in the United States to impose such a requirement, came as coronavirus infections continue to spread rapidly across the country. The policy will apply to more than 30,000 employees, including police officers, firefighters, park employees and sanitation workers. Employees may apply for a medical or religious exemption. As cases of Covid-19 continue to rise, we must take every step necessary and at our disposal to keep everyone in our city safe and healthy, Ms. Lightfoot said in a statement. Getting vaccinated has been proven to be the best way to achieve that and make it possible to recover from this devastating pandemic. And so, we have decided to join other municipalities and government agencies across the nation, including the U.S. military, who are making this decision to protect the people who are keeping our cities and country moving. The Los Angeles City Council passed a similar vaccine mandate last week for the citys nearly 60,000 municipal workers (the public schools there are not part of the city government). Los Angeles County and the city of Seattle have also adopted mandates. In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio has announced that teachers and other school employees will be required to be vaccinated, and other city employees must either be vaccinated or submit to weekly coronavirus tests. The Food and Drug Administration granted full approval on Monday to Pfizer-BioNTechs coronavirus vaccine for people 16 and older, making the vaccine the first to move beyond emergency-use status in the United States. Ms. Lightfoot, whose administration has had a rocky relationship with major labor unions, is expected to face resistance from their members, particularly in the union representing police officers. She said on Wednesday that her administration was in conversations with labor unions to create a vaccination policy that is workable, fair and effective. The Fraternal Order of Police in Chicago said earlier this week that it opposed a mandate and was awaiting more information from the mayors office. Bob Reiter, the president of the Chicago Federation of Labor, which represents union members in Chicago and Cook County, said that while unions believe in the benefits of vaccination, we do not believe punitive mandates are the right path to significantly increase vaccine uptake. We believe this announcement may harden opposition to the vaccine, instead of protecting the workers who have sacrificed so much over the past 18 months, Mr. Reiter said in an email. Nearly 64 percent of Chicago residents age 12 and older have been fully vaccinated; nationwide, 60 percent of Americans 12 and older have been fully vaccinated. Mandatory vaccination of the U.S. military will begin immediately, the defense secretary says. U.S. Army soldiers assigned to Ft. Bragg Army Post, N.C., wait to get vaccinated against the coronavirus. Credit... Kenny Holston for The New York Times Mandatory vaccination against the coronavirus for active-duty U.S. service members who have not already gotten shots will begin now, though no hard deadline has been set to complete it, the secretary of defense said in a memo. Lloyd J. Austin III, the secretary, directed the secretaries of the military departments to immediately begin full vaccination of all members of the armed forces under D.o.D. authority on active duty or in the Ready Reserve, including the National Guard, who are not fully vaccinated against Covid-19. The memo, dated Tuesday, said that only vaccines that have been federally approved will be used. It said the leaders of each branch of the military should impose ambitious timelines for implementation and report back regularly on progress, using established systems for mandatory vaccine reporting. John F. Kirby, a spokesman for the Pentagon, said at a news conference on Wednesday that 68 percent of active-duty troops were already fully vaccinated, including the National Guard and Reserves. He said the Navy was the most-vaccinated branch, with 73 percent of sailors fully inoculated, while the Army was the least, with just 40 percent of soldiers fully vaccinated. The secretary has made clear his expectation to the military departments that he wants them to move with some alacrity here, and get the force fully vaccinated as fast as possible, Mr. Kirby said. Federal approval for Pfizer-BioNTechs vaccine for people 16 and older on Monday allowed the military to begin requiring Covid vaccinations. The other two vaccines now in use in the United States made by Moderna and Johnson & Johnson only have emergency use authorizations from the Food and Drug Administration. Mandatory vaccinations are familiar to all Service members, and mission critical inoculation is almost as old as the U.S. military itself, Mr. Austin said. Our administration of safe, effective Covid-19 vaccines has produced admirable results to date, and I know the Department of Defense will come together to finish the job, with urgency, professionalism and compassion. Over the months when vaccination was voluntary for the 1.4 million active-duty members of the military, a current of resistance developed among younger members. Now that it will be mandatory, Mr. Kirby said, service members who refuse vaccination and lack a valid medical or religious exemption will be offered a chance to discuss the vaccine with a physician and with their commander, which would ideally address the service members concerns, before facing discipline. Its a lawful order, and its our expectation that troops will obey lawful orders, Mr. Kirby said. And we also expect that commanders will have plenty of other tools available to them to get their vaccination rates up, and to get these individuals to make the right decision, short of having to use disciplinary action. Advertisement Continue reading the main story New case reports are leveling off globally despite the U.S. surge, the W.H.O. says. Video transcript Back bars 0:00 / 0:45 - 0:00 transcript Global Surge Is Stabilizing, Albeit at a High Level, W.H.O. Says Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organization, said the number of coronavirus cases worldwide showed signs of flattening after increasing for nearly two months, despite continuing increases in some regions. After increasing for nearly two months, the global number of Covid-19 cases and deaths was stable last week. But its stable at a very high level, more than 4.5 million cases and 68,000 deaths. However, the situation is very different from region to region, country to country, province to province and town to town. Some regions and countries continue to see steep increases in cases and deaths, while others are declining. As long as this virus is circulating anywhere, its a threat everywhere. Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organization, said the number of coronavirus cases worldwide showed signs of flattening after increasing for nearly two months, despite continuing increases in some regions. Credit Credit... Ezra Acayan/Getty Images Reports of new coronavirus cases around the world are showing signs of flattening, even though they are still rising rapidly in the United States, the World Health Organization said in its latest weekly assessment. In the week ended Aug. 22, the W.H.O. said, some 4.5 million new cases were reported worldwide, about the same as the week before, and the rate now seems to be stable after two months of sustained growth. It is stable at a very high level, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the organization, said at a news briefing. As long as this virus is circulating anywhere, its a threat everywhere. Deaths reported from Covid-19 were also similar to the previous week, at 68,000 overall, though they continued to rise in Europe and the Americas, the W.H.O. said. The United States reported the most new cases and deaths of any country, and a 15 percent increase in cases from the week before, the W.H.O. noted, as the Delta variant spread rapidly and politicians sparred over whether to reintroduce mitigation measures. The country recorded 6,712 deaths for the week, an increase of 58 percent from the previous week. Cases are also rising fairly rapidly in Britain, which recorded 219,919 new cases for the week, an 11 percent increase, the W.H.O. said. Iran and India each reported more new cases than Britain did, but their figures and those of Brazil, another major locus of the pandemic, fell last week. Japan, host to the Olympic Games and now the Paralympic Games, reported the fastest case growth its 149,057 new cases for the week represented an increase of 34 percent from the week before. Some Southeast Asian countries, particularly Malaysia and the Philippines, also reported significant increases in cases, while Thailand and the Philippines reported sharp increases in deaths. So far, the W.H.O. said, about 211 million people around the world have had confirmed coronavirus infections since the start of the pandemic, and just over 4.4 million people are recorded as dying from Covid-19. U.S. intelligence agencies delivered a report to Biden on the viruss origins. Security personnel standing guard outside the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan, China, in February. Credit... Hector Retamal/Agence France-Presse Getty Images The director of national intelligence delivered a report to President Biden on Tuesday on the origins of the coronavirus epidemic, according to U.S. officials, but the nations spy agencies have not yet concluded whether the disease was the result of an accidental leak from a lab or if it emerged naturally in a spillover from animals to humans. Mr. Biden had ordered the nations intelligence agencies three months ago to draft a report on the origins of the virus, which has been the subject of an intensifying debate, in part to give the agencies a chance to examine a trove of data that had not been fully exploited. But the inquiry, which examined data collected from a virology research institute in Wuhan, China, the city where the virus first spread, has yet to answer the biggest outstanding question about where it came from. Its absence of conclusions underscores the difficulty of pinpointing the source of the virus, particularly given Chinas refusal to continue to cooperate with international investigations into the origin the coronavirus. In the months after the pandemic began, intelligence agencies began looking into how it started. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo pushed the agencies to look into the theory that the virus was created inside a Chinese lab and accidentally leaked. Mr. Pompeo formed his own research group to study the question. During the Trump administration, intelligence agencies ruled out theories that the virus was deliberately leaked. But they said they could not make a conclusion about what was more likely: an accidental leak from a lab researching coronaviruses or a natural development of the virus. While many scientists were initially skeptical of the lab leak theory, at least some became more open to examining it this year. And some criticized a World Health Organization report in March that found the lab leak theory unlikely. After that report, Biden administration officials became frustrated with a decision by the Chinese government to stop cooperating with further investigations by the World Health Organization into the origins of the pandemic. In the face of what they called Chinese intransigence and a divided American intelligence community, Biden administration officials then ordered a 90-day review of the intelligence, resulting in the report delivered to the president on Tuesday. Current and former officials have repeatedly warned that finding the precise origins of the pandemic may be more of a job for scientists than spies. Under Avril D. Haines, the director of national intelligence, the agencies have stepped up cooperation with scientists, hoping to better understand the current pandemic and possible future ones. Officials also warned that the 90-day review was probably too brief to draw any definitive conclusions. The report remains classified for now, and officials would not discuss its findings. But officials said that Ms. Hainess office would most likely declassify some information later this week. I cant obviously speak to a classified briefing, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said when reporters asked her about the report on Wednesday. I know you are eager to receive an unclassified summary, that is something the intelligence community has been working to produce and as soon as that is available it will be put out publicly. Asked whether the president would be satisfied if the inquiry ended inconclusively, Ms. Psaki said that he was doing everything possible to uncover the truth. I can assure you the president wants to get to the bottom of the root causes of Covid-19, that as you noted has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans, and wishes that there had been more done earlier on to get to the bottom of it, and to of course save more lives, she said. Daniel E. Slotnik contributed reporting. Advertisement Continue reading the main story The window is rapidly closing to gather crucial evidence on the viruss origins, scientists say. Experts from a World Health Organization team arriving earlier this year at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, in the Chinese city where Covid-19 emerged. Credit... Hector Retamal/AFP Getty Images Experts studying the origins of the coronavirus for the World Health Organization warned on Wednesday that the inquiry had stalled and that further delays could make it impossible to recover crucial evidence about the beginning of the pandemic. The window is rapidly closing on the biological feasibility of conducting the critical trace-back of people and animals inside and outside China, the experts wrote in an editorial in the journal Nature. Several studies of blood samples and wildlife farms in China were urgently needed to understand how Covid-19 emerged, they said. Amid a rancorous debate about whether a laboratory incident could have started the pandemic, the editorial amounted to a defense of the teams work and an appeal for follow-up studies. A separate report by American intelligence agencies into the pandemics origins was delivered to President Biden on Tuesday, but did not offer any new answers about whether the virus emerged from a lab or in a natural spillover from animals to humans. The international expert team, sent to Wuhan, China, in January as part of a joint inquiry by the World Health Organization and China, has faced criticism for publishing a report in March that said a leak of the coronavirus from a lab, while possible, was extremely unlikely. Immediately after the reports release, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the W.H.O.s director-general, said that the study had not adequately assessed the possibility of a lab leak. Virologists have leaned toward the theory that infected animals spread the virus to people. In the editorial published on Wednesday, the expert team reiterated calls to test the blood of workers on wildlife farms that supplied animals to Wuhan markets, to see if they carried antibodies indicating past coronavirus infections. The team also recommended screening more farmed wildlife or livestock that could have been infected. (The editorial also notes, somewhat pessimistically, that many Chinese wildlife farms have been closed and their animals killed since the pandemic emerged, making evidence of early spillover from animals to humans hard to come by.) The team pointed to a recent report showing that markets in Wuhan had sold live animals susceptible to the virus, including palm civets and raccoon dogs, in the two years before the pandemic began, and argued that the weight of evidence behind a natural spillover was greater than that for a lab leak. Marion Koopmans, a Dutch virologist and co-author of the editorial, described it in an interview as a cry for urgency. We were getting a little concerned that there really is virtually no debate about the bulk of the recommendations that are not related to the lab hypothesis, and of course theres a lot of discussion of the lab story, particularly coming from the U.S., she said. Our concern is that because of that emphasis, the rest doesnt get any more attention. To identify the first cases of the virus, Dr. Koopmans said, scientists also needed to examine blood specimens from late 2019 before they are thrown away. The expert team received assurances on its visit to Wuhan that blood banks there would keep samples beyond the usual two-year period, she said, but has still not received access to them. The Chinese government has stopped cooperating with investigations by the W.H.O., making it difficult to assess any theories about the viruss origins. Michael Ryan, a W.H.O. official, criticized China at a news conference on Wednesday for pushing unproven ideas suggesting that the coronavirus escaped from an American military lab. It is slightly contradictory if colleagues in China are saying that the lab leak hypothesis is unfounded in the context of China, but we now need to go and do laboratory investigations in other countries for leaks there, Dr. Ryan said. He said, however, that Chinese scientists had reported beginning some of the follow-up studies recommended by the international expert team. The editorial on Wednesday also raised concerns about delays at the W.H.O. The organization said this month that it would form an advisory group to study the emergence of new pathogens, and that the group would support inquiries into the coronavirus. The editorial warned that this new layer of bureaucracy runs the risk of adding several months of delay. Dr. Tedros, the organizations director-general, said on Wednesday that establishing the advisory group will not delay the progress of the studies into the origins of SARS-CoV-2. The W.H.O. said that it was already working to verify studies into the earliest known cases outside China. Rejecting a Covid inquiry, China peddles conspiracy theories blaming the U.S. A laboratory scientist at the U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command at Fort Detrick in Maryland. Credit... Andrew Harnik/Associated Press When a conspiracy theory started circulating in China suggesting that the coronavirus had escaped from an American military lab, it largely stayed on the fringe. Now, the ruling Communist Party has propelled the idea firmly into the mainstream. This week, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman repeatedly used an official podium to elevate unproven ideas that the coronavirus may have first leaked from a research facility in Fort Detrick, Md. A Communist Party publication, Global Times, started an online petition in July calling for that lab to be investigated and said it had gathered more than 25 million signatures. Officials and state media have promoted a rap song by a patriotic Chinese hip-hop group that touted the same claim, with the lyrics: How many plots came out of your labs? How many dead bodies hanging a tag? Beijing is peddling groundless theories that the United States may be the true source of the coronavirus as it pushes back against efforts to investigate the pandemics origins in China. The volume has risen in recent weeks, reflecting the authorities anxiety about being blamed for the pandemic that has killed millions globally. This not only contributes to the further deterioration of U.S.-China relations but also makes it even less likely for the two countries to work together to face a common challenge, said Yanzhong Huang, director of the Center for Global Health Studies at Seton Hall University. We havent seen any bilateral cooperation over the vaccines, tracing the trajectory of the virus or mutations, any of these kind of things. Austin Ramzy and Advertisement Continue reading the main story Delta steps up pressure on employees to get vaccinated. Starting Nov. 1, unvaccinated Delta Air Lines employees will be charged more to stay on the company health plan. Credit... Stefani Reynolds for The New York Times Delta Air Lines is intensifying pressure on employees to get vaccinated with a series of increasingly burdensome requirements over the coming weeks and months, though it stopped short of the mandates that other airlines and businesses have put in place. In a letter to employees on Wednesday, the carriers chief executive, Ed Bastian, said those who had not been vaccinated would immediately be required to wear masks indoors. Starting on Sept. 12, they will also have to take weekly coronavirus tests. On Sept. 30, unvaccinated workers will lose pay protection for employees who test positive for the virus and miss work while having to quarantine. Finally, starting on Nov. 1, any employee who remains unvaccinated will have to pay an additional $200 per month to remain on the companys health care plan. This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company, Mr. Bastian said. In recent weeks since the rise of the B.1.617.2 variant, all Delta employees who have been hospitalized with Covid were not fully vaccinated. The average coronavirus-related hospitalization has cost the company about $50,000 per person, he said. (The airline had said the cost was $40,000 but later corrected the figure.) Like many large employers, Delta insures its own work force, meaning it pays health costs directly and hires insurance companies to manage its plans. The onerous requirements apply to a shrinking share of the airlines work force, with 75 percent of employees now vaccinated, Mr. Bastian said. Weve always known that vaccinations are the most effective tool to keep our people safe and healthy in the face of this global health crisis, he said. Thats why were taking additional, robust actions to increase our vaccination rate. Delta, which is based in Atlanta, its biggest hub, operates the largest vaccination site in Georgia out of its flight museum, Mr. Bastian said. More than 115,000 doses have been administered to state residents there, and more than 150,000 doses have been given to employees, their family and friends. About 50.5 percent of Georgias adult population is fully vaccinated, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which puts the state near the bottom of the country. The airlines approach differs from that of some competitors. United Airlines, for example, announced this month that it would require vaccines across the board. That mandate will take effect on Sept. 27. United employees who provide proof of vaccination by Sept. 20 will receive a full days pay. Frontier Airlines, a smaller carrier, said it will require vaccination by Oct. 1. In announcing the discussions Thursday in a letter, the mayor, Femke Halsema, and the citys alderman for art and culture, Touria Meliani, cited the importance of righting wrongs, according to a translation provided to The New York Times. A return of the painting would be contingent upon the approval of Amsterdams City Council, said two people involved in the discussions over the Kandinsky. James Palmer of the Mondex Corporation, which is assisting the heirs, said his understanding was that after the mayor and heirs reach an agreement, its terms would be sent to the council for review. The story of the painting has drawn wide attention because it is seen by some as emblematic of shifts within the Netherlands related to how the country has handled requests for the return of works believed to have been plundered by Nazis, or sold under duress. For many years, the country was seen as being at the forefront of efforts to return stolen works to the heirs of their rightful owners. Over the last decade or so, critics have taken issue with a balance of interests criteria that the commission used in an effort to weigh the value of the work to the museum against claims by heirs. After considering the case of the Kandinsky, the restitutions commission wrote that the sale of the painting cannot be considered in isolation from the Nazi regime, but added that it had also been caused to an extent by the fact that its owners, Robert Lewenstein and Irma Klein, had experienced deteriorating financial circumstances that predated the German invasion. Inge Ginsberg, who fled the Holocaust, helped American spies in Switzerland during World War II, wrote songs in Hollywood and, in a final assertion of her presence on earth, made a foray into heavy metal music as a nonagenarian, died on July 20 in a care home in Zurich. She was 99. The cause was heart failure, said Pedro da Silva, a friend and bandmate. In a picaresque life, Ms. Ginsberg lived in New York City, Switzerland, Israel and Ecuador. She wrote songs and poetry, worked as a journalist and refused to fade into the background as she aged, launching herself, improbably, into her heavy metal career. She was the frontwoman for the band Inge and the TritoneKings, which competed on television in Switzerlands Got Talent, entered the Eurovision Song Contest and made music videos. Whatever the venue, Ms. Ginsberg would typically appear in long gowns and pearls and flash the two-fingered hand signal for rock on as she sang about the Holocaust, climate change, mental health and other issues. In the 2017 music video for the bands song Im Still Here, Ms. Ginsberg stands in front of a screen showing filmed images of refugees. She sings in a manner reminiscent of spoken-word poetry about her grandmother and four young cousins, all of whom were killed in German camps. At the end, she slices the screen and walks through it, singing as she joins the other band members amid a roar of electric guitars, drums and a pounded piano. VELVET WAS THE NIGHT, by Silvia Moreno-Garcia. (Del Rey, $28.) Immensely satisfying, refreshingly new and gloriously written, this vibrant noir, set in 1970s Mexico City, traces how a dowdy secretary on the cusp of 30 sparks to life thanks to the disappearance of her beautiful and glamorous neighbor. Moreno-Garcia mashes up Anglocentric genres with midcentury Mexican history, resulting in a brew flavored with love, heartbreak, violence, music and unsettling dread, Sarah Weinman writes in her latest crime column. That matters wont end well is a foregone conclusion this is noir, after all. But the gift of this book, and Moreno-Garcias storytelling, is how it imbues this well-worn genre with added strength, grace and even musicality. ALL THE FREQUENT TROUBLES OF OUR DAYS: The True Story of the American Woman at the Heart of the German Resistance to Hitler, by Rebecca Donner. (Little, Brown, $32.) Equal parts biography, history and thriller, this book tells the story of the authors idealistic but doomed great-great-aunt, Mildred Harnack, who, between 1932 and 1942, helped build a network of objectors in Berlin who hoped to stop the Nazis. Donner quotes passages from her sources at length, letting the reader dwell on facts rather than galloping through them, Madeleine Schwartz writes in her review. The archival quality of the book, its enumeration and cataloging of sources, is both surprising for a biography too rarely the site of literary innovation and affecting. It gives a sense of the warped timeline of crisis, how life can shift overnight without moving at all, the way in which change can ricochet from the political sphere to the smallest and most mundane details of a persons life. EVERYTHING I HAVE IS YOURS: A Marriage, by Eleanor Henderson. (Flatiron, $27.99.) It is a confusing time to be a woman who loves a troubled man, Henderson writes in this unflinching memoir of her husbands long and confounding medical conditions. She tells their story with a novelists eye for detail and the honesty of a trusted friend. Yes, Everything I Have Is Yours is an up-close look at a grisly, amorphous illness, Elisabeth Egan writes in her latest Group Text column. But this is also a love story and a family story, told by an accomplished novelist who gracefully executes a triple toe loop (as a wife, a mother and a caregiver), then nails the landing with humor and a certain offbeat panache. Even if you are as squeamish and uncharitable as I am, the generosity of Hendersons memoir will melt your icy heart. SOMETHING NEW UNDER THE SUN, by Alexandra Kleeman. (Hogarth, $28.) Kleemans novel is an unlikely amalgam of climate horror story, movie-industry satire and made-for-TV mystery, following a flailing writer who has come to Los Angeles for a film adaptation of his novel starring a tabloid-tragic teen star. Kleemans dystopia reveals itself slowly, normalcy curdling in the boil, Matthew Schneier writes in his review. The varieties of emergency ecological, psychological, familial, medical are the half-hidden subject of Kleemans novel, burning at the periphery of what begins as a modishly detached rollick through Hollywood and its empty promises. THE RISE AND FALL OF OSAMA BIN LADEN, by Peter Bergen. (Simon & Schuster, $30.) Meticulously documented, fluidly written and replete with riveting detail, Bergens book weaves back and forth between the man and the terrorist, providing the fullest picture we have yet of Osama bin Laden. Along the way, its equally revealing about the Americans and their pursuit of him. Thanks to the bravery of the SEAL team that delayed their departure from Abbottabad to retrieve computers and documents from bin Ladens lair after assassinating him, we now have a vast trove of information not previously available, Louise Richardson writes in her review. Along with other primary sources, Bergen had access to the 470,000 files taken during the raid, and he uses this material lightly, writing with the lucidity of an experienced journalist. WHITEHAVEN, England Britain has been getting out of the coal business for the past 100 years. The fuel that turned an island nation into a black-skied manufacturing giant during the Industrial Revolution has steadily been replaced by oil, natural gas and, increasingly in recent years, offshore winds and the rays of the sun. Thats why a proposal, the first in decades, to dig a new coal mine in Whitehaven, a faded harbor town in northwest England, has excited so much interest enthusiasm from some, repulsion from others. And it has put Prime Minister Boris Johnson in a bind. As he prepares to host the U.N. climate conference COP26 in the fall, the proposal forces him to choose between economic development for a region eager for new investment and burnishing his environmental credentials as climate change dominates political debate. The proposal by West Cumbria Mining calls for investing 160 million pounds, or $218 million, in a mine that would create more than 500 well-paying jobs, ranging up to 60,000 a year. The coal would be used not in power plants, but instead in the making of steel, an industry still heavily reliant on coal. Across Britain, a slow-burning problem has ignited into a supply chain crisis in recent weeks as restaurants, supermarkets and food manufacturers warned customers that some popular products may be temporarily unavailable because of a shortage of truck drivers. McDonalds milkshakes, Nandos chicken, Haribo sweets and supermarket milk are among the items that have become scarce in Britain over the summer. But it goes far beyond food: Nearly every industry is complaining about delivery problems. And already organizations are warning that logistics issues could upend the arrival of Christmas toys and the trimmings crucial to family holiday meals. A long-running shortage of truck drivers has been exacerbated by a post-Brexit exodus of European Union workers. Adding to the problem are disruptions to training for new drivers because of the pandemic. And for years, the trucking industry has struggled to attract new workers to a job that has traditionally been low paid and required long, grueling hours. Ninety-five percent of everything we get in Britain comes on the back of a truck, said Rod McKenzie, the director of policy at Road Haulage Association, which represents the British road transport industry, and estimates that there is a shortfall of 100,000 drivers. So if there are not enough trucks to go around and weve got reports of big companies with a hundred trucks parked up at any one time there simply is less stuff being delivered. A month ago, Vice Media announced a plan to reduce the number of text articles it publishes on Vice.com, Refinery29 and other Vice-owned sites by 40 to 50 percent as the company shifts its emphasis to video. On Thursday, Vice Media laid off more than a dozen employees, many of them writers and text editors. Cory Haik, Vice Medias chief digital officer, shared the news of the layoffs with the staff on Thursday in an email that The New York Times obtained. After noting recent successes on video, including the milestone of hitting one million TikTok subscribers for Vice Indonesia this week, Ms. Haik described larger changes at the company worldwide. As part of this continued global alignment, the email continued, weve unfortunately had to say goodbye to some of our friends and colleagues today. We wish them well and thank them for their dedicated service over the years. Writers and editors for Refinery29 and Vice shared news of their terminations on Twitter. Nearly 20 full-time jobs were cut, mostly in the United States, a person with knowledge of the layoffs said. The job cuts did not affect Vice News or Vice World News. Vice Union said 17 workers had been laid off from Vice and Refinery 29, and criticized Ms. Haik for only including the fact of the layoffs toward the end of her email to the staff. The floods that killed at least 20 people in Tennessee last weekend arrived with shocking speed and force seemingly a case study of the difficulties of protecting people from explosive rainstorms as climate change gets worse. A closer look at what happened in the days, years and even decades before the storm reveals that a series of government decisions where and how to build, when to update flood maps, whether to join the federal flood insurance program and how to warn of dangerous floods left residents more exposed to flooding than they had to be. Record rainfall, at times exceeding three inches an hour, swelled rivers and creeks in Middle Tennessee on Saturday, destroying homes, cutting off power and cellphone service and washing away bridges. Among the dead are 7-month old twins, a 15-year-old girl and an Army veteran who died after helping his wife and daughter escape. Its impossible to say whether any single action could have prevented those deaths, especially given the ferocity of the flooding. But interviews with climate and disaster experts and a review of state and federal data show how governments have been slow to adapt to growing threats and failed to take steps that, together, could have lessened the damage. The 75-year-old man lay sprawled on the floor between the kitchen counter and the island, surrounded by a halo of pills. What happened? his wife asked as she hurried to his side, although she suspected she already knew. He wasnt sure, he told her. One minute he was standing at the counter, getting ready to take his morning medications; the next, just like that, he was on the floor. She helped him sit up. When he was able to, he slowly rose to his feet. It was the third time he fainted in the last week and a half. The first spell came when his wife was out of town. He was dozing on the patio and woke up hot and sweaty. As he made his way into the house, he felt unsteady and braced himself on the wall. He made it to a chair but passed out a couple of times just sitting there. And when awake, he was confused. He was trying to read a text from his daughter but couldnt remember how. The next time, a couple of days later, he woke to go to the bathroom. He got up, then suddenly found himself on the floor. A sharp pain in his forehead told him hed clipped the bedside table on his way down. His wife helped him up and to the bathroom. He found that hed been incontinent. He was embarrassed, in front of his wife of 53 years. He called his doctors office the next morning and arranged to come in the following day. He hadnt been feeling well for the past couple of weeks, he told the young physician assistant. Hed woken up drenched with sweat a few times recently, and his wife told him he rattled the bed with his shivering. He felt feverish. Tired. No appetite. No ambition. Foggy. One night he wasnt even able to remember the prayer he always said before bed. And urinating was strangely uncomfortable. After finishing her exam, the physician assistant sent him to the lab. This was probably a urinary-tract infection, she told him after reviewing his test results. These are not uncommon in older men, because an enlarging prostate can make it hard to urinate. She started him on an antibiotic often used to treat this kind of infection. Hi, my name is Nia DaCosta, and I am the director of Candyman. You guys want to hear a scary story? No. Too bad. So, this scene is Troy and Brianna theyre siblings and Briannas boyfriend, Anthony who is an artist and Troys boyfriend. And theyre all together trying to have a nice dinner, but Troy insists on telling a ghost story about the neighborhood that Brianna and Anthony have just moved into. You see Yahya Abdul-Mateen II playing Anthony, Teyonah Parris playing Brianna, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett playing Troy, and Kyle Kaminsky playing Grady. [LAUGHTER] This is a story about a woman named Helen Lyle. She was a grad student a white grad student doing her thesis on the urban legends of Cabrini Green. For research, she came down to Cabrini a few times. You know, asking questions, taking pictures of graffiti, people. And then one day she just snaps. So, the shadow puppets came about when Jordan Peele, whos the co-writer and producer on the film, he came to me and he was like, I think we should do shadow puppets instead of shooting actual flashback scenes. And I was super into it because I did not want to shoot flashback scenes, and I also didnt want to cut in clips from the first movie. And so, we kind of made a decision, O.K., the flashbacks will be shadow puppetry. But then, as I was working with the shadow puppets and trying to figure out where they fit, it turned out they actually were just going to be much more useful. So thats how they ended up in this scene. We wanted it to be very specific to the teller. So every shadow puppet scene has a very specific style and point of view because it is someones way of thinking about the story. Its not necessarily the truth. Helen arrives with a sacrificial offering. [BABY CRYING] And thats why we wanted to also create that separation between fact and fiction, real and fake. And thats why you see the hands moving because its about these people creating a story puppeteering the way we think about these people. And for Troy, because hes trying to tell a scary story, hes being very hyperbolic. Hes also saying things that didnt happen. We made the style very jagged and scary and very much not the sympathetic character of Helen that we know and love from the original film. Is my rose still in the freezer? You dont want the moscato? Moscatos a dessert wine. [CHUCKLES] Like an awful herald of what could lie in wait as future filmmakers grapple with our ongoing viral nightmare, Stephen Daldrys Together is an almost punishing watch. That its bearable at all is entirely because of the superlative acting skills of James McAvoy and Sharon Horgan as an unnamed couple forced to endure an extended London lockdown. In place of a plot, we get a setup: They cant stand the sight of each other. A yearlong pandemic diary embedded in a prickly domestic negotiation, the movie is essentially a two-person play set in the upscale kitchen of the couples comfortable middle-class home. Repeatedly breaking the fourth wall perhaps to avoid breaking the crockery the two address the camera in earnest monologues. While these can range from confessional to explanatory (like a lengthy ponder on the meaning of exponential when tallying Covid infections), they are almost always suffocatingly self-absorbed. I dont want to say that race played a part in it, she added. But it did. The shooting of Major Dale, 61, got little attention until this month, when the state attorney generals office released videos of the episode filmed by officers body-worn and dashboard cameras. The office is leading an investigation into the matter, and a grand jury will be asked to consider charges against the officers, as New Jersey law requires after a fatal police encounter. Whatever the inquiry yields, the fatal shooting of Major Dale feeds into the continuing debate over whether armed officers are the best people to send on emergency calls to help people in mental distress. That debate grew amid the broader protests against police misconduct that sprang up last year after the killing of George Floyd. Police departments in various cities, including New York, responded by starting to have social workers and medics answer some 911 calls for mental health emergencies. On Wednesday, Newark added 10 social workers to respond to such calls. Other cities, including Albuquerque and, in perhaps the longest-running example, Eugene, Ore., had already started moving that way. Tina Hawkins, Major Dales former supervisor in the equal opportunity office at the Picatinny Arsenal, an Army facility in New Jersey, said the police had overreacted in confronting him. They didnt have to come out with guns a-blazing the way they did, she said. Ms. Cobbertt agreed, noting that the Newton police had responded differently during a January episode involving an 80-year-old white man who is accused of firing twice at officers in a parking garage after calling to report that he had a gun and planned to kill himself. The officers did not fire at the man, who was taken to a hospital for evaluation after being arrested and is charged with attempted murder. A major confrontation on the abortion battlefield looms this fall, when the Supreme Court is expected to hear arguments on whether Mississippi can ban abortion after 15 weeks. Thats roughly nine weeks before viability, the point at which states are now allowed to forbid abortion. To uphold Mississippis law, the court would have to eliminate its own viability rule or reverse Roe v. Wade altogether. Given the composition of the court, there is a real chance the justices may overthrow Roe. But there is also the possibility that the court, for institutional or political reasons, may not yet want to upend that 1973 decision, which found the Constitution protects a womans right to have an abortion without undue government interference. What then? A recent ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit seems tailor made for a Supreme Court that wants to look as if it cares about precedent while shooting a hole through that right. The appellate court relied on a past Supreme Court ruling to give leeway to the Texas Legislature to restrict a certain abortion procedure even though there was uncertainty about the medical consequences of the stricture. Texas is one of several states that functionally ban dilation and evacuation, the safest and most common abortion procedure used in the second trimester. In performing the procedure, a doctor dilates the cervix and then removes a fetus using forceps and possibly suction. But if Democrats want to be sure to beat Republicans, their best bet is to be not like them: to focus on the substance of problems rather than their political implications, to talk about solutions without calculating their political benefit. In these jaded times, a little genuine earnestness could go a long way. That holds true for the media as well. In an excellent column in The Washington Post recently, Margaret Sullivan rued the fact that reporting on government has become reporting on politics, although the two arent or at least shouldnt be the same. Her prompt was the fight between Democrats and Republicans over a congressional investigation into the events of Jan. 6. She implored journalists to stop asking who the winners and losers were in the latest skirmish. Start asking who is serving the democracy and who is undermining it. Stop being savvy and start being patriotic. Amen. A similar plea has a place in the coverage of Afghanistan. Ive pretty much given up on Republicans for the time being, but Im still rooting for better from Democrats, who should focus on how the United States honors the promises we made in Afghanistan, limits the suffering there and reclaims a place of honor and reliability in global affairs. I dont want the handicapping of the 2022 horse race, at least not right now. Not Being Trump Is Not Enough There was some criticism of Biden in last weeks newsletter, and while it was milder than it could have been, I knew the minute I wrote it that some of you would email to say versions of Give him a break. Hes a hell of a lot better than Trump. I agree. Hes a hell of a lot better than Trump. And I worry. A hell of a lot better than Trump cannot become our new presidential baseline. Regan (for newsletter newcomers, my dog) is a hell of a lot better than Trump, but I dont want her at the Resolute Desk. Except maybe for a very quick photo. The adorableness of which we could definitely forge bipartisan agreement about. I will not pretend that I know how we should have left Afghanistan. But neither do a lot of people dominating the airwaves right now. And the confident pronouncements to the contrary over the past two weeks leave me worried that America has learned little. We are still holding not just to the illusion of our control, but to the illusion of our knowledge. This is an illusion that, for me, shattered long ago. I was a college freshman when America invaded Iraq. And, to my enduring shame, I supported it. My reasoning was straightforward: If George W. Bush and Bill Clinton and Tony Blair and Hillary Clinton and Colin Powell and, yes, Joe Biden all thought there was some profound and present danger posed by Saddam Hussein, they must have known something I didnt. Theres an old line: It aint what you dont know that gets you into trouble. Its what you know for sure that just aint so. And so it was with the Iraq war. Bush and Clinton and Powell and Blair knew quite a bit that wasnt true. As Robert Draper shows in his book To Start a War: How the Bush Administration Took America Into Iraq, they were certain Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Only he didnt. They were also certain, based on decades of testimony from Iraqi expats, that Americans would be welcomed as liberators. There were many lessons to be learned from the Iraq war, but this, for me, was the most central: We dont know what we dont know, and, even worse, we dont always know what we think we know. Policymakers are easily fooled by people with seemingly relevant experience or credentials who will tell them what they want to hear or what they already believe. The flow of money, interests, enmities and factions is opaque to outsiders and even to insiders. We do not understand other countries well enough to remake them according to our ideals. We dont even understand our own country well enough to achieve our ideals. Look at the countries in which the war on terror has been waged, Ben Rhodes, who served as a top foreign policy adviser to President Barack Obama, told me. Afghanistan. Iraq. Yemen. Somalia. Libya. Every one of those countries is worse off today in some fashion. The evidentiary basis for the idea that American military intervention leads inexorably to improved material circumstances is simply not there. I wrote a book on political polarization so I am often asked to do interviews where the point is to lament how awful polarization is. But the continuing power of the war-on-terror framework reflects the problems that come from too much bipartisanship. Too much agreement can be as toxic to a political system as too much disagreement. The alternative to polarization is often the suppression of dissenting viewpoints. If the parties agree with each other, then they have incentive to marginalize those who disagree with both of them. At least for my adult life, on foreign policy, our political problem has been that the parties have agreed on too much, and dissenting voices have been shut out. That has allowed too much to go unquestioned, and too many failures to go uncorrected. It is telling that it is Biden who is taking the blame for Americas defeat in Afghanistan. The consequences come for those who admit Americas foreign policy failures and try to change course, not for those who instigate or perpetuate them. Another major obstacle for nuclear power is its price: Nuclear plants cost billions of dollars to build, making them one of the most expensive sources of electricity. Solar panels, by contrast, now generate the cheapest electricity in history so cheap that new solar projects, building costs included, can now compete with existing nuclear plants. What is remarkable about these trends, a report on the nuclear industry found last year, is that the costs of renewables continue to fall due to incremental manufacturing and installation improvements while nuclear, despite over half a century of industrial experience, continues to see costs rising. That explains in part why Frances reliance on nuclear power remains such an outlier. No country has managed to develop a safe, successful, economically competitive nuclear power industry in a market-based environment, Naomi Oreskes, a Harvard historian, said last year. This tells us that nuclear power is unlikely to be successful in market-based economies. It may work in China, but it is unlikely to work in most other places. Nuclear power proponents say its economic problems can be solved. Putting a price on carbon pollution so that fossil fuels reflect their true environmental cost, for example, could help make nuclear power competitive with natural gas, as could advances in reactor designs. Last year, the Department of Energy announced that it would fund the development of two such designs, including one championed by Bill Gates. But carbon taxes have so far proved a political nonstarter in the United States, and an analysis from the Union of Concerned Scientists in March found that so-called advanced reactor designs do not offer obvious improvements over current technology, could pose novel safety risks and will likely take decades to achieve commercial viability. Advances in battery technology that could solve the long-duration storage problem of renewables, on the other hand, appear closer on the horizon. Perhaps most important, nuclear power plants take much longer to build than renewable energy projects. Since the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, the construction time for most reactors in the United States has exceeded 10 years, Allison Macfarlane notes in Foreign Affairs. If the United States hopes to meet its emissions reduction targets, it cant afford to wait that long. We need strong government support of noncarbon-emitting energy technologies that are ready to be deployed today, not 10 or 20 years from now, she writes. We have run out of time. Taxpayers have also benefited from our reforms. Since 2011, their overall tax burden has dropped by more than $13 billion. Property taxes and income taxes were lower when we left office than when we started, and we relieved the tax burden on two of the largest industries that employ people in our state: manufacturing and agriculture. Critics started complaining several years ago that good teachers were being recruited to larger school districts for more responsibility and higher compensation. In 2018, however, I signed an initiative that helped rural schools offset challenges related to economics of scale and staffing. We also provided special help in our budget to districts like Milwaukee that had unique needs related to staffing. Most important, rewarding great teachers is a good thing. A paper published in the August edition of The American Economic Journal examines the effects of our reforms that gave school districts in Wisconsin full autonomy to redesign teacher pay. The paper shows that the introduction of flexible pay raised salaries of high-quality teachers, increased teacher quality (due to the arrival of high-quality teachers from other districts and increased effort) and improved student achievement. The crisis of the Covid-19 pandemic exposed the stranglehold many big government union bosses have on their communities. Union officials and administrators in Virginias Fairfax County Schools pushed to let school district employees jump the line for vaccinations this year yet refused to return to the classroom until months later. Even Mayor Lori Lightfoot of Chicago recognized the damage done to students particularly Black and Hispanic children who had not been in the classroom for nearly a year. In February she expressed her ongoing frustration, saying, We are failing those children by not giving them the options to return to school. Failing grades. Depression. Isolation. And so much more. Sadly, the union bosses fought the mayor throughout the process, even though Roman Catholic schools in Chicago have been open since last fall. Cases like this suggest that more states and jurisdictions could use our common-sense reforms. If Chicago were in Wisconsin, school officials would determine whether their school system was open and under what circumstances not the union bosses. President Franklin Roosevelt raised concerns about government unions, writing, all government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. Our one omission in Act 10 was exempting firefighters and police officers, but the failure of union leaders to allow teachers to return to school in Chicago affirmed our concern over a public safety disaster if the same thing happened in even one community in Wisconsin during the debate over what is now Act 10. An adult female white-necked Jacobin hummingbird is no stranger to invisible labor. When she lays an egg, the male hummingbird who played an equal role in the conception of said egg is nowhere to be seen. It is only thanks to her hours of weaving that the egg has a nest at all. When her chick hatches, she alone will feed it regurgitated food from her long bill. And then there is the constant harassment. As the muted-green females visit flowers to sip on nectar, they are chased, pecked at and body-slammed by aggressive males of their species, whose heads are a flamboyant blue. But some female white-necked Jacobins, which are found from Mexico to Brazil, have a trick up their wing: Instead of garbing themselves in green plumage, they take on bright blue ornamentation and appear essentially identical to male hummingbirds. Scientists found these male look-alikes avoid harassment directed toward green females, according to a paper published Thursday in the journal Current Biology. For the last 50 years, most scientists have relied on the theory of sexual selection, or mate choice, to explain why so many male birds have such foppish traits, such as a peacocks mirage of tail-feathers or a hummingbirds sapphire blue head, said Jay Falk, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Washington and an author of the paper. Dr. Falk led the research on the paper as a graduate student at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and while working with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. That may suggest that were so inured to the idea of a female leader that we have ceased to focus on it at all, a theory that falls into the too-good-to-be-true category. (Making snap judgments based on appearance is a basic part of human nature.) Or it suggests that Ms. Harris consciously and strategically crafted her image to ensure that it could not distract from the duty at hand. Which is not to say she thought about it any less. Consider: From the evening of Aug. 20, when she left Washington to fly to Singapore, through her time in Vietnam, she wore only dark pantsuits in navy, gray and black, with a small flag pin on the lapel, plain white or light blue shells beneath and her signature simple strand of pearls. She wore a dark pantsuit to meet with Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong of Singapore. A dark pantsuit to the orchid naming ceremony. A dark pantsuit to meet with President Nguyen Xuan Phuc of Vietnam to pay homage at John McCains memorial in Hanoi on the third anniversary of his death. Against the backdrop of the messy evacuation from Afghanistan and the need to reaffirm Americas commitment to its allies, with the Delta variant and other forms of the virus casting a cloud of fear over the worlds efforts to combat the pandemic, her somber wardrobe served to reflect the somber state of the world. Chinas buzzy high-tech companies dont usually recruit Cambodian speakers, so the job ads for three well-paid positions with those language skills stood out. The ad, seeking writers of research reports, was placed by an internet security start-up in Chinas tropical island-province of Hainan. That start-up was more than it seemed, according to American law enforcement. Hainan Xiandun Technology was part of a web of front companies controlled by Chinas secretive state security ministry, according to a federal indictment from May. They hacked computers from the United States to Cambodia to Saudi Arabia, seeking sensitive government data as well as less-obvious spy stuff, like details of a New Jersey companys fire-suppression system, according to prosecutors. The accusations appear to reflect an increasingly aggressive campaign by Chinese government hackers and a pronounced shift in their tactics: Chinas premier spy agency is increasingly reaching beyond its own ranks to recruit from a vast pool of private-sector talent. This new group of hackers has made Chinas state cyberspying machine stronger, more sophisticated and for its growing array of government and private-sector targets more dangerously unpredictable. Sponsored but not necessarily micromanaged by Beijing, this new breed of hacker attacks government targets and private companies alike, mixing traditional espionage with outright fraud and other crimes for profit. But while airlines are eager to capitalize on the demand, many appear to lack the staffing to keep up. Bureau of Transportation Statistics data show that the number of full-time-equivalent employees at U.S. scheduled passenger airlines was nearly 14 percent lower in June 2021 than in March 2020. Tens of thousands of flight attendants took leave during the pandemic, the A.F.A. union said. American Airlines said about 3,300 flight attendants have yet to return from leave. So many people were let go so quickly on extended leave of absence, early retirement, that theyre struggling to meet the travel demand, said Paul Hartshorn, a flight attendant and spokesman for the Association of Professional Flight Attendants, which represents about 24,000 American Airlines attendants. And staffing is tight, theres not a lot of wiggle room for storms and maintenance delays. At Southwest Airlines, the chief operating officer, Mike Van de Ven, shared a message with staff on Aug. 20, saying that the increase in bookings has taken a toll on our operation and put a significant strain on all of you. And for that, I am sincerely sorry. He also said that historical staffing models have not been effective in this pandemic environment. Theres not enough people, said Nas Lewis, a flight attendant with a major U.S. airline and founder of th|AIR|apy, a website and Facebook group that addresses flight attendants mental health. Ms. Lewis, who asked that the name of her airline not be published because of its media policy, said the situation generates anxiety for attendants because we dont know what were going to deal with on any given day. A shortage of pilots is another critical pain point for air travel, as is inadequate numbers of gate agents, baggage handlers and delivery drivers, all of which can easily throw a wrench into getting a flight out on time. When a cabin is short staffed, the airlines depend on on-call, or reserve, flight attendants. This summer, airlines have been stretching their reserves to the maximum, to the point where they are running low or out of available attendants before the day has even begun. The climate crisis is at high risk of becoming an economic crisis. That is an increasingly widespread view among leading economic thinkers that a range of economic and financial problems could result from a warming planet and humanitys efforts to deal with it. But if you believe that to be true, what should the United States economist-in-chief do about it? That question has taken new urgency as President Biden weighs whether to reappoint Jerome Powell to another term leading the Federal Reserve or choose someone else. Climate activists and others on the left have argued that Mr. Powell should be replaced by someone with stronger credentials as a climate hawk. Demonstrators backing this cause were planning to protest at an annual Fed symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyo., starting Thursday, but the event was made online-only at the last minute because of a rise in coronavirus cases. Among other things, they want the Fed to use its regulatory powers to throttle the flow of bank lending to carbon-producing industries. At the same time, some Republicans are assailing the Fed for mere research efforts involving climate. It is clear there would be a huge outcry on the right if a new Fed chair were to take an activist stance in trying to limit the availability of capital in energy-extraction businesses. CHICAGO Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois announced on Thursday a new, stricter set of coronavirus restrictions, ordering a statewide indoor mask mandate and requiring that all educators be vaccinated or face regular testing. The mask mandate applies to all Illinois residents age 2 and older and begins on Monday. The vaccine rule, effective Sept. 5, affects all teachers and staff in schools from kindergarten through college. Unfortunately, we are running out of time as our hospitals run out of beds, Mr. Pritzker said at a news conference on Thursday. Hospital staff are becoming overwhelmed and overburdened. People are dying who dont have to die. Health officials in Nebraska are so desperate for staff that they are recruiting unvaccinated nurses, an unconventional attempt to plug the shortage of nurses as the state battles a surge in coronavirus cases. The advertisements for unvaccinated nurses are popping up on postcards, on Facebook and on state job postings: $5,000 sign-on bonus! and No mandated Covid-19 vaccinations, the notices say. The ads are for positions in veterans homes, psychiatric treatment facilities and other locations. State Senator Carol Blood first heard about the advertisements on Monday, she said, when she was inundated with messages from constituents criticizing the outreach. Our health care professionals were calling my office in tears, she said. Its a slap in the face to them. On Thursday, Gov. Pete Ricketts of Nebraska declared a staffing emergency for the states hospitals. New cases in Nebraska have jumped, with hospitalizations rising to the highest level since January, according to a New York Times database. Ken Henson, who co-owns Pelican Brewing, which has locations along the Oregon coast, said the strictest interpretation of the rules was that people should wear masks and pull them down only to take a bite of food or a sip of a drink. But, in practice, he said, his restaurants allow customers to remove their masks once their food or drinks are in front of them. Even among people who have been generally compliant, he said, some customers are growing wary and unwilling to stay on board. The underlying tension is people are just tired, Mr. Henson said. Some places have resisted Ms. Browns orders. Redmonds school board, upset about the statewide requirement that teachers be vaccinated and students wear masks, adopted a resolution on Wednesday night calling for local control over such issues. Other localities, however, have talked about going even further than the governor. In Washington County, just outside Portland, commissioners considered a ban on indoor dining. Kathryn Harrington, the chair of the county board of commissioners, said the board eventually elected not to impose such a ban after getting advice that it would have little effect unless other counties joined in. Instead, the county elected to step up enforcement of mask requirements. Ms. Harrington said she personally did not plan to attend events for the foreseeable future. I am just not going to be taking any risks with anybody elses health, Ms. Harrington said. Its really hard to not see my friends right now. Really hard. But its the right thing to do to limit our gatherings with one another. Until the latest surge, Oregon had endured much of the pandemic as a success story. Among states, it ranks 46th in coronavirus deaths per capita. Several police officers who served during the Capitol riot have come forward with stories of the insults and injuries they faced that day, most prominently at a congressional hearing in July. But the lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court in the District of Columbia, was the first time that the seven plaintiffs, five of whom are Black, offered details of their ordeals. One of the officers, Governor Latson, was helping to secure the Senate chamber when a mob of rioters broke in and shoved him, beat him and hurled racial slurs at him, the lawsuit says. Another, Jason DeRoche, was caught in a melee on the west front steps of the Capitol, where, according to the suit, rioters pelted him with batteries and doused him with mace and bear spray, causing his eyes to swell shut. The suit contends that Mr. Trump and his co-defendants violated the Ku Klux Klan Act, an 1871 statute that includes protections against violent conspiracies that interfere with Congresss constitutional duties. It also accuses the defendants of committing bias-motivated acts of terrorism in violation of District of Columbia law. The use of civil litigation to hold Mr. Trump and many in his orbit accountable for the events of Jan. 6 has taken place even as the Justice Department has undertaken the largest criminal investigation in its history into the Capitol attack and a select committee of Congress has opened its own inquiry into the riot. On Wednesday, members of the committee made far-reaching requests to federal agencies for detailed records of Mr. Trumps movements and meetings on the day of the attack. The first of the lawsuits was filed in February by the N.A.A.C.P. on behalf of Democratic lawmakers who accused Mr. Trump, his former lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani, the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers of conspiring to prevent certification of the Electoral College vote on Jan. 6. It was not the case that Mikey tried to get out of Afghanistan only when the danger became clear. He started his special visa application in 2012, when he was in Kandahar with the military. He had his interview, one of the final steps in the process, in November 2018 when he worked at Camp Duskin in Kabul. He is still waiting for medical tests and approval. Emails he has sent to follow up on his application have gone unanswered. Across the United States, members of the armed forces are leading their own campaigns to pressure the Biden administration to scale up the evacuation of Afghans who worked as their interpreters. They have taken to social media and created fund-raising campaigns such as Help Our Interpreters. Military interpreters are among the most vulnerable of Afghan allies. The nature of their work required that they accompany military personnel in the battlefield and be present during interactions with locals. If residents of the areas where they worked were hostile to Americans, the interpreters could be easily identified for the Taliban. Mikey was a teenager in Kabul when the United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001. In high school he worked hard to learn English, and his language teacher suggested he work as an interpreter for the Americans after graduation. He was dispatched to Kandahar airfield, one of the largest U.S. military bases in Afghanistan, and from there to multiple remote outposts, quickly working his way up to become a lead interpreter. Just days after the Taliban took Kabul, their flag was flying high above a central mosque in Pakistans capital. It was an in-your-face gesture intended to spite the defeated Americans. But it was also a sign of the real victors in the 20-year Afghan war. Pakistan was ostensibly Americas partner in the war against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Its military won tens of billions of dollars in American aid over the last two decades, even as Washington acknowledged that much of the money disappeared into unaccounted sinkholes. But it was a relationship riven by duplicity and divided interests from its very start after 9/11. Not least, the Afghan Taliban the Americans were fighting are, in large part, a creation of Pakistans intelligence service, the I.S.I., which through the course of the war nurtured and protected Taliban assets inside Pakistan. In the last three months as the Taliban swept across Afghanistan, the Pakistani military waved a surge of new fighters across the border from sanctuaries inside Pakistan, tribal leaders have said. It was a final coup de grace to the American-trained Afghan security forces. KABUL, Afghanistan Two explosions killed dozens of people, including at least 13 U.S. troops, ripping through the crowds outside Afghanistans main airport on Thursday, just hours after Western governments had warned of an imminent Islamic State attack and told their people to stay away from the airport. The attack, by at least two suicide bombers, struck at the only avenue of escape for the thousands of foreign nationals and tens or hundreds of thousands of their Afghan allies who are trying to flee the country following the Taliban takeover and ahead of the final withdrawal of U.S. troops, set for next Tuesday. Afghan health officials gave varying estimates of the toll at the international airport in Kabul, the capital from at least 30 dead to more than 60, and from 120 wounded to 140 while a Taliban spokesman cited at least 13 civilians killed and 60 wounded. HANOI Vice President Kamala Harris said on Thursday that the United States would work with its allies to protect women and children in Afghanistan, as the Taliban takeover forced her to confront troubling historical parallels and diverted attention from her original mission on a five-day trip to Southeast Asia. Theres no question that any of us who are paying attention are concerned about that issue in Afghanistan, said Ms. Harris, referring to the protection of women and children in that country. The vice president made her comments in the Vietnamese capital, Hanoi, on the final day of her trip to Southeast Asia, a key part of the Biden administrations strategy to forge partnerships in the region and refocus American foreign policy on competing with Chinas rising influence. For Ms. Harris, the trip was an opportunity to assert herself on the world stage after her first overseas trip to Central America, one centered on addressing the root causes of migration, was marred by political backlash against the Biden administrations response to soaring crossings at the southwest border. BRUSSELS A standoff that has trapped Afghan asylum seekers on the border between Belarus and Poland is a telling example of the European Unions dilemma over migration, especially acute now with the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. As E.U. member states worry about a new flow of migrants and asylum seekers from Afghanistan, they are accusing nonmember Belarus of using migrants as a weapon to destabilize the bloc and worry that Turkey could do the same, as it has done before. The rapid Taliban takeover of Afghanistan less than two weeks ago has shocked Europe, which is still trying to absorb the more than one million asylum seekers and migrants who came in 2015, many of them driven by the horrors of war zones like Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. European leaders have made it clear that this time, they intend to enforce Europes border controls and avoid a new migration crisis and the political backlash that could come with it. Some 37 Afghan migrants, who left their country before the Taliban takeover earlier this month, have been stuck between the borders of Belarus and Poland for two weeks without easy access to food, water or toilets. Poland will not let them in and Belarus, which initially granted them visas, wont let them return from the border. While much of the United States has returned to something resembling life before the coronavirus, the tiny American territory of Guam in the Western Pacific is stuck in time. Its tourism-dependent economy remains paralyzed, and officials say a full recovery is probably years away. The South Korean and Japanese visitors who once thronged the island for its year-round sun and luxury boutiques are long gone. To entice tourists, the government has created a program that offers not just a vacation, but also vaccination. The program, called Air V&V, offers visitors their choice of any of the C.D.C.-approved vaccines for $100 or less per dose. By the end of August, at least 2,100 vaccine tourists will have arrived on chartered planes, according to the Guam Visitors Bureau all from Taiwan, where shots have been hard to come by. A relatively small number of others have flown in on regular flights. TUNIS Year after year, the man now accused of trashing Tunisias Constitution sat straight-backed in a suit and tie at the front of a university lecture hall, his notes on constitutional law tidy in front of him, his Day 1 warning to students ensuring pin-drop silence: Late students will not be admitted. Talk to your neighbor during class, and you will be admonished. Do it again, and you will be asked to leave. I was taken aback at first, recalled Fadoua El Ouni, who took Kais Saieds constitutional law course her first year at Carthage University. Like, are all university courses going to be like this? They were not. Mr. Saied was semilegendary on campus for mesmerizing classrooms with his deep, ringing voice, his speech so starched and archaic that when Ms. El Ouni first heard him converse in everyday Tunisian dialect, it was, she said, an out-of-body experience. Since Mr. Saied suspended Parliament and fired his own prime minister last month amid mass protests over unchecked poverty, corruption and the coronavirus, Tunisians have puzzled over the contradictions: How a political novice whose severe bearing and formal style earned him the nickname RoboCop became so beloved among the young that Facebook fan pages sprang up crediting him with sage utterances he had never uttered. WASHINGTON The cable sent this year by the outgoing C.I.A. officer in charge of building spy networks in Iran reverberated throughout the intelligence agencys Langley headquarters, officials say: Americas network of informers had largely been lost to Tehrans brutally efficient counterintelligence operations, which has stymied efforts to rebuild it. Israel has helped fill the breach, officials say, its robust operations in Iran providing the United States with streams of reliable intelligence on Irans nuclear activities, missile programs and on its support for militias around the region. The two countries intelligence services have a long history of cooperation and operated in virtual lock step during the Trump administration, which approved or was party to many Israeli operations in its shadow war against Iran. That changed after the election of President Biden, who promised to restore the nuclear agreement with Iran that Israel so vigorously opposed. In the spring, Benjamin Netanyahu, then Israels prime minister, even curtailed intelligence sharing with the United States because he did not trust the Biden administration. In late summer 1955, Mamie Till chose to lay the body of her only child, Emmett, in an open coffin, believing that the whole nation had to bear witness to this this Black child of Chicago who had been murdered and mutilated by white men in Mississippi. They had to see what I had seen, she wrote in her memoir. Hundreds of thousands of mourners lined up to witness for themselves the horror wrought on the 14-year-old victim, and many, many more saw it when photographs of his body were published in Jet magazine. From that moment until today, Emmett Till has shaped the civil rights movement in America. Here is a look at who he was, the outrage at his murder and the acquittal of his killers, and his enduring legacy. What was Emmetts childhood like? Emmett Louis Till was born on July 25, 1941, in Chicago. While Emmett, who was nicknamed Bobo, was an only child, he lived with his mother, grandparents and cousins in a middle-class Black neighborhood on the South Side. A younger cousin, Ollie Gordon, said Emmett was a jokester and loved to make people laugh. Many Afghans who worked with the U.S. are desperate to leave Afghanistan, fearing retribution from the Taliban. Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times At least 250,000 Afghans who may be eligible for expedited American visas remain in Afghanistan, far too many for American forces to rescue before their deadline to leave next week, new estimates suggest. Even if American forces continue their current pace of roughly 20,000 evacuations per day a tall order the estimates suggest the effort will not come close to rescuing the full group of Afghans who may be eligible to leave before President Bidens deadline to depart, Aug. 31. Many Afghan interpreters, advisers and others who worked with the U.S. government or American organizations over the past 20 years and their families are eligible for special visas. And many fear retribution from the Taliban and are desperate to leave. But precise figures are impossible, as American officials have not said how many remain in the country. Time is running short for Afghans who worked with the U.S. Evacuations since the Taliban took over Kabul Withdrawal deadline 300,000 evacuees At least 250,000 Afghans remaining Minimum estimated eligible for U.S. visas 200,000 Current pace of evacuation 100,000 1,500 U.S. citizens remaining 82,300 evacuated so far As of Aug. 25 Aug. 14 Aug. 20 Aug. 25 Aug. 31 Time is running short for Afghans who worked with the U.S. Evacuations since the Taliban took over Kabul Withdrawal deadline 300,000 evacuees At least 250,000 Afghans remaining Minimum estimated eligible for U.S. visas 200,000 Current pace of evacuation 100,000 1,500 U.S. citizens remaining 82,300 evacuated so far As of Aug. 25 Aug. 14 Aug. 20 Aug. 25 Aug. 31 Source: The Association of Wartime Allies and researchers from American University Estimates of those remaining in Afghanistan do not include U.S. green card holders, as no data is available. These estimates are based on reports on Afghan employment published annually by the Department of Defense and analyzed by the Association of Wartime Allies, a group that advocates for Afghans affiliated with the U.S., and researchers at American University. Other estimates vary widely, from 100,000 to more than 300,000 people. The group estimated that the number could be far higher, depending on the assumptions used: More than a million Afghans who remain in the country, it found, could be eligible for expedited immigration status. American officials said on Thursday that 82,300 people, including Americans, Afghans and others, had been flown out of Kabul since the government fell to Taliban forces on Aug. 14. To make the estimates, the researchers reviewed Department of Defense employment reports and estimated how many employees filled jobs that were eligible for visas and how long they worked. They then estimated the size of their immediate families and subtracted how many may have already left the country. They include Afghans eligible for two visa programs. Special Immigrant Visas are available to those who worked with the American military and U.S. Embassy as interpreters, translators, advisers and in other jobs during the war. And Priority 2 visas are available to those who worked for American organizations and projects supported by the U.S. government. The figures do not include many more Afghans who are not eligible for visas but could be at risk from the Taliban because of their roles in the Afghan government or military, or because they are activists or religious minorities. On Tuesday, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, estimated that broader number could also be in the millions. The International Rescue Committee has estimated that over 300,000 Afghan civilians have been affiliated with the U.S. mission. One administration official said earlier this week that the number of people who needed to be evacuated could be more than 100,000. On Tuesday, President Biden reaffirmed his plan to remove all American troops by the end of the month, although he said the timeline could be adjusted if necessary. Were currently on a pace to finish by August the 31st, he said. But other senior U.S. officials doubt the evacuations will be complete by then. The number of potentially eligible Afghans is far higher than the number of Americans, who officials have said are their first priority. At least 4,500 American citizens and their family members have been evacuated, and roughly 1,500 American citizens remain, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said on Wednesday. Mr. Blinken said Wednesday that the United States would evacuate as many Afghan allies as possible, and that any Americans or Afghans who have worked with the U.S. mission and want to leave after that date should be free to do so. The Taliban have promised to allow free passage to those who qualify even after the withdrawal, he said. That effort will continue every day, he said. But the evacuation mission is widely expected to slow to a trickle once the U.S. military exits. Despite their promises, the Taliban said they would block Afghans trying to leave the country from traveling to Kabuls airport on Tuesday. Even with the Americans still operating the airport, the obstacles for anybody trying to evacuate are immense. Just getting there is a perilous ordeal, with jostling, desperate crowds braving Taliban checkpoints, clogging the roads and risking injury or death. And some Afghan military interpreters and other close U.S. allies were being turned away at the airport by American officials in order to give priority to U.S. citizens and green card holders, a State Department official said on Monday. That account was supported by interviews with Afghans who have approached the airport in recent days, and American veterans groups and other organizations that have tried to organize departures. One woman who worked for the United States Agency for International Development described being removed from the airport by American officials as she waited with her family at the airport. We risked our lives, said the woman, who asked not to be named because of concerns for her familys safety. You might think of them as solitary creatures, furiously scribbling or typing alone, but as long as there have been writers in New York City, they have socialized together in an assortment of bars, restaurants, apartments and clubs. The Times began writing about these places in its very first issues. In 1910, it published an article lamenting the passing of the literary haunts of New York, noting that many once-famous gathering spots were being razed as the city grew and modernized. Number 19 West 24th is gone, the piece began. At least the old 19 is gone, and no account has been made of the fact that it at one time housed the Authors Club, and that its rakish stairs were somewhat worn away by the feet of Matthew Arnold, Whittier, Lowell and Field. The article went on to list more than a dozen locations that were no more, including Pfaffs beer cellar, where Walt Whitman liked to drink, an unnamed restaurant at 5 Barclay Street where Edgar Allan Poe ate with fellow writers and The Den, where James Fenimore Cooper and friends gathered. Pfaffs, The Den and the rest may be long gone, but over the decades, dozens, if not hundreds, of other establishments popped up to take their places. Here, we celebrate a few of the most memorable ones. After moving around the Upper West Side for years, always seeking a better situation, Brian Michael Hart found himself living with two roommates in Manhattan Valley and paying $1,450 for his tiny room. When the pandemic struck and his roommates left town, Mr. Hart didnt want the burden of finding two more. So he departed, too, heading home to Union County, N.J., where he grew up. It was nice to have space and get some solitude out there, he said. But he had been saving to buy a place of his own and was aching to return. My heart is on the Upper West Side, he said. Its my oasis. An expensive oasis, as he discovered while searching StreetEasy to see what his budget of up to $500,000 would buy. I knew nothing, said Mr. Hart, 31, who works in marketing. The whole process was very intimidating to me. [Are you looking to buy or rent a new home in the New York City metro area? We want to hear from you for a new television series. If interested, contact us at: thehunttv@nytimes.com] He learned that he could afford a studio or maybe a one-bedroom. Mr. Hart discussed the idea of buying a place with some friends who had recently bought their own first homes. One referred him to Karen Kostiw, a licensed saleswoman at Warburg Realty. We were looking at what was available in the price point, Ms. Kostiw said. The Upper West Side is tough. You are really hitting another significant price point to get a larger space. Mr. Hart had a good idea of what he wanted: a place with a nice view, in a large, postwar co-op building. It had to be in move-in condition and have a bathtub, not just a shower. He wouldnt mind common outdoor space, although he was willing to judge case by case, he said. He thought it financially prudent to buy into a large co-op. I liked the assurance of having so many apartments in the building, he said. And that way, he knew he would have a laundry room, an elevator and a doorman. If I am going to live alone, I like that theres a doorman, he said. It wont really feel like Im alone. Among his options: After weeks of stagnation, the United States vaccination campaign has had a relatively successful month, with vaccine uptake rising from early-summer lows in every state in the country. The upswing in vaccinations has come alongside an extended, and much more pronounced, increase in coronavirus cases, hospitalizations and deaths in the United States over the past two months. Public health officials say that in their communities, residents have been driven to get the vaccine by worries that the more-transmissible Delta variant might make them, or their loved ones, sick. The reason why weve seen the marked increase in demand is fear, its the Delta variant, said Robert Ator, the retired National Guard colonel who runs Arkansas vaccination effort. The increase in vaccinations has been especially pronounced in states where immunization levels were (and remain) below the national average of 61 percent. Many of those states have felt the effects of the Delta-led fourth wave most acutely. Least vaccinated states saw greatest summer increase in first doses Percentage point change in total population vaccinated from June 6 to Aug. 21 Percent of total population vaccinated by Aug. 21 45% 60% 75% Pct. point increase in people vaccinated +4 +5 +6 +7 +8 +9 +10 +11 +12 Alaska AK +6 47 53 Maine ME +6 64 70 Vt. VT +4 71 75 N.H. NH +6 60 66 Wash. WA +8 58 66 Idaho ID +5 38 43 Mont. MT +5 46 51 N.D. ND +4 43 47 Minn. MN +6 55 61 Ill. IL +9 56 65 Wis. WI +6 52 58 Mich. MI +6 49 55 N.Y. NY +9 57 66 R.I. RI +8 62 70 Mass. MA +7 68 75 Ore. OR +7 56 63 Nev. NV +11 46 57 Wyo. WY +6 38 44 S.D. SD +6 49 55 Iowa IA +5 50 55 Ind. IN +7 42 49 Ohio OH +5 47 52 Pa. PA +9 59 68 N.J. NJ +8 61 69 Conn. CT +8 64 72 Calif. CA +10 58 68 Utah UT +9 46 55 Colo. CO +7 55 62 Neb. NE +7 49 56 Mo. MO +9 43 52 Ky. KY +9 47 56 W.Va. WV +6 41 47 Va. VA +8 56 64 Md. MD +9 58 67 Del. DE +7 56 63 Ariz. AZ +9 47 56 N.M. NM +10 58 68 Kan. KS +9 47 56 Ark. AR +12 40 52 Tenn. TN +8 40 48 N.C. NC +10 44 54 S.C. SC +9 41 50 D.C. DC +8 58 66 Okla. OK +10 42 52 La. LA +12 36 48 Miss. MS +11 34 45 Ala. AL +12 36 48 Ga. GA +9 41 50 Hawaii HI +5 68 73 Texas TX +11 45 56 Fla. FL +12 50 62 Public health officials said that some areas with lower vaccine coverage, especially rural ones, just hadnt been severely affected by the virus until the Delta surge. Some communities are seeing Covid close up now, said Dr. Mandy Cohen, the secretary of the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services. Theyve seen it on the news, but thats not the same as seeing it close up. That proximity is driving behavior change across the country. The virus is coming to visit these communities and they are starting to feel the pinch, said Colonel Ator. When they start seeing their friends and families being affected by this, then it becomes a reality. States that have seen larger increases in new cases since their early-summer nadirs, such as Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi, tend to be those with bigger increases in new vaccinations. Change in weekly new cases and first vaccinations Week of June 6 to week of Aug. 15 0 +1,000% +2,000% +3,000% Increase in weekly new cases 50% 0 +100% +200% Decrease in vaccinations Increase in vaccinations States where the percentage of the population vaccinated is below the national average as of Aug. 21. Wash. Ill. Calif. Ariz. Mass. Wis. Texas Neb. Utah Ore. Fla. N.Y. R.I. Ga. N.H. N.C. N.J. Colo. Md. Nev. Tenn. Hawaii Ind. Ky. Minn. Okla. Pa. S.C. D.C. Kan. Mo. Vt. Va. Conn. Iowa La. Ohio Mich. S.D. Ark. Del. Miss. N.M. N.D. Wyo. Alaska Maine Ala. Idaho Mont. W.Va. Note: Not all states had hit their lowest weekly vaccinations in early June, when Delta was on the verge of becoming dominant, and some only had mild growth in late July and August. As a result, these states may show a decrease in vaccinations in this analysis. Some of the recent rise in immunizations is due to teens and tweens who are heading back to school, but the bulk of the increase is from working-age Americans, public health officials say and data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirms. And while new vaccinations may be flattening now overall in the U.S., health officials do not expect them to return to previous lows any time soon, especially after the Food and Drug Administration granted full approval to the Pfizer vaccine on Monday. That move is likely to spur new vaccinations, in ways both direct 31 percent of unvaccinated people surveyed in a June poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation indicated they would be more open to getting the jab once a vaccine was fully approved and indirect, as it sets the stage for new vaccine requirements by organizations including corporations, hospitals and colleges. While the uptick in new vaccinations first doses has been the subject of particular interest, total vaccine doses, comprising first and second jabs, have been on the rise as well. They will likely continue to increase as third doses complicate the picture. The F.D.A. this month opened eligibility for third shots for some people with weakened immune systems. And last week, the Biden administration strongly recommended that Americans who received the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna coronavirus vaccines get a booster shot eight months after their second vaccine dose. If the F.D.A. approves that recommendation, boosters will be available starting in late September. However, there is evidence that about 1.2 million people in the U.S. may have already received unauthorized additional doses before these announcements were made, according to the C.D.C. Change in weekly new cases and first vaccinations Week of June 6 to week of Aug. 15 Weekly cases Weekly first doses Increase in pct. pop vaccinated Mississippi Miss. +2,611% 926 25,102 +227% 16,453 53,746 +11 34 45 Louisiana La. +1,381% 2,373 35,139 +183% 26,277 74,337 +12 36 48 Arkansas Ark. +930% 1,528 15,737 +159% 15,174 39,324 +12 40 52 Alabama Ala. +1,732% 1,738 31,845 +142% 33,241 80,455 +12 36 48 Tennessee Tenn. +1,163% 2,765 34,921 +139% 31,593 75,428 +8 40 48 Georgia Ga. +1,780% 2,829 53,172 +139% 79,530 189,795 +9 41 50 Oklahoma Okla. +1,746% 842 15,542 +130% 19,578 45,000 +10 42 52 Utah Utah +274% 1,946 7,273 +129% 20,193 46,297 +9 46 55 North Carolina N.C. +1,103% 3,128 37,621 +128% 45,733 104,335 +10 44 54 Wyoming Wyo. +388% 492 2,399 +86% 3,584 6,661 +6 38 44 South Carolina S.C. +2,858% 857 25,346 +85% 32,157 59,397 +9 41 50 Idaho Idaho +576% 723 4,887 +57% 8,760 13,783 +5 38 43 Kentucky Ky. +1,326% 1,582 22,554 +44% 39,784 57,269 +9 47 56 North Dakota N.D. +491% 248 1,465 +39% 3,449 4,797 +4 43 47 Rhode Island R.I. +860% 221 2,121 +33% 8,689 11,552 +8 62 70 New Mexico N.M. +814% 572 5,227 +32% 17,500 23,072 +10 58 68 Iowa Iowa +945% 569 5,944 +25% 16,726 20,951 +5 50 55 Kansas Kan. +970% 761 8,141 +20% 20,677 24,888 +9 47 56 Florida Fla. +1,325% 11,454 163,197 +19% 242,288 287,284 +12 50 62 Minnesota Minn. +634% 1,186 8,705 +10% 36,416 39,900 +6 55 61 Texas Texas +786% 14,059 124,621 +9% 316,351 344,120 +11 45 56 Alaska Alaska +1,754% 179 3,318 +5% 4,326 4,555 +6 47 53 South Dakota S.D. +1,789% 82 1,549 +5% 6,424 6,757 +6 49 55 Nebraska Neb. +1,308% 238 3,352 +2% 14,229 14,491 +7 49 56 Hawaii Hawaii +1,059% 412 4,777 3% 9,690 9,428 +5 68 73 Ohio Ohio +770% 2,416 21,010 3% 71,374 69,088 +5 47 52 New Hampshire N.H. +774% 191 1,670 4% 8,935 8,617 +6 60 66 California Calif. +1,536% 6,610 108,124 7% 396,263 368,234 +10 58 68 Missouri Mo. +381% 3,631 17,478 7% 44,409 41,132 +9 43 52 Arizona Ariz. +559% 3,090 20,365 8% 61,312 56,465 +9 47 56 Indiana Ind. +701% 2,547 20,411 9% 45,722 41,803 +7 42 49 District of Columbia D.C. +1,168% 90 1,141 9% 5,831 5,284 +8 58 66 Maine Maine +195% 386 1,138 11% 10,783 9,573 +6 64 70 New York N.Y. +783% 3,560 31,433 16% 220,973 186,458 +9 57 66 Nevada Nev. +333% 1,748 7,574 17% 34,202 28,305 +11 46 57 Wisconsin Wis. +955% 925 9,761 18% 44,884 36,740 +6 52 58 Delaware Del. +802% 252 2,274 22% 9,473 7,403 +7 56 63 Illinois Ill. +920% 2,429 24,787 26% 138,999 103,045 +9 56 65 Maryland Md. +860% 718 6,896 26% 60,464 44,623 +9 58 67 Oregon Ore. +678% 1,865 14,514 28% 43,388 31,308 +7 56 63 Pennsylvania Pa. +484% 2,944 17,189 28% 153,442 110,661 +9 59 68 Connecticut Conn. +776% 459 4,020 28% 40,484 29,195 +8 64 72 Virginia Va. +1,398% 1,085 16,253 28% 94,813 68,214 +8 56 64 Washington Wash. +425% 4,108 21,572 32% 99,801 67,691 +8 58 66 Colorado Colo. +129% 4,138 9,473 35% 61,266 39,700 +7 55 62 New Jersey N.J. +694% 1,661 13,196 36% 126,871 81,215 +8 61 69 Montana Mont. +389% 502 2,456 40% 11,662 7,038 +5 46 51 Vermont Vt. +985% 68 738 40% 5,052 3,019 +4 71 75 Michigan Mich. +484% 2,039 11,905 44% 79,270 44,330 +6 49 55 Massachusetts Mass. +932% 896 9,249 49% 79,422 40,502 +7 68 75 West Virginia W.Va. +683% 707 5,536 73% 16,736 4,517 +6 41 47 Show all Note: Not all states had hit their lowest weekly vaccinations in early June, when Delta was on the verge of becoming dominant, and some only had mild growth in late July and August. As a result, these states may show a decrease in vaccinations in this analysis. After watching worries about the Delta variant drive up vaccinations across the U.S., some state officials say they are adjusting their messaging to focus on the stories of people who have experienced Covid-19 illness or death firsthand. North Dakota is developing an Impact Wall, a website with a collection of videos and photos from those who have been sick or lost a loved one. And Arkansas has produced a televised public service announcement featuring a pregnant woman who had a near-death experience with Covid. In the video, she and her husband encourage Arkansans to get vaccinated. We have a rural couple talking to small rural communities, Colonel Ator said. Instead of a guy wearing a tie, I would much rather have the locals talking to them. Out with the old, in with the new: Greek Row gets major upgrade Husum Red Pied is a rare domestic pig breed popularly known as the Danish Protest Pig because its whole reason for being was to imitate the Danish country flag at a time when an actual flag could not be raised. The story of the Danish Protest Pig can be traced back to the mid 19th century when Denmark and Prussia went to war over control of the southern Jutland Peninsula. The two countries couldnt decide where the border between their lands was, so they eventually went to war. In 1848, Denmark won the war and the claim to the contested land, but only a decade later the Second Schleswig War erupted, and this time Prussia emerged victorious. In the years that followed, Prussian authorities launched a campaign against anything Danish, especially the Danish flag, which didnt sit too well with farmers in the disputed Jutland territory. So they devised a cunning plan to bypass the ban Photo: Axel Krampe/Wikimedia Commons (GFDL License) Danish farmers living on land now claimed by Prussia were so upset by the rule forbidding them from raising their home countrys flag that they came up with an ingenious pig crossbreeding program to create a new breed that would resemble the Danish flag a red background covered by a large, white Nordic cross. No one really knows what breeds were used to create the Danish Protest Pig, but according to Wikipedia, many believe that it is a cross between multiple breeds, most likely Holsteinian and Jutlandian marsh pigs, English Tamworth pig, and red variants of the Angeln Saddleback. Although created as a form of protest against Prussian rule, the unique breed was formally recognized as a true breed in the 20th century and named Husum Red Pied. The pig is recognized by its red color, broad white vertical belt, and a trace of a white horizontal belt resembling the colors of the Danish flag that inspired it. It grows to a height of about 90 cm and weighs up to 350 kg. Husum Red Pied pigs corresponding to the original description were last seen in 1984. Specimens bred since are usually missing the white horizontal belt that completes the flag design, but even so, the breed maintains its unique look. The Danish Protest Pig is currently classified as rare, but the German federal state of Schleswig-Holstein supports preservation of the breed for its cultural value. There are currently between 60 and 140 specimens alive in the world, mainly in German zoos. Mike Lindell The ex-President Trump sycophant Mike Lindell is a PR marvel. There is no media coverage about him that doesn't first identify Lindell as the "My Pillow Guy," and in case you've missed his ubiquitous ads appearing across all media platforms, he makes and sells pillows he claims promote better sleep. I don't know about you, but my pillow works just fine. Lindell has figured out how to keep himself and his product in front of the public by proclaiming himself the ayatollah of non-existent voting fraud. According to Lindell, he has iron-clad "proof" the Chinese government stole the 2020 election on behalf of President Joe Biden. The only problem is, he has yet to produce that proof. His own paid cyber security expert said recently the "packets" of data Lindell was always waving around prove nothing. Unfazed by that failure, Lindell has repeatedly said Trump will be reinstated as president. The first date was August 13, the day after his bogus "cyber symposium" closed, where he and a parade of delusional Trump dead-enders staged a kabuki theater in South Dakota that received wall-to-wall coverage on the Trump propaganda outlet One America News. Sadly, a lot of mainstream media got sucked into this freak show because, well, freaks equal ratings. P.T. Barnum knew the grotesque sold sideshow tickets, and Lindall might just be a better promoter than P.T., since broadcast and digital media weren't around in his day. But I can think of nothing more grotesque, more anti-American, than undermining public confidence in America's most hallowed democratic institution, free and fair elections. Facing eroding support among the Orange Man's true believers, however, Lindell moved the goalposts again, declaring Trump will triumphantly return to the White House by New Year's Day, 2022, after he and he alone proves, beyond a shadow of doubt, that the election was stolen by Chinese cyber villains. Lindell cannot possibly believe his own sheepdip. He was smart enough to build a small fortune selling pillows on television. What he has managed to do is keep the media spotlight on himself and by extension, his pillow business, garnering sustained earned media coverage most publicists can only dream about. A cynical strategy? Of course, but the sideshow must go on, and pillows must be sold... and they'd better keep selling because Lindell is facing lawsuits for defaming Dominion Voting Systems and Smartmatic that could end up with Mike using one of his pillows to sleep on a park bench. *** Kevin Foley owns KEF Media in Atlanta. Quinnipiac University is better known nationally for its political polls rather than its academic excellence. Thats why one must assume it had its finger on the publics pulse when it decided against reopening its Irelands Great Hunger Museum, located in Hamden, CT. The COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing lockdown forced the Museum to shut down last year. The Universitys board of trustees have voted to keep the Museums doors locked, which is a slap in the face to 35M Irish-Americans. The Museum honors the memory of the 1M Irish men, women and children who starved to death from 1845 to 1852 due to the failure of the potato crop and genocidal policies of the ruling English. Another 1M emigrated from Ireland. Opened in 2012, the Museum claims its works by eminent Irish and Irish-American artists over the last 170 years represents the worlds largest collection of Great Hunger-related art. Leo Varadkar, Irelands former taoiseach (prime minister) and then transport minister, officiated at the opening. Irelands government helped fund a Museum exhibition that toured Ireland in 2019. The collection also was on display at Irelands New York consulate. The University is tossing overboard the goodwill generated by the Museum. John Lehey, former president of Quinnipiac, was the driving force behind the Museum. He retired in 2019. He told the New Haven Register the Museum provides an international brand and identity for Quinnipiac and that its themes of a peoples encounter with bigotry and hatred are universal. The University says it is looking for a new home for the Irish collection. Quinnipiac is in active conversations with potential partners with the goal of placing the collection on display at an organization that will increase access to national and international audiences about Irelands Great Hunger, said a statement provided to ODwyers by John Morgan, associate VP for PR. Quinnipiac says it will continue to fund research at Irelands Great Hunger Institute and maintain a collection housed at the Lender Special Collection Room of the Arnold Bernhard Library on the Mount Carmel Campus. The Irish Voice fears that Quinnipiac may unload the Museums collection to an entity that may break up or sell its contents. The University is blundering into an unnecessary PR crisis. Reopen the Museum. What was Spike Lee thinking? The Brooklyn filmmaker had featured 9/11 conspiracy theorists in the final installment of his four-part NYC Epicenters 9/11-2021 series to be aired next month on HBO. He interviewed members of the nutjob Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth group, which spread the garbage that the World Trade Center was destroyed by controlled demolition and not by aircraft. In giving them facetime, Lee justified the group. He then set up a false equivalency situation by including interviews with scientists who trashed the notion that 9/11 was an insider job. The Architects and scientists shouldnt be on the same set, Spike The filmmaker defended his work, telling the New York Times on Aug. 23 that he survived past criticism of his films Do the Right Thing (racist), Mo Better Blues (antisemitic) and Shes Gotta Have It (misogynist). He said it was up to viewers to make up their minds about 9/11. After reviewers hammered Lee for showcasing the 9/11 debunkers, Lee caved and is re-editing the last episode. How out of touch could Spike be? His endorsement of the 9/11 conspiracy spreaders is a boost to those who deny the results of the 2020 election and safety of the COVID-19 vaccines. Does Lee want to be a leader in the army of truth-deniers that is ripping the nation apart? One wonders if Lee has gotten his COVID-19 shot, or is that going to be part of his next documentary? HBO also doesnt emerge from the Epicenters mess smelling like a rose. THE chief executive of Offaly County Council has rejected calls for a ban on wind turbines at Lemanaghan Bog. The bog is part of a large area of west Offaly currently designated as 'open for consideration' for wind energy and its owner, Bord na Mona, hopes to install 17 turbines there. The County Council was flooded with hundreds of objections to zoning the bog as suitable for a wind farm with most of the opponents citing its proximity to the early Christian monastic site of St Manchan. At a stormy meeting of the council earlier this year, councillors voted by nine votes to eight to include the bog in the draft wind farm zone, with the exception of a small portion nearest the monatic site and 500m north of the disused Banagher railway line. With final approval of the draft county development plan 2021-2027 still to take place, councillors, TD's and community groups opposed to a wind farm on the bog continued their campaign by making submissions to the council. Former justice minister Charlie Flanagan, Fine Gael TD for Laois-Offaly, lined up with Independent Deputy Carol Nolan in opposition to Bord na Mona's plan for a wind farm, along with another Independent TD, South Tipperary based representative Mattie McGrath Two parish priests who were formerly curates in the area, Fr PJ Hughes and Fr James McKiernan, asked for a wind farm ban at Lemanaghan too, as did Fine Gael councillors John Clendennen and Noel Cribbin. An Independent councillor from the Tullamore Municipal District, Cllr Ken Smollen, was at the forefront of the move to take Lemanaghan out of the wind energy zone, while the other Tullamore Independent, Cllr Sean O'Brien, went even further, calling for the entire area of west Offaly to be declared turbine-free. In their submissions opposing wind energy in the area, Leamonaghan Graveyard & Heritage Site Group and Leamonaghan Wind Farm Action Group both referred to the Lemanaghan Conservation Plan, published by the Heritage Council and sponsored by Offaly County Council, and The archaeology of Lemanghan the story of an Irish bog, by Ellen O'Carroll. Declaring that Lemanaghan bog will remain in the area of west Offaly deemed suitable for wind energy, council chief executive Anna Marie Delaney says the designation Open for consideration for Wind Energy Development does not imply automatic approval. Planning applications for wind farm developments in these areas will still be evaluated on a case by case basis having regard to wind energy development guidelines, environmental impact, traffic, transport, landscape and visual impact assessments. There will also be detailed site visits and advice received from prescribed authorities will be considered before any grant of permission. In her report which is currently being considered by councillors, Ms Delaney also says Lemanaghan Bog is designated as a medium landscape sensitivity and it is only high landscape sensitivity areas which are excluded from wind energy development. She also noted that the Wind Energy Guidelines drawn up in 2006 state that the designation of an area for protection of natural or built heritage or as an amenity area does not automatically preclude wind energy development. The council chief said it is council policy in the draft development plan to support and promote the protection and appropriate management of all monastic sites in the county and as such, the council will have regard to the Lemanaghan Heritage Conservation Plan when assessing applications that are within this area or in close proximity to this area. Her report noted that the Lemanaghan Heritage Conservation Plan establishes that Lemanaghan is a sacred place of great antiquity, a place containing buildings of architectural significance, a place rich in documentary history and archaeological potential, a place where there is a long tradition of devotional practice and place apart, possessing a strong sense of being untouched by the modern world. The impacts of any windfarm development in the vicinity on these areas would need be addressed in a detailed project level (planning application or Strategic Infrastructure Development application) Environmental Impact Assessment with input from experts in the fields of archaeology, cultural heritage and landscape character assessment to determine the appropriateness of the development proposed with regard to [monastic sites protection policy] in the Draft Plan, said the council chief. What's Included With a Digital Only subscription, you'll receive unlimited access to our website and e-edition. Our digital products are available 24/7 and are accessible anywhere, anytime. If you have any questions or need further assistance, please call our customer service team at 716-372-3121 or email nfinnerty@oleantimesherald.com. Are you a current print subscriber? You qualify for online access to the Omak Chronicle. To receive your access, create a website account and then verify your print subscription or e-edition subscription with your subscriber number, which may be found on your bill or mailing label. OMAHA, NE 25 August 2021 - Prior to European encroachment onto the tall grass prairies and short grass plains of the continent, an estimated 30-60 million bison roamed free from Canada to Mexico, the Rockies to the Appalachian and beyond. By 1880, they were nearly all gone but for a handful. While their numbers have recovered somewhat in the last 100 years, they remain but a shadow of what once Jammu: Devotees offered 'Sukran ki Ardaas' at Gurudwara Digiana Ashram in Jammu after the safe arrival of three 'Swaroops' of Sri Guru Granth Sahib from Afghanistan, where the Taliban has seized power. Speaking on the occasion, Jammu and Kashmir Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Sunil Sethi expressed gratitude towards 'Waheguru' for the safe arrival of Sri Guru Granth Sahib. "All the people of Jammu and Kashmir have gathered here today irrespective of the religion to thank 'Waheguru' that three 'Swaroops' of Sri Guru Granth Sahib have safely reached Delhi. We would also like to thank the Central government for its efforts to safeguard the religious sentiments of people," he said. Sethi also condemned the actions of the Taliban in Afghanistan. "Earlier when they came to Afghanistan, they broke the statues of Buddha. And now the way they have seized the control of Afghanistan is a matter of concern. Taliban's fight is not against religion but against humanity. They do not respect any religion. It is good that the three 'Swaroops' were brought here in time," he stated. Sikh devotees visiting the Gurudwara also expressed their gratitude towards the Central government and Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri for the safe arrival of the Sikh holy book. The three 'Swaroops' of Guru Granth Sahib were brought to Delhi from Kabul in an Air India flight with 78 evacuees from Afghanistan and were received at Delhi airport by Hardeep Singh Puri on Tuesday. Meanwhile, devotees also offered 'Sukran ki Ardaas' at Gurudwaras of Bhopal and Shimla after three 'Swaroops' of Sri Guru Granth Sahib were flown back from Afghanistan. Courtesy: ANI New Delhi: After the Calcutta High Court's order for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe in West Bengal violence, the agency has started the investigation and so far registered nine cases in the matter. The CBI team also reached the places of violence in Bengal to investigate. Earlier this month, the Calcutta High Court ordered a court-monitored CBI probe into the incidents of post-poll violence in West Bengal. The High Court also ordered to set up Special Investigation Teams (SIT) to investigate relatively less serious crimes, and senior officers from West Bengal cadre will be a part of the team. The court also directed the state government to take immediate steps to compensate the victims of post-poll violence. Several incidents of violence were reported at various places after the announcement of the Assembly poll results on May 2, after which a four-member team deputed by the Ministry of Home Affairs also visited the post-poll violence-affected areas. Courtesy: ANI Nashik: BJP MLA Devyani Farande on Wednesday demanded action against Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray for using derogatory remarks against his Uttar Pradesh counterpart Yogi Adityanath in the past. "Uddhav Thackeray had said about Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath that he is not 'Yogi' but Bhogi. He also had said that Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath should be beaten with slippers. This is not appropriate. We hope strict action will be taken against him," said the Nashik MLA. "Today, on behalf of the BJP Nashik, we are filing complaints against the Maharashtra Chief Minister and Saamana editor before the Commissioner of Police. The Saamana editor whatever said about Narayan Rane through the medium is derogatory," she added. Rane, who was arrested on Tuesday (August 24) for his alleged derogatory statement against Thackeray, was granted bail a few hours later by the local court in Mahad of Raigarh district. Rane on Monday accused Thackeray of ignorance about the year of India's independence at an event and said, "I would have given (him) a tight slap." The Union Minister was arrested in Ratnagiri district after several FIRs were registered against him at many places, including Nashik and Pune, based on the complaints filed by Shiv Sena leaders for his remarks against Thackeray. Courtesy: ANI Covid-19 vaccinations fell by 80% in Afghanistan in the first week after the Taliban took over the country, according to Unicef. The UN childrens agency is warning that nearly two million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine delivered to Afghanistan about half of the total so far expire in November. In the week beginning 15 August, 30,500 people had been vaccinated in 23 of 34 provinces , whereas the previous week 134,600 people were inoculated in 30 provinces, according to figures provided by Unicef. The drop is understandable, as in situations of chaos, conflict and emergency, people will prioritise their safety and security first, a Unicef spokesperson told a news agency. Data from the World Health Organization (WHO) shows that only 1.2 million doses had been administered as of 20 August in Afghanistan, which has a population of 40 million. (AIR) Indian Navy is participating in the sea phase of Exercise Malabar-2021 along with the US Navy (USN), Japanese Maritime Self-Defence Force (JMSDF) and the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). The four-day exercise beginning today includes participation of INS Shivalik and INS Kadmatt and P8I patrol aircraft. The US Navy will be represented by USS Barry, USNS Rappahannock, USNS Big Horn and P8A patrol aircraft. The Japanese Maritime Self-Defence Force will be represented by J.S. Kaga, Murasame and Shiranui, in addition to a submarine and P1 patrol aircraft. The Royal Australian Navy will be represented by HMAS Warramunga. MALABAR-21 would witness complex exercises including anti-surface, anti-air and anti-submarine warfare drill and other manoeuvres and tactical exercises. The exercise will provide an opportunity for participating navies to derive benefit from each others expertise and experiences. The conduct of the exercise while observing health protocols during the COVID-19 global pandemic is a testimony to the synergy between the participating navies and shared vision for a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific region. Recently, Samaniya had started working with a radio station in Baramulla after completing her graduation, and the trouble started for her after her picture in her studio went viral. Radio Jockey Samaniya Bhatt thought she had got her dream job when she was recently offered a radio jockey job in Baramulla. Her picture in her studio got viral on the internet. This is when the trouble started for her. Islamists in Kashmir threatened her for not covering her head and wearing proper Islamic dress. She was trolled on social media platforms and threatened online. She is the youngest female RJ of North Kashmir. I've completed graduation in Mass Communication from Govt Degree College, Baramulla. I applied for an RJ job among 250 others. I along with 3 male participants got selected, Daily Excelsior quoted her. In March this year, the Indian Army launched its first community radio station, Radio Chinar, in Sopore, Baramulla, North Kashmir, to bridge the gap between the Army and the eoplpe of Kashmir. Talking about her passion, Samaniya told ANI, Journalism was my passion from childhood. I have been working with Kashmir dispatch for three years and worked on the ground. When I got to know Radio Chinar will have its first radio station in north Kashmir, I thought of giving it the first try. I never thought I would be a Radio Jockey or work in a radio station ever. Dibya Kamal Bordoloi Guwahati: The Christian missionaries continue large scale religious conversion in upper Assam using ways of deceit and temptation. Alleged World Hindu Federation, Assam. In a press meet, WHF state president and Satradhikar of Auniati Grihasrami Satra Janarddan Dev Goswami ureg the government to stop such illegal religious conversion by enacting proper law. He further stated that the conversion is taking place, luring poor Sanatani people in the name of providing medical, educational facilities and financial benefits. The conversion pace is so high that there are now 66 Churches in Majuli against 34 Sattras. This development has come up in recent decades to Majuli, the spiritual hub of the Vaishnavite culture. It has become a challenge for the cultural identity of the Sattra town. Dev Goswami regrets that lower Assam is in the grasp of migrant Muslims, and Christian missionaries are targeting upper Assam for religious conversation. WHF state president added that Christian missionaries are now targeting the devotional creations of Guru Shankar Dev for conversion. To save the Sanatani from such aggression, tough law should be enacted against religious conversion by the state government as soon as possible. State general secretary of WHF Balen Baishya stated that political and international forces are involved in religious conversions. More than a dozen people have been arrested for supporting the Taliban, and these supporters are not illiterate. If proper action is not taken at the right time, the situation will worsen, he added. The Taliban on Thursday confirmed that music will be banned in public places in Afghanistan following their takeover of the war-torn nation. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid justified his move by saying that music is forbidden in Islam. "Music will be banned in public places, music is forbidden in Islam," he said. Music was also banned during the previous stint of the Taliban between 1996 and 2001, claiming that music was sinful. During their previous government, cassette tapes and music systems were destroyed. Meanwhile, Afghan radio stations have started playing Islamic music Mujahid is seen as a likely candidate for the ministry of information and culture. Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, representing the West Bengal government, assured the bench that the inquiry would not proceed for the time being. After nudging from the Supreme Court, the West Bengal government assured the court that it would not proceed with the Pegasus spyware investigation till the matter is decided by the Supreme Court. When we are hearing other matters, we expect some restraint. The present issue is connected to other issues. It will have a bearing on it. In all fair fairness, we expect you to wait", observed the CJI NV Ramana on Wednesday (August 25). A bench of Chief Justice of India NV Ramana and Justice Surya Kant was hearing the petitions related to the Pegasus spyware case. The West Bengal government, led by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, had set up an inquiry commission on July 26, comprising retired Supreme Court judge Madan B. Lokur and former Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court Jyotirmoy Bhattacharya, to look into the allegations of snooping on politicians, activists, business leaders and journalists using Israeli spyware Pegasus. On the request of Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who was representing the West Bengal government, to not pass any order, CJI NV Ramana said, "Mr. Singhvi, you don't listen to us. We are saying that next week we will hear. We will pass a comprehensive order. In the meantime, if you start an enquiry, we will have to pass an order." After abandoning Afghanistan and paving way for the Talibans accession to power at Kabul, the United States government has now raised concerns over a possible Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist attack in Kabul. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that the threat of an Islamic State attack in Kabul is a "very real possibility." "It's hard to state the complexity and the danger of this effort. We are operating in a hostile environment and the city is now controlled by the Taliban with the very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack," said Antony Blinken "We are taking every precaution but this is a very high risk," Blinken added After Calcutta High Court ordered CBI to investigate the cases of the alleged murder, rape and violence in West Bengal post elections, a team of 109 officers have landed in the state to investigate the case. The investigation agency has divided the state into four zones and deputed four units. A joint director rank leads each unit to ensure an exhaustive probe into heinous crimes, officials said on Tuesday (August 24). The central agency has dispatched an unprecedented force headed by four joint directors and comprising as many DIGs and 16 superintendents of police and investigators drawn from across the country who will be stationed in the four zones, said the officials. They also said that the teams have started the groundwork in their areas as they have sought from the DGP of West Bengal the details of all rape and murder cases reported post-elections. The Times of India reported the teams had met on Wednesday (August 25) at the Nizam Complex office and four joint directors who are leading the teams were present at the meeting. They decided to start looking at the five most affected districts. CBI sources said Birbhum, West Burdwan, East Midnapore, and South and North 24 Parganas recorded the maximum cases. They also said the documents submitted by the Bengal police were incomplete, and they asked the concerned officials to submit the rest of the papers. "It is an investigation ordered by Calcutta High Court, which has ordered that all cases of murder and crime against women in post poll violence should be investigated by CBI. The agency will look into all the cases as per the report of the National Human Rights Commission," said a CBI official. Following a report from the NHRC Committee on July 13, a five-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court ordered a CBI probe on the cases. The bench passed a unanimous judgement on a batch of PILs seeking an independent probe into the incidents of violence after the polls, which the ruling TMC won by an overwhelming majority. The bench also ordered the constitution of an SIT of state police officers to probe all the other cases. The bench will monitor the investigation of both the agencies and asked them to submit the status report within six weeks. It said there are complainants who are being threatened to withdraw cases and the number of cases of murder being claimed as natural deaths without recording FIRs and conducting investigations. Noting that the West Bengal Police did not respond properly and tried to downplay them, the bench said, "It certainly needs investigation by an independent agency." Elizabeth (Liz) Marie Dean died peacefully surrounded by family at the age of 88 on July 13, 2021 at the family farm near Knoxville, Iowa, where she had been receiving home hospice care. Liz was born on October 16, 1932 to Alvin and Frances Sheldon Johnson of Kanona, Kansas. She was preceded FILE - In this Aug. 12, 2021 file photo, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds attends the opening day of the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines, Iowa. Public health officials in Iowa's largest county are sounding alarms that too few people are wearing masks and getting vaccinated as coronavirus cases and hospitalizations climb. Officials are especially concerned in Polk County, which just hosted more than 1 million visitors to the Iowa State Fair, where mask wearing was voluntary. Do you appreciate the work we do as the only independent media outlet dedicated to serving OU students, faculty, staff and alumni on campus and around the world for more than 100 years? Then consider helping fund our endeavors. Around the world, communities are grappling with what journalism is worth and how to fund the civic good that robust news organizations can generate. We believe The OU Daily and Crimson Quarterly magazine provide real value to this community both now by covering OU, and tomorrow by helping launch the careers of media professionals. If youre able, please SUPPORT US TODAY FOR AS LITTLE AS $1. You can make a one-time donation or a recurring pledge. After a brief hiatus, the annual Tapped Craft Beer Festival is returning to Downtown Midland for its sixth year. The festival is set to take place from 2 to 7 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 28. The event, typically held in June, was cancelled last year and postponed this year due to the social restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. In June, there were more restrictions than we had right now, said Renee Smith, downtown events coordinator with the Downtown Development Authority. Guests will be able to experience a wide variety of drink options, local food and live music that are classic staples of the festival. Area distributors including Fabiano Brothers, Eastmans Forgotten Ciders, Grape Beginnings Winery and Oracle Brewing Co. will provide 85 different drink samples from 52 different brands including Deschutes Brewery of Bend, Oregon; Oskar Blues of Lyons, Colorado; and Dogfish Head Brewery of Milton, Delaware. Food trucks featuring fares from Proper Taco and Molasses Smokehouse will also be present. Guests have the option to bring their own food into the festival, but no outside drinks are allowed. With drinks and food in hand, guests can scope out a high-top table to enjoy conversation and live music by local artists. Therewolf will perform during the first wave, 2-4 p.m., followed by Marsupial Creampie in the second wave, 5-7 p.m. After the first wave ends, there will be a Main Street Afterparty featuring Andy Dalton, 4-6 p.m. and 23 North, 7-9 p.m. in the pedestrian plaza. Smith explained the idea is to encourage people to explore the downtown area and what it has to offer. There will, however, be a couple of new twists this year, the biggest being its new location. The main entrance will be at the corner of Main and Cronkwright streets. The festival will be spread out along Main Street where the food trucks will be stationed, to the East End building where the drink tents will be located. Smith said the event has become crowded in the past, and this new location will provide the needed extra space. While drinks at Tapped have been served from kegs in the past, this year they will be served from cans poured into cups. We have a lot more beverage options this way and its more COVID friendly, Smith said. The use of cans instead of kegs has opened up the selection of beverages. In addition to beer and wine, this years Tapped festival will provide non-alcoholic options and seltzers. If you buy your DD (designated driver) a drink, they can enjoy the festival as well, Smith said. The layout will also be slightly altered. In the past, breweries had their own tent, providing a mixture of beer, ales and wines. This year, each category will have its own tent, providing quicker access to favorite options and an easier system to navigate, said event chair Dustin Neumeyer. I hope visitors find something new that they havent tried yet, Neumeyer stated. Smith expects a good turnout for this years festival with 1,200 tickets sold this year. I hope they love the new location and they like the changes weve done. I hope they find their new favorite beer easier with this layout, Smith said. Weve really listened to people in years past and tried to make it easier this year. Tickets can be pre-ordered for $25. Tickets will be $30 the day of the event and will be available on a first-come, first-served basis. Additional drink tickets will also be available, three for $5 (cash only). For more information about Tapped, visit tappedbeerfest.com. The Upper Thumb will get a blast from the past this weekend and a reminder of what put Michigan on the auto manufacturing map. The Model T Ford Club International will be bringing a collection of vintage Model T cars across the Upper Thumb this weekend, the first time it has done so in 39 years of touring nationwide. The tour is part of the clubs annual Michigan Jamboree, where it tours different locations in the state every year. Tim Juhl, a Sanilac County native, club member and co-chair of the tour, said that previous Model T tours in this part of Michigan have never gone north of Lapeer. There are no Model T clubs above St. Clair County, Juhl said. You need a host club to put it on. The co-chairman from St. Clair county, we did all the scouting for the area. A little over 90 Model T's will be part of this tour, with Juhl saying they not only come from Michigan, but 11 other states ranging from Florida, Arizona, Kentucky, Wisconsin, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. The Model T Ford Club International operates a national tour every year that has travelled all over the United States, from up the east and west coasts, to remote interior stops in Utah and Wyoming, and even international stops like Prince Edward Island in Canada. The cars were manufactured between 1910 and 1927, with the vast majority of them made at the former Highland Park Plant in Detroit, the first auto plant to feature a moving assembly line. Juhl added that Henry Ford had assembly plants all over the country, with auto parts made in Michigan shipped off to other assembly plants. Were more than happy to show our cars to people, Juhl said. A lot of them just enjoy seeing them drive by. It's more about driving than about being in car shows. The cars youll see vary from ones that look like theyre driven off of a museum floor to ones that Jed Clampett would drive. The tour started on Aug. 26, with appearances at Cass City Park, the Thumb Octagon Barn, and the Franklin Inn. The schedule of stops for the cars and their approximate times are as follows: Aug. 27: Ackerman Memorial Park in Elkton from 9 to 10:30 a.m. Lighthouse County Park from 12 to 1:30 p.m. Various locations in Port Austin from 2 to 3:30 p.m. Aug. 28: Ubly Farmers Market from 9 to 10:30 a.m. Harbor Beach City Pier starting at 12 p.m. Port Hope Lumberyard and Depot Museum from 2 to 3 p.m. SYDNEY Authorities in Australias New South Wales state say they will ease pandemic restrictions for vaccinated adults next month even as they are reporting a record 1,029 coronavirus infections and three deaths from COVID-19. The record reported Thursday surpassed the previous high for a 24-hour period of 919 infections just a day earlier. State Premier Gladys Berejiklian says the slight easing of restrictions is coming because the state reached 6 million vaccine doses in a population of 8.2 million. Beginning Sept. 13, families in the highest-risk parts of Sydney will be allowed to leave their homes for an hour of recreation as long as any adults are fully vaccinated. The recreation hour is in addition to the hour people are already allowed out to exercise. Elsewhere in the state, groups of five will be allowed to congregate as long as all adults are fully vaccinated. ___ MORE ON THE PANDEMIC: Pfizer seeking FDA OK for COVID-19 vaccine booster dose WHO: Coronavirus origin window of opportunity stalled, closing fast New NY governor adds 12,000 deaths to publicized COVID-19 tally Treasury Department reports only 11% of rental assistance distributed ___ Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine ___ HERES WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING: WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealand has reported 68 new community cases of the coronavirus, the largest daily increase since April of last year as an outbreak of the delta variant continues to grow. The government put the nation into a strict lockdown last week as it tries to stamp out the outbreak, which has grown to a total of 277 infections. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Thursday that she is confident the lockdown is working and new cases will soon begin to drop. Also on Thursday, national carrier Air New Zealand reported an annual loss of 440 million New Zealand dollars, or about $306 million U.S., after revenue dropped nearly 50% due to the pandemic-induced plunge in international travel. ___ OLYMPIA, Wash, Washington state health officials say the number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients is doubling every 18 to 19 days in the state. Dr. Umair Shah is the state secretary of health and said Wednesday that the surge driven by the delta variant of the coronavirus has stressed, stretched and strained hospital resources across the state,. One hospital official said hospitals throughout the state are facing their highest levels of occupancy ever, and the impact has been especially hard on regional and rural hospitals where there are no critical care beds left. According to the state Department of Health, 1,346 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 on Tuesday. There have been more than 488,000 confirmed coronavirus infections in Washington state during the pandemic, and 6,448 deaths related to COVID-19. ___ NASHVILLE, Tenn. The Tennessee state health commissioner says children now account for more than a third of the states COVID-19 cases, a sharp rise from earlier as the delta variant of the coronavirus continues to spread. Health Commissioner Lisa Piercey said Wednesday that Tennessee had 14,000 pediatric cases in the previous seven days, which she said was 57% more than the previous week. She says such cases now make up 36% of total COVID-19 cases, when its historically been in the 10 to 15 percent range. The spike in cases among school-age children has brought calls from some health officials for more forceful protective measures such as mask mandates at schools. Gov. Bill Lee has resisted such suggestions. ___ TOPEKA, Kan. Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly has directed state employees to resume working remotely if possible because of the surge in infections from the more contagious delta variant of the coronavirus. Kellys announcement Wednesday came after two months of steadily rising numbers of COVID-19 cases that have stressed hospitals. Her directive applies to state agencies under her control. Employees must resume remote work by Sept. 3 and continue at least through Oct. 4. A memo from Kellys administration secretary says any employee who was able to work remotely earlier in the pandemic should do it again. Many state employees spent more than a year working remotely before normal operations resumed in June. ___ LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- Kentuckys governor says the state has set a new high for pandemic-related hospitalizations during its most severe wave yet of coronavirus infections. Gov. Andy Bashear said Wednesday that 2,074 Kentuckians are hospitalized for COVID-19, which is up from 1,658 a week ago. There were 4,849 new coronavirus cases, the third-highest since the pandemic began. The governor warns that our hospitals are overrun. Officials say intensive care unit capacity in five of the states 10 hospital regions is above 80%. ___ SANTA FE, N.M. Top health officials in New Mexico are warning that the state is about a week away from having to ration medical care as coronavirus infections continue to climb. The state health secretary said Wednesday the state is tracking along with its worst-case projections when it comes to spread of the virus and hospitalizations for COVID-19. Dr. David Scarse says there was a 20% increase in pandemic patients needing care in just the past day. Scarse says that the result may be that were going to have to choose who gets care and who doesnt get care, and we dont want to get to that point. He says the biggest constraint right now is the shortage of health care workers. ___ RALEIGH, N.C. --- Hospitals in the Raleigh region of North Carolina say younger and otherwise healthy adults are increasingly being hospitalized for COVID-19 amid the spread of the coronavirus delta variant. The chief physician executive for WakeMed Health & Hospitals said Wednesday that the average age of patients it is treating for COVID-19 is almost 20 years younger on average than during the first surge of the pandemic. The director of Wake Countys EMS agency says it is getting more calls for help than ever before, with daily totals often 33% higher than pre-pandemic levels of about 300 calls. The chief medical officer at UNC REX Healthcare says the hospitas ICU capacity is now full. The more than 3,500 patients currently in North Carolina hospitals due to COVID-19 is the highest since Jan. 21. ___ RENO, Nev. Nevada officials say the coronavirus positivity test rate is continuing a two-week decline statewide but has reached its highest level since December in northern Washoe County, where new daily cases and deaths continue to rise. Washoe County Health District Officer Kevin Dick says 30 new deaths have been reported so far in August in the Reno-Sparks area, compared to five each in the months of June and July. The countrys positivity rate stood at 18.9% Wednesday, the highest since 20% on Dec. 20. Statewide, the 14-day average for the positivity rate is at 14.1%, down from 16.4% on Aug. 13 after a steep climb from as low as 3.3% in early June. Statewide, Nevadas positivity rate peaked Jan. 15 at 21% after a steady climb from 6.1% on Sept. 24. ___ NEW YORK A study from Israel says COVID-19 carries a far higher risk of heart inflammation than Pfizers coronavirus vaccine. Researchers in Tel Aviv estimate there were three cases for every 100,000 people vaccinated with the Pfizer shot. But risk of it was 11 per 100,000 in people who were infected with the virus. The finding were published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine. Dr. Grace Lee is an infectious disease expert at Stanford University and says the paper is the first to assess the potential risks of vaccination in the context of understanding the potential benefits of vaccination. Previous reports have linked the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines to inflammation of the heart muscle. The problem was mainly seen in male teens and young men, who developed chest pain a few days after vaccination. U.S. health officials say they have confirmed about 800 vaccine-associated cases total of two types of inflammation in the heart muscle and in the lining of the heart. The Clalit Research Institute researchers looked at hundreds of thousands of people who were vaccinated and not vaccinated. Separately, they looked at unvaccinated people who were infected or not. Since two different groups of people were studied, the researchers were limited in making comparisons. The study focused only on the Pfizer vaccine, and it did not provide breakdown of results by age or sex. ___ HONOLULU The state of Hawaii says 88% of executive branch employees are fully vaccinated against the coronavirus and 92% are expected to be within the next month. The state released the data after Gov. David Ige this month began requiring state employees to either show proof of vaccination or get tested every week. The data cover 14,000 employees. The figures exclude workers at the Department of Education and the University of Hawaii. The state Department of Human Resources Development says of its 87 employees applied for exemptions from the vaccination or testing requirement. Eleven workers were placed on leave without pay because they didnt comply with the requirement. ___ JACKSON, Miss. Mississippi health officials said Wednesday that a child younger than 5 has died from COVID-19. Dr. Paul Byers, the state epidemiologist, said it was the sixth pediatric death from the virus in Mississippi since the pandemic began. He said the Health Department would not provide any identifying information, including where the child lived. State Health Department spokeswoman Liz Sharlot also said Wednesday that law enforcement officers are investigating threats against the state health officer, Dr. Thomas Dobbs. He has been imploring people for months to get vaccinated, but Mississippi still has among the lowest vaccination rates in the United States. Dobbs wrote Tuesday on Twitter that he has received threatening phone calls from people promoting false conspiracy theories about his family. ___ PORTLAND, Ore. Oregon will deploy crisis teams of hundreds of nurses, respiratory therapists, paramedics and nursing assistants to regions of the state hardest hit by a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations that have stretched hospitals to the limit. Gov. Kate Brown said Wednesday that up to 500 health care providers from a medial staffing company will head to central and southern Oregon, as well as 60 additional nurses under a different contract provider. State health officials say COVID-19 hospitalizations have increased 990% in Oregon since July 9. The personnel will head to Bend, Redmond, Medford, Ashland, Grants Pass and Roseburg and can move around the state as conditions require. ___ CHICAGO Chicago officials say all city employees must be fully vaccinated for COVID-19 by mid-October. Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced the rule Wednesday, saying employees will have to submit proof of vaccination via an online portal by Oct. 15. The city has already required employees in public schools, including teachers and principals, to be vaccinated by the same deadline. City officials say employees can apply for a religious or medical exemption, which will be individually reviewed. Lightfoot says getting vaccinated is the best way to make it possible to recover from the pandemic. ___ NEW ORLEANS A child under age 1 is among the latest reported COVID-19 deaths in Louisiana. The state health department didnt provide the childs exact age or where the death occurred. The childs death was one of 110 in the Wednesday report, which said 85 of the deaths were listed as confirmed COVID-19 deaths and 25 as probable. We last reported a COVID death in a child 6 months ago, the health department said on Twitter. In total, 11 children younger than 18 have died from COVID in Louisiana. The department reported more than 6,619 confirmed and probable cases on Wednesday. Statewide hospitalizations dropped by 12 to 2,844. The disease is blamed for more than 12,000 confirmed deaths in Louisiana. ___ MADISON, Wis. Wisconsins top education official is urging everyone headed into school buildings to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and wear masks. Jill Underly says those steps will help ensure schools dont have to shut down amid a spike in new cases. The state superintendent of schools wrote an editorial Wednesday urging a united front against the virus. She noted the situation was different from last year thanks to the availability of vaccines. Many schools in Wisconsin didnt open in-person learning in the fall of 2020, taking a hybrid approach for at least part of the year. Wisconsins two largest districts, Milwaukee and Madison, were both looking into a vaccine mandate for teachers, something Democratic Gov. Tony Evers says he supports. Evers is a former teacher, school administration and state superintendent for education. A recent poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research indicates a majority support nationwide for mask and vaccine requirements in schools. The following list includes recent reports from the Midland County Sheriffs Office and the Midland Police Department. Compiled by reporter Andrew Mullin. Monday, Aug. 23 9:33 p.m. A 27-year-old City of Midland male was cited for driving while license revoked following a traffic stop in Midland Township. 9:14 p.m. Deputies responded to a Lincoln Township residence reference a report of a domestic assault. A 51-year-old Lincoln Township male was subsequently arrested and transported to the Midland County Jail without incident. 9:06 p.m. Officers responded to a driver operating under a suspended license in the area of Joseph Drive and Paige Court. 4:13 p.m. A deputy was dispatched to the area of Eleven Mile Road and Curtis Road reference objects along and boards with nails in the road. The items had already been removed by the road commission prior to a deputy arriving on scene. 2:04 p.m. Jerome Township female reported she was a victim of three $521.54 fraudulent charges. The bank is currently investigating and is supposed to forward the findings to law enforcement. 5:51 a.m. Officers responded to a two-vehicle crash on Bay City Road. Sunday, Aug. 22 10:56 p.m. Deputies conducted a traffic stop at a Jerome Township location. Deputies contacted the 37-year-old female driver. Upon further investigation, it was discovered the vehicle didn't have any insurance. The female was cited for no insurance. A report is being sent to the Midland County Prosecuting Attorneys Office. 9:15 p.m. Officers responded to an obstruction of justice complaint on Haley Street. 8:27 p.m. Deputies were dispatched to a Warren Township location for a suspicious situation. Reports of an older white minivan was seen driving slowing through the area looking at houses. Deputies patrolled the area but were unable to locate the suspicious van and the scene was cleared without incident. 7:39 p.m. Deputies were dispatched to a Midland Township residence for reports of a 19-year-old Midland Township male being disorderly. Upon deputies arrival, the 19-year-old male had left the residence. Deputies contacted the males 39-year-old mother, who said her son left the residence to an unknown location. Deputies attempted to locate the male, but he was unable to be located. 7:37 p.m. Officers responded to a domestic verbal situation on Abbott Street. 7:27 p.m. Officers responded to a vehicle crash on Airport Road. 5:46 p.m. A deputy responded to a Lincoln Township residence for a death investigation of a 52-year-old male. The death appears to be of natural causes. 5:31 p.m. Officers responded to a two-vehicle crash on Eastman Avenue and Airport Road. 5:19 p.m. A 34-year-old female reported she had a verbal dispute with her 41-year-old boyfriend. The female advised the male left with her keys. Deputies later contacted the female, who had her keys back and no longer needed assistance. 4:04 p.m. A 54-year-old male reported his neighbor allowed an unknown subject to drive on his property. Deputies spoke to the neighbor who said he did not give permission to anyone to drive on his family members property. The male was advised the complainant did not want anyone accessing his property. The neighbor advised he understood. 2:51 p.m. A 41-year-old Edenville Township female reported a 47-year-old Jerome Township male was not out of the house she evicted him from. Deputy arrived to discover the male was moving and needed a few more hours. The female agreed to give the male a couple more hours to move. 2:21 p.m. A deputy was dispatched to an Ingersoll Township residence regarding an animal complaint. The deputy spoke with a 50-year-old male who was having issues with his neighbor's dog getting loose and coming over into his yard. The complainant also had concerns that the dog was being neglected. The incident is under investigation and copy of this report will be sent to Midland Animal Control for follow-up. 1:38 p.m. Deputies responded to a Edenville Township location for a single-vehicle traffic crash. The occupants were transported to MidMichigan Medical Center ER by EMS for minor injuries. 12:01 p.m. A 32-year-old Larkin Township female called to report being harassed by the property owner. The female requested the deputy to tell the owner to leave her along until she is done moving out. 10:38 a.m. A 63-year-old female reported the catalytic converter was stolen from her motor home. The approximate value of the stolen property is $2,000. No suspects are currently known. 10:47 a.m. A deputy conducted a traffic stop at a Hope Township location. The deputy spoke with the 45-year-old male driver who was subsequently arrested for operating while intoxicated. The male was lodged at the Midland County Jail and a report is being sent to the prosecutor's office for review. 9:58 a.m. Someone failed to pay for $103.24 in gas at a Sanford station. The plate obtained came back with no record. Red Silverado dump truck is the description provided of the vehicle. Sammy Wade Ball Jr. was born May 16, 1966 in Bakersfield, CA. He died August 18, 2021 in Shreveport, LA. at age 55 from Covid-19. He was preceded in death by his father, Sammy Wade Ball Sr. He is survived by his wife of 27 years Angela Ball and his 3 children, Bernard, Christian, and Melissa CHICAGO A man wanted on a murder warrant in California was fatally shot during an exchange of gunfire with Amtrak police when officers tried to take him into custody on the platform of Chicago's Union Station, authorities said. Amtrak spokesman Marc Migliari said the shooting took place at about 5 p.m. on Tuesday. He said when the man spotted uniformed officers on the platform he ran away. But he saw that he was running toward other officers and began shooting at them. Chicago Police said an Amtrak police officer returned fire, striking the man in the chest. They said the man was rushed to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead on Tuesday evening. Police also said a gun was recovered at the scene. The man was identified as Jamar Jason Taylor, 33, of San Leandro, California. The Cook County Medical Examiner's office had not identified the man as of Wednesday morning pending the notification of next of kin. Three others were taken to area hospitals. One man was being treated for lacerations to his face and was listed in good condition, police said. Two others were taken to a hospital, but their conditions were not immediately known. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 SPRINGFIELD Republicans in the Illinois General Assembly say new, detailed census numbers released last week show the legislative maps that Democrats pushed through in the spring are unconstitutional. The Census Bureau released the data Thursday, Aug. 12, several months later than usual due to delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors. The numbers show population counts down to the block level, which is what lawmakers need in order to draw districts that are as close to equal in population as possible. Due to the delays, Democrats who control the General Assembly drew maps using population estimates based on survey data. Under the Illinois Constitution, waiting beyond June 30 for the official data would have triggered a provision putting the process in the hands of a bipartisan legislative commission in which Democrats could have lost their partisan advantage. Just as we predicted, the maps that were drawn by Illinois Democrats in a closed room and without public input, and signed by Gov. Pritzker, have proven to be unusable and unlawful given the release of the U.S. Census data, House Minority Leader Jim Durkin, of Western Springs, said in a statement Monday. Previous U.S. Supreme Court decisions have held that in state legislative districts, populations can vary by as much as 10 percent between the largest and smallest districts. Variations below that amount can still be found unconstitutional if they are shown to be discriminatory either by breaking up minority groups to dilute their voting power, or by concentrating them into too few districts in order to limit their representation. But variations of more than 10 percent generally have been held unconstitutional. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Republicans are now arguing that based on their analysis, the smallest and largest districts contained in the new maps that were passed this spring and signed into law by Gov. J.B. Pritzker vary by just under 30 percent from 92,390 in the 83rd House District, which includes Aurora, to 124,836 in the 5th House District, a narrow, rectangular-shaped district that stretches from Chicagos Near North Side south to 79th Street on the citys South Side. In June, Durkin and Senate Minority Leader Dan McConchie, of Hawthorn Woods, filed a federal lawsuit in Chicago seeking to have the maps overturned and asking the court either to order the formation of the bipartisan redistricting commission or appoint a special master to draw new maps. A hearing in that case is currently set for Tuesday, Aug. 24. Trial in the case is set for Sept. 27-29. If the maps are found to be unconstitutional, though, it is not certain that the court would invoke the state constitutions provision calling for the bipartisan commission. Democrats could argue that they met the constitutions June 30 deadline and, therefore, only need to go back and make adjustments to the maps to bring them into compliance. Democratic Sens. Omar Aquino and Elgie Sims, both of Chicago, the chair and vice chair of the Senate Redistricting Committee, issued a joint statement Monday saying they are still reviewing the census data. While we continue to analyze the information released by the U.S. Census Bureau, our commitment to the people of Illinois remains the same: We support a fair map that reflects the broad racial and geographic diversity of Illinois, the senators said. As we go through this review process, if it becomes clear that updates need to be made, we will take the appropriate steps to do so. Aquino and Sims also indicated they may question the accuracy of the data and the Census Bureaus use in the 2020 census differential privacy a mathematical technique designed to prevent users from extracting other peoples personal information from the data. This has been a unique census, and its important we take time to fully understand the data, they said in the statement. This includes the impact of differential privacy, which is used by the Census Bureau to protect identities of respondents but may also result in inaccuracies, especially in more ethnically and racially diverse communities. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1 Republican Glen Evans has announced his candidacy for Illinois state Senate, District 36. Current state Sen. Neil Anderson, R-Andalusia, was drawn out of the district during the Democrat-controlled state legislature remapping process, leaving the seat open for the 2022 election. Evans is an ordained minister and a member of Laborers Local 309, where he served as auditor from 2016 to 2018. He said he was inspired to run for state Senate because Democratic policies in Illinois "seem to primarily benefit the Chicagoland area." "While many in Illinois continue voting robotically Democratic, the Republican party has seen rising support," Evans said. "More and more persons are choosing the Republican policies (and) tax breaks. Motivation (is) rising gradually in Springfield, Illinois." Evans said his priorities were leadership, job creation, tax breaks and "giving a voice back to those who are not heard" and "putting the power back into the hands of the people who wish to see all succeed. "We have too long given our leaders too much autonomy (by) not holding them responsible for silencing the voices of people in our own communities," he said. "I want to change that. The American dream is in the heart of every American and in the eyes of every Illinois resident and business." Evans has previously run for office as a Democrat in about 20 different local races. He has lost every election with the exception of two precinct committeeman races. He has run for Rock Island-Milan school board, Rock Island city council, Rock Island County board, Rock Island Township supervisor and twice for Rock Island County clerk. Evans most recently challenged State Rep. Mike Halpin, D-Rock Island, in the 2018 and 2020 elections, losing both times. Subscribe today and support local journalism! He said Tuesday that he changed his party affiliation from Democrat to Republican five years ago after attending a training with Americans for Prosperity, a Conservative political action group founded by the Koch brothers. "One of the biggest struggles I had with the Democratic Party was that it's moving further and further away from my values," Evans said. "When I got done with the (AFP) training, I saw there was very little I agreed with in the Democratic party. I ran for years as a Democrat, but I saw that they take choice away from the people. "It was frustrating when I looked at government as a whole. I am on the ballot because I am dissatisfied with what I see in community I grew up in. I want to make it better. "It is time for a change for the better; your vote can make that change happen. Your vote is your choice, and you should vote your choice for the candidate who will work for you." Evans may have a Republican challenger in the June 28 primary election. Rock Island Mayor Mike Thoms announced July 12 he is considering running for the 36th District state Senate seat. The general election will be held Nov. 8, 2022. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 CHICAGO When Maribel Cordero told her two children in 2016 that she had breast cancer but that she couldnt afford treatment, the two grabbed empty cans the next day and set out to ask for donations at their school, the mother recalls. They thought that with the little money they collected, I was going to be able to pay for the surgery I needed, said Cordero, 54, who lives in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood. Though she was told that her stage 2 cancer needed to be treated immediately, she was denied urgent treatment because she did not have any type of health insurance. As an immigrant from Mexico living in the country without permission, she does not qualify for federal programs that offer health coverage and she cant afford private insurance. There was no way to pay for the treatment so I thought: Im going to die and who is going to care for my children? She managed to get treated several weeks later through charity care. Now a cancer survivor, the mother faces the long-term effects of the illness, which include copays for multiple doctor visits a month and a bill of more than $3,000 monthly for medicines. While she said her husband and children pitch in to make sure she gets the medicine she needs, a less stressful solution is on the way. Cordero is among 11,000 people in Illinois who would be eligible for Medicaid-like benefits under an extension to a program created last year that was the first in the nation to provide government-subsidized health benefits to seniors living in the U.S. illegally. Under the expansion approved in the new state budget earlier this summer, adult immigrants 55 to 64 living at or below the federal poverty level would also be eligible for the program, which initially covered only seniors 65 and older, including immigrants with legal status who didnt yet qualify for state or federal programs. While advocates applaud the move that is expected to provide a safety net for thousands of workers in that age group who are at risk of contracting COVID-19, other leaders question the sustainability of the program. Many immigrants in Chicago have low-paying but essential jobs, said Graciela Guzman, campaign director of the Healthy Illinois campaign, which has advocated since 2016 for a bill that would guarantee health care for all adult Illinoisans regardless of income or immigration status. Despite being essential, she said, these workers have little access to health care because they cannot afford private insurance and are not eligible for any state or federal programs. COVID-19 really put a magnifying glass on a lot of the experiences that weve been hearing in our communities for a very long time: that people have just been systematically left out from the health care spectrum as we saw how COVID rates and COVID deaths disproportionately impacted immigrant communities, said Guzman. The expansion would guarantee care for thousands of immigrants and precarious workers who have been essential to keep the economy running through the pandemic, Guzman said. Many have already contracted the virus and now face the long-term effects and fear going to the doctor because they cannot afford a copay, she added. Earlier this year, Corderos husband, who is 60 and is her main financial support, contracted COVID-19 and the virus quickly spread in the household. Cordero, her daughter and other family members all had the virus. Miguel Cordero is an essential worker and couldnt stay home even if it meant putting his wife at risk. Gracias a Dios, she said, they all recovered but they were left in a deep financial crisis. Her husband was out of work for a little more than a month and afraid to go to the doctor even though he hadnt fully healed because he knew they couldnt afford to pay, she said. Both Cordero and her husband say they are thankful for the expansion that she has advocated for as a community health promoter under the Resurrection Project, a community organization that serves the immigrant community in the Chicago area. Cordero has openly shared her experience to shine light on the realities that hundreds of families are facing and also on the resources she has been able to find for health care despite the obstacles that she faces by living in the county illegally since she was 19. Other states have recently followed to expand their own health care coverage for noncitizens. California approved a program to cover adults 50 and older, and Oregons governor signed a plan to offer health care coverage to low-income immigrants over age 19 regardless of immigration status. Health care should be a right, not a privilege, said Illinois House Majority Leader Greg Harris, a Chicago Democrat, who vowed to continue supporting the movement to get health care for all adults in Illinois. The push for the bill was also championed by the Illinois Legislative Latino Caucus. Harris said, These folks are paying taxes, theyre shopping and working. Were taking care of them the same way were taking care of all of our seniors, we dont want to exclude a group just because of one demographic characteristic, he said. The state allocated $36 million to the program expansion that is expected to begin in May 2022, and the estimated annual cost is $50 million, according to Jamie Munks, spokesperson for the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services. Those who apply for the program must meet the same income criteria as citizens and legal residents who qualify for Medicaid. More information on enrollment procedures will be available and community outreach will begin later this year, Guzman said. We are making every effort to get this coverage up and running earlier than that. The new program requires changes to the system that determines eligibility, and it takes some time to perform these programming changes, Munks wrote in an email. Nearly a year after outreach and enrollment for the initial program in December, nearly 7,000 seniors 65 and older have been enrolled and as of June it has cost the state $60 million, according to data from the Illinois Department of Health Care and Family Services. Guzman said the enrollment surpassing their initial estimate has really shown us again that these are people that have been in the shadows of the health care system. Although most lawmakers in Springfield have been supportive of the bill, a handful have been vocally against the extension, Guzman said. One of them was state Sen. Terri Bryant, a Murphysboro Republican, who said in an an interview with WJPF radio in July that she did not support the publicity funded health care for immigrants living in the country illegally because Illinois taxpayers are now responsible for the extension. Andrea Kovach, a senior attorney with the Shriver Center on Poverty Law, who has worked with backers of the bill, added that its difficult to get an accurate count of the number of undocumented people because for years, especially the last four years, immigrants have been understandably fearful of answering government surveys or any question that might identify themselves as undocumented. Kovach also said that even if the program is costly, the state will save money in the long run by providing preventive care and avoiding sudden and long-term hospitalizations. She also pointed out that a 2017 study found Illinois residents without legal immigration status contributed more than $758 million a year in state and local taxes, which she said debunks the claims that undocumented dont pay taxes. We are extremely proud that in 2020, amid a pandemic that disproportionately impacted the elderly, Illinois became the first state to provide Medicaid-like coverage to undocumented older adults aged 65 and over, who would qualify for Medicaid if not for their immigration status, Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services Director Theresa Eagleson said in an emailed statement. Under Gov. Pritzkers leadership, were working every day to ensure that in Illinois health care is a right, not a privilege. At HFS, equity is central to our mission, and were now working toward launching the extension of these benefits to undocumented older adults aged 55 to 64. Cordero said that as she waits to finally enroll, she will work to share the news with fellow immigrants. God gave me a second chance by letting me beat breast cancer and allowing me to see my children grow, she said. Now I want to make sure that others suffering from an illness also seek resources to see another day. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1 CARBONDALE SIU Chancellor Austin Lanes worst nightmare came in the form of a phone call in the middle of the night Sunday when he learned one of his own a freshman was taken from this earth too soon. This is what we all fear the most; they don't teach any of us how to handle moments like this, Lane said Wednesday. I received a call from our chief of police at 3:47 a.m. As soon as I saw his name I knew something was wrong. For a third time this week, a community came together to mourn the death of 18-year-old Keeshanna Jackson, the SIU student killed by gunfire on Cherry Street over the weekend. This time, it was Wednesday in the Student Center Ballrooms and they did so through music, tears and the encouraging words from Carbondales faith community. In the days prior, more than 200 gathered at a candlelight vigil Sunday night, and dozens attended an anti-violence rally Tuesday in Jackson's honor. Lane began crying as he spoke saying the death of a student is his and any other administrators worst nightmare. Lane said Jacksons death was a tragedy. He said those who knew and loved her described her as fun to be around and said she always had something to talk about. Any of her friends in the audience would tell you that she could make anyone laugh and she wanted to do everyone's nails, Lane said. One friend said Keeshanna didn't live her life sad and that she was the goofiest person SIU Associate Chancellor Wendell Williams said he hopes Jacksons death helps bring about change. My prayer tonight is that we as part of the Saluki Nation family, that we will let this tragedy serve as something that can change us, Williams said. Something that can change fear into focus, to remind ourselves to focus on our surroundings, and on the things that our parents, friends and relatives have told us that we should focus on. Williams said this is the type of tragedy that can change faintheartedness into faithfulness to remind ourselves that we must now stay faithful to the dreams and the aspirations that brought us here. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Father Joseph Brown spoke virtually at the service and called upon the elders in the community to bring hope back to the young. "But we got to deal with the nightmare. The people who feel terminally hopeless and powerless carry guns and feed some kind of narcotic element to bring them temporary peace. That's not an excuse. It's an explanation. But we are still responsible for one another. And we've got children carrying guns because they are hopeless otherwise, we have got to intervene, Brown said. Pastor Darryl Cox, of the New Zion Missionary Baptist Church, said he wanted to encourage the community and SIU to hold onto hope and do what is right and to speak up if they know anything. It is your God-given right to say that which is wrong, Cox said. It is your God-given right to stand up and stand out. The SIU Foundation announced Wednesday that it will provide a scholarship in honor of Jacksons memory to support a future SIU student from her high school. This fund can be found here. A GoFundMe page was started to help the family with funeral costs. As of Wednesday evening, nearly $3,500 had been raised by more than 70 donors. A link to this can be found here. As of Wednesday evening, there was no new suspect information available. Jacksons family and law enforcement are urging the community to come forward with any information they have about the shooting. The Carbondale Police Department, with the assistance of SIU's Department of Public Safety and other law enforcement partners, continue to actively investigate the shooting incident, Chief Stan Reno said in a news release. I plead for anyone with information to come forward and assist with bringing justice to Keeshanna and her family. Furthermore, I call for an end to the violence in the City as we strive to provide a safe environment for all Carbondale citizens and visitors. We will continue to work with our law enforcement partners and the States Attorneys Office to hold offenders accountable," Reno said in a statement. Anyone with information about this incident is encouraged to contact the City of Carbondale Police Department at (618) 457-3200. You may also call the Carbondale/SIU Crime Stoppers anonymous tip line at (618) 549-COPS (2677) or the Murphysboro/Jackson County anonymous tip line at (618) 687-COPS (2677). Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Photo: (Photo : Taylor Crul/U.S. Air Force via Getty Images) There wasn't just one but three babies born aboard the U.S. airplanes that evacuated people out of Afghanistan during a crucial humanitarian crisis after the Taliban took control of the Afghanistan government, according to U.S. Army Gen. Steve Lyons. Lyons is the commander overseeing the evacuation of U.S. troops and refugees out of Afghanistan. While he appreciated that news agencies reported one birth in a flight that arrived in Ramstein in Germany from Kabul on Saturday, August 21, he said there were actually three babies as of Monday, August 23. Secretary John Kirby later confirmed that all the babies and their moms are in a "fine and healthy" state at the Ramstein Air Base hospital. The secretary didn't know if the babies will automatically become American citizens. However, the State Department's policy cites those babies can't be considered U.S. citizens if they have been born aboard an American plane but outside U.S. airspace. Read Also: Child Tax Credit: Important Dates Parents Need To Remember First Baby Delivery 'In the Wild' U.S. Army Capt. Erin Brymer, a registered nurse, has delivered many babies before, but on Saturday, they were notified at the airbase in Germany that one of the 36 planes arriving from Afghanistan had a mother in labor. When the plane touched down, and nurse Brymer's team got on the aircraft, the mother was already crowning. She was protected and covered by the rest of the female evacuees. Brymer said that it was such a "beautiful sight to see" amid a delivery "in the wild." Her team could no longer transfer the pregnant mom to the hospital because her daughter was ready to come out. The nurse told CNN that she made eye contact with the mother and assured her that everything would be okay. It took just 10 to 15 minutes for the baby's delivery, who came out screaming. Brymer was pleased with the outcome, and they immediately had the mother hold her baby so she could breastfeed. Medical support personnel from the 86th Medical Group help an Afghan mother and family off a U.S. Air Force C-17, call sign Reach 828, moments after she delivered a child aboard the aircraft upon landing at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, Aug. 21. (cont..) pic.twitter.com/wqR9dFlW1o Air Mobility Command (@AirMobilityCmd) August 21, 2021 Afghan Baby Reunites with Dad Meanwhile, the Pentagon revealed that another Afghan baby in a viral video, showing that he was passed from one U.S. troop to the next at the Kabul airport fence, has been reunited with his father. Kirby said that the father passed his child to the U.S. troops because he needed medical attention. The secretary said that the baby had been treated and the family is now safe behind the military perimeter. However, government officials warned soldiers that it's risky to encourage and allow parents to pass their children across the barbed wire fence. The soldiers said that the parents have been desperate, with some pleading to save their babies. They said it was an awful sight to witness, especially after some of the children got caught in the wires, leaving many of them in tears that harrowing night of the evacuation. Related Article: Heartbreaking Photo of 7-Month-Old Baby Separated From Parents at Chaotic Kabul Airport Goes Viral Photo: (Photo : JOHANNES EISELE/AFP via Getty Images) In 1991, rock band Nirvana released their best-selling album, "Nevermind," featuring a naked baby swimming in the pool and going after a dollar on a fish hook. Spencer Elden was the 4-month-old baby on that iconic album cover. Now at 30 years old, Elden is suing the rock band and the studios for child pornography and exploitation. For over two decades, Elden took part in celebrating the album's anniversary by recreating the famous cover, albeit with clothes on, for its 10th, 17th, 20th, and 25th anniversaries. In the last recreation, Elden said in an interview that it was "cool but weird" to be a part of "something so important" to rock music. But in a lawsuit filed in a California court Tuesday, Elden alleged that the Nirvana band members -- David Grohl, Krist Novoselic, the late Kurt Cobain, and his widow Courtney Love -- "profited" from his image as a naked baby. The lawsuit also named photographer Kirk Weddle and at least four recording studios as defendants. He accused the people behind "Nevermind" of commercial child pornography, causing permanent harm, emotional distress, and "lifelong loss of income-earning capacity." Speaking with the New York Times, Maggie Mabie, one of Elden's lawyers, said that everyone her client met had seen his genitalia. For Elden, the album cover constantly reminds him of the privacy he has lost because the album was advertised continuously over the years. Read Also: Florida Toddler Accidentally Kills Mom With a Gun While She Was on Zoom Elden is asking $150,00 each from all of the defendants. His parents, who were friends of the photographer, were paid just $200 for the photo. Mabie said that her client realized when he became much older that his participation in the anniversary celebrations was compounding on his naked baby image's exploitation. Sticker Idea Didn't Stick According to the lawsuit, there was some pushback about having Elden's genitals exposed fully during the discussion of the cover. Cobain, who died in 1994, had a plan to put a sticker on the baby's penis, but the idea was dropped for some reason. Elden's parents also didn't sign any release authorizing their friend to use his photo. Another lawyer, Robert Lewis, told NPR that his "true identity and legal name" are "forever tied" to the "Nevermind" album cover. However, there were a few times when Elden became mad that people still talk about his naked body. He told GQ Australia in 2016 that he wasn't okay with people seeing his penis, but he did not have any choice at that time. In 2015, he told Time that he was upset because he became "famous for nothing," and the only reason he gets interviews is because of the album cover. Deserving of Compensation While he tried to reach out to the band and their people, he never got a response. Elden, an artist, said his feelings began to change sometime after those interviews, and he started talking to lawyers and managers. In 2019, Weddle, who remains in contact with Elden and his family, told The Guardian he used to wonder if the family should be compensated for the photo. He said that when Elden was 16 years old, he was very conflicted about this naked baby photo. "He feels that everybody made money off it and he didn't," the photographer said. "I think he deserves something." Related Article: Heartbreaking Photo of 7-Month-Old Baby Separated From Parents at Chaotic Kabul Airport Goes Viral Photo: (Photo : You Should Know What Qualifies as Medical Malpractice) Medical malpractice is a horrible thing to deal with, as it often results in the impairment or death of a loved one. Doctors are entrusted to take care of patients, and medical malpractice breaks that trust and puts lives in jeopardy. However, not all medical deaths or problems stem from malpractice, and it's important to recognize what qualifies as medical malpractice. Before you rush to call malpractice lawyers in PA to represent you, study up on the different types of medical malpractice and the conditions that must be met for malpractice to occur. Misdiagnosis One of the most common forms of medical malpractice stems from misdiagnosis. When a doctor gets a diagnosis wrong, the patient will likely not get the required treatment for their ailment. Not all instances of misdiagnosis result in medical malpractice, but if there is gross misconduct then it will definitely qualify. For example, if a doctor fails to see obvious clinical signs of an ailment, doesn't go through with standard testing, or does not refer the patient to a specialist for further investigation, then you have a good case to prove medical malpractice. Surgical Errors Surgery is a scary prospect, and patients trust doctors to give their bodies the right amount of care. Although many things can go wrong in surgery, there are a few surgical mistakes that a doctor can make that would qualify as malpractice. For example, making blatant mistakes like operating on the wrong part of the body and performing the wrong type of surgery are gross instances of malpractice. Other instances of surgical malpractice include failure to follow established surgical procedures and leaving tools and surgical equipment inside the patient's body. All these instances can be avoided through the competence of medical professionals, meaning they qualify as malpractice. Wrong Treatments After diagnosing you with an ailment a doctor will go over potential treatment options with you. If a doctor recommends the wrong treatment for your ailment, then it could be a case of medical malpractice. However, simply prescribing the wrong treatment isn't enough for malpractice, it has to be grossly wrong and against common wisdom. When a doctor does something like this it puts the patient at risk for many reasons. First, the problem will likely go untreated and worsen since the prescribed treatment won't be effective. Additionally, most treatments have side effects, so a doctor could be exposing you to side effects from a treatment you don't even need. Failure to Disclose Risks If a doctor is discussing potential treatments and surgical options with you, they are required to disclose all the risks associated with that treatment option. Some treatments come with major life-altering side effects. These side effects can include illness, injury, and even death. Some people may decide to undergo treatment anyway, but others may opt-out based on potential risks. However, if your doctor fails to fully disclose the dangers of treatment and one of the side effects ends up happening, you could have a case of malpractice on your hands. Patients deserve the right to be informed and the ability to make well-educated decisions for their own health. Paris, TN (38242) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 61F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 61F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. This service applies to you if your subscription has not yet expired on our old site. You will have continued access until your subscription expires; then you will need to purchase an ongoing subscription through our new system. Please contact the Parsons Sun office at (620) 421-2000 if you have any questions FAA awards $766m in grants to nearly 280 airports across the USA The US Department of Transportations Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has awarded more than US$766m in grants to build safer, more sustainable and more accessible airports across the USA. The funding from the fifth round of the FY 2021 Airport Improvement Program grants will pay for projects at 279 airports in 44 states, plus facilities in Guam, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. ') } else { console.log ('nompuad'); document.write(' ') } // --> ') } else if (width >= 425) { console.log ('largescreen'); document.write('') } else { console.log ('nompuad'); document.write('') } // --> Steve Dickson, FAA administrator, said, These grants will improve safety, sustainability and accessibility at airports across our country. Projects include US$10.6m to install a geothermal system in the terminal building at Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport to improve the airports energy efficiency. The airport will heat and cool the 37,000m2 terminal building with the new geothermal system, which will replace three existing boilers. The geothermal system will significantly reduce pollutants, such as ozone, carbon monoxide and particulate matter associated with the burning of natural gas. Other projects of note include US$84,000 to buy a passenger lift device to help passengers with disabilities board and deplane aircraft at Charleston AFB/International Airport; US$16.4m to expand the terminal building and apron at Wilmington International Airport; and US$6.1m to expand the terminal building and improve the existing ticketing area at Fort Wayne International Airport. The terminal expansion will provide a service-animal relief area, lactation rooms and childrens play area. The Airport Improvement Program receives approximately US$3.2bn in funding each year. The FAA plans to award more than 1,800 grants in 2021. Superfoundry TSMC plans to raise chip prices by 10 to 20 percent, according to a new report. If true, chip prices across the board could increase as a result, especially AMD CPUs and GPUs from AMD, Intel, and Nvidia. Laptops, Apple iPhones, and Android phones powered by Qualcomm could see price hikes, too. The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacuring Co., the worlds largest chip foundry, plans to raise the prices it charges customers as early as later this year or possibly next year, due to an unusually high demand for chips. The Journal reported that TSMC would charge automakers up to 20 percent more to manufacture key automotive components, but also charge up to 10 percent more for more advanced chips. Those advanced chips will likely include the PC industrys cutting-edge processors of all stripes, which use TSMC as a manufacturing facility. Though Nvidia designs its own GPUs, theyre manufactured at TSMC. Roughly half of TSMCs revenue comes from its 7nm manufacturing process, such as that used by AMDs Ryzen processor. During the first quarter of 2021, TSMC reported that 45 percent of its revenue came from smartphone manufacturers like Apple, though it didnt break out individual customers. All this means is that if TSMC raises prices, youll likely see the prices of chips you care about rise, too. Nvidia has already warned that supplies of its GPUs will be tight next year: A supply constrained environment for the vast majority of next year is my guess at the moment, Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang said during an earnings call earlier this month. Its possible that AMD and Qualcomm may raise prices as well, affecting Ryzen CPUs, Radeon GPUs, and the leading-edge smartphones that use the Snapdragon chips. Remember, too, that consoles like the Microsoft Xbox Series X/S and Sony PlayStation 5 use APUs manufactured by AMD...which are manufactured by TSMC. Even Intels upcoming Arc PC GPU chip will be fabricated at TSMC. And no, there really arent alternatives for the worlds largest chipmakers. As the Journal noted, TSMC makes more than 90 percent of the worlds most advanced chips. That TSMC is raising prices, though, shouldnt come as an enormous surprise. In April, TSMC executives said that TSMC expected chip shortages to last through 2023. All this is the sound of the other shoe droppingright on your wallet. Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Dr. K.K Sarpong, has refuted claims by some Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) that the corporation is seeking a loan of $1.65 million to acquire stakes in Aker Energy and AGM Petroleum Ghana oil blocks. The GNPC has announced plans to purchase a 70% stake in the South Deep Water Tano (SDWT) operated by AGM Petroleum Ghana Limited and a 37% stake in the Deep Water Tano/Cape Three Points (DWT/CTP) operated by Aker Energy Ghana Limited. The corporation is said to have asked Parliament to approve a $1.65 billion loan for the acquisition of the stakes in Ghanas offshore fields. The Energy Minister, Dr. Mathew Opoku Prempeh submitted a memorandum to that effect to the legislature. Provision of a loan not exceeding US$1.65 billion to finance the acquisition at a price to be negotiated which might not exceed US$1.3 billion and GC Explorco share of capital expenditure (CAPEX) to Pecan Phase 1 First Oil of US$350 million. CSOs Threaten Court Action But some fifteen (15) CSOs have kicked against the deal and petitioned Parliament to stop it. They accuse GNPC of acting not in the interest of the nation saying, "we are clear in our minds that the transactions, if approved, will shortchange Ghana. Therefore, we request parliament to intervene given that the deal has already gone through all the relevant branches of the Executive, ostensibly glossing over important threats of the transaction to the countrys fiscal situation". Vice President of IMANI Africa, Bright Simons, speaking at a Town Hall Talk, indicated that the CSOs will take GNPC to court if nothing is done about their petition. "We are not speculating that they are acting against the interest of Ghana. We are asserting that they are acting against the interest of Ghana. "The level of commitment to our position is that GNPC action, not in this matter alone but in a wide range of various matters has consistently been against the interest of Ghana, this is not something we are sugar-coating. "We are deeply concerned about the nature of the action and activities that GNPC is undertaking in this country and we seek to shine light on it . . . and if something is not done at some point, we may proceed to the law court eventually if we have the right grounds," Bright Simons said. Tell The Truth Speaking in an interview on Peace FM's 'Kokrokoo' programme Thursday morning, Dr. K.K Sarpong set the records straight. To him, the CSOs are either not privy to the facts or have decided to lie to the general public. Explaining the facts of the deal, he said what GNPC submitted to Parliament is valuation figures for the acquisition of the stakes and nowhere in the valuation did they request a $1.65 billion loan. "We gave all the valuations to the government and the government also, at Cabinet level to Parliament, they decided on the figure of 1.65 but it's just a guide . . . out of that money, 350 million dollars is GNPC contribution to development if we acquire the stake. We have to also contribute to development of the field to first oil wherever we are to develop . . . when you take out the 350, it means the amount that the government wants Parliament to consider is 1.3 billion for acquisition. The Parliament also gave an upper limit of 1.1 billion. ''There is nothing one can do about the 350; it's an estimated cost that you will incur once you want to do it . . . So, if someone says we have decided on 1.1, that price is yet to be agreed but what Parliament said is at no point go beyond 1.1 . . . even with that, it's not conclusive," he told host Kwami Sefa Kayi. He asserted that there has been no agreement on a fixed amount on the deal stressing the figures quoted are "only indicative" and that, "GNPC will only provide support. When they are done and give us their final feedback, that will be the basis of the acquisition''. Dr. K.K Sarpong admonished the CSOs to ''speak the truth''. Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The Deputy Minister of Education in charge of Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET), Mrs Gifty Twum-Ampofo, has urged parents not to stop their wards from pursuing TVET-related courses. She said the notion that TVET courses were for students who were not academically brilliant was one of the factors that discouraged people from studying those courses at both secondary and tertiary levels. According to the minister, TVET is never for the second grade individual, it is never for the people who are not smart. Investment Mrs Twum-Ampofo made the appeal in an interview with the Daily Graphic when the Parliamentary Select Committee on Education toured some TVET institutions in the Ashanti Region. She explained that the investment the government was making in TVET education and the equipment bought to retool the workshops could not be left to people who were not serious to manage. TVET is for the people who can manage facilities concerning our lives and these are the first-class students and I am appealing to parents to encourage their children who are smart and wish to do TVET to do so. Teachers should also guide our young ones into TVET and by doing so, you reduce poverty to a very large extent and you also reduce youth unemployment, she said. Job creation According to the Deputy Minister, promoting TVET formed part of the governments agenda of Ghana beyond aid and believed that the products from these TVET institutions would constitute the manpower for the countrys industrialisation agenda. She said with the kind of equipment at the TVET secondary schools in the country, products from the second cycle institutions could be self-employed and even employ others with their skills. She said the objective was to equip TVET students with the technical and entrepreneurial skills that could make them self-employed and thereby reducing the rate of employment in the country. Impression Mrs Twum-Ampofo was impressed with the effort of the management of the Akenten Appiah-Menka University of Skills Training and Entrepreneurial Development (AAMUSTED) to increase the number of TVET students and also expand the existing infrastructure to accommodate more students. She was, particularly, impressed with the well-equipped workshops at the university which, she said, showed the readiness of the university to train the teachers for the TVET schools. Visit Led by its chairman, Mr Kwabena Amankwah Asiamah, the committee visited AAMUSTED, Kwadaso Methodist Technical Institute, Kumasi Technical Institute and the Kumasi Technical University where the members were taken round the facilities of the schools. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The Minister of Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, has charged the media in the post-crisis recovery era, to be partners in complementing governments efforts to revive the economy from the economic downturn. This, they should do by highlighting the opportunities and amplifying the successes of the government and businesses. He said there was the need to re-engineer an economic recovery across Africa at a time when media penetration was deepest, which meant that the impact of the media to either spur that process or derail it could not be discounted. Graphic Business-Stanbic Breakfast Mr Oppong Nkrumah was delivering the keynote address at the Graphic Business/Stanbic Bank breakfast meeting at the Labadi Beach Hotel in Accra yesterday. The meeting, held on the theme: Media and marketing communication post-COVID-19: A catalyst for socio-economic resurgence, brought together policy makers, captains of industry, media and communication practitioners and people in academia. It was held as an in-person event, while a link was provided for others to participate virtually. The notable personalities present included the Chairman of the National Media Commission, Mr Yaw Boadu-Ayeboafoh; the President of the Ghana Journalists Association, Mr Roland Affail Monney, representatives of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, Ghana and the Advertisers Association Ghana. Shared responsibility The Information Minister intimated that the government would continue to provide the needed platform, framework and support required for the recovery and expected all stakeholders, including the media, to also play their roles effectively to attract the needed business. We are at the most critical time in the recent economic history of our continent. Therefore, this is the time to rally round the flag and, indeed, rally round the continent-wide effort to recover. This requires a common purpose from policy makers, private sector players and the media. It is the only way to guarantee our common success. On the part of the government, we will continue to provide support for the media industry through fair regulation, capacity enhancement programmes and support to the general economy, which should in turn help the industry. In return, the media should also help project the country to the outside world, he added. Mr Oppong Nkrumah said a lot of literature pointed to the fact that without the media and marketing communication adequately playing the role of positive amplification, the full potential of economic growth and development might not be achieved. That, he said, meant that even in ordinary times, if the country wanted to fully achieve its economic goals and development potential, strong marketing communication and media support was required, noting that in times like this, after a pandemic, it was even more than required. We need to deal with the tendency among some media practitioners who think that our only job is to be a check on the government and the ills of the private sector. We are in this boat together and part of our job is to positively influence society to support the recovery effort, he said. Mr Oppong Nkrumah further noted that if there was ever a time when the country needed to examine the role of the media and marketing communication within the context of unleashing their full economic potential, it was now. We are in extremely extraordinary times, which have caused major economic downturns, and with poverty levels already high, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, the need to recover now and quickly is high. The pace of recovery and the extent of recovery are determined by many factors, including the interaction between the efforts of the government and the media, he stressed. Rallying public The Information Minister said evidence suggested that a strong rallying of the public around the recovery efforts of a country made a huge impact on the success story. For any set of interventions to be successful, it must gain the goodwill and the support of the people. And the people will only support these recovery policies if they understand them well through a credible media, he noted. He said that meant that policy makers must also adopt broad-based, proactive, robust and repetitive marketing communication strategies to get everybody on board. Adherence to ethics Also speaking at the breakfast meeting, a digital marketing and communication expert, Mr Stephen Boadi, commended the media for their role in educating and informing the public at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. They sometimes did this at the risk of even losing revenue, and that must be commended, he said. Mr Boadi said there were, however, some disruptions by some digital media outlets which used their platforms to publish fake and false information. Because we are in a digital world, everybody is a publisher, and its easy to put out content. So we had people publishing all sorts of junk content that disrupted what was going on, he said. He advised the mainstream media to insist on adherence to the ethics of the profession and not fall for the pressure from social media. The trend is that people are going to social media to find news and discover brands, but we will always go back to traditional media to validate what we see on social media, he said. The Managing Director of the Graphic Communications Group Limited, Mr Ato Afful, in his welcome address, said the media and marketing communication industry had also experienced its fair share of the pandemic. He noted that at the height of the first wave and the post-lockdown period, newspaper sales dwindled, while advertising and sponsorship revenue also plummeted. He said there was, therefore, the need for quick economic recovery, saying the media had a clear responsibility and mandate to help restore hope and confidence in Africa and its people. Platform for critical deliberation The Managing Director of Stanbic Bank Ghana, Mr Kwamina Asomaning, noted that the breakfast meeting had become a platform for critical deliberation on issues that bordered on national development. He said that was in line with the banks quest to drive growth in Ghana, adding that the bank was proud of what the platform had become. Mr Asomaning acknowledged the media as one of the most powerful pillars in society, for which reason the country should harness their power for economic growth. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Ghana is systematically rising to become an influential player in the affairs of the global community, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has said. We do want, and we shall work, to take Ghana to where she deserves to be a prosperous and dynamic member of the world community which is neither a victim nor a pawn of the world order, he stated. The President made the declaration in a speech delivered in Dusseldorf, Germany, last Monday as part at the 75th anniversary celebration of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germanys number one industrial region and most populous state. President Akufo-Addo is in Germany for a seven-day state visit at the invitation of the German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Addressing the gathering, which included Chancellor Merkel and the Minister-President for North Rhine-Westphalia, Armin Laschet, President Akufo-Addo said Ghana was determined to participate fully in the global marketplace as an exporter of manufactured goods, not raw materials. Inspiration President Akufo-Addo added that the country was drawing inspiration from the success stories of North Rhine-Westphalia and Germany because, likewise, we want to build a progressive and prosperous country. He said with Germany being a major exporter of industrial products and technology, led by North Rhine-Westphalia, Ghanas relationship with Germany was of utmost importance and must be hinged on that. The recent establishment of a Volkswagen assemblying plant in Accra is a welcome development, and we are encouraged by the fact that more and more German companies have expressed their willingness to set up shop in Ghana, he said. Trade and investment The President said one of Ghanas priority was to increase trade and investment co-operation with Germany because that could develop into economic relations with Germany and the rest of the world, thereby helping put Ghanaian products at the high end of the global value chain. That, he explained, would lead to the creation of jobs for the teeming masses of Ghanaian youth. Transparency and inclusiveness Thirdly, Ghana and Germany must co-operate to ensure the promotion of transparent and inclusive policy and decision-making processes at local, national, regional, continental and global levels. This will include, recognising as key stakeholders, the state to help provide direction and facilitation; the private sector to drive the creation and management of markets, agriculture, industry and decent jobs, and civil society to help ensure accountability within the body politic, he said. President Akufo-Addo reiterated his commitment to renew and deepen relations with Germany, with North Rhine-Westphalia at the centre, for the mutual advantage of the two countries. ECOWAS The President extended the best wishes of the governments and the peoples of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to the people of North Rhine-Westphalia. He also conveyed his deep sympathies on the recent flooding tragedy that befell some parts of Germany. History Recounting the events that had led to the formation of North Rhine-Westphalia in 1946, President Akufo-Addo noted that there were many residents who would have seen for themselves the destruction of their homes and businesses as a result of the Second World War. I am certain many moved on in search of greener pastures elsewhere, and I am equally certain that many more stayed to help in the rebuilding efforts that followed on from 1946. The founding residents of this state will be proud of the transformation that has taken place here since those difficult, dramatic days, he added. He said with North Rhine-Westphalia being Germanys greatest industrial region, and consistently, for several decades, being one of Europe's most important economic centres, these laudable accolades did not happen by chance. It took creativity, determination, enterprise, hard work and innovation, and credit for these goes to successive generations of North Rhine-Westphalians and their leaders, President Akufo-Addo added. Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Executive Director for ASEPA is mad at the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service for their immature way of handling the US$5 million alleged bribery scandal involving the Chief Justice of the Republic of Ghana. Mr. Mensah Thompson expressed his disappointment in an interview with NEAT FMs morning show Ghana Montie. He claimed that the CID department did nothing after his firm petitioned them to thoroughly investigate the wild allegation. We are very disappointed in this process, he said adding that, this will not help Ghanas democracy. Mr. Mensah Thompson further questioned that, Why cant the CID investigate the Chief Justice just like any other person? Lawyer Kwasi Afrifa who is now facing a 9-count charge leveled against him by the General Legal Council accused Chief Justice Kwasi Anin-Yeboah of taking bribe in his line of work. Listen to interview below Source: King Edward Ambrose Washman Addo/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) has begun engaging insurance companies in the country to develop packages to help mitigate the impact of disasters on traders, small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The Chief Executive of the AMA, Mr. Mohammed Adjei Sowah, said the move, which forms part of an integrated disaster risk management approach, seeks to provide economic resilience for traders affected by disasters, particularly in markets and commercial centres, across the metropolis. The impact of flooding in Accra affects the economy and livelihood of people, and mostly, the insurance companies hardly reach out to the informal sector, especially SMEs. So we are working with some insurance companies to understand the risk involved in working with the informal sector players and be able to embrace them in the whole gamut of insurance packages, Mr. Sowah said. He was speaking at a forum to share knowledge on an integrated flood risk management. The project on risk management approaches for climate and health risks was implemented by the German agency for international cooperation and development (GIZ). Impact Mr. Sowah said over the past years, the metropolis had experienced fires and seen several floods which had negative impact on the people living in the capital. He observed that over the years, local authorities did not have the financial wherewithal to address challenges faced after disasters, hence the need for more proactive approaches among local authorities and their National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) units. Government through NADMO is activated in such emergencies with a concentration on emergency relief efforts and with the resultant hardships, he said. Insurance alliance GIZ formed a strategic alliance with Allianz, a German insurance multinational, and joined forces with BIMA, a digital micro insurance company, forming the Strategic Alliance GIZ, Allianz, BIMA (SAGABI) to commence the pilot of a public-private-partnership (PPP). The PPP aims to enable underserved consumers to access simple and affordable mobile-delivered insurance and health services. It is also to increase the overall insurance awareness and health literacy. The Country Director of GIZ Ghana, Mrs. Regina Bauerochse Barbosa, said flooding in the capital had become an occurrence with consequences that affected mostly the urban poor. She said it had, therefore, become critical to design strategies to address disasters and manage them properly. This is why GIZ, through the SAGABI project, partnered with Allianz SE to develop a holistic approach, including the possibility of risk transfer solutions. She further called on the implementing stakeholders, particularly the piloting municipalities, to continue to collaborate to provide sustainable living for the citizens. SAGABI The pilot, which ended yesterday, was implemented in the AMA, the Ga West and Ga East municipalities. At yesterdays forum, the representatives shared their experiences, lessons and best practices during the implementation of the project. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The Police Administration has issued a stern warning to fraudsters who target job seekers to stay off its upcoming recruitment process. "Any fraudster who wants to take advantage of the publication of the Ghana Police Service 2021 recruitment process to swindle people will be dealt with ruthlessly according to the law, the acting Director-General of the Public Affairs Directorate of the Ghana Police Service, Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Mr Kwesi Ofori, said in an interview last Monday. He advised people seeking to join the Ghana Police Service to be vigilant and report any scammer who used illegitimate means and social media platforms in an attempt to swindle unsuspecting people. "The public must be wary of advertisers or persons requesting an upfront fee for processing your applications. A genuine advertiser or employer will not ask you for money. The fraudsters also request for money transfer. Nobody should part with money through any middleman to facilitate his or her recruitment into the Police Service," ACP Mr Ofori said. Middlemen He said the public must also take note of scammers who requested for non-work-related personal information, such as "your appearance or marital status. A recruiter should only need to meet the general requirements specified in the publication". ACP Mr Ofori said the Police Administration had not contracted any middleman for the recruitment process. "Any person who claims to be selling recruitment forms should be ignored. We are not selling any recruitment forms for the process," he cautioned. He urged aspiring recruits to "abide strictly by the instructions stated in the advertisement published in the state media, including the Daily Graphic. The Police Administration, he said, was not using any social media platform for the recruitment Professionals The government recently gave clearance for the recruitment of personnel. The Ghana Police Service was cleared to employ about 5,000 people into the service. An advert announcing the police 2021 recruitment indicated that the process would cover general duty recruits, tradesmen, graduates for general duty and professionals. The professionals being sought for include communications and public affairs officers, language specialists, legal officers (lawyers), clinical psychologists, medical specialists, pharmacists, medical doctors, radiologists, sonographers, certified registered anaesthetists, medical laboratory assistants, health informatics and nurses. There are also opportunities for drivers, riders and motor vehicle mechanics under the tradesmen recruits slots. Requirements All applicants are to satisfy general requirements, in addition to some specific requirements for specific categories. The general requirements include being a Ghanaian, of good character, without criminal records, not having been dismissed from any public service or any other employment, be at least 173 centimetres tall for males and 163 centimetres for women and be physically and medically fit by Ghana Police Service standards. Scams A number of people have fallen for fraudulent characters and parted with huge sums of money in order to be enlisted into the Ghana Police Service. In March 2015, the service was hit with a scandal. Hundreds of people turned up at five police training depots for enlistment into the service but they were disappointed. They found that their recruitment letters were fake, and that the purported enlistment was a scam. The victims were said to have paid money ranging from GH2,000 to GH3,500 to the fraudster. In June 2015, another scam concerning recruitment into the Police Service duped about 500 people. In March 2016, the Eastern Regional Police Command alerted the public to an online recruitment scam and vowed to do everything to track down those behind it. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The Board Chairman of the Graphic Communications Group Limited, Professor Kwame Karikari, has called for the building of institutional capacity of public service media for better delivery. He said in recent times the private media had been performing well with regard to national events and, therefore, the focus must be on building the public service media. Our commercial media are doing very well with public journalism; we need to focus on and build the institutional capacity of public service media, the chairman added. Professor Karikari, made the call at the Graphic Business/Stanbic Bank breakfast meeting in Accra yesterday on the theme: Media and marketing communication post-COVID-19: A catalyst for socio-economic resurgence. The chairman further said in the midst of commercial and private media, it was necessary to support the public service media more through capacity building. We need to build, support and give them a better direction because they are the ones which are obliged to perform certain roles that we may not expect commercial media to perform, he added. Private media A digital marketing and communications expert, Mr Stephen N. Boadi, also called for support for private media organisations to enable them to contribute to public service journalism. He said for Ghana to quickly recover from the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, public service journalism would be significant to rally people to support government policies and interventions. Mr Boadi, however, said public service media organisations could not do it alone, hence the need for the support. The Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) alone cannot do everything you expect the public service media to do, so we need to enable the private media, as partners, to also come on board, he added. Mr Boadi said the support could be in the form of capacity building, adding: The private media dont exist as a charity and so lets give them enough reason to do public service media journalism. Mr Boadi said it was also necessary to provide the media with the needed infrastructure to be able to go about their work diligently. He further suggested that the National Communications Authority could facilitate the provision of reliable internet services for the media to enable them to broadcast efficiently from all parts of the country. He dismissed the assertion that the traditional media were phasing out, saying those who integrated their activities with digital media would continue to remain relevant. It is also about the value you are giving to people. If we refuse to grow and dont adapt to new trends, we will die. So it depends on how the traditional media embrace technology to give more value to customers, he added. Resetting the media The Chief Executive Officer of ABN Holdings Limited, Mr George Twumasi, said the COVID-19 pandemic presented a good opportunity for a resetting of the media industry. He said the pandemic had made everyone aware of the reality of a new digital eco-system, which the media in Africa could leverage. Our digital eco-system in Africa, according to Google, maybe around $180 billion by 2025 and $712 billion by 2050. This presents a huge opportunity to reset and make the digital economy a very powerful income generator for the country and drive the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement. If we get our act right, this country can be the digital leader of Africa, Mr Twumasi added. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The National Democratic Congress (NDC) has said its proposals for electoral reforms are intended to be used to undertake a dispassionate and open discussions towards a review of the electoral process. They are aimed at contributing to a national conversation on electoral reforms against the background of critical and lingering cross-party dissatisfaction with the electoral process, Nana Ato Dadzie, the Chairman of a technical committee of the party that researched and drafted the reforms, said. The reform proposals had been segregated into parts A and B with part A requiring action by the Executive arm of the state while part B contains reform proposals requiring action by the Electoral Commission (EC). Speaking at a news conference in Accra today ( Tuesday), he asked the government to initiate the necessary steps to operationalise the partys recommendations for electoral reforms ahead of the 2024 general election. Giving details of the proposals, Nana Dadzie, a former Chief of Staff in the Rawlings administration and an elder of the party, said the part A consisted of 10 recommendations of which the party considered three as its flagship recommendations. Recommendations The first of the three-flagship recommendations is that the members of the EC should be appointed by the President in consultation with the Council of State and with the prior approval of Parliament, provided that the Chairperson shall be approved by two-thirds of all the Members of Parliament. We draw attention to a similar independent institution of the Constitution, the Supreme Court, whose members are similarly appointed on the advice of the Judicial Council or in consultation with the Council of State as appropriate but in all cases with the prior approval of Parliament. We noted that the Constitutional Review Commission (CRC) of which Mrs. Jean Mensa, the current Chairperson of the EC was a member, made exactly the same recommendation in its report dated December 20, 2011 and the government white paper accepted the recommendation, he said. Nana Dadzie, who was flanked by other members of the technical committee, including Professor Kwamena Ahwoi, Mr. Kofi Attor and Mr. Alex Segbefia, said the second proposal was for the Inter-Party Advisory Committee (IPAC) to be backed by legislation and that its composition and functions be clearly spelt out in the legislation. We draw attention to a similar independent body in the Constitution, the Judiciary, whose Judicial Council also has its composition and functions spelt out both in the Constitution and in legislation, he said. Part B recommendation The second part of the recommendations, (Part B) captured 24 reform proposals out of which the NDC considered nine as its flagship recommendations. They included the implementation of the continuous registration of voters which had already been approved by IPAC and accepted by the EC. Nana Dadzie mentioned the other proposals to include the abolishment of the Regional Collation Centres, maintaining the voting period of 7a.m to 5 p.m and allowing a public broadcast of the presidential vote collation process at the EC Head Office as and when the constituency presidential results are received and certified. Not new Nana Dadzie explained that the proposal of reforms was not a new development but rather a practice that had long existed. All previous ECs have been subjected to intense attack from the political parties over the period, he said. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament for Bosomtwe, Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum, has indicated that the NPPs agenda of breaking the eight-year election cycle is attainable but requires hard work by all members and supporters of the party. He, therefore, charged all supporters and the leadership of the party to unite, put behind their differences and strategise well to come out with the best policies and innovative initiatives that could improve the lives of all Ghanaians. Delegate's conference Dr Adutwum stated this when he addressed his constituents at Kuntanase and Feyiase in the Bosomtwe Constituency last Saturday during the constituencys annual delegates conference. In attendance were about 800 delegates of the party from the constituency. Also present at the conference were the District Chief Executive for Bosomtwe, Mr Joseph K. Assumin; the Constituency Chairman, Mr Aikens Addai-Poku, and a representative from the regional secretariat of the party, Mr I K. Acheampong, who is also the Regional Director of the party in charge of research, among others. Hard work Dr Adutwum, who is also the Minister of Education, said there was the need for all members to put their differences behind them and adopt prudent measures that would improve upon the standard of living of the people as well as attract massive votes that would help the party to win the 2024 election. "Yes the party has delivered its campaign promises to show but that does not mean that we should go to sleep but we should redouble our effort to sustain the gains made so far and beyond," he stated. The minister indicated that, "If we are to succeed in the next election, then we should avoid complacency since it could affect our performance for the upcoming election which is very crucial for the sustainability of the gains made despite the COVID-19 pandemic". Commendation The MP lauded members of the party for their hard work which led to the feat chalked up during the 2020 election. In a statement, Mr Assumin was full of praise for the members of the party in the constituency for their dedication leading to the party's massive victory during the 2020 general election . He assured the delegates that the assembly would continue to provide the critical infrastructural needs to improve the lives of the people, irrespective of location, religion or political affiliation. For his part, Mr Addai-Poku said the party recorded an increase in votes from 82 per cent in 2016 to 85 per cent, describing it as an amazing performance and also lauded the supporters of the party in the constituency for their hard work. He stated that everything possible would be done by the leadership of the party to ensure that it would continue to maintain the parliamentary seat as well as increase its presidential votes in the 2024 election. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The General Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party, John Boadu, has appealed to members of the party and the general public to exercise patience as the list of MMDCEs will soon be released. In a one-on-one interview with Omanhene Kwabena Asante on Adom TVs Badwam Show, the General Secretary assured Ghanaians who have been asking about the list of MMDCEs to expect it after the return of the President from his Germany trip. The list of MMDCEs will be released within a week after President Akufo-Addos return from his Germany trip. I can tell you that it will not take more than a week for the list to be released after his return on August 28, 2021 Mr Boadu indicated. He also intimidated that but for him, MMDCEs should have been elected by the electorate as the President had wanted but for the last minute betrayal of the opposition NDC. Many Ghanaians have been asking questions about the delay in the release of the MMDCEs by the President. Mr. John Boadu, by this statement, puts the anxieties of the general public to rest with this assurance that the President, within a week after his return home, will have the list announced. Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Bernard Allotey Jacobs has fired shots at the various Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in the country over their modus operandi and behaviour. Allotey Jacobs believed the CSOs have been left off the hook for far too long and it's about time to put a leash on them. As a result, he is calling on the intelligence agencies to investigate the CSOs' sources of sponsorship that empowers them to unjustifiably level allegations against government officials. His comments follow a bribery allegation against the Chief Justice, Kwasi Anin-Yeboah. The Chief Justice has been accused by a private legal practitioner, Kwasi Afrifa that he had demanded a $5 million bribe to deliver a favourable judgment in a case involving his client. A Civil Soceity Organization, Alliance for Social Equity and Public Accountability (ASEPA), petitioned President Nana Akufo-Addo to remove the Chief Justice from office citing the bribery allegaion. Justice Kwasi Anin-Yeboah has however denied the allegation and reported to the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service to investigate the matter. Acting on investigations by the Council of State into the allegation, the President, after studying the report, threw out the petition saying it is "devoid of any basis warranting the setting up of a committee under Article 146 (6) to undertake the very serious business of removing a Chief Justice from office. " . . the Supreme Court in interpreting article 146 (6) had in mind unmeritorious and unwarranted petitions such as the instant one. The petition is dismissed accordingly, he stressed in a statement dated August 20, 2021. Allotey Jacobs, discussing the issue, also expressed worry that the CSOs, without a just cause, accuse persons of being corrupt. "You look at a situation just because he has presided over a case that concerns elections, the man has become an enemy to some people. So, you come out to say something freely just like that and then you have a whole team of people supporting you; go ahead, then you have one of the CSOs," he snapped. "Look, intelligence need to find out who are sponsoring these people. Oh yes, it's important! Because when some of these CSOs come out and you don't see exactly what they are about but just purposely to attack government on any issue, then there is something behind," he further asserted on Peace FM's ''Kokrokoo''. Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The General Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), John Boadu, has described as laughable former President John Dramani Mahamas recent corruption comment. John Boadu told NEAT FMs morning show Ghana Montie that Mr. Mahamas claims that the NPP will continue to loot if maintained in office beyond 2024 make no sense' when he did little to fight the canker during his tenure. So, is he [John Mahama] telling us that you always have to steal when in power, or he steals or some of his appointees stole and he is thinking everyone else will steal? he questioned. According to the former NDC flagbearer, keeping the NPP in office beyond 2024 means allowing them to keep all the booty they have looted from the national coffers. The NPP have no intention of fighting corruption and, so, the only way they can be made to account to the people of Ghana is for them to leave office so that the new government will come and audit them and show where they have gone wrong, Mr. Mahama said during his 'Thank You' tour of the Upper West Region, warning: Otherwise, all the money they have stolen, they will just walk away with it. If you participate in politics or are a participant in public service, one of the first things you must be willing to do is to be accountable to the people." The only way they could be accountable is for them to leave office so that the people of Ghana can ask them questions and audit them to make sure they account for the period they were in office, Mr Mahama told a crowd during his tour. But, Mr John Boadu maintained that the former president is not fit to talk about corruption. " If you believe someone in govenment has done something against the law, you are a former number one gentleman of this land, you don't just talk about it, you take steps to make sure the person is dealt with by the law . . ." he said. "If he has basis for his comment he would bring it," he said. Watch video below Source: King Edward Ambrose Washman Addo/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Mame Yaa Aboagye, Deputy Communications Director of the NPP, has hit back at the National Democratic Congress (NDC) for saying they accepted the election petition verdict to save Ghana. The General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Johnson Asiedu Nketia says the party accepted the Supreme Court verdict of the 2020 election petition not because justice was served but rather to protect Ghanas democracy. It will be recalled that Mr. Mahama and the NDC rejected the 2020 results announced by the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission Jean Mensa which saw the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Presidential candidate, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo emerge winner. The former President also refused to acknowledge and congratulate President Akufo-Addo. According to Mame Yaa, NDC accepted the verdict because there was not enough evidence to support their case. After deceiving your supporters that you had evidence of your phantom victory, you could not even collate your election results. Indeed, people died because of your reckless statements after polls. Thankfully, the election petition exposed the lies and deceit of the NDC. Tell your Presidential candidate to congratulate Nana Addo if he really has Ghana at heart. She again chided the NDC for their hypocrisy, When the NDC party wins an election, the people have decided; but when they lose, the EC has rigged the election. She stressed that Ghana was already saved by President Nana Akufo-Addo from Mahamas economic crises such as dumsor, Isofoton, GEEDA and so forth. Ghana is working again under the leadership of President Akufo-Addo. Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Chief Executive Officer (CEO) & President of Inside LLC, New Jerseys premier full-service business management and consulting company, Mr Nana Gyimah has announced the second edition of his mega Ghana to the World: New Era Concert this October 2021. The maiden edition which happened in 2019 was massively sold-out with billed artistes such as R2Bees, Efya, Darko Vibes, and King Promise among other musicians who thrilled patrons at the star-studded concert that took place at the Times Square, Playstation Theater. In 2020, the show was postponed due to the emergence of the global pandemic, but now fans can breathe life into the city after a year-and-half of waiting on the biggest concert which holds the largest concentration of people from the African diaspora. Mr Nana Gyimah, who is poised to bridge the gap between Africa and United States, says the 2021 concert happening in October in New York City will help spread diversity and culture through art and music. The worlds top Afrobeat/African talent billed for the mega concert are Kidi, Ova Wise, Yaw Tog, and Kweku Smoke. The list continues with Wendy Shay, and the new generation Asakaa Boys thus Jay Bahd, OKenneth, KawaBanga, City Boy, and many surprise acts to entertain the mammoth crowd. In an interview with the CEO Mr Gyimah on why he is keen on this years event, he said: We knew the people of New York were dying for more Afrobeat events on a much larger scale. That's why for Inside, LLC Presents: Ghana to the World: The New Era Concert 2021, we knew we had to kick it up a notch to host a much larger audience and feature some of the worlds top Afrobeat/African talent. We are thrilled to announce our second ever concert in New York City come this Oct 2021 at Terminal 5. Ghana to the World: New Era Concert is held annually in the United States of America (USA) and its heavily-attended by people from the diaspora. As Afrobeats rises up the ladder in the music sphere, the music concert is apt to stay and continue to entertain patrons abroad who want to have a feel at home. The New Era Concert goes beyond a normal musical show with patrons feeling the synergy as family members rooted under the umbrella of African music. Check out the recap of the 2019 edition below: https://youtu.be/4lQGffBMhow Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Popular Ghanaian sex worker, Queen Farcadi has explained why she bleached her skin. In an interview with DW TV, she revealed that she bleached to get attention and to fit into the group men want. Farcadi added that after she bleached her skin, men began to give her attention as well as other good deals for modeling roles. Watch the video below... View this post on Instagram A post shared by Amoaning Samuel (@e.ntamoty) Deutsche Welle or DW is a German public state-owned international broadcaster funded by the German federal tax budget. The service is available in 30 languages. DW's satellite television service consists of channels in English, German, Urdu, Hindi, Spanish, Bengali, and Arabic. Headquarters: Bonn, Germany Source: LIB Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The Martin Mars Hawaii owned by the Coulson Group of Companies drops its massive load in this undated file photo. Chief executive Wayne Coulson believes the plane would have "a huge effect" on fires like the one burning near Ladysmith. Logansport, IN (46947) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Thank you for reading the Philadelphia Tribune. You have exhausted your free article views for this month. Please press the "subscribe" button below and see our introductory price of $0.25 per week for 13 weeks. Otherwise, we look forward to seeing you next month. Niklas Astedt Wins His Third Super MILLION$ Title August 26, 2021 Matthew Pitt Niklas Astedt came back from sixth place to become the GGPoker Super MILLION$ champion for the third time in what is a long and illustrious career. Astedt won the Super MILLION$ on April 13, again on May 18, and completed his hat trick on August 24. The Champions Club member joins Michael Addamo (4) as the only player to have won the tournament more than three times. Super MILLION$ Season 2 Episode 9 Final Table Results Place Player Country Prize 1 Niklas Astedt Norway $337,599 2 Benjamin Rolle Austria $267,520 3 Kahle Burns New Zealand $211,988 4 Eelis Parssinen Finland $167,983 5 Rodrigo Selouan Brazil $133,113 6 Neel "Neel" Joshi India $105,482 7 oldfishing Macau $83,585 8 Dario Sammartino Austria $66,235 9 Mike Watson Canada $52,486 *countries as displayed in the GGPoker client The very first hand of the final tables action resulted in the tournament losing a play. Mike Watson raised to 88,000 at the 20,000/40,000/5,000a level, doing so from the cutoff with ace-queen. Neel "Neel" Joshi called on the button with pocket sixes, only for Astedt to squeeze to 332,500 with a pair of kings in the hole. Watson responded with a four-bet shove worth 1,052,824 in total. Joshi ducked out of the way, but Astedt called. Astedts kings held, and Watson crashed out in ninth place. Former WSOP Main Event runner-up Dario Sammartino never managed to get going, and he became the eighth-place finisher during the 35,000/70,000/8,500a level. Sammartino open-shoved with king-deuce from the small blind for only 551,908, and Benjamin Rolle called from the big blind with the dominating king-jack. Both players turned a king, but Sammartino still busted. Blinds had only just increased to 40,000/80,000/10,000a when Eelis Parssinen found aces in the small blind, and raised to 200,000. "oldfishing" defended his big blind with a call holding jack-eight of diamonds. The queen-high flop gifted oldfishing an eight in addition to a diamond flush draw, and the writing was on the wall for the player from Macau. Parssinen led for 120,000 before calling his opponents 1,016,010 shove. A jack on the turn put the ball firmly in oldfishings court, but a three on the river improved Parssinen to a better two pair. U.S. Player Bags 2021 WSOP Main Event Seat Via ClubGG Francisco Estrada is the latest player to win a 2021 WSOP Main Event seat via the ClubGG app. Read the incredible story of Francisco Estrada Indian grinder Joshi was the next player heading for the exits. The action folded to Joshi in the cutoff, and he made it 900,000 to go at the 60,000/120,000/15,000a level, which left him 592,854 chips behind. Astedt found aces on the button and he three-bet to 2,280,000. Astedts raise folded out the blinds, but Joshi looked him up with king-jack. The aces held and Joshi busted out. Brazils Rodrigo Selouan joined the list of busted players after a clash with Rolle did not go to plan. Rolle raised to 240,000 on the button with ace-ten, and Selouan called with suited queen-four. Rolle paired his ten, and the short-stack Selouan paired his four. Selouan checked, Rolle made a 120,000 continuation-bet before calling Selouans 555,718 all-in check-raise. No help arrived on the turn nor river for Selouan, and he headed to the cashiers desk to collect fifth-place money. Four-handed play did not last very long because Parsinnen lost out to the seemingly unstoppable Astedt. A min-raise to 240,000 from Astedt, was three-bet all-in by Parssinen on the button, and Astedt called that 1,756,206 shove. Astedt revealed pocket sixes, Parssinen ace-five of clubs, and the five community cards ran kind for Astedt. Parssinen flopped an ace, but the board four flushed with spades, Astedt holding the six of spades. Samuel Vousden Wins His First WSOP Gold Bracelet Start-of-the-day chip leader Kahle Burns busted in third to send the tournament heads-up. Burns exit hand started with him limping in for 160,000 from the small blind with nine-sevn, and Rolle checking in the big blind with suited nine-six. Both players paired their six on the king-high flop, Burns betting 160,000 and getting called. Both players proceeded to check the ten on the turn, before a nine peeled off on the river. Burns bet 462,000 into the 700,000 pot, Rolle responded with shove, putting Burns to the test for the 1,413,036 chip he had behind. Burns did not believe Rolles story, and called. Game over for Burns. Rolle held a 9,807,174 to 7,292,826 chip lead as a result of that hand, an amazing turnaround of fortunes considering he sat down at the final table as the shortest stack with 24.2 big blinds. It took more than a half-hour of intense one-on-one action for the champion to be crowned. The final hand saw Rolle rip it in with nine-six of diamonds for only 7.5 big blinds, and Astedt call with king-eight. Rolle flopped a gutshot straight in addition to a flush draw, but it proved to be a case of him having too many outs because the turn and river bricked, and Astedt won the pot and the tournament with king-high. It took around six and a half hours for Audrius "Stakelis24" Stakelis to take his start-of-day chip lead and collect all the chips in WCOOP-14-M: $1,050 NLHE [8-Max, Super Tuesday SE] with it, but he didn't have an easy run of it. He had to battle through 81 players who returned on Day 2, out of the original 1,071 entries, with most of the $1.071 million prize pool still in play. The WCOOP title adds to an already strong resume of online wins for Stakelis that includes a SCOOP title from 2020 worth $73,674. Before today's win, he had more than $150,000 in 1st place results since 2019 online, so this prize of $174,896 just adds to an already strong last few years. His run looked like it might be cut short in early action. He came into the day as the chip leader, but that quickly changed after he lost some to Jerry "Perrymejsen" Odeen in the very first hand of the day, then lost another big one a few minutes later to drop to about half his start stack after "aminolast" cracked his queens with ten-nine suited. He managed to survive both those players however, making it to the final table 5th in chips. He hung around with solid play while watching Harry "Iamapoopie" Lodge run roughshod over the final table, amassing a huge stack. Lodge had a couple chances to win it during the heads up stage, but in the end lost a huge pot with the worst ace on an ace-high board and couldn't recover. Stakelis took it down a few hands later with ace-seven over king-jack. WCOOP 14-M Final Table Results Place Name Country Prize 1 Audrius "Stakelis24" Stakelis Lithuania $174,896 2 Harry "Iamapoopie" Lodge United Kingdom $126,236 3 "I am Budhha" Netherlands $91,114 4 Will "hellzito" Arruda Brazil $65,764 5 "Sajanas23" Lithuania $47,467 6 "Spotzilla666" Poland $34,260 7 "Alik_Z1" Russia $24,728 8 Victor "victorbco" Hugo Brazil $17,848 9 Ramon "PESCANCO" Sfalsin Brazil $14,251 That brings coverage of WCOOP-14-M: $1,050 NLHE [8-Max, Super Tuesday SE] to a close, but there's much more WCOOP coverage to come from PokerNews. We'll be covering events throughout the series, so check the schedule at the PokerStars WCOOP 2021 Hub to plan the action you need to catch. Adult film star Ron Jeremy has been indicted on more than 30 counts of sexual assault. The 68-year-old comedian, filmmaker, and adult film actor whose real name is Ronald Jeremy Hyatt was indicted on the counts following allegations made by more than 20 women over the past two decades. According to the Los Angeles Country District Attorney's Office, Ron faces a dozen counts of forcible rape, seven counts of forcible oral copulation, six counts of sexual battery by restraint, four counts of sexual penetration by a foreign object and two counts of sexual penetration of an unconscious or asleep person. The actor also faces one count of committing a lewd act on a minor, stemming from an accusation he sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl at a party in Santa Clarita, California, in June 2004. Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon said in a statement: "Far too often, survivors of sexual assault suffer in isolation. We must ensure that survivors have all options available to help with recovery, including trauma-informed services for healing and support to report such crimes." Ron has entered a plea of not guilty to all charges. Meanwhile, Ron was previously charged in 2020 with raping three women and sexually assaulting another in relation to separate incidents. The charges included an accusation of rape made by a 25-year-old woman, who claims she was raped at a home in West Hollywood in May 2014, as well as two separate instances involving the alleged sexual assault of women ages 33 and 46, which took place at a West Hollywood bar in 2007. Ron was also accused of forcibly raping a 30-year-old woman at the same bar in July 2019. The actor is due back in court for his 30 charges on October 12. On August 19, the Russian state news agency TASS reported on comments made by the Secretary of Russias Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, who claimed Ukraine would be the next Afghanistan if the U.S. and NATO were to abandon its defense. "Did the fact that Afghanistan having the status of a main U.S. ally outside of NATO save the ousted pro-American regime in Kabul? Patrushev asked. A similar situation awaits those who are banking on America in Ukraine, where neo-Nazis are capable of taking power. The country is going to disintegrate, and the White House at a certain moment wont even remember its supporters in Kyiv." Patrushevs comparison is both speculative and false. In fact, the two countries and their relationship to the United States could hardly be more different. Unlike the post-2001 Afghan government, Ukraines government established and achieved independence itself in 1991 as a flawed but functioning democracy. Since then, Ukraine has had multiple contested elections and six different presidents. Ukraine had been peaceful up until 2014, when Russia invaded and annexed part of the country, the Crimean peninsula. Afghanistan has been in a near-continuous state of war involving parties inside and out (Russia among them), dating to the late 1970s. Also, unlike Afghanistan, Ukraine possesses a large, modern domestic defense industry, manufacturing everything from small arms and anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs) to helicopters, fixed-wing aircraft, and long-range cruise missiles. Not only does Ukraine manufacture its own arms and military equipment, but it also is an arms exporter. Although the U.S. has provided some military aid to Ukraine since 2014, and the country also has purchased U.S. weapons, most of its arms and equipment are made at home. Another glaring difference is the Afghan governments reliance on U.S. and NATO troops for security over the past two decades, up until the ongoing U.S. pullout. In 2010, the U.S. military contingent reached its peak of approximately 100,000 troops in the country, not including military personnel from other countries. Even after most U.S. and allied troops left, the Afghan military depended on thousands of private contractors to handle various logistical and technical tasks. The Afghan Air Force depended heavily on foreign contractors to stay operational. Ukraine does not have such dependencies. The country carried out military exercises with NATO member states before the Crimean annexation in 2014. Since then, the only foreign military presence in Ukraine consists of observers and smaller military units conducting joint training exercises. No U.S. or other NATO military personnel have ever taken part in the Donbas region, where Russian-backed separatists are fighting Ukraine. Nor have any NATO military units been permanently based or deployed in Ukraine for the purpose of participating in the war or defending against further Russian aggression. In recent weeks, the world watched Afghans government military practically melt away in the face of the Talibans offensive in anticipation of permanent U.S. troop withdrawals this month. Mass surrenders and desertions took place. One of the major reasons was soldiers and other security personnel not being paid. By comparison, Ukraines military personnel have seen a series of pay raises since 2014. Ukraine has shown no signs of dissolution, as Patrushev claimed. Territories in Donbas retaken by Kyiv-loyal forces in the summer of 2014 have not experienced any kind of organized insurgent activity. As for Patrushevs claims of neo-Nazis coming to power, this has been a common theme of Russian disinformation since 2014. Polls and elections have shown that Ukraines far-right has had dismal support since the 2014 Euromaidan revolution that ousted former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. Despite the street presence of certain far-right groups, there is no evidence they have broadening support or building any ability to come to power. Furthermore, some prominent figures in the Ukrainian far-right are suspected of ties to Russian intelligence. This is again in stark contrast to the Taliban, an insurgent movement that had the backing of Pakistan and had all but won control of Afghanistan by the end of the 1990s. On August 24, Ukraine celebrated 30 years of independence with a military parade in Kyiv. Fourteenth Circuit Solicitor Duffie Stone has stepped aside from the investigation into the June killings of two members of the prominent Murdaugh family, citing new developments in the case. Stone notified Attorney General Alan Wilson of his decision in an Aug. 11 letter, saying he was recusing himself from prosecuting cases arising from the State Law Enforcement Division's probe of the June 7 killings of 21-year-old Paul Murdaugh and his mother Maggie, 52. The two were shot to death at the family's hunting compound along the Colleton and Hampton county lines in a case that has sparked international interest. "Citing the events of today in SLED's investigation of the homicides of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh, I am asking that you assume all prosecutorial functions in this matter immediately," Stone wrote, signaling a potential conflict for his office to proceed further. Robert Kittle, a spokesman for the attorney general, confirmed Stone's exit from the case but declined further comment. Reached on Aug. 25, Stone declined to elaborate on his decision or what transpired on Aug. 11 to cause him to step away from the case. He previously indicated that he had been consulting a legal ethics expert about his involvement in the case, given the Murdaugh family's ties to his office. Alex Murdaugh, Maggies husband and Pauls father, works part time for the 14th Circuit Solicitors Office, which was once run by his father, grandfather and great-grandfather. After retiring from public office, his father, former solicitor Randolph Murdaugh III, continued to work as a prosecutorial consultant, according to his biography on the law firms website. The elder Murdaugh died on June 10; his death was not related to the shooting. Stone initially drew criticism from some quarters for involving himself in the case, given the Murdaugh family's ties to his office. By comparison, when Paul Murdaugh was involved in a fatal boating accident in February 2019, records indicate that Stones office notified the attorney general of its conflict the next day. It sent a letter disclosing the conflict even before search teams located the body of the 19-year-old woman who died in the crash, and weeks before Paul was formally charged with a crime in the case. At the time of the June 7 shootings, he was facing one count of boating under the influence causing death and two counts of boating under the influence causing great bodily injury. Wilson's office was prosecuting that case. Stone drew clear distinctions between the two cases in a statement issued in late June. He recused himself from the boat crash case, he said, after it became immediately apparent Paul Murdaugh would be a suspect Paul's father owned the boat in which the crash occurred, and other passengers were related to employees in Stone's office. Different circumstances existed in the case involving the killings, Stone said. "To my knowledge, there is no clear suspect in this case at this time," Stone said on June 21. "As such, speculation about the propriety of my offices involvement is precisely that speculation." An expert in legal ethics came to a similar conclusion at the time, telling The Post and Courier shortly after the killings that the family's connection to the solicitors office didn't cross ethical lines at that point. Without arrests and a clear suspect, the prosecutors role in the case was limited at that point, former University of South Carolina law dean Robert Wilcox told the newspaper at the time. The solicitors office should primarily be working in an advisory role, he said, making sure that law enforcement handles the case constitutionally and avoids missteps that could taint evidence or testimony. But Wilcox cautioned back then that conflicts could arise depending on where the facts lead and what charging decisions prosecutors ultimately face. It remained unclear late Wednesday what new developments had prompted Stone to decide he should no longer preside over the case. Though theories abound, SLED has not named any potential suspects in the June 7 homicides. Stephen Hobbs contributed to this report. WASHINGTON President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett have postponed their White House meeting as Biden focused his attention on dealing with the aftermath of deadly explosions near the Kabul airport that targeted U.S. troops and Afghans seeking to flee their country after the Taliban takeover. Biden and Bennett were scheduled to meet late Thursday morning for their first face-to-face conversation since Bennett became Israel's prime minister in June. The two will instead meet on Friday. "On behalf of the people of Israel, I share our deep sadness over the loss of American lives in Kabul," Bennett said in a statement posted on social media. "Israel stands with the United States in these difficult times, just as America has always stood with us. Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of the United States." Before arriving in Washington, Bennett made clear the top priority of the visit was to persuade Biden not to return to the Iran nuclear deal, arguing Tehran has already advanced in its uranium enrichment, and that sanctions relief would give Iran more resources to back Israel's enemies in the region. The Israeli leader met separately Wednesday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to discuss Iran and other issues. The visit is his first to the U.S. as prime minister. Bennett told his Cabinet before the trip that he would tell the American president "that now is the time to halt the Iranians, to stop this thing" and not to reenter "a nuclear deal that has already expired and is not relevant, even to those who thought it was once relevant." Biden has made clear his desire to find a path to salvage the 2015 landmark pact cultivated by Barack Obama's administration but scuttled in 2018 by Donald Trump's. But U.S. indirect talks with Iran have stalled and Washington continues to maintain crippling sanctions on the country as regional hostilities simmer. Trump's decision to withdraw from Iran's nuclear deal led Tehran to abandon over time every limitation the accord imposed on its nuclear enrichment. The country now enriches a small amount of uranium up to 63 percent, a short step from weapons-grade levels, compared with 3.67 percent under the deal. It also spins far more advanced centrifuges and more of them than were allowed under the accord, worrying nuclear nonproliferation experts even though Tehran insists its program is peaceful. Bennett's Washington visit comes weeks after Ebrahim Raisi was sworn in as Iran's new president. Raisi, 60, a conservative cleric with close ties to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has suggested he'll engage with the U.S. But he also has struck a hard-line stance, ruling out negotiations aimed at limiting Iranian missile development and support for regional militias something the Biden administration wants to address in a new accord. Administration officials acknowledged that Iran's potential "breakout" the time needed to amass enough fissile material for a single nuclear weapon is now down to a matter of months or less. But a senior administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to preview the scheduled talks, said the administration sees the maximum pressure campaign employed by the Trump administration as having emboldened Iran to push ahead with its nuclear program. Bennett is also looking to turn the page from his predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu had a close relationship with Trump after frequently clashing with Obama. Biden, who has met with every Israeli prime minister since Golda Meir, had his own tensions with Netanyahu over the years. During his latest White House campaign, Biden called Netanyahu "counterproductive" and an "extreme right" leader. Biden waited nearly a month after his election before making his first call to Netanyahu, raising concerns in Jerusalem and among some Netanyahu backers in Washington that the two would have a difficult relationship. The president called Bennett just hours after he was sworn in as prime minister in June to offer his congratulations. Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the liberal Jewish advocacy group J Street, said Bennett is intent on building a positive working relationship with the Biden administration. But Ben-Ami, whose group supports a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, noted that the two leaders are out of sync on several issues in addition to Iran. Bennett opposes the creation of a Palestinian state and supports expansion of settlements in the West Bank, which Biden opposes. In an interview with The New York Times ahead of his visit, Bennett declined to comment on whether he would move to block Biden administration plans to reopen a U.S. consulate for Palestinians in Jerusalem. "The warmth that is going to be projected and the good solid working relationship cannot fully mask the fact that the agenda that Prime Minister Bennett comes to Washington with and the agenda that the Biden administration is pursuing on some of the core issues are still almost as different as they could possibly be," Ben-Ami said. Greenville Countys planning commission rejected a subdivision application in Pelzer that would have added 70 houses and a unique shared septic system that some commissioners feared could fail. The rejection on Aug. 25 came after residents, business owners and officials in the community said they did not want the project. They cited traffic and wastewater concerns, as well as issues with access for emergency vehicles. The commission split its vote, 5-3, in deciding against the subdivision proposal. Yury Shtern of AY Holding SC LLC planned to build 70 single family homes on 39 acres on McKelvey Road near Berry Road. Carol Gilley, who owns the Yum Yum Snack Shop on McKelvey Road nearby said she opposed the plan even though it would likely benefit her business. From a business perspective, youd think wed be anxious to add more residents, Gilley said. More people bring more business which brings more profit, right? Well, youd be wrong. We created our cafe to do something good for the community to enhance it, not detract from it. Gilley said the density of the subdivision didnt match the larger rural parcels surrounding it. Choosing quality over quantity will improve Greenville County on the whole, she said. Zac Terry, fire chief of Canebrake Fire Department, which serves the location, said he was concerned about emergency access to the site, especially during afternoon traffic when Fork Shoals Elementary School lets out. Stephanie Clark lives on a 130-acre cattle farm on McKelvey Road and said the developers plan to clear-cut the land would have left wildlife like deer and turkeys with nowhere to go. Commissioner Mark Jones, who lives in the area, said the school traffic, other subdivisions proposed in the area and the upcoming detour and replacement of a bridge on McKelvey Road led him to oppose the project. Im very much concerned about the infrastructure not being there ready to support this, he said. Commissioners also questioned the developers plan to use a community septic system rather than individual septic tanks as wastewater treatment for the subdivision. Stephanie Gates, an engineer with Site Design, said the system was requested by ReWa, the areas wastewater authority, because it would have allowed the subdivision to connect to sewer service if sewer lines are extended to the community in the future. But, she said, ReWa hadnt taken ownership of the septic field or system and it would initially have been owned by the subdivisions homeowners association. Theres still a lot of angst about that system, a lot of unknowns, said Chairman Steve Bichel. Sign up for our Greenville development newsletter. Get all the latest updates on the Upstate real estate market, more openings and closings, exclusive development news and more in your inbox each week. Email Sign Up! Commissioners Bichel, Jones, Cindy Clark, Metz Looper and Jay Rogers opposed the project. John Bailey, Ellis Forest and Milton Shockley voted in favor. Frank Hammond was absent. Magnolia Trail Townhomes The commission approved a plan for a developer to build 77 townhomes and two houses along the Swamp Rabbit Trail just south of the city limits of Travelers Rest. The project would have direct access to the trail and feature private driveways and a dog park. Its entrance would be on Frontage Road near Old Buncombe Road. Hartness Phase 3 The commission also approved 126 houses for the latest phase of the Hartness planned development community on Highway 14 east of Greenville. Hartness, a traditional neighborhood design community, includes a village center with a restaurant, multiple styles and sizes of homes and townhomes, and bicycles paths and walking trails with 180 acres designated as a nature preserve. Antioch Springs and Antioch Creek The subdivisions, located next to each other on a property recently rezoned on Michelin Road, will include a total of 109 houses on 40 acres just south of Michelins Research and Development center. Milton Shockley, a member of the planning commission, is the projects developer. He recused himself from the vote. The commission also approved the Ansel Farms, Heritage Bend and Ambaura Reserve subdivisions. Ansel Farms will have 33 houses on 34 acres off Ansel School Road in Greer. Heritage Bend will have 21 houses on 28 acres off Highway 81 next to Zion Hill Baptist Church and bordered by the Saluda River. Ambaura Reserve will have 15 lots on 29 acres off Jug Factory Road in Greer. Commission recommends denial of Berea townhome rezoning The planning commission, in a split 4-4 vote, recommended denial of a rezoning request by developer Ronald White for a townhome project in Berea. White wants to rezone 14 acres on West Parker Road to a flexible review district in order to build 117 townhouses near the central business core of Berea. Commissioners took issue with the proposed density of units, proposed at 11 per acre of developable land, in an area where the Berea Area Community Plan calls for four units per acre and the countys comprehensive plan denotes four to eight units per acre. The rezoning could still go before the County Council but would require eight votes to pass. GREENVILLE The Greenville County Schools Board of Trustees approved $5.5 million in federal COVID-19 relief funds for three uses during its Aug. 24 board meeting. Millions of the district's Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSER) funds will be redistributed to finance: Extending COVID-19 leave, as previously approved by the board last year, for employees up to 80 hours through Aug. 31, 2022, for documented quarantines, isolation or illness in accordance with the district's sick leave policy; Hiring permanent substitutes at 27 of the district's 94 schools and center; Hiring temporary personnel or contract services for interpretation and recording of COVID-19 test results for students and employees, tracking and analysis of quarantines and isolations, and ESSER funding compliance. This portion of ESSER funds are part of what the board already approved for remedial and support services for the past school year into the summer, Superintendent Burke Royster said. The board approved moving the funds from those services to the ones outlined at the board meeting. Of the $5.5 million, $600,000 will fund the personnel or contract service for virus tracking and ESSER compliance. By adding this position, the district could shorten quarantine periods for its almost 10,000 employees and more than 76,000 students. Currently, the district has adopted a 10-day quarantine for students exposed to COVID-19 and a 7-day quarantine for employees. COVID-19 test interpretation is done for employees internally at this point. The district is "struggling to keep up" with interpreting teacher tests, Royster said. A staff member must have a test done between days five and seven of their quarantine and, if negative, can return to in-person teaching on day eight. The district will look "as quickly as we can," Royster said, for a person or service to hire. Sign up for our Greenville weekly update newsletter. Sign up for weekly roundups of our top stories, news and culture from the Upstate. This newsletter is hand-curated by a member of our Greenville news staff. Email Sign Up! Trustee Angie Mosley thanked Royster for it, saying, other than the possibility of a mask mandate, excessive quarantines were the largest concern of her constituents. $3.8 million will finance COVID leave for employees, a continuation of what the district previously approved. The amount was determined by last year's cost. If a teacher must quarantine but can work from home, it will not count against their 80 hours. If a teacher can't teach due to illness, they will first be charged leave through their 80 hours and not their accrued sick days. If the teacher has to quarantine or isolate for more than 80 hours throughout the school year and they can't work from home, they will then have to use their accrued sick leave. The 27 additional permeant substitute teachers will be placed in schools that don't have one already employed and "had the highest rate of unfilled sub requests last year," Royster said. Those schools had 80 or more days of unfilled substitutes last year. The district estimated $1.1 million would fund this based on the average cost of a substitute. The ESSER Fund was created as a part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. Inside a dimly lit room in the pediatric intensive care unit, Misty Goodwin spends most days and nights by her daughter's bedside. Twelve-year-old Amari was admitted to the Medical University of South Carolina Shawn Jenkins Children's Hospital on Aug. 14. She'd been transferred from Summerville Medical Center already diagnosed with acute COVID-19, already ventilated, no longer able to use her lungs to fight for precious air. Amari should have started seventh grade last week. Instead, she's unconscious, artificially asleep in an induced coma as doctors and nurses in the ICU try to save her life from a variant of the coronavirus that is proving more threatening to children than any other since the pandemic began. "At the end of the day, I'm just ready for my baby to talk again," her mother Misty said. "This is awful." The vast majority of children who contract COVID-19, even if they come down with the delta variant of the virus, will not become very sick. As with most adults, COVID-19 is often akin to a cold. That's what it felt like for Amari when she started feeling ill in early August. Misty gave her some Tylenol on Aug. 5 and sent her to bed. But because the delta variant is considered to be more contagious than previous iterations of the disease on par with the chickenpox, some experts have said children are more likely to catch it. They're also more likely to be unvaccinated. None of the existing coronavirus vaccines are available to kids under the age of 12. And though the Pfizer vaccine has been cleared for use among patients 12 and older, the vaccination rate for teenagers and pre-teens remains very low. The confluence of these factors, coinciding with the start of the school year, means that children's hospitals are filling up in a way that makes experts very worried. "Ive worked on the business side of pediatrics for nearly 30 years, and Ive never seen it this bad before," said Maggie Cash, executive director of the South Carolina Children's Hospital Collaborative. Nearly three dozen children across the state are currently hospitalized with COVID-19, according to the collaborative's data, and at least three pediatric patients are now ventilated. It's not just COVID patients filling up the children's hospitals. Winter respiratory viruses emerged with a vengeance earlier this summer as mask-wearing and social distancing declined. These factors, compounded with normal summer hospital volume, have created a crisis. Inside South Carolina's four children's hospitals, the pediatric intensive care units are running between 71 percent and 100 percent full. On Aug. 25, between the four facilities, 12 children were in holding patterns in the emergency departments. They all needed a hospital bed. None were available. "This has been a very different wave (of the pandemic) for children," said Dr. Elizabeth Mack, a pediatric critical care specialist at MUSC. MUSC has hospitalized 180 children with COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic, she said. The admissions have been split fairly evenly between 2020 and 2021, but more infants have been hospitalized with COVID this year than last and 20 percent of this year's inpatients have arrived in August. And August isn't over, Mack pointed out. None of the children the hospital has treated have been vaccinated, even though roughly half have been eligible. Last year when adult COVID cases were surging, MUSC and other hospitals announced they would divert some young adult patients to the children's hospitals to free up space. At the time, the state's children's hospitals had beds to spare. "We do not now," Mack said. "This is definitely stressing the system." The morning after Misty Goodwin sent Amari to bed with Tylenol, she woke up with a fever of 104.5. An urgent care doctor diagnosed Amari with COVID-19 and told her to let it run its course at home. But three days later, Amari had stopped eating. She was throwing up. By Aug. 12 she'd started coughing up blood. By the time Misty drove her from their Round O home in Colleton County to Summerville Medical Center, Amari was having so much trouble breathing, she couldn't walk from the car to the front door of the hospital. Misty doesn't know how Amari caught the coronavirus. Her daughter wasn't vaccinated, but they'd made an appointment for her to get one before the school year started. Amari always wore a mask when she left the house, which wasn't often, her mom said. Misty works at Walmart and said she's vaccinated but thinks maybe she brought the virus home somehow. Her 8-year-old son didn't catch it. Regardless, she urged other adults to do their part by wearing masks and getting the vaccine. "If we don't protect our kids," Misty said, "no one else will." For her daughter, there remains some hope. Misty said Amari can squeeze her hand and shake her head. Mack said Amari is showing some signs of improvement, although they're nowhere near out of the woods yet. "She's incredibly sick," Mack said, standing with Misty by Amari's hospital bed. "Mama has been by her side every step of the way." An Air Force crew from Joint Base Charleston helped deliver a baby aboard a C-17 that was transporting evacuees from Afghanistan to another site in the Middle East earlier this week as the Taliban continue to take over the country. On Aug. 23, a C-17 flown by members of the 701st Airlift Squadron out of Charleston was waiting to land after departing Afghanistan when Capt. Dennis Conner heard from a crew member that "they were concerned about a woman in the lavatory who was about to have a baby," a news release from the base said. Tech. Sgt. Leah Schmidt, a 701st Airlift Squadron loadmaster, and Capt. Leslie Green, a 375th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron flight nurse, delivered a baby girl minutes before the aircraft landed, the Air Force Base said. On the runway, they were met by emergency medical responders to help the mother and her newborn girl. Crews at Joint Base Charleston have helped transport Army soldiers and vehicles to Afghanistan to assist with evacuations following the Taliban takeover earlier this month. While the base has been tight-lipped about many of their operations, photos and news releases from the Department of Defense have helped paint a picture of their involvement. Sign up for our SC Military Digest newsletter Get exclusive military reporting, updates from Palmetto State bases, headlines from around the globe and more delivered to your inbox each Tuesday. Email Sign up! Images dated Aug. 14 and released by the Department of Defense show soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg in North Carolina preparing to board buses to head to Joint Base Charleston. Later that day, paratroopers made it onto the runway at Charleston Air Force Base and began loading up in C-17s to fly out to Hamid Karzai International Airport. Images dated Aug. 16 show airmen from the 437th Aerial Port Squadron directing vehicles into the back of C-17s in Charleston. "The 315th AW and other US and allied military organizations remain focused on the present mission directed by the president: to facilitate the safe evacuation of U.S. Citizens, Special Immigrant Visa applicants, and other vulnerable Afghans, to get these personnel out of Afghanistan as quickly and as safely as possible," the base said in a statement. A former project manager with the city of Charleston's Department of Housing and Community Development admitted Aug. 25 he accepted kickbacks to steer housing-repair contracts to local builders. Brian D. Herndon pleaded guilty to bribery at a hearing in U.S. District Court in Charleston. He admitted in court he accepted a total of $15,000 in bribes to provide non-public information about city housing projects to Charles Mincey, operator of Palmettos at Folly. Herndon admitted in court he told Mincey how much money to bid on approximately 30 city housing projects contracted between February 2014 and March 2020. Many of the contracts were for roofing work that was paid for in part by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Herndon admitted in court he also provided information to a second contractor, William "Bill" Kendall, in exchange for kickbacks, but that contractor has since died, according to federal prosecutor Allessandra Stewart. Herndon was paid anywhere from $200 to $500 for steering each contract to the builders, Stewart told the court. Herndon was accused of bribery in a federal complaint filed July 13 in the U.S. District Court for South Carolina. Authorities alleged in the complaint Herndon attempted to steer a city contract to Mincey in February 2020 in exchange for $300. Herndon told Mincey to bid $14,195 for a job repairing a roof at 1521 Acacia St., the complaint states. As a city project manager, he knew that was the city's budget for the project. Palmettos at Folly, Mincey's company, submitted a $14,195 bid for the project, city records show, but was not awarded the contract. A call from federal investigators on April 30, 2020, alerted the city to potential improprieties with the bidding process. After it was rebid, a contract was awarded to Carolina Dream Builders in June 2020 for $12,275. Stewart revealed at the Aug. 25 plea hearing that Herndon's telephone conversations with Mincey about that contract were recorded by authorities. She said Mincey asked Herndon during one conversation whether it would be suspicious if he submitted a bid that matched the city's budget, and Herndon told him it would not be. Court records filed in July stated Herndon agreed to plead guilty to bribery as part of a plea deal with prosecutors. Stewart said at the hearing Herndon was expected to cooperate fully with their investigation as part of the deal, "which we believe he has done." Mincey also provided information to federal prosecutors about the scheme, Stewart said, which helped prosecutors determine the total damages in the case. Bribery is a felony that carries up to of five years in prison and $250,000 in fines. Herndon, 45, said in his plea hearing he was a graduate of Charleston Southern University and now works in landscaping. He said he was previously treated for an opioid addiction in 2009. He is using suboxone to manage that addiction, he said. Herndon was released on a $50,000 unsecured bond while awaiting sentencing. A sentencing hearing has not been scheduled, according to court records. He declined to comment about the case after the hearing. Herndon resigned as city project manager on April 22, 2020. He was employed by the city for over 12 years and was making $57,962 a year at the time of his resignation. "On behalf of the city, I'd like to thank both the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office for their outstanding work in this case," Charleston Mayor John Tecklenburg said on Aug. 25. "As I've said before, this was a serious violation of our trust and our citizens' trust, and I hope Mr. Herndon's sentence will reflect the seriousness of that offense." Geona Shaw Johnson, director of the Department of Housing and Community Development, previously said the city changed how it handles bids as a result of the allegations against Herndon. Previously, construction staff would unseal the bids submitted for work by city-approved contractors. Since becoming aware of the allegations, non-construction staff are now involved in that process. Mincey is identified in state records as having been involved in several construction businesses in South Carolina, including Charleston Renovation Group SC, Palmettos at Folly and Southeastern Site and Utilities Group. North Augusta, SC (29841) Today Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 71F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 71F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Syndicated and guest columns represent the personal views of the writers, not necessarily those of the editorial staff. The editorial department operates entirely independently of the news department and is not involved in newsroom operations. commentary The 3 exports from Afghanistan that are coming: Heroin, people and terrorism One of the things Ive been wondering about is what the scene on college campuses will be like this fall, after a year of students staying home and doing all of their classes online instead of in-person on campus. Imagine what the BLM-George Floyd protests would have been like on campus if they hadnt locked down and emptied out in the spring-summer-fall of last year. Maybe there will be pent-up demand for campus protests to catch up? Well, heres one early indicator. Im back in a live classroom this fall at Berkeley, teaching a basic political science course on the presidency. Yesterday was the first day of classes for the semester, the campus is teeming with student life, and lo and beholda protest at Sather Gate on Sproul Plaza (scene of the famous Free Speech Movement back in 1964). Whats it about? Peoples Park! Yes, you could think weve fallen into some worm hole back to 1969, because that was the first big Peoples Park protest that included riots and lots of police and National Guard presence. The issue thenand nowis that Peoples Park is owned by the University of California, and as everyone knows student housing is very scarce and expensive here. So the university has once again announced plans to develop student housing on the site of Peoples Park. The protests in 1969 caused Berkeley to abandon plans to build. The current administration decided the time had come to go ahead with it. Need I mention that Peoples Park today is overrun with the homeless, and is the scene of frequent crime? (I get about one notice a week from campus security of an assault in or around Peoples Park.) Well see if this protest continues and reaches the dimensions of the riots of 1969. I doubt it. Separately, a California state judge has blocked the construction of a major new building on the north side of campus on Hearst Avenue, where existing facilities and housing are inadequate for the program growth of the academic units housed there, on grounds that the environmental reviews by the university are insufficient. For the moment, the judge is saying that Berkeley cant increase its student population until these reviews are satisfied, and the impacts mitigated. Dont hold your breath for the resolution of either one of these proposed campus developments. The northside project has been in the planning process for several years now. Whats another decade in California planning hell? Gloria Romero was the Democratic majority leader in the state senate from 2001 until 2008, the first woman ever to hold that position. She then stepped down to become chairman of the education committee before leaving the senate due to term limits in 2010. Romero now is now a professor at Pepperdine. Romero has endorsed Larry Elder for governor. She stated: Our public schools need big change. Im Gloria Romero; I was the majority leader of Democrats in the state Senate. I believe in charter schools and in school choice. So does Larry Elder but not Gavin Newsom. He shut our public schools while he sent his kids to private schools. Yes: Im a Democrat. But the recall of Newsom is not about political party. Its about Newsom. Larry Elder for governor. Note the dig at Newsom for his hypocrisy the same kind of hypocrisy that enabled him to dine maskless at a swank restaurant during the height of the pandemic. How much will Romeros endorsement help Elder? I dont know enough about California politics to answer that question. For what its worth, I suspect that theres a huge amount of anger at Newsom, including among Democrats. Many of these Democrats may be trying to decide whether they are angry enough to do the unthinkable vote for a conservative Republican. Maybe Romeros endorsement will persuade some of them that its okay to do so. But probably only if they are already leaning that way. BY THE WAY: The comments to Fox News report on Romeros endorsement includes one that suggests Newsoms path to survival (and is consistent with what Ive heard from others): The Biden administration is gaslighting the fiasco in Afghanistan in a variety of ways, e.g. by hailing the current chaotic skedaddle as the biggest airlift on record, as though it were a positive achievement. But the administration knows its biggest problem is the likelihoodor inevitabilitythat it wont be able to get all U.S. citizens out of Afghanistan. This question has always been clouded by the fact that no one knows how many Americans were in Afghanistan when the exodus began. Administration spokesmen have offered various estimates, including 5,000 to 10,000; 11,000; and 10,000 to 15,000. Today, Secretary of State Antony Blinken implied that the true number is far lower: Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday said that up to 1,500 US citizens are still stranded in Afghanistan shortly after President Biden joked with a reporter who asked about possibly leaving Americans behind in the Taliban-controlled nation. *** Over the last 10 days, roughly 4,500 of these Americans have been safely evacuated along with immediate family members. Over the past 24 hours, weve been in direct contact with approximately 500 additional Americans and provided specific instructions on how to get to the airport safely, Blinken said. Well update you regularly on our progress in getting these 500 American citizens out of Afghanistan. For the remaining roughly 1,000 contacts that we have who may be Americans seeking to leave Afghanistan, were aggressively reaching out to them multiple times a day through multiple channels of communication. These numbers suggest that there were more like 6,000 Americans in Afghanistan when the crisis began, a much lower number than we previously have been led to believe. Further, Blinken argued that quite a few of these may not want to leave: Weve also found that many people who contact us and identify themselves as American citizens, including by filling out and submitting repatriation assistance forms, are not in fact US citizens, something that can take some time to verify, Blinken said. Some Americans may choose to stay in Afghanistan Many of them are dual nationals and may consider Afghanistan their home, who have been there for decades, or who may want to stay close to extended family. And there are Americans who are still evaluating their decision to leave based on the situation on the ground that evolves daily, in fact that evolves hourly. Blinken said some Americans even change their mind from one day to the next, as has happened, and will likely continue to happen. So the administration is preparing to declare victory, no matter where the final numbers come to rest. We will be told that there werent so many Americans in danger after all, and that those who didnt catch an outgoing flight probably wanted to stay. I doubt whether this approach can work, given the images of chaos and violence that we have all seen. Americans are never going to buy the withdrawal from Afghanistan as a success story. Whether it gets worse than that depends, I think, on whether and to what extent specific stories of Americans stranded in Afghanistan come to light. The administration faces two main dangers. The first is that family members of Americans abandoned in Afghanistan come forward. If there really are several thousand Americans who were left behind, this seems inevitable, with the only question one of degree. If we dont start hearing from family members, it will suggest that the initial estimates of Americans in Afghanistan were indeed far too high. The second threat comes from the Taliban. They might take American hostages, triggering a crisis like the one that destroyed the Jimmy Carter administration. Or, even worse, the Taliban could post photos and videos of the slaughter of Americans who were left behind by Joe Biden. That is the ultimate nightmare for the administration. Bidens best hope may be that the Taliban has control over its fighters, and doesnt want to rock the boat while it consolidates control over its country. Its interests, in other words, may align with Joe Bidens to the limited extent of not wanting to publicize any atrocities that may be committed against Americans. That is the pass to which we have come. UPDATE: This Epoch Times piece sheds additional light: U.S. troops have not rescued any Americans in Afghanistan outside of Kabul, though they have the capability to do so, the Pentagon said Wednesday. Only three rescue missions have been conducted by American soldiers since the Taliban took over the country, according to military officials. But all three took place within Kabul, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters in Washington. *** Asked if the United States could help an American couple who is reportedly in Mazar-e-Sharife, he answered bluntly, No. Again, no one has suggested that all Americans who need to be evacuated are in Kabul, but it appears that anyone outside that city is on his own. Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivered remarks on Afghanistan at a press briefing conducted at Foggy Bottom yesterday. He even took a few questions from friendly State Department reporters (although MSNBCs Andrea Mitchell not a State Department reporter asked a critical question that stood out from the rest). The State Department has posted its own video and official transcript here. Blinken discussed the evacuation of Americans from the country and the departments calculation of the relevant numbers. The numbers conflicted with a briefing for Senate staff earlier in the day, but they are in any event dynamic calculations characterized by fluidity (to borrow the terms Blinken himself used). As conveyed in his remarks, the departments efforts are a great success. He concluded regarding the numbers: Thus, from this list of approximately 1,000, we believe the number of Americans actively seeking assistance to leave Afghanistan is lower, likely significantly lower. One can read Blinkens remarks as blaming Americans who remain stranded, whatever their number. He doesnt acknowledge the possible difficulties of getting to Kabul for Americans who may be spread around the country. Although Blinken put a positive face on the departments efforts, he is necessarily aware of the humiliation involved in our utter dependence on the Taliban: Were operating in a hostile environment in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban, with the very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack. Were taking every precaution, but this is very high-risk. As the President said yesterday, were on track to complete our mission by August 31st provided the Taliban continue to cooperate and there are no disruptions to this effort. The President has also asked for contingency plans in case he determines that we must remain in the country past that date. But let me be crystal-clear about this: There is no deadline on our work to help any remaining American citizens who decide they want to leave to do so, along with the many Afghans who have stood by us over these many years and want to leave and have been unable to do so. That effort will continue every day past August 31st. The Taliban have made public and private commitments to provide and permit safe passage for Americans, for third-country nationals, and Afghans at risk going forward past August 31st. The United States, our allies and partners, and more than half of the worlds countries 114 in all issued a statement making it clear to the Taliban that they have a responsibility to hold to that commitment and provide safe passage for anyone who wishes to leave the country not just for the duration of our evacuation and relocation mission, but for every day thereafter. Every day thereafter takes us into Absurdistan. Blinken continued: And were developing detailed plans for how we can continue to provide consular support and facilitate departures for whose who wish to leave after August 31st. Our expectation the expectation of the international community is that people who want to leave Afghanistan after the U.S. military departs should be able to do so. Together we will do everything we can to see that that expectation is met. Everything we can is the motto of the Biden administrations surrender. One cannot understand Blinkens remarks without the video component. Blinken represents the face of defeat. Although his words proclaim a kind of success, Blinken looks like the chump in an old Western who is dancing at the end of a gun being shot at his feet. He is demoralized. He is not proud. He is ashamed. Unfortunately, his shame is insufficient to prompt him to resign. Unlike his boss, Blinken is not stupid. He may not understand the scope of the historic national humiliation in which he is a protagonist, but he appears to be getting there. Shortly after Blinkens remarks the State Department posted this security alert (emphasis in original, links omitted): Event: Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising U.S. citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a U.S. government representative to do so. U.S. citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately. Actions to take: Be aware of your surroundings at all times, especially in large crowds. Follow the instructions of local authorities including movement restrictions related to curfews. Have a contingency plan for emergencies and review the Travelers Checklist. Monitor local media for breaking events and adjust your plans based on new information. Enroll in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program(STEP) to receive Alerts and make it easier to locate you in an emergency. Follow the Department of State on Facebook and Twitter. For humiliation, its hard to top this: Follow the instructions of local authorities including movement restrictions related to curfews. At least 12 U.S. service members reportedly are dead due to the explosions at the Kabul airport. The final death count is not yet in, but it will likely exceed 12. In all of 2020, there were nine U.S. fatalities in Afghanistan. The average yearly number from 2015-2020 was 16. There had been none in 2021. Andy McCarthy filed this column about the explosions. Although ISIS is thought to have set them off, Andy suggests that it might have been the Taliban. He writes: The Taliban is controlling Kabul and the airport perimeter through the Haqqani organization, a significant ally of both the Taliban and al-Qaeda. With President Biden doubling down on our shameful bug-out by next Tuesday leaving even though we know Americans will be left behind the Taliban has every incentive to double down on its objective to project the image of a surrendering superpower skulking out of Afghanistan with its tail between its legs. The Haqqani are very capable when it comes to attacks of this kind, and they have the best intelligence and maneuverability in the environs of the airport. . . . It is a tenet of jihadist lore that the anti-Soviet mujahideen, out of which al-Qaeda and the Taliban emerged, ground the Red Army into dust. They believe the jihad not President Reagan, not the U.S. defense build-up, not the CIAs arming of the mujahideen, not the internal rot of the U.S.S.R. is responsible for the collapse of the Soviet empire. The Soviet military retreat from Afghanistan is a defining moment for them. For years, it drove terrorist recruitment, terrorist fundraising, and the ascendance of terrorist organizations as a global security threat. . . . For the jihadists, the American surrender is a rerun of the Soviet surrender of 1989. It will be as iconic for them as 9/11. (Emphasis added) McCarthys analysis raises a point I think many are missing when they argue that the U.S. could have avoided disaster by evacuating all civilians before withdrawing our troops. That might well have been the better course, but it would have run the risk of incurring a significant number of U.S. deaths. Its hard to imagine the Afghan army standing up to the Taliban once America started a mass evacuation of civilians. Why risk ones life fighting the Taliban, even with U.S. air support, when one knows for certain that the U.S. is just about to pull out and then will offer no support at all? Better to fade away before the military pullout occurs, if one is sure that it will. That would have left around American 3,000 troops to defend against the Taliban more or less on their own. And this would have created a great opportunity for the Taliban to rout American forces in combat something it hasnt done and something that, per McCarthy, would be the stuff of legend. Maybe the Taliban would have passed on this opportunity, waited for the evacuation and the military pullout to be complete, and then taken over the entire country. But it seems as likely that the Taliban would have attacked while our troops were still there so as to claim a famous military victory. In this scenario, U.S. forces would likely have suffered significant loss of life. Perhaps a rout could have been prevented, but only, I believe, if we had brought in a large number of additional forces, with a corresponding increase in American casualties. Im not saying with any certainty that this scenario would have occurred. Nor am I saying that evacuating civilians before pulling the military out would have been inferior to Bidens approach as a way to lose this war. Im just saying that both approaches to losing carried major risks. In the case of Bidens approach, the risk was that the Taliban would get to Kabul before the end of August. In the case of the alternative approach, the risk was that the Taliban would attack U.S. forces and that we would be largely on our own in resisting. Im also saying that theres no good way to lose a war, and that losing this war might end up costing as many American lives as several years of maintaining the stalemate. Please join your fellow VIPs for our VIP Live event tonight, beginning at 7 p.m. Central time (5 Pacific, 8 Eastern). If you are a VIP member, you will get an email with a link to a live address where you can watch the event and submit your own comments and questions. Some people have not gotten our emails in the past. We think there are two reasons for this: first, it may go to your spam folder, so please check there if you dont see the email invitation. Second, there is an issue with Comcast rejecting our emails for some reason. So if you are a VIP but dont see the email, you can email us at [email protected], and we will reply with the link. Topic A will be Afghanistan, of course. Is this the beginning of the end for the Biden administration? Or will Slow Joe ride out the storm? How will todays terrorist bombing impact events? What will the long-term consequences be for American foreign policy? All this, plus your questions and comments. If you are not already a VIP member, you can become one by clicking on the box in the upper right portion of our sidebar. Membership costs $4.80 per month or $48 per year, and gives you access to Power Line Live events, as well as other occasional benefits like videos of Steves lectures. You will eliminate most ads on our site. And, most important, by becoming a VIP you support our work. The URL to become a VIP is now: https://subscriptions.powerlineblog.com So if you are a VIP, please tune in tonight at 7:00 p.m. Central. If you arent, please consider subscribing. Yes, no matter what Yes, but it depends on variety No, for medical reasons, uncertainty No, principle Vote View Results A Nigerian boy, who dropped a birthday note for his mum, went beyond thanking her for being the best mum to him and his brothers he amazingly promised to buy her a big house and a car when he grows up. The boy, Conqueror Aniekan, lives with his parents in Eket, Akwa Ibom State, Nigerias South-south. He is the last of the parents three sons. The mum, Enobong Etuk, runs a flourishing bookstore in Eket and Uyo. The dad, Aniekan, is also an entrepreneur. Conqueror, who is going to be 11 this September, had just finished his primary education and would be going to junior secondary school, also in September, Mrs Etuk said. Apparently to show commitment to the promise he has made to the mum, Conqueror attached a N50 cash to the note. READ ALSO: This is a token from my heart, he said of the money, in the birthday note. Conquerors note, scribbled in neat handwriting, shows a boys love for a dear mum, his thoughtfulness, and attention to details. He titled the note My mummys birthday and dated it 17th August, 2021 which is the mums birthday. He even timestamped his note 10:26 a.m. Happy birthday mummy, thank you for being the best mummy in the world to me and my brother, he wrote. He also thanked the mum for being there for him during his graduation ceremony and during good and bad times. When I grow up I will buy you a big house and a car, he added. Mrs Etuk posted a photo of Conquerors note and the N50 cash on Facebook, and said it was her best birthday gift in 2021. Dear Conqueror, may your thoughts and prayers come to pass in the land of the living in Jesus Name. Amen, she wrote on the social media site. Mrs Etuk told PREMIUM TIMES she was touched by her sons action. He came into my room that morning and wished me a happy birthday and sang for me, and then he told me he will come back later. He asked if I was going out, I said no. To my utmost surprise, about 30 minutes later, he came back into my room with that letter. I was still on my bed. I was very touched. The only thing I saw in that letter was that there was no punctuation, but he wrote it from his heart, she said. My husband was very touched, he was very humbled. He asked me if I had cajoled him to do it. ADVERTISEMENT Mrs Etuk plans to laminate the note and hang it somewhere conspicuous in their living room where it could serve as daily encouragement for their son. It would be there for a very long time, his children too would come and see it, she said. Conquerors siblings had visited their mum in her room to wish her a happy birthday, but they did not leave a note for her. He (Conqueror) has always been very different, actually. He prefers to spend more time with his father. He has his own personality, his desires are quite different, Mrs Etuk said. ADVERTISEMENT Triops of the Multinational Joint Taskforce (MNJTF), have on Wednesday eliminated a total of 43 Boko Haram/Islamic States West Africa Province (ISWAP) terrorists in Diffa, Niger Republic. The Chief of Military Public Information for MNJTF, Muhammad Dole, disclosed this in a statement on from N`Djamena, Chad. Mr Dole, a colonel, said, the troops of Sector 4 Diffa, displayed uncommon acts of gallantry and bravery when their location was attacked by BHT/ISWAP criminals in the early hours of Wednesday. He said the troops tactically lured the criminals to their effective killing zone, brought heavy fire on them and neutralised scores, while others escaped with various degrees of bullet wound injuries. At the end of the encounter, a total of 43 dead bodies of BHT/ISWAP insurgents were scattered around the engagement areas. One terrorist suspected to be their leader was caught alive and a large cache of arms and ammunition were recovered while four enemy gun trucks were also destroyed. Extremely regrettable however, seven gallant MNJTF soldiers paid the supreme sacrifice, while four other soldiers sustained various degree of injuries and are being treated in a military hospital, he said. READ ALSO: Mr Dole disclosed that the Force Commander, MNJTF, Abdul-Khalifah Ibrahim, a major general, was coincidentally in Diffa on the final leg of his familiarisation/operational visit to the sectors. He said Ibrahim commended the selfless sacrifice and acts of gallantry demonstrated by the troops. While praying for the repose of the souls of the deceased soldiers whom he described as matyrs of freedom, he condoled the families of the deceased and wished the wounded soldiers speedy recovery. Ibrahim said, despite the ongoing waves of BHT/ISWAP terrorists surrender, MNJTF forces will continue to take the battle to all identified enclaves of the insurgents. He described the attacks as futile kicks of a dying horse and further charged the soldiers to brace up, remain alert and deal decisively with remnants of the criminals around the fringes of the Lake Chad region. ADVERTISEMENT The Nigerian economy recorded a 5.01 per cent annual growth in real terms in the second quarter of 2021, the National Bureau of Statistics said Thursday. The rise marked the third consecutive quarter of growth following the negative growth rates recorded in the second and third quarters of 2020. The second quarter growth rate was higher than the -6.10 per cent growth rate recorded in the second quarter of 2020 and the 0.51 per cent recorded in the first quarter of 2021. Africas biggest economy went into recession in 2020 after two quarters of economic decline as a result of the coronavirus pandemic that shut businesses and economies globally. This indicates the return of business and economic activity near levels seen prior to the nationwide implementation of COVID-19 related restrictions, the NBS said. The steady recovery observed since the end of 2020, with the gradual return of commercial activity as well as local and international travel, accounted for the significant increase in growth performance relative to the second quarter of 2020 when nationwide restrictions took effect, it said. Real GDP grew 2.70% in 2021 compared to -2.18% for the first half of 2020. With regard to quarter on quarter growth, real GDP grew at -0.79% in Q2 2021 compared to Q1 2021, reflecting slightly slower economic activity than the preceding quarter due largely to seasonality. In the quarter under review, average daily oil production stood at 1.61 million barrels per day (mbpd), which is -0.19mbpd lower than the average daily production of 1.81mbpd recorded in the same quarter of 2020 and -0.10mbpd lower than the 1.72mbpd recorded in the first quarter of 2021. Meanwhile, real growth of the oil sector was 12.65% (year-on-year) in Q2 2021 indicating a decrease of 6.02% points relative to the growth rate recorded in the corresponding quarter of 2020. READ ALSO: Performance in the non-oil sector grew by 6.74% in real terms during the reference quarter (Q2 2021). The Q2 2021 growth rate was higher by 12.80% points compared to the rate recorded in the same quarter of 2020 and 5.95% points higher than the first quarter of 2021, the NBS said. It added that during the quarter, the non-oil sector was driven mainly by growth in trade, information and communication (Telecommunication), transportation (Road Transport), electricity, agriculture (Crop Production) and manufacturing (Food, Beverage & Tobacco). This, the report said, is a reflection of the easing of movement, business and economic activity across the country relative to the same period a year earlier. The Akwa Ibom State Government has marked a popular metropolitan church in Uyo, Holy Ghost Ambassadors Ministry International, for demolition. Nyeneime Andy, the senior pastor of the church, has been very outspoken against the alleged plan by the State Governor, Udom Emmanuel, to foist a successor on the oil-rich state in 2023. Mr Andy was also invited by Nigerias secret police, the SSS, for questioning on Wednesday over his comments on politics in the state, a close associate of the pastor told PREMIUM TIMES. The Akwa Ibom State Government, through its agent, the Uyo Capital City Development Authority (UCCDA), marked the church building on Wednesday for demolition. The church has also been served a notice to that effect. Eshiet Freddy, head of Town Planning Department, UCCDA, in the notice, said the church building did not meet the planning standards for approval. Mr Freddy said the structure negates minimum requirements in terms of space standard, building line and area distribution. It is worth to note that you are occupying/constructing an illegal structure without prior approval from the authority. The said illegal structure constitutes an offence and contravenes provisions of Town and Country Planning Law Cap. 133, Laws of Akwa Ibom State. In view of the above, you are hereby given seven (7) days notice within which to remove the said illegal development and reinstate the land to its original state, Mr Freddy said in the notice. The city development authority said the government would be forced to demolish the building if the church fails to comply with the order. The two-storey building, which was started in 2012, has been serving as a worship centre for many years. Mr Andy, in a recent press briefing, condemned an alleged plan by the governor to impose a successor in 2023. In 2023, it will be a government of the people, for the people and by the people. We will not allow one person to choose a governor for a state of over 6 million people, Mr Andy had said. UCCDA has also issued similar demolition notices to Dunamis International Gospel Centre, Uyo, and Refuge International School, owned by another popular metropolitan church, Gods House of Refuge. PREMIUM TIMES could not immediately reach the authorities of the churches for comments as at the time of filing this report. Fathers of faith Akwa Ibom has a predominant Christian population. Church leaders in the state play an influential role in the politics and governance in the state, especially in the election of new leaders. Governor Emmanuel, himself a church deacon, holds regular meetings with select church leaders, otherwise called fathers of faith, where he briefs them about his administrations policies and actions, including his succession plan.Holy Ghost Ambassadors Ministry International ADVERTISEMENT A retired prelate of the Methodist Church of Nigeria, Sunday Mbang, 85, and a popular Pentecostal preacher, Uma Ukpai, are among the few constant faces in such meetings. Until the recent division among the church leaders, the fathers of faith had in the past expressed their resolve to support Mr Emmanuels succession plan. Mr Emmanuel in May raised some questions for consideration on the quality of who should succeed him. Do you want a leader whose approach to testing his popularity would be to drive in a long convoy to Ibom Plaza and throw money at the hapless people, watching them scramble for the money and the people would say thats Ano owo Mkpo! (one who is good at giving) Is that the kind of a successor you want? Is that the kind of empowerment our people deserve? Or do you desire a successor with a known e-mail address that the international business community recognises? Among the people said to be nursing governorship ambition in the state within the Peoples Democratic Party are Bassey Albert, a serving senator; Udom Inoyo, a former vice chairman of Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited; and Effiong Bob, a former senator. ADVERTISEMENT President Muhammadu Buhari has approved the appointment of Simon Harry as the new Statistician-General of the Federation to head the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). This is according to a statement from Yunusa Abdullahi, Special Adviser, Media and Communications to the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning on Thursday. Mr Harry is to succeed the out-going Statistician-General, Yemi Kale, whose second term tenure of five years expired on August 16. Currently, Mr Harry is the Director of, Corporate Planning and Technical Coordination Department of NBS with almost three decades of statistical experience. He joined the Federal Office of Statistics as Statistician 11 in 1992 and rose to the position of a substantive Director of Statistics in 2019. In the course of his civil service career, he has contributed to several reform initiatives including the reform of the then Federal Office of Statistics which was transformed to the current National Bureau of Statistics. He also contributed to the reform of the Nigerian Statistical System which resulted in the creation and establishment of state bureaus of statistics at the sub-national level. (NAN) ADVERTISEMENT The 136 abducted pupils of Salihu Tanko Islamiyya School, Tegina in Rafi Local Government Area of Niger State, have been released. They were released on Thursday night in Birnin Gwari LGA of Kaduna State after 86 days in captivity. Birnin Gwari shares boundary with Rafi local government area of Niger State where the children were abducted. PREMIUM TIMES reported how the bandits abducted the pupils on May 30. A resident, Kasimu Barangana, who earlier delivered some part of the ransom to the bandits in the forest, was among the people who received the freed pupils at Doka village in Birnin Gwari LGA. Mr Barangana confirmed their release to PREMIUM TIMES. He said he and others were on their way to Minna with the freed pupils. The Chairman of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) in Birnin Gwari, Danladi Idon-Duniya, was reportedly among the people who received the pupils. The children are currently being conveyed from Birnin Gwari to Minna, Niger State capital where they will be reunited with their families on Friday. Local sources said the pupils were released after the payment of over N60 million and five new motorcycles as ransom to their abductors. Anxious parents and residents of Tegina community thronged the highway to witness the return home of the children. Birnin Gwari is about 80 kilometres to Tegina. Its not yet clear whether all the children were released. Officials in Niger State are yet to comment on the development as of the time of this report. This is a developing story which will be updated as we gather more details. ADVERTISEMENT The Africa Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) on Wednesday launched a new collaboration to strengthen community resilience and response to public health emergencies at community levels. The two organisations signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), to build up pandemic response, including testing support to countries; community mobilisation; advocacy and scaling up of contact tracing as well as other areas of public health. According to a statement released through APO, a leading pan-African communications consultancy group, the institutions are expected to increase investments in locally-led actions for prevention and response purposes and also work with governments to ensure they intensify efforts to roll out the COVID-19 vaccination. About Africa CDC Africa CDC is a continental organisation that strengthens the capacity and capability of Africas public health institutions as well as partnerships to detect and respond quickly and effectively to disease threats and outbreaks, based on data-driven interventions and programmes. Partnership details Noting that Africa CDC and IFRC will scale up advocacy against vaccine wastage, the statement stated that the new initiative comes at a time when Africa is facing major vaccine shortages, amid a high level of community transmission in some Africa countries. Africa CDC Director, John Nkengasong, said Africa is facing a double-edged challenge of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, dealing with health response gaps, and also trying to ensure that the continent prepares efficiently for future pandemics, using lessons from the current challenges. Africa CDC has been implementing various public health responses to control COVID-19. These include the engagement of community health workers in risk communication and community sensitisation, surveillance activities for early case identification, contact tracing, and in facilitating referrals for testing and continuum of care, he said. Also speaking, IFRC Secretary General, Jagan Chapagain, said what the IFRC and its network of National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies bring to the partnership is our unparalleled access to local communities. Our community-based volunteers have the access and trust that are needed to address vaccine hesitancy and sensitise communities about adherence to preventive measures, he added. Background Africa CDC has been working to support African Union Member States to build a wide network of 2 million community health workers (CHWs) in line with the July 2017 African Union Assembly Decision. The collaboration with the IFRC network, which includes 1.2 million Red Cross and Red Crescent volunteers across the continent is expected to strengthen community level interventions and consolidate gains in tackling the spread of the virus, while increasing awareness about vaccine benefits. National Red Cross Red and Crescent Societies across Africa remain on the frontline of the response to COVID-19. They are providing ambulance services; conducting contact tracing and point of entry screening. They are also tackling stigma and the spread of misinformation and provide emotional comfort and psychological support to people in need. ADVERTISEMENT The U.S. authorities have trained over 50 Nigerian investigators and prosecutors to tackle cryptocurrency-enabled organised crimes. This was contained in a tweet posted via the verified Twitter account of the U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday. The training, which was held virtually, focused on enhancing the capacity of Nigerian investigators to investigate cryptocurrency. The webinar was a collaboration with the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the U.S. Embassy in Kenya Addis Ababa, the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria and the U.S. government on policies and programmes to combat international narcotics and crimes. @TheJusticeDepts #OPDAT @StateINL funded ICHIPs in @USEmbassyAddis and @USinNigeria and @FBI and @US_AU provided cryptocurrency basics webinar to more than 50 investigators and prosecutors in Nigeria to enhance Nigerians ability to investigate cryptocurrency, the Tweet read. Cryptocurrencies Cryptocurrencies are digital or virtual currencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum and others, that can be used to buy goods and services. They are also traded for profit. Being unregulated and requiring no physical bank vaults, they provide a relatively safe haven for criminals to launder proceeds of corruption, fraud, drug trafficking, and other heinous crimes. There are also concerns about their security with many sophisticated fraudsters able to hack into the digital vaults to steal them from their owners. A study by Whitestream, an Israeli-based blockchain analytics firm, regarded Nigerias commercial hub as the Focal Point for Africas crypto scams. The research indicated that many scammers create a persona of luxurious life achieved from the wealth created with cryptocurrency investments into attract unsuspecting victims. The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had barred commercial banks and other financial institutions from transacting with cryptocurrency in fear of the risks it poses to investments and the economy at large. In justifying the essence of the ban, Osita Nwanisobi, CBN Acting Director of Communications, in a statement in February, explained that cryptocurrencies transaction was devoid of proper regulation and prone to financial crimes in the country. The apex bank said the its decision is based on significant risks that transacting in cryptocurrencies portend risks of loss of investments, money laundering, terrorism financing, illicit fund flows and criminal activities. ADVERTISEMENT The country coordinator, Open Forum on Agricultural Biotechnology (OFAB) in Africa, Rose Gidado, says the Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) technology has been stigmatised greatly in Nigeria. Mrs Gidado spoke in Abuja on Thursday when she led a team on a courtesy call to the Managing Director of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Buki Ponle. She said anti -GMO organisations had even taken her members and partners to court by painting negative pictures on consumption of GM foods. According to her, GMO technology will enable Nigeria to attain the much desired food security as crops will be resistant to pests and insects while far greater yields and profits will be recorded by farmers. Mrs Gidado called for greater partnership with the media in enlightenment of the Nigerian masses on the benefits of GM crops. She mentioned countries, including Brazil and India, that have achieved food security through the adoption of GMO technology in their agriculture. Mrs Gidado said OFAB viewed NAN as a strategic partner in educating Nigerians on mass adoption of GMO technology. Information is vital to make this technology a success, she said. In his speech, the Managing Director of NAN, Mr Ponle said the Agency was willing to partner with organizations especially those in a critical sector like Agriculture. READ ALSO: The Managing Director, who was represented by the Editor-In-Chief, Silas Nwoha, assured OFAB of NAN support in enlightenment of Nigerians on the need to adopt GMO technology. Mr Ponle, who listed the various news products of NAN, said they would be made available to OFAB to enhance its mandate and efforts in Nigeria. Representatives from NAFDAC, African Agricultural Technology Foundation, National Agricultural Seed Council of Nigeria, Sheda Science and Technology Centre, Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria, and National Biotechnology Development Agency were on the team. (NAN) ADVERTISEMENT Governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara State has accused some unnamed politician in the state of sabotaging his efforts to end kidnapping in the state through dialogue with bandits. Mr Matawalle levelled the allegation in a statewide broadcast on Wednesday on the security situation in the state. The state has come under increasing bandits attacks especially in Bakura, Maradun, Maru, Tsafe and Shinkafi local government areas. In Bakura, bandits twice entered the Zamfara College of Agriculture and Animal Sciences and kidnapped the provost and 15 students. But the governor said his dialogue and reconciliation policy had helped in stopping bandits activities for sometime. The state witnessed about nine months of peace; hundreds of kidnapped people were unconditionally released by their captives (captors); hundreds of assorted arms and ammunition were surrendered by both Yan Sakai and bandits He said some disgruntled politicians, however, saw his progress as a threat to their political survival and began making disaparraging efforts to undermine our achivements North West governors not cooperating Mr Matawalle also faulted some governors in the North-west region for not engaging in peace talks with the bandits, which he said contributed in aggravating the attacks. He said the reluctance by affected states to engage the bandits in dialogue provoked them to continue attacking innocent people. He did not mention names. ADVERTISEMENT The lawyer to the family of late Usifo Ataga, Mike Ozekhome, has petitioned the Inspector-General of Police, Baba Usman over the alleged murder of the Super TV CEO in Lagos and the role of the police in unravelling the murder. Mr Ozekhome, in a letter dated August 25, accused the police of being unprofessional in the investigation of the matter by hastily parading the prime suspect, Chidinma Ojukwu, and being complicit in the case. PREMIUM TIMES had reported how Miss Ojukwu, a 300-level student of the University of Lagos (UNILAG) told the press during a parade on June 24 that she stabbed the deceased twice to free herself from a rape attempt. Mr Ozekhome said in the petition that the murder case has so far been most unprofessionally handled and deliberately bungled by the police. READ ALSO: The Ataga family has already pointedly accused the police of deliberately bungling the investigations, so as to allow some major suspects escape justice, or give them soft landing by arraigning them before a Chief Magistrate court and slapping their wrists with lesser offences. The Ataga family had also directly accused Lagos State Police Commissioner of being complicit in deliberately bungling the Usifo murder investigation through his lack of seriousness, depth, thoroughness, and professionalism. Such a grave accusation by Usifos family should not be left uninvestigated and truth discovered, the letter to the IGP tags in part. The police had earlier got a remand order for Ms Ojukwu and Quadri Adedapo, a co-defendant, to allow the police to continue with its investigation while awaiting legal advice from the Directorate of Public Prosecution. The police also arraigned Ms Ojukwus father and four others for their roles in the case. After two days of intra-party spat over claim to its leadership, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), affirmed Deputy National Chairman (South), Yemi Akinwonmi, as the acting national chairman of the party. This was disclosed by the party spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, after the National Working Committee closed door meeting in Abuja on Thursday. Mr Akinwonmi replaces the national chairman, Uche Secondus, who was on Monday ordered by a Rivers State High Court not to parade himself as the national chairman of the PDP. He confirmed the rescheduling of the partys National Executive Council (NEC) for Saturday. Elder Yemi Akinwonmi was unanimously affirmed as Acting National Chairman. We will be holding our caucus and another NWC meeting tomorrow preparatory to holding our National Executive Council meeting at 12 Oclock on Saturday, Mr Ologbondiyan told journalists. Section 45 (2) of the PDP Constitution (as amended) says in the absence of the national chairman, the deputy national chairman from the region as the national chairman will act in that position. The section states: In the case of the National Chairman, he shall hand over to the Deputy National Chairman who shall, without prejudice to Section 45 (6) of the Constitution, act as the National Chairman pending the election of a replacement. Mr Akinwonmi, who declared his assumption of office as the acting national chairman on Tuesday, was rejected by a faction of the NWC led by the Deputy National Chairman (North), Suleiman Nazif, citing the formers health condition. Mr Nazif declared that his southern counterpart was unfit to lead the party at this moment when energetic leadership was essential in restoring normalcy to it. Giving his reason, Mr Nazif took charge of the party affairs on Tuesday when he held an NWC meeting at the partys national secretariat against Mr Akinwonmis earlier directive suspending meetings of the organ indefinitely. He also scheduled an emergency National Executive Committee (NEC) for Friday. Mr Ologbondiyan said at the briefing that Mr Nazif alongside other members of the NWC adopted Mr Akinwonmi as the substantive national chairman. READ ALSO: More controversy in PDP as another national chairman emerges It was a unanimous meeting, there are no sides in the PDP. We can have arguments and turbulence but what is important is that we are able to breeze through the turbulence and sail, he said while fielding questions from journalists in attendance. Atiku, David Mark attend BoT meeting Meanwhile, members of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the PDP are currently in a crucial meeting at the partys national secretariat in Abuja. PREMIUM TIMES can confirm that former Vice-President, Atiku Abubakar, two former Senate Presidents Pius Ayim and David Mark are those in attendance. The PDP Governors Forum also fixed the meeting of its members for Thursday. According to the Chairman of the Forum, Governor Aminu Tambuwal, in a statement on Wednesday, said it would discuss the raging leadership crisis in the party. ADVERTISEMENT He said the meeting would commence by 5p.m. in Abuja. ADVERTISEMENT There have been two explosions outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, leading to the death of many people. The exact number of people that died from the Thursday explosion has yet to be confirmed but AlJazeera quotes a Taliban official as saying at least 13 people were killed and many more injured. The U.S. Pentagon described the explosions as a complex attack, saying it caused a number of U.S. and civilian casualties. PREMIUM TIMES reported how thousands of people have been rushing to the airport for evacuation outside the country since the Taliban took over the country last week. One of Thursdays explosions occurred near the airports Abbey Gate, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said, adding that the second occurred close to the nearby Baron Hotel. We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties, Mr Kirby said on Twitter. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. The U.S. and other Western countries have been evacuating their citizens and supporters from Afghanistan since the government fell and the Taliban took over. READ ALSO: There had been security reports that the airport could be attacked by terrorists. The Thursday attack is believed to have been carried out by an armed group aligned with the Islamic State. The Taliban is yet to form a government but has assured that it would not allow Afghanistan to be a launching pad for use by Islamic terror groups. ADVERTISEMENT The Inspector General of Police (IGP), Usman Alkali, has received the report of the panel set up to investigate erstwhile Commander of the IGP Intelligence Response Team (IRT), Abba Kyari. The report was presented to the IGP by the chairman of the panel, Joseph Egbunike, a deputy inspector general of police. Force spokesman, Frank Mba, made this known in a statement made available to PREMIUM TIMES. The highly decorated Mr Kyari was indicted by a U.S. court as a conspirator in a $1.1 million fraudulent deal against a Qatari businessman by a fraudster, Ramon Abbas, popularly called Hushpuppi. The Police Service Commission (PSC) had suspended Mr Kyari from office as a deputy commissioner of police and head of the Intelligence Response Team (IRT). The suspension, which was a temporary measure, was based on the recommendation of the IGP. Although Mr Egbunike did not disclose the details of the report, he said the committee did a thorough job. Read full statement: PRESS RELEASE IGP RECEIVES NPF PANEL REPORT ON DCP ABBA KYARI Reiterates Commitment to the Course of Justice The Inspector-General of Police, IGP Usman Alkali Baba, psc (+), NPM, fdc today, 26th August, 2021, received the report of the NPF Special Investigation Panel (SIP) investigating the alleged indictment of the erstwhile Head of the Police Intelligence Response Team (IRT), DCP Abba Kyari by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). The report was submitted by the chairman of the SIP, DIG Joseph Egbunike, at the Force Headquarters, Abuja. 2. DIG Egbunike, while presenting the report, appreciated the IGP for the confidence reposed on him and the members of the Panel to conduct the probe. He noted that the Panel commenced investigations immediately; it was inaugurated on 2nd August, 2021 and the report submitted is an outcome of a painstaking, transparent and exhaustive investigative process. He further revealed that the report presented contained the case file of the probe, evidence and findings as well as testimonies from DCP Abba Kyari and other persons and groups linked to the matter. 3. The IGP, who commended the Panel for the work done, stated that the essence of the probe was to carry out discreet investigations into the allegation levied against the Officer to enable the Force leadership to be appropriately guided in its decision-making processes. The IGP assured that a careful and expeditious review of the recommendations would be undertaken by the Force Management Team and thereafter forwarded to appropriate quarters for necessary action(s). He reiterated as always, the commitment of the Force to justice for all. CP FRANK MBA FORCE PUBLIC RELATIONS OFFICER FORCE HEADQUARTERS ABUJA ADVERTISEMENT The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) has queried Channels TV for alleged violation of Nigerias broadcasting code during its breakfast programme, Sunrise Daily, on Tuesday. The regulator claimed the programme which hosted the Benue State governor, Samuel Ortom, contained inciting, divisive and unfair comments. On the programme, Mr Ortom expressed his displeasure about the growing insecurity in the country and accused President Muhammadu Buhari of an agenda to fulanise the country. What Governor Ortom said Mr President is pushing me to think that what they say about him, that he has a hidden agenda in this country is true because it is very clear that he wants to fulanise but he is not the first Fulani president. Shagari was a Fulani President, Yar Adua was a Fulani President and they were the best in the history. But President Buhari is the worst president when it comes to issues of security and keeping his promises. Go back to 2015, what did he say, human rights issues, he talked about press freedom, about the economy, corruption, security. Tell me one that Mr President has achieved. He has achieved some level of development in other sectors but these prominent things that are concerns to Nigerians and we are all worried about, tell me when Mr President has come out to address them. Is it corruption, we are worse in the history of this country. In a notice signed by its director general, Balarabe Ilelah, the NBC accused Channels TV of not thoroughly interrogating the comments made by Governor Ortom. Consequently, Channels Television is required to explain why appropriate sanctions should not be applied for these infractions of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code. Your response should reach the Commission within 24 hours of the receipt of this letter, the notice read. Although Channels TV has not publicly reacted to the letter, an official at the station told PREMIUM TIMES that Channels has responded to NBCs query and denied any wrongdoing. The NBC under Mr Buhari has become intolerant of views critical of the president and the government. In October 2020, Channels TV was one of the broadcast stations fined N3 million naira for their reportage of the #EndSARs protest. In April, the TV station was also warned over an interview the station held with the spokesperson of the outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). Again in May, it was fined N5 million for alleged violation. The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has threatened to file a lawsuit against the commission over the repeated harassment. Were suing to end the harassment of Channels TV simply for carrying out its professional duties, if the unlawful NBC query issued to the station is not withdrawn within 24 hours, the group said Thursday. ADVERTISEMENT The Senator representing Anambra North, Stella Oduah, has defected from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC). Her defection was made known shortly after meeting with the Chairman of the APC Caretaker Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee (CECPC), Mala Buni, in Abuja on Thursday. She said her decision to make the switch was dictated by the need to engage in progressive politics for her constituency and the people of Anambra State. Ms Oduahs defection comes about a month after the Federal High Court in Abuja threatened to issue a warrant for her arrest after failing to appear in court for her corruption trial. She is being charged with laundering funds to the tune of N5 billion alongside Chinese construction giant, CCECC. Nigerias anti-graft agency, EFCC, had in December 2020, filed 25 counts accusing both parties of laundering various sums of money totalling about N5,052,415,984 between February and June 2014. They were also accused of conspiracy to commit money laundering, transferring, taking control and taking possession of proceeds of fraud, aiding and abetting money laundering and opening anonymous bank accounts. The agency also alleged that Ms Oduah and a Ms Odita opened anonymous Private Banking Nominee dollar and naira accounts with First Bank, thereby committing an offence contrary to section 11(1) of the Money Laundering (Prohibition) Act 2011 (as amended) and punishable under section 11(4) (a) of the same Act. Ms Oduah has, however, stated the progress of APC and residents of Anambra State as her reason for leaving as she pledged to join forces with the APC gubernatorial candidate, Andy Uba in the November governorship election. She also said her defection is part of the narrative to change the political narrative of the South-east geopolitical zone. Mr Buni, in his remarks at the brief ceremony, said Ms Oduah will have waiver and enjoy the dividends of joining the ruling party. You will enjoy the privileges enjoyed by all members of the party because you will have a waiver, the Yobe Governor, flanked by other key party players, said on Thursday. In his remarks included in the statement signed by the APC National Director, Publicity, Salisu Dambatta, the chairman of the Progressives Governors Forum, Mr Bagudu, described the Anambra senator as a national figure who has joined a national movement to deliver a greater Nigeria for the future. Mr Uba, the Deputy Senate President, Ovie Omo-Agege, Governors of Kebbi and Imo States, Abubakar Atiku Bagudu and Hope Uzodinma, were present to welcome the lawmaker to the ruling party. The Governor of Imo State, Hope Uzodinma, said the killings going on in different parts of Nigeria can stop if Nigerians agree that it should. Im almost certain that if all of us agreed today, that unknown gunmen and bandits must stop, they will stop, Mr Uzodinma told reporters on Wednesday at the Presidential Villa in Abuja after meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari. Nigeria has been grappling with diverse security challenges, including more than a decade of Boko Haram insurgency in the countrys North-east and the frequent deadly clashes between herders and farmers in several parts of the country. Deadly attacks and abduction-for-ransom by bandits have been on the increase, daily, with the latest being the daring invasion of the Nigerian Defence Academy, Kaduna, Nigerias North-west region, on Tuesday. Two officers were killed and one senior officer abducted during the attack. Governor Uzodinmas Imo State and other states in the South-east region have similarly witnessed several deadly attacks by gunmen suspected to be members of the pro-Biafra group, IPOB. Many police officers have been shot dead in the region, while public and private buildings, including Mr Uzodinmas country home, have been attacked and set ablaze. Six oil workers and one police officer were killed just about two weeks ago in an ambush in Imo. Mr Uzodinma told reporters at the Presidential Villa that the killings in the country persist because those perpetuating it receive encouragement from others, mostly the political leaders. He called on Nigerian leaders to protect the nations interest, respect the rule of law, and condemn criminal activities. It is condemnable that people kill human beings these days as if they are killing rams, the governor said. IPOB not a government in Imo Mr Uzodinma said he came to brief Mr Buhari on the security situation in Imo. Despite the mounting killings in the state, the governor said Imo was relatively very calm now. People are going about their businesses without any molestation. The security agencies have risen to the occasion. And the new Imo is bubbling, he said. Mr Uzodinma also spoke on the sit-at-home order by IPOB, saying the order had not been obeyed in Imo. Most people in Imo are businessmen and women who depend on their daily activities and income to feed their families. So they cannot afford to sit at home idle and allow hunger to ravage the state, he said. He said it is only the governor that is vested with the power to ask residents to stay at home. IPOB is not a government in Imo State, he added. Mr Uzodinma said Imo, unlike other states in the south, does not have an anti-grazing law. ADVERTISEMENT Herders and farmers in the state, according to him, had signed an MOU and have been living together in peace. I think with the political will and cooperation of people, particularly our traditional leaders, we have been able to, a reasonable extent, manage to control criminality, and illegality in Imo State, the governor said. ADVERTISEMENT The Director-General of the National Agency for Food Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Mojisola Adeyeye, a professor, has said she inherited N3.2 billion as debt on assumption of office in 2017. The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reported that Mrs Adeyeye disclosed this while appearing before the House of Representatives Committee on Finance in Abuja, on Thursday. Mrs Adeyeye had appeared before the committee during an interactive session on the 2022 to 2024 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP). She, however, said she had been able to offset N3.1 billion from the debt, adding that the agency was in near comatose when she assumed office. She said when she joined the agency, 80 per cent of the equipment was not working, and that there were no vehicles, laptops and other working tools. She said that if the agencys personnel costs were taken care of by the government, NAFDAC would be self- sustaining, adding that the Federal Government could then pull out from funding the agency. Mrs Adeyeye said NAFDAC was currently digitising its system to prevent leakages, adding that it was also building offices in seven states of the federation. However, members of the committee had earlier asked the NAFDAC DG to make efforts to ensure that the agency became self-sustaining. The committee also cautioned the agency to desist from repeating the same budgetary provision for certain projects. There is a preponderance of this line of issue of repeating the budget by splitting projects, the committee observed. Also, the managing director, Federal Housing Authority, Gbenga Ashafa, told the committee that the agency had not been in the budget of the Federal Government since 1999. Mr Ashafa said the agency had been left to generate revenue and resources to cater for itself, adding that the agency had not remitted N608 million it generated to the federation account. He, however, said that all the emolument of workers and salaries had been paid. Mr Ashafa said a committee had been set up to ensure that Nigerians in the Diaspora could have something to call their own back home He said the agency had embarked on a mass housing scheme in Zuba, FCT and that it was about 90 per cent completed. The committee, however, directed FHA to ensure it remitted the N608 million revenue to the government. (NAN) ADVERTISEMENT The Kebbi State High Court in Birnin-Kebbi on Thursday restored Uche Secondus as the national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). This came barely three days after the River State High Court issued an ex parte order suspending him from office on Monday. Three applicants Yahaya Usman, Abubakar Muhammad, and Bashar Suleman filed an ex parte application dated August 25, 2021 at the Kebbi State High Court for an order for stay of execution of the suspension order issued by the Rivers State High Court. Ruling after the applicants lawyer, Ibrahim Jibril, argued the application on Thursday, the judge, Nusirat Umar, granted leave to Mr Secodus to return to office as the national chairman of the PDP pending the hearing and determination of the applicants motion on notice. Mr Secondus and the the PDP were sued as the defendants in the suit. That an order of interim injunction staying the purported suspension of the first respondent pending the determination of the substantive motion on notice No. KB/HC/M.170/2021 now pending before this Honourable Court. An order of this honourable court granting leave to the first respondent (Uche Secondus) to continue exercising all the constitutional powers of the office of Chairman of People Democratic Party (second defendant) as enshrined in both the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria as amended and the People Democratic Partys Constitution pending the hearing and determination of the applicants motion on notice, the enrolled order of the court read in part. The earlier order restraining Mr Secondus from parading himself as the national chairman of the PDP came amidst the call for his removal by some governors and party members criticising him for the growing defection of their colleagues and members to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). The leadership crisis deepened on Tuesday with two of Mr Secodus deputies laying claim to his seat. Not until Thursday when the party leaders unanimously took a stand, both the Deputy National Chairman (South), Yemi Akinwonmi and his counterpart from the North, Sulieman Nazif, had released separate statements quoting sections of the party constitution that purportedly gave them right to step in Mr Secondus office. The PDP, though its spokesperson, Kola Ologbondiyan, later disclosed that Mr Akinwonmi had been picked by the partys organ as the acting chairman. He also confirmed the rescheduling of the partys National Executive Council (NEC) for Saturday. The Nigerian society is going through a transition of bleakness and blight, which has raged since the war and truly never ended, reaching very precipitous climaxes, even under civil democracy. I have called it the descent from humanism which I have chosen to illustrate with music, the media, and literature. Unorthodox warfare through insurgency, insurrection, frightening banditry, armed herdsmen, lethal violence, dystopia, and wild social incoherence manifest our nations descent from humanism. Many would agree that when the core principles and values inherent in humanism rationality, reason, compassion, human dignity, fellow-feeling, freedom, love, and kindness are in deficit in society, a vacuum is created and all manner of dogmas, doctrines, superstitions, theories, and abstractions hold sway. Human values are required to be reassembled and restored as a result of failings and pitfalls, which include war mongering, stoked by the availability of superior and sophisticated weaponry; moral bankruptcy, such as corruption and the corruptibility of power; pride; greed; rapacious avarice; religious fanaticism; and ethnic irredentism. They defray from humanism and all need to be eliminated for the re-affirmation of humanity. Among these pitfalls also is the robotisation and thingification of humanity, resulting from advanced technological innovation and artificial intelligence. By electing to deploy literature, music, and the media, among the diverse tools and fields of the humanities, to mediate its ideology, humanism, the thought of the choice of three, just three, rests on the three witches in the opening of William Shakespeares Macbeth. There is tempo-spatiality (time and space of when and where); there is so much metaphorical witchcraft in the arts all of them: literature, theatre, film, music, and the media. When you fold or scaffold time and ages into a few hours, hold eternity in the air, take on persons and characters into oneself, remove costumes and make-ups, and wake up instantly from death to active life without the miracle of Christ, confer immediacy upon news and the paces of news, record events into soundtracks and sound bites, and make them live in the real world, you confront the witchcraft and the magic of the arts the humanities. So, the idea of echoing the witches and their witchcraft is not too far-fetched; after all; it is not stretching the imagination too thin, as is done in our vocational engagement in the arts. The Yoruba Nollywood talks of Idan, which is magic. Apidan, the magic-makers, the theatricians, the actors, the storytellers, and the whole process of their art of creation on stage, screen, studios, and so on. And timing (the duration) of the clap-trap of lightning the age of cataclysm, violent eruptions in the streets, outright warfare, which is actually what the witches were referring to; plagues, epidemics and pandemics, tornadoes, massive flooding, ravaging fires, earthquakes; chaos, banditry, kidnapping, dystopia, and the likes. These do not make the echoes of witches, magic, and the cult of Iyas (mothers) too intriguing or too dissimilar to the world of the arts. In all the ages, writers covet the news space for self-expression to say the things that must be said urgently and to test the waters of their creation, as they form words from their thoughts poetry, prose, drama sketches. In that sense, there is an intriguing love relationship between the media and literature. Throughout time, men of letters seek refuge in the media, as they mould their blocks of expression that are later turned into books. The role of newspapers in the evolution of literature drew the writers into the waiting arms of the media, newspapers to be specific, in a relationship that has become permanent, as the newspapers, periodicals, and journals and their creators themselves became a new type of literature and literary artists. Therefore, from the 18th century on, the inventors of the periodical essays extended the tactic of the fictitious self into the new territory and became writers. All over the world, including in Nigeria, overt and subtle control proved incapable of stemming the growth of the media industry. The creeping in of censorship to control the opinions and feelings expressed in rapidly popularising media had begun to accommodate issues and topics on politics, the lives of public individuals and businesses. Its popularity generated the desire of governments to control what would come out in the newspaper the following morning. Patricians and politicians tried hard to control the press, to dictate its views, and to contain its criticisms, but in Britain (and I daresay everywhere, including in Nigeria), the media and literary realms and phenomena proved too large for such arrant limitations. Getting too hot and pinching the skin and the nerves, the government created licensers of the press to hunt down heretical and seditious publications and, through strict licensing laws, to limit the flow and narrow the range of newsprint, but whenever these laws lapsed, innovations in newspapers abounded before new forbidding laws were created. The bid to kill freedom of speech, arising from the gradual dehumanising capacity and strategies of the powerful, had been there and it remains with us today. We must reach out to our society where the contribution of the media in those early days of independence struggle was valiantly resisted by the colonial authority. The politicians (civilian and military) inherited that strategy to control and censor the media. The draconic decrees to muzzle and snuff out freedom of the press and literature are evidence of the descent from humanism, derived from debased and depraved corruption of power in our country and continent. Literature stands as a bridge-head between music and the media. Just as the media and literature are inextricably linked in a Siamese-twins relationship, so also do literature and music bond in close affinity such that, many times, it became difficult to draw distinct lines between the two. Poets were considered as failed musicians and musicians as failed poets, and when those whom the world consider pop culture musicians began to win the Nobel Prize for Literature (Bob Dylan, for instance), the separation line between the two blurs and melts into oblivion. Music became a friend of the media as literature, a friend of music, is the original friend of the media. So much for the justification of the meeting of three subfields of the humanities for mediating humanism! As succinctly captured above, humanism, which I consider the ideological plank of humanity, reclines on the principles of reason and rationality. To attain a better society where love, humane value, and freedom reign, away from excessive religiosity (not religion), the human agency places the power for individual action in some other forces outside of the self and has brought so much human destruction since many centuries ago. There abound myriad theories of humanism since the age of the Renaissance. For instance, humanistic psychology emerged in the mid-20th century as a rebuttal of the limiting cynicisms of Sigmund Freuds psychoanalytic theory, and B.F. Skinners behaviourism provides a perspective that emphasizes and stresses concepts such as free will and self-efficacy. In line with my offering above, humanism has been rendered as a philosophy that stresses the importance of human factors rather than looking at religious, divine, or spiritual matters. It is perceived as being rooted in the idea that people have an ethical responsibility to lead lives that are personally fulfilling while at the same breath, contributing to the greater good for all people. the media, music, and literature should become more prophetic and politically more engaged in raising mass awareness to restore, rekindle, and promote humanism and humanity. Also, the essentialist principle of humanism, which deals with identity retrieval and identity marking, should be more robustly engaged by the media through investigative and development journalism The essence of humanism is its advancement of the significance of human values and dignity. People possess the capacity to solve their problems through rational and scientific means to attain the fulfillment of individual and communal ideals and to transform the world into a better livable place for all people. For many centuries, the tragic emotions and irrationality that dominate religious dogmas and fanaticism, leading to extreme violent movements on intra-religious bases, have had lethal and mortal outcomes on humanity. To the media, the question is, how much information have they rendered to us in recent times, and in our search for truth which ought to promote peace but have provoked wars and battlements? I will like to write on the passionate assessment of the descent to the barbarism of the media traditional and social in Nigeria and elsewhere to get a perspective of the state of ours and the worlds media. On February 21, a prominent Nigerian female journalist, Kadaria Ahmed, gave a very passionate, captivating, and no holds barred address titled My Message to the Nigeria Media, whose altruism has been challenged by other prominent journalists. Kadaria Ahmeds address would have simply gone down as a classic on the need and essence of media practitioners to shun ethnic profiling and return to the traditional, noble profession of truth-telling and leading the nation aright in times of national crisis. Kadaria wrote thus: It is with a heavy heart, worried of Nigeria and a sense of impending doom That I am sending this to you, my colleagues, Let me begin with a question; What exactly will we gain if Nigeria descends into war? How does it advance us if our fellow citizens turn on each other And begin large scale ethnic killings against each other How does enabling ethnic strife help achieve this objective? For some time now, a lot of us has thrown away the book on ethical reporting Propelled by emotion, we have betrayed every moral consideration That assigns our noble profession But the critical probing to the other side of the coin happily carried out by Tayo Olu in The Whistler of February 15, titled Attack on Nigerian Media, has helped to put the attack by Kadaria in context, without necessarily defraying from the value of her address. Tayo Olu shed light on the reaction of Kadarias colleagues overt scathing criticism of journalists reportage of the herdsmen crisis in the country and for fanning the flames of ethnic hate through their coverage of the crisis involving mainly the Fulani ethnic group. Reactions came first from the Chairman of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) FCT Chapter, Emmanuel Ogbeche, Ibanga Isine of Next Edition, and Ekhator Ehi, among others. The rationale of these accusations and counter-accusations among media practitioners is the reality of crass partisanship in the media at a time when they should be the true watchdog of the common folks on whose behalf they ought to speak truth to power and denounce agents of violence and crime. At a time when our humanity is badly assailed on all fronts, the media should be a rallying point and not a house of raucous voices. The social media, on its part, has nearly swamped the traditional media in this digital age. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp, LinkedIn, and the likes have become dominant tools of engagement all over the world, and our country has embraced them irreversibly. Whereas it has increased the democratic space and has been deployed by both government and the citizens, it is radically redefining the nature of engagement (especially political) between the citizens and the state all over the world. It has also generated a lot of conflict and tension because of its massive usage and has brought the two into more direct interaction, and the government can no longer monopolise free speech. Its power (the power of technology that it uses) lies in its immediacy, speed, political reach, and its uncontrollability. It is projected that in the next few years in Nigeria, the deployment of social media will increase by more than 80 percent with more than 44 million people accessing online forms in a demography of about 200 million. The state worries about the potential of social media abuses to undermine the state and threaten the corporate existence of the nation. Yet, apart from its capacity to widen the space for dialogue, its economic development/utility reality, put at about 10 per cent of the nations gross domestic product and used by nearly 25 million people, makes it unstoppable in Nigeria. There is the debate of the mutual advantage of communication technology (in which Twitter is critical) to both government and the citizens and, thus, the increasing local, national, and international criticism of Twitters censor as impeding the nations humanity and freedom of expression. As this debate rages, the state must tread softly in its drive to hammer social media, recognise its universal nature, its mutual advantage in a democracy, and its humanising power. Taking due cognisance of the present realities in the country as imposed by the pandemic, we must wake to the need for science, technology, and the humanities to focus conversations on humanistic issues, and human and social welfare. We must also concentrate our efforts on the centrality of the human race, rather than building knowledge that will lead to its destruction and extinction. And to music, I find the danger of the descent of humanism pointedly depicted in the music of I. K. Dairo, as far back as the early sixties, and which still rings screamingly prophetic today. His album Ise Ori Ran mi ni mo se (loosely translated as I do the job assigned to me by destiny) ramifies this message of the need to restore humanism in society. Every line of this album warns against the dehumanising power of greed and self-debasement in the search for sudden and filthy wealth. The inordinate search for crass materialism demeans and dehumanises the world and sets it on the path of descending humanism. Many of our musicians: Fela, Idreez, and so on, make this frantic call on all us, especially the state, to pursue the path of a humanising society. As we all know, literature is a reflection of society, in the manner of a mirror. Beyond mere reflection, it refracts society in the way that the soul breathes life into the body. Literature, therefore, as an arm of the creative industry, endows, ennobles, and enriches a nations humanity. It advertises and tells its story. Politics and matters of an imperatively political nature have, for instance, in the African experience, preoccupied the literary establishment. Since the colonial aegis, our writers have put their songs and stories in the service of humanising our society, committed to the fact that the poet speaks not for himself only but also for his fellowmen. His cry is their cry, which only he can utter. All this is in the project of reconstructing society in the moment of declining, degenerating humanity, and the pursuit of viable nationhood and the world order. ADVERTISEMENT Generally speaking, Nigerias literature predating the fratricidal war of 1967 to 1970 was essentially in search of a certain socio-spiritual and cultural stability. This was especially so during the cultural nationalism phase, which set the tone for political independence from the hegemonic clutch of colonialism and imperialism. But the war, with all its absurdity and catastrophic devastation of the individual writers, due to suffering and the considerable loss of lives at very close and personal levels, compel the literary characterisation of the decline or indeed descent of our nations humanism. Even though I had described in a previous study on the Civil War, that the conflict wrought a serious body of national literature, its blight compelled a certain kind of dark pessimism and cynicism in the emerging visions. This may have been caused by the deep sense of loss, personal and collective, which the war generated. Okigbo died in the war, Soyinka suffered protracted solitary confinement, and Achebe and Clark, on different sides of the nations pole, carried huge emotional and psychological burdens. The sowing of regenerative seeds in the flesh of the country carried tragic overtones, as we found in some of the war and post-war writings. Additionally, the Nigerian Civil War is used as a background against which the human condition is examined in its perverseness. War is absurd and irrational. The regime of bestiality characterised by war pogroms and genocides which tend toward the deployment of technology and war weaponry, can lead to ultimate human extinction. Through war, wanton killing of ones kind, is the expression of the philosophy of the absurd and the descent from humanism. With the ravaging impact and the trauma inflicted by the COVID-19 pandemic, the arts of creation and creativity, with a positive, cathartic sensibility, have moved on, as we find in Of Shadows and Rainbows: Musings in Times of Covid (2021), a COVID-19, PEN Nigerian publication of poems, short stories, playlets, and essays that I edited along with Folu Agoi. Leaping out of the pages of this publication are lines from the authors gripped by emotions, paroxysms, compassion, searching for startling enlightenment, illumination and, in many cases, reconstructive tropes as an affirmation of humanism. Other evolving creative channels include the platform, All Poets Network (APNET), created to promote poetry in English and native languages in this pestilent era and administered by Dzukogi, Khalid Imam, Ola Ifatimehin, and Ismael Baba, to give voice to young and established poets from all continents of the world, and many more. The Nigerian society is going through a transition of bleakness and blight, which has raged since the war and truly never ended, reaching very precipitous climaxes, even under civil democracy. I have called it the descent from humanism which I have chosen to illustrate with music, the media, and literature. Unorthodox warfare through insurgency, insurrection, frightening banditry, armed herdsmen, lethal violence, dystopia, and wild social incoherence manifest our nations descent from humanism. The mediatory and recuperative essence and power have been explored here somewhat. Part of my recommendations is that the media, music, and literature should become more prophetic and politically more engaged in raising mass awareness to restore, rekindle, and promote humanism and humanity. Also, the essentialist principle of humanism, which deals with identity retrieval and identity marking, should be more robustly engaged by the media through investigative and development journalism, in tracking the concrete character and identity of the bandits, herdsmen, and other agencies of insurrection and insurgency on our land. Taking due cognisance of the present realities in the country as imposed by the pandemic, we must wake to the need for science, technology, and the humanities to focus conversations on humanistic issues, and human and social welfare. We must also concentrate our efforts on the centrality of the human race, rather than building knowledge that will lead to its destruction and extinction. Innovations should focus on the discovery of the inner human strength and capacities through critical and constructive reasoning to sustain humanity and the security of the coming generations. To conclude, in order to establish an inclusive democratic society for everyone, the nation, the states, in particular, should work in collaboration with agencies of humanism, as extolled in this essay, rather than foster mutual distrust and resentment. Olu Obafemi, a playwright, poet and author, is a professor of English and Dramatic Arts. This is an excerpt of the Convocation Lecture delivered during the 2021 Nigerian Academy of Letters Convocation. the authors critical examination of these issues including his intellectual orientation, his praxis, his ethno-regional location, his royal pedigree and privilege also constitutes a veritable ground for further contention. However, while the authors background and location define him, these essays show that they do not exhaust the authors intellectual, socio-economic, as well as political orientations and convictions. What I will like to do is to attempt to take forward the critical role of public intellection through the authors reflections in the book under review. But first a short story. In July 2019, I visited His Highness at the Gidan Rumfa in Kano to seek his views on a research project on the politics of austerity measures. At the end of the interview, we got talking briefly about Nigeria, as His Highness rearticulated some of the developmental plans he had for Kano while also mentioning some of the challenges he was facing. In response, I accused him of abandoning Nigeria for the Kano throne. He disagreed. He explained that apart from taking up the mantle of his heritage, there were important and urgent developmental challenges that needed to be addressed in Kano, in particular, and the north of Nigeria, in general, for which his position as the Sarkin Kano was critical. But I insisted that the more important and urgent developmental challenges in Nigeria, for which his likes were needed, would not allow him, in the long run, to accomplish most of the goals he set for himself as the Emir of Kano. The national body-politic was afflicted with multiple sclerosis, trying to save one of the limbs was therefore inadequate. What Nigeria needed were treatments that could ensure a speedy recovery from the attacks to the national brain and the central nervous system of the body-politic in order to modify the course of the disease and manage the symptoms. The problem in Kano and the north were manifestations of the fundamental problems of the Nigeria state. Thus, what needed saving first was not Kano; it was Nigeria. The appalling leadership in the State was only a reflection of the headship of the Nigerian state. The book that is being presented today in an affirmation that, despite his position on Kanos urgent salvation, the author has always recognised that Nigeria not only needed to be saved but that, correspondingly, as poet and humanist, Odia Ofeimun, insists Nigeria is eminently saveable. Though there is no question that time is running out on Nigeria, especially so in a moment of our national history when utter cluelessness, mixed with mindless indifference, has been turned into a matter of regime pride and even governmental swagger, there are still many who hold out some hope for Nigeria. For the Good of the Nation: Essays and Perspectives, which includes essays, conference papers, and three interviews, published over the last two decades, is not only a kind of manifesto by the author about Nigerias problems and possibilities, it is also a testament to the authors prodigy, as well as a demonstration of his eclectic, even if polemical, take on the most critical issues of our time. More significant is the fact that the book is a testimony to the authors faith in Nigerias possibilities and our collective future as a people. Whether he is reflecting on the debates on the restructuring of the federation, redistributive justice and radical democratic imagination, interrogating Muslim political thought in the modern world, the intellectual sources of Islamist identities, or engaging with Foucauldian philosophy in probing Muslim history and the discursive trends in Islamic law in the context of Nigerias ethno-regional and ethno-religious tensions, including the struggle among Nigerias ruling and ruining class, the authors specific liberal spirit and commitment to Nigeria is strongly reflected in this book. For instance, this spirit and commitment lead the author to embrace the liberating and liberationist ethos of Thomas Paine and Betrand Russell, even while rejecting their atheism. As my late friend, Pius Adesanmi, so able captures it in his Foreword to this book, the author demonstrates the core obligations of public intellection, not just in speaking truth to power, but also in stubbornly confronting, headlong, some of the complex or difficult issues of the Nigerian union, including those regarding the precept, nature and future of the union, the character of ethno-regional relations, as well as elite politics, religion and the politics of piety, and also the uncomfortable question of gender equality in northern Nigeria. This stubborn devotion to confronting uncomfortable questions leads the author, in Adesanmis words, to a humanising synthesis of disparate political traditions (p. xxxi) as a praxis of intervention which seeks to create a middle ground of mutual sympathies and comprehension in a national oasis of acrimony and misunderstanding (ibid). Thus, it is important in this review to foreground the authors critical commitment to public intellection about the most important questions of the age. Against this backdrop, the authors critical examination of these issues including his intellectual orientation, his praxis, his ethno-regional location, his royal pedigree and privilege also constitutes a veritable ground for further contention. However, while the authors background and location define him, these essays show that they do not exhaust the authors intellectual, socio-economic, as well as political orientations and convictions. A man of noble convictions does not have to be a nobleman. Therefore, that intellectual nobility is combined with the nobility of birth in this case is not natural. It is obvious from the essays that the authors social convictions developed over a lengthy period of both fascination with philosophical reflections from different historical eras, as well as open mindedness towards the world. It is striking that the man who has since become the leader of the Tijaniyya movement is also, in this book, the non-sectarian advocate for religious tolerance. One of the most significant goals of this volume, it seems to me, is how to ensure national survival. While the reader may not agree with the author about his diagnosis or prognosis, I suspect that most people across the political and ideological spectrum who are committed to national survival including both the proponents and opponents of restructuring or national conference will agree with the part of the book which speaks powerfully to the spirit of the theme of this book: For the Good of the Nation. There are a range of issues, ideas, and praxis for the reader to engage with in this almost 500 page thought-provoking and in some cases, provocative book. I will point to two of these issues as illustrations of the authors deep reflections, fine intellection, as well as profound, even if contentious, declamations about the Nigerian condition. The first is about the political conditions of Nigeria. I place this under the episteme of national survival that is, in Foucauldian terms, the implicit [and explicit] rules of formation which governs what constitutes legitimate forms of knowledge about the essential character of the Nigerian state in this age. This includes ethno-regional and ethno-religious relations and tensions, the structure of the federation, and the nature and process of recruitment for national leadership. The author who dismisses the Afenifere and Ohaneze,and following Balarabe Musa, accuses the Yoruba bourgeoisie of representing the greatest problem to nation-building (p. 23) in the first year of Obasanjos presidency, is the same who affirms that Chief Obafemi Awolowo and Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe were, unlike Sir Ahmadu Bello, right in pursuing a strong centre within a federal structure, while concluding that The Northern bourgeoisie and the Yoruba bourgeoisie have conspired to keep the Igbo out of the scheme of things (p. 24). While he rejects the attempts to make all Northern Muslims to take responsibility for what he describes as the un-Islamic actions of past northern leaders (p. 37), and rejects a crude and cruel caricature of the Northern Muslim, the author concedes that it is a caricature that finds credibility in the abundance of evidence (p. 227), even while adding in another essay that if there is anything [about] which the political leadership of the North stands guilty as charged, it would be its contemptible and cowardly silence, its tolerance of evil and its open fraternisation with despots. As an example, the silence of Emirs and many notable political and religious leaders in the face of the injustice to which Chief M.K.O. Abiola was subjected is inexplicable (pp. 37-38). It is no wonder he didnt keep silent when he also became an emir. (Although, the reigning emirs might respond that no wonder he is no longer an emir!) Also, the author agrees with most of what northern Christians have to say about northern Muslim elite (p. 55), even while insisting that the northern Muslim poor, perhaps more so than northern Christians, have been visited with adversity by the northern elite. One of the most significant goals of this volume, it seems to me, is how to ensure national survival. While the reader may not agree with the author about his diagnosis or prognosis, I suspect that most people across the political and ideological spectrum who are committed to national survival including both the proponents and opponents of restructuring or national conference will agree with the part of the book which speaks powerfully to the spirit of the theme of this book: For the Good of the Nation. I will quote the author: there is a second, perhaps more fundamental reason, for discussing the structure of the federation. It is the reality that the elite merely exploit or manipulate the secondary contradictions in our polity. They neither created nor concocted them. The historical process which brought together these heterogeneous groups was never destined to achieve a magical and immediate erosion of their histories and a total submersion of their identities into a common national milieu. [Thus] the task of nation-building does not lie in ignoring these differences, as the military have tried to do. Unity is not necessarily synonymous with uniformity. But it also does not lie in a defeatist attitude of despair or a return to a nihilist era of ethnic agendas and tribal warfare. The tragedy of Nigeria does not lie in its diversity, nor in its population, nor in its resources. Our tragedy lies in the lack of a truly nationalist and visionary leadership, an elite that harnesses the diverse streams that flow into the melting pot called Nigeria (p. 5). Against this background, I strongly recommend that you read the authors take on federalism and state creation, as well as his take on the experiences of the northern minorities and the Igbo in the post-Civil War era. The second is about the explication, explanation and/or reconsideration of Islam, the role of Islam in Nigerias history, as well as the philosophical reflections on Islam and modernity, and the implications of theocratic praxis for the future of Nigeria. In his role as an explainer and defender of Islam and Islamic theology and even Islamic jurisprudence in order to achieve rationality within and outside the Islamic world towards acomplishing inter-cultural understanding and inter-faith dialogue, the author, as the book shows, has been assailed by doctrinaire Islamists, as well as non-Muslims. But as a polymath who is also a theologian, one who is as confident about his knowledge in Islamic jurisprudence, as well as the arcane philosophy of ancient Greece, the author competently takes on both the adherents and outsiders or traducers of Islam on different issues, including the Shariah, gender relations within Islam and in the larger contemporary society. One of the key issues that the author attempts to settle in this book is the conflation of culture/tradition with Islam. He engages in an intricate analysis of tradition and culture in ancient Arabia, and tradition and culture in Northern Nigeria in order to separate both from Islamic religion. This is in response to the religious precepts mobilised ignorantly, in his view, by the clerics for instance, in the treatment of women. One key question that the author does not address in this book, which I will suggest he needs to take up in the volume that will follow the book is on the practical steps necessary in producing the kind of leadership that he preaches for in this book. If indeed the fundamental problem of Nigeria, as he argues, is leadership, what is to be done, particularly about ensuring that people of goodwill who have the needed capacity are able to be at the helm of affairs in Nigeria? For all his intellectual exertions in explicating the conditions of an egalitarian national life, particularly his virulent critique of the conditions of poverty in the North and the misinterpretations of Islamic doctrines, the author has been a target of critics. As he writes in the book, My interventions have been received with not a little discomfort, but truthful discourse is no respecter of sensibilities (p. 226). Some, as he acknowledges, have even described him as an arrogant secularist who claims to destabilize the noble edifice of Northern Muslim society, a pretender to being a reformer in the league of Dan Fodio, an agent of the West and dealer in usury, a Marxist who places reason above revelation (p. 330). In a sense, the author wears this criticism as a badge of honour. Why? Because it reveals the kind of misunderstanding and denunciation that serious public intellection exposes one to. I will add that it is significant that the author has been accused of all these. Despite the irony of accusing the caliph of the Tijaniyya Movement of being a secularist, I think that what these collection of essays show is the complex nature of the thought and praxis of the author. An able and nimble mind and one of the most cerebral and controversial Nigerians of his age, the author, as this book again demonstrates, remains a compelling puzzle even in a sense, an oxymoron: a Nobleman Rebel, or Rebel Nobleman. He is as fierce and committed a defender of the tradition and privilege of royalty, as he is a fiery and unhampered instigator of dissent and discontent among the underprivileged; he is as comfortable in a pinstripe suit with bow tie or a Chairman Mao suit, as he is in the long flowing gown and regal costume of Kano royalty complete with a veil over his face; he is as suave in the company of global and local aristocrats, billionaires and leaders, as he is as unpretentious among the commoners and poor pupils learning the tarteel. This compelling puzzle is partly why he attracts the kind of criticism referenced above and also partly why this book recommends itself for close attention. But the cardinal reason why this book is important is not merely because of the tension between nobility and rebellion that the author represents; in my view, it is because of the cardinal concern of the reflections on the future of Nigeria. And what a fitting moment to reflect again on the future of what many from one extreme of Boko Haram would-be theocrats to the other extreme of ethno-regional secessionists regard as Lugards bastard child. One key question that the author does not address in this book, which I will suggest he needs to take up in the volume that will follow the book he is now completing at Oxford on his Central Bank years, is on the practical steps necessary in producing the kind of leadership that he preaches for in this book. If indeed the fundamental problem of Nigeria, as he argues, is leadership, what is to be done, particularly about ensuring that people of goodwill who have the needed capacity are able to be at the helm of affairs in Nigeria? What is to be done to ensure that the electorate themselves stop recruiting one incompetent man after another? Let me conclude on what we might call a hopeful note. The author was conscious of the implications of some of his dark prognosis about the Nigerian condition. Therefore, in the first essay, Issues in Restructuring Corporate Nigeria, he writes, But the audience may ask, is there any hope for this country? My answer is yes. One of the reasons for his position was because of his generation of young, educated Nigerians ready to take up the gauntlet, and ignite the hopes, for a renewed Nigeria. When he wrote this, he was 38. The author is no longer that young. At 60, does he retain this hope? If he does, the hope is not shared by many contemporary young people from those lining behind Nnamdi Kanu and those behind Sunday Adeyemi (Sunday Igboho) to the Boko Haram aspiring theocrats. What is to be done about those who have given up on Nigeria including the millions who may not be organising for another country but are truly sick of the existing one? What is the role of public intellection in responding to this moment that appears like the eve of the tragic denouement in Nigerias history? This is where the authors harsh judgement on the Nigerian elite is relevant. Many believe that if Nigeria collapses, the masses will suffer most. That is true. But it is also true that members of the parasitic Nigerian elite cannot survive in any space on planet earth other than Nigeria. It is therefore in their paramount interest to ensure the good of the nation. Hence, in this moment in our national history when the future of Nigeria appears hazy, this collection of essays and perspectives leads us back to that important but underappreciated epic song by Sonny Okosuns, Which Way Nigeria? That song speaks directly to the theme of this book. I believe that beyond the polemics of the essays in the book, beyond the matters we agree or disagree on, beyond the authors pedigree, his philosophical engagements with politics, religion and society, and his intellectual fascination with contrarian praxis, beyond all these, is the faith, as the book affirms, that binds us together in this potentially great but much abused polity. Against this backdrop, I leave you with the core message of this book which is captured in Sonny Okosuns charge: Lets save Nigeria, so Nigeria wont die! Wale Adebanwi, until recently, the Rhodes Professor of Race Relations, University of Oxford, United Kingdom, is the Presidential Penn Compact Professor of Africana Studies, University of Pennsylvania. ADVERTISEMENT This is a review of For the Good of the Nation: Essays and Perspectives by Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, published by Alfa Communications Ltd, Lagos, 2021. Presented at the Eko Hotel, Lagos, on Tuesday, August 24. ADVERTISEMENT Okun people of Kogi West senatorial district have demanded the zoning of the governorship seat of the state in 2023 to the district. They also asked the state government to establish a university in their area, as have been established in the two other districts. They made the demand in a statement by the president general of Okun Development Association (ODA), Femi Mokikan, which he issued on Thursday on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the creation of Kogi State. According to the statement, the district is the only one that has not produced a governor since the creation of the state in 1991. On the 2023 governorship election, for the purpose of equity, fairness and justice, the time has come for Okun land and Kogi West to present the next Governor of Kogi State. As a matter of fact, The Igalas have produced three different Governors namely, Late Prince Abubakar Audu, Alhaji Ibrahim Idris and Captain Idris Ichala Wada while Ebiras are presently occupying the Lugard House for the second term. More than 30 years now, the Okun people are the most marginalised major ethnic group in Kogi State in the area of employment, appointment, project execution until recently when there was paradigm shift in the present administration of Alhaji Yahaya Bello, the Executive Governor of Kogi State. On assumption of office, the governor introduced a policy known as EBIGO AGENDA, meaning Ebira, Igala and Okun Agenda. This primary purpose of introducing EBIGO was to promote unity and oneness of the Government and people of Kogi State with the sole aim of portraying the interest of Kogi first above individual or selfish interest. Without an iota of doubt, the EBIGO agenda is commendable and one of the best move of the New Direction Government of Alhaji Yahaya Bello as it has confirmed that Kogi State belongs to all, Igalas, Ebiras and Okuns as against the claims of some quarters in the past. Worthy of note and encomiums is the institutionalisation of this agenda in the area of appointments (both civil service and political), allocation and execution of projects. This is why Okun people will continue to be grateful to Kogi Governor for the establishment of one of largest Rice Mill in Ejiba, Yagba West Local Government Area. Also, in the health sector, we are glad with the ongoing construction work at Isanlu General Hospital, Yagba East LGA, while the rehabilitation of the Kabba township road is no doubt a step in the right direction. As Kogi State Celebrates its 30 years of creation, it important to state that Okun is lacking behind as it is the only Area in the State without a university as the East has the Prince Abubakar Audu University, Anyigba while the Central has the New Confluence University of Science and Technology, Osara. This is why were appealing to the State Government to as a matter of fact establish a university in Okun land to justify the equity, fairness and justice that form the mantras of the present administration. We also appeal to President Muhammadu Buhari to urgently sign into law the bill establishing Federal University of Agriculture, Kabba as done for some states in Nigeria recently. At this Juncture, we implore our people in Kabba-Bunu, Ijumu, Mopa/Amuro, Yagba East and West Local Government Areas as well as Oworo land to come out en-masse and participate in the Voters registration by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). If we want continue to maintain the current political participation, it wont speak well for us and our children in future. We call on our people in Diaspora to motivate their children of 18 years and above to register for their PVCs at their respective LGAs. This is because we need to increase our voting strength. For the EBIGO Agenda of this Administration to be institutionalized for even posterity sake, the next Gubernatorial Candidate should be zoned to Kogi West. By so doing, Governor Yahaya Bello will be leaving a legacy of unity that informed the introduction of the Ebira, Igala and Okun Agenda. Finally, we congratulate the governor on the 30th Anniversary of the state and our prayer is that God grant him the wisdom and good health to do more for the state. Kogi State is expected to elect a new governor in 2023 to succeed Governor Bello who will be rounding off his constitutionally allowerd two-terms of eight years in office by then. ADVERTISEMENT The Lagos Independent Electoral Commission (LASIEC) ad-hoc staff at the last local government polls have cried out over non-payment of their allowances one month after the election was held. Some of the affected ad-hoc staff told journalists in Lagos on Wednesday that LASIEC was yet to pay for services rendered for the July 24 elections into 20 LGAs and 37 LCDAs in the state. One of the ad-hoc staff who worked as Presiding Officer in Kosofe area, Segun Komolafe, told journalists that LASIEC had not paid him one month after the poll. Mr Komolafe said that LASIEC kept telling them to be patient, adding that they were running out of patience after one month of waiting in vain for the commission. Patient till when, how much are they paying us that we have to wait till eternity? he asked. Another presiding officer, who requested not to be named, said they were tired of waiting for the money they had worked for. When will our waiting come to an end? If nothing is done this week, we may have to besiege the commissions office with protests if that is what they want, she said. Reacting, the Spokesperson for the commission, Tope Ojo, said about 90 per cent of the ad-hoc staff had been paid. Mr Ojo explained that the payment was being done in batches, from one local government to another. We have paid 90 per cent of the ad-hoc staff, those who have not been paid may be having discrepancies in their account details which is being sorted out, I can assure you that all will be paid between now and next week. READ ALSO: Then, there are people who registered on our website and did not work at the end of the day. We need to sought all these out so we dont pay the wrong persons. These are the reasons for the delay in some of the LGs that have not been paid, he said. Also, the Chairman, Lagos State House of Assembly Committee on LASIEC, Victor Akande, when contacted, urged those who had not been paid to be patient with the commission as the matter was being handled. (NAN) ADVERTISEMENT Akin Abayomi, the Lagos State commissioner for health, says 10 persons have died from COVID-19 related complications in two days. Mr Abayomi disclosed this on his Facebook account @ProfAkinolaAbayomi on Thursday, while giving the states COVID-19 update for both days. He said the 10 deaths, recorded between August 24 and 25, increased the number of the states fatalities to 525. The commissioner, however, did not give additional information on the sex and age of the deceased persons. Two prominent persons were reported dead from COVID-19 complications in Lagos, this week. Biyi Durojaiye, a fourth republic senator, died on Monday at the age of 88. On Wednesday, the Lagos State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party announced the passing of its chairman, Dominic Adegbola. He was 73. Mr Abayomi said that 5,874 tests were conducted on the reported days, out of which 610 new COVID-19 infections were confirmed. The new infections increased the states total COVID-19 infections to 71,544, he said. According to the commissioner, 4,135 persons with active COVID-19 cases are currently receiving treatment under the states home-based care. He said 61,880 out of the infected persons had so far recovered in various communities, while 4,764 recovered in the states COVID-19 isolation centres. READ ALSO: Mr Abayomi disclosed that, currently, there were 240 patients receiving treatment in the states COVID-19 isolation centres. The commissioner added that the total number of COVID-19 tests conducted in the state since the outbreak of the pandemic stood at 672, 549. Earlier, Mr Abayomi had advised residents to get vaccinated and continue to adhere to all COVID-19 non-pharmaceutical protocols in order to reduce their exposure to the virus. The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that the state on August 25 began the administration of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at the 183 designated vaccination sites across the state. (NAN) LEWIS [mdash] Richard A. "Corky" Griffin, 71, of Lewis, passed away unexpectedly, Monday, Aug. 30, 2021, at his home. He was born in Lewis on Oct. 7, 1949, son of the late Benjamin Hastings and Evalina Griffin. Corky worked for Cornwright's Lumber Mill for many years. He is survived by his c Southbury, CT (06488) Today Showers and thundershowers this evening will give way to steady rain overnight. Low 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 2 to 3 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Showers and thundershowers this evening will give way to steady rain overnight. Low 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 2 to 3 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. The only Canadian company, and one of ten globally, chosen for prestigious Tech For Our Planet program at COP26, designed to spark environmental change and help the world reach its net zero targets MONTREAL, Aug. 19, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- BrainBox AI, a pioneer in predictive and self-adaptive commercial building technology, is proud to announce its participation in the Tech For Our Planet challenge program, an initiative at the upcoming 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) empowering new technology that is accelerating the global goal of carbon neutrality. BrainBox AI has been selected by the UK Government to display its technology in Challenge 3 Thinking Smart, which is dedicated to solutions that can capture and share data to better predict and manage energy consumption. In the three months leading into COP26, which will be held in November in Glasgow, BrainBox AI will demonstrate the benefits of grid-interactive buildings to achieve net zero objectives for the electrical grid. A market leader in the cleantech and proptech sectors for its commercial building technology, BrainBox AI is one of just ten start-up companies chosen to participate in the program, which is run by the UK Government and PUBLIC, a leading govtech company dedicated to helping solve public sector issues. "BrainBox AI is excited to present our groundbreaking artificial intelligence technology as part of COP26's showcase of some of the top companies helping to save our planet for future generations," says Sam Ramadori, President of BrainBox AI. "The recent IPCC Report laid out in stark terms how the Earth is transforming in unprecedented ways. Reducing carbon emissions and other greenhouse gases may be our only chance to limit destruction to our climate. By implementing technologies like BrainBox AI in one of the world's greatest energy consumers, buildings, we can turn the tide and help the real estate industry play its part in stopping the effects of climate change." BrainBox AI offers artificial intelligence (AI) to combat climate change by making commercial buildings smarter and more efficient. Its flagship product, currently installed in over 100,000,000 sq. ft. of real estate across 17 countries, combines AI and cloud computing to create a fully autonomous commercial heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) solution. Through seamless communication with building management systems (BMS), the technology optimizes HVAC systems in real-time, permitting the existing infrastructure to become predictive and self-adaptive, while significantly reducing energy consumption and emissions. BrainBox AI's deep learning and cloud-based computing algorithms produce a saving in total energy costs of up to 25%, a 20 - 40% reduction in carbon footprint and a 60% increase in occupant comfort. Building operators can also see up to 50% extension in the service life of the HVAC equipment. This month, BrainBox AI activated its global monitoring network, which provides 24/7 support and HVAC system analysis to its customers around the world. In 2020, BrainBox AI was recognized by TIME as one of the Top 100 best inventions and by CB Insights as one of the Top 100 AI start-ups redefining industries in 2021. The company is also a member of the MaRS Discovery District, the largest urban innovation hub in North America. About BrainBox AI BrainBox AI was created in 2017 with the goal of redefining building automation through artificial intelligence to be at the forefront of a green building revolution. Headquartered in Montreal, a global AI hub, BrainBox AI has a workforce of over 100 employees and supports real estate clients in numerous sectors, including office buildings, airports, hotels, multi-residential, long-term care facilities, grocery stores and commercial retail. BrainBox AI works in collaboration with research partners including the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), the Institute for Data Valorization (IVADO) as well as educational institutions including Montreal's Ecole de technologie superieure (ETS) and McGill University. Learn more about BrainBox AI. Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1598075/BrainBox_AI_BrainBox_AI_to_Showcase_Its_Innovative_Technology_at.jpg Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1598083/BrainBox_AI_BrainBox_AI_to_Showcase_Its_Innovative_Technology_at.jpg For media inquiries: Perry Goldman, Montieth & Company, [email protected]; Source BrainBox AI Inc., Bradley Grill, Director of Public Relations, [email protected] SOURCE BrainBox AI - Commits to creating 500 jobs in the next three years as part of its continued expansion across Canada TORONTO and BENGALURU, India, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Infosys (NSE: INFY) (BSE: INFY) (NYSE: INFY), a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting, today announced that it will establish a new digital development centre at its largest Canadian office in Mississauga. This is aimed at creating 500 high quality jobs in the Toronto Region over the next three years. Spanning nearly 50,000 square feet and bringing significant investment from Infosys to the country, this digital development centre will train, upskill, and reskill employees in the technologies needed to help Canadian businesses accelerate their digital transformation. It will also enable Infosys to better collaborate with clients to develop cross-functional solutions to pressing business challenges. Infosys, in the Toronto Region, currently serves businesses in the financial services, healthcare, communications, retail, and natural resources sectors. Artificial intelligence, data science, automation, and machine learning are the core capabilities that this centre would nurture and expand. In response to surging demand for training, re-skilling, and learning by employers, Infosys previously committed to double its Canadian workforce to 4,000 employees by 2023. The digital development centre will play a key role in this expansion and lead the building of digital capabilities and training for the next generation of IT talent to support Canadian businesses. "We are proud to power digital Canada through the skills of the future and do our part in supporting post-pandemic economic recovery. The Toronto Region met all of our criteria when deciding where to set up the digital development centre, create new jobs and scale our business offerings," said Ravi Kumar, President, Infosys. "Talent and high-tech know-how are in abundance, there is a real aptitude for new workplace development strategies, and many of our clients are based here. Even better, this will enable us to be part of an ecosystem that reaches across the region, linking the private sector with innovative research and learning institutions in Canada," he added. While the digital development centre is the first-of-its-kind in Canada for Infosys, it is based on the proven model of six similar digital centres in the U.S. which hire from local colleges and provide training and digital career paths. Infosys' unique training and education infrastructure builds a tech-savvy and agile workforce with the skills and experience that clients need to become fully digital businesses. Infosys has seen exponential growth in Canada and is firmly committed to strengthening its presence and hiring top tech talent across major hubs. Within the last two years, Infosys has created thousands of jobs across Toronto, Vancouver, Ottawa, Montreal, and most recently, Calgary. The company hires graduates from 14+ local post-secondary educational institutions, such as the University of Toronto and University of Waterloo, to build a strong pipeline of tech talent. In 2021, it was recognized as one of the Best Places to Work in Canada, according to Glassdoor. "Ontario's deep talent pool, cutting edge innovation ecosystem, and competitive business costs make our province an ideal place for investment," said Ontario Minister of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade, Vic Fedeli. "We thank Infosys for investing in Ontario's post-pandemic recovery by developing this global competency hub, tapping local talent, and partnering with local academic institutions to help develop a skilled workforce that will deliver new solutions, and, in turn, help other businesses thrive and grow." "We are thrilled that Infosys has chosen to invest in Mississauga and has committed to bringing hundreds of jobs along with training opportunities to our local workforce," said Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie. "This announcement is a testament to the talent we have in Mississauga as well as our world-class ICT sector, which is one of the largest in the country. The arrival of Infosys will play a significant role in economic recovery and growth, not only here in Mississauga but also across the entire Greater Toronto Area," she added. The launch of this digital development centre and accompanying jobs commitment were announced at the virtual Infosys Canada C-Suite Forum today where executives shared strategies to reshape business for resilience and success in the post-pandemic world. To walk through the Infosys Mississauga Development Centre, please click the link below and use the cursor to navigate your way virtually: https://mpembed.com/show/?m=hjCkdQ2kbU2&custombillboard=1&minimap=2&bgmusic=https://www.bensound.com/bensound-music/bensound-summer.mp3 About Infosys Infosys is a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting. We enable clients in more than 50 countries to navigate their digital transformation. With over four decades of experience in managing the systems and workings of global enterprises, we expertly steer our clients through their digital journey. We do it by enabling the enterprise with an AI-powered core that helps prioritize the execution of change. We also empower the business with agile digital at scale to deliver unprecedented levels of performance and customer delight. Our always-on learning agenda drives their continuous improvement through building and transferring digital skills, expertise, and ideas from our innovation ecosystem. Visit www.infosys.com to see how Infosys (NSE: INFY) (BSE: INFY) (NYSE: INFY) can help your enterprise navigate your next. Safe Harbor Certain statements in this release concerning our future growth prospects, financial expectations and plans for navigating the COVID-19 impact on our employees, clients and stakeholders are forward-looking statements intended to qualify for the 'safe harbor' under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, which involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties relating to these statements include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding COVID-19 and the effects of government and other measures seeking to contain its spread, risks related to an economic downturn or recession in India, the United States and other countries around the world, changes in political, business, and economic conditions, fluctuations in earnings, fluctuations in foreign exchange rates, our ability to manage growth, intense competition in IT services including those factors which may affect our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed-price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, industry segment concentration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks or system failures, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, the success of the companies in which Infosys has made strategic investments, withdrawal or expiration of governmental fiscal incentives, political instability and regional conflicts, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, unauthorized use of our intellectual property and general economic conditions affecting our industry and the outcome of pending litigation and government investigation. Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our United States Securities and Exchange Commission filings including our Annual Report on Form 20-F for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2021. These filings are available at www.sec.gov. Infosys may, from time to time, make additional written and oral forward-looking statements, including statements contained in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our reports to shareholders. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the Company unless it is required by law. Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/633365/Infosys_Logo.jpg SOURCE Infosys BRONX, N.Y., Aug. 24, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and the City University of New York Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy (CUNY SPH) have been awarded a five-year, $14.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to continue leading and expand their research on HIV treatment and care in five Central African nations. The new award builds on previous NIH-funded work by the Central Africa International epidemiology Databases to Evaluate AIDS (CA-IeDEA), a large-scale study involving more than forty researchers and tens of thousands of patients living with HIV/AIDS in Burundi, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Republic of Congo, and Rwanda. The effort began more than a decade ago and has been co-led by Kathryn Anastos, M.D., professor of medicine, of epidemiology & public health, of obstetrics & gynecology and women's health at Einstein, co-director emerita of the Global Health Center, and an internist at Montefiore Health System. CA-IeDEA is one of seven regional centers that belong to a larger global research consortium, the International epidemiology Databases to Evaluate AIDS (IeDEA). The IeDEA teams consolidate and analyze vast amounts of health data so that researchers can study high-priority questions on HIV treatment and care. CA-IeDEA focuses on determining successful strategies that lead to improved outcomes for people living with HIV. These approaches include timely diagnosis and enrollment into care, engaging and keeping patients in care, and rapid initiation of antiretroviral therapy (ART) to reduce the risk of death and further transmission of the virus. More than 86,000 people have enrolled in CA-IeDEA at participating sites in the five countries since the program was launched in 2006. There are nearly 40,000 people currently receiving HIV care at 21 CA-IeDEA sites. The five countries that comprise the center are among those with the greatest burden of HIV infection in the world. In addition to Dr. Anastos, the two other principal investigators on the new CA-IeDEA grant are Marcel Yotebieng, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H. associate professor of medicine at Einstein, and Denis Nash, Ph.D., M.P.H., distinguished professor of epidemiology and executive director of the Institute for Implementation Science in Population Health (ISPH) at CUNY SPH. Combating HIV/AIDS in Central Africa The grant will provide continued support for CA-IeDEA's existing projects and fund three new initiatives: the collection of data on cardiovascular and other noncommunicable diseases to understand how these conditions affect older African adults living with HIV; a research program for adolescents living with HIV, including those who were infected around the time of birth; and studies of people co-infected with tuberculosis that will measure lung function impairment and risk of recurrence after successful treatment. "This new award will allow us to expand our clinical reach and research focus, enrolling more children and adults with HIV/AIDS who visit health clinics in urban and rural areas in our five partner countries," Dr. Anastos said. "Our overall goal is to increase access to HIV services and improve outcomes for patients, including not only successful initiation of ART, but also diagnosis and treatment of metabolic and cardiovascular diseases." Researchers will share anonymized data sets with public health experts and non-governmental organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO). "Larger samples from a variety of patients can help us understand critical questions," said Dr. Yotebieng. "For example, what are the experiences of adolescents living with AIDS, how do they transition to adult care, and how can they benefit more from treatments? A major aim we have is leveraging implementation science approacheslooking at ways services are delivered, what gaps exist, and how to close them." Mentoring Researchers A key part of the grant supports training local scientists and building capacity to sustain research initiatives. "In any country, it takes decades to 'grow' a new community of researchers, and it requires an infrastructure that can nurture them," said Dr. Anastos. "We're putting in place a system to mentor and provide statistical and study design assistance to junior investigators in Africa, so they can ask and answer the questions they want to tackle." Multiregional research Dr. Nash will lead the team's involvement in multiregional research that includes assessing the varying success rates of antiretroviral therapy across the seven IeDEA regions. This has included CA-IeDEA's leadership in assessing "Treat All," the 2015 World Health Organization guidelines to treat all individuals upon diagnosis of HIV regardless of CD4 cell count, as well as the development of IeDEA's consensus statement on research priorities to optimize the guideline's impact on people living with HIV. The CA-IeDEA team is also seeking additional funding to examine the influence of climate change on HIV care and outcomes among the more than 2 million patients who have enrolled at IeDEA-participating sites in 44 countries since 2004. The team will compare data on global temperature and rainfall with that from IeDEA to determine the effect of extreme weather, if any, on patients. "National governments, normative bodies, and global funders, including WHO, UNAIDS, and PEPFAR, have not adequately factored climate-related data into short- and long-term planning, largely because studies like the one we are planning have not been done," said Dr. Nash. The grant is titled "Central Africa International Epidemiology databases to Evaluate Aids" (2U01AI096299-13). About Albert Einstein College of Medicine Albert Einstein College of Medicine is one of the nation's premier centers for research, medical education and clinical investigation. During the 2020-21 academic year, Einstein is home to 721 M.D. students, 178 Ph.D. students, 109 students in the combined M.D./Ph.D. program, and 265 postdoctoral research fellows. The College of Medicine has more than 1,900 full-time faculty members located on the main campus and at its clinical affiliates. In 2020, Einstein received more than $197 million in awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This includes the funding of major research centers at Einstein in aging, intellectual development disorders, diabetes, cancer, clinical and translational research, liver disease, and AIDS. Other areas where the College of Medicine is concentrating its efforts include developmental brain research, neuroscience, cardiac disease, and initiatives to reduce and eliminate ethnic and racial health disparities. Its partnership with Montefiore, the University Hospital and academic medical center for Einstein, advances clinical and translational research to accelerate the pace at which new discoveries become the treatments and therapies that benefit patients. Einstein runs one of the largest residency and fellowship training programs in the medical and dental professions in the United States through Montefiore and an affiliation network involving hospitals and medical centers in the Bronx, Brooklyn and on Long Island. For more information, please visit einsteinmed.org, read our blog, follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook , and view us on YouTube. About the CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy The CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy (CUNY SPH) is committed to teaching, research and service that creates a healthier New York City and helps promote equitable, efficient and evidence-based solutions to pressing health problems facing cities around the world. For more information, visit sph.cuny.edu. Twitter @CUNYSPH. SOURCE Albert Einstein College of Medicine Neurohacker Collective makes the Qualia brand of health supplements. And the breakthrough product they've just released to address digital eye strain is called Qualia Vision . The Qualia brand first rose to prominence in 2016 with its brain health and nootropic formulations. Since that time, the San Diego area startup has experienced strong growth by using novel formulation techniques premised on the emerging field of whole systems science. Instead of only a few ingredients per "formula", or a "kitchen sink" approach of combining many ingredients with minimally researched synergistic relationships, the science team at Neurohacker has a contrastingly strong commitment to holistic formulation. Every ingredient in a Qualia formula is dosed and selected based on the most optimal synergies it has with all other ingredients in a particular formula. The Qualia brand has recently applied this sophisticated technique to formulations well beyond brain health, including: sleep support, immune support, and aging support in an ever-growing lineup. Now with Qualia Vision, this unique brand hopes to offer the market the first truly comprehensive nutritional defense against digital eye strain. Nutrition for visual health is just starting to become more refined in product offerings. Most people remain unaware that ingredients like bilberry, amla fruit, goji berry, and saffron, can combine to create relief from digital eye strain, and the associated irritation, blurry vision, dryness, and visual fatigue. There is rapidly increasing interest in this niche of nutrition as approximately 60% of the global population now is online, normalizing hours of digital screen exposure to the majority of humanity. Additionally, the increasing popularization of online gaming is creating hobbies and careers high in both digital screen exposure and visual acuity needed while performing. Add in the 74% of U.S. workers who now use a computer as part and parcel of their job, and specialized nutrition for visual health is fast becoming a universal need. Qualia Vision combines the ingredients previously listed with many more (9 in total) for a comprehensive regimen against digital eye strain (while also supporting general visual health) in just 1 capsule a day. The Qualia brand is staying true to form with this release, continuing to push the frontier of nutritional science, gaining endorsements along the way from A-list health and wellness influencers like Dave Asprey and Ben Greenfield. Qualia Vision is entering a void in nutritional science with a comprehensive digital eye strain product that also has an extremely competitive price point. Just 20 dollars lets consumers try a month's supply of Qualia Vision with a 100 day money back guarantee. "From the award-winning Lutemax 2020 for macula health and blue-light filtering ...to the MirtoSelect Bilberry that's been used in 60+ studies and protects photoreceptors and the surface of the eye ...Qualia Vision is providing the nourishment hard-working eyes need to perform at their best."--Gregory Kelly, Director of Product Development at Neurohacker. With digital eye strain producing both short-term annoyances and general visual health concerns, Qualia Vision is perfectly suited for recent generations bombarded by digital devices, while the low cost brings it in range for most of Gen X, Millennials, and even Gen Z bombarded by the digital era. As Qualia brand continues to diversify across a widening bevy of human needs, this latest formulation may be the most pioneering, and trendsetting, to date. About Neurohacker Collective Neurohacker Collective was founded in 2015 with the mission to advance human quality of life by creating best-in-class well-being products. Neurohacker Collective's products are radically different because they employ a unique methodology to research and development based on complex systems science. This scientific approach focuses on supporting the body's ability to self-regulate. The company began with a focus on cognitive products with the launch of Qualia Mind and has since developed products to support sleep, longevity, energy, vision and immunity. Learn more about their scientific approach by going to neurohacker.com. SOURCE Neurohacker Collective Related Links http://www.neurohacker.com ATLANTA, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Officials from Atlanta Public Schools (APS) and Ed Farm will announce a first-of-its-kind, two-part fellowship initiative that will prepare 100 district educators to develop, support, and provide real-world personalized and future-ready learning experiences for students. The initiative is developed to also spark students' interest in attending Historically Black Colleges or Universities. (HBCUs). Through the Innovation Fellows program, Ed Farm technology specialists will equip the cohort of educators in the district with technology-based skills and strategies to support active learning by using innovative resources and teaching strategies to create stimulating learning environment for their students, whether virtually or in person. "Technology is rapidly changing the dynamics of the future workforce. This initiative allows for the preparation of a more inclusive, empowered and technologically savvy workforce," said Clark Atlanta University President George T. French, Jr. Ph.D. We are excited about this partnership between Atlanta Public Schools and Ed Farm and we hope students involved will consider our exceptional university as their school of choice when the time comes. APS and Ed Farm will announce the Propel Now program, which is designed to provide APS high school students with unique technology-based learning opportunities and equip them to become passionate about and prepared to attend an HBCU. It focuses on providing access to resources, experiences and spaces that are often not accessible to our most deserving youth. Through partnerships with HBCUs throughout the country, this initiative will help students realize their potential, awaken their passions and provide the support students need to attend and thrive at the HBCU of their choice. The launch of the Innovation Fellows and Propel Now programs follows the January 2021 announcement of the 50,000-square foot Propel Center being built as part of the Atlanta University Center Consortium (AUC Consortium). The Propel Center will include on-site and virtual programming for HBCU students to support entrepreneurship, innovation, and leadership. The announcement of the Innovation Fellows and Propel Now programs by APS and Ed Farm is scheduled to take place Thursday on the campus of Clark Atlanta University (CAU), an HBCU located in Atlanta's Historic West End that is part of the Atlanta University Center Consortium, which includes HBCUs Morehouse College, Morris Brown College, Spelman College and the Interdenominational Theological Center (ITC). WHAT: APS and Ed Farm officials will announce the launch of the Innovation Fellows and Propel Now programs. WHO: Officials available for interviews will be Atlanta Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Lisa Herring, Atlanta Board of Education Chair Jason Esteves, Ed Farm CEO Waymond Jackson, CAU President Dr. George T. French Jr., and an APS high school student who has expressed an interest in the Propel Now program. WHERE: Henderson Student Center (Baranco Multipurpose Room) on the campus of Clark Atlanta University | 799 Atlanta Student Movement Boulevard WHEN: Thursday, August 26, 2021 | 10:30 11:30 AM (There will be an opportunity to shoot footage of a group of Innovation Fellows in their first training session with Ed Farm.) SOURCE Clark Atlanta University Related Links www.cau.edu WILMINGTON, Del., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Corteva, Inc. (NYSE: CTVA) today announced the expansion of its Carbon Initiative for the 2022 crop year, supported by a strategic collaboration with Indigo Ag . Corteva's program continues to provide a simple path for farmers to maximize the value of their soil health practices, now by producing independently verified credits measured, generated and sold through Carbon by Indigo. Expanded farmer benefits for 2022 now include: Aligned Incentives: Farmers will receive 75% of the credit value so as future prices rise, they capture the majority of the upside. Farmers will receive 75% of the credit value so as future prices rise, they capture the majority of the upside. Premium Prices : Highest quality credits built on Indigo's scientific rigor maximize the value of this opportunity. Based on market projections farmers could earn as much as $30 or more per credit, with the added security of a guaranteed minimum payment of $15 /credit. : Highest quality credits built on Indigo's scientific rigor maximize the value of this opportunity. Based on market projections farmers could earn as much as or more per credit, with the added security of a guaranteed minimum payment of /credit. More States: The offering is available across 11 states including Illinois , Indiana , Iowa , Kansas , Minnesota , Missouri , Nebraska , North Dakota , Ohio , South Dakota and Wisconsin . The offering is available across 11 states including , , , , , , , , , and . More Practices and More Crops: Increased nitrogen use efficiency is an eligible practice change, in addition to introducing cover crops and reducing tillage. The Initiative also now supports 17 of the most common crop types across the U.S. Increased nitrogen use efficiency is an eligible practice change, in addition to introducing cover crops and reducing tillage. The Initiative also now supports across the U.S. Longer Lookback: Farmers will get paid on eligible practice changes that were conducted post harvest of 2020. Through this expansion, the Corteva Carbon Initiative's core focus remains to help farmers produce carbon credits simply and for a fair price, with programmatic and agronomic support from a Corteva advisor. Farmers are in control of their practices and can use Corteva's free and easy-to-use digital tool, Granular Insights , to securely log those practices, seamlessly measure their impact, and generate premium credits with Carbon by Indigo. "In a fast-growing agricultural carbon credit market, Indigo's science-based program is committed to demonstrating real climate impact in service of generating real revenue for farmers. Corteva is a partner who shares our position of farmer's choice. As with any crop, quality drives value," said Chris Harbourt, Global Head of Carbon at Indigo. "Mounting demand for high-quality credits has already resulted in price increases of 35% in the first year of our program before the first credit verification is even fully complete. By collaborating with Corteva to empower farmers to become producers of the highest-quality carbon credits today, farmers stand to maximize their return-on-investment tomorrow and in the future as demand continues to climb." Rooted in farmer trust and with a focus on transparency, the Corteva Carbon Initiative now harnesses the power of Carbon by Indigo's advanced capabilities for measuring and verifying carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas abatement at scale and aligned with industry standards, signaling a meaningful step forward for establishing carbon credits as a new revenue source for farmers. The collaboration brings access to a guaranteed buyer network for independently certified carbon offsets, including leading global organizations such as Boston Consulting Group and JPMorgan Chase. "Staying true to Corteva's commitment of delivering farmer-focused sustainable technology to the farm gate, the Corteva Carbon Initiative continues to evolve based on farmer needs," shared Judd O'Connor, President, U.S. Commercial Business at Corteva Agriscience. "Since we first launched in April 2021 to corn and soybean farmers in Illinois, Indiana and Iowa, thousands of U.S. farmers have inquired about our program, so we have worked tirelessly to expand access." The collaboration builds on both companies' efforts to leverage cross-sector industry cooperation to help farmers optimize their return on investment on soil health practices. For example, by measuring and quantifying farmers' carbon impact in accordance with standards set by the Climate Action Reserve , a nonprofit organization that manages leading GHG offset project registries, the collaboration provides transparency and confidence in credits generated for the benefit of growers and buyers. Additionally, participating growers can unlock government funding through FarmRaise , a startup that helps U.S. farmers easily apply to federal, state and local funding for their soil health practices. Farmers interested in learning more can quickly estimate their carbon payout here , and those interested in gaining access to new carbon market opportunities through Corteva's Carbon Initiative can learn more here . About Corteva Corteva, Inc. is a publicly traded, global pure-play agriculture company that provides farmers around the world with the most complete portfolio in the industry - including a balanced and diverse mix of seed, crop protection and digital solutions focused on maximizing productivity to enhance yield and profitability. With some of the most recognized brands in agriculture and an industry-leading product and technology pipeline well positioned to drive growth, the company is committed to working with stakeholders throughout the food system as it fulfills its promise to enrich the lives of those who produce and those who consume, ensuring progress for generations to come. Corteva Agriscience became an independent public company on June 1, 2019 and was previously the Agriculture Division of DowDuPont. More information can be found at www.corteva.com . Follow Corteva on Facebook , Instagram , LinkedIn , Twitter and YouTube . About Indigo Ag Indigo Ag improves grower profitability, environmental sustainability, and consumer health through the use of nature-based and digital technologies. The company's core offerings Biologicals, Carbon, Marketplace, and Transport integrate across the supply chain to optimize how the world's most impactful crops are produced, sourced, and distributed. Founded in 2014 with a mission of harnessing nature to help farmers sustainably feed the planet, today the company's technology connects stakeholders across the agricultural ecosystem to unlock sustainability and profitability benefits for all. Indigo Ag is headquartered in Boston, MA, with additional offices in Memphis, TN; Research Triangle Park, NC; Sao Paulo, Brazil; and Basel, Switzerland. Trademarks and service marks of Corteva Agriscience and its affiliated companies. Cautionary Statement About Forward-Looking Statements This communication contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, which are intended to be covered by the safe harbor provisions for forward-looking statements contained in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, and may be identified by their use of words like "guidance", "plans," "expects," "will," "anticipates," "believes," "intends," "projects," "estimates," "outlook," or other words of similar meaning. All statements that address expectations or projections about the future, including statements about Corteva's strategy for growth, product development, regulatory approval, market position, anticipated benefits of recent acquisitions, timing of anticipated benefits from restructuring actions, outcome of contingencies, such as litigation and environmental matters, expenditures, and financial results, as well as expected benefits from, the separation of Corteva from DowDuPont, are forward looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on certain assumptions and expectations of future events which may not be accurate or realized. Forward- looking statements also involve risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond Corteva's control. While the list of factors presented below is considered representative, no such list should be considered to be a complete statement of all potential risks and uncertainties. Unlisted factors may present significant additional obstacles to the realization of forward-looking statements. Consequences of material differences in results as compared with those anticipated in the forward-looking statements could include, among other things, business disruption, operational problems, financial loss, legal liability to third parties and similar risks, any of which could have a material adverse effect on Corteva's business, results of operations and financial condition. Some of the important factors that could cause Corteva's actual results to differ materially from those projected in any such forward-looking statements include: i) failure to obtain or maintain the necessary regulatory approvals for some Corteva's products; (ii) failure to successfully develop and commercialize Corteva's pipeline; (iii) effect of the degree of public understanding and acceptance or perceived public acceptance of Corteva's biotechnology and other agricultural products; (iv) effect of changes in agricultural and related policies of governments and international organizations; (v) effect of competition and consolidation in Corteva's industry; (vi) effect of competition from manufacturers of generic products; (vii) costs of complying with evolving regulatory requirements and the effect of actual or alleged violations of environmental laws or permit requirements; (viii) effect of climate change and unpredictable seasonal and weather factors; (ix) risks related to oil and commodity markets; (x) competitor's establishment of an intermediary platform for distribution of Corteva's products; (xi) impact of Corteva's dependence on third parties with respect to certain of its raw materials or licenses and commercialization; (xii) effect of industrial espionage and other disruptions to Corteva's supply chain, information technology or network systems; (xiii) effect of volatility in Corteva's input costs; (xiv) failure to realize the anticipated benefits of the internal reorganizations taken by DowDuPont in connection with the spin-off of Corteva and other cost savings initiatives; (xv) failure to raise capital through the capital markets or short-term borrowings on terms acceptable to Corteva; (xvi) failure of Corteva's customers to pay their debts to Corteva, including customer financing programs; (xvii) increases in pension and other post-employment benefit plan funding obligations; (xviii) risks related to the indemnification obligations of legacy EID liabilities in connection with the separation of Corteva; (xix) effect of compliance with laws and requirements and adverse judgments on litigation; (xx) risks related to Corteva's global operations; (xxi) failure to effectively manage acquisitions, divestitures, alliances and other portfolio actions; failure to enforce; (xxii) risks related to COVID-19; (xxiii) risks related to activist stockholders; (xxiv) Corteva's intellectual property rights or defend against intellectual property claims asserted by others; (xxv) effect of counterfeit products; (xxvi) Corteva's dependence on intellectual property cross-license agreements; (xxvii) other risks related to the Separation from DowDuPont; (xxvii) other risks related to the Separation from DowDuPont; (xxviii) risks related to the Biden executive order Promoting Competition in the American Economy; and (xxix) risks associated with our CEO transition, including failure to timely identify a successor CEO. Additionally, there may be other risks and uncertainties that Corteva is unable to currently identify or that Corteva does not currently expect to have a material impact on its business. Where, in any forward-looking statement, an expectation or belief as to future results or events is expressed, such expectation or belief is based on the current plans and expectations of Corteva's management and expressed in good faith and believed to have a reasonable basis, but there can be no assurance that the expectation or belief will result or be achieved or accomplished. Corteva disclaims and does not undertake any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, except as required by applicable law. A detailed discussion of some of the significant risks and uncertainties which may cause results and events to differ materially from such forward-looking statements or other estimates is included in the "Risk Factors" section of Corteva's Annual Report on Form 10-K, as modified by subsequent Quarterly Reports on Forms 10-Q and Current Reports on Form 8-K. SOURCE Corteva, Inc. CAMBRIDGE, Wis. and GREENWICH, Conn., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Dairyland Power Cooperative announced today that it has entered into a purchase agreement to acquire the RockGen Energy Center, a 503 megawatt (MW) natural gas power plant located in Cambridge, Wis., from an affiliate of Starwood Energy Group Global, LLC ("Starwood Energy"). The acquisition is subject to customary conditions, including regulatory approvals, and is expected to close by the end of 2021. "RockGen will help meet our members' power supply needs as we transition to more renewable resources," said Brent Ridge, President and CEO. "Safely delivering reliable and sustainable electricity to our members is critical as we continue to diversify Dairyland's energy portfolio and lower carbon intensity. With the closing of our coal-fired Genoa Station #3 this year, the availability of this existing, low-cost and reliable facility in Wisconsin is both timely and a good strategic fit for our power supply portfolio." "RockGen is a world-class facility and under our ownership, we have been able to add tremendous commercial and operational value to this asset," said Himanshu Saxena, CEO of Starwood Energy. "We are confident that this asset will serve Dairyland and its members for many years to come." Operational since 2001, the RockGen Energy Center is a simple-cycle, dual fuel power generating facility that operates mainly on natural gas. The three 168 MW low-NOx combustion turbines (CTs) can ramp up and down quickly to support intermittent solar and wind resources. In 2020, re-commissioning was completed to allow operation on fuel oil as a backup fuel source. This fuel flexibility enhances reliability in the region when or if the natural gas supply is limited. About Dairyland Power Cooperative: Dairyland, a Touchstone Energy Cooperative, was formed in December 1941. Headquartered in La Crosse, Wis., Dairyland provides the wholesale electrical requirements for 24 distribution cooperatives and 17 municipal utilities. These cooperatives and municipals, in turn, supply the energy needs of more than a half-million people in the four-state service area. Visit DairylandPower.com. About Starwood Energy Group: Starwood Energy Group is a private equity investment firm based in Greenwich, Conn., that specializes in energy infrastructure investments. Through its existing general opportunity funds and affiliated investment vehicles, Starwood Energy has raised in excess of $3 billion of equity capital and has executed transactions totaling more than $8 billion in enterprise value. For more information, please visit starwoodenergygroup.com. SOURCE Dairyland Power Cooperative Related Links http://DairylandPower.com NASSAU, Bahamas, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Delchain, an innovative financial digital asset service provider looking to bridge the gap between regulated financial services and blockchain, announces today their partnership with security and enterprise digital-asset custody solutions provider Ledger Enterprise Solutions. Delchain is a regulated financial services firm offering full-service multi-currency banking, asset management, trading, custody and advisory to blockchain companies and individuals. With agility being at the heart of Delchain's operation, the organization is now sealing the agreement to optimize its operations. Delchain will offer clients a comprehensive, secure, and insured custody solution that requires multiple layers of reviews and approvals, through Ledger Enterprise Solutions' proprietary platform, Ledger Vault. Ledger Vault's platform employs multiple layers of security to ensure the protection of digital assets under management. It allows for the secure, efficient, and prompt transfer of stored cryptocurrencies upon client request. Security and time are two critical factors that contribute to the volatility of crypto markets. Ledger Enterprise Solutions equips Delchain with the resources to accommodate their clients by transacting with their custodied digital assets in a way that accounts for market volatility. With normal cold storage methods, digital wallets are stored on a platform that is not connected to the internet, making it impossible for the assets to fall prey to bad actors or cyberattacks. Through the Ledger Vault platform, Delchain provides clients with the security of traditional cold storage along with the ability to make authorized transactions safely, when needed. "To be able to offer a seamless, insured, asset custody service to our clients, it was imperative we select a technical platform in line with our agile nature," Bruno Macchialli, CEO of Delchain, said. "Ledger Enterprise Solutions is a giant in the digital asset custody industry, and I am looking forward to the growth and development we will experience as we work with them." "Ledger Enterprise Solutions and Delchain both prioritize security of digital assets and user experience. This partnership allows Delchain's clients to rely on institutional-grade custody services," said Alexandre Lemarchand, Vice President of Global Sales and Partnerships at Ledger Enterprise Solutions. "A commitment to helping digital assets investors seamlessly transact and protect their digital assets is what solidified this agreement. We look forward to a long and robust relationship with Delchain as they continue their growth." About Delchain Delchain is a firm that connects the world of blockchain and cryptocurrency to the regulated world of financial services. About Ledger Enterprise Solutions Founded in 2021, Ledger Enterprise Solutions is a division of Ledger, the global leader in security and infrastructure solutions for safeguarding critical digital assets. The mission of Ledger Enterprise Solutions is to enable the digital assets industry to become a multi-trillion dollar industry globally. Ledger Enterprise Solutions provides enterprise-grade security technology solutions and services for custodians, exchanges, banks, and traditional financial institutions. CONTACT Jacob Crompton [email protected] Related Images delchain-logo.png Delchain logo Delchain logo SOURCE Delchain Related Links http://www.delchain.io/ JACKSON, Miss., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- EastGroup Properties (NYSE: EGP) (the "Company", "EastGroup") announced today that its Board of Directors approved a 13.9% increase in its quarterly dividend, raising it to $0.90 per share from $0.79 per share. The dividend is payable on October 15, 2021 to shareholders of record of Common Stock on September 30, 2021. This dividend is the 167th consecutive quarterly distribution to EastGroup's shareholders and represents an annualized dividend rate of $3.60 per share. EastGroup has increased or maintained its dividend for 29 consecutive years. The Company has increased it 26 years over that period, including increases in each of the last 10 years. EastGroup Properties, Inc. (NYSE: EGP), an S&P MidCap 400 company, is a self-administered equity real estate investment trust focused on the development, acquisition and operation of industrial properties in major Sunbelt markets throughout the United States with an emphasis in the states of Florida, Texas, Arizona, California and North Carolina. The Company's goal is to maximize shareholder value by being a leading provider in its markets of functional, flexible and quality business distribution space for location sensitive customers (primarily in the 15,000 to 70,000 square foot range). The Company's strategy for growth is based on ownership of premier distribution facilities generally clustered near major transportation features in supply-constrained submarkets. EastGroup's portfolio, including development projects and value-add acquisitions in lease-up and under construction, currently includes approximately 49 million square feet. EastGroup Properties, Inc. press releases are available at www.eastgroup.net. SOURCE EastGroup Properties Related Links https://www.eastgroup.net ATLANTA, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Equifax Inc. (NYSE: EFX) today announced that the Equifax Board of Directors declared a quarterly dividend of $0.39 per share, payable on Sept. 17, 2021, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on Sept. 7, 2021. Equifax has paid cash dividends for more than 100 consecutive years. ABOUT EQUIFAX INC. At Equifax (NYSE: EFX), we believe knowledge drives progress. As a global data, analytics, and technology company, we play an essential role in the global economy by helping financial institutions, companies, employees, and government agencies make critical decisions with greater confidence. Our unique blend of differentiated data, analytics, and cloud technology drives insights to power decisions to move people forward. Headquartered in Atlanta and supported by more than 12,000 employees worldwide, Equifax operates or has investments in 24 countries in North America, Central and South America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific region. For more information, visit Equifax.com For more information: [email protected] SOURCE Equifax Inc. Related Links http://www.equifax.com SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Inc. Magazine revealed that ProSomnus Sleep Technologies is No. 3,036 on its annual Inc. 5000 list, the most prestigious ranking of the nation's fastest-growing private companies. This is the third year in a row that ProSomnus has earned this honor. The list represents a unique look at the most successful companies within the American economy's most dynamic segment its independent small businesses. Intuit, Zappos, Under Armour, Microsoft, Patagonia, and many other well-known names gained their first national exposure as honorees on the Inc. 5000. ProSomnus EVO, the first patient-preferred OAT device to incorporate advanced materials, manufacturing robotics and artificial intelligence to advance the treatment of OSA. "It is an honor to be named to the Inc. 5000 for the third consecutive year. Consistent performance does not happen by accident. I am very proud that Team ProSomnus is committed to continuous improvement and sustained excellence, and grateful that dental sleep medicine providers trust ProSomnus devices when treating their patients for sleep apnea," commented Len Liptak, CEO. Not only have the companies on the 2021 Inc. 5000 been very competitive within their markets, but this year's list also proved especially resilient and flexible given 2020's unprecedented challenges. Among the 5,000, the average median three-year growth rate soared to 543 percent, and median revenue reached $11.1 million. Together, those companies added more than 610,000 jobs over the past three years. "The 2021 Inc. 5000 list feels like one of the most important rosters of companies ever compiled," says Scott Omelianuk, editor-in-chief of Inc. "Building one of the fastest-growing companies in America in any year is a remarkable achievement. Building one in the crisis we've lived through is just plain amazing. This kind of accomplishment comes with hard work, smart pivots, great leadership, and the help of a whole lot of people." ProSomnus devices are rapidly emerging as the leading alternative to CPAP for the treatment of Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA). Effective, non-intrusive and easy to use, each ProSomnus device is prescribed by a physician and fitted by a dental sleep medicine specialist. ProSomnus devices are an excellent option for people with OSA who prefer a more comfortable treatment experience. "There's no surprise ProSomnus was named to Inc. 5000 three years in a row. ProSomnus continues to innovate as a leading medical device manufacturer providing preferred patient treatment options for Obstructive Sleep Apnea," stated Edward T. Sall, MD, DDS, MBA, Medical Director for ProSomnus Sleep Technologies. "The introduction of the ProSomnus EVO Sleep Device is a result of listening to clinicians and providing an appliance that is unsurpassed in comfort, ease of insertion and efficacy. Sleep physicians should now feel confident in the increased role of oral appliance therapy as a primary treatment for their patients with mild to moderate OSA and for severe patients who fail or abandon CPAP." "ProSomnus has hit the trifecta. Three years in a row? Wow. There's something sexy about hitching yourself to a company that exceeds expectations year after year," commented Kent Smith, DDS, D-ABDSM, D-ASBA. OSA is a chronic sleep breathing disorder that affects one billion people worldwide. It is associated with severe comorbidities including heart disease and stroke, significantly higher healthcare costs, and an increase in everyday issues such as traffic accidents, workplace errors, and educational performance. Symptoms of OSA include snoring, daytime sleepiness, morning headaches and pauses in breathing during sleep. Complete results of the Inc. 5000, including company profiles and an interactive database that can be sorted by industry, region, and other criteria, can be found at www.inc.com/inc5000. The top 500 companies are featured in the September issue of Inc. Related Images prosomnus-evo-sleep-and-snore.jpg ProSomnus EVO Sleep and Snore Device ProSomnus EVO, the first patient-preferred OAT device to incorporate advanced materials, manufacturing robotics and artificial intelligence to advance the treatment of OSA. SOURCE ProSomnus Sleep Technologies SAN DIEGO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On Thursday, September 23, Girls Inc. of San Diego will host its first annual SHE LEADS: Strong, Smart and Bold Women of San Diego event. Business and community leaders throughout San Diego County will come together for this virtual event to honor three extraordinary women who have made standout contributions in the fields of health, technology and government, as well as a commitment to making an impact on women and girls. "Overcoming gender inequity is one of the most critical issues of our time. Many promising young women of color are still at risk of being left out of critical opportunities in education and employment before they even reach high school," said Sandra Ainslie, CEO of Girls Inc. of San Diego. "This makes now an essential moment to invest in girls and highlight female leaders for our girls to look up to." We are privileged to recognize the following trailblazers who are paving the way for the next generation of girls: Donna DeBerry , Vice President of Global Inclusion at Seismic Software, for her long commitment to social justice and diversity and inclusion. , Vice President of Global Inclusion at Seismic Software, for her long commitment to social justice and diversity and inclusion. Saundra Pelletier , CEO of Evofem Biosciences, for her work in revolutionizing women's healthcare. , CEO of Evofem Biosciences, for her work in revolutionizing women's healthcare. Honorable Nora Vargas , Supervisor District 1, for her incredible service to community and the first Latina, immigrant and woman of color in the history of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors. The featured guest emcee will be Keristen Holmes of CBS 8. Along with our honorees, the event will feature stories from three students about how the Girls Inc. programming has shaped them to become strong, smart and bold. The event will take place on September 23 from 5-6 pm PST. While virtual for the audience, there will be live segments which will be broadcast from Hera Hub, a co-working space for women entrepreneurs in Sorrento Valley. The event will conclude with a live panel discussion featuring all three women. To purchase tickets or become a sponsor, visit: https://girlsincsd.org/. About Girls Inc. of San Diego County Girls Inc. of San Diego County inspires girls to be strong, smart and bold by providing hundreds of girls each year with life-changing support and real solutions to the unique issues girls face. By providing no-cost, research-based programming the organization helps girls in the county overcome gender, economic, and social barriers so they may see college as attainable, resist peer pressure, explore professional fields in STEM. (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) and take their seat as tomorrow's leaders. For more than 50 years, the nonprofit organization has supported high-need girls with no-cost programming to help them succeed in life. Media Contact: Sandra Ainslie 619-886-2090 [email protected] SOURCE Girls Inc. of San Diego County Related Links https://girlsincsd.org/ WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The American Association of Kidney Patients (AAKP), the largest independent kidney patient organization in the USA, and its strategic partners at the George Washington University (GW) School of Medicine and Health Sciences (SMHS) continue to make a unique impact in the international battle against kidney diseases. Their 2021 annual Global Summit on Kidney Disease Innovations focused on expanding patient consumer choices and improved health outcomes, engaged a combined audience of over 20,000 viewers across 80 countries, exceeded their 2020 virtual attendance record established at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, and continues to draw viewers worldwide to their online content. The Global Summit is a key component of AAKP's The Decade of the Kidney , an AAKP global initiative ( read article ) launched in 2019 for the 2020-2030 decade to help U.S. and international policymakers better address the devastating human and societal costs of kidney diseases based on patient-defined priorities. The Global Summit has accelerated engagement in an expanding international consortium of influencers, led by patient consumers and advocates, committed to a new era in kidney medicine marked by more inclusive clinical trials, greater use of patient insight data, personalized medicine, and disruptive technologies including artificial implantable and wearable kidneys. The patient-led consortium includes academic and medical researchers, clinical trial designers, innovators, capital market investors, companies, non-governmental and faith-based organizations, as well as elected and appointed government leaders across the globe. Kidney patients worldwide are demanding an end to outdated dialysis care, characterized by staggeringly high mortality rates, and greater access to new products and solutions aimed at detecting, preventing, and treating kidney diseases earlier and in ways that improve quality of life and decrease dependency and disease-related unemployment. They are also organizing and coordinating their policy and grassroots efforts in a sophisticated effort to advance more common sense regulatory and payment reforms that prioritize patient needs and fully support the timely entry of new, safe products into global consumer markets. Based on the ongoing success and rapidly expanding interest in The Global Summit, AAKP and GWU have already opened pre-registration for the May 2022 Global Summit on Kidney Disease Innovations . All 2021 Global Summit virtual presentations are available OnDemand through the AAKP website and AAKP YouTube channel . Dr. Dominic Raj, Co-Chair of The Global Summit, a Professor of Medicine, Biochemistry and Genetics and Biostatistics and Epidemiology, and Director of the Division of Kidney Diseases and Hypertension at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, stated, "As a researcher in molecular biology and genetics, I seek to personalize medicine by genes and molecular pathways, but I think it is more important to personalize by patient needs. This, I believe, is the key take home message from The Global Summit and I am very proud of my colleagues across the globe who are actively incorporating the unique insights of kidney patients in their research and discovery of new therapies to prevent and treat the growing spread of kidney diseases." Hilde Vautmans, Member of the European Parliament (MEP), Chair of MEP Kidney Health, and Deputy Coordinator for the Committee on Foreign Affairs for a Renew Europe (EU) provided a virtual presentation in which she praised kidney patients worldwide for their efforts to work alongside government leaders in the fight against kidney diseases. Further, Vautmans invited greater cooperation among elected leaders in the European Parliament and the U.S. Congress, especially among like-minded members of the U.S. Congressional Kidney Caucus, stating, "This battle is difficult. And I can speak from experience here, but [] change is possible [] but we can and have to act more. In Europe but also in the United States. I always say we need more awareness, more funding and more innovation. Today I want to add a fourth element and that is collaboration, because as we all are aware and all are witnessing, diseases know no borders. So, let's work together []We share a common goal, on both sides of the Atlantic: We must further improve the lives of people with Kidney Disease!" The 2021 Global Summit included over 15 panels featuring over 40 patient and medical experts along with a menu 29 expert videos covering COVID-19 kidney-related issues, diversity in clinical trials, APOL-1 genetic research, diabetic kidney disease (DKD), nutrition, and telemedicine. Executives from top companies in the kidney space underscored the importance and value of patient insights in science, discovery, and the development of new drugs, devices, and diagnostics. Emphasizing the key role patients play in the new era of kidney medicine were leaders from Bayer Pharmaceuticals, Baxter International Inc., bioMerieux, CareDx, Inc., CSL Behringer, Novartis, and Sangamo Therapeutics, Inc. They were joined by key policy and innovation leaders including Barbara L. Bass, MD, Vice President for Health Affairs, Dean of the GW School of Medicine and Health Sciences, and CEO of the GW Medical Faculty Associates (USA); Vivekanand Jha, MBBS, MD, DM, PHD, FRCP, FAMS; Executive Director, The George Institute for Global Health (AU) and President, International Society of Nephrology (IND); Fokko Wieringa, PhD, Principal Scientist, IMEC of The Netherlands and the Dutch Kidney Foundation (EU) and a member of The Kidney Health Initiative (USA); Murray Sheldon, MD, Associate Director for Technology and Innovations, Center for Devices and Radiological Health, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (USA); Jack Kalavritinos, Founder and Principal, JK Consulting and member of the APCO Worldwide International Advisory Council and Health Advisory Board (USA). Richard Knight, President of the American Association of Kidney Patients, a former hemodialysis patient and 14-year kidney transplant recipient, stated, "Kidney disease is a devastating disease that is rapidly expanding and negatively impacting patients, families, and economies throughout the world. Future innovations in kidney medicine depend upon greater patient engagement through fully inclusive clinical trials and research, and the GW School of Medicine and Health Sciences is an established global leader in this field. I thank Dean Dr. Barbara Bass, Dr. Dominic Raj, and our new European Union ally Hilde Vautmans for their deep respect for patients and their concerted efforts to unite patients, clinicians, and policy-makers in the fight against all kidney diseases." Knight (read CJASN article) is a former U.S. Congressional staff member and business consultant who serves on the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) Advisory Council, and as the Co-Chair of the Community Engagement Committee for the Kidney Precision Medicine Project (KPMP). Paul T. Conway, Co-Chair of The Global Summit and AAKP Chair of Policy and Global Affairs, a former peritoneal dialysis patient and 24-year kidney transplant recipient, stated, "AAKP and our friend and ally Dr. Dominic Raj envisioned The Global Summit on Kidney Innovations as a unique international event aimed at accelerating cooperation among patients, researchers, clinicians, and policy professionals. Kidney patient consumers worldwide demand and deserve far greater care choice and are well aware of the value they bring as partners to pioneers developing the next generation of diagnostics, devices, and biologics. AAKP has expanded our collaborations with patient groups worldwide to advance innovation and to support all who share our sense of urgency and intent to transcend legislative, regulatory, and payment barriers that limit care choice and delay entry of new, safe treatments into the global consumer markets." Conway (read CJASN article) is a former Chief of Staff of the U.S. Department of Labor and serves on the External Expert Panel of National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), Kidney Precision Medicine Project (KPMP), the American Board of Internal Medicine's Nephrology Specialty Board, and is a Patient Voice Editor for The Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. AAKP has formal partnerships with the multiple international kidney patient organizations including in support of The Global Summit, The Decade of the Kidney, and the growing international kidney innovation consortium, including: Argentina-based Asociacion Solidaria de Insuficientes Renales (ASIR) ; European Kidney Patients' Federation (EKPF) and the European Kidney Health Alliance (EKHA) ; and United Kingdom-based Renal Patient Support Group . AAKP will be announcing multiple additional global partnerships throughout the remainder of 2021 and 2022. AAKP leaders and their global allies have carried the key messages of The Global Summit into other global forums, including the University of Washington's Center for Dialysis Innovation's recent IDEAS Summit, where Dr. Murray Sheldon of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration conducted a presentation on the expanding international kidney innovation consortium . Future presentations on the key learnings and messages of The Global Summit and the international kidney innovation consortium will be conducted at the AAKP Annual National Patient Meeting September 24-25, 2021, and at the American Society of Nephrology's, 2021 Kidney Week , November 4-7, the largest kidney professional conference in the world. Voices in support of AAKP's expanding global partnerships and international collaborations include: Mr. Colm Clifford, kidney patient and AAKP Global Ambassador in the Republic of Ireland: "Change happens when a collective voice sends a strong message that change is required. This begins from the grassroots. While it may eventually be signed off with the stroke of a pen, it's the strong collective voice that can't be ignored that drives that to happen. In kidney disease, after The Global Summit, I'm confident we really are moving forward and it's an exciting time to be involved." Daniel Gallego, President of the European Kidney Patients' Federation (EKPF): "We are more than happy that the AAKP reached out to us to enforce the collaboration of kidney patients worldwide to really give a push for innovation and new therapies that will enhance quality of life of kidney patients, contributing to expand our daily life activities. EKPF strongly believes that in creating these therapies, patients should be included and in the driver's seat to reach next level therapies. Together we can create and extend a platform that is responsible for the long-overdue innovation that kidney patients are waiting for." Raymond Vanholder, President of the European Kidney Health Alliance (EKHA): "Collaboration for improvement of kidney therapies can really benefit by moving boundaries. We are delighted with the expansion of our international collaboration by teaming up with AAKP. At EKHA we strongly believe in the empowerment of patients to enhance quality of life where possible. We therefore adopted their 'Decade of the Kidney' program to create awareness for the unmet needs of kidney patients. An important part of this collaboration will exist in setting the political agenda at the level of the EU and USA to push for real innovative therapies and corresponding funding to realize them." Dr. Maria Eugenia Vivado Duran, President of the Argentina-based Asociacion Solidaria de Insuficientes Renales of Buenos Aires; AAKP Global Ambassador: "ASIR joins together with AAKP in support of the rights of the kidney patients and to share in efforts to further medical innovations that will better prevent and treat kidney diseases and improve the quality of life for kidney patients." Dr. Vivado Duran, a pediatrician and AAKP Global Ambassador, was diagnosed with kidney disease in 1979 during her second pregnancy. She was on hemodialysis for many years and in 2001, received a kidney transplant from a deceased donor, allowing her to continue working for patients, educating the community, and enjoying her family. She has been president of ASIR for four consecutive terms and does everything in gratitude to her anonymous kidney donor. Dr. Shahid Nazir Muhammad, Specialist Biomedical Scientist, The University of the West of England (UWE) and Academic Lead, on behalf of The Renal Patient Support Group (RPSG), United Kingdom: "Future research integrating perceptions to acknowledge CKD as a condition with diverse morbidities and investigations to explore educational needs is mission critical. The Renal Patient Support Group (RPSG) is a place where awareness and research meet and encourages healthcare service and support in comprehensible proportions. Innovation is good to an extent. However, timely and targeted education relating CKD and recommendations with a solid focus is where best practice between pediatric and adult nephrology, tackling health inequalities is pinnacle to ensure that CKD patients are not forgotten and become unpeople (disenfranchised), and there is kidney disease awareness on an international level." Ms. Vasundhara Raghavan, caregiver to a son with kidney disease and the AAKP Global Ambassador in the United Arab Emirates: "An international consortium of kidney patient organizations will be a catalyst to drive many innovations and bring in much-needed changes in the kidney patient ecosystem. The consortium can help execute cross border treatments for paired kidney transplants possible through an international donor bank. Sharing of best practices, knowledge, and resources will aid the kidney patient community immensely. A collaborative platform such as this will help us gather momentum in kidney research, patient advocacy, and provide financial aid to needy patients. The needs of kidney patients are best expressed by them. They are going through the arduous journey and having firsthand knowledge of what works best for them. Patients driving these discussions will help bring conclusive decisions on policy matters directly impacting them. Through this platform they will have a channel to voice their opinions and get to share their experiences to a wider community. Getting patients involved early on in these discussions is extremely critical and the value addition that they will provide to the conversation will be vastly practical." AAKP and GW SMHS thank their 2021 Global Summit sponsors. Gold Level: Horizon Therapeutics and Travere Therapeutics; Silver Level: CareDx, Inc.; Patron Level: Hansa Biopharma and Sanofi Genzyme; and Supporting Level: AstraZeneca and Eurofins Transplant Genomics. Information on the 2022 Global Summit is available at https://aakp.org/programs-and-events/global-summit/ . About the American Association of Kidney Patients (AAKP): Since 1969, AAKP has been a patient-led organization driving policy discussions on kidney patient consumer care choice and treatment innovation. By 1973, AAKP patients had collaborated with the U.S. Congress and White House to establish dialysis coverage for any person suffering kidney failure, a U.S. taxpayer supported effort that has saved over one million lives. In 2018, AAKP established the largest U.S. kidney voter registration program, KidneyVoters. Over the past decade, AAKP patients have helped gain lifetime transplant drug coverage for kidney transplant recipients (2020); new patient-centered policies via the White House Executive Order on Advancing American Kidney Health (2019); new job protections for living organ donors from the U.S. Department of Labor (2018); and Congressional legislation allowing HIV positive organ transplants for HIV positive patients (2013). Follow AAKP on social media at @kidneypatient on Facebook, @kidneypatients on Twitter, and @kidneypatients on Instagram, and visit www.aakp.org. The Global Summit on Kidney Disease Innovations is produced by AAKP's national strategic media partner, Briar Patch Media, which provides creative consulting and full-service media video production and post-production for corporations, non-profit organizations, individuals throughout the U.S., and several international locations. About the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences: Founded in 1824, the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences (SMHS) was the first medical school in the nation's capital and is the 11th oldest in the country. Working together in our nation's capital, with integrity and resolve, the GW SMHS is committed to improving the health and well-being of our local, national, and global communities. Visit their website at smhs.gwu.edu . MEDIA CONTACT: Jennifer Rate Marketing & Communications Manager [email protected] (813) 400-2394 SOURCE American Association of Kidney Patients Related Links http://www.aakp.org WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Guidehouse, a leading global provider of consulting services to the public and commercial markets, has ranked third among 35 firms in Modern Healthcare's annual survey of the largest healthcare management consulting firms. The firm also ranked second on the list for total provider revenue. In addition to serving hospitals, health systems, and other providers, Guidehouse's Health segment works with government agencies, life sciences companies, employers, payers, and other healthcare organizations. The team includes experts from diverse commercial and public health backgrounds who work together to solve the industry's most complex challenges. "As a trusted partner to healthcare companies across the industry, we are proud to be among the top consulting firms," said Alicia Harkness, Guidehouse partner and Health segment leader who was recently named by WashingtonExec as a 2021 Top Healthcare Executive to Watch. "This Modern Healthcare ranking further validates the work we're doing with leading organizations to enable access to care, improve health equity and patient experiences, and design cost-effective care delivery models." With 11 KLAS #1 rankings, the Guidehouse Health segment offers integrated expertise across the public and commercial health sectors with a team that includes policy and regulatory leaders, provider and payer administrators, clinicians, physicians, scientists, and other experts. The team has deep industry partnerships and decades of strategy, funding, policy, revenue cycle, digital and retail health, managed care, and managed services experience. Guidehouse continues to play an instrumental role in healthcare transformation, and has guided a range of organizations through new and complex challenges amid the COVID-19 pandemic. This includes: Helping more than 350 providers and 20 state and local government entities obtain and substantiate more than $10 billion in federal COVID-19 aid. in federal COVID-19 aid. Supporting multiple pharmaceutical companies and government agencies with COVID-19 vaccine development, commercialization, and deployment strategies. Establishing a certified testing lab for a Fortune 5 company to conduct an estimated 20 million tests annually. Launching the Children's Health Consortium, a joint venture with Connecticut Children's Medical Center offering independent children's hospitals revenue cycle and patient engagement technologies, strategies, and scale. Visit the Guidehouse Center for Health Insights for a complete view of payment, operational, and consumer disruption insights and solutions. Modern Healthcare's 2021 Healthcare Management Consulting Firms Survey includes management consulting firms from the U.S. in various sectors of the medical industry. Results from the annual survey, listing the largest healthcare management consulting firms by 2020 total provider revenue, were announced in the publication's August 16 issue. About Guidehouse Guidehouse is a leading global provider of consulting services to the public and commercial markets, with broad management, technology, and risk consulting capabilities. We help clients address their toughest challenges and navigate significant regulatory pressures focusing on transformational change, business resiliency, and technology-driven innovation. Across a range of advisory, consulting, outsourcing, and digital services, we create scalable, innovative solutions that prepare our clients for future growth and success. The company has more than 10,000 professionals in over 50 locations globally. Guidehouse is a Veritas Capital portfolio company, led by seasoned professionals with proven and diverse expertise in traditional and emerging technologies, markets, and agenda-setting issues driving national and global economies. For more information, please visit www.guidehouse.com. Media Contact: Cecile Fradkin [email protected] SOURCE Guidehouse Related Links https://guidehouse.com NEPTUNE, N.J., Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Hackensack Meridian Health is proud to announce that Project HEAL, a hospital-based violence intervention program based at Jersey Shore University Medical Center, has aided nearly 50 clients through a multi-disciplined program to address community, domestic, and gang-related violence. "We must address the epidemic of gun violence in this country, which claimed nearly 44,000 Americans last year, a national record,'' said Robert G. Garrett, CEO of Hackensack Meridian Health. "We are losing about 120 Americans a day to senseless gun violence, especially in communities of color, and we must take urgent action to address this serious public health threat.'' Mr. Garrett was one of 18 leading healthcare CEOs in the nation to urge Congress to support President Biden's $5 billion hospital and community-based gun violence prevention plan, part of the infrastructure bill that is being considered by Congress. Project HEAL, a community partnership to Help, Empower and Lead, was launched in March to address disturbing trends in community violence. In urban settings, it is estimated that up to 41 percent of patients treated for violent injury are re-injured in five years. One five-year follow-up survey of victims of gun violence found that 20 percent had died in that period. Since the program's launch in March, 43 clients have been aided in multiple ways: through counseling, emergency financial assistance, legal advice, transportation assistance and more. Six new staff were hired since January, including a clinical therapist, violence intervention specialist and clinical advocate. "Creating a very specific type of care for those affected by violence from the moment they enter our emergency department to long after the point of discharge is critical," says Aakash Shah, M.D., medical director for Project HEAL. "It is needed now more than ever, and I applaud Governor Phil Murphy, the office of the Attorney General, and the leadership of Jersey Shore University Medical Center for helping us with this program." According to data from the Uniform Crime Report, three areas of concern in terms of violent crime are Asbury Park, Neptune Township, and Long Branch City. Combined, these areas saw 12 murders and 744 aggravated assaults in the past three years. Between January 2016 and August 2019, Jersey Shore University Medical Center's internal medical data shows that they treated 408 violent injuries in a variety of different capacities: 107 by fist, 176 by knife, 84 by gun, and 41 by other means. Community violence and victimization is rarely a one-time event. Yet, victims often find themselves returning to the very same circumstances that contributed to their injury without resources to prevent future violence. Case in point: despite the psychological trauma of violent injury, many victims of violence struggle to access mental health services. Barriers to services include stigma, distrust, and difficulty navigating the system. "This cuttin', stabbin', & shootin' between these young men, ages 15-30, that's where the action is going on," said Keisha Harbour, a community activist and lifelong resident of Asbury Park. "I want this program to help with that, to give these people other options in life." Harbour recently joined Project HEAL as a violence intervention specialist and is often the first point of contact for a victim of violence treated in the emergency department. Her experience has taught her: "We need to bring balance to our community; we have no balance and no options. We have nothing to help scale these issues back." She notes that the community needs programs like Project HEAL in place and to empower patients with resources and opportunities. Project HEAL takes a multi-pronged approach in trying to help break the cycle of repeat violent injury and victimization in Monmouth County. Its model is multidisciplinary and combines efforts of medical staff with trusted community-based partners to provide safety planning, wraparound services, and trauma-informed care to violently injured people. "Caring for our community, whether it's within our medical center walls or through our outreach efforts, is at the core of everything we do," said Vito Buccellato, MPA, LNHA, chief hospital executive, Jersey Shore University Medical Center. New Jersey hopes to serve as a national model of rethinking how to treat violence from a clinical standpoint, as well as a criminal justice standpoint. The program, part of a $20 million federal grant, is the largest such investment in the United States to address recurring instances of community violence. "As the founder and former Executive Director of Be Jersey Strong, Dr. Shah is uniquely suited to lead Project HEAL," said Kenneth N. Sable, M.D., MBA, FACEP, regional president, Southern Market, Hackensack Meridian Health. "I know he will be successful in guiding this program and providing our community with essential resources to help stem the tide of violence." For more information about the program, call 732-897-8190 or visit www.hackensackmeridianhealth.org/project-heal/ . ABOUT HACKENSACK MERIDIAN JERSEY SHORE UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER Located in Neptune, New Jersey, Hackensack Meridian Jersey Shore University Medical Center is a not-for-profit teaching hospital and the only Level II Trauma and Level II Pediatric Trauma Center in Monmouth and Ocean counties. It is home to K. Hovnanian Children's Hospital the first children's hospital in Monmouth and Ocean counties. With more than 1,200 physicians and dental staff in 60 specialty areas, Jersey Shore University Medical Center's team provides high-quality care in a patient-centered, environmentally-friendly setting. The team's commitment to excellence has earned Jersey Shore University Medical Center numerous accolades, including being named the #6 top hospital in New Jersey and high performing in seven specialties, procedures and conditions by U.S. News & World Report for 2020-2021. The medical center's clinical research program and longstanding commitment to medical education is evident through an affiliation with Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine and a new affiliation with St. George's University School of Medicine. Jersey Shore University Medical Center serves as an academic center dedicated to advancing medical knowledge, training future physicians and providing the community with access to promising medical breakthroughs. Jersey Shore University Medical Center's programs and services have received numerous national recognitions, including designation as high-performing in cardiac, stroke, surgical and oncology services. Jersey Shore University Medical Center's HOPE Tower a $265 million 10-story medical office building provides a healing outpatient experience. Guided by a patient-centered approach towards care, and informed by the latest medical breakthroughs, HOPE Tower includes advanced imaging services, a clinical academic center, innovative simulation laboratory, state-of-the-art amphitheater, specialty physician offices, a nine-level parking garage, and a 58,000 square foot cancer facility. The new cancer facility features a range of comprehensive treatment options, including surgical specialties, medical oncology, and the most advanced radiation therapy and minimally invasive interventional therapies. Nurse navigators guide patients through every step and provide an extra layer of support and coordination. For more information, visit https://www.jerseyshoreuniversitymedicalcenter.com/ . ABOUT HACKENSACK MERIDIAN HEALTH Hackensack Meridian Health is a leading not-for-profit health care organization that is the largest, most comprehensive and truly integrated health care network in New Jersey, offering a complete range of medical services, innovative research and life-enhancing care. Hackensack Meridian Health comprises 17 hospitals from Bergen to Ocean counties, which includes three academic medical centers Hackensack University Medical Center in Hackensack, Jersey Shore University Medical Center in Neptune, JFK Medical Center in Edison; two children's hospitals - Joseph M. Sanzari Children's Hospital in Hackensack, K. Hovnanian Children's Hospital in Neptune; nine community hospitals Bayshore Medical Center in Holmdel, Mountainside Medical Center in Montclair, Ocean Medical Center in Brick, Palisades Medical Center in North Bergen, Pascack Valley Medical Center in Westwood, Raritan Bay Medical Center in Old Bridge, Raritan Bay Medical Center in Perth Amboy, Riverview Medical Center in Red Bank, and Southern Ocean Medical Center in Manahawkin; a behavioral health hospital Carrier Clinic in Belle Mead; and two rehabilitation hospitals - JFK Johnson Rehabilitation Institute in Edison and Shore Rehabilitation Institute in Brick. Additionally, the network has more than 500 patient care locations throughout the state which include ambulatory care centers, surgery centers, home health services, long-term care and assisted living communities, ambulance services, lifesaving air medical transportation, fitness and wellness centers, rehabilitation centers, urgent care centers and physician practice locations. Hackensack Meridian Health has more than 36,000 team members, and over 7,000 physicians and is a distinguished leader in health care philanthropy, committed to the health and well-being of the communities it serves. The network's notable distinctions include having four hospitals among the top in New Jersey by U.S. News and World Report. Other honors include consistently achieving Magnet recognition for nursing excellence from the American Nurses Credentialing Center and being named to Becker's Healthcare's "150 Top Places to Work in Healthcare/2019" list. The Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine opened in 2018, the first private medical school in New Jersey in more than 50 years, welcomed its third class of students in 2020 to its On3 campus in Nutley and Clifton. Additionally, the network partnered with Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center to find more cures for cancer faster while ensuring that patients have access to the highest quality, most individualized cancer care when and where they need it. Hackensack Meridian Health is a member of AllSpire Health Partners, an interstate consortium of leading health systems, to focus on the sharing of best practices in clinical care and achieving efficiencies. For additional information, please visit www.HackensackMeridianHealth.org . SOURCE Hackensack Meridian Health DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Insurance Care Direct (ICD), one of the nation's leading health insurance providers, celebrates the success of students who participated in the company's pioneering Educational Support Program (ESP), a benefit provided to the families of ICD employees during the COVID-19 pandemic. This fall, those students who were not high school seniors will return to their home classrooms in Broward and Palm Beach counties well prepared for the upcoming academic year. In an unprecedented employee benefit program, ICD leadership implemented the ESP program for the children of ICD employees whose schools had transitioned to remote learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. This educational program offered students a safe, in-person environment where a team of experienced teachers and teaching assistants, led by Dr. Jaimee Sabato, provided individualized support to more than two dozen students. This program was open to all children of ICD employees and offered at no cost for the duration of school closures and virtual learning. Recognizing that the closure of schools would present a challenge for parents, ICD's leadership had the vision to partner with Dr. Jaimee Sabato, an expert in K-12 curricula, to develop an educational support program to compliment virtual learning. ICD hosted and sponsored the pod-like learning environment in a COVID-19-compliant converted office space that was organized in a single weekend to minimize gaps in student learning. "Arnold, Seth and Brad Cohen have always prioritized the experiences of their employees and helping others," said ICD's Chief Executive Officer former U.S. Senator E. Ben Nelson. "When faced with the unprecedented challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Cohen's championed this unique and innovative educational support program to help employees and their families. As the success of these students makes clear, their engaged leadership has created a lasting and positive impact." "ICD's educational program made it easy for my two children to complete their schooling online during the pandemic," said Renee Gayle, an ICD employee whose children participated in the program. "Dr. Sabato's team provided one-on-one academic assistance to both of my children. This support made it possible for my son to make up missing credits and successfully complete his senior year of high school. Thanks to the leadership of ICD founder Arnold Cohen and ICD co-chairs Seth and Brad Cohen, my children had access to a boutique learning environment that helped ensure that the COVID-19 pandemic did not disrupt their education or prevent my son from graduating." By providing educational assistance and support for the virtual learning process, ICD's ESP program helped 28 students enrolled in grades K-12 succeed despite the challenges of virtual learning. The program had a significant impact on learning outcomes and helped students improve test scores, develop new skills, and ensure that those struggling to meet graduation requirements were able to receive their diplomas on time. The ESP program is just one of the many ways that Insurance Care Direct invests in its employees and gives back to local communities. Details of ICD's other initiatives are available at https://www.insurancecaredirect.com/philanthropy/. About Insurance Care Direct Founded in 2001, Insurance Care Direct has grown into one of the largest health and life insurance agencies in the country. The Company offers a wide array of competitive products along with comprehensive software to aid insurance professionals in their sales, marketing, and lead management. Headquartered in Deerfield Beach, Florida, Insurance Care Direct is a family owned business and is heavily involved in the local Florida community. SOURCE Insurance Care Direct Related Links https://www.insurancecaredirect.com "Michael Grossi's background is a great addition to the team as we continue to scale the business to address the growing DEM market opportunity," said Mike Triplett, managing director at Insight Partners. "Lakeside has experienced significant growth year over year, and our new office in Boston marks our latest geographical expansion and plays an important part of our strategic growth strategy." Grossi succeeds Lakeside founder Mike Schumacher, who is transitioning from his role as CEO to his new role as chief strategy officer. "As Lakeside continues its growth ramp, I'm pleased to have Michael on board, driving that growth to new levels," said Schumacher. "I'm looking forward to continuing to play a critical role in Lakeside Software's growth trajectory as I lead strategy and technology solution efforts." The rapidly evolving hybrid and remote workforce challenges facing IT departments amid the pandemic has reduced visibility into end user experience and presents a significant market opportunity in the digital experience management space. Lakeside's DEM platform with its unique Intelligent Edge-based analytics helps customers tackle those challenges by enabling them to proactively measure, analyze, and optimize their employees' digital experience anywhere they are working. Lakeside's Digital Experience Cloud manages and optimizes millions of endpoints for customers in more than 40 countries and six continents around the world today. The company already employs 25 people in the Boston office and is hiring aggressively in Boston, Michigan, and around the globe to meet growing customer demand for the company's solutions. "I am thrilled to be joining Lakeside Software, a true leader in the DEM space," said Michael Grossi. "I look forward to helping accelerate Lakeside's growth and further strengthen the company's position and domain expertise across the many areas where customers derive value from Lakeside, including end-user experience management, digital workplace planning, IT asset optimization, remote work management, and proactive service desk operations." Most recently, Grossi served as CEO of HealthcareSource, a leading SaaS talent management solution for the healthcare industry and led the sale of the company to symplr, backed by Clearlake Capital earlier this year. As CEO, he led HealthcareSource through a significant growth phase and transition to a SaaS model. Prior to HealthcareSource, Grossi served as CEO of Ipswitch Software, a provider of IT management solutions for enterprise customers and was acquired by Progress Software in 2019. Grossi lives in the Boston area with his wife and family and will be based in the new Boston office. About Lakeside Software Lakeside Software is a leader in cloud-based digital experience management. Lakeside's Digital Experience Cloud gathers and analyzes data on everything that may impact end-user experience and business productivity, and provides the unmatched visibility IT teams need to design and support rapidly changing digital workplaces. Customers use Lakeside's technology to perform end-user experience management, digital workplace planning, IT asset optimization, remote work management, and proactive service desk operations. For more information, visit www.lakesidesoftware.com. Lakeside Software and SysTrack are registered trademarks and/or trademarks of Lakeside Software, LLC in the United States and other jurisdictions. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are property of their respective owners. SOURCE Lakeside Software SAN DIEGO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- leadPops, a sales and marketing SaaS platform specializing in lead generation for mortgage, real estate, and insurance companies, has successfully secured two rankings on the Inc. 5000 list. leadPops placed 1,242nd in the nation across all categories and was recognized as the fourth fastest-growing software company in San Diego with 387% growth over the last 3 years. 2021 Inc. 5000 #4 fastest-growing software company in San Diego, CA "It's an honor to have made the 2021 Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing companies in America. As #1,242, we are among many truly innovative companies. That also means we've got a lot of work to do to get into the Inc. 500," said Andrew Pawlak, CEO of leadPops. "We're ready for that challenge and will continue to work hard every single day to help our mortgage, real estate, and insurance clients take back their leads. I want to extend a thank you to every leadPops team member and partner who has helped us grow and continue our mission every day. We're incredibly excited about what we're building for our current and future clients and the next phase of growth." leadPops' simple and intuitive lead funnels, websites, and marketing systems empower clients to generate their own leads instead of buying them from a third-party vendor. The concept is quite simple - leads generated in-house through clients' customized funnels will always prove to be higher-quality than those found on tired lists that have been passed around from office to office. With leadPops, clients create powerful, automated lead-generating systems that drive qualified leads directly to their site of choice. Fully customizable, plug-and-play funnels provide clients with the ability to draw leads right into their Customer Relationship Management software (CRM). ConversionPro lead generation websites offer conversion-optimized website services to make the most of online audiences, and in-house managed marketing services help to drive traffic to increase engagement across all active funnels and landing pages. "We have seen a significant increase in clients wanting to own their own lead generation. The lack of understanding about how marketing works for these local business owners is a thing of the past. We have been lucky to work with so many eager clients and partners that are tired of paying for recycled leads. It has been an amazing journey to grow a team while disrupting the lead generation industry," said Rosa Romaine, COO of leadPops. The Inc. 5000 list ranks the fastest-growing, privately held companies in the United States. Today, the list functions as a distinguished editorial award, a celebration of innovation, a network of entrepreneurial leaders, and an effective public relations showcase. The Inc. 5000 ranks companies by overall revenue growth over a three-year period, and all 5,000 honoree companies are individually profiled on Inc.com. Please visit https://www.leadPops.com for more information. About leadPops helps mortgage, real estate, and insurance businesses increase the generation of qualified leads. From 2012-2017, leadPops was developing solutions for a couple of big clients in the real estate lead generation space. The instant the leadPops team fixed their conversion problems, both of those companies went from selling ads to selling leads. leadPops was among the first to prove that driving traffic and clicks doesn't matter if you're not converting those clicks into qualified leads. Because clicks come and go... but good leads can become great clients. Contact Information [email protected] 855-532-3767 Related Files Inc 5000 Post (1).mp4 Related Images 4-fastest-growing-software-company.png #4 Fastest-Growing Software Company in San Diego 2021 Inc. 5000 #4 fastest-growing software company in San Diego, CA Related Video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5p5a3Yk6Uqk SOURCE leadPops, Inc. BOCA RATON, Fla., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Nikki Levy Interiors, a South Florida based interior design firm founded on a commitment to designing spaces that reflect the individuality of their clients, is celebrating eight years in business. The company was founded by its namesake Nikki Levy, who was born in South Africa and found that her interest in interior decor was piqued at a very early age. Since its start, Levy has expanded the business to a team of nine with a studio location in Boca Raton. Levy attributes her success and the rapid growth of Nikki Levy Interiors to her team's talent as well as their dedication and passion for each project. "Just as we know each one of our clients is unique," Levy says, "we ensure each of our interior designs is unique to your design style and design needs. We take pride in each home having its own distinctive flavor and rarely use the same piece of furniture or fabric twice." Nikki Levy Interiors offers the following services: Full interior design services and design guidance of residential and commercial spaces Custom furniture, lighting and cabinetry Luxury functional design Drapery 3D rendering and spatial planning Home accessories Consultations with architects and developers Lighting layout and selections Textiles, wallcoverings and rugs Customer wall panels and molding design Art, mirrors and wall decor With the influx of residents moving to South Florida and the renewed focus on homelife nationwide over the past year due to the pandemic, Levy says business is booming. She also admits there are new pandemic-related supply chain challenges that the entire design industry is facing that have come with the growth, including lack of product, delays in shipping, overwhelmed contractors, price fluctuations, and frustration all around. To handle the challenge, Levy says she and her team have focused on customized items made from scratch; pivoted and commonly reselected products for their clients as necessary; utilized personal relationships with vendors and contractors whenever possible; and prioritized communication with clients. "Navigating this incredibly challenging year has been hard for all of in the design industry," Levy says, "With the increased demand for products and influx of people moving to South Florida has come a shortage in production, worker shortages, lack of products, price increases, shipping delays, and much more. But we are doing everything we can to meet the needs of our clients and keep them apprised of the situation and satisfied to the best of our ability." About Nikki Levy Interiors Nikki Levy Interiors is a Palm Beach County-based interior design firm widely recognized for its individualized and personalized approach. The firm is a five-time Best of Houzz winner and is associated with the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID). Nikki Levy Interiors offers volumes of fabrics and wallpapers, as well as samples of wood, glass and flooring at its disposal to carve out beautiful designs for its clients, on top of an unmatched rolodex of top local and national vendors and partners. Based in Boca Raton, Nikki Levy Interiors and its team of professional and talented designers take on residential and commercial projects primarily within the cities of Boca Raton and Delray Beach. Learn more at www.NikkiLevyInteriors.com. Media Contact: Melissa Perlman BlueIvy Communications [email protected] SOURCE Nikki Levy Interiors Related Links https://nikkilevyinteriors.com DARMSTADT, Germany, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Two physicists, Professor Markus Roth from the Technical University of Darmstadt and Professor Todd Ditmire from the University of Texas-Austin, along with co-founders Dr. Anika Stein, former head of Defense Systems at thyssenkrupp Marine Systems, and Thomas Forner, an experienced entrepreneur and founder of multiple companies, are partnering to launch a new fusion energy startup called Focused Energy. The company will work to commercialize inertial fusion energy (IFE), which involves the use of high-power laser beams to spark a fusion reaction. "The controlled production of fusion energy is an invaluable breakthrough in science. In the face of climate change and an increasing global energy demand, we will soon have an instrument at our disposal to produce an almost unlimited amount of reliable and clean energy," Roth said. "Recent technological advances will enable us to develop commercial fusion power plants for energy production, which will generate several gigawatts of power." Fusion energy is proving to be a promising avenue for clean energy production. Advances at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's National Ignition Facility, where they are using the world's largest laser composed of 192 high energy laser beams to compress hydrogen atoms and release a burst of energy, indicate that fusion energy may play a critical role in the world's energy portfolio. "There is an unprecedented opportunity to transition to more affordable, safe, environmentally friendly, and efficient energy sources," Prime Movers Lab Founder and General Partner Dakin Sloss said. "The Focused Energy team is trailblazing the way to make inertial fusion energy a safe and scalable technology that could ensure a green energy supply with resources that are globally available for millennia to come." In addition, the high-powered laser technology developed by Focused Energy for the IFE approach could revolutionize the way materials are analyzed in areas such as construction and infrastructure. For example, laser technology could detect deficiencies in bridges, significantly reducing the difficult and time-consuming task of conducting such inspections manually. The company is incorporated in the US. Presently, its operations are based in Darmstadt, Germany, and it plans to open operations in Austin, TX. About Focused Energy Focused Energy is a startup dedicated to developing fusion as a means of generating clean alternative energy for the growing needs of society. The company is supported by the TU Darmstadt and was founded in July 2021 after years of extensive research. The founding and management team encompasses entrepreneur Thomas Forner (CEO Focused Energy), engineer Dr. Anika Stein (COO Focused Energy) as well as the two laser and fusion experts Prof. Dr. Markus Roth (TU Darmstadt, CSO Focused Energy) and Prof. Dr. Todd Ditmire (UT Austin/Texas, CTO Focused Energy). Further information can be found at www.focused-energy.world Company contact: [email protected] SOURCE Focused Energy Related Links https://www.focused-energy.world/ Toyota introduced the Corolla in 1966, and it arrived in the U.S. in spring 1968 as a 1969 model, starting at about $1,700. Gas cost $0.35 a gallon, and the median household income was $7,700. The No. 1 TV show in America was "Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In," and top hit songs that early Corolla drivers would have heard on the optional AM radio included Otis Redding's "(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay," Simon and Garfunkle's "Mrs. Robinson" and The Beatles' "Hey Jude." As the Corolla quickly evolved to offer more room, comfort and performance, it became a value benchmark in its class and grew into one of the largest branches in the Toyota family tree. Corolla's most significant role, however, has been the one it has played in the lives of the millions who have been buying and driving this dependable model for more than half a century. The Corolla has been making memories and stories for nearly three generations of customers. That adds up to billions of first jobs, first dates, daily commutes, graduations, vacations, doctor appointments, weddings, kids' ballgames all the meaningful events that make a life. Even people who never owned a Corolla have a Corolla story to tell about one they remember a friend, neighbor, cousin or coworker driving. Fifty million cars later, this pillar of the Toyota family remains trusted for being well equipped for any situation. For an affordable price, the 2022 Corolla combines advanced tech, sporty style and top-level comfort with up to 53/52/52 EPA estimated MPG in the hybrid model and the protection of standard Toyota Safety Sense 2.0 featuring automatic emergency braking. Just as it did at the end of the 1960s, Corolla today offers buyers the freedom and independence that comes from its affordability, along with confidence that a car can provide many years of reliable service with low overall cost of ownership. The 2022 Corolla line continues that proud and personal tradition with sedans, a sporty hatchback, a hybrid and the first-ever Corolla Cross compact crossover. For Corolla, dependability isn't just about how the car runs, but also describes how it becomes a trusted member of the households it serves. It's no wonder that a Corolla has long been the start of a "Toyota family," with other Toyota models soon joining it in many driveways and garages. Ready for Anything Corolla sales were already on the upswing when the October 1973 Oil Embargo set off a chain reaction of long lines and higher prices at the gas pump, and even fuel rationing. The increasing number of buyers who turned to Corolla could be confident that even just few gallons in the tank would be enough to meet the needs of the week or more. Corolla emerged from that downbeat period with even wider and rapidly growing appeal, and Toyota began to add more models, including sporty fastback coupe and liftback versions. Toyota's steadfast dedication to continuous improvement ensured that every new generation of Corolla offered more than its predecessor. By the mid-1980s, Toyota was building Corollas in the U.S., and today, Corollas are built at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Mississippi, Inc. (TMMMS), which opened in 2011. The new Mazda Toyota Manufacturing plant in Huntsville, Alabama, began building the all-new Toyota Corolla Cross this year. While the 2022 Corolla may seem lightyears from its late 1960s ancestor, its core values trace a line right back to that first edition. The Corolla continues to evolve to meet the ever-changing needs of a growing and diverse customer base but has never veered from its mission to deliver renowned Toyota quality, durability and reliability with high fuel economy at an affordable price. It's just gotten a whole lot more refined and enjoyable to drive. Here's a look at how Corolla got to 50 million ... and counting. First Generation: 1969-1970 The first Corolla was the essence of simplicity, with a clean and crisp design offering generous all-around visibility in coupe, four-door sedan and two-door wagon models. A coupe called Corolla Sprinter with a slightly lower semi-fastback roofline arrived later. All Corollas had a short-stroke 1,077-cc overhead-valve four-cylinder engine that used aluminum for the cylinder head, intake manifold, valve cover and clutch housing pretty forward thinking at the time. Wheels were just 12-inch diameter, and the only transmission offered was a four-speed manual. With 60 horsepower (51 hp SAE net) zero-to-60 took around 17 seconds, and the top fuel economy estimate was in the high 20s. The 1969 Corolla two-door sedan started at just under $1,700, and among its standard features were reclining front seats and a locking fuel-filler door. Attention to detail impressed auto media and customers. Said "Car and Driver" magazine in a road test, "Not only is the interior well designed but it's also well finished, right down to the carpet that's perfectly molded to the shape of the floor with every edge carefully bound to avoid that low-priced look." Second Generation: 1971-1974 The second-generation Corolla grew in size, with a slightly longer wheelbase, moved up to 73 horsepower and offered Corolla's first optional automatic transmission, a two-speed. (A three-speed arrived a bit later.) For 1972, an SR-5 coupe featured a 88-hp (SAE net) 1.6-liter engine with a five-speed manual transmission to be a fun companion to the new Celica sport coupe. Corolla had by this time become the second-best-selling car in the world. Third Generation: 1975-1979 The Corolla again grew a bit in size and offered 1.2, 1.3 and 1.6-liter engines. The line added fastback coupe and Liftback models for 1976, which featured fresh front styling. The Liftback was more like a sport wagon and added rear seat head room, the result being both sporty and eminently practical. Fourth Generation: 1980-1984 A bold, angular design distinguished the fourth-generation Corolla, which kept its wide range of models. The new design focused on roominess and quietness while adding more amenities. The U.S. model offered a 75-hp OHV 1.8-liter engine and the 4A-C 90-hp OHC 1.6-liter engine. The two-door models were praised for front seats with a "memory" feature that allowed the seats to slide forward to assist with rear seat ingress/egress, and then return to the same position and recline angle. Fifth Generation: 1985-1988 The fifth-generation Corolla brought big news all around. The main series switched to front-wheel drive for added interior room and better all-weather traction. In a joint venture with General Motors called New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. (NUMMI), Toyota began building Corollas in California. All front-drive engines were now SOHC configuration. A rear-drive Corolla model, known by its VIN prefix "AE86," came in coupe and hatchback styles. The top GT-S version packed the heat of the legendary 4A-GE DOHC 1.6-liter engine. In 1987, a new front-drive FX hatchback was added, and the top version, the FX16 GT-S, inherited the 4A-GE engine to create a new "hot hatch" model. The rear-drive GT-S would later become a drifting legend, in real life and in video games. The spirit of both those cars continues in the 2022 Corolla Hatchback. Sixth Generation: 1989-1992 The sixth-generation Corolla line was now all front-wheel drive, with all models powered by 16-valve DOHC engines and featuring four-wheel independent suspension. The Corolla All-Trac wagon and sedan models had an effective all-wheel drive system. The new coupe featured pop-up headlights like the AE86 and came in SR-5 and GT-S models. The latter was quite sporty, indeed, featuring the 4A-GE engine, special wheels and a bold body kit. The GT-S had 135 horsepower in the 1990-1991 version. Seventh Generation: 1993-1997 The seventh-generation Corolla, available only in sedan and wagon styles in the U.S., became more Camry-like in its design, and in fact moved up in cabin size to the compact segment while the Camry moved to midsize. Both 1.6-liter and 1.8-liter DOHC engines were offered. For 1997, a CE sedan packaged numerous popular options for a special value-priced model. The timing seemed appropriate to celebrate Corolla becoming the best-selling car model in history that year. Eighth Generation: 1998-2002 The eighth-generation Corolla improved on the proven formula, with yet more cabin room on the same wheelbase as the previous model. The redesigned unibody improved passenger crash protection and, notably, side airbags became available. A new all-aluminum 1ZZ-FE 1.8-liter DOHC four-cylinder engine debuted the Variable Valve Timing with intelligence (VVT-i) system and made 120 horsepower with higher fuel economy ratings. Ninth Generation: 2003-2008 In its ninth-generation, Corolla got a bit longer and taller to create its roomiest cabin ever. A Corolla S model added sport-tuned suspension and special body styling. With its 130-horsepower engine, the Corolla had an EPA-estimated 31 combined MPG with the five-speed manual transmission and 28 combined MPG with the four-speed automatic. As a sign of the times, the center console box could hold 14 compact discs. For 2005, the performance-tuned Corolla XRS model combined the high-revving 164-horsepower 2ZZ 1.8-liter engine from the Celica GT-S with a six-speed manual transmission and sport-tuned suspension. "The levels of fit and finish are nothing short of remarkable," commented "Car and Driver" magazine about the ninth-generation Corolla. By 2002, the Corolla had achieved 25 million sold worldwide. 10th Generation: 2009-2013 In the 10th-generation Corolla, a multi-faceted focus on refinement resulted in what "Motor Trend" magazine observed "must be the quietest car in its class, with less wind noise than many luxury cars." The body had a sleeker look than before and was just as roomy. The XRS model returned, now with the 2.4-liter engine from the Camry for higher torque and greater responsiveness in everyday driving. With CDs beginning to fade, the higher-grade Corolla models offered JBL Premium Audio with iPod connectivity, Bluetooth and steering-wheel-mounted audio controls. Comfort and tech had become higher priorities for compact car buyers, and the Corolla obliged with the XLE grade, which offered an available power moonroof and a JBL audio system with AM/FM/six-disc CD changer, plus satellite radio and eight speakers. 11th Generation: 2014-2018 The 11th-generation Corolla debuted a chiseled new body. The rear seat's 41.4 inches of legroom exceeded that of many midsize and full-size sedans. All Corolla models now featured eight standard airbags, including a new driver's knee airbag and front passenger seat cushion airbag. Critically, the 2017 Corolla came standard with Toyota Safety Sense-P, a total safety system anchored by automatic emergency braking and that bundled the Pre-Collision System with Pedestrian Detection; Lane Departure Alert with Steering Assist; Full-Speed Dynamic Radar Cruise Control and Automatic High Beams. Upgraded interior materials continued the premium feel, and a touchscreen audio system featured Bluetooth, USB and iPod connectivity as standard. Automatic climate control became standard on the LE grade and above. The L and sporty S grades standard with a six-speed manual transmission, while the automatic transmission was now a CVT to boost fuel economy. The Corolla Eco model with Valvematic engine technology had an EPA estimated 42 MPG highway / 34 MPG combined. 12th Generation: 2019-present For 2019, the Toyota Corolla line brought a new sedan with a lower, leaner, tauter look. Bigger news: The hatch was back! A sporty hatchback returned to the line after a long absence. And still bigger news: The first Corolla Hybrid Sedan debuted, becoming the fuel economy champ of the line with an astounding EPA estimated 52 combined MPG. The Corolla Hatchback has a body all its own and channels the spirit of the past Corolla GT-S and XRS performance models, thanks to the 169-horsepower 2.0-liter Dynamic Force engine and rev-matching intelligent six-speed manual transmission. This hot yet highly efficient powerplant is also available in the Corolla sedan. And, while the Corolla Hybrid is the line's MPG rating leader, the other models are efficiency experts, too, with the 2.0-liter models having an estimated rating of up to 35 combined MPG. The Corolla Sedan and Hatchback offer a Nightshade Special Edition, an XSE sport model and a luxury-flavored XLE grade. The Dynamic Shift CVT available for all models (except the Hybrid) uses a geared first ratio for a better performance feel and efficiency. The limited-availability Corolla Apex took performance to an even higher level with a bold body kit, track-developed suspension with lowering springs, lightweight 18-inch alloy wheels and a sport-tuned exhaust. For 2022, the first-ever Corolla Cross joins the line, a new crossover with ample space to tackle the town and generously equipped with Toyota's renowned comfort and tech features. All Corolla models are built on the Toyota New Global Architecture (TNGA) platform for high levels of agility and safety. And, all Corolla models feature standard Toyota Safety Sense 2.0 on all grades. The Beat Goes On After 50 million cars, the Toyota Corolla heads into the future offering stylish, agile, quiet, roomy, highly efficient models brimming with the latest tech and safety and ready to write millions more personal stories around the globe. Toyota invites everyone with a Corolla story to share it using #MyCorollaStory. About Toyota Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for more than 60 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands plus our 1,800 dealerships. Toyota has created a tremendous value chain and directly employs more than 47,000 in North America. The company has contributed world-class design, engineering, and assembly of more than 40 million cars and trucks at our 14 manufacturing plants, 15 including our joint venture in Alabama that begins production in 2021. Through its Start Your Impossible campaign, Toyota highlights the way it partners with community, civic, academic and governmental organizations to address our society's most pressing mobility challenges. We believe that when people are free to move, anything is possible. For more information about Toyota, visit www.toyotanewsroom.com. For customer inquiries, please call: 800-331-4331 or visit https://www.toyota.com/corolla/ for more. Media Contacts: Paul Hogard 469-292-6791 [email protected] Note to Editors: Photos b-roll and additional specifications can be found on ToyotaNewsroom.com SOURCE Toyota Related Links https://www.toyota.com LEHI, Utah, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Weave, the all-in-one customer communication platform for small business, has been named to the Utah Business Fast 50 list for the third consecutive year. Utah Business Fast 50 companies are established companies selected based on a combination of revenue growth and total revenue and are vetted by Squire and Co. for financial accuracy. They are ranked in order of 2020 growth. This is the third year in a row Weave has appeared on this list. "We are so excited to be named to the Fast 50 list alongside many other impressive local Utah companies," said Roy Banks, Chief Executive Officer of Weave. "Being recognized for the third year in a row on this list solidifies our growth in the state of Utah and our continued investment in our local community." Weave landed at #13, ranking four places above the company's 2020 and 2019 ranking of #17. This list ranks the top 50 companies in the state of Utah by their total five-year revenue and compound annual growth rate. The Utah Business Fast 50 rankings were announced today during the Fast 50 event. All winners and their rankings will be featured in the September issue of Utah Business magazine. About Weave Weave is the all-in-one customer communications platform for small business. From the first phone call to the final invoice and every touchpoint in between, Weave connects the entire customer journey. Weave's software solutions transform how local businesses attract, communicate with and engage customers to grow their business. The first Utah company to join Y Combinator, Weave has set the bar for Utah startup achievement & work culture. In the past year, Weave has been included in the Forbes Cloud 100, Inc. 5000 fastest-growing companies in America, and Glassdoor Best Places to Work. To learn more, visit www.getweave.com/newsroom/ Contact: Kali Geldis Director of Communications, Weave [email protected] SOURCE Weave Related Links http://www.getweave.com "It's a big deal to us that we are part of the Inc. 5000 and the Vet100." Tweet this YourSix also ranked #12 on the 2021 Vet100 List, a newer ranking designed in partnership with Inc. 5000 to honor the 100 fastest-growing veteran-owned or operated Businesses in America. "It's a big deal to us that we are part of the Inc. 5000 and the Vet100," said YourSix CEO Eric Styles. "As representatives of our economy's most important business segment - independent businesses - this kind of recognition is pure validation of the hard work and passion our team brings to each customer interaction." "The 2021 Inc. 5000 list feels like one of the most important rosters of companies ever compiled," says Scott Omelianuk, editor-in-chief of Inc. "Building one of the fastest-growing companies in America in any year is a remarkable achievement. Building one in the crisis we've lived through is just plain amazing. This kind of accomplishment comes with hard work, smart pivots, great leadership, and the help of a whole lot of people." About YourSix Inc. YourSix is an award-winning, service-disabled veteran-owned Physical Security as a Service (PSaaS) provider. The YourSix solution represents the convergence of video surveillance, access control, IP audio and video monitoring delivered through a unified cloud platform. YourSix is changing the industry with its open standards-based platform, providing operational intelligence and security advancements powered by machine learning/artificial intelligence. Founded in 2015 and headquartered in Roseville, Minnesota. In 2021, Inc. 5000, the most prestigious ranking of the nation's fastest-growing private companies, ranked YourSix Inc. No. 208 in America. For more information, visit www.yoursix.com. Inc. 5000 Methodology Companies on the 2021 Inc. 5000 are ranked according to percentage revenue growth from 2017 to 2020. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by March 31, 2017. They must be U.S.-based, privately held, for-profit, and independentnot subsidiaries or divisions of other companiesas of December 31, 2020. (Since then, some on the list may have gone public or been acquired.) The minimum revenue required for 2017 is $100,000; the minimum for 2020 is $2 million. As always, Inc. reserves the right to decline applicants for subjective reasons. Growth rates used to determine company rankings were calculated to three decimal places. There was one tie on this year's Inc. 5000. Companies on the Inc. 500 are featured in Inc.'s September issue. They represent the top tier of the Inc. 5000, which can be found at. About Inc. Media The world's most trusted business-media brand, Inc. offers entrepreneurs the knowledge, tools, connections, and community to build great companies. Its award-winning multiplatform content reaches more than 50 million people each month across a variety of channels including web sites, newsletters, social media, podcasts, and print. Its prestigious Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to recognize the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The global recognition that comes with inclusion in the 5000 gives the founders of the best businesses an opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers, and the credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. The associated Inc. 5000 Vision Conference is part of a highly acclaimed portfolio of bespoke events produced by Inc. For more information, visit https://www.inc.com/ For more information, please contact: Tracey Boucher Brown, Director of Marketing 763.269.8660 [email protected] SOURCE YourSix Inc. Related Links yoursix.com HONG KONG, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Chinese leading biopharmaceutical company 3SBio (01530.HK) today unveiled its 2021 interim results. 3SBio maintained strong performance in core businesses, with core products occupying a leading market share. Meanwhile, the Company continuously increased investments in research and development, while significantly accelerating its pipeline. In the future, 3SBio will reinforce its position as an industry leader by enhancing its competitive edges with further integration of R&D, manufacturing, commercialization and investment cooperation. Core businesses maintain strong growth and lead the industry In first half of 2021, 3SBio posted revenue of approximately RMB 3.11 billion, an increase of 15.3% over the same period last year. Gross profit rose 16.7% year on year to approximately RMB 2.59 billion. Net profit attributable to owners of the parent added 28% on a yearly basis to approximately RMB 900 million. R&D investment increased 35.6% on an annual basis to RMB 340 million. 3SBio's multiple core products maintained strong momentum and consolidated their positions as market leaders. In the first half of 2021, TPIAO, which is used to treat thrombocytopenia, posted sales of RMB 1.521 billion, an increase of 10.7% year on year, and its market share was 72.3%. Sales of two recombinant human erythropoietin ("rhEPO") products, EPIAO and SEPO, hit RMB 543 million, marking a year-on-year increase of 17.6%, and a market share of 42.8%. Yisaipu, a product to treat rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, and psoriasis, had sales of RMB 429 million, a significant rise of 29.5% year on year. Inetetamab was included in the Chinese Society of Clinical Oncology (CSCO) Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Breast Cancer (2021), becoming a cornerstone drug for the whole-process anti-HER2 treatment of patients with advanced breast cancer. In the first half of 2021, sales of hair growth products led by Mandi doubled year on year. Among them, sales of Mandi (minoxidil tincture) reached RMB 258 million, a year-on-year increase of 100.3%. According to CPA data, Mandi had a share of 71.5% in its category, making itself an absolute market leader. Mandi is now available in more than 2,000 medical institutions, approximately 40,000 retail pharmacies, and e-commerce platforms including Tmall and JD.com, while a strategic partnership has been reached with chain operator Yonghe Hair Transplant. According to the Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Androgenetic Alopecia in Chinese Population issued by the Chinese Medical Doctor Association), minoxidil is superior to other types of therapeutic drugs in preventing and improving androgenic alopecia (AGA) in terms of both efficacy and safety, with the highest-level recommendation. There are 250 million people with hair loss in China, and the current market penetration rate of Mandi is only 1-2%. With increasing demand for the treatment of hair loss, Mandi, as a leading OTC drug for external use to improve hair growth, has huge growth potential. In addition, products in-licensed by 3SBio through partnerships will soon contribute to potential revenue growth. The Phase III clinical bridging trial of Remitch (nalfuraphine hydrochloride orally disintegrating tablets) under the cooperation between 3SBio and Toray, has been successfully completed, and it is expected to become the only product for the treatment of pruritus in patients on maintenance hemodialysis after it goes on the market. Based on the Company's strong capabilities in sales channels in the nephrology field, the product is expected to benefit millions of Chinese patients. Apart from strong momentum in core products, 3SBio's contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) business has also seen significant progress in the first half of 2021. Revenue from 3SBio's CDMO business, consisting of subsidiaries such as Shenyang Desheng, Sunshine Guojian and Italy-based Sirton, posted a year-on-year rise of 9.4% to RMB 40.05 million. Among them, the Shenyang Desheng project has a total planned area of 500 mus, with an aim to build a domestically leading site for biopharma CDMO, biopharma raw and auxiliary supplies and consumables manufacturing and biopharma core process equipment. The site will meet the GMP standards in China, the EU and the United States, and serve global markets. The Phase I CDMO project at Shenyang Desheng, covering an area of more than 110 mus, is planned to have annual capacities of 199,000 liters of original solutions and 1 billion doses of injections. Initially, the production capacity of 76,000 liters will be put into operation in 2022. Accelerating the pipeline development In terms of R&D, 3SBio has been accelerating its pipeline via in-house projects and external partnerships. In the first half of 2021, 3SBio had a total of 35 product candidates under its pipeline, of which 24 were developed as innovative drugs in China. The candidates included 21 monoclonal antibodies or bispecific antibodies, 5 other biological products, and 9 small molecule drugs. There are 14 candidates in oncology, 14 in autoimmune and other diseases, 6 in nephrology, and 1 in dermatology. 6 projects with NDA submissions or in Phase III clinical trials The New Drug Application (NDA) of pre-filled aqueous injection solution Yisaipu (301S) was accepted by the National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) of China in July 2021. The Phase III clinical trial of nalfurafine hydrochloride (TRK820) under a partnership with Japan's Toray for the treatment of refractory pruritus in patients on maintenance hemodialysis met the pre-defined endpoint, and the results were consistent with those of the Phase III trial in Japan. The Phase III head-to-head study between minoxidil foam formulation MN709 and Rogaine in male patients with hair loss was completed, and the results are expected to be presented in the third quarter of 2021. The Phase III clinical trial of TPIAO for immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) in children has been launched. In addition, the Phase Ib/II clinical trial of TPIAO for the mobilization of patients with chronic liver dysfunction at risk of thrombocytopenia in the perioperative period has also been launched. The combination therapy SEL-212 containing SSS11pegitiscase has started the Phase III clinical trial in patients with chronic refractory gout in the United States. The Company is currently conducting the Phase I clinical trial of SSS11 in refractory gout patients with high levels of uric acid. The Phase III clinical trial of 304R, an anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody, has completed the data review. The Company has also completed the Phase I head-to-head comparative clinical trial with Rituxan (rituximab) on the safety and pharmacokinetics in patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma with zero tumor burden. 8 products in Phase II clinical trials The randomized Phase II clinical trial of the long-acting erythropoietin SSS06 has completed patient enrolment. The dose-escalation Phase I clinical trial to evaluate the safety and pharmacokinetics of the long-acting erythropoietin RD001 in healthy volunteers was completed. The patient enrolment for the Phase II clinical trial is ongoing. The dose-escalation Phase I clinical trial of 608, an anti-IL-17A monoclonal antibody, in healthy volunteers was completed, and the Phase II clinical trial in patients with plaque psoriasis is ongoing. The dose-escalation Phase I clinical trial of 610, an anti-IL-5 monoclonal antibody, in healthy volunteers was completed, and the Phase Ib/II trial in asthma patients will soon be launched. The Phase I clinical trial of SSS07, an anti-TNF monoclonal antibody, in healthy volunteers and patients with pheumatoid arthritis was completed. The two dose-escalation Phase I/IIa clinical trials of 601A, an anti-VEGF monoclonal antibody, in patients with age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and diabetic macular edema (DME) were completed. Three Phase II clinical trials in patients with branch retinal vein occlusion (BRVO), central retinal vein occlusion (CRVO), and pathological myopic choroidal neovascularization (pmCNV) have been launched. Two Phase I clinical trials of 602, an anti-EGFR monoclonal antibody, in healthy volunteers and patients with colorectal cancer were completed, and the Phase II clinical trial in patients with colorectal cancer has been launched. The IND of the Phase I/II clinical trials of 302H, an anti-HER2 monoclonal antibody, in combination with 602 in patients with HER2-positive, KRAS/NRAS/BRAF wild-type colorectal cancer has been approved by the NMPA. In addition, the INDs of the clinical trials of 302H in combination with IMM01, an anti-CD47 fusion protein, in patients with HER2-positive solid tumors, and 302H in combination with 609A, an anti-PD1 monoclonal antibody, for neoadjuvant treatment of breast cancer have been submitted to the NMPA. 6 products in Phase I clinical trials or with IND approvals/submissions The Phase I clinical trial of 609A, an anti-PD1 monoclonal antibody, in patients with multiple types of cancer was completed in the United States, and the Phase I clinical trial in China has wrapped up patient enrolment. The IND of 609A in combination with 302H, bevacizumab and chemotherapy in patients with multiple types of cancer has been submitted to the NMPA. The dose-escalation Phase I clinical trial of 611, an anti-IL-4R monoclonal antibody, in healthy volunteers was completed in the United States, and the Phase Ib/II clinical trial in patients with atopic dermatitis is ongoing in China. Patient enrolment for the Phase I clinical trial of HIF-117 in patients with anemia is ongoing. The IND of 612, an anti-HER2 monoclonal antibody for the treatment of HER2-positive cancer, has been approved by the NMPA. The two INDs of clinical trials of 613, an anti-IL-1 monoclonal antibody, have been approved by the NMPA for the treatment of patients with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) and periodic fever syndrome. The IND of 705, an anti-PD1/HER2 bispecific antibody, has been approved by the US FDA for the treatment of patients with HER2-positive solid tumors, and the IND in China has been submitted to the NMPA. Constantly improved comprehensive platform capabilities In 2021, 3SBio has been stepping up efforts to improve its comprehensive capabilities by leveraging the integration of R&D, manufacturing, commercialization and investment cooperation. The Company has been focused on developing innovative biologics products to address unmet medical needs. 3SBio has been focused on building up its in-house clinical R&D capabilities with a R&D team of nearly 600 people. The Company is among first-tier players in China in the field of autoimmune diseases, with a pipeline of anti-IL-4R antibody, anti-IL-5 antibody and anti-IL-17A antibody. In oncology, the Company has been focused on the development of new next-generation biological therapies including, programmed CAR-T cell therapies, immune checkpoint inhibitors, macrophage checkpoint modulators, bispecific antibodies and other new antibodies, antibodies against new targets and combination therapies. On the other hand, 3SBio has also been proactively collaborating with the world's leading technology platforms and biotech companies to develop high-quality drugs, and introducing leading global products into China. Partners include Toray, Samsung Bioepis, Refuge Biotechnologies, Verseau, TLC, Gensight, and Sensorion. In the next 12 months, 3SBio is expected to submit multiple IND applications. Meanwhile, the Company has continuously improved its multiple advantages in the field of CDMO business. 3SBio can support the production of multiple biological drugs, including monoclonal antibodies, bispecific antibodies, neutralizing antibodies, vaccines, and nucleic acid-based (mRNA) drugs to address end-to-end needs from early-stage sample structure analysis to post-launch commercialization. The production line is equipped with reactors with diverse scales, enabling it to address different scenarios for small-batch sample testing and large-batch commercial production. The total production capacity exceeds 200 million doses, covering biological preparations such as vials, freeze-dried powder injections, and prefilled injections. The Company's CDMO production line has obtained GMP certifications from China, Brazil, Colombia, Ukraine, and the European Union, and has successfully passed all inspections by the regulatory authorities. 3SBio has end-to-end technological advantages from R&D to biopharma manufacturing, and cost advantages for commercial production with its 10,000-liter single bioreactor. The Company has additional cost advantages by self-producing raw materials such as culture media and chromatography fillers, as well as quality control advantages with a high level of automation. All these have enabled the Company to sustainably provide high-quality biopharma products and CDMO services for the markets. As of June 31, 2021, 3SBio had close to 3,000 staffers in its sales and marketing teams, with business presence across the country. In addition, products such as TPIAO, Yisaipu, EPIAO and SEPO have been shipped to many countries. Dr. Jing LOU, Chairman of 3SBio, commented: "In the first half of 2021, 3SBio posted significant growth in core businesses, laying a solid foundation for its full-year performance. The Company has proactively responded to the country's initiative to provide healthcare for people in lower-tier regions, and stepped up efforts to improve the access to biological drugs at the primary care level. Meanwhile, the Company accelerated the research and development of proprietary innovative biological medicines, and provided safe and effective hair loss treatment to the market. The Company has a number of in-house core products, with stable cash flows and financial performance, setting the stage for its long-term sustainable development. 3SBio is committed to addressing unmet clinical needs, continuously improving innovation and R&D capabilities, benefiting patients with high-quality drugs, and creating greater value for our shareholders and the broader society." Cautionary Note and Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements, such as those relating to business or products outlook, or Company's intent, plans, beliefs, expectation and strategies. These forward-looking statements are based on information currently available to the Company and are stated herein on the basis of the outlook at the time of this press release. They are based on certain expectations, assumptions and premises, some of which are subjective or beyond our control.These forward-looking statements may prove to be incorrect or may not be realized in the future.With respect to any new product or new indication, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to successfully develop or eventually launch and market such product or indication. Underlying the forward-looking statements is a large number of risks and uncertainties. Further information regarding such risks and uncertainties may be found in our other public disclosure documents.The scientific information involved may only be preliminary and empirical. Shareholders and potential investors of the Company are advised to exercise caution when dealing in the shares of the Company. SOURCE 3Sbio The report identifies the growing popularity of social networking applications as one of the major factors driving the growth of the market. In addition, increasing adoption of mobile AR and surging use CMOS sensors in camera modules are few other factors likely to contribute significantly to the market's growth. However, issues with regard to resolution compatibility and the high price of dual lens camera technology are some of the prominent factors likely to hinder the market's growth in the forthcoming years. This report presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources by an analysis of key parameters. The Dual Lens Camera Smartphone Market is segmented by Price (Premium range, Medium range, and Low range) and Geography (APAC, North America, Europe, South America, and MEA). The premium range price segment held the largest dual lens camera smartphone market share during 2020 and will continue to retain its dominance in the forthcoming years. In terms of geography, APAC accounted for 58% of the market's growth with India and China contributing to the growth owing to the growing demand for smartphones in the region. The dual lens camera smartphone market covers the following areas: Dual Lens Camera Smartphone Market Sizing Dual Lens Camera Smartphone Market Forecast Dual Lens Camera Smartphone Market Analysis Companies Mentioned Apple Inc. ASUSTeK Computer Inc. HTC Corp. Huawei Investment and Holding Co. Ltd. Lenovo Group Ltd. LG Electronics Inc. Nokia Corp. Panasonic Corp. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. Xiaomi Corp. 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 Related Reports: Smartphone Market by Technology, Price Range, Screen Size, and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025 Smartphone Power Management IC Market by Price and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025 Key Topics Covered: Executive Summary Market Landscape Market ecosystem Market characteristics Value chain analysis Market Sizing Market definition Market segment analysis Market size 2020 Market outlook: Forecast for 2020 - 2025 Five Forces Analysis Bargaining power of buyers Bargaining power of suppliers Threat of new entrants Threat of substitutes Threat of rivalry Market condition Market Segmentation by Price Market segments Comparison by Price Premium range - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Medium range - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Low range - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Market opportunity by Price Geographic Landscape Geographic segmentation Geographic comparison APAC - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 North America - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Europe - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 South America - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 MEA - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Key leading countries Market opportunity by geography Market drivers Market challenges Market trends Vendor Landscape Vendor landscape Landscape disruption Vendor Analysis Vendors covered Market positioning of vendors Apple Inc. ASUSTeK Computer Inc. HTC Corp. Huawei Investment and Holding Co. Ltd. Lenovo Group Ltd. LG Electronics Inc. Nokia Corp. Panasonic Corp. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. Xiaomi Corp. 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. Contact Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: [email protected] Website: www.technavio.com/ Report: https://www.technavio.com/report/dual-lens-camera-smartphone-market-industry-analysis SOURCE Technavio Related Links http://www.technavio.com/ OAK BROOK, Ill., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Ace Hardware, the largest retailer-owned hardware cooperative in the world, has already opened 110 new stores in 2021, and is planning to open at least an additional 60 stores by the end of the year. Ace operates more than 5,500 locally owned hardware stores in all 50 states and 70 countries, with global sales topping $20 billion. Ace's unique cooperative business model offers local entrepreneurs not only the ability to become owners of their local store operation, but they also become one of a limited number of shareholders of Ace Hardware Corporation. "Our proposition for consumers is that Ace is the most helpful store on the planet; for prospective new store owners, our proposition is that Ace is the most financially and emotionally rewarding opportunity available," said John Venhuizen, President and CEO of Ace Hardware Corporation. "An essential business, rooted in people, that exists to serve others; we are blessed with local owners who genuinely serve the communities in which they reside." Globally, Ace has opened more than 900 stores in the past five years, while disbursing dividends of $293 million in 2020a 46 percent return for Ace shareholders. Ace Hardware has earned multiple industry accolades this year, including being named one of the Best of the Best Franchises by Entrepreneur magazine, and ranking 5th among the top 200 largest franchise systems based in the U.S., according to Franchise Times. About Ace Hardware Ace Hardware is the largest retailer-owned hardware cooperative in the world with more than 5,500 locally owned and operated hardware stores in approximately 70 countries. Headquartered in Oak Brook, Ill., Ace and its subsidiaries operate an expansive network of distribution centers in the U.S. and have distribution capabilities in Ningbo, China; Colon, Panama; and Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Since 1924, Ace has become a part of local communities around the world and known as the place with the helpful hardware folks. For more information, visit acehardware.com or newsroom.acehardware.com. Media Contact Katie Heraty [email protected] SOURCE Ace Hardware Corporation Related Links www.acehardware.com TOKYO and DUBLIN, Ireland, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Airborne Capital Limited ("Airborne") and Mercuria Investment Holdings Co., Ltd. ("Mercuria") are pleased to announce the agreement, between Airborne and Mercuria's subsidiary Mercuria Investment Co., Ltd., to enter into a joint venture for the operation of a new entity in Japan, called "Mercuria Airborne Capital Co., Ltd." ("JV"). The JV provides Airborne with increased access to Japanese aviation investors, and it enables Mercuria to further expand its expertise in cross-border alternative investments, catering to Japanese investors seeking bespoke aviation investments. The business will be a bridge between the specific needs of Japanese aviation investors and the changing dynamics in the global aviation market. Despite the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, aircraft investment continues to provide attractive investment and yield opportunities to investors worldwide, with the JV being established in anticipation that the role institutional investors play in the aviation leasing industry will grow at a faster pace. Mercuria is a multi-strategy investment management group with offices in Tokyo, Beijing, Hong Kong and Bangkok, and its AUM is about USD 2bn. Mercuria has provided innovative solutions in growth, buyout and real asset investments to Japanese and overseas investors. Airborne is a specialist aircraft leasing and asset management business headquartered in Ireland and with presence in Shannon, Dublin, London, New York, Montreal, Hong Kong, Seoul and Tokyo. Airborne was established in 2017 and manages approximately USD 1bn of aircraft assets through active relationships with global set of investors, including Japanese investors. Toshihiro Toyoshima, CEO of Mercuria said: "This joint venture is an exciting step for Mercuria and will broaden the range of international alternative investment opportunities we can offer our clients. The business marries Airborne's global aviation finance expertise with our strong client base and investment pedigree." Ramki Sundaram, CEO of Airborne Capital said: "We are delighted to partner with Mercuria and expand on our already successful operations in Japan. Mercuria Airborne Capital will offer institutional investors in Japan access to a growing range of attractive investment opportunities in the global aviation finance sector." For more information contact: SOURCE Airborne Capital DALLAS, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Alternet Systems, Inc. (USOTC: ALYI) ("ALYI") today announced that in addition to the expected revenue from ALYI's previously announced EV motorcycle business in Kenya, ALYI expects to begin converting its waiting list for Retro Revolt Electric Motorcycles into orders before the end of the year. The company confirms it expects to exceed its first million in revenue prior to the end of the year from the electric vehicle ecosystem the company has been constructing over the last few years. The company intends to publish a specific revenue target shortly after Labor Day which falls on September 6, 2021. Earlier this week, ALYI initiated conversations with the outsourced manufacturing provider that produced the base Retro Revolt Electric Motorcycle frames used to produce the pilot bike demonstrated earlier this year. ALYI is approaching the finalization of production design now and expects to soon begin manufacturing the Retro Revolt Electric Motorcycle. Retro Revolt Electric Motorcycle sales in North America are expected to add to the overall EV Ecosystem Revenue anticipated before the end of 2021 from the previously announced delivery of electric motorcycles in Kenya for the EV Rideshare Business ALYI is now piloting. ALYI's overall EV Ecosystem Strategy is not to just produced a single EV product. ALYI's business focus is on the introduction of an EV Ecosystem that addresses the entire EV adoption environment from the perpetual design of best in class vehicles to the perpetual design of the myriad of mechanical and digital systems that go into a best in class vehicle; from the charging and maintenance infrastructure that goes into supporting consumer and commercial vehicles, to the EV value proposition itself that drives consumers and businesses to transition from combustion engines to electric powered vehicles. ALYI has seeded an overall EV Ecosystem Business Strategy with the development of its own EV motorcycle business that includes the Rideshare initiative in Africa and the Retro Revolt Electric Motorcycle initiative in North American. The company launched a pilot in Kenya in July in conjunction with a 2,000 electric motorcycle order. CEO Dr. Randell Torno expects to begin delivering on the 2,000 electric motorcycle order before the end of the year. The company has also announced an expansion of the Electric Vehicle (EV) Rideshare Business Pilot into Ethiopia. The pilot expansion in Ethiopia has been in the works for approximately the last year. Dr. Torno visited Addis Ababa earlier this month to finalize expansion plans. Africa has millions of motorcycles, both two wheeled and three wheeled, deployed as taxis or boda-bodas and tuk tuks, and ALYI, as one part of its overall EV Ecosystem Business Strategy, is engaged in a project to replace combustion engine motorcycles with electric motorcycles. The global motorcycle taxi market was valued by Verified Market Research at $16 billion in 2018 and expected to grow to over 29 billion by 2026. Ultimately, ALYI does not intend to go it alone on the overall development and rollout of its overall EV Ecosystem Business Strategy. ALYI is building a core element into its Ecosystem that attracts, if not compels the participation of all would be brand name EV industry leaders in an annual EV symposium and conference. The EV symposium and conference will be anchored by an EV race event in Kenya that comes with a substantial brand name. The EV race market was valued in 2019 at over $80 billion dollars and is anticipated to grow to over $200 billion by 2025. ALYI's EV Ecosystem is founded on building participation in an EV race event as a central component in advancing EV technology and EV branding. ALYI has been developing a partnership with a major EV racing brand for more than two years now. Over a year ago, ALYI entered into a formal partnership agreement that includes that EV racing brand. The first milestone objectives contemplated under the agreement have been achieved and the next steps are imminent. ALYI expects the next steps to include naming the EV racing brand at which time, ALYI management anticipates ALYI's overall visibility within the global EV market to be substantially elevated. The objective of the EV symposium and conference anchored by an EV race is to advance EV technology by building EV solutions for the African market a power constrained, rugged environment with one of the lowest per capita transportation deployments in the world. EV solutions for the African market will be applicable the world around. EV solutions designed and built in Africa also contribute to building an autonomous African economy. ALYI has designed its EV ecosystem solution to include democratized participation. ALYI has partnered with ReovltTOKEN to finance ALYI's growth by offering participation in the EV ecosystem through the sale of Revolt Tokens. To learn more about RevoltTOKEN and how to participate in ALYI's electric vehicle ecosystem through the purchase of Revolt Tokens, visit https://rvlttoken.com/. ALYI plans to make a major announcement later this month regarding the EV race that management expects will garner substantial attention to ALYI's overall EV Ecosystem strategy. For more information and to stay up to date on ALYI's overall latest developments, please visit www.alternetsystemsinc.com . Disclaimer/Safe Harbor: This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Securities Litigation Reform Act. The statements reflect the Company's current views with respect to future events that involve risks and uncertainties. Among others, these risks include the expectation that any of the companies mentioned herein will achieve significant sales, the failure to meet schedule or performance requirements of the companies' contracts, the companies' liquidity position, the companies' ability to obtain new contracts, the emergence of competitors with greater financial resources and the impact of competitive pricing. In the light of these uncertainties, the forward-looking events referred to in this release might not occur. For more information, please visit: http://www.alternetsystemsinc.com Alternet Systems, Inc. Contact: Randell Torno [email protected] +1-800-713-0297 SOURCE Alternet Systems, Inc. WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- American Humane, the country's first national humane organization, applauds President Biden for signing the Puppies Assisting Wounded Servicemembers (PAWS) Act, which when implemented will empower the Department of Defense to fund service dogs for veterans struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder. "American Humane is heartened and encouraged by the bipartisan support for the PAWS Act, which will improve the lives of veterans across the country," said Robin R. Ganzert, Ph.D., president and CEO of American Humane. "Thanks to President Biden, specially trained service dogs will be available to more veterans in need by empowering nonprofits to put healing leashes into the hands that need them most." The PAWS Act instructs the Department of Veterans Affairs to begin a five-year pilot program that will provide specially trained service dogs, as an element of a broader health program, to veterans diagnosed with PTSD. The momentum behind the PAWS Act comes on the heels of a Veterans Health Administration study, the results of which were released earlier this year. Researchers studied the effects of both service and emotional support dogs on a patient's post-traumatic stress disorder checklist, depression symptoms and suicidal ideations. Treatment that included a service dog improved results across all three measures. America's brave men and women in uniform put their lives on the line to defend our freedoms abroad. Sadly, many struggle to return to civilian life and the invisible wounds of war, like PTSD and traumatic brain injury, hinder that process. Up to one in five veterans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan are diagnosed with PTSD during any given year, according to an estimate from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Service dogs can help many who are struggling, but obstacles to obtaining a well-trained dog, including long waitlists and intensive training costs, have delayed their widespread use. The PAWS Act can help change that. American Humane's Pups4Patriots program identifies dogs ideally suited for assisting veterans suffering from PTS or TBI and trains them to be lifesaving service dogs at no cost to veterans. The PAWS act would allow this model to spread with haste and enable other organizations to get much-needed healing leashes into the hands of veterans. "American Humane is honored to provide lifechanging and life-saving service dogs to veterans in need through our Pups4Patriots program," said Dr. Ganzert. "The PAWS Act will empower NGOs across the country to scale up programs and deliver real change veterans suffering the invisible wounds of war." About American Humane American Humane is the country's first national humane organization. Founded in 1877, American Humane is committed to ensuring the safety, welfare, and well-being of animals, and our leadership programs are first to serve in promoting and nurturing the bonds between animals and people. For more information or to support our work, please visit www.americanhumane.org. SOURCE American Humane Related Links http://www.americanhumane.org CHICAGO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, experiential marcom agency August Jackson announces the addition of Anne Leroux as Senior Vice President of Creative to lead the agency's engagement efforts with an expanding base of pharmaceutical and healthcare clients. In this role, Leroux will help clients drive greater salesforce, physician, and patient engagement through innovative campaigns, events and experiences. August Jackson adds top creative talent for growing roster of Healthcare and Pharma clients Tweet this Anne Leroux as Senior Vice President, Creative, August Jackson Prior to joining August Jackson, Leroux developed branding and integrated marketing campaigns for clients in the pharmaceutical, hospital and health insurance sectors, including Kaiser Permanente, Humana and CVS Health. Her agency-side experience includes roles as Vice President, Group Creative Director at Digitas Chicago, co-founder of independent creative agency Rockskip, and freelance creative director at Jack Morton Worldwide. "Anne is a 'swiss-army' creative, bringing so many different aspects of marketing, branding, and communications experience that are deeply relevant to the work we do with our clients," explains Brett Mannes, Executive Vice President, Creative at August Jackson. "She has a deep understanding of the patient and physician mindset and how to engage both their hearts and minds." "I'm excited to join the talented team at August Jackson and contribute to a growing, independent agency," said Leroux. "I look forward to bringing bold, smart, creative work to our clients that helps them put their purpose into practice in a tangible way." ABOUT AUGUST JACKSON For organizations that require highly-engaged people to realize their mission, August Jackson is the brand engagement agency that puts purpose into practice. Our work for corporate brands, hospitals, nonprofit organizations and higher education institutions includes branding, campaign development and multi-channel activation, with an emphasis on live events and technology-enabled engagement. Recognized as a top agency by Chief Marketer and Event Marketer and a Crain's Chicago Best Places to Work award winner, August Jackson works with clients throughout the US and has a presence in Chicago, New York City, Washington, D.C., and Baltimore. https://www.augustjackson.com Media Contact: Regina Farrington 301.641.3084 SOURCE August Jackson Related Links http://www.augustjackson.com NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- According to new research study on "Automated Overhead Cranes Market Forecast to 2028 COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis by Type, Level of Automation, Industry and Geography," market is projected to reach US$ 2928.59 million by 2028 from US$ 1854.10 million in 2021; it is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6.7% during the forecast period of 2021 to 2028. Get in-depth details on " Automated Overhead Cranes Market " (No. of Pages 162, No. of Tables, Charts & Figures - 166) Download PDF Brochure: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPRE00023239/ The rising demand for omnichannel distribution and supply chain strategy by the retail stores to fulfil the demand of their customers at anytime from anywhere is boosting the number of warehouses and distribution centers globally. The constant growth in e-commerce, 3PL, fast moving consumer goods (FMCG), fast moving consumer durable (FMCD), retail, and manufacturing industries is supporting the rising number of organized warehousing spaces in the country. The e-commerce and 3PL market players are the biggest adopters of organized warehousing spaces. For instance, the constant growth in the Indian e-commerce industry is boosting the development in the number of warehouses and distribution centers across the country. The e-retailers are now more strongly looking forward in opening warehouses in tier I and tier II cities. Thus, the demand for automated overhead cranes across warehouse and distribution centers for lifting heavy equipment and material handling will increase. The warehouse crane usually consists of single girder overhead crane, double girder overhead crane, and electric hoist gantry crane for lifting purpose. Majority of the warehouses and distribution centers use automated overhead cranes with the lifting capacity of 1 ton, 3-ton, 5 ton, and 10 ton up to 100 ton. Therefore, the commodities or material substances can be lifted and transferred to other places easily. Get Sample Copy of Automated Overhead Cranes Market: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPRE00023239/ Russia, France, the UK, Italy, Germany, and Spain are among the worst hit countries in Europe due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The region witnessed notable decline in revenue from various industries as the government enacted various containment measures. Due to growing e-commerce activities, Europe had large scale importexport trade operations before the pandemic started. Managing a large warehouse demands shifting and storing of large and heavy crates throughout the warehouse safely and quickly. A network of overhead cranes helps warehouse employees to keep the inventory organized and accessible so their containers and crates can be found and accessed seamlessly whenever required. Since e-commerce activities were reduced to a drastic extent, the demand for various overhead cranes decreased considerably in Europe. Count of new businesses and start-ups that need equipment such as factory equipment, industrial HVACs, and other large machinery was very less. Repair shops use both gantry cranes and bridge cranes to unload products, shift them around the shop and reload them. As the operations were decreased intensely, the demand for gantry cranes and bridge cranes declined immensely across Europe. As the supply chain of several industries was disrupted, including automated overhead cranes, the automated overhead cranes market players experienced severe hardships in selling various types of cranes in 2020. Moreover, as major ports in Europe were experiencing low traffic of vessels, the automated overhead cranes market witnessed decline from demand side in 2020. Adoption of Industry 4.0 for Smarter Lifting Equipment to Propel Automated Overhead Cranes Market Growth in Coming Years The manufacturers of overhead cranes are focusing on designing a smarter lifting equipment by following the trends to develop smarter factories in high-end manufacturing industries. The implementation of automation, smart technology, digital communications, smart factories, the Internet of Things, networks, and cloud-based storage are some of the features offered with the adoption of Industry 4.0 as a part of the fourth industrial revolution. The integration of industry 4.0 with the overhead cranes upgrades the automation within the factory and allows intelligent connectivity of smart devices such as machine to product communication, and machine to machine communication. The implementation of smart technology with the overhead cranes permits them to collect the data from the operation of the cranes. Also, the growing trend of smart technology for maintenance purpose by reviewing the historical maintenance data and technical information of the crane, is boosting the adoption of automated overhead cranes. Inquire before Buying Copy of Automated Overhead Cranes Market: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/inquiry/TIPRE00023239/ Automated Overhead Cranes Market: Industry Overview Based on industry the automated overhead cranes market is segmented into manufacturing, shipbuilding, metals and steel, and others. These industries use cranes to lift the materials, containers, and many more, and place it on specific location accurately. The industry demands the manufacturers to customize the cranes as per there requirement or else they hire these cranes on rent for performing specific tasks. The automated overhead cranes play a vital role in enhancing the safety and operating efficiency of several industries. These automated overhead cranes are customized for any spacewhich includes challenging environments where space is limitedand they greatly boost the manufacturing abilities. The automated overhead console is used across manufacturing units of several industries, including automotive, aerospace, concrete manufacturing, and power plants. Automated Overhead Cranes Market: Competitive Landscape and Key Developments DONGQI GROUP; Konecranes Oyj; EMH, Inc; EntsorgaFin S.p.A; Henan Clescrane System Co., Ltd.; Hoist UK, Kundel Industries Inc.; Weihua Group; Sumitomo Heavy Industries Material Handling Systems Co., Ltd.; and Acculift are among the key players that are profiled during this market study. In addition to these players, several other essential market players were also studied and analyzed to get a holistic view of the global Automated Overhead Cranes Market and its ecosystem. Purchase a copy of Automated Overhead Cranes Market research report @ https://www.theinsightpartners.com/buy/TIPRE00023239/ In 2021, Kalmar, a subsidiary of Cargotec, has entered into an agreement with Companhia Siderurgica Nacional (CSN) for the supply of nine Kalmar Rubber-Tyred Gantry Cranes (RTGs). The cranes will be delivered to Sepetiba Tecon terminal in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Browse Related Reports: Rough Terrain Crane Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis: Get Sample Copy @ https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPRE00022379/ Air Crane Helicopter Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis: Get Sample Copy @ https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPRE00018331/ Mobile Crane Market to 2025 - Global Analysis and Forecast: Get Sample Copy @ https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPTE100000473/ About Us: The Insight Partners is a one stop industry research provider of actionable intelligence. We help our clients in getting solutions to their research requirements through our syndicated and consulting research services. We specialize in industries such as Semiconductor and Electronics, Aerospace and Defense, Automotive and Transportation, Biotechnology, Healthcare IT, Manufacturing and Construction, Medical Device, Technology, Media and Telecommunications, Chemicals and Materials. Contact Us: If you have any queries about this report or if you would like further information, please contact us: Contact Person: Sameer Joshi E-mail: [email protected] Phone: +1-646-491-9876 Research Insight: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/reports/automated-overhead-cranes-market/ Visit Our Web Site: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/ More Research: https://www.openpr.com/news/archive/139407/The-Insight-Partners.html SOURCE The Insight Partners HATBORO, Pa., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand, an Azzur Group company, today announces the appointment of three new leaders: Alex Ferdman, Vice President of Facilities Development and Maintenance; Scott Corbin, Director of Global Operations; and Joel Gates, Senior Director of Operations - Raleigh. Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand offers a hybrid model that includes turnkey GMP support: on-demand cleanroom facilities, materials management, storage, asset management, and supply chain solutions. In his new role, Alex Ferdman oversees construction, remodeling, and maintenance of all existing and planned Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand facilities, to optimize processes for efficient overall operations. Today, Azzur's on-demand cleanroom facilities operate in Burlington, MA; Waltham, MA; and Vista, California, with plans to expand into Raleigh, NC; Philadelphia, PA; and San Francisco, CA throughout 2022. "I'm pleased and enthusiastic to join the ranks of Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand and be a part of a visionaries team changing the way novel therapeutics are brought to market," said Alex. "By working alongside the Cleanrooms on Demand leadership, architects, designers, contractors, and external vendors, my goal is to lay the foundation and execute best-in-class operating facilities that support clients objectives and needs in the best possible way." Alex brings more than 20 years of facilities experience to Azzur Group. Most recently, Alex served as a project manager with CSL Plasma where he was responsible for the upkeep, maintenance, and remodeling of more than 200 facilities throughout the United States. Throughout his career, Alex held leadership positions at globally renowned engineering firms, managing multidisciplinary teams of engineers and supervisors throughout the world. After two years as a director with Azzur's GxP consulting operation in San Diego, Scott Corbin joins Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand as Director of Global Operations. In his new role, Scott oversees operations, from design through commissioning, to ensure all Azzur cleanroom facilities are built and operated according to cGMP regulations. Additionally, Scott is responsible for equipment procurement, validation plans, and contract development on a global level. "I'm excited to embark on my latest chapter with Azzur Group," said Scott. "Working alongside Alex and the rest of the global leadership team, I'm certain that we will continue to provide our customers with safe, efficient, and compliant facilities that meet the challenges faced by early-phase manufacturers today." With 30 years in the life science industry, Scott brings a robust and comprehensive skill set in manufacturing operations, quality assurance, auditing, and validation. Before joining Azzur in 2019 where he led operations and business development for Azzur San Diego, Scott worked across the industry, serving large enterprise businesses, as well as several start-ups. Joel Gates brings to Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand more than 20 years of experience and will oversee all operations and client relations for the new Raleigh practice that's slated to open in early 2022. "I am very excited with the opportunity of using my expertise to help Azzur COD's clients bring their groundbreaking therapeutics from discovery to delivery," said Joel. "My goal is to provide a client experience that is world class and to do so by maintaining a facility that is fit for purpose, compliant, and flexible, while maximizing our opportunities for innovation." Prior to joining Azzur, Joel spent several years at Merck where he was responsible for the oversight of strategic partnerships and external entities developing and producing biologics, biosimilars, and vaccines. Prior to that, Joel held leadership positions at noted pharmaceutical firms, including Pfizer, Bristol Myers Squibb, and Shire, and spent time as a consultant assisting companies worldwide with remediation and GMP readiness. "Alex, Scott, and Joel bring a tremendous amount of expertise to enable our expansion plans beyond our existing facilities, which currently accelerate critical therapies," said Ravi Samavedam, President and Chief Operating Officer, Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand. "I look forward to working with each of them in providing the value of our business model to companies looking for an alternative to 'build vs buy' for early phase clinical manufacturing." For more information about Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand, visit Azzur.com/cleanrooms. About Azzur Group Azzur Group provides the life science community full life-cycle solutions for all their GxP needs. From Azzur Cleanrooms on Demand facilities, to labs, training centers and consulting offices across the nation, Azzur helps organizations start, scale, and sustain their enterprises. With four decades of service to the industry, we've become a trusted partner to leading pharmaceutical, biotechnology, medical device, and healthcare companies, as well as their supply chain. SOURCE Azzur Group, LLC Related Links www.azzur.com Bringing their panache, colorful history and unparalleled hospitality to New York City, seven lucky participants received multi-night hotel stays in Belize at renowned properties, including Naia Resort & Spa, Victoria House Resort & Spa, Ramon's Village Resort, Table Rock Jungle Lodge, Belize Boutique Resort & Spa, the Placencia Resort and Ka'ana Boutique Resort. In addition to accommodations, in-country transportation was also supplied via Tropic Air and Belize Tourism Board for winning attendees. "On behalf of Belize Tourism Board, a thriving destination of culture, diversity and wellness, we are honored to celebrate and recognize National Wellness Month with the Empire State Building," said Mr. Evan Tillett, Director of Tourism. Designed to replicate the lush terrain of Belize, yogis also enjoyed custom backdrops of the country's healing landscape, tropical greenery, and authentic Caribbean music. Two Belizean instructors, Michelle Williams and Ryanna Schnarr, educated attendees on the history of yoga in Belize and ancient Maya practices that have influenced the cultural artform. For more information on Belize, visit travelbelize.org. About Belize Tourism Board The Belize Tourism Board (BTB) is a statutory body within the Belize Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation, and it is governed by a Board of Directors appointed by the Minister of Tourism and Civil Aviation. The BTB works in conjunction with members of the private sector including the Belize Hotel Association, Belize Tourism Industry Association and Belize National Tour Operators Association and is dedicated to building tourism in the most economically and environmentally sustainable manner. As a part of its responsibilities, the BTB promotes Belize as a premier tourism destination to both in-country and international consumers. Among its outreach to the international travel market, the BTB markets the country's unique attractions to travelers, members of the travel trade industry and media outlets in key markets. The BTB is also dedicated to developing and implementing tourism programs that will help strengthen and grow the Belizean tourism industry; promote good destination stewardship; and instill high quality standards for accommodations and travel experiences. For more information on the BTB and its services, visit www.travelbelize.org. Media Contact Lauren Arwood Senior Account Manager [email protected] Editor's Note: High-resolution images available here. SOURCE Belize Tourism Board DALLAS, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Prospera Financial Services, Inc. (Prospera) is proud to announce its partnership with Cascade Wealth Management. Located in Bend, Oregon, the firm brings nearly four decades of experience and adds $420 million in AUM. Prospera, a privately held company, is a Texas-based financial firm founded in 1982 as a full-service, boutique broker-dealer and support organization for successful independent financial professionals across the country. Cascade Wealth Management was established in Fall of 2020, after the acquisition of E.K. Riley Investments by LPL Financial. The business is directed by Lee Handley and Mike Meiners, along with their respective teams. Lee Handley, wealth advisor, has been in the financial services industry for nearly 30 years. His experience as a financial professional began upon his graduation from Chico State University in California, when he became an independent broker with Columbia Pacific Securities. In 2005, Lee moved his business to E.K. Riley Investments as an investment executive, until they were acquired by LPL in 2020. Lee provides his clients with the best service possible by specializing in income-producing investments and helping them structure their assets to achieve their goals. "Joining with Prospera has given us the opportunity to align our client-center focus with a firm that prioritizes customer service. Our partnership with Prospera will help us to expand our reach and continue our mission of providing personal service to our clients with the independence Prospera provides us," said Lee. Mike Meiners, wealth manager, has been a securities broker for over 38 years. As an entrepreneur, Mike started his first company as a founding partner of Columbia Pacific Securities, later acquired by Ragen MacKenzie Investment Services where he served as president. Mike and his team have been operating as an independent group since 2010. Mike's leadership and decades of industry experience has allowed him to build long-term relationships with clients and has helped them and their families accomplish their financial goals. Mike states, "It all comes down to choices, and we chose to partner up with Prospera because they could best provide us with the resources and personalized service that is critical to our business. We have always been passionate about our client relationships and with our new alliance, we know our culture will stay strong." Mike's partner, Leslie Archer, started working with him 23 years ago at Columbia Pacific Securities. She has been with Mike and their clients through the same acquisitions and firm changes. Leslie is a wealth advisor who has also been assisting Lee Handley's team over the past 10 years. Mike and Leslie's assistant, Anna Meiners Hansen, is Mike's daughter and a wealth manager assistant. She has worked in the industry and with the pair for 9.5 years and is a fully licensed advisor. Lee's assistant, Missy Magill, is a client services associate who has been in the industry for over 8 years and with Lee for 3 years. She is currently studying to become a licensed representative. About Prospera Financial Services Founded in 1982, Prospera Financial Services, Member FINRA, SIPC and a registered investment advisory, offers the flexibility and resources only found at some of the nation's largest broker-dealers. Headquartered in Dallas, TX, Prospera was named Broker-Dealer of the Year by Investment Advisor Magazine in 2009, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2018 and 2019. The firm supports independent financial advisors nationwide. For more information about Prospera, visit www.joinprospera.com. Media Contact: Tarah Mattia Williams Chief Administrative Officer Prospera Financial Services, Inc. (972) 581-3015 [email protected] www.joinprospera.com SOURCE Prospera Financial Services Related Links http://www.prosperafinancial.com SACRAMENTO, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- California Health Coalition Advocacy, a non-profit organization based in Sacramento, has been inundated with calls and messages from desperate workers and students concerned that receiving a COVID-19 vaccine is a condition of their employment and education. In an effort to push against mandates, California Health Coalition Advocacy has sponsored a resolution, "SCR 59 Medical interventions: voluntary and informed consent ," introduced by Senator Melendez on August 18, 2021. The resolution would urge the Legislature and the Governor to take actions to protect Californians' right to make their own healthcare decisions. While a resolution is not a law, it can be used to impact the interpretation of laws and to support or defeat the passage of laws. As resistance to mandates grows, California Health Coalition Advocacy encourages lawmakers to support SCR 59. When state and private entities enact COVID-19 vaccine requirements, they neglect to address a myriad of unintended consequences. The vaccine verification or exemption process reveals personal medical or religious information that should be kept private. Those who are disabled, pregnant, or trying to become pregnant object to being treated differently in the workplace or at school. Nurses and doctors who have been on the frontlines of the pandemic, often working without adequate PPE, and once hailed as heroes, are now being threatened with termination if they do not comply. Many health facilities might not survive if unvaccinated workers are fired, quit, or retired early. Reports of unvaccinated patients being denied medical care, students getting kicked out of college, and employees losing their jobs are widespread. One-size-fits-all does not apply when protecting the health and genetic diversity of Californians. Mandating a vaccine represents a violation of basic human rights and disproportionately affects low income and disadvantaged people who are more likely to be victimized by coercive laws. "Rather than using and encouraging these heavy handed, strong-arm tactics to coerce people to receive a medical intervention they do not want, our elected officials should be protecting the fundamental right of all individuals to make their own health care decisions," said Valerie Noble, president and co-founder of California Health Coalition Advocacy. "All medical interventions come with known and unknown risks and often these risks place an unequal burden on individuals who are predisposed to suffering harm from treatments." For more information, visit CaliforniaHealthCoalitionAdvocacy.org SOURCE California Health Coalition Advocacy Related Links californiahealthcoalitionadvocacy.org CAREstream America Chairman, Dr. Al Sperry, commented on the new partnership saying, "We are very pleased to announce a long-term agreement with Serres Fluid Management for the United States. Serres is a dominant European force, and we are proud and honored that they have chosen CAREstream America as their US Partner. We believe that the Serres Product line fits perfectly within the growing CAREstream America product portfolio. We are excited to build our partnership and look forward to many years of growth and success." Known for high quality-products, the Serres Suction Bag System and Serres Nemo* are cutting-edge answers for hygienic fluid waste collection and disposal. The Serres Suction Bag System is an essential component of any surgical procedure, making fluid collection reliable and convenient. Serres Nemo, on the other hand, creates value from a cost-efficiency, work efficiency and occupational safety point of view, making fluid disposal safer, cleaner, and easier than ever before. Nicke Svanvik, the CEO of Serres, noted that he is excited about partnering with CAREstream America, stating, "We have been searching for the right partner to really push through to the American market. Our products are recognized for their reliability, quality, and ease-of-use globally. We strongly believe that US hospitals simply cannot do without our solutions, and we are confident that CAREstream is the ideal partner to take us forward." For more details on the innovative developments from Serres, visit: https://www.carestreamamerica.com/serres-fluid-management-solutions/ About Serres US: As a forward-thinking pioneer of fluid management solutions, Serres is constantly innovating to remain on the cutting-edge of the healthcare industry. Serres is a leading suction bag manufacturer globally. Our headquarters are in Finland, and we serve our customers in more than 50 countries through our worldwide, best-in-class distribution network. Our US operations are based in Springfield, Mass. To find out more about Serres, visit our website www.serres.us. *Serres and Serres Nemo are registered trademarks of Serres Oy. About CAREstream America The CAREstream group is dedicated to bettering the lives of its employees, patients and customers through premium services and products. CAREstream has been serving customer's respiratory and anesthesia needs for over 20 years. In 2013, CAREstream America was formed to expand its distribution of pain and aesthetic solutions including innovative water-jet technologies to help shape the body, an exclusive analgesia delivery system to relieve procedure anxiety and discomfort, and effective regenerative therapies for pain management. Both divisions also offer a variety of additional medical products to furnish quality care for facilities including aesthetics, orthopedics, labor and delivery, hospitals and more. Axiom Therapies, Christie Medical Holdings Inc. and MedPro Respiratory are also elements of the CAREstream Group. www.carestreamamerica.com | www.axiomtherapies.com | www.medprorespiratory.com |http://www.christiemed.com Press Contact: Rachel Howard, 855-892-3872, https://www.carestreamamerica.com SOURCE CAREstream America DALLAS, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Carry The Load, a non-profit that provides active ways to connect Americans to the sacrifices of our nation's military, veterans, first responders and their families, is offering ways for people to unify and strengthen communities across the nation. Carry The Load encourages Americans to show the families that the death of their loved one mattered. Here are ways people can get involved: "This Patriot Day, serve others, teach our youth about unity and always remember those left behind." Stephen Holley, CEO Tweet this National Day of Service, Friday, September 10 in collaboration with the National Cemetery Administration, a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, volunteer to clean headstones and beautify sacred grounds. in collaboration with the National Cemetery Administration, a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, volunteer to clean headstones and beautify sacred grounds. Heroes Challenge, Saturday, September 11 participate in-person or virtually in a workout to test your strength while raising funds to support our military, veterans, first responders and their families. "After serving on active duty post-9/11, many of us returned home having lost good men and women whom we served alongside," says Stephen Holley, co-founder, president and CEO of Carry The Load. "This Patriot Day, I want to challenge Americans to do an act of service in their community, teach the next generation about how 9/11 unified our nation and always remember those left behind." By participating in a Heroes Challenge workout, volunteering at a VA National Cemetery or donating in honor of a hero, people can show support for not only those who died on 9/11, but those who continue to serve and sacrifice daily for our freedom. All activities are family-friendly, follow local COVID-19 guidelines and registration is required. Everyone will receive a list of people who died on 9/11 and a bib to write a name of someone to honor and remember. U.S. Marine Corps Veteran and Carry The Load Board Member Todd Boeding adds, "It showed us that as Americans we come together in times of strife. No 9/11 date should ever pass without Americans coming together and remembering why we have our freedom." ABOUT CARRY THE LOAD Carry The Load is a 501(c)3 non-profit founded in 2011 by veteran U.S. Navy SEALs with a mission to provide an active way to honor and remember our nation's heroes by connecting Americans to the sacrifices made by our military, veterans, first responders and their families. To learn more, visit http://www.carrytheload.org. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube. Media Contact: Renee Cossman [email protected] SOURCE Carry The Load Related Links carrytheload.org CARY, N.C., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Cary Medical Management (CMM), a leading management service organization (MSO) headquartered in Cary, North Carolina, celebrates its second anniversary this September of providing high-quality primary care services to North Carolinians. The organization was formed in late 2019 by physicians, a clinic CEO, and Dr. Siu Tong, a successful healthcare entrepreneur. Cary Medical Managements mission is to deliver better patient outcomes and financial stability to independent primary clinics. "The past two years have been extremely difficult ones for independent, primary care clinics," said CMM founder Dr. Siu Tong. "Many primary care practices face extreme financial pressures from COVID and constant changes to healthcare. CMM's mission is to deliver better patient outcomes and financial stability to independent primary clinics." The team came together to form CMM with a vision for the state of North Carolina, including rural communities to deliver better patient outcomes and significant shared savings to community-based primary care clinics. Two years later, CMM has grown revenue three-fold, brokered a strategic partnership with a national lab vendor, and improved the profitability of their acquired clinics. CMM turned around its first acquired clinic from a negative 10 percent margin in a year to positive 10 percent during COVID, and is on track to further increase profitability this year due to superior performance in value-based care. Specific milestones include: Drastic reduction in total medical costs of its patient populations via better patient outcomes. For example, the currently available Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services' (CMS) data showed CMM's clinic has an annual per capita total medical cost of $7,292 for their Medicare patient populations under CMS' Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP), while the average Medicare per capita spending in 2019 nationwide was $14,150 . Plan to open the first Eastern North Carolina patient service center and rapid response laboratory by Quest Diagnostics next to the CMM's Rocky Mount Family Medical Center, taking down the clinic's internal lab. next to the CMM's Rocky Mount Family Medical Center, taking down the clinic's internal lab. Investment in key strategic hires including Jonathan Fowler , Vice President of Operations, and Clifford Tse , Vice President of Acquisitions; in preparation for accelerating our partnership with clinics to improve outcomes. "A recent survey from the New England Journal of Medicine this year cited that 20 to 40 percent of primary care clinics are planning to sell their practices, permanent closure or consolidation. Another survey this month cited 21 percent of primary care doctors plan to leave primary care within three years," said CMM co-founder and chief medical officer, Dr. Alex Tse. "If this materializes it will significantly reduce patient access and will result in higher medical costs for the country as a whole." CMM developed a unique Tech-Enabled Primary Care Service to maximize shared-savings and operation efficiency. Clinics have the option to partner with CMM to share the upside while remaining independent or transition the operation to CMM's clinic as an exit strategy. About Cary Medical Management Established in 2019, Cary Medical Management was created by a group of experienced clinic operators, physicians, and executives of leading healthcare technology companies with a vision to drive home the "trillion-dollar transformation to value-based-care" promised by the Affordable Care Act. CMM's role is to leverage their wealth of healthcare experience and strong financial backing to ensure their portfolio clinics succeed in the new era of healthcare quality and value. https://carymso.com/ Media Contact: April Umminger [email protected] 703-340-6716 SOURCE Cary Medical Management Christopher Todd Communities At Estrella Commons, a 286-home community located in Goodyear, Ariz., and the 222-home Christopher Todd Communities On Happy Valley in Peoria, Ariz. were purchased by an affiliate of The Inland Real Estate Group of Companies, Inc., the firm's sixth and seventh acquisition of Build-to-Rent communities developed and owned by Christopher Todd Communities. The deal was brokered by NorthMarq's President of Investment Sales Trevor Koskovich, Senior Vice President Jesse Hudson, and Executive Vice President Bill Hahn. "Christopher Todd Communities has set the bar very high with their branded Single-Story Rental Communities (SRC) and the competition is fierce, driven by strong investor value," said Koskovich. Griffin Martin and James DuMars from NorthMarq's Phoenix office arranged the financing for the purchase through its Fannie Mae relationship. SRC is a new luxury category in the BTR sector, a nod to the resort-inspired lifestyle and luxury resident experiences. "As an early BTR Single-Story Rental Community innovator, having jumped into this niche in 2016, we've been able to craft a community experience that is unparalleled in the industry. We are the only BTR Single Story Rental company in the nation to strategically create branded communities that deliver a consistent top tier experience regardless of locale," said Todd Wood, CEO of Christopher Todd Communities. That brand commands faster lease ups, 25-30% higher rent rates, and 50% higher resident retention. "We continue to see opportunities with assets located in Arizona due to the influx in population," commented Matthew Tice, senior vice president of Inland Real Estate Acquisitions, LLC. "Christopher Todd Communities represent the top tier of the single-family rental communities, and we are happy to own and manage so many of these properties. Our Inland affiliates now own and manage approximately $1 billion of commercial real estate in Arizona." The private, smart-gated and walkable communities are comprised of single-story, pet-friendly smart homes. The communities are less dense than typical multi-family, with no one above or below. The keyless door entry makes it easy to come and go with minimal touching of materials, and the private backyards give people the space to be socially distant yet maintain a sense of connection. Resort-style amenities such as pool with ramadas, fitness center, event lawn and parks are part of each community. As part of the sale, each community will retain the Christopher Todd Communities brand, bringing added value to this transaction and a seamless experience for their residents. The two communities in this sale were developed and wholly owned by Christopher Todd Communities and were built prior to its strategic partnership with Taylor Morrison Home Corporation (NYSE: TMHC). Taylor Morrison, America's Most Trusted Home Builder is taking the Christopher Todd brand to markets where they are invested with their traditional home building operations. For more information: www.ChristopherTodd.com Media Contact Martha Moyer Wagoner 602-861-8006 [email protected] SOURCE Christopher Todd Communities NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- We are thrilled to announce that the Citi Foundation has awarded a $500,000 grant to SEO in support of the national expansion of the SEO Scholars program and the launch of the new program initiative, SEO Tech Developer. This effort is part of the Citi Foundation's global Pathways to Progress job skills-building initiative, which addresses the persistent and global issue of youth unemployment. Citi Foundation's grant will enable the expansion of the SEO Scholars program model to new cities in the U.S. SEO Scholars effectively eliminates the academic and opportunity gaps that underserved students in our country's public school systems face. Currently, SEO serves approximately 1,000 students in public schools in New York City and San Francisco, and an additional 1,000 students in colleges across the nation. SEO gets these students to and through college with a 90% college graduation rate, as compared to only 20% of students who come from similar backgrounds. The expansion of the SEO Scholars program model to new cities will allow SEO to continue to find ways to close the opportunity gap for deserving and dedicated public school students around the nation. Citi Foundation's support also allows for the launch of SEO's new Tech Developer program initiative, which will train and prepare at least 60 Black and Latinx youth this summer for careers in the tech industry. Historically, Black and Latinx youth have represented less than 8% of all tech-industry employees, and less than 3% of employees at major tech firms. With this new program initiative, SEO can provide underrepresented and/or underserved young people with access to additional professional development and training in the rapidly-growing technology industry. "This grant from Citi Foundation builds on our longstanding relationship with Citi, who has supported our professional programs for years," said Julian Johnson, Executive Vice President of SEO. "We're energized by this collaboration with the Citi Foundation, which will allow us to continue to increase our impact and forge new paths towards our mission of creating a more equitable society." Support like this will help SEO expand the programming necessary to combat institutional racism and level the playing field for underserved and historically excluded populations. About SEO SEO was founded in 1963 with a mission to create a more equitable society by providing exceptional educational and career opportunities to talented and motivated young people from underserved and underrepresented communities. SEO's five signature programs create an ecosystem of excellence. SEO Scholars is a free, eight-year, academic program that transforms public high school students into college graduates by successfully educating and mentoring underserved, low-income public high school students in New York City and San Francisco to and through college with a 90% college graduation rate. SEO Career is the nation's premier program for recruiting and training high-achieving students who have been historically excluded in industries across Wall Street and Corporate America, which include Black, Latinx, and Native American college students, for challenging summer internships, with 80% of SEO Career Interns earning fulltime job offers from SEO partners before graduating college. Learn more at www.seo-usa.org. Media Contact: [email protected] SOURCE SEO Related Links http://www.seo-usa.org WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Class Technologies Inc. , the company enhancing virtual and hybrid classrooms by adding teaching and learning tools to Zoom, has launched Class Cares to support students and communities in need. "Class was founded from a desire to help people," said Michael Chasen, education software pioneer and Class co-founder and CEO. "Class Cares is a long term initiative that takes our team's desire to help and puts it into action through volunteering, donations, and partnerships to help students in need. We're committed to helping people in need around the world." As part of the initial Class Cares initiative, DC-based Class employees volunteered to pack hundreds of backpacks full of needed school supplies. Helping students go back to school, Class Cares is providing: 200+ backpacks filled by Class team members and brimming with supplies benefiting DC Public Schools (DCPS) students in southeast Washington, D.C. 150+ backpacks provided through a partnership with Kids in Need Foundation (KINF) to students at the American Indian Academy Charter School in Denver, Colorado . Class initially connected with DC Public Schools on TikTok via official Class Social Media Spokesperson, and well known educator, Ms. Sutherd (TikTok: @MsSutherd ). You can follow Class and Class Cares initiatives on TikTok at @WeAreClassTech . "These backpacks carry with them our belief that education is the key to a better future," said Natlee Green, Vice President of People at Class. "It is fitting that our first initiative helps kids right here in our hometown in Washington, D.C., where 25% of people live below poverty. At least 1 in 5 children in the US who live below the federal defined poverty line cannot afford back to school supplies. Class is here to help." Class Cares is a long-term corporate social responsibility program that aims to address education and community needs around the world. The company is committed to planning and participating in ongoing future Class Cares initiatives. The next project is planned for October, when Class Cares will partner with Habitat for Humanity to build a home to commemorate World Habitat Day. About Class Technologies Inc. Class is software developed by Class Technologies Inc., a company founded by education software pioneer Michael Chasen. Class adds teaching and learning tools to Zoom and makes the virtual classroom feel like a real classroom. It helps teachers take attendance, hand out assignments, give a quiz or test, grade work, proctor exams, talk one-on-one with a student, and more. Class is headquartered in Washington, DC with staff around the world. Schedule a demo at class.com and follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @WeAreClassTech. Zoom is a trademark of Zoom Video Communications, Inc. Class Technologies Inc. and its product Class are not sponsored, endorsed, or otherwise affiliated with Zoom. SOURCE Class Technologies Inc. "I started Skylar when I became a mom and learned that my newborn daughter was allergic to my everyday fragrance," says Cat Chen, Founder & CEO of Skylar. "Everyone told me it wasn't possible to create clean fragrances that smell amazing, but I was determined to find a way. It will always be a dream of mine to continue to push and redefine clean fragrances." Staying true to the brand's promise of creating products free of toxic chemicals and made with sustainable ingredients, Skylar remains 100% vegan, cruelty-free, and hypoallergenic. However, with new formula developments, the brand has now excluded even more ingredients that can potentially trigger allergies, and underwent rigorous testing to ensure all products are safe for sensitive skin. Putting consumer wants at the forefront, Skylar also increased its fragrance concentrations to 17% - 20% to now offer Eau de Parfums for a longer-lasting Skylar scent experience. This is an advancement, as potency and longevity are two of the most common concerns when it comes to clean perfume. The full product range has just undergone a total aesthetic transformation as well, with custom elevated packaging that pays homage to the brand's West Coast roots and light, airy persona. With a new elliptical logo inspired by clouds floating in the sky, cloud-shaped, hand-blown glass bottles, and a 100% recyclable bottle, cap and carton, Skylar continues to be an innovator in the sustainable beauty space. "Skylar is entering a new era as a completely reimagined fragrance experience," says Bernard Zion, Chief Marketing Officer & General Manager of Skylar. "The trajectory of the brand continues to evolve as we implement these exciting changes and move into additional like-minded retailers through the end of 2021, as well as introduce new products in the home and body categories in the near future. We look forward to enhancing the consumer journey and garnering loyal Skylar enthusiasts throughout this growth." The full restage, along with two new signature scents Pink Canyon and Fall Cashmere, will launch on Skylar.com on August 26, 2021, and move into Sephora, Nordstrom, Macy's, Hudson's Bay, Anthropologie, Goop, and Revolve throughout the end of the year. About Skylar Founded in April 2017 by Taiwanese American, Cat Chen after her infant daughter experienced allergic reactions to her everyday fragrance. Skylar is creating a whole new world of clean fragrance with dreamy nature-inspired scents that are hypoallergenic, safe for sensitive skin, vegan, and cruelty-free. Skylar's mission is to make everyone feel beautiful, confident, and safe in their own skin. For more information on Skylar, please visit www.skylar.com. For press inquiries, please contact mml PR, at [email protected] . SOURCE Skylar HONG KONG, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- CNOOC Limited (the "Company", SEHK: 00883,NYSE: CEO, TSX: CNU) today announced that Bozhong 26-3 oilfield expansion project has commenced production. Bozhong 26-3 oilfield expansion project is located in the south of Bohai Sea, with average water depth of about 21 meters. In addition to fully utilizing the existing processing facilities, the project has built a new unmanned wellhead platform and a power platform. A total of 8 development wells are planned, including 5 production wells, 2 water injection wells and 1 development and appraisal well. The project is expected to reach its peak production of approximately 2,670 barrels of crude oil per day in 2021. CNOOC Limited holds 100% interest in Bozhong 26-3 oilfield expansion project and acts as the operator. - End - Notes to Editors: More information about the Company is available at http://www.cnoocltd.com . *** *** *** *** This press release includes "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements regarding expected future events, business prospectus or financial results. The words "expect", "anticipate", "continue", "estimate", "objective", "ongoing", "may", "will", "project", "should", "believe", "plans", "intends" and similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. These statements are based on assumptions and analyses made by the Company in light of its experience and its perception of historical trends, current conditions and expected future developments, as well as other factors that the Company believes are appropriate under the circumstances. However, whether actual results and developments will meet the expectations and predictions of the Company depends on a number of risks and uncertainties which could cause the actual results, performance and financial condition to differ materially from the Company's expectations, including but not limited to the Company and its controlling shareholder being listed in the list of the U.S. for sanction against companies with alleged ties to the Chinese military, those associated with fluctuations in crude oil and natural gas prices, macro-political and economic factors, changes in the tax and fiscal regimes of the host countries in which we operate, the highly competitive nature of the oil and natural gas industry, environmental responsibility and compliance requirements, the Company's price forecast, the exploration and development activities, mergers, acquisitions and divestments activities, HSSE and insurance policies and changes in anti-corruption, anti-fraud, anti-money laundering and corporate governance laws. For a description of these and other risks and uncertainties, please see the documents the Company files from time to time with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, including the Annual Report on Form 20-F filed in April of the latest fiscal year. Consequently, all of the forward-looking statements made in this press release are qualified by these cautionary statements. The Company cannot assure that the results or developments anticipated will be realised or, even if substantially realised, that they will have the expected effect on the Company, its business or operations. *** *** *** *** For further enquiries, please contact: Ms. Jing Liu Manager, Media & Public Relations CNOOC Limited Tel: +86-10-8452-3404 Fax: +86-10-8452-1441 E-mail: [email protected] Bunny Lee Porda Havas International Finance Communications Group Tel: +852 3150 6707 Fax: +852 3150 6728 E-mail: [email protected] SOURCE CNOOC Limited Related Links http://www.cnoocltd.com The Minister of Trade, Industry and Tourism, Maria Ximena Lombana Villalba, said that "we continue working for the safe economic reactivation of the country and its tourism sector. In addition to what has been achieved for the return of shipping companies to the country, we have made great efforts to comply with the biosecurity measures implemented in the city and activate all the actors in the chain". In addition, she highlighted the measures determined in a new legal framework where "it was requested that the crew of the cruise ships must be vaccinated and the vessels must have effective measures aimed, if there are positive cases of COVID-19, to identify symptomatic passengers and have spaces available for isolation". The cruise is the Star Breeze, from the Windstar Cruises line, which reached the Cartagena coast with 312 passengers and 190 crew members. The navigation is on a 14-day itinerary that visits the destinations of Aruba, Curacao, Colombia and Panama. The local tour for the cruise passengers included a visit to San Felipe Fortress, the Old City, as well as an exclusive Colombian coffee tasting. Other lines already have stipulated to arrive in Cartagena such as Celebrity Cruises, Royal Caribbean, Scenic Luxury Cruises, Carnival Cruise Lines, Holland America, Princess Cruises and MSC Cruises; and for Santa Marta the Norwegian and Ritz Carlton Yacht, among others, are expected to arrive. For Flavia Santoro, president of ProColombia, the agency in charge of promoting tourism in Colombia, this first call was achieved thanks to the articulated work between all the players in the industry. "This is a key sector for the development and safe economic reactivation of the country because it generates income of more than 60 million dollars per season. For this reason, since last year all the entities linked to the cruise industry have worked on a common purpose to make a safe return for both passengers and destinations". SOURCE ProColombia Related Links https://procolombia.co/ Headlines Reported NPAT $9.5M vs. ( $9.7M ) in PCP vs. ( ) in PCP Reported EBITDA* $25.5M , + $21.3M vs. June 2020 or +511% - Double-digit top and bottom-line growth in focus growth markets, China , and USA - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in Manuka product category - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in digital channels , + vs. or +511% - Double-digit top and bottom-line growth in focus growth markets, , and - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in Manuka product category - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in digital channels Gross profit +730 bps to 53.9% Marketing Investment +$8.7M or +56% Business transformation plan on track Net debt reduced by $10.9M to $4.6M , inventory reduction $11.7M , operating cash inflow $24.8M to , inventory reduction , operating cash inflow 9% reduction in total recordable injury frequency rate (TRIFR) Fully imputed dividend of 4 cps declared TAURANGA, New Zealand, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Comvita (NZX:CVT) today released its full year audited results for the year ending 30th June 2021, reporting a full year EBITDA at the top end of its market guidance at $25.5M. This represents an increase of +511% versus the prior corresponding period (PCP) driven by strong performance in its focus growth markets, focus channels and categories, underpinned by $12.1M of benefits from its transformation programme over the last 18 months. Reported net profit after tax was $9.5M versus a loss of $9.7M in the PCP as work to both focus and simplify the organisation delivered results. Reported net debt was $4.6M vs $15.5M in PCP as Comvita continued to focus on good internal management of cashflows and working capital. Inventory reduced by $11.7M and SKU count by 30%. Comvita is pleased to announce resumption of dividend payments and have declared a fully imputed dividend of 4 cps representing a payout of 30% of NPAT. Revenue in constant currency increased by 1.5% as strong performance in its focus growth markets of China +31% and USA +23% offset material headwinds in its Australia, New Zealand (ANZ) and Hong Kong segments. Underlying revenue grew 5.4%*. It was encouraging to report that Q4 ANZ revenue increased by 17% versus PCP and 33% versus Q3. While the UK market was negatively impacted at revenue level (primarily due to Brexit and Covid impacts), it was encouraging to see the market breakeven at net contribution, proving the longer-term opportunity in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Comvita Chair Brett Hewlett commented "As I shared at the Annual Shareholder Meeting in October 2020, FY21 was a crucial year for Comvita as we looked to prove the significant potential that exists to all stakeholders. We are pleased to report strong earnings growth at the top end of guidance, good management of cash and working capital and to be able to reward our shareholders with the resumption of dividends. In addition, we are particularly encouraged to publish our first Green House gas emissions report in this year's annual report as we embark on our journey to be carbon neutral by 2025 and carbon positive by 2030. We believe our unique business model, with significantly increased investment in our brand and supported by our environmental and social causes, will see Comvita recognised by the investment community as a sustainable premium FMCG brand with associated multiples". CEO David Banfield added "I would like to thank the whole team at Comvita for their absolute focus on delivering the results we share today. The business has gone through significant change in order to arrive at this point, it hasn't always been easy, but we know that this is crucial to enable us to deliver the true potential of Comvita, captured in our 2025 plan. Our 60:15:20 plan sets out our aim to deliver a GP in excess of 60%, marketing to sales ratio of 15% and an EBITDA ratio of 20% by 2025. Today is an important step on that journey. We are genuinely excited by the growth opportunities that lay ahead of us". Strong performance in focus growth markets Comvita was particularly encouraged by its performance in its focus growth markets of China and North America. In local currency, China market sales (the world's biggest honey market), increased by 31% with strong performance delivered across all channels. Despite increasing marketing investment by 139% versus PCP, net contribution increased by 25% as top line growth translated to strong earnings improvement. Comvita remains the clear brand and market leader in China. In North America, total revenue in local currency increased by 23% and net contribution by 18%, despite increasing marketing investment by over 80%. Comvita is the fastest growing Manuka honey brand in North America*** Comvita has a unique business model in the category. Its subsidiary model is designed to ensure that it is better connected to both customer and consumer needs in market and by being closer to customer, it can be more agile and responsive to changing customer needs around the world. Double digit top and bottom-line growth in both digital sales and Manuka honey Comvita continued its strong performance in both its focus Manuka honey category and in the digital channel with both recording double digit top and bottom-line growth. Constant currency digital sales grew 17% versus PCP to 35% of total group sales. Manuka honey sales increased 10% versus PCP as the continued focus delivered results. Comvita strategy on track - Building a Better Business Stabilise results, transform the organisation and deliver long-term resilience and growth Stabilise results The results shared today show that we have come a long way to stabilise performance at Comvita. Not only have we returned to profitability with a reported NPAT of $9.5M versus a loss of $9.7M in the PCP, we have also significantly simplified the business to set up Comvita for long-term profitable growth. Despite significant headwinds in ANZ, we have been able to prove the underlying resilience of our model. In doing this, we have reduced our monthly revenue required to break even to $13.5M, despite a material increase in investment in our brand. It is encouraging that ANZ performance in Q4 was +17% versus PCP and +33% versus the previous quarter highlighting that we can now start to build revenue again in FY22. Comvita improved its GP by 730 BPS versus PCP in this period, in line with its aim to deliver a 60% GP by 2025. This was delivered through focus growth markets (China and North America), focus channels (digital) and focus categories (Manuka honey), along with productivity improvements. Inventory was reduced by $11.7M and SKU count by 30% as our focus on ensuring good management of working capital and SKU profitability continued. Operating cash inflow was $24.8M and net debt finished the period at $4.6M. Transformed organisation We have now completed our restructuring process. Our attention now fully focuses on optimisation and creating an aligned performance driven culture at Comvita. We have a clear view of the steps required to drive profitable growth across all segments and returns for all stakeholders. We have also proven that our new harvest model works, further increasing organisational resilience and reducing risk associated with variability of the weather. Our $25M ($15M +$10M) transformational plan remains on track to deliver by 2025. In the first 18 months, we have delivered over $12M of improvements, investing $1.2M to deliver this in FY21. In FY22 we will invest a further $2.5M in transformation projects. Long-term resilience and growth Our focus remains on setting Comvita up for long-term resilience and growth. We have a clear view and understanding of what it will take to win in our focus growth markets, our focus channels and our focus categories. Our new business model ensures that we have funds available to tell discerning consumers around the world 'why Comvita' and also share the founding story of Alan and Claude from 1974/5 that we know resonates with consumers today. We now focus on delivering our FY22 guidance, and further building trust with all our stakeholders on our journey to deliver our 2025 plan. David Banfield added "A year ago, I shared that we were looking to deliver a rebound in performance in FY21. I am delighted that we have achieved that, but much remains to be done to deliver world class performance and experience for our consumers around the world. We know that we have an incredible opportunity to put in place the foundations that will enable Comvita and our bees to thrive for years to come and we remain absolutely committed to this cause. This starts by delivering our FY22 guidance and ensuring that we become recognised as a sustainable, premium FMCG brand. I look forward to sharing further progress at our Annual Shareholder Meeting in October." Brett Hewlett Chair, David Banfield CEO On behalf of the Board of Directors Note: *EBITDA earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation, constant currency revenue and underlying revenue are non-GAAP measures. We monitor these as key performance indicators and believe they assist investors in assessing the performance of the core operations of our business. Constant currency revenue and underlying revenue are both defined in our Investor Presentation. **Previous corresponding period. ***SPINS data Background information Comvita (NZX:CVT) was founded in 1974, with a purpose to heal and protect the world through the natural power of the hive. With a team of 500+ people globally, united with more than 1.6 billion bees, we are the global market leader in Manuka honey and bee consumer goods. Seeking to understand, but never to alter, we test and verify all our bee-product ingredients are of the highest quality in our own government-recognised and accredited laboratory. We are growing industry scientific knowledge on bee welfare, Manuka trees and the many benefits of Manuka honey and propolis. We have pledged to be carbon neutral by 2025 and carbon positive by 2030, and we are planting more than two million native trees every year. Comvita has operations in Australia, China, North America, South East Asia, and Europe and of course, Aotearoa New Zealand, where our bees are thriving. SOURCE Comvita RABAUD, a major player in the wood-energy industry, complemented its XYLOG wood processor range with a new model that is even more versatile and user-friendly. XYLOG 520 enables to split logs from 20 up to 50 cm long. Ponsse launched a completely modernized range of Scorpion harvesters, which meets all the requirements of forestry today. The new PONSSE Scorpion takes harvest productivity and ergonomics to the next level and sets a new standard for the operator's working environment. Tigercat INC introduced new features in its existing product - the 875 Logger, which was advanced to E- series. Request for sample PDF of report: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/32709 The ongoing crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in disruption of supply chain networks and manufacturing activities. In lieu of the same, sales of forestry machinery is understood to have plummeted during the initial stages of the pandemic. With regional manufacturing sector operations reviving toward threshold rates, the market is expected to recover gradually over the next 3-4 quarters of the next fiscal. Key Takeaways from Market Study Burgeoning construction industry & increasing awareness about connected machines for remote monitoring are anticipated to augment sales of forestry machinery. With research & development, new techniques are making market competition tougher. Tier-I manufacturers are focusing on high performance and advanced forestry machinery for customers. Used machinery is gaining significant amount of demand in the market, owing to lower price. Stringent norms enforced by regional governments and increasing end-user awareness about zero emission-based machinery and off-road equipment are strongly advocating the employment of electric hybrid-operated machinery over conventional fuel-based porotypes. Demand for wood products is increasing with population growth and growing disposable income of the population. This factor is especially true across the U.S., China , and Australia , which is likely to boost demand for forestry machinery. , and , which is likely to boost demand for forestry machinery. Indonesia , Russia , and Latin American countries are picking up pace in the forestry machinery industry. Get customized report by asking an expert: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/ask-an-expert/32709 "Increasing trend of leasing & renting services of forest machinery and design of environment-compliant prototypes by OEMs will be observed as long-term market trends in this space," says a Persistence market Research analyst. Competitive Landscape The forestry machinery market is identified to be significantly consolidated. Some of the key players in the market are John Deere, Hitachi Construction Machinery Co., Ltd., Liugong Machinery Co., Ltd., Caterpillar, Kubota Corporation, Komatsu, Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Ltd., Volvo AB, Ponsse, Bell Equipment, Tigercat International Inc., Rottne Industri AB, Eco Log, and Dafo. These players have higher shares in the global market and have long-standing relationships with a number of end users for the supply of forestry machinery. Get full access of report: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/checkout/32709 Find More Valuable Insights The research report analyzes demand for forestry machinery. The global market has been analyzed with the COVID-19 impact, various macroeconomic factors, market trends, and market background. As per Persistence market Research's scope, the market has been analyzed on the basis of type, sales, operation, and region. The report provides qualitative and quantitative information on various players in this market. This report also tracks the market by both, supply side and demand side. Related Reports: About Persistence Market Research: Persistence Market Research (PMR), as a 3rd-party research organization, does operate through an exclusive amalgamation of market research and data analytics for helping businesses ride high, irrespective of the turbulence faced on the account of financial/natural crunches. Overview: Persistence Market Research is always way ahead of its time. In other words, it tables market solutions by stepping into the companies'/clients' shoes much before they themselves have a sneak pick into the market. The pro-active approach followed by experts at Persistence Market Research helps companies/clients lay their hands on techno-commercial insights beforehand, so that the subsequent course of action could be simplified on their part. Contact Rajendra Singh Persistence Market Research U.S. Sales Office: 305 Broadway, 7th Floor New York City, NY 10007 +1-646-568-7751 United States USA - Canada Toll-Free: 800-961-0353 Email: [email protected] Visit Our Website: https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com SOURCE Persistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd. SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Crosschq , pioneers of the Talent Intelligence Cloud powering a revolution in hiring to help companies better recruit and retain talent, announced today the hiring of data scientist Joshua Ruf. An experienced econometrician versed in machine learning and statistical modeling for business intelligence, Ruf will work closely with Crosschq's Head of Data Christofer Drake to drive and automate data collection. Crosschq Logo Crosschq Data Scientist Joshua Ruf "We couldn't be happier to add Josh to our growing team," said Drake. "With expertise in multiple data science applications and coding languages, he'll not only add a new level of expertise to our analytics platform and products, but he'll also ensure we take a data-driven approach to planning and strategy." Ruf's responsibilities include data visualization for internal and customer-facing products, data warehousing, management, and mining for existing and future data sets. Ruf will also focus on designing and developing multiple machine learning and predictive (AI) algorithms, including the ability to forecast the success of candidates as employees of a company based on their post-hire behaviors and results as well as candidate personas. "Josh is a tenacious data scientist, with an uncanny ability to solve tough problems," said Crosschq Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer Pete Goettner. "His expertise and drive will help us continue to build products that help companies hire and retain talent, better." Prior to joining Crosschq, Ruf served as Data Scientist at Tarifica where he led the team that supported clients' projects, managed in-house Jira and BitBucket, as well as multiple databases. Earlier, he was a Medical Economics Analyst at Centene, an Associate Research Scientist at the Institute of Human Development and Social Change at NYU, and a Statistician at the Health Economic Research Unit at British Columbia Centre for Excellence (BCCfE). Ruf earned his Bachelors in Arts & Science and Economics at McMaster University in Ontario and his Masters in Economics at the University of British Columbia. "I'm excited to be part of a data-driven company that is revolutionizing the way companies recruit and retain talent while equipping them to measure and track the quality of their hires," added Ruf. "We have a dynamic team here, and together I know we will do great things." To learn more about Crosschq or to request a demo, visit https://crosschq.com/ . About Crosschq Crosschq is powering a revolution in hiring to help companies better recruit and retain talent. Crosschq's Talent Intelligence Cloud provides solutions across the new hire lifecycle to help enhance sourcing, screening, and onboarding new hires while providing a single source of truth for customers to accurately measure Quality of Hire. The company's AI driven cloud-based SaaS solutions were built with a talent-first approach prioritizing trust and transparency, minimizing bias, and protecting privacy. Leading innovative companies like Snowflake, Hubspot, Allegis, and Dish Networks trust Crosschq to help build diverse, winning teams. Founded in 2018, Crosschq is backed by Tiger Global Management, GGV Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, SAP, Slack Fund, and Rocketship.VC . To learn more, visit crosschq.com . Media Contact: Elena Arney 415.361.0001 [email protected] SOURCE Crosschq BOSTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Electraflyer has announced that it has passed crossover, meaning it now sells more battery-electric aircraft than polluting ones. Pipistrel sold over 100 battery-electric aircraft last year as they take over from its traditional offerings. Bye Aerospace does not even make conventional aircraft. With its Tesla-style approach, its order book exceeds 720 battery-electric aircraft evenly split between two and four-seaters. As the IDTechEx report, "Manned Electric Aircraft: Smart City and Regional 2021-2041" points out, this has caught Cessna, Cirrus and Piper by surprise. Particularly so because the purchasers are not people easily bamboozled they are mainly pilot training and air taxi businesses that collapse if they get it wrong. Primarily they buy because it saves them money. Brand enhancement and saving the planet are useful bonuses. Iterative improvement of battery-electric aircraft. Source: IDTechEx Attention now turns to two-propeller fixed-wing aircraft up to 10 passengers for business and regional use similarly beating the traditional cost of ownership, with the zero emissions and faster climb typical of battery electric. Noticing this, Textron, owner of Beechcraft which is under threat, has belatedly said it will look into electric. It is not too late because approaches to these larger versions have been questioned by both battery experts and aeronautical engineers. There is no simple scalability. They need disproportionately more power and any new aerodynamics, where proposed, has issues. For instance, the battery team at IDTechEx caution that solid-state lithium batteries of the necessary size and energy density are unlikely to be rolled out by 2026 but several putative makers of regional aircraft promise otherwise. Bye announced a partnership with Oxis Energy enabling such an aircraft in 2026, only to see the company go under shortly afterward. Yes, LG Chem talks of a similar date for such lithium-sulfur batteries with high energy density but IDTechEx advises that 2030 is probably the earliest for full deployment. Believe that only if several issues are overcome such as cycle life and toxic emissions on misuse or wrongful disposal. Other aircraft developers such as Aura Aero and Regent talk darkly of their access to a battery with much-improved energy density but investors would be well advised to check out exactly what they mean and verify that technology's roadmap with battery experts such as IDTechEx. See IDTechEx report, "Solid-State and Polymer Batteries 2021-2031: Technology, Patents, Forecasts, Players" for more. Usually, the aerodynamics and construction of these larger battery-electric aircraft are required to go faster, but 50% faster means three times the battery. The acceptable range may be 500 nautical miles and conventional design may be inadequate for this. Cars put in double the battery to get more range but that is less effective with aircraft. The primary focus should be on reducing the 250kW or so needed in cruise. The Flying Ship Company, Regent, and RDC Aqualines will use ground effect to greatly reduce drag but that limits them to flying low over the sea. Heart Aerospace finds that low speed and short-range are acceptable in Scandinavia so it sharply reduces the battery requirement with 216nm range 215 knots. With a conventional airframe, the conventional lithium-ion batteries are one-third of the weight. The batteries will probably need to be changed fairly often and shorter-range in cold or rough weather will need to be acceptable. Probably the most trustworthy, beneficial improvement to aerodynamics, beyond born-electric sleek designs, is to intimately integrate propulsion with thrust using propellers along the wing. That can include large ones at the wing tip reducing vortice drag. Enjoy at least a 10% increase in range partly from a much smaller wing volume. NASA, the German Aerospace Institute DLR, and others are behind this. Regent and to some extent Aura Aero are going this way. Better sourcing of electricity is also necessary. Airbus is going earlier to 1000nm range by the inelegant approach of huge bulges to carry hydrogen that drives notoriously inefficient fuel cells. They still need quite large batteries. However, the idea of battery aircraft of this size should not be abandoned. Rolls Royce, working with Tecnam and Widere, plans an 11 seat one for 2026 plying the short distances acceptable in Scandinavia. The Tesla approach to cars of many small improvements in powertrain efficiency, lightweighting, and simplification has lessons here. For example, a regional aircraft can have 500km of cabling but in cars, at least 50% of cable weight is eliminated by higher voltage, improved geometry, and board-to-board wireless connection. In-mold electronics, structural batteries, and large aluminum die castings together eliminate at least 1000 parts. However, although solar upper-atmosphere drones will be up for 5 years on sunshine alone and China even has a "Meiying" drone flying 24/7 at only a few thousand meters on solar alone, the necessary 3-5 multijunction solar bodywork all over a business/ regional aircraft would cost $100,000 at present and only contribute 5-10kW. It will be affordable and make sense for up-market single-propeller aircraft around 2031. For the larger aircraft, better opportunities can be taken from cars as detailed in the IDTechEx report, "Routes to 1000 Mile Electric Cars 2021-2041". For more information on this report, please visit www.IDTechEx.com/1000Mile. This report forms part of the broader electric vehicle and energy storage research from IDTechEx, who track the adoption of electric vehicles, battery trends, and demand across more than 100 different mobility sectors. This is summarized in a master report: www.IDTechEx.com/EV , or for further in-depth analysis, please see the full portfolio of electric vehicle research available from IDTechEx: www.IDTechEx.com/research/EV . About IDTechEx IDTechEx guides your strategic business decisions through its Research, Subscription and Consultancy products, helping you profit from emerging technologies. For more information, contact [email protected] or visit www.IDTechEx.com . Images download: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/xp49umpfp3urdug/AAAhLJPoGUuiTYlUfH4KXhYca?dl=0 Media Contact: Natalie Moreton Digital Marketing Manager [email protected] +44(0)1223 812300 Social Media Links: Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/IDTechEx LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/idtechex/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IDTechExResearch SOURCE IDTechEx BOCA RATON, Fla., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- CSL Plasma today announced it will provide influenza (flu) vaccination vouchers to U.S. plasma donors following the completion of two plasma donations made within a calendar month. Beginning Sept. 1, donors can redeem vouchers for the vaccine at no cost at Walgreens pharmacy locations across the U.S. after completion of their second donation. "Plasma donors help save and improve the lives of patients affected by rare and serious diseases, and providing flu vaccination is just one small way we can give back to our donors," said Willy Pardinas, Senior Vice President and General Manager, CSL Plasma. "We are invested in the health and safety of our communities, and this demonstrates our promise to our donors. Helping keep our donors healthy goes a long way to help patients and protect public health." Flu is a contagious respiratory illness caused by influenza viruses that infect a person's nose, throat and lungs. The flu can result in mild to severe illness. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), on average, about 8% of the U.S. population gets sick from flu each season. Annual vaccination is vital as influenza can be hard to predict, viruses that cause flu constantly change and immunity from vaccination declines over time, according to the CDC. Flu vaccines reduce the burden of flu illnesses, hospitalizations and deaths on the health care system. "We believe receiving a flu vaccine is an important action a person can take to help prevent the flu each year," said Dr. Jennifer Hanes, Division Medical Director, U.S. Plasma Operations, CSL Plasma. "While receiving a flu vaccine does not eliminate the possibility of contracting the flu, research shows the flu vaccine has helped reduce related illnesses and the risk of serious complications that can lead to hospital stays or even loss of life. By providing flu vaccines, we want to help our donors, employees and communities stay healthy." Key flu vaccine program details are: Donors who donate plasma beginning Sept. 1 are eligible to receive the flu vaccine voucher. are eligible to receive the flu vaccine voucher. Donors will receive their flu vaccine voucher within 24 hours after their second plasma donation within the calendar month. Vouchers for one free flu vaccination will be sent through our CSL Plasma donor app, which can be found in the App Store and Apps on Google Play. Vouchers will be shared via text and email if a donor has not downloaded the donor app. U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations permit an eligible donor to donate plasma once in a two-day period and no more than twice in a seven-day period. Donors can donate plasma after receiving the flu vaccine. December 2021 will be the last month to be eligible to receive a flu voucher and a second monthly donation must be completed on or before Dec. 17, 2021 . All vouchers expire Dec. 31, 2021 . CSL Plasma's parent company, CSL Behring, uses human plasma to produce therapies used around the world to treat bleeding disorders, including hemophilia and von Willebrand disease, primary immune deficiencies, hereditary angioedema, inherited respiratory disease and neurological disorders in certain markets. CSL Behring's products also are used in cardiac surgery, organ transplantation, burn treatment and to prevent hemolytic diseases in the newborn. Because of CSL Plasma's stringent quality and safety testing and applicable regulations, a person's first plasma donation can only be used after a second donation is completed. When a donor donates plasma for the second time, the process takes much less time than the first visit. CSL Plasma donors receive a payment in connection with their donation with funds added onto a ready-to-use and reloadable card. Anyone interested in donating plasma can learn more at CSLPlasma.com. Find the nearest Walgreens location by using the Store Locator. One non-transferable voucher provided per donor, while supplies last. Donors using vouchers must complete Walgreens' Informed Consent for Vaccination and other documents as Walgreens requires. Void where prohibited by law. About CSL Plasma CSL Plasma, headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, upholds a tradition of innovation and customer focus. We are committed to our work because people's lives depend on us. CSL Plasma is a subsidiary of CSL Behring, a global biotherapeutics company and a member of the CSL Group of companies. The parent company, CSL Limited (ASX:CSL; USOTC:CSLLY), headquartered in Melbourne, Australia, employs more than 27,000 people, and delivers its life-saving therapies to people in more than 100 countries. For more information about CSL Plasma, please go to CSLPlasma.com. Media Contact Rhonda Sciarra Director, Communications, CSL Plasma Office: + 1 561 981 4207 Mobile: +1 551 228 3244 [email protected] SOURCE CSL Plasma BURLINGTON, Vt., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- DealerPolicy, the leading insurance marketplace for automotive retail, today announced its $110 million Series C investment led by the Growth Equity business within Goldman Sachs Asset Management (Goldman Sachs) with participation from existing investors including 3L Capital and Hudson Structured Capital Management Ltd. (doing its re/insurance business as HSCM Bermuda). The new investment will be used to accelerate the growth of the company's next-generation finance and insurance (F&I) offerings for both dealers and car buyers, enabling automotive insurance to be seamlessly integrated online and at the point-of-sale. Goldman Sachs' Paul Pate will join the company's board of directors. "DealerPolicy has successfully pioneered the assimilation of personal insurance into the automotive retail process, in a unified and compliant manner," said Paul Pate, a Vice President in the Growth Equity business within Goldman Sachs Asset Management. "We're thrilled to support the DealerPolicy team as they continue to transform the purchase of cars and insurance." DealerPolicy will expand its operations to further develop and embed modern day insurance throughout the entire car shopping and ownership experience. To expedite the development and roll-out of its insurance distribution and fulfillment solutions with its major insurance carrier partners, the company intends to triple its product and engineering teams over the next 12 months by hiring new talent. Additionally, the company will increase investments in strategic partnerships. "We started the company with the vision of providing a more convenient, transparent, and connected car-buying experience," said Travis Fitzgerald, Co-Founder and CEO of DealerPolicy. "The funding comes at a time when we're seeing mainstream adoption of automotive insurance into dealer sales and F&I processes driven by consumer desire for new dealership practices. This investment will allow us to advance our next-generation F&I offering, which provides consumers with competitive coverage options and tangible savings, as well as greatly increases dealer profitability." On average, DealerPolicy Insurance saves consumers who report savings $64 per month on automotive insurance. DealerPolicy Insurance, the brand's award-winning agency, and its network of over 1,000 dealers and more than 40 leading insurance carriers, have written over $200 million in total premiums for car-buyers nationwide since establishing the company in 2016. Automotive dealerships in their network report on average 44 percent higher gross margins in their F&I departments because of increased customer budgets from their insurance savings. For more information about DealerPolicy please visit, www.dealerpolicy.com . About DealerPolicy DealerPolicy is the most trusted and complete digital insurance marketplace for automotive retailers and their valued customers. The company's innovative mobile technology enables car-buyers to view multiple insurance quotes and immediately purchase online and/or connect with licensed insurance agents to complete the process. With an exclusive combination of partnerships among premier automotive retailers and data providers, an industry-best insurance carrier network, and access to DealerPolicy Insurance licensed agents, DealerPolicy is recognized for its place at the forefront of Insurtech. DealerPolicy Insurance is a licensed insurance agency, with licenses to operate in the lower 48 states. For more information, visit www.dealerpolicy.com . About Goldman Sachs Asset Management Growth Equity Bringing together traditional and alternative investments, Goldman Sachs Asset Management provides clients around the world with a dedicated partnership and focus on long-term performance. As the primary investing area within Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS), we deliver investment and advisory services for the world's leading institutions, financial advisors, and individuals, drawing from our deeply connected global network and tailored expert insights, across every region and marketoverseeing more than $2 trillion in assets under supervision worldwide as of March 31, 2021. Driven by a passion for our clients' performance, we seek to build long-term relationships based on conviction, sustainable outcomes, and shared success over time. Goldman Sachs Asset Management invests in the full spectrum of alternatives, including private equity, growth equity, private credit, real estate and infrastructure. Since 2003 the Growth Equity business within Goldman Sachs Asset Management comprising more than 75 individuals has invested over $13 billion in companies led by visionary founders and CEOs. We focus exclusively on investments in growth stage and technology-driven companies spanning multiple industries, including enterprise technology, financial technology, consumer and healthcare. Follow us on LinkedIn . About Hudson Structured Capital Management Ltd. (doing its re/insurance business as HSCM Bermuda) Hudson Structured Capital Management Ltd. is an asset manager focused on alternative investments seeking mezzanine level returns. Our focus is on the Re/Insurance and Transportation sectors. HSCM launched in 2016 and as of July 1, 2021, has more than $3.3 billion in assets under management and committed capital. HSCM focuses on core economic sectors that are likely to outgrow global GDP, offer low correlations with broader markets, and are experiencing a shift from balance sheet and to market financing. For more information, please visit www.hscm.com. About 3L 3L provides capital, perspective and a global network of entrepreneurs and industry leaders to exceptional, early-stage growth companies. The firm invests in both consumer and enterprise businesses characterized by strong founders and executives, demonstrable product-market fit and scalable unit economics. Representative 3L companies include goPuff, Ro, Daily Harvest, Flaschenpost, ChowNow, and Relativity Space, among others. The firm was founded in 2017 and has offices in Los Angeles and New York City. For more information, visit www.3Lcap.com SOURCE DealerPolicy Related Links https://www.dealerpolicy.com Board Includes Diverse Medical Professionals: Neuroscientist, Anesthesiologist, Addiction Psychiatrist, Interventional Pain Physician and Others to Serve as Thought Leaders and Advisors for Delic Subsidiaries VANCOUVER, BC, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Delic Holdings Corp ("Delic" or the "Company") (CSE: DELC) (OTCQB: DELCF), the leading psychedelic wellness platform today announced the formation of a Medical Advisory Board. The diverse advisory board consists of MDs, PhDs and others who specialize in psychedelic wellness and addition. The Board will advise Delic and its subsidiaries, including Ketamine Infusion Centers, Delic Labs and others, as they develop safety protocols and best practices pertaining to legal psychedelic wellness treatments today and those legalized in the future. The Board will further serve as a resource for media, other medical associates and general audiences interested in the science behind psychedelic wellness and treatments. "Science and medicine are the basis of Delic's approach to psychedelic wellness and our experienced and diverse Medical Advisory Board will help ensure our commitment to safety, quality and efficacy of treatments," said Delic CEO Matt Stang. "This impressive group represents well-known leaders in the psychedelic and addiction fields and will help usher in a greater understanding of the science and data behind what we expect to be the most effective treatments for many mental health conditions ever available." Delic's initial Medical Advisory Board members include: Matthew Cook , MD: Dr. Cook is President and Founder of BioReset Medical and Medical Advisor of BioReset Network. He is a board-certified anesthesiologist with over 20 years of experience in practicing medicine, focusing the last 14 years on functional and regenerative medicine. He graduated from the University of Washington School of Medicine and completed his residency in anesthesiology at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF), and has completed a fellowship in functional medicine. His practice, BioReset Medical, provides treatments for conditions ranging from pain and complex illness to anti-aging and wellness. He treats some of the most challenging to diagnose and difficult to live with ailments that people suffer from today, including Lyme disease, chronic pain, PTSD, and mycotoxin illness. Dr. Cook is President and Founder of BioReset Medical and Medical Advisor of BioReset Network. He is a board-certified anesthesiologist with over 20 years of experience in practicing medicine, focusing the last 14 years on functional and regenerative medicine. He graduated from the School of Medicine and completed his residency in anesthesiology at the (UCSF), and has completed a fellowship in functional medicine. His practice, BioReset Medical, provides treatments for conditions ranging from pain and complex illness to anti-aging and wellness. He treats some of the most challenging to diagnose and difficult to live with ailments that people suffer from today, including Lyme disease, chronic pain, PTSD, and mycotoxin illness. David Rabin , MD, PhD: Board Certified Psychiatrist & Neuroscientist, Co-Founder & Chief Innovation Officer, Apollo Neuroscience, Co-Founder & Executive Director, The Board of Medicine Board Certified Psychiatrist & Neuroscientist, Co-Founder & Chief Innovation Officer, Apollo Neuroscience, Co-Founder & Executive Director, The Board of Medicine Iru Gerard Fernando , MD Dr. Iru Fernando is a board certified general and addiction psychiatrist, the Medical Director of Addiction Services at Psychiatric Wellness Center and Division Medical Director for Aspire Behavioral Health. He has been an advocate for the use of psychedelics in medicine and donated to the cause for the last 10 years. He was the first to present on 'Psychedelics in Medicine' in his psychiatric residency at Harvard South Shore. Dr. is a board certified general and addiction psychiatrist, the Medical Director of Addiction Services at Psychiatric Wellness Center and Division Medical Director for Aspire Behavioral Health. He has been an advocate for the use of psychedelics in medicine and donated to the cause for the last 10 years. He was the first to present on 'Psychedelics in Medicine' in his psychiatric residency at Harvard South Shore. Chris Ray , PhD : Interventional Pain Physician. Dr. Ray provides interventional pain management including Epidurals, Medial Branch Blocks, Radio Frequency Ablations, and Transforaminal Epidurals / Selective Nerve Root blocks in the occipital, cervical, lumbar, sacral, and caudal regions. : Interventional Pain Physician. Dr. Ray provides interventional pain management including Epidurals, Medial Branch Blocks, Radio Frequency Ablations, and Transforaminal Epidurals / Selective Nerve Root blocks in the occipital, cervical, lumbar, sacral, and caudal regions. Yessica Avancena , MFT, MBA, is a Certified Mindfulness Teacher (CMT), Psychotherapist and Entrepreneur. She is passionate about advancing human consciousness through cutting-edge healing practices such as mindfulness and most recently Psychedelic Assisted Psychotherapy. She is the Founder of Aspire Behavioral Health an Intensive Outpatient Clinic, and MindfulYou Psychotherapy and Healing Center as well as author of mindfulness-based children's books and The Mindful Minute App. , MFT, MBA, is a Certified Mindfulness Teacher (CMT), Psychotherapist and Entrepreneur. She is passionate about advancing human consciousness through cutting-edge healing practices such as mindfulness and most recently Psychedelic Assisted Psychotherapy. She is the Founder of Aspire Behavioral Health an Intensive Outpatient Clinic, and MindfulYou Psychotherapy and Healing Center as well as author of mindfulness-based children's books and The Mindful Minute App. Barbara Branaman is the Co-Founder and CEO of the ever expanding suite of BioReset brands, products and services, including BioReset University, a suite of educational products, e-learning and strategic partnerships designed to help educate other practitioners in the field of Regenerative Medicine. Delic is focused on bringing psychedelic wellness to the mainstream. The company does this through an umbrella of related owned and operated businesses to support scaling the impact and reach of treatment, including 1) trusted media platforms and in-person events to market the services directly to patients and consumers and gain data, 2) a licensed lab to develop IP, R&D and innovative high quality and safe product lines and 3) the largest and most accessible network of physical clinics to administer effective treatments. About Delic Corp, Inc. Delic is the leading psychedelic wellness platform, committed to bringing science-backed benefits to all and reframing the psychedelic conversation. The company owns and operates an umbrella of related businesses, including trusted media and e-commerce platforms like Reality Sandwich and Delic Radio, Delic Labs, the only licensed entity by Health Canada to exclusively focus on research and development of psilocybin vaporization technology, Meet Delic the premiere psychedelic wellness event, and Ketamine Infusion Centers one of the largest ketamine clinics in the country. Delic is backed by a team of industry and cannabis veterans and a diverse network, whose mission is to provide education, research, high-quality products, and treatment options to the masses. The Canadian Securities Exchange has neither approved nor disapproved the contents of this news release and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-Looking Information and Statements This press release contains certain "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation and may also contain statements that may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking information and forward-looking statements are not representative of historical facts or information or current condition, but instead represent only the Company's beliefs regarding future events, plans or objectives, many of which, by their nature, are inherently uncertain and outside of DELIC's control. Generally, such forward-looking information or forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "plans", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "budget", "scheduled", "estimates", "forecasts", "intends", "anticipates" or "does not anticipate", or "believes", or variations of such words and phrases or may contain statements that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will be taken", "will continue", "will occur" or "will be achieved". The forward-looking information and forward-looking statements contained herein may include, but are not limited to, closing of the Transaction, satisfaction of the Escrow Release Conditions, use of proceeds of the Offering, and expectations for other economic, business, and/or competitive factors. By identifying such information and statements in this manner, DELIC is alerting the reader that such information and statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of DELIC to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such information and statements. In addition, in connection with the forward-looking information and forward-looking statements contained in this press release, DELIC has made certain assumptions. Among the key factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking information and statements are the following: the ability of the parties to consummate the Transaction; the ability to satisfy the conditions to closing of the Transaction and the Escrow Release Conditions on the proposed terms and schedule; changes in applicable laws; compliance with extensive government regulation; and the diversion of management time on the transaction. Should one or more of these risks, uncertainties or other factors materialize, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking information or statements prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as intended, planned, anticipated, believed, estimated or expected. Although DELIC believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing, and the expectations contained in, the forward-looking information and statements are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information and statements, and no assurance or guarantee can be given that such forward-looking information and statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such information and statements. The forward-looking information and forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as of the date of this press release, and DELIC does not undertake to update any forward-looking information and/or forward-looking statements that are contained or referenced herein, except in accordance with applicable securities laws. All subsequent written and oral forward- looking information and statements attributable to DELIC or persons acting on its behalf is expressly qualified in its entirety by this notice. SOURCE Delic Holdings Inc. Related Links https://deliccorp.com/ "We are thrilled to award this trio of renowned research institutions with funding to address critical oral health research," said Vivian Vasallo, Executive Director, Delta Dental Institute. "Addressing disparities, identifying solutions for access to care, and creating inclusive approaches to care are of utmost importance. The Delta Dental Institute is proud to advance research that can make meaningful improvements in the oral health field, thereby improving overall health." The research topics selected reflect Delta Dental's mission to advance the oral health of all Americans. All three studies will assess opportunities to create more equitable access to care and reduce health disparitiesareas that are always important but became even more evident and immediate during the COVID-19 pandemic. "It's an honor to work with three leading researchers to further collect knowledge on some of the most pressing oral health issues communities are facing," said Dr. Joseph Dill, Head of Dental Science at the Delta Dental Institute. "The scientific rigor, ambition, and high quality of these proposals impressed us, and we look forward to working in partnership with these investigators." These research investments build on prior research funded by the Delta Dental Institute, including a 2020 white paper on oral health literacy. ABOUT THE RESEARCH PROJECTS Harvard School of Dental Medicine: The study aims to conduct an economic evaluation of health care workforce-related policies that have promise for advancing access to care and thereby, oral health among vulnerable populations. Dr. Choi will develop a cost-effectiveness-based framework to estimate the impact of policies related to expanding National Health Service Corps loan repayment and scholarship programs on oral health care utilization and outcomes in underserved areas. University of Colorado School of Dental Medicine: This research focuses on the relationship between overall health and oral health. Dr. Tiwari will evaluate patient-care delivery models that have integrated medical and dental care in a single model of care over the past 10 years. This project will assess the successes and barriers in using these types of care delivery models. University of Iowa: Older adults, especially those in nursing homes, often lack access to high-quality dental care and rely on nurses and other caregivers to brush and care for their teeth. Many of these caregivers feel unequipped to help older adults care for their oral health. Dr. Marchini's research will explore the use of a mobile app, GeriaDental, as a tool to inform and teach care providers how to help older adults with their oral health. ABOUT THE DELTA DENTAL INSTITUTE The Delta Dental Institute is dedicated to advancing oral health for all Americans in partnership with the Delta Dental companies and dedicated partners across the country. With expertise rooted in Delta Dental's rich history of oral health leadership, we engage in and support oral health research, community outreach, and advocacy, striving to ensure everyone understands the importance of oral health to overall health and has access to the care that they need. ### SOURCE Delta Dental Institute Related Links https://deltadental.com/ A recent study of 100 million patient visits found that doctors spend an average of 16 minutes and 14 seconds per patient encounter, with chart review (33%), documentation (24%) and ordering (17%) accounting for most of the time. So, there is very little time for the patient to get to know their physician. "VREasyWait has helped my practice improve the patient experience. Having watched a video of me before coming to visit me gives my patients the feeling that they know me," says Dr. Robert Valenzuela of Washington Heights Urology. "VREasyWait's technology optimizes patient intake and scheduling workflows. Their embedded AI definitely improves provider productivity." VREasyWait's Artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithms analyze the information gathered in the medical history forms to alert the physician to care signals. For example, a patient with a history of breast cancer on chemotherapeutic drugs coming to see a physician because of cough may need more of a workup because of their immunocompromised state versus a healthy patient with no chronic disease. "As a former practice administrator, I have seen how the patient experience is so much better when the patient is able to develop a personalized relationship with their physician. But this is just not possible anymore because Medicare/CMS measures provider productivity in relative value units (RVUs) and RVUs are typically higher for physicians who see more patients per hour," said Jessica Waycaster, CEO of VREasyWait. "Spending roughly $2500 to produce a professional video and using VREasyWait's free features to improve the patient experience is helping physicians personalize their relationship with the patient while keeping their productivity high." SOURCE VREasyWait The love of the Loire Valley led Founder David S. Stare to produce his inaugural 1972 Fume Blanc, and the winery has continued to craft the varietal every harvest since. The 81-year-old Stare was in attendance at the crushpad of his family winery to sprinkle the original 1972 Fume Blanc into the hopper for good luck for the 50 th harvest. Stare is widely known as the first to plant Sauvignon Blanc in Dry Creek Valley, against the advice of vineyard specialists. 50 years later, Sauvignon Blanc is the most planted white grape in Dry Creek Valley. Dry Creek Vineyard has proudly produced Sauvignon Blanc each year of its history and currently features four distinct Sauvignon Blanc bottlings in its portfolio. Stare's daughter, Kim Stare Wallace, is currently the President of Dry Creek Vineyard and continues to lead with a "no compromises" philosophy producing appellation-focused, terroir-driven, varietal-defining wines. "Competition is at an all time high in our industry, so being true to our wines, our vineyards and the terroir of our region is more important than ever before," said Stare Wallace. "Instead of getting sucked into the increasing corporatization of the industry, our family winery is bucking the trends and is an increasingly rare breed." "We are proud to be looking towards celebrating our 50th anniversary in 2022," continued Stare Wallace. "Our goal is to continue forward into the future as an iconic, family-owned, heritage brand reflecting the true essence of Sonoma County." Established in 1972 by David S. Stare, Dry Creek Vineyard is Dry Creek Valley's flagship winery located in the heart of Sonoma County, California. This premier, family-owned winery is celebrating 49 years of winemaking and is led by the second generation. Dave's daughter, Kim Stare Wallace, serves as President overseeing a successful family winemaking and grape growing business that includes 185 acres of sustainably farmed vineyards. Named one of the Top 100 wineries of 2015 by Wine & Spirits Magazine and a Top 10 Tasting Room by USA TODAY, the winery is also 100% Certified Sustainable. Dry Creek Vineyard proudly produces delicious Dry Chenin Blanc, Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Zinfandel, Cabernet Sauvignon and Meritage blends as well as a portfolio of single vineyard selections. To learn more, visit www.drycreekvineyard.com. Connect with Dry Creek Vineyard on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. SOURCE Dry Creek Vineyard Related Links http://www.drycreekvineyard.com FREMONT, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Durabook, the global rugged mobile solutions brand owned by Twinhead International Corporation, offers a range of rugged computers for field workers in the oil and gas industry, where they are considered essential tools. Durabook rugged computers are up to the task for applications such as asset management, field data analysis, running diagnostics, and ensuring on-site safety in challenging environments with poor air quality, humidity, explosive atmosphere, salt and fog, and high temperatures. Durabook's rugged computers are perfect companions for field workers who need intrinsically protected mobile solutions. "Durabook rugged computers withstand the harshest environments," states Tom Wang, Durabook Americas president. "Each one is built with the latest technology, providing an exceptionally high-performing mobile computing device for use across the whole plant or refinery. These particular models are suitable for use in specified hazardous locations across oil and gas, petrochemical manufacturing, mining, and other industries with potentially explosive atmospheres." Features found in Durabook rugged computers include: ANSI/ISA C1D2 Certification ANSI C1D2 is a widely accepted built-in safety standard for rugged computers used in hazardous environments worldwide. C1 means the units may be used where gases, vapors, and liquids are present; D2 means the units are safe for use in an explosive environment during normal operating conditions. This certification allows oil and gas companies using Durabook rugged computers so rated to have on-site conferences, provide remote support, and run diagnostics with the highest accuracy. Ultimate Computer Power Durabook rugged computers are equipped with powerful Intel Core processors and operate on Windows OS, enabling users to run the latest software and programs while improving field engineer's productivity and efficiency. Real-Time Connectivity 4G LTE, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi deliver seamless connectivity for real-time communications between the field and office while built-in GPS provides accurate location tracking and geographic overviews. Long Battery Life Durabook rugged computers can continuously operate anywhere from 16 to 25 hours without swapping the battery in a potentially hazardous environment, which can be a risk of accidental explosion due to an electrical ignition. Superior Viewing Clarity A full HD 1080p display along with Durabook's proprietary DynaVue technology provide superior image quality. Brightness of up to 1000 nits, special light-filtering technology, and the highest contrast ratio among rugged devices help eliminate internal reflections and enhance viewing clarity when viewed at different angles and in bright sunshine or low-light conditions. Uncompromised Ruggedness Durabook rugged computers are certified to meet MIL-STD 810H and MIL-STD-810G standards, withstand up to 6-foot drops, and achieve IP65 certification, delivering the roughness that oil and gas field engineers need. Look for these Durabook fully rugged computers: Z14I Rugged Laptop More rugged than other comparable devices, the Z14I provides the highest performance and infinite possibility that go above and beyond standard requirements for field workers. It comes with the latest 11th Generation Intel Core processor, Iris Xe graphics capabilities, and the latest NVMe PCIe SSDs technology. It can handle data-intensive tasks at speed. U11 Rugged Tablet Choosing between mutually exclusive I/O interfaces and devices is a thing of the past. The U11 rugged tablet has it all. It packs an unprecedented number of productivity features within its extremely compact and rugged exterior, including a detachable keyboard and generous space for further expansion. In addition, the U11 is the only fanless tablet in its class. R11 Rugged Tablet Every inch and detail of the R11 rugged tablet is designed to maximize the efficiency of professional field workers. It is only 0.78" in height and weighs just 2.7lbs, making it the world's most compact tablet in the rugged class. The R11 features a brilliant 11.6" capacitive touchscreen and high-performance energy-smart Intel processor for efficient use on the move. AVAILABILITY For more details regarding Durabook's rugged computing solutions for oil and gas, visit https://www.durabook.com/us/rugged-computers-for-oil-and-gas/. For sales inquiries, contact [email protected] or call 800-995-8946. ABOUT DURABOOK Durabook is the core brand of Twinhead International Corporation in Taiwan, a world-renowned manufacturer of rugged mobile solutions for more than 30 years. All Durabook devices are designed, manufactured, and tested to the highest standards to ensure maximum quality and reliability. Committed to engineering and service excellence, Durabook products have been widely adopted by government and enterprise customers, including oil and gas, utilities, field service, military, and public safety for more than a decade. For more information, visit http://www.durabook.com. PR Contact: Rita Lee Copernio 714.891.3660 [email protected] All products/services and trademarks mentioned in this release are the properties of their respective companies. 2021 Durabook Americas. All rights reserved. Related Files PR_Durabook_Oil and Gas_08262021.pdf Related Images durabook-rugged-computers-for-oil.jpg Durabook Rugged Computers for Oil and Gas Durabook's rugged computers are perfect companions for field workers who need intrinsically protected mobile solutions. SOURCE Durabook Americas, Inc. JACKSON, Miss., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- EastGroup Properties, Inc. (NYSE: EGP) (the "Company" or "EastGroup") announced today its recent business activity. On August 26, 2021, EastGroup purchased DFW Global Logistics Centre, four business distribution buildings totaling 611,000 square feet, for $89.7 million. The property, which is 100% leased, is located adjacent to the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport. This acquisition increases the Company's total square footage in the Dallas market to 4,523,000, which is currently 100% leased. Also, in July, the Company acquired 27 acres in Austin, Texas and immediately began constructing a 176,500 square foot business distribution building known as 45 Crossing. The building has a projected total cost of $26.2 million. In addition to this new development, EastGroup owns 1,126,000 square feet of industrial properties in Austin, all of which are currently 100% leased. In August, the Company acquired 59 acres of undeveloped land in Greenville, South Carolina for $1.4 million. The site, known as Hillside, will accommodate the future development of three buildings containing approximately 400,000 square feet. Commenting on the Company's activity, Marshall Loeb, CEO, stated, "I'm excited about the investment opportunity to further expand our presence in three fast-growing, land constrained sub-markets. Increasing our footprint enhances our ability to meet our customers' growth needs over time. Finally, given the supply/demand dynamics in these markets, we're enthusiastic about the value creation opportunities they present." As of August 25, 2021, EastGroup's portfolio was 98.8% leased and 96.9% occupied. During the third quarter of 2021 to date, the Company has issued and sold 171,821 shares of common stock under its continuous common equity offering program at an average price of $174.60 per share, providing gross proceeds to the Company of approximately $30 million. EastGroup, an S&P MidCap 400 company, is a self-administered equity real estate investment trust focused on the development, acquisition and operation of industrial properties in major Sunbelt markets throughout the United States with an emphasis in the states of Florida, Texas, Arizona, California and North Carolina. The Company's goal is to maximize shareholder value by being a leading provider in its markets of functional, flexible and quality business distribution space for location sensitive customers (primarily in the 15,000 to 70,000 square foot range). The Company's strategy for growth is based on ownership of premier distribution facilities generally clustered near major transportation features in supply-constrained submarkets. EastGroup's portfolio, including development projects and value-add acquisitions in lease-up and under construction, currently includes approximately 50 million square feet. EastGroup Properties, Inc. press releases are available at www.eastgroup.net. SOURCE EastGroup Properties Related Links http://www.eastgroup.net SHANGHAI, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Everest Medicines (HKEX 1952.HK), a biopharmaceutical company focused on developing and commercializing transformative pharmaceutical products that address critical unmet medical needs for patients in Greater China and other parts of Asia, announced today that the first person has been dosed in China as part of the global Phase 3 registration trial, TROPiCS-04, in metastatic urothelial cancer (UC). The multicenter, open-label randomized controlled trial will evaluate sacituzumab govitecan-hziy (SG) compared with standard of care chemotherapeutic options in people with metastatic or locally advanced unresectable UC who have progressed after prior therapy with a platinum-based regimen and anti-programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1)/programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) therapy. The trial includes two study arms to evaluate SG compared to treatment of physician's choice (TPC). The primary endpoint of the trial is overall survival. "We are excited to continue advancing development of SG for people in China with metastatic UC a devastating and fatal disease that continues to experience increasing incidence in the region," said Dr. Yang Shi, Chief Medical Officer for Oncology at Everest Medicines. "This comprehensive and ongoing global study has the potential to add to the existing and robust suite of data already generated for this novel therapeutic candidate." About Urothelial Cancer Urothelial cancer is the one of the most common malignancies diagnosed in China, with the five-year survival rate of metastatic UC estimated to be only 4.6%.[1] There is a significant need for new treatment options for people with UC who have failed platinum-based chemotherapies and checkpoint inhibitors. Urothelial cancer begins in urothelial cells that line the urethra, bladder, ureters, renal pelvis, and some other organs that make up the urinary system. It is estimated that there are more than 80,000 new cases of UC and nearly 33,000 deaths from UC in China per year.[2] About Sacituzumab Govitecan-hziy Sacituzumab govitecan-hziy is a first-in-class, antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) directed at TROP-2, a membrane antigen that is over-expressed in many common epithelial cancers. SG received accelerated approval for advanced or metastatic UC following platinum-containing chemotherapy and a PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor in the U.S. in April 2021. About Everest Medicines Everest Medicines is a biopharmaceutical company focused on developing and commercializing transformative pharmaceutical products that address critical unmet medical needs for patients in Greater China and other Asian markets. The management team of Everest Medicines has deep expertise and an extensive track record of high-quality clinical development, regulatory affairs, CMC, business development and operations both in China and with leading global pharmaceutical companies. Everest Medicines has built a portfolio of eight potentially global first-in-class or best-in-class molecules, many of which are in late stage clinical development. The Company's therapeutic areas of interest include oncology, autoimmune disorders, cardio-renal diseases and infectious diseases. For more information, please visit its website at www.everestmedicines.com. [1] Cumberbatch MGK, Noon AP. Epidemiology, etiology and screening of bladder cancer. Transl-Androl-Urol. 2019;8(1):511. doi:10.21037/tau.2018.09.11 [2] Chinese guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of urothelial carcinoma of bladder 2018 (English version). Chin J Cancer Res. 2019 Feb;31(1):49-66. SOURCE Everest Medicines As one of the largest and most influential fashion business platforms in China, FASHION SHENZHEN SHOW embraced a systematic and strategic upgrade, which turned a trade exhibition into a commerce system covering the entire chain of the fashion industry -- FASHION SHENZHEN. It consists of five series of activities including FASHION SHENZHEN SHOW, THE RUNWAY FASHION WEEK, NEST SHOWROOM, GBA FASHION SUMMIT, FASHION SHENZHENAWARDS. FASHION SHENZHEN SHOW FASHION SHENZHEN SHOW, officially named as "China International Fashion Brand Fair-Shenzhen", is a professional fashion exhibition established 21 years in China. It persistently makes efforts to assist fashion players to capture market opportunities and .innovate the development of the fashion industry. It provides abundant and selected resources and market information to match the various demands of order taking,retail channel development and brand promotion from fashion enterprises. The FASHION SHENZHEN SHOW2021 embraced 3 theme pavilions: "PREMIUM LABEL", "INDUSTRY VALUE CHAIN" and"APPAREL FABRICS AND ACCESSORIES", and 7 specific areas covering ready-to-wear, bags & shoes, fashion accessories, household products and fashion service agent, etc. More than 1,800 fashion brands, designer studios and supply chain companies from around the world were gathering this season to explore the market opportunities in the new ear after covid-19 pandemic. It attracted 100,000 number of visits in 3 days exhibition. THE RUNWAY FASHION WEEK THE RUNWAY FASHION WEEK is a dynamic event connecting brands with buyers and media, represents a fast-growing and highly influential fashion trend publishing platform in China. There are over 50 commercial and independent designer brands joining the show this season. They displayed brands and designers' latest selections, reviewed the core design concepts in an artistic runway show directed by experienced produce team in fantastic venue, together achieved over 4 million exposure from industry and social media in 3 days. NEST SHOWROOM NEST SHOWROOM ,a professional incubator for uprising and potential independent designers focusing to build up their business in China. NEST SHOWROOM adheres to the principle of "transmitting pioneering design concepts to commercial success", it gathered 40 outstanding emerging designer brands, which successfully passed the professional committee's review for their ability of balancing art and business operation. Brands in NEST SHOWROOM were including SAVE THE DUCK under DADASHOW, JIWON YUN, ALPHASTYLE, YESE STUDIO, MOON&STAR, VOICE OF INSIDERS, ZZFY STUDIO, Puree Cashmere, CHIARA FERRAGNI and WRONG, Vmajor, YEEIOU, etc. GBA FASHION SUMMIT GBA FASHION SUMMIT, as one of the five major series of events in FASHION SHENZHEN, the summit focuses on the sustainable development opportunities and possibilities of China's fashion industry now and future. It has become one of the most important and must-go annual event for fashion industry leaders. The GBA FASHION SUMMIT 2021 has the theme of "TIME TRIES BRANDS", it encouraged fashion experts to actively capture the current opportunities in the new market while always cherishing long-termism. In 3 days ,42 speakers from delivered 24 forums ,covering including intellectual property protection, consumer insight, fashion trend, fast-react supply trend management, social media and retail operation, team management, fashion overseas DTC business etc. 12 hot topics in the industry. FASHION SHENZHEN AWARDS FASHION SHENZHEN AWARDS highlights the business spirit of "Focus, Innovation, Excellence" , to award the companies, brands, designers, channel vendors, and strategic partners who have made outstanding contributions in all aspects of the industry according to authoritative industry experts selections. Connie WANG, the chairman of the FASHION SHENZHEN organizing Committee, said, "FASHION SHENZHEN is no longer only a "exhibition", but an integrated platform revealing ecosystem of fashion industry in China. It rooted in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and Shenzhen - one of the pilot demonstration zone in China, which means we gather unparalleled advantage of government tax and policy support , leading fashion supply chain resource and latest technological breakthrough, and transfer them into meaningful support to the fashion industry development." FASHION SHENZHEN will constantly seek breakthroughs, and work with industry experts to explore a sustainable development road for fashion business in China and around the world. SOURCE FASHION SHENZHEN PORTAGE, Mich., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Thermo Scientific EliA SmDP-S test has been cleared by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) for aiding the diagnosis of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE), the most common type of lupus. This new test enhances specificity without sacrificing sensitivity, leading to a more precise diagnosis while also reducing the number of false positives1. "Diagnosing autoimmune diseases is often challenging," said Dr. Henry Homburger, Professor Emeritus of Laboratory Medicine at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. "Existing serologic tests have less than ideal diagnostic specificity for SLE. With the new EliA SmDP-S assay, clinicians can have greater confidence for differentiating SLE from mixed connective tissue disease, because of the improved immuno-chemical specificity. This innovative test in turn, has the potential to improve treatment and outcomes for patients with SLE." The EliA SmDP-S utilizes an advanced coating technique optimized for binding the synthetic SmD 3 peptide antigen, which contains the most specific epitope for Sm peptide antibodies. Antibodies that react with SmD 3 peptide do not cross react with other Sm peptides, which improves the specificity of this test for distinguishing SLE from MCTD2. "The new EliA SmDP-S replaces the former SmDP test to become a best-in-class test for the detection of Sm antibodies, providing clinicians with a higher degree of diagnostic confidence," said Dr. Homburger. "With its improved specificity, EliA SmDP-S could be used to further evaluate potential associations with systemic complications, including nephritis." For more information on the Thermo Scientific EliA SmDP-S test, please visit https://www.thermofisher.com/phadia A bou t Thermo Fisher Scientific Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. is the world leader in serving science, with annual revenue exceeding $30 billion. Our Mission is to enable our customers to make the world healthier, cleaner and safer. Whether our customers are accelerating life sciences research, solving complex analytical challenges, improving patient diagnostics and therapies or increasing productivity in their laboratories, we are here to support them. Our global team of more than 80,000 colleagues delivers an unrivaled combination of innovative technologies, purchasing convenience and pharmaceutical services through our industry-leading brands, including Thermo Scientific, Applied Biosystems, Invitrogen, Fisher Scientific, Unity Lab Services and Patheon. For more information, please visit www.thermofisher.com . Mahler M et al. Improved Serological Differentiation between Systemic Lupus Erythematosus and Mixed Connective Tissue Disease by Use of an SmD 3 Peptide-Based Immunoassay. Clin and Diag Lab Immunol. Jan. 2005 , p. 107-113. (LINK) Mahler M et al. Identification of a SmD 3 epitope with a single symmetrical dimethylation of an arginine residue as a specific target of a subpopulation of anti-Sm antibodies. Arthritis Res Ther 2005, 7:R19-R29. (LINK) Media Contact Information Angela Christoforos Greenough (for Thermo Fisher) 508-801-2391 [email protected] SOURCE Thermo Fisher Scientific Related Links http://www.thermofisher.com SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Firemaps, the startup using tech-driven solutions to defend California homes from wildfire, today announced general availability of their platform across California. Firemaps uses satellite and drone imagery to create ultra highly accurate 3D maps to analyze properties, create a home hardening and defensible space plan, and dispatch the right workers via their marketplace of qualified general contractors. As fire season bears down on California, Firemaps is bringing speed and efficiency to a process that might otherwise take months to complete. Within three weeks, Firemaps can greatly reduce the risk of a home being destroyed by wildfire, quickly bringing properties into compliance with often extensive insurance and municipal codes. The company has also raised $5.5 million in seed investment led by Andreessen Horowitz and including Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi and investor Lee Fixel. Firemaps Firemaps According to a June 2021 report from the UC Berkeley Center for Community Innovation and nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank Next 10, more than 1 in 12 California homes is located in an area that has a high risk of burning in a wildfire event. At the same time, California is facing an insurance crisis. Since 2015, 950,000 California households have been dropped by their property-casualty insurance companies because of escalating fire risk. Firemaps not only helps homeowners parse insurance requirements, the platform can, with homeowner's permission, share comprehensive reports. This way insurance companies can discount rates for work that has been done. Reinsurers can quickly see what proportion of homes in a given area have been secured against wildfire. State and municipal governments can apply grant dollars apportioned for these treatments back to the homeowner via the platform. "As we speak, there are record-breaking wildfires throughout the western half of the USA, as well as in France, Spain, Turkey, Greece, Russia, and in Canada." said Jahan Khanna, CEO of Firemaps. "Wildfire season is now all year. It will continue to threaten the lives of firefighters and destroy homes and communities. There are millions of homes in high-risk areas that need complex work done at an unprecedented scale, as quickly as possible. We created the Firemaps platform as a way to deal with the effects of climate change for the people who have to live with it." Firemaps does not charge homeowners a premium. Due to the efficiency of the platform, contractors pay a fee to participate. Homeowners in high-risk areas can get mapping done for free. Firemaps can also help homeowners procure available grant funding; the state of California has allocated $536 million in fire defense grants. Qualifying homeowners can use this state grant money to help pay for their Firemaps wildfire defense. How the Firemaps process works: Homeowners submit their address at Firemaps.com. Firemaps uses satellite imagery and machine learning to create a preliminary risk assessment. For high-risk homes, Firemaps will construct a 3D map of their home and property using a handheld drone. The map is able to render details of the home's landscape, topography, vent construction, deck construction, roof condition, and porch or deck vulnerability and can measure the particular features of the property to an accuracy of within 1centimeter. The map is used to generate a detailed risk assessment and wildfire defense plan, taking into consideration local fire department guidance and homeowner insurance requirements. Qualified contractors, arborists, and other tradespeople are able to bid on the work remotely, using the Firemaps data. Firemaps project manages the process. The Firemaps platform can routinely dispatch contractors to keep the work maintained as vegetation regrows, and will allow the property owner to voluntarily share the data with insurance agencies, their local fire departments, and other stakeholders in exchange for insurance discounts and local government incentives or tax credits where applicable. Study after study show that this work is not just necessary, but it's critical in the fight against untamed wildfire: An analysis * of over 115,000 homes across over 1200 historical fire events in North America shows that these defensible space landscaping techniques can increase the chances of a home surviving a wildfire by up to 90%. * of over 115,000 homes across over 1200 historical fire events in shows that these defensible space landscaping techniques can increase the chances of a home surviving a wildfire by up to 90%. Hardening the home and replacing roofing, siding, and vents have the potential to add another 50% chance of survivability. California State Forestry research indicates communities where over 70% of the homes in the area have applied both techniques across all homes have done roughly the equivalent of putting an extra fire break in the surrounding geography to secure the neighborhood. Both CALFire and IBHS.org advocate for homeowners to apply these techniques, as do newly introduced CA state regulations and building codes like AB38. "Firemaps is building a critical marketplace to empower homeowners to take meaningful action to address urgent climate risks," said Andrew Chen, General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz. "The Firemaps team is well-equipped to scale their offering into new markets and other climate change problems, such as flooding and storm reinforcements and I'm optimistic about the impact their technology will have." Firemaps was founded in 2020 by a team of executives from Uber, Postmates, and large-scale construction companies. Learn more at www.firemaps.com About Firemaps Firemaps is a climate-tech startup that brings the power of Drone 3d photogrammetry and satellite imagery to help California homeowners defend their homes from wildfires. The Firemaps process, including risk analysis and a personalized fire defense plan and mitigation work done by Firemaps' network of qualified, vetted contractors, can help homeowners reduce their risk of their property being destroyed by wildfire by up to 90%. Founded in 2021, Firemaps has raised $5.5 million in seed money from Andreessen Horowitz, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi and investor Lee Fixel. Learn more at www.firemaps.com. Media Contact for Firemaps: Rebecca Silliman, Whipsmart PR [email protected] (510) 254-7615 *Analysis of Wildfire Fuel Management And Risk Mitigation conducted by Business & Home Safety and Zesty.ai (April 2021) SOURCE Firemaps Related Links http://www.firemaps.com/ DUBLIN, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Global Biodefense Market 2021-2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The publisher has been monitoring the biodefense market and it is poised to grow by $5.41 bn during 2021-2025, progressing at a CAGR of over 7% during the forecast period. Our report on the biodefense market provides a holistic analysis, market size and forecast, trends, growth drivers, and challenges, as well as vendor analysis covering around 25 vendors. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current global market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment. The market is driven by the rising prevalence of infectious diseases and rapid increase in government funding in R&D. The biodefense market analysis includes the application segment and geographic landscape. This study identifies the growing threat of bioterrorism as one of the prime reasons driving the biodefense market growth during the next few years. Companies Mentioned Alexeter Technologies LLC Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc. Altimmune Inc. ANP Technologies Inc. Bavarian Nordic AS Cleveland BioLabs Inc. Elusys Therapeutics Inc. Emergent BioSolutions Inc. General Dynamics Corp. GlaxoSmithKline Plc The report on biodefense market covers the following areas: Biodefense market sizing Biodefense market forecast Biodefense market industry analysis The study was conducted using an objective combination of primary and secondary information including inputs from key participants in the industry. The report contains a comprehensive market and vendor landscape in addition to an analysis of the key vendors. The publisher presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources by an analysis of key parameters such as profit, pricing, competition, and promotions. It presents various market facets by identifying the key industry influencers. The data presented is comprehensive, reliable, and a result of extensive research - both primary and secondary. The market research reports provide a complete competitive landscape and an in-depth vendor selection methodology and analysis using qualitative and quantitative research to forecast the accurate market growth. Key Topics Covered: 1. Executive Summary Market overview 2. Market Landscape Market ecosystem Value chain analysis 3. Market Sizing Market definition Market segment analysis Market size 2020 Market outlook: Forecast for 2020 - 2025 4. Five Forces Analysis Bargaining power of buyers Bargaining power of suppliers Threat of new entrants Threat of substitutes Threat of rivalry Market condition 5. Market Segmentation by Application Market segments Comparison by Application Anthrax - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Smallpox - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Botulism - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Others - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Market opportunity by Application 6. Geographic Landscape Geographic segmentation Geographic comparison North America - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Europe - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Asia - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 ROW - Market size and forecast 2020-2025 Key leading countries Market opportunity By Geographical Landscape Market drivers Market challenges Market trends 7. Vendor Landscape Landscape disruption 8. Vendor Analysis 9. Appendix Scope of the report Currency conversion rates for US$ Research methodology List of abbreviations For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/v9ven Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Research Dive has added a new report to its offering titled, "Digital Educational Publishing Market by End-User (K-12, Higher Education, and Corporate, or Skill Based), Product Type (Digital Textbooks, Digital Assessment Books, and Others), and Regional Analysis (North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and LAMEA): Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 20202027". The Global Digital Educational Publishing Market is expected to garner $27,891.5 million by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 17.0% from 2020 to 2027. The report delivers comprehensive insights into the current condition and future prospective of the industry by meticulously examining market drivers and restraints, opportunities, major segments, and regions. Download PDF Sample Report of Digital Educational Publishing Market Key Segment Findings of the Digital Educational Publishing Market: The market is segmented on the basis of product type, end user, and region. Among product type segment, the digital textbooks sub-segment is expected to hold a leading market share by growing with a CAGR of 16.5% in the estimated period. The growth of this sub-segment is chiefly because digital textbooks are cheap, easily accessible, and make the monitoring of students' progress easier. in the estimated period. The growth of this sub-segment is chiefly because digital textbooks are cheap, easily accessible, and make the monitoring of students' progress easier. Among end user segment, the k-12 sub-segment is anticipated to grab a major share of the market by growing with a CAGR of 16.8% in the forecast period. The growth of this sub-segment is majorly because of the growing adoption of e-learning technologies by schools. in the forecast period. The growth of this sub-segment is majorly because of the growing adoption of e-learning technologies by schools. Among region, the North American region market is anticipated to dominate the global market by gathering a revenue of $9,444.3 million in the estimated timeframe. The growth of this region market is mostly due to the growing demand and awareness about digital educational platforms in this region amidst the COVID-19 turmoil. Get Additional 20% OFF on Report Customization: Grab PROMO CODE Market Dynamics The key factors fueling the growth of the global digital educational publishing market are a widespread rise in the use of smartphones and Internet services across the globe. In addition, growing initiatives by government bodies all over the world to fuel the adoption of digital technologies in the education sector is anticipated to open doors to innovative opportunities for the market growth in the projected period. However, easy access to open-source platforms, such as Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apache HTTP server and others, offering online educational materials is expected to hinder the market growth during the forecast period. Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Digital Educational Publishing Market: The COVID-19 pandemic has made a positive impact on the growth of the global digital educational publishing market. During the COVID-19 pandemic government of various regions has instructed to close educational institutes to avert the spread of COVID-19 infection. As a result education providers are adopting digital means of offering educations to continue their functioning during the pandemic period. Get Access to Comprehensive Analysis of the Impact of COVID-19 on Digital Educational Publishing Market Top Players of the Industry The major players of the global digital educational publishing industry are John Wiley & Sons Cengage Learning Scholastic Corp. Oxford University Press McGraw-Hill Education Inc. Georg von Holtzbrinck Hachette Livre Pearson Cambridge University Press Thomson Reuters - Enquire and Get Quick Access to Top Companies Development Strategies Summary Report [80 pages] Numerous business strategies, such as acquisitions, mergers, R&D activities, new product developments, and much more, are implemented by these players to attain a strong position in the global market. For instance, in April 2020, Comik Publishing, a platform for ingeniously, zany, thought-shattering stories, launched an online education platform with an aim to support educators and students around the globe. Moreover, the report offers other key details of leading players such as business tactics, financial performance, and product/service range of these players along with Porter's five forces analysis and SWOT analysis. More about Industrial Refrigeration Market: Related Trending Topics: About Research Dive Research Dive is a market research firm based in Pune, India. Maintaining the integrity and authenticity of the services, the firm provides the services that are solely based on its exclusive data model, compelled by the 360-degree research methodology, which guarantees comprehensive and accurate analysis. With an unprecedented access to several paid data resources, team of expert researchers, and strict work ethic, the firm offers insights that are extremely precise and reliable. Scrutinizing relevant news releases, government publications, decades of trade data, and technical & white papers, Research dive deliver the required services to its clients well within the required timeframe. Its expertise is focused on examining niche markets, targeting its major driving factors, and spotting threatening hindrances. Complementarily, it also has a seamless collaboration with the major industry aficionado that further offers its research an edge. Contact: Mr. Abhishek Paliwal Research Dive 30 Wall St. 8th Floor, New York NY 10005 (P) +91-(788)-802-9103 (India) Toll Free: 1-888-961-4454 E-mail: [email protected] Website: https://www.researchdive.com Blog: https://www.researchdive.com/blog/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/research-dive/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/ResearchDive Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Research-Dive-1385542314927521 SOURCE Research Dive NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- As per the latest report published by Research Dive, the Global Homeland Security Market is predicted to gain a revenue of $8,03,967.3 million by 2028, rising from $4,92,362.3 million in 2020, at a CAGR of 6.1% from 2021-2028. Download PDF Sample Report of Global Homeland Security Market Regional Analysis: Homeland Security Market The North American Homeland Security Market is expected to garner revenue of $2, 91,598.9 million by 2028, rising at a steady CAGR of 5.9% in the analysis period. This growth is primarily due to the region having a highly advanced set of defence organizations and ensured effective safety of both the public and commercial sectors. Additionally, North American countries such as the USA and Canada are constantly investing in internal security which according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) was valued at $778 billion in 2020. These factors are expected to further add to the growth of the region in the forecast period. Key Market Segments By type, the cyber security sub-segment is expected to hold the highest market share with a revenue of $2,27,201.8 million by 2028, rising from $1,34,648.5 million in 2020. This growth is due to the need to secure computers as well as networks from the constant threat of cyber crimes such as counterfeiting, forgery, and identity theft. These factors are expected to add to the growth of the sub-segment in the analysis period. by 2028, rising from in 2020. This growth is due to the need to secure computers as well as networks from the constant threat of cyber crimes such as counterfeiting, forgery, and identity theft. These factors are expected to add to the growth of the sub-segment in the analysis period. By technology, the security platform sub-segment is predicted to dominate the market with a revenue of $3,84 , 114.6 million by 2028. The rising requirement to provide solutions within various sections of counter terrorism which include border, military, and police is set to ensure the growth of the sub-segment. Additionally, the implementation of artificial intelligence or AI into the security platforms has further enhanced military field operations by providing accurate yet live information to the officials. It also provides rapid assessments that can help to accomplish successful missions while protecting all the assets. These factors are set to contribute to the growth of the sub-segment in the forecast period. , 114.6 million by 2028. The rising requirement to provide solutions within various sections of counter terrorism which include border, military, and police is set to ensure the growth of the sub-segment. Additionally, the implementation of artificial intelligence or AI into the security platforms has further enhanced military field operations by providing accurate yet live information to the officials. It also provides rapid assessments that can help to accomplish successful missions while protecting all the assets. These factors are set to contribute to the growth of the sub-segment in the forecast period. By end-user, the public sector sub-segment is expected to gain the highest market share with a significant rise in the revenue from $3,20,453.3 million in 2020 to over $5,18,643.4 million by 2028 in the analysis period. Governments which are a part of the public sector, constantly need to spend on national security which is further expected to lead to the growth of the sub-segment in the estimated timeframe. Get Additional 20% OFF on Report Customization: Grab PROMO CODE Market Dynamic Global homeland security is a sector that looks after defense requirements of a country which is why it holds significance. It provides constant protection against terror attacks all over the world which ensures the safety of various countries. As per the Institute of Economics and Peace, the worldwide number of deaths due to terrorism stood at 13,826. To add further, the global economy had to bear a cost of over $26.4 billion in 2019 as a result of multiple terror attacks. These factors along with the need to strengthen the defense system of countries are expected to add to the growth of the market. On the other hand, several countries require advanced defense systems to help secure all the sectors which include aviation, maritime, and cyber security. The security of these countries also relies on effective mass transportation systems, cyber security, and power plants where the cost of implementing these is extremely high. These factors are anticipated to restrain the growth of the segment in the analysis period. Rapid developments in technology have led to the introduction of nanotechnology and biotechnology which have been assisting in further improving security systems around the world. In terms of nanotechnology, advanced security devices are being built which use miniature radio frequency identification transponders in addition to biochemical sensors. These devices are compact and also ensure protection in case a need arises. In the field of biotechnology, experts have been developing a advanced variant of X Ray which uses terahertz radiation known as the T Ray. This device is expected to be highly effective in identifying objects based on their chemical composition. These factors are expected to provide an opportunity of growth to the market. Top 10 Key Players, New Developments, and Strategies: Homeland Security Market Northrop Grumman. L3Harris Technologies INC. General Dynamics Corporation BAE Systems. Thales Group Leonardo S.p.A. Elbit Systems Ltd. Rohde & Schwarz Leidos Holdings, Inc Unisys Corporation. - Inquire and Get Quick Access to Top Companies Development Strategies Summary Report In October 2020, General Dynamics Technology, a renowned aerospace and defense organization, received a contract with regard to IT system modernization from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). The contract covers engineering support to the organization along with testing plans, system designs, and architecture. The report also summarizes many important aspects including financial performance of the key players, SWOT analysis, product portfolio, and recent strategic developments. Impact of COVID-19 on the Global Homeland Security Market The rapid increase in the number of coronavirus patients around the world led to governments taking a decision to implement social distancing guidelines suggested by medical professionals. This led to travel bans as well as lockdowns to contain the spread of the virus. As a result of this, governments shifted their attention to providing the required solutions to the raging pandemic, due to which the defense of countries was not the top priority. Also, the travel ban led to the supply chain being severely affected due to which multiple industries unable to acquire their supply of equipment were used to make acoustic sensors, C4ISR systems, sensors, and more. These factors affected the global homeland security market in a negative manner, but it is expected to recover eventually due to the implementation of Industrial Internet of Things in the production of advanced defense devices. Access Our Comprehensive Analysis of THE IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON GLOBAL HOMELAND SECURITY MARKET More about Homeland Security Global Homeland Security Market Is Anticipated To Generate A Revenue Of $8,03,967.3 Million, Growing At A CAGR Of 6.1% From 2021 To 20284 Impeccable Benefits of Working in Homeland Security Global Homeland Security Market Predicted to Garner a Revenue of $8,03,967.3 Million by 2028, at a CAGR of 6.1% from 2021-2028 Related Trending Topics: About Research Dive: Research Dive is a market research firm based in Pune, India. Maintaining the integrity and authenticity of the services, the firm provides the services that are solely based on its exclusive data model, compelled by the 360-degree research methodology, which guarantees comprehensive and accurate analysis. With an unprecedented access to several paid data resources, team of expert researchers, and strict work ethic, the firm offers insights that are extremely precise and reliable. Scrutinizing relevant news releases, government publications, decades of trade data, and technical & white papers, Research dive deliver the required services to its clients well within the required timeframe. Its expertise is focused on examining niche markets, targeting its major driving factors, and spotting threatening hindrances. Complementarily, it also has a seamless collaboration with the major industry aficionado that further offers its research an edge. Contact Us: Mr. Abhishek Paliwal Research Dive 30 Wall St. 8th Floor, New York NY 10005 (P) +91-(788)-802-9103 (India) Toll Free: 1-888-961-4454 E-mail: [email protected] Website: https://www.researchdive.com Blog: https://www.researchdive.com/blog/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/research-dive/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/ResearchDive Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Research-Dive-1385542314927521 SOURCE Research Dive To help kick-off the campaign, actor, producer, director and mother of four Soleil Moon Frye, whose credits include Punky Brewster and kid90, has partnered with GSK to share her perspective as her oldest daughter, Poet, turns 16 and they navigate the meningitis B vaccination discussion with their pediatrician. "I have four children, and they are my whole world. Like all moms, I want to help keep my kids healthy, and vaccinations are one of the ways I've tried to do that. I always ask a lot of questions and do my research, so I was surprised when I only recently learned about meningitis B," said Frye. "My daughter Poet turned 16 this week, an important milestone but also one relevant to meningitis B vaccination. While many of our kids have received a meningitis vaccine when they were younger, they could miss vaccination for meningitis B. It's important to me to help other parents start this conversation with their child's doctorsbecause as parents we want to do everything we can to help protect our children, including from vaccine-preventable diseases." CDC currently recommends meningitis B vaccination for teens and young adults aged 16-23 years (preferred ages 16-18), based on 'shared clinical decision-making', a decision process between the health care provider and the patient or parent/guardian.3 "Ask2BSure" was created to educate and empower parents to start the meningitis B vaccination discussion with their child's doctor. "Like Soleil, parents may not know there are two different types of vaccinations recommended for young adults to help protect against the five vaccine-preventable groups of meningitis, one for groups A, C, W and Y, and another for group B,4" said Dr. Leonard Friedland, VP, Director of Scientific Affairs and Public Health, GSK Vaccines. "As parents catch up on wellness visits and vaccination for their children, it is important to ask their child's doctor if they might be missing meningitis B vaccination." To commemorate the "Ask2BSure" campaign launch, GSK has pledged to donate $1 for every unique view of the campaign video (up to $10,000) to the Meningitis B Action Project, a joint initiative of the Kimberly Coffey Foundation and the Emily Stillman Foundation. The Project was started by two mothers who each lost their daughters to meningitis B and are now on a mission to educate parents, young adults and healthcare providers about meningitis B and vaccinations to help prevent it. Views for the donation will be counted for up to 3 months following the launch. Parents should start the conversation with their child's doctor to Ask2BSure if they have received meningitis B vaccination. Visit Ask2Bsure.com for more information. About Meningitis Meningitis is an uncommon, but serious illness that can cause life-threatening complications, or even death.2 Adolescents and young adults are at an increased risk for contracting meningitis because it can spread through behaviors such as living in close quarters, coughing, sneezing, kissing, and sharing drinks or utensils.2,5 Early symptoms of meningitis may be similar to those of the flu, but can progress quickly and can be fatal, sometimes within 24 hours.6,7 Although vaccination may not protect all recipients, according to CDC, vaccination is the best defense against meningococcal disease.8 About Ask2BSure "Ask2BSure" is a public health campaign by GSK created to help educate and empower parents to ask their child's doctor about meningitis B vaccination. Ask2BSure seeks to raise awareness of the importance of a dialogue between parents/caregivers and healthcare providers about meningitis B vaccination. Resources, including personal stories, infographics and conversation starters, can be found at Ask2Bsure.com. For additional education around meningitis B and vaccination, parents and caregivers of teens and young adults should visit meningitisB.com. About GSK GSK is a science-led global healthcare company with a special purpose: to help people do more, feel better, live longer. For further information please visit www.gsk.com/about-us. GSK enquiries: Media enquiries: Sean Clements +1 215 740 3088 (Philadelphia) Evan Berland +1 215 432 0234 (Philadelphia) Analyst/Investor enquiries: Sonya Ghobrial +44 (0) 7391 784784 (Consumer) James Dodwell +44 (0) 20 8047 2406 (London) Mick Readey +44 (0) 7990 339655 (London) Jeff McLaughlin +1 215 751 7002 (Philadelphia) Frannie DeFranco +1 215 751 4855 (Philadelphia) 1 National, Regional, State, and Selected Local Area Vaccination Coverage Among Adolescents Aged 1317 Years United States, 2019. 2020; 69(33). Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/pdfs/mm6933-H.pdf. Reviewed August 21, 2020. Accessed August 2021. 2 Manual for the Surveillance of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases: Chapter 8: Meningococcal Disease. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/surv-manual/chpt08-mening.html. Reviewed December 2019. Accessed August 2021. 3 ACIP Shared Clinical Decision-Making Recommendations https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/acip/acip-scdm-faqs.html 4 Kempe, Alison et al. 2018. Adoption of Serogroup B Meningococcal Vaccine Recommendations. Pediatrics. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2018-0344. Accessed August 2021. 5 Meningitis. Overview. Mayo Clinic website. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/meningitis/symptoms-causes/syc-20350508. Updated October 1, 2020. Accessed August 2021. 6 Pelton SI. Meningococcal disease awareness: clinical and epidemiological factors affecting prevention and management in adolescents. J Adolesc Health. 2010;46:S9-S15 7 Meningococcal Disease: Signs and Symptoms. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. https://www.cdc.gov/meningococcal/about/symptoms.html. Updated June 2017. Accessed August 2021. 8 Meningococcal disease. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. https://www.cdc.gov/meningococcal/about/prevention.html. Updated March 28, 2017. Accessed August 2021. SOURCE GSK Related Links http://www.gsk.com STOCKTON, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Guardian Alliance Technologies is proud to announce it has completed the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Partner Transformation Program (PTP), furthering the reliability and security of the Guardian Background Investigation Software Platform. Last year, Guardian joined the AWS Partner Network (APN) and participated in the AWS ISV Partner Path and PTP. Through the PTP, Guardian worked with leaders at AWS and solutions architects to accelerate the Guardian-AWS relationship through go-to-market strategies as well as taking a deep dive into Guardian's technological infrastructure. During the 100-day PTP, Guardian completed the AWS Well-Architected Review and AWS Foundational Technical Review (FTR), and has now received the "Reviewed by AWS" badge. "Guardian is already serving hundreds of law enforcement agencies across the country, and we're onboarding new agencies every day. That means more and more data is entering the Guardian ecosystem on a daily basis as well," said Ryan Layne, CEO, Guardian. "System reliability, data security, and privacy are at the core of all that we do, and we work hard to ensure that our system architecture and policies comply or enable compliance with all applicable data security and privacy laws. We're grateful for AWS having invited us to participate in the PTP. It would be impossible to overstate the importance and value of our relationship with them." According to Chief Jeff Brinkley of Mason City Police Department in Mason City, Iowa, "Any time we are considering technology that will handle sensitive data, the features and basic functionality are important, but they're secondary to the importance of data security and our ability to operate in compliance with the FBI's CJIS Security Policy. Without confidence in the security of the system, it is of no use to us. It has always been obvious to me that the folks at Guardian are dedicated to providing a product that is not only feature-rich, but highly secure and allows law enforcement agencies to comply with the CJIS Security Policy while using it. Guardian's completion of the AWS PTP is an observable example of their ongoing efforts to maximize system reliability and data security and serves to further bolster our already strong trust in the Guardian Platform in general." In addition to data security, Guardian's application supports the management and containment of possible Criminal History Information (CHRI) from the National Criminal Information Center (NCIC), which is governed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) Security Policy. Therefore, Guardian has worked with AWS CJIS and solutions architects to ensure that its platform allows agencies to comply with the CJIS policy. "By building applications using the AWS Nitro System and AWS Key Management Service , Guardian Alliance can enforce CJIS Security Policy required controls by securely encrypting their criminal justice information and limiting all access to the CJI to only those with access to the encryption keys. Agencies maintain complete ownership and control over their critical criminal justice data, and Guardian can easily demonstrate how their customers can comply with the CJIS Security Policy while using the Guardian Platform," said Gerard Gallant, AWS Senior CJIS Program Manager, AWS. About Guardian Guardian Alliance Technologies provides cloud-based software to hundreds of agencies across the United States. The Guardian Background Investigation Software Platform is designed to drastically improve the process of vetting and hiring public safety personnel. Use of the Guardian Platform enables agencies to complete background investigations far faster, and with more accuracy than ever before thanks to advanced data mining and management tools, time-saving automation for certain tasks, and artificial intelligence used for social media screening. All of this facilitates more expedient, high quality hiring decisions. SOURCE Guardian Alliance Technologies, Inc. Related Links https://www.guardianalliancetechnologies.com Gundry MD Active Advantage is a revolutionary antioxidant blend designed to help the body support energy levels, strength, and metabolism. The formula contains the powerful antioxidant Astaxanthin, which helps promote mitochondria production, ramping up energy levels, mental stamina and physical endurance. Fulvic Minerals and CoQ10 help support natural ATP levels and better digestion for metabolic support and better management of weight and unhealthy cravings. Tocotrienols, a vitamin E nutrient, help the body's natural ability to fight free radical damage that can cause rapid aging and energy depletionThe blend also contains other antioxidants, amino acids, polyphenols and more of science's most celebrated nutrients. "Fatigue is not your fate," says Dr. Steven Gundry. "We are all designed to enjoy sustained energy, but we must support our metabolic health and ATP production. I created Active Advantage with this in mind, utilizing ingredients that help promote a full-body "power up" for renewed energy throughout your day, a more balanced mood, and greater fitness levels." By helping "supercharge" your mitochondria, the cells that help generate energy production throughout your entire body, you can help fuel many areas of your health to enjoy reduced occasional brain fog and mental fatigue, clearer thinking and a faster metabolism. Active Advantage can also support the brain's ability to produce fresh BDNF, a vital protein that supports thinking, alertness, memory, mood and the ability to learn. - 86% of Active Advantage trial users reported feeling sharper* - 87% reported less occasional "brain fog"* - 94% reported digesting their food better* - 96% noticed more energy to get through the day and reported feeling better overall* ABOUT DR. STEVEN GUNDRY MD Dr. Steven Gundry MD is one of the world's top cardiothoracic surgeons and a leading expert on lectin-free eating, as well as medical director at The International Heart and Lung Institute and The Centers for Restorative Medicine in Palm Springs and Santa Barbara, California. He has spent the last two decades helping people restore their health by optimizing nutrition and lifestyle choices. He is the author of New York Times best-selling books including The Plant Paradox , and The Plant Paradox Cookbook , and The Longevity Paradox , The Energy Paradox and upcoming in 2022, Unlocking the Keto Code. Also, he is the founder of Gundry MD, a line of wellness products, and host of The Dr. Gundry Podcast. ABOUT GUNDRY MD Founded in 2015, Gundry MD is dedicated to innovative solutions using science-backed ingredients to offer all-day energy, a "fired-up" metabolism, smooth, easy digestion, and a youthful-feeling mind and body. It all starts with feeding your body powerful nutrients like polyphenols, one of the most powerful health-boosters out there while avoiding plant proteins called lectins which can wreak havoc on your digestion, energy, and vitality. Based on 20 years of research evaluating how nutrition affects the body, Dr. Gundry personally designs every Gundry MD product. In addition, Gundry MD formulas are third-party tested for quality. Best-selling Gundry MD products include Bio Complete 3 , Energy Renew , and Total Restore . *Results can and will vary. Trial users of Gundry MD Active Advantage reported results within the first 7 days of use, and even more dramatic results over time. Media Contact: Rebecca Reinbold [email protected] SOURCE Gundry MD Tubman family members were joined by 3 rd generation Garland Brothers Funeral Home business owner and 16 th District Onondaga County Legislature candidate, Charles Garland, and local community members. The objective of the Harriet Tubman Memorial Freedom Bridge is to help provide racial equity for local residents and to reconnect the community by all modes of transportation. The Harriet Tubman Memorial Freedom Bridge will help complete the future of the I-81 project in Syracuse, New York. "The addition of the Harriet Tubman Memorial Freedom Bridge to the community grid represents a comprehensive solution that knits our community and neighborhoods back together, said Pauline Copes Johnson, Tubman Family Matriarch. "The Harriet Tubman Memorial Freedom Bridge would create something that all residents can be proud of and honor one of the most influential civil rights icons in American history. I'm proud to be here today with family members to propose this exciting new project." The genesis of the Harriet Tubman Memorial Freedom Bridge concept dates back to 2008 when the New York State DOT announced a now outdated 'Community Grid' stand-alone plan to demolish a segment of Interstate 81 that was built 60 years ago through three predominantly African-American neighborhoods in Syracuse. Garland commented, "By keeping thousands of cars off of our urban neighborhoods' streets and thereby reducing air pollution among one of the most vulnerable populations in our city, too, the Harriet Tubman Memorial Freedom Bridge will directly improve the lives of the residents here. The symbolic value of the bridge also effectively reconciles our past, present and future and serves as a beacon of hope and inspiration. We look forward to working with new Governor Kathy Hochul and our federal representatives to bring this to fruition. " Eighty five (85) family members signed the attached letter to President Biden, Secretary Buttigieg, Senator Schumer, Senator Gillibrand, Congressman Katko and other federal, state and local officials indicating their strong support for the future of I-81. Additional details can be accessed here: https://harriettubmanbridge.com/ Contact: Charles Garland [email protected] SOURCE Garland Bros Funeral Home Related Links https://harriettubmanbridge.com/ HOUSTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- A private chauffeur who had to be cut out of his vehicle and flown to the hospital by helicopter ambulance has filed a lawsuit against Harris County and the deputy constable who caused the crash, accusing them of covering up the accident. According to the lawsuit filed by Emmerick "E.J." Jacob, the deputy's reckless actions and excessive speed are to blame for the collision, which was so forceful that it caused Mr. Jacob's Cadillac Escalade SUV to roll over and left him with a punctured lung. The Harris County Constable's office is refusing to release dashcam video and other relevant evidence, but video Mr. Jacob's lawyers obtained from a nearby gas station clearly shows Precinct 4 Deputy Ronald Rainey sped through a red light. The constable's office, which led the investigation into the accident, has gone to the Texas Attorney General's office to avoid responding to a public information request Mr. Jacob's attorneys filed. "It seems pretty clear to us that the constable's office is trying to cover up for one of its own," said Ashish Mahendru, of Mahendru PC. "All we want to find is the truth." The wreck occurred shortly after midnight on July 18 when Deputy Rainey ignored a red light while enroute to a call and drove through an intersection on Walters Road in north Houston. His patrol car struck Mr. Jacob's Cadillac Escalade, which had the green light and the right of way. According to the lawsuit, Deputy Rainey "barreled through the red light at upward of 70 mph without taking any action to slow down or otherwise clear the intersection." "There are serious concerns here," said attorney Darren Braun, who also represents Mr. Jacob and is himself a former police officer. "For starters, why is the constable's office conducting the investigation of a serious accident involving one of its own deputies? And how did the constable's office turn Jacob into a scapegoat when the evidence is so clear that he did nothing wrong?" The case is Emmerick Jacob vs. Harris County, Cause No. 2021-53263, in the District Court of Harris County. Mahendru PC is a boutique commercial litigation firm whose attorneys are known for their tenacity, intelligence and experience. Founded in 2001, the firm has a simple philosophy: Your problem is our problem. We adopt it, understand it and solve it. Our objective is to resolve every case in the best, fastest and most cost-efficient manner possible. We never wait for our opponent's next move, which means we spend a lot of time at the courthouse and are well-known there. To learn more, visit http://www.thelitigationgroup.com. Media Contact: Jennie Bui-McCoy 800-559-4534 [email protected] SOURCE Mahendru PC Related Links http://www.thelitigationgroup.com INDIANAPOLIS, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- International Medical Group (IMG), an award-winning global insurance benefits and assistance services company, is pleased to announce that Kevin Melton has joined the company as the Global Head of IPMI (international private medical insurance). Melton will be responsible for overseeing and expanding IMG's existing IPMI segment which includes annually renewable, long-term individual, family, small to medium size group, and corporate group coverage options for those based in North America and the U.K., E.U., and Rest of World. Kevin brings with him over 30 years of insurance industry experience, including time in the UK domestic private medical insurance market with Cigna Healthcare and Standard Life Healthcare Limited before moving into the International Private Medical Insurance Market spending nearly nine years as the Head of International Sales for Allianz Worldwide Care. After Allianz, he went on to spend 2 years at Vanbreda International as the Deputy Director of Market Development, before moving to his most recent position, where he was the Global Head of Sales and Marketing for AXA Global Healthcare. "We are thrilled to welcome Kevin to the team," said IMG's Chief Commercial Officer Amanda Winkle, "Kevin's industry experience and expertise are an excellent match for our company. With Kevin at the helm of our already successful IPMI business segment, we are in prime position to continue to grow IMG's market share and revenue." In addition to Melton's sales duties, he will also oversee the creation of a global product portfolio in collaboration with IMG's one brand initiative. As a result, IMG has consolidated their Steyning office and moved staff into their Cardiff and Redhill locations. Melton will be based out of the Redhill office. About International Medical Group (IMG) International Medical Group (IMG), a SiriusPoint company, is an award-winning global insurance benefits and assistance services company that has served millions of members worldwide since its founding in 1990. A leader in the industry, IMG offers a full line of international medical insurance products, as well as travel insurance plans, medical management services and 24/7 emergency medical and travel assistance. For more information, please visit www.imglobal.com. SOURCE International Medical Group (IMG) Related Links http://www.imglobal.com Merkle will be writing Property & Casualty business from WSS' office location in Scottsdale, AZ working to expand the company's presence throughout the area. With over 30 years of trade experience and a sharp focus on Commercial P&C risks, he will be offering products from some of the best top-rated surplus lines carriers and brokerage markets in the industry. "I look forward to building strong relationships with my clients and new colleagues," said Merkle. "Western Security Surplus is a frontrunner in the wholesale market, and I am excited to expand the company's reach throughout the Scottsdale region." Prior to joining WSS, Matt was with Monarch E&S Insurance Services for 17 years, where he served in several positions including Vice President of Operations, Branch Manager, and Senior Underwriter. He was also President and Partner of Excess & Surplus Lines Insurance Brokers, a California wholesaler offering P&C contract and brokerage insurance. Matt is a Southern California native who relocated to Scottsdale in 2018. "Matt brings valuable industry expertise to his new position," said Mark Kaufman, Chief Operating Officer of WSS. "He will be a strong asset to our team and to our clients I look forward to working with him and increasing our services in the greater Scottsdale area." Western Security Surplus welcomes Matt to the team and looks forward to continued success in the P&C market. About Western Security Surplus Western Security Surplus Insurance Brokers, an XPT Partners company, is a wholesale insurance brokerage and general agency founded in 1981, offering a wide range of standard, unique and exclusive insurance programs. WSS holds licenses in various states across the country. About XPT Partners XPT Partners focuses on commercial P&C brokerage, binding and transportation by bringing together wholesale broking and multiple binding authority platforms across many specialty lines. XPT Partners stands apart by delivering expertise, market access, new product development and exclusive service offerings to client agencies through a collaborative partnership culture. For more information, please contact Mark Smith at [email protected] or visit xptspecialty.com. Media Contact: Anita Nevins, [email protected], 707-429-0877 SOURCE XPT Partners PITTSBURGH, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- "I wanted to create an easy, economical and environmentally-friendly way to use an entire bar of soap," said an inventor, from Burlington, N.J., "so I invented the SOAP NO MORE. My design enables you to use the soap pieces that are normally too small for practical use." The invention provides an effective way to make use of small pieces of soap. In doing so, it prevents soap pieces from being discarded. As a result, it increases efficiency and it could save consumers money. The invention features a practical design that is convenient and easy to use so it is ideal for households. Additionally, it is producible in design variations. The original design was submitted to the Philadelphia sales office of InventHelp. It is currently available for licensing or sale to manufacturers or marketers. For more information, write Dept. 19-PND-5095, InventHelp, 217 Ninth Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, or call (412) 288-1300 ext. 1368. Learn more about InventHelp's Invention Submission Services at http://www.InventHelp.com. SOURCE InventHelp Related Links http://www.inventhelp.com Company highlights strong quarter-to-quarter growth in loan originations, shares progress on Post-Pandemic Growth Plans and announces migration to marketplace strategy. Loan origination volume grew to US$34.4 million in Q2 2021, representing an increase of 36.1% over Q1 2021 and representing an increase of 272.4% over Q2 2020. in Q2 2021, representing an increase of 36.1% over Q1 2021 and representing an increase of 272.4% over Q2 2020. IOU added US$18.5 million in loan originations in July 2021 , representing the highest monthly loan origination volume in the history of the Company. in loan originations in , representing the highest monthly loan origination volume in the history of the Company. IOU continued to sell its loan originations to institutional buyers as part of its marketplace growth strategy. The Company maintained a corporate cash position of $11.1 million at June 30, 2021 despite the repurchase of $1.9 million in convertible debentures. MONTREAL, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - IOU FINANCIAL INC. ("IOU" or "the Company") (TSXV: IOU), a leading online lender to small businesses (IOUFinancial.com), announced today its results for the three and six-month period ended June 30, 2021. "We are delivering on our Post-Pandemic Growth Plan and these growth figures are the result," said Robert Gloer, President and CEO. "We are committed to continue delivering on our plans and maximizing the growth potential of the marketplace strategy." The Company is focused on bringing its loan origination volumes back to pre-pandemic levels and returning to profitability on an annual basis by maximizing its exposure to the post-COVID-19 pandemic economic recovery. For all of 2021, the Company is targeting loan originations in the range of US$165M to US$200M as compared to US$84.9M in 2020 and US$154.2M in 2019. In order to achieve this goal, IOU is investing in its Post-Pandemic Growth Plan (PPGP), first announced during its Q1 2021 Financial Results, by targeting 3 key strategic areas: Product expansion: The Company intends to expand its ability to support the post-pandemic growth of small businesses with innovative new funding products designed to meet a wider range of business needs. The Company intends to expand its ability to support the post-pandemic growth of small businesses with innovative new funding products designed to meet a wider range of business needs. Product distribution: IOU is focussed on launching initiatives to expand its network of quality brokers, adding to its sales team, and investing in marketing and communications programs to generate new levels of awareness, differentiation and growth. IOU is focussed on launching initiatives to expand its network of quality brokers, adding to its sales team, and investing in marketing and communications programs to generate new levels of awareness, differentiation and growth. Technology innovation: The Company is investing in its IOU360 technology platform to better support its network of brokers, merchants and employees with a frictionless user experience for all stakeholders. The Company is advancing on all fronts with improvements to the IOU360 technology platform underway, a contribution of over US$2.4 million in IOU USA loan originations generated by ZING Funding in Q2 2021, and the introduction of the IOU Financial Cash Back Loan on August 4, 2021. In addition to the 3 strategic areas outlined above, IOU will further support growth in loan originations by migrating from a loan portfolio strategy (which involves funding directly to IOU's balance sheet) to a marketplace strategy whereby its loan origination growth will be primarily sold to institutional purchasers. This will provide the Company with significantly more room to grow and will necessitate the introduction of new key performance indicators (KPIs) in order to provide meaningful visibility into the performance of the Company. It should be noted that the marketplace strategy will also render previous key performance indicators (KPIs) - such as portfolio yield, cost of borrowing rate, provisional credit loss rates (PCL), net credit loss rates (NCL), allowance for expected credit losses ratio (ACL) and stage 3 delinquency ratios associated with the loan portfolio - irrelevant, and the Company will therefore discontinue the disclosure of these previous KPIs. Instead, the Company will introduce new KPIs to provide meaningful insights into the performance of its marketplace strategy as part of its Q3 2021 Financial Results. The Company's growth strategies are further supported by strategic additions to the management team announced on August 4, 2021, providing IOU with a clear structure to execute on its growth strategies. FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS Please refer to the table below for adjustments made to IFRS gross revenue and operating expenses in order to better reflect the actual operating performance of the business. Loan Originations: In Q2 2021, the Company funded US$34.4 million in loans (2020: US $9.2 million), representing an increase of 272.4% over the same period last year. Loan originations were significantly impacted downwards in Q2 2020 as IOU ceased lending to business and geographical areas which were strongly impacted by COVID-19. Nevertheless, IOU continued to originate loans and has worked to bring its loan origination volumes back to and beyond pre-pandemic levels. For the first half of 2021, the Company funded US$59.7 million in loans (2020: US$47.3 million), representing an increase of 26.3% over the same period last year. Adjusted Gross Revenue: Decreased 49.9% to $2.4 million for the three-month period ended June 30, 2021 compared to Q2 2020 ($4.7 million). The decrease in adjusted gross revenue is due primarily to the following: Interest Revenue: Interest revenue decreased $3.6 million or 93.9% year over year as a result of a decrease in the average commercial loan receivable balance of 82.5% or $45.0 million in Q2 2021 as compared to Q2 2020 as the Company is transitioning to its marketplace strategy by selling its loan origination volume in Q2 2021 to its base of institutional loan buyers. Servicing and Other Income: Servicing and other income increased 135.7% to $2.1 million in Q2 2021 from Q2 2020 mainly due to the migration from a loan portfolio strategy to a marketplace strategy. Servicing income increased 76.4% to $1.3 million in Q2 2021 compared to Q2 2020 ($0.7 million) due mainly to the Company expanding its servicing portfolio. In Q2 2021, the average servicing portfolio increased 23.3% compared to the same period in 2020. In addition, the servicing portfolio yield rebounding back to historical averages from 5.2% in Q2 2020 to 7.5% in Q2 2021. Adjusted gross revenue decreased to $4.6 million (2020: $11.1 million), representing a decrease of 58.4% for the six-month period ended June 30,2021 compared to the same period in 2020. Cost of Revenue: Decreased from $5.6 million in Q2 2020 to $(0.1) million in Q2 2021. The variance is mainly due to the Company recording a provision for loan losses of $4.8 million in Q2 2020 following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic compared to a recovery of loan losses of $0.4 million in Q2 2021. In addition, interest expense decreased $0.5 million in Q2 2021 compared to Q2 2020 as the Company repaid all its outstanding debt to its financing credit facilities at the end of 2020. The cost of revenue for the six-month period ended June 30, 2021 decreased from $11.5 million in 2020 to $0.2 million in 2021. Adjusted Operating Expenses: Increased 45.6% to $2.7 million in Q2 2021 compared to $1.8 million in Q2 2020 as the Company continues to support the future growth in loan originations by investing in innovation and resources as part of its 2021 Post-Pandemic Growth Plan (PPGP). Adjusted operating expenses increased 14.7% to $5.1 million in the first half of 2021 over the same period in 2020. Adjusted Net Loss: IOU closed on its second quarter ended June 30,2021 with an adjusted net loss of $0.3 million compared to adjusted net loss of $2.7 million for the second quarter ended June 30, 2020. IOU closed on the six-month period ended June 30,2021 with an adjusted net loss of $0.7 million, compared to adjusted net loss of $4.9 million for the same period last year. IFRS Net Loss: IOU closed on its second quarter ended June 30, 2021 with IFRS net earnings of $0.0 million, or $0.00 per share, compared to IFRS net loss of $3.1 million or $(0.04) per share for the same period in 2020. IOU closed on the six-month period ended June 30,2021 with IFRS net loss of $0.1 million, or ($0.00) per share, compared to IFRS net loss of $5.2 million or $(0.06) per share for the same period last year. Adjusted and IFRS net earnings (loss) Three-Month Six-Month 2021 2020 2021 2020 For the period ended June 30 $ $ $ $ Interest revenue 232,598 3,815,288 824,210 8,784,674 Servicing & other income 2,129,388 903,282 3,803,768 2,337,675 Adjusted Gross Revenue 2,361,986 4,718,570 4,627,978 11,122,349 Interest expense 352,568 933,936 677,000 1,918,415 (Recovery of) Provision for loan losses (369,069) 4,813,545 (306,305) 10,055,554 Recoveries (18,952) (132,270) (123,916) (442,744) Cost of Revenue (35,453) 5,615,211 246,779 11,531,225 Adjusted Net Revenue (Loss) 2,397,439 (896,641) 4,381,199 (408,876) Adjusted operating expense 2,675,606 1,837,597 5,097,082 4,444,677 Income tax expense - - - Adjusted Net Loss (278,167) (2,734,238) (715,883) (4,853,553) Adjusted Net Loss per Share (0.00) (0.02) (0.01) (0.06) Adjusted Net Loss (278,167) (2,734,238) (715,883) (4,853,553) Non-cash gain on sales of loans 1,586,130 420,977 2,688,811 1,207,554 Non-cash amortization of servicing asset (1,193,981) (746,785) (1,917,979) (1,593,850) Non-cash stock-based compensation (80,588) (19,701) (101,019) (54,984) Non-recurring (loss) gain (22,640) - (22,640) 73,478 Net Earnings (Loss) per IFRS 10,754 (3,079,747) (68,710) (5,221,355) Net Earnings (Loss) per Share 0.00 (0.04) (0.00) (0.06) IOU's financial statements and management discussion & analysis for the quarter ended June 30, 2021 have been filed on SEDAR and are available at www.sedar.com. CORPORATE UPDATE The Company has implemented a work from home program whereby the majority of its Canadian employees can work remotely. As a result, the Company agreed to sub-lease the majority of its office space in Montreal, Quebec it currently rents from Palos to a third-party. The sub-lease term commences October 1, 2021 and ends on April 20, 2027 and is subject to head landlord approval. The sub-lease agreement will result in approximately $1.1 million to be received from the third- party over the sub-lease term. At the same time, IOU has agreed to amend its current sub-lease agreement with Palos, a related party, to lease significantly reduced office space to April 20, 2027 on terms similar to those that would have been present for an arm's length transaction. CONFERENCE CALL The Company will hold a conference call at 4:30 (EST) on September 1, 2021, to discuss its financial results. The dial-in number to access the conference call from Canada and the United States is 1 (800) 430-8332 (toll-free), conference ID: 58373354. About IOU Financial Inc. IOU Financial Inc. is a wholesale lender that provides quick and easy access to growth capital to small businesses through a network of preferred brokers across the US and Canada. Built on its proprietary IOU360 technology platform that connects underwriters, merchants and brokers in real time, IOU Financial has become a trusted alternative to banks by underwriting US$932 million in loans to fund small business growth since 2009. IOU trades on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol IOU (TSXV: IOU), and on the US OTC markets as IOUFF. To learn more about IOU Financial's corporate history, financial products, or to join our broker network please visit www.IOUFinancial.com. Forward Looking Statements Certain information set forth in this news release may contain forward-looking statements that involve substantial known and unknown risks and uncertainties. These forward-looking statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, certain of which are beyond the control of IOU including, but not limited to, the impact of general economic conditions, industry conditions, dependence upon regulatory and shareholder approvals, the execution of definitive documentation and the uncertainty of obtaining additional financing. Readers are cautioned that the assumptions used in the preparation of such information, although considered reasonable at the time of preparation, may prove to be imprecise and, as such, undue reliance should not be placed on forward-looking statements. IOU does not assume any obligation to update or revise its forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Definitions Adjusted gross revenue is defined as gross revenue prepared in accordance with IFRS for the period, plus amortization of servicing assets less gain on sale of loans. The Company uses adjusted gross revenue as it eliminates items that do not necessarily reflect how the Company is performing. Specifically, it eliminates the non-cash gain on sale of loans and the non-cash amortization of servicing assets which influence operating results depending on the timing and amount of the loan sales. Adjusted operating expenses is calculated as follows: total operating expenses prepared in accordance with IFRS for the period less: stock-based compensation and non-recurring costs, plus non-recurring gains. The period-to-date ratios are calculated on a three-point basis, using December, March and June period end balances, presented on an annualized basis. The Company uses adjusted operating expenses as it eliminates items that do not necessarily reflect how the Company is performing. Specifically, it eliminates non-cash stock-based compensation which is given at different times and prices and non-recurring costs and gains which affects operating results only periodically. The calculation of adjusted net (loss) earnings is defined as net (loss) earnings for the period prepared in accordance with IFRS less: gain on sale of loans and non-recurring gains, plus: amortization of servicing assets, stock-based compensation and non-recurring costs. SOURCE IOU Financial Inc. Related Links https://ioufinancial.com/en-ca/ Bols Ready to Enjoy Cocktails will be available in unique 200ml Bols Cocktail Tubes and two larger sizes - 375ml and 700ml bottles. These high quality products create a new, super-premium segment within the fast-growing category of ready to serve cocktails, which have continued to grow in 2021 after seeing 43% global growth in 2020 [1] . The revolutionary Bols Cocktail Tubes serve 1 to 2 cocktails in a sustainable packaging that is designed to preserve exceptional taste and quality. The black Tube is sleek, stylish, and compact enough for your pocket or purse. Simply chill, pour, and garnish, for a true bar experience at home or on-the-go. Each of the Bols Ready to Enjoy Cocktails feature an expertly-crafted blend of premium Bols spirits and liqueurs, with 100% natural flavors and no preservatives. The magic of each blend was created by centuries of craftsmanship, years of careful research and development and inspiration by bartenders around the world. This fall, consumers are invited to recreate the magic of cocktails at home with The Magic Four Bols Cocktails: Bols Margarita Azul: Tangy & Refreshing 14.9% alc/vol Bols Espresso Martini: Rich & Smooth 14.9% alc/vol Bols Red Light Negroni: Bittersweet & Complex 21.9% alc/vol Bols Very Old Fashioned: Aromatic & Intense 30% alc/vol Huub van Doorne, CEO Lucas Bols: "The World's First Cocktail Brand Bols wants to help consumers bring the magic of cocktails home. Our Ready to Enjoy Bols Cocktails are crafted by expert bartenders with our famous Bols liqueurs, vodka, and genever. We prioritized superior quality, convenience and sustainable packaging to revolutionize the cocktail experience at home. Our Bols Cocktail Tubes illustrate our leading position in the development of the global cocktail market." The Bols Ready to Enjoy 200ml Tube debuts fall 2021 in the US (SRP $6.99) and in Bols' home country the Netherlands. 375ml bottles will be available exclusively in the US (SRP $12.99) and 700ml bottles will be available in the Netherlands. Confirmed US retailers include Total Wine, Hy-Vee, Winn Dixie, and more. To further simplify home-tainment, Bols Ready to Enjoy Cocktails will also be available on the bols.com web-shop for home delivery across the US and the Netherlands. Bols Ready to Enjoy Cocktails will be launched in other markets soon thereafter. [1] Source: IWSR Media Contact: Stefany Elliott, The Same Paige Email: [email protected] Phone: 404.803.0752 ABOUT LUCAS BOLS Lucas Bols is the world's oldest distilled spirits brand and one of the oldest Dutch companies still in business. Building on its more than 445-year-old heritage dating back to 1575, the company has mastered the art of distilling, mixing and blending liqueurs, genever, gin and vodka. Lucas Bols owns a portfolio of more than 20 premium and super premium brands of different spirits used in cocktail bars worldwide. Its products are sold in more than 110 countries around the world. Lucas Bols has been listed on Euronext Amsterdam (BOLS) since 4 February 2015. Lucas Bols holds the number one position in liqueur ranges worldwide (not including the US) and is the world's largest player in the genever segment. Many of Lucas Bols' other products have market or category-leading positions. Furthermore, Lucas Bols is a leading player in the bartending community. Through the House of Bols Cocktail & Genever Experience and Europe's largest bartending school, the Bols Bartending Academy, the company provides inspiration and education to both bartenders and consumers. SOURCE Lucas Bols Related Links https://www.lucasbols.com/ Infosys Public Services to implement a modern, customer-centric driver licensing and vehicle registration solution WINNIPEG, MB, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Infosys Public Services Inc. (IPS), a subsidiary of Infosys (NYSE: INFY), a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting, today announced that it will enable Manitoba Public Insurance (MPI), a Crown corporation that delivers auto insurance and driver services, to digitize driver licensing, vehicle registration, and International Registration Plan (IRP) services for over 900,000 Manitobans. Infosys has partnered with Celtic Systems a leading DMV solutions provider to implement the Infosys Celtic Vehicle and Licensing Solution, built on Celtic's portfolio of products (Celtic Motor Vehicle System CMVS and Celtic Transportation Services International Registration Plan CTS-IRP) for Manitoba. Infosys Celtic Vehicle and Licensing Solution consists of interoperable modules that digitize both the core and ancillary functions including driver licensing, vehicle registration, billing, analytics, and reporting for motor vehicle agencies. Infosys Celtic Vehicle and Licensing Solution provides a modern, customer-centric platform with the native flexibility to meet new business and technical requirements, and deploy them quickly with minimal disruption to the business. This future-ready platform is built on Microsoft and other leading technologies with a highly scalable architecture that is easy to implement and use. "We are honored and excited to be selected by Manitoba Public Insurance to help navigate this mission-critical digital transformation initiative," said Eric Paternoster, Chief Executive Officer, Infosys Public Services. "Over the last few years, Celtic and Infosys Public Services have helped 19 jurisdictions across North America modernize and digitize various vehicle and driver licensing processes, reducing cost of operations and improving the constituent experience. We look forward to executing this program leveraging our shared experience, enabling Manitoba to build a modern digital foundation to serve their residents more efficiently." The initiative will be executed using a hybrid agile approach that balances the ability to prototype and rapidly implement new ideas with longer-term designs that lead to real and meaningful change. "We are pleased to work with Infosys Public Services to modernize the motor vehicle and licensing system, enabling the province to deliver more efficient online supported services to our residents," said Shayon Mitra, Vice President & Chief Transformation Officer, Digital and Transformation, MPI. "Through the solutions' agile modular deployment capabilities, we have an incredible opportunity to effectively adapt to changing regulatory and market needs allowing us to better serve millions of residents across the province." About Celtic Systems Celtic Systems is a leader in creating and implementing Enterprise Solutions for Motor Vehicle Administrations across North America. Over the last two decades, Celtic Systems has been helping its clients across USA and Canada to modernize their systems and reap business benefits from latest technologies and streamlined business processes. Our extensive experience in solving the problems of government agencies enables us to effectively modernize agency-wide systems and supporting technologies. Visit www.celtic.bz to know more about how Celtic's solutions can help your agency benefit from best-of-breed technologies and streamlined business processes. About Infosys Public Services, Inc. Infosys Public Services is a leader in next-generation digital services and consulting. With benchmark processes, access to cross-industry insights and innovative solutions, Infosys Public Services is helping public sector organizations to navigate their digital transformation, helping them renew existing systems into modern, agile, intelligent platforms, develop new capabilities and deliver better outcomes to all stakeholders at a lower cost with less risk. Navigate your next with Infosys Public Services. Visit www.infosyspublicservices.com to see how. About Infosys Infosys is a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting. We enable clients in more than 50 countries to navigate their digital transformation. With over four decades of experience in managing the systems and workings of global enterprises, we expertly steer our clients through their digital journey. We do it by enabling the enterprise with an AI-powered core that helps prioritize the execution of change. We also empower the business with agile digital at scale to deliver unprecedented levels of performance and customer delight. Our always-on learning agenda drives their continuous improvement through building and transferring digital skills, expertise, and ideas from our innovation ecosystem. Visit www.infosys.com to see how Infosys (NSE, BSE,NYSE: INFY) can help your enterprise navigate your next. Safe Harbor Certain statements in this release concerning our future growth prospects, financial expectations and plans for navigating the COVID-19 impact on our employees, clients and stakeholders are forward-looking statements intended to qualify for the 'safe harbor' under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, which involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties relating to these statements include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding COVID-19 and the effects of government and other measures seeking to contain its spread, risks related to an economic downturn or recession in India, the United States and other countries around the world, changes in political, business, and economic conditions, fluctuations in earnings, fluctuations in foreign exchange rates, our ability to manage growth, intense competition in IT services including those factors which may affect our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed-price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, industry segment concentration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks or system failures, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, the success of the companies in which Infosys has made strategic investments, withdrawal or expiration of governmental fiscal incentives, political instability and regional conflicts, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, unauthorized use of our intellectual property and general economic conditions affecting our industry and the outcome of pending litigation and government investigation. Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our United States Securities and Exchange Commission filings including our Annual Report on Form 20-F for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2021. These filings are available at www.sec.gov. Infosys may, from time to time, make additional written and oral forward-looking statements, including statements contained in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our reports to shareholders. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the Company unless it is required by law. SOURCE Infosys Funk comes to Massage Heights with over 25 years of experience in the spa, beauty and franchise industries. Her experience includes executive leadership, franchising, public relations, employee acquisition and development, product and service development, training and learning, school administration, teaching and motivational speaking. "Massage therapists and estheticians are the heart of our brand and having someone who can steer the recruitment and retention strategies to enhance the culture of Massage Heights is paramount to our success. I'm confident having a leader of CG's caliber will prove to greatly impact our growth and sustainability," said Susan Boresow, President and CEO of Massage Heights. "CG brings a passion for the massage and spa industry that is unmatched, with vast knowledge and experience which will key in shaping the future of Massage Heights." Prior to joining Massage Heights, Funk operated a boutique spa consulting business, working with companies in the wellness, spa and beauty sectors. Before this, Funk was the Vice President of Industry Relations and Product Development for Massage Envy Franchising overseeing operations standards and procedures, product and service development, vendor relations, franchisee development and training, employee engagement and public relations outreach within the beauty, wellness and spa industries. She also played a key role in three brand acquisition sales during her ten-year tenure. "First and foremost, I am a massage therapist and have held a license to practice for 30 years. I hold a deep belief in the healing power of therapeutic touch provided through massage and skincare services. I greatly respect the work of massage therapists and estheticians and know that, through their skilled hands and compassionate hearts, they make a difference every day in health and well-being of our guests," said Funk. "I am so honored to be joining the Massage Heights leadership team and look forward to working with the national office and franchisees to create a profitable and positive future." In her new role, Funk will lead the efforts and planning of company-wide strategies and programs relating to recruiting, retention and promoting a positive and rewarding employee culture to support the Massage Heights brand, its franchisees and their staff. By leveraging partnerships with leading organizations, initiatives and experts in the field, Funk and the Massage Heights team have their sights set on restructuring the narrative surrounding a career in the spa and wellness industry and seeing the franchises grow to new levels and new markets along the way. About Massage Heights Massage Heights is a family-owned massage and wellness franchise dedicated to elevating the lives of others by providing Members and Guests with professional, affordable and resort-quality massage, skincare and wellness services. Since its founding in 2004, Massage Heights has grown from a single Retreat in San Antonio, Texas, to over 120 Retreat locations across the U.S. and Canada. For more information about Massage Heights and its franchise opportunities, please visit MassageHeightsFranchise.com. SOURCE Massage Heights Related Links http://www.massageheightsfranchising.com ST. PAUL, Minn., Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Anna Euerle (EARL-EE), a 19-year-old college student from Litchfield, Minnesota, representing Meeker County, was crowned the 68th Princess Kay of the Milky Way in an evening ceremony at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds, Aug. 25. Euerle will serve as the official goodwill ambassador for nearly 2,500 Minnesota dairy farm families. She is the daughter of Vaughn and Joan Euerle and attends Ridgewater College. Ten county dairy princesses from throughout Minnesota competed for the Princess Kay of the Milky Way title. Isabelle Lindahl (LIN-DOLL) of Lindstrom, representing Chisago County, and Megan Meyer (MY-ER) of Rollingstone, representing Winona County, were selected as runners-up. Kelsey Erf (URF) of Oakdale representing Washington County, Emily Leonard (LEN-ERD) of Norwood Young America representing Carver County, along with Lindahl, were named scholarship winners. Katrina Thoe (TH-O) of Hayfield representing Dodge County was named Miss Congeniality. Throughout her year-long reign as Princess Kay of the Milky Way, Euerle will make public appearances to help connect consumers to Minnesota's dairy farm families. She will work to bring dairy to life through conversations, classroom visits and various speaking engagements. Euerle's first official duty as Princess Kay will be to sit in a rotating cooler in the Dairy Building (located at the corner of Judson Avenue and Underwood Street) for nearly eight hours to have her likeness sculpted in a 90-pound block of butter the first two days of the Minnesota State Fair Thursday, Aug. 26 and Friday, Aug. 27. This year marks butter sculptor Linda Christensen's 50th and final year carving the Princess Kay of the Milky Way winner at the Minnesota State Fair. The remaining nine finalists will be carved by Linda's successor, Minnesota native Gerry Kulzer. Other finalists are scheduled to have their likenesses sculpted as follows: Saturday, Aug. 28 : Kelsey Erf, Oakdale , representing Washington County Kelsey Erf, , representing Sunday, Aug. 29: Emily Leonard , Norwood Young America , representing Carver County , , representing Monday, Aug. 30 : Jessica Ohmann , Albany , representing Stearns County , , representing Tuesday, Aug. 31 : Alaina Johnson , Dakota , representing Houston County , , representing Wednesday, Sept. 1 : Megan Meyer , Rollingstone , representing Winona County , , representing Thursday, Sept. 2 : Isabelle Lindahl , Lindstrom , representing Chisago County , , representing Friday, Sept. 3 : Katrina Thoe , Hayfield , representing Dodge County , , representing Saturday, Sept. 4 : Kelsey Kuball , Waterville , representing Rice County ; and , , representing ; and Sunday, Sept. 5 : Emeliya Dose, Plainview , representing Wabasha County Throughout the fair, Princess Kay and the other finalists will make appearances near the Butter Sculpture Booth in the Dairy Building and at the Moo Booth in the Dairy Barn. Princess Kay's Facebook page (facebook.com/princesskayofthemilkyway) will provide daily updates and photos of each completed butter sculpture. Princess Kay candidates are judged on their general knowledge of the dairy industry, communication skills and enthusiasm for dairy. Midwest Dairy sponsors the Princess Kay program, which is funded by dairy farmers through their promotion checkoff. Midwest Dairy represents 5,800 dairy farm families and works on their behalf to build dairy demand by inspiring consumer confidence in our products and production practices. We are committed to Bringing Dairy to Life for a Better World by Working with Others to Give Consumers an Excellent Dairy Experience, and we are funded from farmers from across a 10-state region, including Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas and eastern Oklahoma. For more information, visit MidwestDairy.com. Follow us on Twitter and find us on Facebook at Midwest Dairy. CONTACT Megan Anderson Bellmont Partners Public Relations [email protected] (612) 423-0335 SOURCE Midwest Dairy NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- A new report, Quit Stalling 2021, released today by World Animal Protection, a global animal welfare non-profit organization, documents an overall lack of progress on public pronouncements to end the cruel confinement of mother pigs in gestation cratesa metal pen confining them with just enough space to stand and take a few steps forward or back, but not enough to turn around or lay down comfortably. This second Quit Stalling report shows that while most companies had a lack of progress, several continued to advance sow welfare goals amid challenges posed by the global pandemic and a US pork industry notoriously resistant to investing in animal welfare. Progress highlights include Burger King/Restaurant Brands International, which issued a more in-depth policy including stronger language that will disallow the use of gestation crates for the breeding phase of production (rather than just during pregnancy), beginning with a goal to achieve this in Europe by 2030. Bon Appetit Management Company worked diligently with its supplier to achieve a pork supply that never uses gestation crates for its California and Massachusetts markets this year, with a rollout plan for the rest of the US, despite substantial impacts of COVID to its business. Unfortunately, the majority of companies continue to fall woefully behind. "The progress made by leading companies, even amid unprecedented challenges, shows that the companies falling behind are likely not devoting the resources and time to carrying out their welfare commitments. They are instead, relying on customers and advocates to not look into their supply chains," said Cameron Harsh, Interim Programs Director for World Animal Protection. "This 'humanewashing' and unwillingness to make good on public promises poses substantial reputational risk to companies." 67% of companies that have made commitments to eliminate gestation crates either have policy language too weak to be meaningful or have removed policy language altogether. Walmart and Aldi, for example, rely on vague statements regarding expectations of housing systems used for sows that lack clarity or enforceability. 19% of the companies continue to post meaningful policies but are not reporting on progress towards their goals. Target, for example, has a long-standing commitment to eliminate gestation crates fully by 2022 but has never provided information to the public on whether it is on track to meet this. Several companies moved down in the rankings in 2021 due to the stricter assessment of policy language and greater weight for strong policies in this year's report. Companies must clearly state that the policy requires the complete elimination of gestation crates for all sows in its supply chain with a firm timeline by which compliance would be enforced. Multiple current policies state only that "open housing" or "group housing" must be used without clarifying this must be used at all times or they apply only to the ways sows are housed only "during pregnancy". While this language was likely well intentioned, the industry has exploited loopholes, claiming to meet crate-free pork commitments despite housing sows in groups for only part of the time, confining them in crates for as long as 6-7 weeks at a time. Companies including McDonald's and Noodles & Co. moved down in ranking for this reason. "Many companies that are genuinely working to source pork from suppliers that never use gestation crates are being misled by several large producers," said Harsh. "They are being told they are getting 'crate-free' pork when, in reality, it doesn't meet their expectations." A few, including Panera Bread, Dine Brands, and Marriott, are working to prevent this misrepresentation in the way they are reporting progress by providing percentages of pork from suppliers that never use crates, that use group housing for the majority of time, and/or that use conventional crate systems. All of the companies will be required to source gestation crate-free pork for their operations in California and Massachusetts when state laws go into effect in 2022. Failing to work with their suppliers to eliminate gestation crates puts the companies at risk given that the two states represent 17% of the size of the United States economy. The Quit Stalling report assigns a color of Gold, Green, Yellow, Orange, Pink or Red to companies based on their having a meaningful, public-facing policy that requires suppliers to fully eliminate the use of gestation crates that covers all sows in the company's supply chain by a clear deadline and their having publicly available information on their progress. Meaningful commitment is public, reporting indicates 100% of pork purchasing complies with commitment Chipotle; Whole Foods Meaningful commitment is public, reporting indicates recent progress has been made Bon Appetit Management Company; Burger King; The Cheesecake Factory; Panera Bread Meaningful commitment is public, reporting is transparent about lack of recent progress Campbell's; Hilton Meaningful commitment is public, no reporting on recent progress of fully crate-free supplies Ahold Delhaize; ConAgra; Darden; Dunkin'; Johnsonville; Kraft Heinz; Kroger; Metz Culinary Management; Sonic; Target; Wendy's A commitment or statement is public that is not meaningful Albertsons; Aldi; Aramark; Brinker International; CKE Restaurants; Compass; Costco; Denny's; Dine Brands; General Mills; Jack in the Box; Kellogg's; Marriott; McDonald's; Noodles & Company; Nestle; Papa John's; Raley's; Royal Caribbean; Sodexo; Starbucks; Subway; Sysco; Walmart No public commitment or statement could be found Arby's; Baja Fresh; Bob Evans; Bruegger's Bagels; Carnival; Cracker Barrel; Einstein Noah Bagels; Elior North America; Hillshire Brands; T.G.I. Friday's; Trader Joe's, UNFI; Quiznos; Wienerschnitzel; Wolfgang Puck Quit Stalling 2021 enables customers and investors to hold companies accountable to their corporate responsibility promises. Those that fail to uphold their commitments are putting their business at risk. Notes to the editor: Read the full report SOURCE World Animal Protection Related Links http://www.worldanimalprotection.us.org SALT LAKE CITY, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- MountainWest Capital Network (MWCN) today announced the 2021 Utah 100, its annual Alpha List of the fastest growing companies in the state. In addition, MWCN introduces the companies featured in its Top 15 Revenue and Emerging Elite categories. All Utah 100 companies are listed in alphabetical order below, followed by the Top 15 Revenue and Emerging Elite honorees. MWCN will introduce its ranked list during the 27th annual Utah 100 Awards ceremony, which will be held on October 12, 2021 in the Grand Ballroom of the Grand America Hotel. "Every year we assemble this list, we are more encouraged by the strength and resilience of Utah's economy and the broad spectrum of companies that underpin our state's business foundations," said Dave Chase, chairman of the MWCN Utah 100 committee. "Even in the unusual circumstances brought on by the pandemic, we see success among businesses of all sizes and many different industries." Founded in 1994, the Utah 100 Award is the flagship event for the MountainWest Capital Network and attracts thousands of the top business leaders in the state. James Lawrence, The Iron Cowboy, will present a keynote address at the awards event, where the final Utah 100 rankings will be released. Utah 100 honorees are ranked according to a weighted average revenue calculation of percentage and dollar growth over a five year period through December 2020, while those in the Top 15 Revenue category are ranked based on the highest total dollar growth over the same five year period. Companies are only allowed to be recognized in one category. The 2021 Utah 100 in alphabetical order (Ranking to be unveiled at the Utah 100 event on October 12, 2021): 1 Source Business Solutions Abode Luxury Rentals Alpha Warranty Services Altabancorp Aptive Environmental Artemis Health AutoSavvy (Formally AutoSource) Avetta Awardco Beauty Industry Group Beddy's Big Deal Outlet Blue Raven Solar BrainStorm, Inc. Buy Box Experts Campman CB SkyShare Chamber.Media Cingo Solutions Clarus Corporation Clean Simple Eats, LLC Coalatree Collective Medical Complete Recovery Corporation Conductive Group Conservice Coreform LLC Dental Intelligence Design Imaging Disruptive Advertising Dynamic Blending eAssist Dental Solutions eLuma Enso Rings Entrata Evolved Commerce Executech Ezarc Welding, Inc FirstMile Flex Fleet Rental Foresight Wealth Management Foursight Capital Freeus LLC Gathre Grant Victor LLC Huge Brands Image Studios Inside Real Estate Intermountain Nutrition International Products Group Ivanti J. Lyne Roberts and Sons JOJO's Chocolate KURU Footwear Legacy RV Legacy Tree Genealogists Lender Toolkit Lendio, Inc. LGCY Power, LLC Lifevantage Corp Lion Energy LLC Lucid Lulu and Roo Made-By-Mary LLC Max Connect Marketing Motivosity Natures Sunshine Products, Inc. ObservePoint Ogden's Own Distillery, Inc. Olympus Wealth Management OptConnect Packsize PCF Insurance Services Peak Capital Partners Pluralsight PMD Beauty Podium ProdataKey Rocco & Roxie Supply Co. Searchbloom Security National Financial Signs.com SimpleNexus Squeeze Media Group LLC Streiff Marketing LLC Strong Connexions Tech9 Telarus LLC The Page Company, LLC Thread Wallets USANA Vanderhall Motor Works Varex Imaging VPI Technology Group Weave Western Peaks Logistics XPS Ship Xyngular Zamp HR Zonos Top 15 Revenue in alphabetical order: Extra Space Storage, Inc. G&A Partners HealthEquity Layton Construction Malouf Companies Merit Medical Nu Skin Overstock.com Pattern Purple Innovation, Inc. Sportsman's Warehouse Vivint Smart Home Walker Edison Young Automotive Group Zions Bancorporation Emerging Elite in alphabetical order: Baltic Born Bold Divvy Eddy Thirst Drinks Gigi Pip HydroJug Inpivota, Corp. Kenect Lumio, Inc. NoBid Pillow Cube, Inc. Turner Imaging Systems, Inc. Whistic Zyia Active About MountainWest Capital Network MountainWest Capital Network is Utah's first and largest business networking organization devoted to supporting entrepreneurial success and dedicated to the flow of financial, entrepreneurial and intellectual capital. Learn more at www.mwcn.org . SOURCE MountainWest Capital Network Related Links http://www.mwcn.org SAN JOSE, Calif. , Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- MPI America Inc, a wholly owned subsidiary of MPI Corporation Taiwan, and recognized globally as a leader in semiconductor test, is pleased to announce that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Celadon Systems Inc, the market leader in ultra-high performance semiconductor test probe cards. The purchase of Celadon Systems will advance MPI's presence in the wafer test marketplace and is a continuation of demonstrated market leadership in developing numerous innovations while serving customers in all aspects of the semiconductor wafer test market. The acquisition is expected to be completed early September, 2021, subject to the satisfaction of customary closing conditions. "We have recognized the work of the Celadon team over many years now," says Rob Carter, President of MPI America Inc., "and are honored to include their prowess to the MPI offering. With the cross-pollination of technologies and talent, we are providing an even higher level of value to our combined clientele. Together, we are focused on market needs with the products and services that make our customers even more competitive." "After years of successfully partnering to find solutions to our customers' most demanding challenges, the Celadon Team is excited to now join the highly respected industry leader, MPI Corporation family and more specifically MPI America, Inc.", says Karen Armendariz, President and CEO of Celadon Systems, "There is a natural fit and synergy between our organizations, from our core competence to our product catalogs. Both companies are dedicated to serving our customers and together we will bring forward the complete solution our customers have always desired." As the founders and owners, Bryan and Valerie Root added "We wanted to find a buyer that would complement Celadon's admired company culture and customer focused values as well as build on its' successful growth. Knowing the folks at MPI for as many years as we have, it is an easy fit as we transition to our next phase in life." About MPI Corporation Founded in 1995 and headquartered in Hsinchu, Taiwan, MPI Corporation is a global technology leader in Semiconductor, Light Emitting Diode (LED), Photo Detectors, Lasers, Materials Research, Aerospace, Automotive, Fiber Optic, Electronic Components and more. MPI's four main business sectors include Probe Card, Photonics Automation, Advanced Semiconductor Test and Thermal Divisions. MPI products range from various advanced probe card technologies, probers, testers, material handlers, inspection and thermal air systems. Many of these products are accompanied by state-of-the-art Calibration and Test & Measurement software suites. The diversification of product portfolio and industries allows a healthy environment for employee growth and retention. Cross pollination of product technologies allows each new innovation to provide differentiation in areas that are meaningful to our precious customer base. For more information please visit: www.mpi-corporation.com About Celadon Systems Inc. Celadon Systems, Inc., The Home of Peace of Mind Probing, was founded 1997 by Bryan and Valerie Root and is headquartered in Burnsville, Minnesota. Celadon Systems is focused on the design and manufacturing of advanced probe card solutions and high-performance cables. Celadon Systems is a global leader in parametric test, wafer level reliability, modeling, characterization, cryogenic applications, and high-power probe cards for the semiconductor industry. As an industry leading, on-wafer probing solutions provider, Celadon's reputation for delivering ultra-high performance probe cards that thrive in extreme temperatures is unparalleled. Celadon seeks to enrich the lives of our customers, employees, and community partners by offering a challenging, inspiring, and empowering environment that drives strong and profitable growth. For more information, please visit: www.celadonsystems.com SOURCE MPI Corporation DALLAS, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Jacobs (NYSE:J) was selected as NASA's Agency-Level 2020 Small Business Industry Award (SBIA) Large Business Prime Contractor of the Year for NASA Kennedy Space Center (KSC). The Agency-Level award follows Jacobs' FY-20 Center-Level SBIA Large Business Prime Contractor of the Year Award at two NASA Centers: Langley Research Center (LaRC) and Kennedy Space Center (KSC). "Jacobs' relationship with NASA goes back 60-plus years, and we truly value our longstanding collaboration to help to solve the most complex and hazardous challenges of space exploration," said Jacobs Critical Mission Solutions Executive Vice President and President Dawne Hickton. "As NASA's largest service provider, we are committed to providing integrated solutions in support of the agency's mission and the nation's space program." Jacobs was nominated for its most recent award by NASA KSC, where the company serves as the prime contractor for NASA's Exploration Ground Systems program, responsible for the development and operations of flight vehicle components. The KSC nomination acknowledged Jacobs for its ground and flight application software team efforts in support of the Artemis program and critical missions to resupply the International Space Station, as well as overall service to the Test and Operations Support Contract. NASA's goal of traversing space resonates strongly with Jacobs' workforce. As part of NASA's team at nine different facilities across the country (Wallops, Goddard, Langley, Kennedy, Marshall, Johnson, White Sands, Ames and Glenn), Jacobs is a provider and integrator of full lifecycle aerospace capability. This includes design and construction; base, mission and launch operations; sustaining capital maintenance; and secure and intelligent asset management, development, modification, and testing processes for fixed assets supporting national government, military, defense and NASA, as well as commercial space companies. For more on how Jacobs is redefining what's possible, from launch to flight to splash down, visit www.jacobs.com/insights/space-exploration. At Jacobs, we're challenging today to reinvent tomorrow by solving the world's most critical problems for thriving cities, resilient environments, mission-critical outcomes, operational advancement, scientific discovery and cutting-edge manufacturing, turning abstract ideas into realities that transform the world for good. With $14 billion in revenue and a talent force of approximately 55,000, Jacobs provides a full spectrum of professional services including consulting, technical, scientific and project delivery for the government and private sector. Visit jacobs.com and connect with Jacobs on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter. Certain statements contained in this press release constitute forward-looking statements as such term is defined in Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and such statements are intended to be covered by the safe harbor provided by the same. Statements made in this release that are not based on historical fact are forward-looking statements. We base these forward-looking statements on management's current estimates and expectations as well as currently available competitive, financial and economic data. Forward-looking statements, however, are inherently uncertain. There are a variety of factors that could cause business results to differ materially from our forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, including the emergence and spread of variants of COVID-19, and the related reaction of governments on global and regional market conditions and the company's business. For a description of some additional factors that may occur that could cause actual results to differ from our forward-looking statements, see our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended October 2, 2020, and in particular the discussions contained under Item 1 - Business; Item 1A - Risk Factors; Item 3 - Legal Proceedings; and Item 7 - Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations, and our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended July 2, 2021, and in particular the discussions contained under Part I, Item 2 - Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations; Part II, Item 1 - Legal Proceedings; and Part II, Item 1A - Risk Factors, as well as the company's other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company is not under any duty to update any of the forward-looking statements after the date of this press release to conform to actual results, except as required by applicable law. For press/media inquiries: Kerrie Sparks 214.583.8433 SOURCE Jacobs Related Links http://www.jacobs.com LINCOLN, Neb., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- With polarization at its worst in decades, and every day a new fight over filibusters, infrastructure or reconciliation, the U.S. Senate is on a self-destructive path. But Ben Nelson, former U.S. senator from Nebraska, is not going to let the institution destroy itself without a fight. His new book, Death of the Senate, published by Potomac Books on September 1, is a cleareyed look inside the Senate chamber and a brutally honest account of the current political reality. "I served at a time the Senate worked, there are lessons to learn that can help restore the Senate," Senator Nelson writes. "Why does that matter? If the Senate cannot work effectively for the American people, then the government doesn't work. And if the Senate cannot serve as a responsible, credible check on the powers of the Presidentas it was meant to bethen our democracy can't work. If our democracy can't work, our country will decline, and our people will suffer. There's a lot on the line in getting the Senate to function again." In his two terms as a Democratic senator from the red state of Nebraska, Nelson operated as a moderate broker between his more liberal and conservative colleagues and became a frontline player in the most consequential fights of the Bush and Obama years. His trusted centrist position gave him a unique perch from which to participate in some of the last great rounds of bipartisan cooperation, such as the "Gang of 14" that considered nominees for the federal benchand passed over a young lawyer named Brett Kavanaugh for being too partisan. Nelson learned early on that the key to any negotiation at any level is genuine trust. With humor, insight, and firsthand details, Nelson makes the case that the "heart of the deal" is critical and describes how he focused on this during his time in the Senate. Harry Reid, former U.S. Senate Democratic leader from Nevada, says, "Ben Nelson's book has never been more timely or necessary. With sharp insight, honesty, and wit he takes readers inside the United States Senate to reveal how this bulwark of our democracy worked well not so long ago. Nelson traces its fall into partisan division and rancor and outlines how we all can restore the Senatethrough bipartisanship, courtesy, and a willingness to see past each other's differences, for the benefit of all Americans." Ben Nelson, a native of McCook, NE, is a politician, businessman, and lawyer who served as the thirtyseventh governor of Nebraska from 1991 to 1999 and as a United States senator from Nebraska from 2001 to 2013. SOURCE Potomac Books LONDON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- In a new report released by the Financial Times' Professional Wealth Management (PWM) magazine, the Federation of St Kitts and Nevis was recognised for having the most extensive offering in the Caribbean for visa-free and visa-on-arrival destinations. The report, titled "A Guide to Global Citizenship," ranks the best citizenship by investment (CBI) jurisdictions in the world based on nine pillars. Overall, researchers awarded St Kitts and Nevis 2021's top spot for the best CBI programme worldwide. One of the nine pillars of the report is Freedom of Movement, in which St Kitts and Nevis scored highly. The pillar's assessment is based on the number of destinations to which a country's passport allows restriction-free travel, the amount of accessible business hubs, and other nations citizens can settle in. The ranking is based on Government, UN World Tourism Organisation and other official sources. Presently, St Kitts and Nevis citizens can travel to 156 countries and territories across seven continents without limitations of extensive pre-departure paperwork. "Freedom of movement within and between countries is of paramount importance to any individual seeking second citizenship. This holds true whether the individual wishes to travel for work purposes, to visit family, or for leisure," the report stated. "St Kitts and Nevis remains the CBI nation with the fastest processing time and is the Caribbean country with the largest visa-free or visa-on-arrival offering." Considering the ongoing pandemic and the economic crisis it has brought on, many business people and families have resorted to alternative citizenship for safety and security. One of the simplest methods to achieve this status through CBI. CBI allows vetted foreigners second citizenship after they make an economic contribution to a country's economy. In St Kitts and Nevis, the process generally takes less than 60 days under an Accelerated Application Programme fee, and travel to the nation is not required. "What second citizenship means is that it is simply an insurance policy should something go wrong and [it] is applicable to anyone anywhere in the world," said Micha Emmett, a dual-qualified lawyer and citizenship solutions expert in a recent webinar. Families of up to four can also take advantage of a limited time offer under the programme's Sustainable Growth Fund, which grants citizenship for $150,000 rather than the previous $195,000. Media Contact: [email protected], www.csglobalpartners.com SOURCE CS Global Partners Related Links https://csglobalpartners.com/?nowprocket=1 SACRAMENTO, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- As California Insurance Company (CIC) continues its battle on several fronts against the arbitrary, illegal imposition of a conservatorship upon CIC by the California Department of Insurance (CDI) to stymie the very redomestication the CDI and other states approved, New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas has retained California legal counsel on behalf of the State of New Mexico and filed for leave to submit an amicus curiae brief in the Conservation proceedings in California state court to help to undo what lawmakers, industry leaders and regulators have characterized as an exotic misuse of a "conservatorship" by the CDI. The format is one that is imposed exclusively upon distressed carriers, in danger of insolvency, not companies like A+ rated CIC, known for its financial strength as repeatedly confirmed by the California Conservation and Liquidation Office. Attorney General Balderas, who successfully petitioned to file amicus briefs earlier on behalf of CIC in related federal cases is now seeking to act in light of the problems caused for New Mexico's regulators in the redomestication process now that the State of New Mexico has made demands of CIC that are part of its important protocols for insurers entering the state. Recognizing that the redomestication of CIC to New Mexico means jobs, consumer advantages and tax dollars for his state, Attorney General Balderas has acted to factor meaningfully in the case. Meanwhile, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit will hear CIC's appeal in its related federal cases on an expedited basis over the CDI's objections following an earlier ruling on procedural grounds. In this case, CIC could gain its long-sought opportunity to argue against the violation of its constitutional rights prior to the state court hearing in the conservation case. CIC's Executive Vice President and General Counsel, Mr. Jeffrey Silver, Esq. stated: "As A-rated CIC has attempted to complete its redomestication to New Mexico, the CDI has used every means, illegal and otherwise, to block the move, even as recently as its objection to the expedited hearing in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to further delay a hearing on the merits. We seek, after all of these processes, finally to discuss the actual merits before the court despite the CDI's efforts to the contrary. We were subject to the conservatorship with no hearing or procedural opening to state our case. Together with the appeals in federal court, the actions of Attorney General Balderas reflect the sentiment and opinion of many observers, including the media, that CDI appears to be exercising a 'vendetta' against CIC, since New Mexico approved the move, as did the CDI, Iowa, Texas and other states. The CDI then suddenly changed its mind and reversed its decision arbitrarily. It then imposed an illegal conservatorship to block our Company at every turn. We trust that we will finally have the chance to present our case and we thank Attorney General Hector Balderas for taking an affirmative stance to help us secure justice. It is no small matter that Attorney General Balderas, after reviewing this matter, has sought to become involved. Mr. Silver pointed to the unusual and seemingly punitive nature of the conservatorship. "When San Mateo Superior Court Judge George Miram, in November 2019, issued an order handing control of CIC over to CDI's Conservation and Liquidation Office, the move was greeted with incredulity by regulators across the nation, who believe that an instrument, conservatorship, created for distressed, financially troubled companies that put policyholders at risk, was strangely misused by the CDI in its dealing with an A+ rated, financially strong and vital company," he stated. According to the documents filed by Attorney General Balderas, the CDI has answered only that it sought the conservation order because CIC, "attempted to merge its business with a New Mexico-based insurer without first securing the department's prior approval." CIC has argued that CDI officials were present at the administrative hearing in October 2019 in New Mexico and when given the opportunity did not object to the proposed merger. The carrier has also claimed that the CDI's proposed rehabilitation plan should be considered arbitrary and punitive. In his filing, Attorney General Balderas has observed that the conservation plan has effectively "forestalled the merger," and has forced New Mexico officials to threaten regulatory action against the carrier, starting with a show-cause action against CIC, compelling the carrier to finalize its merger and prove it is legally allowed to do business in the state. That action prompted CIC to sue the CDI. According to the filing, New Mexico's Office of Superintendent of Insurance held a hearing in October 2019 to discuss the planned merger, which included state insurance officials from California, Iowa, and Texas. California officials did not object to the merger but nonetheless filed an ex-parte application asking that CIC be placed into conservation because the CDI, again, did not approve the merger. In addition, Attorney General Balderas holds that California officials' "indefinite" conservation plan interferes harmfully with New Mexico's ability to regulate its estates. John Franchini, who served as New Mexico's chief regulator for 16 years and who approved the CIC merger as Superintendent of Insurance, stated: "State insurance regulators are bound to protect the rights of both the policyholders and their insureds. This balance is critical to allow the risk-takers, i.e. insurance companies, to function openly and have faith that the written contract they have provided the public is being followed as the CDI agreed in the interpretation. This allows the policyholders to understand the contract and the risk-takers to pay claims based on written contracts. A balanced insurance market also fosters a predictable claims environment that is acceptable to both parties. The CDI has refused to allow this dependable process to function and has resorted to the Draconian doctrine of regulatory extortion. The CDI has attempted to place the California Insurance Company into a conservatorship, which is designed for financially at-risk companies that might not be able to pay their claims." Former Superintendent Franchini continued, "CIC is a successful, well-managed and profitable insurance enterprise. The imposition of conservatorship is intended for companies in danger of being unable to pay their claims. This is not the case with CIC. The negative impacts of this conservatorship would be to dismantle the robust insurance company and ensure its termination, ending hundreds of high-paying jobs, and forcing loyal insureds to lose insurance and attempt to find coverage elsewhere. The action taken by the CDI is an abomination of regulatory abuse that should not be permitted." According to Bill Hager, former Commissioner of Insurance of Iowa, the Order creating the Conservatorship holds that CIC did not obtain written approval by the CDI as to the New Mexico merger, but having read the transcript of the related New Mexico hearing he concluded: "It is straightforward. After approving the New Mexico merger, the CDI then did a 180-degree reversal of its representation at the New Mexico hearing and would not sign the merger document on behalf of the CDI. Given all of this, it is verging on wrongful that the CDI has placed CIC in Conservatorship." The matter is now proceeding forward in three court actions, two federal, one state. For further information contact: Ryan Gerding, Public Relations, at +1 (913) 602-8531 or at [email protected]. About California Insurance Company (www.nacasualty.com) California Insurance Company (CIC) holds an AM Best Financial Strength Rating of 'A' (Excellent) and a Long-Term Issuer Credit Rating of 'a' (Excellent). The rating pertains to CIC and the seven insurance companies collectively referred to as North American Casualty Group (NAC). According to the ratings agency, "the ratings reflect NAC's balance sheet strength, which AM Best assesses as very strong, as well as its strong operating performance, limited business profile and appropriate enterprise risk management." The companies with the affirmed ratings are: California Insurance Company, Continental Indemnity Company, Illinois Insurance Company and Pennsylvania Insurance Company, domiciled in New Mexico; Texas Insurance Company, domiciled in Texas; Oklahoma Property and Casualty Insurance Company, domiciled in Oklahoma; and Florida Casualty Insurance Company, domiciled in Florida. About Applied Underwriters (www.auw.com) Applied Underwriters is a global risk services firm that helps businesses and people manage uncertainty through its business services, insurance and reinsurance solutions. As a company, Applied Underwriters has been distinguished by its innovative approaches to client care and by its strong financial strength. Applied Underwriters operates widely throughout the US, UK, EU and Middle East. Its operational headquarters is located in Omaha, Nebraska. SOURCE California Insurance Company In Pretrial Advocacy , authors Reuben A. Guttman and J.C. Lore address the challenges of litigating in a civil justice system that is overburdened yet essential to implementation of the rule of law. Even as nearly 90% of all civil matters never come before a jury, lawyers must nevertheless prepare cases as though they will. Because modern civil litigation is, the authors say, "front loaded," lawyers are challenged early on in the pretrial process to consider the rules of evidence and civil procedure as they gather information to plead a plausible complaint. "The pretrial process is laden with unwritten norms. All parties, from litigants to jurists, struggle to provide efficient resolutions while balancing due process," said Lore, a Distinguished Clinical professor and Director of Trial Advocacy at Rutgers Law School. "We wanted to write something that explains it all." The strategies and techniques outlined in Pretrial Advocacy put forward responsive new approaches to teaching advocacy in both law school and continuing legal education settings. In addition to practical tips and insights from some of the nation's foremost jurists and practitioners, Pretrial Advocacy features a foreword by retired U.S. District Court Judge for the District of Massachusetts and Harvard Law faculty member Nancy Gertner. "Pretrial Advocacy fills an important space for litigators," Gertner said. "It teaches how to try cases from the moment a client contacts the lawyer through the trial, encouraging lawyers to engage in strategic decisions about pretrial discovery and motion practice. Why depose this witness rather than another? What is the purpose? What are the salient documentsnot every single one, not just the few 'gotcha' documents, but those that build the narrative." Pretrial Advocacy closes with chapter dedicated to public interest litigation. "We thought a chapter on public interest litigation was necessary because there are too many peoplefrom immigrants to victims of race and gender discrimination and whistleblowersseeking to have their voice heard, and they need competent representation," said Guttman. Guttman is a founding partner of the Washington, D.C. law firm of Guttman, Buschner & Brooks, PLLC, where he has represented clients in False Claims cases in matters returning more than $6 billion to the United States government. Guttman and Lore are available to the media to comment on matters in civil litigation and the civil justice system. SOURCE Guttman, Buschner & Brooks PLLC Related Links http://www.gbblegal.com "As business information evolves and the questions customers ask become more complex, it's critical for businesses to have a search experience that can learn, evolve, and embrace that complexity in order to serve their customers well," said Marc Ferrentino, Chief Strategy Officer at Yext. "With each release, the algorithms powering Yext's AI search platform get smarter and stronger, empowering businesses to optimize their search experiences even further and continue providing customers with the best answers to their questions." The Summer '21 Release includes the following features: Phoenix Algorithm Update: Yext's newest algorithm update makes it possible to analyze and dynamically rerank the best-performing search results. For example, if customers consistently click on a blog post when searching for vaccine information on a healthcare organization's website, dynamic reranking will push that content to the top of the search results page so it appears first any time someone searches about vaccines. The Phoenix update also introduces more relevant results for queries about locations that are "open now" and rich text fields, like lists, in featured snippets. Yext's newest algorithm update makes it possible to analyze and dynamically rerank the best-performing search results. For example, if customers consistently click on a blog post when searching for vaccine information on a healthcare organization's website, dynamic reranking will push that content to the top of the search results page so it appears first any time someone searches about vaccines. The update also introduces more relevant results for queries about locations that are "open now" and rich text fields, like lists, in featured snippets. Data Connector Updates: A business's data can come from multiple sources and exist in various formats, and unifying it is key to powering a robust AI search experience. With the new update to Yext's data connectors framework, businesses can use a low-code "extract, transform, load" (ETL) tool that extracts all of their data and transforms it into the same format for easy integration into their knowledge graph (a unique brain-like database of facts). A business's data can come from multiple sources and exist in various formats, and unifying it is key to powering a robust AI search experience. With the new update to Yext's data connectors framework, businesses can use a low-code "extract, transform, load" (ETL) tool that extracts all of their data and transforms it into the same format for easy integration into their knowledge graph (a unique brain-like database of facts). Apps with Configuration: Businesses that prefer to self-serve can now build their own unique configurations in the Yext platform and package them into installable apps. They also have the option of downloading pre-built solution templates to get their search experiences (or that of their clients and sub-brands) up and running more quickly. Businesses that prefer to self-serve can now build their own unique configurations in the Yext platform and package them into installable apps. They also have the option of downloading pre-built solution templates to get their search experiences (or that of their clients and sub-brands) up and running more quickly. Search Experience Training and Test Search: It's now easier than ever for businesses to test their search experiences as if they were a customer. An upgraded test search tool enables Yext platform administrators to see results for any given query and identify opportunities for improvement. The updated experience training also gives admins the ability to allow or block certain results from appearing. Discover more features in Yext's Summer '21 Release Notes. About Yext Yext (NYSE: YEXT) is the AI Search Company and is on a mission to transform the enterprise with AI search. With the explosion of information and data online, search has never been more important. However, while the world of consumer search has innovated over time, enterprise search has not. In fact, the majority of enterprise search is powered by outdated keyword search technology that only scans for keywords and delivers a list of hyperlinks rather than actually answering questions. Yext, the AI Search Company, offers a modern, AI-powered Answers Platform that understands natural language so that when people ask questions about a business online they get direct answers not links. Brands like Verizon, Vanguard, Subway and Marriott as well as organizations like the U.S. State Department and World Health Organization trust Yext to radically improve their business with answers-led AI search. CONTACT: Amanda Kontor, [email protected] SOURCE Yext, Inc. Related Links http://www.yext.com SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The global orthopedic navigation systems market size is expected to reach USD 6.05 billion by 2028, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc. The market is expected to expand at a CAGR of 14.4% from 2021 to 2028. The increasing geriatric population prone to orthopedic diseases is a key contributing factor propelling the demand for orthopedic navigation systems. Osteoarthritis and osteoporosis are the most common disorders in the population aged 70 years and above. The growing prevalence of these disorders results in an increased economic burden on many countries. Key Insights & Findings: The knee segment accounted for the largest revenue share in 2020 owing to the rising prevalence of osteoarthritis, which is the most common form of arthritis and the leading cause of chronic pain and physical disability in elder persons The spine segment is anticipated to witness the fastest CAGR from 2021 to 2028 due to the rising incidence of spinal deformities According to a CDC report, in 2019, around 34.0% of the adult population and 62.0% of the elderly population were affected by spinal deformities The optical navigation system segment held the largest revenue share in 2020 owing to the affordability of the technology as compared to other navigation systems The hospitals segment held the largest revenue share in 2020. Hospitals use technologically advanced medical devices to improve the Point-of-Care (PoC), which drives segment growth North America dominated the global market in 2020 due to the availability of better-quality healthcare infrastructure and favorable government initiatives The market is highly competitive as major players are focusing more on the product innovation strategies due to changing needs of healthcare establishments, surgeons, and patients The market is moving toward consolidation as large companies are focused on strategic acquisitions of smaller companies to gain a competitive advantage. Read 120 page market research report, "Orthopedic Navigation Systems Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report By End-use (Hospitals, ASCs), By Application (Knee, Hip), By Technology (Electromagnetic, Optical), By Region, And Segment Forecasts, 2021 - 2028", by Grand View Research Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, non-emergency procedures were canceled or postponed, which adversely affected the global market as restrictions resulted in delays to a number of procedures. In the U.K., the number of individuals waiting for surgical procedures has increased to approximately 10 million from 4 million before the pandemic. While the U.S. is expected to have a backlog of more than 1 million joint and spinal surgeries by mid-2022. Currently, most nations have elevated restrictions on elective surgery. As a result of the recommencement of surgical procedures at full force, the market is anticipated to catch up the pace over the forecast years. Rising awareness about the benefits of minimally invasive surgery is expected to further boost the product demand in the coming years. Some of the benefits include less blood loss, reduced risk of damage, condensed risk of infection and postoperative pain, and quicker recovery from surgery. In addition, the introduction of technologically advanced products is boosting market growth. For instance, in July 2021, SeaSpine Holdings Corp. broadcasted the FDA 510(k) authorization for its 7D Percutaneous Spine Module. This module is for minimally invasive surgery. This signifies a novel application and improved functionality for its 7D Flash Navigation System. Grand View Research has segmented the global orthopedic navigation systems market on the basis of application, technology, end-use, and region: Orthopedic Navigation Systems Application Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2016 - 2028) Knee Hip Spine Orthopedic Navigation Systems Technology Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2016 - 2028) Electromagnetic Optical Others Orthopedic Navigation Systems End-use Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2016 - 2028) Hospitals Ambulatory Surgical Centers (ASCs) Orthopedic Navigation Systems Regional Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2016 - 2028) North America U.S. Canada Europe U.K. Germany France Switzerland Italy Spain Belgium Austria The Netherlands Asia Pacific Japan China India Australia South Korea Latin America Brazil Mexico Middle East and Africa and South Africa List of Key Players of Orthopedic Navigation Systems Market B. Braun Melsungen AG Stryker Medtronic Smith+Nephew Johnson & Johnson Services, Inc. (DePuy Synthes) Zimmer Biomet Amplitude Surgical Kinamed, Inc. Globus Medical OrthAlign. Browse through Grand View Research's coverage of the Global Medical Devices Industry: General Surgery Devices Market The global general surgery devices market size was valued at USD 14.1 billion in 2018 and is expected to register a CAGR of 8.5% from 2019 to 2026. Increasing number of surgical procedures, coupled with technological advancements in the field is anticipated to drive the market. The global general surgery devices market size was valued at in 2018 and is expected to register a CAGR of 8.5% from 2019 to 2026. Increasing number of surgical procedures, coupled with technological advancements in the field is anticipated to drive the market. Joint Replacement Market The global joint replacement market size was valued at USD 17.1 billion in 2020 and is expected to expand at a CAGR of 3.4% from 2021 to 2028. Increase in the prevalence of orthopedic disorders, osteoporosis, Osteoarthritis (OA) & lower extremity conditions are driving the market. The global joint replacement market size was valued at in 2020 and is expected to expand at a CAGR of 3.4% from 2021 to 2028. Increase in the prevalence of orthopedic disorders, osteoporosis, Osteoarthritis (OA) & lower extremity conditions are driving the market. Ambulatory Surgery Center Market The global ambulatory surgery center market size was valued at USD 75.2 billion in 2018 and is estimated to register a CAGR of 6.1% over the forecast period. ASCs have proven to be an effective solution in this scenario. Gain access to Grand View Compass, our BI enabled intuitive market research database of 10,000+ reports About Grand View Research Grand View Research, U.S.-based market research and consulting company, provides syndicated as well as customized research reports and consulting services. Registered in California and headquartered in San Francisco, the company comprises over 425 analysts and consultants, adding more than 1200 market research reports to its vast database each year. These reports offer in-depth analysis on 46 industries across 25 major countries worldwide. With the help of an interactive market intelligence platform, Grand View Research helps Fortune 500 companies and renowned academic institutes understand the global and regional business environment and gauge the opportunities that lie ahead. Contact: Sherry James Corporate Sales Specialist, USA Grand View Research, Inc. Phone: 1-415-349-0058 Toll Free: 1-888-202-9519 Email: [email protected] Web: https://www.grandviewresearch.com Follow Us: LinkedIn | Twitter SOURCE Grand View Research, Inc. REDMOND, Wash., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Ossia Inc., the company behind Cota Real Wireless Power the patented technology that delivers power over-the-air, at a distance, and without the need for line-of-sight today announced that it has added two new seasoned professionals to its board of directors, Michael Morgan and Preston Woo. These additions to Ossia's board will drive strategic advisement of the company as Ossia's momentum commercially and in technology development continues to grow, securing the company as the leader in wireless power at a distance. Michael Morgan is a versatile executive with a consistent record of success in all aspects of strategic and operational leadership, business development, financial and operational planning, and business risk management. Michael is currently the President of Camlo Hill Capital, a private investment company. Prior to this role he was a senior executive at T-Mobile USA, where he was the President and Board Chair of T-Mobile's financial services subsidiaries, T-Mobile Financial and TMUS Assurance Corp.. Michael also held executive positions as T-Mobile's Chief Financial Officer and Chief Accounting Officer. Prior to T-Mobile, Michael spent 20 years in the business consulting and audit industries, including being a partner at Arthur Andersen responsible for the Business Risk Consulting business in the Seattle market. These are just a few of Michael's achievements over the years; this extensive experience, especially within financial services and management, will be a tremendous asset to Ossia and its partners. "Michael is a creative, high-energy leader who is accomplished in implementing innovative strategy, disciplined execution and successful teams to drive growth and achieve profitable results," says Ali Kolaghassi, Chairman of the Board, Ossia. "He has been involved with key accomplishments of not only many prestigious companies, such as T-Mobile, Protiviti, and Arthur Andersen, he's been instrumental as a board member to many foundations and schools in the Washington area. We are thrilled to have him on board." Preston Woo is currently the Chief Strategy Officer of Tafi, the leader in customizable 3D avatar solutions. At Tafi, he oversees strategy, licensing, corporate development, and business development. Earlier in his career, Preston served as the Chief Strategy Officer at Ossia, was CFO at Sarcos Robotics, led business development for technology licensing at Intellectual Ventures and was a key member of the private equity investment team at Vulcan Capital. "Preston's long-standing strategic relationships with many forward-thinking companies will bring many opportunities for Ossia," says Mr. Kolaghassi. "We are excited to have him in this new role." Both Michael Morgan and Preston Woo will begin their tenure on Ossia's board starting August 2021. Both Michael and Preston will be sitting on Ossia's Audit and Compensation Committees. About Ossia Ossia Inc. is leading the world on what is possible with wireless power. Ossia's flagship Cota technology redefines wireless power by safely delivering remote, targeted energy to devices at a distance. Ossia's Cota technology is a patented smart antenna technology that automatically keeps multiple devices charged without any user intervention and enables an efficient and truly wire-free, powered-up world that is always on and always connected. Ossia is headquartered in Bellevue, Washington. Visit our website at www.ossia.com . Related Links https://www.ossia.com https://www.linkedin.com/company/ossia-inc- https://twitter.com/ossiainc https://www.facebook.com/OssiaInc/ https://www.ossia.com/cota/ https://blog.ossia.com/ Media Inquiries: Jen Grenz: jeng [at] ossia.com SOURCE Ossia Related Links http://www.ossia.com NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- OTC Markets Group Inc. (OTCQX: OTCM), operator of financial markets for 11,000 U.S. and global securities, today announced i-80 GOLD CORP. (TSX: IAU) (OTCQX: IAUCF), a Nevada-focused mining company, has qualified to trade on the OTCQX Best Market. i-80 GOLD CORP. upgraded to OTCQX from the Pink market. i-80 GOLD CORP. begins trading today on OTCQX under the symbol "IAUCF." U.S. investors can find current financial disclosure and Real-Time Level 2 quotes for the company on www.otcmarkets.com. Upgrading to the OTCQX Market is an important step for companies seeking to provide transparent trading for their U.S. investors. For companies listed on a qualified international exchange, streamlined market standards enable them to utilize their home market reporting to make their information available in the U.S. To qualify for OTCQX, companies must meet high financial standards, follow best practice corporate governance and demonstrate compliance with applicable securities laws. "This is exciting news for the Company and will allow for a broad set of shareholders to invest in i-80. We are pleased to be accepted onto the OTCQX and believe this is the next step in unlocking the value of our Nevada focused mining company," stated, Ryan Snow, Chief Financial Officer of i-80. Stifel, Nicolaus & Company, Inc. acted as the company's OTCQX sponsor. About i-80 GOLD CORP. i-80 as a Nevada-focused mining company holding an organic pipeline of advanced-stage gold projects that will allow the Company to pursue its goal of achieving mid-tier gold producer status. In 2021 the Company will focus on opportunities to expand production at South Arturo, advancing near-term production opportunities at Getchell, and completing permitting for the underground development plan for McCoy-Cove. About OTC Markets Group Inc. OTC Markets Group Inc. (OTCQX: OTCM) operates the OTCQX Best Market, the OTCQB Venture Market and the Pink Open Market for 11,000 U.S. and global securities. Through OTC Link ATS and OTC Link ECN, we connect a diverse network of broker-dealers that provide liquidity and execution services. We enable investors to easily trade through the broker of their choice and empower companies to improve the quality of information available for investors. To learn more about how we create better informed and more efficient markets, visit www.otcmarkets.com. OTC Link ATS and OTC Link ECN are SEC regulated ATSs, operated by OTC Link LLC, member FINRA/SIPC. Subscribe to the OTC Markets RSS Feed Media Contact: OTC Markets Group Inc., +1 (212) 896-4428, [email protected] SOURCE OTC Markets Group Inc. Related Links http://www.otcmarkets.com "Overjet is on a mission to improve oral healthcare for all," said Dr. Wardah Inam, CEO and Co-founder of Overjet. "This ambitious vision pushed us to find world-class investors with a depth of experience supporting the scaling of high-growth technology companies." Overjet's dental AI products are designed to help dentists deliver the best patient care and enable dental insurers to operate more accurately and efficiently. Today's financing follows the FDA's recent clearance of Overjet's Dental Assist TM product designed for dental practices, the first dental AI company to receive such a clearance. "Overjet improves patient care by automating much of the clinical review process with AI and by helping clinicians increase diagnostic quality, consistency, and speed," said Chris Bischoff, Managing Director of General Catalyst. "At General Catalyst, we are excited to partner with Wardah Inam and the entire Overjet team as they deliver on the vision of health assurance in dentistry - creating a win for patients, as well as insurers and clinicians." In the dental benefits space, Overjet has emerged as the leading AI company with dental insurers, inking 15 major carriers as customers for coverage of over 53 million Americans. The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America ( Guardian Life ), a leading dental provider, was the first national carrier to integrate Overjet's dental AI into its claims processing. The two companies started their commercial partnership in late 2019 with a focus on supporting consistency in dental claims review and improving operating efficiency. "Guardian Life continues to be committed to facilitating the best oral health care possible for our members," said Dr Randi S. Tillman, Chief Dental Officer, at Guardian Life. "By partnering with Overjet, we are able to leverage AI technology to improve the consistency of our dental claim review process while ensuring that we are able to make decisions based on the most precise clinical data." "The rapid pace of customer adoption for Overjet's software is a testament to its product differentiation and the market pull for powerful, rapidly improving AI technology in dentistry," said Lonne Jaffe, Managing Director of Insight Partners. "As Overjet scales up, more and more dental payers and providers will get the chance to appreciate the predictive accuracy of its software and the caliber of its team. Overjet is on a mission to solve the most challenging problems in dentistry, which can positively impact millions of patients." With a rapidly growing customer roster, Overjet expects the new funding to only accelerate market adoption, new product launches, and impact on dentistry. "Tens of millions of Americans already have their dental claims processing streamlined and accelerated by Overjet today," said Shaju Puthussery, Chief Operating Officer of Overjet. "With the recent FDA clearance and new funding, more Americans will see Overjet's dental AI technology assisting their dentists at the next check-up. We're committed to helping clinicians deliver the best patient care." About Overjet Overjet is the global leader in dental artificial intelligence, helping both payers and providers improve patient care. The company was founded by experts from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard School of Dental Medicine, and has assembled the largest and most seasoned team of technologists and domain experts with deep AI, dental, and insurance experience. Follow us at www.overjet.ai and on Twitter @overjetdental. About General Catalyst General Catalyst is a venture capital firm that invests in powerful, positive change that endures for our entrepreneurs, our investors, our people, and society. We support founders with a long-term view who challenge the status quo, partnering with them from seed to growth stage and beyond to build companies that withstand the test of time. With offices in San Francisco, Palo Alto, New York City, London, and Boston, the firm has helped support the growth of businesses such as: Airbnb, Deliveroo, Guild, Gusto, Hubspot, Illumio, Lemonade, Livongo, Oscar, Samsara, Snap, Stripe, and Warby Parker. For more: www.generalcatalyst.com. About Insight Partners Insight Partners is a leading global venture capital and private equity firm investing in high-growth technology and software ScaleUp companies that are driving transformative change in their industries. Founded in 1995, Insight Partners has invested in more than 400 companies worldwide and has raised through a series of funds more than $30 billion in capital commitments. Insight's mission is to find, fund, and work successfully with visionary executives, providing them with practical, hands-on software expertise to foster long-term success. Across its people and its portfolio, Insight encourages a culture around a belief that ScaleUp companies and growth create opportunity for all. For more information on Insight and all its investments, visit insightpartners.com or follow us on Twitter @insightpartners. SOURCE Overjet Related Links www.overjet.ai The Packed with Purpose team is made up of solution-oriented problem solvers with their eyes on the prize. Tweet this Women-owned Business Tops Chicago Growth Contenders Founded only five years ago, Packed with Purpose is making its first appearance in the Inc. 5000. The gifting service is the top consumer products and services company on the 2021 list among 115 private companies based in Chicago. The magazine also highlights women and minority-run companies; Packed with Purpose has achieved WBENC certification as a women-owned business "Wow, what an accomplishment," said Packed with Purpose CEO Leeatt Rothschild. "Ranking #149 on the Inc. 5000 list is humbling. Achieving this rank is a nod to all the other small and women-led businesses that are defying the odds to build incredible companies. Taking a risk to turn an idea into a multimillion-dollar business in such a short amount of time that also creates an impact is a dream come true." Inc. has published a growth company ranking since 1982 and expanded the list to 5000 firms in 2007. "Brains, bravery, and optimism propelled these businesses to our annual fast-growth list, even amid the pandemic," the 2021 report stated. Rothschild founded Packed with Purpose in 2016 with a mission to deliver gifts while making a social impact. Gifts include nutritious snacks, premium home goods and eco-friendly office goods, presented in beautiful boxes for personal or corporate giving. Purpose-led Team Rises to Challenge in Year of Social Impact The specialty-gifting company selects purveyors that contribute to women's empowerment; youth advancement; environmental and sustainability action; workforce development; health and well-being; and amplification of women-owned and diverse-owned small businesses. Every product offers excellent quality and social change. "The Packed with Purpose team is made up of solution-oriented problem solvers with their eyes on the prize," Rothschild said. "And when that prize is creating delightful moments and making an impact in our communities, it's easy to remain focused on the right thing." The Highland Park, Illinois native and mother of four also showed gratitude towards other companies who have made that list. "I want to congratulate all the other businesses on this list that, especially during such a challenging year, created solutions to unprecedented problems, supported their employees, did right by their clients, and persevered. Your spot on this list is well deserved." About Packed with Purpose Packed with Purpose is on a mission to create meaningful impact by changing the way companies and individuals give gifts. Packed with Purpose discovers products made by social enterprises and purpose-driven companies to curate memorable gifts that wow recipients and create positive change. From granola handcrafted by female survivors of abuse to glass-blown wine stoppers that support teens affected by gun violence, Packed with Purpose curates unforgettable gifts that do good. Gift with Impact. For more info, visit packedwithpurpose.gifts . About Inc. Media Inc. offers entrepreneurs the knowledge, tools, connections and community to build great companies. Its prestigious Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to recognize the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The global recognition that comes with inclusion in the 5000 gives the founders of the best businesses an opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers and the credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. For more information, visit www.inc.com . Contact Isi Ativie Purpose Brand 312-806-4110 [email protected] SOURCE Packed with Purpose Related Links https://packedwithpurpose.gifts/ DES MOINES, Iowa, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, Jeff Link, a lead attorney for Paraquat Legal Resources, addressed a Parkinson's Disease support group in Washington, Iowa to provide information and resources on exposure to paraquat. Paraquat is a deadly chemical prominent in many herbicides. Scientists have known for years that it is linked to Parkinson's Disease and kidney disease. It's so toxic that China, Brazil, and approximately 40 other countries have banned the use of it, yet it is sprayed on farms across America. Jeff Link of Jeff Link Law, PLLC, and his colleagues working as Paraquat Legal Resources have held town hall meetings across the Midwest to inform individuals and families devastated by Parkinson's Disease and kidney disease the harmful effects that can follow exposure to paraquat. "China and Brazil, of all places, have banned paraquat, yet it is still used on everything from corn and soy to grapes and orchards in America," said Link. "If our government is not going to ban paraquat, the least we can do is hold these companies accountable. We hope this lawsuit can provide some support for those suffering and serve as a wakeup call to the makers of paraquat." Hailing from the small rural town of Burlington, Iowa, Link is familiar with the agriculture and rural values many in Iowa grow up with. Food producing communities take pride in providing the safest and most affordable food system in the world, but too often their values and hard work are taken advantage of by the companies who sell to farmers. Exposure to paraquat whether you're spraying it, exposed to drift, or washing clothes - can lead to these debilitating diseases. Drift and even secondhand contact by washing laundry can devastate a family. One sip of this dangerous herbicide can kill. Link has previously worked under the trade name Midwest Corn Lawsuit, on behalf of farmers who lost revenue due to Syngenta Seed's negligence. That case resulted in recoveries for many American corn farmers injured by Syngenta's conduct. Jeff Link's presentation in Washington, IA follows town hall meetings in Owatonna, Minnesota, Cedar Rapids, Iowa and in Marshall, Minnesota. Paraquat legal Resources will continue to educate potential plaintiffs about exposure and paraquat's link to Parkinson's Disease and kidney disease. Paraquat is known to many by its brand names Gromoxone, Blanco, Chevron, Devour, and Helmquat. Individuals exposed to paraquat and diagnosed with Parkinson's or kidney failure should contact Paraquat Legal Resources for more information and a free evaluation. Jeff Link of Jeff Link Law, PLLC and Paraquat Legal Resources can be reached at (844) 752-6224 toll-free or (515) 489-0006 or at ParaquatLR.com. SOURCE Paraquat Legal Resources *Technology play enhances PDFTron's definitive offering with best-in-class document reconstruction and archiving* VANCOUVER, BC, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - PDFTron Systems Inc., the world's leading provider of digital content solutions for software developers, today announced the acquisition of Solid Documents, provider of best-in-class document reconstruction and archiving solutions embedded in blue-chip company internal software, including that of Coca-Cola and Volvo, and in major commercial document applications, such as Adobe's flagship PDF product line, Acrobat. PDFTron Founder and CTO Ivan Nincic stated, "Converting PDF into MS Office formats is recognized as notoriously challenging within the document technology industry. And without question, Solid Documents is the leading innovator in this area of specialization. Its PDF to Word, Excel, and Powerpoint offers unparalleled accuracy in terms of formatting and content preservation. We welcome them on board as a significant complement to our team, roadmap, and future offering. Together, we can provide our customers unparalleled flexibility to have their users work with and edit documents the way they want, with all major document file types, and across all major platforms." "There are very few document technology companies and even fewer that focus on licensing SDKs and APIs," said Michael Cartwright, CEO of Solid Documents. "From our perspective, therefore, we see PDFTron as a perfect fit. Being able to join forces with a document technology company that shares both our customer and product philosophies feels like a rare gift, and it underscores our commitment to our developer community. We are looking forward to that community, our technology and people thriving in the larger PDFTron ecosystem that we are now part of." PDFTron's recent partnership with Solid Documents comes in the wake of a major strategic investment into PDFTron by leading private equity firm Thoma Bravo in May 2021 . Thoma Bravo's investment has accelerated PDFTron's footprint growth strategy as it establishes the first truly end-to-end digital content platform. This provides for comprehensive digital content viewing and collaboration, and document generation abilities, with diverse no-, low-, and high-code deployment options for those who wish to add professional features to their applications, shorten development timelines, improve security, and reduce development costs. Headquartered in Nelson, New Zealand, Solid Documents currently serves hundreds of thousands of users and organizations worldwide across several industries. In addition, Solid Documents' flagship, enterprise-class SDK "Solid Framework" can be found under the hood powering many professional document applications and platforms, including those of leaders in the document processing space such as Adobe, Foxit, and Smallpdf. About Solid Documents Solid Documents is a leading developer of document reconstruction and archiving software. Hundreds of thousands of users (personal and business) around the globe have used its solutions to share, reconstruct and archive many types of documents including legal documents, manuals, financial records, and more. Most often the converted document is easier to work with and in many cases better than the original. Solid Documents is customer focused and offers unlimited complimentary email support to all registered customers. The company is headquartered in Nelson, New Zealand and can be found at www.soliddocuments.com . About PDFTron Headquartered in Vancouver, Canada, PDFTron is a premier global provider of high-performance digital content processing technology serving OEM and enterprise customers across a broad spectrum of industries. PDFTron's market-leading SDK drives digital transformation and powers next generation software applications with dynamic document viewing, annotation, processing, and conversion capabilities, as well as advanced features such as document understanding, data extraction, and redaction. PDFTron technology supports all major platforms and dozens of unique file types, including support for PDF, MS Office, and CAD formats. For more information, visit www.pdftron.com . SOURCE PDFTron CARMIEL, Israel, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Protalix BioTherapeutics, Inc. (NYSE American: PLX) (TASE: PLX), a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development, production and commercialization of recombinant therapeutic proteins produced by its proprietary ProCellEx plant cell-based protein expression system, today announced that it has completed exchanges (the "Exchanges") of the Company's outstanding 7.50% Senior Secured Convertible Notes due 2021 (the "2021 Notes") with institutional note holders of a substantial majority of the 2021 Notes. Participating institutional note holders include funds managed by Highbridge Capital Management, LLC, UBS O'Connor LLC, Citigroup Global Markets, Whitebox Advisors and Tulip Capital. "The exchange of the notes will allow us to continue proceeding towards resubmission of PRX102 BLA to the FDA subject to the outcome of the Type A meeting scheduled for September 9, 2021, as well as submission of the MAA to the EMA, subject to the meeting with the EMA scheduled for October 2021," said Dror Bashan, Protalix's President and Chief Executive Officer. "We would like to thank the participants in the exchanges for their longstanding partnership." The Exchanges, which were first announced on August 13, 2021, involved the exchange of an aggregate of $54.65 million principal amount of 2021 Notes for an aggregate of $28.75 million principal amount of newly issued 7.50% Senior Secured Convertible Notes due 2024 (the "Exchange Notes"), $25.90 million in cash and approximately $1.1 million in cash representing accrued and unpaid interest through the closing date. The initial conversion rate of the Exchange Notes is 563.2216 shares of the Company's common stock (the "Common Stock") per $1,000 principal amount of Exchange Notes, which is equivalent to an initial conversion price of approximately $1.7755 per share of Common Stock, subject to adjustment in certain circumstances. This initial conversion price represents a premium of approximately 32.5% relative to the closing price of the Common Stock on the NYSE American on August 13, 2021. After giving effect to the Exchanges, $3.27 million aggregate principal amount of the Existing Notes are currently outstanding. This announcement is neither an offer to sell nor a solicitation of an offer to buy any of these securities and does not constitute an offer, solicitation, or sale in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation, or sale is unlawful. The offer and sale of the Exchange Notes and the shares of Common Stock issuable upon conversion of the Exchange Notes, if any, was not registered under the Securities Act of 1933 or any state securities laws, and unless so registered, the Exchange Notes and such shares may not be offered or sold in the United States except pursuant to an exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act of 1933 and applicable state laws. About Protalix BioTherapeutics, Inc. Protalix is a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of recombinant therapeutic proteins expressed through its proprietary plant cell-based protein expression system, ProCellEx. Protalix was the first company to gain U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval of a protein produced through a plant cell-based in suspension expression system. Protalix's unique expression system represents a new method for developing recombinant proteins in an industrial-scale manner. Protalix's first product manufactured by ProCellEx, taliglucerase alfa, was approved by the FDA in May 2012 and, subsequently, by the regulatory authorities of other countries. Protalix has licensed to Pfizer Inc. the worldwide development and commercialization rights for taliglucerase alfa, excluding Brazil, where Protalix retains full rights. Protalix's development pipeline consists of proprietary versions of recombinant therapeutic proteins that target established pharmaceutical markets, including the following product candidates: pegunigalsidase alfa, a modified stabilized version of the recombinant human GalactosidaseA protein for the treatment of Fabry disease; alidornase alfa, or PRX110, for the treatment of various human respiratory diseases or conditions; PRX-115, a plant cell-expressed recombinant PEGylated uricase for the treatment of refractory gout; PRX119, a plant cell-expressed long action DNase I for the treatment of NETs-related diseases; and others. Protalix has partnered with Chiesi Farmaceutici S.p.A., both in the United States and outside the United States, for the development and commercialization of pegunigalsidase alfa, and with SarcoMed USA, Inc. for the worldwide development and commercialization of PRX110 for use in the treatment of any human respiratory disease or condition including, but not limited to, sarcoidosis, pulmonary fibrosis, and other related diseases via inhaled delivery. Forward-Looking Statements Disclaimer To the extent that statements in this press release are not strictly historical, all such statements are forward-looking, and are made pursuant to the safe-harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The terms "expect," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "project," "may," "plan," "will," "would," "should" and "intend," and other words or phrases of similar import are intended to identify forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause actual future experience and results to differ materially from the statements made. These statements are based on our current beliefs and expectations as to such future outcomes. Drug discovery and development involve a high degree of risk and the final results of a clinical trial may be different than the preliminary findings for the clinical trial. Factors that might cause material differences include, among others: the risks that the FDA may not hold a Type A Meeting for the PRX-102 BLA on a timely manner; risks related to the timing and progress of the preparation of an updated BLA addressing the complete response letter; risks related to the timing, progress and likelihood of final approval by the FDA of a resubmitted BLA for PRX-102 and, if approved, whether the use of PRX-102 will be commercially successful; failure or delay in the commencement or completion of our preclinical studies and clinical trials, which may be caused by several factors, including: slower than expected rates of patient recruitment; unforeseen safety issues; determination of dosing issues; lack of effectiveness during clinical trials; inability or unwillingness of medical investigators and institutional review boards to follow our clinical protocols; and inability to monitor patients adequately during or after treatment; delays in the approval or potential rejection of any applications we file with the FDA, European Medicines Agency or other health regulatory authorities, and other risks relating to the review process; risks associated with the outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease, or COVID19, and its variants, which may adversely impact our business, preclinical studies and clinical trials; risks related to any transactions we may effect in the public or private equity markets to raise capital to finance future research and development activities, general and administrative expenses and working capital; the risk that the results of the clinical trials of our product candidates will not support the applicable claims of safety or efficacy, or that our product candidates will not have the desired effects or will be associated with undesirable side effects or other unexpected characteristics; risks related to our ability to maintain and manage our relationship with our collaborators, distributors or partners; risks related to the amount and sufficiency of our cash and cash equivalents; risks relating to our ability to make scheduled payments of the principal of, to pay interest on or to refinance our outstanding 7.50% Senior Secured Convertible Notes due 2024; our dependence on performance by third party providers of services and supplies, including without limitation, clinical trial services; the inherent risks and uncertainties in developing drug platforms and products of the type we are developing; the impact of development of competing therapies and/or technologies by other companies and institutions; potential product liability risks, and risks of securing adequate levels of product liability and other necessary insurance coverage; and other factors described in our filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The statements in this press release are valid only as of the date hereof and we disclaim any obligation to update this information, except as may be required by law. Investor Contact Chuck Padala, Managing Director LifeSci Advisors 646-627-8390 [email protected] SOURCE Protalix BioTherapeutics, Inc. Before the pandemic, the number of children struggling with hunger had been steadily decreasing for a decade. According to the USDA, in 2019, 10.7 million children lived in a family considered "food insecure," a record low. However, in the wake of the coronavirus, as many as 1 in 6 kids in the United States, or about 13 million, live in food-insecure homes and may face hunger this year. To support this worthy cause, now through October 3, 2021, any in-restaurant guest who donates $2 to No Kid Hungry at participating QDOBA locations will receive a free order of chips and queso with the purchase of any entree (coupon redeemable through October 10, 2021). Guests will also be able to show their support of No Kid Hungry by adding their name to a wall hanging in their local restaurant. "Children and their families will feel the impact of the COVID-19 crisis well into the future," said Diana Hovey, senior vice president at Share Our Strength, the organization behind the No Kid Hungry campaign. "But childhood hunger remains solvable, and we are incredibly grateful for partners like QDOBA, who make it easy for people everywhere to get involved." "We applaud No Kid Hungry's outstanding efforts to end childhood hunger in America," said Keith Guilbault, QDOBA CEO. "QDOBA is proud to have helped raise nearly $600,000 to benefit No Kid Hungry through our long-standing partnership, but food insecurity remains a serious issue. We recognize that even the smallest donation can make a big impact, and through a very simple gesture we are able to provide critical meals to children in need across the country with the help of our guests, employees and friends." For more information, visit www.QDOBA.com . About QDOBA Mexican Eats QDOBA is a fast-casual Mexican restaurant with more than 740 locations in the U.S. and Canada. QDOBA uses ingredients prepared in-house, by hand, and fresh throughout the day, to create delicious menu options. Guests can experience QDOBA's delicious flavors by enjoying one of its signature menu options that are chef-crafted for convenience and ease or by customizing their burritos, bowls, tacos, quesadillas, nachos and salads to fit their personal tastes. For three years running, QDOBA has been voted the "Best Fast Casual Restaurant" as part of the USA Today 10Best Readers' Choice Awards. Discover more at www.QDOBA.com or on the QDOBA app, which is available for download on the iTunes App Store or Google Play . Fans can also connect with QDOBA on Facebook , Twitter and Instagram . 1 $1 can help provide up to 10 meals. Meal equivalency varies during COVID-19 relief. No Kid Hungry does not provide individual meals; your donations help support programs that feed kids. Learn more at NoKidHungry.org/OneDollar. SOURCE QDOBA Related Links https://www.QDOBA.com DENVER, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Adam Contos, the CEO of one of the world's leading franchisors in the real estate industry, announces the release of his new book, "Start with a Win: Tools and Lessons to Create Personal and Business Success," available in-stores on October 19. Offering a powerful exploration of how leaders process information and lead effectively, especially during times of crisis, the book is packed with the practical lessons Contos learned throughout his career and as the head of RE/MAX Holdings. Available for preorder, the book conveys how leaders recognize chaos and fear, and transform those negatives into opportunity both personally and professionally. In 2018, Contos launched a weekly podcast called "Start With a Win," which focuses on the ways he integrates the ideas of building hustle daily and being intentional about making a difference into his daily routine. Building on the foundation of this podcast, the book aims to give readers renewed direction to improve their lives and their businesses. "This book is my chance to put the hundreds of episodes we've released to-date, and all the learnings from those conversations, experiences and interviews, into a book reflecting on advice for running a business and enhancing relationships," Contos says. In the book, Contos draws from his experience leading RE/MAX along with time in law enforcement and as an entrepreneur, to help readers avoid the experience of becoming overwhelmed or burned out by relying on simple frameworks to organize thinking, negotiate so that both sides leave with a win, learn and grow throughout a career, and network and lead teams in any situation. After reading "Start With a Win," you'll understand how to: Party with the Beast: control your emotions and climb out of chaos and uncertainty into decisive action Lose the Ego: by putting your people first, you build lasting impact in your field and your community Master the Winning Approach: step up, stay present, deploy kindness and gratitude All proceeds from sales of the Start With A Win book will be donated to Children's Miracle Network Hospitals (CMN Hospitals) a 29-year partner of RE/MAX, LLC. About Adam Adam Contos, CEO of RE/MAX Holdings, Inc, provides strategic direction on major corporate initiatives for all RE/MAX Holdings companies, including two innovative, action-oriented franchise brands RE/MAX and Motto Mortgage. RE/MAX, a global force of nearly 140,000 agents in over 110 countries, and Motto, the first of its kind franchise mortgage brokerage model and one of the fastest growing franchise brands in any industry, both thrive as thoroughly modern operations. Affecting positive change throughout the real estate and mortgage brokerage industries, Contos is a maverick among global corporate leaders. Contos' self-discipline and work ethic stems from his background as a former Sergeant in the U.S. Marine Corps and SWAT commander. About RE/MAX Holdings, Inc. RE/MAX Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: RMAX) is one of the world's leading franchisors in the real estate industry, franchising real estate brokerages globally under the RE/MAX brand, and mortgage brokerages within the U.S. under the Motto Mortgage brand. RE/MAX was founded in 1973 by Dave and Gail Liniger, with an innovative, entrepreneurial culture affording its agents and franchisees the flexibility to operate their businesses with great independence. Now with nearly 140,000 agents across over 110 countries and territories, nobody in the world sells more real estate than RE/MAX, as measured by total residential transaction sides. Dedicated to innovation and change in the real estate industry, RE/MAX launched Motto Franchising, LLC, a ground-breaking mortgage brokerage franchisor, in 2016. Motto Mortgage has grown to over 150 offices across almost 40 states. SOURCE RE/MAX Holdings, Inc. HOLMDEL, N.J., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant General (Retired) Frank Libutti, Chairman of Renaissance Global Services, a New Jersey-based project and construction management firm, urged New Jersey lawmakers to honor a commitment and provide opportunities for Service Disabled Veteran Owned Businesses in New Jersey, consistent with the commitment made by New York to those businesses in the Empire State. General Libutti's op-ed, which ran in NJ Spotlight, can be found here: NJ needs to honor commitments to disabled vets | NJ Spotlight News About Renaissance Global Services: Renaissance Global Services (RGS), LLC is Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business that conducts project management and construction management of capital and facilities projects in the pharmaceutical sector as well as with state and other public agencies. RGS also conducts construction inspections of gas and electric utility infrastructure improvements and manages the initial operation, transition and activation of clinics for the Department of Veterans Affairs in the federal sector. Contact: Robert Zito (917) 692-0747 [email protected] SOURCE Renaissance Global Services Trading Symbol TSX: SVM NYSE American: SVM VANCOUVER, BC, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Silvercorp Metals Inc. ("Silvercorp" or the "Company") (TSX: SVM) (NYSE American: SVM) is pleased to report the results of an updated National Instrument 43-101 ("NI 43-101") Technical Report entitled "NI 43-101 Technical Report Update on the Gaocheng Ag-Zn-Pb Project in Guangdong Province, People's Republic of China" with an effective date of March 31, 2021 (Mineral Resources and Mineral Reserves effective December 31, 2020), prepared by AMC Mining Consultants (Canada) Ltd. ("AMC") (the "GC NI 43-101 Technical Report"). Five of the six authors of the GC NI 43-101 Technical Report qualify as independent Qualified Persons, two of whom visited the GC Mine in January 2018 and examined all aspects of the project, including drill core, underground workings, processing plant, and surface infrastructure. The non-independent author, who is a Silvercorp employee, has visited the site on numerous occasions, with the last two visits from 25 to 30 October 2019 and from 13 to 28 May 2021. The GC NI 43-101 Technical Report will be made available for review on the Company's SEDAR profile and website at www.silvercorp.ca in due course. Highlights of the GC NI 43-101 Technical Report From the start of operations at the GC Mine in 2014 through to December 31, 2020, 1,853,662 tonnes have been mined at average head grades of 94 grams per tonne ("g/t") silver ("Ag"), 1.6% lead ("Pb"), and 2.9% zinc ("Zn"). Despite this mine production depletion, there has been an 8% increase in tonnes of combined Proven and Probable Reserves (39% increase in Proven Reserves and 21% decrease in Probable Reserves) compared to the Mineral Reserve estimate in the previous Technical Report on the GC Mine with an effective date of June 30, 2019 (the "2019 Technical Report"). Based on only Proven and Probable Reserves, the GC Mine has a projected life of mine ("LOM") of 13 years through to 2034, at an average annual production rate of approximately 310,000 tonnes, and with average silver equivalent ("AgEq")[1] grades of approximately 309 g/t. The GC Mine has the potential to extend the LOM beyond 2034, via the conversion of existing Mineral Resources to Mineral Reserves, and further exploration and development. Compared to the Mineral Resources estimate in the 2019 Technical Report, the Measured tonnes have increased by 57% due to the discovery of new veins, new vein interpretations and the conversion of Indicated tonnes (which decreased by 17%) to the Measured Resource classification. Inferred tonnes have also increased by 17%. _____________________________ 1 The equivalency formula is AgEq = Ag g/t + 50.46*Pb% + 43.53*Zn% using prices of US$18.20/oz Ag, US$0.94/lb Pb and US$1.08/lb Zn, estimated recoveries of 82.6% Ag, 89.5% Pb, and 87.3% Zn, and respective payables of 65.5%, 86.2% and 66.3%. The results of the underground drilling program at the GC Mine show that vein structures are still open at depth. 2021 Mineral Reserve and Mineral Resource Update Silvercorp completed its first phase of diamond drilling at the GC Mine in 2008 and has continued through to the present. The 2019 Technical Report Mineral Resource and Mineral Reserve estimates on the GC Mine were as of December 31, 2018. All Silvercorp drilling has been completed with NQ-sized core. Drillhole collars were surveyed using a total station and downhole surveys were completed every 50 m downhole. Core recoveries varied between 35.66% and 100%, averaging 99.36%. Mineral Reserves The Mineral Reserve estimates for the GC Mine were prepared by Silvercorp under the guidance of an independent Qualified Person ("QP"), Mr. H. A. Smith, P.Eng., of AMC, who takes QP responsibility for those estimates. The assumption has been made that current stoping practices will continue to be employed at the GC Mine, namely predominantly shrinkage stoping (69% of projected LOM), combined with some cut and fill resuing (31% of projected LOM), using hand-held drills and hand-mucking within stopes, and loading to mine cars by rocker-shovel or by hand. Minimum mining widths of 1.0 m for shrinkage and 0.5 m for resuing are assumed. Average dilution has been estimated at 19.8% for shrinkage and 12.4% for resuing, with an average of 17.4%. Assumed mining recovery factors are 92% for shrinkage stopes and 95% for resuing stopes. The GC NI 43-101 Technical Report defines Mineral Reserves of 4.131 million tonnes in the combined Proven and Probable categories, grading 94 g/t Ag, 1.5% Pb, and 3.2% Zn, containing approximately 12.5 million ounces of silver, 135 million pounds of lead, and 293 million pounds of zinc. Mineral Reserve tonnes are noted to be approximately 41% of Mineral Resource (Measured plus Indicated) tonnes. Silver, lead, and zinc Mineral Reserve grades are 115%, 124%, and 115%, respectively, of the corresponding Measured plus Indicated Mineral Resource grades. Metal content conversions for silver, lead, and zinc from Measured plus Indicated Mineral Resources to Proven plus Probable Mineral Reserves are 47%, 51%, and 47%, respectively. Mineral Reserves are detailed in Table 1 below. Table 1 GC Mine - Mineral Reserves Classification Tonnes (Mt) Ag (g/t) Pb (%) Zn (%) Contained metal Ag (koz) Pb (Mlbs) Zn (Mlbs) Proven 2.587 93 1.5 3.3 7,743 84 189 Probable 1.544 95 1.5 3.0 4,740 51 103 Proven and Probable 4.131 94 1.5 3.2 12,483 135 293 Notes: 1. Full breakeven cut-off grades: Shrinkage = 215 g/t AgEq; Resuing = 275 g/t AgEq. 2. Marginal material cut-off grade: Shrinkage = 185 g/t AgEq; Resuing = 250 g/t AgEq. 3. Dilution (zero grade) assumed as a minimum of 0.1 m on each wall of a shrinkage stope and 0.05 m on each wall of a resuing stope. 4. Mining recovery factors assumed as 92% for shrinkage and 95% for resuing. 5. Metal prices: Silver US$18.20/troy oz, lead US$0.94/lb, zinc US$1.08/lb, with respective payables of 65.5%, 86.2%, and 66.3%. 6. Processing recovery factors: Ag 82.6%, Pb 89.5%, Zn 87.3%. 7. Effective date 31 December 2020. 8. Exchange rate assumed is RMB6.80: US$1.00. 9. Rounding of some figures may lead to minor discrepancies in totals. Mineral Reserve cut-off grade and key estimation parameters are shown in Table 2 below. Table 2 Mineral Reserve Cut-off Grades and Key Estimation Parameters Item GC Mine Foreign exchange rate (RMB:US$) 6.8 Shrinkage Resuing Operating costs Mining cost (includes development & exploration) (US$/t) 25.94 45.05 Milling cost (US$/t) 13.58 13.58 G&A and product selling cost (US$/t) 9.84 9.84 Sustaining & non-sustaining capital (US$/t) 16.72 16.72 Mineral Resources tax, etc. (US$/t) 1.98 2.56 Total operating costs (US$/t) 68.07 87.74 Mining recovery (%) 92 95 Mill recoveries Ag (%) 82.6 82.6 Pb (%) 89.5 89.5 Zn (%) 87.3 87.3 Breakeven COG (AgEq g/t) 215 275 Note: Metal price assumptions: Ag US$18.20/oz; Pb US$0.94/lb; Zn US$1.08/lb; respective payables of 65.5%, 86.2%, and 66.3%. Mineral Resources: The Mineral Resource estimates for the GC Mine were prepared by Mr. Shoupu Xiang, Resource Geologist of Silvercorp. Ms. Dinara Nussipakynova, P.Geo., of AMC, has reviewed the methodologies and data used to prepare the Mineral Resource estimates and, after some adjustment to the Mineral Resource classification and capping, is satisfied that they comply with reasonable industry practice. Ms. Nussipakynova takes responsibility for these estimates. Resources were estimated using a block modelling approach, with MicromineTM software. Interpolation was carried out using inverse distance squared (ID2) for all the veins. Estimates were made for a total of 156 mineralized vein structures for the GC Mine. The Mineral Resources are reported above a cut-off of 105 g/t AgEq. The cut-off value was based on estimated costs for mining, maintenance/admin, internal ore transport and processing. The cut-off value calculation was generated by AMC with input from Silvercorp. The equivalency formula is: AgEq=Ag g/t+50.46*Pb%+43.53*Zn%. The multiplication factors for Pb and Zn were derived from equations based on metal prices, recoveries, and payable factors. Mineral Resources at December 31, 2020 total 10.0 million tonnes (inclusive of Mineral Reserves) in the combined Measured and Indicated categories, grading 82 g/t Ag, 1.2% Pb, and 2.8% Zn, containing approximately 26.4 million ounces of silver, 265 million pounds of lead, and 619 million pounds of zinc, and are detailed in Table 3 below. Table 3 GC Mine Measured & Indicated Resources (Inclusive of Mineral Reserves), and Inferred Mineral Resources Classification Tonnes (Mt) Ag (g/t) Pb (%) Zn (%) Contained metal Ag (koz) Pb (Mlbs) Zn (Mlbs) Measured 5.286 88 1.3 3.1 14,906 154 360 Indicated 4.747 75 1.1 2.5 11,457 111 259 Measured & Indicated 10.033 82 1.2 2.8 26,363 265 619 Inferred 8.441 87 1.0 2.4 23,562 195 442 Notes: 1. Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum Standards (2014) ("CIM Definition Standards") were used for reporting the Mineral Resources. 2. Mineral Resources are reported at a cut-off grade of 105 g/t AgEg. 3. The equivalency formula is Ag g/t+50.46*Pb%+43.53*Zn% using prices of US$18.20/oz Ag, US$0.94/lb Pb, and US$1.08/lb Zn and estimated recoveries of 82.6% Ag, 89.5% Pb, and 87.3% Zn. 4. Sample results up to 31 December 2020. 5. Mineral Resources have been depleted to account for mining to 31 December 2020. 6. Effective date 31 December 2020. 7. Veins factored to a minimum extraction width of 0.4 m. 8. Mineral Resources are inclusive of Mineral Reserves. 9. Mineral Resources that are not Mineral Reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability. An Inferred Mineral Resource is that part of a Mineral Resource for which quantity and grade or quality are estimated on the basis of limited geological evidence and sampling and must not be converted to a Mineral Reserve. It is reasonably expected that the majority of Inferred Mineral Resources could be upgraded to Indicated Mineral Resources with continued exploration. 10. The numbers may not compute exactly due to rounding. 11. Source: Silvercorp Metals Inc., reproduced as a check by AMC. Qualified Persons and Technical Information D. Nussipakynova, P.Geo., H. A. Smith, P.Eng., A. Riles, MAIG., A. A. Ross, P.Geo., and S. Robinson, P.Geo., MAIG. of AMC are independent Qualified Persons as defined by NI 43-101. G. Ma, P.Geo. of Silvercorp is a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101. All of the QPs reviewed and consented to this news release and believe it fairly and accurately represents the information in the Technical Report that supports the disclosure. The Mineral Reserve and Mineral Resource estimates have been estimated and compiled in accordance with definitions and guidelines set out in the CIM Definition Standards (2014). About Silvercorp Silvercorp is a profitable Canadian mining company producing silver, lead and zinc metals in concentrates from mines in China. The Company's goal is to continuously create healthy returns to shareholders through efficient management, organic growth and the acquisition of profitable projects. Silvercorp balances profitability, social and environmental relationships, employees' wellbeing, and sustainable development. For more information, please visit our website at www.silvercorp.ca CAUTIONARY DISCLAIMER - FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS Certain of the statements and information in this news release constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian provincial securities laws (collectively, "forward-looking statements"). Any statements or information that express or involve discussions with respect to predictions, expectations, beliefs, plans, projections, objectives, assumptions or future events or performance (often, but not always, using words or phrases such as "expects", "is expected", "anticipates", "believes", "plans", "projects", "estimates", "assumes", "intends", "strategies", "targets", "goals", "forecasts", "objectives", "budgets", "schedules", "potential" or variations thereof or stating that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will" be taken, occur or be achieved, or the negative of any of these terms and similar expressions) are not statements of historical fact and may be forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements relate to, among other things: the price of silver and other metals; the accuracy of mineral resource and mineral reserve estimates at the Company's material properties; the sufficiency of the Company's capital to finance the Company's operations; estimates of the Company's revenues and capital expenditures; estimated production from the Company's mines in the Ying Mining District and the GC Mine; timing of receipt of permits and regulatory approvals; availability of funds from production to finance the Company's operations; and access to and availability of funding for future construction, use of proceeds from any financing and development of the Company's properties. Forward-looking statements are subject to a variety of known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual events or results to differ from those reflected in the forward-looking statements, including, without limitation, risks relating to: fluctuating commodity prices; calculation of resources, reserves and mineralization and precious and base metal recovery; interpretations and assumptions of mineral resource and mineral reserve estimates; exploration and development programs; feasibility and engineering reports; permits and licences; title to properties; property interests; joint venture partners; acquisition of commercially mineable mineral rights; financing; recent market events and conditions; economic factors affecting the Company; timing, estimated amount, capital and operating expenditures and economic returns of future production; integration of future acquisitions into the Company's existing operations; competition; operations and political conditions; regulatory environment in China and Canada; environmental risks; foreign exchange rate fluctuations; insurance; risks and hazards of mining operations; key personnel; conflicts of interest; dependence on management; internal control over financial reporting; and bringing actions and enforcing judgments under U.S. securities laws. This list is not exhaustive of the factors that may affect any of the Company's forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements about the future and are inherently uncertain, and actual achievements of the Company or other future events or conditions may differ materially from those reflected in the forward-looking statements due to a variety of risks, uncertainties and other factors, including, without limitation, those referred to in the Company's Annual Information Form under the heading "Risk Factors". Although the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated, described or intended. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company's forward-looking statements are based on the assumptions, beliefs, expectations and opinions of management as of the date of this news release, and other than as required by applicable securities laws, the Company does not assume any obligation to update forward-looking statements if circumstances or management's assumptions, beliefs, expectations or opinions should change, or changes in any other events affecting such statements. For the reasons set forth above, investors should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. CAUTIONARY NOTE TO US INVESTORS The disclosure in this news release and referred to herein was prepared in accordance with NI 43-101 which differs significantly from the requirements of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC"). The terms "proven mineral reserve", "probable mineral reserve", "mineral reserves", "mineral resources", "measured mineral resources", "indicated mineral resources" and "inferred mineral resources" used in this news release are in reference to the mining terms defined in the CIM Definition Standards, which definitions have been adopted by NI 43-101. Accordingly, information contained in this news release providing descriptions of our mineral deposits in accordance with NI 43-101 may not be comparable to similar information made public by other U.S. companies subject to the United States federal securities laws and the rules and regulations thereunder. Investors are cautioned not to assume that any part or all of mineral resources will ever be converted into reserves. Pursuant to CIM Definition Standards, "Inferred mineral resources" are that part of a mineral resource for which quantity and grade or quality are estimated on the basis of limited geological evidence and sampling. Such geological evidence is sufficient to imply but not verify geological and grade or quality continuity. An inferred mineral resource has a lower level of confidence than that applying to an indicated mineral resource and must not be converted to a mineral reserve. However, it is reasonably expected that the majority of inferred mineral resources could be upgraded to indicated mineral resources with continued exploration. Under Canadian rules, estimates of inferred mineral resources may not form the basis of feasibility or pre-feasibility studies, except in rare cases. Investors are cautioned not to assume that all or any part of an inferred mineral resource is economically or legally mineable. Disclosure of "contained ounces" in a resource is permitted disclosure under Canadian regulations; however, the SEC normally only permits issuers to report mineralization that does not constitute "reserves" by SEC standards as in place tonnage and grade without reference to unit measures. Canadian standards, including the CIM Definition Standards and NI 43-101, differ significantly from standards in the SEC Industry Guide 7. Effective February 25, 2019, the SEC adopted new mining disclosure rules under subpart 1300 of Regulation S-K of the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "SEC Modernization Rules"), with compliance required for the first fiscal year beginning on or after January 1, 2021. The SEC Modernization Rules replace the historical property disclosure requirements included in SEC Industry Guide 7. As a result of the adoption of the SEC Modernization Rules, the SEC now recognizes estimates of "Measured Mineral Resources", "Indicated Mineral Resources" and "Inferred Mineral Resources". In addition, the SEC has amended its definitions of "Proven Mineral Reserves" and "Probable Mineral Reserves" to be substantially similar to corresponding definitions under the CIM Definition Standards. During the period leading up to the compliance date of the SEC Modernization Rules, information regarding mineral resources or reserves contained or referenced in this news release may not be comparable to similar information made public by companies that report according to U.S. standards. While the SEC Modernization Rules are purported to be "substantially similar" to the CIM Definition Standards, readers are cautioned that there are differences between the SEC Modernization Rules and the CIM Definitions Standards. Accordingly, there is no assurance any mineral reserves or mineral resources that the Company may report as "proven mineral reserve", "probable mineral reserve", "mineral reserves", "mineral resources", "measured mineral resources", "indicated mineral resources" and "inferred mineral resources" under NI 43-101 would be the same had the Company prepared the reserve or resource estimates under the standards adopted under the SEC Modernization Rules. SOURCE Silvercorp Metals Inc Related Links www.silvercorp.ca The damage was very minimal and should have incidental impact on the completion date, which is slated for late September 2021. Fortunately, the fire was isolated to a small area on the roof, and no one was harmed in the incident. "We are blessed beyond measure. It could have been a lot worse. We appreciate the watchful eye that called it in as well as the large, rapid response from multiple fire agencies who extinguished it quickly while taking care to not cause more damage. We are also thankful to our Almighty God who continues to hold the Blue Line family in His hands of protection," says Trey Walters, CEO. Once completed, the complex will house four companies: Blue Line Aviation, Blue Line Technical Services, Sparkchasers Aircraft Services, and Low and Slow Smokehouse and will be the largest public-private partnership in the airport's history. This unique business model is designed to help people begin their careers in aviation, which is seeing unprecedented need for pilots. Please direct inquiries about the incident to Trey Walters, CEO ([email protected]), or Rich Laviano, President ([email protected]). About Blue Line Aviation Blue Line Aviation is located at 2200 Gateway Centre Blvd #208, in Morrisville, North Carolina and was established in 1995. As one of only a few flight schools in the world to provide quality flight training programs at an accelerated pace. In less than six months, students can go from no experience to fully confident and certified pilots, fully prepared for a career in aviation. For more inquiries and additional information, please visit our website (http://bluelineaviation.com), find us on social media, or contact Ashley Darling, our Sales and Marketing Director, at (919) 578-3713 ext. 305. Press Contact: Ashley Darling 919-578-3713 ext. 305 https://www.bluelineaviationllc.com/ SOURCE Blue Line Aviation JOHANNESBURG, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- A lucky player from Gauteng walked away from his play on Jackpot Cleopatra's Gold Deluxe at SilverSands Casino, with R2,724,363.76 extra in his back pocket. The winner wagered just R5, before winning the life-changing sum in a single spin of Realtime Gaming's recently released progressive slot. Named only as Z. Smit, the winner was referred to SilverSands Casino from the leading online casino and gambling guide, SouthAfricanCasinos.co.za. He is one of literally thousands of South Africans who regularly use the website as a guide to find the safest and best-recommended online casinos for South African players. SouthAfricanCasinos.co.za has been in operation since 2003 and is considered the largest and most reputable casino online gambling guide in the SA online gambling industry. 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It took just one R5 spin on this Ancient Egyptian-themed video slot for Z. Smit to hit the progressive jackpot and become an instant millionaire nearly 3 times over. "I was in a state of shock after I saw that number with the endless digits flash across my screen," recalled the winner. "I didn't really believe it was real until customer support from SilverSands Casino contacted me to confirm. It's like a dream come true. Like most South Africans, I've had quite a challenging year because of the pandemic and my income took a blow. I can't tell you how this money comes just at the right time. I can now afford to fix my roof, buy my wife a car and pay my kids' school fees. I'm SO glad that I listened to www.SouthAfricanCasinos.co.za !" About SouthAfricanCasinos.co.za SouthAfricanCasinos.co.za is a leading online casino and gambling guide customized for South African based players. 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Contact: [email protected] SOURCE South African Casinos DUBLIN, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Lip Cold Sore Treatment Market in China, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Southeast Asia -Revenue Estimation and Forecast by 2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market size is set to increase to $85,265.1 thousand in 2030 from $45,262.1 thousand in 2020, at a 6.7% CAGR between 2021 and 2030. In China and Southeast Asia (SEA), the prevalence of herpes simplex virus type-1 (HSV-1) infection is increasing. Mostly transmitted via mouth-mouth contact, the infection often presents with no symptoms, which makes infected people a potential carrier without their knowledge. HSV-1 infection most commonly presents on and around the lips as blisters. The most-prominent symptoms of this infection are painful gums, headache, fever, swollen lymph nodes, muscle ache, and sore throat. Apart from being in contact with infected people, fatigue, abnormal hormone levels, physical trauma, physiological and psychological stress, and immunosuppression greatly elevate the risk of HSV-1. Thus, the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market is growing with the rising demand for products that can offer symptomatic relief and speed up the healing of the sores. The containment measures taken in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic have led to the shutting down of factories and reduced trade of an array of products. As a result, the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market was negatively affected due to the curtailed manufacturing activities and people staying home. Moreover, the widespread financial distress has forced people to spend only on essential stuff, such as important medication and ration. The fastest growth in the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market in the coming years will be seen in the cream category, on the basis of product type. Creams not only relieve itching, pain, tingling, and burning sensations but also inhibit the growth of the virus. Throughout this decade, the clinics category is projected to hold the largest share in the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market, based on end user. An increasing number of people suffering from this condition are visiting clinics due to the rising awareness on this disease. The pharmacies category dominated the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market in the past, under segmentation by distribution channel. In most cases, a dermatologist prescribes the treatment for this condition, which is why the products are bought predominantly from pharmacies. The SEA lip cold sore treatment market has been the most productive in China till now, and this country is also set to witness the highest CAGR in the years to come. With the increasing prevalence of HSV-1 infection in rural China and the increasing awareness on this disease, the demand for the related treatment products is rising in the country. Key Findings of China and SEA Lip Cold Sore Treatment Market Increasing HSV-1 infection incidence strongest market growth driver Demand for patches for lip cold sore treatment burgeoning Highest consumption of lip cold sore treatment products seen in clinics Pharmacies continue being preferred sales point Market fragmented in nature Players engaging in mergers and acquisitions for larger market share The most-significant players in the China and SEA lip cold sore treatment market include Perrigo Company plc Church & Dwight Co. Inc. Kyungdong Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. Quantum Health Carma Labs Inc. Integria Healthcare ( Australia ) Pty Ltd ) Pty Ltd Blistex Inc. Alliance Pharma plc Li & Fung Limited Viatris Inc. GlaxoSmithKline plc URGO Group Laboratoire HRA Pharma SAS Key Topics Covered: Chapter 1. Research Background Chapter 2. Research Methodology Chapter 3. Executive Summary Chapter 4. Introduction 4.1 Definition of Market Segments 4.1.1 By Product Type 4.1.1.1 Cream 4.1.1.2 Patch 4.1.1.3 Gel 4.1.1.4 Others 4.1.2 By End User 4.1.2.1 Clinics 4.1.2.2 Hospitals 4.1.2.3 Homecare settings 4.1.3 By Distribution Channel 4.1.3.1 Pharmacies 4.1.3.2 E-commerce 4.1.3.3 Direct sales 4.1.3.4 Grocery stores 4.2 Market Dynamics 4.2.1 Trends 4.2.1.1 Increasing demand for patches 4.2.2 Drivers 4.2.2.1 Proliferating modes of transmission of herpes simplex virus 4.2.2.2 Increasing prevalence of cold sores 4.2.2.3 Advancements in treatment with rising number of product launches 4.2.2.4 High lip core sore incidence among children 4.2.2.5 Impact analysis of drivers on market forecast 4.2.3 Restraints 4.2.3.1 Side-effects of lip cold sore treatment products 4.2.3.2 Lack of awareness on lip cold sores and HSV-1 infection 4.2.3.3 Impact analysis of restraints on market forecast 4.2.4 Opportunities 4.2.4.1 Growing disposable personal income 4.3 COVID-19 Impact 4.4 Porter's Five Forces Analysis Chapter 5. China, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and SEA Market Size and Forecast 5.1 Overview 5.2 Market Revenue, by Product Type (2015-2030) 5.3 Market Revenue, by End User (2015-2030) 5.4 Market Revenue, by Distribution Channel (2015-2030) 5.5 Market Revenue, by Country (2015-2030) Chapter 6. China Market Size and Forecast Chapter 7. Indonesia Market Size and Forecast Chapter 8. Philippines Market Size and Forecast Chapter 9. Vietnam Market Size and Forecast Chapter 10. Thailand Market Size and Forecast Chapter 11. South Korea Market Size and Forecast Chapter 12. Malaysia Market Size and Forecast Chapter 13. Taiwan Market Size and Forecast Chapter 14. Hong Kong Market Size and Forecast Chapter 15. Competitive Landscape Chapter 16. Company Profiles 16.1 Business Overview 16.2 Product and Service Offerings 16.3 Key Financial Summary For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/4zxptj Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com TRUSSVILLE, Ala., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- SPOC Automation has been named a "Best Company to Work For in Alabama" by Business Alabama and was named a "Best Place to Work" by the Birmingham Business Journal. SPOC Automation is a family of innovative companies specializing in variable speed drive automation and inverter technologies serving the oil and gas, marine, critical power and energy industries. SPOC is the leader in drives and inverters, but at its core, SPOC is an innovation company. Through SPOC's collective ideas impacting both the process and energy SPOC redefines the standard that drives automation in the field. SPOC challenges everyone at the company with a common mission: to "Lift Up". Employees are encouraged to Lift Up each other, their company, their customers, their community, their country and themselves. SPOC's core values and the Lift Up culture are adopted and lived out daily by all who work at the company. SPOC attributes its success to this incredible culture that has fostered innovation and made the company a leader in the energy space. "Our employees live out their core values daily, and they have a spirit of innovation. As a result of this, I would say our company culture is one of the things that helps make us scalable for the future and makes SPOC the Best Place to Work," states Robert L. Mason, SPOC CEO. In addition to their dynamic company culture, SPOC Automation has a very vibrant and exciting campus, always reminding employees and visitors of the company's commitment to serving its customers. Furthermore, SPOC offers many programs to incentivize employees to ensure they are living up to the company's core values. SPOC also has "dream teams" that constantly work on internal and external experiences to help all the teams grow both personally and professionally. SPOC provides a work environment that is conducive to high productivity and high morale, which sustains employee retention and attracts high quality people. About SPOC Automation SPOC Automation is a family of innovative companies specializing in variable speed drive automation and inverter technologies serving the oil and gas, marine, critical power and energy industries. With over 70,000 drives operating in the harshest applications within the upstream and midstream markets, SPOC is the leader in drives. SPOC's Inverter Technologies provide electrical alternatives the industry has never seen before, with smart grid inverters and energy storage systems. SPOC Automation. Produce More. Spend Less. To learn more about SPOC Automation, visit www.spocautomation.com Contact: Tina Willis 205 322 1010 x702 [email protected] SOURCE SPOC Automation Related Links https://spocautomation.com "We are honored to be recognized by Military & Aerospace Electronics and receive this prestigious award," said Aneesh Kothari, Systel's vice-president of marketing. "Kite-Strike delivers the next-generation of embedded computing technology and leap-ahead capabilities demanded by emerging mission sets, specifically immediate-future requirements for AI and autonomy. Products like Kite-Strike reinforce our commitment to supporting the warfighter with highly innovative and reliable computing solutions." Kite-Strike is a fully rugged, SWaP-optimized embedded edge supercomputer, purpose-built for deployment in austere environments for demanding mission-critical workloads. Integrating the NVIDIA Jetson AGX Xavier system-on-module, Kite-Strike supports force-protection high-resolution sensor systems and enables real-time AI inferencing and DL/ML capabilities at the edge. Kite-Strike is built on an open and modular architecture framework and is CMOA and MOSA-compliant. Systel successfully demonstrated Aided Target Recognition (AiTR) AI capabilities with Kite-Strike to the US Army at a recent Project Convergence 2021 event. "On behalf of the Military & Aerospace Electronics Innovators Awards, I would like to congratulate Systel on their Platinum-level honoree status," said Military & Aerospace Electronics editor-in-chief John Keller. "This competitive program allows Military & Aerospace Electronics to celebrate and recognize the most innovative products impacting the aerospace and defense community this year." Systel will showcase Kite-Strike and other rugged computing solutions at the 2021 AUSA Annual Meeting & Exposition in Washington, D.C. from October 11-13 in booth 1352. Systel's booth will feature a continuous real-time AI demonstration with multiple Kite-Strike systems. About Military & Aerospace Electronics Military & Aerospace Electronics is the leading media resource serving program and project managers, engineering managers, and engineers involved in electronic and electro-optic design for military, space, and aviation applications. Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine delivers time-sensitive news, in-depth analyses, case studies, and real-world applications of new products, industry opinion, and the latest trends in the use of mil-spec, rugged and commercial off-the-shelf components, subsystems, and systems. About Systel, Inc. Systel, Inc. is a leading manufacturer of rugged computer products and solutions Founded in 1988, Systel's pedigree of capabilities spans numerous advanced platforms with thousands of successful deployments in the defense and commercial sectors. Systel's rugged computing solutions are designed and manufactured for continuous operation under the most extreme and austere environmental conditions. All Systel products are proudly made in the USA in the company's headquarters in Sugar Land, TX. Systel is AS9100:2016 and ISO 9001:2015 certified. To learn more, visit systelusa.com, contact our Sales team, or follow us on Linkedin. 2021 Systel, Inc. All rights reserved. All marks are property of their respective owners. Contact: Aneesh Kothari Phone: 281.207.7781 Email: [email protected] SOURCE Systel, Inc. TORONTO, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. ("TGOD" or the "Company") (TSX: TGOD) (US: TGODF), a leading producer of premium certified organically grown cannabis, announces today that the Company intends to list its common shares (the "Common Shares") and listed Common Share purchase warrants (the "Warrants") on the Canadian Securities Exchange (the "CSE"), and has received conditional approval from the CSE to do so. The Company is currently addressing all outstanding items to receive final approval of its application (the "Listing Application") to list its Common Shares and Warrants on the CSE (the "CSE Listing"). Pursuant to Part VII, Section 720 of the Toronto Stock Exchange (the "TSX") Company Manual, the Company has also submitted an application to the TSX to voluntarily delist (the "Voluntary Delisting Application") its Common Shares and Warrants. The Voluntary Delisting Application is subject to TSX approval. The board of directors and management of the Company believe that listing the Common Shares and Warrants on the CSE will be beneficial to the Company and its securityholders, as a result of the Company being subject to reduced filing fees and obligations. In line with recent corporate objectives, the CSE Listing will allow the Company to accelerate plans for an entry into the United States ("U.S.") market. As mentioned in the Company's most recent quarterly results communication, initial discussions have commenced with approximately half a dozen groups in the U.S., in respect of the Company's plans to enter into the U.S. market. In order to advance these discussions, the CSE Listing is vital to show credibility in terms of being able to make an investment or complete a transaction. "We are motivated to advance our discussions past the initial phase and look forward to sharing our plans with investors as the opportunities progress," said Sean Bovingdon, Chief Executive Officer and Interim Chief Financial Officer of TGOD. "We will look to partner with entities that can build on our halo and benefit from our experience and intellectual property, while allowing for synergies to make any agreement accretive in the short term and long term. There are about 1,600 craft growers in the U.S. in the Clean Green Directory, which we feel could benefit from our CleanCraftTM growing process and capabilities." The Voluntary Delisting Application is not expected to have any impact on the Corporation's ongoing operations, nor on its ability to raise further funds, if required, to progress the continued development of its projects. The Voluntary Delisting Application is being made in conjunction with and is subject to the Company receiving final approval from the CSE for the CSE Listing. There is no guarantee that the CSE will approve the Company's Listing Application. If the Company's Listing Application receives final approval by the CSE, it is the Company's intention to take all reasonable and prudent steps, as required and with assistance and cooperation from the CSE and the TSX, to list the Company's Common Shares and Warrants on the CSE without interruption or delay. As a result, the Company is expecting the delisting of its Common Shares and Warrants from the TSX to be effective at the close of business on September 10, 2021, and the listing of its Common Shares and Warrants on the CSE to be effective on September 13, 2021. After this change, the Common Shares and Warrants will only be available for trading on the CSE. Securityholder approvals of the Voluntary Delisting Application and the CSE Listing are not required. About The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. (TSX: TGOD) (US-OTC: TGODF) is a premium certified organically grown cannabis company focused on the health and wellness market. Its organic cannabis is cultivated in living soil, as nature intended. The Company is committed to cultivating a better tomorrow by producing its products responsibly, with less waste and impact on the environment. Its Canadian facilities have been built to LEED certification standards and its products are sold in recyclable packaging. In Canada, TGOD sells dried flower and oil, and recently launched a series of next-generation cannabis products such as hash, vapes, organic teas and dissolvable powders. Through its European subsidiary, HemPoland, the Company also distributes premium hemp CBD oil and CBD-infused topicals in Europe. By leveraging science and technology, TGOD harnesses the power of nature from seed to sale. As of today's date, TGOD's Common Shares and Warrants issued under the indentures dated December 19, 2019, June 12, 2020, October 23, 2020 and December 10, 2020 trade on the TSX under the symbols "TGOD", "TGOD.WS", "TGOD.WR", "TGOD.WA", and "TGOD.WB" respectively, and TGOD'S Common Shares trade in the US on the OTCQX under the symbol "TGODF". For more information on The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd., please visit www.tgod.ca. Cautionary Statements This news release includes statements containing certain "forwardlooking information" within the meaning of applicable securities law ("forwardlooking statements"). Forward looking statements in this release include, but are not limited to, statements about the listing of the Common Shares and Warrants on the CSE, delisting of the Common Shares and Warrants from the TSX, final approval to be obtained from the CSE and the TSX, expansion of the Company into other jurisdictions including the United States, any added benefits of the Company's expansion into other jurisdictions, status of discussions with other parties relating to entry into the U.S. market, synergies with potential partners, and creating added shareholder value. Forwardlooking statements are frequently characterized by words such as "plan", "continue", "expect", "project", "intend", "should", "believe", "anticipate", "estimate", "may", "will", "potential", "proposed" and other similar words, or statements that certain events or conditions "may" or "will" occur. These statements are only predictions. Various assumptions were used in drawing the conclusions or making the projections contained in the forwardlooking statements throughout this news release. Forwardlooking statements are based on the opinions and estimates of management at the date the statements are made and are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties (including market conditions) and other factors that could cause actual events or results to differ materially from those projected in the forwardlooking statements, including those risk factors described in the Company's most recent Annual Information Form filed with Canadian securities regulators and available on the Company's issuer profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Although the Company believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing the forward-looking information or forward-looking statements in this news release are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information and no assurance can be given that such events will occur in the disclosed time frames or at all. The forward-looking information and forward-looking statements included in this news release are made as of the date of this news release. The Company is under no obligation, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation, to update or revise any forwardlooking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as expressly required by applicable law. Neither the TSX nor the TSX's Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of TSX) accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. SOURCE The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. Related Links https://www.tgod.ca/ BALTIMORE, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Out of a field of nearly 1,000 submissions, the American Visionary Art Museum (AVAM) has been selected as one of only five museums nationwide to exhibit three "weird works of art" selected by Last Week Tonight's television host John Oliver. AVAM's required special three-week mini exhibition of the national tour titled, "Last Week Tonight's Gallery for Cultural Enrichment," ( https://lwtgallery.com/ ) will showcase Oliver's collection and open at AVAM on November 1, 2021 and run through November 22, 2021. As part of being selected as a host museum, AVAM will receive a $10,000 grant, with an equal amount being donated by Oliver to a regional food bank designated by AVAM. The Maryland Food Bank was selected as AVAM's chosen recipient. The American Visionary Art Museum Wins John Olivers Last Week Tonight National Museum Contest AVAM Founder Rebecca Hoffberger exclaims, "We are thrilled! Firstly, we were deeply moved that Mr. Oliver recognized and cared that the COVID pandemic and its forced public closures had caused grievous losses to museums. That he then cooked up such a highly visible and fun challenge to publicly underscore that need - well, we were smitten!" Hoffberger included with her proposal a reference to comic truth tellers, inserting John Oliver's face into the classic photo of Oscar Wilde. "I wanted this to pop out and make Mr. Oliver smile with our thanks!" Hoffberger said. "The cherry on top is that our local Maryland Food Bank also gets his help for their good work by our win. Mr. Oliver has long made a high art of using humor to speak truth to power. We hold him in high esteem as our natural brethren to AVAM's own creative social justice DNA!" The "weird art" museum-benefitting competition was conceived by Oliver in October 2020 to highlight the plight of museums and arts organizations in dealing with the COVID-19 global pandemic. In response, nearly one-thousand museums of all sizes vied for selection, with many encouraging their patrons to lobby Oliver and Last Week Tonight through social media campaigns and online petitions. Hoffberger submitted AVAM's award-winning proposal to Mr. Oliver titled, "American Visionary Art Museum's Honeymoon for Amorous Rats, Baltimore, and Thee, Mr. Oliver" (a reference to one of the three of Oliver's works by Artist Brian Swords) writing, "Just like you and dear Oscar (Wilde), Mr. Oliver, our American Visionary Art Museum (AVAM) has wielded humor to broker all those hard truths that impact and matter most to a beautifully diverse public of all ages." Hoffberger's proposal was accompanied with a photoshopped image of Oliver as Oscar Wilde (attached) and one of Hoffberger's favorite quotes, attributed to both Wilde and George Bernard Shaw: "If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you." Hoffberger went on to detail that "Our one-of-a-kind national museum has only a small annual budget - the smallest of any of Maryland's 13 major cultural attractions - and yet has been listed as the 'ONE MUST-SEE ATTRACTION' for our state on every national list of only one recommended pick per state - be it Oprah's Destinations to US News & World Report and USA Today - and has even been included among lists of the top twenty museums of any kind in the world! We just won the 2020 World TravelAdvisory Award from TripAdvisor, designating AVAM as in the top 10% of attractions worldwide." Hoffberger designated the Maryland Food Bank as her choice for receiving the additional $10,000 grant noting, "They have long made an art out of sincerely and practically caring for people in need and and in crisis and are far more deserving of all our help now than ever." Oliver's "weird works'' will be on exhibit at AVAM from November 1 through November 22, 2021.The featured works include: Stay Up Late by Brian Swords - 1992: Dimensions 18 H x 24 W Watercolor on Paper Ties by Judith Kudlow date unknown: Dimensions 14in H x 11in W Oil on Canvas Wendy Williams Eating A Lamb Chop, 2020 (artist unknown) Dimensions 36in H x 46in W Acrylic on Plywood Board About the American Visionary Art Museum (AVAM) is a Congressionally-designated national museum and education center dedicated to intuitive, self-taught artistry. It champions the role intuition plays in creative invention and innovation of all sorts be it art, science, engineering, humor or philosophy, and especially in compassionate acts of social justice and betterment. For more information to go: AVAM.ORG Contact: Greg Tucker, [email protected], 410-624-9536 SOURCE American Visionary Art Museum LEBANON, N.H., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Celdara Medical, LLC (Celdara), The New Hampshire Academy of Science (NHAS), and Crossroads Academy announced today the opening of the Fanger Center. The Fanger Center is an adaptable, cutting-edge facility that functions dually as the Crossroads Academy middle school by day and a New Hampshire Academy of Sciences STEM lab outside of school hours, enabling afterschool, holiday, and summer use. This unique collaboration makes the Fanger Center accessible to STEM-interested middle- and high-school students across the region through NHAS Programs, which include need-based financial aid. Constructed on the Crossroads Academy campus in Lyme, NH, the purpose-built facility was supported by Celdara and named after Dr. Michael Fanger, who co-founded Celdara Medical in 2008 with Dr. Jake Reder. The new facility, designed for chemistry, biology, mathematics, engineering, and computer science, is available to students across New Hampshire and Vermont. An outdoor ribbon cutting ceremony was held today for students and teachers to celebrate the start of the school year in the new space. "The NHAS has a mission to further the work of scientists and future scientists in New Hampshire by providing a forum for scientific discussion, interaction, and collaboration," notes NHAS Executive Director, Dr. Peter Faletra. "The Fanger Center provides an expanded space for students from all our communities to engage in authentic scientific research with teachers and STEM professionals through an apprenticeship model. NHAS intends to be a main hub for STEM opportunities in the states of NH and VT, with The Fanger Center serving as its flagship STEM research Center. Accessibility is core to our efforts; it is our goal to ensure that motivated students can attend, independent of their financial means." Crossroads Head of School, Mr. Dan Morrissey, adds: "At Crossroads Academy, our faculty set children on learning journeys in every field of discovery, teaching them that knowledge and virtue strong minds and kind hearts can change the world. Like Dr. Fanger, our community is eager to create a better future and is continually exploring ways to do so. The inauguration of the Fanger Center on our 30th Anniversary represents our continued investment in thought leadership and innovation. We are thrilled that the region's middle and high school students will have the opportunity to engage in high quality curricular and extra-curricular science and engineering research through our unique partnership with NHAS." The Fanger Center is a replicable and scalable model for schools worldwide and builds upon the success of the current NHAS STEM lab. In addition to regional STEM outreach programs, teacher training and authentic research experiences for students, the existing NHAS STEM lab has resulted in over 100 students from 15 regional schools publishing their research with the American Junior Academy of Science and presenting their work at the annual meetings of the American Association for the Advancement for Science (AAAS). The Fanger Center expands the existing 1,200 square feet of biology lab space to include an additional 2,500 square feet of lab space, in addition to offices, conference spaces, and future-ready maker spaces, all focused on the physical sciences, computer science and engineering. "Mike and I founded Celdara to transform the work of leading scientists into products and services that can help humanity. Mike gave immeasurably to the field of scientific education, as a mentor, entrepreneur, and academician. Increasing equitable access to educational opportunities and investing in STEM leaders of the future is a wonderful way to honor Mike's legacy. Some of the next generation of leading scientists, mathematicians, and engineers will find their inspiration here," said Jake Reder, co-founder and CEO of Celdara Medical. In 1981, Dr. Fanger joined Dartmouth Medical School's Immunology Program, creating a world-renowned Department of Microbiology and Immunology, for which he served as Chairperson for a decade. As an entrepreneur, Dr. Fanger cofounded the pioneering biotechnology company Medarex, generating technology which created nearly half of the human antibodies approved to date. Two Medarex medicines ignited the immunoncology revolution, providing hope for previously incurable patients and saving thousands of lives. In 2018, Drs. Jim Allison and Tasuku Honjo received the Nobel Prize in Medicine for their pioneering work that led to these world changing Medarex drugs. "Mike's impact in the biotech industry is the stuff of legend, but for the many of us that he inspired, his teaching, counselling, advising, mentoring and friendship may be even more impactful. These virtues are a big part of why we are honoring his legacy with this Center. My hope is that every student who passes through these doors will learn something about Mike and realize that they too can be great by doing good," said Reder. About Celdara Medical Celdara Medical was founded by Drs. Jake Reder and Michael Fanger in 2008 and is headquartered at the Dartmouth Regional Technology Center (DRTC) in Lebanon, N.H. Celdara Medical builds academic and early-stage innovations into high-potential medical companies, identifying discoveries of exceptional value at the earliest stages and moving them toward the market. Celdara Medical partners with inventors and their institutions, providing the developmental, financial, and business acumen required to bridge discovery and profitability. With robust funding options, a diverse and high impact Programmatic pipeline, and partnerships with world-class academic institutions and industry leaders, Celdara Medical navigates all aspects of a complex industry, accelerating science to improve human health. Learn More: https://celdaramedical.com/ About the New Hampshire Academy of Science The New Hampshire Academy of Science, Inc. (NHAS) is a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) organization and an affiliated organization of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). NHAS supports the scientific research of New Hampshire high school and middle school students and sponsors their attendance at the annual symposium of the largest scientific organization in the world, the AAAS. The NHAS Mission is to further the work of scientists and future scientists in New Hampshire, provide a forum for scientific discussion, interaction, and collaboration with the general public through our website and conferences, increase public understanding and appreciation of the importance and promise of science in human welfare and progress, and encourage authentic scientific research by having scientists mentor students in middle and high schools. Learn More: https://www.nhacadsci.org/ About Crossroads Academy Crossroads Academy is an independent, coeducational day school committed to academic excellence and moral integrity. We inspire our students to love learning, act honorably, and contribute actively to intellectual, cultural, and civic life. Crossroads Academy was the first independent Core Knowledge school in the United States, and also the first Core Virtue school. We believe that virtues such as perseverance, intellectual honesty, and intellectual courage are both academic and moral virtues. This belief is reflected in the school motto "Scientia Virtusque""Knowledge and Virtue." At Crossroads Academy, the Core Virtues create an ethos of responsibility and caring that fosters a disciplined, passionate, and cooperative pursuit of our program. As students master the content and practice the virtues, they gain, over time, an appreciation of who they are and who they aspire to be. Learn More: https://www.crossroadsacademy.org/ SOURCE Celdara Medical DALLAS, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- We are pleased to announce the appointment of Todd Elms as President & COO, effective August 23, 2021. During his 12 years with Instant Power Corporation, Elms has held many roles across brand marketing, innovation, and customer development. He most recently served as VP of Sales and Marketing, where he fueled the growth trajectory and expansion for the company across multiple geographies. In his new role, Todd will be responsible for maintaining and growing the company's mission, profitability, and fulfilling required benchmarks. In addition, he will provide strategic financial input and leadership on decision-making issues affecting the organization with a focus on performance and continuous improvement of all company activities to ensure they drive growth and customer experience. "From day one, I have been inspired by our business, people, and passion for the industry. Over the past decade, I've had the unique opportunity to experience our business from multiple viewpoints, from product innovation to sales, which has given me an incredible understanding of our brand, our business, our customers, and our consumer," said Elms. "I'm honored to steward the company and its mission as we enter a pivotal time for expansive growth." Former President Lawrence Siegel will continue leading the overall organization as CEO and Board member to ensure the culture, mission, and values remain the focal point of every company action. Todd Elms started his career in retail before moving into product marketing and sales. He holds an MBA from the University of Dallas and a BBA from Texas Tech University. About Instant Power Corporation Instant Power Corporation is a 53-year old family-owned and managed business dedicated to delivering seriously better solutions. Instant Power Corporation is a global supplier and known leader in DIY plumbing, drain chemicals and home cleaning solutions, based in the USA, headquartered in Dallas, Texas. Instant Power is the seriously better, drain experts you trust; our products are guaranteed to clear clogs. Instant Power's largest customers include Fortune 500 hardware, home improvement, mass merchandise, and grocery retailers. Instant Power Corporation also includes Instant Power Professional. For more information, please visit www.myinstantpower.com SOURCE Instant Power Related Links http://www.myinstantpower.com Considered one of the happiest countries in the world, Fiji is best known for its people. While its 333 islands offer breathtaking beaches, award-winning resorts and spas, and adventure activities, the popular destination sets itself apart from other tropical paradises with the hospitality of local residents and the warmth and happiness they ensure every traveler feels while visiting their homeland. As the new partner, 9thWonder will apply its strategic focus to develop messaging, find travel-ready audiences through its ConsumerX targeting, and execute on its digital marketing expertise to encourage North American travelers to plan and book their post-pandemic Fiji vacation. Through a targeted digital ad campaign, 9thWonder will help travelers get a glimpse of the happiness, adventure, and relaxation that await just an easy, overnight flight away. "It is no surprise that COVID-19 has greatly affected the travel and tourism industry," said Ruth Daly, Regional Manager of Tourism Fiji. "We knew we needed a strategic partner that could help us navigate the ever-changing landscape of the pandemic, and 9thWonder is without a doubt that trusted partner. Our North American visitors are so important to us and to the Fijian economy, and 9thWonder has that creative lens and strategy that will help drive excitement for future travel" The "Find Your Bula" campaign includes an interactive quiz that provides travelers with a travel itinerary matching their preferences for optimal happiness. The campaign plays off of the Fijian greeting "bula" a term with many meanings including hello, happiness, good health, and the energy of life. Travelers interested in taking the quiz or learning more can do so at fiji.travel/findyourbula. The addition of Tourism Fiji to 9thWonder's roster of clients further defines the agency's deep bench of travel and destination experience, having worked with Legoland Resorts, Energy Corridor, Heavenly Ski Resort, Tahiti Tourisme, WEHO Design District, City of El Segundo and Los Angeles World Airport (LAX). "We are thrilled to be partnering with Tourism Fiji to help drive anticipation and excitement for the reopening of Fiji," said Scott Thaler, chief marketing officer, 9thWonder. "It's certainly been a roller coaster of a year, and we know people are itching to get away. Fiji is truly the perfect post-pandemic vacation as it isand has always beenthe ultimate travel spot for natural social distancing." For more information about the "Find Your Bula" campaign, please visit fiji.travel/findyourbula. For more information on 9thWonder, please visit 9thwonder.com. About 9thWonder 9thWonder is a minority-owned independent marketing agency comprised of diverse thinkers committed to harnessing the power of difference. 9thWonder has offices spanning North America, South America and Asia, with capabilities including: brand strategy, media planning, creative, research, digital strategy and development, public relations, social media and more. With clients across a wide-range of industries, 9thWonder knows how to market to a diverse America and generate real marketplace results. Contact: Emma Wach [email protected] (630) 390-8474 SOURCE 9thWonder TYLER, Texas, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Education Advanced, Inc., a leading provider of operations management and workflow solutions for K-12 school districts, announced today that two of its products, Cardonex and BuildYourOwnCurriculum (BYOC), have been named Tech & Learning Secondary (6-12) Winners at the 2021 Awards of Excellence: Back to School. "We are honored to be recognized for our leadership in the advancement of education, especially in these uncommon and demanding times," said Education Advanced CEO Dr. Eli Crow. "With over 900 years of education leadership experience, our team deeply understands the challenges associated with school operations. We exist to help educators increase efficiency to build a better future for their schools and the students within them." Cardonex is a patented school master scheduling and staff planning technology that integrates with existing SIS solutions to empower school leaders to build student-centered master schedules and data-driven staffing plans before the first day of school. BuildYourOwnCurriculum (BYOC) is a collaborative curriculum and instruction solution connecting learning objectives to a continuous cycle of development, delivery, assessment, and refinement across teachers, classrooms, and grade-levels in K-12 school districts. "As we head into another uncertain year in education, technology will continue to be one of the key drivers for innovation," says Tech & Learning Group Publisher Christine Weiser. "Our judges chose the winning products recognized here for their versatility, compatibility, value, and ability to help schools solve challenges and support continuous instruction. Congratulations to all of our winners." About Education Advanced, Inc. Education Advanced is a provider of operations management and workflow solutions for K-12 school districts that enable educators to be more efficient, allowing them to dedicate more of their time and resources to exceeding student needs. EAI's product offering includes Cardonex, TestHound, and BuildYourOwnCurriculum (BYOC). These award-winning and patented technology solutions advance the efficacy of master scheduling, staff planning, curriculum development and delivery, and assessment coordination for K-12 school districts across the country. Learn more at www.educationadvanced.com. SOURCE Education Advanced Related Links https://educationadvanced.com Latest Survey from Accuity Reveals Contrasts in How Global Organizations Manage Trade and Export Compliance Tweet this The trade compliance survey conducted by Accuity during the first half of 2021 questioned more than 120 professionals from leading banks, insurance and fintech organizations operating in APAC, EMEA and the Americas. The study shows how widespread manual search remains even years after the emergence of automated solutions to detect trade compliance risks, such as sanctioned entities and dual-use goods. Key findings from the research: Trade compliance is not always handled by a dedicated team: Banks are managing trade compliance mostly through a dedicated compliance function. Non-banking financial institutions (NBFIs) are handling it as part of the KYC process and corporations as part of a central compliance function or general operational team. Banks are managing trade compliance mostly through a dedicated compliance function. Non-banking financial institutions (NBFIs) are handling it as part of the KYC process and corporations as part of a central compliance function or general operational team. Multi-variable screening is mostly limited to banks: More than 90% of banks screen for five or more data points, including sanctions, goods, vessel names and ultimate beneficial owners (UBOs), compared to only a third of non-banks. More than 90% of banks screen for five or more data points, including sanctions, goods, vessel names and ultimate beneficial owners (UBOs), compared to only a third of non-banks. Challenges posed by changing regulation: The biggest challenges for banks and corporations are keeping up with rapidly changing regulations and increasing expectations, while NBFIs find document-heavy processes the biggest burden. The biggest challenges for banks and corporations are keeping up with rapidly changing regulations and increasing expectations, while NBFIs find document-heavy processes the biggest burden. Efficiency gains planned: Sixty percent of firms revealed that they plan to invest in the integration/interconnectivity of systems, with 74% looking to improve data sharing and transparency. Sixty percent of firms revealed that they plan to invest in the integration/interconnectivity of systems, with 74% looking to improve data sharing and transparency. Compliance as an advantage: Competitive advantage is seen as the main benefit of trade compliance. Corporations reported less concern over fines, while prioritising improving the flow of business through smarter licence management. Accuity customer Enas Hamed, Sanctions Unit Head at the Housing Bank for Trade and Finance in Jordan, said, "We have prioritized digitizing and automating our process for screening trade finance transactions against local and international sanctions lists. In doing so, the bank increases its efficiency levels by cutting down on time spent processing and screening potential transactions manually, while simultaneously allowing for a clear audit trail and increased effectiveness in its dealings with both regulatory bodies and its customers." Aneta Klosek, director, trade compliance, at Accuity said, "Trade compliance is a critical function where mistakes can cost businesses millions. An area where the smallest omission can throw off the entire strategy of a business is no place to take a chance. On the other hand, the study has shown that getting trade compliance right can produce a significant competitive advantage, so there is every reason for firms across the breadth of the supply chain to make this a focus. We are seeing more banks and other organizations turn to comprehensive data and technology-enabled solutions to ensure their compliance framework is absolutely watertight and they have flourished throughout the pandemic as a result." Download the infographic, How Companies are Tackling Trade Compliance. To learn more about the issues surrounding trade and export compliance, read the new whitepaper, Trade, Trafficking and Technology: The Ongoing Fight Against Financial Crime. About Accuity Accuity, a LexisNexis Risk Solutions company, powers compliant and assured client transactions to help build an interconnected and trusted financial ecosystem. Our financial crime screening, payment services, and benefits compliance solutions help enable financial inclusion while identifying criminal activity and fraudulent players. With deep expertise and industry-leading data and analytics solutions from the Firco and Bankers Almanac brands, Accuity provides unmatched confidence, efficiency, and compliance for customers around the world. Part of RELX, a global provider of information-based analytics and decision tools for professional and business customers, Accuity has been delivering solutions to banks and businesses worldwide for 180 years. Media Contact: Imogen Nash +44 (0)7789 924 920 [email protected] SOURCE LexisNexis Risk Solutions Related Links http://www.lexisnexis.com HOUSTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- When it comes to witnessing serious crimes, University of Houston Law Center Associate Professor Zachary D. Kaufman believes that people not only have a moral duty but also should have a legal one to get involved. Kaufman, who specializes in Criminal Law and International Law, is writing a series of articles, essays, and op-eds about bystanders and upstanders that will culminate in his next book (under contract with Cambridge University Press). These publications focus on "Bad Samaritan laws," which Kaufman defines in his writing as "statutes that impose a legal duty to assist others in peril through intervening directly (also known as the duty to rescue) or notifying authorities (also known as the duty to report)." As part of his research, Kaufman has compiled the most comprehensive global database of Bad Samaritan laws, encompassing U.S., foreign, and international statutes. In this database and an article, "Protectors of Predators or Prey" (published in the Southern California Law Review), Kaufman documents many more Bad Samaritan laws than any other scholar, which demonstrates that these laws are more widespread than previously recognized. Just within the United States, he has found that such laws exist in 29 states and Puerto Rico, and that Congress enacted a very narrow one, the Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Abuse and Safe Sport Authorization Act, in 2018. As Kaufman has noted, Texas alone has three Bad Samaritan laws: a duty to report felonies in which a reasonable person would believe that serious bodily injury or death may have resulted, a duty to rescue or report in the context of aggravated sexual assault of a child, and a duty to report child abuse or neglect. Kaufman supports Bad Samaritan laws in limited contexts. Specifically, he argues in an article, "Digital Age Samaritans" (published in the Boston College Law Review), that all U.S. states and territories should impose on witnesses a legal duty to report specified violent offenses (murder, kidnapping, sexual assault, aggravated assault, and felonious assault) when it would be safe and reasonable to do so. Where such statutes exist but don't already apply to the serious crimes Kaufman has enumerated, he thinks the laws should be revised to do so. He also recommends other features of Bad Samaritan laws. For example, as he argues in an op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle, he thinks that such statutes should not be restricted to child victims, as the duty-to-report laws in California and Nevada currently are. As Kaufman asserts in this op-ed, "adolescents and adults need and deserve protection, too." Assembling all of his policy prescriptions, Kaufman proposes in "Digital Age Samaritans" a model duty-to-report law for the modern era that legislators could use as they amend or enact Bad Samaritan laws. In his recent research, Kaufman argues that awareness and reporting of serious crimes can be facilitated by technological innovations. In "Digital Age Samaritans," he examines witnesses who view offenses remotely. "Modern technology enables a potentially massive, distributed audience to view, document, and share evidence of crimes," he wrote in the article. "Electronic transmission and receipt of this material through, for example, social media and mobile devices, raises legal, moral, and practical questions about spectators' responsibilities." After conducting extensive research, Kaufman arrived at various potential opportunities that social media and mobile devices provide crime witnesses in these situations. He argues that this technology "enables users to observe crimes, preserve evidence for potential investigations and prosecutions, raise the public's awareness of misconduct, and assist victims or police after or even during the commission of offenses." He further notes that prosecutors "can benefit from these opportunities to obtain convictions in situations that would have been more difficult in the past." A recent, high-profile example of a crime witness facing a choice about how to respond occurred amid Derek Chauvin's killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2020. In an op-ed in the Houston Chronicle, Kaufman commends the actions of Darnella Frazier, whose recording of the killing went viral. While arguing that a Bad Samaritan law didn't and shouldn't legally require civilians to record or report police brutality, Kaufman states that Frazier's video was crucial, and perhaps even essential, in convicting Chauvin of murder and manslaughter. Besides arguing why and how certain bystanders should be prodded to be upstanders, Kaufman has contributed to conceptual understanding of these two categories of witnesses. In both Protectors of Predators or Prey and Digital Age Samaritans he created nuanced, novel typologies of bystanders and upstanders that increase comprehension of the variety of these spectators. Kaufman's research and recommendations about Bad Samaritan laws have attracted attention from both academics and policymakers. The Southeastern Association of Law Schools (SEALS) awarded Protectors of Predators or Prey SEALS's 2020 Call for Papers Award, an annual prize for excellence in scholarship on any subject by a professor of any rank at a SEALS member school. Legislators at the state and federal levels have taken interest in recommendations contained in Kaufman's scholarship. For example, Rep. Jackie Speier incorporated his proposed language about bystander intervention training into the State Harassment and Assault Prevention and Eradication (SHAPE) Act. Kaufman's publications to date on bystanders, upstanders, and Bad Samaritan laws include: Kaufman is Associate Professor of Law and Political Science in the Law Center, where he is Co-Director of the Criminal Justice Institute and teaches Criminal Law, International Law, and a seminar on International Justice and Atrocities. A Life Member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Kaufman currently serves as both Co-Chair of the American Society of International Law's Human Rights Interest Group and Secretary (and future Chair) of the Association of American Law Schools' International Human Rights Section. Two months ago, Kaufman testified before the Belgian Parliament about international and domestic options to prosecute suspected Islamic State members, including more than 500 Belgian citizens and residents who allegedly joined or supported the Islamic State. UHLC media contacts: Carrie Anna Criado, UH Law Center Assistant Dean of Communications and Marketing, 713-743-2184, [email protected] ; Elena Hawthorne, Assistant Director of Communications and Marketing, 713-743-1125, [email protected] ; and John Brannen, Media Relations Rep, 713-743-3055, [email protected] . About the University of Houston Law Center The University of Houston Law Center (UHLC) is a dynamic, top tier law school located in the nation's 4th largest city. UHLC's Health Law, Intellectual Property Law, and Part-time programs rank in the U.S. News Top 10. It awards Doctor of Jurisprudence (J.D.) and Master of Laws (LL.M.) degrees, through its academic branch, the College of Law. The Law Center is more than just a law school. It is a powerful hub of intellectual activity with more than 11 centers and institutes which fuel its educational mission and national reputation. UHLC is fully accredited by the American Bar Association and is a member of the Association of American Law Schools. About the University of Houston The University of Houston is a Carnegie-designated Tier One public research university recognized with a Phi Beta Kappa chapter for excellence in undergraduate education. UH serves the globally competitive Houston and Gulf Coast Region by providing world-class faculty, experiential learning and strategic industry partnerships. Located in the nation's fourth-largest city and one of the most ethnically and culturally diverse regions in the country, UH is a federally designated Hispanic- and Asian-American-Serving institution with enrollment of more than 47,000 students. SOURCE University of Houston Law Center Related Links http://www.law.uh.edu DUBLIN, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Insect Repellent Market 2021-2027" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The global Insect Repellent market is projected to grow at a substantial CAGR of 6.5% during the forecast period (2021-2027). The key aspect that drives the growth of the market includes the increased preference of the people to contain the diseases that spread from bugs or mosquitos. Various diseases such as zika, malaria, chikungunya, and dengue occur due to the infection spread from the mosquitos or bugs, thus, to avoid such mishappening and increased awareness of the consumers, the market is likely to grow during the forecast period. Various novel product launches by the companies including natural contents are also likely to drive the market growth during the forecast period. The global Insect Repellent market is segmented on the basis of category type, product type, and distribution channel. Based on the category type, the market is segmented as a natural insect repellent and conventional insect repellent. The natural insect repellent segment is estimated to hold a lucrative share in the market. Based on the product type, the market is segmented as coil & mat, liquid vaporizer, spray/aerosol, cream & oil, and others. The coil & mat segment is estimated to hold a lucrative share in the market. Based on the distribution channel, the market is segmented into offline channels and online channels. The online channels segment is estimated to hold a lucrative share in the market. Whereas, based on geography, the global insect repellent market is segmented as North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and the Rest of the World. The Asia-Pacific region is estimated to hold a lucrative share in the market. Further, Avon Products Inc., Henkel AG & Co. KGaA, Newell Brands, Perrigo Company Plc (Omega Pharma), Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC, S. C. Johnson & Son Inc., and Spectrum Brands Holdings Inc. among others are some of the prominent players functioning in the global Insect Repellent market. New product launches & developments, partnerships, agreements, and acquisitions are some of the growth strategies adopted by the players in order to sustain in the highly competitive market. Market Segmentation Global Insect Repellent Market Research and Analysis by Category Type Global Insect Repellent Market Research and Analysis by Product Type Global Insect Repellent Market Research and Analysis by Distribution Channel The Report Covers Comprehensive Research Methodology of the global Insect Repellent market. This report also includes a detailed and extensive market overview with key analyst insights. An exhaustive analysis of macro and micro factors influencing the market guided by key recommendations. Analysis of regional regulations and other government policies impacting the global Insect Repellent market. Insights about market determinants which are stimulating the global Insect Repellent market. Detailed and extensive market segments with regional distribution of forecast revenues. Extensive profiles and recent developments of the market players. Key Topics Covered: 1. Report Summary 2. Market Overview and Insights 3. Competitive Landscape 3.1. Competitive Dashboard 3.2. Key Strategy Analysis 3.3. Key Company Analysis 3.3.1. Overview 3.3.2. Financial Analysis 3.3.3. SWOT Analysis 3.3.4. Recent Developments 4. Market Determinants 4.1. Motivators 4.2. Restraints 4.3. Opportunities 5. Market Segmentation 5.1. Global Insect Repellent Market by Category Type 5.1.1. Natural Insect Repellent 5.1.2. Conventional Insect Repellent 5.2. Global Insect Repellent Market by Product Type 5.2.1. Coil&Mat 5.2.2. Liquid Vaporizer 5.2.3. Spray/Aerosol 5.2.4. Cream & Oil 5.2.5. Others 5.3. Global Insect Repellent Market by Distribution Channel 5.3.1. Offline Channels 5.3.2. Online Channels 6. Regional Analysis 7. Company Profiles 7.1. Avon Products Inc. 7.2. Coglans Ltd. 7.3. Dabur India Ltd. 7.4. Enesis Group 7.5. Godrej Consumer Products Ltd. 7.6. Henkel AG & Co. KGaA 7.7. Jyothy Labs Ltd. 7.8. Newell Brands 7.9. Perrigo Company Plc (Omega Pharma) 7.10. Quantum Health Inc. 7.11. Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC 7.12. S. C. Johnson & Son Inc. 7.13. Spectrum Brands Holdings Inc. 7.14. Swayer Ltd. 7.15. The Himalayan Drug Co. For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/c72cmg Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com BOSTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Algofi today announces the upcoming launch of its fast, low-cost, decentralized lending market on the Algorand blockchain. The protocol is currently live on Algorand's TestNet, with plans to launch on MainNet by Q4 of this year. The simple-to-use platform allows everyone from crypto-native traders to less tech-savvy retail users to earn high-interest yield on their cryptocurrency. Algofi will also feature seamless on-ramps for fiat currency into crypto on Algorand, allowing users to begin earning yield on Algofi almost instantly. Founders John Clarke and Owen Colegrove bring traditional finance backgrounds to Algofi, having worked on Citadel's fixed income team before leaving to ideate a new decentralized finance solution, which took shape within Y Combinator's summer 2021 accelerator and launched as Algofi in August 2021. Algofi selected Algorand as its underlying technology partner due to the ready availability of robust developer tools which enabled the simple creation of smart contracts that power Algofi; the active and engaged community around Algorand; and the technology's proven success in real-world financial use cases. In order to create a platform that is user-friendly on a mass scale, points of friction like high transaction fees and confusing bridging processes are untenable: "Building on Algorand enables < $0.01 transactions compared to ~$15 or more on other incumbent networks," said Algofi cofounder John Clarke. "High costs and slow transactions make decentralized lending markets inaccessible to the majority of potential users, so going with a Layer-1 proof of stake protocol like Algorand just made sense. We're also excited to be a part of Algorand's burgeoning DeFi ecosystem alongside the likes of Yieldly, Tinyman and Algodex, where we already see a lot of synergies." "Innovative thinkers like Algofi are building thoughtful and accessible DeFi solutions on Algorand," said David Markley, Director of Business Solutions at Algorand. "Algorand's secure, decentralized technology makes it easy and efficient for the development of disruptive financial products, and we are thrilled to see Algofi joining the expanding ecosystem of DeFi offerings that are based on Algorand's open source technology." Algofi aims to be the first crypto-native bank to truly bridge the gap between traditional and decentralized finance. The initial lending protocol will launch for users everywhere in Q4 of 2021, with additional fiat on- and off-ramp solutions, and more, forthcoming. "Using Algorand will allow us to do things that you can't even dream of doing on, say, Ethereum," Algofi cofounder Owen Colegrove told KryptoNurd 's Monty Allen. "You can start imagining high-speed transactions where you're making real world payments against your balances, or drawing a line of credit very seamlessly against your holdings in the [Algofi] platform....just facilitating real world interactions very cleanly." About Algofi Algofi is building a fast, low-cost crypto lending market on the Algorand blockchain. Building on Algorand enables sub-cent transactions compared to ~$15 on the incumbent Ethereum network. High costs and slow transactions made previous decentralized lending markets inaccessible to the majority of potential users. Traders can use Algofi to go short or to trade with leverage. In addition, users can use the simple fiat on-ramp to begin earning interest on their cryptos. Algofi is planning to offer traditional banking services like savings accounts and credit cards that will be powered by Algorand's growing DeFi ecosystem. About Algorand, Inc. Algorand is building the technology to power the Future of Finance (FutureFi), the convergence of traditional and decentralized models into a unified system that is inclusive, frictionless, and secure. Founded by Turing Award-winning cryptographer Silvio Micali, Algorand developed a blockchain infrastructure that offers the interoperability and capacity to handle the volume of transactions needed for defi, financial institutions and governments to smoothly transition into FutureFi. The technology of choice for more than 700 global organizations, Algorand is enabling the simple creation of next generation financial products, protocols and exchange of value. For more information, visit www.algorand.com . Media contact: Algofi Owen Colegrove & John Clarke [email protected] Algorand, Inc. [email protected] SOURCE Algofi Reliability is key in mission-critical applications, A weak or depleted nickel-zinc cell, unlike lead-acid or lithium batteries, remains conductive, allowing the string to continue operating. "We're thrilled to win the 2021 Top Tier Product Award in Mission Critical Magazine's UPS Systems Category," said ZincFive's CEO, Tim Hysell. "The capability of nickel-zinc batteries is a paradigm shift in battery string reliability and uptime. This award is recognition of that." The power density of the nickel-zinc batteries used in the BC Series Battery Cabinets is also well-suited to large-scale energy storage, where delivering the smallest footprint per megawatt is important to the end-user. "High power density must be accompanied with safety in operation, and ZincFive has developed a high-power density battery that does not exhibit thermal runaway at the cell level based on the results of UL testing," said Aaron Schott, Senior Product Manager, Data Centers, ZincFive. ZincFive's BC Series Battery Cabinet innovates beyond the battery by designing the cabinets to be drop-in replacements for lead-acid battery-based backup systems. Users can utilize the BC Series without modification to their existing UPS. "Previously, BESS users have had to compromise in one or more areas of performance, safety, or the environment when choosing energy storage solutions," said Hysell. "ZincFive's BC Series Battery Cabinets minimize these compromises in BESS while bringing a disruptive battery technology in a turnkey solution to a large global market." Independent third-party analysis of end-to-end environmental impact shows nickel-zinc batteries to have a climate impact score significantly superior to lead-acid and lithium battery chemistries. "This product appears to offer significant advantages with footprint and reliability over lead-acid and lithium-ion UPS battery solutions for new and retrofit applications," said one of the judges. "In addition, the low environmental impact of the product may help end-users meet sustainability goals and green initiatives." About ZincFive, Inc. The modern electrified world requires safe, reliable, powerful, and green battery storage to realize the potential of technology for society. ZincFive's nickel-zinc batteries are the high-power, fail-safe, fully recyclable battery technology powering the future. ZincFive is the world leader in innovation and delivery of nickel-zinc battery-based uninterruptible power solutions for mission-critical applications in Data Centers and Intelligent Transportation as well as providing batteries and storage solutions for Electric Grid reliability and Motive applications. With over 100 patents awarded, ZincFive leverages safe, green nickel-zinc chemistry within its solutions to provide high power density and performance simultaneous with superior safety and environmental advantages. ZincFive is a privately held company based in Tualatin, Oregon. zincfive.com . SOURCE ZincFive, Inc. Related Links http://zincfive.com Analysts at JP Morgan believe the British Airways owner can achieve attractive margins once the market begins to normalise - whenever that may be. When will IAG shares get airborne again? Heres what one leading London bank reckons. Shares in British Airways owner IAG ( ) have had more trouble getting off the ground than the planes it has mothballed during the pandemic. Since early April the stock has lost around 25% of its value as the recovery in international air travel has been stalled by the Covid delta variant. Fears the US may not open its air borders to European visitors as envisaged next month have further depressed sentiment. Yet the ever-optimistic team at JP Morgan Cazenove (JPMC) is keeping the faith with IAG in spite of the headwinds. That said, it had tweaked down its 2021-24 EBITDA and EPS forecasts and has set a new multiples-based price target of 2.45, down from 2.70. Sticking with its overweight recommendation, JPMC told clients: The global aviation market remains very challenging. It remains very difficult to predict the pace and magnitude of the air traffic recovery and, as always, even harder to forecast fares. However, IAG has taken radical action to cut costs and this underpins our view that it can achieve attractive EBITA margins once the market begins to normalise, which we do expect in the next few years. We also note IAGs very low valuation multiples.and so continue to recommend the stock to long-term investors. The company says drilling in 2021 so far has significantly de-risked the Rukwa Basin, demonstrating a working helium system ( ) is looking ahead to a very low cost winter exploration programme at the Rukwa project, chief executive David Minchin has told Proactive. Minchin, in an interview following the results of the Tai-2 well, explained that the findings of the latest well have opened up and de-risked an opportunity to explore for and, subject to results, potentially develop shallow helium resources at Rukwa. Lightweight drilling equipment could be on the ground and in motion before the end of the year, he added. First, the company is advancing plans for geophysical work to further de-risk and prepare for the winter programme. At the same time, the deeper resource potential at Rukwa remains for future programmes to assess. In the interview, Minchin meanwhile highlights the flexibility afforded by the companys healthy cash position. We're well financed, we have got 10mln left in the in the bank. And that gives us a great deal of optionality, and the ability to advance the project very rapidly, Minchin said. I'm looking to mobilise seismic imaging physical this season, so that we're able to get information from before the rain starts in mid-November, it's ambitious, but we try our best because I hate wasting time. Tai-2 well result This morning, Helium One announced the completion of its two-well drill programme. The Tai-2 well completing without identifying helium gas. The two wells drilled in the campaign leave the explorer with a proven working helium system, with beneficial packages of geological data, but not with material discoveries of helium. Chief executive David Minchin highlighted that the Tai-2 well verified the potential for development of newly identified 'Shallow' traps within the Lake Bed Formation, which he says has capacity to open up low-cost exploration of near surface targets along with the deeper potential seen at the Rukwa project in Tanzania. At the same time, chairman Ian Stalker added: Work undertaken so far in 2021 has significantly de-risked the Rukwa Basin by demonstrating a working helium system. "With our maiden exploration campaign clearly demonstrating prospectivty at multiple levels across the basin, the company can now move rapidly to develop a Phase 2 exploration programme that offers value for money. Using various geophysical techniques, we can quickly and cheaply advance both 'shallow' and 'deep' target types to de-risk our ability] to make a commercial discovery with Phase 2 drilling. Stalker noted that Helium One is well financed to deliver its Phase 2 plans, with the focus on cost-effective exploration. Tai-2 was located just some 20 metres from the preceding Tai-1 well which encountered helium shows and multiple intervals that could not be tested due to poor well conditions. The second well was drilled from the same drill pad as Tai-1 and had the same exploration targets. Prior to drilling Tai-2, the company said it had de-risked the project because of the findings of the first well which had confirmed a working helium system. ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) David Minchin joins Proactive about the completion of its 2021 exploration drilling campaign. Minchin talks viewers through what they believe is significant new data to move rapidly to Phase 2 exploration work at its 100% owned Rukwa Project in Tanzania. He says results from Tai-1 have shown a prolific basin with helium shows identified at multiple levels from near surface to basement. And the identification of a 130m thick sealing unit at the top of the Karoo Formation, and presence of untested helium shows within Karoo reservoir, demonstrates potential for 'Deep' structural traps within the Karoo Formation. ( , ) (LSE:CSN, ) John Deane joins Proactive London's Katie Pilbeam to talk about their half-year performance for the life and pensions group. The dividend again rose by 3%, the 17th annual increase as Deane explains and the group completed another acquisition in the Netherlands and have successfully transferred the policies onto the systems of Waard. Statutory pre-tax profits for the half-year to end June 2021 were 20.8mln (9.1mln loss) while net income was 1.9mln (15.1mln) reflecting a 15.9mln foreign exchange loss. This is Deane's last interview with Proactive after announcing he will be stepping down and Steve Murray will take over the reins as chief executive once UK approvals have been given. The airline suspended flights from the airport at the start of the pandemic to use vacant slots at Heathrow British Airways, part of airline conglomerate ( ), is considering shifting all its short-haul operations into a new low-cost subsidiary based at Gatwick Airport, according to reports today. The airline suspended flights from the airport at the start of the pandemic to use vacant slots at Heathrow but with flights starting to edge back towards pre-pandemic levels, the airline is said to be keen to re-establish its presence in the shorter flight end of the market. British Airways has traditionally earned much of its revenue from long-haul especially the US to UK routes and has been hit hard by Covid as these flights have almost all been halted by the pandemic. A subsidiary would allow it to lower its cost base and compete more effectively with dominant European discount carriers such as Ryanair PLC, EasyJet PLC and WizzAir PLC. A British Airways spokesman told the Wall Street Journal any progress on the new subsidiary will require agreement being reached with the groups unions. Earlier today, Gatwick, which is owned by French industrial group Vinci, said it was considering a way to boost capacity at the airport by converting its emergency runaway into a second landing and take-off strip. The conversion would cost 500mln and see the existing northern runway moved 12m sideways and upgraded. Previous attempts by Gatwick to add a second runway have into fierce local opposition and Communities Against Gatwick Noise Emissions (CAGNE) again condemned the plan. The expansion "flies in the face of the climate emergency we are all facing" and would one million tonnes of additional carbon on top of Gatwick's pre-Covid-19 flight figures said the group. Shares in IAG fell 1% to 161.7p. Given rising uncertainty created by the increasing number of delta-variant virus cases, it is deemed unlikely Powell will announce definitive new guidance regarding the Feds policy intentions Making the events scheduled for Friday sound interesting is like making a silk purse out of the proverbial sows ear. Unlikely as it seems, therefore, we have to give thanks to small mercies and the enduring bore-fest that is the Jackson Hole symposium of central bankers. Meeting virtually instead of within the confines of Jackson Hole Resort in Wyomings stunning Grand Teton Mountains, officials are expected to provide carefully modulated guidance to the central banks changing policy, said Joseph Trevisani of FXStreet. The Fed chairman's speech is usually the highlight of the symposium and has, in the past, been used to make important points about the evolution of policy. The question before the market is whether Chair Jerome Powell, who has been one of the most cautious members about a change in policy, will use his speech on Friday to present the case for withdrawing monetary accommodation. It is certain that he will not announce any policy changes. Except in emergencies policy changes are restricted to scheduled meetings, but a positive assessment of the US economy will go a long way to convincing markets that the taper, or its schedule, will be announced at the September 21-21 FOMC meeting, Trevisani. Significant announcements expected Interims: ( ) ( ) Economic data: US personal income/ spending Queensland Pacific Metals Ltd (ASX:QPM) has the Townsville Energy Chemicals Hub (TECH) Project, which is envisaged to become a sustainable producer of critical chemicals for the lithium-ion battery and electric vehicle sectors, particularly nickel. The project aims to import high-grade nickel laterite ore from New Caledonia for unloading at the Port of Townsville and then to be transported by road or rail to the TECH Project site at Lansdown. The site allocated for the project in the Townsville Industrial Precinct has all the necessary infrastructure including, water and gas pipelines, electric transmission lines, fibre optic communications, existing Ross River and edify solar arrays, road train access to Townsville Port and rail line. The company will revisit the development of the northern NSW project to co-produce tungsten and topaz based on metallurgical test-work and a flowsheet employing industry-proven gravity separation and concentration technology. ( ) will revisit the development of its 100%-owned Torrington Project in northern New South Wales with the aim of co-producing critical mineral tungsten along with topaz. Strong tungsten concentrate pricing along with the companys positive metallurgical test-work and flowsheet employing industry-proven gravity separation and concentration technology support the new focus. Tungstens status strengthens It coincides with tungstens strengthening global status as a strategic mineral and metal that includes it being ranked as a critical mineral in Australia. With the tungsten concentrate sitting around US$18,000 per tonne, which is up around 25% year-on-year, the company believes now is a good time to assess Torringtons potential. Torrington well advanced The project is well advanced with the plan for processing involving proven benign water or air-based gravity concentration methods without the use of chemicals. Another positive for this strategy is that cashflow from the sales of topaz as an abrasive would de-risk tungsten co-production. Topaz research project Chase Mining is in discussions with potential industry and financial partners to progress outcomes of the topaz derived mullite fibre research proof-of-concept desktop stage. The company is well-positioned to progress this tungsten and topaz strategy in the near term. While it works on commercialising many of the potential disruptive technology trajectories, it can progress site development and begin production of Topaz concentrate for use in the future production of mullite fibre. The most recent and ongoing NSW COVID-19 outbreaks and restrictions have directly impacted the progression of the companys other activities, whereas Torrington is only 60 kilometres from its operating base in the town of Tenterfield. In conjunction with the Torrington focus, Chase Mining continues to review several complementary projects that would be a strategic fit for the company and would add value for shareholders. Melbourne-based CSVF now holds more than 8.333 million shares of the company representing 6.25% voting power with this forming part of an $8 million funding package. ( ) has gained a new substantial holder in Collins Street Asset Managements ATF Collins St Value Fund (CSVF) which holds more than 8.333 million shares for a 6.25% stake. Melbourne-based CSVF became a substantial holder on August 25 after making a strategic investment in the auto aftermarket company with the shares priced at 30 cents each for a total value of $2.5 million. Last week, RPM Automotive Group executed an agreement with CSVF that will provide $8 million to support the companys ambitious growth strategy. READ: RPM Automotive strengthens its growth strategy with $8 million in funding from a strategic investor As well as the $2.5 million investment, this includes the provision of a competitive three-year $5.5 million unsecured convertible note (CN). RPM plans to use these funds to progress its pipeline of large-scale, EPS accretive acquisitions. Funding package Co-founder and managing director Clive Finkelstein said: Over the next 12 months RPM intends to continue its strategy of growth via strategic acquisitions. This funding package has been set on attractive terms to our shareholders and provides RPM with the capital necessary to take advantage of attractive M&A opportunities while introducing a well-respected institutional investor onto our register. Convertible note The $5.5 million CN is subject to shareholder approval for its conversion and this will be sought at a general meeting to be convened for this purpose. It is convertible at 35 cents per share by CSVF at any time over the term of the CN. Moreover, it is convertible at this amount by RPM at its discretion if RPMs share price trades at $0.50 or higher for 30 consecutive days. The CN pays a coupon rate of 3.5% pa quarterly in arrears in cash or shares, issued at the 30-day VWAP, at the companys discretion. CSVF founder and chief Investment officer Vasilios Piperoglou said: As a concentrated fund we dont back many teams. RPM has proven that they possess the right entrepreneurial management team and maintain a sustainable and scalable business model. Especially in todays markets, we are thrilled to have identified and invested in RPM, a company that offers a great growth strategy, and appears to offer clear value. High ranking fund The Collins St Value Fund provides a different approach to the management of Australian equities. Boutique by design, bespoke by nature, the fund seeks to challenge the status quo to deliver investor outcomes and manages a concentrated portfolio. In 2020 the fund ranked the #1 Australian Equity Fund according to the MercerInsights survey, having ranked #4 the previous year. It also ranked second for Financial Year 2021. As of July 31, 2021, the fund is ranked #1 in its category over 12 months, three years and five years, according to Morningstar data. The Swedish payments company said it will keep expanding into new markets Swedish payments company Klarna announced a jump in transactions in the second quarter as the number of users in the US reached 20mln. The buy now, pay later group said gross merchandise volume (GMV) the value of transactions - rose to US$20bn in the three months to June 30 from US$12bn in the same period last year, while in the first half GMV grew to US$39bn from US$22bn. In the US, GMV rocketed 311% in the first half, driven by an increase in American users of 3mln to 20mln during the second quarter. The group has over 90mln active users worldwide and 2mln transactions a day. It launched in France and New Zealand in the first half and in Poland in August and now operates in 17 countries. The company said it would keep expanding into new markets. Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO and co-founder of Klarna, said: As we invest for growth by expanding our offering in existing markets and bringing Klarna to new markets, we are confident we can continue this strong track record that is helping create a sustainable global digital economy that benefits everyone. The company is widely expected to list in New York in the next couple of years, but gave no details of its plans in Wednesdays earnings release. In June, the company raised US$639 million in a funding round, giving it a valuation of near US$46bn. The clinical research collaboration builds upon its existing strategy of focusing on establishing a better understanding of the basic mechanisms by which DMT exerts its effects in the brain and elsewhere in the body Investigators will carefully characterize any acute and persisting subjective, affective, cognitive, and neural dose-dependent effects for both drugs being evaluated PharmaDrug Inc announced it has entered into a clinical trial agreement with the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) to conduct a clinical study comparing acute and enduring psychological and neural effects of N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) and an undisclosed, potently active comparator molecule. The Toronto-based company said the clinical research collaboration builds upon its existing strategy of focusing on establishing a better understanding of the basic mechanisms by which DMT exerts its effects in the brain and elsewhere in the body. The principal investigator, Dr Frederick S. Barrett, an associate professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, will be supported by co-investigators, Dr Sandeep Nayak and Dr Roland Griffiths, all from the JHU Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research. "We are excited to collaborate and support Dr Frederick Barrett to better understand DMT and its potential, CEO Daniel Cohen said in a statement. The JHU Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research is a global leader in psychedelics clinical research, and we are very grateful to partner with them to achieve our objectives in expanding our pharmaceutical product pipeline for novel uses and delivery forms of DMT to treat unmet medical needs, he added. The company said the first part of the planned study will examine the dose effects of DMT and the other test article. In the second part of the study, healthy subjects will be exposed to a maximum tolerated dose of each drug. During both parts of the study, investigators will carefully characterize any acute and persisting subjective, affective, cognitive, and neural dose-dependent effects for both drugs being evaluated. PharmaDrug noted that much debate exists around the relative potential benefits of micro vs macro-doses for psychedelic compounds. Using a highly controlled approach, it said the currently planned clinical trial will go some way to finding an answer. Under the terms of the agreement, the company said it has an exclusive option to obtain a worldwide, royalty-bearing commercialization license to all rights, title, and interest that JHU may have or obtain in any invention that results from the clinical study. Toronto-based PharmaDrug is a specialty pharmaceutical company focused on the research, development and commercialization of controlled substances and natural medicines such as psychedelics, cannabis and naturally-derived approved drugs. Contact the author at stephen.gunnion@proactiveinvestors.com It hopes todays webinar presentation will allow investors and industry participants to gain a greater appreciation for the impressive quality of data and analysis underpinning its projects ( , , ) remains focused on finding a suitable partner to farm in to one or more of its projects on the Alaska North Slope and the process is ongoing, the AIM-quoted oil and gas company said ahead of a webinar presentation to investors later today. We have discussed many times the requirement of a farmout, or otherwise, to fund the company ahead of a winter 21/22 drilling programme and we have been focused on this goal since April, said chief executive Jay Cheatham. The oil market is much better right now than any of us could have envisioned, putting the company in a stronger position during these negotiations, he said, echoing comments made earlier this month. Pantheon Resources in stronger position as it advances farm-out funding efforts for Alaska venture The company said it hopes todays presentation will allow investors and industry participants to gain a greater appreciation for the impressive quality of data and analysis underpinning its projects. Over the recent months, the company has announced resource estimates which exceed one billion barrels of oil recoverable, net to Pantheon, for the Theta West and Shelf Margin Deltaic (SMD) horizons. The webinar will contain a lot of technical information, however, we believe this is essential to demonstrate the science and the work behind these enormous resource estimates, said Cheatham. Pantheon also commented on a Federal District Court decision last week that reversed the US government's approval of ( )' proposed US$6bn Willow oil development in Alaska. Pantheon noted that Willow is on federal land requiring Bureau of Land Management approval; it lies within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPRA), an environmentally sensitive area governed by a unique regulatory framework; and its proposed infrastructure is within the environmentally sensitive Teshepuk Lake Special Area. Pantheon projects are 100% on State of Alaska owned lands and are not subject to the above and require no federal land management approval, it said. The phytomedicine group has been the top riser in London on Thursday ( , , , ) has been the top riser in the whole of the London Stock Exchange on Thursday, after investors got excited about a US$24mln deal with AMC Holdings. The tie-up with the American drug distributor will see MGC supplying the phytomedicine products CannEpil, CogniCann and CimetrA for use in clinical trials. Roby Zomer, MGC co-founder and managing director, said that the deal provides a pipeline for strong revenue streams over the next three years. The Australian group is harnessing the power of plants to address unmet medical needs, known in science as phytomedicine. The total addressable market for all of its programmes is worth a whopping 60bn, according to analysts at Proactive. CannEpil and CogniCann are being studied for treatment-resistant epilepsy, dementia and Alzheimer's and are both at mid-stage clinical trials. They are MP Line cannabinoids, so they are derived from cannabis. The family includes tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) which is an intoxicating compound but which also has valuable medical properties, and also cannabidiol (CBD) which is non-intoxicating. The main market for cannabinoids is Australia, as they are prescribed for several indications including nausea caused by chemotherapy, cancer pain, palliative care and anorexia associated with chronic illness among others. MGC is also supplying patients in Brazil and work is being done to enter the UK, where the medicinal cannabis market is expected to boom in the short term. CimetrA, instead, is based on food supplement ArtemiC, which contains four natural active ingredients: Artemisinin, Curcumin, Boswellia serrata. ArtemiC is already being sold in Australia. CimetrA is its pharma version and is at the final stage of trials, targeting the cytokine storm a common symptom in severe COVID-19 and other autoimmune indications. The group is very active in the phytomedicine space and has research collaborations with academic institutions such as RMIT University, Epilepsy Action Australia, Lenis and the Medicinal Cannabis Council. Shares climbed 67% to 3.47p on Thursday afternoon. A glance at some of the day's highlights from the Proactive Investors US and Canada newswires Australis Capital, doing business as AUDACIOUS, posted fiscal fourth-quarter results that saw its revenue soar 405% year-over-year thanks to the company's 51% stake in commercial crops facility management firm ALPS, even though the deal was closed less than a month before the fiscal year ended. For the period ended March 31, 2021, the Las Vegas cannabis company earned a pre-tax net income of $3 million, compared to a pre-tax loss of $10.6 million in the fiscal 4Q of 2020. The company benefited from increases in value in its Body and Mind holdings, favorable legacy settlements and cost reductions led by the new management team and other revaluations, said the company. The acquisition of ALPS more than doubled revenues for all of FY 2021 even though the company only owned ALPS for the last 23 days of the fiscal year, noted the company. ( , ) has announced that it shares will graduate from the OTCQB Venture Market and begin trading on the OTCQX Best Market under the symbol MVMDF effective August 27, 2021. Mountain Valley said graduating to the OTCQX Market marks an important milestone for companies, enabling them to demonstrate their qualifications and build visibility among US investors. Kwesst Micro Systems Inc said the TSX Venture Exchange has conditionally accepted the listing of 3,536,057 common share purchase warrants of Kwesst Micro Systems Inc issued in connection with its oversubscribed brokered private placement of 3,536,057 units, which closed on April 29, 2021. The TSX-V has advised that the warrants will be listed for trading on the TSX-V under the symbol KWE.WT effective at market open on Aug. 31, 2021. The offering consisted of 3,536,057 units issued at a price of $1.25 per unit. Each unit consists of one common share of Kwesst and one warrant. Each warrant entitles its holder to purchase one share of the company at a price of $1.75 for a period of 24 months ending April 29, 2023. ( ) has announced that its CLIA/CAP-certified lab Provista Diagnostics has successfully completed the validation studies required to put the Kogene Biotech PCR Variant Test Kit (Kogene Variant Kit) into production. Todos added that it expects to launch variant testing in September 2021. The company said the Kogene Variant Kit is a PCR kit capable of identifying the key mutations associated with specific SARS-CoV-2 variants, including the key P681R mutation identified in the Delta variant, that allows Todos to categorize the lineage of the strain responsible for a positive test result. Altiplano Metals Inc saw its copper grades increase yet again during its July production run from the Farellon copper-gold mine in Chile. Over the month, Farellon produced around 4,020 tonnes of copper-gold material at a grade of around 1.52% a 2% increase in copper grade, according to a release from the company. Altiplano also increased the amount of tonnes extracted by 11.5% compared to the month of June 2021, it told shareholders. ( ) Ltd. has reported financial results for the second quarter of 2021, showing record quarterly revenues achieved and significant growth for its Talicia and Movantik drugs. For the three months ended June 30, 2021, RedHill posted net revenue of approximately $21.5 million while maintaining gross margin above 50%. The increase was attributable to a rise in revenues from Talicia and Movantik despite the challenging coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic environment. RedHill noted that its focus on initiatives to drive Movantik market growth and gain market share had resulted in a strong quarterly performance for Movantik, registering a 5.6% increase in new prescriptions. In addition, Talicia achieved a record quarter, delivering more than 10% growth in prescription volume, compared to the previous quarter. RedHill's cash balance as of June 30, 2021, was approximately $71.5 million. ( , ) has announced that Denny's restaurants across Canada will be offering select NATERA meat-alternative entrees on their menus. The Vancouver-based company said that following a menu test of NATERA products at five Denny's restaurants in British Columbia, guests can now look forward to enjoying NATERA Seasoned Chick-Un Tenders and NATERA Chick-Un Nuggets at 71 Denny's across Canada later this Fall. Naturally Splendid also revealed that Bar One, a restaurant under the Denny's Canada brand, will be offering select NATERA plant-based, meat-alternative entrees shortly after the Denny's launch at all 13 locations in British Columbia and Alberta. NEO Battery Materials Ltd said it has received three additional prototype requests from global-tier battery materials and metals manufacturers and an automotive company. This latest request follows the first samples of NEO's silicon anode prototype that were previously sent out. The company notes it is currently in the process of manufacturing more prototype samples to meet the demand and is refining the prototype for further improvements in performance. Kootenay Silver Inc said it has unearthed a potential new high-grade zone known as the East Block within the Columba Silver project, in Chihuahua State, Mexico. The discovery was made as part of the 2021 phase II drill program during expansion drilling east of the JZ Zone. Hole CDH-21-101 returned results indicative of high-grade areas on the property seen in the F, B and D Veins and JZ zone. ( , , ) announced positive preclinical results from research on its Family 3 group of psilocybin compounds that could significantly improve the sustained effectiveness and safety profile of microdosing practices. The company said in a statement that research on the compounds, comprised of long-acting psilocybin side-chain restricted analogs, demonstrated extended duration of action and decreased effect size at the 5-HT2A receptor. ( , , ) has provided an update on its Phase I diamond drilling program at the Skaergaard Project in eastern Greenland. The company said it commenced drilling in July and has prioritized the northern part of the Skaergaard deposit, including several areas being drilled to determine the open-cut potential at the site. Historically, these priority areas were never drilled at Skaergaard due to the focus on defining a resource in the southern part of the deposit. Major Precious Metals noted that the successful completion of the drill holes within key priority areas by September has the potential to both upgrade and significantly expand the existing mineral resource estimate (MRE) for Skaergaard. ( ) Ltd, a provider of secure access solutions and intelligent data collection, has reported that its second-quarter revenue reached a record high, increasing by two-thirds year-over-year. For the three months ended June 30, 2021, the company generated $1.78 million in revenue, versus $1.08 million in the same quarter a year earlier, a 66% increase. Safe-T attributed the revenue jump to increased demand for its privacy platform and growing partnerships for its ZoneZero solution. Another highlight of the quarter was the recently-announced acquisition of CyberKick, the company added. ( , ) Inc has announced a non-brokered private placement consisting of 43,750,000 units of the company at a price of C$0.08 per unit to raise gross proceeds of C$3.5 million, to be used to complete the very first drill program on its Fortuna gold and copper project in Ecuador and for general working capital. The drill program is expected to be approximately 3,000 meters and is a follow up to the recent discoveries made during the surface exploration work over the past 18 months, the company said in a statement. This includes Wayka's trench T6, which sampled 17.63 grams per tonne (g/t) gold over 3 meters (m). ( ) has reported second-quarter 2021 revenue of C$1,030,518, a 5% year-over-year increase, as the company expanded the existing market for its Primary English Program (PEP) into an additional province in China. Lingo Media also recorded a net profit of C$707,561 for the quarter ending June 30, 2021, up from C$624,329 during the same period last year. We are pleased to see the maintenance and growth of our recurring royalty stream from our PEP business in China even in the face of COVID, Lingo Media CEO Gali Bar-Ziv said in a statement. Tocvan Ventures Corp has told investors it plans to start a trenching program at its Pilar gold and silver project in Mexico in October as the company recapped on the findings of a successful drill program completed in June this year. The 20-hole Phase 2 drill program expanded the so-called Main zone 30 metres (m) to the northwest and 150m to the southeast and defined a new mineralized trend over a 500m strike, parallel to the Main zone. At the Triple Vein zone, one hole also hit a narrow silver-rich zone with gold. ( ) Ltd. has announced results of a new preclinical study demonstrating strong inhibition by its investigational oral pill opaganib (ABC294640) of the coronavirus (COVID-19) Delta variant replication while maintaining cell viability at relevant concentrations. Working with the University of Louisville Center for Predictive Medicine, the company noted that opaganib was studied in a 3D tissue model of human bronchial epithelial cells (EpiAirway) to evaluate the in vitro efficacy of opaganib in inhibiting the Delta (Indian) variant. RedHill said this adds to the previously reported work that showed opaganib also inhibits Beta (South African) and Gamma (Brazilian) SARS-CoV-2 variants. "There is growing evidence in support of the possible key role played by sphingosine kinase-2 in the replication of RNA viruses such as SARS-CoV-2, irrespective of mutations at the spike protein. This makes inhibition of this intra-cellular enzyme a promising therapeutic target for treating COVID-19 disease," said Dr Reza Fathi, RedHill's Senior VP, R&D. ( , , ) said that during the second quarter, it had made great progress on its shovel-ready Posse Gold Project on its Mara Rosa Property in Goias State, Brazil, as it continued to explore its financing options. Heading into a pivotal period for Posse, Amarillos strategy is to make the necessary expenditures to stay on schedule for Posse while minimizing its financial exposure until it obtains full construction financing. Amarillo is gearing up to start building its 100,000-ounces-per-year operation at Posse. For its second quarter ended June 30, 2021, the Toronto-based company had C$40.5 million on hand, most of which is invested in short-term savings and investment accounts awaiting deployment for constructing Posse, exploration, and general corporate purposes. ( ) Corp said it had achieved "stable" second quarter and first half results despite the impact of the pandemic as it outlined plans to continue to grow the business via acquisitions, partnerships and creating new products. The firm, which provides out-of-hospital pain management services in Canada and has a focus on medicinal cannabis, said it ended the period to June 30 this year with $6.4 million in cash after raising $13.8 million gross from a private placing, giving it the firepower to execute on operational and expansion plans. Silver ( , ) Ltd released an encouraging exploration update on recent work at the Cambridge project in western Nevada, which is a joint venture with Auburn Gold Mining LLC. In May, the company completed a detailed soil geochemical survey over the known gold mineralization trends on the property, and results defined clear gold-in-soil anomalies coincident with the Price Lode, Cambridge Mine and North trends. Surveys also defined a 1,350 m long anomaly along the Price Lode trend with peak response of 5,070 parts per billion (ppb) gold in an area of known gold mineralization, Silver Range said. ( ). has announced that the air quality and wastewater permit applications for its Net-Zero 1 project have been filed with the South Dakota Department of Agriculture & Natural Resources. "These permit applications are on schedule and represent the first of the permits necessary for the construction of Net-Zero 1, said Chris Ryan, Gevos president and chief operating officer, in a statement. We are happy to work closely with Pinnacle Engineering, a world-class engineering firm known for specializing in environmental permitting, to draft our permits. These combined efforts are focused on minimizing environmental impact and establishing the lowest CI (Carbon Intensity) score possible. ( ) said assay results from recent drilling at its Pau de Merenda (PDM) target at the Cuiu gold district in northern Brazil suggest the presence of a much larger gold-in-oxide blanket than previously envisaged. In a drilling update, the junior resource company said results from ten additional reconnaissance RC (reverse circulation) drill holes at PDM have expanded the recently identified gold-in-oxide blanket to 800 x 300 metres (m) in size. The blanket remains open in three of four directions, the company added. American Manganese Inc has announced the successful production of electrolytic manganese metal (EMM) in the final stages of the Wenden Stockpile reclamation and advanced material processing project in Arizona. The company said it has conducted multiple stages of bench-scale tests on the Wenden Stockpile material that confirm the viability of its patented manganese recovery process to produce EMM. The project was funded by an award in late 2020 from the US Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) to perform lab-scale work on the US government's 322,000 metric ton manganese stockpile located near Wenden and assess the viability of production using American Manganese's ground-breaking recovery process. ( , ) unveiled a new technical report on its Gaocheng (GC) operation that increases the resources and reserves on the silver-zinc-lead project. The report outlines mineral reserves of 4.131 million tonnes in the combined proven and probable categories at a grade of 94 grams per ton (g/t) silver, 1.5% lead, and 3.2% zinc, containing about 12.5 million ounces of silver, 135 million pounds of lead, and 293 million pounds of zinc. As for the resources, the report reveals 10 million tons inclusive of mineral reserves, grading 82 g/t silver, 1.2% lead and 2.8% zinc, for about 26.4 million ounces of silver, 265 million pounds of lead and 619 million pounds of zinc. Kodiak Copper Corp announced it was restarting its drill program at its MPD copper-gold porphyry project in Southern British Columbia after work was temporarily halted last week due to wildfires. "With improved conditions, wildfire risk to our operations has been reduced, allowing the company to resume work," the explorer said in a brief statement. Thanking fire fighters and first responders, the company's CEO Claudia Tornquist added that the "short interruption" would not have a "material impact on the large exploration program we are undertaking at MPD this year". Nextech AR Solutions Corp said it has closed the previously announced acquisition of UK-based spatial computing company ARWAY Ltd, in an all-stock transaction. The deal will also see Nextech hire key founders Baran Korkmaz and Nikhil Sawlani. ARWAYs spatial mapping platform uses AI to scan and recognize surroundings for hyper-accurate location-based 3D mapping. ( , ) has announced the revenue-generating deployment of four Safe Entry Stations at the upcoming Palm Tree Music Festival in New York. The event will be held on August 29 in Westhampton Beach as part of the company's reseller partnership with the US-based JUICEWORKS. In a statement, Predictmedix said the festival will serve as a unique opportunity to demonstrate its proprietary AI-enabled screening solution to representatives from local, state, and federal government agencies, the military, and tier-1 event organizers in attendance. Empower Clinic Inc has announced the appointment of Annette Robinson to its inaugural global advisory board, which the company said is designed to advance its strategic goals through expert advice and guidance. Robinson, a pharmacist by trade with 37 years of industry experience, is currently president of the British Columbia Pharmacy Association and is the board representative for the Canadian Pharmacists Association. ( ) Vehicles Corp, a designer and manufacturer of electric vehicles, announced that it will bring its flagship three-wheeled, single-occupant, SOLO EV to the Advanced Clean Transportation (ACT) Expo, the industrys largest advanced transportation technology and clean fleet event. The four-day event will kick off on August 31 at the Long Beach Convention Center, in California. ( ) will occupy Booth #1907. The carmaker said it is proud" to be the official sponsor of the ACT Ride and Drive event on September 1 with SOLO test drives available for interested attendees. ( , ) said it has been selected to participate in a virtual trade mission to Mexico presented by the Ontario Ministry of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade (MEDJCT) in collaboration with the Toronto Regional Board of Trade. The selection was based on its CO2 Delivery Solutions application as a clean technology. The objective of the virtual clean tech mission, from September 20-23, is to attain a targeted six pre-screened, high-impact business-to-business meetings coordinated by Global BMT Consulting. Global BMT is a market intelligence company focused on international business, marketing, and trade consultancy that has been retained by the MEDJCT to introduce Ontario-based clean technology companies entering the Mexico market to targeted potential customers and distributors. i-80 Gold Corp. said its application to the OTC Markets Group Inc for the company's common shares to begin trading on the OTCQX Best Market has been accepted. The company noted that its common shares will begin trading on the OTCQX Best Market on Thursday, August 26, 2021, under the ticker symbol IAUCF after qualifying for an upgrade from the OTC Pink market. "This is exciting news for the Company and will allow for a broad set of shareholders to invest in i-80. We are pleased to be accepted onto the OTCQX and believe this is the next step in unlocking the value of our Nevada-focused mining company", Ryan Snow, chief financial officer of i-80 said in a statement. ( ) Company Ltd. has announced that its common shares are anticipated to begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on or about August 31, 2021, under the symbol NSR. In addition to listing and trading on the NYSE in US dollars, Nomad's common shares will continue to be listed and traded in Canada on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) in Canadian dollars under the symbol NSR. Shareholders that purchased their Nomad common shares 'over-the-counter' or OTC, including shareholders whose shares are denoted in their institution/broker account with the symbol NSRXF, are advised to monitor their account to ensure their holdings are updated to reflect the NYSE listing and trading symbol, as Nomad expects OTC quotations for its common shares to cease in connection with the NYSE listing. Nomad's common shares will also continue to trade on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange under the symbol IRL. Bucharest, Aug 26 : Romania's Supreme Council for National Defence (CSAT) decided on Wednesday to participate with a staff of 200 troops in the evacuation and relocation of Afghan citizens who worked for NATO missions in Afghanistan. "The NATO operation will consist in principle of taking Afghan citizens from temporary bases in Kuwait and Qatar and relocating them to temporary bases stationed in the territory of the allied states," announced the Presidential Administration in a press release, Xinhua news agency reported. The CSAT, which includes the president, the prime minister, the ministers of defence and foreign affairs, and intelligence chiefs, acts as Romania's top executive body on security and defence issues. Romania has been part of NATO's missions in Afghanistan since 2002. In the past 19 years, 27 of its soldiers have lost their lives in combat, while about 200 have been injured. Moscow, Aug 26 : Moscow will assist the arrival of around 1,000 Afghans to Russia, particularly those holding Russian citizenship or other documents, head of the Russian Centre for Afghan Diasporas said on Wednesday. The Russian authorities have allowed the entry of certain categories of Afghan citizens, as there are thousands wishing to come to Russia, Ghulam Mohammad Jalal was quoted by the RIA Novosti news agency as saying, Xinhua news agency reported. The first category is people with Russian citizenship, and the second is students who study in Russia but now are in Afghanistan, and the third is persons with Russian work permit and appropriate visa, and the fourth is residence permit owners, the official said. These groups have already contacted the Russian Embassy in Afghanistan and they will fly to Russia as soon as the airport is open, he added. Lucknow, Aug 26 : Poet Munawar Rana's son has been arrested for allegedly faking an attack on himself to implicate his uncles. Tabrez Rana, who is embroiled in an ancestral property dispute with his uncle, was arrested by the Rae Bareli police from Lalkuan locality in Lucknow, late on Wednesday night. Rana, who wanted to contest the state assembly elections from Tiloi in Rae Bareli, had staged the attack on himself to get security and media coverage, besides implicating his uncles, the police official said. He had lodged a complaint with the Rae Bareli police alleging that he was attacked by two bike-borne men at a petrol pump in the Hindola Ratapur area on June 28. When a Special Operations Group of the Uttar Pradesh police probing the case, scanned the CCTV footage of the area, several discrepancies were found in Rana's claims. Tabrez was found alone in a vehicle at the time of the incident though he had claimed that there was another person with him. Rae Bareli SP Shlok Kumar had said that Tabrez Rana, along with his two accomplices Haleem and Sultan Ali, faked the attack on himself. An FIR was also lodged last Friday against Munawar Rana also allegedly for hurting religious feelings by comparing Valmiki, who wrote Ramayana, with Taliban, police had said. "The FIR has been registered against Munawar Rana on the complaint of one P L Bharti, who has alleged that the poet hurt the religious feelings by comparing Valmiki with the Taliban," a senior official had said here. The FIR was registered at Hazratganj police station under sections 153A (Promoting enmity between different groups on ground of religion, race, place of birth etc), 295 A (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class), 505(1)(B) (intent to cause, or which is likely to cause, fear or alarm among the public) and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. Meanwhile, Munawar Rana said on Thursday that his son was being targeted because he had expressed his opinion that was against the state government. "This government believes that every Muslim is a terrorist," he said. Dhaka, Aug 26 : Opposing any reform of the Hindu laws, a group of minority leaders has urged the Sheikh Hasina-led Bangladesh government to assure not to reform the laws. They also demanded legal action against Mahfuz Anam, Editor of The Daily Star, and his wife Shaheen Anam, executive director of Manusher Jonnye Foundation, blaming them of hurting 'religious sentiments' of the Hindu community and creating chaos in their families. Anam has submitted a proposal to the Law Commission for the reform of a Hindu law. Shaheen Anam and Mahfuz Anam have been accused of 'conspiring to change' Hindu family scriptural rules by dividing Hindu family property into individual-centric property distribution, divorce, compulsory and punitive Hindu marriage registration, adoption, maintenance, and so on. The leaders of the organisation named 'Bangladesh National Hindu Grand Alliance' and some other organisations of Hindu community made the call on Sunday during a press conference. Gobinda Chandra Pramanik, an advocate, and Secretary-General, Bangladesh National Hindu Grand Alliance announced the four demands placed before the government. They urged the government to make an announcement by August 30, assuring 'no reform and change' in Hindu law. They said legal action must be taken against Shaheen Anam and some NGOs that are 'creating chaos' in the Hindu society and families by conducting anti-social and anti-religious activities. They also demanded that Shaheen Anam and her associates must apologise to the 'Hindu community'. They warned of launching a mass signature campaign across the country. Advocate Protiva Bakchi, women's affairs secretary of Bangladesh National Hindu Grand Alliance, announced the written statement. At the programme, Professor Hirendra Nath Biswas, president of Bangladesh National Hindu Reformation Society, has claimed that the campaign of Mahfuz Anam and his wife Shaheen Anam to reform Hindu law is a conspiracy to create unrest among the Hindus of the country by destroying unity and heritage of the community. In the statement, Bakchi also said Mahfuz Anam is spreading propaganda against the Hindu community by publishing fiction in his newspaper Daily Star. Swami Sangeetananda Maharaj, Principal of Pranab Math, Dhaka, claimed the non-government organisation 'Manusher Jonno Foundation' is trying to create unrest among the Hindus of the country by destroying unity and heritage of the Hindu community. At the press conference, Col (retd) Niranjan Bhattacharya, president of Bangladesh Brahman Sangsad, said: "Few NGOs were conspiring against Hindu. The law is not changeable in any way. We are embarrassed, the government is embarrassed. We have to rejoice in the golden jubilee of independence but we are protesting here. We demand an immediate end to their conspiracy." Pradeep Kumar Paul, Vice-President of Bangladesh National Hindu Grand Alliance, Joint Secretary General Sujan Dey, Advocate Lucky Bachar, Naresh Chandra Haldar, Publication Secretary Sagarika Mandal, DK Somir, Sagar Sadhu Tagore, Secretary-General of Bangladesh Matua Mahasangha, Advocate JK Pal, Convener of Hindu Law Amendment Prevention Committee, Vijay Krishna Bhattacharya Bangladesh Brahman Sangsad Secretary General were present in the press conference. Chandigarh, Aug 26 : Annapurna Utsav was celebrated in Haryana at almost all 10,000 ration depots last week to commemorate the successful implementation of Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana, officials said on Thursday. Free food grains were distributed in special bags of 10 kg (12.5 kg capacity) and five kg (7.5 kg capacity) to 1.22 crore people. An official spokesperson said that it had come to the notice of the Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Department that spoilt or rotten wheat had been supplied at some depots in Sonipat, Karnal and Kaithal during Annapurna Utsav. Subsequently, three food inspectors have been suspended. A government spokesperson told IANS that the supply of essential commodities to the depots, which received rotten wheat, would be suspended with immediate effect. The spokesperson added any consumer could register a complaint regarding the quality of food grain at toll-free numbers 1800-180-2405 and 14445. Washington, Aug 26 : US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that Washington would work to ensure Americans and Afghan partners could leave Afghanistan beyond the planned August 31 deadline for the ongoing evacuation from Kabul. President Joe Biden confirmed on Tuesday that his administration aimed to complete the evacuation by August 31, while asking for contingency plans to adjust the timeline if necessary, reports Xinhua news agency. Addressing reporters on Wednesday, Blinken said that there was no deadline on the work to help Americans and those Afghan partners who remained in the country to leave. "That effort will continue every day past August 31," he said. "We will use every diplomatic, economic assistance tool at our disposal, working hand-in-hand with the international community, first and foremost to ensure that those who want to leave Afghanistan after the 31st are able to do so," Blinken said when asked about steps to take to assure "high-risk Afghans" would not be left behind after the US military withdrawal. The Secretary of State noted that the Taliban had made "public and private commitments to provide and permit safe passage for Americans, for third-country nationals, and Afghans at risk going forward past August 31". However, the latest statement from the Taliban showed they might be unwilling to cooperate with Washington on this issue. "We are not in favour of Afghans to leave, we are not happy with departure of Afghans," Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Tuesday. "The crowds have not been cleared outside the airport. We want the Americans to bring changes in their policy of encouraging Afghans to leave." The US has been scrambling to evacuate Americans and its Afghan partners from the country since the Taliban captured the capital Kabul on August 15. Blinken said during Wednesday's briefing that at least 4,500 US citizens had been evacuated since August 14, with approximately 1,500 Americans remain in the country. According to Blinken, about 500 have been contacted with instructions on how to reach the airport, and not all of the rest 1,000 Americans are seeking to leave Afghanistan. He said some of them might already leave the country, some may want to stay, and some may not actually be US citizens. Blinken said that around 19,000 people had been evacuated during the 24-hour period ending early Wednesday morning. In total, over 82,300 people had been flown out of Kabul since August 14. -- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text Tehran, Aug 26 : Following the votes of confidence for the majority of his proposed cabinet from Parliament, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has pledged "serious openings" for the Islamic Republic. "Serious openings are underway and we will see a change in people's lives, and this is possible and achievable," Raisi said, adding they will hold the first meeting of the government on Thursday. "Due to the conditions of the country over Covid-19 (resurgence) and economic difficulties in the living conditions of people, it was necessary for the government to be formed immediately in order to reduce the problems and change the conditions in favour of the people," he said. The President added that Ministries controlling the livelihood, economy, welfare and health of people are at the forefront and will begin their work quickly, reports Xinhua news agency. He said that the nomination of proposed ministers was based on the efficiency criteria, like expertise, anti-corruption and honesty with people. "The lawmakers better to know that the issue of anti-corruption is important and central for people," Raisi said, stressing that he will not tolerate the slightest corruption. The Iranian lawmakers on Wednesday gave votes of confidence to 18 out of 19 Ministers proposed by Raisi, according to Parliament's website. The lawmakers started the debates on the qualification of the nominees on August 21 and decided on the list of the cabinet on Wednesday. In the meeting after hearing the last defenses of Raisi about his proposed Ministers, the lawmakers expressed their opinion on the competence of each of the nominees and then cast their votes. Among the 19 in the list, the candidate for Ministry of Education was the only person who failed to win the approval. According to the law, the President has three months to nominate the remaining minister. On August 11, Raisi submitted the list of proposed ministers to Parliament. Among the approved, Hossein Amir Abdollahian has become the Foreign Minister. He was former Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs and also a special aide to the Speaker of Parliament on international affairs. Javad Owji, former head of Iran's National Gas Company, was appointed the Minister of Petroleum. Raisi on Wednesday appointed Mohsen Rezaei, one of his rivals in the June presidential election, as the Vice President for Economic Affairs. Tokyo, Aug 26 : Schools across Japan are taking action against increasing student suicides that have occurred during the Covid-19 pandemic, holding sessions on mental health and helping pupils to show how they feel by using technology. According to government data, Japan reported a record number of 499 student suicides last year amid the pandemic, as many were believed to have felt lonely during months-long school closures to prevent the virus spread, reports Xinhua news agency. The figure for the first half of 2021 was higher than the previous year, the data added. At an educational session on mental health organized by a junior high school in Wakayama prefecture, a school counsellor explained to around 140 students how to recognise signs revealing possible mental health problems. Counselor Eriko Fujita, aged 54, who is also a certified psychologist, suggested second graders to watch out for changes in their habits, such as eating more desserts and spending more time on pets than usual. "You can learn about your mental condition by noticing changes in your physical health and behaviour," Fujita told local media. A high school girl, who was invited to take part in the session to share her experiences, said she had asked for help from local authorities when she felt her mental health was deteriorating. She found it was not embarrassing to send out an SOS signal. Since the session was opened, more students at the school, which is affiliated with Wakayama University's Faculty of Education, have consulted teachers about their mental conditions. "Awareness that it is important to seek help has spread," Fujita told local media. Education board of Osaka in April introduced a software application named "weather of the heart" to monitor the students' mental health. The app is installed onto tablet computers used by all children at elementary and junior high schools operated by the city. In the morning assembly, students can pick one option from "sunny", "cloudy", "rain" and "thunder" to show the way they feel that day. The results are automatically sent to their teachers' devices, noticing them about changes in the mood of the students who chose a different option from before. It could be helpful for young teachers with less teaching experience, a member of the education board said. The data showed that by month, the highest number of student suicide cases in 2020 was reported in August at 65, followed by 55 in September. The figures register students who feel most under pressure psychologically when they go back to school after a long summer vacation. Tetsuro Noda, a professor at Hyogo University of Teacher Education, told local media that schools are required to prepare a system to carefully respond to SOS calls from the students, and it is also important to facilitate an environment for the students to easily reach out for help. "The government needs to expand assistance at schools by increasing the number of teachers or counsellors," Noda added. Mumbai, Aug 26 : Well-known Mumbai-based neurosurgeon Dr. B.K. Misra has been conferred the prestigious American Association of Neurological Surgeons 'International Lifetime Achievement Award in Neurosurgery', an official said here on Thursday. Dr. Misra is the Head of Department of Surgery and Division of Neurosurgery & Gamma Knife Radiosurgery at the P.D. Hinduja Hospital here. He becomes the first Indian to receive the AANS honour which was conferred on him at a virtual ceremony during the AANS Annual Scientific Meeting 2021 held in Orlando this week. "We have the best of tech, infrastructure and skills at par with the best in the world to treat the most complex neurosurgical conditions and even have the potential to become the destination for neurological treatment," Dr. Misra said on receiving the award. The Hospital CEO Gautam Khanna lauded Dr. Misra's medical accomplishment and accolades as a testament to his dedication and treating thousands of patients under his care. AANS is the world's apex body of neurosurgeons that has bestowed its highest global recognition to Dr. Misra -- the President of Asian Australasian Society of Neurological Surgeons and the World Federation of Skull Base Societies, and the 1st Vice-President of World Federation of Neurosurgical Societies. With a long string of credits and firsts, he was the first in the world to execute an Image-Guided Aneurysm Microsurgery, first in south Asia to perform a Gamma Knife Radiosurgery and first in India to perform an Awake Craniotomy for brain tumours. Earlier, he received the Dr. B.C. Roy National Award-2018, and contributes through numerous publications to improve the quality of education in neurosurgery and facilitate spreading the treatment for neurosurgical patients in poor countries globally. New Delhi, Aug 26 : Rahul Gandhi has not yet started tweeting frequently even after the social media platform restored his account. As per the account details, he tweeted on Wednesday, ten days after his account was restored to attack the government on the asset monetisation scheme. Congress sources said that the former Congress President has lost trust in Twitter and he is now relying more on Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms. He is writing on Facebook and gave onam greetings on the platform The Twitter handles of other Congress leaders and the party's official handle had also been blocked, but all are active now after getting unlocked. Social media platform Twitter on August 14 had unlocked the accounts of the Congress, Rahul Gandhi and several others after temporarily blocking them for violating their policy. The Congress had alleged that it was being done on the behest of the government. According to sources, Twitter has unlocked the accounts but have withheld the old tweets. Rahul Gandhi had released a video statement slamming Twitter for blocking his account and alleged that the social media platform was taking sides in the politics of the country. "By shutting down my Twitter they are interfering in our political process. A company is making its business to define our politics. And as a politician I don't like that. This is an attack on the democratic structure of the country. This is not an attack on Rahul Gandhi." He said that he has 19-20 million followers and they have been denied the right to an opinion. "So, this is not only patently unfair, this is their breaching the idea that Twitter is a neutral platform. And for the investors this is a very dangerous thing because taking sides in the political contest has repercussions for Twitter," he had added. Chennai, Aug 26 : Despite the Tamil Nadu government allowing cinema halls to reopen, only 20 per cent of them have started operations, while around 30 per cent will reopen on Thursday and Friday. The remaining 50 per cent of the theatres, especially in rural areas, will reopen only after new Tamil films are released, according to industry sources. In Madurai, Dindigul, Coimbatore, Erode and Trichy mostly there are multiplexes, which have no choice but to reopen by Thursday or Friday with the screening of Hindi and English movies. However in several rural areas, the cinema halls will only reopen in September with the release of new Tamil movies. "I will reopen my theatre only with the release of a Tamil movie, as people here prefer to watch movies made in Tamil language. Even if I reopen my theatre before that, the attendence will be very low. Hence I've decided to reopen my theater with a Tamil movie in September," Mariappan, owner of Ashirvad theatre in Cumbum told IANS. Similarly, several theatres, which were shut due to Covid-19, are concerned whether the audiences would return to theatres or not, as they have to incur a maintenance cost ranging between Rs 5 to Rs 10 lakh a month. Raghavan M.P., owner of a theater in Coimbatore, while speaking to IANS expressed similar concerns while citing the fear of Covid third wave among people. PVR cinemas which has 83 screens across 13 properties in Chennai, Coimbatore and Vellore will reopen its theaters from Thursday. The group, according to a statement, will release movies, "The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It", "Bell Bottom", "Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard". Most of the industry people said that by the middle of September the movie industry of Tamil Nadu will be normal. However, most are keeping their fingers crossed as the possibility of Covid's third wave looms large in the minds of most of the theatre owners. In Tamil Nadu, where there are around 1,200 screens and more than six lakh seatings, a day's closure would lead to a loss of around Rs 8 crore. Tamil Nadu is one of the states in the country that has produced several political leaders from the film industry including the former Chief Ministers M.G. Ramachandran, M. Karunanidhi and J. Jayalalithaa. Dhaka, Aug 26 : Azizur Rahman Jahin, a leader of the banned extremist Islamist group Ansar Al-Islam, has been arrested by the Dhaka Metropolitan Police's Anti-Terrorism Unit (ATU). Jahin was arrested on Wednesday morning in the village of Jagannathpur in Moulvibazar Sadar. According to the police, Jahin wrote various types of books and brochures, that are distributed online and directly among his associates. Mohammad Aslam Khan, Superintendent of Police (Media and Awareness) of the ATU, said that Jahin used his Facebook page to propagate extremism via anti-government posts, calls for jihad, screenshots and violent videos. Khan said to establish an Islamic caliphate in Bangladesh, Ansar Al-Islam carried out the assigned propaganda by the name of Islam and promoted extremism through various online communication. Kolkata, Aug 26 : With the Trinamool Congress approaching the Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday for conducting the pending bypolls in the state, the possibility of an early election cannot be ruled out. According to the rules, Mamata Banerjee who is still not an elected member of the Assembly, will have to become an elected member before November 2 if she is supposed to continue as the chief minister of the state. According to an announcement made by the party, a five-member delegation of Trinamool Congress MPs including Sougata Roy, Jwahar Sircar, Sukhendu Sekhar Roy, Sajda Ahmed and Mohua Moitra will meet the election commissioner at 3.15 p.m. on Thursday. They will again ask the commission to conduct the polls in the state. Earlier five MPs led by the leader of the party in Parliament Sudip Bandopadhyay met the Chief Election Commissioner in July this year and urged him to conduct the pending bypolls in the state. Bandopadhyay had informed that the ECI has assured them of conducting the polls then but even after more than one month nothing has been done in that regard. "In October elections are impossible as there is Durga puja followed by several other festivals and in that case the ECI has only the month of September to conduct the election. The Covid situation in the state is well under control and we have been pressing for long for the bypolls. We have even approached the ECI and requested them to conduct polls but nothing has been done so far," a senior party leader told IANS on the condition of anonymity. As per ECI rules, elections can be conducted on the 24th day after the announcement of the polling dates. Generally, the commission retains 10 days for taking the preparatory steps and the candidates get 14 days of time to campaign. Sources also said that even a large section within the commission is willing to complete the poll process by the end of September. Getting government officers and staff for the purpose of elections will be extremely difficult during the festive month of October. The results for the 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections were announced on May 2. As Mamata Banerjee who contested from Nandigram in East Midnapore was defeated by the Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Suvendu Adhikari she will have to get elected within six months after the announcements of the results that ends on November 2. Sovondeb Chattopadhyay has already resigned from Rashbehari Assembly constituency making room for Mamata Banerjee to contest from the constituency. Now it all depends on the ECI to announce the polls. "Conducting elections during the festive month of October is virtually impossible. So, by all means the polls will have to be concluded by September. But one should remember that for the Assembly bypolls only ECI can say the final word. If the ECI decides to postpone the polls for any reason, neither any state government nor any political party will be in a position to do anything. But since the impact of Covid-19 in the state is much less now, we can expect the ECI to complete the election process by September," a senior party leader said. Chennai, Aug 26 : India's rocket startup Agnikul Cosmos has decided to go in for a 3D printing machine to make the engines for its Agnibaan rocket, said a top company official. "We are buying the 3D printing machine from the German company EOS. This will help in manufacturing our rocket engines and subsystems at a shorter time," Srinath Ravichandran, Co-Founder and CEO, Agnikul told IANS. The German company EOS is a global major in 3D printing technology based in Germany with Indian operations since 1998. The company has more than 90 EOS machine installations in India and works closely with various organisations like Aerospace, Medical, Defence and Industrial customers. "Every Agnibaan rocket will have eight engines. The 3D printing machine will enable us to produce the engines quickly than getting the work done outside," Ravichandran said. According to him, the company can make the eight engines in two weeks' time with 3D printing technology. "Owning engine making end-to-end in-house allows for significant process efficiencies and enables the making of an entire engine including the plumbing systems involved in less than 72 hours, thereby removing a large amount of the complexity one usually associates with liquid propellant engines," Ravichandran added. Declining to share the price of the 3D printing machine due to non-disclosure norms Ravichandran said Agnikul would install an EOS M400-4 printer in its facilities and will take EOS' Additive minds technical support in advancing 3D printing of rocket engines all the way to space qualification. "The machine is one of the largest. Our agreement also includes supply of some raw materials by EOS," he added. Ravichandran said the company may go for additional 3D printing machines once demand for Agnibaan rockets picks up to launch satellites. "Agnikul has been printing and testing engines at a smaller scale since 2018. Last year, we became the first company to fire a single-piece, fully 3D printed rocket engine printed on EOS 3D Printer. This strategic partnership with EOS will elevate our efforts to strategise on efficient and advanced 3D printing techniques to build world-class space technology in India," Moin SPM, Co-founder, and COO, Agnikul said. "As more and more companies start using 3D printing for their realization needs, we are trying to ensure that we play the role of a supporting partner as opposed to being just a vendor and in the process encourage widespread adoption of 3D printing as a mainstream manufacturing technique" said Anand Prakasam, Country Head, EOS India. Ravichandran said Agnikul is recruiting talent after raising $11 million in a Series A funding in May 2021. The funding round was led by Mayfield India, making it the largest funding round for a private Indian space technology company in India. While in March 2020, Agnikul had raised Rs 23.4 crore ($3.1 Mn) in a Pre-Series A funding from institutional investors - pi Ventures, Hari Kumar (LionRock Capital), Artha Venture Fund, LetsVenture, Globevestor, CIIE, and Speciale Invest and the seed round of funding from Speciale Invest in 2019. August 26 : Veteran actor Anupam Kher, who is currently in the US shooting for his upcoming film Shiv Shastri Balboa, is celebrating his 36th wedding anniversary today with his wife, actor and politician Kirron Kher, as he wished her on the special day with a heart-warming note. Taking to his Instagram handle, Anupam Kher shared a bunch of pictures with Kirron Kher as the couple rang in their 36th wedding anniversary. Among the monochrome throwback pictures, one was from the couples wedding ceremony. Sharing the pictures, Anupam Kher wrote, "Happy 36th wedding anniversary dearest #Kirron. It has been a long journey with all the possible emotions of laughter, tears, arguments, sharing, friendship, love and togetherness! But a journey worth it. These black and white pics have all the shades of colour in them. Stay safe and healthy. Love and prayers always! @kirronkhermp #Anniversary #Life #Love Reacting to the post, Kangana Ranaut commented, "Happy Anniversary to you both." Jugal Hansraj also wrote, "Happy Wedding Anniversary to both of you." Soni Razdan commented, "Happy Anniversary dear @kirronkhermp and @anupampkher Here's wishing you many such more. Love to both of you. Still remember when you both came over all those years ago when we had just gotten married and we finished 2 bottles of champagne ... so many happy memories! love always." Anupam Kher and Kirron Khers son Sikandar Kher also wished his parents on Instagram. Sharing a picture of the veteran actors, Sikandar captioned the post as, "Happy anniversary to these two people .. I think Ive seen them somewhere.. to many more #Anniversary #Strangers #Family #Love." Responding to his post, Anupam Kher wrote, "Obviously!! The amount of time you spend with us I dont blame your fading memory." Sikandar replied, "@anupampkher happy anniversary dad love you .. (take it easy you dont wanna mess with me) hugs and kisses." Abhishek Bachchan and Sanjay Kapoor also wished the couple on Sikandars post. While Sanjay wrote, "Happy anniversary," Abhishek commented, "Favs." Kirron Kher was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a type of blood cancer. Confirming this early this year, Anupam Kher wrote on social media that she is on the path to recovery. Anupam Kher is currently completing his upcoming film Shiv Shastri Balboa. Directed by Ajayan Venugopalan, the film will also stars Neena Gupta in the lead role. Anupam Kher also has The Last Show, Mungilal Rocks, and The Kashmir Files in the pipeline. Johannesburg, Aug 26 : South African Airways (SAA) will resume operations on September 23, more than 15 months after it was grounded in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, the flag carrier said in a statement. "After months of diligent work, we are delighted that SAA is resuming service and we look forward to welcoming on board our loyal passengers and flying the South African flag," Xinhua news agency quoted SAA interim CEO Thomas Kgokolo as saying in the statement on Wednesday. "We continue to be a safe carrier and adhering to Covid-19 protocols," he said. Ngokolo added that the SAA will start by flying from Johannesburg to Cape Town, Accra (Ghana), Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of Congo), Harare (Zimbabwe), Lusaka (Zambia) and Maputo (Mozambique). They will add destinations in response to market conditions. "There is a profound feeling of enthusiasm within Team SAA as we prepare for takeoff, with one common purpose -- to rebuild and sustain a profitable airline that once again takes a leadership role among local, continental, and international airlines. "As we are now poised for takeoff, we see this as a major milestone for SAA and the country," Kgokolo said. The SAA faced financial problems despite numerous government bailout and resorted to a business rescue last year. In June 2021, the government agreed to sell a majority stake in the carrier to a local jet-leasing company and private-equity firm. A consortium comprising Johannesburg-based Global Airways, which owns recently launched domestic airline Lift, and private-equity firm Harith General Partners will take a 51 per cent shareholding in SAA. Chennai, Aug 26 : Aiming to bridge the learning gaps, the Tamil Nadu schools that are set to reopen for higher classes from September 1, will initially be conducting refresher classes. The Tamil Nadu State Council for Education Research and Training (SCERT) has prepared a curriculum for refresher classes for students from Class 2 to Class 12. The classes are planned to fill the learning gaps, as almost all the students of the state have not attended a physical class in the last one year. The School Education Department is also formulating schedule in such a way that most of the classes would be for a short duration and would not make students discomfortable. The refresher classes for students of classes 9 to 12 aim mainly at those who have not even attended the online classes regularly, said the departmental sources. They added that the refresher courses will also be helpful to the rest of the students who can revisit the syllabus. A study conducted by the department has found that lack of gadgets, connectivity, power failures and lack of power connection in rural areas have led to students not being able to attend online classes on a regular basis. "The first two weeks of our classes would be dedicated to clear the doubts of the students and teaching the refresher course materials," M.R. Muraleedharan, Headmaster, Erode Government High School told IANS. "We will not put pressure on the students and this will be a new teaching experience for the teachers and a learning experience for students," he added. He asserted that a thorough revision of syllabus of the current academic year that was taught online from June to August would be taken up in physical classes while it reopens on September 1. Kabul, Aug 26 : Americans in Afghanistan are being warned to stay away from the Kabul airport due tothreats tied to the Islamic State (IS) terror group. The US Embassy in Kabul sent out an alert early Thursday, asking US citizens not to travel to the airport "because of security threats outside the gates", The New York Post reported. Senior US officials told the media that the warning was related to specific threats involving the IS and potential vehicle bombs. The State Department security alert also told Americans who where at three specific airport gates to "leave immediately", without further explanation. "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising US citizens to avoid travelling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a US government representative to do so," the statement read. "US citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," it added. President Joe Biden on Tuesday cited "the acute and growing risk of an attack" by the IS affiliate in Afghanistan, known as ISIS-K, as a reason not to extend the withdrawal timeline. "Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and Allied forces and innocent civilians," the President said. A US official told CNN on Wednesday that Washington has received a "very specific threat stream" of intelligence related to multiple potential attacks by ISIS-K against crowds of Afghans who have swarmed the airport day after day in a desperate attempt to get a place on an evacuation flight. Hyderabad, Aug 26 : The municipal authorities in Hyderabad on Thursday removed a banner from a park after alleged moral policing sparked an outrage over social media. Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) swung into action after netizens slammed the authorities for imposing restrictions on the entry of couples into Indira Park. "Unmarried couples are not allowed inside the park" reads the banner which was tied at the entrance. Indira Park near Hussain Sagar lake in the heart of the city is one of the known hangout spot for couples. Officials responsible for the upkeep of the park put up the banner after some couples were caught indulging in indecent acts and complaints by some local residents. The restriction, however, evoked sharp criticism from many on social media platforms with netizens questioning the moral policing and demanding immediate action by the authorities. GHMC zonal commissioner of Secunderabad Zone tweeted that the banner has been removed. "Inconvenience regretted. Informed local police to keep vigil by regular visits to maintain serene atmosphere in the park," the commissioner wrote. The official's tweet came in response to a series of tweets slamming GHMC for moral policing. "New low & new level of moral policing by Indira Park Mgmt in Hyd! A public park is an open space for all law abiding citizens, including consenting couples across genders. How can 'marriage' be criteria for entry," tweeted activist Meera Sanghamitra, who called the move unconstitutional. "Also, this is clearly an anti-working class move. Most couples who frequent Indira Park belong to lower, middle income categories. They cannot access hi-fi pubs & other costly spaces. Working class young couples have every right to access these parks. End Ridiculous Restrictions," added Meera Sanghamitra. Some Twitter users voiced concern that the city is becoming hostile to couples. In 2019 Sanjeevaiah Park beside Hussain Sagar lake had also barred the entry of couples. Authorities had turned it into a park exclusively for children under 14 years of age and their attendants. Patna, Aug 26 : A woman in Bihar's Bhagalpur district registered an FIR against her husband alleging rape, mental and physical harassment, an official said on Thursday. In a complaint to the Bhagalpur police, the woman alleged that her husband, Suman Kumar, who is a wing commander with the Indian Air Force and is posted at air force station Purnia, has taken away her elder son. "My husband has taken away my four and a half year old son from me. He also told other employees of the air force station that I am his son's surrogate mother," the woman said. "I got married to Suman on June 2, 2015 in a temple in Bhagalpur. I gave birth to the first child in 2017 and second in 2020. After the birth of my second child, Suman's behaviour started changing. Initially I thought that the behaviour is changing due to excessive workload. Hence, I ignored it. But his rude behaviour with me intensified. He frequently assaulted me as well which I had objected to while residing in Bhagalpur," the victim said. "Suman took my elder son to Purnia air force station two months ago. He has also switched off his mobile phone. As I have lost contact with him and my son, I went there with my younger son. I stayed there in an officer's mess where I learned that Suman introduced me as a surrogate mother. He has informed air force officials as well as my son that I am the surrogate mother of his son," she said. As I had no option, I approached the Babarganj police station of Bhagalpur and registered an FIR against him. We have also presented proof including photographs of the marriage, birth certificates of children and other necessary evidence," she said in the complaint. "We have registered an FIR against Suman Kumar on the basis of a complaint given by the victim. I have also asked Suman to reply to the allegations levelled by the victim," said an investigating officer of the Babarganj police station. New Delhi, Aug 26 : Amid the rapidly changing situation in Afghanistan after the Taliban seized power on August 15, experts feel that Qatar can play a vital role in the ongoing crisis and it can also be instrumental in protecting India's interests in the war-torn nation. The experts also said that the way the US has deferred its planned exit from Afghanistan with an August 31 deadline, the diplomats of Qatar have been active to persuade the Afghan militia to consider the American forces' plea who wanted to stay there till the evacuation of its last citizen. Former diplomat Gautam Mukhopadhya agrees that Qatar has been playing a vital role in resolving the crisis and they have convinced stakeholders for negotiations. "Qatar is playing an important role in the present crisis in Afghanistan but the results of their efforts are yet to be seen," he said. West Asia expert and senior journalist Qamar Agha also said that Qatar has a lot of influence on the Taliban and it also played an important role during the negotiations between the insurgents and Americans, with the then Afghan government without interfering in the internal affairs in the war-ravaged country. "Qatar has also helped the Palestinians, solving their problems with Israel and tried to mediate with the Hamas in the Palestinian territory. So Qatar has played an important role in negotiating Afghan militia for evacuating the Indians and other countries' citizens who were working in NATO forces in Afghanistan recently," Agha said. He also said that the Qatari diplomats have achieved a certain level of diplomatic practices which had helped certain issues in the Arab World and in Afghanistan too. "Now, after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, Qatar can really play a very important role. Secondly, India has a very good relation with this country and can sort out many of our problems, if needed," he added. Agha also hoped that not only in evacuating the Indians from Afghanistan, Qatar can be helpful in protecting India's interests too. It can also counter Pakistan if they try to interfere in Afghanistan and contain any nefarious activities against India. "India also has good relations with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the two Gulf nations that can also help us protect our interests in the war torn country," he added. However, another foreign affairs expert Sushant Sareen does not hope much from Qatar in resolving the Afghan crisis. "Qatar has been doing this in all hot spots in the world especially in the Middle East and it has outsized its diplomacy by using money with different groups who have issues with the other confronting sections and mediated among them. It's true that it has taken the position of that what Saudi Arabia or the UAE used to have, but nothing substantial has come up after its diplomatic intervention," Sareen observed. "They (Qatar) have a dubious role as they have an US Base in their country but they also host a Taliban office too. They were also funding the Islamic State ultras despite being on the US' side. It has also good relations with the Taliban and had played a very critical role even in Afghanistan; they have a close connection with Pakistan which hugely depends on its gas requirement. So that also gives Qatar a degree of influence in the whole crisis," he commented. Which of the peace process have resulted positive, not even one? Sareen said: "Yes, it can influence the Taliban leadership in protecting India's interest in that country, at least they can persuade them to keep on Indian projects going on." Lucknow, Aug 26 : A woman constable has been sent to lines for uploading her photograph with a firearm. Priyanka Mishra is a trainee constable and regularly posts her photographs on social media. Mishra, in the video on Instagram, is seen in full uniform with a revolver in her hand. In the audio that is playing along with the video, Haryana and Punjab are being compared with Uttar Pradesh on the issue of law and order. The constable is seen brandishing the firearm. Senior Superintendent of Police Muniraj G. has also ordered a departmental probe into the incident. A senior police official in Lucknow said the police personnel in uniform must maintain dignity and decorum and the video is a clear violation of this. Lucknow, Aug 26 : Uttar Pradesh Director General of Police (DGP), Mukul Goel, has issued guidelines for the appointment, duty and training of female beat officers under the third phase of 'Mission Shakti'. The guidelines, issued to all zonal Additional DGPs, Commissioners of Police Lucknow, Gautam Buddha Nagar, Kanpur, Varanasi, Regional Inspector Generals of Police/DIG, SSP/SP, mention that women beat police officers should be appointed by forming a team consisting of female inspector, deputy, chief constable and constable. He directed that in accordance to the number of women sub-inspectors and women police constables in Commissionerate/districts, one woman beat should be formed in three to four beats of police stations and two women beat police officers should be appointed in it. These officers would be named as Women Beat Police Officers. They will be interacting with women in their respective jurisdiction and will ensure necessary action by giving information in case of violence or any other crime, says the guidelines. The guidelines state that cognizance must be taken of even in minor complaints and timely action should be taken. Women beat police officers will visit a beat two to three days every week. They will remain present in the Mission Shakti Room set up in Gram Panchayat Bhawan or newly created village secretariat of each village, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Apart from listening to the problems of women, the beat police officers will make them aware about various schemes run by the government for women and various helplines of the police administration. New Delhi, Aug 26 : Government's push for manufacturing of semiconductors in India is a much needed, long-term step, in the right direction, said SIAM President and Maruti Suzuki Managing Director & CEO Kenichi Ayukawa on Thursday. Speaking at the 61st ACMA Annual Session, Ayukawa said: "The invitation by the government for 'Expression of Interest' for manufacturing semiconductors in India is a much needed, long-term step, in the right direction." "I am sure global investors will take advantage of this opportunity in India. In the meantime, our partners from the component industry have to tackle the current challenge of semiconductor shortage, by deeply engaging with the chip suppliers." Besides, Ayukawa pointed out that semiconductor shortage is not just a challenge, but also an opportunity. "Alongside automobiles, the demand for technology-based equipment has increased manifold. Of course, semi-conductor manufacturing requires very huge investments." "Indian automobile industry alone cannot assure full viability of such an investment in semiconductor project. Hence there is a need for consolidation across sectors." Lately, the global semiconductor supply chain has become increasingly at risk due to several factors. It has impacted auto industry since last year and continues to be a big challenge. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The Principal Economic Adviser to the Finance Ministry, Sanjeev Sanyal, has joined a phalanx of celebrities, from Mindy Kaling and Padma Lakshmi to Preet Bharara, aiming slingshots at Gene Weingarten, a Pulitzer Prize-winning 'Washington Post' humour columnist who was little known in this part of the world till he dissed Indian 'curries', saying they "taste like something that could knock a vulture off a meat wagon". Referring to Weingarten's original assertion (since removed by the newspaper) that Indian cuisine, which he equated with curries, was "the only ethnic cuisine in the world insanely based entirely on one spice", Sanyal tweeted on Thursday: "But the Europeans loved the one spice so much that they ended up discovering America. P.S. Mughals brought 'one spice' to India." Sanyal was pointing to pepper, in search of which Christopher Columbus, a Genovese navigator employed by the Spanish co-sovereigns Isabella I of Castille and Ferdinand II of Aragon, set off on what he thought was an expedition to India, but landed instead in what is now called the Bahamas in 1492. Columbus was following the wrong maps (and Sanyal says in his Twitter profile that he's a collector of old maps), unlike Vasco Da Gama, who actually reached Calicut (Kozhikode) in 1498. Of course, Sanyal's assertion that the Mughals brought "one spice" to India set off a Twitter kerfuffle, but that's another story. Ironically, Weingarten has bracketed Indian 'curries' with many other food items, from balsamic vinegar, which should have upset the Italians (they chose not to take notice of it!) to 'California rolls' ("garbage sushi") and "pizza or hot dog with more than two toppings". It was his rant against Indian food that got the goat of cookery show host and food writer Padma Lakshmi, who promptly penned a riposte that the 'Washington Post' carried. Calling the writer "racist and lazy" and his article "simply not funny", Padma Lakshmi said the "self-described 'epistemologist' - one who studies the construction of knowledge - betrayed himself as a man who does not think to do a rudimentary Google search on something about which he knows nothing". She then went on to give a potted history of Indian food, its many spices and infinite variety. Padma Lakshmi, in fact, has written an encyclopaedia of spices and herbs, among other books. Comedian and Hollywood producer Mindy Kaling, likewise, did not pull back her punches. "You don't like a cuisine? Fine. But it's so weird to feel defiantly proud of not liking a cuisine." Ashok Bajaj, who owns the acclaimed Washington, D.C. restaurant, Rasika, where Weingarten apparently had a meal he did not like, was gentler in his response. "I look forward to converting him as well as I've converted, I would say, thousands of non-Indian fans before," Bajaj said to the 'Washingtonian' magazine, inviting the columnist to have a meal with him at Rasika. Bajaj, incidentally, introduced the American political elite to Indian food after he opened the Bombay Club restaurant in the US capital in 1989. Stung by all this criticism, Weingarten issued an abject apology on Twitter, calling himself "a whining infantile ignorant d***head" and then going on to add: "I should have named a single Indian dish, not the whole cuisine, and I do see how that broad-brush was insulting. Apologies. (Also, yes, curries are spice blends, not spices.)" The apology, clearly, hasn't put the controversy to rest. Chennai, Aug 26 : Women in several districts of Tamil Nadu have lodged complaints with the Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation(TNSTC) authorities over the indecent behaviour of bus conductors and drivers of the corporation. The state government of M.K. Stalin has announced free bus travel for women in Tamil Nadu. Sudhakumari, a private factory employee who had to shell out Rs 35 per day for the bus travel in Trichy, told IANS, "I get a salary of Rs 6,500 and of this I had to spend around Rs 2,000 on my bus travel alone. After the state government announced the free ride for women in State transport corporation buses, I was overjoyed. However, the bus workers insult me day in and day out. They shower abuses and ask whether I am a queen to travel for free. They stop the bus 40 to 50 m in front of the bus stop and I have to run to get into the bus. Still, I am happy that I can save this much money by the decision of the state government." She said that she had lodged a complaint with TNSTC and is awaiting a response. However, the transpeople said that they have not had such an experience from the bus employees of the state government. Transwomen are also entitled to free travel in state-run bus services. Kalki Subramaniam, transactivist and writer, told IANS, "So far I haven't got any information that our people are being targeted in the buses or insulted as they are travelling for free following the government order. I haven't received any such complaints till now." While the leader of the trans women community said that no complaints on insults have not yet come to their notice, the general women public have raised serious allegations against the bus employees. Muthulakshmi, an employee of a garment factory in Erode while speaking to IANS said, "I have experienced rude behaviour from the State road transport corporation employees. They stop the bus either in front of the bus stop or far away from the stop. Either way, we have to run to catch the bus. But we are getting a free ride, courtesy our Chief Minister and the government but the bus employees insult us regularly and tell us that for joy rides we have to run to catch the bus. This is, however, a great solace as the amount I used to spend regularly for transport has now come down to naught." Women passengers who take the state road transport in other parts of Tamil Nadu also expressed similar issues. However, most of the women passengers in Chennai said that they did not face any issues from the bus drivers or conductors for that matter. A top official with the TNSTC told IANS that the department is aware of the issue and that it had even suspended some officials on the issue. He also said that many of them are being given training programmes on behaviour. While speaking on condition of anonymity the senior official said, "TNSTC has knowledge on this and we are trying our best to correct these people. We have suspended some of them and have sent them for training in behaviour. This behaviour will change in the coming days and we profusely apologize to women for this." Bengaluru, Aug 26 : After Techies and IT Professionals expressed their concern and questioned the government's decision of advising IT companies located on the Outer Ring Road (ORR) to extend 'Work from Home' option till next December due to Namma Metro work on the stretch, the government has said the earlier communication was just an advisory. E.V. Ramana Reddy, Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Electronics, IT, BT & Science and Technology had issued an advisory to the National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) on August 21. It was requested to the IT companies operating in the surrounding areas of Outer Ring Road (ORR) to extend the Work From Home (WFH) period till December next year. The Bengaluru Metro Rail Corporation Ltd (BMRCL) is commencing work on ORR from Central Silk Board to KR Puram soon. It could take at least 2 years for completion of work. ORR houses many large tech parks and IT companies, campuses and this stretch carries a large vehicular movement. If IT companies resume work, the vehicular congestion becomes more, the advisory noted. However, the request from the government did not go well with IT professionals. They have tagged IT Minister C.N. Ashwath Narayan with the newspaper clippings and questioned why 18 months lockdown period was not utilised to take up Namma Metro work. Ramana Reddy addressed another letter to the Regional Director of National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) stating that the earlier communication was just an advisory. "The communication was issued as information about the planned construction work and is to be treated only as an advisory for the consideration of the industry. Bengaluru Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL) is focusing on completing the Namma Metro project on time with minimum inconvenience to employees, who want to commute for work or companies that are planning to return to work during the construction phase," the letter said. The IT professionals have questioned that they wanted to return to work as it was almost one-and-a-half-years since they attended work. The Covid rate is going down in the state, even high schools are open. The BMRCL must have utilised the lockdown period of the last 18 months when the road was deserted for construction work, they said. After the protest the government backed off from the proposal and assured completion of Namma Metro work in the stipulated time. As many as 1.5 lakh IT professionals work in about 800 companies located on Outer Ring Road (ORR) stretch in Bengaluru. New Delhi, Aug 26 : A man was allegedly shot in the head near Delhi's Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport, while he was going in his car along with his friends early on Wednesday. The victim, who was identified as Sandeep Bhati, was in his Hyundai Verna along with three friends when the incident took place around 5 a.m., according to the police. He is learnt to be critical and undergoing treatment in a private hospital in Noida. The police said the accused fired two bullets at Bhati's car. The first one hit the rear glass of the vehicle while the second hit Bhati on his head. "We received information through PCR call and when we reached the spot, we were informed by one of his (Bhati) friends that they were on their way back from a temple in Bhiwadi when an unknown person started following them from the airport," said Ingit Pratap Singh, DCP Southwest district. The accused has been identified as Nitin Singh Raghuvanshi and a case has been registered under IPC sections for rash driving, attempted murder and the Arms Act on the complaint of Bhati's friends, the DCP told IANS. He informed that during the investigation, police scanned CCTV footage from the Delhi-Gurugram border to Kalkaji and identified the Swift car that was driven by the accused. "After the firing incident, accused Nitin Raghuvanshi went to Kalkaji and sent his car to a repair shop in Okhla from where our team has seized it. His mother, Archana, is a Delhi Police officer. The family lives in a police colony in Kalkaji," Singh added. New Delhi, Aug 26 : Afghanistan's exiled President Ashraf Ghani must be brought to justice and face criminal charges of embezzlement if he indeed fled the besieged country with duffle bags full of cash intended for the Afghan people, according to House Oversight Committee Republicans of the US. Ghani hastily abandoned Afghanistan earlier this month as the Taliban marched to power. He turned up in the United Arab Emirates, which accepted the president on humanitarian grounds. Fox News reported House Republicans are raising alarms over news reports that Ghani left Afghanistan with "duffle bags full of cash totaling $169 million." In a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland, the lawmakers cite reports that "Ghani in fact had so much looted money with him when he fled Afghanistan that not all of it would fit in his helicopter and that he was forced to leave money lying on the tarmac." Rep James Comer, the top Republican on the Oversight Committee, and Rep Glenn Grothman, R-Wis, sent letters Tuesday to both Garland and Secretary of State Antony Blinken asking for a briefing no later than Aug 31 on whether Ghani is in possession of US taxpayer dollars and whether the US government is seeking criminal charges against him, Fox News reported. "If true, this was not the dignified exit of a benevolent head of state, but that of a coward and grifter," the lawmakers wrote to Blinken in a letter first obtained by Fox News. "The United States must do everything in its power to seize any illicitly gained funds that were corruptly embezzled by President Ghani. If he diverted funds from their intended purposes, the US should bring him to justice." The lawmakers say corrupt foreign government officials cannot be permitted to personally enrich themselves with American money destined to safeguard the Afghan people. "This is particularly the case where President Ghani's reckless and cowardly actions likely contributed to the speed with which the Taliban took over the country and toppled the Afghan government," they wrote. (Sanjeev Sharma can be reached at Sanjeev.s@ians.in) -- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text Gurugram, Aug 26 : Hundreds of cow vigilantes staged a protest against cattle smugglers in Haryana's Gurugram on Thursday and demanded the arrest of the smugglers who allegedly attacked cow vigilantes, leaving three of them seriously injured. The incident took place on Wednesday when three cow vigilantes, -- Sunil Rawat, Rajbeer Singh and Tinku -- were following some suspected cattle smugglers in a car in Ullawas village of Gurugram. The suspects identified as Sheikh, Pravesh, Saddam and Balu, all residents of Haryana's Nuh district, allegedly attacked the vigilantes, leaving them seriously injured. Cow vigilante groups from Haryana and Uttar Pradesh handed over a memorandum to Deputy Commissioner of Gurugram Yash Garg on Thursday and sought strict action against the miscreants. The groups in their memorandum demanded a gun license to one of the group members, free medical aid to the victims and the formation of a Special Task Force to nab cattle smugglers and to stop the illegal smuggling of beef. "We will forward their demands to the government of Haryana. Action will be initiated against those guilty," Yash Garg said. Deputy Commissioner of Police (west), Deepak Saharan who was present with the deputy commissioner said, "A team of police is already investigating the matter and we have also received some lead inputs about the absconding criminals. They will soon be behind the bars." A case under relevant sections of the IPC has been registered against the accused at Sector-65 police station in Gurugram. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The Punjab cabinet on Thursday decided to summon a special session of the Assembly for one day on September 3 to commemorate the historic 400th Prakash Purb of Guru Tegh Bahadur. Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said he will invite Vice President Venkaiah Naidu, Punjab Governor V.P. Badnore and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as guests at the special session. The Cabinet, at a meeting chaired by the Chief Minister, approved recommending to the Governor summon a session of the House. According to a spokesperson for the Chief Minister's Office, the session would start with obituary references at 10 a.m., followed by celebration of the 400th birth anniversary of Guru Tegh Bahadur at 11 a.m. Bengaluru, Aug 26 : Karnataka Home Minister Araga Jnanendra has caused outrage while commenting on the Mysuru gang-rape, which has rocked the state. He also attacked the Congress for politicising the issue. "The rape incident has taken place in a distant place. But, the Congress is choosing to rape me here," he said. He also blamed the victim for moving freely in the late evening. "She should not have gone there. It is a desolate place. She went there late in the evening. The victim lady should not have gone to an isolated place at 7.30 p.m. But, people are free to go anywhere any time." Attacking the Congress, he said gang rape was an inhuman act, but the Congress is trying to politicise the issue. They are unfairly demanding my resignation and the government's resignation, it is not fair. I didn't mean to hurt the feelings of Congress leaders. I said it jokingly," he said. "Mysuru is a cultural town and the incident is a black mark on the whole of the state. This should not have happened," he said. "The police filed an FIR within 12 hours of the incident. Investigation is being taken up before the recording of the statements by the victims," he added. "I have deputed senior officers to look into the issue. They are probing from all angles," Jnanendra said. During the Congress rule in 2014, a rape case in a prestigious educational institution had taken place on July 2, but the FIR was lodged on July 14, he claimed. KPCC President D.K. Shivakumar reacting to the statement of Araga Jnanendra urged him to arrest those Congress leaders who raped him. "He has taken up the portfolio very recently. He is stating that Congress is raping me. The 'rape' word seems to be dear and natural to him. I want answers from all the BJP leaders of the state. I am asking the DGP to file FIR on all Congress leaders who have raped him even if it is Shivakumar or Opposition leader Siddaramaiah," he demanded. Earlier, the Congress attacked BJP by calling it a party which supported rapists. The BJP's Karnataka unit has defended a former minister facing charges of rape, the party has special love for rapists, the BJP will defend the rapists in Mysuru gang rape incident also, Congress said on social media. New Delhi, Aug 26 : India's wearables market grew 118.2 per cent year-over-year (YoY) in 2Q21 (April-June), shipping 11.2 million units, a new report said in Thursday. According to the International Data Corporation's (IDC) India Monthly Wearable Device Tracker, watches continued to be the fastest-growing category accounting for 81.2 per cent share in the wristwear category that includes watches and wristbands, up from 35 per cent a year ago. The earwear category also maintained its momentum, doubling its shipments in 2Q21 and remains the largest category in wearables. The second wave of Covid-19 had a marginal impact as the overall wearable shipments declined by 1.3 per cent sequentially in 2Q21. Partial lockdowns, weekend curfews, and disrupted supply chains resulted in a skewed slump in the early-quarter shipments. However, unlike last year, the market was quick to recover as the vendors stocked the channels to fulfil the pent-up consumer demand in June'21. Over the quarters, the watch form factor seems to be appealing to the consumers, and Indian brands have been quicker to leverage this trend and align their device portfolio. Among the top five brands, three spots are captured by Indian brands, while Huami and Realme are at third and fifth positions, respectively. Noise continues to be the leading player in the overall watch category for five straight quarters with a 28.6 per cent share in 2Q21 and closely followed by BoAt with a 26.9 per cent share. Fire-boltt, another homegrown brand, has entered at fourth position in just three quarters of starting its business in this category. However, Xiaomi maintains its formidable lead in the wristband category with 38.9 per cent share. "Affordability has been the key for Indian brands, and these brands have been immensely successful in gaining a significant portion of the watch market with competitive pricing, aggressive marketing, and faster adoption of new features," IDC India, Market Analyst, Client Devices, Anisha Dumbre said in a statement. The earwear category grew by 113.1 per cent YoY in 2Q21, shipping 9.2-million-units. BoAt's aggressive shipments and diverse portfolio helped it gain a dominant 45.5 per cent share in 2Q21. It also led the TWS category with a 39.6 per cent share in the quarter. OnePlus finished second with an 8.5 per cent category share in the second quarter of this year. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The just released 'Drone Rules, 2021' is expected to generate employment as well as accumulate economic benefits for the country, said Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia on Thursday. The Minister, in a conference cited that the new policy will enable the usage of drones in multiple sectors. "The new policy will promote research and development, manufacturing, service delivery in the country," he said. "There are already 200 Startups in the country even before the announcement of this policy. We expect generation of thousands of jobs via this policy." The Centre has replaced the UAS Rules with the liberalised Drone Rules, 2021 which are built on a premise of trust, self-certification and non-intrusive monitoring. In March 2021, the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) had published the UAS Rules, 2021. "They were perceived by academia, Startups, end-users and other stakeholders as being restrictive in nature as they involved considerable paperwork, required permissions for every drone flight and very few 'free to fly' green zones were available," the MoCA said in a statement. "Based on the feedback, the Government has decided to repeal the UAS Rules, 2021 and replace the same with the liberalised Drone Rules, 2021." The 'Unmanned Aircraft Systems' (UAS), commonly known as drones, offer tremendous benefits to almost all sectors of the economy like agriculture, mining, infrastructure, surveillance, emergency response, transportation, geo-spatial mapping, defence, and law enforcement. "Drones can be significant creators of employment and economic growth due to their reach, versatility, and ease of use, especially in India's remote and inaccessible areas," the statement said. "In view of its traditional strengths in innovation, information technology, frugal engineering and huge domestic demand,India has the potential to be a global drone hub by 2030." --IANS rv/sn/bg Get Outlook for iOS New Delhi, Aug 26 : After the meeting of Rahul Gandhi with Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and T.S. Singh Deo, it is widely expected that the state could see a minor portfolio reshuffle. Singh Deo may be given more importance in the cabinet and it's likely he may be allotted a portfolio soon. Currently he holds the health portfolio. Sources said that Rahul Gandhi is visibly upset over the issues between the two leaders and has asked secretary general (organisation) K.C. Venugopal to sort them out soon. It is said that Singh Deo may be allotted the finance portfolio, while the final decision will be taken by Sonia Gandhi and she is likely to meet the leaders after a truce formula is evolved. In the meeting with Rahul Gandhi, Singh Deo kept the grievances to the fore, and complained against Amarjeet Bhagat who is from the same region as Singh Deo. Meanwhile, Baghel received a huge welcome in Raipur on his return from Delhi on Wednesday after the meeting. He said, "I will step down when Sonia and Rahul Ji order me. Those talking about a 2-2.5 years plan are trying to bring political instability but will never succeed," he said referring to the demand of rotational chief ministership by Singh Deo. On Tuesday, the meeting lasted for over two and a half hours at the residence of Rahul Gandhi. After the meeting, Chhattisgarh Congress in-charge P.L. Punia speaking to the media said, "There was no discussion on change of leadership in Chhattisgarh." Punia attended the meeting along with the state Chief Minister and the health minister. The meeting of these two leaders with Rahul Gandhi came amid Deo's reported claims for the top post in the state, demanding rotational chief ministership. There were several reports of differences between Baghel and Deo, with the latter lobbying hard for months to replace Chief Minister Baghel. On July 27, Deo walked out of the Assembly saying, "it is too much" after the opposition created an uproar demanding a House panel probe into Congress MLA Brihaspat Singh's charge that the Minister was behind an attack on him. Deo and Baghel have been making several trips to the national capital. Deo, for the record, maintains that "Sonia Gandhiji and Rahul Gandhiji will decide." Following his visit, Baghel also rushed to the national capital in July this year. Hyderabad, Aug 26 : The Telangana government on Thursday released another Rs 500 crore for implementation of Dalit Bandhu scheme, on a pilot basis, in Huzurabad Assembly constituency. On the orders of Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, the State SC Corporation released the money to the account of Karimnagar District Collector. With this, Rs 2,000 crore target for implementation of the Dalit Bandhu scheme, as a pilot project, in Huzurabad has been achieved. The Corporation released Rs 1,500 crore since August 23 while Rs 500 crore was made available on August 6. The target of Rs 2,000 crore was announced by the chief minister while addressing a public meeting in the constituency. Officials said that the government machinery has made all arrangements at the field level to take up the project. With the Rs 2,000 crore released as per orders of the CM, implementation of the Dalit Bandhu scheme will now begin on a war footing in accordance with the guidelines. Under 'Dalit Bandhu', a brainchild of the Chief Minister, every beneficiary Dalit family will get Rs 10 lakh as grant and they will be free to chose their profession, self-employment or businesses for utilising the funds. Addressing a public meeting on August 16 at Shalapaly in Huzurabad constituency to launch the scheme, the Chief Minister had announced that the government will disburse over Rs 2,000 crore to 21,000 Dalit families in Huzurabad in next two months. He said there will be no selection of beneficiaries in Huzurabad Assembly segment, as the scheme will be implemented for all the Scheduled Caste (SC) families in a saturation mode. Earlier, on August 5 the the government had released Rs 7.60 crore to extend the financial assistance to 76 Dalit families in Vasalamarri, a village adopted by the Chief Minister in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri district. While addressing the public meeting in Huzurabad, he declared that the all the 17 lakh Dalit families will be benefited from the scheme. The population of Dalits in the state is 75 lakh population. KCR, as Rao is popularly known, said that if Dalit Bandhu is implemented for all 17 lakh SC families in the state, it will cost Rs 1.7 lakh crore. He said the government will allocate Rs 30,000 crore to Rs 40,000 crore in the budget every year for 3 to 4 years. He said to start with poorest of the poor among the SC families will receive the financial assistance. However, the launch of the pilot from Huzurabad constituency has come under criticism from the opposition parties and some NGOs, who alleged that the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) is trying to lure Dalit voters. Huzurabad seat fell vacant following resignation of former minister Eatala Rajender after he was dropped from Cabinet by KCR. Rajender joined the BJP and is preparing to contest the bypoll as the saffron party candidate. Both the Congress and the BJP alleged that the launch of Dalit Bandhu from Huzurabad shows the "desperation" of the ruling party. Toronto, Aug 26 : Fluvoxamine -- a low-cost and safe drug typically used in forms of depression and related disorders -- has the potential to reduce the cytokine storm in Covid-19 patients, finds a study. The study led by a team of international researchers from Canada, the US, and Brazil examined 1,472 patients who were randomly assigned to receive fluvoxamine or placebo. Patients were older than 50 years of age or had a known risk factor for developing severe Covid -19 disease. The drug resulted in approximately a 30 per cent reduction in the primary outcome. The proportion of patients observed in an emergency room foA less than 6 hours or admitted to hospital due to Covid was lower for the fluvoxamine group compared to placebo. The study is one of only a few large Phase 3 platform randomised clinical trials to find evidence for an intervention that can be provided to patients before they become severely ill and prevent the likelihood of patients developing advanced disease. The findings have the potential to change how Covid-19 is treated around the world as fluvoxamine is cheap, well understood, and widely available in most countries. "There are currently limited treatment options for the outpatient clinical management of Covid-19. A drug that costs only $4 per treatment of Covid-19 has major implications for care around the globe," said Professor Edward Mills, from McMaster University in Canada. Several other studies have also shed light on inexpensive and safe potential treatment against Covid-induced cytokine storm -- a potentially fatal amplification of an immune response. Researchers from University of Virginia in the US found that a low cost heartburn drug famotidine improved the odds of survival for Covid-19 patients, especially when it is combined with aspirin. Famotidine drug also suppressed the cytokine storm in Covid patients. Further, a team from the University of Technology in Sydney found that seeds of the plant, Nigella sativa, better known as Kalonji, could be utilised in the treatment of Covid-19 infection. They found an active ingredient of Nigella sativa can also block the 'cytokine' storm that affects seriously ill patients who are hospitalised with Covid-19. Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19) Jaipur, Aug 26 : Health minister of Rajasthan Raghu Sharma on Thursday said that the state is leading in vaccination throughout the country. He said that 20 per cent of the targeted population in the state has been vaccinated by two doses, which is more than 1 crore population till Thursday afternoon. "A total of 4,12,67,359 people in the state have been vaccinated so far. Of these, 3,12,58,116 have been administered the first dose and 1,00,09,243 people have been administered both doses," he said. Vaccination is being done on 3,177 centres in the state including 3,109 government and 68 private sites, he said complimenting the health personnel for this achievement. Anticipating the third wave of the pandemic, the Health Minister said that the infrastructure of all children's hospitals in the state is being strengthened. The ICU along with medical oxygen is being ensured in selected 332 Community Health Centres, he added. Sharma said that oxygen generation plants are being constantly set up in the state for the availability of 1,000 metric tonne of medical oxygen. To overcome the shortage of oxygen, the government has procured more than 50,000 oxygen concentrators, which are being sent to medical institutions in remote areas so that villagers need not have to come to cities, he said further. Washington, Aug 26 : The second dose of Johnson & Johnson's Covid-19 vaccine generates a strong immune response against the deadly virus among people previously vaccinated with its single-shot vaccine, the company said. New interim data demonstrate that a booster dose of the J&J's Covid-19 vaccine generated a rapid and robust increase in spike-binding antibodies. People who received booster doses showed ninefold increase in antibody levels compared with one month after first dose, the US drugmaker said in a statement on Wednesday. The company said researchers observed significant increases in antibody responses in participants between ages 18 and 55 and in those 65 and older who received a lower booster dose. However, the company didn't specify exactly when or how many subjects received the second dose. Further, J&J stated that the study has been submitted on pre-print medRxiv, meaning that the data haven't been peer-reviewed or published in a scientific journal. The company had, in July, reported in interim Phase 1/2a data that a single shot of Covid-19 vaccine generates strong and robust immune responses that are durable and persistent through eight months. In the "new data, we also see that a booster dose of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine further increases antibody responses among study participants who had previously received our vaccine", said Mathai Mammen, Global Head, Janssen Research and Development, J&J, in the statement. "We look forward to discussing with public health officials a potential strategy for our Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine, boosting eight months or longer after the primary single-dose vaccination," he added. The company is engaging with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), European Medicines Agency (EMA) and other health authorities regarding boosting with the J&J Covid-19 vaccine. The Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 single-dose vaccine is compatible with standard vaccine storage and distribution channels with ease of delivery to remote areas. The vaccine is estimated to remain stable for two years at minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 20 degrees Celsius), and a maximum of 4.5 months at routine refrigeration temperatures of 36-46 degrees Fahrenheit (2-8 degrees Celsius). According to the CDC data, 14 million J&J vaccines have been administered in the US -- the least used vaccine in the country by a significant margin. The others, Moderna and Pfizer, have been respectively administered more than 140 million and 205 million times, although two doses are needed for full immunisation, CDC data showed. Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19) Panaji, Aug 26 : Former Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram on Thursday asked media persons if they were confusing Punjab with Afghanistan, when asked to comment on the reports of rebellion in the party's ranks in the northern Indian state. "There is no rebellion in Chhattisgarh, there is no rebellion in Punjab. You are mixing up Afghanistan. There is no rebellion," Chidambaram told reporters at the state Congress headquarters in Panaji. Chidambaram was addressing a press conference at the fag-end of his two-day visit to the state in the capacity as the All India Congress Committee's senior observer in charge of Goa ahead of the 2022 state assembly polls. Chidambaram said that "internal matters" within the Congress party should not be construed as rebellion, citing the example of the change of leadership in BJP-led Karnataka, where a sitting chief minister B.S. Yediyurappa was replaced by Basavaraj Bommai. "These are internal matters which are discussed within the party. Did you describe the Karnataka change of guard as a rebellion?" Chidambaram said. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The Supreme Court on Thursday slammed the Tihar jail authorities for colluding with former directors of Unitech, Sanjay Chandra and his brother Ajay Chandra, who were allegedly engaging in illegal activities from inside the jail and attempting to derail the investigation. A bench comprising Justices D.Y. Chandrachud and M.R. Shah said: "We have lost all faith in the Tihar Jail authorities! They are sitting in the capital city and defeating the order of the Supreme Court! Absolutely shameless on the part of the Superintendent of the Tihar jail!" The bench told senior advocate Vikas Singh, representing the Chandra brothers, that "once we have revoked your facilities, you are only entitled to as much as the other undertrials". "This is defeating the jurisdiction of this court and the investigation by the ED," it added. Additional Solicitor General Madhavi Divan, representing the ED, submitted before the bench that Chandra brothers were operating from the jail, and the agency also found their secret underground office, from where hundreds of original property sale deeds, digital signatures, and computers with sensitive information were seized. She further added the brothers had deputed staff outside the Tihar jail premises for communication on disposing of the properties. The top court said that the status report by the forensic auditor established they did not provide access to all electronic records, including those which were in possession of the chief financial officer of Unitech, which was lack of cooperation. Coming down hard on the Tihar Jail authorities, the court said that they have acted absolutely in connivance with the Chandras and the jail has virtually become a haven for carrying out unlawful activities and for defeating the orders of the apex court. It said it will shift the brothers elsewhere and directed them to be shifted to the Arthur Road jail and Taloja jail in Mumbai. The bench directed that Chandra brothers will not get any additional facilities apart from those which are available in the normal course according to the jail manual. The bench noted that the Enforcement Directorate has filed two status reports dated April 5, and August 16, and the latter contained a letter from its Assistant Director to the Delhi Police Commissioner, listing specific details of the manner in which the premises of Tihar jail have been used for engaging in illegal activities by flouting the jail rules, making efforts to dissipate the proceedings, and attempting to derail investigation and influencing witnesses. It asked why Delhi police chief has not taken any action for 10 days despite the ED's communication in connection with allegations against the jail authorities, and him to conduct an inquiry and submit a report within four weeks. Kochi: Students being screened for COVID-19 as they arrive at their exam center in Kochi to appear for their remaining exams that got postponed due to the onging nationwide lockdown imposed to mitigate the spread of coronavirus, as the Secondary Scho Image Source: IANS News Thiruvananthapuram, Aug 26 : Kerala on Thursday saw 30,007 people turn Covid positive after 1,66,397 samples were tested and the test positivity rate for the day was 18.03 per cent, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijjayan said. In a statement issued here, Vijayan also said 18,997 people turned negative, taking the total active cases to 1,81,209. Another 162 deaths were reported, taking the death toll to 20,134. Ernakulam district accounted for 3,872 cases, followed by Kozhikode with 3,461 and Trissur and 3,157. Health Minister Veena George said that a study by her department revealed that 35 per cent of the spread is taking place at homes and the need of the hour is those who turn positive but do not have facilities for home quarantine should approach the government facilities. Meanwhile, with Kerala continuing to hog the national and international headlines from being the first state in the country to tackle Covid effectively last year to now record as high as 65 per cent of the daily new cases, the highest number of active cases besides the highest deaths, the top opposition leaders have started slamming Vijayan. Minister of State for External Affairs V. Muraleedharan said Vijayan, for more than a year, was live on TV on a daily basis explaining the care and concern of his government, but has gone missing now. "The Central team which visited the state has come out with grave errors that the state government did, especially in the way the home quarantine was carried out. The state government should pull up their socks and do everything they can to fight Covid spread. But sadly the Vijayan government is busy organising the centenary celebrations of the Moplah rebellion," he said. Former Leader of Opposition and veteran Congress legislator Ramesh Chennithala said Vijayan should now apologise to the people of Kerala and take the full responsibility of what is happening in the Covid front. Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19) New Delhi, Aug 26 : India on Thursday granted safety permission for restart of Boeing 737Max operations in the country. Aviation regulator DGCA granted the safety permission to operators of Boeing 737Max to restart operations. "This rescission enables operation of Boeing Company Model 737-8 and Boeing Company Model 737-9 airplanes only upon satisfaction of applicable requirements for return to service," the DGCA said in its order. At present, only SpiceJet has 737Max in their fleet. Bengaluru, Aug 26 : After Home Minister Araga Jnanendra's shocking comments on Mysuru gang rape case, it is the turn of Minister for Labour Shivaram Hebbar to make another loose comment on the serious crime. Shivaram Hebbar said here on Thursday that such incidents of gang rape happen all the time. Such incidents have occurred during the times of other governments also. These things have been taking place for quite a long time. "It is not that such incidents are taking place only when our party came to power. Women have been targeted earlier," he added. Such evil persons who commit crimes are always there in the society. This is an unfortunate and shocking incident. Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai has directed to Home Minister Araga Jnanendra for probe. Demand of resignation in the backdrop of gang rape is not correct, he said, adding that it is common for the opposition to demand resignation. "Our government will initiate action on the accused persons. They will be arrested soon. The victim will be given all the support," he stated. Earlier, Karnataka Home Minister Araga Jnanendra attacked the Congress for politicising the issue. "The rape incident has taken place in a distant place. But, the Congress is choosing to rape me here," he said. He also blamed the victim for moving freely in the late evening. "She should not have gone there. It is a desolate place. She went there late in the evening. The victim lady should not have gone to an isolated place at 7.30 p.m. But, people are free to go anywhere any time." Attacking the Congress, he said gang rape was an inhuman act, but the Congress is trying to politicise the issue. They are unfairly demanding my resignation and the government's resignation, it is not fair. I didn't mean to hurt the feelings of Congress leaders. I said it jokingly," he said. The statements by the two ministers of the ruling government have drawn sharp reactions from the opposition as well as the people. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The BJP believes that the union government's decision to increase the Fair and Remunerative Price (FRP) for sugarcane will help the party in next year's UP assembly polls, specially in Western Uttar Pradesh. Farmers from Western Uttar Pradesh led by Rakesh Tikait have been protesting since last year against the three new farm laws. BJP Rajya Sabha member from Uttar Pradesh, Vijaypal Singh Tomar told IANS that the pro farmer decision will definitely help the party and shows that the Narendra Modi government is concerned about the welfare of the farmers. "Union cabinet decision to increase the FRP will definitely result in winning back farmers' support who are misguided by some political parties and farmer leaders over new farm laws. The decision also shows the Modi government's commitment to the welfare of farmers," Tomar said. Terming the decision historic BJP Kisan Morcha president and Lok Sabha member, Raj Kumar Chahar said, "This is a historic and revolutionary step to increase farmers income. Since day one in office, Prime Minister Modi has been working for the welfare of farmers and to double their income." A senior party leader pointed out that in the past an increase in sugarcane price had yielded political benefits and this time also it will help the BJP in next year's assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday approved FRP of Rs 290 per quintal for sugarcane based on 10 percent recovery. The BJP leaders feel that the move will cool the anger among the farmers over the three farm laws. "With an increase in the FRP, anger among farmers will likely scale down specially in Western Uttar Pradesh where a section of farmers are part of the agitation led by Tikait," a party insider said. But a section within the party in Uttar Pradesh also feels that the Yogi Adityanath government should also increase the State Advised Price (SAP). Many state governments like Punjab and Uttar Pradesh have been announcing their own sugarcane rates SAP, which is given to farmers in the state and is usually higher than the FRP. Earlier this year, a delegation of saffron party leaders including union minister Sanjeev Balyan, party MPs Raj Kumar Chahar, Satypal Singh and Bhola Singh and others met Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath over the issues related to sugarcane farmers including the State Advised Price. A senior party leader said that FRP is still less than the SAP, which needs to be increased to win back the farmers' support in next year's assembly polls. "Any increase in SAP by Adityanath will further benefit the party and consolidate our support base among farmers and in Western Uttar Pradesh," he said. The government has claimed that the decision will benefit the five crore sugarcane farmers and their dependents, as well as the five lakh workers employed in the sugar mills and related ancillary activities. New Delhi, Aug 26 : Prominent Taliban leader Shahabuddin Dilwar, in response to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modis statement casting doubt on the sustainability of a new regime in Afghanistan, has said India will soon know that the Taliban can run the countrys affairs smoothly, Pakistan daily Dawn reported. Dawn said the statement from the Taliban leader came a week after Modi commented on the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, saying "empires created out of terror can dominate for some time, but their existence is never permanent as they cannot suppress humanity forever". The Indian premier, in a veiled criticism of the Taliban, had said: "The destroying powers, the thinking that builds an empire on the basis of terror, may dominate for some time in a period of time, but its existence is never permanent, it cannot suppress humanity for a long time." Reacting to Modi's statement in an exclusive conversation with Radio Pakistan correspondent Bilal Khan Mehsud in Kabul on Thursday, Dilwar warned India not to interfere in the internal affairs of Afghanistan. Dilwar said Pakistan is a neighbour of Afghanistan and a friendly country, as he thanked it for hosting over three million Afghan refugees. "We are thankful to Pakistan for its services... For the welfare of the refugees," he added. Dilwar also underlined that Taliban want peaceful ties with all the countries based on mutual respect. New Delhi, Aug 26: Russia is reinforcing its bases in Central Asia to prevent a fresh influx of extremism in its backyard following the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban. The recent military drills that took place on the Afghan border with Uzbekistan and Tajikistan had Russian forces from these bases-sending a clear signal to the Taliban not to invade or cause problems in the region. Among its bases, Russia maintains its largest presence in Tajikistan where it has deployed its 201 motorised division. Tajikistan In Tajikistan, the division operates from Dushanbe, and Bokhtar, located 100 km to the south of the Tajik capital. The Russians also operate from the Okno base to maintain surveillance over the skies, thus making Tajikistan the core for fostering stability in the entire Central Asian region. The Russians have recently steeled their presence in Tajikistan by deploying their latest Kornet anti-tank missile systems, to deter any intrusion by tanks and mechanised infantry from the Afghan side. The huge 201 military base network houses self-propelled artillery, that is artillery guns mounted on a tracked vehicle to provide heavy fire power on the move. The base also houses tanks and conventional artillery guns to strike enemy columns in depth. Besides, the base has air defence forces, to counter attacks by fighter jets as well as troops that can operate in a nuclear, biological and chemical warfare environment. The Russians also deploy their highly potent S-300 air defence missiles at the base. Under an agreement signed with Russia in October 2012, Russia can operate the base for 30 years. Kyrgyzstan Russia has a military base in neighbouring Kyrgyzstan. Moscow has ensured that the base is strengthened steadily. It has been replenished with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and plans are afoot to improve its air and missile systems as well. Moscow also maintains its 338th naval communication centre as well as the Kant air base in Kyrgyzstan as well as the 954th torpedo testing range and a seismographic station. Kazakhstan Russia also maintains a military base in Kazakhstan which is historically famous for the Baikonur Cosmodrome--the site of the earth's first artificial satellite. The Russians also run the Sary Shagan anti-ballistic missile testing range in Kazakhstan. Over the last decade, it has also been building military bases and other infrastructure in the Arctic. As the waters melt, it is looking at exploiting the rich resources of the region. Besides central Asia, Russia also has military bases in Armenia, Belarus, Georgia and Abkhazia in eastern Europe. Russia maintains its bases under the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO), a security umbrella, which is key to the protection of the member countries in Central Asia, including their military modernisation. Under this alliance, which is similar to the US-led NATO, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu had recently promised to protect the Central Asian countries in case of possible attacks by the Taliban. (The content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative Colombo, Aug 26 : The Sri Lankan government has lifted the ban on Indian nationals entering Sri Lanka. Tourism Minister Prasanna Ranatunga said that giving priority to the health guidelines, fully vaccinated tourists from India and several other countries would be allowed to enter the island nation. "Tourists from India are welcome to visit Sri Lanka and we are making arrangements to allow them to enter the country following strict health guidelines," the minster said. However, Ranatunga said that only those Indian nationals who have received both doses of Covid-19 vaccine would be allowed to go around the country. Those who have received both doses of vaccine can go around the country after obtaining a negative RT-PCR report, he said. However, Ranatunga said that tourists who have not received both doses of vaccine would be allowed to enter the country, but would be placed under a tourist bio-bubble. "Tourists who have not received any dose of the vaccine can visit 22 tourists places, including wildlife sanctuaries and cultural, historical and Buddhist religious places. They would be placed under a bio bubble," he said. The minister also said that plans are underway to start flights from Trichy in Tamil Nadu to Colombo. "We have not stopped any flight from India. It was due to the pandemic that we had stopped allowing anyone coming through India," he said. On the direction of the Sri Lankan health authorities, all arrivals from India were stopped from May 6 due to the surge in Covid cases. Earlier this week, Sri Lanka's Cabinet had announced granting of three-month visa for tourists through the immigration office's online portal. Tourism promotion authorities had been pushing for 'digital nomad' visas for long-term tourists. A key foreign income earner for the island nation, tourism was one of the worst-hit areas due to the pandemic. In 2018, Sri Lanka had earned an all-time high amount of $4.4 billion from tourism, while globally recognised company Lonely Planet had named the country as the No. 1 travel destination for the year. Despite the Easter Sunday suicide bomb attacks in April 2019, Sri Lanka earned $3.5 billion from tourism that year, which dropped to just $682 million in December 2020, owing to the pandemic. R.W. Apple Jr. wrote back in 2001 that "like an unwelcome specter from an unhappy past, the ominous word 'quagmire' has begun to haunt conversations among government officials and students of foreign policy, both here and abroad. Could Afghanistan become another Vietnam?" It took 20 years for the entire world to witness the US exit from Afghanistan. Shocking pictures of Afghan civilians clinging onto a US C17 military aircraft appeared in the media. Some of them shockingly perished in midair at the Kabul airport. The US had to live another Saigon moment. Pictures of US withdrawal in Saigon circulated in the media -- the famous image of a man with a white shirt reaching down to grab a person at the top of a staircase to board the helicopter. On the afternoon of April 29, 1975, CIA officer Oren Bartholomew Harnage was assisting the fleeing refugees and this was in 22 Gia Long Street and not the US Embassy, photographed by Dutch journalist Van Es. Back then, President Nixon's exit from Vietnam had 130,000 South Vietnamese evacuated to the US bases in Guam and the Philippines. Then the evacuees were resettled in the US. Just like refugees who fled Communist rule, today, the same obligation to protect Afghan refugees fleeing the Taliban clutches has fallen on the United States. According to ORF scholar Harsh Pant, 'the hard-won rights for women and minorities and democracy have already been sacrificed at the altar, reaching a modus vivendi with the Taliban'. The US withdrawal was depicted as a humiliation and a loss, falling short of not capturing the accurate strategic dimensions and how the exit would impact India and the regional security of South Asia, especially to smaller South Asian neighbours like Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and the Maldives. The failure of non-military instruments of power Robert M Gates, in his book 'Exercise of Power', admits that "it is probably true that Brent Scowcroft and I as National Security Advisor and deputy should have at least devoted some time to focus on how the US and others might help Afghanistan after a decade of war... we certainly sent the wrong signal when we closed our embassy after the Soviets left. After helping the Afghans defeat the Soviets, we presumably had the foundation of at least some goodwill". The lost opportunity in 1989 was due to the US focus on Eastern Europe than Afghanistan. With the absence of the US between 1996 and 2001, Osama Bin Laden established camps in Afghanistan that trained an estimated ten thousand terrorist fighters. Afghanistan became a state sponsor of terror, and a state sponsored by terror writes President George W. Bush in his memoir Decision Point. Twenty-six days after the 9/11 attack, US military began its airstrikes in Afghanistan. Taliban and al-Qaeda were ousted from Afghanistan by early 2002, with 27 American lives lost and $20 billion spent. After 20 years, the nation building cost was nearly $2 trillion. Gates observed, "We and Afghans would have been better served had our military departed in 2002 and had we thereafter relieved on our non-military instruments of national power and patience", believing that lasting change would come within a more realistic projection. George Town Scholar Christine C Fair rightly assessed that "After clearing Afghanistan of Al Qaeda, which happened in 2004, the United States should have withdrawn. When the United States decided to declare war on the Taliban and enter into a highly ill-devised state-building fiasco, it should have realised that this would be a disaster absent any policy to stop Pakistan from supporting the Taliban". According to Sarah Chaves, while Pakistan was a key factor for the Taliban tentacles to grow in Afghanistan, the Afghan government's corruption is another apparent factor. Taliban and China The US has faced multiple exits and several cycles of proxy wars since the end of the cold war when the hammer and the sickle flag fell in Kremlin. US exit from Afghanistan was a decision taken by the previous Trump administration, taken forward by President Biden. The withdrawal strategy leaves China, the emerging Asia power, with more responsibility to balance the Taliban occupation, making China's western frontier of Xinjiang open for multiple security threats. A month ago, Taliban leaders assured China that they will not allow anyone to use Afghan soil against China and support China to maintain security in their border areas in the Wakhan corridor. However, China's BRI still remains vulnerable when the US leaves Afghanistan, a geographical pivot state wedged between Central and South Asian regions. The calculated exit of the unending war in Afghanistan is a strategy that was in the making for many years in Washington. It was wholly executed by Biden. The danger for the US exit is not the Taliban's hold, but their tentacles and extremist agenda will expand through its proxies to multiple geographies in the region, threatening the regional security balance. Taliban and smaller South Asian nations There is a clear and present danger for India from Taliban. India which focused on its security concerns in the recent past towards north (China) and West (Pakistan) would need a broader spectrum of focus towards the South (Sri Lanka and the Maldives) and east (Bangladesh). Taliban's proxies in Bangladesh - Jund al-Tawheed Khalifa, Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI-B), AQIS, and Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) will have a new lease of life with the Taliban grip in Afghanistan. The Maldives, with its highest per capita contribution to foreign terrorist fighters, will be another nation that will be vulnerable and radicalised extremist in the country who has contact will see an opportunity with the Taliban's emergence to power. In Sri Lanka, the burqa ban, madrasa regulation, and force cremation of Muslims are clear optics towards further radicalisation, which the Taliban will exploit. Jihadist movements such as National Tohweed Jamath (NTJ) with contacts with South Indian cells, will find their energy back with Taliban return. Smaller South Asian nations with weak security structures will be fertile grounds for the Taliban to push the extremist agenda and suppress the secular movements. Sri Lanka, which faced the most significant terror attack in April 2019, is vulnerable to future security threats with the weak political environment. Pakistan will be a breeding ground due to its support towards Taliban insurgents to spread their activity. Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan views the Taliban capture as a moment of freedom, saying, 'Afghanistan has broken the shackles of slavery. The Taliban's grip and expanse will directly threaten India and many other smaller South Asian nations. Anti-India groups such as LeT and JeM have already found sanctuary in Afghanistan due to the Taliban and ISI. The re-Talibanisation of Afghanistan will have severe consequences to Indian national security. The radical Islamic elements will flow across borders easily due to a lack of infrastructure to counter the threat within the region. The multi jurisdictional structures for intelligence sharing and counter-terrorism within South Asia are underfunded and underdeveloped. The Sri Lankan Easter Sunday attacks proves this very argument. Taliban 2.0 and the Indo Pacific Greater Pakistan-China and Sri Lanka-China collaboration and Chinese projects such as CPEC of Hambantota/Port City are development projects to accelerate economic growth. In reality, the security challenges from the Taliban can have a destabilising effect on these projects and cause severe delays. China's inroads n South Asia are well-established in pro-China centric nations within the BRI. Many of these nations did not view the U.S. presence in the region as a positive trend, depicting it as a potential threat to national security projects from miscalculated policy decisions. The U.S. withdrawal is a direct message to the regional powers to look after their own regional security concerns than depending on Washington. The Western allies will draw another strategy in Taliban 2.0, perhaps more towards Indo-Pacific. Thus filling the gap after the withdrawal of the United States will be a challenging task for India, China and Russia. Maintaining the regional security of Central Asia and South Asia is going to be highly contested. China is far from filling the gap and perhaps will not focus on wider security concerns. Russia is monitoring the situation, leaving the burden to India that will face a clear, direct security threat from all directions including smaller south Asian nations. (Asanga Abeyagoonasekera is a geopolitical analyst and author of 'Conundrum of an Island [2021]'. The views expressed are personal) Patna, Aug 26 : The National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) has directed the district magistrate and the senior superintendent of police of Patna to submit the investigation report on the murder of a son of the additional district magistrate of Saharsa. Deepak Purusottam, the son of Purusottam Paswan, the additional district magistrate of Saharsa, went missing from Patna on July 13. His body was recovered from the bank of the Ganga river near Digha locality. After the recovery of the body, his father lodged a FIR against unknown persons in Digha police station. Deepak Purusottam was living with his family in Patna's Nageshwar colony. His father has written to the NCSC for a SIT probe into the murder of Deepak. He has also requested the commission to ensure the security of his family. Purusottam Paswan alleged that the Patna police have identified the accused but have not arrested them. "We suspect some local criminals of Nageshwar colony to be involved in the murder of my son. I have also given the lead about the accused but Patna police have not arrested them yet. The accused killed my son and disposed off the body on the bank of the Ganga river near Digha Ghat," Paswan said. The Patna police have deployed a DSP rank officer to investigate the case. The police officials of Digha police station quizzed the suspects and then let them go. The NCSC has asked the Patna district administration to submit the report in 7 days. The premises of St. Joseph's School and Orphanage in Dongri here were sealed after a whopping 22 out of 95 students tested Covid-19 positive. Image Source: IANS News Mumbai, Aug 26 : At least 22 students of a boarding school in Mumbai, including four aged below 12 years, have tested Covid-19 positive and the hostel premises have been sealed, said a BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation official. The developments came in the wake of RT-PCR tests conducted at the St. Josephs School and Orphanage in Dongri on August 24 when a couple of students complained of fever and other Covid-like symptoms a day earlier. After the two students tested Covid-19 positive, the BMC teams conducted more tests on the 95 students of whom 22 have tested positive, including the four kids below the age of 12. While the students above 12 years have been sent to the Covid care centre in the Richardson & Cruddas Company at Mazagaon, those below 12 years have been admitted to the paediatric Covid centre of Nair Hospital. In a related development, at least 17 Covid cases, including 5 with the Delta Plus variant, have been detected in a single housing society in Kandivali, with the BMC declaring it a containment zone. All the patients in the two areas (Dongri & Kandivali) are stable, and there is no cause for worry, said the BMC. Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19) New Delhi, Aug 26 : Global oil companies are likely to partner with major investment funds which already have submitted Expressions of Interest (EoI) for the state-run BPCL. Along with Anil Agarwal-led Vedanta, Apollo Global Management, and Think Gas (promoted by I Squared Capital) are reportedly among parties who have submitted bids for the state-run energy major. Major energy giants including Reliance Industries, Saudi Aramco, the UAE's Adnoc, and the UK's BP, have not placed interest for the state-run oil major so far. It is now anticipated that some among these energy giants may team with global funds in a bid to acquire the state-owner refiner, said people in the know of things. Recently, the Central government proposed to further sugarcoat the BPCL strategic sale deal for the interested investors by giving few more clarifications through a new set of frequently asked questions (FAQ). Sources had said that the Department of Promotion of Investment and Internal Trade (DPIIT) may soon issue a clarification that the BPCL under new private sector owners would be free to bring in foreign direct investment (FDI) to the tune of the entire 100 per cent equity of the company without conditions. Also, after privatisation, the BPCL would be free to exercise its right to stay or come out of the joint venture company that plans to build the world's largest (60 million tonne) integrated refinery-cum-petrochemicals complex in Maharashtra's Ratnagiri district at an estimated cost of Rs 3 lakh crore. Moreover, the government is also looking to allow the BPCL to sell its stake in Petronet LNG and Indraprastha Gas Ltd, where the oil refiner is one of the promoters, before its own strategic sale. This will prevent new owners ofthe BPCL from making mandatory open offers to the shareholders of these companies, an exercise that could increase the cost for the new investors by up to Rs 20,000 crore. The government is selling its entire 53.29 per cent stake in the BPCL to a strategic investor to mobilise over Rs 52,000 crore as disinvestment receipt. Though started in 2019 when its disinvestment got nod, the BPCL's disinvestment has been postponed on numerous occasions due to the pandemic related disruptions. The proposal to clarify 100 per cent FDI permission for the new owners of the BPCL is required as the refiner is a PSU company right now, where only up to 49 per cent FDI is permitted. Experts say that this clarification is essential as the government already allows 100 per cent FDI in the oil and gas sector and the case for the BPCL should be no different after it gets converted into a private entity. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The Centre has provided security cover by CRPF to the CBI teams probing cases of post-poll violence in West Bengal, sources in the security set up said here on Thursday. According to the sources, four companies of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) have been deployed for providing security to the CBI teams probing the matter. Out of the four, two companies will be stationed at the CBI office in Kolkata, while the other two will be stationed in the districts affected by post-poll violence. Some of the CRPF personnel will accompany the investigating teams during their visits to the areas where violence reportedly took place after the declaration of Assembly election results on May 2. The CBI took over the 'serious' cases of post-poll violence in Bengal following the order of a five-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court, which asked the central probe agency to investigate the alleged murder and rape incidents reported from the state in the aftermath of the declaration of Assembly election results. According to the sources, the CBI registered nine cases on Thursday related to the post-poll violence in the state. Four units of Special Investigation Team (SIT) have also been moved to the crime scenes across the state, the sources said. More cases are under the process of registration with some of them being handed over by the state government, sources further said. On August 19, the Calcutta High Court had ordered the formation of an SIT to probe all other offences related to the post-poll violence in the state. The bench had said that both the investigations will be monitored by the high court, which also directed the central probe agency to file a report on its investigation in the next six weeks. The high court directives came after a committee of the National Human Rights Commission submitted a report on the violence in the state after the declaration of Assembly poll results on May 2, in which the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress retained power with a thumping majority. It has been alleged that the Trinamool Congress (TMC) did not stop its supporters when they clashed with the opposing BJP workers at various places across the state after May 2. Kabul, Aug 26 : A blast rocked the Kabul airport, which is thronged by crowds of desperate Afghans seeking to flee the country after the Taliban takeover, on Thursday, causing numerous casualties. "We can confirm an explosion outside the Kabul airport. Casualties are unclear at this time. We will provide additional details when we can," Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said in a tweet. However, a Taliban leader said that at least 11 people, including women and children, were killed, and a number of Taliban guards got injured in the blast. The blast was said to have taken place outside one of the airport's gates where British troops are stationed to oversee the evacuation process. It is suspected to be a suicide attack. Evacuated Afghan journalist Bilal Sarwary, said in a tweet that the blast took place at a sewage canal where Afghans were vetted. "A suicide attacker blew himself up in the middle of a large crowd. At least another attacker started shooting, multiple eye witnesses in the area & a friend tell me," he said. There was no report about any British casualties, the BBC quoted a UK Defence Ministry source as saying. The incident comes amid warnings by the western nations of a terror strike at the airport as evacuation of foreign citizens continues. New Delhi, Aug 26: Russia has expressed serious concern over the US weapons that have fallen into Taliban hands, especially around 150 man-portable missiles that can bring down aircraft and wreak havoc with their devastating fire power. It is not ruled out that some of these could even be with militant groups other than the Taliban. Russia's Federal Service of Military and Technical Co-operation Director Dimitry Shugaev told journalists in Moscow on Wednesday that "there are more than 150 missiles left behind by the US forces in Afghanistan. We do not know who is in control of these missiles. They could be in the hands of the Taliban or any other militant group who can use them in any part of the world including Europe, America or India." Russia's defence minister Sergei Shoigu has also voiced concern about the Taliban seizing a large number of weapons. He expressed a particular worry about the Taliban obtaining more than 100 man-portable air defence missile systems, according to an AP report from Moscow. Mr. Shugaev explained that because the Taliban is banned in Russia, "we have no military technical cooperation with such a movement. " He said Russia supplied Mi-17 helicopters to Afghanistan in the past but they were bought by the US for the Afghan army. However, these helicopters were serviced by European enterprises outside Russia without the consent of Moscow. Russia no longer has anything to do with these aircraft, he added. Current and former U.S. officials also say there is concern the American weapons could be used to kill civilians or seized by other militant groups such as Islamic State to attack U.S. interests in the region. Interestingly, another worry for US officials is that these hi-tech weapons including aircraft, military drones and communications equipment with the Taliban may be passed on to China, a country that is notorious for "reverse engineering" or copycat products. Technology developed after years of painstaking R&D and spending billions of dollars could now be made available to China on a platter to upgrade its military hardware at a time when Beijing has locked horns with the USA in a fierce geopolitical rivalry. (The content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative Kolkata, Aug 26 : After being given the responsibility to probe 'serious' cases of post-poll violence in West Bengal by the Calcutta High Court earlier this month, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has so far registered nine cases into the matter. Escorted by central armed forces personnel, a team of CBI investigators on Thursday reached the residence of slain BJP supporter Avijit Sarkar at Kankurgachi in North Kolkata. Four officers from the homicide department of Kolkata Police also accompanied the CBI team. However, Avijit's elder brother Bishwajit Sarkar refused to give them entry into the house, following which the homicide officials left the spot. The CBI officers had a detailed interaction with Bishwajit. Based on the conversation, the CBI team restructured the entire scene of the night when the crime took place. The entire conversation between the CBI officials and Bishwajit was also video recorded. Sources in the agency said that it will soon send an initial report to Delhi. The report will have mention of nine FIRs filed in connection with the post-poll violence in the state. Sources further said that some officials of Kolkata Police are also under the scanner and some of them might be summoned for questioning at the CBI office. The CBI will have to submit a status report to the high court within six weeks. The CBI has formed four teams to investigate the serious cases like murder and rape that were reported after the announcement of Assembly poll results in the state on May 2. According to CBI officials, two teams will look into the cases of the city and its adjacent areas and two teams will go to the rural areas. Four companies of CRPF have been allotted to the CBI team to avoid any kind of untoward incident. The agency had earlier written to the West Bengal Director-General of Police seeking details of the cases of alleged murder and sexual abuse of women, in compliance with the high court order. The court had directed the CBI to probe the matter based on a report submitted by a committee set up by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC). "All the cases where, as per the report of the committee, the allegations are about murder of a person and crime against women regarding rape/attempt to rape, shall be referred to CBI for investigation. The committee, NHRC, any other commission or authority and the state shall immediately hand over the entire records of the cases to the CBI for investigation," the court had said. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The Supreme Court has directed the Centre and state governments to provide various high courts infrastructural facilities to establish additional CBI/special courts to fast-track criminal cases against sitting and former MPs/MLAs. A bench headed by Chief Justice N.V. Ramana said: "We, thus, direct the Central government as well as state governments to provide necessary infrastructural facilities to the High Courts for the purposes of establishment of additional CBI/Special Courts, as the case may be." The bench, also comprising Justices D.Y. Chandrachud and Surya Kant, said the special/CBI courts need to be set up in different parts of the state where more than 100 cases are pending to ensure easy accessibility to the witnesses and decongestion of existing special/CBI courts. The top court passed the order in a 2016 petition filed by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay seeking direction to fast-tracking of criminal trials against sitting and former MPs/MLAs. It took up the matter on Wednesday, but the order was uploaded on Thursday. The bench also directed the high courts to take necessary steps to expedite the pending trials and conclude the same within the time frame already fixed by previous orders. According to the CBI status report, there are 121 cases pending trial before different CBI Courts involving sitting and former MPs and 112 cases involving sitting and former MLAs. As per this report, 37 cases are still at the investigation stage, the oldest being registered on October 24, 2013. "The details of cases pending trial unveil that there are several cases in which the charge sheet was filed as far back as the year 2000, but are still pending either for appearance of accused, framing of charges or prosecution evidence," noted the bench. The bench observed that it may not be feasible to direct cases to be taken up on a day-to-day basis for want of necessary manpower and infrastructure. "From the details of the cases pending against MPs/MLAs with the NIA, it appears that no effective steps have been taken even in the matters where charges were framed in the year 2018 and the cases are stated to be under trial or further investigation," observed the bench. However, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta assured the top court that he will take up the matter with the agency. Senior advocate Vikas Singh, appearing for the petitioner, contended that that if an MP/ex-MP or MLA/ex-MLA has been convicted for a criminal offence, such person should be disqualified and debarred for entire life. But the bench said: "Since the vexed question raised herein above has far reaching ramifications and consequences, we deem it necessary to hear the matter at length on an appropriate date, after giving opportunity to all the stakeholders." The top court has posted the matter for further hearing after three weeks. New Delhi, Aug 26 : Amid the rift in the Chhattisgarh Congress Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel will reach Delhi on Friday and meet the Congress leaders. It is also expected that he might meet former party president Rahul Gandhi, sources said. However the crisis in the state has deepened with 36 odd MLAs also coming to New Delhi to meet senior leader KC Venugopal and apprise him of the situation in the state. Twenty more MLAs will board a flight on Friday. While TS Singh Deo on Thursday categorically said that he will take on any responsibility given to him by the party high command, he also said that everyone is an aspirant for the top post in the state. On Tuesday, Rahul Gandhi had met Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and TS Singh Deo who is a contender for the top post. After the meeting, Chhattisgarh Congress in-charge P.L. Punia speaking to the media said, "There was no discussion on a change of leadership in Chhattisgarh." Punia attended the meeting along with the Chief Minister and the state health minister. The meeting of these two leaders with Rahul Gandhi came amid Deo's reported claim for the top post in the state, demanding rotational chief ministership. There were several reports of differences between Baghel and Deo, with the latter lobbying hard for months to replace the Chief Minister. On July 27, Deo walked out of the Assembly saying, "it is too much" after the opposition created an uproar demanding a House panel probe into Congress MLA Brihaspat Singh's charge that the Minister was behind an attack on him. Deo and Baghel have been making several trips to the national capital. Deo, for the record, maintains that "Sonia Gandhiji and Rahul Gandhiji will decide." Following his visit, Baghel also rushed to the national capital in July this year. Kabul, Aug 26 : A blast rocked the Kabul airport, which is thronged by crowds of desperate Afghans seeking to flee the country after the Taliban takeover, on Thursday, causing numerous casualties, including US personnel. There was also a blast at a nearby hotel, causing more casualties. "We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US and civilian casualties. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update," Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said in a tweet. A Taliban leader said that at least 11 people, including women and children, were killed, and a number of Taliban guards got injured in the blast. The airport blast was said to have taken place outside one of its gates where British and US troops are stationed to oversee the evacuation process. It is suspected to be a suicide attack. Evacuated Afghan journalist Bilal Sarwary said in a tweet that the blast took place at a sewage canal where Afghans were vetted. "A suicide attacker blew himself up in the middle of a large crowd. At least another attacker started shooting, multiple eye witnesses in the area & a friend tell me," he said. There was no report about any British casualties, the BBC quoted a UK Defence Ministry source as saying. British Conservative MP Alicia Kearns, a member of the foreign affairs and national security strategy committees, said that "many were hurt" in an attack near the Baron Hotel, where the UK is processing Britons and Afghans eligible for evacuation. "A bomb or attack with gunfire at northern gate of Baron's Hotel. Worried this will devastate evacuation - so many hurt. My heart is with all those injured and killed," she said in a tweet. The attacks came amid warnings by the western nations of a terror strike at the airport as evacuation of foreign citizens continues. In a response, French President Emmanuel Macron said that the situation has "profoundly deteriorated" in Afghanistan. He called for caution before the situation descended into one "that we can't control" and added that the situation around the airport remains very dangerous. Jammu, Aug 26 : Two terrorists belonging to Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) have been arrested from Kishtwar district in Jammu and Kashmir, officials said on Thursday. The police said that on August 24, it was reliably learnt that two youth -- Ashfaq Qayoom Tak from Chatroo in Kishtwar district and Tousif Giri from Pochhal tehsil in the same district -- were in close contact with Hizbul terrorists from Anantnag. "The said youth were providing information with regard to the security forces to the terrorists and were conspiring to carry out terror acts in the jurisdiction of Chatroo police station," the police said. Based on the information, a case was registered at the Chatroo police station. Subsequently, a search operation was launched in the forest area of Naidgam Chatroo on Wednesday. "During the operation, both the terrorists were arrested. Based on their disclosure, a hideout was busted and arms and ammunition were recovered from the hideout in the forest area of Pingnal Chatroo," the police said. The recovered items include one 9 mm pistol with magazine and 20 rounds, one grenade, one AK 47 magazine and two wireless sets. New Delhi, Aug 26 : Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai said on Thursday that the government will submit a petition to the Central government over the 'illegal' irrigation schemes of Tamil Nadu. "We will submit a petition in this regard. Downstream interlinking river projects work taken up by Tamil Nadu is illegal. I have instructed our team of advocates to get the original file suit in this regard listed faster in the Supreme Court for hearing," Bommai said. Tamil Nadu's interlinking project seeks to use surplus water from the Cauvery basin. Bommai said that a miscellaneous application is lying before the Supreme Court on the Mekedatu project by Tamil Nadu. "When it comes up for hearing, we have to clear our stand. Apart from this, a suit has been filed in the Madurai court. We have decided to implead and get it quashed as the suit does not have jurisdiction. There are a number of previous judgments in this regard," Bommai said. "We will also file a petition to the Central government on the Upper Krishna Stage 3 Project. The suit has been filed by the Telangana government and the court will give a hearing soon. It has been decided to get the notification order from the apex court," he said. Bommai on Thursday chaired a meeting of technical and legal experts over the pending inter-state water disputes. New Delhi, Aug 26 : The BSNL Employees Union has called upon all employees of the state-run telco to protest on Friday against the Centre's asset monetisation plan. In a statement, the employees union alleged that in the name of "National Monetisation Pipeline" (NMP), the government has decided to hand over the national assets at throw away price to the corporates. "The argument of the government that, the ownership of these assets will continue to remain with the government itself, is nothing but a 'sugar-coated poison'," it said. "To express its opposition to Monetisation, BSNLEU calls upon the entire BSNL employees to organise protest Lunch Hour Demonstrations throughout the country tomorrow, 27.08.2021." As per the union, it is disturbing that the government has decided to hand over 2.86 lakh kilometre of Bharatnet Optic Fibre, as well as 14,917 mobile towers of BSNL and MTNL. "Accordingly, the entire high speed internet backbone of the country, constructed with the people's money, is going to be handed over to the corporates. Similarly, the handing over of the 14,917 mobile towers to the corporates, is nothing but the beginning of privatisation of BSNL and MTNL. The handing over of the mobile towers to the corporates will deliver a body blow to BSNL and MTNL," said the statement. Amid the criticism of the National Monetisation Pipeline, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday had said that under the plan nothing will be sold off and there will mandatory handing back of the assets to the government. The NMP targets to raise Rs 6 lakh crore through asset monetisation of Central government, over a four-year period, from FY22 to FY25. As per the government only under-utilised brownfield assets will be monetised. New Delhi, Aug 26 : India's Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday virtually chaired the second meeting of BRICS Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (FMCBG) along with Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das, under the Indian BRICS Chairship. This meeting is scheduled ahead of the BRICS Leaders' Summit 2021 to discuss and finalise key outcomes of BRICS finance agenda this year. Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors of Brazil, Russia, China, and South Africa were in attendance. The Finance Minister discussed with her BRICS counterparts the key areas of intra-BRICS cooperation that would be crucial in supporting the recovery of BRICS economies and maintaining macroeconomic stability, while protecting against future uncertainties and risks. Sitharaman also highlighted that BRICS has been playing and will continue to play a crucial role in dealing with crises, such as the Covid-19 pandemic. During the meeting, the participants endorsed the BRICS Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Statement on the Global Economic Outlook and Responding to Covid-19 Crisis with an annexure on snapshot of policy experiences of BRICS in dealing with the economic impact of the pandemic. Sitharaman, as the chair, remarked that India attaches great significance to presenting this Statement before the global community since it unanimously voices the view of BRICS countries on the critical aspects underpinning current international policy conversations on post-pandemic recovery. The "Technical Report on Social Infrastructure: Financing and Use of Digital Technologies" was also endorsed. This report is a unique exercise towards collaborative knowledge sharing between BRICS economies on social infrastructure, including on how BRICS governments have leveraged digital technologies to enhance access and improve service delivery, especially in the health and education sectors. The BRICS Finance Ministers also welcomed the conclusion of negotiations on the text of Cooperation and Mutual Administrative Assistance (CMAA) in Customs matters, along with deliberating progress made on other custom related matters. Das chaired the discussions on Central Bank issues and their outcomes in the meeting, which included Financial Inclusion, Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA) and Information Security Cooperation. Hyderabad, Aug 26 : Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Thursday said genomics will play a key role in fighting Covid-19 and improving healthcare. Genomic sequencing of coronavirus can help understand the factors leading to its mutation and also developing an effective vaccine, he said after inaugurating the NKC Centre for Genomics Research in Hyderabad. Nucleome Informatics has unveiled the centre, which is claimed to be South Asia's largest and most advanced genomics facility. The laboratory will carry out the latest third-generation sequencing and play a critical role in fighting the pandemic by sequencing 5,000 Covid genomes and 500 human genomes. The Defence Minister described genomics is the sunrise sector of the 21st century. "Next generation sequencing can bring revolution in biological sciences and unprecedented progress to society. In view of climate change and Covid's impact on people, genome sequencing can increase productivity and help healthcare," he said. He pointed out that Covid genome sequencing is trying to find out that part of the virus's DNA that does not change, which will contribute to vaccine development. Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Chouhan also addressed the launch ceremony. The event was attended by Nucleome Informatics MD and CEO Dushyant Singh Baghel, and Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government, Prof K. VijayRaghavan. Chouhan said India was committed to doubling farmers' income which will require an increase in productivity, reducing input cost and loss of crop, and right price of the crop. "Agri-genomics can help in increasing productivity, reducing input cost, and increasing resistance to disease. I am sure that agri-genomics will become important and useful for addressing challenges of Indian agriculture and doubling farmers' income," he said. The laboratory, established in the memory of former Member of the Parliament from Khandwa, Nand Kumar Singh Chauhan, will also play a role in upping India's potential in agriculture, animal husbandry, and personalised/precision medicine, among others. "The laboratory is an extraordinary feat and I congratulate Nucleome for this ambitious effort even while remaining connected to the root. This is a remarkable achievement of science and technology and these problem-solving approaches should be done at scale. I am impressed with the technology put in place and will look forward to its implementation," VijayRaghavan said. "Since inception, Nucleome has contributed to the fields of agrigenomics, animal husbandry and wildlife conservation. The Nand Kumar Chauhan Centre for Genomics Research is our tribute to the late Khandwa MP's relentless service to the people. It was his continuous support and morale-boosting that motivated us to abandon the idea of moving the venture to San Diego, the US and to continue in India," Baghel said. He announced that the next NKC Centre for Genomics will be at Indore. With the addition of NovaSeq 6000 (the world's largest short-read sequencing) and GeneTitan platforms, the laboratory will play a critical role in expanding the scope of its in-house services and allow seamless cross-platform services. "We will soon begin to provide our in-house DrSeq suite of predictive genomics products in healthcare to analyse the data of RNA sequencing - we expect this will improve the understanding and uptake of personalised/precision medicine in India," he added. Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19) New Delhi, Aug 26 : India on Thursday granted safety permission for restart of Boeing 737 Max operations in the country. Aviation regulator DGCA had suspended the aircraft's operations in March 2019 after two fatal crashes. "This rescission enables operation of Boeing Company Model 737-8 and Boeing Company Model 737-9 airplanes only upon satisfaction of applicable requirements for return to service," the DGCA said in its order. At present, only SpiceJet has 737 Max in their fleet. It has 13 aircraft of this type. After re-certification, the airline will be able to get 30 or more aircraft for operations. Additionally, the 737Maxs will allow the airline to retire some old fuel guzzlers, leading to higher saving margins. SpiceJet had placed an order for 225 Maxs in 2017, while it has a firm order of more than 150 of these aircraft. The airline on Thursday said it has entered into a settlement with Avolon, a major lessor of Max aircraft. This will allow SpiceJet's 737 Max aircraft to return back to service. The airline expects to start operations of Max aircraft around the end of September, subject to regulatory approvals. SpiceJet's Chairman and Managing Director Ajay Singh said: "I am delighted to share that our 737 MAXs will be back in the air soon. As India emerges from Covid and air traffic picks up again, the MAX aircraft will play a major role in our future expansion." "With a better and a more efficient fleet back in operation, we expect a significant reduction in our operating costs improving our bottom line." Boeing, in a statement, said: "The DGCA's decision is an important milestone toward safely returning the 737 MAX to service in India." "Boeing continues to work with regulators and our customers to return the airplane to service worldwide." As per sources, the proposal for stock market maverick Rakesh Jhunjhunwala backed upcoming airline venture - Akasa - entails the venture to operate an all Boeing 737 Max aircraft fleet. As of now, restrictions have been lifted in more than 175 countries out of 195. In addition, more than 30 operators have returned the Max to service. Hyderabad, Aug 26 : Allegations of land grabbing made against Telangana minister Malla Reddy by state Congress chief A. Revanth Reddy has triggered a bitter war of words with the minister using some abusive words and challenging gestures to hit back at Revanth Reddy. Labour minister Malla Reddy's action not only evoked strong protest from the Congress, but also from others, who demanded his resignation. A group of Congress workers gathered outside the minister's house at Bowenpally in Secunderabad on Thursday. They raised slogans against the minister and demanded his apology for using vulgar language and gesture against Revanth Reddy. However, the police detained the protesters and shifted them to a police station. The Congress workers also staged protest at other places to condemn Malla Reddy's abusive attack on their leader. They also set his effigy on fire. Malla Reddy's gesture of thigh-slapping at a news conference to challenge Revanth Reddy also drew criticism from BSP's state coordinator R.S. Praveen Kumar. He demanded that Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao should sack him from the cabinet. Kumar, who recently took voluntary retirement from the Indian Police Service (IPS) to join politics, wanted to know if this is what Malla Reddy is teaching to the students of his colleges. "What culture this minister wants to teach the the young generation," he asked. Malla Reddy runs a group of educational institutions, including a private university, an engineering college and a medical college. While reacting to the allegations levelled by Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) chief Revanth Reddy at a public meeting on Wednesday that Malla Reddy has encroached lands at several places, the minister launched a bitter counter attack and used some abusive words and gestures, challenging the Congress leader to prove his allegation or resign from the Parliament. Continuing his attack on Revanth Reddy on Thursday, Malla Reddy said he is ready to resign if the Congress MP proves his allegations. "If he fails to prove his allegations, he should resign as MP and seek a fresh mandate," the minister said. Malla Reddy is the second leader from the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) to use abusive words in recent days against their political opponents. TRS MLA from Malkajgiri, Mynampally Hanumantha Rao, had launched a similar attack on BJP state president Bandi Sanjay on August 15. Hanumantha Rao had used foul language while reacting to certain remarks made by the BJP leader after the MLA's supporters roughed up a BJP corporator. New Delhi, Aug 27 : Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Thursday stated that he does not agree with the statements of Home Minister Araga Jnanendra on the Mysuru gang rape case. "I will not agree with his statements. I have directed him to clarify the issue. He has made those statements while reacting to the criticism by the opposition parties and I don't agree with his statements," he said. Jnanendra has said that the gang rape has taken place in Mysuru and opposition Congress is "raping him" in the state capital. He also said that the girl should not have gone to such a lonely place late in the evening. Bommai also directed the police department to report to him directly on the gang-rape case. "I have spoken to ADGP Pratap Reddy, who is heading the investigation and told him to consider the case seriously. The same has been communicated to the state police chief," he said. The police are in touch with the victim, her male friend and their parents. The investigation is being conducted on the available information. "Our government considers such incidents with at most seriousness," he added. Srinagar, Aug 27 : Three over ground workers (OGWs) of terrorists have been arrested in Jammu and Kashmir on Thursday which solved the case of a grenade attack on a Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) camp, officials said. Police said that during investigation into the grenade attack on the CRPF camp, Langate, on August 26, on the basis of reliable input from Jammu and Police Handwara, a joint Cordon And Search Operation (CASO) was launched by parties including army's 30 RR and Special Operation Group Handwara and during detailed search of houses, one OGW Ishfaq Ahmad Dar, resident of Shatpora Mohalla, Langate was apprehended. "On his disclosure, the Joint CASO team recovered arms and ammunition from his possession," police said. Police added that on further interrogation, involvement of two more OGWs Jamsheed Ahmad Shah, resident of Chak Mohalla, Langate and Javed Ah Khan, resident of Asthan Mohalla Langate came forth and they were also apprehended along with arms and ammunition. "During detailed interrogation, it was revealed that all three OGWs were associated with LeT Tanzeem and were involved in supporting the terrorist activities and accepted their involvement in the grenade attack Incident at Langate on August 16 2021," police said. "All three OGWs have been booked under IPC Section 307 and Explosive Substances Act Section 3/4 of FIR No 260/2021 dated August 16, 2021 of PS Handwara." New Delhi, Aug 27 : The Youth Congress on Thursday staged a protest against the National Monetisation Pipeline, alleging that the Central government is selling everything to its 'friends'. Youth Congress workers held placards against the policy at Shastri Bhawan before the police detained a few workers before releasing them later. The protest was staged against Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's recent announcement of the government's four-year National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) worth Rs 6 lakh crore. B.V. Srinivas, President of the Youth Congress, said, "The Prime Minister is not working for the people of India. He is working to establish a monopoly of 2 or 3 industrialists. Everything this country built in the last 70 years is being sold. Keeping the interests of the countrymen at bay, the Modi government is only doing good for itself and its friends." Former Congress President Rahul Gandhi had on Tuesday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of selling the "crown jewel" assets built by his party in the last 70 years. New Delhi, Aug 27 : The soon-to-be-launched National Mission on Air Pollution (NMAP) will have a dashboard for all polluting parameters that are being monitored and for all 132 cities that are currently under the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP). The dashboard will have all the information online, amnd real time in user-friendly manner. There will be a dedicated NAMP website too. The dashboard, that will be an important component, is being developed by the Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change along with GIZ, an arm of the German government working in tandem with several Indian ministries and states on environmental and sustainable issues. "The National Mission on Air Pollution is under consideration and will be launched soon. Effective framework for planning and implementation of activities for improving air quality in identified cities have been put in place involving all stakeholders," Union Environment, Forests and Climate Change Minister Bhupender Yadav told IANS on Thursday. Once the Mission is in place, 132 cities would come under the Mission and the NCAP would be subsumed in it, he added. The NCAP was launched in January 2019 as a long-term, time-bound, national level strategy to tackle the air pollution problem across the country in a comprehensive manner. It had targeted 20 to 30 per cent reduction in Particulate Matter concentrations by 2024, keeping 2017 as the base year for the comparison of concentration. 'The India State-Level Disease Burden Initiative' report of December 2020 by interdisciplinary journal Lancet Planetary Health had pegged the deaths of Indians due to air pollution in 2019, at 1.7 million, or 18 per cent of all deaths in the country. The death rate from outdoor ambient air pollution had increased during this period by 115 per cent, the study had said. Domestic firewood burning, construction dust and that from roads, open fields, agri-waste burning, industrial burning of coal and other fossil fuels, thermal power plants, brick kilns, vehicular emissions and diesel-powered generator sets are some of the prominent sources of air pollution. Bengaluru, Aug 27 : The National Commission for Women (NCW) has taken cognizance of the Mysuru gang rape case and shot a letter to the Karnataka Police on Thursday asking to submit a report on the incident at the earliest. "We have come across a media report where it has been alleged that a young woman, along with her boyfriend, was attacked by a group of men and later, the woman was gang raped at Chamundi Hills in Mysuru. As per the reports, only FIR has been registered and no accused has been arrested in the matter yet," NCW Chairperson Rekha Sharma said. She has written to Karnataka's Director General of Police, seeking that all the accused are identified and immediately arrested and charged under the provisions of the law. The commission has also advised the police department to initiate a process to provide adequate necessary compensation to the survivor as per the rules of the victim compensation scheme enumerated under Section 357 A of the Criminal Procedure Code. Sharma has also said that the victim must be provided with medical counselling support and the action taken on the matter must be communicated with the commission at the earliest. State Women's Commission Chairperson Pramila Naidu, meanwhile, visited the spot and the hospital where the gang rape victim and her male friend are being treated. "I have not been able to speak to the victim as doctors denied permission saying that the survivor and the boy are still in shock. The victim has suffered injuries and she is responding to the treatment. It will take a day or two to recover," she said. She further stated that Police Commissioner Dr Chandra Gupta has assured her of the arrest of the accused by Friday evening. Meanwhile, Congress leader Ugrappa alleged that the victim has suffered serious injuries in the incident and that the ruling BJP is trying to hush up the case. The Mysuru gang rape case is more heinous than the one took place in Hyderabad. According to information collected, the victim was dragged inside by the rapists when she was sitting and chatting with her friend, he said. Patna, Aug 27 : After a few days of peace, Bihar's ruling allies, the JD-U and the BJP, again started taking potshots at each other with JD-U Parliamentary Board Chairman Upendra Kushwaha's claim of disputes among the BJP on the caste census drawing an angry retort. The exchange of words between the two had seen a stop after an all-party delegation from the state met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on August 23 to present views on the demand for the caste census, made by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. "A number of leaders in BJP are in favour of caste based census to be conducted in the country while some others are against it. I believe that BJP should rectify its internal politics," Kushwaha said on Wednesday. "The caste based census is the needs of the hour. It should be conducted in the country," he said, noting that the JD-U, the RJD and other political parties in Bihar have the same view on this issue, and "we are expecting positive results from the Centre" following the meeting with the PM. Kushwaha also said that the caste based census has nothing to do with any religion. BJP MLA Hari Bhuson Thakur, however, sharply reacted to Kushwaha's statement. "JD-U is divided into three power centres and he is wanting to grab one of the slots. This indicates that there is a conflict in the JD-U and not in the BJP. Hence, Upendra Kushwaha should take care of his own house before commenting on others," Thakur, who represents Bispi in Madhubani district, said. New Delhi, Aug 27 : During the all-party meet held on Thursday, Congress leaders Mallikarjun Kharge, Anand Sharma and Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi should brief the opposition about the situation in Afghanistan and the government's stand with regard to the war-torn nation. The Congress leaders also asked about the reports of 'secret' talks being held in Doha, Qatar, with the Taliban to discuss the Afghanistan crisis, but sources said the government did not comment on the matter. The Congress leaders also demanded to know about the government's evacuation strategy and how many Indians are still stranded in Afghanistan. The Congress leaders asked the government to expresses solidarity with the people of Afghanistan and uphold the principles of fundamental right and freedom. What steps for humanitarian assistance are being taken by the government of India, they demanded to konw. The Congress delegation said that there is a perception that India appears to be isolated from its traditional allies in the region. "The Prime Minister recently spoke to the Russian President and the German Chancellor. We would like to know what transpired during these discussions? Further, what diplomatic or other strategic steps are being planned to strengthen our position, both in the short term and in the long run," the Congress delegation asked, as per sources. New York, Aug 27 : US Central Command commander Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr has confirmed that 12 American service members have been killed and 15 injured in two suicide bombings outside Kabul airport on Thursday. Below is an early transcript of Gen. McKenzie's remarks at the first Pentagon briefing after the attacks. "As you know two suicide bombers - ISIS fighters - detonated in the vicinity of Abbey Gate at Hamad Karzai International Airport, and in the vicinity of the Baron hotel which is immediately adjacent. The attack on the Abbey Gate was followed by a number of ISIS men who fired at civilians and military forces. At this time, we know that 12 US service members have been killed in the attack and 15 more service members have been injured. A number of Afghan civilians were also killed and injured in the attack. We're still working to calculate the total losses. We just don't know what it is right now. The loss weighs heavily on us all, and I'll talk a little bit more about that as we go through my prepared remarks. "We continue to focus on the protection of our forces and the evacuees, as the evacuation continues. Let me be clear, I was saddened by the loss of life, both US and Afghan, we're continuing to execute the mission. Our mission is to evacuate US citizens, special immigrant visa holders, US embassy staff and Afghans at risk. Despite this attack, we are continuing the mission. Today, we have approximately 5,000 evacuees on the ramp at a time, awaiting airlift. "Since the 14th, we've evacuated more than 104,000 civilians. Over 66,000 by the United States, and over 37,000 by our allies and partners, and that includes bringing out about 5,000 Americans as the Secretary of State said yesterday. We believe that there are about 1,000 - probably more than 1,000 American citizens left in Afghanistan at this point. We're doing everything we can in concert with our Department of State partners to reach out to them and to help them leave if they want to leave and remember, not everybody wants to. Yesterday, we brought in over 500 American citizens. It would be difficult to overestimate the number of unusual challenges and competing demands our forces on the ground face and the threat to our forces, particularly from ISIS K is very real, as we have seen today." London, Aug 27 : British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Thursday that Britain will continue its evacuation operation at the Kabul airport despite twin bombings there that reportedly have killed at least 60 people. "I want to stress that this threat of a terrorist attack is one of the constraints that we've been operating under in Operation Pitting, in the big extraction that's been going on, and we've been ready for it; we've been prepared for it," Johnson told the reporters after an emergency meeting, Xinhua reported. "And I want to stress that we're going to continue with that operation -- and we're now coming towards the end of it, to the very end of it, in any event," he said. Two explosions took place at the Kabul airport on Thursday night, reportedly caused by suicide bombers. At least 60 people were killed and 140 others wounded in the explosions, the BBC reported, quoting a senior health official in Afghanistan. "Clearly, what this attack shows is the importance of continuing that work in as fast and as efficient manner as possible in the hours that remain to us, and that's what we're going to do," the prime minister said, noting that Britain "will keep going to the last moment." Less than a week is left for the US-led forces to evacuate from Afghanistan. During a Group of Seven (G7) virtual summit on Tuesday, Johnson and leaders of other US allies failed to persuade US President Joe Biden to extend the August 31 evacuation deadline. Johnson said earlier during the day that around 15,000 people -- the "overwhelming majority" of those eligible to come to Britain -- had been evacuated by the British troops. United Nations, Aug 27 : India has called for a unified global stand against terrorism-enablers while condemning the terrorist attacks in Kabul that wounded nearly 150 people. "Today's attacks reinforce the need for the world to stand unitedly against terrorism, and all those who provide sanctuaries to terrorists," India's Permanent Representative T.S. Tirumurti said on Thursday. While "strongly condemning" the terrorist attack in Kabul India extends "heartfelt condolences" to the families of the victims of the attack, he said as he presided over a meeting of the Security Council. Nearly 150 people were reported wounded in the suicide bombing at an entrance to the airport where a large crowd of people were waiting for a chance to be airlifted from the country now under the Taliban. At least 12 US military personnel died in the attack and 15 were injured, according to US General Kenneth McKenzie, who attributed the attack to the Islamic State-Khorasan (ISIS-K) terror organisation. The airport is under the control of the US military, which is facilitating the evacuation of US citizens and others wanting to leave the country. There was also another explosion at a hotel near the airport. Earlier outside the Security Council, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters in a voice choking with emotion: "I want to express in the strongest possible way, the total condemnation of the horrific terrorist attack in Kabul." "I want to send my condolences to the families of all those that perished, Afghans (and) all those who need not be there (but) who died saving the lives of others," he said. His spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said, "This incident underscores the volatility of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan but also strengthens our resolve as we continue to deliver urgent assistance across the country in support of the Afghan people." Guterres is scheduled to meet on Monday with the five permanent members of the UN -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the US, and the worsening Afghan situation is expecting to figure in their discussion. General Assembly President Volkan Bozkir called the bombings a "grotesque development" that "will only complicate and debilitate efforts, among others, at evacuations" of people from Afghanistan. "Violence, the threat of terrorism, an unstable security situation and growing civilian casualties have strong potential to derail the Afghan-led, Afghan-owned peace and reconciliation, which is the only path to enduring peace and stability," he warned. (Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in and followed on Twitter at @arulouis) -- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text Pynwheel Resident Access will allow residents to access common areas, including amenities, entrances and garages, with their smartphone. Unlike other solutions, Pynwheel Access works with any existing fob reader. Pynwheel, Inc. is set to unveil a new contactless access solution for multifamily housing properties, Pynwheel Resident Access. The new product will allow residents to access common areas, including amenities, entrances and garages, with their smartphone. Unlike other solutions, Pynwheel Access works with any existing fob reader. Readers do not have to be replaced with new technology. Pynwheel Resident Access will be officially introduced to the industry at next weeks Apartmentalize Conference in Chicago, IL where it will be part of the Pynwheel trade show exhibit. Pynwheel Access was first released as a feature within Pynwheels self-guided tour solution, Pynwheel Self Tour, in April of 2021. Now also available as a resident tool, Pynwheel Access marks the fourth standalone product under the Pynwheel umbrella. Pynwheel Resident Access will work the same for properties who use the feature as part of Pynwheel Self Tour. Existing fob readers on-site at any property can be retrofitted to be compatible with the tool and common areas will unlock once the resident or staff members smartphone is within range of the vicinity. Pynwheel Access can be utilized with both Apple and Android devices. With the demand for contactless options being stronger now than ever before, I am thrilled that Pynwheel is able to bring Pynwheel Resident Access to the multifamily industry, says Jennifer Cyphers, Founder and CEO of Pynwheel. We are a company who takes pride in crafting innovative tech solutions to benefit apartment staff, residents, and prospects. This product will help properties create safer environments for those that live and work there and aid in resident satisfaction due to growing preferences for these types of solutions. In addition to Pynwheel Access, Pynwheel also creates tour technology to assist multifamily properties in the sales and leasing process including Pynwheel Self Tour, interactive property maps, and sales and leasing touchscreens. Pynwheel will be showcasing all of these products as part of their Apartmentalize Conference exhibit and will be offering demos to attendees for a hands-on experience. For additional information, visit http://www.pynwheel.com or e-mail info@pynwheel.com About Pynwheel Pynwheel is a privately-held marketing technology company in Denver, Colorado founded in April 2012 by Jennifer Cyphers, former Co-Owner, Sole Managing Member, and President of Engrain (fka Multifamily Edge) and Director of ApartmentGuide.com at PRIMEDIA. Pynwheel designs interactive applications for the multifamily housing industry. Pynwheel innovation makes leasing easier for hundreds of apartment communities across the United States. For more information, visit http://www.pynwheel.com or follow Pynwheel on Facebook, LinkedIn, or @Pynwheel on Instagram and Twitter. MEDIA CONTACT: 303.640.3652 Ext. 119 media@pynwheel.com The Ronald McDonald House of Morgantown is doing a great work for the families of West Virginia. What would a clown, a local law firm, and a bunch of big-hearted bikers from all over the country have in common? We all 100% agree that The Ronald McDonald House Charities of Morgantown, West Virginia is worthy of support and donations as they serve the families of critically ill children from all over West Virginia and surrounding states. On Saturday, August 28, 2021, the Robinette Legal Group, PLLC West Virginia Personal Injury Lawyers, is pleased to host the long-distance motorcycle charity Hoagys Heroes as they bring their gifts to the Ronald McDonald House in Morgantown. Hoagys Heroes, under the leadership of Robert (Hoagy) Carmichael, has spent their year during the pandemic productively, raising thousands of dollars for local charities and gathering over 650 GALLONS of aluminum pop tabs along with cash donations to the Ronald McDonald House. A Pony Express style system has been coordinated by dozens of motorcycle riders to relay the tabs from all over the United States to the Hoagy's Heroes headquarters in Glen Dale, West Virginia. Participants for the tabs delivery will load up their bikes with the tabs and travel with a police escort to the Ronald McDonald House in Morgantown, WV. The procession will include riders from West Virginia, Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania, Texas, Indiana, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland. Hoagys Heroes recognizes that the true Heroes are the children who have been diagnosed as having life-threatening disorders and illnesses, those struggling with autism, and the kids who have lost a parent who was serving our country. To honor and support these brave children and families, Hoagys Heroes is committed to raising funds to allow others enjoy wonderful things many of us take for granted. Riders have raised hundreds-of-thousands of dollars in gifts for A Special Wish Foundation, the Children of Fallen Soldiers Relief Fund, the Augusta Levy Learning Center for Autism, and the Ronald McDonald House Charities in Morgantown. To date, Hoagys Heroes have raised over $340,000.00 in pledges for the charities they support and have travelled over 1,417,482 miles of smiles. These rides would not be possible without the magnificent support of volunteers. The all-volunteer Hoagys Heroes staff spend countless hours planning and organizing each ride, while dozens of event day volunteers provide essential support at the beginning and end of each ride. In the past, these event day volunteers have included veterans, staff of local motorcycle dealerships, law enforcement officers, fire fighters, members of civic organizations, local businesses, and spouses and friends of many participants in the rides. The Day the Telegram Came: a potent testament to the power of faith. The Day the Telegram Came is the creation of published author Annabel Santana, who holds a masters degree in public health from Columbia University and seeks ways to spread the gospel of Christ. She is a member of Church of the Revelation in Bronx. New York, presently serving as a choir member, discipleship teacher, and elder. Santana shares, As believers, our lives can be turned upside down in an instant by unexpected crises and challenges that can shake our faith, fill us with despair, or radically transform our lives. How we respond to these challenges will be largely dependent upon what we believe, and what we believe will be dependent upon whose voice we choose to listen to. Jesus said that the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy but that He came that we might have abundant life. But how do we experience abundant life in the midst of lifes painful struggles? In The Day the Telegram Came, we will take a glimpse into the lives of biblical and modern-day men and women who faced formidable challenges. Each was confronted with a choiceto believe the enemys boisterous telegrams of doom, failure, and loss or to believe the promises of the One who came to bring us good news, to open blinded eyes, and to set the captives free. In choosing the latter, each encountered the miraculous and experienced abundant life amid seemingly impossible situations. As you read each account, you too will be challenged to trust God in the midst of your personal season of conflict, pain, and crisis. The choice is yours: telegrams of defeat or words of lifewhose report will you believe? Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Annabel Santanas new book is a moving narrative of the power of faith in the midst of daunting challenges. Pairing a balance of biblical occurrences and modern struggles, Santana relates the lessons available in the Bible to modern times effortlessly. View a synopsis of The Day the Telegram Came on YouTube. Consumers can purchase The Day the Telegram Came at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble. For additional information or inquiries about The Day the Telegram Came, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919. The fact that we continue to win new business and our customers are renewing contracts during the pandemic speaks to the mission-critical nature of what were selling, said ARCOS CEO Bruce Duff. For the seventh time, Inc. magazine has named ARCOS LLC to the Inc. 5000. This year, ARCOS ranked No. 3,473 on the list. ARCOS is the market leader for utility and critical infrastructure resource-management solutions. According to Inc. staff, Only 3.26 percent of Inc. 5000 companies have made the list seven times. To make the list this year, when our country and the world faced so many challenges, is a testament to how our employees improvised and innovatedtheyre remarkable, said ARCOS CEO Bruce Duff. Our solutions automate critical processes like restoring electric, water or gas service, and finding qualified, available airline crew members to fill open trips or shifts due to unforeseen circumstances. The fact that we continue to win new business and our customers are renewing contracts during the pandemic speaks to the mission-critical nature of what were selling. Inc. Editor-in-Chief Scott Omelianuk said, Building one of the fastest-growing companies in America in any year is a remarkable achievement. Building one in the crisis weve lived through is just plain amazing. This kind of accomplishment comes with hard work, smart pivots, great leadership, and the help of a whole lot of people. The 2021 Inc. 5000 is ranked according to percentage revenue growth when comparing 2017 and 2020. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by March 31, 2017. They had to be U.S.-based, privately held, for profit, and independentnot subsidiaries or divisions of other companiesas of December 31, 2020. The minimum revenue required for 2020 is $2 million. The 2021 Inc. 5000 list, including company profiles and an interactive database, is at http://www.inc.com/inc5000. About Inc. Media The worlds most trusted business-media brand, Inc. offers entrepreneurs the knowledge, tools, connections, and community to build great companies. Its award-winning multiplatform content reaches more than 50 million people each month across a variety of channels including websites, newsletters, social media, podcasts, and print. Its prestigious Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to recognize the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The global recognition that comes with inclusion in the 5000 gives the founders of the best businesses an opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers, and the credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. The associated Inc. 5000 Conference is part of a highly acclaimed portfolio of bespoke events produced by Inc. For more information, visit http://www.inc.com. About ARCOS LLC ARCOS provides the leading SaaS-based resource management platform built specifically for utilities and other critical infrastructure industries. Using ARCOS, companies manage the real-time availability of unionized workforces and contractors alongside long- and short-cycle work necessary to keep services flowing for more than 90 million people and businesses across the United States and Canada. ARCOS's best-in-class customer support coupled with its quick return on investment, automated callout capabilities, electronic crew management, contractor management, emergency mobilization, work distribution and field service mobility solutions help its customers safely respond to, restore, report on, and manage critical activity that keeps electric, water, gas and travel running smoothly. Learn about ARCOS resource management software at http://www.arcos-inc.com. Follow ARCOS on LinkedIn, @ARCOS LLC, and Twitter, @ARCOS Our strategic investment in Aumni will allow the company to continue to capitalize on its impressive growth trajectory, unlocking data insights that have historically remained inaccessible in the private markets. Aumni, a leading investment analytics platform that provides the data infrastructure for private capital markets, today announced it has closed a $50 million Series B funding round led by J.P. Morgan. Pelion Venture Partners also participated in the funding alongside other new investors, WndrCo, Citadel Securities, Invesco Private Capital, Vanderbilt University and Kera Capital. The new investors join existing investors, SVB Financial Group, DLA Piper, Next Frontier Capital, Kickstart Fund, First Trust Capital Partners and Prelude, a Mercato Partners fund, who also participated in this Series B funding round. Aumni will use the funds to deepen its presence with investors in the private capital markets and expand its offering to limited partners, law firms and company founders. Since the launch of its flagship product in 2018, Aumni has analyzed more than 100,000 investment transactions. Aumni unlocks, structures and analyzes untapped data in private portfolios to track critical provisions such as key investment rights, portfolio performance and emerging investment patterns, providing previously inaccessible insights to customers throughout the private capital markets. Our strategic investment in Aumni will allow the company to continue to capitalize on its impressive growth trajectory, unlocking data insights that have historically remained inaccessible in the private markets, said Michael Elanjian, Head of Digital Innovation, Corporate & Investment Bank, J.P. Morgan. When we launched Aumni four years ago, we understood that access to structured data in the private capital markets simply did not exist at scale. Today, Aumni remains the only analytics solution able to correctly model the legal and economic foundation of these transactions, said Tony Lewis, CEO and co-founder of Aumni. We are excited to add J.P. Morgan and Pelion Venture Partners as investors as we continue building products that operate at the intersection of fintech and legaltech to transform the future of the private capital markets. Pelion Venture Partners is pleased to participate in Aumnis Series B with one of the most powerful financial institutions in the world, said Blake Modersitzski, general partner of Pelion Venture Partners. Our partnership with Aumni and our investment alongside J.P. Morgan is a source of tremendous excitement. We are proud to support another fintech company, one that has actively chosen to relocate its business to Utah, confirming how dynamic and successful our entrepreneurial ecosystem has become. ChenLi Wang, the previous founder of Dropbox's business operations team and now a general partner at WndrCo, commented, Aumni has developed a thoughtful approach of organizing private financing transactions into a structured data set, which will unlock better analytics, more efficient pricing, and new business models. We are thrilled to partner with the company to build a better future for private investing. We are excited to make a strategic investment in Aumni as it further builds out its leading-edge private markets data platform. Strengthening the infrastructure for systematically capturing critical private company data will help bring transparency and liquidity to these markets, delivering benefits to the broader economy, said Jamil Nazarali, global head of business development at Citadel Securities. To learn more about Aumni, please visit https://www.aumni.fund or follow Aumni on Twitter at @getaumni. About Aumni Founded by former BigLaw corporate attorneys, Tony Lewis and Kelsey Chase, Aumni is an investment analytics platform for private capital markets that includes venture funds, family offices, university endowments, and corporate venture firms. By combining the best of A.I. and human expertise, Aumnis platform extracts and analyzes critical deal data buried in dense legal agreements. In just a few clicks, Aumni provides comprehensive insights regarding every investments financial and legal position. Aumni has analyzed an unprecedented breadth and depth of private capital data representing investors with over $1 trillion in assets under management. With Aumni, investment leaders can make faster and more informed decisions in an ever-changing world. For more information about Aumni, please visit https://www.aumni.fund. Agency management software for employee benefits insurance Multi-carrier level-funded quoting is now available within the Benelinx agency management solution. Insurance tech provider Benelinx today announced the launch of multi-carrier level-funded quoting within its agency management solution. Powered by Vericreds Group Rating API, now employee benefits brokers can quote and compare level-funded plans from Aetna, United Healthcare / All Savers and Humana alongside fully insured medical plans. As a former agency owner, I am keenly aware of the industry shift to level-funded arrangements. When Vericred expanded into that market, we immediately started development to accommodate these new products, said Benelinx CEO & founder Rachel Zeman. We are excited to provide our agency partners with the most valuable products across various markets and will continue to expand our quoting capabilities to ensure our clients have the most relevant products embedded within our solution. Level-funded plans combine the cost savings of self-funding with the risk mitigation and fixed-payment structure of fully insured plans. Unlike fully insured plans, level-funded policies are generally not subject to state requirements or ACA rating and benefit standards. Vericreds industry-leading Group Rating API enables platforms like Benelinx to efficiently deliver innovative, multi-carrier quoting capabilities to its broker partners, said Michael W. Levin, Vericreds co-founder and CEO. The addition of level-funded group medical plans to its platform demonstrates that Benelinx is at the forefront of market demand. With employers increasingly concerned with the rising costs of health insurance, more small groups are turning to level-funded plans as a solution. The Kaiser Family Foundation's 2020 Employer Health Benefits Survey reported: Thirteen percent of small firms (3-199 employees) offered a level-funded plan in 2020, an increase from 7 percent in 2019. Thirty-one percent of covered workers in small firms are in a plan that is either self-funded or level-funded, an increase from 24 percent in 2019. Powered by Vericreds Group Rating API, the Benelinx quoting engine enables instant access to carrier quotes from its built-in market plan library, which includes fully insured, level-funded, dental and vision plans. The quoting engine is seamlessly integrated with the embedded CONGA document generator, enabling brokers to deliver fully customized proposals and benefits booklets to clients in minutes. Built on Salesforce, Benelinx is an all-in-one CRM, AMS and CPQ tool for the employee benefits industry. Benelinx offers a truly integrated solution to significantly reduce overhead, boost productivity, and grow revenue. Key features include an embedded quoting engine, email integration, stewardship reporting, turnkey market proposals, custom benefits booklets, and client self-service portals. To learn more about Benelinx or request a personalized demonstration, visit benelinx.com. More information about Vericred is available at vericred.com. About Benelinx Powered by Salesforce, Benelinx is a complete agency management solution for the employee benefits industry. Benelinx bundles an AMS, CRM and CPQ into a single, secure platform that can be seamlessly integrated with any agencys existing systems. Visit benelinx.com for more information. About Vericred Vericred is the way health insurance carriers and employee benefits providers connect with new technology partners to deliver seamless quote-to-card consumer experiences. We are not the websites or apps you use to choose a plan or find a doctor. We are the infrastructure. We are the pipes that simplify the complex exchange of quoting, enrollment and eligibility data between carriers and the technology partners responsible for delivering health and employee benefits to hundreds of millions of Americans every day. Our APIs transmit billions of data points between InsurTech and insurance carriers, powering digital distribution across the insurance industry. Come join the community of insurance geeks creating a seamless digital quote-to-card experience. Visit http://www.vericred.com. As AI enthusiasts and entrepreneurs, Alex and I became aware of the shortage of quality in-time medical supply in Africa and its consequences, namely millions of casualties per year. Seeing the immense potential of technology in solving this tragic problem, our company was born. Newly launched impact venture capital firm Beyond Capital Ventures is pleased to announce its first investment: Viebeg Technologies. Based in Rwanda, Viebeg is a health tech company that provides high-quality medical supplies and equipment throughout Central and East Africa through an innovative data-driven procurement platform. Beyond Capital Ventures joins its co-investment partners Beyond Capital Fund and Eckenstein Geigy Stiftung in Viebegs pre-seed funding round. Beyond Capital Ventures General Partner Eva Yazhari will join Viebegs Board of Directors. Viebeg Technologies was founded in 2018 by Chief Executive Officer Tobias Reiter, who has prior experience building AI-driven platforms, and Chief Commercial Officer Alex Musyoka, who has sales and operations experience through senior roles at medical supply companies including Crown Healthcare, East Africas largest player. As AI enthusiasts and entrepreneurs, Alex and I became aware of the shortage of quality in-time medical supply in Africa and its consequences, namely millions of casualties per year, said Reiter. Seeing the immense potential of technology in solving this tragic problem, our company was born. Shortages and unaffordability of medical equipment and supplies are persistent causes of exclusionary and poor-quality care in low-income Africa, resulting in thousands of preventable deaths per year. Viebegs data-driven logistics platform encompassing shipping, warehousing, last-mile distribution, and inventory management empowers healthcare facilities to better manage procurement, ensuring that they have the right type and quantities of medical supplies in stock to properly treat patients. By connecting healthcare providers directly with manufacturers and thereby removing brokers and middlemen from the value chain Viebeg can generate average cost savings of 40 percent for its customers. The Companys combination of flexible financing and on-demand delivery also provide superior accessibility and convenience, enabling it to cater to resource-constrained hospitals and clinics that were previously priced out of the market. Crucially, Viebeg also uses customer data to predict near-term demand for medical supplies and optimize its own procurement processes. We are excited to partner with Tobias and Alex and are impressed by their deep commitment to improving the quality of healthcare for underserved populations, said Eva Yazhari, Beyond Capital Ventures General Partner. The Viebeg team has demonstrated resilience, agility, and the ability to successfully execute in challenging market conditions. I could not think of a better example of the type of company Beyond Capital Ventures will invest in. Viebeg has already established a commercial presence in Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, serving 410+ customers since the companys launch. Viebeg is targeting an underserved $4B+ market in East and Central Africa, with the Covid-19 pandemic augmenting the need to strengthen medical supply chains across the region and bolstering demand for essential supplies. ABOUT VIEBEG TECHNOLOGIES Viebeg Technologies, Inc. is a health tech company that provides high-quality medical supplies and equipment in Central and East Africa through an innovative procurement platform. Viebeg utilizes artificial intelligence to de-risk and optimize every aspect of the supply chain in hard-to-serve markets, allowing healthcare providers to procure automatically, transparently, and efficiently via the platform. https://www.viebeg.com/en/ ABOUT BEYOND CAPITAL VENTURES Beyond Capital Ventures is a women-led emerging markets impact venture capital firm, offering a diversified, dynamic, and de-risked portfolio. The firm invests in the next wave of innovations that address the growing needs of 1 billion+ consumers in India and East Africa. Beyond Capital Ventures first closed in Spring 2021 and will invest in conscious leaders building businesses to address growing needs in need-to-have sectors, primarily in healthcare, agriculture and financial inclusion. The fund will also pioneer an Equitable Venture structure that provides Series A level founders in the portfolio with a profit share in the GP carry. http://www.beyondcapitalventures.com Predigen and Biomeme Host Response Test System (HR-BV) Biomeme, the leading provider of portable PCR testing solutions, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Predigen, a privately held diagnostic company and emerging leader in precision medicine focused on host response diagnostics. Predigens acquisition will expand Biomemes capabilities across infectious disease and clinical microbiology, business management, and commercialization. Predigens portfolio includes flagship host gene expression biomarkers for the pre-symptomatic detection of viral infections as well as biomarkers that accurately discriminate viral from bacterial infections to enable appropriate patient management and antibiotic stewardship. Predigen also has signatures for sepsis diagnosis, sepsis risk stratification, and a pipeline of biomarkers for non-infectious diseases. With nine different patents at various stages of execution, this scientific team has received over $50 million in grant funding from the Department of Defense (DoD), National Institutes of Health (NIH), Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and Department of Homeland Security (DHS). According to Brian Best, Predigens CEO, Prior to the pandemic, the over-utilization of antibiotics and increasing antimicrobial resistance were dominant concerns among the infectious disease community. That need still exists and it is a significant market opportunity that requires accurate, near-patient and rapid-result performance capabilities. This merger will enable an end-to-end solution to meet this challenge. Biomemes portable quantitative real-time PCR platforms enable precise measurement of these host transcriptional response signatures for use in a wide variety of settings including, but not limited to, hospitals, emergency departments, physician offices, clinics, nursing homes, pharmacies, schools, cruise ships, employers, and military. With Predigens deep host response portfolio and Biomemes expertise in qPCR consumables, hardware, and software, the new and improved company is equipped to launch their first host response diagnostic platform as early as 2023. It has long been clear that tests to reliably distinguish bacterial and viral infections simply dont exist on the market. We are now on the verge of introducing a revolutionary technology to the medical community: measuring host gene expression at the point-of-need to inform appropriate use of antibiotics, said Predigen co-founder, Ephraim Tsalik, MD, PhD. Over the years, Biomeme and Predigen have worked successfully together on numerous projects, including the Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) Challenge and the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program (CDMRP, DoD). The companies have collaborated to support the Department of Homeland Securitys Cross-Border Threat Screening and Supply Chain Defense. The NIHs Antibacterial Resistance Leadership Group (ARLG) has also sponsored development of the Bacterial vs. Viral host response test with ongoing support for its validation. "Biomeme's mobile molecular detection solutions have been utilized for bio-surveillance by the Defense community for many years, said Biomeme co-founder and Business Lead, Max Perelman, With the explosive growth of our human diagnostic solutions offered during the COVID-19 pandemic, Biomeme is well-positioned to deliver next generation diagnostics in Host Response, infectious diseases, and more. This merger is the next step in a successful and innovative partnership. Combining Predigen's tests with Biomeme's portable gold-standard platforms will deliver a better diagnostic solution for use in diverse healthcare settings. It is only the first step in pursuit of a mutual vision to deliver precision medicine solutions wherever patients and providers need them. Predigen's scientific team has published extensively in the area of host response. Examples of these peer-reviewed scientific achievements and the teams research bibliographies can be found here. About Biomeme Biomeme revolutionized molecular detection in 2012 when it created the first smartphone-based real-time PCR thermocycler. Since its inception, Biomeme has used advanced biology and chemistry, along with world-class hardware and software engineering, to create elegant solutions to complex problems. Headquartered in Philadelphia, USA, with offices in 7 other US cities, Biomeme offers a full suite of end-to-end mobile molecular detection solutions that perform to the gold standard used by the worlds most advanced central labs yet require no lab equipment or special experience to use. Its wholly owned lab services network, One Health Laboratories, specializes in rapid diagnostic testing services across the US, and most recently provided COVID testing services for major film and commercial production studios, major events, K-12 schools and universities, and federal contractors with unvaccinated personnel. To find out more about Biomeme, visit biomeme.com. About Predigen A spin-out from Duke University, Predigen is a global leader in the development of host gene expression signatures for use as prognostic, diagnostic, and therapeutic monitoring tools. Predigens science is built on many years of experience, tens of thousands of patients enrolled globally, hundreds of thousands of biospecimens, and advanced machine learning. Over the past decade, Predigen has pioneered the use of host response to diagnose and manage disease, and as a result has developed robust host gene expression signatures that address unmet needs in medicine. To find out more about Predigen, visit predigen.com CARCO Releases NSA Protect Fraud Fighting Solution for the Non-Standard Auto Market With mobile technology from 2012 and mobile AI since 2019, converged with centralized fraud risk profiling data and subject matter experts, CARCO has provided over $2.4 billion in fraudulent claim avoidance over 5 years. CARCO, a leading provider of mobile artificial intelligence (AI) technology for pre-insurance fraud prevention inspection services and risk solutions, announces the release of its new NSA Protect product, developed to help the non-standard auto (NSA) market fight and prevent fraud. CARCOs NSA Protect solution provides security level protection against fraud through the integration of mobile artificial intelligence (AI) fraud detection and centralized data for high-risk prospect profiling. NSA Protect arms the insurance industry with a predictive and preemptive tool for deterring fraudulent claims. As the insurance industry accelerates its growth plans into the high-risk policyholder market, CARCOs NSA Protect product can help facilitate growth while focusing on lower fraud losses and longer-term competitive premium stability. CARCOs introduction of NSA Protect addresses the current post-COVID pandemic landscape, which is prime for increased fraud as drivers return with increased vehicle purchases and underwriting required for the industry to price premiums. A small increase in driving activities from a small cohort with less disciplined tendencies could cause a claims frequency surge, according to projections from McKinsey & Company. Our NSA Protect fraud detection and deterrence holistic product is a timely industry fraud-fighting strategy component, and consistent with CARCOs 40-plus years providing fraud-fighting technology platforms, said Will Pagan, Senior Vice President and General Manager at CARCO. With mobile technology from 2012 and mobile AI since 2019, converged with centralized fraud risk profiling data and subject matter experts, CARCO has provided over $2.4 billion in fraudulent claim avoidance over 5 years. NSA Protect, CARCOs new fraud fighting holistic solution for the non-standard auto market, is designed to address the increased risk in the current post pandemic landscape. For more information about NSA Protect and other CARCO solutions, visit http://www.carcogroup.com. About CARCO As the leading provider of holistic fraud detection and deterrence services for the personal auto line and high risk non-standard auto markets, CARCO has helped reduce fraud since 1977. CARCO mitigates risk through mobile AI technology platforms integrated with centralized fraud data predictive and profiling functionality, converged with business operational excellence execution by subject matter expertise. CARCO protects carriers and insureds through a suite of fraud avoidance strategies and tools used by the insurance industry, law enforcement, state departments of financial services, and legislative bodies. For additional information, please visit http://www.carcogroup.com. Central Holidays' When In independent vacation packages give everyone the opportunities to hand-craft their ultimate vacations based on their preferences. With flexibility and safety top-of-mind, our When In packages give travelers the opportunity to work directly with our destination experts in planning hotels, transportation, activities, food, excursions, and other requests they may have to tailor-create their ultimate experiences in Europe. Featuring the ultimate in flexibility, Central Holidays novel When In packages that give travelers near-endless options for personalizing their vacations are seeing a significant increase in requests from travelers looking to visit European destinations recently re-opened for tourism. Central Holidays' independent "When In" vacation packages let today's travelers customize the ultimate trip just for them. The brands tailor-created "When in" vacations feature a variety of options and additions that cater to all different budgets. Each When In travel package includes accommodations per the program and breakfast daily, as well as sightseeing, excursions, and experiential activities based on the package selectedTravel in Simplicity, Travel in Style, or Travel in Luxury. Travelers are yearning to get out see the world again and many destinations in Europe are at the top of their lifes list of places to explore. After the past challenging year, we see many travelers are requesting more flexibility in their travels whether focused on more options for outdoor activities, options in accommodations and transportation, private excursions and tours, or added privacy and space. We are thrilled to deliver with our signature When In independent vacation packages that give everyone the opportunities to hand-craft their own travel programs and vacation the way they want, said Maria Jose Merino, Vice President of Operations at Central Holidays. Here is a look at some of the companys most popular When In packages in Europe that can be personalized to each travelers preferences: In Italy, Central Holidays features When In programs to Rome, Venice, Florence, or Rome and Sorento -- centralholidays.com/Destination/Mediterranean/Italy/Independent For independent travel throughout Spain, travelers can choose among When In packages in Madrid, Barcelona, or Seville -- centralholidays.com/Destination/Mediterranean/Spain/Independent As travel to France starts to kick-off, travelers can opt for Central Holidays When In Paris package -- centralholidays.com/Destinations/Mediterranean/France/When-in-Paris A high demand destination due in part to the many outdoor adventures offered here, travelers looking to visit Croatia can create their own vacation with Central Holidays When in Dubrovnik package -- centralholidays.com/Destinations/Mediterranean/Croatia/When-in-Dubrovnik An anticipated surge in demand for travel to Portugal makes Central Holidays When in Lisbon package even more enticing for independent travelers -- centralholidays.com/Destinations/Mediterranean/Portugal/When-in-Lisbon As travel planning begins to gain momentum again, the reliability and peace of mind of booking with a company more than 48 years strong like Central Holidays is even more important to travelers, said Tewfik Ghattas, Board Member of Sakarra Group International, parent company of Central Holidays. The true difference youll benefit from when traveling with Central Holidays is born from our destination specialists and our personalized service. We are proud to say that this insight and love for the destinations we serve, as well as the individual person-to-person service we provide, brings our travel partners and travelers back to travel with us time and time again. Plus, our When In packages give our clients the opportunity to work hand-in-hand with our travel pros in the meticulous planning of hotels, transportation, activities, attractions, food, excursions, and other requests they may have. We invite you to get the insiders perspective into this fascinating continent and enjoy distinctive, one-of-a-kind moments that are standard features of our European travels. For additional details about Central Holidays independent When In vacation packages visit: CentralHolidays.com. About Central Holidays: Founded in 1972, Central Holidays is an award-winning travel brand that offers superior travel programs, value, and service to enchanting destinations across Italy, Europe, Egypt, Africa, West Asia, and Latin America. As true destination specialists, this leader in travel offers an expansive range of Independent, Escorted, Hosted, and Land/Cruise itineraries. Central Holidays presents a wide array of diverse travel opportunities including cultural programs, culinary adventures, family vacations, romantic getaways, and active travel. Group Travel Experiences are a hallmark of the company, offering special interest travel, religious pilgrimages, and fully customized programs. Their newest brand, Journeys by Central Holidays, was created to orchestrate tailor-made travel experiences that redefine luxury. Central Holidays remains at the forefront of the tourism and travel industry, offering distinctive travel programs that support brand promises of reliability, expertise, and flexibility. For more information, contact Central Holidays at 1-800-935-5000 or visit centralholidays.com. Coalition, the leading cyber insurance and security provider, today announced its CEO and co-founder Joshua Motta met with President Joe Biden, members of his cabinet, his national security team, and private sector and academic leaders to discuss the nations cybersecurity efforts. The meeting was established to determine how these groups can work together to collectively improve the nation's cybersecurity as U.S. public and private sector entities increasingly face cyber attacks. Coalition played a unique role in discussing how cyber insurance can help solve these cybersecurity challenges by incentivizing the controls that reduce the likelihood or success of a cyber attack and providing a lifeline to those organizations that have had to file a claim. Were honored to work with President Biden, the government, and other private sector leaders to tackle our nations cybersecurity challenges head on, said Joshua Motta, CEO and co-founder of Coalition. As the threats from ransomware and other cyber crimes accelerate, small and midsize businesses cant be left to fend for themselves. It takes a broad combination of accessible technology and aligned incentives to keep these companies safe. Coalition also made a public commitment to offer its policyholder risk management platform, Coalition Control, to any business at no cost effective immediately. The platform includes continuous attack surface monitoring, recommendations on how to close security vulnerabilities, and a downloadable risk assessment to help organizations control their cyber risk exposure. Coalition is making this risk management platform available at: coalitioninc.com/securityforall. Learn more about Coalitions perspective on addressing cyber risk in our nation here. About Coalition Coalition is the leading provider of cyber insurance and security, combining comprehensive insurance and proactive cybersecurity tools to help businesses manage and mitigate cyber risk. Backed by leading global insurers Swiss Re Corporate Solutions, Arch Insurance, Lloyd's of London, and Argo Group, Coalition provides companies with up to USD $15 million of cyber and technology insurance coverage in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, as well as CAD $20M of coverage across 9 provinces and 3 territories in Canada. Coalition's cyber risk management platform provides automated security alerts, threat intelligence, expert guidance, and cybersecurity tools to help businesses remain resilient in the face of cyber attacks. Headquartered in San Francisco, Coalition's team is global with employees based across the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, and Portugal. CompassIntel.com is now accepting award nominations for the 4th annual 2021 IoT Innovator awards. IoT innovative companies, organizations, products, platforms, and solutions are honored each fall by Compass Intelligence through incoming nominations to the IoT Innovator Awards program. Nominations may come in from PR firms, marketing agencies, executives and leaders from within the organization or company, analysts, press, and journalists. There are no fees to nominate, and companies may be nominated for more than one category. The deadline for submissions will be September 30th, 2021. Compass Intelligence recognizes 21 companies in distinct IoT categories specific to industry, in addition to 5 awards selected solely by Compass Intelligence. Voting will take place in early October by a team of analysts, journalists, editors, and thought leaders. Last years IoT Innovator award recipients included Verizon, Signify, Trilogy Networks, Telit, IBM, Zebra Technologies, Volkert, ClearBlade, Vigilent, Assured Wireless, Vivint, Digital Matter, Spireon, Pedigree Technologies, ORBCOMM, ADLINK Technology, MediaTek, Medigate, NimbeLink, T-Mobile, Roambee, SkyBitz, Aptilo Networks, Skyward, ZEDEDA, and KORE. Award recipients will be announced on October 12th, 2021 in a press and media campaign. Award recipient companies will have the opportunity to share the great news and choose from a number of promotional campaign packages that will include press release services, social media graphics, marketing campaign support, infographics, videos, and more. Compass Intelligence will run a month long media campaign to include press releases, award recognition, custom award graphics for digital and web placement, custom social media graphics, and other campaign services. For more information about the IoT Innovator Awards, including a list of categories, visit https://www.compassintelligence.com/awards--honors.html To nominate, click here: https://www.compassintelligence.com/2021-iot-innovators-nomination-submission.html About The CompassIntel IoT Innovator Awards The 4th Annual CompassIntel IoT Innovator Awards honors companies and vendors demonstrating innovation in Internet of Things solutions, products, applications, and technology. Compass Intelligence has been recognizing companies for more than 8 years, after initially launching the A-List in M2M Awards back in 2012. The Innovator award categories run across 21 IoT innovation categories. In addition, Compass Intelligence also recognizes startups, stand-out products, and emerging and established IoT companies annually that have made an impact to the market and demonstrate superior innovation to elevate IoT. Note: Brand or product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. Media Contact: awards@compassintelligence.com We are honored to have won this contract, and I am confident in our teams ability to complete another critical project for the U.S. Air Force and Air National Guard. Conti Federal Services has been awarded a $19,678,800 firm-fixed-price contract by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha District to construct a Fighter Alert Shelter at the Air National Guards Truax Field in Madison, Wisconsin. Conti Federal specializes in complex infrastructure construction, including secure facilities and anti-terrorism/force protection, for the federal government and military. The project entails constructing a new 28,000- square-foot Fighter Alert Shelter for the universal fighter aircraft along with a number of special construction requirements in support of the current mission. All construction will be compatible with U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Air Force, and base design standards, including hangar systems, special building systems and airfield paving. Additionally, this project will comply with DoD anti-terrorism/force protection requirements per unified facilities criteria. Conti Federal Services has extensive experience in national defense projects that require close attention to detail, effective collaboration, and detailed design requirements. We are prepared to complete this mission on time and on budget only to the highest of standards, said Lou Zecca, COO of Conti Federal. We are honored to have won this contract, and I am confident in our teams ability to complete another critical project for the U.S. Air Force and Air National Guard. Conti Federal has completed similar projects, including the construction of Hardened Aircraft Shelters (HAS), secure buildings, and hangars for the Israeli Air Force, in addition to security enhancements at Hart Tunnel and Russell Courtyard, two of the U.S. Capitols most used buildings. The project is estimated to be completed in November 2022. About Conti Federal Conti Federal Services is a leading global construction and engineering company with roots dating back 115 years. The company has delivered some of the most demanding projects for the U.S. federal government, on time and on budget. Conti Federal specializes in disaster preparedness and recovery, classified and secure construction, critical infrastructure and environmental remediation. Conti Federal is dedicated to ensuring clients meet mission success while committing to their core values of safety, integrity, and compliance. CreditXpert, the mortgage credit score improvement platform, today announced the appointment of Nerissa Naidu and Marianne Sullivan as independent directors to its Board of Directors. Naidu and Sullivan will join CreditXperts founders Dave Chung and Thierry Marbach and CEO Jim Hemmer as the companys first independent directors. Naidu will serve as the boards chair and brings two decades of global experience that spans entrepreneurial endeavors, senior executive roles, and board membership from numerous multinationals. She is currently CEO of axil, and an independent board member to several private companies. Sullivan brings more than 30 years of consulting, board of director and mortgage industry experience. Most recently, Marianne served as the Senior Vice President of Single-Family Strategic Initiatives at Fannie Mae. Dave, Thierry and I conducted an extensive search for external directors that would bring diverse perspectives and deep industry expertise to the board, said Jim Hemmer, CreditXpert CEO. I am confident that Nerissa and Marianne bring the perspective and expertise well need to accelerate CreditXperts growth and expand the impact of our mission to make homeownership accessible and affordable for all. I strongly believe that financial health is the foundation for every major milestone attained by individuals and families, said Nerissa Naidu. CreditXpert's drive to expand financial inclusion by improving financial well-being is admirable. I am excited to join a talented team whose AI driven technology has the potential to transform livelihoods and communities. Over the years, CreditXperts predictive analytics platform has helped originators expand access to homeownership by making credit more transparent, said Marianne Sullivan. And yet, many consumers are still left on the sidelines because they are worried about their credit. I look forward to seeing the impact of this technology as many more originators adopt the CreditXpert platform. Background on Nerissa Naidu Nerissa is a seasoned entrepreneur, CEO, and board member. She is a co-founder and the CEO of axil, a fintech creating a smart wallet for small businesses. Prior to axil, Nerissa has filled numerous senior executive roles in her two-decade corporate career. Over that time, she managed and grew global businesses while at AIG and Accenture, provided board oversight, managed a 5,000+ global workforce, and performed multinational strategic turnarounds. As a native South African who grew up in Apartheid, Nerissa has been a proponent of equality and strives to break the mold of stereotypes in gender, race, and professional norms. Nerissa was selected as a Young Global Leader in the World Economic Forum in 2019, and subsequently elected Chair of its Diversity, Equity, Inclusion Advisory Group in 2021. She has been featured in the Financial Times as a leader to watch. Nerissa holds an executive MBA from the New York University, Stern School of Business, and a bachelors in industrial engineering from the Durban University of Technology. Background on Marianne Sullivan Marianne is a performance-driven executive leader with a history of defining strategies, building technology solutions, and reengineering business practices to achieve profitability, growth, and sustainability for the future. She currently advises and guides decisions as collaborative partner to C-level clients and serves as an advocate for innovation and transformational change in the mortgage industry. As a Senior Vice President at Fannie Mae, Marianne led industry-wide innovation initiatives that streamlined and automated key mortgage origination processes and developed tools that reduced systemic risk in the United States housing market. After spending more than 25 years at Fannie Mae Marianne joined the Board at Finicity where she helped the company pivot to dominate data aggregation in mortgage and beyond prior to their successful sale to Mastercard. She also currently serves on the boards of PennyMac Mortgage Investment Trust, Sagent, and Ardley Technologies, Inc. Marianne holds a bachelors degree in business administration and accounting from Georgetown University. About CreditXpert CreditXperts mission is to expand homeownership by making credit scores more transparent and actionable for lenders and consumers. The companys predictive analytics platform helps mortgage originators and applicants quickly understand an applicants credit record, highlight improvement potential, and identify the actions needed to achieve a higher score. Since its founding, CreditXpert has analyzed more than 750 million credit records. Today most of the top 10 mortgage originators and more than 60,000 mortgage professionals leverage the companys platform. Learn more at http://www.creditxpert.com. Make a Difference: How to Share Your Faith in Christ as a Lifestyle: a potent approach to discipleship. Make a Difference: How to Share Your Faith in Christ as a Lifestyle is the creation of published author Don Sunshine, a devoted husband, father, and grandfather who formerly worked in law enforcement as an officer, a deputy game warden, and a member of a SWAT team trained by the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia. He also worked in the computer and software industry before moving on to follow a calling for ministry. Sunshine shares, Are you a follower of Jesus Christ? If so, then you have been commanded by your Lord and Savior to make disciples, which begins with telling people about your faith. How are you doing with that? Are you being obedient to this command? If not, this book can help. Don Sunshine has been teaching people all over the United States how to share their faith in Christ every day as a lifestyle without fear or embarrassment. Don has taught his Make a Difference (or MAD for short) Live Events in about 700 churches in thirty-six states and Canada. Tens of thousands of people have been impacted by his simple teaching and have begun sharing their faith in Christ every day with a lost world. This book covers a lot of the material that he presents in his MAD live events. Youll learn the following: how to recognize the opportunities (divine appointments) that God gives you every day to tell someone about Jesus; what fears stop you from sharing your faith and how to defeat those fears and live in obedience; and what it looks like when a door opens for you to share your faith, and what to do and say when the door opens. Putting these truths into practice is so simple that Don teaches the same material in Christian middle and high schools. The book is full of real-life examples of Dons teaching that will help you apply the lessons as part of your daily life. And as you do, your life will become the great adventure that God intended it to be. Your faith and joy will grow as your obedience changes your Christian experience on planet Earth. Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Don Sunshines new book is a thorough guide to successfully discussing the gospel of Jesus Christ. View a synopsis of Make a Difference: How to Share Your Faith in Christ as a Lifestyle on YouTube. Consumers can purchase Make a Difference: How to Share Your Faith in Christ as a Lifestyle at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble. For additional information or inquiries about Make a Difference: How to Share Your Faith in Christ as a Lifestyle, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919. Max Armand, Founder of Electric Estates Side empowers us to offer unprecedented technological solutions, elevating the future-forward vision that has made us a market leader and enabling us to provide a highly customized strategy for each client Electric Estates today announced its partnership with Side, the only real estate technology company that exclusively partners with high-performing agents, teams, and independent brokerages to transform them into market-leading boutique brands and businesses. The alliance will ensure that Electric Estates, a tech-savvy company for tech-savvy clients, is powered by the most advanced platform in the industry. Electric Estates was founded by Max Armand, a well-known top-producer within the Los Angeles real estate market who sold over 450 homes in the first 10 years of his career. In 2012, Armand became one of the youngest California real estate brokers at age 23, and he earned the San Diego Association of Realtors Platinum Level Excellence Award after closing more than 100 transactions in 2016 alone. Electric Estates is the product of Armands early and sustained success and the vision of his tech-driven approach. The company serves buyers, sellers, and investors throughout Los Angeles, including Inglewood, Westchester, View Park, Baldwin Hills, Culver City, and beyond. Partnering with Side will ensure Electric Estates remains on the cutting edge of the evolving real estate market while continuing to deliver premium services to its clients. Side works behind the scenes, supporting Electric Estates with a one-of-a-kind brokerage platform that includes proprietary technology, transaction management, branding and marketing services, public relations, legal support, lead generation, vendor management, infrastructure solutions, and more. Additionally, Electric Estates will join an exclusive group of Side partners, tapping into an expansive network from coast to coast. Side empowers us to offer unprecedented technological solutions, elevating the future-forward vision that has made us a market leader and enabling us to provide a highly customized strategy for each client, said Armand. As we continue to refine our concierge service, we look forward to attracting more knowledgeable, dedicated professionals to our team, and serving a greater number of clients seeking the elite service and expertise for which we are known. Side is led by experienced industry professionals and world-class engineers who develop technology designed to improve agent productivity and enhance the client experience. Based on its belief that homeownership is a fundamental human right, Side is on a mission to improve the public good by providing top-performing real estate agents, teams, and indie brokerages with the best system, support, service, experience, and results. About Electric Estates Electric Estates is a future-forward leader in the competitive Los Angeles real estate market with a strong presence in Inglewood. Attentive, sharp, and upbeat, these professionals inspire confidence in buyers, sellers, and investors, many of whom consider them their agents for life. From using the latest market technology to facilitate seamless, efficient transactions to helping clients maximize their investment potential through expert renovations, Electric Estates represents the next generation of real estate. To learn more, visit electricestatesla.com. About Side Side transforms high-performing agents, teams, and independent brokerages into successful businesses and boutique brands that are 100% agent-owned. Side exclusively partners with the best agents, empowering them with proprietary technology and a premier support team so they can be more productive, grow their business, and focus on serving their clients. Side is headquartered in San Francisco. For more information, visit http://www.sideinc.com. 233 Mermaids Bight Naples, FL 34103 The Florida real estate market continues to show incredibly strong demand with new record prices established monthly Engel & Volkers Florida today announced the record-breaking sale of 233 Mermaids Bight in Naples, Florida. Private Office advisor, Thomas Ostrander with Engel & Volkers Olde Naples represented the buyers. At $13,700,000, the sale marks the most expensive transaction in the 34103 zip code. 233 Mermaids Bight immediately caught my clients attention even though they werent in the market for another property having moved recently themselves, said Ostrander. The major aspects that appealed to the buyers were the home's timeless and elegant style, flawless quality, incredible materials and all combined with newer construction and the latest technologies. The homes waterfront location with its lavish dock in Park Shore is also appealing as the new owners keep a large boat at City Dock and this provides short tender ride access to their other obsession. With houses of similar style in St. Louis and northern Michigan, this home perfectly completes their portfolio. The fact that the purchase price soared past all previous comparable speaks to our quickly changing market and the home's unique attributes. This 8,497 square foot mansion comprises five bedrooms and seven bathrooms. It boasts lavish interior features such as gold leaf-trimmed ceilings, grand staircase and rotunda, Italian crystal lighting, 600-bottle climate-controlled wine vault, elevator, four-car garage, private study, second-floor lounge with wet bar, home gym, 12-foot kitchen island, and a smart home system that controls music, lighting, window shades and more. The waterfront estate also offers exterior amenities such as an outdoor kitchen, coral-stone lanai, saltwater infinity pool and spa, three fire pits and a boat dock; all of which are accompanied by automated shutters, awnings and screens. Kimberly Price with Premier Sotheby's International Realty held the listing. Its been an unbelievable year for our market, said Clark Minker, Managing Broker of Engel & Volkers Olde Naples. Discerning families from around the world have recognized the tremendous lifestyle Naples has to offer and chosen to make it their home. To date, I have never met or had the pleasure of working with a more qualified advisor than Tom Ostrander. Tom conducts himself with a level of competence, passion and exclusivity seldom seen. He is the consummate gentleman and we could not be prouder to have him on our team. Closed for $13.7 million, the transaction now ranks as the most expensive sale in the 34103 zip code. This area includes prestigious Gulf Coast neighborhoods such as Park Shore and Moorings. Established in the 1970s, Park Shore has developed into a luxury community inclusive of homes and condominiums, complete with an exclusive beach club. This neighborhood was designed as a cosmopolitan blend of French and Italian Riviera with characteristics of grand European-inspired villas. The Florida real estate market continues to show incredibly strong demand with new record prices established monthly, said Peter Giese, Chief Growth Officer at Engel & Volkers Florida. As an industry leader in luxury real estate around the world, Engel & Volkers enables our advisors to attract discerning clientele who have specific lifestyle needs that they are eager to meet. Ostrander joined Engel & Volkers in 2010, when he relocated to Florida from Connecticut. Since then, he has closed over 200 transactions, totaling nearly $300,000,000 in sales. Prior, he had a successful career in the telecommunications industry with AT&T. He is regularly recognized among the top realtors in the United States, on prestigious rankings such as RealTrends + Tom Ferrys Americas Best Real Estate Professionals. He is a member of Engel & Volkers Private Office, a discrete network for top-performing advisors with high-profile clients that have valuable and often multi-market real estate portfolios. ### Press contact: Linzee Werkmeister, Junior Vice President, Marketing & Franchise Support Email: Linzee.Werkmeister(at)evrealestate.com Tel: (239) 348-9000 About Engel & Volkers: Engel & Volkers is a global luxury real estate brand. Founded in Hamburg, Germany in 1977, Engel & Volkers draws on its rich European history to deliver a fresh approach to luxury real estate in the Americas with a focus on creating a personalized client experience at every stage of the home buying or selling process for todays savvy homeowner. Engel & Volkers currently operates approximately 240 shop locations with 5,000 real estate advisors in the Americas, contributing to the brands global network of over 14,000 real estate professionals in more than 30 countries, offering both private and institutional clients a professionally tailored range of luxury services, including real estate and yachting. Committed to exceptional service, Engel & Volkers supports its advisors with an array of premium quality business services; marketing programs and platforms; as well as access to its global network of real estate professionals, property listings and market data. Each brokerage is independently owned and operated. For more information, visit http://www.evrealestate.com. About Engel & Volkers Florida: Engel & Volkers Florida is the Master License Partner of the global luxury real estate brand Engel & Volkers in the state of Florida. Recognized for uniquely recruiting, training and equipping some of the top professionals in the real estate industry, Engel & Volkers Floridas exclusive franchise model positions its license partners at the top of the premium market to gain market share and support their bottom line. The company represents franchise locations in: 30A Beaches, Amelia Island, Belleair, Boca Raton, Bonita Springs-Estero, Cape Coral, Clermont, Delray Beach, Destin, Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers Downtown, Gainesville, Hollywood Beach, Islamorada, Jacksonville, Jacksonville Beach, Jupiter, Madeira Beach, Marco Island, Melbourne Beachside, Melbourne Central, Melbourne Downtown, Miami Coconut Grove, Neptune Beach, Olde Naples, Orlando, Orlando Downtown, Orlando-Winter Park, Palm Beach, Palm Coast, Ponte Vedra Beach, Sarasota, South Tampa, St. Augustine, St. Pete, St. Pete Beach, Stuart, Tampa Water Street, Venice Downtown, Wellington, and Windermere. Engel & Volkers Florida is continuing to strategically strengthen and expand its presence in premium real estate markets across the state of Florida. If you would like to know more about the Engel & Volkers brand or how to join its global networkwhich is known for demonstrating competence, exclusivity and passion, feel free to call our corporate office, located at 633 Tamiami Trl N, Suite 201, Naples, FL 34102 USA. Tel: +1 239-348-9000. For more information about Engel & Volkers Florida, please visit http://www.florida.evrealestate.com Coat drive by the Church of the Epiphany in downtown Washington DC, to ensure people experiencing homelessness have basic needs met. We know much more about COVID-19 and how it spreads now than we did in the early days of the pandemic, said Nagulan Nesiah. This new campaign, shared through our village Savings with Education groups, will help to dispel the misconceptions about the virus." Episcopal Relief & Development is continuing to support partners in the United States and around the world in providing targeted assistance in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The organization is partnering with local organizations in Brazil, Sri Lanka and Tanzania on additional emergency responses to support the most vulnerable populations. These international projects are supported primarily by a generous grant from Trinity Church Wall Street. In Tanzania, with Episcopal Relief & Development support, Mothers Union is building on the foundation of its 2020 COVID-19 educational awareness campaign. Working with local government departments, the agency is updating the materials to reflect current guidance and information about the virus. The curriculum will be taught to savings group leaders who were trained last year and to leaders from an additional 16 high-risk dioceses. The leaders will then bring that information back to share with their groups and local communities. We know much more about COVID-19 and how it spreads now than we did in the early days of the pandemic, said Nagulan Nesiah, Senior Program Officer, Disaster Response and Risk Reduction, Episcopal Relief & Development. This new campaign, shared through our village Savings with Education groups, will help to dispel the misconceptions about the virus and will help equip communities to better protect themselves. In the United States, Episcopal Relief & Development is supporting the Episcopal dioceses of East Tennessee, Georgia, Puerto Rico, Southwestern Virginia and Washington on new responses to meet additional needs created by the pandemic. The dioceses are assisting marginalized communities through vaccination clinics, incentives for those who receive the vaccine, gift cards for school supplies, assistance in applying for SNAP benefits, medical care, and more. Vulnerable individuals and families in the Appalachian region are historically underserved. Additionally, the area was already experiencing an economic recession before the pandemic began, the effects of which were multiplied by the impact of COVID-19. The Episcopal Diocese of Southwestern Virginia is providing relief this summer to these communities through Grace House on the Mountains network in the region. Grace House on the Mountain, a non-profit community center run by the diocese, is replenishing food pantries to feed 1,500 people and is covering utility expenses for approximately 25 families. Additionally, the diocese is offering assistance with medical expenses, including expenses for care due to COVID-19. "Many families in the Appalachian region are living just below the poverty line," says Katie Mears, Senior Director, US Disaster Program, Episcopal Relief & Development. "Through the efforts of dioceses like Southwestern Virginia and East Tennessee, families experiencing economic hardship caused by the pandemic are getting the help they need." Donations to the COVID-19 Pandemic Response Fund will enable Episcopal Relief & Development to continue to provide assistance to vulnerable communities impacted by the coronavirus, both in the United States and around the world. Learn more about Episcopal Relief & Developments response to the COVID-19 pandemic here. ABOUT EPISCOPAL RELIEF & DEVELOPMENT: For over 80 years, Episcopal Relief & Development has been working together with supporters and partners for lasting change around the world. Each year the organization facilitates healthier, more fulfilling lives for more than 3 million people struggling with hunger, poverty, disaster and disease. Inspired by Jesus words in Matthew 25, Episcopal Relief & Development leverages the expertise and resources of Anglican and other partners to deliver measurable and sustainable change in three signature program areas: Women, Children and Climate. When we learn from the experiences of others, we can save those years and make the right decisions when they count. Author Ed Hoffman offers valuable life lessons gained through experience in Experience Matters (Heres Mine) ($20.49, paperback, 9781662825002; $36.49, dust jacket, 9781662825019; $9.99, e-book, 9781662825026). Hoffman is a titan of his industry who has had some interesting experiences from traveling 800 miles to Pelican Bay Prison to do business with one of the LAPDs top 10 most wanted, to becoming an Amateur World Champion athlete, to becoming a millionaire real estate investor. In Experience Matters (Heres Mine), he shares the wisdom gained from these experiences. The premise: By learning from the experiences of others, everyone can save themselves time, trouble, headache and heartache. If youre only learning from your own experience, youre wasting years of time doing all the wrong things, Hoffman writes. When we learn from the experiences of others, we can save those years and make the right decisions when they count. The book also includes business strategies for those interested in real estate, with real numbers to simplify their startup investments. Ed Hoffman has 30+ years of real estate investing and mortgage experience, and more than a decade as a conservative commentator. Hes learned lessons the hard way, so you dont have to. His weekly radio show/podcast, The Main Event, airs on Salem Radio Network stations and his website EdHoffman.net. He and his wife Dawn live in Southern California. Liberty Hill Publishing, a division of Salem Media Group, is a leader in the print-on-demand, self-publishing industry. Experience Matters (Heres Mine) is available online through amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com. Mindray North America logo We are excited to partner with Gwinnett Tech in its mission to train the next generation of cardiovascular sonographers. - Jim Berry, Marketing Manager, Point of Care Ultrasound To better prepare its Cardiovascular Echocardiography students to thrive in the evolving healthcare environment, Gwinnett Technical College (Gwinnett Tech) has partnered with Mindray North America to enhance department and education capabilities with seven new DC-90 Ultrasound Systems. Gwinnett Techs Cardiovascular Echocardiography program prepares students to provide patient care as cardiac sonographers. The employment of cardiac sonographers is expected to increase 12 percent through the year 2029, much faster than the average for all occupations*. With the increased demand for cardiac sonographers, Gwinnett Tech is uniquely positioned to help students succeed as Georgias second-largest technical college. Excellent performance and reliability are required from the ultrasound systems used to train students. While many schools must use second-hand systems, the partnership with Mindray allows Gwinnett Tech to achieve its educational goals by supplying ultrasound equipment from one of the leading providers of ultrasound solutions in the U.S. The DC-90 machines have been a great addition to our Echo lab. They are extremely user friendly, and the imaging quality is superb," said Lead Instructor of Echocardiography at Gwinnett Technical College, Kathy Johnson. Johnson continued, they are also lightweight and move around effortlessly. The measurement packages are readily accessible which makes it easy to train students in preparation for their transition into the workforce. We could not be happier with the procurement of our Mindray DC-90 machines! The new DC-90 Ultrasound Systems deliver outstanding performance with advanced capabilities for cardiovascular diagnostic requirements. The Systems include Sound Touch Elastography (STE), Ultra-Wideband Non-Linear (UWN+) contrast enhanced ultrasound (CEUS), complete quantitative tools for vascular perfusion analysis, and artificial intelligence (AI) tools (Auto EF and Tissue Tracking Quantitative Analysis). In addition, the Systems feature excellent ergonomics and intuitive control panels that align with Gwinnett Techs teaching and learning philosophy. We are excited to partner with Gwinnett Tech in its mission to train the next generation of cardiovascular sonographers, said Mindray North America Marketing Manager, Jim Berry, Point of Care. Based on an insightful look into customer needs, the DC-90 System is designed to deliver high efficiency and dynamic performance, with intelligent, precise, and clear imaging. With sophisticated applications and intuitive workflow capabilities, were honored to help support Gwinnett Techs mission to deliver high-quality ultrasound education. Gwinnett Techs partnership with Mindray extends beyond the installation of equipment to ongoing service and application support to assure the long-term success of the Cardiovascular Echocardiography program. In addition, Mindrays exclusive Living Technology promise will provide the college with easily upgradable software enhancements to secure product investment protection and keep the ultrasound machines at the leading edge of imaging performance excellence at no additional cost. About Mindray Mindray is a leading developer, manufacturer, and supplier of medical device solutions and technologies used in healthcare facilities around the globe. We believe we can change lives by making the most advanced healthcare technology attainable for all. We do this by empowering healthcare professionals through innovative, high-value solutions that help create the next generation of life-saving tools across three primary business segments: medical imaging, patient monitoring and life support, and in-vitro diagnostics. Mindray maintains its global headquarters in Shenzhen, China; Mindray North America is headquartered in Mahwah, New Jersey. Our Ultrasound Innovation Center is located in San Jose, California, with additional facilities in major international markets around the world. For more information, please visit http://www.mindray.com. About Gwinnett Tech: Gwinnett Technical College, one of Georgias largest technical colleges, is committed to delivering relevant knowledge to meet the workforce training needs of its community. The College offers more than 140 associate degree, diploma, and certificate programs and hundreds of seminars, workshops, and courses providing specialized training. Gwinnett Tech is Gwinnett Countys largest provider of corporate training and also serves residents and businesses in north Fulton County. Gwinnett Technical College is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges to award the associate degree. Contact the Commission on Colleges at 1866 Southern Lane, Decatur, Georgia 30033-4097 or call for questions about the accreditation of Gwinnett Technical College. In addition, some college programs hold separate licensure or accreditation status with appropriate agencies. For more information, visit GwinnettTech.edu. A unit of the Technical College System of Georgia. References: *Gwinnett Technical College Echocardiography Technology AAS Program Fact Sheet Cindy's motto has always been "It's the little things that make the big difference." She carries that motto with her into her new role as owner of Hay Creek Ranch. Many trail riding enthusiasts know and love the endless horse trails through the rugged terrain of the Black Hills in South Dakota at Hay Creek Ranch. Cindy Koebele, the new owner of Hay Creek Ranch, first experienced these trails just one year ago in the summer of 2020. She is your typical horse-lovin gal, but riding in the Black Hills was a magical experience that she just couldnt let go of. Doug (the previous owner) was looking for the right people to take over the ranch, and Cindy jumped at the opportunity. But she didnt do it alone. In 2007, Cindy founded TitleSmart, an award-winning title insurance company in Minnesota. Since then, she has grown TitleSmart to nine locations and over 130 employees. TitleSmart continually ranks on the INC 5000 and top-workplaces lists because of her intense focus on providing an exceptional customer experience. Her motto for TitleSmart has always been Its the little things that make the big difference. She carries that motto with her into her new role as owner of Hay Creek Ranch. In 2019, with encouragement from her husband Jon, Cindy got back in the saddle after a long hiatus from horseback riding. She knew her life was missing something, and it turned out that thing was horses. Luckily, her first experience riding after her long sabbatical was at Madline Horsemanship Clinics in Stillwater, Minnesota. It was there that she met Willie Madline and Ami Keller. Cindy and Ami became fast friends, quickly finding out they had much in common, including their love of all things equine. Willie and Ami set Cindy up with two of their best horses, Hickory and Crosby, who she then leased out for the following year and a half. Cindys weeknights and weekends were quickly gobbled up as she spent all her free time in the saddle alongside Ami and Willie. Willie has been an avid horseman since he was just five years old. He loves everything about horses and riding, and began showing Appaloosa horses as a teen. Eventually, his passion for trail riding took over and he started Madline Horsemanship Clinics, a guided trail riding business, that he operated for over 20 years. Ami started riding at age eight, falling blindly in love with horses. She showed in the 4H and WSCA circuits for 10 years. She then focused on developing her trail riding and guiding skills. She has ridden in the Black Hills dozens of times and understands just how truly unique and extraordinary the South Dakota landscape is on horseback. Ami and Willie had been coming to Hay Creek Ranch for many years prior to meeting Cindy, and they knew Cindy needed to experience the forests, meadows, creeks, and towering rock faces along the trails of Hay Creek. And of course, Cindy fell in love after her first trail ride at Hay Creek Ranch too. And we all know what happened next- Cindy bought Hay Creek Ranch! But only after she found the perfect people to manage it- Ami and Willie. Ami and Willie have been managing the camp and leading near daily trail rides since August 1. When asked how it has been going so far, Ami simply said I love my job! Cindy, Ami, and Willie look forward to welcoming you and your horses to Hay Creek Ranch. Everything you love about Hay Creek Ranch is waiting for you, with new little things including an expanded gift shop with horse treats, apparel and trail riding essentials, new bedding in the cabins, and expanded free Wi-Fi. You can still call us up at the same number, 605-578-1142, to chat or make a reservation, but one of the most exciting new features is the ability to make reservations online at http://www.HayCreekRanchSD.com with no pesky credit card fees. Lets ride! Toyota certified used vehicles are available at Hesser Toyota Customers who are looking to purchase a used vehicle in Janesville, Wisconsin, should visit the Hesser Toyota dealership. The dealership offers Toyota certified used vehicles that ensure good quality and durability of the vehicles. The Toyota certified used vehicles (TCUV) program was launched in 1996. The certification process includes current to six-year-old models with less than 85,000 miles on the odometer. Prior to the inspection of the vehicle, the vehicle history report is reviewed to make sure the used vehicle is worth the approval. There are certain advantages that Toyota offers with their Toyota certified used vehicles which includes 160-point quality assurance inspection, one year of roadside assistance, a twelve month or 12,000-mile limited comprehensive warranty, a seven-year or 100,000-mile limited powertrain warranty, and extended warranty coverage that is transferable at no cost for added resale value. The Hesser Toyota dealership in Janesville, Wisconsin, offers a wide range of Toyota certified used vehicles that include models like 2021 Toyota Prius, 2019 Toyota 4Runner TRD, 2018 Toyota RAV4 Hybrid, and more. Each model is thoroughly checked before it is approved for certification. To learn more about the Toyota certified used vehicles program, visit the Hesser Toyota dealerships website https://www.hessertoyota.com/. Interested buyers can check the Toyota certified used vehicles inventory online or can visit the dealership at 1811 Humes Rd., Janesville, Wisconsin, 53545. Organizations have seen substantial changes in a very short time attracting, retaining and developing talent. The move to remote and hybrid work across the countryand the worldis something our team is already responding to and positioned to capitalize on. Veteran staffing executive Paul Villellas new recruiting and consulting firm, HireCapital, combines traditional recruiting strengths with contemporary methods, linking high tech and high touch. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Villella saw an inflection point within the labor market that dictated a new approach. Along with partners Alana Hyman and Jasmin Moser and recruiting practice lead PJ Godios, Villella founded HireCapital, a firm designed to satisfy the human capital needs of organizations navigating the dynamics of a changing hiring economy combined with accelerated digital transformation. The labor market moves fast and so do we. To us, combining high touch and high tech means creating deep relationships with our clients and candidatesworking to understand their businesses or their career goalsthen nurturing that relationship by leveraging technology to remain accessible and informed, says Villella. HireCapitals integrated, full-service approach comes at a time when many organizations are seeking creative solutions for their labor needs. Villella and his team are taking this opportunity to pivot the firms traditional roots and boutique offerings to bring innovation to the staffing industry. For the past year, HireCapital has been quietly generating interest and building business with dozens of companies. This, combined with its existing database of more than 20,000 candidates and decades of relationships with clients is likely to make the new firm a strong competitor immediately. The firms RaaS (recruiting as a service) subscription model is specifically designed to serve companies experiencing bursts of activity requiring dedicated recruiting support. With its startup in-kind model for emerging growth companies, HireCapital provides advisory services, capital raising support and hiring solutions at a discounted rate in exchange for in-kind equity. These unconventional options are offered in addition to traditional engaged and contingency direct-hire recruiting, contract staffing, contract-to-hire and project-based consulting. Organizations have seen substantial changes in a very short time attracting, retaining and developing talent. HireCapital can deliver entire teams and meet all talent needs. The move to remote and hybrid work across the countryand the worldis something our team is already responding to and positioned to capitalize on. In this new environment, with modern methods and capabilities, we can service a broad base, says Villella. No stranger to changing markets and growth opportunities, Villella began his professional career in technology and management consulting, leading development teams on Wall Street in the mutual fund industry. After notable success as a recruiter with a national staffing firm, Villella founded HireStrategy, which was named the No. 1 staffing firm in the mid-Atlantic region for size and reputation for ten consecutive years before being acquired in 2016. Villellas partners in this new venture are elite professionals in the industry and experts in their fields, representing the leading sales, HR and tech resources from HireStrategy, connected through their shared history with a fresh renewed vision for the future. Founding partner Alana Hyman brings a wealth of connections and business insight to HireCapitals clients through her passion for building meaningful relationships. HireCapital will tap into founding partner Jasmin Mosers extensive network and expertise across finance, accounting, human resources and people operations to help clients build their teams and develop their businesses. PJ Godios sustainable values and background in recruiting top talent for technical positions across industries make him a valuable asset as organizations embrace digital transformation. This leadership team, combined with recruiting centers in Washington, D.C., and Charlottesville, Virginia, offers a critical advantage delivering superior talent to businesses through its extensive network of qualified candidates throughout the country. HireCapital has launched a new website that combines its relationship-focused approach with the efficiency of technology. Learn more by visiting hirecapital.com. About HireCapital HireCapital provides custom solutions for career and workforce management. We connect growing organizations with talented professionals who excel at building agile, innovative, and collaborative team environments. Led by a team of proven staffing professionals, our full-service, integrated approach offers recruiting solutions from direct hire and executive search to consulting and project staffing for enterprise and middle-market companies, along with creative models such as recruiting as a service (RaaS) and in-kind services for startup and emerging growth businesses. Ideal Option, a national leader in outpatient medication-assisted treatment for addiction, and Peak Behavioral Health Services, a private hospital that specializes in treatment for mental health and chemical dependency needs, have come together to host an open house and community forum in Las Cruces. The event will take place on International Overdose Awareness Day to remember those that have lost their lives to addiction and discuss fentanyl, the new driver behind the opioid crisis. Fentanyl, a highly dangerous and addictive synthetic opioid up to 50 times more potent than heroin, has caused overdose deaths to skyrocket across the nation, including New Mexico. According to the NM Department of Health, fentanyl-related deaths more than doubled in 2020 from the previous year. Ideal Options own lab data showed a 104% increase in fentanyl use among enrolling patients nationwide from January 2020 to June 2021. On Tuesday, August 31, from 4:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., all members of the community are invited to gather at the Ideal Option clinic located at 532 N Telshor Blvd, Suite G, for this special event. The event will kick off with an open house from 4:30 p.m. 5:30 p.m. where attendees can enjoy refreshments and learn more about the services provided by Ideal Option, Peak Behavioral Health, the Las Cruces Fire Department, NM Department of Health, Dona Ana County Health and Human Services, the Unified Prevention (UP!) Coalition and ALT Recovery. At 5:30 p.m., City Councilor Kasandra Gandara will give an official proclamation, talk about the opioid crisis in Las Cruces and introduce the following speakers: Naomi Suazo, FNP-C, Addiction Medicine Provider at Ideal Option Gustavo Garay-Vidal, LCSW, Director of PHP/IOP at Peak Behavioral Health Las Cruces Janette Espinoza, DNP PMHNP-BC, Certified Nurse Practitioner at NM Department of Health Thomas Hart, EMT Paramedic at Las Cruces Fire Department Dr. Luis Escobedo, MD, Medical Director at ALT Recovery The community forum will be followed by a live Q&A and networking session. For questions about this event, email Senior Marketing Manager Olivia Easly at oliviaeasly@idealoption.net. About Ideal Option Headquartered in Kennewick, Washington, Ideal Option was founded in 2012 and has since helped nearly 45,000 patients through a network of 70 office-based medication-assisted treatment (MAT) clinics across 10 states, including 26 locations in WA state. With a mission to serve under-served communities, Ideal Option accepts all forms of insurance including Medicaid and Medicare. Financial assistance and payment plans are also available. Ideal Option's team of medical providers carry certifications in Addiction and Emergency Medicine, Internal, OB/GYN, and Family Medicine, among other specialties. The company also employs social workers, caseworkers, counselors, and mental health practitioners. This holistic approach helps drive positive outcomes, including family stability, stable housing, improved overall health, and reduced rates of recidivism. In all the communities it serves, Ideal Option collaborates with existing stakeholders and providers to improve the continuum of care. This approach includes partnerships with emergency rooms and county jail systems, where individuals with substance use disorder often appear, as well as collaborating with numerous support agencies and municipal programs addressing social needs such as housing, mental health, and nutrition support. About Peak Behavioral Health Services At Peak Behavioral, we believe in meeting the patients where they are in their mental health journey. Our evidence-based treatment and carefully selected professionals incorporate group therapy, individual therapy, family therapy, case management, mindful medication management, and recreational therapy to assist each patient in reaching their peak potential. Our end goal is to help our patients live a healthy and productive lifestyle by improving social, coping, and life skills. Our areas of specialization include, but are not limited to suicidal or homicidal ideations, hallucinations, mood dysregulation, anxiety, grief, depression, PTSD, anger, ADD/ADHD, and conduct disorder. The populations we serve at Peak include Active-Duty Service Members, Veterans, General Adult, Senior Adult, and Adolescents ages 12-17. Peak Behavioral is fortunate to offer a full continuum of care for both Adults and Adolescents. Services range from Inpatient Crisis Stabilization and Residential Treatment to Outpatient Day Programming and Assertive Community Treatment. We accept all major insurances in New Mexico and all surrounding states. FREE, confidential mental health assessments are provided at Peak Behavioral 24/7 by masters level therapists who will determine the most appropriate level of care for each individual. Call today to schedule your free assessment today - 575-589-3000. Omni Interactions (Omni), the premier virtual technology platform for the Gig Economy, today announced that it has welcomed Kabir Bazliel as its Chief Digital Officer and Managing Partner. A longtime technology executive in the Digital Transformation space, Kabir will focus on disrupting the marketplace for customer support solutions in the Gig Economy. By integrating Digital Agent, Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Technologies with Omnis Gig Economy, virtual customer support managed services, Kabir and his team look to drive further excellence and efficiency into Omnis solutions. Omnis strategic focus is to support our clients and their customers by engaging, developing and retaining exceptional Gig talent and then deploying them via our platform and customer experience managed services, said Rob Duncan, Founder and President of Omni Interactions. Kabir will play a critical role in increasing the intelligence and automation of supporting our Gig Brand Ambassadors to increase performance and reduce costs. A digital technology visionary, Kabir brings to Omni more than two decades of experience in the design and delivery of cost-effective, high-performing technology solutions. Kabir, in support of rapid domestic and international growth, has held IT oversight responsibilities for the global delivery of client engagements with a total contract value of more than $750 million. Prior to Omni, Kabir was with Capgemini America in the Business Services Division and served in various technology leadership roles at regional and global levels. Most recently at Capgemini, Kabir was the Head of Technology Enablement for the Americas and part of the Intelligent Automation Advisory team for key Fortune 500 clients. In this role he envisioned and established an Automation & Robotics practice. Kabir also architected and delivered an Intelligent Automation @ Scale Disputes Management solution for a Fortune 100 Logistics company. Prior to Capgemini, Kabir led IT Solutions and Systems for Genpact (NYSE: G) Latin America, with Direct leadership of a 46-member cross functional IT team supporting Enterprise Content Management solutions and the systems development, deployment and support for more than 3,000 employees in Latin America and over 7,500 customer users globally. Additionally, Kabir has held roles at GE Capital International Services, the most recent being AVP / IT Head for the GE Insurance Center of Excellence. Kabir graduated from St. Stephens College, University of Delhi with a Bachelor and Master of Arts. He also has a Post Graduate Certificate in Business Management - Service Industry from Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode. We are ecstatic to have Kabir join the Omni team, said Courtney Meyers, COO and Managing Partner at Omni Interactions. Having worked with him on large, transformative digital projects, clients are always impressed with his innovative solutions to solve enterprise challenges. We look forward to Kabir applying this level of expertise to Omnis vision. ABOUT OMNI INTERACTIONS Founded in 2016, Omni Interactions (Omni) is an employee-owned company and a leading technology platform for the Gig Economy. Omnis unique business model leverages the Gig Economy, working and learning from home, and a 100% cloud-based technology platform to revolutionize the handling of omnichannel customer contacts to achieve higher quality outcomes at lower costs. Omni is reimagining the virtual work from home business model in light of the burgeoning Gig Economy and shifting workforce engagement practices. By connecting communities of gig workers with the nations leading brands, Omni delivers consistent, reliable customer experience solutions. Omni reunites the former leadership team of Alpine Access, the leader in cloud-based virtual customer experience solutions. For more information visit OmniInteractions.com If you would like to know more about the T & K, L.P. lawsuit, please contact Attorney Jackland K. Hom today by calling (619) 255-9047. The Northern California labor law attorneys, at Zakay Law Group, APLC and JCL Law Firm, APC, filed a class action complaint against T & K, L.P. ("T & K"), a Taco Bell franchisee, for allegedly failing to accurately pay employees' wages for all their time worked. The T & K class action lawsuit, Case No. 21CV384674, is currently pending in the Santa Clara County Superior Court of the State of California. A copy of the complaint can be read here. According to the lawsuit, T & K allegedly violated California Labor Code Sections 201, 202, 203, 204, 206.5, 226, 226.7, 510, 512, 558, 1194, 1197, 1197.1, 1198, and 2802 by failing to: (1) pay minimum wages; (2) pay overtime wages; (3) provide required meal and rest periods; (4) provide accurate itemized wage statements; (5) reimburse employees for required expenses; and (6) pay wages when due. The lawsuit also alleges T & K violated the Private Attorneys General Act ("PAGA"), which gives rise to civil penalties as a result of T & K's conduct. PAGA allows aggrieved employees to file a lawsuit to recover civil penalties on behalf of themselves, other employees, and the State of California for Labor Code violations. An "aggrieved employee" is defined as "any person who was employed by the alleged violator and against whom one or more of the alleged violations was committed." Cal. Lab. Code section 2699(c). PAGA allows aggrieved employees to become deputized as private attorneys general to enforce the Labor Code. If you would like to know more about the T & K lawsuit, please contact Attorney Jackland K. Hom today by calling (619) 255-9047. Zakay Law Group, APLC and JCL Law Firm, APC are labor and employment law firms with offices located in California that dedicate their practices to fighting for employees who have been wronged by their employers due to unfair employment practices. Contact one of their attorneys today if you need help with workplace issues regarding wage and hour, wrongful termination, retaliation, discrimination, and harassment. -THIS IS AN ATTORNEY ADVERTISEMENT- Title Sponsor for MAMs 9/11 20th Anniversary Special MAMs 9/11 20th anniversary special honors those who lost their lives that day and acknowledges the trials and wins of all the survivors whose lives have forever been altered. As the title sponsor of the Military Assistance Missions (MAM) 9/11 20th anniversary TV special, Lerner and Rowe Gives Back is thrilled to join Sanderson Ford and Discover in bringing a commercial-free half-hour special that commemorates local and national sacrifices made on 9/11. Those interested in viewing the 9/11 special are invited to do so by watching AZ Family 3TVs Youtube broadcast from their mobile devices, turning their television on to the local 3TV channel, or by joining other military supporters at a viewing party from 10:00 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. Viewers can also show their support of Arizona military families by making individual or corporate donations at azmam.org before, during, and after the broadcast. Donations are tax deductible. Special guests of the 9/11 20th anniversary TV special will include an interview with the family of Arizona's only victim of the terrorist attacks. Former Phoenix Fire Chief Bob Khan will also share his perspective on what it was like to be part of the recovery efforts at ground zero. Additionally, Thomas E. Franklin, the photographer who took the iconic photo of the three firefighters raising the flag from the rubble will also be interviewed, as well as people that were inspired to enlist because of that fateful day. 2021 viewing parties will be hosted at these locations: American Legion William Bloys Post 2 (Tempe), American Legion Pat Tillman Post 117 (Phoenix), and Boondocks Patio & Grill (Scottsdale). It's a great honor to serve on MAMs board of directors with such an amazing group of individuals from a variety of industries. That diversity has made it possible for us to create unique and memorable ways to raise awareness about our cause and provide ways to give back directly to our Arizona military families who could use a helping hand, stated Lerner and Rowe Gives Back founder Kevin Rowe. I invite everyone to put aside a half hour on 9/11 to join us in watching this 20th anniversary 9/11 special to honor those who lost their lives that day and acknowledge the trials and wins of all the survivors whose lives have forever altered. To learn more about the MAM's 9/11 20th Anniversary TV Special viewing parties and sponsorship opportunities, please contact MAM via email at mam@azmam.org or call 602-246-6429. More About Lerner and Rowe Lerner and Rowe Injury Attorneys is a powerhouse law firm in representing personal injury clients. Attorneys Glen Lerner and Kevin Rowe have grown their law firm into one of the largest personal injury firms in the country, with over 50 attorneys and nearly 400 support employees located in Arizona, Nevada, California, Washington, Oregon, Illinois, Indiana, New Mexico, and Tennessee. The law firms continuous exalted levels of success can be attributed to the high levels of respect and dignity shown to victims and family members hurt in an accident. For those injured outside one of the previously listed states, Lerner and Rowe has an established network of attorneys across the country, ready to help. The firm takes pride in nourishing these relationships as they know a personal injury attorney can make all the difference in obtaining fair compensation for the pain and suffering inflicted upon the victims of tortious conduct. For more information about Lerner and Rowe Injury Attorneys in Phoenix, please call 602-977-1900. To connect with the law firm socially, follow Lerner and Rowe on Twitter and Instagram, or become a fan of its Facebook page. Also, visit lernerandrowegivesback.com to learn more about the many other community services that the lawyers and legal support team of Lerner and Rowe actively support. ### Valleys and Victories: an inspiring autobiography that paints a vivid portrait of the resiliency of the human spirit. Valleys and Victories is the creation of published author Lorraine Williams-Lewis, a loving mother and native of Illinois who currently lives in Texas. Williams-Lewis shares, The reason why I wrote this book is to assist women of all culture and races with some form of knowledge of how to cope in the valleys of life. I hope women will learn from my mistakes and do it better. I am not a saint or self-righteous. My hope is that they will get to know Christ in an intimate way, because if women have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, their lives will become better. They will have a better survival rate than someone who is on their own and has no one. The bad things that people do to you, God turns it around in your favor. God has a purpose for all our lives. He is always working behind the scenes. When people come against you, God allowed it because it is all in his plan to work the kinks out of you and to take the bad parts of you to make you better. Life sometimes is not fair, but it is serving his plan to create you to be better, stronger, wiser, self-assured, and direct you into his purpose for your life. God intended it for good when he use the Judas of your life. It was hurtful to me when people ostracized me, lied on me, betrayed me, etc. It made me stronger, wiser, nonjudgmental, humbled me and gave me empathy for others. Everything serves a purpose in your life. Stay strong, keep the faith, trust God, stay prayerful, decree and declare great things for your life. Believe and see those great things, for your life is happening even if it is not physically in existence (Hebrews 11:1). Never give up, for if you keep on moving and doing the right things, you will someday succeed and be victorious over your obstacles in your life. God is giving you strength by allowing adversities to come into your life. Your adversities come, not to destroy you, but to push you further into Gods great plan for your life. This is my life lesson learned, and Christ was guiding me the whole time. Yea I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. I will fear no evil: For thou are with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me (Psalm 23:4). Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Lorraine Williams-Lewiss new book is an encouraging and colorful exploration of life. Readers will find a nostalgic tale of faith within the pages of this memoir that offers a sense of hope despite the valleys of life. View a synopsis of Valleys and Victories on YouTube. Consumers can purchase Valleys and Victories at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble. For additional information or inquiries about Valleys and Victories, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919. Surviving the Storm: an encouraging example of faith in action. Surviving the Storm is the creation of published author M. Doctor, a loving mother and current resident of South Carolina who grew up in New York City. She is a graduate of the New School University and has had a lifelong relationship with Christ. Doctor shares, Sometimes we are confused when storms come thinking that bad things arent supposed to happen to us once we have given our lives over to the Lord. However, storms come for different reasons; to clean and remove things that are dead, this may include people too, to make way for what is new. It is all in Gods timing. Ecclesiastes lets us know that, time is made available for things that are pleasant and unpleasant. A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away (Ecclesiastes 3:6). M. Doctor continues to encourage the reader as they weather storms. Published by Christian Faith Publishing, M. Doctors new book is a reassuring look at how God works within ones life. With a personal retelling and relevant scripture, Doctor writes in hopes of encouraging others that, while there are peaks and valleys to life, God is always there. View a synopsis of Surviving the Storm on YouTube. Consumers can purchase Surviving the Storm at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble. For additional information or inquiries about Surviving the Storm, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919. Consider the experience of an individual who rigged scores of battery packs together to charge a car, it didnt end well. All-electric vehicle (EV) production is on a rapid uptick nearly 20 unique EV models are available for sale in the U.S., and nearly 100 EVs are set to debut by the end of 2024. While EVs only account for about 2% of new-vehicle sales, the ability to refuel at home is cited as a major benefit of owning one. In fact, a recent J.D. Power study found this is where most owners (88%) say they charge often or always. EVs come with a 120-volt (Level 1) compatible cable, which allows the vehicle to charge via a standard wall outlet. However, charging speed is extremely slow about four miles per hour and many EV owners prefer to upgrade to a 240-volt (Level 2) outlet. Mercury Insurance Vice President of Property Claims Christopher ORourke advises owners to consult with a professional if they want more power. Consider the experience of an individual who rigged scores of battery packs together to charge a car, it didnt end well, ORourke says. The battery packs overheated and burned down the garage. Fortunately for this person, the homeowners insurance claim was covered. Nevertheless, its best to have an electrician handle any EV charging station installations. EV owners who are looking to install a 240-volt power outlet or hardwired charging station at home should speak with a trusted, local electrician who is trained, licensed and insured to install a NEMA 14-50 outlet. (This is similar to what an electric dryer or oven is plugged into.) They can also speak with their dealers about installation recommendations. ORourke also recommends that EV owners who plan to charge at home: Consider carrying comprehensive auto insurance coverage. While damage to a home may be covered, the charger itself may not be. A standard homeowners insurance policy excludes coverage related to motor vehicles, which means losses to vehicles; trailers, campers or other equipment towed by a vehicle; and vehicle equipment, accessories and parts are not covered. Hard-wired charging stations are usually considered part of your dwelling and thus the station will likely would be covered depending upon the type and cause of a loss, ORourke says. Portable chargers, on the other hand, may be considered vehicle equipment, so its a good idea to make sure to have adequate auto insurance coverage as well. If an electrical issue with the homes wiring causes the charger to catch fire, this will likely be covered by homeowners insurance. Otherwise, comprehensive auto coverage is needed. Stay up-to-date on battery-related recalls and reported incidents. General Motors and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration issued a recall for all Chevrolet Bolts due to fire risks that could be associated with the battery. Recent reports of fires happening while EVs are parked and charging, while rare, should cause owners to be on alert. The fact is all-electric vehicles are still relatively new to the marketplace, so automakers are still perfecting them, ORourke says. EV owners need to do their due diligence and make sure theyre properly educated about their manufacturers recommendations for proper charging. An important part of owning a home or vehicle is knowing what your insurance does and doesnt cover. Mercury found in a recent poll of U.S. homeowners and drivers that 83% say they have read their policies in full. However, half (50%) of the respondents expect their policy to cover 100% of their property for any claim they might file. Mercury recommends speaking with a local agent to fully understand coverage and possible exclusions or limitations. More information about homeowners insurance and auto insurance coverage can be found on Mercurys blog. About Mercury Insurance Mercury Insurance (MCY) is a multiple-line insurance organization predominantly offering personal automobile, homeowners and commercial insurance through a network of independent agents in Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Texas and Virginia. Since 1962, Mercury has specialized in offering quality insurance at affordable prices. For more information, visit http://www.mercuryinsurance.com or Facebook and follow the company on Twitter. RFSOI and mmWave are incredibly important for defense and aerospace applications and we are at the very beginning of broad and exciting adoption. - Mike Noonen, CEO of MixComm MixComm, the mmWave Antennas to Algorithms pioneer, announced today that its RFSOI beamforming technology was recognized among the best by the 2021 Military & Aerospace Electronics Innovators Awards. An esteemed and experienced panel of judges from the aerospace and defense community recognized MixComm as a gold honoree. The gold award level recognizes an excellent innovation, the benefits of which are clear. A gold-level innovators award recipient makes a substantial improvement over previous methods employed, approaches taken, or products/systems used. On behalf of the Military & Aerospace Electronics Innovators Awards, I would like to congratulate MixComm on their goldlevel honoree status, said Military & Aerospace Electronics Editor in Chief John Keller. This competitive program allows Military & Aerospace Electronics to celebrate and recognize the most innovative products impacting the aerospace and defense community this year. MixComms RFSOI semiconductor technology is a revolutionary development in the semiconductor space and has critical implications for the increased use of mmWave for 5G and satellite communications. RFSOI based mmWave phased array systems solve mmWave challenges especially when compared to existing Bulk CMOS or Silicon Germanium (SiGe) solutions. MixComms use of RFSOI process technology has three key advantages: 1. Transistors, substrate and back end for improved RF performance 2. SOI NFET has lower parasitics than bulk CMOS, enabling higher performance (45RFSOI achieves ~40% higher fMax than bulk CMOS) 3. Stacked RFSOI transistors enable 10x higher output and 2-5x higher efficiency This award is particularly meaningful to us, since our RFSOI-based power amplifier and beamforming technology originated from several DARPA programs that ran over the last decade, said Dr. Harish Krishnaswamy, MixComms CTO and Co-Founder. We look forward to continue bringing innovative products to market that benefit the defense and commercial ecosystems alike." MixComm is incredibly proud of this award and recognition of the leadership and impact of our RFSOI mmWave solutions, said Mike Noonen, CEO of MixComm. RFSOI and mmWave are incredibly important for defense and aerospace applications and we are at the very beginning of broad and exciting adoption. This recognition comes on the heels of several award wins for MixComm, most recently it was named on EE Times Silicon 100 Start-Ups to Watch list for 2021. MixComm is also the first mmWave company selected to join the 5G Open Innovation Lab and was selected as the 2020 Broadband Innovation of the Year by the Mobile Breakthrough Awards. About Military & Aerospace Electronics Military & Aerospace Electronics is the leading media resource serving program and project managers, engineering managers, and engineers involved in electronic and electro-optic design for military, space, and aviation applications. Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine delivers time-sensitive news, in-depth analyses, case studies, and realworld applications of new products, industry opinion, and the latest trends in the use of mil-spec, rugged and commercial off-the-shelf components, subsystems, and systems. About MixComm Inc. MixComm, based in Chatham, N.J., is the leading mmWave Antennas to Algorithms company developing transformative solutions for emerging wireless applications and markets. In 2020, MixComm introduced its first of a portfolio of millimeter wave products that deliver revolutionary levels of performance and integration for 5G infrastructure and Satellite Communication. The companys technology is based on breakthroughs from Dr. Krishnaswamys CoSMIC lab at Columbia University and is funded by Kairos Ventures. For more information, visit http://www.mixcomm.com. For more information, visit http://mixcomm.com/ or email info@mixcomm-inc.com. Handheld Radio Mount for Cars, Trucks, Racing, and Outdoors "Mob Armor set out to design a robust solution to mount handheld radios to be used in various ways. The new Rad Mount is used to mount handheld radios in a vehicle, truck, shop, outside, on tool boxes, electrical panels, or anything made of steel." Mob Armor is excited to present our newest handheld radio mounting solution, the Rad Mount, engineered to be the strongest magnetic hand radio mount available on the market. When radio communication is all that connects us to civilization it must be easily within reach. Made for trucks, cars, off-roading, oil field, and construction workers. The new Rad Mount is made with rare earth magnets, an all-metal casing, and rubber pads for shock absorption - the radio isn't going anywhere. Mob Armor is the first to use an all-aluminum construction that provides a lightweight mounting solution that performs up to standards for off-road jobs and adventurous lifestyles. Stick it to any ferrous surface to mount it, or use the included steel disc for alternative mounting solutions. "Mob Armor made a commitment to deeper connect with the core market," says Trevor Orrick, president of Mob Armor. "The importance of radio communication while on the job site, off-roading, or desert racing was clear." He continues, "Yet, none of the available products gave people an effective way to mount their handheld radios within reach. Mob Armor set out to design a robust solution ready to be used in various ways. The new Rad Mount is used to mount handheld radios in a vehicle, truck, shop, outside, on tool boxes, electrical panels, or anything made of steel." Features and benefits of the Rad Mount include: Rubber pads for shock absorption 90lb pull-force rare earth magnets Made from 5052-grade aluminum alloy New products billet aluminum casing will now have an extended 3-year warranty instead of 1-year Rad Mount is now available for only $36.99 MSRP through retail partners and on the website. For more information on Rad Mount, URL of the product page: visit our site About: Mob Armor takes an innovative approach to secure smart devices anywhere in a UTV, daily driver, race truck, emergency vehicles, gym equipment, or anywhere. The product line started with the Rad Mount as a product of necessity. Not one product in the smartphone industry was up to standard or evolving consumer needs, so we created something new. All products are designed and assembled in the USA. The brand has grown to over 150 different products within our 5 years of operation. Mob Armor products are built to last mainly using metal components, robust design, and an obsession with quality. Mob Armor is affiliated with multiple organizations such as the AAM Group and SEMA. Mob Armor has been awarded the 2018 California Congressional Innovation. The Mob Armor brand and Mob Armor products have been featured in magazines and well-known racing video games and continue to be recognized as the ultimate mobile device mounting solution across many countries, including the US, Canada, and Australia. The Steinberg Law Firm is honored to have Benjamin W. Akery, David T. Pearlman, Thomas M. White, Malcolm M. Crosland, Jr., Steven E. Goldberg, Michael J. Jordan, Catherine Dunn Meehan, Kelly M. Alfreds, and J. Kevin Holmes (Of Counsel) featured in the 28th edition of The Best Lawyers in America for 2022. Attorney Benjamin W. Akery has not only received high recognition in the Workers Compensation-Claimants category but has also been voted the 2022 Lawyer of the Year for Workers Compensation Law in Claimants in Charleston, SC award. Attorney Akery joined the Steinberg Law Firm in 2008 after completing law school at Emory University School of Law. In 2016, he made partner at the firm. He focuses on handling workers compensation and personal injury cases. Managing Partner and Attorney David T. Pearlman is recognized in the Workers Compensation Law-Claimants category. He joined Steinberg Law Firm in 1976 and has been an active member of the South Carolina Bar Association for over 40 years. Attorney Thomas M. White is also included in the Workers Compensation Law-Claimants section and has received this honor for over 20 years. Attorney Malcolm M. Crosland, Jr. comes from a family of lawyers, following in his fathers and grandfathers footsteps. In this 28th edition of The Best Lawyers in America he is recognized in Personal Injury Litigation-Plaintiffs and Workers Compensation Law for both Claimants and Employers. He joined Steinberg Law Firm in 1986 and focuses on personal injury. Attorney Steven E. Goldberg has over 25 years of experience and represents clients who have been seriously injured. He is included in the Personal Injury Litigation-Plaintiffs category, as well as the Workers Compensation Law- Claimants category. He is very active in the legal community and serves as the president of the East Cooper Jewish Community as Chairman for Operation Home and serves as chair for the Grant Making and Leadership Committee. Attorney Michael J. Jordan is recognized in three categories: Personal Injury Litigation-Plaintiffs, Product Liability Litigation-Plaintiffs, and Workers Compensation Law-Claimants. He is a member of the South Carolina Bar Association, Berkeley County Bar Association, and Charleston County Bar Association. His concentrated practice areas include workers compensation, car accidents, and wrongful death. Attorney Catherine D. Meehan is recognized in Workers Compensation Law-Claimants category for the 28th edition. She earned her B.A. in psychology from the University of Notre Dame before heading to Medical University of South Carolina to earn a B.S. in nursing. Her medical background serves her well in advocating for victims of personal injury. While she handles workers compensation and personal injury cases, she also works on medical malpractice cases. Attorney Kelly M. Alfreds handles workers compensation and personal injury cases and is featured in the Workers Compensation Law-Claimants category in Best Lawyers. She is a certified mediator, a member of three bar associations in the community, and serves as the First Circuit Representative of the Young Lawyers Division of the South Carolina Bar. Attorney J. Kevin Holmes (Of Counsel) is recognized for his work in Personal Injury Litigation-Plaintiffs and Workers Compensation Law-Claimants. He has 42 years of experience that includes trying civil and criminal cases in the state and federal courts of South Carolina. Founded in 1981 by Harvard Law School graduates, Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith, Best Lawyers is a peer-review publication in the legal realm. The Best Lawyers publications have earned the respect of the profession, the media, and the public as the most reliable, unbiased source of legal referrals anywhere. The 28th edition of The Best Lawyers in America (2022) includes more than 66,000 lawyers in 147 practice areas, covering all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The Steinberg Law Firm houses some of South Carolinas finest practicing lawyers in personal injury and workers compensation. The Steinberg Law Firm was founded by Irving Steinberg in 1927 and, since then, the firm has carried on Irving Steinbergs legacy in helping injury victims. The firm has recovered over $500 million dollars for its clients and prides itself on advocating for victims of complicated negligence cases in South Carolina. The firms practice areas include workers compensation, personal injury, vehicle accidents, brain and spinal injuries, nursing home neglect, medical malpractice, slip, trip, and fall injuries, dog bites, and defective products. To learn more about The Steinberg Law Firm, visit https://www.steinberglawfirm.com/ , or call 843-720-2800 for a free consultation. We find that those who discover a second career in retirement are some of the most valuable contributors across our franchise network, explains Jeff Huber, Home Instead CEO. The number of retirees in the United States increased by an additional 1.7 million more than anticipated in early 2021, according to a study by the Dallas Federal Reserve. This tremendous exodus was spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic, as many individuals opted to retire early. But will these retirees choose to stay out of the workforce among growing hiring needs? Returning to work or Unretirement, as its been coined has been a growing trend for the last several years, predicted to only increase in the future. In fact, more than half (53%) of those planning to retire in the next few years believe they are likely to return to work, according to a survey by Home Instead. And many major employers are seeking out this untapped segment of the labor market. We find that those who discover a second career in retirement are some of the most valuable contributors across our franchise network, explains Jeff Huber, Home Instead CEO. They return to the workforce eager to put their previous experiences to work while learning new skills, often finding a sense of purpose and fulfillment in their new endeavor. As the number of retirees continues to grow, some workforces are particularly primed for those considering a second career. A few of the most popular jobs for older workers include: Caregiver Many unretirees seek out purpose-driven job opportunities. Becoming a caregiver allows them to make a meaningful difference in the lives of older adults every day. Retail salesperson Working in the retail setting provides a chance to connect with others in a low stress environment. Driver Whether delivering packages or chauffeuring people, the job of a driver provides an opportunity to see beautiful scenery, spend time in new places and set a flexible schedule. Culinary Worker Cooking for others is a labor of love and offers those who have a passion for the culinary arts to explore a career doing something they enjoy. Administrative Assistant For those that have spent their lives in the business world, returning to the office in a new role is an ideal way to transition existing skills and expertise while staying connected. While the pandemic has played a major role in the influx of older workers stepping away from the workforce, age discrimination has also been a driving factor. Not only do biases against older workers reduce productivity and inclusive creativity, they also cost the economy billions each year. A joint study by AARP and The Economist Intelligence Unit suggests the U.S. lost approximately $850 billion in 2018 because of the lost economic activity from older workers being stymied in their careers, and is projected to increase to nearly $4 trillion by 2050. Sadly, ageism is an undeniable challenge facing older adults and often pushes talented employees out of the workforce prematurely, discouraging them from exploring new opportunities later in life, says Huber. With nearly all industries facing labor shortages, its more important than ever that we embrace older workers and celebrate the valuable skills they bring to their jobs and overall workplace culture. Despite the challenges, the trend of retirees reentering the workforce is expected to continue to rise in the coming years, fueled by the need for more experienced workers brought on by the pandemic. For those interested in exploring a new career post-retirement, Home Instead has developed several resources to provide additional guidance including articles, success stories and even a quiz to find the right career path for you. To learn more visit: UnretireYourself.com ABOUT HOME INSTEAD Founded in 1994 in Omaha, Nebraska, the Home Instead franchise network provides personalized care, support and education to enhance the lives of aging adults and their families. Today, the network is the world's leading provider of in-home care services for older adults, with more than 1,200 independently owned and operated franchises that provide nearly 90 million hours of care annually throughout the United States and 13 other countries. Local Home Instead offices employ approximately 100,000 CAREGivers worldwide who provide relationship-based care services that enable older adults to live safely and comfortably in their own homes for as long as possible. Home Instead franchise owners partner with clients and their family members to help meet varied individual needs. Services span the care continuum from providing personal care to specialized Alzheimers care and hospice support. Also available are family caregiver education and support resources. Visit HomeInstead.com. Connect with us on Facebook and Twitter. Each Home Instead franchise office is independently owned and operated. Home Instead, Inc. is a subsidiary of Honor Technology, Inc. For more information, visit joinhonor.com. Encouraging Words for Difficult Times: a heartening arrangement of thoughtful reflections. Encouraging Words for Difficult Times is the creation of published author PK Thoma, a loving wife and mother who has a Bachelor of Science from John Carroll University and a masters degree in clinical psychology from Cleveland State University. Growing up, she skated internationally with the Garfield Heights Skating Club, traveling to locations such as Sweden, Finland, and Alaska. Thoma shares, We all face difficult times in our lives. This book was written to encourage people to see that we can all overcome the difficulties that we face. If we can change our perspectives slightly and see what the world is trying to tell us, we will become happier and more fulfilled. And, if we can see that by working through the pain, heartache, and uncertainty that we all face in our lives, we can become stronger, more whole human beings. The pain and difficulties that we overcome shape us into who we are today, and we should be grateful. The world holds keys to help us through our difficulties, and we just have to be open enough to see what she is trying to tell us. I hope by reading this book, peoples eyes can be opened to the wonderful map the world holds for all of us. Published by Christian Faith Publishing, PK Thomas new book is a source of positivity in an often challenging world. Balancing imagery with thoughtful expressions, the author hopes to bring a sense of peace and joy to those going through hard times. View a synopsis of Encouraging Words for Difficult Times on YouTube. Consumers can purchase Encouraging Words for Difficult Times at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble. For additional information or inquiries about Encouraging Words for Difficult Times, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919. Inc. magazine has revealed that Prochant is included on its annual Inc. 5000 list, the most prestigious ranking of the nations fastest-growing private companies. The list represents a unique look at the most successful companies within the American economys most dynamic segmentits independent small businesses. Intuit, Zappos, Under Armour, Microsoft, Patagonia, and many other well-known names gained their first national exposure as honorees on the Inc. 5000. We are proud to be included on the Inc. 5000 list, as its a testament to the commitment and passion of our entire team, says Mathew Mammen, CEO of Prochant. Non-acute care providers including home medical equipment, specialty, and infusion pharmacy providers are playing a critical role in transforming U.S. healthcare to improve health outcomes while also lowering costs. Our innovative, technology-driven services enable providers to outsource key revenue cycle functions, so they can enhance financial performance while improving overall patient care. Not only have the companies on the 2021 Inc. 5000 been very competitive within their markets, but this years list also proved especially resilient and flexible given 2020s unprecedented challenges. Among the 5,000, the average median three-year growth rate soared to 543 percent, and median revenue reached $11.1 million. Together, those companies added more than 610,000 jobs over the past three years. Complete results of the Inc. 5000, including company profiles and an interactive database that can be sorted by industry, region, and other criteria, can be found at http://www.inc.com/inc5000. The top 500 companies are featured in the September issue of Inc., which will be available on newsstands on August 20. The 2021 Inc. 5000 list feels like one of the most important rosters of companies ever compiled, says Scott Omelianuk, editor-in-chief of Inc. Building one of the fastest-growing companies in America in any year is a remarkable achievement. Building one in the crisis weve lived through is just plain amazing. This kind of accomplishment comes with hard work, smart pivots, great leadership, and the help of a whole lot of people. Prochant is the nations leading technology-driven healthcare reimbursement firm. With wholly owned, international back-office operations, we provide business process outsourcing services to providers and RCM companies. Our full-service solutions for HME, infusion pharmacy, and specialty pharmacy providers bring best-in-class results to your business. Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, our client base includes national providers and health systems. For more information, please visit prochant.com or follow us @prochant. More about Inc. and the Inc. 5000 Methodology Companies on the 2021 Inc. 5000 are ranked according to percentage revenue growth from 2017 to 2020. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by March 31, 2017. They must be U.S.-based, privately held, for-profit, and independentnot subsidiaries or divisions of other companiesas of December 31, 2020. (Since then, some on the list may have gone public or been acquired.) The minimum revenue required for 2017 is $100,000; the minimum for 2020 is $2 million. As always, Inc. reserves the right to decline applicants for subjective reasons. Growth rates used to determine company rankings were calculated to three decimal places. There was one tie on this years Inc. 5000. Companies on the Inc. 500 are featured in Inc.s September issue. They represent the top tier of the Inc. 5000, which can be found at http://www.inc.com/inc5000. About Inc. Media The worlds most trusted business-media brand, Inc. offers entrepreneurs the knowledge, tools, connections, and community to build great companies. Its award-winning multiplatform content reaches more than 50 million people each month across a variety of channels including web sites, newsletters, social media, podcasts, and print. Its prestigious Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to recognize the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The global recognition that comes with inclusion in the 5000 gives the founders of the best businesses an opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers, and the credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. The associated Inc. 5000 Vision Conference is part of a highly acclaimed portfolio of bespoke events produced by Inc. For more information, visit http://www.inc.com. For more information on the Inc. 5000 Vision Conference, visit http://conference.inc.com/. We are motivated to continue to partner with our surgeon customers to assist them in healing patients faster and with fewer complications. Prosidyan, Inc. (http://www.prosidyan.com), developer of proprietary fiber-based bioactive glass bone graft substitute products, announces the presentation of the Multi-Center Clinical Evaluation of a Bioactive Fiber-Based Bone Graft Substitute for Posterolateral Fusion clinical study poster based on its FIBERGRAFT BG Matrix product this past weekend at the American Association of Neurological Surgeons Annual Meeting. The clinical study e-poster presentation details the studys design, methods and outcomes that support the conclusion that Prosidyans bioactive glass fiber-based bone graft substitute achieved a successful 96.3% fusion outcome in a multi-center clinical evaluation. There were no complications or adverse events related to the device. FIBERGRAFT BG Matrix is an ultraporous synthetic bone graft substitute made from proprietary bioactive glass fibers. BG Matrix is comprised of the clinically-proven FIBERGRAFT bioactive glass technology and extra-long fibers of pure type I collagen for flexibility and conformability. In additional to this clinical study, FIBERGRAFT BG Matrix has also been evaluated in a preclinical study that showed it to be equivalent to autograft in a challenging rabbit posterolateral spinal fusion model. We are proud of the results achieved in this clinical study and will continue to support the generation of clinical evidence proving the success of our bioactive glass technology in Orthopedic Trauma and Spine surgical procedures. We are motivated to continue to partner with our surgeon customers to assist them in healing patients faster and with fewer complications, said Charanpreet Bagga, Co-Founder, President and CEO of Prosidyan, New Providence, NJ. Within the last twelve months, there have been four FIBERGRAFT abstracts accepted for presentation at world-renowned orthopedic and spine meetings. About Prosidyan Prosidyan was founded in 2009 to develop a family of synthetic bioactive bone graft substitutes based on proprietary bioactive glass fibers. Prosidyans first product, FIBERGRAFT BG Morsels, a synthetic bone graft substitute, received FDA clearance in March 2014, and the first surgery utilizing this innovative bone graft substitute was performed in May 2014. The Companys second product in the line, FIBERGRAFT BG Putty, received FDA clearance in March 2015, and comprises FIBERGRAFT BG Morsels in combination with Prosidyans proprietary bioactive carrier, OSSIGLIDE. Prosidyans latest technology, FIBERGRAFT BG Matrix launched in August 2017, uses Prosidyans proprietary type I collagen-based bioactive carrier. For more information about the company and its products, please visit http://www.prosidyan.com, or call 908.517.3666. Walsh WR, Oliver R, Chistou C, Wang T, Walsh ER, Lovric V, Pelletier M, Bondre S. Posterolateral fusion in a NZ white rabbit model using a novel bioglass fiber combined with autograft. Poster#390, ORS 2017 annual meeting, San Diego, 1922 March 2017. The e sculpture on SIUEs Edwardsville campus. "The Best Value recognition is another welcome acknowledgement of the fine work being accomplished by faculty, staff and students in both rapidly growing schools. College Factual has ranked the Southern Illinois University Edwardsville School of Nursing and School of Business among its Best Value Colleges for 2021. College Factuals Best Value Colleges for Nursing reviewed 649 institutions that offer a bachelors in nursing and ranked SIUE 11th in the nation and #1 in Illinois. College Factual looked at nursing schools that offer a high-quality educational experience at a price lower than expected. When calculating average cost, College Factual took tuition, fees, room and board, books and supplies, and other related expenses into account. College Factuals Best Value Colleges for Business Administration and Management ranking looked at 876 colleges that offer a bachelor's in business administration and ranked SIUE 19th in the nation and #2 in Illinois. When determining best value, College Factual did not simply mean those with the lowest price. For this ranking, College Factual identified those business administration schools that provide students with a high-quality education at a price that is lower than other colleges and universities of the same caliber. It is great to see our affordability recognized in combination with our proven academic quality, said Scott Belobrajdic, EdD, associate vice chancellor for Enrollment Management. The value message is strong and clear. Both schools have earned the highest level of academic accreditation available, he noted. The School of Nursing is accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing (CCNE), and has an outstanding track record of preparing students for the NCLEX and other exams. The School of Business, accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB), has been celebrated by The Princeton Review as a top program for the past 15 years. The Best Value recognition is another welcome acknowledgement of the fine work being accomplished by faculty, staff and students in both rapidly growing schools. At SIUE, the average time it takes a student to graduate is 4.5 years, and on average, the annual cost to attend the school is $17,498. Putting this cost and the average time to graduate together, College Factual determined that the average amount a student would pay for a bachelors in nursing or business administration at SIUE is $79,091. Graduating earlier lessens a students out of pocket cost. The School of Nursings programs are committed to creating excellence in nursing leadership through innovative teaching, evidence-based practice, quality research, patient advocacy and community service. Enrolling more than 1,700 students in its baccalaureate, masters and doctoral programs, the School develops leaders in pursuit of shaping the nursing profession and impacting the health care environment. SIUEs undergraduate nursing programs on the Edwardsville campus help to solve the regions shortage of baccalaureate-prepared nurses and enhance the quality of nursing practice within all patient service venues. The Schools graduate programs prepare nurses for advanced roles in clinical practice, administration and education. The School of Business is among an elite 5% of business schools worldwide that have earned the prestigious accreditation from the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB International). This accreditation represents the highest standard of achievement for business schools worldwide. Less than 25% of AACSB accredited schools also hold the accounting accreditation. The School of Business has been accredited by AACSB since 1975, and the accountancy program achieved separate accreditation in 1987. Undergraduate degrees are offered in accountancy and business administration, with specializations in computer information systems, cybersecurity, economics, entrepreneurship, finance, human resources, international business, management, marketing and supply chain management. Graduate degrees include accountancy, business administration, computer management and information systems and marketing research. For the 15th consecutive year, the School of Business is named an outstanding business school by The Princeton Review. The Best Business Schools: 2021 Edition. The Princeton Review recommends the School as one of the best institutions in the U.S. from which students can earn an MBA. Nearly 29,000 alumni have earned degrees from the SIUE School of Business. Sometimes I Also Love it When it Rains Exhibit at Boston Children's Museum I believe visitors will have a different experience each time they visit Sometimes I Also Love it When it Rains. Boston Childrens Museum has recently opened Sometimes I Also Love it When it Rains, a gallery installation by Senior Exhibit Designer, Joel Reider. The exhibit conjures the contemplative, introspective, and joyful emotions we might unexpectedly associate with rainy weather. Upon entering the exhibit environment, audio, visual, and tactile stimuli inspire sensations and memories of rain. Visitors are prompted to recognize the many positive, though possibly surprising, associations everyone has: the transportive power of watching rain fall across a landscape; the surrender and release of being thoroughly drenched by a downpour; the absolute glee of splashing in a puddle; the fertile imaginative terrain defined by the hazy contours of a rain-filled sky. On reflection, visitors may discover their response to surroundings can shift unexpectedly and is never really fixed. I believe visitors will have a different experience each time they visit Sometimes I Also Love it When it Rains, said Melissa Higgins, Vice President of Programs and Exhibits. Some visitors may choose to sit quietly, watching the visual projection of rain and listening to the rain, while others may choose to actively engage by using instruments to make rain noises or leaving a message about how they feel in the rain. Museum visitors will navigate a short zig-zagging path through curtains of material that suggest sheets of rain. At the end of this path, there is an open area with video, still images and audio that includes original music and recordings of people sharing impressions, feelings, and stories about rain. Visitors are invited to share their own thoughts and feelings in words or pictures on two large chalkboard walls, and to play with an assortment of simple musical instruments that mimic the sounds of rainfall. The Sometimes I Also Love it When it Rains exhibit will be open through November 19. For additional information, please visit http://www.BostonChildrensMuseum.org About Boston Children's Museum Boston Childrens Museum engages children and families in joyful discovery experiences that instill an appreciation of our world, develop foundational skills, and spark a lifelong love of learning. More information about Boston Childrens Museum can be found at http://www.BostonChildrensMuseum.org. Become a fan of the Museum on Facebook and follow us on Twitter Debbie Bagley, Studies Weekly Teacher Advocate School districts that adopt Studies Weekly district-wide can now schedule one-on-one or small group consultations for their teachers with Studies Weeklys new teacher advocate, Debbie Bagley. Teachers will receive personalized, educational support in the form of a Q&A session as opposed to a PD training lecture. Districts must set up these meetings through their States sales representative. With Bagleys 15 years of experience in education, she is a valuable asset to teachers and school districts. Bagley earned two bachelors degrees in education and also received a Kodaly music teaching certificate. She has served on leadership teams focused on 21st century learning, the 6 Cs, integrated instruction, and deep learning for students. As a classroom teacher, she experienced how the Studies Weekly Social Studies curriculum strengthened student understanding of cooperation, empathy, kindness, and respect for differences. Because these life skills can increase a students social-emotional learning, and influence productive life choices, Bagley began integrating these skills into every aspect of her classroom activities. I felt I was making a real impact on a whole generation, Bagley said. She had the opportunity to share her love for the Studies Weekly curriculum and explain the benefits of the program while working as a professional development trainer. As teachers reached out to her for help, she began to realize the need for additional support for classroom implementation. When Studies Weekly offered me this position, it was hard to imagine leaving my students. But I love the Studies Weeklys vision of engaging children in the learning process and how that empowers students, she said. As a teacher advocate, I can reach countless students by helping educators be more effective and passionate about strengthening students positive social influence with this learning tool. Bagley understands the demands of being in the classroom and meeting ELA and math standards. One of her goals is to make using Studies Weekly stress-free. I want teachers to find joy in knowing they are making a difference in their students lives by helping them become better citizens, armed with social and emotional skills. I look forward to supporting my fellow educators as they help their students and communities be the best they can be, she said. Teachers and school leaders can learn more at studiesweekly.com. About Studies Weekly Studies Weekly, a curriculum company based in Utah, has been educating elementary students since 1984. Studies Weeklys curriculum is uniquely presented in a printed periodical format that pairs with an interactive online learning platform. The company offers award-winning K-6 social studies, science, and well-being curriculum, adopted by state boards of education across the nation. Terranet Communications We are proud that The City of Las Vegas and its citizens are now benefiting from an innovative and improved approach to internet access through the establishment of a secure, private LTE, 5G-ready network made possible by the architecture that Terranet Communications built." Terranet Communications, a leading provider of customized, fully integrated LTE and 5G-ready indoor and outdoor private broadband networks, today announced they have been named the winner of a Bronze Stevie Award in the Company of the Year and Tech Startup of the Year categories in the 18th Annual International Business Awards. More than 3,700 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted for the 2021 Stevie International Business Awards for consideration in a wide range of categories. The 2021 competition also featured a number of categories to recognize both organization and individual responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. It is a privilege to be recognized by the Stevie Awards among many other innovative startups, said Bart van Ardenne, CEO and co-founder of Terranet Communications. We are proud that The City of Las Vegas and its citizens are now benefiting from an innovative and improved approach to internet access through the establishment of a secure, private LTE, 5G-ready network made possible by the architecture that Terranet Communications built. We see a bright future in wireless and look forward to continuing to help connect the unconnected and democratize access to broadband. Terranet Communications pioneered the United States largest LTE, 5G-ready municipal network to transform the city of Las Vegas into a Smart City, in pursuit of democratizing access to connectivity. Proof-of-concept, to design, to deployment was achieved in a mere 45 days something unheard of in government, stated Michael Sherwood, Chief Innovation Officer for the City of Las Vegas. Judges were impressed with the initiative and the speed of implementation. One judge noted, It's great to see such a quick turn around on something so critical to education during the pandemic. Another said, personifying the startup spirit, inherently nimble, agile and resourceful, Terranet has made a mark on the industry. The Las Vegas story is just the beginning of a great success story. Terranets design and end-to-end deployment approach to the Las Vegas private network is a significant example of how our companys expert team and best-in-class infrastructure partners can quickly and cost-effectively meet real-world needs for specialized, robust, reliable and secure broadband connectivity, added Mike Kerr, President and co-founder of Terranet Communications. Were thrilled to be recognized by the Stevie International Business Awards in both the Company of the Year and Tech Startup of the Year categories. The Stevie Awards are the world's premier business awards. They were created in 2002 to honor and generate public recognition of the achievements and positive contributions of organizations and working professionals worldwide. In short order, the Stevie has become one of the world's most coveted prizes. Details about The International Business Awards and the lists of Stevie Award winners are available at http://www.StevieAwards.com/IBA. About Terranet Communications Terranet Communications is a leading provider of customized, fully integrated LTE and 5G-ready indoor and outdoor private broadband networks, a market projected to have a compounded growth rate of 39.7% and estimated market size of $14.8bn by 2028. Terranet has proven its exclusive end-to-end approach, using their proprietary Synthesis network design technology platform, custom network architecture, extensive best-of-breed infrastructure partners and experienced executive team, offers governmental agencies, municipalities and real estate organizations, and their communities, a more cost effective, faster and easier way to establishing private network connectivity. Terranet analyzes, designs, integrates, deploys, manages and upgrades customized networks, specific to their customers current and future needs. Founded in December 2020, Terranent Communications is a privately held company headquartered in Orange County, California. Follow Terranet Communications on LinkedIn or Twitter or learn more at https://terranet.global/. About the Stevie Awards Stevie Awards are conferred in eight programs: the Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards, the German Stevie Awards, the Middle East & North Africa Stevie Awards, The American Business Awards, The International Business Awards, the Stevie Awards for Women in Business, the Stevie Awards for Great Employers, and the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Stevie Awards competitions receive more than 12,000 nominations each year from organizations in more than 70 nations. Honoring organizations of all types and sizes and the people behind them, the Stevies recognize outstanding performances in the workplace worldwide. Learn more about the Stevie Awards at http://www.StevieAwards.com. ### Standing 440 feet above the city, Spire offers 360-degree panoramic views of Seattles skyline. With the debut of Spire, homebuyers now have the option for elevated living in Seattle that is simply unmatched. From the citys first automated parking system to every home offering a grand view of the iconic skyline, there is truly no other option like Spire in the market. Spire, the $350 million, 41-story luxury condominium tower that is the closest high-rise to the iconic Space Needle, is now open with the first residents moving into the highly anticipated building by Laconia Development. The grand opening of the newest lavish homes in downtown Seattle comes as Spire reached a milestone with more than $50 million achieved in sales this year alone, including 63 residences ranging from $500,000 to $2 million. The collection of 343 one-, two- and three-bedroom luxury condominiums is now more than 40% sold with sales and marketing efforts led by Polaris Pacific. Spire is making history for being home to the citys first fully automated parking system (APS). The state-of-the-art computer-controlled system, developed by California-based Parkworks, automatically parks cars for residents all within a matter of minutes and without a driver in the vehicle. Standing 41 stories and 440 feet above the city, the prismatic building also offers 360-degree panoramic views of Seattles skyline along with a dramatic two-story lobby with on-site cafe, luxurious co-working spaces, modern fitness center and movement studios, a 24-hour concierge, a private theater and the Spire Club at Level 40 with indoor/outdoor terraces. With the debut of Spire, homebuyers now have the option for elevated living in Seattle that is simply unmatched, said Paul Menzies, CEO of Laconia. From the citys first automated parking system to luxurious amenities and every home offering a grand view of the iconic skyline due to the buildings thoughtful design, there is truly no other option like Spire in the market. Prospective buyers are able to tour the model homes and the buildings impressive amenity areas. For more information about Spire or to schedule a sales appointment, visit SpireSeattle.com. About Spire Designed to connect Seattles natural beauty with its position as a leading center of technology, Spire is a collection of 343 one-, two- and three-bedroom luxury condominiums in the dynamic heart of Downtown Seattle. A brilliant architectural prism designed by VIA Architecture, and with the environmental designation of LEED Silver, Spire frames Seattles breathtaking landscapes with unobstructed 360-degree views of Puget Sound, Mount Rainier and Mount Baker. Standing 41 stories and 440 feet above the city, the residential towers sleek silhouette serves as the exclamation point to Seattles skyline. Spire is the closest high-rise building to the iconic Space Needle and is situated at the nexus of local culture, dining and world-class attractions, all while being within walking distance to some of the worlds most powerful technology companies. Spire radiates intelligent design, connectivity and convenience in stylish interiors with light-filled, open layouts. The extensive collection of inspired amenities includes Seattles first fully automated parking system; a welcoming two-story lobby with on-site cafe; verdant landscaping; luxurious co-working spaces; state-of-the-art fitness center and movement studios; a 24-hour concierge; a private theater; and the Spire Club at Level 40 with indoor/outdoor terraces and 360-degree views. For more, visit SpireSeattle.com. About Laconia Development Bay Area-based Laconia Development LLC is a full-service real estate investment and development firm that envisions and builds high-rise and mid-rise residential communities and mixed-use environments in dynamic urban centers. By focusing on emotionally resonant architectural design, Laconia creates landmark developments that command attention and enhance existing neighborhoods buildings that residents are proud to call home. For more, visit LaconiaLLC.com. About Vanke USA Vanke US is a trusted local strategic partner to real estate developers on both commercial and residential projects. Based in New York and San Francisco, Vanke US is currently focused on partnerships in gateway cities, providing smart capital, which encompasses financing, project management and other value-add services that leverage its entrepreneurial culture, diverse talent and deep corporate resources. Learn more at vanke.us. About Polaris Pacific Polaris Pacific is the leading real estate sales and marketing group for todays new residential communities. Drawing on a 30-year legacy of success in the Western United States, Polaris Pacific specializes in new development, leveraging the latest tools and technology to create a clear path forward. Long-term client relationships with industry leaders provide the companys platform for innovation, establishing Polaris Pacific as the irrefutable expert in major urban markets. For more information, please visit PolarisPacific.com. The Naderi Center for Plastic Surgery and Dermatology honored for 11th Year in a Row with Best of Herndon Award in Skin Care Category The Naderi Center for Plastic Surgery and Dermatology, has been awarded the Best of Herndon business award for the 11th year in a row. Dr. Naderi and The Naderi Center will also be inducted into the 2021 Herndon Business Hall of Fame which recognizes the best of local Herndon area businesses, the center announced today. Every year, the committee running the Herndon Award program selects a small group of companies who exhibit exceptional marketing success in the Herndon local business community. According to the award program, these companies elevate the perception of area businesses with positive images that demonstrate how Herdon as a community is a desirable place to live, work, and play. The Naderi Center has been selected for this exclusive distinction for over a decade. In order to determine the winners in every category, the Herndon Award program committee looks at the quality of what each nominated business is offering in the community. Selection of the final award winners is done through a combination of internal input by the Herndon Award committee and data that is provided through external third parties. Were once again extremely honored to be selected for the Best of Herndon business award. Said Dr. Naderi. We work hard to serve the community and provide the best in surgical and non-surgical cosmetic treatments. The Herndon award and inclusion in the 2021 Herndon Business Hall of Fame is great recognition for our staff for a job well done. The mission of the Herndon Award program is to recognize the areas small business community and their economic contributions. As one of the most respected plastic surgery and dermatology centers in the US, The Naderi Center has been locally and nationally recognized for work cosmetic surgery, injectables, and a multitude of skin treatments include Fraxel laser services, microneedling, chemical peels, PRP injections for hair loss and more. To schedule a consultation with Dr. Naderi or any of the centers specialists or to learn more about the procedures performed at The Naderi Center, visit http://www.virginiafacialplasticsurgery.com. About The Naderi Center The Naderi Center is one of the most specialized and unique plastic surgery & dermatology practices in the US. The Naderi Centers practitioners believe in specialization because it minimizes risk and achieves the best possible results for patients. Each of the centers four board certified physicians focus exclusively on specific areas of cosmetic surgery & dermatology and are recognized as true masters in their field by both physician colleagues and patients. Come see how ultra-specialization is the future of patient safety, results, and satisfaction. Visit http://www.virginiafacialplasticsurgery.com for more information. AIR MILES is one of the foundational coalition programs in the global market and supporting initiatives such as Women in Loyalty make clear the AIR MILES commitment to diversity, gender inclusion, and recognition of our female executives, clients, and partners, said Rachel MacQueen. The Wise Marketer Group (WMG), publisher of TheWiseMarketer.com and operator of the Loyalty Academy, has announced a special feature within its ongoing Women in Loyalty series. This three-part video interview series will be produced in collaboration with AIR MILES and highlights female executives from leading brands who are influential and leading change in digital customer loyalty marketing. The series of video interviews will be hosted by Rachel MacQueen, Senior Vice President, Marketing and Collector Experience, AIR MILES, and will include three outstanding guests. Each video interview is 45 minutes in length and will be aired on a pre-recorded basis. The interview schedule shown below includes a powerful interview and, in each case, the featured guest will be available to engage in a live question and answer session: 1. Andrea Brecka, General Manager, Retail Canada, Shell, September 8, 1pm ET 2. Sandra Sanderson, SVP Marketing, Sobeys, October 19, 1pm ET 3. Kimberley Stuart, Head of Marketing, Kent, November 30, 1pm ET The Women in Loyalty series has been a great success since its launch earlier this year, said WMG CEO and Managing Editor, Bill Hanifin, continuing, the sponsorship and support from AIR MILES is a tribute to their brand and allows us to feature three powerful women who have strongly influenced the development of the customer loyalty business. The Women in Loyalty series has a mission to recognize business leaders in the customer loyalty industry, create opportunities for collaboration and mentorship, and support career growth through growth of a vibrant community of business leaders. These three conversations will not only highlight unique perspectives on loyalty marketing from each guest but will reveal the substance of these notable people and cover some of the challenges facing women in the workplace today. Rachel MacQueen, AIR MILES, emphasized the reason for their support of the series saying, AIR MILES is one of the foundational coalition programs in the global market and we continue to believe in the importance of recognizing and rewarding customers as a source of business growth. Supporting initiatives such as Women in Loyalty make clear the AIR MILES commitment to diversity, gender inclusion, and recognition of our female executives, clients, and partners. Register here for Andrea Brecka's session on September 8th at 1pm ET. Registration for the other sessions will be available soon. Stay informed by subscribing to The Wise Marketer's newsletter. The Wise Marketer is making sponsorship opportunities available for the Women in Loyalty series. The opportunity to partner in support of this notable and important aspect of the customer loyalty industry is unique and powerful. If you would like to be part of The Wise Marketers Women in Loyalty series as a supporter, sponsor or guest, please send us an inquiry here. About the Wise Marketer Group The Wise Marketer Group delivers timely and unbiased publishing, research, and educational products to a global audience of marketing professionals. The Wise Marketer Group publishes TheWiseMarketer.com, the most widely read news source for Customer and Loyalty marketing in the world, with an 18-year history serving the global loyalty marketing industry. The Wise Marketer also operates the Loyalty Academy, the first industry professional certification program, offering the designation of Certified Loyalty Marketing Professional (CLMP) to those completing the curriculum. For details, visit http://www.TheWiseMarketer.com and http://www.LoyaltyAcademy.org This audience is ideal to consider and opine on strategies proven to get quickly past lifes bad breaks and on to a new and better pathway to success and happiness Todd Burnham, founder of Colorados Burnham Law Firm, is scheduled for a keynote presentation at MENSAs World Gathering on August 25 in Houston, Texas. MENSA World Gathering attendees, all members of the exclusive ultra-high IQ global community, will consider Burnhams presentation: Comeback - Epic Rebound Strategies Post Divorce, Injury or Business Trauma based on his upcoming eponymously titled book wherein he shares: His discovery that among thousands of clients his firm had represented, some surprisingly quickly recovered from the trauma of divorce, accident injury, or business failure, whereas; Others remained in a Purgatorial limbo for years focused on trying to get back what they lost. His observations of process commonalities among the successful comebacks from marital splits, physical injuries from auto and other accidents, and the psychological trauma of a business collapse or painful litigation, and; His distillation of the tools, tactics, and strategies used by the uber resilient to properly Comeback following a new path to reach surprising life and career heights. This audience is ideal to consider and opine on strategies proven to get quickly past lifes bad breaks and on to a new and better pathway to success and happiness, said Burnham. The MENSA world conference marks the start of author Burnhams speaking tour. Media Contact Mr. Burnham is represented by Elite Lawyer Management, managing agents for remarkable American attorneys. Media inquiries or to book Todd Burnham: maggie@elitelawyermanagement.com MENSA: An international society with the membership qualification standardized testing results in the population's top 2%. The nonprofit's purpose is to conduct research in psychology and social science, identify and foster human intelligence for the benefit of humanity and serve as a means for stimulating intellectual and social contacts among its membership. Todd Burnham: Founded Burnham Law, a fast growing multi-office Colorado-based divorce, custody, injury, business litigation, and criminal law firm. A veteran podcaster and media commentator on legal and social issues, Burnhams upcoming book: Comeback Epic Rebound Strategies, is set for release through Sutton Hart Press. Sutton Hart Press: An award-winning non-fiction publisher of thought provoking information from high authority leaders. Upcoming and recent titles include Gregory Glovers Immortality, Inc., Steven Hochfelsens Profits of Denial, and celebrity divorce lawyer Dror Bikels bestseller The 1% Divorce When Titans Clash. We look forward to watching 00 on the track as Quinn proudly represents UNITS Moving and Portable Storage and StarCom Racing. UNITS Moving and Portable Storage, a national moving and portable storage franchise headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina, has partnered with StarCom Racing teams as a primary sponsor for the Daytona Coke Zero 400 on August 28 and the Cook Out Southern 500 on September 5. UNITS Moving and Portable Storage launched its partnership with StarCom Racing in 2019 as the franchise sought out new ways to introduce their high-quality storage containers featuring barn-style doors and all-steel construction to one of the largest audiences in the world. The UNITS logo is featured on #00 for the two upcoming races and the car will be driven by Quin Houff. (VIEW CAR HERE) Drivers will pull out all the stops when the Daytona Coke Zero 400 returns as NASCARs Regular Season Finale at Daytona International Speedway this Saturday at 7 p.m. EST. Houff will race #00 again the following Sunday, Sept 5, at 6:00 p.m. EST in the Cook Out Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway in UNITS home state of South Carolina. The races are televised on NBC and NBC Sports, giving the UNITS brand a spotlight on the national stage. We are thrilled to join StarCom Racing as sponsor for a third year in a row, UNITS Moving and Portable Storage CEO Michael McAlhany said, This is an opportunity to put the UNITS brand in front of millions of loyal NASCAR fans. We hope to earn the loyalty of any fan with moving and storage needs. As always, we wish Quin Houff safe and successful races in the next couple of weeks. StarCom Racing, founded in 2017, is based in North Carolina and fields the 00 car in the NASCAR Cup Series. New to the sport, but eager to succeed, SCR acquired a NASCAR Charter in 2018, running a full-time schedule since then in the Chevrolet Camaro. StarCom Racing President Matthew Kohler sees the partnership with UNITS as a terrific fit, as both brands strive consistently for excellence. As a race team, we work hard to compete at the highest level with a quality product on the track each week. Partnering with a company like UNITS Moving and Portable Storage that offers high-quality containers and unmatched customer service aligns with our teams core values, says Kohler. We look forward to watching 00 on the track as Quinn proudly represents UNITS Moving and Portable Storage and StarCom Racing. For more information about UNITS Moving and Portable Storage, visit http://www.unitsstorage.com. ABOUT UNITS Moving and Portable Storage Established in 2004, UNITS Moving and Portable Storage was founded by Michael McAlhany during the emergence of the moving and portable storage industry. The company's mission was to provide personal customer service and supply the most innovative and highest quality equipment. Nationwide UNITS Moving and Portable Storage are locally-owned and operated and familiar with the communities they serve. UNITS Moving and Portable Storage offers high-quality constructed containers featuring barn-style doors and all-steel construction. The UNITS Moving and Portable Storage container is clean, weather-resistant, spacious, and available in 12-ft and 16-ft. lengths. The UNITS Moving and Portable Storage robotic delivery system is the most technologically advanced in the industry, virtually eliminating any shift in contents when lifting containers on and off transport vehicles and placing them in tight areas where competitors cannot. The container may be placed in a UNITS Moving and Portable Storage service center or at the customers desired location, always at ground level for easy access. The national network of UNITS Moving and Portable Storage and Service Centers currently services over 650 cities in North America and continues to grow. About StarCom Racing StarCom Racing, a Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Team, based in North Carolina was launched in September 2017. SCR purchased a Charter in 2018 and ran a full schedule in 2019. SCR was formed by a collective group of seasoned NASCAR specialists, as well as successful business entrepreneurs from SCRs parent company, StarCom Fiber. For more information on SCR or to purchase team gear, please visit http://www.starcomfiber.com. Thermoforming manufacturer Vantage Plastics (vantageplastics.com) and injection molding firm Lotis Technologies (lotistechnologies.com) are proud to announce an affiliation that brings together two of Michigans leading plastics processors. While each company has specialized in returnable packaging and material handling solutions, this affiliation will broaden the markets to which plastic product solutions can be offered. This is an affiliation of two companies who are ideally suited for each other, says Vantage Plastics owner Paul Aultman. "Our individual expertise, when brought together, creates a company uniquely suited to satisfy the needs of existing customers while also strengthening us for growth into new markets. We could not have found a better company to affiliate with, says Lotis Technologies executive Gary Lovins. Vantage is known nationally for their thermoforming expertise, while we are leaders in custom engineered injection molded returnable packaging. According to Aultman, the advantages of the affiliation include: Improved purchasing and operational efficiencies Shared knowledge and expertise Complementary and expanded services to offer existing customers and new prospective clients Under the terms of the affiliation, the companies will maintain their separate headquarters and staffs. Vantage Plastics is located in Standish, Michigan while Lotis Technologies is in Lake Orion, Michigan. Both companies are privately held and will retain existing executives. Founded in 1996, Vantage Plastics provides thermoforming to a wide range of industries, including automotive, food processing, transportation, agriculture, medical, government, and others. Thermoforming is a manufacturing process in which a plastics sheet is heated to a pliable temperature, formed to the shape of a specific mold, and trimmed to create a usable product. Vantage Plastics specializes in heavy gauge cut-sheet custom thermoforming. This process allows for making a wide range of larger robust products ranging from consumers goods such as sleds, kayaks, and kiddie pools to robust reusable and recyclable material handling items like pallets, trays, dunnage, sleeve packs, agricultural equipment and more. Vantages strengths include being a one stop-shop as it is innovative and vertically integrated. Vantage provides in-house custom design, engineering, tooling, sheet extrusion, manufacturing, product verification, warehousing, and shipping all under one roof. The Vantage Plastics family of companies also includes Edge Material Management, which guarantees to buy back any product made by Vantage for its material value so it can be recycled and used to make new products. Edge Material Management also buys post-industrial plastics on the open market to help improve customer material costs and keep a sustainable environment. Vantage Plastics is truly becoming one of the countries most innovative and vertically integrated plastics processors. Vantage Plastics clients include many well-known Fortune 500 companies as it has been on a steady growth trajectory. The company employs over 230 people at its 250,000 square foot facilities and had roughly $40,000,000 in sales during 2020. Lotis Technologies was established in 2005 with the purpose of supporting the returnable packaging industry. The company manufactures stacking columns, seat pallets, shipping trays, automated trays, rack dunnage and more. Lotis Technologies is known for its expertise in design and knowledge of the nuances associated with successful injection-molded product outcomes. This brings great value to clients as Lotis is able to provide a very positive experience for their clientele. Our customers have seen significant cost savings in switching from expendable packaging to returnable/reusable plastic packaging, says Lotis co-owner Gary Lovins. We have engineered a variety of solutions ranging from complex robotically loaded and unloaded seat pallets and automated trays to simple pieces of rack dunnage with great success. Lotis also provides stacking column solutions. Stacking columns provide a fully automatic system with increased storage capacity while maintaining part-separation. Applications include shipping racks, WIP racks, line side buffering and many LCA systems. Lotis offers engineering, prototyping, tooling, and production all in-house. To support its design services, the company features lab equipment, gauges and fixtures, assembly fixtures and steel-to-injection evaluation. Prototyping is supported with mechanical assemblies, 3D printing of various materials, case urethane prototypes and machined CNC prototypes. The Vantage-Lotis affiliation officially went into effect on April 15, 2021. Officials with both companies are eager to see the results. Every day in manufacturing facilities across this nation there are millions of parts that are in constant need to be received, assembled, moved, and created, says Paul Aultman. With this merger, we will be able to create products that are durable, reusable, customizable, lightweight, suitable for any environment, and recyclable. We cant wait. For more information about the Vantage Plastics-Lotis Technologies affiliation, call Paul Aultman at (989) 846-1029 or Gary Lovins at (248) 340-6065 or email sales@vantageplastics.com Elevated remote-based customer care for iconic brands VIPdesk grew 144% during the last 3 years! Inc. magazine revealed that VIPdesk is once again on its annual Inc. 5000 list, the most prestigious ranking of the nations fastest-growing private companies. The list represents a unique look at the most successful companies within the American economys most dynamic segment its independent small businesses. Intuit, Zappos, Under Armour, Microsoft, Patagonia, and many other well-known names gained their first national exposure as honorees on the Inc. 5000. Sally Hurley, CEO of VIPdesk commented on her achievement, "After such a challenging year in so many ways, we are thrilled to once again make the Inc. 5000 list for the 3rd time in 4 years and continue our rapid growth path. We are beyond grateful for our wonderful clients and passionate team members. Without them, this growth would not have been possible." Making the Inc. 5000 is a testament to VIPdesks ongoing success as a premium provider of Outsourced Customer Experience solutions. VIPdesk specializes in utilizing a highly educated remote work team, combining the most passionate and talented team members in North America. For most companies during the last 18 months, this business model not only became a choice but a requirement, allowing VIPdesk and other companies focused on work-at-home technology/services to showcase their specific strengths and flourish through the pandemic. VIPdesk however, has not only been recognized for its innovative virtual service delivery model, VIPdesk is also unique in the industry as it became a registered B-Corp, complying with the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency, and legal accountability to balance profit and purpose. The uncompromised focus on the well-being of their purposefully recruited team members allows VIPdesk to consistently deliver elevated and memorable customer experiences for their family of iconic brands. The companies on this years Inc. 5000 come from nearly every realm of business, says Inc. editor-in-chief Scott Omelianuk. From health and software to media and hospitality, the 2021 list proves that no matter the sector, incredible growth is based on the foundations of tenacity and opportunism. Not only have the companies on the 2021 Inc. 5000 been very competitive within their markets, but this years list also proved especially resilient and flexible given 2020s unprecedented challenges. Among the 5,000, the average median three-year growth rate soared to 543 percent, and median revenue reached $11.1 million. Together, those companies added more than 610,000 jobs over the past three years. Complete results of the Inc. 5000, including company profiles and an interactive database that can be sorted by industry, region, and other criteria, can be found at http://www.inc.com/inc5000. The top 500 companies are featured in the September issue of Inc., which will be available on newsstands on August 20. About VIPdesk VIPdesk, a premium provider of outsourced customer experience solutions, utilizes a select team of remote work-at-home Brand Ambassadors (customer service professionals), located throughout the U.S., to provide elevated customer experience for luxury and premium brands. As a certified B-Corp, Women-Owned-Corporation and Best Workplace winner, VIPdesk is on a fast mission to elevate the human experience with its team members and its partners. Talented team members of VIPdesk not only excel in delivering superior customer service but are passionate ambassadors of the brands they serve. VIPdesk's suite of services include Omni-Channel Customer service handling including all traditional and digital contact channels, full AI and assisted AI solutions, social media management, back office support and customer experience consulting. Visit http://www.vipdesk.com for more information or @VIPdesk on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram. About Inc. and the Inc. 5000 Methodology Companies on the 2021 Inc. 5000 are ranked according to percentage revenue growth from 2017 to 2020. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by March 31, 2017. They must be U.S.-based, privately held, for-profit, and independentnot subsidiaries or divisions of other companiesas of December 31, 2020. (Since then, some on the list may have gone public or been acquired.) The minimum revenue required for 2017 is $100,000; the minimum for 2020 is $2 million. As always, Inc. reserves the right to decline applicants for subjective reasons. Growth rates used to determine company rankings were calculated to three decimal places. There was one tie on this years Inc. 5000. Companies on the Inc. 500 are featured in Inc.s September issue. They represent the top tier of the Inc. 5000, which can be found at http://www.inc.com/inc5000 About Inc. Media The worlds most trusted business-media brand, Inc. offers entrepreneurs the knowledge, tools, connections, and community to build great companies. Its award-winning multiplatform content reaches more than 50 million people each month across a variety of channels including web sites, newsletters, social media, podcasts, and print. Its prestigious Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to recognize the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The global recognition that comes with inclusion in the 5000 gives the founders of the best businesses an opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers, and the credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. The associated Inc. 5000 Vision Conference is part of a highly acclaimed portfolio of bespoke events produced by Inc. For more information, visit http://www.inc.com For more information on the Inc. 5000 Vision Conference, visit http://conference.inc.com VPLS, a cloud-to-edge computing and solutions provider, announces today that it has completed the acquisition of its second Texas data center location (DA2). The property includes 18.8 acres of land and a 75,000 square foot, 10-megawatt facility that is currently 100% leased to a data and technology company. The acquisition provides VPLS with another modern, well-run and maintained data center as well as the property and expansion potential to support additional data center developments in the future. The current facility supports 2.5 megawatts of critical IT load based on a 2(N+1) design and is expandable to 16 megawatts total. It is rated as a Tier III data center based on physical, electrical, and mechanical infrastructure. The highly resilient, purpose-built data center is also designed to withstand direct impact from an F3 tornado. We are thrilled to add this additional Texas location to our growing national portfolio, states Jay Smith, Vice President and General Manager, Data Centers at VPLS. The central US remains a strategically important market for our team and this acquisition was a great opportunity to expand our presence in this geography while also contributing to our revenue stream with a world-class client. George Rogers, Senior Advisor to VPLS, says, This transaction furthers the companys strategy of acquisitions of high-quality data centers in strategic locations in order to provide critical infrastructure support to its customers. Arman Khalili, CEO of VPLS, adds, "The acquisition of this Texas facility demonstrates our focus on growth in key markets. As our data center and network footprint grows, VPLS can immediately deliver our cloud-to-edge solutions and services to these strategic markets and surrounding locations. We look forward to broadening our offerings to current and future VPLS clients. About VPLS VPLS is your trusted global provider for cloud-to-edge computing and technology services. For more information, please visit http://www.vpls.com. A little more than a year ago, Barnes & Noble CEO James Daunt used the forced closure of nearly all of his physical stores to begin refurbishing the interior of each location, as well as to review each stores title selection. Daunt had planned to remake the stores over an 18-month to two-year span, but the retail lockdown, coming less than six months after Daunt took over as CEO following the acquisition of B&N by Elliott Advisors, forced his hand. While Daunt appeared confident B&N could weather the Covid storm, others in the industry were not so sure how much time the new owners would give Daunt to turn around the bookstore chain at a time when the viability of physical retail was being called into question. However, as bookstore sales have bounced back from the depth of last years slump (bookstore sales were up 30% in the first half of 2021 over the comparable period last year), publishers say B&N has been performing well. Simon & Schuster CEO Jonathan Karp credited Daunt with revitalizing the retailer, while HarperCollins CEO Brian Murray praised Daunts decision to remake the stores during the pandemic and for his ability to convince Elliott to keep investing in the business, adding that HCs sales with B&N are up. In an interview with Daunt from his U.K. office, where he has been managing both B&N and the U.K. chain Waterstones, Daunt said total B&N sales are up about 5% to 6% so far this year, compared to 2019, with book sales up by double digits. The pandemic has continued to hurt B&Ns cafe and newsstand results, but books and other core areas, such as educational games, puzzles, and workbooks, have done well, Daunt said. Urban areas are having the hardest time recovering from the pandemic, and New York City in particular, Daunt said, has been a drag on the overall rebound. Unlike his first few months on the job, Daunt said trends now seem to be in B&Ns favor. Book sales have remained resilient during the recession, interest in reading is up, all B&N stores have undergone at least one round of refurbishing, and rents are down. The most important change Daunt has made to B&Ngiving local store managers more control over what, and how, they sell in their stores-has kicked in. Daunt acknowledged that most stores will carry many of the same titles, but where the books are placed, and in what quantities they are ordered, is now left to managers. Managers are in charge of the way the titles are presented, Daunt said. The goal is to make sure books that are selling well have the necessary quantities, and books that arent working are returned quickly. Resupplying stores is a central focus, Daunt said, and the company has invested in its distribution centers and people to make its internal supply chain operate more efficiently. Lowering returns has been one of Daunts priorities since he took over B&N, and while progress has been made, he said there is still room for improvement. Daunt gave store employees full credit for getting B&N turned around, acknowledging the difficult conditions they were working under during the depth of the pandemic while also learning a new way of working. He is resolute in his belief that the key for B&N to succeed is to empower store managers. Once the managers have the right tools and support, the best thing to do is to get out for the way, he said. Staying out of the way doesnt mean more change isnt coming, however. The stores are still adding new fixtures and are beginning to get ready for the fall by adding such things as new cash wraps. This spring, Elliott bought the stationery and gift retailer Paper Source and put Daunt in charge. Daunt said he will use B&Ns stable mate to create better, though not necessarily bigger, stationery sections. At the other end of the spectrum, Daunt remains committed to B&Ns Nook business; earlier this year B&N introduced a new Nook tablet in partnership with Lenovo, and he expects sales for the device to build. B&N has opened six new stores since Daunt took over, and he said he expects to open eight more over the next month. B&N will also continue to close underperforming outlets, and Daunt expects to finish the year with about the same number of locationsabout 625 storesas B&N had at the start of the year. (Sometimes staying even is moving ahead, he said.) In 2022, however, Daunt hopes to open new stores in decent numbers and to have a net gain in outlets. We make good tenants for landlords, he said. Daunt is among those industry members who believe interest in reading will remain high even as other activities that had been closed reopen. He looked back on how excitement over the Harry Potter books created new book audiences and said while some new readers may drop off, the majority will remain. He noted that the most enthusiastic, and loyal, shoppers at B&Ns physical stores have been teens and young adults and that the energy they bring to the stores is fantastic. Given the number of positive trends and what Daunt called the stellar lists from publishers, including literary authors that B&N is well positioned to sell, Daunt is looking for a good close to 2021. Viking Books, a division of Penguin Random House, delivered a shock to booksellers on Wednesday by raising the price for one of the most anticipated books of the coming holiday season. In an August 25 e-mail, the publisher informed booksellers that the forthcoming Amanda Gorman poetry collection, Call Us What We Carry, would go up in price by $5 per book, from $19.99 to $24.99. The book will also have an expanded page count of 240 pages (previously 120 pages)great news for all of us who love Amanda's work, the e-mail read. PRH later confirmed that the book will actually be three times the anticipated length, but excitement quickly faded, with booksellers expressing concerns about recouping the price difference on existing pre-orders. The outcry prompted PRH to announce that they will honor the original price for all customers who pre-ordered the book prior to the price change, which was effective on August 25, 2021, according to a PRH spokesperson. The statement applies to all PRH customers who take pre-orders. Gormans propulsive inaugural poem catapulted her to the fore of American poetry and Viking Books quickly inked a three-book deal with the author in January. The deal included publication of a standalone commemorative edition of the inaugural poem, which was release in March, along with a forthcoming childrens picture book, and Call Us What We Carry. At Quail Ridge Books in Raleigh, N.C., the announcement of the book deal was accompanied by a push to take pre-orders, encouraged by PRH, which was eager to capture the momentum of the inauguration. The store ultimately took 300 pre-orders. The initial price change announcement would have meant that the bookstore would be on the hook for thousands of dollars in losses, with no way to recoup them from customers or the publisher. Jason Jeffries, Quail Ridge general manager, was one of numerous booksellers who reached out to PRH yesterday and he said he was relieved to get a phone call this morning, informing him of the new terms. Were very happy with PRHs solution in that it was very fast, Jeffries told PW. The rollout of the title has had its twists and turns. In a July 27 press release, Viking did a cover reveal for the collection and pushed back the release date of the book from September to December 7. The publisher also changed the title from The Hill We Climb and Other Poems to its current title, Call Us What We Carry. At the time, the price was still listed as $19.99. But it was the price hike that threatened to cause industry-wide disruptions. In most instances, customers pre-order books from indies within a few months of a books release. A bookstore can then securely store the customers credit card data. When the book arrives, the customer is charged. But in the case of Call Us What We Carry, stores processed the transactions immediately last winter because credit card processors do not allow them to hold onto credit card data for extended periods of time. On social media, many booksellers expressed outraged at the price hike. In a BookTok, Tubby & Coos Mid-City Bookshop owner Candice Huber said, Penguin Random House is expecting indie bookstores like minetiny indie bookstoresthat do not have anywhere near as much money at Penguin Random House to either eat the cost of five dollars per book, which may not sound like a lot, but it isit adds upor to pass that cost along to our customers who paid for these books back in January [or] FebruaryIf you can buy Simon and Schuster, you can eat five dollars per book. At Quail Ridge, Jeffries supported booksellers outreach to PRH, but was more measured, noting that artists in other media like music often make changes to their work up to, and even after, the initial release. While print books add to the challenge of making similar changes, he said he shared the publisher's excitement. Amanda Gorman is an important young voice in this country and you want her to release the product that shes happy with and proud of, Jeffries said, adding that the publishers quick resolution of the issue was welcome. PRH noted that they are currently reaching out to booksellers to discuss the process and logistics for honoring these pre-paid pre-orders. We value our bookselling partners and look forward to launching this rich and timeless collection with them, which explores themes of identity, grief and memory. A repurposed cancer drug has been shown to be 100% effective in treating malaria in a Phase 2 clinical trial. Purdue University professor Philip Low led the international team that made the discovery. (Purdue University photo/John Underwood) WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. A cancer drug repurposed to treat malaria has been shown to be nearly 100% effective in helping defeat the disease in just three days, according to the results of a Phase 2 clinical trial. The results of the trial were published Thursday (Aug. 26) in the Journal of Experimental Medicine. The trial shows that the addition of the drug Imatinib to the customary malaria therapy enables clearance of all malaria parasites from 90% of patients within 48 hours and from 100% of patients within three days, says Philip Low, Purdue Universitys Presidential Scholar for Drug Discovery and the Ralph C. Corley Distinguished Professor of Chemistry, who co-directed the international research team. The patients receiving Imatinib also were relieved of their fevers in less than half of the time experienced by similar patients treated with the standard therapy. In our trial, 33% of the patients treated with the standard therapy (but without the Imatinib supplement) still suffered from significant parasitemia after three days, said Low (rhymes with now). Delayed clearance rates are a precursor to and an indicator of potential drug resistance, which has been a problem with malaria for decades. So, this could be significant. Imatinib was originally produced by Novartis for the treatment of chronic myelogenous leukemia and other cancers. It works by blocking specific enzymes involved in the growth of cancers. When we discovered the ability of Imatinib to block parasite propagation in human blood cultures in petri dishes, we initiated a human clinical trial where we combined Imatinib with the standard treatment (piperaquine plus dihydroartemisinin) used to treat malaria in much of the world, Low said. The Phase 2 clinical trial that is described in the paper in Journal of Experimental Medicine compares the standard treatment with Imatinib plus the standard treatment. We did not test Imatinib alone, because it would have been unethical to treat patients suffering from a potentially lethal disease with an untested therapy. Malaria infects human red blood cells, where it reproduces and eventually activates a red blood cell enzyme that, in turn, triggers rupture of the cell and release of a form of the parasite called a merozoite into the bloodstream. Low and his colleagues theorized that by blocking the critical red blood cell enzyme, they could stop the infection. The data from the drug trial confirms that. Low said for the past 50 years, malaria treatments have used drugs that target the parasite itself, but the microorganism eventually developed resistance to the drugs. Because were targeting an enzyme that belongs to the red blood cell, the parasite cant mutate to develop resistance it simply cant mutate proteins in our blood cells, Low said. This is a novel approach that will hopefully become a therapy that cant be evaded by the parasite in the future. This would constitute an important contribution to human health. Malaria is caused by a single-cell parasite, Plasmodium, which is carried by mosquitoes. The World Health Organization estimates that the disease caused 409,000 deaths in 2019 (the most recent year for which data is available). The WHO also notes that 67% of those deaths were in children under 5 years old. The deadliest form of the parasite is P. falciparum, and although most malaria deaths occur in sub-Saharan Africa, a variant of P. falciparum that is developing drug resistance has become established in a corner of Southeast Asia, particularly in Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and Vietnam. In some regions of the area, up to 80% of malaria parasites are at least partially drug resistant. In 2019, professor Olivo Miotto from the Wellcome Sanger Institute of the University of Oxford, told the BBC the rise of the drug-resistant variant in Southeast Asia raises the terrifying prospect of the drug-resistant variety traveling to Africa. A similar event occurred in the 1980s with malaria resistant to the then-standard treatment of chloroquine, which resulted in millions of deaths. Low and his colleagues tested Imatinib in a hot zone of drug-resistant malaria on the border of Vietnam and Laos, in the Quang Tri Province of Vietnam. Its such a remote region of the country that most of the clinics are one- or two-room cinder block buildings with just six or seven cots where people can come in and get treated, Low said. Not only was the drug 100% effective after three days, but the patients saw their fever disappear on the first day, and they felt much better sooner. Although malaria is not a significant disease in North America, Low is planning to apply for approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The FDA is so widely respected around the world that if they approve it, almost all other nations, especially developing countries that suffer from malaria, will rapidly adopt it, he said. The FDA requirements for Phase 3 approval are very rigorous. You have to demonstrate the drug combinations efficacy and safety in a large patient population and then show that you can manufacture and store it safely and reproducibly. You also have to start from scratch and end up with a product that is more than 99% pure. An international priority patent application has been filed in Vietnam by Purdue Research Foundation, VinUniversity in Vietnam, University of Sassari in Italy and Italian company NUREX SRL. Low said he has been in discussions with drug manufacturers in India and Vietnam to produce the drug and estimates that can be done for roughly $1 per pill. Well turn over the technology to any company committed to distributing it to developing malaria-infested areas, he said. Im not interested in making a penny off of this. I just think its important for humanity to have it. About Purdue University Purdue University is a top public research institution developing practical solutions to todays toughest challenges. Ranked the No. 5 Most Innovative University in the United States by U.S. News & World Report, Purdue delivers world-changing research and out-of-this-world discovery. Committed to hands-on and online, real-world learning, Purdue offers a transformative education to all. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue has frozen tuition and most fees at 2012-13 levels, enabling more students than ever to graduate debt-free. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap at https://purdue.edu/. Writer, Media contact: Steve Tally, steve@purdue.edu, @sciencewriter Source: Philip Low, plow@purdue.edu ABSTRACT Imatinib Augments Standard Malaria Combination Therapy Without Added Toxicity Huynh Dinh Chien, Ph.D.1, Antonella Pantaleo, Ph.D.2, Kristina R. Kesely, Ph.D.3, Panae Noomuna, MSc3, Karson S. Putt, Ph.D.4, Tran Anh Tuan, Ph.D.5, Philip S. Low, Ph.D.3-4,*, and Francesco M. Turrini, Ph.D.6. 1 College of Health Science, Vin University, Hanoi, Vietnam 2 Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Sassari, Sassari, Italy 3 Department of Chemistry, Purdue University, West Lafayette IN 47907 USA 4 Institute for Drug Discovery, Purdue University, West Lafayette IN 47907 USA 5 Huong Hoa District Health Center, Quang Tri, Vietnam 6 Department of Oncology, University of Turin, Turin, Italy DOI: 10.1084/jem.20210724 To egress from its erythrocyte host, the malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum, must destabilize the erythrocyte membrane by activating an erythrocyte tyrosine kinase. Because imatinib inhibits erythrocyte tyrosine kinases and since imatinib has a good safety profile, we elected to determine whether co-administration of imatinib with standard-of-care (SOC) might be both well-tolerated and therapeutically efficacious in malaria patients. Patients with uncomplicated P. falciparum malaria from a region in Vietnam where 1/3 of patients experience delayed parasite clearance (DPC; continued parasitemia following 3 days of therapy) were treated for 3 days with either the regions SOC (40mg dihydroartemisinin+320mg piperaquine/day) or imatinib (400mg/day) + SOC. Imatinib+SOC-treated participants exhibited no increase in number or severity of adverse events, a significantly accelerated decline in parasite density and pyrexia, and no DPC. Surprisingly, these improvements were most pronounced in patients with the highest parasite density, where serious complications and death are most frequent. Imatinib therefore appears to improve SOC therapy with no obvious drug-related toxicities. Manufacturing is a major facet of Indianas economy. But a Purdue University research study discovered in-state manufacturers are a step behind other parts of the nation in the transition to becoming data driven and using tools like artificial intelligence. (Stock photo) WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. A quarter of Indianas economic output is based in manufacturing, and the transition to becoming data-driven and using artificial intelligence holds the possibility for broad economic impact among manufacturers, who, at this point, are missing a golden opportunity and lagging behind national trends. That is a finding of a Purdue University study, which also found that those not using the advanced technology are not against the idea. Around 36% of manufacturers responding to the studys survey said they are interested in learning more. Theyre sitting on a very valuable asset that they have to convert into information, said Ragu Athinarayanan, principal investigator of the study and a professor of engineering technology. They just dont know where and how to start and what is necessary to start. Athinarayanan said one of the biggest challenges to adopting this technology in manufacturing is trying to create the platform to collect and use the data. The study, Artificial Intelligence, Manufacturing, and Workforce Development in Indiana, was conducted by Roberto Gallardo, director of the Purdue Center for Regional Development, and Athinarayanan. It was funded by Microsoft. Purdues research was prompted by a 2019 national study that found 87% of U.S. manufacturers surveyed said they have adopted or planned to adopt artificial intelligence as part of their operations within two years. With the studys results, Gallardo said, Indiana needs to ramp up efforts on a number of fronts to take advantage of the interest Indiana manufacturers have in adopting artificial intelligence. Number one is awareness where can manufacturers start and what can they do, Gallardo said. Theres a lot of education and awareness to be done around the topic, which is still a little abstract especially for smaller businesses. We also need supportive systems, from higher education to workforce development and policy, to nurture these businesses as they navigate in the AI on-ramp. The study also recommended training the current and future workforce in using artificial intelligence and expanding AI-related data availability to include rural areas. Athinarayanan said the study information offers anecdotal insight to Indianas future opportunities for artificial intelligence in manufacturing. For the study, more than 500 emails with surveys were sent out to Indiana manufacturers, most with fewer than 100 employees. Survey responses were hindered by the outbreak of COVID-19 around the same time. About Purdue University Purdue University is a top public research institution developing practical solutions to todays toughest challenges. Ranked the No. 5 Most Innovative University in the United States by U.S. News & World Report, Purdue delivers world-changing research and out-of-this-world discovery. Committed to hands-on and online, real-world learning, Purdue offers a transformative education to all. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue has frozen tuition and most fees at 2012-13 levels, enabling more students than ever to graduate debt-free. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap at https://purdue.edu/. Writer, Media contact: Brian Huchel, 765-494-2084, bhuchel@purdue.edu Sources: Roberto Gallardo, robertog@purdue.edu Ragu Athinarayanan, rathinar@purdue.edu If you're interested in submitting a Letter to the Editor, click here. Submit New York City, NY (11385) Today Windy with thunderstorms, some heavy this evening, then periods of rain late. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low 63F. SSE winds shifting to N at 20 to 30 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected.. Tonight Windy with thunderstorms, some heavy this evening, then periods of rain late. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low 63F. SSE winds shifting to N at 20 to 30 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Rep. Mike Waltz, a colonel in the National Guard and a decorated Green Beret, is frustrated with what he describes as the State Departments risk aversion, which he blames for preventing the military from quickly locating and rescuing all Americans still stranded in Afghanistan. With the evacuation window beginning to close, the Florida Republican is urging the Biden administration to take bolder action to track down and extract Americans and Afghan allies who have worked for or assisted the United States. Waltz (pictured) wants to see more rescue missions even if it means sending U.S. special operators into the interior of the country, far from the Kabul airport where 5,800 American troops are anchored to help with the airlifts. Some of those extractions, using helicopters and Central Intelligence Agency personnel and U.S. ground troops, are taking place on a limited basis. But Waltz, an Afghanistan War veteran, and other like-minded members of Congress are pushing the administration to authorize far more such missions with the clock ticking on the Aug. 31 deadline for U.S. withdrawal. President Biden has said he wants to keep the deadline because he believes the risk of a terrorist attacks will increase the longer the U.S. military remains present even as G-7 allies have pleaded for more time to get their people out. The sooner we finish, the better, Biden said Tuesday. Each day of operations brings added risk to our troops. Pressed by a reporter on Wednesday on what he would do if Americans are still trapped in Afghanistan after the deadline, Biden tried to make a joke. Youll be the first person I call, the president said with a laugh. During a briefing by Pentagon officials to members of Congress on Tuesday, Waltz said it was clear that the U.S. military has the ability, the technology and the resources to conduct the rescue missions, but top officials arent authorizing enough of them. They have the assets in place, Waltz told RealClearPolitics. This is risk aversion about upsetting this detente situation with the Taliban. Frustration among Waltz and other veterans about the slow-walking of evacuations has grown as they have watched British and German special forces carry out rescue missions in Kabul and elsewhere to get their citizens out of Afghanistan. The U.S. military has even provided Little Bird helicopters designed for surgical strikes to help German commandos evacuate their citizens from Kabul. The U.S. government says it has evacuated more than 95,000 people as of Wednesday, including at least 4,500 Americans, while communicating with 500 more on efforts to airlift them out. That leaves less than 1,000 Americans who have said they want to leave still stranded in the country, although it does not account for Americans who may be struggling to get in touch with the State Department. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan earlier this week stressed that the department has sent out numerous emails and texts to U.S. citizens known to be in the country, trying to coordinate a safe passage to the airport, Waltz noted. Well, congratulations, but at the end of the day we should have had a much clearer picture of what Americans we had where, what their locations were, what their intentions were, he said. The State Department issued an alert early Wednesday telling Americans and Afghans trying to leave that the U.S. Government cannot ensure safe passage to the airport, and instructing them to wait for email updates rather than calling the U.S. Embassy for the latest guidance because the situation in Kabul continues to change quickly. As the U.S. and other Western troops rushed to evacuate as many foreign nationals and Afghans as possible, the U.S., British and Australian governments have urged crowds trying to access the Kabul airport to leave that area, warning of a high threat of a terrorist attack. Waltz said there should have been a number of safe zones set up for Americans to gather for coordinated airlifts with an agreement from the Taliban not to impede or threaten the departure in any way. We need to be telling them about consequences [for them], not getting dictated to, Waltz remarked. One widely used, U.S. military-developed technology that could have made locating and rescuing Americans far easier was rejected for use in Afghanistan just days ago, according to several defense industry sources, although its unclear if the military and CIA have started using it in the limited extraction missions they are now conducting. The U.S. government went more than a week without using the precision-mapping technology, even though numerous federal and state agencies have used it to rescue more than 2,000 people during seven hurricanes since 2017, including Harvey, Irma and Florence, sources told RCP. It also has been used by state fire-fighting agencies to help federal and local law enforcement agencies coordinate security for big global events such as United Nations General Assembly meetings and the 2020 Super Bowl. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday described the struggle to locate and connect with Americans who want to leave Afghanistan but cannot safely get to the airport. He estimated that there may be as many as 1,500 of them and stressed that the U.S. government is aggressively reaching out or working to make contact. Part of the difficulty, Blinken said, is that the U.S. government does not track Americans movements when they travel around the world, and some do not register with the embassy when arrive in Afghanistan or do not de-register when they leave. But once the State Department is in touch with those in country, the military and numerous other government agencies have mapping technology that can easily pinpoint Americans and Afghans who either have SIV (Special Immigrant Visa) status or have applied for it, as well as their families. Despite the capability, Biden administration officials earlier this week rejected a proposal to use it, the sources told RCP, attributing the move to an interagency decision involving the State Department and the Special Operations Command Central. A Pentagon spokesman referred a question about the decision to the State Department, which declined to comment on internal discussions about specific tools or operations due to security and privacy considerations. We are continuing to contact the Americans who have registered with Embassy Kabul to determine whether or not they are still in Afghanistan, and to help them evacuate if they want to leave, a State Department spokesperson told RCP. We are executing plans on the ground to move Americans and their immediate family members to safety and into the airport compound. Meanwhile, a loose, private group of military veterans, defense contractors, members of the intelligence community, human rights advocates, Capitol Hill aides and even former chiefs of staff to Cabinet secretaries are using the encrypted Signal cellphone application to organize chaotic evacuation efforts for Afghans and Americans alike, Politico reported Thursday in a first-hand piece about the frenzied efforts. Republicans and several Democrats have repeatedly slammed the Biden administration for declining to extend the Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline to guarantee the safe evacuations of all Americans and people who have applied for an SIV. That program is intended to provide a pathway to the United States for Afghans who were employed by or worked on behalf of the U.S. government in some capacity. The Biden administration is not lacking the resources, theyre lacking the will to get our people out, Rep. Jim Banks, a Navy reservist who deployed to Afghanistan in in 2014 to 2015, told RCP. All our resources and energy should be focused on getting Americans home safely. Waltz agrees and blames the White House decision to put the State Department, instead of the military, in charge of evacuation efforts. Part of the overall problem right now, fundamentally, is that State is in the lead and not DoD on this, he said. In June, Democrats failed to sell the federal takeover of state elections known as H.R. 1/S. 1 to the American people. The bill was a laundry list of left-wing fantasies, including using taxpayer dollars to fund political candidates, undermine widely supported voter ID requirements, and totally destroy the authority of states to run their own elections. Americans saw the bill for what it was a Democrat power grab and it failed. Now, Democrats are coming back to the table with new legislation called H.R. 4. Theyre dishonestly calling it a compromise. Dont fall for their partisan lies: H.R. 4 has the same rotten core as H.R. 1 and would make our elections far less secure. H.R. 4s goal is to eviscerate the right of states to manage their own elections with appropriate transparency and ballot-security safeguards. It will attempt to misuse the 1965 Voting Rights Act to achieve this goal. Preclearance is central to H.R. 4 this plank of the law would require every state election official to submit any election law changes to the Department of Justice for approval. In short, Democrats want states to ask Washington, D.C., for permission to pass local laws that would, for example, require voter ID a policy that polls consistently find roughly 80% of Americans in support. Joe Biden and Democrats want their politicized Department of Justice to control how states manage their own elections. This is the same Department of Justice that recently sued the State of Georgia over its new election integrity laws. The RNC intervened to protect Georgia in that lawsuit, and we expect another win there for Republicans on the heels of our recent victory in Brnovich v. DNC, which banned ballot trafficking in Arizona. This Department of Justice is currently trying to strong-arm states into making their elections less secure and transparent, and Joe Biden wants to expand its mandate to control every aspect of state-level elections. That is big-government totalitarianism at its very worst. It bears mentioning that the Supreme Court found old preclearance formulas to be unconstitutional in the 2013 Shelby County v. Holder case. Preclearances subjugation of state law to Washington overreach undermines the rights of states to develop and apply best voting practices informed by local knowledge. Democrats are trying to revive an outdated, unconstitutional provision from the 1960s in their stop-at-nothing efforts to undermine election integrity. H.R. 4 contains other provisions that should concern every American who wants elections to be free, fair, and transparent. The bill takes aim at efforts to clean up voter rolls, attempting to handcuff local officials who attempt to keep their voter lists up-to-date and accurate. For example, the bill would prohibit states from participating in an inter-state accountability process to ensure accurate lists. The bill would also force federal courts to take inaccurate census data and subject every existing strict voter ID requirement to Department of Justice review. This is not what the American people want. Polling shows that Americans including a majority of Democrats and minority voters support voter ID. Polling also shows that 68% of voters believe that state legislatures should decide the voting rules and regulations for their state, not the federal government. That number alone should invalidate Democrat attempts to strip all local authority from state-level election officials. Democrats are upset that states like Georgia, Florida, Arizona, and Iowa have taken the initiative and passed strong election integrity laws. They cant bear the thought that states might act without input from D.C. bureaucrats. That concept is antithetical to their power-grab mentality, and so they want to suppress state-run elections. Democrats failed to pass H.R. 1, and H.R. 4 will meet a similar fate. H.R. 4 is totally out of line with public opinion and an extreme power grab that Americans will reject. As Democrat lies and schemes continue to fail, Republicans will continue to ensure the security and transparency of our elections. The man who was photographed as the naked baby swimming on the cover of Nirvana's Nevermind album filed a lawsuit alleging he was the victim of child pornography. In the complaint filed Tuesday, Spencer Elden, 30, states that the image on the 1991 album -- which features him as an infant swimming underwater with his penis exposed as he reaches for a dollar bill -- portrays him "like a sex worker" and has caused him "lifelong damages." The suit seeks $150,000 from each defendant including photographer Kirk Weddle, surviving Nirvana members Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, as well as Courtney Love, the executor of the estate of the band's late frontman Kurt Cobain, alleging they "knowingly produced, possessed and advertised commercial child pornography." Original Nirvana drummer Chad Channing is also named as a defendant despite being replaced by Grohl in 1990 before the album was recorded and the cover photography was shot. It further names several existing and defunct record companies that have released or distributed the album in the proceeding decades. The suit specifically accuses Weddle of producing "sexually graphic images" of Elden "with the goal of enhancing and increasing the commercial success" of the band and the album. "Weddle took a series of sexually graphic nude photographs of Spencer," the suit states. "To ensure the album cover would trigger a visceral sexual response from the viewer, Weddle activated Spencer's 'gag reflex' before throwing him underwater in poses highlighting and emphasizing Spencer's exposed genitals." Cobain agreed to release the album with a sticker covering Elden's genitals following pushback at the time of the release but the lawsuit states it was "never incorporated into the album cover." The lawsuit continues to allege that the three decades in which the image has persisted as one of the most iconic images in rock music have caused Elden "permanent harm" including "extreme and permanent emotional distress with physical manifestations, interference with his normal development and educational progress, lifelong loss of income earning capacity, loss of past and future wages, past and future expenses for medical and psychological treatment, loss of enjoyment of life and other losses." FOLLOW REALITY TV WORLD ON THE ALL-NEW GOOGLE NEWS! Reality TV World is now available on the all-new Google News app and website. Click here to visit our Google News page, and then click FOLLOW to add us as a news source! Neither Elden nor his guardians signed a release authorizing the use of the image, the suit states. In 2008, Elden's father, Rick, told NPR that Weddle called him to offer him $200 to "throw your kid in the drink" adding he arrived at "a big party at the pool" at the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center where "no one had any idea what was going on!" Elden has recreated the pose as a teenager and adult to celebrate the 10th,17th, 20th and 25th anniversaries of the album's release. He has worn swim trunks in the subsequent photos but told the New York Post he requested to take the photo nude during the most recent recreation in 2016, but the photographer declined. Elden's comments regarding the photo throughout the years have been mixed with him saying in 2007 that it feels "kind of creepy that many people have seen me naked" and that he is often asked to attend events as the "Nirvana baby." By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 08/25/2021 ADVERTISEMENT FOLLOW REALITY TV WORLD ON THE ALL-NEW GOOGLE NEWS! Reality TV World is now available on the all-new Google News app and website. Click here to visit our Google News page, and then click FOLLOW to add us as a news source! Which couples are still together and which MAFS couples have broken up and divorced? And where are they now? has followed 44 different couples getting married at first sight during it's first twelve seasons -- so which couples are still together, who has broken up and divorced, and where are they all now?Each season of -- which debuted in the United States seven years ago and is based on a Danish series -- features couples (previously three couples, but four couples on Seasons 8 and 9, and five couples beginning with Season 10) being matched together by relationship experts and agree to marry when they first meet.Complete strangers become husband and wife in a matter of minutes, and the couples' lives are then documented by TV cameras over the course of the next four to eight weeks (eight weeks, in the case of 's most recent seasons).The couples typically enjoy their first night together in a hotel after exchanging vows -- with some couples deciding to consummate their marriage immediately -- and then embark on a honeymoon, move in together, and simply attempt to deal with the struggles of daily life as man and wife.At the end of the extreme marriage experiment, each couple must decide whether they'd like to stay married or get a divorce on "Decision Day."has experienced very mixed results over the years. While a significant number of couples decide to stay together and continue their new marriage at the end of their season, the real world seems to hit them hard after the cameras leave, resulting in the couple splitting up only months later.Do cast members see a different side of their spouses once cameras are gone, or do the romances naturally fizzle over time?Some couples are still together to this day and are extremely happy. Jamie Otis and Doug Hehner from Season 1, for example, have had two children.Several other couples have also had children -- including Ashley Petta and Anthony D'Amico Shawniece Jackson and Jephte Pierre Danielle Bergman and Bobby Dodd , and Deonna McNeill and Greg Okotie However, there are also relationships that ended badly. Jessica Castro from Season 2, for instance, accused Ryan De Nino of alleged death threats, and she went on to file a restraining order and lawsuit against him.Some couples have also never even made it to "Decision Day" and ended their marriage prematurely, including Season 4 couple Heather Seidel and Derek Schwartz as well as Season 6 couple Molly Duff and Jonathan Francetic Are the remaining couples now lovers, friends or enemies?! What about early season couples like Cortney Hendrix and Jason Carrion, Jaclyn Methuen and Ryan Ranellone, Vanessa Nelson and Tres Russell, Sonia Granados and Nick Pendergrast, and Lillian Vilchez and Tom Wilson?And how about more recent season couples like Danielle DeGroot and Cody Knapek Sheila Downs and Nate Duhon Jaclyn Schwartzberg and Ryan Buckley Dave Flaherty and Amber Martorana , and Tristan Thompson and Mia Bally Keith Dewar and Kristine Killingsworth , and AJ Vollmoeller and Stephanie Sersen Click thelink below to see photos of each couple and find out! BEGIN GALLERY >> Elizabeth Kwiatkowski is Associate Editor of Reality TV World and has been covering the reality TV genre for more than a decade. HARRISON TOWNSHIP The weather radar said the storms were going to go north of us, but none of us Steve Van Assche, my brother Phil and you BELLAIRE A hearing is scheduled in an Antrim County election-related lawsuit in which Michigans Secretary of State intervened, despite a judges earlier decision dismissing the case. A local man, Bill Bailey, filed suit Nov. 23, accusing the county of voter fraud and of violating his constitutional rights, after initial results of the 2020 Presidential election showed about 2,000 votes cast for then-President Donald Trump had mistakenly been assigned to then-challenger Joe Biden. 2020 local election coverage The Record-Eagle's coverage of 2020 local elections and related issues: Antrim County Clerk Sheryl Guy acknowledged her offices human error, an assertion backed by the states Senate Oversight Committee, which in June released a 55-page report rejecting claims of widespread election fraud in Antrim County and in Michigan. Bailey had also accused the county of diluting his vote, after a marijuana proposal, allowing a single dispensary in the Village of Central Lake, passed by a single vote. Records show Bailey is registered to vote in Central Lake Township, and only voters registered in the Village of Central Lake received ballots which included the marijuana proposal. Bailey represented by Matthew DePerno of Portage accused Antrim County of using what he called intentionally compromised Dominion voting equipment, that deliberately switched votes from Republican to Democratic candidates during the 2020 election. These claims have been repeatedly debunked by Dominion CEO John Poulos, and by national, state and county election officials including Chris Krebs, the former chief of the Department of Homeland Securitys Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Ryan Macias, former acting director of U.S. Election Assistance Commission Voting Testing and Certification Program and Alex Halderman, a professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Michigan. Trump political operatives, including attorneys Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, and Trump supporter, MyPillow Chief Executive Officer Mike Lindell, made similar accusations during national media appearances and have all since been sued by Dominion for defamation. DePerno previously received a cease and desist letter from Dominion, records show. More than three months have passed since 13th Circuit Court Judge Kevin Elsenheimer dismissed Baileys lawsuit, granting a motion for summary disposition filed April 9 by attorneys with Antrim County and the states Attorney Generals office. Throughout the U.S., hundreds of lawsuits challenging balloting issues, election equipment or the results of the 2020 election have been filed in local, state and federal courts, information from the American Bar Association shows. At the time of its dismissal, the case in Antrim County was among the few yet to be adjudicated, records show. Elsenheimer granted the motion for summary disposition May 18 and directed attorneys for the plaintiff and the defendant to submit various orders to the court to later be signed by the judge. Objections and further hearings ensued in July and earlier this month DePerno filed an objection to court documents submitted by attorneys representing Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson. Elsenheimer is scheduled to hear arguments on the objection Sept. 13, at a hearing that will take place in person at the Antrim County Courthouse beginning at 11:45 a.m. DePerno filed appeals with the Michigan Court of Appeals in mid-July and shortly thereafter announced in a statement on Twitter his candidacy for state AG. DePerno is running as a Republican, information on the states campaign finance website shows. Benson said the election in Michigan was fair and accurate, claims to the contrary are baseless and that in a more sane political environment, Guys admitted human error would not have been used to try to falsely cast doubt on the results. I think any judge who looks at this case will see the truth, Benson said, during a recent stop in Traverse City, to visit the Barlow Street branch office of the Secretary of State. After we get out of this moment, and this challenge to our democracy, there has to be real accountability for those who seek to misuse this moment to further their own gain. Earlier this month a federal judge sanctioned two lawyers Gary D. Fielder and Ernest John Walker who filed a class action lawsuit in Colorado claiming voter fraud, and now must pay attorney fees for Dominion and others, records show. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel and Benson responded to the sanctions in a press release, where they expressed support for the order issued by U.S. Magistrate Judge N. Reid Neureiter. These lawyers acted in bad faith seeking to overturn a fair and valid election, Whitmer said, calling the decision on sanctions an important step toward accountability. In July, Judge Linda Parker of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, presided over a six-hour hearing, seeking to determine whether Powell, attorney Lin Wood of Atlanta and others allied with Trump should face sanctions for an election-related lawsuit they filed in Michigan. Parker previously called claims made in affidavits submitted fantastical and on Wednesday she signed an opinion and order, sanctioning a laundry list of attorneys from several states, including Michigan, New York, Georgia and Texas. Olivia is a junior journalism major at the University of Georgia. Her love for writing and sharing stories from the community led her to The Red & Black. She loves being able to highlight the people who make up the Athens community. Follow OLIVIA WAKIM Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today Although the pandemic forced us to isolate ourselves in our homes, we would have been far worse off without technology. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp visited the University of Georgia Wednesday evening, discussing the pandemic, state election integrity and national issues to a group of around 100 attendees, hosted by the UGA College Republicans. The event was initially supposed to be held in room 253 of the Miller Learning Center but was moved to a larger room just before the event began. Kemp was introduced by Alex Huskey, chairman of the College Republicans. After thanking the group for supporting him, Kemp reflected on the challenges Georgians have faced over the last year with COVID-19 but also defended fully reopening the state. Kemp issued a shelter-in-place mandate in early April 2020, but also began reopening certain establishments less than a month later. Weve been very resilient as a people in a lot of ways, fighting COVID, but also reopening our economy, when many around the country were heckling us and calling it a death experiment, Kemp said. Wednesday was also the same day that Georgia recorded one of its highest daily COVID-19 case counts to date, with the Georgia Department of Public Health reporting 10,937 new cases. The single-highest case count occurred on Jan. 8, with 12,845 new cases. Thats kind of surprising. I didnt think that when I looked at the numbers, Kemp said when informed of Wednesdays case count. Kemp said he has been consulting with other members of the state government, such as Adjutant General Thomas Carden and DPH Commissioner Kathleen Toomey, to determine how the state can do more to fight the disease. Tuesday, Kemp sent 105 National Guard members with medical training to hospitals around the state to assist health care workers as the pandemic overwhelms them. Georgia currently has 90.4% of its available ICU beds in use, according to the Georgia Geospatial Information Office. Hospitals in Athens-Clarke and surrounding counties are using 98.7% of their beds. Kemp said he would encourage listeners to talk to their doctors, pharmacists and faith leaders to make a decision about receiving a COVID-19 vaccine but vowed that he would not implement a vaccine or mask mandate in the state. When discussing election security, Kemp touted the Election Integrity Act of 2021, which he said makes it easy to vote but hard to cheat in Georgia. We had a lot of things that happened mechanically in the election that we needed to address, Kemp said. We had a lot of people that had lost confidence in the election process last year ... so it was time for us to put all these things to bed ... and thats what we did. Kemp signed the bill on March 25, despite backlash from many Democrats who opposed the measure, saying it would lead to voter suppression primarily against minority voters. When an audience member asked Kemp if he believed that President Joe Biden won a fair and honest election, Kemp replied, I believe Joe Biden is the president of the United States. The election got certified. Theres nothing anybody can do about that. He encouraged the College Republicans to begin working to register new voters for the upcoming gubernatorial and midterm elections. He said all Republicans can unite around pushing back against the Biden administration. Kemp also discussed issues at the U.S. border with Mexico and his opinions on the Biden administrations withdrawal of the U.S. military from Afghanistan. The people that we are hanging out to dry people that have saved American and Georgia soldiers lives those last few years those are the kind of people we need to protect, Kemp said. He supported allowing Afghan refugees into the U.S. with a proper vetting process in place to protect them from potential retribution for helping U.S. soldiers during the war. A protester was removed early on during Kemps talk after interrupting him, but many of the events attendees agreed with Kemps major points. I like that hes pro-life and that hes giving people the choice to mask up or get the shot, said sophomore UGA student Allison Fletcher. If they want to mask up, that's great. If they want to get the shots, great, but hes not going to enforce anything, and hes helping everyone keep a normal school year. Kenansville, NC (28349) Today Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 67F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 67F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Greenville, NC (27833) Today Scattered thunderstorms. Low 67F. SW winds shifting to NW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms. Low 67F. SW winds shifting to NW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%. Brattleboro, VT (05301) Today Cloudy with periods of rain. Low 58F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Cloudy with periods of rain. Low 58F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Brattleboro, VT (05301) Today Rain. Low 57F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Rain. Low 57F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. To the editor: I write this as all of us have experienced multiple days of poor air quality due to large sections of the forests of the West and Canada burning out of control. Everyday, it seems, there is another story of devastating floods around the world with horrific loss of life and property. Ask anyone locally, especially the ever-hard-working road crews, how often they have to deal with the greater amount and intensity of rain falls in our region that destroy infrastructure. Right after the Reformer published the latest head-in-the sand climate denial screed from John McClaughry ("Is climate science settled? Absolutely not," July 28) and the fossil-fuel-industry funded Ethan Allen Institute, I read that a glacier from Greenland melted with enough water to cover all of Florida with 2 inches of water. We were lucky to not have another Irene in the recent pass of Henri. John McClaughry: Is climate science settled? Absolutely not. Anyone with an interest in climate science, and especially anyone interested in what happens I could go on, but anyone with a functioning brain and a conscience knows that human-caused climate change is not only a settled scientific fact but is not some future catastrophe waiting to happen. We experience daily that it is here now and it is at best inconvenient for many and deadly for some. So, do we have to keep doing this? I mean, writing corrective letters to the editor to counter propaganda and disinformation from a source that long since should have taken its discredited ideology and its blind and destructive myopia back to the Stone Age where it belongs? To that end, let's stop pretending that McClaughry's is a valid or truthful perspective and worthy of airing in the democratic domain of public space. His and Ethan Allen's agenda is not in the public interest. Please think again before besmirching your pages with paid content from the climate change denial industry. Bill Conley, Dummerston Beckley, WV (25801) Today Showers early with some clearing overnight. Low near 55F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 60%.. Tonight Showers early with some clearing overnight. Low near 55F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 60%. The state recorded eight additional COVID-19 deaths among those vaccinated as new breakthrough cases appear to have leveled off compared to recent weeks, figures released Thursday show. In total, 7,121 fully vaccinated residents have tested positive for COVID-19 since February, an increase of 1,264 cases since last week report. This increase mirrors what has been seen in recent weeks in August, state data shows. Of the reported breakthrough cases since February, 53 of those individuals have died, a majority of which were over the age of 75, according to a weekly report on breakthrough cases from the state. Though older residents, even those who have been fully vaccinated, are dying more often from COVID-19 infections, younger vaccinated residents are more often testing positive. More than 3,400 of the 7,121 breakthrough infections are among people aged between 35 and 64, the state report shows. An additional 1,100 people who suffered from breakthrough infections are between 25 and 34. Despite the rise in breakthrough cases, the state said COVID-19 vaccines do offer protection against the coronavirus. The 53 recorded breakthrough deaths represent 5.8 percent of all COVID-19 deaths since Feb. 9, the state said. The state said that unvaccinated residents are five times more likely to be infected by COVID-19, five times more likely to die from the disease and are at least 16 times higher risk of being hospitalized with a COVID-19 infection. On Thursday, the state announced 788 new coronavirus cases since Wednesday, with 3.64 percent of all COVID-19 tests coming back positive. An additional two people have been hospitalized with the disease for a total of 380 patients statewide. The state reported that 25 people died in the past week from COVD-19, bring the total fatalities to 8,355. The report Thursday also noted that 92 Connecticut towns are now considered areas of high transmission, defined as 15 or more cases per 100,000 population, up from 73 towns last week. Amid the spread of the highly transmissible delta variant, cases have risen in recent weeks throughout Connecticut. Health experts believe it is the delta variant that is largely driving the breakthrough infections in Connecticut. Yale New Haven Hospitals Dr. Tom Balcezak said this week that almost 100 percent of the COVID cases sequenced are caused by the delta variant, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Tuesday that while the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines had been 95 percent effective against the originally sequenced coronavirus, they proved to be about 66 percent effective in preventing symptomatic and asymptomatic infection caused by the delta variant. Though experts say that a vaccine that is improperly administered does not have full efficacy, they do not believe this issue has been associated with any breakthrough infections in Connecticut. The COVID vaccines, just like the flu shot, are intended for intramuscular injection. A preventable error can occur when a clinician providing the vaccine uses a needle which is too short to reach the muscle a particular problem with larger patients, Rick Martinello, Yale New Haven Healths director of infection prevention told me. If the vaccine is injected into the fat layer overlying the muscle, the immune system will not respond properly to the vaccine- resulting in lesser effectiveness. The state Department of Public Health tracks breakthrough infections, Martinello said, asking providers to guarantee storage and administration is appropriate. The requested information includes the vaccine brand used and location of vaccination, he said. I have not heard of any reports of clusters of breakthroughs thought to be related to improper storage or administration of the vaccine. DPH spokesman Chris Boyle said in an email that, We have no evidence that breakthrough cases are related to administration error. We actively monitor the storage, handling and administration of vaccines across our providers and have not observed any issues, he said. WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett have postponed their White House meeting as Biden focused his attention on dealing with the aftermath of deadly explosions near the Kabul airport that targeted U.S. troops and Afghans seeking to flee their country after the Taliban takeover. Biden and Bennett were scheduled to meet late Thursday morning for their first face-to-face conversation since Bennett became Israels prime minister in June. The two will instead meet on Friday. On behalf of the people of Israel, I share our deep sadness over the loss of American lives in Kabul, Bennett said in a statement posted on social media. Israel stands with the United States in these difficult times, just as America has always stood with us. Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of the United States. Before arriving in Washington, Bennett made clear the top priority of the visit was to persuade Biden not to return to the Iran nuclear deal, arguing Tehran has already advanced in its uranium enrichment, and that sanctions relief would give Iran more resources to back Israels enemies in the region. The Israeli leader met separately Wednesday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to discuss Iran and other issues. The visit is his first to the U.S. as prime minister. Bennett told his Cabinet before the trip that he would tell the American president that now is the time to halt the Iranians, to stop this thing and not to reenter a nuclear deal that has already expired and is not relevant, even to those who thought it was once relevant. Biden has made clear his desire to find a path to salvage the 2015 landmark pact cultivated by Barack Obamas administration but scuttled in 2018 by Donald Trumps. But U.S. indirect talks with Iran have stalled and Washington continues to maintain crippling sanctions on the country as regional hostilities simmer. Trumps decision to withdraw from Irans nuclear deal led Tehran to abandon over time every limitation the accord imposed on its nuclear enrichment. The country now enriches a small amount of uranium up to 63%, a short step from weapons-grade levels, compared with 3.67% under the deal. It also spins far more advanced centrifuges and more of them than were allowed under the accord, worrying nuclear nonproliferation experts even though Tehran insists its program is peaceful. Bennett's Washington visit comes weeks after Ebrahim Raisi was sworn in as Irans new president. Raisi, 60, a conservative cleric with close ties to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has suggested he'll engage with the U.S. But he also has struck a hard-line stance, ruling out negotiations aimed at limiting Iranian missile development and support for regional militias something the Biden administration wants to address in a new accord. Administration officials acknowledged that Irans potential breakout the time needed to amass enough fissile material for a single nuclear weapon is now down to a matter of months or less. But a senior administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to preview the scheduled talks, said the administration sees the maximum pressure campaign employed by the Trump administration as having emboldened Iran to push ahead with its nuclear program. Bennett is also looking to turn the page from his predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu had a close relationship with Trump after frequently clashing with Obama. Biden, who has met with every Israeli prime minister since Golda Meir, had his own tensions with Netanyahu over the years. During his latest White House campaign, Biden called Netanyahu counterproductive and an extreme right leader. Biden waited nearly a month after his election before making his first call to Netanyahu, raising concerns in Jerusalem and among some Netanyahu backers in Washington that the two would have a difficult relationship. The president called Bennett just hours after he was sworn in as prime minister in June to offer his congratulations. Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the liberal Jewish advocacy group J Street, said Bennett is intent on building a positive working relationship with the Biden administration. But Ben-Ami, whose group supports a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, noted that the two leaders are out of sync on several issues in addition to Iran. Bennett opposes the creation of a Palestinian state and supports expansion of settlements in the West Bank, which Biden opposes. In an interview with The New York Times ahead of his visit, Bennett declined to comment on whether he would move to block Biden administration plans to reopen a U.S. consulate for Palestinians in Jerusalem. The warmth that is going to be projected and the good solid working relationship cannot fully mask the fact that the agenda that Prime Minister Bennett comes to Washington with and the agenda that the Biden administration is pursuing on some of the core issues are still almost as different as they could possibly be, Ben-Ami said. TORRINGTON Residents brought their families to Coe Memorial Park Wednesday afternoon for Celebrate Belonging, a chance to meet nonprofits and service organizations while enjoying food, live music and activities. The event was organized by the Be Ready Project, including local member Judy Kobylarz-Dillard, a mother of five. Be Ready is a grassrooots movement to help families find service needs, and fill the gaps, she said. Its about diversity, equity and inclusion. We can do it better if everyones on the same page. Wednesday, the represented groups included Friendly Hands Food Bank, the McCall Center for Behavioral Health, Charlotte Hungerford Hospital, Winchester Youth Service Bureau, the League of Women Voters, Celebrate Recovery, Northwest Connecticut YMCA, Community Health & Wellness, Torrington Public Schools, KidsPlay Childrens Museum, New Opportunities, Our Culture is Beautiful, Josephs House ministry and the Salvation Army. Vouchers for participating food trucks were provided by the hospital. New Opportunities Thalia Castro brought a group of pre-teens to perform an Ecuadorian folk dance, dressed in traditional red velvet skirts and white blouses. The group, she said, has grown from six to 10 girls. Theyre part of New Opportunities youth group, and its a way for them to belong to something, to make friends and feel good, Castro said. We offer mentoring and activities for them. Were planning more performances. League of Women Voters of Litchfield County members Sister Rosemarie Greco, Judy Armstrong and Bernie Harrington handed out information on voter registration and absentee ballots. Most of the people weve spoken to are already registered, Greco said. But theyre asking for registration information, too. Charlotte Hungerford mental health clinicians Alexandra Isaacs and Starlin Astacio had a booth with a colored wheel and encouraged people to share their identity, race or age, while Kimberly Mitola from the Center for Youth and Families, Ginny Potrepka and Joan Neveshi asked visitors to their booth to take a short survey and enter a raffle to win a gift basket. Were just trying to get to know people in the community that we might not otherwise meet, Neveshi said. Lots of people are coming up and asking questions. Its been very busy. On the civic center stage, a band performed, led by Pastor Michelle Turnbull from Josephs House Life Ministries on Water Street. A DJ also provided music. Our Culture is Beautiful founder Angaza Mwando played his drums at the groups booth and was joined by Umar Latifa, Moril Traore and Stephen Thomas, all of Torrington. According to Kobylarz-Dillard, people need to know theyre accepted and can ask for help when they need it. The groups have created this dynamic event to engage the Torrington and surrounding communities in a celebration that brings awareness to the issues of diversity, equity and inclusion that people may be facing, whether race, religion, mental or medical disability, financial status, sexual orientation, and gender identity or expression, she said. They want to encourage acceptance of all differences so all can feel included and supported in their community. For more information, e-mail NWCTconversations@gmail.com or call 860-294-4181. As a part of India's commitment to Nepal, a medical oxygen plant has been donated to Nepal on Thursday for supporting the Himalayan Nation in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic. The oxygen plant was handed over at a ceremony at the Ministry of Health and Population in Nepal. India donates medical oxygen plant to Nepal According to a statement released by the Indian Embassy in Nepal, the Indian Ambassador to Nepal, Vinay Mohan Kwatra handed over the oxygen plant to Minister of State for Health, Umesh Shrestha at the ceremony. As a part of this, the oxygen plant has been installed at the B.P. Koirala Institute of Health Sciences (BPKIHS) and is designed to provide around 5 Litres Per Minute (LPM) per person which amounts to a total capacity of 960 LPM. The plant has the capacity of serving around 200 patients simultaneously. India has been in a robust partnership with Nepal in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic and now through its gift has signified India's dedicated commitment towards Nepal in this situation. Speaking at the ceremony, Ambassador Kwatra also highlighted the significant and multifaceted relationship between India and Nepal. The Government of India will continuously stand with Nepal and its people in fighting the pandemic situation and will provide necessary assistance, he added. Meanwhile, MoS Health Shrestha stated that the donation of an oxygen plant will aid in Nepal's efforts towards tackling the Covid situation. Further, highlighting the previous support provided by the Indian government in building the BPKIHS in Dharan, he said that the addition of an oxygen plant is another milestone that would serve the Nepal people in long run. Tackling of the COVID-19 situation India and Nepal along with many other countries faced several challenges during the second wave of coronavirus. However, the new plant will help in improving the healthcare sector in Nepal. India being the fourth country in the world to develop oxygen generation technology, utilizes the pressure swing absorption technique and molecular sieve technology to generate oxygen directly from the atmosphere. (With ANI inputs) (Image Credits: ANI/representative) The Ministry of External Affairs has released a statement on the terrorist attack that took place in Mali on August 19, Thursday. The statement said that India strongly condemns the terrorist attack on a convoy of the Malian Armed Forces on August 19, 2021, in the Mopti region of Mali that resulted in the killing of 15 Malian soldiers. It further said, We extend our deepest condolences to the families of the soldiers as well as the people, and the Government of Mali and wish for the speedy recovery of all the other injured soldiers. India strongly condemns the terrorist attack on Mali soldiers As per reports, on August 19, a bunch of gunmen ambushed a Malian army convoy in central Mali. This ambush killed at least 15 soldiers. The official account of the Malian Armed Forces (FAMa) had posted a tweet on the same day that translated to, A convoy #FAMa was ambushed today, August 19, 2021, late in the morning. It was 12:45 pm when a vehicle bomb first exploded as it passed, followed by heavy gunfire on the convoy. On the day of the attack, the soldiers had been heading from the town of Douentza to Boni. This is when they came under attack by a vehicle that exploded as it passed. A military statement said that intense gunfire followed soon after that. Although no one has claimed responsibility for the attack, it reportedly bears the markings of armed organisations affiliated with al-Qaeda that has been active in the region for years. In 2012, Islamic terrorists had seized control of several towns in northern Mali. 51 people killed in Mali in another terrorist attack earlier The incident has left people reeling, as it took place just a few days after another attack that occurred in the country on the northern left side. That attack had killed several dozen civilians as reported on August 9. As per the reports, 51 people had been killed in the incident during which terrorists torched homes after storming the villages on motorbikes. Following this, an army patrol from the Malian military had been sent to the regions that faced this violence, which confirmed the number of deaths. Islamic terrorists have continued to carry out deadly attacks, with reportedly hundreds of people killed this year in a series of murders near Mali's border with Niger and in other regions of Africa as well. (IMAGE: AP) PM Modi Lauds New Drone Rules 2021; Terms It A 'landmark Moment' For Indian Aviation The Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) on Thursday released the new liberalised Drone Rules, 2021 which will provide several benefits to various sectors of the Indian economy. The new drone rules will replace the Unmanned Aircraft System Rules (UAS Rules) which came into force on March 12, 2021. Taking to Twitter, PM Modi lauded the new rules and said that it will tremendously help start-ups and the youth working in this sector. It will also open up new possibilities for innovation and business. Read Full Story Here Karnataka: Horrific Politics Over Heinous Mysuru Gang-rape After State Home Min's Shocker The Congress in Karnataka has launched a scathing attack on state Home Minister Araga Jnanendra's statement over the horrific Mysuru gang-rape incident. The Home Minister said that the rape survivor and her male friend had visited a desolate area where the crime occurred adding that the victim shouldn't have gone to such an isolated place, atrociously pinning the blame on the victim. He said he will be travelling to that place in Mysuru to take stock of the developments and the situation there. Araga Jnanendra said that the government and the police department have taken the gang-rape incident in Mysuru "seriously" and all efforts are on to nab the culprits. Read Full Story Here BJP Seeks Apology From RJD's Tejashwi Yadav For 'lumping Together' Animals & SC, STs In a key development, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has sought an apology from Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tajashwi Yadav. The apology is in reference to the statement made by Tejashwi Yadav in a media briefing after meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the caste-based census issue. During the briefing, the RJD leader had put birds, animals, and the people of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe at par, and asked, "If their census could be conducted, then why not the general caste-census in the country?" Read Full Story Here EXCLUSIVE: Amrullah Saleh Exposes Pakistan's Role In Taliban Takeover Of Afghanistan; Vows Resistance In an exclusive interview with Republic TV on Thursday, Afghanistan 'caretaker' president Amrullah Saleh exposed Pakistan's role in the Taliban takeover of his country. While Afghanistan president Ashraf Ghani resigned and fled the country with his associates after the terrorist group stormed into Kabul on August 15, Saleh and Ahmad Massoud have not only stayed put but also managed to keep Panjshir out of its grasp. Maintaining that the Taliban is completely backed by Pakistan, Saleh slammed the failure of the US to publicly acknowledge this. Read Full Story Here EAM Jaishankar Chairs All-party Briefing On Afghanistan; Underlines 'evacuation Priority' The Centre on Thursday chaired an all-party meeting on the Afghanistan crisis. In the 3.5-hour-long meeting, which had in attendance 47 leaders from 31 parties, the Ministry of External Affairs gave a briefing on the present situation. The External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar gave an introductory speech, followed by a presentation on the issue given by Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla. There were discussions on the presentation thereafter, during which the opposition parties raised their issues, and the government issues clarification. Read Full Story Here Abhishek Singhvi Posts Hilarious Meme On India's 'two-in-one' Toss Versus England Indian National Congress politician and top lawyer Abhishek Manu Singhvi posted a hilarious meme regarding India's dismal batting performance against England in the Headingley Test. Team India were dismissed for just 78 runs in 40.4 overs as the English bowlers ran riot. Veteran bowler James Anderson was once again the pick amongst the bowlers as he had astounding figures of 3/6 in his eight overs spell. Read Full Story Here COVID-19: India Donates Medical Oxygen Plant To Nepal; Will Support In Fighting The Virus As a part of India's commitment to Nepal, a medical oxygen plant has been donated to Nepal on Thursday for supporting the Himalayan Nation in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic. The oxygen plant was handed over at a ceremony at the Ministry of Health and Population in Nepal. Read Full Story Here Pfizer Study Reveals Third COVID Vaccine Booster Dose Vastly Improves Antibody Response Drug manufacturers Pfizer and BioNTech on August 25 said that they were applying to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for supplemental approval of coronavirus vaccine booster shots for individuals aged 16 years and above. The firms backed their stance with an elaborate study that proved that antibody responses increased manifold if a third booster was administered to people. This announcement comes days after American President Joe Biden announced the availability of a booster shot from September 20, 2021. Read Full Story Here Kerala Congress Chief Slams Pinarayi Vijayan Govt For 'failure In Tackling COVID-19 Surge' Amid surging cases of COVID-19 in Kerala, concerns over the spread of the virus are growing louder. Slamming the Kerala government over their inability to mitigate the surging COVID-19 cases, Kerala Congress Chief, PT Thomas recently claimed that the state administration has failed to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. Read Full Story Here Japan Suspends Use Of 1.63 Million Doses Of Moderna's COVID-19 Vaccine Over Contamination On Thursday, Japan's Health Ministry stated that the country has decided to stop the use of 1.63 million doses of Moderna Inc (MRNA.O) COVID-19 vaccine after reports of contamination with particulate matter in several lots surfaced. Japanese drugmaker Takeda Pharmaceutical CO., which is in charge of sales and distribution of the Moderna shot in the country, said that the reason behind contamination could be owing to some manufacturing issues in one of the production units in Spain, the japan times reported. The drugmaker further stated that it has informed Moderna and urged for an urgent investigation into the matter, after several vaccination centres reported that foreign substances have been found inside unopened vials from specific lots. Read Full Story Here Amid the intensifying crisis in Punjab Congress with Captain Amarinder Singh and Navjot Singh Sidhu factions at warring terms, there have been reports of a possible internal rift in Chhattisgarh Congress too, between CM Bhupesh Bagel and Chhattisgarh Health Minister TS Singh Deo. Surprisingly, without categorically denying the speculations, TS Singh Deo has rather termed the internal rift as 'healthy competition', thus putting a seal of affirmation on the possibility of the internal feud in the Chhattisgarh Congress. Justifying the internal rift, Deo said "there is rivalry even among siblings". He (Bhupesh Baghel) might be the CM for 50 years or 10 years or 2 years. This is not fixed. There is rivalry even among siblings. Healthy competitions take place. I will carry out the responsibility that is given by the High Command: Chhattisgarh Health Minister TS Singh Deo ANI (@ANI) August 26, 2021 Chhattisgarh Congress crisis "If a person plays in a team then doesn't he think about becoming the captain? Won't you want to become one? Everyone thinks about that but the question is not about his thoughts, it's about his capabilities. High Command takes a decision," TS Singh Deo further said while indicating that the CM Baghel's tenure is not fixed and the final word lies with the Congress leadership in Delhi. Deo also refuted the rumours of splitting the CM tenure for 2.5 years, calling it media speculation and adding that the Congress High Command decides about the role of the people in the party. "Party never spoke about 2.5 years formula. This was just media speculation that such a formula was formed when CM in Chhattisgarh was chosen. High Command decides the roles of people in the party. We carry out those responsibilities, TS Singh Deo said. As the tussle for the chief ministership in the state persisted, CM Bhupesh Baghel and TS Singh Deo met Rahul Gandhi in Delhi on Tuesday. Addressing media upon his arrival at Raipur after meeting Rahul Gandhi, CM Baghel had assured that he would step down from his post if party president Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi ordered him to do so. As the CM Bhupesh Baghel-led Congress's tenure crossed the two-and-a-half-year mark, supporters of TS Singh Deo raised the need for change in leadership and brought in the concern of rotational chief ministership. Reportedly, TS Singh Deo's supporters had claimed that the current Health Minister was promised to be made the CM before his current regime ended. According to sources, TS Singh Deo had already conveyed to the party's high command that he could not wait any more than two months for the change in power. He also said that he would resign from all party posts if his demands were not met. Chhattisgarh Congress Chief PL Punia on Tuesday clarified that there was no change of guard in the party leadership in the state. Chhattisgarh's crisis, if intensified further, will be an added mess for Congress leadership which is already struggling with the crisis in Punjab in the runup to Assembly elections in the state. Punjab Congress crisis Punjab CM Captain Amarinder Singh and Punjab Congress Committee Chief Navjot Singh Sidhu have been at loggerheads for a long time now. However, the rift has intensified further after Navjot Sidhu's elevation to PCC president. The Sidhu led faction has demanded the removal of Amarinder Singh as the chief minister for failure to fulfil some of the poll promises. Moreover, Congress is also facing the ire of the people and the Opposition for the anti-national statements given by Navjot Singh Sidhu's advisor regarding Kashmir's integration. Captain Amarinder has taken strong exception to the recent remarks of Sidhu's advisers on sensitive national issues like Kashmir and Pakistan. Facing criticism, Sidhu summoned Malvinder Singh Mali and Pyare Lal Garg to his residence in Patiala on Monday. Malvinder Singh Mali had waded into the issue of abrogation of Article 370, which gave special status to the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir. He reportedly said if Kashmir was a part of India, then what was the need to have Articles 370 and 35A. Mali also claimed that Kashmir is a separate state. On the other hand, Pyare Lal Garg reportedly questioned chief minister Amarinder Singh's criticism of Pakistan, saying that criticizing Pakistan is 'not in the interest of Punjab.' Drug manufacturers Pfizer and BioNTech on August 25 said that they were applying to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for supplemental approval of coronavirus vaccine booster shots for individuals aged 16 years and above. The firms backed their stance with an elaborate study which proved that antibody responses increased manifold if a third booster was administered to people. This announcement comes days after American President Joe Biden announced the availability of a booster shot from September 20, 2021. Booster shots enhance anti-body responses For the purpose of the study, Pfizer/BioNTech administered a third vaccine shot to 306 volunteers. The booster shot was administered about five and eight months after the second jab. In the aftermath, the companies said that the antibody response against SARS-CoV-2 increased threefold after the second dose. Talking about the adverse effects, the firms stressed that the side-effects of the booster shots were the same as the two initial shots. "The booster (third) dose of COMIRNATY elicited robust neutralizing antibodies to the wild-type strain in participants who were without evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection through one-month post-dose-three. SARS-CoV-2 50% neutralizing titers after the third dose was 3.3 times the titers after the second dose," the company said. Today marks another milestone for Pfizer and @BioNTech_Group as we initiated submission for U.S. FDA approval of a sBLA (supplemental Biologics License Application) for a booster, or a third dose, of our COVID-19 vaccine, in individuals aged 16 and older. Pfizer Inc. (@pfizer) August 25, 2021 Additionally, Pfizer/BioNTech also announced their plans to submit an approval application to the regulatory authorities in Europe and Asia. It is worth mentioning that Israel has already seen a significant downfall in its COVID caseload due to the booster vaccine jabs. Additional reports suggest that the third shot has also been successful in curbing the transmission of the more lethal Delta variant of coronavirus in the country. Earlier this week, the mRNA-based vaccine was given full approval by the FDA and will now be marketed as 'Comirnaty'. According to the FDA, the vaccine will continue to be available under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for individuals aged 12 to 15 years and can be administered as a third dose in 'certain immunocompromised individuals.' Acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock has informed in a press release that the approval of the vaccine from the FDA is a "milestone" amid the battle against the COVID-19 pandemic. Woodcock assured the people that the vaccine meets the "high standards for safety and effectiveness needed for the approval from FDA." Image: AP Morocco's foreign minister Nasser Bourita met Wednesday with the vice president of Libya's presidential council Abdellah Lafi in Rabat. The two officials held a news conference following their meeting, in which Bourita expressed Morocco's support for Libya's political process. Bourita said Morocco was working with Libyan institutions to overcome difficulties ahead of the country's upcoming elections. Lafi said the two discussed the formation of a consular committee in order to "remove obstacles and difficulties with regard to visas" between Morocco and Libya. He added that the government is working to repatriate 195 young Moroccans currently arrested in Libya. Lafi did not elaborate on the subject or give details about who they were. A business forum with delegations from both countries will be also organized in the coming weeks, according to Bourita. The Moroccan top diplomat did not comment on the current crisis with neighboring Algeria that suspended relations with his country on Tuesday. (Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com) A study published on Wednesday revealed that tropical mountain forests in African countries may store up to two-thirds more carbon than what was previously anticipated. These forests store around 150 tonnes of carbon per hectare, which means that one hectare of forest saves carbon dioxide emissions equivalent to providing at least 100 homes with electricity for a year, the International study published in Nature stated. Generally, it is believed that forests at higher altitudes contain less carbon compared to lowland forests owing to factors such as soil and climatic changes that affect growth and thus the amount of carbon the trees can absorb. The researchers based their results after analysing data on carbon stored in trees across 44 highland sites in as many as 12 African countries. 'Mountain forests play vital role in combating climate change' The study also found that African mountain forests are similar in structure to lowland forests in the continent and store more carbon per unit than the Amazon rainforest. Underlining the important role such mountain forests play in combating climate change, the study also stated that the average carbon content of Africa's tropical mountain forests is 149.4 tons per hectare, more or less equivalent to the average carbon content of African lowlands. The researchers also found that at least 0.8 million hectares of tropical mountain forest have been lost in the last 20 years. These have been mostly in Uganda, Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, emitting around 500 million tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Researchers appeal to avoid deforestation Showing their concerns, the researchers reported that if current deforestation rates continue, a further 0.5 million hectares of these forests are expected to be lost in the next 10 years. It should be mentioned here that under the Bonn Challenge, a number of African nations have committed large amounts of land to forest restoration. They accepted the fact that forest restoration is important to mitigate climate change, however, they suggested that avoiding deforestation should be the topmost priority. They also did not deny the fact that past underestimations of carbon storage capacity by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) may have led to governments being less concerned about preserving high-altitude forest areas. Image Credits: Pixabay/Representative Several countries and organizations have come forward to provide aid to Afghanistan after the Taliban's control over the country on August 15. Joining the bandwagon, Denmark-based toymaker the Lego Foundation and its parent company KIRKBI A/S said they will donate 100 million kroner ($16 million) to support vulnerable children in Afghanistan. Showing concern towards the Afghans, they also vowed to provide aid to the Caribbean country Haiti. Speaking to the Associated Press, Thomas Kirk Kristiansen, chairman of the Lego Foundation, said that the humanitarian crises that are happening in Afghanistan and Haiti are unimaginable and only intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic. Afghanistan and Haiti reeling under crisis Since May this year, more than 5,00,000 people have been displaced in Afghanistan. As for Haiti, over 2,000 people lost their lives, and more than 12,000 sustained injuries when a deadly 7.2 magnitude earthquake followed by floods swept the country. The situation has left at least half a million Haitian children with limited or no access to shelter, safe water, health care, and nutrition, reported The Associated Press. Meanwhile, United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) had stated that among affected people by the quake, at least 5,40,000 were children. With COVID-19 still being an imminent threat to the health and safety of Haiti's population, the loss and damage associated with these most recent natural disasters only further compound the dire situation so many children and families are experiencing, stated both companies in a joint statement. Companies partner with UN agencies to ramp up aid supply In an attempt to ramp up the supply of aid to Afghanistan and Haiti, both companies are also said to have partnered up with two UN agencies - UNICEF and UNHCR - as well as Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the United Nations global fund for education in emergencies. According to ECW, its investments have reached 4.6 million children to date, including 2,74,000 pre-primary, 3.3 million primary, and around 6,00,000 secondary school children. Notably, the Lego Foundation is ECW's largest private sector donor. As per a report by the World Food Programme (WFP) approximately 14 million people or one in three Afghans are found to be hungry and two million malnourished children urgently need treatment. Image Credits: AP Hong Kong on August 26 announced that domestic workers from Indonesia and the Philippines will be allowed to fly into the city from August 30. According to the Associated Press, the former British colony has approximately 370,000 domestic workers from Indonesia and the Philippines. The latest move is now expected to ease the shortage of helpers in the city. Under the new arrangements, the Hong Kong government has allowed domestic helpers from Indonesia and the Philippines only if they are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Helpers must also have a working visa. Additionally, they must also quarantine for 21 days at a specific hotel, with the costs to be paid by their respective employers. Hong Kong officials also conceded that the number of arrivals, however, will be restricted. COVID-19 situation in Hong Kong Meanwhile, a rise in COVID-19 cases in the country due to the Delta variant has forced Hong Kong officials to once again reimpose strict virus measures. Earlier this month, the officials announced new guidelines that will now restrict international travellers' entry into the country until they complete 21 days of quarantine. Travellers arriving from the US, India, and 15 other countries - France, Malaysia, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Greece, Iran, the Netherlands, Spain, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, Tanzania and Turkey - will have to quarantine in hotels. There is a rule of 14 days of mandatory quarantine for fully vaccinated travellers coming from Australia, and seven days of mandatory quarantine for travellers coming from New Zealand. It is worth noting that from the beginning, the former British colony has remained strict regarding the implications of COVID-19 measures in the country. Hong Kong's "zero-COVID" strategy has also been a driving force behind keeping coronavirus cases low. Previously, Hong Kong authorities had imposed strict border restrictions and banned flights from countries that were at a high risk of COVID-19. However, to a larger extent, the country has now successfully avoided community spread. Hong Kong is also preparing to re-open its border with mainland China. (With inputs from AP) India and Maldives on August 26 will be signing a contract on the mega Greater Male Connectivity Project (GMCP), which is the largest infrastructure project in the nation. According to ANI, the contract will be inked between the archipelagic nation's government and Maharashtra-based construction and engineering company Afcons infrastructure. The GMCP will be the largest-ever infrastructure project in the Maldives, funded under the Indian Grant and Line of Credit. Indian High Commissioner to the Maldives, Sunjay Sudhir, said, The Greater Male Connectivity Project is concrete proof that India is a robust development partner of the Maldives in addition to being the First Responder in times of any emergency in the Maldives. This iconic project will give a major boost to the Maldivian economy. Indian and Maldives had signed the GMPC agreement in 2020. Sudhir added that the GMCP is not only the biggest project India is doing in the Maldives but also the biggest infrastructure project in the Maldives overall. Further, it is worth noting that the project aims to revitalise the Maldivian economy through a $400 million Line of Credit (LOC) and $100 million grant linking its capital Male with Gulhifalhu Port and Thilafushi industrial zone along with a regular cargo ferry service between the two countries to boost trade and commerce. About Greater Male Connectivity Project As per the news agency, the GMCP will involve the construction of a 6.74 km long bridge and causeway link connecting the capital Male with the adjoining islands of Villingli, Gulhifalhu and Thilafushi. This project will be an infrastructural complement to the Gulhifalhu commercial port project which is being done under an Indian LoC of $800 million. A planned new airport at Gulhifalu under an Indian Line of Credit, and the fact that Thilafushi is where the Maldives industrial zone is located, will make the GMCP an economic lifeline, officials said. The project is composed of three navigation bridges of 140-metre main span across the deep channel between each island, 1.41 km of a marine viaduct in deep water, 2.32 km marine viaduct in shallow water or on land, and 2.96 km of at-grade roads. The land interchanges at Male and Villingili will be signalised junctions. There will be roundabouts at Gulhifalhu and Thilafushi and bus terminals are planned on each island near the junctions with the mainline. (Images & inputs: ANI) While the United States has created a major disaster by pulling out troops from Afghanistan, it has not named the main author of this misfortune, which is the Pakistani ISI. According to Chris Alexander, Canada's former Minister of Citizenship & Immigration, it was not the US policymakers, not the Afghans, but Pakistan and the ISI which played a key role in the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. Speaking on Republic Media Network's primetime debate with Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami, Alexander claimed that the Pakistan ISI founded the Taliban in the 1990s and has used it as an instrument of state power ever since. Alexander said that Pakistan saw the 2020 Doha agreement as an opportunity to invade Afghanistan and treat the country as its colony. "Invading another country is a very serious matter and that is what Pakistan did. They saw the Doha agreement signed in 2020, set a schedule in general headquarters on the advice of ISI for an invasion to begin in Afghanistan as soon as foreign troops left. General Qamar Javed Bajwa came to Kabul on May 10 and the next day this invasion began," said Alexander. He further stated that the United States did not even fully know what Pakistan's agenda was, calling it an unprecedented failure. The Canadian leader added that no country was able to see what Pakistan was doing as they did it with impunity. They have been waging war in Afghanistan, mostly by irregular means, for four to fives decades, all part for their need to compensate for the loss of East Pakistan, said, Alexander. "This doctrine of strategic depth and global Jihad that has been embraced by successive Army generals from Mirza Aslam Beg, including Pervez Musharraf, Ashfaq Kayani, and today's Qamar Javed Bajwa. It is a big threat to global peace and security. The terrorist groups that have come out of this doctrine - the Al Qaeda, the Haqqani network, terrorist groups threatening Central Asia have committed major acts of terrorism on three continents we still do not trace the accountability back to where it actually belongs," he said. 'The US must sanction Pakistan' Alexander stressed that the world needs to hold Pakistan accountable to the same standards that they hold other states. When Russia invaded the Ukraine in 2014, the response was swift - sanctions. The action stopped the invasion in its tracks, even though Russia denied that they were behind it, he noted. Singapore, Aug 26 (PTI) Singapore High Court has upheld an Indian-origin permanent residents 16-month jail term and a fine of over USD 8,100 for prostitution-related offences. Arumaikannu Sasikumar, 46 and his Singaporean partner Rajendran Nagarethinam, 60, were last year found guilty of several prostitution-related offences and for obstructing the course of justice at their Kollywood club. On Wednesday, the High Court acquitted Rajendran of one charge and reduced his sentence in two other charges. His sentence was cut from 30 months' imprisonment and a fine of 3,000 Singapore dollars (USD 2,218) to 19 months' jail and a 2,500-dollar (USD 1,848) fine. The High Court upheld Arumaikannus 16-month jail term and a fine of 11,000 dollars (USD 8,133) for prostitution-related offences. Two Bangladeshi women in their mid-20s, who arrived in Singapore in 2015 and 2016, were forced into prostitution, The Straits Times reported. On separate occasions, Rajendran or Arumaikannu, assisted by a Bangladeshi man named Roky, asked the two women to provide sexual services to customers, it said. One of the Bangladeshi women reluctantly agreed for prostitution as she was worried over salary. Each customer paid her 500 dollars (USD 369) which she passed on to Arumaikannu, it said. When the other Bangladeshi woman refused for prostitution, Arumaikannu slapped her, the report said. In February 2016, the two Bangladeshi women along with two others, who worked at the club, fled, the report said, adding that they reported to the Manpower Ministry that they had not been paid their salaries and were made to go out with customers. PTI GS CPS (Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com) Afghanistan's new rulers - the Taliban on Thursday asserted that Pakistan is like their 'second home'. Speaking to a Pakistan-based news channel, the spokesperson of the insurgent group, Zabiullah Mujahid underlined that Afghanistan and Pakistan share borders, and are also 'traditionally alligned' as far as religion is concerned. The spokesperson added that 'they would not allow any activity on Afghan soil which goes against Pakistans interests'. At this time when the international community as a whole are mulling over ways to help people escape the tyrannical rule of the insurgent group, the Taliban's 'second home' is busy in revelry. Recently, a video surfaced on social media, in which the students of Jamia Hafsa from Lal Masjid in Islamabad could be heard singing 'Salam Taliban' - a song glorifying the violence caused by the terrorist group. That's not all, flags of the insurgent group were raised on the rooftop of a women's madrasa in Islamabad, making it clear that they stand with the Taliban when the entire world stands against it. This is all in line with Imran Khan's comment that the Afghans had "broken the shackles of slavery" while describing the Taliban's triumph over Kabul. But why is Pakistan in appeasement mode? On Tuesday, Pakistan asserted that it would take the Taliban's assistance in dealing with their border issues, specifically with India. A spokesperson of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI), the party of the Imran Khan government, Neelam Irshad Sheikh, said that the terrorist group would help Pakistan in conquering Kashmir. "The Taliban are saying that they are with us and they will help us in Kashmir," Sheikh said during a TV news debate. #PTI leader Neelam Irshad Sheikh: Taliban have announced that they will join hands with Pakistan to liberate Kashmir. pic.twitter.com/MfC7mQ6lLh SAMRI (@SAMRIReports) August 23, 2021 Equipped with a huge cache of modern weaponry left behind by the United States after its hasty exit, the Taliban has become more powerful than ever before, and the insurgents, under most likelihood, are going to use it against India- the staunch enemy of its one and only supporter worldwide, Pakistan. As per the Indian Armed Forces' senior officers, the American-origin weapons, especially small arms, were being sent to Pakistan. After being used by the ISI in Pakistan, these weapons may also find their way into the hands of terror groups operating in India, they suggested. Will Pakistan's allegiance to the Taliban backfire? Meanwhile, Pakistan itself has a number of reasons to worry. The Pakistani wing of the Taliban, Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), had killed more than 130 Pakistani children in a heinous terrorist attack at an Army school in Peshawar in 2014, apart from other attacks. After coming to power, the Taliban has released several prisoners from the Kabul prison, including those of the TTP. A representative of the PTI, speaking to Republic's Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami on Tuesday said that they have had a conversation with the Taliban, and they have 'assured' that those released from the prison won't enter Pakistan. Supporters of Bolivia's jailed former interim president Jeanine Anez marched through the streets of La Paz Wednesday demanding her freedom. Anez's daughter Carolina sat on the steps of the Miraflore's women's prison with President of Bolivia's Permanent Assembly of Human Rights Amparo Carbajal waiting to be allowed inside in vain. "Today they have not even opened a window to give us any type of explanation or to tell us something," she said through tears. "What the government wants is to make her illness worse because its (Bolivian government) intention is to kill my mother." On Saturday, the former interim president suffered self-inflicted injuries to her arms and prison authorities have said the 54-year-old, who has been detained since March, suffers from depression and high blood pressure. Scuffles between her supporters and government supporters broke out with one man receiving a head injury and police sprayed pepper spray on some individuals involved in the melee. Anez's interim government persecuted opponents with "systematic torture" and "summary executions" by security forces, according to a report released by independent human rights experts earlier this month. "Justice for those who killed 36 souls and injured over 1,000 in Senkata, Sacaba and the zones in the South," said Juan Ramos a government supporter. "It was lead by Jeanine Anez and all her ministers. We want them all in jail." IMAGE: AP (Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com) Note: We've recently updated our online systems. If you can't login please try resetting your password. You must login with an email address. If you don't have an email associated with your account email please call (208) 542-6777 for help. We get it. You don't want to see the ads. We'd just ask you to understand that those ads help us pay the bills and our reporters. Please, consider white-listing the Standard Journal in your ad-blocker or, even better, purchase a subscription so that you can help support quality local journalism. The activist vows to continue his human rights work upon his release from prison. Protesters call for the release of Rong Chhun on the first day of his trial for incitement in Phnom Penh, Jan. 15, 2021. Jailed union leader Rong Chhun has urged his supporters to continue to fight injustice in Cambodia despite government intimidation and vowed to return to his work as a human rights campaigner upon his release, in one of his first statements since he was sentenced to prison for incitement last week. On Aug. 18, a court in Cambodias capital Phnom Penh sentenced Rong Chhun, who is also a member of the Cambodia Watchdog Council (CWC) umbrella NGO of unions representing teachers, workers, farmers, and students, to two years in jail for his criticism of the governments handling of a longstanding border dispute with neighboring Vietnam. Rong Chhun was jailed at Prey Sar Prison on Aug. 1, 2020, a day after his arrest for claiming the government has allowed Vietnam to encroach on Cambodian farmland along the border. The Phnom Penh Municipal Court also ordered Rong Chhun to pay 2 million riels (U.S. $490) in fines, in addition to serving the maximum two-year prison term for his charge of incitement to commit a felony in violation of Article 495 of Cambodias penal code. The court sentenced two other activists, Sar Kanika and Tun Nimol, each to serve 20 months in jail and pay the same fine. The court also ordered the three activists to pay about 400,000 riels (U.S. $100) in compensation to the Cambodia Border Affairs Committee. On Wednesday, Ouk Chhayavy, president of the Cambodian Independent Teachers Association, told RFAs Khmer Service that Rong Chhun called her from his cell on Aug. 23, urging his fellow activists not to abandon their fight for freedom and social justice, despite the governments use of the courts to intimidate them. He doesnt want us to ignore any unjust actions and stop making demands because of intimidation, she said. He said he wants us to be strong. She said Rong Chhun told her he will be out of jail within 11 months and will return to lead social and human rights work, as he had done prior to his arrest. In response to Rong Chhuns statement, ruling Cambodian Peoples Party (CPP) spokesman Sok Ey San told RFA that Cambodians already enjoy their full freedoms and there is no need to demand more, adding that the union leaders statement smacks of incitement. We should demand something that we dont have, but we currently enjoy full freedom, he said. [Most people] have been using it correctly except for a small group who dont like it. Why should we demand more? Such a demand is yet another form of incitement. But Federation of Cambodian Intellectuals and Students Secretary General Kean Ponlok welcomed Rong Chhuns statement, saying the activist always puts the national interest ahead of his own, even when he is in jail. He is a true nationalist who has sacrificed himself for the national interest, he said. It is a good thing for [him] to appeal to youths and activists not to be intimidated in their protests and fight against social injustice. UN experts slam ruling On Tuesday, Vitit Muntarbhorn, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Cambodia, slammed authorities for convicting Rong Chhun and his supporters, calling the prison terms and fines neither justified nor proportionate. I am extremely alarmed that the court convicted the three human rights defenders for acts that are protected by their rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, rights guaranteed by Cambodian and international law, he said in a statement. Mary Lawlor, U.N. Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, said human rights defenders should never be arrested, detained or convicted for their efforts to protect human rights of others. We are seriously concerned that the Cambodian government uses the vaguely-worded Articles 494 and 495 of the Criminal Code against incitement to create felony to crack down on dissent and to stifle free expression, the experts said, calling for an end to the intimidation and harassment of human rights defenders. Threat of deportation Meanwhile, activists with the banned opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) who are seeking political asylum in Thailand due to charges they say are politically motivated expressed concern Wednesday that they will be forcibly deported to face prosecution following a senior Cambodian officials request to his counterpart. On Monday, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sens advisor and Ministry of Tourism Secretary of State Sok Sokretya asked Thai Minister of Digital Economy and Society Chaiwut Thanakanusorn to help prevent opposition party activists from using social media in Thailand to attack the Cambodian government. In a comment posted to his Facebook account, Sok Sokretya also requested the Thai official to stop fake news that might affect the two countries relationship. Neang Sokhun, an activist who was jailed and is currently seeking asylum in Thailand, told RFA that the request is yet another sign that his security and that of his fellow CNRP rights campaigners might be compromised. He urged NGOs to monitor the situation, saying the government might seek their deportations. Even though I am afraid, we will continue our mission for democracy and freedom for Cambodians, he said. Cambodias Supreme Court dissolved the CNRP in November 2017, marking the beginning of a wider crackdown by Hun Sen on the political opposition, NGOs, and the independent media that paved the way for the CPP to win all 125 seats in parliament in the countrys July 2018 general election. Another activist in Thailand, Voeun Samnang, said he is afraid that Hun Sens government will hire hitmen to harm them, but vowed to continue broadcasting information about its failures with other CNRP asylum seekers in Thailand through the use of Facebook Live. I am not afraid of being deported, but I am afraid of being ambushed, he said. Am Sam Ath of Cambodian rights group Licadho told RFA that people should be allowed to use social media freely and responsibly and said he does not believe the Thai government would deport the activists at Cambodias request. A democratic country must respect freedom of expression and constructive criticism, he said. Reported by RFAs Khmer Service. Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Joshua Lipes. Volunteer investigator Shangguan says police are doing nothing to follow up on a trafficking ring she exposed nearly a year ago. A man and a woman hold babies in an alley in Beijing in a file photo. Police in the eastern Chinese province of Shandong have yet to follow up on a tip-off from an anti-trafficking investigator suggesting that hospitals in Weifang city could be involved in a baby-trafficking ring, the group said this week. "I have been following up on this medical company in Weifang for nearly a year after finding evidence of illegal surrogacy and baby-trafficking and reporting it to the local authorities," the volunteer, Shangguan Zhengyi, said on her Weibo account on Aug. 25. "The 110 emergency number at the time did nothing, while the local police station said they would deal with it by talking to them, which is a dereliction of their duty," the post said. "I have repeatedly advised the Weifang mayoral hotline that this dereliction of duty is taking place, and that this isn't something that can be resolved with a good talking-to," the account said. "These efforts have been in vain thus far." The post came after the Global Times newspaper claimed on Aug. 2 that the reproductive medical technology company was "under police investigation on suspicion of operating an illegal surrogacy business and child trafficking." A suspect, Zhu Yunli, who heads the company had allegedly been overseeing an illegal surrogacy and infant trafficking business on the quiet, the report said, citing an investigation by the The Paper and Shangguan Zhengyi. The investigation "exposed the underground trading chain dominated by human trafficking gangs who trade newly born infants who are often abandoned by their biological parents. A newborn baby can be sold from tens of thousands of yuan to hundreds of thousands of yuan," the paper reported. Zhu was apprehended by the local police on Monday afternoon and the public security bureau of Weifang has set up a special task force to investigate into the case, Shangguan was quoted as saying on Aug. 2. Shangguan found an infant trafficking gang is made up of about 100 members across several provinces, after posing as an infertile woman wanting a daughter and being contacted by Zhu. "Shangguan found that the business is pretty attractive to some young women who become pregnant unexpectedly and gave birth with no formal record. These women using this network do not need to pay for an abortion and are able to find a home for their child," the Global Times report said. Some doctors and nurses from the W.F. Maternal And Child Health Hospital and Weifang Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine were also involved in the business, it quoted Zhu as saying. The Paper also reported that the traffickers had helped a 22-year-old woman from the northern province of Hebei surnamed Ren to sell her own child for 70,000 yuan. Shangguan Zhengyi was unavailable for comment, so as to protect her identity. 'No information available' An employee who answered the phone at the W.F. Maternal And Child Health Hospital appeared to back away from the allegations when contacted by RFA on Thursday. "We are currently cooperating with the police investigation, and so far there hasn't been a development," the employee said. "How many infants were trafficked from here? I'm not sure that any were. I think you're asking an incorrect question," the employee said. An employee who answered the phone at the Weifang Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine hit out at recent media reports about the case, suggesting it hadn't been contacted by the authorities at all. "It may say that in the articles, but we would have been notified by the relevant departments if there was really any involvement in the case," the employee said. "The provincial government would have notified the National Health Commission and they definitely would have gotten in touch with us." "We haven't had any information about this from them, however." the employee said. "I think the authenticity of these reports should be verified by the relevant departments, don't you?" An official who answered the phone at the Weifang city health department said they are currently awaiting the results of the police investigation. "We know that this case has been filed, and the investigation is currently under way," the official said. "We will wait for the final conclusion as announced by the police, before we pursue the relevant personnel and organizations involved or impose any kind of administrative punishment," they said. A former police academy student surnamed Lu said child trafficking is a long-running problem in China. "A friend of mine couldn't give birth, and so they bought [a baby], which brought a whole lot of problems, and wound up costing them tens of thousands or even 100,000 yuan," Lu said. "My friend and her family treated the kid very well, but there are a lot of people who don't -- it's pretty crazy," she said. Targeted by traffickers Former Weifang resident Liu Jihuai said he knows people who were targeted by traffickers or kidnappers. "My sister and brother-in-laws child was almost abducted in the People's Hospital, the biggest hospital in Weifang," Liu said. "He was only five or six years old at the time." The tearful reunions of a Chinese couple reunited with their abducted son after 24 years of searching for him made international headlines in July. Guo Gangtang and his wife, Zhang Wenge, hugged their 26-year-old son at a reunion organized by police in their hometown of Liaocheng, also in Shandong, the Associated Press reported on July 21. The story of their reunion after Guo crisscrossed China by motorcycle searching for his son and became an activist who helped police return other missing children to their parents prompted an outpouring of public sympathy and condemnation of abductions, the report said. Guo Xinzhen, then age two-and-a-half, was grabbed by a woman and her boyfriend who took him northwest to Hebei province, which surrounds Beijing, the Chinese capital, where he was sold to a couple in central China, police said. Police experts found Guo Xinzhen in June by searching databases for images of people who looked like he might as an adult, and his identity was confirmed by a DNA test. The woman and her boyfriend, identified only by the surnames Tang and Hu, were caught and confessed to trafficking three boys, and have yet to stand trial Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie. Ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) general secretary Xi Jinping has reportedly ordered the vaccination of 78 percent of the population by the end of October. An activist in the central province of Henan has been hauled in for questioning by local police after he applied to stage a street protest over a forcible nationwide vaccination program that is reportedly being spearheaded by ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) general secretary Xi Jinping. Cheng Xiaofeng told RFA that he had applied to police to stage the demonstration in downtown Zhuzhou city, but that police had refused to take the paperwork he handed in, and summoned him for questioning instead. "Their attitude was extremely unfriendly and you could say arrogant," Cheng said. "The police officer just told me ... they wouldn't approve it." "I said that he should at least give me my application back in accordance with legal processes, and indicate that he received it, but he refused," Cheng said. He said according to Chinese law on demonstrations, the lack of a written reply from police is equivalent to approval. "We will be holding the demonstration as scheduled on Aug. 30," Cheng said. Official documents posted to local government websites in recent weeks have indicated that Xi Jinping has announced a target of 78 percent coverage of China's total population by the end of October, with at least 200 million doses administered across the country in the next two months. A July 19, 2021 announcement on the official website of the Nanchong municipal government in the southwestern province of Sichuan reads: "General secretary Xi Jinping personally reviewed the implementation plan for the coronavirus vaccination program in the second half of this year, and made the decision." Despite widespread public concerns over adverse reactions in vaccinated individuals, government departments were exhorted to "Strengthen guidance and propaganda work, organize experts to dispel people's doubts, and boost public willingness to be vaccinated." "The Party Central Committee and the State Council attach great importance to [this task]," it said. While the National Health Commission has said many times that China's vaccination program is purely voluntary, there are reports that local officials are using far more coercive measures to force vaccinations on people, so as to meet the targets laid down by central government. Pressure from local officials A video clip posted to social media showed a CCP village party secretary surnamed Liu arguing with local residents of Caizhuang village in Henan province, boasting that he would "rather kill 1,000 people by mistake than miss a single person out." The person who shot the clip, Zhang Jie, told RFA that he wanted an exemption for him and his wife on medical grounds, as both suffer from thrombosis. "But when I spoke to the hospital [about an exemption certificate], the doctor told me straight that they wouldn't issue one," Zhang said. Meanwhile, local officials contacted Zhang's wife's employer and told them to fire her if she refused to get the jab. The video clip was the result of his subsequent conversation about exemption with party secretary Liu. After it was posted, three police officers from nearby Shuanghe township visited Zhang's home and took him to the police station on suspicion of "spreading negative news" on Aug. 24, Zhang said. "They asked me to delete all the things I had posted from my mobile phone," Zhang said. Entry, access denied Zhang said that people without certification are now increasingly being denied entry to supermarkets and farmers' markets, as well as access to public transportation, with marks against their social credit record. "According to my understanding, a lot of people in China are not coming forward to be vaccinated because they lack confidence in Chinese-made vaccines, and are holding out in the hope of getting foreign-made vaccines," Hu Ping, editor-in-chief of the New York-based magazine Beijing Spring told RFA. "But the Chinese government has made getting everyone vaccinated a top-priority political task," Hu said. "Why didn't China's leaders come out and get the Chinese vaccine to demonstrate their confidence, like Taiwan [president] Tsai Ing-wen did with the Taiwan vaccine?" Cheng Xiaofeng said he wants to protest because Chinese-made vaccines were "launched in a hurry with no clinical trial data." "Some of my friends and classmates have had a high fever after being vaccinated, and it lasted nearly a month," Cheng said. "These are some of the side-effects of the vaccine, but the government has never made this public, as if people have no right to know these things." "The most shameful thing is that they make you fill out a form saying you are having it voluntarily," he said. Fellow Zhuzhou resident Chen Siming said the vaccination campaign is political propaganda designed to show how China's authoritarian political system can outperform that of the United States. "I would rather die from COVID-19 than get it," Chen said. "I am scared to death of the Chinese-made vaccines." Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie. Clashes have increased in Kayah, Kayin, and Kachin states in the last month and may worsen. Military troops and police go on patrol at Kayah state, Myanmar, May 23, 2021. Fighting between Myanmars military and ethnic armed groups has ticked up in August and will intensify in coming days as the junta sends reinforcements to rebel-held territories in the embattled states of Kayah, Kayin, and Kachin, ethnic leaders said Wednesday. The military seized power in a coup on Feb. 1, claiming that a landslide victory by the National League for Democracy (NLD) in the countrys November 2020 general election was the result of voter fraud. It has yet to provide evidence of its claims and has violently repressed widespread protests, killing 1,016 people and arresting 5,937 since the coup, according to the Bangkok-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP). Amid nationwide turmoil, the military has stepped up offensives in remote parts of the country, triggering fierce battles with local Peoples Defense Force (PDF) militias and some of the dozens of ethnic armies that control large swathes of territory along Myanmars periphery. The mobilization in border regions of the multi-ethnic country come days after the anti-junta National Unity Government (NUG) said it would set a date for a D-Day operation to oust the military regime in a popular uprising supported by a network of PDF militia groups and other allies. On Tuesday, a half-hour long clash between government troops and a combined force of Karenni National Defense Force (KNDF) and Karenni Army (KA) soldiers in Kayah states Loikaw township left seven troops dead and 10 injured, while only one KNDF soldier was wounded, KNDF spokesman Khun Thomas told RFAs Myanmar Service. Fighting is likely to continue in the coming days as more military units advance on villages east of Loikaw, the spokesman added. Wherever they plan to start an offensive, there will be fighting and people in nearby villages will have to flee to safety, he said. This is what we can say now but we cannot predict how many people will have to flee. There have been around 20 clashes between the military and Karenni coalition forces this month, Khun Thomas said, adding that six KNDF members have been wounded and none killed. The exact number of military casualties is unclear, he said. Residents of Loikaw told RFA that some 2,000 civilians from about 20 villages were displaced by Tuesdays clash. Meanwhile, in Kayin state, tensions has risen between the military and various divisions of the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), the military wing of the Karen National Union (KNU). The KNLAs 6th Brigade has been fighting with the military almost daily in Kawkareik township since Aug. 22. Dooplaya District Secretary Pado Saw Liston said at least five Myanmar soldiers were killed and two others wounded in clashes with the KNLAs 6th Brigade and two others were injured. The likelihood of more fighting depends on [the military], he said. We did not go out looking for them to start a fight. Fighting will continue if they enter our territory. I dont know what orders they have from their superiors. If they had been instructed to enter restricted areas, then there surely will be fighting. As a result of the clashes, more 1,000 civilians from eight villages between Kawkareik and Kyaikdon townships have fled to safety, KNLA 6th Brigade Doopla District officials said. Kachin clashes Similarly, in Kachin states Tanai township, daily clashes between the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and the military occurred between Aug. 21 and 24 near Nan Kham and Don Khun villages as the military advanced into KIA territory. KIA front-line sources said the military suffered some casualties during recent clashes. The KIA on Wednesday urged all parties to avoid war and find a solution to the current political crisis through dialogue. Colonel Naw Bu, the KIA information officer, told RFA on Tuesday that fighting is likely to intensify soon due to the increased activities of the military in Kachin state. The junta is slowly moving forward with their ordnance and supplies so after the monsoon season and the onset of winter, we might see more military operations, he said. Given the current situation, I think they are going to do something. On Wednesday, Naw Bu told the Irrawaddy online newspaper that the KIA wants to sit down with all parties, including the junta and the shadow National Unity Government. But he added that the ethnic army will not back down if the military attacks. Since Feb. 1, the KIA has clashed some 400 times with junta troops in Myitkyina, Shwegu and Hpakant, townships, KIA officials said. In Hpakant, the junta has shut down access to the internet since Aug. 20 and tightened security in the city, prompting a public outcry and rumors of an impending military offensive. Kaing Yin, a resident of Hpakant, said that since the internet outage, troops have been moving in large numbers in the city and people have begun to flee in anticipation of fighting, citing similar tactics by the military in other offensives. Attempts to contact the office of the juntas Ministry of Transport and Communications to learn the cause of the internet outage went unanswered Wednesday. New fighting expected Dr. Hla Kyaw Zaw, a China-based political analyst, said fighting will intensify in the near future as the rainy season draws to a close. Once the rains are over, there will be more fighting, he said. The junta will launch an offensive at this time of the year and the local people will have to pay the price. They will not win but the next one or two years will be difficult for the people. Political and military observers said fighting is likely to escalate as the junta deploys more troops to ethnic areas from urban centers where they were stationed to curtail anti-coup protests. RFAs calls to junta spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun went unanswered Wednesday. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in a statement on Aug. 17 that there are 205,260 internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Myanmar, most of whom are in Kayin, Kayah, Shan and Chin states. The number does not include the recent list of around 3,000 new refugees in Kayah and Kayin states. They join more than 500,000 refugees from decades of conflict between the military and ethnic armies who were already counted as IDPs at the end of 2020, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center, a Norwegian NGO. Reported by RFAs Myanmar Service. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Joshua Lipes. The Dalai Lama fled Tibet into exile in 1959 amid a failed Tibetan uprising against rule by China, which had annexed the formerly independent Himalayan country by force. Police in western Chinas Sichuan province arrested about 60 Tibetans found with photos of exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama this week, intensifying a campaign against possession of the banned images, Tibetan sources say. Taken into custody in Sundays raid in Dza Wonpo township in the Kardze (in Chinese, Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture were 19 monks from a local monastery and 40 laypeople whose homes were thoroughly searched by police, a Tibetan living in India told RFA. Those who were arrested are currently being held at the Sershul [Shiqu] county police station, RFAs source said, speaking on condition of anonymity and citing contacts in the region. Chinese police then called a meeting on Wednesday, three days later, telling local residents aged 18 and above they would penalized for failure to attend, the source said, adding, The focus of the meeting was to warn people not to keep any pictures of the Dalai Lama or to share any information over their cell phones. A second raid of houses in the township to find banned photos was then launched that same day, the source said. This weeks meeting and raids followed meetings earlier this year in Dza Wonpo in which Tibetans were forced to sign a document pledging not to keep or circulate photos of the Dalai Lama on penalty of criminal prosecution and cut-offs of state aid, according to Tibetan sources. Authorities also inspected a local old-age home on the pretext of cleaning the facility and confiscated a number of the banned photos, giving facility residents pictures of Chinas president Xi Jinping and other Chinese leaders to put up in their place, one source said. Already tightly restricted following widespread protests in Tibetan regions in 2008, Dza Wonpos local monastery drew increased police attention in 2012 when monks refused to host Chinese national flags on the monasterys roofs. Sporadic protests including the scattering of leaflets calling for Tibetan independence have continued in Dza Wonpo since then, with a monk named Tenzin Nyima, also called Tamey, dying in January of injuries sustained from beatings and torture in a Chinese prison after being released in a comatose state. Considered a separatist by Chinese leaders, the Dalai Lama fled Tibet into exile in India in the midst of a failed 1959 national uprising against rule by China, which marched into the formerly independent Himalayan country and annexed it by force in 1950. Chinese authorities maintain a tight grip on the region, restricting Tibetans political activities and peaceful expression of cultural and religious identity, and subjecting Tibetans to persecution, torture, imprisonment, and extrajudicial killings. Reported by Pema Ngodup for RFAs Tibetan Service. Translated by Tenzin Dickyi. Written in English by Richard Finney. The warning comes amid a drive to enforce the use of Chinese as the only language of classroom instruction for Tibetan students. Teachers and staff at the Gyalten School in Sichuan's Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture are shown in an undated photo. Authorities in a Tibetan-populated region of western Chinas Sichuan province are threatening to close a local school, saying it will be immediately shut down if it fails to provide classroom instruction exclusively in Chinese, Tibetan sources say. The Gyalten School, operating in the Tehor Dhargay Rongpa Tsal subdistrict of the Kardze (in Chinese, Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, was founded in 1994 by religious leader Tulku Gyalten Lobsang Jampa, a local source told RFA this week. And though the school was founded by a Tibetan lama, it does not operate as a private school. It is registered and administered under the Chinese government and runs like a government school, RFAs source said in a written message sent under condition of anonymity. And yes, I have heard about a notice sent to the school to change its medium of instruction to Chinese, the source said. Also speaking to RFA, a Tibetan living in India confirmed the threat to close the school, citing contacts in the Kardze region. And if the school refuses to implement the changes, the Chinese government has threatened to shut it down, the source said. Also beginning this school year, the annual entrance exams were all conducted in Chinese, the source added. The Gyalten School holds classes up through sixth grade where Tibetan, English, Chinese, math, science, and vocational training are taught as part of the curriculum, sources say. So far, 642 Tibetan students have graduated from the school. Tulku Gyalten Lobsang Jampa, the schools founder, also serves as vice-chair of the Buddhist Association of Sichuan and is a member of Chinas National Peoples Congress, the rubber-stamp parliament. Private schools already closed Authorities in Sichuan had already begun this year to close down private Tibetan schools offering classes taught in the Tibetan language, forcing students to go instead to government-run schools where they will be taught entirely in Chinese, sources told RFA in earlier reports. The move is being pushed in the name of providing uniformity in the use of textbooks and instructional materials, but parents of the affected children and other local Tibetans have expressed concern over the imposed requirements, saying that keeping young Tibetans away from their culture and language will have severe negative consequences for the future. Just under 1.5 million Tibetans live in historically Tibetan parts of western Sichuan province, according to Chinas 2010 census. Language rights have become a particular focus for Tibetan efforts to assert national identity in recent years, with informally organized language courses in the monasteries and towns deemed illegal associations and teachers subject to detention and arrest, sources say. Reported by Sangyal Kunchok for RFAs Tibetan Service. Translated by Tenzin Dickyi. Written in English by Richard Finney. A group of Uyghur elementary school students whose parents are incarcerated in internment camps or prison are being subjected to special political education classes in schools in northwestern Chinas Xinjiang, with some pupils developing serious emotional problems and getting poor grades, sources in the region said. Since early 2017, Chinese authorities an estimated 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) have been put into political reeducation camps that Beijing says conduct vocational training to combat extremism. Forty-two students at a primary school in Ghulja (in Chinese, Yining) county of the Ili Kazakh (Yili Hasake) Autonomous Prefecture, all of whose parents are in state custody, are undergoing different forms of political education, which has led to setbacks in their other studies, RFAs Uyghur Service has learned. The political education adds stress and depression to the already heavy suffering of children separated from what authorities refer to as severely punished parents, said a source outside the XUAR who is familiar with the current education system. Schools in the XUAR received notices to provide special political education to such pupils, as well as consolation to students whose parents had been given long sentences, the source said. The notice also advised educators take special care to prevent the students from developing antigovernment sentiments, said the source, who declined to be identified for security reasons. A principal in Ghulja county told RFA that his school has 42 students whose parents have been incarcerated and are receiving special political education as directed by higher authorities. A police officer who serves a neighborhood where more than 10 of the 42 children in the school live, said the political education program aims to ensure that they do not despise the Chinese Communist Party and the government. We gather them all together and give comfort to those who are crying, the officer said. We tell them not to worry a bit, that the government isnt going to do anything [bad], that it simply is going to educate people, she said. I call some of the students who have been badly affected by their family situations, especially those who parents have been harshly punished, to my office one by one each week, she told RFA when asked about the effect of indoctrination on the moods and academic performance of the pupils. Ive educated them, telling them that the law is a very just thing, that its not going to harm their parents, that [the parents] are going to return [to normal life], that they will be really great when they return, and that the government is doing great work, she said. By detaining them, the government prevents big trouble in the country. An official from the Ghulja County Department of Education declined to comment on political education for schoolchildren. Police patrol a street alongside a school in the city of Hotan in northwestern China's Xinjiang region, Aug. 30, 2018. Credit: AP Lifelong consequences The 2021 notice on special political education said that the current situation has put a lot of pressure on children because teachers have not been open with the students in an attempt to avoid making mistakes, said the source who had seen the directive. The political education sessions have stoked fear in some children, even when officials treat the children politely, because they are conducted by intimidating figures such as school political ethics advisors, neighborhood committee leaders, or village police, the source said. A political ethics advisor in Yarkand (Shache) county in Kashgar (Kashi) prefecture told RFA that children of severely punished parents are treated no differently than other children, with the exception of the political education. Six children whose parents had received heavy sentences were receiving special political education in her county, the advisor said. Were providing a very good education to these children, the political ethics advisor told RFA. We dont treat them differently. The children are all in the same classes. Uyghur activists in exile say they worry about possible lasting damage to students who undergo political education. The children and orphans separated from their parents will suffer lifelong psychological trauma, said Ilshat Hassan, director of China affairs at the Germany-based World Uyghur Congress. Children without parents will develop psychological handicaps, he told RFA. Its clear from the actions of the Chinese government that a generation of Uyghur children will grow up with psychological issues. Reported by Shohret Hoshur for RFAs Uyghur Service. Translated by the Uyghur Service. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin. Harris tells reporters the US will not shy away from 'difficult conversations,' before departing Vietnam after a two-day visit. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris in talks in Hanoi this week raised U.S. concerns over human rights abuses in Vietnam, where freedom of speech and political dissent is routinely suppressed, Harris said Thursday. Were not going to shy away from difficult conversations, Harris told reporters at a news conference before departing Vietnam after a two-day visit. Difficult conversations often must be had with the people that you may otherwise have a partnership with. And we do have a partnership with Vietnam in addition to concerns about human rights, Harris said. In talks with Vietnams leaders on Wednesday, Harris called for shared efforts to counter bullying by China in the South China Sea, keeping a focus on regional security on a visit in which she also unveiled new American efforts to help Hanoi fight the coronavirus. The Aug. 24-26 visit by Harris, the first U.S. Vice President to travel to Vietnam since the unification of the country under the Communist North in 1975, follows last months call on Hanoi by U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. Speaking in interviews with RFA, relatives of jailed Vietnamese dissidents and other rights activists welcomed Harriss statements of concern for those jailed in Vietnam for advocating greater freedom in the one-party communist state. I was very happy to learn that the U.S. vice president raised human rights issues with the Vietnamese government, said Tran Huynh Duy Tan, brother of jailed blogger Tran Huynh Duy Thuc, now serving a 16-year prison term for his online writings criticizing Vietnams government. If they release Thuc and other political prisoners, this will demonstrate that they respect human rights and the rule of law, and this will show that Vietnam is a reliable partner in the eye of the United States and other nations. We hope there will soon be a new signal about this from the Vietnamese government, he said. Vietnam-based rights activist Tran Bang told RFA that a wide number of activists, especially those with the loudest voices, had been jailed in Vietnam over the last two years. Those now in prison include Facebook users, independent journalists, and journalists for state-run publications whose personal views strayed from the Party line, he said. To sum up, the movement for democracy has been slowed down, he said. Expressions of concern in visits by earlier U.S. leaders, including President Obama and President Trump, had come to nothing, though, he said. In my opinion, the Vietnamese people have to fight for their own human rights, without depending on foreign leaders. According to the California-based Vietnam Human Rights Network, Vietnam is currently detaining around 300 political prisoners. Reported by RFAs Vietnamese Service. Translated by An Nguyen. Written in English by Richard Finney. Harris has used her Asia trip that began in Singapore to criticize Beijings aggressive posture in the South China Sea. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris (L) delivers remarks during the official launch of the CDC Southeast Asia Regional Office in Hanoi, Aug. 25, 2021. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris in talks with Vietnams leaders Wednesday called for shared efforts to counter bullying by China in the South China Sea, keeping a focus on regional security on a visit in which she unveiled new American efforts to help Hanoi fight the coronavirus. Harris has used her Asia trip that began in Singapore to criticize Beijings aggressive posture in the South China Sea and its refusal to respect an international judgement that rejected sweeping Chinese clams over the critical waterway. We need to find ways to pressure and raise the pressure, frankly, on Beijing to abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and to challenge its bullying and excessive maritime claims, Harris said, referring to the international treaty that sets nations rights and responsibilities in the worlds oceans. The U.S. vice presidents remarks at the start of her meeting in Hanoi with Vietnamese President Nguyen Xuan Phuc drew condemnation from Chinese state media, which accused Harris of trying to create a "chasm" between China and some of its southeastern neighbors. "Although U.S. officials have vowed to not force any country to choose sides between Washington and Beijing, they have done exactly the opposite," according to a named commentary in the English-language China Daily newspaper. "In particular, they have instigated some ASEAN member states to confront China over the South China Sea issue," wrote commentator Jia Chunyang. Jia said the real purpose of U.S. officials' visits to the region was "to drive a wedge between China and some ASEAN members using the South China Sea issue as a pretext." The two-day visit Harris, the first U.S. Vice President to travel to Vietnam since the unification of the country under the Communist North in 1975, follows last months call on Hanoi by U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. Both Biden administration officials in their Hanoi visits have worked to bolster ties with former foe Vietnam, helping the country of 98 million people fight the coronavirus pandemic, while courting strategic partners in Chinas backyard. Harris announced in Vietnam that the U.S. will donate another one million doses of Pfizers COVID vaccine following an earlier donation of five million doses to the Southeast Asian country. She also launched the new Southeast Asia regional office of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Hanoi. Civil society meeting Amid verbal sparring Tuesday between Harris and Chinese officials, Vietnam issued a statement stressing that "Vietnam does not align itself with one country against another, underscoring the delicacy of courting countries who want good economic ties with their giant neighbor even if they are wary of Beijing. "The vice president is framing her message in the same way that Secretary Austin did last month, as a positive agenda based on how the U.S. can work with partner nations in the region to deliver public goods, particularly in confronting Covid, supply chain issues, and security, said analyst Greg Poling of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. China is the subtext of some of that, but the administration understands that the region doesnt want to hear U.S. officials come to town and only talk about China, and that doing so could be counterproductive, he added. On Thursday, Harris wraps up her Vietnam visit with a meeting with civil society group members. Family members of some of the estimated 300 political prisoners in Vietnam, and large groups of overseas Vietnamese activists, civil society and religious groups have pressed the vice-president to raise the issue of human rights an area where Hanoi and Beijing have more in common with each other than with Washington. Both China and Vietnam are one-party Communist states that have allowed significant economic freedoms while keeping a tight grip on politics. Vietnam scores modestly higher in many international rankings of political and civil liberties, as well as press freedom, than China. But in a sign that Harris will face a tough audience for her appeals on rights, a court in Vietnams central province of Phu Yen sentenced a member of a Vietnamese exiled political group to 10 years in prison on charges of subversion, the second such case in two weeks. Ngo Cong Tru, 33, was arrested in February for using Facebook to contact and join the Provisional Government of Vietnam, a group the court said aims to eliminate the leadership of the Vietnamese Communist Party and overthrow the government. Reported by RFAs Vietnamese and Mandarin Services. Translated by Viet Ha and Luisetta Mudie. Written in English by Paul Eckert. Armenias National Security Service (NSS) says that dozens of Azerbaijani soldiers have blocked a road between two parts of Armenias southern region of Syunik after an alleged stabbing incident. The NSS said that the Karmrakar-Shurnukh section of the Goris-Kapan highway was closed at about 11 p.m. on August 25, with vehicles in the area being removed. It added that negotiations with the Azerbaijani side on the reopening of the road, which were reportedly conducted by Russian border guards deployed in the area as part of a peace accord, continued on August 26. Azerbaijan did not immediately comment on the accusation, but earlier in the day its Defense Ministry claimed that two Armenian soldiers attempted to stab an Azerbaijani border guard in the area. Armenia's Defense Ministry denied there was any incident, calling the statement a "sheer lie" and "more Azerbaijani disinformation." A 21-kilometer stretch of the road linking two Armenian towns, Goris and Kapan, was built in the Soviet times partly through the territory of Azerbaijan due to peculiarities of the local terrain. It created no problems during Soviet times when borders between Soviet republics were administrative. After the disintegration of the Soviet Union and a 1992-1994 war in the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh, the territory came under the full control of ethnic Armenians who declared their independence from Baku in the former autonomous region and expanded into some territories outside of Nagorno-Karabakh proper. Azerbaijani forces regained control of the territory as a result of last years war with Armenia. Under a Russian-brokered peace accord signed between Yerevan and Baku to end the conflict, the 21-kilometer section of the road will continue to be used by Armenians under the supervision of Russian border guards until Armenia can build an alternative road. Azerbaijani forces regained control of the territory as a result of last years war with Armenia that ended with a Russian-brokered cease-fire agreement signed between Yerevan and Baku to end the conflict. Eventually, an arrangement was made between Armenia and Russia that the 21-kilometer section of the road will continue to be used by Armenians under the control of Russian border-guards until Armenia can build another alternative road for all types of transportation that will connect two parts of the Syunik region, which is also vital for Armenia's connection with Iran. Ethnic Armenian separatists controlling parts of the region of Nagorno-Karabakh have detained an Azerbaijani soldier, whom Baku says escaped from a psychiatric clinic. The de facto prosecutor's office in the breakaway region said on August 26 that an Azerbaijani soldier identified as Camil Babayev was detained in an apartment in the city of Martakert. Babayev was charged with espionage, illegal border crossing, and threatening to kill residents of the apartment he was detained in. Azerbaijan's Defense Ministry said a probe had been launched against Babayev after he allegedly left a psychiatric clinic in the Azerbaijani city of Ganca without permission. Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan, but the territory came under the control of ethnic Armenians during a 1992-94 war. Azerbaijani forces regained control of parts of the territory and surrounding districts previously held by the separatists as a result of a 44-day war last autumn that ended with a Russian-brokered cease-fire agreement signed between Yerevan and Baku. Based on reporting by Armenpress, Interfax, and TASS Armenian media organizations have condemned authorities for removing journalists from a room reserved for the press in the National Assembly during brawls that took place among deputies this week. Current regulations say media representatives can only follow sessions from a room reserved for the press overlooking the chamber and enclosed by glass windows. Security guards entered the room and forced journalists to stop recording and leave when brawls broke out between pro-government and opposition lawmakers during sessions on August 24 and 25. Journalists and media organizations believe that such actions violate their rights and constitute an obstruction of the work of media, which is a criminal offense under Armenian law. Gevorg Tosunian, a reporter with the Civilnet news website, told RFE/RLs Armenian Service that security guards used force to remove the websites journalists from the room during the latest brawl even though Parliament Speaker Alen Simonian had not announced a break, meaning that the session was still in progress. They [security guards] gave no reasons for their actions, Tosunian said. Journalists with other news outlets, including RFE/RL's Armenian Service, were also asked to leave the room. Tosunian said the goal of the National Assembly leadership was probably to prevent the spread of video recordings of incidents inside the chamber. But he said only by seeing such scenes can the public know what is actually happening in the legislature. "This is our work environment. We are protected by the Law on Mass Media, just as we are protected by the Criminal Code, which clearly states that obstructing a journalists activities is already a crime," he said. Media organizations condemned the incidents, calling for an end to what they described as illegal restrictions and the harassment of journalists. Daniel Ioannisian, a representative of the Union of Informed Citizens, said the organization has appealed to the Prosecutor-Generals Office and will seek a criminal case. Videos of the brawls were disseminated by some former journalists who now serve as deputies, he said. "We have all seen all the details of all these incidents through live videos, videos made by deputies. In fact, the public has seen it, but in the meantime the legal professional activities of journalists have been hindered," Ioannisian said. Simonian acknowledged during a news briefing on August 25 that journalists should not have been removed from the balconies. With reporting by RFE/RL Armenian Service correspondent Nane Sahakian In 2020, 31-year-old Alyaksey Sanchuk joined a group of street drummers, part of a wave of mass protests over the presidential election in Belarus that was widely seen as rigged. He was arrested, charged with financing and organizing illegal protests, and sentenced to six years in prison. Sanchuk's wife says other demonstrators, some of whom have since fled Belarus, believe he was tortured in detention. SOFIA -- Bulgarian President Rumen Radev says he will give a third and last mandate to form a government to the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) after two other political parties gave up efforts to set up a coalition following last month's inconclusive vote. If a third attempt to build a majority in the fractured parliament fails -- as expected -- Radev will have to dissolve parliament, appoint an interim government, and call new polls within two months -- the third this year. The prolonged political uncertainty could hamper the European Union's poorest member state's ability to effectively deal with a fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic and tap the blocs multibillion-euro coronavirus recovery fund. In the July 11 elections, the BSP won 36 seats in Bulgaria's fragmented 240-member parliament -- behind the There Is Such A People (ITN) partys 65 seats and the center-right GERB partys 63 seats. The GERB party of former long-serving premier Boyko Borisov returned a mandate to the president on August 20, after the antiestablishment ITN party failed to form a minority government. Radev now has to ask a third party of his choosing to try to form a cabinet, but analysts say the chances anyone will be able to build a majority in parliament are very small. Many politicians are already considering holding this years third parliamentary elections together with the presidential polls. The dates have not been set yet, but many members of parliament suggest holding the general elections and the first round of the presidential vote on November 7, with a second round of voting for president on November 14. April general elections also resulted in a deadlocked parliament that failed to produce a government, forcing Radev to appoint a caretaker cabinet to lead the Balkan country until the July elections were held. The Russian LGBT Network says Daghestan native Ibragim Selimkhanov was abducted earlier this year in Moscow and forcibly brought to the North Caucasus region of Chechnya, where authorities pressed him for information on gay people in the region. The group said on August 25 that four Chechen-speaking men abducted Selimkhanov in mid-May in the Russian capital and brought him by plane to the Chechen capital, Grozny, where he was questioned regarding the Russian LGBT Network's associates who assist gays in the North Caucasus. Days after that, Chechen authorities handed Selimkhanov to his mother, who resides in Grozny. Selimkhanov was under permanent surveillance after that but managed to leave the region for Moscow, where he filed a complaint with police asking to find his abductors and bring them to justice. Rights groups have accused predominantly Muslim Chechnya of targeting sexual minorities, including the use of abductions, torture, and extrajudicial killings. Chechen authorities have rejected the accusations. With reporting by Mediazona TBILISI -- A court in Georgia has sent to pretrial detention five people from the South Caucasus nation's northeastern Pankisi Gorge region who are being held on terrorism charges. At a hearing behind closed doors on August 26, the Tbilisi City Court ruled that Magomed Machalikashvili, Yusuf Tsatiashvili, Gamza Bagakashvili, Ramaz Kavtarashvili, and Ramaz Margoshvili must remain in pretrial detention for at least two months. The five men, all ethnic Chechens, were detained two days earlier and charged with being involved in the activities of the Islamic State terrorist organization. All of the men have rejected the charges. Before the hearing, Georgia's State Security Service published videos showing the suspects taking an oath to an unidentified "Amir of Georgia" and Islamic State. Audio also was published, which the State Security Service claims reveals the suspects discussing plans to conduct a terrorist act in the country. Georgia's Pankisi Gorge region borders Russia's volatile region of Chechnya and is home to Muslims with ethnic ties to Chechens. Former inmates, their families, and human rights activists have long complained of mistreatment and torture at Evin prison, a notorious facility in Tehran that is a primary site for political detainees. Regular detainees, as well as surviving political prisoners and other perceived enemies of Iran's postrevolutionary regime, have alleged torture and other abuse inside its concrete walls to extract coerced confessions, sometimes televised, that are then used to condemn them publicly. Now, unprecedented hacked footage showing beatings and other harsh treatment of Evin detainees has forced Iranian officials into an equally unprecedented acknowledgement of their own: abuse happens at Evin. The embarrassing images come less than a month after the inauguration of a new hard-line president, Ebrahim Raisi, a former judiciary chief who has rejected rights lawyers' and others' claims of inmate abuse by saying prisoners are treated with "kindness and Islamic mercy." Released by a self-described group calling itself Edalat-e Ali (Ali's Justice), they appear to shatter such long-standing public denials. After some of the videos were published by RFE/RL's Radio Farda and other news outlets, the head of the Iranian Prisons Organization, Mohammad Mehdi Hajmohammadi, apologized and accepted responsibility for the unacceptable behavior at the prison. Judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei ordered an investigation into the treatment of prisoners at Evin. 'Tip Of The Iceberg' In one clip sent by Edalat-e Ali to RFE/RL and later posted on the groups social-media accounts, a guard beats a prisoner as the man cowers to protect his face. In another, an emaciated inmate is dragged helplessly through the prison. In another, a detainee appears to faint in an outdoor lot. Other images show an overcrowded cell with bunk beds stacked three high as more prisoners sleep lined up on the floor nearby. Several former prisoners have said that the released footage, which appears to have come from the prisons surveillance cameras, shows the public wards of the Evin prison rather than the section controlled by the feared intelligence branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), where prisoners are reportedly routinely subjected to physical and psychological torture. WATCH: Tehran Prison Abuse Revealed In Security Footage Leak Paris-based political activist Reza Alijani, who has been jailed several times in Iran, says the videos are just "the tip of the iceberg." The country's abuse of prisoners is "systematic," he says. Prisoners go through two stages: interrogations before their trial and then the jailing. In both stages, theyre faced with physical torture as well as 'white torture,' or solitary confinement, that subjects prisoners to psychological pressure. Alijani and others, including some families of prisoners, have said that watching the footage is painful. I have been held several years in different sections of this prison. Seeing these scenes awakens an old pain, but it also gives me slim hope that these videos, and I hope more will be released, particularly from interrogation rooms, might act as a speed bump against the violent methods used in prison, Alijani told RFE/RL. Jason Rezaian, a Washington Post columnist who was held in Evin prison from July 2014 to January 2016, wrote that he had heard accounts of ill-treatment of inmates. Though I spent my entire captivity in an isolated wing of the prison, including a long stretch in solitary confinement -- which itself is considered a form of torture based on international norms -- through my limited interactions with other prisoners and guards, I heard much about the unjust and inhumane conditions of the prisons public wards. Former political prisoner and rights activist Shiva Nazar Ahari told Radio Farda that the scenes in the leaked videos are familiar to Evin's former inmates. We were held in sections controlled by security entities, but the images are very familiar to those of us who were in that [facility], when we were taken to the court or to the yard or the clinic, we would see similar scenes, prison guards engaged in inhumane and illegal behavior toward the prisoners, including beating them. Nazar Ahari said the videos provide evidence for those seeking greater respect for human rights, justice, and an end to a culture of impunity. There have been numerous reports and accounts of abuse in prison, but the fact that it has been documented and everyone can access them and see for themselves is very positive -- its an exceptional opportunity for rights groups, she said. International rights watchdog Amnesty International called the leak of the videos "showing appalling abuse of prisoners" a "rare glimpse" of such violence in Iran and "a chilling reminder of the impunity granted to prison officials in Iran who subject those in their custody to torture and other cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment." Amnesty's regional director, Heba Moreyef, agreed that while "it is shocking to see what goes on inside the walls of Evin prison...sadly the abuse depicted in these leaked video clips is just the tip of the iceberg of Iran's torture epidemic." Some of the released footage appeared to come from earlier this year when Raisi, who is accused of involvement in a months-long campaign of state-sponsored executions of political prisoners in 1988, was still head of the powerful Judiciary. In a February speech ahead of his June election against a heavily vetted field of contenders, Raisi boasted that prisoners in Iran are treated with kindness and Islamic compassion" Systemic Torture Now president following his inauguration last month, Raisi hasnt publicly reacted to the leaked Evin videos. Alijani said he believes the footage is unlikely to bring significant change to the system. I dont think it would have any impact from the top, because Irans judicial and security system is based on fear and torture. But the leak makes their work harder, he said. Abdollah Ganji, the editor of the IRGC-affiliated Javan daily, said on Twitter that some of the released images are neither defensible nor forgivable." He said the Judiciary chief should put an experienced team in charge of the investigation and make its findings public. The images and videos may have been [doctored], he added, saying it was necessary to publish the results of the investigation. The conservative Jomhuri-e Eslami daily said those involved in the prison abuse should be punished as soon as possible to prevent Iran's Islamic establishment from being further targeted by its opponents. Public opinion should know what is going on in prisons and what all the violence is for, the daily wrote this week. The U.S. State Department's office for human rights and democracy said via Twitter that the leaked footage "confirms what we have long known: torture is systemic in Iranian prisons." "We call on Iran to release all political prisoners and to treat all prisoners with dignity," it said in the statement, retweeted by U.S. special envoy for Iran Robert Malley. Numerous intellectuals, academics, lawyers, rights activists, and dual nationals have been held at Evin in the years since Iran's 1979 revolution. The facility has been nicknamed "Evin University" because of the number of intellectuals it has housed in the subsequent decades. Evin was originally built by the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and run by his notoriously brutal security and intelligence service, known as SAVAK. Radio Farda broadcaster Parvaneh Vahidmanesh contributed to this report The Moscow City Court has refused to consider a request filed by former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, who was convicted in Russia on espionage charges that he denies, to transfer him home to serve the remainder of his sentence there. Whelan's lawyers, Olga Karlova and Vladimir Zherebenkov, said on August 26 that the court informed them that their clients request must be heard by the Supreme Court of the Republic of Mordovia, where Whelan is currently serving his term. Whelan was arrested in Moscow in December 2018 on espionage charges and sentenced to 16 years in prison in May 2020 following a trial that was condemned by the United States as a "mockery of justice." A holder of U.S., Canadian, British, and Irish passports, Whelan has rejected the espionage charges and has accused his prison guards of mistreatment. The United States has criticized the Russian authorities for their "shameful treatment" of Whelan. Whelan was head of global security at a U.S. auto-parts supplier when he was arrested. He and his relatives insist he visited Russia to attend a wedding. He is one of several Americans to face trial in Russia in recent years on charges that their families, supporters, and in some cases the U.S. government, have said are trumped up. Another former U.S. Marine, Trevor Reed, is serving a nine-year prison term in Mordovia as well. He was sentenced in July 2020 on charges of assaulting two Russian police officers. The U.S. government and Reed deny the allegations and questioned the fairness of his judicial proceedings. Reports have surfaced several times of a possible swap involving Whelan, Reed, and two Russians -- arms dealer Viktor Bout and drug smuggler Konstantin Yaroshenko -- who are serving lengthy sentences in U.S. prisons. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Yevgeny Ivanov said on August 25 that Washington's unspecified "unconstructive" position makes a prisoner swap unlikely. With reporting by TASS and Interfax Poland has accused the Belarusian authorities of not allowing humanitarian assistance to be delivered to a group of about 30 migrants stranded on the border between the two countries. Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on August 26 that Poland has dispatched humanitarian aid by road that Belarus has so far refused to accept. "We are appealing again. We are trying to ensure that we receive their consent," Morawiecki said, insisting that the migrants were on the Belarusian side of the border. Polish and Belarusian border guards have been keeping the group of migrants, mostly from Afghanistan and Iraq, trapped in a small area on the border, as both countries avoid responsibility for them. In recent months, thousands of migrants, many from Iraq and Afghanistan, have illegally crossed from Belarus into Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland. Belarusian authorities have allegedly funneled migrants across the EU border, which Minsk has denied, in what EU officials called a "hybrid attack" on the bloc in retaliation for sanctions over authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenkas crackdown on the country's pro-democracy movement following a disputed presidential election in August 2020. On August 26, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Gniezno, Wojciech Polak, appealed to Polands politicians to work together to find a solution, saying: "No human being, regardless of religious affiliation and origin, should be an instrument in a political fight." Polish officials insist that the migrants will not be allowed into Poland, saying it would encourage further illegal migration and would play into the Belarusian governments hands. Based on reporting by AFP and dpa Bone-chilling winter temperatures. Sub-Arctic taiga forests as far as the eye can see. Blinding clouds of mosquitos. Vast deposits of diamonds, gold, and other minerals. Add to the list of qualities for the vast Siberian region known as Yakutia: home to the worlds largest wildfires this year. In the United States, the largest blaze wreaking havoc this season is in California, the so-called Dixie Fire, and is currently burning nearly 3,000 square kilometers -- about the size of Luxembourg. In Yakutia, the total area of the fires scorching the taiga this season are 10 times that. But there's more: according to the environmental group Greenpeace on August 16, more than 170,000 square kilometers have burned across Russia this year -- making the 2021 fires the worst in a decade, and possibly ever. That's an area about the size of the U.S. state of Florida. And the fire season still has weeks to go. How Big Are They? As of this writing, there are nearly 300 wildfires reportedly burning across Russia; the worst -- in terms of area and population affected -- are in Yakutia, a region roughly the size of Argentina. With about 40 percent of its territory located above the Arctic Circle, the region, officially known as the Sakha Republic, is known for wide swings in seasonal temperatures, from body-numbing winter cold to oppressive summer heat. Much of the territory is covered with dense taiga: heavy, wet coniferous forests interspersed with boggy permafrost whose warming temperatures pose a distinct threat of their own (more on that later). Home to giant mosquitos, the forests are vast and largely uninhabited -- and prone to burning during the annual fire season. This year is different. As of August 24, according to the regional Emergency Situations Ministry, around 1,300 square kilometers were currently burning. Thats an improvement by about half from early July, when a blanket of smoke prompted officials to advise the roughly 300,000 residents of the regional capital, Yakutsk, to place damp towels around windows and doors to minimize smoke seeping in and to wear masks when walking outdoors. Some 3,800 kilometers to the west, near the Ural Mountain city of Yekaterinburg, a fire sent plumes of smokes and flames soaring over a major highway, halting traffic. Fires have also been raging in the northwestern region of Karelia, across the central Volga region, and elsewhere. The smoke from the Yakutia fires was so extensive that researchers recorded -- for the first time ever -- smoke reaching as far as the North Pole. Is This About Climate Change? Yes. Northern Siberia has seen unusually high summer temperatures over the past couple years. 2020 was particularly brutal, with temperatures showing monthly averages more than 10 degrees Celsius above the average for the 29-year period from 19812010. That June, the Arctic Circle town of Verkhoyansk, about 675 kilometers north of Yakutsk, reported the highest-ever temperature recorded in the Arctic: 38.2 degrees Celsius. In a report released this month on changing climate worldwide, the American Meteorological Society said the increased Arctic and Siberian temperatures in 2020 were very large positive temperature anomalies. In eastern Siberia, a widespread dry anomaly was observed in the region that experienced massive wildfires and a record heat wave, the report said. A multinational group of scientists concluded, in an article published in June in the journal Climate Change, that the prolonged heat in Siberia would have been almost impossible without human-induced climate change. That conclusion, and its effects on this years fires in Yakutia, was endorsed by Sakha Republic head Aisen Nikolayev. The region faced "the driest and hottest summer since the late 19th century," he said in a televised interview on July 21. The word 'unprecedented' is often used this year, mainly in connection with the recent report on climate change, Grigory Kuksin, head of the wildfires section of the Russian branch of Greenpeace, said in a statement. Of course, fires and climate are interrelated things. The unprecedented areas of fire are partly the result of climate change, and partly the fires themselves are driving climate change." What Does The Kremlin Say? For years, the Kremlin has downplayed the findings of climate science and the looming dangers of climate change. In 2018, at an international business forum in Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin questioned the science behind human-induced climate change. He suggested instead it might be explained by changes of global character, cosmic changes, some invisible moves in the galaxy. In addition, the Kremlin has made it a point of playing up the possible positive impact on, in particular, Russias once ice-bound Arctic regions. Melting ice means more access to shipping lanes and makes it easier to search for oil, gas, and other minerals, on land and on the seafloor. Some officials have also predicted that as forests retreat northward in the face of a shifting climate and permafrost becomes arable land, the countrys agricultural output could increase. Still, Putin's rhetoric has begun to shift. At a video conference last month with top officials, Putin specifically focused on the growing number of natural disasters Russia has seen this year. "All this is largely connected to climate change -- both global and in our country," he was quoted as saying. A week later, he highlighted the Siberian wildfires, calling them unprecedented." He also focused on unusual flooding that has affected a swath of southern Siberia, even briefly closing a bridge crossed by the Trans-Siberian Railway. Russian officials have also begun warning of the dangers to Arctic infrastructure as the permafrost melts, including the risk of oil pipelines rupturing or apartment buildings cracking as their foundations sink. During this years annual Direct Line call-in show, when average Russians are able to ask ostensibly uncensored questions of Putin, the Russian president gave one of his clearest statements to date about climate change science. This is one of the most urgent and most debated topics related to climate change and global warming, he said. Many believe, with good reason, that it is connected primarily to human activity, to emissions of pollutants into the atmosphere, mostly carbon dioxide. It may be right or wrong, but we must certainly do our best to minimize our contribution to the developments in the global sphere, including in the universe in general, he said. Russia in 2019 signed the Paris Climate accord, but experts have said Moscow's goal of reducing greenhouse-gas emissions to 30 percent of 1990 levels by 2030 was "critically insufficient." On the question of wildfires, there are more immediate steps the Kremlin, and local governments, should take, environmental groups say. That includes revisiting what many have called the disastrous decision to disband the federal aviation network for spotting fires and to shift its planes and other assets to regional authorities instead. It is necessary to take measures to strengthen forest protection, develop the movement of voluntary forest firefighters, eliminate the practice associated with burning from agriculture and forestry, develop a system of reliable accounting of all types of fires, significantly ease the bureaucratic burden on foresters, which takes time from the real work in the forest and firefighting, Greenpeace said. Wait. It Gets Worse? Some reports have estimated that the Yakutia fires may have already released nearly 800 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The risks of bigger, hotter, wilder wildfires -- and more frequent droughts or floods -- are the most tangible dangers forecast for Russia if the global climate continues to heat unabated. Theres also a potential significant tipping point if permafrost warms quickly and widely. According to a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the United Nations organization for assessing the science related to climate change, permafrost in Russia and other Arctic regions could stop freezing altogether by 2050, resulting in a major release of carbon and methane with the potential to exacerbate climate change. While carbon dioxide is a problem, methane is far more potent and worrisome to scientists. The European Commission climate monitoring agency, the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service, estimated that in 2020, a record 540 million metric tons of carbon dioxide was released by the fires across Siberia and other Arctic regions. And the idea that a warming climate will be an unequivocal boost for Russian agriculture, with more arable land available for farming? The flipside of that could be more frequent and more damaging droughts in Russias traditional breadbasket regions that could reduce harvests for staple grains like wheat and corn. And crop-damaging pests will become an increasingly serious problem in regions where forests are retreating and farmers clear land for planting. Uzbekistan's Supreme Court has exonerated 115 people convicted in the 1920s and 1930s by the Soviet regime for taking part in the Basmachi (Raiders) movement, which fiercely fought against Russian and Soviet forces. The Supreme Court announced its decision to exonerate the men, many of whom were sentenced to death and others sent to prison for many years, on August 25. According to the statement, the exonerated people had been recognized as victims of Soviet repressions by a special commission established in accordance with a 2020 order by President Shavkat Mirziyoev. The case materials revealed that the men were sentenced by troikas of the Soviet OGPU (Joint State Political Directorate), the predecessor to the Soviet KGB. The victims' cases were officially accepted by the Supreme Court for review in February. The Basmachi movement, which emerged during World War I in Central Asia, was eradicated by the Soviets by the late 1920s. However, clashes between Soviet armed forces and remaining Basmachi rebels along the border with Afghanistan continued until the early 1930s. Estonian President Kersti Kaljulaid traveled to Ukraine to participate in the first summit of the Crimea Platform, an initiative of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy aimed at creating a coalition of countries to support the reversal of Russia's annexation and occupation of the Crimean Peninsula and addressing other related issues. President Kaljulaid discussed the initiative in an exclusive interview with RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service correspondent, Olena Removska, in Kyiv on August 24. She spoke about the Crimea Platform initiative and 'windows of opportunity' for Ukraine. ALMATY, Kazakhstan -- An ethnic Kazakh man from China's northwestern region of Xinjiang has received a certificate confirming his Kazakh citizenship after serving 16 years in Chinese custody. The Almaty regional migration service handed the citizenship certificate to 58-year-old Raqyzhan Zeinolla on August 25, his wife Farida Qabylbek told RFE/RL. Qabylbek said her husband was happy to get the certificate but cannot talk to journalists as he signed a gag order while in custody in China saying that he will not talk to the press about his incarceration there. Zeinolla moved to Kazakhstan via the Central Asian nation's special program to relocate ethnic Kazakhs to the country in the late 1990s. In 2003, he applied for Kazakh citizenship and a year later he was informed that it had been granted. However, before receiving his citizenship certificate, Zeinolla decided to visit relatives in his native Xinjiang. He was arrested there on espionage charges and sentenced to 13 years in prison. After serving his full sentence, Zeinolla was re-arrested in 2018 and sent to a "political reeducation camp" for 18 months amid a crackdown by Beijing on the mostly Muslim indigenous population of Xinjiang. He finally returned to to Kazakhstan in April. Qabylbek, along with dozens of people, rallied near the Chinese Consulate in Almaty for many months before her husband was allowed to return to Kazakhstan. In recent years, many similar protests have taken place in Kazakhstan with demonstrators demanding that Kazakh authorities officially intervene in the situation faced by ethnic Kazakhs in Xinjiang. The U.S. State Department has said that as many as 2 million Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and members of Xinjiang's other indigenous, mostly Muslim ethnic groups have been taken to detention centers. China denies that the facilities are internment camps, but people who have fled the province say people from the groups are undergoing "political indoctrination" at a network of facilities officially referred to as reeducation camps. Kazakhs are the second-largest Turkic-speaking indigenous community in Xinjiang after Uyghurs. The region is also home to ethnic Kyrgyz, Tajiks, and Hui, also known as Dungans. Han, China's largest ethnicity, is the second-largest community in Xinjiang. URI is allowing the library to temporarily continue using four of the six available parking spaces the library has traditionally used for its patrons. Photo courtesy of Ocean State Libraries. MARION Crawford Marion Board Of Alcohol Drug Addiction & Mental Health is one of seven Ohio agencies that will receive $125,000 in grant funding, according to a press release issued Wednesday night by U.S. Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio). Portman (R-OH) announced the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) awarded $875,000 grant funding for Drug-Free Community (DFC) Programs throughout Ohio. The Drug-Free Communities program is a proven, evidence-based, and community-oriented program that reduces substance abuse among our nations youth," Portman said. "I authored this legislation more than 20 years ago during my time in the House of Representatives, and it remains today the most effective program for consistently reducing youth drug use. "The COVID-19 pandemic had made our efforts to combat addiction much more difficult and this additional federal funding for Ohio will make a big difference. The programs in Ohio that will receive $125,000 grants include: Crawford Marion Board Of Alcohol Drug Addiction & Mental Health Knox Public Health Family Recovery Center, Inc., Lisbon, OH Mckinley Hall, Springfield, OH Swanton Area Community Coalition Alcoholism Council Of Butler County, OH, Inc. Greater Cincinnati Behavioral Health Services I have seen firsthand that prevention is a powerful tool to counteract drug use in our community, and this funding will help these coalitions across the state, along with other coordinated local efforts with local partners, to save lives," Portman said. "This pandemic is making their efforts to help those struggling with addiction more difficult, and Im committed to doing everything I can to help ensure they have the resources and support they need to serve those in need during these unprecedented times. In 1997, Portman authored the Drug-Free Communities Act, which supports evidence-based, community-oriented drug prevention programs. The Drug-Free Communities Act is designed to be optimally effective and accountable by capping the amount spent on administrative and overhead expenses, requiring all coalitions that receive grants to have experience in drug abuse prevention, and matching federal funding with local funds. No other drug prevention program has achieved the same reduction in youth drug use that has been achieved consistently by the DFC program. Earlier this year, Portman introduced the Drug-Free Communities Pandemic Relief Act to provide flexibility to DFC coalitions during this pandemic by temporarily granting ONDCP the authority to waive the programs local matching requirements if the grantee is unable to meet them due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. MANSFIELD -- The military presence at Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport will move ahead by a century when a new cyber warfare wing begins its new mission, officials said Thursday. The announcement late Wednesday by the U.S. Air Force that it had selected the local base to host a new Ohio Air National Guard Information Warfare (Cyber) Wing means the end of a seven-decade local flying mission. That mission began in 1948 with fighter planes and will end with aging C-130H transport aircraft for the 179th Airlift Wing, which are scheduled to be completely divested by Sept. 30, 2022. But the decision helps guarantee a military future in north central Ohio, according to U.S. Rep. Troy Balderson, who has worked to help land the new mission. "I was ecstatic to receive the phone call from Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall (Wednesday) congratulating us on the department's decision to name Mansfield as its preferred location for the new Cyber Warfare Wing," said Balderson, a Republican from Zanesville whose 12th District includes most of Richland County. "The Cyber Wing will launch Mansfield and Ohio to the forefront of our nation's 21st century defense capabilities," Balderson said Thursday. Balderson said the IWW is expected to bring 175 new jobs for airmen and associated support jobs. An environmental analysis of the base is expected to be completed this fall. New equipment associated with the new mission is expected to arrive in the fall of 2022. Initial mission readiness is expected by 2024 and full operational capacity by 2027. According to a 2020 Air Force magazine article, an IWW brings together experts in intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance; electronic warfare; cyber; information operations; and public affairs. The article said such units help tackle overarching problems in the cyber realm, including U.S. election security, protecting air defenses, and rooting out malignant influences on networks. Col. Todd Thomas, the 179th commander announced Thursday he was confident in the ability of local airmen to meet the new challenge. "The announcement ... sets the stage for the journey towards a mission-capable cyber wing. I have high expectations for this new capability and see this as a long-term win for the wing, Mansfield, Ohio and the nation," Thomas said. The colonel said it's important to acknowledge it will be a difficult transition for the "passionate aviation community" that helped shape the local military heritage and culture. "Since becoming the wing commander, I have always told our airmen we must do everything in our ability to 'keep the front gate open' and flex to whatever mission allows us to be viable well into the future and aligns with the national defense strategy," Thomas said. "I am extremely confident our airmen are capable of shifting focus from tactical air-land and air-drop operations to the cyber battlefield. I look forward to what our airmen will bring to the cyber fight," Thomas said. The move is contingent on Congressional approval to "retire" the eight C-130 aircraft in Mansfield as part of the 2022 Defense Authorization Act. The Air Force has made clear its plan to reduce the number of C-130s in its fleet from more than 300 down to about 255. The active-duty Air Force uses only newer "J" model aircraft. In November 2020, the Air Force announced Mansfield was one of two national sites selected as possible locations for the new IWW with Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in Minnesota as the other. During a visit to Mansfield in July, Balderson said he was "optimistic" Mansfield would be the choice. Though no final decision had been made at that time for the flying mission, the conversation had shifted in recent weeks to converting Mansfield into the new cyber unit. "What better time to talk about cyber security than now, as (the United States) has been hit with (cyber attacks) four times in the last two months?" Balderson asked. "The generals are on board with this and I think that is hugely important. The community is on board with this," Balderson said in July. 'We see a path (forward) there. There was some competition (with Minneapolis), but that competition has somewhat declined. I won't say it's all gone, but I am very optimistic," Balderson said then. Also on Thursday, U.S. Rep. Mike Turner (R-Dayton), a member of the House Armed Services Committee, hailed the Air Force decision to bring the new mission to Mansfield, praising the work of Balderson, Gov. Mike DeWine and Sens. Rob Portman and Sherrod Brown. "The reinvestment into the Mansfield base will create more jobs for Ohioans and bring the base into the 21st century while reinforcing Ohio as a leader in national security," said Turner, who visited the 179th in 2019. MANSFIELD Governor Mike DeWine applauded the U.S. Air Force's announcement Wednesday that the Mansfield Air National Guard Base, home of the 179th Airlift Wing, has been selected as the preferred site for the Air National Guard's first Cyber Warfare Wing. "I spoke directly with the Secretary of the Air Force today who gave me this outstanding news," said Governor DeWine. "Ohio is gaining a leading-edge mission that will strengthen the fabric of the military community and further solidify Ohio as a national leader in cybersecurity excellence. Not only will this new mission bring more jobs into the community, but it will also spur more economic growth and create new opportunities for industry and academic growth. "This is a tremendous win for Mansfield and for the entire state." The new cybersecurity mission in Mansfield will bring an additional 175 positions that are STEM and IT focused and will bolster Ohios efforts to gain a competitive advantage in the workforce by attracting in-demand cybersecurity jobs. This selection will build on the 179th Airlift Wings legacy of excellence to begin a new chapter in the cyber warfare domain, said Maj. Gen. John C. Harris Jr., Ohio adjutant general. The transition to a cyber wing places the Ohio National Guard at the forefront of leveraging cutting edge technologies and capabilities for national defense and mitigating emerging threats. Ohio was one of two locations under consideration, with the other being the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in Minnesota. Among the criteria considered in the decision were manpower, recruiting, and retention; building capacity and connectivity; environmental; construction costs; and cost of living. Partners involved in promoting Mansfield as the prime location for this mission include Ohio's Congressional delegation, as well as JobsOhio, the Mansfield Military Affairs Committee, the Richland Area Chamber & Economic Development, Team NEO, and many other local, state, and federal officials. The U.S. Air National Guard cyber warfare wing in Mansfield will advance our countrys 21st Century warfare capability while attracting new in-demand cybersecurity positions and talent to Ohio, said JobsOhio President & CEO J.P. Nauseef. This new mission amplifies Ohios leading position as Americas most military-friendly state that can also advance our nations militarys fight against emerging cyber threats. Ohio is all in! The Air Force has not yet announced a timeline for the new mission, however the next step is expected to be an environmental assessment of the site. The DeWine-Husted Administration has made the sustainment and growth of Ohios military bases and their missions a priority for Ohio. In 2019, DeWine named retired Air force Colonel Joseph E. Zeis Jr. to serve as the first Senior Advisor for Aerospace and Defense, a new, cabinet-level position. That same year, JobsOhio announced the establishment of military and federal as a new industry sector. Community collaboration was essential for attracting the mission, working with the federal delegation and community leaders in Mansfield. The 179th Airlift Wing has a long and distinguished history that includes that includes the Air Force Outstanding Unit Award; the Alan P. Tappan Memorial Trophy, which designates the outstanding Air National Guard unit in the State of Ohio; and the Rusty Metcalf Award, which acknowledges the unit as one of the best in the entire Air Force. U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) also applauded the announcement for his home town. Mansfield Lahm Air National Guard Base is the pride of Richland County, Brown said. Placing the new cyber warfare mission in Mansfield will help Ohioans perform critical missions to support the warfighter and will expand the strategic capabilities of the servicemembers at the base, who protect and serve their country with pride. In 2018, Brown secured $13 million in military construction funding to replace the fire station at Mansfield Lahm Air National Guard Base. In 2017, in meetings with then-Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis and then-Air Force Secretary Dr. Heather Wilson, Brown pressed for upgrades to the C-130H planes flown at Mansfield Lahm ANGB. As a result of the new cyber mission, the Air Force will divest the eight C-130Hs flown at Mansfield. Senator Brown will continue to support the Airmen serving at the base and will advocate for additional resources to support the new operational mission. MANSFIELD -- The Richland County Sheriff's Office will have an extra set of eyes in the sky for the next year. County commissioners on Thursday approved a $24,600, one-year lease with LiveView Technologies for a mobile camera system that can extend 22 feet into the air. Sheriff Steve Sheldon and Capt. Jim Sweat told commissioners the RCSO has been using the technology on a trial basis, including the Ontario 4th of July Festival, the Shiloh Ox Roast and the recently concluded Richland County Fair. "It's a great camera for security, mainly for events," Sheldon said, adding it would be shared with all law enforcement agencies and fire departments in the county. "We think it's a huge benefit for law enforcement and fire departments and medical people to better protect the citizens of the county," Sheldon said. Sweat told commissioners the system has three cameras, two of which are thermal. The system relies on wi-fi and each camera can be operated independently and remotely. The move comes one month after commissioners approved the RCSO purchase of a new $19,997 drone. Sweat said the sheriff's contractual services budget has funds to cover the camera system lease. "We are not coming here today asking for more money," the captain said. Sweat said he believes the camera system made a difference at the county fair. "The south gate has notoriously been an area where we have problems," Sweat said, "from people trying to get in without paying and fights at the end of the evening. We had none of those issues this year and I think it's the fact people know they are being recorded." In another usage example, Sweat said, the system could be set up in an area where car break-ins are occurring and provide surveillance video that could be used as evidence if it records suspects. "This is a great force multiplier," Sweat said. "It can be reviewed from anywhere that has internet access. We would like to try it for a year." Also on Thursday, commissioners approved a three-year contract with 20.5 Clerk of Courts employees represented by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. The contract, beginning Oct. 1, sets new starting wages for the department's three classifications of workers and also has a 75-cent per hour pay increase for the first year and 3 percent increases in the second and third years. The unanimous vote came after an executive session with Clerk of Courts Lin Frary and county human resources director Kelly Christiansen. MANSFIELD -- Two Mansfield police officers involved in a fatal shooting of a suspect armed with a knife on July 29 will return to work on Friday, according to police Chief Keith Porch. "The Mansfield Division of Police has completed an initial administrative review of the officer-involved shooting at 300 Wood St., Apt. A8," the chief said. "Effective (Friday), Officer Mark Boggs and Officer Clay Blair will be reinstated to full duty," Porch said. The chief said the primary investigation being conducted by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation is still pending. "Once BCI's independent investigation is completed, it will be presented to the Richland County Prosecutor's Office for review," Porch said. Steve Irwin, a spokesman for the state Attorney General, said Thursday the BCI probe "remains active and ongoing." The officers shot a 39-year-old man suspected of stabbing a 31-year-old man inside the apartment. The suspect later died at OhioHealth Mansfield Hospital. The victim survived the attack, which included multiple stab wounds. Neither officer were injured in the incident, according to the chief, who said it was the first officer-involved shooting for either man. Boggs joined the MPD in 2016 and Blair in 2019. A copy of police radio traffic released by MPD indicated the victim was stabbed in the chest and the suspect had multiple gunshot wounds. According to Porch, officers were dispatched to the apartment complex at at 5:28 p.m. after an abandoned 9-1-1 call. The two officers heard someone yelling for help and encountered a man with a knife outside an apartment. The chief said the officers told the suspect to drop the knife, an order he refused as he advanced towards the apartment window that he began to break out. Porch said one of the officers used a Taser, which had no effect on the suspect. "The suspect then began to enter the apartment through the broken window, while still armed with the knife, all while a victim was still yelling for help inside," the chief said. He said officers fired their guns at the suspect as he was re-entering the apartment. The chief said he didn't know if the suspect was hit during the initial gunfire. "Officers then forced entry into the apartment at which time the suspect again confronted the officers with a knife, resulting in the officers having to fire their weapons, striking the suspect," Porch said. One of the officers reported "shots fired" at 5:39 p.m. Both the stabbing suspect and victim were transported to the hospital. Yes! I got it as soon as possible Yes, but only so I could take my mask off Not yet, but I plan to No. I have no plan to get vaccinated Vote View Results Written By Joe Schulz served as the reporter of the Green Laker in 2019 and 2020, before being hired as a reporter for the Commonwealth in October 2020. He is from Oshkosh and graduated from UW-Oshkosh in December with a bachelor's degree in journalism. | Rocky Mount, NC (27804) Today Scattered thunderstorms early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Low 66F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Low 66F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%. Rocky Mount, NC (27804) Today Cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy after midnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 66F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy after midnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 66F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. A judicial decision from Spain has put a halt on an alternative plan to build a giant telescope in the Canary Islands instead of a preferred site in Hawaii where it faces opposition from Native Hawaiians Roanoke Rapids, NC (27870) Today Partly to mostly cloudy skies with scattered thunderstorms during the evening. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Partly to mostly cloudy skies with scattered thunderstorms during the evening. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%. Roanoke Rapids, NC (27870) Today Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Partly cloudy skies after midnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Partly cloudy skies after midnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%. Rutland, VT (05701) Today Rain. Low 54F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall around a half an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible.. Tonight Rain. Low 54F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall around a half an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible. Rutland, VT (05701) Today Rain. Low 54F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible.. Tonight Rain. Low 54F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch. Locally heavy rainfall possible. Danvers, MA (01923) Today Periods of rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Low around 60F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Periods of rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Low around 60F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. Danvers, MA (01923) Today A steady rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Low 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight A steady rain. The rain will be heavy at times. Low 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Localized flooding is expected. As a small business owner, you may or may not need a physical space. Some people can do all of their work remotely. However, many other businesses require a storefront, storage space, or other brick-and-mortar location. Unfortunately, rent is one of your biggest fixed costs as a small business. The good news is that there are ways to get free rent for your business. Get Free Rent for Your Business Before Youve Signed The Lease The Business Journals explains that the best time to negotiate for free rent is before youve signed the lease on a commercial space. After all, the door is wide open for negotiations at this point in time. Once youve signed a lease, youve agreed to the terms. Therefore, you have less wiggle room. Similarly, you might negotiate at the time when your clease comes up for renewal. So, before you sign any lease, consider these things: Come With a Broker, Ready to Negotiate You arent going to get free rent for your business just out of the kindness of your landlords heart. In other words, they arent going to offer it to you. You have to ask. When it comes time to sign the lease, show up to the table with negotiation at the forefront of your mind. Moreover, you should strongly consider bringing a savvy real estate broker with you. After all, these professionals know all about how to negotiate a commercial lease. Therefore, theyre going to be able to help you get free rent for your business or any other concessions you might seek. Ask For Abated Rent This is a variation on free rent. Basically it means that you and the landlord agree on a set period of time at the start of the lease during which you wont pay rent. Typically youll make up the difference with higher rent during the subsequent months. So, its not exactly free rent. Rather, its delayed rent. Nevertheless, having no rent up front can be a big help when first starting a business in a new space. Dont overlook this option. Get Free Rent for Your Business After Youve Signed The Lease Obviously, there are also reasons that you might need to ask for free rent even though youve already signed the lease. In fact, you might be inside a business space for years before situations arise in which you need to ask for rent. For example, lets say that theres a roof leak and your landlord hasnt repaired it, thereby damaging your ability to do work. Or, on the other hand, perhaps an external disaster (such as the COVID-19 pandemic) forced you to shut doors for a period of time. You werent earning money and therefore couldnt pay rent. In these situations, youll work with your landlord. You might also have to call in an attorney to assist you in negotiating to get free rent for your business. Read Your Lease Marketplace points out that there might be clauses in your lease that outline exactly how to deal with such situations. In fact, if you worked with a savvy broker as suggested, then you might have written this stuff into the lease. For example, it might say right there in the lease that you get free rent for your business if certain emergencies occur. Therefore, you simply need to follow the rules laid out in the lease to claim that free rent. Read Your Insurance Policy Likewise, your business insurance might offer some solutions to dealing with unpayable rent in case of emergency. Read through that. Talk to your insurance provider to see if they have solutions for you. Look Into Financial Assistance Depending on your situation, there might be a variety of options open to you to get rent assistance. For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the SBA, PPP loan programs, and many other local programs offered funding to assist tenants in paying their business rent. If you can get funding through various local programs to cover your rent, then youve effectively gotten free rent for your business. You may not need to do anything else. Either way, though, knowing all of the options available to you for paying the rent will help you out whether or not you opt to apply for them. Talk to Your Landlord Hopefully theres something in your lease or insurance policy that will help you out. If thats the case, then you just need to inform your landlord in writing of the situation. However, in most cases, youre unfortunately on the hook for rent. This is when talking to your landlord might be the only way to negotiate to get free rent for your business. Come to your landlord with a plan in place. This is where knowing your options can help. For example, you might say, Im planning to apply for an SBA fund. However, it wont come through until two months from now. Even then, it wont cover the entirety of my rent. Request free rent for your business for two months and reduced rent thereafter. If youve been a great tenant, your landlord might be willing to work with you. Moreover, if theyre in a position where the storefront would lay empty otherwise, then they might have an urge to assist you. Speak to a Small Business Attorney and/or Renters Aid Program Youve done all of your homework. Unfortunately, you cant get your landlord to agree. Whats next? You dont necessarily have to shut doors immediately. Instead, see if you can get additional professional help. You might want to speak with a small business attorney. The SBA, SCORE, law clinics at law schools, and other organizations offer free or low-cost consultations to assist you with these types of issues. They may be able to point you in the right direction. Likewise, there are renters assistance organizations available in many cities, counties, and states. If you have one in your area, then you might turn to them for advice. Sometimes the people in your network can help you with solutions that you havent been able to come up with your on your own. Read More: If you enjoy reading our blog posts and would like to try your hand at blogging, we have good news for you; you can do exactly that on Saving Advice. Just click here to get started. Check out these helpful tools to help you save more. For investing advice, visit The Motley Fool. Click here to read the full article. Kristen Stewart channels Princess Diana with aplomb in the first trailer for Spencer, an upcoming biographical drama about the beloved royal. The movie, directed by Jackie filmmaker Pablo Larrain, is set in 1991 and takes place over the Christmas holiday as Diana (born Diana Frances Spencer) grapples with the decision to end her marriage to Prince Charles. English actor Jack Farthing is starring alongside Stewart as the heir apparent to the British throne. First-look photos of Stewart as Diana have set the internet ablaze, but film fans had been eagerly waiting to hear the American actors take on Dianas British accent. Yet it appears the companies behind Spencer, Neon and Topic Studios, want to keep people guessing since Stewart only utters two words in the minute-long trailer. They know everything, Sally Hawkins, who plays an undisclosed role that appears to be a confidant to the Princess of Wales, tells Diana. She responds: They dont. Despite the minimal dialogue, the teaser offers a captivating glimpse into the extravagant life at the Queens Sandringham Estate, one that includes lavish meals and stunning attire. In the footage, Stewart, dressed to the nines at all times, becomes increasingly emotional as she grapples with rumors of affairs and evades ruthless paparazzi. Spencer isnt entirely true-to-fact, but rather serves as an imagining of what might have happened during that fateful holiday period. The cast also includes Olga Hellsing as Sarah, Duchess of York; Amy Manson as Anne Boleyn; and Niklas Kohrt as Prince Andrew. Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight wrote the screenplay for Spencer, which is scheduled to release in theaters on Nov. 5. Watch the teaser trailer for Spencer below: Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) authorized lethal action against one of the state's endangered wolf packs on Thursday, citing repeated cattle depredation in Ferry County. WDFW Director Kelly Susewind approved lethal removal of one to two wolves in the Togo pack after livestock producers reported four cattle depredation events that resulted in one dead and three injured calves in the past two months. The pack currently consists of five adult wolves and four pups, according to the department. But wildlife advocacy groups say that the state-sanctioned killings could be prevented if strategic cattle grazing practices were implemented, especially during the current drought emergency. "Its such a tragedy that Washingtons Department of Fish and Wildlife has once again put the Togo pack in the crosshairs," said Amaroq Weiss, senior wolf advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity in a news release Thursday. "Rather than continue to work with better alternatives, the agency insists on killing wolves to appease livestock owners. This approach does nothing but fuel a pointless cycle." Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife The state said that impacted livestock producers had implemented several non-lethal deterrence measures, including adding fox lights at night to give the appearance of humans patrolling, adding more range rider activity and increasing the frequency of collar location tracking to aid in separating the wolves and livestock. "Based on the distribution of livestock in the territory, where the depredations occurred, the amount of non-lethal deterrence measures already deployed and currently being utilized, and the behavior patterns exhibited by the wolves, WDFW staff believe depredations are likely to continue, even with additional non-lethal deterrence efforts," wrote WDFW in their order. The state's gray wolf packs have showed signs of recovery over the past decade, with the state's annual report showing that the population increased by 22% in the past year. The population has been increasing by an average of 26% per year since 2008, and the report marks the 12th consecutive year of population growth. "Washington wolf recovery continues to make solid progress," Susewind said when the report was released. "For the first time the North Cascades wolf recovery area has met the local recovery objective four successful breeding pairs during 2020." Courtesy WDFW The report also tracked livestock deaths and found that nine cattle were killed by wolves in 2020. WDFW reported 16 wolf mortalities, including eight legally harvested by tribal hunters and three lethally removed in response to the livestock deaths. But the news of recovery came after former President Donald Trump Administration's delisted gray wolves from the Endangered Species Act in late 2020 after 45 years of protection, returning management of the populations back to states and tribes. Since then, legislatures in several states, including Idaho and Montana, have moved to relax restrictions on hunting and trapping. Although the new kill order is the fifth targeting the Togo pack since 2018, WDFW said that the removal "should not negatively impact the ability to recover wolves in Washington." But conservation groups emphasize that the orders are counterproductive. "With yet another kill order, livestock owners have little incentive to use or continue to use measures that prevent conflicts because they can count on the agency to send sharpshooters into the air," Weiss said. The authorization will expire once the wolves have been removed or after Sept. 26, regardless of whether the wolves were removed. NAMPA, Idaho (AP) The Canyon County Sheriff's Office says a California man has been charged with kidnapping after he was found in a hotel with an 11-year-old girl from Nampa, Idaho. The sheriff's office said in a prepared statement Wednesday that they began investigating on Monday after the girl was reported as a runaway. When they couldn't find her through her friends, investigators searched the child's cellphone records and found frequent communication with a person who had a California phone number. WASHINGTON (AP) The House committee investigating the January insurrection at the U.S. Capitol is demanding a trove of records from federal intelligence and law enforcement agencies, showing the sweep of the lawmakers' review of the deadly attack by a mob of Donald Trump supporters. The request Wednesday seeks information about events leading up to the Jan. 6 riot, including communication within the White House under then-President Trump and other agencies, and information about planning and funding for rallies held in Washington. Among them is an event at the Ellipse, near the White House, featuring remarks by Trump where he egged on a crowd of thousands before loyalists stormed the Capitol. The requested documents are just the beginning of what is expected to be lengthy, partisan and rancorous investigation into how the mob was able to infiltrate the Capitol and disrupt the certification of Democrat Joe Bidens presidential victory, inflicting the most serious assault on Congress in two centuries. In a statement Wednesday evening, Trump accused the committee of violating long-standing legal principles of privilege. Executive privilege will be defended, not just on behalf of my Administration and the Patriots who worked beside me, but on behalf of the Office of the President of the United States and the future of our Nation, Trump said. Committee members are also considering asking telecommunications companies to preserve phone records of several people, including members of Congress, to try to determine who knew what about the unfolding riot and when they knew it. With chants of hang Mike Pence," the rioters sent the then-vice president and members of Congress running for their lives and did more than $1 million in damage, and wounded dozens of police officers. Records requests are typically the starting point for investigations, and the committee is expected to conduct a wide-ranging review as it builds a public record detailing the chaos on Jan. 6. That inquiry could take more than a year, until the end of the congressional session. The demands are being made for White House records from the National Archives, along with material from the departments of Defense, Justice, Homeland Security and Interior, as well as the FBI and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The committee is also seeking information about efforts within the Trump administration to push the presidents baseless claims of election fraud and any efforts to try to overturn the results of Novembers election or to impede the peaceful transfer of power. The request for the National Archives and Records Administration is 10 pages long. The committee is seeking "All documents and communications within the White House on January 6, 2021 related to Trumps close advisers and family members, the rally at the Ellipse and Trump's Twitter feed. It asks for his specific movements on that day and communications, if any, from the White House Situation Room. Also sought are all documents related to the claims of election fraud, as well as Supreme Court decisions on the topic. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., is heading the committee, appointed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., after all but two Republicans opposed the creation of the 13-person panel. The committee so far has heard from police officers who were at the Capitol on Jan. 6. In emotional testimony, those officers spoke of how afraid and frustrated they were by the failure of law enforcement leaders to foresee the potential for violence and understand the scope of planning by the Trump backers. A Capitol Police officer who fatally shot protester Ashli Babbitt was cleared months ago of criminal wrongdoing and was cleared internally by the department this week, and was planning to reveal his identity in an NBC interview to air Thursday. Most in the GOP argued that the majority-Democratic committee would conduct a partisan inquiry. House Democrats originally attempted to create an evenly split, independent commission to investigate the insurrection, but that effort fell short when it was blocked by Senate Republicans. Thompson did not identify the lawmakers whose records the committee would seek, but he has said officials would be contacting communication companies, social media platforms and other tech giants. House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California, who had been in touch with Trump from the besieged Capitol on Jan. 6, again dismissed the committee's investigation as so political. When he was asked whether he would turn over his own phone logs from Jan. 6, he said Wednesday, I told the American public who I talked to that day, referring to his television news appearances that day. In a Fox News appearance Tuesday evening, Rep. Jim Banks, R-Ind., whose phone records may also be sought, said it was an abuse of power to investigate lawmakers. Thompson, in a written statement, said the committee's work was rooted in apolitical fact-finding. "Our Constitution provides for a peaceful transfer of power, and this investigation seeks to evaluate threats to that process, identify lessons learned and recommend laws, policies, procedures, rules, or regulations necessary to protect our republic in the future, he said. ___ AP Congressional Correspondent Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report. ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) Just over half of Floridas 2.8 million public school students now face mandates to wear masks in classrooms as a courtroom battle continues over efforts by Gov. Ron DeSantis to leave such decisions up to parents. A majority of school board members in Orange County told the superintendent on Tuesday to require most students to wear masks, and agreed with her recommendation to keep the mandate through Oct. 30. The district began its school year this month with a parental opt-out, but a surge in students across the Orlando area testing positive for COVID-19 has disrupted classes. Through Tuesday, the district reported 1,968 positive cases among students since school began, with 1,491 people under active quarantine, according to the district's dashboard. At least 10 school boards making up some of the largest districts in Florida are now defying the governor's attempt to ban local mandates on masks in schools. The Orange County board also said it wants to challenge the legality of a Florida Department of Health rule enforcing the ban. In Fort Lauderdale, the Broward County School Board told the Department of Education on Tuesday that it won't back down on its mask policy, which gives parents a medical opt-out for students. The board said it believes that complies with the governor's order and the department's mask rule. Parents, the board said, don't have an unlimited right to send their kids to school unmasked, infringing on the rights of other parents who want their children kept safe. DeSantis is not backing down. Ar a news conference Wednesday, the governor warned of additional consequences for defiant schools districts, but didn't elaborate. DeSantis contends those boards are violating the Parents Bill of Rights, signed into law this summer. It gives parents authority to direct their children's education. Those schools districts are violating state law and they are overriding what the parents judgment is on this, he said, stressing repeatedly that cloth masks dont prevent the spread of aerosols. If these entities are going to violate state law and take away parents rights . theres consequences for that, DeSantis added. The state had given Broward and Alachua counties until Tuesday to end their mask mandates. Broward's students began school a week ago with a mask policy in place. State officials have threatened to withhold funding equal to school board salaries if a district doesnt comply. Those funds make up less than 1% of each districts budget. The debate over masks has gotten heated. On Wednesday morning, police said the father of a student who tried to enter Fort Lauderdale High School without a mask was arrested after he forcefully pushed another student who tried to grab his cellphone. A police report said the father was recording video of students at the schools front gate and the student didnt want to be filmed. The father was charged with one count of aggravated child abuse. School board members from Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties held a virtual news conference Wednesday to discuss the possibility of suing DeSantis and the state. All three said theyve received online threats over the mask issue. We will not be pressured by the governor or the state Board of Education when the safety and health of our students is involved. We have a constitutional duty to protect our students, said Miami-Dade school board member Lucia Baez-Geller. Governor DeSantis has made this issue divisive with his rhetoric and threats. Later Wednesday, the Palm Beach County school board voted unanimously to allow the districts general counsel to work with outside attorneys to potentially file or join a lawsuit against the state. Monroe County's board decided Tuesday to require masks rather than strongly encourage them, but with a parental opt-out that should comply with the DeSantis order. In Tallahassee on Wednesday, testimony ended in a three-day hearing that pits pro-mask parents against the DeSantis administration and state education officials. Circuit Judge John C. Cooper said he would hear closing arguments Thursday and rule Friday. The state contends that parents, not schools, should choose whether their children cover up in classrooms. I take my rights and my freedom very seriously, testified Jennifer Gillen, who supports the governor's order and has two sons in Lee County schools where there is no strict mask mandate. Our rights are actually being threatened. Dr. Jay Battacharya, a Stanford University medical professor and researcher who also supports the governor's approach, said he typically masks up only when required to, or to make others feel at ease not because he believes they prevent coronavirus exposure. I dont believe there is high-quality evidence to show masks are effective in stopping disease spread, he testified Wednesday. The highly contagious delta variant led to a surge in cases around Florida and record high hospitalizations just as schools reopen. By mid-August more than 21,000 new cases were being added per day, compared with about 8,500 a month earlier. However, new cases and hospitalizations have leveled off this past week. There were 16,820 people being treated for the disease in Florida hospitals Tuesday, U.S. Health Department figures showed, down from a record high above 17,000 last week. About 6 in 10 Americans say students and teachers should be required to wear face masks while in school, according to a poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. _____ Associated Press writers Brendan Farrington in Tallahassee and Kelli Kennedy in Fort Lauderdale contributed to this story. BEAVER TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) No criminal charges will be filed against two state police troopers in the fatal shooting of a 63-year-old man in northwestern Michigan. Newaygo County Prosecutor Worth Stay said in a news release Tuesday that the troopers acted in self-defense and that their use of force was reasonable. Johnny King was in a small, fifth-wheel trailer when he was shot May 22 in Newaygo County's Beaver Township. State police have said troopers were responding to a domestic dispute in the area, 60 miles north of Grand Rapids. Two troopers entered the trailer to speak with King," Stay said in a release. "King became combative and pointed a rifle at the troopers. The troopers discharged their service weapons, striking King, who died at the scene. King's weapon turned out to be an air rifle that resembled a firearm, according to the prosecutor's office. King's uncle, Harry Pulsipher Sr., told WOOD-TV in May that police were called to the property because of a dispute between his ex-wife and King. He said King grabbed a BB gun as an officer moved toward him. He says, Im not leaving my house, and the cop started towards him and he reached up, he had a little BB gun up there, he grabbed that BB gun and he brought it down, Pulsipher said. Thats when the guy shot him. He didnt point it at nobody, he just brought it down off the thing. BOWLING GREEN, Ohio (AP) A former truck driver who authorities say is linked by DNA to the slayings of four women at truck stops in Ohio and Illinois is not competent to stand trial in a 1996 killing, a judge has ruled. Wood County Common Pleas Judge Matthew Reger ruled Monday that Samuel Legg III is incapable of assisting in his own defense and will continue to be held in a psychiatric facility. Authorities have said that Legg has a history of mental illness. CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) The first-degree murder trial of a Cedar Rapids man charged in the fatal beating of his mother last year has been postponed until next year. Trial for George Deason, 51, had been set for November, but lawyers on both sides asked for more time to prepare, The Gazette reported. BERLIN (AP) It's not that politics bore him; quite the opposite. But Christoph Gillitzer is stumped by whom to vote for in Germany's federal election next month. The retired engineer says he usually backs the underdog, yet the choices on offer Sept. 26 don't have him convinced. It's really difficult this time, he said on a dreary Berlin morning this week. Like Gillitzer, a large chunk of the German electorate remains undecided going into a parliamentary election that will determine who succeeds Angela Merkel as chancellor after her 16 years in office. Recent surveys show that support for political parties has flattened out, with none forecast to receive more than a quarter of the vote. Merkel's center-right Union bloc and the center-left Social Democrats are neck-and-neck in the polls, closely followed by the environmentalist Greens, who are making their first bid for the chancellery. This is the first time that an incumbent chancellor hasnt run again in a German election, so we have a completely new table of candidates, Gregor Zons, a political scientist at the Heinrich Heine University Dusseldorf, said. For voters who have until now chosen Merkel, the situation is confusing. Germany's long-serving leader announced in 2018 that she wouldn't seek a fifth term, sparking a series of messy leadership contests that ended with her party nominating Armin Laschet, the governor of North Rhine-Westphalia state, as its top candidate. But Laschet's star took a dive last month when his home state was hit by deadly floods and the 60-year-old governor made a series of missteps that included laughing in the background during a somber speech by Germany's president. He also flip-flopped on the urgency of addressing climate change, which experts say has made disasters such as floods more likely. The Greens saw their ratings jump in April after nominating Annalena Baerbock, 40, as the party's candidate for chancellor and announcing the news at a smoothly staged event that contrasted with their rivals' squabbling. The bump in the polls didn't last long. Baerbock's lack of executive experience and a flap over plagiarism in a book she wrote ended up costing her party support. Recent polls by German public broadcasters ARD and ZDF show few voters want either Laschet or Baerbock as chancellor, boosting the previously tepid ratings of Olaf Scholz Germany's finance minister and vice chancellor and his Social Democratic Party. The former Hamburg mayor and federal labor minister was once nicknamed Scholzomat for what critics said was a habit of frequently repeating the same phrases regardless of what question he was asked. Lately, the 63-year-old minister has played up his long experience in government while deftly avoiding the limelight over crises such as the floods and Afghanistan, from where Germany, like other nations, has frantically tried to evacuate its citizens and allies after being surprised by the Taliban takeover. Scholz's main achievement at the moment "lies in not making any mistakes, political scientist Zons said. The Social Democrats have benefited from this cautious approach. One poll this week gave the party a small lead over the Union bloc its first for many years. Stefan Wurster, a professor of policy analysis at the Technical University of Munich, cautioned that the candidates' personal ratings remain historically low, with a sizeable chunk of the electorate still opting for "none of the above." Many people dont decide who to vote for until they reach the voting booth, he added. Gillitzer, the retired engineer, remains undecided. Scholz cuts the best figure, but he doesnt come across as entirely clean either, he said, citing the finance minister's unclear role in two major financial scandals. Merkel has taken a back seat in the Union bloc's election campaign, and its billboards are devoid of the German leader's familiar face this year. Predecessors who are ending their political work should hold back that is my position, my firm conviction, she said in a rare appearance as her party opened its official campaign last weekend. Even the party's worst result under her chancellorship 32.9% of the vote in 2017 appears a long shot at the moment. Asked about the Union's poor ratings Tuesday, Merkel, a veteran campaigner, offered little wisdom for how her would-be successor can take the reins of Europe's biggest economy. We will work every day to get a good election result and not look every day at the polls, she said. ___ Geir Moulson contributed to this report. Thank you for reading! You have reached your 30-day limit of free access to SentinelSource.com, The Keene Sentinels website. If you would like to read two more articles for free at this time, please register for an account by clicking the sign up button below. We hope you find The Sentinels coverage of the Monadnock Region valuable. We rely on our subscribers to bring you strong local journalism and hope you will consider supporting our work by taking advantage of this special subscription offer here. From Serena Dai, The Chronicles senior editor of Food & Wine: Bay Area locals know that the region is one of the best in the country for food. Pristine produce, creative chefs who know how to cook it and multicultural influences are just a few elements that make Northern Californias dining scene so dynamic. The San Francisco Chronicles Food & Wine team is committed to helping readers navigate the constantly changing scene most recently, with a new series called Best Day Ever. With this project, staffers research the Bay Areas best dining neighborhoods and guide readers through one ideal, food-fueled day in one of them. Options include neighborhood cafes, go-to bakeries, lively farmers markets, stylish restaurant hotspots and more. The series is for residents who want a curated itinerary for an area they dont know well and for visitors, who can use it to plan a trip. Because The Chronicles Food & Wine reporters and critics are in-the-know about the best neighborhood gems and most exciting new options, readers can trust that Best Day Ever will blend both must-try, old-school icons and the most compelling newcomers. Its a one-stop shop to get inspired by everything a great dining neighborhood has to offer, said Senior Editor Serena Dai, who leads The Chronicles food and wine coverage. Ive already used it when my friends have come into town to explore the diversity of food options we have. So far, The Chronicle has published these Best Day Ever itineraries: On SFChronicle.com, the digital presentation of Best Day Ever is intended to stand out in a crowded field of restaurant recommendations. Newsroom developer Paula Friedrich, who conceived the look and design, was interested in building a joyful online experience with colorful and slightly off-kilter elements. The look and feel mirrors the overall editorial aims of The Chronicles Food & Wine team, which strives to go beyond white tablecloth restaurants and cover the rich and varied landscape of the Bay Areas dining scene. The whole concept of having the Best Day Ever is so fun and celebratory, I wanted to make sure our readers had that feeling the whole way through these thoughtfully curated itineraries, said Friedrich. Friedrich worked with Alex K. Fong, the newsrooms deputy creative director for projects, to refine the projects design and usability. Fong also worked in collaboration with Director of Audience Jess Marmor Shaw and deputy director of audience Jenna Fowler to create a visual plan to make the project shine on social media. Designer Steven Boyle created distinct graphics for promotion on The Chronicle food teams social media accounts. Emily Jan, the newsrooms deputy director of visuals, oversees the photography for each installment, deciding the right tone for photos for different neighborhoods, and copy editor Bernadette Fay makes sure the guides meet The Chronicles style standards. Tanay Warerkar, assistant food & wine editor, manages the series, and along with the rest of The Chronicle Food & Wine team, decides which neighborhoods should be featured next. The project took weeks to put together, but with upfront work that specifically focused on flexibility for future iterations, The Chronicle is able to produce more Best Day Ever options for years to come. Ongoing development work on the user interface will make it easier for readers to browse for the itinerary that will make up their own Best Day Ever. With every Best Day Ever that we publish, were really adding to The Chronicles expanded universe of the Bay Area food experience, Fong said. And as that grows, well keep adding to how our readers can navigate that universe through tweaks to the design, the visuals and the overall experience. Future installments will expand the geographic zone by targeting cities outside San Francisco. This ambition dovetails with The Chronicle readerships expansion in these areas, as well as the exciting, new restaurant openings and developing food scenes. Truckee, Healdsburg and Sacramento Best Day Evers are in the works in the coming months. Beyond food-filled guides to neighborhoods and areas in close proximity to us, we also wanted to create itineraries that might be useful for readers planning trips farther away or for a weekend, said Warerkar. If you, like me, tend to plan weekend trips based on food destinations, then these upcoming ones are for you. Best Day Ever is just one way that The Chronicles Food & Wine team hopes to offer readers easy-to-use, thoughtful insight into where to dine and drink in the Bay Area. The Chronicles flagship guides, the Top Restaurant and Top Wineries series, are led by restaurant critic Soleil Ho and wine critic Esther Mobley, two of the only full-time critics in the Bay Area who personally endorse and try every option. Their Top 25 Restaurants and Top 25 Wineries lists updated regularly throughout the year to reflect the latest and greatest are starting points for locals seeking eating and drinking inspiration. In order to serve a wide array of readers, the program also dives into specific cravings: People seeking the best burger, the best Vietnamese restaurants, the best restaurants in Marin County, the best wineries for tasting in Napa County and more will also find lists from The Chronicles esteemed critics. While the Top Restaurants and Top Wineries lists are ways for readers to craft their own dining and wine-tasting experiences in the Bay Area, Best Day Ever is intended to highlight options in one particular neighborhood, like a guided tour. Theyre all demonstrations of The Chronicles ongoing commitment to innovative digital service journalism. About The San Francisco Chronicle The San Francisco Chronicle (www.sfchronicle.com) is the largest newspaper in Northern California and the second largest on the West Coast. Acquired by the Hearst Corporation in 2000, The San Francisco Chronicle was founded in 1865 by Charles and Michael de Young and has been awarded six Pulitzer Prizes for journalistic excellence. The staff won ONA Online Journalism Awards for General Excellence in 2020 and for Breaking News coverage in 2019 and 2020. Follow us on Twitter at @SFChronicle. Mendocino County emergency room nurse Kristen Marin says the surge in COVID-19 cases is the worst shes ever seen. In Humboldt County, Dr. James Goldberg worries his exhausted emergency department staff is worn out from working relentless shifts since the pandemic began 18 months ago. Farther north, in Del Norte County, emergency room doctor Aaron Stutz has never seen his hospital so understaffed, and worries about whats to come. Rural California counties are reeling under the latest COVID-19 surge as the delta variant rips across the state and strains already-limited resources in mostly vaccine-hesitant communities. Patients have to wait for beds. Burned-out nurses want to quit. In county after county, intensive care units, which care for the sickest patients, are full. Right now, theres a huge need for nursing and other allied health staff, said Stutz, who works at Sutter Coast Hospital in Crescent City. The hospital the only acute care hospital in Del Norte County, which borders Oregon has always faced staffing challenges, relying on traveling physicians to support medical staff. Now, slammed by the surge thats arrived with the delta variant of the coronavirus, its situation is dire. Because weve just not had enough staffed beds ... a lot of patients who are coming into the emergency department are waiting to be placed, Stutz said. Just waiting. In August, at least seven rural Northern California counties Amador, Del Norte, Humboldt, Lake, Mendocino, Shasta and Tuolumne saw their all-time high rates of hospitalized COVID patients, according to state health data. We are full. Our ICU is full. Our step-down unit is full, Dr. Alexander Heard, medical officer at Adventist Health Sonora, told the Tuolumne County Board of Supervisors last week. Adventist Health is the sole hospital serving the countys 54,000 residents. As of Wednesday, the county had two ICU beds available. The stress comes at the same time when these rural areas are contending with fast-moving wildfires, which severely degrade air quality and can cause health complications for residents with respiratory illnesses or other underlying conditions. Over a seven-day period ending Tuesday, Del Norte County recorded 188 new cases per 100,000, Mendocino County recorded 65 cases per 100,000, Shasta County 61 cases per 100,000 and Humboldt County recorded 41 cases per 100,000, according to The Chronicles COVID-19 tracker. Californias average over the same period was approximately 37 new cases per 100,000 people. Cases are leveling out or dipping elsewhere in some other parts of the state, particularly the Bay Area which has far higher vaccination rates than its rural counterparts, and also for the most part requires rather than recommends the use of masks indoors. Del Norte County ranks 25th among counties in the country in terms of cases per capita over the past seven days, according to the New York Times national tracker. Del Norte County has canceled non-emergency surgeries, restricted visitors and requested more staff from the states Emergency Management Services Agency per the hospitals surge plan. On Tuesday, the county had 23 hospitalized COVID-19 patients, up from six on Aug. 1. It had no ICU beds available. The numbers may sound modest from a big-city perspective, but they are overwhelming for a small rural hospital. Vaccine hesitancy seems to be a big factor in the surge. Eight doctors across Del Norte, Humboldt and Mendocino counties told The Chronicle that more than 95% of their COVID-19 patients were unvaccinated. Around 41% of Del Norte Countys population of nearly 28,000, for example, is vaccinated far below Californias statewide average vaccination rate of 55%. According to state data released Monday, unvaccinated people in California are more than six times as likely to contract the coronavirus than those who are vaccinated. Doctors in Del Norte and surrounding counties became so frustrated last week that more than 100 of them released a stark public letter, begging people to get vaccinated. We must admit we are tired, they wrote. We will keep working, of course. But we are tired. We are tired of the suffering, pain and death that can be avoided by getting vaccinated. Dr. Beth Abels, an internal medicine physician in Eureka who signed the letter, said she was shocked and disappointed that its come to this. Im horrified about the low vaccination rate in our community, she said. This is so unnecessary. We shouldnt be in this position. Vaccines are free, easily available, safe and effective, and theres really no reason for us to have our health care system so severely impacted. Abels said one of her own patients, a nurse, recently told her she was thinking about quitting the field for good. Health care workers are tired and angry. Some are depressed; were all just so burned out, she said. Goldberg, the ER director at Providence St. Josephs in Eureka, said the weight of the pandemic is getting heavier, compounded by the need to address other non-COVID illnesses at the same time. Our staff has done the best under the most trying of circumstance, he said. The hospital is prepared to expand its intensive care capacity from 12 to 19 beds but then will need more staff for the expansion, Christian Hill, a Providence St. Josephs spokesman said. 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. We have been in contact with public health officials in Humboldt County, and CDPH, to try to get additional staff, he said. As of Monday, the hospital had 27 COVID patients seven in the ICU, with five of those on ventilators. Dr. Bessant Parker, chief medical officer at Adventist Health, which runs three hospitals in Mendocino County, said the situation is ripe for more burnout among medical staff everywhere, with death and sadness a recurring reality. The personal toll and impact this has on a person, 18 months into this pandemic, is a lot, he said. Were starting to see the exhaustion throughout our staff. ER nurse Marin, who works at Adventist Health Ukiah Valley, said her colleagues were tired but many were doing their best. We all signed up for this line of work for a reason, but none of us thought this (pandemic) would ever get this bad, she said. With rural hospitals filling up, neighboring counties are starting to accept their overflow COVID patients while also handling their own surges. Dr. Andy Coren, Mendocino Countys public health officer, told a Board of Supervisors meeting last week that three of the countys 27 COVID patients were hospitalized out of county. Dr. Stephanie Dittmer, a family medicine physician who works at Providence Redwood Memorial Hospital in Fortuna (Humboldt County), said the overflow of COVID patients affects all patients in need of medical care. We cant take care of the heart attacks or the pneumonia or the heart failures. It has snowballed in a scary way, she said. The rural doctors had one message for the public: Get vaccinated. The Aug. 16 letter signed by Del Norte County physicians underscored the point: Youve trusted us with every aspect of your health. Please trust us with this. We are not asking you to do anything that we have not already done. Please, for the sake of the community, the young, the old, and all the in-between, get vaccinated. Shwanika Narayan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: shwanika.narayan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @shwanika Instagram: @shwanika Good morning, Bay Area. Its Thursday, Aug. 26, and a heat wave is expected to arrive at the end of the week. Heres what you need to know to start your day. The Millennium Tower cant seem to catch a break. The 60-story luxury tower in San Francisco, which sank 18 inches and leaned 14 inches since opening in 2009, has sunk another inch. A $100 million fix to shore up the building has now been put on hold for a month while engineers try to figure out whats going on. In a statement, a spokesman for the Millenniums homeowners association said that the latest monitoring has indicated an increased rate of settlement associated with pile installation. Read more from J.K. Dineen. A casualty of climate change Courtesy Mount Shasta Ski Park The snow-covered, towering peaks of Mount Shasta are hard to miss. Yet this summer, the tallest peak is barren, something locals say they havent seen in years. Climate experts say the 14,163-foot volcano has become a casualty of Californias extreme drought and heat, and representative of what the extremes of climate change can mean for the landscape. Its pretty much just an ugly brown, not the picture we think of with Mount Shasta, said David Rizzardo, a hydrology manager for the California Department of Water Resources. Kurtis Alexander explains what led to this concerning circumstance. Water levels in Bay Area reservoirs have reached historic lows. Heres how they compare to levels in 2017. Triple-digit heat is expected to reach parts of the Bay Area starting Thursday and lasting through the weekend. As the Caldor Fire continues to grow and spread eastward toward the Tahoe Basin, officials are weighing evacuations. Meanwhile, a new fire in Grass Valley was 60% contained but had forced evacuations. A new court filing shows that PG&E has found no evidence that one of its contractors flew a drone that interfered with early efforts to contain the Dixie Fire. PurpleAir vs. AirNow: How to track the air quality readings near you. Coronavirus updates Photos by Deanne Fitzmaurice / Special to The Chronicle Californias rural areas are suffering as the delta variant continues its rampage. This month, at least seven rural counties in Northern California have seen their peak COVID hospitalization rates since April 2020. Resources are limited in many of these mostly vaccine-hesitant communities, where intensive care units are overwhelmed and health care workers are burned out. Read more from Shwanika Narayan about rural Californias struggles in this latest COVID surge. BottleRock and Outside Lands are happening despite the delta variant. Here's what we know about the risks. Around the Bay Provided by Chesa Boudin Boudin reflects: San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin speaks to The Chronicle two days after his father was granted clemency by outgoing New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. 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. A very narrow margin: Heres just how close the recall election is between keeping Gov. Gavin Newsom in and removing him from office. Also: Caitlyn Jenner tours S.F.s Tenderloin: I feel sorry for these people. Stimulus checks: Heres what you need to know about Californias second round of stimulus checks, expected to start going out at the end of the month. State probe: Alameda County is being investigated over whether officials complied with California law when they sold part of the Coliseum site to the Oakland As. Squaw Valley snag: A state appeals court in Sacramento issued a pair of rulings sure to delay the controversial ski resort expansion. A boisterous barman: Harry Denton, the San Francisco man behind Harrys on Fillmore and the Starlight Room, dies at 77. One year later Laura Morton/Special to The Chronicle Last summer, the CZU Lightning Complex fires tore through the Santa Cruz Mountains, forcing the closure of a number of state and county parks. A year later, a number of those recreation areas have finally reopened after sustaining fire damage. But one of the areas best-known places to view majestic redwood trees still remains shuttered. Tom Stienstra shares the latest details for seven parks affected by last years fires. San Franciscos Stern Grove and Pine Lake Park will remain closed until further notice due to a ruptured water main break. Bay Briefing is written by Kellie Hwang and Anna Buchmann and sent to readers email inboxes on weekday mornings. Sign up for the newsletter here, and contact the writers at anna.buchmann@sfchronicle.com and kellie.hwang@sfchronicle.com. Reality TV star Caitlyn Jenner got more reality than ever when she took a three-block walk through the Tenderloin on Wednesday. What are you going to do for the community? hollered a man in a black hat, a few times, while Jenner stood on the corner of Turk and Hyde streets, explaining to reporters why she wanted very much to be governor. Jenner spun around with the same speed she once brought to the Olympic track. Im going to get you some help! she roared, pointing a finger his way. Get yourself your own motherfing help! the man in the black hat shot back, and he took a tug from a can in the paper sack he was holding. Im for Newsom! So it went as Jenners gubernatorial campaign trail took an amble through one of San Franciscos more unflinching neighborhoods. The candidate passed three sidewalk sleepers, three imbibers and a man changing his pants on the sidewalk. In her yellow-and-white designer sneakers, the candidate stepped adroitly over liquids of unknown origin. Throughout her walk, she touched on familiar campaign themes Newsom was spending too much, homeless nonprofits were ripping off the state, children forced to wear masks to school were being turned into a whole generation of germophobes. And every chance she got, she reminded her Tenderloin listeners that Disney World in Florida reopened months before Disneyland in Anaheim a clear case of Newsoms bungling. We could have done it better, she said. Yalonda M. James / The Chronicle The path down Turk Street may have been slightly shorter than the 110-meter hurdles course she conquered in the 1976 Olympics, but the hurdles were higher. At one point a campaign aide steered her to the south side of Turk Street so as to avoid a dozen sidewalk tents on the north side. To be honest, I feel so sorry for these people, Jenner said. Lifes not easy. I know that. We need to do something. In the gubernatorial replacement race, Jenner finds herself far back in the pack with a crowded field ahead and not a smidgen of daylight for a breakthrough. By most polls, she is trailing arch-conservative talk show host Larry Elder, former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, YouTube blogger Kevin Paffrath and perennial GOP runner-up-for-everything John Cox. Just keeping up with whoever is polling in fourth place is tougher than keeping up with a Kardashian. 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. Jenner called herself a hardworking common-sense person, and, during her Tenderloin campaign swing, did her best to ignore a steady stream of catcalls, many of them profane, from passers-by. Yalonda M. James / The Chronicle She did pause to talk at length with a woman who approached her and identified herself as a transgender woman named Lisa Strawn. Jenner, who is also transgender, took her aside, put her arm around her and offered words of support. Strawn told her she knew she was transgender at age 19. At 19, I didnt have the guts, Jenner replied. After Jenner headed off to her next campaign stop at the Log Cabin Republicans club, Strawn said she supported Newsom, opposed the recall and opposed almost every position of Jenners. Just because shes trans doesnt mean I have to roll with her, Strawn said. Steve Rubenstein is a San Francisco Chroncle staff writer. Email: srubenstein@sfchronicle.com @SteveRubeSF Oakland municipal workers will be required to be vaccinated this fall under new rules announced Thursday by the city. All city employees will need to report their vaccination status or request an exemption by Oct. 15 and to be fully vaccinated by Nov. 1, according to a draft of the policy that City Administrator Ed Reiskin shared with union leaders. Exemptions will be granted for medical or sincerely held religious reasons, and those workers will need to be tested periodically for the coronavirus. Those who dont comply could lose their job. Many cities across California have put in place vaccination mandates, so it is only natural that Oakland, which cares about health and cares about its employees, would do something similar, Mayor Libby Schaaf said Thursday when asked about the rules. Being vaccinated will be a condition of employment, she added. The mandate covers more than 5,000 full- and part-time city employees, including interns and volunteers. Among those not included are contractors working on city projects and school district employees because they arent employed by Oakland. The policy gives employees up to two hours of paid time to get each COVID shot. In the two months since San Francisco became the first city in the nation to announce a similar vaccine mandate on June 23, vaccinations among municipal employees have risen to 90%, said Mawuli Tugbenyoh, chief of policy for the Department of Human Resources. The city has also moved to suspend 20 employees in the Police, Fire and Sheriffs departments who missed the Aug. 12 deadline for disclosing whether they were vaccinated against the coronavirus. The employees can appeal the 10-day suspensions. By early August, at least 2,700 other San Francisco employees including many frontline workers remained unvaccinated and at risk of being fired, The Chronicle reported on Aug. 4. A San Francisco firefighter has sued the city over the policy, claiming that even though workers can win religious exemptions, the mandate violates their religious freedom. Oakland, like San Francisco, cited the health benefits of COVID vaccination in announcing its policy. The public health data is clear, city spokesperson Karen Boyd said in a statement. Vaccination is the most effective tool we have to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus, protect against hospitalizations and death, and bring an end to this pandemic that has killed 4.4 million people around the globe. On Thursday, when the city sent a draft of its policy to union leaders for review and comment, one area of contention arose immediately: whether the matter had to be negotiated with the labor groups. Boyd said the policy is a management decision that doesnt need to be negotiated under collective bargaining rules. Liz Ortega, executive director of the Alameda Labor Council, disagreed. 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. Other employer mandates need to be negotiated with us, and this is no different, she told The Chronicle. Nevertheless, Ortega said, Theres clearly a sense of urgency. She said the union will look closely at the policy before taking a position. We believe in having vaccines. We believe in protecting workers. But we also have some concerns about some mandates and how some employees could use it to just fire people, she said. Police union officials did not respond to requests for comment. Chronicle staff writer Sarah Ravani contributed to this report. Nanette Asimov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: nasimov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @NanetteAsimov Amid reports that the immunity COVID-19 vaccines provide may wane over time, the Biden administration has announced it will begin offering boosters to the general population beginning the week of Sept. 20. In fact, boosters are already widely available through drugstores in many Bay Area counties, and some people are taking it upon themselves to get theirs now. So, should you be running to get your third dose? Health experts say theres no rush at least for most people. The fourth surge, a result of the delta variant, is very real. Hospitals are full, once again, with patients struggling to breathe. But while the number of breakthrough coronavirus infections meaning infections in those who are fully vaccinated has caught experts by surprise, the vaccines appear to be preventing severe illness and hospitalization in the vast majority of cases. This holds true even for early recipients such as health care workers and those living in nursing homes or long-term care facilities, according to two experts interviewed by The Chronicle. Frontline health care workers and anyone else who has higher exposure, they should feel relatively safe that nothing really, really bad is going to happen to them, said Dr. Arnab Mukherjea, a professor of public health at Cal State East Bay. What the evidence is suggesting across the globe is that the protection from mild disease and the protection from getting infected is starting to wane. Even in some of the places hardest hit early in the pandemic, the signs are promising. Take nursing homes, for example. Though there has been a slight rise in coronavirus cases in those facilities, there has not been a corresponding increase in hospitalizations or deaths from the disease, said Dr. Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease specialist at UCSF. We have seen mild breakthrough cases in nursing homes, Gandhi said. But no, what we have not been seeing, even in the face of delta is a lot of hospitalized long-term care facility residents. Dr. Mike Wasserman, a Bay Area geriatrician and former president of the California Association of Long-Term Care Medicine, said he, too, thinks boosters are coming soon enough to avoid any significant outbreaks in those facilities. I dont see us falling off a cliff on this and I continue to be hopeful that we can get delta under control, he said, though he also cautioned against getting too complacent. In addition to the third round of shots, he said, nursing homes will also get a safety boost from a state mandate that says all workers at the facilities must be vaccinated by Sept. 20. So how does all this good news square with reports about waning efficacy? While its true that studies are showing a steady reduction in antibodies over time something scientists always expected thats not the only way the body protects a person from illness, Gandhi noted. The body also has certain memory cells that can help produce antibodies when the body comes into contact with a disease it has encountered before. Luckily, these cells, which defend against severe disease and death, appear to be quite durable, Gandhi said. Shes not convinced theres evidence that younger, healthy people need a booster at all. Still, there are some people who should consider getting a booster now. 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. Federal and local governments, for instance, are encouraging certain immunocompromised patients to seek out a third dose. Those patients include people with leukemia, lymphoma or a late-stage HIV infection, those who have received a stem cell transplant within two years and are on immunosuppressive medications, and those who are taking high doses of corticosteroids or other immunosuppressive drugs. About 3% of the U.S. adult population falls into this category, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Gandhi said she would also recommend boosters now for adults older than 70 who have medical problems as well as people who have a history of serious infections repeated instances of shingles, for example. Anyone who thinks to themselves, I get a lot of infections, I would talk to my doctor, Gandhi said. Another group that is eagerly watching for advice on boosters is people who received the single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine. No federal advice yet exists for them, but San Francisco has begun offering mRNA booster shots to people who got that shot. Johnson & Johnson itself is also developing a potential booster option. For most of the vaccinated population, the bottom line, according to Mukherjea, is that the booster will get to you in plenty of time to do what it is supposed to do. Ryan Kost is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: rkost@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @RyanKost Jen Carter Smitt didnt even know a new fire had sparked when she got the call to evacuate her Grass Valley apartment around 3:45 on Wednesday afternoon. Its been hazy for days in Sierra communities like hers, which is sandwiched between the massive Dixie Fire burning to the north and the Caldor Fire encroaching on Lake Tahoe to the south. At this point do I smell smoke? I dont even know, said Carter Smitt, who was watching aircrafts battle the fire from her car parked on a nearby hillside late Wednesday afternoon. Carter Smitt was in the first wave of mandatory evacuations ordered Wednesday by emergency officials in Grass Valley. The blaze sparked and quickly grew to 25 acres, posing an immediate threat to life, according to evacuation alerts by the Grass Valley Police Department and Nevada County Office of Emergency Services. Areas under evacuation orders include the GRS-E280 and GRS-E222 zones on the northeast side of Grass Valley, in the area east of Highway 20, north of East Bennett Road and west of Brunswick Road. Nearby Atria & Crystal Ridge Assisted Living and Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital were placed under shelter-in-place orders. A temporary evacuation point was established at Nevada Union High School. By 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Cal Fire reported that the blaze had been 60% contained after burning 59 acres just across the highway from downtown Grass Valley. With forward progress slowed, spot fires remained a concern, and road closures and evacuation orders were still in effect. For Carter Smitt, a Bay Area native who moved to Grass Valley 20 years ago after her rental in Oakland was sold, Wednesday was the first time shed actually had to leave her home after years of watching California wildfires become more frequent. Fire Tracker Follow wildfires across the state Latest updates on wildfires burning across Northern and Southern California When the time finally came, she grabbed the plastic tub packed with important documents and coralled her cats Exo and Tess into a collapsible carrier. Then they waited. Im just gonna be watching the plume, Carter Smitt said. I know which direction to evacuate if I have to. Lauren Hepler is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: lauren.hepler@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LAHepler Mount Shasta has long symbolized the grandeur of Californias far north, its muscular flanks and thick cover of snow an enduring expression of natures bounty. But this summer, the north states tallest peak is looking a little frail. Its slopes are drab and dusty, and most of the snow has melted away. Locals say they havent seen the mountain so barren in years, if not decades. The 14,163-foot volcano near the Oregon border, climate experts say, has become a casualty of Californias intense heat and drought, as well as a glaring illustration of what the extremes of climate change can mean for Western landscapes. Its pretty much just an ugly brown, not the picture we think of with Mount Shasta, said David Rizzardo, a hydrology manager for the California Department of Water Resources, who has family in the area. Maybe we thought Mount Shasta was immune (to climate change). But now its clearly showing the stress from extreme conditions. The hard times for the mountain come to bear after two severely dry winters. Its snowpack was only about half of average this spring. Then Junes record heat wave arrived, pushing temperatures on the slopes to rare triple digits, and prompting a sharp and sudden snow melt-off. This disappearance of snow not only dimmed Mount Shastas famously verdant facade, but it exposed structural weakness. Heavy runoff whisked mud and debris off the sides of the mountain, resulting in a series of slides that have been washing out roads and trails since the start of summer. Residents have routinely reported the thundering booms of boulders and trees crashing down drainages. Its been a bit of a mess up here this year, said Tyanna Blaschak, a hydrologist for the Shasta-Trinity National Forest, which manages the mountain and surrounding lands. Part of the problem, she said, stems from the retreating glaciers. The lack of snow has left the mountains seven named glaciers more exposed to sun and heat, hastening the thawing of these once vast ice sheets that help define Mount Shastas physique. The melting ice has joined the snowmelt in exacerbating the runoff. The conditions were seeing this year might not necessarily be a one-off thing, Blaschak said If we keep having continued drought and below-average snowpack and hot summers ... its something to watch out for. The melting of the glaciers is also being monitored. While rising global temperatures have long been shrinking the mountains ice sheets, not unlike whats going on in other alpine areas of the world, a spate of several drought years in California over the past decade has been particularly difficult for Mount Shasta. The mountains longest glacier, the Whitney Glacier on the north side, has lost about a quarter of its length since 2005, according to Mauri Pelto, director of the North Cascades Glacier Climate Project and a professor of environmental science at Nichols College in Massachusetts. The glacier now covers about half the area it did in 1981. Its also breaking into two because theres not enough ice flow to keep it together. The biggest, strongest member of the glacier family is coming apart at the seams. That cant be a good sign for the rest of the glacier family up there, Pelto said. This year, the Whitney Glacier is on track to lose another 10% of its volume, Pelto said. He called it not a recipe for very long duration. 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. What makes this summers saga on Mount Shasta particularly stark is that its playing out so soon in the year. Typically, the effects of heat and dryness come later, as the snow lingers through even the warm June and July months before dissipating in September or October. From many places along Interstate 5, where travelers cant help but gape at the towering volcano, snow has been hard to see for weeks. Its very common that you have no snow visible from the southwest side, but not this early, said Andy Calvert, scientist in charge of the California Volcano Observatory for the U.S. Geological Survey. This is the driest Ive seen it (in summer). Recently, though, getting any clear view of the mountain has been difficult because of smoke. The Lava Fire has been burning just northwest of Mount Shasta since July 24, while the larger Dixie Fire to the east and Monument Fire to the west have similarly strained the areas air quality. The Shasta-Trinity National Forest is among nine national forests that were closed to the public Monday through Labor Day because of wildfire danger. The closure comes at the heart of Mount Shastas climbing season. Meanwhile, federal water officials are contending with the lack of water in Shasta Lake, south of the mountain and reliant on the peaks runoff. The lake is the largest reservoir in California and a key part of the Central Valley Project, which serves much of the states agriculture industry. The reservoir on Tuesday was 28% full, about 43% of where it usually stands at this date. Its just has been a really tough year, Calvert said. Kurtis Alexander is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kalexander@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kurtisalexander The California legislature may consider a landmark bill to mandate vaccinations or frequent testing for workers in the state, and also mandate vaccinations for customers in places like restaurants and bars. Oakland is also mulling a vaccine mandate for city workers, and its unions are intrigued but cautious. Seven rural Northern California counties are seeing all-time high rates of hospitalized COVID patients. And heres why Bay Area residents do not need to worry too much while they wait for boosters. Resources on COVID-19 and Californias reopening: For detailed maps and new city-by-city Bay Area data, check out The Chronicles Coronavirus Tracker. To get regular updates on our coverage, sign up for our coronavirus newsletter. Latest updates: Alameda County Superior Court issues vaccine mandate: All Court employees, contractors, interns, and volunteers to be fully vaccinated by no later than November 1, 2021, the court said. There will be limited exemptions. San Jose Sharks announce vaccine requirement for SAP Center: Effective Sept. 20, all guests ages 12 and older who visit SAP Center at San Jose, or any Sharks Ice public recreational facility will be required to show proof of vaccination upon entry, the organization announced Thursday. A mandate requiring proof of vaccination for all venues owned by the City of San Jose at events with more than 50 people in attendance, was approved by the San Jose City Council on Tuesday. Dreamforce convention will be limited to hundreds of people: Saleforces Dreamforce convention has reduced its event size in San Francisco a second time as the delta variant fuels a surge in cases. Vaccination and invitations will be required. This story has the details. Should Bay Area residents be worried while waiting for boosters? With vaccines widely available at drugstores, some people have already availed themselves of a third dose, whether or not it is authorized. But health experts say theres no rush at least for most people. Read the story here. Oakland aims to require COVID vaccines for all city workers: If the proposal passes, Oakland would join New York, New Orleans and San Francisco in requiring mandates for city employees. But a union told The Chronicle it had some concerns about the proposal. Read the story here. Bay Area health officials double-down on return to in-person learning: Representatives from health departments of 12 Northern California counties, including those in the Bay Area and the city of Berkeley, issued a statement Thursday asserting support of full in-person school, despite a steady rise in COVID cases and hospitalizations in the region driven by the delta variant. "We know that when rates of COVID are high in our communities, cases will appear at schools, just as they do in other settings," they said in the joint letter reaffirming a statement from June advocating for reopening schools, adding that schools have protocols in place to slow the spread of the virus. Schools are offering only limited remote learning options, often for children with health issues. "In San Francisco, we are seeing cases of COVID-19 among children, however the percentage of pediatric cases has been consistent over time including this most recent surge," said Alison Hawkes of the San Francisco Department of Public Health. Substance use spiked for adults with disabilities during pandemic, CDC: A new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows adults with disabilities were far more likely to report serious mental health concerns, substance use, or serious suicidal thoughts and difficulty getting treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nearly two thirds of surveyed adults with disabilities reported adverse mental health symptoms or substance use in early 2021, compared with approximately one third of adults without disabilities. Texas governor issues executive order banning vaccine mandates: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has issued an executive order banning any state or local mandates requiring people to be vaccinated against COVID-19, the Associated Press reports. Hes also calling on legislators to vote it into law during the current special session. The move comes as Texas reported the most COVID-19 patients in its hospitals since the start of the pandemic. CDC will meet next week on booster shot rollout: An advisory group to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will meet on Aug. 30 to discuss a framework for rolling out supplemental vaccine doses. The White House is expected to recommend booster shots for all Americans within 6 to 8 months of having received their second dose of an mRNA vaccine against COVID-19. COVID hospitalizations, deaths at record highs in Florida: The COVID-19 pandemic is currently infecting, hospitalizing and killing more people than at any previous point, the New York Times reported. An average of 227 people are dying every day because of COVID-19 in Florida, by far the most in the nation. The delta variant. Wildfire smoke. Now is the time to break out the N95s, experts say: With revived mask mandates in place to combat the delta variant surge, face coverings have once again become a common sight across the Bay Area. But especially with wildfire smoke compounding the need for protection, should you upgrade to an N95 mask? Many health experts seem to think so. Read the story here. 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. 7 counties in Northern California are seeing all-time high rates of hospitalized COVID patients: Rural California counties are reeling under the latest COVID-19 surge as the delta variant rips across the state and strains already-limited resources in mostly vaccine-hesitant communities. Patients have to wait for beds. Burned-out nurses want to quit. In county after county, intensive care units, which care for the sickest patients, are full. Read the story here. California lawmakers considering sweeping statewide vax requirement for indoor venues: State lawmakers, including members of the Bay Areas delegation, are considering legislation that would require people to prove theyre vaccinated before entering a host of indoor venues. Read the story here. Outdoor festivals are returning to the Bay Area, but they carry risks: BottleRock Napa Valley is set for Labor Day weekend; Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival comes back to Golden Gate Park over Halloween weekend; and other festivals are scheduled in between. But promoters and concert-goers face a fresh set of challenges thanks to the delta variant. Read the story here. Is close contact still 6 feet for 15 minutes? Experts say COVID guidance may be outdated: The delta variant has forced a quick pivot on key pandemic public health recommendations, including the return of universal indoor masking and the green light for vaccine booster shots. Theres another long-standing core guideline, however, that experts say could use new scrutiny: the definition of close contact with an infected person, which dictates at what point someone exposed to the coronavirus should get tested or self-isolate. Read the story here. Pfizer seeks federal approval for a booster dose: The drugmaker announced Wednesday it is seeking FDA approval for a third dose of its vaccine for Americans ages 16 and older. The company says it expects to complete its application with the Food and Drug Administration by the end of this week, before submitting data on supplemental doses of its vaccine to a peer-reviewed journal, as well as file these data with the European Medicines Agency and other regulatory authorities around the world in the coming weeks. Pfizers vaccine received full regulatory approval this week. San Jose passes vaccine mandate for city buildings following protests: Despite facing a swarm of unmasked protesters on the ground and an organized effort by anti-vaccination groups to take over the public comment section of its meeting on Zoom, the San Jose City Council voted unanimously on Tuesday to pass a resolution from Mayor Sam Liccardo to require attendees and staff of events with 50 or more people held at city facilities to show proof of full vaccination for entry. Negative coronavirus tests can not be used as an alternative, according to the new rule. Everybody is absolutely able to make their own health decision on whether or not to get vaccinated, but we as a council are also able to decide how to safely operate our city-owned facilities, Raul Peralez, a councilmember, said at the meeting. ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) The Alaska Federation of Natives has postponed its annual convention because of a rise in COVID-19 cases in the state, officials said in a statement. The convention has traditionally been the largest gathering of Alaska Natives in the state. It had been scheduled for Oct. 21-23 but is now delayed until mid-December in Anchorage, the organization said in a statement Tuesday. The federation's board of directors cited a rise in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations statewide and the increasing pressure placed on Alaska's limited healthcare system. Organizers said they will continue planning for an in-person convention at the Denaina Convention Center in downtown Anchorage with a virtual option. However, the statement said the board will make a decision by mid-October on whether to maintain the in-person part. The high-risk factors of holding a 5,000-person indoor meeting, with delegates coming in from across Alaska, make an in-person October gathering out of the question, Alaska Federation of Natives President Julie Kitka said in the statement. She said the economic impact of the pandemic on businesses and individuals continues to be felt. And when events like the federation's annual convention are turned virtual, there are negative economic impacts for everyone, including the host city. We are working to avoid that if we can, though our top priority remains the health and safety of our delegates and other participants, Kitka said. Other organizers encouraged Alaskans to get vaccinated and wear masks so the convention can be held. One notable celebration this year will be the observation of the 50th anniversary of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. 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 act was the largest land settlement in the nations history when President Richard Nixon signed it into law Dec. 18, 1971 and settled Indigenous land claims in Alaska. Postponing until December provides us an opportunity to gather in person on the 50th anniversary of ANCSA, but it all hinges on everyones willingness and ability to get vaccinated, said Sealaska chairman and Alaska Federation of Natives co-chair Joe Nelson. We want our convention plans for December to be an encouragement to Alaskans to double our efforts, get vaccinated, and mask up, said Sheri Buretta, chair of Chugach Alaska Corporation and the convention committee chair. CHICAGO (AP) All city of Chicago employees will be required to get COVID-19 vaccines and submit proof by mid-October, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced Wednesday. City workers and volunteers will have to submit proof of full vaccination via an online portal by October 15. Earlier this month, city officials announced that public school employees including teachers and principals must also be vaccinated by the same date. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike IS. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. U.S. officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airports perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. Even so, the airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people away.. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. 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. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. ___ Faiez reported from Istanbul, Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) Maine Gov. Janet Mills has briefed President Biden that the state is preparing to accept refugees fleeing Afghanistan after the country's government crumbled because of a swift and unexpected Taliban takeover during the United States' military withdrawal from the country. Afghan Americans in Maine said they are struggling to help their overseas families flee before the Aug. 31 deadline implemented by the Biden administration, which is now being enforced by the Taliban, the Portland Press Herald reported. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has at long last fully approved what was the most exhaustively tested treatment ever to await its unconditional endorsement, the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. Officials hope more people will now stop sitting on the fence separating them and the country from easily obtainable protection against a deadly disease. While hope has been said to be a thing with feathers, when it comes to getting shots in arms, tooth and claw work better. Thats why Gov. Gavin Newsom should seize the opportunity to lead the nation in imposing a statewide vaccine mandate. With hundreds of millions of doses administered across the country yielding scant side effects and showing remarkable efficacy even against coronavirus variants, the FDAs glacial process took federal inertia to a new level. Its conclusion should reassure even the most dedicated stickler for scientific bureaucracy and, more important, leave one less ground for legal challenges to vaccination requirements. The Supreme Court upheld state and local vaccine mandates in precedents that have stood for more than a century. Thats why full approval of the shot, previously administered under emergency use authorization, was closely followed by mandates affecting state and local government workers, educational staff, employees of large companies such as CVS and Chevron, and 1.4 million active-duty military personnel. San Franciscos forward-looking mandate affecting 35,000 city employees, which Mayor London Breeds administration announced back in June, was also contingent on FDA approval. Newsoms administration has, to its credit, required vaccination or testing of state employees, school staff and health care employees. The governor should follow San Franciscos lead in requiring it for bars, restaurants, gyms and other risky indoor activities. He should also phase out the testing option and impose mandates for eligible students, who already face a host of appropriate vaccination requirements. While the federal governments authority to mandate vaccination is more limited than that of states and cities, the Biden administration should also look for opportunities to require the precaution for activities under its jurisdiction, such as air travel. Astonishingly, while no state has imposed a vaccine mandate as sweeping as San Franciscos, nearly a dozen have enacted backward laws against such requirements. By not only allowing but imposing such sensible precautions, California can lead the country in the right direction. This commentary is from The Chronicles editorial board. We invite you to express your views in a letter to the editor. Please submit your letter via our online form: SFChronicle.com/letters. SACRAMENTO There was an unusual twist at Wednesdays gubernatorial recall debate in Sacramento: A Democrat participated for the first time. And that Democrat, 29-year-old millionaire Ventura County real estate investor Kevin Paffrath, jump-started the hour-long debate with some unusual ideas. Paffrath, who has never held elective office, proposed to solve Californias water shortages by building a pipeline to the Mississippi River. He assured viewers that he had a plan to remove every homeless person from the streets within 60 days. And several times he described himself, without much elaboration, as a JFK Democrat. Perhaps because, like the tax-cutting President John Kennedy, Paffrath proposed eliminating state income taxes for anyone making less than $250,000 a year. In his closing remarks, he called on his Republican opponents to withdraw from the race and endorse him in order to prevent conservative GOP commentator Larry Elder who is leading in many polls from being governor should Gov. Gavin Newsom be recalled. "Its time to end the big threat and make sure Larry Elder does not become the next governor by voting Kevin Paffrath, he said. Elder declined to attend for the same reason hes rejected every other debate invitation: because he would not be sharing a stage with Newsom, who also wasnt there. With three weeks left before the Sept. 14 election day, mail-in recall ballots have been sent to registered voters. They ask two questions: Should Newsom be removed from office? And if so, who should replace him? If a majority of voters selects yes on the first question, then whichever candidate wins the second question will serve the remainder of Newsoms term, which ends in January 2023 even if they do not receive at least a 50% majority. On Wednesday, three Republican candidates spent more time railing Newsoms handling of COVID-related mandates, homelessness and the high cost of living than detailing their own plans. Yet unlike Elder, who has pushed voting conspiracy theories, each of Wednesdays participants clearly said they would accept the results of the election. Elders campaign has not responded to questions from The Chronicle about whether they would accept the results. Here are three takeaways from Wednesdays debate that featured Paffrath, former San Diego mayor Kevin Faulconer, San Diego businessman John Cox and Placer County Assemblyman Kevin Kiley: A possible Democratic alternative: California Democrats dubious of Newsom urging them to not choose a replacement candidate have been searching for a non-Republican to support in case the governor is booted. Wednesdays debate offered a showcase for the Paffrath-curious. Paffrath has cultivated a following by offering investment advice on his YouTube channel, where he has 1.7 million followers. Among replacement candidates, he trailed only Elder in a CBSNews Poll this month. But his plan for addressing homelessness sounded half baked. He proposes building 80 emergency housing facilities many of them convention center-sized -- deploying the National Guard to help round up the homeless. No homeless on our streets within 60 days, he said. After the debate, Paffrath told reporters: I know my plans sound bold, and I always get worried that when people hear the plan, they're like Oh my gosh, this is outlandish. But it's better than what we're doing right now, which is virtually nothing. When asked what he would do moving forward to combat the latest COVID surge, Paffrath said first and foremost, we need better masks, promising N95 masks to anyone that needs them. I will make sure we have an appropriate supply of masks that are well fitted for our children and the people of our state, he said. So with proper ventilation, we can actually end COVID. Faulconer, the two-term mayor, questioned Paffraths experience, noting that it's not the time for on-the-job training. One Republican criticizes Elder: Faulconer was the only Republican to call Elder out on the debate stage. Faulconer, who urged Elder to drop out of the race last week after his ex-fiancee alleged he brandished a gun during a heated argument in 2015, again criticized the radio host for his comments about women. Faulconer focused on Elders view that its OK for employers to ask women if they intend to have children because it could raise costs for the business, saying, We need a governor thats going to stand up for working women and knows that every woman in this state can have a career, can raise a family. But in a repeat of last weeks debate, Cox and Kiley left the former mayor dangling alone as he threw jabs at the GOP front-runner. Neither mentioned Elder by name during the debate. Afterward, Cox said Elder should have been present to address his stance on pregnancy discrimination. But Cox said he finds Faulconers insistence that Elder get out of the race unhelpful and suggested Faulconers stance is merely a political calculation. Mr. Faulconer is just a politician, Cox said. Hes playing for a certain segment. I think people could see through that. Scott Strazzante / San Francisco Chronicle Kiley, meanwhile, went further in making light of Faulconers attacks on Elder. I mean, I guess I could call on all of the candidates to drop out, and Id win by acclimation, Kiley quipped. When asked what policies he would pursue to help working women, if elected, Faulconer said he planned to release details of his proposals in the coming days. Water debate mostly shallow: As California falls deeper into an extraordinary drought, all three GOP candidates threw shade on Newsom approach of encouraging conservation. It was one of their most detailed debate exchanges about water policy to date, yet yielded few ideas for immediate action. Kiley framed overcoming the drought as a matter of political will. Rationing should not be an option, he said. Scarcity, rationing and cutbacks are political choices. The GOP candidates suggested the biggest key to solving the drought is building new dams and reservoirs to store more water in wet years projects that would take years to complete. But what would they do to prevent water cuts when reservoirs are at record lows? The three struggled to get specific. The only solution we get from Gavin Newsom every time were in a drought is take a shorter shower, Faulconer said. Thats not going to cut it. Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicles senior political writer and Dustin Gardiner is a staff writer. Email: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com, dustin.gardiner@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @joegarofoli, @dustingardiner WASHINGTON Vice President Kamala Harris will not campaign with Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday, canceling their planned Bay Area rally hours after suicide bombings in Afghanistan killed U.S. troops and scores of fleeing Afghans. (Update: Early on Aug. 27 the Pentagon revised its account of the incident in Kabul to clarify that there was only one suicide bombing, at the airport gate, and not two, as previously stated.) Newsoms campaign spokesman Nathan Click announced the rally was canceled Thursday, shortly after details of the logistics for the scheduled drive-in event at the Cow Palace had been unveiled. As Harris made her way back from a trip to Southeast Asia, her spokeswoman Symone Sanders tweeted that Harris would return to Washington, D.C., after a stop at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, scrapping the previous plan to stop in the Bay Area on her way back. At the time the event was canceled, Harris was en route from a refueling stop in Guam to Hawaii on her way back from Vietnam. The abrupt cancellation came hours after two suicide bombings just outside the Kabul airport that killed scores of civilians trying to escape Afghanistan and at least 12 U.S. service members. Sanders declined to comment on a reason for the change in schedule, referring the Chronicle back to her tweet. The former California senator, attorney general and San Francisco district attorney was scheduled to rally against the recall with Newsom, who was mayor of San Francisco when she was D.A. She was to be the highest-profile surrogate to date to appear at a campaign event for Newsom ahead of the Sept. 14 election. Neither Click nor Sanders had any comment on when the event might be rescheduled, given Harris had pledged to campaign for him. On Thursday, press secretary Jen Psaki told The Chronicle during the White House daily briefing that President Biden still intends to campaign in California for Newsom, despite the chaos in Afghanistan. That was before the bombings Friday morning. Biden, and by extension Harris, have been under fierce criticism as the Taliban swiftly took control of Afghanistan when U.S. troops left the country, causing panicked evacuations of thousands of Americans and roughly 100,000 American green card holders, allies and vulnerable Afghans desperate to escape the new regime. Thousands more had packed around the airport trying to get on flights out when terrorists attacked the primary gate being used to access the area secured by U.S troops. Staff writer Joe Garofoli contributed to this report. Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicles Washington correspondent. Email: tal.kopan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @talkopan A caller to KQEDs Forum interrupted the sparring between the candidates in the hotly contested East Bay Assembly special election Mia Bonta and Janani Ramachandran to interject a rare shot of positivity into a race that has grown increasingly testy as Tuesdays election day approaches. Im actually very excited about both candidates, and its actually hard to choose for once, said the caller, who identified herself as Melanie. We have two activist, progressive, women of color which is an amazing choice to have to make. Either candidate likely would be among the most progressive members of the Legislature. Thats not surprising, as the 18th Assembly district which includes much of Oakland, from its wealthier hills to its poorer flatlands, along with Alameda and San Leandro is among the most left-leaning in California. Here, having two progressive women of color competing to represent it isnt just celebrated as being newsworthy: its seen as overdue. So the ongoing battle between the two is not just about where they stand on the issues, but how they stand on them. Ramachandran said she believes that Bonta is too corporate to be progressive and deliver on what she says. Bonta counters that Ramachandran is a lightweight, all hashtags with little ability to fulfill her lofty promises. Bonta, the 49-year-old president of the Alameda Unified School District Board who handily won the eight-candidate primary in June, points to her elective office experience, endorsements by a wide variety of Democrats and potential to work with other legislators as reasons to send her to Sacramento. Backed by more than $2 million from her own campaign and outside groups, she has a vast fundraising advantage, and boasts of support from many legislators and labor unions, including Oakland Rep. Barbara Lee, progressive Oakland city council president Nikki Fortunato Bas and Georgia voting rights activist Stacey Abrams. She is the CEO of Oakland Promise, a nonprofit cradle-to-college support program focused on the citys low-income students. That, she said, has enabled her to make contacts in the district and Sacramento. Nick Otto/Special to The Chronicle Ramachandran, 29, a social justice attorney and former member of the Oakland Public Ethics commission, is centering her campaign on being free of corporate influence. The Oakland resident says Bonta like many legislators would be incapable of carrying out a progressive agenda because she would be beholden to wealthy donors who oppose those plans. Ramachandran alleges supporters have poured money into Bontas campaign to curry favor with her husband, Rob Bonta, who held this seat until Gov. Gavin Newsom appointed him to be state attorney general. The Oakland resident boasts endorsements from Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Fremont, Our Revolution the organization formed in the wake of Sen. Bernie Sanders first presidential run and the youth environmental organization Sunrise Bay Area. Analysts say the two generally agree on many issues. In California and across the country youve seen the sort of moderate versus progressive battles, but you dont have that here, said former assemblyman Ted Lempert, who teaches about California politics at UC Berkeley. Youve got two clear progressives. In a race like this, Lempert said, voters will decide based on personality, endorsements, whos giving them money, whos going to be more effective and what theyre going to prioritize (in Sacramento). Youve got a more narrow band of distinguishing characteristics. Take how they talk about the minimum wage. Ramachandran supports raising the statewide minimum wage currently at $14 an hour to $22 an hour. That would align the wage floor with Californias true cost of living, she said. Bonta, who is endorsed by the 136,000-member Alameda Labor Council, said that Ramachandrans false cry for a $22 minimum wage illustrates their differences. Bonta remembered the struggles that the labor movement went through during the six years it took to convince legislators to set the $15-an-hour baseline that takes effect in January. I would love a $22-an hour minimum wage. In fact, I would love a $25-an-hour minimum wage, Bonta said. But I formulate my policy positions based on experience and practice. So before putting out a policy statement like, Lets go for $22 an hour minimum wage, I considered what have been going through in this moment right now, in the middle of COVID, as so many small businesses are trying to recover and so many workers were struggling to try to get back to work. Bonta said she would initially focus on helping the region recover from the pandemic if she won. Ramachandran said she doesnt believe that Bonta can truly call herself a progressive. While Bonta may say she supports a single-payer health plan for California, Ramachandran said its unlikely she would advocate for it in Sacramento given that she has received campaign contributions from Blue Shield and other opponents of the plan. Ramachandran said she would focus on health care and housing if elected. She attributed Bontas endorsements even those of Abrams and Congresswoman Lee, who famously cast the only vote in Congress to oppose going to war after the Sept. 11 attacks as being a product of wanting to be connected to the second most powerful politician in California Rob Bonta. Rob Bonta has told me that Mia Bonta stands on her own two feet. She always has since Ive known her when she was 17 years old, when they met as freshmen at Yale University. Rob Bonta said theres a tinge of sexism, frankly, in folks who say her success or her powerful campaign is somehow attributable to her husband. As long as Ive know her, shes always done it on her own. To Ramachandran, you are who your donors are. She hears from people while campaigning door-to-door who agree with her that when you take their money, you take their side. And that is what California history has shown. Mia Bonta said that when she closes her eyes and listens to Ramachandran, she sounds like conservative Republican recall candidate John Cox, delivering exactly the same kind of message of fear, and of establishment politics doing us wrong. Im an independent person with my own mind and with my own perspectives, Mia Bonta has told me in response to criticism about her donors. Ramachandran predicted that Tuesdays results would ripple across California. She said she knows of at least 10 candidates taking on corporate Democrats who are closely watching. If a candidate like her cannot win in one of Californias most progressive districts, she said, what hope is there for the candidate in southern California or the candidate in the Central Valley or far north in California. The two candidates agree on one thing: This race is close. Only 21% of registered voters cast ballots in the primary. And with turnout likely to be low in this off-the-traditional calendar election in the shadow of Californias recall campaign, anything could happen. Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicles senior political writer. Email: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @joegarofoli In some of his earliest memories as a child, San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin recalls the soundproof plexiglass that separated him from his jailed father. There was no hugging, no physical contact at all just two plastic telephones and a wire to connect a father with his toddler son. Boudin was about 3 years old when the plexiglass came down. He was too young to understand it was the result of a lawsuit on jail conditions waged by his parents, then both behind bars for their role in a fatal robbery, but desperate to maintain a bond with their only child. But he knew the visits got better. After the lawsuit, Boudin was able to have human contact with both his mother and father, and the phones that were once the only means of communication with them lent themselves as toys. I have a memory of ... turning those phones into a game, as a way to have fun in the confines of otherwise really dark and depressing space, Boudin said Wednesday in an interview. Two days after Boudins father, David Gilbert, was granted clemency by outgoing New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Boudin spoke to The Chronicle about how his personal history with imprisoned parents shaped his philosophies as San Franciscos top prosecutor, and how his parents candor with him, even as a child, has fortified the relationship they maintain to this day. For as long as I can remember, Ive known that my parents were part of causing tremendous harm not just to families, but to an entire community, Boudin said. And that was a conversation that, in many ways, has been a continuous thread in my life, and in my relationship with both of my parents. Gilbert, along with Chesa Boudins mother, Kathy Boudin, were members of the radical leftist organization Weather Underground. On Oct. 20, 1981, the pair dropped off their 14-month-old son with a babysitter and joined members of the Black Liberation Army in a plan to rob a Brinks armored truck in New York. The robbery turned violent, with other members of the group shooting and killing Brinks guard Peter Paige and two Nyack police officers, Waverly Brown and Edward OGrady. Gilbert and Kathy Boudin were unarmed getaway drivers, Gilbert at the wheel, and Kathy Boudin in the passengers seat. They were charged and convicted under New Yorks felony murder law. Gilbert is serving a sentence of 75 years to life, while Kathy Boudin spent 22 years in prison and was paroled in 2003. After nearly 40 years behind bars, Gilberts commutation provides his first real shot at freedom, with an anticipated hearing with the parole board about six weeks away. Growing up, Boudin remembers asking his parents the same line of questioning over and over: Why did you do it? What made you think it was not going to result in people getting hurt? What made you think it was not going to jeopardize your relationship with me as your kid? The answers grew more nuanced and complex the older Boudin became, but the district attorney said his parents were always honest with him about their roles in the crime. 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. Ive watched many families lie to their children, and tell them that they werent going into a prison, but that they were going into a high-security hospital or university, said Boudin, a former public defender. Of course, in the process of lying or hiding or obfuscating, many of these families are teaching stigma, Boudin said. And I was lucky that my family didnt do that. If they didnt own that harm, if they didnt recognize and take seriously the damage that theyve done, the responsibility that they bore for it, I wouldnt be able to have the strong relationships that we have today. Now as the citys top law enforcement officer, Boudin said his personal history is a constant reminder of the need to prevent crimes before they occur, and that the process of meting out punishment has often produced new victims, who bore no responsibility for the crime that occurred. This is why, Boudin said, hes focused on rehabilitation policies over incarceration, and why he has worked to expand the victim services area of his department, he said. Now, just days away from the birth of he and his wifes first child, Boudin is looking forward to what hes sure will be the happiest day of my life, he said. And it will be all the sweeter because there is now a chance our child wont have to go through prison gates to know grandpa. Megan Cassidy is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: megan.cassidy@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @meganrcassidy Tourists are returning to San Francisco, but a full recovery wont come until around 2025, the citys tourism bureau said Wednesday. In 2021, visitor volume is expected to reach 15.9 million people, a significant improvement from last years 10.2 million, but down 39% from 2019. Spending is expected to rise to $3.9 billion this year from $2.7 billion in 2020, still down 58% from 2019. Tourism is the citys biggest industry and a critical economic engine for restaurants, retailers, hotels and other businesses. During last years devastation, more than 65,000 jobs supported by tourism were lost. The citys hotel occupancy rate has improved to more than 50% this summer, but its far from the pre-pandemic days that averaged upward of 80%, according to STR, a hospitality research firm. Daily room rates have grown to $174.93 per night in July, up from a low of $99.53 in April 2020, but below July 2019s rate of $242.43. The citys economy relies on business spending and international visitors, both of which are lagging leisure travel. Companies have delayed office reopenings to the end of this year or 2022, along with travel to San Francisco and other cities. We anticipated business travel would return after Labor Day, but thats not what were hearing, Amanda Hite, president of STR, said during a San Francisco Travel forecast event on Wednesday. Moscone Center, the citys largest convention center, was closed to events for the past 15 months and instead housed the citys emergency response teams, as well as COVID-19 testing and vaccinations. Only six events are confirmed in the city for this year, including a California Dental Association event starting Sept. 9 and a scaled-back Dreamforce later in the month, followed by 35 in 2022 and 28 in 2023. Its not all rosy out there, but its not all doom and gloom either, said Nicole Rogers, San Francisco Travels chief sales officer. The biggest risk we have right now is the delta variant, Rogers said. We havent seen things go backwards, weve just seen a little bit of a plateau. The number of hotel room nights occupied by convention attendees is expected to drop below 50,000 this year, down from 121,000 last year and a tiny fraction of the 1.2 million room nights in 2019. The city has allocated $4.6 million to help subsidize conventions for smaller organizers to attract more business. 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. Kate Sofis, the new director of the citys Office of Economic and Workforce Development, said she was encouraged that businesses are staying open despite the surge, which will help draw more visitors. The citys new vaccination mandate for most indoor activities is widely supported by business owners, she said. No one is looking at trying to shut down. We are really focused on doing everything we can to keep us all healthy, while staying open at the same time, she said. By and large, I have heard almost overwhelmingly positive support by businesses for that, because it helps them continue to operate safely. Last year, SFO lost more passengers than any other airport in the U.S. Flights to Asia were severed as the region imposed strict lockdowns, many of which remain in place. The China border, a critical market for SFO, remains closed to non-essential U.S. visitors. During the depths of the pandemic, only four out of 44 airline carriers at SFO were active. Now, 28 are back and the airport is in talks to bring on four new airlines. We had hoped to see more improvement this summer, but the delta variant obviously has hit us hard. San Francisco has got some of the bigger challenges in the country right now, because of our dependence on international travel, business travel, said Joe DAlessandro, CEO of San Francisco Travel. I think were headed in the right direction. Roland Li is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: roland.li@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @rolandlisf As San Francisco races to buy four properties by the end of the year for homeless housing, city officials are facing resistance in some neighborhoods, with the strongest so far in Japantown. Many Japantown community leaders, business owners and residents are opposing San Franciscos plan to buy a tourist hotel in the neighborhood and convert it into permanent affordable housing with social services for people experiencing homelessness. Locals say their opposition isnt anti-homeless, pointing out many supported using the Buchanan Hotel to house homeless people during the pandemic. But theyre worried about the demise of tourism if one of the neighborhoods two hotels is permanently lost and critical of what they feel is a rushed process in a historically marginalized community. When you start taking away those economic resources, it will choke the community, said Paul Osaki, a resident for 60 years and executive director of the Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Northern California. Our concern has everything to do with saving our communitys economy and the survival of Japantowns small businesses. By Thursday, more than 2,500 people signed an online petition to stop the sale. During a three-hour virtual community meeting Thursday, 63 people expressed opposition to the plan, with nine in support and three advocating for a compromise. The city originally scheduled only one meeting, but announced another for Sept. 8. Japantown isnt the only neighborhood where residents have concerns. The Buchanan Hotel is one of four properties the city wants to buy by the end of the year to create 368 permanent supportive housing units, where formerly homeless residents pay 30% of their income in rent and receive social services such as case management. Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle The three other locations are in SoMa, the Mission and the Excelsior. At a community meeting Wednesday for the hotel in the Excelsior, residents were divided. One resident who lives near the hotel, which has been housing up to four dozen homeless veterans during the pandemic, said two dozen neighbors oppose the plan, concerned about an increase of syringes and trash over the past year and fears of attracting drug dealing. Locals and nonprofit advocates largely supported the site in the Mission at a meeting Tuesday, eager to see affordable housing for youth in the neighborhood. The SoMa site meeting is scheduled for Monday. Officials, advocates and formerly homeless people have pushed to spread out affordable housing sites to neighborhoods beyond the Tenderloin, where most unhoused and formerly homeless people live, but doing so can spark protests. Neighborhood outrage puts city officials in a tricky position as they seize the opportunity to acquire more housing with new local and state funds to stem the homelessness crisis. Andy Lynch, Mayor London Breeds spokesperson, said the city is in close contact with Japantown leaders and understands concerns about the possible economic impact. We are committed to getting people off of the streets and into the housing and care they need. Doing so not only helps the people experiencing homelessness, but also the surrounding communities, Lynch said, citing a real need to make sure the city is welcoming for tourists and residents. The 131-room Buchanan Hotel, at 1800 Sutter St., is the smaller and more affordable of two hotels in the four-square-block radius of Japantown. Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle After the lockdown shuttered the hotel, owner KHP Capital Partners agreed to let the city use it as a shelter-in-place hotel. According to a spokesperson for the company, the city then came to us to explore the possibility of acquiring the hotel. We viewed it as an opportunity both to help the City in its continued efforts and to provide much-needed permanent supportive housing ... and to help address the severe financial impact COVID-19 has had on our business, the statement read. The statement said the city assured the company it would get feedback. The hotel has already housed many. Pamela Thompson moved in a month ago after a hospital stay. She called the food bad and the staff rude, but said it was better than a shelter. She needs permanent housing and continued medical care. I just want to get myself straightened out, Thompson said standing outside the hotel Tuesday. If the citys going to take over, Im going to stay. Unite Here Local 2, which represents about 30 workers at the hotel, opposed the plan, although President Anand Singh said the union looks forward to working with the city and other partners to pursue solutions to the housing crisis while protecting good jobs. A dozen workers expressed fear during Thursdays meeting that they would lose their jobs. Community leaders criticized the hotel owner and city leaders for negotiating a sale without community input. Robert Sakai, who is a third-generation resident and property owner, said his parents were married in an internment camp in World War II. Despite protests, the city redeveloped the area in the 1960s and 1970s, making it tourist-dependent, he said. As a minority community, we are continually seeming to get the short end of the stick. It angers me, Sakai said. Osaki said supervisors cant sacrifice and break their promise to one community to serve another. Supervisor Dean Preston, whose district includes Japantown, said he found out about the planned acquisition on Aug. 9 and definitely heard a number of concerns in a meeting with community leaders Monday. 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. Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle I am very invested in the success of Japantown and I am also very actively involved in trying to address homelessness in this district and in San Francisco. My office will be involved either in shepherding this proposal at the board or looking at alternative proposals, Preston told The Chronicle Tuesday. He stressed the continued need for community input. Critics said the timeline was rushed and lacked transparency. Some heard about the plan only two weeks ago in an email from the city to community leaders, others from The Chronicles article or a notice mailed to neighbors recently. The plan is for the Board of Supervisors to approve the purchases by the end of September and close on the sale by the end of the year. The city has not yet disclosed prices. That tight timeline is the result of a matching state grant to create homeless housing called Project Homekey. The state will start accepting applications on a rolling basis in late September. Were striving to balance the urgency to bring more housing online quickly to address the crisis of unsheltered homelessness ... with the need for a thorough community process, Lynch said. Opponents say Japantown is still reeling from the economic impacts of the pandemic. Richard Hashimoto, president of the Japantown Merchants Association, said about 12 out of 300 businesses have permanently closed. Linda Mihara, who grew up in the neighborhood and whose family has run the Paper Tree store in the shadow of the hotel since 1974, said she is really upset by the plan and break-ins since the site became a shelter-in-place hotel including at her business for the first time ever. Police data for Japantown shows burglaries and larceny theft fluctuated in the months before and after the hotel was converted, with incidents rising during the winter and then subsiding. Burglaries across the city spiked during lockdown before returning to pre-pandemic levels. Mihara didnt blame hotel residents for crimes, but said the site attracted other homeless individuals who hung around during the day or slept on the streets. Cathy Inamasu, who has run the day care Nihonmachi Little Friends next to the hotel for 45 years, said she was very hopeful when the shelter-in-place hotel started because thats a very needed service and also helps out the hotel. The reality, she said, was an increase in trash, needles and feces; alcohol and drug use; and mental health crises or aggressive behavior. I understand that it solves a problem for the city, but it hasnt worked for this neighborhood, said Jon Osaki, executive director of the Japanese Community Youth Council. Its a challenge for an area thats struggling to survive. Mallory Moench is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mallory.moench@sfchronicle.com Twitter:@mallorymoench - Updates: Get info on the Caldor Fire from the Eldorado National Forest. - Information line: 530-303-2455 - Evacuations: Get the latest info from the U.S. Forest Service and from a map posted by the El Dorado County Sheriff's Office. - Maps: Find from the Forest Service. LATEST Aug. 27, 8 a.m. The Caldor Fire grew to 143,951 acres as of Friday morning with 12% containment, Cal Fire said. The northeast corner of the fire was more active overnight with several spot fires within control lines, the agency said. Aug. 26, 8:35 p.m. The Caldor Fire expanded to 139,510 acres as of Thursday evening, up from 136,643 acres from the morning, according to Cal Fire's latest update. Aug. 26, 12:05 p.m. A flurry of new evacuation orders and warnings were issued Thursday afternoon for several Lake Tahoe area communities as the Caldor Fire continues its slow yet determined and destructive march northeast across California's Sierra Nevada range. More for you News This is what you need in your wildfire preparedness kit,... Officials released evacuation orders for Twin Bridges to Echo Summit; from Highway 50 south to the county line of Amador and Alpine; and Highway 50 north to Flag Pole Peak. Evacuation warnings went into effect for Christmas Valley from State Route 89 west to Echo Summit; Highway 89 due west to Watershed Ridge and south to the county line of Amador and Alpine; Highway 89 south from Luther Pass Road to Picketts Junction; and west on Highway 88 to Kirkwood. "The fire continues to progress toward the northeast, toward the Strawberry Area and South Lake Tahoe," said Henry Herrera, a forester with Cal Fire who is serving as a public information officer on the Caldor Fire. "It hasnt approached aggressively but that is the direction the winds are blowing, and we do continue to see spot fires in that area." Herrera said the evacuations were issued out of an "abundance of caution" to allow firefighters to focus on battling flames rather than evacuating residents in an urgent situation. The fire's northeast edge was about 13 miles southwest of South Lake on Thursday morning and 4 miles west of the community of Strawberry. "We are in Strawberry right now doing structure protection," said Herrera. The El Dorado County Sheriff posted an evacuation map online. Cal Fire The burn area of the fire stood at 136,643 acres Thursday morning with 12% containment, Cal Fire said. The Caldor Fire ignited in heavy timber in the Eldorado National Forest near the small town of Grizzly Flats south of Pollock Pines, burning a destructive path through the community of about 1,200 people. Photos from the aftermath show an elementary school, a post office and homes that were turned into piles of ash. Cal Fire said 465 single residents and 11 commercial properties have been destroyed. Damage assessments are still underway, and a map of damaged structures is available from Cal Fire. The fire has been burning along Highway 50, a main artery between Lake Tahoe and Sacramento. The road has been closed since last Friday. Flames jumped the highway over the weekend, with a spot fire that has now grown to more than 2,100 acres. Cal Fire said in a Thursday morning update that the fire made its way up Wrights Lake Road on Wednesday. Photo Illustration: SFGATE/ Getty Images The U.S. Forest Service officials announced a complete shutdown of the Eldorado National Forest through Sept. 30 because of the fire. The Rubicon Trail is also closed. Air quality has plummeted in the region, with air quality index readings well over 300 near the lake and over 400 in the Truckee area; anything over 150 is considered "unhealthy" and readings over 300 are "hazardous" for all. Officials released new information that provides a more comprehensive look into the ongoing investigation of a California family found dead in the Sierra National Forest south of Yosemite. John Gerrish, 45, Ellen Chung, 30, and their 1-year-old daughter Miju as well as their family dog Oski were found dead in the Devil's Gulch area in the south fork of the Merced River in the Sierra National Forest, the Mariposa County Sheriff's Office said. Responding agencies treated the scene as a hazmat situation due to their uncertainty about the cause of the fatalities. In an update provided by the Mariposa County Sheriff's Office on Thursday, investigators substantively ruled out another cause of death chemical hazards on Hites Cove. The update also sheds further insight into the timeline of events leading up to and following their death, including a witness sighting on the day of their disappearance. Craig Kohlruss/Associated Press The timeline also reveals that a cell phone was delivered to the FBI for further investigation Tuesday, and a search warrant was issued for access to Chung's and Gerrish's social media accounts Wednesday. Toxicology reports from any of the family members have yet to be released, and water samples from around the scene and with the family were sent Monday to the California State Water Resources Control Board and to independent labs, said the sheriff's office. The Fresno Bee reported at the time their deaths were announced that "exposure to toxic algae" could have been a possibility. Craig Kohlruss/Associated Press Toxicology results are expected in two to three weeks. Autopsy data revealed this weekend was only able to rule out acute trauma, such as stabbing, gunshot wounds or blunt-force trauma. The family relocated to Mariposa from San Francisco during the COVID-19 pandemic when Gerrish was presented an opportunity to work remotely for good, the Bee reported. Gerrish was a software engineer at Snapchat; Chung was in graduate school studying to become a family and marriage therapist. The two wanted to raise Miju in a "quiet, slow-paced environment" surrounded by nature, in a setting unlike the hustle and bustle of San Francisco. Craig Kohlruss/Associated Press Before moving to Mariposa, both were avid concert and festival-goers; social media posts dating back to 2017 show Gerrish and Chung at shows with large groups of friends. The family's Sunday hike was intended to be just a daylong hike, which prompted concern from multiple family friends when they didn't come back home. The temperature at the time, according to the sheriff's office, ranged from 103 to 109 degrees. The California Department of Justice and sheriff's office workers are investigating their deaths. Their death is being handled as a hazmat and coroner investigation. We know the family and friends of John and Ellen are desperate for answers, our team of Detectives are working round the clock," said Mariposa County Sheriff Jeremy Briese in a statement. "Cases like this require us to be methodical and thorough while also reaching out to every resource we can find to help us bring those answers to them as quickly as we can. SFGATE managing editor Katie Dowd contributed to this report. The former chief executive of Icahn Enterprises will take over at Lordstown Motors two months after the former CEO and chief financial officer stepped down amid doubts over the number of orders placed for the electric truck startup's marquee vehicle. Daniel Ninivaggi was named CEO Thursday as the Ohio company nears the start of limited production of its Endurance vehicle next month. Ninivaggi, who will also serve as a board member, has also worked at Lear Corp. and Federal Mogul Holdings Corp. Shares, which have fallen more than 70% this year on those questions about orders, spiked nearly 20% before the opening bell Thursday. Earlier this month Lordstown said that aside from the anticipated production start up in September, it expects to complete vehicle validation and regulatory approvals in December and January. However, the company has fought to secure new funding and said that it is unable to guarantee that it will last through the year. Last month Lordstown, based just outside of Youngstown, acknowledged receiving two subpoenas from federal regulators and also that prosecutors in New York have opened an investigation into the company. The Securities and Exchange Commission asked in a pair of subpoenas for documents related to the companys merger with DiamondPeak, a special purpose acquisition company. Special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs, have gained prominence this year as a quick route to becoming publicly traded and listing shares on an exchange. But now investors are seeking information that would traditionally be included in an initial public offering, information that was not available when Lordstown went public through a SPAC. The company has since acknowledged that it had no firm orders for its vehicles and Lordstown said that the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Southern District of New York was investigating these matters. RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) Few Palestinians in the occupied West Bank get to board an airplane these days. The territory has no civilian airport and those who can afford a plane ticket must catch their flights in neighboring Jordan. But just outside the northern city of Nablus, a pair of twins is offering people the next best thing. Khamis al-Sairafi and brother Ata have converted an old Boeing 707 into a cafe and restaurant for customers to board. Ninety-nine percent of Palestinians have never used an airplane. Only our ambassadors, diplomats, ministers and mayors use them. Now they see an airplane and it is something for them,' said Khamis al-Sairafi. After a quarter century of effort, the brothers opened The Palestinian-Jordanian Airline Restaurant and Coffee Shop al-Sairafi on July 21. Families, friends and couples turned up for drinks in the cafe situated below the body of the plane. Many others came to take photos inside at a price of five shekels (about $1.50) per person. Customers said they were motivated to visit after seeing pictures of the renovated plane circulating online. For a long time, I have wanted to see this place. I wish I had seen this place before it was turned into a cafe, said customer Majdi Khalid. For years, the jetliner sat along the side of a major highway in the northern West Bank, providing endless fodder for conversation for passersby baffled by its hulking presence. The 60-year-old identically dressed twins' dream of transforming the airplane into a cafe and restaurant was born in the late 1990s when Khamis saw the derelict Boeing aircraft near the northern Israeli city of Safed. At the time, the plane already had an illustrious history. The aircraft was used by the Israeli government from 1961 to 1993 and flew then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin to the United States in 1978 to sign Israel's historic peace agreement with Egypt, according to Channel 12 TV. It was later bought by three Israeli business partners who dreamed of turning it into a restaurant, but the project was abandoned following disagreements with local authorities, the station said. After tracking down one of the owners, the brothers agreed to buy it for $100,000 in 1999. They spent an additional $50,000 for licenses, permits and to transport it to the West Bank. Khamis said the then-mayor of Nablus, Ghassan Shakaa, quickly approved the transportation and renovation of the airplane. Moving the plane to Nablus was a 13-hour operation, requiring the wings to be dismantled and the temporary closure of roads in Israel and the West Bank. At the time, Israel and the Palestinians were engaged in peace talks and movement back and forth was relatively easy. The al-Sairafi brothers were successful traders and scrap metal merchants. They regularly traveled to and from Israel buying pieces of metal that they then sold and smelted in the West Bank. They also owned a successful waste disposal business and used their earnings to build an amusement park including a swimming pool and concert venue on the same patch of land where the plane was placed. But they said their project was put on hold after the outbreak of the second Palestinian uprising in late 2000. An Israeli military checkpoint was built nearby, they said, preventing customers from the nearby city of Nablus from reaching the site. The checkpoint remained for three years and the Israeli military took over the site. The project collapsed. They even built tents under the wings of the plane, Ata al-Sairafi said. The Israeli military did not respond to a request for comment. For nearly 20 years, the airplane and the site were abandoned. After the uprising faded out in the mid-2000s, the brothers scraped by with their waste disposal business and the small amusement park in Nablus they opened in 2007. After more than a decade of saving, they decided in 2020 to begin rebuilding what they lost, this time starting with the renovation of the airplane. The coronavirus crisis, which included multiple lockdowns, hit the Palestinian economy hard and caused further delays. Following months of work, the aircraft is almost ready for full service. The interior is freshly painted, fitted with electricity and nine tables and the doors are connected to two old sets of airstairs allowing customers to board safely. The nose of the plane has been painted with colors of the Palestinian flag and the tail with Jordanian colors. The cafe is already open and the brothers hope to open the restaurant next month. They plan to install a kitchen below the body of the plane to serve food to customers on board. However, their long-term goal of re-building the amusement park and swimming pool remains a long way off. The pair said they were disappointed they had not received financial support from the municipality and are looking for investors. God willing, I hope the project works and that it becomes the best it can be, said Ata al-Sairafi. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (AP) Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has announced that IGT Technologies Inc. will invest nearly $4 million to expand its Knoxville operation, creating 200 new jobs. According to a news release, IGT is a business process management and software development company. The company's expansion project will include an inbound call center and a technology development center. It will also set a customer experience incubation lab to support startup companies. LATEST Aug. 26, 11:30 a.m. Most evacuees forced to flee Grass Valley in the Sierra Nevada foothills are now able to come back, officials said. Cal Fire reports that the Bennett Fire has been largely contained, burning about 59 acres with 70% containment. Only one zone, GRS-E222B, remains under evacuation orders. Aug. 25, 5:40 p.m. Police officers in a historic California Gold Rush town are ordering residents to evacuate immediately due to a wildfire that erupted Wednesday afternoon. More for you News This is what you need in your wildfire preparedness kit,... The order was announced by the Grass Valley Police Department on Wednesday afternoon, just hours after the Bennett Fire started. KCRA reports that the fire has burned about 25 acres as of 4:40 p.m with zero containment. Residents in zones GRS-E222, GRS-E280 and E-380, which encompass Whispering Pines, the Olympia Glade Mobile Home Park and Glenbrook Shopping Center, are under the evacuation order, while GRS-E250 and GRS-E381 where Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital and two assisted-living facilities are located are being asked to shelter in place. Nevada County officials are ordering residents affected by the orders to go to Nevada Union High School. The cause of the fire remains unknown, and the Sacramento Bee reports that Cal Fire and other agencies are working to battle the blaze. The evacuation website Zonehaven, which officials are using for evacuation orders, describes the Bennett Fire as a "fast moving wildfire" with an immediate threat to life." This is a developing story and will be updated. BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) A Hungarian orchestra conductor received a COVID-19 vaccine booster shot onstage during a free open-air concert in Budapest on Wednesday as part of an effort to encourage people to get vaccinated. Budapest Festival Orchestra conductor Ivan Fischer removed his jacket to reveal a white dress shirt with a hole cut out of the sleeve. As he kept his baton moving and the orchestra played on, a doctor administered the shot, Fischer's third dose, to applause from the crowd. The carefully choreographed action was an attempt to further raise awareness of the need for vaccination in Hungary, the orchestra's managing director, Orsolya Erdodi, said. "Vaccination can give us the chance to live and work in a normal way of life again, just as we did before the coronavirus pandemic, she said. Hungary has enjoyed a comparative summer reprieve from the COVID-19 pandemic after a devastating spring, when the country for a time had the world's highest number of virus deaths per capita. While confirmed cases and deaths are down, the vaccination rate also has slowed dramatically. Hungary was an early vaccination leader, using doses from Russia and China as well as ones procured through the European Union to conduct one of the EU's fastest immunization campaigns. More than 32% of the Central European country's adult population has not received a first shot amid stubborn vaccine hesitancy. Many other European countries have since overtaken Hungary's vaccination rate. Hungarys chief medical officer has described a recent slow uptick in cases as the beginning of a fourth wave, dominated by the highly transmissible delta variant. With the threat of another surge in cases looming, the Budapest Festival Orchestra decided to make a push for vaccines and vigilance against the coronavirus. Fischer, a frequent champion of progressive social causes, not only received his booster shot, but members of his prestigious orchestra took rapid COVID-19 tests on stage Wednesday as the music played on. Further vaccination and testing are the most important thing in order to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, to maintain a normal life and to allow people to go to concerts," Erdodi, the orchestra's managing director, said. After reports emerged in July that Chinas Sinopharm vaccine, which Hungary uses, may provide poor protection to older adults, Hungary became the first country in the 27-member EU to offer booster shots to individuals who want them. As of Thursday, 240,000 people in Hungary had received a booster jab. STOCKHOLM (AP) Her cannons firing a powerful salute, a full-size replica of an armed merchant ship that sank in 1745 sailed into port at the Swedish capital Thursday, ahead of a voyage to Asia next year. Drawing crowds in every port she visits, the nearly 60-meter (197-feet) long Gotheborg of Sweden is billed the worlds largest operational wooden sailing vessel and will be used to promote Swedish businesses and culture, and advocate for sustainability. Its the first time in six years that the three-masted ship has left her home port in western Sweden, so the trip offered a chance to bring the new crew up to speed. The ship is actually made for ocean passages, said 26-year-old Marielle Cocozza, the second in command. Shes missing the oceans and this trip to Stockholm is to prepare us to work together and I think that has been achieved. In 1745, the original Gotheborg ran aground and sank just outside her home port of Goteborg at the end of her third round trip to China. More than 130 men were on board, and all survived. The ship was owned by the Swedish East India Company, which traded with China and completed a total of 132 voyages with 37 vessels until it ceased operating in 1813. The ships wreckage was found in 1984, triggering the idea to build a replica. Work started in 1995, and the vessel was launched eight years later. A maiden voyage from Goteborg to Stockholm was made in 2005. Between 2005-2007 the ship sailed the historical route to Asia and back. The latest of several voyages around Europe was in 2015. Since our last expedition to China we have been looking forward to this," said the ship's captain, August Jansson. "Now it seems it will become true so we are all very happy. Gotheborg of Sweden will remain in Stockholm until Sept. 4, after which she will head home and prepare for a departure in April 2022 for the Far East through the Suez Canal. Although the exact route has not been set, stops are planned in London, Lisbon, Palma de Mallorca, Athens, Alexandria, Djibouti, Muscat, Chennai, Singapore, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong and Shanghai. On a recent sticky Sonoma County summer day, I slipped through the back door of a new Santa Rosa restaurant called Sushi Rosa, where the air inside was cool compared with the swelter outdoors. I was throwing on a sweatshirt when I was spotted, almost immediately, by an attentive server. He was wearing all black and had an iPad slung over his shoulder like a purse. Smiling beneath his mask, he asked, How many? (Just me.) and where Id like to sit. Thats when I awkwardly sputtered, I want to see the robot. Against the backdrop of an ongoing pandemic, restaurants, once my happy place, have become too stressful for me to enjoy casually. I now need a reason to dine indoors, something Ive done only a handful of times in recent months. Last week, that reason was a news blurb Id read about a new downtown Santa Rosa restaurant where sushi is delivered by, yes, a robot. For nearly 20 years, the 4th Street location had been the home of Tex Wasabis, a sushi-barbecue mash-up that was among Guy Fieris early successes. Though Fieri had handed off the business a few years before, its connection to him and his roots in the North Bay remains. So I found it darkly amusing to think of Fieri, who is nothing if not intensively human, being replaced by a robot. Then again, Fieri is famous, in part, for his gimmicks and flamboyant persona, so perhaps Sushi Rosa was a worthy successor? Regardless, I wanted to see for myself. Freda Moon As the granddaughter of a domestic, the daughter of a waitress, and someone who worked my way through school as what, by the late-1990s, was called a server, I have complicated feelings about service work. Twenty years after my final stint in food service, my most visceral memories of that time are of working alongside brilliant, take-no-prisoners women funding their law school tuition on tip money and of being grabbed and groped and talked down to by entitled customers for whom, in retrospect, I may as well have been a robot. Its probably unsurprising, then, that Im conflicted about the notion that restaurant workers might be replaceable by machines. --- The pandemic has led to an overdue conversation about service jobs in general, from the abuse that flight attendants are suffering to the inadequate pay and mistreatment of hotel workers to the myriad ways in which the restaurant industry is dysfunctional. There is now a shortage of workers for these roles and everyone seems to have an opinion about why. To me, it seems obvious. Its physically grueling work that pays only reasonably well and thats during the best of times. On first glance, Sushi Rosa looks like a generic, if a bit oversized, middle America sushi restaurant-meets-sports bar. Its familiar, unflashy and, were it not for the droid in the corner, not the kind of place Id drive 60 miles to visit. But I grew up in the heyday of restaurant gimmickry, a time when the Chevys Rube Goldberg-esque tortilla machine and the conveyor belt sushi boats of San Franciscos Japantown mall were true destinations places my family went out of our way to visit again and again. Freda Moon For better or worse, I have a real taste for culinary showmanship. I love watching food being prepared: the slapping of hand-pulled noodles, the spinning, dripping trompo of al pastor taco meat, the smoking, sizzling flash-bang of charcoal-fueled sumiyaki. But Im equally enamored with a creative delivery: Dim sum carts zipping through a palatial dining room. A whole fish being deboned tableside on a beach in Zihuatanejo. Even the seemingly mundane Fresh Choice buffet bar of my childhood was delightful. My brother and I were given the same blank canvas of a plate and ended up with completely different meals. To us, it felt like art. --- After my clumsy server request, I was relieved when Michael, the sole human manning the floor, seemed more amused than offended as he walked me to a bar-height table for two and handed me a menu a glossy, spiral-bound encyclopedia of California-style Japanese food. Among Sushi Rosas multi-page offerings: the Aca roll, a $12 cylinder of rice stuffed with fried asparagus, cucumber and avocado, the Carburetor (shrimp and cucumber topped with crab, mango and avocado, $18), a Pretty Woman Roll, a Red Bull Roll and, in an unexpected nod to the Minnesota State Fair, some deep fried Oreos. There was plenty of cream cheese and macadamia nuts and mango, and the drink list included both sake and soju, root beer and Orange Crush, but no green tea. Freda Moon Between the heat, the wildfire smoke and my creeping suspicion that Sushi Rosas sushi may not be the restaurants strength, I wasnt all that hungry. When Michael came back around, I ordered a couple pair of nigiri and a hot sake. Then, as my order hung in the air between us, a robot awakened across the room. Hed been virtually invisible in the corner, stashed away alongside the sushi bar. But when he came alive everyone in my section stopped and stared. The robot server, who looked less like the humanoid robots of my imagination than a two-tiered plastic tray table with wheels and a black screen on its back, glided across the floor toward us. Silent, or seemingly so against the backdrop of classic earworms, our service droid was a white food cart with a heart-shaped nose and cat-like whiskers. The robot server saddled up to my neighboring table, followed closely by Michael, who reminded me of the responsible kid trailing a drunk student around a party, making sure his friend is okay. Freda Moon Whatever concern I had about restaurant workers livelihoods being undercut by machines was assuaged by the absolute ineptitude of Jerry (which is the robots name, as I later learned). Sweet, wildly incomptetent Jerry. In my imagination, Jerry was C-3PO. But in reality, he wasnt an engaged personality so much as a conveyor belt-like delivery system. During these lean times of indoor dining, the sushi chefs and Michael seemed to be working hand-in-hand to help the machine, not vice versa. He was less a threat to server worker jobs and commiserate pay than an argument in their favor. --- Freda Moon As I was leaving, having eaten four fine but in no way noteworthy nigiri, I said goodbye to Michael and asked, off-handedly, what its like working with a robot. I didnt expect him to comment. It would be impolitic, I thought, to weigh in on a coworker with a customer. But Michael seemed eager for an opportunity for connection. He helps us a lot especially on a day like today, when its busy. I resisted glancing around at the largely empty dining room. It, he, helps keep the food fresh, Michael added. The music on Sushi Rosas playlist is one elevator tune after the next, the kind of Temptations (My Girl) to Train (Hey, Soul Sister) to Bob Marley transition that can only really happen in a place that doesnt think too deeply or take itself too seriously. I thought back on how, when my own plate of nigiri arrived, Michael was right behind Jerry, a helicopter parent to a toddler. Hes still learning, he said. He may get a little close. Then, when I realized I was missing chopsticks, Michael apologized. I keep forgetting things today, our eyes meeting above our masks. Our shared humanity felt like the elephant in the room. Freda Moon Feeling as if I hadnt gotten my fill of either Sushi Rosas sushi or Jerrys hospitality, I returned the following afternoonday. Michael recognized me immediately and I was embarrassed for appearing two days in a row, the weird middle-aged woman with a thing for robots. But sitting at one of the high-top tables overlooking the bar, I watched a pre-teen kid in a I paused my game to be here t-shirt come in with his mom, scan the menu and leave. But not before walking over to where Jerry rested silently and saying, Goodbye, Jerry! Despite the promise of artificial intelligence, Santa Rosas Sushi Rosa was much closer, as restaurant gimmicks go, to an early 1990s all-you-can-eat salad bar than the flame-throwing joys of Benihana. And maybe thats OK. We dont have to worry (yet) about the rise of robot servers. Instead we can be joyfully, childishly amused by them. Jerry isnt taking anyones job anytime soon. What a pretty little girl you are, Caitlyn Jenner says to me, in a grandmotherly kind of way, as we sit outside a room at the Marines Memorial Club in San Franciscos Tenderloin. Ive just pulled off my mask, per Jenners request, so she can hear me better. Ive had enough of all that, she says of the masks. Jenner, the Olympic medalist and reality TV star, was in town to visit San Francisco on a gubernatorial campaign stop, and after touring the Tenderloin neighborhood earlier in the day, shes dropped by a gathering of Log Cabin Republicans, a group of LGBTQ conservatives, to speak. I was looking forward to meeting Jenner as a longtime Kardashian superfan, but I was especially interested to see how she is running her campaign from a first-person perspective. Not many reporters were present only one other member of the media was in attendance. Most eyes were on the debate happening Wednesday night, featuring recall candidates Kevin Falconer, John Cox, Kevin Kiley and Kevin Paffrath. Jenner has said she will not participate in debates unless Gavin Newsom is participating. The speech was pretty much what youd expect. Lots of Gavin Newsom bashing, airing of grievances, and so on. She mentions Californias high tax rates, the states homelessness issues and why shes running in the state recall in the first place. When I first started thinking of running, it was kind of a little seed in the back of my head, she tells the crowd of 25 or so people. Some people have talked to me about it, and Ive always been involved politically in a lot of issues, LGBT issues, tremendous issues, stuff like that, as a lobbyist, trying to help out. Jenner has in the past visited LGBTQ youth centers to speak and has advocated for suicide prevention for transgender youth, but has also said that she does not believe transgender women and girls should be allowed to play women's sports. On her campaign website, she says, "Biological boys should not be allowed to participate in girls sports. It is a question of fairness." After speaking for about 30 minutes, Jenner opened the floor for questions, most of which were indisputably softballs. She answered all of them, or mostly answered them, with fairly level-headed responses and minimal tangents. Im an inclusive Republican, she told the audience, before going on a rant about fellow recall candidate Larry Elder, specifically comments she said hes made about women. [Elder] scares me to death, she said. Then there were cheers for the police and Donald Trump and lots of cocktails drunk and meatballs noshed. I was most anticipating the promised one-on-one time with Jenner, who announced her candidacy for California governor in April. I am a proven winner and the only outsider who can put an end to Gavin Newsoms disastrous time as governor, she said in a Twitter statement at the time. Ballots have already been sent out for the California recall election Sept. 14, presenting voters with two questions: Shall Newsom be recalled? Yes or no? And which of the 46 candidates on the ballot should replace Newsom if he is recalled? Jenner is, of course, not the first celebrity to run in a California recall election. Weve had Ronald Reagan, Arnold Schwarzenegger and, arguably, Larry Elder, who once hosted a daytime TV court drama. Yet Jenner has a unique kind of fame. She's known for her longtime role as the parental figure on Keeping Up With the Kardashians and her previous fame as an Olympic runner. But back to the issues. I had about 10 minutes with Jenner, so I chose my questions wisely. First up: California wildfires. Wildfires, she said, are a big, big issue. ... I personally take the fires really seriously. She mentioned the Woolsey Fire, which burned close to her Malibu home in 2018. I'm standing in my backyard watching 300-foot flames come at my house, she remembered. There was so much fuel down in the canyons below me. It was just ridiculous. She said global warming is not causing the fires, which scientists dispute widely. What is causing them, in Jenners opinion? Too much fuel. She called for greater forest management and more controlled burns so theres less fuel in these areas where they can stop these fires. Jenner mentioned visiting the Northern California wildfires currently burning. She said she met with forest managers and firefighters, who she says told her that Newsoms done nothing for us. She said Newsom, who also recently visited the fire zones, was in it solely for the photo op. As were speaking, Jenners assistant Dawson, who revealed to me earlier he also worked on the Trump presidential campaign, is waving us to wrap things up. So we switch gears to homelessness, an issue Jenner once said could be resolved by placing homeless people in big open fields. That comment, which she made in late June, was made a long time ago, she said, assuring me she has since switched gears. She also recommended buying every homeless person an RV: For a billion dollars, how many RVs could you buy everybody? You could house everyone in an RV for a billion dollars. We have to find a solution because with the homeless, there's mental issues, there's, you know, veterans, there's obviously drug issues, she said, noting she saw a man shoot up on the street earlier that day. She said it comes down to law enforcement. We have laws on the books right now about drugs on the streets of San Francisco or any city in this state. You get caught doing that and youre going to jail, she said. But now its open season, just like stealing. Its legal to steal in this city, she continued. You know, as long as you dont take too much. With that, our conversation was over. Im going to go get my glass of wine, she said. Anh Phoong's Bay Area media takeover began en route to a cruise in Miami. "Right off the airport into, you know, when we're driving to the hotel, I had seen a billboard for this other [law firm]," she told SFGATE. "It was like 444-PAIN, it was some kind of auto accident [attorney] ... Well, whatever I didn't really pay attention to the big pink sign." Then, the sheer volume of the advertising wore Phoong down. The incessant radio jingle, the bright-pink signing all over the Magic City, it all clicked. "There's so many billboards, and then there was commercials, and there was a jingle, and by the end of the week, I was singing their song," she said. Her first thought: "Well, we don't have something really like that in Sacramento; why not start it and bring it over?" And six years into owning her own law firm, she decided to take the step that turned her from small firm owner working out of a spare bedroom to ubiquitous Bay Area and Northern California figure. Plenty of personal injury attorneys advertise on park benches, through the radio and TV airwaves. Phoong, herself, admits that it's not a particularly novel idea to infiltrate a city with advertising. Only a few firms, either through the sheer novelty of their advertising material (think J.G. Wentworth and their incredibly earworm-y jingle) or their total and complete ubiquity (Cellino and Barnes also had a great jingle, but were well-remembered in New York because they permeated the city so thoroughly), break through to any semblance of cultural familiarity. Anh Phoong has become one of them, all without a jingle. Between her firm, authoritative tone in those TV and radio ad spots she joked that people on the street have recognized her off her voice alone and her slogan, she's emerged as something of a local celebrity, a figure as embedded in the Bay Area as BART-Man or Dolores Park weed and booze vendors. And, just in case you somehow hid her iconic slogan in the recesses of your brain, its Something wrong? Call Anh Phoong! (For those curious, the slogan was an inside joke between her and her husband, who also works at the firm, for years.) Part of it is the sheer stronghold her firm's advertising has over the Bay Area and the larger Northern California landscape. Within, say, a 2-mile radius of my Oakland apartment, I can see two, maybe three, billboards with Phoong's face and her number not to mention the steady stream of AC Transit buses with her countenance plastered on the side. Madeline Wells/SFGATE The other, perhaps, is that it's still fairly unexpected to see a woman of color run a firm, and be so visible in doing so. A 2021 Berkeley Law report found that only 10% of partners at firms in the United States are Asian; only 4% are women of color, a statistic that the report called "abysmally low." Phoong, who is Chinese Vietnamese, copped to doubts about how her advertising would be received by the general public. "How are people going to perceive me, being that I'm a female, being that I'm a minority, are they going to reject me? Are they going to think, 'Oh, she can't win or she can't fight hard for me like those other guys?" But the response over the past four years, she said, has been overwhelmingly positive her signs, a refreshing respite in a sea of white guy personal injury attorneys. "People were just like, 'Oh my gosh, you know, it's great to see someone different. ... You sound very confident, you're aggressive, and it's just good to see a change,'" she said. "I think that for people to see, you know someone like me, a woman of color It's been so humbling and it really melts my heart." Phoong only very recently stopped picking up intake calls, partly because of the amount of clients who call in nowadays. But, for many years, she took her own client intakes. As much as I can when the phone rings, the intake line, I pick it up and they're like Are you actually Anh Phoong? And I'm like yeah, and they're like, Why are you picking up your own phone? Well, I'd like to talk to my potential client. Phoong says she didn't anticipate any of this when she first ditched her plans to study business at California State University Sacramento and pivot to a major in criminal justice. By her own admission, she was a good-not-great student. A 3.3 GPA, to be exact. The LSATs proved to be even tougher. She didn't divulge her score, understandably, but said it was low very low. It was her fault, she admits, for not studying hard enough at the time. She found Lincoln Law School, a smaller local law school in Sacramento with California Bar Association accreditation that she hoped would have taken her even with her less-than-stellar stats. (Most elite law schools, she said, have American Bar Association credentials.) It also let her attend school part-time while she worked for the Solano County Public Defender's Office. OK, I'm just going to go to Lincoln, so I interview there with the dean and even he was like, This is even too low for us, she said. He told her: Dont come back until your LSAT is 25% higher; and she did. Her score bumped up 27%. And she developed a bit of an axe to grind with the dean, who ended up teaching one of her first-year law courses and was a little tough on her. Whatever it may have been self-determination, the small inkling of spite to prove someone else wrong or a mixture of the two she ended up as the valedictorian of her graduating class. (She advertises this, still, on her website a testament to her hard work and also perhaps as a bit of a flex to that dean.) That same mixture proved to be pivotal when she first left law school, when, after she was turned down for a job with the Solano County government, she set her sights on personal injury law. After working for an unnamed firm for a few months, she felt more and more sure of her own skills as an attorney. I just did not like his practice, I did not like the way he handled his practice, she said. The way that he was handling things, I just felt like I could do better so why don't I just start my own firm? Fast-forward to now: Phoong says that she's actually scaling back what's effectively been a nonstop ad blitz and trying to grow more sustainably a victim of her own success. I didn't want to set myself up for failure, she said. Who cares if we can get five, 10,000 cases if people aren't happy, right? I'd rather run a smaller shop with people who are happy and satisfied versus being global or big and have a bunch of bad reviews. A new building for her firm, a third following one in Sacramento and another in Oakland, is also in the works. The recognition also means that she faces more skeptics, that she's an "ambulance chaser" or that shes only in it for the money. Murmurs of grievances pop up every now and again on social media platforms such as Yelp and Reddit. And those suspicions come even from proponents of the firm; one positive Yelp review reads, "I thought a TV injury lawyer was in the category of an ambulance chaser, but this law firm definitely [proved] me wrong." She very much understands those concerns, that other attorneys might fleece their clientele or are solely in it for the cash, even if she firmly believes that shes not one of them. There is that stigma behind it, Phoong says, but what I've tried to do is really prove you know by our service and, you know, prove them wrong. (The idea of wanting to prove people wrong rears its head again, such is her M.O.) She also says she owes a debt to the communities she operates in, hence charity work and other community involvement are a big part of her non-law work. "Once people actually know me and they're like, 'Oh wow, you're, you're not just an ambulance chaser' I have nothing to prove to you individually. If you want to take the time to get to know me, then you'll see you know who I really am." For what it's worth, she says only 40% of her business comes from the ads; the majority of it is word-of-mouth referrals. But, no matter hopefully, she remains just a friendly face on your TV or your nearby billboard. And if something goes wrong, well, you probably already know her catchphrase. MANAGUA, Nicaragua (AP) Settlers have again attacked Indigenous communities in Bosawas nature reserve on Nicaragua's Caribbean coast, killing a dozen members of the Miskito and Mayangna people, activists and environmentalist charged Wednesday. The reserve has been hit by illegal mining and logging despite its status as a protected area, and activists have reported several attacks on Indigenous people. Environmentalist Amaru Ruiz, director of the Del Rio Foundation, blamed the latest assault on settlers who have invaded indigenous lands. It was a massacre," Ruiz said. Residents have so far confirmed the deaths of nine Miskito people and three Mayangnas." The Center for Legal Assistance to Indigenous Peoples said in a statement that Indigenous residents were attacked with machetes and guns, and were tortured. They hung their bodies from a tree. The Nicaraguan government had not confirmed the killings. Ruiz said authorities had not been to the remote community where they occurred. One resident told a local radio station that neither the army nor the police had responded. A request for comment from the army went unanswered. Indigenous activists say the government of President Daniel Ortega has not done enough to address the problems on the jungle-clad coast, something his administration denied. Human rights lawyer Maria Luisa Acosta said the latest attack was the fourth this year on Indigenous communities in the Bosawas area. The Center for Justice and Human Rights on the Atlantic coast of Nicaragua said at least 49 Indigenous people have been killed by settlers since January, and many others were forced to flee. Activists say many of the settlers moving onto the lands are former soldiers linked to timber and illegal logging interests. In March, Indigenous groups complained to the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights about land takeovers and killings that have hit the Miskito and Mayangna communities. The commission is part of the Organization of American States. One of the worst attacks came in January 2020, when settlers burned 16 houses in the Indigenous community of Alal and killed at least four inhabitants. Last March 4, an attack on the Mayangna community of Kimak Was left one person wounded and another missing. OMAHA, Neb. (AP) A Florida man set to stand trial for second-degree murder in the fatal July shooting of his father in Omaha reportedly told police his father asked to be shot. A Douglas County judge on Wednesday ordered Julian Lopez, 23, of Palm Bay, Florida, to stand trial on the murder charge and a weapons count in the July 16 shooting death of 40-year-old Jose Valenzuela, the Omaha World-Herald reported. MINNEAPOLIS (AP) Seven people were injured, including one critically, after two people began shooting at each other outside a business in Minneapolis Uptown neighborhood early Thursday, police said. Police said the shootout happened at about 12:30 a.m. Thursday on the 3000 block of Lyndale Avenue South, a prominent thoroughfare in the city. SAN FRANCISCO (AP) Al Capone is infamous for having been a ruthless mob boss, but one of his granddaughters says his softer side will shine through when the family auctions the Prohibition-era gangsters personal items including diamond-encrusted jewelry with his initials, family photographs and his favorite handgun. Capone's three granddaughters will also auction a letter he wrote to their father and his only child, Albert Sonny Capone, from Alcatraz, where the mobster served an 11-year sentence following his 1934 tax evasion conviction. In the letter written in pencil, Al Capone refers to Sonny as son of my heart. He was called Public Enemy No. 1 after the 1929 Valentines Day Massacre of seven members of a rival bootlegger gang in Chicago by his associates. But his granddaughter Diane Capone describes him differently. He was very loving, very devoted to family, very generous, and the letter that we have is such a poignant, beautiful letter from a father to his son. These are things that the public doesnt know about, said Diane Capone, 77. Diane Capone and her two surviving sisters will sell 174 items at the Oct. 8 auction titled A Century of Notoriety: The Estate of Al Capone hosted by Witherell's Auction House in Sacramento. Among the pieces are gold-rimmed porcelain fine china, ornate furniture, artwork and Dresden figurines that once decorated the Palm Island, Florida, villa where the Chicago mobster lived after his release from prison and until his death in 1947. Also up for sale is the Colt .45-caliber pistol Capone always carried with him and used several times to protect himself, Diane Capone said. That particular .45 was used in self-defense, and it probably saved his life on a few occasions and so, he referred to it as his favorite, she said. Diane Capone said she didn't know if the gun was used to commit any crimes and said her grandfather, who she called Papa, was never charged with killing anyone. He was accused of doing that, but he was never found guilty of shooting anyone, she said. The pistol with elaborate etchings and a wooden grip will be the centerpiece of the auction and is valued at up to $150,000, said Brian Witherell, founder of Witherells Auction House. When you think about Al Capone, you don't think Gosh, I wonder what his German porcelain figurine looks like, you wonder what his cigar humidor looks like, what his Colt .45 looks like," he said. The sisters are also selling a diamond-encrusted pocket watch, an 18k gold and platinum belt buckle and a gold initialed AC money clip and home movies featuring Al Capone and his associates. Witherell said he had no reservations about helping the Capone sisters and that he expects the auction to draw international attention because of the items historical significance. We want to handle things that arent objectionable to a lot of people, but we still cant rewrite history, he said. He was a legendary figure. I think his judgment comes from somebody other than me. Sonny Capones daughters lived quietly for decades in Northern California after moving here from Florida in 1961 following their parents breakup. That changed in 2019 when Diane Capone published a book titled Al Capone: Stories My Grandmother Told Me using her maiden name. She said her father faced constant challenges because of his last name, including men picking fights with him for no reason and not being able to find a job. In the mid-1960s, he dropped Capone as a last name and went by Albert Francis. He died in obscurity in 2004 in Northern California, where he had lived for decades, his daughter said. The sisters decided to sell their grandfather's personal belongings because they are all in their 70s, they are the only people who know the stories behind the memorabilia, and they are worried about a wildfire destroying the collection, Diane Capone said. We were very fortunate that even after my grandfather died, we were very close to my grandmother and so, for years weve heard her talk about my grandfather and about their lives, and about a lot of these items that are going to be auctioned off, she said. Nina Salarno, president of the advocacy group Crime Victims United of California, said it is undisputed that Brooklyn, New York-born Capone headed Chicago's mob during Prohibition and orchestrated the deaths of many people. She called the sale of his personal belongings an insult to his victims. Those victims also have surviving family members, and now were glorifying what he did to them by selling his memorabilia, Salarno said. She added: They say it was part of history, I would agree with that so, donate (his belongings) to a museum, but dont profit off of the back of victims. Diane Capone acknowledges her grandfather led a criminal life but says that was not the person she knew. What she remembers is a doting grandfather. My grandfather certainly did some bad things during his life. That was part of his public life, she said. He went to jail, he served his time, he paid his debt to society and after he was released, in the last years of his life, he did everything to make peace with God and with his family, and with everybody, she said. James Finckenauer, a criminal justice professor at Rutgers University who has written extensively about organized crime, said the fascination with mobsters and organized crime in the U.S. started with Al Capone after his crimes attracted intense media coverage. The average person didn't know 99.9% of the people that might be involved in this, but they knew Al Capone. He became the poster boy for organized crime, he said. Finckenauer said some people are fascinated with real and fictional mobsters because they think of them as having exciting lives. Most people, from their perspective, live humdrum lives and they see these guys and their portrayal in shows like The Sopranos, as people who demand respect and live their lives as they please, he said. MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) Alabama is seeing a sharp rise in COVID-19 cases in school-age children, an increase officials say is likely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant and is causing some schools to temporarily switch to remote learning. The Alabama Department of Public Health said Thursday that 5,571 children ages 5 to 17 were reported to have contracted COVID-19 last week. That compares to 702 cases in school-aged children during the same week last year, when more than half of students were studying remotely and the delta variant was not circulating. State Health Officer Scott Harris pointed to the more contagious delta variant as the most likely explanation. The numbers are staggering, Harris said of the increase. We want to remind people that everyone needs to be vaccinated who is eligible, that is everyone 12 and up. We strongly recommend universal masking in schools. The numbers represent a seven-fold increase in cases over that timeframe last year, although hospitalizations and deaths in children remain relatively rare, according to state numbers. Of the nearly 2,900 patients in state hospitals with COVID-19 on Thursday, fewer than 50 were children, according to the Alabama Hospital Association. State health officials have said about 6% of infected children develop the lingering symptoms known as long COVID. Harris said a state dashboard that lists school cases should resume reporting Friday. Alabama Superintendent Eric Mackey said the number of schools implementing temporary remote learning is growing every day and it is growing exponentially. The delta variant is so much more contagious. It certainly has been more contagious among youth. We are seeing that, Mackey said. We never anticipated there would be this kind of spike not in schools but a community-wide spike, that would hit the week we began to open school. It was the perfect storm, Mackey said. Lee, Cullman and Lawrence counties are among those that this week announced a temporary return to remote learning for some individual schools. Cullman County Superintendent Shane Barnette said five schools in that system will switch to remote learning for the next two weeks. The decision came after one-third of students there were absent either because they tested positive for COVID-19 or were in quarantine because of being in close contact with someone who did. The safety and well-being of our students, faculty and staff is the number one priority in our school district, Barnette said. Shelby County Schools on Thursday announced the system would begin requiring masks to be worn in schools. State officials have left decisions on masks to local systems. Superintendent Lewis Brooks wrote to parents that the move, gives us the best chance to stay in school without a complete shutdown." Mackey urged parents to be patient. These are challenging times for teachers and principals. We know that it is frustrating for them and for parents, but parents just need to be patient. Well get through this difficult spike, Mackey said. He also urged people to talk to their medical provider about getting vaccinated to slow the spread and not have another spike. Currently Reading Alert: Mayor says 2 people were killed, 1 injured in a shooting near the courthouse in the northern Illinois city of Kankakee Currently Reading Alert: Russian Foreign Ministry says suicide attack outside Kabul airport has killed at least 2 people and wounded 15 Currently Reading Alert: US official says attack outside Kabul airport is 'definitely believed to be' carried out by the Islamic State group Currently Reading Alert: US official: Several US Marines killed in Afghanistan blast, a number of US military members wounded LONDON (AP) A former Royal Marine who runs an animal charity in Afghanistan said Thursday that he, his Afghan staff and dozens of dogs and cats were caught in the chaotic aftermath of a suicide attack outside Kabuls airport as they sought to get a flight out of the country before evacuation efforts end. The attack involving two explosions and gunfire hit near a gate where people gathered attempting to get into the airport. At least 13 people were killed, and U.S. officials said American troops were among the injured. Were fine but everything is chaos here at the moment, Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47." Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with about 200 of the groups rescued animals. Hours earlier, he appealed to the Taliban to allow the group safe passage into the airport. He tweeted to Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen that we have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage. Truly would like to go home now. Farthings supporters have clashed online with British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, who refused to airlift the animals on a Royal Air Force plane, saying I have to prioritize people at the moment over pets. Celebrities including comedian Ricky Gervais expressed support for Farthing, and criticism of the British government, on social media. The U.K. defense ministry later said it would help Farthing, his group and the animals leave on a chartered jet funded by Farthing's supporters, if they could reach the airport. Wallace criticized the bullying, falsehoods and threatening behavior by some towards defense personnel, saying it was unacceptable and shameful. On Twitter, he urged Farthing backers to please let my civil servants and military get on with dealing with one of the most dangerous and challenging evacuations for a generation. Dominic Dyer, a British animal campaigner who is assisting Farthing, said the chartered plane was due to leave the U.K. later Thursday for Kabul. Armed Forces Minister James Heappey said Thursday that U.K. forces at the airport would facilitate the flight. He told ITV that the difficulty is getting Pen into the airfield. Before Thursday's blasts, Britain had urged people to stay away from the airport, citing very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack by militants linked to the Islamic State group. The U.K. government says the RAF has airlifted more than 12,000 people, including over 7,000 Afghans, from Kabul in the past two weeks. Heappey told the BBC that Britain plans to run 11 more evacuation flights from the airport on Thursday but the window of opportunity to evacuate people is closing as the U.S. prepares to end the operation by Aug. 31. ___ Follow APs Afghanistan coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan PHOENIX (AP) An Arizona county that has resisted parts of a subpoena issued by the state Senate as it reviews how it handled the 2020 election must turn over everything the Senate wants or lose all its state funding, the state attorney general said Thursday. Attorney General Mark Brnovich issued the decision after a Republican senator asked him if Maricopa Countys refusal to hand over routers, passwords and other items the Senate says it needs to complete the unprecedented partisan review violated state law. The county has turned over its vote-counting machines, servers and huge amounts of data but balked at handing over routers it uses county-wide and passwords it says it does not control. But the county board of supervisors has said the routers were never connected to election tabulation equipment but were used by every county department, including the sheriffs office, and that turning them over would compromise sensitive law enforcement information. Brnovich, also a Republican, said that refusal to comply with the Senates subpoena violates state law and triggers another law that penalizes counties, cities or towns that have policies in conflict with laws enacted by the Legislature. The county has until Sept. 27 to comply or it will lose all the revenue it gets from the state about 25% of its budget, which was $2.8 billion in 2020. County spokesman Fields Moseley said the Board of Supervisors will be meeting with lawyers to decide on a response. The board is controlled 4-1 by Republicans but has been increasingly at odds with the Senate over its 2020 election review, which board members say is being conducted by incompetent consultants who are spreading conspiracy theories. Earlier, a lawyer for the county urged Brnovich to reject the complaint, arguing the subpoena is unenforceable because lawmakers are not in session. A Maricopa County Superior Court judge ruled in February that previous subpoenas were valid. Our courts have spoken, Brnovich said in a statement. The rule of law must be followed. The county could try to fight the attorney general's conclusion in court. And Brnovich's solicitor general, Beau Roysden III, wrote that nothing in his written report should be read as suggesting that county board cannot resolve the violation by turning over the materials, or negotiating a settlement with the county that resolves its security concerns. The decision comes after a report on the vote recount to state Senate Republicans was delayed yet again Monday after the supporter of former President Donald Trump who was hired to lead the effort and several others involved contracted COVID-19. It was the latest delay for the review, which is led by a small computer security consultant called Cyber Ninjas. It has so far taken more than double the 60 days it was originally supposed to take. The report was commissioned by Senate Republicans and funded mostly by Trump allies promoting his unsupported election fraud narrative. It will not be immediately made public. Rather, two senior Republican senators will review it along with their lawyers and advisers to decide whether the findings are supported by evidence. Election experts have been highly critical of the review, which Senate President Karen Fann launched late last year as Trump and his allies hunted unsuccessfully for reasons to block the certification of Democrat Joe Bidens victory in the presidential election. BALTIMORE (AP) Educators in Baltimore say an enormous infusion of federal dollars for COVID-19 relief has the potential to transform aspects of district school programming while also providing a rare opportunity to make some long-needed infrastructure upgrades. John Davis, the Baltimore districts chief of schools, said the system has some very audacious plans for the one-time federal recovery aid with a mix of infrastructure upgrades, programming and direct COVID-19 mitigation efforts. So far, the school system has gotten $48 million and another $198 million is coming that must be used by the end of September 2023. The final round of relief funds will provide a whopping $443 million. Whether or not the district will use the windfall to dream big as the Biden administration has urged is not yet clear. An initial priority is educating youngsters in safety amid the ongoing pandemic. In Baltimore, classrooms will be operating on a five-day-a-week schedule come Aug. 30 and millions are being spent on pandemic-related equipment such as air purifiers. In the next tranche, some $13 million is earmarked for indoor air quality. Davis said this kind of spending is necessary. We will make classrooms safe, he said. Last school year, Baltimore was the first major school district in Maryland to successfully return to in-person instruction in classrooms. Other spending will go toward WiFi hotspots and laptops for students and staff. Some will directly help struggling students, including anticipated spending of some $4.6 million on mental health clinicians and programming. One plan is to extend the school day for struggling children so they can catch up with personalized instruction. Infrastructure is also being targeted including upgrades to some HVAC systems. Since March 2020, the federal government has provided $190 billion in pandemic aid to schools, an amount that's more than four times what the U.S. Education Department spends on K-12 schools in a typical year. The Associated Press, relying on data published or provided by states and the federal government, tallied how much money was granted to nearly every school district in the country. The aid averages nearly $2,800 per student nationally, but it varies widely by district and state, according to the APs analysis. Nationwide, high-poverty areas received much more under the funding formula. In Baltimore, the federal funding per student equals $9,117. There are no shortage of local critics who are fed up with the track record of Baltimore's school administration and are skeptical the district will make the best use of the money. Baltimore City Schools already spends about $16,000 per student each year. Thats only behind the spending per student in New York City, Boston, Atlanta and nearby Montgomery County, Maryland. It also has outsized administrative spending. History has shown that the Baltimore City school system is inefficient, ineffective and is failing to educate our children. There seems to be no accountability, said an email from members of the People Empowered by the Struggle, a nonprofit that's calling for the resignation of the district's CEO. Many Baltimore schools have no shortage of challenges, particularly those in deeply disenfranchised areas. And as is the case with other districts, data has offered a grim picture of academic progress amid the pandemic. Youngsters notching failing grades have soared in Baltimore and in other districts across Maryland. Last school year, the citys district saw a jump in chronic absenteeism and some 60% of students in middle and high school got not complete for grades K-8 or no credit for grades 9-12 in at least one or more classes. The Baltimore Teacher's Union says the district has not released complete information about how federal aid will be spent. We have not seen an increase in staffing overall, and many teachers and clinicians are reporting instances of overcrowding in their classrooms and caseloads, the union said. Davis said the district has to think about what it can viably sustain since the one-shot funding will end in September 2024. Baltimore is in the top 50 largest school systems in the country. The system has nearly 80,000 students, roughly 10,000 employees, and a $1.18 billion budget, largely funded by the state. ___ Follow APs coverage of the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic. FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) Kentucky's governor said Thursday that the latest wave of grim COVID-19 statistics would have triggered a statewide mask mandate indoors if he still wielded the authority to take such action. But the Kentucky Supreme Court recently shifted pandemic-related decisions on masking and other issues to the Republican-dominated legislature, Gov. Andy Beshear said. So the Democratic governor used his bully pulpit to continue urging people to mask up when indoors, away from home. The Bluegrass State has reached uncharted territory with the prolonged escalation of virus infections, hospitalizations and patients in intensive care, he said at a news conference. On Wednesday, Kentucky reported 65 virus-related deaths. It also notched its third-highest daily number of new COVID-19 cases as the highly contagious delta variant overwhelms many hospitals. That would have been the trigger for me, if it was in my authority to put in a masking order for indoors across the state, Beshear said of the statistics. "Every other time weve been this high, weve done that and its worked. It has decreased the number of cases. I can't do that now, and I get that, the governor added. And I'll provide all the information that I can to the General Assembly and hopefully they will make the best choice that they can. Later Thursday, Beshear reported new record highs in Kentucky with 2,115 virus patients hospitalized, including 590 in intensive care and 345 on ventilators. The state suffered 27 more virus-related deaths and had 5,401 new COVID-19 cases, its second-highest daily total of the pandemic. The escalation caused more than 10,000 COVID-19 infections reported statewide in the past two days, and 4,600 children tested positive for the virus in the last three days, he said. As the surge worsens, Beshear has had discussions with legislative leaders as he weighs whether to convene lawmakers for a special session to deal with COVID-19 issues. Republican Senate President Robert Stivers said this week that a blanket masking mandate would stand a very limited chance with lawmakers. The states Supreme Court on Saturday gave lawmakers the upper hand when it cleared the way for new laws to limit the governors emergency powers, which he used to impose virus-related restrictions previously. The justices said a lower court wrongly blocked the GOP-backed measures. Now, various emergency measures previously issued by Beshear are set to expire as a result of the landmark court decision. It's up to lawmakers to decide whether to keep them in place. Right now, they have in hand a whole list of different things that we need things like workers' compensation for our front-line workers if they get COVID, the governor said Thursday. My goodness, we've got to provide that. Things like recognizing doctors licensed in other states, so that we can help increase our health care capacity. And they're taking a close look at it. Stivers has said GOP lawmakers are ready to present their plan if reconvened by the governor, saying they've been "formulating for quite some time things that we think would be effective. More than 30 Kentucky hospitals are reporting critical staffing shortages, Beshear said. Smaller hospitals are struggling to care for much sicker patients than they normally treat. As horrible as last years surge was, and it was awful, we were never in a position where doctors worried theyd need to choose between treating a patient who cant breathe because of COVID, or treat a patient whos bleeding out because of a car accident," the governor said. "But that is the strain that our hospitals are under. Dr. Dennis Beck, interim chief administrative officer at Deaconess Henderson Hospital, said patients are "dying without need as he urged people to get vaccinated. The crisis is real," he said in a video. "Our patient volumes are higher than they ever have been in any summertime period in the history of our hospital and our health system." Beshear has increasingly turned to doctors and nurses across Kentucky to try to persuade the unvaccinated to take the shots. Mohan Rao, a general surgeon at Baptist Health Madisonville, said he thought last year's COVID-19 surges would be the worst of it due to the introduction of vaccines. But he said the virus has now "come back with a vengeance. As somebody who believes in individual liberties, which I do, Im vaccinated," he said in another video shown Thursday. "And I did that for the protection of myself, for the protection of my family and for the protection of my patients. ___ Follow more of APs pandemic coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic. SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) California lawmakers will wait until next year to consider decriminalizing psychedelics, with the bill's author saying Thursday that he will keep working to persuade the public and legislators that it's a good idea. The bill would allow those 21 and older to possess for personal use small amounts of psilocybin, the hallucinogenic component of so-called magic mushrooms. It also covers psilocyn, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), ibogaine, mescaline excluding peyote, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) and 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, often called ecstasy). It passed the Senate and Assembly policy committees before it stalled for the year. The bill moved significantly farther than anticipated, Sen. Scott Wiener, a Democrat from San Francisco, said in a statement. The delay will allow supporters to capitalize on the momentum from this year while building support in the Assembly for next year. Wiener previously removed ketamine from his bill after opponents said it could be used as a date-rape drug. He also stripped out an allowance for social sharing of the drugs on his list. But the California District Attorneys Association was among groups that remained opposed, arguing that hallucinations can be dangerous to users and bystanders alike and that LSD has been linked to homicides. Wiener said the decriminalization would be part of the larger movement to end the racist War on Drugs, and that research shows the drugs can help treat mental health and substance use disorders. The University of WisconsinMadison said this week it is launching a research center to coordinate ongoing studies and education in psychedelic compounds. It cited growing evidence of their utility in treating substance abuse and psychiatric disorders, such as major depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. The bill bars sharing with those under age 21 or possessing the substances on school grounds. Oregon voters last year approved decriminalizing small amounts of psychedelics among other drugs, and separately were the first to approve the supervised use of psilocybin in a therapeutic setting. Oakland and Santa Cruz are among cities including Washington, D.C.; Ann Arbor, Michigan; and Somerville and Cambridge, Massachusetts, that have decriminalized certain natural psychedelics that come from plants and fungi. Denver was the first U.S. city to decriminalize hallucinogenic mushrooms for personal use two years ago. Last month, Wiener announced that a related bill that would give opioid users a place to inject drugs in supervised settings will also be delayed until next year. That measure would allow Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco and Los Angeles County to start programs giving people a place to inject drugs while trained staff are available to help if they suffer accidental overdoses. Associations representing prosecutors and narcotics officers also oppose those sites. ALEXANDRIA, La. (AP) A central Louisiana city's firefighters are getting a raise. The Alexandria City Council on Tuesday agreed to a new contract that will provide increases to their base salaries. The new agreement raises base pay for the fire department from $24,000 a year to $30,750 with additional increases each year. Base pay will increase to $32,000 annually in the third year of the contract, KALB-TV reported. In July, the council ratified the citys agreement with the police union on a pay increase for the police department. Mayor Jeff Hall said getting the contracts approved is important to give the officers and firefighters the raises they deserve. By all means, we want to do everything we can to enhance, improve and have the best people doing what they do with public safety, Hall said. We think this means a whole lot for the community that we continue to have excellent fire ratings. This is the first base pay raise for the fire department since 2008. ATLANTA (AP) Georgia prosecutors say they will not retry a man once accused of raping a woman after DNA testing cast doubt on the evidence. The decision involving Ron Jacobsen comes 31 years after he was sent to prison, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported this week. The new DNA testing strongly indicated that he did not commit the crime, the newspaper reported. They did the right thing, Jacobsen, 61, said Wednesday. It should have happened earlier. But its here. Its done. Im relieved. Jacobsen was charged with raping a store clerk in 1990. He maintained his innocence, and had witnesses who testified that he was with them in Tennessee at the time of the crime. But he was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. Jacobsen wrote to the New York-based Innocence Project, which took on his case. In 2017, DNA tests conducted by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation crime lab cast doubt on the evidence. Two years later, a Newton County judge overturned Jacobsens conviction. In a statement, District Attorney Randy McGinley said his review of the case led him to believe he could not convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that Jacobsen committed the crime. He cited the new DNA evidence, the passage of time, and the death of a witness among the reasons why. OSHKOSH, Wis. (AP) Oshkosh Area School District officials postponed a school board meeting after a group of protesters stormed the room and refused to wear masks. WBAY-TV reported that the district implemented a mandatory mask policy on Monday. A group of 20 to 30 people showed up at the school board meeting Wednesday to protest the policy. The group refused a police officers order to don masks and an argument broke out with mask supporters in the audience. District officials said if the group didnt wear masks they wouldnt hold a meeting. Board members walked out of the room and minutes later board President Bob Poeschel announced the meeting had been postponed. Superintendent Bryan Davis announced Thursday that masks will be mandatory through Oct. 1. COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) Denmark's Parliament is expected to end a nurses' strike Thursday by implementing a previously rejected pay proposal, a rare intervention in a country with a labor market model that calls for employers and unions to agree on work conditions through collective bargaining. The compromise proposal from the Social Democratic government would end the strike that started in mid-June on Saturday. It would give Danish nurses a 5% salary increase over three years - terms they rejected in March when they voted against a 3-year pay deal their union leadership had approved. MADISON, Wis. (AP) A Democratic Wisconsin state senator who encouraged donations to defeat a Republican lawmaker who was diagnosed with COVID-19 and is now on a ventilator tweeted Thursday that she was sorry he was sick but stopped short of apologizing for her call to unseat him. Sen. Andre Jacque, of De Pere, announced on Aug. 16 that he had tested positive for COVID-19 and said then that he was largely asymptomatic. The next day, Sen. Kelda Roys, of Madison, tweeted a link to the Democratic fundraising arm and said, Just gonna drop this here, so we can have a nice bundle for whoever runs against him. Roys preceded that tweet with one condemning Jacque for Selfish, irresponsible, dangerous behavior because he had testified at a packed committee hearing room without a mask days before he announced his diagnosis. Roys' tweet brought a storm of condemnation from conservatives, including a call for her to resign from presumptive Republican gubernatorial candidate Rebecca Kleefisch. One of those who criticized her the loudest was Pierre Jacque, who said he is the sick senator's brother. On Wednesday night, Pierre Jacque tweeted to Roys: you apologize for this poorly timed, super tacky, and unhelpful (to anyone) fundraising tweet, and in return I will endorse whomever runs against Andre or runs for his seat. Roys responded on Thursday, stopping short of an apology. When I tweeted, he was asymptomatic according to public info, she said. I wish your brother well and hope he recovers quickly. Im thankful he is getting excellent medical care; this disease is horrible. I appreciate all you do to help encourage safe behavior in the midst of this pandemic. Roys did not immediately return a message Thursday asking if she stood by her original tweet calling for fundraising to defeat Jacque. She has not deleted the tweet. Jacque was elected to the Senate in 2018 and is up for reelection next year. Roys is pregnant and therefore at a higher risk for severe illness if she gets COVID-19. Jacque's spokesman said Wednesday that the lawmaker was put on a ventilator on Monday and was in stable condition. Jacque is one of the Legislature's most conservative members and has been a vocal critic of mask and vaccine mandates. Cases of COVID-19 and hospitalizations are spiking in Wisconsin thanks to the more contagious delta variant, leading to renewed calls by health officials for extra vigilance to avoid spreading the virus. Unvaccinated Wisconsin residents are almost three times as likely to catch COVID-19, nearly four times as likely to be hospitalized and 10 times more likely to die than those who have been vaccinated, according to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services. Officials in Detroit are looking at making continued changes to city towing rules after several federal corruption probes. Mayor Mike Duggan told reporters Thursday that hes asked the citys police chief for a plan in two weeks to eliminate a decade-long practice of rotating towing duties to a list of preferred companies. On Wednesday, search warrants were executed at offices in City Hall. Agents and state police also were seen at the homes of Councilman Scott Benson and Councilwoman Janee Ayers. It was not immediately known if the ongoing probes are related to Detroit's towing practices. The FBI did not provide details Wednesday about the search warrants. Ayers name emerged several years ago in a bribery investigation involving towing magnate Gasper Fiore, according to The Detroit News. She has not been charged in that investigation. A former high-ranking Detroit police official and about a half-dozen ex-police officers have been indicted in recent years for bribery in connection with towing contracts. A decision was made in 2011-12 to not competitively bid towing contracts. A permit system was created and involved a rotation among a preferential group of companies, Duggan said. Owners of stolen or impounded vehicles have to pay towing costs and storage fees before their vehicles are returned. It is a system fraught with potential for abuse, Duggan said. The amounts of money that are involved are just breeding potential for abuse. Since 2017, the city has terminated contracts with some companies and changed the practice where a company could find a stolen vehicle and then claim the tow work, Duggan said. We had evidence that it appears some of the towers were in cahoots with the car thieves, he said. After we stopped that practice, the car theft rate dropped significantly. Duggan said he will withhold judgment until he sees what develops from Wednesday's searches, but added that no one has been charged. Its never good when the Feds are delivering search warrants, he said, adding that the FBI has not shared any details of their investigation with him. In 2018, Fiore, of Grosse Pointe Shores, was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison for his role in the bribing of a suburban official for help with a municipal towing contract. Former Detroit Deputy Police Chief Celia Washington was sentenced that year to a year and a day in prison in a corruption case related to towing contracts. Washington was accused of accepting at least $3,000 from Fiore. Last month, Detroit Councilman Andre Spivey was charged in federal court with conspiracy to commit bribery and accused of accepting $1,000 from an undercover law enforcement agent in October 2018. The indictment also alleges that between 2016 and 2020, Spivey and public official A accepted more than $35,000 in payments to influence votes concerning an industry under review by the council. In June, former Councilman Gabe Leland was sentenced in Wayne County Circuit Court to probation after pleading guilty to accepting an illegal $7,500 cash campaign contribution. Federal corruption charges were to be dismissed as part of Lelands plea deal. ___ Williams reported from West Bloomfield, Michigan. Almost two dozen students and their parents from San Diego County in California are trapped in Afghanistan after they visited the country this summer, the authorities said. The 20 students and 14 parents are stuck in Afghanistan and have requested government assistance to fly home, according to a statement from the Cajon Valley Union School District and a tweet from Rep. Darrell Issa, who represents the district where the students are from. The children range in age from preschool to high school, said David Miyashiro, the district superintendent. The students and parents, who make up five families, went to Afghanistan to visit their extended families, the school district said. But they soon realized they wouldnt make it back for the first day of school on Aug. 17; two days earlier, the Taliban had stunned the world by capturing Kabul at alarming speed. It became nearly impossible to secure a flight out of the country, and the families could not reach the airport even though they had plane tickets, Cajon Valley School Board President Tamara Otero told the Los Angeles Times. The families were not among the hordes of people desperately trying to board a plane out of the Kabul airport, Miyashiro said in an interview Wednesday night. Most of them are hiding and sheltering in place until somebody contacts them to help them get out, he said. One of the families asked on Aug. 16 that the school hold their childrens spots in their classrooms while they were stranded, the school district said. However, one family secured passage out of Afghanistan. Four students and two parents, along with one infant, returned home this week after stopping in another country, Miyashiro said. Issa said Wednesday on Twitter that he was working diligently to bring the stranded families home. I wont stop until we have answers and action, he said. Jonathan Wilcox, a spokesman for Issa, said in a statement that the congressman is trying to obtain immigration paperwork for his constituents who are stuck in Afghanistan. We are in consistent contact with official channels including the State Department and the Pentagon, the statement said. This article originally appeared in The New York Times. KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) Federal prosecutors in Missouri have charged 19 restaurant owners and managers most living in Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma accusing them of a racketeering scheme to hire and employ immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. The indictments unsealed Wednesday charges the defendants with counts ranging from fraud and conspiracy to money laundering and illegal use of social security numbers. They were unsealed as federal Homeland Security agents carried out search warrants at 10 locations in Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma. Fourteen of the 19 people indicted were arrested. NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission says it has received reports from residents that some 150 people were killed earlier this month in an alleged attack by the Oromo Liberation Army, which the government declared a terrorist group this year. A statement by the government-created rights group on Thursday said the killings in East Wollega in the Oromia region on Aug. 18 were followed by a revenge attack the next day that left another 60 people dead. FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) Former state Rep. Jonathan Shell, who helped orchestrate Republicans' historic takeover of the Kentucky House, has announced he will run for state agriculture commissioner in 2023. Shell, a former member of House leadership, is looking to relaunch a political career that was derailed in 2018 when he lost his reelection bid to the legislature in the GOP primary. Shell, a fifth-generation farmer from Garrard County, promised to defend agriculture and conservative Kentucky values on every front in announcing his 2023 plans Wednesday. This campaign is about supporting farm families and ensuring that all Kentucky communities, from the most rural to the most urban, understand the importance of our agriculture industry," Shell said. Current Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles, a Republican in his second term, is considering a run for governor in 2023. Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear intends to run for reelection. Republican state Rep. Richard Heath, chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, announced his bid for agriculture commissioner earlier this month. Shell rose quickly through the ranks after being elected to the Kentucky House in 2012. He was chosen by GOP leaders to spearhead the party's recruitment of House candidates for the 2016 election. Republicans took control of the chamber for the first time in nearly a century in that year's election cementing GOP dominance of the legislature. The following year, Shell joined House leadership as majority floor leader. Republicans passed a series of bills reflecting many of the party's long-held priorities, including anti-abortion legislation and a measure making it illegal to require workers to pay union dues to keep a job. But Shell was swept out of office in 2018 for his role in pension legislation that drew protests at the statehouse. In a sign of his continued influence in the party, Shell served as chairman of U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnells successful reelection campaign in 2020. If elected agriculture commissioner, Shell said he would build on the legacies of the past two commissioners Quarles and James Comer in supporting agriculture. Kentucky has a diversified farm economy led by poultry, corn, soybean, equine and cattle production. Shell is the owner of State Solutions LLC, which provides strategic and public policy advising for various statewide organizations. He works on his familys farm, Shell Farms and Greenhouses, in Garrard County, where they grow flowers, corn and pumpkins and raise cattle. The Islamic State offshoot that Americans blame for a deadly suicide attack outside the Kabul airport coalesced in eastern Afghanistan six years ago, and rapidly grew into one of the more dangerous terror threats globally. Despite years of military targeting by the U.S.-led coalition, the group known as Islamic State Khorasan has survived to launch a massive new assault as the United States and other NATO partners withdraw from Afghanistan, and as the Taliban return to power. President Joe Biden cited the threat of Islamic State attacks in sticking with a Tuesday deadline for pulling U.S. forces out of Afghanistan. Biden blamed the group for Thursday's attack, which included a suicide bomber who slipped into the crowds of Afghans outside airport gates controlled by U.S. service members. The group has built a record of highly lethal attacks in the face of its own heavy losses. A look at a deadly group influencing the course of the Kabul airlifts and U.S. actions: WHAT IS ISLAMIC STATE KHORASAN? The Islamic States Central Asia affiliate sprang up in the months after the groups core fighters swept across Syria and Iraq, carving out a self-styled caliphate, or Islamic empire, in the summer of 2014. In Syria and Iraq, it took local and international forces five years of subsequent fighting to roll back the caliphate. The Afghanistan affiliate takes its name from the Khorasan Province, a region that covered much of Afghanistan, Iran and Central Asia in the Middle Ages. The group is also known as ISK, or ISIS K. WHO ARE THE ISLAMIC STATE KHORASANS FIGHTERS? The group started with several hundred Pakistani Taliban fighters, who took refuge across the border in Afghanistan after military operations drove them out of their home country. Other, like-minded extremists joined them there, including disgruntled Afghan Taliban fighters unhappy with what they unlike the West saw as the Taliban's overly moderate and peaceful ways. As the Taliban pursued peace talks with the United States in recent years, discontented Taliban increasingly moved to the more extremist Islamic State, swelling its numbers. Most were frustrated that the Taliban was pursuing negotiations with the U.S. at a time when they thought the movement was on the march to a military win. The group also has attracted a significant cadre from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, from the neighboring country; fighters from Iran's only Sunni Muslim majority province; and members of the Turkistan Islamic Party comprising Uighurs from China's northeast. Many were attracted to the Islamic States violent and extreme ideology, including promises of a caliphate to unite the Islamic world, a goal never espoused by the Taliban. WHAT MAKES THEM A LEADING THREAT? While the Taliban have confined their struggle to Afghanistan, the Islamic State group in Afghanistan and Pakistan has embraced the Islamic States call for a worldwide jihad against non-Muslims. The Center for International and Strategic Studies counts dozens of attacks that Islamic State fighters have carried out against civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, including minority Shiite Muslims, as well as hundreds of clashes with Afghan, Pakistani and U.S.-led coalition forces since January 2017. Though the group has yet to conduct attacks against the U.S. homeland, the U.S. government believes it represents a chronic threat to U.S. and allied interests in South and Central Asia. WHAT IS THEIR RELATIONSHIP WITH THE TALIBAN? They are enemies. While intelligence officials believe al-Qaida fighters are integrated among the Taliban, the Taliban, by contrast, have waged major, coordinated offensives against the Islamic State group in Afghanistan. Taliban insurgents at times joined with both the U.S. and U.S.-backed Afghan government forces to rout the Islamic State from parts of Afghanistan's northeast. A U.S. Defense Department official, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was working covertly, said previously that the Trump administration had sought its 2020 withdrawal deal with the Taliban partly in hopes of joining forces with them against the Islamic State affiliate. The administration saw that group as the real threat to the American homeland. WHAT IS THE RISK NOW? Even when the United States had combat troops, aircraft and armed drones stationed on the ground in Afghanistan to monitor and strike the Islamic State, Islamic State militants were able to keep up attacks despite suffering thousands of casualties, Amira Jadoon and Andrew Mines note in a report for West Point's Combating Terrorism Center. The withdrawal is depriving the United States of its on-the-ground strike capacity in Afghanistan, and threatens to weaken its ability to track the Islamic State and its attack planning as well. Biden officials say the Islamic State group is only one of many terror threats it is dealing with globally. They insist they can manage it with so-called over-the-horizon military and intelligence assets, based in Gulf states, on aircraft carriers, or other more distant sites. One of the United States' greatest fears about pulling out its combat forces after two decades is that Afghanistan under Taliban rule again becomes a magnet and base for extremists plotting attacks on the West. That threat, U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN last weekend, was something we're focused on, with every tool in our arsenal." ___ Knickmeyer reported from Oklahoma City and Gannon from Islamabad. HONOLULU (AP) The ground at the summit of Kilauea volcano in Hawaii has been rumbling and swelling in recent days, prompting scientists to warn that the mountain could once again disgorge lava. But there's no indication an eruption is imminent. The volcano, which is among the world's most active, has behaved similarly in the past without any magma breaking the surface. Here's an overview of the latest developments at Kilauea: WHAT ACTIVITY ARE SCIENTISTS SEEING? Scientists at the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory on Monday noticed a surge of earthquakes and the ground swelling at the southern part of the crater at Kilauea's summit. There are indications magma is shifting about a half-mile to a mile (1 to 2 kilometers) below the surface. It's not uncommon for Kilauea to have earthquakes, which could indicate rocks are moving. It's also not unusual for the ground to swell as the heat from the sun and saturation from rain can cause the ground to expand and contract. However, earthquakes and ground swelling at the same time may indicate magma is on the move. We get a lot of earthquakes here and we get a lot of deformation here, but the combination of the two makes us much more aware," said Jefferson Chang, a geophysicist at the observatory, which is part of the U.S. Geological Survey. There have been hundreds of earthquakes since Monday, striking as often as 25 times an hour. The strongest measured magnitude 3, with most coming in between magnitude 1 and 2 At these levels, the quakes are generally too small for people to notice. Chang said there haven't been any reports of people feeling them. WHERE IS THE ACTIVITY HAPPENING? It's occurring at the summit of Kilauea volcano, an uninhabited area within Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island. This is about 200 miles southeast of Honolulu, which is on a different island called Oahu The site is miles from the nearest town. The park has close off this part of the summit to the public since 2008. Ben Hayes, the park's interpretation and education program manager, said the park is preparing for a potential eruption, but he said there's nothing to be alarmed about. It's a natural process at one of the world's most active volcanoes, he said. HAS THIS HAPPENED BEFORE? Chang said scientists observed activity in the same part of the summit in 2015. That episode lasted three days, and the volcano didn't erupt. Just like this time, the ground swelled. One difference is that there were more earthquakes then. The last time Kilauea erupted at the southern part of its caldera or crater was in 1974. WHATS THE CURRENT SITUATION? The earthquake swarm stopped about 4:30 a.m. Monday. The ground swelling has also subsided. But the activity could return. Chang said sometimes there's a lull in activity lasting a day or two. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO CHANGE THE ALERT LEVEL? The observatory changed Kilauea's volcano alert level to watch from advisory on Tuesday, meaning the mountain was showing heighted unrest with increased potential to erupt. But scientists don't know when that eruption may occur, if it does. If scientists believe a hazardous eruption is imminent, they will change the alert level to warning. The observatory also changed the aviation color code to orange, alerting pilots that there's potential for an eruption and they may need to avoid the area if one occurs. HOW OFTEN HAS KILAUEA ERUPTED BEFORE? Hawaiian chants and stories tell the stories of countless eruptions. In Hawaiian tradition, Kilauea is home to the volcano goddess Pele. Kilauea has erupted 34 times since 1952. From 1983 to 2018, it erupted almost continuously, in some cases sending streams of lava that covered farms and homes. At the end of this decades-long eruption, Kilauea spewed lava from vents in a residential neighborhood on its eastern flank and destroyed more than 700 homes. In December, Kilauea erupted at the crater, creating a lake with enough lava to fill 10 Hoover dams. That eruption ended in May. KEY WEST, Fla. (AP) Federal aviation officials fined a woman $17,000 for drinking alcohol not served by the airline, vaping and refusing to wear a mask on a flight to Charlotte, North Carolina. The Federal Administration Administration said the woman on a Republic Airways flight from Key West, Florida, on Feb. 28 was drinking alcohol that wasnt served by the airline, interfering with crew members, trying to use a vape pen and was not complying with the federal face mask mandate, news outlets reported. The FAA said the aircraft returned to the gate at the Key West airport and she was removed from the plane. LAKE CHARLES, La. (AP) The head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency traveled Thursday to southwest Louisiana to view the region's recovery from Hurricane Laura, hearing an earful of concerns about housing needs and the slow pace of disaster rebuilding aid for schools a year after the storm. FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell met with Gov. John Bel Edwards and regional leaders before touring the area to see some of the rebuilding work. She said she hoped to address the worries raised in her meetings, but she also noted: Recovery does take time. Hurricane Laura struck southwest Louisiana on Aug. 27, 2020, as a Category 4 storm just south of Lake Charles. Less than two months later, Hurricane Delta swept into the same area as a Category 2 storm. Nearly 47,000 homes were damaged by Laura across 21 parishes, most in the Lake Charles region, according to state estimates. Criswell said Laura was the most powerful storm to impact Louisiana since 1856, with enough debris removed from the region to fill New Orleans' Superdome six times. Edwards and Lake Charles Mayor Nic Hunter thanked FEMA for its quick response to the storms. But Hunter raised concerns about a pending request to the White House seeking to decrease the portion of rebuilding costs state and local government agencies must pay. And Edwards said Calcasieu Parish has had difficulty with the pace of FEMA rebuilding aid that threatens to slow school repairs. Meanwhile, Hunter continued to stress the need for congressional relief in the form of disaster recovery block grant aid. Louisiana has received hundreds of millions of dollars in FEMA rebuilding assistance given to states after disasters, but not the supplemental disaster assistance Congress usually allocates after hurricanes. Edwards has requested $3 billion in assistance, mainly for housing programs. We continue to plead with Washington, D.C., to provide that needed aid, Hunter said at a live-streamed news conference with Edwards and Criswell. The Democratic governor said he's hopeful the disaster block grant aid will be included in congressional budget legislation expected in September. The visit to southwest Louisiana near the one-year anniversary of Laura comes as the state is threatened by a tropical depression that formed Thursday and could become a major hurricane. The time to prepare is now," Edwards said. We have a storm that will soon enter the Gulf. The Gulf is absolutely ripe in terms of the conditions for rapid intensification of this storm." TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) Florida will receive $5 million in a settlement with a nonprofit domestic violence agency and its former CEO, who were sued over exorbitant pay the state said should have gone to domestic abuse shelters, Attorney General Ashley Moody announced Thursday. The state investigated the Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence after learning president and CEO Tiffany Carr received $7.5 million in compensation, much if it in paid time off, for the three years before she resigned in November 2019. Millions of dollars ... should have originally gone to victims of domestic violence and not officers, directors and certainly not Tiffany Carr for their own personal gain, Moody said at a news conference in Orlando. Carr stacked the nonprofit's board of directors, which then approved bonuses, raises and paid time off with unspent money that should have been returned to the state at the end of the fiscal year, Moody said. Carr's attorney said that she didn't break any laws, the coalition was audited each year and Carr was unfairly targeted by the state. The Attorney General said in court Ms. Carr never lied to anyone and that the Board had complete authority to award whatever amount of compensation it deemed appropriate. So to now claim Ms. Carr is corrupt' or that she misrepresented' anything is both unsubstantiated and unfair, lawyer Christopher Kise said an email. Carr will personally pay $2.1 million toward the settlement. Kise also noted that the growth in the coalition's budget grew from a few million a year to $70 million under Carr's leadership and the number of shelter nights made available to victims nearly tripled. There was a disagreement about the amount of compensation Ms. Carr received. That dispute has been resolved. Further character assassination is contrary to the good faith nature of the parties agreement," Kise said. Moody, though, said that Carr tried to hide the excessive pay by accruing it in paid time off. Some of this paid time off was so excessive that when it was accrued and rolled over, it amounted to millions of dollars when it was ultimately redeemed, Moody said. In one year Tiffany Carr received 360 days of paid time off ... and in one year it was 465 days of paid time off. Until February 2020, state law established the coalition as the only agency that can pass government money on to groups that help domestic violence victims. Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill stripping the coalition of that special status. We don't want to see this repeated, said DeSantis, who appeared with Moody at the news conference. You've got to have accountability and transparency. That was obviously lacking with this organization for many, many years. The money recovered from the settlement will be distributed to domestic violence centers. Moody said authorities are still looking into criminal charges. JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) A federal judge sentenced a former Florida sheriff's deputy to 35 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to producing and possessing child pornography, the U.S. Attorney's Office announced. The judge Wednesday also ordered Travis Ryan Pritchard, 38, to register as a sex offender. He was accused of having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old girl. Pritchard was a member of the Clay County Sheriff's Office DUI unit when he was arrested last year. According to court documents, Pritchard used an online chat app to engage with the girl from December 2019 to May 2020. She told investigators Pritchard asked her to send nude pictures of herself and that he knew she was only 15, prosecutors said. The deputy came to her house to have sex with her after her parents went to sleep, the U.S. Attorney's Office said in a news release. On April 29, 2020, an undercover detective took over the girl's identity and chatted with Pritchard on the app. Records show Pritchard encouraged the girl to sneak out of the house to meet him. He sent her a message that said, I'm here," when he arrived at her house in his patrol car around 2 a.m. on May 2, records show. Minutes later he was arrested by police. A forensic review of Pritchards cellphone found multiple conversations with the child, along with an encrypted digital folder with numerous images of child sexual abuse, the newspaper reported. The images included the sexual abuse of the girl, produced at the direction of Pritchard, and the rape of a younger girl, prosecutors said. K. Jim Phillips, assistant special agent in charge of Jacksonvilles Homeland Security office, said all child sexual abuse is appalling, but when this crime is committed by someone in a position of trust, it is beyond comprehension. Pritchard had faced 15 to 50 years in prison. TAMPA, Fla. (AP) A former Florida postal clerk pleaded guilty Thursday to stealing mail and passport applications as part of an identify theft scheme. Jasmine Wynne, 31, of Ruskin, pleaded guilty in Tampa federal court to one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud, five counts of aggravated identity theft and one count of theft of a postal key, according to court records. She faces up to 50 years in prison at her Nov. 17 sentencing. LONDON (AP) French President Emmanuel Macron held talks with top Irish officials in Dublin Thursday, focusing on a major overhaul of taxes on the worlds biggest multinational companies. During the one-day state visit his first to Ireland Macron met with President Michael Higgins and Taoiseach Michael Martin. Ireland is not among the approximately 130 countries that backed an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) deal which would see minimum corporation tax set at 15% worldwide. Ireland's rate is currently 12.5%. The proposal, supported by all Group of Seven nations, seeks to deter complex avoidance schemes that have cost governments billions in revenue. Macron said while he believed a common framework made sense for a post-COVID-19 world, it was not for France to put pressure on Dublin to sign up to the agreement. Martin said significant challenges remained before his government could accept the deal, but maintained that Ireland was engaging constructively in the discussions. The taoiseach hailed France as Irelands now nearest neighbor within the European Union, following the U.K.s departure from the trading bloc. The leaders joint news conference was delayed following reports of the explosion at Kabuls airport amid the evacuation operation by the United States and NATO following the Taliban takeover. The French president said the security situation at the airport had seriously deteriorated, but work to move out foreign nationals and eligible Afghans would continue for as long as possible towards August 31, when U.S. forces complete their withdrawal from the country. CROWN POINT, Ind. (AP) A Gary man has pleaded guilty to a reduced charge and agreed to testify against two co-defendants charged in the fatal shootings of two teenage boys slain last year in northwest Indiana. Elijah D. Robinson, 19, pleaded guilty Wednesday to one count of residential entry in connection with the killings of Maxwell Kroll, 17, and Elijah Robinson, 18, who police said was not related to the defendant. ATLANTA (AP) Students in one of Georgia's largest school districts will be spending an extra five days in school this year, thanks to federal pandemic aid, while teachers in a fast-growing charter school have been getting additional professional development and teaching materials. Those are just two examples of how Georgia school leaders plan to spend the more than $5.9 billion in aid that's meant to help schools through the COVID-19 pandemic. Schools have already used the money to buy protective equipment and computers for students to take home. Some are now making heating and air conditioning upgrades and spending to help students make up ground academically. It has been just a battle for schools, said Emily Castillo Leon, founder of the Ethos Classical School charter in Atlanta. We have been fighting nonstop, but having the additional financial aid makes that one worry that is not on our list. Since March 2020, the federal government has provided $190 billion in pandemic aid to schools, more than four times what the U.S. Education Department spends on K-12 schools in a typical year. The AP tracked about $155 billion sent to states to distribute among schools since last year, including general pandemic relief that some states shared with their schools. The biggest recipient in Georgia is DeKalb County, the state's third-largest district with 93,000 students, which got $486 million. The traditional district that got the least was tiny Glascock County, which got $1.28 million for its fewer than 600 students. The average amount per district and independent charter school in Georgia was about $27.9 million, compared to $2.3 million nationwide. Georgias average district is larger with poorer students than the average district nationwide. Aid was nearly $2,800 per student nationally, but varies widely by district and state, according to the AP's analysis. Districts that have larger shares of impoverished students got more per student. The district that got the most per student in Georgia was Clay County, at $14,000. The district that got the least was Forsyth County, at $405 per student. DeKalb County schools Chief Financial Officer Chuck Burbridge said one of DeKalb County's biggest expenditures is extending the school year by five days, pushing back out to 180 days. DeKalb County and many other Georgia districts cut schooling to 175 days during the Great Recession. Were expanding the opportunity for kids to learn," Burbridge said. The district is expanding preschool, offering Saturday school, summer programs, and tutoring. It's training teachers in virtual instruction and in how to integrate technology into the classroom. Burbridge said DeKalb County's enrollment is smaller than expected, but that it may leave extra teachers in classrooms to cut class sizes. DeKalb County has said students lost one to four months of learning in math and somewhat less in reading. Making up those gains could take years, though. If a school district knew how to gain a years worth of learning in a couple of months, they would have done that," Burbridge said. The district is also increasing the number of school counselors. Burbridge said much of DeKalb Countys first round of money was spent on personal protective equipment and improved sanitation. Part of the second round has been spent on heating and air conditioning upgrades at a number of schools. The district also bought laptops for all students and is spending to upgrade networks at schools to handle sharply increased demand for internet. The latest and largest round of funding, totaling $123 billion nationwide, is still being distributed and gives schools enormous flexibility in how to spend it. While 20% must be used to address learning setbacks, the rest can be used on nearly any cost school officials deem reasonable and necessary. Schools have three years to spend it. Castillo Leon said Ethos Classical, which opened in 2019, has added extra teachers so some can teach only virtually and some can teach in-person. She said the school has also invested in professional development and materials for teaching math and reading. We definitely don't see the fix as being a one-year fix, said Castillo Leon. We think of it as a ramp of maybe three years. ___ Follow Jeff Amy on Twitter at http://twitter.com/jeffamy. ___ Follow APs coverage of the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic. Whether students and staff should be required to mask up in Pennsylvania schools will remain a local decision, at least for now, after top Republican lawmakers on Thursday rejected Democratic Gov. Tom Wolfs call for a statewide mandate. The majority of districts are not requiring masks as students return to class, and just 36% of Pennsylvania residents between the ages of 12 and 17 are fully vaccinated, according to recent federal data. Children under 12 are not eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine. Republican leaders acknowledged that coronavirus cases are again surging across the state but said that local leaders are best positioned to respond to the pandemic. At this late date, in many of our communities, local leaders have already made important decisions they believe are in the best interest of their residents and are prepared to adjust those decisions as challenges evolve, Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman, R-Centre, and House Speaker Bryan Cutler, R-Lancaster, wrote in a letter to Wolf. We believe that the current approach allowing local officials to manage and respond as needed makes the most sense and should be continued, their letter said. The Republican response, which was expected, came one day after Wolf asked the GOP leaders of the House and Senate to summon lawmakers to Harrisburg to pass legislation requiring masks in classrooms. Wolf cited sharp increases in COVID-19 cases, deaths and hospitalizations. The governor did not signal an intention to unilaterally mandate masks Thursday, but repeated his call for legislative action. Given the rising case count in Pennsylvania and around the country and the legislatures desire to be included in emergency response, we thought it was prudent to reach out to try to work with them to keep kids safe and in school, said his spokesperson, Lyndsay Kensinger. The governor is disappointed that Republican leadership does not want to come back to session, but quick action is often what is needed during times of emergency when conditions change. Republican leaders pointed out that Wolf himself had recently ruled out a statewide mask mandate for schools after requiring them last year. The tussle over masking in the classroom comes as Pennsylvania reports nearly 3,000 new confirmed COVID-19 infections per day, up more than tenfold since July. Hospitalizations are also up sharply, to more than 1,600, and deaths have nearly tripled in two weeks, to an average of 16 per day. Pennsylvanias two statewide teachers unions last week urged K-12 schools to require masks in school buildings, citing the threat of the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends masks in schools for students, staff and teachers. But masking is a highly contentious issue, and school board meetings have been the scene of heated debate as parents argue for and against. School directors in one of the state's largest districts, Central Bucks outside Philadelphia, rejected a mask mandate by a 5-4 vote on Wednesday night after hearing passionate pleas from both sides. I'm not here to take your religion from you; you believe the mask works, you have a choice to wear it. You trying to take that choice away from my child is completely wrong, said parent Donna Shannon of Doylestown. Other parents called masks a vital tool to help prevent outbreaks. As soon as we go back to school, we're going to have hundreds of kids that have this if you don't mask up," said Jim Barlow of Buckingham, who runs a biotech company and whose two children are too young to be vaccinated. Referring to the delta variant, he added: It's here, it's going to be very serious, and I ask you, the board, to protect our kids against what's coming and to stand up for what's right. The board rejected a plan that included a masking requirement, but plans to come back to the issue next week. At the end of July, just 59 of 474 school district plans submitted to the Education Department mandated masks for the 2021-22 school year, according to the Wolf administration. Pennsylvania has 500 school districts total. LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) Gunmen have released some of the children kidnapped from a school in northern Nigeria back in May, some of whom were as young as 5 years old, the school's head teacher said late Thursday. Abubakar Garba Alhassan told The Associated Press that the freed students were on their way to the state capital, Minna, but added he could not confirm the exact number freed. Authorities have said that 136 children were abducted along with several teachers when gunmen on motorcycles attacked the Salihu Tanko Islamic School in Niger state. Other preschoolers were left behind as they could not keep pace when the gunmen hurriedly moved those abducted into the forest. Alhassan did not provide details of their release, but parents of the students have over the past weeks struggled to raise ransoms demanded by their abductors. There was no immediate comment from police of the Niger governor's office. The release, though, came a day after local media quoted one parent as saying six of the children had died in captivity. More than 1,000 students have been forcibly taken from their schools during those attacks, according to an AP tally of figures previously confirmed by the police. Although most of those kidnapped have been released, at least 200 are still held by their abductors. The government has been unable to halt the spate of abductions for ransom. As a result, many schools have been forced to close due to the concerns about the kidnapping risk. After one abduction at a university in Kaduna state earlier this year, gunmen demanded hundreds of thousands of dollars in ransom. They killed five other students to compel the students parents to raise the money, and later released 14 others. SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) Vice President Kamala Harris has canceled a planned campaign appearance alongside California Gov. Gavin Newsom aimed at boosting Democratic turnout in the final weeks of the recall election that could force him out of his job. The vice president's decision to cancel her trip to her native state followed attacks in Afghanistan that killed at least 12 U.S. service members. She and Newsom were set to appear at a rally south of San Francisco. Spokespeople for Harris did not immediately answer questions about whether she would reschedule the trip. It was also unclear whether President Joe Biden would travel to California to campaign for Newsom amid the ongoing events in Afghanistan. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Wednesday, before the attacks, that Biden planned to do so. The president's and vice president's plans to campaign for Newsom underscored the closeness of the race and its potential to significantly alter the political landscape in the nation's most populous state. Voters last elected a Republican to statewide office in 2006. About one-tenth of the 22 million registered voters in California have already cast ballots. The last day to vote is Sept. 14. At this point, a visit from Biden could do more harm than good for both he and Newsom because of the unfolding situation in Afghanistan, said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a professor of public policy communication at the University of Southern California. I don't see any reason, on either end, that it's absolutely necessary, let alone positive, for the president to take time to go campaign for Gavin Newsom right now," she said. She similarly said it was smart for Harris to cancel her trip, though it would have drawn attention and excitement from some Democrats. Californians elected Harris statewide three times, first as attorney general and later a U.S. senator. Newsom in recent weeks has focused his campaign messaging on women and voters of color, groups that Harris is uniquely poised to speak to as the nation's first woman vice president, as well as the first Black and South Asian person to serve in that role. Should voters recall Newsom, they have the chance to elect the state's first Black governor: Talk radio host Larry Elder, who is running as a Republican. In recent weeks, Newsom and his Democratic allies have focused almost exclusively on Elder, warning his libertarian and conservative policies would be wrong for California. On a Tuesday campaign call, Black women leaders argued Newsom is a better ally to the Black community than Elder. Harris and Newsom began their political careers in the same San Francisco political circles. Harris' was the city's district attorney in the early 2000s when Newsom served as its mayor. They have never competed against each other for political office, and they share donors and political consultants. Democrats have tried to nationalize the race, linking the recall effort to Republicans including former President Donald Trump, who has not publicly commented on the contest. Republicans, meanwhile, have tried to keep the race focused on California issues and what they consider to be Newsoms failures in tackling homelessness, crime and wildfire prevention. The nation's withdrawal from Afghanistan has not been a topic of discussion. SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) Lawyers and expert witnesses this month ground through seven days of highly anticipated hearings on the Public Service Co. of New Mexicos proposed merger with two massive utility companies. The hearings, which concluded late last week, offer little indication of how hearing examiner Ashley Schannauer will advise the Public Regulation Commission or what ruling the five-member commission will make. But at many points, testimony revealed just how high the stakes are for the players involved, the Santa Fe New Mexican reported. PNM hopes to merge with Connecticut-based Avangrid and its parent firm, Iberdrola of Spain. If the merger is rejected by the commission, the company would have the chance to come back with a revised proposal. Regardless of what happens, the commissions decision can be appealed directly to the New Mexico Supreme Court. New Mexicos future in electricity is at stake, with Avangrid and Iberdrola promising investments and the ability to move the state more deftly into the era of renewable energy. But critics fear a loss of local control of New Mexicos largest utility company. They also express concern about an Avangrid subsidiarys service record in Maine, plus Iberdrolas link to a wide-reaching Spanish investigation of alleged corporate spying. The laborious hearings involved technical matters, such as the effectiveness of New Mexicos electricity system, shareholder benefits from a merger and customer costs. The hearings also were sprinkled with moments of conflict and humor. At one point Avangrid attorney Brian Haverly addressed longtime PNM nemesis Mariel Nanasi as Mariel. Im Ms. Nanasi to you, responded Nanasi, an attorney and head of New Energy Economy, which has led the fight against the proposal. I apologize, Ms. Nanasi, Haverly said. PNM attorney Richard Alvidrez grilled New Energy Economy expert witness Christopher Sandberg, a retired attorney who now is a professional photographer, on his expertise of the issue. He also jabbed at Sandberg about the background he used in the Zoom meeting. You look very scholarly sitting there with your bow tie and the backdrop of the books, Alvidrez said. Im assuming that thats a backdrop youve conjured up and that youre not quite sitting in a library with leather-bound books. The bow tie is real, Sandberg said. The background is fake. Otherwise you would have to look at my very messy workroom and that would be very distracting. Schannauer, who is employed by the Public Regulation Commission and has been a quasi-judge on the merger proposal for much of the year, gave the many attorneys involved a schedule at the end of the hearing. Schannauer said the participants should submit position statements by Aug. 30, legal briefs by Sept. 21 and responses to those briefs by Sept. 28. He said he would make his recommendation based on where the elements of the proposed deal stood at the end of the hearing and would not factor in any negotiations after the hearing. He noted another hearing vital to PNM, about its departure from Four Corners Power Plant, will start Aug. 31. That hearing also is important to Avangrid and Iberdrola because they have said they expect PNM to have a plan to abandon the coal-fired Four Corners Power Plant in northwestern New Mexico. PNM expects to turn its 13% share of the plant over to the Navajo Transitional Energy Co. Because it was handled by Zoom technology, the merger proposal hearing lumbered along. Witnesses and lawyers tried to keep up on their own laptop and desktop computers with the stream of exhibits and previous testimony that was cited. If speculation can be made about Commissioner Joseph Maestas lengthy comments and questions to Avangrid executive Robert Kump, the Santa Fe commissioner sounded willing to compromise. Maestas, of Santa Fe, said he wanted to see the merger applicants promise investments in modernizing the states electrical grid and weatherization program. The state needs help, Maestas told Kump. We lack resources to truly, you know, implement the planning effort for New Mexicos electric system. Maestas also suggested residents who are behind in their electric bills should be given a continuation of a grace period until federal assistance and other forms of help are sorted out. Avangrid was eager to help the state modernize its electric grid, Kump responded. Well, certainly if we were fortunate enough to have this deal close and we could work with the folks at PNM, we would be more than willing to assist, Kump said. Clearly we have the balance sheet, and wed love to work with PNM on that. Pedro Azagra Blazquez, an Avangrid board member and Iberdrola executive, said in his testimony a couple of weeks ago he was willing to increase the incentives his companies have offered the state. Blazquez said he would increase the customer rate credits to $67 million, up from $65 million and significantly more than the original offer of $25 million. He also said under questioning by the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority that the companies would create a $1 million scholarship fund, a $1 million apprenticeship program and raise assistance from $6 million to $10 million for people who are behind on their electric bills. A PNM spokesman wrote the applicants put on a strong case. An Avangrid spokeswoman claimed the hearings revealed enthusiasm for the merger. What became clear in the hearing is that the vast majority of the parties support the merger, spokeswoman Joanie Griffin wrote in an email. We look forward to the ruling, and moving forward to help New Mexico achieve its energy transition goals. The proposal is supported by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, Attorney General Hector Balderas and numerous community and environmental groups. Some organizations have not signed on, however, such as Bernalillo County and the city of Albuquerque. Since the merger proposal late last year, thousands of pages of opinions, questions, answers, claims and data have been filed with the commission. Schannauer expressed eagerness to finish the job, noting: We need to get a decision done in this case. HONG KONG (AP) Hong Kong authorities ousted an opposition legislator from his seat Thursday after finding him to be insufficiently loyal amid Beijings tightening grip on the semi-autonomous city. Cheng Chung-tai of the populist Civic Party was disqualified from the legislature after he failed to fulfil the legal requirements and conditions on upholding the Basic Law and bearing allegiance to Hong Kong, the government said in a statement. The Basic Law is Hong Kongs mini-constitution. He was one of two remaining opposition lawmakers in the legislature, after the pro-democracy camp of legislators resigned en masse last year following the disqualification of four of their colleagues. Hong Kongs chief secretary, John Lee, said in a news conference that Cheng was disqualified after an opinion was sought from the territory's national security committee, which said Cheng had failed to comply with the requirements of being a legislator. The committee was set up last year when Beijing imposed a strict national security law that effectively criminalized opposition to the government and silenced dissent. The committee referenced negative behavior from Cheng in seeking public office, Lee said, without describing any specific incidents that led to his disqualification. In considering and making a decision as to whether a candidate passes the review ... we will look at his previous acts and statements, what a candidate has written about, including books and articles, Lee said. Cheng, considered an independent opposition lawmaker, opposed a number of bills favored by the pro-Beijing camp, including electoral reform legislation earlier this year that reduced the proportion of directly elected lawmakers. Cheng said he was not aware of any legal recourse he could seek regarding his disqualification. From my point of view, I think it is not meaningful to appeal or follow up on any legal procedures, he said. He was previously convicted of desecrating the China and Hong Kong flags after he was seen flipping them upside-down during a legislative debate, and was fined 5,000 Hong Kong dollars ($640). Authorities cracked down on political dissent after months of anti-government protests in 2019, arresting scores of pro-democracy activists and banning protests, citing health risks from the coronavirus. Most of the citys most prominent activists are currently behind bars. ST. LOUIS (AP) Artists will no longer have to incorporate hunting imagery to win a coveted spot for their work on the federal duck stamp, a reversal of a Trump-era requirement. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said it's eliminating the celebrating our waterfowl hunting heritage theme from its annual Federal Duck Stamp contest, a change that goes into effect after this year's competition. The Biden administration said this week that artists competing to have their work featured on the stamp will have more freedom of expression without a mandate to include a gun, dog or some other hunting component. Since it was established in the 1930s, the duck stamp has generated more than $1.1 billion for conservation efforts, including the preservation of roughly 6 million acres of wetlands, according to the service. Waterfowl hunters who are at least 16 years old are required to buy the $25 stamp to hunt. The stamps are also sought after by others including conservation supporters and collectors who just appreciate the striking artwork. When the Trump administration enacted the hunting imagery requirement in 2020, it said it was helping recognize the role hunters play in conservation efforts. But some groups including the National Audubon Society opposed the move, saying it unnecessarily stirred up political controversy. It is the birds themselves that unite both birders and hunters and that is what should be celebrated in the duck stamp, said Erik Schneider, policy manager at the National Audubon Society. The Biden administration said some artists were unhappy about the hunting requirement and that the rule change will help the stamps appeal to a broader audience. Ducks Unlimited, a wetlands and waterfowl conservation organization that also works with hunters, supported the Trump administration requirement, saying it helped honor the stamps hunting heritage. But Nick Wiley, chief operating officer of Ducks Unlimited, said the group is OK with the Biden administrations decision and that the programs conservation benefits are more important than the debate over huntings place in the contest. The key point here is that it is not taking away hunting. It is continuing to allow the flexibility for artists to include hunting and give a nod to the hunting heritage, he said. The service said a hunting component was part of the 2018 contest before the theme was made permanent in 2020. It said some supporters of the requirement had the mistaken impression that it was a traditional part of the decades-old program. Many groups purchase duck stamps, but the service said hunters are its largest buyers. Duck stamps go on sale each summer before the hunting season. The hunting theme requirement is still part of this years competition, which will be judged next month. Contest winners arent paid, but they keep the rights to their work and can sell it to collectors. Winning also brings attention. A trio of brothers have collectively won the contest 13 times, gaining acclaim within the wildlife art community and even a mention in the 1996 film Fargo." One of those brothers, Robert Hautman of Minnesota, had his work featured on the 2018-2019 stamp, his third time winning the contest. He said the competition is a great environmental success story but the hunting imagery requirement wasnt necessary. Hand-drawn submissions must be 7 inches by 10 inches and the winning pieces are eventually shrunk down for reproduction on a stamp. Artists are required to feature at least one of several chosen waterfowl, so additional elements must be drawn to a small scale that does not disrupt the whole painting, Hautman said. It is an added obstacle. It is something that I dont think needs to be in there for a duck stamp, Hautman said. __ The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of APs environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/environment CHICAGO (AP) Illinois health care workers and educators from kindergarten through college will be required to be vaccinated against COVID-19 or submit to weekly testing, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Thursday in announcing new safety protocols that also include a fresh statewide mandate for masks to be worn indoors. The mandates, which overlap in several places with existing rules, are a response to a spike in COVID-19 infections fueled by the highly contagious delta variant, particularly in southern and central Illinois. Our current vaccination levels are not enough to blunt the ferocity of the delta variant hospitalization surges, Pritzker, a first-term Democrat, said at a Chicago news conference. In some regions, hospital administrators are asking for more help to manage the sheer number of incoming patients who, I'll emphasize again, are almost exclusively individuals who have chosen not to have gotten the life-saving vaccine. Pritzker said the requirements are designed to better protect move vulnerable populations, including young children who do not yet qualify for vaccines. Pritzker said that 98% of Illinois' COVID-19 infections from January to July were among the unvaccinated. The mask order, which begins Monday, applies to everyone age 2 and older, regardless of vaccination status. It's similar to an order issued in May 2020, which was later relaxed for vaccinated people. First doses of the vaccine are required by Sept. 5 for health care workers, including nursing home employees, K-12 educators and support staff and higher education teachers, staff and students. Those who don't comply will have to undergo weekly COVID-19 testing. Other cities and states have made similar requirements. Earlier this month, California required all teachers and school staff to be vaccinated or undergo weekly testing. The surge in Illinois, with more than 4,400 cases reported Wednesday, has started overwhelming hospitals in less populated areas in the state where vaccination rates are low and there are fewer health care facilities. For instance, in southern Illinois fewer than half of the residents are vaccinated and earlier this week there was only one available intensive care unit hospital bed available, according to state health officials. In August, public health departments statewide have reported more than two dozen COVID-19 outbreaks at schools, according to Pritzker's office. Illinois already has a mask requirement for all schools and two of the largest education systems, Chicago Public Schools and the University of Illinois, already require educator vaccinations. The U of I system also already requires student vaccinations. A large number of hospital systems have also required employee vaccines. Teachers unions have voiced support of the vaccine and masking rules, but some schools have failed to enforce them and there have been complaints from some private schools and conservative lawmakers. ___ Follow Sophia Tareen on Twitter: https://twitter.com/sophiatareen. NEW DELHI (AP) Police accompanied by activists from a childrens rights group raided automobile repair shops on the edge of the Indian capital on Thursday and removed 17 children who were employed illegally. Activists from Bachpan Bachao Andolan, or Save the Children Movement, whose founder, Kailash Satyarthi, was the co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014, went from shop to shop, removing children whose hands, clothes and feet were smeared with grease. The group helps authorities prosecute people employing young children. Children under age 14 are not allowed to work in India except in family businesses and farms. Those between 14 and 18 are barred from working in hazardous conditions. Employers can face up to two years in prison and a fine of up to 50,000 rupees ($675). In Thursday's raids, the children, who ranged in age from 13 to 18, were taken away by district government officials. Police sealed the shops where they had been working. A nationwide coronavirus lockdown imposed last year pushed millions of people into poverty, encouraging the trafficking of children from villages to cities to work. The pandemic has also hampered enforcement of anti-child labor laws, with fewer workplace inspections and less vigorous pursuit of human traffickers. Manish Sharma, director of the Save the Children Movement, said traffickers and brokers found it easier to manipulate parents and children during the economic downturn. Many became jobless and many reached the brink of starvation. Traffickers took full advantage of such situations, he said. According to UNICEF, the U.N. children's agency, the number of children working worldwide increased to 160 million in June 2021. It warned that an additional 9 million could be at risk by the end of 2022 due to the pandemic. On Thursday, some parents appeared at the automobile repair shops soon after the raid and pleaded with police and activists to let their children go. He is working hard, right? He is not stealing, smoking marijuana, or drinking alcohol, said the mother of one of the children. She said she only allowed him to work because schools were shut and he was whiling away his time. Sharma said rehabilitation of rescued children is key. The former employers will be made to pay unpaid wages and the children will be helped in obtaining various government benefits, including admission to schools, he said. For more than three decades, Satyarthi and the organization he founded have worked to rescue children and create awareness to keep them in school. The group says it has helped rescue more than 9,000 working children since April 2020 and assisted in the arrest and prosecution of 260 traffickers. Satyarthi won the Nobel Peace Prize along with Pakistani activist for female education Malala Yousafzai. WEST BEND, Wis. (AP) An inmate in a southeastern Wisconsin county jail has been charged with killing another inmate in what the local sheriff called a vicious, unprovoked attack. According to Washington County sheriff's officials, the 23-year-old inmate was attacked, kicked in the head 28 times at the jail in West Bend Aug. 17 and died over the weekend. A Washington County judge on Wednesday set bond at $750,000 cash for 31-year-old George Telford, of Fargo, North Dakota, who is charged with first-degree intentional homicide and battery to a prisoner. The judge also ordered a competency exam. Sheriff Martin Schulteis said Telford has been jailed since July 4 on a domestic incident and had no history of major discipline. This was, for all intents and purposes, an unprovoked attack, said Schulteis. It was not a jail fight. It was an attack on a fellow human being. The victim from Washington County had been in jail for two days on a probation hold through the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, WITI-TV reported. He has not been identified. Telford and the victim were housed in the same cellblock with five other inmates at the time of the attack, the sheriffs office said. None of the other inmates were involved or intervened in the attack. Washington County corrections officers and medical staff responded to the cellblock after an officer saw the assault taking place, according to the sheriffs office. The officer immediately activated the emergency response protocol, which sent all inmates in the cellblock back to their cells and locked down the unit. Telford's public defender, Andrew Leech, did not immediately return a call for comment. DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) A western Iowa mother of twin boys is suing the state over its law banning schools from ordering face masks to be worn as a way to protect students against COVID-19. Frances Parr, of Council Bluffs, sued the state, Gov. Kim Reynolds and several state officials Monday in Polk County District Court. The lawsuit seeks an order requiring the state to issue a universal mask mandate for all students and school personnel until a voluntary plan can be implemented that segregates mask-wearing students and staff from those who opt not to wear masks. TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) Kansas hospitals are clamoring for traveling nurses as the number of COVID-19 patients rises to levels last seen in January. The state had 407 open travel nurse positions as of Monday, according to data from Aya Healthcare, a leading travel nursing agency. Employers are willing to pay big dollars, with advertised positions in Kansas and Missouri topping $5,600 a week, The Kansas City Star reports. You cant fault them for wanting to take advantage of this opportunity," said Kelly Sommers, director of the Kansas State Nurses Association. She said nurses are making three times more traveling than they could in a regular job. Robin Allaman, chief nursing officer at the 25-bed Kearny County Hospital in tiny Lakin, told The Associated Press that the rising prices are making it hard to hire traveling nurses. There is somewhat of a bidding war going on for those staff members, so you may think you have someone coming the next day and then only to call and find out that they have canceled your contract and accepted one for much higher pay, she said. Cindy Samuelson, a spokeswoman for the Kansas Hospital Association, said in an email to the AP that the demand for traveling nurses over the last month in a region that includes Kansas, Iowa, Missouri and Nebraska has increased anywhere from 35% to 127%, depending on the type of position. The association has floated several options to address the demand, including additional funding to offset the cost to retain and recruit staff. The money, which would presumably go toward pay and benefits for staff, would help keep these burned out staff members across our communities retained, Samuelson said. Additional measures proposed by the association include helping small, sometimes rural, hospitals keep acutely ill patients in their facilities. This could involve more extensive consultations between doctors at larger hospitals that have handled many COVID-19 patients and those at smaller facilities with less experience. The association has also discussed finding ways to refer more rural patients transferred to large hospitals back to their small community hospitals after they improve, as well as providing flexibility around licensing to make sure professionals coming from other states can begin working quickly. In a letter Wednesday, Kansas House Speaker Ron Ryckman, an Olathe Republican, urged Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly to act on a serious shortage of nurses in hospitals. He raised the possibility of using federal COVID-19 funds for sign-on bonuses, overtime pay and other incentives. Kelly also expressed concerns about the staffing problems in a news conference last week. She has promoted vaccinations as a way to reduce infections and has encouraged schools to require masks. Most of the state's largest districts including Wichita and Shawnee Mission are now doing so. On Wednesday, she posted a link on Facebook to a new YouTube video calling for parents to get children over 12 vaccinated, have all youngsters wear masks in school and to test regularly. TELFORD, Tenn. (AP) A Korean manufacturer of auto parts is making its first expansion into the U.S. in Tennessee, state officials said. Officials with Sungwoo Hitech America said the company is investing $40 million to bring manufacturing operations to the town of Telford in Washington County, Tennessee economic development officials said in a news release Wednesday. The company plans to create more than 100 jobs with the move. RENO, Nev. (AP) A California appeals court has blocked the expansion of Lake Tahoes famed Squaw Valley ski resort because the development plan fails to adequately address potential harm to air and water quality, as well as increased noise levels and traffic in the area. A three-judge panel of California's Third District Court of Appeals granted parts of two appeals brought by Sierra Watch. It reversed a state judges 2018 ruling and ordered the lower court in Placer County to issue a new ruling specifying additional actions the resort must take to ensure the new development complies with the California Environmental Quality Act. In addition to other concerns, the panel said Tuesday existing plans fail to adequately address climate change or impacts on regional wildfire evacuation plans surrounding the site of the 1960 Winter Olympics. Opponents say the development planned across 94 acres (38 hectares) would double the population of Olympic Valley 6 miles (10 kilometers) north of Tahoe City, California. They say 40% of the new traffic generated will travel into the lake's basin, increasing the amount of sediment transported to the lake and raising nitrate emissions two major threats to Tahoes world-renowned clarity. Sierra Watch executive director Tom Mooers said the appellate courts decision marks a major milestone in the decade-long effort to block the expansion first proposed in 2012. Alterra Mountain Co., Denver-based owner of Squaw Valley, wants to build 850 units in a series of high-rise condo hotels in what is now the parking lot of the ski resort. The expansion includes plans for a rollercoaster and a 90,000-square-foot (8,361-square-meter) indoor waterpark. Alterra was hell-bent on bringing Vegas-style excess to the mountains of Tahoe, Mooers said. It was a direct threat to everything we love about the Sierra. Justices Vance Ray, Cole Blease and Elena Duarte granted the appeal on Tuesday. In the second related appeal, they agreed with Sierra Watchs argument that Placer Countys Board of Supervisors violated public meetings requirements when it approved parts of the expansion plans. But it stopped short of vacating the countys action and instead instructed the lower court to issue a new ruling addressing the conservation groups concerns. Dee Byrne, Squaw Valley Alpine Meadows president and COO, said in a statement emailed to The Associated Press Wednesday night that they are disappointed in the ruling but noted it upheld most of the environmental review attached to the development plan. We are committed to carrying out a responsible development in the valley, one that brings higher-paying jobs, increased tax revenue, more affordable housing and millions in future investment in support of conservation and transit to Olympic Valley and the region, she said. The countys 2016 review approved by a state judge concluded the expansion would add an average of 1,353 daily car trips an additional 23,842 vehicle travel miles on busy days. It acknowledged it could take more than 10 hours to evacuate via the single access road during a wildfire. The appellate courts 53-page ruling noted that the developer had argued that the ski resort lies outside the Lake Tahoe Basin and that the expansion project would not result in storm-water runoff or other pollutants draining into the lake. But it said the county admitted after the formal approval of the environmental impact report attached to the formal expansion plans that increased vehicle miles traveled contribute to pollution of the lake. The county acknowledged the connection between vehicle miles traveled and Tahoes clarity after the final Environmental Impact Report was prepared, revealing six days before the board of supervisors approved the project that increased (vehicle miles traveled) and its related effects tailpipe emissions and crushed abrasives have a direct role in lake clarity," Tuesday's ruling said. But none of that was disclosed in the (environmental impact report). And so when the final (environmental impact report) acknowledged the project would significantly increase traffic in the basin ... the public had little if any ability to evaluate the relevance of that change to Lake Tahoe. That was improper. The court also agreed with Sierra Watchs argument that the impact report underestimated wildfire evacuation times by wrongly assuming emergency responders would provide traffic control at key intersections in the narrow, forested canyon along the Truckee River leading to Interstate 80. It noted the chief later clarified to the developers consultant that its assumption was highly unrealistic because any available public safety personnel would be tasked with much higher priority tasks and even then, the numbers of public safety personnel would likely be inadequate. Squaw Valley attempted to downplay the issue by noting the fire chief ultimately supported the evacuation plan prepared for the project, the court said. But the report itself continued to present a misleading estimation of evacuation times that prevented informed decision-making. FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) The attorney for parents suing to overturn Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis executive order banning strong student mask mandates told a judge Thursday that it violates the authority of school districts to decide health issues on their campuses something the governor's lawyer strongly disputed. Craig Whisenhunt told Circuit Judge John C. Cooper that DeSantis is endangering children by not letting districts follow guidelines issued by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which recommends that children be masked at school. He pointed to Floridas skyrocketing COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations since the delta variant took hold in June, including among children. Several Florida childrens hospitals have recently reported that they have more COVID patients than any time previously. Despite that reality, despite all of the science, the governor has sought to insert himself into matters of local health concerns and impede the ability of school boards to do what they are constitutionally mandated to do, which is to operate and control their schools, Whisenhunt told the judge. The Tallahassee hearing, concluding a four-day trial, was held online because of the pandemic. But Michael Abel, an attorney representing DeSantis and the state, argued there are widely divergent opinions among doctors over whether masks stop the disease's spread, particularly at schools. Given that, the governor has the authority to side with parents who believe it is their right to decide what is best for their children and not school boards or other parents, Abel argued. Parents know their own children better than their teachers know them. Better than their childrens doctors know them. Better than school administrators know them. Better than school district representatives know them, he said. And they definitely know their children better than the other parents of the children in their class. Cooper's decision, which he expects to issue Friday, will, for now, decide the legality of strict mask mandates imposed in 10 of the state 67 countywide school districts, including most of the largest. Defying the governor and the state Board of Education, the districts have said students must wear masks in class unless their parents provide a note from a doctor. The districts represent about half of the state's 2.8 million public school students. DeSantis has said districts may only impose a mask mandate if parents can opt their child out with a note from themselves. A few districts have done that, but most districts have left it up to parents. Both sides have indicated that if they lose, they will appeal Cooper's decision to a higher court. The hearing comes as DeSantis threatened two districts, Broward and Alachua, and their boards with more drastic but unspecified punishments if they don't revoke their mandates. The districts, which cover Fort Lauderdale and Gainesville, have said they will not back down. The state has already threatened to withhold funding equal to the two districts school board salaries, an amount that would be less than 1% of the districts budgets. That will happen very soon," DeSantis said of the increased penalties during an Orlando news conference. And then I know theres parents whove had their rights taken away who are going to pursue legal action. DeSantis has not yet gone after the other eight districts that have imposed strong mandates, including those that cover Orlando, Tampa, Jacksonville, Tallahassee and West Palm Beach. During Thursday's closing arguments, Whisenhunt said the governor's order against mask mandates is different than an earlier pandemic program through which DeSantis gave districts extra money if they went back to in-person classes. Courts upheld that program, something DeSantis' lawyers have cited in this trial, but Whisenhunt said this is different because he is punishing districts that defy him. What we have now is a directive from the governor to impose a restriction on school boards' ability to do their job under the threat of a loss of funding," Whisenhunt said. "He is no longer tempting them with a carrot; he is beating the school boards down with a stick. He said that while DeSantis argues he is protecting the rights of parents who don't want their children to wear masks, he is also violating the rights of those parents who believe that masks protect their children. Most doctors say masks primarily prevent the wearer from expelling the virus, giving protection to others. Our parents are being forced to choose between their child's right to an education and their child's right to be safe," Whisenhunt said. Abel argued that Florida has an educational hierarchy in which districts do have substantial autonomy, but the governor and Legislature can impose laws and rules restricting their discretion. DeSantis and the state board have decided, he said, that parents have the ultimate authority over their child's health care, including whether they should wear a mask. Parents, Abel said, have the fundamental right to direct the upbringing and the education and health care and mental health of their minor children. BEIRUT (AP) A Lebanese judge leading the investigation into last years massive explosion at Beiruts port issued a subpoena for the country's caretaker prime minister after he failed show up for questioning on Thursday, the state-run National News Agency reported. Last month, judge Tarek Bitar confirmed charges filed by his predecessor against outgoing Prime Minister Hassan Diab and three former ministers. Dian was summoned for questioning on accusations of intentional killings and negligence. Bitar also summoned former and current generals. Hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive material used in fertilizers that had been improperly stored in the port for years, exploded on Aug. 4, 2020, killing 214 people, injuring more than 6,000 and devastating nearby neighborhoods. The blast was one of the largest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded and was the most destructive single incident in Lebanons troubled history. Bitar set a new date for questioning Diab, Sept. 20. The prime minister had also declined to be interrogated last year by Bitar's predecessor, Fadi Sawwan. Bitar was named to lead the investigation in February after Sawwan was removed following legal challenges by senior officials he had accused of negligence that led to the blast. Diab, who resigned following the explosion, said in an interview last year with The Associated Press that he was being singled out and charged while others knew more. On Wednesday, Bitar supervised a simulation of the welding that took place at the port shortly before last year's explosion, according to the news agency's report. Its aim was to determine whether the welding could have been the main cause of the fire that preceded the explosion. The simulation was attended by a group of lawyers and security officers. NEW ORLEANS (AP) Prosecutors say a man who pleaded guilty to heroin distribution in federal court in New Orleans will also forfeit a luxury car, a diamond-encrusted Rolex watch and other jewelry. Prosecutors said in a Thursday news release that 44-year-old Arthur Johnson of New Orleans faces at least 10 years in prison and possibly life after pleading guilty to conspiring to distribute heroin. The release from U.S. Attorney Duane Evans also says Johnson could be fined as much as $10 million. Court records show the plea was entered Tuesday. AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) Members of the Maine Legislature have proposed a bill to block Gov. Janet Mills administration from enforcing regulations that they say threaten to shutdown a key dam on the Kennebec River and a local mill nearby. Senate President Troy Jackson, D-Allagash, and Maine House Speaker Ryan Fecteau, D-Biddeford, proposed legislation to establish reasonable standards for permitting and operation of dams and clarify the Legislatures role in water quality rulemaking, The Bangor Daily News reported, citing a news release. PORTLAND, Maine (AP) Maine's largest city is considering a return to indoor mask rules due to the rise of COVID-19 in the state. Portland City Council is scheduled to discuss the possibility of an indoor mask mandate on Sept. 8. The entire state was under an indoor mask mandate until late May, when it was lifted. A return to a mask mandate would make Portland the first municipality in the state to go that route. The Portland Press Herald reported City Councilor Andrew Zarro requested the workshop because of a surge in cases caused by the delta variant. The possibility of a new mandate in Portland comes as Maine officials are recommending indoor mask use in almost all of the state. The state is recommending indoor masking in parts of the state that have substantial or high transmission of the virus. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday that is true of 15 of the 16 counties in the state. The only county in the state with moderate transmission of the virus is Sagadahoc. No counties are the site of low transmission. Cumberland County, where Portland is located, is the site of substantial transmission. In other pandemic news in Maine: CASES RISE AGAIN Maine health authorities have said the delta variant is responsible for almost all the new COVID-19 cases in the state. New cases of the virus have been climbing over the course of the summer in Maine, as they have around the country. The pandemic has led to 926 deaths in the state, the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention said. The agency has also reported more than 74,000 confirmed virus cases since the start of the pandemic. The seven-day rolling average of daily new cases in Maine has risen over the past two weeks from 172.83 new cases per day on Aug. 10 to 175.00 new cases per day on Aug. 24. The seven-day rolling average of daily deaths in Maine has risen over the past two weeks from 0.14 deaths per day on Aug. 10 to 2.43 deaths per day on Aug. 24. The AP is using data collected by Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering to measure outbreak caseloads and deaths across the United States. ___ PLEA FOR SHOTS Leaders of a group of health organizations in Maine held a joint news conference on Thursday to say that the rise in COVID-19 cases in the state is putting a strain on the health system. The event included representatives from Northern Light Health, MaineHealth, Central Maine Healthcare and MaineGeneral Health. The representatives called on the public to get vaccinated if they have not, wear masks when indoors and be cautious about attending indoor gatherings. The more COVID we take care of in our hospitals, the less resources we have to take care of all of those other things, said Joan Boomsma, chief medical officer for MaineHealth. MADISON, Wis. (AP) Making a Murderer subject Steven Avery has appealed his latest unanimous legal defeat, asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to take the case. Avery, 59, filed the request Wednesday, his attorney Kathleen Zellner said Thursday. COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) Authorities are searching for a central Missouri man who is charged in the deaths of his girlfriend and the woman's 11-year-old daughter. Prosecutors on Wednesday charged J.T. McLean, 45, of Fulton, with two counts of first-degree murder. A news release from the Boone County Sheriff's Department said authorities have been unable to find McLean, who works as an over-the-road truck driver. BOSTON (AP) A man charged with stabbing a rabbi outside a Jewish school in Boston was ordered held without bail Thursday pending a dangerousness hearing as his attorney described him as suffering from severe mental illness. Khaled Awad, 24, faces charges on nine indictments including armed assault with intent to murder, violating an individuals constitutional rights and carrying a dangerous weapon on school grounds. Awads defense attorney, Janice Bassil, said Thursday that Awad has a history of severe mental illness and often experiences hallucinations. This is a very ill individual, said Bassil, according to the Boston Globe. Investigators said security camera footage showed Mr. Awad, 24, approaching Rabbi Shlomo Noginski outside the Shaloh House in the citys Brighton neighborhood as a childrens camp was underway. Noginskis style of dress made him identifiable as an Hasidic Jew, investigators said. Awad drew a weapon that appeared to be a gun and made what the victim interpreted to be a demand for the keys to the school van, investigators said. When Noginski attempted to hand over the keys, Awad rejected them and instead motioned for him to enter the van in an apparent attempt to isolate him. At the same time, Mr. Awad put away the weapon and pulled out a knife. Noginski used the moment to run to a nearby park where Awad chased him and attacked him with the knife, investigators said. Noginski was stabbed nine times and suffered serious wounds to the upper left chest near his heart and deep lacerations to his left arm. Awad, who is originally from Egypt, was being held at Bridgewater State Hospital for an evaluation of his mental health following a July 8 hearing in Brighton District Court. During Thursday's court hearing, a clinician said Awad has bipolar disorder, has not been taking psychiatric medication while in Massachusetts and was deemed incompetent to stand trial in Florida, where he faced criminal charges last year. His lawyer said Awad is now on a medication that appears to have stabilized him. Noginski, an Israeli citizen with 12 children, was released from the hospital the day after the stabbing. The attack has been condemned by Bostons Jewish community. District Attorney Rachael Rollins said the alleged attack was a hate crime. It is imperative that we denounce hatred and bigotry in any form and respond clearly and firmly when we encounter it, Rollins said in a press release Wednesday after a grand jury returned indictments against Awad. Awas has been charged with: armed assault with intent to murder; aggravated assault and battery by means of a dangerous weapon (knife); assault by means of a dangerous weapon (gun); assault and battery for the purpose of intimidation resulting in bodily injury; violating an individuals constitutional rights; two counts of assault by means of a dangerous weapon; and two counts of carrying a dangerous weapon on school grounds. MINNEAPOLIS (AP) A southern Minnesota man has pleaded guilty to illegally possessing a firearm after he bragged about his illegal shotgun and plans to kill a police officer at a Donald Trump rally at the state Capitol. The Minneapolis Star Tribune reported 22-year-old Dayton Sauke of Owatonna entered his plea in federal court in Minneapolis on Wednesday. HILLSBORO, Mo. (AP) An eastern Missouri man being sought for an attack with a machete had a previous conviction for firing a crossbow and assault rifle at an acquaintance. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that 31-year-old Ted Treece of High Ridge was charged in at-large warrants Wednesday with first-degree assault and armed criminal action. He has no listed attorney. CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) A grassroots group on Thursday recalled the centennial of a deadly fight to organize West Virginia coal miners in urging Sen. Joe Manchin to support higher wages and better voting protections. Members of the Poor Peoples Campaign invoked the Battle of Blair Mountain after traveling by motorcade from Madison in Boone County to the state Capitol in Charleston. A century ago, the fight for miners' rights ended in surrender to federal troops though their struggle has lived on as a rallying cry for workers' rights in West Virginia. Group members have repeatedly pressed the influential moderate Democratic senator and called for a diverse coalition of working people to apply pressure on Manchin, who has opposed a $15 federal minimum wage and a bill known as the For the People Act. The bill has been touted as the answer of Democrats to a state level-GOP push to enact voting restrictions following the 2020 election. It passed the House in March, but has bogged down in the Senate. Manchin ultimately declared he couldnt vote for it because it lacked bipartisan support. The Rev. William Barber, co-chair of the Poor Peoples Campaign, has held several rallies this year in West Virginia to bring focus on Manchin, this time drawing comparisons to the Battle of Blair Mountain. In late August 1921, a police chief sympathetic to miners who wanted to improve their lives was fatally shot. That spurred thousands of miners to embark on a march, leading to the 12-day battle in which 16 men lost their lives. The bottom line is, 100 years ago, black and white miners were fighting against two things," Barber said. "They were fighting against the bosses that were controlling the politics, and being paid in scrip. And they got tired of it. Today Manchin is blocking people from getting their due. And hes blocking voting rights, which is allowing the elite to control who get elected. Its all wrong. And thats why 100 years later, we would be dishonoring them if we werent standing up for this. Manchin said in a statement later Thursday that every American and West Virginian deserves to make a living wage. We cannot allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good. Instead of a $15 minimum wage, he has proposed an $11 minimum wage indexed to the cost of living, which he said would ensure no one working 40 hours a week is living below the poverty guidelines while also removing Congress from the constant battle to raise the minimum wage year after year. Manchin said a bipartisan group of senators also continues to discuss voting rights legislation that will ensure "accessible, fair and secure elections across the United States for years to come. Pushing through legislation of this significance on a partisan basis may garner political points but will inevitably only increase the political polarization of America. "I will continue to work with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to reach a reasonable agreement on an $11 federal minimum wage that protects working Americans without burdening our small businesses and on voting rights legislation that protects the right to vote for every American. The West Virginia Mine Wars Museum in Matewan is planning multiple events to remember the centennial of the Battle of Blair Mountain over the Labor Day weekend. BURTONSVILLE, Md. (AP) A Maryland teacher said she was placed on leave after refusing to comply with a school mask mandate. Angela Harders, a special education teacher at Paint Branch High School, said she was taking a stand against forced masking, The Washington Post reported. Everyone should have the freedom to choose, she said in the report Wednesday. A teacher for 12 years, Harders said she has held several positions in Montgomery County Public Schools, the states largest school system. Face coverings are at odds with her doctors orders and her religious faith, she said. Harders had medical-related accommodations last school year and said she didnt know she needed to seek accommodations again. In an Aug. 25 letter that Harders posted online, Principal Afie Mirshah said Harders was being placed on paid leave for the day because of allegations of inappropriate, unprofessional behavior. It said she was told Monday that she was required to wear a mask indoors and asked to leave when she refused. On Wednesday, she was maskless and refused to comply when approached by the principal, it said. An investigation would be conducted, the letter said. A Paint Branch staffer who refused to wear a mask was asked to leave, school system spokeswoman Gboyinde Onijala confirmed, but she couldnt provide further details because of privacy protections. Wednesdays incident was the first Onijala had heard of in the system with more than 24,000 workers. While there haven't been widespread refusals like Harders as schools open, there have been reports of other cases, including in Oklahoma, Florida and North Carolina. MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) Tennessee's most populous county has reached the highest number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients since the pandemic started a year and a half ago, officials said Thursday. Hospitals in Shelby County, which includes Memphis, were treating 701 coronavirus patients, with 515 in acute care and 186 in intensive care, county Health Department Director Michelle Taylor said during a news conference. Most of those patients were not vaccinated, officials said. The previous high was 661 patients on Jan. 6., Taylor said. The seven-day rolling average of newly reported cases has increased in recent weeks in Shelby County. It was 744 cases on Wednesday, the Health Department said. Taylor said a mask requirement for indoor public spaces that was set to expire Aug. 31 would be renewed. Last week, hospital emergency department directors in the Memphis area sent a letter to the region's mayors discussing what they called a crisis caused by the latest surge in COVID-19 cases and a lack of skilled personnel such as nurses and technicians. The letter warned of a shortage of hospital beds should the recent increase in cases continue. More than 30 National Guard medics were helping treat hospital patients in the county, officials said. Meanwhile, the president of CEO of the Memphis-based St. Jude Children's Research hospital said in a letter Thursday that parents should protect their children by insisting that they wear masks in the classroom. In his letter, Dr. James Downing mentioned Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee's recent executive order allowing parents to opt out of mask mandates issued by school districts. Many school systems are complying with the Republican governor's order, but Shelby County Schools in Memphis and the school district in Nashville are defying it and still requiring K-12 students and staff to wear masks in school buildings. Some parents have protested the mandates outside schools and at board meetings, arguing that mask-wearing by their children should be their choice. Downing wrote that masks are safe to wear and they help prevent the spread of COVID-19. Cases among children have been rising since the school year began this month, data shows. Of the roughly 8,500 active cases in Shelby County, 32% are among people 17 and under, officials said. Protesting mask mandates puts an agenda before childrens health, Downing wrote. This stance is not rational. Stop the arguments and the protests. Stand up as a community and do what is right to protect children. Let Tennessee be the model of a good citizen. On Thursday, Shelby County government sued Lee over the opt-out order, news outlets reported. The complaint filed Thursday claims the order puts children at risk of exposure to the virus and damages public education, The Commercial Appeal reported. Lee's office had not filed a response to the lawsuit as of late Thursday, the newspaper eported. Lee has resisted implementing a statewide mask mandate for schools, and had left the decision to local school officials. The Republican governors order lets parents opt out if either a school board or a health department enacts a mask requirement over a school district. Right now, some of the greatest frustration is occurring in our K-12 schools, especially around the issue of mask mandates, Lee said in a news release when he announced the order Aug. 16. While local decision-making is important, individual decision-making by a parent on issues regarding the health and well-being of their child is the most important. 3 1 of 3 Martin Buckingham/AP Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Mary Buckingham and Martin Buckingham/AP Show More Show Less 3 of 3 HONOLULU (AP) The Michigan parents of a man shot and killed by Hawaii police in June filed a wrongful death lawsuit Wednesday, saying officers didn't announce themselves and didn't need to shoot him 13 times. At the time, police said Daniel Buckingham, 31, originally from Ann Arbor, Michigan, cut an officer with a large knife when officers responded to an alarm at a Big Island home that was supposed to be empty. WINDOW ROCK, Ariz. (AP) The Navajo Nation on Thursday reported 55 new COVID-19 cases and one more death. The latest numbers pushed the tribes totals to 32,430 coronavirus cases and 1,400 known deaths since the pandemic began more than a year ago. SALT LAKE CITY (AP) A conservative member of Utah's board of education who criticized the use of a gay pride flag in a social media post is under investigation. The Utah State Board of Education said in a statement released Tuesday that Natalie Cline's post does not represent the school board and that it is reviewing the post for potential violations. REDMOND, Ore. (AP) A school board in central Oregon, where COVID-19 is surging, has passed a resolution protesting statewide mandates that require masks in schools and vaccines for all teachers, staff and volunteers. The resolution that passed on a 3-2 vote in Redmond on Wednesday says the 7,500-student district will fight to regain local control of decisions around mask-wearing and vaccines in its schools The resolution specifies that the board supports the district using medical and religious exemptions to avoid the mandates and includes the possibility of legal action against Democratic Gov. Kate Brown. BREMERTON, Wash. (AP) The families of children who were injured on the Tilt-A-Whirl at the Kitsap County Fair in 2018 are suing the owner of the amusement company that operated the ride at the fairs carnival and its manufacturer. The lawsuit filed in Kitsap County Superior Court names the owner of the Tilt-A-Whirl ride, Davis Amusement Cascadia Inc., and the manufacturer of the equipment, J&S Rides Inc., dba Larson International, the Kitsap Sun reported. HELENA, Mont. (AP) Several parents are suing Missoula public schools over a mask requirement as the school year in Montana is set to begin amid a new wave of COVID-19 cases. An attorney representing parents of students in Missoula said the requirement is in violation of the states constitution, which guarantees individuals the right to make their own medical decisions. Lawyer Quentin Rhoades said Thursday that there isnt sufficient scientific evidence that children wearing masks prevents the spread of the coronavirus for the government to override that individual right. Kevin Twidwell, an attorney at the Kaleva law office representing the schools, said they disagree with the allegation that face coverings violate the plaintiffs' constitutional rights. An online fundraiser organized to cover the costs of filing the lawsuit raised $10,000 as of Thursday. Matt Stivers, who donated $100, wrote that his son has difficulty breathing while wearing a mask because of a heart defect. Kids need to see each others' faces and deserve a normal experience in school. They are being deprived of non-verbal communication with other students, Stivers wrote on the fundraiser page. The Missoula County Public Schools Board of Trustees voted earlier this month to approve the mask mandate for the first six weeks of school. Missoula is one of several districts in Montana where masks are required for students and staff, following recommendations issued by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in part because vaccines are not yet available for children under age 12. In Billings, a mask mandate issued Saturday has led to pushback from teachers. Three teachers in the district were placed on unpaid leave over refusing to follow the policy. Some students were also denied entry to schools for refusing to wear masks. Superintendent of Public Instruction Elsie Arntzen, a Republican and a former elementary school teacher, was among the hundreds of people at a protest held earlier this week in Billings opposing the mask requirement. HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) The State Ethics Commission on Thursday said the superintendent of Pittsburgh's public schools submitted negligent reimbursements for travel and was improperly paid for days off when he was not working for the school district. The three-page order also said Superintendent Anthony Hamlet violated ethics rules by taking money for public appearances, speeches or presentations related to his public position. The commission ordered him to pay $1,750 to the state and $6,200 to the school district and to forfeit 14 vacation days. He was also directed to file amended financial disclosures for 2016-2018. At a news conference Thursday in Pittsburgh, Hamlet said it was a great day for him, ending a two-year process that has been a cloud over him, even though I know I have done nothing wrong. With this review behind me, it looks like a fresh start, he said in a video message. His attorney, David Berardinelli, said the violations were the result of clerical errors, lack of ethics training and Hamlets contract letting him receive pay for speeches even though that type of compensation is not permitted under state law. While it does not excuse the errors on the forms, Dr. Hamlet and his team never received any formal ethics training on the forms or in general on Pennsylvania ethics laws," Berardinelli said. That will be remedied and training from the commission itself is going to be arranged so that Dr. Hamlet and all staff members file complete and wholesome forms moving forward. School board President Sylvia Wilson told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that the board was reviewing the report. We want to be able to sit down and talk about it ourselves, Wilson told the paper. KENNEWICK, Wash. (AP) Authorities believe one gunman killed three people and wounded another during a spree of shootings and arsons in eastern Washington on Wednesday. A suspect was believed to have been found dead later after police fired on a vehicle. PEMBROKE PINES, Fla. (AP) Two South Florida students are accused of making online threats to terrorize" their high school, police said. Police in Pembroke Pines said they received a tip on Monday about an online threat of a potential shooting at Charles W. Flanagan High School. Additional officers were deployed to the school, which is located in western Broward County. SEATTLE (AP) Police are investigating after a man was shot and killed in Seattles Belltown neighborhood early Thursday morning. Seattle Police Department officers were called to the 2600 block of 2nd Avenue around 1:05 a.m. after multiple people called 911 to report hearing gunshots in the area, KING5 reported. When officers arrived, they found a man with a gunshot wound to his chest. First responders attempted to save his life, but the man died at the scene. Police said the victim is about 50 years old. SPDs CSI Unit responded to the scene to collect evidence. Homicide detectives were leading the ongoing investigation. No suspect information was immediately available. MIDDLE TOWNSHIP, N.J. (AP) A sergeant with a southern New Jersey police department has been suspended without pay after he was charged with two counts of witness tampering. The Cape May County Prosecutor's office announced the charges against Joshua Bryan on Thursday, but did not disclose further details about the allegations against the Middle Township officer. They said the arrest occurred July 21 and stemmed from an investigation that is ongoing. NEW YORK (AP) The public will have a chance to weigh in beginning next month on New Yorks plan to charge a new toll for motorists entering Manhattan. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority on Thursday announced 13 virtual meetings beginning on Sept. 13 and lasting through mid-October. The final three meetings, on Oct. 7, 12 and 13, will focus specifically on the program's potential impact on minority and low-income communities in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. New York plans to create a new tolling zone for the area south of 60th Street in Manhattan, an area that accommodates hundreds of thousands of vehicles daily from the New Jersey and New York suburbs and beyond. The plan, commonly referred to as congestion pricing, has been tried in Europe but would be the first of its kind in any U.S. city. The MTA says congestion pricing is necessary to reduce traffic gridlock and help fund improvements to New Yorks bus and subway systems. New York's legislature approved the plan in 2019 and it was supposed to go into effect this year, but it stalled under the Trump administration and was eventually given the go-ahead from federal regulators this year. It isn't likely to be put in place until 2023, as the MTA has said the environmental review process will take until late 2022. The congestion pricing plan has been met with criticism from some New Jersey politicians who say motorists from their districts already pay high tolls to enter the city and shouldn't have to pay an additional fee. This month, Democratic New Jersey Rep. Josh Gottheimer announced proposed legislation that would withhold federal transit grants from New York and offer tax credits to New Jersey motorists if the fee is implemented. LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) Facing a rise in new coronavirus cases, some Kentucky schools across the state are grappling with the unintended consequences of new legislative limits on at-home instruction, leaving some students out of school for up to two weeks. A law passed by Kentuckys GOP-dominated General Assembly this year, returned schools to their usual limitations on non-traditional instruction or NTI days. Now, once schools go past their limit of 10 NTI days, they have to make up any others by adding more instructional days on to the end of the school year. The bill received some Democratic support in both chambers, and Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear signed it into law. The legislation also required school districts to submit their plans for the upcoming school year by the end of May, when the rate of new coronavirus cases had slowed to roughly a few hundred new cases a day. Now, months later, with Kentucky reporting an average of more than 3,000 new coronavirus cases a day in the last week, several school districts have had to cancel school altogether to keep up with staffing shortages and large student quarantines. Lee County School District, for instance, has closed school for all instruction, virtual and in-person, until Aug. 27, Wasson confirmed in an interview Thursday. Students who had previously opted in to virtual learning at the beginning of the school year, will continue, but all other students will instead use at-home learning packets until Sept. 7. The school year began in Lee County on Aug. 10. A small, rural school district already contending with teaching shortages, schools there had previously closed for three days last week due to coronavirus cases in both students and teachers. In one instance, a quarantine of nine staff members prevented the elementary school from resuming fifth grade classes after a brief shut down. We hope that the separation will help us slow the spread of the virus and determine who might be positive from the recent quarantines, Superintendent Sarah Wasson said in a letter to families Wednesday evening. In the previous school year, schools had unlimited non-traditional instruction days, which gave school districts like Wassons the ability to pivot to at-home learning in the event of an outbreak. In order to have that option again, the state legislature would have to pass a new law to add more days. Though she has urged concerned parents to contact Senate President Robert Stivers and state Representative Bill Wesley, Wasson said she plans to reach out to them soon. The districts board president and several teachers have also reached out, she added. Asked earlier this week if there would be a need for a special legislative session, Stivers said some legislative tweaks might be needed, including to nontraditional instruction days. Still, with the pandemic-related state of emergency ending as a result of a recent state Supreme Court ruling, Beshear is weighing whether to convene a special legislative session. If he does so, he has the authority to set the agenda, and said Monday he is in ongoing talks with legislative leaders about the possibility. Meanwhile, Greenup County closed schools Wednesday for the rest of the week, without virtual instruction. The days off will be added to the school calendar, Superintendent Traysea Morsey said in a letter to parents. The number of students and staff who are positive and/or quarantined has greatly impacted our ability to operate buses, kitchens, and maintain classroom staffing, she said. The next two days will be used for our staff to regroup, make long-term plans and thoroughly clean our facilities. Magoffin, Leslie, Knott and Jenkins are among other school districts that have also shut down for multiple days due to COVID-19 since the beginning of the school year. Kentucky youngsters have accounted for larger shares of new COVID-19 cases in recent weeks. More than 1,500 of new cases logged Wednesday were children. ___ Associated Press writer Bruce Schreiner contributed to this report. ___ Hudspeth Blackburn 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. ___ Follow APs coverage of the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic. BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) A panel of North Dakota lawmakers on Thursday agreed to use the current number of legislators and the districts they represent as a template for redrawing new political boundaries. The redistricting committee, which has 14 Republicans and two Democrats, began the arduous task of redistricting that when finalized later this year likely will show urban areas of the state gaining political strength in the Legislature, and rural parts losing clout due to population shifts in the past decade. The panel is expected to complete its work by November, after several work sessions. No drafts of proposed legislative districts were offered at the initial meeting. North Dakota now has 47 legislative districts, with each represented by two House members and a senator. The Legislature has 141 lawmakers 47 senators and 94 House members. The North Dakota Constitution says the Legislature may have as few as 40 districts or as many as 54. The number of districts also could be expanded to prevent already sprawling districts from becoming more so. That idea has met some resistance in the past, with more conservative lawmakers arguing it grows government. During the 1990s, the Legislature had 49 districts and 147 members. It had 53 districts and 159 members in the 1980s. Finley GOP Rep. Bill Devlin, chairman of the committee, said the current 47-district legislative map would be used as a starting point, though other plans that would expand the number of districts could be considered. Legislative redistricting happens every 10 years after a federal census. It aims to ensure each lawmaker represents about the same number of people. North Dakotas population is estimated at a record 779, 000, up almost 16% during the last decade, but most of the states rural legislative districts continued losing residents, according to U.S. Census data. That means more real estate would be needed to reach the increased population numbers in the rural districts. But when rural legislative districts grow, the chances increase that a new district map will put incumbent lawmakers in the same region, which forces them to oppose each other if they want to stay in the Legislature. Devlin told reporters he expects at least three rural legislative districts likely will be eliminated. When the Legislature completed its last redistricting plan a decade ago, district populations averaged about 14,500 people. The new plan adds about 2,000 more people to that, with new census estimates. Areas in and around Fargo, Bismarck, Minot and Grand Forks already account for nearly half of the Legislatures members. Fargo and Bismarck are assured of adding more districts with new population estimates. Devlin told reporters he doesnt believe there much of an appetite on the committee to establish House "subdistricts in rural legislative districts. In a subdistrict arrangement, the senator would still represent the entire district. It would be split in half for House representation, with one House member representing each half. None of the five American Indian reservations in the state would be divided into separate Legislative districts, Devlin said. We do not split a reservation, Devlin said. That just not happen in North Dakota. The panels next meeting is Sept. 8 in Fargo, followed by six others in Bismarck in the following weeks. The Legislature would finish the redistricting job during a special or reconvened session this fall. The full Legislature has to approve the plan, and the governor must sign off on it. The redistricting plan would be reflected in the June 2022 primary. WARWICK, R.I. (AP) A Rhode Island man who authorities say abused his 10-week-old son by squeezing, dropping and swinging the infant has been convicted of second-degree child abuse. Anthony Dicicco, 32, of Coventry was found guilty by a judge on Wednesday after a jury waived trial, The Providence Journal reported. BRAILA, Romania (AP) Romania and Japan celebrated a century of diplomatic relations on Thursday with officials from both countries visiting the site of what will be one of Europe's longest suspension bridges. The bridge in the eastern city of Braila will cross the Danube River and is a joint venture between Japans IHI Infrastructure Systems Co. Ltd. and Italian company Webuild. The project is expected to cost 411 million euros ($483 million) and the bridge will boast a central span of 1.12 kilometers (0.7 miles). The bridge, which is almost equal in length to San Franciscos Golden Gate Bridge, is around 55% complete and is expected to be fully operational by the end of 2022. Ionut Ciurea, director of Pro Infrastructure Association, a nongovernmental organization that monitors major road infrastructure projects in Romania, told The Associated Press that the new bridge will bring significant regional benefits. The bridge is a turning point, Ciurea said. Its important for the whole country. Its definitely one of the biggest transport infrastructure projects in the country. It basically connects the port of Constanta to the whole region, Moldova and especially the Danube Delta. According to Webuild, the Italian contractor, the bridge will consist of steel wires with a total length of about 40,000 kilometers (25,000 miles) the same as the circumference of the Earth. Hiroshi Ueda, Japans ambassador to Romania, said that the suspension bridge is a very good example of connectivity within the European Union. According to the Japanese Embassy in Bucharest, more than 100 Japanese companies in Romania have created approximately 40,000 jobs. In 2018, Shinzo Abe was the first Japanese prime minister to pay a working visit to Romania. ___ Stephen McGrath reported from Sighisoara. PHOENIX (AP) A new court ruling says reimbursement of attorney fees and costs of litigants who come out ahead in legal fights over release of public records isn't determined solely by what the records they receive. The Arizona Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that trial judges have broad discretion to consider other factors when deciding whether to order reimbursement allowed under state law if a requester substantially prevails" in court. NORFOLK, Va. (AP) A school board in Virginia has agreed to pay $1.3 million in legal costs to the American Civil Liberties Union after the nonprofit spent six years representing a student who sued over the board's transgender bathroom ban. Gavin Grimm's suit against the Gloucester County School Board ended in June after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the boards appeal to reinstate its bathroom policy. Lower courts ruled that the board's policy was unconstitutional and discriminated against Grimm because he was required to use restrooms that corresponded with his biological sex female or private bathrooms. He was barred from the boy's facilities in high school. The board agreed to the pay the ACLU's legal costs in a filing made in a U.S. District Court in Norfolk on Thursday. Josh Block, senior staff attorney with the ACLU LGBTQ & HIV Project, said in a statement that it should not have taken over six years of expensive litigation to get to this point. Grimm, who is now 22, said in a statement that he hopes "this outcome sends a strong message to other school systems that discrimination is an expensive, losing battle. David Corrigan, an attorney for the Gloucester County school board, released a board statement that said its insurance provider has addressed the ACLU's request to cover legal costs. The board declined to comment further. It's unclear what the board's own legal costs have been over the years. The Associated Press filed a request in 2018 with the school board's insurance carrier under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act seeking that information. Steve Craig, managing director of the Virginia Risk Sharing Association, responded at the time that such information is exempt because the matter was still pending. Craig declined to comment on Thursday, stating in an email that we cant be of assistance and cant offer any information or comment on the case. School systems that are insured are unlikely to suffer any long-standing financial repercussions from one lawsuit, said Francisco M. Negron, Jr., chief legal officer for the National School Board Association. They may see a rise in premiums just like any other insured would experience, he said, speaking generally and not about Gloucester. Grimm began transitioning from female to male while he was a student at his high school, located in a mostly rural area about 60 miles (95 kilometers) east of Richmond. He had chest reconstruction surgery and hormone therapy. Grimms case began after his mother notified school administrators that he had transitioned to a boy as a result of his medical treatment for gender dysphoria. That was at the start of his sophomore year at Gloucester High School. Grimm was initially allowed to use the boys restroom. But after some parents complained, students were told their use of restrooms and locker rooms shall be limited to the corresponding biological genders or a private restroom. Grimm filed his lawsuit in 2015 and argued that he suffered from urinary tract infections from avoiding school bathrooms as well as suicidal thoughts that led to hospitalization. The case then pinballed through the federal courts. It became a federal test case when it was supported by the administration of then-President Barack Obama. It was scheduled to go before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2017. But the high court hearing was canceled after President Donald Trump rescinded an Obama-era directive that students can choose bathrooms corresponding with their gender identity. Grimm's case was heard again in U.S. District Court in Norfolk in 2019 and by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2020. Both ruled in his favor. LONDON (AP) A Scottish court on Thursday dismissed extradition proceedings against a Catalan politician sought by Spain over Catalonias failed independence bid. Clara Ponsati was accused of sedition by Spain over her role as education minister in Catalonias unsuccessful 2017 effort to secede, which involved a referendum that wasn't sanctioned by the Spanish government. A former academic at the University of St. Andrews, she won a seat in the European Parliament in 2019 and later moved to Brussels. A Scottish judge, Sheriff Nigel Ross, ruled Thursday that Scottish courts had no jurisdiction in the case because Ponsati had indicated she didn't plan to return to Scotland. You cant extradite someone who is not here, he said, dismissing the case. Scottish government lawyers didn't contest the decision, but said Ponsati had committed a clear breach of (her) position of trust by failing to tell the court she was resigning her post at St. Andrews and moving to Belgium. In the European courts, Ponsati and two other former top Catalan officials are fighting attempts to remove the parliamentary immunity they have as EU lawmakers. HONOLULU (AP) People on Wednesday praised Gov. David Ige's latest nominee to serve on the Intermediate Court of Appeals, telling the Hawaii Senate Judiciary Committee that Sonja McCullen was highly qualified for the job. The Senate last month voted down Ige's first choice for the position, a white man, amid complaints that it had been decades since a Native Hawaiian had been appointed to the states appeals or supreme courts. The committee was scheduled to vote on McCullen's nomination on Thursday. The full Senate was due to follow on Friday. McCullen is a Native Hawaiian and a Honolulu deputy prosecuting attorney. Melody MacKenzie testified on behalf of the Native Hawaiian Bar Association saying that McCullen's extensive experience as an appellate attorney would enable her to make a smooth transition to the appeals court and help the court address its case backlog. She predicted McCullen would serve with diligence, competence and humility. She is a compassionate person of good moral character with excellent appellate experience, MacKenzie said. McCullen's current boss, Honolulu Prosecutor Steve Alm, said he would hate to lose her in his office, saying she has been a workhorse on appeals cases. Shes down to Earth, shes smart, shes compassionate. Shes going to be the last one to toot her own horn, Alm said. McCullen previously served as a lawyer for United Public Workers and was a law clerk for Hawaii Supreme Court Associate Justice Paula Nakayama. She spent nearly five years in her first career teaching Hawaiian studies and language at Waianae High School. She earned her bachelor and law degrees from the University of Hawaii and graduated from high school on the Big Island. She told senators she is also of Korean, Japanese and Portuguese ancestry. McCullen said she was from a working class family. Her father was an Aloha Airlines baggage handler and her mother a lei maker. Ige had initially appointed Dan Gluck to the appeals court, selecting him from a list of names provided by the Judicial Selection Commission as required by state law. Gluck attempted to withdraw his name from the confirmation process after large numbers testified against him, but doing so would have created confusion over how the next appointment would be made. The Senate went ahead and voted not to consent to his appointment, which allowed the governor to make another appointment. REDONDO BEACH, Calif. (AP) A gunman opened fire at a popular Southern California pier complex and wounded two people, prompting a stampede of people fleeing the scene before police killed him, authorities said. The shooting Wednesday night at the Redondo Beach Pier sent people running to get away, and police tweeted for people inside businesses on and near the pier to stay inside. The landmark horseshoe-shaped pier has shops, restaurants, bars and expansive areas for fishing and sightseeing. Numerous 911 calls reported a lone suspect shooting at citizens around 8:20 p.m., a police statement said. The suspect was shot after officers responded and he fled down a rock embankment toward the ocean's water line, where he was found dead, the statement said. KTLA-TV reported that witnesses said the shooter was in the pier parking lot and began randomly shooting at people on the pier. The suspect, described only as a man in his 30s, did not seem to know the people he had fired on, Los Angeles County sheriffs Lt. Brandon Dean said. It was indiscriminate shooting, Dean told the Los Angeles Times. People near the shooting described chaos when the gunman opened fire. It was a stampede of people on the pier, and we were all running in the same direction to get off the pier, witness Patricia Shafik told KCBS-TV. The suspect was armed with a handgun and a knife, according to a statement from the sheriffs department, which was assisting local police. The victims, a man and a boy, suffered non-life-threatening gunshot wounds to their lower torsos, the sheriffs department said. They were hospitalized in stable condition. Authorities did not immediately identify the suspect. FISHERS, Ind. (AP) A small plane landed on a street in suburban Indianapolis Wednesday evening, a fire department official said. The two-seat plane landed shortly before 6:30 p.m. along 96th Street, Capt. John Mehling of the Fishers Fire Department said. The plane did not strike any cars or cause any injuries, police said. Mehling said the reason for the landing was mechanical, but he did not have further details. ST. LOUIS (AP) A new leader has been hired to oversee St. Louis' jail system that has been plagued by unrest among detainees and concerns about conditions. The mayor's office on Wednesday announced that Jennifer Clemons-Abdullah will take over as corrections commissioner on Sept. 13. She has 30 years of experience in corrections, most recently as an associate warden at a federal prison in Arkansas. BOSTON (AP) Massachusetts reported nearly 1,800 additional confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 13 new deaths on Thursday the biggest single-day surge since mid-April officials said. The state Department of Public Health said the latest figures push the statewide total of confirmed cases over 702,000 since the start of the pandemic. Massachusetts' death toll now stands at 17,841. Officials said 565 people were hospitalized as of Thursday, and more than 140 of those were in intensive care. Just under 4.5 million of the state's 7 million residents are now fully vaccinated, they said. ___ LATEST VAXMILLIONS WINNERS A woman from Leominster and a high school student from Conway are the final winners of the Massachusetts VaxMillions Giveaway coronavirus vaccination lottery, the governor's office announced Thursday. Cynthia Thirath was the winner of the $1 million prize for fully vaccinated state residents ages 18 or older, and plans to use her winnings to invest in her future, according to a statement. Gretchen Selva was named the winner of the $300,000 college scholarship grant for state residents ages 12 to 17. Selva will be a sophomore at Four River Charter Public School in Greenfield this fall, and as a passionate musician plans to attend college to pursue a career in music writing and production, according to the statement. Over 440,000 residents became fully vaccinated during the time that the VaxMillions program was running, and we are grateful to our partners at the Treasury and the Massachusetts State Lottery in helping to launch this program, Gov. Charlie Baker said in a statement. More than 318,000 residents have received a first dose of a vaccine since the program was announced June 15 as an incentive to encourage more people to get their shot. About 2.5 million people signed up for the lottery. More than 4.4 million state residents are now fully vaccinated, according to the state Department of Public Health. The governor's office also disclosed Wednesday that one of the 10 people selected for a prize failed to respond in time, so that prize was given to another person. Winners were notified by email, text and telephone and then had 24 hours to respond. Officials did not say which of the five weekly drawings the winner missed out on, and did not say whether the person won the $1 million or the scholarship grant. NEW YORK (AP) A teenager was arrested Wednesday in a shooting that killed a young woman and wounded six other people at a Brooklyn apartment building in November, police said. The 17-year-old boy, whose name was not released, was arrested on murder and weapons-possession charges, the New York Police Department said. Police have said they were looking for more than one suspect in the shooting. The gunfire erupted late on Nov. 22 at a building on Albany Avenue in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, where police found a 14-year-old and five older teens with gunshot wounds. Police later realized that 20-year-old Daijyonna Long had also been shot at the same place and taken in a private car to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead. Long lived in Virginia and was in New York to visit a friend, her grandmother and the friend told the Daily News in November. Betty Long told the newspaper her granddaughter was a talented, outgoing college student and makeup artist. She was my princess, the grandmother said. At the time, police said they believed the violence was related to a shooting that wounded a 17-year-old boy about two hours earlier near a sweet-16 party in the East New York neighborhood. There's no immediate information on whether investigators still think that's the case. NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) The leader of Tigray forces in Ethiopia has expressed the commitment to a negotiated end to the nine-month war that has killed thousands and left nearly half a million people facing famine, while the United Nations secretary-general on Thursday warned there is no military solution. In a letter to U.N. chief Antonio Guterres, seen by The Associated Press ahead of Thursdays U.N. Security Council meeting on the crisis, Debretsion Gebremichael said the Tigray side requires an impartial mediator, among other conditions. But he warned that the African Union, whose headquarters are in Ethiopia, cannot provide any solution to the war that the continental body endorsed early in the fighting. That complicates the AU initiative announced Thursday to appoint former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo as its special representative to the Horn of Africa. The prospect for talks between Ethiopias government and the Tigray leadership, who dominated the national government for 27 years before Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took office, remains deeply challenging. Ethiopias government earlier this year declared the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front a terrorist group, and the United States told Thursday's meeting that the government has not responded positively to calls for talks. Meanwhile, the conflict has spread in recent weeks into Ethiopias Amhara and Afar regions, displacing hundreds of thousands of people, while Abiys government has called all able citizens to war, urging them to stop the Tigray forces once and for all. The heated rhetoric on both sides has led to growing international calls for an immediate cease-fire. The further the resurgent Tigray forces advance outside the Tigray region, the greater the harm to the ethnic Tigrayans for whom they act, Kenyan Ambassador Martin Kimani told the Security Council meeting, while urging Ethiopia to be prepared to lift the terror designation. He also encouraged the African Union to step up. What began as a political falling-out now threatens to destabilize Africas second most populous country, while abuses have been committed by all sides in the mix of armed groups that include those from neighboring Eritrea. The world's worst hunger crisis in a decade continues to worsen. Guterres at Thursday's meeting criticized the de facto humanitarian blockade of the Tigray region of 6 million people, with food warehouses there now empty, and the United States warned that if these impediments continue, large numbers of people will starve to death. With sadness and disbelief, we are once again discussing the possibility of a manmade famine in Tigray," Norway's Deputy Ambassador Trine Heimerback said, referring to Ethiopia's catastrophic starvation crisis in the 1980s. The aim is to exterminate Tigrayans by starving them to death, Debretsion's letter asserted. Ethiopian Ambassador Taye Atske Selassie told the meeting that his country is improving the process for the delivery of aid. Ethiopia's government has accused Tigray forces of looting and impeding the delivery of aid. The TPLF is standing between Ethiopia and peace, he said, accusing it of being bent on destabilizing the country of 110 million people. We are open to working with all well-intentioned partners, he added. The war that began in November has affected all Ethiopians and has already drained over a billion dollars from the countrys coffers, Guterres said. But the Security Council appears largely powerless to take significant action on the crisis, as permanent member China expressed its opposition to external interference in Ethiopia's affairs. Both China and Russia warned that sanctions by individual countries, as the U.S. imposed this week against the chief of staff of Eritrea's defense forces, would only worsen the conflict. NEW YORK (AP) The U.S. government said Thursday it is shutting down a federal jail in New York City after a slew of problems that came to light following disgraced financier Jeffrey Epsteins suicide there two years ago. The federal Bureau of Prisons said the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan will be closed at least temporarily to address issues that have long plagued the facility, including lax security and crumbling infrastructure. The facility, which has held inmates such as Mexican drug lord Joaquin El Chapo Guzman and Mafia boss John Gotti, currently has 233 inmates, down from a normal population of 600 or more. Most are expected to be transferred to a federal jail in Brooklyn. The decision to close the MCC billed as one of the most secure jails in America comes weeks after Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco toured it and saw the conditions firsthand. Until recently, the facility had been recruiting new staff. Now, employees are being sent letters notifying them of a force reduction. In an effort to address the issues at MCC NY as quickly and efficiently as possible, the Department has decided to close the MCC, at least temporarily, until those issues have been resolved, the Justice Department said. The department did not give a timetable for the closure, saying planning is underway. The Department of Justice is committed to ensuring that every facility in the federal prison system is not only safe and secure, but also provides people in custody with the resources and programs they need to make a successful return to society after they have served their time, the statement said. Epsteins death a month after his arrest on child sex trafficking charges has been a lingering shadow over the jail, which was since marred by the rampant spread of the coronavirus, inmates complaints about squalid conditions, a smuggled gun, an inmates death and a revolving door of wardens. Inmates and lawyers have complained that the jail was infested with mice, rats and roaches and that multiple inmates were forced to share dirty sinks and toilets that leaked water, urine and feces. Water leaks across multiple floors have been blamed for structural issues. Jack Donson, a former longtime official at the Bureau of Prisons, said given all the remediation needed, it could be years before the Metropolitan Correctional Center reopens if at all. Its been a long time coming addressing the infrastructure issues, Donson said in a telephone interview. Is it coincidental with the recent publicity of the Epstein suicide and the rampant corruption in that facility? It makes sense to maybe start anew. Over the years, the jail's inhabitants have included several close associates of Osama bin Laden and Wall Street swindler Bernard Madoff. Guzman, famous for his prison escapes, was held at the jail while on trial in Brooklyn in 2019, prompting closures of the Brooklyn Bridge each day as he was taken to and from court. The Metropolitan Detention Center, the Brooklyn jail that will absorb Metropolitan Correctional Center inmates, has also drawn scrutiny for problems including sexual assault allegations against correctional officers, a weeklong power failure in January 2019, and an inmates death last year after he was sprayed with pepper spray. Donson said the larger Brooklyn facility, which currently has about 1,500 inmates including Epsteins longtime confidante Ghislaine Maxwell and singer R. Kelly, has the capacity to permanently replace the Manhattan jail. Do they really need MCC? Donson said. They dont really need it right now in my opinion bed wise, capacity wise. The Justice Departments inspector general has yet to complete an investigation into lapses at the Metropolitan Correctional Center that allowed Epstein to end his life. Two officers responsible for monitoring him that night have pleaded guilty to charges they lied on prison records because they were sleeping and browsing the internet instead of doing their jobs. In March 2020, just before the pandemic prompted federal prisons to halt visitation, the jail went on a weeklong lockdown after officials got a tip that a gun may have been smuggled inside. Investigators found a handgun and turned up other banned items, such as cellphones, narcotics and homemade weapons, sparking an ongoing probe into guard misconduct. After the gun was discovered, then-Attorney General William Barr launched a task force to address criminal misconduct by officers at several correctional facilities. As the coronavirus took hold, Metropolitan Correctional Center employees werent able to get masks. Staff restrooms ran out of soap. Workers in charge of refilling the dispensers were pressed into duty as correctional officers because of staffing shortages. Early in the crisis, more than 25% of staff positions were vacant. A few months later, a court-authorized inspection found inmates with coronavirus symptoms were neglected and social distancing was almost nonexistent, with some inmates sleeping within arms reach of each other. Earlier this year, a lawyer alleged that an inmate with the mental capacity of a child was left in a holding cell for 24 hours while awaiting a competency evaluation. ___ On Twitter, follow Michael Sisak at twitter.com/mikesisak and Michael Balsamo at twitter.com/mikebalsamo1 NEW YORK (AP) The night before he was indicted this week, a Long Island dentist suspected of exchanging painkillers for sexual favors was sending text messages suggesting hed give a woman a Percocet prescription if she wanted to hang out and party a bit, federal prosecutors said Thursday. Barry Arnold, 70, of Williston Park, New York, is charged with 28 counts of distribution of controlled substances, accused of abusing his prescription privileges in a four-year scheme to supply women with oxycodone, Percocet and Xanax in exchange for sex acts. Arnold, indicted on Tuesday and arrested Wednesday, was expected to be arraigned Thursday afternoon in federal court in Central Islip. Prosecutors are seeking his detention, arguing he is a danger to society and that the potential for a lengthy prison sentence could compel him to flee the country. Arnold was uncooperative with authorities during arrest processing and refused to provide his thumbprint to unlock his iPhone despite a search warrant requiring him to provide biometric data, federal prosecutors said. Acting U.S. Attorney Jacquelyn Kasulis said Arnolds alleged crimes were an abdication of his professional oath. Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent-in-Charge Peter Fitzhugh said the dentist's alleged behavior is really no different than a street dealer. A message seeking comment was left with Arnolds lawyer. Arnold, first licensed to practice in New York in 1975, remained listed Thursday as a registered dentist in the states licensing database. His name did not appear in records of misconduct proceedings. A message seeking comment was left with the states licensing agency. According to prosecutors, Arnold doled out prescriptions to at least six different women on numerous occasions from October 2016 to August 2020, often meeting them after hours at his dental offices in Lynbrook and Valley Stream. The women were not Arnolds dental patients and the prescriptions were not for legitimate medical purposes, prosecutors said. Arnold engaged in sex acts with women as payment and on several occasions went with them to pharmacies to collect a kick back in the form of pills that he then handed out to women individually, prosecutors said. Arnold also bought and used crack cocaine with some of the women, prosecutors said. On Monday, Arnold exchanged text messages with a person he believed to be one of the women, asking if she wanted to hang out and party a bit and saying he might be able to give you a perc script, prosecutors said. Arnold then texted that she could bring a friend that likes to party, prosecutors said. ___ Follow Michael Sisak on Twitter at twitter.com/mikesisak PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) The United States pledged another $32 million in aid to the victims of Haitis 7.2-magnitude earthquake Thursday, as the countrys interim prime minister defended his governments response. U.S. Agency for International Development Administrator Samantha Power said the U.S. government had learned from the 2010 Haiti earthquake and said USAID was coordinating closely with the government of Prime Minister Ariel Henry. This $32 million of funding will provide additional shelter, health, food, water and other urgent life-saving assistance, with the input and guidance of the Haitian government, Power said. Perhaps the most important lesson (from 2010) is that no development agency and no army or diplomatic corps can just import a perfect humanitarian response from afar. You need local expertise and local leadership to reach communities in need. The Aug. 14 earthquake killed more than 2,200 people and left hundreds of thousands homeless on Haitis southwestern peninsula. Power and Henry said providing emergency shelter was the top priority nearly two weeks after the temblor. Speaking together at the capitals international airport as U.S. military aircraft ferried people and supplies into the country, Henry said his government was coordinating the relief response despite the turmoil created by the assassination of President Jovenel Moise July 7. The Haitian government is facing a lot of challenges, Henry said. We have political difficulties, we have economic difficulties, but despite all these issues, we are addressing the challenges of the earthquake. He rejected the assertion that the government was in chaos. The Haitian government is present, he said. Far more visible since the earthquake have been nongovernmental organizations and U.S. government agencies in the earthquake zone. For days the relief effort was hampered by the inability to safely move relief supplies and quake victims through a gang-controlled area south of the capital. The government has pledged more security. Moise was killed by a team of mercenaries who breached the presidential residence. The investigation into his murder is still underway. Justice Minister Rockefeller Vincent said Thursday, anyone who has a finger in the killing of the president will face justice. Vincent said the new investigating judge appointed this week would have all of the resources he needs to carry out the investigation. The first judge appointed to the case withdrew after four days. Vincent announced $60,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of three fugitives in the case. I am asking the population to stay calm and let justice do the work, Vincent said. SALT LAKE CITY (AP) Another Utah petroglyph has been defaced in the latest recent vandalism case of its kind in the Moab area, authorities said. The vandalism appears to be the word petroglyphs followed by Taylor Trey Wes Travis Aug. 3, 2021 scratched into the red rock, the Spectrum reported. NORFOLK, Va. (AP) A Virginia university is offering money to students, faculty and staff who can show proof of a vaccination against COVID-19. Norfolk State University is offering $500 to students and $1,000 to faculty and staff, The Virginian-Pilot reported. The incentive follows Mondays approval by the Food and Drug Administration of Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine and a month after Norfolk State announced its vaccine requirements for students and employees. SPRINGVILLE, Tenn. (AP) Gretchen Catherwood remembers the worst moment of her life: three Marines and a Navy chaplain were walking toward her front door, and that could only mean one thing. Her 19-year-old son, Marine Lance Cpl. Alec Catherwood, was dead, killed fighting the Taliban on Oct. 14, 2010. As she watched the news over the last two weeks, it felt like that day happened 10 minutes ago. The American military pulled out of Afghanistan, the Taliban took over, and in an instant all the battles fought and sacrifices made seemed to be for nothing. Gretchen Catherwood's phone buzzed with messages: from the officer whod delivered the news of her son's death; the parents of others killed in battle or by suicide since; her sons fellow fighters in the storied 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, nicknamed the Darkhorse Battalion, that endured the highest rate of causalities in Afghanistan. Friends told her how horrible theyd felt that her son had died in vain. As she exchanged messages with the others whod paid the price of war, she worried its end was forcing them to question whether all they had suffered had mattered. There are three things I need you to know, she said to some. You did not fight for nothing. Alec did not lose his life for nothing. I will be here for you no matter what, until the day I die." The 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment deployed in the fall of 2010 from Camp Pendleton, California, sending 1,000 U.S. Marines on what would become one of the bloodiest tours for American service members in Afghanistan. The Darkhorse Battalion spent six months battling Taliban fighters in the Sangin district of Helmand province, which remained almost entirely in the Talibans control nearly a decade into the U.S.-led war. Sangin was Alec Catherwoods first combat deployment. He had enlisted in the Marines while still in high school, went to boot camp shortly after graduation, then was assigned to a 13-man squad led by former Sgt. Sean Johnson. Johnson was impressed by Catherwoods professionalism physically fit, mentally tough and always on time. He was only 19, so that was extra special, Johnson said. Some are still just trying to figure out how to tie their boots and not get yelled at. Former Cpl. William Sutton of Yorkville, Illinois, swore Catherwood would crack jokes even during a firefight. Alec, he was a shining light in that darkness, said Sutton, who was shot multiple times fighting in Afghanistan. And then they took it from us. On Oct. 14, 2010, Catherwoods squad came under fire from ambushing Taliban fighters, and then came a deafening explosion one of the Marines had stepped on a hidden bomb. Another explosion followed. Looking to his left, Johnson saw Catherwood floating facedown. It was obvious, he said, that the young Marine was dead. The Darkhorse Battalion returned to California in April 2011. After months of intense fighting, theyd largely seized Sangin from the Talibans grip. It came at a heavy price. In addition to the 25 who perished, more than 200 returned home wounded, many with lost limbs, others with scars harder to see. Some who served with the Darkhorse Battalion are having a hard time seeing it any way other than that their efforts, their blood and the lives of their fallen friends were for nothing. Im starting to feel like how the Vietnam vets felt. There was no purpose to it whatsoever, said Sutton, 32, who now works in the veterans services office of a county outside Chicago. We were able to hold our head up high and say we went to the last Taliban stronghold and we gave them hell, Sutton said, only for it all to be taken away. In the blink of an eye. Former Sgt. George Barba of Menifee, California, 34, works as a private security guard near Los Angeles. He and his wife are expecting their first child. He said hes had trouble sorting his feelings about the bleak news from Afghanistan. It really is weird, Barba said. Ive seen my guys get mad. Ive seen my guys get frustrated. But not like this. This is like somebody spit in their face. Johnson, 34, works as a commercial diver in Florida. He said the U.S. should have acknowledged years ago that the Afghan security forces Americans trained and equipped would never be able to defend the country on their own. My personal opinion, yeah, we probably should have pulled out years and years ago, Johnson said. If youre not going to win the damn thing, what are you doing there? In the woods behind the Catherwood's house, Gretchen and her husband, Kirk, are building a retreat for combat veterans, a place where they can gather and grapple together with the horrors of war. They call it the Darkhorse Lodge, and there are 25 rooms, each named after one of the men killed from their sons battalion. The ones who made it home have become their surrogate sons, she said. And she knows of more than a half-dozen who have died from suicide. I am fearful of what this might do to them psychologically. Theyre so strong and so brave and so courageous. But they also have really, really big hearts. And I feel that they might internalize a lot and blame themselves, she said. And oh God, I hope they dont blame themselves. ___ Bynum reported from Savannah, Georgia. SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) The state of Washington on Thursday ordered the killing of one or two wolves from the Togo pack in Ferry County in response to repeated attacks on cattle. The state Department of Fish and Wildlife said nonlethal deterrents used by three different ranchers had not stopped the attacks. The department had documented one dead and three injured calves since June 24. The attacks were attributed to the Togo pack. Three occurred within the last 30 days. Removing individual wolves is one of the toughest decisions we face and is never taken lightly, said Julia Smith, wolf policy lead for the department. Those communities and WDFW staff have worked diligently to protect their livestock and meet expectations, and the season has been relatively quiet until now. August and September are typically months in which wolf-livestock conflict peaks, so this is not unexpected." The pack consists of five adult wolves and four pups, the department said. Ranchers tried a variety of approved methods to deter the wolves including using range riders, removing sick or injured cattle and properly disposing of dead cattle but those methods failed, the department said. Killing one or two wolves from the Togo pack territory is not expected to harm the wolf populations ability to reproduce in the state, the agency said. The department has documented three known wolf deaths in the state since Jan. 1. In previous years, it has documented 12 to 21 wolf deaths per year, and the population has continued to grow. An environmental group decried the kill order. At the end of 2020, the states wolf population consisted of only 132 wolves confirmed by the wildlife agency and another 46 wolves estimated on the Colville Indian Reservation. Washington state is home to 1.1 million cattle, the Center for Biological Diversity said. Its such a tragedy that Washingtons Department of Fish and Wildlife has once again put the Togo pack in the crosshairs, said Amaroq Weiss, senior wolf advocate at the center. Rather than continue to work with better alternatives, the agency insists on killing wolves to appease livestock owners." The new kill order is the fifth since 2018 targeting the Togo pack, which lives in prime wildlife habitat in northeastern Washington, the center said. The state has killed 34 wolves since 2012. The animals are listed as endangered under state law throughout Washington. Gray wolves were removed from the federal Endangered Species list in January. A coalition of 70 groups recently filed a formal petition to relist the gray wolf as an endangered species throughout the West. Last week, however, attorneys for the Biden administration asked a federal judge in California to reject the lawsuit from wildlife advocates. HELENA, Mont. (AP) A Connecticut woman has been sentenced to seven days in jail, must pay more than $2,000 in fines and fees and is banned from Yellowstone National Park for two years after other tourists captured photos and video of her leaving the boardwalk and walking on thermal features in the Norris Geyser Basin. Although a criminal prosecution and jail time may seem harsh, its better than spending time in a hospitals burn unit, Acting U.S. Attorney Bob Murray said in a statement. The 26-year-old woman pleaded guilty to a petty offense foot travel in thermal areas on Aug. 18. In addition to the jail sentence, she was fined $1,000 and ordered to make a $1,000 community service payment. Magistrate Judge Mark Carman also placed her on two years of unsupervised probation, during which time she is banned from Yellowstone National Park. The woman has until the end of January to serve her jail time and make the community service payment. She has until December 2022 to pay the fine, said Mark Trimble, spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Wyoming. The woman, who did not retain an attorney, declined comment when reached by phone on Thursday. Prosecutors said she was in the park with two other people on July 22 when she and one other person got off the boardwalk and were walking on thermal ground in Norris Geyser Basin, which is marked with warning signs to stay on the boardwalk. Other visitors took photos and video of the violation. Court records do not identify the other person who walked off the boardwalk and no co-defendants were charged. Boardwalks in geyser basins protect visitors and delicate thermal formations, Yellowstone spokesperson Morgan Warthin said in a statement. The ground is fragile and thin and scalding water just below the surface can cause severe or fatal burns. More than 20 people are known to have died from hot spring-related injuries in and around Yellowstone since the late 1800s, park officials said. The most recent death happened in June 2016 in the Norris Geyser Basin, when a 23-year-old Oregon man left the boardwalk, slipped on some gravel and fell into a highly acidic hot spring. By the next day, there were no significant human remains to recover, park officials said. CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) West Virginia schools and libraries will be eligible for $48 million for internet connection-related upgrades through the American Rescue Plan. Sen. Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, said Wednesday that applications for the Emergency Connectivity Program will be open from Sept. 28 to Oct. 13. SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) New Mexico students have fewer school days than other children in the U.S., and a decade of research and investment by state officials hasnt changed that fact. In a legislative hearing Thursday, one expert called extra learning a lost cause, suggesting that children won't recover academically from the pandemic because school districts have declined to add extra learning days to their calendars. Most states have a minimum of 180 school days for districts. New Mexico sets goals for the number of days and instructional hours that students get, but even those standards can be waived. Some schools operate only four days per week, and some students have 150 or fewer school days. The state has allocated millions of dollars to pay for the extra teacher hours. The voluntary programs add 25 days of school for children in K-5 and 10 days for higher grades. But the funding has failed to win over school districts. Many parents and teachers don't want summers shortened. Legislators proposed making the programs mandatory, but the idea died in a Senate subcommittee. I tend to treat it as a lost cause. It didnt happen, economist Stephen Barro told lawmakers. Some losses, were not ever going to make up now. Legislators at the committee hearing in Taos heard from Education Secretary Kurt Steinhaus, who answered their questions for the first time after taking the position last week. Steinhaus predecessor was from out of state, and he quit his post after two years. Im glad youre from New Mexico, Rep. Harry Garcia said. We want to keep you for a long time. Steinhaus said he endorses a universal mandate for extending the school year, especially with that extra 10 days, the program aimed at upper grades. A mandate won't be revisited until the next legislative session, in early 2022, and it would not go into effect in the 2022-2023 school year. Lawmakers also heard from Karen Sanchez-Griego, superintendent of the Cuba Independent School District, who signed all of her schools up for the additional learning days. Those days, on top of social worker support and tailored solutions to student needs one without electricity was given a solar panel to charge her laptop the district neutralized learning loss. At the end of the year in May we didnt see any growth. But we didnt see regression, Sanchez-Griego said. Cuba was one of a few districts that conducted widespread student testing, despite waivers from state officials that allowed them not to do so. The district also increased graduation rates in recent years, from below the state average to above it. Among Native American students, the graduation rate increased from 58% to 88% between 2017 and 2020, according to state education data. ___ Attanasio is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. Follow Attanasio on Twitter. You are now listening to the sounds of the New Generation. A podcast created for those who desire a new way of gaining information rather than reading a traditional newspaper. In our show we will discuss everything from sports, pop culture, politics, and local news. To stay up to date on our latest episodes every week be sure to follow us on your favorite podcast service. And dont worry, we keep it short. Local featured Pleading for justice: Buchanans hope key testimony can bring justice for slain son David Bossick | Daily News David Bossick | Daily News Bill and Denita Buchanan of Mears hold up a photo of their son, Billy, near a table that is set up in remembrance of him. Billy Buchanan was killed in April 2019, and the criminal case has not been resolved. The couple hope pleas through the media to a key witness will bring them the justice they seek. Billy Buchanan David Bossick | Daily News Denita and Bill Buchanan stand in the garage at their home in Mears beneath a hood that was made in remembrance of their son, Billy. David Bossick | Daily News David Bossick | Daily News photos Bill and Denita Buchanan of Mears sit on the bed of their late son, Billy, in his room at their home in Mears. Billy Buchanan was killed in April 2019, and the criminal case has not been resolved. The couple hope pleas through the media to a key witness will bring them the justice they seek. MEARS The family of Billy Buchanan will gather soon to celebrate his birthday, which would have been today (Thursday, Aug. 26). The guest of honor, though, wont be there. Billy was 32 when he was killed on April 16, 2019, in Free Soil Township. We all get balloons and write something and let our balloons go to heaven with a little memo, said Denita Buchanan, Billys mom. We usually go in our neighbors because she doesnt have trees. We go over there and theres probably a dozen balloons that go to heaven. Corey Beekman was accused of the crime, and he sat in the Mason County Jail awaiting trial. But when law enforcement officers were unable to serve witness Katlin Buck a subpoena to appear, then-Mason County Prosecutor Paul Spaniola asked for the charges against Beekman to be dismissed last fall, though they could be refiled. Spaniola said Bucks testimony was critical for the case to move forward. After waiting several months, the family is pleading through various media outlets for Buck to come forward and agree to testify. We feel we have no choice other than (to) step outside the system and ask for help. Because for 2 1/2 years now, nothing has been done nothing, Denita said, with husband and Billys father, Bill, at her side. Were at a standstill until Katlin (Buck) is willing to come forward and say this is what happened, there will be no charges, there will be no court, nothing. Basically, shes the only witness other than her children. In an interview with the Daily News, the Buchanans discussed their frustrations with the judicial system. They recalled the joys of their son and the subtle reminders of him they see every day. They talked about the learning of his death, shared thoughts on the various delays and the dismissal, discussed winning a civil suit against Beekman for more than $8.2 million, talked about whats next and how they continue to remember their son. PLEA FOR HELP While Buchanan was fatally shot on that April morning, Buck was also struck in the arm. Bucks two young children were also in the home at the time of the incident. And its as a mother that Denita is appealing to Buck. Please do the right thing. You know you were there. You know what you witnessed, Denita said. Just please, say the right thing. Get up there and tell the truth. During the preliminary examination in 79th District Court before then-Judge Peter Wadel, Buck was overcome with emotion at times during her testimony. The Buchanans are hopeful that Buck is able to overcome whatever uncertainty she may be facing, but not just for her. From mom to mom, for your sake and your kids sake, lets get this behind you a little bit and stop letting your kids carry this on, Denita said. And know that as they get older, they know what happened, (their) mom knows what happened and we know what happened. But nobody will let us tell the truth. Its through these various pleas that the Buchanans hope some closure comes for not only for their family, but for Buck and her children, too. Were reaching out, and hopefully she will see that were not giving up. Ill never give up and neither will Bill. Ill fight until the end of my life and still keep fighting. But, its like, do whats right, Denita said, later adding, Its been horrible for us. We relive this every day. Its to the point where we dont know what to do. WHO WAS BILLY? The Buchanans raised Billy and his older sister, Bobbie, in the LaPorte and Michigan City areas of northern Indiana. Bobbie sought to protect her younger brother at every turn. Her and Billy had a bond that was just unbreakable, Denita said. She was his protector. Nobody would bother my little brother this is the way it was. Denita said Billy would often have a smile on his face, full of energy and trying to make people laugh. He loved using tools, too. Even when his father was working in his garage, Billy was right there to help with whatever needed fixing. It didnt take long for young Billy to take up riding motorcycles. Daddy bought him his first dirt bike when he was 5 years old, with training wheels. After the first few days, he didnt need the training wheels because he was a little demon then, Denita said. It progressed from there to his four-wheeler. He began riding, and then he wanted to race. He did so well racing, this tiny little boy on his tiny dirt bike. He was always full of love and had a heart of gold. Just loved doing the things he was doing with his daddy and his cousins and his sister. It was just so amazing to watch him grow. The Buchanan family has owned property in the Silver Lake area for roughly 20 years, and they moved there from Indiana about 10 years ago. Riding around on the dunes was a joy for everyone. Billy loved fixing whatever needed to run, from cars to quads. When the Fast & Furious franchise of movies came out, Billy and his friends would drive around in their souped-up Honda Civics. He loved his Hondas, Denita said. They were those that let off that vroom-vroom noise when they let off the gas and stuff. He got one, and gutted the whole thing out, and rebuilt the whole interior and painted it. It was so beautiful. Billy involved his own young son, William Buchanan III, on the project. They were very close, and they just did the same thing, Denita said. He taught his son how to ride tiny dirt bikes. His son was wrenching when he was tiny, too, and doing things to Daddys car that he wished he didnt do, but they had fun. You could see our Billy in his son doing the same things. His daddy taught him what his daddy taught him. It was chain of beautiful things running through the generations. But, then, all of this. APRIL 16, 2019 Billy died before 7 a.m. on April 16, 2019, at a residence just off of U.S. 31 in Free Soil Township. {p dir=ltr}The Buchanans didnt find out until later that afternoon. An officer saw Bill driving away from their home around 4:30 p.m. and pulled him over, Denita said. The officer said he needed to talk to Bill and Denita together. Bills heart fell because he knew then that something was not right. He came home, and there was another two officers that come in behind him. I was in the back, and Bill said an officer is here, and I was like, Oh, God, Billy got a ticket, or Billy did something stupid. I was like, Whats wrong? The officer just stood there, and this other one was in there. I said, Wheres our son? and he just stood there. Now, I know, thats a terrible job that he has. I felt bad for the officer. Hes like, Theres been an accident. We thought car accident and he got hurt. I said, What kind of accident? That could mean anything. Where is our son? And he said, Your son is deceased. And, I called him a liar. I said, Youre wrong. I grabbed Bill and we couldnt let go of each other. I said, This isnt true. Youre making a mistake. I said, This isnt Billy. He said that hes very sorry. He said that he is deceased. I said, Where is he? I dont know. Well, what happened? I dont know. I said, I want to see him. Where is he? Well, we dont know. I said, You know nothing, but you come here and tell us our son is deceased? I mean, I was going off on this cop because we wanted answers. Its like my knees just turned to jello. And I went to the floor. And I started beating on the fridge. And I grabbed Bill and I says, This is wrong. There is something terribly wrong. This isnt true. And then the victims advocate come over. And I said, We need to find out where hes at. Come to find out, they had taken him from there to the morgue and then took him to the (medical) examiners office. We were numb. We had no feeling. And then we came in and were talking and still knew nothing. I said the second-hardest thing we have to do is to call our daughter three hours away in Indiana. We called, and I told my son-in-law that I need to talk to Bobbie. Well, he knew in my voice and crying that something was wrong. He said (to Bobbie), You need to take this outside the truck, because they had their little granddaughter with them. She said, Mom, whats wrong? Are you OK? Is Daddy OK? Is my brother OK? I said, Honey, hes gone. She said, What do you mean, gone? And I just got silent. I dont know how to tell her. I said, Hes passed away. And, Ill never forget this blood-curdling scream. Ill never forget it all my life. She said, What happened? What happened? I said, We know nothing. I dont even know where hes at. I said, Let me talk to Sam, because I couldnt understand her. Then, she was crying. I talked to Sam. He said, Im sorry, Momma. He says, Ill get a hold of the rest of the family for you. I said, OK, I love you. And then it was just like, we just sat here trying to figure out why, where he went, you know, what happened. And then to go the next day and see our family come home and call a funeral home for our child was the most devastating thing. Because as a mom, when I was younger, I said, Dear God, dont let me live long enough to bury my child. And here we are, burying our son. It was the most devastating thing ever for us to have to go through. DELAYS AND DISMISSAL The charges against Beekman second-degree murder, assault with intent to commit great bodily harm less than murder and two counts of possession of a firearm while committing a felony were bound over to circuit court in June 2019. A trial date was set for mid-December 2019, but both the prosecutor and defense sought more time to work on the case. Then came more delays, chiefly because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The trial was scheduled for April 2020, but the pandemic pushed the trial date back with a potential start of the criminal jury trial in September 2020. The pandemic, had it not kicked in, I believe maybe (Buck) would have said the truth, Denita said, and I believe we would have gotten this handled and over. But I believe that as this pandemic kept kicking and kicking this back, I believe she had more time to think about this and say I dont have to say nothing. Im not going to say nothing. I really believe this whole pandemic destroyed it for us because I really believe back then, we really had many, many, multiple times to have this resolved. I believe that if she didnt have time to think about it, and got right up on that stand when it was supposed to be, wed be done. And we would have that little bit of closure. I believe as time went on after that, it just made it easier and easier for (Buck) to say, I dont want to be a part of this. Buck could not be served a subpoena, and her testimony during the preliminary exam was ruled by 51st Circuit Court Judge Susan Sniegowski to be inadmissible during the jury trial. Spaniola made a motion to dismiss the charges, but yet have the ability to bring Beekman back on charges once the prosecutors office has all of its evidence and witnesses. The Buchanans say they understand, yet their faith in parts of the system is shattered. They both are unhappy with Spaniolas handling of the case, and their patience is wearing thin with current Mason County Prosecutor Lauren Kreinbrink. It feels like Billy has been pushed under the rug, to put it bluntly, Denita said, adding later, They say they care. (Kreinbrink) says she cares, but if you care, you would do better on getting (Buck) to say the truth. To me, shes not doing that. This whole thing of being turned down, rejected, pushed aside, its been on and on and on for over two years now. Its going nowhere. Our son, his life had meaning. He was an amazing young man. Yeah, he had issues. We all have issues in our life, but did he not deserve what he got, no, no. To be left alone, to die alone, no, he did not deserve that. I will not sit back, and neither will Bill, and allow our son to be just shoved under the rug like his death was nothing. He was a human being. He had a life ahead. He had future. And all of that was taken away and nobody is doing nothing. The Daily News attempted to contact Kreinbrink for her thoughts on the case, from why Bucks testimony is critical to what else may be needed to refile charges in the case. However, the Daily News did not receive a response. The Buchanans are very appreciative of the detectives at the Mason County Sheriffs Office Det. Mike Kenney, Det. Steve Hansen and Det. Sgt. Tom Posma. They had extensive interactions with Kenney, and they truly appreciate all the work each put into the case. They have been busting their behind. I couldnt ask for three nicer people. But like right now, we dont have nothing to talk about because we cant do anything, Denita said. Kenney was always in touch with me, and we talked all the time. He was so good, such a kind man and cared about this thing. Its like everybody is at a standstill. Mason County Sheriff Kim Cole said hes hopeful that Buck will come forward. Its my hope she will process the events of that day and agree to testify, Cole told the Daily News. CIVIL SUIT WIN, NOT JUSTICE SERVED Denita, on behalf of Billys estate, sued Beekman in 51st Circuit Court seeking damages from the death and won. The Buchanans sought a default judgment to consider medical expenses, hospital expenses, funeral and burial expenses, pain and suffering and other damages, and they sought an amount in excess of $25,000. On July 7, Sniegwoski found a monetary judgment against Beekman in damages amounting to $8,267,576.78, according to court records. An additional $280 in court costs were also assessed. While the estate of Buchanan stands to gain more than $8.2 million, Denita doesnt think the family will see one red cent. Well never see the money, our lawyer said, she said, adding she didnt believe that Beekman does not have the assets to pay. As a family, we agreed that we would do that (file the suit, but) to us, thats like putting a price tag on our sons head. Theres no money, like I told (Sniegowski), thats going to bring our son back. I dont care what the amount is, no matter how big or how little, its never going to bring our son back. The Buchanans want justice to be served more than anything else. We arent interested in his money, Denita said. What we want is someone in prison for the rest of their life for taking a mans life for no reason. We really dont see that happening, though. Not if it depends on (Buck) coming in and having to talk. WHAT IF? But what if Buck decides to testify in a criminal case? Ill be happy. Im not out to get Katlin (Buck). My heart goes out to Katlin and I would just be grateful as a mother and my husband as well to say that shes finally doing whats right. Would I have anything to say to her? Maybe at the end. And if it was over with, and justice prevailed and he was in prison. Yes, I would be the adult and say, thank you. Other than that, that would be that. I would be very grateful to see her. It would show me that she is stepping up to the plate, even though its years later. But at the end, if we prevailed, I would say thank you. I would really say thank you because she did us a favor. But in my heart, it will never happen. Ill probably be long gone before anything happens. So what will the Buchanans do if their pleas for cooperation to testify dont come to fruition? We wont stop. Then my next step would be to write to the attorney general. Write to the governor. Go anywhere that I can go because Im not going to stop as a mother, and neither will Bill. I have always been outspoken, but Ill become more outspoken now. I dont care whose toes I step on. If you cant do it, Ill go to the next one. Its not that so-and-so isnt doing the best that they can do. But its like, this didnt work. (Buck) is not getting the picture here, so I will go somewhere else and I will beg as a mother to a mother, please, please do in your heart what you know is right. SIGNS OF REMEMBERING Every day, reminders of Billy are around them beyond the memorial set up in their living room, beyond Billys bedroom in their home, beyond the hood of a car in the garage painted in remembrance of Billy. We can hear the kids riding four-wheelers, and it will bring us back because Billy should be out there riding with these kids. Its just little things. For example, (Bill will) be using a tool and then hell lay it somewhere and it comes up missing, Denita said. Hes like, I know youre doing this to me, son, because this is what Billy would do to him all the time. Always joking and playing jokes on Dad and doing the same with me. But its like, thats so different now. Its like when he goes in the barn, theres not that laughter. Its silence. Total silence. Its just not the same. Billys birthday is also not the same, as he wont be physically present. The family gathers together, four generations of Buchanans from Bill and Denita to their great-granddaughter and Bobbies granddaughter, Aria. This will be the third birthday without Billy. But hes there. The family feels his presence, guiding the balloons up when the Buchanans release them into the sky. We sit there and say, Which one are you going to grab, Billy? Little Aria last year, she set one off and she said, Mines going crooked. Mines going crooked, Nana. Billys not going to get it. Next thing I know, it goes straight up. She goes, Uncle Billy got my balloon! It was just the most precious little thing. She knows where its going. She knows her Uncle Billy is in heaven, and she gets excited when it comes time for his birthday. Convenient home delivery Unlimited website access 24/7 Unlimited e-Edition access 24/7 The best local, regional and national news in sports, politics, business and more! Get the Ludington Daily News delivered straight to your door and receive unlimited access to our website and e-Edition when you purchase a Print + Digital Subscription. Page Content New York City employers that do not offer their own retirement savings plans to employees will soon be required to do so. Two recently enacted New York City laws (Bill Nos. 888-A and 901-A, collectively the "Retirement Security for All" acts) will require private-sector employers with five or more employees to enroll eligible New York City employees in either their own plan or in a city-managed retirement savings plan. Who Is Covered? A covered employer is any person or entity that employs five or more employees in New York City, has been in continuous operation for at least two years, and does not offer an employee retirement plan to its employees. Covered employees are those who are at least age 21 and work 20 or more hours per week in New York City. What Is Required? Under the new laws, employers must: (1) automatically enroll eligible employees in individual retirement savings accounts (IRAs); (2) deposit employee funds into the IRA accounts; and (3) retain records confirming compliance with the laws' requirements for at least three years. Employees may opt out of the program, adjust their contribution rates up or down, or do nothing at all. Each IRA is portable. Thus, employees who change jobs may continue contributing to their IRAs or roll over their IRAs into other retirement savings plans. When Do These Requirements Take Effect? We do not yet know when employee savings will commence. The laws became effective on Aug. 9, but the Retirement Savings Board (the agency created by the laws to implement the program) has up to two years to formalize program details and set a commencement date. Thus, covered employers do not need to take any immediate action. How Will the IRAs be Funded? The laws do not mandate employer contributions. Employee IRAs will be funded with deductions from employees' wages. The default employee contribution rate is 5 percent, capped at $6,000 for employees under age 50, and $7,000 for employees over age 50 (the annual IRA maximums). What Is the Penalty for Noncompliance? Employers that fail to enroll their eligible employees or to deposit employee funds into IRAs may be penalized as follows: First violation: $250 per employee. Second violation within two years of the prior violation: $500 per employee. Third and subsequent violations within two years of the prior violation: $1,000 per employee. In addition, employers that fail to maintain proper records of compliance with these laws may be subject to an additional $100 fine per violation. Employees alleging a violation of the laws may file a complaint within one year of the date the employee learned or should have learned of the violation with an enforcement agency to be designated by the mayor. Employees may thereafter commence an action in court. An aggrieved employee may be entitled to damages, equitable relief, and attorney's fees and costs. Is the Act Pre-Empted by ERISA? No. The laws specify that the program is not an employee benefit plan under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) and direct that employers are not to contribute to employee IRAs in any way that would cause the program to become an ERISA benefit plan. Further, if the city of New York determines that the laws likely conflict with or are preempted by state or federal law (including ERISA), the program will be discontinued. What About New York Employers that Operate Outside of the City? The retirement-for-all mandate may soon be extended to employers statewide. On June 7, the New York State Senate approved NY A03213-A, (which previously passed the State Assembly). The bill converts the state's existing voluntary IRA program into a mandatory program for private-sector employers with 10 or more employees that do not currently offer a retirement program. The proposed legislation is similar to the city's, but would require that employees be auto-enrolled in an IRA with a 3 percent minimum contribution rate. The legislation also prohibits employers that currently offer retirement plans from terminating such plans in order to participate in the state program. The bill will soon be sent to the governor for signature. Shawn Matthew Clark and Thelma Akpan are attorneys with Littler Mendelson in New York City. 2021 Littler Mendelson. All rights reserved. Reposted with permission. Page Content On Aug. 5, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania held for the first time that Pennsylvania's Medical Marijuana Act (MMA) allows an employee to sue his or her employer for taking an adverse employment action based on the employee's status as a certified user of medical marijuana. In Palmiter v. Commonwealth Health Systems, Inc., the superior court affirmed the decision of the Court of Common Pleas of Lackawanna County, allowing the employee's MMA claim to proceed. In so holding, the superior court found that the MMA as a whole and the statute's employment provision, 35 P.S. 10231.2103(b) (Section 2103), indicate that Pennsylvania's legislature intended to create an implied private right of action for aggrieved employees. Although this decision clarifies employee rights and employer obligations under the MMA, additional key questions still remain. Background In 2017, the plaintiff began working as a medical assistant for Medical Associates of NEPA. In December 2018, the plaintiff became licensed to use medical marijuana within the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania due to chronic pain, migraines and persistent fatigue. Around that time, the defendant hospital acquired Medical Associates of NEPA. The plaintiff alleged that, despite this acquisition, her superiors had assured her that she would maintain her job and seniority. The plaintiff applied for the position of certified medical assistant with the hospital in January 2019 and was notified that she was "a new employee of [the hospital]." Later that month, however, the plaintiff submitted to a pre-employment drug test and tested positive for marijuana. Although the plaintiff claimed that she had shared her medical marijuana certification with the drug-testing laboratory, the hospital allegedly terminated her employment due to the positive drug screen. The plaintiff filed a lawsuit against the hospital in the Court of Common Pleas of Lackawanna County, alleging a violation of the MMA's Section 2103, wrongful discharge in violation of public policy, and various other claims. The hospital unsuccessfully sought an early dismissal of the plaintiff's MMA and wrongful termination claims. In reaching its decision, the Court of Common Pleas of Lackawanna County determined, as a matter of first impression, that Section 2103 of the MMA contained an implied private right of action that allowed the plaintiff to bring suit. The hospital appealed, arguing that the Pennsylvania General Assembly did not intend to create a private cause of action under the MMA. In support of this argument, the hospital noted that the employment provision of the MMA does not contain any limitations period for an aggrieved employee to bring a claim, nor does it indicate what (if any) damages might be available to an employee. Additionally, the hospital noted that the Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH) bears sweeping responsibility for implementation and enforcement of the MMA, and argued that the MMA conferred exclusive enforcement jurisdiction to the DOH. Although the superior court acknowledged that Section 2103 lacks any limitations period or damages provisions, it found that those omissions were not dispositive. As the MMA is remedial in nature, the court found that the statute should be given a liberal construction and viewed Section 2103 as containing "rights-creating language" for the benefit of employees prescribed medical marijuana. The court also found that the DOH did not have exclusive enforcement authority over the MMA and noted that Section 2103 contains rights for employers as well, such as the ability to discipline employees who are under the influence of medical marijuana in the workplace. As a result of this analysis, the superior court determined that the General Assembly intended to allow employees to bring private suit against their employers for violations of Section 2103. Accordingly, the superior court affirmed the trial court's decision allowing the plaintiff's MMA claim to proceed. Finally, the superior court held that the trial court did not err in refusing to dismiss the plaintiff's claim of wrongful discharge in violation of public policy. Although the hospital argued that Pennsylvania had never recognized a claim for wrongful discharge based on the results of a drug test, the superior court opined that medical marijuana should be viewed as more akin to a "prescription drug." In light of these holdings, the superior court remanded the case to the Court of Common Pleas for further proceedings. Key Takeaways Although the Court of Common Pleas and the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania had previously reached similar conclusions as the superior court in this case, this appellate decision of first impression will carry significant weight with state and federal courts across the commonwealth moving forward. Unfortunately, as MMA cases continue to increase, key questions remain about the statute and the risks to employers, such as the relevant statute of limitations and damages available in Section 2103 claims. As a result, Pennsylvania employers may want to stay abreast of the latest developments in this fast-moving area of the law. Jessica M. Bocchinfuso and Donald D. Gamburg are attorneys with Ogletree Deakins in Philadelphia. 2021 Ogletree Deakins. All rights reserved. Reposted with permission. The new study, published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report on Tuesday, showed that among people not vaccinated the risk of infection was 4.9 times while hospitalisation was 29.2 times. Washington, Aug 25 (IANS) Not vaccinated against Covid-19 yet? You may be at 29 times more risk of hospitalisation with Covid than those who are fully vaccinated, according to a study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). "These infection and hospitalisation rate data indicate that authorised vaccines were protective against SARS-CoV-2 infection and severe Covid-19 during a period when transmission of the Delta variant was increasing," the agency wrote in the study. The study was based on 43,127 infections in residents of Los Angeles County, California between May 1 and July 25. Covid hospitalisations were defined as hospital admissions occurring within 14 days after infection, the agency said. Among all county residents, hospitalisation rates increased "exponentially" among unvaccinated, fully vaccinated and partially vaccinated people, with the highest rates among unvaccinated people in late June, the agency said. The data shows that "if you are not yet vaccinated, you are among those at highest risk," CNBC news quoted CDC Director Dr Rochelle Walensky as saying on Tuesday. "Do not underestimate the risk and serious consequences of this virus," she said during a White House briefing on the pandemic. "Vaccines are the best tool we have to take charge of this pandemic." As of Monday, more than 201 million Americans, or 60.8 per cent of the total US population, have had at least one Covid shot, according to data compiled by the CDC. More than 171 million Americans, or 51.5 per cent of the total US population, are fully vaccinated, according to the agency. US officials hope the Food and Drug Administration granting full approval to Pfizer-BioNTech's Covid vaccine will persuade some unvaccinated Americans to finally get the shots. --IANS rvt/skp/ Barclays is planning to pump in more than $400 million into its India arm. This move is taken to tap rising corporate and investment banking activity in the country which is gradually picking up post the pandemic. This marks Barclays' single largest capital infusion in the Indian business in the last three decades. This comes after the British lender pulled out of the retail business in Asia's third-largest economy in 2011 and exited its equity investment business in 2016. Furthermore, Barclays comments that the investment would help develop its corporate and debt investment banking, and private clients businesses. Jaideep Khanna, head of Barclays, Asia Pacific and Country CEO, India says, "As economic activity gathers momentum, there is increased demand for capital from clients." A Reuters poll found India's GDP growth likely touched a record high in the quarter through June, reflecting a very weak base last year and a rebound in consumer spending. With the fresh capital infusion, Barclays Bank PLC India's Tier-1 capital has increased by 55percent. "According to central bank norms, there are limits placed on what a lender can do with respect to their balance sheet but now that the bank's overall capital base has expanded, its ability to lend more has increased," says a source close to the firm. Barclays, which has had a branch presence in India since 1990, is now present in six locations. It has 600 employees across its corporate banking business in India. Including offshore operations, it employs more than 23,000 people in the country. Barclays Bank PLC India inaugurated its International Banking Unit branch at GIFT City in the western state of Gujarat in February. Do you think you could survive the summer in Trenton, Michigan, without an air conditioning unit? Oh, okay, if we are being literal, then it is clear that you would definitely survive it. Yet, we can all agree that it wouldnt be such a pleasant summer without you being able to set and maintain the perfect temperature at home. Well, you could always try and find more info on how to keep cool without this unit, but I am pretty sure that all those solutions will be short-term and that you wont exactly like them that much. Fortunately for you, though, you already have an AC unit that works perfectly, meaning that you have nothing to worry about and that you can enjoy your summer in Trenton without any issues. Whats that? Your unit has broken down completely, or it has stopped working as efficiently as before? Oh, well, I suggest you make your peace with it and learn how to live without this machine because there is absolutely nothing you can do about it now. I hope you understand that I am joking about that and that you definitely shouldnt just make your peace with this and set yourself up for a rather unpleasant summer. There is always a way out of this situation and it consists of getting the unit properly repaired if thats possible. If it isnt, then the trick is in installing a new one. I am quite sure, though, that youll be able to repair the unit, so dont rush into buying a new one just yet. When I mentioned that you will be able to repair the unit, you might have gotten the wrong impression, which could lead to you buying certain tools and trying to fix things all on your own. That is, however, not what I had in mind. Sure, if you want to try and do this all alone, nobody will probably stop you, but that doesnt automatically make it a good idea. In fact, if you dont have any experience in repairing these appliances, then it is a very, very bad idea that could result in some even bigger issues. What does all of this mean exactly? To put things simply, it means that you will need to find the perfect company in Trenton, Michigan, that will be able to fix these problems for you and thus equip you with a perfectly efficient AC unit. Instead of trying to do it alone, I suggest you start searching for these experts right away, because you dont have their skills, or their experience, to get the work done successfully. While you are probably aware of the fact that youll need to hire experts for the job, there is a fair chance that you might not be sure how to choose the perfect firm. It is completely normal to be confused about this, which is why I have actually decided to help you out by giving you a few helpful tips. You will find those tips if you keep on reading and I am sure that they will help you find and hire the most perfect experts that will repair your AC unit in no time. So, here we go. Dont Get Tempted By Low Prices As youll see if you visit https://www.aircomfortpro.com/ac-repair-trenton-mi or a different great source of information when it comes to AC units, the repairs dont need to cost a fortune, especially if you find a company that has certain special offers you could use. Nevertheless, this does not mean that you still wont need to pay a certain price for the services and that there is no way that a great company would offer them at some extremely low costs. Thats why you shouldnt get tempted if you come across those suspiciously low prices. Instead, those low offers should be, well, suspicious to you. The best thing would be to never decide based on the prices and to keep some other factors in mind as well. Dont Ignore Reputation One of those factors is the reputation of the AC repair firms in Trenton that you have in mind. I suppose you wouldnt want to work with companies that people complain about a lot. Well, that is precisely why you should check their reputation before making any final decisions. You can do that by searching for reviews on the Internet or perhaps by talking to some past clients directly, if you find that this is a viable option. Interview Several Candidates The most important thing to remember is that you dont have to hire the first experts that you have a conversation with. There is absolutely nothing wrong in talking to more candidates before hiring anyone. Whats more, this is encouraged, meaning that you should conduct a few interviews with a few different candidates before deciding which company might be worth hiring, as well as which ones you shouldnt consider further. Choose Experienced Ones When you conduct those interviews and find all the information you need about particular candidates, you will need to sit down and make your final decision on which company to hire for the job of repairing your AC unit in Trenton. Well, I have another tip to give you that will definitely be useful in the final stage of making this decision. In short, make sure to hire experienced professionals, as you want to be sure that they know what they are doing and that theyll fix your AC unit in no time. The world has witnessed a strong relationship between India and Afghanistan, based on historical and cultural links. The association has its foundations in the historical contacts and interchanges between the people. Moreover, it has resulted in a healthy relation concerning trade. Since the Taliban has taken over Afghanistan, worries hovered large among countries like India that have trade aliments with war-torn countries. India has invested heavily in Afghanistan for a better future for both countries. During the past two decades, India has invested a heavy amount in Afghanistan's infrastructure, consisting of over 400 projects across all provinces. These projects mainly focus on infrastructure, human resource development and capacity building, humanitarian assistance, community development, and improving trade through air and land networks. In addition, at the 2020 Geneva conference, India proclaimed 100 community development projects value USD 80 million and the construction of the Saudi Arabian dam in Kabul. The dam was expected to provide drinking water to two million inhabitants. Other than the various infrastructure projects, India is an important trade partner for Afghanistan when it comes to bilateral trade. As per an agreement of 2011, Afghanistan was allowed duty-free access to the Indian market. According to 2019-20, trade exchange between the two nations was evaluated to be over USD 1.5 billion, which predominantly comprises dried fruits, vegetable products, carpets, wool and other things. India is one of the biggest export markets for Afghan, and it has shown an increase in the total worth of all exports by USD 500 million in the year 2020-2021. Lately, India's struggling container market is fall to face a new round of challenges as shipments to Afghanistan are likely to take a hit. The shipments are getting cancel, delay and rollover as a result of the military takeover of the country. India exports a lot of sugar and other agricultural commodities to Afghan, and it could be interrupted in the upcoming days. On the other hand, India exports sugar, tea, coffee, clothing, pharmaceuticals, transmission powers, cherry, watermelon, and medicinal herbs to the South Asian nation. Afghanistan has been the second-largest purchaser of Indian sugar in the current marketing year 2020-21 (October-September) so far, buying a record 624,000 mt, as per the All India Sugar Trade Association. The future of the projects seems vague with the Taliban-led Afghanistan. India has not had a working relationship with the Taliban in the past. Transport and expense scenario of goods Director-General of The Federation Of Indian Export Organisation (FIEO), Ajay Sahai, says that the imports from Afghanistan to India have been blocked because the Taliban halted cargo movement to Pakistan, from where the goods further move to India. "We keep a close watch on developments in Afghanistan. Imports from there come through the transit route of Pakistan. As of now, the Taliban has stopped the movement of cargo to Pakistan, so virtually imports have stopped," he was quoted as per ANI. The transportation routes that traverse Dubai and the International North-South Corridor are also used for trade between the two countries. Trade experts say these transit routes are still valid. According to IE reports, banking channels between the two countries have also collapsed since the Taliban took over. As the circumstances have shifted in Afghanistan, Sahai is still optimistic about the trade relationship with Afghanistan. "I am pretty sure over a period of time Afghanistan will also realize that economic development is the only way to move forward and they will continue with that kind of trade. I think the new regime will like to have political legitimacy and for that India's role will become important for them also," DG Sahai stated in a report. Former FIEO president and country's leading exporter S K Saraf also agreed to predict a significant fall in bilateral trade. Sharing the same insight, FIEO Vice-President Khalid Khan proclaimed there would be an absolute standstill in the trade for a specific time, as Afghanistan is a scene of chaos. "It is a landlocked country and the air route is the main medium of exports and that has been disrupted. Trade will resume only after the uncertainty will get down," Khan stated. The organization has shown concerns over the varying prices of dry fruits in the upcoming days. It would be affecting the local merchants of the country. As India imports 85% of dry fruits from Afghanistan, Sahai further said that it might not directly impact the prices, but the very fact that one of the import sources no longer exists, assumption of rising in the process is not excluded. Demand of a new trade policy Biswajit Dhar, a professor of economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University, commented that India's support to Afghanistan was developing a market for indigenous products and because of the present scenario, "all this will stop". Brijesh Goyal, chairman of the Chamber of Trade and Industry (CTI), shows his concern on the uncertain future of the bilateral trade between India and Afghanistan. As the shipments of people are in difficulties and payments of people could be stuck on a large scale. There is a need for some immediate cognizance, and some way should be found. Considering all of the concerns, many in the trade industry believe that regularity in trade will be restored soon. Some of them are looking forward to getting introduced to any new policy. As the new establishment in Afghanistan may launch a policy that will support bolster trade. As per some sources in Afghanistan, the banks are expected to resume in 10-15 days. It might restart the sugar trade. To continue, please log in, or sign up for a new account. We offer one free story view per month. If you register for an account, you will get two additional story views. After those three total views, we ask that you support us with a subscription. A subscription to our digital content is so much more than just access to our valuable content. It means youre helping to support a local community institution that has, from its very start, supported the betterment of our society. Thank you very much! But how do they make money? There are two specific ways these services make money: by charging merchants fees for purchases and by charging customer fees for late payments. Afterpay charges its merchant customers a fee for each sale it processes for them. Evidently, many merchants are happy to hand over these fees since Afterpay is bringing them more sales. But Afterpay and other buy now, pay later services are often criticised by consumer groups for making a percentage of their revenue from late fees charged to users who dont pay their instalments on time. In 2020, Afterpays revenue from late fees dropped to less than 10 per cent from 14 per cent the year before. Afterpays 2020-21 financial year results posted in late August show that its reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) were $38.7 million, down 38 per cent. Its total loss soared from $22.9 million to $159.4 million, but the gross profit grew to $675,106 from $384,856. Jack Dorsey is the founder and CEO of both Twitter and Square. Credit:Bloomberg But wait, Afterpay isnt actually profitable? While its co-founders are two of the richest entrepreneurs in Australia, the company has never made a profit nor paid a dividend to shareholders. The founders wealth comes from Afterpays soaring share price, with many investors happy to buy the stock now on the promise of future profits from its current explosive growth. The founders say its a strong result given the COVID-19 pandemic (the same one that sent Afterpays share price soaring last year) and a global expansion strategy thats seen 6 million new customers using the service. Afterpay has also recently launched an app called Afterpay Money. Beginning in Australia, users will deposit their salary into the app to allow for a wider range of payments and gives insight into the future trajectory of the companys expansion strategy. How are BNPLs regulated? Is there a concern? Many consumer groups want buy now, pay later services to be subject to the same laws as credit card companies. But a 2020 Senate inquiry into fintech determined that consumers did not need legal protections when using BNPL services because, at this stage, the industrys self-regulation provides a satisfactory regulatory framework that can later be backed up by a federal government policy statement. So far, the industry has managed to justify its operations because its the new kid on the block. For now, BNPLs can effectively run as unsecured loan books operating outside the scope of financial regulation. This light touch regulatory approach from the federal government may change if the Square takeover goes through, though. The consumer groups are most concerned by companies such as Afterpay that operate without credit checks. Many BNPLs do not check credit scores but instead have a cap on late fees and prevent a consumer from further spending after they miss a payment. ASIC highlighted the danger of these services at the end of last year, saying one in five customers missed payments in 2018-2019. Of these customers, 67 per cent were under the age of 35. Despite this, ASIC did not go as far as recommending they be subject to the same regulations as credit card companies. Buy now pay later services are allowed, by the Reserve Bank of Australia, to stop their merchants from imposing a surcharge on consumers that would cover the 4-6 per cent fee they charge merchants. Credit card companies, which impose a far lower fee on merchants, are more regulated and cannot do the same. The RBA says it will review this decision as the BNPL industry continues to grow, but this process has been delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A Square tap and go card reader. Credit:Square Whats Square then? Youve probably been using Square without even knowing it. Owned by Twitter founder Jack Dorsey and valued at $US129 billion ($174 billion), Square is the financial payments behemoth responsible for those little white payment readers cropping up at your local coffee shop or newsagent. These readers accept cards as well contactless cards (such as Apple Pay) where you hover your phone over the payment device. Dorsey was inspired to start Square in 2009 with his friend Jim McKelvey, who had complained he was unable to sell household items because he couldnt accept a credit card. Square also owns Cash App, a mobile payment service used by 70 million active customers where users transfer money to one another via their phones, without the need for a bank account. Square also has its own business finance company Square Loans and ecommerce platform Square Online. At the moment, more than 85 per cent of revenue generated by Squares seller ecosystem is driven by the US. However, Australia is Squares biggest market outside the US, largely used by small businesses. Its set-up costs are comparatively low, although it does charge higher operation fees than the big four banks or domestic counterparts. Despite the fees, Squares Australian uptake has been growing at an average rate of 92 per cent annually since 2016. So, whats the deal with Square buying Afterpay? The history-making acquisition hinges on Treasurer Josh Frydenbergs acceptance but for him to sign off, the Foreign Investment Review Board will have to approve it. For Square, Afterpay is the missing link. The takeover would encourage Afterpays 98,000 merchants to adopt Squares payment processing platforms as well as facilitate a relationship with some of Afterpays big clients such as Amazon. Upmarket department store David Jones has seen its profits soar back into growth for the 2021 financial year but is facing new challenges as more than half of its stores remain shut through the NSW and Victorian lockdowns. The retailer, which is owned by South African business Woolworths Holdings, reported a 281 per cent increase in adjusted earnings to $84 million for the 12 months to the end of June after the company slashed costs and axed its loss-making food division. Sales gained 2.3 per cent to $2.1 billion for the same period. David Jones sales has seen its profits soar across the financial year. Credit:Getty Woolworths Holdings chief executive Roy Bagattini told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald the company had done a good job to stabilise during the pandemic and was in a far better position than 12 months ago when earnings were down 20 per cent and the business was overstored. However, the executive noted the company had hit a speed bump when NSW and Victoria went back into lockdown. Sales at the department store have fallen 26.7 per cent for the first seven weeks of the new financial year. Similarly, trade at stablemate Country Road Group (CRG) is also down, falling 13.4 per cent. Masimo Corp. Chief Executive Officer Joe Kiani has waged his share of hard-nosed patent fights with competitors in the medical device field, but says his current battle with Apple is taking things to a new level. Masimo, a manufacturer of signal-processing technology for health-care monitors sued Apple in January 2020, accusing it of stealing trade secrets and improperly using Masimo inventions for health monitoring in the Apple Watch. Yet, the case has been bogged down for almost two years by Apples challenges over the validity of the patents and disputes over access to information. Ive been through three major litigations, said Kiani. Apples refusing to even play by the rules set by the court. Masimo is accusing Apple of stealing trade secrets and improperly using its inventions for health monitoring in the Apple Watch. The courtroom delays, Kiani said, prompted Masimo to file a complaint in June at the International Trade Commission, seeking to block imports of the Apple Watch Series 6. When Angus McDonald painted Mariam Veiszadeh, a lawyer, writer and refugee advocate, for the 2019 Archibald Prize he did it in the style of Vermeers Girl with a Pearl Earring. The six-time Archibald Prize finalist liked the juxtaposition of the famous figure of western European painting with a powerful, contemporary Muslim woman who had endured online abuse as a result of her public campaign to call out Islamophobia. Artist Angus McDonald with sitter Mariam Veiszadeh. Credit:Angus McDonald By doing it that way I wanted to challenge all those old-world distinctions of race and religion, McDonald said. Now the artist and filmmaker has put the arresting portrait up for a snap auction, with the proceeds to go to a fund established by a fellow artist, Archibald Prize winner Ben Quilty, to raise $1 million for the United Nations Refugee Agency. The New England renewable energy zone has drawn a flood of prospective investors with more than 80 projects offering to build about 34 gigawatts of new solar and wind farms in NSW. The response was more than four times the 8 gigawatts of capacity on offer for the so-called REZ, one of three specially designated areas in the state for new clean energy projects. A solar farm near Gunnedah, NSW. Investments in clean energy are rapidly increasing. Credit:Bloomberg NSW Energy Minister Matt Kean said the response indicated strong investor support for the states electricity infrastructure road map, that was legislated late last year. The New England REZ is expected to deliver around $10.7 billion in investment and around 830 operational jobs, as well as 1250 construction jobs each year, all while putting downward pressure on electricity prices and providing landowners with new income streams, Mr Kean said. Theyre no strangers to going viral. But in pandemic times, influencers have emerged as a surprisingly powerful voice in spreading the pro-vaccination message far and wide. New data released by influencer analytics platform HypeAuditor shows that between January and July, more than 200 Australian influencers shared 300 positive posts about the vaccine, reaching a combined 3.8 million people. The company is also reporting a rapid increase in social media posts this month. From left to right: Abbie Chatfield, Adam Liaw and Tully Smyth share vaccine selfies. Credit:Instagram Posts with hashtags such as #getvaccinated and #getthevax were examined, finding TV personality Carrie Bickmore, chef Adam Liaw and writer Clementine Ford had the highest reach. A scroll through Instagram also reveals celebrities such as comedians Hamish Blake and Celeste Barber drawing in tonnes of likes and plenty of heated dislikes for their vaccine selfies. Lifestyle influencers, such as Tully Smyth and Olivia Rogers, have also pulled thousands of eyeballs. I want to go home to Bilo. Those were the words echoed by two young asylum seeker children on national television, as their future hangs in the balance with deportation still a very real possibility. Nades and Priya Murugappan with their daughters Kopika and Tharnicaa. The Tamil family, who lived in the rural Queensland town of Biloela, begged Immigration Minister Alex Hawke to allow them to stay in Australia, for the sake of the children. Nadesalingam and Priya Murugappan fled Sri Lanka separately, coming by boat to Australia in 2012 and 2013, respectively. Is Peter Mayes of Petersham (C8) the only person stuck at home in Sydney who has lost weight? Wendy Crews of Lane Cove North reckons the most astounding part of Peter Mayes click-and-collect belt was that hes lost weight during lockdown. Theres a best-selling book to be published, Peter. Joy Allen of Five Dock hopefully offers: surely he could share his weight loss secret/s rather than his belt-tightening? Alan Gibson need not worry that the light at the end of the tunnel (C8) is a train rushing towards him as none of the trains purchased by Transport Minister Andrew Constance can fit in any of our tunnels, is the wry comment of John Bailey of Canterbury. Murray Hutton of Mount Colah offers four points of perspective. A pessimist sees a never-ending dark tunnel. An optimist sees a light at the end of the tunnel (C8). A pragmatist sees a train coming towards them. The train driver sees three idiots standing on the tracks. You want it darker? Lance Millar of Tweed Heads obliges. My vague suspicion remains that light at the end of the tunnel (C8) may turn out to be the dull gleam on the edge of the abyss. Leonard Cohen would be proud. There are car hire companies that are actually made for Australian roads (C8). Judith Hadley of Surry Hills hired a Brits Campervan to tour the outback in the 1990s and found out the hard way that about how bad the road going into the Bungle Bungles was when the roo bar fell off. The only surprise the rental car company experienced was discovering that we had hauled it in and out of the campervan every day so we could return it to them. NSW counter-terrorism police are tracking more than 1000 people of interest as growing concerns about right-wing extremism add to the long-standing threat posed by radical Islamists. The senior police officer overseeing counter-terrorism operations in NSW also warned that the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan could lead to a greater risk of violent extremism in Australia. Opening a new counter-terrorism training facility, NSW Police have warned of an increasingly diverse extremism risk. Credit:NSW Police Launching a $3 million facility to train officers in tactics during terrorist attacks, Deputy Commissioner David Hudson said police, in concert with other state and federal agencies, had a range of initiatives in place to prevent radicalisation and to manage extremists. He said a known entity management model used by police involved officers monitoring, to varying degrees, over 1000 people in the state of NSW who may be of interest to us at some stage of the terrorism continuum. She also said health officials would work smarter by using text message surveys to ask positive cases if they were close or household contacts, or authorised workers. Increasing case numbers do challenge our services, but we are supported by a broad team to look at how best we can focus, Dr Chant said on Wednesday. But strains on the system are causing agony for families in Sydneys south-west who live in large households and fear for their loved ones. Over in Greenacre, Imad Raad, his wife and four children all have COVID-19, but he believes the situation could have been avoided. Imad Raads whole family now has COVID-19 at home in Greenacre, after their son never received a text from health telling him he had tested positive. Credit:Kate Geraghty One of his sons contracted the virus at work and has been isolating in his bedroom. But when police came to check on him, they had two names on their list of COVID-19 patients. They found out Mr Raads other son also had the infection, but had not been informed. Now he has passed it on to the rest of his household. It took two series of tests for the family to determine that information: the first set, conducted at their house, could not be found at the pathology lab, so they had to drive to the Lakemba clinic to try again. Canterbury-Bankstown councillor Bilal El-Hayek, who is providing aid to families, said there were stories like this all over south-west Sydney. Health are doing a fantastic job but they cant keep up; its not the communitys fault, he said. Last week NSW Health scrapped surveillance testing for thousands of workers, and is now urging people who dont have symptoms to avoid being tested to free up resources. They are compromising public health response. We want to focus testing resources to get turnaround times back to under 24 hours, Dr Chant said. Mr Moufarej developed symptoms last Friday night, got tested on Saturday, and was alerted by text that he was positive on Sunday. At that point he sent his wife and children to get tested - Ms Sassine was positive, but the children were negative. The Chester Hill family feel abandoned by the health system, and are anxious for their youngest child. Credit:Kate Geraghty The couple have been anxious to get their children tested again, given their youngest sons health issues. Their calls to Health on Monday timed out; on Tuesday they got through and were promised a call back that never came. The police have come three times to check the couple were home, but could not assist with tests. I knew the system was overwhelmed, but a phone call would be nice, Mr Moufarej said. I just want to feel like a human being. Its my family, I need to protect my family. On Wednesday morning, two of the children woke with symptoms. Ms Sassine called every doctor and pathology clinic around. I was begging, crying - saying, please help me, I just need to see if my son is ok and look after him, she said. Do I have to wait for them to call back until, God forbid, my son dies? Still without an answer on Wednesday night, they told the children to get dressed and walk to the nearest testing centre while Mr Moufarejs cousin followed them in a car. Loading But when the children arrived at the drive-through clinic on foot, they were turned away. So their aunt, who is in her 50s and has health conditions, had to drive them through in her car. She, too, is now in isolation, and the children are awaiting their results. The Berejiklian government accuses us of spreading COVID-19 between our families; says that were too close, Mr Moufarej said. But they havent sent anyone to help us. I dont want food, I dont want financial help. I just want to make sure the kids are safe, thats all I want from this government. A spokesperson for NSW Health said it was monitoring its operations, contact tracing teams and public health units closely, and continuing to expand capacity to meet the high demand from a surge in cases. NSW Health services are in contact by phone with people who have tested positive for COVID-19 as soon as possible to obtain information, assess and manage their health and work together with other agencies to ensure they have suitable accommodation, and their basic needs are met including food and medications, the spokesperson said. We were sorting out the house after my parents died when one of my daughters came across an old notebook from my schooldays. It was a sort of journal, filled with the sort of earnest nonsense, laboured angst and overworked yearning that was the stuff of being a teenager in the 1960s. My daughter was taken by the fact I had written out the entire lyrics of The Rolling Stones anthem to misery, Paint It Black. I had underlined the opening words: I see a red door and I want it painted black/No colours any more, I want them to turn black. Frankly, they didnt teach me this stuff at judges school. Judge Robyn Tupman, from the District Court of NSW, is trying to explain where the Kabul airports Abbey Gate is in relation to the main entrance. Ive been there, she hasnt. But she knows her way around the airport better than me, having poured over Google Maps for the past 72 hours, along with New Zealand Supreme Court Justice Susan Glazebrook, President of the International Association of Women Judges. For three days solid, the IAWJ has kept an online zoom vigil with female judges around the globe, taking shifts to share and direct information to any of their 270 colleagues in Afghanistan attempting to leave, or take refuge in safe houses. Waiting to board a Royal Australian Air Force flight at Kabul airport. Credit:ADF Its a bit scary to be involved in this, says Tupman. Her last shift caused these two normally stoic women to panic when a safe house in Kabul to which they had directed their colleagues suddenly turned suspect. Susan and I had to ring six people and say, Move, move now! Following the brutal assassination of two women on the Supreme Court in Kabul in January, Afghanistans female judges know they are a Taliban target. They also know the Taliban are biding their time, sitting out the next few days until D-day, August 31. Thats the date when the United States has promised the Taliban all foreign military will leave for good. The inhumanity and arrogance of such a promise is for interrogation at a later time. Right now the hours are ticking. Each second draining blood from womens futures. How fitting that the 20th anniversary of the Tampa affair should fall at this moment, while Afghanistan is collapsing and nearly 60 per cent of Australians are in lockdown. Tampa was the moment that has determined our asylum seeker policies ever since, especially our brutal practice of indefinite, offshore detention. This we did to people fleeing the very same Taliban we were bombing. Now we look back upon that moment from a COVID detention of our own, with the Taliban freshly returned to power. And through all that, one constant persists: our almost radical lack of empathy. The Tampa crisis took place in 2001. Credit:Andrew Dyson Thats most obvious in the Tampa case. Its not merely that the Howard government sent out the military in unprecedented fashion to keep the Tampa out of our waters. Its the vast demonisation campaign that supported this. These people were illegal immigrants and queue jumpers, who may well be terrorists. Within about six weeks, the government had graduated from smears to bald untruths: falsely claiming some asylum seekers had thrown their children overboard as a way of forcing us to rescue them so they could claim refugee status. I dont want in Australia people who would throw their own children in to the sea, declared John Howard, assigning these people a cynical immorality. But theres no denying where the cynicism truly lay. Authorities in Shepparton fear people who have visited exposure sites are still not coming forward for testing as the regional city braces for more COVID-19 infections over coming days. The Shepparton outbreak was Victorias fastest-growing cluster on Thursday 18 new infections were reported as more Australian Defence Force personnel arrived to help with the response. ADF personnel conduct COVID-19 tests at the Shepparton Showgrounds on Thursday. Credit:Justin McManus There are now 85 active cases in the cluster, but Goulburn Valley Health chief executive Matt Sharp warned that the numbers would increase in coming days. He issued an urgent call for people who were symptomatic or had been to an exposure site to seek coronavirus tests. A man will stand trial on 60 charges of rape and dozens of other allegations he drugged and sexually assaulted 11 women over more than three years. Frank Hu, also known as Xiaodong Frank Hu, pleaded not guilty to more than 200 charges on Thursday following a two-day hearing in Melbourne Magistrates Court. Victoria Police and Australian Border Force officers raid Frank Hus Melbourne office in 2019. Mr Hu, 34, is accused of sexually assaulting 11 women between 2016 and 2019 after he was arrested over allegations he lured women to his Melbourne office - where he ran migration and travel agencies - under the pretense of offering a job interview. Charge sheets allege Mr Hu administered drugs to the women and that he sexually assaulted them. For our free coronavirus pandemic coverage, learn more here. Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size Its not even noon and Oliver Tallis is already run off his feet. Customers line up along his cafe counter and every table is busy with digital nomads and parents with young children. Oliver Tallis makes a customer a coffee at his Livid Skate Cafe in Perth. Credit:Marta Pascual Juanola In sun-kissed Scarborough, a coastal suburb of Perth, it feels like the weekend has come in early. Dozens of surfers crowd the beach. Couples walk the dog down the promenade and children shriek in the playgrounds. The only reminders of the coronavirus pandemic are the mandatory check-in QR codes and bottles of unused hand sanitiser on the counter. There are no crowd restrictions, no two-square-metre rule, no face masks. Mr Tallis cant believe his luck. Most of his friends are locked down in NSW and Victoria as those states battle to curb the spread of the highly infectious Delta strain of COVID-19. The rest are stuck overseas in Norway and Switzerland. To protect this way of life, Western Australia sealed itself off indefinitely from NSW on Thursday and flagged Victoria could be next if it reaches 500 cases a day. The new border rules effectively erase exemptions on compassionate grounds and allow only defence, state and federal officials to travel to WA, reducing the number of arrivals from NSW to just a handful a week. Advertisement It comes as WA continues to cling to its zero-COVID-19 policy, pledging to keep early circuit-breaker lockdowns and strict border controls with other states, a strategy that has propelled Premier Mark McGowans popularity to celebrity status. WAs success in quashing the virus with its last case in the community recorded in June has opened the states doors to concerts and events with no crowd restrictions, and, for the first time, has placed the state as the frontrunner to host 60,000 mask-free fans for the AFL grand final. Wembley Downs locals Flynn and Beau Campbell play with pet dog Percy in Scarborough. Credit:Marta Pascual Juanola But WAs go-it-alone attitude and us-versus-them rhetoric has caused friction between Mr McGowan and the Commonwealth and antagonised the leaders of other jurisdictions, particularly NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian. When Prime Minister Scott Morrison referred to West Australians as people who want to stay in the cave, Mr McGowan was quick to return serve. I think everyone would rather just see the Commonwealth look beyond NSW and actually appreciate what life is like here in WA, he said. Advertisement We currently have no restrictions within our state, a great quality of life and a remarkably strong economy which is funding the relief efforts in other parts of the country. As other states look to 70 and 80 per cent vaccination targets as the key to a move away from lockdowns and border closures, Mr McGowan has made it clear he will keep the tools in his arsenal until phase D of the national plan is reached a move which will probably keep WA a hermit kingdom until early 2022. Customers wait in line at Livid Skate Cafe in Scarborough. Credit:Marta Pascual Juanola The diversion from the national agreement has received little pushback from the WA public, with a July poll revealing 43 per cent of West Australians supported lockdowns being called in response to a single community case, compared to 11 per cent nationally. For people like cafe owner Oliver Tallis, the prospect of enjoying the freedoms that come with living in a COVID-19-free state offset the draconian government measures. Look at the way were operating, you still get to live a normal life, he says. I think that [Mr McGowan] made the right calls in that department. Its hard to fault it when you still get to run your business and hang out and do stuff. Advertisement At Scarboroughs waterfront, retiree Greg Starke says he feels like he is living in an oasis as he scores the performances of his mates in the surf break. Greg Starke plays with a dog in Scarborough. Credit:Marta Pascual Juanola He only thinks about COVID-19 when he reads the news. The rest of the time, weather conditions and choosing where to meet his mates after a surf are the extent of his worries. For a while, I was concerned that we were perhaps too wrapped up in cotton wool here, he said. But something must be working if we feel so lucky to be living in the environment that we live in. Mother-to-be Amanda Valentine agrees: Mark McGowan has handled this like a pro. I love him. Credit:Illustration: Matt Golding Ms Valentine will face the birth of her daughter without the support of her two sisters, who live on the Gold Coast, but trusts Mr McGowans response to COVID-19 will keep West Australians safe, even if it means being separated from family. Advertisement He will make sure that COVID wont come to Perth and if it does, he will go straight back into lockdown. Thats exactly why we dont have any cases. Rosy economic conditions spurred by the mining industry and Mr McGowans unrivalled popularity have created a wave of interstate migration not seen since the mining boom a decade ago, as more Australians look for refuge and certainty in WA. Holiday towns like Broome and Exmouth are seeing record-breaking tourist seasons, as West Australians choose to holiday in their own backyard amid fears of sudden border closures. April Valentine is fearful of facing the birth of her second child alone due to border restrictions but remains supportive of WAs COVID approach. Credit:Marta Pascual Juanola The COVID situation seems to have enhanced that sense of Western Australia doing it itself and going its own way, says University of Western Australia social demographer Amanda Davies. Not being able to leave effectively, people in Western Australia have been moving more around the regional parts of WA for holidays and work and other things and that has pulled together what was more of an urban-rural divide to what is more of an ideology about Western Australia as a whole. But there are fears WA may be living on borrowed time, with an outbreak of the Delta strain inevitable due to rising case numbers in the east. Advertisement Western Australias conservative border policies may see Qantas move its direct London flight from Perth to Darwin once international borders reopen. But Premier Mark McGowan labelled the potential shift outrageous, given the state had spent $15 million upgrading a terminal at Perth Airport to secure the flights, and had kept the country afloat through the COVID-19 pandemic. Qantas is thinking about switching its direct London flight from Perth to Darwin. The national airline, which announced a $2.35 billion loss on Thursday, says it expects its non-stop flight between the United Kingdom and Australia, first launched three years ago, to be in higher demand post-COVID. A statement by Qantas on the potential re-start of its international flights said discussions were continuing around the routes future. Australia Post has disclosed to the wages watchdog that it underpaid 19,500 former workers about $1.8 million, before interest, after a payroll error miscalculated how much annual leave they should be paid out upon leaving the postal service. A spokesman for Australia Post apologised for the error, which it reported on Thursday and equates to an average of $92 per underpaid worker. Those staff will be repaid with interest, which is likely to add about $450,000 to the bill. More than 19,000 former Australia Post employees were underpaid when they left the service. Credit:Sam Mooy The figure is far less than some other major organisations that have underpaid their staff, such as Woolworths bill of at least $390 million and the ABCs $12 million, though it could grow if the Fair Work Ombudsman applies a penalty. Pay practices at Australia Post have been in the public eye since former chief executive Christine Holgate resigned because a firestorm of criticism about her decision to reward four senior employees with Cartier watches worth a total of $20,000. Former prime minister John Howard has defended his actions in the Tampa and children overboard affairs 20 years ago, insisting he didnt introduce racism into the immigration debate and nor did it win him the 2001 election. As a new wave of refugees to Australia is expected as a result of the crisis in Afghanistan, Mr Howard reflected on the two events the defined the Coalitions approach to asylum seekers two decades ago. An Australian navy ship passes by the MV Tampa off Christmas Island in 2001. Credit:Craig Sillitoe On August 26, 2001, Norwegian freighter the MV Tampa rescued more than 400 asylum seekers from a stranded boat and headed for Christmas Island, a tiny Australian territory south of Java. The Australian government refused to let them unload or claim asylum and sent special forces troops to board the ship and prevent it from approaching Australian territory. Mr Howard said on Thursday he hadnt expected the Tampas captain to take the actions he had, but the minute he did do that, there was only one possible response. If not now, when? That is the catch-cry for a powerful argument that defined federal politics this week, will echo around the country for months and could easily decide the next election. It is the distilled version of a message from Scott Morrison that comes down to trust. The Prime Minister tells Australians the time has come to emerge from lockdown. And he assures them it will be safe. Prime Minister Scott Morrison wants state and territory leaders to stick to the plan to lift lockdowns once vaccination targets are reached. Credit:Sydney Morning Herald and The Age This is not Morrisons promise alone. The premiers and chief ministers have also signed up to the national agreement to ease the restrictions in stages after the country reaches a vaccination rate of 70 per cent and then 80 per cent. They will decide the health orders that control the outcome. Yet the promise from Morrison is a pivotal point in the pandemic. He senses the frustration among Australians who believe life in lockdown cannot go on, which means voters are receptive to his message. The bigger question, however, is whether voters have full disclosure on the consequences. The assurances made in Canberra do not sound so convincing to those who are a long way from Parliament. In the Victorian town of Shepparton, for instance, locals warn of a crisis. In the hospitals of western Sydney, meanwhile, health workers struggle to cope with the load. Federal Energy Minister Angus Taylor says his plan to shake up the national energy market wont subsidise coal power, despite caution from state governments and fears from some stakeholders it will deliver a win for fossil fuels at the expense of renewables. Mr Taylor must secure agreement from state energy ministers to enact the reforms, recommended by the Commonwealths Energy Security Board, to incentivise private investment in whats known as dispatchable power. Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction Angus Taylor. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen More dispatchable power is needed to support renewables when the wind isnt blowing and the sun isnt shining. It traditionally came from coal but is now available from new technology in fast-start gas plants, pumped hydro and batteries. The reform centres on the creation of a capacity market that would require retailers, who sell electricity to households, to pay generators to invest in sufficient dispatchable power to fill gaps in supply. It may divide them geographically, but in normal times the Cooks River brings the communities of Earlwood and Marrickville together. They play sport on each others soccer fields, share flying foxes in the parks, and weave between both sides of the bank on a cycle path that stretches to the airport. During the pandemic the river has come to be regarded as a modern-day moat, protecting the inner suburbs from COVID-19. Marrickville, which is on the north side of the Cooks, is in the Inner West Council area, which has not been designated as a hotspot. Earlwood, to the south, is under tighter restrictions because it is part of Canterbury-Bankstown, a relatively new council area and the citys largest. Laura, 11, and Owen, 13, from Oatley who often ride over the bridge but now cant as its locked. Credit:Edwina Pickles On August 23, both suburbs had the same number of active cases, and Earlwood had a higher proportion of residents with at least one vaccination. Due to their council area, residents of Earlwood are only allowed out of their house for an hour, while Marrickvilles exercise and recreation is unlimited. The Queensland government will move ahead with a regional Howard Springs-style quarantine hub near Toowoomba, west of Brisbane, after negotiations with the federal government stalled. The Wellcamp announcement comes one day after the Premier paused arrivals from interstate hotspots NSW, Victoria and the ACT for two weeks as hotel quarantine became stretched to the limit. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said the facility would have 500 beds open by the end of the year and 1000 beds by the end of the first quarter of 2022. We all know that our hotels were not built to deal with the Delta strain of this virus, she said. The Health Department said 60 per cent of symptomatic cases detected over the past seven days had not been tested as soon as they developed symptoms. Mr Andrews said some Victorians, particularly those in younger cohorts, were both neglecting to get tested and making visits to other peoples homes. He could not say, however, how many of this weeks cases had occurred due to gatherings that were in breach of health orders. The fact of the matter is, if these rules that are on now are followed, theyll work. And thats why Im appealing to everybody to make the best choices you possibly can, he said. I dont know that theres too many more levers to pull. In a sign of the difficulties underpinning Victorias push to reduce community transmission to zero, Professor Sutton revealed three-quarters of infections in recent weeks have been passed on either asymptomatically or before the first case experienced symptoms. Australia Defence Force troops are doorknocking Shepparton residents asked to self-isolate. Credit:Justin McManus NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian stuck to her promise of easing restrictions for the fully vaccinated once NSW hit 6 million jabs. Lockdown was extended in NSW regional areas, but outdoor gatherings of up to five would be allowed outside western Sydney local government areas from September 13. Mr Andrews declined to comment on Ms Berejiklians announcement. The NSW government will get their own health advice, and theyll make decisions. Hopefully all those decisions are consistent with the national plan, he said. States and territories have agreed to suppress cases as much as possible until they hit the 70 and 80 per cent vaccination targets. National cabinet will meet on Friday to discuss making 12- to 15-year-olds eligible for vaccination, as well as vaccine passports and what restrictions will apply to the unvaccinated once Australia starts to reopen. Mr Andrews said he could not offer guidance on when Victorian schools would return. Loading He instead pointed to plans to offer a vaccine dose to year 11 and 12 students before the first VCE exam in just over two months and suggested they would be invited to priority lanes at many of the states 55 vaccination hubs. Home-schooling is tough. Absolutely its tough. Whats even harder than that the notion that I would ignore any advice, open the schools, have the kids back there, bring it home ... thats not better. I dont want to see kids in hospital, I just dont. Victoria administered a record 33,932 vaccines in state clinics on Wednesday, made up of about 6000 AstraZeneca doses and the remainder Pfizer, and about another 45,000 were delivered through the Commonwealth-run program. About 200,000 appointments were booked on Wednesday after every Victorian aged 16 and over became eligible for the Pfizer shot. Thursdays 80 cases came after a promising run of 45 on Wednesday, 71 on Tuesday and 50 on Monday. Following clarification from the Doherty Institute this week that Australias reopening plan at 70 and 80 per cent vaccination could proceed even with hundreds of cases per day, Professor Sutton said Victoria remained committed to the national aggressive suppression strategy. If we can get to zero, fantastic. But if that is not attainable, were still not going to let it run. Were still not going to allow thousands upon thousands of cases to emerge because we know that the restrictions hold that in check. Asked if he would consider a lockdown lite to lessen the mental health burden on Victorians until the state hit 70 per cent full vaccination - likely in November - the Chief Health Officer said it was possible. Of course, we would consider all options if we can understand the modelling, know what it means and be confident that itll keep a cap on transmission, Professor Sutton said. Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton left the door open to a lockdown-lite to ease the mental health burden. Credit:Getty Images Opposition Leader Michael OBrien criticised the Premier for lecturing Victorians and called for him to offer hope in the form of reversing restrictions such as the ban on playgrounds. Mr OBrien said Mr Andrews should replicate NSW in easing restrictions for vaccinated people before national targets are reached. I think its hard to imagine that NSWs public health advice is so much different from Victorians. And if NSW is able to give their people a little bit of leeway, a little bit of a reward for the great effort theyve done in getting vaccination rates up, itd be great to think Victoria could look forward to the same thing, the Liberal leader said. Burnet Institute epidemiologist Brendan Crabb said Victoria could still return to zero community transmission, framing the lockdown as a tough measure that could allow a higher quality of life later in the year. Professor Crabb said Sydney probably had too many cases to return to zero at any point. Theres no COVID-zero life for NSW for the foreseeable future. Just less and less lockdown, he said. Loading But for [Victoria] if we do get back to zero, then we will have a more open life, like South Australia and Queensland and Tasmania and Western Australia have. Thats why weve got to give it a go. While Apples iPhones and Samsungs Androids are relatively evenly matched, theres one area Apple has been winning for far too long: wearables. The Apple Watch has been hands-down been the best smartwatch on the market since it was released; effortlessly balancing ease of use, simple notifications, and advanced fitness features. Samsung has out-innovated Apple on new smartphone features for years, but for some reason watches are an area it cant compete on. Dont get me wrong, previous Samsung watches were among the best available for Android phones, and the physical rotating bezel on some models is wonderful. But the Tizen operating system lacked sparkle, elegance and simplicity. For a while, my theory was that it was being held back by its compatibility with all phones; it couldnt specialise in bringing out what made Samsung smartphones great, because Samsung wanted to sell it to iPhone and Android users alike. Samsungs Galaxy Watch4 is powered by Googles WearOS. The brand-new Samsung Galaxy Watch4 keeps the same look as the recent Samsung Galaxy Watch Active2, but runs on Googles Wear OS with a custom skin, giving it access to the (admittedly, still limited) apps in the Google Play Store for Wear OS. It also does away with trying to be all things to all people, no longer compatible with iPhone and reserving its best features for Samsung owners only, such as Body Composition, Blood Oxygen and Blood Pressure. Incidentally, two of those are features that the Apple Watch doesnt have. But, after a week of use, my experiences have been mixed. Receiving notifications has been better a lot of the time, though I still have multiple instances each day where the watch vibrates and makes a sound, but then displays no notification. At those times I feel like one of the characters in Lassie, trying to guess whether Timmys fallen down the well again. Prime Minister Scott Morrison has condemned the evil, calculated attack outside Kabuls airport overnight as he confirmed the Australian evacuation mission in Afghanistan has ended. Islamic State struck the crowded gates of Kabul airport in a suicide bomb attack early Friday morning AEST, killing scores of civilians and 13 US troops, and throwing into mayhem the airlift of tens of thousands of Afghans desperate to flee. Onlookers and injured people surround the site of a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. Credit:Asvaka News Agency via AP Kabul health officials were quoted as saying 60 civilians were killed. ISIS-K, an offshoot of the ISIS terror group, claimed the attack, which followed intelligence that warned of the threat. Video shot by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies strewn around a canal near the airport. At least two blasts rocked the area, witnesses said. Australia managed to get all its Defence and Foreign Affairs staff out of Afghanistan on Thursday night, shortly before the bombing. Warning: graphic content Kabul: Thousands of anxious Afghans seeking a new future were once again massing at Kabuls airport on Thursday, waiting to be frisked by the US Marine Corps at Abbey Gate. There were five days left before the departure of the Americans, five days to escape a nation suddenly under control of the Taliban. But as the crowds pressed forward to the gate, their entry point to a new life, a suicide bomber detonated his explosive belt. A second explosion followed at the nearby Baron Hotel, then gunfire. The entrance of a hospital after the explosions at the Hamid Karzai International Airport. Credit:Getty People were burning alive, people could not breathe, said one Afghan eyewitness, who was with his wife and other family members waiting for an evacuation flight. Dead people were everywhere, said a second Afghan man who, like other eyewitnesses, spoke on the condition of anonymity because he feared reprisals. I saw a woman in blood, wrapped up in a blanket covered in blood. By nightfall, the full extent of the carnage came into clearer focus. At least 13 US troops were dead and an additional 18 wounded, one of the deadliest assaults on US soldiers in the past two decades of conflict here and the first US military fatalities in Afghanistan since February 2020. Afghan refugees crouch in a group as British military secure the perimeter outside the Baron Hotel, near the Abbey Gate, in Kabul, Afghanistan. Credit:Getty The total number of casualties remained uncertain late on Thursday (Friday AEST). One person with knowledge of the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media, said 40 people were killed and 120 injured. He said the death toll was expected to rise, and other reports late Thursday put the tally far higher. The Taliban, who seized control of the country earlier this month, have promised to prove they can govern the nation and maintain security. But within seconds on Thursday, a sewage canal that flowed by the blast walls of the international airport was transformed into a mass grave, according to a video that went viral. In one section, twisted bodies mostly of young men, lay piled atop each other, some faces frozen in agony. Read more: Dead people were everywhere in carnage and chaos at Kabul airport The man on Facebook said he was an Australian citizen. Credit:Facebook DFAT has been contacted for comment. As thousands continued to descend on the airport two young girls were reportedly refused entry when their parents were let in. Pointing at the girls an Afghan man said: Mr Biden, you did this! You planned this. You made the deal with the Taliban. This is the consequences of it. Mr Biden you were against Trump, now we are against you. The Taliban took control of Afghanistan nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a US-led invasion following the September 11 attacks. The Talibans return to power has pushed many Afghans to flee, fearing reprisals or a return to the brutal rule they imposed when they last ran the country. Thousands of people are still thought to be trying to leave, and its not clear that all of them will be able to before the end of the month. Loading Another 1200 people were evacuated on six Australian flights and one New Zealand flight on Wednesday night. The total number of those rescued by Australian authorities is now more than 4000, which Prime Minister Scott Morrison said was more than three times what he anticipated a week ago. Those operations remain in place, they continue even now, but the situation is deteriorating, Mr Morrison warned. We will continue to operate safely, but paramount in our operations is ensuring the safety of those Australians who are directly involved in the evacuation. Asked about the bloodied Australian mans condition at a press conference in Canberra on Thursday, Mr Morrison said he didnt want to respond to the specific case. But I can assure you, anywhere we have been able to make it possible to get people out we have been doing that, he said. The Australian government has told any remaining Australians and Afghan nationals with visas not to travel to Kabuls airport, in a strong sign that the nations evacuation efforts may be over five days earlier than expected. Assistant Defence Minister Andrew Hastie on Thursday said there was now a risk of suicide bombers outside the airport. The situation has deteriorated so much now that the US, Australia and other countries have told people moving to the airport to turn back - because the risk of a suicide bomber is so high, he told the 6PR radio station. Evacuations were supposed to continue up until the August 31 deadline imposed by the Taliban, but the security situation around the airport has severely worsened over recent days. The Australian governments Smartraveller website updated its travel advice overnight, saying theres an ongoing and very high threat of terrorist attack in Afghanistan. Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport, the advice states. If youre in the area of the airport, move to a safe location and await further advice. Australian citizens, permanent residents and their immediate families should register with DFAT. Take all extra precautions for your safety. Remain vigilant and be aware of your surroundings. A spokesperson for DFAT said it was not the policy to turn away Afghan nationals with Australian visas at the airport. Australian officials are working around the clock to ensure the safe departure of Australians and visa holders seeking to leave Afghanistan, the spokesperson said. What is IS-K? IS-K is an offshoot of the Islamic State terrorists who established a sprawling caliphate in Iraq and Syria that was eventually destroyed by a US-led bombing campaign. The K stands for Khorasan, a geographical region which under the Abbasid caliphate from the 8th to the 13th centuries took in parts of what is now Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan and Central Asia. US officials have grown alarmed in recent years about the groups growing strength, savagery and intent on attacking Western targets. IS-K, in adherence to the wider Islamic State groups ideology, regards modern nation-states as colonial constructs and rejects all dealings with the United States, which it considers the modern enforcer of those constructs against the will of Muslims, who it believes should be ruled by a caliphate. It considers the Taliban, which has negotiated with Washington and forged diplomatic relations with Beijing and Moscow, to be corrupted and views its commitment to an Afghan state as un-Islamic. The two militant groups have engaged in attacks on each other. Of particular concern for military planners is IS-Ks focus on launching attacks in Kabul. It mounted six major attacks in the Afghan capital in 2016, 18 attacks in 2017 and 24 in 2018, the official said. Its attacks have continued to intensify. People tend to a wounded person near the site of a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. Credit:AP Theyve been a persistent and vexing problem because, despite all the pressure that we and then the Taliban have placed on them, theyve managed to maintain operational cells that have been effective as weve seen over the past few years in Kabul, London said. Most of the attacks that were the most heartless ones, like against hospitals and the maternity ward, were all [IS-K]. That capability to launch deadly attacks is also the reason IS-K poses such a threat to the Taliban and the affiliated Haqqani Network, London said. They maintain these capabilities, and those are the reasons they and the Taliban are mortal enemies because [IS-K] represents a competitor. They represent a competitor for resources, materials and power, even though theyre relatively small. Who are the Islamic State-Ks fighters? The group started as several hundred Pakistani Taliban fighters, who took refuge across the border in Afghanistan after military operations drove them out of their home country. Other, like-minded extremists joined them there, including disgruntled Afghan Taliban fighters unhappy with what they unlike the West saw as the Talibans overly moderate and peaceful ways. As the Taliban pursued peace talks with the United States in recent years, discontented Taliban increasingly moved to the more extremist Islamic State, swelling its numbers. Most were frustrated that the Taliban was pursuing negotiations with the US at a time when they thought the movement was on the march to a military win. The group also has attracted a significant cadre from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, from a neighbouring country; fighters from Irans only Sunni Muslim majority province; and members of the Turkistan Islamic Party comprising Uighurs from Chinas north-east. Many were attracted to the Islamic States violent and extreme ideology, including promises of a caliphate to unite the Islamic world, a goal never espoused by the Taliban. What is their role with the taliban? They are enemies. While intelligence officials believe al-Qaeda fighters are integrated among the Taliban, the Taliban, by contrast, have waged major, coordinated offensives against the Islamic State group in Afghanistan. Taliban insurgents at times joined with both the US and US-backed Afghan government forces to rout the Islamic State from parts of Afghanistans north-east. A US Defence Department official, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was working covertly, said previously that the Trump administration had sought its 2020 withdrawal deal with the Taliban partly in hopes of joining forces with them against the Islamic State affiliate. The administration saw that group as the real threat to the American homeland. What makes them a leading threat? While the Taliban have confined their struggle to Afghanistan, the Islamic State group in Afghanistan and Pakistan has embraced the Islamic States call for a worldwide jihad against non-Muslims. The Centre for International and Strategic Studies counts dozens of attacks that Islamic State fighters have launched against civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, including minority Shiite Muslims, as well as hundreds of clashes with Afghan, Pakistani and US-led coalition forces since January 2017. Though the group has yet to conduct attacks against the US homeland, the US government believes it represents a chronic threat to US and allied interests in South and Central Asia. London said IS-K developed in Afghanistan and parts of Pakistan. Its members are a cross-section of tribes including Mehsudis, Waziris and Pashtuns from the cross-border area in the north-east quadrant. Thats where the heart of it is been. Those folks, really they dont really see themselves as Afghans, nor do they really see themselves as Pakistanis, London said. Loading A lot of IS-K members came up through the ranks of Pakistani extremist groups like Tehrik-e- Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LJ), which was involved in the 2002 kidnap and murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, according to London. But he said others defected from the Taliban because they favoured its more extreme and militant ideology. IS-K school attack On May 8, IS-K attacked a school for girls in Kabul and killed at least 68 people, wounding more than than 165, most of them girls, according to a Defence Intelligence Agency assessment cited by the Defence inspector-general. A suicide bomber drove a car laden with explosives into the schools gate, and, as the children fled, additional bombs exploded. The school was for the Hazara, a Shiite Muslim ethnic minority targeted by the Sunni IS-K. In May 2020, IS-K attacked a Hazara maternity clinic, killing 24 mothers, newborns and a health care provider. Before the withdrawal of US troops, negotiated by former president Donald Trump and accelerated by Biden, US military commanders sought to annihilate IS-K. Army General Joseph Votel, former head of US Central Command, declared that IS-K terrorists were not reconcilable. In 2017, the US Department of Defence unleashed the largest conventional bomb in the US arsenal, the Massive Ordnance Air Blast, also known as the Mother of All Bombs, on an IS-K stronghold. The explosion killed an estimated 96 fighters. Evidence of the groups fanaticism, according to intelligence gathered two years ago, showed that IS-K fighters stranded in mountain passes survived on a small supply of pine nuts, the intelligence official said. They preferred starving to profiting from the lucrative trade in opium, he said. MCT, AP, with Maher Mughrabi ~ Prosecutors refused to arrest the driver.~ PHILIPSBURG:--- Police are busy investigating an accident that took place on L. B Scott Road by the entrance of Emilio Wilson Estate where a motorcycle rider slammed into a car that was turning left to go towards the foot ballfield. The motorcycle rider passed away shortly after. SMN News learned that the deceased driver is known to all in the community of Simpson Bay as Jason Peterson. Police Spokesman Joe Josepha issued the short statement above and said more information will be released on Thursday. SMN News learned that a civil servant and VKS officer was involved in the deadly accident, relatives of the deceased are demanding justice because they said the driver of the car is a VKS officer and he is the one that hit down the motorcycle rider who was coming down L. B Scotts Road, riding straight along the main road when he was hit down by the VKS officer who turned left to enter into the Emilio Wilson Estate at a very high speed. The relatives said the Prosecutors Office chose not to detain the driver neither they did not order a blood or urine test to see if the VKS officer was under the influence of alcohol or any other substance. The relatives said that politicians such as former Minister of VROMI Miklos Giterson and others were prosecuted for minor traffic accidents while a VKS officer was let off the hook even after someone lost their lives. PHILIPSBURG:---The Rupert I Maynard Youth Community Centre was the venue for the recently concluded IGT Coding and Robotics Rock! Camp in St. Maarten. The virtual tech camp got off to a stirring start two weeks ago and came to a successful end on Thursday, August 19 with three teens now equipped with new computer skills to maximize on the benefits of technology in the current digital era. The IGT Coding and Robotics Rock! Camp is the latest groundbreaking educational outreach of International Game Technology (IGT) through its flagship philanthropic initiative, the IGT After School Advantage Programme (ASA). Introductory lessons in various aspects of coding and robotics were presented by the highly skilled team at the Mona GeoInformatics Institute (MGI) located at The University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica. During the camp, teens from the island; aged 16 and 18 years old, joined 33 other youth from several IGT After School Advantage Centre (ASA) sites across the Caribbean on Zoom, as they clicked away with enthusiasm into their delightful digital journey. The remaining participants were nationals of Barbados, Jamaica, St. Kitts & Nevis, and Trinidad & Tobago. All 36 youth accessed the daily sessions utilizing the state-of-the-art IGT ASA computer centres and equipment which have been provided and maintained throughout the Caribbean since 2011 by IGT the renowned leader in gaming technology. Regional Director for IGT in the Caribbean, Brendan Hames noted that the camp showcases IGTs innovative character and equally responds to calls from the regions governments for more investments in STEM education. We believe in technology. It is at the heart of what we do at IGT. The purpose of these ASA Centres is to open doors of digital opportunity. It is to bridge the digital divide that exists in our communities. We want to see Caribbean youth empowered and understand that with technology, there are no heights impossible. He continued, The future is digital and the IGT Coding and Robotics Rock! Camp offered each of these students an opportunity to maximize the use of technology so that they will know how to navigate the digital economy, learning, and professional spaces which are being presented to them today and which they will see more of, emerging out of a global pandemic. MGI, the partnering educational institution for this initiative, developed a robust and engaging curriculum from which the students were taught. This was done with expert guidance from Education Specialist and STEM Educator at the UWI, St. Augustine campus, Dr. Nalini Ramsawak-Jodha. The director at MGI, Dr. Parris Lyew-Ayee Jr. noted that in designing the curriculum, his team was very careful to make it practical and relevant to the social reality of the participants. We were committed from the onset to make this training relevant to the youths needs. It was a no-brainer to have a Child Development Specialist on board, giving us the relevant advice to complement our exciting lineup of coding and robotics modules for our students development. We know that these skills will give them the competitive edge they need in this time of the fourth industrial revolution where those who are not technologically savvy will lag. We made it interactive for them and are pleased that it all ended on fun and empowered note. On day one, students were given an in-depth overview of computer software, hardware, and applications used in coding and robotics. This overview set them in high gear to delve into their projects throughout the training camp. The MGI tutors adapted a practical pedagogic approach in lesson delivery while the students steadily navigated their way through the technical processes of developing their web pages with a myriad of creative and fascinating features. Some of the practical content covered included: HTML, JavaScript, and CSS projects along with group robotics activities. Ably guided by their MGI tutors in one of two Zoom breakout rooms, the students followed through intuitively with instructions on how to create a webpage and basic layout. Many questions were forthcoming in the Zoom chat and the camps WhatsApp group from IGT ASA Centre supervisors on behalf of students who encountered difficulties, but so too were the quick responses by the MGI representatives who were determined that no student would be left behind. Each student received a certificate of participation for their engagement in this first-of-its-kind Caribbean tech camp hosted and fully funded by IGT. Diane Logsdon, 66, of Science Hill, passed away Tuesday, August 31, 2021 at her residence. Arrangements are pending and will be announced later by Morris & Hislope Funeral Home. Condolences may be expressed to the family at: www.morrisandhislope.com. Somerset resident David Townsend was one of several who spoke at Somerset City Council Monday about the issue of homelessness and how it may be contributing to the rise of drug use in the community. Some residents are concerned about used syringes being discarded on the ground or in places where children can access them. Open Supervised Device Protocol (OSDP) what you need to know about modern and future proof access control security? Access control and management of trusted identities are the building blocks of security, safety, and site management policies for many businesses and organisations. The current pandemic has compounded this with the introduction of new policies and regulations, particularly around social distancing and contact tracing. Most organisations will have some form of legacy access control in place, ranging from the most simplistic options, such as locks and keys, to technology-based systems. The issue with legacy systems of any type is that risks, just like technology, evolve. What was secure, convenient, and efficient a few years ago is often found wanting as the threat landscape changes. The standards governing the development and testing of physical access control systems (PACS) have also evolved to improve security and product interoperability. An example is the Open Supervised Device Protocol (OSDP), introduced 10 years ago as an alternative to the antiquated and vulnerable Clock-and-Data and Wiegand protocols. However, when it comes to planning infrastructure upgrades or implementing new tools, businesses must carry out due diligence to ensure the solutions are future-proof and deliver the expected level of security. Vulnerabilities and challenges In the early 1980s, Clock-and-Data and Wiegand protocols were widely adopted as the de-facto standard for interoperability between access control readers and physical access controllers. Those de-facto standards were later formalised and adopted into industry standards by the Security Industry Association in the 1990s. Wiegand is unencrypted and unable to protect from man in the middle attacks and vulnerabilities There were weaknesses, though, Wiegand is unencrypted and unable to protect from man in the middle attacks and vulnerabilities from the reader to the controller. Not only that, but Wiegand delivers limited range options and is operationally inefficient. It is also easy to target via its learnable language and a host of hacking devices available via online sources. Furthermore, the retrofitting installation alongside a legacy system is complicated for integrators and expensive for organisations, as most readers require dedicated home-run wiring. Extensive wiring on a large-scale project, such as a school or corporate campus, results in considerable often prohibitive costs for the installation of a PACS. Legacy access control protocol Despite the well-publicised vulnerabilities and weaknesses, Wiegand is still one of the most common protocols in legacy access control, with estimates indicating it is used in more than 90 percent of installed systems. This not only presents issues about physical security but also raises concerns relating to the protection of personal data. Access control systems not only contain information about who can and cannot use certain doors. OSDP is a communication standard Modern systems include a wide range of personal data, ranging from qualifications and certifications of individuals, home contact details, and even medical conditions or HR and employment information. With the potential fines associated with GDPR breaches, companies need to take this concern seriously. These weaknesses pushed the security industry to adopt a new protocol: Open Supervised Device Protocol (OSDP). This access control communications standard was developed by Mercury Security (now part of HID Global) and HID Global in 2008, and donated, free of intellectual property, to the Security Industry Association (SIA) to improve interoperability among access control and security products. Since then, it has been adopted as a standard by SIA, becoming the first secure, bidirectional reader/controller protocol to be governed by a major standards body in the security industry. In 2020 OSDP reached an additional milestone in becoming an International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) standard. Why implement OSDP as a standard? OSDP is the only protocol that is secure and open for communication between readers and controllers The growth of networked devices, such as video and access control products, has led to an increased demand for converged solutions. Businesses and organisations recognise the value of implementing an integrated solution to enhance security and add value to technology investment. OSDP is the only protocol that is secure and open for communication between readers and controllers and is also being widely adopted by industry-leading reader and controller manufacturers. It is an evolving, living standard, making it a safer, more robust, future-proof option for governing physical access control systems. OSDP offers important benefits: 1) Increased security Implementing OSDP standards can increase security, as OSDP with Secure Channel Protocol (SCP) supports AES-128 encryption that is required in U.S. federal government applications. Additionally, OSDP constantly monitors wiring to protect against tampering, removing the guesswork since the encryption and authentication are predefined. 2) Bidirectional communication Early on, communication protocols such as Wiegand were unidirectional, with external card readers sending information one way to a centralized access control platform. OSDP has transformed the ability for information to be collected, shared, and acted upon with the addition of bidirectional communication for configuration, status monitoring, tampering, and malfunction detection, and other valuable functions. In fact, OSDP is the only open, non-proprietary, bidirectional, secure protocol for communication between card reader and physical access controller. 3) Open and interoperable OSDP adds new technology that enhances its ability to protect incoming and outgoing data collection OSDP supports IP communications and point-to-point serial interfaces, enabling customers to flexibly enhance system functionality as needs change and new threats emerge. They also can proactively add new technology that enhances their ability to protect incoming and outgoing data collection through a physical access control system. 4) Reduced installation costs OSDPs use of two wires (as compared to a potential of 11 wires with Wiegand) allows for multi-drop installation, supervised connections to indicate reader malfunctions, and scalability to connect more field devices. Daisy-chaining accommodates many readers connected to a single controller, eliminating the need to run home-run wiring for each reader, and the use of a four-conductor cable achieves up to 10x longer distances between reader and controller than Wiegand while also powering the reader and sending/receiving data. 5) User friendly OSDP gives credential holders greater ease of use, with audio and visual feedback such as coloured lights, audible beeps, and the ability to display alerts on the reader. For security administrators, managing and servicing OSDP-enabled readers also becomes increasingly convenient, as OSDP-enabled readers can be remotely configured from network-connected locations. Users can poll and query readers from a central location, eliminating the cost and time to physically visit and diagnose malfunctioning devices. Unlimited application enhancements OSDP streamlines installations and upgrades while saving organisations the expense of replacing readers OSDP supports advanced smartcard technology applications, including PKI/FICAM and biometrics, and other enhanced authentication protocols used in applications that require Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) compliance and interactive terminal capabilities. Audio-visual user feedback mechanisms provide a rich, user-centric access control environment. OSDP offers advantages for users, administrators, and integrators, alike. It adds security and real-world efficiencies, and its interoperability ensures that organisations can use systems from numerous manufacturers as they invest in infrastructure that maximises the protection of critical data. For our part, HID Globals range of HID Signo readers is OSDP verified, ensuring they offer the intended interoperability and security for secure bidirectional communication and provide an easy migration from Wiegand devices. In a campus environment, OSDP streamlines installations and upgrades while saving organisations the expense of replacing readers if a new access control solution is implemented. There are also service and maintenance benefits as OSDP encourages continuous monitoring of system uptime and allows for remote configuration of -- or upgrades to -- a reader. Cost savings upon system upgrade Integrators can also capitalise on the introduction of OSDP by encouraging open standards, which can, in turn, help them build new customer relationships and win more projects. Although upgrading to access control systems that adhere to OSDP standards is a significant initiative, the range of benefits outweighs the cost of upgrading. Increased security coupled with business efficiencies adds value for those administering the system and a high level of interoperability ensures users can deploy systems from numerous third-party manufacturers. Integrators who understand the benefits of OSDP can also help their customers support both current and future technology requirements. When a sites needs change, OSDP offers significant cost savings as the open functionality makes adding new devices easier and reduces the expense of requiring all readers to be replaced if a new solution is installed. Businesses and organisations transitioning to OSDP will also enhance value in terms of operational costs such as servicing and maintenance. News spotlight Landkamer begins role as new Nicollet County administrator PhilipW / By PHILIP WEYHE philip.weyhe@apgsomn.com Mandy Landkamer is the new leader of Nicollet County, accepting the county administrator position after the Board of Commissioners selected her at the end of an interview process Aug. 18. (Philip Weyhe/southernminn.com) Landkamer Whiting A new, but familiar face will be at the top in Nicollet County. After interviews Wednesday, Aug. 18, the Board of Commissioners deliberated and ultimately decided to select Mandy Landkamer as the new county administrator. The other finalist was Polk County Administrator Chuck Whiting. These were two strong candidates, Board Chair Terry Morrow said. We were pleased as a group with the candidates brought before us. Both offered strengths and visions for the county. The idea of being dependable, trustworthy, having communication with staff (makes Landkamer stand out). Being there to support residents and visitors and staff is a core function of the Nicollet County administrator position. I think Mandy articulates that commitment, and in the interim position, she has enacted those principles. As she said, she talks the talk and walks the walk on these points. Long-time employee Landkamer previously served as the interim county administrator and Property and Public Services director for Nicollet County. She has also served as their Environmental Services director and has been employed with Nicollet County for over 13 years. Prior, she served as a land use specialist/enforcement for Blue Earth County for one year, as the senior planner/deputy zoning ordinance administrator for Nicollet County for six and a half years, and as an assessing clerk for the city of Eden Prairie for nearly one and a half years. Landkamer is a Buffalo, Minnesota native who went on to get a bachelors degree in political science from Minnesota State University, Mankato. She originally started working for Nicollet County in 2000 on a recommendation from one of her instructors at MNSU Tina Rosenstein. She has gone on to work for the county for about 20 years, with just over a year away when she took a job elsewhere around 2006. Nicollet County is a smaller county, but everyone seems to have a common goal and common values, Landkamer said of why shes stuck around. I missed that at my other job. And just building relationships with our residents was part of it, too. In property services, we typically deal directly with rural residents; its not just one conversation; its multiple, and you get to build that trust over time. While she enjoyed her work in property services, she had higher aspirations, hoping to one day be a county administrator. t had been a professional goal of mine to be a county administrator, and the opportunity came up here, she said. Not that many times does a position like that come up within your own county that you really enjoy working in. Landkamer replaces former County Administrator Ryan Krosch, who left, along with Human Resources Director Jamie Haefner, under mysterious circumstances. The two former county leaders both departed with separation agreements, but no public explanation from the county. Landkamer said she intends to be clear and accessible in her leadership role. We want to make sure that we have clear communication and transparency for all of our residents, she said. The county has made some changes in the last year to encourage transparency to our residents, and if there are concerns, we would like to hear those concerns. Interviews During the final interview, Landkamer emphasized her familiarity with the county and her interest in helping it to move forward in the direction it is now. She noted that she believes Nicollet County is a progressive (forward thinking) county within the state of Minnesota, and thats a reputation she wants to continue. Whiting was clear from the top that, at almost 62 years old, he will look to retire in three-to-five years, which may have impacted his chances, but the board did not specify on any particular reasoning, instead voting through a straw poll. The vote was 4-1 for Landkamer in the straw poll, but then all five voted in favor when the motion was made to offer the job to Landkamer. Landkamer later signed a contract to officially take the position. During her interview, she said, I would say that Im an invested employee; Im here for the long haul; I have no intention of leaving. She also spoke at length about her leadership over the last decade-plus in the Property and Public Services Department. She used that experience to answer one question about working with someone who disagrees with her and offers resistance. In my experience, working in Planning and Property Services, we deal with the facts, she said. In my situation, its laying out the facts, providing them with a timeline of events, whats happening now and what the potential outcome will be. If you can make a decision based on facts, there are no questions about how you reached that outcome. Of course, she will have more than zoning-specific work in her leadership role for the county. One area she admitted minimal experience was in finance and long-range planning. As we work with DDA early in the process, we talked about what type of qualities are indispensable and what areas can potential and development be acceptable, Morrow said. No one is going to check each and every box perfectly. I specifically asked about budgeting, and the response I received was that budgeting is something that you can learn, as long as you know the basics. He added, You cannot teach dependability, a commitment to serving the public. On the other end, an area that Landkamer is confident she will push forward is technology. Weve learned a lot in the last year and a half related to how important technology is to our day-to-day work, she said. We did so much of our communication (in the PPSD) through email. We set up a separate account for people to submit plans. We did some of our site visits over Zoom. It was an opportunity to be pushed as a county and see that Wait, we still can do this, and look, we can do it even faster and more efficient too. She also made a point to mention the work being done locally with more diverse communities, and she highlighted that as an area she wants to see the county continue to pursue and move ahead. Sky today announces a new eight-part Sky Original drama A Town Called Malice, a raucous crime thriller and family saga set on the Costa Del Sol in the early 1980s, with a pulsating 80s soundtrack. Casting is yet to be announced but filming is set to begin later this year and run into 2022 in London and Spain.The series is a co-production between Vertigo Films, Sky Studios and Rogue State, and is created by Nick Love (Bulletproof, The Sweeney), who is also the lead writer on the series. A Town Called Malice follows the Lords, a crime family of petty thieves from South London who have fallen to the bottom of the criminal food chain. And theyre not happy about it.Gene Lord is the youngest son in the clan, overlooked and neglected by his family who fail to recognise his killer instincts and keen intelligence. After narrowly surviving a gangland battle, Gene and his formidable girlfriend, Cindy, flee to Spain to evade arrest. The lovers quickly find themselves embroiled in the local underworld, and trouble starts to follow these two like night after day.When the other Lords join them on the Costa del Sol, the family realises this is a golden opportunity to re-invent themselves and re-capture their former glory - much to the annoyance of Gene and Cindy, who have a very different plan. This is an operatic and high-octane thriller - and a musical love letter to the 80s - filled with romance, obsession, violence, deceit, swagger and high camp.Gabriel Silver, Director of Commissioning, Drama, Sky Studios, said: If Dallas and Pulp Fiction created a love child to the strains of Duran Duran, it would be A Town Called Malice -- an intoxicating cocktail of 80s romance, avarice and violence, served up with pineapple chunks and an umbrella Brought to life so brilliantly by Nick Loves scripts, audiences will be taken back to the vivid world of the Costa Del Sol in its pomp, with a glorious take on the soundtrack of the era. The series is a fantastic addition to our growing line-up of home-grown, British drama on Sky in 2022.Nick Love creator and writer said: Im over excited and hugely grateful to Sky for supporting my vision once again - I have lived and breathed Malice for the past few years, and for it finally to come to fruition, is a dream come true.Jane Moore, CEO of Vertigo Films said: Vertigo is delighted to be working once again with Sky and our long-time friend and colleague, Nick Love, on this exciting project, and look forward to bringing Nicks unique vision of the 80s to life on screen.A Town Called Malice was commissioned by Zai Bennett, Skys Managing Director of Content with Paul Gilbert as the Commissioning Editor for Sky Studios. The series is a co-production between Vertigo Films, Sky Studios & Rogue State. Nick Love is the lead writer and is joined in writers room by Melissa Bubnic, John Jackson, Liz Lake and Matt Evans. The series producer is Andy Noble.NBCUniversal Global Distribution will handle international sales of the series on behalf of Sky Studios.A Town Called Malice will TX on Sky Max and NOW in late 2022. STAMFORD Once a year, descendants from the small Italian village of Settefrati gather in Stamford to pay tribute to their ancestral hometown. At the center of the celebration stands a massive, six-foot painting depicting a young shepherdess kneeling in prayer side-by-side with an angel before the Lady Madonna. But this year, when the time for the annual Mass to honor La Madonna di Canneto (Our Lady of Canneto) came around, the painting was nowhere to be found. I was hoping that it had just been moved somewhere. But we searched the whole church, and we couldnt find it, said Antonia DAmico, president of the Madonna Di Canneto Society in Stamford. The painting, which sits on a raised altar decorated with flower arrangements during the Mass, has been the centerpiece for the celebration since 1931, when the Settefratese Social Club the host of the Mass was founded in Stamford. During the celebration, people often kneel before the painting, which is in homage to a local legend in the greater Lazio region, and say silent prayers. After the Mass, many can be seen taking photos in front of the painting. DAmico said she and other members of the club were shocked when they learned the antique painting was missing from its home inside the Sacred Heart Church in Stamford when they were preparing for the annual Mass last weekend. The painting originates in an old legend told by the townspeople of Settefrati, which is located in the Province of Frosinone, about 75 miles east of Rome. According to the legend, one day a shepherdess was leading her flock of sheep through a valley in the region when she was greeted by an apparition of the Mother Mary, who came bearing a mission for the young girl. The apparition told the shepherdess to go immediately to the archpriest of Settefrati and tell him that the mother of God wants a church dedicated to her in the valley. The child replied, however, that she could not leave her sheep there, since there was no water in the area. The legend goes that in response, the woman touched a nearby rocky cliff and water began to gush out. That previously nonexistent water source eventually became the Melfa River, or so legend says. Legend has it that the miracle spurred the people of Settefrati to build the Sanctuary of Canneto, which still draws visitors from around the world. DAmico said that when Settafratese immigrants started coming over to America between World War I and World War II, a large contingent of them banded together and, in a nod to their heritage, pitched in together to purchase the painting. These were all first generation immigrants, so they really had to nickel-and-dime and pool their money together in order to buy the painting, she said. The painting has since become a sort of linchpin for their community. Thats why when DAmico learned the painting was missing last weekend, she said her heart sank. She said she has filed a police report for the missing the painting, but she hopes it can be recovered without any lengthy investigations. Please help us find it, she said in a plea to the public. The painting just means so much to our community and we just want to know what happened. Its been with us for a very long time, and its very meaningful to us. Its not about the money, its about what it means to us. The Stamford Police Departments Property Crimes Unit is investigating the missing painting. Anyone with any information about the missing painting is asked to contact police at 203-977-4407. DANBURY An arrest warrant for a teen charged Tuesday in connection with the Aug. 11 shooting at the Danbury Fair mall outlined for the first time what investigators learned following the incident that led to a sweeping lockdown and massive response from law enforcement. Derek Sotelo, 18, of Danbury, was identified as being part of the group that arrived at the mall intending to confront the group that included the 14-year-old male shooter, Lt. Adam Marcus said in a statement on Wednesday. The alleged 14-year-old shooter in the incident was charged after he turned himself in Aug. 16. Marcus said Sotelo was seen on surveillance footage displaying a hammer as a weapon during the incident. A judge granted a warrant to charge Sotelo on Tuesday, and detectives took him in to custody at a Danbury residence. Sotelo was charged with criminal attempt to commit second-degree assault, first-degree reckless endangerment, inciting a riot, inciting injury to a person, risk of injury to a minor and breach of peace. His bond was set at $100,000. The charges stem from the Aug. 11 shooting at the mall, where a 15-year-old girl was shot in the upper chest. Police from surrounding towns responded to help Danbury and state police lock down and evacuate the mall. In Sotelos warrant, police provided previously unreleased details about the shooting and those involved, including what surveillance footage captured. The shooting happened just outside of Macys second-floor exit into the mall, between Jennys Spa and Aeropostale, according to the arrest warrant. An officer reported finding a spent shell casing near Jennys Spa. Macys surveillance video footage showed a group of seven people go into the store at 6:57 p.m. One of the people in the group seemed to be trying to keep something secure in his waistband, investigators wrote in the warrant. The footage captured another group sitting on some chairs outside the Macys within the mall. When the first group comes out of Macys at 6:58 p.m. the footage, which has no audio, shows things were getting heated between the groups, the warrant read. Thats when one boy gets up from a chair, walks backward toward Jennys Spa, pulls a gun from his waistband and fires one shot, investigators wrote in the warrant. The individual from the first group, who was described as trying to keep something secure in his waistband, is seen on the footage with a hammer in his right hand. The warrant said he lunged toward the shooter before both individuals fled in opposite directions. Around 7 p.m., about two minutes after the gunfire, five of the seven people in the initial group are seen on the surveillance video rapidly exiting Macys, the warrant read. The teen who appeared to be holding something in his waistband was seen on the footage running from the store, carrying an object that appears to be a hammer in his right hand, according to the warrant. The victim, who initially would not give her name or information to police, eventually told officers she was in the mall with some friends, in Macys, and remembered ducking and getting hit with something, the warrant read. Danbury Hospital staff told police the girl suffered a fractured vertebrae. She was transferred to Connecticut Childrens Medical Center in Hartford for further treatment. Her injuries were not considered life-threatening. Marcus said investigators identified the 14-year-old alleged shooter, also a Danbury resident, and recovered the gun used in the shooting. A warrant was granted for the teen on Aug. 13. Three days later, accompanied by his parents and an attorney, he turned himself in at police headquarters. He was not named publicly given his age. The investigation is ongoing. Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Paul Carroccio at 203-797-2169 or p.carroccio@danbury-ct.gov. Anonymous calls can be made to the tips line at 203-790-8477. Milton, PA (17847) Today Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming mostly clear overnight. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming mostly clear overnight. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Localized flooding is expected. DAVIDSON [emdash] With heavy hearts, we announce the death of Edwin Sarbiewski (Davidson, North Carolina), born in Ashtabula, Ohio, who passed away on August 30, 2021 at the age of 85. He was loved and cherished by many people including : his parents, Bruno Sarbiewski and Blanche Sarbiewski; FILE - Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones poses for a portrait on Nov. 14, 2016, in New York. Watts' publicist, Bernard Doherty, said Watts passed away peacefully in a London hospital surrounded by his family on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. He was 80. (Photo by Victoria Will/Invision/AP, File) Published: 26 August 2021 Domestic tourism at a record high level in July 2021 Overnight stays at accommodation establishments were at a record high level in July 2021. Overnight stays by resident tourists exceeded by more than a quarter the level of July 2019 preceding the corona crisis. Overnight stays by non-resident tourists decreased by 77 per cent compared to July 2019. The total amount of overnight stays was 3.34 million, which was two per cent more than two years ago. These figures are preliminary data from Statistics Finlands statistics on accommodation establishments and they have been collected from accommodation establishments with at least 20 beds or caravan pitches with electricity connection. Monthly overnight stays at accommodation establishments, 20192021 July records were broken in nearly all regions The recovery of tourism is illustrated by comparison with the year before the corona crisis started in 2020. For leisure trips, overnight stays by resident tourists increased by 30 per cent from July 2019. Overnight stays by resident business travellers also increased by 14 per cent. Overnight stays by non-resident leisure travellers were 80 per cent less than two years ago and 65 per cent less by non-resident business travellers. Changes in overnight stays (%) by month and trip purpose, 2021/2019 Examined by region, overnight stays decreased compared to July 2019 only in Uusimaa, by 31 per cent, North Karelia, by 16 per cent and South Karelia, by 2 per cent. Compared to July last year however, overnight stays increased in all regions. Change in overnight stays in July by region 2021/2020,% Occupancy rates of hotel rooms high in several regions Among the regions, the highest occupancy rates of hotel rooms were measured in North Karelia, 87.5 per cent, and in South Karelia, 86.4 per cent. In Helsinki, the hotel room occupancy rate was 48.7 per cent, 86.8 per cent in Tampere, 91.1 per cent in Turku, 81.0 per cent in Oulu and 36.2 per cent in Rovaniemi. In July 2021, the realised average price of a hotel room was EUR 105.99 per day for the whole country. Twelve months earlier, it was EUR 99.20. There was a total of 54,656 hotel rooms available in Finland, which was 7,292 more than in July 2020. Hotel room occupancy rate and the monthly average price Overnight stays increased by 4.9 per cent in January to July 2021 In January to July 2021, a total of 9.13 million nights were spent in Finnish accommodation establishments. This was 4.9 per cent more than in the corresponding period one year earlier. In all, 8.58 million overnight stays were recorded for resident tourists and 0.55 million for non-resident tourists. The number of nights spent by resident tourists increased by 24.6 per cent and nights spent by non-resident tourists declined by 69.9 from the previous year. Overnight stays declined from all of the most important countries of inbound tourism to Finland. The smallest drop was seen in overnight stays by Swedes. Overnight stays by them declined by 14 700 nights. The biggest drop was seen in overnight stays by Russians, down by 231,500 nights. Their overnight stays were 94.5 per cent down on January to July 2020. The biggest group of non-resident tourists were Germans with 80,000 overnight stays. The second largest group was Estonians with 67,000 overnight stays. The third largest group was Swedes with 57,000 overnight stays, and fourth were U.S. tourists with 31,000 overnight stays. The fifth largest group was Dutch tourists (19,000 nights), sixth was Britons (17,000 nights), seventh French (16,000 nights) and eight was Italians (15,000 nights). Change in overnight stays in January-July 2021/2020, % Source: Accommodation Statistics. Statistics Finland Inquiries: Ossi Nurmi 029 551 2984, liikenne.matkailu@stat.fi Head of Department in charge: Hannele Orjala Publication in pdf-format (388.8 kB) Updated 29.07.2021 Referencing instructions: Official Statistics of Finland (OSF): Accommodation statistics [e-publication]. ISSN=1799-6325. July 2021. Helsinki: Statistics Finland [referred: 2.9.2021]. Access method: http://www.stat.fi/til/matk/2021/07/matk_2021_07_2021-08-26_tie_001_en.html Ambassador Hiroshi Ueda said on Thursday in Braila that the suspension bridge in Braila, built by the Japanese company IHI Systems, is a conclusive example of the connection between Japan and the EU, established through the economic partnership in year 2019, agerpres reports. "Today's ceremony marks the erection of the catwalk platform of the suspension bridge at Braila in the year of the centennial of diplomatic relations between Japan and Romania. The bridge is built by the association between companies IHI from Japan and Astaldi from Italy. This bridge is very important for improving the connection between the Black Sea area and the eastern part of Romania, but also between Romania, an EU member country, and the Republic of Moldova, a non-EU country, and thus with all European countries. It is also a conclusive example of the connection between Japan and the EU, established through the partnership in 2019. I am very proud that Japanese technology is contributing to such a significant project," Hiroshi Ueda said at ceremony marking the 100th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Japan and Romania. The diplomat mentioned that 100 years ago, when the diplomatic relations between Japan and Romania were laid, the whole world faced the "terrible Spanish flu" and today, on the centennial of these relations, we face the COVID-19 pandemic.The Embassy of Japan and the company IHI Systems organized on Thursday, aboard a ship on the Danube, in the immediate vicinity of the bridge site, a ceremony dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Japan and Romania.Deputy Prime Minister Dan Barna and local authorities from Braila, Tulcea and Galati were present at the event marking the centenary of bilateral relations between Romania and Japan.The tender for the construction of the suspension bridge over the Danube was won, in January 2018, by the association of IHI Systems from Japan and Astaldi from Italy and the contract stipulates that the work will be completed in 2023, given that 18 months are allocated for design and 36 months for building.For this purpose, non-reimbursable funds were allocated in the amount of approximately 363 million euros from the European Regional Development Fund, money that will be used both for the construction of the bridge and for the construction of a 23-kilometer road network, which will connect with the bridge.The suspension bridge over the Danube will have a length of 1,974 meters, of which 1,120 meters represent the central opening, to which are added two lateral openings of 489 meters on the bank from Braila and 364 meters on the bank from Tulcea. At the time of completion, it will be the third bridge in Europe in terms of central opening and length. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bogdan Aurescu, sent a message on Twitter on Thursday in which he strongly condemns the terrorist attacks in Kabul, mentioning that the institutional crisis task force is in contact with the nine Romanian citizens in Afghanistan, who were not affected by the attacks, agerpres reports. "I strongly condemn today's terrorist attacks in Kabul. Condolences to the families of the victims and speedy recovery to the injured! MAE Romania / Interinstitutional Crisis task force is in contact with the 9 Romanian citizens still in Afghanistan who were not affected by the attacks," Aurescu wrote. The Pentagon said at least two blasts near Kabul airport on Thursday were part of a "complex bombing" in which U.S. civilian and military casualties were reported. The local media, quoted by the EFE agency, report that at least 13 people were killed and another 60 injured as a result of the two explosions. The deputy Prime Minister Dan Barna, co-chairman of USR PLUS (Save Romania Union - Unity, Liberty and Solidarity), said on Wednesday evening, for public TV broadcaster TVR, that he has a "fair and balanced relationship" with the head of state, but there are topics where they have different points of view. "There are and have been - in the last months, also being summer, it was no longer the case, but there have been, during the first months, a monthly meeting with the president where we discussed about the current agenda. I am convinced that once the parliamentary activity resumes, this will also resume. I have a fair and balanced personal and institutional relationship with the president. Of course there are certain topics where we have different points of view, as it is normal, in a functional and democratic political system", Barna declared. He specified that the president never felt to step in to a subject, in another way than expressing his point of view. "The president steps in or stepped in more like a point of view. I cannot say that I felt at any moment that the president would intervene in a topic. The president's message, just as I perceived it during each meeting, was that we were urged to be responsible and to understand the fact that Romania has no other option today other than this coalition," Dan Barna added. The implementation of Romania's aggregate national budget in the first seven months of 2021 ended with a government deficit of 33.97 billion lei (2.89% of GDP), down from 49.68 billion lei (4.71% of GDP) seven months into 2020, the Finance Ministry announced on Thursday, agerpres reports. "This positive trend was determined by an increase in government revenues by 1.38 percentage points of GDP y-o-y, mainly influenced by an advance in Value-Added-tax (VAT) revenues and European funds, as well as by a cut in government outlays by 0.44 percentage points from GDP, as staff expenditure decreased. Also, in July, there is a budget balance close to zero (-0.16 billion lei), compared to -4.5 billion lei in July 2020," the Finance Ministry points out. At the same time, in January-July 2021, investment expenditures were by 4.87 billion lei higher than in the same period of the previous year, and the extra payments generated by the COVID-19 epidemic were 9.18 billion lei, 14.05 billion lei in all or 1.2% of GDP. Education Minister Sorin Cimpeanu, said on Thursday that an implementation schedule for the "Educated Romania" project will have to become available before September 10, adding that in order to achieve the intermediate objective of the project, the allocation 4.7% of the Gross Domestic Product for education spending, money from Romania's National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR), money from the European Social Fund and funds from the national budget are taken into account, agerpres reports. "Today we had the first meeting of the inter-ministerial board for the implementation of the 'Educated Romania' project. It was in fact a meeting in preparation for the next meeting on Thursday, September 2, at 13:00hrs, a meeting where each of the ministries represented in the inter-ministerial board will receive information and will decide from the perspective of the ministry they represent on to the implementation schedule, which will have to become available by September 10, according to the deadline pledged in a governmental memorandum. We presented the current state of play and we presented the objectives that we must achieve under the 'Educated Romania' project. Things are not good at all, as we know," Cimpeanu said on Thursday, at the end of a meeting of the inter-ministerial board monitoring the implementation of the 'Educated Romania' project. Early in the meeting chaired by Prime Minister Florin Citu, Cimpeanu said that underfunding is one of the challenges facing the Romanian education system."We are at almost 3.6% of GDP, but in a governmental memorandum we pledged to reach as an intermediate objective 4.7% of GDP in education spending, which is what the European average for public education spending is. Of course, money should be geared toward where they can generate reliable results. I have always understood and supported the principle that results in education can always be seen in the medium and long term, but we can have a consistent strategy, that is our role, more precisely, a schedule for the implementation of the 'Educated Romania' project under which to direct investment in education in an efficient way," said Cimpeanu.He explained that Romania will reach a 4.7% of GDP in public education spending through budget building. President Klaus Iohannis said on Thursday that Romania needs to increase its COVID-19 testing resources and streamline its public health directorates. "Regarding our health system, the minister of health presented to me the measures designed to deal with wave four [of the COVID-19 pandemic]. Doctors are already well trained and experienced. There is a clear need to streamline public health directorates. I'm expecting more involvement from everyone to increase the testing resources, as well as to prepare the healthcare system to take on non-COVID patients as well. Those patients should receive the treatments they need and not suffer as the 4th wave intensifies," Iohannis told a news conference at the Cotroceni Presidential Palace. The clarifications were made at the end of a working meeting on the beginning of the new school year with Health Minister Ioana Mihaila and Education Minister Sorin Cimpeanu. The schools will open on September 13 with the physical presence of all preschoolers and pupils, with strict observance of the protection norms: mask, distancing, ventilation of classrooms, if the incidence of the last 14 days of cases in the locality remains below the threshold of 6 coronavirus infections per thousand inhabitants, announced President Klaus Iohannis. "In order to ensure a quality education for as many pupils as possible, although the health crisis has not yet ended, this is why the schools will open on September 13 and will operate with the physical presence of all preschoolers and pupils, of course, with strictly respecting the protection norms: mask, distancing, ventilation of classrooms. As long as the incidence in the last 14 days of the cases in the locality remains below the threshold of 6 infections per thousand inhabitants, we will have all the children in the classrooms. If this threshold is exceeded, schools go online in that locality," the head of state specified, after the working meeting regarding the beginning of the new school year with the Minister of Health, Ioana Mihaila, and the Minister of Education, Sorin-Mihai Cimpeanu. President Klaus Iohannis said on Thursday that Romania is in the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic and the effects of this pandemic wave depend directly on vaccination coverage. "We are in the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic and I wanted to talk to the two ministers, on the one hand, about how the healthcare system is prepared and, on the other hand, about the beginning of the new school year. This pandemic wave depends directly on the vaccination coverage of the Romanian population," said Iohannis after a working meeting on the beginning of the new school year with the Health Minister Ioana Mihaila and Education Minister Sorin-Mihai Cimpeanu. The government is seeking to amend the current draft Law on vulnerable consumers so that more than 427,000 households, as provided for so far, can benefit from support in paying the bill, Labor Minister Raluca Turcan said on Thursday. "According to the current draft law, it is about 427,000 beneficiaries, and their support will have a budgetary impact of 172 million lei. We want to have more beneficiaries, but I will present the result after discussions with the prime minister," Turcan said. She pointed out that this will be done by increasing the revenue ceiling from which these aids will be granted, through amendments that will be brought to the current bill. "We have seen a lot of manipulations, misinformation and generalizations that do not do any good, even if some are trying their best to show that this government is out of touch with reality and are not concerned with governing. They are wrong and they are lying. As an immediate tool to compensate for the rise in prices and the increase in the cost of living we have made the Law on Vulnerable Consumers transparent since the end of December. We were close to getting the law dropped on our heads, because few believed in it, people said we had no money and it was not appropriate," Turcan said. "The law has an emergency procedure and has been lying in Parliament since March when it was approved by the government, it has not been voted on yet. So far, why has no one come up with suggestions?!" the Labor minister wondered. On Wednesday, Labor Minister Raluca Turcan said that the Law on compensating the vulnerable consumers' energy bills could be applied as of January 1 next year, if the bill is expedited in Parliament, Agerpres informs. The Financial Oversight Authority (ASF) has launched an online instrument that facilitates the process of authorization on the non-banking financial market which is part of the institution's strategy to digitize its activity, announced, on Thursday, the ASF. The new section of the Authorization heading, hosted on the Authority's website, makes available to those interested a list with all the necessary documents in the process of authorization on all three markets, as well as the normative acts that govern the process. "As I promised since taking over my mandate, we bring new, digital solutions to come to the support of citizens, as well as companies. ASF must be an institution that works in the interest of the consumer, and this new online instrument represents one of the projects done in this sense," said the head of the Financial Oversight Authority, Nicu Marcu. The head of the ASF mentioned that, in the coming period, the new online section for the authorization process will have new value, becoming an interactive portal, where it will be possible to upload documents and use electronic signatures. "ASF is transforming into a flexible, modern, digital institution. The interactions between us and stakeholders must be just a click away," said Nicu Marcu. The Financial Oversight Authority was established in 2013 through Emergency Ordinance 93/2012, approved by Law 113/2013, to regulate and oversee the insurance market, the private pensions market, as well as the capital market. ASF contributes to the consolidation of the integrated framework for functioning of the three sectors, which total over 10 million participants, Agerpres informs. Prime Minister Florin Citu said on Thursday that it is time for the "Educated Romania" project to be implemented, underscoring that it will have funds from multiple sources, and Romania's National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) includes opportunities to fund projects of utmost importance to the national education system. Citu participated in the first meeting of an inter-ministerial board monitoring the implementation of the "Educated Romania" project, also announcing that on September 2 a new meeting will take place in order to prepare the first related pieces of legislation. "It is the largest education reform project, 'Educated Romania', developed by the Presidential Administration, a project that represents the vision and strategy of the country in the field of education ahead of 2030, supported, of course, by the government agenda 2020-2024. At the same time getting the 'Educated Romania' project started was included as a commitment in the National Defence Strategy for 2020-2024," said Citu. He added that the reforms envisaged by the "Educated Romania" project, combined with the measures provided for in the government agenda, are harmonised with the specific country recommendations of the European Commission and with the national reform programme. "'Educated Romania' is in PNRR - I would like to announce in this way that PNRR will be approved at the end of September, so we are on schedule with PNRR - and operational programmes, central budget, local budgets, public-private partnerships, non-reimbursable funds, funding, contributions of privately-owned companies. So we have sources of funding; we now have a platform, 'Educated Romania,' we know very clear where we want to go with the system, it is time to implement this programme," said Citu. The prime minister added that the premises for a new legislative package are being created. "And that, in fact, we are doing under this inter-ministerial board in order to secure the necessary legal support for the reform and coherence with other legal regulations, as well as with the requirements of a constantly changing socio-economic environment. In order to implement the 'Educated Romania' project, a PNRR draft submitted to the European Commission in June 2021, includes opportunities to finance projects of the utmost importance to the national education system designed for training and reaching the pledged reform targets. On July 14, 2021, the Government took up by memorandum the implementation of the 'Educated Romania' project and the approval of priorities in the reform of the national education system (...) This is the first meeting today, and I would like to announce that next week, on September 2, we will already have another meeting to prepare the first pieces of legislation that will enter into force. I believe on September 9 we will have the first pieces," said Citu. Presidential adviser Ligia Deca pointed out that pending the passage of a legal framework for the "Educated Romania" project, there is a need to speed up some measures already pledged by the government regarding education and for the best possible inter-institutional co-operation. "There is a next stage with a deadline of September 10, and already the minister, together with my colleagues from the Department of Education and Research, is working on a draft implementation plan to be discussed and finalised with you starting next week precisely in order to be able to be passed on in the public space, that will say what we propose concretely with steps, actions, deadlines, managers and budgets for the implementation of the 'Educated Romania' project. There have been many debates in the public space since the official launch, the level of expectation for change for the better is very high and I think it will be at its peak with the start of the school and university year. Therefore, I am very glad that we can meet in an extended format to anticipate a little these expectations of the society and put on the table some things that can happen even faster than the adoption of a new legal framework. These are good things (...) and they do not necessarily need a new legal framework, but speeding up some measures, plus inter-institutional co-operation," said Deca. She warned that Romania does not afford to lose any more children from the formal educational process, given the alarming estimates of the demographic trend. "There is also a demographic emergency: if the current trend holds, Romania's population could fall below 16 million inhabitants by 2050. Also, the percentage of young people in the overall population is low, which leads us to the need to support every child in Romania. More bluntly: we cannot afford to lose any child, we want each of them to become active citizens to steer the society the way we want, in a European context, in a democratic context and so on," the presidential adviser explained, Agerpres informs. There is now a simplified registration procedure for finance-seeking companies on the Made in Romania platform developed by the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB), following the transfer of public data from the Termene.ro platform, the Stock Exchange said in a release on Thursday. Thus, when a company profile is completed and the Single Identification Code is introduced, all the public data required for registration in the Made in Romania community is automatically taken over. The new functionality is implemented with the support of Termene.ro, a platform that provides real-time updated information about Romanian companies, which is available at www.investingromania.com. "Through the Made in Romania program, the Bucharest Stock Exchange proves its dedication and engagement in building a solid business environment. The results of the Made in Romania editions in recent years, but also the ever increasing openness of entrepreneurial companies towards the capital market show us that we are on the right track. The partnership with Termene.ro comes to reaffirm our direction towards digitalization and transformation of everything stock market into a product that is flexible and easy to access both by the entrepreneurial teams seeking financing and by investors," said Bucharest Stock Exchange CEO Adrian Tanase. The Made in Romania platform was launched in April 2021, along with the 4th edition of the Made in Romania program. There are currently 114 company accounts, 45 consultant accounts and 91 investor accounts registered on the platform. The companies that register in the Made in Romania community have the opportunity of getting in contact with the financiers and to participate in a mentoring program that will take place in the next period, Agerpres informs. The National Alliance of Romania's Student Organizations (ANOSR) is criticizing, on Thursday, the Government for the way it is managing public funds, accusing it of allotments "by the stroke of a pen" and depending on "arbitrary interests", by which it is slowing down the increase in the quality of life of students, while increasing the subsidies of political parties. "The message that the Government is sending to the students of Romania is that the needs of the political parties are a priority, which raises a lot of questions if other measures that regard the performance and the equity of the higher education system, as well as the employability of students will not remain 'important' only in closed drawers. (...) Despite the prior statements of the Prime Minister of Romania, Mr. Florin Citu, regarding the subsidies for political parties, the Government he leads proposes the supplementation of funds from the state budget for these subsidies. (...) We request, still, adequate financing and measures for the issues of students, which should not remain only PR pages in the Governing program," states the ANOSR, in a release. "It is hard for us to figure out how badly the situation of students has to deteriorate, affected by the pandemic and lacking any dedicated mechanism, for the Government to wake up to reality," stated the chairman of the ANOSR, Horia-Serban Onita, quoted in the release. According to the organization, the information presented by the Government regarding the budget revision that is to be adopted this week shows that the sums for subsidies allotted to political parties will be increased from 162 million RON to 265 million RON, Agerpres informs. Certain issues assumed in the governing program "did not take any step further", Save Romania Union-Unity, Freedom and Solidarity Party (USR PLUS) co-chair Dan Barna told public broadcaster TVR on Wednesday evening, stressing that a coalition cannot function if "a partner (...) ticks all its political goals and another partner stands by and applauds overcome with emotion". "In a coalition, the political goals and strategic goals of each partner must be prioritized equally. The idea that one partner or another ticks all their political goals and another partner stands by and applauds overcome with emotion cannot ensure the functioning of a coalition. There are topics - SIIJ [the Section for the Investigation of Judicial Crimes], zero taxes on the minimum wage (...) - which, although they have been brought on the agenda and are part of the governing program, have not taken any steps further. Or, a coalition cannot function in circumstances where only one or the other of the members fulfills their objectives," declared Barna. He stressed, however, that leaving the government, although it would be the easiest option for USR PLUS, would not help Romania. "The easiest thing is to slam the door and go home. There is a group in our party that says, 'Let's leave government, and go home. This is not possible, we either carry out our reforms or we leave.' That's the easiest option, but it's an escape that doesn't help Romania at all, because if we were to leave government, we would dramatize for two or three days, bloody tickers, misery, crying, after which Romania will be the one before USR PLUS. A Romania in which there would be very little hope and in which people would have no one to believe in anymore. Many of them, those who see the European Romania. Not all in this country are like that, but at least that piece of Romania that believes that Romania can modernize is looking at us right now," added the USR PLUS co-chair. Dan Barna said his party is determined to remain in the coalition "until it becomes clear that no reforms can be made." However, he considers that this situation will not be reached, because he found, both in the National Liberal Party (PNL) and the Hungarian Democratic Union of Romania (UDMR) "an openness and a responsibility for what the need for reforms in Romania means". Four years later, the St. Louis company has 115 employees and has raised nearly $90 million in venture capital. Its latest financing round, announced last week, brought in $37.5 million and was led by Stripes, a New York firm that has backed such companies as GrubHub and Blue Apron. Cliff Holekamp, a partner at Cultivation Capital, taught Bernstein in an entrepreneurship class at Washington University, and Cultivation is an investor in Balto. In the recent venture capital round, Holekamp said, Balto had the choice of which financing partners to work with. They had multiple offers. Eberlin said he wasnt surprised to see his former employees find success. I knew they were super gifted, he said, I was all for it when they left to pursue such a great idea. Baltos staff has more than doubled in the past year, and the new money will fuel more growth. Kontes said the company has 43 open positions now and expects to have 200 employees by next year. But in 2016, Qatar reached out, and a year later, Boeing was awarded a $6.2 billion contract for 36 new planes. When Leeanne Caret, CEO of Boeings defense arm, addressed Qatari officials on Wednesday, she said the deal led to work on an upgraded F-15, the EX, that got Washington writing checks again. Kumar, the F-15 program head, later said the Qatari variant created a baseline for the EX, which has radar and other systems unique to the U.S. We owe you gratitude in so many forms, Caret told Qatari officials before unveiling the plane at Wednesdays event. The U.S. Air Force inked a $1.2 billion contract last July for eight updated planes, two of which were delivered earlier this year. Congress passed a budget with money for 12 additional planes in December. And in its most recent budget proposal in May, the Air Force said it expects to buy 144 in total. Kumar said that will keep the line going through the end of the decade. ST. LOUIS Lawyers for Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, leading a lawsuit filed with 11 other states, sought on Wednesday to block an order by President Joe Biden that places a social cost on the production of greenhouse gases. Bidens order aims to assign a cost to pollution and then use that value to guide federal decisions. But Schmitt and the states argue in their suit that the administration, in applying the costs to virtually every regulatory program administered by the federal government, has exceeded its authority, and will have wide-ranging impacts on the U.S. economy. These values are going to be incredibly important, said John Sauer, Missouris solicitor general and a top aide to Schmitt. Theyre designed and intended to have a far-reaching impact on the economy. Oral arguments opened on Wednesday in federal court here. Bidens team argued Schmitt and the states dont have grounds to sue over a government decision that has yet to be finalized or harm anyone. The lawsuit was filed in March by the group of Republican attorneys general, several of whom are mounting runs for higher office. That same month, Schmitt announced his run for Missouris U.S. Senate seat set to be vacated by the upcoming retirement of longtime incumbent Roy Blunt. Bolyards has thoroughly transformed the space that previously housed the second iteration of the Dubliner and, before that, the Muddled Pig. The exterior brick has been painted white. The interior, which in its past couple of lives evoked the proper dimness of a pub without the corresponding coziness, now features natural light and gleaming white tile. The look is minimalist, though one wall is decorated with a pattern of illustrated livestock. The model is counter-service; you place your order at the same counter where you can peruse and make purchases from the butchers display case. In its retail and restaurant operations, Bolyards continues to feature pasture-raised beef, pork and poultry from Missouri farms: Price Family Farm in Troy, Newman Farm in Myrtle, Buttonwood Farm in California. (For this review, I called ahead for takeout on each visit, so I cant report on the speed of table service. On the phone, employees generally and accurately estimated around 15 minutes to prepare my orders.) The drugs are lab-made versions of virus-blocking antibodies that help fight off infections. Antibody treatments are among the few therapies that can lessen the effects of COVID-19, and they are seen as an option for those with mild to moderate cases who arent in hospitals. BJC Healthcare in St. Louis has been offering the treatment since November with great success, said Dr. Maya Jerath, co-lead for monoclonal antibody treatment at BJC and a professor of medicine at the Washington University School of Medicine. Jerath said just 3% to 5% of patients at BJC who receive the antibody treatment end up being hospitalized, which is a lot lower than you would expect with the kind of patients that they are because this is being used in high-risk patients. Among the factors that put people at higher risk are old age, obesity, diabetes and heart disease. Demand is especially high in states that have low vaccination rates and crowded hospitals, such as Missouri, Florida, Louisiana and Texas. The White House said recently that federal shipments of the drugs increased five-fold in July to nearly 110,000 doses. The main antibody drug is Regeneron, which the U.S. government purchased in mass quantities. Regeneron is the drug former President Donald Trump received while he was hospitalized with COVID-19 in October. Allison Dolak, principal of Immanuel Lutheran Church & School in Wentzville, said her small parochial school had the means to use rapid COVID-19 tests for students and staffers but it took ingenuity. Dolak said applying for tests was a no-brainer to help keep their doors open. There would have been so many kids that had to online-learn had we not had those tests, she said. At times, the suburban St. Louis school had to call on parents who were nurses to administer them. Dolak even performed a few herself in the parking lot. State data as of early June shows the school received 200 tests and used 132. It did not require masking. Many schools indicated they intended to test only staff members, applications obtained by Kaiser Health News show. Missouri directed schools at first to use Abbotts rapid tests on symptomatic people, which further limited testing. Arguably, some of the reasons limited testing occurred arent bad in interviews, educators said they curbed infections by screening for symptoms and requiring masks. Currently, Missouri authorizes testing on symptomatic and asymptomatic people. He pleaded guilty the next year and was sentenced to three years in prison; but Judge Darrell E. Missey suspended execution of the sentence and put Treece on probation, according to online court records. A probation violation was filed with the court on July 26. Treece is also facing a pending charge in Jefferson County for domestic assault in May. The arrest warrant said Treece is a persistent offender with four felony convictions, including unlawful use of a weapon in St. Louis city and assault and resisting arrest in Columbia, Missouri. The judge in the Columbia case ordered Treece to undergo anger-management training, among other requirements. His attorney in the crossbow case, Guy Wold, couldnt be reached for comment. In Tuesdays attack at the gas station, Jefferson County Sheriff Dave Marshak said, someone outside the gas station asked Treece what he was doing after seeing Treece put on a ski mask holding a machete. Treece said something to the effect of, Im going in to scare a guy, then walked into the gas stations convenience store. Agreeing to a moratorium on new charter schools needs to be the first step in any partnership with the district, said board member Alisha Sonnier. While I understand that a citywide plan cannot just be SLPS, the commitment does have to be in centering SLPS and in protecting SLPS, Sonnier said at the meeting. We have to acknowledge whats most at risk here and who is most vulnerable and start there. Representatives of Better Futures including David Dwight, executive director of Forward Through Ferguson, and Sherita Love, executive director of the Education Equity Center of St. Louis, did not commit Tuesday to supporting a moratorium during their presentation to the board. Lets engage with that as a conversation but theres so much urgency these efforts have to go forward, Dwight said. After the meeting, an SLPS spokeswoman released a statement saying the district will pause further engagement in Better Futures until the School Boards concerns are addressed. A spokesman for Mayor Jones said she is following the districts lead and that her participation is contingent on adding more stakeholders to the planning process. The case is likely to be appealed, but judicial scrutiny of the legislation is not over. Last week, attorneys for Cedar and Cooper counties asked Green to block the law over concerns about provisions affecting the regulation of concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs. Green has not issued a decision in that case. Regarding the health orders, the legislation allows a local health agency to issue public health orders similar to the type issued during the pandemic for no longer than 30 days before a countys governing body must act to extend the order by a simple majority. If there is no declared state of emergency by the Missouri governor, the local governing board would have to approve extension of the order by a two-thirds vote after 21 days. The limits on local health orders took effect immediately after Gov. Mike Parson signed the measure on June 15 because lawmakers added an emergency clause to the legislation. The bill also forbids governments from requiring COVID-19 passports by requiring someone to show proof of vaccination to access a transportation system or other public accommodation. KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) Federal prosecutors in Missouri have charged 19 restaurant owners and managers most living in Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma accusing them of a racketeering scheme to hire and employ immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. The indictments unsealed Wednesday charges the defendants with counts ranging from fraud and conspiracy to money laundering and illegal use of social security numbers. They were unsealed as federal Homeland Security agents carried out search warrants at 10 locations in Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma. Fourteen of the 19 people indicted were arrested. The case involves 45 Mexican restaurants across several states that received employment services from Specialty Foods Distribution, based in Joplin, Missouri, and another affiliate. Prosecutors allege that over the course of nearly 20 years, the company helped staff the restaurants with people not eligible to work in the U.S. The indictment names Jose Louis Bravo, of Claremore, Oklahoma, and owner of Specialty Foods Distribution, as the leader of the operation. Attempts to reach Bravo through the company Thursday morning were unsuccessful, and a message for Bravo could not be left with the company's voicemail system. Even people who got vaccinated are expressing anxiety these days, wondering whether theyll be protected from the delta variant. Most likely yes, if it involved any of the three vaccines available in the U.S. Every one of them, Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson and Johnson, make the chance of dying from the coronavirus, or even going into the hospital, much lower. But some vaccine recipients might still be worried because theyve heard mRNA vaccine immunity wanes. This story is still evolving, but its common for circulating antibody levels against any microbe to drop over time. Its also common for cells that make specific antibodies to remain in the body long term, often hanging out peacefully until re-exposure causes them to ratchet-up antibody production. Likewise, specialized immune cells, called T cells, can lurk around in low numbers ready to nab the virus and amp up the immune system. These cells are harder to detect than antibodies, so the storys not clear cut. Nonetheless, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is recommending that people who got an mRNA vaccine but who didnt respond strongly should get a booster shot now. Who are those people? Those who had been treated with immune-suppressing drugs for something like cancer or an autoimmune disease recently are among the candidates. Nows the time for them to get the booster. Eric Schmitt is at it again. Missouris lawsuit-happy Republican attorney general who has sued China over the pandemic, sued schools over mask mandates, and sued to overturn the 2020 presidential election is now suing the Biden administration over its attempts to address climate change. This ongoing abuse of litigation to stoke the hard-right base for his U.S. Senate run should tell voters everything they need to know about Schmitts fitness for that office. Or this one. As the states top lawyer, the attorney generals primary duty is to represent the Missouri government in court, and more broadly to represent the legal interests of Missouri citizens. Of course, attorneys general of both parties, here and in other states, routinely push beyond their formal job description to weigh in on political controversies. This isnt always a bad thing, as long as they observe the line between serious litigating and ideological pandering. Schmitt lands on the wrong side of that line a lot. Shares is the leading weekly publication for retail investors. It is packed with investment ideas, news and educational material to help build and run portfolios and get more from your money. Shares puts on free Investor Events throughout the year across the country. They provide an opportunity for investors to learn more about companies on the stock market and hear from a range of investment experts including fund managers and Shares journalists. The U.S. Navy received the first of at least five APL-S-67 berthing barges in July and the fifth one began construction in August. These Auxiliary Personnel Lighter-Small berthing barges are a new design and the first new navy berthing barge design since the 1950s. Sailors who have seen the new APL-67s report that in addition to being new, they have a lot of the new features sailors have long sought for these temporary accommodations. The older berthing barges had not aged gracefully and the navy did not put a high priority on spending money required to keep the elderly berthing barges at least as accommodating as living quarters on warships. Another problem was that there were not enough berthing barges available to meet demand. In some emergency situations sailors are housed in local hotels temporarily and the difference between that and a berthing barge was considerable. Worse, many sailors or close kin had spent time on commercial berthing barges used in remote work sites. This was the standard the new navy berthing barges had to match. The APL-67 barges have to be towed into position and the first one is on its way to an American naval base in Yokosuka, Japan. Before the completion of the first APL-67 class barge, the most recently built berthing barge was twenty years old, and one of the World War II era APLs was still in service. The basic APL design was created in World War II and over fifty were built by 1945. Some went through refurbishment and were kept in service for decades. Some commercial berthing barges were obtained during the naval build up in the Persian Gulf after 2001. Commercial berthing barges are widely used, with accommodation ranging from basic to motel-class for housing workers in areas where there are no suitable commercial accommodations. Oil field workers in remote parts of the world are frequently housed in berthing barges and morale was maintained by using modern, comfortable berthing barge designs. The APL-67 design is larger and with more amenities than the World War II APLs, which held about a hundred personnel each. The APL-67s will replace six older berthing barges, some of them way past their replacement date. Thanks to the Internet, sailors assigned to these older barges reported to other naval personnel the decrepit conditions on the older barges and a few sailors familiar with more recent berthing barge designs described the differences in excruciating and embarrassing, for the navy, detail. The older barges had become a major morale problem, which was part of the motivation for the new APL design. The first three of these new barges will all be in service by 2022. The first two will cost $39 million each and that includes the cost of designing them. These ships will all have entered service by 2023 and ultimately the average cost per barge will be about $30 million each. The new 2,700-ton barges have accommodations for 74 officers and 537 enlisted sailors. The new barges are built to accommodate mixed gender enlisted personnel. Each barge has all the facilities found on warships. This includes offices, classrooms, washrooms, laundry, medical treatment, barbershop and a fitness facility. There is a dining facility that can feed 228 enlisted and 56 officers per sitting. These six new berthing barges are the beginning of a program where all older berthing and messing (dining only) barges, especially those with accommodations inferior to those found in the latest warships, will be replaced. Improving ship accommodations was found to be a major factor in whether sailors stayed in the navy. The navy is also building a larger version of the new berthing barge that can accommodate about a thousand personnel and feed 3,000 a day. The new barges reflect changes in the last fifty years, with ships getting more amenities and mixed-gender crews. More crew members have families and can often live at home during longer periods when the unmarried crew is on the berthing barges. The barges are currently used at eight bases or shipyards in the mainland United States, plus some in Hawaii, Guam and Japan. The navy has long used berthing barges to house crews when their ships are undergoing repairs or refurbishment that makes it impossible for the crews to still live on the ship. Since World War II the navy has used berthing barges, rather than barracks ashore, for this task. The berthing barges spend most of their time tied up to a dock and connected to shore-based electricity, sanitation and water supplies. The main advantage of berthing barges is that, when needed at another base or shipyard, they can be disconnected from local utilities and towed to the other base, just like any other barge. The new barges will have better-living accommodations for enlisted crew and, most importantly, are new, not decades old. Moreover, the new barges are built to house civilians to support the navy assisting in disaster relief missions. This is a relatively new task but one that is much appreciated in U.S. and overseas locations where the navy shows up to provide supplies, electricity (from ships), communications and air (helicopters and surveillance) support. The APL-67s are built to last at least 40 years, including one or two rounds of refurbishment. Chinese efforts to gain control of the South China Sea have become increasingly aggressive. For example, this year Chinese garrisons on artificial islands have been firing flares towards approaching Filipino warplanes or ships. Its a symbolic gesture but another escalation towards eventually opening fire with real bullets. In the last few months, the online (Information War) and diplomatic aspect of the South China Sea conflict has become particularly heated and unscrupulous. China is usually the aggressor online and in news media while delivering a kinder and gentler message diplomatically. Recent remarks of senior Filipino officials demonstrate that the Philippine government is nearly unanimous in believing the Chinese assurance and promises cannot be trusted. While the Philippines admits it cannot stand up to China in a war, they can use Chinese tactics and disrupt Chinese military and civilian operations in the South China Sea. Other nations suffering from the Chinese aggression are similarly fed up and going Chinese on the Chinese. Filipinos are also angry at other forms of Chinese deception and outright lies. For example, China promised large economic investments in the Philippines and more Filipinos being allowed to work in China. Both of these gifts and investments never arrived. The promised foreign worker angle backfired big time as the government allowed more Chinese to enter the Philippines and many were not the expected tourists or legal entrepreneurs, but gangsters who have become a growing problem. The most recent backfire was the Chinese-developed covid19 vaccine that was provided to the Philippines. This initially backfired when it was discovered that China was charging the Philippines three or more times per dose as other customers in east Asia and Africa were paying. Moreover, the Chinese vaccine turned out to be much less effective than Western vaccines also available to the Philippines. Worse, all these negotiations and delays in Chinese deliveries have meant that the Philippines will be the last nation in the region to receive enough vaccine to suppress the covid19 threat. Recently China delivered large quantities of their vaccines at no cost. The Philippines appears to get most of the unwanted Chinese attention in the South China Sea because the Philippines has the most to lose. In terms of land area, the 7,600 islands that comprise the Philippines amount to only 300,000 square kilometers (120,000 square miles) of land area. Compare this to China, with 9.6 million square kilometers of land. According to international law, the Philippines controls (via its EEZ or Exclusive Economic Zone) water areas covering 2.26 million square kilometers. By the same standards the Chinese EEZ waters comprises 877,000 square kilometers. The Philippines is also the weakest (in military terms) nation China is seizing territory from and their mutual defense treaty with the United States is not always adequate to deal with the Chinese tactics. Moreover, the American government can change readily every four years because of presidential elections. The current U.S. president is seen as less steadfast in dealing with China. So far that has not been the case, as the new American government has only been in power since January 2021. So far the U.S. pledges to continue supporting resistance to Chinese South China Sea claims remain in place. Retrograde Rebels The accelerating decline of rebel and Islamic terrorist groups has led to more optimistic forecasts of when these groups will become non-existent, except the few veterans who join local criminal gangs. Earlier this year the communist NPA was seen as gone by mid-2022 and that now appears pessimistic. Military and police intel indicates that NPA is down to about 3,500 members and fading fast. This decline became noticeable after the late 2020 decision to designate the CPP (Communist Party of the Philippines) and NPA (New Peoples Army) terrorists under the New Anti-Terrorism Act. The NPA has been suffering a massive decline in popular and communist party support. Increasingly most NPA units must depend on extortion, theft and other criminal activity to survive. This is causing much anger and protest in areas where the NPA still operates for the good of the people. Yet the NPA can no longer do much political work when their very survival is at risk. The government tried, without much success, to negotiate a peace deal with the NPA. The leadership, as well as the commanders of various armed factions, were split on which peace terms were acceptable and most were continuing to operate (fighting and stealing). The NPA, to most Filipinos, have become bandits with a veneer of communist ideology to justify their crimes. The banditry option is not working well enough to assure long-term survival. This can also be seen when factions run short of money. Less cash and popular support led to more desertions. The army will grant amnesty to NPA members who surrender, especially if they bring their weapons and some useful information with them. Information on the location of NPA camps, weapons storage sites or covert supporters is considered useful and the fact that more NPA camps are being attacked, weapons storage sites seized and key supporters arrested indicates that the NPA is losing secrets as well as people and popular support. Some NPA leaders feel this is all a temporary setback and that a peace deal would enable a revitalized Philippines Communist Party to become a major political power. These delusions make negotiating a peace deal difficult. Meanwhile the NPA has maintained its status as a major source of criminal, as opposed to Islamic terrorist, activity in the country. Most of the NPA senior leadership live in Europe and are considered somewhat out of touch with the reality of what the NPA has become in the Philippines. The exiled NPA leadership still has some support in Western nations, which contributes to criticism of the Filipino tactics used to suppress NPA criminal activity. August 24, 2021: In the south (Lanao del Sur and Lanao del Norte provinces) soldiers pursuing ISIL (Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant) affiliated rebels since the 15th and that led to about 2,000 villagers fleeing their homes in the last week to avoid being near a gun battle between the troops and about 30 fanatic members of DITG (Dawlah Islamiyah Torayfie Group). Members of this group tend to fight to the death rather than surrender and will often make their last stand in a remote village, where dead villagers are considered involuntary martyrs in the defense of Islam. Remnants of several ISIL factions have been trying to survive in this area since 2017. DITG has few personnel left and there have been a few DITG bombings since 2019, usually against military convoys or camps. A month ago, one the last known DITG bomb-builders was killed and the army found evidence that there were more armed DITG members around than previously believed. On the plus side all or most of them had coalesced into one group led by a known DITG leader. This faction was first identified and encountered on the 15th and several times since then. The troops are trying to force the Islamic terrorists into a fight, or a surrender. DITG survived four years of constant army patrols and civilians who phone in tips as well as those who provide just terrorists have been here messages. While there is cell phone coverage in 95 percent of the populated areas there are still many rural areas where people own cell phones but have to travel to a town or city to use them. Desperate Islamic terrorists will destroy existing cell towers in areas where they are being pursued. What has hurt the Islamic terrorists most is that more rural Moslems openly provide information and the security forces have lists of towns and villages where there are informants. The names of informants are often not provided but local soldiers and police know that just asking local leaders or merchants will get them to someone who has timely information to share. DITG has been trying to regroup, rebuild and move forward with more devastating attacks. Their attacks since 2019 caused little damage and few casualties. DITG was never officially acknowledged by ISIL and is composed of the survivors of the Maute Group, which was largely wiped out in 2017 when they tried to take over the nearby city of Marawi. That failed in a spectacular fashion, which is one reason ISIL does not want to be associated with this group. August 20, 2021: In the south (Negros Occidental province), an army patrol, responding to a tip, confronted about a dozen NPA rebels and there was a 35-minute-long firefight, which left two rebels and one soldier dead. The remaining rebels fled in different directions. Local civilians had called the local army base to report the armed NPA men in their area demanding revolutionary taxes and trying to recruit locals, especially teenage boys, to join them. This NPA visit failed on all counts and is typical of what the NPA is suffering from; less fear and cooperation among local civilians. Too many civilians will see them coming and grab their cell phones to report the leftist rebels, and then stall them until the army or police arrive. The players are getting played. In the capital president Duterte publicly thanked the Chinese ambassador after the Chinese had donated another million doses of their Sinopharm covid19 vaccine. Duterte told the ambassador that the Philippines would remain neutral in disputes between China and other countries. That was a lie but the Filipinos have learned to use Chinese tactics against the Chinese. Everyone smiles and goes back to preparing for war. China wants the South China Sea and would prefer to get it without fighting. August 16, 2021: In the south (Eastern Samar province) acting on detailed information from locals, soldiers carried out a pre-dawn raid on an NPA camp locals believed was also where NPA built roadside bombs. Many of the NPA at the camp fled but sixteen were killed and 29 assault rifles were captured along with other equipment, including explosives. Some of the rebels who escaped were wounded and when it was light enough the troops tracked the fleeting rebels. Its become common for individual NPA members, especially after surviving an attack like this, to later surrender to police and guide them to hidden locations where bombs and other weapons were stored for later use. Local civilians have become increasingly and openly hostile towards the NPA on Samar Island. This began three years ago and. The communist rebels adapted to the hostility of the rural populations by attacking them regularly. These marauding leftist rebels are now seen as political bandits rather than potential liberators. The security forces had to deal with these new rebel tactics, which are particularly effective in rural areas where roads are few and the rebels can set up their ambush on routes certain to have army or police vehicles pass by. NPA use of roadside bombs and gunfire became a favorite tactic that caused the leftist more problems than it solved. In the South China Sea Filipino and Indian warships carried out joint training exercises. Five days earlier the two Indian warships had carried out similar training with Vietnamese warships off the Vietnamese coast. India has become a more active part of the growing coalition of nations opposing Chinese claims on the South China Sea. August 13, 2021: In the south (Maguindanao province) there was another arranged surrender by a BIFF (Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters) commander and his followers. In this case eleven BIFF men turned themselves in with their weapons and told interrogators what they knew. There are less than a hundred BIFF members left and most are veterans, which explains how they have remained active for so long. Because of their small numbers, BIFF has not been able to carry out any attacks lately. Just surviving has become a full-time BIFF activity. August 11, 2021: In the south (Sulu province) eleven more members of Abu Sayyaf Islamic terrorists surrendered. So far this year operations in the south have put about 150 Abu Sayyaf out of action with most of them surrendering. Surrenders and arrests account for nearly 90 percent of al Shabaab losses so far this year, with the rest killed by troops and police. July 29, 2021: The government agreed to renew the existing VFA (Visiting Forces Agreement) with the United States. Until recently president Duterte has threatened to let the VGA expire. Without the VFA any American troops entering the Philippines have to apply for a visa. This is a time-consuming process but that is not all. Without VFA American military personnel are subject to Filipino courts and legal proceedings. As a general rule the United States requires something like the VFA, usually called a Status Of Forces (SOF) agreement, before it will allow U.S. troops to enter the territory of a friendly nation. The Philippines still has a Mutual Defense Treaty with the United States and that could still be invoked by the Philippines if needed. The most immediate damage from no VFA is American military assistance during an emergency, usually of the natural disaster variety. The closest American aid is usually the U.S. Navy, which can quickly provide helicopters, medical care, electrical power (from docked warships) as well as radio and other communications gear brought ashore for a disaster zone. Without a VFA/SOF such emergency aid is limited depending on the risk from corrupt local justice systems and politicians. American troops have been visiting the Philippines to provide training assistance or, as has often happened in the last few decades, the U.S. forces provide additional intelligence and aerial surveillance support. Without the VFA these troops have restrictions on their activities. They are usually restricted to the bases they are working from as well as travel restrictions. The Filipino military opposed the VFA cancellation. The cancellation threat was in response to the U.S. sanctions imposed on some Filipinos involved with president Dutertes war on drugs. One of the key Filipino police commanders who carried out the war on drugs was Ronald dela Rosa, who commanded the national police at the start of the war on drugs five years ago. Two years later he retired, ran for the senate and won. His victory was largely because of his prominent role in getting the war on drugs going. Even before Duterte became president dela Rosa was a fan and, in the Senate, he became a major ally. But some foreign nations consider dela Rosa a criminal for what they feel was illegal acts during the war on drugs. Duterte and most Filipinos disagree with that. They also disagree with punishing dela Rosa with sanctions so there was some popular support for discarding the VFA. Duterte also demanded more economic and military aid than the U.S. was willing to provide. The Americans responded with some more aid but only in return for cooperation from Duterte. Montana Army National Guardsman John Clements Newell was arrested on suspicion of raping and strangling a woman at the Fort Harrison National Guard base on Aug. 19, 2021. (Lewis and Clark County Sheriffs Office) HELENA, Mont. (Tribune News Service) A Montana Army National Guardsman was arrested on suspicion of raping and strangling a woman at Fort Harrison, a National Guard base located outside Helena, according to authories. John Clements Newell, 31, is charged with felony aggravated sexual intercourse without consent and felony strangulation. On Aug. 19, a Lewis and Clark County Sheriffs Office deputy responded to Fort Harrison for reports of a sexual assault. The deputy made contact with the victim, who alleged that the previous night Newell had entered her room without permission raped and strangled her. Court documents state the defendant put his hand on the victims throat and pinned her against the wall, touched her chest and attempted to kiss her several times. He is also accused of attempting to take off her shirt, pinning her to the bed with his body weight and slapping her several times. The victim was reportedly able to wrestle out of his control, and the defendant allegedly attempted to make small talk with the woman before attacking her again. This time, Newell was accused of groping, raping and strangling the woman. The victim told the deputy that the defendant asked her later if the intercourse was consensual, and she told him yes out of fear of reprisal. Court documents state the deputy observed bruises on the victims neck consistent with her story. The victim said she is not in any relationship with the defendant. When the deputy made contact with the defendant, he invoked his Miranda rights to not speak to the deputy without an attorney present. Rob Allinson, public affairs officer for the Montana Army National Guard, confirmed the suspect is a National Guard member but said he could not provide any additional information on the matter. ___ (c)2021 the Independent Record (Helena, Mont.) Visit the Independent Record (Helena, Mont.) at www.helenair.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Texas National Guard troops have begun to clear land for construction of a border wall under the direction of Gov. Greg Abbott. About 60 of the more than 1,000 troops deployed on state orders are working on the border wall. The majority of troops are supporting the Department of Public Safety. (Texas Military Department) More than 1,000 Texas National Guard members are now deployed to the states border with Mexico, with some troops helping with the early stages of building a border wall, the governors office said. Gov. Greg Abbott announced the additional construction mission Tuesday, saying he has surged troops to the border under state orders. He initially deployed 500 troops in March to work with the Department of Public Safety in a border security mission dubbed Operation Lone Star. More than 60 Guard engineers are now working with local and state agencies to construct temporary barriers in key areas along the border, supporting the immediate need to deter criminal activity in the area, according to the Texas Military Department. The Texas National Guard engineer force is trained to [construct] expeditionary and temporary structures and barriers as a part of their base skill sets. Additionally, every service member assigned to Operation Lone Star receives additional training specifically for this mission, the department said. Abbott, a Republican, secured $250 million in state funding and then began requesting donations to build a border wall this year following President Joe Bidens announcement to end the construction started under former President Donald Trump. Abbotts office said they have more than $1.2 million in donations as of last week. The Texas National Guard is playing an unprecedented role to secure the border because of the unprecedented refusal of the federal government to fulfill its obligations under federal law, he said in a statement. Guard troops from at least two other states with Republican governors South Dakota and Arkansas were deployed to Texas. Abbott also has requested more funding for border security that, if approved, could increase the number of troops deployed. The state-controlled troops are in addition to about 3,800 troops deployed under federal orders to support the Department of Homeland Security across the entire U.S. border with Mexico. Those troops were initially deployed on the federal mission under Trump and remain under Biden, even after the national emergency declaration at the border was rescinded. Last month, Abbott announced the Texas Guard members would shift from a largely supportive role with the Department of Public Safety to helping state troopers arrest migrants for trespassing. The governors office and the Texas Military Department declined to say whether troops were only allowed to arrest people for certain violations or if they had the authority to enforce all state laws. The Department of Public Safety did not immediately respond to questions. Rose Thayer This story has been corrected A U.S. Marine Corps F-35B Lightning II stealth fighter prepares to launch from the HMS Queen Elizabeth on the Pacific Ocean on Aug. 20, 2021. (Zachary Bodner/ U.S. Marine Corps) The HMS Queen Elizabeth recently traded F-35B Lightning II stealth fighters with a U.S. amphibious assault ship at sea, another first for the U.K. aircraft carrier on its first operational deployment, according to the U.S. Marine Corps. The USS America and the Queen Elizabeth held a cross-deck training exercise Friday in the Philippine Sea, the first time the two flagships and their groups have worked together. The America, homeported at Sasebo Naval Base, Japan, its amphibious ready group and elements of the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit have been at sea since June, according to the Navy. The Queen Elizabeth, carrying 18 F-35Bs 10 of which are from a U.S. Marine Corps squadron is making its way to Japan for scheduled port calls in September. Its first patrol is expected to cover 26,000 nautical miles over 7 months and 40 nations. As part of the Navys Large-Scale Exercise 2021, the Queen Elizabeth launched F-35Bs, built for short take-offs and vertical landings, that the America recovered, reloaded, refueled and relaunched, according to a Marine Corps press release Tuesday. The operation highlighted a change in modern warfare, said Marine Corps Col. Simon Doran, U.S. senior national representative to the U.K. strike group. The [exercise] underscored our continued effort to shift away from static, built-up airfields towards distributed maritime operations, he said in the news release. The two groups trained through several other scenarios, including large-formation maneuvers, anti-submarine and surface warfare and aviation drills, according to a Sunday news release from the U.S. Navys 7th Fleet. These events allow us to work with an unmatched network of partners and allies in a complex environment, supporting the common goal of a free and open Indo-Pacific, Rear Adm. Chris Engdahl, commander of Expeditionary Strike Group 7, said in the release. The blended air wing aboard the Queen Elizabeth includes F-35Bs from Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 211 and the Royal Air Forces No. 617 Squadron. "The U.K. Carrier Strike Group offers the largest fifth generation air wing afloat today and working with our close allies to develop operating procedures and capabilities while concurrently showcasing the agility of land and carrier-based aviation in the Indo-Pacific demonstrates our commitment to the region," said Commodore Steve Moorhouse, the strike group commander, said in the Sunday news release. During a Tuesday night news conference, Moorhouse said Indo-Pacific exercises differ from those in the North Atlantic or Mediterranean because they focus primarily on multiple-threat scenarios. That presents a chance to learn to balance traditional surface and underwater threats with space and cyber elements. The ability of the two nations F-35Bs to communicate seamlessly highlighted the advantage of allied forces integrating their technology and communications, Moorhouse said. Failure to do so would be like fighting with one hand behind your back, he said. The Queen Elizabeth in the Indo-Pacific marks the U.K.s first military presence in the region in 25 years. The ship has completed several firsts since its departure from the U.K. in May, including an exercise with the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan in July. Correction A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that the exercise took place near the Hawaiian islands. Japanese and U.S. military officials collect samples of treated wastewater at Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, Okinawa, July 19, 2021. (U.S. Marine Corps) CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa The governor of Okinawa prefecture demanded the Marine Corps stop releasing potentially contaminated water into the public wastewater system, soon after the Marines started releasing it Thursday. At a news conference in Naha, Gov. Denny Tamaki said he learned the Marines were releasing the water at about the time it was being done. He said the Marines notified the prefecture and Okinawa Defense Bureau by email at 9 a.m. that the water, which contains low levels of toxic organic compounds, was about to be released. It must have come as a shock for all stakeholders, Tamaki said, adding that disposal methods were supposed to be discussed that day. "This is totally unacceptable. Representatives of the defense ministry and the U.S. military were scheduled to meet later Thursday to discuss results of July wastewater tests and disposal methods. The water contains spilled firefighting foam and is stored in underground tanks at Marine Corps Air Station Futenma. The Marine Corps treated the water prior to releasing it, but it still contains low levels of toxic PFOS and PFOA. Japanese officials collect samples of treated wastewater at Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, Okinawa, July 19, 2021. (U.S. Marine Corps) Once in the wastewater system, the water eventually reaches the ocean, according to a spokesman from the Okinawa Prefectural Enterprise Bureau, the agency responsible for the islands water quality. A defense bureau spokesman said the bureau was informed just prior to the waters release. He declined further comment Thursday. Government officials in Japan customarily speak to the media on condition of anonymity. Marine Corps Installations Pacific spokesman Lt. Col. Matthew Hilton announced the water release in a statement Thursday. He said it was treated by a PFAS Effluent Treatment System, an activated carbon/ion exchange system technology, to all but eliminate PFAS contamination in water. The PFAS residue removed by the system will be incinerated elsewhere in Japan at a facility approved by the Japanese government, the statement said. Hilton in his statement said the installations command would continue to focus on maintaining high standards of responsible environmental stewardship. He declined to say if the command had received permission from Japanese authorities to release the water. The Marine Corps has been fully open and transparent with stakeholders about its plan to treat the contaminated water, Hilton said in a subsequent email Thursday to Stars and Stripes. We are not going to release the communication exchange between the Marine Corps and local government, he wrote. PFOS and PFOA are synthetic compounds found in aqueous firefighting foam, aircraft grease, water-repellant materials and fluorine chemicals. They have been known to cause tumors, increases in body and organ weight and death in animals. In July, public broadcaster NHK reported that the U.S. military wanted to release harmful contaminants into a river on Okinawa. The Marines responded by saying it had asked to release the treated water into the wastewater system. Okinawa prefecture asked the U.S. military to thermally dispose of the contaminants rather than release them into the environment. The Marine Corps in a July 8 statement dismissed that idea and pledged to fully coordinate its plans with Okinawan officials prior to releasing any treated water. Japan has a combined safety threshold of 0.05 micrograms per liter for PFOS and PFOA for its drinking water. The threshold is not law, but a quality standard guideline. The United States threshold is 0.07 micrograms per liter. Samples taken at MCAS Futenma by the prefecture in July registered 0.0025 micrograms per liter, Tamaki said at the news conference. He said the situation was handled poorly by the U.S. military and not about whether a smaller number is good or bad. No samples taken from the water on July 19 exceeded 0.0027 micrograms per liter, the Marine statement said. This makes a safer and cleaner environment for all, the statement said. Tamaki called on the Japanese government to strongly protest the release of the water. HONOLULU The Department of Land and Natural Resources is warning mariners and others to stay clear Thursday of the Sampan Channel area of Kaneohe Bay while the U.S. Navy detonates one of two unexploded ordnance from about 13 feet of water. After the recent discovery of the munitions, DLNRs Division of Aquatic Resources asked the Navys Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit One Detachment Explosive Ordnance Disposal to dispose of them. To ensure the publics safety, DLNR and Marine Corps Base Hawaii will be patrolling outside the perimeter of the bomb site, which will have a 2, 100-foot security cordon around it, while the detonation occurs. A half hour after the first of the two bombs is detonated in place, the security cordon will be lifted. An all clear will be given no later than early afternoon. The second unexploded ordnance will be removed from the water and taken elsewhere for disposal. Personnel will also be deployed as animal watchers to ensure that marine wildlife is not in the area during the operation, DLNR said in a news release. To the extent possible, under the emergency circumstances, the Navy and DLNR will take steps to prevent and minimize adverse impacts to marine wildlife. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will also have monitoring and response teams on site before and after the operation to assist with preventing and minimizing potential harm to marine mammals and sea turtles. To report strandings and other incidents, call NOAA Fisheries Marine Wildlife Hotline at (888 ) 256-9840. ___ (c)2021 The Honolulu Star-Advertiser Visit The Honolulu Star-Advertiser at www.staradvertiser.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Kentucky State Rep. Brent Yonts, D-Greenville, attends a session in the House chambers in Frankfort, Ky., on March 1, 2007. Yonts, who was fully vaccinated, died Aug. 20, 2021, after battling a COVID-19 infection. He was 72. (Patti Longmire/AP) Former Kentucky lawmaker Brent Yonts, who sponsored mine-safety legislation and led a key House panel during his long legislative career, died Friday after battling a COVID-19 infection. He was 72. Yonts, a Democrat from Muhlenberg County, was first elected to the Kentucky House in 1996 and represented his western Kentucky district until his defeat during a statewide Republican wave in 2016. The GOP took control of the House in that election, cementing legislative majorities in both chambers. Yonts was vaccinated against the coronavirus, according to former colleagues. He still contracted the virus, was hospitalized for weeks and eventually was placed on a ventilator. In a social media post days before his death, his daughter, Ellen Yonts Suetholz, wrote about her father's battle with the virus. "We are all heartbroken and continue to pray for peace and healing for my dad," she wrote. "As we've not been able to be with him to comfort him, we especially pray he knows he is not alone. When we were able to talk to him, we were sure to let him know how many of you asked about him and prayed for him. He teared up every time we mentioned one of you." Yonts, an attorney, was a Frankfort fixture for decades in an era when Democrats controlled the House. He was known for his colorful jackets, clever wit and jet-black hair. In a social media tribute Friday, Gov. Andy Beshear said Yonts "worked to better the lives of Kentuckians." Yonts' legacy drew praise from both sides of the political aisle. Republican House Speaker David Osborne called Yonts a "respected colleague." The speaker said he hoped Yonts' family is "able to find comfort in his many accomplishments and the knowledge that Kentucky is a better place because of his service." In a joint statement, the House Democratic leadership team Reps. Joni Jenkins, Derrick Graham and Angie Hatton praised Yonts for his stint as chairman of the House State Government Committee, saying he "helped guide several critical laws strengthening our public retirement systems." The Democratic leaders called for intensified efforts, in Yonts' memory, to combat the pandemic. "On his behalf, we urge eligible Kentuckians to get vaccinated against COVID-19 if they have not yet and to take whatever other steps are necessary to put this terrible pandemic behind us," they said. "The virus has taken so much from so many, and the breakthrough case of Brent, who was vaccinated, is another tragic example of that." Yonts also was remembered for playing an instrumental role in passing mine-safety legislation. The measure included provisions that exceeded the requirements of federal law in response to mining accidents in Kentucky, mine safety advocate Tony Oppegard said Friday. The measure increased inspections of underground Kentucky mines, gave the state subpoena power to investigate unsafe working conditions in mines and required that all electrical work underground be performed by certified electricians, he said. "He was the rare legislator whose beliefs didn't shift with the political winds," Oppegard said. "He was a champion of coal miners and all working people." Buy Photo A statue of Elvis Presley, paid for by fans, stands on a bridge in a park in Bad Nauheim, Germany, where the American singer lived from 1958-1960 when he served in the Army. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Two years after Bad Nauheim last rocked to the strains of Elvis Presley soundalikes with slight German accents, it again welcomed thousands of visitors to its mid-August celebration of the king of rock n roll. Women in swing dresses walked through the spa towns parks, and couples danced in the street on Aug. 15, the last day of the European Elvis Festival. Next to the Hotel Villa Grunewald, where Elvis briefly stayed in 1958 when he arrived in Germany to serve as a U.S. Army private, people laid flowers and left candles and pictures at a stone memorial to the star. Nearby, Germans had their picture taken next to shiny Chevrolets and Cadillacs. Buy Photo Hotel Villa Grunewald overlooks Elvis-Presley-Platz in Bad Nauheim, Germany, Aug. 15, 2021. Elvis Presley stayed briefly in the hotel when he arrived in Germany in 1958 to do 18 months of military service. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Women sit near a vintage Chevrolet Corvette in Bad Nauheim, Germany, on Aug. 15, 2021. The Corvette was one of many classic cars that were in the spa town for the European Elvis Festival, a tribute to Elvis Presley, who lived in Bad Nauheim when he was a soldier, from 1958-1960. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo A woman carrying a handbag and wearing a petticoat swing dress with pictures of Elvis Presley walks with another woman through a park in Bad Nauheim, Germany, on Aug. 15, 2021. The spa town hosts a festival in August in honor of Presley, who lived in Bad Nauheim when he was a U.S. Army private from 1958-1960. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) The 19th edition of the Elvis festival also brought a new attraction to Bad Nauheim: a bronze statue of the American icon on a bridge spanning the aptly named Usa River. To comply with social distancing rules, crowd control officials allowed only small groups of people onto the bridge to take pictures by the statue, which replicates a pose Presley struck on the same spot in a photo shoot in March 1959. Buy Photo People wait on a bridge in Bad Nauheim, Germany, to take pictures next to a statue of Elvis Presley, Aug. 15, 2021. The spa town holds a festival in August in memory of Presley, who lived in Bad Nauheim when he served in the U.S. Army from 1958-1960. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Once on the bridge, people ignored coronavirus rules and stood close to one another before handing their phones to strangers to take snaps of them close to what some said wasn't the best likeness of Elvis. Coronavirus-wary Elvis fans can take photos by the statue after the festival is over; its staying put on the bridge. The three-day tribute to the King has been held every year since 2002 except for last year, when it was canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic. It always takes place over the weekend in August that falls closest to the anniversary of Presleys death on Aug. 16, 1977. Presley was already a star when he shipped out to Germany in early 1958 to serve in Company D, 32nd Tank Battalion, 3rd Armor Division, based in Friedberg, about 4 1/2 miles south of Bad Nauheim, where he first lived in the Hotel Villa Grunewald on what is now Elvis-Presley-Platz. Soon after arriving, he and his entourage, including his father, grandmother and some friends from Tennessee, had to move to a house on Goethestrasse, to make way for King Saud of Saudi Arabia, who had booked the entire hotel for one of his regular visits for spa treatments in the town. For those who have never heard of Presley, arent huge fans of his or visit the town outside of the festival dates, Bad Nauheim has plenty of other attractions, many within walking distance of one another. Buy Photo People ride in paddle boats on the lake in the Kurpark in Bad Nauheim, Germany, Aug. 15, 2021. The lake, the park and paddle boats are some of the attractions of the spa town, where Elvis Presley lived from 1958-1960. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) At the art nouveau Sprudelhof, visitors can sip the waters that bubble up from springs under Bad Nauheim and are said to treat heart conditions and backache. They can stroll through the Kurpark, go paddleboating on its lake, tour a duck habitat or breathe in air laced with sea salt at any of the five giant gradierbauten around town. Near the bridge and statue, bronze plaques lining the walk of fame show that other notable Americans including a young Franklin D. Roosevelt, media magnate William Hearst and his wife, actress Marion Davies, Albert Einstein, Mark Twain, actress Lilian Gish, and Gen. George Patton also spent time in Bad Nauheim. Hearst reportedly met Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in the town and is said to have described him afterward as a marvelous man. But no one was bending over any of their commemorative plaques snapping photos in mid-August. At that time of year, Bad Nauheim and its visitors move to the beat of Elvis Presley, probably the coolest resident the town has ever had. Buy Photo Flowers, candles and photos of Elvis Presley stand at Elvis-Presley-Platz in Bad Nauheim, Germany, Aug. 15, 2021. The town, where the American rock 'n' roll star lived from 1958-1960, holds a festival in Presley's memory in August. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo A picture of Elvis Presley when he was a U.S. Army soldier sits near a memorial to him in Bad Nauheim, Germany, Aug. 15, 2021. The text on the photo says, "Long after I'm gone, what I did today will be heard by someone else.I just want to give them all the best I had." (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo A statue and cutout of Elvis Presley in the tourist office in Bad Nauheim, Germany, Aug. 15, 2021. The spa town hosts the European Elvis Festival in August as a tribute to Presley, who lived in Bad Nauheim from 1958-1960 when he was a U.S. Army private. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Elvis Presley T-shirts are for sale outside a shop in Bad Nauheim, Germany, August 15, 2021. The spa town hosts the European Elvis Festival in August, in tribute to Presley, who lived in Bad Nauheim from 1958-1960 when he was a private in the U.S. Army. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes) Directions: Bad Nauheim is about one hour from Wiesbaden, two hours from Kaiserslautern, 2 hours from Spangdahlem and three hours from Stuttgart. Cost: The large outdoor parking lot on Frankfurterstrasse costs 2.50 euros for four hours or 3.50 for 24 hours. Coins only. Walk from there through the Kurpark into the center of town. The Elvis statue on the bridge over the Usa River is a few hundred yards away. Food: The many dining options include Fellini Cafe Vinoteca at Kurstrasse 3, where a salad and cappuccino run around $13, with U.S. credit cards accepted. Information: Online: bad-nauheim.de/en Buy Photo The hamburger-and-lamb set from Sherlock Holmes, a hamburger and steak restaurant near Yokota Air Base in western Tokyo, is served with vegetables and a baked potato. (Juan King/Stars and Stripes) During a recent ride home to Yokota Air Base, I stumbled on a not-so-hidden spot in Tachikawa, the Sherlock Holmes Hamburg and Steak Restaurant, and decided to visit for lunch. Finding the restaurant is simple its only a short drive from the bases east gate. From the street, it does not look very big, but inside I found plenty of seating with 22 tables available. A few more than a handful of customers were inside. Greeted at the door with Irasshaimase!, Japanese for welcome, I was promptly seated and given a menu in Japanese and English. An English-speaking waitress took my order, although I try to challenge myself to use Japanese while out in town. It is a work in progress. From the main dishes to the drinks, the Sherlock Holmes menu has a good selection. I ordered the charcoal-grilled hamburger-and-lamb set with vegetables and a baked potato for 2,080 yen, about $19. I opted for the smaller, 100-gram (about 3 ounces) portion of meat. The 170-gram portion (nearly 6 ounces) costs 2,280 yen, about $21. Grilled pork sausage or chicken are also options. With my set was salad and corn soup as an appetizer, a choice of rice or bread, a drink and dessert. From the first bite, I knew I would visit again. The salad, topped with a ginger dressing, was a good start to the meal. The corn soup, cooled for the summertime, was a little different for me since I have only eaten it hot. It was still a good addition. Buy Photo Chilled corn soup and salad are just a couple of the appetizers found at Sherlock Holmes, an eatery specializing in hamburger patties and steak in western Tokyo. (Juan King/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Slices of cool, fresh fruit, a wedge of chocolate cake, a dish of Japanese fruit jelly and a scoop of green tea ice cream cap off a delicious meal at Sherlock Holmes, a hamburger and steak restaurant in western Tokyo. (Juan King/Stars and Stripes) After a short wait, the main dish arrived, steaming and sizzling on a hot skillet plate. The waitress placed it carefully on the table and asked if I would like it cooked more. I did, so she sliced and grilled the meat a bit more while adding my selection of ginger-soy sauce to dress it up. Other sauces, like garlic brown, pepper and tomato are on the menu. Both the hamburger and the lamb were extremely tender and well-seasoned, but not too salty. I savored every bite. The side dishes, including a plate of perfectly cooked rice, enhanced the meal. After finishing my entree, I received an artistically decorated plate of dessert suitable for the summer heat. Several slices of cool, fresh fruit, a wedge of chocolate cake and a small dish of Japanese fruit jelly arrived with a scoop of green tea ice cream that melted in my mouth and capped off a delicious meal. The portions I received there were more than enough for lunchtime. I left satisfied and even purchased bento meals to go. Yes, they do have a takeout menu. Children are also welcome. Location: 2 Chome-6 2-1 Tachikawa, Nishisunacho, Tokyo, 190-0034 Directions: A short drive from Yokota Air Bases east gate. Google Plus Code: P9J7+3P Tachikawa, Tokyo. Hours: Open 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. weekdays for lunch; 5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. for dinner; open 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Takeout available. Prices: Lunch menu ranges from 1,500 yen to about 2,300 yen. Dinner can range to more than 3,500 yen on select sets. Dress: Casual Information: 042-531-7856 king.juan@stripes.com Buy Photo Soleil Hill Park near Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan, offers a considerable number of activities, from playgrounds to go-karts, both for a fee and for free. (Daniel Betancourt/Stars and Stripes) Families living on and around Yokosuka Naval Base in Japan have an all-in-one, kid-friendly getaway at a park just a half-hour drive away. Soleil Hill Park delivers a considerable number of activities, both for a fee and for free. And with parking for 1,500 vehicles and affordable parking (1,000 yen, or about $9, for the day), staying as long as you please is a no-brainer. Two huge, free playgrounds incorporate swings, Tarzan ropes, slides and climbing nets. There are also a couple of food and craft workshops accessible for kids that require only signing in at the location unless the class is booked. Workshop reservations are not an option. Buy Photo Soleil Hill Park near Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan, offers a considerable number of activities, from playgrounds to go-karts, both for a fee and for free. (Daniel Betancourt/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo At Soleil Hill Park near Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan, you can enjoy one of the various water areas where kids and adults alike dip their feet or splash around to cool off. (Daniel Betancourt/Stars and Stripes) A number of park activities require a ticket, which can be bought at the park entrance or nearby any of the activities that require one. Solo ticket purchases are 320 yen, or about $3, per ticket; a 12 pack goes for 3,200 yen. Some of the ticketed activities include go-karts, a mini-excavator, archery, pedal boats, grass sledding, merry-go-round and the petting zoo. Buy Photo Soleil Hill Park's ticketed activities include go-karts, a mini-excavator, archery, pedal boats, grass sledding, merry-go-round and a petting zoo. (Daniel Betancourt/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Grass-sledding is just one of many activities available at Soleil Hill Park near Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan. (Daniel Betancourt/Stars and Stripes) Dining possibilities include an all-you-can-eat-for-70-minutes seafood buffet on weekends and holidays only. The park has available everything you need to barbecue, including the food, which you must purchase there. Bringing your own is not allowed. The grill food set will cost you about 2,600 yen. Youll also find a few small eateries are scattered through the park serving burgers, fries, cold drinks and soft-serve ice cream for prices ranging from 250 yen to 650 yen. If camping is your thing, Soleil Hill offers bungalows and free camping sites from March to November. Campsites available to rent will cost 3,500 yen to 13,000 yen. The drawback here is that the booking website is only available in Japanese. Being outside in Japans humid summers can be grueling, so if you come outfitted with a bathing suit, you can enjoy one of the various water fountain areas where kids and adults alike dip their feet or splash around to cool off. There are some factors to be mindful of while visiting Soleil Hill. The only animals allowed in the park are service dogs. You cannot bring bicycles, skateboards or any self-propelled vehicles. Smoking is allowed only in designated areas. Only pop-up tents are permitted in the camping area. Plucking flowers or capturing animals is not permissible. There are no ATMs in the park, so be sure to bring all the cash you will need with you. Soleil Hill has an English-friendly website that clarifies all its functions and prices. It has seasonal activities and hours, so always check to see what those may be. Special events take place year-round, particularly on holidays. Buy Photo Soleil Hill Park near Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan, offers a considerable number of activities, from playgrounds to go-karts, both for a fee and for free. (Daniel Betancourt/Stars and Stripes) Directions: 4 Chome Nagai, Yokosuka, Kanagawa 238-0316; a 30-minute drive from Yokosuka Naval Base Times: Open daily 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Costs: Tickets are 320 yen each; a 12-pack costs 3,200 yen. Food and drink prices range from 250 yen to 2,600 yen. Food: A buffet-style restaurant and DIY barbecue grills Information: seibu-la.co.jp/soleil/english A worker in protectively overalls and carrying disinfecting equipment walks outside the Wuhan Central Hospital where Li Wenliang, the whistleblower doctor who sounded the alarm and was reprimanded by local police for it in the early days of Wuhan's pandemic, worked in Wuhan in central China on Feb. 6, 2021. In a commentary published Wednesday Aug. 25, 2021, the international scientists dispatched to China by the World Health Organization to look for the origins of the coronavirus say the search has stalled. (Ng Han Guan/AP) LONDON The international scientists dispatched to China by the World Health Organization to find out where the coronavirus came from said Wednesday the search has stalled and warned that the window of opportunity for solving the mystery is "closing fast." Meanwhile, a U.S. intelligence review ordered up by President Joe Biden proved inconclusive about the virus's origin, including whether it jumped from an animal to a human or escaped from a Chinese lab, The Washington Post reported Wednesday. In a commentary published in the journal Nature, the WHO-recruited experts said the origins investigation is at "a critical juncture" requiring urgent collaboration but has instead come to a standstill. They noted among other things that Chinese officials are still reluctant to share some raw data, citing concerns over patient confidentiality. Earlier this year, WHO sent a team of experts to Wuhan, where the first human COVID-19 cases were detected in December 2019, to probe what might have triggered the pandemic now blamed for nearly 4.5 million deaths worldwide, with more than 10,000 people a day succumbing despite more than 5 billion doses of vaccine administered. In their analysis, published in March, the WHO team concluded the virus probably jumped to humans from animals, and they described the possibility of a laboratory leak as "extremely unlikely." But the WHO experts said their report was intended only as a first step and added, "The window of opportunity for conducting this crucial inquiry is closing fast: any delay will render some of the studies biologically impossible." For example, they said, "Antibodies wane, so collecting further samples and testing people who might have been exposed before December 2019 will yield diminishing returns." China said Wednesday that officials should "concentrate on other possible avenues that may help trace the origin" of COVID-19 and suggested studies should be pursued in other countries. Fu Cong, a director-general in China's Foreign Ministry, agreed it is a "pity" the search for COVID-19's origins has stalled but said it wasn't China's fault. "China has always supported and will continue to participate in the science-based origin tracing efforts," he said. He accused the U.S. of "hyping the lab leak theory" and trying to shift the blame onto China, and implied the coronavirus might be linked to high-level American research labs, suggesting the United States invite WHO to investigate some of its installations. Marion Koopmans and her WHO-recruited colleagues listed a number of priorities for further research, including conducting wider antibody surveys that might identify places where COVID-19 was spreading undetected, both in China and beyond, testing wild bats and farm-raised animals as potential reservoirs of the virus, and investigating any credible new leads. Some other scientists fear the best opportunities to collect samples might have been missed during the first few weeks after some of the earliest human cases appeared linked to a Wuhan seafood market. Chinese researchers collected hundreds of environmental samples immediately after the coronavirus was found, but it is unclear how many people or animals were tested. "Once you have wildlife traders shifting over to other kinds of employment because they're worried about whether they'll be able to do this anymore, that window starts to close," said Maciej Boni, a Pennsylvania State University biology professor who has studied virus origins and was not part of the WHO team. Still, Boni said scientists might be able to pinpoint COVID-19's animal source by hunting for closely related viruses in species like raccoon dogs, mink or ground squirrels. But he said it could take about five years to do the kind of extensive studies necessary. The search for COVID-19's origins has become a bitter source of dispute between the U.S. and China, with increasing numbers of American experts calling for the two Wuhan laboratories close to the seafood market to be investigated, something China has flatly rejected and branded "scapegoating." Biden in May ordered a 90-day review by U.S. intelligence agencies of both the animal-to-human hypothesis and the lab leak theory. In July, even WHO's Director-General Tedros Adhanom Gheybreyesus said it was premature to have rejected the lab theory, adding that research accidents are common. ___ Ken Moritsugu in Beijing contributed to this report. Medical workers prepare syringes with doses of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine this spring at Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan. (Tetsuya Morita/U.S. Navy) TOKYO The U.S. military in Japan and South Korea is ready to carry out Defense Secretary Lloyd Austins order to inoculate all active-duty military members with the coronavirus vaccine, spokesmen for those commands said Thursday. The Pfizer BioNTech vaccine, given full approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Monday, is in good supply at bases in South Korea and Japan, and both commands expect resupply. Yes, there are enough doses and incoming doses [are] on the way, Air Force Maj. Tom Barger of U.S. Forces Japan, headquartered at Yokota Air Base, said in an email to Stars and Stripes. U.S. Forces Korea has enough on-hand supplies of Pfizer to meet an initial demand until we are provided more vaccines by the Defense Department, said Col. Lee Peters by email from Camp Humphreys. USFK also possess an adequate supply of Moderna if service members choose that vaccine over Pfizer. Meanwhile, one U.S. base in Japan reported a new case of COVID-19, the coronavirus respiratory disease, on Thursday. Sasebo Naval Base, on Kyushu Island, said the person tested positive Wednesday following close contact with another infected individual. Tokyo continued to see a comparative decline in new coronavirus cases on Thursday. The metropolitan government reported another 4,704 newly infected people, still high but 830 fewer than a week prior, according to public broadcaster NHK and metro government data. The coronavirus fifth wave in Japan continues relatively unabated, however, as the central government prepares to add on Friday another eight prefectures to a state of emergency that already covers 13 prefectures. Japan reported another 24,317 new coronavirus cases Wednesday, and 45 people died of COVID-19 complications, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Nearly 43% of Japans population, or 54.1 million people, are fully vaccinated, About 70% of USFJs uniformed personnel are fully vaccinated, according to Barger. He said many unvaccinated service members are rolling up their sleeves now that the shot is mandated by DOD. Yes, an increase was noted in anticipation of the recent memorandum from Austin, he wrote. USFK has not seen the same increase, according to Peters. But more than 80% of USFK service members and the affiliated population are vaccinated, he wrote, and the number of shots we administer to our service members should push us well over 90% vaccination rate as vaccines continue to arrive. Austin on Tuesday directed the military to impose ambitious timelines for implementing plans to fully vaccinate U.S. forces. Barger said a timeline has yet to be established for USFJ. We will vaccinate the force as rapidly as we have the Pfizer vaccine available, he said. He said USFJ anticipates many unvaccinated service members will comply with the mandate, which effectively rolls COVID-19 vaccines into the same system that keeps thousands of service members up to date on a battery of already required shots. Hold-outs will have time to make up their minds, but apparently not an unlimited amount of time. Our medical team will ensure every effort is made to explain and educate anyone who has questions about the vaccine prior to receiving it, Barger said. There is currently no timeline for when administrative action may need to be taken, but each service is developing their own processes in accordance with standing practices for any other vaccine. A U.S. Marine greets a child being evacuated out of Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Aug. 24, 2021. (Samuel Ruiz/U.S. Marine Corps) CAMP HUMPHREYS, South Korea South Korean military forces received much help from U.S. troops to get nearly 400 Afghans out of Kabul as nearby Taliban forces tightened their control of Afghanistan, government officials told Stars and Stripes on Thursday. Nearly 380 Afghan evacuees arrived on a South Korean military aircraft at an airport outside of Seoul on Thursday afternoon. Thirteen others are expected to arrive on another aircraft at a later date, a defense ministry official said on a customary condition of anonymity. Following the Taliban's rapid advance into Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, South Koreas government moved to evacuate Afghans who worked at its embassy, hospitals, vocational training centers and provincial reconstruction teams. The evacuees included over 70 families with more than 100 infants and 80 children between ages 5 and 10, according to South Koreas Ministry of Defense. Park Min Ho, the director of the ministrys Multilateral Security Policy Division, said the Afghans were told to meet at a pre-determined location, and six buses carried them to Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul. Meanwhile, Taliban forces were inspecting people on the way to the airport, Park said Thursday, adding that U.S. forces deployed to Afghanistan persuaded the Taliban through negotiations so we could pass through [their] security inspection at the airport. We got much help from U.S. troops and realized the importance of the [South Korea]-US alliance this time, Park told Stars and Stripes. The first group of Afghan evacuees arrived at Incheon International Airport at around 4:30 p.m. Thursday. They immediately received health checks and were tested for COVID-19, the coronavirus respiratory disease. The South Korean-led mission was dubbed Operation Miracle because we need to give hope to our facilitators in a crisis called escape from Afghanistan, Park said. Over 3,900 South Korean troops had served in Afghanistan since 2002, a Defense Ministry official said Wednesday. One South Korean soldier died after a bomb attack in 2007. Roughly 6,000 U.S. troops are deployed to Afghanistan to assist in the evacuation, which President Joe Bidens administration expects to end by Aug. 31. Biden said the evacuation is currently on pace to meet the deadline, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday, despite some concerns that the U.S. may leave some Americans and Afghan allies behind. Buy Photo Airmen at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, watch as evacuees from Afghanistan board a commercial flight to the United States on Aug. 26, 2021. The speed of outbound flights from Ramstein to the United States is picking up but Ramstein is struggling to keep up with a huge influx of evacuees. About 10,000 were expected overnight Thursday. (Jennifer H. Svan/Stars and Stripes) RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany The U.S. military was struggling to support a surge of evacuees in Europe on Thursday as Afghans fled Kabul in what little time remained to escape Taliban rule. More than 10,000 evacuees were destined for Ramstein on Thursday afternoon and overnight, the largest influx since the air base became the primary evacuation hub in Europe. Our main challenge right now is flow, said Brig. Gen. Josh Olson, the 86th Airlift Wing commander. Were continuing to struggle to have that outflow back into the U.S. It was uncertain Thursday how many more Afghans would be able to fly from Kabul following a series of bombings outside the airport that resulted in deaths and scores of injuries. But flights to Ramstein have continued to bring evacuees in from elsewhere, including Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. In less than a week, Ramstein has transformed from an air base supporting European and African military operations into an international airport and city, Olson said. More than 350 tents fill ramp space along the flight line, and all flight operations are part of the evacuation mission, with commercial carriers flying from Ramstein, base officials said. Ramstein has capacity for about 12,000 evacuees, while Rhine Ordnance Barracks, a neighboring Army post, has space for about 5,000, Olson said. The two installations expect to reach that capacity by Friday, he said. Youre about to see the busiest next couple of hours, Olson said. Tonight, well be maxed out. The pace of flights from Ramstein to the United States has more than doubled in the past 24 hours, base officials said. More than 3,500 people had departed as of Thursday afternoon. Buy Photo A little girl is held while sitting inside a makeshift passenger terminal for evacuees from Afghanistan who are waiting for a flight to the United States from Ramstein Air Base, Germany, Aug. 26, 2021. The number of inbound evacuees is far exceeding the number of outbound passengers. (Jennifer H. Svan/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Evacuees from Afghanistan wait to board a plane inside a makeshift passenger terminal at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, on Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. More than 3,500 evacuees have left Ramstein for a new life in the United States but thousands more are inbound. Ramstein was expecting about 10,000 incoming evacuees overnight Thursday. (Jennifer H. Svan/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo A woman waves before boarding a commercial flight taking evacuees from Afghanistan to the United States. The Boeing 767 departed Ramstein Air Base, Germany, on Aug. 26, 2021, for Dulles International Airport near Washington, D.C. (Jennifer H. Svan/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Volunteers with the American Red Cross hand out care packages and assist new arrivals from Afghanistan, Aug. 26, 2021. Ramstein was expecting about 10,000 more evacuees overnight Thursday. Some evacuees were to be housed temporarily at Rhine Ordnance Barracks, a neighboring Army base. (Jennifer H. Svan/Stars and Stripes) About 275 people were crowded into a hangar turned into a temporary passenger terminal Thursday afternoon waiting to board a flight to Dulles International Airport near Washington, D.C. An additional 200 had just boarded a commercial Boeing 767 destined for Dulles. Im traveling to America, said an excited Rasool Ahmad Qaderi, who fled Kabul with most of his family. Qaderi, 27, said he had high hopes for the future and wants to live in New York City. About five planes were scheduled to depart Ramstein on Thursday and six on Friday, transporting a total of more than 3,000 passengers, said Maj. Dustin Dere, director of operations for the 721st Air Mobility Operations Group. But the pace needs to pick up, Dere said. Just with the inbound passengers and the lodging facilities filling up, we need to get more aircraft filled and out of here, he said. The problem is the aircraft just arent here yet. Besides carriers United and Delta, Air Force KC-10 tankers based in the United Kingdom have flown evacuation missions across the Atlantic. But theyre playing a bigger role in ferrying evacuees from interim staging bases between Afghanistan and the U.S., Dere said, since the tankers have room for fewer passengers. Olson said he didnt know why there were so many evacuees coming in at one time. Aircraft arriving from both Qatar and Kuwait are often filled to emergency capacity, he said, with more passengers than there are seats. Other evacuees are being flown to U.S. bases in Sigonella, Italy, and Rota, Spain, Olson said. Evacuees are staying an average of four days at Ramstein, Olson said. While at Ramstein, they receive health and background checks, and their identification is vetted. The State Department is focused on identifying American citizens, their families, legal permanent residents and those who fall under Special Immigrant Visa categories, such as Afghans who have worked for the United States, a department spokesman said. RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany Sewing machines whirred in a chapel annex on Ramstein Air Base Thursday as a dozen volunteers stitched together prayer garments for Afghan women. They werent able to bring more than what theyre wearing when they fled Kabul, said Elizabeth Chambers, who launched the sewing group days earlier after seeing a request on social media for someone to turn donated bed sheets into clothing the evacuees wear to pray. We watched a couple of videos and tutorials online, and I made a pattern to turn a queen-size sheet into a matching skirt and khimar, a garment that covers the head and arm, Chambers said. Three days after launching the group, the women had sewn 102 khimars, 76 other head coverings, 20 full-length prayer skirts, nine dresses and 13 prayer mats, give or take a few, she said. Buy Photo Lauren Williams sews a prayer garment for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) All have been distributed to the evacuees by the bases imam and his wife, who have reported back that the Afghan women are grateful to have something after wearing old T-shirts as head coverings and praying on dirty cardboard, she said. Im just helping in a way that I could ... sewing is something Im good at, Im fast at and I could start right away, Chambers said. Buy Photo Ann Llams, left, and Maggie Mayfield prepare cloth that volunteers will turn into prayer garments for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Volunteers try on a prayer garment they made for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) Nearby, in what used to be the base movie theater, Master Sgt. Mitch Meis checked box after box of items that had been dropped off Thursday, making sure that the items inside were needed, clean and in good shape. There was clothing, baby items, toys, and lots of blankets, much-needed to help the thousands of evacuees who have arrived at Ramstein since Saturday deal with the cool German weather after Afghanistans searing heat. Volunteers took the donations to the large room that used to house cinema seating and a movie screen, where dozens more people sorted and placed them in plastic bags according to size, gender and what the items were. This is a centralized hub that agencies like the USO and others can come to and get what they need to help the evacuees, said Heather Mecsko, who has been assisting with logistics at the intake site since Saturday, when she came to drop off some items for the evacuees herself. Back then, less than a week ago, donations for the evacuees were being accepted, sorted and distributed at a more artisanal level by Ramstein first sergeants, in a much smaller building, where volunteers would show up after hearing of the effort by word of mouth. The guy taking the donations was wiped out and I thought we needed to do something, Mecsko said. Buy Photo Donations for Afghan refugees are sorted by category at a supply drive at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Nadia Perez, left, and her siblings Rodrigo, Yvette and Astrid bring donations to a drive for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Heba Abdelaal, Heather Mecsko, and Master Sgt. Mitch Meis help organize a donation drive for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) A few phone calls later, the alliesrefuge.org website had been set up, where people can see what the evacuees need and where volunteers are required. From there, the operation mushroomed into the effort it is now, with 200 people volunteering at the intake site every day, sorting through truckloads of donations, which are distributed at other sites around Ramstein. Smaller-scale operations have been stood up at other U.S. installations in Europe, including Naval Support Activity Sigonella in Italy, which has taken in 662 evacuees since Sunday. While thats a small fraction of the 14,500 who have arrived at Ramstein since last weekend, the effort at Sigonella and other installations has been as energetic as at the Air Force base in Germany. NSA Naples has gathered enough diapers, wipes, toothpaste, shampoo, crayons, coloring books, clothing and other items to fill six pallets to send to Sigonella. On Thursday, around a dozen volunteers were working at the chapel on NSA Naples Gricignano di Aversa site to sort and pack donations. Shoes were in high demand as many Afghan children have arrived in Europe barefoot, said Cmdr. Gary Foshee, NSA Naples command chaplain. In Ramstein, a call went out one morning this week for stuffed animals to give to the children before they left to fly to their new homes in the U.S. Within an hour, so many teddy bears and other cuddly toys had been donated that a second call was posted on social media to say they werent accepting any more for the time being. U.S. Air Force Airman Andrew Markos, 721st Aerial Port Squadron passenger service specialist, hands a Teddy bear to an Afghan evacuee at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, Aug. 24, 2021. U.S. airmen and volunteers have been working to deliver clothing, toys, water and other items to around 14,500 evacuees who have arrived at Ramstein since August 17, 2021. (Edgar Grimaldo/U.S. Air Force) Buy Photo The number of donations collected for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021, exceeded what volunteers could process. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo Donations are collected for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) Buy Photo A military volunteer signs up to help with relief efforts for Afghan refugees at Ramstein Air Base on Aug. 26, 2021. (Phillip Walter Wellman/Stars and Stripes) But the effort for the evacuees continued unabated, with more and more people chipping in like the woman at Ramsteins commissary who brought lunch to the volunteers at the old movie theater, or people who are about to PCS out that are spending their last few hours here, doing what they can to help, Mecsko said. Were motivated by the Afghan children and their families, she said. They didnt ask for this but theyre stuck in the middle of something that shouldnt have happened, and we want to help them the best we can. And well be here for as long as they need us. Stars and Stripes reporter Alison Bath contributed to this report. An Afghan Air Force's helicopter rovers near the Afghan Parliament house in Kabul on Aug. 2, 2021. (Wakil Kohsar, AFP via Getty Images/TNS) WASHINGTON (Tribune News Service) With Taliban forces rapidly seizing territory across Afghanistan and Americans rushing to evacuate the besieged capital, a decorated former diplomat who twice headed the U.S. embassy in Kabul said the United States could have avoided this disastrous coda to its longest war. Spokane Valley, Wash., native Ryan Crocker arrived in the Afghan capital to reopen the shuttered embassy in January 2002, weeks after the U.S.-led invasion toppled the Taliban regime, and returned to serve as ambassador from 2011 to 2012. In an interview with The Spokesman-Review on Friday, Crocker said while the pace of the insurgents' advance has surprised him, the Biden administration should have seen it coming. "I think the direction was predictable; the trajectory was not," he said. "What President Biden has done is to embrace the Afghan policy of President Trump, and this is the outcome." After Trump signed off on a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban in February 2020 that excluded the Afghan government, on April 13 Biden announced his administration would withdraw U.S. troops from the Central Asian country by Sept. 11. That symbolic date falls exactly two decades after al-Qaida attacked the United States from its base in Afghanistan, where the Taliban gave the terrorist group safe haven. During a four-decade career in the Foreign Service that earned him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, Crocker served as U.S. ambassador to six countries, most recently when President Barack Obama called him out of retirement in 2011 to serve as America's top diplomat in Kabul. In July, Biden accelerated the withdrawal, saying most U.S. forces would leave Afghanistan by the end of August. His administration has said about 650 troops will stay in Kabul to protect the embassy, with no combat role, but on Thursday the State Department said 3,000 troops would return to the country to partially evacuate the embassy as Taliban forces close in on the capital, and Biden increased that number to 4,000 on Saturday. Since Biden announced the U.S. withdrawal in April, Taliban insurgents have overrun much of the country, taking control of key border crossings and most provincial capitals. As of Saturday, the Taliban controlled roughly two-thirds of Afghanistan's territory, according to the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a foreign policy think tank. Crocker said the rapid collapse of Afghan security forces, in which the U.S. government has invested roughly $83 billion to train and equip since 2001, is largely due to cratering morale and the loss of U.S. air power. "We've spent the last almost two years delegitimizing the Afghan government and its security forces," he said. "It has destroyed the morale of the government and certainly of its security forces." While the U.S. troop level declined from about 12,000 in March 2020 to roughly 3,500 when Biden announced the withdrawal in April, Crocker said even that limited presence gave Afghan allies symbolic and practical support. By cutting the Afghan government out of the peace talks, while agreeing to terms that included the release of up to 5,000 Taliban prisoners, Crocker said the U.S. government "effectively sided with the Taliban" in the eyes of Afghan forces, who have reportedly deserted in large numbers. "It is not exactly a climate in which these young troopers can be reasonably expected to hold that line, having been sold out by us," he said. Despite that indignity, Crocker said Afghan security forces largely did what the U.S. government asked of them and maintained garrisons throughout the country, but those deployments were only viable with the help of U.S. airstrikes. The predictable collapse of Afghan forces without that air support, he said, suggests "a total lack of coordinated, post-withdrawal planning on our part." "That's why this is all so sad," he said. "It is a self-inflicted wound." The administration's special envoy for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, arrived in Qatar on Monday to press Taliban representatives to halt their offensive and ask diplomats from other countries in the region not to recognize a Taliban government without a peace deal. But Crocker said the Islamist group cares far less about diplomatic relations than it does about the idea that it has defeated the world's strongest military, a narrative he fears will embolden other Islamist militants around the world. "We're going to pay for that for a long time to come, and that's why it is insane just idiotic to think that we can tell the Taliban that if they don't stop taking over territory and play nice, the international community will withhold recognition and support," he said. "The Taliban really doesn't care, because they've got something far more valuable." Crocker said he also worries the Taliban could again harbor terrorist groups, while U.S. intelligence agencies will be less capable of tracking threats in the country after the withdrawal. "We have seen this movie before," he said. "This would be the Taliban of the 1990s that gave safe haven to al-Qaida, except they're meaner and tougher than they were then because of what they've been through." Khalilzad began his role under the Trump administration in 2018 and shepherded the negotiations that led to the U.S.-Taliban deal in 2020. Crocker said Biden's decision to retain the veteran diplomat was unusual and signaled he intended to stick with his predecessor's approach to Afghanistan. "By keeping the envoy of the previous administration, he was keeping the policy of the previous administration," he said. "That's how these things work." In addition to evacuating embassy staff and other Americans, the 4,000 additional troops who began arriving in Kabul on Friday are charged with evacuating Afghans who have worked for the U.S. government and are now being targeted by the Taliban. The White House has said it will take thousands of Afghans who have applied for the Special Immigrant Visa program to safe locations outside the country, but that daunting effort is in even greater jeopardy with most of the country under Taliban control. Crocker said the U.S. government should move those Afghans out of the country quickly and "sort out the red tape later." "But even with all of that, I'm afraid a lot of people are going to die," he said. "As the Taliban moves into different cities and towns, they've got their hit list. So it's going to be messy, it's going to be incomplete and more people are going to die, but we've got to make our best possible effort." While Trump spurned international alliances and advocated a more insular U.S. foreign policy, the Biden administration has sought to reassert a leadership role on the global stage. As a senator, Biden chaired the Foreign Relations Committee and was the first U.S. lawmaker to visit Kabul when the embassy reopened in 2002, but Crocker said Biden's haste in leaving Afghanistan has made him question the president's leadership. "I'm left with some grave questions in my mind about his ability to lead our nation as commander-in-chief," Crocker said. "To have read this so wrong or, even worse, to have understood what was likely to happen and not care." Orion Donovan-Smith's reporting for The Spokesman-Review is funded in part by Report for America and by members of the Spokane community. (c)2021 The Spokesman-Review (Spokane, Wash.) Visit The Spokesman-Review (Spokane, Wash.) at www.spokesman.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. In this Aug. 24, 2021, file photo, provided by the U.S. Marine Corps, families walk towards their flight during ongoing evacuations at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Samuel Ruiz/U.S. Marine Corps) EL CAJON, Calif. Three families from a San Diego suburb have made it out of Afghanistan after they went to the country earlier this summer to visit relatives and got stuck there amid the chaos following the Talibans takeover, officials said Thursday. Five other families from El Cajon were still trying to get out, and U.S. government officials along with California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa were working on their safe return. The suburb, east of San Diego, has a large refugee population. Many of the families had gone to Afghanistan in May and early June, weeks before the crisis unfolded, so their children could see their grandparents and other relatives. Officials initially said six families from El Cajon were trapped there but later learned there were a total of eight families from the city trying to get out of the country. We have more work to do and under extremely difficult conditions, Issa said in a statement. Fraidoon Hashemi, an Afghan who works as a community liaison for the Cajon Valley Union School District, said he has been in contact with the families and on Thursday was awaiting word from those who remain. All the families have children attending various schools in the district. He said he was growing concerned because of news that two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport Thursday. We hope to hear from them soon, he said. Howard Shen, a district spokesman, said one family with five children arrived in San Diego on Wednesday night. The two other families were out of Afghanistan, but Shen said he could not confirm exactly where they were only that they are safe. Thats all we want, he said. Counseling was being made available for the families and for their childrens schools. Hashemi said the family back in San Diego was still shaken after their harrowing experience. They are OK now, he said. They need to calm down and forget what theyve seen. In all, the El Cajon families included two dozen children, some of whom witnessed shootings and other violence in and around the Kabul airport in recent days, Hashemi said. The families had each traveled to Afghanistan on their own on different dates and were not part of an organized trip. The families asked U.S. officials for help after being blocked by the throngs of Afghans at the airport desperately trying to escape after their governments rapid collapse and the withdrawal of U.S. troops. The school district became aware of the problem after a relative of one of the families reached out to say their child would be late starting the school year, which began Aug. 17. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan. It was unclear if that included all the El Cajon families. Some are U.S. citizens; others have U.S. residency. Despite travel warnings from the U.S. government, many felt an urgency to go to the country after not being able to see their extended families because of travel bans from the coronavirus pandemic, Hashemi said. Most of the El Cajon families came to the United States on a special immigrant visa after having worked for the U.S. government or U.S. military in Afghanistan, officials said. The visa allows in only the person and their spouse and children. Superintendent David Miyashiro said the families are particularly scared because of the upcoming Aug. 31 deadline for the United States to complete its withdrawal. Miyashiro said he could not provide more details since the children and their parents could be in danger. ___ This story corrects the spelling of district community liaison Fraidoon Hashemis last name. Afghan forces destroy a Taliban weapons cache during a night operation in Ney Meydan, Sar-e Pul province, Afghanistan, on Feb. 23, 2018. Afghan forces maintained constant pressure on the Taliban and ISIS-K throughout the 2017-2018 winter in the northern Afghan provinces. (Sean Carnes/U.S. Air Force) Since coalescing in eastern Afghanistan six years ago, an Islamic State affiliate there has grown into one of the most dangerous terror threats globally. Despite years of military targeting by the U.S.-led coalition, the group known as Islamic State Khorasan has survived to pursue new attacks as the United States and other NATO partners withdraw from Afghanistan, and as the Taliban return to power. President Joe Biden cited the threat of Islamic State attacks in sticking with a Tuesday deadline for pulling U.S. forces out of Afghanistan. And ahead of deadly suicide bombings at the Kabul airport Thursday, there were urgent Western warnings of a potential attack by the group, under cover of the throngs that have gathered at the Kabul airport seeking evacuation. U.S. officials said the killings are believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group. The group has built a record of highly lethal attacks in the face of its own heavy losses. A look at a deadly group influencing the course of the Kabul airlifts and U.S. actions: WHAT IS ISLAMIC STATE KHORASAN? The Islamic State's Central Asia affiliate sprang up in the months after the group's core fighters swept across Syria and Iraq, carving out a self-styled caliphate, or Islamic empire, in the summer of 2014. In Syria and Iraq, it took local and international forces five years of subsequent fighting to roll back the caliphate. The Afghanistan affiliate takes its name from the Khorasan Province, a region that covered much of Afghanistan, Iran and central Asia in the Middle Ages. The group is also known as ISK, or ISIS K. WHO ARE THE ISLAMIC STATE KHORASAN'S FIGHTERS? The group started as several hundred Pakistani Taliban fighters, who took refuge across the border in Afghanistan after military operations drove them out of their home country. Other, like-minded extremists joined them there, including disgruntled Afghan Taliban fighters unhappy with what they unlike the West saw as the Taliban's overly moderate and peaceful ways. As the Taliban pursued peace talks with the United States in recent years, discontented Taliban increasingly moved to the more extremist Islamic State, swelling its numbers. Most were frustrated that the Taliban was pursuing negotiations with the U.S. at a time when they thought the movement was on the march to a military win. The group also has attracted a significant cadre from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, from a neighboring country; fighters from Iran's only Sunni Muslim majority province; and members of the Turkistan Islamic Party comprising Uighurs from China's northeast. Many were attracted to the Islamic State's violent and extreme ideology, including promises of a caliphate to unite the Islamic world, a goal never espoused by the Taliban. WHAT MAKES THEM A LEADING THREAT? While the Taliban have confined their struggle to Afghanistan, the Islamic State group in Afghanistan and Pakistan has embraced the Islamic State's call for a worldwide jihad against non-Muslims. The Center for International and Strategic Studies counts dozens of attacks that Islamic State fighters have launched against civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, including minority Shiite Muslims, as well as hundreds of clashes with Afghan, Pakistani and U.S.-led coalition forces since January 2017. Though the group has yet to conduct attacks against the U.S. homeland, the U.S. government believes it represents a chronic threat to U.S. and allied interests in South and Central Asia. WHAT IS THEIR ROLE WITH THE TALIBAN? They are enemies. While intelligence officials believe al-Qaida fighters are integrated among the Taliban, the Taliban, by contrast, have waged major, coordinated offensives against the Islamic State group in Afghanistan. Taliban insurgents at times joined with both the U.S. and U.S.-backed Afghan government forces to rout the Islamic State from parts of Afghanistan's northeast. A U.S. Defense Department official, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was working covertly, said previously that the Trump administration had sought its 2020 withdrawal deal with the Taliban partly in hopes of joining forces with them against the Islamic State affiliate. The administration saw that group as the real threat to the American homeland. WHAT IS THE RISK NOW? Even when the United States had combat troops, aircraft and armed drones stationed on the ground in Afghanistan to monitor and strike the Islamic State, Islamic State militants were able to keep up attacks despite suffering thousands of casualties, Amira Jadoon and Andrew Mines note in a report for West Point's Combating Terrorism Center. The withdrawal is depriving the United States of its on-the-ground strike capacity in Afghanistan, and threatens to weaken its ability to track the Islamic State and its attack planning as well. Biden officials say the Islamic State group is only one of many terror threats it is dealing with globally. They insist they can manage it with so-called over-the-horizon military and intelligence assets, based in Gulf states, on aircraft carriers, or other more distant sites. One of the United States' greatest fears about pulling out its combat forces after two decades is that Afghanistan under Taliban rule again becomes a magnet and base for extremists plotting attacks on the West. That threat, U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN last weekend, was something "we're focused on, with every tool in our arsenal." ___ Knickmeyer reported from Oklahoma City and Gannon from Islamabad. Buy Photo (Noga Ami-rav/Stars and Stripes) WASHINGTON Thirteen U.S. service members were killed and 18 others were wounded Thursday in a terrorist attack at the airport in Kabul, where U.S. and coalition forces have been evacuating tens of thousands of Americans and Afghans since the Taliban took control of the country nearly two weeks ago, according to the Pentagon. Two suicide bombers and an unknown number of gunmen launched attacks as the troops who were killed and injured screened evacuees at an airport gate, said Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, the top U.S. commander in the region. Ten of those killed and several of the injured were Marines, Maj. Jim Stenger, a Marine Corps spokesman, confirmed Thursday. Defense officials have not provided the service branches of the three others killed, though The Associated Press reported at least one Navy corpsman had died from the attack. The surviving injured troops are being evacuated from Afghanistan on specially equipped C-17s with embarked surgical units, said Navy Capt. Bill Urban, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command. The service members killed were the first combat-related deaths to happen in Afghanistan since Feb. 8, 2020, when Sgt. 1st Class Antonio Rodriguez was killed in Nangarhar province, according to the Army. With 13 killed, it is also among the deadliest attacks on U.S. troops since the war in Afghanistan began nearly 20 years ago, Reuters reported. The U.S. is working to determine who initiated the attacks, McKenzie told reporters at the Pentagon, though the Taliban is not suspected because they have a practical reason for wanting us to get out of here. The Islamic State took credit for the attacks, according the Amaq News Agency, which is affiliated with the terrorist group. Pentagon officials had been warning of possible threats by ISIS-K, an Afghanistan-based branch of the Islamic State. The first bomb exploded near the airports Abbey Gate, where ISIS gunmen fired on civilians and U.S. troops shortly after, McKenzie said. The gate is one of three entrances to the airport where crowds of people had been gathered since last week to vie for evacuation flights. Troops screen evacuees face-to-face at the gates, McKenzie said. At the screening points, you got to get very up close and personal to the people that youre bringing out, theres no way to do that safely from a distance, the CENTCOM commander said. We should all just bear in mind weve been doing it for well over a week we brought 104,000 people out. The second explosion happened shortly after the first one at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate, Kirby said. Kirby said Afghans were also hurt and killed in the attacks, though he did not know how many. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid condemned the attacks in a tweet Thursday afternoon. The Islamic Emirate strongly condemns the bombing of civilians at Kabul airport, which took place in an area where U.S. forces are responsible for security, Mujahid wrote in a tweet translated from Arabic. The Islamic Emirate is paying close attention to the security and protection of its people, and evil circles will be strictly stopped. Images of bloodied Afghan men walking or being carted in wheel barrows away from the scene of the blast have been circulating on Twitter. Since Aug. 14, the U.S. has evacuated approximately 95,700 Americans and Afghans who helped the U.S. during its nearly two decades in Afghanistan. The U.S. sent thousands of troops to Kabul to assist with the evacuations and provide security at the airport. There were 5,800 U.S. troops at the airport, though 400 were transported out of Kabul on Wednesday. The attacks come after U.S. evacuation numbers slowed down after three consecutive days of exceeding its goal of moving 5,000-9,000 people per day from Kabul. Military aircraft lifted 5,100 people out of the country on Thursday, the White House said, compared to 11,200 people Tuesday, 12,700 on Monday, and 11,000 on Sunday. The evacuation mission will continue despite the attacks, McKenzie said, noting about 1,000 Americans remain in Afghanistan. The U.S. is scheduled to pull out of Afghanistan on Tuesday. However, Kirby on Wednesday said the U.S. military will need to start prioritizing troops and equipment in the final days leading up to the Aug. 31 deadline. We have put more than 5,000 U.S. service members at risk to save as many civilians as we can. Its a noble mission, McKenzie said. Today, we have seen firsthand how dangerous that mission is. ISIS will not deter us from accomplishing the mission, I can assure you that. As the deadline draws near, hopeful evacuees on the ground in Kabul have reported rumors of the U.S. ending evacuations by Saturday, but Kirby on Thursday denied the reports. Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours, Kirby tweeted. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg condemned the horrific terrorist attack Thursday, tweeting our priority remains to evacuate as many people to safety as quickly as possible. NATO forces have been assisting the U.S. with the operations, flying thousands of evacuees out of the country each day. On Thursday, 74 coalition aircraft moved 8,300 people from Kabul besting the U.S.s daily total, the White House said. Paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security operations as they continue to help facilitate the evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on Wednesday, Aug 25, 2021. (Jillian G. Hix/U.S. Army ) ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan claims responsibility for attack DUBAI, United Arab Emirates The Islamic State group's affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the deadly attacks outside the Kabul airport. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport on Thursday, killing at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The IS branch, known as The Islamic State-Khorasan Province after a name for the region from antiquity, said in its claim of responsibility that it targeted American troops and their Afghan allies. The affiliate is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. The statement carried a photo of what the militant group said was the bomber who carried out the attack. The image shows the alleged attacker standing with the explosive belt in front of the black IS flag with a black cloth covering his face, only his eyes showing. The statement made no mention of a second suicide bomber or gunmen. The claim could not be independently verified. IS also said the bomber managed to get past Taliban security checkpoints to come within 5 meters of a gathering of U.S. soldiers, translators and collaborators before detonating his explosives. It said Taliban were also among the casualties. The extremist IS group has battled the Taliban, which it views as traitorous for agreeing to a peace deal with the United States. Associated Press Defense secretary issues statement on Kabul attack Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin issued a statement on the attack, expressing condolences to the families of those killed. On behalf of the men and women of the Department of Defense, I express my deepest condolences to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and wounded in Kabul today, Austin said in the statement. Terrorists took their lives at the very moment these troops were trying to save the lives of others. ... But we will not be dissuaded from the task at hand. The full statement is below. On behalf of the men and women of the @deptofdefense, I express my deepest condolences to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and wounded in Kabul today. Full statement below: pic.twitter.com/GqwuJBKAAF Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III (@SecDef) August 26, 2021 Stars and Stripes Officials: At least 11 Marines, 1 Navy corpsman killed in attack KABUL, Afghanistan At least 12 U.S. service members were killed in the Afghanistan bombings, including 11 Marines and one Navy corpsman, according to two U.S. officials. Officials say a number of US military troops were wounded. They warn, however, that the numbers may grow. Associated Press Pentagon spokesman issues statement confirming deaths of US service members in attack The Pentagons chief spokesman posted a statement to Twitter confirming the deaths of U.S. service members in Thursdays Kabul airport attack. "We can confirm that a number of U.S. service members were killed in today's complex attack at Kabul airport, John Kirby said in the statement. A number of others are being treated for wounds. We also know that a number of Afghans fell victim to this heinous attack. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and injured." Stars and Stripes Taliban condemns Kabul attack The Taliban has condemned the attack, which spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said took place in an area where U.S. forces are responsible for security. On Twitter, Mujahid said the Taliban is paying close attention to the security and protection of its people, and evil circles will be strictly stopped, according to a machine translation of the post. Chad Garland ISIS affiliate responsible for attacks, says SITE Intelligence Group The attacks outside the Kabul hospital Thursday are believed to have been carried out by a local affiliate of the Islamic State group, according to the director of an American nongovernmental intelligence organization. The more we learn about the attacks the more it is apparent that #ISIS Khorasan Province carried out this attack, and may still carry out more, Rita Katz, director of the organization SITE Intelligence Group that tracks terrorist threats, said in a Twitter post. Since Taliban took over, the group has repeatedly warned of upcoming attacks in Afghanistan, and Kabul has long been a top target. The incident bears some hallmarks of attacks ISIS-K has claimed in recent years, many of which have involved dual bombings on different sides of large gatherings, meant to inflict a much larger number of casualties. Taliban insurgents have battled the terrorist group, which in 2018 carried out a deadly bombing against a gathering of Taliban and other Afghans celebrating a rare cease-fire being observed by both the militants and the government at the time. Chad Garland Kabul hospital: 60 wounded, 6 dead in airport attack At least 60 people were wounded in the Kabul airport attack and are being treated at Kabul Surgical Centre, according to a tweet from humanitarian nongovernmental organization Emergency. Around 60 patients wounded in airport attack have arrived at our Kabul Surgical Centre so far, the organization tweeted. Emergency previously tweeted that 6 patients were dead on arrival at the Kabul hospital. Stars and Stripes Kirby: Second explosion outside Kabul airport Pentagon spokesman John Kirby confirmed another explosion "at or near" the Baron Hotel, as well as U.S. and civilian casualties, in his most recent tweet. We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties, Kirby said in the later tweet. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update. It was unclear Thursday whether the casualties included deaths. The military uses the term to describe injuries and fatalities. At least one more explosion happened shortly after at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate, Kirby said. He did not say if any casualties resulted from the second explosion. Kirby was scheduled to hold a press briefing at 10:30 a.m. but postponed the event as the news of the explosion broke. The bombing is believed to have been a suicide mission, Reuters reported. Since Aug. 14, the U.S. has evacuated approximately 95,700 Americans and Afghans who helped the U.S. during its nearly two decades in Afghanistan. The U.S. sent thousands of troops to Kabul to assist with the evacuations and provide security at the airport. There were 5,800 U.S. troops at the airport, though 400 were transported out of Kabul on Wednesday. As the deadline draws near, hopeful evacuees on the ground in Kabul have reported rumors of the U.S. ending evacuations by Saturday, but Kirby on Thursday denied the reports. Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours, Kirby tweeted. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission. Kirbys tweet was sent before the reports of the explosions. It was not clear Thursday whether the explosions would affect evacuation efforts. Russias Foreign Ministry says a second explosion has gone off outside Kabul airport, according to The Associated Press. The twin suicide attacks killed at least 13 people and wounded another 15. U.S. officials said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing operations. The blasts happened outside the airport, where thousands of Afghans have gathered hoping to join a U.S.-led airlift after the Taliban takeover. Stars and Stripes Explosion outside Kabul airport, news reports say US Marines injured Pentagon spokesman John Kirby confirmed an explosion occurred outside Kabul airport Thursday. There were no details on casualties, Kirby said in a tweet. At least three U.S. Marines were injured in the blast, Fox News reported, citing unnamed U.S. officials. About an hour before confirming the blast on Twitter, Kirby had pushed back on rumors that the U.S. would be wrapping up its evacuation efforts ahead of an Aug. 31 deadline. Evacuation operations in Kabul will not be wrapping up in 36 hours, he said. We will continue to evacuate as many people as we can until the end of the mission. The large explosion occurred at the Abbey Gate, followed by reports of gunfire, the State Department said in a security alert. The gate is one of three entrances to the airport where crowds of people had been gathered since last week to vie for evacuation flights. Images of bloodied Afghan men walking or being carted in wheel barrows away from the scene of the blast began to circulate on Twitter. President Biden has been briefed on the explosion, a White House official told CNN. Western nations had warned Thursday of a possible attack on Kabuls airport, where thousands have flocked as they try to flee Taliban-controlled Afghanistan in the waning days of a massive airlift. Several countries urged people to avoid the airport, where Belgium said there was a threat of a suicide bombing. But with just days left before the evacuation effort ends and American troops withdraw, few appeared to heed the call. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of Americas longest war and the Talibans takeover, as flight after flight landed to pull out those who fear a return to the militants brutal rule. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of historys largest airlifts. The Taliban have so far honored a pledge not to attack Western forces during the evacuation, but insist the foreign troops must be out by Americas self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31. Stars and Stripes U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. (Donald R. Allen/U.S. Air Force ) KABUL, Afghanistan Western nations warned Thursday of a possible attack on Kabuls airport, where thousands have flocked as they try to flee Taliban-controlled Afghanistan in the waning days of a massive airlift. Britain said an attack could come within hours. Several countries urged people to avoid the airport, where Belgium said there was a threat of a suicide bombing. But with just days left before the evacuation effort ends and American troops withdraw, few appeared to heed the call. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of Americas longest war and the Talibans takeover, as flight after flight landed to pull out those who fear a return to the militants brutal rule. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of historys largest airlifts. The Taliban have so far honored a pledge not to attack Western forces during the evacuation, but insist the foreign troops must be out by Americas self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31. But overnight, new warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from Afghanistans Islamic State group affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during their blitz across the country. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC on Thursday there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport, possibly within hours. Heappey conceded that people are desperate to leave and there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. There is every chance that as further reporting comes in, we may be able to change the advice again and process people anew, but theres no guarantee of that, he added. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport, with Australias foreign minister saying there was a very high threat of a terrorist attack. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, a C-17 Globemaster lll lands on the runway as evacuees from Afghanistan debark a C-17 Globemaster lll on Monday, Aug. 23, 2021, at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. (Kylie Barrow/U.S. Air Force) Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent. Its not correct, he wrote in a text message after being asked about the warnings. He did not elaborate. On Thursday, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. While some fled, others just sat on the ground, covered their face and waited in the noxious fumes. Nadia, a 27-year-old Afghan woman who gave only her first name for fear of reprisals, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Nadia said. My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Gunshots later echoed in the area as Nadia waited. There is anarchy because of immense crowds, she said, blaming the U.S. for the chaos. Many Afghans have felt the same in the wake of the Talibans takeover. The hard-line Islamic group wrested back control of the country nearly 20 years after being ousted in a U.S.-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid concerns about attacks, military cargo planes leaving Kabul airport already use flares to disrupt any potential missile fire. But there are also worries someone could detonate explosives in the teeming crowds outside the airport. We received information at the military level from the United States, but also from other countries, that there were indications that there was a threat of suicide attacks on the mass of people, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said, talking about the threat around Kabul airport. Senior U.S. officials said Wednesdays warning from the embassy was related to specific threats involving the Islamic State group and potential vehicle bombs. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss ongoing military operations. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan grew out of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even-more extreme view of Islam. Naming themselves after Khorasan, a historic name for the greater region, the extremists embarked on a series of brutal attacks in Afghanistan that included a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul that saw infants and women killed. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan. However, their advance across the country likely saw IS fighters freed alongside the Talibans own. There are particular concerns that extremists may have seized heavy weapons and equipment abandoned by Afghan troops who fled the Taliban advance. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, some European nations said they would have to end their evacuations. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told RTL radio said his countrys efforts would end Friday evening due to the U.S. pullout. Danish Defense Minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul. Denmarks last flight has already departed, and Poland and Belgium have also announced the end of their evacuations. The Dutch government said it had been told by the U.S. to leave Thursday. The Taliban have said theyll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. The Taliban have promised to return Afghanistan to security and pledged they wont seek revenge on those who opposed them or roll back progress on human rights. But many Afghans are skeptical. Fueling fears of what Taliban rule might hold, a journalist from private broadcaster Tolo News described being beaten by Taliban. Ziar Yad said the fighters also beat his colleague and confiscated their cameras, technical equipment and a mobile phone as they tried to report on poverty in Kabul. The issue has been shared with Taliban leaders; however, the perpetrators have not yet been arrested, which is a serious threat to freedom of expression, Yad wrote on Twitter. Lawless reported from London and Gambrell from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press writers Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; and Colleen Barry in Milan contributed to this report. Two paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security while a C-130 Hercules takes off during a evacuation operation in Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (Department of Defense) WASHINGTON The security threat that prompted the State Department to urge Americans to move away from the perimeter of the Kabul airport was credible and urgent, the acting U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan said Thursday. Speaking to ABC News from Kabul, Ross Wilson said he could not discuss specifics of the threat or its current status. It was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling, he said. Ross spoke as the United States worked to get remaining Americans out of the country. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan amid growing warnings of terrorist threats targeting the airport. President Joe Biden has set a Tuesday deadline for ending the evacuation. Asked about news reports that the evacuation could end on Friday, Wilson declined to comment. He said there are safe ways to get to the airport for those Americans who still want to leave, and he added that there undoubtedly will be some at-risk Afghans who will not get out before Bidens deadline. Untold thousands of at-risk Afghans are struggling to get into the airport even as many thousands of other Afghans already have been flown to safety in nearly two weeks of round-the-clock flights. The airlift continued Thursday despite warnings of vehicle-borne bomb threats near the airport. The White House said 13,400 people had been evacuated in the 24 hours that ended early Thursday morning Washington time. Those included 5,100 people aboard U.S. military planes and 8,300 on coalition and partner aircraft. That was a substantial drop from the 19,000 airlifted by all means the day before. Several of the Americans working phones and trying to pull strings to get out former Afghan colleagues, womens advocates, journalists and other vulnerable Afghans said they were still waiting for U.S. action. Its 100% up to the Afghans to take these risks and try to fight their way out, said Sunil Varghese, policy director with the International Refugee Assistance Project. Secretary of State Blinken emphasized at a State Department briefing on Wednesday that evacuating Americans is our top priority. He added: Were also committed to getting out as many Afghans at-risk as we can before the 31st, when Biden plans to pull out the last of thousands of American troops. As more nations began shutting down own evacuation flights and pulling out before the U.S. withdrawal, there were new European warnings about the threats. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC that there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport, possibly within hours. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul, the capital, issued a security alert Wednesday warning American citizens away from three specific airport gates. Senior U.S. officials said the warning was related to ongoing and specific threats involving the Islamic State and potential vehicle bombs. Blinken said the State Department estimates there were about 6,000 Americans wanting to leave Afghanistan when the airlift began Aug. 14, as the Taliban took the capital after a stunning military conquest. About 4,500 Americans have been evacuated so far, Blinken said, and among the rest some are understandably very scared. The 6,000 figure is the first firm estimate by the State Department of how many Americans were seeking to get out. U.S. officials early in the evacuation estimated as many as 15,000, including dual citizens, lived in Afghanistan. The figure does not include U.S. Green Card holders. About 500 Americans have been contacted with instructions on when and how to get to the chaotic Kabul airport to catch evacuation flights. In addition, 1,000 or perhaps fewer are being contacted to determine whether they still want to leave. Blinken said some of these may already have left the country, some may want to remain and some may not actually be American citizens. Blinken emphasized that the U.S. and other governments plan to continue assisting Afghans and Americans who want to leave after the deadline for Bidens planned end to the evacuation and the two-decade U.S. military role in Afghanistan. Biden has cited what he U.S. says are rising security threats to U.S. forces, including from an affiliate of the Islamic State terror group, for his determination to stick with Tuesdays withdrawal deadline. The U.S. Embassy has already been evacuated; staff are operating from the Kabul airport and the last are to leave by Tuesday. Biden said this week he had asked his national security team for contingency plans in case he decides to extend the deadline. Taliban leaders who took control of Afghanistan this month say they will not tolerate any extensions to the Tuesday deadline. But Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen tweeted that people with legal documents will still be able to fly out via commercial flights after Tuesday. U.S. troops are anchoring a multinational evacuation from the airport. The White House says the airlift overall has flown out 82,300 Afghans, Americans and others on a mix of U.S., international and private flights. The withdrawal comes under a 2020 deal negotiated by President Donald Trump with the Taliban. Refugee groups are describing a different picture than the Biden administration is when it comes to many Afghans: a disorganized, barely-there U.S. evacuation effort that leaves the most desperate to risk beatings and death at Taliban checkpoints. Some Afghans are reported being turned away from the Kabul airport by American forces controlling the gates, despite having approval for flights. U.S. military and diplomatic officials appear to still be compiling lists of eligible Afghans but have yet to disclose how many may be evacuated and how private Americans and American organizations said. We still have 1,200 Afghans with visas that are outside the airport and havent got in, said James Miervaldis with No One Left Behind, one of dozens of veterans groups working to get out Afghans who worked with the U.S. military during Americas nearly 20 years of combat in the country.. Were waiting to hear from the US. government and havent heard yet. U.S.-based organizations, speaking on background to discuss sensitive matters, cite accounts from witnesses on the ground as saying some American citizens, and family members of Afghans with green cards, still were having trouble pushing and talking their way into the Kabul airport for flights. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the U.S. military will preserve as much airlift capacity at the airport as possible in the coming days. But he added that in the final days and hours there will have to be a balance in getting out U.S. troops and their equipment as well as evacuees. Associated Press writers Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida, contributed to this report. A U.S. Marine provides security for qualified evacuees boarding a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Afghanistan on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. Refugees from Afghanistan have arrived at Fort McCoy in Wisconsin and up to 10,000 more could do so in the coming weeks (Taylor Crul/U.S. Air Force) MADISON, Wis. Refugees from Afghanistan have arrived at Fort McCoy in Wisconsin and up to 10,000 more could do so in the coming weeks, U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson said Wednesday after meeting with base officials. The base, located about 40 miles east of La Crosse in western Wisconsin, is one of three military installations nationwide that has been processing people evacuated from Afghanistan since the country fell to the Taliban. Johnson, a Republican, visited Fort McCoy along with Republican state lawmakers and some military veterans. Democratic Gov. Tony Evers was also there separately and met with refugees, U.S. Northern Command Gen. Glen VanHerck and Maj. Gen. Paul Knapp, the leader of the Wisconsin National Guard. Our allies from Afghanistan have a long road ahead of them, and Wisconsin will continue to extend our support and assistance to these individuals who bravely contributed to our countrys efforts over the past two decades, Evers said in a statement. U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, a Democrat from Wisconsin, said at a Madison event on voters rights that the United States has a moral obligation to help those who assisted the country for years in Afghanistan and those who are at risk under a Taliban regime. During a news conference at the base, Johnson questioned the status of the refugees being brought there and whether they had been fully vetted. He said he saw numerous refugees during his visit and got the impression that those who had arrived were happy to be there, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. It sounds like the first group of people that arrived are just relieved to have been able to escape Afghanistan. They won the lottery, theyre here in America, he said. The vast majority are here wanting what we want, the opportunity to raise their families in safety and security, with opportunity. But Johnson faulted President Joe Bidens administration, saying its assurances about the vetting process was putting lipstick on a pig. Maybe theyre taking biometrics, but you need biometrics taken beforehand that you can compare them to, he said. It would be nice if we knew everyone even just had an identification card, but Im hearing they dont. State Rep. Tony Kurtz, who is a veteran, said its important to get the Afghans who worked alongside the U.S. out of Afghanistan. The vast majority of them are here for the right reason, but all it takes is one and weve got to make sure we do our due diligence, he said. We need to take time, once they get out of harms way, to make sure were getting the right people and doing the proper vetting. All of the refugees go through security vetting before they can enter the country, White House officials said Monday. Upon arrival, they are tested for COVID-19. Those who test positive will have access to space to quarantine. Johnson said the Biden administration should be focusing only on evacuating Special Immigrant Visa applicants and their families, and people who U.S. military members personally vouch for. About 1,000 service members from multiple units of the U.S. Army and Army Reserve are slated to assemble at the base to provide support to the refugees. A flag of Israel and an American flag are displayed at the Pentagon in Washington, on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's scheduled meeting Thursday with President Joe Biden was put on hold as Biden turned his attention to the situation at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, where more than a dozen people were killed by explosions. (Andrew Harnik/AP) WASHINGTON President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett have postponed their White House meeting as Biden focused his attention on dealing with the aftermath of deadly explosions near the Kabul airport that targeted U.S. troops and Afghans seeking to flee their country after the Taliban takeover. Biden and Bennett were scheduled to meet late Thursday morning for their first face-to-face conversation since Bennett became Israel's prime minister in June. The two will instead meet on Friday. Before arriving in Washington, Bennett made clear the top priority of the visit was to persuade Biden not to return to the Iran nuclear deal, arguing Tehran has already advanced in its uranium enrichment, and that sanctions relief would give Iran more resources to back Israel's enemies in the region. The Israeli leader met separately Wednesday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to discuss Iran and other issues. The visit is his first to the U.S. as prime minister. Bennett told his Cabinet before the trip that he would tell the American president "that now is the time to halt the Iranians, to stop this thing" and not to reenter "a nuclear deal that has already expired and is not relevant, even to those who thought it was once relevant." Biden has made clear his desire to find a path to salvage the 2015 landmark pact cultivated by Barack Obama's administration but scuttled in 2018 by Donald Trump's. But U.S. indirect talks with Iran have stalled and Washington continues to maintain crippling sanctions on the country as regional hostilities simmer. Trump's decision to withdraw from Iran's nuclear deal led Tehran to abandon over time every limitation the accord imposed on its nuclear enrichment. The country now enriches a small amount of uranium up to 63%, a short step from weapons-grade levels, compared with 3.67% under the deal. It also spins far more advanced centrifuges and more of them than were allowed under the accord, worrying nuclear nonproliferation experts even though Tehran insists its program is peaceful. Bennett's Washington visit comes weeks after Ebrahim Raisi was sworn in as Iran's new president. Raisi, 60, a conservative cleric with close ties to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has suggested he'll engage with the U.S. But he also has struck a hard-line stance, ruling out negotiations aimed at limiting Iranian missile development and support for regional militias something the Biden administration wants to address in a new accord. Administration officials acknowledged that Iran's potential "breakout" the time needed to amass enough fissile material for a single nuclear weapon is now down to a matter of months or less. But a senior administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to preview the scheduled talks, said the administration sees the maximum pressure campaign employed by the Trump administration as having emboldened Iran to push ahead with its nuclear program. Bennett is also looking to turn the page from his predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu had a close relationship with Trump after frequently clashing with Obama. Biden, who has met with every Israeli prime minister since Golda Meir, had his own tensions with Netanyahu over the years. During his latest White House campaign, Biden called Netanyahu "counterproductive" and an "extreme right" leader. Biden waited nearly a month after his election before making his first call to Netanyahu, raising concerns in Jerusalem and among some Netanyahu backers in Washington that the two would have a difficult relationship. The president called Bennett just hours after he was sworn in as prime minister in June to offer his congratulations. Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the liberal Jewish advocacy group J Street, said Bennett is intent on building a positive working relationship with the Biden administration. But Ben-Ami, whose group supports a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, noted that the two leaders are out of sync on several issues in addition to Iran. Bennett opposes the creation of a Palestinian state and supports expansion of settlements in the West Bank, which Biden opposes. In an interview with The New York Times ahead of his visit, Bennett declined to comment on whether he would move to block Biden administration plans to reopen a U.S. consulate for Palestinians in Jerusalem. "The warmth that is going to be projected and the good solid working relationship cannot fully mask the fact that the agenda that Prime Minister Bennett comes to Washington with and the agenda that the Biden administration is pursuing on some of the core issues are still almost as different as they could possibly be," Ben-Ami said. Poeple evacuated from Kabul, Afghanistan, walk through the terminal before boarding a bus after they arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Va., on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (Jose Luis Magana/AP) RICHMOND, Va. Gov. Ralph Northam's administration received notification Wednesday that the Department of Defense had authorized the use of Marine Corps Base Quantico to house Afghan refugees, as well as a national guard installation in central Virginia. Fort Lee, an Army training site in Virginia, was already housing immigrants who recently fled Afghanistan. Over the coming weeks, capacity at Quantico and Fort Pickett in Nottoway County "will build" to support about 5,000 and 10,000 people, respectively, according to an email a senior Northam administration official received and shared with The Associated Press. "We welcome these refugees, no matter how long or short they are here," said Billy Coleburn, the mayor of Blackstone, which neighbors Fort Pickett. An email seeking further comment from the Department of Defense wasn't immediately returned. U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger, whose district includes Fort Pickett, said her office was requesting additional information from Biden administration officials about the plans and how they will impact the area. A military truck exits the main gate to Fort Pickett Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, in Blackstone, Va. (Steve Helber/AP) Since the Taliban seized the Afghan capital on Aug. 14, about 82,000 people have been airlifted from Afghanistan. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may still be awaiting evacuation. And untold thousands of at-risk Afghans are struggling to get into the Kabul airport. As of Wednesday morning, more than 8,600 evacuees have arrived in the U.S. through Virginia's Washington Dulles International Airport, according to figures provided by Grant Neely, a communications advisor for Northam. U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said at a community event Wednesday that officials were looking for additional airports to serve as entry points because Dulles was "getting overwhelmed," according to a transcript of his remarks provided by his office. At the airport Wednesday, a steady trickle of evacuees made their way from a holding area, where their papers were processed and they were tested for COVID-19. They were then put on waiting buses that would take them to the Dulles Expo Center or other temporary sites. Some said they had been waiting a day or more at the airport. In contrast with other international arrivals passing through customs with loads of luggage on carts, the evacuees often have had few or no belongings at all. Neely wrote in an email that military flights and buses were providing transportation to take evacuees who are not U.S. citizens or green card holders to military installations for further processing toward their final destination. U.S. citizens were passing through immigration and customs and being offered assistance for such things as temporary lodging and travel, he said. Virginia agencies and local governments were helping with the logistical efforts. The Virginia Department of Health was testing everyone arriving without documentation of a negative COVID test in the last 72 hours, Neely said. Of the more than 900 tests done Tuesday, 11 people tested positive, he said. Fairfax and Loudoun counties were providing isolation and quarantine space for U.S. citizens who test positive as needed, according to Neely. The state and defense departments were handling those accommodations for noncitizens. The evacuees were also being offered vaccines against the coronavirus and taking them at a higher rate than Virginians, Warner said. Northam said in an interview Wednesday that he was proud of the state's efforts. Northam and his wife, Pam, also described the conditions at Fort Lee, where they both recently visited but press access has not been allowed. They said the refugees were being provided adequate, culturally sensitive accommodations with access to medical care and space for recreation and worship. "As you might imagine, logistically, it's a major challenge. But they're handling it well," Northam said of the efforts at Fort Lee. ____ Associated Press writer Matthew Barakat contributed to this report. U.S. Marines with Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force - Crisis Response - Central Command, provide assistance during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Kabul, Afghanistan, Aug. 20, 2021. (Nicholas Guevara/U.S. Marine Corps) WASHINGTON Leaders in the Biden administration and on Capitol Hill took steps Wednesday to discourage members of Congress from taking further unauthorized trips to Kabul, delivering sharp rebukes to a pair of lawmakers who made such a journey this week and warning others not to follow. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin privately made it clear he would approve no VIP visits to the Kabul airport, the epicenter of a massive evacuation effort, according to a defense official who requested anonymity to discuss internal communications. The moves came in response to Tuesdays visit to the evacuation by Reps. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., and Peter Meijer, R-Mich., a pair of Iraq War veterans who have pressed President Joe Biden to move faster to help vulnerable Afghans. The statements came as two other lawmakers were heading toward Afghanistan on Wednesday, according to a Biden administration official who was not authorized to discuss their plans. The official said the House members, whose names could not be confirmed, were in Europe and had requested passage to Afghanistan. The Pentagon rejected the request, the official said. Moulton and Meijers visit Tuesday was first reported by The Washington Post, setting off a wave of criticism of the lawmakers for making a freelance excursion that they kept secret from military leaders who were trying to manage a massive, potentially lifesaving operation. The congressmen were only in Kabul for hours, leaving on a flight used for evacuating Americans and Afghans. But it was enough to prompt officials to vigorously warn anyone else who might be considering such a trip. We dont want anybody to think that this was a good idea and that they should try to follow suit, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., told reporters Wednesday. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., agreed. I dont think its smart for others to go, he said. Youre putting yourself not just yourself, but youre putting Americans - in harms way, if the military has to protect you, which they will do. McCarthy said he has given explicit advice to others considering the trip: I explained to them that I dont think they should. The Moulton-Meijer trip added a striking new twist to what was already a volatile situation. Bidens decision to end a 20-year war in Afghanistan, followed by the countrys rapid fall to the Taliban, has triggered a massive evacuation effort with consequences that will probably play out for years. Even traditionally circumspect officials made little secret Wednesday of their frustration that the two lawmakers had thrust themselves into such a landscape. We obviously are not encouraging VIP visits to a very tense, dangerous and dynamic situation at the airport, Defense Department spokesman John Kirby said. Moulton and Meijer had initially traveled from the United States to Qatar via a commercial flight that they paid for, according to Tim Biba, a spokesman for Moulton. From there they figured out a way onto an empty military flight going into Kabul, Biba said. Moultons office provided few other specifics about that, other than to say it was an allied military plane. One official said the administration had received troubling reports that the pair were not honest about their identities on the manifest on the aircraft. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because the person was not authorized to discuss the details of the lawmakers travel. Moulton played down that account but did not deny it. If that happened, I was unaware, said Moulton via a text message from his spokesman. I told the crew who I was. Reached by cellphone, Meijer denied using a fake name and said he had no knowledge of how manifests worked. In any case, the lawmakers arrived in Kabul at about 4 a.m. D.C. time on Tuesday and left around 7:30 that night, Biba said. During their brief time at the airport, the pair met with service members, diplomats and civilians, all of whom were scrambling to evacuate thousands of Americans, U.S. allies and vulnerable Afghans by Bidens Aug. 31 deadline. Witnessing our young Marines and soldiers at the gates, navigating a confluence of humanity as raw and visceral as the world has ever seen, was indescribable, Moulton said in a post on social media. He said the trip was made in secret to reduce risks and impact on the mission. The pair were flown out of Kabul via a military plane that included evacuees. Moulton said the lawmakers insisted on leaving in a plane that was not full, in a seat designated for crew, so that we didnt take a seat from someone else. And the Massachusetts congressman said that in the coming days he and Meijer will have more to share about what theyve learned. But it is unclear how receptive their colleagues will be. Several spoke angrily about the pairs decision to show up in the midst of a military operation and put additional strain on the armed forces. Neither one of them should have their ass in Afghanistan right now, said Rep. Mike D. Rogers (Ala.), the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee. The Defense Department has enough to do without having to try to protect two members of Congress. Period. He added that the Pentagons resources are stretched thin in Afghanistan as it is. The last thing that the Defense Department needs is to defend two members of Congress, Rogers said. I cannot believe those two very fine men went over there and did that to this country. Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., chairman of the Armed Services committee, was a bit more restrained. It does complicate what theyre doing, Smith said. Pelosi said congressional delegations abroad generally need approval from the relevant committee chairs and ranking members, and no such approval was granted to the two lawmakers, both of whom are combat veterans. Weve put out the word to committee chairs, Pelosi said Wednesday. There arent going to be any planes or this or that for people going to the region, or any facilitation. The House was in session while the lawmakers were on their trip, so neither was present for votes on several matters, including Bidens $3.5 trillion budget blueprint. Both invoked a coronavirus-era rule allowing other House members to cast proxy votes on their behalf. Moulton tapped Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. But McGovern was told that Moulton would be in Massachusetts and had no idea that he was standing in so his colleague could travel to Kabul, according to a person familiar with the exchange. Meijer had Rep. Blake D. Moore, R-Utah, cast a proxy vote. Moores office did not respond to a request for comment. Austin was among those who were not aware of the lawmakers plans, according to Kirby, his spokesman. The secretary would have appreciated the opportunity to have had a conversation before the visit took place, Kirby said. They certainly took time away from what we had been planning to do that day. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that the White House was also in the dark about the trip. This is not the time to travel to Afghanistan, she said during the daily White House news briefing. Our focus, our objectives, our resources need to be laser-focused on evacuating Afghan partners, evacuating American citizens. McCarthy, however, said he does empathize with the pent-up ire that may have prompted the trip. Its not the best idea to go there, but I understand their frustration, McCarthy said. He blamed the Biden administration for not providing enough information on the evacuation, suggesting that this lack of transparency prompted the trip. Some rank-and-file lawmakers with military backgrounds also defended Moulton and Meijers actions based on what they consider a general lack of information about the situation in Kabul. Well, I wouldnt have done it, but I understand the frustration, said Rep. Mike Waltz, R-Fla., who served in the Army. This is very personal for many of us, the level of frustration for the lack of information were getting. Rep. Chrissy Houlahan, D-Pa., an Air Force veteran, agreed that lawmakers are not getting a full picture. Thats almost my exact experience, she said. It just shows how troubled so many of our veterans are, said Rep. Mikie Sherrill, D-N.J., a former U.S. Navy helicopter pilot. Its certainly ill-advised, but I think they were - I think it shows just how so many of our veterans are very concerned about the situation. But Pelosi dismissed any such explanation of Moulton and Meijers motivations. They wanted to freelance on their own, she said. I would not make anything bigger of this. - - - The Washington Posts John Hudson contributed to this report. Veteran David Crenshaw and his service dog Doc at a Capitol Hill news conference to promote House bill, H.R. 1022, the Puppies Assisting Wounded Servicemembers Act, or PAWS Act, on March 3, 2021. (JOE GROMELSKI) WASHINGTON President Joe Biden on Wednesday signed a bill into law that will allow some veterans with mental health conditions to receive service dogs. The new law orders the Department of Veterans Affairs secretary to develop and launch a five-year pilot program that provides service dog training to benefit veterans diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. Previously, the VA only covered some costs of service dogs for veterans with certain physical disabilities, such as blindness, hearing impairment and mobility issues but not mental health conditions. Biden signed the bill in the Oval Office. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., who led the legislation through Congress, attended the ceremony. Ive had the chance to visit with veterans and their service dogs in my district, and it couldnt be clearer how service dogs make life better for our veterans, Slotkin said in a statement Wednesday. From waking them from PTSD-related nightmares, helping them open doors, or finding an exit in a crowded space, it can be transformational. The Puppies Assisting Wounded Servicemembers for Veterans Therapy Act, or PAWS Act, requires the VA to start the pilot program in early 2022, and it must be carried out by at least five VA medical centers. The facilities will partner with accredited service dog organizations to perform the training. Theres a chance the program could extend beyond five years. When the five years are up, the VA must report back to Congress about whether it should be extended or made permanent. If it does continue, lawmakers will consider expanding the program to include veterans with mental health conditions other than PTSD. Mental health service dogs are task-trained to assist people with PTSD, panic disorders, anxiety disorders, depression and other conditions. They can retrieve medication, bring their partner an emergency phone, call 911 or a suicide hotline with a K9 rescue phone, turn on lights and help with emotional overload, among other things. Some lawmakers and advocates have pushed the VA for years to help veterans with PTSD cover the costs of training service dogs. The department maintained there wasnt enough scientific evidence showing dogs helped treat PTSD and its symptoms. Congress directed the VA to conduct a study on the issue in 2010. The initial results were published in March. The study found veterans paired with service dogs experienced a reduction in the severity of their PTSD symptoms, and they exhibited fewer suicidal behaviors and ideations. More results of the study, including its cost-effectiveness as a treatment for PTSD, are expected to be published in September. The research is clear on the range of benefits a service dog can provide for veterans experiencing those kinds of symptoms, which is why were thrilled to see this pilot program become law, Christine Myran, executive director of the nonprofit Blue Star Service Dogs, said in a statement. Providing support to our veterans is essential for helping with their transition back to civilian life, and this law will make a real difference for those making that journey. Nikki Wentling Gretchen Catherwood holds the flag that draped the casket of her son, Marine Lance Cpl. Alec Catherwood, in Springville, Tenn., on Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021. In 2010, Alec, 19, was killed in Afghanistan fighting the Taliban. (Karen Pulfer Focht/AP) SPRINGVILLE, Tenn. She was folding a red sweater when she heard a car door slam, went to the window and realized that a moment she always imagined would kill her was about to be made real: three Marines and a Navy chaplain were walking toward her door, and that could only mean one thing. She put her hand on the blue stars she'd stuck next to the front door, a symbol meant to protect her son, Marine Lance Cpl. Alec Catherwood, who had left three weeks before for the battlefields of Afghanistan. And then, as she recalls it, she lost her mind. She ran wildly through the house. She opened the door and told the men they couldn't come inside. She picked up a flower basket and hurled it at them. She screamed so loud and for so long the next day she could not speak. "I just wanted them not to say anything," said Gretchen Catherwood, "because if they said it, it would be true. And, of course, it was." Her 19-year-old son was dead, killed fighting the Taliban on Oct. 14, 2010. As she watched the news over the last two weeks, it felt like that day happened 10 minutes ago. The American military pulled out of Afghanistan, and all they had fought so hard to build seemed to collapse in an instant. The Afghan military put down its weapons, the president fled and the Taliban took over. As thousands crushed into the Kabul airport desperate to escape, Gretchen Catherwood felt like she could feel in her hands the red sweater she'd been folding the moment she learned her son was dead. Her phone buzzed with messages from the family she's assembled since that horrible day: the officer who'd dodged the flowerpot; the parents of others killed in battle or by suicide since; her son's fellow fighters in the storied 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, nicknamed the Darkhorse Battalion, that endured the highest rate of causalities in Afghanistan. Many of them call her "Ma." Outside of this circle, she'd seen someone declare "what a waste of life and potential" on Facebook. Friends told her how horrible they'd felt that her son had died in vain. As she exchanged messages with the others who'd paid the price of war, she worried its end was forcing them to question whether all they had seen and all they had suffered had mattered at all. "There are three things I need you to know," she said to some. "You did not fight for nothing. Alec did not lose his life for nothing. I will be here for you no matter what, until the day I die. Those are the things I need you to remember." Construction continues on the Darkhorse Lodge in Springville, Tenn., on Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021. Gretchen and Kirk Catherwood are building the retreat for combat veterans, a place where they can gather and grapple together with the horrors of war. (Allen G. Breed/AP) In the woods behind her house, the Darkhorse Lodge is under construction. She and her husband are building a retreat for combat veterans, a place where they can gather and grapple together with the horrors of war. There are 25 rooms, each named after one of the men killed from her son's battalion. The ones who made it home have become their surrogate sons, she said. And she knows of more than a half-dozen who have died from suicide. "I am fearful of what this might do to them psychologically. They're so strong and so brave and so courageous. But they also have really, really big hearts. And I feel that they might internalize a lot and blame themselves," she said. "And oh God, I hope they don't blame themselves." ___ The 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment deployed in the fall of 2010 from Camp Pendleton, California, sending 1,000 U.S. Marines on what would become one of the bloodiest tours for American service members in Afghanistan. The Darkhorse Battalion spent six months battling Taliban fighters in the Sangin district of Helmand province. An area of green fields and mud compounds, Sangin remained almost entirely in the Taliban's control nearly a decade into the U.S.-led war. Fields of lush poppies used in narcotics gave the militants valued income they were determined to hold. When the Marines arrived, white Taliban flags flew from most buildings. Loudspeakers installed to broadcast prayers were used to taunt U.S. forces. Schools had closed. The Marines came under fire as soon as a helicopter dropped them outside their patrol base. "When the bird landed, we were already getting shot at," recalled former Sgt. George Barba of Menifee, California. "We run, we get inside and I remember our gunnery sergeant telling us: `Welcome to Sangin. You just got your combat action ribbon.'" Snipers lurked in the trees. Fighters armed with rifles hid behind mud walls. Homemade bombs turned roads and canals into deathtraps. Marine Lance Cpl. Alec Catherwood the night the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment was deployed from Camp Pendleton, Calif., in 2010. Former Sgt. George Barba recalled Catherwoods first helicopter ride during training, and how he was smiling ear-to-ear and hes swinging his feet like hes a little kid on a highchair. (Chelsea Lee via AP) Sangin was Alec Catherwood's first combat deployment. He had enlisted in the Marines while still in high school, went to boot camp shortly after graduation, then was assigned to a 13-man squad led by former Sgt. Sean Johnson. Johnson was impressed by Catherwood's professionalism physically fit, mentally tough and always on time. "He was only 19, so that was extra special," Johnson said. "Some are still just trying to figure out how to tie their boots and not get yelled at." Catherwood also made them laugh. He carried around a small, stuffed animal he used as a prop for jokes. Barba recalled Catherwood's first helicopter ride during training, and how he was "smiling ear-to-ear and he's swinging his feet like he's a little kid on a highchair." Former Cpl. William Sutton of Yorkville, Illinois, swore Catherwood would crack jokes even during a firefight. "Alec, he was a shining light in that darkness," said Sutton, who was shot multiple times fighting in Afghanistan. "And then they took it from us." On Oct. 14, 2010, after a late night standing watch outside their patrol base, Catherwood's squad headed out to assist fellow Marines under attack, who were running low on ammunition. They crossed open fields, using irrigation canals for cover. After sending half his squad safely ahead, Johnson tapped Catherwood on the helmet and said: "Let's go." After running just three steps, he said, gunfire from ambushing Taliban fighters sounded behind them. Johnson looked down and saw a bullet hole in his pants where he had been shot in the leg. Then came a deafening explosion one of the Marines had stepped on a hidden bomb. Johnson blacked out momentarily, waking up in the water. Another explosion followed. Looking to his left, Johnson saw Catherwood floating facedown. It was obvious, he said, that the young Marine was dead. Explosions during the ambush killed another Marine, Lance Cpl. Joseph Lopez of Rosamond, California, and badly wounded another. Back in the United States, Staff Sergeant Steve Bancroft began an excruciating two-hour drive toward Catherwood's parents' house in northern Illinois. He'd served seven months in Iraq before he became a casualty assistance officer, tasked with notifying families of a death on the battlefield. "I'd never wish that on anybody, I can't express that enough: I do not wish looking a mom and dad in the face and telling them their only son is gone," said Bancroft, who is now retired. He was stoic when he had to be, as he escorted families to Dover, Delaware, to watch coffins be rolled out of a plane. But when he was alone, he cried. And he still weeps when he thinks about the moment he arrived at the home of Gretchen and Kirk Catherwood. They laugh now about the hurled flowerpot. He still regularly talks to them and other sets of parents he notified. Though he never met Alec, he feels like he knows him. "Their son was such a hero, it's hard to explain, but he sacrificed more than 99% of the people in this world would ever think of doing," he said. "Was it worth it? We lost so many people. It's hard to think about how many we've lost." he said. ___ Gretchen Catherwood works at Darkhorse Lodge, with her husband Kirk, left, on Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021. On her arm is a tattoo replica of the bracelet she had made in memory of her son, Alec, who died in Afghanistan. (Karen Pulfer Focht/AP) Gretchen Catherwood keeps the cross her son was wearing on a chain around her bedpost with his dog tags. Alongside it hangs a glass bead, blown with the ashes of another young Marine: Cpl. Paul Wedgewood, who made it home. The Darkhorse Battalion returned to California in April 2011. After months of intense fighting, they'd largely seized Sangin from the Taliban's grip. Leaders of the provincial government could move about safely. Children, including girls, returned to school. It came at a heavy price. In addition to the 25 who perished, more than 200 returned home wounded, many with lost limbs, others with scars harder to see. Wedgewood had trouble sleeping when he finished his four-year enlistment and left the Marine Corps in 2013. As he slept less, he drank more. A tattoo on his upper arm showed a sheet of scroll paper bearing the names of four Marines who died in Sangin. Wedgewood considered reenlisting, but told his mother: "If I stay, I think it'll kill me." Instead, Wedgewood enrolled in college back home in Colorado, but soon lost interest. A welding program at a community college proved a better fit. Wedgewood had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. He was taking medication, participating in therapy. "He was very engaged in working on his mental health," said the Marine's mother, Helen Wedgewood. "He was not a neglected veteran." Still, he struggled. On the Fourth of July, Wedgewood would take his dog camping in the woods to avoid fireworks. He quit a job he liked after a backfiring machine caused him to dive to the floor. Five years after Sangin, things appeared to be looking up. Wedgewood was preparing for a new job that would take him back to Afghanistan as a private security contractor. He seemed to be in a good place. After a night of drinking with his roommates, Wedgewood didn't show up for work on Aug. 23, 2016. A roommate later found him dead in his bedroom. He had shot himself. He was 25 years old. He left a short note. "He basically said that he loved us, but he was tired," Helen Wedgewood said. She considers her son and others who took their own lives to be casualties of war every bit as much as those killed in action. Lance Cpl. Paul Wedgewood embraces his father, John, at Camp Pendleton, Calif., after returning from Afghanistan in April 2011. Paul took his own life five years later. Now that Americas longest war is ending, and the Taliban that U.S.-led forces drove from power have retaken Afghanistan, Wedgewoods mother says she refuses to believe it was all for nothing. (Helen Wedgewood via AP) When the Taliban swept back into control of Afghanistan just before the fifth anniversary of her son's death, she felt relief that a war that left more than 2,400 Americans dead and more than 20,700 wounded had finally come to an end. But there was also sadness that gains made by the Afghan people especially women and children may be temporary. "As a mom, this kind of stabs you, because would he still be around, would any of these young men still be around if this whole war hadn't happened?" she said. "But I try to gently correct people when they say this was a waste or this was all for nothing. Because that's not true. We don't know what impacts it's had on the safety of our country, on the safety of the Afghan people." ___ Some who served with the Darkhorse Battalion are having a hard time seeing it any way other than that their efforts, their blood and the lives of their fallen friends were all for nothing. "I'm starting to feel like how the Vietnam vets felt. There was no purpose to it whatsoever," said Sutton, 32, who now works in the veterans services office of a county outside Chicago, helping military vets get care. "We were able to hold our head up high and say we went to the last Taliban stronghold and we gave them hell," Sutton said, "only for it all to be taken away. In the blink of an eye." Barba, 34, works as a private security guard near Los Angeles. He and his wife are expecting their first child. He said he's had trouble sorting his feelings about the bleak news from Afghanistan. His wife recently woke to Barba screaming in his sleep. "I think your nightmares are back," she told him. "It really is weird," Barba said. "I've seen my guys get mad. I've seen my guys get frustrated. But not like this. This is like somebody spit in their face." Johnson, 34, works as a commercial diver in Florida. He said the U.S. should have acknowledged years ago that the Afghan security forces Americans trained and equipped would never be able to defend the country on their own. "My personal opinion, yeah, we probably should have pulled out years and years ago," Johnson said. "If you're not going to win the damn thing, what are you doing there?" ___ A few months ago, Gretchen Catherwood was painting the cabins that will become the Darkhorse Lodge. It was dark, still without electricity and no cell service, so it was quiet. She felt suddenly like she could feel her son and his 24 fallen comrades. She could almost see their faces. "It's a place where I can feel like they're together," she said, "and that they are still caring for their brothers." The Catherwoods moved out of their home in Illinois. Every time she walked to the front door, Gretchen remembered those four men arriving with the news. She couldn't bear it anymore. Gretchen Catherwood wipes a tear after unveiling a marker during a ceremony for Gold Star families in Paris, Tenn., on Friday, Aug. 20, 2021. Her son, Alec, 19, was killed in Afghanistan. (Karen Pulfer Focht/AP) The gold star pins she wore everyday on her chest kept breaking. She'd always disliked tattoos and hassled her son when he got one as a Marine. But then she found herself at a tattoo parlor. She had his name inked on her arm, and the shape of a gold star pin put permanently on her chest, just above her heart, so she'd never take it off again. She could no longer care for her son, she said, but she could for those who made it home. She and her husband moved to the woods in Tennessee and got to work on the Darkhorse Lodge. They fashioned their logo after the battalion's mascot, a fierce-looking horse, facing left, its mane sharp like a serrated knife and its eyes squinted for battle. The artist who drew theirs softened its edges and turned it to the right, facing toward a future after war. They raised a million dollars, mostly in small donations. One woman sends a check for $2 every month. Bancroft, the officer who notified her of her son's death, donates every year. The obituary for one soldier who died by suicide asked for donations to the Darkhorse Lodge in his memory, and checks flooded the Catherwoods' mailbox. They hope to open next summer and offer free stays for any combat veteran from any war or branch of the military who might benefit from time in the woods, where the only conflict is among the dozens of hummingbirds fighting over the feeders on her front porch. She is hopeful that the American withdrawal from Afghanistan means no one else will die on a battlefield there. But she also worries that it might rattle the vets who made it home, and who might already be struggling to make sense of what happened there and why. "That's a constant fear, it's been my fear since they got back but now it's even worse," she said. "They experienced things that 99% of the country never will. I've never watched a friend die. I've never fought to the death. We are losing these people at a frightening, frightening rate to suicides, and we can't afford to lose one more." She and her husband don't believe that the chaotic end honors their son's service, and are particularly troubled that some of the Afghan interpreters and others who helped the military for years might not make it out alive. But they also can't imagine how it might have ended any other way, had the United States stayed in Afghanistan another year or five or 20. Part of Alec Catherwood remains there, and for a while that bothered his mother. When he was alive, she loved to touch his face. He had baby soft skin and when she put her hands on his cheeks, this big tough Marine felt like her little boy. The military did an honorable job making him look whole, she said. But when she touched his cheek as he laid in the casket, she touched a part that had been reconstructed - it wasn't really him. "That used to be much harder than it is now," she said. "Now, it's like, damn straight, he's still there. He's always going to have a presence there, flipping off the Taliban." Good things will grow where he is, she likes to think. "He's part of their dirt, their soil, he's part of the Earth there, he is forever there." ___ Bynum reported from Savannah, Georgia. Stillwater Fire Station No. 2, located in an circa-1938 historic building on the OSU campus, is a community landmark but Fire Chief Terry Essary says it no longer functions well as living quarters and doesn't accommodate larger equipment. A new fire station west of campus that would better meet the needs of SFD and residents has been proposed as part of a package of capital projects. Bobbie Gene Silvers, 92, died August 25, 2021. His graveside service will begin at 10:00 a.m. on Thursday, September 2, 2021 at Sunset Memorial Gardens, Stillwater, OK. Strode Funeral Home and Cremation is in charge of arrangements. Changes to the SunCommercial's back end processing means the e-edition is getting a facelift. The biggest change is the e-edition, by default, is now presented in Text view. A pharmacy on the Coromandel Peninsula is calling on its community to get jabbed against the flu to make more space for Covid-19 vaccines. The Tairua-Pauanui Pharmacy, on the Peninsula's eastern coast, put the message out on social media. Pharmacist Aidan Kortegast says influenza vaccines from this year took up about about a quarter of the space in the pharmacy's small inoculation fridge. "We want to provide as many vaccines as possible ... and our fridge space is limiting that." Kortegast says if they could use those vaccines, it could "potentially double our output" of Covid-19 vaccines. He says the other half of the fridge is needed for medicines like insulin. Kortegast says there's "only two places that these vaccines can go": in people's arms or going to waste if they are there long enough to expire. The community had responded well since the message went out on Saturday, which Kortegast was "pleasantly surprised" by. "We're getting phone calls and we're quite easily able to schedule these extra flu injections throughout the day." Kortegast says he has seen an increase in demand to get vaccinated against Covid-19 since the start of the current outbreak, particularly because the Coromandel Peninsula had a range of locations of interest. "There is a lot more urgency," he says. "Prior to this, I felt that there was a little bit of complacency." Kortegast thinks there's a possibility some people may not have received their influenza shot because they were eligible to get vaccinated for Covid-19 earlier this year, ultimately leaving the pharmacy with extra stock. "What's motivating me to do this is that I want to help the Tairua community as much as I can, I'm passionate about that." -RNZ/Jake Heke. Do you already have a paid subscription to any of the SWNewsMedia newspapers? If so, you can Activate your Premium online account by clicking here. Activation will allow you to view unlimited online articles each month. To activate your Premium online account, the email address and phone number provided with your paid newspaper subscription needs to match the information you use in setting up your online user account. If you are having trouble or want to confirm what email address and phone number is listed on your subscription account, please call 952-345-6682 or email circulation@swpub.com and we'll be happy to assist. Current Print Subscribers will be prompted to either login to their current site user account or to create a new one. 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Chance of rain 80%. v1p3r Senior - BHPian Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: BLR / BOM / LON Posts: 5,169 Thanked: 4,298 Times View My Garage Re: IT industry salary survey I regularly hire people who get paid in multiples of 6-7 lakhs per year of experience. These are non-Tier 1 candidates, with average communication skills, and under 5 years of experience. If they were not, they would already be in the US at x100k salaries. If you run a product company, handle heavy data loads, and dabble in learning and intelligence, this is par for the course. If you are in a bodyshopper, then there's really nothing to say. These leeches looted students for two decades - starting salaries haven't changed in 20 years and have actually decreased, armtwisted governments into extending their tax holidays and tax-free status, and never scaled themselves up on the value chain. Every coder there aspired to middle management - some sort of xL (TL, PL) leader, and then manager. None of these roles require upskilling, new knowledge sets, or any real technical skills. Now they're all left clutching their bellies, wondering why they don't get paid the 1 cr that an Amazon PM with 8 years of experience gets paid. Caught in between, of course, are smaller companies that are deep-tech but not yet spinning enough cash to retain 'rockstar' or 'ninja' talent. Like me. and both apply here. Quote: reignofchaos Originally Posted by I have around 15 years experience and most folks in this range in product dev companies are earning well above 8 figures now. Org is offering huge hikes and RSUs just to retain folks as there is a huge lack of resources in the area I work. I've personally approved 60L+ packages for people with 5-6 years of solid experience. Salaries in Bangalore are now more lucrative on a PPP level than anywhere else in the world. Absolutely crazy! Quote: vredesbyrd Originally Posted by Yes, god has favourites and I'm not one of them. Quote: YD14 Originally Posted by Can anybody give me some tips what would be the best way to make the most out of this situation in the industry if it persisted for a few more years? Quote: kavensri Originally Posted by Though this is slightly off-topic as this thread is about salary in IT industry, I still thought of posting this message here. Whether it is 10 LPA or 60 LPA for a 10+ years of experienced IT person, I always wonder why my sister with 25+ years of experience is paid less than 10 LPA. She has been managing a whole branch of a private home loan company in a tier-2 city. Her working hours are worse than mine (I am having 23+ years of experience working for a product MNC) and her responsibilities are also much more (and worse) than mine. Are we going to see any revolution in the salaries of non-IT sector in India? Quote: VaibhavShatna95 Originally Posted by Mr. Moorthy is a great man and all the co founders of Infosys have done this country proud. From Aadhar to Indian IT laws all were introduced by these gentlemen. The kind of era where they started this business from absolutely nothing is a different story altogether. I am sure though you could do better. Also, there is no need for a passive-aggressive statement like 'you could do better'. Maybe the person you're quoting has already started and cashed out of a multi-million dollar startup. Who knows? Be kind. There seems to be a misunderstanding of the 'IT industry'. Bodyshoppers like Infy, Wipro, TCS and their 4 lakh starting salaries, with bloated middle management, are as far removed from product company unicorns as a Model T is from a Pagani. Both have four wheels and an ICE, but that's about it.I regularly hire people who get paid in multiples of 6-7 lakhs per year of experience. These are non-Tier 1 candidates, with average communication skills, and under 5 years of experience. If they were not, they would already be in the US at x100k salaries. If you run a product company, handle heavy data loads, and dabble in learning and intelligence, this is par for the course.If you are in a bodyshopper, then there's really nothing to say. These leeches looted students for two decades - starting salaries haven't changed in 20 years and have actually decreased, armtwisted governments into extending their tax holidays and tax-free status, and never scaled themselves up on the value chain. Every coder there aspired to middle management - some sort of xL (TL, PL) leader, and then manager. None of these roles require upskilling, new knowledge sets, or any real technical skills. Now they're all left clutching their bellies, wondering why they don't get paid the 1 cr that an Amazon PM with 8 years of experience gets paid.Caught in between, of course, are smaller companies that are deep-tech but not yet spinning enough cash to retain 'rockstar' or 'ninja' talent. Like me.andboth apply here.This is in line with what I'm seeing. No surprise at all.You drive two German cars in a country where god hasn't even given some people food or shelter. Consider yourself firmly in the favourite camp.DM me. If you or your friends are that good, I'll hire you.We are not going to see any such revolution. These salaries exist because the end user of the built product is in the US/EU. It would cost multiples more to build it there, so it's built here at a discount. Even given the higher salaries of the locals who build it, the profit margins are massive enough to sustain much higher-than-normal local salaries. Your home loan is sold to locals, and there is no tech component. In a country with rampant unemployment, a job that doesn't have a high degree of differentiated technical skill is easily replaceable and thus not prone to salary increases.NRN is a hypocritical clown who was 'embarrassed' to sing the Indian national anthem at one time. Yes, he has made money and made his investors and early colleagues rich. That does not make him a great man, any more than Sachin Bansal or Bhavish Agarwal - who actually have built competitive world-class products. He has made a significant portion of his money off tax-free land and laws bent for him, and his sidekick has switched political parties to make sure every citizen's data is on the world's least secure database and being accessed by the PLAA willy-nilly. He also turned a blind eye to his blue-eyed boy's continued sexual crimes, because the money was flowing him. Of course, your view is blinded by the fact that his 'largesse' is paying for your PG degree, so I would not expect a realistic opinion. No offence meant. My knowledge from this comes from knowing some of these people personally.Also, there is no need for a passive-aggressive statement like 'you could do better'. Maybe the person you're quoting has already started and cashed out of a multi-million dollar startup. Who knows? Be kind. Last edited by Rudra Sen : 23rd August 2021 at 20:12 . Reason: Two smileys only and you know the board rules. In brief: The chip shortage has accelerated the consolidation of the semiconductor industry, leading to a massive wave of mergers and buyouts. Western Digital is only the latest company to consider such a move, and its eyes are set on Kioxia, its longtime partner in making 3D NAND. If you thought Nvidia purchasing Arm would forever change the semiconductor landscape, you wouldn't be wrongwe're talking about a $40 billion deal that doesn't involve chips. What it does involve is blueprints for RISC chips used throughout the tech industry to design custom silicon for a variety of uses. Then there's AMD's $35 billion acquisition of Xilinx, which adds important capabilities to the former and further consolidates the semiconductor industry. However, there's been another big deal brewing in the background that made some splashes today. Western Digital is reportedly in advanced talks to merge with Kioxia Holdings Corp in a deal valued at over $20 billion. The acquisition would mark a major shift in the flash storage industry. Manufacturers have been under enormous pressure over the last few years to deliver faster storage, higher bit densities, and all of it at high volumes and profit-margin-eroding lower prices, leaving fewer opportunities for smaller companies to grow. Western Digital has had its eyes on the Japanese company for some time. Back in 2017, when Kioxia spun off from Toshiba's burning business group, Western Digital was willing to pay as much as $18.2 billion, but Toshiba rejected the offer at the time. Fast forward to today, and Western Digital is valued at over $19 billion while Kioxia is getting ready for an IPO. Micron, who until recently was a potential bidder, decided the idea is too wild and dropped all discussions of a merger. That leaves only Western Digital, which has a 20-year history of working with Kioxia on various projects, the most recent of which is persistent memory. At the same time, Western Digital CEO David Goeckeler told Nikkei during a recent interview that "we have a tremendous partner in Kioxia, and we look forward to making the future happen together." Furthermore, he rightly pointed out that when you combine Western Digital and Kioxia's market positions, you end up with a giant the size of Samsung, with the potential to get even larger over time. Even if the deal doesn't materialize, the two companies still have a strong partnership with joint ventures around 3D NAND manufacturing, such as a factory in Yokkaichi and another in Kitakami, Japan. With SK Hynix buying Intel's NAND business, a merger between Western Digital and Kioxia is looking increasingly worth it. In brief: The dream of making drone deliveries as ubiquitous as those made by humans is still alive, with companies like Wing doing their best to figure out a working strategy for how to do it at scale. So far, the Alphabet-owned company has done around 400,000 test flights and is on track to reach 100,000 deliveries in the two years since it started its pilot program in Logan, Australia. Delivery drone company Wing today said it would likely hit over 100,000 customer deliveries by the end of this week. The milestone will be reached just as the Alphabet-owned company comes close to its second anniversary after a pilot launch in Logan, Australia, home to more than 300,000 people. Wing says it delivered over 10,000 cups of coffee, 1,200 roast chickens, and 1,700 snack packs to residents in Logan alone, but the company also operates in Finland and the US, where it has made over 50,000 drone deliveries to date. The numbers may seem small, but that's only because the service isn't accessible to all residents of these cities, and the overall selection of goods that can be delivered is relatively small. Delivery drones generally take between six to ten minutes to arrive at their destination, and the company says the current record is two minutes and 47 seconds from order to arrival. The drones have a range of around six miles (9.65 km) and are designed to carry packages weighing up to 2.6 lbs (1.2 kg). They typically fly at a height of around 150 feet (45 m) and descend to about 23-25 feet (7 m) upon arrival, after which they slowly lower a tether and release the package with no need for human intervention. Wing plans to expand to more medium-sized cities, such as Florence, Italy, Manchester, England, and New Orleans, US. The company isn't the only one looking to bring drone deliveries into the mainstream but has a decent chance to make them work thanks in no small part to its drones, which are designed to operate in both fixed-wing and hover flight modes. Their only downsides are noise and the need to find a spot with enough clearance to make for a safe delivery, meaning this will only work in suburbs and low-density urban areas. At this point, it's not clear if the drone delivery model can scale that well, and profitability is still a nebulous topic. Earlier this year, a Wired report went into great detail on how Amazon's dream of incorporating drones into its logistics and delivery empire has failed to materialize in any meaningful way. In brief: AMD is apparently following in Nvidia's footsteps by launching a new line of crypto mining cards based on its latest GPUsif leaked photos from Vietnam are to be believed. They show what appears to be a card from XFX featuring a Navi 21 GPU and lacking any display outputs. The images, spotted by I_Leak_VN, were posted on Facebook by a PC hardware store in Vietnam. The PCB shows a logo for XFX, which makes AMD gaming cards. The card's capacitor layout suggests it is using the Navi 21 GPU, while the dual-slot design bears a strong resemblance to AMD's Instinct M100 Accelerator. It features two 8-pin power connectors on the back, confirming this is a Navi 21 GPU rather than Navi 22 or Navi 10. Having no display outputs is also what one would expect to see in a mining card. While Nvidia has supported gamers over minerspublicly, at leastand brought out the Lite Hash Rate (LHR) versions of the RTX 3080, RTX 3070, and RTX 3060 Ti, AMD said in March that it has no plans to limit the performance of its RDNA 2 offerings. The Radeon RX 6600 XT is a particularly strong product for Ethereum mining. With a 32 MH/s hash rate at 55 W, the Navi 23 card is twice as efficient as a GeForce RTX 3060. "RDNA was designed from the ground up for gaming, and RDNA 2 doubles up on this. And what I mean by this is, Infinity Cache and a smaller bus width were carefully chosen to hit a very specific gaming hit rate. However, mining specifically enjoys, or scales with, higher bandwidth and bus width so there are going to be limitations from an architectural level for mining itself," said AMD product manager Nish Neelalojanan at the time. Also see: What is Crypto Mining? As with all leaks, take this one with a dose of salt. But given the previous leaks from the Linux kernel updates that suggested AMD might be working on Navi 21-based mining cards, the company could soon offer a new rival to Nvidia's CMP line. h/t: VideoCardz In brief: Samsung has given us another reason not to buy stolen goods: the Korean giant has revealed a feature that allows it to disable its televisions remotely. The technology was recently used after a number of TVs were stolen from a warehouse in South Africa. Samsung explains that the Television Block Function is already pre-loaded on all Samsung TV products, though it only works if Samsung knows the serial code of a stolen unit. Once the set connects to the internet, its number is checked against a database on the company's servers. A match results in all of the TV's functions being disabled. Samsung utilized Television Block last month after unrest and looting in South Africa saw several of its sets stolen from the company's Cato Ridge distribution center. As they were taken from Samsung directly, the company knew exactly which serial numbers to look out for. "In keeping with our values to leverage the power of technology to resolve societal challenges, we will continuously develop and expand strategic products in our consumer electronics division with defence-grade security, purpose-built, with innovative and intuitive business tools designed for a new world. This technology can have a positive impact at this time, and will also be of use to both the industry and customers in the future," said Mike Van Lier, Director of Consumer Electronics at Samsung South Africa. We still don't know if Samsung TV owners can or will be able to report their stolen set's serial numbers to Samsung so the company can activate the block, or if the service is reserved for large-scale thefts from stores and warehouses. While the technology will doubtlessly be helpful in deterring thieves, Samsung TV owners might be concerned by the company's ability to brick their sets remotely, especially if the feature could potentially be hacked. Samsung added that anyone in South Africa whose television was blocked by accident must send their proof of purchase to zaservicemanager@samsung.com. In brief: The hacker purportedly responsible for the recent T-Mobile data breach has told The Wall Street Journal that he used a simple tool available to the public to scan T-Mobiles known Internet addresses, leading to an unprotected router that served as an entry point into a data center containing more than 100 servers. The hacker contacted the Journal using Telegram, an encrypted communications app. The 21-year-old told the Journal that he moved from the US to Turkey a few years ago and has used several online aliases since 2017. The exposed router was discovered in July, and he started lifting data from T-Mobiles servers around August 4. The Journal said the user, identified as John Binns, communicated from a Telegram account that had discussed details of the breach before they were widely known. Binns also shared screenshots from within T-Mobiles network, but refused to be photographed for the story. Generating noise was one goal, Binns said, but declined to say whether or not someone paid him to perform the job or if he had sold any of the stolen data. The story took an unusual turn, however, as the Journal notes: He contacted a U.S. relative last year, claiming by telephone that he was a computer expert who had been kidnapped and taken to a hospital against his will, this person said. He gushed about how he could do anything with a computer, this person said. In Telegram messages with the Journal, Mr. Binns repeated similar claims. He said he wanted to draw attention to his perceived persecution by U.S. government authorities. He described an alleged incident in which he claims he was abducted in Germany and put into a fake mental hospital. I have no reason to make up a fake kidnapping story and Im hoping that someone within the FBI leaks information about that, he wrote, explaining his reason for publicly discussing the hack. T-Mobile confirmed the security breach in mid-August, and offered impacted customers two years of free identity theft protection through McAfees ID Theft Protection Service . The company said it has already fixed the security hole that allowed for the attack. The Seattle branch of the FBI said it is aware of the incident but does not have anything additional to share at this time. The FCC is already looking into the matter. Image credit Anete (Photo : GettlyImages/ SOPA Images ) Jeff Bezos amazon Jeff Bezos, the world's richest man and the founder of e-commerce company Amazon, has reportedly bought himself an unlimited soft-serve ice cream machine and installed it at his LA home. Jeff Bezos Gets Ice Cream Machine Ice cream firm CVT Soft Serve posted about the news on Instagram and stated that they are the ones who are supplying Jeff Bezos' house with ice cream. The said machine is on 24/7. CVT Soft Serve also pointed out that Bezos is their first-ever residential client. The post includes a picture of the company's founder, Joe Nicchi, who posed beside several ice cream boxes, according to The Verge. CVT Soft Serve sells its ice cream machine that looks like a minitruck, called CVTeeny. The ice cream machine has a customized licensed place on the front, making it look similar to a food truck. Also Read: Jeff Bezos, Crewmates Received 14-Hour Training for Blue Origin Spaceflight According to the company's website, the CVTeeny machine serves vanilla, chocolate, and twist soft-serve ice cream. The machine was installed in Bezos' Beverly Hills home in Los Angeles, California. Bezos made his fortune from e-commerce giant Amazon and has since shifted his focus to Blue Origin, his very own space firm. The billionaire is known to love ice cream. In 2019, he was photographed with two of his children at Milk Bar, a famous dessert restaurant and bakery in New York City, where he reportedly ordered the famous Cereal Milk ice cream. In the same year, he and his wife, Mackenzie Scott, filed for a divorce after 25 years of marriage. He transferred 25% of his Amazon stake to his ex-wife, which was 4% of the company, immediately making her one of the richest women in the world. Space Flight Backlash The public does not always welcome the billionaire's decisions. Last month, he thanked all the Amazon employees and customers for paying for his trip to space, but his remarks have drawn criticism from celebrities and politicians. Jeff Bezos' space flight was a success, and Blue Origin is planning to have more trips this year. Also, Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin company is selling a seat for $28 million and is open to anyone interested. During a news conference after his space trip aboard Blue Origin's New Shepard, the billionaire said he thanks every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer "because you guys paid for all of this." However, critics quickly pointed out that Amazon workers have been complaining of poor working conditions, unjustified long hours, and very low pay while also accusing Bezos of not paying taxes, according to Sky News. New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said on Twitter that Amazon workers paid for the trip as they had to suffer low wages, union-busting, an inhumane workplace, and drivers not having health insurance during a COVID-19 pandemic. Ocasio-Cortez also pointed out that Amazon customers paid for the trip with the e-commerce company abusing their market power to hurt small businesses. US Senator Elizabeth Warren accused Bezos, who already stepped down as the CEO of Amazon prior to the flight, of not paying taxes. She is currently calling for the launch of a new bill called wealth tax. On Twitter, Senator Warren said that the billionaire forgot to thank all of the Americans who paid taxes to keep the country running while Bezos and the e-commerce company "paid nothing." Senator Warren added that she is working on passing tax laws, and she wants to make billionaires and massive corporations begin paying their fair share. Related Article: Netflix Releases 1st Trailer for SpaceX Documentary of Its Private Spaceflight 'Inspiration4' This article is owned by Tech Times Written by Sophie Webster 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. A leaked ULA email, which has now been deleted, is still making a huge noise after various security experts discovered that it contains some alarming allegations and conspiracies against SpaceX and NASA. Because of this, the United Launch Alliance, one of the largest competitors of Elon Musk's space agency, announced that it would investigate the leaked files since it is considered a cybercrime. "While we are continuing to thoroughly investigate, we have no evidence to suggest any ULA accounts or systems have been breached," said Jessica Rye, the ULA spokeswoman. As of the moment, SpaceX's competitor said that it is hard to tell if the leaked email files are legitimate since there are insufficient details about them. Although this is the case, there are various websites claiming that the released information is authentic. These include Ars Technica, saying that one of the alleged conspiracies in the files includes NASA having a connection with the recent Trump administration. What the Leaked ULA Email Contains According to Futurism's latest report, the leaked email file of the United Launch Alliance first appeared on Raid Forums. However, it has already been deleted. Also Read: GetResponse, Complete Online Marketing Tool Developer, Wins MarTech Breakthrough Award But, BackChannel was able to save the details that the alleged email from ULA contains. Involved security experts said that it caught their attention because of the following reasons: SpaceX conspiracies A new account posted the leaked email files The details were distributed without using a paywall Aside from NASA and Donald Trump, the zip file also shows some email exchanges of Hasan Solomon, a lobbyist at the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, and ULA Vice President Robbie Sabethier. Based on their alleged messages, they are discussing the relationship of Elon Musk and the recent U.S. President, saying that the billionaire is a supporter of the CCP and its interests. Other Musk Conspiracies in the Email Based on the leaked emails, which include a Microsoft Word document, the Tesla CEO has hard on U.S. regulatory agencies but was submissive when Chinese regulators are involved in his Tesla automotive business. As of the moment, ULA is still investigating the leaked information to see if the files are authentic and if hackers really breached their system. For more news updates about ULA and SpaceX conspiracies, always keep your tabs open here at TechTimes. Related Article: Activision Blizzard Accused of Illegally 'Withholding and Suppressing Evidence' in Harassment Lawsuit Expansion This article is owned by TechTimes Written by: Griffin Davis 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Choosing the best face mask for your kid is currently important since the U.S. public and private schools are planning to return students to their physical classrooms. Currently, the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) still hasn't approved Pfizer to be administered to children below 12 years old. However, its developers are hoping that their vaccine would have FDA approval before 2021 ends. Because of this, wearing a face mask and other safety measures against COVID-19 are being implemented in schools, especially since many young students are still not eligible to get vaccinated because of their age. On the other hand, the ABC Science Collaborative published a study that revealed that face coverings are still effective when preventing in-school transmission. The new research even claimed that face masks could still prevent COVID-19 even when social distancing is less than three feet. Involved medical experts said that they conducted their study in 100 school districts and 14 charter schools located in North Carolina. How To Choose the Best Face Mask for Your Kid According to NPR's latest report, the World Health Organization and other medical agencies explained that there are many factors you need to consider when buying face masks for your kids. These include the following: Also Read: Healthy Heart Linked to Drinking Water, Study Finds; Which Hydraton Apps Are Effective to Remind You? Checking if your kids are comfortable with the face-covering you bought. Make sure that it is a great fit for them. Face masks for kids must have multiple fabric layers if they are not medical face coverings. Check if the mask can be washed without suffering from heavy damage. Always check if the ties or ear loops are secured since kids tend to accidentally take them off, especially when they are playing. In other news, WHO's COVID-19 origins study is entering its next phase, which could help medical researchers know more about the rising pandemic. On the other hand, UK MHRA decided to approve the first monoclonal antibody against COVID-19. What Face Mask Types Should You Get? WHO reported that if your kid is in good health, they can rely on non-medical or fabric face coverings. But, if they have medical complications, such as cystic fibrosis, cancer or immunosuppression, then you need to make them wear medical face masks. These brands or models include N95, child-size KN95 respirators, and other types of medical face coverings. For more news updates about face masks and other related topics, always keep your tabs open here at TechTimes. Related Article: New UK Study Shows Reducing Mechanical Ventilation Helps Critically Ill Children 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Microsoft has released an Xbox Series X that has a "Halo Infinite" limited edition theme, with its stocks and preorder having a rare availability to the public. It is already known that the Xbox Series X has a stock problem among its retailers and from Microsoft's store, not to mention bringing in a limited edition release with one of Microsoft's feature games. It is widely known that the tech industry is hit with chip shortage problems which have kept a lot of manufacturing efforts at the minimum, having increased the demand versus the supply. Microsoft Xbox Series X with Halo Infinite Theme Microsoft has revealed that it is celebrating the 20th anniversary since the first release of "Halo" which has now spun into a massive franchise most beloved by Xbox and PC gamers. It is a known Xbox exclusive game, and it is one of the mainstays of the console line of Microsoft. With this, the company has released the Xbox Series X Halo Infinite-themed console, with a revamped body with new decals that show the armor of the characters. Additionally, the Xbox controller would also have its new wraps, corresponding with Halo's design. This has been apparent with most PlayStation consoles, but it is not yet with most Xbox consoles, as the company opts for its original designs. Microsoft only does these designs for special editions and popular games with which they have ties. Read Also: Xbox Series X Restock Alert August 23-29 2021 | Best Buy, Antonline, Microsoft, Walmart, GameStop, Target, and Amazon Where to Find Stocks All of the releases of Microsoft earlier this Wednesday have all sold out and people are clamoring for the preorders which have been very limited to the public. It remains scarce and has sold out immediately in all direct websites and retail partners. "Halo Infinite" is one of the most celebrated and awaited games for the Xbox Series X, and its adaptation as a console theme is a massive one for Xbox fans. Walmart Walmart Status: Sold Out; Check back for updates known for constant restocking. Price: $550 SRP Check out Xbox Series X's Listing on Walmart. Best Buy Best Buy Status: Sold Out / Out of Stock; Check back for updates, but no news of restocking for the limited-edition console with Halo design. Price: $550 SRP Check out Xbox Series X's Listing on Best Buy. Target Target Status: Sold Out / Out of Stock; Check back for updates, no significant restocks after Wednesday drop, remains a limited release from Microsoft. Price: $550 SRP Check out Xbox Series X's Listing on Target. Microsoft Store Microsoft Status: Sold Out / Out of Stock, check for updates as Microsoft is the main source, and would be the first to have it. Price: $550 SRP Check out Microsoft's website for Xbox Series X Console and Deals. Related Article: PS5 and Xbox Series X are at Walmart, Here's How to Get Your Hands on Them This article is owned by Tech Times Written by Isaiah Richard 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Google and Microsoft have both pledged into a combined $30 billion funds for Cybersecurity, following a White House event that involved President of the United States, Joe Biden. The focus would be for a five-year plant that would improve the cybersecurity landscape of the country, starting from these companies' products. Several industries in the United States, even those outside the tech industry, have been hit with massive ransomware attacks in the past, with Microsoft being the most recent. Other companies include Kaseya, JBS Meats, EA, and more. Google, Microsoft Pledge $30b for Cybersecurity According to the Fact Sheet by the White House with regards to the Cybersecurity event, Google and Microsoft are to lead the efforts of the White House to convene with private sectors of the country. Here, Google has pledged a whopping $10 billion budget for the efforts of the country with regards to cybersecurity and improving their systems for the entire tech landscape. Google would also focus on open-source security, something which they are familiar with already, as Android is a well-known open-source platform. On the other hand, Microsoft has the biggest contribution among the companies, pledging a massive $20 billion for cybersecurity. Satya Nadella has also relayed via Twitter about the software company's plans with regards to their contribution to the cause. Here, $150 million is allotted for the US government agencies and all their needs. Read Also: Apple Customer Support Impersonator Collects 600K Private iCloud Photos by Scamming Victims US's Cybersecurity Efforts The cybersecurity efforts of the United States are aimed at increasing threats against the technology landscape of the country. It has been evident that everyone who uses the internet is subject to the said breach and hacks, giving not only the companies but also the public that uses their product a hard time. The efforts of the White House and POTUS stem from earlier projects this year, which have already brought in a lot of private sector companies to help and join the movement. Big Tech for Cybersecurity Big Tech was called upon Washington D.C. and the White House with regards to this matter, and it involved big names like Apple, Amazon, IBM, Girls Who Code, and more. Here, everyone has announced their parts in seeing this movement strengthen the campaign of the US government. Not all contributions are of monetary value, as Apple, Amazon, and other big tech companies have pledged on providing service and programs for this matter. Related Article: New UPS Delivery Scam Can Deceive Even the Experts--Do Not Open the Email Immediately This article is owned by Tech Times Written by Isaiah Richard 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. (Photo : Image from Yara Website) First Zero-Emission Ship Makes Voyage with No Crew Members Onboard The first ever zero-emission ship made its voyage without any crew members onboard. The Norwegian company called Yara International reportedly claims to have made the world's first ever zero-emission ship capable of transporting cargo autonomously. Yara Birkeland Electric Cargo Ship According to Electrek, the Yara Birkeland electric cargo ship was initially conceptualized back in 2017 but the ship currently looks to make its first voyage without the help of crew members onboard later this 2021 in Norway! Yara International is a particular Norwegian company that was initially founded in 1905 in order to combat the rising famine in Europe at that time. The company was able to create the world's very first nitrogen fertilizer which currently remains its largest business focus today. In addition to the company's perpetual battle against hunger, Yara also focuses on emissions abatement as well as sustainable agricultural practices. Yara Marine Technologies While the company still wants to continue finding success when it comes to feeding the planet, it also believes that the company can do so sustainably. In order to combat toxic Sulfur Oxides or SOx as well as Nitrogen Oxides or NOx emissions from diesel engines on ships, the particular Norwegian company created Yara Marine Technologies. The move towards electric cars looks to be moving closer as Biden aims to reach a significant EV goal by 2030. In 2017, the company actually started conceptualizing the possibility of an autonomous, fully electric ship in order to get rid of toxic emissions altogether. Today, the Yara Birkeland is reportedly afloat in Norway and is named after the popular Norwegian researcher who discovered the ability to be able to add nitrogen to fertilizer. Autonomous Voyage As of the moment, the electric cargo ship looks to complete its very first journey without even a single crew member onboard. A report from CNN noted that the Yara Birkeland electric cargo ship is set to make its very first autonomous voyage between the two Norwegian towns namely Herya to Brevik later this 2021. While there will reportedly be no crew onboard this cargo ship, it will still be very closely monitored from three different control centers onshore. To start, the loading and unloading of the ship will still require human beings. Jon Sletten, the plant manager for Yara's factory in Porsgrunn, Norway, noted that most of the operations will eventually be operated through autonomous technology. Read Also: "Electric Mud" Can Be Used to Power Smartphone and Reduce Pollution, Scientists Says Autonomous Ships This will then include autonomous cranes as well as straddle carriers that would help move containers both on and off the ship. The focus on autonomy helps lower the cost of operation for those transporting goods. Fully electric cargo ships also help simultaneously battle carbon emissions. While electric jet planes used to be a main goal for scientists, it seems like electric ships are looking close towards the finish line. The electric cargo ship features a massive 7 MWh battery capacity which powers two 900 kW Azipull pods and two 700 kW tunnel thrusters which deliver a top speed of 13 knots or around 15 mph. The cargo capacity as of the moment is 120 Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit TEU or up to sixty 40' shipping containers. Related Article: BMW's CE 04 Electric Scooter Brings 80 Miles of Range and Top Speed of 75mph under $12k; Is it Worth It? This article is owned by Tech Times Written by Urian B. 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Apple's CSAM detection tool plan is receiving another swipe. This time, from Edward Snowden, the former whistleblower, and intelligence contractor, now a journalist. Snowden further called the plan of Apple to scan photos from iPhones and iPad a "disaster-in-the-making," further dubbing the move as a "tragedy." As per AppleInsider, the former whistleblower made these pronouncements in an editorial write-up on Substack, entitled "The All-Seeing "i": Apple Just Declared War on Your Privacy." Apple CSAM Detection Tool Most of you may have known by now Apple is controversially planning to add a feature on iOS 15 that tackles child sexual abuse materials, or shortly known as CSAM. The function is set to release initially in the United States alongside the debut of the upcoming operating system for iPhones. The upcoming detection tool seeks to scan photos from the device's library that are for upload in iCloud. It is worth noting that Apple is touting this feature to specifically child abusive images on an iPhone or iPad user. The Cupertino giant will then inform the authorities upon verifying that someone is indeed keeping CSAM. However, Snowden sees the detection tool as a means to "erase the boundary dividing which devices work for you, and which devices work for them." The former whistleblower further opined that the solution that Apple plans to introduce redefines "what belongs to you, and what belongs to them." He also raised that Apple is known as the "pro-privacy" tech company. And despite that, the Cupertino behemoth is allegedly betraying its users with the CSAM tool. Snowden: Apple's Branding and CSAM Detection On top of that, Snowden noted that Apple users could easily avoid the CSAM detection tool by simply disabling the iCloud Photos uploads. That said, the former whistleblower went on to conclude that the move is a mere marketing scheme, instead of a tool to go after those who abuse younger minds. Read Also: Apple App Store Promotes Scam Applications, Mistakenly? Some of Them Even Have More Than $10 Weekly Fee: How To Know If It's Fake CSAM Tool and Government Abuse Earlier critics of Apple's CSAM tool, like security expert and cryptographer, Matthew Green, raised the alarming possibility of some oppressive authoritative government to abuse the photo scanning feature. Green further noted that it could pave the way for law enforcers to override end-to-end encryption capabilities. Snowden echoed similar fears, adding that the government might force Apple to require users to turn on the detection tool at all times. He added that the limits of the tool are loosely based on "Apple's all-too-flexible company policy, something governments understand all too well." However, Apple has already addressed this issue, saying that they are also against it and that the tech giant will refuse to follow orders from governments. Elsewhere, a watchdog claimed that Apple is not doing enough to protect children against adult content on its app marketplace. Related Article: Apple's CSAM Catches San Francisco Doctor With Child Exploitative Images on His iCloud This article is owned by Tech Times Written by Teejay Boris 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Exoplanets are the worlds that are beyond the solar system, which contains the Earth. Space experts are studying these heavenly bodies to find new habitable planets that have similar characteristics to the ones that people live in today. Elon Musk's SpaceX and other independent and international space agencies are making huge efforts to find nearby and outside planets that could sustain life, especially since Earth is suffering from rising global warming. Although scientists explained that the expiration date of Earth is still far from reality, NASA and other companies are spending a lot of money to find a replacement as soon as possible. One of the candidates to replace Earth is Mars, which Elon Musk wants to colonize. However, a new class of exoplanet was also discovered to have the same characteristics as Earth and other Earth-like worlds. The Cambridge researchers said that the so-called Hycean planets are covered in enough oceans and atmospheres to support life. New Exoplanets With Boiling Oceans Could Support Life? According to CBS News' latest report, the newly discovered Hycean exoplanets have bigger and hotter surfaces than Earth. Involved space scientists said that most of them are also 2.6 times larger. Also Read: Hubble Space Telescope Captures Image of 'Einstein Ring' On the other hand, these worlds' temperatures could reach up to 200 degrees Celsius (392 degrees Fahrenheit). Although it seems like these heavenly bodies are unlikely to support life, CNN World reported that their boiling oceans are necessary to produce enough hydrogen, which is one of the most important elements of a habitable planet. Since Hycean planets have larger surfaces, these boiling oceans produce enough hydrogen to be dispersed on most parts of these new worlds. "Essentially, when we've been looking for these various molecular signatures, we have been focusing on planets similar to Earth, which is a reasonable place to start," said Nikku Madhusudhan, the leading expert of the new study. In other news, Hubble Space Telescope takes breathtaking photos of Nebulae. On the other hand, the new Chinese Death Star-like spacecraft could be in development. Why Hycean Discovery is Important The Cambridge experts said that the new study is essential since Hycean planets are usually not the main focus. NASA and other space institutes are mostly focusing on studying super-Earths. Thanks to the new study, the Hycean worlds are now added to the habitable exoplanet classes. However, this is still a concept until humans are actually transported in these heavenly bodies. For more news updates about Hyceans and other new exoplanets, always keep your tabs open here at TechTimes. Related Article: SpaceX Falcon 9 Rocket Test-Fires After Two Months of Hiatus-Ahead of Cargo Resupply Mission This article is owned by TechTimes Written by: Griffin Davis 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Hantavirus has infected six mice in the Mount Laguna area, according to a report by Fox5 San Diego. The six mice included five deer mice and a single brush mouse, all collected during routine monitoring in the area. The mice subsequently tested positive for the hantavirus, which county health officials announced to the public. As a result, San Diego County officials are now reminding residents never to sweep up or vacuum after any rodents they find in their sheds, garages, homes, or cabins. They were advised to use "wet cleaning" methods to ensure that they don't inhale the virus once it goes airborne. Hantavirus is a very common viral infection among wild rodents in San Diego County. In 2019, 42 such detections were made, and last year, a total of 25 were identified. But while people are rarely exposed to the virus, it can cause potentially fatal infections for which there's no cure or vaccine. A hantavirus outbreak is the absolute last thing the world needs right now. Coronavirus is still wreaking havoc throughout the globe, infecting 214 million people and killing almost 4.5 million, according to the latest data from the WHO. Read also: WHO Investigates New Marburg Virus-Experts Claimed the New Ebola-Like Disease Has 88% Mortality Rate Hantavirus At a Glance The hantavirus, as previously mentioned, is common in wild rodents. They shed the virus through their urine, saliva, and feces. Once these secretions dry up, the virus can be stirred airborne, where people can breathe it in. Once a human breathes the hantavirus in, it causes hantavirus pulmonary syndrome or HPS. According to the CDC, it is a severe and sometimes fatal respiratory illness in humans. It is a very potent virus because even healthy individuals are at risk of getting ill after getting enough exposure. Fortunately, cases of HPS have been quite rare all over the world. Aside from rarely affecting humans at all, there's been literally no case of a hantavirus infection being passed on from one human to another. Still, it's always good to be warned about this specific infection, considering it can be spread airborne, unlike most coronavirus variants. But this doesn't mean there's been no instance of death from a hantavirus infection. In the CDC news archives, there was an outbreak of HPS (which was previously unknown at the time) back in 1993 in an area in the Southwestern US known as "The Four Corners." The case involved a young and physically fit Navajo man who died very quickly after being rushed to a New Mexico hospital for shortness of breath. But since this case and the others that followed it, there has been no other major outbreak. Furthermore, experts unanimously agree that the hantavirus still isn't potent enough to become a pandemic. How To Protect Against It As previously mentioned, the most dangerous aspect of the hantavirus is that it can go airborne. To prevent just that, cleaning up after a rodent infestation must be done by wetting the immediate area. By doing so, you ensure that the dried-up secretions of rodents won't stir the virus into the air. Related: Hantavirus: Signs, Symptoms, And Everything You Should Know About This Potentially Deadly Virus This article is owned by Tech Times Written by RJ Pierce 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Changes to The Messenger's back end processing means the e-edition is getting a facelift. The biggest change is the e-edition by default is now presented in Text view. Its a sad irony that the first draft of history recorded Lake Charles and the rest of Calcasieu Parish as fortunate, after a slight shift in Purchases made via links on our site may earn us an affiliate commission The confrontation between the US and China over access to the audits of Chinese companies listed in the US is getting ever closer to a crunch point. It was the Trump administration that championed legislation enacted late last year that would force the delisting of Chinese companies if they fail to hand over audit information, including the auditors working papers, and allow the US Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) to examine it. The PCAOB was established after the collapse of Enron to improve the integrity and quality of US public company audits. China is insistent that any foreign regulator wanting to inspect the accounts of a Chinese company must obtain the approval of its own authorities. Credit:AP The legislation was passed against the backdrop of the escalating tensions between the US on a wide range of fronts, from trade imbalances to human rights and the treatment of Hong Kong. It also, however, followed a string of accounting scandals involving Chinese companies and the failure of a 2017 trial to produce a formula for audit co-operation that was acceptable to both countries authorities. Qantas boss Alan Joyce says his airlines plan to resume regular flights to London, North America and parts of Asia before Christmas hinges on whether the federal government will let travellers quarantine at home when they fly into Australia. While outlining an optimistic course to restart his airlines mothballed international operations, Mr Joyce on Thursday also said he expected NSW and Victoria will be shut off from the rest of Australia until early December, with vaccination the only way to bring the states spiralling COVID-19 outbreaks under control. Qantas boss Alan Joyce said the airline plans to restart international flights in December, but changes to quarantine requirements would be crucial. Credit:Janie Barrett Trade and Tourism Minister Dan Tehan responded with caution, emphasising that Australia would have to hit 80 per cent vaccination levels before setting up travel bubbles with other countries that have high vaccination rates. Mr Tehan praised the concept of at-home quarantine but noted only South Australia was trialling it so far. Wouldnt it be wonderful, especially for returning Australians, if there was an ability to be able to quarantine at home in the lead up to Christmas, he said on Thursday. If there was one unavoidable lesson from reporting season this week, it is that Delta has got many more ways of giving everyone the blues. Its disruptive effect on everything from supply chains to lockdowns is clouding the corporate outlook. Woolies groceries business has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of our collective lockdown but even CEO Brad Banducci is sweating over the prospect of delivering Christmas to its supermarket and discount store customers as COVID strangles its supply chains. Given what happened in China last week, we are anxious just more broadly on making sure we get all the products we need into the country for Christmas, in food and Big W, Baducci said after its full year results on Thursday. Workers at a Woolworths distribution centre in Larapinta, Brisbane. Credit:Fairfax media Although dividend hikes and share buybacks continued to rule the earnings results, logistics issues highlighted by some companies drew sharp reactions from investors. This was primarily true for Woolworths, Lovisa and Ansell, which recorded bumper profits while sharing anxiety about disruptions in global shipping and supply chains, Kalkine Group chief executive Kunal Sawhney says. It also poses problems for this weeks travel sector pickup. Any revival in travel stocks is expected to be temporary and short-lived unless broader positive fundamental developments take hold, says Sawhney. The real world can prick the stock bubble. A massive $2.3 billion payout from Wesfarmers and a record result from Lynas Rare Earths was not enough to lift their respective stocks on Friday after the attack outside Kabul Airport Thursday night. The best performing sectors include Information Technology and Energy, as both are up over 2 per cent followed by Materials up over 1 per cent. The worst performing sectors include Consumer Staples and Utilities, which are both down over 2 per cent followed by Communication Services down over 1 per cent, he says. While the market is still technically bullish, it is searching for a two year high and, as such, we need to consider that this may be occurring right now, although it is a little too early to tell, he concludes. BlackRock is gearing up for the first test of Chinese investor appetite for its own mutual fund products, more than 15 years after entering the worlds most promising wealth market. The companys new China unit is launching its debut product on August 30, just two months after winning regulatory approval to become the nations first wholly foreign-owned mutual fund firm. Its wealth management joint venture with China Construction Bank and Singapores Temasek also said earlier it obtained permission to start a quant equities offering in the near term. BlackRock, led by Larry Fink, is leading a global charge into Chinas 100 trillion yuan asset management industry after regulators eased curbs on foreign control last year. Credit:Bloomberg The worlds largest money manager is leading a global foray into Chinas 100 trillion yuan ($21.3 trillion) asset management industry after regulators eased curbs on foreign control last year. It faces a challenge appealing to yield-hungry Chinese retail investors in a crowded market thats dominated by local firms, even as surging demand provides a promising entry point. Fund launches are rising steadily and have stayed at high levels in recent months, said Sun Guiping, an analyst at Shanghai Securities Co. BlackRocks first fund is coming right in time to catch a big wave of launches in the second half of the year. The next 10 years are really critical, Ms Johnson said. We need rapid and deep emissions cuts. An EPA spokeswoman said the agency was reviewing the order and its implications for the agency. The EPA is an active government partner on climate change policy, regulation and innovation, the spokeswoman said. It is a part of the whole-of-government approach to climate change embodied by the NSW Climate Change Policy Framework and Net Zero Plan, including supporting industry to cut emissions. The EDOs Ms Johnson said the courts decision was the first in Australia to find that a government agency has a requirement to address climate change. Its breaking new ground, she said, adding that other states could face similar legal challenges. Justice Preston also ordered the EPA to pay the applicants costs of the proceedings. Loading Jo Dodds, president of the Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action group, welcomed the decision as a significant win for everyone who has been affected by bushfires. BSCA members have been working for years to rebuild their homes, their lives and their communities, Ms Dodds said. This ruling means they can do so with confidence that the EPA must now also work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the state, she added. Global warming is creating the conditions that can lead to hotter and fiercer fires, and all of us need to work to make sure were doing everything we can to prevent a disaster like we saw during 2019 and 2020. Chris Gambian, chief executive of the Nature Conservation Council, said the court ruling put the states biggest polluters on notice. Most people will be astonished to learn the EPA has until now not regulated greenhouse gases, which are arguably our most dangerous environmental pollutants, Mr Gambian said. But that will now have to change after the court found the EPA had a duty to address climate change, which is the most significant challenge our society has ever faced, he said. This is a great day for environmental justice. Justice Preston stated that the EPAs duty must evolve over time and place to address changes to the threats to the environment, including global warming from greenhouse gas emissions. [T]he pollutants of yesteryear, with their concomitant threats to the environment and risks to human health, may no longer be the pollutants of today, which pose different threats to the environment and different risks to human health, he wrote in his judgment. Nick Witherow, the principal lawyer at Environmental Justice Australia, said the decision could open up the possibility of similar challenges in other jurisdictions. Loading But he noted the NSW EPA is governed by its own particular law (the PEOA Act), which is different to those in Victoria and South Australia. New environment laws were introduced in Victoria from the start of last month that give the EPA greater power to regulate pollutants, including greenhouse gases. These laws are new and havent been tested, and this [decision in NSW] raises the question of what is possible, Mr Witherow said. In March, the Victorian EPA released a long-awaited review of the states heavily polluting coal-fired power station licences, which was undertaken to ensure they were compatible with the latest science and take into account community views and expectations. The EPA said it would not force coal power stations to lower their greenhouse gas emissions, following this review and renewal of their licences. For the first time, it did introduce limits on mercury pollution, and tightened limits on other pollutants such as sulphur dioxide and small particulates, or PM2.5. But no restrictions will be set on greenhouse gases, which would be capped at approximately current levels. Comment was sought from NSW Environment Minister Matt Kean. Cate Faehrmann, NSW Greens environment spokeswoman said the court was huge. A man who tested positive for COVID-19 and allegedly refused to isolate has been charged with 13 offences after being arrested at a Sydney unit. An arrest warrant for 27-year-old Anthony Karam was issued on August 20 for multiple alleged breaches of public health orders. An arrest warrant for 27-year-old Anthony Karam was issued on August 20. Credit:NSW Police Police said he had tested positive to COVID-19 but had not been isolating. NSW Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant at the time issued a public warning statement, saying Mr Karam posed a risk to the health or safety of the public. She said Fatimas husband had ticked all the boxes required by the Australian government in their visa application. The Herald has not published the names of the couple to protect their safety. Her husband is one of 200 people in Kabul who Sydney migration lawyer Anna Ryburn is desperately trying to help get to Australia. She shares Fatimas fears and says his life will be at risk because he is part of the Hazara religious minority the Taliban has persecuted. It has been more than a year since the couple last hugged each other. With the August 31 evacuation deadline looming, Fatima, who lives in Sydneys west, worries he wont get out. Fatima fears she will never see her husband again after his two attempts to escape from Kabul in Afghanistan were violently aborted. Hes not just a random Afghan at risk from the Taliban, he is the spouse of an Australian who has done all the checks, she said. Why would he not be part of the rescue mission? The couple first met as children in Afghanistan and have been waiting for more than two years for the Department of Foreign Affairs to process the husbands spouse visa application. They now feel desperate that their time is running out as they cling to each minute they connect on the telephone. After his two attempts to escape Kabul were aborted at the airport where the Taliban struck him with an iron pole, Fatimas husband is fearful of risking his life a third time. Fatima said her husband went to Kabul airports north gate on Saturday after he received a call from DFAT asking him to come. But he wasnt allowed in because he did not have a visa. He told her that when he arrived, he caught the eye of an Australian soldier and explained his situation and that DFAT had called him. The soldier spoke to a superior but did not return and would no longer make eye contact with him. They didnt allow him to go inside because he didnt have a visa, she said. And now he went home again. DFAT contacted him as well and told him to come to the airport. He went there so many times until he got to the gate and the Australian soldiers turned him away. If you have found it difficult, as I have, not to verbally challenge our irresponsible, coffee cup-carrying, chin-covering, non mask-wearing freedom fighters, try this approach. On your walk, acknowledge those who are acting responsibly with a friendly wave and attempt just eye contact with those who are not. I find the look of shame on the guilty faces so rewarding, and so much easier on my blood pressure. Bridget McArthur, I have plenty of time for those who need care, but none for those who put our health at risk. Robert Phillips, Templestowe We need a more compassionate approach to funerals The COVID-19 regulations are very hard on people who have had a death in their family and need to have a funeral. I have conducted two funerals this week. We were limited to 10 people attending. It is not allowable to have any gathering afterwards and when the mourners go home, they can have no visitors. The mental health issues around this are very concerning. There must be a way of supporting the grief stricken and keeping COVID-safe. The current restrictions are a very blunt instrument. I would urge Victorias Chief Health Officer, Brett Sutton, to take a new and compassionate look at this. Father Graham Reynolds, Soldiers Hill Why some people think twice about checking in Many people disregard the QR code check-in requirement for various reasons, including wanting to avoid having to isolate if someone who was there at the same time as them tests positive to COVID-19. The fully vaccinated who are isolating should receive some incentive, such as being allowed to leave home for exercise as a single person. Yes, I was recently isolating and the persons who did not check in at the same time as me roam the community freely. The next time I am due to check in, I will think about the implications of my decision whereas before there was no delay. Morris Trytell, Glen Iris THE FORUM Wear masks correctly As a (fully vaccinated) doctor now spending time in quarantine after being exposed to an unsuspecting COVID-19-positive patient, I despair at the way people use face masks. A mask is not a fashion accessory and needs to be worn correctly, left in place and not touched by at-risk fingers. I was wearing a proper surgical mask and spectacles for the 10 minutes I was with my patient, but the Delta variant is so contagious that experts have decreed this was not enough. I languish alone, missing my patients and feeling guilty that colleagues take on extra duties to care for them. Many hospitals are grossly understaffed due to furloughed doctors and nurses in similar situations, and those who are left are tired and overworked. We are all suffering through lockdowns, and agree that vaccination is the way free, but in the meantime please stop the spread by using this simple piece of safety equipment correctly. Dr Jenny Dowd, Ivanhoe East Not our responsibility The federal government is clearly keen for the states to open up. Does this have something to do with the fact that the states will held responsible for the resulting overloaded state health services, especially the lack of hospital beds for children? This government is doing what it does best, shift the blame and responsibility to someone else. How many sick and dying children will be too many? Haydn Moyle, Flemington Our gain and their loss In many news bulletins we are told of exhausted hospital staff and health systems in several countries struggling to keep up with the influx of COVID-19 patients. The Victorian government hopes to recruit 350 doctors and specialist nurses from overseas. Which countries have surplus staff? Is it ethical to contemplate importing staff from countries which are struggling to treat their own citizens? Dr Juliet Flesch, Kew Lets not give up on gold We are stumbling towards a go light approach to COVID, despite evidence from other countries that this creates economic and psychological disaster. Some leaders now have much lower expectations about the publics fortitude. That seems to have also been influenced by a fringe group of violent protesters who have been condemned widely. That lot must be delighted to learn that their methods attract attention and are working. Will we next say we cannot aim for gold, it will be bronze? Or might we say we cannot stand the war any longer, so let us give up and learn to live with the foreign invader? Ross Gillespie, Mitcham More than a coincidence? Last weekends freedom protests in Melbourne took place five days before Victorias COVID-19 case numbers roughly doubled. Might these two events be connected? Peter Greig, Colac United for common good Liberal MP Katie Allen and Labor MP Mike Freelander, both paediatricians, are united on speeding up vaccinations for the sake of all children (Opinion, 26/8). What an inspiring bipartisan example for solving other major issues instead of political point-scoring and dividing us. Barbara Fraser, Burwood We almost had a plan Your correspondent How will our hospitals cope with the influx of cases? (Letters, 26/8) says that our current situation is yet another example of no long-term government planning. In 2007, former health minister Tony Abbott put into train a pandemic preparedness plan to prepare businesses, social institutions and hospitals to cope in the event of a pandemic. A projected budget of $600million was allocated. I remember this well as I had a minor involvement. Unfortunately the plan was smothered by bureaucrats state and federal which led to this forward thinking initiative being mothballed. Had the plan been implemented, Australia would have been better prepared. George Greenberg, Malvern Learning from the master Gladys Berejiklian has certainly mastered Scott Morrisons look over there strategy. Look at the freedom of the vaccinated (the lucky people in the right age groups). Ignore infection numbers, deaths and those who are only just eligible to be vaccinated. Kay Moulton, Surrey Hills The greats reunited What makes a great drummer? For the Stones, it was Charlie Watts. For the Who, it was Keith Moon. Likewise, Ginger Baker for Cream or Elvin Jones for John Coltrane. All drummers without peer. All now gone. Rest in peace. Chris Burgess, Port Melbourne Always a true Stone Youd think Sir Paul McCartney (on Twitter) would have known better than to describe the late, great Charlie Watts as a rock! Kerry Reid, Hampton Exposing the empire I hope Rupert Murdochs US cable TV network Fox News does try to take legal action against the ABC over its Four Corners episode that examined the broadcasters coverage of Donald Trump and its role in the aftermath of the US election. (The Age, 26/8). It will further expose how Murdochs media is a cancer on democracy and increase the pressure here for a royal commission into it. Grant Nichol, Ringwood Please, enough already OK, Richard Pusey is out of jail and the journalistic analyses have been carried out (The Age, 26/8), so can we please now never hear about him again? Stop giving him all this unwarranted attention, and more importantly think about the effect his constant appearances have on the police officers families and friends. Heather Glassford, Williamstown Theres no comparison How disappointing to see the player ranked number 85 in the world getting equal billing in the headline announcing Ash Bartys latest title victory Barty wins, Kyrgios nicks off (Sport, 24/8). She is world number one, the winner of two grand slam singles and one grand slam doubles and an Olympic medal winner. He has decided to pull out of a tournament due to his left knee injury. There is no equivalency between the two. Robert Gibson, Kensington Labors lack of policies I agree with Gillian Upton that federal Labor remains indistinguishable in action on climate change from the government, and the millions of voters for whom this is a most pressing issue will look elsewhere with their vote (Letters, 26/8). But what option do people have? Yes, they can vote for the Greens but in most seats their preferences will be directed to Labor. I guess Labor factors this in and is seeking to get votes from the less committed. Hopefully, if it manages to do this, it will unveil some real policies when in power. Dave Torr, Werribee Opposition must step up Your poll shows state Labor making gains and the opposition still languishing at its 2018 support levels (The Age, 26/8). Michael OBrien and Co, stop your sniping and white anting of the governments efforts to control the COVID-19 outbreaks. This is a war where both parties should be standing shoulder to shoulder. The time for a creditable opposition will be needed when the majority of our population is vaccinated and we can live with the virus. Dave Tasker, Lilydale A desperate situation Afghanistan is in crisis. Women, men and children, many of whom have offered costly, critical help to our defence forces or have Australian visas, are in danger of death. We cannot leave them to the mercy of the Taliban. Please, Prime Minister, we need mass evacuation flights and guaranteed entry now. Caroline Miley, Heidelberg A waste of money or ... I agree with the transport economists who say the planned Suburban Rail Loop could turn out to be a very expensive white elephant (The Age, 24/8). For a number of years a circular bus route has been in operation from the south-eastern suburbs around the city, terminating in the western suburbs, with, I understand, few passengers. Tony Adami, Caulfield South ... a much needed loop The Suburban Rail Loop has been badly needed for decades. Major employment and activity centres are no longer confined to the inner-city, and the radial train network is inadequate. We need decent cross-town connections. The business case might only show a moderate gain (dollar wise), but how can a rail link to Monash, Deakin and (possibly) Latrobe universities not be a big hit? The effect on Monash alone will be enormous. At last students will be able to catch the train to uni from any station in Melbourne. It will also give shoppers from the eastern suburbs quick access to Southland, Glen Waverley and Doncaster Shoppingtown. Finally, Doncaster will be on the rail network. And eventually everyone on the loop will be able to catch a train direct to the airport. That will be especially popular in the northern suburbs, where it will be a quick trip, instead of the proposed airport rail via the city. Geoff Dalton, East Malvern AND ANOTHER THING Credit:Illustration: Matt Golding Politics Australias shame: abandoning refugees. We have not progressed in humanity after 20 years. Jean Andrews, Cheltenham Our PM announces we wont accept boats from Afghanistan instead of providing enough planes to prevent more boats. Trevor Hay, Montmorency ScoMo versus Albo is a no go. Its time to be daring, Labor. Peter Cooke, Warrnambool Maybe Scott and Josh will understand this: Weve overspent our carbon budget. Vince Corbett, Essendon Re endangered species (26/8). Stop logging indigenous forests. Please, Dan, love you but ... Jan Dwyer, Rosebud Brilliant as usual, Niki Savva (26/8). Pamela Pilgrim, Highett An endangered species: a politician who can answer a question without making a speech. Elisabeth Schiller, Glen Iris COVID-19 BC: Before COVID. AD: After Delta. Michael Helman, St Kilda East Has the first sod been turned at Mickleham yet? Wendy Batros, Templestowe Id prefer people took their coffee cups home rather than drop them on the ground. Peter Carlin, Frankston South Furthermore A Stone rolls no more. Vale the wonderful Charlie Watts. Gary Oraniuk, Geelong West Australia was in an infrastructure no mans land as it evaluated the impact of changing work habits on the nations big projects, the chief executive of Infrastructure Australia told a business lunch in Brisbane. Representatives from some of Queenslands biggest infrastructure projects were in the audience, including the massive Inland Rail freight project, the Port of Brisbane redevelopment, Transurbans network of toll roads, and Denis Wagner, whose family firm built Toowoombas Wellcamp Airport and will now build a COVID-19 quarantine centre in Toowoomba for the Queensland government. Infrastructure Australia chief executive Romilly Madew speaks about the impact of COVID-19 on infrastructure projects at a business forum in Brisbane on Thursday. Credit:Tony Moore Infrastructure Australia CEO Romilly Madew said COVID-19 forced all state and territory governments to reprioritise their infrastructure projects over the past 12 months. I will say this: every state and territory, including Queensland, because of COVID-19 has relooked at their infrastructure strategy, Ms Madew said. Many Victorian health workers exposed to COVID-19 will avoid extended isolation and be allowed to continue working as part of a new furloughing policy to prevent hospitals being paralysed by staff absences. The move has given special allowances to vaccinated workers and comes as the Victorian government activated a fourth COVID hospital in response to the growing outbreak at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. The Royal Melbourne Hospital has furloughed hundreds of staff in the past week. Credit:Justin MacManus There are now a string of mostly small hospital clusters in Melbourne, including at The Royal Childrens Hospital, and emergency departments at Sunshine Hospital, The Alfred and Northern Hospital. More than 500 Melbourne hospital workers have been furloughed in recent days, largely at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, which has the largest cluster eight staff, seven patients and a visitor. The RMH was in ambulance bypass mode for several days until Wednesday, meaning only ambulances carrying seriously ill patients were advised to use the hospital. Members of the public were still able to access the hospital off the street. State Liberal and Nationals MPs interested in understanding the partys position 15 months out from the election may have missed the latest polling which appeared on the front of this newspaper on Thursday. The results, which showed the Coalition has failed to make up any ground during the 18 months of the pandemic, were conveniently left out of Thursdays news clippings sent to MPs each morning from the office of leader Michael OBrien. Premier Dan Andrews and Opposition Leader Michael OBrien. Given the Coalitions woeful primary vote, its little wonder OBrien didnt want to provide his colleagues with more fuel to stoke the simmering leadership fire. But the omission had the opposite effect, only sparking increased interest in the results. Industrious MPs who tracked down the data would have learnt that in the three years since the last election, the Coalition has failed to claw back any support in Victoria, with its primary vote stuck in an election-losing position of 35 per cent. The Strait of Sunda is the passage between the Islands of Sumatra and Java, leading from the Indian Ocean into the Sea of Java. It is 70 to 90 miles wide, and the W. coast of Java on the one side of the straitwhere the principal loss of life, as far as is known, took placeis from 90 to 100 miles in length. On the western coast, some 30 or 40 miles from the north-western point of Java, was situated the town of Anger, and about 30 miles off this town, and nearly in the middle of the strait, was the island of Krakatoa. This island, which was uninhabited, was six or seven miles long and four or five miles broad, and on it was Mount Krakatoa, rising 2623 ft. above the level of the sea. This is a volcanic mountain, and had, we believe, been last in a state of eruption about 30 years previously. Although it is supposed that many other extinct volcanoes burst into activity about the same time, it is to the sudden eruption of Mount Krakatoa that the great convulsions that have taken place, and the consequent tidal wave, are attributed. Long before the Roma reached the Strait of Sunda indications that something unusual had occurred were noticed. Instead of a favorable current, Captain Mann met with a very strong one in the opposite direction, and when 200 or 300 miles away large quantities of floating lava or pumice same were met with. This got thicker as the strait was approached, and some of the pieces seen were of great bulk. The weather was very bad, and as the vessel lurched a good deal the pipes by which water is supplied to the circulating pump got completely blocked up with small particles of lava. Until these were cleared it was impossible to continue steaming, and while this work was being done the steamer had to be stopped for several hours. This delay, which the passengers regarded at the time as very annoying, probably saved the fine steamer Roma from destruction. Had she continued without stopping she would have reached the strait before daylight on the morning of the 5th instant ; and as the ordinary channel, in which there had previously been 28 fathoms of water, had become studded with dangers, the chances, of her escaping shipwreck would have been extremely small. As is was, at 8 oclock on the morning of the 6th instant, the Roma was steaming along on the usual course, when there hove in sight the Dutch man-of-war, Prince Heinrich, flying the signal You are running into danger ; stop ! It may be imagined that Captain Mann was not slow in carrying out this command. The man-of-war soon came up, and, sending off a boat to the Roma, conveyed the tidings that the strait had been completely transformed, and that the old channel was no longer navigable. Captain Mann, however, was given a course to steer which had been ascertained to be safe, after which the vessels parted company, the Roma proceeding cautiously towards the strait, and the Prince Heinrich continuing to cruise about the vicinity to warn other vessels that might be following in the same track. The Roma had to make a considerable detour from the usual course, and by going slow and taking soundings escaped all dangers. On getting into the strait ample evidences were seen of the great convulsions that had taken place. In some places islands shown on the chart had completely disappeared, others had been broken up in several parts, and land and rocks had been thrown up above the water where previously no dangers had existed. One island of considerable size, called Thwart-the-Way, is situated right in the middle of the strait. The tidal wave, which is described as having been over 100 feet high, must have swept clean over Thwart-the-Way, and what was once a picturesque island, covered with beautiful green trees, has been burst up into five or six distinct pieces of land, rugged looking and bare. Mount Krakatoa now stands alone in its grandeur. All the surrounding portions of the islands have been thrown over into the main channel towards Beezee Island, about 5 miles to the north-north-east. The volcano itself is apparently as high as ever, and Captain Mann describes its appearance as exactly resembling the Rock of Gibraltar. A view of Krakatoa [far left] and surrounding islands in 1846. Two small islands (Verlaten and Langs) close to Krakatoa Island, strange to say, remain almost intact. Fourth Point Lighthouse is gone, only the foundations remaining ; and at Flat Capethe south-west point of Sumatra the lighthouse keepers quarters have been demolished, and only a temporary light is exhibited. The western coast of Java, at one time thickly studded with villages, is now a scene of desolation. As far as the Roma people could see, not a habitation was left. Some say that a portion of the coast has actually subsided, and that what was densely inhabited land is now sea. The Roma passed within half-a-mile or so of what was once the town of Anjer, but not a vestige of it remains above water. It is said that this was the most thickly populated part of densely-inhabited Java, and the loss of life must have been, as it has been described, appalling. Far inland could be seen the marks left by the wave that had inundated the country ; and all along the coast, as indeed all land in the vicinity of the strait is covered with white lava dust, appearing at a distance similar to hoar frost. As the Java shore was previously lined with green trees and rich verdure, the contrast is indeed striking. All shipping on the coast must have been swept up on the land or foundered. It is not known that any large vessels were in the neighborhood at the time, but there is sure to have been a large number of smaller craft at Anjer and other towns on the coast. New Zealand has recorded 68 new COVID-19 cases in the community, as the fast-moving Delta variant ripples through Auckland and Wellington. Thursdays increase took the clusters total to 277 associated cases, the Director of Public Health Dr Caroline McElnay said at the daily national briefing on the pandemic response. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the nature of the Delta outbreak has changed its impact on the community. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern: Delta is very, very tricky. Credit:Internet We can expect the lag time and our numbers to potentially be longer and bigger, she said. The Broadway cast of Moulin Rouge! The Musical sat down in a heavily marked-out rehearsal studio for its first read-through of the script following the Covid-19 shutdown. Typically called a "table read," this rehearsal was socially distanced and saw each actor behind a music stand. Based on Baz Luhrmann's 2001 film about doomed love among bohemians in the Montmartre neighborhood of Paris, Moulin Rouge! manages to squeeze a remarkable amount of pop hits from the last 60 years into one extravagant stage musical. According to our review, "If you go in expecting a spectacle, you will not be disappointed." Moulin Rouge! was one of the first Broadway shows to be shuttered by Covid-19 when an ill cast member led to the cancellation of the March 12, 2020 matinee. It has not performed since. As we reported earlier, Moulin Rouge! is set to resume performances at Broadway's Al Hirschfeld Theatre on September 24. Principal actors Aaron Tveit, Danny Burstein, Sahr Ngaujah, Tam Mutu, Ricky Rojas, and Robyn Hurder are all set to return to their roles. Karen Olivo, who originated the role of Satine on Broadway, has departed the production and the role will be played by Natalie Mendoza. Students don face coverings as they wait in line to enter for the first day of in-class learning since the start of the pandemic at Garden Place Elementary School, Monday, Aug. 23, 2021, in north Denver. All students, visitors and staff are required to wear face coverings while in Denver Public Schools regardless of vaccination status with the start of the school year. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis gestures as he speaks, Monday, June 14, 2021, at the Shul of Bal Harbour, a Jewish community center in Surfside, Fla. Up for debate: Live legislation tracker Check out the latest developments on bills pending before state lawmakers in four key topics. State Sen. Alessandra Biaggi, D-Bronx, speaks to state legislators during a public hearing on sexual harassment in the workplace Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2019, in Albany, N.Y. Instant unlimited access to all of our E-Editions and content on thechronicleonline.com. The Chronicle E-Edition Newsletter emailed to you each week, the night before the paper hits the street! This subscription is for NEW or RENEWING online subscribers. (The charge will appear as "Country Media Inc." on your credit card statement) Searcy, AR (72143) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 67F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 67F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Towanda, PA (18848) Today Clearing skies after some evening rain. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Clearing skies after some evening rain. Low 54F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch. Localized flooding is expected. Towanda, PA (18848) Today Rain early. Decreasing clouds with mostly clear skies by morning. Low 54F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Rain early. Decreasing clouds with mostly clear skies by morning. Low 54F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Localized flooding is expected. Oneonta, NY (13820) Today Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming partly cloudy. Low near 50F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near an inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Cloudy and damp with rain early...then becoming partly cloudy. Low near 50F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near an inch. Localized flooding is expected. Oneonta, NY (13820) Today Rain early...then remaining cloudy with showers overnight. Low near 50F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Rain early...then remaining cloudy with showers overnight. Low near 50F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch. Localized flooding is expected. Steve Wildsmith was an editor and writer for The Daily Times for nearly 17 years; a recovering addict, he now works in media and marketing for Cornerstone of Recovery, a drug and alcohol treatment center in Blount County. Contact him at wildsmith steve@gmail.com. Click the image to the left and log in to get your exclusive reader perks. Ben Shapiro is a graduate of UCLA and Harvard Law School, host of The Ben Shapiro Show and editor-in-chief of DailyWire.com. He is syndicated through Creators. This is Jingles! Jingles is 12-years-old and has more beds and blankets than we can count, but she prefers to sleep on her mom's Tempur-Pedic. Forest City, NC (28043) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 62F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 62F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Masked students wait in a socially distanced single file line before heading to the cafeteria at an elementary school in Louisville, Ky., on March 17, 2021. (Jon Cherry/Getty Images) 4 Arizona School Board Members Face Recall Over Mask Mandate Four members of the Scottsdale Unified School District Governing Board in Arizona face recall petitions after voting Aug. 17 to require masks be worn inside school buildings in response to a recent uptick in CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus infections among students. The two petitions name SUSD Governing Board President Jann-Michael Greenburg and members Julie Cieniawski, Patty Beckman, and Libby Hart-Wells. Zach Lindsay, who voted against the mask mandate, is not included in either petition. Patricia Lee Pellet, a Scottsdale resident, filed a petition demanding the recall of Greenburg, citing his disregard for district parents, teachers, staff, and especially the students. Under his leadership, the mental and emotional health of many SUSD students has steadily declined to an alarming level, the petition states. The education of all SUSD students has suffered and continues to suffer. The CCP virus, commonly known as the coronavirus, is the pathogen that causes COVID-19. The petition claims that parents are not allowed to have a voice in the upbringing, education, health care, or mental health of their children as it relates to decisions being made by Jann-Michael Greenburg. This is a direct violation of parental rights under Arizona law. Parents, teachers, staff, and students do not feel like they have a voice and feel silenced and disrespected, the petition adds. Cieniawski and Hart-Wells are included in the petition but are not directly named. Both petitions filed with the superintendents office need 29,935 signatures to move forward. Pellet said her main reason for filing the petition is over parental rights. There are so many angry parents who need [to be] heard and not have it sound like its just over masks, Pellet said in a text message to The Epoch Times. Asked whether she feels the petition will be successful, Pellet responded, Im known for winning all my battles, and declined further comment. Scottsdale resident Nicole Curtis has filed a separate recall petition against Beckman. Curtis could not be reached for comment. Beckman did not respond to an email requesting comment. In response to the petitions, Greenburg said Wednesday the board will remain focused on implementing our districts vision of engaging all students in world class, future focused learning and getting the necessary work done to accomplish this goal. There are some in our community who are tired of progress and want to go back to where we were before, posing as many distractions as possible. But they are wrong, Greenburg said in an email to The Epoch Times. We must remain focused on better new days. We must go forward or founder. The SUSD mask mandate follows recent votes by the Phoenix Union and Flagstaff Unified school districts to require masks. On July 27, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican, reiterated the states prohibition of mask mandates, or discrimination in schools based on who is or isnt vaccinated. Weve passed all of this into law, and it will not change. The CDC is recommending that we wear masks in school and indoors, regardless of our vaccination status. This is just another example of the Biden-Harris administrations inability to effectively confront the COVID-19 pandemic, Ducey said in a statement. He added that getting vaccinated is the best weapon against COVID-19. At an SUSD Governing Board meeting on Aug. 24, a large group of parents gathered outside to oppose the districts mask mandate that runs through late September. According to a post at Schoolboardwatch.org, a conservative watchdog group, the meeting was filled with passion, tension, and a lack of empathy from the board. As roughly 200 people stood outside, voicing their frustrations, the board showed nothing but disrespect for both parents and students. Concerned parents gathered outside were solely focused on gaining signatures to recall the four board members who voted to take away parental freedom, the post added. In an Aug. 13 letter to parents, SUSD Superintendent Scott Menzel announced 78 confirmed cases of COVID-19 since students returned to school in early August. There were 31 confirmed cases among students who stayed at home, and 150 students with symptoms who were sent home. In addition, 632 students were quarantined as close contacts with infected students, in compliance with Maricopa County Department of Public Health guidelines, Menzel said. Construction workers observe the wreckage after a crane collapsed at a construction project to build a 14-storey student hostel in Nairobi, Kenya on Aug. 26, 2021. (Brian Inganga/AP Photo) 9 Dead After Crane Collapses in Kenyas Capital: Police NAIROBI, KenyaPolice in Kenyas capital say nine people are dead after a crane collapsed at a high-rise construction site in Nairobi. Officer Muturi Mbogo said the crane collapsed midday Thursday while it was being dismantled by workers. He said another worker was seriously injured and the collapse is under investigation. A worker at the site, Michael Odhiambo, said the crane fell after its work was completed on the 14th floor. It seems they did not realize the nuts tying it were loose, he said of fellow workers. We heard a loud bang, only to realize the crane was down. Two Chinese engineers were among the victims, Odhiambo said. The project to build a 14-story student hostel is being supervised by a Chinese construction firm. The Zhejiang Chengjian Construction Africa Ltd said in a statement that it has sealed off the site and is cooperating with police and other authorities. National of the former Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic and educator Zilvinas Silenas speaks to The Epoch Times' Crossroads program about the challenges posed by socialism. (The Epoch Times) American Supporters of Socialism Dont Realize Its Absence of Equality, Environmental Care, Justice: Educator Americas younger generationsmany of whom support socialist policies that claim to be a path to achieving equality, the environment, and justiceare unaware that these claims quickly become empty promises once socialism is in action, said Zilvinas Silenas, president of the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE). Among those who express positive opinions of socialism, they can largely be separated into three different groups, Silenas told EpochTVs Crossroads program. There are people who honestly believe in socialism, people who will use anything bad happening in the United States to justify socialism, and people who do not know what socialism is, he said. He sympathized with the pro-socialist American youth who want to do good in the world, acknowledging that it is difficult to know the facts given the world is a difficult place. Whenever something bad happens, there are multiple sorts of factors behind it, he said. American media and social media have made this challenge even worse by providing not many facts and a lot of opinions, Silenas said, adding that this is not wrong as long as opinions are presented as opinions, and facts as facts. Opinions should not be passed as facts, or vice versa, he said. As a result, many Americans have been left confused about the reality of life under socialism, Silenas said. He warned Americas youth against believing those who claim that socialism is the answer to achieving equality, environment protection, and justice, saying that in reality, these things are absolutely absent under socialism. Environmental Performance Under Socialism A memorial for the Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster victims is pictured in front of the sarcophagus covering the destroyed 4th power block of Chernobyls nuclear power plant on Feb. 22, 2011, ahead of the 25th anniversary of the meltdown of reactor number four due to be marked on April 26, 2011. (Sergei Supinsky/AFP/Getty Images) You couldnt find any country that has had worse environmental performance than the Soviet Union, or the whole entire Soviet bloc, or even China, for that matter, Silenas said. The largest environmental disasters happen in socialist countries. Silenas gave examples of two environmental disasters that took place in the Soviet Union: the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, one of the worlds most significant accidents at a nuclear power plant; and the devastation of the Aral Sea, the fourth-largest inland sea in the world that basically is gone due to environmental mismanagement. The Aral was nearly destroyed as a result of the Soviet Unions irrigation project carried out in the 1960s, which was aimed at boosting cotton production by diverting two rivers feeding the sea to irrigate a desert. Although irrigation made the desert bloom, it devastated the Aral Sea, the Earth Observatory of NASA reported. After visiting the Aral Sea in 2017, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called it probably the biggest ecological catastrophe of our time, according to a UN statement. If you want environmental protection, socialism is not the answer, Silenas said. Life In a Socialist Country A Lithuanian demonstrator stands in front of a Soviet Red Army tank during the assault on the Lithuanian Radio and Television station in Vilnius on Jan. 13, 1991. Thirty years ago, the Baltic republic of Lithuania declared independence, heralding the start of the break-up of the 15-member Soviet Union, which imploded in Dec. 1991. (STF/AFP via Getty Images) As for justice, that was a mockery in the Soviet Union, Silenas said. Silenas was born in Lithuania when it was still a Soviet republic. It had been forcefully incorporated into the Soviet Union in 1940. What is right and what is wrong, what is truth and what is lies, are defined by the party and the politicians, not by independent courts. Independent courts is an oxymoron under socialism, he said of the reality in all socialist states. Silenas also said he witnessed no equality in the Soviet Union while living there, despite the promises of a more fair and equal society. There were many poor people. But at the same time, there were connected people that were rich people, all of them were connected to the communist party, he said. The humanitarian situation in the Soviet Union at the time was so bad that communist party members had their own special shops selling goods imported from Western countries, the former Yugoslavia, or the former Eastern Germany, Silenas said. [Those goods] were sort of considered luxuries that regular people could not even buy. Silenas said he grew up in a 30-square meter apartment (an equivalent of just over 320 square feet), which was considered good because it had its own bathroom and its own kitchen. Many families lived in a kind of dorm, where they had to share a kitchen and a shower with other families, Silenas explained. It wasnt a temporary thing like it is for students to live in a dorm. That was basically [the] aspiration of your life to live there. People who were connected to the communist party could live really well, Silenas said. They had cars, they had drivers, they had dachas, which are seasonal or year-round holiday homes located in the woods or by the sea. Anyone else was basically living in poverty. According to U.S. congressional records, since the Soviet Union established its socialist dictatorship, the ideology of socialism has unnaturally claimed the lives of least 100 million people in countries under socialist rule. Many of those victims died as a result of man-made famines. Silenas cited the Ukrainian famine, also known as Holodomorwhich occurred in the early 1930sas an example of the failures of the socialist system. The Soviet Union was confiscating grain from Ukrainian peasants on purpose, to punish them for resisting collectivization, he explained, adding that, as a result, at least five million people [died], if not more, from starvation. More people have escaped poverty under capitalism than they have under socialism, Silenas said. Im not talking poverty, about having a lesser iPhone than your friends. Im talking real poverty when you lack food or have nowhere to sleep. If you care [about] whats the best thing for the most people; if you want the world healthy, fed, and reasonably wealthy, capitalism is the way to go, he argued from his experience of socialism. Silenas then quoted Winston Churchill, who said: The inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries. If youre looking for equity, opportunity if you care about the environment, if you care about justice socialism doesnt deliver any of these things. Socialism delivers a relatively comfortable life for a very small group of people Theyre not the smartest people. Theyre not even the most creative people. Theyre just people [with the] most connections or people who would give up their friends to the authorities, Silenas said. All Socialist systems throughout history have exercised strict control over speech and thought. In the Soviet Union, millions of people were shot dead on the spot or sent to reeducation camps, or death camps, for thinking wrong things, for saying wrong things, or sometimes even for just having a little bit of land, on which they would grow crops for themselves and their families, or have fat pigs, Silenas said. People were also reported to the authorities by their neighbors for being anti-Soviet, he added. He also said that although getting banned today from Facebook for 30 days is nothing compared to being sent to a Siberian death camp for 30 years, the tone and intention from the authorities is eerily reminiscent of life under socialism. Its the same idea that people are not smart [enough] to determine what kind of information is correct, that people are not smart and can be manipulated. Thats a very dangerous notion that does look reminiscent of totalitarian regimes. I do hope it doesnt go any further than it does right now, he said. Ella Kietlinska Reporter Ella Kietlinska is a New York-based reporter for The Epoch Times. Paul Farthing, also known as Pen Farthing, in an undated image from his animal shelter in Kabul, Afghanistan. (PA Media) Animal Shelter Convoy Led by Former UK Marine Stuck at Kabul Airport The former Royal Marine who is trying to get some 68 people and 200 animals out of Kabul says he is stuck with his convoy outside the airport, where he has arranged for a charter plane. Paul Farthing, also known as Pen, runs an animal shelter in Kabul. After the fall of Kabul, he refused to leave without his staff and their families, and without his cats and dogs. After obtaining authorisation for his people, Farthing arranged for a charter plane that could take animals in the hold. After a war of wordsplayed out in the mediawith Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, he was given the green light for his charter plane. Farthing now appears to be stuck outside the airport, just hours after U.S. and UK authorities warned people not travel there due to an imminent threat of a terrorist attack from a local ISIS spin-off group. The UK government said that it was making efforts to get Farthings people and animals inside the airport, but were hampered by the need to carry out security checks. Farthing revealed the plight of his convoy in a Twitter post on Aug. 26 as he appealed for help from Suhail Shaheen, the Talibans spokesman. Dear Sir, my team and my animals are stuck at airport circle, wrote Farthing. We have a flight waiting. Can you please facilitate safe passage into the airport for our convoy? We are an NGO who will come back to Afghanistan but right now I want to get everyone out safely, he wrote. We have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage. Truly would like to go home now. Lets prove the IEA [Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan] are taking a different path. About an hour later, Iain McGill, who supports Farthings shelter from the UK, wrote on Twitter: Pen at South Gate surrounded by Taliban. Cant get through as Airport not opening from USA/UK side. Taliban will let him pass, US and UK leaving him exposed and stranded. McGill, who has been highly critical of the UK governments handling of assistance to Farthing, added, Ben Wallace, act now or cause all their deaths. The flight, from a Polish operator, is due to land on Friday, Aug. 28. Armed forces minister James Heappey told Good Morning Britain that efforts were being made to allow Pens convoy inside the airport and that the charter plane would be permitted to land. He said that the bottleneck in getting Farthings convoy into the airport is not capacity on planes, but vital security checks. That is causing the queue, he said. There is also a highly credible threat in place causing us to advise people against going to the airport. As a British passport holder, Farthing can be processed faster, said Heappey. But for the Afghans and their families from the shelter, further security checks are required. If their security checks are sped up for them, he said, it would mean pushing other Afghans in the same position back down the queue. A sign indicating school closure due to the spread of the CCP virus is displayed at Deer Valley High School in Glendale, Ariz., on April 2, 2020. (Christian Petersen/Getty Images) Arizona School Board Member Apologizes for Cursing at Meeting The head of the Scottsdale (Arizona) Unified School District (SUSD) Governing Boardone of four members facing a recall election by petitionis in hot water for using an expletive at a public meeting. I apologized during the board meeting, as well as to individual parents who have written in and in the news. To be clear, I should not have said what I said and I am very sorry for this mistake. It will not happen again, SUSD President Jann-Michael Greenburg told The Epoch Times in an email. On Aug. 24, the five-member board held a meeting where parents who wished to comment were asked to remain outside the building until they were called in. At the beginning of the meeting, Greenburg discussed recent protests over a new mask mandate and other incidents that he described as escalations. The public was given limited access to the meeting to ensure safety. Greenburg asked that community members and speakers remain civil during the meeting. At the beginning of the meeting, Greenburg discussed a recent incident involving the discovery of neo-Nazi fliers at one school campus. One parent who spoke claimed an employee of the district was responsible for distributing copies of the comic book White Will by William L. Pierce III, author of The Turner Diaries. I stopped that speaker and clarified that the statement was false and no employee was involved, Greenburg said. In reality, during the first week of our investigation an employee was suspected of being the culprit. However, that employee was shown to be innocent and the real culprit was apprehended two weeks later when he attempted to distribute more copies on the same campus. He was caught by Scottsdale Police Department, which was surveilling the area. Because there are many people familiar with this incident and who the suspected employee was, I wanted to be very clear that the employee is, in fact, innocent. Placing an identifiable employees reputation, job, and potentially safety on the line is not acceptable to me, he added. After the speaker left the podium, Greenburg is seen on the YouTube video leaning over to a board member. He is then heard whispering the expletive before saying these people. Greenburg acknowledged he made the remark, which prompted a call for his resignation by one parent and letters from others. Parents Seek to Oust Board Members According to the Arizona School Board Association (ASBA), there is no sanction, fine, or disciplinary action under the organizations code of conduct for the use of inappropriate language by a school board member short of a recall election. Theyre elected board members. Theyre not employees, ASBA Director of Communications Heidi Otero told The Epoch Times. Two recall election petitions are currently being circulated within the SUSD, which seek to oust Greenburg and fellow board members Julie Cieniawski, Patty Beckman, and Libby Hart-Wells, claiming their leadership has been detrimental to student health and education. Its not acceptable, said Patricia Lee Pellet, a Scottsdale resident, of Greenburgs use of inappropriate language during a board meeting. He showed how he honestly feels about the parents and their kids that night, Pellet told The Epoch Times. Pellet is one of two parents who filed a recall election petition against the four board members. She names Greenburg, Cieniawski, and Hart-Wells for removal. Scottsdale resident Nicole Curtis seeks to remove Beckman through the special election. Other school officials in other state districts have also faced censure over the recent use of foul language. Earlier this month, the vice chairman of Jefferson Countys school board in Louisville, Kentucky, resigned his position after saying [expletive] you to a state senator on social media, according to local media. In August 2020, a member of the Mount Ascutney School District Board in Vermont stepped down after she dropped an F-bomb during a zoom meeting streamed by more than 70 people. An autonomous firefighting tank is being developed by Rheinmetall Defence Australia. (Supplied) Australia Funds 5G Autonomous Firefighting Tanks The Australian government is bankrolling the research and development of an autonomous tank equipped with 5G technology to help fight the nations bushfires. Dubbed the fire tank, the machine will be tasked with traversing highly treacherous terrains to support missions involving firefighting, path clearing, and rescue. The federal government awarded the $1.5 million (US$1.1 million) grant to Rheinmetall Defence Australia, a subsidiary of German-headquartered Rheinmetall Group specialising in defence and security technology. Based on the German Armys Marder tank design, the fire tank will be operated by establishing a drone-based 5G communication relay using an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). German Army Marder tank on May 12, 2012. (Kombat/Wikimedia Commons) Rheinmetall Defence Australia Managing Director Gary Stewart said that Telstra, Australias largest telecommunications company, would be supporting Rheinmetall in providing a 5G network to the tank. Rheinmetall is pleased to be partnering with Telstra and is looking forward to commencing tests at MILVEHCOE, our state-of-the-art facility in South East Queensland, Stewart said in a media release. Stewart said that the tank was designed to reduce risk to frontline firefighters following Australias severe bushfires in 2019-20. The fireswhich were visible from spaceravaged New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, and South Australia, burning 17 million hectares of land and killing 33 Australians. The investment is one of 19 made by the federal government and part of its $20 million (US$14.5 million) 5G Innovation Initiative intended to support a variety of research on applications of 5G technology. Minister for Communications, Urban Infrastructure, Cities and the Arts Paul Fletcher said that the investments would strengthen the nation amid an ongoing proliferation of 5G throughout Australias industries. Minister for Communications and the Arts Paul Fletcher addresses media in the Press Gallery at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia on June 23, 2021. (Photo by Sam Mooy/Getty Images) The Initiative will help businesses take advantage of innovative digital technologies, creating jobs and supporting Australias economic recovery in the Year of 5G, Fletcher said in a media release. This is a critical technology, and these projects will help Australians realise the benefits of 5G sooner. The initiative had announced a further $2 million (US$1.5 million) of funding to go towards Australias largest freight warehousing, the Moorebank Logistics Park in New South Wales. The Moorebank project plans to develop fully automated freight processing and handling backed by 5G, including automated cranes and driverless electric carriers. The government also granted $1.5 million towards the 5G application of high resolution, 4K video streaming of sheep to enable fast and accurate counting of livestock using artificial intelligence. The tank has joined a growing arsenal of fire-fighting tech, with three Australian space organisations joining forces earlier this year to announce the launch of an Australia-made, bushfire-detecting satellite into orbit. The satellite, which will be launched in 2022, will detect and track bushfires within three minutes of them starting, allowing emergency responders to control and squash unplanned fire outbreaks rapidly. Medical support personnel help an Afghan mother and family off a U.S. Air Force C-17, moments after she delivered a child aboard the aircraft upon landing at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, on Aug. 21, 2021. (U.S. Air Mobility Command via Reuters) Baby Born on Afghanistan Evacuation Flight Named After Aircraft Call Sign A baby girl who was born on a U.S. evacuation plane out of Afghanistan on Aug. 21 has been named after the call sign of the aircraft, the head of U.S. European Command told reporters on Aug. 25. Weve had further conversations with the mom and the dad of the baby, Gen. Tod Wolters, who is also NATOs Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, told reporters at a briefing from the Pentagon. They named the little girl Reach. And they did so because the call sign of the C-17 aircraft that flew them from Qatar to Ramstein was Reach. The aircrafts call sign is Reach 828. So, that childs name will forever be Reach. And as you can well imagine, being an Air Force fighter pilot, its my dream to watch that young child called Reach grow up and be a U.S. citizen and fly United States Air Force fighters in our air force, Wolters added. The U.S. Air Mobility Command previously reported that the girls mother was having labor complications on the Air Force C-17 military aircraft that was en route to Ramstein Air Base in Germany on Aug. 21. The Afghan woman was on the second stage of the evacuation flight that had taken off from a base in Qatar. The aircraft commander decided to descend in altitude to increase air pressure in the aircraft, which helped stabilize and save the mothers life, according to the Air Mobility Command. Upon landing, airmen from the 86th Medical Group came aboard the aircraft and helped the mother deliver the baby girl in the cargo bay. The mother and child were then transported to a nearby medical facility and were reported to be in good condition. There have been two other births by Afghan special immigrant visa holders over the past week. Those two babies were not delivered on board an aircraft, but were delivered at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, a military hospital operated by the United States Army in Landstuhl, Germany. All three babies are good, Wolters said on Aug. 25. As of early Aug. 26, the United States and its allies have evacuated more than 88,000 people from Afghanistan since Aug. 15, including 19,000 in the past 24 hours. The U.S. military said that planes have been taking off the equivalent of every 39 minutes, reported Reuters. However, the U.S. embassy in Kabul advised Americans to avoid traveling to the airport and the airport gates late Aug. 25 unless given individual instruction, citing security threats. Read More US Embassy in Kabul Advises Americans to Avoid Airport, Citing Security Threats Since the Taliban terrorist organization took full control of the Afghan capital of Kabul on Aug. 15, crowds have flooded to the gates of Kabul airport, desperate for help from U.S. allies to leave the country. Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid told reporters in Kabul on Aug. 24 that they want all foreign evacuations to be completed by Aug. 31 and will accept no extensions to the deadline. Beware the Technocratic Virus Spreading Through Our Parliaments Commentary The word unprecedented has been thrown around almost without a thought over the past 18 months. But from lockdowns and border closures to the single largest peacetime budget line itemJobKeeper (A$90 billion)was anything really unprecedented? Or was everything about our COVID-19 experience, including the onset of unquestioned rule by experts, in fact, very much precedented? For more than two decades, Australia has been run by a class of managerial elites who are largely unencumbered by the wishes of the Australian people as expressed at elections. Instead, they rule by technocratic mandate. For example, since the Global Financial Crisis, experts at the Reserve Bank of Australia have decided to place the official cash rate as close to zero as possible to revive business investment and create full employment. But the flipside of this has meant Australians have experienced the longest-running structural decline in new private sector business investment relative to the size of the economy. Australians have also been signed onto the Paris Agreement against their will, partly due to climate science expertise, despite expressing multiple times at elections their opposition. In 2013, Liberal Party leader Tony Abbott won a resounding victory after promising to repeal the carbon tax, a tax implemented by the previous Labor government in direct contradiction of earlier election promises. The climate election of 2019which saw current Prime Minister Scott Morrison win government on the back of resource-centred electoratesprovided further evidence for anyone still unsure of how Australians felt about emissions reductions and economic security. Prime Minister of Australia and leader of the Liberal Party Scott Morrison, flanked by his wife Jenny Morrison and daughters Lily Morrison and Abbey Morrison, delivers his victory speech at the Sofitel Sydney Wentworth in Sydney, Australia, on May 18, 2019. (Tracey Nearmy/Getty Images) Sadly, this preference is now being ignored by the prime minister, who has expressed a desire to implement a net-zero emissions target. Australians, in some ways, are well-primed for the technocratic COVID era. Our experience has given way to a desire from political leaders to remove politics from democracy and focus on expertise. However, this is nothing more than removing democracy from democracy. Leader of the Greens and the federal member for the seat of Melbourne, Adam Bandt, revealed this was indeed his preference. Speaking to The Age newspaper, he said he thought voters in the federal electorate of Higgins wanted evidence-based policy, and that the catastrophic failure to listen to experts in the COVID crisis will be outstripped by the impacts of failing to listen to experts on climate change. Aside from the fact that Australias federal and state responses to COVID-19 were based entirely on listening to the experts, it raises the disturbing question: What is the point of having elections if the job of a parliamentarian is simply to implement expert advice? Politicians in Australia are supposed to represent the views of their constituents. Their job is to listen to many different stakeholders, weigh up their views, and make a decision that balances these insights with the best interests of those who live in their electorate. But this is not how democracy functions in Australia anymore. This was made abundantly clear in the federal parliament in August when the federal member for Dawson, George Christensen, was condemned by colleagues for a speech he made in the House of Representatives. Christensen argued that lockdowns dont destroy the virus, but they do destroy peoples livelihoods and peoples lives. There is ample evidence supporting this statement, including a recent Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) analysis outlining how lockdowns are devastating small businesses. The IPA surveyed a three-week period from the commencement of lockdowns in Greater Sydney on June 26 and estimated that over 540,000 jobs were destroyed in small and medium-sized businesses across Australia. Thats equivalent to 25,000 per day. A tram construction site is closed in the central business district of Parramatta in Sydney, Australia, on July 31, 2021. (Lisa Maree Williams/Getty Images) The experience across New South Wales, Victoria, and now New Zealand confirms what many have argued since the start of the pandemic; that it is impossible to eliminate the virus. The federal government has now adopted this as its official position, with Treasurer Josh Frydenberg arguing on Aug. 24 that zero-COVID forever is unrealistic it is a fallacy that you can eliminate COVID You must learn to live with it. Yet, only two weeks prior to making this statement, Frydenberg and other government members voted to condemn Christensen for expressing a similar statement. But the condemnation should never have occurred in the first place because it was Christensens job to air the views of his constituents. Moreover, parliamentarians should never be censured, condemned, or cancelled for expressing any views in parliament, which is why they are given parliamentary privilege. Alarmingly, Federal Labor Senator Murray Watt even celebrated that tech behemoth Facebook decided to censure Christensen by removing a video of his speech. Such is the state of Australian democracy in 2021 that an elected representative of the people can be condemned for expressing an opinion that goes against the supposed expert advice of the day, while their colleagues support the actions of foreign corporations silencing the views of millions of Australians. The Great Southern Land has thrown vast resources at tackling COVID-19. Yet, we should be wary of another variant: the highly infectious technocratic virus that has infiltrated and undermined our democracy. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. President Joe Biden delivers remarks on the terror attack at Hamid Karzai International Airport, and the U.S. service members and Afghan victims killed and wounded, in the East Room of the White House, Washington, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images) Biden: America Will Retaliate Against ISIS for Kabul Bombings The United States will strike ISIS in retaliation for bombings in Kabul that left a dozen U.S. troops dead, President Joe Biden said on Thursday. To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: we will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. Ill defend our interests and our people with every measure at my command, Biden said from the White House in Washington. The president has directed military officials to draw up plans to strike ISIS facilities and fighters. We will respond with force and precision at our time, at a place we choose, at a moment of our choosing, he said. These ISIS terrorists will not win. America will not be intimidated. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack, bragging that a suicide bomber made it through both Taliban checkpoints and the U.S. security presence in Afghanistans largest city. The ISIS terrorist managed to reach a large gathering of translators and collaborators with the American army, and then he detonated his explosive belt, the group said in a statement. It claimed the attacker was able to get within five meters of U.S. troops at an eastern gate to the airport. U.S. officials initially pegged the death toll among Americans at 12, with another 15 troops wounded. Another service member died hours later, according to The Associated Press. Kabul health officials were quoted as saying that at least 60 Afghan civilians were killed, reported Reuters. Smoke rises from a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 26, 2021. (Wali Sabawoon/AP Photo) A screengrab shows people carrying an injured person to a hospital after an attack at Kabul airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 26, 2021. (Reuters TV/1TV via Reuters) Biden spoke about seven hours after the explosions went off at the U.S.-held airport in Kabul. He and administration officials, save for a short briefing from a U.S. general, had gone dark following the attack, prompting calls for his resignation by some leading Republicans. Biden described himself and First Lady Jill Biden as outraged and heartbroken for the losses, adding that their hearts are aching for the families who lost loved ones. He related how his late son, Beau Biden, died of cancer after serving in the military, recounting feeling like youre being sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest. U.S. troops have been cooperating with the Taliban terrorist group, which took over Afghanistan in mid-July, to carry out mass evacuations in the country. There is no indication the Taliban was involved in the attack or let it happen, Biden said, echoing Gen. Kenneth McKenzie. Fresh explosions rocked the Kabul airport late Thursday. A Taliban spokesman said the explosions were set off by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment, stoking fear that Americans may withdraw before the Aug. 31 deadline Biden set. But the president said the plan is, as of now, to remain until the deadline. People still need help escaping the country, including Americans, the president said, adding: The militarys concluded thats what we should do. I think theyre right. I think theyre correct. Editors Note: This article has been updated to include an updated death toll and details of the deaths. President Joe Biden gestures as delivers remarks on the U.S. militarys ongoing evacuation efforts in Afghanistan from the East Room of the White House on Aug. 20, 2021. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images) Biden Postpones Meeting With Israels Prime Minister After Explosions in Kabul President Joe Bidens bilateral meeting with Israels prime minister has been postponed after U.S. forces in Afghanistan were among the casualties of at least two bombings in Kabul. Biden was scheduled to convene with Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and other Israeli officials at the White House at 11:30 a.m. on Aug. 26. The White House sent word shortly after the scheduled start time that the meeting was delayed. It later said the meeting will take place on Friday. Biden was briefed on the Kabul bombings by his national security team, including Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley, the White House said. Other administration meetings and briefings were pushed back or canceled, including a Pentagon briefing, a White House COVID-19 team update, and a press conference from White House press secretary Jen Psaki. A video call that Biden was set to share with governors who want to welcome Afghan refugees to their states also was canceled. Biden planned to speak with Bennett, his chief of staff, and Israels ambassador to the United States, among others, to convey the United States ironclad commitment to Israels security and self-defense, a White House official told reporters earlier this week. But the bombs that went off in Kabul on Aug. 26 prompted a schedule change, creating an obstacle for the White House as it tries to complete evacuations from Afghanistan before its self-imposed Aug. 31 deadline. An initial explosion at Abbey Gate at the U.S.-held airport in Afghanistans largest city was followed by at least one other a short distance away. Twelve U.S. troops were killed and 15 others were wounded. U.S. troops were rushed to Afghanistan in the middle of the month to secure the airport after the Taliban terrorist group made rapid gains against the U.S.-backed government, before toppling it all together. The airport is currently being used to ferry Americans, Afghans, and others to safe havens, with many ultimately being flown to the United States. Biden had insisted that the evacuation efforts were on track to finish by the deadline he put into place in the summer after breaking with a deadline the Trump administration hammered out in an agreement with the Taliban and the Afghan government. The Taliban is now insisting that the United States adhere to the Aug. 31 deadline set by Biden, warning of consequences if it doesnt do so. As many as 1,500 Americans remained in Afghanistan as of Aug. 25, U.S. officials said. They said the number might be lower, because some of the Americans being flown out arent reporting their departures to the government. Protesters demonstrated near the Park Street subway station, and then marched to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health in Boston, Mass., on Aug 25, 2021. (Learner Liu/The Epoch Times) Boston Parents Protest Mask Mandate in Massachusetts Schools Several hundred people rallied for medical freedom in Boston on Wednesday as the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) authorized a mask mandate in public schools through October 1. Protesters demonstrated near the Park Street subway station, and then marched to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health while shouting slogans like my child, my choice and we will not comply. They said it should be parents but not the government to decide whether their children need to wear masks. Protesters demonstrated near the Park Street subway station and then marched to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health in Boston, Mass., on Aug 25, 2021. (Learner Liu/The Epoch Times) Protesters marched to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health in Boston, Mass., on Aug 25, 2021. (Learner Liu/The Epoch Times) We have a lot of families that want masks, and a lot of families that dont. And the most equitable thing would be to just let parents choose for themselves and their own families, and whats best for their children, the event organizer Samantha Muise said. The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education board voted 91 Tuesday to give Commissioner Jeffrey Riley the power to issue a mask mandate for schools. Paymon Rouhanifard, the only board member who voted no, said it was a bad public policy. Muise said that, as masks could do damage to children long term, a good solution is to give parents the choice and have them sign liability forms for consequences of either wearing or not wearing masks. I have a 4-year-old son. How do you teach him his ABCs if he cant see your face? Rayla Campbell, a speaker at the rally said. Another protester Cynthia Maloney was concerned about masks mental effects on children. They are being told that they are carrying diseases, and they are going to be killing people. What kind of psychological damage is [that] doing to our children I am a mother. I am a grandmother. I have to watch my grandchildren go through this. This is not OK, she said. She said that mask mandates for children are more ideological than scientific. Nobody is looking at the actual science. They are believing the scientists are like their God. Its a new religion, Maloney said. According to DESEs announcement, it was effective immediately that public school students (age 5 and above) and staff are required to wear masks indoors in schools. The requirement will be in place until at least October 1, 2021. Students and staff who cannot wear a mask for medical reasons, and students who cannot wear a mask for behavioral reasons, are exempted from the requirement. After October 1, 2021, if a school demonstrates a vaccination rate of 80 percent or more of students and staff in the school, then vaccinated individuals in that school would no longer be subject to the DESE mask requirement. The announcement said whether and when a student should be disciplined for failure to wear a mask is a local decision. Districts should provide written notice to students and families about expectations and potential consequences, and are encouraged to use a progressive discipline approach. Prior to the vote on Tuesday, some protesters gathered outside the DESE building in Malden to oppose the proposal and call for parent choice. Business Freedom Diminishes as the CCP Expands Its Role in Companies Commentary Under Xi Jinping, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is increasing its control of the economy by establishing the Party units in state-owned enterprises, private companies, joint ventures, and foreign companies, both at home and abroad. Through the cybersecurity law, the Party is able to gain access to all data, even data held by foreign companies. And through the infiltration of the Party members, the Chinese regime is able to place loyal eyes, ears, and hands in companies and research institutions around the world. The 1993 company law required both foreign and domestic companies in China to establish CCP units. In the 2000s, former CCP leader Jiang Zemin called for the Party to represent the entrepreneurial class, who were once considered enemies of the people. More recently, CCP branches in private business have increased dramatically. Under Xi, it seems the country is moving to an old-style economic policy, where the CCP will play a larger role in companies. When the CCP revised its charter in 2017, language was added, expanding its sphere of control: Party, government, army, society, and education, east, west, south, and north, the Party leads on everything. The Partys control of private companies means that a cell of three Party members must be employed by those companies, in order to form a Communist Party Unit. Many private companies are too small to comply, but as of 2021, about 48.3 percent of private companies and 92 percent of the China 500 companies host Party units. As of 2018, it became mandatory for all companies listed on the stock exchange to host a Party unit. Originally, the role of Party units was to recruit new Party members, provide welfare assistance, and organize study and training sessions, as well as social gatherings. More recently, the Party units mandate has been expanded to recruiting entrepreneurs into the Party. They also maintain databases with profiles of employees and managers to know whos loyal. The Party unit must also educate entrepreneurs, ensuring that they dont lose their socialist values. This includes instructing entrepreneurs to work and behave in such a way that pleases the Party. Private companies are also expected to recognize the leading role of the Party in their charter. Large companies must hire a Party secretary and workers, allowing those Party representatives to have a significant influence on hirings and other decisions. Those rules apply to state-owned enterprises, private Chinese companies, listed companies, and foreign companies. In order to increase its control over the private sector, the CCP acts through the United Front, a unit responsible for increasing the Partys influence and control both within China and abroad. The United Front is building a database of private citizens, entrepreneurs, state employees, investors, and stakeholders. It seems that Xi favors the state sector, but will give priority to companies that assist in realizing the goals of the CCP, rewarding them with financial and policy resources. It became mandatory for both private and state-owned firms to incorporate the Party into their charter in 2020. In that same year, the United Front published a paper, Opinion on Strengthening the United Front Work of the Private Economy in the New Era, which called for the United Front to help create a modern state-owned enterprise system with Chinese characteristics, echoing the words of Xi in a 2016 speech. The term Chinese characteristics meant incorporating the Party into the companys management and decision-making, Xi explained. Ye Qing, vice chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, then extended this call to private companies, encouraging the building of a modern private sector with Chinese characteristics. This meant allowing the Party to not only have control over hirings and firings, but also to carry out audits and to monitor internal behavior. The CCP has determined that overseas Chinese projects would also have a Party cell, which should raise some concerns in other countries about foreign political influence. In China, joint ventures are expected to maintain a Party cell. The foreign partner to a joint venture must accept that the Party may be influencing or outright making decisions for the Chinese side. Chinas cybersecurity law requires all companies, including foreign companies, to turn over data to Chinese authorities. This raises real issues of data security and customer and employee privacy. For a wholly foreign-owned enterprise (WFOE) it seems strange to have to host and pay for a Party cell. According to a list of 1.95 million Party members, leaked to the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, companies and research institutions around the world, including Boeing, Qualcomm, and Pfizer, are riddled with CCP members who have sworn an oath to never betray the Party and are obligated to further the interests of the state and Party when called upon to do so. Under Xi, business and social freedoms appear to be diminishing, as the CCP expands its sphere of control and plays an increasing role in companies, not only monitoring and controlling them, but also gathering data and actually making decisions about staffing and behavior. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. Conservative MP Garnett Genuis rises during question period in the House of Commons in Ottawa on June 1, 2021. (The Canadian Press/Adrian Wyld) Canada Should Ramp Up Private Sponsorship of Those Fleeing CCP Persecution: Tory Candidate Canadas refugee program needs to better support private sponsors who are helping victims of the Chinese communist regime abroadespecially human rights defenders and refugees at imminent risk of persecution, says Conservative candidate Garnett Genuis. In particular, Canada should not limit the number of private sponsors who want to help refugees, Genuis said at an ethnocultural press conference on Aug. 23. Right now the cap on private sponsorship says that beyond a certain threshold, we wont let private individuals and groups sponsor refugeeseven if theyre coming up with the money, even if theyre the ones taking care of it, said Genuis, who was an MP and his partys shadow minister for international development and human rights before the Parliament was dissolved for election. What we would say is that lets support and facilitate, and not cap the generosity of Canadians. He acknowledged it would be impossible for Canada to accept all vulnerable refugees who need help, but said the system should not stop Canadians who want to offer support. Genuis made the comments when asked about how the Conservative Party, if elected, would help victims of human rights violations in China, such as Hong Kong pro-democracy activists, Uyghur Muslims, and adherents of the spiritual practice Falun Gong. He noted that the Conservative Partys platform has a section dedicated to addressing the issue of standing up to Chinese state aggression. This would include using Canadas Magnitsky law to sanction Chinas worst human rights offenders and granting asylum to mainland Chinese proponents of freedom and persecuted minorities, including Tibetans, Falun Gong practitioners, Hong Kong democracy activists, and others. Genuis said Canada should do more to help young democracy activists and human rights defenders in Hong Kong after Beijings national security legislation was passed in July 2020. The law is widely seen as a tool for clamping down on pro-democracy activists in the former British colony. The [federal] government did make an announcement, but frankly it wasnt nearly adequate. It was an opportunity for people to make applications as economic refugees from Hong Kong essentially, but it didnt recognize the particular vulnerability or do anything to particularly help human rights defenders, Genuis said. Dave Hayer, the Conservative candidate for Fleetwood-Port Kells who also attended the press conference, said hes heard from many Canadians of Asian origin who are worried about the situation in Hong Kong, where theres basically no rights or freedoms. I visited Hong Kong many times before 1997, and before China took over Hong Kong, and people were saying [theyre] happy to do some business here. But now, when I talk to them, they said if you speak against the governmenteven at the national anthem, if you said few lines wrongthey can throw you in jail, Hayers said. We have to condemn the human rights [abuses] in China and also in Hong Kong as many people as we can, because many of those people have families here [in Canada]. If we allow the program where privately the family can sponsor their friends and relatives, that will make it easier for them to adjust to here and to be successful here, he said. Genuis noted Canada could also play a role in supporting other victims of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), such as the Uyghur minority group, who manage to escape China for other countries but remain in danger due to the influence of the Chinese regime on other sovereign governments. Those minority communities are sometimes being, unfortunately, subject to abuses by the government of the country where they sought refuge, as a result of pressure from the government of China, he said. Genuis has also been a vocal critic of the CCPs persecution of adherents of Falun Gong, and has supported Bill S-204, legislation that would combat forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners in China by making it a criminal offence for Canadians to travel abroad to receive an organ taken without consent. In this image provided by the U.S. Marine Corps, families begin to board a U.S. Air Force Boeing C-17 Globemaster III during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 23, 2021. (Sgt. Samuel Ruiz/U.S. Marine Corps via AP) Canadas Last Military Flight to Leave Kabul Thursday, as Monsef Admonishes Taliban The Canadian military will end its mission at Kabul airport on Thursday, as Liberal cabinet minister Maryam Monsef sparked controversy by using the term brothers to challenge the Taliban to protect those left behind. Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan said because the U.S. is leading the mission and providing security, its 6,000-strong contingent must be the last to leave the airport on Aug. 31, the American deadline for departure. That means Canadas special forces and aircrews must begin their departure preparations in advance. Canada is using two C-17 transport planes to airlift Afghans to safety and is one of 13 countries taking part in the airlift. It also has special forces operatives on the ground who are working outside the airports confines to spirit fleeing Afghans to waiting flights. Drawing down a mission takes a considerable amount of time. It is not done overnight, and it comes with considerable risk, Sajjan said. Senior government sources, who spoke anonymously citing the need to maintain operational safety, said the last C-17 would depart Kabul sometime on Thursday, but it was not clear when given the chaotic situation on the ground. Nor was it known if all Canadian military personnel would be on the plane because Canada and its allies are also helping each other by evacuating their personnel on their various flights. In the coming days, the U.S. military will have to extract its own soldiers and equipment, but will prioritize human life and helping its partners, said Pentagon spokesman John Kirby. We are now and have been working with our allies and partners to help them withdraw their people. And well help them withdraw their forces as well. The pace of Canadas evacuation efforts has ramped up noticeably in the past three days with a record 535 on a Tuesday flight, part of the frantic effort to fully evacuate all foreign nationals and vulnerable Afghans who helped Canada and its allies before the countrys recent fall to the Taliban. In addition to the Aug. 31 deadline, which Taliban leaders have insisted is non-negotiable, American and Canadian military planners fear the risk of an attack on the airport and the massive throngs of would-be evacuees outside by a breakaway faction of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, a group the Pentagon refers to as ISIS-K. The two most senior U.S. commanders on the ground in Kabul, Rear Admiral Peter Vasely and Maj.-Gen. Chris Donahue, are directly involved in the effort to ensure eligible evacuees are able to get into the airport, Kirby said. I fully recognize that not every step of this process is in our firm control, and that there are going to be instances where it doesnt work as advertised. Monsef, the minister for women and gender equality, used a government briefing to make an impassioned appeal directly to the Taliban to allow Afghans to flee the country and respect the rights of others who are left behind. I want to take this opportunity to speak to our brothers, the Taliban, she said in a remark that caught attention on social media and on the campaign trail as the federal party leaders were vying for votes ahead of the Sept. 20 election. We call on you to ensure the safe and secure passage of any individual in Afghanistan out of the country. We call on you to immediately stop the violence, the genocide, the femicide, the destruction of infrastructure, including heritage buildings. Referring to Monsefs use of the phrase our brothers, Conservative Leader Erin OToole said, the language used by the Trudeau government is completely unacceptable. Dan Albas, a Conservative running for re-election in British Columbia, said on Twitter that he strongly disagreed with Monsefs use of the term, but added: I also believe it is important we disagree on policy. Disagreement and debate should never be used as a catalyst for personal attacks. Monsef was born in Iran to Afghan parents during the height of the Soviet Unions occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s. Her family came to Canada as refugees in the 1990s after having fled Afghanistan once the Taliban came to power in Herat, where they had returned to live at the time. I think this whole situation is jarring that there are terrorists taking over my beloved ancestral land, she told the briefing. Muslims refer to one another as brothers and sisters, she added. Rest assured, I continue to believe deeply that the Taliban are a terrorist organization. NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said he wasnt interested in scoring political points at Monsefs expense. Foreign Affairs Minister Marc Garneau said the security situation keeps deteriorating, and that with time running out, there is a possibility that were not going to be able to bring everyone that we want to when the air bridge stops. A vivid illustration of that desperation came with the emergence of a cellphone video posted on Facebook that appeared to depict Canadian troops at the airport wall not engaging with desperate Afghans, brandishing the documents they needed to come to Canada. We have our visas, our approved visas with all the instructions but nobody is gonna take care of us, says an English male voice above the shouting. Sajjan called the video heart wrenching but said there are many other examples of Canadian Forces personnel doing tremendous work to take Afghans to safety in a high threat environment that includes terrorist groups as well as the obstructionist Taliban. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the Aug. 31 deadline does not mean the end of American and allied efforts to get people out of Afghanistan. The Taliban have made public and private commitments to provide and permit safe passage for Americans, for third-country nationals and for Afghans at risk going forward past Aug. 31, Blinken said. Garneau said Canada and the G7 will soon be telling the Taliban it must not block Afghans from leaving the country. We are working together to develop the necessary approach that we will take towards this Taliban regime in the coming days and to put down in front of them very important markers with respect to how they have to treat Afghans who want to leave the country. By Mike Blanchfield and James McCarten China Still Main Source of Fentanyl in US Chinese fentanyl is pouring into the United States. Its moved through Mexican cartels, and with implicit permission from the Chinese Communist Party. The White House appeals to the private sector to beef up defenses against cyberattacks, while experts say China is actively engaged in war with the United States. China revives old claims about the origin of the pandemic. Beijing accuses the U.S. military of bringing the infection to Wuhan, but one report says otherwise. The United States is reportedly allowing Huawei to buy auto chips, even though the blacklisted Chinese telecom firm was flagged over concerns Beijing could use it for spying. The pressure to get citizens vaccinated is rising in China. Some governmental organs and state-owned companies are now ordering employees to persuade others to get the shot. If they fail, they can expect a pink slip. Subscribe to our YouTube channel for more first-hand news from China. For more news and videos, please visit our website and Twitter. A Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) chemist checks confiscated powder containing fentanyl at the DEA Northeast Regional Laboratory in New York, on Oct. 8, 2019. (Don Emmert/AFP via Getty Images) Chinas Alliance With Mexican Cartels Continues to Fuel Deadly Fentanyl Crisis in US: Former DEA Official Distributing and trafficking fentanyl to the United States is the perfect tool in the Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) campaign of unrestricted warfare against the West, according to a former division head of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). They are not dropping bombs or putting armies on the ground in America, but theyre still killing Americans at record levels, said Derek Maltz, former head of the Special Operations Division of the DEA, referring to the CCPs plan to destabilize the country using unconventional forms of warfare. Theyre taking advantage of a massive, addicted population in America. Maltzs warning comes as a new report found that China remains the primary source for the trafficking of illicit fentanyl and fentanyl-related substances in the United States, despite the Chinese regime banning the drug in 2019. Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid thats 50 times more potent than heroin. The Aug. 24 report (pdf) by the U.S.China Economic and Security Review Commission also found that while direct shipments to the United States have declined since the ban, Mexico is playing an expanding role in the explosion of fentanyl addictions and deaths around the country. Americans are being killed at record levels, the former DEA official said, and its all because of the massive chemical flow from China. In 2020, during the pandemic, deaths from overdoses of synthetic opioids, mostly from fentanyl, surged to a record of more than 56,000an increase of 20,000 from the year earlier, according to provisional data by the National Center for Health Statistics. The country is facing the worst drug crisis in its history, Maltz said, adding that the alliance between China and the cartels could be the top day-to-day threat impacting Americas future. According to the report, the Chinese regimes weak supervision and regulation of its chemical industry has aided the efforts of Chinese fentanyl traffickers. Thus, with limited abatement, Chinese traffickers are continuing to ship precursor chemicals to Mexico to produce deadly fentanyl. Millions of counterfeit pills containing fentanyl are being made, and the deadly drug is often mixed with other drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine. Thousands of pounds of fentanyl have been seized this year, the former DEA official said. Phoenix, for example, went from zero seizures in 2015 to 6 million fake pills in 2020, and leadership in the DEA says it has already seized over 6 million in 2021. Maltz referred to a lab analysis by the DEA that determined that 26 percent of the pills analyzed contained lethal doses of fentanyl. Taking into account the 6 million pills seized in Phoenix in 2020, that means over 1.5 million people were saved from just one DEA office. Money Laundering Schemes Exacerbate the Problem Beyond Chinas involvement in the rise in fentanyl seizures, the Aug. 24 report also acknowledges money laundering operations between the Asian country and Mexican cartels. While Maltz praised law enforcement for infiltrating Chinese transnational criminal networks, he said the CCP continues to escalate the trafficking of drugs into Mexico. And the transnational criminals are indeed taking over money laundering services for the cartels. According to the report, The fentanyl challenge has grown in complexity since Chinese suppliers began to evolve their tactics in 2019. Maltz believes there are two key components contributing to the evolution of this massive crisis. China has the drug production chemicals, and they have the money laundering servicesand without the chemicals or the money, they couldnt operate. The international money laundering market has become more appealing to the CCP and Mexican cartels. Describing the operation, Maltz said: China has brokers sitting in Mexico with drug kingpins, and theyre making deals to pick up money all over America. The money is moved from one Chinese bank to another overseas, and then theyre fulfilling legitimate consumer goods orders to be shipped to South America, Central America, and Mexico. In the next step, he said, consumer goods are sold and the money circles back to the drug traffickers. He calls it a sophisticated process, adding that law enforcement is acting as quickly as possible to infiltrate the operations. However, criminal and money laundering investigations are hampered by limited cooperation between Chinese and U.S. authorities, the report found. Maltz said that during the Trump administration, there was some positive movement to prevent the export of pure fentanyl and fentanyl analogs out of China[but] the Chinese transnational criminals got very smart and started reducing the exports of fentanyl and increasing the precursor chemical exports. While the chemicals China may be exporting are legitimate chemicals, he said the regime is simply allowing the Mexican cartels do more of the dirty work on the production of fentanyl. Rather than seeing pure fentanyl sent to the labs in Mexico, mass amounts of chemicals are being shipped. The process is changing because thats what criminals do, Maltz said. China and the Mexican cartels will keep making adjustments to reduce their vulnerabilityand theyre both very clever at it. Chinese State-Run Media Creates Cartoon Aimed at Educating American Children With Critical Race Theory Recently, Wisconsin-based nonprofit Mythinformed, which works to limit the effects of authoritarian ideology, posted a tweet warning that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Beijing is promoting woke ideology targeting American children, referring to a cartoon video created by the regimes English-language broadcaster China Global Television Network (CGTN) in September 2020. CGTN promoted critical race theory (CRT) in its four-minute video and encouraged parents to shape their children into racial activists. The opening line of the video says, Racism is passed down from generation to generation. One scene of the cartoon shows a white child telling a black child, You cant be Spider-Man, you are black. The video also instructs parents to use examples from daily life and the news to educate their children about being anti-racist. The video ends with the narrator telling the viewer that being not racist just keeps things the way they are now. By being anti-racist, you can help lead our children to a brighter future. The entire video echoes the sentiments of radical leftist and CRT activist Ibram X. Kendi who theorized that racism is deeply rooted and institutionalized in all aspects of American society, and that white supremacy and racism is the main cause of socioeconomic disparities between blacks and Hispanics living in America compared to whites. CGTN has been classified as one of six foreign missions in the United States, in an attempt to warn Americans that the content from the broadcaster is controlled by the CCP. After this video was uploaded to YouTube about a year ago, it has received bitter criticism by viewers, with more viewers disliking than liking the video. After Mythinfomed posted the propaganda clip on its Twitter account on Aug. 16, it has received extensive attention. In the Twitter comment section, a netizen by the name JimHansonDC wrote: Helping Americans hate each other with lies, I guess thats slightly better than unleashing a viral pandemic. Another netizen pointed out that the CCP did not even do their research, as the person portraying Spider-Man in the latest Spider-Man movie, Miles Morales, is in fact black. CRT Fuels Social Conflict On July 10, the founder and chairman of the Asian American Coalition for Education, Zhao Yukong, wrote an article titled Why should Asians oppose Critical Race Theory? If you replace White people with landlord capitalists, people of color with proletariat, racism with class oppression, then you get that CRT is an airbrushed version of the class struggle theory that is now being promoted as a racial struggle theory. CRT tells us that racial oppression in America is everywhere and that racism needs to be tackled year after year, month to month, and day to day to achieve racial equality,' Zhao wrote. Zhao quoted and mocked Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong in the article. Mao made a famous statement in 1962 during a CCP Central Committee plenary: Class struggles must be carried out year after year, month to month, and day to day. Zhao pointed out that the anti-racist struggles that are in full swing across the United States today, which are fueling internal social conflicts under the guidance of CRT, such as the Black Lives Matter Movement, have also seen Asians become fat sheep under the butchers knife. He gave the example of the cancellation of SAT scores in high schools with the intention of achieving racial equity in education outcomes, and the fact that Harvard, Yale, and other prestigious universities across the country now consider race and ethnicity an important factor in their college admissions process, which strongly advocates for CRT. Deja Lindsey, 20, a junior at Georgetown University, talks on her cell phone in front of Healy Hall on campus in Washington on Sept. 1, 2016. Georgetown University will give preference in admissions to the descendants of slaves owned by the Maryland Jesuits as part of its effort to atone for profiting from the sale of enslaved people. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin) African-American Father Opposes CRT During the past six months, many parentsincluding Asian-Americans and African-Americanshave come together to stand up against the CRT curriculum being introduced to schools in at least 26 different states. Christopher Rufo, a senior researcher at the Manhattan Institute, shared a video on Aug. 19 in which a black father gave a speech at a school board meeting saying that putting Critical Race Theory into our classrooms is not combatting racism, its fanning the flames of what little embers are left. In this clip, the father says: I am the direct descendant of the North American slave trade. Both my parents are black, all four of my grandparents are black, all eight of my great-grandparents are black, [and] all sixteen of my great-great[-grandparents are black]. On my mothers side, my ancestors were enslaved in Alabama; on my fathers side we were enslaved in Texas. I am not oppressed. Im not oppressed, and Im not a victim. After hearing his opening lines, the audience gave the father a standing ovation. He continued saying: I travel all across this country of ours [and] I am treated with kindness, dignity, and respect literally from coast to coast. I have three children; they are not oppressed either, although they are victims. I have taught my children they are victims of three things: their own ignorance, their own laziness, and their own poor decision making. According to local media, after the speech made by this father and others, the school board voted 3-2 to ban CRT from the 49th District of Colorado Springs. Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) speaks during a joint veterans town hall on Aug. 26, 2019 in Fairfax, Virginia, a few days after dropping out of the 2020 race. (Alex Wong/Getty Images) Democratic Congressman Pushes Back Against Criticism of Surprise Trip to Afghanistan U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) pushed back against critics who say his secret trip to Afghanistan with another congressman was wrong and could have created more issues for security forces inside Afghanistan, telling a newspaper on Aug. 25 that he doesnt care one bit about anonymous quotes from Washington when hes saving the lives of our allies. The Democrat told The Boston Globe from Doha, Qatar, that on multiple occasions he had requested permission to travel to Afghanistan, but had been turned down. The Marine Corps veteran said he was motivated to make the trip to help get families out of the country since they werent getting the assistance they needed via remote efforts. I got several, not just families, but groups through the gates, Moulton told the Globe, referring to the heavily guarded Kabul airport, where Taliban fighters have blocked access for some Americans as well as many Afghans who are seeking to flee the country. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) was among the critics, and said that while she, too, cares about the people in Afghanistan, any lawmakers who would decide to go to Afghanistan while the evacuation effort is underway are diverting resources. Member travel to Afghanistan and the surrounding countries would unnecessarily divert needed resources from the priority mission of safely and expeditiously evacuating America and Afghans at risk from Afghanistan, Pelosi wrote. Moulton said: Its amazing that people think this is about politics when its about innocent lives and saving people who have given everything to us from torture and death. Every single person that we can get through the gates who is one of our allies, that is the difference between freedom and death. The lawmaker from Massachusetts made the trip with Republican Rep. Peter Meijer (R-Mich.), a fellow veteran, on Aug. 24. Moulton pushed back against criticism from officials who said the trip to Afghanistan could have put an extra burden on military personnel conducting the evacuation, responding that he and Meijer were low-key and stayed mainly at headquarters. Then-Michigans 3rd District Congressional Republican candidate Peter Meijer speaks at a campaign rally in Grand Rapids, Mich., on Oct. 14, 2020. (Carlos Osorio/AP Photo) House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said he could understand the frustration that veterans that Moulton and Meijer are experiencing. When pressed further by a reporter who suggested that his empathy could lead more impressionable lawmakers to make a trip, McCarthy said they shouldnt go. Look, they shouldnt go, said McCarthy at an Aug. 25 briefing. These people are veterans, he said. I talked to Peter Meijer a couple of different times. Ill show you the text that he sent me was working to get people out. He was frustrated. McCarthy said the frustration was coming from the fact that the State Department seemed to be overwhelmed and not getting to all the urgent calls for help by people in Afghanistan. You know how many calls I would get about the State Department, they wont answer? he said. I got an interpreter, I worked with their families, theyre stuck inside a house, they dont know that they can go out, or an American family and theyre frustrated as a member of Congress trying to help these individuals getting nowhere in sight, and they come back to Congress, called back in a special, and all they spend their time on is $5 trillion. I dont think its smart for others to go, McCarthy added. You put yourself, not yourself in harms way, but you put Americans in harms way if the military has to protect you. The congressmen put out a joint statement on Aug. 24 clarifying their reason for making the trip. As members of Congress, we have a duty to provide oversight on the Executive Branch. There is no place in the world right now where oversight matters more. We conducted this visit in secret, speaking about it only after our departure, to minimize the risk and disruption to the people on the ground, and because we were there to gather information, not to grandstand. They are urging President Joe Biden to extend the Aug. 31 deadline to guarantee that all Americans and allies can get out safely. Discovering the Real Nevada Fairly or not, most people think of Las Vegas when they think of Nevada. However, as I learned recently, theres more to the Silver State than the city that never sleeps. My recent visit started after flying into Reno, which admittedly felt like a smaller Las Vegas. After picking up a rental car and spending the night at the Aloft, a newer hotel right across from the airports passenger terminal, I embarked upon a three-day road trip across Reno-Tahoe to discover Nevadas oldest towns. The Nevada Capitol in Carson City. (Dennis Lennox) Anchored by the state capital of Carson City, the region sits on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains near magnificent Lake Tahoe. At more than 6,200 feet in elevation and 1,645 feet in depth, the lake is North Americas largest alpine lake and the second-deepest lake anywhere on the continent. I first stopped in Virginia City, which despite its name, isnt a city. Instead, the unincorporated old mining townfirst settled in 1859 after the discovery of the Comstock Lodeand seat of Storey County with a population of 855 people at the last census is officially recorded in government records as a census-designated place. Some readers may remember it from the old TV series Bonanza, which revolved around life at the fictional Ponderosa Ranch. While small today, Virginia City had one of the largest populations anywhere west of the Mississippi River when Nevadas silver and gold mining industry was at its peak. Just how important were the mines? The amount of silver and gold extracted in and around the town has been valued at more than $20 billion in todays currency value. J.T. Basque Bar & Dining Room in Gardnerville, Nev., is an iconic Carson Valley restaurant. (Dennis Lennox) In fact, silver mining was a major reason behind Nevada joining the Union as the 36th state just eight days before the 1864 presidential election. Not only did the mines finance the North during the Civil War, but the states Republican-dominated politics of the time were helpful to President Abraham Lincolns wartime reelection. Virginia City is a postcard-perfect Old West town with blocks of historic buildings. Most date from after 1875, when a fire destroyed pretty much everything in the town. The Carpenter Gothic-inspired First Presbyterian Church on C Street is an example of a building that survived the fire. A couple of blocks away is St. Marys-in-the-Mountains, which was rebuilt after the fire within the brick walls of the original church. The cathedral-esque Roman Catholic church with its Gothic revival architecture overshadows St. Paul the Prospector, the first Episcopal parish in Nevada. Now as then, the churches play second fiddle to the saloons, although the number of drinking establishments today is far fewer than the 100 saloons that once lined Virginia Citys streets. The old mining town of Silver City, near Virginia City. (Dennis Lennox) About a half-hours drive away, through other once-prosperous mining towns such as Gold Hill and Silver City, is Nevadas capital. Carson City, named after legendary explorer Kit Carson, is one of the countrys most underrated state capitals. What looks like the palace of an obscure European principality is the Capitol building, which dates back to around 1871. The surrounding park with various statues and monuments, including one of Carson, offers plenty of shade from the dry heat of the high desert. Within walking distance is the interesting Nevada State Museum, partially housed in an old U.S. mint. Other attractions include the Stewart Indian School Cultural Center & Museum, which had the unfortunate luck of opening in early 2020 just before the start of the pandemic, and the State Railroad Museum. Twenty minutes south in Douglas County is Carson Valley, where cattle, sheep, and even wild horses graze against a backdrop of the mighty Sierra Nevadas. Nevadas oldest bar is the aptly named Genoa Bar & Saloon in Genoa, Nev., the states oldest town. Mark Twain, Presidents Ulysses S. Grant and Theodore Roosevelt, and the actor Clark Gable are among the famous names who stopped in to quench their thirst. (Dennis Lennox) I later found myself in the quaint town of Genoa. It dates back to 1850, when it was the Utah Territory and the Latter-day Saints erected a small trading post on the California Trail called Mormon Station. With a population of 939, the townNevadas first settlementhas a streetscape reminiscent of a small town somewhere in New York, Ohio, or Pennsylvania. My guide, Sue Knight, showed me everything to see, including the famous Genoa Bar. Having opened in 1853, its the states oldest continuously operated bar or, as the sign out front proclaims, thirst parlor. Visitors craving more than a drink should visit the deli in the Genoa Country Store, which is across from the reconstructed stockade at Mormon Station State Historic Park. The county courthouse-turned-local historical museum is also nearby. The coolest experience I had over the three-day trip was an early morning excursion in the Carson Valleys backcountry to see the wild horses with local wildlife photographer J.T. Humphrey. The horses have been genetically traced to the horses first brought to the New World centuries ago by the Spanish. Nevadas lush Carson Valley. (Dennis Lennox) If You Go Virginia Citys Visitor Center on C Street, effectively main street, is a must to visit. Not only can you buy tickets to all of the attractions, including the Virginia & Truckee Railroads awesome journey to Gold Hill, but you can also get a tour from docent Deke DiMarzo, who portrays several characters from the olden days. I stayed at Cobb Mansion, a circa 1876 Victorian Italianate home, in Virginia City. The charming bed-and-breakfast features six well-appointed rooms, all en suite, and the delightful hospitality of the owner-innkeeper. Alternatively, try the Silverland Inn & Suites. Making Carson City your base makes sense if you dont want to switch hotels every night. The brand-new Staybridge Suites is the best option. Eat at Virginia Citys Cafe Del Rio; J.T. Basque Restaurant in Gardnerville, which is connected with the Carson Valleys legacy of Basque sheepherders; and The Pink House in Genoa. Trip planning resources are available at the websites of the Reno-Tahoe Territory (RenoTahoe.com), Visit Carson City (VisitCarsonCity.com), Visit Carson Valley (VisitCarsonValley.org), and Virginia City Tourism Commission (VisitVirginiaCityNV.com). Dennis Lennox writes a travel column for The Epoch Times. Follow @dennislennox on Twitter and Instagram. House GOP Urges Democrats to Address Afghanistan During Emergency Session After Sen. Bernie Sanderss (I-Vt.) $3.5 trillion budget resolution just squeaked through the Senate hours before Congresss August recess, House Democrats called an emergency session for Aug. 23 that continued late into Tuesday evening. At the session, the House considered three monumental pieces of legislation: the Senate-passed infrastructure bill, Sanderss budget resolution, and Rep. Terri Sewells (D-Ala.) John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. The infrastructure bill, as laid out in an agreement made Tuesday morning between Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), was pushed off to be considered by the House sometime before Sept. 27. But in a party line vote, Democrats voted 220-212 to advance Sanderss budget and Sewells election bill. Republicans spent much of the session criticizing Democratic priorities. This emergency session was the first since the fall of Kabul to the Taliban terrorist group, and Republicans urged Democrats to put politics aside and hold consideration of the three bills until the Afghanistan crisis was dealt with. Early in the session, Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) put forward a motion to suspend scheduled votes and to consider instead his bill that would ensure no Americans are left behind in Afghanistan. He blasted Bidens handling of the crisis, referencing the quick fall of the nation and the administrations lack of a plan to evacuate American citizens and allies. It is time for this body, this Congress, to act, he said, to hold the administration accountable and save lives. The bill would require daily reports to Congress on the number of Americans left in the country and the number of Afghan allies seeking refuge. In addition, he said, the bill prohibits the president from withdrawing our forces until all Americans who want out are safely out of the country. He criticized the president for doubling down on [an] Aug. 31 withdrawal date despite bipartisan opposition. Make no mistake, he said, if we get out on Aug. 31 we are going to condemn thousands to death. This is America. A great country such as ours takes care of our citizens and our allies, he said, adding that it may be too late to save face from this debacle; but it is not too late to save lives. Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.) responded curtly to this, saying that while he has great respect and reverence for [Gallagher], suspending consideration of Democrats ambitious agenda couldnt be done because it would hand over the floor to the Republican conference. He said that the legislation in consideration was incredibly important, and that he would not support voting on Gallaghers bill. Democrats said little more on the Republican proposal. Later in the session, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) gave a fiery speech on the subject, blasting Democrats for shooting down Gallaghers bill. [Neguse] says he respects Mr. Gallagher, but that he could not turn the floor over to Republicans. Because if the floor was turned over to Republicans, instead of changing the election laws [and] spending $5 trillion, [Democrats] would put the American public first! God forbid we do that! he said, calling it devastating that Democrats allowed Gallaghers proposal to be so easily shot down. This week, the House is in session for the first time since Kabul fell to the Taliban, he continued. Whats happening in Afghanistan is a disaster for Americas security and credibility. He criticized Bidens withdrawal date as unconditional surrender to the Taliban that would leave thousands of Americans trapped in the country. McCarthy said that instead of considering $5 trillion in spending and taxes and changing election law to benefit one party over another, the House should be using the session to prove that the United States doesnt abandon its people or interests. Like other Republicans, McCarthy insisted that there should be no timeline for evacuation until every American is home. But the House was not doing that, McCarthy said, because the [Democratic] majoritys only interest is themselvesnot the American people. He turned to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who said earlier in the session that today is a great day of pride for our country and Democrats. McCarthy disagreed. If theres any moment of time to put politics aside, I would have thought today is the day. Id have thought that wed focus on what the rest of the world is focusing on, he said. Maybe in your caucus you think its a great day for you and the Democrats. Its an embarrassing day for America. Despite this effort, Democrats did not address Afghanistan or the Gallagher bill during the rest of the session. The emergency session was concluded after Democrat priorities for the day were achieved in a party line vote. Volunteers and medical staff bring an injured man on a stretcher for treatment after explosions outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images) Explosions Rock Kabul, Causing Multiple Casualties At least two explosions took place near the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 26, complicating efforts to evacuate Americans, Afghans, and others trying to leave the country before the United States pulls out its troops. A bomb went off at the Abbey Gate at Hamid Karzai International Airport, U.S. Department of Defense spokesman John Kirby said. At least one other explosion erupted at or near the Baron Hotel, which is a short distance from Abbey Gate. The bombs killed 13 U.S. troops and wounded over a dozen others, officials said later. Photographs and video footage showed people being rushed to a nearby hospital. Others were being treated inside the airport, which is being held by U.S. troops. The ISIS terrorist group claimed responsibility. Paul Farthing, a former British Marine who now runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan, told the Press Association that he was outside the airport when the initial explosion went off. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47, he said. Weve been in the airport, and back out of the airport; the whole things a mess. German Chancellor Angela Merkel told reporters in Berlin: We dont know all the details, but the terrorists were targeting people waiting outside the airport gates hoping to leave. They want security and freedom for themselves and therefore this is an absolutely horrendous attack in a very, very tense situation and I think in these minutes of the victims and their families. Crowds of people show their documents to U.S. troops outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 26, 2021. (Stringer/Reuters) The explosions happened shortly after Britains Armed Forces Minister James Heappey warned that there was a very credible threat that the airport in Kabul would be attacked by the ISIS terrorist group within hours. Britain, the United States, and Australia had urged citizens not to travel to the airport late Aug. 25. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul warned of unspecified security threats. I cant get into the specifics of the threat information but it was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling, Ross Wilson, the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, said on ABC News on Aug. 26 just before the explosion. Our intention was to urge Americans and, frankly, others, not to come to the airport. As many as 1,500 Americans remain in Afghanistan, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Aug. 24. Thousands of people have been rushing to the airport to try to flee the Taliban-held country before U.S. troops withdraw. Ahead of the Aug. 31 U.S. withdrawal date, and with Taliban militants stopping many from reaching the airport, several European countries had already stopped or prepared to halt evacuations while Canada ended its evacuation efforts. The reality on the ground is the perimeter of the airport is closed, Gen. Wayne Eyre, Canadas acting chief of defense staff, told a press conference earlier on Aug. 26. The Taliban have tightened the noose. Its very, very difficult for anybody to get through at this point. FivePoint CEO to Step Down From Leading Company FivePoint Holdings, a major land developer of planned communities of coastal areas across California, including Irvines Great Park neighborhood, announced in a recent statement that the companys founder, Emile Haddad, will be stepping away from his role as CEO, president, and chairman. Despite stepping away from his roles in leading the company, Haddad will still remain as a member of the Board of Directors and will become senior adviser, where he will be able to pursue initiatives and focus on the strategic direction of the company as well as new ventures and initiatives the company may consider pursuing in the future, Erik Higgins, chief financial officer for FivePoint, told The Epoch Times. [Haddad] is stepping down from his day-to-day responsibilities as a public company CEO, but hes not going anywhere, Higgins said. He founded the company in 2009, we went public in 2017, and the company is established, its really accomplished a lot and is on really solid footing. Weve got great irreplaceable assets, a very strong balance sheet, and we have a management team thats proven that we can execute. So from Emiles perspective, hes very passionate about deal-making, visionary thinking, strategic thinking, and I think stepping away from his day-to-day role as a CEO is going to enable him to pursue initiatives that will help propel FivePoint to the next level. While Haddad steps down on Sept. 30, the company ultimately decided not to name a new executive officer and instead name Stuart Miller as executive chairman and Lynn Jochim as president of the company. Miller will be working with Haddad on the strategic direction of the company while Jochim will focus on running the operations of the company. Were just reconfiguring in a way that will take advantage of everybodys strengths, really to help us drive shareholder value, Higgins said. Between Lynn, Stuart, and Emile, weve really got all the components in place; those are the roles that a typical CEO would fill, and the board just didnt see value added in naming a CEO or conducting a search when weve got Emile, Stuart, and Lynn all working together to accomplish really what amounts to the same mission. Higgins said in the short term, people wont be seeing much change in the direction of the company, but in the medium and long term under the new leadership, the company looks forward to getting to the next level. FivePointwhich has developments in Orange County, Los Angeles County, and San Francisco Countyis developing areas that are designed to include 40,000 residential homes and approximately 23 million square feet of commercial space, making the company one of the largest developers of mixed-use communities in coastal California. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis speaks to reporters during a press conference opening up an infusion site in Charlotte County, Fla. (Jann Falkenstern) Florida Surpasses 10,000 Monoclonal Antibody Treatments at State-Sponsored Sites PUNTA GORDA, Fla.The state of Florida has administered more than 10,000 doses of the monoclonal antibodies treatment at state-sponsored sites since Florida began rolling out the program two weeks ago, the office of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) told The Epoch Times. Demand for the treatment is high and is expected to go higher as word gets out and new sites are continuing to open throughout the state, Christina Pushaw, the governors press secretary, said. The 10,000 doses administered at state-sponsored sites do not include treatment administered at infusion centers at clinics and hospitals around the state. Baptist Health South Floridas Dr. Oscar Hernandez says he refers five to six patients for the treatment every day. The state is doing their part, Hernandez said. Doctors need to be more proactive in recommending the monoclonals to high-risk patients who test positive for COVID-19. He said people need to know their options after they test positive for COVID-19. He recommends a fact sheet be distributed to patients at drive-through testing sites. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as the novel coronavirus. Fauci Touts Effectiveness of Monoclonal Antibodies Tuesday, the White House Chief Medical Adviser, Dr. Anthony Fauci touted the effectiveness of Monoclonal Antibodies. He estimated that the treatment could reduce hospitalization by up to 85 percent. Fauci encouraged anyone with suppressed immune systems as well as other mitigating factors take advantage of the treatment. Bottom line is this is a very effective intervention for COVID-19. It is underutilized, and we recommend strongly that we utilize this to its fullest, Fauci said at the press conference on Tuesday. Flagler County Health Department Administrator, Bob Snyder received his COVID-19 vaccine in January 2021, but because of an underlying health condition contracted COVID-19 about six weeks ago. Initially, he did not know what was wrong because the symptoms were so mild, he thought he was just run down from his busy work life. It was sunny and 95 degrees and Im freezing, Snyder said. I thought to myself, Ive got to go to bed. Snyder said it occurred to him that he may be one of the breakout cases he had read about and went to the local pharmacy and bought an in-home COVID-19 test. It was positive. That prompted Snyder to call a colleague who is a doctor. The doctor had two words for him: Monoclonal Antibodies. I went to my local emergency room, and they gave me the Monoclonals by IV, he said. Within 24 hours I was 50 percent back to normal and by 72 hours I was 100 percent back. Florida Resident Feels Blessed to Have Access to Treatment Broward County resident Renee Post sends her 70-year-old mother to a skilled nursing facility during the day while she works. The facility tested residents for COVID-19 every 36 hours. I was picking my mother up from the skilled nursing facility and they wouldnt let us leave until after my mother tested negative for COVID, Post said. Then the nurse came running out to my car and told us we couldnt leave because my mom had tested positive for COVID. Post said she recalled seeing a news report on the monoclonal antibodies and knew what she needed to do. I had her transported to Broward Health and they were well organized and took her right away and in two hours she walked out, she said. Post said that her mother had the sniffles the next day but otherwise you could not tell she had even been sick. Post said her mother is obese and suffers from a myriad of health problems. She would have been another statistic if I had not taken her and known about the monoclonals, she said. I feel so blessed to have had access to this treatment for her and I know if we had waited, we wouldve had a different outcome. Post said her mother was unvaccinated because her mother had a urinary tract infection and other underlying conditions. Post said she works primarily from home but has coworkers internationally who have been affected by the virus. I see what it [the virus] can do, she said. I have lost 22 co-workers in India. If she were to contract COVID-19, Post said she will seek the treatment for herself because she sees what a miracle the treatment is. This week DeSantis is opening more treatment sites, including one at The Villages, a retirement community in central Florida. Pushaw, the governors press secretary, said of the 10,000 treatment landmark: If even 50 percent of those people were saved from needing hospitalization, that is 5,000 patients who would otherwise have been hospitalizeda huge number, almost a third of our total COVID hospital census This rollout is definitely saving lives. The monoclonal antibodies can prevent hospitalization or death in high-risk patients with COVID-19 and is widely available in Florida. Individuals 12 years and older, who are high-risk and have contracted or been exposed to COVID-19, are eligible for this treatment. Treatment is free and vaccination status does not matter. Similarly in Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott set up sites around the state beginning November 2020 and used Bamlanivimab, the Eli Lilly & Company monoclonal antibody therapy. It was the first to garner FDA approval followed by Regeneron. When former President Donald Trump made a full recovery from COVID-19 after using monoclonals, he instructed the federal government to buy hundreds of thousands of doses of the two monoclonal treatment drugs and allocate supplies to the states, which would in turn determine distribution to hospitals and healthcare facilities. The doses were allocated to states and U.S. territories based on their share of hospitalized and infected patients. The crew of an A400M military transport aircraft poses after evacuating people from Kabul as part of the operation "Apagan" at the French military air base 104 of Al Dhafra, near Abu Dhabi, on Aug. 23, 2021. (Bertrand Guay/AFP via Getty Images) France to End Afghanistan Evacuations on Aug. 27 France will stop its evacuation efforts at the Kabul airport on Aug. 27, the countrys prime minister has announced. From tomorrow evening onward, we are not able to evacuate people from the Kabul airport, French Prime Minister Jean Castex told RTL radio on Aug. 26. The Dutch government said it expected to carry out its last evacuation flight out of Afghanistan on Aug. 26. The United States and its allies have urged their citizens and visa holders to move away from the airport, citing the threat of terror attacks by the ISIS terrorist group. UK Armed Forces Minister James Heappey said on the morning of Aug. 26 that there was a very credible threat of a highly lethal terror attack on Kabul airport within hours. The threat is believed to have come from ISIS-K, or Islamic State Khorasan, an ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan that consists of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even more extreme view of Islam. The group is said to be enemies of the Taliban, but its likely to have seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country. The Netherlands has been informed by the United States that it has to depart today and will most likely perform the last flights later today, the Dutch government wrote in a letter to Parliament. This is a painful moment because it means that despite all the great efforts of the past period, people who are eligible for evacuation to the Netherlands will be left behind. The Dutch government said evacuees can no longer be assisted in and around the airport due to the security situation and are strongly recommended not to come to the airport. Denmarks last evacuation flight has already departed. It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul, Denmark Defense Minister Trine Bramsen said. Poland and Belgium ended their evacuations on Aug. 25. We cannot risk the lives of our diplomats and of our soldiers any longer, said Polish Deputy Foreign Minister Marcin Przydacz. The Czech Republic declared its own evacuation mission complete last week. Heappey said the UK has 11 more flights scheduled out of Kabul for Aug. 26, but declined to say whether that will be the end of the operation, citing the security of troops on the ground. Eight Royal Air Force flights managed to lift 1,988 people from Kabul within the past 24 hours, Heappey said on Aug. 26, taking the total since the Taliban began its march back to power to 12,279. Reuters, The Associated Press, and PA contributed to this report. France's President Emmanuel Macron speaks during a joint press conference with Irish Prime Minister Micheal Martin (unseen) following their meeting at Government Buildings in Dublin on Aug. 26, 2021. (Paul Faith/AFP via Getty Images) Frances Macron Warns Security Situation in Afghanistan Not Under Control After Blasts The security situation in Afghanistan is not under control, Frances president said after at least two blasts went off outside the Kabul airport on Thursday. The situation has profoundly deteriorated around the military airport, Macron told reporters in Ireland as he met with Irish Prime Minister Michael Martin. It has been a few days that France and other allies have been doing their best in this situation, he added. We will keep doing so as long as the conditions will allow it at the airport. And at the moment I am speaking, we are in an extremely tense situation, leading us to coordinating with our American allies and to call everyone to remain cautious in this situation we cant control. The blasts in Kabul left U.S. troops and others wounded or dead, disrupting efforts to evacuate Afghans and citizens from countries across the world. ISIS claimed responsibility. Injured people arrive at a hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 26, 2021. (Asvaka News via Reuters) Macron said the situation in Afghanistan is extremely dangerous and that the tension there is increasing greatly. French officials are in discussions with the Taliban, the terrorist group that controls Afghanistan, on evacuating the remaining French nationals in the country, Macron added. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, meanwhile, told reporters at The Hague that some Dutch citizens would not be evacuated from Afghanistan. There are Dutch citizens with their families and others we had wished to bring to the Netherlands, that we cant take with us now, Rutte said. We are frantically working with others to see how we can support them as well as we can. We have intensive contacts within Europe, with the French, the Germans and the British, Macron, Merkel, Johnson, and foreign and defense ministers and with countries in the region, to see how best to do that, he added, referring to German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. In Ottawa, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was confronted with a question about relatives of a person trapped in Afghanistan claiming he would have blood on his hands if the person were killed there. I cant imagine the despair, the anguish that so many individuals are facing this is a horrific situation, Trudeau said, hours after the Canadians announced they were ending their evacuation efforts. Getting to the Root of Potato Salad How South American tubers and European dressings converged to become an American cookout classic Potato salad has always been a German thing to me. But the origin of the main ingredient was South America, and represents one of the earlier cultivated crops on earth. Europe didnt see them until Spanish conquistadores took them from the Inca Empire, but soon after, they became rooted in European culinary traditions. Irish potato famine? French (Belgian) fries? All recent history to the potato. From the Andes With Spuds Wild potatoes originated in the Andes in South America. The people of the high plains there cultivated them more than 7,000 years ago, long before even the Incas existed, but even before the rise of the Sumerians in Mesopotamia. And there they remained until after Francisco Pizarro and his conquistadors arrived in 1526 in what is today Peru. The Spanish found it to be a staple for the Inca and, convinced, took this domesticated tuber home. Potato salads soon followed: boiled in spiced vinegar or wine and mixed with oil and salt. The French added Dijon mustard to the mix, and may have been the first to add mayonnaise. The first potato patches brought back across the Atlantic to North America were planted by Scotch-Irish settlers in 1719, in Londonderry in the colony of New Hampshire, but it was the Germans who are generally credited with bringing potato salad to our picnic. Called Kartoffelsalat, it remains popular in Germany, but takes on a different recipe from the one with which most Americans are familiar. Especially in southern Germany, the dish incorporates beef broth in the soaking of the potatoes, and either white or apple cider vinegar with a bit of mustard, perhaps Dusseldorf, for the dressingbut no mayo. Finally, bacon bits and fat are added at the end. Red potatoes work well for this, and the dish is served warm. At a deli in the Midwest, you might find a vinegar-centric German-style potato salad alongside the more common mayo-based version. The Turn to Mayonnaise The origins of mayo are a bit murky. Similar sauces existed as far back as the 18th century in France and Spain. The name mayonnaise itself precedes what we think of as mayo today, and was applied to earlier recipes that often involved meat broths or cream. Aioli is a relative that predates modern mayonnaise, but it is similar only in this: It is an emulsion, i.e., a mixture of two substances that dont want to mix but can be whipped to do so (or persuaded with another substance, an emulsifier). Contrary to what we are often served, the original aioli is not garlic-flavored mayo, but rather garlic cloves pounded into a paste and whipped together with olive oil (plus salt and lemon juice). Try it; it turns opaque, and its wicked good. Mayonnaise, on the other hand, is made from raw egg yolks (or even whole eggs) with oil, plus the salt and acid in the form of vinegar and/or lemon juice. It appears to have arrived at this form in the early 19th century. In 1903, Richard Hellmann emigrated from Vetschau, in the north of Germany where mayo had invaded, and landed in New York City, where he married into a deli family. But soon after, he opened his own deli with his wife. Customers loved his original mayosthere were two recipesand they bought them in bulk. In several years, he needed a factory to keep up with demand. The more popular of the two mayos he marked with a blue ribbon, and you can still see such a ribbon in the Hellmanns label over a century later. The Best Taters for Your Salad Waxy potatoes are the best: Their skins are easy to clean and dont need to be peeled; they have less starch and so keep their shape better when cooked; and their texture is smoother. Save the starchy Russets for baked and maybe mashed potatoes, as they soak up water more and come apart more easily. Yukon Golds are the universal tater: medium-starchy but able to perform quite well both for salad and mashed. In any case, dont overcook them. Also consider red potatoes, peeled or not, or new or fingerling potatoes. For a nod to potato heritage, and for freaking out your cookout guests, add a few of purple South American spuds, too. The Dressing Use a good mayonnaise. While some swear by Miracle Whip as an alternative, I find it much too sweet. Yellow mustard is common to give mayo a bit more spice, and fancier blends such as Dijon or Dusseldorf varieties carry a bit more complexity. My own favorite potato salad recipe incorporates the mayo-mustard mix plus a vinegary element: pickle juice. Your pickle jar comes with it in excess, and it gives the nicest touch of sour to the salad. I use hamburger dill pickle slices myself, chopped into smaller pieces, like a relish, to add a bit of texture to the salad. Bring some more texture and flavor with finely diced red onions or shallots, and maybe some fresh chivesas much for the flavor as the color, to an otherwise bland-looking dish. Vidalia onions are also a good option. Adding fresh dill is nice, but the pickles bring enough of that flavor, in my opinion. I dont do celery, but bless your heart if you add that anyway. I always admire people who play with their food: Some may try walnuts, or swapping plain yogurt or sour cream for some or all of the mayo. There are no hard fast rules here, but be warned that if you experiment too much on a large audience, you might lose some fans at the cookout. The Poison of the Picnic? I grew up believing potato salad on a hot summer day could ruin the party. Mayo originally had raw eggs in it, and it was believed that if anyone got sick at the park, potato salad should take the blame. That may have been true years ago, but today that seems unlikely as commercial varieties are pasteurizedplus the acidity should also deter bacteria. Poorly cleaned hands, prep utensils, and cutting surfaces are more likely the cause of picnic flu, not to mention chicken or tuna in a salad, or even the potatoes themselves if they werent kept properly. All that said, its probably not the mayo you need to worry about, but keep your food in a cooler until its ready to eat. RECIPE: Revs Potato Salad If your onions are too strong, slice them first and put them in a bowl of cool water to soak for 5 to 10 minutes, then drain and chop. Serves 10 3 pounds Yukon Gold potatoes 1/2 to 1 cup mayonnaise, plus more to taste (Im a Hellmans fan) 1 to 2 tablespoons mustard (yellow, Dusseldorf, Dijon), according to the mayo amount 1/4 cup finely diced red or sweet onion, or shallots (see headnote) 2 tablespoons chopped chives (optional) 1/2 cup chopped dill pickles or hamburger pickle slices 2 tablespoons pickle juice, or to taste 1 tablespoon fresh dill, chopped 1/2 cup cooked bacon, chopped in large pieces (optional) 1 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more as needed 1 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper 4 hard-boiled eggs, peeled and chopped or sliced 1 teaspoon paprika Wash the potatoes well and pat dry, then peel and cut into 1-inch cubes. Add them to a pot of water large enough to cover all the potatoes and bring to a boil. Be alert that the starches of potatoes make them prone to boiling over. Use a large enough pot, dont leave the cover on it, or place a large wooden or metal spoon across the top of the pot. Reduce to a simmer and cook for about 8 minutes, or until you can easily pierce the potatoes with a fork, yet they dont lose their shape. Drain them in a strainer and dont continue the recipe until theyve cooled. Transfer the potatoes to a large bowl. Mix the mayo, mustard, onions/shallots/chives, pickle juice, and pickles in a small bowl first, then add the mixture to the potatoes, folding them over repeatedly with a spatula without mashing up too many of the pieces. Mix in the dill, and the bacon, if youre going there. Then salt and pepper to taste. Add the chopped or sliced hard-boiled eggs at the end, folding gently so they retain some shape, then sprinkle paprika over the bowl. Serve cold, and keep leftovers in the fridge for a couple days. Roasted green chiles are the star of this iconic New Mexico stew. (Fanfo/Shutterstock) Green Chile Stew You dont need chicken soup. You need green chile, I was told the first time I had a cold in New Mexico, years ago. With huge amounts of vitamins A and C, many immune boosters, and anti-inflammatory properties, chiles are a superfood. The American Heart Association reported in 2020 that regular chile consumption was associated with a 26 percent reduction in cardiovascular disease mortality, a 23 percent reduction in cancer mortality, and a 25 percent reduction in death overall. Can chicken soup do all that? And cure the common cold? My recipe for green chile (New Mexicans dont say stew, as its inherent in the term green chile) is adapted from those used by generations of cooks I learned from in New Mexico and Colorado. Adjust it as you like, but I strongly urge no skimping on the garlic, cumin, or chileyou wouldnt order a cappuccino without coffee or milk, would you? 1 pound fresh green chiles (not Anaheims) 2 tablespoons lard or vegetable oil 1 headstrong garlic (hard neck purple or red, not white), minced 2 medium yellow onions, diced 1 pound pork steak, shoulder, or (fancy version) tenderloin, diced into half-inch cubes 1 tablespoon cumin 1 teaspoon dried sage, or to taste 1 teaspoon dried oregano, or to taste 1 teaspoon salt, or to taste 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or to taste Water or chicken stock 1 to 2 tablespoons cornstarch Broil the chiles in the oven for 10 minutes on each side, until lightly charred blisters appear. Remove from oven, cover with a damp cloth, and let steam until the skins loosen. Peel the skins and dice. In a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat, lightly caramelize the garlic and onions in the lard or vegetable oil, about 10 minutes. Add the pork and brown, about 20 minutes. Add the peeled and diced chiles to the pork, along with the cumin, sage, oregano, salt, and pepper. Add enough water or chicken stock to cover, bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Thicken the stew with cornstarch as desired, and taste to adjust seasonings. Serve with fresh corn tortillas and ranch beansblue corn is traditional, but yellow, red, or white are OK. Gunmen Attack Nigerias Defense Academy KADUNA, NigeriaThe Nigerian military is hunting for gunmen who attacked its premier defense academy early Aug. 24, killing two, wounding one, and abducting another. Security analysts described it as a humiliating attack on the Afaka Barracks of the Nigeria Defense Academy (NDA), located in the Igabi Local Government Area (LGA) of Kaduna state, central Nigeria. Two mid-cadre officers, Lt. Cmdr. Wulah and Flt. Lt. Okoronwo, were killed. Maj. Christopher Datong was taken hostage while 2nd Lt. Onah escaped with gunshot wounds, according to NDA spokesman Maj. Bashir Muhd Jajira. Major Abducted Whether Datong survived the attack is disputed. Some online media reports claimed the kidnappers had reached out to the NDA authorities asking for a ransom of 200 million Nigerian naira (about $486,000). Others have reported that he was killed. Neither the NDA nor the family of the kidnapped officer was willing to give an official clarification by Aug. 25. However, a close family friend to Datongs family, who spoke exclusively to The Epoch Times in Kaduna on Aug. 25 and requested her name not be mentioned for fear of reprisal, said the major was alive and had spoken to his wife on Aug. 24. The kidnappers called the wife of the major on Tuesday afternoon and they gave Datong the phone and he spoke to his wife and told her he was alive, she said. But within some minutes social media started reporting that he has been killed and his body dumped by the road. No one has shown us any corpse. [The wife] cried and called the NDA commandant when people started calling her to tell her sorry after they read it in the social media. [The commandant] told her to disregard the rumor and said that the NDA was doing its best to get him out alive. Maj. Christopher Datong with his wife in an undated photo. (Courtesy family of Major Datong) An Aug. 24 statement signed by Jajira read: The security architecture of the Nigerian Defense Academy was compromised early this morning by unknown gunmen who gained access into the residential area within the Academy in Afaka. During the unfortunate incident, we lost two personnel and one was abducted. The Academy in collaboration with the 1Division Nigerian Army and Air Training Command as well as other security agencies in Kaduna state have since commenced pursuit of the unknown gunmen within the general area with a view to tracking them and rescue the abducted personnel. The NDA is Nigerias equivalent of the U.S. Armys training academy West Point and has produced virtually all the commissioned Nigerian military officers and others from several African countries since 1964. Its built on an expansive, well-fenced area of around 2,500 acres, 10 miles from the city of Kaduna. Its isolated from the town by fields on all sides, especially on its western flank where bandits and violent criminals have captured thousands of hectares of areas and made them ungovernable spaces. In conjunction with the military training of cadets, its also a high-profile university that offers doctorate degrees. Defense Experts Decry Incident The attack was a humiliating incident on the face of the Nigeria military, according to retired Col. Albehu Gora, a security consultant and public analyst, who spoke to The Epoch Times from Abuja. The retired Nigerian army colonel, who was deployed to Liberia and Sudan in the 1990s, said: The invasion of Afaka NDA barracks is a huge humiliation to the Nigeria military as an institution and an insult on all of us who passed out from that school. The brazen nature of the attack is like a man confronting a moving train and getting away with it. It shows you that under the present government, security has become so compromised that anything is possible. The Nigerian defense structure needs total overhaul and citizens must wake up and speak. David Otto, an international counter-terrorism consultant, told The Epoch Times that the incident represents a humiliating national security breach on a critical institution that trains the elite forces of the Nigerian military. If unknown gunmen can penetrate the perimeter of such a high-value target, assassinate military officials, and abduct another successfully then questions must be asked of the leadership command on how such a breach could happen undeterred, he said. It is difficult to comprehend that such a breach and attack could have happened without insider collaboration and help. Kaduna Schools Targeted by Bandits The Defense Academy is only the latest of a string of bandit raids on Kaduna universities. On March 11, armed men broke through the fence of the Federal School of Forestry in Afaka, close to NDA, and kidnapped 39 students. They were held for 40 days until a ransom was paid. Greenfield University, 18 miles from Kaduna on the major road to Abuja, Nigerias capital city, was invaded by armed Fulani bandits and 20 students kidnapped. To press their demands, the kidnappers murdered five of the students, and after 42 days in captivity, $437,400 was paid before they were released. Bethel Baptist Academy, Kujama, about five miles east of Kaduna city, was invaded by armed Fulani bandits and 121 students abducted. So far, 56 students have been released after a reported total sum of 100 million naira ($243,013) was paid. As of Aug. 25, 65 of the school children were still with their abductors. Past Assault on Barracks The Aug. 24 attack wasnt the first time in recent months that a military barrack was attacked by unknown gunmen in Kaduna state. In June, Nigerian media had reported an attack launched by unknown gunmen at the Army Barrack of the Command Staff College, Igabi LGA of Kaduna state, where mid-cadre officers are trained for promotion to senior military officers. The attack took place on June 23, around 2 a.m. and the attackers were said to have rustled hundreds of cows belonging to the military personnel serving there. President Muhammadu Buhari assured Nigerians on Aug. 25 that the attack on NDA would move his administration to end kidnapping and terrorism in the country faster than planned. Special media adviser to the president Femi Adeshina signed a statement Aug. 25 titled Attack on NDA Wont Dampen Resolve of Our Military to Bring Decisive End to Criminality. The attack launched on the facility of the Nigerian defense Academy (NDA) on Tuesday, rather than throw a dampener into the morale of our armed forces as it is intended to, will buoy their determination to make a decisive end of criminality in the country, the statement read. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris holds a press conference before departing Vietnam for the United States, following her first official visit to Asia, in Hanoi, Vietnam, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Evelyn Hockstein/POOL/AFP via Getty Images) Harris Concludes Visit to Vietnam by Calling out Beijing for Threatening Rules-Based Order U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris repeated her criticism of Beijing for undermining the rules-based international order on Aug. 26, during a press conference in Vietnam just hours before departing for the United States. However, she didnt offer details about what actions the Biden administration might take to fend off Beijings aggression in the South China Sea and against Taiwan. I believe that this trip signals the beginning of the next chapter in the relationship between the United States and Vietnam, Harris said. She arrived in Vietnam on Aug. 24 after concluding a three-day visit to Singapore. Throughout my visit here, I also reaffirmed the commitment that the United States has to our common vision for a free and open IndoPacific. And we will continue to work with Vietnam to push back against threats to freedom of navigation and the rules-based international order. Harris has been outspoken against Beijing throughout her Asia trip. Speaking in Singapore on Aug. 24, she said Beijing continues to coerce, to intimidate, and to make claims to the vast majority of the South China Sea. During a bilateral meeting with Vietnams president on Aug. 25, Harris said there was a need to raise the pressure on Beijing and to challenge its bullying in the South China Sea. She also talked about upgrading bilateral ties to a strategic partnership. Harriss Asia tripaimed to deepen ties with Singapore and Vietnam while showing the United States commitment to the regioncomes at a time when the Chinese regime is attempting to erode U.S. leadership around the world. The regime has seized on the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan to launch an aggressive propaganda campaign to label the United States as an unreliable ally. Chinas hawkish state-run media Global Times, in an article published on Aug. 25, said Vietnam and Singapore are clear about how U.S. diplomacy was about making allies sacrifice for the United States. In 2016, an arbitral tribunal ruling rejected Beijings territorial claims to an area demarcated by a Nine-Dash Line. Ignoring the ruling, Beijing has instead adopted aggressive tacticsincluding building military installations on islands in the disputed seato exert its territorial assertion. Other aggressive tactics include denying fishermen from other countries from accessing fishing grounds in the disputed waters. Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam all face territorial disputes with China in the sea. Beijings aggression against Taiwan mostly involves flying Chinese military jets into Taiwans air defense identification zone (ADIZ). So far this month, such incursions have happened on 11 different days, most recently on Aug. 25, when an anti-submarine warfare plane entered the ADIZ, according to Taiwans Ministry of National Defense. The Chinese regime has also threatened war against Taiwan and held military drills near the island. Taiwan, a de facto independent nation, is a self-ruled democracy with its own military, constitution, and currency. However, the Chinese Communist Party sees the self-ruled island as a part of its territory that must be reunited with the mainland, by force if necessary. If China continues its aggression in the region, particularly in Taiwan, what is the Biden administration prepared to do differently to deter it, given that nothing seems to be working so far? a reporter asked Harris. The reporter also asked if the administration would consider increasing its military presence in the South China Sea or place sanctions on Chinese officials. Harris didnt comment on Taiwan, the possibility of increased U.S. military force, or possible U.S. sanctions. Were going to speak up when there are actions that Beijing takes that threaten the rules-based international order, Harris said in response to the reporters question. We are going to continue to do what we can to make sure that we stay committed to our partners and allies on these important kinds of issues. On Aug. 4, the Biden administration approved its first arms sale to Taiwana package that included 40 self-propelled howitzers and 20 field artillery ammunition support vehicles. In March, U.S. Adm. Philip Davidson, then-head of U.S. IndoPacific Command, said during a congressional hearing that Beijing could invade Taiwan in the next six years. Orange County Health Care Worker Shares Fears Over Vaccine Mandates As California imposed a strict vaccine mandate for all health care workers, nurses in Orange County that stood on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic fear they will lose their livelihood for refusing to get vaccinated. For 17 years, nurse Dave (a pseudonym), has served at MemorialCare Saddleback Medical Center in Laguna Hills. When Californias Department of Public Health (CDPH) announced in early August that health care employees would need to be vaccinated by Sept. 30, Dave, along with other unvaccinated nurses, began to worry about what their employment status would be after Oct. 1. These are nurses that have busted their buttscrying, getting hit, punched, [and] kicked, for the past two years, and just very brutal conditions, he told The Epoch Times. When everyone, to be honest, was sitting at home, in isolation, these girls were kicking butt, taking care of COVID patients with lack of supplies and all the mystery of whats going onand now theyre just being kicked to the curb. Dave is currently a clinical supervisor that overlooks an acute care floor with about ten staff members. Every day, he hears from multiple nurses on his floor and at other MemorialCare centers about their concerns about the vaccine mandate and harassment occurring within their workspace. Im having staff calling me crying because theyre pregnant, and they dont want to take the vaccine, he said. Essentially, because of the state mandating crazy last-minute mandates, were being tested now twice a week, and they still have not said if were going to have a job come Oct. 1. Medical personnel protest mandatory vaccines in Orange, Calif., on Aug. 9, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times) While the pressure to receive the vaccine is applied to health care employees, Dave said the higher-ups are blaming the unvaccinated staff for the current spike in COVID-19 cases. Its one of the hardest things, and I know all of our staff really care for all the patients, he said. Nursing is a really tough job. It is very stressful, and to have that message put out not only really just stomped on my heart, but then it began to empower other people to yell at the unvaccinated. Dave, along with other unvaccinated staff have been yelled at by doctors and other staffers, he said, creating a difficult environment to work in. This is a hostile workplace, Dave said. Its a very tough environment to work in, and people essentially are going to walk out. Not only because of that environment, but they dont want the vaccine. On Aug. 25, the staff of MemorialCare received an email regarding information for those choosing to remain unvaccinated. To be eligible, health care workers will have to file a religious or medical exemption by Sept. 1. MemorialCare will then determine whether the exemption is approved or not. While the email clarifies questions from the unvaccinated staff, there is still confusion over what constitutes a medical exemption. A first-trimester pregnant nurse who works with Dave requested a medical exemption but she was denied. Dave said his boss is begging him to get a religious exemption to avoid the possibility of losing his employment status once the deadline arrives. As the date draws near, Dave said his co-workers who are beginning their careers remain nervous about losing pay and health benefits for themselves and their families. If thats what the hospital is requiring, Im more than happy to step aside, but theres a lot of people that are going to do the same thing and theyre done with nursing, he said. I dont know how its going to be with flu season coming up, and this is just my hospital. I cant imagine whats going on around the state. While the consequences for health care workers without exemptions are unknown, the possibility of a COVID-19 virus spike in late fall brings the concern of a larger nurse shortage, Dave said. As many health care workers are facing stress amid rising COVID-19 cases and the pressure to get vaccinated, Dave encourages workers to contact Resilience in Stressful Events (RISE) provided by Johns Hopkins Hospital to receive mental health care from a psychiatrist and psychologist. Lawmaker Cheng Chung-Tai pauses during a press conference after being disqualified from the legislature in Hong Kong, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Vincent Yu/AP Photo) Hong Kong Disqualifies Independent Lawmaker From Legislature HONG KONGHong Kong authorities ousted an opposition legislator from his seat Aug. 26 after finding him to be insufficiently loyal amid Beijings tightening grip on the semi-autonomous city. Cheng Chung-tai of the populist Civic Party was disqualified from the legislature after he failed to fulfil the legal requirements and conditions on upholding the Basic Law and bearing allegiance to Hong Kong, the government said in a statement. The Basic Law is Hong Kongs mini-constitution. He was one of two remaining opposition lawmakers in the legislature, after the pro-democracy camp of legislators resigned en masse last year following the disqualification of four of their colleagues. Hong Kongs chief secretary, John Lee, said in a news conference that Cheng was disqualified after an opinion was sought from the territorys national security committee, which said Cheng had failed to comply with the requirements of being a legislator. The committee was set up last year when Beijing imposed a strict national security law that effectively criminalized opposition to the government and silenced dissent. The committee referenced negative behavior from Cheng in seeking public office, Lee said, without describing any specific incidents that led to his disqualification. Lawmaker Cheng Chung-Tai displays a document as he is surrounded by reporters after being disqualified from the legislature in Hong Kong, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Vincent Yu/AP Photo) In considering and making a decision as to whether a candidate passes the review we will look at his previous acts and statements, what a candidate has written about, including books and articles, Lee said. Cheng, considered an independent opposition lawmaker, opposed a number of bills favored by the pro-Beijing camp, including electoral reform legislation earlier this year that reduced the proportion of directly elected lawmakers. Cheng said he was not aware of any legal recourse he could seek regarding his disqualification. From my point of view, I think it is not meaningful to appeal or follow up on any legal procedures, he said. He was previously convicted of desecrating the China and Hong Kong flags after he was seen flipping them upside-down during a legislative debate, and fined $640. Authorities clamped down on political dissent after months of anti-government protests in 2019, arresting scores of pro-democracy activists and banning protests, citing health risks from the coronavirus. Most of the citys most prominent activists are currently behind bars. Protesters supporting U.S. President Donald Trump gather near the east front door of the U.S. Capitol after groups breached the building's security on Jan. 6, 2021. (Win McNamee/Getty Images) House Probers, Unlike FBI, Seek Conspiracy Behind Jan. 6 Capitol Incursion Federal law enforcement officials reportedly think there was no grand scheme behind the Jan. 6 Capitol Hill breach, but House investigators still appear convinced that there was a conspiracy involving individuals linked to former President Donald Trump. Earlier this year, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) appointed Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) as chairman of the House Select Committee on the Jan. 6 Attack on the United States Capitol, to investigate the facts and causes of the terrorist mob attack. In announcing the panel, Pelosi told the House during a floor speech that the Jan. 6 attackers were out to get me for the bullet in the head or to hang the vice president of the United States, assault the lives of members of Congress, traumatize our staff, disrespect the workers in the Capitol. More than 500 people have been arrested and charged on multiple felony counts in connection with the breach, including many individuals who remain jailed with tight security restrictions in the District of Columbia, awaiting trials that arent expected to begin until 2022. Dozens of those charged are accused of conspiring beforehand to cause a riot and prevent Congress from certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election. Many of Trumps most fervent supporters believe his reelection victory was stolen on behalf of President Joe Biden. To date, only a handful of the defendants have reached deals with Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors for lighter sentences in return for cooperation with law enforcement. But Reuters reported on Aug. 20 that, after months of reviewing testimony from participants and Capitol Hill police, as well as thousands of hours of videos of the attack, FBI officials see no evidence of a sinister conspiracy behind the events that led to the arrests and detentions. Ninety to 95 percent of these are one-off cases. Then you have five percent, maybe, of these militia groups that were more closely organized. But there was no grand scheme with Roger Stone and Alex Jones and all of these people to storm the Capitol and take hostages, Reuters reported, quoting an unnamed law enforcement source with direct knowledge of the FBI conclusions. Reuters went on to report: Senior lawmakers have been briefed in detail on the results of the FBIs investigation so far and find them credible, a Democratic congressional source said. Asked on Aug. 26 by The Epoch Times if the reported FBI conclusion had influenced the investigative work plan of the select panel, a spokesman for the panel said that both the FBI and the committee are still looking into the incident. Federal law enforcement investigations into the Jan. 6 attack are ongoing and, as far as the select committee is aware, the findings and direction have not been shared with Capitol Hill, the spokesman said. Our members and investigators are seeking answers, and we wont prejudge anything until weve uncovered the facts about Jan. 6. On Aug. 25, Thompson announced a massive request for documents related to communications within and among the White House and Executive Branch agencies during the leadup to January 6th and on that day; attempts to place politically loyal personnel in senior positions across government after the election; the planning, organization, funding, and response to events in Washington, D.C. on January 5th and 6th and earlier; and attempts to subvert the rule of law, overturn the results of the November 3rd, 2020, election, or impede the peaceful transfer of power, according to a summary posted by the select panel. The request was made in letters to seven federal departments and agencies. The request to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) sought Executive Branch records pertaining to strategies and plans to derail the Electoral College vote count; planning for and coordination of the rallies leading up to January 6th; the former Presidents knowledge of the election results and what he communicated to the American people about the election; potential plans to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power and challenge the validity of the 2020 election. The request to the DOJ asked for records pertaining to potential invocation of the Insurrection Act, martial law, or the 25th Amendment; communications between the department and the former Presidents campaign legal team and others dealing with the validity of the 2020 election or challenges to the elections outcome. Thompsons requests were also sent to the Department of Defense, Department of the Interior, Department of Homeland Security, FBI, the National Counterterrorism Center, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. In a related development on Aug. 26, seven Capitol Hill police officers filed a lawsuit naming Trump, Trump ally Roger Stone, and various far-right groups, claiming they were responsible for the events on Jan. 6. As this lawsuit makes clear, the Jan. 6 insurrection was not just an attack on individuals, but an attack on democracy itself. It was a blatant attempt to stifle the votes and voices of millions of Americans, particularly Black voters, Damon Hewitt, president and executive director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (LCCUL) said in a statement. The LCCUL represents the seven officers, five of whom are black. For months after the 2020 election had been officially called, former President Trump and his associates made coordinated and systematic attempts to lodge their false claims of election fraud, targeted toward major cities with significant populations of voters of color, Hewitt said. The officers said in the statement that they joined the Capitol Police to uphold the law and protect the Capitol community. On Jan. 6, we tried to stop people from breaking the law and destroying our democracy. Since then, our jobs and those of our colleagues have become infinitely more dangerous. We want to do what we can to make sure the people who did this are held accountable and that no one can do this again. Congressional correspondent Mark Tapscott may be contacted at: mark.tapscott@epochtimes.nyc. Follow him on Twitter at @mtapscott and on Parler at @Mtapscott. Idaho Supreme Court Invalidates Ballot Initiative Law The Supreme Court of the State of Idaho unanimously ruled this week that the states new statute governing citizen-initiated ballot initiatives is unconstitutional because it infringes on the publics right to enact laws without the participation of the state Legislature. The decision came Aug. 23 in the case known as Reclaim Idaho v. Denney, dockets 48784 and 48760. Lawerence Denney is Idahos Republican secretary of state. Reclaim Idaho is a left-wing political action committee that led a successful Medicaid expansion initiative in 2018 and supports boosting funding in kindergarten through 12th-grade education by increasing Idahos corporate tax rate and taxes on individuals earning $250,000 or more annually. The groups website explains that Reclaim Idahos primary organizing tactic is the ballot initiative. We also engage in grassroots advocacy efforts, such as fights against cuts to Medicaid and restrictions on initiative rights. Our grassroots advocacy campaigns organize local leaders and volunteers to contact their legislators, advocate at the capitol, and host local town-hall meetings. But the initiative is our primary tactic because it has the greatest potential for growing a statewide movement. Idahos highest court found that the statute at hand runs afoul of Idaho voters fundamental right to carry out a citizen-led initiative. Denney and the state Legislature both failed to present a compelling state interest for limiting that right, according to the new court opinion. Ultimately, the effect of SB 1110 [i.e. the new statute] is to prevent a perceived, yet unsubstantiated fear of the tyranny of the majority, by replacing it with an actual tyranny of the minority, the court stated in striking down the statute. The court also noted that the statute conflicts with the democratic ideals that form the bedrock of the constitutional republic created by the Idaho Constitution. According to The Idaho Statesman, the state Legislature will have to pay Reclaim Idaho and [another litigant] their attorney fees for the lawsuit, on top of the fees paid its own attorney to defend the law. The U.S. Supreme Court briefly involved itself in the issue a year ago, when it temporarily blocked a federal district judges order that relaxed election rules to give Reclaim Idaho additional time to gather signatures for a ballot initiative during the pandemic. In the Idaho courts opinion, Justice Gregory W. Moeller noted that Article III, Section 1 of the Idaho Constitution, states in part: The people reserve to themselves the power to approve or reject at the polls any act or measure passed by the legislature. The people reserve to themselves the power to propose laws, and enact the same at the polls independent of the legislature. Idaho Code section 34-1805(2), as amended by a law known as SB 1110, requires that, for an initiative or referendum to appear on the ballot, organizers must obtain a threshold number of signatures from each of the thirty-five (35) legislative districts in the state. Both Denney and the Legislature argued that the changes enacted by SB 1110 were a lawful exercise of the legislatures constitutionally delegated power to prescribe the conditions and manner under which initiatives and referenda may be carried out by the people. Denney also argued, among other things, that this case presents a nonjusticiable political question that the Idaho Supreme Court should not address. Moeller also noted that Reclaim Idaho, alongside another group called the Committee to Protect and Preserve the Idaho Constitution Inc., sought a declaration that the new signature threshold mandated by SB 1110, requiring signatures from every legislative district, was unconstitutional. The two groups also contested the constitutionality of another statute, Idaho Code section 34-1813(2)(a), which was amended in 2020 and states that an initiative may not become effective earlier than July 1 of the year following the vote in which it was passed. Reclaim Idaho welcomed the ruling. Thousands of Idahoans will be breathing a sigh of relief, said group co-founder Luke Mayville, KTVB reported. Those of us directly involved in the case are ecstatic. Its an historic day. A fundamental right of the people of Idaho has been restored. Illinois Gov. J.B. Prtizker announces a statewide mandate requiring masks be worn in all Illinois public schools, preschool through high school, in Chicago on Aug. 4, 2021. (Scott Olson/Getty Images) Illinois Requires COVID-19 Vaccine for Students, Mandates Masks Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced a statewide mask mandate on Aug. 26 and ordered every eligible student, among other high-risk settings, to get vaccinated against the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus. Pritzker, a Democrat, said the vaccination mandate will apply to pre-K through 12th-grade teachers and staff, higher education personnel, and students, as well as health care workers, nursing home employees, and the offices of doctors, according to a government statement. Anyone who refuses, or is unable, to get vaccinated is required to get tested for the CCP virus at least once per week, Pritzker said, noting that this may get increased by the Ilinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) or the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) in certain situations. The new statewide mask mandate will apply to everyone in all indoor settings who is over the age of 2, regardless of their vaccination status. The measure will go into effect on Aug. 30. While face coverings are not required outdoors, masks are strongly encouraged in crowded outdoor settings like festivals and concerts, as well as for activities that require close contact with people who are not vaccinated, the statement reads. Today, Im announcing a series of additional vaccine requirements aimed at protecting our most vulnerable residents, unvaccinated children, and their families and the ability of hospital systems to handle the #DeltaVariant surge in Illinois. pic.twitter.com/2UNxgcPNEo Governor J.B. Pritzker (@GovPritzker) August 26, 2021 The latest policy was issued amid a resurgence of CCP virus cases, spurred largely by the Delta variant of COVID-19, and increasing reports of breakthrough cases in which people already vaccinated against the virus are becoming infected. To put it bluntly, we are fighting a battle we thought would be over, Pritzker said. Unfortunately were running out of time as all of our hospitals are running out of beds. Pritzker also noted that since Aug. 1, health officials in the state have reported 27 outbreaks of the CCP virus at schools, resulting in hundreds of schools being observed for potential COVID-19 exposures. Earlier this month, ISBE punished 37 public school districts with a total enrollment of nearly 30,000 students as of Aug. 23 for not following Pritzkers school mask mandate, its records show. Parents and children line up outside George B. Armstrong International Studies Elementary School in Chicago on March 1, 2021. (Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Chicago Sun-Times via AP) On Aug. 23, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was given full approval for use by the federal government. But the Pfizer authorization is for people ages 16 and older, not younger children. Pritzkers announcement also comes in the wake of Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoots recent order requiring all city employees, including police and firefighters, to be vaccinated or have proof of a valid medical or religious exemption. The policy in the third-largest U.S. city comes as numerous other municipalities, school districts, and governments across the nation grapple with masking and vaccination requirements. Reuters contributed to this report. From NTD News Traders work after the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street in New York City, on Aug. 15, 2019. (Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images) Investors Borrow Less to Buy Stocks for First Time Since Pandemic Began, an Ominous Sign U.S. investors cut their use of leverage in July, marking the first month since the onset of the pandemic that saw a reduction in the use of margin debt to buy securities such as stocks, potentially a warning sign for markets buoyed by heavy use of borrowed money. Data from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) on the use of margin debt, which is money borrowed by investors from brokers to buy securities, show $844 billion borrowed against portfolios in July. Thats the first month the metric has dipped since embarking on a steady month-over-month climb in March 2020, when it stood at $479 billion. Margin loans had hit a record high of $882 billion in June 2021, according to FINRA figures. A separate data point from Interactive Brokers, which serves about 1.5 million clients, showed that margin debt among its customers fell 2 percent from June to July, according to the Financial Times. Some see the reduction in borrowing as an ominous sign for markets, coming as some analysts believe the stunning bull run in U.S. equities is due for a correction. Stephen Suttmeier, technical research strategist at Bank of America, wrote in a recent note cited by Fortune that rising leverage tends to confirm U.S. equity rallies and that its not new record highs for margin loans that are cause for worry, but we get concerned when margin debt stops rising to suggest that investors have begun to reduce leverage. Nick Reece, portfolio manager at Merk Investments, told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement that the buildup in margin debt since the end of 2019 has matched the rise in the market, and thats nothing to be concerned about. In his view, what would be concerning is to see a major buildup in margin debt relative to the market, which ties into the idea that if asset prices continue to rise, then a commensurate rise in borrowing is nothing to worry about, particularly whenas nowborrowing costs are low. At the same time, Reece believes the feverish bull run for the benchmark S&P 500, which has continued to push to new all-time highs, is ripe for a pullback. I continue to think the market is due for a short-term correction or sideways consolidation, he said. The market is trading at the top end of the bull market trend channel. And there hasnt been a 10 percent correction since the March 2020 lowsits always worth being mentally prepared for one. Of course, a 10 percent correction might only start 10 percent higher from here, so trying to time it is a fools errand in my view, he said, noting that a positive medium-term market outlook for equities continues to be supported by a number of data points, including the business cycle expansion and the so-called TINA effect, an acronym for there is no alternative, which is the notion that frothy markets will keep rising despite showing signs of weaker fundamentals because there are no other options for yield-seeking investors. Suttmeier argued in his note that the dial-back in leverage sends an ominous signal. Although peaks in margin debt dont always coincide with highs for the [S&P 500], they tend to be bearish for equities, he said. An overview of the Abbey Gate at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 25, 2021. (Satellite image 2021 Maxar Technologies via Reuters) ISIS Claims Responsibility for Afghanistan Bombings, US General Says America Prepared to Take Action The ISIS terrorist group has claimed responsibility for the bombings in Kabul, Afghanistan, that killed a dozen U.S. troops. ISIS published a photograph of a man it claimed conducted one of the suicide bombings and described the explosions as targeting American forces and their spies. It also threatened additional attacks. The bombs were set off just outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, which U.S. troops have been guarding since mid-August. Thirteen U.S. troops were killed and more than a dozen others were wounded. Kenneth McKenzie, the CENTCOM commander general, also pinned the attack on ISIS, and said the United States was preparing for more bombings. U.S. officials had warned this week about a possible ISIS attack, including in briefings with Congress. Military officials are continuing to coordinate with the Taliban, including conveying what they expect that terrorist group to do to protect us, according to McKenzie. That includes pushing the Taliban to expand the ground they are patrolling outside the airport. Theres no indication the Taliban was involved in the attack or let it happen, according to U.S. officials. President Joe Biden vowed recently that any action against U.S. troops would trigger a swift response. Asked about that, McKenzie told reporters it would depend on locating those behind the attack. If we can find whos associated with this, we will go after them. Weve been clear all along that were going to retain the right to operate against ISIS in Afghanistan and we are working very hard right now to determine attribution, to determine whose associated with this cowardly attack, and were prepared to take action against them. 24/7 we are looking for them, he said. Volunteers and medical staff unload bodies from a pickup truck outside a hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 26, 2021. (Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images) The exact circumstances of the attack are under investigation but the preliminary understanding of the initial explosion is a suicide bomber got to the gate before setting off a bomb. U.S. troops are in position at the gates to vet people trying to get through. The vetting includes checking for bombs or other weapons. Theres no substitute for a young man or woman, a young United States man or woman, standing up there conducting a search of that person before we let them on, McKenzie said. Before the first bomb went off, 104,000 people had been let through the gates. Many of them were Afghans who are fleeing the country after assisting U.S. troops during the decadeslong war. The Taliban check people at their checkpoints before letting them pass but sometimes those searches are not thorough. The United States began controlling the airport around the time the Taliban took over the country. Its the only ground U.S. troops control ahead of their planned withdrawal on Aug. 31. Right now our focus is actually going forward ensuring another attack of this nature does not occur, because as you know the pattern is typically multiple attacks, McKenzie said, adding that evacuations were continuing. Biden has been briefed on the attack, according to the White House. Neither he nor any other White House officials have spoken publicly since the bombings. Japan Suspends 1.6 Million Doses of Moderna Vaccine After Reports of Contamination No reported safety incidents so far Japan announced on Aug. 26 that its suspending the use of about 1.63 million doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine due to reports of contamination. The countrys health ministry said foreign materials were found in at least 390 dosesor 39 vialsof the Moderna vaccine coming from eight vaccination sites, according to The Asahi Shimbun. Takeda Pharmaceutical, a Japanese drugmaker distributing the Moderna vaccines in Japan, had received reports of contamination from multiple vaccination sites. The health ministry subsequently learned of the matter on Aug. 25, the outlet reported. Its a substance that reacts to magnets it could be metal, a ministry official reportedly said, according to Nikkei Asia. The reports of contamination involve a batch that has a total of 565,400 doses. The ministry said it decided to suspend the lot as a precaution after it had consulted with Takeda. It also suspended another two batches. The three batches altogether contain 1.63 million vaccine doses, which have been distributed to 863 vaccination centers across the country. The ministry will request that the centers not use them. Officials said that an unknown number of doses from the affected lot have been administered, but there have been no reported adverse effects thus far. Takeda said in a statement that it had asked Moderna to investigate the safety of the vaccine as a matter of emergency. It also shared the batch numbers, which are 3004667, 3004734, and 3004956. Moderna confirms having been notified of cases of particulate matter being seen in drug product vials of its COVID-19 vaccine, Moderna said in a statement. The company is investigating the reports and remains committed to working expeditiously with its partner, Takeda, and regulators to address this. The health ministry said that all of the vaccines currently being rolled out in Japan are manufactured by a company based in Spain. It wasnt immediately clear whether the issue affected supplies of the Moderna vaccine to other countries. Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said that the Japanese government is discussing ways to minimize the effect on the countrys vaccination rollout with Takeda. We will do [our] utmost in order to avoid any impact on vaccination progress, especially at worksites and large-scale centers, Kato said. About 43 percent of the population in Japan has been fully vaccinated; about 50 percent have received at least one dose. The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report. Lawyer Sidney Powell speaks to media while flanked by President Donald Trump lawyer and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (L) and Trump campaign senior legal adviser Jenna Ellis at a press conference at the Republican National Committee headquarters in Washington, on Nov. 19, 2020. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times) Judge Sanctions 9 Trump Campaign Attorneys Over Election Lawsuit A federal judge in Michigan on Aug. 25 sanctioned Sidney Powell, Lin Wood, and seven other attorneys who represented the Trump campaign in a lawsuit challenging the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. U.S. District Judge Linda Parker, an Obama appointee, referred the nine attorneys for investigation and possible disbarment or suspension by relevant state authorities. Parker also ordered the sanctioned individuals to pay the court fees tied to the election lawsuit and to take legal education classes. This lawsuit represents a historic and profound abuse of the judicial process, Parker wrote in a 110-page opinion (pdf). It is one thing to take on the charge of vindicating rights associated with an allegedly fraudulent election. It is another to take on the charge of deceiving a federal court and the American people into believing that rights were infringed, without regard to whether any laws or rights were in fact violated. The attorney representing seven of the sanctioned lawyers, including Powell and Wood, didnt immediately respond to a request by The Epoch Times for comment. The judge said the attorneys involved failed to conduct the necessary due diligence to present allegations as truth, advanced untenable claims, and didnt proceed with the lawsuit in good faith or with a proper purpose. This lawsuit should never have been filed, Parker wrote. The State Defendants and the Intervenor-Defendants should never have had to defend it. Rudy Giuliani, the lead Trump campaign election attorney, wasnt among the sanctioned attorneys as his name didnt appear on any of the filings. Giulianis licenses to practice law in New York and Washington, D.C., were suspended earlier this summer over his involvement in post-election legal efforts and public statements. And this case was never about fraudit was about undermining the Peoples faith in our democracy and debasing the judicial process to do so, Parker wrote. While there are many arenasincluding print, television, and social mediawhere protestations, conjecture, and speculation may be advanced, such expressions are neither permitted nor welcomed in a court of law. A battery of election lawsuits filed by attorneys, who were affiliated and not affiliated with the Trump campaign, didnt change the outcome of the election in six contested states. The U.S. Congress certified Joe Biden as the winner of the presidential election on Jan. 6. Trump continues to hold that the election was stolen. According to a poll conducted in June, one in three Americans held the same opinion. A screen grab shows people carrying an injured person to a hospital after an attack at Kabul airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 26, 2021. (Reuters TV/1TV via Reuters) Last Canadian Military Flight Takes Off From Kabul, Ending Mission OTTAWACanadas military mission in Afghanistan ended Thursday, hours before suicide bombers attacked crowds at Kabul airport, killing several American marines, and leaving an unknown number of Canadians and their families trapped. The withdrawal occurred as Canada and its military allies braced for imminent attack and to allow for the American-led mission to eventually meet its Aug. 31 deadline for departure. The Associated Press reported that U.S. officials said 11 American marines and one navy medic were killed in the attack by a pair of suicide bombers and gunmen in the crowd clamouring outside Kabul airport. Its not known how many other U.S. personnel were injured. An unknown number of Canadian military personnel stayed behind to assist the American withdrawal, and all were safe and accounted for after the Thursday bombing, the Canadian Forces said on Twitter. Canadas departure, its fiery aftermath, and the concerns about those left behind laid bare the raw emotional scars of the firmly severed connection in the long-suffering country. There, Canadian blood was spilled alongside its Western allies to help the Afghans build a prosperous country after the Taliban was routed in 2001. Its estimated more than 47,000 Afghan civilians, as well as over 66,000 members of the Afghan national military and police also died in the war. Ill just say from our perspective, warfare is always chaotic, and unpredictable. And hindsight is 2020. Based on the information we had at the time, yes, we were surprised by the speed of the of the Taliban takeover of Kabul. And Im sure therell be much ink spilt about this, said Gen. Wayne Eyre, the acting chief of the defence staff. Eyre said Canadians were among the last to leave, that military personnel are taking the withdrawal personally and many will feel guilty that they had to leave people behind. He said Canada brought roughly 3,700 people out of Afghanistan, which fell to the Taliban earlier this month. Eyre said the airport was under constant threat of attack and Canada and its allies acted admirably. An hour after Eyre and other government officials finished the sobering media briefing, locals left behind could hear several explosions near Hamid Karzai International Airport, named after the man who became Afghanistans first post-Taliban president two decades ago. The conditions our armed forces members working under were unlike anything weve seen in decades, even during our previous mission in Afghanistan, Eyre said in the emotional briefing informed by his own service in Canadas military mission years ago. Theyve witnessed horrific things. Theyve faced incredible dangers. And the feeling of helplessness and guilt that arises from having to leave people behind can be overwhelming. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, said the military was still trying to quantify the impact of Thursdays attacks, which were punctuated by gunmen opening fire on civilians and armed troops. The evacuation effort is continuing despite the attacks, he added. It would be difficult to overestimate the number of unusual challenges and competing demands our forces on the ground have faced, McKenzie said. The U.S. is attributing the attacks to an Afghan chapter of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, also known as ISIS-K. The threat from ISIS is extremely real we saw it actually manifest itself here in the last few hours with an actual attack, he said. We believe it is their desire to continue those attacks, and we expect those attacks to continue, and were doing everything we can to be prepared for those attacks. Moments after the long-delayed Pentagon briefing ended Thursday, new reports of a third explosion began to filter out of Kabul. Eyre said about 1,000 Afghans bound for Canada were airlifted out of Kabul on Wednesday night, half on a C-17 and half by the Americans. The federal government is still trying to determine how many Canadians might still be left in Afghanistan. Cindy Termorshuizen, the assistant deputy minister at Global Affairs Canada in charge of consular, security and emergency management, said hundreds of Canadians and permanent residents and their families made it out of Kabul on Wednesday. She said there were large numbers of Canadians on flights out her department was combing through the numbers and flight manifests to gain a clearer picture of how many might have been left behind. The government is aware of people who have ended up in third countries, and Canadas entire network of foreign embassies and high commissions is on alert to track them down, she said. We recognize that todays announcement will be distressing news for those who are still in Afghanistan and wish to leave, said Termorshuizen. For our fellow citizens still in Afghanistan, if you need to move to a safer location please do so with great caution. Use your judgment to decide the best time and the safest means to do so. Assess the risk carefully as you take the necessary steps to ensure your security and that of your family. Eyre said Canadian personnel will have to reflect on whether all the efforts expended in Afghanistan were worth it, but that Canadians made a difference in thousands of lives. We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone who was so desperate to leave, said Eyre. That we could not is truly heartbreaking. But the circumstances on the ground rapidly deteriorated. Now this is an extraordinary humanitarian crisis. But make no mistake: this is a crisis of the Talibans making. MacKenzie said he believes the evacuation efforts can continue even in the face of continued attacks. Any time you build a non-combatant evacuation plan like this, and you bring in forces, you expect to be attacked, he said. We are prepared to continue the mission I think we can continue to conduct our mission, even while were receiving attacks like this. Daniel Mills, assistant deputy minister with Canadas Immigration Department, said visa applications for Afghan citizens who applied for them are still being processed. Mills said the department received 8,000 applications under its special program for Afghans and 2,600 of those people who made it out of Afghanistan. But that doesnt mean the rest are still trapped inside the country, because some of those applicants have already fled to third countries. I want to assure you that IRCC has been and continues to work tirelessly to process all applications under our special immigration measures, said Mills. By Mike Blanchfield A closed sign is seen on a business at Newport beach, in Sydney, Australia on Dec. 18, 2020. (AAP Image/Dan Himbrechts) Lockdowns Devastate Small Business and Leaves Economy Dominated by Large Corporations Lockdowns have disproportionately affected workers for small businesses compared to large businesses, according to an analysis by the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA). The analysis of Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) unemployment data found that between June 26 and July 17, 420,000 jobs were lostor 20,000 a day. The New South Wales (NSW) jobs sector was hit hardest, with 200,000 small business workers, 64,000 medium-sized business workers, and 12,000 large business workers losing their jobs over the three-week period. Lockdown measures have a much larger impact on small businesses than they do on large businesses, IPA research fellow Kurt Wallace said. Every time a lockdown is implemented, the effect is the same: thousands of small business workers are forced out of work, while those working for large corporates are far more likely to keep their jobs. A person is seen walking past a for lease sign on a building in Melbourne, Australia, on June 8, 2021. (AAP Image/James Ross) Further, the IPA argues that unrelenting lockdowns mean large conglomerates will dominate the economy as local communities lose their small businesses. Lockdowns have the same effect as an aggressive form of asset stripping, where all of the capital from small businesses is stripped and re-directed toward big corporates, Wallace said. The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) had similar conclusions back in March when it said the experience of businesses in lockdown had been quite uneven. Small businesses were around twice as likely as large businesses to have reported declines of 50 percent or more, RBA assistant governor Christopher Kent said. Kent said much of the difference reflects the fact that some of the most heavily affected industries, such as cafes, restaurants, and recreation, are small businesses. IPA said there were a few factors that caused small businesses to be disproportionately harmed by lockdowns. For example, they are less likely to be able to accommodate remote working, less able to withstand prolonged periods of reduced income, and more likely to have difficulty getting external funding. A Store closed sign is seen on the window of a business in the CBD of Brisbane, Australia, on Jan. 11, 2021. (AAP Image/Albert Perez) July ABS data did reveal that the unemployment rate had fallen to 4.6 percent, the lowest in 12 years. However, this was driven by decreased participation rate and higher underemployment. Normally, when the unemployment rate hit a 12-year low, it would be a cause for celebration, but not today as millions of our fellow Australians are in lockdown, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said on Aug 19. Todays numbers show the impact that the lockdowns are having as 230,000 people in New South Wales became employed but on zero hours. To help small businesses access more funding, Frydenberg announced they were expanding the eligibility for the SME Recovery Loan Scheme. Small and medium businesses will now be eligible to receive government assistance without having received JobKeeper in the March quarter or being a flood affected business. This means that SMEs who are dealing with the economic impacts of COVID-19 and have a turnover of less than $250 million will be able to access loans of up to $5 million for a term of up to 10 years. The government will also guarantee 80 percent of the loan. Trash litters the water near a storm drain in the Venice Beach area of Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times) Los Angeles City Council Passes Motion to Crack Down on Illegal Dumping The Los Angeles City Council voted Aug. 25 to crack down on illegal dumping in the city, an issue that has been brewing over the last few years. Under the measure, the city will reconvene an interdepartmental group that will focus on targeting dumping after a report from the Los Angeles Controllers office in March found that illegal dumping of trash and hazardous waste in the city increased 450 percent from 2016 to 2020. Controller Ron Galperins report also noted that sanitation crews picked up 14,500 tons of solid waste in the first eight months of 2020an increase from 9,200 tons in 2016, with some areas seeing 500 to 600 percent increases. A spokesperson for Galperin told The Epoch Times in an email that the city is cleaning up more trash each year, but not deterring people from dumping it. Galperin called on the city to take action to eliminate illegal dumping and to hold responsible those accountable for the harm it causes local communities. Public spaces meant to be used by everyone are being abused by too many, Galperin said. Businesses and individuals are illegally dumping thousands of tons of trash, debris and hazardous waste on our sidewalks and streets, lessening the quality of life nearby. The report said that the citys Bureau of Sanitation (LASAN) is also tackling cleanups and illegal dumping created by homeless encampments, and that slows sanitation crews ability to respond to illegal dumping reports. The average time it took cleanup crews to respond to reports in 2020 was five days. Los Angeles Sanitation General Manager Enrique Zaldivar told the Los Angeles Times in March that the department had only seven enforcement staffers and 17 vacancies, which they couldnt fill due to the citys hiring freeze. The report said theres often a nexus between illegal dumping and the buildup of large discarded items at homeless encampments. While homeless encampments and illegal dumping are two distinct issues, they often exist within the same spaces, the report said. This is because illegal dumpers sometimes seek out spaces that are already impacted by poor sanitary conditions. Illegal dumping at encampments or in adjacent spaces only worsens unhealthy living conditions for unhoused individuals. In addition to reconvening the interdepartmental working group, the city councils motion will also instruct LASAN to report back to the city in 60 days about several initiatives, including the number of permanent illegal dumping crews required to meet demand, the number of existing vacancies across several key departments, and purchasing and installing 60 illegal-dumping cameras across the city. I applaud the city council for taking action on my report, Galperin said. This will help the city be more aggressive with its illegal-dumping response, resulting in cleaner communities and a safer, healthier environment for all Angelenos. Chinese Americans line up outside of the Sing Tao News offices to donate money for the victims of the earthquake in China, in Chinatown, San Francisco, on May 14, 2008. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) Major Pro-Beijing Newspaper Registers as Foreign Agent in US A major pro-Beijing newspaper has registered its U.S. subsidiary as a foreign agent after being compelled to do so by the Justice Department, as Washington steps up scrutiny of Chinese influence efforts in the United States. Sing Tao U.S., whose parent company operates Hong Kongs oldest newspaper, distributes newspapers in New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. It also runs a U.S.-based radio network and the Chinese Times, a daily newspaper that has become dormant. Sing Tao disputed the Justice Departments decision, stating that its U.S. entities are similarly situated to other for-profit media companies operating in the United States, according to an Aug. 23 filing with the department. While the newspaper isnt formally affiliated with the Chinese regime, Sing Tao has taken a strong pro-Beijing stance under the oversight of pro-Beijing businessman Charles Ho Tsu-kwok, who for more than two decades has chaired Sing Taos Hong Kong-based parent company, Sing Tao News Corporation Ltd. Ho has since 1998 served as a standing committee member of the Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference, Beijings top advisory body that also oversees Chinese influence operations worldwide. During the large-scale pro-democracy movement in recent years, the Hong Kong-based businessman has frequently lashed out at the citys protesters in editorials and interviews and often blamed the local government for being too soft on them. Sing Taos Hong Kong edition also ran front-page ads echoing Beijings anti-protester rhetoric after police violently suppressed protesters. The Nov. 20 edition of 10 Hong Kong newspapers, seven of whichexcept for The Epoch Times and two other outletscarried pro-Beijing advertisements. (The Epoch Times) In 2001, the year he took over the company, Ho entered into a joint venture with a subsidiary of Chinese state media Xinhua to form an information service platform called Xinhua Online. He sold most of his stakes in Sing Tao in June to Chinese real estate developer Kwok Hiu-ting. A former Sing Tao staff member said Ho was a frontman for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which ultimately called the shots in the organization. To say that its a foreign agent is not misrepresenting it at all, the former employee told The Epoch Times on condition of anonymity. Its under the CCPs influence in many respects. That influence, the former employee said, includes dictating what content goes on the papers front page and inside pages, its editorial stance, and frontpage headline selections. The CCP exerted control by stationing designated personnel at the publications office, appointing those with pro-Beijing viewpoints as editorial staff, and exerting pressure on the newspapers advertisement partners, the person said. (LR) Pansey Ho, Charles Ho, and Kim Lee Chan attend the amfAR Hong Kong Gala at Shaw Studios in Hong Kong, on March 25, 2017. (Ulet Ifansasti/Getty Images) More than half of the Sing Tao U.S. content is outsourced to Star Production Limited in Shenzhen, a Chinese city bordering Hong Kong, the filings show. Sing Tao U.S. has also maintained friendly ties with Chinese diplomats in the United States. Successive consul generals of the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco have attended Sing Taos birthday events. The most recent one, a banquet marking Sing Taos 83rd year, took place in early August, during which Consul General Wang Donghua repeated the CCPs rhetoric that the United States was trying to contain a benign China, according to the consulates website. Former deputy consul general for the New York Chinese Consulate Zhang Meifang in 2013 also praised Sing Tao as a key window for Americans to have a true, comprehensive, and objective understanding of China, and promised to provide support within the consulates power to tell the Chinese dream to U.S. mainstream society, a post from the consulates website said. During the same event, Mei Jianguo, then the chief executive director for Sing Tao U.S.s East Coast edition, who is now overseeing Sing Taos entire U.S. edition, expressed appreciation for Zhangs visit and vowed to be a civil level public diplomacy messenger and further U.S.-China relations. In February 2020, as the pandemic began to take a toll on the United States, Sing Tao U.S.s West Coast edition was a key organizer in raising $150,000 in funds to purchase a total of 130,000 N95 and regular masks for Wuhan, where COVID-19 first began. Sing Tao joins Chinese state-run media outlets CGTN and Xinhua as registered foreign agents for Beijing. The Justice Department declined to comment. Sing Tao didnt respond to an inquiry from The Epoch Times by press time. Ty Garbin, one of six people charged in an alleged plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, is seen in this undated file photo. (Kent County Sheriff via AP File) Man Who Plotted to Kidnap Michigan Governor Gets 6 Years in Prison A man who admitted his role in a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer was sentenced to six years in prison on Aug. 25. Ty Garbin received a significantly lower sentence due to his prompt decision to cooperate with prosecutors who were building cases against five other alleged conspirators. Garbin is the first of the six alleged conspirators to plead guilty. He had admitted his role in the plot weeks after being arrested last fall. At the sentencing hearing, he apologized to the governor and her family. I cannot even begin to imagine the amount of stress and fear her family felt because of my actions, Garbin, 25, said. And for that, I am truly sorry. According to the plea deal, Garbin said he and five other men trained at his property in Luther, Michigan, where they built a house resembling Whitmers vacation home and assaulted it with firearms. The prosecutors noted Garbins cooperation and recommended a nine-year sentence. U.S. District Judge Robert Jonker decided on a sentence of just over six years, explaining that he was convinced Garbin would stay out of trouble once released from prison. The Constitution is designed to ensure that we work out our fundamental and different views peacefully, not at the point of a gun, not with some other blunt force threat or a kidnapping conspiracy, the judge said. Both the defense and the prosecution praised Garbins willingness to admit guilt before the government revealed all the evidence after his arrest. Assistant U.S. Attorney Nils Kessler said Garbin didnt hold back. He would come out and say, We planned to do this and I was knowingly a part of it. He sat for hours answering all of our questions, Kessler said. Garbins attorney, Gary Springstead, told the judge his client is going to be a star witness against the other alleged conspirators. Springstead told reporters that Garbin can tell what was in his mind at the time, which is that this wasnt some fanciful plot. This was real. And he can tell the government why he believes other people had the same intent that he did and show them where to look. Ty Garbin testified in front of the grand jury in support of the indictment that got him indicted. He is truly, genuinely, and sincerely sorry, said Mark Satawa, another defense lawyer. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer addresses the state during a speech in Lansing, Mich., on March 2, 2021. (Michigan Office of the Governor via AP) Whitmer wrote a victim impact statement to the judge, saying, things will never be the same. Threats continue, she said in June. I have looked out my windows and seen large groups of heavily armed people within 30 yards of my home. I have seen myself hung in effigy. Days ago at a demonstration, there was a sign that called for burning the witch. Last year, Whitmer put major restrictions on personal movement and the economy because of COVID-19, although many limits have since been lifted. The Michigan Capitol was the site of rallies, including rallies in which gun-toting protesters called for the governors removal. Some of those accused in the plot, including defendants charged in state court, joined the protests. Prosecutors have said the ringleader initially talked of recruiting 200 men to storm the building, take hostages, and execute tyrants. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Newport Beach Calls for Local Control on Mask and Vaccine Mandates in Schools The Newport Beach City Council passed a resolution supporting the local school districts (rather than the states) control of implementing mask or vaccine mandates. The resolution countering the states mask mandate in K12 schools passed by a vote of 61 with Councilwoman Joy Brenner dissenting. Councilman Noah Blom, who introduced the item, said the resolution is about maintaining local control and speaking up for the freedom of Newport Beachs residents. We should get to make our own decisions about people that dont legally get to make their own decisions. And those are our children, Blom said during the Aug. 25 meeting. We do have their best interests at heart. We dont want to hurt them, he said. Dozens of residents supported the councils decision during public comments, while few opposed it. Many had written council emails both in favor of and against the resolution, councilmembers said. Blom said the city council is hoping to empower the school board since they feel like their hands are tied. I also feel like they have a hard time fighting against the state and state-mandated health laws, and rules, he said. Newport Beach was among the first cities in the county to terminate its local emergency declaration in June after finding that the conditions of extreme peril no longer existed, according to a city report. But the city council doesnt have jurisdiction over the citys schools. The Newport-Mesa school board must comply with the states mask mandate or risk losing its funding, said Blom. Our goal is to safely open schools this week for in-person instruction, and keep them open, as we continue to follow the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) guidelines. We, like all schools in CA, are required to abide by the CDPH requirements for schools, which includes masks ONLY when indoors, Newport-Mesa Unified School District spokeswoman Annette Franco told The Epoch Times in an email. We are not authorized to make decisions on the use of face coverings in schools, or create policies related to public health. We are hopeful that with the support of our community we can keep schools open and continue to provide a safe environment for students and staff. The CDPH told The Epoch Times in an email that its goal is to get kids back in school for full in-person instruction, period. In order to get there, were continuing to use COVID-prevention strategies as recommended by the CDC and American Academy of Pediatrics, including: vaccinations, masking, testing, and more. This is a public health order that school districts are expected to follow, similar to the other public health orders that have been implemented throughout this pandemic. We are committed to working with school districts, other local governments, and other state officials to ensure schools implement this requirement to keep children and staff safe. Brenner voted against the resolution because she said this issue was not something the council needed to take a position on. It was not in our lane. We dont make decisions for the school district. In this case, even the school district and the school board are not making the decisions on this. Its coming from a higher agency. Brenner argued the resolution polarizes our community based on people who agree and disagree with a mask mandate. What we really want to encourage is those people who are on both sides to continue to look all the information, she said. The resolution states that California, not the Newport Mesa Unified School District Board of Education has implemented universal masking requirements in K-12 school settings throughout the state, without regard for any local conditions such as case rate, hospitalization rates, or site-specific improvements such as ventilation upgrades. It also claims the states blanket mandate is contrary to the citys first guiding principle in its legislative platform, which says the city supports the protection or expansion of a local, decision-making authority and its ability to provide public services. We trust our school board with 21,000 kids. But apparently Sacramento doesnt trust them to make some of the decisions about them, and thats not right, Councilman Will ONeill said during the council meeting. When decisions like this are being made at a level in Sacramento, where we cant petition, we cant reach out, we are going to feel frustrated. Councilwoman Diane Dixon said her grandchildren tell her to wear her mask because theyre so afraid that I will die if I dont wear my mask. The fear that is instilled in young children is heartbreaking, Dixon said during the council meeting. She said that if Newport-Mesa doesnt follow the states mandate, there could be negative consequences for the district, such as a loss of funding. The California School Board Association and Gov. Gavin Newsoms office didnt respond to a request for comment by press deadline. Children hold up signs during a rally against critical race theory being taught in schools at the Loudoun County Government center in Leesburg, Va., on June 12, 2021. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images) North Carolina Task Force Reports Themes of Critical Race Theory in K-12 Schools Race shaming and allusions to surgical castration in childrens literatureas well as accusations of xenophobia against political figuresare among the themes found in Lt. Gov. Mark Robinsons Indoctrination in North Carolina Public Education report. Robinson previously told The Epoch Times that he created the Fairness and Accountability in the Classroom for Teachers and Students task force (F.A.C.T.S.) to gather evidence of Critical Race Theory (CRT) in the K-12 North Carolina school system. CRT is a Marxist philosophy that suggests society is a class struggle between oppressors and the oppressed, labelling white people as the oppressors and all other races as the oppressed. The task force, according to the report, consists of volunteer education professionals with experience in various roles in education, such as teachers, administrators, university professors, education policy experts, and elected members of the state Senate and House. Through an online portal, parents, teachers, and students could anonymously submit evidence from curriculums by email. The report was released on Aug. 24 and was gathered from over 500 submissions. What has surfaced are themes of CRT, bias, sexualization, and race shaming of children, Robinson said in a press release posted on Facebook (pdf). In one parents submission, a child, in learning the word xenophobia, was instructed to use former President Donald Trump as an example. The teacher had definitions on one side and sentences on the other and the sentence that described xenophobia was President Trump has xenophobia, the parent said. Another example was a definition of Republican was that Republicans dont care for peoples issues and Democrats are people who care for people. The example provided in the image was a prompt for the student to define xenophobia. The prompt said: It can be said that Donald Trump has xenophobia, because of his fear of people from other countries than the United States. Allusions to Surgical Castration Another submission involved a book titled George, by Alex Gino, which is a childrens novel about a transgendered, fourth-grade girl. According to the report, the book is used in North Carolina classrooms to illustrate the story of a biological boy in the fourth grade who wants to be a girl. The book talks about cutting off male genitalia and hormone therapy, the report stated. The submitter who shared this information said the book was included in their childs elementary school. This book is recommended for third to seventh-grade students. An excerpt from the book as follows was provided in the report: So, like, do you want tohe made a gesture with two fingers like a pair of scissorsgo all the way? George squeezed her legs together. Maybe someday, she said. Faculty Microaggression A submission from a teacher alleged microaggression training class requirements for faculty and staff. The teacher, who remained anonymous, said shes been teaching high school for 14 years. Faculty and staff are required to attend professional development related to equity and microaggression as it relates to race, gender, and other areas, the teacher said. They define microaggression as The everyday slights, indignities, put-downs and insults that people of color, women, LGBT populations of those who are marginalized experiences in their day-to-day interactions with people. White staff members are told that they are unaware of their racism, the teacher reported, in these personal development sessions. We are given examples of microaggression such as a statement: I believe everyone can succeed in todays society if they work hard and the most qualified people should get the job, the teacher said, adding that this statement, according to the tenet of microaggression, translates as: White people believe people of color are lazy and dont work hard. We Didnt Hide in the Dark The Senate Education Committee passed House Bill 324 on Tuesday after a heated exchange between state Sen. Jay Chaudhuri and Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson regarding the task forces mission. According to the bill, its purpose is to ensure the equality and rights of all persons by requiring that students, teachers, administrators, and other school employees recognize the quality and rights of people by prohibiting the promotion of certain concepts that are contrary to that intent. Chaudhuri, a Democrat, said that, during the first week of school, students should be honored instead of debating what he called a Fox News-driven issue thats more about fearmongering thats turned into a fishing expedition of our public-school teachers. The task force, Chaudhuri added, operated without abiding by open-meeting laws. We didnt hide in the dark, Robinson, a Republican, said. We didnt ask to do it. Parents, teachers, and students within the North Carolina school system demanded it, Robinson said. And to sit here and call it a Fox News-driven issue when I have stood with teachers who have cried because they feel like their jobs, livelihoods, and professions have been threatened, for you to call it that is an insultan absolute insult, Robinson said. And you know where my office is, and you know that this task force is going on. When did you contact me? Please dont turn this into some partisan issue. U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Allyson Black, a registered nurse, cares for COVID-19 patients in a makeshift intensive care unit at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center on January 21, 2021 in Torrance, Calif. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) Nurses Warn of Staff Shortages Due to COVID-19 Vaccine Mandates Terminations, job walk-offs could be devastating to communities A nationwide shortage of nurses and health care workers may soon worsen as thousands of medical staff face losing their jobs by refusing to obey new COVID-19 vaccine mandates. It will be really terrible. Were already understaffed, said one veteran registered nurse who works at a health care facility north of Seattle. She said she will lose her job after her employers Aug. 31 mandated vaccine goes into effect unless she complies with the requirement. She estimates that as many as 40020 percentof the health centers 2,500 employees refuse to take the vaccine. That number will likely shrink due to the financial hardship of job loss, she said, though even losing 5 percent would be devastating to the community, she told The Epoch Times. The nurse, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said her only solution is if her employer grants her a religious exemption, which appears unlikely at this point. It looks like theyre going to reject my religious exemption. They need more information, but theyre not telling me what information theyre going to need. It puts me in a really tough situation, she said. I have two [elderly] parents who live with me. It would be extraordinarily disruptive to move them. Its extremely scary trying to start again somewhere else. Stephanie Thorpe, a registered nurse in the UCHealth Colorado system, is also stuck between an employee rock and a medical hard place over her companys pending vaccine mandate. Thorpe said she, too, could lose her job if her application for a religious exemption is denied. UCHealth reports more than 92 percent of 26,000 employees systemwide are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. That leaves a reluctant 8 percent who refuse the shots. These medical professionalsThorpe includedwill have until Sept. 1 to comply with UCHealths Oct. 1 vaccine mandate, or else they will face disciplinary action up to and including termination. We do allow if there is a religious exemption or a medical exemption as well, said UCHealth spokeswoman Kelly Tracer. UCHealth has been facing the same staffing challenges that hospitals around the country are, definitely. Its a national shortage. Thorpe estimates a couple hundred staunch opponents to the vaccine mandate are willing to walk away because of the vaccines. Right now, [UCHealth] is working short-staffed at many facilities, she told The Epoch Times. Thorpe said that even if a small percentage of UCHealth employees are fired or walk off the job, their departure could be significant. Im concerned that the people who are vaccinated and are going to stay are going to take the majority of the workload, Thorpe said. We cant even get people now to fill positions. It could get very scary. UCHealth, however, states that over the past six months, more than 4,400 new employees, including 1,100 new nurses, have been hired. Our new employee orientations often have hundreds of people in each class, and today, we have about 7 percent more employees than at this time last year, UCHealth said in a statement. These new employees are making a difference, but especially when our hospitals are as full as they are right now, recruiting employees and retaining our current employees are top priorities for us. However, its not only UCHealth employees that refuse the vaccine that may soon join the ranks of the unemployed. A partial list of other U.S. hospital systems that have mandated or plan to mandate vaccinations for their employees includes Allegheny Health Network (19,000 employees) in Pennsylvania, Banner Health Network (52,000) in Arizona, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center (13,000) in New Hampshire, Kaiser Permanente (216,000) in California, Ascension Health (160,000) in Missouri, Advocate Aurora Health (75,000) in Illinois, Bay State Health (12,000) in Massachusetts, and New York-Presbyterian (20,000) in New York. Ballad Health Care CEO Alan Levine told reporters that mandating shots on the 22-hospital systems remaining 38 percent of unvaccinated workers would likely worsen an ongoing nursing shortage. While at least one media outlet referred to those medical professionals who refuse to take the vaccines as unlikely to be hesitant because of their knowledge and medical training, several nurses interviewed by The Epoch Times said its their scientific training that gives them pause. The nurse in Washington said theres a lot of distrust of the vaccine and the media narrative safe and effective. There are a lot of credible doctors out there, she said, and theyre being shunned by the medical community because they oppose the mRNA shots. Another registered nurse, in Virginia, said she chose to give notice to her employer rather than be compelled to take the vaccine. This is a new type of vaccinean mRNA vaccine that has never been used on humans before, she told The Epoch Times on condition of anonymity. Its different from any of the other vaccines. I am not against vaccines, she said. I encourage people to get vaccines that have been studied for years. I dont think Im being hypocritical by saying Im pro-vaccine, but not pro this vaccine. Like Thorpe, the nurse said COVID-19 vaccine mandates will make the shortage of health care workers much worse. Who is going to take care of people with the [COVID-19] influx? You can only work short-staffed to a degree without compromising patient safety, she said. To illustrate her point, the nurse said she was recently offered a position at a health care facility without an interview ever taking place. The offer was rescinded when she refused to comply with the companys vaccine mandate. Ive been in health care over 10 years. Ive never been given a job offer prior to an interview, she said. Currently, there are nearly 4 million registered nurses in the United States. However, the need to hire thousands more qualified staff was present even before the pandemic. Without decisive action, nurses will practice under increased stress. As the health care system is strained by an aging population and broadened access to public health care, it will be nurses that feel the weight of patient responsibility on their shoulders, according to the American Nurses Association (ANA). The ANA adds that by 2022, there will be far more registered nurse jobs than any other profession. With more than 500,000 seasoned registered nurses (RNs) anticipated to retire by 2022, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects the need for 1.1 million new RNs to replace those that have retired and to avoid a nursing shortage. According to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), the United States will also see an estimated shortage of 37,800 to 124,000 physicians by 2034, including shortfalls in both primary and specialty care. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted many of the deepest disparities in health and access to health care services and exposed vulnerabilities in the health care system, said AAMC President and CEO David J. Skorton in a statement. To bridge the gap, hospitals and health care systems now offer various incentives to lure qualified nursing staff. At Duke University Hospital in North Carolina, for example, a recent job posting sought an experienced RN Clinical Team Lead with a $15,000 sign-on bonus. Nationwide, a skilled RN can earn anywhere from $70,000 to $130,000, and even more in states such as California. In Arizona, there are currently 75,600 total nurses to serve an aging population that continues to grow. Ann-Marie Alameddin, president and CEO of the Arizona Hospital and Health Care Association, said the shortage is mainly due to nurse retirement and normal attrition, as well as COVID-19 burnout. Only a handful of hospitals in Arizona currently require a COVID-19 vaccine as a condition of employment, Alameddin told The Epoch Times. This is becoming a pandemic of the unvaccinated, she said, and likened those employees who get vaccinated to honoring a social contract to keep people safe. Jennifer Bridges, a former nurse at Houston Methodist Hospital, said: The thing thats really scary is now [hospitals] are mandating [the vaccine], like everywhere. I mean, nurses and other staff are contacting me from so many different states and all over the place right now. And a lot of them are not going to take [the vaccine] or theyre getting fired or seeking an exemption. A lot of times they deny exemptions, so its just going create more of a shortage all the way around the board, Bridges said. In June, a federal judge threw out a lawsuit brought by 117 employees at Houston Methodist who were suing the hospital system over its COVID-19 vaccine requirement. The social cost of the vaccine mandates being felt, however, has nothing to do with public health or safety, the nurse in Washington said. Its really shocking and devastating to me. Im going to lose a whole number of [vaccinated] people I consider friends. I feel like Im going through this feeling of grief. Im really scared what this means for society, she said. Zachary Stieber contributed to this report. New York State Senator Brian Benjamin, right, and State Senator John Liu, second from left, attend the "Voting is Justice Rally," in New York, on June 20, 2021. (Brittainy Newman/AP Photo) NY Governor Hochul Chooses NY Senator Brian Benjamin as Lieutenant Governor Gov. Kathy Hochul announced today that state Senator Brian Benjamin, a Democrat from Harlem, will be the lieutenant governor of New York, the second-highest position in the state. Hochul, a Democrat, was sworn in as the first female governor on Tuesday, following former Gov. Andrew Cuomos resignation after his involvement in a sexual harassment scandal. According to the governors official website, Hochul and Benjamin have worked together in the past on issues such as fighting the opioid epidemic, improving addiction recovery programs, helping minority and women-owned business enterprises, and giving easier voting access to New Yorkers. I believe that governing is about working together. Teamwork is the essence of effective leadership, and it is more important than ever as we confront the urgent problems facing the state, Hochul said. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul speaks to reporters after a ceremonial swearing-in ceremony at the state Capitol in Albany, N.Y., on Aug. 24, 2021. (Hans Pennink/AP Photo) My administration is going to attract the best and the brightestpeople who share my values of working hard for the people of this state and who will get the job doneand that includes the newest member Senator Brian Benjamin who has agreed to serve as my Lieutenant Governor. There is so much work to do, and I am grateful to have him by my side as we implement our vision for a safer, healthier and fairer New York, she added. Benjamin, 44, was born in Harlem Hospital and is a son of Caribbean immigrants. He is a graduate of Brown University and Harvard University and previously served as New York State Senator for District 30, which incorporates Harlem, East Harlem, and the Upper West Side. He is involved heavily with Harlems community and has, in the past, worked to develop over 1,000 units of affordable housing in his district, which are said to be environmentally sustainable. I want to thank Governor Hochul for trusting me with the incredible honor of serving alongside her as Lieutenant Governor, Benjamin said after it was officially announced that he would become lieutenant governor. Governor Hochul is a collaborator who makes sure everyone has a seat at the table, and, like me, is laser focused on listening to the needs of New Yorkers and empowering local leaders. We have a strong history of collaboration that will help us to hit the ground running immediately as we help guide New York through this challenging moment in history. Benjamin is also a member of Harlems First Corinthian Baptist Church. His influence in the city could help bolster support for the new governor, as more than a third of the states 13.4 million registered voters live in New York City. Benjamin ran for New York City comptroller this year but didnt succeed. He is currently serving as senior assistant majority leader in the Senate and is also chair of the budget and revenue committee. A morning commuter walks in front of the China Central Television (CCTV) building in Beijing, China, on Dec. 2, 2015. (Damir Sagolj/Reuters) Ofcom Fines Chinese Broadcaster Over Forced Confession Programs UK broadcast regulator Ofcom has fined a Chinese state broadcaster a further 200,000 ($273,000) over two programs aired in the UK that contained forced confessions. CGTN, previously known as CCTV, is an international English-language satellite news channel owned by the Chinese regime and directly controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Ofcom revoked CGTNs broadcast license back in February after campaigners, angered by forced confessions aired in the UK, pointed out that licensing to corporations effectively run by the CCP could be in violation of UK law. Ofcom also found the broadcaster in violation of its standards for various programs going back several years but had yet to mete out fines for some of the violations. Today, Ofcom announced it was handing China Star Sun Limited two fines of 100,000 ($136,000) each in relation to complaints brought by Simon Cheng, a former UK consulate general employee in Hong Kong, and Swedish book publisher Gui Minhai. Cheng was tortured and forced to make a TV confession when he was detained for 15 days in August 2019 by mainland Chinese police. Simon Cheng on March 31, 2020. (Courtesy of Simon Cheng) Gui, who sold books critical of Chinas political leadership while based in Hong Kong, was detained by mainland police in 2018 and was also forced to make TV appearances confessing his alleged offences. Ofcom said in a statement emailed to the Epoch Times: Following investigation, we upheld two complaints after we found the individuals concerned were unfairly treated and had their privacy unwarrantably infringed. Among other things, CGTN failed to obtain their informed consent to be interviewed. In addition, material facts which cast serious doubt on the reliability of their alleged confessions were left out of the programmes. Given the seriousness of these breaches, we have imposed two financial penalties of 100,000 each, totalling 200,000. Ofcom this year also fined the Chinese broadcaster 125,000 ($171,000) for serious violation of UK impartiality laws during its coverage of pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong. It also fined them a further 100,000 ($136,000) fine for airing a forced confession extracted from British citizen Peter Humphrey in 2013. Back on the Airwaves? Ofcom revoked CGTNs broadcast on something of a technicality back in February: the fact that the owner of the licence, China Star Media Limited, did not have editorial control, which is in violation of UK law. Significantly, however, when CGTN applied to transfer the license to another parent corporation with appropriate editorial control, Ofcom refused. Ofcom said it would be in breach of the law to be controlled by a body which is ultimately controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. UK broadcasting laws do not allow licences for media controlled by political bodies. Most European countries are signed up to an agreement to accept each others broadcasting licences, having to swallow differences in regulatory standards. Without its UK licence, CGTN temporarily lost the right to broadcast across Europe. A few weeks later, however, they got a license from the French regulator. Last week, Chinese media declared that CGTN was now back on the air in the UK via that licence. However, it appears to be available only to a very limited number of viewers via internet-based television. Safeguard Defenders, a human rights group that has been challenging CGTNs broadcasts in Europe, say that CGTN doesnt have a licensing problem, but a PR problem. They wrote in an Aug. 24 article, The problem for CGTN to air in the UK has therefore not been a licensing issue but rather that none of the main TV providers in the UK have been willing to air CGTN after it both lost its license and [was] convicted for a long list of severe breaches of UK broadcasting law. Lily Zhou and Alexander Zhang contributed to this report A crime scene is marked by the Irvine Police Department in Irvine, Calif., on May 5, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times) Orange County Sheriffs Department Arrests 4 More Suspects Connected to String of Burglaries The Orange County Sheriffs Department announced on Aug. 24 the arrest of four more suspects related to a string of burglaries across the county. The departments Directed Enforcement Team found the suspects while they were burglarizing a residential home in the city of Irvine on Blue Note St. on Aug. 23 at approximately 9:30 pm. The homeowners returned home during the burglary, and the burglars attempted to flee the scene in two different vehicles but were blocked by deputies. The suspects were later identified as Johan Martin Rivera Zambrano, 31, Tonathiu Enrique Najera Torres, 44, Jorge Damian Hernandez Barraga, 28, and Diego Aguilar Gonzalez, 30, with all the suspects having an unknown city of residence. Video of the incident online shows a struggle between deputies and the alleged burglars before they were taken into custody. The four individuals arrested at the crime scene are believed to be connected to the other two burglars arrested by the sheriffs department Aug. 14, where $250,000 of stolen jewelry was found in the getaway car. OCSD didnt find stolen goods this time as the burglary was interrupted. The Directed Enforcement Team, through their ongoing investigation, has determined that the suspects are related to numerous burglaries that occurred throughout Orange County, Orange County Sheriffs Department spokesman Sergeant Ryan Anderson told The Epoch Times. We also do believe that they are related to the burglary suspects who were arrested back on August 14. In regards to the Irvine arrest, the department learned on further investigation that one of the suspects was used as a lookout during the crime, and also switched the license plates on one of their cars to avoid detection by police. Burglary and prying tools were also found in and outside of the vehicles, the department said. After their arrest, the suspects provided false names, and police later learned that three of the four suspects had outstanding warrants from Los Angeles for burglary-related charges. While recent burglaries have affected Newport Beach and Irvine, the majority have been located in South Orange County, including the cities of Laguna Hills, San Juan Capistrano, and Rancho Santa Margarita. The investigation is still ongoing to determine whether or not there are more suspects involved, Anderson said. Margaret Ng (L), Lee Cheuk-yan (C), and Figo Chan (R), the convener of the local pro-democracy group Civil Human Rights Front, speak to reporters outside of the West Kowloon court building in Hong Kong, on April 16, 2021. (Sung Pi-lung/The Epoch Times) Organiser of Hong Kong Tiananmen Anniversary Rally Investigated by National Security Police HONG KONGThe pro-democracy group that organizes Hong Kongs annual June 4 rally to commemorate those who died in the bloody Tiananmen Square crackdown in 1989 is being investigated by national security police on suspicion of collusion with foreign forces. Police sent a letter to the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China requesting information about its membership, finances, and activities by Sept. 7, according to a copy the group sent to reporters. Similar letters were sent to several individuals and associations that are members of the alliance, the group said. Police did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The letters accused the alliance of being an agent of foreign forces. Failure to provide the information by the deadline could result in a $12,840 fine and six months in jail, the letter said. The group said in July that it had laid off staff members to ensure their safety and that half of its committee members had resigned. Its ridiculous that the police accused the alliance of being an agent of foreign forces, alliance vice-chairwoman Chow Hang Tung told Reuters. It has nothing to do with any foreign agents nor has it received any instructions from foreign countries. Albert Ho (top L) and Lee Cheuk-yan (top C) of the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, speak while holding candles before entering Victoria Park in Hong Kong, on June 4, 2020. (Anthony Wallace/AFP via Getty Images) Alliance leaders Albert Ho and Lee Cheuk-yan are already in jail over their roles in anti-government protests that roiled the city in 2019. The investigation comes days after Civil Human rights Front (CHRF), the group that organizes Hong Kongs annual July 1 rally and galvanized millions to take part in street protests in 2019, disbanded after it was investigated by police. It also marks the latest blow to the opposition movement, which has come under immense pressure since Beijing imposed a national security law last year that punishes broadly defined crimes, such as collusion, with up to life in prison. Since then, scores of opposition politicians and activists have been arrested, jailed, or fled into exile. Civil society groups have also disbanded, including the Professional Teachers Union, after it was criticized by Chinese state media. Critics of the law say it is being used to crush dissent, an assertion authorities in Beijing and Hong Kong reject. News of the police inquiry casts a shadow over the future of the June 4 rally in Hong Kong, where thousands of people gather to light candles for the pro-democracy demonstrators killed by Chinese troops in Beijing. Authorities banned the rally this year, citing coronavirus restrictions, and deployed thousands of police across the city to prevent people gathering. By Jessie Pang A program assistant at an adult care center helps her elderly patient. Cuts in cost-of-living adjustments impact retirees, making it more of a challenge to pay for health care services. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) Pennsylvania to Renew Human Services Contract Despite Complaints Despite hearing from Pennsylvanians who say they are getting the run-around when trying to get services for elderly or disabled adults through third-party service provider Maximus, Pennsylvanias Department of Human Services wants to expand the companys role. Pennsylvanians gave testimony on Monday at the state House in Harrisburg, a joint, bipartisan hearing of the following committees was held: House Aging and Older Adult Services; House Human Services; Senate Aging and Youth and Senate Health and Human Services. Imagine trying to bring a loved one home from the hospital for hospice care, but waiting so many months to hear back on approval that the loved one dies in the hospital before any service is obtained. Or trying to keep a sick family member at home, but because it is so difficult to navigate the approval process, their health declines while waiting for answers and home care is no longer an option. These stories were shared during the hearing. Those seeking financial assistance must contact independent enrollment broker Maximus to set up hospice services, transition from home or hospital to a nursing home, or like Tammy Schwab of Mercer County, set up in-home care. Schwab is caregiver and mother to Teneille, age 20, who lost nursing services partly due to COVID-19 in September. Schwab has been trying to arrange new nursing services so she can return to work while he daughter receives care. Teneille has multiple disabilities including a chromosome disorder, muscle, and mobility issues. She requires full-time care and help with everyday tasks such as eating and dressing. When she applied through Pennsylvania Independent Enrollment Broker (PA IEB), operated by Maximus, a phone agent hung up on her and another promised to send an application packet but never did, Schwab testified. She called back many times, retelling her complicated story and finally receiving a packet of papers. She filled out the packet, sent it back, and again waited to hear from PA IEB. Hearing nothing, she called again and found they had no record of her previous calls and lost her packet. They mailed out another packet. Eventually, she heard back, first that she hadnt filled out the packet properly, and later that services were denied, but she could appeal. Now, 11 months later, through more rounds of lost paperwork and phone calls, Schwab has gotten nowhere. Without care for her daughter, she cant return to work. At this point, I feel like Im failing my child, because I cant physically perform her physical therapy. Because she doesnt have a nurse, and because of COVID, she cant go to school, Schwab said. And then the school district stopped paying the physical therapist to come to the house. Because I didnt have services to send her to school, they ceased the other services as well, Schwab said. The whole system is wrong. Before any of this happened, Schwab injured her arm and requires surgery which will be delayed until she can arrange nursing for her daughter. She can only use one arm to feed, bathe and change her adult daughters diaper. You call in. You leave a voicemail on a computer. And you pray to God that someone who cares stumbles across it and forwards it to the next department, Schwab said. Its not the first time the Pennsylvania Senate has held a hearing about poor service from Maximus. A 2016 hearing detailed how Maximus lost paperwork repeatedly, denied receiving mail even when a senator had a valid delivery receipt, and sent out robocalls to seniors. If a senior hung up on the prerecorded robocall three times, Maximus assumed they didnt want services. The robocall problem was resolved, according to 2016 testimony. New Contract for Maximus Maximus is in the process of negotiating a new procurement contract through the Department of Human Services to continue enrollment work and take on additional duties. The company did not have a representative at the hearing. Maximus is proud of our decades-long work with the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services to improve the lives of individuals and families. Our dedicated and passionate team of experts takes a comprehensive, person-centered approach to health and human services in every aspect of our work serving the people of Pennsylvania. Maximus is aware that the federal government rules require eligibility assessment to be independent of Medicaid service delivery, Eileen Cassidy Rivera, Maximus vice president of public relations and communications, told The Epoch Times in an email. The company has had contracts with Pennsylvania since 1986, Cassidy said, starting with its first state contract with the Superior Court of Pennsylvania and in 1989, with the Erie County Domestic Relations office. In 2012, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) directed states like Pennsylvania to separate enrollment and assessment services from the delivery of Medicaid reimbursable services. The federal government raised concerns about a potential conflict of interest with one agency handling enrollment and assessment services as well as providing Medicaid reimbursable services. In Pennsylvania, the 52 county-level Area Agency on Aging (AAA) offices handled enrollment, assessments, and Medicaid reimbursable services. Then in 2016, Maximus took over enrollments. In the new contract, Maximus is expected to also take over assessments, while the AAA will continue to provide Medicaid reimbursable services working with managed care organizations. The new contract may mean many AAA workers across Pennsylvania, who currently conduct face-to-face and often in-home assessments, would lose their jobs. These are the people who intervene when applicants have trouble navigating Maximus. Awarding Maximus a contract that expands its scope of work with Pennsylvanias seniors would be a bad decision for seniors, their families, and the workers who support them, Steve Catanese, President of SEIU Local 668, the union representing AAA workers told The Epoch Times. Maximus has a long, documented history of failure when it comes to serving Americas most vulnerable citizens. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania should not award this contract to Maximus and, instead, keep services in the hands of local community aging offices where this vital work is already being performed with more expertise, care, and cost-efficiency. The AAA applied to offer services for the next contract, but Gov. Tom Wolfs administration already decided to go with the Maximus expansion. Its unclear when the new contract will go into effect because the AAA filed a bid protest with the state to put the contract on hold, typically for 60 days, which would be up until Sept. 28. My primary focus is ensuring that we have personal, responsive, and knowledgeable brokers working with our seniors and adults with disabilities, state Senator Michele Brooks, Chairwoman of the Health and Human Services Committee, told The Epoch Times. They need local, individualized support that will never be accomplished by a 1-800-nowhere number. The AAA has provided these services for many years and were paid under $100 per successful enrollment; yet, the state replaced them with a call center and a multi-million dollar contract with Maximus thats quality fails in comparison. Bucks County opened a phone hub in January for people unable to get the assistance they need, testified Bucks County Commissioner Diane Ellis-Marseglia, who is also a social worker. The Bucks County Area Agency on Aging has received 842 calls since January from people asking for help with Maximus. Its unbelievable [the AAAs] have to spend double time doing something they could have done on their own, Ellis-Marseglia said. The people calling, who have to deal with Maximus, are people at the worst point of their lives. Some of them were just widowed and they were not the person dealing with the paperwork in their family. Now they are trying to get assistance for themselves and they dont know where everything is. Sometimes theyre sick, or in a hospital. Lots of times they are struggling with dementia. And we cant assume everyone has a child living in their county. Some people are truly all by themselves, and theres where the AAAs have come in and been like a family member. They literally will crawl under the bed, pull out those boxes and find the missing bank statements that are out there. That isnt what happens when you call Maximus. The Department of Human Services did not respond to requests for comment. A nurse prepares a Pfizer BioNTech COVID-19 vaccination as part of a vaccine drive by the Fernandeno Tataviam Band of Mission Indians in Arleta, Los Angeles, Calif., on Aug. 23, 2021. (Lucy Nicholson/Reuters) Pfizer COVID-19 Vaccine Linked to Heart Inflammation Risk in Real-World Study Real-world data from Israel linked Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine to an elevated risk of heart inflammation, researchers said this week. Israeli scientists found that vaccination likely caused myocarditis, or heart inflammation, in one to five people per 100,000 who wouldnt have otherwise suffered the condition. However, they also said that getting COVID-19 was linked to a higher riskwith 11 inflammation events out of 100 attributed to the disease. Most of the heart inflammation cases post-vaccination were in young males. The 21 people who had myocarditis in the vaccinated group had a median age of 25, and 90.9 percent were men. We estimated that the BNT162b2 vaccine resulted in an increased incidence of a few adverse events over a 42-day follow-up period. Although most of these events were mild, some of them, such as myocarditis, could be potentially serious, they said, referring to the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. However, our results indicate that SARS-CoV-2 infection is itself a very strong risk factor for myocarditis, and it also substantially increases the risk of multiple other serious adverse events. These findings help to shed light on the short- and medium-term risks of the vaccine and place them in clinical context. Further studies will be needed to estimate the potential of long-term adverse events. The research analyzed adverse events reported among 884,828 vaccinated people and an equal number of people who didnt receive a vaccine, as well as a cohort of more than 240,000 people who contracted COVID-19. It was published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Aug. 25. Dr. Ran Balicer, of the Clalit Health Services in Tel Aviv, led the research group. They were funded by Harvard Medical School and the Clalit Research Institute. A Pfizer spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email that the company is aware of rare reports of myocarditis and pericarditis, predominantly in male adolescents and young adults, after mRNA COVID-19 vaccination. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines utilize messenger RNA, or mRNA, technology. The spokesperson noted that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention describes the heart inflammation as a rare side effect. Patients have typically rapidly improved with conservative treatment. It is important to note that CDC continues to strongly encourage COVID-19 vaccinations for eligible individuals aged 12 and older. With hundreds of millions of doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine administered globally, the benefit risk profile of our vaccine remains positive, the spokesperson added. The Pfizer vaccine has been found in multiple countries to be associated with an increased risk of heart inflammation, including the United States. U.S. health officials added a warning to the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines in June regarding the higher risk, but have continued recommending them for use, and earlier this week, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave full approval to the Pfizer vaccine. The Pfizer vaccine, as well as shots offered by Moderna and Johnson & Johnson, had previously been made available to the public through emergency use authorization (EUA) from the FDA. The Moderna and Johnson & Johnson shots are currently still under EUA. Dr. Grace Lee, of the Stanford University School of Medicine, highlighted how the risk of myocarditis was higher among COVID-19 patients than the vaccinated in an editorial accompanying the new study. What is even more compelling about these data is the substantial protective effect of vaccines with respect to adverse events such as acute kidney injury, intracranial hemorrhage, and anemia, probably because infection was prevented. Furthermore, the persons with SARS-CoV-2 infection appeared to be at substantially higher risk for arrhythmia, myocardial infarction, deep-vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism, pericarditis, intracerebral hemorrhage, and thrombocytopenia than those who received the BNT162b2 vaccine, Lee wrote. Not everyone was enthused by the research, however. Dr. Vinay Prasad said issues in the study included the lack of a one-dose cohort, as Pfizers regimen requires two doses, and it not identifying people who recovered from COVID-19 but didnt get vaccinated. You need to report separately for boys aged 16-24, who face a vastly higher rate of myocarditis and may not gain much beyond 1 dose, Prasad, an associate professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the University of CaliforniaSan Francisco, wrote on Twitter. People disembark from a chartered plane and board waiting busses, after being evacuated from Afghanistan, during arrival at Melsbroek Military Airport in Melsbroek, Belgium, on Aug. 25, 2021. (Olivier Matthys/AP Photo) Poland, Belgium End Afghan Evacuation as Clock Ticks Down WARSAW, PolandPoland and Belgium ended their evacuations from Afghanistan, but other European nations vowed Wednesday to press on for as long as possible, as the clock ticks down on a dramatic airlift of people fleeing Taliban rule ahead of a full American withdrawal. President Joe Biden said he will stick to his Aug. 31 deadline for completing the U.S. pullout. European allies pressed for more time but, as a practical matter, will need to end their evacuations before the last American troops leave. Several countries have not said when they plan to end their operations. The Taliban wrested back control of Afghanistan nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Their return to power has pushed many Afghans to flee, fearing reprisals and a possible return to their brutal rule. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned U.S. citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain, and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday morning not to go to the airport, where there was a very high threat of a terrorist attack. Australia has helped evacuate around 4,000 people, and Prime Minister Scott Morrison noted the increasingly dangerous situation. That danger and those risks have been increasing each and every day as we always knew they would, and thats why weve been moving with the haste that we have, he added. The Taliban said they would allow normal commercial air traffic to resume when they assume control of the airport after Aug. 31, but its unclear whether airlines would be willing to fly into an airport controlled by the terrorists. With the deadline looming, Marcin Przydacz, a Polish deputy foreign minister, said Poland had evacuated its last group. We cannot risk the lives of our diplomats and of our soldiers any longer, Przydacz said. A number of troops will remain briefly to wrap up operations, Przydacz said. Poland has used over a dozen planes to bring hundreds of evacuees to Warsaw. Some later traveled on to other countries. Hours later, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said his country ended its evacuation flights carrying people from Kabul to Pakistan. Belgium will continue to repatriate to our country those people evacuated in the days ahead, De Croo said. More than 1,100 people have been flown to Belgium. People disembark from a Belgian military plane, after being evacuated from Afghanistan, as it arrives at Melsbroek Military Airport in Melsbroek, Belgium, on Aug. 25, 2021. (Olivier Matthys/AP Photo) The Czech Republic declared its own evacuation mission complete last week, and Hungary said it plans to end its operations soon. Due to extreme tension on the ground and the scheduled departure of American forces, these evacuations are a true race against time, French government spokesman Gabriel Attal said Wednesday. He said that his countrys evacuation would likely end a few hours, maybe a few days ahead of the American departure. U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots, assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 24, 2021. (Master Sgt. Donald R. Allen/U.S. Air Force via AP) The White House said Wednesday around 19,000 people were evacuated from Kabul over the last 24 hours. It said the United States has evacuated or facilitated the evacuation of around 82,300 people since the Taliban takeover in mid-August. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation, a figure that suggests that part of the U.S.-led airlift could be completed before the Tuesday deadline. The State Department estimated about 6,000 Americans had wanted to leave when the airlift began Aug. 14. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the military will continue to evacuate needed populations all the way to the end. But he added that in the final days and hours there will have to be a balance as the 5,400 troops in Kabul and critical systems also need to be withdrawn. In Kabul itself, life has been slow to return to normal, but many peopleespecially womenare staying inside, fearful of the Taliban or the general instability. Kabul Mayor Dawood Sultanzoy said many city workers have yet to return to work, with the absence of experienced staff hindering normal operations. But he said the city has begun to remove the blast walls that became ubiquitous in recent years as the Taliban and other armed groups carried out bombings and other attacks against the Western-backed government. The Taliban say the decades of war are over and there will be no revenge attacks on people who opposed them. But there have been reports of summary executions and other abuses, and many Afghans fear a return to the Talibans hard-line Islamic rule of the 1990s, when women were largely confined to their homes. Chaos at the Kabul airport has transfixed the world after the Taliban captured most of Afghanistan in a matter of days this month. Afghans poured onto the tarmac last week, and some clung to a U.S. military transport plane as it took off, later plunging to their deaths. At least seven people died that day, and another seven died Sunday in a panicked stampede. Hundreds of people run alongside a U.S. Air Force C-17 transport plane, some climbing on the plane, as it moves down a runway of the international airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 16, 2021. (Verified UGC via AP) Thousands have thronged the airport in the days since, and the United States and its allies have worked to speed the evacuation, sometimes flying people out before their paperwork is fully processed and bringing them to transit points. On Wednesday, 51 people landed in Uganda, the first African nation to serve as a transit point. For now, the U.S. military coordinates all air traffic in and out of the Kabul airport. Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen tweeted that people with legal documents will be able to fly out of Kabul airport via commercial flights after the August deadline. On Wednesday, a stream of military planes took off from the airfield as evacuees lined up on the tarmac. The desperate remained outside, some standing knee-deep in sewage and waving identity documents at Western soldiers in hopes of being allowed to go beyond the barbed wire fencing and onto a flight out. While the final withdrawal date just under a week away, analyst Patricia Lewis said the practical deadline for the evacuations to stop was the next couple of days. Theres a huge amount of stuff that has to be done, including getting all the people out who are doing the job and all the equipment, said Lewis, who is the director of the international security program at Chatham House, an international think tank. All of the allies are highly dependent on the U.S. for military cover, particularly air cover, Lewis said. They cant put their own people at risk, so it really depends on when the U.S. starts packing up. A Qantas aircraft takes off from the international terminal of Sydney Airport in Sydney, Australia, on March 19, 2020. (Cameron Spencer/Getty Images) Qantas Aims to Restart International Flights by December Australian airline Qantas expects to resume international flights to key COVID-safe markets by Christmas, including North America, the United Kingdom, and more. This hinges on the Australian governments plan to reopen international borders once an 80 percent COVID-19 vaccination threshold is achieved by the end of the year, the airline said in a statement on Thursday. Qantas Group hopes to restart flights to COVID-safe destinations from mid-December, using Boeing 787s to fly to Singapore, the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom, and Canada; as well as Airbus A330s, Boeing 737s, and A320s for services to Fiji. The carrier also hopes to see the two-way Australia-New Zealand travel bubble restart at the same time. The prospect of flying overseas might feel a long way off, especially with New South Wales and Victoria in lockdown, but the current pace of the vaccine rollout means we should have a lot more freedom in a few months time, Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce said. Australia closed its international borders in March 2020. Currently, more than half of the countrys 25 million people are in lockdown amid outbreaks of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as the novel coronavirus Delta variant. Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce is seen during a Business Council of Australia breakfast in the Mural Hall at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on March 17, 2021. (Sam Mooy/Getty Images) Joyce said that with Australia on track to achieve 80 percent vaccination coverage by the end of the year, the airline was thinking ahead to prepare for the time when the international borders reopen. This includes training staff and bringing aircraft out of hibernation. The airline also has to get its IT systems ready to help customers prove their vaccination status, which will be required for overseas travel. Based on current data, Qantas Group is preparing for the highly likely chance that key markets will be classed as low-risk countries for vaccinated travellers to visit and return from. At that stage, the Australian government has said reduced quarantine requirements would kick in during Phase C of the countrys roadmap out of the pandemic. We can adjust our plans if the circumstances change, which weve already had to do several times during this pandemic. Some people might say were being too optimistic, but based on the pace of the vaccine rollout, this is within reach and we want to make sure were ready, Joyce said. The airline expects high demands for services on A380 aircraft to London from November 2022, with flights to the west coast of the United States projected to restart sooner, from July 2022. Flights to Hong Kong are hoped to resume in February 2022, and the rest of the Qantas and Jetstar networks are planned to reopen from April 2022. The announcement comes as the airline posted a $2.35 billion (US$1.71 billion) statutory loss due to the pandemic. Queensland Police stop cars in Griffith street Coolangatta at the Queensland border in Coolangatta, Australia, on Aug. 25, 2021. (Chris Hyde/Getty Images) Australian State to Build New Regional COVID-19 Quarantine Facility The government of the Australian state of Queensland announced on Thursday that it has struck a deal with billionaire John Wagner to build a fit-for-purpose regional COVID-19 quarantine facility at Wellcamp, Toowoomba, providing 1,000 beds to ease pressure on the states hotel quarantine system. This comes less than 24 hours after Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk slammed shut its borders for two weeks, citing pressure on the hotel quarantine system. The first 500 beds will be ready by the end of the year, with the remaining 500 expected by the end of the first financial quarter of 2022. Palaszcuk said hotels were not built to specifically deal with the Delta strain of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as the novel coronavirus. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is seen during a press conference at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre in Brisbane, Australia, on Aug. 11, 2021. (AAP Image/Darren England) We need regional quarantine facilities. I have been advocating this for a long, long time. It is a no brainer, she told reporters on Thursday from Toowoomba, where she said works had already commenced. Howard Springs has been a brilliant example. Youve seen our Olympians come back and stay there. Its spread out. Its fresh air for people. People dont have to stay in rooms without balconies. Ive done hotel quarantine myself. There is a constant flow of people coming up and down in the lifts. Our hotels were not meant to be the last line of defence to deal with a global pandemic, the premier said. Australian Olympians (L to R) Kiah Melverton, Chelsea Hodges, Mollie OCallaghan and Meg Harris pose for a photo at Brisbane Airport after undergoing 14 days of mandatory quarantine at Howard Springs in the Northern Territory, in Brisbane, Australia, on Aug. 17, 2021. (Jono Searle/Getty Images) The Queensland government will finance the Wellcamp facility after it failed to get the Commonwealth funding. Instead, the Commonwealth is funding a 1,000-bed facility near Brisbanes international airport in the suburb of Pinkenba. The Commonwealth struck a deal with the Queensland government for the Pinkenba facility in June after Palaszczuks Wellcamp proposal failed to meet the Commonwealths requirements for a fit-for-purpose quarantine facility. The premier said the Wellcamp facility would cost a lot less than the Commonwealths Pinkemba facility, but refused to elaborate, citing the deal was commercial in confidence. Palaszcuk noted that she had been calling for the Wellcamp facility since January. It could have been built by now, but we are going to have this facility, starting to be up and running by the end of the year. Prime Minister Scott Morrison at a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Mick Tsikas/AAP Image) Meanwhile, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Palaszczuk had been at liberty to build the Wellcamp facility for months. Weve made it very clear that that facility did not meet the national guidelines and thats why were going forward together at Pinkenba, Morrison told reporters in Canberra on Thursday. But the Queensland Government was always been in a position to go ahead with that facility, if thats what they wish to do, and to have people quarantine there rather than in hotel facilities. He added, They could have done that months ago. Wagner Corporation will build the facility, with the accommodation modules to be manufactured in Queensland. The Queensland Government will operate the facility once it is up and running. John Wagner said his side and the Queensland government were working through final design criteria to ensure the facility was the best it could be. He noted that it would provide local jobs during the construction and operating phases, including staff to provide at least 3,000 meals a day. 2019 | R | 2h 12min Bonnie and Clyde (1967) could have been made in todays post-truth era, considering it glorified two notorious outlaws by having the exceptionally beauteous Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty portray them. Also, communism (which is what post-truth is a harbinger of) is represented in the 1967 movie. How? It supported the notion of Bonnie and Clyde being laudable robbin hoods, who robbed the Depression-era bankers, who were driving America into the ditch of economic ruin. Both the insidious institutional redistribution of wealth and the violent gangster robbery version are inherently communist. And communism is part of the current zeitgeist againonly its got a few new monikers. Ironically, in these confused times, here comes a more traditionalist take: In Netflixs 2019 The Highwaymen, a subdued, slow-burn, somber police procedural, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow are presented as coldblooded murderers. The Highwaymen also reestablishes how it was with the more upright social mores of that era, and feels vastly more realistic than its famous 1967 cinematic predecessor. Maney Gault (Woody Harrelson, L) and Frank Hamer (Kevin Costner) in The Highwaymen. (Netflix) The Doings Texas Governor Ma Ferguson (Kathy Bates) hires two former Texas Rangers to come out of retirement: the legendary rifleman Frank Hamer (Kevin Costner) and his former partner Maney Gault (Woody Harrelson). Texas Governor Ma Ferguson (Kathy Bates) surrounded by underlings in The Highwaymen. (Netflix) Following Bonnie and Clydes 1934 Midwest killing spree, Hamer and Gault track the deadly duo across Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and eventually to the couples famous bloody death by machine-gun ambush in backwoods Louisiana. Naturally, because this is a film called The Highwaymen and not Bonnie and Clyde, when it comes to Bonnie (Emily Brobst) and Clyde (Edward Bossert), these two maddeningly elusive, ruthless outlaws are intentionally sidelined. Director John Lee Hancock creates a powerful air of mystery and danger by never showing the killers visages until the last minute. This ramps up a visceral, human response to the fact that here are basically two demonically possessed, sweet-faced kids with lethal weaponry stashed under the dashboard. The following relentless rain of lead that reduces them to macabre dancing puppets in the metal kill-box of their handsome new Ford V8 is all the more powerful. Gault, Hamer, and a posse of lawmen ambush Bonnie and Clyde in The Highwaymen. (Netflix) While the pacing is slow, tension is nevertheless high throughout, which is a difficult thing to pull off. The most powerful scene comes when Hamer tracks down Clydes father, Henry (William Sadler), a mechanic, who insists his boy wasnt born under a bad sign. All he did was steal a chicken. Hamer observes that there had to have been something dark inside the boy that caused him to steal that chicken in the first place. Then follows Hamers own confession in Costners riveting monologue: His character had originally wanted to join the seminary, but after surviving three shotgun buckshot blasts, when his chance at retribution came, he shot his perpetrator dead on his porch, and there went his priesthood plans down the drain. Finally seeing eye-to-eye about destiny, Clydes heartbroken dad implores Hamer to end it quickly. Actually, theres another powerful scene: the shot-up Ford, towed through the town, is swarmed by insane fans hysterically elbowing past cops to snatch souvenirswatches, earringsoff their heroes bloody bodies like scavenging hyenas. Bonnie and Clydes funerals are like mini-Woodstocks. As the corpses of Bonnie and Clyde are towed through a Southern town, their fans mob the car in The Highwaymen. (Netflix) The Acting and the Ethics Both Costner and Harrelson are steeped in classic American lawman ethos. Costner played Elliot Ness, who nabbed Al Capone in 1987s The Untouchables; Harrelson played bounty hunter Carson Wells in 2007s No Country for Old Men, not to mention his True Detective series with Matthew McConaughey. Harrelsons Gault often ponders whether their present mission falls within the purview of old men (but not without his trademark eye-twinkle), while Costner is an old-fashioned, steely, Wyatt Earp-type lawman-unto-death. Frank Hamer (Kevin Costner), in a gun shop, buys a considerable load of lethal gear and ammo in The Highwaymen. (Netflix) There are many well-written exchanges between Hamer and Gault over evolving lawman ethics, the curse of taking a life, and throughout, damning commentary on the media turning killers into cult heroes. Theres a lot of shame on yous to reporters offering cash for interviews. Have a look at The Highwaymen and then 2014s Nightcrawler to compare and contrast the giant gap between old and new journalism ethics. Old is better. Hamer and Gault are cut-and-dried, but whats tragic about Bonnie and Clyde was revealed by my looking up a poem written by Bonnie and then reflecting on how the paths of good and evil can turn on a dime. Heres an excerpt. I recommend reading the whole thing. The Story of Bonnie and Clyde They call them cold-blooded killers; They say they are heartless and mean; But I say this with pride, That I once knew Clyde When he was honest and upright and clean. But the laws fooled around, Kept taking him down And locking him up in a cell, Till he said to me, Ill never be free, So Ill meet a few of them in hell. The Highwaymen Director: John Lee Hancock Starring: Kevin Costner, Woody Harrelson, Kathy Bates, John Caroll Lynch, William Sadler, Emily Brobst, Edward Bossert Running Time: 2 hours, 12 minutes MPAA Rating: R Release Date: March 15, 2019 Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars A view of Bagram Air Base after all U.S. and NATO troops left, some 43 miles north of Kabul, Afghanistan, on July 2, 2021. (Zakeria Hashimi/AFP via Getty Images) Russia, Belarus Plan Massive Anti-NATO Military Exercise in Wake of Afghan Defeat Commentary Vladimir Putin has emerged as a major beneficiary of President Joe Bidens surrender in Afghanistan and his backing off sanctions against the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. Russia and Belarus have announced plans to conduct a joint military exercise from Sept. 10 to 16, called Zapad 2021, which takes on added significance due to NATOs humiliation in Afghanistan and the lack of confidence in the alliance among its easternmost members. They say it will point out the futility of NATO reinforcing Poland and the Baltics in the first major show of force since Bidens reckless withdrawal. More than 200,000 troops, 80 aircraft, 760 military vehicles, and 15 ships will be involved in the exercise, the Russian news site Gazeta.Ru reported. Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Main Military-Political Directorate of the Russian Armed Forces, told a Moscow radio station: They want to tell us that there is a projection of a military bloc for the Kaliningrad enclave so that we feel and understand it. We are ready for these hints and made it clear to them. I believe that during the Zapad-2021 exercise, we will once again try to show our partners that there is no need to do this, there is no need to bother the Russian bear. Russia and Belarus have held similar exercises in prior years, but this exercise takes on added significance in the wake of Bidens humiliating performance and leadership in Afghanistan. Earlier this year, the Polish military suffered a major defeat in a wargame that exposed its vulnerability to attack by Russian forces in the adjacent Kaliningrad region, which exposed the weakness of NATOs eastern flank. Russia and Belarus are also in discussions to deploy Russias S-400 surface-to-air missiles to Belarusian territory, which aim to deny NATO aircraft access to the airspace over Poland and the Baltics. Bidens hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan has the United States most vulnerable NATO allies thinking about alternatives. It has visibly shaken their confidence. This is particularly true of Poland and the Baltic States, which have felt threatened by Russia since it invaded Crimea in 2014. Instead of projecting strength in the face of Russian aggression, NATO now projects weakness, something that Putin will likely exploit. This kind of troop withdrawal caused chaos. Chaos causes additional suffering, Artis Pabriks, Latvias defense minister, told local radio earlier this month, according to The Financial Times, noting that such long-term missions were unlikely in the future. This era is over. Unfortunately, the West, and Europe in particular, are showing they are weaker globally. Poles are nervous about the defeat in Afghanistan and worry that theyll feel the consequences on their borders with the Russian bear breathing down their necks. A post from an unidentified ordinary Pole that appeared on the Polish news website Wirtualna Polska lashed out at Biden and NATO: Shame on the USA and NATO! Thousands of young people have died, and now they are running like rats from a sinking ship. Another poster warned that history would repeat itself and that Poland was on its own. A leading Polish journalist warned that Russian provocations to undermine NATO would likely increase. The number of military provocations will increase, not only in the airspace, but also in the Baltic Sea, where Russia is strengthening its navy. Moscow is also likely to try to undermine the cohesion of the Alliance, or even launch a targeted attack on one of its weak members, testing the reaction of others, Grzegorz Janiszewski wrote in the Polish news magazine Do Rzeczy. Biden has left our allies on NATOs eastern flank feeling as though theyre on their own. The destruction of NATOs credibility could make war more likely. Putin has used the Nord Stream 2 pipeline as a wedge to divide NATO. The pipeline circumvents Ukraine and gives Russia leverage over the West to pit it against Ukraine in the Russians favor and is widely considered an aspect of gray-zone warfare. Bidens decision to back down against Putin over the Nord Stream 2 project particularly angered Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, who had been a staunch supporter of Trumps effort to sanction work on the pipeline. And Germanys heir apparent to Chancellor Angela Merkel, Armin Laschet, was blunt about the fallout from the disorganized withdrawal from Afghanistan. This is the greatest debacle that NATO has seen since its foundation, and it is an epochal change that we are facing, Laschet said. Merkel has criticized the fact that German troop deployments in Afghanistan were dependent on the U.S. government. Bidens Afghanistan catastrophe accomplished what Biden claimed would happen if President Donald Trump were reelected. It has discredited NATO. Biden ran for president saying he would work to strengthen the NATO alliance, in contrast to Trump. He even ran an ad that accused the former president of being dangerously incompetent due to his frosty relations with NATO leaders. If we give Donald Trump four more years, we will have a great deal of difficulty of ever being able to recover Americas standing in the world and our capacity to bring nations together, Biden said in the ad. The president claimed in a Democratic debate in July 2019 that the NATO alliance will fall apart if Trump were reelected. However, Biden, a man who spent the Trump years crowing about his support for NATO and condemning the former presidents skepticism of the alliance, has discredited the United States in the eyes of the members of the alliance. I think that what has happened shows that Europe needs to develop this famous strategic autonomy in order to be ready to face challenges that affect us eventually, EU High Representative Josep Borrell of Spain said during an extraordinary videoconference of EU Foreign Ministers, noting that the Afghanistan experience reminds Europe that it needs to make other arrangements for its security. Biden is who he claimed Trump would be. History shows that weakness and appeasement invite wars. Biden has given Putin more in eight months as president than Trump gave in four years. In the late 1990s, Putin is alleged to have said that the way to destroy NATO was from within. It seems that Biden is giving Putin his wish. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. San Jose Passes Vaccine Mandate for Indoor City Events SAN JOSE, Calif.The San Jose City Council unanimously passed Mayor Sam Liccardos urgency ordinance on Aug. 24. The ordinance will require all attendees and staff at events in city-owned facilities to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination prior to entry, and it will not offer an option to use a negative COVID-19 test instead. At the start of the meeting, a group of protesters interrupted. Protestors entered the City Hall chambers, holding signs opposing vaccine mandates, and some individuals refused to wear masks. Mayor Sam Liccardo asked people to put on masks, and he adjourned the meeting for approximately half an hour. People who refused to comply were escorted outside by security. Upon resuming the meeting, the audience capacity was capped to around 20 people, with the remaining in-person speakers waiting in a different room. I certainly appreciate and understand that people are frustrated, said Liccardo, addressing the press during recess. We are all frustrated. This pandemic has gone on so long. Under the mandate, all attendees age 12 and older must either present a vaccine card or use the State of Californias QR code-enabled system. The ordinance specifies that while event staff, volunteers, vendors, and attendees must show proof of vaccination, performers and players are exempt from the requirement. Over a hundred individuals expressed their opinions on the vaccine policy during public comments; one person supported the mandate idea, and the overwhelming majority opposed it. Im not against the vaccine per se; I am against the mandate. I think it should be a personal choice for what happens to our bodies, what we inject into our bodies, said Nan, a resident who didnt give her last name. Speakers raised issues of freedom of choice as well as people who cannot be vaccinated due to health reasons. Some argued that vaccine mandates are violations of their religious beliefs, the Constitution, and the Nuremberg Code. Others compared the mandate to slavery and rules under the Chinese Communist Party, Cuba, and Nazi Germany. Some speakers also threatened to recall the mayor and city council members who vote in favor of the mandate. However, one caller spoke in favor of the proposal. Identified only as Caller 6910 on Zoom, the person said: Its hard to follow such great scientific minds, historians, political geniuses, and social justice warriors, but Im going to give it a shot. I will be the one person to support the mandate. At the end of public comments, city officials addressed some comments they had heard. Theres obviously no surefire of eliminating risk from COVID transmission. We dont live in that world. We live in a world in which we need to take reasonable measures that can reduce risk. This certainly seems like a reasonable measure, said Liccardo. The mayor and council members repeatedly emphasized that the vaccine mandate is only requiring proof of vaccination to attend large indoor events, not requiring residents to be vaccinated. Most importantly, with what we are actually voting on todayas the mayor has reiterated, because there did seem to be a lot of confusion about thatwe are voting to require proof of vaccination for anyone wishing to enter a city-owned facility that is hosting events of 50 people or more. And I absolutely support that, said Councilmember Raul Peralez. Some council members disagreed with public comments equating the vaccine mandate to historical atrocities, calling the comparison difficult or inaccurate. Councilmember Sylvia Arenas asked about the possibility of medical exemptions, but city officials said it would need further discussion. In the evening, after nearly three hours of comments, all 10 council members voted in favor of the mandate. Currently, there is no implementation date, as the mayor explained that event venue operators would need time to adjust. The mayor also told the press that the vaccine mandate, once in effect, will remain until further notice. Council members plan to discuss at a future meeting the possibility of requiring proof of vaccination for indoor dining and to enter certain private-owned facilities. Seniors, Housing, Pandemic Policy: Party Leaders Continue Promises on Day 12 of Election Campaign Day 12 of the federal election campaign saw party leaders focus on a range of issuesfrom seniors, housing, and healthcare to pandemic preparedness and COVID-19 related health measures. Liberals. During a campaign stop in Quebec City on Thursday, Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau vowed to increase federal aid to lower-income seniors if re-elected. He pledged to raise the guaranteed income supplement by $500 for individuals and $750 for senior couples. Trudeau also announced in a press release Wednesday that the government would raise the corporate income tax of Canadas largest banks and insurance companies by 3 percent on all earnings over $1 billion, which would be put toward programs to help more Canadians afford homeownership. The same banks and insurance companies would also be required to share a portion of their profits in a Canada Recovery Dividend. Conservatives. Conservative Leader Erin OToole announced Thursday his party would introduce a safety net for gig economy workers who dont currently qualify for Employment Insurance (EI). He pledged to ensure gig economy companies make contributions equivalent to Canada Pension Plan and EI premiums, to be put into a portable Employee Savings Account every time they pay their workers. OToole also announced Wednesday his party aimed to create more integrated mental health care systems across the country, and promised to boost healthcare transfers to provinces to six percent annually over the next 10 years. His plan also includes encouraging employers to add mental health coverage to their employee benefit plans, creating a nationwide 3-digit suicide prevention hotline, and providing $150 million over three years in grants to nonprofits and charities for mental health and wellness programs. NDP. NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh continued his focus on housing affordability Thursday, with a pledge to help families buy their first home. At a campaign stop in Winnipeg, Singh promised to double the first-time homebuyers tax credit and convert it into a rebate so that buyers can get the money right when they move into their home instead of at tax time. He would also introduce measures to help homeowners lower their mortgage payments. Green Party. Green Party Leader Annamie Paul criticized Canadas pandemic preparedness during a campaign stop in Mississauga on Wednesday, saying the country needs to step up measures to protect against future threats. She said Canada needs to develop the domestic capacity to manufacture pharmaceuticals, have a sufficient stockpile of personal protective equipment, and create an intergovernmental task force to coordinate all the elements of the pandemic to better prepare against any future pandemic threats. Peoples Party. PPC Leader Maxime Bernier issued a statement Thursday on his partys approach to the COVID-19 pandemic. He said if elected, the PPC would focus on protecting the most vulnerable while guaranteeing the freedom of Canadians to make decisions based on informed consent and would reject coercion and discrimination regarding pandemic health measures. His plan includes repealing vaccine mandates or regular testing for federal civil servants and workers, repealing vaccine passports, and opposing other authoritarian measures imposed by provincial governments. Firefighters work among the debris of a collapsed building in the town of Peniscola, Spain, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Eva Manez/Reuters) Spanish Rescuers Pull Body From Collapsed Building, One Still Missing PENISCOLA, SpainFirefighters in the Spanish coastal town of Peniscola found the body of a teenager early on Thursday in the wreckage of a collapsed building and said they were still searching for another missing person. Peniscolas mayor Andres Martinez told Reuters the boy was around 15 years old and had been staying in the three-story building, which collapsed for unknown reasons on Wednesday evening in the region of Valencia on Spains eastern coast. Firefighters work among the debris of a collapsed building in the town of Peniscola, Spain, on Aug. 26, 2021. (Eva Manez/Reuters) Around 140 firefighters and emergency personnel worked through the night on the recovery operation and, around midnight, rescued a man who had been buried in the rubble, the local authorities said. He was completely trapped by a slab and any wrong maneuver would have had fatal consequences, firefighter Carlos Verchili said. By Eva Manez Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen gives a speech after visiting the Navy's 131st Fleet in Keelung, Taiwan, on March 8, 2021. (Ann Wang/Reuters) Taiwan Eyes Jet Fighter Buy Amid Modest Hike in 2022 Defence Spending TAIPEITaiwan announced a more modest pace in defence spending for next year on Aug. 26, but the budget will include $1.44 billion for new fighter jets, as the island bolsters its forces in the face of increased pressure from Beijing. China has stepped up its military activity near Taiwan, including holding assault drills last week near the island, which it regards as Chinese territory to be brought under Beijings control, by force if necessary. President Tsai Ing-wens cabinet is proposing military spending of $16.89 billion for the year starting in January, up from this years budget of $16.27 billion, the government said in a statement. That number includes $1.44 billion for new fighter jets, although not specified by the government, likely referring to F-16s. The United States in 2019 approved an $8 billion sale of F-16 fighter jets to Taiwan, a deal that would bring the islands total to more than 200, the largest F-16 fleet in Asia. The rate of increase would be smaller than the 10 percent rise budgeted for this year, according to Reuters calculations based on government data. In March, China said its 2021 defence spending would rise 6.8 percent from 2020, as the worlds second-largest economy emerges from the repercussions of the coronavirus pandemic. Taiwans proposed defence budget is the third-largest government expenditure for next year, after social welfare and combined spending on education, science, and culture. The budget must be approved by parliament, where Tsais Democratic Progressive Party has a large majority, making the approval easier. Tsai has made modernizing Taiwans armed forceswell-armed, but dwarfed by Chinasand increasing defence spending a priority. Part of that is making Taiwan a porcupine equipped with advanced, highly mobile, weapons to make a Chinese invasion as difficult as possible. By Ben Blanchard and Yimou Lee Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid speaks at his first news conference, in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 17, 2021. (Rahmat Gul/AP Photo) Taliban Condemn Attack at Kabul Airport The Taliban terrorist group on Thursday condemned the bombings at the U.S.-held airport in Kabul. The Islamic Emirate strongly condemns the bombing of civilians at Kabul airport, which took place in an area where U.S. forces are responsible for security, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement. The Islamic Emirate is paying close attention to the security and protection of its people, and evil circles will be strictly stopped, he added. At least two bombings killed and wounded a number of people outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport earlier Thursday, including Americans. U.S. troops, assisted by soldiers from various allies, have been in control of the airport for about two weeks, facilitating evacuations after the Taliban routed the U.S.-backed Afghan government. ISIS claimed responsibility for the bombings, after officials from multiple countries had warned against a possible attack by ISIS-K, an affiliate of the ISIS terrorist group. CENTCOM Commander General Kenneth McKenzie told reporters on Wednesday that ISIS carried out the bombings. The Taliban and ISIS have historically feuded. The United States was relying on the Taliban to control the situation outside the airport, and top U.S. lawmakers said the attack showed that they failed. As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We cant trust the Taliban with Americans security, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Thursday. President Joe Biden must immediately hold the Taliban accountable, added Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.). Biden said last week that weve made clear to the Taliban that any attack on our forces or disruption of our operations at the airport will be met with a swift and forceful response. The White House canceled or postponed a slew of briefings and meetings after the bombings and has said little beyond conveying that Biden has been briefed on them. Military officials confirmed the explosions but said they were still gathering details, including how many were injured and killed. Other lawmakers were keen to blame ISIS. Biden needs to make it abundantly clear that attacks like these carried out by ISIS-K will be met with swift and brutal force resulting in their complete decimation, Rep. Anthony Gonzalez (R-Ohio) wrote on Twitter. A failure to do so emboldens ISIS and will lead to more lost American lives. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott leaves a press conference where he signed Senate Bills 2 and 3 at the Capitol in Austin, Texas, on June 8, 2021. (Montinique Monroe/Getty Images) Texas Governor Issues Order to Maintain Ban on COVID Vaccine Mandates Regardless of FDA Approval Status Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has issued an executive order maintaining the states prohibition of COVID-19 vaccine mandates by any government entity, regardless of a vaccines approval status with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The Republican governor also said he was adding the issue of vaccine mandates to the Special Session agenda. The Aug. 25 executive order (pdf) comes two days after the FDA gave full approval to Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine. Abbott had previously blocked making vaccinations distributed under emergency use authorizations mandatory. The other two vaccines available in the United States, from Moderna and Johnson & Johnson, are currently operating under emergency use authorization. The governors latest order states that no governmental entity can compel any individual to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, with exceptions for places such as nursing homes, state-supported living centers, assisted living facilities, or long-term care facilities. A public or private entity that is receiving or will receive public funds cannot require a consumer to present proof of vaccination in order to receive a service or enter a place, the order states. A nurse administers a COVID-19 vaccine to a man in Houston, on Feb. 11, 2021. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP) A spokesperson for the governor told the Texas Tribune that private businesses have the option of mandating vaccines for employees, saying, Private businesses dont need government running their business. Abbott said in a statement that he will ask lawmakers to consider which exemptions should apply. Vaccine requirements and exemptions have historically been determined by the legislature, and their involvement is particularly important to avoid a patchwork of vaccine mandates across Texas, Abbott said in a statement. The Texas House finally restored quorum last week when enough Democrats returned to the state after staging a 38-day protest of a Republican-backed election overhaul measure. While Republicans control both legislative chambers in Texas, as well as the governors mansion, two-thirds of lawmakers must be present to constitute a quorum. Republicans only hold 82 seats in the 150-seat lower chamber. Abbott has also banned mask mandates from being enforced by state and local government entities. In an executive order issued on July 29, Abbott said that government entities such as county, city, school district, or public health authorities risk a $1,000 fine if they try to impose mask mandates. His mask mandate ban has been defied by the city of El Paso, nine counties, and dozens of school districts. Dallas County on Aug. 25 became the latest county in the Lone Star State to obtain a court order blocking enforcement of the ban. The FDAs full approval of the Pfizer vaccine has sparked a growing number of schools and employers to mandate vaccinations. President Joe Biden speaks about COVID-19 vaccines in the South Court Auditorium at the White House complex on Aug. 23, 2021. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images) President Joe Biden has encouraged American companies to mandate vaccines. Today, Im calling on more companies in the private sector to step up with vaccine requirements that will reach millions more people. If youre a business leader, a nonprofit leader, a state or local leader, who has been waiting for full FDA approval to require vaccinations, I call on you now to do that, Biden said on Aug. 23. Require it. Do what I did last month. Require your employees to get vaccinated or face strict requirements. The American Postal Workers Union was one of a number of unions to voice opposition to such mandates. As the White House considered so-called vaccine passports as a condition of employment for federal employees, the union said last week that its not the role of the federal government to mandate vaccinations for the employees we represent. A healthcare worker prepares a dose of the COVID-19 vaccine during the opening of the MTA's public vaccination program at Grand Central Terminal train station in Manhattan in New York City on May 12, 2021. (Carlo Allegri/Reuters) The Courts Go AWOL on the Virus Vax Commentary During the 20th century, the Supreme Court created new constitutional rights not mentioned in the Constitutions text, primarily by claiming those rights were inherent in the Fifth and 14th Amendment due process clauses. They included rights to privacy, autonomy, and bodily integrity. In accordance with those new precedents, citizens have asked the courts for protection against oppressive pandemic restrictions. Yet, the courts have dismissed most of their cases, relying on an old Supreme Court decision largely superseded by the newer precedents. A recent example of this treatment was Justice Amy Coney Barretts refusalwithout referring the case to her Supreme Court colleaguesto put on hold a vaccination mandate issued by Indiana University, a state institution. Before proceeding further, let me clarify: I agree that during pandemics, the states police power (governance authority) is very broad. I have been vaccinated against the CCP virus, and I believe most people probably should be. Nor am I a fan of the Supreme Courts inventive 20th-century jurisprudence. But the current Supreme Court generally has been upholding that jurisprudence, so those challenging pandemic restrictions have a right to rely on it. The older case that judges have been citing in preference to more recent decisions is Massachusetts v. Jacobson, decided in 1905 (pdf). For reasons explained below, Jacobson has been superseded by the Supreme Courts later cases. But even if Jacobson were still good law, its a weak precedent for requiring universal COVID-19 vaccinations. The facts of the Jacobson case were as follows: The Massachusetts Legislature passed a law authorizing cities to require inhabitants to be vaccinated against smallpox. The city of Cambridge issued such an order. The state prosecuted Jacobson for refusing to be vaccinated. Both the highest court of Massachusetts and the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the law as a reasonable exercise of the states police power. But the mandate upheld was for vaccination against smallpox. Smallpox is far more deadly than COVID-19. Its lethal for all demographic groups, and even when it doesnt kill, it leaves permanent scars. COVID-19 isnt dangerous to the overwhelming majority of the healthy college students targeted by the Indiana University mandate. In addition, the risks of vaccination for smallpox and COVID-19 are different. As the courts opinion in Jacobson pointed out, by 1905, the world already had a century of experience with the smallpox vaccine: It had proved effective against the disease and safe for nearly everyone. With the COVID-19 vaccine, we have had a very brief experience. No one knows how long it will be effective and what long-term side effects, if any, it may have. From the foregoing, its clear that in the case of COVID-19 (unlike smallpox), there are different decisional factors for people of different ages. In the case of COVID-19, an older person risks serious illness or death if he remains unvaccinated. But if he is vaccinated, he has little to fear from long-term side effects because he likely wont live long enough to experience them. On the other hand, the typical college student isnt in serious danger if he remains unvaccinated. If he is vaccinated, he might suffer from long-term side effects now unknown. In sum, it would have made more sense for Indiana University to mandate jabs for older faculty and staff while offering them on a voluntary basis for younger people. Justice John Marshall Harlans opinion in Jacobson itself informs us that we must not take his ruling too far. He strongly suggested that in cases where a vaccination requirement was arbitrary and oppressive, it wouldnt be constitutional because it would violate the 14th Amendments equal protection clause. And certainly, you could call a mandate targeted at people who are not at risk arbitrary and oppressive. So even if Jacobson were still good law, it wouldnt be firm precedent for mandatory COVID-19 vaccination. However, Jacobson is no longer good law. Modern precedents throw a cloudor rather a monsoonover it. Jacobson held that a state may, in the performance of its police power, limit individual freedom if the government acts reasonably. But for most constitutional rights, the Supreme Court hasnt used that standard for at least 80 years. The modern rule is that a government action is unconstitutional if it violates a persons privacy, personal autonomy, or bodily integrityunless the action survives one of several much tougher tests. Its not enough for a vaccination mandate to be reasonable. It must be tailored to the task, and if there are less intrusive ways of fighting COVID-19, then they should be employed instead. The court of appeals ruling in the Indiana University case (pdf) exemplifies the defects in some of the decisions dismissing challenges to COVID-19 rules. In addition to a mechanical reliance on the Jacobson case, the court of appeals relied on the fact that Indiana University provided exemptions for health and religious reasons. But in this country, we dont need government permission to exercise constitutional rights. The court added that people who do not want to be vaccinated can go elsewhere. But a government entity may not deny services to a person for properly asserting constitutional rights. Finally, the court said that non-vaccination wasnt a fundamental right engrained in the American tradition. But for cases such as this, the Supreme Court abandoned the engrained in the American tradition requirement years ago. Modern jurisprudence protects the right to commit sodomy, for example, even though such a right was never engrained in the American tradition. Why do the courts protect some claims to bodily integrity, autonomy, and privacy, but not others? Consider this hypothetical situation: Suppose the trustees of Indiana University are determined to protect human life from causes besides COVID-19. They announce that prospective students must sign a pledge not to have an abortion or encourage another to have an abortion while enrolled at the university. The university grants an exemption only if a student shows that (1) pregnancy would be medically dangerous to her or (2) the student is a member of a religion requiring abortion. Those who refuse to sign are told they are free to enroll elsewhere. If challenged in court, how many minutes do you think such a policy would survive? Answer: Not very many. The key to the difference lies in the fact that some rights further liberal political goals and others do not. Ironically, the court of appeals decision in the Indiana University case was written by Judge Frank Easterbrook, who is generally considered libertarian or conservative. Even so, his decision reflects the bias of the federal judiciary. Part of that bias is that those rights liberals favor are placed in, as the Supreme Court expresses it, a preferred position. The rights favored by everyone else can be more readily trampled. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. The World, the Flesh, and the Devil: Christopher Marlowes The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus A member of Congress wakes one night and finds Lucifer standing at the foot of his bed and staring at him. What do you want? he asks. I want to give you everything you desire or could imagine, Lucifer answered. Youll be reelected in every election. Youll have a fortune beyond your wildest dreams, beautiful women, mansions, expensive cars, a yacht. You name it, and its yours. The Congressman sat up in bed. Wow, that sounds great! But whats in it for you? In 24 years, you give me your immortal soul, Lucifer replied. The Congressman was astonished, but then burst out laughing. No, really, come on. Whats the catch? That old joke, or its variations, speaks volumes about modernity. Like our ancestors, we still see evil in the world, but in our age of science, psychology, social science, and statistics we nearly always look to genetics, circumstances, or environment as explanations for wickedness. Childhood abuse accounts for the man who shoots up a tavern; a boatload of debt drives the executive who embezzles money and bankrupts her company; ideology infects and sickens the dictator who orders millions executed. Rarely in these explications do we hear about evil or the human soul. And certainly no one in the public square brings up the devil. Which brings us to Doctor Faustus. The Basic Plot Christopher Marlowes 17th-century play The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, now routinely referred to as Doctor Faustus, is based on the stories told of Johann Faust, a German magician and alchemist who became a Renaissance legend. In Marlowes play, Faustus is a professor and intellectual star at the University of Wittenberg. Eager to win greater fame and power, he turns away from logic, reason, and theology and seeks to gain power through the use of magic. Very quickly in the play, Faustus finds himself in league with Lucifer and his emissary, Mephostophilis. He signs a contract in his own blood affirming that in exchange for his soul, these dark powers will give him all that he wishes for the next 24 years. For the most part, Faustus abuses or wastes these powers, thinking of little but his personal gain, spending time playing jokes on the pope, for example, or demanding the affections of Helen of Troy. Meanwhile, Faustus dithers back and forth between God and Lucifer, inclined to seek forgiveness from God but then returning to his alliance with evil. Finally, he believes that his time for the possible expiation of his sins has run out and he sees himself as doomed. For the vain pleasure of four and twenty years, Faustus says near the end of the play, hath Faustus lost eternal joy and felicity. I writ them a bill with my own blood. The date is expired. And so Faustus dies, estranged from heaven, his body torn apart by demons, and his soul dispatched to hell. The play ends with these lines: Faustus is gone: regard his hellish fall, Whose fiendful fortune may exhort the wise Only to wonder at unlawful things, Whose deepness doth entice such forward wits To practice more than heavenly power permits. Title page of a 1620 edition of Christopher Marlowes The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, with a woodcut illustration of Doctor Faustus and a devil coming up through a trapdoor. (Public Domain) Pride Goeth Before a Fall His enormous ego and intellectual arrogance at first blind Faustus to the consequences of his flirtations with the diabolic. In Act 1, for example, when Mephostophilis pays his first visit, Faustus tells him: The word damnation terrifies not me For I confound hell in Elysium. My ghost be with the old philosophers! And when Mephostophilis tries to warn Faustus about the loss of heaven that awaits him if he continues this course, Faustus replies: What, is great Mephostophilis so passionate For being deprived of the joys of heaven? Learn thou of Faustus manly fortitude And scorn those joys thou shalt never possess. Even after he has met Mephostophilis and signs the diabolical contract, the hubristic Faustus declares, I think hells a fable. In the end, Faustuss overweening pride brings his destruction. The devil Mephostophilis in Faust stories goes by many names. Mephisto, after 1883, by Mark Antokolski. (Shakko/CC-BY-SA 3.0) Power Had I as many souls as there be stars Id give them all for Mephostophilis. By him Ill be a great emperor of the world, And make a bridge through moving air To pass the ocean with a band of men; Here in this early scene, we hear Faustus speculating on the power that will soon belong to him, the ability to control the earth and all that dwell upon it. This newfound power will not draw on logic or reason, but on magic and the supernaturalthe dark arts that allow their practitioner to step outside the order and laws of the physical realm and so control nature and human beings. Power tends to corrupt, Lord Acton famously stated, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Faustus will soon learn this lesson in corruption known to every absolutist monarch and dictator who ever lived. Lust In Act 5, near the end of the play, Faustus implores Mephostophilis to grant him the affections of Helen of Troy. That I may have unto my paramour That heavenly Helen which I saw of late, Whose sweet embraces may extinguish clear These thoughts that do dissuade me from my vow, And keep mine oath I made to Lucifer. Mephostophilis grants this wish, and when Helen enters, Faustus speaks the most famous lines of this play: Was this the face that launched a thousand ships And burnt the topless towers of Ilium? Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss. Her lips suck forth my soul. See where it flies! Come, Helen, come, give me my soul again. Here will I dwell, for heaven is in these lips. We may construe these lines as compliments rendered by a man smitten with beauty, a bouquet of words to win affection, but something more sinister lies at the heart of this laudatory speech. Helen has no power to make Faustus immortal, and the lines Her lips suck forth my soul and heaven is in these lips tell us that Faustus, like so many others before and after him, has mistaken the pleasures of the flesh for the raptures of heaven. Bust of Helen of Troy, wearing a pileus (brimless hat), by Antonio Canova. Victoria and Albert Museum. (Yair Haklai/CC BY-SA 3.0) An Upside-Down World At one point, Lucifer and Beelzebub entertain Faustus by parading before him the Seven Deadly Sins: Pride, Covetousness, Envy, Wrath, Gluttony, Sloth, and Lechery. After these seven explain themselves and exit the stage, Faustus exclaims, O, how this sight doth delight my soul! Lucifer then reassures him, But Faustus, in hell is all manner of delight. Here Faustus, encouraged by Lucifer, turns the moral order on its head. Scenes such as this one, found throughout the play, demonstrate the give-and-take between the tempted and the tempter. Lucifer and Mephostophilis offer a banquet of enticements, and Faustus, so brilliant as a scholar, lacks the foresight and wisdom to refuse them. Lessons From Doctor Faustus Is there a more appropriate play than Doctor Faustus for the 21st century? Some of us may no longer believe in hell or Lucifer, the Father of Lies; but the Faustian bargain, when we exchange our principles or upright character for power, fame, or wealth, remains very much in play. The same temptations faced by Faustusthe blind pride, the burning desire for power, the greed, the belief that we can be as gods and shape the world and human beings as we wish in spite of their nature, and the same catastrophic falls into ruin and disgraceoccur all the time in our postmodern world. We can daily read the stories of these modern-day versions of Faustus in our newspapers and online blogs. Some American politicians and statesmen, for example, believed we could build a modern nation-state out of Afghanistan. Others more recently told us that our departure from that country would be orderly, an analysis far removed from reality. Some experts are certain that we humans can control manifestations of nature, like gender or the climate. Some Hollywood moguls believe they can take sexual advantage of actors and actresses, too far above the law to be in danger of detection or punishment. Because of pride and their conviction that they know whats best for the rest of us, some of our elitemembers of our Congress and our governors, men and women in media and academia, the big tech gangbehave like Faustus as well, wielding power as if they were great emperors of the world. This self-exaltation often leaves such people, and the rest of us as well, blind to the ending of their own stories, oblivious to the possibility of shame and wreckage ahead of them, the demolition of their good name and character. They overlook what Faustus realized with only one hour left on his contract: The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike, The devil will come, and Faustus must be damnd. NYPD officers stand guard during a protest in New York City, on Sept. 3, 2020. (Kena Betancur/AFP via Getty Images) Top NYPD Union Promises Legal Action If City Imposes COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate The largest police union in New York City is planning to file a lawsuit if the city tries to force police officers to get a COVID-19 vaccine. If the City attempts to impose a vaccine mandate on PBA members, we will take legal action to defend our members right to make such personal medical decisions, Police Benevolent Association (PBA) President Patrick Lynch said in an email obtained by the New York Post. So far, the city hasnt indicated whether it will impose a vaccine mandate on the New York Police Departments (NYPD) officers, he added. City workers in New York must either get a COVID-19 shot or submit to weekly testing, Mayor Bill de Blasio, a Democrat, announced last month. More recently, de Blasio announced that teachers and other school staffers must get a vaccine or face termination. While New York City Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said on NY1 last last year that officers wouldnt be required to get a COVID-19 vaccine, that has changed. New York City Police Commissioner Dermot Shea in an undated file photo. (Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/Getty Images) Asked this week if he would support a mandate, Shea said he would. One hundred percent. I think were well past that time. We lost three members last week, two of them to COVID, and I think its all unnecessary to some degree, he said. Everyone, I think, all across this country really should be embracing these vaccines. Shea noted that the Pfizer vaccine was fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration before adding, I think everyone should be lining up to get it that hasnt gotten it yet. The NYPD has approximately 36,000 officers; its the nations largest police force. Police officers in New York who havent filed proof of COVID-19 vaccination must wear masks while on duty, including when theyre outdoors, the department informed officers last week, according to local outlets. Officers who dont abide by the new rules could face disciplinary action, a bulletin to officers stated. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus. A member of the UK Armed Forces fist-bumping a child evacuee at Kabul airport in an undated file photo. (LPhot Ben Shread/MoD via PA) UK Troops Have Now Rescued Over 12,000 from Kabul British troops have rescued a total of more than 12,000 people from Afghanistan, according to the UK armed forces minister, including nearly 2,000 in the past 24 hours. The evacuation mission is entering its final days and hours, as troops prepare to wind up operations and get themselves out before the Aug. 31 deadline. About 1,000 Afghans who have been authorised to come to the UK are still estimated to remain in Kabul. Armed forces minister James Heappey said that since Aug. 13 the UK has airlifted 12,279 people out of Afghanistan. That includes 1,988 people on eight RAF flights in the past 24 hours. Eleven more flights are scheduled out of Kabul today, he said. PA news agency reported that on Aug. 25 nearly 2,000 Afghans authorised for UK evacuation under the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy were still estimated to be stuck in Kabul. But Heappey said the number outstanding has now dropped to potentially half of the previous estimate. The government has given no precise figure on how many Brits are still in Afghanistan. UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab previously said that almost all single-nationality UK citizens who wanted to return are now out of Afghanistan. Last-ditch evacuation efforts are currently being hampered by the threat of a terrorist attack at Kabul airport by a local ISIS spin-off group. British and U.S. authorities have warned people not to travel to the airport, due to what Heappey described as a very imminent risk of a highly lethal attack, possibly within Kabul. As a consequence, weve had to change the travel advice to advise people not to come to the airport, indeed to move away from the airport, find a place of safety, and await further instruction, he told the BBC. The British evacuations are expected to end in the next day or two, or to at least dramatically drop, as the military starts to wind up its operations and withdraw ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline. Heappey has declined to say whether todays flights out of Kabul will mark the end of the rescue operation. Former defence chief Lord David Richards previously told The Daily Telegraph that although rescue operations would likely end by Friday, British troops would continue to sneak others in who arrived late along with their own people. The French prime minister has already announced that France will end evacuation flights tomorrow. In the United States, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said that evacuations can continue until the end but conceded that they will have to prioritise moving out U.S. military capability in the last couple of days. He said more than 4,400 American citizens have been evacuated so far. More than 80,000 people, mostly Afghans, have been airlifted by the United States since Aug. 14, he said. PA contributed to this report Evacuees wait to board a Boeing C-17 Globemaster III during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 23, 2021. (U.S. Marine Corps/Sgt. Isaiah Campbell/Handout via Reuters) US Embassy in Kabul Advises Americans to Avoid Airport, Citing Security Threats Warning echoed by Britain, Australia The U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistans capital city, issued a statement on Aug. 25 advising Americans in the country to avoid traveling to Kabul airport, citing security threats. Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising U.S. citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a U.S. government representative to do so, the embassy said in a security alert. It added in a bolded statement, U.S. citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately. The alert did not provide further details as to what security threats lie outside Kabul airport, also known as Hamid Karzai International Airport. The embassy provided a list of actions to take, including to be aware of your surroundings at all times, especially in large crowds, and to monitor local media for breaking events and adjust your plans based on new information. Americans are also advised to follow local authorities instructions, which includes movement restrictions related to any curfews. It followed warnings by President Joe Biden and other U.S. officials of a threat made by the ISIS terrorist group to evacuation operations. Since the Taliban terrorist organization took full control of Afghanistan on Aug. 15 after the U.S.-backed government fled, crowds have flooded to the gates of Kabul airport, desperate to leave. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters in Washington on Aug. 25 that the State Department believes that more than 4,500 Americans have been evacuated from Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover. He added that up to 1,500 Americans remain there. He said that the estimations are based on dynamic calculations and the true figure is difficult to pin down with absolute precision at any given moment. Altogether, the United States and its allies have evacuated more than 88,000 people since Aug. 15, including 19,000 in the past 24 hours, with the U.S. military saying planes are taking off the equivalent of every 39 minutes. Britain, Australia Also Warn of Security Threat The British government on Aug. 25 similarly told its citizens to not travel to Kabul airport. The security situation in Afghanistan remains volatile. There is an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack. Do not travel to Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport, Britains Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office said on its website on Aug. 25. If you are in the area of the airport, move away to a safe location and await further advice. Commercial flights are not currently operating, the office added. If you can leave Afghanistan safely by other means, you should do so immediately. It also said that the British Embassy in Kabul has had all of its non-essential operations suspended and has relocated in response to the deterioration in the security situation. Separately, Australias Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne on Aug. 26 warned about a very high threat of terrorist attack. She said people should not travel to Kabul airport, and if they are in the area of the airport, to move to a safe location and await further advice. Afghanistan remains highly volatile and dangerous. Be aware of the potential for violence and security threats with large crowds, she also told reporters. Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid previously told reporters in Kabul on Aug. 24 that they want all foreign evacuations to be completed by Aug. 31 and will accept no extensions to the deadline. We are sending a message to the Americans again to evacuate their citizens by [Aug. 31] because they have the means to do so, they have planes and the airport is with them and they have to transfer all the forces and contractors who have relation [sic] with foreigners, he said. We are not in favor of allowing Afghans to leavewont allow themand after that, we will not allow [Americans] to be here and we will take a serious position, God willing, he added. But on Aug. 25, Blinken said that evacuation efforts does not strictly conclude on Aug. 31, saying that it will continue for as long as it takes referring to both Americans and Afghan allies who wish to leave Afghanistan. Our expectationthe expectation of the international communityis that people who want to leave Afghanistan after the U.S. military departs should be able to do so, he said, adding later, We will use every diplomatic, economic assistance tool at our disposal working hand-in-hand with the international community, first and foremost to ensure that those who want to leave Afghanistan after the 31st are able to do so. Biden previously said on Aug. 24 that the United States is on a pace to finish evacuating every American who wants to leave by the Aug. 31 deadline, a statement that appears to contradict those of Democrats and Republicans in Congress. The final stages of the evacuation effort in Afghanistan are under further strain after a warning that a highly lethal terror attack could be launched within hours. Undated UK Ministry of Defense file photo. (UK Ministry of Defense/PA) Very Credible Threat of ISIS Attack on Kabul Within Hours: UK Minister There is a very credible threat of a highly lethal terror attack on the Kabul airport within hours, a UK minister has warned. Britains armed forces minister James Heappey said on Thursday that there is very credible reporting of an imminent and severe threat to the airport from the ISIS terrorist group. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul issued an alert on Wednesday evening, urging citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and said those already at the gates should leave immediately, citing unspecified security threats. Britain and Australia have also urged their citizens and visa holders not to travel to the airport, where thousands are waiting to be evacuated out of the country ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline. The British government now believes there is a very imminent risk of a highly lethal attack possibly within Kabul, Heappey told BBC Breakfast. As a consequence, weve had to change the travel advice to advise people not to come to the airport, indeed to move away from the airport, find a place of safety, and await further instruction, he said. He told LBC radio the possible attack could come within hours, adding the ISIS terror group, also known as Daesh, is guilty of all sorts of evil. The opportunism of wanting to target a major international humanitarian mission is just utterly deplorable but sadly true to form for an organization as barbarous as Daesh, he said. U.S. President Joe Biden rejected the request from Britain and other allies to extend the Aug. 31 deadline, saying he prefers that U.S. troops leave on Aug. 31, because staying longer puts them in danger from terror attacks from a group known as ISIS-K. ISIS-K, or Islamic State Khorasan, is an ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan that consists of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even more extreme view of Islam. The group carried out a series of brutal attacks that included a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul, in which infants and women were killed. ISIS-K is said to be enemies of the Taliban, but it is likely to have seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country. Eight RAF flights managed to lift 1,988 people from Kabul within the past 24 hours, Heappey said, taking the total since the Taliban began its march to power to 12,279. He said Britain has 11 more flights scheduled out of Kabul for Thursday but declined to say whether that will be the end of the operation. PA, Reuters, and The Associated Press contributed to this report. West Australian Police Commissioner Chris Dawson speaks to the media during a press conference in Perth, Australia on Apr. 26, 2021. (AAP Image/Richard Wainwright) WA Police Chief Becomes Vaccine Commander To Combat Low Jab Rates The Western Australia (WA) government has elected its police commissioner as its new vaccine commander in a bid to bolster the states vaccine rollout. WA Police Commissioner Chris Dawson, who is also currently serving as the states emergency coordinator, will oversee the rollout and is tasked with maximising the number of West Australians willing to get the COVID-19 vaccine. In particular, the vaccine commanders role will involve communicating with non-government sectors to ensure specific hesitant groups are supported to take up the vaccine. Currently, 28.5 percent of over 16s in WA have been fully vaccinatedthe lowest out of any state, closely followed by Queensland at 28.9 percent. WA Premier Mark McGowan and Police Minister Paul Papalia extolled Dawson as the ideal candidate for the role. The Police Commissioner has done a tremendous job throughout the pandemic, McGowan said in a media release. I have full confidence he will continue to excel and deliver on this important task ahead, as both the State Emergency Coordinator and Vaccine Commander. A police force member inspects cars at a Border Check Point on Indian Ocean Drive, north of Perth in Western Australia, Australia, on June 29, 2021. (Photo by Matt Jelonek/Getty Images) As WAs top cop, Commissioner Dawson has shone through this pandemic, and its fitting he will lead WAs COVID-19 Vaccine Program, Papalia added. Last year, the WA Police Force launched a COVID-19 enforcement squad of more than 200 officers tasked with conducting spot checks on gatherings and people required to self-quarantine. During the pandemic, our police officers have played a significant role in keeping the State safe, be it through day-to-day policing, effectively bolstering our borders or targeted special operations to catch criminals and syndicates bucking the law, Papalia said. Dawsons placement mirrors that of Lieutenant General John James Frewen, a senior officer in the Australian Army who was elected as Coordinator of the National COVID Vaccine Taskforce in June. It also comes as Australia has upped its street presence of police and military forces in an attempt to restrict anti-lockdown protests that have broken out across the nation. This includes thousands of Australians in Sydney and Melbourne who came out to protest last month as part of the World Wide Rally for Freedom. Thousands of people gather in Melbournes CBD to protest lockdown restrictions in Melbourne, Australia, on Aug. 21, 2021. (Getty Images) New South Wales Police Commissioner Mick Fuller, who labelled the protesters anarchists, has since requested for a combined 800 Australian Defence Force personnel to help expand Sydneys lockdown operations. In Victoria, police are considering shutting down Melbournes public transport system to crack down on future protests. WA Police had also previously drawn ire after it was uncovered that it had used SafeWAthe states COVID-19 tracing appon two separate investigations for non-contact tracing purposes. Dawson defended the access, saying that it was done within the bounds of the law. An audit (pdf) into SafeWA later revealed that police ordered WA Health to provide check-in data on six occasions, of which only three were granted before the state passed legislation prohibiting its use for purposes other than contact tracing. Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters' Shannon Bushey holds up a ballot envelope during a media presentation at the Santa Clara County registrar of voters office in San Jose, Calif., on Aug. 25, 2021. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) Watchdog Groups Voice Concern Over Flaw on Ballot Envelopes for Newsom Recall Election Two voter integrity groups say holes in some absentee ballot envelopes designed to aid low-vision Californians fill out their ballot have the potential to reveal whether someone voted yes to ousting Gov. Gavin Newsom in next months recall election. The election integrity watchdog groups Amistad Project and the American Voters Alliance say they have identified at least three counties, including Los Angeles and San Diego counties, where absentee ballot envelopes contain a window showing voters recall preferences. California voters are calling attention to a glaring flaw in the design of absentee ballot envelopes being used in the recall election of California Governor Gavin Newsom, the groups said in a joint statement released on Aug. 23. The issue first gained attention after voter Amy Cox shared a video on Instagram thats gone viral, showing a ballot and an envelope with holes. When I saw this ballot envelope, I was shocked to see that it could reveal someones actual vote, Cox said in a statement. Our votes are supposed to be private. If someone can tell how people voted, then anyone who comes into contact with ballots could easily tamper with or discard votes they dont like. Former Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell shared the clip on Twitter at the time, writing, This is cheating. Responding to the video, the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk said that ballot envelopes have had holes for years. The design of the ballot return envelope is not new and has been used for several election cyclesand the design is a recommended accessibility practice by civic design consultants, a spokesperson for the office told The Epoch Times in an email, pointing to advice from the Center for Civic Design. The intent and purpose of the holes are two-fold: to assist with accessibility for low vision voters to locate where to sign the envelope and to ensure no ballots were missed and left in envelopes once our office has received and processed them. The office told concerned people on social media that the envelope design does not interfere with postal or sorting equipment. It declined to answer whether any problems have arisen in the past with the holes. Phill Kline, director of the Amistad Project, said in a statement that a voter should never be forced to reveal their vote by negligent design. Unfortunately, it appears these flaws are pushed by the same group of shadowy nonprofits who dictated election policies that turned government offices into partisan get-out-the-vote centers, he said. The recall election of Newsom, a first-term Democrat, is set for Sept. 14 and follows mounting criticism from within his party and from Republicans over his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and other issues. He faced intense backlash after he was seen dining at the French Laundry restaurant in Napa County with lobbyists last fall after telling Californians to stay home, and as COVID-19 cases surged. Newsom apologized for the incident. Zachary Stieber contributed to this report. A clock and the motto "In God We Trust" over the Speaker's rostrum in the U.S. House of Representatives chamber in Washington on Dec. 8, 2008. (Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images) Western Disenchantment and the Cost of Separating Faith From Reason Commentary Its often said that ideas have consequences. Ordinary men and women intuitively understand that good ideas yield good results, while bad ideas produce poor decisions and tragic consequences. Over the last century, avant-garde ideas about the nature of progress have produced a compulsive desire for intellectual certainty and immediate self-gratification. Today, historical experience and examples set by preceding generations are generally regarded as irrelevant to the conditions of modern humanity. Modern opinion-makers and politicians constantly put forward premises and techniques that promise to propel society to higher levels of reasoning. More and more, public figures are piloted by dialectical analysis and critical theory, which highlights past errors, assigns blame, and proposes to set us on a course toward a more perfect existence. Build back better is the seductive mantra of our 21st-century illuminati. Good and Bad Ideas Good ideas are generally based on human experience and truth. Bad ideas frequently reject truth and rely almost entirely on peoples wish to believe. A natural inclination to believe in the conventional wisdom leads many to accept whats false as true and whats imagined as real. Much of the Wests current philosophical disposition goes back roughly 400 years to the European Enlightenment. Enlightenment thought revolved around the idea that God and tradition could be replaced by human reason as the primary source of authority and legitimacy. Eighteenth-century liberal philosophers advocated for ideals such as reason, science, progress, liberty, tolerance, fraternity, freedom of speech, constitutional government, democracy, and the separation of church and state. In and of themselves, these ideas were good and, to the extent they endured, served us well. Enlightenment and Religion The United States and other Western democracies were founded at the apex of the Enlightenment. But early democratic experiments were carried out in societies that also had deep religious convictions. Individual liberty was tempered by long-standing forms of spiritual worship and moral authority. At the birth of modern democracies, traditional virtues and obligations such as self-discipline, chastity, compassion, personal responsibility, family loyalty, friendship, hard work, courage, perseverance, honesty, patriotism, and faith provided a sound moral basis for free and well-ordered societies. Over the last 200 years, intellectuals from city centers such as Paris, Frankfurt, and New York set out to reason away most of the moral and religious ties that bound traditional communities together and tempered the excesses of liberal-progressive thought. For my own post-World War II generation, this led to profound cultural change. To my grandparents, who hailed from a small fishing outport on Newfoundlands Northern Peninsula, ignoring the traditions and faith that held people together would have seemed as pointless as trying to push back an incoming tide. Today, if pockets of popular wisdom still exist, its outside the dominant relativistic worldview of our progressive establishment. Precious few contemporary people of influence and power argue in favor of traditional virtues. The Wisdom of Tradition One notable exception is the young Iranian American New York Post op-ed editor Sohrab Ahmari, whom I have had the pleasure of meeting through a couple of events sponsored by the Canadian Civitas Society. Ahmari might best be described as a young man with an old soul. In his formative years, he transitioned, with his parents, from Shiite Islam in Iran to the seductive liberal culture of America and New York City. His final transition to Christianity, marriage, and fatherhood left him convinced that our present version of Enlightenment culture is no longer one of freedom rightly understood. In his recent book, titled The Unbroken Thread: Discovering the Wisdom of Tradition in an Age of Chaos, Ahmari urges us to rediscover the inherited traditions and ideals that once gave our lives meaning and purpose. He has come to believe that the very modes of life and thinking that strike most people in the West as antiquated or limiting can liberate us, while the Western dream of autonomy and choice without limits is, in fact, a prison; that the quest to define ourselves on our own is a kind of El Dorado, driving to madness the many who seek after it. In order to bring out the best in us, he writes, other parts of us must be tied down, enclosed, limited, bound. For centuries, religious truths and timeless common sense taught us that genuine happiness lay in pursuing virtue and accepting limits. Disenchantment, Alienation, and Uncertainty In the late 1970s, an era eerily similar to the one in which we presently find ourselves, U.S. scholar George Gilder argued that the success of democratic-capitalist societies depended on the interconnected virtues of work, faith, and family. Gilder and other liberal-conservative thinkers reconnected the link between faith and reason. What followed was a new morning for the United States and the West, as well as global developments that freed millions from Soviet tyranny and perpetual serfdom. Today, among those who are the best schooled, best fed, and most powerful, critical theory invites the rejection of traditional virtues and the choice of a lifestyle thats fashionable, easy, and sustainable. All were left with are the capricious desires that a technologically advanced society is equipped to fulfill. Liberty has become license. Equality is equity. Self-discipline and chastity are prudish. Compassion is reduced to virtue-signaling. Hard work is for others. Honesty is seldom the best policy. Patriotism is xenophobia, and faith in God is for rubes who cling to their Bibles and their guns. We suffer from a morbid form of narcissism that leads us to believe that we can sit in God-like judgment of others while nothing stands in judgment of us. We accept lectures from social misfits, tolerate corruption of the democratic process, reject leaders who project common sense, and elect fools to govern our civic and national affairs. The result is a deeply divided society and individual lives that are marked by disenchantment, alienation, and uncertainty. Weve pursued and achieved the modern dream of defining ourselvesbut at an enormous cost. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. The trading symbol for BlackRock is displayed at the closing bell of the Dow Industrial Average at the New York Stock Exchange in New York on July 14, 2017. (Bryan R. Smith/AFP via Getty Images) Woke Capital Hastens Americas Demise by Backing China Commentary America is underwriting its own demise. Woke Capital apparently wants to hasten it. Coming on the heels of a letter from titans of American industry to the Biden administration calling for it to jettison punitive China tariffs post-haste and resume trade negotiations with Beijing, BlackRocks research arm recently urged investors to increase their exposure to the PRC by 2 to 3 times. The worlds leading asset manager of some $10 trillion in assets did so 18 months after China helped foist a pandemic on America and the world that has caused incalculable damage in blood, treasure, and sacrificed liberty and justice. It did so after China crushed Hong Kong, clashed with India, antagonized Australia, and as it threatens a takeover of Taiwan. It did so in spite of the fact that Xi Jinping is currently waging a jihadeuphemistically referred to as a regulatory crackdownagainst Chinas largest businesses, U.S.-listed ones that saw $400 billion of market value lopped off this summer. It did so surely knowing those funds ultimately redound to the benefit of the sworn adversary of the United States that seeks to supplant it and reign as the dominant world power. It did so notwithstanding all the U.S. government has done for it, BlackRock having been dubbed the fourth branch of government for its political and pecuniary ties to the feds generally, and the quasi-public Federal Reserve in particular. And it did so irrespective of its claimed fealty to progressive investing principles. Former Trump administration deputy national security adviser Matt Pottinger, one of the principal architects of the administrations China strategy, broadly captured the symptoms of Woke Capitals China addiction, and exposed the hypocrisy of the likes of BlackRock, in a recent piece in Foreign Affairs. Pottinger noted: The retirement savings of millions of Americans currently finance Beijings military modernization and support Chinese companies that are complicit in genocide and other crimes against humanity. Even as Beijing was systematically expelling foreign journalists from China and making the countrys investment climate increasingly opaque, stock index providers such as FTSE Russell and MSCI continued to add Chinese companies to their indexes, sometimes under pressure from Beijing. Because many American funds benchmark their investments to those same indexes, billions of U.S. dollars automatically flow to Chinese companies, including those that Washington has sanctioned or subjected to export controls. This issue is so systemic that until the Trump administration forbade it, the retirement funds of federal employees were being funneled into malevolent Chinese companies as well. Meanwhile, many financial firms pledging allegiance to environmental, social, and governance standards (ESG) demonstrate that those concerns dont stretch beyond Americas shores. As Pottinger says: Some money managers eschew investing in Western companies that dont meet ESG criteria but happily invest in Chinese companies that feature atrocious records in all three categories. There are U.S. university endowments, for instance, that could deliberately decide to invest in only ESG-compliant companies in the United States but simultaneously invest in a raft of Chinese firms that flout all accepted standards of corporate governance and environmental stewardship. Chinese firms contribute more to greenhouse gas emissions, ocean plastic pollution, and illegal fishing than do the companies of any other country on earth. As for social responsibility, a wide variety of Chinese companiesfrom leading technology firms to manufacturers that export globallywork with Beijings security apparatus to track, incarcerate, and extract forced labor from ethnic Uyghur and Kazakh Muslims. With respect to corporate governance, CCP cells, operating mostly in secret, wield significant and often decisive control over Chinese companiesmaking a mockery of Western standards of corporate transparency and independence. When it comes to the likes of BlackRock and its peers, its ESG for thee, but not for Xi. Americanincreasingly in-name-onlyfinancial firms, which lubricate the global economy, epitomize the woke elite, who reject the very system from which they have so richly benefited. That the rest of that eliteour political class, media, academic institutions, and so onare literally and figuratively invested in, beholden to, or at minimum afraid of running afoul of China, is at root a symptom of an existential crisis that threatens to undo America far before we ever get around to doing all that is necessary to counter Beijing. The existential crisis concerns our understanding of who we are as a nation, our confidence in its purpose, and our resolve to do whatever is necessary to defend and protect it and cultivate its greatness. A pervasive America Last mentality of wokeism, decadence, and decline prevails over the commanding heights of society. Its born of a sort of moral narcissism, as Roger Simon has termed it, under which our elites confess their sins of power and privilege while supporting paternalistic policies falling hardest on those for whom they claim to care most. The elites virtue-signal without bearing any coston the contrary, they end up further ensconced in their preeminent societal position. Unserious as this cynical charade is, it may prove fatal. A nation that prioritizes politics over merit, rewards mediocrity over excellence, protects the connected and targets the contrarian, permits tyranny under the guise of health and safety, privileges foreigners over citizens, and inculcates an ethos of national self-loathing aimed at undoing the system on which it is based, no matter the resources and capabilities of those laboring under it, will be poised to crumble well before it gets around to confronting its global foes. Domestic peace and prosperity will erode, morale will recede, the will to survivelet alone thrivewill be extinguished. The zeitgeist of wokeism, decadence, and decline will defeat us before China has a chance to say kowtow. That our putative leaders already kowtow in word and deedindeed are actively aiding, abetting, and enabling our worst enemydemonstrates the extent of the rot that has already set in. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. Amazon has invested more than $14.6 billion in the Phoenix region and $16 billion in Arizona since 2010, according to findings from the companys U.S. Economic Impact Report. The United States is currently evacuating Afghanistan ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline President Joe Biden has laid out to get American military forces and Afghan civilians who helped the country in the 20 years spent in Afghanistan out of the country. The evacuations have already faced threats of violence as the Taliban has taken over the country quicker than anticipated, creating multiple questions and a power vacuum. The ever-evolving situation in Afghanistan can be hard to keep track of, as new events happen every day. Presented below are various updates about what is currently happening in Afghanistan to help understand the situation. "The most important things to know are that our defeat was not a surprise but the pace of it was," said Dr. Stephen Saideman, Paterson chair in international affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ont. "When American forces pulled out in 2014, NATO pulled out most troops in 2014. Most combat after that was done by the Afghans and they fought hard, but the Taliban was doing progressively better. Whatever leverage we had Trump threw away when he negotiated with the Taliban and didnt involve the standing Afghan government, he just said 'were out of here'. There were no conditions." "Biden was told May was too fast, so he aimed for September," Saideman continued. "When people can see the end game they work backwards and think, 'why fight now', given that they had fought hard for so long. Troops and police in the country were not getting food, ammo and water because their leadership was corrupt, so they thought, 'why should I fight', once one or two cities collapsed, other folks made that calculation, the deal from the Taliban was if you keep fighting well kill you, if you lay down your arms, well let you live." The Taliban and the United States came to an agreement for the U.S.'s exit back in February of 2020, a deal made by the Trump administration that the Biden administration has largely stuck to, after extending the deadline to September. It's important to note that even if the United States had evacuated either earlier or later, this same process may have happened, Saideman said. "Given that the mistakes made at the outset and the government the United States was dealing with, if they let everybody know they'd be there another 20 years, maybe the Taliban couldnt have waited the U.S. out," Saideman said. "Given the failures of the government and the failures of the U.S. doing what they sought to do, if Biden had disagreed with Trumps deal, the Taliban would have increased activity and the Americans didnt have enough troops two months ago to defeat the Taliban. They had enough to protect themselves and help the Afghan government. The Taliban wouldnt have accepted a delay, they have their own agency, whatever the U.S. would do would shape the Talibans calculus in return. The U.S. wasn't shaping this on their own." The United States faces terrorist threats in evacuations The Aug. 31 deadline, which Biden is sticking firmly to, is an agreement between the United States and Taliban for the U.S. to be out of the country. Biden says he fears threats of violence if the U.S. overstays the deadline, and that there is a risk of violence the longer the United States remains in Afghanistan, according to the AP. "Every day were on the ground is another day that we know ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both us and allied forces and innocent civilians," Biden said at the White House. ISIS-K is the Islamic State groups Afghanistan affiliate, known for staging suicide attacks on civilians. The Taliban took over Afghanistan's capital of Kabul seven months before optimistic expectations had them taking over the capital, however, those expectations still had the Taliban taking over the capital. "It depends which estimate you get, there were more that were on target, there were possibilities of a range of times," Saideman said. "Wishful thinking will cause people to think things would take longer, it was thought the Afghan army would fight this to the end and that didnt happen. The Afghan national army gave up and that made it much faster, the forces they were counting on stopped fighting." Those threats of violence are already coming to fruition. On Thursday, two blasts at Kabul's airport caused the deaths of four U.S. Marines, with 12 Americans altogether dying in the blasts, along with 60 Afghan civilians. This was while people were trying to evacuate the country. U.S. officials have blamed ISIS-K for the attacks. Gen. Frank McKenzie, overseeing the evacuations in Afghanistan, warned of further, ongoing threats. These violent threats come while Afghan refugees flock to the Pakistan border, seeking refuge in the neighboring country. Threats persist while the U.S. attempts to work with the Taliban's deadline, according to the AP. The mass exodus of both U.S. military forces and the Afghan civilians who helped them has already caused several deaths, as seven died in a panicked crush of people attempting to flee the country. More than 82,000 people have so far been evacuated from Afghanistan, one of the largest airlifts in U.S. history. The deadline to evacuate U.S. troops under the agreement reached when Trump was President was May 1, but Biden extended that deadline to September. That's why there's this rush of forces out of the country. Afghans who are friendly to the United States fear retaliation from the Taliban, per the AP. U.S. allies are frightened of further violence These acts have caused U.S. allies like Canada and several European nations including Belgium and Denmark to halt flights and France has said it was stopping its rescue efforts on Friday. Other countries have been attempting to withdraw from Afghanistan, as Poland has recently ended their evacuation efforts, but several European countries were still in the process of getting people out before Thursday's bombings. Canada has said that it may not be able to evacuate everyone they want to before the Aug. 31 deadline. Europe's evacuations come as the G7 attempts to pressure Biden to ease his hard deadline of Aug. 31 for getting American troops and the Afghan citizens who helped them out of the country. Europe fears that a mass wave of refugees may be heading for the continent, after Europe struggled with a wave of refugees in 2015 due to the civil war in Syria. They warn refugees to go to neighboring countries, but "don't come here", according to the AP. "It must be our goal to keep the majority of the people in the region," Austrian Interior Minister Karl Nehammer said this week, echoing what many European leaders say. How we got here Thousands of American citizens remain in Afghanistan, with less than a week to get out of the country before the deadline. Some 1,500 Americans are still in the country, and estimated tens of thousands of Afghans who qualify for special visas remain in the country. Biden has vowed to get all Americans and Afghan helpers out of the country before Aug. 31. However, despite all these concerns, Saideman said this is not the worst evacuation efforts could have gone. "The majority of the United States' forces left in 2014 with NATO," Saideman said. "The United States could have pulled out more of the troops earlier, but this is not actually that bad as far as ending a war goes when you dont win." Since May, the local Afghan government had lost or abandoned more than 200 of the 400 districts in Afghanistan, many of which have fallen to Taliban control. The Taliban has used fear-mongering and misinformation campaigns to frighten Afghan government officials and to intimidate local residents. "The Afghan government was corrupt and incompetent," Saideman said. "The U.S. made deals to make war cheaper and easier, so the U.S. was relying on warlords, and they werent the best to build a government." How will the Taliban lead? There are several questions about the Taliban, per Vox. That includes how the Taliban treats women in the country, how the Taliban does the everyday work of delivering food and water to Afghan citizens and whether or not the Taliban will share power with the people of Afghanistan, including the 4.5 million people in Kabul -- far more than the few hundred thousand people who lived in the city in 1996. After using women's rights to help fuel support for the war, the United States is pulling out, causing a precarious situation for women's rights in the country. Women's rights has taken a massive forward step in the 20 years since America arrived in Afghanistan, and women's rights could take an equally massive step back with the Taliban back in power, as repressive policies were a part of the Taliban's first regime in the country back in the 90's, but now women must wait and see what the Taliban does in the country in regards to women's rights, per Vox. That list of people waiting to see how the Taliban handles women's rights now includes Salgy Baran, who was the country's top high school graduate in 2021, according to the AP. However, there are worries that the Taliban still has the same world view and could reinstate the same policies as it did when the group originally had control of Afghanistan in the 90's. According to Vox, there are already reports of executions, of women and teenage girls being forced into marriages with Taliban fighters, of female students being turned away from schools. The fact that the Taliban is now better at public relations does not mean it has changed wholly, Vox says. "We dont know how they will lead," Saideman said. "We have past behavior that shows it was brutal, there was genocide against minorities, abuse of women, their sense of justice is very brutal. I dont have a lot of faith in their current portrayal of difference." Concerns for Afghanistan going forward Other questions now linger, and there are other concerns facing Afghanistan and the country's civilians. That includes, as with all countries in 2021, COVID-19, which remains another public health threat while American forces and their allies attempt to pull off mass evacuations. The threat of COVID-19 is now rising in Afghanistan, as coronavirus testing and vaccinations have plummeted since the Taliban took control. The Afghan refugees coming to the United States will receive COVID-19 tests as soon as they land. Two million doses of the vaccine are set to expire in Afghanistan in the coming months, per the Washington Post. Other concerns include financial ones, as some Afghans are running out of money. The Taliban has cut off money being taken outside of the country, and the group is attempting to get bankers back to work in the country, per the Washington Post. Banks hadn't been open in more than a week since the Taliban took over the country, as prices rose and uncertainty spiked with soaring costs. The Taliban is reportedly facing a cash squeeze of their own. There are also concerns about foreign relations going forward. There is a power gap in terms of foreign relations to be filled. There is now some concern that gap could be filled by China, with the Taliban already saying that they have "good relations" with the country, per the Atlantic. The Taliban has responded positively to steps China is taking to improve relations with the new regime, but Afghanistan could eventually be a test for China and the United States of how the countries are able to come together to handle security concerns on an international stage. From the United States, American veterans of the war in Afghanistan are working hard to get the interpreters and other Afghans who helped them safely out of the country. This is not new, as American veterans have been attempting to help the people who helped them and in some cases saved lives get out of Afghanistan (and Iraq, for that matter) safely for a while, but face long waiting times and difficult paperwork processes. Keeping up the fight In Afghanistan, there remains an active militia that will fight the Taliban's control of the country, although that militia faces long odds in fighting the Taliban, according to the New York Times. The man leading that militia against the Taliban is Ahmad Massoud, the 32-year-old son of a legendary mujahedeen commander, Ahmad Shah Massoud. Massoud picks up his father's fight against the Taliban 20 years after the senior Massoud's death in a suicide bombing. The militia force will fight the Taliban from the Panjshir Valley, per the AP, a valley in the Hindu Kush with a single narrow entrance. It's the last region in Afghanistan not under Taliban control and a place where local fighters held off the Soviets in the 1980s and the Taliban a decade later. Afghanistan has been called the "graveyard of empires", as many empires who have attempted to control Afghanistan have suffered for the attempt. However, Saideman said the situation is more complex than that. "Historys more complex than that, thats a nice story people like to say," Saideman said. "The success rate has varied, the British did okay, but were beaten pretty badly before they started doing well. There was stability in Afghanistan before the Soviet period, I hate people talking about history that way. Its not the graveyard of empires." New concerns and moving forward New concerns are constantly propping up in Afghanistan. For example, on Thursday, the Taliban denied the involvement of Osama bin Laden, killed by Navy Seal Team Six in 2011, in the terrorist attacks perpetrated against the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. Bin Laden's presence in Afghanistan was one of the reasons the United States used to justify the war in Afghanistan, although Bin Laden was later found and killed in Pakistan. "The U.S. was in Afghanistan because thats where the attacks of 9/11 came from," Saideman said. "Failed states were breeding grounds for terrorism. America built up a government, that develops a logic and inertia that makes it very hard to leave, by leaving now weve learned either theres no good time to leave or that anytime is good to leave, the Afghan government would collapse no matter what the U.S. did." Saideman said that he sees parallels to the Vietnam war at the end of the war in Afghanistan. "In that sense the U.S. fought an insurgency campaign that was not successful, there are parallels," Saideman said. The evacuations are ongoing and with the deadline on Tuesday, Aug. 31, updates from Afghanistan are unlikely to end soon. Mankato, MN (56001) Today Clear this evening then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low 58F. Winds ESE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Clear this evening then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low 58F. Winds ESE at 10 to 15 mph. Salida, CO (81201) Today Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low around 55F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%. Locally heavy rainfall possible.. Tonight Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low around 55F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%. Locally heavy rainfall possible. Hundreds of shoes in clear bags sat outside the Fox Den Store-It storage units in Vine Grove on Tuesday evening as they waited to be loaded in a truck. The shoes were collected as a mission project by New Hope Family Life Ministries in Radcliff in collaboration with Funds2Orgs. Fugitive Jo Ferrari turns himself in BANGKOK: Fugitive Thitisan Utthanaphon, aka Jo Ferrari, has surrendered himself in Myanmar, according to police sources. policecrimecorruptionmurderhomicide By Bangkok Post Thursday 26 August 2021, 09:04PM Thitisan Utthanaphon (handcuffed) at the Crime Suppression Division in Bangkok on Thursday night as national police chief Pol Gen Suwat Jangyodsuk (right) questions him. Photo: Royal Thai Police He was reportedly brought across the border to Mae Sot in Tak province from adjacent Myawaddy on Thursday evening (Aug 26), reports the Bangkok Post. National police chief Gen Suwat Jangyodsuk was scheduled to hold a briefing at 9pm on the same day. Thai media earlier reported he succumbed to mounting pressure from the massive police hunt and alerted authorities to his whereabouts. Khaosod reported that the arresting team went to his hideout and then took him to a safehouse. Pol Gen Suchart Teerasawat, head of the investigation team, would fly from Bangkok to interrogate him, reports said, but did not say where. Thitisan, 39, was wanted for the alleged fatal torture of a 24-year-old drug suspect at Muang Nakhon Sawan Police Station in Nakhon Sawan province on Aug 6, where Thitisan was stationed as superintendent. Earlier, senior police said detectives had not concluded whether the death resulted from an attempt to extort money or acquire information. Thitisan appeared at the Crime Suppression Division in Bangkok on Thursday night and was interrogated by national police chief Pol Gen Suwat Jangyodsuk. Pol Maj Gen Jirapop Puridet, deputy commissioner of the Central Investigation Bureau, said detectives were about to arrest Thitisan in Chon Buri province but the suspect told police that he wanted to surrender at the CSD headquarters. Probe targets abuse of authority, unusual wealth Widely known by the nickname Jo Ferrari, Thitisan handled cases involving 368 smuggled cars during 2011-17. Customs Department Director-General Patchara Anuntasilpa said the department examined its records and found that Thitisan had been the official in charge of confiscating 368 illegally imported vehicles, including luxury cars and supercars, during the period. Of the total, 363 cars were auctioned, raking in about B1 billion, and the remaining five have not been sold. According to customs regulations at the time, 30% of the proceeds from all smuggled products were incentives for police teams or those bringing cases to the attention of authorities and 25% were rewards to other officials, including police. He said Thitisan was among the beneficiaries of the rules but declined to disclose information about the recipients. The data would have to be first forwarded to authorities concerned, he added. Mr Patchara pointed out the regulations were repealed in 2017 and the incentive and reward rates have since been changed to 20% each and capped at B5 million total per case. The customs chief also admitted he had heard rumours that his departments auctions of smuggled cars had attracted little interest because they were believed to have been dominated by a group of bidders with an advantage. He declined to confirm or deny them. According to the rumours, the electronic control units of the vehicles had been removed before they were sent to the Customs Department and only people with access to the units could use them. This means winners outside this group had to pay extra for them. The departments explanations followed media reports that police had found 13 luxury cars worth more than B100mn in total at Thitisans B60mn house. His wealth also prompted the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) to step in. As a police colonel, he received a salary of around B40,000 a month before he was dismissed from service on Tuesday. Niwatchai Kasemmongkol, NACC spokesman, said his office was investigating Thitisan for abuse of authority and unusual wealth. Anti-graft officials are gathering facts for the investigations. However, he noted that the abuse of authority probe over torture of the drug suspect is being sought by the anti-graft agencys Region 6 and the NACC has yet to determine if the case falls under its jurisdiction. A source in the NACC said allegations of bribe-taking and use of nominees in holding assets worth over B200mn will also be forwarded to the NACCs subcommittee on assets inspection for consideration. One of his estranged actress girlfriends told Thai media in 2017 that he had offered to give her B230mn in cash held by a nominee. Srisuwan Janya, secretary-general of the Association for the Protection of the Thai Constitution, on Thursday submitted a petition to the Public Sector Anti-Corruption Commission (PACC) to investigate Thitisan and six others, who all now stand accused of torture and killing of a drug suspect earlier this month while trying to extort B2mn from the suspect. One Phuket fresh market closes over COVID concerns, as another market reopens PHUKET: The busy fresh market at Baan Lipon, located near the Khao Lan Intersection on Thepkrasattri Rd in Tambon Thepkrasattri, has been ordered closed until at least next Thursday (Sept 2) amid concerns of an outbreak of COVID-19 infections there. Thursday 26 August 2021, 12:23PM Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality Baan Lipon Fresh Market has been ordered closed until at least next Thursday (Sept 2). Image: Thepkrasattri Municipality Phuket Town Fresh Market 2, near Robinson department store on Ong Sim Phai Rd in Phuket Town, has reopened after two weeks closure after a big cleaning event at the market yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Phuket Town Municipality The order for the market to close was issued yesterday, and came into effect today (Aug 26). The closure order came as Phuket marked 189 new COVID infections confirmed yesterday, the highest number of COVID infections confirmed in Phuket on one day. Meanwhile, the Phuket City Municipality Fresh Market 2, located on Ong Sim Phai Rd near Robinson department store, reopened today after staff of Phuket City Municipality and vendors conducted a big cleaning event yesterday to boost local peoples confidence in using the market. The market last reopened on Aug 13 after Phuket City Municipality ordered it closed for two full weeks after more than 100 COVID-19 infections had been found linked to the market. The Phuket City Municipality allowed the market to reopen tomorrow (Aug 27), or until the market had met the required sanitation standards and been assessed and approved safe by officers from the Disease Control Department. The market has now reopened a day early. Following the first reopening of the market after the outbreak there in June, Phuket Town Mayor Saroj Angkanapilas explained that the market has been in operation for 42 years. However, in response to concerns that the market may again become an epicentre of COVID infections, he noted that the market will now operate in two sections, with different hours of operation. The main market, comprising 483 vendors in the market building, will operate from 4am to midday, while 57 vendors on Ong Sim Phai Rd and a further 61 vendors located near Robinson department store will serve the public from 3pm to 11pm, Mr Saroj explained. Phuket fresh kratom prisoners released PHUKET: A total of 15 prisoners incarcerated for possession of fresh kratom have been released from Phuket Provincial Prison now that possession of the plant in its natural state has been removed from the Narcotics Act. drugscrime By The Phuket News Thursday 26 August 2021, 05:22PM Phuket Provincial Prison. Photo: The Phuket News / file No Phuket provincial officials or Phuket officers from the Department of Corrections have recognised the prisoner release following the change in the law, which came into effect on Tuesday (Aug 24). However, an officer of the Registration Department at Phuket Prison agreed to comment to The Phuket News today (Aug 26) on condition of anonymity. We have already released a total of 15 prisoners who were sentenced only under the change of possession of fresh kratom; they were released on Tuesday, the prison officer told The Phuket News this afternoon (Aug 26). About 60-70 prisoners are in the prison for other charges in addition to possession of fresh kratom. We have already filed a list of the prisoners names to the court for consideration of having their sentences reduced, the officer added. On Aug 30, we will also release another 129 prisoners who behaved well and received royal pardons issued on the birthday of His Majesty King Maha Vajiralongkorn Bodindradebayavarangkun (Rama X) on July 28, she said. These prisoners have behaved well and most of them have only a couple of years left to stay in the prison. The 129 prisoners are only one of three groups to be released, but I do not know when the second and third groups will be released, she added. The Department of Corrections on Tuesday reported that 1,297 prisoners were serving jail sentences for kratom-related charges across the country, reported state news broadcaster MCOT. Of those, 1,038 were already serving sentences handed down, with the remaining 259 being detained while waiting for the court to rule on the charges against them, MCOT reported. Only 121 people throughout all of Thailand were serving sentences in prisons for possession of fresh kratom only, the report noted. Of those, 20 had already been sentenced, while 101 were still awaiting trial to conclude. After speaking with the prison officer in Phuket today, it was not made clear whether 15 of the 20 prisoners serving sentences already handed down were released in Phuket. Police launch manhunt for ex-cop on the run BANGKOK: Police have launched a manhunt for a former police station chief who allegedly killed a drug suspect while attempting to extort from him B2 million while in police custody, national police chief Suwat Jangyodsuk said yesterday (Aug 25). corruptioncrimedeathpolice By Bangkok Post Thursday 26 August 2021, 08:30AM A copy of the warrant for the arrest of Thitisan Utthanaphon, left, is posted along with those for other suspects on a notice board displayed during a press conference in Nakhon Sawan yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: Chalit Phumruang Pol Col Thitisan Utthanaphon, formerly the superintendent of Muang police station in Nakhon Sawan, disappeared three days ago before a video clip of him committing torture and trying to extort money from the suspect was released on social media on Tuesday, said Pol Gen Suwat. The clip made headlines and prompted Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha on Tuesday to order the police to investigate the incident that reportedly led to the mans death by suffocation. The dead suspect was yesterday identified as 24-year-old Chiraphong Thanaphiphat. The seven police allegedly involved in Chiraphongs death have been dismissed from their positions and arrest warrants have been issued, said Pol Gen Suwat yesterday. The suspects, five of whom have already been detained, now face charges for dereliction of duty, torture, and murder. Four of the detained police have been identified as Pol Maj Rawirot Ditthong, who was the chief investigator of Muang district station. Also identified were Pol Capt Songyot Khlainak, who was a deputy chief police investigator; Pol Sen Sgt Maj Wisut Bunkhiew; and Pol Sen Sgt Maj Suphakon Nimchuen. The officers were all from the same station. The fifth detained former officer is Pawikon Khammarew who is from Takhli district station. The only two that remain at large are Thitisan and Thoranin Matwanna, who was a deputy chief police investigator at Muang station. The police are seeking cooperation from their counterparts in neighbouring countries in attempts to locate Thitisan in case he already has fled across the border, said Pol Gen Suwat. On Tuesday lawyer Sittha Biabangkerd posted the clip on his Facebook page in which a police officer putting a plastic bag over the head of a man (Chiraphong), who was wearing a yellow T-shirt. Other police were present. The clip showed Chiraphong resisting. The lawyer said he obtained the clip from a junior police officer who sought his help in forwarding the clip to the national police chief. The junior officer asked the lawyer to follow up on the case before he and his fellow officers were killed, Mr Sittha said. Immigration police at all border checkpoints have been alerted to the possibility of the suspect attempting to flee the country, said Pol Lt Gen Sompong Chingduang, chief of the Immigration Bureau. Although all border checkpoints are closed due to the COVID-19 situation, cargo trucks are still allowed to cross the borders, Pol Lt Gen Sompong said. The immigration police now seek cooperation from other security authorities in stepping up patrols along borders and at sea for fear the suspect may attempt to sneak out through a forest trail or by sea, he said. Meanwhile, state-run Sawanpracharak Hospital, which issued a death certificate for the dead drug suspect, have defended their finding that methamphetamine poisoning was the cause of death. The hospital said it wasnt a final conclusion as they are still waiting for blood test results to find out the exact levels of methamphetamine in his system. The results are expected next week. The hospital said that a forensic examination was conducted on Aug 7 after Chiraphong was referred from a private hospital to Sawanpracharak Hospital on Aug 5. Chiraphong died on Aug 6, it said. Sawanpracharak Hospital was informed by a private hospital that the man fell down and lost consciousness while he was running away from police who were chasing him during a drug crackdown. NACC probe After the Nakhon Sawan provincial court approved arrest warrants yesterday, police began searching locations where Thitisan might have been, including his luxury house in Kannayao district of Bangkok, said Pol Gen Suwat. Found at Pol Col Thitisans B60mn house were 29 luxury cars worth more than B100mn in total, said a source. Two Myanmar caretakers told police that Thitisan usually stayed at the house only on weekends, mostly alone but sometimes with his girlfriend. Meanwhile, the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) is probing the unusual wealth of Thitisan. The NACC has the authority to conduct this investigation along with the police investigation into the murder case, said Niwatchai Kasemmongkol, NACC spokesman, yesterday. Evidence about the suspects unusual wealth has been compiled and will today be forwarded to the NACCs subcommittee on assets inspection for consideration, he said. The 39-year-old is also accused of taking bribes, said Mr Niwatchai. A police source said Thitisan wasnt this rich from the beginning but he has built his own wealth out of some grey area businesses including trading edible birds nests while he was a deputy sub-division chief at Narcotics Suppression Division 4, overseeing drug suppression operations in the South. At that time he emerged as a rising star in drug suppression who handled many important cases, which led him to know people in illicit businesses and the birds nest trade, said the source. He later moved on to making money out of suppressing the smuggling of luxury cars and supercars in the South. He earned a lot of money from rewards offered for seizing such cars - 45% of the value of the car confiscated - and handing them over the Customs Department for resale through an auction, said the source. He earned B900,000 for a car worth B2mn, for instance. The source did not say to what extent this activity could be considered legitimate. Police ramp up Sandbox tourist safety PHUKET: The designated SHA+ Managers at SHA+ accommodation venues have been instructed to closely monitor the movements of Phuket Sandbox tourists who are elderly or infirm, women traveling alone, girls or single men in the provinces efforts to ramp of security for travellers arriving under the Sandbox scheme. tourismSafetypolice By The Phuket News Thursday 26 August 2021, 11:21AM The move to closely monitor the four groups of at risk Sandbox tourists was announced at a meeting yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: PR Phuket The move to closely monitor the four groups of at risk Sandbox tourists was announced at a meeting yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: PR Phuket The move to closely monitor the four groups of at risk Sandbox tourists was announced at a meeting yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: PR Phuket The move to closely monitor the four groups of at risk Sandbox tourists was announced at a meeting yesterday (Aug 25). Photo: PR Phuket Phuket Immigration Superintendent Col Thanet Sukchai announced the move at a meeting held at the EOC Command Centre at Phuket Provincial Police headquarters in Phuket Town yesterday (Aug 25), chaired by Phuket Vice Governor Vikrom Jakthee. SHA Plus managers must closely monitor these risk groups for the maximum safety of tourists, Col Thanet said. Vice Governor Vikrom yesterday reported that 177 Sandbox tourists arrived on five incoming flights on Tuesday, with all 177 testing negative for COVID-19 on arrival. So far 73 Sandbox tourists have tested positive after landing on the island. Since the Sandbox scheme launched on July 1, 24,190 tourists had arrived on 288 flights, Vice Governor Vikrom said. Of those, 5,416 were still on the island, he noted. Col Thanet noted that a crime triangle strategy was being deployed to increase safety for tourists arriving on the island. Not mentioned at the meeting was that officials and police across Phuket were ordered to ramp up security measures after 57-year-old Swiss tourist Nicole Sauvain-Weiskopf, who arrived in Phuket under the Phuket Sandbox scheme, was found murdered near Ao Yon Waterfall on Aug 5. The strategy is to create safety for local people and for tourists arriving under Phuket Sandbox to build confidence and our tourism image, because safety is an important indicator of world-class tourist attractions, Col Thanet said. Phuket is another destination that tourists decide to travel to. As a result, the province has raised security levels to build confidence for tourists in Phuket Sandbox, he added. The Phuket Governor had previously ordered the relevant agencies to inspect 198 tourist attractions throughout Phuket in detail, and we have found two high-risk tourist sites which have now been ordered closed, by closing both the entrance [to the sites] and removing the tourist attractions listings on the internet. If people search the internet, the location of these areas will not be found, he said. Col Thanet did not mention which tourist attractions had been closed. Meanwhile, 26 more moderate and low-risk areas were identified, Col Thanet continued. Modifications are to be made to these sites, with landscape adjustments, increased lighting, trees being removed and having volunteers increase the frequency of patrols, as well as local local authorities setting up the budget for installing more CCTV cameras in the areas that will be linked to the EOC Phuket Sandbox Center, he said. People arriving via the checkpoint at Tha Chatchai must go through a thorough criminal history check in order to intercept individuals with outstanding warrants from entering the province. Pol Lt Gen Kitirat Phanphet, Provincial Police Region 8 commander, has donated smart card readers to officers to help speed up the checks, he added. For tourists traveling through Phuket International Airport, Phuket Immigration will designate tourists who are likely to become victims into four groups, consisting of elderly-sick people, women traveling alone, girls and single men. SHA Plus managers must closely monitor these risk groups for maximum safety of tourists, he repeated. I have been working for at least three decades to end the live trade in cetaceans (whales, dolphins, and porpoises), and their subsequent exploitation in circus-like shows and tourist interactions in concrete tanks and small sea pens. In the United States, I have mostly targeted those facilities that are more amusement park than aquarium, where cetacean performances have little, if any, educational value, animals are bred to supply juveniles for sale to other facilities, and minimal research takes place (if at all), despite the hype that it does. Mystic Aquarium wasnt one of those facilities. Mystic, a nonprofit organization, did legitimate research. Certainly, they were included in my general campaign against the captive display of these species, but I rarely had cause to call them out by name. They didnt get involved in the more controversial aspects of their industry, such as displaying orcas (far too large to maintain humanely in concrete tanks), overcrowding, exporting surplus cetaceans to foreign facilities with poorer welfare standards, or capturing cetaceans from the wild. Until now. On Tuesday, just three weeks after Havok, a young male beluga whale imported from Marineland in Canada, died at Mystic, the aquarium announced that a second, female beluga from that same import is gravely ill. Yet at the time of Havoks death, Mystic assured the public that the remaining four belugas from Marineland were in good health. Mystic began planning to import captive-born beluga whales at least two years ago. The laws and treaties that govern the live cetacean trade are relatively weak when it comes to captive-born individuals such individuals are typically a rubber-stamp situation, a simple matter of filling out the paperwork and off they go. From the laws point of view, these individuals were born in captivity, so whats the worry from a conservation standpoint? I dont think thats how it should be, and I am constantly working to have laws and regulations address not only conservation but also welfare issues raised by these cross-border transports. At present, however, its virtually impossible to stop an import of captive-born cetaceans into the United States for public display or research. Sometimes I dont even write in opposition to such proposed imports because they are virtually always approved. Unless they are descendants of wild-caught cetaceans from a depleted stock. A depleted stock is one that is at 60 percent or less of its original population size. During the 1990s and early 2000s, Marineland purchased more than two dozen wild-caught belugas who came from a Russian stock that has since been declared depleted under U.S. law. U.S. law prohibits the import of any whales or their progeny from a depleted stock for the purpose of public display. This provision is meant to discourage further captures from, or trade in, a depleted stock. There is an exemption for research. This is why Mystics proposal was to import five whales all descendants of this depleted Russian stock of belugas for research. But they would also be on public display. So my colleagues and I fought hard to keep the United States from becoming a market for these depleted whales and their progeny. We specifically told the U.S. government that if they allowed this import despite our protests, then they should prohibit Mystic from training these whales for performance or breeding them to prevent the offspring from someday transitioning into display animals when the research ended. We were unhappy when the permit was issued, but the conditions we demanded were included, so we stood down. Now Mystic, Marineland, and the agencies on both sides of the border must face the consequences of this import. Havok is dead. Another whale is seriously ill. How did this happen? How did those responsible for these whales welfare fail to note the precarious health status of these two whales? How did the animals paperwork pass muster at the border? And what if its not just those two but the other three whales as well? I am horrified to think that maybe theres something going on at Marineland that means no whales there are healthy enough for transport. It is imperative that authorities in Canada and the United States thoroughly investigate how two (and possibly more) whales who never should have been moved at all were brought to Mystic. I was angry and saddened by Havoks death. He should never have been subjected to the stress of transport. I am appalled at the announcement that another whale is dangerously close to dying. No entity involved in this import is blameless. These whales deserved better. Dr. Naomi Rose is the marine mammal scientist for the Animal Welfare Institute in Washington, D.C. EDWARDSVILLE A special use permit to allow a private personal recreational vehicle track in Collinsville Township was denied Wednesday by the Madison County Zoning Board of Appeals. Aaron Wells, on behalf of SW Properties, had sought the permit for 1211 Clifton St., Collinsville, for plans that included dirt tracks for personal recreational vehicles. The area is zoned R-2 single-family residential. A number of residents had complained about the proposal. The ZBA unanimously voted not to recommend the request. Six other requests were approved, including: Nathan and Wilhelmina Roney, owners of property at 6345 Makayla Brooke Lane, Maryville, requested a minor bulk variance to construct an accessory structure 45 feet from a property line rather than the required 50 feet. The area is in an A agricultural district. James Holmes Sr., owner of property at 5178 Nameoki Road, Granite City, requested a special use permit to place a mobile home on the site which is in a single-family residential district. Craig Engeling, owner of property at 5360 Illinois 162, Glen Carbon, requested a setback variance to allow a new accessory structure to be 28 feet from a property line instead of the required 50 feet. The property is in an agricultural district. Craig and Lauren Watson, owners of property at 6005 Old Poag Road, Edwardsville, requested the rezoning of 1.8 acres from dual-zoned M-1 limited manufacturing to R-3 single-family residential. Bill Branz, on behalf of the Charles D. and Ann L. Moore Family Revocable Trust, owners of property at 8720 Old Moro Road, Dorsey, requested a setback variance to allow the construction of an attached garage to a single-family house 44 feet from a property line instead of the required 50 feet. The property is zoned agricultural. Mary Jo Guinn, applying on behalf of Agape Farms LLC, owner of property at 8176 Lebanon Road, Troy, requested a special use permit to allow public stables and horse boarding on the property. It is located in agriculturally-zoned property. All the requests will go before the Building & Zoning Committee at 5 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 1 at the Madison County Administration Building. The requests will then go to the full council for approval. On Wednesday, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed two pieces of legislation into law aimed to establish mental healthcare infrastructure in Illinois. House Bill 2595 requires medically necessary mental healthcare to be covered by insurance beginning Jan. 1, 2023. Illinois follows California and Oregon in requiring coverage for mental, emotional, nervous or substance use disorders. House Bill 2784 creates a first responder system that will coordinate 911 and 988 emergency responses when the national 988 mental health crisis line is established in the summer of 2022. This initiative the first statewide approach of its kind in the nation aims to reduce arrests for those with mental illnesses who are deserving of a specialists intervention. "Im proud and inspired to be a part of making bold changes to our mental healthcare services in Illinois that will help all Illinoisans receive the essential services and care they need, no matter where they live or their socioeconomic status," Pritzker said in a statement. "Mental healthcare is healthcare. Its medically necessary, its lifesaving and it can help address the systemic trauma that has held many communities back for far too long." HB 2595 expands access to insurance for mental healthcare, requiring every insurer to provide coverage to all medically necessary mental healthcare across the state. This includes, beginning Jan. 1, 2023, the treatment of mental, emotional, nervous or substance use disorders. The legislation requires the Illinois Department of Insurance to file a joint report on mental, emotional, nervous or substance use condition parity to the General Assembly no later than Jan. 1, 2022. "Today, Illinois takes a critical step forward toward ending discrimination against people with mental health and substance use disordersmaking the promise of equal access to treatment a reality," said former U.S. Rep. and founder of The Kennedy Forum, Patrick J. Kennedy, in a statement. "With his signature, Governor Pritzker makes Illinois a national leader in holding insurers accountable for following nationally recognized clinical standards of care." HB 2595 is effective Jan. 1, 2023. HB 2784, also known as the Community Emergency Services and Support Act or the Stephon Edwards Watts Act requires all Illinois municipalities to coordinate 911 and 988 services, with the goal of prioritizing community care over incarceration or improper use of force when it comes to mental or behavioral health emergencies. When an individual is dispatched through a 911 system, HB 2784 ensures that an appropriate mobile response is available, requiring 911 call center operators to coordinate with mobile mental and behavioral health services, established by the Illinois Department of Human Services Division of Mental Health. Thank you, Governor Pritzker, for signing HB 2784. This new law will provide all Illinois residents with the community care and compassion they need when dealing with mental and behavioral health emergencies," said Grace B. Hou, secretary of the Illinois Department of Human Services, in a statement. "IDHS and our Division of Mental Health will provide training and guidance to mobile health units and police officers, so they are equipped and ready to respond to these extremely important emergencies and life events." The DMH helps individuals with mental illnesses recover and participate fully in community life. Under this law, DMH will provide guidance on coordinating mobile units, when responding to an individual who is experiencing a crisis. The Division will also establish regional advisory committees in each Emergency Medical Services region to advise on mental and behavioral health emergency response systems. To ensure lasting change, the law requires appropriate responder training, which helps train police officers when responding to mental health emergencies. HB 2784 is effective January 1, 2022. "Access to affordable mental healthcare is a right and not a privilege. Right now, 56% of Americans who need mental healthcare dont receive it. As more and more people are feeling stressed, helpless and grief-stricken, we must do everything we can to fight our way through this pandemic," said Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton in a statement. "With the signing of these bills, Illinois ensures that there will be increased access to the professionals and the resources needed to manage a crisis, create safe spaces, and improve mental health outcomes for the people who need it most. We must remove the stigma around mental healthcare, and these bills are a step in the right direction." The legislation builds upon the administrations commitment to establish partnerships with law enforcement and mental health resources; therefore, reducing arrests of those who suffer from mental illnesses. Previously, the Governor signed the First Responder Mental Health Bill, which creates a database and webpage with a comprehensive collection of mental health resources specifically geared toward first responders. The administration is also strengthening Illinois crisis mental health infrastructure ahead of next years nationwide rollout of 988. Last month, the Governor signed legislation that made Illinois one of the first states in the nation to expand access to telehealth coverage, turning the states emergency pandemic response into a permanent reality. Scranton, PA (18503) Today Rain, occasionally heavy, early. Decreasing clouds overnight. Low around 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall possibly over one inch. Localized flooding is expected.. Tonight Rain, occasionally heavy, early. Decreasing clouds overnight. Low around 55F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall possibly over one inch. Localized flooding is expected. Westerly, RI (02891) Today Showers and thunderstorms likely - heavy rainfall is possible, especially this evening. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low around 60F. Winds E at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected.. Tonight Showers and thunderstorms likely - heavy rainfall is possible, especially this evening. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low around 60F. Winds E at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 3 to 5 inches of rain expected. Pensions are set to be a key battleground in the war to take control of defence firm Meggitt. The Coventry business is being circled by American predators engineer Parker-Hannifin and private equity outfit Transdigm. The tussle has outraged MPs and military figures who want Meggitt to retain its British roots amid fears of a hollowing out of the UK defence industry. Pensions row: Defence firm Meggitt is being circled by American predators engineer Parker-Hannifin and private equity outfit Transdigm But one pensions expert has warned that retirement pots will increasingly become a deciding factor meaning pension commitments could decide Meggitt's future. Alex Waite, an independent pensions consultant at LCP which is advising firms such as G4S as well as Parker-Hannifin as it pursues Meggitt, said pension trustees are becoming wary of the amount of debt involved in takeovers. Trustees of the Morrisons pension schemes have sounded the alarm over the proposed 7billion deal for the supermarket chain. From this autumn, company directors and pension trustees can be jailed or fined up to 1million for doing anything which 'puts pension benefits at risk'. Higher offer for Augean Waste company Augean has switched horses and backed a new takeover offer worth 341million. It had accepted a 315million go-private bid from Morgan Stanley Infrastructure, worth 300p a share. But it is now backing a buyout offer from a consortium of investment managers Ancala Partners and Fiera Infrastructure, which has bid 325p a share. Their approach raised the prospect of a bidding war. Augean's stock rose 17.2 per cent, or 49p, to 334p a sign higher takeover offers may materialise. Executive chairman Jim Meredith said: 'We believe the acquisition is a good outcome for all stakeholders.' This means Meggitt's trustees will be keeping a close eye on the leverage or debt levels, compared to profits imposed on the company by Parker's and Transdigm's bids. Deals which pile more debt on a company could weaken the pension schemes, since the business will have to spend more on paying interest and could have less for retirement pots. Debt will usually take priority over pension scheme funding if a firm goes bust. Waite said: 'Pension fund trustees could be held responsible if they allow a deal with too much leverage to pass, if this ends up harming the pension schemes. It's not just trustees. The directors of the target company also need to consider what a deal means for pension fund members.' Meggitt's pension scheme has a 201million funding hole, and looks after the retirement savings of 4,600 current and ex-employees. A takeover by Parker or Transdigm is likely to leave Meggitt which makes 'black boxes' for the RAF Typhoon jets and flight deck display instruments for commercial aircraft with higher debt levels. Parker's leverage is around two times, according to analysts, while Transdigm's is around seven times. And both figures will rise as more debt is taken on during the Meggitt takeover. Transdigm said: 'Our British businesses employ over 2,000 people, so we fully understand the requirements of acquirers.' Parker said: 'We have signed a legally binding memorandum of understanding with the trustee of the Meggitt pension plan alongside our recommended offer. 'We very much recognise the importance of upholding Meggitt's pension obligations and are committed to putting the pension plan on a stronger foundation.' Leeds tech firm bought by Relx in 130m deal The founder of a Leeds software company is set to make 18million after his firm was taken over by British data giant Relx. John Lord founded Trunarrative in 2016 and is chief executive of the company that helps banks, casinos, accountancy firms, retailers and logistics groups screen suppliers and customers and check for signs of fraud. Relx is understood to be paying about 130million, with Lord, 54, in line for 18million as he has about 13.5 per cent of the shares. American tycoon Larry Smith owns another 83 per cent through his firm Provenir and stands to make around 108million. And Trunarrative's top executives, including operating chief Ryan Morrison, commercial boss Mike Harriss and technology chief David Eastaugh, also look in line to share a pot of about 5million. Relx last year bought Cambridge analytics firm Scibite for 65million, anti-fraud tech firm Emailage Corp for 350million and identification firm ID Analytics for 273million. Price boost for miner Bacanora Lithium miner Bacanora has accepted an improved 285m takeover offer after shareholders complained it was being sold 'on the cheap'. The offer tabled by China's Ganfeng is now worth 73.6p per share, compared to a previous bid of 67.5p per share, or 259million. This comprises 67.5p in cash as well as shares in the Zinnwald lithium project in Germany. Ganfeng's earlier offer fuelled a grassroots revolt. Its proposal needs 75 per cent shareholder support. Lithium is key in making batteries, and currently in high demand. Rival swoops on fund administrator Sanne Jersey fund administrator Sanne has agreed to be sold to rival Apex Group for 1.5billion. Apex will pay 920p per share, higher than the 875p bid from private equity firm Cinven in July. Sanne provides outsourcing services to nearly 2,000 clients, varying from private debt to capital markets. Apex is a fund services group with 5,000 staff. Sanne chairman Rupert Robson said: 'Sanne has delivered substantial value creation to shareholders since IPO and today's acquisition ensures investors are compensated for the future potential of the business.' The deal is yet to be voted on by investors. The City watchdog has effectively blacklisted the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange by declaring that it is 'not capable' of supervision by regulators. In a letter to the UK arm of Binance, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said the firm posed 'a significant risk to consumers'. It added the firm was unwilling to engage with it. But the regulator is unable to stop Britons using Binance.com as the website is not connected to its UK entity. The criticism comes at a time when cryptocurrencies, such as bitcoin, are soaring in popularity. Crackdown: The Financial Conduct Authority said cryptocurrency exchange Binance posed 'a significant risk to consumers' Consumers wanting to purchase bitcoin will often use an exchange like Binance, which matches buyers with sellers. According to its website, 1.5billion worth of cryptocurrencies are traded on Binance every day. But the FCA and the Bank of England are increasingly worried about the risks posed to customers by its governance and products. Binance also allows traders to place highly leveraged bets on cryptocurrencies, meaning customers can suffer heavy losses if punts go wrong. The FCA led by chief executive Nikhil Rathi is also understood to be concerned about Binance's money-laundering and fraud controls. It issued a stinging rebuke to Binance in June, forcing it to plaster warnings on its website telling consumers that it 'is not permitted to undertake any regulated activity in the UK'. Yet the FCA has few avenues left to prevent consumers buying Binance products. The regulator said Binance Markets Limited, the group's UK arm, 'refused' to respond to basic questions including enquiries relating to money laundering. In its letter to Binance Markets, the FCA said: 'The FCA considers that firm's responses have been incomplete and have included direct refusals to provide information.' Fraud concerns: The FCA led by chief executive Nikhil Rathi (pictured) is understood to be concerned about Binance's money-laundering and fraud controls The FCA listed failures to provide details about how the group is organised, to explain what routes UK consumers could use to buy its products, and to identify the legal entity behind it. The firm, founded in 2017 in China by Changpeng Zhao, is domiciled in the Cayman Islands. It was planning a UK site when it bought British firm EddieUK, changing the name to Binance Markets. But under new FCA rules, Binance Markets pulled the application this year. All cryptocurrency firms in the UK must register with the FCA by March 2022, but it says many applications it has received are totally inadequate. Andrew Bailey, Governor of the Bank of England, has warned investors that they should be prepared to 'lose everything'. Binance said: 'As noted by the FCA, Binance Markets has fully complied with all aspects of its requirements. We continue to engage with the FCA to resolve any outstanding issues. 'As the cryptocurrency ecosystem industry continues to grow and evolve we are committed to working with regulators and policymakers to develop policies that protect consumers, encourage innovation, and move our industry forward.' Swedish hedge fund Cevian Capital now has a 5.02% stake in British insurer Aviva Activist investor Cevian Capital has bumped up its stake in Aviva. The Swedish hedge fund, whose boss Christer Gardell has been dubbed the Butcher, revealed in June that it had taken a 4.95 per cent stake in the British insurer. It has now ramped that up to 5.02 per cent, stock market filings revealed, taking its holding to just over 802million. Gardell has a reputation for ruthlessness and called for the return 5billion of excess cash to shareholders by next year. This month, Avivas chief executive Amanda Blanc set out plans to hand back 4billion. Niko Pakalen, a partner at Cevian, said: We remain confident that Aviva will meet or exceed the expectations we have communicated. Spain remains the favourite destination of Britons hoping to retire abroad, but many are reconsidering their plans due to Brexit and the pandemic, new research shows. Nearly half of over-50s who want to live overseas would choose Spain, while a fifth prefer France which takes second spot, followed by Portugal, Italy and southern European countries such as Greece and Cyprus. That represents virtually no change from last year, apart from New Zealand slipping from sixth to seventh place - perhaps because pandemic restrictions make it impossible to travel there at present - according to a survey by Canada Life. View over Granada: Spain remains the favourite destination of Britons hoping to retire abroad But 50 per cent of over-50s who are thinking about or planning on moving abroad are rethinking where they might go due to Brexit, up from 46 per cent when the study was carried out last year. Some 47 per cent say uncertainty over Brexit is making them reconsider altogether, up from 44 per cent in 2020. This year, Canada Life also asked about the impact of the pandemic. It found 42 per cent were reconsidering which country to retire to in light of the health crisis, and 39 per cent were pondering whether to give up the idea of spending their retirement abroad. When asked about their reasons for wanting to leave the UK, 69 per cent say the weather would be better, 62 per cent are seeking a more desirable lifestyle, and 45 per cent reckon it would be cheaper. However, one in four are unaware of a major financial stumbling block to retiring abroad, depending on where you intend to spend your old age. Why are state pensions frozen for some expats? Whether an expat's pension is frozen or not depends entirely on where you move to, because the Government has struck individual deals with some countries but left around 150 others out in the cold. This has created an historical anomaly, which originated some 70 years ago, where people retiring to Canada, Australia, India, Africa and many parts of the Caribbean lose out on state pension increases, while those living in EU countries, the US, Jamaica, Israel and the Philippines get their full whack. Read more here about the frozen state pension trap. If you move to the 'wrong' country, whatever amount the state pension is set at when you leave is what you will continue to get throughout retirement, unless you move back to the UK. That means some expats who retired when the full basic rate was 67.50 a week in 2000 still get that, rather than the 137.60 a week now received by others who retired that year. In November 2020, some 1.1million people had their state pensions paid abroad, and nearly 490,000 were frozen, according to Government data. Just one in five people in the Canada Life survey said they know which countries are affected - see the full list below. People who move to the EU, Switzerland, and countries which are in the European Economic Area but not the EU - Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway - will continue to get state pension increases under post-Brexit arrangements. Sean Christian, managing director of Canada Life's wealth management division for Canada Life, says: 'Despite Brexit and the ongoing global pandemic, many over-50s continue to harbour the dream of a retirement which includes better weather, a more desirable lifestyle, or cheaper standards of living than the UK. 'There are a number of key considerations when planning a move abroad, such as which countries offer reciprocal payment agreements [on state pension increases], thinking about the impact of currency exchange rates and whether state pensions will keep pace with the cost of living.' The firm surveyed 1,000 over-50s who want to retire abroad. Retiring abroad? Here's a handy checklist Canada Life offers the following tips for a smooth retirement overseas. 1. Get an estimate of your state pension here. 2. Tell HMRC that you are moving overseas, so they can let you know of any UK tax liability you may have even though you are planning to live overseas. You can also allow any UK pension you have to be paid gross (no tax deducted) and taxed in your country of residence, though this only applies if the country you live in has a double taxation agreement with the UK. Where would YOU retire? There is little change from last year's list, but New Zealand has slipped a spot 3. Check what reciprocal social security agreements are in place with the destination country regarding your UK state pension, including whether it will be increased or frozen, and other benefits. The Government has more information here. 4. Find out about your welfare rights in your destination country. Also, check the cost of healthcare in the country you are thinking of moving to, and consider some form of medical insurance. 5. Keep an eye on exchange rates as your state pension and other income is likely to be paid to you in pounds and you will then need to convert it to the local currency which may mean your income fluctuates. Read more here. 6. If you decide to keep your property in the UK you will need to let your mortgage provider and insurance company know if it will be rented or remain empty. 7. Do your homework on the cost of living in the country you want to move to 8. Notify utility companies, financial institutions and your local council when you are leaving 9. Contact the electoral register, and arrange for mail forwarding via the Post Office 10. If you plan to keep an account at your UK bank, contact it and ask if you will face any new rules or restrictions after moving abroad. Source: International Consortium of British Pensioners Tifton, GA (31794) Today Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low 71F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%.. Tonight Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low 71F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Instant unlimited access to all of our content on tillamookheadlightherald.com. The Headlight Herald E-Edition Newsletter emailed to you each week, the night before the paper hits the street! This subscription is for NEW or RENEWING online subscribers. (The charge will appear as "Country Media Inc." on your credit card statement) Tillamook, OR (97141) Today Mostly clear and windy. Low 44F. N winds at 20 to 30 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph.. Tonight Mostly clear and windy. Low 44F. N winds at 20 to 30 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph. Cresaptown, MD (21502) Today Evening clouds will give way to clearing overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low near 55F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Evening clouds will give way to clearing overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low near 55F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. remaining of SUPPORT LOCAL JOURNALISM! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. Sunrise: November 25, 1978 Sunset: August 29,2021 Jocelyn was born November 25, 1978 to the late John Henry Baker and Linda Ann Baker who preceded her in death. She was a free spirited ambitious individual and very self driven. One of her hobbies she loved most was singing. Also, in her leis Damage from the storm in East Norriton is seen in this photo posted on Facebook on July 21, 2021. Residents were without power for days. Perhaps the highlight of Wednesday's state Senate hearing on the public ethics enforcement in New York was the appearance of Julie Garcia, a former member of the beleaguered Joint Commission on Public Ethics who quit the panel in 2019, nine months after reporting an alleged leak of confidential information to former Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Garcia, an attorney who was appointed to the ethics panel by Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, was contacted by a top Heastie staffer a few hours after a January 2019 meeting of JCOPE; the aide told her the governor had called Heastie to criticize the way his appointees had voted on the question of whether or not to proceed with an investigation of Joe Percoco, Cuomo's former top aide. Garcia reported that communication to JCOPE, which reported it to the state inspector general's office, which conducted a nine-month investigation but neglected to question Cuomo, Heastie or the legislative aide who called Garcia. In her virtual appearance before the Senate hearing, Garcia said she thought the leak was part of a pattern of improper activity, and laid out what's she said was at stake when ethics watchdogs fail to credibly do their jobs. "When someone doesn't investigate something, to me that's almost consciousness of guilt just do the damn investigation ... (and) if at the end of the day if there's no wrongdoing, then there's no wrongdoing," she said. Garcia was blistering in her criticism not only of the IG, but also of Heastie, who she accused of attempting to obfuscate what occurred in January 2019. "I was appointed by someone to do a job, and I did my job, and then people who had information and knew about the leak did not have my back," she said. "We all understand there's a reason people don't come forward and talk about what's going on in Albany: because no one really has their back. No one's going to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them and tell them, 'I'm going to be there, I'm going to stand there with you, I'm going to back you up on this.' Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. "There were certainly people that could have backed me up," Garcia continued. " ... But what happens in government on the state level and on the federal level is when we turn our heads away, when we stay silent, we end up with 11 people who are victimized by a government that is abusive, that is bullying, condescending, threatening to ruin people's careers." Watch her full answer here: On Thursday morning, JCOPE narrowly voted to ask state Attorney General Letitia James to investigate the alleged leak as well as the inspector general's handling of the matter. All of Cuomo's appointees abstained. This summer, the dining options at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in North Adams, Mass., look a little different. On weekends, walk past the upside-down trees suspended on cables and youll come upon a summer scene. Beneath the canopied tree that reliably turns burnt gold each fall, rugs casually overlap on the gravel courtyard, and bright, patterned cushions lean against its trunk. Scattered at casual bistro tables, couples and small groups sip wine and chatter animatedly while a chef turns long kebab skewers packed tightly with meat over charcoal, sending smoke skyward from a low outdoor grill. Chama Mama, a Georgian restaurant with two Manhattan locations, is in residence through late September at the urging of a member of the museums board of directors, and it is steadily feeding a curious crowd. In name, Chama Mama trips off the tongue, but while chama means eat, mama is Georgian for father. Thats something that owner Tamara Chubinidze finds amusing, allowing the globally common understanding of Mama to capture memories of grandmothers and mothers cooking at home. Chama Mama is centered on three key components of Georgian cuisine: tone, the traditional clay tandoor-style oven; khapuri, Georgian bread; and kvevri wines, which are wines traditionally fermented in bulb-shaped clay vessels buried in the ground. At Mass MoCA, Chubinidze delivers a pared-down version of the full Chama Mama menu, executed by fellow Tbilisi-born chef Nino Chiokadze, a smiling force who overcame logistical limits, including the absence of a tone. She tweaked her flavorful bread dough so that it could be oven-baked, and worked with feta, mozzarella and ricotta to approximate regional Georgian cheeses. The focus is on lavash flatbreads and khachapuri pillowy, fluffy breads stuffed with cheese and three regional versions are offered. (In Georgia there are 47). Khinkali soup dumplings, thickly pleated like purses, are filled with mushrooms, lamb, pork and beef, revealing the influence of both East and West on Georgian cuisine. The simply seasoned, skewered meats from an outdoor grill are a tradition of summer houses and outdoor summer kitchens across the Caucasus region between the Black and Caspian seas. Of the al-fresco scene, Chubinidze says with a laugh: I wanted it to feel effortless, as if you could lounge there with a book, talking, drinking wine, as we would at home. If it almost sounds more like a place to lose time rather than a formal restaurant, it is. And given the warm welcome, full plates and daytime hours from noon to 8 p.m. each weekend for the next month, this is probably what you should do there. It can feel as if Georgia burst onto the dining scene only recently, fueled by global interest in natural wine and orange wine, especially Georgias traditional method of production. There also has been a surge in cookbooks exploring Silk Road spice routes across Syria, Turkey, Armenia and Azerbaijan, and the culinary identities of Russia, Ukraine and Georgia, former states of the Soviet Republic all bordering the Black Sea. But dining in the company of Darra Goldstein, the Williamstown-based author and multidecade authority on Georgian food meant, we were cradled in her deep knowledge as she described techniques behind breads and jewel-colored pickles from jonjoli (salt-pickled blossoms) to gandzili (ramps), whole garlic cloves and cabbage, and welcomed in true Georgian-style with open arms and heaps of food. In opening Chama Mama, Chubinidze wanted to capture something missing since she arrived in New York City in 1996. The few Georgian restaurants offered a taste of home but lacked crucial details in ambiance, dishes and good Georgian wine, and she wanted to create a restaurant that could be a cultural experience as well as educational, showing how Georgian cuisine is not monolithic but regionally diverse. Admiring the Le Pain Quotidien brand for its elegant exploration of simple Belgian food, she worked for the company as a baker for two years before finding an investor to back the opening of Chama Mama in Manhattans Chelsea neighborhood in March 2019 and, in 2020, mid-pandemic, signing on an Upper West Side location that opened in April of this year, just months before the Mass MoCA pop up. As we sipped Kvevri dry red Ojaleshi, a velvety, ruby-colored wine rich with jam and berries, pepper and spice, we shared a khachapuri trio made with chef Chiokadzes high-gluten dough for an impossibly light, delicately chewy bread. Quartered to share, we marveled at Imeruli, a cheese-stuffed version from the Imereti region for which Chiokadze blends local ricotta, feta and mozzarella to approximate salty and stretchy flavor and texture; lobiani, filled with buttery, smashed beans; and from the high, mountainous Svaneti region, kubdari, a meat-filled twist on the theme. Onto the patterned tablecloth come platters of soup dumplings. A flower in the twisted topknot identifies those filled with mushrooms, fresh tarragon, cilantro and parsley. Were told to hold the dumplings by their knots, nibble a small hole to drink the soup, demolish in a few bites and discard the doughy handle. (The practice reminds me of British pasties, meat-filled hand pies with thick, crimped crusts that miners would eat by hand before discarding the soiled edge.) The lamb dumplings are fragrant with a heady aroma from Chiokadzes blend of spices and peppers. On the mixed-grill platter are beef, pork and chicken kebab and mtsvadi (pork skewers), loosened to dunk in homemade adjika (hot chile oil) and tkemali (green plum sauce). More bread appears in soft, floppy triangles, part roti, part paratha and utterly unique. We graze leisurely, picking at meat and pickles, having more wine and more happy talk. Our stomachs are bursting as a beautiful silver platter dusted in confectionery sugar appears. There are millefeuille layers of Napoleon cake for those wanting sweetness; muraba, preserved Georgian figs with fresh walnuts; and traditional pelamushi, a set dessert close to panna cotta made with grape juice. Here, white and purple grape juices are layered in a nontraditional, two-tone version. Its our Americanized pelamushi, Chubinidze said, adding: In Georgia, were not big into desserts. The answer to Whats for dessert? is always more wine. Restaurant Review Chama Mama at Mass MoCA Where: 1040 Mass MoCA Way, North Adams, Mass. Hours: Noon to 8 p.m. Friday through Sunday, through Sept. 26 Info: For updates, follow @chamamamanyc on Instagram. Private catering inquiries: 646-438-900. The company website is chamamama.com, but the Mass MoCA menu is smaller than at the New York City restaurants. Note: The Mass MoCA pop-up is open for walk-in dining and to-go orders only. No reservations accepted. See More Collapse In fact, wine is so integral to Georgian life that, Im told, tourists passing through border control are given a passport stamp and a bottle of wine. Whether thats a joke barely matters. Hospitality, conviviality, shared dining, talk and endless bottles of wine are at the heart of Georgian culture and life, captured most clearly in the tradition of the supra Georgian feast. Chubinidzes connections have helped her to connect regional wine producers to U.S. importers, and Eater.com recently recognized Chama Mama for the most comprehensive wine list in the city. Dont miss the chance to try some extraordinary wines and traditional Georgian plates. Plus, theres a ticketed supra event planned for the weekend of Sept. 17 to 19. And as the pop-up serves walk-ins only, you can stay or place a to-go order to round out your museum day. As the Chama Mama website says: Lets chama. Lets eat. Chama Mama at Mass MoCA, a pop-up restaurant, is open from noon to 8 p.m. through September 26th, 2021, and is expected to return for summer 2022. Colony Farm is a former state prison dairy farm in the Catskill-Shawangunk region once operated by Eastern Correctional Facility, and still owned by New York States Department of Corrections (DOCCS). Currently its leased out to area farmers, but one local man believes the 500 acres could be put to better use if it was opened up to recreation, too. Someone once told me the western slope of the Catskills is a sleeping giant, said local farmer John Adams. People go to Minnewaska State Park, turn around, and go to New Paltz. Down this side of the mountain an extra five minutes, they could be at Colony Farm. So far DOCCS hasnt been convinced to change how the land is used or give it up. New York State Assemblyman Brian Miller, who grew up on a pick-your-own apple farm and believes in the benefits of agritourism, said more discussions are needed before a decision is made on what to do with the land. Adams, who lives on a nearby farm and grew up on the Hurds Family Farm in Modena, has advocated for opening the Colony Farm land to recreation and tourism since the late 1990s. At that time, he requested agricultural conservation easements to the prison farm, which he believed would close. The prison farm ultimately did close, in June of 2009, though the prison itself is still in operation. The next year, the Ulster County Agriculture & Farmland Protection Board wrote a letter recommending that the state-owned farmland be permanently protected for agriculture and open space. Adams proposed a mixed-use option, suggesting to Ulster County officials that they ask DOCCS to surplus the property to another agency that could secure conservation easements, add trails, and maintain its agricultural use as well. Adams later spearheaded a farm feasibility study in 2017 with the Town of Wawarsing that lasted for several months and examined potential new uses for the land. The study compiled a number of findings but specifically cites a mixed-use approach, including recreation and agritourism, as the key finding and having the largest benefit. The study estimated that the costs of establishing preliminary trail infrastructure on the site would cost approximately $270,000, but the overall impact generated by the site was estimated to be $770,000 once fully operational and assuming 35,000 visitors a year. Four years since that feasibility study, nothing has changed. From prison town to adventure destination? Instead of being a prison town, we could be a recreational gateway community. We could provide amenities for tourists, said Adams. We need a champion in government. Surrounded by thousands of acres of parkland, the Town of Wawarsing is well-positioned as the western gateway to the Shawangunk Mountains and the gateway to the Catskills on the east. Colony Farm is a land bridge between the two, said Adams. It joins Minnewaska State Park to the Vernooy Kill State Forest and Catskill Park beyond that. Its also along the scenic byway and a mile from the O&W Rail Trail. Elected officials have shown some interest in repurposing the prison farmland. In 2017, U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer announced that the Town of Wawarsing would receive $25,000 in federal funding for the aforementioned feasibility study. The best alternative use for the land parcel would be to provide more recreation opportunities for locals and visitors, while preserving existing farmlands and reactivating Colony Farm and its buildings, the feasibility study found. However, the study also outlined a no change option of leaving the land in the hands of DOCCS, which would require no additional administrative action or resource expenditure. This is the most desired option should DOCCS have ongoing need for these parcels, or the use of the parcels will remain either vacant or leased for agricultural uses that requires little additional site development (as is currently the case with two of the parcels), read the report. In a statement to Times Union: Hudson Valley, the DOCCS reiterated their use of the land and the studys no change option: DOCCS uses that land for a variety of training purposes that are essential to the Departments needs. The Town of Wawarsing initiated a study in 2017 that determined the best use of the land is for DOCCS to retain ownership and continue its use of the property, a finding with which DOCCS agreed. A new vision for Wawarsings agriculture Around the region, agritourism has proven to be successful. On the other side of the Shawangunk Mountains, New Paltz sees thousands of visitors every year who are interested in hiking Minnewaska and picking fruit and vegetables at local farms. Nationally, Farm agritourism revenue more than tripled between 2002 and 2017, according to the latest Census of Agriculture data. Agritourism is one of the biggest economic drivers in the Hudson Valley, said Miller, whose district includes Angry Orchard cidery and other wineries and breweries. Downtime is the best time Make the most of your Hudson Valley weekend, every week with our newsletter. Recently, Adams has gone to state Senator Mike Martucci and Miller to solicit their support for Colony Farms revitalization. That was the first time weve heard about it, said Miller. Were out talking to local municipal leaders in the area to get their opinions on it to get more community input we need to learn a lot more first. Miller said his office isnt ready to contact key stakeholders involved in this process and instead wants to take it slow and one step at a time to see if everyone is on board. DOCCS said that currently one farmer leases 101 acres of the parcel for hay; the lease is set to expire on March 1, 2022, and costs the farmer $2,528 a year. Ulster County Department of Economic Development Director Tim Weidemann said that the land currently drives no revenue for the county since it is state-owned and has no commercial activity. We have plenty of underutilized property resources throughout the county that its in all of our best interest to put them to their best and highest use, said Weidemann. This is a property that has recreational and agricultural value, and Id love to see it used as such. RELATED: Let us be your guide to the natural world in the Hudson Valley. Sign up for our weekly Outdoors newsletter. Similar to Miller, he warns that this will not happen overnight considering it is still owned by DOCCS. I think we paint this broad picture of our $850 million tourism sector, but really the sector is so successful because it has niche opportunities with special interest, like agritourism, that we are naturally highly competitive with, so adding a resource like [Colony Farm] would only strengthen our position, said Weidemann. Ulster County recently announced a proposed marijuana facility for the town, which County Executive Pat Ryan has trumpeted as a future economic driver for the area. Since its heyday as part the Borscht Belt, the area hasnt reached its full potential, said Adams. While Adams is in support of the proposed cannabis cultivation facility because it will bring more jobs, he thinks agritourism is the key to the regions success by rebranding the town as a recreational community. The Town of Wawarsing has also completed a natural resources inventory and open space plan to identify conservation priorities and recommend actions. In 2019, they implemented one key policy recommendation by designating the 8,000-acre Cedar Swamp and the Catskill-Shawangunk Greenway Corridor as critical environmental areas, making it harder to develop the land. At a local level, Wawarsing is really modeling a planning approach for the future thats not only going to help people through tourism and the economy, its not only going to help wildlife by having intact habitat, but its also going to help the community be resilient to climate change, said Laura Heady, from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, in a YouTube video. Local anchor John Gray sat down with the New York State Writer's Institute this week to talk about writing and his rescue dogs (he and his wife have five). Gray is an award-winning local journalist who anchors the afternoon and evening newscasts at WTEN/FOX23. He also has a weekly column in The Record and the Saratogian and has written several best-selling books. NIAMEY, Niger (AP) Hundreds of Islamic militants attacked a military outpost in southeastern Niger overnight, killing 16 soldiers and wounding at least nine others, the country's defense ministry said Wednesday. Extremists from the Boko Haram group targeted the soldiers near the village of Baroua, not far from the border with Chad. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike IS. We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. U.S. officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airports perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. Even so, the airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people away.. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. ___ Faiez reported from Istanbul, Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. Former U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos said Tuesday she will not run for Michigan governor in 2022, putting an end to speculation about the onetime Trump administration Cabinet member and partner in one of the state's most influential Republican couples. I am not running for governor, DeVos told The Detroit News, which reported the announcement first. It's not going to be me. I appreciate that some folks are interested in that, but I think the rumor and interest really only serves to highlight how desperate Michiganders are for new leadership." Advisers to DeVos, 63, said she never weighed a campaign to challenge Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, despite weeks of chatter in Michigans political class. Though a billionaire able to finance a campaign and former state party chairwoman with key connections, DeVos would have faced complications in a Republican primary and the general election. Despite four years on former President Donald Trump's Cabinet, DeVos quit her post a day after the deadly U.S. Capitol siege in January, blaming the defeated president's false claims that the 2020 election was stolen for inflaming tensions as Congress prepared to certify the 2020 presidential election. There is no mistaking the impact your rhetoric had on the situation, and it is the inflection point for me," she said in her letter of resignation. In the meantime, some Trump loyalists who backed the former president's claims and organized Michigan supporters' travel to Washington to protest the outcome have taken a seat in the state party's inner circle. In a general election, DeVos would carry the Trump baggage, who won the state in 2016, but lost it narrowly in 2020. DeVos would also be the face of her husband Dick's decade-long effort to curb union power in the longtime manufacturing state. Dick DeVos, Michigan's losing candidate for governor in 2006, successfully lobbied Republican Gov. Rick Snyder in 2012 to sign legislation prohibiting unions from requiring employees to pay dues as a condition of employment. The DeVoses later focused their political fundraising group, Michigan Freedom Fund, to defend Republican legislators who backed the bill. Still, DeVos remains respected in the party, and sparked talk of a gubernatorial bid after speaking to the Midland County Republican Party committee meeting last month, not a typical venue for a former Cabinet secretary. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. DeVos spoke at the meeting at the invitation of U.S. Rep. John Moolenaar, aides said, an appearance aides said she only more recently had time to accept since leaving Washington. Democrats, with whom DeVos remains unpopular, sought to capitalize on the rumors. Chiefly, Whitmer, a Democrat expected to seek a second term, used it to raise money. DeVos is a threat to public education and the future of our state, and we need to be ready to counter her billionaire-funded campaign," Whitmer was quoted as saying in a campaign fundraising email last week. Republican James Craig, the recently retired Detroit police chief, has announced his candidacy for governor in 2022. ST. LOUIS (AP) A veteran Missouri political consultant pleaded guilty Wednesday to a federal tax charge, saying he takes full responsibility for his actions. David Barklage was indicted in May on a felony count accusing him of failing to report $443,633 in income from 2012 through 2014. The indictment said that as a result, he failed to pay $151,843 in taxes. Barklage said in a statement after his guilty plea that he will make full restitution. His attorney, Joseph Passanise, said he will ask for probation. Barklage operates the Barklage Company and his clients have included several prominent Republicans in Missouri government. He was a consultant last year to the Uniting Missouri political action committee, which provided financial backing for Gov. Mike Parsonss successful election bid. Barklage also has worked with key players in the Missouri House and Senate, and his efforts in the 1990s helped Republicans take control of the Missouri General Assembly. ALBANY Three schools. One path to a law degree. Thats the latest possibility for Capital Region students under a new program launched Wednesday with an agreement between the presidents of Hudson Valley Community College, the University at Albany and Albany Law School. Students accepted into the new Legal Studies Pathway Program will embark on a road-mapped plan designed to guide them through the trio of institutions to obtain a law degree. That road begins at HVCC in Troy, where students will be required to have continuous, full-time enrollment. Once they graduate with an associate degree from HVCC, students will transfer to UAlbany to work toward a baccalaureate degree. Finally, the students will enroll at Albany Law School to work toward the law degree, officials said. To be accepted into Albany Law School, students still must apply. And they must have achieved a grade point average (GPA) and a onetime or average score on their Law School Admission Test (LSAT) no lower than the median GPA and LSAT score for the prior class that entered Albany Law School, officials said. The program, which starts this fall, is open to no specific number of students as of yet, officials said. UAlbany President Havidan Rodriguez, HVCC President Roger Ramsammy and Albany Law School Dean and President Alicia Ouellette signed a memorandum of understanding agreement to start the program at a ceremony in UAlbany's University Hall. Ouellette said the program will enable students to attend law school who otherwise may not have considered a legal career. "We really want to expand our pool of applicants to students who are first generation college graduates," Ouellette said. In 2015, UAlbany and Albany Law School entered into an affiliation to share some academic programs and services. Rodriguez said UAlbany has partnerships with both Albany Law School and HVCC Ramsammy highlighted the case of Kayla Mumtaz of Troy, a 2020 graduate of HVCC now in her final year at UAlbany, as someone ideal for the program. Mumtaz, a married mother of three children who also cares for a step-daughter and younger brother, received a 2020 SUNY Chancellor's Award for Student Excellence. Mumtaz, who had served as a secretary and president of the Black and Latino Student Union, won the Departmental Award for Excellence in Academic Writing in the spring 2019 semester. She was named to the President's List each semester since she began at HVCC. Mumtaz, who attended the ceremony Wednesday, said the new program sounded amazing. She previously wanted to enter a program at UAlbany while at HVCC but could not, she explained. Mumtaz said she wanted to attend law school -- something the law school president clearly heard. "Let's talk," Ouellette told Mumtaz. On a recent weekday, the slot machines at Akwesasne Mohawk Casino jingled and beeped for masked regulars. But laced through the bright, windowless space now with a slew of COVID-19 safety measures in place the chairs in front of the Canadian-currency slot machines were empty. The business sits in Akwesasne, a Mohawk territory straddling the U.S.-Canada border. While it operates from the New York side, on the St. Regis Mohawk Reservation, the casino and resort used to have a steady stream of pre-pandemic visitors from nearby cities such as Montreal and Ottawa. But with the current U.S. border restrictions, Canadian customers havent been allowed to visit for nearly a year and a half. We had to reduce hours of operation, and close Mondays and Tuesdays, said Emily Lauzon, the casino resorts general manager. Lauzon, who has worked at the casino since it opened in 1999, said that normally about 40 percent of its visitors come from Canada. Their absence has hit the business hard, stalling its pandemic recovery compared to ventures that dont rely on border traffic. The loss of revenue is a pattern all along New York's northern border, though certain businesses were able to make up a portion of the deficit by attracting Americans vacationing within the country due to COVID-19. When we did our initial layoff, we had 790 employees; right now we're below 500 still, Lauzon said, noting that many former employees have been clamoring to return. With 46 percent native representation among staff, the casino is a major employer both on the reservation and in surrounding communities. Funding for social services on the territory has been hit by the lost business, and so has New Yorks bottom line: Lauzon said the casino pays 25 percent of its machine revenue to the state government, while remaining profits go to the tribal government. James Lazore, the director of economic development for the Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe, said smaller local shops have been giving him similar feedback, noting theyve lost nearly half of their business due to the closed border. Theyre the benefactors, obviously, of traffic to the casino, but you would also see a lot of Canadian plates coming from the bridge, perhaps even gassing up or buying goods before they headed south, Lazore said. When the Canadian government opted to allow vaccinated, COVID-tested Americans to drive into the country starting Aug. 9, U.S. Travel Association President and CEO Roger Dow was one of many industry advocates who flagged the financial losses the U.S. would face as long as it maintained its own ban on visitors entering by land. Every month that travel remains stagnant, the U.S. loses $1.5 billion in potential travel exports and leaves countless American businesses vulnerable, Dow said, adding that Canada accounted for 26 percent of all inbound traffic in 2019. But on Aug. 20, the Department of Homeland Security announced that driving into the country from Canada and Mexico would still be off-limits until at least Sept. 21, though most foreign nationals can travel from those same countries by airplane. Exceptions remain for travel deemed essential, such as trucks transporting goods or American citizens and permanent residents returning home. Ted Sobel, the DHS attache to Canada, spoke earlier this month at an annual summit about the American reluctance to change its border policy even after the Canadian shift. Noting that public health looms large in the administrations decision-making, Sobel pointed to the spread of the new Delta variant in the U.S. and the rising infection and hospitalization rates it was causing. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. It doesnt do anyone any good to announce one thing one month and then reverse it, because the situation is changing very rapidly, Sobel said. For the two Niagaras, another set of cities split on either side of the border by their eponymous waterfall, a surge of tourists tends to flood the area in warmer months. This year, Niagara Falls, N.Y., Mayor Robert Restaino said their marketing strategy started to focus more on Mid-Atlantic and northeastern travel, instead of on drawing in international visitors. Though Niagara Falls in Ontario is its own city, it feels like part of the same metropolitan area to his constituents: You might have a favorite restaurant on this side of the bridge. Someone may have a favorite store on that side of the bridge. And thats just the normal, off-season commerce that hasn't been available to us, Restaino said. Its been a year-plus of having a neighborhood cut off. While some businesses that count on Canadian customers havent been able to survive, he said, a large outlet mall that draws consumers across the border for its prices and designer stores is one of those that have just grown quiet. When I go shopping, theres nobody in there now, said Michele Fortuna. Her husband is the third-generation owner of Fortunas, a Southern Italian restaurant open since 1945 thats just 10 minutes from the outlet mall. The Canadians really shopped here for groceries, for bulk items, for clothing. Fortuna said her family's restaurant is used to getting a lot of customers from across the border, especially in the summer months. Since it's less than five minutes from the Rainbow Bridge, she said it was nothing for people to come from Ontario for a meal. This season, the restaurant has been serving more American tourists than usual, though with less clients theyve had to cut their hours. Weve been able to hold on you know, pay our bills and pay our employees, Fortuna said. But she expects business will change again as another pandemic-wounded tourist season dwindles, and cold weather returns. SPRINGVILLE, Tenn. (AP) She was folding a red sweater when she heard a car door slam, went to the window and realized that a moment she always imagined would kill her was about to be made real: three Marines and a Navy chaplain were walking toward her door, and that could only mean one thing. She put her hand on the blue stars shed stuck next to the front door, a symbol meant to protect her son, Marine Lance Cpl. Alec Catherwood, who had left three weeks before for the battlefields of Afghanistan. And then, as she recalls it, she lost her mind. She ran wildly through the house. She opened the door and told the men they couldnt come inside. She picked up a flower basket and hurled it at them. She screamed so loud and for so long the next day she could not speak. I just wanted them not to say anything, said Gretchen Catherwood, because if they said it, it would be true. And, of course, it was. Her 19-year-old son was dead, killed fighting the Taliban on Oct. 14, 2010. As she watched the news over the last two weeks, it felt like that day happened 10 minutes ago. The American military pulled out of Afghanistan, and all they had fought so hard to build seemed to collapse in an instant. The Afghan military put down its weapons, the president fled and the Taliban took over. Then suicide bombers killed several U.S. military members, including at least 11 Marines, in attacks Thursday at the Kabul airport, where thousands have been trying desperately to escape. Gretchen Catherwood felt like she could feel in her hands the red sweater shed been folding the moment she learned her son was dead. Her phone buzzed with messages from the family shes assembled since that horrible day: the officer whod dodged the flowerpot; the parents of others killed in battle or by suicide since; her sons fellow fighters in the storied 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, nicknamed the Darkhorse Battalion, that endured the highest rate of causalities in Afghanistan. Many of them call her Ma. Outside of this circle, shed seen someone declare what a waste of life and potential on Facebook. Friends told her how horrible theyd felt that her son had died in vain. As she exchanged messages with the others whod paid the price of war, she worried its end was forcing them to question whether all they had seen and all they had suffered had mattered at all. There are three things I need you to know, she said to some. You did not fight for nothing. Alec did not lose his life for nothing. I will be here for you no matter what, until the day I die. Those are the things I need you to remember. In the woods behind her house, the Darkhorse Lodge is under construction. She and her husband are building a retreat for combat veterans, a place where they can gather and grapple together with the horrors of war. There are 25 rooms, each named after one of the men killed from her sons battalion. The ones who made it home have become their surrogate sons, she said. And she knows of more than a half-dozen who have died from suicide. I am fearful of what this might do to them psychologically. Theyre so strong and so brave and so courageous. But they also have really, really big hearts. And I feel that they might internalize a lot and blame themselves, she said. And oh God, I hope they dont blame themselves. ___ The 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment deployed in the fall of 2010 from Camp Pendleton, California, sending 1,000 U.S. Marines on what would become one of the bloodiest tours for American service members in Afghanistan. The Darkhorse Battalion spent six months battling Taliban fighters in the Sangin district of Helmand province. An area of green fields and mud compounds, Sangin remained almost entirely in the Talibans control nearly a decade into the U.S.-led war. Fields of lush poppies used in narcotics gave the militants valued income they were determined to hold. When the Marines arrived, white Taliban flags flew from most buildings. Loudspeakers installed to broadcast prayers were used to taunt U.S. forces. Schools had closed. The Marines came under fire as soon as a helicopter dropped them outside their patrol base. When the bird landed, we were already getting shot at, recalled former Sgt. George Barba of Menifee, California. We run, we get inside and I remember our gunnery sergeant telling us: `Welcome to Sangin. You just got your combat action ribbon. Snipers lurked in the trees. Fighters armed with rifles hid behind mud walls. Homemade bombs turned roads and canals into deathtraps. Sangin was Alec Catherwood's first combat deployment. He had enlisted in the Marines while still in high school, went to boot camp shortly after graduation, then was assigned to a 13-man squad led by former Sgt. Sean Johnson. Johnson was impressed by Catherwoods professionalism physically fit, mentally tough and always on time. He was only 19, so that was extra special, Johnson said. Some are still just trying to figure out how to tie their boots and not get yelled at. Catherwood also made them laugh. He carried around a small, stuffed animal he used as a prop for jokes. Barba recalled Catherwoods first helicopter ride during training, and how he was smiling ear-to-ear and hes swinging his feet like hes a little kid on a highchair. Former Cpl. William Sutton of Yorkville, Illinois, swore Catherwood would crack jokes even during a firefight. Alec, he was a shining light in that darkness, said Sutton, who was shot multiple times fighting in Afghanistan. And then they took it from us. On Oct. 14, 2010, after a late night standing watch outside their patrol base, Catherwoods squad headed out to assist fellow Marines under attack, who were running low on ammunition. They crossed open fields, using irrigation canals for cover. After sending half his squad safely ahead, Johnson tapped Catherwood on the helmet and said: Lets go. After running just three steps, he said, gunfire from ambushing Taliban fighters sounded behind them. Johnson looked down and saw a bullet hole in his pants where he had been shot in the leg. Then came a deafening explosion one of the Marines had stepped on a hidden bomb. Johnson blacked out momentarily, waking up in the water. Another explosion followed. Looking to his left, Johnson saw Catherwood floating facedown. It was obvious, he said, that the young Marine was dead. Explosions during the ambush killed another Marine, Lance Cpl. Joseph Lopez of Rosamond, California, and badly wounded another. Back in the United States, Staff Sergeant Steve Bancroft began an excruciating two-hour drive toward Catherwood's parents' house in northern Illinois. Hed served seven months in Iraq before he became a casualty assistance officer, tasked with notifying families of a death on the battlefield. Id never wish that on anybody, I cant express that enough: I do not wish looking a mom and dad in the face and telling them their only son is gone, said Bancroft, who is now retired. He was stoic when he had to be, as he escorted families to Dover, Delaware, to watch coffins be rolled out of a plane. But when he was alone, he cried. And he still weeps when he thinks about the moment he arrived at the home of Gretchen and Kirk Catherwood. They laugh now about the hurled flowerpot. He still regularly talks to them and other sets of parents he notified. Though he never met Alec, he feels like he knows him. Their son was such a hero, its hard to explain, but he sacrificed more than 99% of the people in this world would ever think of doing, he said. Was it worth it? We lost so many people. Its hard to think about how many weve lost. he said. ___ Gretchen Catherwood keeps the cross her son was wearing on a chain around her bedpost with his dog tags. Alongside it hangs a glass bead, blown with the ashes of another young Marine: Cpl. Paul Wedgewood, who made it home. The Darkhorse Battalion returned to California in April 2011. After months of intense fighting, they'd largely seized Sangin from the Talibans grip. Leaders of the provincial government could move about safely. Children, including girls, returned to school. It came at a heavy price. In addition to the 25 who perished, more than 200 returned home wounded, many with lost limbs, others with scars harder to see. Wedgewood had trouble sleeping when he finished his four-year enlistment and left the Marine Corps in 2013. As he slept less, he drank more. A tattoo on his upper arm showed a sheet of scroll paper bearing the names of four Marines who died in Sangin. Wedgewood considered reenlisting, but told his mother: If I stay, I think itll kill me. Instead, Wedgewood enrolled in college back home in Colorado, but soon lost interest. A welding program at a community college proved a better fit. Wedgewood had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. He was taking medication, participating in therapy. He was very engaged in working on his mental health, said the Marines mother, Helen Wedgewood. He was not a neglected veteran. Still, he struggled. On the Fourth of July, Wedgewood would take his dog camping in the woods to avoid fireworks. He quit a job he liked after a backfiring machine caused him to dive to the floor. Five years after Sangin, things appeared to be looking up. Wedgewood was preparing for a new job that would take him back to Afghanistan as a private security contractor. He seemed to be in a good place. After a night of drinking with his roommates, Wedgewood didnt show up for work on Aug. 23, 2016. A roommate later found him dead in his bedroom. He had shot himself. He was 25 years old. He left a short note. He basically said that he loved us, but he was tired, Helen Wedgewood said. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. She considers her son and others who took their own lives to be casualties of war every bit as much as those killed in action. When the Taliban swept back into control of Afghanistan just before the fifth anniversary of her sons death, she felt relief that a war that left more than 2,400 Americans dead and more than 20,700 wounded had finally come to an end. But there was also sadness that gains made by the Afghan people especially women and children may be temporary. As a mom, this kind of stabs you, because would he still be around, would any of these young men still be around if this whole war hadnt happened? she said. But I try to gently correct people when they say this was a waste or this was all for nothing. Because thats not true. We dont know what impacts its had on the safety of our country, on the safety of the Afghan people. ___ Some who served with the Darkhorse Battalion are having a hard time seeing it any way other than that their efforts, their blood and the lives of their fallen friends were all for nothing. Im starting to feel like how the Vietnam vets felt. There was no purpose to it whatsoever, said Sutton, 32, who now works in the veterans services office of a county outside Chicago, helping military vets get care. We were able to hold our head up high and say we went to the last Taliban stronghold and we gave them hell, Sutton said, only for it all to be taken away. In the blink of an eye. Barba, 34, works as a private security guard near Los Angeles. He and his wife are expecting their first child. He said hes had trouble sorting his feelings about the bleak news from Afghanistan. His wife recently woke to Barba screaming in his sleep. I think your nightmares are back, she told him. It really is weird, Barba said. Ive seen my guys get mad. Ive seen my guys get frustrated. But not like this. This is like somebody spit in their face. Johnson, 34, works as a commercial diver in Florida. He said the U.S. should have acknowledged years ago that the Afghan security forces Americans trained and equipped would never be able to defend the country on their own. My personal opinion, yeah, we probably should have pulled out years and years ago, Johnson said. If youre not going to win the damn thing, what are you doing there? ___ A few months ago, Gretchen Catherwood was painting the cabins that will become the Darkhorse Lodge. It was dark, still without electricity and no cell service, so it was quiet. She felt suddenly like she could feel her son and his 24 fallen comrades. She could almost see their faces. Its a place where I can feel like theyre together, she said, and that they are still caring for their brothers. The Catherwoods moved out of their home in Illinois. Every time she walked to the front door, Gretchen remembered those four men arriving with the news. She couldnt bear it anymore. The gold star pins she wore everyday on her chest kept breaking. Shed always disliked tattoos and hassled her son when he got one as a Marine. But then she found herself at a tattoo parlor. She had his name inked on her arm, and the shape of a gold star pin put permanently on her chest, just above her heart, so shed never take it off again. She could no longer care for her son, she said, but she could for those who made it home. She and her husband moved to the woods in Tennessee and got to work on the Darkhorse Lodge. They fashioned their logo after the battalions mascot, a fierce-looking horse, facing left, its mane sharp like a serrated knife and its eyes squinted for battle. The artist who drew theirs softened its edges and turned it to the right, facing toward a future after war. They raised a million dollars, mostly in small donations. One woman sends a check for $2 every month. Bancroft, the officer who notified her of her sons death, donates every year. The obituary for one soldier who died by suicide asked for donations to the Darkhorse Lodge in his memory, and checks flooded the Catherwoods mailbox. They hope to open next summer and offer free stays for any combat veteran from any war or branch of the military who might benefit from time in the woods, where the only conflict is among the dozens of hummingbirds fighting over the feeders on her front porch. She is hopeful that the American withdrawal from Afghanistan means no one else will die on a battlefield there. But she also worries that it might rattle the vets who made it home, and who might already be struggling to make sense of what happened there and why. Thats a constant fear, its been my fear since they got back but now its even worse, she said. They experienced things that 99% of the country never will. Ive never watched a friend die. Ive never fought to the death. We are losing these people at a frightening, frightening rate to suicides, and we cant afford to lose one more. She and her husband dont believe that the chaotic end honors their sons service, and are particularly troubled that some of the Afghan interpreters and others who helped the military for years might not make it out alive. But they also cant imagine how it might have ended any other way, had the United States stayed in Afghanistan another year or five or 20. Part of Alec Catherwood remains there, and for a while that bothered his mother. When he was alive, she loved to touch his face. He had baby soft skin and when she put her hands on his cheeks, this big tough Marine felt like her little boy. The military did an honorable job making him look whole, she said. But when she touched his cheek as he laid in the casket, she touched a part that had been reconstructed - it wasnt really him. That used to be much harder than it is now, she said. Now, its like, damn straight, hes still there. Hes always going to have a presence there, flipping off the Taliban. Good things will grow where he is, she likes to think. Hes part of their dirt, their soil, hes part of the Earth there, he is forever there. ___ Bynum reported from Savannah, Georgia. Her husband had the text typed out for her: Im getting inside the airplane. Im coming to you. But moments after he hit the send button, a U.S. soldier eyed him as he readied to board the plane in Kabul. Mariams husband didnt have family with him, so he couldnt evacuate with the other Afghans and U.S. citizens, he was told. He had to turn around and go home, past the numerous airport gates he had managed to get through, past the Taliban checkpoints on the streets, past the swarms of desperate people trying to escape, past the scenes of beatings and gunshots. Mariam, who lives in Albany, was left, once again, waiting. (The Times Union is using a pseudonym to protect her safety and that of her family) Since the Taliban takeover of Kabul earlier this month, as U.S. troops prepared to fully pull out of Afghanistan, the capitals airport has been swarmed by thousands of Afghans trying to escape. Critics say problems with the evacuation could have been avoided. They also also say that with immigration programs flawed from the start, which took hits during the Trump administration and later the pandemic, todays scramble to evacuate Afghanistan was inevitable. We had an opportunity to avoid the situation, we had an opportunity to use an immigration program to protect people, said Betsy Fisher, director of strategy at the New York-based International Refugee Assistance Project. We needed leadership earlier. A race for life The death threats started coming, and Mariams family knew it was time to leave Kabul. After a years-long process, in 2017 her father was finally able to get his wife, Mariam and her sibling to the U.S. on special immigrant visas (SIV), a program for Afghans and Iraqis who worked with the U.S. military. They were the lucky ones. Since its creation during President Obama's administration in 2009, the SIV program has struggled to reach its full potential. The first two years of its existence, less than 10 applicants were accepted each year. But by 2014, the administration mobilized around the program, and the number of visas approved for Afghan applicants (excluding their family members) jumped from three to 63 to an all-time high of 4,120 in fiscal year 2017. Once the Trump administration took over the program, though, that number dropped to 1,649. We believe thats due to changes made in the security check process, or, maybe just a de-emphasis on getting things done maybe the political will to allocate resources failed, said Fisher. Of Afghan SIV applicants approved for an interview stage, 84 percent received a visa in fiscal year 2016. In 2019, that rate dropped to 60 percent. The numbers were on par with the Trump administrations policy on immigration, which ultimately resulted in the refugee intake ceiling being slashed from over 110,000 during the final year of the Obama administration to just 18,000 in 2019. After years of setbacks to immigration programs during the Trump administration, the shutdown of embassies and pause on interviews during the pandemic created an even larger backlog. The State Department declined to give the Times Union the current number of pending SIV applications for Afghans, but the number has been reported to be over 17,000, as well as at least 53,000 family members. And while the State Department reports the processing time for SIV applications to be about 700 days, advocates say that number is a major underestimate. Despite inheriting a significant backlog and a statutorily defined 14-step process while also facing a COVID outbreak and a rapidly deteriorating security situation we dramatically accelerated SIV processing and launched an unprecedented and ongoing effort to relocate Afghan Special Immigrants to safety, a State Department spokesperson wrote in an email to the Times Union. However, there have been numerous reports of chartered planes departing Kabul with hundreds of empty seats, despite the fast-approaching Aug. 31 date by which President Joe Biden wants to have all remaining military forces withdrawn. For people in the late stage of the process, we shouldnt be talking about the program, we should be getting them to the U.S., Fisher said. What wont work is continuing to insist on extensive documentation and taking years and years to verify it. Mariams brother, a former interpreter for the U.S. military, is one of those applicants waiting for SIV approval. But he has a wife and children unlike Mariams husband, he cant risk his life to go to the airport, only to be turned around at the plane door. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. Lost hope The nightmare unfolded around Mariam. As she heard the news of the Taliban takeover, Mariam couldnt believe what she was hearing. On that day in August, my country was burning, and everyone was watching, she said. I wont forget that day my entire life. With targets on his and his familys backs, Mariams husband knew he needed to try anything to escape despite not being issued a visa yet. His follow-to-join visa has all its documents approved, but is pending an interview at the embassy all of which have been canceled due to the pandemic. After three years of waiting for his visa, he couldnt wait to leave his country any longer. The SIV program is one program that helps one set of people. It excludes tons of people who worked for the U.S. government, and even more people who worked for U.S.-based journalists, said Fisher. We're concerned about promoting access to human rights, and making sure that people can live their lives and dignity and freedom. And that involves a broader conversation than just military interpreters. It took near-death encounters, sleepless nights and days without food for Mariams husband to make it to the first gate at the airport. He managed his way through questions such as why he and his wife dont have the same last name, and passed the first gate. He got to a second gate, where he was asked for his visa with the help of a State Department email about his application status, he somehow managed to get through. But by the time Mariams husband reached the plane, his luck ran dry. He hasnt left the house since that day. But at least when hes home, out of danger, Mariam has the appetite for food and sleep. He lost his entire hope. Why would he risk his life to be kicked off the plane again? Mariam said. Someone tell me, where should I get his visa? To borrow a line from Casablanca, we are shocked shocked! at the suggestion of corruption when it came to the bidding for state gambling licenses. Which is to say, we are not surprised and these allegations bear serious scrutiny. The question is, by whom? To borrow another line from that great film, certainly not the usual suspects. The state watchdogs that might look into this are simply too compromised or conflicted to be trusted. This investigation requires unquestioned independence. The allegations were leveled by Jeffrey Gural, owner of Tioga Downs casino in the Southern Tier. Based on what he acknowledges is secondhand information, he claims the Cuomo administration rigged the 2014 bidding process that granted the first three licenses for full-scale casino gambling. The alleged scheme, Mr. Gural contends, went like this: Upstate New York, which was to get the first casinos, was divided by the state Gaming Commission into three areas, including the Southern Tier. But the Southern Tier as most people know it was expanded to reach much further north up to Wayne County. Along the way, it encompassed an existing racino, del Lago in Seneca County, which was planning to bid for one of the licenses. That raised the concern of another gambling company, Delaware North, which runs the Finger Lakes racino and racetrack located about a half-hour away from del Lago. But Mr. Gural, who says he spoke with Delaware Norths president about this, says the firm was dissuaded from objecting after being assured by a Cuomo administration official that Mr. Gural's racino, not del Lago, was set to win the Southern Tier region casino license. Tioga Downs, about two hours from Finger Lakes, presented less of a competitive threat. When the licenses were awarded, however, it was del Lago that won the Southern Tier license. So was Delaware North purposely deceived? Was the fix in for del Lago? Who should get to the bottom of this, especially when most of the people who might know arent talking publicly, and the former administration says nothing was amiss? Certainly not the Gaming Commission, which drew the maps. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. Certainly not the Joint Commission on Public Ethics, which was and remains in the control of ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomos appointees. Certainly not the state Inspector General, whose last major investigation of a matter concerning the former governor had all the appearance of a cover-up. Certainly not Gov. Kathy Hochul, whose husband is a Delaware North executive and counsel. This matter should go, first, to Attorney General Letitia James, who proved herself to be not at all hesitant to investigate Mr. Cuomos administration in her probes of undercounts of coronavirus deaths among nursing home residents and allegations of sexual harassment against the former governor himself. And if Ms. James investigators find federal laws may have been violated, she should team up with the FBI. It may not be a shock to hear of corruption in a matter concerning gambling, but these serious, detailed claims demand a full and credible investigation. And not, as the song goes, as time goes by. Now. Farmington, WV (26555) Today Cloudy early, becoming mostly clear after midnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Cloudy early, becoming mostly clear after midnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Biomeme & Predigen Merge to Enable Point-of-Care Delivery of Host Response Tests That Address Critical Unmet Needs in Healthcare Utz Brands Is Recognized for Its 100 Year Anniversary by U.S. House of Representative Member Lloyd Smucker Sarah Lasko and her steer, Fiona, walk back to the arena after being judged at the Crawford County Fair on Monday. Lasko, who is an FFA member, is showing her animals with nine other students from Conneaut Area Senior High Schools FFA program. For copyright information, check with the distributor of this item, The Santa Fe New Mexican. Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy and Republican rival Jack Ciattarelli will go head to head in two debates in late September and mid-October while their running mates will clash once A teenager has been arrested in a shooting that killed a young woman and wounded six other people at a Brooklyn apartment building in November Kansas hospitals are clamoring for traveling nurses as the number of COVID-19 patients rises to levels last seen in January Inmates at a northwest Arkansas jail have been prescribed ivermectin to combat COVID-19, despite warnings from federal health officials that the antiparasitic drug should not be used to treat the coronavirus Why Diaspora Liberians Matter Ansu Opa Dualu No, Liberians abroad are not internet citizens nor are they insignificant when it comes to national issues they shape the direction of the country for good for the most part. It is even fair to say that they actively influence every crucial decision that is made in the country. Furthermore, what the diaspora is capable of bringing to Liberia is far greater than the sum of the fears some local Liberians have towards their compatriots abroad! Apart from responsible governance, Liberias greatest opportunity for economic revitalization rests with its diaspora citizens! If Liberia is truly serious about its growth, it must employ every strategy to harness the capabilities of its citizens abroad, not necessary in government but especially to promote trade, increase its human capital and local investments. Given the shortages of local resources and expertise required to generate the kind of meaningful growth and revenue we need to develop, the authorities must design a master plan directed at Diaspora Liberians, like is being done with our brothers in Ghana where billions are pouring in from overseas. Liberia needs its diaspora capital, its best and brightest to help ignite a developmental revolution! Contrary to what most Liberians who fear competition in the job market believe, enterprising Liberians abroad do not come home to take political positions; most come to create jobs and contribute to the social, cultural, political and economic innovation of the nation! The Diaspora Liberian role should not be restricted to sending remittances. They can also promote trade and foreign direct investments, spur entrepreneurship and innovation, transfer skills and knowledge, serve as the nations eyes and ears to the outside world, but most importantly, could drive the economic development of a country if the right local policies decisions are implemented with heightened degree of sincerity. Moreover, increased diaspora participation in the public sphere has tremendous economic and social benefits to local operations. Their presence could also discourage corruption given that they are mostly used to doing business in a corruption-free way. There is no suggestion that these benefits are automatic, however. Citizens abroad especially those in more developed countries are in a higher socio economic bracket when compared locally, and hence, typically oppose to doing business under the table and have a greater reach and more doors opened to them than locally based Liberians. The presence of more affluent Liberians usually enhances every platform in the country, creates a new form of positive thinking and a higher standard of living. Nevertheless, a multifaceted government strategy targeted at diaspora efforts can magnify overall national vision like what we are seeing in Ghana, Nigeria, Rwanda, etc. These strategies can help develop networks, open new lines of communications and partnerships on both sides; encourage investments by relaxing legal and other barriers thus increasing cash flow across borders. This further institutionalizes and eases money transfers efforts through consultation with local government, lowering remittance costs and strengthening the integrity of our financial and investment systems. Given what we know about the Liberian Diaspora especially those who live in the United States, the Liberian Government can get a whole lot more from its overseas citizens if it formulated a plan with calculated intentions to increase government intake. What do we know? There are approximately 1.2 million Liberians and people with Liberian Heritage scattered all over the globe, with the bulk of them calling the United States home. The average Liberian in these developed locations to include Australia, United Kingdom, parts of Western Europe, and South Korea make about $40,000/year compare this to the average $600 per capita income in Liberia! This amount equates on average to about $24B (Twenty four billion United States Dollars per years - 600k*40k! Note that six hundred thousand was arbitrarily chosen as an example and because not everybody works or has an income this number could be much higher however; this is just a conservative estimate and to give the reader an idea)! This $24B/year is twelve times our entire GDP (Gross Domestic Product Liberias is roughly $2B/year). Why is the government satisfied with a pittance of $400M in remittances when compared in the grand scheme of things? Why are there zero strategy to drastically increase this amount? The diaspora potential is huge. Although Liberia is on the high end of contributions from the diaspora given our very small economy Liberians abroad send home about 25% of our entire GDP! The potential exists to contribute a hell of a lot more. The government just have to devise a plan to get more. See comparison below: Here are some steps the Liberian Government can initial to increase remittances and diaspora investments in their country of origin: a) Constitute the Ministry of Diaspora Affairs that focuses exclusively on diaspora investments, exchange of knowledge, remittances and making available what this group of Liberians has gotten accustomed to b) Target skilled Liberians and incentivize them to move back home through this ministry c) Grant Dual-Citizenship to people of Liberian Heritage without restrictions d) Grant overseas voting privileges and attach an annual fee to maintain the privilege e) Counter the malevolence towards Diaspora Liberians and make them feel at home Also, the Liberian Government could encourage initiatives proposed by Diaspora Liberians like the ones listed below: Liberias One Billion Dollar Challenge; https://frontpageafricaonline.com/opinion/liberia-the-one-billion-dollar-challenge-synopsis/; Or Why Should Liberians Invest their Money in the $1B Challenge; https://frontpageafricaonline.com/opinion/why-should-liberians-invest-their-money-in-the-1b-challenge/ Here are additional engagement strategies laid out by various international bodies: Key Diaspora Engagement Strategies Recommended by Diaspora Ministerial Conference: Finally, given our very small population, shameful educational system and the lack of adequate local expertise in almost every crucial area, a country that ranks on the bottom of nearly every single Human Development Index, Liberia needs all of its citizens more than ever. We cannot afford to alienate any one of us, especially those with the most resources and the capabilities to fast track our developmental endeavors. One might ask: Why spend all this effort on the diaspora? The answer is simple: Liberia needs $20 billion dollars to build its infrastructure and truly begin the developmental process; Diaspora Liberians have approximately $24 billion dollars every year, the connections and expertise! Who else is best positioned to change Liberia for the better if not this group of Liberians? References: Mitra, Pritha (2016) Addition by subtraction: How Diasporas can boost home-country growth, IMFBLOG, Insight & Analysis on Economics & Finance, Available at: https://blogs.imf.org/2016/05/18/addition-by-subtraction-how-diasporas-can-boost-home-country-growth/ (Access August 20, 2021). Diaspora Ministerial Conference, (2015) IOMs 3E Strategy to engage and empower diaspora, Available at: https://diaspora.iom.int/ioms-strategy-enable-engage-and-empower-diaspora (Access August 24, 2021) August 26, 2021 The digital world has swept the traditional marketing practices but few of them are revamped to the digital marketing world. One among them is PR. In the age of inbound marketing, press releases still play a vital role in improving a websites online visibility. The art of PR is alive and kicking and honestly, the modern media is uplifting press release to the next level. There are several reasons why press release is still alive one such reason is immediate traffic and backlinks. Spread the word Regardless of which industry you belong to, the press releases help your business earn a reputed media coverage across the globe. If the business has any breaking news, its likely that you are doing great within your circle and amongst your competitors. There is a need to share this with your competitors and to the whole world. Few popular reasons why a press release is required is to share company news to the whole world, addressing an issue or crisis, making announcements, and unveiling product updates, sharing accolades and announcements about any upcoming event, etc. Press Pog offers press release distribution services where one can get an written press release done for them. A well-crafted press release is an excellent marketing tool. The targeted audience is always curious to know about whats happening in the future. Example, the news about product launches and announcements about a new event always gets the highest amount of traffic. Always write the press release keeping a broad audience in mind, only then it will be beneficial for the business owners. Never lose focus from your primary goal reaching the right target audience. How should a press release service be? Press releases shouldnt narrate a story rather they are crisper version of a big announcement. Make it short and to the point. Articulate what is important for your company on the initial stage of the PR and then share your intentions behind this press release. Explain how unique your product/service is and add any additional points that will grab the users attention. Majority of media releases are focused on reputation management. Press releases can also be used for maintaining the reputation. A negative reputation can be made constructive with the right PR. While writing them, ensure to improve your SEO so that it appears in the organic search results. Distribute your PR to different press release sharing websites where all the information is collectively displayed to the audience. Press Release is proportional to social media Give a social media boost to the press releases by sharing them across all the social media platforms. In the digital world, news releases are saved and archived for future usages. Sharing the word at social media platforms can make a big difference. Similarly, look for partners who can display your news in their platforms. Know exactly where you are what you are writing. Never forget the sole purpose of writing press releases. Monitor the metrics and keep an eye on the analytics. [August 25, 2021] Advent International to Acquire bareMinerals, BUXOM, and Laura Mercier from Shiseido Americas Advent International ("Advent"), one of the largest and most experienced global private equity investors, today announced the signing of a definitive agreement with Shiseido Americas Corporation ("Shiseido Americas"), a subsidiary of Shiseido Company, Limited ("Shiseido"), under which a newly formed affiliate of Advent, AI Beauty Holdings Ltd., will acquire three of Shiseido Americas' iconic cosmetics brands, bareMinerals, BUXOM, and Laura Mercier. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210825005846/en/ Pascal Houdayer (Photo: Business Wire) Upon completion of the transaction, Pascal Houdayer, who has 30 years of senior management experience in the beauty industry, will serve as Chief Executive Officer of the standalone business. Advent Operating Partner Janet Gurwitch, a distinguished beauty industry investor and founder and former CEO of Laura Mercier, advised Advent on the transaction and will continue to advise the firm and the new company. Launched in 1995, bareMinerals is the leader in mineral-based cosmetics and is considered the creator of "clean beauty" and "makeup so pure and clean you can sleep in it." BUXOM, created in 2007, is a color cosmetics brand focused on "going big, being bold, and feeling sexy." It is ranked among the top five U.S. brands across various lip categories. Prestige makeup brand Laura Mercier was founded in 1996 and pioneered the natural, "flawless face" category. "We are strong believers in the bareMinerals, BUXOM, and Laura Mercier brands," said Tricia Glynn, a Managing Director at Advent. "They are clear leaders in prestige beauty and are widely recognized for their quality, authenticity, and innovation, with differentiated products and devoted customers. We are excited to partner with Pascal as CEO of the new company to accelerate the growth of these brands by continuing to develop innovative products, expanding into new categories and geographies, and enhancing digital engagement with customers." "We have been proud stewards of bareMinerals, BUXOM, and Laura Mercier, and we believe Advent is the right partner to guide these incredible brands into their next chapter," said Ron Gee, President and Chief Executive Officer of Shiseido Americas and Global M&A Leader. "This transaction will infuse bareMinerals, BUXOM, and Laura Mercier with the resources and support needed for the brands and their talented teams to continue to grow." Pascal Houdayer, a Seasone Executive in the Beauty Industry Pascal Houdayer has three decades of experience leading beauty and personal care businesses across both developed and emerging markets. He previously served as Chief Executive Officer of NAOS (Bioderma, Esthederm, Etat Pur), a global leader in dermo-cosmetics that develops innovative skin care and personal care products, and as an Executive Vice President and member of the Management Board at Henkel, where he was responsible for the Beauty Care Division, after leading the Asia-Pacific region, Digital, New Business Development, and the global Home Care business. In 2017, he led Henkel's carve-out of Shiseido's North American Hair Professional business, including the Joico and Zotos brands. Prior to that, Pascal worked for 19 years at Procter & Gamble holding various international management positions in the United States, Europe, and Africa. He most recently served as President and Founder of stratosPHere, a global private equity senior advisory and consulting firm. "I'm honored to be part of the team that will guide the future of bareMinerals, BUXOM, and Laura Mercier," said Pascal Houdayer. "We believe these brands have significant runway for growth, particularly as we see the large and growing color cosmetics market benefitting from secular tailwinds. I look forward to helping expand these brands across new products, channels, and regions, while enabling the new company to realize its full potential." Advent Brings Significant Experience in the Beauty Sector and Carve-Outs Advent is an established investor in popular consumer brands and the services that power them. The purchase of three brands from Shiseido Americas is Advent's second investment in the beauty industry in the last two years, following its acquisition of prestige hair-care brand Olaplex in January 2020. Advent was also the majority owner of Douglas, Europe's leading beauty retailer, from 2013 to 2015. During that time, Advent helped the company enhance its profile, expand its international presence, and transform from a diversified retail conglomerate to a specialist retailer of selective beauty products. Over the past 30 years, Advent has invested $13.6 billion in more than 80 retail, consumer, and leisure companies worldwide. Its most recent North American investments in the sector include Olaplex, Thrasio, Sovos Brands, First Watch, Aimbridge Hospitality, and lululemon. Advent also has significant experience in buying businesses from large, global companies, having completed over 70 corporate carve-outs across 22 countries since 1991. Transaction Details The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to be completed by the end of the year. Upon closing, the newly formed company, AI Beauty Holdings Ltd., will complete the acquisition of the three brands (bareMinerals, BUXOM, and Laura Mercier) and the company will be renamed. Jefferies LLC is serving as financial advisor, and Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP is acting as legal counsel to Advent. Perella Weinberg Partners is serving as financial advisor, and Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP is acting as legal counsel to Shiseido Americas. About Advent International Founded in 1984, Advent International is one of the largest and most experienced global private equity investors. The firm has invested in over 380 private equity investments across 42 countries, and as of March 31, 2021, had $75 billion in assets under management. With 14 offices in 11 countries, Advent has established a globally integrated team of over 245 private equity investment professionals across North America, Europe, Latin America and Asia. The firm focuses on investments in five core sectors, including business and financial services; health care; industrial; retail, consumer and leisure; and technology. After more than 35 years dedicated to international investing, Advent remains committed to partnering with management teams to deliver sustained revenue and earnings growth for its portfolio companies. For more information, visit: Website: www.adventinternational.com LinkedIn (News - Alert) : www.linkedin.com/company/advent-international About Shiseido Americas Corporation Shiseido Americas Corporation is a subsidiary of Tokyo-based Shiseido Company, Limited (TSE:4911), a leading global beauty company. Led by President and CEO Ron Gee, Shiseido Americas' portfolio of prestige beauty brands includes bareMinerals, BUXOM, Cle de Peau Beaute, Drunk Elephant, Laura Mercier, NARS, brand SHISEIDO and several prestige fragrance brands including Issey Miyake, Narciso Rodriguez and Tory Burch. Shiseido Americas is headquartered in New York City and employs more than 2,500 individuals in the United States, Canada, and throughout Latin America. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210825005846/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Bitcoin Association appoints global ambassador to promote BSV for Italian community ZUG, Switzerland, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Bitcoin Association, the Switzerland-based global industry organisation that works to advance business with the Bitcoin SV (BSV) blockchain and digital currency, today announces that it has appointed Francesco Morello as Bitcoin Association Ambassador for the Italian community as part of its global ambassador programme. Bitcoin Association Ambassadors are experienced professionals from the BSV ecosystem who work to raise awareness and improve understanding of the BSV blockchain and digital currency, as well as the power of the original Bitcoin protocol to support a massively scaled distributed data network for both peer-to-peer electronic cash payments and enterprise-grade blockchain applications. With the addition of Morello, there are now 25 Bitcoin Association Ambassadors representing 26 different countries, territories and communities. Morello is best known in the blockchain space as the creator of BullishArt a curated platform for artists to create non-fungible tokens (NFTs) based upon their contemporary art. A Sicily, Italy native, Morello relocated to Seoul, South Korea in 2006, where he has been an active member of both the Italian and blockchain communities. A long-time supporter of Bitcoin SV, Morello helped to organise and run South Korea's first BSV meetup held before the CoinGeek Seoul conference in October 2019. He has also worked to roll out an increasingly diverse set of Italian-language BSV education nd learning materials. The BSV Blockchain is the world's largest public blockchain by all major utility metrics; data storage and daily transaction volume, scaling ability and average block size. To find out more about Bitcoin Association and its global ambassador programme, visit bitcoinassociation.net Commenting on today's announcement, Bitcoin Association Founding President Jimmy Nguyen, said: "As global interest and demand in BSV continues to grow, so too must our global ambassador programme to support more languages and communities. The great work that Francesco Morello has been doing to generate interest in BSV-based NFTs with his BullishArt platform, in addition to his efforts to grow the Italian-language BSV community make him an ideal candidate to become a Bitcoin Association Ambassador. I look forward to working with him on our ever-increasing agenda of international outreach and community development centred around the BSV blockchain." Speaking on his appointment as Bitcoin Association Ambassador for the Italian community, Francesco Morello said: "It is an honour to be appointed a Bitcoin Association Ambassador to the Italian community. The Italian community is underrepresented in the digital asset space, part of which can be attributed to a general reluctance around new technologies a factor not helped by a distinct lack of Italian-language content and representatives. In my new role, I look forward to opening the eyes of people in the Italian community about the power of Bitcoin; there are so many brilliant minds who, once they understand the potential and opportunities apparent with BSV, will join us on our journey to change the world by learning, building and working with the BSV blockchain." About Bitcoin Association Bitcoin Association is the Switzerland-based global industry organisation that works to advance business on the Bitcoin SV blockchain. It brings together essential components of the Bitcoin SV ecosystem enterprises, start-up ventures, developers, merchants, exchanges, service providers, blockchain transaction processors (miners), and others working alongside them, as well as in a representative capacity, to drive further use of the Bitcoin SV blockchain and uptake of the BSV digital currency. The Association works to build a regulation-friendly ecosystem that fosters lawful conduct while facilitating innovation using all aspects of Bitcoin technology. More than a digital currency and blockchain, Bitcoin is also a network protocol; just like Internet protocol, it is the foundational rule set for an entire data network. The Association supports use of the original Bitcoin protocol to operate the world's single blockchain on Bitcoin SV. View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/bitcoin-association-appoints-global-ambassador-to-promote-bsv-for-italian-community-301363499.html SOURCE Bitcoin Association [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] The Fanger Center, an Innovative Collaboration with Celdara Medical and the New Hampshire Academy of Science, Opens at Crossroads Academy LEBANON, N.H., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Celdara Medical, LLC (Celdara), The New Hampshire Academy of Science (NHAS), and Crossroads Academy announced today the opening of the Fanger Center. The Fanger Center is an adaptable, cutting-edge facility that functions dually as the Crossroads Academy middle school by day and a New Hampshire Academy of Sciences STEM lab outside of school hours, enabling afterschool, holiday, and summer use. This unique collaboration makes the Fanger Center accessible to STEM-interested middle- and high-school students across the region through NHAS Programs, which include need-based financial aid. Constructed on the Crossroads Academy campus in Lyme, NH, the purpose-built facility was supported by Celdara and named after Dr. Michael Fanger, who co-founded Celdara Medical in 2008 with Dr. Jake Reder. The new facility, designed for chemistry, biology, mathematics, engineering, and computer science, is available to students across New Hampshire and Vermont. An outdoor ribbon cutting ceremony was held today for students and teachers to celebrate the start of the school year in the new space. "The NHAS has a mission to further the work of scientists and future scientists in New Hampshire by providing a forum for scientific discussion, interaction, and collaboration," notes NHAS Executive Director, Dr. Peter Faletra. "The Fanger Center provides an expanded space for students from all our communities to engage in authentic scientific research with teachers and STEM professionals through an apprenticeship model. NHAS intends to be a main hub for STEM opportunities in the states of NH and VT, with The Fanger Center serving as its flagship STEM research Center. Accessibility is core to our efforts; it is our goal to ensure that motivated students can attend, independent of their financial means." Crossroads Head of School, Mr. Dan Morrissey, adds: "At Crossroads Academy, our faculty set children on learning journeys in every field of discovery, teaching them that knowledge and virtue strong minds and kind hearts can change the world. Like Dr. Fanger, our community is eager to create a better future and is continually exploring ways to do so. The inauguration of the Fanger Center on our 30th Anniversary represents our continued investment in thought leadership and innovation. We are thrilled that the region's middle and high school students will have the opportunity to engage in high quality curricular and extra-curricular science and engineering research through our unique partnership with NHAS." The Fanger Center is a replicable and scalable model for schools worldwide and builds upon the success of the current NHAS STEM lab. In addition to regional STEM outreach programs, teacher training and authentic research experiences for students, the existing NHAS STEM lab as resulted in over 100 students from 15 regional schools publishing their research with the American Junior Academy of Science and presenting their work at the annual meetings of the American Association for the Advancement for Science (AAAS). The Fanger Center expands the existing 1,200 square feet of biology lab space to include an additional 2,500 square feet of lab space, in addition to offices, conference spaces, and future-ready maker spaces, all focused on the physical sciences, computer science and engineering. "Mike and I founded Celdara to transform the work of leading scientists into products and services that can help humanity. Mike gave immeasurably to the field of scientific education, as a mentor, entrepreneur, and academician. Increasing equitable access to educational opportunities and investing in STEM leaders of the future is a wonderful way to honor Mike's legacy. Some of the next generation of leading scientists, mathematicians, and engineers will find their inspiration here," said Jake Reder, co-founder and CEO of Celdara Medical. In 1981, Dr. Fanger joined Dartmouth Medical School's Immunology Program, creating a world-renowned Department of Microbiology and Immunology, for which he served as Chairperson for a decade. As an entrepreneur, Dr. Fanger cofounded the pioneering biotechnology company Medarex, generating technology which created nearly half of the human antibodies approved to date. Two Medarex medicines ignited the immunoncology revolution, providing hope for previously incurable patients and saving thousands of lives. In 2018, Drs. Jim Allison and Tasuku Honjo received the Nobel Prize in Medicine for their pioneering work that led to these world changing Medarex drugs. "Mike's impact in the biotech industry is the stuff of legend, but for the many of us that he inspired, his teaching, counselling, advising, mentoring and friendship may be even more impactful. These virtues are a big part of why we are honoring his legacy with this Center. My hope is that every student who passes through these doors will learn something about Mike and realize that they too can be great by doing good," said Reder. About Celdara Medical Celdara Medical was founded by Drs. Jake Reder and Michael Fanger in 2008 and is headquartered at the Dartmouth Regional Technology Center (DRTC) in Lebanon, N.H. Celdara Medical builds academic and early-stage innovations into high-potential medical companies, identifying discoveries of exceptional value at the earliest stages and moving them toward the market. Celdara Medical partners with inventors and their institutions, providing the developmental, financial, and business acumen required to bridge discovery and profitability. With robust funding options, a diverse and high impact Programmatic pipeline, and partnerships with world-class academic institutions and industry leaders, Celdara Medical navigates all aspects of a complex industry, accelerating science to improve human health. Learn More: https://celdaramedical.com/ About the New Hampshire Academy of Science The New Hampshire Academy of Science, Inc. (NHAS) is a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) organization and an affiliated organization of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). NHAS supports the scientific research of New Hampshire high school and middle school students and sponsors their attendance at the annual symposium of the largest scientific organization in the world, the AAAS. The NHAS Mission is to further the work of scientists and future scientists in New Hampshire, provide a forum for scientific discussion, interaction, and collaboration with the general public through our website and conferences, increase public understanding and appreciation of the importance and promise of science in human welfare and progress, and encourage authentic scientific research by having scientists mentor students in middle and high schools. Learn More: https://www.nhacadsci.org/ About Crossroads Academy Crossroads Academy is an independent, coeducational day school committed to academic excellence and moral integrity. We inspire our students to love learning, act honorably, and contribute actively to intellectual, cultural, and civic life. Crossroads Academy was the first independent Core Knowledge school in the United States, and also the first Core Virtue school. We believe that virtues such as perseverance, intellectual honesty, and intellectual courage are both academic and moral virtues. This belief is reflected in the school motto "Scientia Virtusque""Knowledge and Virtue." At Crossroads Academy, the Core Virtues create an ethos of responsibility and caring that fosters a disciplined, passionate, and cooperative pursuit of our program. As students master the content and practice the virtues, they gain, over time, an appreciation of who they are and who they aspire to be. Learn More: https://www.crossroadsacademy.org/ View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/the-fanger-center-an-innovative-collaboration-with-celdara-medical-and-the-new-hampshire-academy-of-science-opens-at-crossroads-academy-301363277.html SOURCE Celdara Medical [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] HUAWEI CLOUD celebrates 2nd anniversary in Latin America using Cloud and AI to Help Fight COVID-19 and Protect Biodiversity MEXICO CITY, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- HUAWEI CLOUD is celebrating its two-year anniversary in Latin America and the Caribbean with a series of events. During August 25 - September 3, experts from across industries will share their experience and insights on how to use new technologies like cloud computing, AI, and big data to drive digital transformation across the region. Specifically, the company has been using its strength in Cloud and AI to help fight the COVID-19 and protect biodiversity in countries across the region. "Latin America is one of the most important emerging markets for cloud computing. HUAWEI CLOUD has been investing heavily in this market and has achieved rapid growth," said Mr. Zhang Ping'an, Senior Vice President of Huawei, CEO of Huawei Cloud BU, and President of Huawei Consumer Cloud Service. "Looking forward, we will boost our support for the digital transformation and the upgrading of intelligent systems of our customers in Latin America through four initiatives: continuous tech innovation, joint outreach by HUAWEI CLOUD & Huawei Mobile Services, global + local services, and high-quality business ecosystems. We are inviting our partners to join in the efforts. Together, we will build a robust digital ecosystem around the world and lay the cloud foundation for an intelligent world." Fernando Liu, President of Latin America Cloud Business Dept, Huawei, said, "We position our company not only as a provider of leading cloud infrastructure and services, but also a long-term business partner in Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as a responsible corporate citizen. As a cloud service provider with the largest number of nodes and the fastest growth in Latin America, HUAWEI CLOUD will continue to invest more in Latin America with more local nodes, new solutions, and partner support. We are dedicated to bringing he latest technology to Latin America and the Caribbean." Over the past two years, HUAWEI CLOUD has been working with more than 20 hospitals in several countries in the region, including Ecuador, Chile, Colombia, Brazil, Peru, and Mexico, and utilized an AI-assisted screening system to speed up the scanning of CT images for COVID-19 symptoms. These have helped improve the efficiency. Most recently, Huawei has continued to partner with NGOs to use our technologies to help protect biodiversity in Latin America. On August 17, 2021, under Huawei's TECH4ALL initiative, Rainforest Connection (RFCx) and Etica de los Bosques, the Ministry of the Environment (MMA) and Superintendency of the Environment (SMA) of Chile, launched the "Guardians of the Forest" project in Chile. Powered by network and AI technologies, it is aimed to protect Darwin's fox, a critically endangered canid in the Nahuelbuta mountain range. The project uses solar-powered wireless devices, called Guardians, which can work continuously under high temperature and humidity levels. They are installed in trees to record audio data in the rain forests and send it to Huawei Cloud. AI models trained using ModelArts, Huawei's one-stop AI development platform, are then used to analyzes the data and compare it against the sound patterns of different species stored to identify specific animals. This enables experts to analyze the distribution and behavior of specific species, allowing them to provide guidance on how to better protect them. The system also detects the sounds of chainsaws and gunshots, so law enforcement can quickly respond to poaching and other criminal activities. Huawei has partnered with RFCx previously in Costa Rica to build intelligent models to detect and analyze the sounds of spider monkeys, helping researchers obtain information about the species' habitats, the threats they face, and even their behaviors and lifestyle. This helps protect the endangered species. HUAWEI CLOUD, celebrating its second anniversary in Latin America and the Caribbean, has been working with local partners to drive digital transformation in sectors such as retail, logistics, education, finance, energy, Internet, and health care. In the retail sector, HUAWEI CLOUD is helping transform some of the top retailers, streamlining their online and offline processes, supporting smart business transformation, and setting new benchmarks for digital transformation of the entire sector. In logistics, HUAWEI CLOUD has helped some of the top logistics companies in the region integrate the SAP HANA infrastructure to simplify processes, ensure high availability, improve user experience, and reduce costs. HUAWEI CLOUD and partners have deployed 45 AZs (availability zones) in 23 regions around the world. In Latin America, As of today, HUAWEI CLOUD operates three core regions in Chile, Brazil, and Mexico, and two country-level regions in Argentina and Peru, with eight AZs in total. HUAWEI CLOUD is committed to its goal of delivering a reliable, efficient, and low-latency cloud service experience for customers across the region. For more information, please visit: Portuguese: https://www.huaweicloud.com/intl/pt-br/about/anniversary2021.html Spanish: https://www.huaweicloud.com/intl/es-us/about/anniversary2021.html SOURCE HUAWEI CLOUD [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 23, 2021] Landis+Gyr Signs Contract with Louisville Gas and Electric Company and Kentucky Utilities Company for Advanced Metering Infrastructure and IoT Network CHAM, Switzerland, Aug. 23, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Landis+Gyr Technology Inc., a subsidiary of Landis+Gyr Group AG (SIX:LAND) signed a five-year agreement with Louisville Gas and Electric Company (LG&E) and Kentucky Utilities Company (KU) to provide a comprehensive advanced metering and smart grid infrastructure. The contract, which covers both operating utilities, includes 930,000 advanced electricity meters and 300,000 gas modules, in addition to network equipment and software. Both utilities will deploy Landis+Gyr's Gridstream Connect solution, which links the electric and gas advanced metering infrastructure endpoints to an IoT network capable of supporting a variety of intelligent devices for managing energy distribution systems. "Installing this technology across our customer base has been a goal of ours for some time and we're pleased full deployment of advanced metering infrastructure was approved in June by the Kentucky Public Service Commission," said David Huff, Director of Advanced Meter Initiatives at LG&E and KU. "Once installed and operational, this technology will enhance the safe, reliable service we provide our customers and will better enable them to save energy and money through access to their granular energy use." Landis+Gyr's Gridstream network provides utilities with the information and access needed for planning, maintenance, and improving system reliability. Beyond energy consumption information, the network can interface with load management and analytics platforms to provide actionable intelligence for utility operations. "Landis+Gyr is excited to be part of this grid modernization effort and we look forward to implemening technology that enables the goals that LG&E and KU have defined for the future of energy in Kentucky," said Prasanna Venkatesan, Landis+Gyr's Executive Vice President of the Americas region. About LG&E and KU Louisville Gas and Electric Company and Kentucky Utilities Company, part of the PPL Corporation (NYSE: PPL) family of companies, are regulated utilities that serve more than 1.3 million customers and have consistently ranked among the best companies for customer service in the United States. LG&E serves 332,000 natural gas and 425,000 electric customers in Louisville and 16 surrounding counties. KU serves 564,000 electric customers in 77 Kentucky counties and five counties in Virginia. More information is available at www.lge-ku.com and www.pplweb.com. About Landis+Gyr Landis+Gyr is a leading global provider of integrated energy management solutions for the utility sector. Offering one of the broadest portfolios, we deliver innovative and flexible solutions to help utilities solve their complex challenges in Smart Metering, Grid Edge Intelligence and Smart Infrastructure. With sales of USD 1.4 billion in FY 2020, Landis+Gyr employs more than 5,000 people in over 30 countries across five continents, with the sole mission of helping the world manage energy better. For more information, please visit our website www.landisgyr.com. Contact Media Melissa van Anraad Head of PR Phone +41 41 935 6398 Melissa.vanAnraad@landisgyr.com Eva Borowski SVP Investor Relations & Corporate Communications Phone +41 41 935 6396 Eva.Borowski@landisgyr.com Contact Investors Christian Waelti Head of Investor Relations Phone +41 41 935 6331 Christian.Waelti@landisgyr.com View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/landisgyr-signs-contract-with-louisville-gas-and-electric-company-and-kentucky-utilities-company-for-advanced-metering-infrastructure-and-iot-network-301360759.html SOURCE Landis+Gyr [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] National Geographic Learning Introduces an Adaptive Online Placement Test for English Language Learners BOSTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- National Geographic Learning, a Cengage Group brand, is today introducing National Geographic Learning Online Placement Test, an adaptive online test to help institutions quickly and reliably assess English language learners around the globe and place them in one of fourteen levels correlated to the Common European Framework of Reference. "We believe half of the world will speak or learn English by 2030 because proficient English is the gateway to a promising career for millions across the globe," said Alexander Broich, President of Cengage Global Businesses and General Manager for English Language Teaching. "As enrollments are growing by up to 5 percent annually, institutions need a valid and reliable test to place students at the correct level of English learning. Our online placement test addresses that need without human testers and at scale." National Geographic Learning's adaptive test, designed for learners ages 15 and older, auto-collects speaking samples for a finer degree of placement and features a Score Report for each test-taker with skill-specific scores for listening, reading and use of language. "For our students, faculty and staff, having ready access to a high-quality placement instrument is an absolute necessity," said Richard McDorman, Chief Academic Officer for Languge On Schools in Florida. "With National Geographic Learning's new placement test, we can be assured our students will enter the right level of our program so students can benefit from our instruction and shine, both inside and outside class, as they live their English adventure." The Online Placement Test database includes a broad range of questions that reflect real-world contexts and authentic audio featuring global speakers. All questions have undergone rigorous global user-testing to ensure validity, led by a panel of leading assessment experts. The Online Placement Test already has early pre-launch adoptions in the United States, Mexico and Vietnam. To learn more about National Geographic Learning's Online Placement Test, visit: ELTNGL.com/onlineplacement. About National Geographic Learning National Geographic Learning, a Cengage Group brand, is a leading educational publisher for the English Language Teaching and secondary education markets worldwide. At National Geographic Learning, we believe that an engaged and motivated learner will be a successful one, and we design our materials with a highly interactive storytelling approach which is a great way to invoke these connections. To learn more, visit: eltngl.com. About Cengage Group Cengage Group, a global education technology company serving millions of learners, provides affordable, quality digital products and services that equip students with the skills and competencies needed to be job ready. For more than 100 years, we have enabled the power and joy of learning with trusted, engaging content, and now, integrated digital platforms. We serve the higher education, workforce skills, secondary education, English language teaching and research markets worldwide. Through our scalable technology, including MindTap and Cengage Unlimited, we support all learners who seek to improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education. Visit us at www.cengagegroup.com or find us on LinkedIn and Twitter. Media Contact: Emily Featherston, Cengage Group 617.757.8035, Emily.featherston@cengage.com View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/national-geographic-learning-introduces-an-adaptive-online-placement-test-for-english-language-learners-301363061.html SOURCE Cengage Group [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] SEC Commissioner Crenshaw and Former FASB Chairperson Seidman to Keynote XBRL US Investor Forum 2021 XBRL US announced today that the annual XBRL US Investor Forum 2021: Data that Delivers, will feature two keynote speakers, Commissioner Caroline A. Crenshaw of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission; and Independent Corporate Director and former FASB Chairperson, Leslie F. Seidman. This year's virtual forum, which will take place on November 10, 2021, will focus on how machine-readable data has transformed the way investors, analysts, auditors, and public companies manage assets, and conduct due diligence and research for a variety of activities. "The availability of machine-readable financial and nonfinancial data has revolutionized the data ecosystem. Startup analytics providers have developed new ways to analyze massive amounts of digital information, which streamlines the process and allows more time for analysis," said Leslie F. Seidman, former FASB Chairperson. "This event provides an opportunity to showcase the powerful combination of digitized data and user-friendly technology." The forum, which will be live-streamed and is free to the public, is sponsored by Baruch College's Zicklin School of Business, CFA Institute, and CFA Society New York. Registration is required: https://xbrl.us/events/investor-forum-2021/. The program will also feature speakers from Calcbench, idaciti, MOOG, Inc., PwC, Securities Exchange Commission's Division of Economic and Risk Analysis Office of Structured Disclosure, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College, and Whiting Petroleum Corporation, among others. Case studies will be presented on how standardized data is being used today to deliver better analytics and research for regulators, standard setters, public companies, and investors. When: Wednesday, November 10, from 12:30 PM to 5:00 PM ET How: view the full agenda and register https://xbrl.us/events/investor-forum-2021/ This event is free to attend but registration is required. About XBRL US XBRL US is the non-profit consortium for XBRL business reporting standards in the US and represents the business information supply chain. Its mission is to support the implementation of business reporting standards through the development of taxonomies for use by US public and private sectors, with a goal of interoperability between sectors, and promoting XBRL adoption through marketplace collaboration. XBRL US has built standards for government agencies including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and the Department of Energy, as well as industry sponsored standards for surety insurance, municipal government reporting, and corporate actions. http://xbrl.us View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005539/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 25, 2021] Hepsiburada Announces Role Changes in the Executive Management Team ISTANBUL, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- D-MARKET Electronic Services & Trading ("Hepsiburada", or the "Company"), a leading Turkish e-commerce platform, today announced certain role changes in its executive management team. In line with the Company's growth plans, Hepsiburada has taken the strategic decision to make the following role changes to its executive management team to help with the execution of its growth plans and to optimize the roles & responsibilities across the team. Effective as of September 1, 2021: Murat Buyumez, current Chief Strategy & Business Officer (CSBO) will assume the role of Chief Commercial Officer (CCO), focused on category management and commercial operations. Mutlu Erturan, current CCO will assume the role of Chief Business Officer (CBO), focused on new ventures, growth initiatives and strategic opportunities. The role of Chief Strategy Officer will remain currently vacant. The Company remains committed to attracting and developing world-class talent while evolving its team for best-in class execution. Fo information regarding the experience of Mr. Buyumez and Ms. Erturan, see disclosure under "Senior Management" starting on page 141 of the registration statement on Form F-1 (the "Registration Statement") filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") in connection with our initial public offering, available on the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. About Hepsiburada Hepsiburada is a leading e-commerce technology platform in Turkey, combining a globally proven e-commerce business model with a one-stop 'Super App' to cater to our customers' everyday needs and to help make people's daily lives better. Customers can access a broad range of products and services including same-day delivery of groceries and essentials, products from international merchants, airline tickets and payment services through our embedded digital wallet, HepsiPay. In 2020, we seamlessly connected 33 million members and approximately 45 thousand Active Merchants. Founded in Istanbul in 2000, Hepsiburada was built to lead the digitalization of commerce in Turkey. As a female-founded organization, we are committed to meaningful action to empower women. Through our 'Technology Empowerment for Women Entrepreneurs' programme, we have reached over 19,000 female entrepreneurs across Turkey to date. Investor Contact Helin Celikbilek, Investor Relations Director ir@hepsiburada.com Media Contacts Harika Eldogan, Head of Public Relations corporatecommunications@hepsiburada.com Brunswick Group hepsiburada@brunswickgroup.com Azadeh Varzi Caroline Daniel Nick Beswick View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/hepsiburada-announces-role-changes-in-the-executive-management-team-301363185.html SOURCE Hepsiburada [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 25, 2021] Kyriba and Openpay Offer Smarter Payments Experience for US Based Clients SAN DIEGO and MELBOURNE, Australia, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Kyriba, a global leader of cloud-based finance and IT solutions, and Openpay Group Ltd. (ASX: OPY) (Openpay), a global diversified payments fintech Company, announced a strategic partnership to introduce Openpay's OpyPro SaaS solution for B2B payments to Kyriba clients to improve their working capital performance and strengthen customer relationships. "We are thrilled to join this strategic partnership with Kyriba, a leading innovator in enterprise liquidity management," said Brian Shniderman, CEO of Openpay, US division. "Kyriba's leadership in cash management, payments, and connectivity makes this partnership highly valuable for Kyriba clients and Openpay as we continue to expand the reach of our OpyPro B2B solution into North America." Coupled with Kyriba's Enterprise Liquidity Management platform and award-winning Working Capital solutions, the OpyPro solution digitizes and automates the onboarding of customers, a critical advantage to optimize new customer acquisition at scale. The self-service buyer and supplier portals reduce manual tasks and administration providing 24/7 access to critical transaction, invoice and statement data. OpyPro improves days sales outstanding (DSO), and reduces fraudulent transactions, reconciliation time and costs. "Openpay is a payment innovator, offering critical buy now pay later solutions to CFOs and treasury teams to improve their cash conversion cycle and incrase revenue growth," said Jean-Luc Robert, chairman and CEO of Kyriba. "Kyriba customers have been searching for new payment solutions like OpyPro that support their digital transformation and eCommerce evolution." The Kyriba partnership is Openpay's first expansion into the United States, one of the world's largest B2B payments markets. Based on initial client response to the new partnership, Kyriba and Openpay aim to offer OpyPro to Kyriba's more than 2,000 clients world-wide. About Kyriba Corp.: Kyriba is a secure, scalable open platform that leverages artificial intelligence, automates payments workflows, and enables thousands of multinational corporations and banks to optimize liquidity, protect against loss from fraud and financial risk, and reduce operational costs. With more than 2,000 clients worldwide, including 25 percent of Fortune 500 and Eurostoxx 50 companies, Kyriba empowers CFOs, Treasurers, and their IT counterparts to transform how they optimize liquidity and manage risk, managing more than 1.3 billion bank transactions per year, and 200 million payments into 140 countries annually. Kyriba is headquartered in San Diego, with offices in Dubai, Frankfurt, London, Minsk, Paris, Shanghai, Singapore, Tokyo, Warsaw and other major locations. For more information, visit www.kyriba.com. About Openpay Openpay Group Ltd (ASX: OPY) is a fast-growing and highly differentiated player in the global 'Buy now pay later' (BNPL) payment solutions market. The Company's strong platform enables it to deliver the most flexible plans in the market with durations of 224 months and values of up to $20,000. Openpay focuses on industries where it can make a true difference: Automotive, Healthcare, Home Improvement, Memberships and Education; and its target customers are finance-savvy and of an older demographic who use Openpay plans as a cashflow management tool. Openpay also has a unique B2B offering, OpyPro (formerly Openpay for Business), a SaaS-based platform that allows companies to manage trade accounts end-to-end, including applications, credit checks, approvals and account management in the one system. Openpay provides services to Customers and Merchants in Australia, New Zealand, the UK and entered the US market, under the brand name Opy, in December 2020. See more at www.openpay.com.au. View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/kyriba-and-openpay-offer-smarter-payments-experience-for-us-based-clients-301363187.html SOURCE Openpay Group Ltd. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 25, 2021] Chope enters strategic partnership with Alipay to digitalise Asia's F&B businesses Leveraging Alipay's technology and know-how to accelerate Chope's rapid growth and evolution into multi-service dining app Strategic partnership to help F&B businesses across Asia recover from crisis and transform for the future SINGAPORE, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Leading regional F&B tech startup Chope and Alipay, the world's leading digital payment platform operated by Ant Group, announced a strategic partnership today, working together to accelerate digitalisation of F&B businesses across Asia. Through this strategic partnership, Alipay will provide Chope with its mini program Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and know-how, while Chope becomes Alipay's platform partner with the capability to integrate a wide variety of mini programs quickly and flexibly, enhancing the functionality and scalability of Chope's platform. Businesses of all sizes will now be able to easily integrate into the Chope app through mini programs, which are easy to build, highly-customisable and cost-effective. This allows F&B operators to reach Chope's millions of users, leverage Alipay's innovative technology and digitalise their operations in one fell swoop - providing speedy access to market, and a truly omni-channel experience. Meanwhile, diners can look forward to a wider variety of F&B types and dining services on the Chope app. Arrif Ziaudeen, CEO of The Chope Group, said, "The pandemic has fueled adoption of digital solutions and services among F&B operators. For some, the extreme restrictions have forced them to finally adapt to digital lifestyles not only to remain competitive, but to survive. Our partnership with Alipay comes at an opportune time to help lead this evolutionary step-change. We look forward to not only the F&B industry's recovery but also growth in the region, and we believe that building an open mini program ecosystem will be a powerful enabler of that. Working closely with Alipay and our F&B partners, our ambition is to do with Asia's giant foodservce industry what e-commerce has done with shopping". This strategic partnership is a testament to Chope's position and strong reputation as the region's leading F&B technology startup with its products used by thousands of clients and backed by leading venture capital and tech investors. Chope works with the region's largest F&B operators and has become a ubiquitous app on diners' phones by combining a keen understanding of how restaurants really work with consumers' evolving habits. From reservations to table management, marketing, deals, and delivery, Chope has built a comprehensive offering and aggregated a fragmented market, forming a strong foundation for the Alipay partnership. "We are constantly striving to support the digital transformation of the service industries including F&B, and we strongly believe in an open ecosystem approach so that our partners can make the most use of our capabilities such as the mini program SaaS," said Cherry Huang, General Manager, Global Merchant Partnership, South and Southeast Asia, Alipay. "Chope makes an outstanding partner of choice for Alipay with its vision to drive innovation and its vast network of local F&B operators, many of which are small and medium-sized businesses. With Chope's integration with Alipay's mini program, we look forward to supporting the recovery of local F&B businesses and helping them thrive." This strategic partnership comes as the local F&B industry continues to tackle the challenges brought upon by the ongoing pandemic, signaling both firms' continued commitment to the recovery of the local F&B industry. About Chope Chope wants you to dive into the good things in life by getting out and what better way to do so than with food? In our mission to be Asia's premier dining platform, our goal is to match millions of restaurants to billions of diners, ensuring that people can regularly and easily make the most out of their dining experiences. Having seated more than 83 million diners to date, Chope is well-positioned to understand what gets people excited about dining out, and how best to maximise business for our 5,000 restaurant partners. With Chope, diners can discover restaurants, make instant bookings, and save with great dining deals. Chope's demand generating diner platform is seamlessly incorporated with a suite of integrated solutions that encompass reservation, call, queue, and table management. This technology frees restaurants up to focus on what they do best: Providing their customers with the best food and service. Founded in 2011 and currently in seven cities (Singapore, Hong Kong, Bangkok, Phuket, Shanghai, Bali, and Jakarta), Chope has grown consistently over the past 10 years, and despite the effects of COVID-19 on the F&B industry this past year, are bouncing back stronger than ever. Powering this growth is Chope's close relationships with top restaurant partners, which include The Lo & Behold Group, JUMBO Group, Soho Hospitality, Lost Heaven, Dining Concepts, Hospitality Management Asia, Ismaya Group and The Union Group. Chope's ecosystem is further enriched by key partnerships with the likes of Google, TripAdvisor, Meituan Dianping, DBS and CapitaLand. Visit www.chope.co and download the app (www.chope.co/app) for more information. About Alipay Alipay is the leading digital payment platform in China, serving hundreds of millions of users, and connecting them with merchants and partner financial institutions that offer inclusive financial services and digital daily life services such as food delivery, transport, entertainment, and healthcare. SOURCE The Chope Group [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 25, 2021] CHURCHILL ALERT: Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. Reminds Investors That a Class Action Lawsuit Has Been Filed Against Churchill Capital Corp. IV and Encourages Investors to Contact the Firm Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C., a nationally recognized shareholder rights law firm, reminds investors that a class action lawsuit has been filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama on behalf of investors that purchased Churchill Capital Corporation IV (NYSE: CCIV) securities between January 11, 2021 and February 22, 2021, inclusive (the "Class Period"). Investors have until August 30, 2021 to apply to the Court to be appointed as lead plaintiff in the lawsuit. Click here to participate in the action. On January 11, 2021, Bloomberg (News - Alert) News reported that Lucid Motors Inc. ("Lucid"), an American automotive company specializing in electric cars, is in talks to go public via merger with one of Michael Klein's special purpose acquisition companies, including Churchill. Over the next several weeks, Lucid's Chief Executive Officer Peter Rawlinson made media appearances during which he stated that Lucid was aiming for a spring delivery for its first vehicles. On February 22, 2021, the merger between Churchill and Lucid was announced with transaction equity value estimated at $11.75 billion. Churchill's share price closed at $57.37. The same day, after the market closed, Bloomberg News reported that production of Lucid's debut car would be deayed until at least the second half of 2021 with no definite date for the actual delivery of vehicles. Details of the merger also disclosed that Lucid was projecting the production of only 557 vehicles in 2021, instead of the 6,000 it had been touting in the run-up to the merger announcement. On February 23, 2021, Churchill's stock fell $22.16, or 38%, to close at $35.21 per share on February 23, 2021. The complaint filed in this class action alleges that throughout the Class Period, Defendants made materially false and/or misleading statements, as well as failed to disclose material adverse facts about the Company's business, operations, and prospects. Specifically, Defendants failed to disclose to investors: (1) Lucid was not prepared to deliver vehicles by spring of 2021; (2) Lucid was projecting a production of 557 vehicles in 2021 instead of the 6,000 vehicles touted in the run-up to the merger with Churchill; and (3) as a result of the foregoing, Defendants' positive statements about the Company's business, operations, and prospects were materially misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis. If you purchased Churchill securities during the Class Period and suffered a loss, are a long-term stockholder, have information, would like to learn more about these claims, or have any questions concerning this announcement or your rights or interests with respect to these matters, please contact Brandon Walker, Melissa Fortunato, or Marion Passmore by email at investigations@bespc.com, telephone at (212) 355-4648, or by filling out this contact form. There is no cost or obligation to you. About Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C.: Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. is a nationally recognized law firm with offices in New York, California, and South Carolina. The firm represents individual and institutional investors in commercial, securities, derivative, and other complex litigation in state and federal courts across the country. For more information about the firm, please visit www.bespc.com. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210825005869/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 25, 2021] Comvita Announces Strong Earnings Improvement Headlines Reported NPAT $9.5M vs. ( $9.7M ) in PCP vs. ( ) in PCP Reported EBITDA* $25.5M , + $21.3M vs. June 2020 or +511% - Double-digit top and bottom-line growth in focus growth markets, China , and USA - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in Manuka product category - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in digital channels , + vs. or +511% - Double-digit top and bottom-line growth in focus growth markets, , and - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in Manuka product category - Double digit top and bottom-line growth in digital channels Gross profit +730 bps to 53.9% Marketing Investment +$8.7M or +56% Business transformation plan on track Net debt reduced by $10.9M to $4.6M , inventory reduction $11.7M , operating cash inflow $24.8M to , inventory reduction , operating cash inflow 9% reduction in total recordable injury frequency rate (TRIFR) Fully imputed dividend of 4 cps declared TAURANGA, New Zealand, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Comvita (NZX:CVT) today released its full year audited results for the year ending 30th June 2021, reporting a full year EBITDA at the top end of its market guidance at $25.5M. This represents an increase of +511% versus the prior corresponding period (PCP) driven by strong performance in its focus growth markets, focus channels and categories, underpinned by $12.1M of benefits from its transformation programme over the last 18 months. Reported net profit after tax was $9.5M versus a loss of $9.7M in the PCP as work to both focus and simplify the organisation delivered results. Reported net debt was $4.6M vs $15.5M in PCP as Comvita continued to focus on good internal management of cashflows and working capital. Inventory reduced by $11.7M and SKU count by 30%. Comvita is pleased to announce resumption of dividend payments and have declared a fully imputed dividend of 4 cps representing a payout of 30% of NPAT. Revenue in constant currency increased by 1.5% as strong performance in its focus growth markets of China +31% and USA +23% offset material headwinds in its Australia, New Zealand (ANZ) and Hong Kong segments. Underlying revenue grew 5.4%*. It was encouraging to report that Q4 ANZ revenue increased by 17% versus PCP and 33% versus Q3. While the UK market was negatively impacted at revenue level (primarily due to Brexit and Covid impacts), it was encouraging to see the market breakeven at net contribution, proving the longer-term opportunity in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Comvita Chair Brett Hewlett commented "As I shared at the Annual Shareholder Meeting in October 2020, FY21 was a crucial year for Comvita as we looked to prove the significant potential that exists to all stakeholders. We are pleased to report strong earnings growth at the top end of guidance, good management of cash and working capital and to be able to reward our shareholders with the resumption of dividends. In addition, we are particularly encouraged to publish our first Green House gas emissions report in this year's annual report as we embark on our journey to be carbon neutral by 2025 and carbon positive by 2030. We believe our unique business model, with significantly increased investment in our brand and supported by our environmental and social causes, will see Comvita recognised by the investment community as a sustainable premium FMCG brand with associated multiples". CEO David Banfield added "I would like to thank the whole team at Comvita for their abolute focus on delivering the results we share today. The business has gone through significant change in order to arrive at this point, it hasn't always been easy, but we know that this is crucial to enable us to deliver the true potential of Comvita, captured in our 2025 plan. Our 60:15:20 plan sets out our aim to deliver a GP in excess of 60%, marketing to sales ratio of 15% and an EBITDA ratio of 20% by 2025. Today is an important step on that journey. We are genuinely excited by the growth opportunities that lay ahead of us". Strong performance in focus growth markets Comvita was particularly encouraged by its performance in its focus growth markets of China and North America. In local currency, China market sales (the world's biggest honey market), increased by 31% with strong performance delivered across all channels. Despite increasing marketing investment by 139% versus PCP, net contribution increased by 25% as top line growth translated to strong earnings improvement. Comvita remains the clear brand and market leader in China. In North America, total revenue in local currency increased by 23% and net contribution by 18%, despite increasing marketing investment by over 80%. Comvita is the fastest growing Manuka honey brand in North America*** Comvita has a unique business model in the category. Its subsidiary model is designed to ensure that it is better connected to both customer and consumer needs in market and by being closer to customer, it can be more agile and responsive to changing customer needs around the world. Double digit top and bottom-line growth in both digital sales and Manuka honey Comvita continued its strong performance in both its focus Manuka honey category and in the digital channel with both recording double digit top and bottom-line growth. Constant currency digital sales grew 17% versus PCP to 35% of total group sales. Manuka honey sales increased 10% versus PCP as the continued focus delivered results. Comvita strategy on track - Building a Better Business Stabilise results, transform the organisation and deliver long-term resilience and growth Stabilise results The results shared today show that we have come a long way to stabilise performance at Comvita. Not only have we returned to profitability with a reported NPAT of $9.5M versus a loss of $9.7M in the PCP, we have also significantly simplified the business to set up Comvita for long-term profitable growth. Despite significant headwinds in ANZ, we have been able to prove the underlying resilience of our model. In doing this, we have reduced our monthly revenue required to break even to $13.5M, despite a material increase in investment in our brand. It is encouraging that ANZ performance in Q4 was +17% versus PCP and +33% versus the previous quarter highlighting that we can now start to build revenue again in FY22. Comvita improved its GP by 730 BPS versus PCP in this period, in line with its aim to deliver a 60% GP by 2025. This was delivered through focus growth markets (China and North America), focus channels (digital) and focus categories (Manuka honey), along with productivity improvements. Inventory was reduced by $11.7M and SKU count by 30% as our focus on ensuring good management of working capital and SKU profitability continued. Operating cash inflow was $24.8M and net debt finished the period at $4.6M. Transformed organisation We have now completed our restructuring process. Our attention now fully focuses on optimisation and creating an aligned performance driven culture at Comvita. We have a clear view of the steps required to drive profitable growth across all segments and returns for all stakeholders. We have also proven that our new harvest model works, further increasing organisational resilience and reducing risk associated with variability of the weather. Our $25M ($15M +$10M) transformational plan remains on track to deliver by 2025. In the first 18 months, we have delivered over $12M of improvements, investing $1.2M to deliver this in FY21. In FY22 we will invest a further $2.5M in transformation projects. Long-term resilience and growth Our focus remains on setting Comvita up for long-term resilience and growth. We have a clear view and understanding of what it will take to win in our focus growth markets, our focus channels and our focus categories. Our new business model ensures that we have funds available to tell discerning consumers around the world 'why Comvita' and also share the founding story of Alan and Claude from 1974/5 that we know resonates with consumers today. We now focus on delivering our FY22 guidance, and further building trust with all our stakeholders on our journey to deliver our 2025 plan. David Banfield added "A year ago, I shared that we were looking to deliver a rebound in performance in FY21. I am delighted that we have achieved that, but much remains to be done to deliver world class performance and experience for our consumers around the world. We know that we have an incredible opportunity to put in place the foundations that will enable Comvita and our bees to thrive for years to come and we remain absolutely committed to this cause. This starts by delivering our FY22 guidance and ensuring that we become recognised as a sustainable, premium FMCG brand. I look forward to sharing further progress at our Annual Shareholder Meeting in October." Brett Hewlett Chair, David Banfield CEO On behalf of the Board of Directors Note: *EBITDA earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation, constant currency revenue and underlying revenue are non-GAAP measures. We monitor these as key performance indicators and believe they assist investors in assessing the performance of the core operations of our business. Constant currency revenue and underlying revenue are both defined in our Investor Presentation. **Previous corresponding period. ***SPINS data Background information Comvita (NZX:CVT) was founded in 1974, with a purpose to heal and protect the world through the natural power of the hive. With a team of 500+ people globally, united with more than 1.6 billion bees, we are the global market leader in Manuka honey and bee consumer goods. Seeking to understand, but never to alter, we test and verify all our bee-product ingredients are of the highest quality in our own government-recognised and accredited laboratory. We are growing industry scientific knowledge on bee welfare, Manuka trees and the many benefits of Manuka honey and propolis. We have pledged to be carbon neutral by 2025 and carbon positive by 2030, and we are planting more than two million native trees every year. Comvita has operations in Australia, China, North America, South East Asia, and Europe and of course, Aotearoa New Zealand, where our bees are thriving. View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/comvita-announces-strong-earnings-improvement-301363210.html SOURCE Comvita [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 25, 2021] English Language Training Market in China to grow by $ 80.54 bn during 2021-2025 | Industry Analysis, Market Trends, Market Growth, and Forecast 2025 | Technavio NEW YORK, Aug. 25, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "English Language Training Market in China segmented by End-user (Institutional learners and Individual learners) and Product (Classroom-based, Online, and Blended) - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025" has been added to Technavio's offering. Do you know the English language training market size in China is expected to reach a value of USD 80.54 billion during 2021-2025? Find extensive research with data synthesis and validation on English Language Training Market In China report. Download a Free Sample Now! As the business impact of the COVID-19 spreads, the English language training market in China is expected to have POSITIVE growth. Companies across the globe are focusing on creating a Resilient Business Model in the Face of COVID-19. Vendors are continuing their ongoing operations while building resilient business models as the path to recovery from the pandemic is being carved out. The recovery process involves various phases including: Addressing Potential Impacts by Facilitating changes in Process Designs Build Resilience by making effective resource and investment choices for individual business units, products, and service lines. Assessing Impact on Critical IT infrastructure and Software System Fetch Pandemic-Driven Insights on English Language Training Market In China Key Considerations for Market Forecast: Impact of lockdowns, supply chain disruptions, demand destruction, and change in customer behavior Optimistic, probable, and pessimistic scenarios for all markets as the impact of pandemic unfolds Pre- as well as post-COVID-19 market estimates Quarterly impact analysis and updates on market estimates Get Access to On-demand, Syndicated Extensive Research Reports using Technavio's Subscription Platform Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform Corresponding Reports: Global Business English Language Training Market - Globalbusiness English language training market is segmented by end-user (institutional learners and individual learners), learning methods (blended learning and online learning), and geography (APAC, North America, Europe, South America, and MEA). Download Exclusive Free Sample Report Digital English Language Learning Market in APAC - Digital English language training market in APAC is segmented by end-user (non-academic learners and academic learners), deployment (on-premise and cloud-based), and geography (China, India, and the rest of APAC). Download Exclusive Free Sample Report Major Three English Language Training Market in China Participants: Berlitz Corp.: The company conducts ELT through numerous learning methods that include Targeted learning, Intuitive grammar, and others. ChinaEDU Corp.: The company offers online test platform, a real-time online question and answer platform that enables students to ask questions to teachers who are available online. EF Education First Ltd.: The company offers a wide range of ELT solutions including Guided learning courses, Self-study courses, and others. If you purchase a report that is updated in the next 60 days, we will send you the new edition and data extract FREE! Get report snapshot here to get detailed market share analysis of market participants during COVID-19 lockdown: https://www.technavio.com/report/english-language-training-market-in-china-industry-analysis English Language Training Market In China 2021-2025: Segmentation English language training market in China is segmented as below: End-user Institutional Learners Individual Learners Product Classroom-based Online Blended The English language training market in China is driven by increased investment in online English training vendors. In addition, a rise in the number of international schools is expected to trigger the English language training market in China toward witnessing a CAGR of over 22% during the forecast period. Unlock the English Language Training Market In China Report Statistics through Our Sample Report- https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR40432 Market Drivers Market Challenges Market Trends Vendor Landscape Vendors covered Vendor classification Market positioning of vendors Competitive scenario 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. Contact Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Report: www.technavio.com/report/english-language-training-market-in-china-industry-analysis Newsroom: newsroom.technavio.com/news/digital-english-language-learning-market View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/english-language-training-market-in-china-to-grow-by--80-54-bn-during-2021-2025--industry-analysis-market-trends-market-growth-and-forecast-2025--technavio-301362005.html SOURCE Technavio [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Timmy Trumpet's 'Diamonds' - World's First Music Video Filmed in Isolation, Hits the Big Screen in Hollywood LOS ANGELES, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- An ambitious project on a shoestring budget has made its way from a one-bedroom apartment in Australia, to the red carpet in Los Angeles. Directed by Shaun David Barker, produced by Rhino Punk Media, the music video for Diamonds is an official selection in the critically acclaimed film festival DANCES WITH FILMS (DWF:LA) celebrating its 24th year. Multi-platinum DJ, Timmy Trumpet, was in the middle of a North American tour with Steve Aoki when the pandemic struck. The following day he was one of thousands scrambling for the next plane out of LAX as the world headed into lockdown. A week later, Timmy livestreamed from his humble apartment in Sydney. Usually accustomed to gigantic festivals like Tomorrowland and EDC, some staging alterations werein order. C02 cannons were replaced by air freshener cans, pyrotechnics with birthday cake sparklers. The set clocked more than 10 million streams online, becoming one of the most viewed performances of the year. "Timmy opened the set on Diamonds, and it was the first time anyone had heard it. Then he said the words "from my home to yours, welcome" and the idea hit me in an instant" says Director, Shaun David Barker. 'Diamonds' was the first official video to be filmed and directed entirely in isolation. The project captured an experience that will forever be unique to our generation. Watch Diamonds: https://youtu.be/vLadkYLi8YE The music video is an inspirational undertaking of multi-cultural digital unity. With the help of Timmy's fans, footage was shot by over 500 contributors in 40 countries via Zoom, Facetime, and DM's. "The Diamonds video perfectly captures what our industry is all about. People coming together and spreading good vibes even in the hardest of times." - Dimitri Vegas (2 x World #1 DJ) A team of producers worked tirelessly around the clock. The final product took an astonishing 11 days to produce on a $6,000 micro-budget. "In a time where isolation and darkness felt overwhelming the video truly demonstrated the universal power of dance to unite and bring joy to all during the pandemic." - Jacob Merlin (CMO, 1001Tracklists) "An uplifting reminder of what we've all been missing!" - Martin Carvell (Managing Director, DJ Mag) Diamonds joins a star-studded line-up of eclectic films premiering AUG 27 - SEPT 9, at TCL Chinese Theatre on the historic Hollywood Walk of Fame. The film festival opens with The Art of Protest, that examines the intersection of the art, music and protest worlds. Financed by rocker Dave Navarro(Red Hot Chilli Peppers/Jane's Addiction), it includes interviews with Tom Morello, Shepard Fairey, Moby, Pussy Riot and others. DANCES WITH FILMS honourees this year are producer Michael London(Thirteen, Sideways, Trumbo, Milk) and director Paul Greengrass(United 93, Captain Phillips, News of the World, Jason Bourne). https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13460910/ https://danceswithfilms.com/home-2021/ View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/timmy-trumpets-diamonds---worlds-first-music-video-filmed-in-isolation-hits-the-big-screen-in-hollywood-301363301.html SOURCE Rhino Punk Media [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] German Electric Vehicle Manufacturer, Next.e.GO, successfully closes $ 57 M Series C funding round AACHEN, Germany, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ -- Next.e.GO Mobile SE, the German Electric Vehicle manufacturer company producing affordable, purpose-built and sustainable urban electric vehicles based on its disruptive technologies and unique microfactory, announced today that its majority shareholder, nd Industrial Investments B.V., part of international private equity company nd Group B.V. has successfully closed a series C equity funding round of $ 57M for the company. The funding round, participated by existing investors as well as new ones, enables e.GO to accelerate its effort in transforming the urban electromobility, by enhancing the production of its e.GO Life platform, driving the development of additional models and offering unique value adding features to the customers including the battery swap. The funding round also highlights the investors' confidence in e.GO's successful trajectory and the progress it has made in becoming one of the only western independent Battery Electric Vehicle companies that are actually in production and delivering cars to customers. "We are very pleased with the success of the Series C funding but, above that, wih the vote of confidence from our investors. The team at e.GO is determined, more than ever, to drive the much-needed transformation to carbon-free urban mobility by offering an electric vehicle like no other." says Ali Vezvaei, Chairman of the Board at Next.e.GO Mobile SE. Next.e.GO Mobile SE Next.e.GO Mobile SE, headquartered in Aachen, is a manufacturer of electric vehicles and sustainable mobility systems. Around 400 employees of Next.e.GO Mobile SE are working in agile teams on various cost-effective, particularly durable and sustainable electric vehicles for short-distance traffic. ND Group B.V. nd Group B.V. is a Private Equity and Holding company, headquartered in the Netherlands. Founded in 2008, the firm is primarily focused on EV, Alternative Energy, Fintech, HealthTech, Industrial assets and real estate. Contact: Next.e.GO Mobile SE Public Relations Lilienthalstrae 1 52074 Aachen T +49 241 47574-227 presse@e-go-mobile.com ND Group B.V. Public Relations Flight Forum 880 5657 DV Eindhoven, The Netherlands Phone: +31 40 30 40 50 1 press@nd.net View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/german-electric-vehicle-manufacturer-nextego-successfully-closes--57-m-series-c-funding-round-301362839.html SOURCE Next.e.GO Mobile SE [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Handheld introduces new wearable RS60 Ring Scanner LIDKOPING, Sweden, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ -- Handheld Group, a leading manufacturer of rugged mobile computers, today introduced the RS60 Ring Scanner, a comfortable hands-free scanning solution for use in warehouses, retail, distribution and other situations requiring highly mobile scanning. This device is the second in the newly introduced wearable line from Handheld following the SP500X ScanPrinter which was released earlier this month. To view the Multimedia News Release, please click: https://www.multivu.com/players/uk/8941251-handheld-introduces-new-wearable-rs60-ring-scanner/ "The new RS60 ring scanner is all about efficiency and mobility. It can be worn on either the right or left hand so workers can maximize productivity while keeping their hands free," says Johan Hed, Handheld director of product management. "Rather than holding a scanning device, a ring scanner is wearable and lets warehouse workers simply point and click, leaving them free to also move products and packages." RS60 ring scanner key features: The efficiency of a traditionl scanner and the convenience of a hands-free wearable solution Super-fast 2D-imager accurately captures barcodes on the move Tap to pair with any NFC enabled device or scan a barcode to connect BT class 1 let workers stay connected to devices up to 100 m (300 feet) away (300 feet) away IP65 dust and water resistance, operating from 0C to 50C and can survive multiple drops to concrete Up to 11 hours runtime Enterprise-focused accessories, including a four-slot charging station and an eight-slot battery charger "Enterprises have increasingly seen the value of equipping their workers with tools to maximize efficiency and mobility. Our new wearable line is designed to fit those needs," says Thomas Lofblad, CEO, Handheld Group. "Handheld has always been about mobile computing, and we'll be expanding our wearable product line further in the future." Availability Devices are in stock and available for immediate order and shipment. Helpful links RS60 ring scanner product info Product video RS60 media images Handheld's product lineup About Handheld Handheld Group is a manufacturer and global supplier of rugged mobile computers, including handhelds and tablets. Handheld and its partners worldwide deliver complete mobility solutions to businesses in industries such as geomatics, logistics, forestry, public transportation, utilities, construction, maintenance, mining, military and security. Handheld Group, headquartered in Sweden, has subsidiaries in Finland, the U.K., the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Australia and the USA. Learn more at www.handheldgroup.com View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/handheld-introduces-new-wearable-rs60-ring-scanner-301362907.html SOURCE Handheld Group AB [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Epos Now Announces Appointment of Chief Financial Officer The leading cloud-based POS and Payments provider further strengthens its Executive Leadership Team, ahead of its anticipated IPO. LONDON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Epos Now, a leading cloud-based software provider, supporting over 45,000 retail and hospitality locations across 71 countries, today announced the appointment of Imran Anwar as Chief Financial Officer. This appointment further strengthens the business' Executive Leadership Team and provides a significant injection of relevant experience ahead of its anticipated IPO. Imran brings 15+ years of cross-industry experience, in maximising sustainable company growth, raising capital, Initial public offering (IPO) and strategic business transformation. Prior to joining Epos Now, Imran served as Deputy Group CFO at The Hut Group (THG PLC). During this time he built out the finance, governance and risk infrastructure to drive the company through a successful IPO on the London Stock Market, the largest UK initial public offering for 3 years. "I am delighted to welcome Imran to Epos Now's Executive Leadership Team," said Jacyn Heavens, Founder and CEO of Epos Now. "He has a proven track record for successfully transforming, leading and professionalising fast-growth businesses. He also brings a deep understanding of both the risk and governance requirements of completing an IPO process and the ongoing responsibilities of managing a public company. This knowledge will be invaluable as we accelerate our growth plans together towards IPO and beyond." "I can't imagine a more exciting time to join Epos Now," says Imran. "We're seeing rapid growth in the cloud-based POS and Payments market and I am looking forward to working with Jacyn to deliver that growth in a sustainable manner which drives long term shareholder value." About Epos Now Epos Now is a global payment and technology provider focused on small and medium businesses in the retail, hospitality, and personal care sectors. Founded in 2011, its mission is to help a worldwide community of over 45,000 retail and hospitality locations harness the power of cloud technology to create amazing customer experiences. With Epos Now, businesses can control every element of their operation from any location, and on any device. Its cloud systems include payments, smart inventory control, custom reporting, staff & customer management as well as supporting businesses transition to meet a new type of merchant with robust eCommerce, delivery, and collection functionality. www.eposnow.com Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1600719/Epos_Now.jpg For more information contact Tillie Demetriou, PR Executive at Epos Now, at tillie.demetriou@eposnow.com, +44(0)-808-291-4479. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] SolidProof Offers Free Audit for DeFi projects in a Community Tournament Handewitt, Germany, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- German-based audit company SolidProof has just kickstarted a free audit program for DeFi projects. The firm sets out to show appreciation to its supporters by launching a free audit tournament. The community will have an opportunity to vote for the projects they find most suited to get a free audit and report. The announcement comes after Solidproof has successfully audited the BSC-based CyberRacing project. Protecting Project Investors and Users The DeFi market has been hit hard by many challenges, but fraud-related cases are the most evident. The space has seen new inventions and innovative companies that are looking to curb this issue. Solidproof uses auditing and KYC procedures to build trusted blockchain-based DeFi projects, unlike other companies that offer just one of them. The auditing procedure renders a project genuine, and hence the investor is assured of safety. The audit company determines a user's identity and establishes that their funds' sources are legit KYC services. However, you should note that the DSGVO regulation guards the data againstunauthorized access, so there is little to no leakage. Projects Voting Details To vote for the projects, you have to follow SolidProof on their Telegram and subscribe to all their social networks; Twitter and Facebook. Once you have checked all the eligibility boxes, you can then apply to participate. You will be required to submit an application through this google form . Once submitted, there will be a week of voting on Twitter and Telegram for everyone who has applied to participate. Over the week, various projects users will vote projects in or out. Those who voted in will receive a free audit and the confirmations posted on Twitter. You can check more details about the tournament here . So that more people are motivated to vote for their project, there is a 5 x 100 USDT giveaway . Also, the participants will randomly receive prizes after the tournament completion. SolidProof Auditing Services are Top-Notch SolidProof, without a doubt, offers trustworthy and seamless auditing with minimal errors. Defi providers get a chance to secure their smart contracts. The first step when auditing a project is the communication phase. This is where the exciting project sends a non-binding request and code to SolidProof. The company will then assess the project and invoice a personalized offer to the client. When given the go-ahead, the auditing team will then review the code a couple of times to identify vulnerabilities that could render the project prone to hacking or any other form of attack. The vulnerabilities are ranked between critical, medium, and low and sent back for fixing. The SolidProof team ensures that it works with the project developer to ensure that all issues get fixed. After that, another audit takes place. Once the code is satisfactory, the audit company offers an audit certificate that shows the project has been audited and is free from attacks. Get in Touch To participate in the auditing voting, remember to follow Solid Proof on their social media pages below. You can also scour more information on the poll whenever they update the information. Group: https://t.me/solidproof Twitter: https://twitter.com/SolidProof_io Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/solidproof.io Website: https://solidproof.io/ Media Contact - MAKE Solutions UG Mails Nielsen Hello@solidproof.io [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Viridis Terra Announces Closing of $3.2 M CAD Seed Funding Round QUEBEC CITY, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW Telbec/ - Viridis Terra, a green technology company based in Quebec City, has closed its CA $3.25 million (US $2.5 million) seed funding round, which will be used to further develop its TreesOfLives integrated technology platform created to support its degraded land restoration projects and tackle the climate and ecological crises. List of investors This round was supported by a group of angel investors, including lead investor Bruce McKean, two partner companiesGestion ChaMarin and NEL-i, Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC)and Quebec City. "The closure of this funding round is a key step in the commercialization and expansion of Viridis Terra's international operations and the consolidation of our multidisciplinary team. The capital will be used primarily to build on our expertise by adding experienced IT, marketing and sales professionals to the team, optimizing our operations and continuing to invest in the development of our technologies." said Martin Beaudoin-Nadeau, founder of Viridis Terra. The TreesOfLives platform In the coming months, Viridis Terra will advance the development and commercialization of the TreesOfLives technology platform, used to finance, optimize operations management and facilitate the sale of sustainable, zero deforestation commodities from forest landscape restoration projects. Through te TreesOfLives impact investment fund launched in February 2021, people already have the opportunity to get involved in the company's restoration and reforestation activities while offsetting their greenhouse gas emissions with a minimum investment of C$5,000. TreesOfLives is an integrated system that allows investors to monitor the progress of Viridis Terra's restoration projects, the return on their investment, and the impact of their contribution with respect to carbon, biodiversity, and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, all in a dedicated secure space. With a database to collect information on field activities, TreesOfLives will provide unprecedented transparency and traceability to all its stakeholders. "With TreesOfLives, we can turn a cost of restoration, reforestation, and carbon offsetting into an impact investment that generates sustainable returns at all levelsfinancial, social, environmental, and economic. The technology platform allows us to scale up activities, a key aspect in the development of the emerging industry of using nature-based solutions for tackling climate change and the degradation of nature." says Beaudoin-Nadeau. Learn more about TreesOfLives at www.treesoflives.com About Viridis Terra Founded in 2015 in Canada and now operating in four countries, Viridis Terra initially focused on the restoration of industrial sites, primarily in the mining sector. The company has developed unique restoration approaches with high-performance biotechnology, enabling the rapid reforestation of new forests, agroforests, and natural ecosystems. Thanks to the expertise developed by its team, the company opened a subsidiary in Peru in 2019 to diversify its activities and initiate large-scale sustainable forest landscape restoration projects. Peru was chosen to lay the foundation for the model because of its ability to mobilize the civil, public, and private sectors to restore degraded lands. By the end of 2022, the company expects to have restored up to 3,000 hectares under phase 1 of its operations in Peru. The Viridis Terra model will then be replicated on a large scale in other Latin American countries and elsewhere in the world. Learn more about Viridis Terra at www.viridisterra.com SOURCE Viridis Terra International [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] President and CEO of Rafael Pharmaceuticals, Sanjeev Luther, to Present at the 11th Annual World Orphan Drug Congress USA 2021 CRANBURY, N.J., Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Rafael Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Rafael or the Company), a leader in the growing field of cancer metabolism-based therapeutics, announced that Sanjeev Luther, President and CEO, will present at the World Orphan Drug Congress taking place on August 25-27 at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Oxon Hill, Maryland. Its a distinct honor to share the knowledge weve accumulated in the time devimistat has moved from preclinical to Phase 3, Sanjeev Luther, President and CEO of Rafael Pharmaceuticals, said. The World Orphan Drug Congress gathers the most passionate people in the rare disease space and Im looking forward to the opportunity to both share and hear more about important advancements and perspectives from patients, advocates and other life science companies. Presentation Details: Title: Leveraging Relationships in Ultra-rare Cancers: the laser-focused approach Date: Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021 Time: 3:55 p.m. ET The presentation will include an overview of how Rafael focused on building relationships to shepherd forward CPI-613 (devimistat) for use in ultra-rare cancers with few patients and fewer therapeutic options. Learn more at https://www.terrapinn.com/conference/world-orphan-drug-congress-usa . The presentation will be available at Rafaelpharma.com following the congress. About CPI-613 (devimistat) CPI-613 (devimistat) is a first-in-class clinical lead compound of Rafael, which targets enzymes that are involved in cancer cell energy metabolism and ar located in the mitochondria of cancer cells. Devimistat is designed to target the mitochondrial tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle, a process essential to tumor cell multiplication and survival, selectively in cancer cells. Devimistat substantially increases cellular stress and the sensitivity of cancer cells to a diverse range of chemotherapeutic agents. This synergy allows for potential combinations of devimistat with lower doses of these generally toxic drugs to be more effective with lower patients side effects. Combination with devimistat represent a diverse range of opportunities to substantially improve patients benefit in many different cancers. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has given Rafael approval to initiate pivotal Phase 3 clinical trials in pancreatic cancer (AVENGER 500) and acute myeloid leukemia (ARMADA 2000) and has designated devimistat as an orphan drug for the treatment of pancreatic cancer, acute myeloid leukemia, myelodysplastic syndrome, peripheral T-cell lymphoma, Soft Tissue Sarcoma, Burkitts lymphoma and biliary tract cancer. The EMA has granted orphan drug designation to devimistat for pancreatic cancer and acute myeloid leukemia. About Rafael Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Rafael Pharmaceuticals is a leader in the growing field of cancer metabolism. The company is developing a new, first-in-class category of metabolic oncology therapeutics that attack hard-to-treat cancers by targeting the metabolic processes the disease needs to survive, grow and proliferate. Rafael Pharmaceuticals lead compound, CPI-613 (devimistat), is a highly selective, well-tolerated and effective anti-cancer agent that is being evaluated in ongoing and completed Phase 1, 2 and 3 clinical trials. Devimistat has been granted orphan drug status by the FDA for the treatment of pancreatic cancer, acute myeloid leukemia (AML), myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and Burkitts, peripheral T-cell lymphomas and soft tissue sarcoma and biliary tract cancer. The Company's investors include Rafael Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: RFL). On June 21, 2021, we announced that we have entered into a merger agreement with Rafael Holdings, Inc., to create a publicly traded late-stage clinical oncology company focused on cancer metabolism-based therapeutics. For more information, please visit www.rafaelpharma.com. Safe Harbor Statement This press release contains forward-looking statements. These statements relate to future events or the companys future financial performance. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as "may", "will", "should", "expect", "plan", "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "predict", "potential" or "continue", the negative of such terms, or other comparable terminology. These statements are only predictions. Actual events or results may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors. Although we believe that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements are reasonable, such statements should not be regarded as a representation by the company, or any other person, that such forward-looking statements will be achieved. The business and operations of the company are subject to substantial risks which increase the uncertainty inherent in forward-looking statements. We undertake no duty to update any of the forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. In light of the foregoing, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements. ### Rafael Media Contact: Diana Cleinmark rafael@antennagroup.com (408) 713-1216 [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Excision Announces NIH Martin Delaney Grant Awarded to Temple University to Support "CRISPR for Cure" for HIV CRISPR-based therapies as a curative approach to HIV infection included in the program for first time. Collaboration with Temple University includes research on EBT-101, a CRISPR-based therapeutic candidate in development as a potential cure for chronic HIV. The research will look to develop multiple CRISPR approaches to excise HIV Proviral DNA with the potential to be a one-time functional cure for individuals infected with HIV. SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Excision BioTherapeutics Inc, the developer of CRISPR-based therapies intended to cure viral infectious diseases, today announced that the Temple University team collaborating with Excision on a project, CRISPR for Cure, has received a Martin Delaney Grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) of $4.8 million on an annual basis for the next five years as a part of approximately $53 million annual funding from the NIH to find a cure for HIV. Research will be done at Temple University, as well as the University of California, Los Angeles, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Case Western Reserve University, Drexel University College of Medicine, and the Scripps Research Institute. The funding has been awarded to 10 research organizations as a part of the expansion of the Martin Delaney Collaboratories program to expedite HIV cure research by bringing together researchers from multiple academic institutions, the private sector, and government partners. The announced investment is an expansion from the original 2016 program from 6 research collaborations and $30 million in annual funding. The NIH Martin Delaney Grant, of which the investigation of CRISPR-based curative therapies is a part, demonstrates the commitment of the NIH to find a cure for an infectious disease for which no vaccines are available and treatments only manage the disease, said Daniel Dornbusch, Chief Executive Officer of Excision. It is a privilege to collaborate with Dr. Kamel Khalili of Temple University to further develop our CRISPR-based HIV DNA ablation therapeutic, EBT-101, and we look forward to advancing the program towards clinical trials. This grant award is supported by National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), a division of the NIH under Award Number 1 UM1AI164568-01. The content of this press release is solely the responsibility of the Company and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH. About Excision BioTherapeutics, Inc. Excision BioTherapeutics, Inc., is a biotechnology company developing CRISPR-based therapies intended to cure viral infectious diseases. Excision is focused on improving the lives of chronically ill patients by excising viral genomes from infected individuals. By using CRISPR in unique ways, the Company has already demonstrated the first functional cure for HIV in animals. Excision is developing technologies and IP developed at Temple University and U.C. Berkeley. Excision is located in San Francisco, California and is supported by ARTIS Ventures, GreatPoint Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Adjuvant Capital, Cota Capital, WRVI Capital, IndusAge Partners, Loreda Holdings, Olive Tree, Anzu Partners, SilverRidge Venture Partners, Oakhouse Ventures, and Gaingels. For more information, please visit www.excision.bio. Editors Note: Kamel Khalili is Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Consultant, and holds equity in Excision Biotherapeutics, which has licensed the viral gene editing technology from Temple University. Kamel Khalili is a named inventor on patents that cover the viral gene editing technology. Dr. Khalili is employed by Temple University, and both he and faculty within his department conduct research activities sponsored by the company. Questions regarding his affiliation with Temple University may be directed to coisom@temple.edu. In addition to owning the viral gene editing technology that Excision is licensing, Temple University also holds an equity interest in Excision. As a result of these interests, Temple University could ultimately potentially benefit financially from the outcome of this research. These interests have been reviewed and approved by Temple University in accordance with its Institutional Conflict of Interest policy. Questions about this can be directed to coitemple@temple.edu. Contacts: Investors Eric Ando Burns McClellan, Inc. 212-213-0006 eando@burnsmc.com Media Robert Flamm, Ph.D. Burns McClellan, Inc. 212-213-0006 rflamm@burnsmc.com [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] C5 Capital Leads $20 Million Funding Round for Oomnitza WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- C5 Capital, a specialist cybersecurity investor, has led a $20 million growth funding round for Oomnitza and their pioneering SaaS-based Enterprise Technology Management solutions. Other participants in the round included Gula Tech Adventures , Aspenwood Ventures (also known as Hummer Winblad ), along with existing investors Riverside Acceleration Capital, and Shasta Ventures . C5 Managing Partner William Kilmer will help accelerate the company's growth by joining the board of directors. The investment in Oomnitza is the eighth from C5's Cyber Partners II fund, which invests in companies supporting the secure data ecosystem, including cybersecurity, applied data analytics, and cloud infrastructure. The fund already has had two notable exits: Shape Security, acquired by F5 Networks; and IronNet Cybersecurity, which is being acquired in a SPAC merger with LGL Systems Acquisition Corp. The investment in Oomnitza aligns with C5 Capital's strategy of investing in high-growth organizations where C5 can apply its expertise, network, and international experience in data security to help its portfolio companies expand. "Oomnitza takes a unique approach to IT asse management by giving companies a one-stop-shop for lifecycle management across hardware, software, network, cloud environments that forms the basis of good cybersecurity," said Kilmer. "We believe that enterprise technology management is poised to become a multi-billion-dollar market. Oomnitza is clearly the standout market leader with an A-list of more than 150 customers, including major digital disruptors in nearly every sector." In May 2020, Oomnitza raised $12.5M Series A led by Shasta Ventures and has raised $36M since inception. IT Asset management is now strategic The enterprise focus on digital transformation and the move to a hybrid IT ecosystem requires an aggressive and evolutionary way of thinking about security, compliance, and the overall employee experience. Oomnitza fulfills this requirement by becoming the system of record of enterprise technology assets, allowing organizations to identify, secure, and manage assets to optimize investment as well as ensure auditability and regulatory compliance. The company's SaaS-based solution is more than just a platform for delivering IT products and services to customers; it's now a strategic asset in the era of digital transformation. "Our customers include nearly two dozen tech unicorns as well as Fortune 500 organizations across retail, hospitality, automotive, and financial services sectors. Together, companies representing nearly $3 trillion of market capitalization have adopted Oomnitza's solution to become their system of record to manage their technology assets," said Arthur Lozinski, CEO and Co-Founder of Oomnitza. "We welcome C5 Capital's deep security and technology experience as we continue to accelerate our success in this rapidly growing, ever-changing market." About C5 Capital C5 Capital Limited (C5) is a global specialist investment firm that exclusively invests in the secure data ecosystem and in the transformation of critical infrastructure, including cyber security, cloud, AI, energy, and space. The firm is dedicated to nurturing a secure digital future with an investment strategy that is based on building long-term relationships with innovative companies that share in our mission. For more information, visit: www.c5capital.com . About Oomnitza Oomnitza is the first Enterprise Technology Management solution that provides a single source of truth for endpoints, applications, cloud, networking, and accessories. Our customers can orchestrate lifecycle processes, from purchase to end-of-life, across all IT assets, ensuring their technology is secure, compliant, and optimized, enabling their employees. Oomnitza is headquartered in San Francisco, CA. For more information, visit www.oomnitza.com . Contact: Mary Magnani, marym@codepr.com View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/c5-capital-leads-20-million-funding-round-for-oomnitza-301363315.html SOURCE C5 Capital [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] CoreLogic to Deliver Automation Efficiencies Through Deep Integrations into the ICE Mortgage Technology Platform CoreLogic, a leading global property data and analytics-driven solutions provider, today announced that it has entered into an enterprise agreement with ICE Mortgage Technology, part of Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. (NYSE: ICE), a leading global provider of data, technology and market infrastructure, to support the company's commitment to delivering a true digital mortgage offering for mortgage lenders and their borrowers. To drive this shared vision of improving the mortgage manufacturing process, CoreLogic will leverage Encompass Partner Connect across ten fundamental CoreLogic solutions to update critical data-driven processes and make these solutions available to thousands of mutual clients on the ICE Mortgage Technology Platform. Through the collaboration, ICE will be providing its customers the ability to automate the ordering of CoreLogic services, natively through the workflow automation within Encompass. In addition, ICE will be exposing APIs for these services, so lenders can deploy service ordering throughout any of the ICE solutions, including through Consumer Connect, TPO Connect and other systems. These automation capabilities will extend to valuations, credit reports, borrower verification solutions, income analysis, flood solutions, fraud and risk mitigation, automated valuation models, and title services-on the ICE Mortgage Technology Platform, enabling a fully streamlined and automated workflow. "The customer-first relationship between CoreLogic and ICE Mortgage Technology continues to grow," said Mike Mitchell, executive, business development, CoreLogic. "Modernizing the integration of our core solutions on the ICE Mortgage Technology Platform via Encompass Partner Connect will allow shared clients to benefit from new features such as automated service ordering, data-driven processing and a more optimized user experience. This relationship is incredibly beneficial to both CoreLogic and ICE Mortgage Technology's customers by helping mortgage lenders and their borrowers to access the next generation of service ordering and fulfillment." "Our focus is on automating the entire workflow, both to provide a better experience for the consumer, but also for our clients, as we help them lower their overall cost of originating or acquiring a loan, and this is a shared priority with CoreLogic," said Parvesh Sahi, Senior Vice President of Business and Client Development, ICE Mortgage Technology. "By automating the ordering of the wide array of solutions that CoreLogic has on our platform, we will make it easier for our customers to originate or acquire more loans, at lower costs, and in a fraction of the time." About Intercontinental Exchange Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. (NYSE: ICE) is a Fortune 500 company that designs, builds and operates digital networks to connect people to opportunity. We provide financial technology and data services across major asset classes that offer our customers access to mission-critical worklow tools that increase transparency and operational efficiencies. We operate exchanges, including the New York Stock Exchange, and clearing houses that help people invest, raise capital and manage risk across multiple asset classes. Our comprehensive fixed income data services and execution capabilities provide information, analytics and platforms that help our customers capitalize on opportunities and operate more efficiently. At ICE Mortgage Technology, we are transforming and digitizing the U.S. residential mortgage process, from consumer engagement through loan registration. Together, we transform, streamline and automate industries to connect our customers to opportunity. Trademarks of ICE and/or its affiliates include Intercontinental Exchange, ICE, ICE block design, NYSE and New York Stock Exchange. Information regarding additional trademarks and intellectual property rights of Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. and/or its affiliates is located here. Key Information Documents for certain products covered by the EU Packaged Retail and Insurance-based Investment Products Regulation can be accessed on the relevant exchange website under the heading "Key Information Documents (KIDS)." Safe Harbor Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 -- Statements in this press release regarding ICE's business that are not historical facts are "forward-looking statements" that involve risks and uncertainties. For a discussion of additional risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements, see ICE's Securities and Exchange Commission ( SEC (News - Alert) ) filings, including, but not limited to, the risk factors in ICE's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2020, as filed with the SEC on February 4, 2021. About CoreLogic CoreLogic, a leading provider of property insights and solutions, promotes a healthy housing market and thriving communities. Through its enhanced property data solutions, services and technologies, CoreLogic enables real estate professionals, financial institutions, insurance carriers, government agencies and other housing market participants to help millions of people find, buy and protect their homes. For more information, please visit www.corelogic.com. CORELOGIC and the CoreLogic logo are trademarks of CoreLogic, Inc. and/or its subsidiaries. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005150/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] PackEX, Plast-EX, and Advanced Manufacturing Return In-Person as Canada Opens for Business Advanced Design & Manufacturing (ADM) Toronto, Canada's leading end-to-end conference and exhibition driving exploration into the latest trends and technological advances in the design and manufacturing industries, today announced the in-person return to Toronto with the support of key industry partners: Annex Media Chemical Industry Association of Canada, Plastics Division PAC - Packaging Consortium PEMA - Process Equipment Manufacturers Association Slated for November 9-11 at the Toronto Congress Centre, the 2021 edition of ADM comprises five renowned event brands - PackEX, PLAST-EX, Automation Technology Expo (ATX), Powder & Bulk Solids, and Design & Manufacturing (D&M). Strategically designed to provide an all-in-one experience, attendees will have the opportunity to explore the latest trends and technologies shaping the future of advanced design and manufacturing across automation, robotics, energy efficiency, packaging, plastics, processing, and more. "The power of face-to-face connection plays an undeniable role in the industry's advancement and has been sorely missed over the past eighteen months," said Jenny McCall, Group Event Director, ADM, Informa (News - Alert) Markets. "We could not be more excited to reconnect the industry in-person this November in Canada's epicenter of innovation and progress the manufacturing industry, a sector that accounts for 10% of the country's GDP. This event is strategically held in Toronto, as its home to a selection of the world's leading injection mold and toolmakers, additive manufacturing metal powder suppliers, and emerging R&D in machining technology. Many of these innovators will walk the halls of ADM in search of new deals and peer-to-peer connection." Geared up to connect 250 brands with thousands of buyers, the event will reunite the community for the first time since in-person meetings came to a halt over eighteen months ago. Among the industry-leading exhibitors includes Absolute Haitian, CAM Packaging Systems, Carlo Gavazzi Canada, Cog-Veyor Systems, Creaform, Firing Industries, Flexlink Systems, IKO Thompson Bearing Canada, Jenike & Johanson, Kongskilde Industries, KUKA (News - Alert) Robotics Canada, Multivac Canada, PlexPack Corporation, Proax Technologies, Reiser Canada, SMC Corp, VC999 Canada, and Vortex. Also serving as a platform for international business connection, the event follows the U.S. and Canada opening borders to international travel. As of August 9, vaccinated American and Canadian travelers with documened proof of vaccination are permitted to travel internationally. Further laying the foundation for a successful in-person gathering, Canada is now one of the leading countries in the world for vaccinations, with 71% of their population having received at least one dose of the vaccine and 62% of the population being fully vaccinated as of August 13. Visitor registration is open; secure a conference and expo pass below: Press interested in attending the trade show can register for a free pass here. Stay connected across PackEX, PLAST-EX, Automation Technology Expo (ATX), Powder & Bulk Solids, and Design & Manufacturing (D&M) Toronto with #Discover#EngineerBuild and #ADMToronto About Informa Markets - Engineering: Informa Markets' Engineering portfolio is the leading B2B event producer, publisher, and digital media business for the world's $3-trillion advanced, technology-based manufacturing industry. Our print and electronic products deliver trusted information to the engineering market and leverage our proprietary 1.3-million-name database to connect suppliers with buyers and purchase influencers. We produce more than 50 events and conferences in a dozen countries, connecting manufacturing professionals from around the globe. The Engineering portfolio is organized by Informa, the world's leading exhibitions organizer that brings a diverse range of specialist markets to life, unlocking opportunities and helping them to thrive 365 days of the year. For more information, please visit www.informamarkets.com. About Informa Markets Informa Markets creates platforms for industries and specialist markets to trade, innovate and grow. Our portfolio is comprised of more than 550 international B2B events and brands in markets including Engineering, Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals, Infrastructure, Construction & Real Estate, Fashion & Apparel, Hospitality, Food & Beverage, and Health & Nutrition, among others. We provide customers and partners around the globe with opportunities to engage, experience and do business through face-to-face exhibitions, specialist digital content and actionable data solutions. As the world's leading exhibitions organizer, we bring a diverse range of specialist markets to life, unlocking opportunities and helping them to thrive 365 days of the year. For more information, please visit www.informamarkets.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005161/en/ [August 26, 2021] Evoque Data Center Solutions Strengthens Channel Partner Program, Hires Industry Veteran Monica Walton to Drive Relationships DALLAS, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Evoque Data Center Solutions, a global provider of connectivity, cloud and data center services, today announced an expansion of its channel partner program, designed to leverage existing relationships between service providers and their clients, while providing end-users with a full range of world-class data center services, ranging from colocation to the cloud. Under the expanded offering, Evoque will provide its channel partners with a full range of tools designed to help them drive additional business, including a consistent commission structure and process with increased incentives. The program will also offer new programmatic partner support, along with expanded co-branded marketing support designed to drive awareness and communicate the wide scope of advantages delivered by Evoques full line of capabilities. The company said it has begun broadening its focus to attract partners from a variety of segments, including brokers, master- and sub-agents and technology alliances. In addition, Evoque announced the appointment of Monica Walton as the companys vice president of channel sales. Ms. Walton previously served as vice president/general manager of sales for Lumen Technologies Rocky Mountain Region. Prior to Lumen, she worked at Level 3 Communications, directing a wider range of sales teams across multiple vertical industries. In those roles, Walton managed organizations that produced more than $250 million in annual sales across multiple states and consistently delivered annual positive revenue growth. Monica is a respected leader who dives in, looks for ways to strategically drive results, and works with tenacity to ensure her companys success, said Lisa Miller, president at Spearhead Advisors, a Dallas-based telecommunications consultancy. I know her leadership style is to dig in, nalyze, and achieve strong, consistent results. She is highly customer-focused and understands how to work with the channel to drive solutions and exceed customer expectations. Channel partners signing with Evoque will have a significant range of assets at their disposal to share with their clients. In addition to data centers located throughout the United States as well as in Europe and Asia, Evoque has acquired Foghorn, a cloud engineering consultancy that works with mid- to large-size enterprises, as well as companies born in the cloud. It has also introduced its Multi-Generational Infrastructure (MGI) strategy, designed to enable firms to optimize their options for workload deployment across the widest range of options, including on-premises, colocation, and edge data centers, as well as cloud and multi-cloud hybrid configurations. More than ever, the channel is a vital conduit for communicating our value proposition and driving sales, Walton said. By expanding our reach and scope to a greater range of trusted channel partners, we will help them deliver proven solutions to their clients, and will grow our customer base at the same time. Walton said Evoque plans to double its number of channel-based bookings over the next 12 months, noting that since she joined the company, Evoque has already surpassed its total channel sales funnel from the previous year. Working with my team, Im committed to developing and delivering a channel program that will benefit everyone at every phase: the end-user, our partners and us, Walton added. About Evoque Data Center Solutions Evoque Data Center Solutions offers local and global businesses an unparalleled range of services and solutions at its facilities across four continents and 15 highly-connected markets. Evoque provides companies with a unified offering of colocation, connectivity, and cloud engineering. Evoques market-first Multi-Generational Infrastructure (MGI) strategy enables its clients worldwide to develop and utilize both reliable colocation and hybrid cloud offerings for all businesses taking an application-first approach. Evoque delivers a combination of connectivity, security, and redundancy that leaders increasingly require in their digital transformation initiatives. The company supports a diversified base of mid- to large-size enterprise and hyperscale customers across multiple segments, helping them comply with regulations like HIPAA, NIST, ISO and more. Visit https://www.evoquedcs.com/ for more information. Evoque Data Center Solutions is a portfolio company of Brookfield Infrastructure Partners, a leading global infrastructure asset manager that owns and operates high-quality, long-life assets in the utilities, transport, midstream and data sectors across North and South America, Asia Pacific and Europe. For more information: Steve Friedberg sfriedberg@evoquedcs.com 484.550.2900 [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Behavox Appoints Chief Customer Intelligence Officer to Drive Global Expansion, Accelerate Adoption of Its AI-Powered Workplace Insights Behavox, which provides insights to protect enterprises and their employees from illegal, immoral, and malicious behavior, today announced the appointment of Fahreen Kurji as Chief Customer Intelligence Officer, responsible for the external elevation and communication of the company's industry-leading insights and innovative product offerings. "Fahreen has seen first-hand how the world's most innovative companies harness the power of Behavox insights to help create a fair, safe, and productive workplace," said Erkin Adylov, Founder & CEO of Behavox. "Her experiences and analysis are of tremendous value to our customers. She has a vision of today's modern moral workplace where companies can take action to preserve their reputations and employees are secure and confident to do their very best work. Her stories and lessons learned from the front lines of today's workplace are very impactful." Prior to her new role, Kurji successfully led and scaled the Behavox customer success team, overseeing the company's expansion into new regions. Her knowledge of the challenges being faced by global enterprises, and the cutting-edge technology that helps to solve those challenges, givesher a unique perspective that has made her an industry-leading analyst and commentator. "Over the past five years, I've watched how large enterprises leverage Behavox to provide their teams with the insights they need to protect their business and employees," Kurji said. "Even though the pandemic has accelerated digital transformation around the world, many enterprises are yet to implement technology that enables employees to be productive on communication channels without compromising on compliance or mitigating risk. Behavox has an essential role to play as enterprises finally start to unlock the value in their communications data and I'm looking forward to sharing that message far and wide." Kurji is dedicated to elevating diverse perspectives and fostering untapped talent. She created the first Behavox employee development group, BeWomen, an initiative that enables the company's growing, global workforce to have access to industry insiders and thought leaders. About Behavox Ltd. Behavox provides AI-powered insights that protect companies and their employees from illegal, immoral, and malicious behavior. Insights are generated by analyzing communication data from email, instant messaging, voice, and video conferencing platforms. By proactively monitoring these platforms using AI rather than manually reviewing content, employees are protected while maintaining their privacy. Founded in 2014, Behavox is headquartered in New York City and has offices in Montreal, London, San Francisco, Seattle, Singapore, Tokyo, Dallas, and Abu Dhabi. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005186/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Axel Springer to Acquire POLITICO The publishing group Axel Springer signed an agreement to acquire POLITICO, including the remaining 50 percent share of its current joint venture POLITICO Europe, as well as the tech news website Protocol from Robert Allbritton. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005451/en/ POLITICO will complement and strengthen Axel Springer's portfolio with an authoritative voice offering inside perspective and analysis of politics and policy in Washington D.C., across the U.S., and around the globe. Together with INSIDER and Morning Brew, which are already part of the company's portfolio, Axel Springer's U.S.-headquartered news brands will have a significant reach. Over its 15-year history, POLITICO has emerged as one of the world's most-influential news sources, and one of the preeminent models of successful media innovation in the 21st Century. Today, more than 500 journalists at POLITICO and its sibling publication Protocol, launched in 2020, help set the agenda on the most urgent issues dominating the global public policy landscape. With significant revenue derived from high-value business-to-business subscriptions and advertising, the publishing model has produced steady growth and healthy profits, and has a proven strategy for further robust expansion moving forward. Axel Springer and POLITICO in the U.S. have been joint venture partners since 2014 when they launched POLITICO Europe. The Brussels-based publication has since become an indispensable source of information in the EU and has continuously grown both its newsroom and its revenues and has been profitable since 2019. Mathias Dopfner, CEO Axel Springer, commented: "POLITICO's outstanding team has disrupted digital political journalism and set new standards. A true North Star. It will be a privilege and a special responsibility to help shape the future of this outstanding media company. Objective quality journalism is more important than ever, and we mutually believe in the necessity of editorial independence and nonpartisan reporting. This is crucial for our future success and accelerated growth." Robert L. Allbritton, Founder and Publisher of POLITICO and Protocol: "My 15-year adventure with POLITICO has been the ride of a lifetime. I reach this milestone with a sense of satisfaction that I hope is shared by every PLITICO. Together we have built what is without a doubt the most impressive and most enduring of the many experiments in new publications over the past generation. Particularly in recent years, we have put the emphasis on doing rather than boasting, and what multiple competitors have aspired to-a consistently profitable publication that supports true journalistic excellence-we have achieved. Above all, I have always known that ownership is about responsibility. As POLITICO has prospered in recent years, accompanied by the successful launch of Protocol, it became steadily more clear that the responsibility to grow the business on a global scale, to better serve the audience and create more opportunities for our employees, might be better advanced by a larger company with a significant global footprint and ambitions than it could be by me as owner of a family business. As I have often said, I would only welcome a new investor that reflected my values and POLITICO's distinctive company values. Axel Springer and Mathias Dopfner and his team meet that test better than any other company in media today. I look forward to working with them as publisher of POLITICO and Protocol as we reach even greater heights." Robert Allbritton will continue as publisher of POLITICO and Protocol. The editorial and management leadership teams of POLITICO in the U.S., POLITICO Europe and Protocol will remain in place, and will continue to operate their publications separately from Axel Springer's other brands headquartered in the U.S. Both parties have agreed not to disclose the deal terms. Subject to regulatory approval, closing of the transaction is expected in Q4 2021. About Axel Springer Axel Springer is a media and technology company and active in more than 40 countries. By providing information across its diverse media brands (amongst others BILD, WELT, INSIDER, POLITICO Europe) and classified portals (StepStone Group and AVIV Group), Axel Springer SE empowers people to make free decisions for their lives. Today, the transformation from a traditional print media company to Europe's leading digital publisher has been successfully accomplished. The next goal has been set: Axel Springer aims to become global market leader in digital content and digital classifieds through accelerated growth. The company is headquartered in Berlin and employs more than 16,000 people worldwide. About POLITICO POLITICO is the global authority on the intersection of politics, policy, and power. It is the most robust news operation and information service in the world specializing in politics and policy, which informs the most influential audience in the world insight, edge, and authority. Founded in 2007, POLITICO has grown to a team of 700 working across North America, more than half of whom are editorial staff. POLITICO Europe, its seven-year-old European edition has grown to nearly 200 employees. Early this year it acquired E&E News, the renowned news organization focused solely on energy and the environment. About Protocol Protocol is a leading digital media company focused on the people, power and politics of tech. Technology is no longer just an industry; it's a global power center with the sweep and impact of any nation's capital. At Protocol, we cover it with no agenda and just one goal: to arm the most senior decision-makers in tech, business and public policy with the unbiased news and analysis they need to navigate a world undergoing rapid change. Launched in 2020, Protocol covers U.S. and China "big tech" in addition to areas such as enterprise technology, fintech and the evolving tech workplace. Protocol's team includes reporters in San Francisco, New York, Washington, D.C. and London. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005451/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] LBMC Employment Partners Adds Cigna National Plan to PEO LBMC Employment Partners, a leading professional employer organization based in Nashville, TN, is pleased to announce the addition of the Cigna national plan to its PEO. The Cigna addition expands LBMC Employment Partners' Professional Employer Organization (PEO) to provide a full suite of benefit offerings to businesses headquartered outside the state of Tennessee and complements the company's established BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee plan offered to employers based in Tennessee. The key strategic expansion allows LBMC Employment Partners, a Certified PEO and member of NAPEO, to offer competitive health insurance to companies headquartered across the U.S. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005093/en/ Cigna Addition Expands LBMC Employment Partners' National Presence; Allows Firm to Offer Outsourced HR Solutions to Companies Across the U.S.; Further Establishes Firm as Leading PEO (Graphic: Business Wire) "The addition of the Cigna national plan to our suite of service offerings has been one of our key strategic initiatives for LBMC Employment Partners and our clients," said Sharon Powlus, President/CEO, LBMC Employment Partners. "For several years, we have worked to secure a national health plan to complement our current BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee plan. We are excited to announce we finalized that plan through Cigna and are now able to sell our PEO service anywhere in the U.S." Through the Cigna national plan, LBMC Employment Partners will provide four medical offerings on Cigna's largest network, along with dental and vision plans. "Our expanded national PEO will bring enhanced peace of mind to employers and employees alike. Employers can offer more competitive benefits packages, which in turn allows them to retain talent and stand out to potential recruits, and employees will have the advantage of a large network regardless of where they are located. With the hybrid workforce here to stay, offering a national plan will add even more value to the services we provide our clients," said Powlus. About LBMC Employment Partners LBMC Employment Partners, LLC, a member of the LBMC Family of Companies, is a world-class professional services firm. LBMC Employment Partners provides a comprehensive suite of human resource-related services to businesses, including Professional Employer Organization (PEO) services, HR Outsourcing (HRO), Payroll, Payroll Tax Outsourcing, Human Resource Consulting, Employee Benefits, and ACA Compliance Consulting. LBMC Employment Partners is also the only Tennessee-based PEO to receive the Certified Professional Employment Organization (CPEO) designation in the first round of IRS certifications. For more information visit www.lbmcep.com. About LBMC LBMC is a Forbes Top Recommended Firm, one of the Southeast's largest accounting and business consulting firms and a top 50 firm in the nation serving approximately 10,000 clients with diverse needs across a spectrum of industries. The LBMC Family of Companies has more than 700 employees, with offices in Chattanooga, Nashville (Brentwood), and Knoxville, TN, and Charlotte, NC. Founded in 1984 as a traditional accounting firm, LBMC has expanded its focus to meet a broad range of advisory and business consulting needs for its diverse client base. Today, we've become industry leaders in financial, human resources, technology, information security, and wealth advisory services for businesses and individuals. For more information, visit www.lbmc.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005093/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Creatio Hosts the First in History Event for Financial Services Industry Focused on No-code Technologies BOSTON, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Creatio, a global software company that provides a leading low-code/no-code platform for process management and CRM, is inviting professionals from the Financial Services industry to its unparalleled online event No-code Day: Finserv Industry on October 5th. The virtual conference is aimed at equipping its attendees with knowledge and skills to drive innovation, leverage talent with a no-code approach, and improve the efficiency of front and middle-office. No-code Day: Finserv Industry features six sessions for varying roles in finance, over 30 expert speakers, and vetted practical content to help master strategic skills. During the online event, attendees will learn about latest tech trends, innovative approaches to doing business today, applying the no-code approach to different modern banking functions, and ways to gain a competitive advantage on the market to meet customer expectations. "We recognize that financial organizations are under pressure of being disrupted by fintech startups, and a no-code development approach canaddress that threat. No-code offers immense potential to businesses; it allows for the engagement of employees without coding skills into workflow automation projects, thus speeding up and scaling the business transformation process," said Creatio CEO and Founder Katherine Kostereva. The event sessions include: Consumer Banking a step-by-step guide on how to connect with retail customers in a new way. Business Banking practical suggestions on building stronger relationships with business clients through data insights and seamless interaction. Customer Experience illustrative examples on how to enhance your client excellence. Governance, risk and compliance best practices on how to improve decision quality and reduce risks. Lending, loan recovery, and payments insights on bring innovation to reduce complexity and improve decision accuracy. Corporate functions and middle office - recommendations on how to streamline internal workflows and operations. To stay up to date on the conference agenda, speaker lineup and to save your spot, register here. About Creatio Creatio is a global software company providing a leading low-code platform for process management and CRM. The company combines an intuitive low-code platform, best-in-class CRM and a robust BPM in a single solution to accelerate sales, marketing, service and operations for mid-size and large enterprises. Creatio is highly recognized as a market leader by key industry analysts and together with hundreds of partners, operates in 110 countries worldwide. For more information, please visit www.creatio.com. Media Contact: Vera Mayuk +1 617 765 7997 317498@email4pr.com View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/creatio-hosts-the-first-in-history-event-for-financial-services-industry-focused-on-no-code-technologies-301363046.html SOURCE Creatio [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Enzyvant Announces First-Ever Data on Burden of Illness and Costs of Supportive Care for Pediatric Congenital Athymia On average, pediatric congenital athymia patients spent 150.6 days each year in the hospital with a mean total cost of $5,534,121 for supportive care over three years Mean total costs for patients with annual inpatient stays of 365 days are $11,763,320 over three years When treated with supportive care, patients with congenital athymia endure numerous, severe medical consequences and caregivers experience intense emotional, social, and financial burdens CAMBRIDGE, Mass. and BASEL, Switzerland, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Data from two first-ever studies reveal extreme clinical, emotional, social, and financial burdens on patients with pediatric congenital athymia and their families, and extraordinary costs of supportive care to healthcare systems. Congenital athymia is an ultra-rare condition in which children are born without a thymus, leading to profound immunodeficiency, life-threatening immune dysregulation, and high susceptibility to potentially fatal infections. Estimated incidence of congenital athymia in the U.S. is ~17 to 24 live births each year.1 Currently, there are no FDA-approved treatments for congenital athymia. Manifestations of congenital athymia are frequent and multidimensional. Supportive care is used to prevent potentially fatal infections and manage other symptoms of immunodeficiency and immune dysregulation due to congenital athymia. In addition to strict isolation protocols in the hospital and at home, supportive care involves a broad scope, volume, and intensity of diagnostic and medical interventions. With only supportive care, patients with congenital athymia typically die by age two or three. To evaluate the burdens of congenital athymia on patients and families, and the total medical costs associated with supportive care, two separate studies were conducted. Posters of each of the studies were presented at the Clinical Immunology Society 2021 Annual Meeting. A burden of illness study (n=18), published in Advances in Therapy, investigated the complicated and traumatic medical journey pediatric patients with congenital athymia face, as reported by their caregiver(s).1 A study (n=10) of congenital athymia supportive care costs, published in the Journal of Medical Economics, looked at real-world healthcare resource utilization as reported by treating physicians based on actual patient medical charts.2 Pediatric patients with congenital athymia face lengthy hospital stays, life-threatening clinical manifestations, and acute medical interventions. Congenital athymia patients are recommended to be placed in isolation immediately after diagnosis. In the hospital, isolation may involve specialized air flow rooms or intensive care settings (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit/NICU or Pediatric Intensive Care Unit/PICU), infection prevention protocols for hospital staff, and restricted visitation from family and friends. In the study, patients spent an average of 150.6 days a year in the hospital, with two patients experiencing the highest annual stay of 365 days. Clinical manifestations of congenital athymia reported in both studies were acute and frequent: Patients experienced frequent and multiple types of infections and immune dysregulation events In an average year, 80% of patients had two or more types of infections 40% of patients experienced sepsis with an average frequency of 3.5 times a year 60% had respiratory infections on average 3.3 times a year 60% of patients had skin manifestations of immune dysregulation at an average frequency of 5.8 times a year Patients receive multiple medications prophylactically and for the treatment of infections. They also may receive immunosuppression for autologous graft versus host disease and are frequently monitored with medical tests to evaluate immune function. Patients may also endure invasive procedures. Ninety percent of patients required placement of a feeding tube and 70% needed a central line. Caregivers characterized the medical procedures as repeated trauma for patients. Isolation required for infection control places severe burden on patients and their families. At home, caregivers of pediatric congenital athymia patients and family members, are instructed to maintain strict isolation and hygiene procedures. Any interactions by the family with individuals outside the immediate household can potentially expose the patient to pathogens that can lead to fatal infections. In the burden of illness study, caregivers described the severe consequences of congenital athymia and how strict isolation required to protect a congenital athymia patient presents daily challenges that require many sacrifices for parents and siblings: Caregivers rnked the most significant impacts on their families Living in isolation (100% of respondents) Fear of death, infection, and worries about the future (100%) Financial hardship (78%) Inability to meet family/friends (72%) High burden of medical care (67%) Negative impact on siblings/families (67%) Isolation for infection control causes patients to miss out on social interactions needed for emotional and social development There are also impacts of isolation on caregivers lives, including the feeling of separation from their support system of family and friends The significant consequences of congenital athymia extend to siblings lives as they may be home-schooled and restricted from interacting with peers, participating in sports, or joining in social activities for extended periods of time As stated in the publication, caregivers communicated the emotional toll of caring for a patient with congenital athymia, describing a constant fear that their child would die Healthcare systems bear extraordinarily high costs for pediatric congenital athymia patients requiring supportive care. As a result of strict isolation requirements, profound immunodeficiency, and immune dysregulation, patients with congenital athymia can have prolonged hospital stays of weeks, months, and beyond. Within the medical chart review study, 79% of the total costs associated with supportive care were for inpatient hospital stays. Patients spend an average of 150 days a year in the hospital with a mean total cost for supportive care of $5,534,121 over three years. For congenital athymia patients who spend 365 days in the hospital each year, the total costs over three years were $11,763,320. About the Congenital Athymia Burden of Illness and Cost of Supportive Care Studies Both the congenital athymia caregiver-assessed burden of illness and cost of supportive care studies were fully supported with funding from Enzyvant. To explore burdens of congenital athymia, a cross-sectional study was conducted among caregivers of 18 congenital athymia patients: five patients currently receiving supportive care and 13 patients who had received supportive care in the past. The study used a quantitative survey and qualitative interviews. Authors for the burden of illness study include: Cathleen Collins, M.D., Ph.D., Rady Childrens Hospital and University of California San Diego Julie J. Kim-Chang, M.D., Duke University School of Medicine Abigail Silber and Matthew OHara, Trinity Life Sciences Sarah Kulke, M.D., Enzyvant Therapeutics, Inc. Elena Hsieh, M.D., University of Colorado, Anschutz School of Medicine; Childrens Hospital Colorado Healthcare resource utilization data were gathered from 10 patient medical charts and analyzed. The medical chart audit study was conducted among U.S. board-certified/eligible healthcare practitioners (HCPs) who had previously treated at least one patient with congenital athymia. A web-enabled questionnaire was used to abstract medical chart data. Medical chart data were required to be available for at least 12 continuous months prior to three years of age while receiving supportive care. Costs were gathered from literature, national cost databases, consumer retail websites, or publicly available hospital chargemaster data. As stated in the publication, costs for inpatient room charges were derived from the 2020 chargemaster data from Childrens Hospital, Colorado, which is representative of a real-world care setting for congenital athymia patients based on clinical experts direct experience. The study estimated the mean annual utilization of each medical resource. A mean annual cost per patient was estimated across medical chart visibility, then multiplied by three to determine the total direct medical costs per patient for the first three years of life. A scenario analysis was conducted comparing two real-world patient scenarios based on inpatient hospital stays, high inpatient utilizers, and low inpatient utilizers. Authors for the cost of congenital athymia supportive care study include: Megan Cooper, M.D., Ph.D., Washington University, St. Louis Cathleen Collins, M.D., Ph.D., Rady Childrens Hospital and University of California San Diego Julie J. Kim-Chang, M.D., Duke University School of Medicine Abigail Silber and Matthew OHara, Trinity Life Sciences Sarah Kulke, M.D., Enzyvant Therapeutics, Inc. Elena Hsieh, M.D., University of Colorado, Anschutz School of Medicine; Childrens Hospital Colorado About the Thymus and Congenital Athymia The T in T cell stands for thymus because it is where T cells are selected to fight infections or are destroyed if they have the potential to attack the body instead of invaders. Congenital athymia is an ultra-rare condition in which children are born without a thymus, causing profound immunodeficiency, vulnerability to potentially fatal infections, and life-threatening immune dysregulation. With only supportive care, children with congenital athymia typically die by age two or three. Athymia is initially detected by T-cell deficiency observed in newborn screening for SCID (severe combined immune deficiency), which is now required in all 50 U.S. states. SCID and congenital athymia are both primary immunodeficiency disorders but they are distinct conditions. The estimated incidence of pediatric congenital athymia in the United States is 17 to 24 live births each year. About Enzyvant Enzyvant, a wholly owned subsidiary of Sumitovant Biopharma Ltd. (wholly owned by Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Co., Ltd.), is a biotechnology company dedicated to developing novel, transformative regenerative therapies for people with devastating rare diseases. Enzyvants lead asset is the investigational tissue-based regenerative therapy, RVT-802, for congenital athymia, an ultra-rare and life-threatening pediatric immunodeficiency. RVT-802 has been granted multiple regulatory designations, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration designation as a Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy (RMAT). The RVT-802 Biologics Licensing Application (BLA) was resubmitted this year and the expected action date provided by the FDA under the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) is October 8, 2021. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has granted Orphan Drug designations and the Advanced Therapy Medicinal Product (ATMP) designation for RVT-802. For more information about Enzyvant, visit Enzyvant.com. Follow @Enzyvant on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. About Sumitovant Biopharma Ltd. Sumitovant is a global biopharmaceutical company with offices in New York City and London. Sumitovant is the majority shareholder of Myovant (NYSE: MYOV) and wholly-owns Urovant, Enzyvant, Spirovant, and Altavant. Sumitovants promising pipeline is comprised of early-through late-stage investigational medicines across a range of disease areas targeting high unmet need. Sumitovant is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma. For further information about Sumitovant, please visit https://www.sumitovant.com. Follow Sumitovant on LinkedIn. Media Contacts: Enzyvant Eliza Schleifstein 6 Degrees (917) 763-8106 Eliza@schleifsteinpr.com Sumitovant Biopharma Maya Frutiger VP, Head of Corporate Communications media@sumitovant.com ___________________ 1 Hsieh, E.W.Y., Kim-Chang, J.J., Kulke, S. et al. Defining the Clinical, Emotional, Social, and Financial Burden of Congenital Athymia. Adv Ther (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12325-021-01820-9 2 Collins, C., Kim-Chang, J.J., Hsieh, E. et al. Economic burden of congenital athymia in the United States for patients receiving supportive care during the first 3 years of life. J Med Econ. (2021). https://doi.org/10.1080/13696998.2021.1962129 [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Harrison Street Brings Alternative Investment Expertise to Canada Harrison Street, one of the leading investment management firms exclusively focused on alternative real assets, today announced it is bringing its significant expertise investing in demographic-driven alternative assets to the Canadian market and will pursue investments in senior living, student housing, medical office, life sciences, storage, and digital assets throughout Canada. Harrison Street Canada Alternative Real Estate Fund recently completed its first closing and, based on committed capital and targeted leverage, anticipates initial capacity to invest over CAD$550 million in stabilized, cash-flow producing assets with up to 35% invested in value-add strategies. The Fund has received capital commitments from accredited investors, including a variety of institutional investors and prominent Canadian family offices, such as the Hennick Family and senior executives of the firm. Christopher Merrill, Co-Founder, Chairman and CEO at Harrison Street, said, "For more than 15 years, Harrison Street has been a first mover in highly differentiated, demographic driven real estate, first in the United States and then Europe. Now, we are thrilled to bring our deep expertise and track record to the Canadian market. Demographic characteristics in Canada are like those we see in the United States, however, alternative real estate remains underdeveloped compared to the U.S. market. Our expansion into the Canadian market is a natural evolution to our platform and we look forward to identifying attractive investment opportunities for our global investors and partners in the alternative real asset space in Canada." Jonathan Turnbull, Managing Director and Head of Canadian Transactions for Harrison Street, added, "Similar to how Harrison Street has built its business in the U.S. and Europe, relationships with best-in-class developers and operators on a local and national level is a critical component to our successful execution in Canda. Accordingly, we have a robust and actionable pipeline of off-market opportunities with multiple partners across our sectors of focus and several investments, closing in the near term, are in partnership with operators who are new to the Harrison Street platform. Additionally, our strategic alignment with Colliers, one of the top global players in commercial real estate will further amplify our reach into the market." About Harrison Street Harrison Street is one of the leading investment management firms exclusively focused on alternative real assets. Since inception in 2005, the firm has created a series of differentiated investment solutions focused on demographic-driven, needs-based assets. The firm has invested across senior housing, student housing, healthcare delivery, life sciences and storage real estate as well as social and utility infrastructure. Headquartered in Chicago with offices in London and Toronto, the firm has more than 195-employees and approximately $36 billion in assets under management and is owned by its senior leadership team in partnership with Colliers International Group Inc, one of the top global players in commercial real estate, creating long-term stability and strong alignment with investors. Clients of the firm include a global institutional investor base domiciled in North America, Europe, Middle East, Asia and Latin America. Harrison Street has been awarded Best Places to Work by Pensions & Investments for the last seven consecutive years and was named 2020 Global Alternatives Investor of the Year by PERE. For more information, please visit www.harrisonst.com. This information is not intended to be an offer or solicitation to buy or sell securities. Any such offer or solicitation will be made only by means of the Confidential Offering Memorandum relating to the Fund. Access to information about the Fund is limited to investors who qualify as "accredited investors" in the applicable Canadian jurisdiction, pursuant to other prospectus exemptions, or internationally, pursuant to local laws. Forward-Looking Statements In addition to historical information, this press release contains financial projections and other forward-looking statements that involve risk and uncertainty. These statements are based on current expectations, estimates, projections and assumptions made by management. Sentences or phrases that use words such as "expects", "believes", "anticipates", "hopes", "plans", "may", "can", "will", "projects," and others, are often used to indicate forward-looking statements, but their absence does not mean a statement is not forward-looking. By their very nature, such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. Many of these uncertainties and risks are difficult to predict and beyond Harrison Street's control. Forward-looking statements are not a guarantee of future performance, results or events. Harrison Street assumes no obligation to update or supplement forward-looking statements that become untrue because of subsequent events. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005502/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Wipro and DataRobot Partner to Deliver Scalable Enterprise AI Solutions Wipro Limited (NYSE: WIT, BSE: 507685, NSE: WIPRO), a leading global information technology, consulting and business process services company, today announced a global strategic partnership with DataRobot, a leader in Augmented Intelligence. The partnership will deliver Augmented Intelligence at scale to help customers become AI driven enterprises and accelerate their business impact. DataRobot's Augmented Intelligence platform complements Wipro's (News - Alert) expertise in enterprise AI. This collaboration will help accelerate the execution of AI strategy and will ensure quicker "data to value" for businesses. The partnership will streamline the process of infusing AI-led intelligence into customer business decisions and positively impact their bottom line. Harish Dwarkanhalli, President - Applications & Data, iDEAS, Wipro Limited said, "Wipro is committed to helping clients in their journey to become intelligent enterprises and implement AI at scale. Our approach is to simplify AI deployment in enterprises using a democratized methodology and utilizing diverse skill sets to collaborate with our technology partners along with our Wipro Holmes AI platform. We are excited to work with DataRobot, a leader in this segment, to further enhance the value we create for our customers." This collaboration will strengthen Wipro's partner ecosystem in the dynamic Enterprise AI segment and highlight its commitment to making AI accessible. Furthermore, DataRobot's Augmented Intelligence platform will empower key stakeholders across organizations to conduct cutting edge data science at an enterprise level. Gardner Johnson, Vice President, Worldwide Channels at DataRobot said, "As leaders in AI, Wipro and DataRobot are perfectly suited for collaboration. We couldn't be more excited about our partnership with Wipro as we bring the power of AI to more organizations. We look forward to helping customers across every industry and geography achieve more value from their data." Tom Reuner, Senior Vice President, HFS Research said, "The partnership is all about accelerating the operationalization of AI across the enterprise. By helping clients to set up AI CoEs and to institutionalize MLOps methodologies, Wipro and DataRobot drive best practices and speed up automation. The joint effort on Data Science legacy modernization provides a clear differentiation in the market." About Wipro Limited Wipro Limited (NYSE: WIT, BSE: 507685, NSE: WIPRO) is a leading global information technology, consultin and business process services company. We harness the power of cognitive computing, hyper-automation, robotics, cloud, analytics and emerging technologies to help our clients adapt to the digital world and make them successful. A company recognized globally for its comprehensive portfolio of services, strong commitment to sustainability and good corporate citizenship, we have over 200,000 dedicated employees serving clients across six continents. Together, we discover ideas and connect the dots to build a better and a bold new future. About DataRobot DataRobot is a leader in Augmented Intelligence, delivering trusted AI technology and enablement services to global enterprises competing in today's Intelligence Revolution (News - Alert) . DataRobot's enterprise AI platform democratizes data science with end-to-end automation for building, deploying, and managing machine learning models. This platform helps maximize business value by delivering AI at scale and optimizing performance over time. The company's proven combination of cutting-edge software and world-class AI implementation, training, and support services, empowers any organization - regardless of size, industry, or resources - to drive better business outcomes with AI. DataRobot has offices across the globe and funding from some of the world's best investing firms including Alliance Bernstein, Altimeter, B Capital Group, Cisco, Citi Ventures, ClearBridge, Counterpoint Global (Morgan Stanley), DFJ Growth, Franklin Templeton, Geodesic Capital, Glynn Capital, Intel (News - Alert) Capital, Meritech, NEA, Salesforce Ventures, Sands Capital, Sapphire Ventures, ServiceNow Ventures, Silver Lake Waterman, Snowflake Ventures, Sutter Hill Ventures, Tiger Global, T. Rowe Price, and World Innovation Lab. DataRobot was named to the Forbes 2020 and 2021 Cloud 100 list and the Forbes 2019, 2020, and 2021 Most Promising AI Companies lists, and was named a Leader in the IDC (News - Alert) MarketScape: Worldwide Advanced Machine Learning Software Platforms Vendor Assessment. For more information visit http://www.datarobot.com/, and join the conversation on the DataRobot Community, More Intelligent Tomorrow podcast, Twitter (News - Alert) , and LinkedIn. Forward-Looking Statements The forward-looking statements contained herein represent Wipro's beliefs regarding future events, many of which are, by their nature, inherently uncertain and outside Wipro's control. Such statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding Wipro's growth prospects, its future financial operating results, and its plans, expectations and intentions. Wipro cautions readers that the forward-looking statements contained herein are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results anticipated by such statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding fluctuations in our earnings, revenue and profits, our ability to generate and manage growth, complete proposed corporate actions, intense competition in IT services, our ability to maintain our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed-price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, the success of the companies in which we make strategic investments, withdrawal of fiscal governmental incentives, political instability, war, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, unauthorized use of our intellectual property and general economic conditions affecting our business and industry. The conditions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic could decrease technology spending, adversely affect demand for our products, affect the rate of customer spending and could adversely affect our customers' ability or willingness to purchase our offerings, delay prospective customers' purchasing decisions, adversely impact our ability to provide on-site consulting services and our inability to deliver our customers or delay the provisioning of our offerings, all of which could adversely affect our future sales, operating results and overall financial performance. Our operations may also be negatively affected by a range of external factors related to the COVID-19 pandemic that are not within our control. Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, including, but not limited to, Annual Reports on Form 20-F. These filings are available at www.sec.gov. We may, from time to time, make additional written and oral forward-looking statements, including statements contained in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our reports to shareholders. We do not undertake to update any forward-looking statement that may be made from time to time by us or on our behalf. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005476/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Life Clips Closes Belfrics Group Acquisition AVENTURA, Fla. and DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Life Clips, Inc. (OTC Pink: LCLP) (the Company), Life Clips is pleased to announce it has closed on its previously announced acquisition of Belfrics Group, a global blockchain technology firm that runs cryptocurrency exchanges on its proprietary platform. The acquisition includes Belfrics operations in Malaysia, Singapore, India, Kenya, Tanzania, Nigeria, and Bahrain, Belfrics CEO and Founder, Praveen Kumar, will remain the CEO of Belfrics, while Robert Grinberg will serve as CEO of Life Clips. Life Clips CEO, Robert Grinberg, said "We are very excited to close our acquisition of Belfrics group and look forward to building a company that will be meaningful in the industry. I will be traveling to Dubai this week and look forward to discussing our strategic plan with Belfrics Group's key personnel, as well as meeting with investors." Mr. Grinberg continued, "We believe this acquisition represents a tremendous opportunity for our shareholders. As a result of our great working relationship with the Belfrics team, we were able to close ahead of schedule and discuss many new opportunities." Visit our corporate website at www.lifeclips.com. Follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/realLifeClips. Join us on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/life-clips-inc. About Life Clips, Inc. Life Clips, Inc. is the parent company of Cognitive Apps Software Solutions Inc. and distributes single-use and cordless batteries under the Mobeego brand for use with cellular phones and other mobile devices. Cognitive Apps is an AI-Powered mental health analytics platform that empowers businesses to measure, understand, and improve mental well-being of their employees, patients and customers. Drug development for mental health disorders and other cognitive impairments is hampered by the inability to identify at risk groups before the onset of clinically significant symptoms, as well as continuous assessments on the progress made by the participants. Cognitive Apps is addressing this problem by pioneering a speech-based AI technology which could help accurately predict risk for various types of depression and mood and anxiety-based disorders years before a clinical diagnosis is obtained. Our technology can help detect and monitor subtle changes in mental state by assessing individuals more frequently and more objectively than the assessments used today. The speech and voice recognition market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 17.2% from 2019 to 2025 to reach $26.79 billion by 2025. Forward-Looking Statement Disclaimer This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements may be preceded by the words intends, may, will, plans, expects, anticipates, projects, predicts, estimates, aims, believes, hopes, potential or similar words. Forward-looking statements are based on certain assumptions and are subject to various known and unknown risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the Company's control, and cannot be predicted or quantified and consequently, actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements: (i) the initiation, timing, progress and results of the Companys research, manufacturing and other development efforts; (ii) the Companys ability to advance its products to successfully complete development and commercialization; (iii) the manufacturing, development, commercialization, and market acceptance of the Companys products; (iv) the lack of sufficient funding to finance the product development and business operations; (v) competitive companies and technologies within the Companys industry and introduction of competing products; (vi) the Companys ability to establish and maintain corporate collaborations; (vii) loss of key management personnel; (viii) the scope of protection the Company is able to establish and maintain for intellectual property rights covering its products and its ability to operate its business without infringing the intellectual property rights of others; (ix) potential failure to comply with applicable health information privacy and security laws and other state and federal privacy and security laws; and (x) the difficulty of predicting actions of the government and its regulations. All forward-looking statements included in this press release are made only as of the date of this press release. The Company assumes no obligation to update any written or oral forward-looking statement unless required by law. For Media and Investor Relations, please contact: David L. Kugelman (866) 692-6847 Toll Free - U.S. & Canada (404) 281-8556 Mobile and WhatsApp dk@atlcp.com Skype: kugsusa https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkugelman/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Nelly Pitocco Joins ESO as Chief Revenue Officer ESO, the leading data and software company serving emergency medical services (EMS), fire departments, hospitals, and state EMS/trauma offices, today announced Nelly Pitocco as Chief Revenue Officer. Pitocco brings more than 25 years of experience leading domestic and global teams at Fortune 500 companies. In her role at ESO, Nelly will be responsible for building a cohesive sales and marketing organization focused on driving customer acquisition, customer success, high-velocity growth and international expansion. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005548/en/ Nelly Pitocco (Photo: Business Wire) "Nelly's experience building and scaling high-functioning teams, as well as her deep understanding of marketing and sales integration, will benefit us as we focus on accelerating growth, delivering value to the markets we serve and leading the international charge," said Chris Dillie, President and CEO of ESO. "We are excited to add someone of Nelly's caliber and talent to our executive leadership team to focus on go-to-market and organic growth strategies that will be key to ESO's long-term success." Prior to ESO, Pitocco was Head of Solution Enineering and Innovation at T-Mobile (News - Alert) . In her time at T-Mobile, she played a strategic role across the organization - leading and transforming sales, marketing and solution engineering business segments to better serve customers and drive profitability. Before T-Mobile, Pitocco held executive positions at Apollo Education Group, AT&T and IBM (News - Alert) where she was responsible for solution development, sales, operations, contract management and negotiations for global enterprise businesses. She graduated from DePaul University with a degree in Computer Networking Technologies. "It's rare you find an organization that is truly driven by its mission and focused on helping improve lives," said Pitocco. "The dedication I've seen from the team to make a difference for our customers and the communities they serve is extremely satisfying. We have a tremendous opportunity to grow our business and extend delivery of our mission nationally and internationally." About ESO ESO (ESO Solutions, Inc.) is dedicated to improving community health and safety through the power of data. Since its founding in 2004, the company continues to pioneer innovative, user-friendly software to meet the changing needs of today's EMS agencies, fire departments, hospitals, and state EMS offices. ESO currently serves thousands of customers throughout North America with a broad software portfolio, including the industry-leading ESO Electronic Health Record (EHR), the next generation ePCR; ESO Health Data Exchange (HDE), the first-of-its-kind healthcare interoperability platform; ESO Fire RMS, the modern fire Record Management System; ESO Patient Registry (trauma, burn and stroke registry software); and ESO State Repository. ESO is headquartered in Austin, Texas. For more information, visit www.eso.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005548/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] VelocityEHS Machine Learning Expert Authors Award-Winning Research Highlighting Benefits of Predictive Monitoring Programs CHICAGO, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- VelocityEHS, the global leader in cloud-based environmental, health, safety (EHS) and environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) software, announced today that Dr. Julia Penfield, Ph.D., principal machine learning scientist at VelocityEHS, has received the Best Paper Award for her work on the application of machine learning in predictive online monitoring for the maintenance of power system assets at the 2021 icSmartGrid conference. The paper, Machine Learning Based Online Monitoring of Step-Up Transformer Assets in Electrical Generating Stations, was co-authored by Matt Holland, Maintenance Engineer at BC Hydro and provides evidence of the significant financial and safety benefits of applying machine learning to predictive monitoring programs. Machine learning is a sub-set of artificial intelligence which can learn patterns and behavior in data. When applied to predictive maintenance scenarios, machine learning-based solutions eliminate most of the guesswork around the data collected over time to monitor the operating state of equipment to find patterns that can help predict and prevent failures. This can lead to major cost savings, higher predictability, and the increased availability and use of the systems being monitored. Our studies prove the increasingly common view that machine learning in predictive maintenance outperforms traditional maintenance strategies, said Dr. Penfield. Furthermore, BC Hydros success in using machine learning for a predictive online monitoring risk identification scheme demonstrates that machine learning is both an attainable and useable tool all companies should implement to achieve operational excellence. Whether its analyzing incident reports for categorization, facilitating efficient root cause and corrective action identification, extracting requirements from regulatory documents for auditing purposes, or using computer vision for remote ergonomic evaluation and analysis, machine learning replaces the costly human labor efforts required to complete these tasks to significantly increase safety, time/cost efficiencies, productivity, and profitability." Dr. Julia Penfield is globally recognized for her significant contributions to the machine learning field. After graduating from the University of British Columbia (UBC) with a Ph.D. in the Application of Machine Learning in Electrical Engineering, she continued working in the electric utility industry at BC Hydro, the electric utility of British Columbia, Canada. Thee, Dr. Penfield led the machine learning and data sciences programs such as electrical demand forecasting using advanced recurrent neural networks architecture, generation plant asset failure prediction using unsupervised machine learning, and wind farm generation forecast using fully connected neural networks architecture. She also utilized Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Computer Vision (CV) in several machine learning projects. Following eight years in the electric utility industry, Dr. Penfield joined VelocityEHS in 2021 as the principal machine learning scientist leading its Machine Learning Programs. With the largest R&D investment in the industry, VelocityEHS is at the forefront of innovative machine learning technologies, said John Damgaard, CEO of VelocityEHS. Our advanced Industrial Ergonomics software is the most widely, actively deployed and highly valued application of Machine Learning technology in the industry, used by more than 200 leading manufacturers in the automotive, food & beverage, pharmaceutical, and aerospace industries. Under Dr. Penfields direction, we will continue to find better ways to leverage machine learning to support our customers in evolving from a documentation and compliance focus to a focus on prediction, intervention, and outcomes in complex areas of EHS and ESG management. Part of the VelocityEHS Accelerate Platform, the companys all-in-one advanced Industrial Ergonomics solution combines online training, smart assessment tools and powerful program management features to seamlessly deploy, monitor, and manage the industrial ergonomics process across one, hundreds or even thousands of locations. The systems sensorless motion-capture technology allows users to perform real-time risk assessments with video taken on any mobile device, collecting data faster and more accurately than any other method. The companys recent acquisition of Kinetica Labs sensorless motion-capture technology further advances its industry leadership in innovative machine learning. As part of the acquisition agreement, Dr. Penfield will oversee the ongoing new research by Dr. SangHyun Lee, founder and CTO of Kinetica Labs and a professor at the University of Michigan, focused on the continued enhancement of Kineticas existing motion capture technology and the development of new EHS applications and use cases by utilizing the state-of-the-art machine learning sciences. For more information about VelocityEHS and its complete award-winning software solutions, visit www.EHS.com . About VelocityEHS Trusted by more than 20,000 customers worldwide, VelocityEHS is the global leader in true SaaS enterprise EHS technology. Through the VelocityEHS Accelerate Platform, the company helps global enterprises drive operational excellence by delivering best-in-class capabilities for health, safety, environmental compliance, training, operational risk and environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG). The VelocityEHS team includes unparalleled industry expertise, with more certified experts in health, safety, industrial hygiene, ergonomics, sustainability, the environment, AI, and machine learning than any EHS software provider. Recognized by the EHS industrys top independent analysts as a Leader in the Verdantix 2021 Green Quadrant AnalysisVelocityEHS is committed to industry thought leadership and to accelerating the pace of innovation through its software solutions and vision. VelocityEHS is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, with locations in Ann Arbor, Michigan; Tampa, Florida; Oakville, Ontario; London, England; Perth, Western Australia; and Cork, Ireland. For more information, visit www.EHS.com. Media Contact Betsy Utley-Marin 312.881.2307 butleymarin@ehs.com [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Manitoba Public Insurance Awards legacy modernization contract to Infosys Public Services Infosys Public Services to implement a modern, customer-centric driver licensing and vehicle registration solution WINNIPEG, MB, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ -- Infosys Public Services Inc. (IPS), a subsidiary of Infosys (NYSE: INFY), a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting, today announced that it will enable Manitoba Public Insurance (MPI), a Crown corporation that delivers auto insurance and driver services, to digitize driver licensing, vehicle registration, and International Registration Plan (IRP) services for over 900,000 Manitobans. Infosys has partnered with Celtic Systems a leading DMV solutions provider to implement the Infosys Celtic Vehicle and Licensing Solution, built on Celtic's portfolio of products (Celtic Motor Vehicle System CMVS and Celtic Transportation Services International Registration Plan CTS-IRP) for Manitoba. Infosys Celtic Vehicle and Licensing Solution consists of interoperable modules that digitize both the core and ancillary functions including driver licensing, vehicle registration, billing, analytics, and reporting for motor vehicle agencies. Infosys Celtic Vehicle and Licensing Solution provides a modern, customer-centric platform with the native flexibility to meet new business and technical requirements, and deploy them quickly with minimal disruption to the business. This future-ready platform is built on Microsoft and other leading technologies with a highly scalable architecture that is easy to implement and use. "We are honored and excited to be selected by Manitoba Public Insurance to help navigate this mission-critical digital transformation initiative," said Eric Paternoster, Chief Executive Officer, Infosys Public Services. "Over the last few years, Celtic and Infosys Public Services have helped 19 jurisdictions across North America modernize and digitize various vehicle and driver licensing processes, reducing cost of operations and improving the constituent experience. We look forward to executing this program leveraging our shared experience, enabling Manitoba to build a modern digital foundation to serve their residents more efficiently." The initiative will be executed using a hybrid agile approach that balances the ability to prototype and rapidly implement new ideas with longer-term designs that lead to real and meaningful change. "We are pleased to work with Infosys Public Services to modernize the motor vehicle and licensing system, enabling the province to deliver more efficient online supported services to our residents," said Shayon Mitra, Vice President & Chief Transformation Officer, Digital and Transformation, MPI. "Through the solutions' agile modular deployment capabilities, we have an incredible opportunity to effectively adapt to changing regulatory and market needs allowing us to better serve millions of residents across the province." About Celtic Systems Celtic Systems is a leader in creating and implementing Enterprise Solutions for Motor Vehicle Administrations across North America. Over the last two decades, Celtic Systems has been helping its clients across USA and Canada to modernize their systems and reap business benefits from latest technologies and streamlined business processes. Our extensive experience in solving the problems of government agencies enables us to effectively modernize agency-wide systems and supporting technologies. Visit www.celtic.bz to know more about how Celtic's solutions can help your agency benefit from best-of-breed technologies and streamlined business processes. About Infosys Public Services, Inc. Infosys Public Services is a leader in next-generation digital services and consulting. With benchmark processes, access to cross-industry insights and innovative solutions, Infosys Public Services is helping public sector organizations to navigate their digital transformation, helping them renew existing systems into modern, agile, intelligent platforms, develop new capabilities and deliver better outcomes to all stakeholders at a lower cost with less risk. Navigate your next with Infosys Public Services. Visit www.infosyspublicservices.com to see how. About Infosys Infosys is a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting. We enable clients in more than 50 countries to navigate their digital transformation. With over four decades of experience in managing the systems and workings of global enterprises, we expertly steer our clients through their digital journey. We do it by enabling the enterprise with an AI-powered core that helps prioritize the execution of change. We also empower the business with agile digital at scale to deliver unprecedented levels of performance and customer delight. Our always-on learning agenda drives their continuous improvement through building and transferring digital skills, expertise, and ideas from our innovation ecosystem. Visit www.infosys.com to see how Infosys (NSE, BSE, NYSE: INFY) can help your enterprise navigate your next. Safe Harbor Certain statements in this release concerning our future growth prospects, financial expectations and plans for navigating the COVID-19 impact on our employees, clients and stakeholders are forward-looking statements intended to qualify for the 'safe harbor' under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, which involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties relating to these statements include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding COVID-19 and the effects of government and other measures seeking to contain its spread, risks related to an economic downturn or recession in India, the United States and other countries around the world, changes in political, business, and economic conditions, fluctuations in earnings, fluctuations in foreign exchange rates, our ability to manage growth, intense competition in IT services including those factors which may affect our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed-price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, industry segment concentration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks or system failures, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, the success of the companies in which Infosys has made strategic investments, withdrawal or expiration of governmental fiscal incentives, political instability and regional conflicts, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, unauthorized use of our intellectual property and general economic conditions affecting our industry and the outcome of pending litigation and government investigation. Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our United States Securities and Exchange Commission filings including our Annual Report on Form 20-F for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2021. These filings are available at www.sec.gov. Infosys may, from time to time, make additional written and oral forward-looking statements, including statements contained in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our reports to shareholders. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the Company unless it is required by law. View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/manitoba-public-insurance-awards-legacy-modernization-contract-to-infosys-public-services-301363687.html SOURCE Infosys [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] CRMLS Launches IDX Transparency Initiative to Benefit Real Estate Professionals and Consumers CHINO HILLS, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On September 1st, 2021, California Regional MLS (CRMLS) will officially update its rules regarding Internet Data Exchange (IDX) websites to benefit agents and consumers on both sides of the residential real estate transaction. IDX is the term the real estate industry uses for the portions of agent and broker websites devoted to searching MLS data. IDX sites using CRMLS data will soon give consumers a much clearer picture of agents' relationship with the listings consumers find online. The newly updated rule, number 12.16.5 in the CRMLS Rules and Regulations, will read as follows: "12.16.5 Listing Credit. All Listing Brokers grant permission for any Advertising Broker to display any listings submitted to the service by the Listing Broker only if the listing display or advertisement is clear so that a reasonable real estate consumer understands: a) Who is the Listing Agent & Broker, b) Who is the Advertising Broker and c) How to contact that Listing Agent or Broker." In describing the updated rule, CRMLS CEO Art Carter said, "It shouldn't take a consumer more than a few seconds of looking at a listing to determine who the Listing Agent, Listing Broker, and Advertising Broker are." The CRMLS Rules Committee, composed of active real estate professional CRMLS users, devised the rule based on feedback from members of CRMLS's participating Associations, Boards, and MLSs. The CRMLS Board of Directors, also working real estate professionals, approved the rule. "CRMLS leadership has been discussing this subject, and this proposed soluton, for years now," said Carter. "Now that we have approval to update the rule, we're beyond excited to help increase transparency and reduce friction for consumers, brokers, and agents." The rule change only affects IDX websites, not any other form of marketing. It is unrelated to communications between real estate professionals and their clients. CRMLS aims to improve communication between consumers and real estate professionals with this rule update. CRMLS Vice President and General Counsel Edward Zorn laid out consumer use cases, and how the updated rule will benefit both the consumer real estate professionals, like this: "Under the old rules, a consumer with a question on a listing they see on an IDX website would contact the advertising agent, the most prominently displayed agent. Too often, they'd find that the agent had no relationship with the listing and didn't know the answer to certain questions. The frustrated consumer would break off their contact, including any potential future contact, with the advertising agent. Then they would leave the website that the agent paid to advertise on, look up the listing agent online, and contact the listing agent directly or give up on that listing completely." "However, under the new rules, when a consumer sees a listing on an IDX website, they'll know within a matter of seconds who the advertising agent and the listing agent are. If they have a question about the property, they can contact the listing agent directly without needing to leave the advertising agent's site. If they're interested in exploring a relationship with the advertising agent, they can go into the relationship with a full understanding of the advertising agent's role." Zorn also explained that the rule may also increase the level of lead quality of the consumers that contact the advertising broker, since those consumers specifically decided they wanted to speak with the advertising agent, not the listing agent. CRMLS is supporting the rollout of the updated rule with a new, internally developed platform allowing brokers to control the contact information that appears on their listings. Brokers can also decide to leave the decision on which contact information to display up to their individual agents. This launch also includes a targeted awareness campaign for CRMLS users, featuring videos, written guides and FAQs, emails, MLS system pop-up notices, social media, blog posts, and training sessions. "Equipping consumers with more information and added transparency will benefit all of us," said Carter. "We look forward to continuing our work on behalf of our community of real estate professionals." About California Regional Multiple Listing Service (CRMLS) California Regional MLS is the nation's largest and most recognized subscriber-based MLS, dedicated to servicing more than 108,000 real estate professionals from 40 Associations, Boards, and MLS organizations. CRMLS is the industry powerhouse and thrives on providing the most relevant products and services to its subscribers. For more information on CRMLS, visit www.crmls.org. Contact: Art Carter, art@crmls.org View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/crmls-launches-idx-transparency-initiative-to-benefit-real-estate-professionals-and-consumers-301363647.html SOURCE California Regional MLS [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Apple introduces the News Partner Program Apple (News - Alert) today introduced the News Partner Program, a new slate of initiatives to expand Apple's work with and support for journalism. The News Partner Program aims to ensure Apple News customers maintain access to trusted news and information from many of the world's top publishers, while supporting publishers' financial stability and advancing efforts to further media literacy and diversity in news coverage and newsrooms. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005554/en/ The News Partner Program expands Apple's work with and support for journalism and is designed for subscription news publications that provide their content to Apple News in Apple News Format. (Graphic: Business Wire) The News Partner Program is designed for subscription news publications that provide their content to Apple News in Apple News Format (ANF). ANF enables an exceptional reading experience on Apple News and unlocks the full benefit of the platform for publishers, and empowers publishers to create brand-forward stories, immersive issues, and audio stories, with designs that scale seamlessly across Apple devices. ANF also supports advertising, and publishers keep 100 percent of the revenue from advertising they sell within Apple News. To support publishers who optimize more of their content in ANF, Apple News is offering a commission rate of 15 percent on qualifying in-app purchase subscriptions from day one. "Providing Apple News customers with access to trusted information from our publishing partners has been our priority from day one," said Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice president of Services. "For ore than a decade, Apple has offered our customers many ways to access and enjoy news content across our products and services. We have hundreds of news apps from dozens of countries around the world available in the App Store, and created Apple News Format to offer publishers a tool to showcase their content and provide a great experience for millions of Apple News users." Publishers may apply for the News Partner Program beginning today. Eligibility and requirements Participants must maintain a robust Apple News channel in Australia, Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom, and publish all content to that channel in ANF. For publishers based outside of these regions and who do not publish in ANF, they must share content via an RSS feed as permitted by their rights. The primary function of a publisher app must be to deliver original, professionally authored news content. Publishers' apps must be available on the App Store and allow users to purchase auto-renewable subscriptions through Apple's in-app purchase system. Publishers must agree to a separate addendum to the Apple Developer Program License Agreement. The News Publisher Program is available to Apple Developer Program members globally. Publishers can learn more about and apply for the News Partner Program at https://developer.apple.com/programs/news-partner/. Apple is also announcing a recommitment of support to three leading non-profit organizations - Common Sense Media, the News Literacy Project, and Osservatorio Permanente Giovani-Editori - that offer nonpartisan, independent media literacy programs. Apple has been supporting the work of these organizations over the past two years as part of ongoing efforts to empower young people with critical thinking skills. The News Partner Program will also support, fund, and collaborate with additional leading organizations globally that educate news consumers on media literacy and further efforts to diversify news coverage and newsrooms. Specific projects the News Partner Program will support will be announced at a later date, and will represent organizations doing critical and impactful work on these issues. Apple revolutionized personal technology with the introduction of the Macintosh in 1984. Today, Apple leads the world in innovation with iPhone (News - Alert) , iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Apple TV. Apple's five software platforms - iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS - provide seamless experiences across all Apple devices and empower people with breakthrough services including the App Store, Apple Music, Apple Pay, and iCloud. Apple's more than 100,000 employees are dedicated to making the best products on earth, and to leaving the world better than we found it. NOTE TO EDITORS: For additional information visit Apple Newsroom (www.apple.com/newsroom), or call Apple's Media Helpline at (408) 974-2042. 2021 Apple Inc. All rights reserved. Apple, the Apple logo, Apple News, and App Store are trademarks of Apple. Other company and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005554/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Housing Repair Program Helps Louisiana Woman with New Windows Myrtle Walker has a house full of new windows, thanks to a $6,000 Special Needs Assistance Program (SNAP) subsidy from Hancock Whitney and the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas (FHLB Dallas). This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005592/en/ A New Iberia, Louisiana, homeowner received new windows and trim with the help of a Special Needs Assistance Program subsidy from Hancock Whitney and the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas. (Photo: Business Wire) Ms. Walker, 68, said her New Iberia, Louisiana, home, built in 1966, was drafty. Wood trim around the windows had deteriorated over the years, allowing in moisture. The SNAP subsidy paid for new windows, window trim, insulation and touch-up paint. Ms. Walker learned about the program when she saw another home repaired on her street and found out that SNAP funds were used to pay for the work. She inquired about the program and applied through her bank, Hancock Whitney. "I'm just thankful that I got chosen, and that I was able to get my windows replaced," Ms. Walker said. Through member institutions such as Hancock Whitney, SNAP provides subsidies for the repair and rehabilitation of owner-occupied housing of eligible, special-needs individuals. The maximum SNAP award per household is $6,000 unless the member or another lender contributes $350 toward the rehabilitation costs and/o inspection fees. Then the maximum award per household is $7,000. Hancock Whitney Assistant Vice President and Community Development Officer LaCarsha Babers said FHLB Dallas' SNAP funding has made an impact. "We've used SNAP funding for more than a decade and have witnessed firsthand the good works it has accomplished for homeowners in multiple communities we serve," she said. FHLB Dallas set aside $2.5 million of its 2021 Affordable Housing Program funds for SNAP, and all SNAP funds were allocated in January for the highly sought-after program. Last year, FHLB Dallas awarded $2.5 million in SNAP subsidies that assisted 421 families. Since the program's 2009 inception, nearly $20.5 million in funding has been awarded across FHLB Dallas' five-state District. "This program is popular with our members because it reaches homeowners who have special needs such as disabilities, health issues or who are older residents, generally on fixed incomes," said Greg Hettrick, first vice president and director of Community Investment at FHLB Dallas. "Hancock Whitney has been committed to tapping into SNAP for the betterment of their communities, and we think that's a great mindset." To learn more about SNAP, visit fhlb.com/snap. About Hancock Whitney Since the late 1800s, Hancock Whitney has embodied core values of Honor & Integrity, Strength & Stability, Commitment to Service, Teamwork, and Personal Responsibility. Hancock Whitney offices and financial centers in Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Texas offer comprehensive financial products and services, including traditional and online banking; commercial and small business banking; private banking; trust and investment services; healthcare banking; certain insurance services; and mortgage services. The company also operates a loan production office in Nashville, Tennessee. BauerFinancial, Inc., the nation's leading independent bank rating and analysis firm, consistently recommends Hancock Whitney as one of America's most financially sound banks. More information is available at www.hancockwhitney.com. About the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas The Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas is one of 11 district banks in the FHLBank System created by Congress in 1932. FHLB Dallas, with total assets of $58.6 billion as of June 30, 2021, is a member-owned cooperative that supports housing and community development by providing competitively priced loans and other credit products to approximately 800 members and associated institutions in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico and Texas. For more information, visit our website at fhlb.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005592/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] GoodSuite continues strategic growth with the acquisition of Select Business Systems. WOODLAND HILLS, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- GoodSuite, California's premier provider of critical business systems, announced today it has acquired Select Business Systems. This is the largest acquisition in GoodSuite's 20-plus year history. "Select Business Systems' dedication to an outstanding customer experience that started with Eric Mumma and continued with his son, Todd is ideally aligned with GoodSuite's core value of delivering unrivaled service," said Dan Strull, CEO of GoodSuite. "We are excited to provide a seamless transition and begin developing strategic partnerships with our new customers." "It is rare to find an organization so well matched in its operating principles," said Todd Mumma, President of Select Business Systems. "We selected GoodSuite knowing that our customers will be in excellent hands and continue to receive outstanding service." Like Select Business Systems, GoodSuite, founded in 1998, is a family-owned business that has grown from a copier company to one offering award-winning multifunction printers and copiers, ITservices, managed print services, digital signage, collaboration and interactive display systems, VoIP services, and most other critical business systems. About GoodSuite GoodSuite is a premier provider of critical business systems, offering a wide array of products and services. For over 20 years, GoodSuite has delivered peace of mind with an unrivaled level of customer service based on a commitment to speed, innovation, and technology. GoodSuite offers a new choice: a better way of providing proactive technology products and services that can prevent problems from occurring so that customers' workflows don't miss a beat. About Select Business Systems Founded in 1978, Select Business Systems has grown to become California's Central Valley's premier technology solutions provider, supporting today's modern office environment with a mutually beneficial relationship with clients. Select Business Systems is awarded the prestigious Hyakuman Kai Award by Sharp Electronics, year after year, for successfully operating at the highest sales and customer service levels. For more information, please visit www.goodsuite.com . Media Contacts: Greg Smith and Nasim Attaripour (818) 874-1200 info@goodsuite.com View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/goodsuite-continues-strategic-growth-with-the-acquisition-of-select-business-systems-301362999.html SOURCE GoodSuite [August 26, 2021] Electrify Expo Announces its First Tour Stop at the Orange County Great Park in Southern California IRVINE, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Electrify Expo, North America's largest e-mobility event, will begin its Nationwide tour in Southern California at the Orange County Great Park on September 18-19, 2021. Electrify Expo is North America's largest e-mobility festival that gathers the world's top electric vehicle (EV) manufacturers, all in one place. Electric Vehicle and E-mobility brands, including Hyundai, Kia, Jeep, Polestar, Volvo, Volkswagen, MINI USA, SUPER73, and Rad Power Bikes will be joined by dozens of other exhibitors on display. Brands will show off their latest products and technology with interactive displays as well as offer free test drives on thrilling demo courses. Electrify Expo offers consumers a one-stop shop opportunity to experience the best Electric Vehicles, E-Motorcycles, E-Bikes, E-Scooters, E-Skateboards and more. "The micro-mobility trend has been accelerated and brands like ours have been fortunate to be at the forefront of this unprecedented growth," said Michael Cannavo, Co-Founder and CMO of electric bicycle company SUPER73. "Our team's hard work and our CEO's calculated vision have put us in a great spot to accept thousands of new riders and evolve with the momentum of the space. Giving new consumers the chance to experience our products at Electrify Expo next month is helping us meet our vision for the future of transportation." The beauty and size of the Orange County Great Park is unparalleled with its thousands of acres of green space, nestled next to a discontinued airstrip used for EV demo rides, providing the perfect location in what has become a powerhouse region for e-mobility and technology. People who live in Southern California have a higher curiosity for Electric Vehicles than anywhere else in the country. Brnging Electrify Expo to Orange County provides an opportunity for the region to experience the best in e-mobility all in one weekend. "Southern California is a hub for the EV market and as the home to Hyundai Motor America, we're proud to be part of that," said Hyundai's Senior Manager of Auto Shows and Events Edwina Walker-Wright. "We're excited to bring shoppers in Orange County the opportunity to experience Hyundai's electric vehicles first-hand at Electrify Expo." The Expo will take up over 500,000 square feet of outdoor, open-air space, where guests will have a full day of electrifying fun with food, drinks, music, and more. The evening of Sept 18th will also include a special concert by the world-renowned electronic dance-pop trio, ARIZONA. Electrify Expo was created to accelerate the adoption of e-mobility products through meaningful hands-on experiences. "The best way to appreciate and understand the benefits of owning an electric vehicle is by actually driving or riding one," said Electrify Expo founder BJ Birtwell. Tickets start at $20, but children ages 5 and under can attend for free. For tickets and more information regarding the Electrify Expo in Orange County, please visit: https://www.electrifyexpo.com/attend#great-park About Electrify Expo Electrify Expo is North America's largest e-mobility event. It is an outdoor weekend festival showcasing the best of electric mobility including EVs, e-motorcycles, e-bikes, e-scooters, e-skateboards, and e-surfboards. Attendees will experience test drives, new product unveilings, and future technologies from the world's leading brands. Three stops in 2021 will bring Electrify Expo to Orange County Great Park (September 18-19), Miami Marine Stadium (October 16-17), and Austin Circuit of the Americas (November 12-14). Tickets are on sale now starting at $20. Kids 5 and under are free. More at www.electrifyexpo.com Media Contact Shaye McClory KCOMM shaye@kcomm.com PHOTO DOWNLOAD Caption: Electrify Expo Venue Map of the Orange County Great Park View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/electrify-expo-announces-its-first-tour-stop-at-the-orange-county-great-park-in-southern-california-301363770.html SOURCE Electrify Expo [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Zhongan Online Announced 2021 Interim Results HONG KONG, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- ZhongAn Online P & C Insurance Co. Ltd. ("ZhongAn Online" or "ZhongAn" or the "Company", HKEx: 6060), a leading online InsureTech company in China, today announced its unaudited interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2021 (the "Period'). Adhering to mission of "Empowering the finance business with technologies and providing insurance services with a caring hand", ZhongAn Online leverages its proprietary technology and ecosystem integration advantages to provide all-around ecosystem-oriented services to customer and to promote insurance inclusion continuously. In the first half of 2021, the Company recorded gross written premiums of approximately RMB 9,841 million, representing a year-on-year increase of 45%. Revenue from technology segment increased by 122% to RMB 266 million. Benefiting from the Company's long-term commitment to "sustainable quality growth" and effective tech-driven cost control, the combined ratio improved by 4.1 percentage points to 99.4% in the first half of 2021. During the Period, net profit attributable to owners of the parent amounted to RMB 755 million, representing a year-on-year increase of 54% and achieved underwriting profitability for the first time. The Company adheres to the philosophy of "Technology for Social Good" and actively fulfills corporate social responsibilities and practices public welfare. In the first half of 2021, the Company launched series of inclusive insurance with simplified and customized terms and value-added services to the unserved populations with real protection needs. During the pandemic and Henan floods, ZhongAn Online launched seven emergency plans to practice philanthropy. The Company also actively embraced the concept of "Green Finance" though online operations and paperless office, contributing to low-carbon and environmental protection. Accelerated exploration of new scenarios and continuous iteration of product mix in the health ecosystem to facilitate the construction of Healthy China During the Period, ZhongAn Online brought the internet-based "insurance + medical care + medicine" closed-loop strategy to the next level. By fully leveraging the advantageous role as a payer in the health ecosystem and proactively connecting with more ecosystem partners including pharmaceutical companies, medical device companies, and optional medical companies, the Company endeavored to provide better services to a wider customer base and to increase users' lifetime value. In the first half of 2021, the health ecosystem recorded a total GWP of RMB 3,926 million, representing a year-on-year increase of 29%. The number of paying users increased by 10% to 9.1 million, and premium per paying users increased by 17% to RMB 430. Adhering to the commitment of "providing national medical insurance for over 100 million people", ZhongAn Online enriched product matrix, actively participated in the government-endorsed "HuiMinBao" project, and make every effort to promote inclusive insurance with affordable protection for different demographics. As the medical scenarios became more diversified, health ecosystem service and product offerings extended along the value chain from required medical scenarios such as inpatient and critical illness, to the daily needs of the outpatient and emergency, chronic disease management, health management, rehabilitation management, and optional medical. The Company is committed to refined operation in every process from consultation to post-operative care, to better serve the users' entire life cycle to improve the overall health status. The Company are closely deploying digital medical scenarios through internet hospital services. By fully integrating internet hospital services into more medical insurance products, ZhongAn Online now provides 24/7 online video medical advice, electronic prescription and e-pharmacy services through its in-house and external teams of doctors. Innovative products serve the diversified digital life of users and drive the rapid growth of the digital lifestyle ecosystem ZhongAn Online tap the incremental market by continuous innovation of new product verticals. This year, the Company continues to iterativey upgrade product offerings and services in the digital lifestyle ecosystem, GWP from digital lifestyle ecosystem increased by 52% to RMB 3,345 million. The company complies with the decentralization trend of the e-commerce ecosystem, merges mature insurance products such as shipping return policies into more distribution channels and new consumption scenarios. ZhongAn Online launched innovative products such as phone screen crack insurance, pet insurance, family property insurance and accident insurance, and recorded breakthroughs within the Period. GWP from innovative business grew by over 130% year-on-year, contributing nearly 20% in the digital lifestyle ecosystem and fully penetrated to digital lifestyle scenarios of users. Building brand and proprietary platforms under a customer-centric approach to deepen cross-selling effect ZhongAn Online has been focused on optimizing the cross-selling effect across ecosystems and delivering refined operations under a customer-centric approach. In the first half of 2021, the GWP generated through proprietary platforms grew by 48% year-over-year to RMB 1.55 billion, contributing 16% of the Company's total GWP. The number of paying users reached 3.81 million in the first half of 2021, clocking in roughly 20% year-over-year growth from 3.18 million of the same period last year. The per capita premium from users of proprietary platforms grew from RMB 330 in same period last year to RMB 406 in the first half of 2021, representing a 23% increase year-over-year. Through omnichannel marketing strategy, the number of followers on mainstream short video sites has exceeded 10 million. ZhongAn closely follows the latest cultural trends such as Guochao and Hip-Hop among Millennials and Gen Z. By integrating brand building with its cultural insights, the Company has successfully deepened its customer interface and seen higher level of activity among users. The accumulated views of its user-generated content (UGC) across all platforms hit approximately 820 million, and the brand received a total of roughly 16 billion page views in the first half of 2021, demonstrating the value of the Company's brand building efforts. Prospering technology segment generating significant value In the first half of 2021, ZhongAn recorded revenue from technology segment of RMB 266.3 million, representing a year-over-year increase of 122%. The Company continues to focus on the InsureTech sector, offering technology solutions powered by its advanced InsureTech experience and technology strengths to both domestic and overseas insurance companies and Internet platforms. ZhongAn has built a complete product mix that can empower the digital transformation of the insurance industry. The product mix fully covers clients' needs in production, user growth and tech infrastructure development. With such strong product offering and efforts on overlay sales, ZhongAn has successfully mapped these dynamics so as to optimize the lifetime value of its customers. The recurring revenue in technology segment for the first half in 2021 as a percentage of total tech revenue has reached 48%. In response to regulatory policies, ZhongAn was the first company in the industry to roll out a visual backtracking product in 2020. As of now the product has been offered to 48 clients. This year the Company continues to explore potential market opportunities in RegTech and has launched products related to regulatory data reporting, helping foster sustainable and complied development of the industry. ZhongAn positions itself not only as a cutting-edge technology service provider, but also a trusted business partner that offers its leading business models to both domestic and international insurance companies. The Company has made continuous strides in technology segment in overseas markets. In the first half of 2021, ZhongAn has further expanded geographically, covering more countries in Southeastern Asia, serving leading local property insurers, life insurers and Internet insurance platforms. This year the Company has tapped into European InsureTech market and has completed its first customer's product launch. ZA Bank and ZA Insure work together to build a one-stop shop providing a full set of financial service in Hong Kong and practice the concept of inclusive finance The Company's virtual bank, ZA Bank and the fully digital insurance company, ZA Insure are committed to creating a brand new and accessible digital financial experience for customers in Hong Kong, carrying out the concept of inclusive finance. As the first licensed virtual bank to open its digital doors in Hong Kong, ZA Bank has maintained the leading position in both customer base and scale of business among virtual banks in Hong Kong. As of 30 June 2021, ZA Bank's deposits doubled to HKD 7.6 billion and loans grew 20 times to HKD 1.3 billion. As of mid-July 2021, the number of ZA Bank users had exceeded 400,000. ZA Insure upholds its mission to provide insurance to customers and dedicates to providing insurance products that everyone can afford through internet platforms for residents 24/7. The Company hopes to apply its fintech capabilities and insights into customers in Hong Kong's mature financial market to deliver refined user experiences and help carry out the concept of inclusive finance. As the only technology company in Hong Kong that has both a virtual bank license and a digital insurance license, ZhongAn has realized the first in-depth cooperation between a virtual bank and a fully digital insurer. In May 2021, ZA Bank officially partnered with ZA Insure, aiming to create a fast and smooth insurance experience on the bank's App. Meanwhile, relying on its own digital development framework, ZhongAn has launched ZA One, a one-stop shop that provides customers with diversified investment services such as IPO GO, covering customers' diversified financial needs. With cost advantages and sharing of technical strength, the synergistic effect between ZA Bank and ZA Insure will continue and the two entities will work together to create more value for enhanced user experience in digital wealth management in the future. Outlook ZhongAn will continue to adhere to its two-winged strategy of "Insurance + Technology", its belief "Tech for good" and its pursuit of "quality growth". The Company will uphold its mission of "empowering the finance business with technologies and providing insurance services with a caring hand" and drive product innovations with technology capabilities. The Company expects to foster development in building its brand and proprietary platforms. ZhongAn aims to provide ecosystem-oriented insurance solutions to further promote the concept of inclusive insurance. The company will also closely follow the regulations and development plans, help foster digital transformation of insurance industry and build a Healthy China with its cutting-edge technological capabilities and proven business models. - End - About ZhongAn Online P&C Insurance Co Ltd (Stock Code:6060.HK) ZhongAn Online P&C Insurance Co., Ltd. ("ZA Online" or "the Company") is a leading online-only InsureTech company in China. Founded in October 2013, the Company adopts an ecosystem-oriented approach and focuses on customers' lives on the Internet, meeting customers' diversified protection needs and creating value for them through ecosystem partners and its proprietary platform. ZA Online seamlessly integrates technology across its insurance business, and now exports its technology to help other companies accelerate their growth. On 28 September 2017, ZA Online became the first Fintech company listed on the HKEx (Ticker: 6060) and since 2018, the Company started expanding its Fintech and InsureTech solutions to various international markets. View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/zhongan-online-announced-2021-interim-results-301363774.html SOURCE Zhongan Online [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] OSE Immunotherapeutics and ARCAGY-GINECO Announce First Patient Randomized in Phase 2 Clinical Trial Evaluating Tedopi in Combination with Pembrolizumab in Ovarian Cancer Clinical trial sponsored and conducted by the French oncology cooperative group ARCAGY-GINECO and supported by Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp. (MSD), a subsidiary of Merck & Co., Inc., Kenilworth, NJ, USA, known as MSD outside of the US and Canada, and OSE Immunotherapeutics. Innovative approach in ovarian cancer, an oncology indication with high unmet medical need. First Results expected beginning of 2025. NANTES, France, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- OSE Immunotherapeutics (ISIN: FR0012127173; Mnemo: OSE) and the French cooperative group ARCAGY-GINECO announced today that the first patient has been randomized in the Phase 2 clinical trial evaluating Tedopi alone and in combination with MSDs Keytruda (pembrolizumab) as maintenance treatment in patients with recurrent ovarian cancer after chemotherapy (the TEDOVA trial). The three arm TEDOVA study aims at evaluating the neo-epitope-based vaccine Tedopi as a maintenance treatment, alone or in combination with anti-PD-1 immune checkpoint inhibitor Keytruda, versus best supportive care in patients with first or second platinum-sensitive recurrent ovarian cancer with controlled disease after platinum-based chemotherapy and who have already received both bevacizumab and a PARP (Poly ADP-Ribose Polymerase) inhibitor. Dr. Alexandra Leary, Chief Investigator of TEDOVA study from Gustave Roussy cancer center, comments: We are very pleased to announce enrolment of the first patient in TEDOVA, the first trial evaluating an innovative maintenance strategy for patients in first or second platinum sensitive relapse post-PARP inhibitor and bevacizumab. We look forward to evaluating this therapeutic option for women with ovarian cancer and a strong unmet medical need. Patients with ovarian cancer do not respond to checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) alone because these tumors are immune cold. The objective of TEDOVA is to turn ovarian cancer into an immune hot tumor using a combination of tumor associated neo-epitopes that have been optimized to break immunological self-tolerance. This Phase 2 trial, sponsored by the Association de Recherche sur les CAncers dont GYnecologiques (ARCAGY-GINECO) on behalf of GINECO, is designed to enroll 180 patients and will be conducted at approximately 30 sites in France and around 12 sites in Germany and Belgium. Alexis Peyroles, Chief Executive Officer of OSE Immunotherapeutics, adds: Having the first patient enrolled by our oncology group partner marks a significant milestone in Tedopis development by exploring its impact in an additional oncology indication. We are expecting first results on the potential of such an innovative PD-1 targeted checkpoint combination strategy at the beginning of 2025. ABOUT OVARIAN CANCER Worldwide, ovarian cancer is the seventh most common cancer and the eighth leading cause of cancer death in women. The five-year survival rate for ovarian cancer worldwide is 30-40%. In 2018, there were nearly 300,000 new cases diagnosed. Once the first relapse has occurred, ovarian cancer is managed as a chronic disease, requiring iterative lines of platinum-based chemotherapy. After 6 cycles, chemotherapy is stopped and one of the major priorities is to extend chemotherapy-free intervals for the patients by proposing maintenance strategies with targeted therapies (PARP inhibitors or bevacizumab). By the time patients with ovarian cancer present with first or second relapse, they will have received BOTH a PARP inhibitor and bevacizumab, thus patients progressing post-PARP inhibitors and bevacizumab represent an area of unmet medical need, they are offered chemotherapy alone with no maintenance strategy. The TEDOVA trial focuses on these women. ABOUT GINECO GINECO (Groupe dInvestigateurs National pour lEtude des Cancers de lOvaire et du sein) is the French Cooperative Group in Oncology labelled by INCa (Institut National du Cancer or French NCI) developing and conducting gynecological and metastatic breast cancer clinical trials at the national and international level. The GINECO group was founded in 1993 and is member of international consortia such as ENGOT and GCIG (Gynecologic Cancer InterGroup). ABOUT ENGOT ENGOT (European Network for Gynecological Oncological Trial groups) is a research network of the European Society of Gynecological Oncology (ESGO) and was founded in 2007. ENGOT is a platform that guarantees that the European spirit and culture is incorporated into the medical progress in gynaecological oncology, and that all European patients and countries can participate in an active way in clinical research and progress. The ultimate goal is to bring the best treatment to gynecological cancer patients through the best science and enabling every patient in every European country to access a clinical trial. Currenly, ENGOT includes 21 cooperative groups from 25 European countries. ABOUT MSD Established in France since 1961, MSD France, a research-based pharmaceutical company, is a subsidiary of the American company Merck & Co., Inc., Kenilworth, NJ, USA. MSD France aims to deliver patients and healthcare professionals with a global innovative health offer including prescription medicines (mainly in four major therapeutic areas: cardio-metabolism, oncology, infectious diseases, vaccines), solutions and services, especially in the digital field. For more information, visit www.msd.com. ABOUT OSE Immunotherapeutics OSE Immunotherapeutics is an integrated biotechnology company focused on developing and partnering therapies to control the immune system for immuno-oncology and autoimmune diseases. The companys immunology research and development platform is focused on three areas: T-cell-based vaccination, Immuno-Oncology (focus on myeloid targets), Auto-immunity & Inflammation. Its balanced first-in-class clinical and preclinical portfolio has a diversified risk profile: Vaccine platform Tedopi (innovative combination of neoepitopes): the companys most advanced product; positive results for Step-1 of the Phase 3 trial (Atalante 1) in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer post checkpoint inhibitor failure. In Phase 2 in pancreatic cancer (TEDOPaM), sponsor GERCOR. In Phase 2 in ovary cancer, in combination with pembrolizumab (TEDOVA), sponsor ARCAGY-GINECO. In Phase 2 in non-small cell lung cancer in combination with nivolumab, sponsor Italian foundation FoRT. (innovative combination of neoepitopes): the companys most advanced product; positive results for Step-1 of the Phase 3 trial (Atalante 1) in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer post checkpoint inhibitor failure. In Phase 2 in pancreatic cancer (TEDOPaM), sponsor GERCOR. In Phase 2 in ovary cancer, in combination with pembrolizumab (TEDOVA), sponsor ARCAGY-GINECO. In Phase 2 in non-small cell lung cancer in combination with nivolumab, sponsor Italian foundation FoRT. CoVepiT: a prophylactic second-generation vaccine against COVID-19, developed using SARS-CoV-2 optimized epitopes against multi variants. Positive preclinical and human ex vivo results. Voluntary and temporary Phase 1 enrollment suspension on-going (July 2021). Immuno-oncology platform BI 765063 (OSE-172, anti-SIRPa mAb on SIRPa/CD47 pathway): developed in partnership with Boehringer Ingelheim in advanced solid tumors; positive Phase 1 results in monotherapy and BI 765063 dose escalation study ongoing in combination with Ezabenlimab (PD-1 antagonist). (OSE-172, anti-SIRPa mAb on SIRPa/CD47 pathway): developed in partnership with Boehringer Ingelheim in advanced solid tumors; positive Phase 1 results in monotherapy and BI 765063 dose escalation study ongoing in combination with Ezabenlimab (PD-1 antagonist). CLEC-1 (novel myeloid checkpoint target): identification of mAb antagonists of CLEC-1 blocking the Dont Eat Me signal that increase both tumor cell phagocytosis by macrophages and antigen capture by dendritic cells. (novel myeloid checkpoint target): identification of mAb antagonists of CLEC-1 blocking the Dont Eat Me signal that increase both tumor cell phagocytosis by macrophages and antigen capture by dendritic cells. BiCKI: bispecific fusion protein platform built on the key backbone component anti-PD-1 (OSE-279) combined with new immunotherapy targets; 2nd generation of PD-(L)1 inhibitors to increase antitumor efficacity. Auto-immunity and inflammation platform FR104 (anti-CD28 monoclonal antibody): Licensing partnership agreement with Veloxis in the organ transplant market; ongoing Phase 1/2 in renal transplant (sponsored by the Nantes University Hospital); Phase 2-ready asset in an autoimmune disease indication. (anti-CD28 monoclonal antibody): Licensing partnership agreement with Veloxis in the organ transplant market; ongoing Phase 1/2 in renal transplant (sponsored by the Nantes University Hospital); Phase 2-ready asset in an autoimmune disease indication. OSE-127/S95011 (humanized monoclonal antibody targeting IL-7 receptor): developed in partnership with Servier; positive Phase 1 results; in Phase 2 in ulcerative colitis (OSE sponsor) and an independent Phase 2a planned in Sjogrens syndrome (Servier sponsor). (humanized monoclonal antibody targeting IL-7 receptor): developed in partnership with Servier; positive Phase 1 results; in Phase 2 in ulcerative colitis (OSE sponsor) and an independent Phase 2a planned in Sjogrens syndrome (Servier sponsor). OSE-230 (ChemR23 agonist mAb): first-in-class therapeutic agent with the potential to resolve chronic inflammation by driving affected tissues to tissue integrity. For more information: https://ose-immuno.com/en/ Click and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn https://twitter.com/OSEIMMUNO https://www.linkedin.com/company/10929673 Contacts OSE Immunotherapeutics Media Sylvie Detry sylvie.detry@ose-immuno.com +33 153 198 757 U.S. Media: LifeSci Communications Darren Opland, Ph.D. darren@lifescicomms.com +1 646 627 8387 Guillaume van Renterghem LifeSci Advisors gvanrenterghem@lifesciadvisors.com +41 76 735 01 31 Investor Relations Thomas Guillot thomas.guillot@ose-immuno.com +33 607 380 431 French Media: FP2COM Florence Portejoie fportejoie@fp2com.fr +33 607 768 283 ARCAGY-GINECO www.arcagy.org www.twitter.com/ArcagyGineco Benedicte Votan bvotan@arcagy.org Forward-looking statements This press release contains express or implied information and statements that might be deemed forward-looking information and statements in respect of OSE Immunotherapeutics. They do not constitute historical facts. These information and statements include financial projections that are based upon certain assumptions and assessments made by OSE Immunotherapeutics management in light of its experience and its perception of historical trends, current economic and industry conditions, expected future developments and other factors they believe to be appropriate. These forward-looking statements include statements typically using conditional and containing verbs such as expect, anticipate, believe, target, plan, or estimate, their declensions and conjugations and words of similar import. Although the OSE Immunotherapeutics management believes that the forward-looking statements and information are reasonable, the OSE Immunotherapeutics shareholders and other investors are cautioned that the completion of such expectations is by nature subject to various risks, known or not, and uncertainties which are difficult to predict and generally beyond the control of OSE Immunotherapeutics. These risks could cause actual results and developments to differ materially from those expressed in or implied or projected by the forward-looking statements. These risks include those discussed or identified in the public filings made by OSE Immunotherapeutics with the AMF. Such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance. This press release includes only summary information and should be read with the OSE Immunotherapeutics Universal Registration Document filed with the AMF on 15 April 2021, including the annual financial report for the fiscal year 2020, available on the OSE Immunotherapeutics website. Other than as required by applicable law, OSE Immunotherapeutics issues this press release at the date hereof and does not undertake any obligation to update or revise the forward-looking information or statements. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] MDxHealth Reports Half Year 2021 Results NEWS RELEASE - REGULATED INFORMATION 26 AUGUST 2021, 18:00 CET MDxHealth Reports Half Year 2021 Results Conference call with Q&A today at 19:00 CET / 1PM US ET, details provided below IRVINE, CA, and HERSTAL, BELGIUM August 26, 2021 MDxHealth SA (Euronext: MDXH.BR), a commercial-stage precision diagnostics company, today announced its financial results for the half year ended June 30, 2021. Michael K. McGarrity, CEO of MDxHealth, commented: We are encouraged by our positive progress in the first half of 2021. Our results reflect our confidence that the key fundamentals of our business are in place and will drive sustained growth for MDxHealth. We believe this progress is evidenced by the following: Publication of draft foundational Local Coverage Determination (LCD) for Biomarkers to Stratify Patients at Increased Risk for Prostate Cancer by Palmetto GBA under its MolDx program, which cites evidence of the clinical utility of SelectMDx and, when finalized, is expected to support coverage for qualified Medicare patients throughout the United States; Third consecutive quarter of sequential increases in billable volume for our ConfirmMDx test, second consecutive quarter of sequential increases in billable volume for our SelectMDx test; Improvement in collections and capital allocation, supported by continued focus on operating discipline; and Advancement of development programs to expand our Prostate Cancer menu into Active Surveillance. In addition to positive results for our menu of SelectMDx and ConfirmMDx, at the conclusion of the half year, we made a Urinary Tract Infection (UTI) diagnostic panel available to a limited number of urology practices, as our first channel opportunity into urology, where approximately 20% of the 10 million UTI patients present in the U.S. annually. As we have stated, we have restructured our sales and overall commercial team to not only drive growth of our core and expanding prostate cancer menu, but to also take advantage of additional opportunities to serve our customer base and leverage this channel. Highlights for the half year and quarter ended June 30, 2021 H1-2021 services revenue of $10.5 million, up 9% as compared to $9.6 million in H1-2020; Q2-2021 services revenue up 43% from Q2-2020 H1-2021 ConfirmMDx billable test volume increased 4% to 7,978 versus 7,662 for the same period last year; Q2-2021 up 30% from Q2-2020 and 4% sequentially from Q1-2021 H1-2021 SelectMDx billable test volume increased 9% to 7,051 versus 6,462 for the same period last year; Q2-2021 up 82% from Q2-2020 and 16% sequentially from Q1-2021 Cash balance as of June 30, 2021 was $31.3 million; cash use in H1-2021 was $13.1 million, an increase of $0.2 million, or 1%, versus cash use in H1-2020 Successful financing of 25 million (approximately $30 million), with broad support from U.S. and European investors including continued support from our Reference shareholders, MVM, Valiance and BioVest Summary of Billable Test Volume by Product Product Second Quarter Ended June 30, 2021 2020 % Change ConfirmMDx 4,065 3,130 30% SelectMDx 3,792 2,079 82% Product Half Year Ended June 30, 2021 2020 % Change ConfirmMDx 7,978 7,662 4% SelectMDx 7,051 6,462 9% Financial review for the half year ended June 30, 2021 USD in thousands (except per share data) Unaudited Half Year Ended June 30 2021 2020 % Change Services 10,462 9,596 9% Licenses and royalties 269 284 (5%) Total Revenue 10,731 9,880 9% Gross Profit 5,215 4,686 11% Operating expenses (17,658) (17,674) 0% Operating loss (12,443) (12,988) (4%) Net loss (13,299) (13,709) (3%) Basic and diluted loss per share (0.12) (0.18) (33%) Total revenue for the first half of 2021 was $10.7 million compared to total revenue of $9.9 million for the first half of 2020. Revenue from ConfirmMDx and SelectMDx amounted to $10.5 million, an increase of 9% as compared to $9.6 million a year earlier. Revenue from ConfirmMDx represented over 90% of product revenue for all periods. Gross profit on products and services for the first half of 2021 was $5.2 million as compared to $4.7 million for the first half of 2020. Gross margins on products and services were 48.6% for the first half of 2021 as compared to 47.4% for the same period in 2020, representing a gross margin improvement of 120 basis points. Operating expenses in the first half of 2021 were $17.7 million, consistent with the same period last year. Excluding non-cash expenses such as depreciation, amortization and stock-based compensation, operating expenses for H1-2021 were $15.7 million, an increase of $0.3 million, or 2%, over H1-2020. Operating loss and net loss for the first half of 2021 were $12.4 million and $13.3 million, respectively, with losses narrowing compared to $13.0 million and $13.7 million, respectively, over the same period in 2020, for the reasons stated above. Cash and cash equivalents as of June 30, 2021, were $31.3 million, strengthened by the January 2021 equity raise of 25 million (approximately $30 million). Total cash collections amounted to $10.2 million in H1-2021, a decrease of 11% compared to the same period last year, due to the impact of COVID-19. Cash burn for H1-2021 was $13.1 million compared to $12.9 million in the prior year period. Outlook Michael K. McGarrity, CEO of MDxHealth, commented: Even amidst the dynamics of the pandemic and its variant strains, as well as the impact on patient flow, we are confident that adoption of SelectMDx and ConfirmMDx as standard of care in the diagnostic pathway of patients at risk for prostate cancer is beginning to take hold and will drive long term growth beyond 2021. In addition, we are developing active surveillance (AS) of prostate cancer solutions with our AS-MDx and Monitor-MDx tests. These menu additions would provide clinically actionable results for urologists evaluating cancer patients for consideration of active surveillance, as well as regular monitoring of these patients where the current standard of care is an annual biopsy. This is a well characterized market where a less invasive actionable solution is needed. We believe these initiatives, coupled with our current menu, will allow MDxHealth to be uniquely positioned to provide urologists with advanced diagnostics to take a patient from an elevated PSA through the diagnostic continuum of care with clinical confidence. Finally, we are excited to extend our menu of precision test offerings into our direct urology channel in the U.S., with a limited introduction of a UTI test. The market for UTI testing is well-defined, with urologists accounting for approximately 20% of the 10 million UTI tests ordered annually. This market is one of the few remaining diagnostic segments that relies on outdated culture methods. A rapid and highly sensitive UTI offering can provide timely and clinically actionable results. We look forward to providing additional visibility to our progress and outlook for this channel expansion opportunity. Subsequent Events Mr. Timothy Still, Independent Non-Executive Director (serving through Tstill Enterprises LLC), has stepped down from the Board of the Company on July 28, 2021 to pursue other opportunities. The Company thanks Mr. Still for his services and wishes him success in his new endeavors. Conference Call Michael K. McGarrity, Chief Executive Officer and Ron Kalfus, Chief Financial Officer, will host a conference call and Q&A session today at 19:00 CET / 1PM US ET. The call will be conducted in English and a replay will be available for 30 days. To participate in the conference call, please select your phone number below and use the Conference ID: 5051964. International: 323-794-2093 Belgium: 0800 58228 The Netherlands: 0800 023 1436 United Kingdom: 0800 358 637 US: 800-458-4121 Webcast: http://public.viavid.com/index.php?id=146152 To ensure a timely connection, it is recommended that users register at least 10 minutes prior to the scheduled start time. About MDxHealth MDxHealth is a commercial-stage precision diagnostics company that provides actionable molecular diagnostic information to personalize the diagnosis and treatment of cancer. The Company's tests are based on proprietary genetic, epigenetic (methylation) and other molecular technologies and assist physicians with the diagnosis of urologic cancers and prognosis of recurrence risk. The Companys European headquarters are in Herstal, Belgium, with laboratory operations in Nijmegen, The Netherlands, and U.S. headquarters and laboratory operations based in Irvine, California. For more information, visit mdxhealth.com and follow us on social media at: twitter.com/mdxhealth, facebook.com/mdxhealth and linkedin.com/company/mdxhealth. Financial statements and auditor review The Company's statutory auditor, BDO Bedrijfsrevisoren CVBA, has confirmed that its review procedures with respect to the Company's condensed consolidated financial statements as of and for the six-month period ended 30 June 2021, prepared in accordance with the International Financial Reporting Standards as issued by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) and as adopted by the EU, have been substantially completed. The aforementioned condensed consolidated financial statements may be found on the Company's website at www.mdxhealth.com. For more information: MDxHealth info@mdxhealth.com LifeSci Advisors (IR & PR) US: +1 949 271 9223 ir@mdxhealth.com This press release contains forward-looking statements and estimates with respect to the anticipated future performance of MDxHealth and the market in which it operates. Such statements and estimates are based on assumptions and assessments of known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which were deemed reasonable but may not prove to be correct. Actual events are difficult to predict, may depend upon factors that are beyond the companys control, and may turn out to be materially different. Examples of forward-looking statements include, among others, statements we make regarding expected future operating results; product development efforts, our strategies, positioning, resources, capabilities and expectations for future events or performance. Important factors that could cause actual results, conditions and events to differ materially from those indicated in the forward-looking statements include, among others, the following: uncertainties associated with the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, including its possible effects on our operations, and the demand for our products; our ability to successfully and profitably market our products; the acceptance of our products and services by healthcare providers; the willingness of health insurance companies and other payers to cover our products and services and adequately reimburse us for such products and services; and the amount and nature of competition for our products and services. MDxHealth expressly disclaims any obligation to update any such forward-looking statements in this release to reflect any change in its expectations with regard thereto or any change in events, conditions or circumstances on which any such statement is based unless required by law or regulation. This press release does not constitute an offer or invitation for the sale or purchase of securities or assets of MDxHealth in any jurisdiction. No securities of MDxHealth may be offered or sold within the United States without registration under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or in compliance with an exemption therefrom, and in accordance with any applicable U.S. securities laws. NOTE: The MDxHealth logo, MDxHealth, ConfirmMDx, SelectMDx, AS-MDx and MonitorMDx are trademarks or registered trademarks of MDxHealth SA. All other trademarks and service marks are the property of their respective owners. Attachment Press Release [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] PDFTron Acquires PDF-to-Office Innovator Solid Documents *Technology play enhances PDFTron's definitive offering with best-in-class document reconstruction and archiving* VANCOUVER, BC, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ - PDFTron Systems Inc., the world's leading provider of digital content solutions for software developers, today announced the acquisition of Solid Documents, provider of best-in-class document reconstruction and archiving solutions embedded in blue-chip company internal software, including that of Coca-Cola and Volvo, and in major commercial document applications, such as Adobe's flagship PDF product line, Acrobat. PDFTron Founder and CTO Ivan Nincic stated, "Converting PDF into MS Office formats is recognized as notoriously challenging within the document technology industry. And without question, Solid Documents is the leading innovator in this area of specialization. Its PDF to Word, Excel, and Powerpoint offers unparalleled accuracy in terms of formatting and content preservation. We welcome them on board as a significant complement to our team, roadmap, and future offering. Together, we can provide our customers unparalleled flexibility to have their users work with and edit documents the way they want, with all major document file types, and across all major platforms." "There are very few document technology companies and even fewer that focus on licensing SDKs and APIs," said Michael Cartwright, CEO of Solid Documents. "From our perspective, therefore, we see PDFTron as a perfect fit. Being able to join forces with a document technology company that shares both our customer and product philosophies feels like a rare gift, and it underscores our commitment to our developer community. We are looking forward to that community, our technology and people thriving in the larger PDFTron ecosystem that we are now part of." PDFTro's recent partnership with Solid Documents comes in the wake of a major strategic investment into PDFTron by leading private equity firm Thoma Bravo in May 2021 . Thoma Bravo's investment has accelerated PDFTron's footprint growth strategy as it establishes the first truly end-to-end digital content platform. This provides for comprehensive digital content viewing and collaboration, and document generation abilities, with diverse no-, low-, and high-code deployment options for those who wish to add professional features to their applications, shorten development timelines, improve security, and reduce development costs. Headquartered in Nelson, New Zealand, Solid Documents currently serves hundreds of thousands of users and organizations worldwide across several industries. In addition, Solid Documents' flagship, enterprise-class SDK "Solid Framework" can be found under the hood powering many professional document applications and platforms, including those of leaders in the document processing space such as Adobe, Foxit, and Smallpdf. About Solid Documents Solid Documents is a leading developer of document reconstruction and archiving software. Hundreds of thousands of users (personal and business) around the globe have used its solutions to share, reconstruct and archive many types of documents including legal documents, manuals, financial records, and more. Most often the converted document is easier to work with and in many cases better than the original. Solid Documents is customer focused and offers unlimited complimentary email support to all registered customers. The company is headquartered in Nelson, New Zealand and can be found at www.soliddocuments.com . About PDFTron Headquartered in Vancouver, Canada, PDFTron is a premier global provider of high-performance digital content processing technology serving OEM and enterprise customers across a broad spectrum of industries. PDFTron's market-leading SDK drives digital transformation and powers next generation software applications with dynamic document viewing, annotation, processing, and conversion capabilities, as well as advanced features such as document understanding, data extraction, and redaction. PDFTron technology supports all major platforms and dozens of unique file types, including support for PDF, MS Office, and CAD formats. For more information, visit www.pdftron.com . View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/pdftron-acquires-pdf-to-office-innovator-solid-documents-301362926.html SOURCE PDFTron [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Anyone Home Presenting Two Panel Sessions at National Apartment Association Apartmentalize 2021 LAKE FOREST, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Anyone Home , the industry-leading provider of technology that helps rental-housing operators engage and connect with residents and prospects, today announced it will be presenting two panel sessions at the National Apartment Association (NAA) Apartmentalize 2021 in Chicago. The 45-minute panels, Tour Type and Demand: Not all Tours Are Created Equal and Using Post-Pandemic Metrics to Optimize Sales Conversions. The Using Post-Pandemic Metrics to Optimize Sales Conversions session will be moderated by Todd Katler, founder and CEO of Anyone Home and will feature panelists Kyle Johnson, marketing and technology at R & V Management, Justin Choi, director of marketing at Sequoia Equities and Kristin Hupfer, first vice president of national sales at Equity Residential. Panelists will provide new key performance indicators and different leasing strategies to add to multifamily playbooks to help drive leads and convert those leads into lases. This session will break down the different sales metrics that emerged during the pandemic and assess how the industry is evaluating performance with new metrics. Data featured in the presentation will highlight key findings about the new tour type realities within the industry and how companies are adapting. New metrics from different tour types can identify opportunities within the sales process where the customer experience can be enhanced and highlight the ways customers choose to buy. According to metrics from Anyone Home, prospects who complete a self-guided tour at any point in the leasing process have a 54% higher conversion rate compared to those who take only an agent-led tour. "Measuring sales metrics has evolved during the pandemic, especially after our definition of a tour has significantly expanded," Katler said. "We have to take a step back as an industry and really evaluate how we're measuring overall performance, some of the new critical metrics that have emerged and what metric gaps we still need to fill with the new tour type reality." Tour Type and Demand will be moderated by Justin Choi and feature panelists Kyle Johnson, Jaime Conde, vice president of sales at Anyone Home and Jennifer Carter, director of marketing at SmartRent. The presentation will dive into the new tour type reality in multifamily and why not all tour types are created equal. Panelists will explore the different technologies powering new tour types, how to effectively track different tours and key conversion metrics. Tracking new tour types can be a difficult task, and even defining the new tour types can vary from community to community. But these are essential components to identifying new leasing metrics, technologies needed to power tours and track conversions and understanding how the new benchmarks are key indicators of demand. The Apartmentalize conference will be held at McCormick Place in downtown Chicago from Aug. 31 to Sept. 2. Industry-leading apartment owner/operators and supplier partners will be presenting networking sessions and exhibitions in between NAA-hosted events and activities. About Anyone Home Headquartered in Lake Forest, Calif., Anyone Home is completely focused on prospect and resident engagement. Its solutions and services create higher NOI by driving more leasing activity by giving prospects the freedom of choice in how and when they choose to interact. Its solutions include Anyone Home CRM, Property Tours, Leasing Chatbot, Contact Center, and Performance Analysis. For more information, visit AnyoneHome.com . View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/anyone-home-presenting-two-panel-sessions-at-national-apartment-association-apartmentalize-2021-301363476.html SOURCE Anyone Home [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] CalHFA Fills Three Key Leadership Positions The California Housing Finance Agency (CalHFA) is pleased to welcome Ellen E. Martin, Erwin J. Tam and Pratixa A. Desai, who have been appointed by Governor Gavin Newsom to leadership positions at CalHFA. "We're very excited about the variety of skills and experience that Ellen, Erwin and Pratixa will bring to CalHFA," said Executive Director Tiena Johnson Hall, who also recently joined CalHFA. "All three of these positions are important to set the Agency up for continued success in this challenging housing environment, and I'm looking forward to working with them to help us make great strides in the coming months." Ellen E. Martin will serve as the Director of Business Development and Stakeholder Relations. Martin has been a Principal at Economic and Planning Systems Inc. since 2019. From 2005 to 2019, she held multiple positions at EPS. She was Policy Analyst and Legislative Coordinator at United Domestic Workers of America from 2004 to 2005. Martin earned her master's in Public Policy and Administration from California State University, Sacramento. She is a member of the Urban Land Institute and the California Association for Local Economic Development. CalHFA's new Director of Financing is Erwin J. Tam. Tam has been Senior Vice Preident for Backstrom McCarley Berry & Co. LLC since 2020. He was Vice President at KNN Public Finance from 2014 to 2020. Tam was Vice President and Senior Vice President at Backstrom McCarley Berry & Co. LLC. from 2009 to 2014. He was an Associate at RBC Capital Markets in 2008. Tam was an Associate at Bear, Stearns & Co. Inc. from 2005 to 2007. He was Consultant and Senior Managing Consultant at Public Financial Management from 2001 to 2005, and received his B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley. Pratixa A. Desai has been appointed Risk Manager. Desai has been Vice President and Tax Credit Investment Manager at East West Bank since 2020. She was Assistant Vice President and Underwriter for Specialty Tax Credit Solutions at PNC (News - Alert) Bank from 2014 to 2020. Desai was Senior Officer at IL and FS Infrastructure Development Corporation Ltd. from 2008 to 2012. She earned her master's in Infrastructure Planning from CEPT University, School of Planning and Public Policy in Ahmedabad, India. Desai earned her master's in Public Policy and Management from Carnegie Mellon University. The California Housing Finance Agency was created in 1975 with the goal of helping more Californians find a place to call home. CalHFA has helped more than 201,000 low- and moderate-income homebuyers with $32.6 billion in first mortgages and used $6.1 billion in financing for the construction and preservation of more than 70,000 affordable rental housing units throughout the state. CalHFA is a self-supported state agency that doesn't rely on taxpayer dollars for its operational costs. For more information on CalHFA programs and how we are creating progressive financing solutions for affordable housing in California, visit www.calhfa.ca.gov or call toll free at 877.9.CalHFA (877.922.5432). View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005602/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Effects, Lessons of Pandemic Focus of Stanford Symposium Series Featuring Distinguished Speakers The COVID-19 pandemic has killed millions, threatened the health of billions and disrupted every aspect of society. And while its impact will be felt for decades, COVID-19 won't be the last global threat of its kind. What we do to prepare for the next one is critical. That reality is the motivation for an ambitious symposium series presented by Stanford Medicine and the Stanford Graduate School of Business that will convene eminent experts - across health care, business and government - to discuss the global COVID-19 response, lessons for recovery and how we can better prepare for future threats. By capturing a wealth of perspectives and spotlighting innovative thinking, The Pandemic Puzzle: Lessons from COVID-19 series will help define how different sectors might rebuild to emerge stronger and more resilient. The virtual, interactive, multi-day symposium is free and open to the public. "We have a once-in-generations opportunity - and a profound responsibility - to learn from this crisis and recreate a health system that is more responsive, efficient and equitable," said Lloyd Minor, MD, the Carl and Elizabeth Naumann Professor and dean of the Stanford School of Medicine. "This conference will be an important step toward makingthat happen." Jonathan Levin, PhD, Philip H. Knight Professor and dean of Stanford Graduate School of Business, who is co-hosting the conference with Minor, said that the next few years will be critical. "We must seize the moment and the momentum," he said. "The pandemic disrupted the health system and our entire economy, revealing weaknesses and disparities. We can use that information and insight to build a stronger foundation and a brighter future." Conference attendees will hear the latest thinking from leading epidemiologists and public health officials, business leaders in vaccination development and delivery, and the policymakers who were on the front lines of the global response. Speakers include Janet Woodcock, MD, acting commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration; Andy Slavitt, a former senior adviser from President Joe Biden's COVID-19 response team; Sally Susman, chief corporate affairs officer at Pfizer; Soumya Swaminathan, chief scientist at the World Health Organization; renowned economist Alex Tabarrok, PhD; and Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, chair of the White House's COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force. Joined by leading faculty from the Stanford School of Medicine and Stanford Graduate School of Business, the conference will cover multiple aspects of the pandemic and the global response. Panelists and session participants will explore the intersecting roles of government, industry, health care and academia; the pandemic's impact on American households and the global economy; underlying issues of access, equity and community health and their importance in improving a future pandemic response; the need to modernize critical elements of our global health systems; the pandemic's knock-on effects and their impact on education and housing; and the potential of cutting-edge technologies and biomedical research to blunt or even prevent future pandemics. Registration is open. To see a detailed agenda, the latest speakers and to register, visit the website. About Stanford University School of Medicine The Stanford University School of Medicine consistently ranks among the nation's top medical schools, integrating research, medical education, patient care and community service. For more news about the school, please visit http://med.stanford.edu/school.html. The medical school is part of Stanford Medicine, which includes Stanford Health Care and Stanford Children's Health. For information about all three, please visit http://med.stanford.edu. About Stanford Graduate School of Business Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) is developing the next generation of principled global leaders. Since 1925, Stanford GSB has been delivering rigorous and experiential management education combined with personal development and leadership that has the power to change both careers and lives. Stanford GSB's faculty are empowered to design and discover original research that pushes the boundaries of knowledge. The school's diverse programs include the 2-year MBA program; 1-year Master of Science program for experienced leaders (MSx); PhD program; Executive Education; Stanford LEAD, an online certificate program; and Stanford Seed, a Stanford GSB-led initiative that partners with entrepreneurs in emerging markets to build thriving enterprises that transform lives. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005615/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Former Mastercard International President Baldomero Falcones Joins Card Division For Bit2Me MADRID, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Bit2Me continues to add talent to its project. Baldomero Falcones, a Spanish executive with a long and recognized track record of professional achievement, will become part of the cryptocurrency platform's team as Senior Advisor. His mission will be to expand Bit2Me Card, the company's debit card service. Baldomero Falcones Experience Among other management positions, Falcones was President of Mastercard International between 2002 and 2006, chairman of FCC, a construction company listed on the Ibex 35, and chairman of insurance area and director of operations at Banco Santander. He was a founder of Magnum Industrial Partners, a renowned venture capital firm in Spain and the largest in Spain and Portugal, dedicated to mid-market transactions in the Iberian Peninsula. Bit2Me Launch Card & ICO The Bit2Me Card offers a latest generation Mastercard card connected to the world of cryptocurrency. It can be held in both traditional plastic and virtual formats. The plastic version has NFC technology for contactless payments. The incorporation of Baldomero Falcones as Senior Advisor coincides with Bit2Me's launch on September 6 of its B2M token, which will be the largest ICO undertaken in Spain. The company has completed a previous private sale among investors, reaching a record amount in our country, earning some 2.5 million euros. The holders of the token will receive benefits relating to Bit2Me products. Those interested in participating can do so via the official site. Baldomero Falcones stated that: "Innovation is the engine of rowth for companies, investors and countries, and innovation is in Bit2Me's DNA. It is essential for progress. It is the factor that convinced me to join this exciting project led by Leif and Andrei." Leif Ferreira, founder and CEO of Bit2Me, believes that: "Baldomero will help us connect Bit2Me with the more traditional financial system. Our primary task is taking everyday cards to the crypto market in an exponential way. Our aim is for each new virtual currency we include to be incorporated into the Bit2Me Card." Andrei Manuel, co-founder and COO of Bit2Me, is sure that: "Baldomero's experience will take Bit2Me to another level. We seek excellence in the Spanish and international banking, financial and business sectors, and he will help us achieve it." About Bit2Me Bit2Me is an industry-leading company in the cryptocurrency sector in Spain. Its suite of services includes more than 20 solutions to buy, sell and manage virtual currencies and euros from a single place, safely and easily. The company has private customers, professionals, and companies in more than 100 countries and has managed operations worth more than 1 billion since being founded in 2015. In January this year, FORBES magazine selected Bit2Me as one of the companies in Spain that will drive change in 2021. Since its creation in 2015, the company has received several awards in the financial sector such as 'Winners of the World', in the Visa-sponsored international competition; 'Best Spanish startup 2015', by CaixaBank; or 'Best Business Model' awarded by Deloitte. In addition, the European Commission has invited Bit2Me on multiple occasions to present and discuss Blockchain technology and bitcoin. One of the first initiatives of the company after its birth was the creation of Bit2Me Academy, which trains more than 1.7 million students every year. Bit2Me Academy is currently the largest cryptocurrency training portal in Spanish, with more than 400 free articles, certified courses, and videos for those interested in learning about the birth, operation, and evolution of cryptocurrencies and the world of blockchain. Bit2Me Socials Telegram | Twitter | Facebook |Team Media Contact Details Contact Name: Victoria Salas Contact Email: media@bit2me.com Bit2Me is the source of this content. This Press Release is for informational purposes only. The information does not constitute investment advice or an offer to invest. Related Images image1.png View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/former-mastercard-international-president-baldomero-falcones-joins-card-division-for-bit2me-301363656.html SOURCE Bit2Me [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Japan B2B Payment Services Voice of Customer Set to Register a 3.3% CAGR from 2021 to 2026 DUBLIN, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Japan B2B Payment Services Voice of Customer, 2021" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The Japanese government encourages a shift toward cashless through initiatives such as the tax rebate program and open banking law reform. As the proportion of customers using cashless transactions rises, businesses increasingly seek solutions to complement their B2B2C needs. A staggering 55% and 70% of companies received payments today are from consumers and SMEs, respectively. B2B2C payments needs are driving B2B payment solutions development, while demand for B2B solutions alone is far lower. The publisher studied 101 businesses in Japan between January and February 2021 to assess the current state of the industry and uncover actionable insights to drive digital B2B payment services in Japan. The study found that the digital B2B payments transaction value looks set to register a 3.3% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2021 to 2026. There is room for improvement fo financial services providers serving the B2B space, particularly in fees, as 69% of companies surveyed think that the current fees are too high. About one-third of polled companies feel that transaction fees for local and international transactions should be lower. Besides fees, companies' ability to cope with fluctuations in payment volumes and cash flow problems are key issues that need to be addressed. Market developments point to the untapped potential beyond digitizing businesses. Harvesting the opportunity with industry digitalization is often matched with the adoption of emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), Big Data, robotic process automation (RPA), and cloud. Whereas digitization can lead to automation of the payment process, digitalization is much more than that and can lead to more efficient and effective use of resources. It can facilitate more advanced functionality, including dynamic payment routing that can solve customer pain points. In Japan, business potential does not always translate into business success. Size does matter. The reality on the ground is that despite the need, Japanese companies are in no rush to embrace change. Nevertheless, change is on the horizon as business needs challenge the inertia resisting change. Already, we see partnerships providing added value and businesses getting the benefits. The momentum is building, with credit card market participants establishing a comprehensive B2B payments ecosystem through partnerships with accounting services, transportation services, and office supplies providers. This study covers Japan. This report's target audience includes financial services providers and payment services providers keen on understanding the financial services needs of business customers in Japan. Companies Mentioned JCB Mizuho MUFG Sumitomo For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/zai58d Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager press@researchandmarkets.com For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/japan-b2b-payment-services-voice-of-customer-set-to-register-a-3-3-cagr-from-2021-to-2026--301363625.html SOURCE Research and Markets [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Blend to Participate in the Deutsche Bank Technology Conference Blend Labs, Inc. (NYSE: BLND), a leader in cloud banking software, today announced that Marc Greenberg, Head of Finance, will participate in a virtual fireside chat at the Deutsche Bank Technology Conference on Friday, September 10, 2021. The discussion will begin at 9:45 a.m. PT / 12:45pm ET. This fireside chat will be webcast live on the Company's investor relations website at https://investor.blendcom. A replay of the webcast will be available at the same Web address for 10 days following the conference. About Blend Blend's cloud banking platform is designed to power the end-to-end consumer journey for any banking product, from application to close. Our technology is used by Wells Fargo (News - Alert) , U.S. Bank, and over 310 other financial services firms to acquire more customers, increase productivity, and deepen relationships. Through our software, we enable our customers to process an average of more than $5 billion in loans per day, helping consumers get into homes and gain access to the capital they need to lead better lives. To learn more, visit blend.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005629/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] 70% Of U.S. Office Workers Are Embracing a Return to the Office, New Survey Shows Eden Workplace, the complete suite of workplace software for the modern hybrid company, today released findings from the latest survey in its Return To Office series. Following the technology companies' February 2021 report, this edition marks the first analysis of U.S. office workers' real-time sentiments following their COVID-era re-entry to the workplace either full-time or in a hybrid capacity. The data finds the vast majority (70%) of office workers who have already returned to the office prefer being back in the office either part- or full-time compared with working entirely from home. Conducted by Wakefield Research, the survey involved 1,000 nationally representative U.S. full- and part-time office workers from July 21 - July 27, 2021, who returned to the office at some point during the prior 1-3 months. "The data shows a couple things conclusively: a healthy majority of people are enjoying their return to the office, and that the future is hybrid," said Joe Du Bey, CEO and Co-founder of Eden Workplace. "That said, only a minority of people gave their employers an "A" for their return-to-office execution, finding their mployers lacking on a couple key fronts. For one, a majority of office workers want their employers to protect them by making vaccinations mandatory, yet only a minority of companies have done so. Additionally, today's workforce wants their employers to use best-in-class tools and processes, as the new hybrid workplace requires a new suite of tools in addition to a more flexible and progressive mindset." "As the US enters the fifth wave of COVID-19, bringing new challenges in particular from the Delta variant, it is clear that the return-to-office situation is fragile and requires constant monitoring for best practices," Du Bey said. "We hope and believe that employers will consider their team's best interests as they continue to execute the right way to return. While it is clear that a vast majority of team members want to be able to return to the office, the health of our communities must come first, and we are seeing companies be extra thoughtful about the right way to navigate this storm." Eden Workplace-rated one of Y Combinator's Top Companies, Inc.'s 500 Fastest Growing Private Companies, and San Francisco Business Times' Fastest Growing Private Companies in the Bay Area-analyzed the data from its latest survey, revealing the current thinking among office workers, who expressed a heavy emphasis on flexibility. Based on the respondents, results showed more than half (62%) of employees want a hybrid work environment on a permanent basis moving forward. However, 23% have proven to be diehard office fans, wanting to return five days per week, while 15% want to be fully remote. Overall, the survey finds 85% of employees prefer working in the office in some capacity, verifying the February 2021 Eden Workplace Return to Office Survey, which also reflected that 85% of US information economy workers looked forward to returning to the office in some form at the start of this year. While a majority of employees are happy to be back in the office at least part-time, only 37% give their employers an 'A' grade for how they've managed resuming in-person work. The vaccine debate played a heavy hand in these sentiments, with only 44% of employers having vaccine requirements, while a majority of employees (57%) would prefer their companies mandated it. Further, 78% of employees whose companies require vaccinations are happy to be back in the office at least part-time. In companies where there is no vaccine mandate, workers were also in favor of returning to the office in some capacity, although to a lesser degree (65%). All findings from the latest Eden Workplace Return to Office Survey are available here. About Eden Workplace: Eden Workplace is the complete suite of workplace software for the modern hybrid company. Eden Workplace's best-in-class Software-as-a-Service ( SaaS (News - Alert) ) tools help teams safely return to the office, book their desks, manage their floor plans, register visitors, track employee ticketing and help desk requests, reserve conference rooms and more. Eden Workplace is based in San Francisco and investors include Y Combinator, Bessemer Venture Partners, Fifth Wall, S28 Capital, JLL, ENIAC, SV Angel, and more. Eden Workplace's mission is to create a better place to work, for everyone. To learn more, visit www.edenworkplace.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005540/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Quantropi makes history by quantum-securely distributing true random numbers over vast distances using existing network infrastructure Cybersecurity startup distributes Quantum Entropy as a Service worldwide, showcasing the transmission speed and scalability of its QiSpace platform OTTAWA, ON, Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ - Quantropi, Inc., a groundbreaking Canadian quantum security solutions provider, announced today the impressive results of a high-profile demonstration of its patented technology. A portion of the demonstration was enabled by CANARIE, the federal partner in Canada's National Research and Education Network (NREN), and its Alberta partner in the NREN, Cybera. CANARIE's participation in the demonstration leveraged existing network infrastructure to support Quantropi's solution and the evolution of the Canadian quantum ecosystem. The results signal a radical shift in capability as compared to prevailing Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) methods. Quantropi's QiSpace platform generates quantum-secure random numbers for provisioning to enterprise customers in the form of SEQUR Quantum Entropy as a Service. Quantum Entropy is used to privately create strong, trusted keys, which are then quantum-securely encrypted and distributed anywhere in the world (or space) via the existing wireline or wireless Internet. The company leveraged CANARIE's ultra high-speed network infrastructure to demonstrate QiSpace SEQUR Quantum Entropy as a Service in a real-life environment. The deployed configuration originated with the QiSpace Cloud server in the CANARIE data center in Ottawa, Canada, and involved transmitting quantum entropy to both Canadian and international locations. The first leg of the demonstration involved transmission over the CANARIE Network from Ottawa, Ontario to Edmonton, Alberta, to a site operated by Cybera, CANARIE's NREN Partner in Alberta. The test was extended over the Internet and reached San Francisco and New York in the USA, London and Frankfurt in Europe, and finally ended almost 15,000 kilometers away in Singapore. The demonstration achieved speeds in the megabits per second as high as 100 Mbs to Edmonton, as low as 14 Mbs to Singapore. A complete comparative summary performance chart can be viewed here. "Let's translate these results to the business world," said Michael Redding, Chief Technology Officer of Quantropi. "If a 32-byte AES key is the standard, we're transmitting anywhere from just under 400,000 (Edmonton) down to 55,000 keys per second (Singapore). To get your head around this, Google representing ten times the traffic of any other site on the planet requires an estimated 64,000 32-byte keys per second. So just from our small beta server in Ottawa pre-optimization we can support anywhere in the neighborhood of one to six Googles per second. With every single key delivered as secure from any attack classical or quantum." "Now compare that performance to conventional QKD," Mr. Redding continued. "At 20 kilometres QKD can get to roughly 10 megabits, or half a Google that's already less than what we achieve at 15,000 kilometres. And beyond 100 kilometres QKD goes to zero; it cannot operate. So, what we are demonstrating here is a radical disruption, by quantum-securely distributing keys across huge distances, over any network. The distribution occurred over both the CANARIE and Cybera high-speed research and education networks and the commodity Internet, so there are no dependencies on what network technologies are deployed. They might be using undersea cables, microwaves, satellites it doesn't matter, we don't care. And that's a game changer." For Quantropi, as the company prepares to open its QiSpace Platform commercially to the broader public and private enterprise market, the results are in line with expectations, as well as prior closed-beta testing. James Nguyen, Co-Founder and CEO of Quantropi, said: "We were anticipating exceptional results, so we're not surprised by these scores. What impressed me was how fast our team was able to deploy and scale our platform to so many global locations while offering "TrUE" (Trust, Uncertainty, Entropy) Quantum Security. In terms of performance, our QiSpace software platform is 100% algorithmic in nature founded in quantum mechanics expressed as linear algebra and no photons means no photonic speed or distance limitations. Still, we knew we had to do a high-profile test, or we'd never put the question to rest. These results will rock the QKD industry to the core." "We are pleased that we were able to leverage the CANARIE Network to enable this innovative demonstration with Quantropi," said Mark Wolff, CTO of CANARIE. "Support for both private sector and research and education sector partners amplifies the value of historic and ongoing investments in the network." Through the demonstration with CANARIE, Quantropi has proven that it is already, even prior to formal commercial launch, capable of provisioning any world-class digital user with Quantum Entropy as a Service. As the company readies its QiSpace platform for general availability, the burgeoning quantum communication industry, and QKD in particular, may be in for a shock. About Quantropi Quantropi, Inc., is a Canadian cybersecurity company that delivers novel, end-to-end quantum-secure data communication solutions uniquely capable of all three cryptographic prerequisites: Trust, Uncertainty, and Entropy. Powered by quantum mechanics expressed as linear algebra, only Quantropi's patented "TrUE" technologies: (1) establish unquestionable Trust between any two parties via MASQ asymmetric quantum-secure encryption (in development); (2) provide Uncertainty to attackers, rendering data uninterpretable forever, via QEEP symmetric quantum-secure encryption; and (3) distribute SEQUR Entropy, the strong keys and pure random numbers that enable quantum-secure data communications over unlimited distances, at network speeds, using today's Internet. All Quantropi's TrUE quantum-secure key generation, encryption & distribution solutions are accessible via the company's flagship QiSpace platform. By offering an easily deployable, cost-effective and effortlessly scalable solution that enables organizations to progressively upgrade towards 100% quantum security, forever, Quantropi's vision is to protect Truth & Trust beyond the information age. Bring it on. About CANARIE Established in 1993, CANARIE is a non-profit corporation created to equip Canadian researchers, students, and startups to excel on the global stage. Together with its thirteen provincial and territorial partners, it forms Canada's National Research and Education Network (NREN), an ultra-high-speed network connecting Canada's researchers, educators, and innovators to each other and to global data, technology, and colleagues. In addition, the organization funds and promotes the development of software for research, as well as national efforts to manage data generated from research. To strengthen the security of Canada's research and education sector, the corporation collaborates with its NREN partners along with government, academia, and the private sector to fund, implement, and support cybersecurity initiatives. CANARIE also provides identity management services to the academic community and boosts Canadian startups with cloud resources and expertise in emerging technologies. View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/quantropi-makes-history-by-quantum-securely-distributing-true-random-numbers-over-vast-distances-using-existing-network-infrastructure-301363139.html SOURCE Quantropi Inc. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] $RLY Community Approves Vote for Unique Decentralization Plan to Evolve the Rally Project Into Five Separate and Independent Entities Rally, a leading crypto platform for creators, announced that the $RLY community approved a proposal today to create five separate and independent entities, specifically: Rally : Creator monetization and community engagement project built on the $RLY protocol focused on US creators, artists and more. As a Delaware corporation, Rally will continue to be governed by leadership from its executives and from its existing directors, with the participation of creator and developer stakeholders in order to provide creators with the most efficient and regulatory compliant experience possible. : Creator monetization and community engagement project built on the $RLY protocol focused on US creators, artists and more. As a Delaware corporation, Rally will continue to be governed by leadership from its executives and from its existing directors, with the participation of creator and developer stakeholders in order to provide creators with the most efficient and regulatory compliant experience possible. SuperLayer Labs : Forthcoming venture studio that invests in and partners with developers to build new tokenized consumer applications on top of the $RLY protocol. : Forthcoming venture studio that invests in and partners with developers to build new tokenized consumer applications on top of the $RLY protocol. Creator-focused Project in Asia : Forthcoming project built on the $RLY protocol for creators, artists and brands in Asia to launch their own personal cryptocurrencies and build digital economies with their communities by offering multiple benefits and access points. : Forthcoming project built on the $RLY protocol for creators, artists and brands in Asia to launch their own personal cryptocurrencies and build digital economies with their communities by offering multiple benefits and access points. Non-profit $RLY Network Association: Non-profit association that builds and maintains the core technology, oversees network protocols and rewards, and oversees a portion of the community treasury. It will be based in Switzerland, a jurisdiction that has historically encouraged and supported the growth of crypto projects and the development of governance innovations. Non-profit association that builds and maintains the core technology, oversees network protocols and rewards, and oversees a portion of the community treasury. It will be based in Switzerland, a jurisdiction that has historically encouraged and supported the growth of crypto projects and the development of governance innovations. $RLY Ecosystem DAO: A decentralized, autonomous organization run directly by $RLY token holders to grow the ecosystem and distribute a 20 million $RLY and 2 million $USDC budget for the benefit of the network. "From the outset, we've been committed to achieving decentralization. Rally's mission is to truly empower creators and their communities, and the only way to fulfill this promise is to ensure that there's no 'big tech' central entity that controls the ecosystem. Now with a global roadmap in place and new products and businesses enabled by the decentralized $RLY protocol, the original core mission of delivering the nex 100 million users into crypto can be realized by a growing network of innovative projects," said founder Kevin Chou. "Based on the early success of the $RLY protocol and its first consumer application, Rally.io, paving the way to tokenizing creators, the ecosystem is expanding to include many new projects tokenizing every person, community, and brand on the internet." The goals of Rally's decentralization are: Ensure no singular entity will control the protocol by putting in place the non-profit $RLY Network Association to oversee and maintain the protocol, while a network of decentralized consumer applications can build off of it. Establish Rally as one of the growing number of projects that make up the $RLY ecosystem network. Clearly delineate the governance roles and responsibilities of $RLY token holders. Enable global expansion. Empower experimentation to build and launch next generation projects that leverage the $RLY protocol. As part of the proposal, former Patreon executive Bremner Morris will be elevated to Chief Executive Officer of Rally. Morris was appointed by the community earlier this year to lead go-to-market initiatives for the $RLY network's flagship app, Rally. Since joining the project, Morris has assisted with rapidly scaling Rally to become a leading crypto platform for creators and by doing so, bringing interest and attention to the innovative use cases for $RLY and the $RLY protocol. In the last quarter alone, Morris oversaw the launch of a forthcoming visual brand identity and website, assembled a leadership team of creator economy experts including execs from Twitch, Twitter, Facebook, Kickstarter and YouTube (News - Alert) and partnered with UTA to represent Rally to the creator / talent ecosystem. Prior to joining Rally, Morris held senior leadership positions in the creator and digital economy ecosystems, including serving as Patreon's Head of Go-to-Market and Revenue and Head of Creator Partnerships. Prior to joining Patreon, Morris drove the growth of AppDirect, a leading cloud software marketplace provider. "Rally offers a new frontier for creators to engage with their communities, receive meaningful value for their creative endeavors and have full ownership over their own independent economies," said Bremner Morris. "I believe that creators should be fairly valued for their contributions and Rally has one of the clearest use cases in crypto, with a vibrant ecosystem that's already making a real positive impact. The Rally team is looking forward to driving the next phase of creator and community empowerment through social tokens and NFTs." The proposal also broke down separate budgets for each project from the $RLY network community treasury, which is funded by community activity including through a raise of $50 million USD flowing directly to the community treasury through token sales conducted by a community-appointed agent. Rally plans to use its portion of the community-approved budget to continue to invest in services and staff to support creators, including significant investment in regulatory compliance features and processes - an area where Rally stands alone in its capabilities among other social token and NFT projects. With the passing of the community proposal to decentralize the $RLY network ecosystem, former CEO Kevin Chou and his co-founder Mahesh Vellanki will launch a venture studio, SuperLayer Labs, that will fund and accelerate separate projects on top of the $RLY network. They will continue to work within Rally in a community capacity. The proposal also allocated a budget from the community treasury to establish a separate creator-focused project that will aim to mirror Rally's success in the greater Asia region. The Rally project's original funding included a mix of VCs including Andreesen Horowitz, Canaan, Battery Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Green Bay Ventures and other major blockchain VCs, entrepreneurs, and more. The full community proposal can be read here. ---------- About Rally Rally is a crypto platform that allows creators and artists to launch their own digital currency and to build sustainable, independent economies with their fan communities. Powered by digital assets on the blockchain, Rally offers creators the ability to monetize through fans purchasing and using their social token and through crypto reward systems. Fans gain access to benefits including unreleased content, private communities, backstage passes, early-access to tickets, and exclusive merch - all while showing their fan loyalty by holding their favorite creator's coin. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005617/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] $ 4.90 Bn growth in E-mail Encryption Market 2021-2025 | Analyzing Growth in Internet Services & Infrastructure Industry | 17000+ Technavio Report NEW YORK, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Technavio has been monitoring the e-mail encryption market and it is poised to grow by USD 4.90 billion during 2021-2025, progressing at a CAGR of over 22% 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. Understand the driving forces behind the E-mail Encryption Market and target Potential Customers Here. Download Free Sample Report Now! The COVID-19 impact report on the e-mail encryption market offers pre as well as post-COVID-19 market estimates. Technavio analysts have curated the reports extensively through both qualitative and quantitative research methodologies to derive the most industry-relevant and business-relevant outcomes. With the continuing spread of the novel coronavirus pandemic, organizations across the globe are gradually flattening their recessionary curve by leveraging technology. Building business resilience and enabling agility will aid organizations to move forward in their journey out of the COVID-19 crisis towards the Next Normal. This post-pandemic business planning research will aid clients to: Recognizing the existing business model Focusing on agile execution of proposed and approved changes. Conceptualize scenario-based planning to mitigate future crisis situations. Download the Post-Pandemic Business Planning Structure Key Considerations for Market Forecast: Impact of lockdowns, supply chain disruptions, demand destruction, and change in customer behavior Optimistic, probable, and pessimistic scenarios for all markets as the impact of pandemic unfolds Pre- as well as post-COVID-19 market estimates Quarterly impact analysis and updates on market estimates Gain instant access to 17,000+ market research reports by using Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform Reports that might interest you: Global Secure Email Gateway Market - Global secure email gateway market is segmented by deployment (on-premises, cloud-based, and hybrid) and geography (North America, Europe, APAC, South America, and MEA). Download Exclusive Free Sample Report Global Email Hosting Services Market - Global email hosting services market is segmented by type (webmail and hosted email) and geography (North America, Europe, APAC, South America, and MEA). Download Exclusive Free Sample Report Emerging Opportunities with Key players Broadcom Inc.: The company offers email encryption products symantec with these features: Fraud protection and Impersonation controls. Cisco Systems Inc.: The company offers Cisco secure email encryption service with these features such as confidentiality, ease of use, and enhanced email controls. Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co.: The company offers email encryption products brands such as HPE ProLiant DL380T Gen10 server and HPE ProLiant Gen10 Plus server platform. If you purchase a report that is updated in the next 60 days, we will send you the new edition and data extract FREE! Get report snapshot here to get detailed market share analysis of market participants during COVID-19 lockdown: https://www.technavio.com/report/e-mail-encryption-market-industry-analysis E-mail Encryption Market 2021-2025: Segmentation E-mail encryption market is segmented as below: End-user BFSI Healthcare Government Others Solution Secure E-mail Gateways Software Geography North America Europe APAC South America MEA The e-mail encryption market is driven by the high adoption of cloud-based services. In addition, stringent government regulations are expected to trigger the e-mail encryption market toward witnessing a CAGR of over 22% during the forecast period. Plan and Strengthen your business and marketing strategies: https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR41465 Market Drivers Market Challenges Market Trends Vendor Landscape Vendors covered Vendor classification Market positioning of vendors Competitive scenario 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. Contact Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Report: www.technavio.com/report/e-mail-encryption-market-industry-analysis Newsroom: newsroom.technavio.com/news/e-mail-encryptionmarket View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/-4-90-bn-growth-in-e-mail-encryption-market-2021-2025--analyzing-growth-in-internet-services--infrastructure-industry--17000-technavio-report-301362880.html SOURCE Technavio [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] MetLife Investment Management and Norges Bank Investment Management Announce $825.1 Million Acquisition of One Memorial Drive MetLife Investment Management (MIM), the institutional asset management business of MetLife, Inc. (NYSE: MET), and Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), the asset management division of Norges Bank, today announced the acquisition of One Memorial Drive in Cambridge, Massachusetts for $825.1 million. The transaction represents the largest single-asset U.S. office transaction to date in 2021, according to data provider CoStar. One Memorial Drive is a 17-story, Class A office building located on the Charles River with 409,422 square feet of leasable space. Built in 1986 and renovated in 2018, the fully occupied property has two long-term tenants, InterSystems Corporation and Microsoft (News - Alert) Corporation. Robert Merck, global head of Real Estate and Agriculture at MetLife Investment Management, said: "We continue to see significant areas of opportunity within the commercial real estate sector despite the challenges posed by the pandemic over the last 18 months. We are delighted to have once again partnered with Norges Bank Investment Management on a landmark transaction for the U.S. commercial real estate market, one which we believe will create strong value in the years to come." The acquisition underscores MIM's and NBIM's focus on sustainability. One Memorial Drive received LEED silver certification from the U.S. Green Building Council in 2017. MIM plans to build on past efforts to create an even more sustainable and healthy workplace. One Memorial Drive will be included in MIM's MetZero program which uses a Carbon Cascade approach to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions year over year. By reducing emissions through a combination of energy efficiency and on- and off-site renewables, One Memorial Drive will continue to align with the environmental goals of its tenants and the community. Sara Queen, head of Real Estate Equity at MetLife Investment Management, said: "We're proud to continue partnering with the team at Norges Bank Investment Management as we add high-quality office properties that will generate value over the long-term for our portfolio and our clients. The One Memorial Drive transaction reinforces our approach of targeting properties in strategic geographies and markets, as well as our commitment to environmental sustainability across our real estate portfolio." The transaction is the latest joint venture between MIM and NBIM, building on a program established in 2013 to invest in Class A office properties in key U.S. markets. The MIM and NBIM joint ventures received a 5-star rating from Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark (GRESB) last year. "One Memorial Drive reflects our continued strategy to pursue top commercial rel estate assets in highly coveted markets," added Ashleigh R. Simpson, regional head of Acquisitions and Joint Ventures at MetLife Investment Management. "Located in a city where demand for office space significantly outstrips supply, and with reliable tenants in resilient industries such as technology and life sciences, we believe One Memorial Drive will be a trophy property within our portfolio." MIM and NBIM acquired the property from Oxford Properties Group and a fund advised by J.P. Morgan Global Alternatives. MetLife Investment Management's commercial real estate platform comprises equity and debt origination and asset management capabilities across 13 offices in the U.S. and international markets, including the U.K., Japan, Korea, Chile and Mexico. MIM's total commercial real estate assets under management was $106.6 billion in gross market value as of June 30, 20211. MIM has continued to be an active investor through the Covid-19 pandemic, with $4.5 billion in acquisitions, including One Memorial Drive, since January 2020. MIM's real estate equity strategies include core, core-plus, build-to-core, value-add and opportunistic. About MetLife Investment Management MetLife Investment Management, the institutional asset management business of MetLife, Inc. (NYSE: MET), is a global public fixed income, private capital and real estate investment manager providing tailored investment solutions to institutional investors worldwide. MetLife Investment Management provides public and private pension plans, insurance companies, endowments, funds and other institutional clients with a range of bespoke investment and financing solutions that seek to meet a range of long-term investment objectives and risk-adjusted returns over time. MetLife Investment Management has over 150 years of investment experience and as of June 30, 2021 had $666.7 billion in total assets under management.2 About MetLife MetLife, Inc. (NYSE: MET), through its subsidiaries and affiliates (MetLife), is one of the world's leading financial services companies, providing insurance, annuities, employee benefits and asset management to help its individual and institutional customers navigate their changing world. Founded in 1868, MetLife has operations in more than 40 markets globally and holds leading positions in the United States, Japan, Latin America, Asia, Europe and the Middle East. For more information, visit www.metlife.com. About Norges Bank Investment Management Norges Bank Investment Management is the asset management division of Norges Bank, the Norwegian central bank. As manager of the Government Pension Fund Global, its mission is to safeguard and build financial wealth for future generations in Norway. Norges Bank Investment Management aims for the highest possible long-term return within the investment mandate set by the Norwegian Ministry of Finance. The fund is invested globally in equity, fixed income, and real assets and had investments worth 11,673 billion Norwegian kroner as at 30 June, 2021. Forward-Looking Statements The forward-looking statements in this news release, such as "believe," "continue," "generate," "long-term," "plans," "provides," remain," "seek," and "will," are based on assumptions and expectations that involve risks and uncertainties, including the "Risk Factors" MetLife, Inc. describes in its U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings. MetLife's future results could differ, and it has no obligation to correct or update any of these statements. Endnotes 1 As of June 30, 2021. At estimated fair value. Represents the value of all commercial mortgage loans and real estate equity managed by MIM, presented on the basis of gross market value (inclusive of encumbering debt). 2 Total assets under management is comprised of all MetLife general account and separate account assets and unaffiliated/third party assets, at estimated fair value, managed by MIM. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005697/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] MetroNet Announces Grand Opening of Davenport and Surrounding Cities MetroNet today celebrated the grand opening of the Davenport storefront as the fiber optic company is busy connecting homes and businesses across the Iowa community. MetroNet, the nation's largest independently owned, 100 percent fiber optic provider, continues to make progress through the community's fully funded, multi-million infrastructure build, which began in 2019 and kicked off the overall construction in the Quad Cities region. The MetroNet Davenport storefront is located at 902 W. Kimberly Rd., Suite 7, and is only steps away from local businesses like Flowers by Jerri and Video Games ETC!. The storefront will allow customers to learn more about the 100 percent fiber optic connections to their home or business with incredible bandwidth, allowing for faster symmetrical speeds. "The City of Davenport is excited celebrate this next milestone with MetroNet," said Mayor Mike Matson. "MetroNet has provided Davenport businesses and residents with access to a future-proofed network and more choice." Customers in serviceable areas of the Quad Cities region may begin visiting the storefront immediately to learn more about MetroNet and sign up for services including symmetrical gigabit fiber internet, phone and television. Online resources are also available at etroNetInc.com. "We are thrilled to announce the official grand opening of MetroNet in Davenport and to provide residents and businesses alike with access to a future-proof, 100 percent fiber optic network," said MetroNet Director of Business Development/Government Relations Kathy Scheller. "Davenport, along with each of the communities represented here today, continues to be incredible to work with on this important initiative, and we are excited to provide service options that will support continued economic development in the Quad Cities." MetroNet provides cities like Davenport with a symmetrical 100 percent fiber optic network that allows businesses and residents to have access to the fastest internet speeds available in a time when access to reliable internet is a necessity. Currently, the rapidly growing company serves more than 120 communities across 12 states. About MetroNet: MetroNet is the nation's largest independently owned, 100 percent fiber optic company headquartered in Evansville, Indiana. The customer-focused company provides cutting-edge fiber optic communication services, including high-speed Fiber Internet, full-featured Fiber Phone (News - Alert) , and Fiber IPTV with a wide variety of programming. MetroNet started in 2005 with one fiber optic network in Greencastle, Indiana, and has since grown to serving and constructing networks in more than 120 communities across Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Virginia, Texas and Wisconsin. MetroNet is committed to bringing state-of-the-art telecommunication services to communities - services that are comparable or superior to those offered in large metropolitan areas. MetroNet has been named in the top 50 small and medium companies on Glassdoor and has been honored with a Glassdoor Employees' Choice Award recognizing MetroNet among the Best Places to Work in 2020. MetroNet has been recognized by PC Mag as one of the Top 10 Fastest ISPs in North Central United States in 2020 and Top 10 ISPs with Best Gaming Quality Index in 2021. Broadband Now has recognized MetroNet as the Top 3 Fastest Internet Providers and Fastest Fiber Providers in the Nation in 2020, and #1 Fastest Mid-Sized Internet Provider in two states in 2020. In 2020, MetroNet was awarded the Vectren Energy Safe Digging Partner Award from Vectren. For more information, visit www.MetroNetinc.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005600/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] MPI America Inc. Agrees to Acquire Celadon Systems Inc. SAN JOSE, Calif. , Aug. 26, 2021 /CNW/ -- MPI America Inc, a wholly owned subsidiary of MPI Corporation Taiwan, and recognized globally as a leader in semiconductor test, is pleased to announce that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Celadon Systems Inc, the market leader in ultra-high performance semiconductor test probe cards. The purchase of Celadon Systems will advance MPI's presence in the wafer test marketplace and is a continuation of demonstrated market leadership in developing numerous innovations while serving customers in all aspects of the semiconductor wafer test market. The acquisition is expected to be completed early September, 2021, subject to the satisfaction of customary closing conditions. "We have recognized the work of the Celadon team over many years now," says Rob Carter, President of MPI America Inc., "and are honored to include their prowess to the MPI offering. With the cross-pollination of technologies and talent, we are providing an even higher level of value to our combined clientele. Together, we are focused on market needs with the products and services that make our customers even more competitive." "After years of successfully partnering to find solutions to our customers' most demanding challenges, the Celadon Team is excited to now join the highly respected industry leader, MPI Corporation family and more specifically MPI America, Inc.", says Karen Armendariz, President and CEO of Celadon Systems, "There is a natural fit and synergy between our organizations, from our core competence to our product catalogs. Both cmpanies are dedicated to serving our customers and together we will bring forward the complete solution our customers have always desired." As the founders and owners, Bryan and Valerie Root added "We wanted to find a buyer that would complement Celadon's admired company culture and customer focused values as well as build on its' successful growth. Knowing the folks at MPI for as many years as we have, it is an easy fit as we transition to our next phase in life." About MPI Corporation Founded in 1995 and headquartered in Hsinchu, Taiwan, MPI Corporation is a global technology leader in Semiconductor, Light Emitting Diode (LED), Photo Detectors, Lasers, Materials Research, Aerospace, Automotive, Fiber Optic, Electronic Components and more. MPI's four main business sectors include Probe Card, Photonics Automation, Advanced Semiconductor Test and Thermal Divisions. MPI products range from various advanced probe card technologies, probers, testers, material handlers, inspection and thermal air systems. Many of these products are accompanied by state-of-the-art Calibration and Test & Measurement software suites. The diversification of product portfolio and industries allows a healthy environment for employee growth and retention. Cross pollination of product technologies allows each new innovation to provide differentiation in areas that are meaningful to our precious customer base. For more information please visit: www.mpi-corporation.com About Celadon Systems Inc. Celadon Systems, Inc., The Home of Peace of Mind Probing, was founded 1997 by Bryan and Valerie Root and is headquartered in Burnsville, Minnesota. Celadon Systems is focused on the design and manufacturing of advanced probe card solutions and high-performance cables. Celadon Systems is a global leader in parametric test, wafer level reliability, modeling, characterization, cryogenic applications, and high-power probe cards for the semiconductor industry. As an industry leading, on-wafer probing solutions provider, Celadon's reputation for delivering ultra-high performance probe cards that thrive in extreme temperatures is unparalleled. Celadon seeks to enrich the lives of our customers, employees, and community partners by offering a challenging, inspiring, and empowering environment that drives strong and profitable growth. For more information, please visit: www.celadonsystems.com View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/mpi-america-inc-agrees-to-acquire-celadon-systems-inc-301363906.html SOURCE MPI Corporation [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Paine Schwartz Creates New Platform with Investment in Registrar Corp, the Leading Provider of Supply Chain Compliance Software and Services SAN MATEO, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Paine Schwartz Partners, a global leader in sustainable food chain investing, today announced a new platform investment by Paine Schwartz Food Chain Fund V ("Fund V") in Registrar Corp ("Registrar" or the "Company"), a leading provider of supply chain compliance software and services to domestic and foreign food & beverage, medical device, pharmaceutical, and cosmetic customers. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Founded in 2003 and headquartered in Hampton, Virginia, Registrar is the category leader in tech-enabled supply chain compliance for highly regulated and life sustaining markets. The Company leverages proprietary software and automation to facilitate the flow of essential trade, removing regulatory friction through providing data-driven visibility into, and assurance for, global supply chains at scale. Registrar operates 19 worldwide offices and serves 30,000+ customers across 175 countries who rely on the Company's solutions to ensure compliance with recurring FDA requirements. Co-Founders Thomas Fass and David Lennarz will continue leading the business. Registrar offers solutions in three key areas: US Agent, FDA Registration, and FDA Compliance: Registrar is the leading provider of global FDA-related compliance and supply chain assurance solutions across food, medical devices, pharmaceuticals, and cosmetics. Registrar is the leading provider of global FDA-related compliance and supply chain assurance solutions across food, medical devices, pharmaceuticals, and cosmetics. Compliance Monitor: SaaS-solution that leverages Registrar's extensive regulatory database to evaluate and control supplier risk, allowing users to quickly demonstrate compliance with the FSVP and internal controls. SaaS-solution that leverages Registrar's extensive regulatory database to evaluate and control supplier risk, allowing users to quickly demonstrate compliance with the FSVP and internal controls. Online Training: Registrar is a leading provider of asynchronous online food safety certification courses, offering a low cost and flexible alternative to live in-person regulatory-mandated training. This strategic investment builds on Paine Schwartz's successful track record of investing in supply chin and regulatory compliance-based products and services, including Sterilex and FoodChain ID. "We are excited about this investment from Paine Schwartz, which we believe will usher in our next phase of success," said David Lennarz. "Thanks to the efforts of our team, we are proud to be the first touchpoint in the export compliance process and a trusted partner to our valued customers who have built their legal and regulatory compliance practices around our solutions." "We are poised to reach new levels of growth by expanding our core agent and registration business, ramping up our tech-enabled compliance and training businesses, extending our compliance solutions, and capitalizing on disciplined M&A opportunities," added Thomas Fass. "Paine Schwartz brings significant experience across the supply chain, a focus on safety and compliance that aligns with our values, and the resources to help us achieve our goals. Together with the Paine Schwartz team, we will continue building out our offerings, growing our customer base, and expanding our leading market share." Angelos Dassios, Chief Investment Officer of Paine Schwartz, said, "We are pleased to establish a new investment platform with Registrar, the clear leader in FDA-related compliance solutions. Food safety and compliance have long been an investment thesis for Paine Schwartz. With increasingly stringent regulatory and compliance environments, growing supply chain complexity, and a more robust and global trade landscape, the demand for Registrar's services continues to increase. Thomas, David, and their team have built a strong business with loyal customers and multiple avenues for growth. We look forward to working with them to capture the significant opportunities ahead." Baird served as the financial advisor and Morrison & Foerster LLP as legal counsel to Paine Schwartz Partners on the acquisition. About Registrar Corp Registrar Corp was founded in 2003 to help businesses comply with U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations. Since opening its headquarters in Hampton, Virginia, USA, Registrar Corp has expanded to 19 worldwide offices and serves more than 30,000 companies across 175 countries. Employees include former U.S. FDA officials, scientists, and industry experts. About Paine Schwartz Partners A global leader in sustainable food chain investing, Paine Schwartz Partners is a private equity firm focused exclusively on investment opportunities in the fast-growing, dynamic global food and agribusiness sectors. The firm's investment, operations and finance professionals invest throughout cycles across the food and agribusiness value chain, and bring a collaborative and active management approach to portfolio companies. For further information, please see www.paineschwartz.com. Contacts: Andy Brimmer / Aaron Palash Joele Frank, Wilkinson Brimmer Katcher +1 212-355-4449 View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/paine-schwartz-creates-new-platform-with-investment-in-registrar-corp-the-leading-provider-of-supply-chain-compliance-software-and-services-301363966.html SOURCE Paine Schwartz Partners [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Bertram Capital Completes Sale of Registrar Corp FOSTER CITY, Calif., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Bertram Capital ("Bertram") announced today the completion of the sale of Registrar Corp ("Registrar" or "the Company") to Paine Schwartz Partners, a private equity firm specializing in sustainable food chain investing. Registrar, headquartered in Hampton, VA, is a leading provider of U.S. Food and Drug Administration ("FDA") compliance software and services to food, medical device, drug, and cosmetic facilities all over the world. The transaction represents Bertram's 18th exit since its launch in 2006. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. "Registrar represented the perfect intersection of a growing market, an excellent leadership team, and an opportunity to fully deploy our Bertram High 5 strategy. We leveraged the capabilities of our in-house IT services team, Bertram Labs, completed six strategic add-on acquisitions and expanded the overall market opportunity for the Company," said Tom Beerle, Partner at Bertram Capital. "David Lennarz, Tommy Fass and the talented team at Registrar have been outstanding partners. Working together, we built a scalable, industry-leading platform that is poised for continued success." Since Bertram's investment in Registrar, the Company has invested heavily in the development of the Compliance Monitor, an advanced compliance software solution for importers, retailers, and manufacturers. In addition, the Company has become one of the leading online food safety training providers in the industry, offering self-paced, asynchronous courses, including the only PCQI and FSSC fully online certified courses in the market. "Te Bertram team, led by Tom Beerle, was the right partner at the right time for Registrar. They delivered what they promised to deliver to help support our growth initiatives," said David Lennarz, Co-Founder and President of Registrar Corp. He added, "Not only did Bertram bring exceptional technology talent in the form of Bertram Labs, but they also helped us strategically grow the business to become a meaningful platform by supporting our team through targeted acquisitions, new product development initiatives and key hires." Bertram would like to acknowledge the banking team at Houlihan Lokey, led by Ranon Kent and Casey Schwartz, for their work on this successful transaction. About Registrar Corp Registrar Corp was founded in 2003 to help businesses comply with U.S. FDA regulations. Since opening its headquarters in Hampton, Virginia, USA, Registrar Corp has expanded to eighteen international offices and annually assists over 30,000 companies in more than 175 countries around the world. Employees include former U.S. FDA officials, scientists, and industry experts. Registrar Corp offers FDA compliance assistance for the food and beverage, medical device, drugs, cosmetics, electronics, and tobacco industries. Visit www.registrarcorp.com for more information. About Bertram Capital Bertram Capital is a private equity firm targeting investments in lower middle market companies. Since its inception in 2006, the firm has raised over $2.2B of capital commitments. In addition to supplying strategic growth capital, Bertram Capital leverages proprietary processes and services, Bertram High-5sm and Bertram Labs, to empower its portfolio companies to unlock their full business potential. The Bertram High-5sm is an operationally-focused value creation strategy, which includes management augmentation, operational initiative implementation, complementary business acquisition, sales and marketing improvements, and leveraging technology and IP. The cornerstone of this strategy is Bertram Labs, its in-house technology team, which seeks to drive growth and value through digital marketing, e-commerce, big data and analytics, application development, and internal and external platform optimization. Visit www.bcap.com for more information. View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/bertram-capital-completes-sale-of-registrar-corp-301363981.html SOURCE Bertram Capital [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Navitas Highlights Next-Generation Semiconductor Growth at Jefferies Investor Summit DUBLIN, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Navitas Semiconductor ("the Company" or "Navitas"), the industry leader in GaN power integrated circuits ("ICs"), announced participation in Jefferies' high-caliber 'Semiconductor, IT Hardware & Communications Infrastructure Summit'. Navitas recently announced a proposed business combination with Live Oak Acquisition Corp. II ("Live Oak II") (NYSE: LOKB), a publicly-traded special-purpose acquisition company. Jefferies is serving as a co-financial advisor, PIPE placement agent and capital markets advisor to Navitas in connection with the proposed business combination. "We're tapping into a $13 billion GaN electrification opportunity." Gene Sheridan , Navitas CEO Gallium nitride (GaN) is a next-generation semiconductor technology that runs up to 20x faster than legacy silicon, and enables up to 3x more power and 3x faster charging in half the size and weight. Navitas' GaNFast power ICs integrate GaN power and drive plus protection and control to deliver simple, small, fast and efficient performance. With over 130 patents issued or pending, and significant trade secrets including a proprietary process design kit (PDK), Navitas believes it has a multi-year lead in next-generation GaN power ICs. "The Jefferies 'Semiconductor, IT Hardware & Communications Infrastructure Summit' offers investors the opportunity to meet with the leadership of innovative companies at the forefront of each of these key sectors," said Mark Lipacis, Managing Director at Jefferies. The conference will be virtual, and held on August 31st September 1st. To participate, and to arrange 1-on-1 meetings, please contact Isabel Zakoscielny, at izakoscielny@jefferies.com. "We have already shipped over 25 million GaNFast power ICs to tier-1 companies including Dell, Lenovo, Xiaomi, LG and OPPO, and now have high-power partnerships with Enphase for solar and Brusa for EV markets," noted Navitas co-founder and CEO Gene Sheridan. "We're tapping into a $13 billion GaN electrification opportunity and are grateful to Jefferies for this platform to meet with future-thinking investors." About Jefferies Jefferies Financial Group Inc. is a diversified financial services company engaged in investment banking and capital markets, asset management and direct investing. Jefferies Group LLC, our wholly owned subsidiary, is the largest independent, global, full-service investment banking firm headquartered in the U.S. Focused on serving clients for nearly 60 years, Jefferies is a leader in providing insight, expertise and execution to investors, companies, and governments. Our firm provides a full range of investment banking, advisory, sales and trading, research, and wealth management services across all products in the Americas, Europe, and Asia. Jefferies' Leucadia Asset Management division is a growing alternative asset management platform. About Navitas Navitas Semiconductor Limited is the industry leader in GaN power IC's, founded in 2014. Navitas has a strong and growing team of power semiconductor industry experts with a combined 300 years of experience in materials, devices, applications, systems and marketing, plus a proven record of innovation with over 200 patents among its founders. GaN power ICs integrate GaN power with drive, control and protection to enable faster carging, higher power density and greater energy savings for mobile, consumer, enterprise, eMobility and new energy markets. Over 130 Navitas patents are issued or pending, and over 25 million GaNFast power ICs have been shipped with zero reported GaN field failures. On May 7th, 2021, Navitas announced plans to "Go Public at an Enterprise Value of $1.04 Billion via Live Oak II (NYSE: LOKB) SPAC Business Combination." Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward Looking Statements The information in this press release includes "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "Securities Act"), and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. All statements, other than statements of present or historical fact included in this press release, regarding the proposed transaction, the ability of the parties to consummate the transaction, the benefits of the transaction and the combined company's future financial performance, as well as the combined company's strategy, future operations, estimated financial position, estimated revenues and losses, projections of market opportunity and market share, projected costs, prospects, plans and objectives of management are forward-looking statements. When used in this press release, the words "could," "should," "will," "may," "believe," "anticipate," "intend," "estimate," "plan," "seek," "expect," "project," "forecast," the negative of such terms and other similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements, although not all forward-looking statements contain such identifying words. Live Oak II and Navitas caution you that the forward-looking statements contained in this press release are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, including the possibility that the expected growth of Navitas' business will not be realized, or will not be realized within the expected time period, due to, among other things: (i) Navitas' goals and strategies, future business development, financial condition and results of operations; (ii) Navitas' customer relationships and ability to retain and expand these customer relationships; (iii) Navitas' ability to accurately predict future revenues for the purpose of appropriately budgeting and adjusting Navitas' expenses; (iv) Navitas' ability to diversify its customer base and develop relationships in new markets; (v) the level of demand in Navitas' customers' end markets; (vi) Navitas' ability to attract, train and retain key qualified personnel; (vii) changes in trade policies, including the imposition of tariffs; (viii) the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Navitas' business, results of operations and financial condition; (ix) the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the global economy; (x) the ability of Navitas to maintain compliance with certain U.S. Government contracting requirements; (xi) regulatory developments in the United States and foreign countries; and (xii) Navitas' ability to protect its intellectual property rights. Forward-looking statements are also subject to additional risks and uncertainties, including (i) changes in domestic and foreign business, market, financial, political and legal conditions; (ii) the inability of the parties to successfully or timely consummate the proposed transaction, including the risk that any required regulatory approvals are not obtained, are delayed or are subject to unanticipated conditions that could adversely affect the combined company or the expected benefits of the proposed transaction or that the approval of the stockholders of Live Oak II is not obtained; (iii) the outcome of any legal proceedings that may be instituted against Live Oak II or Navitas following announcement of the proposed transaction; (iv) the risk that the proposed transaction disrupts Live Oak II's or Navitas' current plans and operations as a result of the announcement of the proposed transaction; (v) costs related to the proposed transaction; (vi) failure to realize the anticipated benefits of the proposed transaction; (vii) risks relating to the uncertainty of the projected financial information with respect to Navitas; (viii) risks related to the rollout of Navitas' business and the timing of expected business milestones; (ix) the effects of competition on Navitas' business; (x) the amount of redemption requests made by Live Oak II's public stockholders; (xi) the ability of Live Oak II or the combined company to issue equity or equity-linked securities in connection with the proposed transaction or in the future; and (xii) those factors discussed in Live Oak II's registration statement on Form S-4 (File No. 333-256880) (the "Registration Statement") filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC") and Live Oak II's final prospectus filed with the SEC on December 4, 2020 under the heading "Risk Factors" and other documents of Live Oak II filed, or to be filed, with the SEC. If any of the risks described above materialize or our assumptions prove incorrect, actual results could differ materially from the results implied by our forward-looking statements. There may be additional risks that neither Live Oak II nor Navitas presently know or that Live Oak II and Navitas currently believe are immaterial that could also cause actual results to differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements. In addition, forward-looking statements reflect Live Oak II's and Navitas' expectations, plans or forecasts of future events and views as of the date of this press release. Live Oak II and Navitas anticipate that subsequent events and developments will cause Live Oak II's and Navitas' assessments to change. However, while Live Oak II and Navitas may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, Live Oak II and Navitas specifically disclaim any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing Live Oak II's and Navitas' assessments as of any date subsequent to the date of this press release. Accordingly, undue reliance should not be placed upon the forward-looking statements. Important Information and Where to Find It In connection with the proposed transaction, Live Oak II has filed the Registration Statement with the SEC, which includes a proxy statement/prospectus of Live Oak II. Live Oak II also plans to file other documents and relevant materials with the SEC regarding the proposed transaction. After the Registration Statement has been cleared by the SEC, a definitive proxy statement/prospectus will be mailed to the stockholders of Live Oak II. SECURITYHOLDERS OF LIVE OAK II AND NAVITAS ARE URGED TO READ THE PROXY STATEMENT/PROSPECTUS (INCLUDING ALL AMENDMENTS AND SUPPLEMENTS THERETO) AND OTHER DOCUMENTS AND RELEVANT MATERIALS RELATING TO THE PROPOSED TRANSACTION THAT WILL BE FILED WITH THE SEC CAREFULLY AND IN THEIR ENTIRETY WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE BEFORE MAKING ANY VOTING DECISION WITH RESPECT TO THE PROPOSED TRANSACTION BECAUSE THEY WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT THE PROPOSED TRANSACTION AND THE PARTIES TO THE PROPOSED TRANSACTION. Stockholders will be able to obtain free copies of the proxy statement/prospectus and other documents containing important information about Live Oak II and Navitas once such documents are filed with the SEC through the website maintained by the SEC at http://www.sec.gov. Participants in the Solicitation Live Oak II and its directors and executive officers may be deemed to be participants in the solicitation of proxies from the stockholders of Live Oak II in connection with the proposed transaction. Navitas and its officers and directors may also be deemed participants in such solicitation. Securityholders may obtain more detailed information regarding the names, affiliations and interests of certain of Live Oak II's executive officers and directors in the solicitation by reading Live Oak II's Annual Report on Form 10-K filed with the SEC on March 25, 2021 and the proxy statement/prospectus and other relevant materials filed with the SEC in connection with the proposed transaction when they become available. Information concerning the interests of Live Oak II's participants in the solicitation, which may, in some cases, be different than those of Live Oak II's stockholders generally, will be set forth in the proxy statement/prospectus relating to the proposed transaction when it becomes available. Navitas Semiconductor, GaNFast and the Navitas logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Navitas Semiconductor Limited. All other brands, product names and marks are or may be trademarks or registered trademarks used to identify products or services of their respective owners. Contact Information Stephen Oliver, VP Corporate Marketing & Investor Relations ir@navitassemi.com View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/navitas-highlights-next-generation-semiconductor-growth-at-jefferies-investor-summit-301363902.html SOURCE Navitas Semiconductor [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Access Ready Speaks Out at Maryland Election Officials Conference PINELLAS PARK, Fla., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Reporter Newsletter is a service of Access Ready Inc. which is a nonprofit cross disability advocacy organization promoting a policy of inclusion and accessibility across information technology through education and best practices. The Board of Directors of Access Ready has deemed inaccessible information technology to be a clear, growing, and present danger to the civic, economic, and social welfare of people with disabilities. Our message is a simple one, registration, validation, and voting must be a continuum of private and independent accessibility. Yes, under the law this does mean all election technology including pollbooks. We are here representing our community partners: The Image Center for People with Disabilities, The National Association of the Deaf, The National Council on Independent Living, and The National Federation of the Blind, to ask for your help. Read More MICROSOFT ACCESSIBILITY BOSS JENNY LAY-FLURRIE REFLECTS ON THREE DECADES OF THE 'LANDMARK' AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT Read More GOVERNMENT SPOTLIGHT COLORADO FIRST IN NATION TO REQUIRE WEB ACCESSIBILITY FOR GOVERNMENT To the state lawmaker who sponsored legislation for people with disabilities, the success of House Bill 21-1110 is the perfect example of why representation matters. After freshman Democratic Rep. David Ortiz of Littleton was elected in 2020, he became the first person who uses a wheelchair to serve in the Colorado General Assembly. This year, Ortiz led efforts to incorporate some federal protections for people with disabilities into state law, making it easier for them to sue the government for discrimination. ACROSS FEDERAL WORKFORCE, PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES SEE NEED FOR MORE REPRESENTATION Read More ELECTION ACCESSIBILITY Sponsored by VOTEC DISABLED VOTERS SEEK FEDERAL BULWARK AS STATES CHIP AWAY ACCESS Disabilities advocates wathing states chip away at voting opportunities are leaning on the Biden administration to make tangible strides to make voting more accessible. The federal government can do more to ensure that basic amenities like wheelchair accessible ramps are provided at polling stations or that vital election materials are translated into American Sign Language. Disabilities advocates, who recently met with Vice President Kamala Harris, are rallying in advance of draft recommendations from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) on making voting more accessible Read More MARYLAND VOTERS SUE TO PROTECT SECRET BALLOTS- NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND AND ITS MARYLAND AFFILIATE ALSO PARTIES TO LITIGATION Read More WHY SHERRI TURPIN IS ASKING THE FCC TO MAKE TELECOMMUNICATIONS 'ACCESSIBLE AND INCLUSIVE FOR ALL' Read More SWIMMER BECCA MEYERS' ORDEAL SHOWS EVEN THE PARALYMPICS DOESN'T LISTEN TO DISABLED PEOPLE Read More CURRENT LEGAL ACTIONS DOJ SETTLES WITH FLORIDA'S VOLUSIA COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT TO PROTECT STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES FROM CLASSROOM REMOVALS AND OTHER DISCRIMINATION Read More BUSINESS ACCESSIBILITY CREATING A MORE ACCESSIBLE AND INCLUSIVE WORKPLACE FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES Read More WALMART FIRED AN EMPLOYEE WITH DOWN SYNDROME WHO WORKED THERE FOR 16 YEARS. A JURY SAID IT SHOULD PAY HER $125 MILLION. Read More ACCESSIBLE HEALTHCARE BIDEN EXTENDS AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT PROTECTIONS TO COVID LONG-HAULERS Read More ACCESSIBLE TECHNOLOGY WHAT WE LEARNED ABOUT ACCESSIBILITY BY SCANNING MORE THAN 2 MILLION FEDERAL .GOV WEB PAGES The Innovation Technology Innovation Foundation recently published an accessibility analysis of federal .gov websites, but this just scratches the surface of the need for a holistic, scalable approach to digital government accessibility. ITIF scanned 72 federal websites -- plus their second- and third-most popular pages -- for issues that violated WCAG 2.0 Level A or Level AA standards. The assessment tool used was the axe DevTools browser extension, a single-page automated scan. Read More Sponsored by Commonlook Content Curation sponsored by Microassist Circulation sponsored by eReleases Contact: Douglas Towne 727-531-1000 317544@email4pr.com View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/access-ready-speaks-out-at-maryland-election-officials-conference-301363993.html SOURCE Access Ready Inc. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Evoqua Water Technologies Announces Proposed Settlement of Stockholder Derivative Action Evoqua Water Technologies Corp. (NYSE: AQUA), a leader in mission-critical water treatment solutions, today announced that on August 23, 2021, the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania entered an order preliminarily approving a settlement of the previously disclosed stockholder derivative action entitled In re Evoqua Water Technologies Corp. Derivative Litigation and scheduling a hearing for November 2, 2021, to determine whether to give final approval to the settlement. Under the settlement agreement, the company agreed to implement a series of enhanced corporate governance measures, including the replacement of a non-independent director serving on the company's Board of Directors with a new director who meets the New York Stock Exchange criteria for director independence; enhancements to the responsibilities and duties of the company's Director of Ethics and Compliance position; additions to the charter of the Compensation Committee of the Board of Directors; employee training in risk assessment andcompliance; mandatory continuing director education programs; and the establishment of a management-level Risk Committee responsible for the company's risk management policies and oversight of the operations of the company's risk management framework. A copy of the court-approved notice of the proposed settlement describing the litigation and the settlement in greater detail and specifying the procedures and deadlines for any stockholder objections is available, along with a copy of the full stipulation of settlement, on Evoqua's Investor Relations website at https://aqua.evoqua.com. About Evoqua Water Technologies Evoqua Water Technologies is a leading provider of mission-critical water and wastewater treatment solutions, offering a broad portfolio of products, services, and expertise to support industrial, municipal and recreational customers who value water. Evoqua has worked to protect water, the environment, and its employees for more than 100 years, earning a reputation for quality, safety, and reliability around the world. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the company operates in more than 160 locations across ten countries. Serving more than 38,000 customers and 200,000 installations worldwide, our employees are united by a common purpose: Transforming Water. Enriching Life. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005714/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] Rebuttal to 8/25/21 Cassava Sciences Press Release On August 18, 2021, Jordan Thomas of Labaton Sucharow filed a Citizen Petition to the FDA on behalf of our clients who collectively have expertise in neuroscience, drug discovery, biochemistry, and finance. They also hold short positions in Cassava stock. The Company responded on August 25, 2021 to the Citizen Petition with a press release in which they provided a rebuttal to the specific complaints in the Citizen Petition and denied any wrongdoing. Since the issuance of the press release, leading international experts on scientific integrity have independently validated key aspects of the Citizen Petition and have posted comments on PubPeer. On Twitter, they have critically questioned the Company's response. Notably, commenting generally on the Western blots in question-those that reportedly form the foundational data for simufilam (PTI-125) as a treatment for Alzheimer's Disease-to Retraction Watch, David Vaux, deputy director of science integrity and ethics at the Australian Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research (WEHI) stated: "It is not conceivable that features in the images (such as apparent duplications) arose due to coincidence (chance) or accident, leaving the only plausible explanation being that the images were deliberately falsified or fabricated." View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005765/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] LAIX Inc. Announces Second Quarter 2021 Unaudited Financial Results SHANGHAI, Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- LAIX Inc. ("LAIX" or the "Company") (NYSE: LAIX), an artificial intelligence (AI) company in China that creates and delivers products and services to popularize English learning, today announced its unaudited financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2021. Second Quarter 2021 Financial and Operating Highlights Net income for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB14.0 million ( US$2.2 million ), compared with a net income of RMB12.2 million for the previous quarter and a net loss of RMB92.5 million for the same quarter last year. ( ), compared with a net income of for the previous quarter and a net loss of for the same quarter last year. Gross margin for the second quarter of 2021 was 80.4%, compared with 77.6% for the previous quarter and 71.9% for the same quarter last year. Gross billings [1] for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB138.6 million ( US$21.5 million ), a 10.2% decrease from RMB154.4 million for the previous quarter and a 54.7% decrease from RMB306.2 million for the same quarter last year. for the second quarter of 2021 were ( ), a 10.2% decrease from for the previous quarter and a 54.7% decrease from for the same quarter last year. Net revenues for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB179.5 million ( US$27.8 million ), a 9.6% decrease from RMB198.5 million for the previous quarter and a 33.4% decrease from RMB269.4 million for the same quarter last year. ( ), a 9.6% decrease from for the previous quarter and a 33.4% decrease from for the same quarter last year. Sales and marketing expenses for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB88.9 million ( US$13.8 million ), a 4.3% decrease from RMB92.9 million for the previous quarter and a 55.7% decrease from RMB200.7 million for the same quarter last year. ( ), a 4.3% decrease from for the previous quarter and a 55.7% decrease from for the same quarter last year. Operating cash outflow for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB35.1 million ( US$5.4 million ), compared with RMB57.3 million for the previous quarter and RMB66.4 million for the same quarter last year. ( ), compared with for the previous quarter and for the same quarter last year. Approximately 0.2 million paying users purchased the Company's courses and services for the second quarter of 2021, compared with approximately 0.3 million paying users for the previous quarter and approximately 0.5 million paying users for the same quarter last year, primarily attributable to the Company's stringent cost control in user acquisition expenditures. [1] "Gross billings" for a certain period refer to the total amount of cash received from the sale of course packages in that period net of the total amount of cash refunds paid to users in the same period. Management Comments Dr. Yi Wang, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of LAIX, commented, "We are pleased to have achieved another solid set of quarterly results, thanks to our dedication and relentless efforts to enhance our operating leverage and improve profitability. The gross margin and net income for the second quarter 2021 further grew to 80.4% and RMB14.0 million, up from 77.6% and RMB12.2 million, respectively, in the previous quarter." "During the second quarter, our new growth initiatives, including enterprise learning services and international expansion, continued to make solid progress and are expected to drive meaningful user traffic and new revenue streams. We also remain fully committed to leveraging our proprietary AI technology and expanding product portfolio to provide superior value to all of our users while also exploring more opportunities in the non-language learning sector such as quality education and vocational education. We believe our operational strategy and diversified product portfolio will help us deliver long-term value to all stakeholders," Dr. Wang concluded. Second Quarter 2021 Financial Results Net Revenues Net revenues for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB179.5 million (US$27.8 million), a 9.6% decrease from RMB198.5 million for the previous quarter and a 33.4% decrease from RMB269.4 million for the same quarter last year. The quarter-over-quarter decrease was primarily attributable to a decrease in gross billings caused by the decrease of paying users. Cost of Revenues Cost of revenues for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB35.2 million (US$5.5 million), a 20.7% decrease from RMB44.4 million for the previous quarter and a 53.5% decrease from RMB75.6 million for the same quarter last year. The quarter-over-quarter decrease was primarily due to the decrease in salaries and welfare for full-time employees, and reduced spending on IT service fee and content-related costs. Gross Profit and Gross Margin Gross profit for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB144.3 million (US$22.3 million), a 6.4% decrease from RMB154.1 million for the previous quarter and a 25.5% decrease from RMB193.8 million for the same quarter last year. Gross margin for the second quarter of 2021 was 80.4%, compared with 77.6% for the previous quarter and 71.9% for the same quarter last year. Operating Expenses Total operating expenses for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB137.1 million (US$21.2 million), a 5.7% decrease from RMB145.4 million for the previous quarter and a 52.7% decrease from RMB289.7 million for the same quarter last year. The decreases were primarily due to the cost control strategy and improvement in operating efficiency. Sales and marketing expenses for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB88.9 million (US$13.8 million), a 4.3% decrease from RMB92.9 million for the previous quarter and a 55.7% decrease from RMB200.7 million for the same quarter last year. The decreases were primarily due to continued efforts to improve personnel management efficiency. Research and development expenses for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB26.3 million (US$4.1 million), a 22.0% decrease from RMB33.7 million for the previous quarter and a 45.8% decrease from RMB48.5 million for the same quarter last year. The decreases were primarily due to the savings in salaries and staff benefits attributable to efficiency improvement in personnel management and the decrease in share-based compensation. General and administrative expenses for the second quarter of 2021 were RMB22.0 million (US$3.4 million), a 17.2% increase from RMB18.7 million for the previous quarter and a 45.7% decrease from RMB40.5 million for the same quarter last year. The quarter-over-quarter increase was primarily due to impairment losses on gift goods and textbooks for kids in light of the potential impact by the recent regulation regarding after-school tutoring for K-12 students. (Loss)/income from Operations Income from operations for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB12.2 million (US$1.9 million), compared with an income from operations of RMB12.8 million for the previous quarter and a loss from operations of RMB95.9 million for the same quarter last year. Foreign exchange related gains/(losses), net Foreign exchange gain was RMB1.3 million (US$0.2 million) in the second quarter of 2021, compared with a foreign exchange loss of RMB0.9 million for the previous quarter and a foreign exchange gain of RMB0.1 million for the same quarter last year. Net (loss)/income Net income for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB14.0 million (US$2.2 million), compared with a net income of RMB12.2 million for the previous quarter and a net loss of RMB92.5 million for the same quarter last year. Adjusted EBITDA[2] for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB24.6 million (US$3.8 million), compared with an adjusted EBITDA of RMB25.3 million for the previous quarter and an adjusted EBITDA loss of RMB77.8 million for the same quarter last year. Adjusted net income[3] for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB19.0 million (US$2.9 million), compared with an adjusted net income of RMB19.0 million for the previous quarter and an adjusted net loss of RMB85.3 million for the same quarter last year. Basic and diluted net income per ordinary share attributable to ordinary shareholders for the second quarter of 2021 was RMB0.28 (US$0.04), compared with basic and diluted net income per ordinary share attributable to ordinary shareholders of RMB0.24 for the previous quarter and basic and diluted net loss per ordinary share attributable to ordinary shareholders of RMB1.87 for the same quarter last year. [2] "Adjusted EBITDA" is a non-GAAP measure, which represents EBITDA before share-based compensation expenses. EBITDA represents net (loss)/income before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization. See "Reconciliations of GAAP and Non-GAAP Results" at the end of this press release. [3] "Adjusted net (loss)/income" is a non-GAAP measure, which excludes share-based compensation expenses. See "Reconciliation of GAAP and Non-GAAP Results" at the end of this press release. Balance Sheet & Cashflows As of June 30, 2021, the Company's cash, cash equivalents, restricted cash and short-term investments amounted to RMB133.4 million (US$20.7 million), compared with RMB172.6 million as of March 31, 2021 and RMB229.6 million as of December 31, 2020. As of June 30, 2021, the Company's deferred revenue and long-term deferred revenue amounted to RMB638.1 million (US$98.8 million), compared with RMB687.4 million as of March 31, 2021 and RMB746.2 million as of December 31, 2020. Net cash used in operating activities were RMB35.1 million (US$5.4 million) and RMB66.4 million for the three months period ended June 30, 2021 and 2020, respectively. As of June 30, 2021, the Company's total shareholders' deficit was RMB676.3 million (US$104.7 million) and the current liabilities exceeded the current assets by RMB708.2 million (US$109.7 million). The Company's liquidity to meet its future working capital is based on its ability to enhance user engagement and retention by offering higher quality and diversified courses after the consideration of the uncertainty impacted by the recent regulation changes on education industry, while optimizing traffic acquisition strategy to efficiently control and reduce user related costs. The Company will further preserve liquidity and manage cash flows by reducing various discretionary expenditure including labor costs and other operating expenses. The Company's liquidity is also based on its ability to obtain capital financing from equity or debt investors. Currently, the Company believes that it has sufficient cash to fund operations for at least the next 12 months with the implementation of the above mentioned measures. Recent Developments Preliminary non-binding going private proposal On August 4, 2021, the board of directors of the Company (the "Board") received a preliminary non-binding proposal letter from Dr. Yi Wang, co-founder, chairman of the Board and chief executive officer of the Company, Mr. Zheren Hu, co-founder, director and chief technology officer of the Company, Dr. Hui Lin, co-founder, director and chief scientist of the Company (collectively, the "Founders"), and PCIL IV Limited (together with its affiliated investment entities, "Primavera," and together with the Founders, the "Buyer Group"), to acquire all of the outstanding ordinary shares of the Company (the "Ordinary Shares"), including the Class A ordinary shares represented by the American Depositary Shares of the Company (the "ADSs," each representing one Class A ordinary share) that are not already held by the Buyer Group for a proposed purchase price of US$1.13 per Ordinary Share or ADS in cash (the "Proposed Transaction"). On August 6, 2021, the Board formed a special committee (the "Special Committee") consisting of two independent directors, Dr. Li-Lan Cheng, who serves as the chairman of the Special Committee, and Ms. Min (Jenny) Zhang, to evaluate and consider the Proposed Transaction. On August 17, 2021, the Special Committee retained Houlihan Lokey (China) Limited as its financial advisor and Kirkland & Ellis as its U.S. legal counsel in connection with its review and evaluation of the Proposed Transactions. The Board cautions the Company's shareholders and others considering trading the Company's securities that the Special Committee is continuing its evaluation of the Proposed Transaction and other strategic alternatives of the Company and that, at this time, no decisions have been made by the Special Committee with respect to the Company's response to the Proposed Transaction. There can be no assurance that any definitive offer will be received, that any definitive agreement will be executed relating to the Proposed Transaction, or that the Proposed Transaction or any other similar transaction will be approved or consummated. The Company does not undertake any obligation to provide any updates with respect to any transaction, except as required under applicable law. New regulations regarding after-school tutoring and other relevant matters On July 24, 2021, China's official state media, including Xinhua News Agency and China Central Television, announced the Opinions on Further Alleviating the Burden of Homework and After-School Tutoring for Students in Compulsory Education (the "Opinion"), issued by the General Office of the CPC Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council. The Opinion contains high-level policy directives about requirements and restrictions related to after-school tutoring services, including, among others, (i) no approval will be granted to new institutions providing after-school tutoring services on academic subjects to students at China's compulsory education stage ("Academic AST Institutions"), existing Academic AST Institutions need to be registered as non-profit institutions, and an approval mechanism will be adopted for online Academic AST Institutions; (ii) Academic AST Institutions are prohibited from raising funds through public market or capitalization; (iii) listed companies are prohibited from raising capital to invest in Academic AST Institutions; (iv) foreign stake in Academic AST Institutions is prohibited, including through contractual arrangement. Academic AST Institutions in violation of the above restrictions need to take rectification measures. The Opinion further provides that Academic AST Institutions are prohibited from providing online tutoring services to pre-school children, or providing tutoring services on academic subjects in compulsory education during public holidays, weekends and school breaks; and Academic AST Institutions must follow the pricing guidance to be established by relevant authorities. Administration on institutions providing after-school tutoring services on academic subjects in high schools (which do not fall within China's compulsory education system) shall take into consideration the Opinion for reference. Besides, on July 29, 2021, the General Office of the Ministry of Education issued the Notice on Further Clarifying the Scope of Academic Subjects and Non-academic Subjects with respect to After-School Tutoring Services in the stage of Compulsory Education, which categorizes English tutoring services involving contents of courses contained in national curriculum standards as tutoring services on academic subjects. The Company is an artificial intelligence company in China that creates and delivers products and services to popularize English learning for all-age groups. The majority of the Company's products and services, such as English Liulishuo and Liuli Reading, are designed to target adults, mostly college students and professionals, while only a limited portion of the Company's products and services target kids of three to twelve years old ("K-12 Students"). Furthermore, the products and services the Company delivers to K-12 Students primarily aim to enhancing their reading, hearing and speaking abilities instead of providing English tutoring services on content contained in national curriculum standards. However, as the Opinion is newly issued and only provides high-level policies on Academic AST Institutions, there are substantial uncertainties as to how the Opinion will be interpreted and implemented and to what extent the Opinion would be applicable to us. The Company is closely monitoring the latest regulatory development and carefully assessing its implications on the Company's business, especially the Opinion's impact on the Company's English learning services related to K-12 Students. The Company will continue to make all necessary efforts to comply with all applicable rules and regulations, including those to be adopted following the policy directives of the Opinion and proactively seek guidance from the government authorities in this respect. About LAIX Inc. LAIX Inc. ("LAIX" or the "Company") is an artificial intelligence (AI) company in China that creates and delivers products and services to popularize English learning. Its proprietary AI teacher utilizes cutting-edge deep learning and adaptive learning technologies, big data, well-established education pedagogies and the mobile internet. LAIX believes its innovative approach fundamentally transforms learning. LAIX provides its products and services on demand via its mobile apps, primarily its flagship "English Liulishuo" mobile app launched in 2013. On the Company's platform, AI technologies are seamlessly integrated with diverse learning content incorporating well-established language learning pedagogies, gamified features and strong social elements to deliver an engaging, adaptive learning experience. LAIX provides a variety of courses inspired by a broad range of topics and culture themes to make English learning more interesting and is committed to offering a fun, interactive learning environment to motivate and engage its users. For more information, please visit: http://ir.laix.com. Use of Non-GAAP Financial Measures The Company uses adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net (loss)/income, each a non-GAAP financial measure, in evaluating its operating results and for financial and operational decision-making purposes. The Company believes that adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net (loss)/income help identify underlying trends in its business that could otherwise be distorted by the effect of certain expenses that the Company includes in (loss)/income from operations and net (loss)/income. The Company believes that adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net (loss)/income provide useful information about its results of operations, enhance the overall understanding of its past performance and future prospects and allow for greater visibility with respect to key metrics used by the management of the Company in its financial and operational decision-making. Adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net (loss)/income should not be considered in isolation or construed as an alternative to (loss)/income from operations, net (loss)/income or any other measure of performance or as an indicator of the Company's operating performance. Investors are encouraged to review the historical non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures. Adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net (loss)/income presented here may not be comparable to similarly titled measures presented by other companies. Other companies may calculate similarly titled measures differently, limiting their usefulness as comparative measures to our data. The Company encourages investors and others to review its financial information in its entirety and not rely on a single financial measure. Exchange Rate Information This announcement contains translations of certain RMB amounts into U.S. dollars at a specified rate solely for the convenience of the reader. Unless otherwise noted, all translations from Renminbi to U.S. dollars are made at a rate of RMB6.4566 to US$1.00, the rate in effect as of June 30, 2021 published by the Federal Reserve Board. Safe Harbor Statement This announcement contains forward-looking statements. These statements are made under the "safe harbor" provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements can be identified by terminology such as "will," "expects," "anticipates," "aims," "future," "intends," "plans," "believes," "estimates," "confident," "potential," "continue" or other similar expressions. Among other things, the quotations from management in this announcement, as well as LAIX's strategic and operational plans, contain forward-looking statements. LAIX may also make written or oral forward-looking statements in its periodic reports to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, in its annual report to shareholders, in press releases and other written materials and in oral statements made by its officers, directors or employees to third parties. Statements that are not historical facts, including but not limited to statements about LAIX's beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties, and a variety of factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement, including but not limited to the following: LAIX's goals and strategies; LAIX's future business development, results of operations and financial condition; the expected growth of the education market; LAIX's ability to monetize the user base; fluctuations in general economic and business conditions in China; PRC governmental policies, laws and regulations relating to the Company's industry; the potential impact of the COVID-19 to LAIX's business operations and the economy in China and elsewhere generally; and assumptions underlying or related to any of the foregoing. Further information regarding these and other risks is included in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. All information provided in this press release and in the attachments is as of the date of the press release, and the Company undertakes no duty to update such information, except as required under applicable law. For investor and media inquiries, please contact: LAIX Inc. Investor Relations Email: ir@laix.com The Piacente Group Investor Relations Brandi Piacente Tel: +1-212-481-2050 Email: liulishuo@tpg-ir.com Emilie Wu Tel: +86-21-6039-8363 Email: liulishuo@tpg-ir.com LAIX INC. UNAUDITED CONSOLIDATED BALANCE SHEETS (Amount in thousands of Renminbi ("RMB") and US dollars ("US$")) As of As of December 31, 2020 June 30, 2021 RMB RMB US$ ASSETS Current assets: Cash and cash equivalents 137,996 118,991 18,429 Restricted cash 511 551 85 Short-term investments 91,049 13,907 2,154 Accounts receivable, net 5,892 4,916 761 Prepayments and other current assets 58,272 40,729 6,308 Total current assets 293,720 179,094 27,737 Non-current assets: Property and equipment, net 30,074 23,808 3,687 Investment in equity fund 5,711 5,654 876 Intangible assets, net 14,341 10,751 1,665 Operating lease right-of-use assets, net 82,488 55,605 8,612 Other non-current assets 5,866 4,779 740 Deferred tax assets 13,547 13,547 2,098 Total non-current assets 152,027 114,144 17,678 Total assets 445,747 293,238 45,415 LIABILITIES Current liabilities: Accounts payable 83,576 65,632 10,165 Deferred revenue 689,325 599,262 92,814 Salary and welfare payable 132,433 96,253 14,908 Tax payable 77,327 78,745 12,196 Operating lease liability, current 31,845 25,974 4,023 Accrued liabilities and other current liabilities 19,382 21,468 3,324 Total current liabilities 1,033,888 887,334 137,430 Non-current liabilities: Deferred revenue, non-current 56,905 38,862 6,019 Operating lease liability, non-current 56,903 34,744 5,381 Other non-current liabilities 10,614 8,551 1,324 Total non-current liabilities 124,422 82,157 12,724 Total liabilities 1,158,310 969,491 150,154 Shareholders' deficit Class A Ordinary shares 212 214 33 Class B Ordinary shares 121 121 19 Subscriptions Receivable from shareholders (201) (299) (46) Treasury Stock (15,327) (15,327) (2,374) Additional paid-in capital 1,198,852 1,211,305 187,607 Accumulated other comprehensive income 10,256 8,032 1,244 Accumulated deficit (1,906,476) (1,880,299) (291,222) Total shareholders' deficit (712,563) (676,253) (104,739) Total liabilities and shareholders' deficit 445,747 293,238 45,415 LAIX INC. UNAUDITED CONSOLIDATED STATEMENTS OF COMPREHENSIVE (LOSS)/INCOME (Amount in thousands of Renminbi ("RMB") and US dollars ("US$") except for number of shares and per share data) Three months ended Six months ended June 30 March 31 June 30 June 30 June 30 2020 2021 2021 2020 2021 RMB RMB RMB US$ RMB RMB US$ Net revenues 269,405 198,544 179,464 27,795 497,743 378,008 58,546 Cost of revenues (75,646) (44,418) (35,205) (5,453) (154,445) (79,623) (12,332) Gross profit 193,759 154,126 144,259 22,342 343,298 298,385 46,214 Operating expenses: Sales and marketing expenses (200,726) (92,926) (88,899) (13,769) (465,466) (181,825) (28,161) Research and development expenses (48,482) (33,710) (26,280) (4,070) (107,701) (59,990) (9,291) General and administrative expenses (40,461) (18,741) (21,958) (3,401) (62,600) (40,699) (6,303) Total operating expenses (289,669) (145,377) (137,137) (21,240) (635,767) (282,514) (43,755) Other operating income 25 4,097 5,072 786 43 9,169 1,420 (Loss)/income from operations (95,885) 12,846 12,194 1,888 (292,426) 25,040 3,879 Other income/(expenses): Interest income/(expenses) 366 (1,430) (1,159) (180) 1,049 (2,589) (401) Foreign exchange related gains/(losses), net 140 (948) 1,317 204 (2,179) 369 57 Change in fair value of short-term investment 806 29 4 1 1,323 33 5 Investment income - 493 771 119 - 1,264 196 Other income, net 2,098 1,169 971 150 2,780 2,140 331 (Loss)/income before income taxes expenses (92,475) 12,159 14,098 2,182 (289,453) 26,257 4,067 Income tax expenses (28) - (80) (12) (57) (80) (12) Net (loss)/income (92,503) 12,159 14,018 2,170 (289,510) 26,177 4,055 Net (loss)/income attributable to LAIX Inc.'s ordinary shareholders (92,503) 12,159 14,018 2,170 (289,510) 26,177 4,055 LAIX INC. UNAUDITED CONSOLIDATED STATEMENTS OF COMPREHENSIVE (LOSS)/INCOME (Amount in thousands of Renminbi ("RMB") and US dollars ("US$") except for number of shares and per share data) Three months ended Six months ended June 30 March 31 June 30 June 30 June 30 2020 2021 2021 2020 2021 RMB RMB RMB US$ RMB RMB US$ Net (loss)/income (92,503) 12,159 14,018 2,170 (289,510) 26,177 4,055 Other comprehensive (loss)/income Foreign currency translation adjustment, net of nil tax (385) 1,049 (3,273) (507) 6,391 (2,224) (344) Comprehensive (loss)/income (92,888) 13,208 10,745 1,663 (283,119) 23,953 3,711 Net (loss)/income per Class A and Class B ordinary shares Basic (1.87) 0.24 0.28 0.04 (5.87) 0.53 0.08 Diluted (1.87) 0.24 0.28 0.04 (5.87) 0.52 0.08 Weighted average number of Class A and Class B ordinary shares used in per share calculation Basic 49,337,462 49,637,358 50,053,539 50,053,539 49,348,103 49,846,690 49,846,690 Diluted 49,337,462 50,242,298 50,242,183 50,242,183 49,348,103 50,243,482 50,243,482 LAIX INC. Reconciliation of GAAP and Non-GAAP Results (Amount in thousands of Renminbi ("RMB") and US dollars("US$") except for percentage data) Three months ended Six months ended June 30 2020 March 31 2021 June 30 2021 June 30 2020 June 30 2021 RMB RMB RMB US$ RMB RMB US$ Net (loss)/income (92,503) 12,159 14,018 2,170 (289,510) 26,177 4,055 Add: Share-based compensation expenses 7,241 6,882 5,023 778 15,015 11,905 1,844 Depreciation of property, plant and equipment 7,781 4,859 4,365 676 15,128 9,224 1,429 Income tax expenses 28 - 80 12 57 80 12 Subtract: Interest (income)/expenses (366) 1,430 1,159 180 (1,049) 2,589 401 Adjusted EBITDA (77,819) 25,330 24,645 3,816 (260,359) 49,975 7,741 Net (loss)/income (92,503) 12,159 14,018 2,170 (289,510) 26,177 4,055 Add back: Share-based compensation expenses 7,241 6,882 5,023 778 15,015 11,905 1,844 Adjusted net (loss)/income (85,262) 19,041 19,041 2,948 (274,495) 38,082 5,899 View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/laix-inc-announces-second-quarter-2021-unaudited-financial-results-301363414.html SOURCE LAIX Inc. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [August 26, 2021] CW Bancorp Quarterly Cash Dividend CW Bancorp (OTCQX: CWBK), the parent company of CommerceWest Bank announced the approval of a quarterly cash dividend by its Board of Directors. The Board of Directors declared a cash dividend of $0.20 per common share, payable October 1, 2021 to shareholders of record on September 10, 2021. CommerceWest Bank is a California based full service business bank with a unique vision and culture of focusing exclusively on the business community by delivering on customized products and services. Founded in 2001 and headquartered in Irvine, California, the Bank serves businesses throughout the state of California. We provide a wide range of commercial banking services, including, remote deposit solution, online banking, mobile banking, lines of credit, M&A / working capital loans, commercial real estate loans, SBA loans and treasury management services. Mission Statement: CommerceWest Bank will create a complete banking experience for each client, catering to businesses and their specific banking needs, while accommodating our clients and providing them high-quality, low stress and personally tailored banking and financial services. Please visit www.cwbk.com to learn more about the bank. "BANK ON (News - Alert) THE DIFFERENCE" Statements concerning future performance, developments or events, expectations for growth and income forecasts, and any other guidance on future periods, constitute forward-looking statements that are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from stated expectations. Specific factors include, but are not limited to, loan production, balance sheet management, expanded net interest margin, the ability to control costs and expenses, interest rate changes, financial policies of the United States government and general economic conditions. The Company disclaims any obligation to update any such factors or to publicly announce the results of any revisions to any forward-looking statements contained in this release to reflect future events or developments. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210826005772/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] a61422 TULLAHOMA, Tenn. Guardsmen from the Tennessee National Guard and Active Duty Soldiers from Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, trained and competed against each other at the Tennessee National Guards Adjutant General Match, Aug. 20-22, at Tullahomas Volunteer Training Site. The TAG Match, hosted and organized by the Tennessee Combat Marksmanship Program, is a training exercise and competition testing marksmanship proficiency and providing valuable training for Guardsmen. This weekend focused on pistol marksmanship with the rifle match held this past July. Capt. Andrew Hahn, the commander of A Company, 795th Military Police Battalion, headquartered at Fort Leonard Wood, was previously a member of the Tennessee National Guard up until 2017, when he transitioned to Active Duty. His company trains new recruits to become Military Policemen for the Active Army, National Guard, and Reserves. Hahn brought four members of his unit, all of which are drill sergeants, to compete with the Tennessee National Guard. The Tennessee Guard has some very proficient shooters, said Hahn. Training with experts in their field naturally develops us and pushes us to be better going forward. Hahn has experience as part of the Tennessee Combat Marksmanship Program during his time with the Tennessee Guard. He competed with the team regularly from 2011 to 2017. He knows this training is valuable for his Soldiers. We train more than 2,300 new Soldiers every year, said Hahn. Learning new techniques and challenging ourselves with new skillsets will have a great impact on the quality of training we are able to provide for new recruits entering the Army. The team from the 795th Military Police Battalion performed well all weekend; however, the Tennessee National Guards 117th Regimental Training Institute, headquartered in Smyrna, took first place honors, just as they did at the rifle competition back in June. A member of the 117th, Staff Sgt. Sean Hart, took home first place honors in the individual competition. He also won first place at the rifle competition. Training with the Guard gives great perspective for our team, said Hahn. Learning in an environment like this gives us ideas for new techniques we can implement with our staff back at Fort Leonard Wood; and thats really invaluable to our whole operation. We will 100% come back again given the opportunity. The purpose of the Tennessee Combat Marksmanship Program is to promote skills and training at all levels of the Tennessee National Guard. Members who compete in these competitions are subject matter experts in the marksmanship field and take these valuable skills back to their units to train other Soldiers and improve marksmanship across the state. All in all, it was a great weekend of training and competition in Tullahoma, said Master Sgt. Michael Brumer, State Marksmanship Coordinator. The American COVID comeback isn't going as well as we hoped. Here's a glimpse of another setback and how it will impact locals seeking help from Sunflower State government . . . "Public offices serving customers will be encouraged to reinstitute mitigation protocols that were previously utilized during the pandemic, such as scheduling "by appointment only" or making allowances for virtual as opposed to in-person interactions." Read more via www.TonysKansasCity.com news link . . . Right now we take another peek at hottie Khloe and her body of work as we check pop culture, community news and top headlines. Check the www.TonysKansasCity.com news compilation . . . Get On The Bus?!? RideKC services expand with KC Library, other partners- The Beacon Delivered every Tuesday and Thursday morning A donation to The Beacon goes beyond the newsroom. We amplify community voices, share resources and investigate systems, not just symptoms. The Beacon in your inbox. In-depth reporting delivered every Tuesday and Thursday morning. Crooks Caught On Camera At Least WATCH: Jackson County deputies seek info on 2 armed men in assault case INDEPENDENCE, MO (KCTV) -- The Jackson County Sheriff's Office is seeking help with identifying two suspects in an assault investigation. The incident took place Monday in Salem East, an unincorporated portion Jackson County. Deputies released Ring security video of two armed men seen pulling guns on a man. Show-Me White Collar Crackdown Longtime Missouri GOP consultant pleads guilty in federal tax case ST LOUIS - A veteran Missouri political consultant pleaded guilty Wednesday to a federal tax charge, saying he takes "full responsibility" for his actions. David Barklage was indicted in May on a felony count accusing him of failing to report $443,633 in income from 2012 through 2014. Celebrate Local Living Space These cities have the most expensive homes in the Kansas City area by: Stacker Posted: / Updated: Buying a home is an investment - and an increasingly expensive one. The median value of a home in the United States today is $281,370, an 11.6% increase over the last year. Meanwhile, the median monthly housing cost for a home with a mortgage is $1,558 and $490 without a mortgage. Cuteness Born Into Captivity Little calf that could: Prematurely born oryx joins herd at Kansas City Zoo by: Juan Cisneros Posted: / Updated: KANSAS CITY, Mo. - A prematurely born oryx at the Kansas City Zoo has rejoined the main herd after weeks in intensive care and in the barn. The scimitar-horned oryx known as Kibrina was born May 1, 2021, weighing only 4 kilograms. The Savannah Team decided to hand-raise Kibrina when it was clear they could not stand or nurse. Celebrate Internets Snack Khloe Terae Goes Topless & Licks A Watermelon In Steamy Instagram Post Khloe Terae turned up the heat to the max in a steamy Instagram share on Monday morning. The Canadian hottie posted a series of images in which she rocked sage-colored bikini bottoms and nothing on top as she posed with a watermelon. The NSFW images certainly drove fans wild. Debating Disaster To Distract Outcry Against Nation Building FAIL Opinion | Afghanistan war critics need to look in the mirror For years, politicians and pundits on both the left and right have been invoking the misleading mantra of " endless war" to condemn the continuing presence of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and to demand that U.S. troops return home regardless of continued threats facing Americans. Partisan Slap Fight Worsens McCarthy says Biden is leaving US hostages for the Taliban: 'He turned his back on our own citizens' House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy blasted President Biden for sticking to an Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline from Afghanistan and said "thousands of Americans" could be left stranded in the Taliban-controlled country as a result. "The president's misguided decisions run the risk of creating the largest international hostage situation we've ever faced as a nation," McCarthy, R-Calif., said at Capitol news conference on Wednesday. Check The Internets Good Life Khloe Kardashian, Kris Jenner's Side-by-Side Mansions Show Progress Khloe Kardashian and Kris Jenner are inching closer to the move-in date that will make them next-door neighbors, as construction crews work to finish their custom mansions. We've obtained pics showing the progress that's been made in and around the modern farmhouses Khloe and Kris are building a stone's throw from each other in an exclusive enclave in the Calabasas area. Local Losing Streak Cont'd Royals fall to the Astros in extras 6-5 After being shutout in Game 2 on Tuesday night, the Royals were victim of a walk-off and fell to the Houston Astros in extra innings. With the loss, Kansas City finishes with a 4-3 record against the Astros in 2021. Kangaroo Ice Cream Kickoff Betty Rae's debuts new UMKC-inspired flavor, 'Roo Blue Swirl' KANSAS CITY, Mo. - A beloved Kansas City ice cream shop known for its unique flavors and neighborhood feel is celebrating a local university with its latest creation. Betty Rae's Ice Cream is now scooping "Roo Blue Swirl" in homage to the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Cool Down Coming Soon?!? clear tonight with lows in the mid 70s It will remain mostly clear tonight with lows in the mid 70sPatchy clouds will arrive and last through Thursday morning, otherwise tomorrow will be sunny with highs in the mid-90s. Heat index levels will be near 108 Thursday and Friday. The heat continues through Saturday, then slightly cooler air with chances for rain and storms returns Sunday night into Monday. And this is the OPEN THREAD for right now. Another grand scheme plan was hatched this week in hopes that an outdated form of fixed rail transit will inspire more confidence amongst local investors . . . Kansas City real estate developers hope to deposit thousands of high-rent new residents along the a sketchy and often violent part of Midtown and then see what happens. Take a peek . . . It doesn't show it on the diagram but this locale is where, on separate occasions, two gay dudes were ruthlessly gunned down in murders that were pretty hateful even if they didn't merit the distinctive government label as such. Here's the pitch that www.TonysKansasCity.com stole quoted from a lesser blog . . . "The $110 million proposal also would renovate the old New Yorker apartment building at 3521 Baltimore, adapt the US Bank office building at the corner into retail, offices and residential, and build two smaller apartment buildings at Armour and Baltimore." Now, the best case here is that the big money effort will push out all of the poor people and transform this part of Kansas City into an enclave for upwardly mobile professionals and more hipsters & mistresses living off daddy's money. I guess that might be cool. I'm sure a half dozen more local coffee shops are part of the plan. However, the track record of KC developers has been mixed at best and this scheme predicated on the future of toy train transit amid the ongoing plague seems . . . Far fetched. Sadly, I'm sure KC taxpayers will end up funding it. Developing . . . Missouri right-wing politicos back former Prez Trump policy after a Supreme Court victory. Here's the double down quote . . . "What weve seen of course since Biden's reversal of MPP... has been an unmitigated disaster at the southern border," Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt told Fox. "Its been a humanitarian crisis, its been a national security crisis, and so to get this victory and reinstate President Trumps successful policy is a big win." Read more via www.TonysKansasCity.com news link . . . Remain-in-Mexico SCOTUS ruling: Missouri AG declares decision a 'huge victory for border security' Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt on Wednesday said the Supreme Court ruling to reinstate the Trump-era Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) is a "huge victory" for border security while promising to make sure the policy is implemented by the Biden administration. Related reading . . . Missouri, Kansas restaurant owner among 19 charged with hiring undocumented workers KANSAS CITY, Mo. - The owner of dozens of Mexican restaurants in several states, including Missouri and Kansas, is among 19 charged in a federal racketeering conspiracy to hire undocumented workers. The company's president, CFO, controller and sales manager are also charged. You decide . . . Of course Steve Kraske is worthy of tribute. He has worked in Kansas City journalism over the course of decades and listening to that many casual lies has driven lesser men to seek out "alternative lifestyles" or take a spouse on her first & last rock climbing trip. However, and I'm trying to be nice here, Kraske is a mainstream journalist paid to enforce the status quo of the political establishment on the plebs and create the illusion of choice in order to garner compliance from the unwashed masses. It's a tricky biz and that's why they always whisper on local NPR stations . . . So they can stay below the radar of anybody who would loudly call B.S. on American partially-taxpayer-funded state-run media. It's amazing how much goodwill a free tote bag can buy. But I digress . . . In the latest issue of The Pitch (that nobody reads anymore) . . . The so-called "alternative" mag offered a love letter so embarrassing and cringe-worthy that we hope the author earned free college credit and/or complimentary knee-pads. Here's a sample . . . "The pursuit of the absolute and objective truth is something Kraske does not take lightly. As his career has evolved over the years through a decline in newspaper readership, an era of burgeoning distrust of the media goaded by an anti-news president, and then a rise in public radio listenership, objectivity has remained a pillar of his reporting. But journalisms ever-changing landscape makes it difficult to know what to expect for future generations." Note to any aspiring blogger journalist . . . YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO FAWN OVER PEOPLE LIKE THAT UNLESS THEY'RE HOTTIE CELEBRITIES OR (AT LEAST) A FIVE FIGURE CHECK HAS CLEARED!!! Fact is . . . We respect Kraske but he's mostly wrong and has worked as a glorified mouthpiece for one "progressive" Kansas City leader after the next. Again, the most memorable blunder from Kraske and his disco buddy Dave Helling was mistakenly believing left-wing talking points before Missouri Republicans BLEW THE MISSOURI DEMOCRATS OUT OF THE WATER during the 2020 election cycle and swept every statewide contest. Brief aside . . . Kansas City newsies often make the mistake in believing that their peer group offers an accurate representation of the real world. In reality, issues amongst this clique rarely garner the attention of most locals . . . Sadly, this point of view has followed cowtown MSM hacks into the social media world where they desperately work to maintain their bubble. Kraske's career is a symptom of this elitist mindset that now isn't any more relevant than Steve Glorioso lying in his cold, cold grave. Meanwhile . . . The hipsters at The Pitch kissing up to an old school white dude "journalist" betrays their vanilla management & content mill approach to writing which seemingly (and mistakenly) contends that squeezing some chubby middle-aged woman into a romper qualifies as a nuanced take on the local discourse. P.S. - I'm still waiting to hear back from The Pitch on that proposal for a 2,000 word feature story on a COVID-safe guide to local swinger's clubs. I hope this post didn't ruin my chances. Read more via www.TonysKansasCity.com news link . . . Move over David Blaine. Take a seat David Copperfield. Presto. Changeo. Just made an 8,000 pound, Ford F-350 truck disappear from a Trenton street. Voila! Now you see it actually, this abandoned vehicle just waited for someone to take action for an entire year now, you dont. Had expected an extended interaction with the Trenton Police Department about removing this Ford truck on Forrest St. One phone call attracted immediate reaction. Police investigated the vehicle and a tow truck took away the Ford before noon. No big sendoff, just an arrival home to notice the truck disappearance. Still, its a victory celebrated with a girlfriend who delivered Spanish exclamations and another friend immersed in joy. This is all that happened. Phoned Trenton police dispatch at (609) 989-4170. Gave information about the situation including make and model of vehicle, license plate and voiced concerns about how long the vehicle had lingered. Pretty easy and an amazing response by police. This sounds like a minor accomplishment but in the grand scheme of parking in Chambersburg, one extra space ranks as significant. Bottom line? You can make a difference on your street, neighborhood, etc. Thats the big message here fix issues on your street. Occasionally, change requires making a phone call or picking up a broom. Say something or do something. Johnstown, PA (15901) Today Cloudy early, becoming mostly clear after midnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 51F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Cloudy early, becoming mostly clear after midnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 51F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. CLINTON - Vernon Lee Kispert, 84, of Clinton passed away August 30, 2021. He was born on April 27, 1937, to Bernice and Elwood Kispert. Vernon is survived by his loving wife Ginny and daughter Shawna Kispert; stepchildren: Wayne (Nancy) McClara of Blanford, Bob (Judy) McClara of Mena, AR, Ma Illinois health care workers and educators from kindergarten through college will be required to be vaccinated against COVID-19 or submit to weekly testing, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Thursday in announcing new safety protocols that also include a fresh statewide mandate for masks to be worn indoors. If your looking for a great beach and the friendly staff look no further. I cant say enough how much I love this resort.the staff are always checking to make sure you have everything you need . The lobby bar staff and the beach bar staff are so nice and helpful . As Im sitting writing this 3 staff have stop to say hi and ask if Im ok . The Cubas miss the Canadian at their resort . They will ask are you Canadian and when say yes the smile and say we missed you . I love how at home I feel . The lady that does my room each day leaves me notes her first note said welcome home . How awesome is that . Dieny One of the head butler has been amazing what ever you need he can do it . Our hotel staff in Canada should take a course from him in hospitality. Amazing trip . Paul As the NHS Scotland Vaccination certificate is not recognized by Belgium, assuming you are not a national of the EU/Schengen, you may only travel to Belgium for an essential reason. So you need to be, and able to prove ( you must carry an Essential Travel Certificate or official document) first- and second-degree relatives of the bridal couple. Edited: 26 August 2021, 06:55 Greetings! I'm planning to travel to Greece over Thanksgiving break with my high schooler. We will stay a few days in Athens, then would like to visit an island. Naxos just feels like a great place to visit, but I'm having trouble finding *recent* information about what's open/running. I have found some open hotels including one in a village about 30min drive outside of old Town. Here are my questions: 1. Will only the most practical/local shops be open? I see photos of cute shops selling local goods and would be bummed if they were all closed. 2. Are there any ferries running from Athens? Looks like availability doesn't open up until September, and I'd rather not wait that long before deciding to book a flight. Is it even fun/worth taking a ferry for 1/2 a day during late November, or will we just be sick due to bad weather/wave? 3. Better to rent a car for 4 days on the island, or hire a driver to take us around? If driver: any recommendations? 4. Any other tips for Naxos in November? e.g., taking a hop over to Paros for a day? Thanks so much in advance! 2. .Hello, A friend and I will be in Azerbaijan the last week in September and two weeks in October. We'll spend four or five days in Baku and then head outward to other parts of the country. Our plan was to travel around the country by public transportation upon leaving Baku but the Delta covid variant has changed our thinking even though we're both vaccinated. As a result, I'm inquiring about hiring a private driver for approximately two weeks, someone whose sole responsibility is driving us from place-to-place, not also acting as a tour guide. We would consider hiring a driver in Baku for the entire two weeks or finding drivers along the way as we travel from village to village or region to region. I'd appreciate information and suggestions on either approach with respect to cost, how to make driving arrangements and anything else we should know (e.g. vaccination and english-speaking status of the driver?). Thanking anyone in advance for their response There have been fully-vaccinated persons who have become severely ill and some who have actu Over the past day, August 25, five ceasefire violations by the armed formations of the Russian Federation were recorded in the Joint Forces Operation area in eastern Ukraine. In particular, the enemy launched two attacks on Ukrainian positions near Novoluhanske (53km north-east of Donetsk), using hand-held antitank grenade launchers and heavy machine guns; grenade machine guns were fired outside Travneve (51km north-east of Donetsk); grenade machine guns, hand-held antitank grenade launchers and heavy machine guns towards Katerynivka (64km west of Luhansk), the press center of JFO Headquarters posted on Facebook. In Luhansk region, an Orlan-10 UAV was spotted flying over the line of contact. Ukrainian troops fired back in response to the enemy attacks. No casualties were reported. The Ukrainian side of the Joint Control and Coordination Center (JCCC) informed the OSCE SMM about all violations by the Russian-occupation troops through the established coordination mechanism. As of 07:00 on August 26, no ceasefire violations were recorded. "Ukrainian soldiers control the situation in the Joint Forces Operation area to repel and deter the armed aggression of the Russian Federation," the JFO Headquarters stressed. ol President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky by Decree No. 427/2021 of August 24, 2021, promoted Commander of the Medical Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Tetiana Ostashchenko, to a senior military rank of Brigadier General. Thats according to the press service of the Ministry of Defense, Ukrinform reports. "To confer the military rank of brigadier general of the medical service on Colonel Tetiana Mykolayivna Ostashchenko with the Medical Service, Commander of the Medical Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine," the Decree reads. On July 30, Defense Minister Andriy Taran signed an order appointing the first woman senior commander in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Colonel Tetiana Ostashchenko with the Medical Service took the position of Commander of the Medical Forces. Commenting on the landmark appointment, the Minister recalled that this was the first woman brigadier general to appear in the Armed Forces soon. On August 24, 2021, the President of Ukraine signed a relevant decree. Taran also recalled that almost a quarter of the total number of military in Ukraines Army ranks are women, and their role in the army development is ever-growing. Equal access to positions and military ranks implies the same level of responsibility in military service, the defense chief noted. im Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Strategic Industries Oleh Urusky and Head of the NATO Representation to Ukraine Alexander Vinnikov have discussed the reform of the Ukrainian defense industry, the Ministry for Strategic Industries has reported. "The sides discussed current cooperation and the reform of the Ukrainian defense industry," the report said. Urusky informed Vinnikov about measures being taken by the Ministry for Strategic Industries in the context of the corporatization of defense and aerospace enterprises, as well as the formation of a proper business environment in Ukraine that would meet modern approaches and contribute to the country's successful integration into NATO. Vinnikov welcomed the intensification of the defense industry reform in Ukraine. He said NATO was ready to continue to provide expert support in the reform process, including the reform of the domestic defense industry. Vinnikov also proposed presenting in NATO this autumn the Strategy for the Development of Ukraine's Defense Industry until 2030, which has recently been adopted by the National Security and Defense Council and approved by a presidential decree. "I stressed that our country has two strategic goals - accession to the EU and accession to NATO. I believe that our country's integration into the Alliance will precede its accession to the EU. I am convinced that the reform of the defense industry will be very good and will not slow Ukraine's movement towards NATO. After all, military-technical cooperation between Ukraine and the Alliance is an important component of integration processes," Urusky said. Vinnikov's term in Ukraine is coming to an end, so Urusky thanked him for his cooperation. "Our state has always felt the personal support of Alexander Vinnikov and the Alliance in general in this difficult time of hybrid aggression from Russia," Urusky said. op Ukraine intends to strengthen cooperation with Norway in the field of renewable energy production and also plans to attract foreign investment in this area, according to Yaroslav Demchenkov, Ukraine's Deputy Minister of Energy for European Integration. "We would like to strengthen cooperation with Norway in the field of renewable energy production. For example, as part of its energy decarbonisation strategy, Ukraine plans to develop offshore wind power. We are also interested in the development of hydrogen energy - technologies, pilot projects, etc. In addition to attracting Norwegian investment, it will be useful to revive the exchange of experience and developments," the Ukrainian Energy Ministry's press service quoted Demchenkov as saying. According to him, Norway last year approved its own hydrogen strategy, which lists the challenges related to the safety of hydrogen technologies and measures to implement relevant standards and legislation. The relevant document is a model for Ukraine, he said. "Norway's hydrogen strategy is a good example to follow. Attention to detail and open recognition of strengths and weaknesses are the basis for a sound hydrogen policy. Ukraine is currently developing its own hydrogen strategy, and the level of quality of the political document approved by the Norwegian government is a model for us," Demchenkov added. Ukraine and Norway earlier signed a memorandum strengthening cooperation between the two countries on nuclear safety. op Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has signed a decree dismissing Andriy Shevchenko as Ukraine's ambassador to Canada and Ukraine's representative to the International Civil Aviation Organization, the president's press service has reported. "To dismiss Andriy Vitaliiovych Shevchenko from the post of Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to Canada and from the post of Ukraine's representative to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)," the document reads. On his Facebook page, Shevchenko said the six years he served as ambassador were "cool" and stressed that "representing such a nation is a privilege and a pride for life." He thanked Presidents Petro Poroshenko and Volodymyr Zelensky for the opportunity to serve his homeland at an important time and on an important section of the front, noting that "these are priceless honour and trust." "I am returning with gratitude of fate and great faith in Ukrainian-Canadian friendship. We have everything for this today - a true partnership, the planning horizon and a powerful diaspora that creates special energy between us," Shevchenko said. Shevchenko was appointed Ukraine's ambassador to Canada in September 2015. op Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine (CDTO) Dmytro Senik and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ireland Simon Coveney solemnly opened the Embassy of Ireland in Ukraine. As the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine informs, the opening ceremony participants noted that the establishment of the first-ever Irish diplomatic mission in Kyiv would bring bilateral relations to a qualitatively new level. "The opening of the Embassy of Ireland in Kyiv creates additional opportunities for the development of trade cooperation between our countries and will undoubtedly contribute to the intensification of bilateral cooperation in many areas, including IT sector, investment, and education. Minister Dmytro Kuleba highlighted these cooperation priorities during a bilateral meeting with his Irish counterpart on the sidelines of the inaugural summit of the Crimea Platform," Senik said. He also drew attention to the successful activities of the Irish companies CRH and Ryanair in Ukraine and expressed hope for further expansion of business cooperation between the two countries. Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ireland Simon Coveney noted that the opening of the embassy in Kyiv was an important milestone in the development of bilateral cooperation and part of #GlobalIreland strategy to expand Ireland's presence in the world. Diplomatic relations between Ukraine and Ireland were established on April 1, 1992. The Embassy of Ukraine in Ireland opened in August 2003. On August 19, 2021, Ambassador of Ireland to Ukraine with residence in Kyiv Teresa Gili presented her credentials to President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky (before that, Ambassador of Ireland to the Czech Republic was accredited to Ukraine concurrently). The official opening of the Embassy of Ireland in Kyiv took place on August 23, 2021, during the visit of Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ireland Simon Coveney to participate in the inaugural summit of the Crimea Platform. According to the State Statistics Service of Ukraine, in 2020, UkraineIreland total trade in goods and services amounted to $677 million (0.8% of total trade in goods and services between Ukraine and EU member states). In the first quarter of 2021, UkraineIreland trade decreased by 15.8% compared to the first quarter of 2020 and amounted to $176.5 million. The main areas of trade and economic cooperation are agriculture, pharmaceuticals, food industry and food products, instrument manufacture, etc. In the field of services, the main volumes of trade account for transport, computer, and telecommunications. Photo credit: mfa.gov.ua ol During a meeting with representatives of the Ukrainian World Congress (UWC) on August 25, Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal stated that Ukrainians abroad were a driving force to promote our country in the world. "Ukrainians abroad are a driving force for the promotion of our country in the world. We all have a common goal: Ukraine must become a regional leader in terms of political and economic development," Denys Shmyhal said, the Government portal informs. He stressed that the state would continue to take measures to support Ukrainians living abroad. The Prime Minister emphasized that Ukraine continued to develop and move towards the implementation of reforms that advance the country's progress towards Euro-Atlantic integration. One of the unconditional priorities of these reforms, according to the Head of Government, is to create a comfortable environment for foreign investors and foreign business in Ukraine. "Our systematic and comprehensive work is already yielding the expected results. Ukraine is becoming increasingly attractive for foreign investment. We are ready to continue to provide all possible assistance to foreign companies that want to work in Ukraine," Shmyhal stressed. The Prime Minister thanked the UWC for its active position in defending the interests of our state, which contributes to the consolidation of international support. As reported, Verkhovna Rada Speaker Dmytro Razumkov met with UWC leadership and discussed, in particular, attraction of investment to Ukraine and cooperation within the Crimea Platform. Photo credit: Government portal ol The NATO Parliamentary Assembly welcomes the creation of the Crimea Platform and is ready to develop its parliamentary dimension, Co-Chair of the Ukraine-NATO Interparliamentary Council (UNIC) Ojars Kalnins has said. According to the information office of the Verkhovna Rada, Kalnins said this at a meeting with Ukraine's First Deputy Parliament Speaker Ruslan Stefanchuk and Head of the Verkhovna Rada's Permanent Delegation to NATO Yehor Cherniev. "During the meeting, Kalnins said that the NATO PA was the first to set up an informal support group for the Crimea Platform, which will be an important contribution to consolidating the international community's efforts to counter Russia's aggressive policy and the militarization of the Ukrainian peninsula," the report said. Stefanchuk, in turn, informed the participants of the meeting about significant progress Ukraine has made in various areas of Euro-Atlantic reforms, including the adoption of important legislation and guidelines in the field of security and defense, including the laws of Ukraine "On Defense Procurement" and "On Intelligence," as well as Ukraine's National Security Strategy and Ukraine's Military Security Strategy. Cherniev proposed that the security situation in the Black Sea region and countering the militarization of Crimea be determined as a priority topic for discussion at the UNIC meeting in Odesa set for October 26-27, 2021. He also emphasized the importance of involving Georgian colleagues and representatives of other delegations in the development and implementation of an effective deterrence strategy for the Russian Federation. At the end of the meeting, Kalnins shared the positive experience of the NATO PA session held in Riga, which can be useful for Ukraine in the context of holding the 2022 meeting of the Assembly in Kyiv. During August 22-25, a NATO PA delegation paid a working visit to Kyiv and took part in the inaugural summit of the Crimea Platform and the celebration of the 30th anniversary of Ukraine's independence. The Crimea Platform summit took place in Kyiv on August 23. The summit participants adopted a joint declaration reaffirming their support for Ukraine's territorial integrity, condemning the temporary occupation of Crimea, the militarization of the peninsula, violations of human rights and freedom of navigation in the region, and urging the Russian Federation to constructive participation in the platform. op Ukraine has evacuated more than 250 Ukrainian citizens, members of their families, and foreigners from Afghanistan. About 90 more Ukrainians and members of their families are awaiting evacuation. "Currently, there are about 90 Ukrainian citizens and members of their families in Afghanistan. For example, a husband is a citizen of Ukraine, and a wife and children are citizens of Afghanistan but since this is a family, we definitely help them all escape. We have already evacuated more than 250 citizens of Ukraine, members of their families, and foreigners," Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba said at an online briefing, an Ukrinform correspondent reports. He stressed that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs aimed to evacuate everyone and the next flight was being arranged now. "Ukraine never abandons will never abandon its people," Kuleba said. The minister noted that this morning he had received information about the escalation of the situation at Kabul airport and the refusal of some countries to operate evacuation flights due to the inability to guarantee their safety. Given the effectiveness of Ukraine's actions, the Foreign Ministry receives requests from other countries and international organizations to take on board their citizens or Afghan citizens who cooperated with them, but priority will always be given to Ukrainian citizens, the minister added. Kabul airport has been a scene of chaos since the Taliban seized the Afghan capital on August 15 and proclaimed the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. Many countries, including Ukraine, send planes to Kabul to evacuate citizens. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the Alliance was coordinating efforts to ensure the evacuation of people from Kabul. The radical Islamist Taliban movement could ban the evacuation from Kabul after August 31. ol On Friday, August 27, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky will visit Chisinau on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of Moldova's independence and hold bilateral talks with President Maia Sandu. "On Friday, August 27, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky will visit Chisinau on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the independence of the Republic of Moldova at the invitation of President of Moldova Maia Sandu," the press service of the Office of the President of Ukraine reports. During the visit, Zelensky will hold bilateral talks with the President of Moldova and take part in a multilateral meeting of heads of foreign delegations. As reported, President of Moldova Maia Sandu paid a visit to Ukraine on August 23 and took part in the inaugural summit of the Crimea Platform. ol 9-year-old Nazeela watches the local elders chat. UNHCR/Edris Lutfi Today, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, welcomes the announcement of a 30 million DKK (US$4.7 million) contribution from the LEGO Foundation and KIRKBI, the owners of the LEGO Group, to respond to the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan. This donation the largest single contribution by the private sector towards UNHCRs Afghanistan 2021 supplementary appeal will help meet the growing needs of those who have been internally displaced by the conflict, including vulnerable children. UNHCR is deeply worried about the present situation and future prospects of Afghan children growing up amid this crisis with an estimated 60 per cent of people displaced since May 2021 under the age of 18. This grant is an important part of The LEGO Foundations ongoing commitment to supporting children affected by crisis, said John Goodwin, CEO, The LEGO Foundation. Explaining the LEGO Foundations global work further, he noted, We know that by giving attention to young children and their continued access to learning in crisis settings we can make a big positive difference to them immediately and in the long-term. Together with UNHCR, we hope to provide more children with access to play-based early childhood education, needed to develop skills such as critical thinking, creativity, and problem solving. Social and emotional skills are especially vital for children to overcome the stressors caused by crisis situations, build resilience and adapt to the needs of the rapidly changing world. The role of the private sector is crucial to supporting refugees. This support is even more vital when it comes to an emergency response and exemplifies the spirit of the Global Compact on Refugees, says Indrika Ratwatte, UNHCR Director for Asia & the Pacific. Thank you to the LEGO Foundation and KIRKBI for leading the way with their generous contribution and showing other private sector companies how they can help. Support from the private sector is critical for UNHCRs emergency response to the crisis in Afghanistan, where more than 3.5 million people are currently internally displaced, including more than half a million since the beginning of the year. In July 2021, as the crisis in Afghanistan began rapidly escalating, UNHCR appealed for US$62.8 million to cover the period July-December 2021 for an emergency response that prioritizes preparedness in Afghanistan and nearby countries (the Islamic Republic of Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan). This donation from the LEGO Foundation and KIRKBI is part of a larger grant of 100 million DKK (US$15.7 million), which will be distributed to UNHCR and other organizations to support vulnerable children in Afghanistan and Haiti. The LEGO Foundation has been a strong supporter of the refugee cause, especially refugee children. At the Global Refugee Forum in December 2019, the LEGO Foundation announced a US$100 million grant for play-based learning through PlayMatters, an initiative to strengthen resilience and develop the social, emotional, cognitive, physical and creative skills of young refugees. Earlier this year, the LEGO Foundation and UNHCR announced a new partnership to ensure that refugee children in Ethiopia are learning through play during COVID-19. About UNHCR UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, leads international action to protect people forced to flee because of conflict and persecution. We deliver life-saving assistance like shelter, food and water, help safeguard fundamental human rights, and develop solutions that ensure people have a safe place to call home where they can build a better future. For more information: www.unhcr.org. About the LEGO Foundation The LEGO Foundation aims to inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow; a mission that it shares with the LEGO Group. The LEGO Foundation is dedicated to building a future where learning through play empowers children to become creative, engaged, lifelong learners. Its work is about re-defining play and re-imagining learning. In collaboration with thought leaders, influencers, educators and parents the LEGO Foundation aims to equip, inspire and activate champions for learning through play. Learn more on www.LEGOfoundation.com. ABOUT KIRKBI KIRKBI A/S is the Kirk Kristiansen familys private holding and investment company founded to build a sustainable future for the family ownership of the LEGO brand through generations. The KIRKBI Group is focused on three fundamental tasks all contributing to enabling the Kirk Kristiansen family to succeed with the mission to inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow: To protect, develop and leverage the LEGO brand across all the LEGO branded entities, commitment to a long-term and responsible investment strategy to ensure a sound financial foundation for the owner familys activities as well as contributing to a sustainable development in the world. And, dedicated support the family members as they prepare for future generations to continue the active and engaged ownership as well as supporting their private activities, companies and philanthropic work. KIRKBIs strategic activities include among others 75% ownership of the LEGO Group. Hundreds of people wave at passing cars on 40th Avenue toward the end of a protest against vaccine mandates Saturday, Aug. 14, 2021, in Yakima. Students return to campus to attend in-person classes for the first time since Spring 2020 at Cal State LA on Monday, August 23, 2021. (Christina House/Los Angeles Times/TNS) An Austin-Travis County medic loads a patient with COVID-19 symptoms into an ambulance on Aug. 5, 2020 in Austin, Texas. The medics were transporting the sick nursing home resident to a hospital. (John Moore/Getty Images/TNS) Hugh Oscar Walton, 71, of Gray, and formerly of Sparta, passed away Friday, Aug. 27, 2021. Graveside services for Hugh Walton will be conducted on Wednesday, Sept. 1, 2021, at 11 a.m. in the Sparta City Cemetery. Hugh was born on Jan. 20, 1950, in Greensboro, Ga. to the late James Thomas "Sl (@FahadShabbir) Wellington, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Aug, 2021 ) :Air New Zealand managed to cut its losses by a third in the last financial year as strong domestic and cargo demand partially offset the impact of the global pandemic, the airline said Thursday. The flag carrier said its net loss for the 12 months to the end of June was NZ$289 million (US$202 million), compared with a NZ$454 million hit the previous year. The result was boosted by a 71 percent increase in cargo revenue and a recovery in domestic demand to 93 percent of pre-pandemic levels. However, border closures meant operating revenue slipped 48 percent to NZ$2.5 billion. Chairwoman Therese Walsh said the loss reflected a reality in which Air New Zealand was still unable to operate two-thirds of its passenger network. "In a severely constrained environment, Air New Zealand maintained cost discipline, focusing on delivering with excellence in the areas in its control," she said. "The return of a strong domestic business and growth in the cargo services that underpin our key export markets was a reminder of the airline's crucial role in New Zealand's infrastructure. " The airline said the government had committed to remaining a majority shareholder after a planned capital raising, which has now been deferred to early next year. It said New Zealand's current lockdown, imposed as the country battles an outbreak of the Delta variant, would impact the bottom line of the 2021-22 financial year. "Given uncertainty surrounding the current national lockdown, ongoing international travel restrictions and uncertainty regarding the level of demand as these restrictions lift, Air New Zealand has suspended 2022 earnings guidance," it said. The airline also said it did not anticipate paying a dividend until earnings had substantially improved. Shares in Air New Zealand were down 0.98 percent at NZ$1.52 in early trading on the NZX-50, which was off 0.22 percent. (@FahadShabbir) Adviser to Prime Minister for Commerce and Investment, Abdul Razak Dawood on Tuesday appreciated the 'Sazgar' auto for becoming the first Pakistani company to export 3-Wheelers (Rickshaws) to Ethiopia ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 25th Aug, 2021 ) :Adviser to Prime Minister for Commerce and Investment, Abdul Razak Dawood on Tuesday appreciated the 'Sazgar' auto for becoming the first Pakistani company to export 3-Wheelers (Rickshaws) to Ethiopia. A batch of 170 Rickshaws will be exported next month, the Adviser said this on his twitter account. The Adviser said that this is a vindication of Govt's "Make-in-Pakistan" policy. Razak Dawood said that Pakistan's engineering products have a lot of potential in Africa. "I urge the exporters to aggressively market their products to new destinations in order to diversify Pakistan's export portfolio" he said. The number of COVID-19 cases in Indonesia rose by 18,671 within one day to 4,026,837, with the death toll adding by 1,041 to 129,293, the country's Health Ministry said on Wednesday JAKARTA, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 25th Aug, 2021 ) :The number of COVID-19 cases in Indonesia rose by 18,671 within one day to 4,026,837, with the death toll adding by 1,041 to 129,293, the country's Health Ministry said on Wednesday. According to the ministry, 33,703 more people were discharged from hospitals, bringing the total number of patients recovering from COVID-19 to 3,639,867. To date, at least 33. 09 million people in the country have received two shots of vaccines, while 59. 01 million have taken the first doses, the ministry added. Indonesia has given its emergency use approval to Russia's Sputnik-V COVID-19 vaccine, the country's National Agency of Drug and food Control said in a statement on Wednesday. Since January, the agency has issued emergency use approval for seven COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers, namely Sinovac, BioFarma, Sinopharm, AstraZeneca, Moderna, Pfizer and Sputnik-V. A third shot of the Pfizer vaccine is 95% effective against the coronavirus and has 97% efficacy against severe symptoms, Israel's Channel 12 reported on Thursday, citing the health ministry TEL AVIV (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) A third shot of the Pfizer vaccine is 95% effective against the coronavirus and has 97% efficacy against severe symptoms, Israel's Channel 12 reported on Thursday, citing the health ministry. Vaccine efficacy rose to 86% a week after the inoculation with a third shot, and to 95% in 16 days, the broadcaster said. Over 1. 6 million people have received a booster Pfizer dose in Israel, according to official figures. On Monday, the health authorities expanded the COVID-19 booster vaccination to those over 30 years old. On July 30, Israeli President Isaac Herzog and his spouse, Michal Herzog, became the first citizens of the country to get booster shots. Some 58% of Israel's 9.3 million population have been vaccinated with two shots of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine so far. The immunization drive among adolescents aged 12-15 was launched in June. (@FahadShabbir) PARAMARIBO, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News / WAM - 26th Aug, 2021) The UAE non-resident ambassador to the Republic of Suriname, Saleh Ahmed Al Suwaidi, presented his credentials to President Chandrikapersad Santokhi, during a meeting at the presidential palace in capital Paramaribo today. During the meeting, Al Suwaidi conveyed to Santokhi the greetings of President His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, and His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, as well as their sincere wishes to the President of Suriname and his people for further development and prosperity. In turn, Santokhi reciprocated the greetings, wishing the UAEs government and people further growth and development. He affirmed Suriname's interest in boosting the relations between the two countries in various fields. He appreciated the UAE's support for Suriname's participation in Expo 2020, noting he is looking forward to a distinctive participation in the much-awaited global event. The president wished the ambassador full success in his endeavours to bolster relations between the two nations and his determination to support his diplomatic mission in a way that reflects positively on strengthening their friendship bonds. During the meeting, both sides discussed the prospects of fostering cooperation between the UAE and Suriname across various fronts. (@FahadShabbir) Berlin, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Aug, 2021 ) :She was called "the leader of the free world" as authoritarian populists were on the march in Europe and the United States but Angela Merkel is wrapping up a historic 16 years in power with an uncertain legacy at home and abroad. In office so long she was dubbed Germany's "eternal chancellor", Merkel, 67, leaves with her popularity so resilient she would likely have won a record fifth term had she wanted to extend her mandate. Instead, Merkel will pass the baton as the first German chancellor to step down entirely by choice, with a whole generation of voters never knowing another person at the top. Her supporters say she provided steady, pragmatic leadership through countless global crises as a moderate and unifying figure. Yet critics argue a muddle-through style of leadership, pegged to the broadest possible consensus, lacked the bold vision to prepare Europe and its top economy for the coming decades. What is certain is that she leaves behind a fractured political landscape, with the question of who will govern Germany next wide open just weeks before the September 26 election. Assuming she stays on to hand over power, she will tie or exceed Helmut Kohl's longevity record for a post-war leader, depending on how long the upcoming coalition negotiations drag on. - 'Do the right thing' - The brainy, unflappable Merkel has served for many in recent years as a welcome counter-balance to the big, brash men of global politics, from Donald Trump to Vladimir Putin. A Pew Research Center poll late last year showed large majorities in most Western countries having "confidence in Merkel to do the right thing regarding world affairs". However the last days of her tenure have also been marred by what Merkel called the "bitter, dramatic and terrible" return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan -- a debacle in which she shares the blame as German troops pull out. A trained quantum chemist raised behind the Iron Curtain, Merkel has long been in sync with her change-averse electorate as a guarantor of stability. Her major policy shifts have reflected the wishes of large German majorities -- among them phasing out nuclear power after the 2011 Fukushima disaster -- and attracted a broad new coalition of women and urban voters to the once arch-conservative CDU. (@ChaudhryMAli88) Ankara, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 25th Aug, 2021 ) :Turkey said Wednesday it had started pulling troops out of Afghanistan, apparently abandoning plans to help secure Kabul's strategic airport. "The Turkish Armed Forces are returning to our homeland with the pride of successfully fulfilling the tasks entrusted to it," the Turkish defence ministry said in a statement. Turkey had more than 500 non-combat troops stationed in Afghanistan as part of NATO's now-abandoned mission in the war-torn country. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara was still interested in playing a role in Afghanistan, keeping its lines of communication open with Taliban leaders. "It is important for Afghanistan to stabilise," Erdogan said as the troop withdrawal was announced. "Turkey will continue to be in close dialogue with all parties in Afghanistan in line with this goal."The Turkish defence ministry also left open the option of playing a security role in Kabul down the line. "Turkey will continue to be with the Afghan people as long at they want," it said, noting the troops had been stationed at the airport for the past six years. United Nations, United States, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 27th Aug, 2021 ) :United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday called a meeting of the permanent members of the Security Council to discuss the chaotic situation in Afghanistan, diplomats said. Guterres sent letters formally inviting the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China to meet on Monday, the diplomats told AFP. Some member countries of the so-called P5 had been discussing the possibility of a meeting for a few days, they added. Russia was supposedly reticent but all of the five are expected to join, one diplomat said. A spokesperson for Guterres confirmed the meeting, which will not include the current ten non-permanent members of the Security Council. The full Security Council last met on Afghanistan on August 16, a day after the Taliban swept to power in the country. Guterres also condemned Thursday's bombings at Kabul airport, which killed dozens including 12 US servicemen. "This incident underscores the volatility of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan but also strengthens our resolve as we continue to deliver urgent assistance across the country in support of the Afghan people," he said in a statement. (@fidahassanain) The actress has shared her photo with the fans and promised to share amazing people, food and places of her visit. LAHORE: (UrduPoint/UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News-26th, 2021) Lollywood actress Nadia Jamil is set to embark on a journey to northern areas of Pakistan. Nadia is not using any luxurious car this time but will have a motor bike on her way to Hunza. Taking to Instagram, Jamil shared a photo Turning to her Instagram on Thursday, Jamil shared a photo of herself riding on a bike. She wrote, "Off to beautiful @hunza_valley.pk," began Jamil. "Stopped en route for a karak chai and met up with the amazing @venturer.pk team. What an inspiring team! My next adventure will have to be on a motor bike, ". "Will keep sharing the many amazing people, foods and places I'm about to visit!," she adorably captioned alongside her photo. Jamil's fans were quick to shower praises on the actor. "More power to you!" wrote one user in the comments, "Bless you," said another. More than 30 people were injured in Kazakhstan on Thursday in an explosion at an ammunitions depot, as authorities evacuated residents of nearby villages NurSultan, Kazakhstan, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Aug, 2021 ) :More than 30 people were injured in Kazakhstan on Thursday in an explosion at an ammunitions depot, as authorities evacuated residents of nearby villages. The blast took place at a defence ministry arms depot in the southern Jambyl region, the local government said in a statement. It said that 32 people had been admitted to a hospital in the city of Taraz with various injuries. The defence ministry said in a statement a fire "resulted in an explosion of unidentified objects". It added that fire services were working on extinguishing the blaze and that a commission had been set up to determine the cause. Residents of four villages, including one of 250 people less than a kilometre from the site of the blast, were being evacuated, the statement said. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said on Twitter that the injured were emergency services workers and soldiers. A video shared on the Telegram messaging app that could not be verified immediately showed a column of smoke billowing from a fire before a powerful explosion sent the flames shooting out. In 2019, a munitions dump explosion near the town of Arys in the adjacent Turkestan region killed two people and injured scores as tens of thousands were evacuated. That blast was the third lethal explosion in the town's vicinity in the space of a decade. WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett met and discussed Iran's nuclear program, its support backing of militia groups in the middle East, and its maritime activity, Defense Department spokesperson John Kirby said. "Today in Washington, DC, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III met with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett to reaffirm the US commitment to the strategic partnership and addressing regional security challenges together," Kirby said in a press release on Wednesday. "The leaders discussed the wide range of threats posed by Iran's nuclear program, support of terrorism and maritime aggression. " Austin emphasized the United States' commitment to stabilize the Middle East, including through military cooperation, Kirby said. Austin and Bennett also agreed for the United States and Israel to cooperate in the field air and missile defense, Kirby said. The US Defense Secretary reaffirmed the United States' commitment to maintaining Israel's military edge in the region, he added. Bennett is scheduled to meet with US President Joe Biden at the White House on Wednesday. HELSINKI (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) A senior official with the Estonian interior ministry said on Wednesday that the country does not rule out the possibility that some Afghans who have worked for Tallinn will have to stay in Afghanistan. Last week, the Estonian government agreed to host up to 30 Afghan nationals, who had worked with the military and civilian experts from the Baltic state, as well as those who had collaborated with Estonia's allies in Afghanistan. "As evacuation has to be completed until the end of August, little time remains. There is a possibility that not all the people who have cooperated with our humanitarian organizations, will arrive in Estonia," the head of the ministry's citizenship and migration policy department, Ruth Annus, told the national ERR broadcaster. Earlier in the day, the Estonian foreign ministry reported that three Afghans who Estonia was set to receive, failed to get the access to the evacuation flights. Annus specified that those had worked for Estonian humanitarian organizations and expressed hope that the country's allies would agree to fly them out of Afghanistan. On Tuesday, Estonian Foreign Minister Eva-Maria Liimets said that the first group of 13 refugees from Afghanistan was heading to Estonia. At the press conference next day, the government of Estonia specified that three Afghan families with a total of 13 kids were flying to the country. Ten more Afghan nationals who worked at the EU and NATO missions are expected to arrive in Estonia later. Upon arrival, the evacuees will be taken to a special center and a thorough security check-up will be carried out. Only then, if they are confirmed not to pose a threat to the society, they will be granted the refugee status, Egert Belitsev, the head of the border guard department of the Estonian police, told Estonian media. Afghanistan fell to the Taliban (designated a terror group by Russia) on August 15, which prompted many Afghans to seek escape from the country. Many countries dispatched their planes to evacuate their citizens and diplomatic missions from the Central Asian country. French Prime Minister Jean Castex announced on Thursday that his country will not be able to conduct evacuation flights from the Kabul airport starting from Friday, four days before the August 31 evacuation deadline expires PARIS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) French Prime Minister Jean Castex announced on Thursday that his country will not be able to conduct evacuation flights from the Kabul airport starting from Friday, four days before the August 31 evacuation deadline expires. "From tomorrow night we will no longer be able to carry out evacuation [flights] from the Kabul airport," Castex told RTL radio. Earlier this week, French government spokesman Gabrial Attal said that France may end operations to evacuate people from Afghanistan in near future but did not specify the exact date. All land border crossings from Afghanistan are currently controlled by the Taliban (a terrorist organization banned in Russia]. The evacuation of foreign citizens and Afghans who worked for international missions is carried out through the only airport in Kabul, which is held by the military of the United States and other NATO member countries. The Taliban said they do not intend to provide additional time to the US to evacuate people after August 31. French President Emmanuel Macron has invited his Tajik counterpart, Emomali Rahmon, to visit Paris, the Elysee Palace said on Thursday, with the two leaders set to continue discussion on recent developments in Afghanistan following their phone conversation PARIS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) French President Emmanuel Macron has invited his Tajik counterpart, Emomali Rahmon, to visit Paris, the Elysee Palace said on Thursday, with the two leaders set to continue discussion on recent developments in Afghanistan following their phone conversation. "The republic's president invited president Emomali Rahmon to come to France. He will receive him on October 13," the palace said in a statement. During the phone call, which took place on Wednesday, the leaders also discussed the consequences of the Taliban (banned in Russia as a terrorist organization) takeover in Kabul and Afghan refugees. "They agreed to continue the exchange of view in order to ensure stability and security in the region," the statement added. The Tajik leader's office, in the meantime, told Sputnik that Rahmon briefed Macron on Dushanbe's measures to beef up security at the Tajik-Afghan border in light of the recent developments. The sides agreed to continue consultations on Afghanistan and decided to instruct their foreign ministers to be in constant contact on the matter. The Tajik president also thanked his counterpart for his initiative to discuss current issues of the Tajik-French relations and topical issues of the international and regional agenda. (@FahadShabbir) DAMASCUS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) One soldier was killed and eight others received injuries after a truck delivering food to the Syrian army was attacked by militants in the southern province of Daraa, a security source told Sputnik on Thursday. "The militants ambushed a truck with food supplies for the Syrian army on the Nawa-Al Sheikh Maskin highway. As a result, one soldier was killed and eight were injured," the source said. On Wednesday night, a group of militants assassinated Judge Faisal Khalil in the town of Nawa. In late July, a military field source told Sputnik that the Syrian army had launched an offensive to neutralize terrorist groups in Daraa who had refused to lay down arms. Earlier in August, the United Nations called for a ceasefire between the Syrian government forces and the rebels in the province to ease the suffering of civilians. (@ChaudhryMAli88) Two Russian evacuation planes with Kyrgyz citizens aboard who were evacuated from Afghanistan on Wednesday landed in Kyrgyzstan, the Russian Defense Ministry said MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 25th August, 2021) Two Russian evacuation planes with Kyrgyz citizens aboard who were evacuated from Afghanistan on Wednesday landed in Kyrgyzstan, the Russian Defense Ministry said. "Two planes of the military transport aviation of the Russian Defense Ministry landed at an airfield in Kant in Kyrgyzstan with citizens of the country evacuated from Afghanistan," the ministry said in a statement. Earlier in the day, Four Russian Defense Ministry aircraft with citizens of Russia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and member states of the Collective Security Treaty Organization took off from Kabul. One of the planes landed in Tajikistan. MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) Claims that Afghanistan's ex-president Hamid Karzai and High Council for National Reconciliation chief Abdullah Abdullah are held under house arrest in Kabul are not true, they stay in the Afghan capital voluntarily, Mohammad Naeem, a spokesman for the political office of the Taliban (banned as a terrorist organization in Russia), told Sputnik on Thursday. Earlier in the day, CNN reported, citing sources that Karzai and Abdullah are under house arrest in Kabul after the Taliban confiscated their cars and took away their security teams. "These reports are not true. I do not know what they mean. Claims about some restrictions on them are not true," Naeem said. The safety of Karzai and Abdullah is within the competence of the Islamic Emirate, the spokesman assured. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Thursday convened crisis talks after a large explosion at Kabul airport, his office announced London, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Aug, 2021 ) :British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Thursday convened crisis talks after a large explosion at Kabul airport, his office announced. A Downing Street spokesperson said Johnson had been "updated on the situation at the airport in Kabul" and called a meeting of the COBR emergencies committee for later Thursday. (@FahadShabbir) UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the terrorist attack outside Kabul airport on Thursday, saying the incident underscores the volatility of the situation in Afghanistan UNITED NATIONS, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Aug, 2021 ) :UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the terrorist attack outside Kabul airport on Thursday, saying the incident underscores the volatility of the situation in Afghanistan. "The Secretary General is following with great concern the situation, ongoing situation in Kabul and especially at the airport," his Spokesman ,Stephane Dujarric, said in a statement read out at the regular noon briefing at UN Headquarters in New York. "He condemns this terrorist attack which killed and injured a number of civilians and extends his deep condolences to the families of those killed," the statement said, adding the UN chief stands in solidarity and wishes a speedy recovery to those injured. It added, "This incident underscores the volatility of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan, but also strengthens our resolve as we continue to deliver urgent assistance across the country in support of the Afghan people."Replying to questions, the spokesman said that efforts were being made to determine whether any member of UN staff was among the casualties. Today, the United States donated 3.7 million doses of the life-saving Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine to the Government of Pakistan for distribution to the Pakistani people through the COVAX facility Islamabad (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Aug, 2021) Today, the United States donated 3.7 million doses of the life-saving Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine to the Government of Pakistan for distribution to the Pakistani people through the COVAX facility. Todays donation of 3.7 million vaccines is in addition to the 5.5 million Moderna vaccine doses that the U.S. government donated to Pakistan in July, bringing the total number of doses sent from the United States to Pakistan to over 9.2 million. This donation is part of the 500 million Pfizer doses the United States purchased this summer to deliver to 92 countries and economies worldwide, including Pakistan, to fulfill President Joe Bidens commitment to provide safe and effective vaccines around the world and supercharge the global fight against the pandemic. There is an urgency, now more than ever, to put an end to this devastating pandemic, and Pakistan and the United States are continuing to work together to achieve that goal, said U. S. Embassy Charge daffaires Angela P. Aggeler. The United States is proud to partner with the Pakistani people to defeat COVID-19. Together, we will continue to build a world that is safer and more secure against the threat of infectious disease. The United States has also delivered more than $63 million in COVID-19 assistance through our partnership with the Government of Pakistan. Since the start of the pandemic, the United States has worked together with Pakistan to improve infection prevention and control, enhance patient care, expand laboratory testing, and support frontline healthcare workers. The United States is the single largest contributor supporting COVAX efforts toward global COVID-19 vaccine access. Tashkent has maintained contact with the Taliban (a terrorist organization banned in Russia) for several years and considers it an indisputable part of the Afghan society, Uzbek Deputy Foreign Minister Farkhod Arziyev said on Thursday, adding that Uzbekistan acknowledges that the movement came to power in Afghanistan TASHKENT (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th August, 2021) Tashkent has maintained contact with the Taliban (a terrorist organization banned in Russia) for several years and considers it an indisputable part of the Afghan society, Uzbek Deputy Foreign Minister Farkhod Arziyev said on Thursday, adding that Uzbekistan acknowledges that the movement came to power in Afghanistan. "The Taliban came to power in Afghanistan and we can say that they completely control the country," Arziyev told a Senate session. The diplomat recalled that Uzbek authorities have maintained contact with the Taliban for several years and consider that "an indisputable factor of the Afghan society." "We support the formation of a government in Afghanistan that takes into account the interests of all political forces and achieves them through peaceful negotiations. We have always distanced ourselves from the idea that the Afghan problem can be solved by force in Afghanistan," Arziyev added. As Pope Francis meets with the members of the Laudato si Movement, climate scientist Gregory Asner explains that science can offer tools to Catholic faithful in the effort to research and combat climate change. By Devin Watkins Laudato si speaks to people in ways that a scientist cannot. Pope Francis really gives us a gift to communicate where science plays into integral ecology, as part of a larger responsibility. That remark sums up for one scientist the Popes contribution to promoting integral ecology among people of all religions. According to Gregory Asner, a US-born climate and biodiversity scientist, faith and science can work together on the issue of climate change and are not opposed, as seen in the Popes 2015 encyclical. Mr. Asner spoke to Jean-Charles Putzolu on the sidelines of a papal audience in the Vatican on Thursday with the Laudato si Movement, formerly known as the Global Catholic Climate Movement. Faith and science work together Hearing Pope Francis, the Church, and Laudato si, I see an understanding that [the issue of climate change and biodiversity] is critical, said Mr. Asner. We have to play a role in improving our conditions across the planet for people and for nature. Science and faith, he added, can absolutely work together to achieve that goal. In his travels to many of the worlds nations, Mr. Asner noted that he often encounters the idea that science and faith are opposed to one another. He said his upbringing showed him that the two are both important, but for different reasons. Faith gives us compass, understanding, and much more than science will ever give us, said Mr. Asner. But science gives us something unique: tools. The tools offered by science, he added, can help us move from points A to B and improve our world. Science offers tools Referring to his own country of the United States, Mr. Asner said he often hears people almost raising climate change to the level of belief, saying I dont believe in climate change. His response is that climate change is not a belief but a scientific measurement using tools. It difficult for people to realize that science is not in combat with belief; its a utility, a tool, a way to navigate forward, he said, offering the example of turning on a cars headlights while driving at night. They just show me where to go. Laudato si bridges the gap The encyclical Laudato si, according to Mr. Asner, bridges the gap between faith and science, calling it such a unique perspective. The Popes mentality, he said, is that the two work together. Beliefwhichever belief system you associate withcannot ignore the fact that science is speaking loudly, telling us that we have to change our habits, the way we are consuming the earths resources, and change the stress we are putting on ecosystems, biodiversity, and the climate. He said humanity must take responsibility for what weve been giventhis earthand take care of it. Pope Francis appoints Sr. Alessandra Smerilli, FMA, as the interim Secretary of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development and as a delegate of the Vatican Covid-19 Commission. By Vatican News The Pope has appointed Sister Alessandra Smerilli "to replace Msgr. Bruno Marie Duffe and Fr. Augusto Zampini, respectively Secretary and Assistant Secretary of the same Dicastery, both of whom have returned to their dioceses." The Italian religious sister has served as an Undersecretary at the Dicastery since March 2021. According to the Holy See Press Office, Pope Francis has ordered that management team of the Vatican Covid-19 Commission be composed" of Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, Prefect of the Dicastery, Sister Alessandra Smerilli, and Father Fabio Baggio, Undersecretary of the Migrants and Refugees Section. New role Born in the Italian town of Vasto (Chieti) in 1974, Sister Smerilli has been the Undersecretary of the Dicastery since March 2021, as well as coordinator of the Economic Taskforce of the Vatican Commission Covid-19. As Secretary she takes the place of Msgr. Bruno-Marie Duffe, who left the Dicastery in July, and as delegate of the Task Force she replaces Father Augusto Zampini. The latter is also leaving the Dicastery and returning to serve in his home diocese in Argentina. Grateful for chance to serve "I am grateful to the Holy Father, said Sr. Smerilli, for the challenging task he has called me to take on, and I pray the Lord will help me honor this call in a spirit of obedience to the Church, with the humility, passion, creativity and ability to listen that it requires. My desire and commitment are to be able to serve the mission of the Church to the best of my ability, for as long as the Pope sees fit." After thanking her superiors, Sr. Smerilli said she was certain she could "count on the spirit of communion and collaboration of the entire Dicastery, as well as the many international partners who collaborate with the Covid Commission, for the integral promotion of the person and the care of creation by promoting and developing those principles of the Church's social doctrine to which Pope Francis constantly calls us for the construction of a better world." New phase of Commissions work A statement from Father Augusto Zampini was also posted on the Dicastery's website. "I am grateful to the Holy Father for entrusting me with the challenging task of coordinating the Vatican Covid-19 Commission and serving as the Dicastery's assistant secretary. Now that the Commission is ready to enter a new phase, and in communion with my bishop, I have asked Pope Francis for permission to return to my Diocese. I am confident that under the leadership of Sister Alessandra Smerilli the Commission will be able to continue the healing journey to help both people and the planet out of this difficult situation." In a video message, Pope Francis greets the members of Caritas Argentina as they continue the synodal process of La Caminata (The Journey), undertaken every three years. By Vatican News staff reporter Pope Francis has sent a video message to the volunteers of all Caritas organisations parish, diocesan and national in Argentina, spiritually joining the launch of the community stage of La Caminata 2021. The initiative is being organised as part of an institutional renewal process that takes place every three years and which, as its promoters explain in a statement, is an experience that puts us on the move and serves as a means for community discernment. Pope's greetings In his video message sent on Wednesday, the Holy Father greets all the participants of La Caminata which he describes as a synodal process. The 2021 journey, he says, is an experience of going outwards, listening to each other, and discerning how to love and serve more tangibly according to time and circumstances. And above all by seeing the signs of the times and places. He concludes his brief message with best wishes for participants, saying, May the Lord accompany you on your journey, and please do not forget to pray for me. Two stages of La Caminata Caritas Argentina explains that La Caminata takes place in two stages. The first involves a pilgrimage of the images of the Virgin Mary and St Joseph with the Child Jesus through each region and each diocese. As the images pass through the various towns and communities, they awaken the joy and hope that are born of the popular faith that is expressed and becomes gesture and commitment. The images are currently travelling through the Argentine littoral region. The second stage involves pastoral discernment within each community, which leads to proposals and initiatives that help us to identify the signs that God is awakening in each place and to continue deepening more and more the pastoral orientations for the Charity of the Church. All invited to participate This synodal process unites us with the whole Church in Argentina, with the Church in Latin America (and its process of Ecclesial Assembly), and with the Universal Church, says Caritas Argentina. The organization recalls that all its members each chapel, parish, regional, diocesan or national team are invited to participate in the process." A recently-released UNICEF report for World Water Week warns of the unprecedented impact and scale of water scarcity on children in the Middle East and North Africa, where 9 out of 10 children live in areas of high-water stress with negative consequences on their health and development. By Benedict Mayaki, SJ World Water Week this year runs from 23 27 August. The five-day event is an opportunity for everyone to examine our relationship with natural resources, particularly water, and to discuss management, development and sustainability issues as it relates to this precious resource. In the wake of a widening climate crisis amid reports of wildfires, earthquakes and hurricanes and other natural disasters in recent weeks, the 2021 theme, Building Resilience Faster, will address the climate emergency, along with the impact of other challenges, including the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic which is further exacerbated by emergence of new variants. Water crisis in the Middle East/North Africa In the Middle East and North Africa, water challenges have existed for thousands of years. However, the impact of this crisis today is unprecedented as it is now a threat to the survival of children. A recent UNICEF report released on World Water Week warns that nearly 9 out of 10 childen in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) live in areas of high or extremely high-water stress with serious consequences on their health, nutrition, cognitive development and future livelihoods. The region, the report added, is reportedly the most hard-hit in the world of the 17 most water-stressed countries. Around 41 million people in the MENA region lack access to safely managed drinking water, and nearly 66 million people lack basic sanitation. In addition, very low proportions of wastewater are adequately treated. Children affected by water scarcity With water scarcity affecting agriculture, causing food insecurity, as well as driving conflict, displacement and migration, children, the poor and the marginalized, have been heavily affected. UNICEF Deputy Regional Director for the MENA region, Bertrand Bainvel, notes that water Scarcity is having a profound impact on children and families, starting with their health and nutrition. It is also increasingly becoming a driver for conflicts and displacement. Within this context, Bainvel added, it is even more unacceptable that those fighting in conflicts target water infrastructure. Attacks on water infrastructure must stop. Furthermore, in many countries of the region, children are increasingly having to walk long distances just to fetch water instead of spending that time at school or with their friends playing and learning, said Chris Cormency, UNICEF WASH Regional Advisor for the Middle East and North Africa. Factors driving water scarcity The report, entitled Running Dry: the impact of water scarcity on children in the Middle East and North Africa, highlights several key drivers behind the water scarcity in the MENA region, including urbanization, poor water management, and climate change. In countries like Syria, Yemen and Sudan, additional factors contributing to water scarcity include conflict. In fact, conflicts and regional economic and political instability have increased the demand for emergency water sources including trucking, further exacerbating groundwater depletion, UNICEF said. In addition, the rising agricultural demands and the expansion of irrigated land using aquifers places increased strain on the already water-stressed region. The report notes that while globally agriculture accounts for an average of 70 percent of water use, it is more than 80 percent in the MENA region. Joint efforts to combat water scarcity In the face of the situation, UNICEF reiterates its commitment to support local partners, governments and civil society to address the vulnerability of water resources in the MENA region. This includes working to preserve the individuals human right to access water and sanitation services with it being compromised by other uses or threatened in conflict settings; creating an enabling environment with policies that address scarcity, as well as working with civil society, including the youth, as agents of change on the value of water and its conservation. The UN Childrens Fund will also work to create coordination groups between key ministries to support policy revisions, as well as support capacity building of key water sector actors, including regulatory bodies, private sector operators and national water utilities. World Water Week World Water Week was started by Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) in 1991. Every year, the conference gathers students, politicians, business representatives, researchers and grassroot groups in dialogue to link practical knowledge with science, as well as policy and decision making. The five-day observance is held as a digital event this year. World Water Week 2021 will offer sessions with a broad array of water-related topics, including food security, health, agriculture, technology and biodiversity to participants from over 130 countries across the globe. Mayor Will Frohlich Declares State of Emergency in the City of Victor in the Face of the Delta Variant FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact Troy L. Butzlaff , ICMA-CM (retired)August 25, 2021 Interim City Administrator714-745-5615(Victor, Idaho) -- Mayor Will Frohlich announced today that in response to the rising cases of COVID-19 largely resulting from the Delta Variant, a State of Emergency is declared within the City of Victor. The Emergency Declaration is an administrative tool that allows the City to more quickly and efficiently serve the community as COVID-19 evolves. The latest State of Emergency will go into effect at 5:00 pm on Wednesday, August 25, 2021.In declaring a State of Emergency, Mayor Frohlich said, It is unfortunate we are in this situation, but the Delta variant is extremely dangerous. Our local cases have grown exponentially over the last weeks and instituting social distancing practices and a mask mandate may once again become necessary to contain the spread of COVID-19 and protect yourself and our vulnerable neighbors.There are currently 357 active cases in the Eastern Idaho Public Health District area with 26 of those being from Teton County. Teton County has the highest case per 10k rate in the region at this time. Last week, the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare projected the State numbers hitting a new high within a few weeks. This is all due to the low level of vaccination in the State and the increased ability to spread that the Delta Variant has. I believe the best way to curb the development of variants and stop the spread remains vaccination, said Mayor Frohlich. Vaccines are safe and highly effective, free, and widely available in Teton County. I encourage all residents to get vaccinated. The Victor City Council will consider adding an urgency item to tonights City Council agenda to consider an ordinance affirming the Mayors Declaration of a Local Emergency Related to Covid-19 and Authorizing the Mayor to take Necessary Actions to Protect the Health of Residents and Visitors to the City. Tonights City Council meeting is scheduled to begin at 7:00 pm in the City Council Chambers located at 32 Elm Street.For more information, please contact Troy L. Butzlaff, Interim City Administrator, at 714-745-5615.### A Battambang farmer was arrested earlier this week and convicted on Wednesday for incitement for criticizing the implementation of a proposal by Prime Minister Hun Sent to procure longan fruit from farmers who were affected by export issues. The prime minister had ordered the Bodyguard Unit on August 17 to procure longan from smallholder farmers after China blocked exports from Thailand, halting purchases of Cambodian longan by Thai buyers. The farmer criticized this ad hoc procurement and allegedly attempted to incite people. Duong Saran, a spokesperson at the Battambang Provincial Court, said the defendant Nguon Ly, who also goes by Phat, was convicted on Wednesday for incitement and sentenced to 10 months in prison. The longan farmer was arrested earlier this week and the Battambang court unusually fast-tracked the conviction. A video posted to the Battambang Provincial Polices Facebook page on Tuesday shows Nguon Ly apologizing for posting videos criticizing the prime minister and longan procurement process. But he denied inciting anyone. I apologize to the royal government, to the head of the royal government for what I said. I apologize to samdech, he said, using an honorific used for Hun Sen. I posted this not to incite, but I just wanted to help the farm owner. I am afraid that no dealer is coming to buy on time, he said in the video posted by the Battambang police. Videos posted to Nguon Lys Facebook page on August 22 show him criticizing dealers who were meant to buy the longan from another farmer. He said the buyers were being picky about buying the longan and, in another video, that one buyer asked his farmer friend to first pack the fruit in plastic and then wanted them in a box. The government doesnt want to buy. They [want to] deceive, he said in the video posted on his Facebook page. The other farmer, who Nguon Ly mentions, is seen in the Battambang police video but was released without being charged. Chak Sopheap, who heads the Cambodian Center for Human Rights, said the case showed the continued misuse of the incitement charge and the governments failure to intervene in an effective way to help distressed farmers. The continuation of using incitement charges against people is not good for Cambodia as a democracy, said Chak Sopheap. Theng Savoeun, president of the Coalition of Cambodia Farmer Community, supported the Cambodian government's initiative to buy longan from farmers to provide them short-term relief. He said the government should work to find better markets and investments for longan farmers. The state must solve the concerns and issues strategically, such as setting up a system to [ensure] proper local and overseas markets and demand, he said. From trucks stuffed with carpets, bedding, clothes and even goats, around 200 Afghan refugees look beyond the horizon toward Spin Boldak in their country's south, waiting to return home from Pakistan. Dreading another period of harsh rule after the Taliban's rapid takeover following the U.S. troop withdrawal, thousands have been desperately trying to flee Afghanistan, with chaotic images emerging from the Kabul airport. But some families want to repatriate to their homeland, saying the Taliban will bring stability to the war-torn nation. "We emigrated from Afghanistan during bombing and hardships, when Muslims were in trouble, now, praise be to Allah, the situation is normal, so we are returning to Afghanistan," Molavi Shaib told AFP while waiting at the border. Divided by a 3-meter-deep trench filled with barbed wire, the mountainous boundary separating Spin Boldak from Chaman in Pakistan's southwest sees thousands crossing the trade route every day. As scores try to escape Taliban rule, Pakistan has ramped up security at the border, making the process more stringent. "People want to return but they are not allowed to cross, we request the Pakistani government to allow us to cross the border because there's no war, and peace has been established," Muhammad Nabi said. "We have our household with women and kids waiting -- we want them to cross the border." Pakistan has housed more than 2 million Afghan refugees since the first wave of war broke out in Afghanistan over 40 years ago, with numbers fluctuating based on the conflict's intensity, but the country has said it is not in a position to take in any more. Displaced Afghans have long complained about feeling unwelcome with little access to employment and citizenship rights. Many have become pawns in a diplomatic blame-game between the countries, which have accused each other of aiding militant groups. Islamabad has long been seen as protecting the Taliban and could be one of the few governments with close ties to the new regime in Kabul. With dust blowing over their belongings and children squeezed in between the furniture, dozens of trucks are parked in Chaman's barren fields, as returnees complete document checks and wait for their crossing to be approved. On the back of one truck, a teenage boy holds a baby, surrounded by a hodgepodge of household goods including a bucket, a bed and a bicycle. Another boy sits next to him on a yellow cushion while a white goat can be seen milling about between them. The returnees say they will have better lives in Afghanistan. "I am returning to Ghazni, now peace has been established and we are happy that we are returning back to our home. It's much better to go back and settle there," Wali Ur Rahman told AFP. His words are a jarring contrast to the images from Kabul airport where people have clung to the exterior of planes and at least one person has fallen to their death off a departing jet. Many of those trying to get out of Afghanistan fear reprisals from the Taliban after working for foreign governments that fought the militants during the 20-year war. But Nabi told AFP he was confident the end of the conflict would bring a brighter future. "We migrated here to Pakistan because of the ongoing war in Afghanistan, now peace has been established," he said. Britain deported several Zimbabweans, who arrived in the country in a chartered flight on Thursday. This is the second time the British government has deported Zimbabweans in almost a month. Fourteen Zimbabweans, said to be convicted criminals, were deported last month. (Video: Thomas Chiripasi) A World Health Organization official said Thursday that the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic on the continent appeared to be stabilizing, but numbers of infections are still very high, with almost 248,000 new cases reported in the past week alone. During a virtual briefing on the status of the pandemic in Africa, WHO Africa Regional Director Matshidiso Moeti said that 24 countries were seeing a resurgence of infections and that deaths were rising in eight countries. She said, This is a preventable tragedy if African countries can get fair access to the vaccines. Moeti said the good news was that 13 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines were administered in the past week, triple that of the previous week. She said many of the doses came from donations and sharing arrangements through the WHO-administered COVAX vaccine cooperative. She said 117 million doses were due to arrive in Africa in the coming month. But to meet the goal of having at least 10 percent of the continent vaccinated by the end of September, she said, another 34 million doses will be needed. The WHO Africa director urged nations with ample supplies to keep sharing doses. She said, With international solidarity we can protect those at highest risk of COVID-19 in all countries in the world. She also encouraged African governments to ensure that staffing and financial resources were available when shots arrived to get vaccines into the arms of our populations. No precious doses should be wasted. Some information in this report came from The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse. The World Health Organization said Wednesday that the data available for justifying the need for COVID-19 vaccine booster shots were inconclusive. Earlier this month, WHO officials called for a moratorium on administering COVID-19 booster shots until more was done to address vaccine inequities around the world between wealthy and poor nations. At the agencys regular news briefing at its headquarters in Geneva, WHO officials were asked about the moratorium. WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan said the organization based its policies on the available science and the consensus from a recent meeting of researchers and regulatory experts who determined the results of research on the need for COVID-19 vaccine boosters were "not conclusive." WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus agreed with that assessment and said there also was the moral issue of wealthy nations administering boosters while other nations have not delivered a single shot to their high-priority populations. Tedros compared it to offering a man floating in a life jacket another life jacket while others around him are drowning. He said booster shots would do very little to help the world recover from the pandemic. WHO officials have argued that getting at least one shot in the arms of at least 10% of the population of all the worlds countries will go further to stop the development and spread of COVID-19 variants. WHO officials also responded to statements made this week by Chinese government officials who ridiculed theories that COVID-19 escaped from a lab in Wuhan, China, and suggested it came from a lab at a U.S. Army base in the state of Maryland. Mike Ryan, WHO executive director of health emergencies, said all theories about the origins of COVID-19 were on the table, but he noted there was a contradiction in Beijing's saying the hypothesis that the virus came from a Chinese lab is a non-starter, while insisting labs in other countries should be investigated. Ryan said he found that thinking difficult to understand but would be willing to listen to his Chinese counterparts explain what they meant by that statement. Some information for this report came from the Associated Press and Reuters. Western governments warned Thursday of the threat of a terror attack at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, and said those gathered in the area seeking evacuation from the country should move to a safe location. "Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising U.S. citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a U.S. government representative to do so," the U.S. Embassy in Kabul said in a statement. "U.S. citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately." British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told BBC radio, There is now a very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack. Australias Foreign Affairs and Trade Department also cited an ongoing and very high threat of terrorist attack, while Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said his government ended its evacuation operations after hearing from the United States and other sources about a possible attack. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated Wednesday that the United States sees a potential threat from the Islamic State groups affiliate in Afghanistan. "It's hard to overstate the complexity and the danger of this effort," Blinken said at the State Department. "We're operating in a hostile environment in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban, with the very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack. We're taking every precaution, but this is very high-risk." The United States is pledging to continue efforts to extricate Americans, U.S. permanent residents, allies and other vulnerable Afghans, even if it means going past the end-of-the-month deadline for American forces to leave Afghanistan. There is "no deadline in getting out Americans and Afghans who want to leave past August 31," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said. "The will not be forgotten," Blinken emphasized as he responded to reporters' questions. "And as I said, we will use every diplomatic, economic assistance tool at our disposal to pressure the Taliban to let people leave the country." Throughout Wednesday at the State Department, the Pentagon and the White House, officials continued to rebut criticism about chaos at the gates of Kabul's airport. The White House said Wednesday that since Aug. 14, the United States has evacuated or helped evacuate about 82,300 people on U.S. military and coalition flights in one of the largest airlifts in history. Since the end of July, the U.S. has relocated about 88,000 people, nearly half of them women and children. "We're on track to have the largest U.S. airlift in history. And I think that speaks for itself," Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, told reporters. As many as 1,500 American civilians remain in Afghanistan. There were about 6,000 Americans in Afghanistan on Aug. 14, according to Blinken, when Taliban insurgents took military control of the country and evacuations began. But since then, he said, at least 4,500 Americans have been airlifted out of the country, including 500 in the past day. About 10,000 people hoping to escape the country are currently crammed in the airport in Kabul, according to U.S. officials who say a total of 90 U.S. military and international flights flew from Kabul in the past day. It "will not be an American responsibility" to control security at the airport after Aug. 31, according to Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby. Officials at the Pentagon and White House on Wednesday urged U.S. lawmakers to not travel to Kabul to witness the evacuation after Representatives Seth Moulton, a Democrat, and Peter Meijer, a Republican both of whom served military tours of duty in the Mideast made an unannounced trip to the Afghan capital this week to assess the situation. "We conducted this visit in secret, speaking about it only after our departure, to minimize the risk and disruption to the people on the ground, and because we were there to gather information, not to grandstand," the lawmakers said in a joint statement. The lawmakers released their statement after flying out of Kabul on a chartered plane. They said that in their view, after seeing the situation firsthand and speaking to commanders on the ground, "we won't get everyone out" before President Joe Biden's Tuesday deadline. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued a statement Tuesday saying travel to the region by lawmakers would divert resources from the evacuation operation. "Given the urgency of this situation, the desire of some (members of Congress) to travel to Afghanistan and the surrounding areas is understandable and reflective of the high priority that we place on the lives of those on the ground," Pelosi said. "However, I write to reiterate that the Departments of Defense and State have requested that (lawmakers) not travel to Afghanistan and the region during this time of danger. Ensuring the safe and timely evacuation of individuals at risk requires the full focus and attention of the U.S. military and diplomatic teams on the ground in Afghanistan." Other lawmakers are seeking hearings about what went wrong with the U.S. departure from Afghanistan. "The House Foreign Affairs Committee intends to conduct oversight to evaluate the policies that led to the Taliban's reestablishing control of the country, including those that drove the Trump administration's February 2020 agreement, and how this will impact the United States' broader Afghanistan and counterterrorism strategy," the committee's chairman, Democrat Gregory Meeks, said in a statement Wednesday. Biden "has signed the death warrant for thousands of Afghans who helped us," Republican Senator Lindsey Graham told the Fox News cable news network, calling for the president's impeachment for "dereliction of duty" as the commander in chief. Blinken was asked by a reporter Wednesday whether those in the Biden administration, in power for seven months, are willing to accept responsibility for the recent U.S. shortcomings regarding Afghanistan. "I take responsibility. I know the president has said he takes responsibility. And I know all of my colleagues across government feel the same way," Blinken said. He added there will be plenty of time to look back and see what might have been done differently and more effectively, but right now, "my entire focus is on the mission at hand." The Taliban have assaulted a journalist in Kabul at gunpoint in breach of pledges the Islamist group would uphold freedom of expression in Afghanistan. The incident comes amid accusations Afghan journalists and activists are increasingly being harassed by the Taliban since the group took control of the capital city more than a week ago. I was beaten by the Taliban in Kabul's New City [or Shahr-e-Naw area] while reporting, Ziar Khan Yaad, who works for the TOLO news channel, the countrys largest, tweeted Thursday. Cameras, technical equipment and my personal mobile phone have also been hijacked, he wrote. The TOLO news network reported that Yaad and his cameraman were filming footage of jobless people and laborers when they were beaten by Taliban forces. I still don't know why they behaved like that and suddenly attacked me. The issue has been shared with Taliban leaders; however, the perpetrators have not yet been arrested, which is a serious threat to freedom of expression, Yaad wrote. I was beaten by the Taliban in Kabul's New City while reporting. Cameras, technical equipment and my personal mobile phone have also been hijacked Some people have spread the news of my death which is false.The The Taliban got out of an armored Land Cruiser and hit me at gunpoint Ziar Khan Yaad (@ziaryaad) August 26, 2021 A senior member of the Talibans cultural commission, Ahmadullah Wasiq, while responding to Yaads complaint, said an investigation into the incident was underway. We have taken the incident seriously and we have shared it with the security agencies. Necessary steps will be taken following the investigation, Wasiq said. Meanwhile, Afghan journalists and activists reportedly staged a sit-in protest in Kabul Thursday, demanding that the world protect them. The Taliban have searched properties belonging to at least five journalists in Kabul, according to media rights organizations. Chief Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid has repeatedly said in recent days that media were free to report, citing a blanket amnesty his group has offered to those who worked with the United States or other Western nations. Maybe there are incidents, small incidents. Maybe some of our fighters are near your offices, Mujahid told a news conference on Tuesday when his attention was drawn to the harassment of journalists. We will be removing our forces from near media offices, and you can work freely. Media rights organizations describe a gargantuan effort to vet and find safe passage for hundreds of journalists at risk from the Taliban The U.S.-based International Womens Media Foundation said the Talibans pledge doesnt square with what it is hearing from Afghan media. "We have heard directly from journalists on the ground that the Taliban [have] been searching for them, and [have] come to their houses, and they are terrified, IWMF deputy director Nadine Hoffman told VOA. She added that many of the women feel that everything they've worked for the last 20 years has disappeared overnight. International media freedom advocates have been pressing the United States and other Western nations to prioritize the safety of Afghan journalists and ensure their evacuation from the country along with others fearing Taliban retribution. Former Afghan government officials are also complaining that despite offering the amnesty, they routinely are being harassed. Halim Fadai, who governed four provinces under the ousted Afghan government, tweeted Taliban fighters visited his home for an eighth time Thursday. SAINT PAUL Beginning today, Minnesotans can now see proposed 2017 rate information submitted by Minnesota insurers for individual health insurance plans, including those that will be sold through MNsure. The rate proposals, along with information provided by insurance companies to justify them, are available on the federal RateReview.HealthCare.gov website and through the Minnesota Commerce Department website. The rate proposals apply only to the approximately five percent of Minnesotans who directly purchase their own individual health insurance through MNsure, insurance agents or the insurance companies themselves. Most Minnesotans receive their coverage from employer-based insurance or public programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and MinnesotaCare. Final 2017 rates will be announced on September 30. The 2017 open enrollment period to buy health insurance begins on November 1 and continues through January 31, 2017. Seven insurers filed rate proposals for 2017, down from eight in 2016. In late June, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota announced that it would not sell plans on the individual market in 2017, except for its Blue Plus HMO plan. To provide insurers with time to reevaluate the states individual market and file revised rates, the federal government delayed posting Minnesotas rate information until today. The insurers proposals for 2017 are undergoing a detailed review by the Minnesota Commerce Department. Since Blue Crosss announcement, the department has worked hard to stabilize the individual insurance market and thoroughly review each companys rate request, said Commerce Commissioner Mike Rothman. Minnesota is not unique, as large insurers have announced they are leaving these markets across the country and many that are staying for 2017 are proposing significant rate increases. The underlying conditions causing these issues are posing challenges across the country. On behalf of Minnesota consumers, the Commerce Department is conducting a rigorous, thorough rate review of each companys proposal. Rates must be justified both by the benefits that consumers receive for their premiums and by the insurance companys ability to pay expected medical claims costs based on premium revenue. Insurers must also comply with state and federal laws that protect consumers, including coverage of pre-existing conditions and free preventive care, the adequacy of the provider network and the procedures an individual must follow to enroll or have a claim paid. As part of the rate review process, the Commerce Department is accepting public comments on the insurers 2017 rate proposals. Minnesotans can submit comments to healthinsurance.ratecomments@state.mn.us Statement from Governor Dayton on Proposed 2017 Individual Health Insurance Rates ST. PAUL, MN Following todays release of the proposed 2017 individual health insurance rates, Governor Mark Dayton issued the following statement. I am alarmed by the drastic increases in health insurance rates for Minnesotans in the individual market, which are also occurring in many other states under the Affordable Care Act. Fortunately, many individuals, who purchase their insurance through MNsure and qualify for the federal tax credits, can offset most of the listed rate increases. Also, these increases do not impact the 95 percent of Minnesotans who receive insurance through their employer or state programs. Nevertheless, these increases are reason for very serious concerns and for improvements to the Affordable Care Act by both Congress and the Minnesota Legislature. I will reconvene my Task Force on Health Care Financing, which previously reviewed our state program, and ask its members to look at the individual market, in light of these developments. I am most appreciative of the insurance providers, who, with one exception, have remained in our states individual health insurance market to offer Minnesotans their choices of health insurance throughout our state. I am extremely disappointed that one carrier, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, has withdrawn from the individual market, as they reportedly have done in other parts of the country. The continued participation of private insurers in the Affordable Care Act is essential to its survival. Overall, as a result of the Affordable Care Act, we have the lowest rate of uninsurance in our states history. And anyone, who believes this country would be better off after a collapse of the Affordable Care Act, is seriously mistaken. Local news is important. It's the information that will directly impact your life because its going on around you, every day. Join our group of dedicated readers today ... Subscribe Photo: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images You never know where Pablo Larrain is going next. After making several films in his native Chile, the director gave the biopic genre a much-needed jolt with Jackie and Neruda. The thrillingly unorthodox films, both released in 2016, reinterpreted their subjects public images, zeroing in on singular chapters of Jacqueline Kennedys and poet Pablo Nerudas lives to subvert the cradle-to-grave approach that most filmmakers take. This fall, Larrain will release the much-anticipated Spencer, in which Kristen Stewart plays Princess Diana. The film follows her over the course of the 1991 Christmas holiday when she decides to leave Charles. If the haunting close-ups in Jackie and the noirish lyricism of Neruda are any indication, Spencer will be another mood-driven interpretation of its subject (including a score by Phantom Threads Jonny Greenwood and cinematography by Portrait of a Lady on Fires Claire Mathon). Larrain sees biopics not as historical documents but as fables that can reveal profound insights about human nature. In the run-up to Spencer, however, Larrain released a non-biopic work the low-budget DIY odyssey, Ema, now playing in select theaters. Set in his home country, the movie follows a testy choreographer (Gael Garcia Bernal) and a pyromaniacal dancer (Mariana Di Girolamo) who recently gave up the child theyd adopted together and are in the throes of relationship chaos. Larrain, a master of cinematic reinvention, gave his Ema actors only a broad outline to start with. Once production began, he handed them the script pages (developed with writers Guillermo Calderon and Alejandro Moreno) the day before those scenes were to be shot. Along the way, the cast and crew would feel their way through the volcanic story, often taking inspiration from the trippy lighting design and the reggaeton-inflected score. Its very different from everything else Ive ever done, so I keep it in my heart with a lot of love and good memories of the process, Larrain explains in an interview with Vulture, in which he discusses hiding scripts from his actors, the Hollywood projects hes been offered, and the moviegoers who will inevitably misunderstand Spencer. Its interesting that you chose Ema after Jackie, a movie that was very demanding in terms of production design and your obligation to historical accuracy. Youd re-created an entire White House tour shot for shot. Ema let you go in any direction you wanted. You didnt even let the actors see full scripts. After Jackie, were you looking for something more stripped-down and open-ended? Its not really a reaction to a previous work. Its basically, Where are the possibilities to find the space where you can be as free as possible? What I really try to do is challenge the conventions of how do you make a movie? A movie is made with a lot of people, and a movie is made with as you were saying preconceptions of whatever youre going to capture. The bigger the movie, the little that is left for [what happens on] set. Theres a way to do the opposite, which is to really not prepare anything and just have a script that is in development as you shoot. Thats what happened with Ema and another movie I did, The Club. They were both made with the same styles. Actors never knew the script; they never knew what we were going to shoot. They spent more time dancing than talking or rehearsing at all. What was the structure of the film that you went in with compared to the final product that we now see? We shot three different endings, and we had a very abstract structure that I think is reflected in the movie. But how things happened and how they evolved in the characters is all new. We started shooting with an outline, and then during the process, we were writing. It might sound crazy because movies are made the same way all over the world you end up with an actor in front of a camera and things can be very simple somehow. But its a low-budget film and we didnt really have to explain the movie to anyone. We didnt have to go out and try to make a point and present a script and a schedule. No, we just found pieces over time and put them together. You certainly wouldnt have been able to make a movie that way in the United States. Were you specifically seeking the freedom that Chile gives you? Yeah, its possible that this movie, in the way we did it, would never have been made anywhere else. But also this movie is made in the heart of a city that only exists [in Chile], so it could only happen there. The city [Valparaiso] is a character that beautiful and strange port that we have on our coast is full of history and our own ways for immigrants. It has a very punk, artistic culture. I think the new movie Gaspar Noe shot, he did it like this. Maybe there are people who are trying to do this. Part of the problem is that its so expensive to shoot in the U.S. The system in the U.S. will never allow you to make a movie like this, even for a low budget. Here, we do have unions and you respect them, of course, but theres a way where people can go and feel that theyre really expressing themselves on a movie and not just moving a light or putting a dolly somewhere. That creates a different energy in the crew and in the cast. They understand that its a little journey and it takes a couple of months to do it. This is the third movie youve made with Gael, who has said that he signed on before reading any kind of script whatsoever. There must be a reason that you keep returning to him. What kind of shorthand developed at this point? Hes a very good friend, first. Were both parents, and I think theres something in the subject that we cared about. Then theres something in the character himself, which is the absurd crisis of the artist. I guess he connected with that, too. Hes obviously a great actor and a very handsome person, but he has something that is the essence of cinema, which is that hes mysterious. You put him in front of a camera and you ask him not to do much and to just give a few indications, and the audience will always wonder whats going on. Its that mystery. Maybe people dont go to the movies and say, Hey, I love that actor because hes mysterious, and even sometimes in the press or in the reviews, they dont talk about that. But if you talk about great actors, most of them have that. Im always mesmerized by that. Much of your work revolves around characters in crisis: the central couple in Ema, the protagonists in No, Jackie, Liseys Story. In Spencer, Diana is at Sandringham House, where the royal family spends its holidays, grappling with her disintegrating relationship with Charles. Why do you think you gravitate to that? Isnt it the key of cinema to have an actor or a character in a crisis? All the dramatic theory orbits around that somehow. There are movies like Jackie or Spencer where you dont know what the character wants up until the point of the movie. Some characters dont know what they want, but a situation makes them understand they are in a crisis. And as the movie evolves, they need to really understand it. So its a more existentialist type of cinema. Its really about the structure, but theres always something that has to make the character explode. At this point, youve worked with a number of famous A-listers: Natalie Portman, Julianne Moore, Clive Owen, Kristen Stewart. As talented as they may be, audiences have preconceived notions of them. Whats the advantage of casting someone like Mariana Di Girolamo, whom audiences can see as a blank slate? I actually just saw a picture of her in a magazine, and then I had a coffee with her and we hired her. She had some experience in television, but not a lot in movies. Gael was very helpful in understanding the logic of how you make a movie with a single camera and how you perform for one camera. But I guess the main thing is that Mariana, as the character, is completely unpredictable. You have no idea whats going on inside of her, and that makes her quite dangerous, especially when shes holding a flamethrower. I remember we were testing it, and we were going to have a stand-in who was going to operate the flamethrower. But Mariana wanted to do it. I said, Mariana, that is not how you do movies. Youre going to have a stand-in. Its a war weapon. She really insisted. All of a sudden, I had an actress that I never knew really throwing a loaded flamethrower on the set. We rehearsed it and it was safe, but it was like, Whoa! She built that character from an unknown place. She didnt know much about the character or the story because I hid the scripts from the actors. If you hid the scripts from the actors, what did you tell them? I told them the main concept and where it was going. Sometimes it was troubled. Troubled? Yeah, because some actors would take it well and say, Okay, whatever. But Gael, sometimes I would say, Do this or Say that, and he was like, Why? Id say, Because that is whats needed. Okay, but I need to understand, my friend. There are many ways to make a movie, but in this case, its an exercise in facing the void of life. You have no idea whats really going to happen to you in the following hours; anything can happen. Thats what I was trying to reach. I wanted actors who were standing there in a void of things that may happen or may not. The style of dance that we see in Ema makes so much sense in terms of the personalities of the two central characters. The choreography is full of sensual silhouettes, very street-dance-inflected. Tell me about conceptualizing the style of the choreography and what it represented for you. Im about to turn 45, so reggaeton is something thats not really my generation. Its quite strong in Latin America. [Composer] Nicolas Jaar made me think that the only way to do this was through reggaeton. We quickly changed the concept that we had before, which was more of a contemporary dance company, and we turned it into more of a street-type dance. We brought that into the argument of the film, because the choreographer [played by Bernal] does not understand the love and passion for reggaeton. And the dancers who really feel that they want to express themselves want to connect with whats going on in the streets. They dont care about this idea of culture. That was a very interesting friction. And then I had to embrace reggaeton. It was not easy! Its a very tough, distinct melody that has roots in Central America, which, even though its close to us, is quite different from our culture. It made me understand that we were making a movie about a generation that is different from us. Our country is changing right now in an incredible and great way because of the new generation. Dance opened my eyes to something that was way deeper that has political meanings and also a cultural perspective that I needed to embrace and understand. That was very beautiful for me. At some point, instead of conducting them so much, especially the female characters, I just let them say what they wanted. Somehow that became very relevant to the heart of the narrative. Something I admire about your work is the way that each project is stylized in a totally different way. I think back to the film-noir stylings of Neruda, the extreme close-ups in Jackie. Do you feel like you get to reinvent yourself with every movie? I try. I wouldnt want to repeat myself. I admire a lot of directors who have a very precise style over the years, like Pedro Almodovar. You know what youre going to get when you see his movies. But Im trying to behave in a way that I can feel surprised with the way that were shooting. Im trying to look for something we havent done before and to be in a place that is unknown for [the audience]. You dont always succeed, but I try to stay out of the comfort zone with things that you know will work. I want to create a mood. For Ema, the mood and the tone of the film are part of the experience for the audience. In this case, having Nicolas score before we started shooting really helped me to understand how we were going to move around. What was the speed? What was the tone? Estefania Larrain, our production designer, designed everything with very precise colors, and Sergio Armstrong, our DP, went really weird with certain lighting systems. I hadnt seen something like that, at least on my sets. Then you embrace it, and that becomes the style of the movie. Its interesting when you try to do that because also I never see a movie again. Your own movies, you mean? Yeah, I just dont look back, because its very cruel. By the time Jackie came out, youd been making movies for a while. But it really put you on the map with American audiences, and obviously people are going to draw comparisons between it and Spencer. What kind of offers and opportunities did you get from Hollywood in the wake of its success? All kinds of things. I dont think Hollywood executives could put me on any specific list around any specific type of movie or style. I remember when I started working with an agent at CAA nearly 14 or 15 years ago. I did a movie called Tony Manero that was about a serial killer, and then I got a lot of serial-killer scripts, which was strange. And then over the years I have been invited to different kinds of things. I worked for a while to develop Scarface, but it didnt work out. When I was invited to do Liseys Story, I thought it was something interesting because it just came out of nowhere. There wasnt really a logic for why you would be inviting someone like me to do something like that. I had never been in that space before, so I went for it. I love to be hard to classify. Are you conscious of the fact that, after Jackie, Neruda, and Spencer, people see you as someone who is deconstructing the biopic genre? Ive never done it consciously. First, I dont have a plan of doing this or that type of movie. Im not trying to build my career so people can create any kind of logic or analyze it in any specific way. Also, I dont think Ive ever done a biopic. I think Neruda and Jackie and Spencer are movies about people in certain circumstances where everything is about to explode. Theyre not really biographical analyzations; its not the study of a life of someone. I think some people could misunderstand it. Before they go to see a movie like Spencer, they might say, Were going to really understand who this person was. No! Wrong number! Wrong movie! We dont do that! Were just trying to work with whatever that person was and create a fable out of it. Thats what Im looking for. Well see if it works. This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity. A group of volunteers in Decatur are heading across the state line to help people in need after catastrophic flooding killed more than a dozen people in Tennessee. "This is an opportunity for people to reach out to other people in their moment of need, and it's a way to share God's love so it's very important for us to do that," Cindy Sandlin, the operations manager at the United Methodist Disaster Relief Warehouse in Decatur, said. After seeing the devastation that took place in Waverly, Tennessee, she knew she had to help. "Reaction was to start getting on the phone and on email to reach out to our coordinators in the area and see what our needs were," Sandlin said. This won't be the only time the team heads to Tennessee. Sandlin says they expect more supplies will be needed in the next couple of days. "The next step may be to kind of help families get their houses cleaned out if they've had massive damage. That will involve sending rakes, shovels, wheelbarrows, box fans, two gallon sprayers," Sandlin said. 'We can distribute some of the mold and mediation supplies those kind of things." Sandlin said for right now they're just waiting to see what is needed next, and are ready to help out for as long as they're needed. A glimmer of hope in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic. Madison County's positivity rate has recently gone down, and local hospitals are hopeful numbers are starting to flatten. For nine days of the last two weeks, Madison County saw a declining number of new COVID cases. The current positivity rate in the area is around 19%. Health officials hope it means the transmission of the Delta variant is slowing down. However, the burden on hospitals is nowhere near over as they usually start feeling the impacts two to three weeks after someone gets infected. Right now, Madison County hospitals are taking care of nearly 200 inpatients. All ICU beds are being used, mainly by COVID patients. "COVID is not done with us yet, and the only way we are going to save ourselves and the people that we love is to get vaccinated," Dr. Pam Hudson said. She adds that Madison County's vaccination rates have shown progress with more than 50% of the population receiving at least one dose. However, she says most of the region has lower rates, which is concerning. As the Delta variant spreads, the FDA is considering authorizing COVID booster shots to improve people's immunity against COVID-19. Dr. Neil Lamb with Hudson Alpha says the current vaccines are doing its job. He points out to the current hospitalization numbers as evidence. 90% of COVID inpatients in madison county are unvaccinated. Hospital officials believe the burden would be much less if they had all gotten the shot. Dr. Lamb says there are three reasons why vaccine efficacy is going down. One is the impact of the Delta variant. It's more transmissible and could overwhelm your body's immune response. Secondly, people are getting more exposed to the virus as there are fewer protective measures in place. Dr. Lamb says people are solely relying on the vaccine to keep them safe instead of taking other preventative measures like masking and avoiding large crowds. The third and final reason is that over time your level of immunity does goes down. Dr. Lamb says this is normal and was expected from the beginning. We just weren't sure how long the immunity from the vaccine would last. However, he stresses that the vaccine does work! "COVID vaccines were developed to provide protection against becoming seriously ill, being hospitalized or dying. They continue to do an incredible job in that respect, you know in the range of 80s to 90% efficacy against those three things," Dr. Lamb explained. He adds that the vaccine is not 100% effective, so you shouldn't be surprised if someone who is vaccinate does end up in the hospital. Dr. Lamb emphasizes the vaccines' safety. He says one in 100,000 or less experience serious symptoms with the vaccine. Health experts are also concerned about the potential for new variants to form. Dr. Lamb explains new variants are not only expected, but is normal for viruses to do. Viruses change their genetic code on a regular basis. The key is whether these new variants that develop end up being more transmissible or even immune to our current COVID vaccines. Unfortunately, experts won't be able to prepare or know how to fight these new variants until it's too late and we start seeing the impacts. "That's why it's so important to get people vaccinated. It's so important to practice things like masking and distancing because we need to try and prevent the virus from having people that it can replicate in and gain new variants," Dr. Lamb explained. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - President Joe Biden says the United States will complete its evacuation of Americans and others from Kabul, despite the attack that killed at least 13 U.S. service members and many Afghan civilians. He vowed to avenge the deaths, saying the U.S. has some idea of who perpetrated the attack and will hunt them down. Continuing the evacuation means Biden risks more deaths, but the alternative would be an early end to the pullout and leaving behind Americans still seeking to leave the country. Biden ordered U.S. flags lowered to half-staff to honor the service members who were killed. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. (Master Sgt. Donald R. Allen/U.S. Air Force via AP) Decatur, IL (62521) Today Clear skies. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Clear skies. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. Decatur, IL (62521) Today A clear sky. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight A clear sky. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. FILE - In this Monday, Aug. 2, 2021 file photo, Rev. Jesse Jackson speaks to the crowd during a demonstration supporting the voting rights, on Capitol Hill, in Washington. The Rev. Jesse Jackson and his wife, Jacqueline, have been hospitalized after testing positive for COVID-19 according to a statement Saturday, Aug. 21, 2021. He is vaccinated against the virus and publicly received his first dose in January. According to a statement released Saturday evening, the Jacksons are being treated at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago. He is 79 years old. Jacqueline Jackson is 77. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File) 750,000 people in Italy sign petition to legalise euthanasia. Right-to-die activists in Italy have secured more than 750,000 signatures in a petition calling for a referendum to decriminalise euthanasia. The signatures - over 500,000 gathered in person and more than 250,000 online via Italy's digital identity system SPID - are well in excess of the half a million threshold required to trigger a public vote. Campaigners have now reached their stated goal of obtaining 750,000 names by 30 September but say the petition will continue, "to send an even clearer and stronger message to the institutions and to the whole country." What is the petition calling for? The petition, which began in June, calls for a referendum to abolish a clause in a 1930 law that punishes the homicide of a consenting person with up to 15 years in jail. Assisted suicide is a divisive issue in Italy and faces strong opposition from conservative politicians and the Vatican which condemns it as "an intrinsically evil act." However Italy's health minister Roberto Speranza, of the left-wing LeU group, says he is in favour of a parliamentary debate on the matter. Things had really been looking up for WeWork. Since the last time it tried to list its shares, it has slashed costs, closed particularly unprofitable locations and appointed more sensible management. And like IWG, it should benefit from the shift to hybrid working thats been accelerated by the pandemic. Companies are realizing they dont need to own as much office space and their employees would prefer a shorter commute. At the end of the day, airlines have a business to run and its in their interest to do everything possible to make passengers feel comfortable with the idea of boarding a plane. This is why Delta the airline would rather call the troublesome delta variant by its scientific name, B.1.617.2. Its why the airlines have bent over backwards to tout the benefits of their (quite good but not perfect) ventilation and filtration systems and supported a Transportation Security Administration face-mask mandate that was just extended through January of 2022. Its why there was a domino effect on employee vaccine requirement announcements from other airlines once United made the first move, with Hawaiian Airlines and Frontier Group Holdings Inc. taking similar steps. But speaking for myself, Im less worried about catching Covid-19 from a masked flight attendant than I am about getting it from an unvaccinated seatmate who may be less than enthusiastic about face coverings. While theres obviously a political divide when it comes to vaccine requirements, they are more popular than one might think based on the headlines. A recent poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that 57% of American adults support requiring vaccinations for air travel. Stock brokerages such as Charles Schwab and TD Ameritrade regularly produce 1099-B forms, which summarize taxable gains for customers and help the Internal Revenue Service ensure that all taxes are paid. Not so in crypto and particularly in the world of decentralized finance, where nebulously governed platforms execute transactions through automatic market makers. Consider the decentralized finance (DeFi) exchange Uniswap, which gave away 150 million UNI coins to users last September a taxable windfall worth at least half a billion dollars, and possibly as much as a few billion dollars total, depending on when people claimed their airdropped tokens. Uniswap didnt send out any forms to help users understand their tax liability, leaving them to figure it out for themselves. Many might simply ignore it, or turn to one of the third-party services that in some cases charge up to hundreds of dollars to generate tax forms. The Securities and Exchange Commission is probing whether DWS, a Frankfurt-based asset manager thats 80% owned by Deutsche Bank AG, overstated its application of ESG criteria to some investment products, according to the Wall Street Journal. The German financial regulator BaFin is also scrutinizing the firm, Bloomberg News reported Thursday. The investigations come after the Journal said earlier this month that Desiree Fixler, who was fired as the firms chief sustainability officer in March, filed an unfair dismissal case alleging she was dismissed for objecting to ESG claims made in the companys annual report. If Laschet is to secure the chancellery, he will likely need to strike a coalition deal with the Greens and the FDP in a Jamaica alliance, so called because the party colors black, green and yellow match the Caribbean islands flag. However, if the current trend persists and the SPD wins, Scholz could form a red-yellow-green coalition with the FDP and the Greens, known as the traffic light option. Another possibility, though unlikely, would be a red-red-green alliance with the far-left Linke replacing the pro-business FDP. The SPD joined with Merkel in a grand coalition for 12 of her 16 years in power and the two sides have all but ruled out a repeat of that this time. Forming a government could take many weeks and Merkel will remain at the helm until the Bundestag votes for a new chancellor. The nations involved in Afghanistan include three nuclear powers, the U.S., U.K. and France, and one of the worlds greatest economic powers, Germany. These mighty nations would have us believe that they cant stay in Afghanistan a minute longer than the U.S. does, because, even together, they are unable to hold back a ragtag force like the Taliban not even long enough to evacuate their own citizens and the Afghans who had worked with them. Thats what all the desperate discussion of deadlines between the U.S. and the Europeans is about. The impression of utter powerlessness this creates about the Europeans is worse than any damage Americas reputation is suffering because it has set such a tight deadline, effectively abandoning thousands of people to their fate. The movements are at odds. They have fought over territory and doctrinal differences. Islamic State, which views the Muslim world as one entity that should be united under a single caliph, or Islamic ruler, lambasts the Taliban for being a nationalist movement and for being too tolerant of Afghanistans Shiite Muslim minority, who are anathema to Islamic State. In its propaganda, Islamic State excoriated the Taliban for reaching a deal with the U.S. in 2020, under which it pledged not to allow any group to use Afghanistan to threaten the security of the U.S. or its allies, in exchange for a commitment for the withdrawal of all U.S. and allied troops. In a newsletter, Islamic State denounced the Taliban for taking the Crusaders as their new allies and said it wouldnt stop attacking the Americans in Afghanistan. Yet the angry public backlash from OnlyFans users shows how these decisions are rippling out unpredictably after Covid-19. As the pandemic dragged more of the global economy online, more people have had to rely on tech platforms to scratch out a living. Its not every day you have performers like Erica Cherry calling on banks to hear the voices of the sex-work community. We shouldnt dismiss the dark side of online porn, but legitimate sex workers not just banks have networks to maintain, too. Its easy to see why Hong Kong authorities would welcome such a project and also why it has caused such agitation. If faithful to the source material, The Expats will portray a privileged class of people who are able to carry on their narrow and self-obsessed lives oblivious to the concerns and upheavals of the society that surrounds them. For a government keen to emphasize how Hong Kong remains open for business to foreign investors and businesspeople, thats a convenient message. Entirely omitted, even as background noise, is the epochal drama of Hong Kongs failed struggle for democracy and the majority of people who supported it. (The Expatriates, by Janice Y.K. Lee, on which the series is based, was published in 2016, between the Occupy movement that disrupted the city in 2014 and the start of the 2019 unrest.) But Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.s $12 billion Arizona factory is a sign that the world has changed from what it was 10 or 15 years ago. Yes, Taiwans flagship chipmaker which by some measures is ahead of Intel Corp. in the race for advanced technology is a special case. Taiwan is in danger of a blockade should China decide to force reunification with the island, so a factory in the U.S. helps diversify the company against that risk. But the fact that it chose the U.S. instead of a cheaper country like Mexico, or another Asian country like Japan, is encouraging. Unlike former President Donald Trumps failed plan to put a Foxconn Technology Group factory in Wisconsin, TSMCs Arizona investment is for real. Adding fuel to this fire is the increasing belief particularly among those who lean toward jihad and violence but are not quite there yet that politics doesnt work, nor does democracy or the nation state as defined by the West. They may see the Taliban as a model and alternative, says Rasha Al Aqeedi, senior analyst and the head of the nonstate Actors program at the Newlines Institute in Washington. Certainly, she says, the idea will be glorified again and the appetite to do something will be there and that is always a problem. And if they want money aid or investment Doha has much deeper pockets than Islamabad. This will be especially important in the first months of the new administration, when Western governments and donors will hold back funding while they take the measure of the new dispensation. Even if they remain suspicious of the Taliban, those inclined to keep assisting the Afghan population will feel more comfortable using Qatar as a conduit than relying on Pakistan. The trailer for the documentary Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal and Greed teases that it will hold a shocking secret about the upbeat host of the long-running art-instructional public television show, who died in 1995 after spending years famously encouraging viewers that they, too, could paint happy trees and clouds. We want to show you the trailer, an ominous on-screen title reads, but we cant. This is followed by a disembodied voice that sounds like Rosss saying, Ive been wanting to get this story out for all these years. As it turns out, the voice doesnt belong to Ross, but to his son Steve Ross (who sounds a little like his father). And the story, while sad, isnt that the TV personalitys signature bush of curly hair was a perm he called it getting his springs tightened, Steve says or that the elder Ross had an affair, while married to someone else, with his business partner Annette Kowalski (alleged in the film but disputed). Rather, its that the Bob Ross name or, rather, the Bob Ross brand, which can be found trademarked on paints, brushes, mugs, bobbleheads and even a Bob Ross Chia Pet was stolen from him, and, as a result, from his heir Steve. The thief, according this compelling film: Bob Ross Inc. (BRI), a family business originally formed by Ross with Annette and her husband Walt Kowalski, and now run by their daughter Joan Kowalski. The film is well made, but it takes a while to spill all its beans. TV-14. Available on Netflix. 93 minutes. But the Baltimore pediatrician is abiding by the same advice he has given to the 50 or more parents who have called him recently. We all want our children to get the best protection. he said. And just as much as we want to do it, we want to do it in the safest way possible. Weve got to wait for the data to play out. Haberman met her husband on the job: Dareh Gregorian, now a politics reporter for NBC News, was the night-shift rewrite guy when she first joined the New York Post as a copy aide. And though she resisted pressure to move from Brooklyn to Washington for the White House beat, her home life has remained entwined with her journalism. On a typical day during the Trump presidency, the relentless multitasker during nearly every interview for this story she was in the middle of something else would be in touch with about 50 sources by phone, text or other means, often multiple times a day, to the extent that she often recalls key stories in connection with the life event they interrupted the story she broke about Trump firing campaign manager Corey Lewandowski during her childs kindergarten graduation, for example. As an Indigenous guide, Joe Urie offers an experience different from typical tours of Jasper National Park in Alberta, Canada. While taking his guests into the Maligne Valley and in search of bears, wolves and moose, he often counters the Canadian Rockies established history. Since tourism began bringing people to the mountains, the narrative has been very colonial, Urie says. The narrative of my valley was that David Thompson discovered the path through the mountains, which isnt true at all. He was shown the way through by Indigenous people. He just happened to draw a really excellent map. Grimm decided to sue the school board, winning the applause of transgender advocates nationwide and the support of the Obama administration. His suit then began working its way through the courts: Grimm won in U.S. District Court and at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit. The Supreme Court agreed then to take the case. Prosecutors have allowed misdemeanor defendants to plead to one of four charges applied to those who went into the Capitol but did not engage in violence or destruction. Thus far, nearly all have chosen parading, demonstrating or picketing inside the Capitol building, a petty offense that carries a punishment of at most six months in jail and a fine of up to $5,000. The crime also does not require defendants to admit they trespassed or attempted to block the peaceful transition of power. I take extremely seriously the prohibition on leaking classified information, but I believe there are several aspects of Mr. Hales case that merit a full pardon, Omar wrote in the letter sent to Biden on Thursday morning. The information, while politically embarrassing to some, has shone a vital light on the legal and moral problems of the drone program and informed the public debate on an issue that has for too many years remained in the shadows. The weekly average number of cases per 100,000 residents is up most starkly in the region in Virginia, where the figure reached 32 as of Wednesday, compared with six a month ago. In D.C., the figure was 24 as of Wednesday and seven a month ago, and Maryland was at 17 as of Wednesday compared with four a month ago, according to data collected by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. But, she said, he is amenable to treatment. Grant said she would check in on him at the D.C. jail regularly by video, even though hes a Redskins fan, she said jokingly. Roseberry, who appeared to be in good spirits, clarified that Im not a Redskins fan anymore, Im a Washington fan. The team changed its name last year under pressure to stop using a word derogatory toward Native Americans. When I answered, I saw all these guys in khaki suits and a state trooper, Bailey said in testimony he gave to a Senate Judiciary subcommittee this summer. I got so scared. I had no idea what was happening. It was ICE, and they told me they were taking me because of the conviction even though it was so many years before. ICE grabbed me and didnt care that my 11-year-old daughter came out screaming and crying. Two Virginia voters, Roy L. Perry-Bey and Carlos A. Howard, argue in that suit that McAuliffe should not legally appear on the ballot, in part because he did not sign the candidate form. They also argue that the state constitution does not allow for governors to serve more than one term. McAuliffe was governor from 2014 to 2018. The election also will test Democrats grip on the state, a longtime Republican stronghold that steadily turned purple amid demographic shifts and then solidly blue after the 2016 election of Donald Trump. Over the past four years, the states suburban swing voters abandoned the GOP, allowing Democrats to take control of the state House and Senate, hold the Executive Mansion and flip three congressional seats. Despite having seats and visas, the group which included children and infants was repeatedly turned away from the airport by soldiers of different nationalities over two successive days this week. Some, after braving Taliban checkpoints and waiting outside airport gates for hours, were forced to wade through a canal filled with sewage; others were affected by tear gas when foreign troops deployed it near where they waited. While it may be tempting to some to use this moment to score political points, now is not the time for that. I urge my fellow Americans to gather together to mourn the fallen, comfort those in pain, and pray for peace, leadership, and safety. President Biden should also step up, be the commander in chief we need, and show the world we will not tolerate an evil attack like this, Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) said. They fill out applications for work authorizations and are connected with refugee agencies who can help with resettlement. Many will continue to be housed at military bases Fort Bliss in Texas and Fort McCoy in Wisconsin are two of the main sites before being cleared to leave. A senior administration official could not say how long that process might take, but said the expectation is not for refugees to spend months on the military bases. One law clerk kept a written log of comments the judge she worked for made about her legs and hair, and his instructions on what to wear. Another said his judge subjected him to mind games and characterized his work as garbage. A third, who was engaged to be married, was asked during a job interview to confirm that she would not become pregnant during her one-year clerkship. Indeed, defense attorney Gary Springstead told the judge that Garbin is going to be a star witness against the others. He later told reporters that Garbin can tell what was in his mind at the time, which is that this wasnt some fanciful plot. This was real. And he can tell the government why he believes other people had the same intent that he did and show them where to look. Peacock, an Arkansas native who worked in D.C. and California before returning home, said the region is a top place to live, but is not well-known other than as home to Walmart. Part of the idea with the program is simple publicity. The other part is to help attract forward-thinking individuals who can found the next Walmart. Already, 55 percent of northwest Arkansas residents hail from out of state, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures. The daughter of a couple who met at the program in 1985, Viswanath, 32, has been attending Yiddish-Vokh her entire life and now brings her children to the event. Theyre the fourth generation in her family to be involved in the program, as she also happens to be a granddaughter of Mordkhe Schaechter (and Rukhls niece). My hope is that this designation is an invitation to a deeper conversation within the congregation whatever they decide. Open up storytelling and open up conversation about these issues that are very human, that we are all dealing with, Kanter said. Part of being a person of faith is trusting that God made us in human form to procreate and to love in many different ways. That everything we have is holy. Many Filipinos are all right with that. Some 91 percent were satisfied with his performance, according to Pulse Asia in September, despite a recession and record hunger. A double Duterte ticket, with Duterte-Carpio as president, was the top pick in a June survey by the same pollster. (The populist leader said this year that women were not fit for the presidency, but he and his daughter previously shared power as mayor and vice mayor of the southern city of Davao, swapping roles when their terms were up.) Todays Headlines The most important news stories of the day, curated by Post editors and delivered every morning. Email address By signing up you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy Marilyn Sue Lents, 84, of Washington, passed away at 10:58 a.m. Monday, Aug. 30, 2021 at Ketcham Memorial Center. She was born Sept. 1, 1936, in Washington, Indiana, to the late Icel and Mary Kirk. Marilyn married Carol "Chick" Lents on Aug. 4, 1995, and he survives. She enjoyed tending to h Trusted local news has never been more important, but providing the information you need, information that can change sometimes minute-by-minute, requires a partnership with you, our readers. Please consider making a contribution today to support this vital resource that you and countless others depend on. Qantas has started the mammoth task of repairing its pandemic-ravaged balance sheet sooner than expected and is cutting costs faster than planned, helping ease investor fears that it may need to raise fresh equity to survive the tail end of the COVID-19 crisis. The $9.5 billion airlines boss Alan Joyce said on Thursday that a surge in domestic travel to above pre-COVID levels in the June quarter while state borders were open generated enough cash for it to pay $500 million back to its lenders, lowering its debt pile to $5.9 billion. Qantas CEO Alan Joyce said the airline has been dealing with diabolical trading conditions.. Credit:Janie Barrett An aggressive cost-cutting program - which has including axing around 9400 jobs, or more than a third of its workforce, since the start of the pandemic - was ahead of schedule, with $650 million taken out of its cost base during the 12 months to June 30. Mr Joyce said that should grow to $850 million by the end of this financial year and $1 billion in 2023, delivering improved profitability both across its Qantas and Jetstar operations when domestic and international travel restarted. Its the breathtaking art exhibition few in Australia have seen, and may never get the chance to see again. Illuminating the reputation of a groundbreaking female painter and occultist who believed her art was a revelation from higher guides from the spirit world, the survey had been showered with praise by the critics and adored by the few visitors who had made it to the show before lockdown. Hilma af Klint: The Secret Paintings at the Art Gallery of NSW. Stored away and scarcely known for decades, the works of Af Klint have been cut short by lockdown. Credit:James Brickwood Now Hilma af Klint: The Secret Paintings at the Art Gallery of NSW has quietly closed for good after opening to the Australian public for a mere 14 days. In 2018, Hilma af Klint: Paintings for the Future drew more than 600,000 people to New Yorks Guggenheim more than any other show in the museums 60-year history. In late 2019 Adrien Brody was trekking with friends in Nepal, where the Himalayan Mountains soar and the oxygen can get thin, when the time came to give an answer. The Academy Award-winning actor had to decide whether he wanted to dedicate himself to an ambitious television adaptation of the Stephen King short story Jerusalems Lot, putting himself at the centre of a period horror tale suffused with contemporary unease. The trek was a wonderful experience, very challenging, but its an interesting place to ... make a decision about what type of work I would be accepting and jumping into for a relatively extended period of time, Brody says. I was joking that I took a leap of faith on that mountaintop. It might not be the time to make those decisions, but Im glad I did. Almost two years later, after a lengthy and sometimes COVID-marred shoot in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, Brody is happy with his decision. The finished series, Chapelwaite, offers a showcase for an actor whose finely contoured face can convey the inexorable build of dread. Regret wells up in Brodys eyes, fear hardens the set of his mouth. The 48-year-old is the perfect proxy for an audience that wants to be immersed in supernatural torment. Adrien Brody as Charles Boone, a 19th century ships captain who takes possession of a family home in Maine locals believe cursed. Credit:Stan Stephen King may well be the most adapted novelist of the past 40 years, with his name alongside expectations creators have to live up to prominent on film and television works. In the past 18 months alone Ben Mendelsohn has starred in The Outsider; The Stand was once again produced as a saga of good and evil, and Liseys Story had Julianne Moore and Clive Owen as a couple torn between worlds. Yet roughly half the King adaptations made fail. Sydney intensive care specialist Mark Nicholls has warned that Australians who dont get tested early for COVID-19 are putting their lives at risk. Dr Nicholls told ABC News 24 on Thursday he was concerned about stories of people dying at home from COVID-19 and others not seeking tests or taking days to get a test and spreading the virus. Loading Dr Nicholls, the vice-president of the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society, wants people to get tested as soon as they notice symptoms so they get early medical support. I know [Victorian Premier] Daniel Andrews was talking about people walking around in the community for eight days with COVID and affecting other people, but they are causing harm to themselves, Dr Nicholls said. If people get early testing and early diagnosis then they get early help. There is hospital-in-the-home [treatment] that is operating across NSW, and they have a range of infectious diseases doctors who reach out using the technology like we are using and speaking to people and doing health checks. And in some cases they are doing it three or four times a day. There are issues of language, but they are working through those issues as well. And if they think there is a risk of these patients deteriorating, they get them into hospital earlier. But if you have symptoms of COVID, get tested so you can be diagnosed and you can be managed at home, then we can recognise if you are deteriorating and get you into hospital. The other thing I find is that, when people present in extremis at the door of hospitals, they are putting themselves at great risk because, if people come gradually through the hospital system, gradually to intensive care, we keep a close eye on them. We are finding that we are not needing to use a ventilator as much as we are able to use the high flow nasal oxygen and the drug combinations. The other thing I have to say is that I am impressed with SBS. They are doing multilingual translations of the Premiers message and reaching out to people. When Scott Morrison chose to start the week by telling us to adjust our mindset, prepare to leave our cave and get back our freedoms once 70 per cent of eligible Australians have been vaccinated, he used a lot of words in his prepared remarks: by my count, 1139 of them. But one word didnt make it. There was one word that the Prime Minister did not use when raising the prospect of Australia needing to open up. Credit:Getty He said that at above the magical 70 per cent mark, cases of COVID-19 would not be the issue. Dealing with serious illness, hospitalisation, ICU capabilities, our ability to respond in those circumstances: that will be our goal and we will live with this virus as we live with other infectious diseases, the PM said. The recovery of human DNA from the 7200-year-old remains of a woman in the islands between Asia and Australia has given researchers incredible insight into how and when ancient peoples first reached the region. The woman belongs to an isolated group of humans called Toaleans by researchers who are known from a handful of skeletons and an abundance of distinctive stone arrowheads, and who died out about 1500 years ago. The womans remains have been dated back about 7200 years, while her DNA was the first to be recovered from the Wallacea region. Credit:University of Hasanuddin The Toaleans lived in a small area of the island of Sulawesi and are believed to be directly related to the first humans who travelled into the region of Wallacea, the ancient name for the modern Indonesian archipelago. Griffith University archaeologist and study co-leader Adam Brumm said the extraction of the DNA was noteworthy itself as it was the first ancient human DNA recovered from the region. The Crimes Act (1958) covers a myriad of sins from murder to piracy with violence. It does not, however, include the offence of being a self-entitled, cold-blooded clod. If it did, Richard Pusey would remain in custody for many more years. As it doesnt, he was released from prison on Wednesday. Richard Pusey leaving Ravenhall on Wednesday afternoon. Credit:Joe Armao On April 22 last year he was pulled up on the Eastern Freeway having been clocked in his Porsche at a speed of 149km/h. Four police, Leading Senior Constable Lynette Taylor, Senior Constable Kevin King and constables Glen Humphris and Josh Prestney were killed when they were hit by a truck as they stood by Puseys car. Tens of millions of dollars would bounce Western Australias way along with the AFL grand final, should the codes showpiece spectacle be relocated from its traditional MCG home to Perth. The state is also slated to host the third Bledisloe Cup Test next month, which has faced scheduling issues amid a recent COVID-19 outbreak in New Zealand, but was likely to be rescheduled to September 5. Crowds will flock to hospitality venues nearby and at the Optus Stadium precinct. The AFL cannot confirm Optus Stadium as the 2021 venue until the Victorian government gives the league consent to move it from the MCG, which is contracted to host the grand final until 2058. Tourism Council WA chief executive Evan Hall said a local premiership decider would inject a timely economic boost to WA tourism and hospitality industries impacted by the states hard border. The team of international scientists who led the World Health Organisations mission to Wuhan say that without urgent action the source of the COVID-19 pandemic will never be known. Crucial clues may be only months away from dissolving forever, the team fear. But the international scientific investigation has stalled amid politics and accusations. Medical workers move a person who died from COVID-19 at a hospital in Wuhan in Febuary 2020, at the beginning of the pandemic. Credit:AP In July, China rejected the World Health Organisations plan for the second phase of the investigation, in part because it included investigations into the lab leak theory. That led to a war of words between China and other nations. Beijing slammed the politicisation of the investigation; the White House called Chinas move irresponsible and, frankly, dangerous. This is not how it was supposed to be. If everything had gone according to Plan A, Scott Morrison would have called an election within days, then sailed through the campaign as the Prime Minister who had led the country through a once-in-a-century pandemic with minimal loss of life and only temporary disruption to the economy. Under Plan A, Morrison would have been the Prime Minister to lead the country out of the pandemic. Credit:Getty That would have carried him to victory with an increased majority, and probably set him up for another. It would have been a proud legacy. Instead, there is a fractured federation, premiers grown accustomed to wielding immense power even at the expense of the national good, a prime minister powerless to stop them, a devaluing in almost every way of what it means to be an Australian, 15 million people locked down, the prospect of a second recession in two years, enough debt to cripple generations and a vaccination rollout Morrison nominated as his priority in February which could even now qualify as the greatest policy failure since Federation. He says five flights operated between Kabul and Islamabad on Wednesday and all personnel involved in the operation and those evacuated are now in Pakistan. De Croos says that Belgium will continue to repatriate to our country those people evacuated in the days ahead. More than 1100 people have been flown to Belgium in recent days. A Taliban fighter patrols in Kabul, Afghanistan. Credit:AP The Taliban said they would allow normal commercial air traffic to resume when they assume control of the airport after August 31, but its unclear whether airlines would be willing to fly into an airport controlled by the militants. With the deadline looming, Marcin Przydacz, a Polish deputy foreign minister, said Wednesday that Poland had evacuated its last group after consulting with US and British officials. After a long analysis of reports on the security situation, we cannot risk the lives of our diplomats and of our soldiers any longer, Przydacz said. Loading A number of troops will remain briefly to wrap up operations, Przydacz said. Poland has used over a dozen planes to bring hundreds of evacuees to Warsaw. Some later travelled on to other countries. The Czech Republic declared its own evacuation mission complete last week, and Hungary said it plans to end its operations soon. The White House said Wednesday around 19,000 people were evacuated from Kabul over the last 24 hours. It said the US has evacuated or facilitated the evacuation of around 82,300 people since the Taliban takeover in mid-August. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the military will continue to evacuate needed populations all the way to the end. But he added that in the final days and hours there will have to be a balance as the 5400 troops in Kabul and critical systems also need to be withdrawn. Loading Two members of Congress drew criticism after a surprise visit to Afghanistan this week, which diverted resources from the USs hasty withdrawal. Britains Foreign Office on Wednesday advised against all travel to Afghanistan, adding the security situation in the country remained volatile, with a high threat of a terrorist attack. The security situation in Afghanistan remains volatile. There is an ongoing and high threat of terrorist attack, the Foreign Office said in an advisory. The advisory also urged not to travel to the Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. If you are in the area of the airport, move away to a safe location and await further advice, it said. In Kabul itself, life has been slow to return to normal, but many people especially women are staying inside, fearful of the Taliban or the general instability. Kabul Mayor Dawood Sultanzoy said many city workers have yet to return to work, with the absence of experienced staff hindering normal operations. But he said the city has begun to remove the blast walls that became ubiquitous in recent years as the Taliban and other armed groups carried out bombings and other attacks against the Western-backed government. The Taliban say the decades of war are over and there will be no revenge attacks on people who opposed them. But many Afghans distrust the group, and there have been reports of summary executions and other abuses in areas under Taliban control. Many fear a return to the Talibans hard-line Islamic rule of the 1990s, when women were largely confined to their homes. Chaos at the Kabul airport has transfixed the world after the Taliban captured most of Afghanistan in a matter of days this month. Afghans poured onto the tarmac last week, and some clung to a US military transport plane as it took off, later plunging to their deaths. At least seven people died that day, and another seven died Sunday in a panicked stampede. People wait in line to board a US Air Force plane in Kabul. Credit:AP Thousands have thronged the airport in the days since, and the US and its allies have worked to speed the evacuation, sometimes flying people out before their paperwork is fully processed and bringing them to transit points. On Wednesday, a group of 51 people landed in Uganda, which became the first African nation to serve as a transit point. European nations, including American allies Germany and the United Kingdom, had pressed for a longer window to continue evacuations. However, Biden has stuck to the August date, even after an emergency online summit of the Group of Seven nations. That left European nations with no choice but to abide by the deadline. That the overall deployment literally stands and falls with the stance of the militarily strongest member of the alliance, the US, was always clear to us, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in a speech to Parliament. We will continue the evacuation operation for as long as possible, she added, without specifying when operations would end. For now, the US military coordinates all air traffic in and out of the Kabul airport. Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen tweeted that people with legal documents will be able to fly out of Kabul airport via commercial flights after the August deadline. On Wednesday, a stream of military planes took off from the airfield as evacuees lined up on the tarmac. The desperate remained outside, some standing knee-deep in sewage and waving identity documents at Western soldiers in hopes of being allowed to go beyond the barbed wire fencing and onto a flight out. Little Rock: Inmates at a northwest Arkansas jail have been prescribed ivermectin to combat COVID-19, despite warnings from federal health officials that the antiparasitic drug should not be used to treat the coronavirus. Washington Countys sheriff confirmed on Tuesday night (Wednesday AEST) that the jails health provider had been prescribing the drug. Sheriff Tim Helder didnt say how many inmates at the 710-bed facility had been given ivermectin and defended the health provider the jail uses that has been prescribing the medication. Despite warnings, ivermectin tablets are being prescribed for coronavirus. Whatever a doctor prescribes, that is not in my bailiwick, Helder told members of the Washington County quorum court, the countys governing body. Wilmington, DE (19810) Today Showers and a possible thunderstorm during the evening will give way to cloudy skies after midnight. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low 61F. Winds NW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Showers and a possible thunderstorm during the evening will give way to cloudy skies after midnight. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low 61F. Winds NW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Wilmington, DE (19810) Today Showers and a possible thunderstorm during the evening will give way to cloudy skies after midnight. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low 62F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Showers and a possible thunderstorm during the evening will give way to cloudy skies after midnight. Isolated tornadoes possible. Low 62F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror. Reporter I cover a range of stories for WDRB, but really enjoy tracking what's going on at our State Capitol. I grew up on military bases all over the world, but am a Kentuckian at heart. I'm an EKU alum, and have lived in Louisville for 30 years. In this image provided by the U.S. Marine Corps, a Marine processes youth to be evacuated, at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Monday, Aug. 23. (Gunnery Sgt. Melissa Marnell/U.S. Marine Corps via AP) Thank you for Reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. MIDDLETOWN It was a shared passion for culinary arts and Mediterranean cuisine that brought childhood friends Vasileios Gkavos and Thodoris Dimitrakopoulos from neighboring villages in Greece to Middletown to launch a restaurant. Mediterranean Flavors Bar and Grill opened up at 825 Saybrook Road in mid-July. Prior to that, it was Ninos Restaurant and Bar, and before that, Tommys Restaurant. The duo have been serving up authentic cuisine with ingredients directly from Greece. Dimitrakopoulos said he wants to share these traditional specialties with Connecticut residents who havent yet experienced them. People might think Greek food is just grapes and gyros, but we have more, he said. The co-owners perfected their skills through years of culinary school and working at restaurants in Greece. They arrived in the United States three years ago, looking for a better opportunity to pursue their passion, Dimitrakopoulos said. That dream was realized when a mutual friend connected the pair with the owner of the Saybrook Road building that was recently been vacated. Gkavos mother Maria Staikopoulos assists in the operation. She called the opportunity exciting. They wanted to bring the real authentic Mediterranean cuisine to the states, Staikopoulos said. She said the focus is on the food, with most ingredients, from olive oil to wine, sourced directly from the southeastern European country. The interior decor has been upgraded and outdoor dining area was improved. Otherwise, Staikopoulos said, they are saving any other updates for the future. There are going to be lots of changes eventually, Staikopoulos said. Right now, we are focused on the food and making it better every day. The two chefs have had years of friendship to build their chemistry. Its very easy for us, Dimitrakopoulos said. I know how he works and he knows how I work. Dimitrakopoulos said that cooking is like a habit for him and Gkavos, and there isnt anything hed rather be doing. ... I love my job, he said. So far, the new restaurant has enjoyed good business, the owners said. Staikopoulos said theyve done some promoting on Facebook and Instagram to spread the word of the opening. For information, visit mediterraneanflavorsbargrill.com. (The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Ali A. Olomi, Penn State (THE CONVERSATION) The rapid takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban left many surprised. To Ali Olomi, a historian of the Middle East and Islam at Penn State University, a key to understanding what is happening now and what might take place next is looking at the past and how the Taliban came to prominence. Below is an edited version of a conversation he had with editor Gemma Ware for our podcast, The Conversation Weekly. How far back do you trace the Talibans origins? While the Taliban emerged as a force in the 1990sAfghan civil war, you have to go back to the Saur Revolution of 1978 to truly understand the group, and what theyre trying to achieve. The Saur Revolution was a turning point in the history of Afghanistan. By the mid-1970s, Afghanistan had been modernizing for decades. The two countries that were most eager to get involved in building up Afghan infrastructure were the United States and the Soviet Union both of which hoped to have a foothold in Afghanistan to exert power over central and south Asia. As a result of the influx of foreign aid, the Afghan government became the primary employer of the country and that led to endemic corruption, setting the stage for the revolution. By that time, differing ideologies were fighting for ascendancy in the nation. On one end you had a group of mainly young activists, journalists, professors and military commanders influenced by Marxism. On the other end, you had Islamists beginning to emerge, who wanted to put in place a type of a Muslim Brotherhood-style Islamic state. Daud Khan, the then-president of Afghanistan, originally allied himself with the young military commanders. But concerned over the threat of a revolutionary coup, he started to suppress certain groups. In April 1978, a coup deposed Khan. This led to the establishment of the Peoples Republic of Afghanistan, headed by a Marxist-Leninist government. How did a leftist government help ferment the Taliban? After an initial purge of the ruling Communist Party members, the new government turned toward suppressing Islamist and other opposition groups, which led to a nascent resistance movement. The United States saw this as an opportunity and started to funnel money to Pakistans intelligence services, which were allied with Islamists in Afghanistan. At first, the United States funneled only limited funds and just gave symbolic gestures of support. But it ended up allying with an Islamist group that formed part of the growing resistance movement known as the mujahedeen, which was a loose coalition more than a unified group. Alongside the Islamist factions, there were groups led by leftists purged by the ruling government. The only thing they all had in common was opposition to the increasingly oppressive government. This opposition intensified in 1979, when then-Afghan leader Nur Mohammad Taraki was assassinated by his second-in-command Hafizullah Amin, who took over and turned out to be a wildly repressive leader. Soviet fears of the U.S. capitalizing on the growing instability contributed to the Soviet Union invasion in 1979. This resulted in the U.S. funneling further money to the mujahedeen, who were now fighting a foreign enemy on their land. And the Taliban emerged from this resistance movement? The mujahedeen waged a guerrilla-style war against Soviet forces for several years, until exhausting the invaders militarily and politically. That and international pressure brought the Soviet Union to the negotiating table. After the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989, chaos reigned. Within three years, the new government collapsed and the old mujahedeen commanders turned into warlords with different factions in different regions, increasingly turning on one another. Amid this chaos, one former Islamist mujahedeen commander, Mullah Mohammad Omar, looked to Pakistan where a generation of young Afghans had grown up in refugee camps, going to various madrassas where they were trained in a brand of strict Islamic ideology, known as Deobandi. From these camps he drew support for what became the Taliban taliban means students. The bulk of Taliban members are not from the mujahedeen; they are the next generation and they actually ended up fighting the mujahedeen. The Taliban continued to draw members from the refugee camps into the 1990s. Mullah Omar, from a stronghold in Kandahar, slowly took over more land in Afghanistan until the Taliban conquered Kabul in 1996 and established the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. But they never took full control of all of Afghanistan the north remained in the hands of other groups. [3 media outlets, 1 religion newsletter. Get stories from The Conversation, AP and RNS.] What was behind the Talibans success in the 1990s? One of the keys to the Taliban success was they offered an alternative. They said, Look, the mujahedeen fought heroically to liberate your country but have now turned it into a war zone. We offer security, we will end the drug trade, we will end the human trafficking trade. We will end the corruption. What people forget is that the Taliban were seen as welcome relief for some Afghan villagers. The Talibans initial message of security and stability was an alternative to the chaos. And it took a year before they started to institute repressive measures such as restrictions on women and the banning of music. The other thing that cemented their position in the 1990s was they recruited local people through force sometimes, or bribery. In every village they entered, the Taliban added to their ranks with local people. It was really a decentralized network. Mullah Omar was ostensibly their leader, but he relied on local commanders who tapped into other factions aligned with their ideology such as the Haqqani network, a family-based Islamist group that became crucial to the Taliban in the 2000s, when it become the de facto diplomatic arm of the Taliban by leveraging old tribal alliances in order to convince more people to join the cause. How crucial is this history to understand what is happening now? An understanding of what was going in the Saur Revolution, or how it led to the chaos of the 1990s and the emergence of the Taliban, is crucial to today. Many were surprised by the quick takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban after President Biden announced a withdrawal of U.S. troops. But if you look at how the Taliban came to be a force in the 1990s, you realize they are doing the same thing now. They are saying to Afghans, Look at the corruption, look at the violence, look at the drones that are falling from U.S. planes. And again the Taliban are offering what they say is an alternative based on stability and security just as they did in the 1990s. And again they are leveraging localism as a strategy. When you understand the history of the Taliban, you can recognize these patterns and what might happen next. At the moment, the Taliban are telling the world they will allow women to have an education and rights. They said the exact same thing in the 1990s. But like in the 1990s, their promises always have qualifiers. The last time they were in power, those promises were replaced by brutal oppression. History isnt just a set of dates or facts. Its a lens of analysis that can help us understand the present and what will happen next. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here: https://theconversation.com/the-history-of-the-taliban-is-crucial-in-understanding-their-success-now-and-also-what-might-happen-next-166630. MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) After long months of illness, Uruguay is once again starting to dance. The government last week authorized ballrooms and event halls to open as the country's COVID-19 death rate once among the highest in the world per capita has fallen sharply. Seventy percent of Uruguayans have received both doses of vaccines against the virus and once-overstressed hospitals now have empty beds. The government decided to let ballrooms for dancing open five hours a day though with limited capacity and mandatory 20-minute pauses each hour to air out closed spaces. It's a very strange thing, said Paola Dalto, a DJ with the Cherry Show, production aimed at the LGBT community which had to adapt its dance and music to the on-and-off rules. Several ballrooms, and even people in the streets, raced to take advantage on Tuesday, which is usually nostalgia night, when clubs play music from decades past. The selective lockdowns have been devastating in a small nation of some 3.5 million people where tango and other dances are a powerful tradition. Sixty 60 venues closed, according to Javier Abal, president of the Association of Fiestas, which groups 100 ballrooms and event halls that depend heavily on weddings and the traditional celebrations for girls' 15th birthdays. Rosario Echavarria said the pandemic closure of her tango dance hall for older adults had destroyed life ... I stumbled economically and emotionally. So she rented a bus and organized an open-air party in the countryside. For those who like to dance, you don't take that away, she said. It's their life. Also back are dances in open-air squares. Over the past weekend, Lucia Sotelo led a team of candombe dancers in a street in Montevideo's Brazo Oriental neighborhood as 40 drummers pounded out the beat. Such open-air gatherings were authorized last month There were 5,037 new positive cases of COVID-19 reported in Indiana on Wednesday by the Indiana State Department of Health (ISDH). ISDH said that now, 833,968 total Hoosiers had tested positive for COVID-19 to date. The state health department also said Wednesday that 19 new COVID-19 deaths had been identified throughout the state. That brought the total number of COVID-19 deaths in Indiana to date to 13,903. Latest statewide COVID-19 data released by ISDH Wednesday Several of our local Indiana counties saw high new numbers of COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, along with several new COVID-19 deaths. New Local COVID-19 Increases Reported by ISDH Wednesday: Vanderburgh County: 232 new cases, 1 new death new cases, new death Warrick County: 69 new cases, 2 new deaths new cases, new deaths Knox County: 126 new cases new cases Gibson County: 40 new cases new cases Daviess County: 44 new cases new cases Dubois County: 46 new cases new cases Posey County: 32 new cases new cases Perry County: 19 new cases new cases Pike County: 34 new cases new cases Spencer County: 29 new cases Recommended Article: State Health Department Testing for COVID-19 in Evansville Due to High Demand COVID-19 County Metrics Map Shows Several Local Counts Now "Red" In addition to updating the state on new COVID-19 cases and deaths on Wednesday, the Indiana State Department of Health released new data for its COVID-19 County Metrics Map. Many southwestern counties are now under a "Red" advisory level on the map, indicating the highest rate of COVID-19 spread based on a two-factor rating system. Counties in our area that are now in the Red on the County Metrics Map include Knox, Gibson, Posey, Warrick, Spencer, Perry, and Dubois. Vanderburgh, Daviess, and Pike counties remain in the "Orange." For more information on COVID-19 in Indiana, you can visit the state health department's COVID-19 dashboard. Allentown, PA (18103) Today Cloudy and cooler with periods of rain, some heavy at times. Watching moisture associated with Ida which could lead to flash flooding.. Tonight Overcast with occasional rain, heavy at times, which will likely lead to flash flooding. Also stay alert for a strong or severe storm tonight and overnight. NWS Weather Alert NOTE: This information is provided by the National Weather Service. Forecast may differ from local information provided by our own 69News Meteorologists ...FLASH FLOOD WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT THROUGH THURSDAY MORNING... The Flash Flood Watch continues for * Portions of New Jersey...and Pennsylvania...including the following areas...in New Jersey...Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Morris, Somerset, Sussex, and Warren. In Pennsylvania...Berks, Carbon, Delaware, Eastern Chester, Eastern Montgomery, Lehigh, Lower Bucks, Monroe, Northampton, Philadelphia, Upper Bucks, Western Chester, and Western Montgomery. * Through Thursday morning. * The remnants of Hurricane Ida will pass through the region today and tonight. Periods of heavy rain and scattered thunderstorms associated with this low will result in widespread rainfall totals of 3 to 6 inches, with locally higher amounts possible. Much of this rainfall may occur in a short period of time, exacerbating the flooding threat. Combined with wet antecedent conditions, this will lead to numerous instances of flash flooding, some of which may be significant. * Flooding of creeks, streams, urban areas, and poor drainage areas is likely in the areas of heaviest rain. Water is likely to cover the roads, especially in low-lying areas. Moderate to major flooding is possible along some main stem rivers, and roads and structures near these rivers may be flooded. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... You should monitor later forecasts and be prepared to take action should Flash Flood Warnings be issued. && In this image provided by the Department of Defense, paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, conduct security as they continue to help facilitate evacuations at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug 25, 2021. (Department of Defense via AP) Project Officer (Information Management), Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso Organization: IOM - International Organization for Migration Country: Burkina Faso City: Ouagadougou Office: IOM Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso Closing date: Wednesday, 1 September 2021 Country: Burkina Faso Organization: International Organization for Migration Closing date: 1 Sep 2021 Position Title: Project Officer (Information Management) Duty Station: Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso Classification: Professional Staff, Grade P2 Type of Appointment: Special short-term graded, six months with possibility of extension Estimated Start Date: As soon as possible Closing Date: 01 September 2021 Established in 1951, IOM is a Related Organization of the United Nations, and as the leading UN agency in the field of migration, works closely with governmental, intergovernmental and non-governmental partners. IOM is dedicated to promoting humane and orderly migration for the benefit of all. It does so by providing services and advice to governments and migrants. IOM is committed to a diverse and inclusive work environment. Read more about diversity and inclusion at IOM at www.iom.int/diversity. Applications are welcome from first- and second-tier candidates, particularly qualified female candidates as well as applications from the non-represented member countries of IOM. For all IOM vacancies, applications from qualified and eligible first-tier candidates are considered before those of qualified and eligible second-tier candidates in the selection process. For the purpose of this vacancy, the following are considered first-tier candidates: Internal candidates Candidates from the following non-represented member states: Antigua and Barbuda; Botswana; Cabo Verde; Comoros; Cook Islands; Cuba; Fiji; Gabon; Guinea-Bissau; Guyana; Holy See; Iceland; Kingdom of Eswatini; Kiribati; Lao Peoples Democratic Republic (the); Latvia; Libya; Luxembourg; Marshall Islands; Micronesia (Federated States of); Montenegro; Namibia; Nauru; Palau; Saint Kitts and Nevis; Saint Lucia; Saint Vincent and the Grenadines; Samoa; Sao Tome and Principe; Seychelles; Solomon Islands; Suriname; The Bahamas; Timor-Leste; Tonga; Tuvalu; Vanuatu Second tier candidates include: All external candidates, except candidates from non-represented member states. Context: IOM Burkina Faso provides extensive technical support to the Government to strengthen border management and security. An essential aspect of this support is the enhancement of the Border management Information System (BMIS) and IOM has deployed Migration Information and Data Analysis System (MIDAS) at 14 locations including fixed and mobile border posts. The aim is to enhance the Governments capability to collect, process, store, and analyse traveller information and streamline data collected from different data bases. Working under the overall supervision of the Chief of Mission (CoM) and the direct supervision of the Head of Immigration and Border Management Unit, and with the technical support of IOMs global MIDAS unit, the successful candidate will be responsible for coordinating all projects having the BMIS components, including assessment, installation, upgrade, interconnectivity, interoperability and capacity building. Core Functions / Responsibilities: Install and upgrade MIDAS workstations in all priority border crossing points and mobiles truck with the most updated software and hardware to ensure continuous operations. Provide technical inputs for the design and implementation of contextualized capacity building activities and deliver training to immigration officers and other relevant Government officials on the use (including information management and data analysis) and maintenance of border management information systems. Provide technical support in coordination with relevant institutions and experts, as required to ensure interconnectivity and interoperability of the different systems for (real-time) data exchange between the systems. Conduct assessments, monitoring and evaluation visits at the border areas of intervention related to the BMIS and in coordination with the MIDAS unit, draft relevant reports, briefs and procurement plans. Supervise and provide training and guidance to the staff assigned to the project and monitor the work of consultants/implementing partners (IPs) recruited to undertake specific activities. Support the head of the IBM unit in project implementation according to the work plans, technical requirements and expenditure plans to facilitate timely achievement of project activities and results. Draft project progress and implementation reports, propose and implement action to expedite project delivery, and identify and document significant project events, decisions, problems or deviations. Facilitate adequate information management on project related activities including project awareness raising and visibility, and the production of regular updates, summaries, press releases and other relevant materials, in coordination with the donor and IOMs Public Information Department. Participate in relevant meetings, conferences, workshops, working groups, interagency coordination meetings, and other forums on immigration and border management. Undertake duty travel relating to project implementation, monitoring visits, project assessments, liaison with counterparts, etc. Perform such other duties as may be assigned. Required Qualifications and Experience: Education Masters degree in Information Management/Information Systems, Computer Science, or a related field from an accredited academic institution with two years of relevant professional experience; or University degree in the above fields with four years of relevant professional experience. Experience Technical training in relevant areas of data system development and management and in project management; Experience in the field of migration issues, including operational and field experience on border management information systems; Strong background in border management, including border management technologies with ancillary background in travel and identity documents, biometric applications in border management, and related areas; MIDAS experience is an advantage; Experience in liaising with governmental authorities, other national/international institutions and partners is considered an added advantage; Proficiency in the back-end and front-end development based on MS SQL Server database and data replication techniques; Work Experience of the region is an advantage; Skills Knowledge of IOM/UN project financial management procedures and tools, an advantage; Tags border management burkina faso computer science data analysis financial management immigration officers information management information systems management information systems monitoring and evaluation press releases procurement project implementation project management public information sql server standards of conduct technical training transparency Ability to formulate IM-related technical requirements and operating procedures. Languages IOMs official languages are English, French, and Spanish. External applicants for all positions in the Professional category are required to be proficient in English and have at least a working knowledge of one additional UN Language (French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian or Chinese). For all applicants, fluency in English and French is required (oral and written). Proficiency of language(s) required will be specifically evaluated during the selection process, which may include written and/or oral assessments. Notes Accredited Universities are the ones listed in the UNESCO World Higher Education Database ( https://whed.net/home.php). Required Competencies: Values - all IOM staff members must abide by and demonstrate these three values: Inclusion and respect for diversity: respects and promotes individual and cultural differences; encourages diversity and inclusion wherever possible. Integrity and transparency: maintains high ethical standards and acts in a manner consistent with organizational principles/rules and standards of conduct. Professionalism: demonstrates ability to work in a composed, competent and committed manner and exercises careful judgment in meeting day-to-day challenges. Core Competencies - behavioural indicators level 2 Teamwork: develops and promotes effective collaboration within and across units to achieve shared goals and optimize results. Delivering results: produces and delivers quality results in a service-oriented and timely manner; is action oriented and committed to achieving agreed outcomes. Managing and sharing knowledge: continuously seeks to learn, share knowledge and innovate. Accountability: takes ownership for achieving the Organizations priorities and assumes responsibility for own action and delegated work. Communication: encourages and contributes to clear and open communication; explains complex matters in an informative, inspiring and motivational way. Managerial Competencies - behavioural indicators level 2 Leadership: provides a clear sense of direction, leads by example and demonstrates the ability to carry out the organizations vision; assists others to realize and develop their potential. Empowering others & building trust: creates an atmosphere of trust and an enabling environment where staff can contribute their best and develop their potential. Strategic thinking and vision: works strategically to realize the Organizations goals and communicates a clear strategic direction. IOMs competency framework can be found at this link. https://www.iom.int/sites/default/files/about-iom/iom_revised_competency_framework_external.pdf Competencies will be assessed during a competency-based interview. Other: Internationally recruited professional staff are required to be mobile. Any offer made to the candidate in relation to this vacancy notice is subject to funding confirmation. This selection process may be used to staff similar positions in various duty stations. Recommended candidates will remain eligible to be appointed in a similar position for a period of 24 months. The list of NMS countries above includes all IOM Member States which are non-represented in the Professional Category of staff members. For this staff category, candidates who are nationals of the duty stations country cannot be considered eligible. Appointment will be subject to certification that the candidate is medically fit for appointment, accreditation, any residency or visa requirements, and security clearances. Vacancies close at 23:59 local time Geneva, Switzerland on the respective closing date. No late applications will be accepted. How to apply: Interested candidates are invited to submit their applications via PRISM, IOM e-Recruitment system, by 01 September 2021 at the latest, referring to this advertisement. IOM only accepts duly completed applications submitted through the IOM e-Recruitment system. The online tool also allows candidates to track the status of their application. Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted. For further information please refer to: www.iom.int/recruitment Posting period: From 19.08.2021 to 01.09.2021 No Fees: IOM does not charge a fee at any stage of its recruitment process (application, interview, processing, training or other fee). IOM does not request any information related to bank accounts. Requisition: SVN 2021 194 Project Officer (Information Management) (P2) Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (57135264) Released Posting: Posting NC57135265 (57135265) Released Link to the organizations job offer: https://unjobs.org/vacancies/1629533883154 Driver, Yerevan, Armenia Organization: UNHCR - United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Country: Armenia City: Yerevan Office: UNHCR Yerevan, Armenia Closing date: Tuesday, 31 August 2021 Eligible Applicants: Candidates must meet the essential minimum requirements of the position and candidates not citizens of the country must comply with all eligibility requirements for employment in line with the prevailing legislative prerequisites in the country. Procedures and Eligibility: Applicants are invited to fill in the online application. It is very important that all internal applicants update their fact sheets (languages, education and prior working experience) before submitting their applications. External vacancies are posted on the external UNHCR website and applicants who do not have internal status must apply through the external UNHCR website. Application and instructions are provided on www.unhcr.org - Careers - Vacancies - Armenia. No late applications will be accepted. Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted. Shortlisted candidates will be required to pass a driving test and oral interview. The driving test is eliminatory and those who get the passing score of 70% and above will be invited to the oral interview. UNHCR does not charge a fee at any stage of the recruitment process (application, interview, processing or any other fees). For any technical problems encountered during the on-line application, please contact the Global Service Desk at globalsd@unhcr.org well before the deadline to allow sufficient time for problems to be resolved. For any other type of support, please contact the HR Unit on armyehr@unhcr.org UNHCR is committed to diversity and welcomes applications from qualified candidates regardless of disability, gender identity, marital or civil partnership status, race, colour or ethnic and national origins, religion or belief, or sexual orientation. Duties and Qualifications: Driver Organizational Setting and Work Relationships The Driver in the UNHCR Office is normally supervised directly by the Administrative Officer/Associate/Assistant or another staff member when the scale of the Operation so requires it. Besides driving, the incumbent is responsible for upkeep and maintenance of the assigned UNHCR vehicle(s) as per technical guidance and specifications established by the Organisation. S/he is required to follow strict instructions and security guidance provided by the supervisor. While the basic function of a driver is to drive the official vehicles of UNHCR, s/he may be called upon to perform minor maintenance and repair of UNHCR vehicles. The Driver has regular contacts with staff within the UNHCR Office and with others (including Partners, government authorities, etc.) outside UNHCR involving a limited exchange of information. UNHCR implements several projects in Goris that are aimed at capacity building of state institutions, supporting the local community initiatives, and also aiming at peaceful co-existence of host communities with people in refugee-like situation from Nagorno-Karabakh. The Driver may be required to travel to various locations in Syunik province in order to perform the official duties linked to the above-mentioned projects and daily operational activities. The incumbent may be required to perform clerical tasks, if and when required, to provide administrative support on the issues under the purview of the Goris Field Unit or the Country Office in Yerevan. All UNHCR staff members are accountable to perform their duties as reflected in their job description. They do so within their delegated authorities, in line with the regulatory framework of UNHCR which includes the UN Charter, UN Staff Regulations and Rules, UNHCR Policies and Administrative Instructions as well as relevant accountability frameworks. In addition, staff members are required to discharge their responsibilities in a manner consistent with the core, functional, cross-functional and managerial competencies and UNHCRs core values of professionalism, integrity and respect for diversity. Duties Drive UNHCR vehicles for the transport of authorized passengers, deliver, and collect documents and other items. Meet official personnel at airports or other locations and facilitate immigration and customs formalities as required. Perform day-to-day maintenance of the assigned vehicles; check oil, water, battery, brakes, tires, etc. and ensure that the assigned UNHCR vehicles are road or waterway worthy and maintained up to the established security standards. Tags customs formalities durable solutions human rights humanitarian law information dissemination international refugee law maintenance and repair operational activities primary education refugee law refugees russian language vehicle mechanic vehicles Perform minor repairs, arrange for other repairs, and ensure that the vehicle is kept clean. Ensure that the steps required by rules and regulations, or other local procedures, are taken in case of involvement in an accident. Log official trips, daily mileage, gas consumption, oil changes, greasing, etc. Ensure that instructions and security guidance provided by the supervisor and security focal point are strictly followed. Ensures valid documentation for passengers, items or cargo in vehicle. Perform other related duties as required. Minimum Qualifications Education & Professional Work Experience Years of Experience / Degree Level For G2D - 2 years relevant experience with Completion of Primary Education or High School Diploma or higher Field(s) of Education Not applicable. Certificates and/or Licenses *Driving Licences; (Certificates and Licenses marked with an asterisk* are essential) Relevant Job Experience Essential Driving licence, knowledge of driving rules and regulations. Desirable Not specified. Functional Skills * DV-Driving Rules and Regulations; DV-Basic Vehicle Mechanical Skills; (Functional Skills marked with an asterisk* are essential) Language Requirements For International Professional and Field Service jobs: Knowledge of English and UN working language of the duty station if not English. For National Professional jobs: Knowledge of English and UN working language of the duty station if not English and local language. For General Service jobs: Knowledge of English and/or UN working language of the duty station if not English. Knowledge of Eastern Armenian is mandatory. Knowledge of Russian language is an asset. Position Competencies: Core Competencies: Accountability Communication Organizational Awareness Teamwork & Collaboration Commitment to Continuous Learning Client & Result Orientation Managerial Competencies: Not applicable Cross-Functional Competencies: Technological Awareness Analytical Thinking Planning and Organizing Additional Information Location: Goris, Armenia Temporary Appointment for 1 year. Remuneration: A competitive compensation and benefits package is offered. For information on UN salaries, allowances and benefits, please visit the portal of the International Civil Service Commission at: http://icsc.un.org Useful links http://un.am/en/agency/UNHCR https://www.unhcr.org/ https://undg.org/document/united-nations-sustainable-development-cooperation-framework/ https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/ https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/ See below for this postions Operational Context The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a humanitarian and non-political organization mandated by the United Nations to protect refugees and help them find lasting solutions to their problems. UNHCRs activities are based on a framework of international refugee law and standards that includes the 1951 United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol, as well as an array of international and regional treaties on human rights and humanitarian law. The core mandate of UNHCR is the international protection of refugees. The provision of international protection by UNHCR implies ensuring the basic human rights of refugees in their countries of asylum and that refugees will not be returned involuntarily to a country where they could face persecution. Longer term, the organization helps refugees find appropriate durable solutions to their plight, by repatriating voluntarily to their homeland, integrating in countries of asylum or resettling in third countries. UNHCR has presence in the Republic of Armenia since 1992, under a Co-operation Agreement signed with the Government. UNHCRs work in Armenia presently concentrates on capacity-building activities geared towards strengthening national authorities, laws and policies to ensure the proper handling of refugee and asylum issues, the reception and care of refugees, the promotion of self-reliance of refugees and the realization of durable solutions. These are carried out in combination with other activities such as advocacy, information dissemination and monitoring. Closing Date The closing date is 31 August 2021. Link to the organizations job offer: https://unjobs.org/vacancies/1629398196105 Williamson, WV (25661) Today Rain showers this evening with mostly clear conditions overnight. Low 59F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Rain showers this evening with mostly clear conditions overnight. Low 59F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%. Willmar, MN (56201) Today Partly cloudy this evening, then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low around 60F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy this evening, then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low around 60F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph. NORWICH An eastern Connecticut aid organization was well placed when the 7.2-magnitude earthquake hit the southwestern claw of Haiti on Aug. 14. The Haitian Health Foundation has been working in that section of the country for 36 years. Now, 250 staffers in Haiti, aided by five in the Norwich office, are in the midst of helping Haitians in the GrandAnse area whose homes were destroyed and who have infected wounds but little soap, food or supplies. Haitian Health Foundation / Contributed photo Normally we care for 250,000 people in Jeremie and in the villages around it, said Marilyn Lowney, executive director of the agency. Her father, Dr. Jeremiah Lowney, traveled to Haitis capital of Port-au-Prince in 1982 to offer free dental care. After Mother Teresa asked him to focus on the southwestern peninsula, he began the foundation in 1985. A clinic was built in 1987. At 85, hes working there right now, Lowney said. He has been a volunteer all these years and hes pretty much full-time in our office fundraising. Her mother, Virginia Lowney, volunteers to run Save a Family, a monthly giving program. Because it has been working in Haiti for so long, the foundation is trusted by the local Haitian residents. They know that were fair, that we give to the poorest of the poor, Marilyn Lowney said. The babies we were treating when we first got there are now mothers, fathers, grandmothers, grandfathers, she said. Were trusted in the community. The foundations staff in the country are almost all Haitian, and most of them have been there for years, Lowney said. The small staff in Norwich focuses on fundraising, administration and logistics. The charity has a four-star rating from Charity Navigator, with 91.8 percent of donations going directly to those in need. Haitian Health Foundation / Contributed photo The earthquake, which has killed more than 2,200 people, hit east of Jeremie, a remote, mountainous area where relief and aid has been slow to arrive. The earthquake hit at 8:30 a.m. and by 9 we had staff showing up to help, Marilyn Lowney said. After the earthquake a 5.0-magnitude aftershock, as well as smaller aftershocks, hit. It really hit Jeremie hard, as well as Les Cayes, Lowney said. Its going to be a long-term recovery because thousands of homes are damaged and destroyed. People are traumatized. Theyre sleeping outside, for fear of more aftershocks. Haitian Health Foundation / Contributed photo Now its a week later and more people are still living outside, sleeping outside, still homeless, she said Monday. Respiratory disease and diarrhea are among the illnesses from which the people are suffering, and the big fear we have is cholera, she said. Lowney said people also were showing up with infected wounds. This is what happens after a disaster, she said. There are isolated pockets of people out in the mountains and we were fearing that when we got to them we would find this kind of problem, and we have. Theyve got wounds that havent been treated for a week and other problems. Soap sells for $3.50 in a country in which people make $3 to $5 a day, Lowney said. Even before this earthquake, food and essentials haven been increasingly expensive. A lot of food, hygiene supplies were out of reach of the poor. Haitian Health Foundation / Contributed photo Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Were working with our partners to try to get supplies from more local areas, while a container ship must stop in Port-au-Prince and supplies than shipped across the country, she said. The partners include World Central Kitchen, founded by chef Jose Andres, Partners in Health and Hospital Albert Schweitzer. A hurricane in 2016 really devastated the area also, so theyre just starting to recover from that, she said. We repaired thousands of roofs. A less powerful earthquake in 2010 hit the capital of Port-au-Prince, killing 250,000 people. Weve got the only X-ray for miles around, a digital machine, Lowney said. The foundation also has an ambulance. We usually use it to go up in the mountains and bring women in who are having issues with their pregnancy. Now, a bridge that is the only way in to a section of the country has been closed. Political turmoil and crime also are endemic to Haiti. President Jovenel Moise was assassinated July 7 and gangs have stolen aid from hijacked relief trucks. Lowney said the healing and rebuilding will take time and money. Its a long road ahead. Were committed, she said. To donate, go to haitianhealthfoundation.org. edward.stannard@hearstmediact.com; 203-680-9382 EL CAJON, Calif. (AP) Three families from a San Diego suburb have made it out of Afghanistan after they went to the country earlier this summer to visit relatives and got stuck there amid the chaos following the Taliban's takeover, officials said Thursday. Five other families from El Cajon were still trying to get out, and U.S. government officials along with California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa were working on their safe return. The suburb, east of San Diego, has a large refugee population. Many of the families had gone to Afghanistan in May and early June, weeks before the crisis unfolded, so their children could see their grandparents and other relatives. Officials initially said six families from El Cajon were trapped there but later learned there were a total of eight families from the city trying to get out of the country. We have more work to do and under extremely difficult conditions, Issa said in a statement. Fraidoon Hashemi, an Afghan who works as a community liaison for the Cajon Valley Union School District, said he has been in contact with the families and on Thursday was awaiting word from those who remain. All the families have children attending various schools in the district. He said he was growing concerned because of news that two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport Thursday. We hope to hear from them soon, he said. Howard Shen, a district spokesman, said one family with five children arrived in San Diego on Wednesday night. The two other families were out of Afghanistan, but Shen said he could not confirm exactly where they were only that they are safe. That's all we want," he said. Counseling was being made available for the families and for their children's schools. Hashemi said the family back in San Diego was still shaken after their harrowing experience. They are OK now, he said. They need to calm down and forget what theyve seen. In all, the El Cajon families included two dozen children, some of whom witnessed shootings and other violence in and around the Kabul airport in recent days, Hashemi said. The families had each traveled to Afghanistan on their own on different dates and were not part of an organized trip. The families asked U.S. officials for help after being blocked by the throngs of Afghans at the airport desperately trying to escape after their governments rapid collapse and the withdrawal of U.S. troops. The school district became aware of the problem after a relative of one of the families reached out to say their child would be late starting the school year, which began Aug. 17. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that as many as 1,500 Americans may be awaiting evacuation from Afghanistan. It was unclear if that included all the El Cajon families. Some are U.S. citizens; others have U.S. residency. Despite travel warnings from the U.S. government, many felt an urgency to go to the country after not being able to see their extended families because of travel bans from the coronavirus pandemic, Hashemi said. Most of the El Cajon families came to the United States on a special immigrant visa after having worked for the U.S. government or U.S. military in Afghanistan, officials said. The visa allows in only the person and their spouse and children. Superintendent David Miyashiro said the families are particularly scared because of the upcoming Aug. 31 deadline for the United States to complete its withdrawal. Miyashiro said he could not provide more details since the children and their parents could be in danger. ___ This story corrects the spelling of district community liaison Fraidoon Hashemi's last name. JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) A Chicago woman convicted of assisting her then-boyfriend in her mothers murder and stuffing the body in a suitcase on Indonesias tourist island of Bali in 2014 will be released from prison in October after serving six years of a 10-year sentence, her Indonesian lawyer and a government official said Thursday. Heather Mack, who was 18 when she was arrested a day after the discovery of Sheila von Wiese-Macks body in the trunk of a taxi parked near the St. Regis Bali Resort, will be deported to the United States the day of her release, said Rika Aprianti, a spokesperson for the corrections department at the Justice and Human Rights Ministry. Aprianti declined to give the date of Macks release. Mack and her then-boyfriend, Tommy Schaefer, then 21, were convicted in 2015. Schafer received an 18-year sentence. Her Indonesian attorney, Yulius Benyamin Seran, said the early release from prison is in part the result of a six-month remission of sentence awarded to her by the Indonesian government during the countrys Independence Day celebration this month, he said. Heather Mack has significantly changed in prison, Seran said. She (got) involved in activities arranged by correctional officers, she was entitled to the sentence reduction and will be a free people again in October. The pending release is the latest chapter in a story that has generated national and international attention for years in large part because of photographs of the suitcase that appeared far too small to hold an adult woman's body. Before Mack was convicted, she gave birth to her and Schaefer's daughter, Stella Schaefer. There were also reports of a troubled relationship between Mack and her mother, with officials confirming that police had been called to the familys Oak Park home dozens of times. In 2016, Robert Bibbs, a cousin of Schaefer, pleaded guilty to helping to plan the killing in exchange for $50,000 of money Mack was expected to inherit and was sentenced the next year to nine years in prison. He remains in prison. Then in 2017, the Chicago Tribune reported that court documents revealed that the FBI was investigating whether others were involved in the the conspiracy of Mack and Schaefer to kill Macks mother. After seeing reports about Macks pending release, von Wiese-Macks brother, William Wiese reiterated his suspicion that Indonesian officials imposed the seemingly light sentence in exchange for money. I believe Heathers original 10-year sentence was a travesty of justice and likely influenced by the outrageously large amount ($150,000) that the Chicago judge ordered to be sent to Indonesia for her defense, he said in a statement. Macks immediate deportation upon release leaves open the question of whether she will face charges when she sets foot in the United States. The U.S. Attorneys office in Chicago declined comment, but one legal expert said there is a possibility though slim that she could face charges if an investigation reveals she was involved in paying a bribe before sentencing. Charging her with murder again is impossible, but as a U.S. citizen you cant pay bribes to anyone, so thats how they could try to prosecute her, said Phil Turner, a former federal prosecutor. But Turner said such charges are unlikely. Upon her release from prison, Mack can under Indonesian law be reunited with her daughter, who is now 6. But Seran said Mack, who has not seen the little girl for more than 18 months because authorities halted prison visit because of the coronavirus pandemic, has asked Indonesian authorities to let the girl remain with her foster family until she can return to Bali. She doesnt want to come back to the U.S. with her daughter as she scared that media will expose her and Stella to what happened, Seran said, She would protect her daughter from media as best she could for the sake of her future because she had nothing to do with what her parents were doing. ___ Babwin reported from Chicago. ATLANTA (AP) More than half of all Georgia public school students are now required to wear masks in class, according to district announcements tracked by The Associated Press, as many school systems that had sought to let students and parents decide on the divisive issue of face coverings clamp down amid roaring COVID-19 infection rates. At least 56 of Georgia's 180 traditional school districts are now requiring masks in at least some schools, up from only a handful of districts before class started in August. The rules cover nearly 950,000, or about 55%, of Georgia's 1.7 million public school students. The shift began in late July, when Atlanta and Gwinnett County schools joined DeKalb and Clayton counties in saying they would require masks. But many other districts tried to open their doors as mask-optional. Some switched positions within days, while others held out for weeks. During that time, infections leaped. More than 1% of school-age children in Georgia have tested positive for COVID-19 in the past two weeks. Children between the ages of 5 and 17 are now more likely than adults as a whole to test positive for COVID-19. The state Department of Public Health reported more than 30 infection clusters in schools statewide, the highest since the epidemic began. Georgia's 7-day rolling average of COVID-19 infections rose to nearly 8,700 on Wednesday, according to state figures. The state is rapidly approaching the peak of more than 9,600 daily infections recorded in early January. The number of COVID-19 patients in hospitals rose to 5,500 across Georgia on Wednesday, close to the record of roughly 5,700 set in early January. More than 90% of all intensive care beds statewide were also in use. Many districts have been overrun by infections and quarantines, with so many teachers out that they can't staff classrooms. Statewide, 26 districts and charter schools are sending all their students home and going all-virtual temporarily. The coastal Glynn County district, with more than 12,000 students, became the largest to take that step Tuesday. Two districts and a charter school have already returned from timeouts from in-school learning, while at least eight districts are closing individual schools. At least seven districts have switched to A/B schedules where students attend class every other day. Overall, more than 100,000 students statewide have been affected by closures or schedule changes. The 28,000-student Columbia County district in suburban Augusta moved to require masks on Tuesday after hundreds of students and employees had tested positive over three weeks of school and more than 1,000 students were sent into quarantine. School leaders say they're requiring masks in part to cut quarantines. Under guidance the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated over the summer, if everyone in a classroom is masked and 3 feet (1 meter) or more apart, students don't have to quarantine as long as they don't show symptoms. Georgia school districts are free to set their own rules, but the CDC rules remain influential. If we are going to be able to complete school from now until May 25, this appears to be our best chance, The Augusta Chronicle quoted Columbia County board member Judy Teasley as saying on Tuesday. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp has said he opposes mask mandates but wants to let local school districts decide. State Superintendent Richard Woods, who was hospitalized with a breakthrough case of COVID-19 last month, wrote in an opinion piece distributed Tuesday that people should prioritize in-person learning. Though issues like mask mandates can divide us, there is more that unites us, Woods wrote. One unifying belief shared across spectrums is the critical need for in-person learning. Mask-wearing continues to draw opposition. Dalton and Whitfield County schools are letting parents send a note to school opting their children out of mask requirements. Parents both seeking and opposing mandatory face coverings continue to protest in Cobb County, the state's second largest district. Cobb is part of a ring of conservative-controlled suburban holdouts from the move toward masks, along with Cherokee, Paulding and Forsyth counties. But the rising tide of illness is pressuring even those districts. Forsyth County Superintendent Jeff Bearden told parents in a written message that the district was launching a campaign to promote voluntary masking among students and staff. He noted that nearly 800 students and 100 staff had active cases of COVID-19. Our biggest concern is having sick children attending school and potentially spreading the virus, Bearden wrote. ___ Follow Jeff Amy on Twitter at http://twitter.com/jeffamy. Winchester, VA (22601) Today Rain showers this evening with clearing overnight. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 40%.. Tonight Rain showers this evening with clearing overnight. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 40%. Winchester, VA (22601) Today Cloudy early with some clearing expected late. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Cloudy early with some clearing expected late. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph. Winchester, VA (22601) Today Cloudy early with some clearing expected late. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Cloudy early with some clearing expected late. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. Sometimes a wall is more than just a wall. Sometimes a wall is more than just a wall. Its a blank canvas. And in recent years, artists in Selkirk have turned several into works of art, highlighting local figures and traditions, using paint to transform bricks and plaster in the downtown into a growing visual history of the city. SUPPLIED This mural showing Elder Annie Bowkett lighting a quilliq is located at Young Minds at 222 Manitoba Ave. in Selkirk. Its the work of artist Ashley Christiansen, knowledge keeper Jeannie Red Eagle and youth from Promoting Aboriginal Student Success. Since 2018, nearly 20 murals have emerged, depicting everything from the traditional community round dance to Indigenous and settler women thriving on the Prairie landscape to a grandmother passing on her teachings. Others bring needed attention to the ongoing crisis of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, and to everyone affected, in the past and present, by the Indian Residential School System, those who came home and those who never did, artist Jordan Stranger says. All these murals will serve as the backdrop for a free public art crawl Sept. 4 and 5, with local vendors and artisans posting up next to them and getting a long-awaited opportunity to share their work with the community, including handmade goods, paintings, crafts, sewing and woodworking pieces, and much more. The art crawl is the brainchild of local artist and tattooist Ashley Christiansen, who herself has worked on seven murals in the city in the last three years, alongside established and emerging artists, including students from nearby high schools. SUPPLIED Charlie Johnston and students Kaitlyn Barnett-Lussier, Cheyenne Cockerill, Ramsey Desjarlais, Julie Stevenson and Ela Wasney worked on this mural of former Senator Murray Sinclair, who attended Lord Selkirk Regional Comprehensive High School, where the mural is located. "During the pandemic, most artists havent had shows or in-person events," she says. "Theres not many places you can go to and sell your art." What better place to do that than under the crowd-drawing walls that have quickly turned Selkirks buildings into must-see attractions? Selkirks mural renaissance started roughly three years ago, when Joanie English of the Interlake Art Board approached Selkirk-born artist Charles Johnston a leading muralist to establish a mural creation and mentorship program along with local artists, students, and others who were interested. SUPPLIED The Charlie Johnston mural became a tribute to the Humboldt Broncos. On the day of the 2018 fatal bus accident, the muralist was painting the New Player and gave that characters gear the teams colours. "By mentoring artists and organizers, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, my goal was to help create a top-grade, comprehensive, mural-art environment that would ultimately be self-sustainable," he says. Prior to that, Johnston says, the community, like many others, had experienced some hits and misses with murals improperly prepared surfaces, substandard materials or a lack of insight into the artforms potential. "When I returned to Selkirk after a long time away, it felt tired and desperately in need of a burst of creativity and a coat of paint," Johnston says. SUPPLIED The mural's theme is about how Reconciliation is made up of layers. Each layer becomes more opaque than the previous ones. "But first, the community was hungry for public art. The desire was there, the will was there. Dedicated volunteers within Selkirk made it all happen," he adds. "Without this, thered be nothing. No murals, no public art of any significance." In true collaborative fashion, volunteers and artists found connections with businesses and local organizations to develop and fund murals, and in just three years, the city is indeed bursting with colour. Artist Mandy van Leeuwen, whos worked on dozens of murals across the province, says the project has connected the community and elevated stories and ideas through art, while events such as the art crawl shine the light on the communitys wealth of artisans. "Its not just murals," she says. "They are only one backdrop." SUPPLIED Charlie Johnston painted a time-travelling teapot that has steeped its way through the temporal looking glass, pouring a mammoth serving. The White Rabbit is late as ever, while Alice struggles to find the right size for every occasion. In 2020 and 2021, five murals have been completed by a diverse collection of artists, including some, such as Christiansen, Brad Lent and many others, whove been mentored in all facets of mural-making as part of the mural program. The program has also made a concerted effort to use the artform to respect the citys roots while showcasing the rich history of Indigenous peoples who lived in the area millennia before settlers arrived in the 19th century. To that end, Selkirks Jeannie Red Eagle, an Anishinaabe Ikwe member of Rolling River First Nation, has acted as a knowledge keeper and traditional helper on Indigenous-led pieces such as Healing Path, an intricate mural adorning the Manitoba Metis Federation building on Manitoba Avenue, and Legacy of Love, a mural at the Gaynor Family Library honouring Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. Teams work on the murals together. SUPPLIED Charlie Johnston portrays an elaborate game of cats cradle that becomes a cosmic session of electrochemical psychotherapy at 357 Eveline St. in Selkirk. Those projects, as well as an upcoming interactive mural-sculpture-amphitheatre behind the regional library depicting a giant turtle emerging from the ground, have been conceptualized through engagement with community leaders and elders. For Red Eagle, they represent a form of healing and connectivity. Thats how Christiansen and Johnston see it: an opportunity to use art to tell stories while handing down skills to those with a desire to learn. Doug Speirs | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Though she says she still has a ton to learn, in only a few years Christiansen has been trained in mural prep and design, panel mounting, strategy and, of course, the painting techniques. Upcoming murals to be unveiled in the community include one depicting Manitobas endangered species along with 3D sculptures of a lady slipper and a peregrine falcon and another centred on Metis musical history. SUPPLIED Ashley Christiansen, a tattoo artist and muralist in Selkirk, has organized an art crawl as a way to draw public attention to the citys murals while giving artists impacted by the pandemic a shot to share their work with the community. The art-filled present is a far cry from Christiansens memory of public art growing up in Selkirk. "We had Chuck the Channel Cat statue, and that was about it," she says with a laugh, intending no disrespect to the giant fibreglass catfish sculpture thats greeted visitors to the city for more than 30 years. Now, theres a lot more, with more yet to come, and Christiansen hopes attendees discover new art when they visit for the crawl. Not just the murals, but the pieces and artisans sitting nearby, waiting to be seen. The event takes place Sept. 4-5 in downtown Selkirk from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m. Locations include the Gwen Fox Gallery, Selkirk Friendship Centre, Merchants Hotel, Gordon Howard Senior Centre, Roxies Uptown Cafe, Bonded Mobility and Essential Cannabis Co. Participating vendors pay $20 per day, and can register by contacting Christiansen at smashley88@hotmail.com. ben.waldman@freepress.mb.ca ISABELLA, Minn. (AP) Officials in the Superior National Forest said Thursday that the ongoing drought has created tinderbox conditions in northeastern Minnesota as firefighters continue to battle an uncontained wildfire, while rain that's expected to fall in coming days is unlikely to provide much help to crews who are growing tired. ISABELLA, Minn. (AP) Officials in the Superior National Forest said Thursday that the ongoing drought has created tinderbox conditions in northeastern Minnesota as firefighters continue to battle an uncontained wildfire, while rain that's expected to fall in coming days is unlikely to provide much help to crews who are growing tired. Crews have been working on fighting and suppressing wildfires since the spring, and Minnesota's wildfire season is not likely to end until snowfall. These are just tinderbox conditions, Superior National Forest Supervisor Connie Cummins said during a situation update for Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith and Gov. Tim Walz. The Greenwood Lake fire has already burned 25,991 acres (40.61 square miles) in Minnesota's Arrowhead region. Incident Commander Brian Pisarek said 12 seasonal homes or cabins are among the more than 50 structures that have been lost. Pisarek said about 300 people are currently evacuated. We got a little bit of rain today so we dont expect much fire growth today, he said Thursday, adding that firefighters are using the day to prepare for winds that are expected to come on Monday. So far, more than 400 firefighters are working to contain the fires, and more help has been requested. As the Greenwood Fire continues to burn, smoke from the blaze fills the air, almost obscuring the Bong Bridge and Denfeld Senior High School, bottom tower, Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021, in Duluth, Minn. (Brian Peterson/Star Tribune via AP) But Pisarek said rain that's expected to fall in the area over the next few days is not likely to help much with containment. One of our tactics is to remove the fuel in front of the fire on the east side, and this rain, of course, inhibits us from doing that, he said. Youd think rain would be the best thing we could get but timing of the timing of the rain is also critical to our operation." This firefight is dependent on the weather," he added. Meanwhile, one North Carolina family is questioning whether they did enough to mitigate fire risks on land they own, as the drought-stricken forest had been already weakened by an outbreak of spruce budworm, which decimated the areas balsam fir trees. Robert C. Hayes Jr., of Charlotte, North Carolina, whose extended family owns about 12,350 acres, or 20 square miles, at the Greenwood Lake fire site, told the Star Tribune: Im afraid to go up there because the pictures Ive seen. Its just scorched. A Star Tribune analysis of property records shows more than half of the Hayes' forest land appears to be inside the fire perimeter. Duluth photographer and writer Michael Furtman likened the situation to throwing a match on acres of dried-out Christmas trees. Furtman, who owns a cabin on Middle McDougal Lake, adjacent to the Hayes property, said he and his wife spent an estimated $2,000 to hire workers to cut down dead trees and remove potential tinder. As the Greenwood Fire continues to burn, smoke from the blaze fills the air near Pitcha Lake (bottom left) as fire crews set back fires to better control the perimeter, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, in Isabella, Minn. (Brian Peterson/Star Tribune via AP) The individual small landowners are doing everything they can, and can afford, Furtman said. Has the wealthy landowner done everything he can and can afford? Hayes called those questions reasonable. We are actively asking that of ourselves, he said. As the Greenwood Fire continues to burn, smoke from the blaze fills the air near Slater Lake and Highway 1 & 2 intersections as fire crews set back fires to better control the perimeter, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, in Isabella, Minn. (Brian Peterson/Star Tribune via AP) Hayes' family has owned the land for 30 years and wanted it to be a canvas for the moose and the wolf and the environment." The land is technically held by Lake County Land & Timber LLC, which is owned by a trust for the benefit of Hayes' father, Robert Cannon Robin Hayes, a former congressman and North Carolina Republican Party chairman who pleaded guilty in 2019 to lying to the FBI in relation to a bribery scheme. Former President Donald Trump pardoned him in January. Robert C. Hayes Jr., a trustee and head of the family office, said professional foresters help manage the trust's forest holdings, including one in South Carolina. He said the trust worked on fire management at the South Carolina forest, but not in Minnesota. He said the trust let the Minnesota property go natural so it could reach maturity. While the family was aware of problems with the spruce budworm, reducing the fire risk was not brought up. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. It was never discussed that it was fuel building up for forest fires, he said. I guarantee you it will be moving forward. As the Greenwood Fire continues to burn, smoke from the blaze fills the air near Slater Lake and Highway 1 & 2 intersections as fire crews set back fires to better control the perimeter, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, in Isabella, Minn. (Brian Peterson/Star Tribune via AP) Forest officials announced this week that they will keep the popular Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness closed until Sept. 3, dealing a blow to tourists who spent months planning their trips there and to the outfitters and other businesses serving the 1 million-acre wilderness. Cummins said Thursday that the area, or maybe parts of the Boundary Waters, would reopen once it is safe. Several fires caused by lightning have burned in the wilderness during this summers drought conditions, while the much bigger Greenwood Lake fire just to the south has forced the evacuation of about 280 homes and cabins since it was spotted Aug. 15 about 15 miles (24 kilometers) southwest of the town of Isabella. Fires burning just across the Canadian border, in Ontarios Quetico Provincial Park, led officials to close some parts of the Boundary Waters north of Ely earlier this summer. But when the John Ek fire took off late last week, forest officials decided to close the entire wilderness area as a precaution. They said that fire and the Greenwood Lake fire had stretched their resources too thin to ensure the safety of paddlers and campers. Cummins said the John Ek fire is kind of a time bomb" because if conditions are right, it could make a run toward the Gunflint Trail. The U.S. is projected to see nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths between now and Dec. 1, according to the nation's most closely watched forecasting model. But health experts say that toll could be cut in half if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. FILE - In this Aug. 20, 2021, file photo, two visitors peer into the room of a COVID-19 patient in the intensive care unit at Salem Hospital in Salem, Ore., as a nurse dons full protective gear before going into the room of another patient. Gov. Kate Brown announced Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, that the state has contracted with a medical staffing company to provide up to 500 health care workers to hospitals around the state to help respond to the surge in patients due to the delta variant. (AP Photo/Andrew Selsky, File) The U.S. is projected to see nearly 100,000 more COVID-19 deaths between now and Dec. 1, according to the nation's most closely watched forecasting model. But health experts say that toll could be cut in half if nearly everyone wore a mask in public spaces. In other words, what the coronavirus has in store this fall depends on human behavior. "Behavior is really going to determine if, when and how sustainably the current wave subsides," said Lauren Ancel Meyers, director of the University of Texas COVID-19 Modeling Consortium. "We cannot stop delta in its tracks, but we can change our behavior overnight." That means doubling down again on masks, limiting social gatherings, staying home when sick and getting vaccinated. "Those things are within our control," Meyers said. The U.S. is in the grip of a fourth wave of infection this summer, powered by the highly contagious delta variant, which has sent cases, hospitalizations and deaths soaring again, swamped medical centers, burned out nurses and erased months of progress against the virus. Deaths are running at over 1,100 a day on average, turning the clock back to mid-March. One influential model, from the University of Washington, projects an additional 98,000 Americans will die by the start of December, for an overall death toll of nearly 730,000. The projection says deaths will rise to nearly 1,400 a day by mid-September, then decline slowly. But the model also says many of those deaths can be averted if Americans change their ways. "We can save 50,000 lives simply by wearing masks. Thats how important behaviors are," said Ali Mokdad, a professor of health metrics sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle who is involved in the making of the projections. Already there are signs that Americans are taking the threat more seriously. Amid the alarm over the delta variant in the past several weeks, the slump in demand for COVID-19 shots reversed course. The number of vaccinations dispensed per day has climbed around 80% over the past month to an average of about 900,000. White House COVID-19 coordinator Jeff Zients said Tuesday that in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, "more people got their first shots in the past month than in the prior two months combined." Also, millions of students are being required to wear masks. A growing number of employers are demanding their workers get the vaccine after the federal government gave Pfizer's shot full approval earlier this week. And cities like New York and New Orleans are insisting people get vaccinated if they want to eat at a restaurant. Half of American workers are in favor of vaccine requirements at their workplaces, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Early signs suggest behavior changes may already be flattening the curve in a few places where the virus raged this summer. An Associated Press analysis shows the rate of new cases is slowing in Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas, some of the same states where first shots are on the rise. In Florida, pleas from hospitals and a furor over masks in schools may have nudged some to take more precautions. However, the troubling trends persist in Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia and Wyoming, where new infections continue to rise steadily. Mokdad said he is frustrated that Americans "arent doing what it takes to control this virus." "I dont get it," he said. "We have a fire and nobody wants to deploy a firetruck." One explanation: The good news in the spring vaccinations rising, cases declining gave people a glimpse of the way things used to be, said Elizabeth Stuart of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and that made it tough for them to resume the precautions they thought they left behind. "We dont need to fully hunker down," she said, "but we can make some choices that reduce risk." Doug Speirs | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Even vaccinated people should stay vigilant, said Dr. Gaby Sauza, 30, of Seattle, who was inoculated over the winter but tested positive for COVID-19 along with other guests days after an Aug. 14 Vermont wedding, even though the festivities were mostly outdoors and those attending had to submit photos of their vaccination cards. "In retrospect, absolutely, I do wish I had worn a mask," she said. Sauza, a resident in pediatrics, will miss two weeks of hospital work and has wrestled with guilt over burdening her colleagues. She credits the vaccine with keeping her infection manageable, though she suffered several days of body aches, fevers, night sweats, fatigue, coughing and chest pain. "If we behave, we can contain this virus. If we dont behave, this virus is waiting for us," Mokdad said. "Its going to find the weak among us." ___ 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. GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) A man upset over state-ordered coronavirus restrictions was sentenced to just over six years in prison Wednesday for planning to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a significant break that reflected his quick decision to cooperate and help agents build cases against others. GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) A man upset over state-ordered coronavirus restrictions was sentenced to just over six years in prison Wednesday for planning to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a significant break that reflected his quick decision to cooperate and help agents build cases against others. Ty Garbin admitted his role in the alleged scheme weeks after his arrest last fall. He is among six men charged in federal court but the only one to plead guilty so far. It was a key victory for prosecutors as they try to prove an astonishing plot against the rest. FILE - This file photo provided by the Kent County Sheriff, shows Ty Garbin. Prosecutors preparing for the first prison sentence in an alleged plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer are loudly signaling to five other defendants that a key insider has shared extraordinary details about the operation. Garbin, one of six people charged in federal court, cooperated within weeks of being arrested and prosecutors want a U.S. District Judge to take it into consideration Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, when he sentences Garbin for conspiracy. (Kent County Sheriff via AP File) Garbin apologized to Whitmer, who was not in court, and her family. "I cannot even begin to imagine the amount of stress and fear her family felt because of my actions. And for that I am truly sorry," the 25-year-old aviation mechanic told the judge. In his plea agreement, Garbin said the six men trained at his property near Luther, Michigan, constructing a "shoot house" to resemble Whitmers vacation home and "assaulting it with firearms." FILE - This file photo provided by the Kent County Sheriff, shows Ty Garbin. Prosecutors preparing for the first prison sentence in an alleged plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer are loudly signaling to five other defendants that a key insider has shared extraordinary details about the operation. Garbin, one of six people charged in federal court, cooperated within weeks of being arrested and prosecutors want a U.S. District Judge to take it into consideration Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, when he sentences Garbin for conspiracy. (Kent County Sheriff via AP File) The government, noting Garbins exceptional cooperation, asked U.S. District Judge Robert Jonker to give him credit for helping investigators reinforce their case against his co-defendants. The "Constitution is designed to ensure that we work out our fundamental and different views peacefully, not at the point of a gun, not with some other blunt force threat or a kidnapping conspiracy," the judge said. Prosecutors recommended a nine-year prison term. But Jonker went shorter, at 6 1/4 years, saying he was convinced that Garbin was an "excellent prospect" to stay out of trouble when released from prison. The government and Garbin's lawyers took turns praising his willingness to admit guilt even before investigators revealed all the evidence following his arrest. Garbin "didnt hold back," Assistant U.S. Attorney Nils Kessler said. "He would come out and say, We planned to do this and I was knowingly a part of it. He sat for hours answering all of our questions." Indeed, defense attorney Gary Springstead told the judge that Garbin "is going to be a star witness" against the others. He later told reporters that Garbin "can tell what was in his mind at the time, which is that this wasnt some fanciful plot. This was real. And he can tell the government why he believes other people had the same intent that he did and show them where to look." "Ty Garbin testified in front of the grand jury in support of the indictment that got him indicted. He is truly, genuinely and sincerely sorry," said Mark Satawa, another defense lawyer. When the kidnapping case was filed in October, Whitmer, a Democrat, pinned some blame on then-President Donald Trump, saying his refusal to denounce far-right groups had inspired extremists across the U.S. It added even more heat to the final weeks of a tumultuous election season. Trump had earlier urged supporters to "LIBERATE" Michigan from stay-at-home mandates. Whitmer wrote a victim impact statement to the judge, saying, "things will never be the same." Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "Threats continue," she said in June. "I have looked out my windows and seen large groups of heavily armed people within 30 yards of my home. I have seen myself hung in effigy. Days ago at a demonstration there was a sign that called for burning the witch." Last year, Whitmer put major restrictions on personal movement and the economy because of COVID-19, although many limits have since been lifted. The Michigan Capitol was the site of rallies, including ones with gun-toting protesters calling for the governors removal. Some of those accused in the plot, including defendants charged in state court, joined the protests. Prosecutors have said the ringleader initially talked of recruiting 200 men to storm the building, take hostages and "execute tyrants." "The plots and threats against me, no matter how disturbing, could not deter me from doing everything I could to save as many lives as possible by listening to medical and health experts," Whitmer said. "To me it is very simple: this had to be the priority." ___ White reported from Detroit. MONTREAL - Forcing health-care workers to get vaccinated could lead to cancelled surgeries and other service disruptions, but the health order is necessary to protect workers and patients, Quebec Health Minister Christian Dube said Thursday. Quebec Health Minister Christian Dube arrives at a legislature committee studying mandatory vaccination, at the provincial legislature in Quebec City, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jacques Boissinot MONTREAL - Forcing health-care workers to get vaccinated could lead to cancelled surgeries and other service disruptions, but the health order is necessary to protect workers and patients, Quebec Health Minister Christian Dube said Thursday. Some workers may choose to quit their jobs instead of being vaccinated, while others may be suspended for refusing, Dube acknowledged during questioning at a committee hearing in Quebec's legislature. The ones who stay, however, will be protected from the novel coronavirus and likely won't need to take extended sick leaves, he added. "In an environment where resources are extremely stretched, we cannot allow more staff to be withdrawn for reasons that could have been avoided through proper vaccination," Dube told the committee. "Our objective with this measure is to protect our most vulnerable, but also to maintain our hospital capacity and maintain our level of care, notably by reducing absenteeism." Quebec has announced it will require health-care workers who are in regular contact with patients to get vaccinated or risk being reassigned or suspended without pay. Employees in both the public and private health system will have until Oct. 15 to get both doses of COVID-19 vaccine. The government held the first of two days of committee hearings on the health order Thursday in Quebec City. Dube, public health officials and doctors groups argued in favour of the mandate, while unions representing health-care workers said the order goes too far and could lead to legal action. At the peak of the pandemic, 12,000 health-care workers were absent due to medical reasons, Dube told the committee, adding that around 2,000 workers are currently on medical or preventive leave. About 30,000 workers in the public health-care system are not vaccinated, Dube said. The number in the private health system is likely even higher, he added. Quebec's public health director, Dr. Horacio Arruda, told the committee that he considers the mandate a "temporary measure." He declined, however, to say when he thought it would end. The president of one of Quebec's largest union federations said that 18 months into the pandemic and with no end in sight, suspending an employee without pay is effectively the same as firing them. Caroline Senneville, president of Confederation des syndicats nationaux, which represents more than 100,000 workers in health and social services, said she expects at least one unvaccinated worker to file a grievance if they're suspended. The union, she said, has no choice but to defend grievances filed by its members. Senneville said she's also worried about the impact of unvaccinated workers leaving or being suspended. "On the ground, it's going to be hell, because it's going to mean fewer people, whether we want it or not," she said. Nancy Bedard, president of Quebec's largest nurses union, said she's concerned the decision had already been made before Thursday's hearings. She said she doesn't understand why workers are being subjected to a vaccine mandate at a time when other restrictions are being relaxed in health-care settings because of the high rate of vaccination among health staff. Quebec's public health institute says more than 91 per cent of health-care workers at public facilities and at private facilities that have contracts with the government have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. More than 86 per cent are considered adequately vaccinated. Dr. Vincent Oliva, president of Quebec's association of medical specialists, said his organization supports the mandate without reservation and doctors who aren't vaccinated shouldn't be in direct contact with patients. He said 97 per cent of doctors have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 96 per cent have received two. Doug Speirs | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "However, we believe that we need to go a little further and that all staff in health-care settings should be vaccinated, no matter their level of contact with patients," he said, warning that unvaccinated workers could infect colleagues in hallways or cafeterias, who will then spread the virus to patients. The hearings are scheduled to resume Friday and will discuss whether the vaccine mandate should be extended to other workers such as teachers and early childhood educators. Meanwhile, Quebec reported 603 new cases of COVID-19 Thursday and one more death attributed to the novel coronavirus. The Health Department said the number of hospitalizations linked to the pandemic rose by nine, to 119, and 36 people were in intensive care, a rise of three. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship. FREDERICTON - New Brunswick's deputy chief medical officer of health is urging the public to voluntarily wear masks in indoor spaces to help slow down COVID-19, as the virus continues its spread in some communities. New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs speaks with the media in Fredericton on Friday, June 4, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Stephen MacGillivray FREDERICTON - New Brunswick's deputy chief medical officer of health is urging the public to voluntarily wear masks in indoor spaces to help slow down COVID-19, as the virus continues its spread in some communities. "It is true that masks are not currently required by law, but remember we are dealing with a communicable disease that can and will spread quickly among the unprotected," Dr. Cristin Muecke said during a Thursday news conference. She said there has been a rise in COVID-19 cases in recent weeks and there are Alpha and Delta variants of the virus in the province. "Since moving into the green level of our COVID-19 recovery plan on July 30, New Brunswick has seen a surge in COVID-19 infections. More people moving around provides more opportunity for the virus to find new hosts. So this is no surprise," she said. However, Muecke said she is concerned with the number of cases where officials have not been able to determine their direct source. She said 13 cases in the Moncton region and one in the Fredericton area have been classified as community transmission. Muecke reported eight new cases of COVID-19 Thursday, including six in the Moncton region and two in the Fredericton area. New Brunswick has 157 active reported cases of COVID-19 and four people in hospital with the disease. About 74.2 per cent of New Brunswickers aged 12 and older are fully vaccinated and 84 per cent have received at least one dose of vaccine. Muecke said the pace of vaccinations had slowed but is starting to pick up again as people complete their summer vacations and prepare for school. Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Health Minister Dorothy Shephard said during the news conference she was encouraged by the increase in vaccinations, and echoed Muecke's advice about mask use. "The public has grown to understand through our COVID reality that they have the opportunity and power to protect themselves against COVID-19," said Shephard. "Vaccinations are the greatest tool in the tool box, but we know wearing masks in indoor public spaces is a smart thing to do." Last week, New Brunswick released its back-to-school plan, which included mask use for students and staff. Students in kindergarten to Grade 8 will wear masks in indoor common areas and all students will wear masks on school buses. Classrooms are not considered common areas. High school students will return to school full time and will need to be masked during assemblies and in common areas of school buildings until 90 per cent of students in their health zones are vaccinated. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. Kentucky and Texas joined a growing list of states that are seeing record numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in a surge that is overwhelming doctors and nurses and afflicting more children. A Dallas County Health and Human Services nurse completes paperwork after administering a Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine at a county run vaccination site in Dallas, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. (AP Photo/LM Otero) Kentucky and Texas joined a growing list of states that are seeing record numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in a surge that is overwhelming doctors and nurses and afflicting more children. Intensive care units around the nation are packed with patients extremely ill with the coronavirus even in places where hospitalizations have not yet reached earlier peaks. The ICU units at Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital in Georgia typically have room for 38 patients, and doctors and nurses may have only two or three people who are very sick, said Dr. Jyotir Mehta, medical director of the ICU. On Wednesday, the ICU had 50 COVID-19 patients alone, roughly half of them relying on ventilators to breathe. I dont think we have experienced this much critical illness in folks, so many people sick at the same time, Mehta said. He said talking to family members is difficult. They are grasping for every hope and youre trying to tell them, Look, its bad,' he said. You have to tell them that your loved one is not going to make it. Were going to have to choose who gets care and who doesnt get care." Dr. David Scrase In New Mexico, top health officials warned Wednesday that the state is about a week away from rationing health care. The number of coronavirus patients needing care at hospitals jumped more than 20% in a day. Were going to have to choose who gets care and who doesnt get care, state Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. David Scrase warned. And we dont want to get to that point. A Dallas County Health and Human Services nurse, right, injects a woman with her second dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine at a county run vaccination site in Dallas, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. According to the unidentified woman receiving the shot, her employer required all employees to be vaccinated. (AP Photo/LM Otero) In Idaho, state leaders called on residents to volunteer to help keep medical facilities operating. Texas and Kentucky on Wednesday reported more COVID-19 patients in their hospitals than at any other time since the pandemic began, 14,255 and 2,074, respectively. The Texas record is based on U.S. Department of Health and Human Services data. At least six other states Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi and Oregon have already broken their hospitalization records. In Texas, nearly 47% of the population is fully vaccinated below the national average of almost 52% and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has banned mask and vaccine mandates. Many counties and school districts have defied his mask ban. In Kentucky, just under 48% of the population is fully vaccinated, and public health officials have blamed the lag in part for the state's surge. Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear's COVID-19 restrictions expired in June, and the GOP-controlled legislature has blocked him from issuing new mask requirements or capacity limits. Nationwide, COVID-19 deaths are running at more than 1,100 a day, the highest level since mid-March, and new cases per day are averaging over 152,000, turning the clock back to the end of January. As of early this week, the number of people in the hospital with the coronavirus was around 85,000, a level not seen since early February. The surge is largely fueled by the highly contagious delta variant among people who are unvaccinated. In areas where vaccination rates are particularly low, doctors have pleaded with their communities to get inoculated to spare overburdened hospitals. They have also sounded the alarm about the growing toll of the variant on children and young adults. Children now make up 36% of Tennessees reported COVID-19 cases, marking yet another sobering milestone in the states battle against the virus, Health Commissioner Lisa Piercey said Wednesday. She said the state had 14,000 pediatric cases in the last seven days a 57% increase over the previous week. In South Carolina, students will again be required to wear masks on school buses starting Monday as COVID-19 cases among children and students rise rapidly. Nearly 30% of new cases in South Carolina in the past two weeks have been in people 20 and under. During the same time in 2020, about 17% of cases were in children and teens, according to state officials. Anderson Lopez Castillo, a nurse who cares for seriously ill COVID-19 patients at UAB Hospital in Birmingham, Alabama, said treating people as young as 16 in critical care has become an additional strain on top of a nearly yearlong ordeal that left him questioning his choice of a profession. Initially we saw a lot of older people getting it. It was like, OK, we can tackle this. Even if it is stressful, even if its a dangerous virus, itll probably not be that bad on us as nurses taking care of these older patients, he said. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Castillo, 24, said he now sees the virus making young people very sick, and it makes him and other young nurses think of their own mortality. Theres definitely a little subconscious thought in the back of all of our heads going, You know, that could be us,' he said. ___ This story has been corrected to reflect that nearly 47% of Texas' population is fully vaccinated, below the national average. ___ Associated Press reporters around the country contributed to this report. SAN FRANCISCO (AP) Al Capone is infamous for having been a ruthless mob boss, but one of his granddaughters says his softer side will shine through when the family auctions the Prohibition-era gangsters personal items including diamond-encrusted jewelry with his initials, family photographs and his favorite handgun. Diane Capone holds a copy of a photograph of her father, Albert "Sonny" Capone as a young boy and her grandfather Al Capone on display at Witherell's Auction House in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. The granddaughter of the famous mob boss and her two surviving sisters will sell 174 family heirlooms at an Oct. 8 auction titled "A Century of Notoriety: The Estate of Al Capone," that will be held by Witherell's in Sacramento. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli) SAN FRANCISCO (AP) Al Capone is infamous for having been a ruthless mob boss, but one of his granddaughters says his softer side will shine through when the family auctions the Prohibition-era gangsters personal items including diamond-encrusted jewelry with his initials, family photographs and his favorite handgun. Capone's three granddaughters will also auction a letter he wrote to their father and his only child, Albert Sonny Capone, from Alcatraz, where the mobster served an 11-year sentence following his 1934 tax evasion conviction. In the letter written in pencil, Al Capone refers to Sonny as son of my heart. He was called Public Enemy No. 1 after the 1929 Valentines Day Massacre of seven members of a rival bootlegger gang in Chicago by his associates. But his granddaughter Diane Capone describes him differently. He was very loving, very devoted to family, very generous, and the letter that we have is such a poignant, beautiful letter from a father to his son. These are things that the public doesnt know about, said Diane Capone, 77. Diane Capone and her two surviving sisters will sell 174 items at the Oct. 8 auction titled A Century of Notoriety: The Estate of Al Capone hosted by Witherell's Auction House in Sacramento. A platinum and diamond Patek Philippe pocket watch with the initials AC, that once belonged to mob boss Al Capone is seen on display at Witherell's Auction House in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. The watch is among the 174 family heirlooms that will be up for sale at an Oct. 8 auction titled "A Century of Notoriety: The Estate of Al Capone," that will be held by Witherell's. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli) Among the pieces are gold-rimmed porcelain fine china, ornate furniture, artwork and Dresden figurines that once decorated the Palm Island, Florida, villa where the Chicago mobster lived after his release from prison and until his death in 1947. Also up for sale is the Colt .45-caliber pistol Capone always carried with him and used several times to protect himself, Diane Capone said. That particular .45 was used in self-defense, and it probably saved his life on a few occasions and so, he referred to it as his favorite, she said. Diane Capone said she didn't know if the gun was used to commit any crimes and said her grandfather, who she called Papa, was never charged with killing anyone. He was accused of doing that, but he was never found guilty of shooting anyone, she said. The pistol with elaborate etchings and a wooden grip will be the centerpiece of the auction and is valued at up to $150,000, said Brian Witherell, founder of Witherells Auction House. When you think about Al Capone, you don't think Gosh, I wonder what his German porcelain figurine looks like, you wonder what his cigar humidor looks like, what his Colt .45 looks like," he said. A collection of photographs from the estate of mob boss Al Capone is seen on display at Witherell's Auction House in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. The photographs are among the 174 family heirlooms that will be up for sale at an Oct. 8 auction titled "A Century of Notoriety: The Estate of Al Capone," that will be held by Witherell's in Sacramento. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli) The sisters are also selling a diamond-encrusted pocket watch, an 18k gold and platinum belt buckle and a gold initialed AC money clip and home movies featuring Al Capone and his associates. Witherell said he had no reservations about helping the Capone sisters and that he expects the auction to draw international attention because of the items historical significance. We want to handle things that arent objectionable to a lot of people, but we still cant rewrite history, he said. He was a legendary figure. I think his judgment comes from somebody other than me. Sonny Capones daughters lived quietly for decades in Northern California after moving here from Florida in 1961 following their parents breakup. That changed in 2019 when Diane Capone published a book titled Al Capone: Stories My Grandmother Told Me using her maiden name. She said her father faced constant challenges because of his last name, including men picking fights with him for no reason and not being able to find a job. In the mid-1960s, he dropped Capone as a last name and went by Albert Francis. He died in obscurity in 2004 in Northern California, where he had lived for decades, his daughter said. The sisters decided to sell their grandfather's personal belongings because they are all in their 70s, they are the only people who know the stories behind the memorabilia, and they are worried about a wildfire destroying the collection, Diane Capone said. We were very fortunate that even after my grandfather died, we were very close to my grandmother and so, for years weve heard her talk about my grandfather and about their lives, and about a lot of these items that are going to be auctioned off, she said. Nina Salarno, president of the advocacy group Crime Victims United of California, said it is undisputed that Brooklyn, New York-born Capone headed Chicago's mob during Prohibition and orchestrated the deaths of many people. She called the sale of his personal belongings an insult to his victims. Those victims also have surviving family members, and now were glorifying what he did to them by selling his memorabilia, Salarno said. She added: They say it was part of history, I would agree with that so, donate (his belongings) to a museum, but dont profit off of the back of victims. Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Diane Capone acknowledges her grandfather led a criminal life but says that was not the person she knew. What she remembers is a doting grandfather. My grandfather certainly did some bad things during his life. That was part of his public life, she said. He went to jail, he served his time, he paid his debt to society and after he was released, in the last years of his life, he did everything to make peace with God and with his family, and with everybody, she said. James Finckenauer, a criminal justice professor at Rutgers University who has written extensively about organized crime, said the fascination with mobsters and organized crime in the U.S. started with Al Capone after his crimes attracted intense media coverage. The average person didn't know 99.9% of the people that might be involved in this, but they knew Al Capone. He became the poster boy for organized crime, he said. Finckenauer said some people are fascinated with real and fictional mobsters because they think of them as having exciting lives. Most people, from their perspective, live humdrum lives and they see these guys and their portrayal in shows like The Sopranos, as people who demand respect and live their lives as they please, he said. WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden vowed Thursday to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite the day's deadly suicide bomb attack at the Kabul airport. He promised to avenge the deaths of 13 U.S. service members killed in the attack, declaring to the extremists responsible: We will hunt you down and make you pay. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., speaks during his weekly news conference at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite) WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden vowed Thursday to complete the evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan despite the day's deadly suicide bomb attack at the Kabul airport. He promised to avenge the deaths of 13 U.S. service members killed in the attack, declaring to the extremists responsible: We will hunt you down and make you pay. Speaking with emotion from the White House, Biden said the Islamic State group's Afghanistan affiliate was to blame for the attacks that killed the Americans and many more Afghan civilians. He said there was no evidence they colluded with the Taliban, who now control the country. He asked for a moment of silence to honor the service members, bowing his head, and ordered U.S. flags to half-staff across the country. As for the bombers and gunmen involved, he said, "We have some reason to believe we know who they are ... not certain. He said he had instructed military commanders to develop plans to strike IS assets, leadership and facilities. Gen. Frank McKenzie, the U.S. Central Command chief, said more attempted attacks were expected. Children accompanied by their families evacuated from Kabul, Afghanistan, sit inside a bus after they arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Va., on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana) The IS affiliate in Afghanistan has carried out many attacks on civilian targets in the country in recent years. It is far more radical than the Taliban, who seized power less than two weeks ago. The most heralded American attack on the group came in April 2017 when the U.S. dropped the largest conventional bomb in its arsenal on an IS cave and tunnel complex. The group more recently is believed to have concentrated in urban areas, which could complicate U.S. efforts to target them without harming civilians. We will respond with force and precision at our time, at the place of our choosing, Biden said. These ISIS terrorists will not win. We will rescue the Americans; we will get our Afghan allies out, and our mission will go on. America will not be intimidated. Biden said U.S. military commanders in Afghanistan had told him it is important to complete the evacuation mission. And we will, he said. We will not be deterred by terrorists. Secretary of State Antony Blinken speaks about Afghanistan during a media briefing at the State Department, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, Pool) Indeed, Gen. McKenzie, who is overseeing the evacuation operation from his Florida headquarters, told a Pentagon news conference shortly before Biden spoke, Let me be clear, while we are saddened by the loss of life, both U.S. and Afghan, we are continuing to execute the mission,. He said there were about 5,000 evacuees on the airfield Thursday awaiting flights. As many as 1,000 Americans and many more Afghans are still struggling to get out of Kabul. McKenzie said 12 U.S. service members had been killed and 15 were wounded. Later, his spokesman, Capt. William Urban, said the toll had risen to 13 dead and 18 wounded. Urban said the wounded were being evacuated from Afghanistan aboard Air Force C-17 transport planes equipped with surgical units. In this image provided by the Department of Defense, two paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security while a C-130 Hercules takes off during a evacuation operation in Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (Department of Defense via AP) The Marine Corps said 10 Marines were among those killed. Central Command did not identify the dead by service. In somber, sometimes halting remarks, Biden praised U.S. forces and asked for the moment of silence. Asked later about further actions, press secretary Jen Psaki said that personal calls to families would wait for notification of next of kin and that Biden might travel to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware when the remains of the fallen service members are returned. They were the first U.S. service members killed in Afghanistan since February 2020, the month the Trump administration struck an agreement with the Taliban that called for the militant group to halt attacks on Americans in exchange for a U.S. agreement to remove all American troops and contractors by May 2021. Biden announced in April that he would have all forces out by September. FILE - In this Aug. 16, 2021, file photo, hundreds of people gather near a U.S. Air Force C-17 transport plane at the perimeter of the international airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. A school district in a San Diego suburb that is home to a large refugee population says many of its families who had taken summer trips to Afghanistan to see their relatives have gotten stuck there with the chaos following the withdrawal of U.S. troops. (AP Photo/Shekib Rahmani) Thursday's attacks, came 12 days into the rushed evacuation and five days before its scheduled completion. Some Republicans and others are arguing to extend the evacuation beyond next Tuesday's deadline. The administration has been widely blamed for a chaotic and deadly evacuation that began in earnest only after the collapse of the U.S.-backed Afghan government and the Talibans takeover of the country. More than 100,000 people have been evacuated so far, Afghans, Americans and others. Thursdays attack was sure to intensify political pressure from all sides on Biden, who already was under heavy criticism for not beginning the pullout earlier. He had announced in April that he was ending the U.S. war and would have all forces out by September. President Joe Biden speaks during a meeting about cybersecurity, in the East Room of the White House, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci) House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California called for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to bring the chamber back into session to consider legislation that would prohibit the U.S. withdrawal until all Americans are out. Pelosis office dismissed such suggestions as empty stunts. After the suicide bombers attack at the airports Abbey Gate, a number of ISIS gunmen opened fire on civilians and military forces, he said. There also was an attack at or near the Baron Hotel near that gate, he said. We thought this would happen sooner or later, McKenzie said, adding that U.S. military commanders were working with Taliban commanders to prevent further attacks. U.S. Marine Corps Gen. Frank McKenzie, center, the commander of U.S. Central Command, meets with U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Peter Vasely, commander of U.S. Forces Afghanistan-Forward, at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, Aug. 17, 2021. (Capt. William Urban/U.S. Navy via AP) As details of the day's attack emerged, the White House rescheduled Bidens first in-person meeting with Israels new prime minister on Thursday and canceled a video conference with governors about resettling Afghan refugees arriving in the United States. A number of U.S. allies said they were ending their evacuation efforts in Kabul, at least in part to give the U.S. the time it needs to wrap up its evacuation operations before getting 5,000 of its troops out by Tuesday. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Despite intense pressure to extend the deadline, Biden has repeatedly cited the threat of terrorist attacks against civilians and U.S. service members as a reason to keep to his plan. President Joe Biden speaks about the bombings at the Kabul airport that killed at least 12 U.S. service members, from the East Room of the White House, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci) In an interview with ABC News, Ross Wilson, the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, said, There are safe ways to get to the airport for those Americans who still want to leave. He added that there undoubtedly will be some at-risk Afghans who will not get out before Bidens deadline. The airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people from the airport and as other countries began shutting down their efforts. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. ___ Associated Press writers Aamer Madhani, Lolita C. Baldor and Ellen Knickmeyer in Washington and James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida, contributed to this report. MIAMI (AP) Joel Steckler was eager for his first cruise in more than a year and a half, and he chose the ship that just two months ago became the first to accept passengers again after a long pandemic shutdown. n this Friday, Jan. 29, 2021 photo, The Carnival Dream cruise ship arrives as construction work is underway for Carnival Cruise Line's new Terminal F, which will be the homeport to the Carnival Celebration cruise ship at PortMiami, in Miami. Cruise companies are adapting to a changing landscape amid a rise in COVID-19 cases that is threatening to dampen the industrys comeback.(AP Photo/Lynne Sladky) MIAMI (AP) Joel Steckler was eager for his first cruise in more than a year and a half, and he chose the ship that just two months ago became the first to accept passengers again after a long pandemic shutdown. Steckler was fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and that was enough to resume cruising, under initial guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Now, the 63-year-old from Long Island, New York, is going to postpone the trip he had planned for Saturday amid new, tighter guidelines prompted by the delta-variant-fueled surge in cases and breakthrough infections. You just have to make a personal decision, said Steckler, who takes medication that suppresses his immune system and changed his plans after consulting his doctor. You dont want to be in a position where you are sick on a cruise and you have to fly home or somehow get home. Cruise lines have detected infections among vaccinated crew members and passengers, including in an elderly traveler who recently died. Last Friday, the CDC began advising travelers who are at a higher risk for severe COVID-19 illness to avoid cruises. It is also recommending that passengers show both a recent negative COVID test and proof they've been immunized. In addition to the surging delta virus, the CDC changed its cruise guidelines for high-risk groups because of the close proximity of ship passengers, the limited options for care on board and the challenges of medically evacuating travelers at sea, Centers spokeswoman Kristen Nordlund said Tuesday. In this Saturday, June 26, 2021 photo. The Celebrity Edge is moored at Port Everglades, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Cruise companies are adapting to a changing landscape amid a rise in COVID-19 cases that is threatening to dampen the industrys comeback.(AP Photo/Marta Lavandier) Some cruise lines and cruise destinations are also revising their own guidelines. Starting Sept. 3, the Bahamas a favored stop for cruises is requiring all passengers 12 and older to be vaccinated against COVID-19 as a condition for ships to dock. That has prompted companies including Disney Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean and Carnival to announce this week that they are adopting the same requirement. The companies will ask for a government vaccination card or a record from a health care provider. They've been able to do so in Florida after a federal judge this month temporarily blocked a state law banning cruise lines from requiring passengers to prove they're vaccinated. The companies are also once again requiring masks in indoor areas of the ships and other places where people gather. "Unfortunately, no venue on land or at sea is COVID-free right now," Carnival Corp. said in a written statement. Carnival commented on the case of a vaccinated 77-year-old woman who later came down with the virus. The company said the woman almost certainly did not contract COVID on our ship, suggesting she was already infected when she embarked. Neither cruise lines nor the federal government are reporting how many cases they have had on their ships. They have only acknowledged that there have been infections. Officials in Belize, however, recently reported that 26 crew members and one passenger of a Carnival cruise ship all of whom had been vaccinated tested positive for COVID-19. They said all of them had mild or no symptoms, and were in isolation. Jaime Katz, an analyst who covers the cruise industry for the Morningstar financial services company, said while many high-risk travelers might postpone their trips, others will continue to book for the future, betting that the current wave of cases will subside by the time their ship sails. Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Flexible booking and cancellation policies have made cruising more palatable for nervous travelers, he said. Companies are offering full refunds if people test positive for COVID-19 or decide to cancel after a cruise line shortens the length of a planned trip. Royal Caribbean International is also offering to fly people home if they or anyone in their party test positive during the cruise. Chris Woronka, a Deutsche Bank analyst who follows the leisure industry, said cruisers, including those over 65, are an avid bunch so eager to get back on the water that they wont easily be dissuaded by the current COVID surge and more stringent travel requirements. I dont think this is permanent unless were dealing with delta 2.0 or whatever the next one is, Woronka said. ___ Koenig reported from Dallas. A group of major Canadian long-term care operators will require all staff be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 this fall, with those who don't take the shots being asked to go on unpaid leave. Barbara Violo, pharmacist and owner of The Junction Chemist Pharmacy, draws up a dose behind vials of both Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines on the counter, in Toronto, Friday, June 18, 2021. A group of major Canadian long-term care operators will require COVID-19 vaccination for all staff this fall. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette A group of major Canadian long-term care operators will require all staff be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 this fall, with those who don't take the shots being asked to go on unpaid leave. Chartwell Retirement Residences, Extendicare, Responsive Group Inc., Revera Inc., and Sienna Senior Living announced the plan in a joint statement on Thursday. They said the stronger policy is necessary as a fourth wave of infections driven by more contagious variants of the virus is spreading in the country. "Front-line staff at each organization have demonstrated an enthusiastic response to our voluntary vaccination programs," the group said in a statement. "We thank them for their commitment, but we need to do more." Employees who arent fully vaccinated as of Oct. 12 will be placed on unpaid leave of absence. Vaccination will also be required for new hires, students and other personnel working with the companies. The group said it doesn't expect the new policy to impact staffing levels, noting that the companies now offer staff access to education about vaccination, help with booking appointments and paid time off to get vaccinated. It said those policies have resulted in "already high staff vaccination rates that continue to rise each week." Thousands of long-term care residents have died from COVID-19 since the pandemic began as homes across the country dealt with major outbreaks. The Writ The federal election occurs Sept. 20 and we have you covered. Get the latest campaign news, insights, analysis and commentary delivered weekly to your inbox with our free newsletter. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. The coalition of home operators said unvaccinated staff are more likely to bring the virus to work as infection rates increase again. Their statement said the vaccination policy will help reduce the need for isolation and other restrictions on residents in the event of outbreaks. In Ontario, where more than a third of people who have died from COVID-19 were long-term care residents, the province has set minimum standards for vaccination policies in seniors' homes. Staff must show proof of full vaccination or a medical exemption, and those not vaccinated must take an educational program about COVID-19 vaccination. The Ontario Long-Term Care Association has asked the province to strengthen those rules by mandating COVID-19 vaccinations for all direct care providers. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. HALIFAX - For Halifax residents like Matt Whalen, the looming end of pandemic-era rent control in Nova Scotia signals that even middle-class people will struggle to find affordable accommodation in the months to come. Police attend a protest after the city removed tents and small shelters for homeless people in Halifax on Aug. 18, 2021. Some Halifax residents say they are worried about quickly rising rents in the city and about the looming end to the rent control order imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan HALIFAX - For Halifax residents like Matt Whalen, the looming end of pandemic-era rent control in Nova Scotia signals that even middle-class people will struggle to find affordable accommodation in the months to come. I make a good salary, but rent is half of my gross income and it's only going up, the digital marketing specialist said in a recent interview. We're very quickly becoming a city that caters only to the wealthy. For the 33-year-old, the bad news came in December, in the form of a two-page letter from the property manager of his unit. His landlord said that once the two per cent cap on rent hikes is lifted, his rent would rise by about $100 a month. Former Liberal premier Stephen McNeil set a two per cent cap on rent increases in November 2020. The cap was retroactive to September of that year and is set to expire in February 2022 or when the COVID-19 state of emergency in the province is lifted whichever comes first. Whalen is one of many Nova Scotians raising concerns about the quick inflation of rent. Global News reported last week that one Halifax resident was informed the day after the Aug. 17 provincial election that rent on his two-bedroom would rise from $790 to $1,650 a 109 per cent hike once the rent increase cap is lifted. Whalen, meanwhile, was told by his landlord, POLYCORP, that the company had canvassed comparable buildings on the peninsula and found its units were well below market rates." Effective May 1, his rent would rise to $1,565 from $1,465, but in light of the rent cap, the increase would temporarily be about $30 a month. They sent that during the height of the pandemic, Whalen said. One thing was just the callousness of the message and the timing was quite unfortunate, but then the other part was the clear disregard for the spirit of the legislation. POLYCORP was not immediately available for comment. Rent control and housing have quickly become an issue during premier-designate Tim Houston's first week in office. The day after he was voted into power last week, protests broke out in Halifax against a police operation tasked with removing a series of homeless encampments. Halifax police said 24 people were arrested in connection with the protest. Houston told reporters earlier this week he didnt believe in rent control as an answer to the larger housing issue in Nova Scotia. The solution to a housing crisis is more housing, Houston said. I think theres lots of ramifications of rent control that are actually not productive to adding housing stock. Houston mentioned the Nova Scotia Affordable Housing Commission, which in its most recent report was also hesitant to call rent control a key strategy to address the housing crisis. The Commission said the cap on rent increases should be lifted in the time outlined by the province. It also recommended that when rent control ends, the government should offer temporary assistance to some low-income households. Tris Winfield, CEO of local real estate investment firm KKT Investments, echoed Houstons point in a recent interview. It's easy," Winfield said, you build more, you raise the supply, you move the restrictions on supply. And as a result of more supply, well, you have more units being built. Guess what prices will be? Guess what rent will do? It will fall. Rent control as a public policy has proven to be flawed, he added, causing enormous growth in demand but stifling growth in supply. Because the landlord is going to have a greater selection, there's a much more competitive tenant situation with rent control, where the landlord has more choice, Winfield said, adding that the policy negatively impacts lower-income tenants. Theres also the matter of the increased cost of property maintenance, said Kevin Russell, executive director of the Investment Property Owners Association of Nova Scotia. Property investors, he said in a recent interview, may be facing expense issues when it comes to maintenance. Currently, the two per cent rent cap is in place. However, expenses are running at about four, four and a half per cent on an ongoing basis, Russell said. There's a lot of landlords struggling with the rent control in place as it is, so they're making decisions to put off capital investments into the property to upgrade the property. Lisa Roberts, the federal NDP candidate for Halifax, said in an interview Thursday rent control is well-suited to address the city's housing woes. "Investing in real estate doesn't necessarily result in more stock," Roberts said about property owners who buy old buildings, renovate them and increase rents. "I feel sometimes that we're cutting off our nose to spite our face in protecting the interest of owners, not recognizing that there are costs to the economy." Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Whalen said he has doubts whether more housing will solve the problem of unaffordable rent hikes for ordinary citizens. He said he suspects property managers may take the opportunity to charge as much as the market will bear. And he said he's not sure if he will remain in the apartment he currently lives in but hopes to stay on the peninsula if he can. "That's where my friends and my life is," he said. "I don't think I can stay even at a $100 (increase). It's not ideal, but there's there's no place to go right now." This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. --- This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship. Imagine a world full of corn dogs. Think innumerable personal configurations scores of sauces and seasonings, not to mention the variety of meats and cheeses that can be found inside these deliciously crispy concoctions. Could it be the classic pairings of ketchup and mustard or the adventurous sweet mayo, teriyaki and honey butter? Is the batter just panko-crusted, or does it have potatoes on it? Perhaps its infused with squid ink? Maybe on the inside, theres a long pull of mozzarella cheese, with the choice of chicken, veggie, pork or beef for the meat. Perhaps, however, you want to scrap the sausage altogether and just go with oozing chocolate instead. ALEX LUPUL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Jane Khau and her husband Eric Lai applied to open a store last year, just shortly after Chung Chun launched as a brand in 2019. Thats exactly what Jane Khau had in mind when the Winnipegger opened the new Chung Chun Rice Dog store on Jefferson Avenue in the Maples. "There really is a world of possibilities," Khau told the Free Press. Its a food trend that has taken the world by storm. Celebrities, bloggers and social media influencers have garnered millions upon millions of views on videos reviewing the over-the-top, deep-fried hotdogs wrapped in rice-flour batter, inspired by the streets of South Korea. Chung Chun Rice Dog itself is a Korean brand that has gone global, with more than 200 stores worldwide in countries including Australia, the United States, China, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam and the Philippines. "Thats why I wanted to bring this trend here in the city that I grew up in," Khau said. "As a foodie myself and a person who loves to travel for food, when I found out there was a franchise that we could potentially bring here, I definitely jumped at the chance." ALEX LUPUL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS The restaurant offers a wide range of sauces, dips and seasonings inspired by Korean street food. Khau and her husband Eric Lai applied to open a store last year, just shortly after Chung Chun launched as a brand in 2019. Their new shop is now the first in the Prairies, with other Canadian stores found only in Quebec, Ontario and British Columbia. And in the short period that the fast-food joint has been open in the city, since it soft-launched a few weeks ago, there have been lineups outside every single day, from start to closing hours. The Chung Chun shop is sharing retail space on Jefferson Avenue near Adsum Drive with Asia City Express, a Winnipeg favourite that sells fusion food and bubble tea. "To me, thats the best part," said Khau. "I get to have this franchise in the same location that I sort of grew up in, because Ive worked right at Asia City since I was probably 16." In many ways, the restaurant business runs in Khaus blood. Her dad, sister and many other family members are affiliated with the industry in one way or another. ALEX LUPUL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS A squid ink and cheese dog Getting here hasnt been so easy, however. "The pandemic has definitely made life much, much harder," said Khau. "As any restaurant owner will tell you, were already the type of people that rarely get to take any breaks working 12-hour days, seven days a week, and bringing that work home. Now, COVID-19 has brought a completely different set of challenges." At Khaus new shop, those challenges include not just a delay in getting to launch, but the operational complexity that comes with going above and beyond Manitobas public-health orders to keep her staff and customers safe. Chung Chun has installed a giant sneeze guard on its seasoning station, with cleaning every 15 to 30 minutes. There are Plexiglas barriers, sanitizer stands and the option to get takeout dips for those who prefer not to use the in-store dipping experience as was originally intended. It also meant having to make the difficult decision to scrap indoor dining. Khau's store is inspired by the rise in popularity of corn dogs capturing the flavours of South Korea. Initially, when the province had eased dining rules, Khau did allow customers to eat inside at the large seating area that snakes around the store. But because her staff had to constantly police people for physical distancing, she said it just isnt feasible until the threat of COVID-19 dampens. "A lot of our intentional, Korean-street-style experience does get lost with the pandemic. Its just absolutely heartbreaking because weve all put our sweat and tears into this," said Khau. "I have to say that none of this would be possible to manage, though, without my staff. Theyve jumped at every chance to help... Try our Dish The latest on food and drink in Winnipeg and beyond from arts writers Ben Sigurdson and Eva Wasney. Dish arrives in your inbox every other Friday. See sample. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "And you already know how hard it is trying to tell someone who doesnt want to wear their mask." But come rain or shine, Khau is determined. And she hopes this trend will last at least until Winnipeggers get their fill. "Im just taking it one day at a time," she said. "For now, how about we all just enjoy a delicious corn dog? Well all figure out the rest later." temur.durrani@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @temurdur A year after Manitoba Hydro stopped taking on new contracts for broadband network access, and three months after Xplornet won the bid to manage that network, critics are complaining the continuing moratorium has left would-be customers in the lurch. A year after Manitoba Hydro stopped taking on new contracts for broadband network access, and three months after Xplornet won the bid to manage that network, critics are complaining the continuing moratorium has left would-be customers in the lurch. Adrien Sala, NDP critic for Hydro, is calling on the Progressive Conservative government to end the stop sell order and disclose the revenue losses suffered from the disruption. "It is taking far longer than anyone expected it to and it is creating further and further delays for a lot of ISPs (Internet service providers), school divisions and regional health authorities that have asked for service upgrades," Sala said. A spokesperson for Reg Helwer, minister of central services, confirmed that the Xplornet agreement has yet to be finalized but is expected to be soon. The official said the delays are a result of the complexity of the agreement, the fact that there are three parties who are each conducting their own due diligence and that it is an agreement with several technical portions that require time to review. The outsourcing of Manitoba Hydro Telecom (MHT) was ostensibly part of a larger restructuring of Manitoba Hydros non-core operations. But the disruption in new service connections while a third-party agreement was worked out came at a time of acute demand for enhanced service during the pandemic from many areas of the province that have long endured very poor broadband connectivity. "It has been a disaster," Sala said. "The impact of the stop sell and the whole process has been huge. Large numbers of rural and northern communities have been forced to wait for improvement to their broadband connectivity, we have lost untold millions in economic development opportunities and we have lost out on huge profits for MHT that would have otherwise gone directly to Manitoba Hydro that would kept our Hydro rates low." Sala said there has never been a proper explanation as to why this had to happen, especially given that MHT had been doing an excellent job by all accounts. "I think it is clear... it is because they (the Progressive Conservative government) are simply doing what they do," Sala said. "They are looking at getting government out of something they believe should be delivered by the private sector. They are intent on privatizing bit by bit." Dave MacKay, the executive director of the Coalition of Manitoba Internet Service Provider (C-MISP) calls it an "ignominious anniversary" Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. He has said many times since last August that his members had hundreds of millions of dollars worth of development that has been forced to be shelved. In some cases it has meant that his members have deployed capital in other provinces. But MacKay said he is hopeful that an agreement with Xplornet could be forthcoming in the next few weeks and that business could start flowing again by sometime in September. Meanwhile, Morden-based Valley Fiber Ltd. is undertaking a major broadband build-out in southern and central Manitoba with the assistance of $164 million from the federal government funded Canadian Infrastructure Bank. Among other things the MHT stop sell order is forcing Valley Fiber to lay its own fibre optic cable parallel to MHTs in some areas. "It is a huge embarrassment that Valley Fiber... has announced a massive project that will bring connectivity to a huge number of Manitobans but the PC government is nowhere to be seen," Sala said. Officials from Xplornet were unavailable for comment. martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) Protesters descended upon the Minnesota State Capitol on Wednesday to rally against Enbridge Energys Line 3 oil pipeline as the project nears completion. ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) Protesters descended upon the Minnesota State Capitol on Wednesday to rally against Enbridge Energys Line 3 oil pipeline as the project nears completion. The rally, part of a series of events called Treaties over Tar Sands organized by Indigenous and environmental activists, called on Gov. Tim Walz and President Joe Biden to pull permits and shut down the Line 3 replacement pipeline project. Construction began in December and oil is expected to start flowing before the end of the year. More than a dozen tipis stood on the state Capitol mall as rallygoers carrying flags and signs that read Defend the Sacred and Honor our Treaties gathered before the building. Opponents of the pipeline, which would carry Canadian tar sands oil and lighter crude, argue the project violates Native American treaty rights and will aggravate climate change and risk spills that would contaminate areas where Indigenous people hunt, fish and gather wild rice. We're here in ceremony. We're here to assert our treaty rights and our right to exist and our right to clean water, Nancy Beaulieu, a founder of the Resilient Indigenous Sisters Engaging Coalition, told rallygoers. Line 3 violates our treaty and all the treaties along the Mississippi because the water flows. This is a people's problem, this is not just a Native issue here. Organizers estimated the crowd at more than 2,000 while Capitol Security put it at about 1,000. State troopers watched from the steps of the Capitol building behind fencing reinstalled by state officials last week in anticipation of the event a move that was criticized by protesters ahead of the event. Hundreds of water protectors have been arrested or ticketed in protests across northern Minnesota since major construction began in December. They have arrested 800, almost 900 people all for a Canadian corporation to make a buck in the middle of climate chaos, Winona LaDuke, executive director of the Indigenous based environmental group Honor the Earth, said in an interview. Its poor policy and its worse practice and were here to ask the governor why he continues with such egregious policies and how were going to change that. Doug Speirs | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Line 3 opponents are running out of options for stopping the project in court. The Minnesota Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to hear a challenge to last years decision by the Public Utilities Commission to grant a certificate of need and route permit and approve the environmental review for the project a decision that gave Calgary, Alberta-based Enbridge a green light to start construction. Though the Minnesota segment of the pipeline is nearly 90% completed, LaDuke said the fight isn't over. In addition to the pending legal challenges, they will continue to demand a federal review of how the project would impact the area's environment before oil starts to flow through the pipeline. Maybe we should check the pipe and check the permits and check the environment before they let them put oil in the pipe, she said. Line 3 starts in Alberta and clips a corner of North Dakota before crossing northern Minnesota en route to Enbridges terminal in Superior, Wisconsin. The 337-mile (542.35-kilometer) segment in Minnesota is the last phase in replacing the deteriorating pipeline that was built in the 1960s. Enbridge says the new pipeline will better protect the environment while ensuring reliable oil deliveries to Midwestern refineries, and that it has worked to respect Native American concerns. ___ Mohamed Ibrahim 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. SEOUL, South Korea (AP) North Korea will convene its rubber-stamp parliament next month to discuss efforts to salvage an economy strained by pandemic border closures after decades of mismanagement and U.S.-led sanctions. FILE - In this Jan. 17, 2021, file photo provided by the North Korean government, members of the Supreme People's Assembly attend a meeting in Pyongyang, North Korea, The Norths official Korean Central News Agency said Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021, the Supreme Peoples Assembly will meet on Sept. 28 in Pyongyang to discuss economic development, youth education, government organizational matters and other issues. Korean language watermark on image as provided by source reads: "KCNA" which is the abbreviation for Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP) SEOUL, South Korea (AP) North Korea will convene its rubber-stamp parliament next month to discuss efforts to salvage an economy strained by pandemic border closures after decades of mismanagement and U.S.-led sanctions. The Norths official Korean Central News Agency said Thursday the Supreme Peoples Assembly will meet on Sept. 28 in Pyongyang to discuss economic development, youth education, government organizational matters and other issues. The report didnt mention any plans for discussions on foreign policy. Doug Speirs | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Talks between the United States and North Korea have stalled since the collapse of a summit between former President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in 2019, when the Americans rejected the Norths demand for a major easing of economic sanctions in exchange for a partial surrender of its nuclear capabilities. Kim has since pledged to bolster his countrys nuclear deterrent while urging his people to stay resilient in a struggle for economic self-dependence in the face of U.S. pressure. But experts say Kim is now facing perhaps his toughest moment as he approaches a decade in rule, with North Korea maintaining a border lockdown indefinitely to keep out the coronavirus and with no prospect in sight to end international sanctions. Meetings of the full Supreme Peoples Assembly are usually brief affairs intended to approve budgets, formalize personnel changes and rubber-stamp Kims policy priorities. During its previous session in January, the Assembly passed decisions made during a rare congress of the ruling Workers Party earlier that month where Kim vowed to strengthen his nuclear arsenal and laid out economic development plans for the next five years. The congress came months after Kim during another political conference showed unusual candor by acknowledging that his plans to improve the economy werent succeeding. Despite its economic troubles, the North has so far rejected the Biden administrations overture to resume nuclear diplomacy, saying that Washington must discard its hostile policies first. FREDERICTON - Licensed cannabis producers in New Brunswick now have the option to sell their products on-site at their facilities. A Cannabis NB location in Sackville, N.B., is seen on Sunday, Oct. 14, 2018. Licensed cannabis producers in New Brunswick now have the option to sell their own products on-site at their facilities. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan FREDERICTON - Licensed cannabis producers in New Brunswick now have the option to sell their products on-site at their facilities. The FarmGate program will increase visibility for local licensed producers and create potential tourism opportunities, according to Cannabis NB, the province's Crown-owned cannabis corporation, which is the only legal retailer in the province. The province's cannabis industry is just a few years old but the corporation has been discussing how to grow the market, Lara Wood, vice-president of operations, said in an interview Thursday. "We have seen more local producers in our market who are really enthusiastic about their products," she said, adding that the FarmGate stores are another opportunity to generate revenue. "It's also a chance to showcase their products in their locations, be able to talk about them in-depth, and do the education around them," she said. "I think that's what a lot of them are looking forward to." The program is also an opportunity for producers who produce small batches of product to try them out in their store before selling through Cannabis NB. Wood said producers will have to apply to Cannabis NB for consideration and all products must go through Health Canada's approval process and adhere to federal rules for packaging. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "It has to go through the same process it would to go through one of our retail stores," she said. As well, everything sold at the FarmGate stores will have to be grown, produced and packaged on-site. Wood said Cannabis NB will charge an administrative fee but producers can set the prices for their own products. "We're still in early conversations," she said. Wood said there are currently five fully licensed producers in the province but at least a dozen others are at varying steps of the licensing process. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) Few Palestinians in the occupied West Bank get to board an airplane these days. The territory has no civilian airport and those who can afford a plane ticket must catch their flights in neighboring Jordan. But just outside the northern city of Nablus, a pair of twins is offering people the next best thing. A Boeing 707 aircraft has been converted to a cafe, in Wadi Al-Badhan, just outside the West Bank city of Nablus, Aug. 11, 2021. Few Palestinians in the occupied West Bank get to board an airplane these days. The territory has no civilian airport and those who can afford a plane ticket must catch their flights in neighboring Jordan. But twins brothers, Khamis al-Sairafi and Ata, are offering people the old airplane for customers to board. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed) RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) Few Palestinians in the occupied West Bank get to board an airplane these days. The territory has no civilian airport and those who can afford a plane ticket must catch their flights in neighboring Jordan. But just outside the northern city of Nablus, a pair of twins is offering people the next best thing. Khamis al-Sairafi and brother Ata have converted an old Boeing 707 into a cafe and restaurant for customers to board. Ninety-nine percent of Palestinians have never used an airplane. Only our ambassadors, diplomats, ministers and mayors use them. Now they see an airplane and it is something for them,' said Khamis al-Sairafi. After a quarter century of effort, the brothers opened The Palestinian-Jordanian Airline Restaurant and Coffee Shop al-Sairafi on July 21. Families, friends and couples turned up for drinks in the cafe situated below the body of the plane. Many others came to take photos inside at a price of five shekels (about $1.50) per person. FILE - In this Oct. 6, 2009 file photo, an old Boeing 707 awaits conversion to a restaurant and cafe, near the west bank town of Nablus. The territory has no civilian airport and those who can afford a plane ticket must catch their flights in neighboring Jordan. After a quarter century of effort, twins brothers, Khamis al-Sairafi and Ata, opened The Palestinian-Jordanian Airline Restaurant and Coffee Shop al-Sairafi on July 21, 2021, offering people an old airplane for customers to board. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty, File) Customers said they were motivated to visit after seeing pictures of the renovated plane circulating online. For a long time, I have wanted to see this place. I wish I had seen this place before it was turned into a cafe, said customer Majdi Khalid. For years, the jetliner sat along the side of a major highway in the northern West Bank, providing endless fodder for conversation for passersby baffled by its hulking presence. The 60-year-old identically dressed twins' dream of transforming the airplane into a cafe and restaurant was born in the late 1990s when Khamis saw the derelict Boeing aircraft near the northern Israeli city of Safed. At the time, the plane already had an illustrious history. The aircraft was used by the Israeli government from 1961 to 1993 and flew then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin to the United States in 1978 to sign Israel's historic peace agreement with Egypt, according to Channel 12 TV. It was later bought by three Israeli business partners who dreamed of turning it into a restaurant, but the project was abandoned following disagreements with local authorities, the station said. After tracking down one of the owners, the brothers agreed to buy it for $100,000 in 1999. They spent an additional $50,000 for licenses, permits and to transport it to the West Bank. A Boeing 707 aircraft has been converted to a cafe, in Wadi Al-Badhan, just outside the West Bank city of Nablus, Aug. 11, 2021. Few Palestinians in the occupied West Bank get to board an airplane these days. The territory has no civilian airport and those who can afford a plane ticket must catch their flights in neighboring Jordan. But twins brothers, Khamis al-Sairafi and Ata, are offering people the old airplane for customers to board. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed) Khamis said the then-mayor of Nablus, Ghassan Shakaa, quickly approved the transportation and renovation of the airplane. Moving the plane to Nablus was a 13-hour operation, requiring the wings to be dismantled and the temporary closure of roads in Israel and the West Bank. At the time, Israel and the Palestinians were engaged in peace talks and movement back and forth was relatively easy. The al-Sairafi brothers were successful traders and scrap metal merchants. They regularly traveled to and from Israel buying pieces of metal that they then sold and smelted in the West Bank. They also owned a successful waste disposal business and used their earnings to build an amusement park including a swimming pool and concert venue on the same patch of land where the plane was placed. But they said their project was put on hold after the outbreak of the second Palestinian uprising in late 2000. An Israeli military checkpoint was built nearby, they said, preventing customers from the nearby city of Nablus from reaching the site. The checkpoint remained for three years and the Israeli military took over the site. The project collapsed. They even built tents under the wings of the plane, Ata al-Sairafi said. The Israeli military did not respond to a request for comment. Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. For nearly 20 years, the airplane and the site were abandoned. After the uprising faded out in the mid-2000s, the brothers scraped by with their waste disposal business and the small amusement park in Nablus they opened in 2007. After more than a decade of saving, they decided in 2020 to begin rebuilding what they lost, this time starting with the renovation of the airplane. The coronavirus crisis, which included multiple lockdowns, hit the Palestinian economy hard and caused further delays. Following months of work, the aircraft is almost ready for full service. The interior is freshly painted, fitted with electricity and nine tables and the doors are connected to two old sets of airstairs allowing customers to board safely. The nose of the plane has been painted with colors of the Palestinian flag and the tail with Jordanian colors. The cafe is already open and the brothers hope to open the restaurant next month. They plan to install a kitchen below the body of the plane to serve food to customers on board. However, their long-term goal of re-building the amusement park and swimming pool remains a long way off. The pair said they were disappointed they had not received financial support from the municipality and are looking for investors. God willing, I hope the project works and that it becomes the best it can be, said Ata al-Sairafi. CANBERRA, Australia (AP) Qantas Group posted a 2.35 billion Australia dollar ($1.7 billion) pandemic-related annual loss on Thursday and forecast Australia will reopen to international travel in December. FILE - In this Feb. 27, 2014, file photo, Qantas Airways chief executive Alan Joyce speaks during a press conference in Sydney. Joyce said on Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. that Qantas has posted a 2.35 billion Australia dollar ($1.7 billion) pandemic-related annual loss and forecast Australia will be reopen to international travel in December. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File) CANBERRA, Australia (AP) Qantas Group posted a 2.35 billion Australia dollar ($1.7 billion) pandemic-related annual loss on Thursday and forecast Australia will reopen to international travel in December. The Sydney-based airline company said it expected flights to countries with high vaccination rates including the United States, Britain, Japan and Singapore would resume in mid-December. Flights to countries with lower vaccination rates including Indonesia, the Philippines and South Africa would restart from April next year at the earliest, Qantas said in a statement to the Australian Securities Exchange. One of the biggest unknowns is the quarantine requirements for fully vaccinated travelers entering Australia, the statement said. If Australia keeps its requirement for vaccinated and unvaccinated travelers to spend 14 days in hotel quarantine, travel demand would be very low. A shorter period with additional testing and the option to isolate at home will see a lot more people travel, the statement said. Australia has had some of the worlds toughest pandemic border restrictions since March 2020. Most Australians must ask the government for an exemption from a travel ban to leave the country and foreigners are in most circumstances refused permission to enter. The Qantas prediction for a resumption in international travel was based on an agreement reached by Australian government leaders in July that the country will begin to reopen when 80% of the population aged 16 and older is fully vaccinated. Qantas expects Australia will have reached that target by December. Doug Speirs | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. According to the latest government figures released on Thursday, 32% of the target population was fully vaccinated. Qantas said it had lost AU$16 billion in revenue because of COVID-19 since the pandemic began. The lost revenue would likely exceed AU$20 billion by the end of 2021. Australias largest airline has also suffered financial losses because of domestic travel restrictions. More than half the Australian population and the two biggest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, are currently locked down due to a delta variant outbreak that began in mid-June. In the fiscal year that ended in June 30, 2020, Qantas annual loss was AU$1.96 billion ($141 million). The company had recorded a AU$771 million ($554 million) pre-tax profit in the first half of that fiscal year before the pandemic struck. The neon rainbow playground ball is a top seller. Pop fidget pencil cases and journals sold out coast-to-coast in three weeks. Backpacks with dinosaur and mermaid prints are flying off the shelves. Retailers are banking on a robust back-to-school shopping season as students gear up to return to in-classroom learning many for the first time in more than a year. Back to school supplies are shown in a store in Toronto, Thursday, Aug. 18, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Cole Burston The neon rainbow playground ball is a top seller. Pop fidget pencil cases and journals sold out coast-to-coast in three weeks. Backpacks with dinosaur and mermaid prints are flying off the shelves. Parents and kids are not only on the hunt for essential back-to-school supplies this year, but unique gear to help kids settle into a new routine, says Mastermind Toys CEO Sarah Jordan. Because kids havent consistently been in school for the past two years, theres a real need for gear to be replaced because its either outdated or theyve outgrown it, she said. But back-to-school gear is also a form of expression and its more important this year than ever. Retailers are banking on a robust back-to-school shopping season as students prepare to return to in-classroom learning many for the first time in more than a year. The lucrative spending period was sluggish last year as some parents opted to homeschool their children and many schools shifted to online learning. But consumer spending is expected to be strong in the run up to schools reopening this fall. Many parents and students began stocking up early, and sales of school-related supplies from lunch boxes to sneakers are projected to remain strong into September. For many retailers, back to school is a critical period second only to Christmas, said Retail Council of Canada spokeswoman Michelle Wasylyshen. This year back-to-school shopping should be huge compared to last year since schools will be returning to in-person at all ages. In the U.S., the National Retail Federation said consumers plan to spend record amounts for school supplies this fall. Families with children in elementary to high school plan to spend an average of US$849 on school items, while post-secondary students and their families plan to spend an average of US$1,200, the trade association said. The rosy sales projections are largely mirrored in Canada, with experts noting that the return to in-person instruction, the restart of many extracurricular activities and the return to the office should provide retailers with a big lift. Consumers are expected to spend significantly more than last year, said Markus Giesler, associate professor of marketing at York Universitys Schulich School of Business. Its not that surprising given more students are expected to return to in-person learning, he said. But the uncertainty with the fourth wave could still impact sales. Statistics Canada said Aug. 20 that retail sales rose 4.2 per cent to $56.2 billion in June as public health restrictions were eased in many parts of the country. While the agency said its preliminary estimate for July, which will be revised, showed retail sales fell 1.7 per cent, experts say traditional back-to-school categories like apparel appeared to do well. Tamara Szames, Canadian retail industry adviser with The NPD Group, said early sales figures for the back-to-school period suggest fashion retailers will see double-digit growth over 2020 and single-digit growth compared to 2019. July has been a really promising month for what we can expect to see for the back-to-school season, she said. But the recovery story starts to overshadow this back-to-school season. Stores have been heavily promoting school sales this month, with mailbox flyers and online ads featuring everything from classroom supplies and apparel to electronics and dorm room essentials. Many are offering classic doorbuster items to lure shoppers into stores, like a 29 cent pack of wooden pencils at Staples or an 88 cent box of coloured crayons at Walmart. Retail observers say the aim is to get consumers through the door with steeply discounted items in the hopes theyll spend more on discretionary items and higher margin goods like backpacks, footwear and clothing. Apparel is one of the stars at retail right now as we reopen, said retail analyst Bruce Winder. Were really seeing apparel rocketing back up now, and thats after seeing sales slip as much as 80 per cent during the height of the pandemic. Some stores are featuring masks and hand sanitizer as part of their back to school selection. John DeFranco, chief commercial officer of Staples Canada, said the store is featuring sanitation options alongside its usual school supplies. Electronics remain a bit of a question mark, as many students and families already purchased new technology during the pandemic, retail experts say. Yet some families appear to be buying cellphones for elementary and high school aged students in order to stay connected, they say. There might be a lot of parents interested in buying their children cellphones before the start of school, said Anwar White with McGill Universitys Bensadoun School of Retail Management. They didnt need one last year because they were mostly home, but now theyll be apart more. Indeed, parental guilt about seeing children cope with pandemic restrictions for 18 months could give an extra boost to back-to-school shopping, he said. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. I would say the majority of parents are going all out, White said. Theres this inherent guilt involved with this removal of a normal experience for children. Back-to-school shopping also offers some normalcy in an uncertain time, Giesler said. Its a ritual for parents and students that is a sign of stability and reliability, he said. Theres a sort of emotional, therapeutic side. Still, the wild card with back-to-school spending is the Delta variant, Winder said. Sales may start to soften if we see COVID-19 cases start to rise again. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. SITKA, Alaska (AP) The Sitka Assembly has authorized a 20-year lease of land to an Alaska Native corporation for development for cruise ship passengers. SITKA, Alaska (AP) The Sitka Assembly has authorized a 20-year lease of land to an Alaska Native corporation for development for cruise ship passengers. The Assembly, voting 5-2, approved leasing 17 acres to Shee Atika Inc., which plans to work with another company, Adventure Sitka, to develop the land with attractions such as zip lines, a salmon bake and a canoe launch, the Daily Sitka Sentinel reported. The land is between the ferry terminal and Sitka Sound Cruise Terminal. Chris McGraw, who owns the terminal and manages Adventure Sitka, said development of the property will be an important part of handling an expected large number of tourists. Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. The key to over-tourism is good distribution of guests, McGraw said at Tuesday's Assembly meeting. Karl Potts, CEO of Shee Atika Inc., said the lease would generate $300,000 and $400,000 a year for the city. Assembly member Kevin Knox raised questions about staffing at the site, citing difficulties businesses are having this year with hiring staff. But he said he would vote yes because of an expected influx of passengers next year. We dont have a lot of options here, he said. Adventure Sitka and Shee Atika Inc. were the only respondents to a city request for proposals to buy or lease the property. Elements of the site plan will need approval by the local Planning Commission. WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealand says it was not able to get everybody it wanted out of Afghanistan in time before the deadly attacks near Kabuls airport brought its rescue mission to an end. In this image provided by the Department of Defense, two paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security while a C-130 Hercules takes off during a evacuation operation in Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (Department of Defense via AP) WELLINGTON, New Zealand New Zealand says it was not able to get everybody it wanted out of Afghanistan in time before the deadly attacks near Kabuls airport brought its rescue mission to an end. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Friday she is not yet sure how many people were left behind or whether they were New Zealand citizens, residents or visa holders. She said the New Zealand military had gone to great lengths to try and find people in recent days and had been able to fly several hundred people to safety. We went to extraordinary efforts to bring home as many as we could who were either New Zealanders or who had supported New Zealand. But the devastating thing is that we werent able to bring everyone, Ardern said. And now, we need to look to see what we can do for those who remain. Both Ardern and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison strongly condemned the attacks that took place Thursday. Morrison described them as evil and inhuman. ___ MORE ON AFGHANISTAN: Kabul airport attack kills 60 Afghans, 12 US troops Explainer: How dangerous is Afghanistans Islamic State? Was it worth it? A fallen Marine and a wars crushing end Biden left with difficult choices after deadly Kabul attacks Female Afghan robotics team hopes to work for country UK animal charity staff caught up in deadly Kabul blast Afghanistans top high school graduate fears for her future Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan ___ HERES WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING: TIRANA, Albania The Albanian government said that a first group of Afghans evacuated from their country arrived early Friday. A government spokesman confirmed the arrival without giving more details. A civilian airplane of the Egyptian Almasria Universal Airlines was seen landing at the Tirana international airport with men and women, children and old people leaving it. A government spokesman, speaking anonymously due to security reasons of the operation, said before the planes arrival that 171 Afghans were expected. The Afghans were first taken to military tents, where they had a rapid virus test, other medical and psychological assistance, registration before being moved to hotels. The government has said the Afghans may stay at least a year while proceeding with applications for special visas for final settlement in the U.S. FILE - In this Aug. 16, 2021, file photo, hundreds of people gather near a U.S. Air Force C-17 transport plane at the perimeter of the international airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. A school district in a San Diego suburb that is home to a large refugee population says many of its families who had taken summer trips to Afghanistan to see their relatives have gotten stuck there with the chaos following the withdrawal of U.S. troops. (AP Photo/Shekib Rahmani) Prime Minister Edi Rama has said that the tiny Western Balkan country may house up to 4,000 Afghans. Albania was among the first to offer temporary shelter to the Afghans leaving their country after all western military left and the Taliban took power. ___ SEOUL, South Korea South Korea says it strongly condemns the Kabul airport attack, saying terrorism cannot be justified for whatever reason. South Koreas Foreign Ministry said Friday it will join international efforts to root out terrorism and conveyed deep sympathy to those killed during the attack and their family members. South Korea had already evacuated 391 Afghans to Islamabad before Thursdays attack occurred. The ministry said 378 of them came to South Korea on Thursday and the other 13 are to arrive later Friday. They had worked for South Korean-run facilities in Afghanistan or were their family members. ___ WASHINGTON House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has ordered the flags at the U.S. Capitol to be flown at half-staff in honor of the U.S. service members and others killed in the attack in Afghanistan. The speakers office said she had ordered the flags lowered Thursday after the bombings outside the Kabul airport in Afghanistan. The toll of service members who died has risen rose to 13, according to Capt. Bill Urban, spokesman at Central Command. The latest number of injured is now 18, all of whom were in the process of being evacuated from Afghanistan on specially equipped C-17s with surgical units. At least 60 Afghans also died. ___ WASHINGTON -- President Joe Biden presided over a moment of silence for U.S. service members on Thursday following attacks at the Kabul airport that killed at least 60 Afghans and 12 Americans. Biden held his moment of silence for those in uniform during somber remarks at the White House. Suicide bombings and gunfire killed 11 Marines and one Navy medic attacks the U.S. is blaming on the local affiliate of the Islamic State. The American service members had been carrying out screenings at the gates of the airport, where thousands of Afghans have crowded in for nearly two weeks in hopes of an evacuation. These American service members who gave their lives its an overused word, but its totally appropriate here were heroes, Biden said. ___ WASHINGTON President Joe Biden says the U.S. servicemembers who were killed in attacks outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, were heroes. Addressing the nation from the White House, Biden says they were engaged in a dangerous, selfless mission to save the lives of others. At least a dozen U.S. servicemembers were killed in Thursdays attacks, along with scores of Afghans. Biden addressed those responsible for the attack, telling them, We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attacks. ___ FILE - In this Aug. 24, 2021, file photo, provided by the U.S. Marine Corps, families walk towards their flight during ongoing evacuations at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan. A school district in a San Diego suburb that is home to a large refugee population says many of its families who had taken summer trips to Afghanistan to see their relatives have gotten stuck there with the chaos following the withdrawal of U.S. troops. (Sgt. Samuel Ruiz/U.S. Marine Corps via AP, File) DUBAI, United Arab Emirates The Islamic State groups affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attack outside the Kabul airport. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport on Thursday, killing at least 60 Afghans and 12 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The IS branch, known as The Islamic State-Khorasan Province after a name for the region from antiquity, said in its claim of responsibility that it targeted American troops and their Afghan allies. The statement carried a photo of what the militant group said was the bomber who carried out the attack. The image shows the alleged attacker standing with the explosive belt in front of the black IS flag with a black cloth covering his face, only his eyes showing. The statement made no mention of a second suicide bomber or gunmen. The claim could not be independently verified. IS also said the bomber managed to get past Taliban security checkpoints to come within 5 meters (yards) of a gathering of U.S. soldiers, translators and collaborators before detonating his explosives. It said Taliban were also among the casualties. The extremist IS group has battled the Taliban, which it views as traitorous for agreeing to a peace deal with the United States. The statement also said the bomber got around U.S. security measures and that the camp that was targeted was where U.S. forces were gathering paperwork for those whove worked with the military. ___ WASHINGTON President Joe Biden is set to speak following the deadly explosions outside the airport in Kabul that killed 12 U.S. service members and scores of Afghans. The White House says Biden will address the nation from the White House at 5 p.m. on Thursday. Two suicide bombers and gunmen struck crowds of Afghans waiting in Kabul to flee life under the Taliban on departing flights. A U.S. operation airlifting American citizens and vulnerable Afghans to other countries is set to end Tuesday, a deadline set by Biden. The Islamic State groups affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for the attack. Biden has been under intense pressure to extend the evacuations beyond Tuesday, but repeatedly has cited the threat of attack for sticking to his deadline. ___ WASHINGTON The State Department says it is tracking roughly 1,000 American citizens who it believes may still be in Afghanistan, as evacuation efforts proceed despite deadly suicide attacks outside the Kabul airport. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had said Wednesday that some 1,500 U.S. citizens were still thought to be in the country but the department said Thursday that it confirmed about 500 of them had been evacuated. In the meantime, it said another 500 people claiming to be Americans wanting to leave had gotten in touch with the U.S. Embassy but that it expected the majority of them would turn out not to be U.S. citizens. Of the 1,000 Americans the department believes to be in Afghanistan, it said about 75% were making preparations to leave. ___ WASHINGTON The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation from Afghanistan says the United States will go after the perpetrators of the Kabul airport attacks if they can be found. Gen. Frank McKenzie said the attacks on Thursday were believed to have been carried out by fighters associated with the Islamic State groups Afghanistan affiliate. He said the attacks, which killed 12 U.S. service members, would not stop the United States from continuing its evacuation of Americans and others. McKenzie warned there are still extremely active security threats at the airport in the Afghan capital. We expect these attacks to continue, he said, adding that Taliban commanders have been asked to take additional security measures to prevent another suicide bombing on the airports perimeter. He said he sees no indication that the Taliban allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. In this image provided by the U.S. Army, paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security operations as they continue to help facilitate the evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on Wednesday, Aug 25, 2021. (Sgt. Jillian G. Hix/U.S. Army via AP) Also Thursday, Defense Secretary LLoyd Austin suggested the evacuation will go on and expressed his deepest condolences to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and wounded in Kabul today. Terrorists took their lives at the very moment these troops were trying to save the lives of others, he said. We mourn their loss. We will treat their wounds. And we will support their families in what will most assuredly be devastating grief. But we will not be dissuaded from the task at hand. To do anything less especially now would dishonor the purpose and sacrifice these men and women have rendered our country and the people of Afghanistan, the statement also said. ___ DUBAI Saudi Arabia says it strongly condemns the Kabul airport attack and reaffirms that such criminal acts contradict religious principles and human values. The kingdom said on Thursday that it extends its deepest condolences to all those killed and wounded. The Saudi Foreign Ministry statement added that Saudi Arabia stands with the people of Afghanistan at this time. Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron also condemned in the stronger terms the attacks at Kabul airport. Macron expressed in a statement France's condolences to the families of victims and praised the heroism of those on the ground who are carrying out the evacuation operations. Also later Thursday, Albanias foreign minister strongly condemned the attacks at the Kabul airport. In a tweet, Olta Xhacka condemned the horrific terrorist attack, adding that our hearts and our prayers go out to all those who lost their loved ones. Albania, a NATO member country since 2009 and aspiring to join the European Union soon, will be one of the transit hubs for the Afghans evacuated from their country. Prime Minister Edi Rama said the country could house up to 4,000 Afghans. The first group may arrive early Friday. We remain committed to guarantee the lives and security of all our Afghan allies, said Xhacka. ___ WASHINGTON U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was briefed by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in a phone call after the attacks in Kabul on Thursday that also killed at least 12 U.S. service members, including 11 Marines and one Navy medic. Pelosis office dismissed the House Republican leaderships calls to bring Congress back into session as empty stunts amid the extraordinary evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan. Right now, American heroes are risking & giving their lives to execute an extraordinarily dangerous evacuation, Pelosis spokesman Drew Hammill said on Twitter. Whats not going to help evacuate American citizens is more empty stunts & distraction. ___ WASHINGTON U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that those responsible for the attack in Kabul on Thursday will be sought and brought to justice. The New York Democrat said in a statement that he had just spoken to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin about the heinous attacks on U.S. personnel and the Afghan partners. I strongly condemn this act of terrorism and it must be clear to the world that the terrorists who perpetrated this will be sought and brought to justice, he said. Meanwhile, the U.S. House Republican leader called on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call the Congress back into session so lawmakers can consider legislation would prohibit the Aug. 31 withdrawal until all Americans are out of Afghanistan. Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California said, It is time for Congress to act quickly to save lives. A return to session before the deadline is highly unlikely. The Democrats aligned with President Joe Biden hold majority control and are not expected to consider such legislation to alter the withdrawal date. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, a C-17 Globemaster lll lands on the runway as evacuees from Afghanistan debark a C-17 Globemaster lll on Monday, Aug. 23, 2021, at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. (Airman 1st Class Kylie Barrow/U.S. Air Force via AP) Republicans have been highly critical of Bidens handling of the situation in Kabul. ___ BERLIN The German defense minister says her country has ended its evacuation mission in Afghanistan. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said the last of the German military aircraft and troops arrived in Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Thursday evening. She said that, in all, Germany evacuated 5,347 people from at least 45 nations, including more than 4,000 Afghans. Germany hadnt publicly specified ahead of time when exactly its flights would end but other European nations also have been wrapping up their evacuation efforts ahead of an Aug. 31 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops. Kramp-Karrenbauer said the last flights had been loading at the time of Thursdays attacks just outside the airport and the German commander then set in motion plans for an emergency departure. She added that the attacks we saw this afternoon have made clear that an extension of the operation in Kabul was not possible. The security situation on the ground, and also the Talibans decision not to tolerate an extension beyond Aug. 31, made it impossible. The minister said Germany offered a medevac plane that was overhead at the time to bring out wounded from other nations but according to my information, that wasnt the case so far. She said the plane, which flew on to Tashkent, will be provided if needed. ___ ISLAMABAD Pakistans prime minister say the international community should help the Afghan Taliban to restore peace after their takeover of Afghanistan. Imran Khan spoke at a gathering of his ruling party on Thursday; the speech was televised. The remarks are the most openly supportive by Khan of the Taliban since they swept into Kabul on Aug. 15 and practically took over the entire country. Khan says the Taliban are talking about peace and the world community should help them. He added that the Taliban have stated that they want to form an inclusive government, respect human rights and not allow anyone to use the Afghan soil to stage attacks. The prime minister a famous former cricket player who turned to politics and became a conservative Islamist said the Afghan people need peace. Khan's speech came shortly before twin suicide bombings and gunmen outside the Kabul airport killed at least 13 people and wounded 15 wounded. Several Marines were killed and a number of other American military were wounded. Pakistans foreign ministry said children were among those killed and added that Pakistan condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. ___ LONDON British Prime Minister Boris Johnson says the barbaric bomb attack at Kabul airport has caused many casualties, but that the U.K. evacuation operation in Afghanistan will continue for a bit longer. The U.S. says several Marines were among those killed when two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans outside the airport on Thursday. Johnson offered condolences to the U.S. and Afghanistan, saying Americans very sadly have lost their lives, and there were also many Afghan casualties. He said Britain would continue with the evacuation operation, though were now coming towards the end of it. He said that what this attack shows is the importance of continuing that work in as fast and as efficient manner as possible in the hours that remain to us. Johnson did not say when the British effort would end. U.S. forces are due to leave the airport by Aug. 31, and other countries missions will have to wrap up before then. Several countries have already announced the end of their airlifts. ___ In this image provided by the U.S. Army, a paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security during the evacuation of U.S. citizens, Special Immigrant Visa applicants, and other at-risk Afghans out of Afghanistan, at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (Sgt. Jillian G. Hix/U.S. Army via AP) TEHRAN, Iran Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said Afghanistan's neighbors should support the formation a broad-based government in Kabul. Raisi spoke on Thursday during a meeting with visiting Pakistani foreign minister to Tehran, saying other nations should only play the role of a facilitator for establishing a broad-based and inclusive government with presence of all people and groups. The remarks were posted on Raisi's website. He said Iran has hosted some 4 million Afghan refugees in the past four decades and it has supported the people of Afghanistan. The presence of Western nations in the region would not be conducive to its security, he alleged. Iran has seen the presence of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq as a threat on its doorstep. It has welcomed the U.S. evacuation even as it cautiously looks to the next moves by the Taliban. Unlike in 1998, when Iran came to the bring of war with the Taliban over the killings of several Iranian diplomats in Afghanistan after the Taliban came to power, Iranian state media have in recent weeks claimed that the Taliban have changed and pose no threat to Iran. Critics, however, warn that the Taliban will return to their anti-Iranian stance as soon as they shore up their full control of Afghanistan. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands The foreign minister of the Netherlands says the last Dutch diplomats and troops have flown out of Kabul as the international airlift winds down and that her thoughts are now with the people left stranded in the Afghan capital. Foreign Affairs Minister Sigrid Kaag said in a tweet on Thursday: Its terrible to have to leave Afghanistan this way after 20 years. She says her thoughts are with people left stranded in Afghanistan after the international flights out of the country end. Kaag also said the Netherlands and its allies remain committed to helping all those entitled to return or evacuate and to continue to support the Afghan people. The Netherlands has in recent days flown more than 20 flights out of Kabul to airports in the region. More than 1,700 people have been flown back to the Netherlands, including over 1,000 Afghans who worked with Dutch forces and diplomats. ___ TBILISI, Georgia The government of Georgia says about 2,000 people have been evacuated from Afghanistan to Tbilisi, the countrys capital. A government statement on Thursday said NATO cargo planes are making daily flights from Tbilisi to Kabul and that evacuations are also conducted by charter flights. The former Soviet republic is not a NATO member but in recent years has cooperated closely with the alliance. The statement said Georgia is cooperating with international institutions including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to evacuate their personnel from Afghanistan. ___ WASHINGTON Sen. Robert Menendez, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, in a statement called the situation unfolding in Kabul a full-fledged humanitarian crisis. He said that U.S. government personnel, already working under extreme circumstances, must secure the airport and complete the massive evacuation of Americans citizens and vulnerable Afghans desperately trying to leave the country. I understand that American personnel were among the casualties and my prayers are with the victims of this cowardly attack and their families, Menendez said. As we wait for more details to come in, one thing is clear: We cant trust the Taliban with Americans security. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands NATO chief has condemned the twin suicide bombings at the Kabul airport as a horrific terrorist attack that targeted desperate Afghans trying to leave the country and the alliances efforts to evacuate them from Afghanistan. People wait in a bus after disembarking from a Belgian chartered plane, as part of an evacuation from Afghanistan, upon arrival at Melsbroek Military Airport in Melsbroek, Belgium, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. (AP Photo/Olivier Matthys) Jens Stoltenberg said on Twitter after the explosions on Thursday: I strongly condemn the horrific terrorist attack outside #Kabul airport. My thoughts are with all those affected and their loved ones. Our priority remains to evacuate as many people to safety as quickly as possible. The bombings struck outside Kabuls airport, where large crowds of people trying to flee Afghanistan have massed, killing at least 13 people and wounding 15, according to Russian officials. Western nations had warned earlier in the day of a possible attack at the airport in the waning days of a massive airlift. ___ LONDON A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the explosion near the Kabul airport. Paul Pen Farthing said the group was outside the airport when the blast occurred on Thursday. Were fine but everything is chaos here at the moment, he told Britains Press Association news agency. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47. Weve been in the airport, and back out of the airport; the whole things a mess, he added. Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. They have been stuck outside Kabuls airport as they try to get a flight out. He spoke as reports emerged of two suicide bombings outside the airport that killed at least 13 people and wounded another 15. U.S. officials meanwhile have said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. ___ DUBLIN French President Emmanuel Macron said the situation has seriously deteriorated near the Kabul airport after several explosions happened in the last hours. Speaking in a news conference during a visit to Dublin, Ireland, Macron said we are facing an extremely tense situation that makes us coordinate obviously with our American allies and call for the utmost caution in a context we dont control. He added France will seek to protect and evacuate French nationals, people from allied countries and Afghans as long as the conditions will be met at the airport. Macron said he did not have more details about the circumstances of the explosions. The Russian Foreign Ministry has said there were two suicide bombings outside Kabul airport that killed at least 13 people on Thursday and wounded another 15. U.S. officials meanwhile have said that American personnel were wounded in the blast, without elaborating. ___ MOSCOW The Russian ambassador in Afghanistan says 360 Russian citizens have been flown home from Kabul. Ambassador Dmitry Zhirnov said in televised remarks Thursday that all those Russians who wanted to leave Afghanistan were taken home the previous day aboard four Russian Defense Ministry planes. He said that along with 360 Russians, the planes also evacuated 38 nationals of other ex-Soviet nations. Zhirnov said that the embassy was now trying to help a few Russians who were unable to leave for logistical reasons. He noted that about 100 Russians who remain in Afghanistan havent expressed a desire to leave. The Russian Foreign Ministry says the flights were organized with the assistance of the Taliban and the United States, which controls Afghanistans airspace. The ambassador said that Russian diplomats in Kabul are also working to help about 400 Afghan students who have enrolled Russian universities travel to Russia for studies. He said the embassy maintains close contacts with the Taliban. ___ In this image taken from video, people tend to a wounded person near the site of a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Two suicide bombers and gunmen have targeted crowds massing near the Kabul airport, in the waning days of a massive airlift that has drawn thousands of people seeking to flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. (Asvaka News Agency via AP) WASHINGTON The acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, says the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News on Thursday, he would not give details and did not say whether the threat remained. Wilson also said there remain safe ways for Americans to reach the airport for evacuation. He said there undoubtedly will be Afghans who had worked with or for the U.S. in Afghanistan who will not be able to get out before the U.S.-led evacuation ends. ___ TORONTO Canada has ended evacuations from Kabuls airport, a Canadian general said Thursday, as the clock ticks down on dramatic Western efforts to help people flee the Taliban takeover ahead of a full American withdrawal. General Wayne Eyre, the countrys acting chief of Defense Staff, said all the other countries have to leave the airport before the Americans can wrap up their mission. Canadian military flights evacuated about 3,700 people. We stayed in Afghanistan for as long as we could. We were amongst the last to cease evacuation operations. We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone who was so desperate to leave. That we could not is truly heartbreaking, but the circumstances on the ground rapidly deteriorated, Eyre said. U.S. President Joe Biden has said he is sticking to his Aug. 31 deadline for completing the U.S. pullout as the Taliban insisted he must, ramping up pressure on the already risky airlift from Kabul to get out as many people as possible in the coming days. Canada and European allies pressed for more time but lost the argument. Canada is one many countries taking part in the evacuation of people facing Taliban reprisals from Kabuls airport. Over 1,000 refugees are in Canada now. Canada has plans to resettle 20,000 Afghan refugees. ___ BERLIN Germanys defense minister says terror threats in Kabul have become significantly more concrete as the international evacuation effort from the airport in the Afghan capital is nearing its end. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said on Thursday that the effort is now in what is certainly the most hectic, dangerous and sensitive phase. We know that the terror threats have intensified massively and that they have become significantly more concrete. She said Germanys foreign ministry told people in Kabul overnight that they should not try to get to the airport on their own, in line with warnings by the U.S. and others. The German military was still flying between Kabul and Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Thursday. It wasnt immediately clear when exactly the German evacuation effort would end. Germanys top military commander, Gen. Eberhard Zorn, said that as of Thursday afternoon German flights had evacuated some 5,200 people from 45 nations, including about 4,200 Afghans. Zorn said two small German helicopters that were flown into Kabul a few days ago, intended to help get individuals to the airport, were flown out to Tashkent overnight. ___ WARSAW, Poland A deputy foreign minister in Poland said on Thursday that his country is looking for the family of 13-year-old Afghan boy, Fawad, who got separated from his parents in the crowd pressing on the Kabul airport. Fawad has been brought to safety in Poland but his parents' whereabouts were not immediately known. Marcin Przydacz said that Fawads parents could have been evacuated on another flight to a Western country, such as the United States or Britain, but have not yet been localized. The first appeal for help in finding Fawads family, with the boys photo was made on Twitter by Polands government official, Michal Dworczyk, on Tuesday. ___ President Joe Biden pauses as he speaks about the bombings at the Kabul airport that killed at least 12 U.S. service members, from the East Room of the White House, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci) LONDON Britains prime minster says the overwhelming majority of people eligible to come to Britain have been evacuated from Afghanistan, but time is running out on the airlift. Boris Johnson said about 15,000 people have left Kabul airport on Royal Air Force flights. He said that in the time we have left, which may be -- as Im sure everybody can appreciate -- quite short, well do everything we can to get everybody else. U.S. forces are due to leave the airport by Aug. 31, and other countries missions will have to wrap up before then. Visiting a military base in London where the British evacuation effort is being coordinated, Johnson said Britain hoped to continue evacuations after the end of the month, and urged the Taliban to facilitate it. Johnson said the safe passage for those who want to come out is the key precondition for development aid and access to international funding for Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. ___ BRUSSELS The European Union still has a skeleton staff in Kabul working to evacuate people as the end of airlifts from the chaotic airport looms. A number of European nations have said that they are ending their evacuation efforts ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. European Commission foreign affairs spokesman Peter Stano said Thursday that a small EU team will be on the ground as long as necessary in order to complete the evacuation operations. He declined to give more details, saying he didnt want to share more details because they are operating in an environment which is not exactly friendly. Stano says that more than 400 Afghans who worked for the EU in Afghanistan, along with their families, have already been evacuated. He adds that there are still some people who we need and want to get out but would not give more detail, citing operational reasons. Commission spokesman Eric Mamer says that the 400 Afghan EU workers and their families are in the process of being transferred to member states who offered places. He called discussions about their relocation a very intense process but adds that members of the 27-nation bloc are very clear that they are they are willing to help accommodate the EUs Afghan staff. ___ MOSCOW The Kremin says that Russia will closely follow the developments in Afghanistan before making a decision on whether to recognize the Talibans rule. Russian President Vladimir Putins spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Moscow will watch the Talibans future steps to ensure order and security of the countrys citizens and provide security for the Russian diplomats. Peskov emphasized that Russia wants to see peace and stability in Afghanistan and hopes that efforts will be taken to stem the flow of drugs coming from the country. Moscow, which fought a 10-year war in Afghanistan that ended with the Soviet troops withdrawal in 1989, has made a diplomatic comeback as a mediator over the past few years, reaching out to feuding Afghan factions including the Taliban even though the group was added to the Russian list of terrorist organizations in 2003. ___ BUCHAREST, Romania Romanias Supreme Council of National Defense says Romania will contribute a maximum of 200 troops to NATO missions to evacuate and relocate Afghan citizens. The NATO operation will, in principle, consist of taking Afghan citizens from temporary bases in Kuwait and Qatar and relocating them to temporary stationed bases on the territory of allied states, the supreme council said in a statement after a meeting Wednesday. Workers walk on the roof of the White House in Washington, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021, after lowering the flag for the U.S. service members and other victims killed in the terrorist attack in Kabul, Afghanistan. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh) The council said that Romanian troops would contribute for a maximum of six months and that operations would start in August. The security council also said that during the meeting it decided further steps would be taken to bring Afghan citizens, such as journalists, human rights activists, magistrates, and students to safety in Romania. It did not provide further details on how or when this would happen. Romanian authorities have earmarked a number of Afghans for evacuation to Romania, but none could make it safely to Kabul airport last week when Romania carried out three evacuation flights, officials said. The security council also said in the meeting that Afghanistans swift takeover by the Taliban may have security consequences for Romania, due to the dangers posed by extremism, terrorism, the export of instability in the region, drug and arms trafficking, (and) illegal migration. ___ LONDON A former Royal Marine who runs an animal charity in Afghanistan says he, his Afghan staff and dozens of dogs and cats are stuck outside Kabuls airport as they try to get a flight out of the country. Paul Pen Farthing appealed to the Taliban to allow the group safe passage into the airport. He tweeted to Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen that we have been here for 10 hours after being assured that we would have safe passage. Truly would like to go home now. Farthing has been pressing for days to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. Dominic Dyer, a British animal campaigner who is assisting Farthing, said a plane had been chartered and was due to leave the U.K. later Thursday for Kabul. Farthings supporters have clashed with Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, who refused to airlift the animals on a Royal Air Force plane. saying I have to prioritize people at the moment over pets. The U.K. defense ministry later said it would help Farthing, his group and the animals leave on the privately funded chartered jet. Armed Forces Minister James Heappey said Thursday that U.K. forces at the airport would facilitate the flight. He told ITV that the difficulty is getting Pen into the airfield. ___ HELSINKI Finland said Thursday it had evacuated 51 people from Kabul to the Nordic country, adding that its total number of evacuees has risen to close to 340 people. The Finnish Foreign Ministry wrote on Twitter that Finland too had assisted four people on their way to other countries Wednesday when the people were evacuated. Cooperation is power, the ministry wrote, adding that Finland in total had assisted 30 persons from our partner countries. ___ MILAN The Afghan director of a school for girls dedicated to an Italian newspaper correspondent killed in Afghanistan is trying desperately to gain access to the Kabul airport for evacuation, with anxiety growing as the end of flights nears. Shir Ahmad Mohammadi has sent messages to contacts in Italy as well as Italian officials in Kabul, saying that the Taliban are not allowing him and his family near the airport, Corriere della Sera reported on Thursday. Help me, I cant go on. The Taliban are not allowing us to pass. They are asking for U.S. documents that we dont have, Mohammadi wrote. He is the director of a school in Herat province named for Maria Grazia Cutuli, a Corriere correspondent killed in 2001. He traveled by bus with his wife and two daughters, finding himself in the capital controlled by the Taliban and with foreign troops by now closed off in the airport. I served female students in Afghanistan, giving them the chance to study in the name of your country. Now it is time that I think of my daughters, and try to get them to safety, he wrote. I have my two daughters with me, what should I do, I cannot leave them to be treated in this way. I have to take care of their security and their dignity. That is why I made this trip. A victim receives medical assistance in a hospital after he was wounded in the deadly attacks outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. (AP Photo/Khwaja Tawfiq Sediqi) He said his wife and daughters are under increasing strain. I dont know how long we can keep going in these conditions, Mohammadi wrote. ___ WARSAW, Poland Poland says the reason it has halted its evacuation flights was so that the United States could meet its Aug. 31 deadline to quit Kabul. That is the date when the last U.S. soldier is to leave Kabul airport, Deputy Foreign Minister Marcin Przydacz said Thursday, but to make that possible all others must leave first. Przydacz said that some countries have not yet evacuated all their citizens and associates and for this reason they were continuing their evacuation missions. Poland however has met its evacuation goals and ended its mission. Przydacz said that no matter how long the mission would have taken and how many people would have been evacuated, if a Polish diplomat or a soldier got hurt, the mission would not have been a success. Przydacz said it was a difficult decision to wrap up the evacuation but that today, with such high level of terrorist threat, amid the growing instability, we see no possibility of putting the lives of our people at risk any longer. They have really done an immense job. He mentioned the consuls at the spot, finding people in the crowd, diplomats in various countries securing instant permission for Polish planes to fly over their territory, and officials in Warsaw who worked round the clock to bring people to safety. Poland has evacuated some 1,300 people in 14 flights, through Uzbekistan. Some 200 of the evacuees were rescued at the request of other countries, and of the IMF. The last group arrived Thursday morning. Przydacz said that Poland will be ready to air lift more people if commercial flights from Afghanistan are restored. ___ ISTANBUL The first Turkish troops evacuated from Afghanistan arrived back in Turkey on Thursday. TV footage showed a Turkish Airlines flight carrying 345 soldiers land at Ankaras Esenboga Airport, having departed Kabul on Wednesday evening. Some 600 Turkish troops were based in Afghanistan. We aim to complete the transfer as soon as possible, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said in a statement. ___ COPENHAGEN, Denmark The foundation created by toymaker Lego and its parent company say they will donate 100 million kroner ($16 million) to support vulnerable children in Haiti and Afghanistan. The humanitarian crises that are happening in Haiti and Afghanistan are unimaginable and only intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic, said Thomas Kirk Kristiansen, chairman of the LEGO Foundation. Since May 2021, more than 500,000 people have been displaced in Afghanistan. As for Haiti, the Aug. 14 violent earthquake that was followed by a tropical storm has left half-a-million Haitian children with limited or no access to shelter, safe water, health care, and nutrition. With COVID-19 still (being) an imminent threat to the health and safety of Haitis population, the loss and damage associated with these most recent natural disasters only further compounds the dire situation so many children and families are experiencing, they said in a joint statement. Based in Denmark, the Lego Foundation and parent company KIRKBI A/S said that they had partnered up with, among others, two U.N. agencies -- UNICEF and UNHCR as well as Education Cannot Wait, a global fund to transform the delivery of education in emergencies. ___ DUBAI, United Arab Emirates Qatar says it has helped the evacuation of more than 40,000 people from Kabul airport. The small nation on the Arabian Peninsula says most will transit through Qatar after staying in temporary accommodations. Qatar says that the evacuation efforts will continue in the coming days in consultation with international partners. Qatar also hosts an office of the Taliban and was the site of negotiations between America, the toppled Afghan government and the insurgents. ___ NEW DELHI India says it has evacuated most of its nationals from Afghanistan and is doing everything to bring them back home. Indias External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told a meeting of political leaders on Thursday that India has operated six flights so far from Kabul after a stunning takeover by the Taliban. A few of them (Indians) are still there. He didnt give the exact number of Indians and Afghans evacuated so far from Kabul but the Indian media put their numbers around 800. He declined to say how India is going to deal with the Taliban government in Afghanistan. The situation in Afghanistan is yet to settle down. I will talk about it later, Jaishankar told reporters. New Delhi had stayed away from the Taliban except for back-channel contacts in recent months. It didnt recognize the Taliban government that ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001. ___ ISLAMABAD Pakistans prime minister has called on the international community to continue engagement with Afghanistan, saying it was a way forward to avert any humanitarian crisis and secure peace and stability. Imran Khan made his comment during a meeting with David Beasley, executive director of the United Nations World Food Program who met with him in Islamabad. Khan also called for the formation of an inclusive government to ensure peace and avoid an humanitarian crisis, after the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan. The latest development comes as dozens of Afghans continue to enter Pakistan via its land borders. But the number of Afghan people entering Pakistan through land routes has been steadily decreasing since earlier this week. ___ BUDAPEST, Hungary Hungary says its army has evacuated all Hungarian citizens from Afghanistan of which the defense ministry is aware. Defense Minister Tibor Benko told a press conference on Thursday that 540 people, among them 57 Afghan families including 180 children, had been evacuated to Hungary from Kabul. Of the Afghan citizens who assisted Hungarian forces in Afghanistan since 2003, the army has evacuated 87%, he said, adding that Hungarian, Afghan, Austrian and U.S. citizens were evacuated during the operation. All of the nearly 100 Hungarian soldiers that participated in the evacuation operation have returned to Hungary, Benko said. No injuries occurred during the evacuation operations, though there were Afghan citizens who sustained injuries prior to their evacuation, he said. Seven Hungarian soldiers were killed during military operations in Afghanistan since 2003, Benko said. ___ THE HAGUE, Netherlands The Dutch government says it is pulling its troops and diplomats out of the Kabul airport over the security situation. In a letter to parliament Thursday, the foreign and defense ministers say that the Netherlands has been told by the United States to leave today and will most likely carry out its last flight later today. They add that in light of the extremely quickly deteriorating situation in and around the airport, evacuees can no longer be assisted by the Netherlands to get access to the airport. ___ Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. LONDON The British, French and Danish militaries have given stark warnings about the security situation at the Kabul airport, where Afghan civilians are scrambling to evacuate ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for foreign troops to leave Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told the BBC on Thursday there was very, very credible reporting of an imminent attack at the airport. Other warnings emerged about a possible threat from Afghanistans Islamic State affiliate, which likely has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban freeing prisoners across the country. Heappey conceded that people are desperate to leave and there is an appetite by many in the queue to take their chances, but the reporting of this threat is very credible indeed and there is a real imminence to it. French Prime Minister Jean Castex told French radio RTL on Thursday that from tomorrow evening onwards, we are not able to evacuate people from the Kabul airport due to the Aug. 31 American withdrawal. Meanwhile, Danish defense minister Trine Bramsen bluntly warned: It is no longer safe to fly in or out of Kabul. Denmarks last flight, carrying 90 people plus soldiers and diplomats, already had left Kabul. Poland and Belgium have already ended their evacuations from Afghanistan. OTTAWA - Canada's military mission in Afghanistan ended Thursday, leaving an unknown number of Canadians and their families trapped just hours before suicide bombers staged a "complex attack" on crowds at the airport in Kabul, killing more than a dozen U.S. soldiers and nearly 100 local Afghans. OTTAWA - Canada's military mission in Afghanistan ended Thursday, leaving an unknown number of Canadians and their families trapped just hours before suicide bombers staged a "complex attack" on crowds at the airport in Kabul, killing more than a dozen U.S. soldiers and nearly 100 local Afghans. The withdrawal occurred as Canada and its military allies were bracing for imminent attack and to allow for the American-led mission to eventually meet its Aug. 31 deadline for departure. U.S. officials said 13 U.S. service members were killed in the attack, which began with a pair of blasts near a crowded entry gate, followed by gunmen opening fire on the crowd. At least 90 local Afghans all of them hoping to escape the country were also killed. Another 18 U.S. military members were injured. An unknown number of Canadian military personnel stayed behind to assist the American withdrawal, and all were "safe and accounted for" after the Thursday bombing, the Canadian Forces said on Twitter. Canada's departure, its fiery aftermath and the concerns about those left behind laid bare the raw emotional scars of the firmly severed connection in the long-suffering country. There, Canadian blood was spilled alongside that of western allies to help the Afghans build a prosperous country after the Taliban was routed in 2001. It's estimated more than 47,000 Afghan civilians, as well as over 66,000 members of the Afghan national military and police, also died in the war. "I'll just say from our perspective, warfare is always chaotic, and unpredictable. And hindsight is 20/20. Based on the information we had at the time, yes, we were surprised by the speed of the of the Taliban takeover of Kabul. And I'm sure there'll be much ink spilt about this," said Gen. Wayne Eyre, the acting chief of the defence staff. Eyre said Canadians were among the last to leave, that military personnel are taking the withdrawal personally and many will feel guilty that they had to leave people behind. He said Canada brought roughly 3,700 people out of Afghanistan, which fell to the Taliban earlier this month. Eyre said the airport was under constant threat of attack and Canada and its allies acted admirably. An hour after Eyre and other government officials finished their sobering media briefing, locals left behind could hear several explosions near Hamid Karzai International Airport, named after the man who became Afghanistan's first post-Taliban president two decades ago. "The conditions our armed forces members working under were unlike anything we've seen in decades, even during our previous mission in Afghanistan," Eyre said in the emotional briefing informed by his own service in Canada's military mission years ago. "They've witnessed horrific things. They've faced incredible dangers. And the feeling of helplessness and guilt that arises from having to leave people behind can be overwhelming." U.S. President Joe Biden struck an equally sombre tone Thursday as he led a moment of silence for those killed and vowed to pursue the perpetrators to the ends of the earth. "We will not forgive; we will not forget," a tight-lipped Biden said. "We will hunt you down and make you pay." Biden also promised to continue the evacuation mission, describing the operation as designed to function even under severe stress and attack. And he also defended his decision to pull out of Afghanistan in the first place, insisting the time was long overdue. "Our commanders on the ground ... made it clear that we can and must complete this mission, and we will. That's what I've ordered them to do," he said. A Canadian coalition forces member walks through an evacuation control checkpoint during ongoing evacuations at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Kabul, Afghanistan, in a Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021, handout photo from the U.S. Marine Corps. The acting chief of the defence staff says the Canadian mission in Kabul has ended and the vast majority of Canadian personnel left the airport about eight hours ago. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP-HO, U.S. Marine Corps, SSgt. Victor Mancilla, *MANDATORY CREDIT* "Terrorism has metastasized around the world; we have greater threats coming out of other countries a heck of a lot closer to the United States ... ladies and gentlemen, it was time to end a 20-year war." Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, said the military was still trying to quantify the impact of Thursday's attacks, which were punctuated by gunmen opening fire on civilians and armed troops. The evacuation effort is continuing despite the attacks, he added. "It would be difficult to overestimate the number of unusual challenges and competing demands our forces on the ground have faced," McKenzie said. The attacks were carried out by an Afghan chapter of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, a faction also known as ISIS-K. "The threat from ISIS is extremely real ... we saw it actually manifest itself here in the last few hours with an actual attack," he said. "We believe it is their desire to continue those attacks, and we expect those attacks to continue, and we're doing everything we can to be prepared for those attacks." Moments after the long-delayed Pentagon briefing ended Thursday, new reports of a third explosion began to filter out of Kabul, but were later attributed to operations to destroy military equipment being left behind. Eyre said about 1,000 Afghans bound for Canada were airlifted out of Kabul on Wednesday night, half on a C-17 and half by the Americans. The federal government is still trying to determine how many Canadians might still be left in Afghanistan. Cindy Termorshuizen, the assistant deputy minister at Global Affairs Canada in charge of consular, security and emergency management, said hundreds of Canadians and permanent residents and their families made it out of Kabul on Wednesday. She said there were large numbers of Canadians on flights out and her department was combing through the numbers and flight manifests to "gain a clearer picture" of how many might have been left behind. The government is aware of people who have ended up in third countries, and Canada's entire network of foreign embassies and high commissions is on alert to track them down, she said. "We recognize that today's announcement will be distressing news for those who are still in Afghanistan and wish to leave," said Termorshuizen. "For our fellow citizens still in Afghanistan, if you need to move to a safer location please do so with great caution. Use your judgment to decide the best time and the safest means to do so. Assess the risk carefully as you take the necessary steps to ensure your security and that of your family." Eyre said Canadian personnel will have to reflect on whether all the efforts expended in Afghanistan were worth it, but that Canadians made a difference in thousands of lives. The Writ The federal election occurs Sept. 20 and we have you covered. Get the latest campaign news, insights, analysis and commentary delivered weekly to your inbox with our free newsletter. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "We wish we could have stayed longer and rescued everyone who was so desperate to leave," said Eyre. "That we could not is truly heartbreaking. But the circumstances on the ground rapidly deteriorated. Now this is an extraordinary humanitarian crisis. But make no mistake: this is a crisis of the Taliban's making." Daniel Mills, assistant deputy minister with Canada's Immigration Department, said visa applications for Afghan citizens who applied for them are still being processed. Mills said the department received 8,000 applications under its special program for Afghans and 2,600 of those people who made it out of Afghanistan. But that doesn't mean the rest are still trapped inside the country, because some of those applicants have already fled to third countries. "I want to assure you that IRCC has been and continues to work tirelessly to process all applications under our special immigration measures," said Mills. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. QUEBEC - Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is promising a bump in federal aid to low-income seniors if re-elected, appealing to an age cohort most likely to cast a ballot with a pledge that could also help him in key Quebec races. Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau makes a campaign stop in Surrey, B.C., on Wednesday, Aug 25, 2021. Trudeau is in Quebec City this morning, where he is promising a re-elected Liberal government will hike the guaranteed income supplement by $500 for individuals and $750 for senior couples. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick QUEBEC - Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is promising a bump in federal aid to low-income seniors if re-elected, appealing to an age cohort most likely to cast a ballot with a pledge that could also help him in key Quebec races. Trudeau's pledge would see the guaranteed income supplement rise by $500 a year for individuals, and $750 for senior couples, reaching some 2.2 million seniors who receive the old-age benefit. The Liberals didn't detail how much the measure would cost. The first time the Liberals gave a bump in benefits to the country's poorest seniors, the measure was credited for lifting some 57,000 retirees out of poverty, although many of them moved barely above the poverty line. On Thursday, Trudeau argued that an extra $42 per month for individuals would make a material difference in their lives. "Unfortunately, we know that for many, many seniors, every dollar counts," Trudeau said. "That's been particularly clear during this pandemic where our seniors have been unbelievably vulnerable both to COVID itself, to the isolation they felt, but also with extra costs they've had to absorb." Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau speaks with a senior gardening at a campaign stop in Quebec City, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick The number of Canadian seniors has reached record levels, and their ranks are only expected to grow as more people retire and live longer in retirement a double-whammy for federal costs. As a result, spending on old age security and the low-income supplement is expected to rise from $62.5 billion this year to $81 billion in 2026, based on the projections in the spring budget. That budget also made good on a 2019 campaign promise to raise old age security payments by 10 per cent for seniors over the age of 75. It estimated that would provide an extra $766 in benefits to 3.3 million retirees, but that doesn't kick in until next year. In the meantime, the Liberals sent one-time payments of $500 to the country's oldest seniors to hold them over until next year, with the payments landing in bank accounts beginning the day after Trudeau started the election campaign. NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh criticized Trudeau's announcement, noting that benefits for low-income seniors had been cut if they received emergency benefits, which pushed up income used to calculate the value of seniors' benefits. "If Justin Trudeau wants to make life better for seniors, he should start today by reversing his cuts to income assistance for seniors," Singh said in a statement. Seniors are always a critical constituency in an election because they turn out to vote in higher numbers. In the 2019 election, 79 per cent of those between 65 and 74 voted, well above the overall turnout rate of 67 per cent as reported by Elections Canada. Their votes could be doubly important for the Liberals in Quebec with candidates in tight races, including with the Bloc Quebecois. That party supports boosting benefits for seniors, but Trudeau demurred when asked why he could not have proposed the measure in a minority Parliament. Jean-Yves Duclos is one of the Liberal ministers in a tight race with the Bloc, having barely won his riding of Quebec in 2015 and again in 2019. The former academic had studied the effects of federal policy on seniors' poverty rates, and his work was part of the decision by the Liberals to set the age of eligibility for old age security at 65, rather than 67 as the previous Conservative government proposed. But between Thursday's announcement for more money for seniors and billions for the province's publicly funded child-care system, Duclos was asked if the Liberals weren't just copying-and-pasting from the Bloc's playbook to wedge them in Quebec. "The Bloc Quebecois speak. We act," Duclos told reporters after the event. The Writ The federal election occurs Sept. 20 and we have you covered. Get the latest campaign news, insights, analysis and commentary delivered weekly to your inbox with our free newsletter. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "(Bloc Leader Yves-Francois) Blanchet has never been invited to the federal cabinet to defend the interests of Quebecers, so he can say whatever he wants. We're there to help people in Quebec." Trudeau made a stop in Trois-Rivieres later Thursday, speaking to a small group of supporters on an outdoor patio alongside his industry minister, Francois-Philippe Champagne, and the local candidate, Martin Francoeur, who found himself in the Conservatives' crosshairs. The Tories noted that last year Francouer had written a critical editorial about the WE Charity affair and questioning Trudeau's ethics. Speaking to reporters, Francouer suggested he had no concerns about that now following an ethics commissioner's review. "If I had any doubt about the integrity about either the leader of the party or any member, I would not have been candidate for the Liberal party," Francouer said. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 26, 2021. WHITEHORSE - Yukon will lift its civil state of emergency put in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic as it shifts to targeting specific outbreaks, Premier Sandy Silver said Wednesday. WHITEHORSE - Yukon will lift its civil state of emergency put in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic as it shifts to targeting specific outbreaks, Premier Sandy Silver said Wednesday. He said certain health measures, like mask-wearing and physical distancing, remain important preventive measures but will no longer be legally mandated as of midnight. Yukon Premier Sandy Silver arrives for a dinner meeting with former federal finance minister Bill Morneau and provincial and territorial finance ministers in Ottawa, Sunday, June 18, 2017. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand "It's time to minimize the impacts of broad, restrictive public health controls as we mitigate the risk of infection," he told a news conference. The territory has released a six-pillar plan to manage its response to the virus. They include increasing vaccination, continued testing and tracing to curb outbreaks, along with supports for vulnerable people. The territory is also leaving open the possibility of reintroducing some emergency measures if there is a surge in COVID-19 cases, similar to what was seen earlier in the summer, Silver added. Yukon saw a surge of cases largely tied to an outbreak in June, and has reported two cases of the Delta variant. Despite rising numbers of Delta variant cases across the country, and neighbouring British Columbia bringing back some health measures, Silver said he's confident the territory will be able to change its response quickly if it's necessary. "We are all in very different situations," he said. "We're comfortable in the alternative methods to manage the pandemic." Dr. Catherine Elliott, the territory's acting chief medical officer of health, said despite emergency measures being lifted, the territory will be able to handle the Delta variant. The Writ The federal election occurs Sept. 20 and we have you covered. Get the latest campaign news, insights, analysis and commentary delivered weekly to your inbox with our free newsletter. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "I am confident that we have the tools to respond to Delta when it becomes part of COVID transmission in Yukon," she said. Elliott added that it can be hard to compare health restrictions of different jurisdictions, as each has their own differences in pandemic approaches and methods for limiting the spread of the virus. The territory reported two new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, bringing the total number of active cases to 36. More than 80 per cent of eligible Yukon residents 12 years and older have been fully vaccinated. By Nick Wells in Vancouver This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 25, 2021. CLIMATE change, poverty, foreign aid and Indigenous reconciliation are a few of the issues people of faith are being asked to consider as they prepare to vote. CLIMATE change, poverty, foreign aid and Indigenous reconciliation are a few of the issues people of faith are being asked to consider as they prepare to vote. The issues, published in election guides from national faith-based organizations, are designed to help Canadians discuss topics of concern with candidates. The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, the advocacy arm of Jewish federations across Canada, is encouraging Jewish Canadians to ask candidates about how they will combat anti-Semitism and hate speech, protect places of worship and address Holocaust denial. Other issues they want to raise with candidates include improving foreign aid, supporting Israel, implementing the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and enhancing food security for low-income Canadians. (See their guide.) "Those are the issues that are important to the constituency we serve," said spokesman Martin Sampson. At Canadian Foodgrains Bank, the focus is on climate change and food security in the developing world. Noting the number of extreme weather events in the world has doubled during the past 30 years due to a changing climate, the organization points out small-scale farmers in developing countries are being hit the hardest. "Canada has made some progress in the area over the past few years, doubling its commitment to climate change finance," said James Kornelson, who manages public engagement at the foodgrains bank. "But now we need more attention on adaptation and building resiliency for people in the developing world, and to bolster local food systems." It also highlights that Canadas foreign aid is at a 50-year low, and notes the pandemic has dramatically increased global hunger. Uniquely, the foodgrains bank offers different questions for Liberal, Conservative and NDP candidates on issues such as climate change, effective foreign aid, support for small-scale farmers and pandemic recovery. Kornelsen realizes issues such as foreign aid and global hunger arent typically top of mind during election campaigns "but if we dont ask, politicians will think nobody cares about them," he said. (See their guide.) "Creating a Just Canada" is the theme of Citizens for Public Justices guide. Members of the national progressive organization are inspired by faith to act for social and environmental justice in public policy. The group invites its supporters to raise issues such as implementing a fair and progressive tax system that contributes to a more equitable distribution of wealth, Indigenous reconciliation, racism, refugees, climate change and the environment. "We want to communicate there are some underlying systemic problems that can be remedied if they would be addressed," said Natalie Appleyard, a socioeconomic policy analyst with the organization. "Things like climate change, poverty and Indigenous issues are all in a state of crisis, but there are viable solutions." The Writ The federal election occurs Sept. 20 and we have you covered. Get the latest campaign news, insights, analysis and commentary delivered weekly to your inbox with our free newsletter. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. The message she wants Canadians to send to politicians is "we can do better, we expect elected officials to do better." For the Mennonite Central Committee, the key issues are ensuring people in the developing world get access to COVID-19 vaccines, addressing the impact of climate change, improving foreign aid, supporting a just peace between Israel and Palestine and promoting reconciliation with Indigenous people. "We feel we are at a crossroads with this election," said Bekah Sears, a policy analyst with the organization. "The pandemic exacerbated so many things that Canadians may not have once been aware of, but they are now," she said. The committee feels "theres an opportunity to do something different in how we care for people to make sure they dont fall through the cracks. We just need to get our voices out there," she said. (See their guide.) faith@freepress.mb.ca Apparently, Shelly Glover didn't get the memo. The former Winnipeg police officer and former member of Parliament told the Free Press she will seek the soon-to-be-vacated leadership of the Progressive Conservative Party of Manitoba. A formal campaign launch is expected in the near future. Glover's candidacy is a disheartening turn of events for former health minister Heather Stefanson, who declared her interest in replacing Premier Brian Pallister a week before the rules for a leadership campaign were even drafted. With the support of two-thirds of the Tory caucus, Stefanson pushed the PC party executive council into adopting a timetable that was expressly designed to discourage anyone else from getting in the race. A politician with a reputation for plain talk and independent thought, Glover took Stefanson's attempt to engineer an acclamation as a personal challenge. "This is not the PC party I joined," Glover said. Does Glover stand any chance? She is well known as a politician who solicits her own donations and knocks on her own doors. The prevailing wisdom is that in a one-member, one-vote leadership battle, she will be able to muster the $25,000 and 1,000 new memberships required by Sept. 15 to qualify for the Oct. 30 convention. Former MP Shelly Glover says she is throwing her hat in the ring to run for leader of the provincial PC party. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Winnipeg Free Press) However, Glover has two other advantages that will make life difficult for the stampeding Stefanson campaign. First, she is likely to capitalize on a growing backlash against Stefanson's campaign tactics. Federal Conservatives, in particular, are furious Stefanson would force the party to hold a formal leadership race during the heat of a federal election campaign. "I am very discouraged and disheartened at the speed at which Heather has forced this race to occur," said Manitoba Conservative Sen. Don Plett, a pillar of conservative politics in Manitoba who has co-chaired federal and provincial Tory election campaigns. "To force the (Manitoba PC) party to have a leadership now in the middle of a bloody federal election is ridiculous. I think this is going to backfire on her big time." There is also backlash coming from party members outside the Perimeter Highway. Ken Waddell, publisher of the Neepawa Banner and a candidate in the 2006 leadership won by Hugh McFadyen, wrote an editorial in his paper this week that lamented this latest attempt by "the Winnipeg establishment" of the party to engineer an acclamation. "What the PC party needs is a race and they may still get one," Waddell wrote. "What they dont need is another acclamation. What they dont need is another weak-kneed race like the one in 2006. One where candidates are squeezed out by large deposits, short timelines and an aloof, if not hostile, mostly Winnipeg-based party establishment." Glover has another advantage beyond the opportunity to capitalize on an "anybody-but-Heather" sentiment: she doesn't have to defend the Pallister government's record. In trying to forge her own profile as a leader, Stefanson has already wobbled under the weight of Pallister's baggage. Shelly Glover is a former federal minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages. (Sean Kilpatrick / The Canadian Press files) She quickly perhaps prematurely declared Bill 64 dead. It wasn't a very risky move; the entire Tory caucus was upset about Pallister's insistence on revamping public school governance and eliminating local school division input. But beyond Bill 64, Stefanson has seemed unwilling to admit the Pallister government had any shortcomings. That extends to the disastrous pandemic response, which Stefanson has so far defended with long-standing government talking points, and the austerity that has strangled the health-care and public education systems. Glover is not burdened by having to defend what is objectively indefensible. In fact, last February, Glover lashed out at the Pallister government for not properly funding personal care homes to avoid chronic understaffing that was stretching nurses and health-care aides to the breaking point. "I am so mad at Pallister," said Glover, who has been working as an aide in a southern Manitoba personal care home. "Where is the money that should have gone into personal care homes? They were the targets of this stupid virus. We knew this for months for a year, we've known this. Why are there no staffing increases?" 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. The Free Press sought an interview with then-health minister Stefanson about those comments. Not surprisingly, given her now legendary hermit-like performance while in the health portfolio, Stefanson declined. It should be noted that Glover has her own challenges to overcome. Her previous political experience was as a minister in former prime minister Stephen Harper's government. Although she never did or said anything to suggest she disagreed with Harper's form of conservatism, we really don't know where Glover, unshackled from another leader's agenda, might wander in terms of policy. As is the case with Stefanson, we also have no way of knowing if Glover has what it takes to be a leader. Many a promising front-bench minister has discovered, to their shock and dismay, that political leadership is a much different job that requires a whole different skill set. But for now, Glover's value to the party and perhaps a future government of Manitoba is that she is willing to become the second candidate in a race that has been made-to-order by and for a single candidate. dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca After fleeing his second house fire in just six months, a Winnipeg man is urging political parties to provide more affordable housing. After fleeing his second house fire in just six months, a Winnipeg man is urging political parties to provide more affordable housing. "Our system is failing us," said Mark Olfert, whose was evacuated last week from the Main Street hotel hes lived since February, when his Langside Street rooming house caught fire. Activists, agencies look for government help as they struggle with Winnipeg's critical shortage of affordable housing Click to Expand RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Mark Olfert has experienced the difficulty of finding suitable housing multiple times in the last couple of years. Hes slept on friends couches, lived in a rooming house and now has a North Main Street apartment. Posted: 7:00 PM Aug. 13, 2021 The two-bedroom flat just north of the Main Street railway underpass costs Mark Olfert $575 a month. Theres no charge for the constant wail of emergency-vehicle sirens. Its slightly cheaper than the $625 he paid a month to live alongside drug dealers at a Langside Street rooming house. He lived there for two stressful years until a fire ripped through the building last February, destroying almost all of his possessions. One of his three cats went missing in the aftermath. Read Full Story Olfert appeared in a Free Press article on Aug. 14 about the shortfalls of the national housing strategy in Winnipeg, where few can find safe living arrangements at a monthly cost of less than $800. The article examined how the Trudeau governments promise to bring Ottawa back into the affordable-housing market doesnt match the rate of federal support that existed up until the 1990s. It also looked at how the Pallister government in Manitoba has diverted federal funds intended for creating new public-housing units into covering the cost of repairs instead. Three days after the article, Olfert woke up to the knock of firefighters and a blaring fire alarm. An adjacent apartment building at 802 Main St. had caught fire, risking the whole block going up in flames. Olfert, 58, used his cane to make it down the stairs. The Humane Society took his cats for temporary safe-keeping. The Red Cross put him up in a hotel for three nights with a $52 daily stipend, and hes been sleeping at a friends Norwood house this week. "It was like deja vu, happening all over again," Olfert said Wednesday. Hes among thousands of Winnipeggers whom social-service groups say are falling through the social safety net. JOHN WOODS / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS "Our system is failing us," said Mark Olfert, whose was evacuated last week from the Main Street hotel hes lived since February, when his Langside Street rooming house caught fire. Olfert had lived and worked in St. Vital for 12 years, until his landlord renovated his apartment building enough to increase the monthly rent from roughly $650 to $800, just as an injury left him on assistance. He spent two years in an unsafe rooming house on Langside Street until it caught fire this February, leaving him sleeping at friends places and relying on donations from his Mennonite church until he moved into his current two-bedroom flat, just north of the Main Street railway underpass. "I wouldn't be surprised if I get PTSD from this, because I am just so scared right now," he said. "We need decent housing, and no slum landlords." Olfert is an avid newswatcher, and has been distraught at what federal parties have been putting forward to help with affordable housing. "We need decent housing, and no slum landlords." Mark Olfert On Tuesday, the Liberals unveiled a suite of measures targeted at homebuyers. For affordable housing, the party has pledged to build 100,000 new units, and expand renter subsidies. The Conservative platform similarly focuses on homebuyers, calling for various grants and tax breaks to encourage the building of more housing in general. It also promises to explore "converting unneeded office space to housing." The NDP have numerous pledges on affordable housing, meant to fast-track the Liberals housing strategy and have Ottawa build 500,000 affordable housing units, half of them within five years. Olfert is critical of the Trudeau government, whose housing strategy has only created 63,000 new homes since late 2017, according to the Parliamentary Budget Officer. "They always say things on a campaign but do they deliver on their promises? No," Olfert said. "They need to get a better grip on this." JOHN WOODS / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Olfert is critical of the Trudeau government, whose housing strategy has only created 63,000 new homes since late 2017, according to the Parliamentary Budget Officer. Olfert counts himself lucky. Firefighters held back the blaze, and his Main Street hotel is structurally sound. The area feels dangerous, but its the only place he can find for a monthly rent of $575. He wants Canadians to think about the strength of the safety net, and how easy it is for people lose their housing, and their dignity. "If there was a high school reunion right now, I would be embarrassed to go, because of what happened to me," he says, his voice rising in anger. "People would probably look down at me and say, 'He's just a failure." dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca Winnipeg lawyer Jay Prober is up against two counts of professional misconduct for comments he made to the media last year as he defended fallen fashion magnate Peter Nygard. Winnipeg lawyer Jay Prober is up against two counts of professional misconduct for comments he made to the media last year as he defended fallen fashion magnate Peter Nygard. "In contrast with how disappointing the pursuit of justice against (Peter) Nygard has been, this has been a small and sweet victory," said former Winnipegger KC Allan, whose complaint to the Law Society of Manitoba prompted the charges. WAYNE GLOWACKI / FREE PRESS FILES Jay Prober made comments to both the Free Press and CBC alleging several women who had accused Nygard of sexually assaulting them were trying to cash in on the sexual assault claims. Allan, 58, filed a complaint last year after Prober made comments to both the Free Press and CBC alleging several women who had accused Nygard of sexually assaulting them were trying to cash in on the sexual assault claims. Nygard, 80, has been held in Headingley Correctional Centre since his arrest last December and is awaiting possible extradition to the U.S. to face sex trafficking and racketeering charges that date back decades. According to law society correspondence shared with the Free Press, one of the charges against Prober is for failing to be courteous and civil and act in good faith, while the second is for making public statements that may prejudice a partys right to a fair trial. "Prober is part of the system that reoffends against victims," Allan said. "If we can at least make it a more civilized process by which women come forward, that will be a victory." Allan, who lives in the U.S., has accused Nygard of raping her in 1979, when she was 17, after the two met at an Exchange District nightclub. Allan filed a complaint with Winnipeg police in June 2020. Prober, under threat of a defamation lawsuit, penned a letter of apology saying he wasnt aware of Allan when in February 2020 he was quoted in the Free Press as saying, "A lot of people see dollar signs and they are jumping on the bandwagon." In another Free Press interview the following April, Prober said: "And, as I predicted before, more women are jumping on what they perceived to be the money train, the gravy train. They see this as a cash cow." Prober made similar comments to the CBC. Prober declined to comment about the misconduct charges to the Free Press. "As the matter is pending, I have decided it would not be politic to make any comments at this stage, even though I would like to," he said Thursday. Winnipeg police confirmed officers had completed an investigation into sexual assault allegations against Nygard and had forwarded their findings to the Manitoba Prosecution Service. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "Id like to celebrate the moment, but its a bittersweet victory, because I am still waiting to hear if the charges I made against (Nygard) are going to be pursued," Allan said. "Its a 40-year-old crime, so I dont have a lot of confidence that they will be pursuing it." Nygards extradition hearing is set to begin Nov. 15. The U.S indictment against Nygard alleges that from 1995 to 2020, Nygard alongside his business associates and co-conspirators engaged in a "pattern of criminal conduct involving at least dozens of victims in the United States, the Bahamas and Canada." Nygard is accused of raping and sex trafficking young girls, often targeting individuals from "disadvantaged backgrounds" with a "history of abuse," and keeping them quiet via "threats, false promises of modelling opportunities" and "other coercive means." Nygard has twice been denied bail, with the courts ruling his bail plan did not address concerns he might tamper with witnesses if released. dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca The Manitoba legislature is set to enact a vaccine requirement, a decision warmly received by constituents of one unvaccinated MLA. Yet the Pallister government refused Wednesday to explain how the policy will work. The Manitoba legislature is set to enact a vaccine requirement, a decision warmly received by constituents of one unvaccinated MLA. Yet the Pallister government refused Wednesday to explain how the policy will work. "At this time no interviews will be conducted, as more detailed work is underway on the public health order and on the policies to support it," wrote a Progressive Conservative caucus spokeswoman. She declined to say how officials will verify MLAs have been vaccinated, or how often tests will be taken if they remain unvaccinated, and who would pay for those tests. "Government will share more details in the weeks ahead." On Tuesday, Premier Brian Pallister wrote to the NDP and Liberal house leaders, asking for their consent to require MLAs to get COVID-19 shots or be tested regularly in order for them to sit in the legislature this fall. He said it was only fair to expand new measures for front-line public servants to include MLAs. Both parties say theyll support such a measure. "I'm surprised it came this late because politicians, just by nature of our jobs, are very likely to catch COVID," Liberal Leader Dougald Lamont said Wednesday. "If you're going to be out there shaking hands and kissing babies, so to speak, you should be double-vaccinated and given enough time for that vaccination to take hold." The NDP confirmed its support in a Tuesday letter, calling on the premier to ensure all MLAs, including PC leadership candidate Heather Stefanson, support such a move. Stefanson told media Aug. 18 that shed prefer to persuade MLAs instead of requiring them to get shots. Her campaign didnt respond to an interview request Wednesday. The PC party disclosed in mid-July that two of its MLAs had not received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine. The Free Press surveyed all MLAs and learned all had been fully vaccinated except for Infrastructure Minister Ron Schuler and MLA Janice Morley-Lecomte, both of whom have described vaccination status as a personal matter. Neither would give an interview Wednesday. Yet constituents in Morley-Lecomtes riding of Seine River generally supported the new policy for the legislature. "I think its a fair ask," said Randy Waylett, a Barlow Crescent resident in St. Vital. "I would expect all our officials in higher positions to be following these rules." Waylett said he supports Morley-Lecomtes right to choose, but he said its a reasonable compromise to ask her to submit to regular testing. However, he wishes shed live up to the standard her party is asking of Manitobans. "Theyre trying to set a precedent, try to encourage people to be vaccinated, and I really think that those people need to set an example," he said. "Otherwise people are just going to use that as an excuse 'Because shes not vaccinated, I dont have to.'" Most of the roughly 10 constituents who spoke to the Free Press also supported the policy and wanted their MLA to get vaccinated. However, one woman who would only identify herself as Jazmine stood solidly against asking Morley-Lecomte to get vaccinated. 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. Jazmine was skeptical of long-term safety, and noted vaccine incentives as a reason to think they may be dangerous. Thats despite overwhelming evidence that the approved vaccines are safe and that the risk of long-lasting health problems from COVID-19 far outweigh the risk of side effects from vaccines. Still, Jazmine did not oppose the premiers methods entirely. "If she dont take the vaccine, thats fine," said the Alderbrook Road resident. "But doing the test, thats OK. I will choose doing the test over taking the vaccine right now, because to me thats the safest." dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca cody.sellar@freepress.mb.ca Whats happening today Jagmeet Singh at a news conference in Windsor, Ont., on Wednesday. (Paul Chiasson / The Canadian Press) Singh stops here: Singhs first campaign announcement, about housing, is in the North End later this morning. He will be joined by First Nations leaders at the second announcement, which is happening at Oodena Circle at The Forks this afternoon. Singh is scheduled to greet supporters in Kenora, Ont., late this afternoon. Read More Last flight leaving: The Canadian military will end its mission at Kabuls airport today. Canada is using two C-17 transport planes to airlift Afghans to safety and is one of 13 countries taking part in the airlift. The Canadian Press reports. Read More Warning about airport attack: Several countries are urging Afghans to avoid Kabuls airport amid warnings of a possible terrorist attack. Read More Weather Your forecast: A mix of sun and cloud with a high of 20 C and peak winds from the east at 15 km/h later today. In case you missed it The Craig Block is for sale. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Winnipeg Free Press) Buildings link to Black history: A building on Main Street that was once the offices of North Americas first Black labour union is for sale without historical status protection. Cody Sellar reports. Read More Align our efforts: Mayor Brian Bowmans office said he expects the city will review a provincial policy requiring front-line workers to be immunized against COVID-19 and "undertake to align with the province where feasible." Joyanne Pursaga reports. Read More It is horrible: Reporter Kevin Rollason spoke with another person who couldnt visit a loved one at St. Boniface Hospital because an unvaccinated patient was in their room. Read More On this date On Aug. 26, 1947: The Winnipeg Free Press reported that a U.S. army tech, his wife and their dog were rescued from a swampy bush region 192 miles north of Winnipeg where they had been forced to land during a storm while en route to Churchill. The couple was found and rescued by Canadian Army paratroopers in co-ordination with the RCAF. In Winnipeg, a 14-month-old boy died while his parents were inspecting their new house when he grabbed a stove wire and was electrocuted. Today's front page Get the full story: Read today's e-edition of the Winnipeg Free Press Read More IMMEDIATE concerns over Afghan evacuations aside, Canadas political parties and their leaders seem so far strangely content to have foreign-policy issues fade into the background of this federal election, even as both the plight of Afghanistan and the pandemic clearly illustrate the deep, interconnected nature of risks countries and their citizens face in a globalized world. Opinion IMMEDIATE concerns over Afghan evacuations aside, Canadas political parties and their leaders seem so far strangely content to have foreign-policy issues fade into the background of this federal election, even as both the plight of Afghanistan and the pandemic clearly illustrate the deep, interconnected nature of risks countries and their citizens face in a globalized world. This, too, while the very integrity of Canadian institutions and democratic systems is being actively undermined by rival nations. Canadas spy agency, CSIS, warned in July that foreign state actors, widely understood to be China and Russia, will likely attempt to alter future election outcomes to their advantage via voter blackmail, bribery and intimidation, as well as strategic political donations and online disinformation campaigns. Canadians have for years had a front-row seat to the hardened tribalism unfolding in America as it diverges into not only distinct political blocs but also alternate realities. Its hubris to think that a similar fraying of social cohesion and distrust of liberal democracy couldnt be sown more widely in Canada by motivated geopolitical competitors. Such efforts are indeed already happening. When it comes to Russia, Vladimir Putins nuclear-armed mafia state is incapable of competing economically on the global stage. Instead, it succeeds by deftly feeding disorder by subverting elections, arming and propping up rebel groups and rogue-state regimes, feinting military operations only to pull back later, and harbouring criminal gangs that continue to launch devastating cyber- and ransomware attacks daily including against Canadian targets. How do Canadas political parties propose to mitigate mounting cyberthreats to Canadian businesses and critical infrastructure, while also asserting Canadian interests in the Arctic? Meanwhile, Afghanistan the site of Canadas longest, most expensive modern military deployment has fallen back under Taliban control after two decades of foreign intervention. Extremist groups everywhere have been emboldened by the wests humiliating exit, and Afghanistan may become a new terrorist haven used for training militants, broadcasting propaganda and planning international attacks. The unfolding humanitarian and refugee crises that began with the Talibans lightning sweep back into power will also only get worse, with regional and global reverberations to be felt for years. What lessons Canada can learn from all of this? The U.S.-led global war on terror has collectively cost western nations more than US$ 6.4 trillion, caused more than 800,000 deaths and displaced 37 million people. There are clearly more effective military, diplomatic, financial and humanitarian levers that can be used to help foster security and advance national interests while protecting human rights in fragile regions and active conflict zones. But will voters hear about them? Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Ottawa has for several decades steadily reduced Canadas contributions to global peacekeeping efforts and international assistance, instead relying on sanctions in concert with its allies as Canadas go-to means to promote freedoms, development and human rights. But evidenced by the durability of autocratic regimes in Iran, North Korea, Myanmar, Syria, Venezuela and recently Belarus, sanctions these days appear to amount to little more than cost-free virtue-signalling by the global north. Are there better ways to support civil society and achieve policy change in oppressive states? Canadas liberal causes elsewhere are also damaged by how Ottawa profits from weapons and military goods sales to authoritarian states such as Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Canadian military exports last year totalled nearly $2 billion, following a record high of $3.75 billion in 2019 the realpolitik of maintaining economic benefits often circumventing arms-control measures. More obvious issues for Canadian foreign policy include how to handle deteriorating relations with China, Americas bipartisan turn inward, crumbling treaties around nuclear weapons, the worldwide assault on civil rights and media freedoms, and how to marshal co-ordinated global action on climate change. Justin Trudeaus Liberals have generally preferred platitudes over action when dealing with global affairs. The election platforms of both the Conservatives and NDP contain many new, interesting ideas for Canadian defence and foreign policy that could help further distinguish their parties in the minds of voters yet both appear oddly reluctant to campaign on any of them. Hopefully, that will change. Now more than ever, voters deserve to know more about how those vying to lead Canadas next government will defend the countrys security, interests and reputation abroad. Kyle Hiebert is a Winnipeg-based researcher and analyst, and former deputy editor of the Africa Conflict Monitor. THE adage used to be that if a woman was running for political-party leadership, it usually meant the party was in need of CPR. Some might think this is the case for the Manitoba Progressive Conservatives after all, it has not one, but two women running. Opinion THE adage used to be that if a woman was running for political-party leadership, it usually meant the party was in need of CPR. Some might think this is the case for the Manitoba Progressive Conservatives after all, it has not one, but two women running. Former MP Shelly Glover told the Free Press on Tuesday she intends to run against Tuxedo MLA Heather Stefanson. Glover represented the riding of Saint Boniface from 2008 until 2015; she did not stand for re-election in 2015. Stefanson announced last week she is running, endorsed by 24 of her 35 caucus colleagues. On Tuesday, maverick Riel MLA Rochelle Squires ended speculation by announcing she will not run, and will focus instead on her commitment to her cabinet responsibilities. Meanwhile, Winnipeg City Coun. Scott Gillingham (St. James) is still weighing his options. Should Stefanson or Glover win, she will become Manitobas first female premier. Sharon Carstairs was Manitobas (and Canadas) first female leader of the opposition when she took the helm of the provinces broken Liberals back in 1988. The NDP under Howard Pawley had been reduced to third-party status as Gary Filmons PCs won a minority; Carstairs had rebuilt the Liberals, and they took 20 of 57 seats, owing largely to support from disenchanted NDP voters. So much has changed for women in politics since Carstairs. Thankfully. Whichever candidate is successful in the PC Party race will have two years left before the next election. According to political scientist and researcher Linda Trimble, "Thats a lot of time left to make headway take a look at Kathleen Wynne, for example." The former Ontario premier, the first female to hold the office in that province, took over the helm in 2013 from Dalton McGuinty, whose Liberal minority government was mired in poor ratings and scandal. Wynne ended up leading the party to a decisive majority in 2014. Trimble says the Conservative Party has been quite positive for women leaders overall. "For example, Kathy Dunderdale was the first female premier of Newfoundland and Labrador. And of course, our first and, so far, only female prime minister was a Conservative: Kim Campbell." Other notable firsts? Canadas first female premier was B.C.s Rita Johnston, who inherited Social Credit leader Bill Vander Zalms scandal-plagued government in 1991 and was defeated in 1992. Yukons Pat Duncan, a Liberal, became the first woman to defeat a sitting premier in 2000. However, after some of her MLAs defected to the opposition, she was reduced to a minority government and called a snap election. Both Johnston and Duncan show that for women, its not always a direct trajectory to success. So far, the only female politician to win back-to-back victories is Christy Clark, the B.C. Liberal premier from 2011 to 2017. At one point, Clark was premier in B.C., Alison Redford was the Conservative premier in Alberta, Wynne held office in Ontario, Pauline Marois was the Parti Quebecois premier of Quebec, Eva Aariak was the premier in Nunavut and Dunderdale was chief in Newfoundland and Labrador. Its the only time in Canadian history women simultaneously led governments in six regions which, at the time, represented about 88 per cent of Canadas population. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. None of those women holds power now. At present, Caroline Cochrane is the lone female first minister, representing the Northwest Territories. However, Trimble makes it clear that women can no longer be viewed as only a second choice in politics. "We come too far, and too much has changed for us to see it that way," she says. "Its exciting to see this happening in Manitoba. This is a chance for Stefanson and Glover to change the party over the next two years. It will be fascinating." Earlier this week, the details regarding the leadership race were released. It will cost leadership contestants $25,000 to enter the race and by Sept. 15 they must have signed up at least 1,000 party members. The new leader and premier will be chosen through a one-member/one-vote process; there will not be any delegates to determine the result. Voting will be conducted by mail, and the ballots will be counted in Winnipeg on Oct. 30. Shannon Sampert is a Winnipeg-based political scientist and the former politics and perspectives editor of the Winnipeg Free Press. shannon@mediadiva.ca Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh hopes to appeal to Winnipeggers who can't find affordable housing. Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh hopes to appeal to Winnipeggers who can't find affordable housing. "We want to get big money out of housing," Singh said Thursday during his first Manitoba stop of the federal campaign. Singh spoke at Sinclair Park, which in the Winnipeg North riding that the NDP wants to take from Liberal incumbent Kevin Lamoureux, who has held it since 2010. The NDP pointed to a report from the parliamentary budget officer that found the Liberal government's national housing strategy has created only 63,000 new homes since late 2017. In Manitoba, thats amounted to just 143 new affordable-housing units as of February. At his Sinclair Park stop, Singh highlighted the case of a Metis couple who has struggled to buy a house for three years. Their landlord has jacked up the rent and they have encountered bidding wars that drive up the cost of homes. "Its made looking for a place dreadful," said Gabriel Pelletier. "The selling point of affordable housing in Winnipeg isnt a reality anymore, and honestly, it breaks my heart thinking about having to leave Winnipeg." Winnipeg North NDP candidate Melissa Chung-Mowat said the Liberals have done things to fight poverty such as increasing baby-bonus payments, but she argued they could have done more, and that nothing has changed locally. "Over the last 10 years, we can't point to a single thing that has improved in Winnipeg North because of having a federal Liberal MP," Chung-Mowat said. MIKAELA MACKENZIE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Jagmeet Singh makes a housing announcement along with NDP politicians and supporters while campaigning in Winnipeg on Thursday. "We can't just ride on the coattails of the work that's done federally. What has specifically happened to improve the living conditions here in Winnipeg North?" she asked. The Liberals contend their efforts to reduce poverty have had a tangible effect across Canada and particularly in Winnipeg, and that long-term education initiatives will also raise living standards. Thursday afternoon, Singh was joined at The Forks by two of Manitoba's three grand chiefs, although they insisted both the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs and Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak are non-partisan. The chiefs were receptive to the NDPs pledge to guarantee funding to revamp the child-welfare system. The Liberals passed legislation to restore Indigenous authority over foster care, which was praised as historic, but the government was criticized for not having permanent funding. "It's one thing to give jurisdiction but systems also need proper funding," said Winnipeg Centre incumbent NDP MP Leah Gazan. She noted the Liberals still havent fulfilled their promise to comply with a federal tribunal order to compensate families who were discriminated against through child-welfare underfunding. "We will continue to push those issues until we see the justice that all kids deserve." The Writ The federal election occurs Sept. 20 and we have you covered. Get the latest campaign news, insights, analysis and commentary delivered weekly to your inbox with our free newsletter. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Meanwhile, Singh was circumspect when asked whether Ottawa should keep flags at half-mast, a move Trudeau took three months ago after unmarked residential school burial sites were found. Conservative Leader Erin OToole said Thursday that Canada "should be proud to put our flag back up" on federal buildings. Singh refused to weigh in on the issue, instead saying actions are more important than symbolic gestures. Polls have the NDP riding high, with voters attracted to Singhs charisma and turned off by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's decision to call an election. The New Democrats are hoping to take Winnipeg North and hold onto their three seats in the province: Winnipeg Centre, Elmwood-Transcona and the northern Churchill-Keewatinook Aski riding. dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca OTTAWA - Out of more than 350,000 comments sent to incumbent candidates on Twitter during the first week of the federal election campaign, more than a quarter were considered toxic, according to a new project from a non-partisan research group. Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau talks with reporters in from Hamilton, Ont., on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick OTTAWA - Out of more than 350,000 comments sent to incumbent candidates on Twitter during the first week of the federal election campaign, more than a quarter were considered toxic, according to a new project from a non-partisan research group. Sabreena Delhon, executive director at the Samara Centre for Democracy, said the research, which looked only at Twitter, found 20 per cent of the tweets were on the low or middle end of a "toxicity scale," containing insults, sexist language or rude comments. She said a further seven per cent of the tweets were "severely toxic," including hateful, aggressive comments or threats of violence against candidates or their families. "If you're on the receiving end of these messages, they are insidious. They are relentless. They are coming at a rate of dozens, hundreds or even thousands a day," she said. The results of the project so far, which will run throughout the campaign, has found the Liberals are most often on the receiving end of toxic tweets, followed by the Conservatives, the Greens, the Bloc Quebecois and then the New Democrats. More information about those numbers are currently unavailable, but the first detailed report is due later this week. Delhon said the research found that women seeking re-election as Liberals faced the most toxicity during the period studied and were over five times more likely to receive toxic tweets than men running as candidates for the same party. The research found Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is the most targeted party leader with nearly 19,000 tweets aimed at him considered "toxic." Numbers for other party leaders were unavailable. A spokesperson for Twitter Canada said in a statement the company takes action when it identifies tweets or accounts that violate the company's rules and that it has a civil integrity policy that covers the publishing of misleading content on Twitter. "We want Twitter to be a place for safe, healthy conversations," the statement said. The Samara Centre for Democracy partnered with Areto Labs, which has been tracking toxicity online for several years during election campaigns in Canada, the United States and New Zealand. They developed an artificial intelligence tool that uses machine-learning to review, track and rank toxic tweets received by political party leaders and incumbent candidates during the campaign. "This means being able to distinguish a rude or insulting tweet from one that is threatening or even sexually explicit," Delhon said. The two organizations will publish weekly reports on hate online during the campaign. The Conservatives, NDP and Greens didn't respond to requests for comment on the issue. "The Liberal Party of Canada condemns all forms of hate and discrimination," spokeswoman Adrienne Vaupshas said in a statement Wednesday. "Hateful and harmful content has no place on social media platforms or in our political discourse." Delhon said hateful statements and acts discourage voters and candidates from engaging in the democratic process, especially women and members of minority communities. "That's a pretty big problem because it's hindering equity in representation and limiting the inclusiveness of our democracy," she said. The Liberal government introduced a new law shortly before the House of Commons rose for the summer that it said would force social media companies to remove hate speech and any statements that are illegal in Canada. The bill died on the order paper when Parliament dissolved for the Sept. 20 election. A spokesperson for Facebook Canada wasn't available for official comment, but shared some information and data on the company's efforts to fight hate speech on its platform. The company's data suggest that it had removed 31.5 million pieces of content for violating Facebook's hate speech policies in the second quarter of this year alone and that nearly 98 per cent of it was removed before users reported it. The company says it will host virtual candidate training for candidates from all political parties to help them reach and engage with their communities. Duff Conacher, the co-founder of Democracy Watch, said Canada needs an independent watchdog agency with the necessary resources to enforce the rules that prohibit people and entities from publishing hate speech and false statements about candidates during the election campaign. The Writ The federal election occurs Sept. 20 and we have you covered. Get the latest campaign news, insights, analysis and commentary delivered weekly to your inbox with our free newsletter. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "It doesn't do anything to stop them six months later, because the election is over and the negative effect on the election results has already happened," he said. He said the Liberals' policy of asking social media companies to enforce their own rules is not sufficient enough to tackle this issue that is threatening democracy in Canada. "The Liberals have left it in the hands of these big social media companies who we know nothing about and who are operating in secret," he said. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 25, 2021. This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabul's airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, Afghan and U.S. officials said. The U.S. general overseeing the evacuation said the attacks would not stop the United States from evacuating Americans and others, and flights out were continuing. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said there was a large amount of security at the airport, and alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in. About 5,000 people were awaiting flights on the airfield, McKenzie said. The blasts came hours after Western officials warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport. But that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence on Aug. 31. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel. The IS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, who recently took control of the country in a lightning blitz. The Taliban were not believed to have been involved in the attacks and condemned the blasts. In an emotional speech from the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden said the latest bloodshed would not drive the U.S. out of Afghanistan earlier than scheduled, and that he had instructed the U.S. military to develop plans to strike IS. This photo provided by the French Army Thursday, Aug.26, 2021 shows Afghan refugees arriving in a military plane at Roissy airport, north of Paris, Wednesday, Aug.25, 2021. At least 1720 Afghans and a hundred French people have been evacuated by France since the beginning of the operation last week. French President Emmanuel Macron promised France would evacuate Afghans who worked for the country as well as activists and others under threat. (Eric Cadiou/Etat Major des Armees via AP) We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay, Biden said. U.S. officials initially said 11 Marines and one Navy medic were among those who died. Another service member died hours later. Eighteen service members were wounded and officials warned the toll could grow. More than 140 Afghans were wounded, an Afghan official said. One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own clothes darkened with blood. In this image provided by the U.S. Army, paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security operations as they continue to help facilitate the evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on Wednesday, Aug 25, 2021. (Sgt. Jillian G. Hix/U.S. Army via AP) Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the airport attack, in addition to 10 who were dead when they arrived. Surgeons will be working into the night, said Marco Puntin, the charitys manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone into the physiotherapy area and more beds were being added, he said. The Afghan official who confirmed the overall Afghan toll spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, a C-17 Globemaster lll lands on the runway as evacuees from Afghanistan debark a C-17 Globemaster lll on Monday, Aug. 23, 2021, at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. (Airman 1st Class Kylie Barrow/U.S. Air Force via AP) Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. McKenzie said clearly some failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate. He said the Taliban has been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication that the Taliban deliberately allowed Thursdays attacks to happen. He said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airports perimeter. Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what's known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, a member from the 379th Air Expeditionary Wing prepares to marshal a C-17 Globemaster lll as another C-17 taxis onto the flightline Aug. 23, 2021, at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. (Airman 1st Class Kylie Barrow/U.S. Air Force via AP) The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment. A former Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport. All of a sudden we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted, had our driver not turned around he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47," Paul Pen Farthing told Britains Press Association news agency. In this image provided by the Department of Defense, two paratroopers assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conduct security while a C-130 Hercules takes off during a evacuation operation in Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (Department of Defense via AP) Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the groups rescued animals. He is among thousands trying to flee. Over the last week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America's longest war and the Taliban's takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying those who fear a return to the militants' brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their home and widely imposed draconian restrictions. Already, some countries have ended their evacuations and begun to withdraw their soldiers and diplomats, signaling the beginning of the end of one of history's largest airlifts. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America's self-imposed deadline of Aug. 31 and the evacuations must end then, too. FILE - In this Aug. 16, 2021, file photo, hundreds of people gather near a U.S. Air Force C-17 transport plane at the perimeter of the international airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. A school district in a San Diego suburb that is home to a large refugee population says many of its families who had taken summer trips to Afghanistan to see their relatives have gotten stuck there with the chaos following the withdrawal of U.S. troops. (AP Photo/Shekib Rahmani) Even so, the airlift continued Thursday, though the number of evacuees fell for a second day as the terror attack and further threats kept people away.. From 3 a.m. to 3 p.m., Washington time, about 7,500 people were evacuated, a White House official said. Fourteen U..S. military flights carried about 5,100, and 39 coalition flights carried 2,400. The total compared to 19,000 in one 24-hour period toward the start of the week. In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul. Families evacuated from Kabul, Afghanistan, walk through the terminal before boarding a bus after they arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Va., on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana) Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from IS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Talibans freeing of prisoners during its advance through Afghanistan. Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling. But in an interview with ABC News, he would not give details. Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately due to an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport. Families evacuated from Kabul, Afghanistan, wait inside a bus after they arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Va., on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana) Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the group's fighters have deployed and occasionally used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops. Before the blast, the Taliban sprayed a water cannon at those gathered at one airport gate to try to drive the crowd away, as someone launched tear gas canisters elsewhere. Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. (Master Sgt. Donald R. Allen/U.S. Air Force via AP) We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger, Sadat said. "My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping. Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband's work with NATO. The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO," he said. They are looking for them house-by-house at night. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. In this image provided by the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Air Force loadmasters and pilots assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, load people being evacuated from Afghanistan onto a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. (Master Sgt. Donald R. Allen/U.S. Air Force via AP) The Sunni extremists of IS, with links to the group's more well-known affiliate in Syria and Iraq, have carried out a series of brutal attacks, mainly targeting Afghanistan's Shiite Muslim minority, including a 2020 assault on a maternity hospital in Kabul in which they killed women and infants. The Taliban have fought against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have wrested back control nearly 20 years after they were ousted in a U.S.-led invasion. The Americans went in following the 9/11 attacks, which al-Qaida orchestrated while being sheltered by the group. Amid the warnings and the pending American withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have said they'll allow Afghans to leave via commercial flights after the deadline next week, but it remains unclear which airlines would return to an airport controlled by the militants. Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said talks were underway between his country and the Taliban about allowing Turkish civilian experts to help run the facility. ___ Faiez reported from Istanbul, Baldor reported from Washington and Krauss from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Sylvie Corbet in Paris; Jan M. Olsen from Copenhagen, Denmark; Rahim Faiez, Tameem Akhgar and Andrew Wilks in Istanbul; James LaPorta in Boca Raton, Florida; Mike Corder at The Hague, Netherlands; Philip Crowther in Islamabad; Colleen Barry in Milan; and Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. There will be a Celebration of Life held at the Wanek Center, 730 Raider Dr. in Arcadia on Saturday, August 28, 2021, at 1:00 p.m. Rev. Sebastian J. Kolodziejczyk will officiate. Friends and family may visit from 11:00 a.m. until the time of service. A police and fire procession will begin at 10:00 a.m. ending with a salute to Jeff at the Wanek Center. A complete obituary can be found at www.blaschkeschneider.com. TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) Scientists have traced the genetic makeup of lake trout, a feat that should boost efforts to rebuild populations of the prized fish in the Great Lakes and other North American waters where they've been hammered by invasive species, overfishing and pollution, officials said Tuesday. U.S. and Canadian researchers completed a reference genome, or digital genetic map, for lake trout. It will help explain characteristics that enabled the species to evolve and spread across its vast range, with certain types becoming better suited to particular locations and depths. The data also will provide vital information for managers of programs that stock lakes with young trout to supplement natural reproduction, said Marc Gaden, spokesman for the Great Lakes Fishery Commission, a U.S.-Canadian agency that funded the research. Lake trout are widely distributed across North America, and there are huge variations in habitat use, shape, size, body mass, color," Gaden said. We need to understand why they look the way they do, why some types are more successful in some habitats than others, why some types in hatcheries do better than others. There are certainly many unknowns that unfold as this story progresses, but it is clear these are war refugees, often escaping certain death or persecution, in need of assistance from the good people of the State of Wisconsin. It is interesting to see the structure, organization, and timing that will most assuredly be in place as the refugees are vetted in a highly controlled logistical process, in order that the required services be available, and the variety of relief organizations and local communities prepping to help, as well as the military preparedness that must take place to house and process hundreds of refugees will be interesting to witness. There will most assuredly be no random release of hundreds of refugees out of Fort McCoy. While confusion about the course of events in Afghanistan is still confusing for millions of Americans, it is expected those refugees will be welcome in most locations. The Beaver Dam School Board unanimously approved entering into a consortium with other Wisconsin school districts that will allow an additional option if kindergarten through fifth grade students might need a virtual educational option. Beaver Dam Unified School District director of teaching and learning Rob Meyer said the special meeting was called for the Beaver Dam Unified School District Board of Education on Wednesday because the agreement was not prepared by the time the board met this month, and he did not feel the board would want to wait until its next scheduled meeting on Sept. 20. The board entered into the agreement with JEDI Virtual School. Last year, we provided our own virtual program as you are aware, Meyer said. As you are aware, we are in the middle of a pandemic. BDUSD does partner with Wisconsin Virtual School for 7th to 12th grades where students can apply to take virtual classes. Wisconsin Virtual School can support students in sixth grade as well. When we were investigating if we should need a virtual option for certain students, particularly students who cannot attend school for whatever reason that is: health concern, long term injury. We have been exploring elementary option, Meyer said. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Refugees from Afghanistan have arrived at Fort McCoy in Wisconsin and up to 10,000 more could do so in the coming weeks, U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson said Wednesday. Remember GBV victims Wits pays tribute to victims of GBV and solidifies action on the ground. The colourful mural commemorating Asithandile, the slain student and victim of gender-based violence (GBV), is an invitation to engage with the struggles of women. The name Asithandile Kwasa Zozo is etched in the minds of many South Africans. Zozo, a first year Wits student, was fatally stabbed in her home in Eastern Cape by a jilted lover after she ended the abusive relationship. The fatal stabbing of the 19-year old biological sciences student rocked South Africa on 17 August 2020 bringing to the fore once more the scourge of GBV in the country. To commemorate the one year anniversary of her passing, the Wits Gender and Equity Office (GEO) has paid tribute to Zozo through a mural, located near the Matrix multi-complex, one of the busiest areas on campus. The bright mural beckons from a distance and stuns upon realising that the girl whose eyes and smile sparkle, was lost to GBV. It is the power of this reality, that lingers and forces deep internal conversations. GEO Education Campaigns Officer, Thenjiwe Mswane, says the mural is a tribute to Zozo and victims of GBV. Remembering victims of abuse is an act of defiance against erasure, silence and goes a long way in highlighting the struggles of women in society, says Mswane. As such visual activism is a powerful tool in engaging people. Zenande Mketeni says people are conflicted by the painting and the general sentiment is that its a beautiful painting but they wish it was under different circumstances. This is the power of visual activism. The GEO invites members of the Wits community to add the names of GBV victims and survivors on the wall next to the mural and commit to creating a safer environment for women. One of the names to be remembered is that of Rachel Dolly Flavia Tshabalala who died tragically on 29 June 2014. Tshabalala was a staff member in the Wits School of Civil and Environmental Engineering where she worked as a senior secretary. At the time of her death she was also studying towards an additional BA in psychology at the Wits Plus Centre for Part-Time Studies. The brutal deaths and abuse of young women calls for intensified action against GBV. Nosicelo Mtembeni (University of Fort Hare), Uyinene Mrwetyana (University of Cape Town), Zolile Khumalo (Mangosuthu University of Technology), Takalani Mbulungeni (University of Venda) are just a few of the thousand women whose lives were cut short by GBV. At Wits, the GEO is a partner in this battle and continues to be on the ground through ongoing education and awareness campaigns on campus. The Office will conclude August by holding a discussion themed Deconstructing Masculinity. The Department of Higher Education and Training will also host a webinar on 27 August 2021 titled From policy to implementation action and accountability. The Departments intends to release a set of instruments that will help turn the sectoral GBV Policy Framework (launched by Minister Blade Nzimande in July 2020) into action. Students place trust in Wits as they vaccinate Wits students who got the Covid-19 vaccine jab at the SABC vaccination site on Thursday morning say they chose to place their trust in Wits and science. Final-year mechanical engineering students Nare Moseu and Tisetso Leshilo were among the first group of people to get vaccinated in Auckland Park this morning. The upbeat Moseu said he was confident about his decision to vaccinate as the University has led vaccine clinical trials against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19 (coronavirus disease). I know Wits will do the right thing. I know Wits wont throw us under the bus, said Moseu. Leshilo said he was motivated to vaccinate after receiving information via email from the University with details regarding the vaccination process. Witsies who are 18 years and older can get their Covid-19 vaccine at the Liberty vaccination site in Braamfontein and at the SABC vaccination site. Staff and students should check their emails for vaccination updates. According to information from Wits Business Intelligence Services, approximately 85% of Wits student population fit in this age category and approximately 3200 staff members. Just over 1000 are under 18 and do not yet qualify for the vaccine. Scott Smalley from the Faculty of Health Sciences, who is part of the Universitys Wellness Forum and coordinator of logistics pertaining to the vaccination of the Wits community, said a large number students are registering to vaccinate at these sites, using the dedicated time slots for Wits. Also in the queue to vaccinate was Tanaka Mapondea, who is studying industrial engineering at the University of Johannesburg. Mapondea said that a lot needs to be done to combat misinformation about the vaccines. One such myth is that vaccines cause infertility and will change ones DNA. Read six myths about the vaccines. Another myth causing delay in vaccination is the misconception that South Africa will be safe when herd immunity is achieved. Scientists have dismissed the concept of herd immunity; herd immunity is not going to happen because the virus mutates so rapidly. Visit the Universitys Covid-19 webpage for updated information and articles by Wits experts. Earlier this month, Mississippi ICU nurse Nichole Atherton resigned, worn down by the stress, young patients and preventable deaths that have overwhelmed the state's hospitals during the Covid-19 pandemic. "It looks heroic," Atherton, of Singing River Ocean Springs Hospital, told CNN. "But that's not what it is. It's sweaty and hard and chaotic and bloody. And it's hard to live in this every day and then go home and live a normal life." Mississippi now has at least 2,000 fewer nurses than it did at the beginning of the year, according to the Mississippi Hospital Association's Center for Quality & Workforce. The staff shortages add to the growing strain on the state's hospital system -- both due, in large part, to the Covid-19 pandemic. When asked if the health care system is reaching a breaking point, Singing River Nursing Manager for Personal Care Buddy Gager said, "I think we already broke." State Epidemiologist Dr. Paul Byers said Tuesday that Mississippi set a new record of Covid-19 related deaths. And of the 875 staffed ICU beds across the state, more than 93% are in use and more than 63% of those beds are occupied by Covid-19 patients, according to the US Department of Health and Human Services. The head of the Singing River Hospital System, Lee Bond, is urging the state to use some of its $1.8 billion in Covid relief for retention bonuses in hopes of keeping some of the nurses who are turning to leave. "Do I think it's going to fix the problem? A lot of nurses have told me it's not about the money at this point. It's about, 'I need to recharge my battery,'" said Dr. Randy Roth, Chief Medical Officer of Singing River Health System. Saying goodbye to her colleagues, Atherton felt that she couldn't leave them in the thick of the chaos and chose to put her resignation on hold and cut back her hours instead. But she isn't the only nurse to consider leaving. Melissa Davis has worked as nurse in the Singing River Pascagoula ICU for 17 years, but she told CNN she had never felt burnout quite like that from the Covid-19 pandemic. And as a result, nurses are leaving she never thought would. "It's hard to see a 34-year-old with a family not make it," she said through tears. "You can't describe that." For Atherton, fewer staff and more critical Covid-19 patients also mean more tough decisions. There have been moments when two critical patients are in crisis at once, and she has to decide which room to run to first, because there aren't enough nurses and respiratory therapists to respond to both. Singing River Health System currently has more than 160 nursing vacancies, Media Relations Director Sarah Duffey said. Since the start of the pandemic, 289 nurses have left. Some reinforcements are on the way. Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said Tuesday that more than 1,000 health care workers have arrived to help with hospital staffing shortages across the state. Reeves said 808 nurses, three certified registered nurse anesthetists, 22 Nurse Practitioners, 193 respiratory therapists and 20 paramedics are among health care personnel deployed Tuesday morning to 50 hospitals. "We have been working around the clock to secure additional medical personnel through both federal and private sector sources to shore up the staffing shortage that our hospitals find themselves in. Getting boots on the ground this quickly is a step in the right direction," Reeves said during a news conference Tuesday. Duffey told CNN the state has committed to sending 53 RNs 18 and respiratory therapists to its three Gulf Coast hospitals. She hopes the first will arrive by the end of the week. CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misspelled Buddy Gager's last name. The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. 2020 wasn't just Europe's hottest year on record. It was the hottest year by quite a bit and one of the three hottest years globally in recorded history, according to a new climate report. Here's what you need to know to Get Up to Speed and On with Your Day. (You can also get "5 Things You Need to Know Today" delivered to your inbox daily. Sign up here.) 1. Afghanistan US diplomats in Kabul warned American citizens early this morning to immediately leave several gates into the airport following what one US official called a "very specific threat stream" from a branch of ISIS. The US believes ISIS-K, a sworn enemy of the Taliban, wants to sow mayhem at the airport and is capable of carrying out attacks. The Taliban's new rule in Afghanistan has raised fears of a revival of al Qaeda, ISIS and other terrorist entities. In a February deal with the US, the Taliban pledged to prevent al Qaeda and other terror groups from using Afghan soil. Though the Taliban has so far kept such terrorist entities at bay, US officials worry now that the US is on its way out, there is less incentive for such efforts. The dissolution of US intelligence on the ground in Afghanistan makes this possibility even more grave. 2. Coronavirus Moderna has completed its submission to the FDA for full approval of its Covid-19 vaccine for people 18 and older. Meanwhile, Pfizer and BioNTech have begun submitting data for full approval of a third "booster" dose of their vaccine. As expected, full FDA approval of the two-dose Pfizer vaccine is leading to more mandates. The Pentagon is requiring all US military service members to get fully vaccinated against Covid-19 immediately. Disney World also reached a deal with two employees unions to require vaccinations among applicable staff. In a worrying turn, some people have been ingesting ivermectin, a drug used to de-worm livestock, as a treatment for Covid-19. Some hospitals and poison control centers have seen an uptick in such cases as some Republican elected officials and conservative media figures irresponsibly tout the drug. 3. Capitol riot The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot has demanded a large collection of documents from several US government agencies. The wide-ranging requests cover communications related to former President Trump's family members and any communications between Trump or his allies and "any DOJ official" in the days before and after January 6. The committee has also requested information from the National Archives, which houses all of Trump's records from his time as president. Trump yesterday said he would invoke executive privilege to try to block the investigation but didn't specify how he would go about that. Ultimately, Trump could try to go to court to stop the committee from obtaining some of these documents. 4. Extreme weather Search and rescue efforts have been suspended in Tennessee following a weekend of destructive floods that claimed 20 lives. Now, it's up to the National Guard and the state Transportation Department to begin massive cleanup efforts. In the West, the region around Lake Tahoe in California and Reno, Nevada, is experiencing the worst air quality in the country by far as several large wildfires burn nearby. The Air Quality Index, an indicator of how unhealthy the air is, spiked to 694 in Tahoe City on Monday; an AQI between 300 and 500 is considered "a health warning of emergency conditions." As if that weren't enough, more hurricane activity could happen around the Gulf of Mexico soon. The National Hurricane Center gives the Gulf area an 80% chance of a tropical system developing in the next few days. Check your local forecast here>>> 5. Hong Kong Hong Kong's national security police are investigating the group behind the city's annual June 4 vigil, which commemorates pro-democracy protesters who died in the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. As part of the investigation, the group must submit meeting records and personal details of all its directors and members, including addresses and other contact information. Police claimed such information will help them investigate possible crimes against national security. The group, the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, has reportedly considered disbanding under the city's controversial new security law as more protesters, journalists and pro-democracy figures have been arrested. BREAKFAST BROWSE Alana 'Honey Boo Boo' Thompson is turning 16 Hoo boy, nothing makes you feel old like realizing child stars are growing up. Fossil confiscated in Brazilian police raid is one of the most complete pterosaur skeletons ever found This piece of news could send you down the fascinating rabbit hole of illegal (or at best, questionably legal) fossil trades. New Bob Ross documentary paints a complex portrait of the artist's life and the battle that followed it Don't worry, it won't ruin any happy little memories. The new 'Matrix 4' trailer dropped at CinemaCon It's been a whole 18 years since "Matrix 3" came out, if you're keeping track. (And yes, Keanu Reeves is in this one!) OnlyFans suspends proposed ban on sexually explicit content The company said its banking partners assured it the site could be "a home for all creators." TODAY'S NUMBER $5 million That's how much the FCC has proposed as a fine against right-wing political operatives Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman for apparently violating US robocalling laws. An investigation found the two men allegedly created hundreds of robocalls designed to discourage voting in the 2020 election. TODAY'S QUOTE "I feel like the world's biggest porn star." Spencer Elden, who appeared as a naked baby on the cover of Nirvana's 1991 album "Nevermind." Elden made the comment to the Sunday Times in 2007. He is now suing the band, claiming the iconic record cover is an example of child pornography and exploitation. AND FINALLY Show me the (ripped, waterlogged) money Did you know if you have messed-up bills, you can take them to the US Treasury and they'll give you fresh ones in return? Here's how they make sure you're getting every crusty, musty dollar you're owed. (Click here to view.) The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. At least two explosions took place outside the Kabul airport on Thursday as the United States and other countries try to evacuate their citizens and Afghans at risk from the Taliban. Three US officials and a source familiar with the situation said that according to initial reports, there were some US personnel among the casualties. "We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties. We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate. We will continue to update," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby tweeted. The blast happened at one of the entry gates of the Hamid Karzai International Airport and appears to be a suicide attack, according to three US officials. Crowds of Afghans have been gathering at the gates trying to gain access to the airport, which has become the only way out of the country since the Taliban took over Kabul. The US Embassy in Kabul said that US citizens who were at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate of the airport "should leave immediately" in the wake of the blast. "There has been a large explosion at the airport, and there are reports of gunfire," the security alert said. "US citizens should avoid traveling to the airport and avoid airport gates at this time," it added. The French Ambassador to Afghanistan, David Martinon, warned that a second explosion at the Kabul airport remained a possibility. "To all our Afghan friends if you are close to the doors of the airport get away as quickly as possible and shelter yourselves. A second explosion is possible," he tweeted. Tens of thousands of people have been evacuated by the US military and NATO allies from the airport in the past two weeks. These evacuations are set to start winding down in the next few days, ahead of the August 31 deadline for the final exit from a 20-year war in Afghanistan. One US official said there are injuries among Afghans, but there is no information yet on any US casualties. US officials said earlier on Thursday that concerns about security around the airport have increased based on "a very specific threat stream." The top US diplomat in Kabul, Amb. Ross Wilson, said Thursday that he could not get into the specifics of the security threat outside the gates of the Kabul airport cited in an embassy alert, but noted that "it was clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling." US President Joe Biden has been briefed on the explosion outside Kabul airport, a White House official said. The President was in the situation room along with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken. A spokesperson for the UK government said the government was "working urgently to establish what has happened and its impact on the ongoing evacuation effort." "Our primary concern remains the safety of our personnel, British citizens and the citizens of Afghanistan. We are in close contact with our US and other NATO allies at an operational level on the immediate response to this incident." The emergency services of the Bundeswehr, Germany's military operations command, were unaffected by the explosion, the German Defense Ministry tweeted Thursday. This is a developing story. The Federal Communications Commission proposed a record-breaking $5 million fine against right-wing political operatives Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman on Tuesday, after an investigation by the agency found that the two men appeared to have violated US robocalling laws. The decision, which is not yet final, follows charges by Michigan's attorney general last year linked to hundreds of robocalls allegedly created by Wohl and Burkman and designed to discourage voting in the 2020 election. The robocalls allegedly warned listeners that voters' personal information would be used against them by credit card companies and police departments. In May, New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a separate lawsuit against Wohl and Burkman over similar allegations of voter suppression. If affirmed, the proposed FCC fine against Wohl and Burkman would represent the largest ever brought under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, the FCC said. The law outlaws robocalls sent to consumers who have not previously opted into receiving the calls. CNN reached out to attorneys for Burkman and Wohl for comment Wednesday. But Burkman told The Washington Post that the fine was "tyranny and madness," and Wohl declined to say he made the robocalls. As part of its investigation, the FCC said, officials interviewed consumers and also reviewed subpoenaed call records and recordings provided by two dialing service providers that Wohl and Burkman had hired to conduct the robocalling campaign. The 1,141 calls had been placed on Aug. 26 and Sept. 14, 2020, identified Wohl and Burkman by name and used Burkman's phone number for the caller ID, the FCC added. The call falsely claimed that mail-in voters will have their personal information shared with law enforcement "to track down old warrants" and that they could be added to a list for "mandatory vaccines." A federal judge previously ruled that James' office was allowed to join a lawsuit against Wohl and Burkman filed by the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation and a group of voters over an effort to suppress Black voters. Wohl and Burkman's alleged campaign had reached "approximately 5,500 New Yorkers, sought to undermine and interfere with the then-ongoing efforts by the state of New York to fairly and safely administer its elections during the COVID-19 crisis and protect its citizens from voter intimidation and harassment," her office previously said in a statement. The FCC said Burkman and Wohl have "admitted, under oath, their involvement in the creation and distribution of the robocalls," citing court transcripts from that lawsuit. CNN previously reported the voice on the robocall said it was sponsored by a group founded by Burkman and Wohl, who have spent years perpetrating hoaxes and false smears against Democratic politicians and opponents of former President Donald Trump. During an interview with CNN last year, Wohl denied that he or Burkman was responsible for the misleading and racist calls and said they had learned about them only after Burkman started receiving angry messages from people who had seen his number on their caller ID. "We've never done any robocalls," Wohl said at the time. "We are categorically uninvolved." KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) (UPDATED) - Two suicide bombers and gunmen have targeted crowds of Afghans flocking to Kabuls airport, in the waning days of a massive airlift that has drawn thousands of people seeking to flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. An Afghan official says at least 60 Afghans were killed and 143 wounded. U.S. officials said 12 U.S. service members were killed, including 11 Marines and a Navy medic. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the two blasts were near an airport entrance and a short distance away by a hotel. A U.S. official said the complex attack was believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group, whose affiliate in Afghanistan grew out of disaffected Taliban members who hold an even more extreme view of Islam. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby confirmed the blasts, saying one was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. Inaugural Building Connections and Bridging Differences awards announced BCBD to offer new OpenMind training this fall Three people and one department at William & Mary are being recognized for their efforts to promote compassion, empathy and respectful discourse around difficult topics. The universitys Building Connections and Bridging Differences initiative has selected Director of Student Health Services David Dafashy, Associate Professor of Business Katherine Guthrie, Maheen Saeed 23 and the W&M Police Department as the inaugural recipients of its namesake awards. Presented to a faculty member, staff member, student and organization, the awards are meant to honor those who exemplify W&Ms values of belonging and respect. This years recipients were selected from 79 nominations based on the level, impact and reach of their efforts and their contribution to pandemic response operations. The four awardees were recognized during Employee Convocation in July. There's no mistaking that this is hard work, said Melody Porter, director of the Office of Community Engagement. It's emotional for many of us. Being open to and engaging with people we have real differences with can even make us feel unsafe and uncertain. But it's important work, and it's so necessary in our world where division is only growing as time goes on. Our inaugural award recipients have demonstrated courage, compassion and openness in their unique realms. They offer inspiring examples of belonging and respect." The inaugural recipients Dafashy is being recognized for his efforts around integrated wellness, which he has set as a priority for the staff of the Student Health Center. He has participated in multiple steering committees across the university and established the Student Health Directors committee for universities across Virginia, establishing him as a leader in healthcare during the pandemic by sharing best practices with other medical professionals. His very approachable servant leadership style encourages belonging through his open door policy and the establishment of an internal student health committee (that discusses) the ever-changing pandemic-related priorities weekly, according to a nomination letter. His display of curiosity, excellence, flourishing, integrity, respect and service and his collaboration with other departments through his participation on a myriad of university steering committees has truly been exemplary. Guthrie has provided multiple opportunities for students to deepen their educational experience by founding the Women in Business student association and launching the womens leadership summit and international stock pitch competition. During the pandemic, she organized a free, four-week online Summer Business Institute for students. She also created a professional development course, Diversity in the Workplace: Finding your Voice, for students from across campus. Her background in economics, extensive experience in the (diversity, equity and inclusion) field, genuine care and openness, and her own experience as a first-generation student have enabled her to contribute significantly towards our DE&I efforts, one nominator wrote. As the only Muslim Pakistani representative on the Student Assembly, Saeed has been a consistent advocate for all people of color. She has also been an ally of students with disabilities, hosting workshops and spearheading initiatives around related issues. It is thanks to her role as an active listener first and foremost that people who have been largely unseen for so long find a voice for themselves through Maheen Saeed, said one nominator. If there is a person who can bring together those of different perspectives and make them feel heard and actively make change for them, it would also be through Maheen Saeed. William & Mary Police officers volunteer in the community in a variety of roles, including participating in marches and presenting programs to student organizations. Striving to fulfill their mission of assuring the safety and wellbeing of the community, they consistently look for ways to be of service, doing such things as changing tires for motorists, conducting impromptu campus tours or even paying for an Uber for a community member who could not. The officers not only epitomize our value of respect, they have the respect of many throughout the community because of their integrity and commitment and more importantly the lasting relationships they develop and nurture within the community each and every day, said a nominator. The BCBD initiative The Building Connections and Bridging Differences initiative began in 2019, thanks to an anonymous donor who was inspired by a discussion between W&M President Katherine A. Rowe and Chancellor Robert M. Gates 65, L.H.D. 98 about kindness and doing disagreements well. The initiative is led by the University Ombuds, Health & Wellness, the Compassionate Action Board and Institutional Research, and its committee includes faculty and staff from across the university. According to Kelly Crace, associate vice president for health & wellness, the group initially identified three goals: to raise awareness as to where W&Ms mission, vision and values connect to the principles of building connections and bridging differences; to recognize and celebrate where that is happening on campus; and to create opportunities for learning and interaction with each other around these concepts. As part of the third goal, the group created a set of training modules last semester, focused on flourishing, openness and courage. A series of facilitated discussions were hosted in April and May as part of the training. The goal of the training modules is to give you the skills you need and the opportunity to practice using these skills so they move from the realm of good ideas or intellectual knowledge to how you actually live your life in relationship with others, said Porter. This semester, the William & Mary community is invited to participate in additional training through OpenMind, an interactive, psychology-based platform that teaches skills to overcome differences, engage in difficult conversations and work together toward shared goals. The four-week program includes a total of eight lessons, with two being taken online each week starting Sept.13. Participants may take the online lessons on their own time, but after every two, they will be invited to participate in a facilitated discussion with others about what they are learning. Those discussions will be hosted in the McLeod Tyler Wellness Center at 4 p.m. on Sept. 16, 23 and 30 and Oct. 7. Participants may also engage in the discussions live online through Zoom. Members of the W&M community may sign up for the program online. Our hope is that this program will help you feel more connected to others, but also to your best hopes for yourself as well as to our university values, all creating and deepening a culture of wise care and thoughtful connection across differences, Porter said. Black-necked cranes are seen in Nyingchi, southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, March 26, 2021. [Photo by Zhang Ning/Xinhua] LHASA, Aug. 24 (Xinhua) Summer is hot in most parts of China but Nagqu, a city with an average altitude of more than 4,500 meters in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, sees the temperature cool down to as low as three degrees Celsius. The chilly climate has made a local hot spring a popular destination for many, including Karma Dorje, a Nagqu native who paints Thangka in the regional capital of Lhasa. "Bathing in the hot water improves blood circulation. The pimples on my face have gone," said the 26-year-old, who comes to the hot spring every three days whenever he returns home. By utilizing natural and cultural resources, many areas in Tibet have developed rural tourism, bringing tourists as well as additional income to farmers and herders, which helps boost rural vitalization. With the water temperature around 60 degrees Celsius, the geothermal hot spring in Tonglung Village, Nagqu's Nyainrong County, is one of the highest in altitude in the world. The village has established a cooperative for the hot spring operation, receiving some 10,000 tourists from the city and nearby counties every year, according to Chophe, head of the village. The cooperative granted 12,000 yuan (about 1,850 U.S. dollars) per household to 75 households of the village last year as a dividend. A total of 35 villagers, including formerly impoverished ones, work in the cooperative. "With my job at my doorstep, I can finally take care of my ailing mother at home," said Chimed Wangmo, 20, who used to work in Nagqu City. By working as a cashier and cleaner in the cooperative, she earns 2,500 yuan a month now. In Tashi Chodan, a community known for Tibetan opera in the city of Shannan, a troupe of more than 30 performers act for tour groups from across the country every day. Tibetan opera combines talking, singing, acting, dancing, and literature and has a history of over 600 years. It is regarded as a "living fossil" of Tibetan culture and was included in the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009. An actor performs Tibetan Opera in Doilungdeqen District of Lhasa, southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, Jan. 25, 2020. [Xinhua/Chogo] "At the peak season, we have six to seven performances a day. The monthly income can be more than 2,000 yuan for performing alone," said 38-year-old Purbu Kelsang, a local farmer. To accommodate the tour groups, 58 households of the village are engaged in homestay businesses. Local villager, Dawa, 63, no longer has to toil at construction sites in cities. With his homestay of eight beds, he earns more than 30,000 yuan a year. He provides buttered tea free of charge and plays flute for his guests which is welcomed by them. "They like my home a lot. Some of them called when they returned home, promising that they will come every year," he said, adding that his tourists are from provinces like Anhui, Hubei and Hunan. In 2020, the per capita net income of the community reached 24,000 yuan, up 13.1 percent compared with the previous year. Wang Huadong, executive vice mayor of Shannan, said the city government has planned to help introduce a third-party company to help the community develop rural tourism more professionally. "The third-party company may be responsible for leasing nearby farmland from villagers, and turn the barley plots into galsang flower fields to attract more tourists," he said. In Tibet, rural tourism had created, directly or indirectly, 86,000 jobs for local farmers and herdsmen, resulting in an increment in annual per capita income of 4,300 yuan by 2020. Optimistic about the prospect of tourism, Tonglung Village is expanding the hot spring cooperative, with three more pools being built. The village has planned to make the resort a comprehensive venue that covers tourism, recreation and accommodation to generate more income for villagers. Nyima Degyi, deputy head of Nyainrong County, said a national highway section passing by the county is under construction. "The section linking Zadoi County, Qinghai Province, and Nagqu, will definitely bring more tourists here," she said. (Source: Xinhua) Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, talks with local residents while visiting Binhe community in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of Chengde City in Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] CHENGDE, Hebei, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) Chinese President Xi Jinping has stressed implementing the new development philosophy, promoting the Saihanba Spirit, and striving to achieve this year's major goals for the country's economic and social development. Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks during an inspection tour of Chengde City in north China's Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. Xi stressed implementing the CPC Central Committee's decisions and arrangements, staying committed to the general principle of pursuing progress while ensuring stability, and putting into practice the new development philosophy in an all-round, faithful manner. He also underlined the need to achieve a balance between COVID-19 prevention and control and economic and social development, and between development and security, to promote high-quality development, and to strive to fulfill major social and economic targets and tasks for this year to ensure a good start of the 14th Five-Year Plan. Xi began the tour with a visit to the Saihanba mechanized forest farm in the northernmost part of Hebei on Monday afternoon. China has the world's largest area of man-made forests, an extremely great achievement, as noted by Xi. Saihanba, he said, has set an example in the global history of ecological progress. Xi expressed his hope that the farm staff would continue to work hard and take bold steps to explore deepening the reform of state-owned forest farms, promoting green development and increasing their carbon-sink capacity. He visited the farm's first man-made forest, named after a late farm official Wang Shanghai. Talking with staff representatives of the farm, Xi said generations of workers there have forged through concrete actions the Saihanba Spirit, featuring staying true to the original aspiration, being hardworking and enterprising, and pursuing green development. The achievement, Xi said, is an example to the rest of the country in advancing ecological progress. He urged the promotion of the Saihanba Spirit to inspire people to make new contributions to the realization of China's second centenary goal. On Tuesday morning, Xi inspected the Chengde Mountain Resort, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, to learn about the protection of cultural relics. He stressed efforts to properly protect, develop and utilize fine traditional Chinese culture, in a bid to build stronger cultural confidence and foster the national spirit. Leaving the site, Xi went to the Puning Temple, which was first built in 1755. Xi stressed upholding the principle that religions in China must be Chinese in orientation, with active guidance provided to religions so that they can adapt themselves to the socialist society. He then visited the Chengde Museum. Noting that China is a united multi-ethnic country, Xi said the diverse Chinese nation has been formed over the course of a long history. Experience has shown that only the CPC can unite the Chinese nation, and only under Chinese socialism can all ethnic groups work together and achieve development and prosperity, Xi said. Continuous efforts should be made to consolidate and develop socialist ethnic relations of equality, unity, mutual assistance and harmony, he added. In the afternoon, Xi paid a visit to the village of Daguikou in Chengde, where he inspected progress on rural vitalization. Highlighting the crucial role of industries in advancing rural vitalization, Xi urged efforts to develop industries with local strengths and deliver more benefits to rural areas and rural residents. He also called for strengthening public health services in rural areas. Xi dropped by the home of villager Huo Jin and chatted with the family. He stressed that, even when China's urbanization has reached a high level, there will still be hundreds of millions of people working and living in rural areas. Prosperity must be achieved in both urban and rural areas, Xi said, calling for building a new socialist countryside that is more beautiful and has better living conditions. He also visited a community-based service center for elderly home-care in the city. Pointing out that ensuring a happy life for the elderly people in their later years is a vital responsibility of Party committees and governments at all levels, Xi called for efforts to develop all-inclusive elderly care services and improve the networks for community-based service centers for elderly home-care. He also called on communities to play an active role as the first line of defense in coordinated control mechanisms and remain vigilant against the COVID-19 epidemic. Talking with community residents in a public square, Xi said that China will definitely realize national rejuvenation as more than 1.4 billion people are bending their efforts in one direction and traveling with perseverance on the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era. Enditem Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the preservation and development of cultural heritage at Chengde Mountain Resort during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, talks to villagers while conducting field research in Daguikou Village during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, waves to staff members, volunteer representatives and community residents while conducting field research at Binhe community service center for elderly home care during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the elderly care services at Binhe community service center for elderly home care during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Shen Hong] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the rural vitalization in Daguikou Village during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the rural vitalization in Daguikou Village during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the rural vitalization in Daguikou Village during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the rural vitalization in Daguikou Village during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the ethnic unity at the Chengde Museum during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the ethnic unity at the Chengde Museum during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, talks with tourists while conducting field research at Chengde Mountain Resort during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the religious affairs at the Puning Temple during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, conducts field research on the religious affairs at the Puning Temple during an inspection tour of Chengde in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, learns about the management and protection of the Saihanba forest farm, as well as Hebei's coordinated efforts in conserving its mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands, and desertification control during an inspection tour of the forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, learns about the management and protection of the Saihanba forest farm, as well as Hebei's coordinated efforts in conserving its mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands, and desertification control during an inspection tour of the forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, learns about the management and protection of the Saihanba forest farm, as well as Hebei's coordinated efforts in conserving its mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands, and desertification control during an inspection tour of the forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, makes an inspection tour of the Saihanba forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, learns about the management and protection of the Saihanba forest farm, as well as Hebei's coordinated efforts in conserving its mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands, and desertification control during an inspection tour of the forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, visits forest rangers during an inspection tour of the Saihanba forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, visits forest rangers during an inspection tour of the Saihanba forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, visits forest rangers during an inspection tour of the Saihanba forest farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, talks with staff members at a forest named after Wang Shanghai, a late official of the Saihanba forest farm, during an inspection tour of the farm in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, checks the growth of the trees and learns about the promotion of the Saihanba spirit and the high-quality development of the Saihanba forest farm at a forest named after Wang Shanghai, a late official of the farm, in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of the Saihanba forest farm on Monday. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, checks the growth of the trees and learns about the promotion of the Saihanba spirit and the high-quality development of the Saihanba forest farm at a forest named after Wang Shanghai, a late official of the farm, in north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 23, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of the Saihanba forest farm on Monday. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, chats with the Huo Jin family while visiting Daguikou Village in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of Chengde City in Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, checks projects while visiting Binhe community service center for elderly home-care in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of Chengde City in Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, visits Binhe community service center for elderly home-care in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of Chengde City in Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, learns about improvements in rural medical and health conditions and regular epidemic prevention and control while visiting Daguikou Village in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of Chengde City in Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. [Xinhua/Li Xueren] Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, visits Daguikou Village in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province, Aug. 24, 2021. Xi made an inspection tour of Chengde City in Hebei Province from Monday to Tuesday. [Xinhua/Xie Huanchi] (Source: Xinhua) Volunteers and medical staff unload bodies from a pickup truck outside a hospital after two powerful explosions outside the airport in Kabul on August 26 Calls for North Wales to have a Maggies Cancer site to support patients across the region Wrexhams MP has called for the opening of Maggies Cancer site in North Wales. The centres operate across Wales and the UK and provide support, information, and practical advice to cancer patients up and down the country. Maggies centres are operated outside of the NHS but are linked to NHS hospitals, helping to provide effective advice to patients and their families. Currently, the nearest Maggies centre is Maggies Wirral, which is located at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre. Following meetings with the Steve Morgan Foundation, Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB) and Maggies Cancer Centre, Sarah Atherton, the Member of Parliament for Wrexham, is calling for a Maggies Cancer site in North Wales. Ms Atherton has already raised the importance of having a centre for cancer patients in North Wales, as provided by Maggies Cancer Centres across the United Kingdom, during meetings with Betsi Cadwaladr Health Board and with the Managing Director of the Wrexham Maelor Hospital. Earlier this month, Ms Atherton also met with Haydn Jones, a Mold Town Councillor, who was successfully treated for cancer at the Wrexham Maelor and now volunteers at the Maggies Cancer Centre in Clatterbridge. Mr Jones has also started a Facebook group, Supporters of a Maggies in North Wales to bring together people who are passionate about having a Maggies Centre in North Wales. Commenting on the campaign, Sarah said: As a former nurse I know how important it is that cancer patients and their families have access to the information, help and support that Maggies Centres can provide and having met with users of Maggies centres, I am also very aware of how important these services can be to cancer patients and their families. From meetings with local donors whose philanthropy must be applauded I know that the funding for this centre is in place and that the team at Maggies are very interested in opening a new site in North Wales. It is now up to the local health board to finish the deal, which is why I have started this campaign. I personally think that the Wrexham Maelor would be an ideal site for one of these new centres but failing the Maelor, I still believe it is important that we have a Maggies Centre within the health board area to support cancer sufferers across the region. In this regard, I know that the health board are looking positively at other sites such as Glan Clwyd in order to serve all patients across north Wales. Staff at Wrexhams BHF Furniture and Electrical store celebrates the British Heart Foundations 60th birthday Its a month of celebrations at the British Heart Foundations Furniture and Electrical Store in Wrexham as the charity marks its 60th birthday. Donations and sales help fund the BHFs life saving research into heart and circulatory diseases which cause around 25 deaths each day in Wales. Every item sold is turned into funds for research that could help transform the lives of the 340,000 people in Wales living with heart and circulatory diseases. Area manager, Nigel Marston has been with the charity for over 16 years and said its fantastic to be able to celebrate the 60th birthday and the shops reopening after such a difficult period for the charity during lockdown. Nigel said: Our work is vital to the charity. We raise money to fund life saving research across the UK. But we are heavily reliant on volunteers. We have a huge range of volunteer positions available from sales assistant roles to warehouse positions. All of our volunteers leave having learned new skills, so whether people are interested in customer service, warehouse logistics or sales we have opportunities to suit everyone. Dean Campbell is one of our regular volunteers who works 5 days a week in our warehouse. He volunteers as it keeps him busy, improves the look of his CV at the same time is helping to save peoples lives. He also jokes the lifting of furniture keeps him fit and is much cheaper than joining a gym. Regional Member of the Senedd Mark Isherwood joined Nigel and the team of staff and volunteers to celebrate the BHFs big birthday. Mark said: During my informative visit to BHFs Furniture and Electrical Store in Wrexham, I enjoyed a tour around the shop, meeting staff and volunteers, and chatting about both the stores successes and challenges, and BHF Cymrus current policy work. 340,000 people in Wales are living with the daily burden of heart and circulatory disease. This year the BHF is celebrating their 60th birthday. For 60 years they have wanted to beat heartbreak for Wales by funding life-saving research into heart and circulatory diseases to find better ways of diagnosing, treating and ultimately curing them. BHF shops like this raise vital funds to support world leading research happening right here in Waless universities. Nigel added: We rely on the goodwill of the residents of Wrexham to donate their pre-loved furniture and electrical items to the BHF. We are able to collect most items if they are in full working order and in good condition. A collection can be arranged by phoning the store on 01978 884140 or online at www.bhf.org.uk/shop/donating-goods/book-furniture-collection-near-me To find out more about volunteering and career opportunities or furniture collection call the store on 01978 884140 or visit www.bhf.org.uk. Wales to send 7.2m of PPE equipment to Namibia to help in the global fight against COVID-19 Wales is giving PPE to Namibia to help the global fight against COVID-19. Over 7m worth of masks, gowns and hand sanitiser, which is not needed in Wales, are being donated and a further 500,000 grant is being given for oxygen equipment and nurse training. Namibia is currently experiencing its third wave of the pandemic and this third surge has exposed the critically insufficient health infrastructure in Namibia. The kit includes over 1.1m face masks, 500,000 gowns, 100,000 protective aprons and over 1m worth of hand sanitiser. Wales will also donate 500,000 for essential oxygen equipment and nurse training through the Welsh Governments Wales and Africa programme. Namibia has a severe problem with oxygen supply and a lack of personnel with the skills to deliver oxygen to save the lives of the seriously ill. The equipment will be donated through Cardiff Universitys Phoenix Project and follows a grant earlier this year of 125,000 given to promote awareness of the need for coronavirus vaccinations in Namibia. Professor Kenneth Matengu from the University of Namibia met with the First Minister Mark Drakeford in June to report on the grant. In the meeting Professor Matengu gave a moving account of the dreadful situation in Namibia, with University staff dying daily and the hospitals overwhelmed. Following the meeting the First Minister asked the Welsh NHS if they had PPE kit that could be sent to Namibia. The First Minister of Wales, Mark Drakeford said: I have heard directly from Namibia on the extremely difficult situation that they face in the battle against COVID-19. We have a duty to help those in need and Im proud that Wales is stepping forward to fight the global threat of coronavirus. Wales will stand alongside Namibia and we will do everything we can to help them through this difficult time. During the pandemic NHS Wales has worked hard to build resilient supply chains and a robust PPE stockpile. Minimum order volumes meant that in some cases stocks were built up beyond that now needed to protect Wales, providing an opportunity to support partner countries in Africa. Professor Judith Hall of Cardiff University and Phoenix Project Lead said: Wales and Africa, Welsh Governments international development programme led by Minister for Social Justice Jane Hutt, is a remarkable project and an exemplar of its kind for the world. The Phoenix Project is delighted to be delivering the PPE donation and managing the Oxygen grant on behalf of the Welsh Government. Namibia has a serious problem with oxygen supply and a lack of personnel with the skills to deliver oxygen to save the lives of those with severe COVID-19. These donations will make a huge and sustainable difference to the people of Namibia and in the short term, thousands of lives will be saved. The Phoenix Project works with agencies in Namibia on health promotion, poverty reduction and environmental projects. NASHVILLE, TN (WSMV) - Transportation Licensing Commission denied the permit approvals of more than 30 new entertainment vehicles on Thursday afternoon. This latest push to control the industry comes after a man fell off a party bus and injured himself last month. Nashville party bus rider falls off bus, gets run over on Broadway NASHVILLE, TN (WSMV) - A tourist was taken to the hospital early Thursday after he fell from, and was run over by a party bus in downtown Nashville. The group Safe Fun Nashville demanded the board to stop all approval of party vehicles. At Thursday's meeting, the commission denied the applications of 32 additional party vehicles, including ten pedal taverns. Pull Quote This is a first step. Party vehicles are posing a serious threat to the safety and tourist economy in our city. If were going to take safety seriously, we need to first make sure that the party vehicles already on the street are following the regulations we have in place." Jim Schmitz, a downtown resident and co-organizer of Safe Fun Nashville Safe Fun Nashville said it has 2,000 people signing a petition to back them up. To sign the petition, click here. Metro Health opened two new lanes at their drive-thru location and vaccination center in Nashville. That's because demand for testing is so high. Health experts tell News 4 theyre seeing numbers at testing sites they havent seen since last fall. But theres a disappointing trend happening Families evacuated from Kabul, Afghanistan, walk through the terminal before boarding a bus after they arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport, on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana) The US State Department declared Wednesday that the number of Americans still waiting to leave Kabul is under 1,000, perhaps only a few hundred. The announcement came as the Biden administration continued to maintain that it would complete evacuations by the August 31 deadline announced by President Biden last week. The pace of evacuations has reached a new peak of 19,000 Wednesday, according to official Pentagon figures, with 90 flights departing from the Kabul airport in a 24-hour period, counting all planes, US and other foreign, military and civilian. At a press conference Wednesday afternoon, Secretary of State Antony Blinken provided the first official estimate of the total number of Americans present in Kabul before the US-backed puppet government collapsed on August 15 and the Taliban consolidated its control over the entire country. He said there were 6,000 Americans in Afghanistan at that time, and that 4,500 had been evacuated in the past 10 days. Another 500 had been reached by State Department officials and were scheduled to leave the country, leaving about 1,000 who had not yet responded to State Department inquiries. This figure would include many who had left the country without notifying the US Embassy of their departure, as well as others who were not actually US citizens or who had decided to stay in Afghanistan because of family considerations. The actual number of Americans who remained to be evacuated was likely considerably less than the figure of 1,000, he said. This accounting undercuts one of the principal props of the non-stop campaign in the American media demanding an extension of the US military presence at Kabul airport beyond the August 31 deadline. That narrative suggests that huge numbers of Americans are trapped in the country and require military force to free them from the Taliban. The major daily newspapers and television networks continue to sound this theme at full volume, suggesting, in the most strident version, that nothing less than a full-scale re-invasion of the country is required. Republican congressional leaders have taken up this issue as well, with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy denouncing the Biden administration for creating the largest international hostage situation weve ever faced as a nation. President Biden has turned his back on our own citizens stranded in Afghanistan, McCarthy told a press conference Wednesday. Hes turned his back on his duties as a commander in chief. Congressional Democrats also pressured the administration to extend the August 31 deadline, both at a House Intelligence Committee briefing Monday and at a closed-door briefing for all members of Congress on Tuesday, conducted by Blinken, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines. Representative Jason Crow, Democrat of Colorado, a former Army Ranger who fought in Afghanistan, said full evacuation cant be accomplished between now and the end of the month, so the date has to extend until we get that mission done. Crow is one of 11 US military-intelligence veterans first elected to Congress in 2018 as Democratic candidates, who now exercise inordinate influence over US national security policy. Another of these CIA Democrats, Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, said there was a bipartisan demand by Democrats and Republicans that administration officials pressure the president to shift the August 31 date. A major theme, a major comment, a major point that we all tried to make: urging them to do more to advocate with the president to extend the deadline, she said. Biden had suggested over the weekend that the deadline was flexible, but this changed abruptly on Monday after a meeting in Kabul between CIA Director William Burns and Taliban political director Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar. While Biden himself initially set the August 31 date, the Taliban has now embraced it and apparently rejected efforts by Burns to shift it. The Islamic militia is in full control of the environs of the airport and could shut down further evacuations at will, simply by using mortars and artillery to bombard the runway. This would not only stop flights carrying US and Afghan civilians, but would also trap the 6,000 American troops currently deployed at the base. Neither the Taliban nor the Biden administration seems prepared to risk that scenario. In comments Tuesday, Biden emphasized the cooperation offered by the Taliban to facilitate the evacuations, but left at least a small loophole. The completion by August 31st depends upon the Taliban continuing to cooperate and allow access to the airport for those who were transporting out and no disruptions to our operations, he said. In addition, Ive asked the Pentagon and the State Department for contingency plans to adjust the timetable should that become necessary. While the corporate media in the United States continues to portray the conditions at the airport as chaotic, with huge numbers of desperate people packed into the facility, seeking to flee, the reality on the ground is apparently different. This was confirmed by two members of Congress, one Democrat and one Republican, who carried out an unauthorized visit to Kabul and came away with a different view from that portrayed on the television networks. Representative Seth Moulton (D-Massachusetts) and Representative Peter Meijer (R-Michigan) traveled to Qatar on commercial flights and then boarded military planes to reach Kabul on Tuesday, where they spoke to officials and soldiers before taking a flight out. The two were widely quoted in the media Wednesday declaring that they believed Biden should extend the August 31 deadline, and that there were so many people seeking to flee that they could not all be evacuated by September 11. But in a remarkable interview with the New York Times, posted Wednesday night, it was clear that the September 11 quote was taken entirely out of context. Moulton told the Times, Almost every veteran in Congress wants to extend the Aug. 31 deadline, including us, and our opinion on that was changed on the ground, because we started the evacuations so late. Theres no way we can get everyone out, even by Sept. 11. So we need to have a working relationship with the Taliban after our departure. And the only way to achieve that is to leave by Aug. 31. Meijer added that the conditions at the airport were orderly and controlled, not chaotic: There were I think close to 20,000 individuals who were waiting on flights out a day or two before we arrived. When we were there, the Air Force and the other personnel on the ground had so efficiently moved those individuals to intermediate staging locations that there were some people there, but it was by no means an overwhelming number waiting for flights. It was probably in the few hundreds. In one of the few honest or self-critical media comments to appear in recent days, Stephen Collinson of CNN.com wrote: Throughout this crisis, there has been a strong impression that the fury at the President from Washingtons national security, political and journalistic communities over the fate of Afghans left to face possible death at the hands of the Taliban has not been more broadly shared in the general population. The media frenzy has not had a significant impact on popular opinion in the United States, where working people overwhelmingly oppose any renewed American military intervention in Afghanistan and are concerned about the ever-rising toll of infections, hospitalizations and deaths brought on by the surge of the Delta variant of the coronavirus. To get in touch with the World Socialist Web Site to discuss forming a rank-and-file committee, John Deere workers can email deerewrfc@gmail.com or text (484) 514-9797. As contract talks between the United Auto Workers (UAW) and farm and construction equipment giant Deere & Co. entered their second week, workers are expressing anger over being kept in the dark on the status of negotiations by the UAW. Talks between Deere and the UAW began last Tuesday with the current six-year contract expiring on October 1. Some 10,100 workers from plants in Iowa and Illinois, and a Kansas facility, will be covered under the new contract. Deere Harvester Works in East Moline, Illinois (John Deere website) The UAW has told workers nothing. Not a thing has come out, one worker told the WSWS, its all silent. Another worker added, I haven't heard anything either. The UAW has remained publicly silent on negotiations, not publishing anything on contract talks with Deere on its website or Facebook page. It is imposing a blackout on negotiations, with the aim of keeping Deere workers off-guard and preventing them from mobilizing opposition to another sellout contract. The UAW told workers it will hold a strike authorization vote on September 12 and reveal the companys initial offer for feedback from workers. A contract ratification vote will then be held at the end of September, or early October, the workers were told. This is the first time in my 14 years we will have the company's first offer to look at before we vote, a Deere worker told the WSWS. If the UAW is pretending to be democratic it is only because the Solidarity House executives and their regional and local flunkies are keenly aware that Deere workers are determined not to have another sellout agreement rammed down their throats. In 2015, the UAW rammed through the last deal without giving workers a chance to read a single word of it. Instead, the UAW distributed a 17-page highlights document to workers two hours before they voted. The UAW claimed the deal passed by the razor thin margin of 180 votes, amid accusations of vote fraud and workers demands for a recount. Even if the UAW unveils the companys initial offer, this will only be combined with a campaign of lies and intimidation aimed at forcing workers to accept it. Last week, the WSWS published the statement UAW and John Deere meet to negotiate on how to ram through a sellout contract. Thousands of workers have read the statement and many have expressed to the WSWS their determination and readiness to wage a fight to win back concessions handed out by the UAW in previous contracts. The statement made clear that the so-called negotiations between the UAW and Deere are not negotiations between two rival parties, but rather planning meetings between two collaborating interests over how to strangle opposition among workers to impose yet another pro-corporate agreement. The UAW-Deere talks are being led by UAW Vice President Terry Dittes who oversaw the betrayal of a 40-day strike by 46,000 General Motors workers in 2019. The deal signed by Dittes allowed the Detroit automaker to massively expand its low-paid temporary workforce and proceed with the shutdown of three factories, including the Lordstown, Ohio assembly plant. If Deere workers are to prevent another sellout and prepare a real fight to win substantial improvements in pay, benefits and working conditions, they will have to take the conduct of the struggle into their own hands. This means following the example of the Volvo Trucks workers in Virginia and Pennsylvania, and most recently Dana workers by establishing rank-and-file committees, which are controlled democratically by workers themselves and committed to fight for what workers need, not what the company and the UAW says is affordable. The formation of a Deere Workers Rank-and-File Committee will set the stage for a genuine fight back against the company and the union. Conditions have sharply deteriorated after decades of UAW-backed concessions. This is not a good company to work for anymore, a veteran worker at Deeres Harvester Works in western Illinois said. If I hadnt been here as long, I would have left. A lot of new hires are walking out the door. They have sliced the standards for our work, so we work harder for less money. Like several other workers who reached out to the WSWS, the worker said that Deeres CIPP productivity improvement schemethe Continuous Improvement Pay Planwas a major source of dissatisfaction among workers: The company brags about CIPP payouts. The departments with this force you to put your body thru hell. Then the company says, It didnt happen here. They just want machines out the door. Several workers have gotten hurt and have lawsuits, the worker continued. Rumor has it you have to go to Chicago to get a good lawyer thats not in bed with Deere. The union is not strong enough. I dont know, maybe theyre in Deeres pocket too. The company does what they want. Another Deere worker told the WSWS, The last contract was my first experience. I loathe to admit voting yes, but I did, despite my hesitancy. Our local reps had assured me it was a good deal and I foolishly trusted them. Theres lots of issues at my facility, I dont even know if I could list them all, he continued. Safety is something that concerns me personally which gets deflected by both the company and the union safety rep. Too many people and parts crammed into too small of a building, tons of forced overtime, mismanagement issues, and so on. He said the CIPP program pitted workers against each other. The CIPP program steals our hard work and gets teams fighting with each other, he explained. Ive been told the union doesnt want to fight the program. Indeed, CIPP is only one of the myriad of joint labor-management schemes cooked up by the UAW and the corporations over the last 40 years, as the UAW abandoned any resistance to the attacks on workers and was integrated into the structure of corporate management. The formation of a rank-and-file committee is necessary to establish lines of communication and coordinated action with workers at Volvo, Dana, the Big Three automakers and Deere, Caterpillar, Case IH workers throughout the US and internationally. Only in this way can workers prepare an industrial counter-offensive to overturn decades of eroding living standards and working conditions. In a nakedly anti-democratic and self-serving move, the Labor Partys parliamentary caucus this week agreed to assist the Liberal-National Coalition government push four far-reaching electoral bills through parliament with breakneck speed. As a result of Labors complicity, the bills could be rammed through both houses of parliament and become law within days. In fact, the three main bills were rushed through the House of Representatives yesterday. Anthony Albanese addresses ALP conference in March 2021 (Source: YouTube) There has been virtually no public discussion or media coverage on this historic attack, unveiled suddenly last week on the eve of the next federal election, which is due by May next year. The bills contain a host of measures to suppress alternative political parties and the basic rights of voters. Neither the Morrison government nor Labor has offered any explanation as to why these bills have been brought forward now, seemingly out of the blue. But the reason is clear. These bills have been tabled amid the worsening global COVID-19 pandemic, which is producing an immense public health and political crisis in Australia and internationally, now accelerated by the Delta variant. Public support for all the governments responsible for failing to protect the population from this disaster is collapsing off a cliff, as an opinion survey reported last week. This crisis is wracking the entire political order. The underlying fracturing has only intensified since the last election in 2019, in which Labors vote fell to a near-record low, allowing the Coalition to barely cling to office. Due to defections, Prime Minister Scott Morrison no longer has a working majority in parliament, and the prospect looms of another hung parliament, with neither the Coalition nor Labor holding a majority. The most sweeping provision in the bills seeks to strip party registration from every party not currently represented in parliament. It would compel parties to provide lists and details of 1,500 memberstriple the existing requirementwithin three months of the laws passing, all in the middle of widespread lockdowns. Without party registration, federal election candidates for the Socialist Equality Party (SEP) and 35 other currently registered parties would be prevented from having their names and thus identifying their political affiliations on ballot papers. Their candidates would have to stand without any party name, or as undifferentiated and unexplained independents. This represents a direct attack on the basic democratic rights of all political parties. It also violates the essential right of voters to know the political identities and programs of candidates. In particular, it robs them of the ability to cast a conscious vote against the capitalist ruling elite and for the SEPs socialist policies. Labors backing confirms that this is a bipartisan assault on the rights of the population, especially the working class, to organise politically and contest elections to challenge the increasingly discredited and loathed corporate and political establishment. As the Australian Financial Review stated approvingly yesterday, Coalition and Labor will team up to change Australias electoral laws. The SEP has unequivocally condemned these bills and called for a powerful campaign on social media and throughout the working class against them. At the same time, we are appealing to all our supporters and readers to join the SEP to help us defeat this assault. The Coalition and Labor claim that the new 1,500-member rule is now necessary to demonstrate that a party has a genuine base of community support. That makes a mockery of elections themselvestheir purpose is meant to be to gauge the level of voters support! Predictably, the existing parliamentary parties would continue to be exempt from any membership requirement whatsoever. They could well have difficulty nominating 1,500 members, unless they could count MPs, staffers, trade union officials and other office holders. In addition to the drive to deregister most political parties, the bills: Ban parties from using certain names, including socialist or communist, as well as labor, liberal, or green, if a registered party has already claimed that label. That could affect the SEP, as well as other parties, such as the breakaway New Liberals and Liberal Democratic Party. Severely restrict voting rights by limiting periods for pre-poll voting to a maximum of 12 days before elections. Increase jail terms to a draconian three years for the criminal offence of interference with political liberty, which could now be constituted simply by supposed obscene or discriminatory abuse or just harassment. Lower the election expenditure threshold from $500,000 to $100,000 for a non-registered party or group to register as a political campaigner, thus having to file detailed financial records. Give the Electoral Commissioner the power to classify someone as a designated elector who can only cast a declaration (provisional) vote that is subject to subsequent vetting, supposedly to prevent them casting multiple votes. Each of these measures is designed to curtail voting rights, shore up the disintegrating base of support for the major parliamentary parties, and give them a monopoly over the parliamentary system. There is no evidence of significant multiple voting or for the need of any of the other provisions. The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) and courts can already rule whether a partys name can be confused with another party, or implies a false association. The AEC has stated previously that no party can own a common political name. The truth is that new parties have emerged primarily to appeal to the growing numbers of voters who are disgusted by the old parties. Trust in the major political parties fell to an all-time low even before the COVID crisis, with a 2018 survey showing only 16 percent of respondents trusted them. Revealingly, Labor and the Coalition reportedly expressed concern about misuse of pre-poll voting after the May 2019 federal election, claiming that longer periods for voting ahead of election day distorted their campaigns and required more manpower at polling stations. In 2019, a record 4.76 million voters chose to cast early votes and another 1.5 million sent postal votesover 40 percent of registered voters in total. That is not misuse of the electoral legislation, which allows early voting when people are set to be away from their home electorate on polling day, if they are at work or have religious or medical reasons. Rather, it is an expression of peoples wish to be able to vote in a considered manner, without waiting in long lines on polling day, and without being subjected to the endless advertising and propaganda of the corporate-financed parties. The only provision that Labor will not support is the lowering of political campaigner financial disclosure obligations for advocacy, welfare, environmental and other groups that participate in election campaigns. The existing 500-member rule was itself an anti-democratic measure introduced under the Hawke Labor government in 1983 to try to prop up the parliamentary establishment, for which popular support was already crumbling because of growing social inequality and declining working and living conditions. Labors support for the Morrison governments bills is typical of the role of this trade union-backed party. It is in line with Labors constructive assistance, along with the unions, for the corporate and government response to the pandemic, which has been dominated by the prioritising of private profit over lives and public health. The same bipartisan front has been formed on every attack on fundamental democratic rights over the past two decades. This includes the repeated tightening of police-state terrorism laws, the foreign interference legislation to potentially outlaw links to international or overseas parties, and the 20172018 expulsion of members of parliament who were possibly entitled to dual citizenship, effectively disqualifying millions of people with immigrant backgrounds from even nominating for election. Workers at the main library in the Berlin district of Tempelhof-Schoneberg revealed earlier this month that a number of books authored by socialist and anti-fascist authors had been wilfully mutilated. The destruction of the books was discovered at the end of July and made public by the head of the district's libraries, Boryano Rickum, who expressed his opinion that far right extremists were behind the attack. Rickum told the news magazine Der Spiegel that a trainee at the library found a basket containing seven books that had been cut up in such a manner as to make them unreadable. He said: All of them had one thing in common: they critically deal with right-wing social tendencies or relate the biographies of socialists, namely Karl Marx and Clara Zetkin. He concluded: I see a clear right-wing extremist motivation behind the crime. The library head stated, quite correctly: Libraries have to ensure that freedom of expression and freedom of information are guaranteed. So now we have no choice but to fight back. When books are destroyed because of their content, something fundamental is at stake that concerns the whole of society. Library of Tempelhof Rickum declared that the library intended to obtain fresh examples of the destroyed books and put them prominently on display. He encouraged the public to read the books that had been mutilated and expressed his wish that other libraries follow his example. In a short period of time, Rickums tweet revealing the damage to the books went viral with many messages from persons and other libraries expressing their outrage at the attack and expressing their support for the stance taken by the library staff. The library in Neusss posted a photo of its prominent display of a series of books dealing with far-right extremism and the politics of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), and wrote, Last week we heard about the horrific incident at the library in Berlin. We followed the librarys call to highlight the destroyed titles and other thematically appropriate media. In an utterly hypocritical manner, local politicians, including the district councilor for culture Matthias Steuckardt (Christian Democratic Union, CDU), and Berlin's culture senator Klaus Lederer (Left Party) expressed their opposition to the abuse of books. In fact, all of the parties in the German parliament and the Berlin Senate have collaborated politically with far-right extremists and bear direct responsibility for the growing political influence of parties such as the AfD. In the Reinickendorf district assembly in Berlin, the CDU lined up with the AfD last year to impose a discriminatory, anti-Muslim ban on headscarves for schoolgirls, while in the same year the Social Democratic Party (SPD) voted alongside the AfD in the Berlin district assembly of Spandau to defeat a motion calling for the drawing up of a local Wealth Report. In March this year the head of government in the state of Thuringia, Bodo Ramelow (Left Party) used his deciding vote to secure AfD deputy Michael Kaufmann a position as vice president in the state parliament. In an interview with Belltower News, libraries director Rickum responded to the question of whether a parallel could be drawn with the mutilation of books today with the notorious burning of books carried out by the Nazis in 1933. The comparison is obvious, of course, Rickum noted, while declaring that a significant difference was that the book burning in 1933 was carried out at the direct instigation of the state and supported by librarians who, at that time, provided the Nazi regime's henchmen with literature lists. One of the authors of the books damaged in Berlin, Lou Zucker, also drew a parallel with the Nazi assault on culture. The author of a recently published biography of the leading Marxist revolutionary Clara Zetkin, tweeted: In the Tempelhof-Schoneberg library, books were destroyed that deal critically with #nazis and right-wing structures. My biography about Clara Zetkin was amongst them. Books are just paper. But we know the history. I want to ensure the damage is limited to paper!! Zuckers reference to history is entirely appropriate. Her remarks recall the famous line from the play Almansor (1821) written by the outstanding German-Jewish author Heinrich Heine: Where they burn books, they will, in the end, burn human beings too. (Dort, wo man Bucher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen.) Copies of Heine's books were among the many burned on Berlins Opernplatz in 1933, and his warning is now engraved on the site. The extent of the opposition to far-right attacks on culture in Germany was already evident in the broad support on the part of cultural institutions and artists for the Declaration of Many, which declared in 2019, Right-wing populism stands in hostile opposition to the art of the many. Right-wing groups and parties frequently disrupt events, aim to determine repertoires, polemicise against the freedom of art and above all are working on the re-nationalisation of culture. Their disrespectful reaction to people seeking refuge, to dedicated artists and dissidents, clearly shows how they plan to deal with our society should a shift of power in their favour become reality. The far right and neo-Nazis carry out such vile and cowardly attacks on culture and on anti-fascists because they sense that the majority of the population vehemently oppose them. At the same time these reactionary forces are given support by Germanys official parties and are either acquitted or given light sentences for their offences by German judges, blind in the right eye. This powerful opposition to the far right and its cultural barbarism is being systematically undermined not only by Germanys main political parties but also by influential forces in the countrys universities. The burning of books in 1933 took place across Germany at the instigation of the National Socialists. One of the biggest fires took place across the road from the Humboldt University and is referenced briefly by an exhibition currently featuring in the hallway of the universitys main library (Jacob-und-Wilhelm-Grimm-Zentrum). One of the placards on view reads: Many members of Friedrich-Wilhelms Universitat, which was renamed Humboldt Universitat in 1949, adopted National Socialism wholeheartedly, with staff and students participating in the burning of books by Jewish, gay and left-wing writers or by authors who were otherwise deemed unsuitable. At the same time the exhibition fails to mention the role of prominent academics currently active at the university, such as the right-wing extremist professor Jorg Baberowski, who promotes the activities of the far right, has sought to rehabilitate the Nazi apologist Ernst Nolte and is vehemently opposed to socialists and socialism. In February 2020, Baberowski went so far as to physically assault a student at the university and tore down posters of the International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE). Baberowski continues, up until today, to enjoy the support of the Humboldt Universitys President Sabine Kunst, a member of the SPD. Frozen vials of the COVID-19 vaccine (AP Photo/Francisco Seco) On Monday, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that Pfizers COVID-19 mRNA vaccine was granted full authorization for the prevention of COVID-19 disease in people 16 years of age or older. The vaccine, now being marketed under the new name Comirnaty, will still be available to those aged 12 through 15 under the initial emergency use authorization. In the press brief announcing the approval, acting FDA commissioner Dr. Janet Woodcock said, The FDAs approval of this vaccine is a milestone as we continue to battle the COVID-19 pandemic. While this and other vaccines have met the FDAs rigorous, scientific standards for emergency use authorization, as the first FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccine, the public can be very confident that this vaccine meets the high standards for safety, effectiveness, and manufacturing quality the FDA requires of an approved product. In concert with the FDA announcement, President Joe Biden released a statement from the White House urging business leaders, as well as state and local officials, to begin mandating vaccines for their employees. The Pentagon followed suit hours later declaring they would now enforce the vaccine mandates for 1.4 million soldiers and another million civilian employees. Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, told the Los Angeles Times, Youre going to see a lot more groups being more comfortable saying a shot is required. Theyll be more firm about helping people understand that, pure and simple, it is much safer to get the vaccine than to get the disease. As important as the vaccines have been to stem severe disease and death from COVID-19 infections, the FDAs full approval for Pfizer does not mean any real progress in ending the pandemic. Vaccination alone is not enough; it must be combined with a massive public health campaign, including lockdowns as well as masking and social distancing, with the goal of eradication, not mitigation of SARS-CoV-2. At the recent event hosted by the World Socialist Web Site, For a Global Strategy to Stop the Pandemic and Save Lives , Dr. Michael Baker, renowned epidemiologist with the University of Otago in New Zealand, warned, We cannot vaccinate our way out of the pandemic. Even if we had global vaccine access and high coverage, we would still have circulating virus. So, we need to combine vaccine with public health measures. Given the contagiousness of the Delta variant, vaccination will have little impact in suppressing the growth of the circulating virus. Critical modeling analysis conducted by Dr. Malgorzata Gasperowicz, a developmental biologist and researcher at the University of Calgary, Canada, demonstrated that given the present efficacy of the vaccines against the Delta variant, only in combination with moderate public health measures could the growth of the pandemic in the US be brought under one, where, over a period of several weeks, the community outbreaks would be brought to zero. In the current formulation by the White House, the CDC, and the entire political spectrum, the vaccine-only mandate gives free rein to the virus, which will have the final say on the matter, acting on the basis of well-known epidemiological laws. Whether it is the let-it-rip approach advocated by Republican governors, or the mitigation but not eradication approach of Biden and the Democrats, the virus will be able to expand exponentially, as will hospitalizations and deaths. In two short months since the US saw the lowest case and death count, the seven-day moving average has now climbed to 150,000 infections per day with more than 850 people dying each day. On August 24, more than 1,100 people succumbed to the infection. And the current drive to fully open all schools for in-class instruction will only accelerate the present massive surge of infections. The week ending August 19 saw 180,000 COVID-19 cases among children, a 50 percent increase over the previous week, and coming weeks will surpass the highs of the winter, when more than 211,000 children were infected in the week ending January 14, 2021. As evidence through the last 18 months has now clearly demonstrated, children in schools function as a primary catalyst for the waves of infections within communities. Equally concerning is the mounting evidence that over time the COVID-19 vaccines, and in particular, the Pfizer jab, are demonstrating waning efficacy after a few short months. A recent study from the University of Oxford, in the UK, using data obtained from the Office for National Statistics, found that three months after vaccination, the efficacy against symptomatic infections for the Pfizer vaccine had slipped from the mid-90s to 75 percent. The efficacy of AstraZenecas COVID-19 vaccine dropped but at a much slower rate. Extrapolating the data, Oxford projected that Pfizers efficacy would eventually drop below 50 percent, the level typically required to win FDA approval in the first place. The threat the Delta variant poses is best exemplified by the present experiences in Israel, which has fully vaccinated more than 60 percent of its population. It is currently facing a surge of new infections that are also matching previous winter highs. And with these infections, the death toll appears to be keeping pace with trends during previous waves. A spokesman for Pfizer, in response to a question from the press, declared, These latest data from Israel are consistent with the epidemiological trends we have been observing and reinforce the need for a booster dose to re-establish maximum protective efficacy. Since the Israeli government launched a campaign to offer those aged 60 and older a third shot on July 30, approximately 60 percent in this group have received the booster. In the older group, it appears the rates of infection are declining once more, making many in the media and other countries take notice. Yesterday, Israel extended the eligibility for a third dose to those 30 years and older who had received the second dose at least five months prior. With the granting of full approval, the FDA helps clear the way for an influx of people clamoring for booster shots, as physicians will now have more discretion to offer COVID-19 vaccines. While little has been said in the American media or by the Biden administration, when such additional vaccination campaign measures are implemented across the US and Europe, many middle- and low-income nations will be left in the lurch, as they are once more pushed to the back of the line, unable to give most of their citizens even a first shot while people in the wealthy countries get a third one. On September 20, the Biden administration will begin offering boosters for fully vaccinated individuals who received their second dose more than eight months before. However, the current approval, plans for mandates, and then boosters, will do little to stem the present disastrous wave as schools are beginning to admit students by the millions for in-person instruction. No vaccine campaign can win a foot race against the Delta variant without strict mitigation measures and lockdowns to check its spread. Troubling evidence has only confirmed the dangers this virus poses. In a recent analysis conducted by investigators during of the outbreak in Guangdong, China in May, and June of 2021, they found that those infected with Delta strain are more likely to infect others before they become symptomatic than people infected with the earlier version that first emerged in Wuhan. People infected with Delta shed viral particles for almost two days before developing symptoms. Previous data placed the window for asymptomatic shedding at less than one day. Additionally, a recent study from South Korea confirmed that the viral load shed by infected individuals when they first develop symptoms was 300 times higher than with the original virus and remained higher throughout the window of communicability. The rise in the number of breakthrough infections suggests that the neutralizing antibodies in people who are fully immunized are not providing sufficient protection against the Delta variant. The main target for the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines is the receptor binding domain (RBD) and the N-terminal domain (NTD) in the viruss spike protein. A just published study from Osaka, Japan, suggested that if the Delta variant acquires additional mutations beyond the ones it already possessed, it could develop the ability to escape vaccine-induced immunity. The acquisition of other mutations is expected, highlighting the importance of tracking these mutations where they start. According to a report providing explanation of the Osaka study published yesterday in News - Medical, Additional mutations of the Delta variants may make it fully resistant to the immune sera of vaccinated individuals. Thus, the Delta variant is likely to acquire further mutations with increased infectivity and resistance. The authors concluded that though a third round of booster immunization with the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine is currently under consideration, our data suggest that repeated immunization with the wild-type spike may not be effective in controlling the emerging Delta variants. They call for the development of a new vaccine directed against the spike protein of the Delta strain. The implication of these findings means the need to rewind the pandemic clock and develop and produce new vaccines against the Delta variant and once more initiate a new vaccination campaignin other words, vaccination without an all-encompassing public health response can become a never-ending treadmill, with new vaccinations required to guard against ever more virulent and dangerous variants of the virus. The university group of the International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) at Humboldt University (HU), Berlin has once again entered the student parliament with two representatives in this year's elections. The IYSSE received 2.7 percent of the votes cast. The elections took place amid the pandemic that is also hitting thousands of students hard and bringing all the problems of capitalism to a head. Our election result is therefore of great significance, explains Sven Wurm, spokesperson for the IYSSE at Humboldt, who himself won one of the two mandates. Millions of coronavirus deaths, job losses, climate change, the danger of war and fascismall these issues move students here at HU and all over the world. We were the only university group to show a socialist way out of this impasse in our election campaign. That struck a nerve. The IYSSE, the youth and student organisation of the International Committee of the Fourth International, has been represented in the HU Student Parliament (StuPa) for seven years, giving voice to the vast student opposition to the revival of right-wing and militarist ideology at the university. In our election statement, we advocated building an international socialist movement to stop the rise of extreme right-wing forces and a renewed relapse into barbarism. Poster of the IYSSE at Humboldt University The urgency of this perspective was also evident in this year's election campaign. A few weeks before the election, Sven Wurm filed a disciplinary complaint against HU President Sabine Kunst for vehemently backing right-wing attacks on students. In the last StuPa election in 2020, the right-wing radical HU professor Jorg Baberowski had marched around the campus in a rage, tearing down IYSSE election posters and physically attacking and threatening our candidate Sven. Baberowski had already been agitating against students and colleagues on social media. Despite his blatant trivialisation of Nazi crimes and his infamous neo-right salon in the middle of Berlin, Baberowski continues to hold the chair of Eastern European history at HU and has the full backing of the university management, the Berlin Senate (state executive) and the majority of the professoriate. Even three months after Wurm filed the disciplinary complaint, nothing has been done to investigate the allegations against Baberowski and the university president. But students are not prepared to accept this right-wing conspiracy. The IYSSE campaigned strongly against it online and publicised the disciplinary complaint widely. Many fellow students reacted with shock at the extent of the falsification of history and ideological right-wing turn at Humboldt University, which is closely linked to the return of German militarism and the encouragement of far-right networks in the state apparatus. Several student representative bodies, including the student councils at Humboldt and Bremen universities, supported the disciplinary complaint and expressed solidarity with the IYSSE. The main phase of the election campaign coincided with the 80th anniversary of the German war of extermination against the Soviet Union, which began on June 22, 1941. The IYSSE introduced a resolution that was adopted by the student parliament to commemorate the millions of victims and made the monstrous crimes of the Nazis the focus of their first election campaign event. In an online lecture, we demonstrated in detail how Professor Baberowski today trivialises the Nazis policy of extermination in the Second World War. We warned that this falsification of history serves to prepare new wars and crimes. Just how topical this warning is can be seen in the current Bundestag (federal parliament) election campaign, in which the bourgeois parties are crying out for greater military spending and want to use the catastrophe of the Afghanistan war as a pretext for new imperialist adventures. At our second event, members of the IYSSE from Germany and Britain addressed the devastating consequences of the coronavirus crisis and explained why students and youth must base themselves on working-class resistance and a socialist programme to stop the pandemic. This years elections took place under extremely adverse conditions due to the pandemic. While members of the IYSSE used to be extremely active on campus, organising numerous information tables and discussions with fellow students, this time the election campaign shifted to the internet and social media. The postal vote was fraught with bureaucratic hurdles and even had to be repeated in the middle of the summer break because of irregularities. On election day, students could only vote at one polling station on the main campus. The next semester begins during the fourth wave of the coronavirus pandemic. Although the highly contagious Delta variant threatens young people in particular, schools and universities are now reopening with almost no protective measuresa paradise for the virus, a nightmare for pupils and students who will infect themselves and their loved ones. Humboldt University and the other Berlin universities have also announced that they will return to face-to-face teaching. Those who have been vaccinated, tested, or recovered should be able to sit in full lectures and seminar rooms in the autumn without minimum distances, according to the authorities. At the same time, thousands of Berlin students are struggling to make ends meet and have seen nothing at all of genuine coronavirus assistance and adequate support during the pandemic. At Humboldt University, the pandemic has also exposed what decades of cuts in teaching, staff, digital equipment and social support have resulted in. University President Kunst also played a leading role here. While systematically promoting right-wing professors, she imposed rigorous austerity measures directly after taking office in 2016. The coronavirus pandemic acts as a trigger event that raises all existing crises to a new level. Students and young people are looking for a viable perspective against social inequality, war and right-wing radicalism, says Sven Wurm. We will use our strong election result as a prelude to intensive work at HU in the new academic year. We wont allow right-wing ideology and Nazi trivialisation to be tolerated, and well also oppose the dangerous policy of disease control. Join a university group today, become a member of the IYSSE and fight for a socialist future! Schaeffer Hall, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa (Wikimedia Commons) Monday, August 23 marked the first day of classes at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa, with tens of thousands of incoming freshmen and returning students arriving on campus for in-person learning from all across the state, the country and internationally. This influx of students and the accompanying pre-semester activities, such as residence hall move-in, are being done with no mask mandate requirement from the school. While new university President Barbara Wilson has asked students to wear masks and get vaccinated, the rulings of the Iowa Board of Regents in regards to safety from the pandemic on campus are much more revealing. Earlier this summer, the Board declared that it was unlawful for the three largest universities in the stateUniversity of Iowa, Iowa State, and Northern Iowato require mask mandates or proof of vaccination for students and faculty during the fall semester. As for the University of Iowa, it remains the only school in the Big Ten to not require a mask mandate in class. Social distancing will also not be enforced and classes will be filled to capacity with only classes containing 150 or more students to be held online. Perfunctory measures which do not hinder the spread of the airborne COVID-19 virus, like extra hand sanitizer and plexiglass shields, are being implemented along with a free vaccine clinic and free masks to be distributed around campus. Wilson noted in a recent interview that the schools rulings regarding COVID-19 were not a political issue, but a health issue. As has been said numerous times by the World Socialist Web Site, the COVID-19 pandemic and the social crisis that continues to this day is one of enormous political stakes which exemplify the irreconcilable class tensions in society between the capitalist ruling class and the working class. As with many other corporations and institutions, the aim is not to protect students and faculty but instead to risk their lives by forcing them back to work and to school in person to maintain the profits of these billion-dollar universities. And, also like many other reopenings, there has been considerable resistance on the part of educators and students alike. When the University of Iowa announced its plans for the semester earlier in the month, over 500 employees (including hundreds of faculty) signed a petition to the Board of Regents pushing for more stringent policies to mitigate risk. The petition also asked for more online or hybrid teaching options for the fall given the rapid spread of the more infectious Delta variant. The Regents in response said they would only relent to those different teaching methods when there is a legitimate business rationale that serves the best interest of the institution. In other words, the decision to return to remote learning would only occur if the university loses profits in conjunction with the lives and health of its workforce. The effort to hide the immediate lethal threat of the Delta variant and COVID-19 in general from workers and students was apparent in the guidelines sent by the university to faculty regarding their ability to speak about masks and vaccinations in the classroom to students. The original guidelines called for teachers to only discuss these matters in explicit regards to a students health and not in any other capacity. It also stated that any faculty member discussing mask usage or vaccination would only be able to describe their own personal feelings regarding their own decision, not as a statement regarding the use of masks or vaccination in general. A flurry of angry responses from faculty citing this blatant restriction of free speech caused the guidelines to be taken down within only a few days. The university was forced to revise the guidelines and remove this section in the subsequent weeks. Meanwhile, Iowa City has implemented a mask mandate for indoor spaces throughout the area, meaning the university will be the only place in the city where a mask mandate is not required. This inconsistent and disorienting atmosphere will contribute to the already arbitrary and unclear methods being raised by the university to stop the spread of the disease. In regards to the whole state, K-12 schools are not being required to enforce mask mandates, meaning the other schools in Johnson County, where the university is located, will also not be enforcing mask usage or social distancing. As with many other universities, the University of Iowa has claimed the minimal measures it has put in place are sufficient and instead places the blame squarely on students in regards to the success or failure of the in-person semester. Christine Petersen, Director of the Center for Emerging Infectious Disease at the university, said on Iowa Public Radio that she is much more worried about the disease spreading in off-campus gatherings and parties among students than in the classroom which she says is a much safer environment. In a direct address to students she said, We know that college is supposed to be fun and free years of life, but its also when youre making that transition into adulthood. And we really need you to be grownups and take responsibility for your body. The ruling class and its representatives have repeatedly sought to blame students and the working class as a whole for the pandemics continued spread. There is no mention of the destructive and obfuscating policiesunder the rubric of so called herd immunity or mitigationwhich have allowed the disease to spread rampantly amongst the working class, leading to at least 650,000 unnecessary deaths. On Sunday, August 22, the World Socialist Web Site held a meeting with leading scientists from around the world to discuss a scientific program for eradicating COVID-19involving lockdowns, the closure of schools and non-essential businesses with full compensation, in coordination with a global massive vaccination campaign, until the virus is stamped outas the only course of action which will end the pandemic. As the pandemic continues to escalate in even more dangerous ways, the actions taken by institutions like the University of Iowa show a true contempt and disregard for human life by the capitalist class. Students, workers and educators must unite under a program of socialism under the leadership of the international working class in order to save lives. The policies by the University of Iowa and other states and institutions forcing young people and workers back in person with total disregard to their health and safety must be opposed at every turn. Contact the Socialist Equality Party and the International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) today to join this fight. As the Socialist Equality Party candidate for California governor, I call for decisive measures, including an immediate halt to the reopening of schools to stop the spread of the pandemic, eradicate COVID-19 and save countless lives. Nearly 650,000 people in the United States, including some 450 children, have died from the pandemic over the past year and a half. One-tenth of these deaths, more than 65,000, have been in California. The global death toll is approaching 4.5 million officially, while the real figure, based on excess deaths, is more than 10 million. Far from being over, as claimed by the Biden administration in the spring, the pandemic is surging once again. The daily death toll in the US has risen above 1,000, as the more infectious Delta variant spreads throughout the country. In California, new cases are again over 13,000, higher than at any point outside the massive surge between November 2020 and February 2021. Most horrifying is the impact of the Delta variant on children, many of whom cannot yet be vaccinated. Pediatric hospitals in many states are overflowing with patients. More than 1,900 children are currently hospitalized in the US with COVID-19, a record. In addition to dying from the disease, it is estimated that between 10 and 15 percent of children infected can develop symptoms of Long COVID, with severe and still poorly understood consequences for mental health and cognitive development. Under these conditions, the reopening of schoolsin California and throughout the United Statescan be described as nothing other than criminal. The ruling class is carrying out a barbaric experiment with the lives and health of millions of children. The Newsom administration and the media claim that all is well in California due to its higher vaccination rates and mask mandates. They know this is a lie. On August 16, the same day the states largest school district Los Angeles Unified (LAUSD) reopened, Newsoms office issued emergency orders to prepare hospitals and ICUs for an influx of patients. The Democrats know full well that, masked or not, students in schools will become major vectors of the virus. School districts across the state are already experiencing major outbreaks. In just one week of instruction, LAUSD reported 1,478 cases among students and staff. The campaign to recall Newsom has been driven by far-right forces in the Republican Party like radio host Larry Elder, who want to end even the pretense of fighting the pandemic. For this reason, the SEP has called for a No vote on the recall. At the same time, however, Newsom and the Democrats have fully participated and implemented the policies responsible for the massive and ongoing loss of life. It is now the Biden administration that is spearheading the reopening of schools to in-person learning. This is driven by the imperative to keep workers on the job where they can continue to pump out profits for corporations. The entire ruling class is opposed to the necessary measures to end the pandemic once and for all. It has the critical assistance of the trade unionsincluding the American Federation of Teachers, the National Education Association, and the California Teachers Associationwho are fully behind the reopening of schools. This mad policy must be stopped! A policy based on science and saving lives must be initiated! This past weekend, the World Socialist Web Site hosted a panel discussion with leading public health scientific experts who clearly outlined what must be done. The elimination and eradication of the COVID-19 virus is possible, but it requires aggressive public health measures, including the shutdown of schools and nonessential production, universal testing and contact tracing. In the words of Dr. Malgorzata Gasperowicz, a developmental biologist at the University of Calgary, The Delta variant is our wake-up call. We need everything we have in our toolbox to stop it, to slow it down. While vaccination is necessary, it is not sufficient to end the pandemic. Vaccinated people can still transmit the virus, and its further spread guarantees the emergence of new, more infectious and even vaccine-resistant strains. With the assistance of powerful vaccines, Dr. Gasperowicz explained, aggressive public health measures can eradicate the virus in the space of two months. These measures should have been implemented from the beginning. If they had, millions of people would be alive now who are not. To save the lives of millions more, they must be implemented now! The Socialist Equality Party calls for: The immediate shutdown of all schools and nonessential businesses. This must be combined with fully resourced online learning for all students and full income to support workers who cannot work remotely. A serious program of mass testing, contact tracing, and quarantine to track and eliminate any remaining transmission. The provision of adequate protective equipment and infrastructure upgrades to ensure a safe working environment for all essential workers. An immediate moratorium on evictions, loan payments, credit card debts, water, electricity and phone bills, along with emergency housing assistance to Californias homeless population. These measures must be paid for with the massive fortunes accumulated by the ruling class which have grown enormously over the past year and a half. The pandemic cannot be eradicated in California alone. It requires national and global coordination, since the spread and evolution of the virus in any location risks reinfection and new outbreaks everywhere. What has blocked the implementation of a scientific and rational program to eradicate the virus is the fact that at every point the necessary measures to save lives have been subordinated to the profit interests of the rich. Both the Democrats and the Republicans, along with their counterparts globally, represent the capitalist ruling class. It is the working classeducators, parents, autoworkers, logistics workers, health care workers and the entire working class internationallythat must be organized and mobilized to put an end to the needless suffering produced by the pandemic. I call on all workers in California, including parents and educators, to build rank-and-file safety committees to fight for the shutdown of schools and nonessential businesses. This must be connected to the development of an independent political movement of the working class, in opposition to the Democrats and Republicans, that is directed at the ruling class and the capitalist system. Vote for me, David Moore, in the California recall election and join the SEP to take up the fight for socialism! On Saturday , August 28, at 2:00 pm Pacific Time, David Moore will be speaking at the meeting of the West Coast Educators Rank-and-File Committee to discuss the perspective of the SEP in the California recall elections. Striking Motherson workers hold food plates to symbolize their plight. (WSWS) Anger is developing among workers at the Motherson Automotive Technologies and Engineering (MATE) plant in Sriperumbudur, in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, over the betrayal of their 11-day strike by the Maoist-led Left Trade Union Center (LTUC). On August 14, the LTUC called off the strike, which was limited to permanent workers, and ordered them to return to work, according to an agreement it reached with Motherson management in the presence of the Assistant Commissioner of Labour (ACL) the previous day. The decision was implemented arbitrarily without the union presenting the agreement to the workers, let alone their voting on it and approving the ending of the strike. MATE employs more than 1,600 workers, including over 300 permanent workers, 450 contract workers, 224 trainees and 350 government-sponsored NEEM workers. MATE is the polymer division of Motherson Sumi Systems Ltd (MSSL), whose mother company formed a joint venture with Japanese-based Sumitomo Wiring Systems. Motherson operates in 42 countries outside India and employs over 135,000 workers. Although the Motherson workers raised eleven demands when they launched their strike August 3, the LTUC leadership reduced them to one single issue in negotiations with management: that the company provide edible, worm-free food to all workers, including night-shift workers, who were only given a cake and banana. At the conclusion of negotiations, management agreed to provide food for nightshift workers, while insisting workers on dayshift and general shift were already receiving decent food. At the unions request, MATE management also agreed not to take any disciplinary action against workers who went on strike. The strikers original eleven demands included tea and toilet breaks, hygienic toilet facilities, withdrawal of disciplinary action against workers who have been victimized for demanding decent food, and 30-minute breaks for night shift workers after four hours on the job. They also demanded paid leave for COVID-19-infected workers with the full cost of treatment to be borne by the company, the dropping of disciplinary measures against workers who could not come to work without factory buses and public transport during pandemic lockdowns, and pick-up bus facilities for workers traveling from distant places like Arakkonam, Walaja, Chengalpattu and Seiyaru. The LTUC agreed to end the strike, by abandoning all those demands. When workers returned to the plant, they were furious to learn that even the demands the union claimed management had agreed to were not being honored by the company. The nightshift was abolished for the workers who joined strike and they were integrated into the first and second shifts. The non-permanent workers, including contract workers and trainees, who remained on the nightshift were not provided food. Workers also saw the casual workers, who were recruited as scabs by management during the strike period, were still working there. On their return-to-work, the strikers were also arbitrarily moved around to different departments. Consequently, workers felt let down not just by management, but also by the Maoist LTUC leadership, which was in a hurry from day one of the strike to wind it up and send the workers back to work. Workers posted angry messages on social media denouncing the LTUC leadership and its betrayal of the strike. One worker said: Leader! Where are our 11 demands? When we returned to work on August 14, it seemed to me nothing has changed at the plant. We have submitted 11 demands to the management. Out of these how many demands were agreed by the management and put its signature for? Tell us, leader?! During the 11 days strike we came along behind you wherever you wanted us to come. But why did you call off the strike without consulting the workers? It was at the initiative of the workers you called for the strike. But now even without winning the single most demanddecent food for allyou told the workers to return to work? Another worker asked: Tell us, leader! In how many days the management has agreed to implement all the 11 demands? The workers who raised these questions were bullied by the LTUC leadership, which told them that they are not allowed to question the leadership and are free to leave the union. One worker was summarily removed from the LTUCs WhatsApp group on the instruction of LTUC head S. Kumaraswamy. These undemocratic actions have further intensified tensions between the union leadership and rank-and-file workers. There is a growing mood of militancy among MATE workers and some workers have expressed their readiness to resume strike action to win their demands. The Maoist LTUC felt obliged to call the August 3 strike to maintain a degree of credibility among the rank-and-file. In 2019, the LTUC betrayed a militant, more than four-month-long strike at Mothersons Sriperumbudur plant, ordering workers to return to their jobs without winning a single one of their demands. As part of its capitulation to management, the LTUC refused to insist on the reinstatement of 49 workers who were suspended and later fired following a rigged inquiry. On August 18, five days after the sellout agreement was signed between the company and LTUC, a union delegation responded to mounting anger among militant workers by holding talks with management to complain about its failure to fulfill its written promises. Ramana, the chief management representative in the tripartite talks, told the union delegates that the company can provide only tiffin (a snack or light tea time meal) for nightshift workers either at 10 PM when they are about to start their shift or at 5:30 AM as they are about to leave work. The company representative added that cake and banana would also be provided at 1:30 AM, together with tea at various inbetween times. The union delegates felt compelled to reject this offer for fear that workers would not accept it, and instead reiterated their demand for a full and decent meal around 2:30 AM as workers would feel hungry at that time. Union delegates also raised the failure of the management to fulfill other agreed demands, including the ending of disciplinary action against striking workers and the provision of tea breaks for workers. They also pointed to the placing of returning strikers in different departments as part of a job rotation scheme. However, MATE management postponed any discussion on these issues to a future round of talks. Analyzing the MATE workers strike, the World Socialist Web Site warned on August 11: Today, the striking Motherson workers face a war on two fronts. On the one hand, they confront MATE management, which is determined to maintain its brutal work regimen at the plant. In this, MATE has the full backing of Tamil Nadus new Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) state government, which won the election with the support of the mainline Stalinist parties and has pledged to ensure the states auto sector remains competitive for international investors. On the other front, the Motherson workers find themselves pitted against the leadership of the LTUC. Whilst the Maoist-led LTUC claims to be more militant than the unions led by the Stalinist CPM [Communist Party of India (Marxist)] and CPI [Communist Party of India], it shares their vehement opposition to broadening the struggle and, like them, seeks to divert workers into futile appeals for government, Labour Department support. The latest betrayal carried out by the Maoist LTUC vindicates the warnings made by the WSWS. Like all the trade unions, the LTUC has proven incapable of fighting for even the workers most basic demands. To take their struggle forward, Motherson workers should establish a rank-and-file strike committee to broaden their struggle, including by mobilizing the contract and trainee workers, and arm it with a socialist program. A precondition for this struggle is a political and organisational break from the unions and their affiliated parties, including the Stalinist CPM and CPI, and the Maoists. The strongest allies of Motherson workers are autoworkers and industrial workers across India and internationally, who are joining a global upsurge of workers struggles to fight for better wages and working conditions, and to defend jobs. A Motherson workers rank-and-file committee should issue a special appeal to autoworkers in the United States, Europe, and throughout Indias auto sector to unify their struggles in an international counter-offensive against the globally mobile corporations. Olymel, one of Canadas largest meatpacking companies, is threatening to eliminate 500 jobs at its hog slaughtering and processing plant in Vallee-Jonction, Quebec, if the plants 1,100 striking workers dont surrender to its demands for a concessions contract by this Sunday. On strike since April 28, the Vallee-Jonction Olymel workers last week rejected by a margin of 57 percent a tentative contract negotiated and endorsed by the Olymel Vallee-Jonction Workers Union (STOVJ), which is affiliated with the Confederation of National Trade Unions (CNTU). Striking workers from Olymels Vallee-Jonction, Quebec pork processing plant join their class brothers and sisters from Exceldor on their picket line on June 2 (STOVJ Facebook page) In repudiating the tentative agreement, the Olymel strikers defied a corporate-media intimidation campaign that has sought to blame them for the difficulties faced by pork producers who cant bring their hogs to slaughter. Olymel has responded to the rejection vote with an escalating campaign of bullying and threats. First, it provocatively announced that it couldnt offer workers a penny more because to do so would place the plants viability at risk. Only if workers agreed to extend the duration of the next contract beyond the currently proposed six years could this change, it insisted. Then on Tuesday, it announced the impending elimination of the afternoon shift, and almost half of the jobs at the Vallee-Jonction facility. This decision will come into force if no agreement is concluded and accepted by union members by midnight Sunday, August 29, declared Olymel management. Quebecs unabashedly pro-big business Coalition Avenir Quebec (CAQ) government has been working behind the scenes for weeks to force an end to the strike on the companys terms. On Wednesday, Labour Minister Jean Boulet announced on social media that he was summoning union and management representatives to his office Thursday morning. 'The [two] parties have to reach an agreement, declared Boulet. It has to stop.' The labour minister suggested that he will press for the appointment of an arbitrator with the power to dictate the terms of the next contract on all outstanding issues. These include wages, vacations, the establishment of a proper pension plan, and the length of the workday for nightshift workers. Both the company and the CAQ government are relying on the STOVJ and CNTU, which have isolated and sought to demobilize the militant Olymel workers, to bring a quick end to the strike. The Olymel workers, who have been forced to toil under unsafe conditions throughout the pandemic, walked off the job nearly four months ago determined to make substantial gains, including a significant catch up wage increase. In 2007 and 2015 the STOVJ ended strikes by accepting concessions contracts that have reduced workers wages and benefits by more than 40 percent in real terms. The companys refusal to address the workers catch up' wage demand was a major reason the proposed contract was decisively rejected by the rank-and-file. The union-backed tentative agreement also included rollbacks on working conditions. For example, as one striker explained on social media, it would have stripped workers of the right to choose their vacation dates. Throughout the strike, the STOVJ has kept its members in the dark about its negotiations with Olymel. The tentative agreement was reached on the night of August 13-14, and only presented to workers on the afternoon of August 16, just before the ratification vote. Due to this anti-democratic procedure, workers had no time to properly analyze the proposed contracts contents and discuss it among themselves. However, it was so obviously a surrender to Olymel that workers nonetheless voted it down. The union censored its Facebook page to delete comments that denounced its attempt to stampede workers into ending the strike, including two comments by a WSWS reporter calling for rejection of the agreement on the basis that workers did not have enough time to analyze it. The No voted stunned and angered both Olymel management and the union bureaucrats. When the vote result was announced, the August 16 meeting turned stormy as workers accused the union executive of neglecting the interests of rank-and-file members. STOVJ President Martin Maurice responded with a vulgar tirade and threatened the executive would resign en masse. The anger of the STOVJ officials was thus directed not at the company and the brutal conditions of exploitation it imposes on Olymel workers, but at the workers for daring to rebel against those conditions and the rotten agreements negotiated by the union. Olymel and the government also reacted with fury to the workers' courageous resistance. An Olymel vice-president immediately threatened to curtail the plants operations, claiming that the company is at the end of its ability to pay and that the plants viability and sustainability is in jeopardy. These are lies. Olymel is a division of the Quebec-based agribusiness giant Sollio (formerly the Coop federee), which had sales of more than $8 billion in 2020. Olymel alone had profits of more than $234 million in 2020. If the workers' demands enrage management, it is because they threaten the viability of the companys profits and their high salaries and bonuses. Throughout the dispute, Olymel has received support from the Quebec Pork Producers Federation (FPPQ) and the Union des producteurs agricoles (Quebec farmers union). Reprising the arguments the CAQ government used to attack and intimidate striking poultry slaughterhouse workers at Exceldor, another agri-food giant, they have claimed that the strike is forcing hog producers to slaughter livestock and waste food. (See: Quebec establishment demands end to strike by food processing workers, invoking plight of chickens for slaughter ) FFPQ President David Duval called the Olymel workers rejection of the tentative contract a slap in the face for producers, and called for Quebec Premier Francois Legault to personally intervene to force an end to the strike at the Vallee-Jonction plant. A multi-millionaire and former Air Transat CEO, Legault routinely demonstratively sides with corporations in labour disputes, and in recent weeks has threatened to criminalize threatened strikes by construction and public sector workers. On August 18, Legault responded on Twitter, appealing to the parties' sense of responsibility to resolve the dispute, and soon after Boulet appointed a special mediator. Now, with his summoning of union and company representatives to his Quebec City office Thursday morning, Boulet intends to work in tandem with the company to force a quick end to the strike. The labour minister has himself repeatedly raised the possibility of adopting a strikebreaking law against the Vallee-Jonction workers, only to dismiss it on the grounds this is a private dispute. The reality is the government would much prefer using its union partners to impose a pro-company collective agreement on the Olymel workers, so as not to run the risk of transforming a strike at a single factory into a wider and overtly political struggle by criminalizing it. As if to highlight where the governments sympathies lie, it granted Olymel $150 million in public funds, in the form of an 'investment, on May 18, when the strike was about to enter its fourth week. The Olymel strikers should be under no illusion: they are fighting not just their own ruthless employer, but the corporate media, the CAQ government and the entire ruling establishment, who all fear that their militant anti-concessions struggle could spark far broader social discontent, under conditions where the pandemic has dramatically intensified social inequality. The Olymel strikers must also recognize that their own union is fully participating in this anti-worker conspiracy. The STOVJ and CNTU have done nothing to extend the strike. They have issued no call to the well over 10,000 workers at other Olymel plants in Quebec, Ontario and Alberta, and have responded to the companys threats to axe 500 jobs by pleading for further negotiations. In 2007, the union capitulated to a company threat to close the Vallee-Jonction slaughterhouse by accepting sweeping concessions. No doubt, it is now readying to present the membership with a new tentative agreement that will differ from the rejected one only by a few commas. The struggle at Olymel can only be won if workers break the isolation imposed by the STOVJ and CNTU. A crucial first step is the formation of a rank-and-file committee, independent of and opposed to the corporatist union apparatus. Such a committee should turn to their natural allies, their class brothers and sisters in Quebec, the rest of Canada, and internationally, with the aim of making the Olymel strike the spearhead of a working-class counteroffensive against all concessions, production speed-ups and job cuts and for improved working conditions for all. On May 25, US President Joe Biden publicly embraced the conspiracy theory that COVID-19 may have been released from Chinas Wuhan Institute of Virology, ordering the US intelligence agencies to produce a report within 90 days into the potentially man-made origins of the disease. Three months later, the US intelligence agencies have failed to produce a shred of evidence to substantiate claims by the Trump administration, Biden administration and every major US media outlet that a lab leak is a plausible scenario. This was despite what was, according to media reports, a giant US effort. On August 5, CNN reported that the US was examining a giant catalog of information [that] contains genetic blueprints drawn from virus samples studied at the lab in Wuhan, China. To process the massive amount of data in its possession, US intelligence agencies were relying on supercomputers at the Department of Energys National Labs, a collection of 17 elite government research institutions. In its reporting, CNN strongly indicated that the United States had carried out a cyberattack on medical and scientific institutions, writing the machines involved in creating and processing this kind of genetic data from viruses are typically connected to external cloud-based serversleaving open the possibility they were hacked. And after all this, what are the findings? The report was, in the massaged words of the New York Times write-up, defined by an absence of conclusions. It did not, in the words of the Wall Street Journal, yield a definitive conclusion. Both newspapers claim to be passing on the statements of senior officials. The Times and the Journal claim that the intelligence agencies could not come to a conclusion due to Chinas refusal to continue to cooperate with international investigations and Chinas refusal to give access to certain data sets. However, neither report mentioned CNNs reporting about US access to a giant catalog of secret data, and why, if the US had access to the data being hidden by China, nothing was found. The reason why the US intelligence agencies failed to find anything is simple: There is no evidence, secret or otherwise, that the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) has anything to do with the origins of COVID-19. More than half a year since the Trump State Department released a fact sheet claiming that researchers at the WIV showed symptoms, prior to the outbreak of the pandemic, consistent with common seasonal illnesses, there has not been a single piece of evidencewhether made public or even hinted at--that substantiates the lab leak theory. In March of this year, the World Health Organization (WHO) team investigating the origins of COVID-19 said in its report that it had seriously considered the lab leak hypothesis but declared it extremely unlikely based on the absence of evidence. The report expressed willingness to follow up on new evidence supplied around possible laboratory leaks, but since then, none has been provided. The members of the team found no evidence for leads to follow up, and that remains so to this day, they wrote in an article published in Nature on Wednesday, timed to correspond with the submission of the intelligence agencies report. The scientists warned that the United States single-minded efforts to blame China for the pandemic were seriously undermining the fight to determine the actual origins of the disease. They wrote, The search for the origins of SARS-CoV-2 is at a critical juncture. There is willingness to move forward from both the WHO international team and the Chinese team. But as time passes, SARS-CoV-2 antibodies wane, while farms that provide wild animals to the public are now closed and the animals have been culled, making any evidence of early coronavirus spillover increasingly difficult to find. We were getting a little concerned that there really is virtually no debate about the bulk of the recommendations that are not related to the lab hypothesis, and of course theres a lot of discussion of the lab story, particularly coming from the US, Marion Koopmans, a Dutch virologist and member of the WHO delegation, told the New York Times. Our concern is that because of that emphasis, the rest doesnt get any more attention. In the face of the United States failure to provide any evidence to back up its inflammatory conspiracy theory, the US media has turned its focus to accusing China of promoting its own inflammatory conspiracy theories. There is no merit to the claims by figures within China that a lab leak by the US military is responsible for the pandemic. However, everything that the US media now accuses China of doing applies with even more validity to the US media. In a report placed far higher than the article reporting the US intelligence agencies failure to find evidence of a laboratory origin of the coronavirus, the New York Times wrote yesterday: When a conspiracy theory started circulating in China suggesting that the coronavirus escaped from an American military lab, it had largely stayed on the fringe. Now, the ruling Communist Party has propelled the idea firmly into the mainstream... Beijing is peddling groundless theories that the United States may be the true source of the coronavirus, as it pushes back against efforts to investigate the pandemics origins in China. The disinformation campaign started last year, but Beijing has raised the volume in recent weeks, reflecting its anxiety about being blamed for the pandemic that has killed millions globally. These lines would be entirely correct if re-written as follows: When a conspiracy theory started circulating in the United States suggesting that the coronavirus escaped from a Chinese military lab, it had largely stayed on the fringe. Now, the ruling Democratic Party has propelled the idea firmly into the mainstream... Washington is peddling groundless theories that the Wuhan Institute of Virology may be the true source of the coronavirus, as it pushes back against efforts to investigate the pandemics origins... The disinformation campaign started last year, but Washington has raised the volume in recent weeks, reflecting its anxiety about being blamed for the pandemic that has killed millions globally. The Wuhan Lab conspiracy theory, which originated in the fascist circles of Chinese expatriates around Steve Bannon and the far-right Epoch Times newspaper, has been promoted by the Biden White House, the New York Times and the Washington Post because it serves a pressing need for American capitalism. Nearly 650,000 people are dead in the United States from COVID-19, and millions more have been either seriously sickened or lost a loved one. As workers demand an end to the pandemic through the eradication of COVID-19, there will be calls for accountability from the political figures who sacrificed human lives in the name of preserving private profit. Workers must and will draw the conclusion that the responsibility for this disaster lies not with China but with American capitalism. Spanish schoolchildren (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti) Though over 10,000 coronavirus cases are recorded in Spain every day, the Socialist Party (PSOE)-Podemos government plans to send all children back to in-person education at the start of September. The decision to fully reopen schools, even as the virus still circulates widely, poses immense dangers to children, educators and parents across Spain and internationally. The start of the new school term last autumn precipitated an enormous upsurge in infections and deaths. Before schools even reopen, however, average daily cases this year are now more than double what they were a year ago. Soaring infection rates are hitting younger age groups particularly hard. Among school-aged children ages 12 to 19, the 14-day incidence rate exceeds 600 per 100,000 people. In five of Spains 17 regions, this measure surpasses 1,000 per 100,000, meaning more than 1 percent of young people in these areas is suffering from COVID-19. These figures are significantly higher than the rate for the population as a whole, which stands at a still dangerously high 292 per 100,000. Though official case numbers have fallen for the last several weeks, an average of around 10,000 people are still being infected every day. Deaths are continuing to climb. Last Friday closed with the highest weekly deaths in Spains fifth wave, with 660 deaths. According to the Instituto de Salud Carlos III, in the three weeks from July 26 to August 15, 82,587 children and adolescents aged between 5 and 19 were infected with the virus. Using a recent study published in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health showing that around 4.4 percent of children aged 5 to 17 infected with coronavirus contract Long COVID, this amounts to roughly 3,600 of them suffering persistent COVID. Under these conditions, the PSOE-Podemos governments reckless reopening of schools in only two weeks endangers the lives of tens of thousands of children. It is not the result of a mistaken policy, but part of an international drive based on the policy of the capitalist class to force parents back to work in unsafe conditions to further extract profits from the working class and finance skyrocketing corporate and bank bailouts. Sending students back to school last year led to three new waves of infection. In June last year, Prime Minister Sanchez made the now-infamous statement: We have defeated the virus. At that time, excess deaths due to the pandemic stood at 48,000. Over the following year, as the PSOE-Podemos government reopened schools in September, over 52,000 people would die needlessly. The colossal surge led to a quarter million infections each day last January. The PSOE-Podemos governments staggering indifference to human life confirms the British Medical Journal s characterization of the ruling elites pandemic policy as social murder. Responsibility lies above all with the left populist Podemos party. Having promised radical change and an end to austerity, Podemos became the PSOEs chief co-conspirator in the ruling elites pandemic policy. The reopening of schools takes places as even so-called mitigation measures (nightly curfews, mask mandates, banning of gatherings of more than 10 people) are lifted. Last month, at the appeal of the far-right Vox party, Spains Constitutional Court ruled that COVID-19 lockdown measures imposed from March to June 2020 were unconstitutional. Soon after, several regional courts ruled against nightly curfews, most recently last week in Catalonia. There, the courts ended the COVID curfew, banning the Catalan governments grossly inadequate attempt to lower the incidence rate through nightly curfews in 148 cities and towns in the region. The PSOE-Podemos government is not only forcing parents to send children back into unsafe schools, but is even scaling down, or even removing outright, the minimal social distancing measures that existed last school year. While masks will remain compulsory for all children above 6 years of age, social distancing, nominally still maintained, has been reduced to only 1.2 metres (4 feet). This reduction in required social distancing will allow schools to reopen at full pre-pandemic capacity, junking already inadequate class-size limits imposed in previous terms. Infant schools will accommodate up to 25 pupils per class (compared to 20 last term), and primary schools up to 30 (up from 25). Secondary schools and post-16 education centres will return to class sizes of 30 and 35, respectively. This takes place as only 18 percent of adolescents aged 12 to 19 are fully vaccinated. No vaccines have yet been approved for children under the age of 12. This will leave the most vulnerable to infection, serious illness, and even death. Moreover, thousands of children and teenagers infected over the summer will begin the school term with lasting COVID-19 symptoms: extreme fatigue, chest pain, headaches, stomach aches, problems with concentration, dizziness and heart palpitations. Tens of thousands more will contract the virus as schools open and children are herded into crowded classrooms. If the PSOE-Podemos government can proceed with this criminal policy, the political equivalent to calling for children to be sent into burning buildings, it is above all due to the role of the trade unions and pseudo-left parties which work as foot soldiers for Podemos. Spains two largest unions, the Workers Commissions (CC.OO) and General Union of Labour (UGT), have said nothing. Their main focus in recent months has been to oversee billions of euros in corporate bailouts being funnelled from Brussels to Spains corporations and banks, while negotiating plant closures and tens of thousands of redundancies. Likewise, the pseudo-left Workers Revolutionary Current (CRT) has maintained a complicit silence on the so-called fifth wave of the pandemic, which has infected more than 900,000 people and killed over 2,000. Over the last month, it has not published a single article on its Izquierda Diario website addressing the risk of COVID and the threat to children as schools reopen. Their only recent coverage of the pandemic has been two articles solidarising themselves with anti-health pass protests in France called with the support of the far-right. While French President Emmanuel Macrons policy is anti-scientific and insufficient to halt the spread of the pandemic, the CRTs opposition to it does not stem from a principled call for a scientifically-guided struggle to eradicate the virus. In reality, it is aligned with the ruling class herd immunity policy in all its fundamentals, denouncing social distancing as authoritarian and repressive. Throughout the pandemic, the Morenoites have denounced social distancing measures such as lockdowns as authoritarian and palliative. Last September, the CRT defended the policy of reopening schools, calling for a safe return to education centres, all while acknowledging that the safety of teachers and students cannot be guaranteed. During the fifth wave, they launched a politically criminal campaign encouraging youth to pour back into nightclubs and bars. The International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) has launched an international campaign to eradicate the virus, based on the policies advanced by epidemiologists and other scientists. Eradication entails the deployment of every weapon in the arsenal of measures to combat COVID-19through masking, social distancing, mass testing, vaccination and the shutdown of schools and non-essential production, coordinated on a global scale, to stamp out the virus once and for all. The ICFI, in support of this programme, calls on educators and other workers to form rank-and-file safety committees in every school and workplace, independent of the trade unions and the PSOE-Podemos government, to coordinate the struggle to stop the reopening of schools and end the pandemic. The hospital system in Sydney is in its deepest crisis in years, as the number of COVID patients grows rapidly and daily coronavirus infections continue to exceed previous records multiple times per week. Some of the largest hospitals in the country are being compelled to curtail their services and activate emergency plans, amid warnings of a possible breakdown of healthcare in Australias most populous city. The situation is the direct and foreseeable product of the criminal, pro-business policies of governments, including the New South Wales (NSW) state administration of Premier Gladys Berejiklian. For more than two months, the government has allowed the highly-infectious Delta variant to spread throughout Sydney, as it has rejected workplace shutdowns and other measures demanded by epidemiologists. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian (Screenshot, ABC News) The consequence is the worst outbreak in Australia since the pandemic began. Today, NSW reported 1,029 new cases, most in Sydney, the first time any jurisdiction in the country has registered a four-digit case tally. With infections still tending to double roughly every eleven days, the state is on track to record several thousand cases per day by the end of next month. Under these conditions, the entire focus of the NSW and federal Liberal-National Coalition governments, backed by state and federal Labor representatives, is for a reopening of the economy once vaccination rates reach 70 percent of the adult population, sometime in October. As is the case internationally, the ruling elite is insisting that workers and young people must learn to live with the virus, in a homicidal program that will lead to even greater illness and death. This program will lead to a catastrophe, as it has in countries such as Italy and India, where the healthcare systems were completely overwhelmed. Already, there are 698 COVID-19 cases admitted to NSW hospitals, with 116 people in intensive care units (ICUs), 43 of whom require ventilation. A week ago, on August 19, there were 474 COVID patients, 82 of them in ICUs and 25 needing the use of a ventilator to breathe. Already, ICUs in NSW are at 80 percent capacity, with COVID cases accounting for 17 percent. Nationally, there are just 2086 ICU beds, for a population of some 25 million, of which 1740 are occupied. The strain is greatest in the working-class suburbs of western and southwestern Sydney, which have been the epicentre of infections for most of the current outbreak. Westmead, the states second largest hospital, received 280 COVID patients last week alone. On Tuesday night, the facility, in Sydneys west, activated a code-yellow, an alert indicating that demand could not be met by internal resources alone and that a disaster management response was required. An internal memo, announcing the measure, outlined an immediate response, which included a reduction of ambulance arrivals with COVID patients for 24 hours, the transfer of some critically-ill patients to other hospitals and an urgent review, including into care capacity. Paramedics have reported being turned away from Westmead with COVID patients on Wednesday. Blacktown Hospital issued a similar alert that afternoon. Yesterday, the Sydney Morning Herald reported that both facilities are preparing makeshift triage units to process COVID-positive patients when they arrive. Some patients at Westmead, including those in the cardiothoracic and geriatric wards are being transferred to the nearby Westmead Private Hospital. The activation of the emergency plans came as paramedics reported being forced to wait for hours with COVID-infected individuals, and of being turned away from multiple hospitals, while working shifts of up to 18-hours. COVID positive patients told of being treated in the back of ambulances in the car park of Westmead Hospital for up to 12 hours. The crisis is not limited to one or two facilities, with 25 of the states public hospitals treating COVID patients. This month, there have also been a spate of outbreaks within the hospitals themselves, including at Liverpool Hospital, Canterbury Hospital, St George Hospital and Nepean Hospital. At least one hundred infections have been acquired within hospitals, by patients receiving treatment for other conditions, resulting in at least 16 deaths, including 11 at Liverpool Hospital alone. The possibility of a bed shortage is coinciding with warnings of a staffing crisis. Over the past month, reports have consistently indicated that at least one thousand health workers, including doctors and nurses, have been in isolation at any given time, after having been potentially-exposed to the virus. During the initial stages of the Nepean Hospital outbreak, some staff were compelled to continue working without adequate personal protective equipment (PPE), despite having come into contact with COVID-infected mental health patients. Earlier this week, management at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital sent a letter to staff, warning of a possible supply issue with N95 masks, and advising that a review into stocks was underway. In addition to those in hospital, private and public medical facilities are managing a ballooning number of COVID outpatients. Taken together, the total of COVID-infected people being treated by the NSW health system stands at over 1,500, a figure growing by roughly 200 everyday. Disturbingly, a growing number of fatalities are occurring in homes. That includes all three deaths announced today, among men in their 30s, 60s and 80s. On Tuesday, a woman in her 30s died in her home in the western suburb of Emerton, while a 27-year-old man perished at home in the southwestern Fairfield area. The deaths have occurred as the states contact-tracing system has broken down. Everyday, the vast majority of infections are being reported as under investigation, meaning the authorities do not know the source of transmission. At the NSW state government press conference yesterday morning, a journalist raised that they are aware of an entire family that had tested positive to COVID, but was not contacted by authorities five days after notification of their result. At the same conference, NSW Chief Medical Officer Dr Kerry Chant complained that too many people were going to get COVID tests and that this was delaying results. The statement presented those seeking an examination as little more than a public nuisance, even though cases are being recorded throughout the city and the previous advice has been for anyone with concerns to be tested. It amounted to an extraordinary admission of the bankruptcy of the NSW testing and tracing regime, and yet another attempt to blame ordinary people for government failures. Each day, Premier Berejiklian and Health Minister Brad Hazzard vaguely assert that the state can cope with any level of hospitalisation, a claim belied by the crisis that has already developed. As the graphs below show, however, the rates of hospitalisation and of those requiring intensive treatment are outpacing those registered during the COVID surge in the neighbouring state of Victoria, mid-to-late last year. In that outbreak, the state Labor government only instituted a stringent stage four lockdown when the hospital system was on the brink of collapse in August. This graph shows the levels of hospitalisation in the two outbreaks: This, the demand for ventilators and ICU beds: Not only is the NSW state government refusing to implement a genuine lockdown, it is moving to rapidly lift the inadequate restrictions currently in place. Today, to mark the arbitrary figure of six million vaccination doses administered in the state, Berejiklian announced that fully-vaccinated people outside hotspot local government areas in the west and southwest of Sydney will be permitted to gather in groups of five outdoors. A full reopening is set to begin in October, based on the figure of 70 percent of adult vaccinations, and to be accelerated at the 80 percent mark. Berejiklian, together with Prime Minister Scott Morrison, have declared that this will result in a sharp increase in infections, hospitalisations and deaths. They have insisted, however, that this is necessary, because the population must live with the virus, and the economy, i.e., the activities of major corporations, must return to normal. The state and federal Labor parties have all endorsed the plan, with state and territory Labor leaders participating in its adoption during meetings of the National Cabinet. Modelling released this week by University of Western Australia epidemiologist Dr Zoe Hyde found that an end to lockdowns and a full reopening, at vaccination rates of 80 percent, could result in 25,000 deaths across the country, and 270,000 cases of long COVID. Under conditions in which at least a third of infections during the current outbreak have been among children and teenagers, Mark Duncan-Smith, the Western Australian president of the Australian Medical Association, has warned that a reopening based on adult vaccination rates alone would be bordering on child abuse. He pointed to the situation in Israel and large parts of the southern United States, where paediatric ICUs are full with children who are grievously ill as a result of COVID infection. Around 7,000 Toll truck drivers will strike for 24 hours on Friday. The nationwide strike was called on Monday after 94 percent of Transport Workers Union (TWU) members at the company voted in favour of industrial action. The dispute is over a new enterprise agreement (EA), currently being negotiated between Toll and the TWU. The previous EA expired in June 2020, but bargaining was deferred until April 2021 in a union-management deal that also allowed the company to slash jobs in the event of any downturn in volume as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. In exchange, workers were granted ten days paid pandemic leave. Toll facilities in Burnie, Tasmania (Source: Toll Group) In fact, Tolls annual revenue increased by almost one third to $6.3 billion for the year ending March 2021, while workers were subjected to a pay freeze as a result of the delayed negotiations. The company responded to the workers vote to strike with a marginally increased pay rise offer, up from 1.5 percent in 2021 and 1.75 in 2022 to 2 percent each year. The TWU has made no explicit mention of this bump, merely characterising the pay offer as unacceptably low, indicating that it may push workers to sign on to a figure short of the meagre 3 percent the union has previously demanded. In key disputes over recent months, including at General Mills and McCormick Foods, unions have presented 3 percent (or almost 3 percent) annual pay rises as victories. In current negotiations with Australia Post, the Communications Electrical and Plumbers Union (CEPU) has proudly noted that it is twice the national average. These claims serve only as an indictment of the massive assault being carried out against the Australian working class, accelerated by the pandemic and enforced by the trade unions. In real terms, 3 percent is a pay cut, especially given that Toll workers, like those at Australia Post, did not receive a pay rise at all last year. The Australian Bureau of Statistics last month announced a 3.8 percent rise in the Consumer Price Index, which vastly underestimates increases in the cost of living, for the year to June 30. The union is also calling for a 0.25 point increase in employer superannuation contributions to 15 percent. Toll has backed down on moves to implement a B rate tiered wage system under which new hires would receive up to 30 percent less than the rates paid to existing workers. The companys proposal to introduce fixed term contracts, a proposal which has not been rescinded, still threatens secure, full-time jobs. While the company has walked back a plan to stop paying overtime rates to part-time drivers working less than 38 hours per week, Toll still plans to pay ordinary rates if these workers volunteer for overtime. The TWU complains of the companys rejection of limits on outside hire and real commitments to full utilisation, but in reality this simply means the retention of conditions signed off on by the TWU in previous EAs. Clause 17 of the 2017 agreement states, in part: Toll commits (a) to the full-time engagement of its Transport Workers wherever possible; (b) subject to reasonable practical requirements, such as adequately servicing industry peaks, to promote job security through the full utilisation of full-time permanent Transport Workers/Owner-Drivers before the engagement of part-time Transport Workers/Owner-Drivers, or casual Transport Workers/Owner-Drivers or Outside Hire. [Emphasis added] In other words, Toll is committed to nothing. Under the current union-management agreement, the company has carte blanche to declare that reasonable practical requirements mean it is not possible to offer overtime hours to full-time drivers in preference to cheaper part-time, casual, contract, or outsourced labour. The fact that so many of the unions claims relate to overtime payments is itself an indictment of the unions role over decades in creating a situation in which workers cannot live on their base rates and are forced to consistently work dangerously long hours to make ends meet. The proliferation of casual, contract, labour-hire and other insecure forms of work has been facilitated by the unions since it began under the Hawke-Keating Labor government Accords of the 1980s and 1990s. In recent years the TWU has promoted illusions that the rampant abuse of these work arrangements could be fought in the courts or through parliamentary reforms. The bankruptcy of this perspective of appealing to the bourgeois state was borne out earlier this month when the High Court ruling upheld the primacy of freedom of contract over the true nature of the employment relationship. Far from protecting workers conditions, the High Court has now enshrined in law that workers are completely at the mercy of their employers and their contracts. Following the principle of never let a good crisis go to waste, Toll Global Express President Alan Beacham said: Threatening industrial action at a time when our country is in the middle of a global pandemic is playing politics with peoples lives and jobs. This suggestion that drivers should be deprived of the basic right to defend their working conditions because of a pandemic that they have been forced to work through is particularly filthy given that the Global Express courier division is being sold in the middle of a global pandemic. Toll has refused to guarantee that Global Express workers pay and conditions will be maintained after the sale to private equity firm Allegro Funds. Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt used Wednesdays parliamentary question time to divert responsibility for the disastrous vaccine roll out onto Toll workers. Hunt said: I would also note that there is one element which may affect distribution over the coming days. There is the risk of a transport strike on Fridayand we hope that there is no impact on distribution. The TWU continues to insist that, as the union outlined at its national council meeting in May, Toll, and Australias other multi-billion dollar fleet operators are victims of the major retailers, the manufacturers, the oil companies, the banks, who sweat the trucking companies and the owner drivers. TWU New South Wales (NSW) state secretary Richard Olsen said this week: We should not forget that the squeeze comes from clients at the top like Amazon whose profits ballooned 224 percent to $11 billion in just the first quarter this year. The TWU fight is about holding these companies to account and stopping the race to the bottom that sees bankruptcies and a lowering of standards for the small business operator. This utterly disingenuous attempt to equate major logistics companies with troubled small businesses serves only as a cynical attempt to justify the close alignment of the TWU with management. It is also an entirely nationalist agenda that Australian companies (notwithstanding the 2015 sale of Toll to Japan Post) must be defended against their purportedly more competitive and powerful international rivals. This only serves to pit workers in Australia against the working class internationally. The assault on the wages, conditions and very lives of transport workers is being conducted throughout every country and it is among these workers that support must be fought for, not the Australian ruling class. Alongside the Toll dispute, 6,000 drivers at StarTrack and FedEx and 2,000 workers at Linfox are also in the process of voting on whether to carry out strike action. Workers at all of these major logistics companies confront similar issues and the TWUs staggered approach to the disputes can only be seen as a ploy to isolate workers and limit the impact of strikes on the supply chain as a whole. The conduct of Australias unions, including the TWU, over the last 15 months stands as a stark warning for workers of the perfidious role played by these organisations. From the outset of the pandemic, the unions have been at the forefront of a major assault on the working class. Australian Council of Trade Unions boss Sally McManus and her best friend forever, then Attorney-General Christian Porter, were the architects of the JobKeeper wage subsidy, a $90 billion handout to big business which granted employers unprecedented powers to restructure their workforces. When NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian belatedly announced tightened movement restrictions for workers in Sydneys COVID-19 hotspots, the TWU was among the most eager and vociferous defenders, not of workers health and safety, but of the unimpeded operations and profitability of big business. Within hours of the July 17 announcement, the TWU demanded: ALL essential transport workers must be automatically exempt from panicked snap restrictions from the NSW Government. This callous subjugation of the health of workers, their families, and the population as a whole to corporate profit interests is a sharp demonstration that workers cannot entrust their fate to the TWU or any other union. A genuine struggle for trucking workers rights and conditions can only go forward through a break with the union and the establishment of independent rank-and-file committees, to unite workers across the sector, along with their colleagues at other trucking companies, Australia Post and throughout logistics. These essential supply-chain and delivery companies should be placed under public ownership and democratic workers control. That requires a fight for a workers government and socialism. High ranking officials attend the Crimea Platform summit in Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Aug. 23, 2021. (Ukrainian Presidential Press Office via AP) The inaugural Crimea Platform summit was held Monday in Kiev in an attempt by the government of President Volodymyr Zelensky to build international support for a military offensive against Russia to return the Crimean peninsula to Ukraine. Officials from 44 countries and blocs took part in the summit, including representatives from all 30 NATO members. Zelensky opened the conference by denouncing Russian aggression, and accused Moscow of militarizing the peninsula and persecuting Crimean Tartars, a Muslim minority living on the peninsula in the Black Sea. I will personally do everything possible to return Crimea so that it becomes part of Europe together with Ukraine, Zelensky stated. In addition to taking part in a large number of photo ops on a stage standing next to Zelensky, the participants of the summit issued a Joint Declaration which stated: Participants in the International Crimea Platform do not recognize and continue to condemn the temporary occupation and illegal annexation of Crimea, which constitutes a direct challenge to international security with grave implications for the international legal order that protects the territorial integrity, unity and sovereignty of all States. The declaration also included a call for Russia to join the initiative and engage in talks over giving Crimea back to Ukraine, a suggestion which was predictably ridiculed by Moscow. The event was the culmination of a strategy approved by Ukraines National Security and Defense Council in March which is aimed at retaking Crimea and reintegrating the strategically important peninsula. As part of its 3 pillars strategy for retaking Crimea, Zelenskys administration sought full Ukrainian sovereignty over not just Crimea but that of the port city of Sevastopol as well, which serves as the home of the Russian Navys Black Sea Fleet. The provocative announcement of this strategy triggered a major military crisis in the Black Sea this spring. Crimea, a peninsula in the Black Sea, was annexed by Russia in March 2014, following a US-backed, far-right coup in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. A referendum was held at the time on integrating Crimea to Russia and received support from over 95 percent of the Crimean population. Crimea was previously part of Russia, but was transferred by decree to the Ukrainian SSR in 1954 by Nikita Khrushchev. Following the Stalinist dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the port of Sevastopol had been leased to Russia by several successive Ukrainian governments. Its potential loss following the US-backed ousting of the President Viktor Yanukovych in 2014 was widely seen as one of the primary motivators in Russia annexing the militarily strategic peninsula. Both Zelensky and the Crimea Platforms participants are well aware that Moscow would never willingly place its only major warm water seaport back in the hands of a right-wing NATO-affiliated government, imbuing the entire conference with a high degree of political provocation. While the Ukrainian government gloated over the number of attendeesincluding the presidents of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Moldova, Slovenia and FinlandFrench President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel were conspicuously absent from the summit. Merkels absence was particularly glaring as she had just left the country the previous day after meeting with Zelensky in an attempt to control the fallout between the two countries over the completion of the $12 billion Nord Stream 2 pipeline that will carry Russian gas directly to Germany through the Baltic Sea. The pipelines completion threatens to significantly undercut Ukraines importance to European energy markets and deprive it of approximately $2 billion in annual gas transit fees. Prior to meeting with Zelensky in Kiev, Merkel had met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow to discuss Nord Stream 2 and the ongoing civil war in eastern Ukraine between the Ukrainian military and Russian-backed separatists that has claimed the lives of over 14,000. The United States, which has been Ukraines biggest military supporter since 2014 providing the country $4.9 billion in military aid, sent its Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm. The real purpose of her visit in Kiev was to meet with both Ukraines and Germanys energy ministers to smooth over strained relations between Kiev and Washington over Nord Stream 2. The Zelensky government was essentially blindsided when the Biden administration announced in July that it had come to a deal with Berlin not to oppose Nord Stream 2s completion. Zelensky is currently scheduled to travel to Washington to meet with Biden on August 31. Last week, in an interview with the Washington Post, Zelensky again expressed his disagreement with the Nord Stream 2 deal. In line with the course taken by the Biden administration, German Economy and Energy Minister Peter Altmaier made clear that the purpose of meeting with Granholm and Ukrainian officials was not to put Germanys participation in the pipeline in question, stating, From todays perspective we shouldnt reject any suggestions, but also not create any insurmountable obstacles [for the completion of the pipeline]. The entire Crimea Platform summit was predictably met with disdain in Moscow where Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denounced the summit as an anti-Russian event. Following the meeting spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova called it a political performance that is removed from reality. She warned that Russia will be forced to view participation of separate countries, international organizations and their representatives in the Crimea Platform as encroachment on Russias territorial integrity which will inevitably have its effect on our relations. Zakharovas comments make clear that the continued attempts by an increasingly authoritarian Zelensky government to gain support for an aggressive offensive to retake Crimea are a reckless provocation that threatens the outbreak of a full-scale war between Russia and Ukraine. While Zelensky was initially elected in 2019 on the basis of a rejection of the far-right militaristic nationalism espoused by his predecessor Petro Poroshenko, Zelensky has increasingly decreed authoritarian anti-Russian measures by prosecuting political opposition and banning media outlets it dubs Russian propaganda. On the eve of the Crimea Platform summit, the Zelensky government last week banned the popular opposition website strana.ua by decree. The site was one of the few major media outlets in Ukraine that reported on the violent exploits of the countrys various militant far-right nationalist groups and corruption within the Ukrainian government Earlier in February, Zelensky undemocratically shut down three popular predominantly Russian-speaking television stationsZiK, 112 Ukraine and NewsOneall of which were affiliated with the rival oligarch and pro-Russian opposition leader Viktor Medvedchuk. Medvedchuk was later arrested and charged with high treason by the Ukrainian government. Hypocritically, the Crimea Platform denounced Russia for supposedly limiting fundamental freedoms in Crimea, such as the right to peaceful assembly, the rights to freedoms of expression and opinion, religion or belief, association, restrictions on the ability to seek, receive and impart information, as well as interference and intimidation that journalists, human rights defenders and defense lawyers face in their work. Since coming to office, the Zelensky government has made clear that, in Ukraine, such fundamental freedoms do not apply to anyone that does not blindly support the nationalist and right-wing course of the government in Kiev. A pair of bomb attacks that caused US and civilian casualties outside Kabul airport Thursday rocked the frantic final stages of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, with time fast running out to rescue up to 1,500 Americans, and the fate of fleeing Afghans looking darker by the hour. Pentagon press secretary John Kirby tweeted that a "complex attack" consisted of one explosion at the Abbey Gate of Kabul airport and a second blast took at the nearby Baron Hotel. The Pentagon said in a statement that "a number of US service members were killed in today's complex attack." The statement said a number of others were being treated for wounds. The attack came a day after a US defense official had told CNN that officials were alarmed by a "very specific threat stream" about the ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan, which planned to attack crowds outside the airfield. The attacks underscored the extremely fragile security environment at the airport where thousands of US and allied troops are wrapping up the mass US airlift of foreign nationals and Afghans who worked with their allies during 20 years of war. President Joe Biden has set an August 31 deadline to complete the withdrawal -- partly citing the highly dangerous conditions facing US troops in Kabul. So far, after an initially chaotic drawdown, a mammoth and daring airlift has brought more than 95,700 people out of Kabul -- with more than 13,400 people evacuated in the last 24 hours on US and coalition flights, according to the White House. Earlier Thursday local time, US diplomats in Kabul suddenly warned American citizens to "immediately" leave several gates into the airport, citing security threats. The question now is how the long-feared attacks will influence the rest of the evacuation. And how long the Pentagon will give the operation before it transitions to a mission to extract thousands of troops and material, which could take several days and curtail the departures of noncombatants. A source familiar with the situation told CNN's Nick Paton Walsh that there are an estimated 150 American citizens in Afghanistan who the United States needed to get to the airport. The source said the estimate is the number known to need assistance to get to the airport as of Thursday morning. That means a race against the clock to find and extract the remaining Americans who want to leave and likely means that thousands of Afghan translators and others could be left behind, in a final tragedy of America's longest war. But the intense military mobilization has bought Biden some political space, after the lightening collapse of the Afghan state and army directly contradicted his predictions that the Taliban would not suddenly seize power and force the United States into a hurried, humiliating retreat. Biden told Americans this week that he would send no more of their sons and daughters to die in Afghanistan. And the fact that US troops are not actively seeking to round up American citizens far from the airport in Taliban territory -- apart from a few publicly known examples -- suggests the White House is keeping the risks of the operation as low as possible. But Washington is on edge, hostage to developments halfway across the globe. Any US fatalities, terror attacks or exchanges of fire with the Taliban could turn a crisis that is poised on a knife edge for the President into a full-blown political disaster, in addition to the human pain and loss they would cause. As hundreds of Afghans reach US soil, meanwhile, attention is beginning to focus on how the US will absorb the refugees, with some Republicans, including ex-President Donald Trump, already attacking their arrival in a toxic political offensive. ISIS-K poses 'very real' threat US troops were already in a deeply vulnerable position on the airport, the last piece of Afghanistan they now control, after the enemy they spent two decades fighting, the Taliban, swept across the country in a lightning advance. But the added threat from ISIS-K makes the situation even worse. The group is a sworn enemy of the Taliban and the US, so it has every reason to cause mayhem. It showed its awful potency in Kabul earlier this year in an attack on a school for girls that killed dozens of people, mostly children. Thousands of Afghans have been crushing against Taliban checkpoints in recent days, seeking access to gates controlled by US and allied soldiers. Any attack would have the potential to cause terrible casualties. ISIS-K's ranks are believed to have been swelled by escapees from Afghan prisons and potentially a number of hardened fighters from Syria. "It's hard to overstate the complexity and the danger of this effort," US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday. "We're operating in a hostile environment in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban with the very real possibility of an ISIS attack." Blinken gave the most detailed breakdown yet of the number of Americans who may be in Afghanistan. He said US forces had so far pulled out at least 4,500 US citizens. He said the US had provided another 500 Americans with instructions on how to reach the airport safely. He said officials were inundating the remaining possible 1,000 citizens with emails, texts and calls. But he cautioned that some may have left of their own accord or may not in fact be Americans at all. Among Americans still in the country are about 20 students from San Diego and their families who traveled to Afghanistan this summer and have been unable to get to Kabul's airport, school and congressional officials told CNN. Since August 14, more than 82,300 people have been flown out of Kabul, and in an intense 24-hour period from Tuesday to Wednesday, around 19,000 people left on 90 US and coalition flights, Blinken said. But the fact that even US citizens appear to be having trouble accessing the airport means that potentially tens of thousands of Afghans eligible for resettlement in the US and elsewhere may have already lost their chances. The Taliban had already said they would stop Afghan citizens from reaching the airport. But officials in Washington said they would do everything they could to get as many Afghans out by the deadline as possible. "They will not be forgotten," Blinken said. But perhaps ominously for those who want to leave in the next few days, he stressed that the US effort to save Afghans with ties to this country will not cease once the troops leave. It is not clear how that will happen. "Along with American citizens, nothing is more important to me as secretary of state than to do right by the people who have been working side by side with American diplomats in our embassy," Blinken said. "We are relentlessly focused on getting the locally employed staff out of Afghanistan and out of harm's way." But the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas, told CNN's Wolf Blitzer that his office was fielding messages from many Afghans seeking safe exits. Asked if US forces could extract all remaining citizens and eligible Afghans, McCaul answered, "I don't think it is humanly possible." He also cited what he said were credible stories of translators who had worked for the US being intercepted at the airport, taken home to see their families killed and then being beheaded themselves. CNN has not independently verified the reports. A growing political storm Afghans who do manage to get out of the country are not being flown directly to the US. Many are being taken to holding centers in third countries, including Qatar. But those who have undergone security vetting and health checks have already begun to stream into the United States. Several thousand evacuees have arrived in the US, including 1,200 who have reached the Washington, DC, area, said Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor, deputy director of the Joint Regional Operation. A CBS News poll released over the weekend found that 81% of Americans thought that the government should help Afghans who had worked with US officials, troops and intelligence agencies come to the US. But their arrival has already triggered what may turn into a new front of the bitter battle over immigration that Trump and other extremist Republicans have used to ride to power. While still president, Trump made a deal with the Taliban to leave -- behind the Afghan government's back -- which experts say contributed to the swift collapse of the state. And he made little accommodation for the tens of thousands of Afghans who risked their lives to help US forces and officials over 20 years and are owed sanctuary in return. Now Trump is slandering many of those same Afghans, claiming -- as he did with Mexico at the start of his 2016 campaign -- that the Taliban are not sending the country's "best" people to the United States. "We can only imagine how many thousands of terrorists have been airlifted out of Afghanistan and into neighborhoods around the world," Trump said in an inflammatory statement on Tuesday. "What a terrible failure. NO VETTING. How many terrorists will Joe Biden bring to America?" Actually, one of the reasons why the situation has been so chaotic has been the intense vetting that Afghans have had to endure to secure special immigrant visas to the US. But the ex-President is not alone among politicians seeking to weaponize the Afghan arrivals to activate his base voters. Ohio US Senate candidate J.D. Vance, who's competing for Trump's loyalty in a crowded GOP primary, made a similar attempt in a web video this week, raising the possibility that the issue could be a burning concern of grass roots conservatives in midterm elections next year. Biden will seek to counter such demagoguery when he holds a virtual meeting with bipartisan governors who have shown willingness to temporarily offer refuge or help resettle Afghans brought out of Kabul. And there was one rare, hopeful note on Wednesday after an otherwise wrenching week of news from Afghanistan, when the US military announced that a baby girl born on a cargo jet after a flight from Kabul to the US Ramstein Air Base in Germany had been named Reach, after the aircraft's call sign. The-CNN-Wire & 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (WTHI) - The Hickory Treatment Center in Terre Haute opened in March 2021. Since then, the center has helped hundreds of women fight their addictions. Early data shows that drug overdoses have increased due to isolation from the pandemic. Indiana's drug overdose deaths increased dramatically from 2019 to 2020. According to CDC statistics, there were 1,704 drug overdoses in 2019 and 2,268 in 2020. The Hickory Treatment Center at Terre Haute is offering help to those struggling with addiction, especially women. The center offers a 28-day program to help women recover from addictions. Women are also sometimes given medications to help them stay clean. Nurses, therapists, and social workers all help these women get back on the right track. The clinical director at the center, Sara Collins, shares the impact this center has on women. "Usually by the time they leave they're ready to pursue a new life and we've seen that happen here which is awesome," says Collins. One woman currently being helped by the center is Dorothy Rytczak. She is a recovering alcoholic and is grateful for all the center does to help her get her life back. "The staff is wonderful, I've never met anyone nicer. They are really helpful, whatever you need, whatever problems you have they help you solve it" says Rytczak. If you or someone you know could benefit from the Hickory Treatment Center at Terre Haute program click here to find out how they can help you. SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (WTHI) - Starting Monday, the indoor mask mandate is back in Illinois. Illinois Governor JB Pritzker made the announcement on Thursday morning. He said hospital administrators across the state had asked his office for more help. That's as the state's ICU bed shortage reached critical levels. Only three percent of ICU beds are available in the state. It never dipped below 15 percent during the spring surge. Governor Pritzker says his vaccine mandates are aimed at helping to protect the most vulnerable, the elderly and kids. Pritzker said about 70 percent of Cook County residents had received the vaccine, and Illinois is the most vaccinated state in the midwest. He said that doesn't make up for what's happening in the southern and east-central parts of the state. The governor said in Illinois, from February to July, 98 percent of all cases of COVID-19 are among the unvaccinated. Ninety-six percent of hospitalizations are unvaccinated. Ninety-five percent of deaths are unvaccinated. HOUSTON, Miss. (WTVA) - Houston students will continue virtual learning through Friday, Sept. 3. This is for all students in Lower Elementary, Upper Elementary, Middle and High schools. All students who are not quarantined or isolated due to COVID will return to their campuses on Tuesday, Sept. 7 following the Labor Day holiday. JACKSON, Miss. (WTVA) - Mississippi health officials met virtually Wednesday afternoon to clear up some misconceptions surrounding the coronavirus. During the meeting, officials reported an additional 3,385 COVID cases and 22 deaths on Wednesday. Wed love to be able to say that its plateauing. I cant say that it is right now," said state epidemiologist Dr. Paul Byers. "Weve had a little bit of a slow down in the numbers, but that doesnt mean that tomorrow we wont have an increase. Weve seen some leveling in the number of hospitalizations, but, guys, theres still very, very high. This includes impacting children. Byers reported that Mississippi lost another child to COVID-19. The child was under the age of five. This death makes six pediatric fatalities total in the state due to the virus. Byers also clarified a previous statement about Ivermectin calls to Poison Control. He said 2% of the calls to Poison Control were about the drug. 70% of those calls about Ivermectin included individuals ingesting the livestock medication. However, Byers said he doesn't want people to lose focus on the important message he was trying to convey. People have been taking livestock medication and its highly dangerous and its highly toxic, he said. Dr. Byers also mentioned along with the younger age groups, the variant is impacting the lives of the elderly. He said about 50% of the deaths reported over the last two days were people over the age of 65. Morgantown, WV (26505) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Morgantown, WV (26505) Today Mostly cloudy early, then clearing overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Mostly cloudy early, then clearing overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 53F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Staff Writer JoAnn Snoderly can be reached at 304-626-1445, by email at jsnoderly@theet.com or on Twitter at @JoAnnSnoderly. Clarksburg, WV (26301) Today Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 52F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph.. Tonight Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Slight chance of a rain shower. Low 52F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Biden, Israeli leader Bennett to meet at White House Israels new prime minister heads to the White House on Thursday for an introductory meeting with President Joe Biden and the promise of a new era of cooperation in U.S.-Israeli relations. The face-to-face meeting between Biden and Naftali Bennett will be their first since Bennett became prime minister in June. In an interview with the New York Times, Bennett said he would emphasize his opposition to U.S. efforts to reinstate a nuclear agreement with Iran and stress that he intends to proceed with efforts to expand West Bank settlements that Biden opposes. Bennett ruled out the possibility of reaching a peace agreement with the Palestinians on his watch and declined to support Bidens plans to reopen a consulate for Palestinians in Jerusalem. In Opinion: Israel's new government will make Middle East affairs a lot easier for Joe Biden What to know about Naftali Bennett: Who was Bennett prior to becoming prime minister Prefer to listen? Check out the 5 Things podcast: State Department tells Americans at Kabul airport gates to 'leave immediately' The U.S. Department of State Bureau of Consular Affairs tweeted out a warning last night for U.S. citizens at Kabul airport gates, advising people to "leave immediately." The warning comes the same day that Secretary of State Antony Blinken said as many as 1,500 Americans may still be in Afghanistan, as the deadline for U.S. withdrawal looms. To meet the Aug. 31 deadline, U.S. military forces will need to stop evacuating people out of the airport days before their final troop withdrawal, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said Tuesday. That means the window for evacuating refugees and others is even closer than the official end of American presence on the ground. What will the final US days in Afghanistan will look like? Story continues In six days or less, the last American service member who boards the last flight out will mark an end to the costly 20-year U.S. presence in Afghanistan. Under an Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline, the retreat of U.S. forces is entering its final, dangerous phase. Afghans who aided the American war effort will engage in a life-or-death struggle as they and their families try to secure seats on one of the last flights out. The American withdrawal is likely to conclude with U.S. warplanes blowing up weaponry used to safeguard the evacuation, U.S. officials told USA TODAY. Though thousands of Afghans have left, many will not make it out because there won't be enough time or space on planes, they said. Vice President Harris to hold news conference before returning to US Vice President Kamala Harris will speak at a news conference Thursday, as part of the final leg of her trip to Southeast Asia. Over the course of this week, Harris has made stops in Singapore and Vietnam in an effort to bolster the relationships between the two nations and the United States with emphases on the economy and defenses. The vice president has also revealed agreements with Singapore to combat cyberthreats and tackle climate change, and to do the same for Vietnam in regards to COVID-19. Although Harris has maintained focus on her meetings with officials and Biden administration talking points on China this week, she will likely face questions on U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan during her Thursday news conference. As Harris travels to Asia, activists push her to speak out for women fleeing Taliban in Afghanistan Kanye West to hold third listening event for 'Donda' album in Chicago Rapper Kanye West will hold a third listening event Thursday for his next album, "Donda," which is named after his late mother Donda West, who died in 2007. Unlike the previous listening events for the album Thursday's will take place in West's hometown of Chicago, moving from the Mercedes Benz Dome in Atlanta. West's latest appearance also comes as he works to change his legal name to Ye, with no middle name or last name. The artist formally filed a petition for the name change earlier this week, according to Los Angeles Superior Court documents obtained by The Associated Press. Previous listening event: Kanye West's much-improved 'Donda' featuring The Weeknd, Jay-Z impressed in Atlanta stadium Mark Ronson says Kanye West changed his mind about Auto-tune The Associated Press contributed to this report This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Kanye West, Kamala Harris, Biden and Naftali Bennett: 5 things to know Thursday Facebook is considering forming a commission to advise on thorny issues related to global elections, according to a report Wednesday from The New York Times. The company has begun to approach academics and policy experts, who The Times says could potentially weigh in on issues ranging from political ads to election misinformation. What's more, it is not just US elections where a commission could find itself weighing complicated election issues; the commission would also likely have a mandate to weigh in on closely watched elections in Hungary, Germany, Brazil and the Philippines. Facebook declined to comment. On its face, the commission sounds a lot like Facebook's Oversight Board, an independent panel of journalists, academics and activists often described as a "Supreme Court" that's tasked with reviewing Facebook's policies. The Oversight Board is perhaps best known for upholding Facebook's decision to ban Donald Trump, though since its formation last year it has also agreed to weigh in on doxing; hate speech; how politicians at large should be treated; content moderation in coup-torn Myanmar; moderation by algorithms; and the appropriate treatment of satire content. But though the makeup of the election commission sounds like the Oversight Board and could similarly let Facebook side-step ownership of controversial decisions there could be an important difference, according to The Times. Whereas the Oversight Board weighs in on decisions that Facebook has already made (much like the Supreme Court considers contested court rulings), the election commission would have the latitude to proactively offer advice, even on matters where Facebook had not yet taken a public stance. If Facebook goes ahead with outsourcing election-related decisions to an advisory committee, it would be a departure from its previous attempts to counter election misinformation, which have been largely reactive, and almost always imperfect. Even after a temporary ban on political ads ahead of the 2020 US election, some ads were still showing as active in Facebook's ad library. Facebook last year also endeavored to label ads from politically connected publications, and earlier this year moved to show users less political content altogether. Though Facebook reportedly hopes to launch the commission ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, The Times also describes the outreach as preliminary, with no guarantee that Facebook will move forward on this. A 21-year-old man visiting Miami Beach was fatally shot by a gunman while protecting his 1-year-old son at a restaurant, police and family said. The alleged suspect, 22-year-old Tamarius Blair Davis Jr., of Norcross, Georgia, told investigators he shot the young father, Dustin Wakefield, on Tuesday night because he "was high on mushrooms, which made him feel empowered," according to an arrest report obtained by local outlet WSVN. There was a guy sitting at a table with all his family and kids and everything, a witness said, according to WSVN. He was right there, and the guy went there and shot the guy a few times. A second witness claimed Davis was "smiling and laughing" the whole time he was shooting Wakefield. A video captured by a witness appears to show the suspect dancing just after the killing. Wakefield was visiting Florida with his family from Castle Rock, Colorado. The family sat inside a restaurant at around 6:30 p.m. Wednesday when the suspect walked in with a gun. The victim's uncle, Mike Wakefield, said in a statement to the Miami Herald that "Dustin stood up between the gunman and the baby, and he shot him. He shot him multiple times on the ground." HUNDREDS FORCED TO EVACUATE MIAMI CONDO BUILDING DEEMED UNSAFE This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. After the shooting, Davis allegedly fled the restaurant and was apprehended in a nearby alley, police said. Cellphone footage shows Davis lying spread-eagle on his back and smiling as three officers approach with their guns pointed toward the ground, warning that if he touches his gun, he will be shot, according to footage obtained by the outlet. Davis has been charged with murder, and he was held without bond Wednesday at a Miami-Dade County jail. It was not immediately clear whether he had legal representation. The victim's uncle said Dustin Wakefield was "the kindest kid. He loved his family. He loved being a dad." CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Story continues Wakefield is survived by his wife and their 1-year-old child. A GoFundMe account was established for the family following the shooting. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it. Washington Examiner Videos Tags: News, Florida, Miami, Restaurants, Gun Violence, Crime, Law Enforcement, Law Original Author: Kaelan Deese Original Location: Florida tourist shot dead while protecting 1-year-old son Greg Abbott. Lynda M. Gonzalez-Pool/Getty Images Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) on Wednesday issued an executive order banning COVID-19 vaccine mandates regardless of a vaccine's FDA approval status, the Texas Tribune reports. His previous executive order also prohibited COVID vaccine mandates, but only for shots under emergency use authorization. The decision comes just one day after Pfizer-BioNTech's Comirnaty received full FDA approval, a certification many health officials and lawmakers hoped would encourage shot mandates and curb vaccine hesitancy. Instead, writes the Tribune, Abbott's message is the opposite: "No governmental entity can compel any individual to receive a COVID-19 vaccine," regardless of approval from the FDA. Exceptions are preserved for places like nursing homes and state-supported living centers, per the Tribune. The order also maintains that state agencies and local political divisions cannot adopt or enforce vaccine mandates, and any public or private entity that receives government funding cannot deny entry based on vaccination status nor can it require customers to share that information, per Austin's KXAN. Abbott's pandemic management has come under renewed scrutiny as embattled Texas school districts attempt to safely reopen and the highly-infectious Delta variant ravages the Gulf Coast. The governor recently tested negative for COVID-19 after having contracted the virus, saying his infection was "brief and mild" because he was vaccinated, per KXAN. You may also like Actor suspected of participating in Capitol attack arrested in California CIA director reportedly holds secret meeting with Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar Israel's new prime minister says he'll present a new strategic vision on Iran in upcoming meeting with Biden John Bolton, right, Mike Pompeo, center, and President Donald Trump, left. REUTERS/Leah Millis Trump's national security advisor John Bolton slammed Mike Pompeo over his negotiations with the Taliban. Bolton said it was "impossible" to "rewrite history" about the Trump administration's role in the Afghanistan pullout. Pompeo and Trump have come under attack over their deal with the Taliban in February 2020. See more stories on Insider's business page. Donald Trump's former national security advisor John Bolton criticized former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who negotiated a deal with the Taliban in February 2020, for distancing himself from the Afghanistan withdrawal. "Trying to extricate yourself from this withdrawal is I think difficult if not impossible to do, especially to rewrite history about what actually happened," Bolton told Politico in a report published Thursday. "I think that's a prescription for Democratic attack ads that would be fatal to someone's credibility." Pompeo and Trump have come under attack over their agreement with the Taliban, which stipulated that US troops be withdrawn from Afghanistan within 14 months on the condition that the militant group not turn the country into a terrorist base. At the signing ceremony in Qatar, Pompeo posed for photos alongside the Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar, who is anticipated to head the next Taliban government in Afghanistan. At the time, critics slammed the Trump administration for negotiating with the Taliban and excluding the Afghan government out of the deal, arguing the move strengthened the Taliban's legitimacy. That criticism has been renewed amid the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan and the collapse of the US-backed Afghan government on August 15. Read more: We identified the 125 people and institutions most responsible for Donald Trump's rise to power and his norm-busting behavior that tested the boundaries of the US government Bolton, who served as Trump's national security advisor from 2018 to 2019, has said both the Trump administration and President Joe Biden are responsible for the chaotic, ongoing removal of US troops from Afghanistan. Story continues Other Republicans who have criticized Trump and Biden over the pullout include Reps. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois and Liz Cheney of Wyoming. H.R. McMaster, Trump's national security advisor from 2017 to 2018, denounced Trump's Taliban deal as a "surrender agreement." Pompeo and Trump have attempted to absolve themselves of the situation in Afghanistan and blamed Biden for the fallout. "I hope this Administration comes to understand that apologizing, placating, appeasing, being weak, only presents risks to American security," Pompeo tweeted on Thursday. Read the original article on Business Insider What to do To limit the spread of COVID-19, the Yakima Health District and the state Department of Health recommend: Get vaccinated Wash your hands often and carry sanitizer Wear a mask when inside or in crowded outdoor settings and maintain at least 6 feet of space from others. Keep gatherings small and outside whenever possible, and avoid any large outdoor gatherings Get tested immediately if you think you have symptoms and stay home if you are sick or exposed to COVID-19. Sign up for WA Notify to help alert others if you have been exposed to COVID-19. Immunocompromised individuals are eligible to receive a third booster dose from any vaccine provider, the health district stressed. Yankton, SD (57078) Today Partly cloudy skies early will give way to cloudy skies late. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low near 65F. Winds SE at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies early will give way to cloudy skies late. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low near 65F. Winds SE at 10 to 20 mph. Yankton, SD (57078) Today Partly cloudy skies this evening will become overcast overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low near 65F. Winds SE at 15 to 25 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies this evening will become overcast overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low near 65F. Winds SE at 15 to 25 mph. Greensboro, NC (27407) Today A shower or two possible this evening with partly cloudy skies overnight. Low 63F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%.. Tonight A shower or two possible this evening with partly cloudy skies overnight. Low 63F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%. Greensboro, NC (27407) Today Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to mainly clear skies after midnight. Low 63F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Our directory features more than 18 million business listings from across the entire US. However, if we're missing your business, add your business by clicking on Add Your Business. YORK Brittney Jochum, 32, a former inmate at the Nebraska Correctional Center for Women, who was earlier sentenced to traditional probation in a case involving the assault of another inmate while she was in custody is back in jail. Jochum appeared this past week before Judge James Stecker in the York County District Court where she was accused of violating terms of that probation. She was initially charged with a Class 2 felony, which was later amended to a Class 1 misdemeanor as part of a plea agreement. When the assault took place, Jochum was serving a two-year sentence for two convictions of possession of methamphetamine out of Lancaster County. When she was sentenced, Judge Stecker told her, For priors, you have two convictions of possession of a controlled substance, a theft, making false statements, DUI, MIP, theft, forgery and two infractions for possession of marijuana. You have an extensive criminal history and you are currently on post-release supervision. You have taken steps to address your behaviors and the probation officers believe you are appropriate for probation given your progress, and she was sentenced to two years of probation. The flags for each branch and the American flag are my favorite, Kay said. When they move in the wind, there is nothing more beautiful. Kay has lived in Fairmont for the past 25 years. She said it is a very loving community where people stick together. She said this is true small-town living. When my husband passed away, people were right there to help, Kay said. He would be very proud of this. Bob Bettger is one of the members on the Fairmont Veterans Memorial board. He was asked to join and he said he gladly signed up to volunteer his time. Im a fifth-generation farmer, Bettger said. My family has been here forever. Its where I was born and raised, and we still farm around here. There is tradition and history of my family here. Serving in the military hits close to home for his family. He said the memorial is a great way to honor all of the countrys service people. He has a plaque for himself on the wall. I was in the Army during the Vietnam era, Bettger said. My great-grandfather was in the Army, and he served in France in World War I. My family has three generations of plaques on the walls. It's a new day, a new beginning. It's all about starting life afresh. So as you begin a new journey, find out what the stars have in store for you today. There are twelve zodiac signs and each has its distinct features. Be it, Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces each of the signs has something unique to tell. Aries You may have to say goodbye to dinners out every night and hello to cost-effective home-cooked meals for a while. On the plus side, lucrative work opportunities will flow your way for the next four weeks. Polish up your professional profiles and materials so you can greet them enthusiastically! Taurus Desire, want, love: What ISN'T beating inside you? In case you're seeing someone, its important to communicate today. Single? It's not the greatest night to meet new individuals. Invest in a good property today. Gemini Divert yourself with a vivid work venture or home-cleaning mission. In the event that you need an awkward discussion with somebody, don't rationally practice it endlessly; simply give your opinion and be finished with it. Odds are, the expectation is the most exceedingly awful part! Cancer In spite of the fact that many invested individuals will be attracted to you during this appealing trip, you'll additionally need time to appreciate your very own conversation. Focus on your appearance today, and you will attract a lover. Gains from future investments are possible. Leo Pause for a moment to restore your brain, body and soul before giving everything a chance to go out. Work on yourself and on your thoughts - both at work and at home. This self-care respite will possibly make your splendid arrangements that greatly improve when you return to them tomorrow. Virgo Students, put resources into preparing that will enable you to jump into another class. As of now have a few achievements to boast about? An epic birthday gathering could be the ideal event to meet new people. If you're feeling somewhat depleted by all the late spring's serious travels, dedicate the following a month to individual rebuilding. Libra Regardless of your affection for agreement and reasonable play, you may face a bit of uncertainty. It's likewise conceivable that you could get captured in others' crossfire. Watch where you walk since somebody could be attempting to control you into favoring one side. Professional growth is bound to come to you today - especially with new projects on the way. Scorpio If youre dating someone, its best to keep your feelings straight out on the table and talk about how youre feeling. Moreover, your professional growth might come to you at an unexpected time. Its best to focus on whats best for you in terms of career. Health issues will be resolved. Sagittarius Quit turning in circles. The moon in your extraordinary eighth house may leave you fixating to the point of uneasiness. Keep in mind: You can't control what befalls you, simply your response. On the off chance that you feel troubled, connect with yourself spiritually, and try meditating for a while. Capricorn Open your brain to a match who falls outside your typical "type." Something new could help you better. Work might be very smooth today, as you will not have a lot of tasks on your list. Its best to take this as a day to cleanse yourself of all stress. Aquarius Focus on what comes next for you. Are you looking to expand professionally? Or do you want to settle down? Work along those lines. Domestic issues will be sorted today and there will be lots of harmony at home. Its best to get a short workout in order to keep your body going. Pisces Not everyone will be pleased by you, and thats okay. Its best to focus on yourself and please yourself first. At the office, you will find yourself being appreciated by many around you. Try to find some time to meditate to keep the mind calm. The astrological predictions are by Dr Sundeep Kochar. New Delhi: The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) led by Ferozepur MP Sukhbir Singh Badal has registered a clear majority by winning 27 seats out of the total 46 in the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) election held on Sunday, results of which were announced on Wednesday. The victory has given a boost to the SAD ahead of the next year`s Punjab assembly polls in which the party would aim to dislodge the Amarinder Singh-led Congress government. Incumbent DSGMC president Manjinder Singh Sirsa of SAD has, however, lost the election by over 500 votes to Harvinder Singh Sarna of SAD-Delhi. He had contested from the Punjabi Bagh ward. Despite the defeat, Sirsa flashed the victory sign to the media while exiting the counting center at Aryabhatt Institute of Technology on Wednesday afternoon. He said, "the people have once again given us a chance to serve". "By making us win 27 out of 46 seats, the Sangat of Delhi has given us great pride. This victory belongs to the entire Sangat of Delhi, we bow our heads at the feet of the Sangat of Delhi and thank them for giving this honour to the Shiromani Akali Dal," he wrote in a social media post. The SAD`s rival group and the main opposition Shiromani Akali Dal (Delhi) has secured 14 seats in the election. One seat each has gone to the Independent candidate and Panthic Akali Lehar. Jag Aasra Guru Ott (JAGO) party has won three seats. "Punjabi Bagh had the highest turnout with 54 per cent," said Narinder Singh, director of Gurdwara elections. Sirsa said that the results will give a boost to the party campaign in Punjab as it shows with which have the support of Sikhs. The DSGMC, which goes to the polls every four years, controls Sikh shrines in the national capital along with various academic institutions and hospitals. It comprises 46 members elected from as many wards and the rest are appointed from different holy Sikh shrines. A total of 312 candidates, including 132 independents, were in the fray this year. The election is being conducted by the Delhi government`s directorate of Gurdwara elections. Live TV New Delhi: Amid fall in state revenue and GST collection in view of COVID-19 crisis, Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj S Bommai on Thursday demanded the Centre to extend the GST compensation period to states beyond 2022, for three more years. After a meeting with Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Bommai said he also discussed the GST (Goods and Services Tax) dues to the tune of Rs 11,000 crore to be paid to Karnataka in installments. "The dues that were to be paid from July 2022 are being advanced through installment from this year. Along with this, I discussed extending the GST compensation to states beyond 2022," he told reporters after the meeting. In the meeting, the CM informed Sitharaman that the state GST collection has not yet stabilised in view of COVID-19 crisis, and it would be more helpful in this ongoing revenue crisis if the GST compensation to states is extended for three more years. Karnataka is one of the best performing states since the enactment of GST in 2017. "However, the COVID crisis since the last financial year has brought the state revenue collection down including the GST collections," he said in a representation made to the FM. Keeping in mind the revenue crisis in all states, the Centre had provided the GST compensation loan for the 2020-21 fiscal and it has also been extended for the current fiscal. "However, the compensation loan would support the states for only the current financial year, but the impact made by the COVID on revenue collection will be carried forward for next few years also. So, it will take time for GST revenue collection to reach the protected amount," he said. "I request you to kindly reconsider the state's request on extending the GST compensation," the CM stressed. In the meeting, Bommai -- who is also a member of the GST Council -- also flagged that the 15th Finance Commission in its final report for 2021-26 recommended reduction in Karnataka's share in tax devolution to 3.647 per cent, as compared to 4.71 per cent recommended by 14th Finance Commission. Since Karnataka has seen the steepest cut of 23 per cent because of the reduction in the devolution share, he requested the FM to reconsider the criteria of horizontal devolution for sharing of resources between the states. The CM also informed that the state government had submitted an additional memorandum to the Commission in this regard. But the Commission has not considered the state's request. "This has severely impacted Karnataka compared to other southern states," he noted. The CM also brought to the notice of the FM that the central government has not considered the 15th Finance Commission recommendation to award state specific grants of Rs 6,000 crore to Karnataka for holistic improvement of water bodies of Bengaluru and for Peripheral Ring Road. "... The government of India in its explanatory memorandum has not considered the Finance Commission's recommendation. This would be a set back to the state which is already strained due to severe cuts in tax devolution," he said. Bengaluru, the IT and start-up hub of the country, has a major contribution to the services sector of the national economy. And the city has further potential to attract more investments if the critical infrastructure is improved, he said. That apart, the NABARD assistance given to different groups including SC and ST women, Self Help Groups and for infrastructure purposes-- was also discussed in detail with the FM, he added. Also Read: Big Aadhaar card update for NRIs! No need to wait for 182 days! Apply for Aadhaar immediately upon India arrival --Check the complete process here Bommai on the second day of his visit to Delhi is also scheduled to meet Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya and Commerce and Food Minister Piyush Goyal. Also Read: Google Pay could offer fixed deposits on app, investors to get up to 6.35% interest: Report New Delhi: The Family Man actor Manoj Bajpayee filed a criminal defamation complaint against actor Kamaal Rashid Khan alias KRK on Tuesday. Reacting to this development, KRK tweeted that whatever he said was similar to stand-up comedian Sunil Pal's statement but why legal action has been taken against him only. KRK tweeted: Sunil Pal said the same thing about web series #Familyman2 whatever I said. But Manoj Bajpayee doesnt mind, if Sunil says something. And Manoj is having Big problem, if I say something. Its proof that Bollywood people are jealous and obsessed with Me Me Me #thebrandKRK! Sunil Pal said same thing about web series #Familyman2 whatever I said. But Manoj Bajpayee doesnt mind, if Sunil says something. And Manoj is having Big problem, if I say something. Its proof that Bollywood people are jealous and obsessed with Me Me Me #thebrandKRK! KRK (@kamaalrkhan) August 26, 2021 If a person goes all the way from Mumbai to Indore, obtains temporary residence proof and file a case against you, so just imagine that how much he hates you? How much obsessed he is? Mujhe Toh #Darr film ka #SRK Yaad Aa Gaya! If a person goes all the way from Mumbai to Indore, obtains a temporary residence proof and file a case against you, so just imagine that how much he hates you? How much obsessed he is? Mujhe Toh #Darr film ka #SRK Yaad Aa Gaya! KRK (@kamaalrkhan) August 26, 2021 The plea has been filed at an Indore court for posting an alleged derogatory tweet against him, Bajpayee's lawyer told PTI. According to PTI report, Manoj Bajpayee filed the criminal complaint in the court of judicial magistrate first class (JMFC) against Khan (46) under IPC section 500 (punishment for defamation). He urged the court to register a criminal defamation case in the matter, Bajpayee's lawyer Paresh S Joshi said in a press release. The tweet in question was posted by Khan on July 26 and it defamed the 52-year-old actor and tarnished his image among his fans, Joshi said. Bajpayee personally appeared before the court to record his statement, he added. Reportedly, KRK had tweeted about Manoj Bajpayee's latest hit web series The Family Man 2. On the work front, he will be seen in The Family Man season 3, Kurup and Despatch. His latest outing Dial 100 premiered on ZEE5 on August 6, 2021. Manoj Bajpayee was recently honoured with the Best Performance (Male) in Web Series at the Indian Film Festival of Melbourne Awards for The Family Man 2. New Delhi: Model-actress Urvashi Rautela has a huge fan following on social media - all thanks to her amazing style and upcoming projects. She recently took to her Instagram account and shared her post where the actress boarded a flight. Urvashi Rautela boarded her flight looking glamourous and classy, wearing a bright yellow outfit from 'Versace'. She paired it with her Rs 15 lakh 'Christian Dior' lady bag. The actress has donned her yellow outfit with her silver and white Christian Dior bag and her shades of goggles make the actress look flawless. Fans showered their comments for their favourite actress and commented how classy and sophisticated the actress looked. Urvashi's picture made rounds on the internet making the audience fall in love with her. On the work front, Urvashi Rautela will be making her Tamil debut with a big-budget sci-fi Tamil film in which she will be playing the role of a microbiologist and an IITian, and later she is going to appear in a bilingual thriller Black Rose along with the Hindi remake of Thirutu Payale 2. The actress recently got a blockbuster response for her song "Doob Gaye" opposite Guru Randhawa and "Versace Baby" opposite Mohamed Ramadan. Urvashi is starring in a lead role in web series Inspector Avinash opposite Randeep Hooda, which is a biopic based on the true story of super cop Avinash Mishra and Poonam Mishra. New Delhi: The External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will brief the floor leaders on the situation in Afghanistan after the Taliban seized power in the war-ravaged country. The Centre has called for an all-party meeting on Thursday (August 26, 2021) morning to discuss the Afghanistan situation. The decision to call an all-party meeting comes after the Opposition parties asked the Centre to issue a statement on the Afghanistan crisis. The meeting will be attended by the Leader of Opposition (LoP) in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and LoP in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge as well. The meeting comes at a time when the Government of India is evacuating people from Afghanistan as the Taliban entered the Afghan capital on August 15 and declared its victory over the government. Earlier, on August 17, India had announced that it would issue an emergency e-visa to Afghan nationals who want to come to the country in view of the prevailing situation in Afghanistan after the Taliban captured power there. Additionally, Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri revealed that India has evacuated 626 people including 228 Indian citizens from Afghanistan till Tuesday. "626 people including 228 Indian citizens have been evacuated from Afghanistan till now. The number of Afghan Sikhs who have been evacuated is 77," Puri had informed earlier. Meanwhile, PM Narendra Modi asked the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to brief floor leaders on the recent developments in Afghanistan. "Floor Leaders of Political Parties would be briefed by EAM @DrSJaishankar on the present situation in Afghanistan, on 26th August, 11 am in Main Committee Room, PHA, New Delhi. Invites are being sent through email. All concerned are requested to attend," Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi tweeted on Tuesday. PM Modi had also chaired a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) and directed all concerned officials to undertake all necessary measures to ensure the safe evacuation of Indian nationals from Afghanistan in the next few days. The Ministry of Home Affairs also announced that all Afghans, irrespective of their religion, can apply for the e-Emergency X-Misc Visa online. "The MHA reviews visa provisions in view of the current situation in Afghanistan. A new category of electronic visa called `e-Emergency X-Misc Visa` introduced to fast-track visa applications for entry into India," a Home Ministry spokesperson said in a statement two days after the Taliban captured power in Afghanistan. The officials said, since the Indian missions in Afghanistan are shut, the visa can be applied online and applications will be examined and processed in New Delhi. (With ANI inputs) Live TV New Delhi: The Assam government on Thursday (August 26) announced to start physical classes for Class 12 students and those studying in final-year degree and post-graduation courses from the first week of September in view of drop in COVID-19 cases. The decision was taken at a meeting held under the chairmanship of Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma. The cabinet decided to start classes for HS final, Degree final and PG final year from 1st week of September, 2021," PTI quoted a communique from the Chief Minister's Office (CMO) as saying. It was also decided that the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine will be mandatory for attending the offline classes. To facilitate the students and staff, vaccination camps will be organised at the offices of block elementary education officer, district elementary education officer, inspector of schools and all university campuses from Friday till September 5, where teachers, non-teaching staff and students above 18 years of age will be able to get the COVID-19 jab. "To open hostels, boarders will be required to take both doses of the vaccine," the release added. A detailed coronavirus standard operating procedure (SOP) on reopening of educational institutions will be issued by August 31. Assam on Wednesday (August 25) recorded 689 new coronavirus cases and seven fatalities. The death toll reached 5,607, while the caseload climbed to 5,86,378, as per a bulletin issued by the National Health Mission. Earlier on Wednesday, National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisations (NTAGI) working group chairman Dr NK Arora said that schools should be reopened for all classes now provided that adults around them are vaccinated with the COVID-19 jab. "Be it primary schools, secondary schools or higher schools, they all should be opened. In fact, primary schools have children aged less than 10 years, and they are least infected by the virus. However, a safe environment should be created by vaccinated all adults in their environment," Arora told ANI. (With agency inputs) Live TV New Delhi: Maharashtra Health Minister Rajesh Tope on Thursday (August 26) warned that the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic could strike the state as early as October end. He predicted that as many as 60 lakh people could be infected by the time the festival season ends in November. Maharashtra will be hit by the third wave of the coronavirus by the end of October or the first week of November as most festivities come to an end, and at least 60 lakh people will be infected by Covid-19, Tope told an English news channel. He said that owing to the upcoming festivals such as Ganesh Chaturthi, Navratri, Dussehra and Diwali, a surge in infection could be seen. He said that at least 13 lakh people would likely require oxygen support. He asserted that the state government is making all necessary preparations for dealing with the pandemic. We have increased our oxygen capacity to 2000 MT, he said. Tope said that the government is in the process of recruiting more doctors and health staff and enhancing healthcare capacity. We are recruiting 1200 doctors. By September end, we will recruit 7,000 more health staff. We are increasing the production of oxygen and the number of hospital beds. We've purchased 1000 new ambulances, Tope said. We have approved an increment of Rs 1500 in the salary of ASHA workers. This will benefit 71,000 ASHA workers. Approximately, Rs 275 crore will be included in the budget for the same, he added. He further said that the government has directed district collectors and local authorities to complete vaccination of teaching and non-teaching staff by September 5. Also Read: COVID-19 third wave: Odisha govt estimates 1.5 times more daily cases than second wave Live TV New Delhi: The Special Cell of Delhi Police on Thursday (August 26) arrested two gangsters for allegedly supplying arms to Khalistani terrorists. The police recovered 18 pistols, 60 live cartridges from their possession. The arrested accused have been identified as Bablu Singh and Rajendra Singh Barnala. Khalistani used to sell weapons to terrorists online through social media. They are being interrogated by the police. Live TV NEW DELHI: The Narendra Modi-led NDA government at the Centre has reportedly approved all the nine names of judges recommended by the Collegium for elevation to the Supreme Court. Three women are among the 9 names recommended by the Supreme Court Collegium for appointments as judges of the top court. Notably, Justice BV Nagarathna of the Karnataka High Court, who is also among the three women judges recommended by the Collegium, is in line to become the first Chief Justice of India. After the Centres nod, the names have been sent to President Ram Nath Kovind for issuing warrants of appointments. The top court currently has 24 judges against a sanctioned strength of 35. Highly placed sources were quoted as saying by media reports that the recommendations have been processed, approved and forwarded to the President for issuance of warrants of appointment. The Supreme Court Collegium, comprising Chief Justice N V Ramana and Justices U U Lalit, A M Khanwilkar, D Y Chandrachud and L Nageswara Rao, had on August 17 recommended nine names, including eight High Court judges and an advocate, for elevation to the apex court. The nine nominated by it were four High Court Chief Justices Vikram Nath (Gujarat), A S Oka (Karnataka), Hima Kohli (Telangana) and J K Maheshwari (Sikkim) four High Court judges Justices B V Nagarathna (Karnataka), M M Sundresh (Madras), C T Ravikumar (Kerala) and Bela M Trivedi (Gujarat), and Senior Advocate P S Narasimha. Live TV Srinagar: Bilqees Ara, an ASHA worker from a remote village of Jammu and Kashmirs border district Kupwara, has set an example for people by donating blood 25 times since 2012, saving a number of lives. Bilqees says he understands the importance of donating blood. She donated blood for the first time when her cousin was in need of it in 2012. The happiness she felt that time made her a regular volunteer and she has continued doing it ever since. I still remember when my cousin was pregnant and she had lost a lot of blood and was desperately in need of it. That was when I donated blood for the first time, said Bilqees. She added that people should come forward and donate blood to save lives. It doesnt harm one, it makes you feel better mentally as well as physically, she said. Bilqees is now a registered blood donor at the District Hospital Handwara where she has donated blood more than twelve times so far. She has also donated blood at Kupwara hospital and Lal Ded hospital in Srinagar on several occasions. Bilqees has the complete support of her family, especially her husband who always supported her. The health officials said that Bilqees is setting the trend due to which several women volunteers have come forward and become regular blood donors. Live TV Male: A contract for the construction of the largest-ever infrastructure project funded by India in the Maldives will be signed on Thursday (August 26). The contract will be inked between the archipelagic nation`s government and Maharashtra-based construction and engineering company Afcons infrastructure. The Greater Male Connectivity Project (GMCP) will be the largest-ever infrastructure project in the Maldives, funded under the Indian Grant and Line of Credit. Indian High Commissioner to the Maldives, Sunjay Sudhir, said that the GMCP is not only the biggest project India is doing in the Maldives but also the biggest infrastructure project in the Maldives overall. "The Greater Male Connectivity Project is concrete proof that India is a robust development partner of the Maldives in addition to being the First Responder in times of any emergency in the Maldives. This iconic project will give a major boost to the Maldivian economy," he said. India and Maldives signed the GMCP agreement in 2020. The project aims to revitalise the Maldivian economy through a $400 million Line of Credit (LOC) and $100 million grant linking its capital Male with Gulhifalhu Port and Thilafushi industrial zone along with a regular cargo ferry service between the two countries to boost trade and commerce. This project involves the construction of a series of bridges and causeways that amount to 6.7 kilometres long connecting Male to Vilingili, the industrial zone in Thilafushi, together with the newly proposed International Port at Gulhifalhu. This project will be an infrastructural complement to the Gulhifalhu commercial port project which is being done under an Indian LoC of USD 800 million. Since the current Male port has already reached its maximum physical capacity, the Maldives Government has decided to shift the Male port to Gulhifalhu island. This has given rise to the need to consider the development of link bridges to the three industrial islands for seamless connectivity, as per sources. ALSO READ: Afghanistan crisis: Ashraf Ghanis escape shattered whatever positivity was left, says former vice president Amrulla Saleh Live TV New Delhi: Just days after armed Taliban militants captured Afghanistan's Kabul, Rangina Kargar a woman MP from the country was allegedly deported two hours after arriving at Delhi airport. Though, officials at Ministry of External Affairs have claimed that are not aware of the incident involving Kargar. A report published by the Indian Express claimed that the MP had arrived at the Indira Gandhi International Airport on August 20 from Istanbul. However, she was not able to clear immigration and she claims she was deported from the IGI airport two hours upon her arrival. Also read | Former Afghanistan minister Syed Ahmad Shah Sadat works as pizza delivery person in Germany, pictures go viral Kargar stated that she has travelled to India several times in the past on the same passport but this time, she was asked to wait as immigration officials said they will have to consult their superiors, The Indian Express quoted her as saying. Kargar goes on to say she never expected to be treated this way. I never expected this from Gandhijis India... But in this situation, they have treated a woman and a member of Parliament like this. They told me at the airport, sorry, we cannot do anything for you, she said. Kargar is a member of the Wolesi Jirga holds a diplomatic passport which facilitates visa-free travel under a reciprocal arrangement with India. Kargar is a Turkmen who was born in Mazar-e-Sharif in 1985, and is not affiliated to any political party. The 36-year-old parliamentarian said that as there are no flights to Kabul and she remains stuck in Istanbul. Live TV NOIDA: Three men allegedly involved in the Rs 12.67 lakh loot here four days ago were arrested here on Thursday after a gunfight with police in which two of them suffered injuries, officials said. Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (Noida) Ranvijay Singh said the trio had looted the money from a collection agent of a Delhi-based trader on August 22 at gunpoint in daylight. "After the incident, an FIR was lodged at the Sector 39 police station and the matter was investigated. The victim was also asked about inputs on identification of the trio who came on a motorcycle," Singh said. "On the basis of that information and other evidence gathered during probe, continuous checking was ensured. Today, we got a tip-off that the trio would be in Sector 58 police station area," he said. The three were intercepted by a joint team of the Crime Branch, led by Inspector Shavez Khan, and local police led by ACP Rajnish Verma. An encounter broke out after the accused opened fire on the police party, he said. "Two of the accused got injured in retaliatory firing by the police while one managed to escape but was held during a combing operation,? the additional DCP told reporters. Those held have been identified as Rakesh, Subodh and Suraj, all residents of Khoda colony in Ghaziabad, police said, adding that they have confessed to committing the August 22 loot. Police said it has recovered Rs 8.23 lakh of the looted money and seized two illegal pistols from them besides impounding the motorcycle used by them in the crime. A fourth member of the gang has also been identified and efforts are underway to nab him soon, police said. Additional DCP Singh said the Noida Police is committed to stop street crimesand Thursday's incident reaffirms its commitment towards public safety. Live TV New Delhi: An Indian Air Force (IAF) flight carrying 24 Indian and 11 Nepalese evacuees from Kabul is on its way to Delhi under Operation Devi Shakti. The special IAF flight is expected to land in Delhi shortly. "Op Devi Shakti in action!@IAF_MCC flight with 24 Indian and 11 Nepalese evacuees from Kabul is on its way to Delhi. #DeviShakti," Ministry of External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi has informed through a tweet. Indian Air Force flight with 24 Indian and 11 Nepalese evacuees from Kabul, Afghanistan is on its way to Delhi: Ministry of External Affairs pic.twitter.com/mmP3Za0CCM ANI (@ANI) August 26, 2021 The evacuation operation from Afghanistan in the backdrop of the Taliban`s takeover of the country last week is known as "Operation Devi Shakti". Earlier, MEA had urged all Indian nationals in Afghanistan requiring assistance to contact Special Afghanistan Cell immediately to move out of the war-torn country. Up till now, around 626 people from Kabul have been evacuated that covered Indian citizens as well as Afghan nationals including Sikhs and Hindus of Afghanistan. Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Tuesday informed that a total of 626 people including 228 Indian citizens have been evacuated from Afghanistan till now. Puri also informed out of them, 77 were Afghan Sikhs. Afghanistan`s situation is worsening as people are in rush to leave the nation after the Taliban seized control last week. On August 15, the country`s government fell soon after President Ashraf Ghani left the nation. Live TV New Delhi: President Ram Nath Kovind is set to begin his four-day visit to Uttar Pradesh on Thursday (August 26, 2021) at noon. The President is scheduled to attend various functions and ceremonies on his four-day visit to the state. President Kovind is slated to launch various projects of the department of culture and tourism under the Yogi Adityanath-led Uttar Pradesh government. According to official sources, the president will also visit Ayodhya on the last day of his visit and will become the first President to pay obeisance to Ram Lalla. He will also pray at the under-construction Ram temple site. The President will first attend the ninth convocation ceremony of the Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University in Lucknow on Thursday evening. This is followed by participation in the diamond jubilee celebrations of Captain Manoj Kumar Pandey UP Sainik School in Lucknow on Friday, where he will unveil a six-foot-tall bronze statue of former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Dr. Sampurnanand. President Kovind will also inaugurate an auditorium named after Dr Sampurnanand. He will also attend the 26th convocation of the Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences (PGIMS) in Lucknow on Friday. The next day President Kovind will visit Gorakhpur on Saturday (August 28, 2021) where he is scheduled to lay the foundation stone for the Mahayogi Guru Gorakhnath AYUSH Vishwavidyalaya and inaugurate the Mahayogi Gorakhnath Vishwavidyalaya. On the last day of his visit, the president will travel to Ayodhya on a presidential train. The President will also launch various projects in the town, including the renovation and construction of the Tulsi Smarak Bhavan, the development of the Nagar Bus Stand and Ayodhya Dham. President Kovind's visit to Uttar Pradesh will reportedly be his second one in the past two months. Earlier in June, he had visited his village Paraunkh in Kanpur. He had taken a train from Delhi's Safdarjung railway station to reach his village. (With Agency inputs) Live TV Kochi: Lakshadweep MP PP Mohammed Faizal said that the Save Lakshadweep Forum (SLF) will hold a meeting in Kavaratti on the island to plan a protest against the administrator Praful Khoda Patel over the arbitrary reforms. He also added that the forum will soon go to Delhi to meet President Ram Nath Kovind, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah. People in Lakshadweep are protesting against the draft legislation like Lakshadweep Prevention of Anti-Social Activities Regulation (Goonda Act), Lakshadweep Animal Preservation Regulation and Lakshadweep Panchayat Regulation, 2021 among others. Faizal said, "The administrator is not regularly present in the archipelago and he is not of any importance to the democratic system like panchayat and member of Parliament. The current administrator takes arbitrary decisions and acts as per his interests. He is trying to make legislation without asking the people of the island. The administrator does not allow the people of Lakshadweep to speak on the requirement of development on the island. The panchayat has been converted into a rubber stamp and the SLF opposes this." He added, "It is natural that the people will be worried as the Administrator has called for tender notification to implement new projects on the land without asking any permission from the owners. We will face this issue legally." "Thousands of contract and casual workers working with the Administration have been expelled in the name of the pandemic. Thus, he is trying to harass the residents of Lakshadweep people mentally and financially. We have declared non-cooperation movement," the MP said. "The Union Home Ministry is responsible for the arbitrary reforms made by the Administrator. No individual in Lakshadweep can co-operate with the dictatorial trend of him," Faizal concluded. Patel, who was appointed as the Administrator of Lakshadweep in December 2020 is facing opposition over policies introduced by him from the people of the union territory and politicians, both from within Lakshadweep and neighbouring state Kerala. The Bharatiya Janata Party unit in Lakshadweep also suffered a setback after about 15 members on the island resigned from the party after a sedition case was filed against filmmaker Aisha Sultana allegedly for her comments against the Centre`s COVID-19 management in the union territory. Meanwhile, Kerala High Court in June issued an interim stay on two orders issued by Lakshadweep Administrator Praful Khoda Patel. Live TV New Delhi: As India reported a rise of 22.7% in daily COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi on Thursday (August 26) made a two-pronged attack on the Centre. Gandhi took to Twitter and expressed worry over the spike in coronavirus cases and stressed on increasing the pace of vaccination against COVID-19. Rising #COVID numbers are worrying. Vaccination must pick up pace to avoid serious outcomes in the next wave, the Congress leader tweeted. Rising #COVID numbers are worrying. Vaccination must pick up pace to avoid serious outcomes in the next wave. Please take care of yourselves because GOI is busy with sales. Rahul Gandhi (@RahulGandhi) August 26, 2021 Attacking the Narendra Modi-led Central government on the National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) policy, Gandhi added, Please take care of yourselves because GOI is busy with sales. India logged 46,164 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, pushing the caseload to 3,25,58,530. With 607 fatalities, the death toll mounted to 4,36,365, as per Union Health Ministry data on Thursday. India's active cases rose to 3,33,725 in 24 hours, comprising 1.03% of the total infection count. The daily positivity rate was recorded at 2.58%, while the weekly positivity rate was logged at 2.02%. Meanwhile, Gandhi on Wednesday slammed the Centre over the monetisation scheme and accused the government of putting India on sale". The former Congress chief tweeted, First they sold faith and now #IndiaOnSale." On Monday, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman unveiled a Rs 6 lakh crore National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) that included unlocking value by involving private companies across infrastructure sectors -- from passenger trains and railway stations to airports, roads and stadiums. The government plans to monetise assets-- including 25 Airports Authority of India (AAI) airports, those at Chennai, Bhopal, Varanasi and Vadodara, as well as 40 railway stations, 15 railway stadiums and an unidentified number of railway colonies have been identified for getting private investments-- over a four-year period, from Financial Year 2022 to Financial Year 2025. Live TV Chennai: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin on Thursday (August 26) introduced a bill in the state Assembly to provide 7.5% reservation to students from government schools in professional courses like agriculture, law, fisheries and engineering. Speaking in the assembly during the tabling of the bill, the Chief Minister said that the government`s move was to ensure that a sizeable number of students from rural and village backgrounds with poor means and studying in government schools are provided with the opportunity to enter into professional courses. Supporting the bill, Opposition leader in the Tamil Nadu assembly and former Chief Minister, K Palaniswami welcomed the government`s move. The bill is likely to be passed unanimously in the assembly. Last year, the previous AIADMK government had introduced a 7.5 per cent horizontal reservation to government school students who cleared the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) for admission to undergraduate medical courses including MBBS. In August first week, the Chief Minister in the cabinet meeting announced the decision to extend the 7.5 per cent reservation for government school students to other professional courses like engineering, law, fisheries and agriculture. He had also stated that a legislation to this effect would be brought in the assembly. Stalin said that in 2006, the DMK government had cancelled the entrance examination for professional courses, adding that the decision of the then DMK government was to provide equal opportunities to students from rural backgrounds. "There are several challenges for the students from rural backgrounds studying in government schools to get into professional courses through entrance exams. They have to compete with students from private schools," IANS report quoted him as saying. The decision has been taken as per the recommendations of Justice (Rtd) D Murugesan committee, which was constituted on June 15 to study the reasons for poor representation of government school students in professional courses. The committee that submitted its report on June 21 recommended that government school students be provided with preferential treatment, besides recommending to the government to provide not less than 10 per cent reservation to students of government schools for admission to professional courses. The Stalin government, however, decided to implement 7.5 per cent reservation considering various other social and economical factors. (With Agency Inputs) New Delhi: After Khela Hobe Divas, Trinamool Congress (TMC) now celebrates Chhatra Parishad Foundation Day in Tripura. The TMC workers have been preparing for the event and LED screens are to be put up across colleges in Tripura where party supremo Mamata Banerjees address will be shown virtually. However, Tripura Police is yet to grant permission for the event. Meanwhile, TMC MP Abhishek Banerjee has been making repeated visits to the state and has vowed to defeat the ruling BJP in upcoming the 2023 Assembly polls in Tripura. Addressing a press conference in Agartala on August 2, TMC MP Abhishek Banerjee told the media that the "TMC will form a government in Tripura in the next 1.5 years and bring governance to its doorstep." Earlier, on August 8, after the alleged attack on TMC workers in Agartala, Abhishek Banerjee has said that democracy is being choked in Tripura and TMC will not spare a single inch for the BJP in the state. Speaking to reporters outside the Agartala airport here, Banerjee alleged that the TMC workers, who were attacked, have been booked instead of the attackers. "BJP wants to remain in power by threatening people. This is my second visit to Tripura in less than seven days. Whoever challenging the atrocities and hooliganism of BJP are being sent behind the bars. Instead of the attackers, the TMC workers who were attacked are booked. The entire country is watching how democracy is being choked in Tripura. TMC will fight. TMC will not spare a single inch to BJP in Tripura," he said. The developments make it clear that TMC has started "Khela" for the 2023 Assembly election in Tripura with Abhishek Banerjee at the commanding seat, leading the state party workers from the front. Live TV New Delhi: A five-member delegation of TMC MPs will be visiting the Election Commission office here on Thursday (August 26) to submit their written replies to the EC over earlier letter seeking views of parties on holding the polls. The Trinamool Congress delegation to consist of MPs Saugata Roy, Sukhendu S Ray, Jawhar Sircar, Sajda Ahmed and Mahua Moitra. Earlier on August 12, the EC has issued several guidelines/instructions/Orders for campaigning during general election/bye election in wake of COVID-19 pandemic in the country. It sought the views of the political parties on holding the election amid such situation. The Election Commission office has sought the views of the political parties in view of several bye-elections and general elections to the Legislative Assemblies of five states are due in 2021-22. The EC office stated that "It is requested that views and suggestions of your party may be furnished to the Commission latest by 30th August, 2021 so that exhaustive guidelines in this matter may be prepared." Live TV Jammu: Two terrorists belonging to the Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) were arrested in Jammu and Kashmir's Kishtwar district on Thursday, officials said. The arrests were made based on reliable information received at Chatroo police station that two youths -- Ashfaq Qayoom Tak of Passerkot and Tousif Giri of Pochhal -- were in close contact of the terrorists of the proscribed outfit HM from Anantnag in Kashmir, they said. The two were providing information with regard to the security forces to the terrorists and were conspiring to carry out terror acts in areas falling under the Chatroo police station, they added. On the basis of the information, a case was registered at Chatroo police station. Subsequently, a search operation was launched in the forest area of Naidgam, Chatroo, and both the terrorists were arrested, they said. On their disclosure, a hideout was busted in the forest area of Pingnal in Chatroo and arms and ammunition were recovered. The recovered arms include one 9 mm pistol with magazine and 20 rounds , one grenade, one AK 47 magazine, two wireless sets and letter pad of HM outfit division of Doda, they said. Live TV New Delhi: A 26-year-old woman living in JNU campus died under mysterious circumstances here on Thursday morning, police said. The police suspect that it is a case of suicide. They said the woman may have allegedly jumped from the second floor of the hostel and died but the cause of death will only be ascertained after the post-mortem examination. Madhuri Kumari, a resident of Buxar in Bihar, was staying at the Brahmaputra hostel inside the Jawaharlal Nehru University campus along with her husband who is pursuing PHD from the varsity, they said. The police said the couple got married in June this year, police said. No suicide note has been recovered yet, police said, adding an investigation is underway to determine the sequence of events. "The woman fell from a height and was taken to a nearby hospital where she succumbed to her injuries. We were then informed by the hospital administration," a senior police officer from southwest district said. Priliminary enquiry revealed that the woman came to the campus to meet her husband who had recently complained of seizures, police said. "Her husband was not feeling well and so he called his wife. But it is not known yet what happened between the couple later. A detailed enquiry is underway into the matter to ascertain the exact cause of death but we suspect she committed suicide by jumping from the second floor of the hostel building," the officer said. As the marriage is within seven years, a Sub Divisional Magistrate enquiry has been initiated in the matter following which the statement of the husband and the deceased's family will be recorded, he added. The body has been sent for post-mortem and the exact cause of death will be ascertained through an autopsy report which is awaited. ALSO READ: 13-yr-old Ghaziabad girl falls to death with pet puppy while trying to save him Live TV New Delhi: Amid the ongoing tussle between Shiv Sena and BJP, Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut on Thursday (August 26) slammed Union minister Narayan Rane for his 'won't let Maharashtra become West Bengal' statement. Taking a jibe at the BJP, Raut reminded the saffron party that it lost the recent West Bengal Assembly elections where Mamata Banerjees TMC came back to power with a thumping victory. Further, he said that if BJP leaders keep on using such language, they will soon become insignificant in Maharashtra, ANI reported. What does the 'won't let Maharashtra become West Bengal' statement (by Narayan Rane) mean? You (BJP) lost in West Bengal. If you keep on using same language, your presence in Maharashtra will also become insignificant. West Bengal is the tiger of the country, Sanjay Raut was quoted as saying by the news agency. What does the 'won't let Maharashtra become West Bengal' statement (by Narayan Rane) mean? You (BJP) lost in West Bengal. If you keep on using same language, your presence in Maharashtra will also become insignificant.West Bengal is the tiger of the country: Sanjay Raut,Shiv Sena pic.twitter.com/RRwwTyJZqM ANI (@ANI) August 26, 2021 Rauts statement comes a day after Rane said he will not allow Maharashtra to turn into West Bengal. The BJP MP was addressing reporters after securing bail from the local court in Mahad of Raigarh district on Wednesday in the case for allegedly making derogatory remarks" against Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray. He also said he is not afraid of the ruling Shiv Sena in the state, adding that the party should "not forget" that he had a "big role in spreading Shiv Sena and making it big". The Union Minister was arrested on Tuesday evening and was granted bail a few hours later by the local court in Mahad on Wednesday. Rane was arrested in Ratnagiri district after several FIRs were lodged against him at many places including Nashik and Pune, based on the complaints filed by Shiv Sena leaders for his remarks against Thackeray. Earlier, Rane had accused Thackeray of ignorance about the year of India's independence at an event and said "I would have given (him) a tight slap." (With ANI inputs) Live TV New Delhi: External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar on Thursday (August 26) said that India will approach the situation in Afghanistan in the spirit of national unity. His remarks came after the all-party meeting in which the MEA briefed floor leaders. The all-party meet on Afghanistan lasted 3 and half hours. 37 leaders from 31 parties attended it. The EAM took questions from MPs and a presentation was given on the priorities and the challenges. On this matter, we all have a similar view and we have a strong national position on Afghanistan, EAM said, adding we approach the situation very much in the spirit of national unity. India has been evacuating its nationals and a number of Afghans from the country under operation Devi Shakti. So far, India has evacuated 565 people, of which 175 are embassy personnel, 263 are other Indian nationals, 112 are Afghan nationals including Hindus and Sikhs and 15 are citizens of other countries. The EAM said, India has brought back most of the Indians. There are still few out there, some of them could not make it to the flight yesterday, but we will bring out everybody. For repatriation, India on August 16 formed the Afghan special cell. So far it has handled 3014 calls, 7826 WhatsApp messages and 3101 emails. The cell is manned by more than 20 MEA officials. Sources said, during the all-party meet, EAM listed pre-emptive measures like temporary withdrawal of India-based personnel from Indian consulates in Herat and Jalalabad (April 2020), scaling down of Indian Embassy in Kabul (June 2021), evacuation from Kandahar, Mazar-e-Sharif and issued security advisories from time to time. He highlighted that the government is very strongly committed to ensure full evacuation as soon as possible. In terms of any international decisions that are made, our diplomacy, our role and interest are recognised. We are in touch with our partners. In the meet, EAM pointed out challenges during evacuation which included frequent firing incidents near the airport and inside Kabul, multiple checkpoints by various groups, landing permissions delays, flight clearances from relevant countries. Also Read: Taliban stop 140 Afghan Sikh, Hindu pilgrims from leaving Kabul: Sikh community Leaders Live TV New Delhi: Karnataka Home Minister on Thursday (August 26) made a controversial remark on the gangrape of a college girl by five men near Chamundi Hill in Mysuru, ANI reported. The gangrape has shocked Karnataka and the opposition has targeted the ruling BJP over the case. Accusing the Congress of politicising the matter, Karnataka Home Minister Araga Jnanendra said, The rape happened in Mysuru but Congress trying to gain political mileage from the incident. It was an inhuman incident. The girl and her friend must have gone to a deserted place there, they should not have gone there. The rape happened in Mysuru but Congress trying to gain political mileage from the incident. It was an inhuman incident. The girl &her friend must have gone to a deserted place there, they should not have gone there: Karnataka Home Minister Araga Jnanendra on Mysuru gangrape case pic.twitter.com/GYc3DovcuJ ANI (@ANI) August 26, 2021 Jnanendra also said that the government and the police department have taken the gang-rape incident in Mysuru "seriously" and all efforts are being made to arrest the culprits. "We have sent our senior police officer ADGP Pratap Reddy from Bengaluru, and Mysuru police commissioner and senior officials have been asked to form teams, investigate seriously, nab the culprits and bring them to justice," he was quoted as saying by PTI. Speaking on if any arrest has been made so far, the minister replied, "There is no information on any arrests so far, once arrested, it will be made known." A female student was allegedly gangraped by unidentified people at Chamundi Hills in the Mysuru district of Karnataka. The incident took place at 7 pm on Tuesday (August 24). The victim, a student of a private college, was crossing through that area on a bike with her male friend when she was attacked and raped by some men. The girl and her male friend, who was assaulted by the gang, are undergoing treatment in a private hospital. Meanwhile, National Commission for Women (NCW) has taken cognizance of the Mysuru Gangrape case and wrote to Karnataka Police. "The National Commission for Women has come across a media post wherein it has been alleged that a young woman along with her boyfriend was attacked by a group of men and later the woman was gang raped at Chamundi Hills in Mysuru. As per the reports, only FIR has been registered and no accused has been arrested in the matter yet," the release by the NCB read. (With agency inputs) Live TV BENGALURU: Karnataka Home Minister Araga Jnanendra on Thursday (August 23) kicked up a row over his rape comments made in the context of a gangrape incident in Mysuru, that did not go down well with Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai and opposition Congress, prompting him to withdraw his controversial statement. The Home Minister's remarks that the gangrape victim and her male friend should not have gone to the deserted place and his claims that the opposition Congress was trying to 'rape' him by targetting him, following the incident, evoked sharp reactions from the opposition party, even as Jnanendra accused it of trying to derive political mileage from the 'inhuman' incident. Hitting out at the Home Minister and the ruling BJP, the Congress said they are 'incapable' of protecting the people of the state. With the issue snowballing into a major controversy and the Chief Minister also disapproving of his comments, Jnanendra withdrew his statement. Meanwhile, the Chief Minister said his government will form a special team to investigate the gang-rape case and asserted that the perpetrators will be caught soon and brought to justice. Bommai also disapproved of the comments made by Jnanendra and said, "I just don't agree with the comments made by my Home Minister regarding the gang-rape incident. I have advised him to give a clarification." "I have directed the officials to pursue the matter seriously and update me on the developments," he added. "Once the DGP (Director General of Police) and I reach Bengaluru, we will immediately form a special team," Bommai, who was on a two-day visit to the national capital, told PTI. A college girl was allegedly raped by five men near Chamundi Hills in Mysuru late on Tuesday and the incident came to light on Wednesday. The girl and her male friend, who was assaulted by the gang, are undergoing treatment in a private hospital. "Around 7-7:30 pm (on Tuesday) they (the victim and male friend) had gone there. It is a deserted place, they should not have gone.. But we can't stop anyone from going, they have gone. It is a deserted place and no one usually goes there as no one will be there," Jnanendra said in response to a question. Speaking to reporters here, he said there are concerns about lack of police patrolling in such places and that he was going to Mysuru and hold discussions with officials to rectify the lapses. Reacting to opposition Congress' criticism on the law and order situation in the state after the gang-rape incident, the Minister said "Rape has happened there (in Mysuru), but the Congress was trying to rape me.. They are trying to rape the Home Minister. They are trying to gain political mileage. It is an inhuman act." "When such incidents happen, instead of exerting pressure to see it from a humanitarian perspective and detect (the culprits), attempts are on to derive political mileage in such a situation. People will see it. I will not say much on this. Instructions have been given on what has to be done by the police so that such things don't recur and we are at it," he said. Attacking the Home Minister for his statement, state Congress President D K Shivakumar urged the police to arrest his party men involved in "raping the Home Minister", whether it is him or Congress Legislature Party leader Siddaramaiah or any other leader. "He (Home Minister) has claimed that Congress was raping him. He is using the word rape very lightly...It seems he likes that word. I seek the response of BJP leaders on this statement. When the Home Minister is saying that Congress is raping him, what is the administration of the state doing?" he asked. Targeting Jnanendra for his comment that the victim should not have gone to deserted place, the Congress party said, "Home Minister you have the onus of protecting the state. Are you not ashamed of making such a shabby remark?" "With this statement he (Home Minister) has agreed that it is dangerous to venture out even at 7:30 pm under a BJP rule," it said. Pointing out that it has been nearly 48 hours since the incident occurred and no arrest has been made, Shivakumar said it is a shame on the police department and the party was concerned about the image of Karnataka. He said Congress is constituting a fact-finding committee to look into the incident under the Chairmanship of former MP V Ugrappa. They would visit Mysuru and submit a report and the party will do everything possible to get justice for the victim. Later, in a statement withdrawing his comments, the Home Minister clarified that he had no intention of hurting anybody in criticising the Congress leaders who had sought his resignation over the unfortunate incident in Mysuru. "I have withdrawn the statement made earlier on the Congress party leaders," he said. Referring to the rape incident, Jnanendra said police officials are conducting an investigation to nab the culprits. He said the victim and her male friend are being treated in the hospital and are under medical care. The Minister also said that security measures will be tightened further to ensure the protection of all, especially women, adding that "We are committed to ensure the safety of all sections in society." Meanwhile, Mysuru police have intensified efforts to identify the culprits with the help of mobile phone numbers that operated in the area at the time of the crime, and are also looking into CCTV footage of nearby areas, official sources said. They said the culprits allegedly made a video of the sexual assault and demanded money for not making it public. Some student organisations staged protests in Mysuru, demanding justice for the victim. Live TV New Delhi: Actor Abhishek Bachchan is returning to Chennai to resume shooting his next film after undergoing surgery in Mumbai. Abhishek came back to Mumbai for treatment after having a freak accident in Chennai. The Guru actor took to his Instagram to share the news with his fans. In the photo shared by Abhishek, he can be seen having a plaster cast on his right hand but at the same time showing a thumbs-up. Abhishek is wearing a casual sky blue colour hoodie, blue denim jeans and white sneakers. The actor is also wearing a black face mask and stylish glasses. Had a freak accident in Chennai on the set of my new film last Wednesday. Fractured my right hand. Needed surgery to fix it! So a quick trip back home to Mumbai. Surgery done, all patched-up and casted. And now back in Chennai to resume work, wrote Junior Bachchan. On a lighter note, he further added, As they say... The show must go on! And as my father said.... Mard ko dard nahin hota. Abhishek however admitted, it is a hyperbole and continued, Ok, ok, ok it hurt a little. Thank you all for your wishes and get-well-soon messages. Various fans, friends and family members took to the comment section to wish Abhishek a speedy recovery. Hope you get well soon, wrote Bobby Deol, Get well soon my brother, commented Reitesh Deshmukh. Karan Johar, Navya Naveli Nanda, Sonali Bendre, Manish Malhotra, Zoya Akhtar, Sikander Kher, Shweta Bachchan Nanda and Anand Ahuja were some other people who commented on Abhisheks post. On the work front, the actor will next be seen in Sujoy Ghoshs Bob Biswas, which is a spin-off from Vidya Balans Kahaani. Abhishek will also be seen in Tushar Jalotas Dasvi along with Nimrat Kaur and Yami Gautam. New Delhi: Bhabhi Ji Ghar Pe Hain fame actress Saumya Tandon is deeply worried for her Afghan friends after the Taliban took over the country. The actress says she has been unable to contact them and remembers the hospitality, the graciousness of Afghans when she visited Kabul for a month in 2008. Its heartbreaking to see whats happening in Afghanistan and how people are scrambling for their lives the visuals are extremely disturbing. I shudder to think what the future has in store for them. I hope and pray that they are safe, the actress told ETimes. She further continued, I had been to Afghanistan and stayed in Kabul for a month to shoot an international project, in which I played an Afghan girl, Khushi. The story was about a girl, who aspired to be a doctor and fulfils her dream despite facing resistance from people and society. It was a story of women empowerment and whats happening right now is ironic. Talking about how her stay helped her overcome her preconceived notions about the country, Saumya shared, The locals are so warm and giving. When I visited shops and the minute the owners realised that I was from India, they would give me things for free, as gifts. The people there have a very strong sense of self-respect. They like to do things for others. What I experienced during my stay was so different from the perception I had of the country, which has been facing war for so many years. The actress has however not been able to contact her Afghan friends post the unrest. After the recent unrest, I tried contacting my Indian friends through whom I had gone there, but I didnt get any reply. I hope they are safe. I just want to reach out and ask them if they are okay because the visuals that we are seeing are very disturbing. I feel helpless, but my prayers are with them and my heart goes out to them, shared Saumya. New Delhi: Bollywood Greek god Hrithik Roshan took to his Twitter handle and posted an interesting food-related GIF along with a tweet that read Guess whats on my mind #ThursdayThoughts. And ever since his tweet, fans have gone berserk trying to guess whats on his mind. Hrithik Roshan is a major foodie and this tweet has led fans to keep their guessing game on. Check out a few funny and interesting replies from netizens on Hrithik's tweet: Samosa is love Anand Abhirup // (@AnandHR_Odia) August 26, 2021 order some samosa bestie . (@karishmaokay) August 26, 2021 Pet pujja fir kam duja https://t.co/olk0Q2YkXA Hrithikroshan_only (@iHrithik_only) August 26, 2021 Youre not alone in this! Gaurav Prabhu (@Gauravprabhu15) August 26, 2021 In 2019, the WAR actor confessed his love for samosas and also shared how much he loves to eat, which is quite unbelievable, thanks to his super-fit body. He had written, The other guy inside me is a fitness freak. Currently, we are happy together. I eat. He works out. We don't encroach in each other's space. Sorted. In another post, while at the shoot, he spoke about how he was missing his samosas, told fans not to get fooled by the serious face and that he was looking at the menu on the laptop screen. On the work front, theres a lot of excitement around Hrithik and Deepika coming together for Fighter. There are also reports of him starting to shoot for the Vikram Vedha remake soon. New Delhi: Popular Bengali actress turned TMC MP Nusrat Jahan has been blessed with a baby boy today at a Kolkata hospital. She was admitted to the city hospital on August 25, 2021. Both mother and baby are doing fine, reportedly. A day back, Nusrat was admitted to Neotia Hospital in Kolkata. She had visited the hospital for her check-up. In June this year, Zee News got an exclusive first photo of Nusrat flaunting her baby bump, thereby, confirming her pregnancy news. In the picture, Nusrat Jahan can be seen posing with Bengali actress Srabanti Chatterjee and other acquaintances. Nusrat Jahan recently announced her split with husband Nikhil Jain and released an official statement as well. The actress-turned-politician said, "Our separation happened long back, but I did not speak about it as I intended to keep my private life to myself." For the unversed, TMC MP Nusrat Jahan and Nikhil Jain who tied the knot in June 2019 in Turkey, have been making headlines due to marital discord and cheating allegations on the former. Meanwhile, after allegations were made against Nikhil Jain and his family in the past few days, he decided to reveal some important facts about his relationship with Nusrat. He issued an official statement about the ongoing marital discord and made some important revelations in it. Nusrat Jahan tied the knot with her businessman beau Nikhil Jain in the picturesque Turkish town of Bodrum on June 19, 2019. The wedding ceremony was done as per Turkish Marriage Regulation. Amid these speculations, Nusrat Jahan's intimacy with BJP's actor-turned-politician Yash Dasgupta has also gained ground. Yash and Nusrat worked together in the Bengali film SOS Kolkata in 2020. New Delhi: The Punjab government on Thursday (August 26) announced a minimum increment of 15% in the basic pay of its lakhs of employees. The state government has also announced the restoration of certain allowances. The salary hike of lakhs of Punjab government employees is expected to cost Rs 1,500 crore to the exchequer. "With this, the total average increase in salary/pension per employee has gone up to Rs 1.05 lakh per annum," the Punjab government said in a statement. Previously, state employees received an average of Rs 79,250 hike per annum in their basic pay. The 6th Pay Commission's recommendations were accepted with effect from July 1, 2021, offering a Rs 4,700 crore bonanza for the employees. The latest step to increase the basic salaries of Punjab government employees was taken in a Cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Amarinder Singh. Meanwhile, the chief minister has also called for improving communication in the ministries. He directed all ministers, administrative secretaries and heads of departments to talk to their respective employees for early redressal of their grievances, PTI reported. "While all reasonable demands of employees should be resolved following today's announcements," he made it clear that strict action should be taken as per rules if the employees continue to agitate. Also Read: Kia Seltos X Line revealed! Check features, specs and price ahead of September launch Singh urged for effective communication with the state government employees after several workers agitated against the authorities over the delay in rolling out the benefits under the Sixth Pay Commission. Also Read: Apple Car announcement in 2021? Nobel prize winner Akira Yoshino predicts tech giants entry into automotive New Delhi: Payments Council of India (PCI), the representative body for payment companies in the country, has refuted media claims that had previously said that it customers will have to remember their credit card and debit card number from next year for online payments. PCI said that the customers will not have to remember the 16-digit card number for online payments effective Jan 2022, in contrast to what has been reported in certain sections of the media. The industry and PCI are working in alignment with Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on possible secure card on file solutions which will ensure a near similar customer experience for online purchases whilst enhancing the security of the storage of card credentials of customers, said PCI Statement. On March 31, 2020, RBI released a notification, for payment system providers and participants to put in place workable solutions such as tokenization for enhancing the security of storage of customers card credentials, within the framework of the relevant guidelines issued by the RBI. PCI has shared with RBI the principles which can be adopted by the industry for developing such secure card on file solution. We are working closely with RBI on charting a roadmap of the possible solutions that could be adopted by the industry for securing the storage of raw card data. Solutions being worked upon, would not require the customers to enter their card number manually every time they make an online purchase says PCI. The solutions will adhere to the security checks and controls and frameworks prescribed by RBI, it further added. From tightening the security of card not present transactions by introducing the requirement of AFA in 2009 to tackling the risk associated with data storage/breach effective Jan 2022, RBI has played a key role in enhancing the security of card transactions. The apex monetary institution has also played a catalytic role in the development and growth of digital payments across the country thereby progressing towards the goal of less-cash society. It has set out guidelines and circulars for the effective functioning of the payment systems with focus on security controls. RBI has over the time published several guidelines on security of card transactions, as cards is right now one of the most accepted forms of digital payment. Payments Council of India was formed under the aegis of IAMAI in the year 2013 catering to the needs of the digital payment industry. The Council was formed inter-alia for the purposes of representing the various regulated non-banking payment industry players, to address and help resolve various industry level issues and barriers which require discussion and action. Live TV #mute NEW DELHI: AICC in-charge of Punjab Harish Rawat has thrown hints that the newly appointed advisors of state Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu may be sacked after a bitter political storm erupted over their highly objectionable comments on Kashmir and Pakistan. The senior Congress leader, while speaking to a TV news channel, expressed his sheer displeasure over the controversial statements made by the two advisors of Sidhu - Pyare Lal Garg and Malwinder Mali. Rawat said that their comments were clearly not in line with the stated official position of the party on Kashmir and Pakistan. Several top Congress leaders, including Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh and Manish Tewari, had objected to and condemned the remarks made by the two men in question. Rawat further said that both Garg and Mali were not appointed by the party and that Sidhu had been directed to dismiss or take strict action against them. Throwing his weight behind the Chief Minister, Rawat said that the upcoming assembly elections in the state will be fought under Capt Amarinder Singh. He will lead the party and will be the main face of the Congress in Punjab assembly elections, Rawat said. Briefing mediapersons after a meeting with a delegation of Punjab Ministers and MLAs at his residence in Dehradun, Rawat said, "We will contest 2022 Punjab elections under the leadership of Captain Amarinder Singh." A section of Punjab Congress leaders had expressed their resentment over Amarinder Singh to party high command, demanding the removal of Captain as chief minister. They reportedly said that his working style is harming the party and the state. Punjab CM Captain Amarinder Singh had reportedly `complained` to Sonia Gandhi that Sidhu`s criticism of his government is not good for its smooth functioning and gives a bad impression in the public domain. Sidhu was appointed Punjab Congress chief last month despite strong objections by Captain Amarinder Singh in a bid to end months of infighting in the state unit. Live TV New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the shifting of former Directors of Unitech Sanjay Chandra and Ajay Chandra from Tihar Jail to Arthur Road Jail and Taloja Jail immediately. The apex courts order came after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) revealed that both the sons along with their father and erstwhile Unitech founder Ramesh Chandra were operating the business from jail. The ED told the Supreme Court that it has unearthed a secret underground office here which was being operated by Ramesh and was visited by his sons Sanjay and Ajay when on parole or bail. In its recent order, the Supreme Court bench of Justice D Y Chandrachud and M R Shah also made it clear that the two accused - Sanjay Chandra and Ajay Chandra - will not receive any additional facilities inside the Arthur Road Jail and Taloja Jail. ED has been investigating several money laundering charges against the Chandras' and Unitech Ltd for the past few years. The department said that that both Sanjay and Ajay have rendered the entire judicial custody otiose as they have been freely communicating, instructing their officials and disposing of their properties from inside the jail. Appearing on behalf of the ED, Additional Solicitor General Madhavi Divan revealed that Chandras' have deputed their officials outside the jail to communicate their instructions to the outside world. During one of our search and seizure operations, we have unearthed a secret underground office, which is being used by Ramesh Chandra and visited by his sons when they are out on parole or bail. We have recovered hundreds of original sale deeds from that office, hundreds of digital signatures and several computers which contain sensitive data with regard to their properties in India and abroad, Divan told the bench. She said the probe agency has submitted two status reports in sealed cover to the court and have provisionally attached Unitech Ltd properties worth Rs 600 crore both in India and abroad. Divan pointed out that the agency has found a very intricate web of money trail through shell companies and the properties are being disposed of in real time, which is creating problems in the probe. Also Read: Koo, made in India Twitter alternative, crosses 1 crore downloads in 18 months They (Chandras') have been operating from inside the jail premises. They have rendered the entire judicial custody otiose. They are freely communicating and passing on instructions with the help of people deputed outside the jail premises. ED has found that they have even tried to influence a dummy director when he was being interrogated by the agency, Divan said. Central govt issued new rules for drone usage, now drone flying gets easier - With PTI inputs. Live TV #mute New Delhi: Apple could enter into the automotive space as soon as 2021, according to a prediction by Nobel Prize winner Akira Yoshino, an honorary fellow at Japanese chemical manufacturing company Asahi Kasei. Yoshino, the pioneer behind lithium-Ion batteries, made his prediction in a recent interview with Reuters. He won the prestigious award in 2019 for developing the first safe, production-viable lithium-ion battery that is now powering smartphones and notebooks. During the interview, he deep-dived into the future of electric vehicles and talked about how tech firms are increasingly shifting their focus to mobility. Of all the firms, he appeared to be excited for the launch of the rumoured Apple car. "The one to look out for is Apple. What will they do? I think they may announce something soon. And what kind of car would they announce? What kind of battery? They probably want to get in around 2025. If they do that, I think they have to announce something by the end of this year. That's just my own personal hypothesis," he said in his interview. Reports suggest that Apple has been working on an electric car under the project name Titan. In the past few years, the tech giant was reportedly said to be in talks with several South Korean car manufacturers such as Hyundai. Also Read: Tata Motors presents Altroz to 24 athletes who missed out on bronze in Tokyo Olympics However, Apple has refuted most of the reports associating it with global automakers. At present, John Giannandrea is heading the project Titan. Previously, Giannandrea was heading Google Search till 2018. Also Read: Air taxis to fly in India soon? Check what Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia has to say New: Koo has crossed 1 crore installs since its launch in March 2020, the Microblogging platform announced on Thursday (August 26). Founded by Aprameya Radhakrishna and Mayank Bidawatka, Koo currently lets users express their views in 8 languages - Hindi, Kannada, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Assamese, Bangla and English. The application witnessed a surge in downloads amid the brawl between Twitter and the Indian government over new IT rules. Between February and August 2021, Koo saw 85 lakh users (8.5 million) downloading the app, the company said in a statement. The microblogging platform has introduced a slew of features to enable more Indians, especially from Tier 2 and beyond cities, to engage in online conversations. The app shows its users with interests in their language, helping them in engaging within their communities. The homegrown application, which is seen as Indias answer to Twitter, has witnessed prominent faces from Bollywood, politics, sports, literature and journalism joining the social media platform in the past months. Bollywood actors such as Anupam Kher, Tiger Shroff and Kangana Ranaut, politicians such as Nitin Gadkari, Kamal Nath, Ashok Gehlot, and Yogi Adityanath, among others, have created their accounts on Koo. The platform also features sportspersons like Mohammed Shami, Wriddhiman Saha, Aakash Chopra, and Javagal Srinath, among others. A total of 14 chief ministers of Indian states have also joined the microblogging platform in the past few months. On crossing 1 crore installs, a Koo Spokesperson said that Koo was started with a dream to create a digital platform where millions of Indians could express themselves freely and share their thoughts in their preferred language. Also Read: ITR filing for FY 2020-21: Salaried people using ITR-1 SAHAJ must keep these 9 documents handy, here's your checklist Since we launched in March 2020, the response has been heartening. Koo has achieved 1 crore downloads now. Our growth in the future will be at an even faster pace than what weve experienced in the recent past. We are both humbled and excited to pave the way for homegrown digital companies to go global as India aspires to make the Aatmanirbhar Digital India dream a reality and unite the country through technology and languages. Also Read: Gold Price Today, 26 August 2021: Gold continues to fall for 2nd day, still cheaper by nearly Rs 9,100 from record highs New Delhi: The pre-bookings for Galaxy Z Fold3 and Galaxy Z Flip3 were 2.7 times high in India as compared to Galaxy Note20 Series launched last year, industry sources revealed on Wednesday. Samsung has received a tremendous response to its new foldable smartphones in India, with the company securing the best ever pre-bookings for any Galaxy flagship launched in India, sources told IANS. Most of the pre-bookings are coming from young consumers, the sources added. Pre-bookings for newly-launched Galaxy Z Fold3 5G and Galaxy Z Flip3 5G smartphones opened in India on Tuesday. Consumers looking to buy Samsung's third generation of category-defining foldable devices can log on to Samsung.com or visit leading retail stores to pre-book Galaxy Z Fold3 5G and Galaxy Z Flip3 5G. Galaxy Z Fold3 5G and Galaxy Z Flip3 5G are Samsung's most powerful and premium smartphones as well as more durable. The devices are built to last with IPX8 water resistance. For the first time, Samsung announced big offers on Galaxy Z Fold3 & Galaxy Z Flip3 during the pre-booking phase. Samsung has signed up Bollywood actor Alia Bhatt to be the face of Galaxy Z Series. The Fold3 carries a starting price-tag of Rs 1,49,999, while the Flip3 starts at Rs 84,999. Consumers pre-booking Galaxy Z Fold3 5G and Galaxy Z Flip3 5G will be eligible for either an upgrade voucher of up to Rs 7,000 or HDFC Bank cash back of up to Rs 7,000 using credit and debit card, taking the starting price of Galaxy Z Fold3 5G at Rs 1,42,999 and Galaxy Z Flip3 5G at Rs 77,999. In addition to this, consumers will be eligible for free 1 year Samsung Care plus Accidental & Liquid Damage Protection worth Rs 7,999 on pre-booking Galaxy Z Fold3 5G and Rs 4,799 on pre-booking Galaxy Z Flip3 5G. Consumers can pre-book their Galaxy Z Fold3 5G and Galaxy Z Flip3 5G on Samsung.com and across leading retail stores starting Tuesday till September 9 and the sale will commence from September 10. San Francisco: Google has rolled out an "experimental" picture-in-picture (PiP) feature for its iOS YouTube app that allows premium subscribers to view video content while using other apps. For now, the PiP mode is limited to YouTube Premium customers and is considered an experimental feature, which means it must be manually activated before use. When enabled, the feature allows users to minimize YouTube's viewing window into a "mini player" that sits atop other apps, reports AppleInsider. To take advantage of PiP, subscribers must first visit YouTube.com/new while logged in to their Google Account and navigate to the "Picture-in-picture on iOS" experiment. Selecting "Try it out" activates the option for that account. Next, opening the YouTube app on iPhone and playing a video, users can swipe up or press the home button to close the app and reveal a mini player. The video will continue playing in the small PiP pane. Locking the screen pauses the video, though content can be resumed via lock screen controls, YouTube said. YouTube announced plans to roll out a PiP mode for US subscribers of its premium service in July. Lucknow: Poet Munawwar Rana`s son has been arrested for allegedly faking an attack on himself to implicate his uncles. Tabrez Rana, who is embroiled in an ancestral property dispute with his uncle, was arrested by the Rae Bareli police from Lalkuan locality in Lucknow, late on Wednesday night. Rana, who wanted to contest the state assembly elections from Tiloi in Rae Bareli, had staged the attack on himself to get security and media coverage, besides implicating his uncles, the police official said. He had lodged a complaint with the Rae Bareli police alleging that he was attacked by two bike-borne men at a petrol pump in the Hindola Ratapur area on June 28. When a Special Operations Group of the Uttar Pradesh police probing the case, scanned the CCTV footage of the area, several discrepancies were found in Rana`s claims. Tabrez was found alone in a vehicle at the time of the incident though he had claimed that there was another person with him. Rae Bareli SP Shlok Kumar had said that Tabrez Rana, along with his two accomplices Haleem and Sultan Ali, faked the attack on himself. An FIR was also lodged last Friday against Munawwar Rana also allegedly for hurting religious feelings by comparing Valmiki, who wrote Ramayana, with Taliban, police had said. "The FIR has been registered against Munawar Rana on the complaint of one P L Bharti, who has alleged that the poet hurt the religious feelings by comparing Valmiki with the Taliban," a senior official had said here. The FIR was registered at Hazratganj police station under sections 153A (Promoting enmity between different groups on ground of religion, race, place of birth etc), 295 A (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class), 505(1)(B) (intent to cause, or which is likely to cause, fear or alarm among the public) and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. Meanwhile, Munawwar Rana said on Thursday that his son was being targeted because he had expressed his opinion that was against the state government. "This government believes that every Muslim is a terrorist," he said. New Delhi: Remember the baby who was born on board a US evacuation flight from Kabul? Yes, we are talking about the Afghan baby girl born on a C-17 military aircraft earlier this week. The news of a new life amid the Afghanistan evacuation sent little waves of happiness in an otherwise stressful and uncertain situation. In a new development, the parents of the Afghan baby girl have named her after the planes call sign Reach. The head of US European Command told reporters on Wednesday that officials had spoken to the mother and father of the child, adding that they have decided to name her Reach because the transport aircrafts call sign is Reach 828. The baby girl was born Saturday. The mother and her family were then helped by the US Air Force upon landing at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany. European Command said that the mother went into labour during the flight. "During a flight from an Intermediate Staging Base in the Middle East, the mother went into labor and began having complications. The aircraft commander decided to descend in altitude to increase air pressure in the aircraft, which helped stabilize and save the mother's life," the Air Mobility Command said in a tweet. "Upon landing, Airmen from the 86th MDG came aboard and delivered the child in the cargo bay of the aircraft. The baby girl and mother were transported to a nearby medical facility and are in good condition," they added. Meanwhile, two other babies have been born over the past week, whose parents were evacuated from Afghanistan, at the US military hospital in Germany. Live TV Chennai: Parameshwaran and Umavathi, two labourers from Therkoorai village of Tamil Nadu's Ramanathapuram district, fell in love and decided to get married around 10 years ago. However, the parents of Parameshwaran did not accept the marriage since the girl belonged to a different caste. However, this did not deter the couple as they decided to go ahead after Umavathi's family supported them. After the couple got married, they were ousted by the villagers for the last 10 years. Neither, they were allowed to visit the village temple nor were they allowed to use the drinking water tap in the village. They were residing at the border of the village. Both of them decided to settle at the land which belonged to Ummavathi's mother in the village. However, the villagers cut off the way by putting bushes and thrones. The duo resided at the village for many years until they finally decided to move back to their village, they were barred from entering for almost 10 years. The couple filed a complaint in the nearest police station and the issue went up to the revenue department. A team led by Thasildhar Parameshwaran, along with the administrative officers of the village, went to the village on Wednesday and conducted a meeting between the two parties. "We have come here after the directions of the collector. The issue has been resolved, we have cleared the way for them to get back to their land and we will issue the documents soon," Parameshwaran was quoted by News18. The administrative officials warned both parties not to disturb the couple after this. The couple, who are also parents to a 9-year-old child, has thanked the officials for solving the decade-long matter. Live TV New Delhi: An Afghan journalist has denied media reports of his killing by the Taliban and clarified that he was beaten while reporting in Kabul. Earlier on Thursday (August 26), some news agencies reported that the Afghan journalist was killed by the Taliban. Taking to Twitter, Tolo News reporter Ziar Khan Yaad recounted the incident and said that he was thrashed by the Taliban in Kabul's new city while reporting, adding that his camera and mobile have also been hijacked. Denying the reports of his death, Yaad tweeted, I was beaten by the Taliban in Kabul's New City while reporting. Cameras, technical equipment and my personal mobile phone have also been hijacked. Some people have spread the news of my death which is false. The Taliban got out of an armored Land Cruiser and hit me at gunpoint. I still don't know why they behaved like that and suddenly attacked me. The issue has been shared with Taliban leaders; however, the perpetrators have not yet been arrested, which is a serious threat to freedom of expression. Ziar Khan Yaad (@ziaryaad) August 26, 2021 Further, he added that the matter has been raised with the Taliban leaders. I still don't know why they behaved like that and suddenly attacked me. The issue has been shared with Taliban leaders; however, the perpetrators have not yet been arrested, which is a serious threat to freedom of expression, Yaad added. According to Tolonews, its reporter Ziar Yaad and his cameraman were beaten up by Taliban fighters while they were working in Kabul on a report. Since the Taliban captured Kabul on August 15, reports of several journalists being beaten or killed by the militant group have come to the fore. As per Reuters, the Taliban shot and killed a relative of a Deutsche Welle journalist while hunting for him last week. Deutsche Welle director general Peter Limbourg told French news agency AFP, "It is evident that the Taliban are already carrying out organised searches for journalists, both in Kabul and in the provinces. We are running out of time!" Earlier, Indian photojournalist Danish Siddiqui was killed by the Taliban in July. The Taliban had denied their role in the death of Siddiqui. New Delhi: Former vice president of Afghanistan Amrulla Saleh on Thursday (August 26, 2021) said that former president Ashraf Ghani leaving the country was a "stain on our history. In an exclusive interview with WION's Palki Sharma, he said, Ghanis escape shattered whatever positivity was left about his image, adding that "at the right moment he did not show a sense of sacrifice and a sense of giving back to the country, I feel very sorry that. About former president Ashraf Ghanis escape from the war-ravaged country, Saleh stated that had Ghani stayed in the nation and honoured his word it would have been much better both for "his legacy and the Afghan people". Former vice president Amrulla Saleh also slammed Ghani on his hollow words and promises. Saled revealed that Ghani had claimed that, "I am a fan of King Amanullah", the leader who had regained independence from the British, however, when the time came for him to act like King Amanullah, he fled the country. The former Afgan vice president went on to reason that even if Ghani was imprisoned by the Taliban miscreants it would have been a "rallying point" for the Afghans. Ghanis capture would have led to an outcry in the international community and things could have been different. "I don't think his escape from Afghanistan has either helped him or those around him. This will be a dark chapter in our history," Saleh claimed. During the interview, the former vice president also spoke about the reason behind his decision of not to fleeing Afghanistan. "If a person of my stature and history tries to escape it would be disgraceful and a historic shame, Saleh exclaimed. "I share every hardship that the Afghans are facing" Former Afghanistan Vice President @AmrullahSaleh2 speaks to @palkisu. Catch the #EXCLUSIVE interview only on WION. LIVE TV: https://t.co/waIaRZcNrE pic.twitter.com/uR3pmpXmc2 WION (@WIONews) August 26, 2021 "When the country is seeking our trust if we escape it would dishonouring the sacrifices of the Afghan people, Saleh said, adding that he did not want to be part of that disgrace, humiliation and historic shame." "I am with the Afghan people and I am on my soil, I share their pain and frustration," he said. Saleh also declared that he is prepared to share "every hardship" with the citizens of Afghanistan. Meanwhile, earlier on Thursday, the US embassy in Kabul has advised the American citizens not to travel to the Hamid Karzai International Airport at this time amid reports of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport. Additionally, the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken revealed the United States has so far evacuated over 82,000 people from Kabul, with about 19,000 in the last 24 hours alone, in "one of the largest" airlifts in world history. Starting on August 14, the day when the Taliban toppled the US-backed Afghanistan government, there were 6,000 American citizens in the war-torn country who wanted to leave. Live TV Washington: The US has so far evacuated over 82,000 people from Kabul, with about 19,000 in the last 24 hours alone, in "one of the largest" airlifts in world history, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said. Starting on August 14, the day when the Taliban toppled the US-backed Afghanistan government, there were 6,000 American citizens in the war-torn country who wanted to leave. Over the last 10 days, roughly 4,500 of these Americans have been safely evacuated along with their immediate family members, Blinken told reporters here on Wednesday. Since August 14th, more than 82,300 people have been safely flown out of Kabul. In the 24-hour period from Tuesday to Wednesday, approximately 19,000 people were evacuated on 90 US military and coalition flights. Only the US could organise and execute a mission of this scale and this complexity," he said. Blinken said, "This is one of the largest airlifts in history, a massive military, diplomatic, security, and humanitarian undertaking." "Over the past 24 hours, we've been in direct contact with approximately 500 additional Americans and provided specific instructions on how to get to the airport safely," he said, adding that the US is aggressively reaching out to the remaining roughly 1,000 contacts. Noting that the US is operating in a hostile environment in a city and country now controlled by the Taliban, with the very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack, the secretary said the US is taking every precaution, but this is very high-risk. The US is "on track" to complete its mission by August 31 provided the Taliban continue to cooperate and there are no disruptions to this effort, Blinken said, adding that President Joe Biden has also asked for contingency plans "in case he determines that we must remain in the country past that date". But let me be crystal-clear about this: There is no deadline on our work to help any remaining American citizens who decide they want to leave to do so, along with the many Afghans who have stood by us over these many years and want to leave and have been unable to do so. That effort will continue every day past August 31," he asserted. Blinken said the Taliban have made public and private commitments to provide and permit safe passage for Americans, third-country nationals and Afghans at risk going forward past August 31. The US, our allies and partners, and more than half of the world's countries, 114 in all issued a statement making it clear to the Taliban that they have a responsibility to hold to that commitment and provide safe passage for anyone who wishes to leave the country, not just for the duration of our evacuation and relocation mission, but for every day thereafter, he said. We are developing detailed plans for how we can continue to provide consular support and facilitate departures for those who wish to leave after August 31. Our expectation, the expectation of the international community, is that people who want to leave Afghanistan after the US military departs should be able to do so. Together we will do everything we can to see that that expectation is met, Blinken said. Live TV WASHINGTON: The US embassy in Kabul has advised the American citizens not to travel to the Hamid Karzai International Airport at this time, according to an embassy security alert issued late on Wednesday. Citizens already at the airport`s Abbey Gate, East Gate, and North Gate were advised to leave immediately, said the security alert issued by the embassy. The alert, posted on the embassy website, gave no reason for why it was issued. "US citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," the security alert from the US Embassy in Kabul said. Because of security threats outside the gates of Kabul airport, we are advising US citizens to avoid traveling to the airport & to avoid airport gates at this time unless you receive individual instructions from a US govt representative to do so, the US Embassy said. The State Department warned US citizens at the gates outside of the airport in Kabul to leave "immediately" due to threats. "US citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately," a security alert from the US Embassy in Kabul said. pic.twitter.com/iJb3WB3ClI ANI (@ANI) August 26, 2021 It followed warnings by US President Joe Biden and other administration officials of a threat by Islamic State to evacuation operations as crowds thronged airport gates, desperate to leave following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. The alert advised Americans to "be aware of your surroundings at all times, especially in large crowds." The German Embassy has also advised its local citizens not to go to the Kabul airport, warning in an email that the Taliban were conducting increasingly strict controls around the airport. A senior US military official said there had been short periods in the last 24 hours when the gates to Kabul airport have been closed, but no reported change in the "enemy" situation in and around the single-runway airfield. A Taliban official, speaking to Reuters, said security risks could not be ruled out but that the group was "aiming to improve the situation and provide a smooth exit" for people trying to leave over the weekend. The Taliban are still trying to hammer out a new government and the group's co-founder, Mullah Baradar, arrived in Kabul for talks with other leaders on Saturday. The group's lightning advance across the country as US-led forces pulled out, coinciding with what German Chancellor Angela Merkel described as the "breathtaking collapse" of the Afghan Army, sparked fear of reprisals and a return to a harsh version of Islamic law the Taliban exercised when they were in power two decades ago. Live TV Moscow: The Danish air force has finished flights out of Kabul, has evacuated over 1,000 people since the Taliban took over, the Danish Defense Ministry said on Wednesday (August 25). "The last Danish Hercules plane has taken off from Kabul. Since August 15, the Danish air force has taken more than 1,000 people out of Afghanistan," the ministry said. The list of evacuees includes diplomatic personnel from the Danish embassy in Kabul, their families, and former translators who assisted the country`s troops in Afghanistan, as well as Danish nationals and citizens of some other countries. On August 15, Afghanistan fell under the control of the Taliban, prompting many countries to begin evacuating their citizens and diplomats, as well as limited numbers of local collaborators. As thousands of Afghans stormed the Kabul airport in the hope of getting out, the radical movement closed the gates to all but foreign citizens. It also warned that all evacuations must end on August 31. Live TV New Delhi: At least 13 people died and several were injured in two major explosions near Afghanistans Kabul airport today. The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for it. The blasts occurred even as the US and NATO forces guarded the facility where evacuation was going on. The US had prior intelligence about the possible terror attack but it could still not prevent it. So much for the peace agreement! Zee News Editor-in-Chief Sudhir Chaudhary on Thursday (August 26) explained how the animosity between ISIS and the Taliban triggered the blasts and how the US and other powerful western nations could do nothing to stop it. The first explosion happened near Abbey Gate of Kabul Airport. It is one of the four gates from where people enter the airport. The second blast happened near a hotel about one and a half kilometers away from the airport. This attack was said to be carried out by suicide bombers. The US has confirmed that some of its citizens have also died in the blasts. At present, security has been beefed up around the airport. But the question is, how will the Taliban who only have experience in carrying out attacks defend such attacks and save the Afghans. US President Joe Biden had expressed the possibility of this attack a day earlier. The Intelligence Unit of America issued an alert asking its citizens to stay away from Kabul airport. They even issued an alert asking people standing at Abbey Gate, North Gate and East Gate of Kabul airport to vacate immediately as there could be a big explosion. This clearly establishes that America had absolutely correct information about this terrorist attack. Even Britain's Armed Forces Minister James Heappey had said in one of his interviews this morning that he had already received the communication which he would have to give to the press in the event of an attack at the airport. Not just America and Britain, the armies of NATO countries also received the alert of a possible terrorist attack 24 hours in advance. But these western countries, the so-called superpowers, did nothing more than close the airport gates and issue alerts. They left thousands of Afghan civilians at risk despite knowing about the attack. There can be two motives behind these attacks by ISIS. The first objective may be to challenge America, which fought for 20 years to eliminate such organisations. That is why today the big question is whether a country like America will remain hiding inside the airport even after this attack or will it take action against this terrorist organisation and save lives. The second objective is to challenge the Taliban, who believe that they alone have control over the whole of Afghanistan. By carrying out this attack, ISIS has sent a message that they too are active in the region and can still carry out major attacks. Ultimately, it is the common people of Afghanistan who will have to bear the brunt of this animosity. Innocent people are being killed while the world watches. It is to be noted that these bomb blasts at Kabul airport may impact the deal the US had made with the Taliban. The first condition of the Doha peace agreement last year was that the Taliban would not allow such terrorist organisations to use their soil to operate. But this agreement was broken even before final pull out by the US. Therefore, now the challenge before the US is whether it will cancel the decision to withdraw its forces from Afghanistan in violation of the agreement or will it carry on with the rescue operation ignoring these attacks. If the latter happens, then the peace agreement would be rendered meaningless. Read more about Taliban here: Taliban's History Live TV Washington: A group of US lawmakers has urged President Joe Biden to ensure that the Taliban, which is now the de facto ruler of Afghanistan, do not destabilise Pakistan and acquire nuclear weapons. The lawmakers demanded that Biden should answer critical questions on what happened in Afghanistan and what are his plans to move forward. Are you prepared to support regional allies militarily in the event that the Taliban militarise the Afghanistan border? What is your plan to help to ensure that the Taliban do not destabilise its nuclear neighbour Pakistan? the group of 68 lawmakers from the Senate and the House of Representatives asked in a letter addressed to Biden on Wednesday (August 25, 2021). Do you have a plan to ensure that Afghanistan, under Taliban occupation, will never acquire a nuclear weapon? they asked. The lawmakers said over the past weeks, the world watched with utter shock as the Taliban took over Afghanistan with astonishing speed, "the result of unforced errors made by withdrawing completely the small remaining footprint of our main military force from Afghanistan, and by unnecessarily delaying the evacuation of US personnel and its Afghan partners". ALSO READ | As August 31 deadline nears, US says it has evacuated over 82K people from Afghanistan so far The situation in Afghanistan has rapidly "metastasized" into Taliban rule with reinstated oppression of women and girls, the repression of civil society, the displacement of countless Afghans from their homes who the Taliban then use force to prevent from fleeing Afghanistan, and a power vacuum that China seeks to fill by increasing its ties to the Taliban, they said. Observing that the consequences of US withdrawal from Afghanistan are not isolated to that country, or even to the Middle East region, the lawmakers said the action carried geopolitical and strategic consequences that have already begun to unfold and will reverberate for decades. Dealing with these consequences means that we must take action now to chart the course for American strategy, while we manage the immediate repercussions of this self-inflicted crisis in Afghanistan. To this end, we write to ask you to outline what your plan is to move America forward, they wrote. Noting that the intelligence community has warned that Al Qaida and ISIS-K will be given carte blanche by the Taliban to use Afghanistan as a safe haven to train and equip for future terrorist attacks against the US, they asked, What is your plan to ensure that Al Qaida does not resurge and regain a foothold in Afghanistan? What 'over the horizon' operations are you prepared to use to counter this threat? ALSO READ | India anticipated Taliban takeover but timeline surprised us, says CDS Bipin Rawat The letter questioned that with the Taliban taking over Kabul, does the armed group now have de facto command and control over the Afghan security forces' former personnel, equipment and infrastructure. "If so, does this mean that the Taliban possess an air force through this de facto control? What is your plan to disable any air forces that operate under orders from the Taliban? it asked. The lawmakers asked Biden about his plan to ensure that more US and Afghan military equipment do not end up in the hands of the Taliban. What is your plan to reclaim US military equipment that has already fallen into the hands of the Taliban? they asked. Live TV WASHINGTON: A US official says the complex attack outside Kabul airport is definitely believed to have been carried out by the Islamic State group. The official says members of the US military were wounded in Thursday's attack, which involved two suicide bombers and gunmen. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing operations. The Islamic State group is more radical than the Taliban and has carried out a wave of attacks targeting civilians. The official says evacuation flights have continued to take off from Kabul airport in the waning days of an airlift to help people flee the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. According to a local reporter, a suicide attacker blew himself up in the middle of a large crowd and another attacker started shooting. "AFG Explosion took place outside of the eastern gate of airport and gunfire is underway. There are casualties and fatalities, multiple eyewitnesses tells me," Afghan reporter Bilal Sarwary tweeted. A Taliban official said at least 13 people were killed in the blast, including children, and many Taliban guards were wounded. A U.S. official, citing initial information, told Reuters as many as 5 U.S. military personnel may have been hurt, including at least one seriously. In recent days, Kabul airport has been witnessing chaotic scenes as people are reaching the airport in hurry to escape from the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. Second explosion reported in Kabul, near hotel where Americans gathered A second explosion struck Kabul on Thursday near a hotel in Afghanistan's capital, where US citizens were gathering to be evacuated, Fox News reported. The second explosion took place after a suicide bombing earlier in the day near the gates of the Kabul airport. Soon after the first explosion at Kabul airport, France Ambassador to Afghanistan had warned of a second possible explosion at the airport. "To all our Afghan friends: If you are near the airport gates, getaway urgently and take shelter. A second explosion is possible," tweeted French envoy David Martinon. French President Emmanuel Macron said the situation has seriously deteriorated near the Kabul airport after several explosions happened in the last hours. Live TV Canberra: There is a high threat of a terrorist attack near the airport in Kabul, Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne said on Thursday (August 26, 2021), as Canberra urged its citizens and those with a visa for Australia to leave the area. Australia has been evacuating its citizens and visa holders for more than a week from Kabul airport, where Canberra had urged people to travel in order to be ready for transport. Late on Wednesday, Australia changed its advice to those in the area, which Payne said was based on heightened concerns of an attack. "There is an ongoing and very high threat of a terrorist attack," Payne told reporters in Canberra. ALSO READ | Avoid going to Kabul airport: US embassy warns American citizens citing security threats The warning heightens the risk that scores of Afghans holding visas for Australia could be left behind as Canberra readies to end its evacuation programme. Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who has previously said Australia will unlikely be able to evacuate everyone, declined to comment on whether Australia would continue flights up to the Aug 31 deadline the Taliban insists must be adhered to. Morrison said Australia has now evacuated about 4,000 people out of Afghanistan after another 1,200 people were flown out overnight. Many of these remain in the United Arab Emirates, Morrison said, while 639 have been evacuated to Australia. ALSO READ | Ensure that Taliban do not destabilise Pakistan and acquire nuclear weapons: US Australia was part of a NATO-led international force that battled the Taliban and trained Afghan security forces in the years after the militants were ousted in 2001. More than 39,000 Australian military personnel served in Afghanistan and 41 were killed there. Live TV Kabul: Nearly two weeks after they took over Afghanistan, the Taliban have admitted that the Afghan women are not safe under its current regime and have directed them to work from home. Addressing a news conference, Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid has said that women should not go to work for their own safety, undermining the group`s efforts to convince international observers that the group would be more tolerant towards women than when they were last in power. As per a CNN report, Mujahid said that the measure was necessary because the Taliban "keep changing and are not properly trained." When last in power between 1996 and 2001 the militant group banned Afghan women from the workplace, stopped them from leaving the home unaccompanied and forced them to cover their entire bodies. The new direction from the Taliban came after the World Bank halted funding in Afghanistan, citing concerns about the safety of women, and within hours of the UN calling for a "transparent and prompt investigation" into reports of human rights abuses since the Taliban takeover, dealing another blow to an economy that relies heavily on foreign aid. Meanwhile, the Taliban have promised its new era will be more moderate, but Taliban leaders have refused to guarantee women`s rights will not be stripped back and many have already faced violence. The Taliban also warned on Tuesday that the US must stick to next week`s deadline to pull out, and said they were "not allowing the evacuation of Afghans anymore," though a source familiar with the situation said that the apparent ban had not yet had a discernible effect on arrivals at Kabul airport. The source said some priority local Afghans would get help in the coming hours, the source said, though some applicants for the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program -- an avenue for Afghans who worked for US forces and agencies to get out of the country -- would have to wait. The Pentagon has said on Wednesday that a total of 19,000 evacuees left Afghanistan in the last 24 hours, including 11,200 people flying on 42 US military aircraft and another 7,800 evacuated by coalition partners. A frantic Western evacuation operation at Kabul`s airport has provided the only faint opportunity for many Afghans to escape the country in recent days, and crowds outside the facility have swelled since the militants seized power. Live TV Porn actor Ron Jeremy on Wednesday pleaded not guilty to more than 30 counts of sexual assault, including 12 of rape, in the Los Angeles area over a 23 year period. The Los Angeles District Attorney's office said Jeremy was indicted by a grand jury last week on the charges, which involve 21 women aged between 15 and 51 years old. Jeremy, 68, was among the biggest names in the adult film industry having appeared in more than 2,000 movies starting in the 1970s. Jeremy's attorney said in an email on Wednesday that the actor was "innocent of all charges." In August 2020, Jeremy wrote on Twitter; "I can`t wait to prove my innocence in court! Thank you to everyone for all the support." He was first arrested more than a year ago on charges of raping three women and has remained behind bars ahead of a trial. More victims have come forward during the months-long investigation. The District Attorney's office said the indictment involved 21 victims and conduct dating back to 1996. The counts include 12 of forcible rape, seven of forcible oral copulation, six of sexual battery, and two of penetration while the victim was asleep or unconscious. The alleged offences took place at night clubs and bars in the Los Angeles area, during a photo shoot, and at Jeremy`s home, the District Attorney's office said. Police are still investigating the case. Live TV New Delhi: In a worrying development, Sikh community leaders have said that 140 Afghan sikh and Hindu pilgrims have been stopped by Taliban from leaving the country. The development comes days after in a presser Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said that that they won't allow evacuation of Afghans anymore even as foreigners can leave the country. The Afghan Sikhs were to reach Delhi later today for the 400th Birth Anniversary of Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur and a kirtan darbar was scheduled for Sunday. "Many member members of our community from various parts of the world have already arrived to attend the same.Unfortunately Taliban has denied them access to the Kabul Airport ", Partap Singh (Afghan Origin) , President of Gurdwara Sri Guru Arjan Dev Ji , New Mahavir Nagar Delhi said. India has so far evacuated 565 people, this includes 112 Afghan nationals. These Afghan nationals include Hindus and Sikh. Over the weekend 2 Afghan Sikh MPs--Anarkali Honaryar and Narendra Singh Khalsar reached India in an evacuation flight. Guljeet Singh (Afghan Origin) , President of Gurudwara Guru Nanak Sahib Ji , Vikaspuri, pointed, "regret to note that last night these law-abiding pilgrims were turned back by Taliban security forces from the airport after waiting for more than 15 hours in their convoys. Last week, after the fall of Kabul, India's ministry of home affairs started e visa system for many Afghans who want to come to India. This is the first time e visa system is opened for Afghans, and those who get the visa will be given for a period of 6 months. During the previous evacuations, India also brought back Holy Guru Granth Sahib as well. To receive the holy book, India had sent 2 union ministers at the airport. Meanwhile, Puneet Singh , President of Indian World Forum, who has played a key role in the evacuation process, especially in coordination, "appealed to Taliban to facilitate an early departure of Afghan Hindu & Sikhs Pilgrims in the interest of humanity at the highest level", pointing that , "Hindu & Sikh community in Afghanistan has significantly contributed in the development and economic growth of the Islamic nation and they should be granted free and safe access to arrive and depart. There has been no response by Taliban spokespersons on the development. Live TV